>n>)MnnM^>nis^$UHn>siii^^lu v^v.■• ( UA H^Uj O U yi » O a i ^ f i ^ i f i( H'^)i * i ii f ^ i i'i i i i i^ n >^.," LI E) RAR.Y OF THE UNIVLRSITY or ILLINOIS 8>23 C9>\32e ^^ fl' EAST AND WEST OK, ONCE UPON A TIME. BY J, PRAZEE COEKRAN. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: HUEST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHEES, SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN, 13, GREAT MARLBOKOUGH STREET. 1861. The right of Trandation is reserved. LONDON PRINTJiO BY SPOTTI5WOODE A.ND CO. K-EW-STREET SQUAKE 8^3 C8l3ge ONCE UPON A TIME, CHAPTER I. '•'It was a happy place — once upon a time." A community of weavers and spinners bordered one end of the great metropolis, ,., like a pretty selvage, such as used to finish off a piece of their own silk or velvet loom-work. They were a cheerful and : industrious race, these descendants of the Huguenots — driven by the revocation of ^' the Edict of Nantes to seek a land of equal S laws, whose hospitality they repaid by the ;; transfer of an enriching industry, and by a^an infusion of moral benefit that could not vi be too highly appreciated. ^ At the time our story begins, a revolu- tion was approaching, whose end would pro- VOL. I. B 2 ONCE UPON A TIME. bably be beneficent, but whose stormy work- ing was to be marked by sad ravage. It was no upheaving of the elements of society, no explosion of a long pent-up indignation, laying low the high — not always to exalt the lowly. It was neither a political nor a social revolution. It was simply a material change. It was the coming of a giant upon the earth to do the work of man by other and more powerful means, but exacting the inevitable price of present sacrifice, which every great change entails. Machinery, with its iron fingers, moved by the almost illimit- able agencies of fire and of water, with strength hardly to be calculated, and with a delicacy equal to its strength, was about to annihilate the spinning wheel and the loom, the distaff and the lace cushion, those primitive types of male and female industry, which are to house-work what the spade and plough, the scythe and rake, and pruning hook are to the field. To w^age war with machinery would be child's folly. We should, on the contrary, hail all developments of power as so much ONCE UPON A TIME. 5 gain. We ought to regulate its action, if we only knew how; but that most needed science, the science of the distribution of the infinite wealth which the Almighty has placed at the disposal of his creatures, that science which would be the crowning of mankind with honour, is not yet in its infancy. It is not yet born. Still it is no mystery like that of iniquity. In the honest exertion of each, animated by the love of all, lies the secret, if secret it be, which for our safety's sake is the simplest of truths, written on our hearts, revealed by divine inspiration within our souls, told to us every hour by the cry of misery, and staring all society in the face with reproach, unheeded, because familiar. Honesty and love make up no compound riddle. The place to which we must introduce our readers is one they would now hardly like to visit. But at the period of which we are speaking it was a bright, airy, cleanly quarter — populous, but not over-crowded ; although connected with London by lines B 2 4 ONCE UPON A TIME. of continuous habitations, it was not, as it is now, engulfed in the ever-spreading city. At this time, when there were bathing ma- chines at Blackfriars Bridge, and the light wherry shot over its own image, and braved the fall under the old city bridge, through a cloud of sweet spray — a time before the noblest of city rivers had become the foulest of city sewers — the suburban town rejoiced in its natural play-ground, the simply and expressively named Green. The fields lay not far beyond, and they, like kind friends before quitting town, had left standing here and there some shady trees, one of old Time's monopolies, which wealth and art cannot equal. It was well there was so much verdure where there was so much whiteness, for these weavers used the lime brush plentifully. It kept away illness from their narrow dwellings, and made all sweet within doors and pleasant without, and the verdure tempered the colour to the eyes. The approaching marriage of John Bessonet with Marian Thorpe excited some ONCE UPON A TIME. £^ serious differences in our busy little com- munity. The schism, which had some time previously broken out amongst the sect of Methodists, to which these people chiefly belonged, gave a sort of public importance to this purely domestic event. Who should perform the ceremony — the rector or the preacher ? — that was the question. If the former, the Primitive body, who refused to sever their connection from the establish- ment, would have triumphed ; and if the preacher, why, then would be held up a practical sign and proof of an independent congregation, whose leaders could lawfully perform binding ceremonies, administer sa- craments, and stand up erect as the recog- nised pastors, armed with truth only. One of the persons who took an active lead in the business of the parish was Mr. Elias Mathews, of whom, as we shall have much to say, we must needs give a par- ticular description. Mr. Elias Mathews, apparently a placid, and, at first sight, rather a good-looking man of middle age, lived in an old-fashioned house, standino; off B 3 6 ONCE UPON A TIME. the high road to London. Notwithstand- ing certain external indications of opulence, he possessed no larger fixed income than that he derived from the situation of cashier in the Bank of Lush, Snug, and Dreary, in the City ; but he had other ways and means at command, to be described hereafter. His family consisted, with his wife, of one son, at this time above thirteen years old, whom he had christened Obadiah, but who went by the diminutive of Obady, and two daughters — the eldest, Deborah, perhaps sixteen, and Cicely, a year younger than Obady. This Mr. Elias Mathews was a great pa- tron of people in his own little way. He wished to be considered charitable and re- ligious, although his master passion was avarice. A conspicuous class-leader amongst the Methodists, he remained faithful to the establishment; and by this act of fidelity not only added a leaf to his crown of virtue, but advanced himself a step in the scale of patronising power. He patronised the rector, whom he held to be under a sort ONCE UPON A TIME. 7 of personal obligation, by the manner in which he gave himself credit for having arrested a defection that threatened Dr. Shortley with empty pews. As soon as the marriage of John Bessonet with Marian Thorpe came to be spoken of, what a vista of small activities opened to the limited imagination of Elias Mathews ! John was one of the faithful, but Marian, like a true woman, was swayed more by reverential affections than by abstract questions of right and dignity. Her ghostly adviser, if we may so designate Mr. Samuel Steele, was indeed very little like those other preachers with whom attendance from her earliest years at the little unpretending chapel in the neighbourhood had made her ac- quainted. He was a singular mixture of simplicity and of unconscious vanity. Samuel Steele, at sixty years of age, was a remarkably good-looking man. Of fair height and large proportion, without cor- pulence, he walked erect, with a light, firm step ; his head thrown back, his long, silky grey hair curling down to his shoulders, B 4 8 ONCE UPON A TIME. and his bright, ecstatic blue eyes looking from out a pair of protruding rosy cheek bones, as if trying to take advantage of a nose too small to take its own part against such odds, but which showed its disdain by a slight cock of its own. Such was Samuel Steele, as he wended his Avay to the obscure little chapel, which was to him the scene of pleasurable labours, and of his greatest triumphs. In dress he was as much unlike his fellow-preachers as he was in his elastic step, for he wore the costume of a dignitary of that church from which he had broken off the old connection. His wide-brimmed hat was looped up behind and slouched be- fore. Instead of the dull, coarse blue coat, and drab breeches, and leggings which ty- pified disdain of mundane foppery, he wore black, such as a dean might figure in at court; black also enveloped his shapely calves, his cravat was snowy white, and his fair, exceedingly clean, soft, pulpy hand did not disdain a gold-headed cane ; such was Samuel when seen on the hisfh- ways of this world. Had he dressed so ONCE XJPON A TIME. \) upon calculation, to produce a particular kind of effect upon the habitations rather than upon the personal admiration of the poor, he would have merited, the credit of understanding human nature, for he was a sanitary commission in himself. Who dare place Samuel on a dirty chair, or at a filthy table, or appear before so much su- preme cleanliness in slattern apparel ? — not that he, the self-absorbed, good, easy man, ever saw anything beneath the clouds, but that his presence banished foulness as the sun darkness. In the pulpit he was another man, and yet the same ; never did self-sufficiency wear so musical an air. It was evident, yet inoffensive. Looking at his open, candid countenance, and listening to and feeling the unctuous richness of his vibrating, sympathising voice, one would have taken his assurance for the truth of anything but one, his declaration about him- self, that he was a miserable sinner, and the last of the least. He looked, while uttering such self-condemnatory assertions, as if coaxing some angel to contradict him, the 10 ONCE UPON A TIME. spiritual coquette that he was. Yet he did contrive to win all human hearts, and that not without aid from the seductive auxili- aries of his forgivable little weaknesses ; and if love of our fellow-beings be not the foreshadowing and the promise of higher love elsewhere, we know not what is. Can anyone wonder that Marian should desire to have the religious ceremony, after the legal registration, performed by Samuel Steele? To make the reason perfect, we must mention some other qualities, or rather some other applications of the one general quality which formed the basis of his strength and influence. If Samuel was great in his grand doctrine of man's free will and noble but terrible re- sponsibility — if he was touching and enter- taining in his narration of those personal anecdotes which make picture-books of Methodist sermons — if he was the very hero of the love-feast, metamorphosing the buns into ambrosia, and imparting to the water the taste of that which gushed from the rock at the wand of Moses — if he could ONCE UPON A TIME. 11 sway big people like a pendulum between the darkness of unutterable woe and the un- speakable resplendency of future reward — what could he not do with the little people ? His special children's sermon was a genuine children's treat. His hands seemed literally made for patting and stroking little heads of hair. His mouth was made for telling children's stories, with all the essential machinery of the super- natural, the supernatural being here true. His ordinary affectation melted away so completely in his essential benevolence, that he did not commit even the affectation of speaking down to the supposed level of his audience. Speaking down ! ay, he es- caped that worst and most damaging of the mistakes of self-conceit. Speaking down is not the way to induce hearers, be they mechanics or children, to think up ; be- cause speaking down never moves, and emotion is the soul of thinking as well as of action. No more flat speaking down, for it can never elevate. He became as one of themselves, cordial, gentle, familiar, 12 ONCE UPON A TIME. playful, loving ; when he talked of sin, he looked with awe and horror as if he saw an evil spirit ; and when he exhorted to piety, he raised up an ideal character, such as might in the evening walk with God in a garden of Eden. In fact, he could do with children that which is so hard to do with adults ; that is to say, appeal to, and draw out each and every element of their being, and move all in action and harmony. Fancy, imagination, sentiment, veneration, love, honourable fear, moral courage, conscience, were all alive, and not one deadened or destroyed, or in an undue pre-eminence over the other, which is the world's work on the character of the grown man, mutilating his soul, and even with regard to virtue advancing one good quality at the cost of another. There is no such inharmonious disarrangement as this in the general character of children; so that never was orator more at ease; never had he more complete command of an instrument, no string of which was broken ; never was there less occasion for ONCE UPON A TIME. 13 special direction to some one predominating taste, or necessity for limiting its range and scope ; never could Samuel Steele allow such free play to his own genial nature as when in presence of his own favourite congregation, of those to Avhom he loved to repeat the divine words, " Suffer little children to come unto me." It must be a very sweet nature indeed, in which there is not one drop of gall. Over the most serene countenance the cloud must pass sometimes. The kindliest heart must have its occasional little contractions of vexation — something is an eye-sore to the dreamiest of eyes. There is always a some- body who, whether he will or no, does tread on somebody else's corns. Now the man who exercised this unlucky power over the Rev. Samuel Steele, as he allowed himself to " be called ; the man who, through the triple fold of his piety, benevolence, and placid self-satisfaction, could reach the tiny vial of gall hid in the one little neglected corner of his carefully-kept heart ; the man who stood in his sunshine and disturbed his 14 ONCE UPON A TIME. placidity was the rival preacher, Mr. Sam- son Shepherd. His offences were manifold ; he was young and presumptuous ; he was hard, worldly, and unconverted ; he was the rebellious head of those schismatics who refused to drink at the pure well of un- mixed Wesleyanism, but crept under the cold shadow of the established church for the sake of gentility. Such was Samuel's opinion of Samson, and it was altogether erroneous. Need the experienced reader be told that there are people in this world who cannot understand each other ? The very youngest have already made the un- pleasant experience of antipathies. Miss Jane cannot bear cats, and she shrinks from a certain Miss Susan with whom she never exchanged more than a dozen words. Susan is her cat, whose every syllable scratches some tender nerve; and yet Susan is a good girl, and so is Jane, each in her own way ; and they are both liked by their com- mon acquaintances, who cannot understand their mutual repugnance. What a discovery this would be in mid-honeymoon, before ONCE UPON A TIME. 15 Sir Cresswell Cresswell was invented ! We will talk no more about it. Mr. Samson Shepherd was indeed the op- posite of the reverend dissenter. He was a young man whose native capacity of obser- vation had put him in possession of the mysteries of human nature more perfectly than a life of the most varied experience could have done. Better far, this antici- pation of experience while mental and bodily powers are quick with the elasticity of youth, and yearn to put forth their fresh strength. Of a thoroughly manly nature, that which he most prized was force of cha- racter. He cared very little about exter- nals, and not much about doctrine. Had lie chosen to follow those who set up the standard of independence, his eloquence and his activity would soon have secured him the leadership. But he did not possess a particle of vanity. The least selfish of human beings, his sole aim was the happi- ness of his fellow-creatures. Some of the more strict and narrow-minded brethren suspected him of being a philosopher in 16 ONCE UPON A TIME. sheep's clothing. There was something suspicious in his enjoyment of the sports of men and of boys. He has been seen to linger rather too long at a wrestling match ; he has been positively known to handle a cricket-bat ; he could call foul names too, as once, on seeing a blackbird fall, whose song in a woodpath had entranced him, he seized tlie cockney sportsman by the collar, and called him a murderer. Upon entering a poor body's dwelling he would put the body before the soul in his inquiries, believ- ing the soul to be a tender thing, which must not be taken unawares, but approached gradually, and led on solemnly. Upon draw- ing nigh to the sanctuary, do we not slacken- our pace, take off our hat, and commune a little with ourselves, to tune the string for a part in the sublime harmony ? Like a prac- tical man, Mr. Samson Shepherd first looked to the creature-comforts, thinking that the church must be swept and warmed to re- ceive the congregation — discomfort predis- posing, as he thought, to discontent. He was a terrible poker at fires, would not ONCE UPON A TIME. 17 allow water to be poured on the tea until the monotonous sing had mellowed into laughing bubbles. If he fasted, and he did fast often, it was in secret ; but he liked home-made hot cake amazingly, to the very great pride and delight of Metho- distical houscAvives. If he would not leave the Church, it was simply because he could see no utility in a separation which, as he believed, was calculated only to contract his own means of doing good. You are narrowing instead of enlarging your con- nection, he would say. He and others had observed that there was a growing disposi- tion, on the part of the Church, to burst through its cold formalities, and admit more glowing zeal ; and as rich zeal was powerful to melt away her cold formalisms, there would remain that perfected organi- sation which is so essential to the stability of every human institution. He had de- tected the shortcomings of both the Church of England and of that vigorous young auxiliary which the great Wesley had raised up for her support ; but which was now, VOL. I. c ^J, 18 ONCE UPON A TIME. with the usual tendency of sects, splitting into divisions. The Church had declined in influence, because its members knew not how to leave at the door the artificially dis- tinctive marks between not merely rich and poor, but between high and low society. The world within retained the form and spirit of the world without ; they had not all agreed to assume that attitude of equality suitable to Christian souls in the temple of the carpenter's son. How shall that mys- terious law ever be explained by which the outside does become unconsciously the sym- bol of what is passing within ? The character of a system may be learned, like that of an individual, from his dress, without talking of his manners. Among those hard, rec- tangular pews, some are both carpeted and curtained, others carpeted only; and even among those which are neither the one nor the other, there are distinctions in the car- pentry which the divine son of the carpenter would have treated, as he served the dealers who made His father's house a den of thieves. In these pen-folds for the flock there has ONCE UPON A TIME. 19 been a provision made for artificial breed, which has turned the cry of miserable sin- ners into very inharmonious bleating; in- deed, for the really miserable sinners, there are no pen-folds at all. How Lady Rachel would colour with anger if she found her- self seated by the side of Mrs. Baker, and obliged to kneel with conventional humility in close company with that lady, although the latter has duly fitted herself for service with rustling silk, the sight of which has turned poor little Miss Sally from the church door, who postpones her prayers until the milliner has fitted her for communion with the saints. Mr. Samson Shepherd told Mr. Shortley, the rector, with his usual brisk, good-humoured bluntness, that he would save the Church with rows of benches. But, my dear Sir, the pews are let, and if you demolish them in comes the voluntary system. How was so strong an argument to be resisted ? The decay which menaced dissent arose, in Mr. Shepherd's mind, from a very dif- ferent cause. A man of taste himself, who c 2 20 ONCE UPON A TIME. enjoyed all good things in due season ; who rejoiced with those who did rejoice, and who could weep with those who wept ; who, if he did not go to plays or read novels himself, because the demands on his time and attention were too great, did not re- prove those who moderately indulged in innocent relaxation of mind and body, such a man could not fail to discern the defici- encies of ill culture. If knowledge be power, ignorance must be weakness, and most of the prominent leaders of the sect rejoiced in their contempt for learning. Utterly ignorant men they could not be called who made the Book of Books their constant study; but society is not to be softened and improved by persons who refuse all sympathy to the varied pursuits of mankind; awk- ward, vulgar manners, ludicrous tones of voice, with the arrogance attending the assumed possession of peculiar gifts, survive the first fervour of enthusiastic claimants to inspiration ; and as the fire slackens, the faults become more obvious to a world growing critical as it ceases to be affected, ONCE UPON A TIME. 21 and the sect dies out, or gives place to some fresh novelty of doctrine. Against such fatal dangers the Church possesses security in its organisation ; and yet it suffers from its own terrible respectability. She feels she is not Catholic in the true, spiritually- democratic sense of the word ; and she is accordingly ever seeking to absorb the spirit of rivals who, whatever be their errors, have mastered the grand principle of equality. She was at this time making advances to Methodism. Already there was a rising tendency towards Calvinism, incompatible as are its gloomy doctrines with her cheerful precepts, and noble free will, and responsibility, so well suited to the English love of individual power; by and by she will ape the gorgeous ceremo- nies of Rome, until, perhaps, she finds at length the desired cure in some simple in- ternal arrangement of her own. Two individuals, who are about to be- come one, are at the same time in separate consultation with the rival preachers. Marian is standing before Samuel Steele in c 3 22 ONCE UPON A TIME. the little side room of the old chapel, which is already putting on the air of a vestry; and John Bessonet is seated by the side of Samson Shepherd, in a back drawing-room, only separated from the front by a folding door. When opened, the two rooms, over the baker's shop, serve the purposes of a chapel, until such time as the more commo- dious tabernacle, for whose building Samson is raising subscriptions, shall be erected. Not to keep the maiden standing, we shall first listen to the conversation in which she is engaged. ^'Art thou troubled in spirit, dear daughter, that thou comest to me for com- fort ? Didst thou not first wrestle with the Evil One?" "It is about the marriage," Marian began, demurely ; when the good old man, whose thoughts were not in a moment to b& fixed on sublunary matters, interrupted her, saying — " Yes, thou doest well to have the wed- ding garment ready, for the bridegroom cometh like a thief in the nisrht. Be not as ONCE UPON A TIME. 2'3 the foolish virgin, without oil in her lamp, but as the wise one." Marian, in turn interrupting, blurted out, ''It is of my marriage with John that I speak." " There cometh one greater than he." " John Bessonet — it is of him I speak." " Ah ! John Bessonet, thou hast wan- dered from the fold. I pray that thou be'st saved from the sin of backsliding ; for backsliders shall not " " Oh, he is no backslider — he is pious and good." " There is none good — no, not one." Poor Marian shrunk under the reproof, which, indeed, was not meant to be one. Like many others of the sect, who use and abuse Scripture texts, it only needed that some word should be uttered recalling one of the same kind in some other texts, and out they came, with that hap-hazard applicability which has given rise to the peculiar term cant "Yet," continued Mr. Steele, with the same looseness of logic, " He came not to c 4 24 ONCE UPON A TIME. call the righteous, but sinners, to repen- tance. Repent ye, for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Oh ! it is a blessed book ; so full and abounding in gracious promises to sinners who lay their burthens at His feet who came to seek and to save those that are lost. Seek out those pas- sages, Marian, and meditate upon them by day and by night, even from the going down of the sun to his uprising ; and his sun, the sun of righteousness, will arise with healing in his wings ; for if we take the wings of the morning, and fly to the furthermost ends of the earth, he is there ; — and now we must part, and pray." "Dear Mr. Steele," cried Marian, in an unusual fit of desperation, " will you not perform the marriage ceremony ? I am going to marry John Bessonet, and want you to act as clergyman." Perhaps there is some good in a little self-love, after all, for Mr. Steele descended from his stilts, and by this pretty flattery was humanised in a moment. " Dear Marian, he who knoweth the ONCE UPON A TIME. 25 secrets of our heart, knows well with what joy old Samuel Steele would pronounce, *let no man put asunder ;' uttering the solemn injunction for the first time at the marriage of our dear sister in the Lord, Marian Thorpe — but I have not the power." " You have," cried Marian, in a direct and somewhat business tone ; "for the Act of Parliament is plain on the subject." "What is an Act of Parliament, Ma- rian ? — I never read newspapers, and know nothing of the ways and doings of this wicked world. It is our duty to submit ourselves to the higher powers, rendering to Csesar the things that are Caesar^s." " An Act of Parliament is a law." " The law was given by Moses." " Not this law, which was carried by a large majority on the second reading of the bill, and then passed through the House of Lords, and received the King's assent. See, Sir, Anno sexto et septimo. Gulielm. IV. c. 85 " " Dost thou quote the Douai version, Marian?" 26 ONCE UPON A TIME. " Here it is, the Act of Parliament, bought with my own money from Mr. Maltheson, the bookseller." Mr. Steele, who would be sorry that his declaration of ignorance should be regarded as other than professional, now thought he had sacrificed sufficiently to his conscience to look at the book of the law, as he called it ; but, being unaccustomed to the jargon of the legislature, he became lost in the inex- plicable verbosity of the Act of Parliament. " Here is the clause," observed Marian, coming to the poor man's relief. " What wouldst thou have me to do ? " " To marry us according to Act of Par- liament ; " adding, innocently, ^' we need not be married at all." "AYhat, Marian?" " Not at all ; we have only to be regis- tered." " Kegistered ? " " And we are married in law." " And the bishops seated in high places amongst the Gentiles, in the House of Lords, agreed to an Act which reduces ONCE UPON A TIME. 27 marriage to a merely civil contract ! Are we not fallen upon evil times ? Are we not right to quit the establishment ? " " That is what I say ; if we must be re- gistered, we will be registered ; but we will be married, all the same.*' " I fear I have not the power, Marian." ^' Oh ! that is what the busybody, Elias Mathews, is putting into John's head — he who starves his wife and children, and keeps watch over a madman for lucre, in the big house above his station." " Speak evil of no man. There be one, as thou say'st, under his roof possessed of a devil." " It is a mysterious story that.'* " Could we not cast out the devil ? " " Ay, and have him run to keep company with legion in the hard heart of the hypo- crite." " Be not wroth, my dear child," mildly reproved the good man, not so much out of abundant charity as because of lurking sympathy with the object of a dislike which in truth was universal. 28 ONCE UPON A TIME. "Methinks," said Mr. Samuel Steele, whom the worldly turn of the conversation had sobered into an approach to practical sense, " that this question of marriage must be settled by the conference, which meets some months hence. Should it, after prayerful inquiry, be resolved that Samuel Steele may lawfully ask John Bessonet 'Dost thou take this woman to be thy wedded wife ? ' and he answering * Yea,' may likewise put the same question to thee, Marian Thorpe " '' I fear. Sir, John would not wait so long." She blushed ; he blessed her ; and they went their ways ; and now we turn to John, whom we left seated by the side of Mr. Samson Shepherd. 29 CHAPTER 11. " The reason why I requested you to re- main after the congregation, Brother Bes- sonet, was that I observed you to look occasionally dissatisfied during the sermon, and it struck me that I may have uttered something of which you could not in con- science and justice approve " " My dear Sir," exclaimed John Bes- sonet, shocked at this charge of presumption against him, for his admiration of the young pastor was profound. Without noticing the interruption further than by a gentle pres- sure of the hand upon John's arm, he continued — " I affect no false humility ; I believe that I am, as I ought to be, better in- structed in those subjects which it is my duty to study, than you are ; but that is not saying much, for the best and wisest 30 ONCE UPON A TIME. can do no more than acquire, in some limited degree, the rudiments of that heavenly science which has boundless in- finitude for its exercise, and eternity for its completion. I fear that I am not simple enough and clear enough to reach the heart ; that I only bewilder these poor people with a torrent of w^ords, and that they, mistaking surprise for emotion, re- ceive no really profound impression. Tell me the truth ; is it not so ? " " You do yourself injustice. How could you, at twenty-five years of age, have ob- tained influence over high and low, rich and poor, by mere words, although words are a great power ? I am sure you were never more impressive than you showed yourself this morning ; and if your eye, which takes in everybody, so that each fancies your discourse to be addressed to him alone, in falling upon me discovered my sinful want of attention, it was owing to the presence of Mr. Elias Mathews, who besets me in all places, and at all times, about my intended marriage." ONCE UPON A TIME. 31 " Yes, I perceived him looking on you frequently, and whispering." " He fears lest I should yield to Marian's wish to have the marriage ceremony per- formed by Mr. Steele, instead of by Dr. Shortley at the church." " I know Samuel Steele. He will refuse to act until the conference shall have de- cided. Still we must please Marian. Her love and veneration for the dear old servant of the Lord is praiseworthy, and promises well for your happiness, John. Those good qualities will be transferred to you in due time, and it would not be wise now to cast the chill of contradiction upon them." '^ But Mr. Steele hates you, Samson Shepherd, as much as he can hate any- body." " Only professional hatred, merely sur- face and canonical," said Shepherd, with that pleasant smile that sometimes stole over his well-defined features, which, not- withstanding a natural richness of com- plexion, were, by the force of thought and severe self-examination in the exercise of 32 ONCE UPON A TIME. duty, becoming severe. " Sectarian hatred, strangely enough, is in proportion to the slightness of difference ; yet not so strange, for self-love becomes more exasperated at being baffled by small than by great ob- stacles. However, we will talk no more of that. I have been up to Mr. Masterman on the subject, and he has arranged a ca- pital wadding breakfast, to which all your friends of the factory are invited." " He employs five hundred men, women and children. What have you done, dear Mr. Shepherd? — poor Marian will sink with shame." " And it is Samuel Steele who is to pro- nounce an exhortation, and he wdll be satis- fied ; and we all wdll be satisfied. It will be a day to be talked of to your children's children. Besides, I think it probable that Mr. Masterman will raise your position. He said you w^ere rather above your fellow- workmen in point of education and intelli- gence. I do not repeat this to flatter your self-love, that inward demon towards which each of ns should be a Saint Michael, ONCE UPON A TIME. 33 thrusting it back to the bottomless pit with our brightest spear of power. No, not for that ; but as there must come in- creasing demands with family wants, it is well that at the outset of married life there should thus open a prospect of more abun- dant means." " Old Maltheson is, I am told, lecturing against marriage as the cause of all the miseries of society." '' I have sounded Maltheson, and do not think him dangerous. He knows something of everything, and nothing profoundly. As such a man exposes his ignorance as often as he meets some one well versed in the subject of which he has merely caught up a loose general notion, and as many from different points of view discover him to be shallow, the result is to leave him without influence. Were he to confine himself to any one of his questionable topics, and brood over it until it became an article of faith, with its accompanying fanaticism of zeal for conversion, then indeed I might dread the effect of his teaching on shallow VOL. I- D 34 ONCE UPON A TIME. minds. Such a one seems to see his nar- row object with perfect clearness, because he has allowed utter darkness to gather over his soul, leaving that the only illumi- nated point. Kegarding marriage, which is honourable unto all, we must indeed not despise evident difficulties and objections. But the idea that poor mortal man can bind down Providence for his security is monstrous. You, for example, are, in the foolish worldly sense, a poor' man — that is to say, living upon your weekly wages ; but you have religion to raise self-denial from prudence to virtue, and you have an in- structed mind to do the pleasurable work of filling up your moments of idleness with abundant thoughts. Marian is a helpmeet worthy of you, who will make your humble home a clean, sweet paradise, in which, please God, the cherubs will not be wanting." '' I wish this wholesale breakfast were over." Mr. Samson Shepherd laughed outright, and John's fear ran away as from a pack of cachinnatory pursuers. ONCE UPON A TIME. 35 " Fear not, John," he continued, with a subsiding good-humour. " God gives no more than the raw material. Whether it be the one or the ten talents, you have only to work up your gifts, be they what they may, and He will bless them to the desired end. How oddly my laughter sounded in the place where we heard such sweet singing this morning ! How fine it will be in our lofty new chapel !" " I think," said Bessonet, with that prac- tised turn to which the artisan can so promptly incline, " I think I can do some- thing to make this temporary place of wor- ship more comfortable." " Can you indeed? Then let us set to work immediately." " You have not yet breakfasted, Mr. Shepherd." " That is to say, you have not." If we could follow Mr. Shepherd down- stairs to the baker's shop, we should find him asking for a loaf in a tone of voice and with a manner such as the Attorney- General might assume when begging a favour of his 36 ONCE UPON A TIME, friend the Lord Chancellor, or the Arch- bishop of the Prime Minister. We may not perhaps have hit upon the right example of that bland courtesy with which Mr. Shep- herd always addressed people to whom he gave orders as if requesting favours, but we take it for granted that the highest speci- mens of the bar and the episcopacy must be the most polite. " And if you would be so good as to allow the maid to buy two bowls of milk, and bring all upstairs, I shall feel much obliged." Had the good baker's wife suspected that the gentleman wanted these things for his own breakfast, she would have been profuse in her offers of accommodation in her own back parlour ; but she was accustomed to his way of bringing in a hungry fellow-creature and giving him a quiet unobserved meal, and so she took it as an ordinary circum- stance. The tray was laid upon two forms drawn closely together so as to present sufficient breadth of surface; and now sitting and now standing up, taking measurements ONCE UPON A TIME. 37 and suggesting improvements, the break- fast became only an occasional affair. " Pardon the liberty 1 take with you, Mr. Shepherd," mildly expostulated Bessonet, *' when I tell you that if you mix business with meals you will hurt your digestion." " Life is so short, and there is so much to be done " " That we must not make it shorter by imprudence, and do with painful effort what we might do easily and cheerfully had we not put our tools out of working order." " Are not these my own words, brother Bessonet ? " " They are, Sir; but pardon me again for saying that, wise as Solomon when ad- vising and directing others, you violate your rules as regards yourself, for you care not when or what you eat." " Come now, you cannot add * or what I put on,' for I make it a point to be respect- ably dressed." " Quite true — Marian wonders how it is that your cravat should always be as white as a blossom with the sun upon it." D 3 38 ONCE UPON A TIME. " I'll take it off now, if you please, and my coat too. Thanks to God for this good breakfast; and now let us show our gra- titude by putting forth our renovated strength in His service — we must first take away these folding doors." And they were removed with an effort which called for breathing time. " What a pity, Mr. Shepherd, that you should not have to yourself a place more worthy of your ministry!" " All places are the same in the sight of God. He sees no difference save between purity and impurity. Is not the poor place, like the poor man's prayer, as accept- able as the choral grandeur of the Temple ? Still I should not be satisfied with so feeble an expression of my desire to typify by outward means the depth of my love and the boundlessness of my admiration, could I afford to do better. No wonder they should be called ages of faith, they that erected those cathedrals which by their astonishing beauty dwarf our cold science. They seem to have been cast up like fountains out of ONCE UPON A TIME. 39 the intensity of the heart's love, to take the chance symmetry of the arched spray drop- ping in white wavy columns. You will be surprised, Brother John, when I tell you that my ideal of a fine religious service is that of the Abbey." " Why, Sir, we could organise as beautiful a choral service as ever was heard. The children in the hymn class say they never heard so divine a voice as yours. You have made the little creatures musicians ; and I too could take an humble part." '' Such a service would be out of place. Where is the lofty roof; or, not to speak of material parts, where is the mysterious weight of vaguely recognised tradition, looking out as it were from the sun-trans- figured windows ?" " We could manage the windows — stained glass is no mystery." " Those sorry little square things could only be converted into bits of finery. No, John, we must go with the age if we mean to be useful ; tastes change, new habits spring up, forms are eternally varying — D 4 40 ONCE UPON A TIME. that is to say, man is never long contented with the same mode of expressing feelings for which the adequate expression never can be found, and the end will be a return to the primitive simplicity. But we must not get out of our depth : let us see what work we have got immediately to do, and do it, trusting, indeed knowing, that the end will come right. Here is a plane ; I will run a few shavings off this bench." Whish ! the plane flew, throwing up shavings, through the interstice where the steel is fixed, like waves. John Bessonet wished to shift the posi- tion of the pulpit or reading desk, so that the light should not fall so directly on the preacher's eyes. He was soon out of breath, for he was not a strong man, but of shght, delicate appearance. Mr. Shepherd, whose imagination had been excited through the quickened current of his blood, seemed to be rushing through his object. " It is a glorious thing, work; through work man feels that he is made in the image of his Maker. The world, left to itself, would ONCE UPON A TIME. 41 be a wilderness — the abode of noxious things. Man re-creates the earth ; the gardens are his, the vineyards are his, the gorgeous palaces, solemn temples — oh, thou wonderful Shakespeare ! — are his." (Wliish! whish! whish! flies the plane.) "A Michael Angelo strikes a Moses out of the rock, as Moses struck out the water, and for the same purpose — to refresh the spirit. Even I, in my own little way, can smooth the rude plank, removing its unsightliness, which is something." He is stopped, not by fatigue, but by the voice of his fellow- workman, who is singing to himself. Bessonet is in the pulpit, hammering down a nail or two to steady it in its new position ; and, workmanlike, in his forget- fulness he is singing to himself a popu- lar melody rather unsuited to the place. Whether Mr. Shepherd meant to object or not we cannot say, for at the same moment the door opened, and Mr. Elias Mathews entered with two gentlemen, whom let us describe. 42 ONCE UPON A TIME. Had John Bessonet's pale, delicate face any blushing power, it would have no doubt exhibited modest shame's rosy co= lours on both cheeks — a blush on the one side, on his own account for his thoughtless, preference of profane to sacred literature in a sacred place, and a blush on the other on Mr. Shepherd's account, whose dignity stood compromised in shirt-sleeves before such a man as Mr. Elias Mathews and two strangers, a glance at whom showed, how- ever, that they were true gentlemen, who politely looked as if they' saw nothing in- congruous. " Hearing a hymn as we were passing," began Mr. Mathews, with that cold slyness which he meant for veiled reproof, "I thought you might have changed your hour of service. Allow me to introduce my brother. Surgeon Mathews of the Royal Navy, and Count D'Avray, who, on their way to France, have been good enough to come to see me." All bowed. " Please put on your coat, Mr. Shepherd, ONCE UPON A TIME. 43 or you may catch cold,'^ said John Bessonet to the preacher, who, in his heedless simplicity, was no more thinking about his personal appearance than the plane in his hand. He complied, however, seeing that his work was not to be resumed. " Very happy to make your acquaintance, both as my brother's friend and as a gentle- man of whom I have already heard so much. My friend Count D'Avray has had his curiosity excited about these distant relatives of his countrymen whom an act of barbarous intolerance turned from children of France into excellent British subjects." " I fear Count D'Avray will be dis- appointed if he expects to find, so far as their minds are concerned, any traces of consideration for the old country, they being in all their feelings essentially English. Their physiognomies do in many instances bear marks of their descent ; and the dark brown eye and swarthy features do not more distinguish them from the Saxon with his flaxen hair, clear complexion, and blue eyes, than do a certain superiority of manner 44 ONCE UPON A TIME. and a sort of refined intelligence. Brother John is a tolerable, although not very robust, specimen of the race." ^' Oh ! this is Monsieur voire frere ; " and the Count politely bowed. " Oh ! you are not yet up to spiritual relationships, Count," burst out Surgeon Mathews, with a low rich chuckle, as if a river of honey were effecting its conjunction with a river of oil. *• My poor song was not so bad as that," thought Bessonet to himself, comforted and at ease. Henry Mathews, the surgeon, some years younger than Elias, was shorter and stouter, with an open countenance beaming with benevolence and humour. His short, shiny, black, curling hair gave a character of force to his head quite in keeping with his firm springy walk. He was a man who, notwithstanding his merry tendencies, could be resolute on right occasions. His burst of laughter was not here, perhaps, in the right place, or at the right time ; but the reproving angel must have been fas- ONCE UPON A TIME. 45 tidious, if in that glitteringly dewy eye, beaming mouth, and broad surface of cheek puckered into a playground of hills and valleys for all Queen Mab's train to wanton in, he could have found error serious enough for heaven's chancery. He was a married man — married to Count D' Avray's sister. Henry Mathews and Count D'Avray had met abroad, when the ships in which they respectively served — the Count being a French naval officer — lay in the same waters. As usually happens, the neigh- bourhood of the ships led to interchange of courtesies and civilities between the English and French officers. A fever broke out in the French ship, carrying off the medical man, with several of the crew. Count D'Avray, the captain of the frigate, caught the fever, and was on the point of death, when, with the cordial permission of his own commander, Surgeon Mathews left his vessel, which, owing to his own wise sanitary regulations, had escaped contagion, presented himself to D'Avray, supposed to be dying, and restored him to life, after which 46 ONCE UPON A TIME. both became devoted friends. Availing him- self of a cordial invitation to pay a visit to the Count's house in France, Henry Mathews went there, fell in love with his friend's sister, and with her hand received sufficient fortune to enable him to quit the service. Count D'Avray was, like most of his countrymen, of dark complexion, and of grave manners, but by no means severe. He did not laugh, but he could smile very graciously, and he smiled more frequently of late than he used to do when setting an example of order and vigilance on the quarter-deck of ^'L'Eclair." Companionship with his brother-in-law was sufficient to account for his more habitual relaxation of features ; but his throat never did catch the infection of Henry's chuckle, which had many a time communicated itself to friends at table. Henry and his brother-in-law were making a short excursion together, and they had run down to pay a visit to Mr. Elias Mathews and his family. The Count, although he could not help smiling more at his brother-in-law's laugh ONCE UPON A TIME. 47 than at his own mistake, was not in the least disconcerted . With characteristic quickness he seized at once the meaning of the name " brother," in the sense in which it was addressed by Samson Shepherd to John Bessonet. In fact, he understood and spoke English well, only using French words in conversation with English people, either from inadvertence or when at a loss for the right term. " I know what you mean," he resumed, with an unembarrassed air, more com- municative in its subtle influence than Henry's mirth. '^ Brethren in heart." " In spirit," interrupted Elias, dogma- tically. " In spirit and in heart. Ah ! it is this habit of uniting together for common ob- jects which makes the force of England. But what surprises me most is, you are all orators, which is the more strange, as indi- vidually you are supposed to be silent." " You are thinking of those foolish fel- lows we stopped to listen to as they argued on the green. A queer set." 48 ONCE UPON A TIME. Elias put the stopper on Henry's bubbling humour, remarking, " They were a set of radicals and infidels who met there to dis- turb the minds of the parish." " O est precisement ce que f admire. Your government permits the free expression of opinion. Your government is wise enough to understand that amongst a people habi- tuated to the exercise of their faculties, there will be contradiction, by which false affirmation will be corrected. Est-ce que je me fais comprendre^ Henri 1 " " Better than a member of Parliament, for you are obliged to think and choose your words, and speak with concision ; that is to say, to act as your own gallery reporter — Hear and cheers, go on." " The police are very negligent of their duty. One day I stopped to hear a wicked fellow, whose language made my hair stand on end. I called on the policeman to com- mit him to gaol ; and do you know, Count, how he answered me ? He winked one eye, put his finger. Sir, to the right side of his nose, and grumbled, in a husky voice. ONCE UPON A TIME. 49 * Catch me in a haction for false himprison- ment.' " " Elias, you would make a capital actor." Elias groaned with horror at the idea of the stage, which he firmly believed covered the mouth of the bottomless pit. *' How admirable ! He is charming, your policeman ! To think that the first lesson given to a sergent de ville should be to respect the liberty of the subject ! " '* For which reason," observed Henry, cheerful in his very gravity, ^' the people trust the police. They know that they never interfere without just cause, and one man may go into a crowd and arrest a law-breaker single-handed; for should the policeman himself violate any man's right, the law will punish the policeman." " Evil too may be made the means of good," said Samson Shepherd, as he pulled up the breast of his coat ; " for, as it was observed that these people, although fond of controversy, never entered a place of wor- ship, our dear brother, Samuel Steele, de- VOL. I. B 50 ONCE UPON A TBIE. termined to improve the occasion; so, mounting one glorious Sabbath evening upon a stone bench, he raised his venerable grey hairs above the crowd, sending forth his rich voice in a volume of unctuous exhortation to listen to the word of life." "How can you name that vain old schismatic ; and you know he hates you ! " " Come, come, Elias, let us hear the story out. How did the people receive him r " They listened, as they always do, to the language of sincerity poured forth in sympathising eloquence ; and, as' Goldsmith says, ' some who went to scoff remained to pray.' " Elias shook his head at the profane quo- tation. " In fine," observed the Frenchman, in his epigrammatic way, " your Mr. Steele plays the double part of parson and policeman. It is the best way. Allow liberty, wdth all its inconveniences, it will correct itself." " But, pardon me, gentlemen," modestly chimed in John Bessonet, "Mr. Shepherd ONCE UPON A TIME. 51 has not told you all ; he might have added, that when Mr. Steele tried his hand a second time he failed — they were no longer to be taken by surprise — and he had no variety of ways, like Mr. Shepherd, who went amongst them familiarly and proved him- self to be as humorous and as witty as the funniest scoffer amongst them. They are delighted now when he appears, and out of that crowd he converted some. He con- verted me," He raised Shepherd's hands to his lips, and let fall a tear upon it. " Perhaps you might like to see our little school, gentlemen ?" " I would be enchanted." " The Count would be very much pleased indeed," added Henry, who thought it ad- visable to translate D'Avray's thought into more sober English. " I would be charmed." '' Brother Bessonet," half whispered Elias, " you will be married in church — marriage by Steele — " X 2 52 ONCE UPON A TIME. " Would not be half strongly enough bindhig," chuckled Henry, mightily pleased with his own joke, which did the service a joke sometimes effects, that of stopping a bore. CHAPTER III. Few readers of novels care much about school training, school visiting, or systems of education, and as we have no particular theory of our own to forward we shall make no long stay among Mr. Shepherd's pupils. Neither religion nor education can be much served through histories of this kind, and yet they both are so inti- mately interwoven with society that any view of human manners, from which all reference to these subjects should be sys- tematically excluded, would be necessarily imperfect. A professedly religious novel is no more, generally speaking, than a drama- tised tract, in which the adversary is made to get the worst of the argument, and must needs be a bad fellow because of £ 3 54 ONCE UPON A TIME. erroneous thinking, wliich is not always the case in life. We take people as we find them, and if we do not call upon our readers to ride a hard steeple chase in order to gain a prominent object some distance off, it is because that which is called a moral purpose is only another word for some rigid and narrow system which my lord, the au- thor, has set up for people to bow down before and worship. The school-house, a compact building, neither too high to be with difficulty heated, nor too low to admit a free current of fresh air, had to be approached through rubbish occasioned by the w^ork going on for the chapel. Mr. Shepherd had deter- mined, as soon as sufficient money was col- lected, to make sure of the school-house — for through the school he would make sure of the young, an object which was not always to be effected with the less malleable old. There is an instinct which generally directs a man to his proper calling, if he only would follow it, supposing always that his way be not choked up with conflicting necessities. ONCE UPON A TIME. 55 Now, Mr. Shepherd was formed by the Father of all to be a teacher of the young, and the work of his mission was to be found in his sympathy with the feelings and pursuits of children. It is not a com- mon quality, that of sympathy with other people's children. Your own are, of course, most beautiful in your own particular pair of eyes, but very seldom so in the eyes of any one else. A multitude of parents sitting in ecstasy before a swarm of pink sashes, muslin trowsers, exquisitely tiny feet, glossy curls, and rosy cheeks, see, when taken indi- vidually, each their own little group of per- fections throwing the whole swarm of fire- flies into the shade by halos of supernatural brightness. They are a multitude of anta- gonisms, despite their smiling air of bene- volence; and if one professes admiration of the child of another, it is praise lent out on usury, in expectation of compound inte- rest ; and yet the self-sacrificing character of a parent makes it the purest of all — only take care that it become no extended self- ishness. Let not indifference to the wants 56 ONCE UPON A TIME. of the worthy be hypocritically exalted into a virtue by pleading duty to one's own. This rare gift of sympathy with children belonged peculiarly to Shepherd. He could feel each child's particular difficulties, put- ting himself in its place, stumbling and struggling with it, and not losing his tem- per, but recovering his own feet and helping on the poor blunderer with an encouraging hand. He felt the same call upon his man- liness that a brave fellow would experience, who finding that he had some way got into a morass along with a young companion, would think more of the other's danger than of his own, would suppress his inward apprehension, look courageously, spring from one hard spot to another until the continuous hard ground should be reached, when, instead of venting irritated temper, he would go on his way rejoicing, to run up the next hill, or climb the next rock. Good teachers are few, and a great teacher is as scarce as a man of genius, because his great- ness, like all true greatness, must come from ONCE UPON A TIME. 57 the same source — large tender nature. Women are the best teachers for the very young, and if their education was not gene- rally so limited, would carry on instruction with advantage to a more advanced time of even a boy's life than they are allowed under existing circumstances. Have not almost all great men sprung from remark- able mothers ? The long building formed two compart- ments of equal size, one for boys, and the other for girls, for Mr. Shepherd was con- vinced that, without being mixed together, the male and female children might with advantage, especially to the former, be placed in near neighbourhood. Boys' man- ners become softened and refined, and their tempers are rendered more chivalrous and manly by the occasional society of females. They see how the masters bow with cour- tesy and politeness to the mistresses, and they learn to do likewise. The girls, on the other hand, acquire habits of sober freedom, and learn to conduct themselves independently, without shyness, coquetry, 58 ONCE UPON A TIME. or boldness, but openly and candidly, in the company of men. They first entered the female school, when that low, earnest buzz, like that of an industrious swarm of bees, which indicates the presence of a crowd of young scholars, suddenly ceased. A little to the surprise of the strangers, Mr. Shepherd, addressing two ladies, evidently the superintendents, asked Lady Softworth first how she did, and after receiving an answer, which, although of the ordinary character, was yet uttered in a tone which marked a highly -bred gentlewoman, put the same question to Miss Bond, whose satisfactory assurances as to her state of health indicated more familiar acquaintance. " Is not the room too warm ? " asked Mr. Shepherd, with his quick attention to the conditions of health, of which fresh air and cleanliness are amongst the chief; and suit- ing the action to the word, a window was opened from the top. '^ Have they read their Bibles yet ? " asked Mr. Elias Mathews, addressing Miss ONCE UPON A TIME. 59 Bond with somewhat of an imperious tone. " This is not the day for Scripture read- ing," answered the lady, with a sort of authoritative meekness, no doubt acquired in the exercise of her occupation. " And is a day allowed to pass without prayers ? " " Not without prayers," interposed Mr. Shepherd, cutting shoi*t Mr. Elias's horrified magniloquence ; " not without prayers ; but the Scriptures are only read on stated days, and as a specially serious duty. We must guard against that irreverential fami- liarity which attends ordinary routine. We must bring children to the sacred volume with minds fresh and free from pre- occupa- tion about their other lessons; and then we must particularly select the exquisite parables, and the touching histories which mingle human interest with divine teach- ing." " And you point out the errors of Popery and Socinianism ? " " We teach them to love their neighbours 60 ONCE UPON A TIME. as themselves; or rather we let those beautiful passages sink of themselves into their young souls. We try to form tastes and habits which will not be shaken by controversy, and which will attract from error by the sweet beauty of example." Without intending it Mr. Shepherd had fallen into tones adapted to the place, and all eyes were directed towards him as if he were delivering one of his impressive and balmy lectures. Lady Softworth looked on him with the whole luminous strength of her large, soft grey eyes ; while from under her inclined brow Miss Bond regarded him with gentle earnestness. And Count D'Avray, directing with a squeeze of his arm Henry's observation to the children's faces, whispered " What little angels ! " As the party passed into the boys' de- partment. Count D'Avray lingered for the sake of having a few words with Lady Softworth. Now the fair reader who would have skipped this chapter in order to escape the ONCE UPON A TIME. 61 sermonising would have missed a very in- teresting problem, one that takes many a young lady's life to solve, and regard- ing which very few can ever come to a satisfactory conclusion. We shall put it in the form of a question. Is there really such a thing as love at first sight ? And yet we are not going to produce a case in point, for Lady Softworth is already married — yes, a married woman with a widowed heart. Could the fault have been on her side ? Look at her as Count D'Avray is looking at her now, drawn towards her by the indescrib- able attraction of a beaut}^, the proper name of which is loveliness — for it is beauty of that order which is not to be described by details, like an inventory taken of eyes, nose, hair, lips, and complexion. We have said of her eyes that they were large, soft, and grey. We wish we had said nothing of the colour, of which we protest we are not sure — yet being true, as a first im- pression, the colour may stand ; but we have heard it disputed whether they were not of the most delicate blue ; and one lady 62 ONCE UPON A TIME. has been heard to insist that they had a darkish tendency — yes, she would hazard the word — violet ; and there was another who, although aware she was running the risk of being called paradoxical, had de- tected a fleeting green, like that which is sometimes seen in the evening sky at the time when Yenus is about to hang like a pendant to the ear of the young moon. Perhaps they were of chameleon character, taking their hue from the succeeding emotion. Is it not a foolish thing to be attempting such refined speculations about a woman's eyes ? A mystery is a mystery, and no more can be said about it. Cheeks are or ought to be less bewilder- ing. The author-artist is supposed to have only one colour to lay on, or none at all. The rose and the lily have been doing their beautiful service on the cheek of woman since the time when Solomon sung so divinely of love that his song takes pre- cedence of the Apocrypha, a puzzle for Biblical critics to the world's end. If the cheek be not rosy, why, of course it ONCE UPON A TIME. 63 must be pale ; there is no alternative, unless the sparkling brunette should enter a pro- test, which, indeed, the spirited creature is very likely to do. Well, now, that calm, full, rich countenance of Lady Softworth is not to be painted by any blending of rose and lily of which our rough fingers are capable. Perhaps that most delicate speci- men of the queen of the garden, the blush rose, may be an approach to this tinted marble imbued with warm life. A poet speaks of the porcelain of human clay, but we must fancy this imagined porcelain to have been hardened out of cream, if we are to admit the poet's porcelain at all. Then how the lips seem to have unfolded of them- selves — how they have broken spontaneously into those rich symmetrical waves of which nature has hidden the secret from the art of man. All beautiful things seem to dissolve away from rigid measurement, as if each in itself, and all together should be legible symbols of infinitude ; as we cannot tell ex- actly — mind exactly — the colour of eyes or cheeks, so neither can we say whether the lips 64 ONCE UPON A TIME. were small or large. The difficulty having been mentioned to Henry Mathews, that fa- cetious gentleman suggested that '^ truth lay between." The forehead was not remarkable — the eye-brows were delicately arched, and she wore her light, silky brown hair plain. Brown, did you say? — we have caught you in a direct definition at last. Let that hair fall down. Sir or Madam, over those shoulders of which we shall simply say they were glorious, which means, more- over, that nothing need be said of arms and hands, and then see whether any epithet, single or compound, will serve your purpose. You might as well ask a word for a dawn -cloud, or for a wave of the sea, when the breeze and the water are playing together, and the sun peeping out now and then. Her figure was not tall or short, and in order to prove our perfect candour and impartiality, for we are not looking through D'Avray's eyes, we admit it was rather heavy than otherwise. As it has been mentioned that she was married, you do not ONCE UPON A TIME. 65 of course take it for granted that she was young, and you ask her age. We protest we cannot even guess, but by and by, as soon as we shall have consulted the bap- tismal register, taking a margin of some ten years, we shall be happy to satisfy your curiosity. Do you care now to look at her com- panion. Miss Bond ? — perhaps it may afford relief to look at something positive. She is of fair height, with well-formed, regular features, and clear eye, — intelligent, and yet gentle, — of composed manners, not without a touch of gracefulness. The bloom of youth has indeed passed away ; yet she is too young for those grey hairs, although they become her. Still we must call her an old maid. It is a pity, too, that woman so made for loving should not have something to love with her whole great heart. Gats and dogs are the other end of the doll instinct. Midway, if the heart be not taken up into the great company of all nature's improved joys, it may escape being like poor Lady Softworth's — a widowed heart; VOL. I. F 66 ONCE UPON A TIME. but it is an orphaned heart — one cut off from its inheritance, which we are all bound to support. D' Avray saw all that we have been labour- ing to describe and explain, and a great deal more, in a second of time, if not less, for it is wonderful how much a thoroughly wide-awake glance will reveal. Say rather how much kindled sympathy reveals to itself ; for are there not moments in which the soul feels conscious of an inward revela-- tion, when all holy joys and blessed dis- cernments open at once, and there is no bound to the power of comprehension ? The sensitive Frenchman perceived as well, and indeed better than if he had heard all about it, for he perceived for himself that these two ladies represented influence and intelligence, not separated in either, but combined in different degrees. The order, the neatness, the method which marked every arrangement, and which were visible in the clean, tidy appearance of the exceed- ingly good-looking little girls, may possibly have been in some degree imposed by the ONCE UPON A TIME. 67 strict hand of Miss Bond. But the looks of aifectionate respect, amounting to' awe, the low whispers, as if in a temple, the open eyes seeking for approval, and never cowering with fear, and the becoming polite- ness, must have been derived from the pre- sence of the perfect lady. She was not remarkable for ability. Her accomplish- ments were indeed manifold, but they were Only such as the children of wealthy and fashionable parents usually receive with so much aid as scarcely to require the pupil's effort. Young ears easily take in languages, whose sounds young tongues easily imitate, and music and drawing are pastimes. Lady Softworth was no clear commentator. Mr. Elias rose highly in his own estimation when he heard her " expound ;" yet when he dared to " improve the occasion " with a little "word in season," nobody thanked him. He may have helped the sense, but he spoiled the music. When her Ladyship read one of the Saviour's parables, which need no commentary, her voice retranslated it into the old language. There stood F 2 68 ONCE UPON A TIME. before them one who would have ministered to the divine Son — the perfect faith to which he accorded miraculous grants — the perfect love that casteth out all fear. When she used to go to the theatre, happy would be the actor whose eye caught her gaze, for he played to and for her alone, and never played so well. Happy the orchestral leader of the concert, to which she still occasionally re- paired, for Mozart underwent a new reading by her sweet delight — a smile no more, for more open expression would disarrange the calm harmony of her countenance. Even old Samuel Steele declared, wdth tears in his eyes, that a power departed from him the day she ceased to sit under his ministry, " She seemed," he would say, " as a field calmly imbibing the dew of grace — not a word of his appeared to fall in vain." The old man was right ; there lay the secret of her attraction. She made all her bene- factors, to the satisfaction of their own self- love. She made herself, not meaningly, a mild dependent upon others' bounty, and none could refuse her all their best trea- ONCE UPON A TIME. 6^ sures. D'Avrav looked on her as a dove whom he could cherish. He felt himself within magic influence, and bound by a spell. Still it was incumbent upon him to justify his delay, and he proceeded with admirable presence of mind to act the part of an inspector of schools, required to examine into the sanitary condition of his then Ma- jesty's little subjects. The ladies, upon the other hand, seeing that he was a French- man, felt all their gentle enthusiasm fired by the hope of educating him as a missionary, making him capable of introducing their school system into the monarchy of the bar- ricades, interested as a loyal subject would be to confide the safety of the dynasty to a well-behaved rising generation. " Permit me, Madam, to demand what system is adopted ? I do not ask the de- tails — only a general idea." Lady Softworth directed an eye towards Miss Bond. " Well, the system — the system — really I know not how to answer — the system is the man himself." F 3 70 ONCE UPON A TIME. " I understand, it is the pastor who directs the boys — he is their system ; and you ladies are the girls' system." " Oh, no ! you overrate our influence, — does he not, Janet ? " " Your share, no, dear Lady Soft- worth." " I can only say the children come, and we teach them." " And the State, besides the authoriza- tion of the minister, allows a certain sub- vention for the support of the school ? " " The Government has nothing to do with it. We are quite independent of the Government." " Then the Municipality, perhaps." '' You mean the Corporation. We never hear of the Corporation, except as a great diner :" at which, as Miss Bond smiled, the Count felt obliged to compliment the lady on her esprit, " Mr. Shepherd leaves all special instruc- tion in our hands, such as reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, which we impart voluntarily." ONCE UPON A TIME. 71 " This is, according to what I have heard, called the voluntary system. If it produces such teachers, and such results (looking round at the pretty children), it must be the best." " I do not altogether agree with you. Miss Bond and I have frequently discussed the question together, and we have come to the conclusion that the State does owe sup- port to the weak, whether the weakness spring from childhood, poverty, sickness, or old age — besides, there will always be abundant opportunity for the exercise of individual exertion in this world, no matter how great the number of State institutions, as we sometimes argue with Mr. Shep- herd." " Does Mr. Shepherd resist such obvious truth?" ** Mr. Shepherd," replied Lady Softworth, " has so much self-reliance that he cannot understand any one admitting dependence of any kind." *' But children cannot teach themselves." " He would throw even children, as much p 4 72 ONCE UPON A TIME. as possible, upon their own resources — making them find out things for themselves — a genuine Anglo-Saxon," said Miss Bond, with something like enthusiasm. " Yes, the Celtic race is too fond of being governed," observed Count D' Avray, with a sigh. " And we have our faults too. We be- come, through our excessive individualism, hard and unsympathising." " You hard and unsympathising ? " Both ladies looked a little surprised. '^ If you like to understand more of Mr. Shepherd," quietly resumed Lady Soft- worth, ^' you should hear him lecture at the time when he assembles the children, both male and female, and recounts some interesting piece of biography, — how atten- tive and delighted they look ! " " Yes, and those concerts which he has organised." " Oh, they are divine ! " " He must be a remarkable man — Mr. Shepherd." *' Indeed he is.'* ONCE UPON A TIME. 73 The Count fancied that Miss Bond sighed. " When you go into the next room you will see it hung with maps, showing not only the position of different countries, but their productions above as well as below the soil ; and indeed all objects that speak to the senses of children. He says that the senses must be pressed into the service of the understanding, and that the body must be made strong and pure, like the heart and soul and mind." This being a long speech for her lady- ship, she stopped, and with her eyes asked her friend to help her out. " He proposes to have gymnastic exer- cises, and a laboratory, and to inculcate attention to the laws of health." At this moment the conversation was in- terrupted by a vigorous hurrah, from lungs so stout as to show that instruction re- garding the laws of health had not been thrown away. " The holiday for ivir ! I vote for the holiday ! " could be heard distinctly above 74 ONCE UPON A TIME. the general turmoil, from a voice which there was no mistaking had acquired its accents in the Emerald Isle. When Count D'Avray and the ladies en- tered, Mr. Shepherd, Elias, and Bessonet, were trying to restore order, while Henry Mathews, the cause of the outbreak, was looking on with a glittering eye, which seemed more disposed to enjoy than to reprove the storm. Mr. Shepherd held up his forefinger, but as he failed for once in his efforts to look stern, the little rogues discerned that he was inwardly giving way, and that it was unnecessary to resist an authority which was yielding of its own accord. Elias was looking clouds and darkness, but he was no master. He wished to flog somebody ; he wished to flog them all. He felt the desire of Caligula, that all the urchins had but one pair of small clothes, and he holding the birch. His son, Obady, was there ; for out of patron- age and feigned humility, and the wish, too, for a little instruction not to be paid for, he let Obady set an illustrious example. ONCE UPON A TIME. 75 Poor Obady ! if he could only have peeped into his father's breast, he would have beheld there all the paternal feelings arrayed like a jury upon him. Obady drew to his uncle's side, as if for protection, while the kind Henry rubbed his hand through the boy's rich brown hair. " Be home before me," ordered the father, in a mild voice ; and Obady went — the good man observing that it was not well for the lad to witness in- subordination. '' I say, Obady, wait for me," shouted a joyous-looking, fair-haired little fellow, who was his constant comrade, as he darted after him. Elias could not flog that boy, but he mentally resolved to call on his father and plead the duty of paternal castigation. Meantime Bessonet was running to and fro, trying by appeals, threatening and tender, — by appeals to the feelings, and by shakes of little coat-collars, — to quell the mutiny — all in vain. Usually the appearance of a strange gentleman occasioned respect ; that of Miss Bond, attention ; of Lady Softworth, awe, — rather say, loving sway. 76 ONCE UPON A TIME. On this occasion the stranger was hailed as an ally, and very logically, for was he not the friend of Mr. Henry Mathews, w^ho, on an explosion of good-nature, had cried out, " Here is a ten-pound note to spend in a holiday ?" The ladies did indeed produce an effect, manifested not in the subjugation of the storm, but in a change of character and direction. The boys clustered about them, begging their interference with the master to let them have the holiday. This time, when the master held up his two hands, the noise subsided ; the little Milesian voice being the last to sink into silence. " My good boys, if this kind gentleman had merely requested that you should be allowed a half holiday, I would have cheer- fully complied ; but as at the same time he proposes a gift which, I can assure you, amounts to a considerable sum " " Two hundred shillings, and every shil- ling twelve pence," abstractedly muttered little O'Flaherty, making a calculation in his own mind ; " and, with the young led- dies, we make fifty." ONCE UPON A TIME. 77 This occasioned a laugh, at which the little red-headed fellow looked surprised. "I am pleased to find that Thomas 'Flaherty, with a gallantry and generosity peculiar to his nation {cheers)^ means to include those whom he properly calls ladies, by which he anticipates and sup- ports the amendment I intend to move, which is that, instead of foolishly dissi- pating this large sum of money on toys and cakes, we form a fine country party " The rest of the sentence was lost in cheering, which was renewed when Count D'Avray begged to be allowed to contri- bute an equal sum. " But why not the half holiday as well?" cried the little " father of the man," unable to resist a present pleasure. '^ They are too unsettled to do anything more to-day," sagaciously whispered Miss Bond. " I fear you are right. Well, I will let you go if you promise " *' Oh ! that we will," shouted a score of voices. " To be good boys." 78 ONCE UPON A TIME. And the school broke up, particularly to the satisfaction of Master 'Flaherty, who had an affair of honour on hand. We must do the hero justice; the boy he meant to meet had been convicted of a petty theft, for which the master had forgiven him, threat- ening expulsion should the like occur again. Young Mark did repeat the offence, on which the chivalrous 'Flaherty said he would not tell, but he would thrash him, as he detested an informer more than a thief. It was because the half holiday afforded such an excellent opportunity for fulfilling the engagement, that, other reasons inclu- ded, the little gentleman exhibited so much anxiety not to be disappointed. When little, fair-haired Justin Forbes overtook Obady Mathews, the latter, after the indulgence of a run to get beyond arms' reach of his Papa, had relaxed into a lounging gait, sticking each hand into a side pocket, and giving no other sign of the activity of mental his powers than a sort of absent-minded kick to any soft or elastic substance lying in his way. Obady was ONCE UPON A TIME. 79 evidently out of humour. He was a fine boy, with brown hair, dark blue eyes, well- formed features, and good complexion ; a clever, self-willed fellow in the hands of a narrow-minded father, and easy, indulgent mother, who submitted, like himself, to the same domestic tyranny, differing only in mode of exercise. There were fine elements in Obady ; but under a system of terror he had learned somewhat of the ordinary vices of the slave, and had, moreover, taught himself to set too high a value upon indulgences of which he was unfairly de- prived. Justin, or, as he was familiarly called. Just, was the step-son of Mr. Mal- theson, the bookseller, who, after the death of his father, a practising surgeon and apothecary, had married his mother. Just was allowed a good deal of his own way, and, to do the brave boy justice, he did not very much abuse his privilege, for he was one of those open, artless natures that seem instinctively to go right. Obady seldom had a penny, and often hungered after a little money, while Just was never without 80 ONCE UPON A TIME. coin of some kind, for which he seemed to care so little as to inspire Obady with a high regard for the splendid liberality of his disposition. Just, on the other hand, profoundly esteemed Obady's talents, which appeared, to his awkward inability to turn points of difficulty with ingenuity, extra- ordinary indeed. The}^ Avere, in fact, bosom friends, ay, and their friendship was genuine, and would have stood much tougher trial than that of older people. It had already borne that severest of ordeals, unsettled money transactions ; but then Just never could be made to understand that Obady owed him anything, while Obady was magnanimously arranging in his imagination how he would, at some far future day, repay his obligations with in- terest. Mr. Elias Mathews would pro- bably have called the boy a parricide, had he been let into the secret of his post-obit resolutions. " I say, Obady," cries Just, coming up, panting like a water-spaniel, " don't fret at father stopping your holiday, for I will keep you company at home." ONCE UPON A TIME. 81 " Do you think he would let you ? " " Do you think he would turn me out ? If he did, I would have Mother soon down upon him." " That's a dodge I didn't think of. What frets me, Just, is to lose the fight. Do you know that I promised Fla' (abbreviation of O'Flaherty) to be his second ?" " Then it is all the better you should have to go home," argued Just, who in- stinctively disliked brutality. "But think of my honour. Just; for I carried the message." " In that case I will take your place, and stand by him." " My dear boy," says Obady, with a pro- tective and patronising air, " you are not skilled in the science — you have taken no lessons in the noble art of self-defence." " I suppose I would only have to pick Fla' up, take him on my knee, give him a drink, and encourage him." " Very good. Just ; but all that would not win the battle for Fla'. I know what that Shark is, — a cool chap, who will let the VOL. I. G 82 ONCE UPON A TIME. hot little Fla' exhaust himself, and then take his head into Chancery. I am the boy to rein in Fla' — in fact, I must go ! " " Your father will flog you." " I have got a dodge that will puzzle him to come over.'* " You have ; tell it to me." Before Obady whispered the secret of what he called the dodge, he looked about with that precocious caution which was one of the fruits of his peculiar domestic educa- tion. As we have no right to pry into a secret intended for a single friendly ear, we shall only say that, as soon as the pro- cess was described by which an uplifted hand could be made to appear as if it had become suddenly spell-bound. Just's face exhibited an expression of something like terror as well as admiration. Yet so curious did the experiment promise to be, that he resolved upon being a spectator. A bright thought struck Just, who, not liking to see his friend guilty of the sin of disobedience to parents, fancied he had found a way to get out of the difficulty by ONCE UPON A TIME. 83 proposing to ask Mamma's leave — ''Mamma will say yes at once." "And catch it nicely on her own ac- count," suggested the son, with a myste- rious expression of countenance. " I have it. I tell you what you'll do. You will go in and ask for me — you under- stand ? I am out. You will be asked to sit down — don't. You won't be asked to eat bread and jam, for Father keeps the keys. Deborah, my big sister, will look sus- picious — don't mind her either. Cicely, the darling, will look friendly — don't mind her, either. Mamma, good Mamma, will kiss you ; and when she does, do you say, as if unawares — 'If I meet Obady, Ma'am, may we go and take a walk ? ' She will say ' Yes,' and you cut." " Capital. And then, if Father goes to beat you, I intercede, saying it was all my fault ; and " " And then you'll see the dodge." The programme was duly carried out ; nor was Just's admiration of Obady's saga- city diminished, as the result proved the G 2 84 ONCE UPON A TIME. precision with which the latter had marked out a course of events of which he could not have received information, even from that supernatu rally-gifted being, " the little bird " who is the revealer of so many- secrets. Deborah did look suspicious ; but, as Just did not betray himself by a blush, even her distrust was disarmed by a coun- tenance innocent in its very guile. Friendly Cicely would have engaged him in conver- sation on the subject of birds, when the prophesied maternal kiss intervened in due time to allow the request to be made, which was granted precisely in the way contem- plated. " All right ! " was Just's laconic announcement ; and the two boys ducked their heads and ran with the stealthy acti- vity of a pair of young Indians, from ima- ginary pursuit. " Your uncle is not like your father," observed Just, in the interval of the hardly interrupted run which the two boys kept up on their way to the ground." ^' Uncle's a trump ! He gave Cicely and me a guinea apiece — we being children. I ONCE UPON A TIME. 85 forgive his calling me a child, on account of his having tipped the yellow-boy. To De- borah, who is a woman, I suppose he gave a silk gown, and bonnet to match." " A guinea ! " " My dear Just," exclaimed Obady, stop- ping for once, '^ do you think so meanly of me as to suppose that, had the guinea been left with me, I would not have repaid a part, at least, of what I owe you ?" " It is a shame for you, Obady, to speak that way to me ;" and Just found it neces- sary to draw the back of his hand across his eyes, and to blow his nose as if he had caught cold from his friend's unkindness ; for the last thing the generous boy thought of was the debt alluded to, which he never could be brouo^ht to re2:ard as such. " Yes ! it is not enough for Father never to allow me a penny to keep the Evil One (his own name for old Scratch) out of my pocket, but he must meddle with what doesn't belong to him. He finds out that I want things of use ; and I must put down a shilling for this charity, and a shilling for G 3 86 ONCE UPON A TIME. that; and have my name in print, and a story about his children in the pulpit." "But that was all very good," answered the simple Just. '^Now suppose somebody gave you a guinea," and Obady conveyed his idea of the supposed parallel case of interference with the rights of property, and of retaliatory re- sentment, by a jerk of his head, and a look full of what he thought to be terrible mean- ing. Just's thoughts were away in another direction. Suppose he had a guinea for pocket-money ! He had never quite so large a sum as that, and the sound set his imagina- tion busily at work. The castle that it built, and how it was inhabited, were thus revealed to his more calculating companion : — " If I had a guinea, I would first double Blackey's allowance." " The nigger to whom you are always making presents, besides the penny a week regular?" " He was a poor slave, you know." • " There are slaves with white faces too." "Are there, indeed? I never read of them." ONCE UPON A TIME. 87 "Goon. What next ?'^ " I would buy lots of cakes, and give them away to the little children ; and I would buy a cage for your sister Cicely's canary, and bring Mother home a purse; and " " And pay the national debt ! " " Ah ! you're joking, Obady." " I tell you what's no joke — that a cove should be made to spend presents in buy- ing things like this," and he kicked his cloth cap into the air^ Just's blood being warmed by the run- ning and excitement, he too was carried away by the instinctive love of exercising his limbs in a game of football ; and in this way both arrived at the scene of action, which was a low-lying green field, imme- diately adjoining the infantry barracks. " Clear the ring," cries Obady, who at once assumed a tone of command, which immediately confirmed Fla's confidence in his second. " Now, Shark, recollect, no foul play ! " " Mind your own business," growled a G 4 88 ONCE UPON A TIME. low-browed, ill-looking lad, who proved to be Shark's friend on the occasion. " Never you fear ; I will mind my busi- ness/' replied the young gentleman, very significantly ; and to prove that he under- stood what he was about, he proceeded to prepare young Fla' for the trial, while pour- ing into his ear some profound instruction in a language which, although rounded off with a terminology as astounding as that of Kant, was perfectly intelligible to the scientific pupil of this accomplished master, and concluded with the considerate advice to pitch as hard into Shark as would send him not farther into eternity than the middle of next week. Before matters had proceeded to an ex- tremity the match was interrupted by the appearance of two sergeants, looking in their red coats, white-duck trousers, red sashes, white gloves, with canes, as smart, trim, and orderly as British sergeants usually do. A pair of military heroes, each wearing the medal, was an unlooked-for addition to the spectators. They gave ONCE UPON A TIME. 89 weight and respectability to the occasion, and promised to impart additional fire to the combatants. Yery much to the sur- prise and dismay of the spectators, and not without a little latent grain of comfort to one of the principal actors in the scene, the sergeants laid hold of each of the rival can- didates for the champion's belt. For a mo- ment they looked very terrible, raised their canes, and then burst out laughing. Good humour was immediately created, and con- fidence too, and, when it was seen to be established, the older-looking of the two, a young man, however, addressed the lads : — " "We know who you are ; you belong to Mr. Shepherd's school — that good man, that pious Christian, who is doing the work of his Heavenly Father; and what would he think if he should be told that the fruit of his instruction was evil ? Would it not break his honest heart ? — he who is your best benefactor ; for it is the bread of life with which he feeds your young souls ; and you to be so ungrateful as to turn the Saviour's lessons of brotherly love, which ^0 ONCE UPON A TIME. he tries to instil into your little hardened hearts, into bitter gall." " Shall I call out the guard and take them into custody ?" interrupted the second sergeant, with mysterious gravity. " Not until we have appealed to their better feelings. First, you two lads, the chief leaders in this wickedness, shall shake hands, and ask God's forgiveness for having committed the sin of malice." Shark, with most admirable promptitude, put out his lean, sinewy arm, while his sinister little face relaxed into a smile which only brightened up its expression of low cunning. Fla' folded his own chubby pair, and resolutely refused. The two sergeants remonstrated, the one sternly, the other graciously, but all in vain ; and, Fla' though gifted Avith no small share of his country's fluency, would give no reason to excuse his apparent vindictiveness. Poor Fla' ! he would not take the hand of a thief who had broken his word, and he would not turn informer. After long suspense, and when it was about to be settled that Fla' should ONCE UPON A TIME. 91 be brought to punisbment, Obady whis- pered the state of the case in the sergeant's ear, who let the boy go, taking no further steps, as he and his companion very wisely concluded that justice would be best at- tained by leaving the matter to be settled by these noble little fellows, according to their own notions of truth and honour, which, however wild they might seem, were just and wholesome. Before we conclude this chapter, we wish to say a few words touching the behaviour of our worthy English sergeants. Some of our readers, we are sure, expected that the interference of such men would have been exercised in quite an opposite manner. They have said to themselves, why, the trade of these men is to fight. They are hired to fight, not to preach; and what would become of the country if all the red- coats should prove parsons in disguise ? But what do you say of Cromwell's In- vincibles ? Oh, the case is different, and to be intelligibly explained by a peculiar state of things. Well, just so. The British 92 ONCE UPON A TIME. army is now, as well as then, always has been, and probably ever will be, impene- trated with the prevailing sentiments and ideas of the people at large. The soldier preserves the early inclinations acquired in the pure English home; and while there are in the ranks, as there is in general society, many a thoughtless and dissolute fellow, there are others who are fond of the luxury of reading and of listening to in- struction, and not a few who are devout. Such men are generally Dissenters, for amongst Dissenters class distinctions dis- appear, at all events under the chapel roof, where the spiritual "experience" of a private is as edifying as that of any other individual whose respectability is not judged by his coat, but by the brightness of that armour which is described by St. Paul in one of his most eloquent passages. 93 CHAPTER IV. The three gentlemen, Count D'Avray, Henry, and Elias Mathews, walked together to the last-named gentleman's house. Now the mind of Mr. Elias was generally under the operation of one or other of these three motives : — how to make converts ; how to make money ; how to make himself a man of importance in the world without expen- diture. It so happened that in the course of an hour or less opportunities for testing his powers in these three ways presented themselves successively and in due order, with the addition of a fresh and unexpected problem arising out of that particular ex- periment which Obady was meditating, and to which he gave the quaint title of "dodge." " Are there people of our persuasion in 94 ONCE UPON A TIME. France ?" The question was of course addressed to the Frenchman, who, contrary to his usual habit of mind, seemed insen- sible to the objects and persons around him, for reasons better known to the reader than to his two companions. Henry, who was as well aware of his brother-in-law's large intellectual culture as he was of his brother's limited acquain- tance with foreign countries and books, interposed in his usual pleasant way, saying that he could answer for one, Madame ]\Iathilde Mathews n&e D'Avray. " Then Count D'Avray is a Protestant?" " Non sequitury Ha! Henry had converted his wife! Who could have expected so much from the apparently careless Henry ? The way was then prepared, the good seed sown; why should he not put in his sickle for the harvest ? Such were the thoughts running in Elias's mind. But how was he to ap- proach the subject ? This was no common man to whom he could direct a rough ques- tion about transubstantiation or the Virgin ONCE UPON A TIME. 95 Mary, and yet this fine diplomatist who could practise his art so adroitly when sounding a poor brother or sister in the Lord as to their possible power of repaying borrowed money with legal interest and an illegal bonus, which conscience settled by calling it an insurance premium rising with the hazard of the transaction — this fine diplo- matist felt his science baffled by the sense of a superior presence. Besides, the Count's absence of mind was a difficulty in itself. After some cogitation he resolved to open his approaches with the question — " How did you like the school ?" Count D'Avray started — a strange effect to be produced by so simple a question. The shrewd Henry began to suspect something. He recollected the long delay in the girls' de- partment ; and he remembered that there were two handsome ladies. Which of the fair ones had achieved the conquest ? He would have liked to say something sly, but felt restrained by the presence of Elias, for Henry had all the delicacy of a gentleman in his hearty nature. 96 ONCE UPON A TIME. Mr. Samson Shepherd is a remarkable man." " I did not converse much with him." "No, I recollect, you directed your in- quiries to our dear sister, Lady Softworth." " She is your sister, Henry ?" The brothers were startled in turn at the energy of the question. " My dear D'Avray, have you not your- self remarked that every profession has its own conventional language as well as its conventional morality. Pious lawyers are allowed liberties with truth, Right Honour- able Peers may play tricks on the turf, one may look a lie in the Stock Exchange, and each profession has its own tongue as well as creed!" "Oh! shame, Henry, — your brother Elias did not expect this from you. There may be hypocrites, whose language is " "Whose language is cant; but, believe me, Elias, I did not mean to apply the in- sinuation to you." Count D'Avray, shaken out of his dream by this momentary difference between the ONCE UPON A TIME. 97 brothers, replied to the first observation of Elias, that Mr. Shepherd was a remark- able man, as if he had not noticed what followed. " Yes, Mr. Shepherd does seem a man remarkable." " Sound in doctrine — very sound." " He does a great deal of good, I am sure ! " " No good works — no good works — all faith." " How can man show love to his neigh- bour as himself, except by good works ? — yet differences on the subject of religion are so much upon secondary points, while with regard to the one great source of light and love there is such universal agreement that superior minds, recognising the harmony of natural theology with revealed religion, of reason with faith, of philosophy with religion, have aimed at the reconcilement of all creeds." Elias was sorely puzzled. Philosophy was another word for infidelity, and reason pretty much amounted to the same thing, VOL. I. H 98 ONCE UPON A TIME. except when used against Papists. Happily for the safety of the unprepared knight, his formidable rival wandered off again into the land of dreams, led by the enchantress, Lady Softworth. It was in some degree a relief to Henry, when Elias, taking him by the arm a little in advance, so as to leave the Count " never less alone than when alone," whispered almost, ^' You and your brother-in-law find hotel charges high?" "Well, rather." " Hum. I could make two rooms at home." '^ My dear Elias, you must not think of putting your family to inconvenience." " Why not ? Deborah and Cicely could sleep together, and " " No, no, our stay is so short. At the same time I will take an opportunity to tell my brother-in-law of your kind considera- tion — your affectionate hospitality." As the voice was going crescendo^ Elias squeezed his brother's arm, by way of reminding him of the confidential character of the con- ONCE UPON A TIME. 99 versation. Besides those words whicli Henry poured into his brother's ears, there ran along an aside in his own mind, to this effect: — How unjust people are to this worthy brother ! How much better we are than we seem to be ! He does not like to make parade of his benevolence. Elias, after he had interrupted the fra- ternal expression of admiration, cut short the mental soliloquy. " I did not mean that precisely. You know that a man's first duties in this world are to his family — the first after that higher duty to his immortal soul. My idea was to serve you and serve myself — that is to say, them — by affording suitable accom- modation upon reasonable terms." Henry's heart collapsed within him. He did not betray what he felt at this mean- ness, as he considered it to be — or if not meanness, yet want of gentlemanlike tact, for he only thought of the subject with re- ference to his friend — so he declined the offer, and there was no more conversation until they reached the house. H 2 100 ONCE UPON A TIME. " My poor pensioners ! " ejaculated Elias, with a commiserating sigh. Around the little outer garden gate were collected some poor people, upon whom the good man cast looks of compassion blended with reproof, which conveyed the sort of blame that says " Why will you always be coming to me? — my charity is indeed unbounded, but my purse is small." Henry thought within himself that he must have wronged so good a brother. What if he had tried to turn an honest penny ? Yet Elias had been brought up to business, and was not so fortunate as himself in having obtained entrance into a liberal profession. He and D'Avray lingered, while on the steps of the hall door a group of wretches were picturesquely arranging them- selves to show off to advantage a middle-aged benevolent gentleman with a loaf of bread in one hand, and a knife in the other. If Elias was too deeply tainted with avarice to trust a cupboard key to his wife, what brought those poor people there ? Because the master of that mansion was supposed to have considerable patronage at ONCE UPON A TIME. 101 his disposal. He was liberal of time, if not of money. He liked to run about with re- commendations to the favour of good persons and to charitable institutions. The work brought him into notice, and created a re- putation which was of use to him in many ways. So, knife in one hand and loaf in the other, he allowed himself to be so deeply absorbed in a tale of distress, or to be dis- tracted amongst many, that the very knife itself seemed to be seized with absence of mind, and to forget the presence of the loaf, which it was dutifully to cut into very thin delicate slices. Mr. Elias's dexterity, when he did set his hand to work, was such as could only have been derived from practised habit. No man knew better than he did, and very few^ as well, the art of making the loaf go far. Such delicate shavings would have made a reputation in a company of fine ladies, but would have cruelly tried the tempers of children, feeling it no shame to obey the requirements of nature, and would have infuriated even these broken-spirited beggars, only that 102 ONCE UPON A TIME. they wanted to conciliate the benefactor's interest, which experience had taught to be effective. Henry felt strongly tempted to take the loaf out of his brother's hand and share it fairly ; but when he calculated how little it would give to each, he took out his purse and distributed its contents, D'Avray fol- lowing his example, which excited more emo- tion than it would be pleasant to describe. Henrj^ and D'Avray, shown up into the drawing-room, were entering into conver- sation at the moment when Mr. Elias, who had remained lingering alone at the door, the beggars having melted away, heaven knows where, perceived Obady and Just afar off. As soon as they saw him they changed their slouching gait into a brisk walk, as if they had been hastening home with all their might, their manner proclaiming of itself that it v/as not their fault should they happen to be behind time. '' I shall catch it, Just ! " said Obady, as his experienced eye observed his father's sudden manner of disappeanng. ONCE UPON A TIME. 103 " Let me settle your cap," said Just, re- moving a dent, which conscience suggested might have been the mark of his own toes. '' Now for the dodge, Just." What could that dodge be which Just would have given anything to know, and which he was now about to witness ? The little gate is passed. Mr. Elias Mathews seems to fill the ample doorway with his presence ; the right hand, which lately wielded the charitable knife, is now behind his back, and Obady knows what that means. He sees, moreover, the tail of a familiar monster curling between Papa's heels. It is a sort of lady's riding-whip, and the dexterity of that right hand is by this time pretty accurately understood. " You have disobeyed my command, Obady. You have disobeyed your father. You have broken one of the Command- ments. Can you tell me which it is ? " " Honour thy father and mother." " And you have dishonoured them." '' No, I have not ; for Mother gave me leave ; ask Just." H 4 104 ONCE UPON A TIME. " Indeed she did ! " Without seeming to hear Obady's last sentence, or to notice the presence of Just, the father repeated, " You have broken one of the Commandments, and must be punished according to Solomon." " If Solomon flogged the children of his 300 wives and 900 " *' What, Sir ! do you add profane speak- ing to disobedience ?" " He could not have had time to write his Proverbs." Little Just opened his eyes with as much astonishment as Mr. EUas himself at Obady's audacity. Obady had been prematurely hardened into recklessness, as he had been sharpened into cunning, by the abuse of the rod ; for it appears that, like all good things, even birch may be administered in excess. " Walk into the parlour. Sir. And, my good little man," addressing himself to Just, " as you have wickedly connived at the sin, you shall at least witness the punishment, my power, as far as you are concerned, ex- tending no farther." ONCE LTON A TIME. 105 " Mind the dodge," whispered Obady. "What is that you say, Sir ?" " Nothing." " Do you dare to tell your father a lie ? Oh ! Obady." The good man lifted up his eyes to heaven, and his whip in the same direction. "Father," says Obady, ''Hf you strike^ I sivear ! I will, by ; take care ! by " "Don't swear, Obady." "Then don't strike!" " I must chastise you ; my duty as a father obliges me, for the sake of your soul." " Then don't you damn my soul by making me swear ; for swear I will, by " Mr. Elias tried by ingenious manoeuver- ing to throw Obady oiF his guard, and put in a blow before the oath could be out ; but Obady was too cool and wary to be caught. The father, baffled each time he raised the whip, exchanged the perpen- dicular for the horizontal ; even that re- quired a brisk movement of the hand, and the slightest indication was paralysed by the first letter of an oath. 106 ONCE UPON A TIME. " And that's the dodge," thought Just. This scene of violence was attended with very little noise. The father desired that justice should be executed with dignity ; and the victim, with the pride of a spirited boy, dreading exposure more than pain, restrained his voice, lest he should attract witnesses to his own degradation. The threatened oaths with which the blows were so successfully parried, probably produced the more effect from the quiet, concentrated manner in which Obady seemed ready to hiss them out, the manner exhibiting more deter- mination than mere boyish boisterousness would have done. So noiselessly did the scene pass in the parlour as not to be heard by the party which occupied the drawing- room, consisting of Miss Mathews, Mrs. Mathews, and Cicely, with Uncle Henry and the French gentleman, received on the cordial footing of a family connection. We have named Miss Mathews first, be- cause, by right of well-established superi- ority, she had risen long before into the first place. In some families there is some- ONCE UPON A TIME. 107 body who is the tyrant, and somebody else who is the drudge. The tyrant was Deborah, and the little Cinderella was Cicely; the mother being simply without will. If she was without will, it was not altogether her own fault. Originally she had been endowed with a fair share, which, if wills were more equally divided, would have been considered a due allowance for any woman; quite enough for the active ex- ercise of power for her own and others' good, without intruding upon others' wishes and rights. But if two wills have to live to- gether, side by side, the strong will eventu- ally wears down the weak, notwithstanding intellectual advantages. Mrs. Mathews pos- sessed a more enlarged mind, and was in every way superior to her husband ; and yet that hard, mean, narrow-minded, worldly fanatic had broken this soft, generous, in- telligent, unworldly woman into a submis- siveness that had become a second nature. Yet she never looked sad or desponding, or seemed to understand that she had, out of sheer weariness, abdicated her sceptre. Her 108 ONCE UPON A TIME. quiet face more frequently wore a sweet, indulgent smile. It was rather a colour- less face, like the half faded blue silk that varied a wardrobe of which Deborah had creamed off the freshness before it had taken its middle place in the descent to Cicely, with alterations to fit her. Deborah, although hardly out of her teens, had nothing of that bloom which is the crown- ing beauty of her years. The evanescent delicacies of the spring had never flitted over her liard features, which were, how- ever, good enough to deceive her into the belief that she was a beauty. Her eyes were good, her cheeks well-coloured, her features all regular ; but they did not seem to har- monise. The general look was heavy and inexpressive. She was her father's favou- rite — rather say, she was his Grand Vizier. To her he would not be very much afraid to entrust his keys. She kept the accounts of domestic expenditure, which he checked, and never found reason to complain of ex- travagance. Her checks upon servants and tradespeople exalted his admiration of her ONCE UPON A TIME. 109 ingenuity into respect for her understand- ing, and touched his sympathies by the unpopularity in which they involved this devoted young creature. In cases of doubt and difficulty, the mother was never troubled with being called on for an opinion, which, indeed, long cessation from the exercise of judgment would have rendered it impos- sible to give. They were reserved for the one supreme decision, and father and daughter discussed and settled the point as if the lady of the house was a wax figure, such as hair-dressers keep for showing off wigs and curls. Little Cicely, her eldest sister's drudge and victim, was not handsome, only because she wanted the child's natural viva- city, and with it the child's natural freedom and grace. Her wings were clipped, and her foot was tied ; but when the feathers grow again, and the cord is cut, who shall say what Cicely may be on outspread wing ? Her face resembled her mother's — it was pale and kindly, and she was timid and shy, and did what anybody bid her, as if she had been born to serve. Her only playmate 110 ONCE UPON A TIME. was Just, who was very fond of her, and she of him ; for Just had somewhat of girls' tastes ; was fond of telling stories, and of listening to them; was fond of birds, flowers, toys, and cakes, and had generally a supply of good things of some kind, which in a miser's house produced a very strange and pleasant effect. The truth is. Cicely was not so over-fed that a cake was not some- thing more at times than a dainty, and even the mother has unconsciously nibbled a biscuit offered by Just, with a child's gra- tification. Yet the house was well, even richly furnished ; and a family picture over the fireplace imparted an air of taste and opulence to the chief room, representing, as it did, the man of the house dressed to look like a clergyman en disponihilite^ and his lady in affluent attire, she gazing admiringly on him (he would have it so), and he pater- nally on Deborah, who is reading the Bible in blue silk ; Cicely listening in white muslin and blue sash ; while Obady's hand is on that of his father, who seems to have just bestowed upon him a green jacket with three rows of gilt buttons. ONCE UPON A TIME. Ill The French gentleman became immedi- ately the lion of this little family party. His appearance was so elegant, and his way of speaking their language so pretty in its thoughtful and guarded precision, that all were in admiration. The beginnings of all conversations are much alike. After it had been ascertained upon the one side that rain fell sometimes in France, and upon the other that the sun was occasionally visible in London, and many questions had been asked which made the stranger smile at the strange notions one civilised people may entertain of another, it so happened that at length Count D'Avray expressed freely his own observations of English life. We pass over his admiration of the political in- stitutions so favourable to the development of personal independence and public liberty, and settle with him upon the topic which more immediately applied to the family present. He was first struck, as in duty bound, with the beauty of the women — their fine clear complexions, blue eyes, and freshness of look and manners, which charm- 112 ONCE UPON A TIME. ing characteristics being appropriated by Deborah to herself, she felt bound to blush an acknowledgment to her tenderly- smitten conscience. Then the mothers of families were such mothers — so benignant and ma- tronly ; it was no wonder they should be allowed such perfect predominance by hus- band as well as children. Why did the lady, the gentle lady, for whom this re- mark was supposed to be intended hold down her head, and Deborah do the same, her colour becoming still more heightened ; and why did Cicely fix her large eyes with an involuntary stare upon her sister? The good-natured gentleman little imagined how piercingly ironical was the expression of those fine eyes of his as they fell upon the illustration before him of a queenly mother, the pride of her own home. " Ha ! what a pretty little fellow ! You did not tell me, Henri, of this other nephew. You have a charming family, Madame I " This was said partly of and partly to Just, who had put in his head through the half- open drawing-room door, his face animated ONCE UPON A TIME. 113 with expressioD, for it was charged with a communication for Cicely, whose attention he had been trying to attract, as she sat on her uncle's knee. When Just, in consequence of the success of Obady's wonderful dodge, could no longer be a w^itness of Mr. Elias's triumphant vindication of the violated com- mandments, he became transformed into a witness of an event of a different cha- racter — that of paternal defeat, which, as it was not wholesome to witness, he was mildly handed out of the parlour. Just, although sound in all his notions of pro- priety, could not resist the attractive power, whatever it may have been, which drew him by little and little to the door a listener, with his young sharp ears, to what was passing within. He in fact suspected treachery. That sly, cruel eye which sought an open- ing through Obady's novel armour of de- fensive swearing impressed Just with strange fear, and if he kept his eye to the keyhole it was from the same sort of fas- cination as that in which a squirrel is held by the glance of a serpent. He could only VOL. I. I 114 ONCE UPON A TBIE. see the back of Mr. Elias's chair, but he could distinctly perceive Obady's face as he stood before the judgment seat of the awful Kha- damantus of whom, with Minos and the other infernal judge, every schoolboy has heard. By way of satisfaction to Obady's mind, his father had laid the whip across the chair behind him, and then commenced a searching examination as to the boy's disposal of his time from the period when he had left the school. Obady frankly told all that had occurred so far as he himself was concerned, but refused to compromise others. He even avowed his own part in the boxing match, and, with an audacity which made Just's silky fair hair stand on end, confessed his disappointment at the untimely interruption by the military. But he would not name the combatants. Having heard all that Obady would consent to tell, the judge arose, declaring that for such high crimes and misdemeanours punishment must be inflicted ; it was a duty he owed, et cetera. He tried to reason Obady into a flogging — to persuade Obady into a ONCE UPON A TIME. 115 flogging — to coax Obady into a flogging ; it would be good for his soul, and not bad for his body. It was a principle that was at stake ; now, my dear Obady, you may by submission get off with so many strokes on the hand, which, if not submitted to with a good grace, shall be turned into an in- definite quantity of stripes about the shoulder, with a broad allowance of margin. Eloquence produced no effect upon the ob- durate boy, who held his father in check with his little by play. But Papa had a dodge of his own, for which the boy, with all his watchfulness, was not prepared. He sprang at his throat, which he held with one hand, so as to render profane swearing impossible, except with the furious heart, and through the furious eyes, while with the other the blows were administered. On witnessing this, Just flew up stairs, and was beckoning to Cicely when his animated face caught the eye of Count D'Avray. " How old are you, my fine boy?" taking the lad's two hands in his. i2 116 ONCE UPON A TIME. " You are mistaken, Count, Master Forbes is not Mamma's son. He is not my brother." " But I should like to be Cicely's brother ; " and Just burst out crying, upon which Cicely, leaving her uncle Henry's knee, took her young friend by the hand. " Sit down. Cicely," ordered the elder sister, w^ho, forgetting the amiable part she was performing, fell unawares into her harsh tone of command. "But Cicely can't sit down when her Papa is choking Obady below stairs, in the little parlour." ^ Poor Mrs. Mathews grew paler than usual ; still she sat trembling as if unable to move. " Don't stir — I'll see what it's all about," said Henry, as he rose quickly, leaving the room, and taking care to shut the door after him. " You are an ill-behaved boy, and I shall complain to your mother, and to your step- father." " So you may, for father would not beat me, and make me swear, to keep off the ONCE UPON A TIME. 117 blows of a big whip, and then seize me by the throat, the way Mr. Mathews is doing with Obady." " You hear what he says, Mamma, — that Obady has been swearing, for which Papa very properly corrects him ? " That was not exactly what Just had said ; yet, unable to find the proper words at the moment, he could only cast at Miss Deborah a very angry look, which she resented by putting him out of the room, when Cicely beginning to cry, she was served in a similar manner; but the manoeuvre did not serve the tyrannical young lady's purpose, which was to exhibit herself to ad- vantage to the amiable and accomplished stranger, whose eyes sought for an explana- tion of this conduct, which she felt it rather embarrassing to give. Could she have seen a little farther into his mind, she would have felt more than embarrassed at the contrast ; she would have found his thoughts engaged with an image of gentle beauty and high breeding, lodged there henceforward and for ever, to be a trying standard of I 3 118 ONCE UPON A TIME. comparison, by which Miss Deborah, of all others, could with least credit be judged. " Do, Deborah, go down stairs and see what is the matter, and bring me back word." " Nonsense, Mamma ; Papa is too good and too just to exercise parental authority- otherwise than according to the precept of sacred writ. ' Spare the rod, you spoil the child ; ' and again, ' Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.' " Anxious to ascertain the effect produced by this burst of sententious eloquence, Deborah threw no sheepish glance of inquiry, but followed the ball to the mark. Before she could ascertain how near it had gone to the centre, the door opened, and a gentleman of strange yet mild appearance entered. He was care- lessly dressed, and his eyes were downcast. Mrs. Mathews trembled, but it was only at the sudden opening of the door, for she met the visitor with a bland smile, as if of habitual compassion. But Deborah took ONCE UPON A TIME. 119 him abruptly by the hand, and led him away, closing the door after her in an affectedly cool manner, which nevertheless betrayed ill humour. The Count and Mrs. Mathews thus found themselves alone. " Do not allow yourself to be agitated, dear Madam, Henri will intercede for his nephew. His father will pardon him, and we shall all be happy once more." " You are a friend of the family, a con- nection — I may say a relation." She spoke with hurried utterance, as one who felt she had not a moment to spare. " Do not think it ill of me, if I ask you for — a guinea — only a loan, only a loan ! " The Count put his purse into her hand, thinkuig to himself that his sister's new relations were a little singular. When the door next opened Henry entered, leading Obady by one hand and Cicely by the other ; Elias following, with a look of such soft, simpering character that none but a very sagacious physiognomist could have read its real meaning. I 4 120 ONCE UPON A TIME. " Come over to me, Obacly," called the kind mother, about whose neck the boy- threw his arms, with a cordiality of affection which showed a good nature, whose per- version had already begun. 121 CHAPTER V. Is it not time to let the church bells ring their wedding melody upon this fair May morning, which the author, v/ith the privilege of a Joshua, has caused to stand still while he has been gossiping with the reader about the bride and bridegroom, their friends and neighbours, their patrons too, and their companions, and of some who are only connected with them and their fortunes, as we are all, in some subtle way, linked together in this living web of humanity, of which not a thread can be touched without a thrill through the whole ? The world being divided into three classes — the married, the unmarried, and those who are waiting to be married — it follows that everybody feels an interest in a wedding. It is a pretty sight, even if 122 ONCE UPON A TIME. there was nothing else, that of a couple in their best attire, he in blue coat with gilt buttons, and she delicately veiled in vapoury gauze, like some fair creation of the gods waiting for the spell which is to give her to the arms of a mortal. Do not think, because John Bessonet and Marian Thorpe earned their living by manu- facturing the silk which makes up the best part of their betters' appearance, that when they put on their bravery they did not pre- sent some approach to those lilies of the valley which, without toiling and spinning, are arrayed beyond Solomon in all his glory. The young weaver was intellectual as well as handy, and being of a reverential turn, there only needed his being in love to render him a perfect gentleman ; and in love he was. Marian could not be called intel- lectual ; but she possessed a fund of native good sense, which, as bad times were coming, was a more precious gift, and if she was not invested with a swarm of dear little evanescent graces and airs, there was a freshness and purity, a truth and ONCE UPON A TIME. 123 honesty, that inspired all with earnest in- terest in her happiness ; and what more could the finest lady in the land desire at such a moment ? As the ceremony is not to be interrupted by a shriek from the church- door, or a sinister growl from behind the bridegroom — as he is not to stagger, nor she to faint, nor peoples' nerves to be shaken by melo- drama at the hymeneal altar, we would have nothing more to do than take seat at the breakfast-table, prepared in the long factory-room at Mr. Masterman's, under the superintendence of his lady and daughter, Julia, a little lady now enjoying her twelfth May. But we are disposed to linger in sympathy with that pale, earnest face of a foreign gentleman, directed, as it is, to the gallery, in front of which is seated Lady Softworth. A delicate pink bonnet and shawl aid her exquisitely delicate com- plexion ; but is it an accident, or is it an emblem, that black lace veil which she lets down as soon as the ceremony is over ? There were critics — there always are critics, 124 ONCE UPON A TIME. even in church, who go there as much to criticise as to pray, and they talked of caprice and bad taste ; and there were apologists who suggested absence of mind ; but their little tattle would have weighed as dust in the balance, if set against the sincere, heartfelt admiration of him in whose eyes every turn of her head or hand was a flash from what the good old romancists of an ex- ploded school would have called the "jewel of his soul." Dear old romancists, the delight of our pre-realist days ! You were not, indeed, very keen observers of ordinary things, appealing only to memory, at which people clapped their hands, and rapturously exclaimed " Oh, la ! how like ! " You tried to raise us from a world of low feelings and vulgar manners; and if your unreal fan- tasies and quaint artificialities would not bear close examination, yet did they not fail of effect. They wrapt our grand- mothers in pleasant day-dreams, and kept our grandfathers awake at night. In them, women,* painted as goddesses, were bound at least to be amiable, and men, imitating ONCE UPON A TIME. 125 the knights of old, to be courteous, and not smoke in a lady's presence. Surely your high-flown stories were as natural as the Italian Opera, to which we go because we must have our fairy land somehow or somewhere. Why, then, should not the soul, like the sun, light up 4ts own jewels, formed from the purest combina- tions of ray and dew in the sweetest ground- work of odorous flowers ? Yes, she did glitter there, wdth his whole soul upon her, as a transcendental jewel, which is a highly transcendental way of putting it if you will ; but we are now dealing with realities which love will not leave in their cold simple state ; but which the wild en- chanter must sublimate into illusions in an atmosphere of intoxication, where sentiment takes counsel of misleading fancy, and both play strange tricks together I " As you are going to the breakfast, Elias, I will take out Obady for a walk. D'Avray wishes to have the other little fellow along with him, and we shall all be home for dinner." 126 ONCE UPON A TIME. Elias could not well refuse ; so to spare himself the unpleasantness of giving his assent in words, he asked, " What did you think of Mr. Shortley, the rector ?" " A portly man, Elias, but no match for Mr. Shepherd.'' ^' His house is open to all, rich and poor." " No doubt ; and so he is ever at home to receive company, which is very good ; but Shepherd does not wait for people to come to him, he goes to them. Wherefore it is, Elias, that Dr. Shortley is a portly man. Dock the adverbial termination, and as you are fond of economy, the first syllable will set the face to match the body." " A portly man, with a port face." " Just so." Elias shook his head, and they went their several ways. With the aid of spring flowers, profusely supplied from the country seat of the Mastermans, the long ware-room, usually appropriated to the finished productions of the loom, was made to look exceedingly ONCE UPON A TIME. 127 gay ; and an abundance of good things, on milk-white table-cloths, served to combine comfort with sweetness and freshness. It was too early in our ungenial season for much display of fruits, but there were some early strawberries and a quantity of preserves. Weight and size used in those days to represent English ideas of hospitable elegance. The highest eulogium that could be pronounced upon a feast would be to say of it that there were lots of everything. Abundance made up for want of artistical arrangement, or rather was supposed to shape itself into forms most fascinating to the eye as well as tempting to the palate. We fear, notwithstanding our cautious approaches to the reader's credulity, to mention the colossal proportions of that Mont Blanc of a bride-cake, on which rose a sugar Tower of Babel, whose ap- proaches were guarded on all sides by a rising generation of rosy Cupids, whose way to the heart lay in a melting direction. It almost eclipsed the fair face of Mrs. Masterman at the head of the table, with 128 ONCE UPON A TIME. the bride upon one side and the bridesmaid on the other. Indeed, it did so far obscure her presence as to oblige her to bend her head upon one side or the other whenever Mr. Masterman, for instance, from behind a corresponding mountain of cold roast beef, addressed the frequently repeated question, " How are you going on at your side of the house ?" On one side of the host sat the rector, Dr. Shortley, and upon the other Mr. Elias Mathews, whose honour- able position was in some measure due to the important service he had rendered the Church in the matter of the present wed- ding ; for that worthy gentleman had con- trived to persuade himself and others that it was owing to his interference the ceremony had been properly performed by the regularly ordained clergyman. Mr. Samson Shepherd plunged into the crater of a huge pigeon- pie, and it devolved upon that goodly man, but rather indifferent carver, Mr. Samuel Steele, to serve duck and green peas to the ladies. The wines were good ; and in the eyes of a company of people little accus- ONCE UPON A TIME. 129 tomed to such luxuries, and regarding port and sherry as the elixir of life, crowned the feast with magnificence. Mr. Masterman was as easy, but not so refined, as the rector who sat beside him. He had great animal spirits tempered by conceit ; for to have made money Avas, in his mind, to have achieved the great aim of man in this world. Having immense powers of calculation, he believed that he possessed a great mind. He could, while people were talking about him, abstract his thoughts, and, without losing a word of what was said to disturb his judgment rather than actually to deceive him, settle the value of commodities, working up the raw material through the various stages of manufacture, with all the attendant cost, and strike the profit with something like mathematical accuracy ; and as the result generally ap- peared in the shape of addition to his large income, he of course had tangible proof under his eyes, and in his banker's hands, that he was a man of profound ability. To take advantage of necessity, obliged to VOL. T, K 130 ONCE UPON A TIME. sell below value in order to escape some worse alternative, to screw down wages, or find pretext for fines or deductions, was fair play and good generalship. In the battle of competition no quarter is given. In this death struggle the leader thinks he has a right to avail himself of every kind of cover and of all exposed weakness. In the way of business Mr. Masterman would not, as his people said, spare his own father, could his father return from the other world with some new articles of commerce. In business he had no more bowels than one of his own looms. Out of business he loved to enjoy the fruits of his own wisdom ; and his greatest enjoyment was that the world should accord the sort of fame which attends this sort of wisdom, by knowing his riches and bowing down to his golden calf. There was no mark of care on his shining bald head, over which sixty years had slipped lightly ; but it was not a good head. It was narrow about the temples, and bene- volence had jostled veneration into ugly bumps; and yet this very clean, comfort- ONCE UPON A TIME. 131 able, well-to-do man, all his animal happiness set off with snowy cravat and buff waist- coat, would have won the hearts of the majority of casual beholders — won, but not kept them. His speech was jovial, and it would be a nice discernment, indeed, that could detect the wariness that lurked in the mirth of his eye, or have perceived that his merriment was a cloak in which he wrapped up his dealings with his fellow-men, or have caught in his facetiousness the chuckle in which he habitually indulged over his own good and his rival's ill-fortune. His hap- piness upon the present occasion was not lessened by finding himself seated with a favourite on either side. He liked Dr. Shortley, who shared his port and did not trouble his conscience ; and he liked Mr. Ehas Mathews for his suppleness and his suspicion of the lower orders. With the Established Church he associated aristo- cracy, respectability, the just influence of wealth, and the rights of property. The affectation of simplicity, of not being above his business, and of not looking down upon K 2 132 ONCE UPON A TIME. that loyal democracy of bees who made his honey, would probably have induced him to order the family carriage to the modest little chapel of the Dissenters, but the incongruity was so manifest to the fastidious eyes of his well-bred and well-born lady, that the ex- periment was never repeated. As the visit was upon the occasion of a charity sermon, it was looked upon as exceptional, and created only observations to his credit. If Dr. Shortley won the heart of Mr. Master- man by freer dealings with his port than his conscience, it is only justice to the rector to acknowledge that he had not a single enemy in the parish. He was a cold man in the sense of not being spontaneous or impulsive. His sermons were fairly written out, and never exceeded the pre- scribed twenty-five minutes. He was visible all the forenoon to persons of every degree ; gave good ordinary advice when appealed to on domestic troubles ; and bestowed as much charity as he could afibrd. Still he took a professional view of his calling, kept his books accurately, crediting against ex- ONCE UPON A TIME. 133 penditure his burial and other fees. When he received his newspaper he first read the paragraphs that bore upon his own interests. No lady considered more attentively that triple history of life, the births, deaths, and marriages, indeed none so much, for ladies are not particularly interested in the de- mise of deans and bishops. But after he had prayed, preached, christened, married, and buried ; issued certificates to candidates for vacancies in charitable institutions ; be- stowed odd shillings, and in extreme cases a good bottle of wine, he looked on his day's business as done, and loved to enjoy his evening like any other hard-working mortal. Mrs. Masterman, who sat at the opposite end of the table, between the bride and the bride's mother, was a lady of high family, who some twenty years before had not dis- dained to bestow her portionless hand upon the prosperous manufacturer who could place a carriage and country seat at her disposal, with a town house in a fashionable square for the summer season — town being, according to the taste of the upper classes, K 3 134 ONCE UPON A TIME. the proper place for enjoying June roses, and the fiery heats of July. Her face was pale and placid, must have been handsome, and was still refined and pleasing. Her pride, of which she had a good deal, was never obtrusive, and the distance she maintained between herself and those in humbler station was easy and unconstrained. She was a kind, gentle lady, whose only dislike was to personal trouble, which, as she advanced in life, turned into one of the milder forms of selfishness. She was always pleased to hear of good things being done, but shrunk from any more direct call for active participation than the bestowal of money, for which, how- ever, she had a temperate regard, and was not therefore over-liberal. Sunny looks and sympathetic tones were not hers, on which account she had often to complain of ingratitude, a graceful complaint that served her egotism, while its expression was made to play the part of shocked sensibility. The most serious demands upon her patience were made by that little uncontrollable Julia, her daughter of twelve, who com- ONCE UPON A TLME. 135 bined in very agreeable proportions, as most people thought, her mother's distinction of taste and manners with her father's animal spirits, whose high colour she inherited, giving thus to the features she had taken from her mother all that they wanted to make them strikingly handsome. Thus in- stead of pale cold eyes she had bright blue, with glossy fair hair, and in fact all the magic charms of colour on her fresh young countenance. Her mother said there was no keeping her quiet, and it was never her mother's way to exaggerate, and the truth is, there was no keeping her quiet. The number of times she left her chair and whis- pered some word to this person and to that defied calculation, indulging a curiosity that knew no bounds, and dispensing pretty pleasant sayings that seemed to be inex- haustible. She was like a merry little octave in a great band of music, whose tremulous pipe plays about the deepest and loudest sounds with fairy-like caprice and mocking distinctness. All eyes seemed to follow the little flashing creature wher- K 4 136 ONCE UPON A TIME. ever her rosy shoes carried her; and she did more to set poor people at their ease and blend the company together than she got credit for. The parents loved her as an only child is loved, with an expansive selfishness which had all the charm of disinterested generosity. They provided teachers of music, for which she showed no aptitude, and of languages, which like most children she caught up with facility ; still her mother was beset by one fear, which brought her to the only state of mental distress of which she Avas capable, — that of feeling uncomfortable. Her fear was lest Julia should be vulgar, that is to say lest Julia should be natural, which means an apprehension lest she should yield to im- pulse, even though bearing her in all right directions, and not submit to the restraint of elegant artificialities. It was a grievous sign that Julia should take such extra- ordinary delight in visits to the factory; how she liked to romp and play wdth rosy little smutty-faced girls at catch- catch through the labyrinth of the looms; and wished to be taught to fling the shuttle, and ONCE UPON A TIME* 137 declared her liio^hest ambition was to weave herself a dress. Judo^e then what a favourite Julia must have been with the company present at the wedding breakfast. Her mother, who never engaged in long contests, eventually gave up the task of calling her to her proper place, resolving in her mind to hold a consultation with the governess. Reference to the father, from whom the taint was supposed to have been derived, was out of the question, the more parti- cularly as his sympathies ran altogether with the wild child. The more substantial part of the feast being over, Mr. Shepherd obeys an invita- tion from the Lady President for a little word ; and at the other end Mr. Mathews looks as if he were playing the umpire in a dispute between the host and Dr. Shortley. " These good people look very happy, Mr. Shepherd. It is quite delightful to see so many happy faces." " You would like to do more good, if it lay in your power ? " "Oh, certainly!" 138 ONCE UPON A TIME. "Well, Mrs. Masterman, I have been thinking that out of the fragments of this bountiful feast there remains enough to make as many more happy." " Oh ! do not ask me to preside over a second party — it is so fatiguing, and I have not your strength." " Hum ! there are some old people." " I shall have all gathered up, and you can dispose of what remains as you will." "It is not the eating and drinking, Madam, so much as the sense of considera- tion, and protection, and sympathy of which these things, if offered under this roof, would be the sign, that " " Well, well, have your own way — you are too good." Mr. Shepherd gently repelled the com- pliment, and with a lighter heart resumed his seat. " The fact is, Doctor, it is the right thing to do ; these people work hard, and a wedding does not occur every day." " My dear Mr. Masterman, you speak as if I did not quite agree with you on the ONCE UPON A TIME. 139 subject ; it is the right thing to do ; and I would have you extend the rule of general feasting to christenings." "Oh, ho, ho! — ha, ha! — thank you, Doctor. I have daily occupation enough, already." ^^ Now that they have eaten enough, and may some of them like a glass of wine, would it not be as well to allow these tall gentlemen in fine livery to retire ? Their presence " " Was meant for a compliment. Doctor." ^' And protracted longer would prove a restraint." Now the rector had been blaming the introduction of the nine tall fellows in silk stockings, yellow plush, gold lace, and powdered hair, as a sin against good taste ; and although he tried to veil his meaning under a quiet air, the shrewd Masterman divined his thought and appealed to the obsequious Elias, who, having his own reasons for not offending either, took refuge in a vague maxim about purity of intention. " You had better, now that the servants 140 ONCE UPON A TIME. are gone, bring up the bridegroom, with a toast to the happiness of the young couple." What Englishman ever yet could resist the opportunity of making a speech ? Mr. Masterman said : — " My good friends, — Never did I, in the whole course of my eventful career, rise to propose a toast with feelings of more solemn satisfaction than I do upon the present oc- casion, when I find myself surrounded by you, my good friends, who have shared my toils and participated in my fortunes — who have borne with your, I trust, indulgent master the labour and heat of the day; and when I find myself in presence of this honest young couple, united, this auspicious day, in the holy bonds of matrimony, by the reverend gentleman on my right, and ac- cording to and in conformity with the rites of the Church as by law established, I do, I say, feel more than I can express." Here the orator stopped Avith perceptible embarrassment, for he felt that he had not quite rounded off so eloquent a sentence with a becoming fulness of phraseology, nor could ONCE UPON A TIME. 141 he, as there were no cheers, take refuge in the ordmary consolation for an oratorical break down, that the rest of the sentence was drowned in enthusiastic applause. Having lost the thread of this weighty beginning he dropped into a more colloquial strain, drawing a modest picture of his own early struggles, and holding forth himself as an example of successful industry for the en- couragement of the people who were his guests upon the occasion, and more parti- cularly for young Mr. and Mrs. Bessonet, who immediately began to build castles in the air, on the foundation of the great man's patronage. Mrs. Masterman did not seem quite to like the allusions to early struggles preceding their union, in which, indeed, she had not participated, and which excited the more particular attention from the earnest- ness with which Julia listened to this part of the discourse, crying out in an audible voice, " Oh, poor Papsy ! " the simple and affectionate naturalness of which proved more touchingly effective than Papsy's oratory. Mr. Masterman's retrospective 142 ONCE UPON A TIME. humility was only another form of his os- tentatious self-sufficiency. What could he not afford ? He was so rich ; he could even afford being humble. When the rich man exhibits his ladder, he wishes to convey the idea that it is made after the pattern of Jacob's, up which he climbed with the help of all the cardinal virtues, ascending and descending. If Mrs. Masterman held down her head and fidgeted, Mr. Elias Mathews turned up his eyes with admiration, which, as he was seated nearer, afforded much en- couragement to the speaker, who at length concluded by proposing health, long life, and prosperity to the bride and bridegroom. Julia clapped her hands so rapidly as to call for a gentle reproof from Mamma, who disliked all strong expressions of feeling ; but the signal having been given, there arose one of those healthy storms of rattling human sound, which is the opposite of anger, and which rends the atmosphere with its burst of good nature. Hearts, like throats, seem to be clearing themselves for a song, and the harmony never fails. ONCE UPON A TIME. 143 Mr. Bessonet, as we must call him, out of respect for his more responsible position in society, rose and returned thanks. He said: — "Mrs. and Mr. Masterman, my honoured mistress and master. — Ladies and Gentle- men, — My heart is too full for utterance. I will begin by a confession. I had written a speech, but it appears so poor, so tame, so cold, that I cast it from me (he flung the speech on the table). Yes, I will trust to feelings for words — they may be confused, but they will only the better represent emotions which defy language. This is the happiest day of my life, and it is the most troubled — do not look wonder- ingly and reproachfully at me, Marian — I mean sweetly troubled (loud cheers). Calmer days will come with you, beloved companion, beloved wife, there can be no distressing agitation ; we shall lead a life of cheerful industry, do our duty, love, and be happy." Bessonet suddenly sat down, but his next neighbour having whispered in his ear, he quickly rose : — 144 ONCE UPON A TIME. '' Mrs. Masterman, honoured lady and mistress, I have to apologise for a deplorable omission. It was my intention, as it was my duty, to propose your good health, as well as that of my honoured master, who proposed my own and Marian's health with so much feeling ; but again I want words." Here occurred an amusing incident. At the moment that Bessonet threw down his written speech, the rejected document as- sumed a form of fascinating attraction for the eyes of Julia, who contrived to finger it into her lap, and slily to read it over, and had just come to the part introducing her mother's health, when she, being quite absorbed, caught the speaker's voice com- plaining that he wanted words, on which she artlessly said, going up to him, " Here they are." This occasioned a shout of jovial laughter, which rendered it impossible for Bessonet to do more than propose the toast. This brought up Mr. Masterman again, who referred, in the most pathetic manner, to her who had been the partaker of his joys, as she had been the partner of his ONCE UPON A TIME. 145 sorrows ; and he drew an imaginary picture of trials which, supposing privations endured and overcome, that in reality had never existed, or he would not have spoken of them, did not quite satisfy the fastidious lady whom the narration was meant to glorify. Mr. Shepherd next rose, and observed that he thought this was the fitting mo- ment, when they were returning thanks to their benevolent hostess, to announce a kind act on her part, which could not fail to awaken in their hearts the liveliest feel- ings of gratitude. " While we are enjoying ourselves we are bound to think of others — not in the spirit of him whose sense of home comforts is enhanced by the sighs and moans of the weeping storm out of doors, which seems laden with the miseries it occasions ; but as one who looks around for a brother with Avhom to sweeten the morsel by sharing it. You have gratefully noticed the abundance, and super-abun- dance of good things provided for this worthy occasion. Enough remains to glad- VOL. I. L 146 ONCE UPON A TIME. den the hearts of some poor old friends whom I need not name — but whom we all know — and it is Mrs. Masterman's generous wish that they be assembled here this even- ing" (Cheers, in which nearly the rest of the sentence was lost). Mr. Masterman whispered something in no pleased tone to Mr. Mathews about not having been consulted, in which the latter frowningly acquiesced; but on a remon- strance from Dr. Shortley the matter drop- ped ; and as some voices called for Mr. Steele, that venerable gentleman rose to deliver what is sometimes called the speech of the day. We regret our inability to report an ora- tion which was of somewhat inordinate length. Mr. Steele began by an allusion to the recent religious separation, which he fervently rejoiced was not a divorce, and so he ran through a matrimonial metaphor, suggested by the occasion, until he arrived at a more lasting union where they were neither to marry nor be given in marriage ; and here he wept, and stretched forth his ONCE XJPON A TIME. 147 hand to the rector, who rose from his seat and took it very cordially, amidst general demonstrations of satisfaction. Having re- lieved his mind of public concerns, Mr. Steele addressed his discourse more parti- cularly to the bride, of whose docile sitting under his ministry he drew an edifying pic- ture ; and then, by a natural association of ideas, he reverted to his own early history ; and, without apparent consciousness of the fact, treated the company to a love story, but one so intermingled with texts of Scrip- ture, and dressed up so quaintly in peculi- arities of language familiar to attendants at meeting houses, with little anecdotical em- broideries and unromantic pieces of collo- quialism, that if not a sermon after the usual manner, it was an "experience" re- counted at a love-feast. The circumstances, divested of digressions and circumlocutions, were few and simple. The approaches to the heart of the late Mrs. Steele were made under the cover of pretty books, which af- forded opportunities for differences of opi- nion, which again brought out the yielding L 2 148 ONCE UPON A TIME. amiabilty of the gentle critic, who won the heart by submission to the superior reason. It was meant to be particularly encourag- ing to the young couple about to enter upon the thorny paths of life, to learn that the late Mrs. Steele had preceded them without shoes to her feet, until the humble individual who addressed them had, with his own hands, and according to his calling, made her a pair. The attentive listeners saw nothing ludicrous in an avowal which, indeed, presented no unusual occurrence. Mr. Steele was not the only man whom they knew to have risen in the same way from similar occupations to be influential leaders, with the bearing of truly reverend gentlemen. After all, what is dissent — if not a spi- ritual democracy — where the race is to the swift, and the battle is to the strong ? Mr. Steele's manner rendered a common-place narrative highly interesting by a manner which, as we have not the art to reproduce it, we are obliged to reduce to mere outline* Yet, after all, is it not those circumlocu- ONCE UPON A TIME. 149 tions, and digressions, and infinite nothings, which compose the charm of all love stories, including this particular one of Mr. Steele, the Methodist preacher ? Who would care to follow the happy pair from the declaration to the church door, if the way lay along a straight high road ? No, we must diverge from the beaten path, and from under the gaze of dull staring eyes, and wander as we will, and as we can, through thorny bushes that demand the lover's care, and with ex- cuses for stopping afforded by some tricksy thrush, which seems to articulate the pet diminutive of the beloved's name. It is now a flaunting flower that nods its odorous benediction ; and now a brook that cries take care, through slippery stones and peb- bles which it encircles with flashing rings, and foaming pearls more beautiful than that which was dissolved in the cup of Egypt's impassioned Queen. To one pressed by care, and hurried by business, these gos- samer nets of love and precious delays would be mere impediments and waste of time; but to those whom a wedding had J. 3 150 ONCE UPON A TIME. tuned into the mood, the nothings that were all to thee, thou holy widower, rejoicing in the consolations of thy reminiscences, they were everything ; and to them, also, who were led by the perfect grace of sincerity through ups and downs which, not having thy hand in ours, we cannot follow. What said the rector, in his turn ? The rector said grace, and the feast was over. Mr. and Mrs. Masterman drove home in their luxuriously-lined coach, driven by Jehu, in short horse-hair wig, under a broad- brimmed cocked hat, over a bright pink complexion of considerable breadth of sur- face ; while over the carriage-roof slanted upward the shining gold-headed canes of a pair of human ornaments. Mr. Masterman sat with folded arms in one corner, Mrs. Masterman gracefully re- clined in the other, and Julia fell fast asleep opposite. Why do you not feast your eyes, oh favoured father, upon that rich, sweet gift, who is destined to bear up the golden fruit of thy industry, in the form of acquired honours ? Why, on the contrary, art thou ONCE UPON A TIME. 151 morose and sulky ? As thou wilt not answer, we must tell it for thee. The good man was wearied ; he had just put a job off hand, which a sort of sense of duty, of no exalted kind, had forced upon him. He had acted his forced part, and was done with his exacting audience with a " let them go hang." His speech did not astonish ; Bessonet — John Bessonet was applauded — Shepherd was applauded — Steele was ap- plauded ; — the rector, who made no speech, produced an effect by a respectable solem- nity, such as did not mark his own uprising or his sitting down. Mrs. Masterman had not consulted him about the supplementary feast of fragments. Even Julia had not behaved herself with the propriety of an heiress. The sum of grievances was very small, but ill-humour, like jealousy, makes the meat it feeds upon. It is an irrit- able cuticle, of which a flea becomes the despot. " My dear, I suppose you will make this worthy, honest Bessonet overseer, in place of old Mr. Timbs, who has at length taken L 4 152 OXCE UPON A TIME. the hints you gave him to resign, rather than ungraciously turn him off after thirty years' faithful service ?" This was not said sarcastically, nor was it taken as such, for the lady was very matter-of-fact in her speech, and the gen- tleman thought he was only doing right in replacing used-up human machinery by new ; yet conscience is sometimes too strong for economy of that sort; not strong enough always to break through the accumulated crust of scientific selfishness, but yet sufficiently alive to set the giant writhing under his Etna, and make him vent his remorse in barren cinders. " No, my dear, I will not appoint Bes- sonet to Timbs's place." " It will be a disappointment, I fear ; for you certainly raised their hopes." "Why, what did I say ?" She could not recollect the words ; she only remembered the impression ; and it is the impression, conveyed by words, that makes the real meaniiig. " Impression, indeed ! What would im- ONCE UPON A TIME. 153 pression signify in a court of law ? Answer me that ! " She knew nothing of courts of law. Whom would he appoint — if it was a fair question ? It was a fair question — a very fair question — and he would answer it — he would appoint Soapey. "Oh, dear! that tall, thin, white-faced fellow, who lisps, and never looks you straight in the face." " My dear, you do not understand busi- ness. A manufactory is a government. Letat c'est moi, (The bit of French tickled his fancy, and he laughed.) " I must have my minister of police, as well as my general, and my secretary. Now you heard Bes- sonet, and if you understood human nature you would have perceived that he is of a literary turn ; he writes well, for I have peeped into that speech picked up by Julia, and he is gifted with eloquence. I even suspect him of poetry. Do you think he would watch the fellows for me, and bring me reports ? He would first see me • 154 ONCE UPON A TIME. Pardon me, my dear, I was going to use one of those shocking expressions of which you have cured me. Oh, Soapey is the man for me ! " '' Dear me, how suddenly the weather has changed ! " A clap of thunder woke up Julia as the carriage drew up at the door of the town mansion in St. James's SquarCo 155 CHAPTER YI. "We must introduce the reader to Mr. and Mrs. Maltheson, the step-father and mother of Justin Forbes, whom we shall however continue, until he gets out of cap and jacket, to call by the diminutive Just. Mr. Mal- theson had not always been the respectable bookseller that he is now, nor had his good wife, until she accepted him, a year, to the day, after the death of Mr. Forbes, surgeon and apothecary, always enjoyed the same liberty of speech and of locomotion in which, under the tolerant rule of her second lord, she is wont to indulge. The late Mr. Forbes, when he set up shop in this promising district, looked round for a lady with money or good family connec- tions. If he could only get footing in a rich bilious circle, he fairly calculated upon 156 ONCE UPON A TIME. the profits of dyspepsia to make up original deficiencies of fortune. He accordingly in- vested his expectations in the not very rich but influential and esteemed family of which the future Mrs. Forbes was the hope and ornament. A sudden indisposition, while their own doctor was away, afibrded Surgeon Forbes the opportunity of feeling the pulse and the heart together ; and it was very much to the surprise, and very, very much indeed to the indignation of a proud father and mother, that they learned one morning, from a neatly written note, that their con- sent was not asked, only because it would have been asked in vain by their " still ever dutiful and devotedly afi^ectionate Comely." The signature of the pet name only added to the fury which this announce- ment occasioned ; and when the enraged gentleman fell sick, it was not Surgeon Forbes who was sent for, but the old esta- blished physician of the place, whose reme- dies for the body were not meant to heal his patient's vexation. ONCE UPON A TIME. 157 Mr. Forbes soon discovered that he had made an erroneous calculation. His wife brought him neither money nor acquain- tances with morbid nerves or incurable hypochondria. The only bile with which he had to deal was her own portion, for which, as he sulkily administered, he won- dered to himself how she could have ever been called Comely. Her complexion ought to have been fair, but was not, and her hair was meant to be red, but looked as if it had been blighted before it could reach the blooming fire of the orange. As the family so treated him, he determined after a while so to treat her. By what process of logic his evil mind had arrived at this singular conclusion it would be vain to inquire. There are no rules about human mind and character, which, however accurate they m^y generally seem, are not baffled by ever- varying exceptions. Mr. Forbes resolved to cut his wife, but to cut her after a fashion of his own invention. He would live with her, but not speak to her either when alone or in company ; she might 158 ONCE UPON A TIME. question, he would not answer. If he left home he would not say where he was going ; when he returned he would not say where he had been. Before friends at dinner it would be the same course of proceeding. He would so manage as not to address to her a word, and for the pleasure of tor- menting her would turn the conversation upon the most novel and tempting exhibi- tions, such as he had been to see in the city, and of which and of his enjoyment thereat his wife would learn in this indi- rect way before strangers. Mrs. Forbes had tried every known remedy, but not one would meet this unknown species of perse- cution. She became as much puzzled as would have been the surgeon himself, had he encountered a novel distemper, whose diagnosis was not set down in any medical authority, and which baffled his treatment. She stormed, she wept, she pouted, she ad- ministered strong applications of irony and sarcasm, tried tenderness and harshness, but all failed in turns and alike upon the hard, dark face, whose only expression was ONCE UPON A TIME. 159 a sly smile of triumph. What could she do ? She dared not return to her family to endure scorn in another form ; she was too much a lady to think of earning her bread, even if she knew how. So what could she do but submit ? As there is no standing still in nature, the affections, whose expan- sion was arrested by a cold, iron hand, turned inwardly to fermenting hatred of the author of this negative tyranny, and would have become hatred of her kind were it not for the blessing which Provi- dence interposed in the gift of little Just. How the great work of this world is done by the helpless ! Those who can do nothing for themselves, the feeble old, the feeble young, the still more feeble sick, set the best part of the strong in action, and by exercising their love and sympathies, be- come benefactors in turn. This life's sufferers are the martyrs who redeem wild, wasteful, foolish mankind. When heedless strength descends from its pedestal of harsh arrogance to take gently the hand that is sinking, that hand repays the kindness with 160 ONCE UPON A TIME. the holy pressure of one soon to be an angel, and leaves the mark of Heaven before it is withdrawn. Babies are, in a more literal sense than is supposed, cherubs. There is joy in the mother's heart as she looks on her cherub. There would have been hell in thine, poor ill treated Comely Forbes, only for this precious gift. It was not a complete Eden, however ; for very bitter feelings had obtained too firm possession of a corner, at least, to allow of that. Mr. Forbes became, notwithstanding an affectedly pleasant exterior, an unpopular person in his neighbourhood. The real character of a man is generally pretty well understood. There are spies upon his un- guarded actions, of whom he is not aware. We paint ourselves unconsciously in the most trifling doings and sayings, for nature is very resolute in exacting: harmonious to relations. The face cannot lie, and that is a truth which makes a fool of the false tongue. There was the inevitable handwriting upon the wall of that agreeable physiognomy, which any screaming child could decipher as well as a prophet. In this sort of soli- ONCE UPON A TIME. 161 tude, which Forbes created around him, he was glad to take to the society of Mal- theson, who, from having kept a book-stall at the corner, had risen to the importance of a regular bookseller in a good, comfort- able shop. The contempt with which the lady at first treated Mr. Maltheson, as a low bred person, did him no harm in the eyes of her lord, who, since he had suffered injury, as he supposed, at the hands of the aristocracy, had taken decidedly to social equality ; but his more enlarged views of humanity failed to make him a better husband. His wife, on the contrary, who, while amongst her own family, never troubled her mind about social distinctions, felt now disposed to look at the question in a point of view different from that taken by Mr. Surgeon and Apo- thecary Forbes. She began to think that her family must have been justified in their contempt of an individual who had suc- ceeded in rendering himself contemptible in her own eyes. Eeasonings, which have their source in lacerated feelings, must not VOL. I. M 162 ONCE UPON A TIME. be expected to be logical, and if the poor lady attributed ill conduct to blood, and took to family pride for comfort, we must not refuse her such slight consolation. Independently of the additional annoy- ance which the introduction of Mr. Malthe- son to the family board afforded his wife, Mr. Forbes had other reasons of a more justifiable kind. The bookseller was a highly popular man in the neighbourhood, and his shop the rendezvous of all who wanted to hear news about the publications and politics of the day, and to pass an hour in semi-intellectual gossip. Frequent op- portunities were afforded for recommending the professional services of his neighbour, whose card was stuck in a conspicuous place to catch the eye. Besides, the man himself was a pleasant companion. Alto- gether self-taught, there was nothing which he could not do, and certainly there was nothing which he would not attempt, no matter how difficult. The fact was that he possessed a vast deal of loose, undigested information, without real hold of any single ONCE UPON A TIME. 163 subject. He was ever starting theories which he fancied to be original, but which had been disposed of years and years before, and wasting his energies, that, however, seemed inexhaustible, upon experiments which, for the day in which he lived, were as antiquated as the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone. His dogmatism about matters of which he was essentially igno- rant was never provoking, but was mostly amusing. How he had advanced in the world from a stall to a shop, encumbered with qualities which have precipitated so many from opulence to distress, would have been a puzzle, unless explained by an un- tiring sanguineness of temperament, which carried him off in a twinkling from unre- gretted failure upon a wild-goose chase in another direction. He was as fickle in his fancies as a child with his toys, breaking and throwing away the favourite of to-day for the novel monstrosity of the morrow. So he never dwelt long enough upon his absurdity to be a bore to others, either by an irritable anxiousness, such as he never M 2 164 ONCE UPON A TIME. felt, or by complainings in which he never indulged. He was a shrewd fellow, never- theless, always catching glimpses, and never totally in the dark ; his perception of cha- racter was somewhat remarkable, and he could handle men more cunning than him- self with considerable skill. This knowledge of mankind was probably acquired during his book- stall days ; at that time he would sit in his sort of sentry box making obser- vations upon those who used to avail them- selves of the privileges supposed to be allowed of looking at and through volumes for sale in the open air. The position was one which was rather agreeable, as it suited his tastes and mode of life. A cursory reader, but no deep student, and fond of fresh air without having to seek for it with labour of bodily exercise, Mr. Maltheson could, while seated in his box, indulge his taste for reading without too frequent interruption. So per- fect had his tact become through every-day experience that, by a glance from his page, he could not only distinguish the buyer ONCE UPON A TIME. 165 from the time-killer, but all the varieties of both species. He knew the special man who would buy one particular kind of book, and if he had it not to offer him he took no more trouble for the moment, but resumed his reading, allowing the special man to hunt eagerly, though in vain, for the object of his search ; for he calculated that the presence of one brought others, and did good to his establishment. Nevertheless, he made mental note of the circumstance, in order that he might suit that particular customer upon a future occasion. But this was not all. He would take care to look over the book, whether of law, physic, or divinity, that he might engage the special man in conversation and take, as he called it, " a start out of him," by revelation of familiarity with the subject. This brought the special man back again to have " his brains sucked," another favourite expres- sion, and his purse opened with his infor- mation by fresh purchases of special books. Then there was the temptable buyer of small means, who required to be angled M 3 166 ONCE UPON A TIME. like a trout, and to have his resolution de- termined by an artful stimulating of curio- sity and gentle letting down of price. Of this species there was an almost endless variety, the distinguishing of which, and the treatment of whom, sharpened his saga- city and exercised his diplomatic powers, which were very considerable. He had also his famished scholars and spiritual dependents, whom he fed with free loans of odd volumes. In this way it only took him the trouble to rise from his seat and walk three steps to see the world ; in fact, the world came to him. It was that half active, half idle, that dreamily industrious and curiosity-indulging sort of life which would keep him who consented never to deviate from it alive to those hundred rounded years which Flourens lays down to be the right natural term of existence. The Patriarchs must have led some such life as this when man was a rarity whom it was pleasant to meet ; when short crops and machinery were the one no source of dread, and the other no necessity ; when the ONCE UPON A TIME. 167 only literature flowed direct from the foun- tain of divinity, and pictures were every- where. Ah 1 dream on, and forget Joseph and his brothers. When Mr. Maltheson had accumulated money enough to take the shop next door to his own stall, he soon found how very serious a thing a single step may be. The class of people who used to stop to look at his books dared not to cross his shop door, simply because, instead of being allowed to attend themselves, they were necessarily waited upon. New books becoming a shop must not be thumbed over, even when the leaves are cut ; and there is the uncom- fortable sense of an eye being concentrated upon you, besides the awkwardness of escape through the door without having made a purchase, especially if the door be opened by an obsequious hand, with a bow of reproachful politeness. While losing those waifs and strays of custom, which had yet to be replaced by more regular imports and exports, the master found that he had parted with his precious ease and liberty, M 4 168 ONCE UPON A TIME. for it would not do now to be seated in a corner eating his own confectionary. He must seem to be busy, or people will be prognosticating bankruptcy. There are house rent, taxes, lighting, and clerk to j)ay, and repentance of no avail ; for what man can bear to descend from any elevation he has once attained ? No not even the philosophic and equable Mr. Maltheson. In order to create a new connection out of the old, the bookseller hit upon one of those expedients which seem simple after they have been tried and have succeeded. He replaced the stall, and he stood at his door, like a watchful, patient angler, to triumph in the effect. By and by certain old familiar faces appeared, and old familiar eyes looked about with no more vacant disappoint- ment, and, like baffled hounds, old familiar noses smelt about for the accustomed pro- vender ; and they were caught, and talked to, and fairly carried in and made acquainted with the change. By degrees the new con- nection became formed ; old branches were grafted upon new stock ; and in due time ONCE UPON A TIME. 169 the old stall disappeared, leaving no trace save in the sensitive memory of the apothe- cary's lady. The shrewd bookseller soon perceived how matters stood in that back parlour where scents more pleasant than those of the shop drugs regaled his senses while occupied with his game of cards. As he had rendered himself useful to the husband he resolved upon rendering himself useful to the wife, and became every day more agreeable to both. To no member of the family was he more useful or agreeable than to little Just, and he would half seriously declare that if any one could convert him to the principle of matrimony (how frequently he used that word principle) it would be that flaxen-haired little fellow. He who could do anything was not to be baffled by the craft and mystery of toys, of which he was never without one on hand for Just ; and true to his doctrine of principles, the toys were mostly models of new or old ma- chinery, or scientific instruments, calculated to awaken curiosity of the right kind. Ex- 170 ONCE UPON A TIME. planation led to demonstration ; higher in- telligence than that of Master Just became interested. Father and mother would by their presence make up a respectable audi- ence. The mother began to look up to the bookseller as an extraordinary man, a most extraordinary man, and to institute com- parisons not to the advantage of one whom, before such opportunity of comparing intel- lects had been afforded, she used to think very clever indeed. He could tell so well the many things he had superficially ac- quired, as to persuade attentive listeners that they too, in imbibing his instruction, exhausted the whole of the immediate sub- ject. Sometimes Mr. Forbes might be observed peeping with open eye over his hand of cards in astonished dismay at his wife's ready exchange of erudition with her partner in the game. Not to be outdone in scientific display he would now and then throw in an oracular qualification of a ques- tionable statement, only to get piqued in turn by a reference to the higher court of appeal, whose opinion confirmed or quashed ONCE UPON A TIME. 171 his own. By Jupiter ! thought he to him- self, Mrs. Forbes is not so dull and ignorant as somebody used to think. He began to respect the lady's legal title to be the better half of this no great things of a whole. How the sly artificer did contrive to take up the old threads of their long broken discourse and knit them together ! It was not a very perfect work, and required to be held by his own hands ; for when left to itself it seemed to be ever threatening to fall asun- der. If the lady, after being long despised, began to find out that she was worth some- thing, we must not wonder that, with aroused mental faculties, there woke up resentment, for which sharpened intellect found a tongue. Mr. Forbes could not fall back upon silence. To fall back upon an abandoned position would have been to confess poverty of re- sources, if not actually to acknowledge de- feat. The situation was changed ; it was for the lady to assume superiority in turn ; and to retaliate silence by silence not being that particular woman's way, she employed sarcasm, until Mr. Forbes died — not of it. 172 ONCE UPON A TIME. Nevertheless his malady was of no well- defined kind. A general state of ill-health set in, for which he was advised change of air, mineral springs, and the usual remedies where there is a mysterious sinking of vital power from moral causes. The man was dissatisfied with himself, and there was no one to help him save his friend Mr. Malthe- son, whose faculties were not of a nature to penetrate the depth called for in this case. Mr. Maltheson, failing to save the hus- band, did probably the next best thing — he married the widow. Rather say she mar- ried him ; for she made up her mind, with all the strength of her newly-discovered and put-forth will, that she would waive distinc- tions of birth according to certain maxims she had for some time been familiarising her mind with about Heaven's nobility and Nature's gentlemen. Had not Mr. Malthe- son already conferred upon her a title of nobility, even before the death of her first husband, as she used to speak of him six weeks after his death, by raising her to that dignified position in the world of letters, an ONCE UPON A TIME. 173 editress of the " Cornucoplan Magazine," a serious monthly miscellany, in which arti- cles about science predominated over light reading? . After their marriage Mr. Maltheson dis- covered — and like most discoveries it was made too late to be of use — that his previous deference had been carried too far, inasmuch as the superiority to which he had so long affected to bow was taken in too literal a sense. But there was no help for it. The bookseller's acquaintances laughed in their sleeve at seeing the old lecturer against improvident marriages caught by an or- dinary pedantic widow who took snuff, and was of course a slattern as well as a despot. Strange to say, little open-countenanced, simple-hearted Just, whom they both loved, became their bone of contention ; and what seems stranger still, the source of disagree- ment sprung from the boy's virtues and intelligence ; for while the lady, whose aristocratic notions still clung to her, saw reflected in the boy all her ancestral characteristics, the step-father attributed 174 ONCE UPON A TIME. the blossoms to his own cultivation. Each took pride in the boy from different motives. The self-love of both found satisfaction in the youth. He was of his mother's flesh and blood, but was he not of the step-father's mind and spirit ? " You have nothing to say to him," the mother would observe as she tapped her box. " If he had not fallen into my hands I know what would have become of him, ^vith a negligent father and a mother " As the lady never liked the enunciation of an abominable truth, she always cut short the " controlled by a tyrant," which she knew coming, by a kiss, and " we'll say no more about it," which only meant, " no more about it for the present." As Just was generally called to give account of the way in which he passed his time when not immediately under the eyes of his mother, the latter had no difficulty in coming at the particulars of the flogging scene. Mr. Maltheson, who was not pre- sent at the first examination of the boy, was called in from his desk — a more ONCE UPON A TIME. 175 dignified position than that behind the counter, and therefore preferred, — in order to be a witness to the enormities which passed in the house of Mr. Elias Mathews. " Only to think, Malt (she always called him Malt in private, and Just was not present now), of a boy of Obady's age taking to swearing as a defence from the brutality of a puritanical father ! And you. Malt, are not quite free from blame, seeing that Obady is, as I may say, your own pupil." " My dear Mant " (so he called his Amantha in public and private), " my dear Mant, if I did not consent to let Obady partake of the instruction which it is my pleasure, and my duty, and my privilege to impart to our dear little Just, the boy's education would be altogether neglected; and you must acknowledge that he is a very fine boy " " As compared with other boys, Malt, — not with mine." " I make no comparisons ; for, according to your own happy quotation in that excel- lent article by a certain editress, — you 176 ONCE UPON A TIME. know whom I mean — comparisons are odious." How well the scientific Malt knew the way to divert the rising storm from his own head ! "It is kind of you, Malt, to permit Mathews's son to share lessons with Just — nay, it is Yevj charitable. Mr. Mathews, as I sometimes convey to his unfortunate wife, can hardly appreciate the extent of his obligations to Mr. Maltheson." " Well, well, Mant, I would hardly go so far as that." "Why not?" " For poor Mrs. Mathews's sake." " I do not try to spare the foolish woman. I feel so angry with her for her submission to such mean tyranny. I have a mind to make an article of her." " There are no telhng points," interposed the husband ; " the surface is too smooth, too characterless ; Avhy not make an article of him ?" " I would not soil my pen with such a fellow ; the subject would make me sick." ONCE UPON A TIME. 177 " Yes, Maiit ; your impressible nature is not suited for dealing with characters of that description." " I could do it if I liked." *^ Of course you could, my dear — of course you could j that is not precisely what I mean." " Oh, bother! " cries the impressible Mant, whose toilette was by this time sufficiently advanced to allow of her setting out upon her intended visit to Mrs. Mathews, whom she thought it her duty to assist occa- sionally with her advice. Off she went, tying her bonnet strings as she passed out of the street door, like a second Christina of Sweden, another learned lady of impetuous character, who, while mounting a horse, set it off at a gallop, and seated herself while at full speed. She next proceeded to apply to their right uses a couple of pins which had remained hidden in her mouth, in order as Mant once, in a rare moment of facetiousness observed, to give point to her conversation ; and she thought the joke good enough for profes- VOL. I. N 178 ONCE UPON A TIME. sional purposes, on which account she enjoined him, as a duty he owed his family, not to let it out before any author of their acquaintance. Mark how silent and watchful those clever fellows are, she would say ; they never waste their wit in each other's company. They spend their money which is their profit, but never intrench on the raw material. Perhaps it was of the joke she was thinking, as she smiled to herself while attaching both ends of a kerchief that crossed at her waist ; or it may be that she was inwardly triumphing at the anticipated sting which she might at the moment have been half consciously illustrating; and on she went, as if with her firm flat feet she was pushing up against a stronger resisting medium than that of air ; indeed her motion was something like that of wading into the sea. In due time she reached her place of destination, and as Mr. Mathews was absent, partaking of the wedding breakfast, she caught the lady and her two daughters together. " Pretty doings here, pretty doings, upon my word ! " ONCE UPON A TIME. 179 The three to whom this was addressed looked inquiringly. " What doings, Mrs. Maltheson ?" asked Deborah, who generally took the lead. "Oh! what doings? Of course you know nothing about your brother's accom- plishments in cursing and swearing ! " " Ah !" deeply sighed Deborah. Mrs. Mathews wiped her eyes. Cicely looked terrified at the dreadful image which the witch had called up. Mrs. Maltheson was the only happy one of the party, for she had struck home, and produced the effect at which she aimed, which was to render her friends uncom- fortable ; she was a perfect artist in this her way. The ground-work had been laid in, and now for brino:ino^ out the varied ex- pression of torture with a master hand. " AYhy do you sigh. Miss Mathews ? And why do you wipe your eyes, you foolish, walked- over, poor Mrs. Mathews ? And there you are, staring as if you saw a ghost, Cicely. Shame upon you, not to have run in and saved your poor brother ! " 180 ONCE UPON A TIME. " I would if I could," whimpered Cicely. " And who prevented you ? — not your poor, weak, soft mother, I am sure?" "Oh, no, not ray Mother — not Mamma ; she has often saved me /" " Hold your tongue, Cicely ! What a shame to expose your dear good father to strangers !" " So I am a stranger. Miss Mathews ?" "I used the word in a general sense." *' Well, as we are friends, not strangers, may I ask you, in a friendly way, why you did not interfere to prevent so shocking a spectacle ? You are old enough, I am sure ; you are two and twenty." Deborah almost screamed a protest. " Well, you look as old, which is the same thing." Deborah threw an involuntary glance at a glass which stood on the work-table. " Ah ! you are looking at yourself in the glass ; I did not think you so vain." Deborah bit her nails. Her tormentor significantly handed her a pair of scissors, ONCE UPON A TIME. 181 which the latter flung on the ground, greatly to the former's satisfaction c " Come, come, let us be friends. I have a bean in my eye ; and as he is not too young, I wished to deduct a few years from him, and make them a present to you, not to let the disparity be too great." ^' Whom do you mean ?" asked Deborah, almost smiling, while the tears yet in Cicely's eyes glittered, and the mother held up her head. " Oh ! you guess already ?" Then she nodded her head mysteriously, and whis- pered more mysteriously still. "He is recovering fast. Maltheson assures me that he has discovered the way to cure him — set him all right here (touching her head). A fine job it will be. Great fortune, you know; he under obligations^ you know; sees nobody in the way of a pretty girl but yourself, — eh, Deborah ?" Deborah blushed scarlet. Cicely very puzzled. Mrs. Mathews particularly pained. Mrs. Maltheson supremely happy. Her eyes overflowed with delicious venom. Her N 3 182 ONCE UPON A TIME. lips looked as jovial as if some " bee had stung them newly." Her nose rejoiced in fresh pinches of snuff. "What do you mean?" asked the in- dignant young lady; what do you mean, Mrs. Maltheson, by these insinuations? You know as well as we do the circum- stances under which my poor dear papa consented to receive the son of Mr. Lush under his roof. It was out of Christian charity ; yes, Mrs. Maltheson, you may smile at the word, as much as to say how can a poor man perform charity towards a rich one ? But was it not charity to take this unhappy gentleman out of a private asylum, from amongst mad people, and surround him with the comforts and happi- ness of our sweet domestic circle ? And now that he is apparently on the way to recovery, thanks to our unwearied attentions — and I will confess to those extraordinary opera- tions of Mr. Maltheson (she said this to soften her antagonist) — you think me base enough to take ad — ad — advantage " Her feelings overpowering her, she dashed ONCE UPON A TIME. 183 out of the room. Mrs. Maltheson, not the least affected, rose from her seat, and takmg Cicely by the arm, hurried her out of the room, saying, " Eun and hold your sister, or she may throw herself out of the window." Cicely, taken unawares, did run, did catch her sister, and was rewarded with a pinch, which caused her to scream, while at the same moment Mr. Mathews was heard to enter the house and ask what was the matter. The arrival of the master of the house evidently disturbed the purpose for which Mrs. Maltheson had hurried Cicely out of the room, and which was to be alone with her mother, for the sake of administering to her a sufficient dose of wholesome reproaches on account of her submission to domestic tyranny ; and by way of encouraging her to resistance she would have liked to stand at the door, of which she held the handle, and to catch the particulars of the revela- tion Miss Deborah was making to her papa, about a conspiracy between the wicked Cicely and the still more wicked Mrs. Mal- N 4 184 ONCE UPON A TIME. theson against her gentle innocent self, when the shutting to of the parlour door cut off the communication. " Poor dear Mrs. Mathews, how I pity you ! but as I walked fast, and have spoken a great deal, I want a glass of wine." " A glass of wine ! oh, yes, certainly — but I have not my keys." " Your husband keeps them ? " " He does." " I should like to see my husband locking up cupboards, I would, — and putting the keys in his pocket ; " and she tapped the lid of her silver snuff-box with her knuckle. '^ Dear me ! — what would you do ?" "I would lock the hall door, and not allow him in until he surrendered and begged my pardon ! " '* Deborah would let him in." " Deborah ! — your own child — Deborah ! " There is fascination in the eye of a rattle- snake, as squirrels can tell you, and their testimony is supported by surviving birds and rabbits ; there was fascination in that fixed glance of matrimonial insurrection, ONCE UPON A TIME. 185 counselling revolution^ which it was not in the nature of poor Mrs. Mathews to with- stand, and she threw herself into the arms of the captivator. " Yes, rest on my bosom," cooed the dove, subsiding from the wisdom of the serpent, while she mentally contemplated a good situation for a Cornucopian tale of domestic affliction — " rest on the bosom of your sympathising friend." But as her ear caught the sound of advancing feet, her voice suddenly returned to its habitual tone, and she fired off in a broadside the whole armament of maxims she had intended to discharge one by one, with deliberate aim, while observing the successive effect. " A wife whose husband keeps the keys is not worth a lock of her own hair. Her duty is to disobey. She is not worth a pinch of snuff — not to say a box. Did he ever raise his hand ? I wish he would only commit an aggravated assault, for nothing else will rouse your bile. Do give him a lesson in my presence. Here he comes — dry your eyes ; on my life you cling to me 186 ONCE UPON A TIME. more and more ; what can I do to help a woman who will not help herself?" "Eh, what's the matter?" blandly in- quired Mr. Elias Mathews, as he gently opened the door, and entered with his usual soft step, and with white waistcoat and cravat — he had drawn off the wedding gloves, looking more than usually sanctified. " Hush ! come here." He stooped down, while she quietly put her hand into his pocket, and drawing out the keys, coolly desired him to unlock the cupboard and take out the decanter of wine. To his wife's surprise he did as he was desired. Indeed the wife could not have failed to make the required observation, for the order was ac- companied with a preliminary nudge in the side, while a second nudge supplied the place of a moral application of the example. " Take those cakes out of your nice dress- coat pocket. Whenever I go to a wedding I put my piece of wedding cake in double folds of paper, not to grease my silk, — how tempting it looks! we must have a feast — ring for glasses." The bell was rung ONCE UPON A TIME. 187 and glasses ordered. " Call up tlie girls, Deborah and Cicely." Deborah entered, expecting a scene of another kind. Cicely's eyes sparkled with delight, for Cicely was a pure child of nature, who gave way to the impression of the moment — laughing with those who laughed, and weeping with those who wept ; one of those artless creatures who sink and rise with circumstances, surprising the world at times by the development of unexpectedly high qualities. Wedding cake and wine were probably Cicely's ideal of an earthly feast. "Ob, Papa, you are too good ! " sen- timentally uttered Deborah. "There is no one too good, my dear — you read your Bible to very little purpose ; there is none righteous you know — not even Mr. Ehas Mathews. If David fell seven times a day, you may allow your papa a little stumble over, by way of a tilly, as my Irish milkmaid says — especially when returning from a wedding breakfast, where, if the water be not turned into wine, it is only mixed with it." 188 ONCE UPON A TIME. Mr. Mathews drew himself up very straight, as if he suspected an allusion for which there might have been some foundation. The quickly-divining Deborah rallied to her father's assistance. "Oh, fie! Mrs. Maltheson ; how profanely you deal with the sacred volume ! " '' You see I understand it, at all events, — come, Deborah, forget and forgive ; take a glass of wine with me." '• May I, Papa ? " " May I^ Papa ! — a great big girl like you — fit to be married ; and with I know not how many beaux to her string, whimper- ing, ' May I, Papa ? ' " Cicely laughed outright at the perfect imitation. The mother dared to smile. Deborah looked thunder at her sister, and a cloud of displeasure at Mamma, while Mr. Elias Mathews put on an expression of grave reproof. " Here, Cicely, drink this wine I poured out for your sister, since she will not take it." Cicely pressed it to her mamma's lips, and would not remove the glass till she had finished it. ONCE UPON A TIME. 189 " Good girl, Cicely — now here is one for yourself. That is the way the lady of the house, as the wife and mother in one is properly called — the husband's better half — should rule in her own domain with undivided sway ; she is the head of the Cabinet, in which the husband takes his place as Chancellor of the Exchequer, bound to provide the supplies." " The husband, Mrs. Maltheson, is the lord." " My dear Mr. Mathews, you know as little of the Constitution as Deborah does of the Bible. The Lords have notJiing to do with money bills." Seeing that the point of illustration was not seized, the learned lady was not dis- pleased at being alForded the opportunity of explaining the mysteries of the British Con- stitution — the more especially as there was a gentleman present whom it was her special mission to humble. " I have a work on the British Constitu- tion, by a Frenchman too. I must show it to Count D'Avray when he returns with Henry." 190 ONCE UPON A TIME. " D'Avray — D'Avray — Count D'Avray. My mother was a D'Avray ; descended from a noble French family of the name." " He is walking somewhere with my brother Henry." " The boys are with them," added Mrs. Mathews, " I mean Obady and your own son. Just." Mrs. Maltheson began to cogitate, mark- ing the inward operation of her mind by frequent appeals to her snuff-box. Her old aristocratic associations rose up, and she, whose delight it was to make sport of others' weaknesses, exposed her own, which was particularly of the kind called family pride, that in English circles commands most sympathy ; accordingly, as she dilated upon the respectability of her connections, even Mr. Mathews became reverentially attentive, and when she rose to take her leave, in her most softened and amiable mood, he offered her his arm down stairs, and when she had taken leave resumed the keys of the cupboard. 191 CHAPTEE YII. When Uncle Henry took out Obady for a country walk, accompanied, as the reader may recollect, by his friend D'Avray and Master Justin Forbes, he had, besides the prospect of enjoyment in frolicsome boy- hood's society, a motive of a more serious kind. Henry, nearly fifteen years younger than his brother Elias, was, like many men of that truly joyous cast which arises from the combination of the sana mens in sano corpore^ much more shrewd and thoughtful than, merely looking to his love of plea- santry, people might generally have sup- posed. Perceiving that his brother's avari- cious temper had become more hardened with advancing years, and that his harsh- ness was tending to cruelty, the good uncle not unreasonably feared that his nephew 192 ONCE UPON A TIME. misrht be lost, which would be the more lamentable as he was a fine promising boy. Above all he apprehended the terrible con- sequences on the mind of youth of having daily to witness such discord between reli- gious profession and religious practice. It was not that Elias was a hypocrite. He did not assume appearances for the sake of forwarding worldly advantages, which, as it so happened, were not affected by his sanctimoniousness. So far as religion was concerned he was really what is called a true believer ; and during the moments he found himself engaged in pious exercises felt devoutly. The evil lay in this, that his faith and his avarice ran in two distinct currents ; the one failing in strength to overcome the other. His hypocrisy was rather the result of invincible propensity than of deliberate design. Obady was too young to make distinctions which do not strike many older minds. They were clear enough to Henry's observation; but what would be the use of his attempting to unite his nephew with himself in an analysis of ONCE UPON A TIME. 193 the father's moral nature ? There is no- thing more worthless, if not pernicious, than premature instruction. Besides, philosophy which " could not make a Juliet," would be offered in vain to the age of feeling as a support against injustice. Seeing that his father was mean and harsh, while profess- ing to act under the direction of religious principles, the boy learned to treat his parent without love, and religion with small respect. The uncle too wondered to him- self why Obady, instead of being sent to school, was forced to scramble out an educa- tion in irregular ways. He entertained no doubt that Just's step-father might be the well-informed man Elias described him, yet Henry placed small reliance upon gratuit- ous instruction; and, at all events, he con- sidered a public school to be the right place of training for a life which is to be passed in intercourse with our fellow-creatures. If a school presented no other advantage than that of destroying individual vanity and conceit, for boys are intolerant of ill- grounded assumptions of superiority, it VOL. I. o 194 ONCE UPON A TIME. would on that account alone claim prefer- ence over solitary training. Uncle Henry had accordingly resolved within his mind to propose that Obady should be sent to school, at his own expense, for a couple of years, at the end of which time he would have his nephew come to him on a visit to Paris, where he would finally decide the question of his future profession, which would probably be the one he himself had followed previously to his marriage. Although these serious thoughts occupied the good uncle's mind, we must not ima- gine that the walk was not a gay one. How could a stroll in the sweet green lanes of England, upon a fine May day, be other than delightful ? To Henry, after his wan- derings, the home scene of his youth was thrice blessed — blessed on its own account, this scene of fertile green fields and scented hedges, with the placid enjoyment of graz- ing cattle, and browsing sheep, and birds merry under the flying shadows of soft clouds. Blessed because of reminiscences of the fresh spring-time of life, brought up in ONCE UPON A TIME. 195 such harmonious accord with the fair coun- try around him — and blessed again because of the sympathies communicated by his company — the boys, instinctively joyous with the impulses of the season, the wide prospect, the exhilarating air, acting in spontaneous trials of swiftness, agility, and strength, audacious contempt of hurts and accidents, and desires to do mischief or court danger, not knowing why or where- fore ; and that grave foreigner, to Henry a brother indeed, saying to himself. This is a fair land, an undulating bosom sweet to look upon. Was it not the symbol and very type of one who had suddenly pos- sessed his whole being, whom he saw every- where, and whose presence was on him and around him, like the all-pervading spirit, a love that was a religion. In this irregular stroll the personal com- binations, if we may so speak, occasionally varied ; now the boys, racing and romping together, would leave Henry and D'Avray by themselves, — then Henry and Obady would be for a while side by side in ad- o 2 196 ONCE UPON A TIME. vance, may be, or behind D'Avray and Just, and meeting and separating thus they would go on and stop, while the conversation affected by these and other accidental cir- cumstances was very varied. Obady, when side by side with the uncle, would ask about his adventures ; and the uncle, partly because of his anxiety about his nephew, whom he pitied, and from a sort of rever- ence for that soul of youth which it is criminal to sully, would tell seriously and simply the events of his life, and he found that he was listened to with intent earnest- ness, and felt that he was captivating to himself the confidence of that ill-guided relative. " I wish you would take me when you go, Uncle." " I will come or send for you two years hence, if you work hard at school. You must learn French, for what could you do amongst French people if you did not speak the language ? " " That is true." " Then Paris is a famous place for a ONCE UPON A TIME. 197 young fellow who should wish to become a doctor like myself; but you could not follow lectures unless you understood the tongue in which they were delivered." " They are clever men, those lecturers." '' They are as clever as any men in the whole world. They are most remarkable men — first-rate in point of ability, and singularly gifted with power to communi- cate their knowledge clearly and agreeably." " That's very odd." "Why is it odd?" " Because people about me are always abusing the French." " Because they do not know them. Igno- rance is the main cause of prejudice. They, the French, abuse you." "1 should like to hear them — wouldn't I?" " Take care, they are given to duelling, which is one of their most hateful vices." "With what do they fight?" " Swords and pistols ! " " Well, there can be no harm in learning how to defend oneself." 3 198 ONCE UPON A TIME. " The best defence, Obady, is politeness and a good temper/' "But a polite fellow might meet a chap, you know " "With whom he is not bound to quarrel." " That's very fine talk." " Well, I never quarrelled." " You didn't ?" " No. I never fought a duel." " And you an officer in the navy ?" " No, a surgeon." "Is it not the same thing?'* " Not quite." "But would not a surgeon fight, if he were insulted ?" " It is a surgeon's duty to cure, not kill." " But a surgeon may fight like another gentleman, mayn't he. Uncle — tell me ?" " Any man may fight." " I think I should rather be an officer than a surgeon." " He's a fine boy, this little Just," inter- rupted D'Avray, who came up, leaving the little gentleman at a hedge side, breaking off a blossom; "such candour and inno- ONCE UPON A TIME. 199 cence ! Do you not see some resemblance in his face to that lady we met at Mr. Shep- herd's school?" ''Lady Softworth?" " Lady Soft worth — Soft worth — the same." '^ A little, perhaps." "Oh, Just is always talking of Lady Softworth ; — the lady who writes poetry ; but who won't put her name to it." "She writes poetry! — I should like to read it. Lady Softworth a poetess ! Could you repeat me some of her poetry ? Do, and I will give you a piece of gold." " My eyes, Just, come here ! " " What's that, Obady ?" " Just, can you repeat some of Lady Soft worth's poetry ?" "Mrs. Barbauld's?" " No; Lady Softworth's. Mrs. Barbauld's not worth a piece of gold. Just." " I only know Mrs. Barbauld's." " Bother Mrs. Barbauld ! I say, won't it do if I get off some ?" O 4 200 ONCE UrON A TIME. '^ Xo, Obady. Monsieur D'Avray could learn it quicker himself; or I." " Oh, Uncle ! poetry is not your line." " Ha ! ha ! ha ! and what is your line, Obady?" " The Drama ! Oh, if we could only get up a play ! How I would bring down the house with Eichard the Third ; or with Pierre, in Venice Preserved ! " " Does Just play ?" " Yes. I am drilling him for Richmond and Jaffier ; but you won't tell Father ?" " That I promise you." " What a nice piece of water, this !" ob- served Henry, as they came to a pond on which the sun was raining a shower of gold, while a light breeze rippled the surface ; " I wish I had my Thunder here." " Is Thunder a dog ?" asked Just. "He is ; — a fine Newfoundland dog, who would take you out and save you from drowning." " How I should like a dog!" says Just. '' A dog is nothing to a horse," says Obady. " How pleasant it would be to have a ONCE UPON A TIME. 201 ride through those delicious green lanes! Would you not like it, D'Avray?" " Exceedingly." " Uncle, Uncle ! there is a man who lets out horses and ponies close by — my eyes, Just ! would you not like a pony?" "Is it easy to ride ?" " Trust to Obady— he'll set you all right." "Without waiting for further objection, Obady ran towards an inn, at no great dis- tance, — Just following." " I have told my nephew, Obady, that I would take him to France. He is a fine little fellow — full of genius, which will never be cultivated here ; and of spirit that will only serve to lead him the wrong way." "I should like to take his companion at the same time. I like that boy Just — I know not why." " You said he resembled Lady Soft- worth." Poor D' Avray might as well have told his shrewd brother-in-law the secret at once." The agreement was quickly made, and the horses led out, saddled. Obady, who 202 ONCE UPON A TIME. had learned in the riding- school of the bar- racks, of which he was a tolerated habitue, on account of his liveliness and courage, selected for himself a stout, hard-trotting cob ; choosing for Just a more showy and pretty pony, which, as it had been trained for a lady, knew no step between a walk and a sort of rocking-horse movement, which the fair rider used to take for a gal- lop, displaying her own impetuosity, which was of the mildest character, to great advantage. Obady, whose precociousness stood in the place of years, felt bound to protect his more innocent companion, in years almost as old as himself, and feeling kindly towards him withal, chose this pony, knowing that while he was not vicious, his pace was of the kind to raise Just's opinion of his own talent for horse- manship very highly and encouragingly. Just felt accordingly much surprised when his pony broke into a full gallop, as he thought it, that he did not tumble off; then he wondered at finding what an easy thing it was to ride ; then he would give ONCE UPON A TIME. 203 his pony no peace ; but whipped and struck with his heels, as if with spurs, and even encouraged Obady to make his horse go faster, who, the sly rogue, affected to wonder at his friend's superior skill and courage. At length all set off at a round pace. Just shouting at the top of his voice, when, coming to a corner, they startled a beautiful little horse, drawing a shell-shaped cabriolet upon four wheels, driven by a lady, without companion or attendant. The horse reared ; the lady maintained her self-command, call- ing to the animal with perfect presence of mind. The animal, as if soothed by her exquisitely soft voice, stood still, but trem- bled all over ; and apparently ready to start off the moment the spell was withdrawn. The charmer of brute and man was none other than Lady Softworth. The two elder gentlemen, taking off their hats, apologised. Both possessed that agreeable frankness acquired in a sea life. Henry's medical experience, besides, enabled him to see at once that the lady's nerves were in an excited state, and he without 204 ONCE UPON A TIME. hesitation explained how it happened that he and his friend D' Avray, desiring to gratify the two lads with a ride through this beautiful country, had mounted hired horses, which, to do them justice, seemed to enter into their wishes for a pleasant run. Lady Softworth appeared not disinclined to renew acquaintanceship with the pair of strangers who, on their visit to Mr. Shep- herd's school, had inquired so earnestly into the system of instruction, and who had marked their liberality and kindness of heart by donations for a holiday. The lads' faces were familiar to her. Indeed she looked upon them as amongst her own little friends, more particularly Just, whose father's shop she had frequent occasion to visit. "You seem to be good horsemen, my little friends. How have you learned to ride so well ?" " Just was never on a horse before." Obady said this partly to evade the necessity of having to reveal his own special school of instruction, which it may be remembered was rather of questionable character for a ONCE UPON A TIME. 205 civilian of tender years, and partly to amuse himself with Just's simplicity, always ready to exhibit itself more to the boy's advantage than his more knowing com- panion was able to perceive. "What a brave little fellow you are!" At which compliment from so fine a lady Just blushed, and looked very proud and handsome. " I forget your age — how old are you ?" " Thirteen, Madam, and some months." "You do not look quite so much. As I am driving by your papa's house, I shall stop at the door and tell him that he must buy you a pony when he can afford it, and I will allow it to be kept in my own stable and cared for at my own expense ; the ad- ditional cost will not be much." How could Just speak to be heard from the Seventh Heaven of ecstasy into which he had been raised ? But as he was an impulsive little fellow, he stretched forth his hand, which the lady took into her own, while he pressed hers to his lips in a very gallant and graceful manner. 20 G ONCE UPON A TIME. *^ Obady, you shall have a pony when you come to me," whispered the good- natured uncle, who promptly played Saint Michael to the demon of jealousy, which he thought he saw rising in his nephew's heart, and Obady's feelings were restored to their buoyancy. D'Avray was enchanted with the lady, whom, seeing for the second time only, he yet saw under circumstances which, however little calculated to reveal depths of character in the approved romantic style, invested her with graces of irresistible fascination. She was about to take leave, when her pretty horse again became nervous and excited. A wasp had stung him in the ear, and was wheeling about, narrowing his circles more and more, with the evident in- tention of repeating his bite, when D'Avray, with a dexterous stroke of his whip, laid the little monster low, a service for which the lady felt as much obliged as if he had been a hero of the fabled ages who came to rescue an afflicted land from a big monster who was eating up all the virgins. Still ONCE UPON A TIME. 207 the poor creature was not to be quieted, and its mistress at length betrayed failing courage. D'Avray proposed that Mr. Henry Mathews should ride a little in advance, as the sight of the animals would quiet the horse, and he begged to be allowed to ride alone by his head, an offer which was as graciously accepted as politely offered. Opportunities for conversation were thus afforded, which, beginning, it must be con- fessed, in an ordinary way, in speculations as to the probable durability of Frisk's re- turning composure, deepened by degrees into more earnestness. " Madam," at length began D'Avray, " I shall in a few minutes bid you adieu, and, as I fear, for ever. I am a Frenchman, viewed on that account with little favour." " Je rCai pas de prejuges^^^ delicately in- terrupted the lady, and D'Avray, at once adopting his native tongue, expressed what he desired to say with more freedom, and with increase of admiration at this fresh discovery of another accomplishment. He told her he was an officer in the navy (his 208 ONCE UPON A TIME. profession accounted to her for his direct yet gentlemanly frankness), how he had met Mr. Henry Mathews, was saved by him from dying, returned home, consented to his sister's marriage, had accompanied his brother in a hasty visit to his native home ; then assured her how much he had been struck with all he saw, and with nothing so much as that institution in which her lady- ship took such deep interest, declaring, with a tone not to be mistaken, that his only consolation for being compelled to leave a place in which it would be the desire of his heart to abide for ever, was the recollection that would be treasured up in his memory to the end of his life. "If, Count D'Avray, you should, upon your return to France ; if you should meet Sir Stephen Softworth, tell him that his once unhappy wife " " Married, and your husband living, and separated from you — from an angel !" " These horses are all wild to day ; what is the matter ?" The matter was this, — that, as Master ONCE UPON A TIME. 209 Just gave his pony no peace, the latter, as the best tempered creatures, both four- legged and two-legged, sometimes will do, set off in an angry gallop, determined in his own mind, as the young gentleman, of whose inexperienced power he felt no great dread, was fond of a hard pace, to give him enough of it. Uncle Henry restrained Obady from following, lest he should the more excite the flying pony as well as his own, while he called up all his own presence of mind in the pursuit, which he undertook alone. There seemed little necessity for extraordinary precautions, the faster the pony ran the more delighted appeared to be Just. He even turned the animal up the street where he lived, in the hope that his parents might be witnesses of his prowess. His wish was gratified ; for there was Mr. Maltheson's good stout figure standing at the door, the sun upon his half humorous eye and iron-grey hair, and he, with his hands in his pockets, quietly cogitating about a miscellaneous number of things, in which his good lady and step-son were no doubt VOL. I. p 210 ONCE UPON A TIME. included. At the same moment, while one of the many objects of his thoughts was flying past on his swift steed, the other was returning from her visit to Mr. Elias Mathews^s, in a more gentle mood than that in which she had set out. She had taught Mrs. Mathews a lesson, supported with practical illustrations, on the subject of re- ducing husbands to obedience, and she was on the way, as she hoped, of gratifying her own personal pride by the discovery of a titled relation. Still she had omitted some things, the consideration, of which served the purpose of giving lively occupation to her thoughts on her way home ; she carried on an imaginary conversation with Mr. Elias Mathews, in which that gentleman got the worst of it. Indeed there were some sarcasms so admirably poignant that she felt half inclined to go back, and turn the dialogue in such a direction as to bring about the collision naturally, as it were. The only omission she almost grieved at having made was the point suggested by the gentleman's wedding party habiliments, ONCE UPON A TIME. 211 in which he looked so spruce and gay. She might have hinted to Mrs. Mathews the pru- dence of looking after her health, as, in Mrs. Maltheson^s mental opinion, which she was so sorry not to have expressed aloud, there was something in his eye which told her, that under certain possible circumstances, he could not long remain a widower. In this balanced state of mind she had arrived oppo- site her own door, and was already commenc- ing the counterpart of that operation, the undoing of her toilette, which, as it may be recollected, she completed peripatetically, by loosening the ribbons of her bonnet and undoing pins, when her attempt to cross the street was prevented by the sound of horses* feet thundering along the pavement, while her alarm was turned into conster- nation by a shout from the rider, " Hurrah ! Mother, Hur-a-e-a-e," the sound dying off in the distance. Mr. Maltheson could no longer keep his hands in his pockets, as they were necessary to support his fainting wife. In the mo- ment of their mutual distress appeared p 2 212 ONCE UPON A TIME. Henry Mathews, who, passing quickly by, bid both be of good cheer, as there was no danger; then came up Obady; and then Lady Softworth in her graceful shell- like car, accompanied by the gentleman whom neither recognised. Lady Softworth desired Obady to ride to her house, which was at no great distance, and order her servant boy to come and lead home her horse, of whose disposition she felt no longer quite sure, while she would sit for a while in Mr. Maltheson's shop. Obady gladly took a message which relieved him of the pain of doing nothing in a moment of suspense. In a few minutes, which appeared an age to the troubled parents, to the hardly less troubled Lady Softworth and to the strange gentleman, horses' feet were heard returning, but more slowly, and Just and Mr. Henry appeared riding together side by side, quite jolly and contented ; whereupon Mrs. Maltheson scolded her son, as if his not being carried home senseless had occasioned her a waste of that sensibility which it was a shameful ONCE UPON A TIME. 213 piece of extravagance to have thrown away upon imaginary alarm. When she found that no one sympathised with her anger, and that Just was pro- claimed a fine brave little fellow, maternal pride danced in her eyes, and she shook Lady Softworth's hands with more feeling than she was accustomed to exhibit, as the latter declared that Just should have a pony, Avhich she would order to be kept along with her own. As Lady Softworth intimated her inten- tion of walking home. Count D'Avray begged permission to accompany her to the door. They had already talked French so long together that he involuntarily preferred his request in his native tongue. Keminded by the strange tongue that she was in search of a relation, Mrs. Malthe- son, drawing herself up to her full height — she was a low-sized woman at the best — looked him grandly in the face, saying, *' I am a D'Avray ! yes, I am a descendant of that noble family!" whereupon, as the usual termination of great emotions, she p 3 214 ONCE UPON A TIME. had recourse to her snuff-box, taking a pinch, and tapping the lid with her knuckle. Send a lover upon a forlorn hope ; order him to the cannon's mouth ; bid him meet the rude Hyrcanian boar, or the armed rhi- noceros ; encounter any form but that of the ludicrous in presence of the woman he loves, and he will do it. Lady Softworth perceived his annoyance, well disguised as it was under his gentle good breeding, and the circumstance deter- mined her to accept an offer she might otherwise have declined ; so, politely express- ing herself obliged, she abruptly departed, accompanied by Count D'Avray. " There are many comparatively poor persons residing here who are descended from good French families, and Mrs. Mal- theson is really a respectable and highly intelhgent woman." "Oh, we are not aristocratic in our country. Social distinctions were destroyed by the revolution." " It may be weakness, it may be preju- dice, but I think there are advantages in rank." ONCE UPON A TIME. 215 " Of which advantages Lady Softworth avails herself only to devote herself to the instruction of the poor, and to exhibit an example of noble manners." " These are kind compliments, and there was a time when I might have been vain enough to be pleased by them." " Not compliments, truth — simple truth. Were you not, Madame, about to charge me with a commission for Sir — your — husband, — when ?" " An accident cut short an imprudence." *' Do not say so. My stay is very short. I must join my ship at Toulon within a few days — unhappily I must. Tell me, I pray, what can I do ? It would make me happy more than I can express to render such a lady a service." " You may never meet him ; — oh, you will not meet him. What could have caused such an idea to enter my head ?" " But suppose I should meet him ? '^ " Tell him I think of him, and wish him happiness." " Good God ! what could have separated p 4 216 ONCE UPON A TIME. you? Is he a demon, or did a demon, jealous of such heavenly perfection ?" "This is my door; — good-bye, — God bless you ! " D'Avray felt no inclination to return to meet la dame a la tabatiere, as he mentally called the lady who claimed relationship ; so he wandered to his hotel, a prey to con- tending emotions. Never is man more disposed to rail against fate than when he fancies that he has missed happiness for life, or when the conditions upon which perfect felicity have been revealed come accompanied by the grievous consciousness that they cannot be fulfilled. Would that he had met this lady earlier, or not at all ! And yet for all the world of misery and regret that lay before him he would not have lost that sight of ideal loveliness and purity, of perfect humanity, which exalted his species by showing what beings of this world might become. What sort of man, what sort of monster, could he be who was incapable of glorying in this heavenly trea- sure ? She had not cast him off, for had ONCE UPON A TIME. 217 she not delicately and even tenderly inter- posed his name, and as it were summoned his presence to forbid declarations it did not become her, situated as she was, to hear? Had his own consciousness of un- worthiness rendered him jealous ? Had he said to himself, it cannot be that so exalted a creature can regard me ? No, that could not be. Did not that last per- fecting grace and finish of all perfection, self-unconsciousness, that most exquisite unselfishness, repel such a supposition ? Did it not proclaim sufficiently the exist- ence of some unworthy reasons for this shocking abandonment ? Who in her pre- sence could feel other humiliation than that of sweet worship, which itself means partition in sense and knowledge of re- vealed beautiful things ? No ; he must be some devil, rebuked by the virtue invested with suitable loveliness, such as no evil eye can look upon without an inward wither- in o;. "I would wao^er the earth to this orange peel that he grovels in the society of some wretched companion. Paugh (how 218 ONCE UPON A TIME. came he to pick up such a thing, which he cast away ?) I If we could meet, he and I ; and — horrible! Is this the way that I — even I. who. alas, condemn him, am plung- ing into wicked thoughts ? Is this the way I treat that message of forgiveness which she has entrusted to me ? Has her parting benediction served me no better ? Is there equality between the one who left and the one who seeks her love ? ^liy should I rail against fate for having mocked me with this possibihty of happiness, seeing that I stand self-convicted of unworthi- ness ?" Henry, upon his return, found D'A%Tay in no happy mood. He too had been making his reflections, and they brought him to the conclusion that the sooner he took his brother-in-law back to his own country the better it would be for him ; and fortunately there would be no more than time barely sufficient for his reachinof Toulon. Henrv had learned from the Malthesons the storv of Ladv Softworth, which happened very singularly, as it seemed ONCE UPON A TIME. 219 afterwards to D'Avray, to coincide with his own conjectures. Married very young to a dissipated baronet, given to gambling and other vices, separation had ensued through the simple form of his resuming an illicit connection, being taken by his companion, whose ascendancy seemed to be complete, to the Continent, where he was travelling somewhere under a feigned name. " Then the faults, in this case at least, were not on both sides." When Mr. Henry made this observation to Mrs. Maltheson, he was little prepared for the supreme look of contempt with which that lady meant to punish male con- ceit in his person. " That is so like you men ; as if there could be no such creature in this world as an injured woman. Faults on both sides, forsooth ! — as if no man could ever have faults enough for any two ! There is no such thing as injured innocence, to be sure, in this world. Who ever heard of a victim before ? — not you, I suppose ! It is not in human nature, of course, that on one side 220 ONCE UPON A TDIE. there should be orentle sufferinof, and on the other wicked tyranny. Vice and virtue never of course come into collision ; vice having the strength all on its own side. It's very well for you to be so innocent at your time of life — for I take it you are out of vour teens.'' Henry was mightily amused with the lady's grotesque indignation. At another time he would have drawn her out, as he said, but wishing to obtain some precise information for D' Avray's sake, he ventured to ask where Lady Softworth's husband had gone. Mrs. iMaltheson substituted an expression of hope for information, which hope was so emphatically conveyed, that, if fulfilled, it would have consi2:ned the obiect of her anger to very unpleasant quarters, while she herself abruptly disappeared as if over- come bv her feelinofs. Henrv therefore took his leave, turning in his mind on the way to the hotel the scraps of information he tried to disentangle from the lady's blended hints and commentaries, so as to shape to ONCE UPON A TIME. 221 his imagination something like a succinct narrative. Obady felt his uncle's departure very keenly. That hardened boy, as his wise father thought him, wept as if his heart would break ; and if Cicely seemed to feel less, it was because she had so much to do to try and comfort her brother. Miss Deborah thought them both an ungrateful young pair, to display so much more affec- tion for an uncle than they had ever shown towards their own parents, particularly to the best of fathers. As Obady passed whole days in silence, his father concluded that he had been spoilt by over indulgence, an evil which was only to be counteracted by increased doses of severity. Obady did not now care about being locked up. He rather liked it, as he filled his solitude with thoughts of that dear uncle. Oh ! if he had been his father — how different a life would be his ! With a pony to ride, and a dog to follow him, and a gentleman's life in prospect. His dear mamma would not be the weighed- down, poor spiritless woman she 222 ONCE UPON A TIME. had become, nor would there be any Deborah to act second in command. This analogy- he had picked up in the military riding school, and, in confidential conversation with Just, he alluded to her as the adjutant, a person sometimes mentioned in Deborah's presence, to Just's confusion, which happily for him had either not been observed, or was attributed to a conscience smarting under the sense of some heinous misdemeanour, which these artful young gentlemen had learned so well to conceal as to render inquiry need- less. Obady and Just found themselves linked by fresh ties. They had the mar- vellous prospect before them of a journey to a foreign land, where they would be received by kind friends, and see strange sights, and a people differing from their own. Would they be all like Count D'Avray ? Obady pooh-poohed the supposition. " Must there be no people, Just, to till the land, and act as servants, and be soldiers ? — they are capital soldiers, they say. By the way. Just, what a cavalry officer you would make ! " Just did not like fighting, but as ONCE UPON A TIME. 223 he had a warm imagination he dashed off his imaginary horse and waved his imagi- nary sword. The truth is, Just had, since his pony adventure, risen highly in Obady's opinion, and they became better friends than ever. 224 CHAPTER yill. Three persons are seated together at a tea- table, in a little back parlour looking out upon a flower-garden. They are trying to solve this problem: How can the greatest possible diffusion of human happiness be extracted from thirty-two guineas ? Con- sidering the nature of the question, the reader will not be surprised to learn that the majority of that council was composed of the tender and fair sex. Who the male councillor is has probably been divined already. It is Mr. Shepherd. One of the ladies has already been casually introduced — Miss Bond; the other is an old woman almost blind, whose fingers are constantly at work knitting, while her ears are ever in search of intelligence ; she is Miss Bond's mother — old Mrs. Bond ; and when Miss ONCE UPON A TIME. 225 Bond is not at the school, or engaged in matters connected with it requiring her presence out of doors, she is doing her best to render her mother happy; nor is the task by any means difficult, although strangers would probably imagine the con- trary, thinking the blind, or nearly blind old woman must be of a querulous disposi- tion, because she is fond of bewailing her infirmities, and of talking about her own and others' woes. But those who know her best understand that, as soon as her pre- liminary complaints run off, she becomes very pleasant and cheerful. The suffering naturally love to think that the strong sym- pathise with them, or do not shun or despise them. And as for ailments, she treats them as single maids and bachelors treat pet dogs and fancy cats, for having ex- pended a sufficient amount of fondling upon them, she puts them down, and bestows undivided attention upon her friends and visitors. With this view of her character, it will only appear in keeping with ordinary experience that, before the business of the VOL. I. Q 226 ONCE UPON A TIME. evening opened, there should have been a previous question raised whether it would not have been agreeable to have had the tea things laid in that little arbour which Mr. Shepherd had, with his own hands, con- structed at the end of the garden. " It would, indeed, only that the evenings are sometimes damp, and night air might hurt mamma." Whereupon the invalid presented the well-remembered inventory of pains and aches ; but why should she debar others from their proper enjoyment ? she asked. Could there be enjoyment without her ? The ques- tion was balm. *' Oh ! we are very well Avbere we are. The carpet after all feels cozily under the feet. The air comes in sweetly through the open window. In fact, the comfort of indoors and the gaiety of the garden are combined, so we will stay where we are, keeping the door shut to prevent draft." It may have been owing to the veil which hung between the old lady's mind and the outer world, that her thoughts kept pace with her active fingers, working out for ONCE UPON A TIME. 227 her satisfaction the whys and wherefores of all things, whicli she sometimes accom- plished with remarkable sagacity. Why were those thirty-two guineas subscribed ? and what were the motives of the donors ? This was the skein which her keen thouofhts were working into solid material, while her fingers were keeping pace with, if not sym- bolising the operations of her mind. She could understand the spontaneous genero- sity of the two strangers, fired, as their admiration may have been, by the evidence before their eyes of Mr. Shepherd's good work, and his admirable power of speech ; nor had her daughter's hand been missed in these arrangements which took the strangers by surprise. She wished she could have heard their voices with her quick ears, distinct visibility being denied to her. Well, twenty guineas were accounted for, at least. Lady Softworth had bestowed five guineas — the dear lady; it was a good sum for her who was not rich, considering her position, and who gave so much in various ways. Mr. Masterman had added an equal Q 2 228 ONCE UPON A TIME. sum. He was not considered a liberal man, notwithstanding the wedding breakfast, of which she had heard particulars, atid about which she told Mr. Shepherd more than that active-minded gentleman — too active to be held down by observation of present things under his eye — knew himself. She told Mr. Shepherd, for instance, that Mr, Mas- terman felt piqued at his lady's having arranged, at his, Mr. Shepherd's suggestion, the feast of fragments without consulting him. This she had spelled out for herself, with the certainty of that stocking sole she had completed while working her mental way to that conclusion. " Yes, Mr. Shep- herd, and Mr. Masterman put down his five guineas, not to be backward in generosity, and by way of retaliation too." "Of retaliation! — how could that be, dear Mrs. Bond ?" " Oh ! how could it be, Mother ? Eeally, if I did not know you to be the kind- est hearted, dear old mother breathing, I would suspect you of being ill-natured. You do attribute such strange motives for ONCE UPON A TIME. 22? ordinary acts — at least, which seem such to me." '' Yes, retaliation ! He, the lord and master, my dear, would show his better half that he too could do something of his own way and will, without asking anybody's leave. That's the fact — you may take my word for it." Mr. Shepherd could hardly refrain from laughing at this shrewd guess ; and would probably have laughed out, only that he perceived Miss Bond did not wish to encou- rage her mother's habits of analysis. "Well, dear Mother, let us now think rather about the way of spending the money to the best advantage than of the motives which induced friends to give it, assuming them, however, to have been praiseworthy." " I must, Janet, know first what could have persuaded Mr. Eiias Mathews to put down two guineas — he who never did such a thing in his life before." Here she laid down her hands upon her lap, suspending her knitting, and with her head thrown back and her mouth squeezed, Q 3 230 ONCE UPON A TIME. set her mind to work with its whole undi- vided and concentrated power upon this more than ordinary tough problem. " What did he say when he gave the money ? Did he positively declare that it came from himself ?" " Neither that nor the contrary." " Had it come from himself, he would have proclaimed it on the house top." "Oh, Mother!" " He would have had out the bellman, and the little boys and idle people congre- gated on the green to announce the won- derful performance." " You must know. Mamma, that the bell- man is never hired for such purposes." " Well ! if any one could hire the bell- man to ring his own praise, it would be Elias Mathews. Ah ! I have it now. Did he say he would go himself upon the excur- sion ? " " Yes, Mrs. Bond, and take his whole family." " What ! out of the general fund ?" " Oh, no ; at his own private expense — that he clearly gave me to understand." ONCE UPON A TIME. 231 " So much the better ; — country air tries appetites sorely which are not too well satis- fied at home." " Mr. Shepherd, you must not mind Mamma ; she is sometimes naughty." " Mr. Shepherd, here is the mystery. He means to patronise the excursion — to play the great Mr. Benevolence who did it all." '' Well ! he has some right to take credit for his brother's subscription, and even that of his brother's friend." "No! Mr. Shepherd. Why should he ?" Here she paused ; for she was one of those persons who can only give out the results of trains of thinking, without explaining the process by which they are reached. She had not been afforded time to strengthen her own question by some summary form of conclusive reasoning against Mr. Elias Mathews's right to appropriate even fra- ternal charity, when a simple observation of Mr. Shepherd's gave to her mind another clue to discovery. " Mr. Mathews means to take poor Mr, Lush " q4 232 ONCE UPON A TIME. " The deranged gentleman ?" . " He is getting over his complaint." The great, rich banker's son, Mr. Lush, junior, of the house of Lush, Snug, and Dreary, whose cashier, or something or other, is this same Mr. Elias Mathews." *' He is now allowed cheerful society, and country air is good for all." " Then it is Mr. Lush gives the two guineas ! I see how it is, Mr. Shepherd — I see how it is, Janet ! Oh, the poor, blind, little old woman, who can see nothing but the end of her knitting-needle !" '' It may be." " It is — it is," and the knitting-needles flew across each other like two small swords in the fury of combat. Happily they were conductors of the energetic little woman's surcharged electricity, and by the time com- fortable space had been provided for a toe, the magnetic storm was over, and her mind at peace. " I should like to see how the poor gen- tleman would behave himself." " Then why not come with us, dear Mother ?" ONCE UPON A TIME. 233 " No, my dear. I should only be a re- straint upon you. I know you too well, Janet; while your presence would be re- quired here and there, and you all anxiety to see things made pleasant and comfort- able, I should be keeping you back — that is, you would stay with me whether I liked it or not." " Indeed, Mother, I promise you." •' But, my dear, you forget I cannot see you at the little distance you are from me even now." " Poor dear Mamma," said Janet, kissing her, " do come. The air of Eichmond will do you good ; and you have other senses so open to enjoyment — there will be such scents from blossom and flowers — and such gaiety for the ears, if not the eyes — do come. Must she not come, Mr. Shepherd?" " I assure you, my dear Mrs. Bond, that you shall be left quite at your ease ; no one, not even Miss Janet, shall remain with you longer than you please. Such shall be the general order from the commander-in-chief of the expedition." 234 ONCE UPON A TIME. " Mr. Shepherd, will you promise me one thing?" " In case you come with us, I will promise you anything." " Whether I go or whether I stay ?" " Ah ! come, Mrs, Bond, promise for pro- mise is only fair ; as soon as you say yes, I will not say no." " Ah ! it is impossible." " Why impossible, Mamma ?" " Because — I have my reasons." " Which surely will bear the light, Mrs. Bond ?" " No more than my poor eyes, Mr. Shepherd; they are so weak." '' A comparison is not a reason, although yours is touching." " Well, well." " You yield. Mother ; that's a good Mamma." " No, I don't ; I will stay at home." '' Now, Mamma, I know what is passing in your mind as well as you do yourself. You are saying to yourself that fidgety Janet will be running about and eating nothing ; ONCE UPON A TIME. 235 and as for Mr. Shepherd, he never thinks of himself at all ; and when they come home they will be so glad to have a refreshing cup of tea; and it will be so amusing to pass a lovely evening within doors, baking a cake over the fire, which nobody will be able to eat." " Now don't despise my cakes, Janet." " Well, Mamma, we'll make a bargain. You shall bake the cake before you go, and we will eat it up upon our return ; will we not, Mr. Shepherd?" '' I shall reserve my appetite expressly for the purpose of performing my part." '' The cake would be nothing, my dear, without the tea." " We will have the tea. Bridget shall have the kettle boiling." " Bridget is indeed pretty nearly re- claimed, but not quite, Mr. Shepherd, who selected her for her vices." ''■ No, no, not selected, but did not repel, because I thought I saw ground for hope, which has so far been justified ; she no longer drinks strong liquors, and she has given over lying.'* 236 ONCE UPON A TIME. " But she smokes ; she still smokes ; and were she left a whole clay to herself, your good work would be quite undone." Mr. Shepherd felt that there was truth in the observation ; and Janet, perceiving that the great gun was silenced, felt her own courage fail. " I shall be so happy too. My birds will sing the more cheerfully to keep me com- pany. Will you not, Mr. Goldfinch?" whereupon the little fellow hopped from his perch to the wires of his cage, making a sound like a yes ; " and 1 shall picture the whole scene to my mind, and keep Bridget out of harm's way, and make the cake, no matter what you say, that I will, so do not oppose me." *' I do not oppose you." "No, no; it is no use; I must have my way." " So you shall have, dear Mamma." " Well, Mr. Shepherd, so you will not promise what I ask ?" " I did not say that." " Well, well, no matter." ONCE UPON A TIME. 2 37 " Now I will promise what you ask ; for I am sure you will impose nothing un- reasonable." " It is only to make Janet ride for a good long hour upon a donkey." " Why, Mother, I never ride." " It will do her so much good ; she does not take sufficient exercise ; and I have de- tected a little dry cough occasionally, which, were it to increase, would send me out of my senses, that's the truth of it," and her knitting needles became seized with a fit of impatience. " I quite agree with you, Mrs. Bond ; the prescription is excellent." *' You too against me, Mr. Shepherd ?" *' He has promised, Janet ; he has pro- mised." " I hope I may be thrown." " You wicked Janet ! Mr. Shepherd, you will stay beside her, and not let her be thrown ?" " Ah ! Mr. Shepherd, you have made one promise; do not be caught a second time. You need not, either. I only spoke 238 ONCE UPON A TIME. carelessly. I will mount the donkey, and take care not to be thrown. So now, as we must start early, for the vans will be ready by seven o'clock for all the children, we had all better say good night." 239 CHAPTER IX. The gentleman to whom such apt allusion was made by the shrewd Mrs. Bond in the last chapter, and truly described as the son of Mr. Lush, the wealthy city banker, was neither idiotic nor mad, but a victim to some undetermined kind of mental malady, re- quiring that he should not be left altogether to himself. True it is that he was only occasionally subject to aberrations, which happily never took him unawares. They always announced their approach by symp- toms he had become accustomed to recog- nise, when, of his own free will, he would shut himself up from all society save that of his proper guardian. During the intervals he amused himself with music and reading and lonely walks, now through town, now into the country. A steady, gentle melan- 240 ONCE UPON A TIME. choly, quite free from depression, gave in- terest to his mild, thoughtful countenance. He neither sought nor avoided society, as if he had learned to resign himself to the will of Providence, taking and enjoying what- ever came in his way, and making no com- plaints whatever happened. His father, a widower, having amassed a large fortune^ felt ambitious that his only son, Edward Plantagenet Lush, should form a brilliant matrimonial connection. Fore- casting the boy's position from his birth, he caused him to be baptized by the name Edward Plantagenet, in order to neutralise the Lush, and no pains were spared in having the youth, as he grew up, educated in a way to render him fit for the high social position for which he fancied him to be destined. Edward's disposition seemed to lend itself very satisfactorily to his father's views. He was a born young gentleman, a little too shy perhaps, and not given enough to horse-racing, rowing, betting, and fine dress to suit his father's ideas of true aris- tocratic dash. Seeing, however, the youth's ONCE UPON A TIME. 241 popularity at Oxford, how courted was his society, and how beloved on account of some overpoweringly winning gentleness of nature and of naanners naturally refined, Mr. Lush resolved, as he would say, to leave well enough alone. The first symp- tom of the malady which was to mar the father's hopes, and the son's happiness, oc- curred on the death of Mrs. Lush, when an outbreak of immoderate grief (he was then nineteen years of age) developed the illness which never afterwards left him. Mr. Lush procured the best medical advice, and the best medical advice was to allow him to have his own way. An old Irish servant woman, w^hom we cannot describe as fault- less, acquired over him an ascendancy which was due to her warmth of heart, the source of her devoted sympathy, and her marvellous tact in dealing with the invalid, as much to his happiness as advantage. Old Shelah had a daughter, Catherine, en- dowed with that peculiar characteristic of Irish beauty, a fair complexion and dark blue eyes ; she was gifted also with a melli- VOL. I. R 242 ONCE UPON A TIME. fluous tongue and quick wit, with a natural grace of movement and a captivating man- ner, and could tell fairy tales and legends, or chaunt a melody, in a low thrilling tone of voice. In fact Kate Cassidy was gifted with that power of communicating emotion, without which the lessons of art are learned in vain, and which is itself, if not the highest art, yet the very highest that art can do. This wild flower was as sweet and pure as any upon which the grace of Heaven ever fell. Poor Kate had but one fault — the fault of being poor. What Edward Plantagenet or his father ever opined about her was what perhaps neither could tell. By the time the former might have thought of putting the question to himself it was too late; and when the latter heard the story of his son's marriage with a low-born Irish pea- sant and a Papist withal, he was no more capable of reasoning about the girl's qua- lities than he supposed his son to be, whom he set down to be a fit subject for a lunatic asylum. Had old Mr. Lowry Lush known human ONCE UPON A TIME. 243 nature better, he would probably not have been so overwhelmed with surprise that a young man of high nervous sensibility, keenly alive to kind attentions, easily touched by the aspect of lively yet tender beauty ; captivated by wild music with immortal verse married thereto, a suitable match withal, and a pretty girl acting as bridesmaid at the altar of this spiritual union, and he mostly alone in a country house with large rooms, in every corner of each a valuable tongue to round off the strain as from hidden shells ; and gardens to delight the eyes, and a grave old grove, to which the rooks had taken long ago, and seemed to chatter overhead about the melancholy wanderer below; had Mr. Lowry Lush thought of all this, would he have lost his own senses by plunging his reason into a foaming caldron of paternal wrath ? Yet Mr. Lowry Lush believed he knew human nature well, because he could tell the extent to which the firms of Cotton & Co., and Leather & Co., and Linen & Co. might fairly be trusted. He understood a bill or 244 ONCE UPON A TIME. promissory note as a connoisseur might a picture ; could detect the earliest signs of weakness in a long-established house, and mark the growing indications of prosperity in one of recent origin ; was not to be baffled by the best conceived and executed accom- modation bills, and could, from the connec- tion of a pair of the most artfully assorted names, bring to light the most hidden ma- chinery for raising the wind or flying a kite. He could mark the colourable from the real with the hand of a master. Be- sides, he could see into the depths of any pocket — could carry in his memory each man's balance at his banker's, with the variations thereof, and how alFected by the fluctuating pressure of the market. It was wonderful with what promptitude he heard of bonds and mortgages affecting ware- houses or family property ; and while be- traying pecuniary necessities, affording him the most recently corrected measures for set- tling his customers' trustworthiness. Books, except of account, or pamphlets touching trade and the currency, he never read ; ONCE UPON A TIME. 245 and only such portion of newspapers as seemed to bear practically on his concerns. Such a man, we need hardly say, believed himself and was believed by others to pos- sess great knowledge of the world. He had human nature so completely at his fingers* ends that no one could do him. They who know human nature after this fashion generally despise it, as we despise every- thing of which we think we have reached the end. It is only the infinite that en- gages our respect, and there is no infini- tude in those small concerns, and the small men absorbed by them, on which, and with whom Mr. Lowry Lush played the Triton amongst the minnows. A life passed in fluctuation between ostentatious display and eiForts to counteract attempts to de- ceive is not the most ennobling, although it may be the most money-making. Mr. Lush, who was a dignified sort of man in appear- ance — a bald head with silver fringe, and a face that spoke good living, set upon a frame solid and tall, and not more corpu- lent than necessary to give efiect to his B 3 246 ONCE UPON A TIME. bunch of gold seals ; this opulent, ample Mr. Lush, who would put down a round sum to any charity patronised by a Lord, and who loved to see his name figure this way in print, would probably have wondered if aware of the small meannesses of which he was capable in the way of business. No man would drive a harder bargain with a poor wretch, to whom the pence that fell from his table would have made all the difference between a dry and a moistened crust, than this city Dives, this gorged and gorgeous millionnaire. With him money was power, and as such was inordinately estimated. The habits of mind being such as to reduce the mind itself to a calculating machine, his charities, his dinners, his equipage, his most seemingly careless lavishness of expenditure, were set off against the open credit account which was the bible of his soul. His 50/. gift was an investment in a Lord's smile or public applause, taken by a sort of double entry to the credit side of another account elsewhere. But where he had no interest in this poor wretch's opinion, or that poor ONCE UPON A TIME. 247 deviPs good or ill will, both being alike indif- ferent, he meted out his payment drop by drop, as if parting with the elixir of life. He was not aware of his meanness and cruelty — he could do magnificent things — he was always doing them — he passed, in the eyes of the shallow world, for being all he thought himself. He could, by holding up his finger, procure a seat in parliament. Why did he not do so ? Why did not he, who, having exhausted one world, longed with all his soul to mount into the heaven of the Peerage, seek for that title, Member of Parliament, which, according to Moore, in his Life of Sheridan, is the talisman that opens the door of aristocratic prejudice to the man of plebeian origin ? It was pride — Mr. Lowry Lush would not sit for a borough. No ; unless returned by a large commercial community he would remain plain Mr. Lush. A borough would do indeed very well for a young man entering life — and when his son, Edward Plantagenet's malady first de- clared itself, it was no insignificant element in the fiither's vexation and sorrow, that R 4 248 ONCE UPON A TIME. his son would be disqualified from being returned along with the Hon. Mr. High- flyer, with whom he had formed a friend- ship at Oxford. With this view of Mr. Lowry Lush's character the reader will learn, without sur- prise, that the discovery of his son's clan- destine marriage with the daughter of an old servant, who had risen from the kitchen to be housekeeper, was almost as astound- ing, although not quite so much, as if upon awakening some dark morning it had been told him that the bank had stopped, and a commission of bankruptcy been issued ■against the time and city -honoured house of /Lush, Snug, and Dreary. The story was not iold him until Kate's reputation required ihat it should be no longer concealed. " Father, I knocked at your door be- cause I heard you saying your prayers, and you are in a frame of mind to bless and forgive me." " Bless you ! to be sure — but forgive! — for what ? Some foolish debt — a thousand? Eh! so much as that? — No? Five hun- ONCE UPON A TIME, 249 dred? No ? — pooh, pooh — you will find my cheque book on the table — how much do you want ? " " Father, it is not that; I am married." ^'Married!" Mr. Lush sprang up from the seat he had taken before his dressing table in order to write the cheque, as if stung by a ser- pent. " Married ! — to whom ? — some low per- son ? Eh ? " " To Kate." "Kate, whom?" " Kate Cassidy." " The housekeeper's daughter ?" " You do not know her. Father, — she is an angel ! " " Et cetera — et cetera — not a defect to work a sum in subtraction, but all the vir- tues on earth multiplied by all the angels in heaven — You fool ! " Mr. Lush had hardly uttered his apos- trophe, when he felt alarmed at the effect. Fool was the most terrible word to flino^ at him, who was haunted by the dread that a 250 ONCE UPON A TIME. fool he would become. He sank into a chair, turned deadly pale ; his eyes staring as if fixed upon a spectre ; and so they ■were — upon the spectre of a fool. The aspect of such distress restored the father to himself — a man not easily disconcerted, and whose self-possession soon returned. He was now the man of business, prepared to take a practical view, as if of the con- cerns of a house that had stopped payment. " What day of the month is this ? This is yesterday's date in the case. Tom shall catch it for neglecting his duty. Must pay the fellow his wages, and then do his busi- ness with my own hands — there now — the 21st of March. Your birthday, Mr. Edward Plantagenet — Plan-ta-ge-net. Hum ! " " It is because of my birthday I hoped to find you more forgiving." " To-day you were twenty-one. You are not of age, Sir." A cold shudder ran through Edward, who seized his father's meaning that the marriage was illegal. " I am now of age. Father, and confirm ONCE UPON A TIME. 251 the act. And, after all, our child will be born in wedlock." " I did not suppose that you included law in your studies. I see I have no fool to deal with." Again the fit returned, as if the word fool was a spell of diabolical power. Thi« time the father cared less for his son's agitation, his own fury having settled down into harsh, dogged vexation, the least im- pressible of humours, and the most impla- cable in its propensity to worry. " Does your law carry you so far, my young counsellor, as to instruct you that marriage with a Papist is unlawful? — as I take it for granted that no clergyman of the Church of Ens^land would have de- graded himself in the business ; and that if married at all (a long pause and a searching look) — if married at all, the ceremony, so called, has been performed by a priest, and, as between Protestant and Catholic, is il- legal." " What is to prevent my changing my religion ?" 252 ONCE UPON A TIME. " Perhaps, Sir, you have none to change ; but that is not the question. You had not changed when you married ; and that is enough." Edward threw himself on his knees. " Oh, Father, listen to me. You know how ill I have been, and how ill I am doomed to be ! While this interval between the gloom gone by and the heavier gloom re- turning — heavier because foreseen — while this interval of light lasts, listen to me ! What would you say if, sick at heart and ever sick, one should meet you before whom the soul's sadness rolled off — one whose voice filled the whole being with balm — one whose eye was a delight, whose step made elastic your own heavy gait, whose speech, and, above all, whose song created joys in the place where melancholy thoughts weighed you down. If you found your life to depend upon hers ; that light and darkness succeeded as she came and went ; that you, doomed to a life of misery, had found your remedy — the one only remedy — rejecting which, there was no more hope ; and that ONCE UPON A TIME. 253 she, with all the fascinations of pure natural gifts, so that she seemed to embody, and resume, and symbolise nature's self; — the waterfall, and nodding flowers at its brink, the soft rising and softly sinking voices of the wind through heaven's musical instru- ments, the branches, and all that is sweet, and fresh, and exhilarating, and healing, would you reject the gift, and become in- deed a fool?" This utterly unintelligible speech con- vinced Mr. Lush that his son's mind was in a very bad state ; and while the poor youth fancied that his father was sharing his emotion, the father was turning in his mind to what maison de sante he would consign him after he had undone that foolish busi- ness, the marriage, which, as no legal con- sequence could be attached to it, he was already treating as he was in the habit of treating all acts not cognisable by the law. "Rise, Sir, — rise, Edward, and take a chair beside me. I perceive you are ill. There now ! I mean to say you will render yourself unfit to talk this matter over with 254 ONCE UPON A TIME. me. Suppose, now, we undo this foolish business. Well, now only suppose it. I tell you what I am ready to do in case you obey me. I shall at once put you in posses- sion of the ample fortune you would in- herit at my death — inherit, unless I make a will, which I can do, to your disadvantage." " Do so. Sir, if you please." " That is the way you treat your father, Edward, turning him and his affection for you into contempt. You would prefer, I presume, an Irish mud cabin with that low girl?" " She is my equal in social position, be- ing my wife; in every other respect my superior." " And my superior too, of course ? and wicked, false, abominable old Shelah my superior likewise? What a mother-in-law to one who had such a mother ! " " My mother is where earthly distinctions must seem very poor — amongst pure spirits, who reo^ard no differences but such as exist between vice and virtue. Kate is the child she would choose, perhaps has chosen, to ONCE UPON A TIME. 255 lead me to herself in eternal bliss. She it is, I doubt not, who planted in my heart those feelings of veneration for my adorable Kate, which, by a natural transition, melt into worship of the Creator of excellence. It was not, indeed, my angel mother who created her — she is God's work ; His seal of purity is upon her — but it was my mother interceding for her lonely orphan son ob- tained for me that next best gift to all perfection, — the capacity of recognising it, of appreciating it at its priceless worth, of clinging, and growing, and becoming at- tached to it, until made one with itself. I must endeavour to be like Kate — to be her equal in goodness, sweetness, and worth, and so be worthy of her. Yes, Mother, I hear your voice of approbation and encou- ragement. I see you before me ; do you not see her. Father?" " My poor boy, you must not give way to such emotion. You faint." He ran to the window and let in the fresh air. Edward opened his eyes, gave a wan , look, and closed them again. 256 ONCE UPON A TIME. His father, now alarmed and touched at the sight of suffering, rang the bell, and upon his servant appearing, ordered him to aid in partially undressing his son and lay- ing him upon his own bed. His next course was to send for the family doctor. The latter's carriage was soon at the door, and forthwith father and doctor were in deep consultation. " It is, indeed, a very bad case," said the doctor — " a most serious one; indeed one which requires exceedingly energetic treat- ment. I never heard of so bad a case of matrimony in my life. Of course the peace of a respectable family must not be poisoned, and I can have no hesitation in prescribing a separation." " You are quite of my opinion, that such a marriage is an act of insanity ?" " Of course it is." " Happily, it is illegal." " It must be so ; it could not be other- wise ; our healthy constitution would soon break down, if such alliances were permitted. As for the marriage itself, a good dose of ONCE UPON A TLME. 257 law will settle that. The operation of cutting off this unsound member, rather say this excrescence, may be painful, but it is necessary." " We cannot help the pain, Doctor." " Oh, Mr. Lush, I am well aware of your fortitude, which I honour." " Then, Doctor, you have no hesitation in writing the necessary certificate?" " Hesitation, Mr. Lush ! I would fling my diploma in the fire ; I would call upon the Duchess of Lovepill, who, I am happy to say, is recovering ; and upon my no less respected patient, the Marchioness of Hyper- conderton ; and I would next visit my dear Countess of Qualmsey ; and without waiting to administer my favourite drops — they are such drops — I would hurry to my Lord Swallow's admirable lady, and, bidding her an adieu for ever, next proceed to take leave of the wife and children of Sir Jonas Fische, Baronet ; and then knock at the door of Sir Purse Proud, Knight ; and never see Mr. Miles Millionnaire, again, if, upon an occasion like the present, I should VOL. I. s 258 ONCE UPON A TIME. exhibit the infinitesimal part of a moment of hesitation. Let me have pen, ink, and paper, Mr. Lush, at once." " Perhaps you had better see Edward first ; he is lying upon my bed." "Oh! time enough — time enough; we -will look to him after — let us lose no time. You are a man of business, Mr. Lush, and so am I ; and a man of business takes things in their due order." The certificate was drawn up accor- dingly, and a note for fifty pounds whis- pered its silvery paper acknowledgment into the soft palm of Doctor Snob, whom we need not accompany through the minor part of the morning's performance. " You are now quite satisfied. Doctor ?" asked Mr. Lush, as they returned to the study. " Quite ; and now, my dear Mr. Lush, what can I do for you ?" " For me ! Do you see anything really the matter with me ?" " Nothing but a little temporary excite- ment, like that experienced by my friend the ONCE UPON A TIME. 259 Chancellor of the Exchequer, after an agi- tating exposition of the currency. I will order a little composing draught, which he has acknowledged to be very effectual. He slept as sound as the leader of the opposi- tion, who was to answer him. I think you are of my right honourable friend's consti- tution, and I should like to be able to tell him that I proved and confirmed the effi- cacy of this prescription upon Mr. Lush, of whose financial reputation he has heard." " Indeed, Doctor ! he sent for me upon a late occasion, to ask my opinion upon a cer- tain matter." " Of great importance, no doubt ?" ** Merely a small loan of ten millions, subscribed for immediately." " Why do you not go into Parliament ?" " Well — well — ah — well — hum ! " " You would find this bottle of such use after your great speech ; and I have some little electioneering interest. To be sure it lies mostly amongst the Peers, not allowed to take part in such matters ; but there are ways of managing — you understand ?" s 2 260 ONCE UPON A TIME. "Well; we'll think of it, Doctor." " And I shall drive over to Dr. Singleton, to prepare him for his important charge, and give him proper instructions. Adieu." Dr. Singleton, to whom Edward was about to be consigned, was a man of altogether different stamp from the dark, dapper little Dr. Snob. His private asylum for persons afflicted with those most melancholy of disorders, affections of the brain, was admirably ar- ranged. The doctor was an enthusiast in his profession, and yet there was nothing in his appearance or conversation to indi- cate exclusive devotion to his pursuit. This freedom of mind and manner arose, per- haps, from his deep insight into the nature and character of the individuals whom he met ; and the excellence of his system, like the agreeableness of his manner, consisted in his power of adapting a special mode of treatment to each particular case ; just as he suited his lano^uao^e and manner to the individual with whom he happened to come into contact. This he did quite undesignedly ONCE UPON A TIME. 261 and naturally, for he was a grave, sincere, thoughtful man ; one in whose breast incli- nation and duty coincided. To a careless observer he might appear of an unhappy nature. Although not more than forty, his face wore the sternness of an antique statue; his regular features were white as marble, his mouth severe, his eyes deeply set under a lofty bald head; and yet when he smiled, his smile was most gracious. Besides the pleasure he took in the practice of his art, and it was intense, there was in him an all- presiding sense of responsibility, which his sensitive conscience never allowed to rest. He looked on his fellow-creature as an awful trust. That the immortal portion related to the God whom he profoundly worship- ped should be disturbed by some merely physical disarrangement impressed him with a sense of something like terror. It was to him the most awful of the mysteries of our mysterious being. Although he treated bodily ailments as such, yet in the course of his practice he had habituated himself to look deeper and to look higher, and to seek 262 ONCE UPON A TIME. for the connection which, in most cases, if not in all, subsists between the moral and spiritual state and the physical disarrange- ment. Consequently he condemned general specifics as impudent and shallow quackery. There were, no doubt, numbers of ordinary cases which should be treated pretty much alike ; but of settled maladies he took more comprehensive views. In fine, he was a marked individuality — a man of genius — himself the remedy, which could not be copied or learned by any other man. He was a force in himself, and bore with him an influence like all men of intense will and purpose. Gentle, where gentleness was necessary, he could, if need required, be as despotic as a Eoman emperor. Had he chosen to follow his profession in the ordi- nary way, perhaps he might not have been quite so successful as the obsequious Dr. Snob ; as he very probably would have ser- monised victims to ennui, and idleness, and luxury ; although, assuredly, in serious cases he was the man who would have been called in for the occasion. A wish to con- ONCE UPON A TIME. 263 line himself to a single form of disease, and that the one which would allow him to utilise those abstract inquiries into the ope- rations of the mind in which he loved to indulge, led him to prefer devoting his attention to that description of suffering which, while it opened wider range to his thoughts, and most severely tested skill and patience, yet reached most surely the foun- tain of tenderness which lay deep in his own breast, out of the reach of ordinary soundings. In order that he might be able, without interference with his treatment, whether designed or accidental, and to allow himself to remain at home as long as he pleased — for he was systematic in his habits, and was not fond of frequent calls and sum- monings — he determined upon removing to a large mansion a few miles from town, situated in a fine piece of ground, with a lawn before the door, and a garden opening into a spacious field behind ; and this he converted into what is commonly called a private madhouse. Dr. Snob's instructions to Dr. Singleton s 4 264 ONCE UPOE A TIME. were not likely to produce a very deep impression ; and yet Dr. Snob, as his horses started off at their usual flying pace to the mansion of his Grace, whose par- ticular malady was no worse than dying for the presence of that wonderful phy- sician for whose tender finger there was a rivalry of languid Peeressian arms — that Dr. Snob, as he sat prominently and un- comfortably forward, that the wondering world might see who it was with whom a pair of fiery coursers were all but run- ning away, was indulging in the pleasant illusion that he had quite amazed Dr. Singleton. His deep acquaintance with the pharmacopoeia of titled names argued his scientific attainments ; and his relays of horses for wheels whose only rest was during the golden moments of consultation, proved that his practical skill must at least have equalled his theoretical studies. The fact is. Dr. Singleton knew his man too well to have thought it worth while to enter into any discussion. He listened politely, and even attentively, to his colleague's ONCE UPON A TIME. 265 harangue, ready to seize the two grains of wheat which it was not impossible might fall out of the bushel of chaiF, and which, to a mind so prompt to turn any suggestive circumstance, however trifling in appear- ance, to account, would prove useful. This seeming deference was, by Dr. Snob, taken to be real, and he good-naturedly resolved upon putting in a good word for a man of such plain, humble sense, and so ready to follow superior instruction, as soon as he should again call on Mr. Lush to inquire into the effect of his right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer's compos- ing draught. Mr. Lush was not kept long waiting in Dr. Singleton's study. Edward, who had offered no resistance, and who allowed him- self to be led like a lamb to the slaughter, had sunk into a chair, the image of despon- dency. All he knew was that he and Kate were to meet no more. Through the darkness of a mind bereft of its solar glory, he could dimly discern that fact as a trail of departed light. His one poor thought 266 ONCE UPON A TIME. lay frozen up in comfortless arctic desola- tion. To his father, whose observations were of the ordinary common-place descrip- tion employed on such occasions, he made no reply. His very breath was frozen — his heart was held in frost — had he closed his eyes, he might have sunk into that long winter sleep allowed to creatures spared the sufferings he was doomed to undergo, and whose awakening is a hail to the resurrec- tion of the Spring. His father's presence oppressed him like an overhanging weight of sunless sky ; and as the pale doctor en- tered, his gaoler as he took him to be, he regarded him as some grey grizzly bear, the master of this arctic world, about to fix his savage deliberate eyes upon him — yet what did he care ? Dr. Singleton, pointing to a chair for Mr. Lush, listened to his speech, which, somewhat to the latter's embarrassment, he did not aid by a single question. In fact he kept his eye fixed on Edward. At length he drew towards his patient, and said, very, very kindly, " Give me your hand." ONCE UPON A TIME. 267 The tone was so different from what Edward expected, that the doggedness with which he had armed himself gave way. It was as if a mild air had passed through an opened window into a heavy chamber — a refreshing sense of relief flowed through his whole frame. " Why not give me your hand, my good friend ?" Edward held out both ; they were tied together, but the coat cuffs had concealed the strap round the wrists. The doctor frowned, and a flush passed over his pale face ; he unloosened the bonds, which he jerked aside with an expression of contempt, that brought the light to Ed- ward's eyes, and very much stung Mr. Lush, whose millionnaire person was not used to that kind of treatment. Dr. Singleton took Edward's hands into his own, and the pressure had a sweet soul in it. What tremendously speaking power there is in a gently sympathising pressure of that angelic instrument with which man wins all his victories ; with which he baptizes 268 ONCE UPON A TIME. and marries ; and fights his battle of life ; and wreathes his crown of victory, or draws the mantle round his face and falls, and wooes as no voice can woo ! Then he gently rubbed the wrists one after another, and finally asked Edward Avould he not like to stay with him ; and Edward answered he would. " Yery well. Now go up to the drawing- room, and make acquaintance with Mrs. Singleton, whom you will like very much. Here, Mrs. Moran, will you conduct Mr. Lush, this young gentleman, to Mrs. Sin- gleton ?'* This was addressed to a large, good-looking housekeeper, with a step as light as that of a young maiden, and a sunny autumnal smile of face. When a newly-arrived patient was sent up at once to Mrs. Singleton, the latter, a quiet, sensible lady, understood with whom she had to deal, and Edward was treated pretty much in the way he had been re- ceived below. As soon as he had disap- peared, Dr. Singleton asked how long it was since the first symptoms had appeared. ONCE UPON A TIME. 269 "Two years ago; yes, two years exactly — on the occasion of his poor mother's death, to whom he was very much attached." " He is, then, of an affectionate disposi- tion ? In fact, I suspected as much." He continued — " May I ask. Sir, is he truthful ? Can he be confided in ? I mean, now, suppose I should ask him to promise me something, could I depend upon his word?" Dr. Singleton was obliged to vary the same question, on account of the embar- rassment each form of it seemed to occasion Mr. Lush, who shifted his seat and looked puzzled and vexed. At length he an- swered — " Sir, he is not to be trusted ; he is not to be confided in ; he is deceitful ; he is wicked. He has destroyed my hopes, and ruined his own expectations." " Then I have been too hasty, perhaps, in forming a good opinion of him ?" " Did you form a good opinion of him ?" half exclaimed Mr. Lush, glad of an oppor- tunity to retaliate the want of respect Avith 270 ONCE UPON A TIME. which he conceived the doctor to have treated him. "He is of a highly excitable, nervous temperament, very impressible to kindness, or the contrary — may be raised into a state of exultation amounting to ecstasy, or thrown into paroxysms of suffering, which I cannot, however, exactly call fury. Either stage is followed by deep depression ; and it is out of that state he is to be gently drawn, by attention to his innocent incli- nations ?" " His inclinations are not innocent ! He is fond of low company and the society of low people, Sir ! " "But suppose — and now I come to the object of my question — suppose he should like to ramble out, so as to feel that he is not under irritating restraint — could I reckon upon his promise to return within a given time ?" "No, Sir; he would deceive you. He would run after that treacherous, vulgar girl who has brought down shame upon his foolish head." ONCE UPON A TIME. 271 "Oh! he has betrayed some confiding fellow-creature, Mr. Lush ? I honour your virtuous indignation, and deeply commi- serate your feelings." " Sir, I am not accustomed to commi- seration from any man ! I tell you he is a monster, who has married a low-born, low- bred girl, the daughter of my own cook ! '^ " Married her!" ejaculated Dr. Singleton, as if a weight had been raised from his breast. " Married her ? Well, Sir, I am happy to hear that however foolish may have been his conduct, it has not been wicked." "Doctor Singleton, we had better cut short this conversation. It is quite clear that regarding moral subjects you and I cannot agree ; but you are not a clergyman, and no man is expected to know any but his own business. You are a doctor, of whose skill and eminence I have heard sufficient to satisfy me that I place this wretched son of mine in good hands. The marriage to which I allude is null and void ; but his deception of his father no less proves the falsehood of his nature, so do 272 ONCE UPON A TIME. not trust him. Keep him under lock and key — promise me that." " I promise to treat him according to what I may believe to be the requirements of his case ; and so long as he is in my hands I am responsible for my patient, and I allow no dictation, no interference whatever." ''All right. You are the pilot who, when he takes charge of the ship, super- sedes the captain. I wish you a very good morning." " He is a disagreeable fellow," muttered Mr. Lush, as he sunk into a corner of his deliberately drawn coach. " Disagreeable ; so much the better ; he is not likely to be imposed upon by the boy's hypocritical manner. I am glad I cut short all talk. The man will fear me secretly, notwith- standing his rude outward ways. He is rude because he is obliged to be so with patients of the kind, and cannot put aside his manner when in presence of a gentle- man of sound understanding." Thus Mr. Lush's easy ride to the City bank was not so pleasant as thr.r, of Dr. Snob to the man- sion of his Grace. 273 CHAPTER X. About eighteen months may have elapsed when Dr. Singleton paid a visit to Mr. Lush, to whom, after expressions of satis- faction as to the state of mind and body of his son, he said, " Sir, I wish you to think seriously of what I am about to say. I see no need for your son remaining any longer in my establishment. Hear me out — provided that he be confided to loving hands. I have watched him closely — my wife has done so too — and we are of opinion that the best way to secure his perfect re- covery mentally, morally, and, let me add, spiritually as well as bodily, would be not to thwart his one, his all-absorbing wish, to be re-united to her whom he regards as his wife." '' Impossible ! " " Why impossible, Mr. Lush ? With VOL. I. T 274 ONCE UPON A TIME. your great wealth — pardon me for saying so — you. can make social distinctions bend to your own will. Some of our highest families are not the worse for a noble heir having yielded to other attractions than those of rank and fortune." " Again, I say, impossible." " Then, Mr. Lush, willing as I might be to profit by your liberal allowance in this case — and believe me when I say that I make a sacrifice in oifering to part with the society of this most interest- ing young gentleman, in whose welfare Mrs. Singleton and I take the deepest in- terest, and for whom we have truly formed an attachment ; yet seeing, as I think I do see, the means of his perfect recovery within reach, I feel it my duty to you, as his father, particularly to take the course I have done, although aware that it is an ex- ceedingly delicate thing, even for a medical man, to interfere in family concerns." " Eor the third time, Doctor, I must re- peat that what you propose is impossible ; but allow me to thank you for the kind ONCE UPON A TIME. 275 feelings which prompted you to make a proposition which, at the same time, I beg of you never to repeat." " Then, Mr. Lush, there remains no alternative." " You mean, Doctor, to require my son's being withdrawn?" " On the contrary, Mr. Lush, I mean that he shall stay where he is." Doctor Singleton, without further re- mark, rose to take leave. Never doubting his own disinterestedness, he cared not what Mr. Lush might think of his cool professional way of expressing a resolution, however much to his own advantage. " Suppose I now take Edward into my own hands ? " '' You do so upon your own responsi- bility." " Of course — but what would be the consequence ? " " A worse relapse than ever, within a month." " Will you please to sit down, Doctor Singleton?" T 2 276 ONCE UPON A TIME. The doctor complied. '' When, Doctor, I replied to your pro- posal by saying it was impossible, I meant what I said. I always do. We men of business are men of few words. It is not our habit to assign reasons, because, for instance, if I gave reasons why such a man's bill cannot be discounted, I should throw a slur upon his credit — perhaps render myself liable to an action at law for libel ; do you understand ? " " Those things to which you allude are not much in my way ; yet I think I do understand your meaning." " Yery well. It is impossible, because it is impossible — now you understand ? " " I do not." " You do not ? Well, I forgot, you are not a man of business ; and a doctor, after all, is entitled to more than ordinary confi- dence. This marriage. Doctor, is already annulled ; — the girl has gone abroad ; — where her mother is I cannot say, and do not care." " AVas it by a suit in the Ecclesiastical ONCE UPON A TIME. 277 Court, Mr. Lush ? Pardon ine for asking the question ; but had there been any such proceeding I should have held myself en- titled to be made aware of it/' " Ecclesiastical Court, indeed ! What a pretty joke ! — treat a little Papist to the Ecclesiastical Court ! Why not favour her Irish ladyship with the House of Lords? No, Doctor; I put the matter into the hands of my law agent, to whom I gave carte blanche. He first silenced the priest : there was little difficulty there ; for his shrewd reverence was not slow to perceive his danger. He next opened the old lady's eyes with a rounder sum than ever she had seen in her life ; and the girl, finding herself without support, entered into the service of a family going abroad, leaving the child with her mother." " So that all have disappeared ? " " To be sure they have." "It is a sad business. We must, how- ever, keep these particulars from the patient; and, for my part, I cannot say when there may even be a likelihood of his T 3 278 ONCE UPON A TIME. being in a ^t state to return to society, from which he is now probably excluded for ever. Good morning, Mr. Lush." " Doctor, there is, I think, a quarter due ; allow me to present you with a cheque for the amount." " Not at present — not at present." The doctor went away more deeply af- fected than Mr. Lush, with his profound insight into City human nature, could have believed possible for a man of such cold stern exterior to be. Interviews between Mr. Lush and Dr. Singleton were never agreeable to the former. Yet how were they to be put an end to ? Edward was cured — only required loving hands. Loving hands — and what were his ? Were the hands of his own father not loving ? Suppose Edward married to another. Ha ! — but then Edward should be told all that had happened, and then would come the relapse threatened by Dr. Singleton. If he could find some trust- worthy family willing to undertake the charge — a family by whom he would be ONCE UPON A TIME. 279 rigorously watched, yet with whom he could remain apparently as a boarder — many advantages would be obtained by such a course. First, there would be an end of the Lunatic Asylum — the private madhouse, the Maison de Sante; and there would be an end of unpleasant meetings with Dr. Singleton, who played the superior with that powerful prince of finance whose ante-chamber was filled with courtiers of all complexions. It was a question whether the lost tribes of the House of Israel might not be recognised any morning at the house of Lush, Snug, and Dreary, in Lombard Street, all bowing low down to the sacred calf enshrined in the high-priest's tights, within an overlayer of golden top boots. Loving hands ! what would they cost ? Was it impossible to buy them? — no more than any other hands with which the market of self-interest is ever stocked. There was one man upon whom he could place perfect confidence — a prudent, pious, painstaking man ; he was a married man too, this Mr. Elias Mathews. His present T 4 280 ONCE UPON A TIME. confined little house would not do ; his salary was small, his wants many, and he was of respectable family. These were all favourable conditions — a poor, pious, depen- dent gentleman. Now if he, Mr. Lush, would only buy that house, advertised to be sold a bargain, the man and his family would feel themselves raised in the social scale beyond their expectations. The same amount paid to Dr. Singleton, with a liberal allowance for sundries, would be wealth to Mr. Mathews. So ruminated Mr. Lush, and the reader must, we flatter ourselves, be sufficiently acquainted with the former's character to need no particu- lar assurance that the arrangement was promptly concluded, and Edward Lush removed from the care of Dr. Singleton. It was not for Dr. Singleton, conscien- tious as he was, to raise objections to a plan of proceeding adopted without refer- ence to himself, although he never allowed pride to bar his sense of duty, yet pride in the present instance was allowable. Were his pride of a querulous character it might ONCE UPON A TIME. 281 have driven him to complaints of ingrati- tude; for clearly Mr. Lush had not appre- ciated his services to his son, which, rightly regarded, were services to the father. With his usual disinterestedness, his whole thoughts turned upon the subject of weak- ening the evil he foresaw. Having, in a short interview with the future guardian of his patient, taken the accurate measure of that gentleman, he said within himself, this narrow-minded man can possibly, per- haps certainly, be restrained from irri- tating my poor young friend. He would dread the injury likely to occur to his own interests should Edward be excited into paroxysms demanding his removal to this or another institution of the kind, so he will abstain from experiments prompted by his foolish fanaticism ; but, on the other hand, how is the needful light intellectual food to be secured for this delicate spirit ? And then, turning to Mrs. Singleton, he said, " There are some volumes which we must cull from our library for Edward — not books which enervate the mind by 282 ONCE UPON A TIME. leadino: to vao^ue reverie, but which have their uses where it is the purpose to coun- teract the contrary — as Emerson is the reaction against as well as the cure for excessive mercantilism ; nor yet philoso- phical inquiries demanding close efforts of thought, but Shakspeare, Dante, Milton, which bring up the whole harmonies of thought and feeling, engaging heart and soul and mind together — such books predis- pose to right reading of the Scriptures. We must give Edward these books, otherwise he will not be allowed them ; and, in order to present a substitute for original compo- sition, of which the effort might be in- jurious, I will even recommend his under- taking translation, say from Dante, and the Paradise rather than Hell. Mrs. Singleton, whose actions moved in harmony with those of her husband, took down the books, and when she had set them on the table, the fire threw up a light which rendered candles unnecessary, or rather, candles would have spoiled the picture finished off by that purring tongue of flame ONCE UPON A TIME. 283 that had just darted from the slit of a dis- solving lump of shining jet coal, and then drew in, and then came flashing through the thin curling gas, and played lights and shadows over the book-bindings, and con- verted Mrs. Singleton's shadow into a giantess, and made the doctor's image on the wall that of a great man, indeed. Was it not the moment to advise calmly and gently with Edward ? " Oh, no ! " quoth the sagacious doctor, " he must not have his night's rest disturbed. We will speak to him in the morning after breakfast. The communication made here would produce the effect of that light upon his mind ; it would throw up uncertain and dispropor- tionate shadows, and between sleeping and waking they would not amuse as they do now. Let it be morning." As autumn seems to die mournfully on the lap of winter, so winter passes brightly and vigorously into the spring; how all things typify the resurrection into life! It was a month since Christmas; how strangely beautiful it is that Christ should 284. ONCE UPON A TIME. have been born in the deep gloom of the ending year ! Human fiction, with its weak fancies, would have made the star in the east conduct to a cradle of amorous flowers, shedding scents, and kissing the tender treasure; — human fiction, that feebly loves to shun the realities of life, or escape from insupportable reflection into the mad ex- citement of battle. It never could have entered into mortal head to make the Spiritual Conqueror of the world be born as He was born — He who came to grapple with these same stern realities of life, and show how they were to be borne ; not shunning any human temptation, even that of despair, in order that despair might learn to hope. Breakfast was over; it was so fine a morning that the red curtain had to be drawn, lest the bright pale ray should smite into black death the ruddy fire in the hearth — a type, again, of the all-sufl'ering spiritual ray which allows no earthly flame when it takes its own full possession. They went to the window, the doctor and Edward, ONCE UPON A TIME. 285 and looked out upon the sparkling borders of box, and their eyes rested upon a dripping holly, whose red berries seemed to be en- gaged in melting the night's snow from the glistening prickly leaves. Within and without a cheerful scene ; and it suited the intense, earnest countenance of that man whose life's business it was to hold up a light wherever there was mental desolation, and who had as much to do with balmy ease as a labourer with the smell of musk or any other sickly odour. Mrs. Singleton, without whose matronly hand the breakfast- table had been a dull eating necessity, instead of the cheerful banquet that it was, had left, for she knew what the doctor wished to say, and that her own emotion would have only caused him greater trouble. " Edward," said the doctor, " you know that I have been always frank with you. I did not conceal from you the nature of your malady out of any apprehension that you might be mortified by a discovery which is calculated to render men cowards, not only in presence of their fellow-creatures, 286 ONCE UPON A TIME. but cowards to themselves. I wanted you to cure yourself, by the proper exercise of all your faculties, and it is believed that you have succeeded." " Am I going to be taken away?" asked Edward, with that rapid suspicion which was probably an accompaniment of his morbid mental state. " You surely would not desire to pass more time than is absolutely necessary in an estabhshment of this kind ? " " Where am I to go to ? — I would rather not return to father's." " I will satisfy you at once on that sub- ject — you do not return to your father's." " To her then? — can it be — tell me — you are breaking gently the news to me ? I know your way. I am strong and calm, and can bear it. Am I indeed to be re- united to Kate?" Dr. Singleton was so little prepared for the conversation taking this turn that he stood in need of his presence of mind. Foreseeing a paroxysm, he poured a few drops out of a little medicine bottle into a ONCE UPON A TIME. 287 glass of water, which he obliged him to drink before he would proceed. "Ah! I feel now so well. You see, Doctor, I am ready for any communication.'* " Your father, Edward, has made me acquainted with that story." And now the doctor felt obliged in some degree to belie his own sentiments and opinions, as he proceeded to take part ap- parently with the father. " I must say that, considering Mr. Lush's position in the world, and how much his hopes are centred in you, his only son and heir to his large fortune, I ought not to wonder that he should object to a choice made without consulting him." " He never would have consented, and I should have died — and is not self-preserva- tion a supreme law ? " " Except there be dishonour." " But there was no dishonour. Kate was my equal — did I say equal ? — my supe- rior, infinitely my superior, in all those heaven-gifted qualities which cast the rub- bish of this earth into contempt ! " 288 ONCE UPON A TIME. " Well, it cannot be, Edward." " What cannot be ? — is she dead ? '^ " Not dead ; at least I believe not, she is in another country." "Where?" " I know not." "And our child?" " I cannot answer you. I only know what I have learned from yourself, and what your father has told me ; that clandes- tinely, which was wrong, you married the daughter of a servant — one too of a dif- ferent religion ; and that, inasmuch as the marriage was illegal, because performed by a priest — you too being under age — and for other reasons ." " My imputed madness ? What matter ? I am well now — and for other reasons. Well " " The marriage has been broken. She has gone to another country — not with her mother, who has disappeared ; gone pro- bably back to her native country, with the infant." "Doctor Singleton, Doctor Singleton ! how ONCE UPON A TIME. 289 strange I should never have asked the ques- tion before — is the child male or female?" Again the Doctor felt thrown off his centre. " Well, positively I cannot tell." " My father knows ? " " I rather think he does not, for he never would hear one word on the subject — that I learned from his own lips." " Unnatural father ! " " Only too natural — too natural, I fear, Edward." " The child must have been born — how odd — I never can calculate." " A year ago — say a year ago." " Stay," and Edward, taking out his tablets, wrote down the year — only the year — then he sank into a chair, becoming absorbed in deep reverie. "If," he muttered to himself, " she should be a girl, and I should meet her some years hence." Then his eyes became fixed, as if upon some horrible phantom. The Doctor was pre- paring to lay hold of him, when Mrs. Siufifle- ton entered ; upon which he started up, VOL. I. u 290 ONCE UPON A TIME. and seizing her, exclaimed, " Oh ! blessed woman — blessed presence — how can I thank you for having banished such a fear- ful — such a horrible thought? — I dare not name it ! and you have brought in your train such a sweet host of orphans. You both think I am mad, I am not. I will prove to you that I am not — because such a holy thought as mine now is could never have visited a diseased mind ; look at this date, Mrs. Singleton ; it is the year just passed — a never to be forgotten year ; a life of joy and a life of sorrow were comprised in that short year. Well, I mean to adopt every poor orphan born in that year ; what sort of madness is that, Mrs. Singleton ? " ** The madness of charity and of bene- volence, Edward." " But the little tombs — bah ! — they place no head-stones at the graves of orphans, so I need think no more of that." " It is a good thought," resumed Mrs. Singleton, " and I should like to help you — but where is the money to come from ? " " The Doctor has just told me that I am the heir to a large fortune." ONCE UPON A TIME. 291 " If you survive your father.'* " Is there any fear I shall not ? " " Not if you follow my advice. You are now, as I meant to have told you, about to take up your abode in a quiet, respectable family — for a time — only for a time; after which you become your own master. In fact it now depends upon yourself how soon you shall enter into free disposal of your person and property." " You know the people ?" " I have been introduced to Mr. Mathews — and here, lest you should not find books to your taste, are some which my wife and I have selected." Edward's eyes sparkled ; he seized Mrs. Singleton's hands and kissed them, and kissed Shakspeare, and kissed Dante, and kissed Milton, with the same lips that had just vowed adoption of the orphans. And then he kissed the hand of the good Doctor with lips redolent of Shakspeare, of Dante, and of Milton. "I do not mean that you shall be idle either, Edward ; you will take with you a u 2 292 ONCE UPON A TIME. nice little writing-desk, which you will not esteem the less for being a present from Mrs. Singleton." Edward's eyes flowed over, which was so much the better. " I have put in some quires of paper." " Dear good Doctor ! " " And you will amuse yourself with translating portions of the ' Paradise ' — will you do that ? " " It will be a labour of love." " And now bid us good-bye, like a man." Edward did his best. The source of Dr. Singleton's alarm was well got over. The next caused him more serious apprehension. What he most feared was a settled apathy succeeding to those alternations of paroxysm and de- pression which did not constitute in his mind the worst form of Edward's malady. He apprehended the establishment of a chronic dulness and indifference, which, if not lifelessness, would be a very low form of life itself. In dealing with Edward he had two objects to accomplish : the one was to remove, as far as possible, the recurrence of ONCE UPON A TIME. 293 those fits of exaltation which, in the eye of the world, were the complaint, and next to bring all the powers of mind and body into regularly active operation. This double object may be said, then, to resolve itself into one, that of restraining and directing the nervous energy which wasted itself in occa- sional bursts of extravagance. It became therefore necessary to employ the mind, and employ it constantly — and with the mind the bodily senses, and keep all the activities in gentle, regular motion, under a course of skilful, watchful discipline. Already Edward had learned the exercise of self-command, a great power not only over oneself, but others ; he was able to detect the approach- ing signs of attack, and to guard against it, unless when taken unawares by painful communications, such as Dr. Singleton had been obliged to make upon the morning of removal to the house of Mr. Elias Mathews. Placed amongst unsympathising people, and narroAv-minded, moreover, likely to worry him by obtrusive attentions, betraying their own teasing acquaintance with a state u 3 294 ONCE UPON A TIME. out of which he ought to be insensibly drawn, and from which he could not be drawn if morbid uneasiness were kept up, through having his condition forced upon his mind and made the subject of constant reflection ; it was to be apprehended that he would shrink from notice, lose his cheer- fulness, become reserved, shun intercourse, and from want of bodily exercise betake himself to reading, although incapable of enjoying it, and thus decline into a dull me- chanism, with life indeed performing its daily functions in a merely material sense, the animal existence surviving, as it were, the tor- pidity of the soul — this was what he feared. For a while the habits acquired under Dr. Singleton's discipline would go on ; he would read his Shakspeare, and his Dante, and his Milton, but with whom could he talk about his favourite poets ? On what at- tentive ear could he discharge the over- flowing fulness that comes up eternally from these master spirits ? Into what eyes could his soul plunge as into a bath of tears and light? What tongue would chime in harmony with his ? On what kind, placid ONCE UPON A TIME. 295 shore would the great wave of feeling roll silvering — against what invigorating con- tradiction would it beat ? How was life to go on in the absence of life's necessary con- ditions ? — the life of this active imprisoned soul, that needs infinitude for the exercise of its immortal strength. What could it do while waiting for emancipation, if the cage were hid in a dark corner, but mope and cease to twitter the syllables of the future harmony ? Musing this way to himself, Dr. Singleton was using illustrations after Edward's own manner, as if by force of imagination he had taken his place, and was mournfully prophesying his own de- generacy. This circumstance of unusual reverie rendered the aspect of the case the more pathetic. His scientific perception was painfully clear. His experience told him how possible it is for the being to adapt itself to any situation — it can accustom itself to food that will not nourish, and yet sustain ; to air that is close and encumbered with foul exhalations, in which the flame shows its vitality by a circle of dead ir 4 296 ONCE UPON A TIME. grey, but throws out no rays — sinking clown to the level of that from which it draws sustenance. The man seems to warrant the theory of development upwards by a counter process of shrinking backwards. He gasps upon the marshy bank, and neither wholly asleep nor wide awake, seems some huge breathing connection between the animal and vegetable forms of life. One spark of instinctive will, Oh benevolent powder ! and he puts forth blindly the rudi- mental fin or arm, as the crowning organisa- tion puts forth, under a still mightier spark, those rudimental wino^s which are stirrinsf in us all ; and lo ! a sword that shall cleave the elements, and weapons for the universal battle, in which wailing is swallowed up in triumph, and without which there is no passionate gratification of victory ! It happened as foreseen. The madness, without sinking into idiocy, hung in a middle state of indifferent consciousness. The little children of the Mathews' could not have failed to draw out Edward's kindly dispositions under other circumstances; that ONCE UPON A TIME. 297 is to say, had the father been a man with whom he could have satisfactorily con- versed, and Mrs. Mathews not an abject dependent. As the children were growing up, Edward was settling more and more into his marshy state. Any one could do with him what he pleased ; and by the time Miss Deborah had, through the force of her original graces, anticipated the years of discretion, the son of Mr. Lush formed a pretty subject upon which to exercise her talent for rule and government. Mr. Lush was becoming all this time more and more estranged from his son. His hopes were marred — his pride hurt — such as his hopes were, and such as his pride was — hopes of mounting by the ladder of gold into the Olympus of the upper ten thousand, and pride wounded by the low tastes and imbecile mind of him whom he had regarded as the promised founder of a dynasty of Lushian Plantagenets. It sometimes occurred to Mr. Lush to marry again ; but as he continued his ordi- nary pursuits, the idea not having an 298 ONCE UPON A TIME. unoccupied mind to germinate in, never de- veloped into a decided resolution. The great seething city is not favourable to brooding sentiments. To be an active par- taker for some hours every day in that troubled confluence of all the interests of the whole world is enough excitement for the evening at least, especially when one is a magnate, a merchant prince, the head of a banking firm, an oracle on the Stock Ex- change, and not one of the myriad bubbles, but an Iris spanning the cataract itself. Then he seldom dined alone. When he did so, it was for the sake of enjoying the luxury of rest, of imbibing his port with a sunshiny, basking sensation, which imparted what, speaking by analogy, might be called a romantic hue to the city article of his Glohe or Courier, It was after his lunch, served in a snug recess of his private office, one day that Dr. Snob bustled in, all smiles and bows, to beg to be allowed to show up Lady Fitzspinning, widow of the late Lord Fitzspinning. While the Doctor is explaining the purport of his ONCE UPON A TIME. 299 visit, allow us to relate how it was that her ladyship came to be seated in his carriage, drawn up at the private entrance for dis- tinguished visitors. She had arrived a few days before from Boulogne, in second mourning attire for her lord, of whose death in Italy she had been made aware casually, through a news- paper old enough to abridge conveniently the time conventionally required for weeds, which did not become her uncontrollably jovial aspect. The sun, surrounded by ebon blackness, could not wear a more in- congruous appearance than that of Lady Fitzspinning's face in a widow's cap. The aspect would have been as unbecoming as that of Columbine skipping out of a coffin to meet Harlequin. While obliged by cruel custom to sacrifice her beauty, for beauty it was, in spite of forty years of pleasant existence, she resolved to with- draw into privacy from the gaze of her creditors — those bold birds that dared to stare at her without winking ; she could not bear the sight of them. Second mourn- 300 ONCE UPON A TIME. ing was a different thing. It allowed of some play to the fancy, and a pretty range of choice in colours; she was herself in the purple-and-violet colour time of life, and if she could not put on bright hues, neither need she wear those whose sadness typified deeper trouble than that of soft regrets in their transitive stage. Her sorrow became set in jet brooches, jet bracelets, and mourning rings ; black bugles, as they replaced diamonds down her waist, seemed to have caught the glitter of her large black eyes; and blackish berries nestled in her hair — shemio;ht have su2:2:ested to a painter an image of night, touched by the faintest streak of the morning dawn. Alighting from the Continent at a West End hotel, the emptiness of her purse oc- casioned a vertigo which required the pre- sence of a physician, and she would admit only the attendance of the most eminent. Dr. Snob was accordingly called in. The Doctor found only a slight perturbation of the pulse ; the tongue was not quite clean, although the lips were ruby ; and the ONCE UPON A TIME. 301 languor of the eyes was such as a fine lady might have put on simply for consistency sake before a medical man. Dr. Snob, with his usual tact, perceived that the present was a case of gossip, requiring a dose from the red-book, with an emollient of gules and dragons out of the book of heraldry. This was precisely the medicine which the sick lady wanted when she called in Dr. Snob ; she had tried it at the famous waterino-- places and gambling places of the Continent, and found it to answer her expectations. An unprotected lady in a strange place, what could her nervous system do without the comfort of the Doctor in vogue, who knew everybody, and all about everybody, as well as a Confessor, rather better ! In a short time the conversation between doctor and patient was of the pleasantest possible description. It resembled a game of some new kind, in which the former held court cards as usual, which the latter matched with foreign titles. If the Doctor played a Knight, the lady matched it with a Che- valier. Barons covered Lords, Counts took 302 ONCE UPON A TIME. up Earls ; Marquisses on both sides were equal ; but the lady predominated in Dukes. The Doctor tried the Garter, and was matched by the Golden Fleece ; but finally, when Ministers of State were ex- hausted on both sides, including the Doctor's Eight Hon. friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, his fair antagonist carried off the honours of the game with Prince Ponkmoramowski. The Doctor should certainly become acquainted with her dear Ponkmor — so she playfully called the dear old man. Could not the Doctor cut his patients in the dead season when all the world was out of Rotten Row, and make a run over to Wiesbaden, where Ponkmor always passed a month, unless the place was too full to afford accommodation to his numerous suite. She often rallied her dear Amowski, for so she divided his name, re- turning it to him in instalments — was not that funny ? — but he was used to it. " ' Now do, my dear Ponkmor, contrive to manage with a dozen less pair of legs in plush, and substitute a second Chamberlain.' ' Yes, my ONCE UPON A TIME. 303 dear/ * Amowski, do better still, travel incog, and escape the wearisome attention of that mob of nobility by which you are beset/ The fact is, Ponkmor has his weak- nesses ; he is good-natured withal ; and as he knows that it is enough to make a man's fortune in the world to be called the friend of Amowski ; you see I forget, Doctor, and speak to you as if I were chatting familiarly with himself; but the truth is so. It is a fortune in itself that people should say of a man — there goes a friend of Prince Ponkmoramowski." What would not Dr. Snob give to be looked after by people at Wiesbaden, whis- pering to each other, " There goes a friend of Prince Ponkmoramowski ! " The Doctor having lost the game which was won by that matchless trump, the Prince, it was only fair that he should pay the stakes. He would take no fee of course. It was in vain that the lady talked of chang- ing a post-bill for 100/. ; the polite Doctor was thinking, on the contrary, of doing him- self the honour of presenting her ladyship 304 ONCE UPON A TIME. Avith a copy — a very plain one indeed, in calf — of Sir Bernard Burke's Peerage, as a slight token of the pleasure afforded him by the most instructive conversation he had ever enjoyed in the course of his professional practice. For knowledge of serene highnesses and excellencies of courts ; for depth of information on the statistics of nobility, Lady Fitzspinning surpassed all his own right honourable acquaintances. Be- fore the enchanted Doctor could take leave, her ladyship requested the favour of his advice upon another subject, which she in- troduced with many graceful apologies ; but she, a widow lady, obliged by family matters to hurry so fast from the Continent that she left her equipage behind, was afraid to be carrying loose money about her, so she thoucrht of askino^ some friend to intro- duce her to a respectable banker. "To be sure, Lady Fitzspinning, there is my friend, Mr, Lush — oh, you must know Mr. Lush, the head of the eminent firm of Lush, Snug, and Dreary ; he will be charmed to be asked by me to extend his ONCE UPON A TIME. 305 financial protection over a lady of rank. I will drive there forthwith, and your lady- ship shall receive an invitation to call and open an account with the bank at your convenience." " A thought strikes me, Doctor ; as my carriage has not arrived, perhaps you would oblige me with a seat in your own. What is to prevent our driving together to Mr. — Mr.— ?" " Mr. Lush. Nothing in the world." " I feel so strong, Doctor — you have done me so much good — that I protest I think I could walk into the City." "How facetious, how unaffected, is the friend of Prince Ponkmoramowski !" thought Dr. Snob to himself, as Lady Fitzspinning, with her usual ease and rapidity, put on shawl and bonnet, which, as gentlemen never remark the fashion, only struck the Doctor as highly becoming. Mr. Lush had hardly time to brood over the confined range of his knowledge, never having heard of Lady Fitzspinning or Prince Ponkmoramowski, when the former was VOL. I. X 306 ONCE UPON A TIME. ushered in, in all the glitter of bugles, dark eyes, and captivating smiles. Happily for her purpose Dr. Snob opened the conversa- tion with reference to her ladyship's Con- tinental experiences, which afforded her an opportunity of conducting the bewildered Mr. Lush through courts, palaces, villas, watering-places, until he was at length brought in imagination to her feet ; — yes, to the feet of the second wife, the one connected with the nobility, of whom he had from time to time vaguely dreamed, and who was there before him, introduced by his confidential friend, Dr. Snob, a man who, notwithstanding his familiarity with great ladies, was evidently struck with ad- miration of this vivacious beauty. Her ladyship said she did not know how to apologise for having trespassed too long upon his time, which was so precious, the time of a merchant prince — in her opinion the first of nobles, the real supporter of the wealth and power of her dear country, worth all the Ponkmoramowskis in the world ! ONCE UPON A TIME. 307 Mr. Lush had, as he declared, never passed so agreeable a half hour in his life. " Her little affair was not worthy of occupying his attention. To be sure it was only a preliminary matter — a title-deed which she wished to deposit as a security for a thousand pounds — say a thousand; but perhaps, in her foolish ignorance of business matters, she was committing some shocking blunder in offering security only, no matter how unexceptionable ; in which case, perhaps, Mr. Lush would obligingly favour her with advice." " Deed or no deed, it was just as her ladyship pleased. The name of Lady Fitz- spinning should be credited at once with a thousand pounds — had her ladyship said a thousand ?" " Well, yes, a thousand would do. It was so good of Mr. Lush ! Now she thought of it, she really did not know what she would have done while the proctors and lawyers were settling those plaguy papers of her late dear lord, had not a kind Provi- dence visited her with an indisposition that X 2 308 ONCE UPON A TIME. obliged her to call in Dr. Snob, whose skill was surpassing, and whose benevolence was equal to his skill ; and Dr. Snob conducted her to Mr. Lush, whose behaviour was equal to Dr. Snob's eulogiums, unbounded as they appeared to be. Yes, England was a noble land. Why had she ever left the shores of so glorious a country, whose doctors spurn merely lucrative advantages, and look alone to the peace and happiness of patients, and whose bankers put to shame the compara- tively petty ways of foreign princes ! Good- bye, Mr. Lush. Would not Mr. Lush often dine with her as soon as she had fixed on her mansion ? for never would she leave England again, except, perhaps, for a month or two in the dead season, and for the mutual advantage of Dr. Snob and Prince Ponkmoramowski, unless, indeed, Mr. Lush would honour the party ? He had better think of it, for she would dispose of her chateau on the Rhine, but not of the wine, equal to Johannesberg, and which she would reserve for some dear friends — would not Mr. Lush accept a few dozen ? Perhaps ONCE UPON A TIME, 309 Mr. Lusli could recommend her a furnished mansion to be let during the absence of some one of his noble friends ?" Mr. Lush knew exactly of the thing that would suit her ; rent for six months 400^ , no more — a bagatelle. Mr. Lush would look about it immediately, and would do himself the honour to call at her ladyship's hotel. Mr. Lush did call. Mr. Lush saw, and Mr. Lush conquered — so thought Mr. Lush ; while Lady Fitzspinning was hum- ming, Veni, vidij vicij to herself. They were married — the lady reserving to herself only the right of being addressed by her title. Mrs. Lush would remain the Lady Fitzspinning. Hardly was the honeymoon over when Mr. Lush found his acquaintances consider- ably extended, and his correspondence in- creased. Every morning the post brought him a letter from a previously unknown hand, preferring an unexpected claim. In fact. Lady Fitzspinning's fortune consisted in debts without number ; and the expecta- X 8 310 ONCE UPON A TIME. tions she brought with her consisted in embryo lawsuits of endless variety. Her ladyship was nevertheless no impostor ; her connections were truly such as her title implied. All the troubles she brought her husband, without reserving any to herself, were occasioned by an utter want of prin- ciple. She ran into debt without consider- ation — never thought of paying anybody for anything until compelled — raised money upon ruinous conditions — and had, proba- bly, never received more than ten per cent, of the value of her outstanding debts. For a while she encountered Mr. Lush's inquiries, as to the particulars of her debts, with playful badinage. She was no ac- countant — understood nothing of book- keeping — was of too easy a temper to resist the troublesome importunities of trades- people — could not help borrowing. "Will you only tell me the gross amount, my dear Lady Sally ?" " Gross amount ! — what was that ? — what did gross amount mean ? — perhaps he meant groceries ?" Poor Mr. Lush only looked grave. How Dr. Snob ONCE UPON A TIME. 311 would have enjoyed her pun ! " What sum of money would cover her ladyship's debts ? — that is what he wanted to know ; and to be done at once with the subject." ^' What- ever the sum be, it would be nothing to so wealthy and so good a husband!" "Very likely — but what is it ?" He might as well have asked her to tell the amount of the national debt in farthings. Mr. Lush paid and paid ; but he was like one who, trying to enjoy the river's breeze at summer's sun- down is beset by swarms of flies, which he tries in vain to beat off. He may catch some in his hand, and smite down others with hat or handkerchief; but partial destruction seems only to irritate the viva- city of countless survivors. Like many wealthy men who never experienced need in their own person, Mr. Lush felt scorn of debtors — in his opinion, the worst and most contemptible of sinners. To be un- worthy of credit was, in the banker's opi- nion, to have suffered excommunication. His wife was a commercial heretic, and his eternal torments on her account seemed to X 4 312 ONCE UPON A TIME. have commenced, without any prospect of their ever coming to an end, in this world at all events. It was with a melancholy air that Dr. Snob surprised Dr. Singleton one morn- ing with a call, and put into that grave colleague's hands a newspaper, with an advertisement warning the public that the "undersigned would not hold himself responsible for, or pay any debts hence- forth to be contracted by the Lady Sally Fitzspinning, otherwise Lush." Dr. Singleton thought of Edward. Dr. Snob did not know what to think ; and Dr. Singleton was not the man to help him. Dr. Singleton considered it possible that the father might now be persuaded to accept the society of his son ; but there was a form of disease which even this man of deep insight had not completely mastered. It was that particular species of pride which is better expressed by the French word, amour-propre, than by our pride, vanity, self-esteem, or any compound of these terms which we can contrive. If Mr. Lush had ONCE UPON A TIME. Sl3 been capable of taking an impartial view of his own conduct, his son's marriage ought to have looked less inexcusable, for he might have reasoned thus with himself: " He was young and inexperienced; and I neither young nor unacquainted with the world. He was a sufferer peculiarly alive to sympathy ; and I a man of money, sensi- tive to the smiles of rank. Providence made him not quite a fool; but who the deuce contrived that I should make a fool of myself ! He found a rich sweet soul in poverty, and he undertook the romantic task of setting the jewel according to the conventional taste of society ; and I found a titled adventuress, whom I asked to take me out of my own heavily gilt — gilt what ? — say golden frame, and set me in high life ; and it is very well she did not set me in the Old Bailey or the Fleet, which would have been rather worse than a madhouse, where I deserve to be — old fool that I am ! Come, Edw^ard, to the arms of your father, and elevate Mrs. Plantagenet Lush to the place left vacant by the Lady Fitzspin- 314 ONCE UPON A TIME. ning." Mr. Lush did not reason so. Rea- son and the reader agree that he ought; although it is more than probable that, under similar circumstances, reason and the reader would part company. It is so much the custom for men to act according to amour-propre^ that conduct directed by sense and justice rises to the height of mag- nanimity. Men love the exercise of patron- age more than recognition of merit for its own sake; if to acknowledge merit serves to reflect credit on the benevolent patron, why, well and good. There is some cliance for merit, provided it does not hazard an essay at independence ; and then good-bye to the chances of honour and honesty, which will have the goodness to make way for sycophancy. How Mr. Lush did reason it would be hard to say; for private maledictions on himself, however sincere, did not result from any logical process of ratiocination, such as could be distinctly set forward by an ordinarily analytic pen. His arguments, suffice it to say, were of the kind which. ONCE UPON A TIME. 315 instead of clearing mental views, only sour the temper. Because he was angry with himself, he could not be pleased with any one else. To make a private confession, seasoned with free dealings with the name of Satan, was a different thing from the manly avowal of a fault, followed by its proper moral of toleration for others' weak- nesses ; although ashamed, he was not hum- bled — he was only annoyed, and instead of learning a lesson of gentleness, he became morose and irritable. It is ever so — our choice must lie between virtues and their opposites. When Dr. Singleton called to pay a friendly visit to Mr. Lush he was rather well received ; not because of any modifica- tion of the latter's feelings towards his son, but that, having cast off Dr. Snob, to whom he attributed his misadventure, he felt that he was inflicting some contempt upon that obsequious physician by receiving a rival, whom he knew to be peculiarly antagonistic to that gentleman. There was a better reason, however. Mr. Lush had been taught 316 ONCE UPON A TIME. to pay homage to the word and honesty of a man whom he had not trusted as he ought to have done. He did not, indeed, mean to say so openly, because he did not wish to afford the Doctor an opportunity of bring- ing forward the subject which he divined to be in his mind. His own unhicky mar- riage had amongst its worst effects that of completing his estrangement from Edward. But as there is always a lurking sense of justice in the most perverse nature, Mr. Lush was so far softened as to be disposed to make more liberal allowance for the young man's comforts. Mr. Elias Mathews, who had not been slow to perceive advan- tages for himself in the inquiries addressed about Edward's tastes and likings, opened the way to prospective concessions by the information that he seemed to like the news- paper. The fact was, that Mr. Elias wished to have a newspaper for himself, but did not want to pay for it, or any other neces- sary of life not absolutely essential for keeping body and soul together, and for the purposes of decent appearance. But as Mr. ONCE UFON A TIME. 317 Elias's little transactions in the city, on his own account, extended with the gathered fruits of his economies, he found the Metho- dist Magazine^ even when not a month old, and freshened by the marginal notes of the dear sisters through whose hands it came, laden with pious reflections, no sufficient guide to investments amongst the moths that corrupt. A newspaper subscribed for Edward would be virtually a present to himself; and as Dr. Singleton's call coin- cided with Mr. Mathews' suggestion of the day before, Mr. Lush was not displeased to find himself with a practical topic of con- versation. " It is kind of you. Doctor Singleton, to call on me to make inquiries about my un- fortunate son ; and now I shall take the liberty of asking you would it be safe to allow him a newspaper?" " By all means, Sir, by all means. I am quite delighted to hear that he shows such a sign of an awakening interest in the life of the world, of which the newspaper is the mirror, as the drama is the mirror held 318 ONCE UPON A TIME. up to nature — rather say was; for the drama is now making way for the journal. Delighted, indeed, am I." " Is there no fear, Doctor, of his memory becoming burthened with the variety and multitude of things which fill the many columns of a daily paper ?" " Not at all, not at all. Like an animal finding its way to its own proper food, he will prefer particular sources of information, rejecting those which do not assimilate with his mind. Now here must be some person of nice tact set to observe the sort of in- formation he likes best, and if it be good and wholesome, then books of more ex- tended character might be laid in his way." '' But, Doctor, suppose he should prefer the unsound parts, the brutal details of the police office, or the indecent investi- gations ?" " That would be bad, indeed. But no, no ; I know Edward too well. Unless he be greatly changed since he was under my care, he will turn from such things with loathing. What I expect is, that his ONCE UPON A TIME, 319 curiosity will be excited by news of what is passing in all countries. Some wonder, Mr. Lush, at the declining hold of works of imagination ; but the imaginings and fancies of poets and writers of fiction are beaten by facts. Think, Sir, of the whole world being brought under the eye, and seen at a single glance ! Is not this more astonish- ing and more exalting than fancied islands, (for which there is no place) peopled with creatures that look tame in presence of the marvels of the microscope and the revela- tions of pure science ? We seem to hold this globe in our hands, and to view man- kind as one race indeed, not divided by seas and mountains into natural enemies, but a vast brotherhood, held together by common interests. We see this growing fact in the newspaper only ; for it is the mirror showing the whole world to the in- telligence." "Well, Sir, Edward shall continue to have the newspaper. There is another subject upon which I should like to have your opinion. Mr. Mathews assures me 320 ONCE UPON A TIME. that Edward has derived much benefit from a gentleman who is not professional. He is a bookseller, a Mr. Maltheson, an in- genious sort of person, who seems to have read much. This Mr. Maltheson has been practising some experiments, which, accor- ding to Mathews' description, are too inno- cent to do harm. It appears that he can put Edward into a sound sleep at will, and contrives to soothe him. He has no in- terest in the matter, for he makes no charge ; but of course Mathews has my authority to convey presents to any extent he thinks right ; for Mathews is a conscien- tious fellow, upon whom I place implicit reliance. Do you see any objection to this proceeding ?" " Not the least. I know well the sys- tem to which you refer, and think it not unlikely that we have stumbled upon a dis- covery demanding careful investigation. There may be little in it, and there may be a great deal." " Again, Doctor, Mathews tells me that Edward desires to join a country party, composed of school children." ONCE UPON A TIME. 321 " Let him go, by all means. Let him read newspapers, see companj^, go about, and set life in motion ; and perhaps you will again be the happy father of a restored son." "Happy!" Mr. Lush sighed. "Good- bye, Dr. Singleton ; I must leave you." It was after this interview that Mr. Lush authorised Elias Mathews to take a carriaofe for his family to Richmond, and pay a sub- scription into the hands of Mr. Samson Shepherd. END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. VOL. I. Y LOXDOIT PKINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO. NEW-STEEET SQUARE UNIVERSITY OF ILLIN0I9-URBANA 3 0112 041697159