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 H
 
 ARTINGALE CASTLE 
 
 BY 
 
 T. ADOLPHUS TEOLLOPE. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 
 1867. 
 
 (Hiffht of Ileproduction and TraviMion rescrred.)
 
 rRlKTBD BT W. CLOWES ASD SOXS, STAXFORO CTRKBT 
 
 AND CHARING
 
 6^3 
 
 I8C1 
 \J.\ 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 BOOK I. 
 INTEODUCTOEY. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. JACK 
 
 Two Cuttings from an Old Newspaper .... 1 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 Jessie Melville 9 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 Mistress Agnes Artingale 20 
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 The Precentor op Sillchester Cathedral ... 38 
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 Agnes Artingale's Love-Story 52 
 
 BOOK II. 
 
 AETINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN 
 
 ♦ 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 ^r Sir Hildebrand's Family 77 
 
 CHAPTEE IL 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 p^" Artingalb Castle 88 
 
 ; Felix Farland, of Farlandstokb 97
 
 IV CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. PACE 
 
 Felix Farland, the Younger 118 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Artingalb shall be itself again 135 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Little Bertha 162 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 Who's Who at Farlandstoke 189 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 The Dinner -Party at Farlandstoke 212 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 Mr. and Mrs. Henningtree make a Bet . . . 234 
 
 BOOK III. 
 THE RESTORATION OF THE CASTLE IS BEGUN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 The Bed-Room at the Cottage 252 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 The 'Hero' arrives up to Time 268 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Mu. Purcell Lancaster is admitted into Society . 282 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Bertha's Visitors 299
 
 AETINGALE CASTLE 
 
 BOOK I. 
 Introductory. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 TWO CUTTINGS FROM AN OLD NEWSPAPER. 
 
 In one of our western counties there is a fine old 
 English home — one of the most beautiful of 
 those time-honoured mansions which have made 
 English homes famous throughout the world. 
 The present resident and owner of this mansion 
 is the son of a man who became such under 
 circumstances so remarkable as to be quite as 
 well worth the telling as many a tale invented 
 by the writers of fiction for the amusement of 
 their readers. Some vague allusion to the facts 
 of the story may be read in one of the latter 
 volumes of a certain voluminous county history 
 of the shire in question. But it must not be 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 I ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 supposed that the story is to be found there 
 precisely as it is about to be told here. Much of 
 the explanation of the facts delicately touched on 
 by the county historian, and many of the main 
 facts of the case themselves, were only obtainable 
 from other less obvious sources. The principal 
 of these (it can now injure nobody to say) was a 
 garrulous old gentleman — a Mr. Joseph Gib- 
 bons — whose father had been the managing 
 clerk of a once well-known, but now long since 
 extinct, firm of solicitors. One might have 
 supposed that this old gentleman had inherited 
 a taste for, and an instinct and skill in, *' getting 
 up cases," as a pointer pup inherits pointing, 
 so carefully had he pieced together the frag- 
 mentary bits of fact and document which make 
 the basis of the narrative, and so keen was liis 
 pleasure in relating and pointing out the bear- 
 ing of them. 
 
 Of course the story reads somewhat differently 
 in the aristocratically decorous pages of the 
 county chronicler. No class of writers are more 
 called on to make, and are more skilful in 
 making things pleasant, than these excellent and 
 useful writers. Necessarily so, for they have 
 not the story-teller s privilege of changing the
 
 TWO CUTTINGS FROM AN OLD NEWSPAPER. 3 
 
 venue of their tale, concealing names, and alter- 
 ing irrelevant circumstances, so as to prevent 
 their revelations from giving pain or offence to 
 individuals. 
 
 It is hoped that these precautions have been 
 sufiSciently taken in the following pages. 
 
 Nearly a hundred years ago, in one and the 
 same small ill-printed sheet of daily news which 
 sufficed to tell all that our grandfathers cared to 
 know about what was going on in the world 
 around them, might be read — and may still by 
 any who will seek for them in the stores of the 
 British Museum — the two following announce- 
 ments. 
 
 The first is taken from the body of the paper, 
 under the heading of " Fashionable Intelligence," 
 and runs thus : — 
 
 " It is with feelings of the liveliest satisfaction 
 that we avail ourselves of the privilege specially 
 accorded to us, of informing our readers of the 
 approaching nuptials of one of the brightest 
 stars in the galaxy of fashion. It is understood 
 that on an early day next month Sir George 
 Artingale, of Artingale Castle, in the county 
 of Sillshire^ will lead to the hymeneal altar 
 the Lady Geraldine Tarlatane, the lovely
 
 4 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 and accomplished daiigliter of the Earl of 
 Foxley." 
 
 The second of the bits of information alluded 
 to occurs among the advertisements, which fill 
 some two-thirds of the fourth page of the paper, 
 and runs as follows : — 
 
 " On Monday the 24th instant will sail, wind 
 and weather permitting, for Boston, in the 
 colony of Massachusetts, North America, the 
 good ship * Mary Thornton ' of this port, Captain 
 Robert Johnson. For freight or passage apply 
 to Thornton, ^fallings, and Co., 9, Black^riars, 
 Thames Street." 
 
 It was on a day some ten days previous to 
 that mentioned in the latter extract that the Sir 
 George Artingale mentioned in the former 
 newspaper article called on his confidential 
 lawyer, Julius Harding, gent., attorney-at-law of 
 G-ray's Inn ; and his visit had reference to both 
 of the bits of newspaper intelligence. He was 
 not so fortunate however as to find Mr. Hardins: 
 at home when he called ; and after having fired 
 off a volley or two of curses after the fashion of 
 gentlemen of rank and station of that day when 
 irritated, he bade the clerk tell his master that 
 he had called to ask what progress had been
 
 TWO CUTTINGS FROM AN" OLD NEWSPAPER. 5 
 
 made with the marriage settlements, and also to 
 hear Mr. Harding's report of what he had done 
 " in that other matter. Your master will know 
 what I mean." 
 
 Accordingly, when the attorney returned to 
 his chamber, his clerk, standing at the door of 
 the lawyer's room, while his master sat himself 
 down at a table thickly covered with papers, 
 said — 
 
 " Sir George Artingale here an hour ago, 
 sir. Cursed and swore a good five pounds' 
 worth. Said he wanted to know how his marriage 
 settlements are getting on ; item, what you had 
 done in the matter you know about." 
 
 " Yery good, Gribbons ! Put down the curses. 
 I dare say your estimate is a fair one, duly con- 
 sidering that some abatement should be made on 
 the large quantity he takes of the article ; as for 
 the settlement deeds, you could tell him, as well 
 as I, that they cannot be ready before the end 
 of next week ; and as for the business I know of, 
 why, I know it a great deal better than I like it, 
 Gibbons." 
 
 " Yes, sir ! If he calls again, sir, am I to tell 
 him that ?" 
 
 " Yes ! you may tell him that — if }- ou can think
 
 h ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 of nothing better to say. But I am going to 
 see about the business he speaks of, this after- 
 noon ; and I dare say I shall speak with Sir 
 George myself." 
 
 And accordingly a few hours later in the day 
 Mr. Harding, looking into his clerk's room as 
 he passed, and saying, " I shan't be back here 
 this afternoon. Gibbons — at the usual hour 
 to-morrow morning. Let Baldock and Brad- 
 shaw's people have that deed of Alderman 
 Snowbridge's this evening ; and — yes, that's all, 
 Gibbons !" walked out of his chambers into the 
 great dreary square of Gray's Inn. 
 
 Passing out of the Inn under the gateway 
 leading to Holborn, Mr. Harding set his face 
 eastward, and there being neither omnibuses nor 
 cabs in those days, and hackney-coaches being 
 few, dear, and very slow, proceeded to walk for 
 the best part of an hour in that direction. 
 When he had reached Cheapside, he turned out 
 of the great thoroughfare to the northwards, and 
 in a few minutes more stopped at the door of a 
 small house in one of the narrow streets which 
 make an intricate labyrinth of that region. The 
 district in question was neither so wholly given 
 up to business purposes, nor so poor in the portions
 
 TWO CUTTINGS FROM AN OLD NEWSPAPER. 7 
 
 not SO given up in those days as it is now. 
 There were then a very much larger number of 
 decent-looking private residences — narrow, 
 cramped, dismal, quiet, and gloomy-looking, 
 but having a certain prim and threadbare re- 
 spectability of appearance. 
 
 Knocking with a modest tap-tap at one of 
 these, Mr. Harding asked of the girl who an- 
 swered the door' — a Scotch lassie, unless every 
 feature of her face utterly belied her — if Mrs. 
 Melville was within, and having not only been 
 told in reply that she was then within, but spon- 
 taneously furnished with the further information 
 that she had never been out since she came to 
 the house, was shown into a little parlour on the 
 ground-floor, while the lady in question was 
 summoned from an upper part of the house. 
 
 Mr. Harding sat down, if sitting it could be 
 called, on a little horsehair-covered sofa about a 
 foot wide, and tall in proportion to its slimness, 
 and employed the interval of waiting apparently 
 in biting his nails, but no doubt less visibly in 
 meditating on the business he was there to trans- 
 act. In a very few minutes Mrs. Melville 
 entered the room. 
 
 Evidently the attorney had seen her before.
 
 8 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Had he set eyes on her then for the first time, it 
 would have been impossible for him to have 
 avoided manifesting in some way the effect her 
 remarkable beauty was calculated to produce. 
 She was certainly not more than twenty years 
 old, and had an appearance of utter girlishness 
 about her, which seemed totally unsuited to the 
 matronly appellation she bore. Any one accus- 
 tomed to the specialties of national type, and to 
 observation of the little peculiarities of manner, 
 would have guessed her also to be a Scotch- 
 woman. And the first accents of her voice 
 turned the guess into a certainty.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 JESSIE MELVILLE. 
 
 Mk. Harding jumped up as she entered, and 
 first bowing very ceremoniously, while she with 
 equal solemnity executed an elaborate, but evi- 
 dently rural-taught curtsey, took her hand, and 
 in very courtly style placed her in the middle of 
 the abominable postilion's-bar-like sofa, which he 
 had just quitted. 
 
 " I have called, my dear madam, by the direc- 
 tions of my client. Sir George Artingale," began 
 the lawyer, '* to hear from you the result of your 
 consideration of the proposals I had the honour 
 of making to you on his behalf, and to tell you 
 that an opportunity for conveniently carrying 
 them into execution now offers itself." 
 
 " If you think that it was an honour to make 
 those proposals, sir ," began the lady, in a
 
 10 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 strongly-marked and somewhat rustic Scotch 
 accent, but with a pecuharly modest and 
 naive elegance of manner. The lawyer, how- 
 ever, did not allow her to proceed any further. 
 
 "My dear Mrs. Melville," he cried, interrupt- 
 ing her, " pray do not mistake me ; you are 
 aware that I am but an agent ; I spoke only of 
 the honour of being employed to communicate 
 with you. You must know, that I have -neither 
 art nor part, as we lawyers say, in the events 
 which have made the arrangements I am em- 
 ployed to carry out — ahem ! expedient — I may 
 say, exj)edient. Nor am I called upon to ex- 
 press an opinion concerning them. The wisest 
 plan will be for us to confine ourselves strictly 
 to the consideration of the future." 
 
 "I have come to understand, sir," said the 
 lady, while a silent tear rolled down her cheek, 
 " that that is what gentlemen may consider — 
 expedient — in circumstances such as mine. What 
 can the result of consideration be," she added 
 after a pause, " to one so utterly helpless as I 
 am? 
 
 " My dear Mrs. Melville " began the 
 
 lawyer again ; but this time it was his turn to 
 be interrupted.
 
 JESSIE MELVILLE. 11 
 
 " And I do not think it right, sir, or honour- 
 able for you to address me by that name," said 
 the lady. 
 
 " My dear madam," returned the lawyer, with 
 a strong and a pained expression of face, " is this 
 wise ? Now, I put it to yourself, is this reason- 
 able ? Have you not consented to the adoption 
 of the name you object to ? Are you not known 
 here in this house by that and by no other ?" 
 
 ** You know, sir, how I have consented," she 
 said ; ^' I consented to do what I was compelled 
 to do. And when the people here call me Mrs. 
 Melville, they know no better. But you do 
 know that that is not my name." 
 
 " My dear lady," cried the lawyer, drop- 
 ping his arms by his sides in an attitude of 
 despair, and heaving a deep sigh, ''shall we 
 gain anything by going over all that matter 
 again? You compel me to remind you that 
 I have no such knowledge as you attribute 
 to me. I do not know that your name is not 
 Melville. At least, I do not know that you 
 have any title to the name you claim. I do not 
 know that you have no title to it. I simply 
 know nothing on that subject. What I do know 
 is, that I can see no means by which you can
 
 12 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 prove yourself to be entitled to the name of 
 Lady Artingale. You assert that that took 
 place between you and Sir George Artingale, 
 which would assuredly have made you his wife, 
 according to the Scotch law, could it be proved 
 to have occurred, exactly as you suppose it to 
 have occurred. You assert that two witnesses 
 were present. But you have no idea where to 
 find them. You do not even know their names. 
 You say that they were servants of Sir George. 
 It is to be feared that if all that you suppose to 
 have taken place, did take place, and if even 
 you could put your hand on the persons you 
 mention, your position would be no whit im- 
 proved. For in that hypothesis the servants 
 would doubtless testifv according; to the wishes 
 and directions of their master. Pray under- 
 stand, however, that with all this I have nothing 
 whatever to do. My client assures me that no 
 legal marriage took place between you. You 
 conceive that such a marriage did take place. 
 But you fail to show me the smallest proof of 
 your assertion. Far from being able to adduce 
 any proof that would be available in a court of 
 law, you are unable to show me, sitting here, 
 any reason to convince me that you were not the
 
 JESSIE MELVILLE. 13 
 
 victim of an error, arising from your ignorance 
 of the circumstances necessary for the constitu- 
 tion of a legal marriage. I have no doubt — no 
 moral doubt — that you fully and entirely be- 
 lieved yourself to be contracting marriage. But 
 I do not, as I said before, see any possibility of 
 your succeeding in legally establishing the fact. 
 If I did see any such, I should not feel at liberty, 
 even in the interest of my old client, to advise 
 you that your case is hopeless, and to tell you, as 
 I have told you, and now tell you, that you 
 have no course open to you but to close with the 
 proposals made to you." 
 
 " It is very, very cruel ; — very, very wicked !" 
 said the poor girl-mother, down whose pale 
 cheeks the salt tears had been coursing during 
 the latter part of the lawyer's harangue. 
 
 *' Upon all that I can pronounce no opinion ; 
 you must feel, yourself, my dear madam, that in 
 my ignorance of the circumstances, I can pro- 
 nounce no opinion." (The lawyer's conscience 
 twinged him a little as he said this.) " I can 
 safely say that / have not acted and am not 
 acting cruelly or wickedly in the matter ; and 
 that must suffice for me.'* 
 
 '^ I do not say that you have been cruel, sir !"
 
 14 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 sobbed the poor Scotch lassie, somewhat recon- 
 ciled to her visitor by his declaration of perfect 
 belief in her own belief in the genuineness of 
 her marriage. 
 
 *' In truth," pursued he, " I would fain be as 
 kind in this painful business as the nature of the 
 circumstances will admit. And now let us 
 calmly look at the matter as it stands. Under- 
 stand, once for all, that in laying before you the 
 proposals which I am commissioned by my client 
 to make, I express neither approbation nor blame 
 of any kind. It is not my province to do so. I 
 am but the medium of communication. Begging 
 you to bear this in mind, I have to point out to 
 you that the idea, which you have conceived, 
 whether erroneously or otherwise, of the position 
 which ought by right to be yours, makes it 
 undesirable to Sir George Artiugale, who denies 
 your claim, that you should remain in this 
 country. At the same time, he fully admits that 
 what has passed between you gives you a claim 
 on him which he is willing to recognize, if you, 
 on your part, wall consent to seek a home in the 
 colonies, and w^ill promise to live there under 
 the name w4iich you have now assumed, making 
 no attempt to use or lay claim to any other. On
 
 JESSIE MELVILLE. 15 
 
 these conditions he undertakes to provide for 
 you, and I have directions to see settled on you, 
 legally and indefeasibly^ the sum of two hundred 
 pounds a year, which will be regularly paid to 
 you, wherever you may settle yourself in your 
 new country." 
 
 " And if I should refuse to leave the country^ 
 and to accede to the conditions?" asked she. 
 
 " In that case I have no proposals to make to 
 you. Such a contingency, I may say, has not 
 been contemplated. For you must excuse me, 
 my dear lady, if I say that it would be unwise 
 to a degree, not to be expected from any sane 
 person. You would be rejecting a position of 
 competency, comfort, and respectability for one 
 — forgive me for saying so — the reverse of all 
 these. Eemember, that whatever may be your 
 impression respecting the union between you 
 and Sir George Artingale — whatever even may 
 have been the real facts of the case — you have 
 no hope whatsoever of establishing your claim ; 
 no hope of inducing the world to believe in it. 
 Your boy, if you remain, will suffer from the 
 
 stigma attaching to his birth " 
 
 "No stigma is attached to his birth!" broke 
 in the young mother, passionately.
 
 16 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " from the stigma supposed to attach to 
 
 his birth," continued the lawyer; "whereas in 
 the new home proposed to you he will be free 
 from any such disadvantage. You will be 
 known there as Mrs. Melville, a widow. And 
 the future before you may be in all respects as 
 happy a one as that of any comfortably pro- 
 vided widow. It is, indeed, impossible to 
 hesitate about accepting the proposal made to 
 you." 
 
 " You say^ sir, that you believe me to be sin- 
 cere in my solemn declaration that I was duly 
 and truly married to Sir George Artingale. Do 
 you advise me, bearing this in mind, to go to 
 America ? Bearing in mind that you are speak- 
 ing to a poor betrayed, helpless creature, who 
 has no human being to give her counsel, 
 would you, if you were called on to advise some 
 one in whom you had yourself an interest, advise 
 them to give up their true station of a married 
 wife, and go away for ever ?" 
 
 " Most honestly and truly, my dear madam, if 
 I were advising any one, however near and dear 
 to me, under the circumstances, I should not 
 hesitate for an instant to say that the only thing 
 to be done was to go. Here there is, as I most
 
 JESSIE MELVILLE. 17 
 
 truly believe, no hope for you. With all my 
 heart, and in my conscience, I advise you to accept 
 the terms, and to go." 
 
 " I will go, then !" said the poor girl, dropping 
 her head upon her bosom. 
 
 " Believe me, it is the wisest — the only course 
 open to you. Trust to me that the arrange- 
 ments for your voyage, and for your subsequent 
 means — two hundred pounds a year secured to 
 you for life — shall be well and properly attended 
 to. You will, of course, let me know where you 
 fix your home, as soon as you have settled your- 
 self." 
 
 " And when am I to go ?" she asked, sub- 
 missively. 
 
 " That is one of the points on which I came 
 to speak to you. See, here is the advertisement 
 of a ship about to sail for New England. The 
 ' Mary Thornton' will sail in about ten days' 
 time. It is a good ship ; the owners are very 
 respectable people, and the captain — Captain 
 Johnson — is a very worthy man. I have made 
 all inquiries on the subject. A berth shall be 
 secured for you and your boy ; and I will let the 
 owners and the captain know that you are the 
 widow of a client of our firm." 
 
 VOL. I. c
 
 18 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " In ten days from this time ?" asked she, 
 wistfully. 
 
 " Yes ; the ship sails about that date. By- 
 the-bye, it would be well that I should know 
 your Christian name. It has never been men- 
 tioned to me," said the lawyer, with a business- 
 like briskness, that seemed to show the relief he 
 felt at having brought his negotiation to a 
 successful termination. 
 
 " My Christian name is Jessie. I suppose I 
 may be allowed to keep that. My maiden name 
 was Jessie Carrington," she replied, while the 
 recollections connected with the old sound caused 
 her tears to flow afresh. 
 
 " Oh, yes, to be sure ; there is no reason why 
 you should change that. But it will be as well 
 perhaps to avoid all mention of the name of 
 Carrington, as well as of course — any other 
 name. The berth shall be secured in the name 
 of Jessie Melville," said the lawyer. 
 
 There was little more to be said between Mrs. 
 Melville and her visitor. A few arrangements 
 were made respecting her preparations for the 
 voyage. The lawyer promised to come for her 
 himself, and to accompany her on board, and 
 introduce her to the captain ; and then took his
 
 JESSIE MELVILLE. 19 
 
 leave, heartily glad that the matter w%s settled, 
 and the business off his hands. 
 
 And on the 24th of May^ in the year 17 — , 
 the 'Mary Thornton' dropped down the river, 
 carrying with her to the new world " Mrs. 
 Melville, widow, and George Melville, aged one 
 year, son of the above."
 
 20 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MISTRESS AGXES ARTIXGALE. 
 
 The ^Mary Thornton' duly sailed, and duly 
 arrived at her port ; and shortly afterwards 
 the widow Melville found herself settled, com- 
 fortably enough and happily as far as outward 
 circumstances were concerned, in the little town 
 of Newport. On this side of the Atlantic — save 
 once by the discreet but not unkind Mr. Julius 
 Harding — she was no more heard of; and Sir 
 George was left free to " lead the Lady Geraldine 
 Tarlatane, the lovely and accomplished daughter 
 of the Earl of Foxley, to the hymeneal altar," 
 according to the programme laid down for him 
 in the " Fashionable Intelligence." 
 
 He did so lead her ; and having afterwards 
 led her during a London season through the 
 usual exhibiting places appointed for such pur-
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 21 
 
 poses, he led her next to his ancestral castle of 
 Artingale, in the county of Sill shire. And 
 thereafter the lovely and accomplished Lady 
 Geraldine was almost as much unheard of and 
 forgotten as was Jessie Melville in her distant 
 home on the other side of the Atlantic. For 
 Sir George was not a man who delighted in the 
 beauties of that ancestral home, or in Sillshire, 
 or in the worshipful state in which the Sillshire 
 worthies expected the owner of Artingale Castle 
 to live on the lands of his forefathers, or indeed 
 in any of the joys and pleasures of domestic life. 
 The only " angulus terrse " which really smiled 
 to him was Tattersall's corner; and the only 
 glades he cared to wander among were those of 
 Bond Street and its neighbouring haunts. 
 
 The lovely and accomplished daughter of the 
 house of Foxley saw very little indeed of him at 
 Artingale. At the end of a year a daughter, 
 christened Agnes, an old hereditary name in the 
 family, was born to him. Possibly the sex of 
 his first-born child was a disappointment to Sir 
 George ; though he did not seem to be a man 
 likely to think much about such matters, or to 
 care for the preservation of a name, the " soiling" 
 of which for aye he seemed to be the " ane sad
 
 22 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 losel" destined to accomplish. Nevertheless, 
 there are unnoticed nooks and corners in men's 
 minds in which sentiments lie hidden, which no 
 one — perhaps not even the owner of them him- 
 self — would have suspected himself of possessing. 
 And it may be that with the stupid unreasonable- 
 ness of a selfish and dissipation-brutalized man, 
 Sir George was alienated more than might 
 otherwise have been the case by this disappoint- 
 ment from his neglected wife. 
 
 At the end of a second year, however, the 
 Lady Geraldine presented him with a son, who 
 was named Hildebrand, according to the ancient 
 practice of alternating that name with George 
 in the house of Artingale. And it may have 
 been that the birth of this lord of the creation 
 might have had the effect of making Sir George 
 a somewhat better husband, if any opportunity 
 had been given him for such reformation. There 
 was no such opportunity ; and I suppose there- 
 fore that we must give him the benefit of the 
 doubt; though my own notion is that no such 
 process as the converting of a sow's ear of a 
 dissipated London man of a very dissipated 
 period into the silken purse of a dignified, 
 domestic, wife-and-home-loving baronet could
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 23 
 
 ever have been effected. There was, however, 
 as has been said, no opportunity of trying the ex- 
 periment in the interest of poor Lady Geraldine ; 
 for she died within a few weeks after the birth 
 of her son, and had the honour of being laid to 
 her rest in the Artingale chapel attached to the 
 chancel of Artingale church, among a large 
 assembly of most unexceptionable predecessors. 
 
 As for Sir George, he took his place by her 
 side, in that notable assembly of the bearers of 
 the proud old name, in the most decorous fashion 
 about five years later. It was the first occasion 
 on which he had visited Artingale since his 
 wife's death. But that fiwe years' interval had 
 not been passed by the Artingale people, by the 
 tenants, and specially by Mr. Decimus Oblong, 
 the old steward, without very frequent reminders 
 of the baronet's continued existence. The life 
 Sir George was leading in town made his calls 
 for money very frequent. None was forth- 
 coming, on the other hand, for the repairs which 
 the grand old pile had for some years past 
 urgently needed. Bad was going to worse very 
 rapidly at Artingale during those five years. 
 The grass grew in the avenue^ and all over the 
 once nicely gravelled walks of the old Italian
 
 24 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 garden ; moss discoloured the flags of the grand 
 terrace, and the steps of the great entrance ; 
 and the rooks in the noble old trees seemed to 
 caw with a melancholy consciousness of the 
 general desolation. 
 
 It was well that there remained any rooks to 
 caw at all ! Had those evil days to Artingale 
 been extended from five years to ten, it is safe 
 to say that Mr. Decimus Oblong would not 
 have succeeded in keeping a tree standing on 
 the estate. As it was, many a noble tree in 
 some outlying woodland at a considerable dis- 
 tance from the house went down before the 
 woodman's axe for the supply of the spendthrift 
 baronet's needs. And it was fortunate that the 
 woods in question existed to bear the brunt, 
 which would otherwise have fallen on the mag- 
 nificent ornamental timber near the castle. As 
 it was this was spared. And though sadly out 
 of repair, and urgently needing the outlay of a 
 much larger sum of money tliau could be aiforded 
 from the estates for the purpose, Artingale 
 Castle, when it came into the possession of its 
 new infant owner, was still one of the most 
 beautiful and noble residences in England, and 
 by no means too far gone in decay to be restored
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 25 
 
 to all its original magnificence bj the judicious 
 outlay of a sufficient sum of money. This, how- 
 ever, poor Mr. Decimus Oblong had no means 
 of furnishing ; and he was compelled, during 
 the minority and the absence of the new pro- 
 prietor, to keep the place water-tight, and stave 
 off ruin by the best make-shifts he could. 
 
 It was fortunate for Artingale Castle that the 
 losel baronet died early — fortunate for the castle 
 and fortunate for the castle's heir — fortunate 
 for the latter, as far as such matters come 
 within the scope of human ken, in more im- 
 portant respects than the mere preservation of 
 his heritage from utter destruction. The prema- 
 ture death of the father made the chance that 
 the son might grow to be a different guess sort 
 of man a much better one than it would other- 
 wise have been. And Sir Hildebrand did 
 become a very different sort of man from his 
 father. His character and that of his sister 
 Agnes^ one year older than her brother, were 
 mainly due to the care bestowed on their train- 
 ing by an old maid — herself also an Agnes 
 Artingale — and an aunt of Sir George. He, 
 Sir George, had been an only child of the 
 previous Sir Hildebrand. His orphan children
 
 26 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 had accordingly neither uncle nor aunt to take 
 care of them. But there was an only sister of 
 that Sir Hildebrand, an aunt therefore of Sir 
 G-eorge. She was, indeed, the only person 
 remaining of the blood of the two infant 
 Artingales to whose care they could be en- 
 trusted. And Mistress Agnes Artingale (who 
 always called herself so — never either Miss or 
 Mrs.) immediately on her graceless nephew's 
 death came forward with an offer to take charge 
 of her grand-nephew and grand-niece. 
 
 Of her nephew, Mistress Agnes Artingale 
 had seen very little, indeed absolutely nothing 
 during several years before his death. She had 
 never seen the Lady Geraldine, his wife ; and of 
 course had never seen the children, of whom she 
 offered to take charge. The offer from her was 
 not, therefore, produced by any sentiment of 
 affection. Mistress Agnes had felt it to be a 
 matter of duty. I am inclined to think that old 
 maids generally are a duty-recognizing race. 
 And it would have been difficult to name the 
 task that Mistress Agnes Artingale would not 
 have done, or attempted to do, if she were clearly 
 of opinion that it was her duty. 
 
 I have no doubt that the good old lady was
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 27 
 
 duly sensible of the higher sanctions, which 
 require the performance of our duty from each 
 of us alike, whether peer or peasant. But she 
 did not habitually put these forward in her 
 talk. Perhaps she felt that such considerations 
 were of too sacred a nature to be so put forward, 
 and was of opinion that the prominent mention 
 of them at every turn savoured of a cant which 
 was especially obnoxious to the old lady. What 
 she was in the habit of continually putting thus 
 forward was a sort of modification of the grand 
 and well-known, " England expects that every 
 man this day will do his duty," which might be 
 expressed tolerably accurately, perhaps, by, 
 " Artingale expects every man, and woman too, 
 this day to do his, or her, duty." 
 
 What '' Artingale " represented to her mind 
 in this context was perhaps not very accurately 
 definable. It did not mean the visible extant 
 head of the family, who never did any kind of 
 duty himself, assuredly. It was a kind of ab- 
 straction, elaborated by her mind out of all the 
 glories, the greatness and the worth of past 
 generations of the house. I think that the 
 outward and visible manifestation and symbol 
 of this abstraction was, to the mind of Mistress
 
 28 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Agnes_, the grand and beautiful old castle itself. 
 The stones, and the walls, and even the ex- 
 pressive windows, and the trees of the old place, 
 however, could only by a very strong poetical 
 license be said to expect anything, save tumbling 
 down. And the ancient lady did not, probably, 
 really attribute to them any conscious expecta- 
 tions respecting the conduct of the members of 
 the family. The sentiment was with her a 
 special and particular adaptation of "noblesse 
 oblige!' There was, to the mind of Mistress 
 Agnes, no nobility equal to that attaching to 
 the house of Artingale. And the old French 
 saying, therefore, was in her mind applicable, 
 with a greater force, to the members of that 
 house than to any other mortals whatever. 
 
 The obligations which " noblesse " laid on 
 Mistress Agnes were often heavy enough to be 
 borne, and the duty which Artingale expected 
 from its own sufficiently arduous. But Mistress 
 Agnes never shrank from the call. Every duty 
 which she conceived to be laid on her by these 
 expectations she performed, or strove to the 
 utmost to perform. 
 
 She must have been nearly sixty when Ar- 
 tingale expected her to take the charge of her
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 29 
 
 good-for-nothing nephew's orphan children, 
 having been by some years his father's senior. 
 She was living at the time, and had been for 
 many years living, in the cathedral city of 
 Sillchester, some five-and-thirty or forty miles 
 away from Artingale Castle, which is situated 
 in the northern part of the county. The society 
 of the city of Sillchester is generally considered 
 — not by Sillshire people only — to be better 
 than that of most country towns. It might lead 
 to an inconveniently long examination of the 
 social theories of different classes of persons, hold- 
 ing various shades of class opinions, if it were 
 attempted to investigate the exact nature of the 
 superiority thus claimed. But it is a fact that 
 the number of persons belonging to those classes 
 which are understood to constitute society is 
 more than usually large at Sillchester. It 
 is a very favourite residence with independent 
 persons of moderate though comfortable means. 
 It is a very pretty city, situated in a very 
 beautiful country. It is not a great centre 
 of trade ; and it possesses no manufactures. 
 Genteel people, who are not rich, have a better 
 chance there, therefore, than in any of the great 
 wealth- creating towns of England. The clergy
 
 30 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 attached to the cathedral leaven the society 
 pleasantly and advantageously, not being so 
 numerous, in proportion to the rest of the 
 Sillchester world, as to render the tone decidedly 
 and exclusively clerical, as is the case in some of 
 our smaller episcopal cities ; yet holding a suf- 
 ficiently important position in it to insure a 
 somewhat higher degree of general culture, and 
 a somewhat more aristocratic tone, than the 
 place would have been likely to possess had the 
 large cavalry and infantry barracks, which con- 
 tributed a very agreeable element to the general 
 mixture, been left to give the exclusive flavour 
 to it. 
 
 In the. society of this happily and favourably 
 constituted city Mistress Agnes Artingale held 
 a well-marked and indeed rather a high place. 
 The aunt of a Sillshire baronet of large estates 
 had claims to which the Sillchester world was 
 the last world in the world to be slack in allow- 
 ing their full value. The aunt of any baronet of 
 large property would have been duly considered 
 there ; but the aunt of a Sillshire baronet was 
 held to be entitled to a far higher degree of con- 
 sideration ; for the Sillshii-e folk are a clannish 
 set. The Dean's wife and Mistress Agnes
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 31 
 
 called each other ''mj dear." The country 
 gentlemen exchanged presents of wonderfully 
 fine melons with her, and always owned them- 
 selves vanquished in the rivalry. The posses- 
 sors of deer-parks in the neighbourhood used to 
 send her haunches of venison. It was as regular 
 a thing for the bishop to dine with Mistress 
 Agnes Artingale^ whenever he came to the 
 palace, as it was for the judges to be entertained 
 by the sheriff. It was sufficient for a minor 
 canon's wife to have been seen in her drawing- 
 room for her title to a place in the best Sillchester 
 set to be at once recognised. Cornet Ibbotson 
 of the 99th Dragoons knew himself to be a made 
 man, as far as social promotion went, when 
 Mistress Agnes had declared that she remembered 
 his grandmother. 
 
 It will be understood, then, that the old lady 
 occupied a decidedly distinguished position in 
 the world in which she moved, and that her 
 life was in all respects an infinitely preferable 
 one to that which she would have led in a poky 
 little house in May Fair, such as the modicity 
 of her fortune, combined with the necessities of 
 Artingale obligations, would have condemned
 
 32 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 her to inhabit, had she even been tempted to 
 leave her native shire for the great Babylon. 
 
 In this matter of a house it was very espe- 
 cially better. For the house which Mistress 
 Agnes inhabited and owned in Sillchester was 
 perhaps the most beautiful in the town, and 
 very certainly a more beautiful one than most 
 of the towns of England could show. It was 
 situated immediately within the grey and lichen- 
 grown old walls of the city, which were also the 
 walls of her large garden. The ground fell 
 away very rapidly from the foot of the wall, 
 after leaving along the base of it just sufficient 
 space for an espalier of roses, and an exquisitely 
 charming sunny terrace walk, commanding the 
 finest view of the cathedral in all Sillchester, and 
 of the picturesque range of hills shutting in the 
 valley of the Sill on the further side of that river. 
 Mistress Agnes' garden, indeed, was one of the 
 marvels and stock sights of Sillchester, and was 
 duly celebrated in the guide-book to that famous 
 city. 
 
 In that pleasant abode Mistress Agnes Artin- 
 gale had for many years been leading the even 
 and somewhat monotonously uneventful, but 
 dignified, calm, and not unpleasant tenor of her
 
 MISTRESS AGNES AETINGALE. 33 
 
 life, when her nephew's death threw upon her 
 the duty of undertaking the charge of his two 
 cliildren. It was a very serious matter to the 
 old lady, involving no trifling changes in her 
 establishment, her habits, and her household. 
 Her old-fashioned but excellent house afforded 
 ample room for the reception of the new comers. 
 Nor were there any troublesome considerations 
 respecting the financial part of the arrangement 
 to complicate the matter. There was no need 
 to trench on the comfortable but moderate com- 
 petence of Mistress Agnes for the supply of any 
 portion of the expenses occasioned by the orphan 
 children. The Artingale acres were abundantly 
 sufficient to furnish all that was required for this 
 purpose, and to supply a round yearly sum for 
 the recovery of the estate, and the clearing off 
 of debt during the years of a long minority into 
 the bargain. Nevertheless, to the old lady her- 
 self, and in a nearly equal degree to the old 
 lady's old servants, the coming of the two children 
 to the Moat House at Sillchester involved a great 
 revolution, and the changing of many of the 
 inveterate habits of many years. And to a 
 maiden lady of sixty such changes are not agree- 
 able. Artingale, however, expected Mistress 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Agnes to do her duty, and she earnestly set about 
 performing it in no grudging spirit. In a word, 
 the one object of the maiden aunt's Kfe thence- 
 forward became the education of the Artingale 
 children, and the due training of them in the 
 special way in which it became Artingale 
 children to go. 
 
 It might be expected perhaps that in her 
 efforts towards this end a maiden aunt would be 
 likely to be more successful with her niece than 
 with her nephew. Both were educated entirely 
 at home by the help of all such governesses, 
 tutors, instructors, and masters as seemed most 
 calculated to attain the high end in view. 
 Neither expense, nor assiduous care, nor constant 
 thought devoted to the subject were spared. 
 But whether it were that, as had been hinted. 
 Mistress Agnes was more capable of girl than 
 of boy culture, or whether it was that the mate- 
 rial was more fortunate in the one case than the 
 other, the fact was the Sillchester education 
 turned out much better in the case of Miss 
 Agnes Artingale, junior, than in that of her 
 brother, the young Sir Hildebrand. 
 
 Not that the heir to the Artingale name and 
 estates was a bad boy, or grew up to what could
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 35 
 
 be called a bad man. He grew to be as different 
 a man from his profligate father, to begin with, as 
 it was possible for a man to be. The main things, 
 after all, to be complained of in Sir Hildebrand 
 arose, I think, from deficiency of brains. He 
 was a dull lad, and he grew to be a dull man. 
 The live-long lectures on the Artingale greatness, 
 which were intended by Mistress Agnes to 
 generate in him the same noble code of high 
 Artingale virtue which made the law of her 
 own life, only succeeded in begetting in the 
 home-bred youth intense pompousness, and a 
 monstrously exaggerated notion of his own im- 
 portance. He grew up self-willed, imperious, 
 and domineering. Had he inherited an evil dis- 
 position and vicious tendencies, he would have 
 been intolerable. But he really had little harm 
 in him. He was not ill-natured, or grossly 
 selfish, or spiteful, or unforgiving, or violently 
 passionate, or given to low indulgence of any 
 kind. He was simply a cold, pompous, ludi- 
 crously proud v/orshipper of his own family 
 greatness. 
 
 His sister was formed of much finer clay. 
 She grew up to great beauty of a noble * and 
 queenly type. Her brother, it may be men-
 
 36 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 tioned, was also a handsome man of the large, 
 heavy, placid-featured sort. But the feeling of 
 family pride, which only made him a heavy 
 bore, communicated to her manners a stately 
 grace and slightly old-fashioned elegance of 
 deportment, which suited well her queenly style 
 of beauty. She also — this second Agnes — 
 accepted her great-aunt's code of Artingale duty 
 in the same lofty sense in which the old lady 
 practised it. '' Noblesse oblige " was in all its 
 fullest force the maxim of her life. It might 
 safely and literally have been said of Agnes 
 Artingale, the younger, that she would not 
 have, at any time from her sixteenth year 
 upwards, done any act or spoken any word 
 which she deemed unworthy of her name to 
 have saved her life. And to her larger and 
 more genial mind and heart, to do almost any- 
 thing inconsistent with the highest and purest 
 code of conduct and morality was to derogate 
 from what was due to the Artingale name. 
 
 In a word, Agnes Artingale, the younger, 
 was at eighteen a very noble creature ; the 
 cynosure of all eyes in her little Sillshire world ; 
 the facile princeps belle of the county ; receiving 
 the homage due to her beauty, her goodness,
 
 MISTRESS AGNES ARTINGALE. 37 
 
 and her social station with an unspoiled modesty 
 and quiet dignity of manner which, while 
 adding a kind of courtly grace to her walk 
 through life, was saved from becoming offensive 
 to the sensitiveness of the various pride and 
 vanities around her by the genuine sweetness of 
 her disposition, and the genuinely native good 
 breeding of a delicately sympathising character. 
 But as she is not the heroine of the following 
 tale, the events of which occurred when she had 
 become an old woman, I cannot venture to detain 
 the reader over this introductory matter longer 
 than is necessary to make him acquainted with 
 the facts and the persons, which have been thus 
 presented to him in a general way, because they 
 were influential in producing the characters 
 which, in their turn, produced the events which 
 have to be related.
 
 38 
 
 CHAPTER lY. 
 
 THE PRECENTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 
 
 It was for the above reason desirable, before 
 entering on the main subject of the following 
 narrative, to make the reader acquainted with 
 the facts which have been laid before him, and 
 to give him some slight acquaintance with the 
 antecedents of some of the personages concerned 
 in them. Nearly enough has been said for this 
 purpose. Excellent Mistress Agnes Artingale 
 had been sleeping beneath the flags of the nave 
 of Sillchester Cathedral for several years when 
 the circumstances took place, the narrative of 
 which will begin with the following book of this 
 story. The Moat House had long since passed 
 into other hands ; and her place of honour in 
 the choir of that fine old church knew Mistress 
 Agnes no more.
 
 THE PRECENTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 39 
 
 Nor is it necessary to say anything more 
 respecting the early days of Sir Hildebrand. 
 He was one of those characters which can be 
 fully described in a very few words — a dull flat, 
 marked only by one notable specialty, the only 
 high ground in all the monotonous level of the 
 horizon — his inordinate family pride. 
 
 Enough, perhaps, has also been said to enable 
 the reader to form some not altogether inade- 
 quate conception of the richer and nobler cha- 
 racter of his sister. And we might at once 
 proceed to the main business of our story, but 
 that there was one incident in the early life of 
 Agnes Artingale, the younger, of such import- 
 ance in the formation of her mind and character, 
 as it had become at the time when the reader 
 will again meet with her, that it must be men- 
 tioned. It was an incident of the kind which 
 is wont to be the most important of all the inci- 
 dents of a woman's life ; and it was very im- 
 portant to Agnes Artingale. But the importance 
 of it to her was different in kind from that 
 which exists in the cases of most women. 
 
 Both the Agnes Artingales were great lovers 
 and cultivators of music ; and the great-aunt, on 
 receiving her nephew's orphans into her house,
 
 40 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 had been delighted to find this point of sympathy 
 between her and her infant grand-niece. She 
 had not failed to cultivate the budding talent 
 and taste of the child by all the means which 
 the Sillchester world was capable of supplying. 
 In a cathedral city, in which the service was per- 
 formed in admirable style, where the clergy and 
 even the citizens in general prided themselves 
 on the excellence of their choir, and where the 
 clerical element was a strong constituent portion 
 of the society of the place, it will be easily 
 understood that the cultivation of music, espe- 
 cially at the time of which I am here speaking, 
 was tinged — hardly, perhaps, with an eccle- 
 siastical hue, that would be saying too much — 
 but with the colouring of those styles of music 
 which would be likely to find favour in eccle- 
 siastical eyes, and to be cultivated by profes- 
 sors mainly conversant with cathedral choral 
 practice. 
 
 Many of the prebendaries, and all the minor 
 canons, were more or less accomplished musi- 
 cians. I remember well that it was a source of 
 much trouble to the worthy Dean and Chapter 
 that one of those gentlemen was grievously 
 addicted to poaching — was, indeed, known to be
 
 THE PRECENTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 4i 
 
 an incorrigible poacher. And there was an 
 irreverent and unmusical owner of some shooting 
 in the immediate neighbourhood of the city, with 
 whom the erring (but never missing) minor canon 
 used occasionally to get into very unecclesiastical 
 hot water. But then he had such a splendid 
 voice, not only for an anthem of Clarke's or 
 Croft's, but for " Glorious Apollo," or " Drink to 
 me only with thine eyes/' that the Chapter was 
 fain to wink at backslidings, the cognizance of 
 which would have risked irreparable injury to 
 the Sillchester choir. But these are remini- 
 scences which, it must be owned, have very little 
 to do with our present story, and are, moreover, 
 bygones, which our severely proper age will 
 probably think had better be allowed to be 
 bygones. I suppose it is better that they should 
 be so. But the fact is that there was much 
 cakes and ale in the land (perhaps too much) in 
 those days. 
 
 I was saying, when my recollection of the 
 Rev. Minor Canon Brackenbury led me into 
 this digression, that the Chapter of Sillchester 
 used to be a remarkably musical body. And the 
 similarity of tastes in this respect led to a still 
 greater degree of intimacy between several of
 
 42 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the cathedral clergy and the inhabitants of the 
 Moat House than might otherwise have been the 
 case. Now one of the minor canons — a man 
 of a very different stamp from " poor Jack 
 Brackenbnry," as that reverend gentleman was 
 habitually, though somewhat irreverently, called 
 in Sillchester — the most thorough musician 
 among them, and a very respectably clerical 
 clergyman into the bargain, was an especially 
 frequent visitor at the Moat House. This 
 gentleman's name was Perivale — the Eeverend 
 Sandgate Perivale. He was in every respect a 
 treasure to the Sillchester Chapter, being a most 
 competent and enthusiastic musician, the owner 
 of a superb tenor voice, a scholar, a gentleman, 
 and a good clergyman, and withal poor enough 
 to be contented and glad to hold a minor canonry 
 eked out by the proceeds of a very small chapter 
 living in the city of Sillchester, which it was not 
 worth the while of any of the cathedral digni- 
 taries to hold. All these qualifications were not 
 often to be met with combined in the same 
 individual at the period of which I am writing ; 
 and the Chapter prized their young precentor 
 accordingly. 
 
 Besides all the good gifts that have been
 
 THE PRECENTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 43 
 
 mentioned, the Rev. Sandgate Perivale was a 
 very handsome man ; and it was well known in 
 Sillchester that if the bachelor precentor had 
 only had the discretion to fall in love in the 
 right place, there was more than one lady in 
 Sillchester who would have been w^ell content to 
 become Mrs. Perivale, and who in becoming so 
 would have more than doubled the minor canon's 
 somewhat slender ecclesiastical income. But 
 the precentor must needs fall in love in the 
 wrong place. In a word, he fell in love with 
 Agnes Artingale. Singing with her, teaching 
 her, mingling their enthusiasms for the choice 
 works of their favourite authors, the result was 
 not one to be wondered at. Bearing in mind 
 what has been said of the gentleman and what 
 has been said of the lady, it would surely have 
 been more to be wondered at if that which did 
 happen had not happened. It strikes me so, 
 and it probably strikes you so, gentle reader. 
 It would strike anybody so except the persons 
 concerned and their immediate surroundings. 
 They all thought it very wonderful. 
 
 All such portion of the Sillchester world as 
 became cognizant of the fact thought it very 
 wonderful. And yet they all knew Miss Agnes
 
 44 AETINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Artingale the younger and the Eeverend Mr. 
 Sandgate Peri vale to be exactly what they have 
 been described to be in these pages. But 
 though they knew this, the facts that more 
 spontaneously and persistently presented them- 
 selves to the Sillchester mind, as having a 
 permanent bearing on the question, were the 
 indisputable ones, that Miss Agnes was an 
 Artingale, the niece of the venerated and stately 
 inhabitant of the Moat House, the daughter of 
 one of the most magnificent of Sillshire baronets, 
 and the bearer of a name far more ancient and 
 more honourable in Sillshire minds than any 
 baronetcy or dignity of belted knight, or marquis, 
 duke and a' that, that any king can mak'. On 
 the one side there were these ruling facts cor- 
 roborated by that other outward and visible one, 
 that the lady in question, " vera incessu patuit 
 dea " — that she stepped along the flags of the 
 sunny and picturesque Sillchester High-street 
 with a queenly grace and maidenly dignity that 
 seemed to put a dividing abyss between her and 
 the other mortals of those parts. 
 
 On the other side the facts that stared the 
 Sillchester public unpleasantly in the face were, 
 that though the precentor was the very beau-
 
 THE PRECENTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 45 
 
 ideal of a precentor and a thorough gentleman, 
 and very charming man as all female Sillchester 
 allowed, the precentorship was notoriously worth 
 but 120/. per annum, and the living of St. 
 Botolph ad Pontem only 90/. ! Nor was this 
 the worst of the matter. Sillchester would have 
 forgotten if it could — but it was impossible — 
 that old Peri vale, the father of the faultless 
 precentor, had been not only a mercer in the 
 High-street, but a bankrupt mercer who had 
 died in grief and trouble ; while another old 
 Perivale, the bankrupt mercer's brother, a 
 prosperous grazier in the north of Sillshire, had 
 brought up his unfortunate brother's orphans, 
 and had sent Sandgate Perivale first to the 
 Sillshire grammar school, and then, with an 
 exhibition, the reward of the lad's good conduct, 
 to Sillchester College in the University of Ox- 
 ford, whence he had returned with the best 
 possible character and recommendations to 
 clerical preferment in his native city. 
 
 Sillchester could not forget all this. And 
 Sillchester thought that under the circumstances 
 it was very wonderful that the precentor should 
 fall in love with Miss Agnes Artingale. The 
 wonder was not felt or spoken ia an ill-natured
 
 46 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 or spiteful way; for the Reverend Sandgate 
 Peri vale was a very popular man. People 
 looked on it more as an awful misfortune which 
 had fallen upon them. " Have you heard this 
 sad business of poor Perivale ?" was whispered 
 to one another among those who were aware of 
 the melancholy truth. Even the ladies were 
 not savage on the subject, comforted as they 
 were by the consideration that any practical 
 result of so infatuated a passion was wholly out 
 of the question, and looking on the sad result as 
 a misfortune partaking of the nature of a judg- 
 ment naturally following on the dangerous rash- 
 ness of such a walking of the angels with the 
 sons of men as had taken place between Agnes 
 Artingale and ]\Ir. Perivale. 
 
 There was one exception indeed to this 
 general female charity, in the person of the 
 Lady Sempronia Lindisfarne, the wife of one of 
 the canons of the cathedral. She was an acidu- 
 lated noble lady of a pessimist tone of mind, and 
 a tendency towards Low Church doctrines, which 
 had created a little distance between her and the 
 inhabitants of the Moat House. She used to 
 say in speaking of the matter that it was " a 
 great trial :" as in truth it was to those more
 
 THE PRECEXTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 47 
 
 immediately concerned. But Lady Sempronia 
 meant — and by some incomprehensible process of 
 mind felt — that it was a great trial to her to have 
 to witness such circumstances. She very openly 
 and decidedly moreover propounded the '^ judg- 
 ment" view of the case, and was manifestly 
 solaced under her trial by the consideration that 
 judgment was executed. 
 
 But among all those who felt that this luckless 
 passion was a wonderful thing, calculated to 
 overturn all preconceived notions of probability, 
 none were so much surprised and wonder-struck 
 as the principal parties themselves. As was to 
 be expected, under the circumstances, full 
 recognition of the fact had been reached gradu- 
 ally ; gradually by the precentor, and yet more 
 gradually and slowly by his lovely pupil. Yet 
 the fact that had to reveal itself to Agnes 
 Artingale was a two-fold fact, each half of which 
 might, it may be thought, have helped to render 
 manifest the other. Perhaps, after all, it was so 
 to a certain degree. For it was even in the 
 midst of the great sorrow of attaining to a con- 
 viction that Perivale loved her, that the yet 
 greater pain came upon her of having it revealed 
 to her consciousness that she loved him !
 
 48 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 How had it happened ? how had it been pos- 
 sible ? How had it been possible for her to have 
 allowed herself to fall into such oblivion of all 
 that Artingale expected of her ? For to Agnes 
 Artingale the whole matter, in all its bearings, 
 became clear in the same moment in which her 
 mind opened itself to the fact that she loved 
 Sandgate Perivale. As a woman she felt no 
 shame that, being loved by such a man, she 
 should love him in return. She knew what he 
 was ; and she did not attempt, for an instant, to 
 disguise from her mind his entire worthiness of her 
 love. But none the less was the entire, the irre- 
 versible impossibility of their union fully present 
 to her mind in the same moment that she became 
 aware that she loved him. There was no doubt, 
 and could be no hesitation about the matter. Oh 
 that she were the poor and undistinguished 
 daughter of some other minor canon ! Poor ! 
 Wealth had nothing to do with it ! Even 
 could she only have been as Lucy Slowcome, the 
 pretty daughter of the rich Sillchester attorney ! 
 But there could be no such fate for her ! She 
 was an Artingale. Her path of duty was clear. 
 And she had but to follow it, at whatever cost 
 of suffering and hopeless future blank for herself.
 
 THE PRECENTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 4D 
 
 As for him, be was hardly less impressed 
 with the hopelessness of his love. He did not 
 dare to hope that it should be returned. He was 
 not a confident lover. And those who assure us, 
 as some do, that such are the most likely to 
 succeed, have gathered their experience from 
 not the best specimens of womankind. But 
 even if he had ventured to expect that Agnes 
 Artin gale's love might be his for the winning, 
 he would have been almost as certain as she was 
 that all happy love between them was out of the 
 question — quite shut out by the paramount 
 requirements of other sterner, more palpable, 
 and more recognized facts. 
 
 Why did he not put himself out of harm's 
 way, while he might yet have escaped compara- 
 tively scatheless ? Ay ! Why upon earth did 
 he not do so^ when he knew that no good could 
 come of his staying ? " Yirginibus puerisque 
 canto." And perhaps some of them may be 
 able to answer the question. Why does the 
 moth keep circling around the lamp, till at last 
 he perishes in the flame of it ? 
 
 The Rev. Sandgate Perivale, however, was 
 not quite so blindly reckless as the moth— not so 
 irresistibly passion-driven as to make no effort for 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 50 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 his escape — to plan no retreat from a position 
 whicli every passing day made more sweet, and 
 yet more intolerable. Again and again Le 
 determined to fly at all hazards ; and again and 
 again his courage was insuflScient for the execu- 
 tion of his intent. But at last fortune lent 
 her aid in so unmistakeahle — so providential a 
 manner, as some persons would say — that he felt 
 that now or never was the moment to break the 
 hourly strengthening chain that bound him. 
 There came to him an offer of a living, a very 
 comfortable rectory worth some £400 a year, in 
 the north of Sillshire, not far from the little 
 town of Billiford — ^not far either from Artingale 
 Castle. In other circumstances he would, in all 
 probability, have declined the preferment. For 
 he was attached to the cathedral and city of 
 Sillchester, as Sillchester was attached to him ; 
 and there was little doubt that some better pre- 
 ferment would have been found for him by the 
 Chapter ere long, which might have been tenable 
 with the precentorship which all Sillchester was 
 so anxious that he should continue to hold. 
 
 But as matters were he felt that it would be 
 madness, and culpable madness, to refuse to 
 avail himself of the legitimate means of escape
 
 THE PRECEXTOR OF SILLCHESTER CATHEDRAL. 51 
 
 thus held out to him. So he determined to 
 accept the rectory of Saliton Regis, and to bid 
 adieu to the pleasant close and streets and 
 streams of Sillchester for ever. 
 
 But he determined, after long consideration 
 and much painful indecision, to speak before he 
 went. Why? Perhaps — perhaps there was an un- 
 avowed, almost unconscious, gleam of hope still 
 lingering at the bottom of his heart. Perhaps 
 he thought that it might be that some miracle of 
 love would make the impossible possible in his 
 favour. Perhaps the temptation of letting the 
 queen of his soul know that he was going forth 
 into the wilderness (almost literally so ; for 
 Saliton is on the borders of the vast wild moor- 
 land district which occupies a large portion of 
 the north of Sillshire) — that he was leaving all 
 that had hitherto smiled on him in life, and 
 going into a solitary, lone, and permanently 
 loveless exile for love of her — perhaps, I say, 
 the temptation of telling this to Agnes Artingale 
 (for he was but a mortal man) was too great for 
 him to resist. 
 
 At all events he did determine to tell his love 
 before he renounced it for ever. 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITV OF IILIIKXS
 
 52 
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 AGNES ARTINGALE's LOVE-STORY. 
 
 It was on a lovely afternoon in July that he 
 betook himself to the Moat House for the purpose 
 of doing so. He had been singing the lovely and 
 touching anthem from the Psalm, " By the 
 waters of Babylon we sat down and wept, when 
 we remembered thee, oh Zion !" in the afternoon 
 service of the cathedral, with more than usual 
 expression and effect ; and he went direct from 
 the cathedral on his errand. 
 
 The gate at which visitors to the Moat House 
 ring for admission does not admit the comer 
 immediately into the house, but into a little 
 court, on which the house opens on one side 
 while the other side of it is open to the garden, 
 in such sort, that any one admitted at the outer 
 gate may proceed to the garden without en-
 
 AGNES ARTINGALE's LOVE-STORY. 53 
 
 tering the house. The old servant who opened 
 to Mr. Perivale told him that Miss Agnes was 
 in the garden, probably on the terrace, which 
 has been before mentioned, and offered to call 
 her in, supposing that the precentor had come 
 on his usual musical errand. But Mr. Perivale 
 said that he would go himself and find Miss 
 Agnes in the garden. 
 
 He did go accordingly with a brisk and quick 
 step, but a wildly beating heart, straight to the 
 terrace, under the old city wall, which formed 
 the boundary of the garden on the side farthest 
 from the house. Along the whole middle length 
 of this beautiful terrace walk the ground fell 
 away in a well -shaven turfy bank, so steep as to 
 be scarcely practicable for the foot. The two 
 Artingale children, while they were children, 
 and before little Sir Hildebrand had learned 
 that such movements were incompatible with the 
 dignity of his position — a lesson which he under- 
 stood and learned at a surprisingly early age — 
 would run races down the steep incline, and 
 often perform the latter half of the descent in 
 very un- Artingale rolling fashion. But this 
 was done to the great grief and scandal of the 
 ancient gardener ; and for all save as could be
 
 54 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 guilty of such cliildish indecorums tlie flagged 
 walk at the top of the high bank might be deemed 
 inaccessible in all that part of its course from the 
 lower garden. But at either extremity of the ter- 
 race there was a broad flight of handsome free- 
 stone steps, by which the terrace was reached, 
 passing up between the garden-wall on the one 
 side of them and a series of standard roses and 
 geraniums in pots on the inner side. The garden- 
 walls, which joined the city walls at right angles, 
 at either end of the long terrace were completely 
 hung with Yirginia creeper, which was already, 
 at the date of Mr. Perivale's visit, beginning to 
 assume here and there some of the crimson tints 
 of its autumnal gorgeous livery. 
 
 Mr. Perivale approached the terrace by the 
 steps nearest the house. He had been conscious 
 of a temptation to gain a few minutes' reprieve 
 by crossing the lower garden to the steps at the 
 further end of it. But he had been ashamed of 
 the cowardice which prompted the thought, and 
 marched straight to his work like a man, feeling 
 much as the leader of a forlorn hope might be 
 supposed to feel in scaling a similar height. 
 
 He had very little doubt that he should find 
 Agnes on the terrace ; it was her most favourite
 
 AGIS'ES ARTINGALE S LOVE-STORY. 00 
 
 walk ; and they had often paced the grey old 
 flower-hordered flagstones together, enjoying in 
 company the magnificent sunsets over the distant 
 valley of the Sill, where it opens out into the 
 wide flat estuary which that river forms for a 
 few miles before it reaches the western sea, and 
 the gorgeous skies behind the grey mass of 
 the square cathedral tower, every outline of 
 which was traced in black on the golden ground. 
 Such walks had been many ; and the terrace had 
 become of late more than ever the spot which 
 Agnes loved best in all the world ; and the 
 conversations which had passed there with her 
 musical instructor, beginning for the most part 
 with subjects musical, but branching off insensi- 
 bly into long interchanges of thought on every 
 conceivable topic, had shown of late a marked 
 tendency, which Agnes herself had noted not 
 without a vague and but partially understood 
 misgiving, to make themselves the unfailing 
 topic of her subsequent solitary musings in the 
 same spot. 
 
 Mr. Perivale was not wrong in his expecta- 
 tions that he should find Miss Artingale on the 
 terrace. As his head reached the level of its 
 stones, he saw her at the further end of it ; and
 
 56 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 she was alone. She was standing still at the 
 moment when he first caught sight of her, in an 
 attitude of evidently pensive reverie. Her small 
 graceful head, with all its wealth of glossy, 
 golden-coloured hair catching and reflecting the 
 evening sunlight, like a highly-glazed silken 
 tissue, was drooping on her bosom ; and the 
 light straw hat which should have protected the 
 shining ripples from the sun's too curious gaze 
 was hanging by its long blue ribbon from one 
 listless hand, while the other was raised to her 
 face in such sort that the delicate little chin was 
 held in its palm, while the long and slender fore- 
 finger was pressed against the cheek and temple. 
 She was tall, considerably more so than the 
 average height of women, and she was wont to 
 hold herself with marked uprightness, which girl 
 critics were apt to call stiff, and which even the 
 Sillchester youth of the other sex protested, 
 when speaking to such criticizing belles, and 
 admitted even to each other, recalled in the ex- 
 pression of it a more than sufficiently distinct re- 
 membrance of Scotland's device and motto. 
 And notwithstanding the drooping attitude of 
 the head, the wonted erectness of the slight figure, 
 proudly and firmly poised on its long and slender
 
 AGXES ARTINGALE's LOVE-STORY. 57 
 
 and beautifully arched feet, was shown to advan- 
 tage, as Perivale caught sight of her against the 
 evening sky. 
 
 He was going quickly up the steps, but on 
 seeing her thus standing motionless he in- 
 stinctively paused too, and he perceived that 
 she had not seen him. But her thought, what- 
 ever it was, that had produced the pause in her 
 walk and had thrown her into the attitude of 
 pensive reverie, passed from one phase to an- 
 other, even during the moment Perivale stood 
 spell-bound on the steps. For with a sudden 
 movement the head was thrown up with a 
 slight awakening shake of its lovely curls, she 
 crossed her arms on her bosom^ with the hat still 
 hanging by its string from her hand, and re- 
 sumed her walk with a somewhat extra expres- 
 sion thrown into the usual goddess-gait, which 
 seemed to correspond with the proud movement 
 of the head. 
 
 Perivale in the same instant resumed his 
 ascent of the terrace steps. She was walking 
 tow^ards the end of the terrace at which he was 
 ascending, and it was impossible but that in the 
 next moment she should become aware of his 
 presence. He sprang forward at a bound, and
 
 58 AKTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 stood on the walk at the top, and she saw him. 
 It was the commonest and most likely incident 
 in the world that he should be there at that 
 hour. And if the unusual emotion, which the 
 knowledge of the errand on which he had come 
 caused in him, were in any degree felt by her 
 also, the reason of it could be found only in the 
 nature of the meditations which had been occu- 
 pying her. 
 
 That expression of her attitude and person 
 which has been described were changed at once 
 on seeing him. That extra proudness in the step 
 went out of it, leaving only the amount of grace- 
 ful, but &[ight\y prononcee dignity which always 
 characterized it. The stately carriage of the 
 head was somewhat relaxed, and she came for- 
 ward with a quickened step to meet him, and 
 with her hand extended in greeting. 
 
 But even as she neared him, she became aware, 
 by the expression of his face and manner, that 
 something more than ordinary was occupying 
 his mind, and was in all probability about to 
 form the subject of his words ; and suddenly a 
 half-conscious sympathy of embarrassment took 
 possession of her also, which rapidly grew into 
 a cold and mighty dread, as she marked the
 
 AGNES artingale's loye-stort. 59 
 
 pallor of bis face and tlie unusiia] working; of 
 his features. She could not have told at that 
 moment what she feared ; but afterwards her 
 reflection on what was then passing in her heart 
 would have enabled her to confess to herself that 
 she knew in that moment that he was going to 
 tell her that he loved her. And she was un- 
 feignedly thankful — nay, she could hardly escape 
 from the persuasion that it was a strangely mys- 
 terious and merciful providence which had 
 willed that the previous current of her own 
 thoughts had in some degree prepared her for 
 the occasion. 
 
 " Miss Artingale," he said, as they met, speak- 
 ing in a strange and constrained manner, but in 
 a low voice, and with a quieter calm than usual 
 — " Miss Artingale, I have come to tell you of a 
 piece of fortune that has happened to me ; of 
 singularly good fortune, I suppose I ought to say." 
 
 " Indeed ! I am so glad " 
 
 " Yes. I am sure you would be glad. You 
 have always been so kind. The fact is, that I 
 have had the offer of a living — a very good 
 living — a rectory — and " 
 
 "I am truly glad. What, here in Sill- 
 chester ?"
 
 60 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " No ; not here. A long way off in the north 
 of Sillshire. But I have decided to accept it — 
 indeed have accepted it." 
 
 " But, Mr. Perivale, what will Sillchester do 
 without you ? What will become of the choir ? 
 Do you really mean to give up Sillchester ?" 
 
 '' Yes, I shall give up Sillchester, and the 
 church will have no difficulty in getting a better 
 precentor. I have thought it best," he went on 
 more hurriedly. " One cannot have everything 
 just as one would wish it — even if I did wish to 
 remain here ; but I have made up my mind that 
 I do not wish that. I have come to the 
 decision that it will be best for me to quit Sill- 
 chester." 
 
 " I am very sure that all Sillchester will 
 regret the decision," she said, speaking some- 
 what more lowly than before, and dropping her 
 eyes on the ground with a very slight corre- 
 sponding movement of her head. 
 
 "Thank you, Miss Artingale, thank you !" he 
 replied, with a little quaver in his voice ; " it is 
 very kind of you to say that. I have not an- 
 nounced my determination to the Chapter, or 
 indeed to any of my friends in the city yet. I 
 wished to tell it first to you. Miss Artingale,
 
 AGNES ARTIX gale's EOVE-STORY. 61 
 
 because — because there was something else that 
 I wished to tell you at the same time." 
 
 " To me, Mr. Perivale ?" 
 
 The words were all but repellent ; and 
 maidenly pride, combining with Artingale pride, 
 intended that they should be spoken with all 
 the freezing dignity with which they infallibly 
 would have been said to any other man in the 
 world in the position of Mr. Perivale. But the 
 poor little quaking heart turned traitor to its 
 mistress, and imparted a tremor to the voice, 
 and constrained the eye to look shyly up from 
 under its lid into his face for one infinitesimal 
 portion of a moment as she spoke, which might 
 have told her secret to a shrewd bystander. 
 But these manifestations told nothing to Mr. 
 Perivale. He went on more hurriedly and with 
 increasing agitation — 
 
 '' Yes, Miss Artingale, there is something 
 which I wish before leaving Sillchester for ever 
 to tell you. I have had much difiSculty in 
 making up my own mind whether I should do 
 so or not ; and my difficulty is made greater by 
 my doubts whether you may think that I ought — 
 whether you may consider that it is pardonable 
 in me to do so under the circumstances or not."
 
 62 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Pardonable, Mr. Perivale ?" 
 
 " Miss Artingale," he hurried on, drawing up 
 his handsome person into a more rigidly upright 
 attitude before her, and looking into her face 
 with the boldness of desperation as he spoke — 
 " Miss Artingale, I am, as I have told you, 
 about to leave this place ; I shall not see either 
 Sillchester or you more. I go to find a new 
 life, and to face it and bear it as best I may. 
 And this I do because I have been mad enough 
 to dare to love you. I have raised my eyes to 
 you, and have loved you, and do love you with 
 a love unconquerable — unquenchable — a love 
 that will live with me while I live, and, I think, 
 not die when this life shall end. And this I 
 could not go away into my exile without telling 
 you. Were I not sure that after this day and 
 this hour I shall see you no more, I should not 
 have ventured — I should not have deemed it 
 fitting to tell you my secret. But being so sure, 
 the telling it can occasion no ill to you, and it 
 will be a consolation to me that you should 
 know what is the cause that has driven me forth 
 from this place, and how madly I have loved 
 you. Can you forgive ?" 
 
 All this he had said as rapidly as he could
 
 AGNES ARTINGALE's LOVE-STORY. 63 
 
 speak tlie words, and then stood before lier 
 unmoving, as if awaiting the doom that was to 
 scathe him. 
 
 She stood equally upright, equally motionless ; 
 but she had become very white, and a tremulous 
 motion might have been observed in her closed 
 lips. After a pause, which seemed to have been 
 of many minutes to the man who was standing 
 before her, she opened her lips, and essayed to 
 speak ; but no sound came from them that 
 could reach his ears ; and in the terrible silence 
 he was constrained to speak again. 
 
 " Have I unpardonably offended you. Miss 
 Artingale?" he said, in a low, slow, pleading 
 voice. 
 
 She shook her head slowly and sadly ; and 
 then forming the words apparently with dif- 
 ficulty, said — 
 
 " You have accepted this offer you say, Mr. 
 Perivale ?" 
 
 " I have accepted it. Miss Artingale." 
 
 " You will announce your acceptance of it ?" 
 
 " I shall announce it to the Chapter to-morrow 
 morning." 
 
 " And — my aunt ? You will take leave of 
 her ?"
 
 64 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " I purpose doing so, and thanking her for all 
 her much kindness to me now — this evening — 
 before leaving the house." 
 
 " And after that you will see her no more ?" 
 
 " After that I have no purpose of seeing her 
 again." 
 
 Then there was again a long pause, while the 
 two still retained their position opposite to each 
 other, till at length Mr. Perivale added — 
 
 " Have I your forgiveness, Miss Artingale, 
 for having said to you the words I have 
 spoken ?" 
 
 " I think you have done rightly," she then 
 said, still speaking in the same slow way that 
 seemed as if the dryness of her throat made 
 utterance difficult to her — " I think you have 
 done rightly, Mr. Perivale, and wisely, in de- 
 termining to act as you tell me you have 
 determined under the circumstances you have 
 disclosed to me. I think it will be well that 
 you should go from Sillchester ; for, since it is 
 as you say, your continuing to live here could — 
 could — could not be for good. It is well — and 
 right — that we should part here this evening, 
 as you have decided — for — for ever. But I too 
 have something that I would wish to say. I
 
 AGNES ARTINGALE's LOVE-STORY. 65 
 
 have to thank you for much kindness — for 
 much — much ' ' 
 
 But here the proud bosom began to swell, and 
 the quivering lips to tremble, and she was 
 obliged to stop short in her Words. 
 
 " Miss Artingale " he began again. 
 
 But she interrupted him with an upraised 
 forefinger, as she resumed, having mastered her 
 emotion. 
 
 " Hush !" she said ; " you have done well, Mr. 
 Perivale, as I have said. But this is very 
 sudden to me. You have had time to think 
 of — of — of all that you wished to say to me. I 
 would fain say some further words to you before 
 saying my last farewell. But I need time to 
 think awhile. Give me a little time. See, 
 now ; you shall go down these steps, and walk 
 slowly round the garden, and come up again to 
 the terrace at the further end, and I will wait 
 here the while. And when you return we will 
 say our farewell. Will you do this ?" 
 
 So he turned from her, and walked slowly 
 down the steps. 
 
 And Agnes Artingale set herself to use the 
 truce she had bargained for with all the power 
 of her mind. 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 66 ARTINGALE CASTLE. ' 
 
 She loved the man who had thus told of his love 
 — loved him as she felt then in that moment that 
 she could never love again — -loved him with a love 
 that made it seem quite sure to her that she could 
 never love at all again. All scales had fallen from 
 her eyes, and upon this point she had no longer 
 any doubt at all. But the point to the decision of 
 which she strove, during the few minutes that 
 were accorded to her, to bend her mind with all 
 its clearness was not whether she should, could, 
 or possibly might accept this proffered love, and 
 freely give her own in return. On this question 
 there was for Agnes Artingale no possibility for 
 doubt, or space for a moment's hesitation. What 
 would have made her happiness was not more 
 clear than the absolute necessity of at once, and 
 without a second thought, renouncing it. Was 
 she not an Artingale ? Was not the duty of 
 loyalty to her race and to the obligations imposed 
 by it paramount to every other consideration ? 
 Had it not ever been so with the members of 
 her house ? (Of course, the Artingale chronicles 
 carefully set forth by Mistress Agnes and incul- 
 cated on the youthful daughter of the race had 
 very cursorily and slightly mentioned the gesta 
 of her own father.) Would not any the smallest
 
 AGNES artingale's LOYE-STORY. 67 
 
 failure in this respect bring heart-break on every 
 human being who was near and dear to her? 
 Would she not be marked, some day, in the 
 solemn assemblage of the sons and daughters of 
 the name in that holy of holies, the Artingale 
 chapel at Artingale, as the only unworthy scion 
 of the house who had brought shame on the 
 grand old name ? And what was her personal 
 happiness to this ? Such thoughts as these, and 
 the accepted facts deposited in the deepest soil of 
 the mind by years of such habitual thinking, 
 did not now pass through her mind in the 
 detailed fashion in which they are set down here. 
 The general out-come and product of them was 
 too much a constituent part of her mind itself 
 for any such meditation to be necessary or pos- 
 sible. It never for the space of any lightning- 
 flash of the mind occurred to Miss Artiugale 
 that there was any possibility of her uniting 
 herself to the son of the bankrupt mercer of 
 Sillchester High-street. 
 
 The question on which she was striving to 
 arrive at a decision before Mr. Peri vale should 
 have accomplished the round of the garden was 
 this : Should she reward the confession he had 
 made to her by making a similar one to him ?
 
 68 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 There is mncli in every girlish heart that does 
 and should make such a confession difficult. 
 There are many, probably, who, fully alive to 
 smaller proprieties, and incapable of understand- 
 ing the bearing of larger ones, may think that 
 the confession in question was one that, under 
 the circumstances, ought not to have been made. 
 But the feelings which were prompting Agnes 
 Artingale to make it were the promptings of a 
 very noble and generous nature, and of a large 
 and loving heart. 
 
 Had it not been made certain to her that 
 Mr. Perivale was on the point of quitting Sill- 
 chester, Agnes Artingale would not have con- 
 templated doing what she was now making up 
 her mind to do. Not that she would have for a 
 moment imagined that any danger to herself 
 could have arisen to her from such a course — 
 any danger of being led into a possibility of 
 changing her mind, or falling from her resolution 
 on the subject. This would never have occurred 
 to her as within the limits of possibility. But 
 she would have felt that such a confession would 
 have made continued intercourse with the object 
 of it inconvenient and indecorous. As it was, 
 there was no place for any considerations of 
 that sort.
 
 AGNES ARTIXGALE'S LOVE-STORY. 69 
 
 But what moved her was a grand and noble 
 feeling that she should thus be giving a life-long 
 consolation to him whose happiness had, along 
 with her own, to be sacrificed to the ^necessities 
 of her position. She knew that her own happi- 
 ness — all that happiness which can be born of 
 happy love, which, to people at Agnes Artin- 
 gale's time of life, and to such hearts as hers, 
 all too truly represents itself as the only happi- 
 ness life has to give — she knew that all this 
 happiness was to be renounced by her for ever. 
 And she fully believed that a similarly cold and 
 sunless future was before the man who loved 
 her also. She felt that the confession which he 
 had made to her would henceforth for ever be 
 the one " green spot in memory's waste," to 
 which she might look back through future years, 
 and that to it, and to him who had made it, she 
 would owe the consciousness that she had, at 
 least, been loved. And she felt and knew that 
 this was very precious to her. Was it not due to 
 him to give him a similar consolation — to furnish 
 him with the same support through the blank 
 loneliness to which the inexorable path of duty 
 led him as it led her ? 
 
 Before the precentor's head had appeared on
 
 70 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the level of the terrace, coming up from the 
 garden at the further end of it, she had decided 
 that such consolation was due from her to him. 
 And she had determined on going through the 
 ordeal of administering it to him. 
 
 As Mr. Peri vale approached her, slowlj 
 coming along the far-stretching terrace, she 
 turned towards him ; and this time she was able 
 to speak more calmly and easily. It is true that 
 what she had to say was that which in ordinary 
 cases is most difficult to a maiden to articulate. 
 But all contemplation of those consequences 
 which usually follow from such a confession by 
 maidenly lips was so totally excluded from her 
 mental horizon ; it was so wholly a sequel-less 
 and purposeless love that she was about to own, 
 a boon so saintly in its object that she was about 
 to confer, that her confession seemed to be quite 
 moved out of the range of those feelings which 
 usually impart to such a conscious embarrass- 
 ment. 
 
 There was also, perhaps, another feeling which 
 prompted Agnes Artingale to wish that the man 
 who loved her should not be left unaware of the 
 nature of her feelings towards him. To use the 
 ordinary compendious expression, she was about
 
 AGNES ARTINGALE's LOYE-STORY. 71 
 
 to sacrifice her love and her lover to " family 
 pride." And yet never was gentle heart less 
 moved by anything akin to pride in her own 
 private estimate of her own private self. She 
 was simply doing a duty which she had been 
 taught to consider as binding on her beyond 
 almost any other. And she felt a generous 
 anxiety that the gentleman who had honoured 
 her with his love (for all the Artingale pride 
 did not avail to make her — for her own individual 
 self — feel the matter otherwise) should not be 
 left to imagine that she had failed to comprehend 
 that he was worthy of her love, and, had they 
 but stood alone on some unstoried shore, might 
 have freely had it. 
 
 '' Let us take a turn together — one more," she 
 said, "to the other end of the terrace; and I 
 will say what I had it in my mind to say to 
 you, my dear friend." 
 
 The last three words were said with a little 
 pause between each, and with a marked em- 
 phasis on each of them. 
 
 Mr. Perivale turned and placed himself in 
 silence by her side for the proposed walk. For 
 a minute they stepped on thus side by side 
 without speaking.
 
 72 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " You have told me, my dear friend," she 
 said at length, again laying a distinct emphasis 
 on each of the three words, "that your departure 
 from Sillchester, for good and all, is definitively 
 decided ; that this is the last time we shall see 
 you ; that you say your farewell to us to-night. 
 And — you have told me that — you love me. 
 And I have told you that it seems to me right 
 and wise that you should go. And yet this is 
 not all that I would fain have said between us 
 before you go." 
 
 She paused again for some time ; and then in 
 the same tones, low and quiet but not inexpres- 
 sive of emotion, she continued — 
 
 " Do you know why I told you that it 
 seemed to me wise and right that you should 
 go?" 
 
 "I can but suppose, Miss Artingale, that it 
 was because the confession which I had dared to 
 make to you was unacceptable." 
 
 " Unacceptable ! — Yes ; it was unacceptable — 
 for two reasons. The first because considerations 
 of which you must be aware, and which I am 
 above all things bound to respect, make it im- 
 possible that such— such a — proposal should be 
 accepted ; the second reason^ because it is most
 
 AGNES ARTINGALE's LOVE-STORY. 73 
 
 painful to me to know that what I am bound to 
 do and to say must cause you pain and suf- 
 fering." 
 
 " Miss Artingale " 
 
 " Let me go on," she said hurriedly ; " I have 
 yet more to say. The reasons I have given you 
 make it absolutely impossible that I should, in 
 one sense_, listen to the words you have spoken 
 to me. They are therefore, as you say, unac- 
 ceptable. It is absolutely, irrevocably necessary 
 that we part, to meet no more, on this evening. 
 But there is another sense," she continued, 
 bending her head and dropping her eyes to the 
 ground, and speaking in a very low voice — 
 " there is one sense in which what you told me 
 was not unacceptable to me. Did I not believe in 
 the singleness, nobleness, and sincerity of your 
 heart, even as I believe in the truth and sim- 
 plicity of my own, I could not say to you what 
 I am now saying." 
 
 " Miss Artingale, can it be " 
 
 " Pardon me^ my friend, for interrupting you, 
 and I pray you hear me out. To my own heart 
 your declaration was not unacceptable. I wish 
 you to understand that the rejection, or rather 
 the renunciation of your love, which pains you,
 
 74 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 is, believe me, not less painful to me. While 
 refusing to you that which would, you tell me, 
 make your happiness, I am also sacrificing my 
 own. But I am sacrificing it in obedience to 
 the ^ imperative commands of duty. Would to 
 heaven, my friend, that no such duty was im- 
 posed on me ! Would to heaven that I were 
 free to act in this matter according to the 
 dictates of my own heart ! Believe me that they 
 would be in accordance with those of your own. 
 And you will not, I am sure, fail to attribute my 
 having thus spoken to you to its true motive. 
 I could not bear that, after what you have told 
 me, you should go away from me without carry- 
 ing with you the only one consolation which it 
 was in my power to give you. Your love has 
 not been thrown away on one incapable of 
 appreciating the value of it. For me, too, what 
 has been said this day between us will never be 
 forgotten, never be cancelled. And the love 
 which duty will not permit me to accord to you 
 will — be very sure of it — -never — never be given 
 to another." 
 
 She stopped in her walk, as she ceased speak- 
 ing, and turned full round in face of him, proudly 
 lifting her head and fair open broW to meet his
 
 AGNES ARTINGALE's LOVE-STORY. 75 
 
 gaze, and looking with her clear and candid eyes 
 into his face, and holding out both her hands for 
 the grasp of his. 
 
 " Bid God to bless me, my friend !" she said, 
 as he took them into his trembling with emotion ; 
 " and pray to Him often for me. And now leave 
 me without further word ! So best ! God 
 bless and keep you, and comfort you, ever and 
 ever !" 
 
 Her voice for the first time trembled as she 
 spoke the last words ; and she turned away, as 
 she uttered them, towards the part of the terrace 
 furthest from the house. He made a movement 
 to detain her yet a moment, and would have 
 spoken, but she said — 
 
 " No ! no more words save to bid God bless 
 me ; it is best so." 
 
 She lingered a moment for the blessing she 
 had asked ; and he said, with a broken voice, 
 placing his hand on her head as he spoke, " May 
 God for ever keep, and bless and comfort you, 
 Agnes !" 
 
 And so he turned and went down the steps. 
 And that was the beginning and the end of 
 Agnes Artingale's first and last love-story. 
 
 And it was expedient for the due under-
 
 76 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 standing of many passages of the following 
 narrative that the reader should know thus 
 much of the history of Agnes Artingale the 
 younger, the sister of Sir Hildebrand.
 
 77 
 
 BOOK IT. 
 Artingale shall be Itself again". 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 SIR hildebrand's family. 
 
 At a period somewhat more than twenty years 
 subsequently to the date of the circumstances 
 narrated in the last chapter, Sir Hildebrand 
 Artingale and his family were living at Artin- 
 gale Castle that quiet and dignified, but some- 
 what monotonous life which Sir George Artin- 
 gale, the present baronet's father, had condemned 
 his noble wife to lead in solitude, but which he 
 had so utterly refused to share with her. The 
 family of Sir Hildebrand consisted of his wife, 
 the Lady Lavinia Artingale, his daughter Mary, 
 and his maiden sister. Miss Agnes Artingale. 
 Sir Hildebrand had no son; and this was a
 
 78 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 matter of great sorrow to him. He promised 
 himself however that Mary's husband should 
 one day assume the name and arms of Artin- 
 gale ; and he was a man who could find in 
 contemplating this arrangement a very consider- 
 able consolation for the other disappointment. 
 
 This disappointment, however, had not been 
 the only trouble of Sir Hildebrand's life. He 
 had lived always since his majority in a state of 
 monetary "tightness." It would be too much 
 to say that he had been an embarrassed man ; 
 but he had ever had pressing need of larger 
 funds than he could command — need, that is, 
 not of the means of living comfortably and 
 in a quiet way consistently with his social posi- 
 tion, but need of means sufficient to effect what 
 he had very nearly at heart — the perfect re- 
 covery and restoration of the Artingale estates 
 and Artingale Castle from all the evil that had 
 been inflicted on them by the spendthrift prodi- 
 gality and neglect of the worthless father whom 
 he had never known. 
 
 Sir Hildebrand was by no means a spendthrift 
 or extravagant man, in the ordinary acceptation 
 of the words. He was, on the contrary, a care- 
 ful man, a man of laborious accounts, and far
 
 SIR hildebrand's family. 79 
 
 from exorbitant in liis own personal expenses. 
 Nor was lie afflicted with an extravagant wife, 
 or a costly family. For twenty years the 
 domestic economy at the Castle had been ma- 
 naged on a scale of expenditure not mean in- 
 deed, or inconsistent with the perfect comfort of 
 the inhabitants and the due keeping" up of the 
 status of the Artingale name in the county, but 
 careful, moderate, and such as suited the notions 
 of dignified county magnates, who were not in 
 the habit of migrating annually to the great 
 Babylon. 
 
 Nevertheless Sir Hildebrand was constantly 
 labouring at, and more frequently than not 
 sighing over his accounts, as he worked at them 
 with old Mr. Decimus Oblong, now a very aged 
 man. The fact was that Sir Hildebrand had a 
 very long and up-hill work before him when he 
 took possession of the Artingale estates on 
 coming of age. It is true that much had been 
 done during his long minority ; but much niore 
 still remained to be done — at least according to 
 Sir Hildebrand' s notion of what " Artingale 
 expected" from him. The rental of the estates 
 was a large one ; but it had been dreadfully 
 dipped by the late reckless spendthrift, Sir
 
 80 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 George, who had received them from his father 
 in a by no means intact condition. Then the 
 Castle itself was in a really pitiable state. For 
 generations past it had been deprived of the 
 care and repairs necessary to keep it in really 
 good condition ; and during the latter part of 
 the reign of the late baronet it had been allowed 
 to fall into complete dilapidation ; and nothing, 
 or but little, had even yet, at the epoch to which 
 I referred at the beginning of this chapter, been 
 done to remedy this beyond such absolutely 
 indispensable repairs as were requisite to render 
 one wing of the immense building habitable by 
 its present tenants. Nothing had been done for 
 the restoration of the grand old building to its 
 original magnificence ; and this after twenty 
 years of occupancy by the present baronet, whose 
 heart was set more intently probably than on 
 any other earthly object in accomplishing this 
 restoration. But what could he do ? It was, as 
 Mr. Decimus Oblong continually urged, a yet 
 more important object to clear the estates of 
 debt. Much had been done towards this during 
 Sir Hildebrand's minority; and the rest was 
 now in a fair way to be accomplished. Still for 
 some years to come a large portion of the rental
 
 SIR hildebrand's family. 81 
 
 of the estates would have to continue to be set 
 aside for the completion of the arrangements 
 which had been made with the holders of the 
 various claims on the property ; and with these 
 arrangements Sir Hildebrand would not and 
 indeed could not well interfere. 
 
 Yet it appeared to him that the old walls of 
 his ancestral home reproached him mutely every 
 time he looked at them and marked their de- 
 plorable condition. And this was every day and 
 nearly every hour. Artingale had been expecting 
 these restorations so long ! If there could have 
 been anything touching in the cold and pompous 
 dulness of the baronet's character it would have 
 been his love and veneration, his almost wor- 
 ship for his home — the home of his fathers — 
 the outward and visible symbol of the greatness, 
 the antiquity, and the dignity of his name ; 
 and Sir Hildebrand longed with a longing far 
 greater than he was capable of feeling on any 
 other subject that he might yet live to ac- 
 complish the complete restoration of the noble 
 old pile. He would have been only too happy 
 if the time had come when it would be pos- 
 sible to devote every penny of the income not 
 needed for the personal every-day wants of 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 82 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the family to the accomplishment of this great 
 work. 
 
 For all that sum would be needed, and needed 
 for several years. It was indeed a great work 
 that had to be done ; and it by no means entered 
 into the baronet's notions to do it in a perfunc- 
 tory manner^ or in a grudging spirit. What 
 could be too good or too grand for Artingale 
 Castle ? And the chapel was all but absolutely 
 in ruins. It had been a gem of fourteenth- 
 century Gothic architecture. Dust from the 
 slowly crumbling vault above was lying thick 
 on the cracked and partly rotten oaken stairs of 
 the grand staircase, which had been one of the 
 finest specimens of the early Tudor style in the 
 kingdom. The great hall was in a yet worse 
 condition ; for the oaken panelling had been 
 torn from the walls throughout the greater part 
 of it. The stone- work of the grand terrace was 
 almost ruinous ; the balustrades dividing it from 
 the gardens beyond were mostly broken, and in 
 great numbers had altogether disappeared. The 
 fixtures throughout the part of the house not 
 inhabited by the present family — that is to say, 
 about three-quarters of the entire structure — 
 would have to be renewed, and indeed so would
 
 SIR hildebraxd's family. 83 
 
 those of the part that was occupied ; for of 
 course the thing must be complete ; and the 
 fittings, which according to Sir Hildebrand's 
 notion would have to be on a very different scale 
 of magnificence from those which had been put 
 in to serve the nonce in the inhabited rooms, 
 must necessarily be changed. 
 
 It will be easily understood that the work on 
 which Sir Hildebrand had set his heart was no 
 small one. Various partial and somewhat loose 
 estimates of the necessary expense had been 
 made ; and Mr. Decimus Oblong declared that 
 it would go a long way, " the best part of the 
 way. Sir Hildebrand, towards six figures." 
 
 The baronet was fortunate — more than most 
 men with similar tastes and desires — in having 
 the perfect sympathy on this point of all the 
 members of his family — all women-kind, as we 
 have seen them to be. It would not be true to 
 say that to all or either of these three ladies the 
 restoration of the Castle was as wholly engross- 
 ing an object, as paramount a desire, as it was to 
 the baronet himself. But they all three in their 
 different ways loved the place dearly, and would 
 fain have seen at least its progress to decay 
 arrested, if they did not sigh for that Phoenix-
 
 84 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 like magnificence of resurrection which was 
 never absent from the baronet's day-dreams. 
 
 Miss Agnes Artingale perhaps shared most 
 largely in her brother's ambition. To her, as to 
 him, there was something sacred in the ancient 
 walls, and a symbolic virtue in the name tbey 
 bore. They were " Artingale" to her as to him ; 
 the embodiment of all the past historic glories 
 of the name. Miss Agnes was all for restora- 
 tion, but she did not feel the necessity of adding 
 fresh splendours to the ancestral pile. Mary 
 was enthusiastically fond of the place in which 
 her entire life had been passed ; she w^as now 
 very nearly twenty years old, and she admired 
 the beauty of her home with all the keenness of 
 a thoroughly cultivated taste ; but I suspect that, 
 apart from the wish that the desires of her elders 
 should be gratified, she would have been content 
 for her own part if the old walls could have been 
 rendered secure to stand as they were ; if the 
 ivy, which had overgrown the east end of the 
 chapel, could be so cared for and pruned as to 
 render visible the stone-work tracery of the 
 arched windows ; if the great terrace could be 
 put into good repair, and the lawns in front of 
 it well kept and closely shaven. Lady Lavinia
 
 SIR hildebrand's family. 85 
 
 in her inmost heart wished mainly, and in the 
 first place, that the needed repairs might be 
 quickly executed in such sort as should prevent 
 certain bitter draughts from sweeping as they did 
 in certain conditions of the wind from the old 
 uninhabited rooms through the occupied portions 
 of the mansion, for Lady Lavinia " enjoyed a 
 delicate state of health." But in the next place, 
 and really I think almost as eagerly as she 
 desired that cherished dearest wish, Lady Lavinia 
 wished very sincerely all that her lord and 
 master wished. She wished the accomplishment 
 of the great work of Artingale's ambition also 
 on a third ground. She considered that it was 
 hardly respectable to have one's house, or, at 
 least, parts of it in such a — well, really, in 
 such an untidy condition as many of the rooms 
 at Artingale. She was not quite easy in her 
 mind as to what people might say of it ; for 
 Lady Lavinia, though a noble lady (she was the 
 fifth daughter of the Earl of Sorley, of Tor 
 Sorley, in the southern division of the county), 
 and though Mrs. Grrundy is essentially a middle- 
 class potentate, yet Lady Lavinia was a devout 
 worshipper at the Grundian shrine. She was a 
 gentle, weak creature, industriously bent, as it
 
 86 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 seemed, on getting the utmost sorrow and trou- 
 ble out of a life that gave her very small oppor« 
 tunities in that line ; and her fears of Mrs. 
 G-rundy afforded a means of getting a little 
 misery out of circumstances that without such 
 fears could not have been available for the pur- 
 pose. Then she was an invalid, and that was a 
 resource to her, without which it is difScult to 
 say how she would ever have contrived to make 
 the two ends of the four-and-twenty hours meet. 
 The visit of her doctor, Mr. Jonas Hathaway, of 
 Billiford, was to her the epoch in her day, which 
 his daily dinner is to many a man, at that time 
 of life when most other pleasures have begun to . 
 fail him. Lady Lavinia withal was to the best of 
 her lights and abilities a good wife and a good — 
 well, she could hardly perhaps be called a good 
 mother, but was, at least, an affectionate and 
 kind mother. She was perfect in that great 
 wifely duty of devoutly believing that her 
 husband was the greatest and noblest man who 
 stepped the earth. She had married him under 
 a different impression : she had in those days 
 imagined that she, the daughter — though the 
 fifth daughter —of the Earl of Sorley, had de- 
 scended somewhat from her lofty sphere to ally
 
 SIR hildebrand's family. 87 
 
 herself with the Sillshire baronet — leaving 
 entirely out of her consideration the fact that the 
 grandfather of the noble earl her father had 
 been a very industrious and successful maker of 
 bricks. No Artingale, however, was likely to 
 overlook that circumstance ; and Sir Hildebrand 
 at a very early period of his married life found 
 occasion to open his wife's eyes to the true doc- 
 trine on this point, and without any great diffi- 
 culty succeeded in effecting her thorough con- 
 version to the orthodox faith. She was now, 
 and had been for many years perfectly well 
 aware that it was her husband who had raised 
 lier to an eminence far superior to that on which 
 her birth had placed her, and that her posi- 
 tion in Mr. Burke's " roll of fame," as the 
 daughter of a mushroom earl, was as nothing in 
 comparison with admission to a place in the 
 Artingale pedigree. 
 
 For all these various reasons the three ladies 
 who composed Sir Hildebrand's family were 
 agreed in wishing what he wished — the restora- 
 tion of the grand family residence ; and in truth 
 the old place well merited their care and affec- 
 tion for it.
 
 88 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Artingale Castle, I say, was worthy of tlie 
 love of its inmates, and of the restoration which 
 it was their hope and intention to bestow on it. 
 The Artingales had been there lords of Artin- 
 gale manor, church, village, park-lands, wood- 
 lands, corn-lands and meadow-lands, and of many 
 an adjacent manor, from a period far antecedent 
 to the date of the oldest portion of the existing 
 Castle. Their location in the land dated from 
 the Conquest ; while the Castle was of the early 
 Tudor period. But the lords of Artingale must 
 have lived beneath some roof in the antecedent 
 time ; and Sir Hildebrand, and Mr. Decimus 
 Oblong, and the local antiquaries and the Billi- 
 ford guide-book maintained that certain very 
 donjon-like cellars, beneath what was now the
 
 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 89 
 
 great staircase, were the remains of an earlier 
 mansion, and dated from a period as early as 
 — any date Sir Hildebrand thought fit to assign 
 to them. 
 
 The main part of the existing buildings, how- 
 ever, clearly belonged to the early Tudor period. 
 But the great terrace, and the Italian garden in 
 front of it, had been constructed after the Eesto- 
 ration. The front of the building, along which 
 this terrace ran, faced the south, and turned 
 its back on the sea, the coast of which was about 
 four miles to the northward. The main entrance 
 of the Castle was not in this southern front, but 
 on the side of the building, on the left-hand of 
 one facing in that direction, — to the eastward that 
 is to say. On that side lay the greatest extent 
 of the park, through which the road approached 
 the Castle, having entered it nearly three miles 
 from the house, at the gate-house which opened 
 on the road from Billiford, on the south, to 
 Billmouth, a little fishing village of that name, 
 on the coast to the northwards. 
 
 On the other side, on the right, that is^ of one 
 standing on the terrace and looking southwards, 
 was the chapel, believed to be the oldest part of 
 the now existing buildings, once a gem of Grothic
 
 90 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 architecture, but now little better than a ruin, 
 though a very picturesque one. The roof was 
 still on, though not in very water-tight condition. 
 But the principal beauty of the building, which 
 still remained to it, consisted of the windows of 
 what, in technical ecclesiastical phraseology, is 
 called the east end, and should be such in fact ; 
 but which, in the case of the chapel of Artingale 
 Castle, was the south end. For the chapel had 
 been built in such sort that the east side of it 
 was contiguous with the west side of the Castle ; 
 and there were two entrances to it, one from the 
 outside at the (should be) west front, which in 
 fact was to the north, and one from the interior 
 of the Castle at the east side. But the whole of 
 that portion of the little chapel which answered 
 to the position of the lady-chapel in a cathedral, 
 the part which (formed like the majority of 
 French cathedral churches, and unlike almost 
 all English ones) was enclosed by a pentagonal 
 east end, and which contained in each of its 
 ^YQ walls the beautiful windows, or rather the 
 remains of them — all this portion of the chapel, 
 in form like a huge bay window, projected 
 beyond the southern front of the Castle ; in such 
 sort that it formed the western boundary of the 
 grand terrace.
 
 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 91 
 
 The stone-work in these windows was still nearly 
 complete, and very beautiful ; and the beauty 
 was increased by the thick drapery of ivy which 
 had covered the whole of that part of the chapel 
 walls ; only that there was rather too much of a 
 good thing, and the yearly encroaching ivy threat- 
 ened at last to turn the whole pentagonal end of 
 the chapel into a huge and shapeless mass of 
 green. And this was the little pet bit of restora- 
 tion that Mary Artingale most sighed for — the 
 clipping of the ivy in such a manner as to 
 constrain it to let the beautiful arches and 
 mullions of the windows to be seen. It will be 
 understood, if I have succeeded in making my 
 topography intelligible to the reader, that one of 
 the five windows of the east end of the chapel 
 looked right down the length of the terrace, 
 forming a most beautiful termination to it. This 
 one window Mary had prevailed on Mr. Decimus 
 Oblong to have liberated from the obliterating 
 ivy ; and Mary, in her moonlight walks on the 
 great terrace, could thus enjoy the capricious 
 play of the moonbeams finding their devious 
 way into the interior of the deserted chapel, 
 through the ivy-clothed opposite windows to 
 the west and south-west.
 
 92 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 The inhabited portion of the house was that 
 on the east side, nearest the entrance, and at 
 the opposite end of the terrace to the chapel. 
 And that wing had two good rooms, looking on 
 to the terrace, besides a charming little window 
 occupying a projection facing and corresponding 
 to the projecting part of the chapel which has 
 been described. This little room, which indeed 
 could be considered such only by comparison 
 with its neighbours, was a square as large in 
 either direction as the width of the terrace ; and 
 it had two windows at right angles ; so that one 
 of them, to the south, looked over the country 
 beyond the terrace in that direction, and the 
 other, looking to the west, commanded the entire 
 length of the terrace. This room was called 
 Lady Lavinia's boudoir. But as her ladyship 
 had for many years made a practice of sitting 
 in her chamber during the entire morning and 
 until dinner-time, the delightful little room in 
 the south-eastern angle of the Castle had become 
 the joint property and favourite abiding place of 
 Mary and her aunt, Miss Agnes. 
 
 There are few more exquisitely beautiful 
 home-views in England — which is equivalent to 
 saying that there are few in the world — than
 
 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 93 
 
 that commanded from the windows of this room, 
 and indeed by the whole of the terrace to the south 
 of Artingale Castle. The main feature in the 
 landscape is the wide valley of the little river, the 
 Bill ; a valley a world too wide for the purpose 
 of affording a way for that noisy and fussily 
 important little stream to the sea. The Castle, as 
 has. been said, stands at about three or four miles 
 from the coast, turning its back on it, and facing 
 the more genial southern and inland view. 
 Almost immediately behind the Castle — perhaps 
 at nearly half-a-mile distant from it — the noisy 
 little stream of the Bill expands itself into a 
 tidal estuary ; and, content with its increased 
 importance, becomes silent. The estuary itself, 
 however, is but a small one, barely affording at 
 its mouth the means of shelter for a few fishing 
 boats. The general course of the stream, coming 
 down from a tract of high moorland farther to 
 the south, is from south to north. But at that 
 part of its course at which Artingale Castle 
 stands it has been forced, by the projection from 
 the western side of the valley of a promontory 
 of some geological formation too hard for the 
 chafing little river to cut through, to deviate 
 from its course, making a turn to the eastward
 
 94 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 in front of the Castle, and resuming its southward 
 course as soon as the obstacle has been got 
 round. Upon this sort of promontory the Castle 
 stands, facing the up valley southward, and 
 looking from its back windows over the es- 
 tuary. 
 
 The little promontory which thus turns the 
 stream for a short space out of its course, and 
 on which the Castle is built, is not high ; nor are 
 the gently sloping sides of the valley through 
 which the river runs, and which shut in the view 
 from the terrace and the south front of the 
 building. The flat bottom of the valley is 
 occupied by grazing land and meadows, in part 
 irrigated, and all of them of the brightest green. 
 The swelling sides of the valley, diversified and 
 divided by numberless yet smaller valleys and 
 ravines, bringing tiny contributions of water to 
 the Bill, are very richly wooded. An abundance 
 of the silver birch fringes the lower extremity 
 of the woodland in a wavy line, every here and 
 there receding up the hill-side sufficiently to 
 allow an upland meadow to encroach on the 
 domain of the woods, and anon descending into 
 the valley so far as to plant its most advanced 
 videttes on the margin of the river. The upper
 
 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 95 
 
 portion of the woods consists of alternations of 
 oak, beech, and plantations of larch. 
 
 Nestled into a little fold of the hill- side on the 
 eastern slope of the valley, almost on a level 
 with the stream at the bottom of it, at no great 
 distance from the before-mentioned park gates, 
 yet so placed as to be nearer to the south-eastern 
 angle of the Castle than they, is the little village 
 of Artingale, with its church, its delicately- 
 tapering church spire, and last, not least im- 
 portant, its somewhat celebrated peal of bells. 
 They were very musical bells ; and Mary 
 Artingale often raised a question whether the 
 rooks in the rookery, which stood just on the 
 further side of the chapel at the western end of 
 the terrace, or the Artingale bells in their nook 
 to the south-east of it, made the sweeter music. 
 
 Add to all these elements of beauty a numerous 
 population of grazing herds on the pasture lands 
 at the bottom of the valley, many a glimmering 
 and glistening patch of the sparkling waters of 
 the Bill, caught by the eye here and there in its 
 sinuous course down the glen ; and close in the 
 whole with the distant blue line of the moorland 
 high grounds, varied in one or two places by the 
 craggy outline of rocks rising above the rest of
 
 96 
 
 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the horizon— and it will be admitted that the 
 inmates of Artingale Castle had a fair scene to 
 look on, and abundantly wherewithal to endear 
 them to their home.
 
 97 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 OF FARLANDSTOKE. 
 
 It was a lovely spring morning in April, 18 — , 
 and Sir Hildebrand, having left his sister and 
 his daughter in the breakfast-room (Lady 
 Lavinia never, by any chance, appeared at 
 breakfast), had retired to his study, a comfort- 
 able and handsome room at the north-east angle 
 of the Castle, and forming there a projection 
 which corresponded to that occupied on the south- 
 east angle by the room which has been described 
 as Lady Lavinia's boudoir. The baronet's study 
 had also two windows at right angles, one of 
 which, that to the east, commanded a view of 
 the drive, by which the principal entrance of 
 the Castle was approached ; and the other, that 
 to the north, caught a distant view of the estuary 
 of the Bill, and a peep at the sea beyond. Over 
 the chimneypiece, which fronted this latter 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 window, there was hung a magnificently-em- 
 blazoned pedigree of the Artingales, beginning 
 with Sir Leoline, who came over with William 
 the Conqueror. The large sheet on which the 
 pedigree had been originally engrossed and 
 emblazoned was mounted on a much larger 
 sheet, so as to leave a large margin, on which a 
 great number of notes and references, the results 
 of Sir Hildebrand's studies and researches, were 
 written in his fine and carefully- formed, but 
 somewhat crabbed characters. 
 
 Sir Hildebrand sat himself down, on the morn- 
 ing mentioned, to his morning's work, at his 
 study table, and proceeded slowly and methodi- 
 cally to draw forth sundry bundles of papers, on 
 which it was to be expended. 
 
 He was a handsomely built personable man, 
 somewhat heavily formed for his time of life, 
 which was still on the sunny side of fifty ; not 
 that he had any tendency to that paunchiness 
 which but too often results from fifty years of 
 more feeding than working, but the whole 
 framework of the man was massive; his limbs 
 were huge, and his hands and feet the same. And 
 the make of him, as well as the manner of his 
 movements, was of the kind that indicates a lym-
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. 99 
 
 phatic temperament. Of his face much the same 
 might be said. It was composed of regular and 
 not ill-cut features, and would have been really 
 handsome if the lower part of it had not been 
 more massive and heavily formed than the upper 
 part. The eyebrows were black, large, and re- 
 gularly shaped, but so much arched as to impart 
 to the countenance an expression which was not 
 that of deep wisdom. He was entirely and 
 scrupulously shaved, and the large extent of face 
 thus exhibited had a complexion which was 
 almost that of a young girl in the purity and 
 delicacy of its pink and white. The mouth was 
 indicative of weakness, but thoroughly good- 
 natured in expression. As for his costume it is as 
 well to describe it, once for all, because it never 
 varied, save from its before-dinner phase to its 
 after-dinner phase, and because it was as much 
 a part of the ideal presentment answering to the 
 name of Sir Hildebrand Artingale_, in the minds 
 of all those who knew him, as his face itself. 
 He wore powder, a square-cut blue tail-coat with 
 brass buttons, and light-coloured drab kerseymere 
 breeches, which, with Hessian boots, set off his 
 tall j&gure to much advantage. Add to this a 
 double eye-glass hanging from his neck, and a
 
 100 ARTINGALE CASTILE. 
 
 somewhat broad-brimmed and low-crowned black 
 beaver, which he had a habit of carrying in his 
 hand more frequently than on his head ; and 
 further, picture to yourself a carriage almost 
 ridiculously erect ; a gait, the grace of which was 
 injured by a tendency to a slight rising on the toes 
 while walking, and which was further calculated 
 to provoke a smile in those who saw the baronet for 
 the first time by the extreme and precise turning 
 out of the toes of the handsome Hessian boots ; — - 
 let the reader, I say, put together these proper- 
 ties and accidents in his mind's eye, and he will 
 have as accurate a picture of the baronet in the 
 flesh, and, indeed, nearly as complete a know- 
 ledge of the man in the spirit, as if he had lived 
 in the northern division of the county of Sill- 
 shire for the last quarter of the past, and the 
 first quarter of the present century. 
 
 One more trait, and the portrait shall be 
 handed over to the reader's imagination for fill- 
 ing up, without any further touches. Sir Hilde- 
 brand's gloves cost him nine pounds two and 
 sixpence a year ! I do not think that the fact 
 ever presented itself to his mind in that form ; 
 but I deduce it from a long observation of his 
 practice, joined to an elaborate calculation. They
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. 101 
 
 were a pair of very thick handsome buckskin 
 gloves — a pair, for it was not on record that he 
 had ever changed or replaced them by a new 
 pair — and therefore I leave out of my calculation 
 of the expense of them the original cost. He 
 never wore them by any chance, but always took 
 them out with him ; always threw them into his 
 hat when he carried it in his hand, and always 
 lost them every day. Every day they were 
 brought home to the Castle by some ragged little 
 urchin of the village, and every day this service 
 was rewarded with sixpence = per annum 
 9Z. 25. 6(i., Q. E. D., barring leap-year. Sir Hilde- 
 brand's gloves were a regular source of income, 
 and the finding them a recognised industry 
 among the village urchins^ who might often be 
 seen tracking the baronet at a respectful distance, 
 and eagerly awaiting the results of his careless- 
 ness. 
 
 Sir Hildebrand had barely sat himself down 
 to his table, and pulled out his papers, as has 
 been said, when he was interrupted by the 
 entrance of an old servant in livery, who, shut- 
 ting the door behind him, advanced two steps 
 into the room, and made a low bow before 
 speaking his errand.
 
 102 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " If you please, Sir Hildebrand, Mr. Oblong 
 is wishful to speak to your honour." 
 
 " Been here long, Eichard ?" 
 
 '^ Not long. Sir Hildebrand. Your honour 
 was at breakfast when he come." 
 
 " Tell him I am ready to see him, Eichard ; 
 — and, Eichard, put a chair on that side of the 
 table for Mr. Oblong. Mr. Oblong is beginning 
 to get an old man !" 
 
 " Hey ! your honour ; he beginned that a 
 goodish number of years ago, Mr. Oblong did ; 
 but he don't think himself an old man ! I'll go 
 bail, your honour, he thinks hisself younger nor 
 lam!" 
 
 "Shouldn't wonder, Eichard! Tell him to 
 come in," said the baronet, who seldom let any 
 occasion of communicating with a servant pass 
 without some few words in the nature of chat. 
 Sir Hildebrand's servants and dependents thought 
 him the least proud gentleman in the world ; 
 but the county gentry, his neighbours, thought 
 him a few degrees prouder than Lucifer. 
 
 Mr. Decimus Oblong entered, — very evidently, 
 whatever he might think about it, a much older 
 man than Eichard. He was very tall, taller 
 than Sir Hildebrand — as thin as a whipping-
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. 103 
 
 post, and almost as upright, though evidently 
 a little shaky about the knees. 
 
 "How do. Oblong? Always hearty, eh? 
 How's the rheumatism, eh ? Sit down," said 
 Sir Hildebrand. 
 
 " Oh ! bless your heart. Sir Hildebrand, fve 
 no rheumatism — not to speak of ; but I suppose 
 I shall have some day as I get on. It's what we 
 most of us come to. But for the present, Sir 
 Hildebrand — for the present, I don't feel that I 
 am much the worse for wear." 
 
 " That's right. I wish the ceilings of the 
 great staircase were like you. Oblong. But I 
 fear they will come down before you do. I was 
 looking at them before breakfast. I am sadly 
 afraid that if we cannot manage to do something 
 before long, we shall have to talk of rebuilding 
 the old place instead of restoring it." 
 
 " My errand this morning. Sir Hildebrand, 
 was to tell you that T think I see a fair chance — 
 a very fair chance — of being able to get to work 
 at the repairs at once." 
 
 " What, have you seen Mr. Farland ?" asked 
 the baronet, eagerly, while the sudden flush over 
 his large pink and white face showed how closely
 
 104 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the matter on which the old steward had touched 
 sat to his heart. 
 
 " Yes, Sir Hildebrand, I saw him yesterday 
 evening. He has just returned to Stoke with 
 young Mr. FeHx from Bath. He bid me tell 
 you, with his compliments, that he and Mr. 
 Felix hope to have the pleasure of riding over 
 to the Castle to-morrow morning." 
 
 ''And about — about our notion, Oblong? — 
 the idea which suggested itself to you, you 
 know, respecting the — ha — hum " 
 
 " Well, Sir Hildebrand, my impression is that 
 Mr. Farland would be likely enough to fall in 
 with such a proposal. It was not my place, you 
 know, Sir Hildebrand, to do more than feel the 
 ground, as I may say ; and I did feel the 
 ground — just feel the ground as far as I thought 
 I could do without presumption ; and my im- 
 pression is that Mr. Farland would not be 
 indisposed to entertain the idea — ah — ha — hum 
 — ^yes ! I may say — entertain the idea. Mr. 
 Farland alluded to the expediency of certain 
 conditions — alluded vaguely and generally, as 
 of course he would do to a person in my posi- 
 tion ; and I have no doubt — really. Sir Hilde- 
 brand, no doubt that his purpose in riding over
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. 105 
 
 here to-morrow morning is to discuss the matter 
 with you himself." 
 
 "Yery good, Oblong, very good. You have 
 managed the matter very discreetly — very ; and 
 it would he a very great thing ! Wouldn't it, 
 Oblong, eh?" 
 
 " A very fine thing, indeed. Sir Hildebrand ; 
 and I am sure I for one should go to m.y grave 
 content when I had lived to see the job done." 
 
 Now the " idea " which had been suggested 
 and the "job" to be done were briefly these. 
 It had been suggested by the steward that Mr. 
 Farland might lend Sir Hildebrand the sum of 
 money necessary for the restoration of the 
 Castle. But to make the reader understand the 
 value and the feasibility of the idea, it is ne- 
 cessary to explain who Mr. Farland was. 
 
 Felix Farland, of Farlandstoke, was a country 
 gentleman, the owner of a very pretty estate of 
 that name in the adjoining parish to Artingale. 
 The property was a very much smaller one than 
 that of Artingale ; and the residence on it was a 
 house of infinitely less importance and pretension 
 than Artingale Castle. Yet Mr. Farland was a 
 very much richer man, especially richer in 
 available ready cash than Sir Hildebrand ; and
 
 106 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the house at Farlandstoke was a yet more 
 ancient mansion than the Castle. The Far- 
 lands indeed were an older family in the county 
 than the Artingales, being one of those few 
 remaining families of Saxon blood who main- 
 tained the pretension, and it was believed with 
 justice, that they had held their lands from father 
 to son from times anterior to the Conquest ; and 
 Felix Farland, Esquire, was to the full as proud 
 of his Saxon descent as Sir Hildebrand Artin- 
 gale could be of his Norman ancestry ; and the 
 two representatives of the two old once-hostile 
 races had many a sparring match together on 
 the subject — all in good part and on friendly, 
 neighbourly terms, although the two men were 
 almost as dissimilar as it was possible for two 
 country gentlemen, both of ancient blood, to be. 
 Mr. Farland was, to begin with, sixty years 
 old — a good fifteen years Sir Hildebrand's 
 senior — though in vivacity of manner and 
 brightness of mind he might well have seemed 
 the younger of the two. The fact was, that the 
 elder gentleman was a man of considerable 
 talent and quickness of parts, shrewd, active- 
 minded, and a scholar of very considerable, 
 especially antiquarian, learning; whereas the
 
 OF FARLANDSTOKE. 107 
 
 baronet was, it can hardly be denied, rather a 
 dull fellow, and very much of a blockhead. Then 
 Mr. Farland was a small man, and Sir Hilde- 
 brand was a very big one. Mr. Farland was 
 the father of an only son — Sir Hildebrand of an 
 only daughter. Mr. Farland was a widower — 
 the baronet's wife was yet living. Finally, Sir 
 Hildebrand might be called for the reasons, and 
 in the sense which has been explained, a poor 
 man, while Mr. Farland was a very rich one. 
 
 The manner in which this last point of con- 
 trast came to pass was this. The Farlands had 
 for very many generations been very small 
 landowners in comparison with their Norman- 
 descended neighbours the Artingales. The 
 rental of the latter property was at least tenfold 
 that of the former. But the Artingales had 
 been in some degree permanently and in a much 
 greater degree temporarily impoverished by the 
 causes which have been related ; while the 
 father of Felix Farland the elder, the present 
 owner of Farlandstoke, had married the enor- 
 mously rich heiress of vast iron mines and iron 
 works in South Wales. Felix Farland the 
 elder, the sexagenarian owner of Farlandstoke 
 at the time of my story, and the father of Felix
 
 108 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Farland the younger, bad also married an heiress, 
 who had brought him a large and very valuable 
 estate situated in the rich alluvial flats of 
 Somersetshire, near Bridgewater ; and Felix 
 Farland the elder bad been, and Felix Farland 
 the younger now was, an only son. The Somer- 
 setshire heiress had died young when her only 
 child was but seven years old, and since that 
 time his father had lived the life of a solitary 
 and studious bachelor, having occasion for but 
 small expenses beyond what was required for 
 the continual increase of his library. So that it 
 came to pass at the time of which I am speaking 
 that Felix Farland, Esq., of Farlandstoke, was a 
 very wealthy man indeed. 
 
 The mansion at Farlandstoke was also a very 
 different style of residence from the Castle at 
 Artingale. There was a certain portion of it 
 which Mr. Farland maintained was as old as the 
 twelfth century at least ; and in all probability 
 it was so. This ancient work, however, formed 
 no part of either of the outer facades of the 
 existing house, but was entirely enclosed in 
 building of a more recent date, much as the 
 dwelling-house of Ignatius Loyola has been 
 enclosed by a comparatively modern church ;
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. 109 
 
 and this ancient kernel of his mansion was held 
 by the master of it to be well-nigh as sacred as 
 the Order of Jesus deem the jealously guarded 
 dwelling of their founder. The oldest part of 
 the visible fagade of the house was the entrance 
 and the porch, and the bay window over it; 
 and a very picturesque morsel it was — built of 
 deep-coloured red bricks, with cut stone corners 
 and mouldings ; but the house in general made 
 no pretence to symmetry or uniformity. Origin- 
 ally a quiet small residence, it had been in- 
 creased, not to any very great extent, at various 
 periods; the most notable enlargement having 
 been a long gallery, run out by the present 
 owner from the side of the house, in communica- 
 tion with his own study, for the accommodation 
 of his extensive library. 
 
 Now, different, and indeed contrasted in many 
 points, as the men were. Sir Hildebrand Artin- 
 gale and Mr. Farland had always been very 
 good neighbours, and, to a certain degree, friends. 
 They were the representatives of the two by far 
 oldest names in that part of the country ; and 
 they had both, though in somewhat different 
 ways, a strong reverence for antiquity and for 
 ancient blood, and a feehng of respect for each
 
 110 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 other on that ground to begin with. When Sir 
 Hildebrand had first taken possession of his 
 estates and the Castle, then a young man of one- 
 and'twenty, he had found Mr. Farland his 
 nearest resident neighbour ; and the elder man 
 had very cordially welcomed the younger one, 
 and taken him by the hand, while giving pro- 
 nounced expression, as he did so, to that 
 deference which was so dear to Sir Hildebrand, 
 and which was genuinely felt by Mr. Farland 
 towards the representative of such a name, and 
 the owner of such a grand monument of 
 antiquity as the Castle. And time had gone on 
 ripening their intimacy into friendship. They 
 had discussed together many a magnum of port 
 in the provisional dining-room at Artingale, and 
 as many in the more thoroughly comfortable 
 oaken-panelled parlour at Farlandstoke ; and 
 they had wrangled almost as frequently over 
 the pretensions to antiquity and comparative 
 glories of their families. 
 
 They had also very often during the later 
 years of the period inquestion discussed another 
 matter with less of wrangling and greater 
 identity of views. In a word, it had appeared 
 very desirable to both fathers that their names
 
 Ill 
 
 and estates should be united by the union of 
 their children. Of course, Sir Hildebrand would 
 have much preferred having a son of his own. 
 But of this, alas! there was no chance. If, 
 indeed, it should please Providence, taking into 
 consideration the peculiarity and urgency of the 
 circumstances, to remove the Lady Lavinia, and 
 so leave it open to the baronet to contract a 
 second alliance^ from which an heir to his name 
 and title might be hoped, the case would have 
 been a different one. But the ailments of the 
 Lady Lavinia seemed to be of the nature of 
 those which has given rise to the saying — the 
 creaking wheel runs the longest ! And to do 
 the baronet justice, it never entered his head to 
 wish that his plaintive wife's placid days should 
 be shortened. He was a very kind husband, as 
 far as he knew how to be, and was entirely dis- 
 posed to be so to a wife who worshipped the 
 Artingale greatness, and himself as the incarna- 
 tion of it, so thoroughly as the Lady Lavinia did. 
 Mr. Farland also had formed his own opinion 
 on this part of the subject. He had taken more 
 than one opportunity of obtaining from that 
 somewhat bluff and coarse, but exceedingly 
 shrewd practitioner of the old school, Mr. Jonas
 
 112 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Hathaway, bis opinion on this point. And the 
 result was that Mr. Farland did not see any- 
 great probability that Sir fiildebrand would 
 ever form a second marriage. And if he did 
 not, Mary Artingale would assuredly be a 
 great heiress. Mr. Farland was perfectly well 
 acquainted with the exact position of the Artin- 
 gale estates ; knew all that had been done to 
 clear them, and how much remained still to be 
 accomplished. He knew quite as well as the 
 baronet himself, and much more scientifically, 
 what was needed for the perfect restoration of 
 the Castle ; and was perfectly well aware of the 
 difficulty of finding means for doing this, and at 
 the same time going on with the arrangements 
 for the clearance of the property. 
 
 Knowing and clearly understanding all this, 
 Mr. Farland was well aware that Mary would 
 be an heiress very well worth having, even by 
 so rich a man as his son would be. It would be 
 the third wealthy marriage made in succession 
 by three generations of the house of Farland, 
 and would place that family in a position in the 
 county, and, indeed, in England, which need veil 
 the bonnet to never a Norman-descended noble 
 in the land !
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. L13 
 
 But the mere wealth that was one day to be 
 Mary Artingale's made in Mr. Farland's mind 
 but a small — or, at any rate, a quite secondary — 
 item of the desirableness of a marriage between 
 her and his son. There was the blood, the 
 name, the situation of the broad and rich acres 
 close to his own, and lying around Farlandstoke, 
 for more desirable in his eyes than any acres 
 elsewhere. And then, above all — yes, I really 
 think, above all in the considerations which 
 tempted Mr. Farland to desire the match — there 
 was the Castle itself. He not only strongly sym- 
 pathised with Sir Hildebrand's longing for the 
 restoration of it — it might almost be said that he 
 was as anxious about it as the owner. Mr. 
 Farland was not an envious or covetous man, 
 nor by any means disposed to think that any 
 body had got anything better than he had 
 himself. But he did almost envy Sir Hildebrand 
 the possession of Artingale Castle. Then he 
 feared, very greatly feared, that Sir Hildebrand 
 would make a mess of the great work of restora- 
 tion, if he were ever able to take it in hand. 
 He feared that the baronet would not be so 
 amenable to advice as could be wished in this 
 matter. He felt that he himself knew exactly 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 AKTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 how every part of the work should be done, and 
 carried in his mind's eye the appearance of the 
 restored fabric as clearly as it could be shown in 
 an architect's plan. 
 
 If only he could have the doing of it, what a 
 place he would make of it ! And if his son and 
 the heiress of Artingale were to be man and 
 wife, he would at least, it might be hoped, have 
 some say in the matter. And then what a name, 
 what a race would be that that should spring 
 from such an alliance ! Two such names joined ! 
 What nobility could boast such a descent as 
 that from the Saxon Farland and the Norman 
 Artingale ! 
 
 Thus although Mr. Farland, the son and the 
 husband of wealthy heiresses, was quite alive to 
 the advantages of Mary Artingale's pecuniary 
 expectations, his desire for the marriage was not 
 altogether mercenary in its nature. It recom- 
 mended itself to his antiquarian and genealogical 
 tastes and prejudices yet more strongly than to 
 his sense of the value of wealth. And to the 
 baronet the idea was an equally acceptable one 
 from feelings and considerations of much the 
 same sort, partaking in his case rather more of 
 the appreciation for pelf, pure and simple, and
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. 115 
 
 rather less of gratification for his antiquarian 
 tastes perhaps, than in that of his more highly- 
 educated and cultured neighbour. 
 
 Both the fathers, however, had long since 
 satisfied themselves that such a marriage would 
 be, under all circumstances, a very desirable 
 one. They had not, in their frequent discussions 
 of the matter, spoken much of the aptitudes or 
 qualifications of the parties more immediately 
 concerned. It is a way fathers are apt to have, 
 to leave such minutiae out of the question. The 
 two representatives of the two ancient families 
 had talked much and long as to the assuming of 
 names and arms, and such matters, but had 
 taken the acquiescence of their children quite as 
 a matter of course. Mr. Farland indeed had in 
 no wise concealed his ideas upon the subject 
 from his son, and had met with no sort of op- 
 position to them in that quarter. All the 
 country side knew that Mary Artingale was a 
 very lovely girl, and Felix Farland, junior, was 
 as much aware of the fact as the rest of the 
 world. Every one knew that the Lady Lavinia 
 was a cipher, and a sick cipher too, if one may 
 be allowed that somewhat incongruous mixture 
 of metaphor with literalness. And everybody
 
 116' ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 in the north of Sillshire had the highest possible 
 respect for and opinion of Miss Agnes Artingale ; 
 and knew that the education of Mary was the 
 work of her intellect and her loving care. Mary 
 had lived among the Sillshire world all her life, 
 and nothing but good had been ever heard of 
 her. And it is not, therefore, much to be won- 
 dered at if Mr. Farland, junior, notwithstanding 
 he had as yet but little opportunity of knowing 
 Mary Artingale, found nothing to object to in 
 his father's notion. 
 
 As for Mary, no such direct communication of 
 the destiny intended for her had as yet been 
 made to her. It had been considered premature, 
 and on the whole injudicious to do so. Enough, 
 however, had been often said in Mary's hearing, 
 by all those about her, to lead her to guess that 
 it was probable enough that her parents might 
 consider young Mr. Farland as the most suitable 
 person for _her future husband, and to invest 
 him, therefore, with an interest in her eyes. As 
 yet she could hardly be said to be acquainted 
 with him ; for since they had both been children, 
 and during his holidays playmates, he had 
 been at Oxford, and almost entirely absent in 
 Somersetshire during the vacations. Sir Hil-
 
 FELIX FARLAND, OF FARLANDSTOKE. 117 
 
 debrand, however, felt perfectly secure of the 
 dutiful acquiescence of his daughter, and ex- 
 pressed himself to Mr. Farland as having no 
 shadow of doubt on the subject. Was she not 
 an Artingale ? And even in the altogether 
 improbable case of her inclinations prompting 
 her to differ from her relatives in her views as 
 to the bestowal of her hand, had not the ladies 
 of his house always known how to postpone 
 inclination to duty in these as in all other 
 matters ? 
 
 Now this was the state of circumstances under 
 which an idea had occurred to Mr. Decimus 
 Oblong, which had been eagerly adopted by 
 Sir Hildebrand, that it was not improbable that 
 Mr. Farland might be willing to lend the money 
 necessary for the restoration of the Castle. And 
 this, in fact, was the business on which that 
 gentleman had proposed to talk with Sir Hil- 
 debrand on the morrow of the day on which 
 the steward gave Mr. Farland's message to his 
 master.
 
 118 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 FELIX FARLAND, THE YOUNGER. 
 
 About ten o'clock on the following morning 
 Mr. Felix Farland, senior, and Mr. Felix Farland, 
 junior, were trotting up the road through Ar- 
 tingale Park to the Castle door, followed by a 
 groom who was carrying, rather to his own 
 inconvenience, a large something, about the size 
 of a man's head, carefully enveloped in white 
 paper. It was not a man's head, nor was it 
 any mysterious object on which the interest of 
 my story hinges, and anent which the reader is 
 to wonder and speculate till towards the end of 
 the third volume. It was simply a huge bouquet 
 of magnificent hot-house flowers. There were 
 no hot-houses, as yet, at the Castle ; and these 
 cuttings, from the abundant stores of the Far- 
 landstoke gardens, were an offering from the
 
 FELIX FARLAND, THE YOUNGER. 119 
 
 younger Mr. Farland to the intended lady of his 
 love. 
 
 " A remarkably fortunate circumstance it was, 
 Felix, that the late baronet lived no longer than 
 he did!" said the elder gentleman, looking 
 around him with much admiration on the beau- 
 tiful trees with which the park was thickly 
 studded ; " another five years of that ne'er-do- 
 weel scamp's existence, and there would not 
 have been a stick of it left ! The mischief would 
 have been irreparable — quite irreparable !" 
 
 " Ah ! that would have been a thousand 
 pities 1 What did he die of^ the late baronet ?" 
 
 " How should I know ? London, and London 
 ways, I suppose. He died of London ! What 
 does it signify ? He died in time ; and one 
 of the finest parks in England is as fine 
 as ever ! One of the finest parks in England, 
 I maintain it to be — and with a residence to 
 match." 
 
 " If the old walls only stood as firm as the 
 trees !" rejoined his son ; " but it is little better 
 than a ruin as it is." 
 
 " It is such a ruin, that if I had the spending 
 of some fifty thousand on it, it should be a house 
 such as no hundred thousand could now pro-
 
 120 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 duce — let alone the history of the place, and the 
 memories attached to it !" 
 
 '^Ah! the memories!" said his son. 
 
 " I don't think that you ever saw much of 
 Mary Artingale," resumed his father, after a 
 pause ; " but I suppose you remember her ?" 
 
 " Oh ! yes, sir ; I remember her," said the 
 young man. 
 
 " And don't you remember her as a charm- 
 ingly pretty girl — as one of the prettiest girls 
 you ever saw ?" 
 
 " Well, father, that would be saying a good 
 deal, you know, for a fellow who has just come 
 from spending the winter at Bath. We had 
 a rare lot of fine women there, I can tell you — 
 tip-toppers from London, some of them." 
 
 " Pooh ! London, indeed ! And ' tip-toppers ' 
 — a thoroughly vile, and objectionable phrase! 
 I will wager my head that there was not a lass 
 among them to be compared for beauty, fresh- 
 ness, or goodness to Mary Artingale !" 
 
 " I dare say you are right, sir." 
 
 " Of course I am ! Don't talk to me about 
 your fine ladies at Bath ! And hark ye, here, 
 Felix — do you think there was any one of them 
 to be found in the pump-room or at the Mall
 
 FELIX FARLAND, THE YOUNGER. 121 
 
 wlio was the heiress to such a park as this, and 
 such a castle as that, my boy ! What do you 
 say to that ?" 
 
 *' I am awake, sir ! Besides," added the 
 young man, after a pause, and in a different 
 tone, "I never meant, you know, to suppose 
 that any of that lot were fit to hold a candle to 
 Miss Artingale. Only, you see, I would not 
 have her think that I had never seen a pretty 
 face except hers in the world, or fine women, or 
 dashing women, or tip — I beg pardon — number 
 one-ers I mean." 
 
 " Number one-ers !" ejaculated the senior, with 
 a groan. " Heavens, what will become of our 
 pure vernacular speech ! Pray, Felix, is that 
 expression a recognized one among the cultivated 
 of the rising generation ? I am aware of the 
 fact that language is ever changing." 
 
 His son assured the old gentleman that the 
 phrase in question was authorized by the prac- 
 tice of the politest circles. 
 
 " In that case," rejoined the senior, " it may 
 be that Miss Artingale will not object to it. 
 Nevertheless, I should counsel you, Felix, in 
 communing with a young lady, whose walk in 
 life has hitherto been a somewhat secluded
 
 122 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 one, to be sparing of neology, however pic- 
 turesque." 
 
 " Certainly, sir !" answered the young man 
 dutifully, having, however, as much notion of 
 what his father meant as the horse he was 
 riding. 
 
 " Now I shall go into Sir Hildebrand's study 
 to speak to him on business," said Mr. Farland, 
 after another pause, as they neared the Castle, 
 and you had better ask if the ladies are at home, 
 as I have no doubt they will be. And while I 
 and the baronet are settling our affairs, do you 
 make the most of your time with Miss Mary. 
 Do you understand ?" 
 
 " I am awake, sir !" said the young man, 
 giving his father that consolatory assurance for 
 the second time. And with that the father and 
 son dismounted from their horses at the door, 
 and Mr. Felix, junior, took the bouquet from the 
 hands of the groom. 
 
 I am afraid the reader will not have been as 
 much impressed in favour of Mr. Farland, junior, 
 by what has already been seen of him, as that 
 young gentleman deserves. And it is necessary 
 that right should be done in this matter. 
 
 Felix Farland, junior, was twenty-four years
 
 FELIX FARLAND, THE YOUNGER. 123 
 
 old at the time of which I am speaking, and he 
 was what is generally called a fine young man ; 
 unquestionably, in the eyes of any recruiting 
 officer in the service, a very fine young man. He 
 stood six feet one inch in his stockings, and was 
 athletically built in proportion to this fine 
 height. His face was of that type which would 
 have proclaimed him of Teuton race, all the 
 world over. Blue eyes, well opened, frank, and 
 guileless ; a fair clear skin, ruddy with health, 
 and slightly tanned by the sun and wind ; round 
 face, with an aj^pearance of being, if anything, 
 broader than it was long ; a thoroughly good- 
 tempered mouth, with large lips, somewhat of 
 the thickest ; an abundance of light-coloured and 
 slightly curling hair ; no unshaven beard or 
 moustache ; large ears, with an indomitable ten- 
 dency to stand out from the head like handles, 
 and a kind of loose and broad manner of carry- 
 ing himself, which seemed as if every part of 
 his person were exulting in its own bigness, and 
 freedom to become bigger if it pleased — all this 
 bespoke the purity of the Saxon blood, and in- 
 dicated a nature of creature quite as different 
 from that of the Celto-Frank or Latin variety of 
 the genus homo as a dog is from a fox.
 
 124 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Such was the outward and visible presentment 
 of the heir and representative of the long line of 
 Farlands. It is a type very easily described and 
 understood, and the description of the inner man 
 need hardly be more complex. If Felix had 
 lived in the days before culture by means of 
 books had well-nigh superseded the conception 
 of any other kind of culture in men's minds, I 
 do not think that he would have been deemed 
 altogether a blockhead. As it was, I fear, he 
 was so deemed. It seemed as if the soil of his 
 mind was uncultivable by that method ; and this 
 was the more unfortunate that his father Vas 
 essentially and especially a book man. There 
 are bibliophobes as well as bibliophiles. And 
 FeHx, the younger, was afflicted by the former 
 phrase of affection to a very remarkable degree 
 — to a much greater degree, doubtless, than 
 would have been the case, had not the four-and- 
 twenty years of his life been passed in a con- 
 tinual and painful struggle against the attempt 
 on the part of the world around him to drench 
 him forcibly with book-learning. Nature is 
 strong however, and Felix nearly beat them in 
 the end. Some natures are said to throw off 
 that which is repugnant to them, as a duck's
 
 125 
 
 back does water ; and the simile expresses very 
 completely the way in which young Farland's 
 mind threw off learning. Forced upon him, as 
 it might be, by superior force for a while, 
 triumphant nature on the first opportunity ex- 
 pelled it from the system, and left the original 
 nature as untainted by the foreign substance as 
 before. 
 
 It spoke well for the young man that the 
 life-long struggle which had thus been going on 
 between him and the world around him had in 
 no degree soured his natural disposition. It is 
 true that it is more easy for the conquering 
 party to come out of a struggle with unruffled 
 temper than for the conquered party to do so ; 
 and Felix came out the life-long contest a victor. 
 The conquered party were all the teachers, 
 peedagogues, tutors, college deans, wardens, and 
 vice-chancellors, who had been conspiring to- 
 gether to force book-learning into his system. 
 Felix had beaten them triumphantly, and for- 
 gave them. 
 
 To strive to become learned and to fail in the 
 hard attempt from incapacity to learn must be 
 very painful. But Felix had been pained by no 
 such strivings. He wished only to escape from
 
 126 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the enforced attempt. He was not without powers 
 of observation, and he saw that the book-men 
 around him at the University were mainly pale, 
 while he was the very picture of health and 
 strength ; they often had headaches — he knew 
 not what a headache was ; they were frequently 
 cross and out of spirits — he was in perfect good 
 humour, and in excellent spirits, and in charity 
 with all men from one year's end to another. 
 For those who were compelled to worry them- 
 selves over books, by the necessities of finding 
 the means of life, he had the profoundest pity ; 
 but for those who, undriven by dire necessity, 
 subjected themselves to the same slavery, he had 
 but unmitigated wonder and astonishment. 
 
 For the rest, he had many qualities which all 
 men and all women consider excellent and ad- 
 mirable. Imbued by the earliest home-teachings 
 with an entire and affectionate respect for reli- 
 gion and its spiritual teachers, he would on Sun- 
 day, with punctual attention and reverence, and 
 complete assent of mind, listen to the precepts 
 which enjoined him to turn the other cheek to 
 the smiter when smitten on the first ; and on 
 Monday he would have felled to the ground with 
 Lhe utmost certainty and alacrity any human
 
 FELIX FARLAND, THE YOUNGER. 127 
 
 being who had the temerity to raise a hand 
 against him, or against any weaker creature 
 whom he felt himself called upon to protect. 
 And he generally did feel called upon to protect, 
 to the best of his judgment and light, most of 
 those around him who were weaker than himself. 
 
 He could ride like a centaur, swim like an 
 otter, jump like a stag, box like Jackson, and 
 was as complete a master of the mysteries of 
 single-stick and wrestling as the most competent 
 professors of those accomplishments. Fencing 
 he had not chosen to learn, considering it to be 
 a French, and therefore an effeminate pursuit ; a 
 conclusion to which he had been led by the mis- 
 chance that the only professor ol the art whom 
 he had happened to fall in with was a French- 
 man. 
 
 He was careful in money matters, and had a 
 shrewd, half-humorous sort of appreciation of 
 what is called " the main chance," which was not 
 in him incompatible with very considerable 
 generosity. He had a country-bred and almost 
 instinctive abhorrence of waste, but it was waste 
 in its simplest and most apparent form, not waste 
 as a political economist would understand it, that 
 revolted him. Ten useless well-fed serving-men
 
 128 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 in his father's house would not have annoyed him 
 in the least ; but the sight of a bit of good bread 
 thrown into the hog-tub was an offence to him. 
 Victuals were in the first case doing what 
 victuals were intended to do ; but the second 
 seemed to his guileless mind a wanton provoca- 
 tion of that judgment of '^want" which has 
 been promulgated by an authority equal to that 
 of scripture — if, indeed, it were not scripture — 
 against wastefulness. 
 
 On the whole, Felix Farland, the younger^ was 
 not a bad fellow, though he did talk of ladies 
 as tip-toppers, and boast of his acquaintance with 
 the belles of the Bath pump-room ; not so bad a 
 fellow as the reader was inclined, I am sure, to 
 consider him, from his first appearance on this 
 stage. Neither was he, I should be inclined to 
 think, a fellow whom many a girl, perhaps most 
 girls, might not have been easily brought to 
 love. He had the disadvantage, to be sure, of 
 extreme shyness on all occasions where the sex 
 were concerned. He was as utterly afraid of a 
 woman as he was unafraid of any man ; and the 
 real explanation of those boastings to his father 
 respecting his Bath experiences must be sought 
 in the terror with which he was looking forward
 
 FELIX FARLAND, THE YOUNGER. 129 
 
 to his coining interview with Miss Artingale. 
 It was mere bragging to keep his courage up ; 
 and shrewd old Mr. Farland, who knew his son 
 pretty well, was perfectly aware that such was 
 the case. 
 
 In the Castle, on the other hand, the promised 
 visit of the two Mr. Farlands had been looked 
 forward to with yet more of anxiety and prepa- 
 ration than on the part of the visitors ; for on 
 their side it was the young man only who was 
 at all nervous on the subject. Old Mr. Farland 
 had of course no reason to be at all anxious or 
 excited on the occasion. But Sir Hildebrand 
 could not help feeling a good deal of nervous 
 excitement. Was the great, the paramount 
 desire of his life about to be gratified ? Should 
 he indeed live to see Artingale Castle as it 
 ought to be ? What would be the nature of the 
 proposals which Mr. Farland would make to 
 him ? 
 
 Then it cannot be denied that Miss Artingale 
 had been looking forward to the visit, of which 
 her father had duly warned her, with some 
 natural girlish trepidation and expectation. The 
 state of her mind, with regard to young Far- 
 land, has been described. She had no idea that 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 130 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 it was considered by her parents as irrevocably 
 fated that she was to become Mrs. Farland, or 
 Artingale-Farland, or Farland-Artingale. She 
 was far from aware that such a marriage had 
 ever been distinctly planned, or even that such 
 a notion had ever presented itself to the Far- 
 lands, either father or son. But she knew that 
 the young man, who was coming there then for 
 the first time as a young man, was in a position 
 which made it seem to everybody a very likely, 
 natural, and suitable thing that they should 
 become man and wife ; and she felt a little 
 trepidation accordingly. 
 
 It was two or three years since she had last 
 seen Felix, and boys, and still more girls, 
 change so rapidly at that age, that it was almost 
 the same thing as making the first acquaintance 
 of a stranger. Mary had no very distinct 
 recollection of what the boy looked like when 
 last she saw him. She had been yet more of a 
 child at the time than he had been ; her de- 
 velopment into a woman both mentally and 
 physically having been one of those late and 
 rapid ones which I think are most frequently 
 observed in fine and rarely endowed female 
 natures.
 
 FELIX FARLAND, THE YOUNGER. 131 
 
 Under these circumstances it was pardonable 
 that Mary could not help looking forward to 
 the expected visit with a certain degree of 
 anxious expectation and interest ; and that — 
 though she would hardly have admitted even to 
 herself that such was the case — she should have 
 bestowed a little extra care on her toilette that 
 morning. 
 
 It was not needed; for Mary, both in face 
 and figure, was possessed of that rare perfection 
 of loveliness which no adventitious aid can 
 enhance. She was very much what her Aunt 
 Agnes had been at her age, and was an Artin- 
 gale every inch of her. She was as tall as her 
 aunt, but somewhat slighter than the queen-like 
 figure which had awed while it charmed the 
 Sillchester jeunesse doree somewhat more than a 
 quarter of a century ago. Mary was slender 
 for her height almost to a fault ; and, had it not 
 been for the air of perfect health and the fawn- 
 like elasticity of her step and movements, it 
 might have been feared that the frail delicacy of 
 her invalid mother had been inherited by her 
 child together with the beauty which had capti- 
 vated Sir Hildebrand when he was just entering 
 into manhood. Such was not the case, however ;
 
 132 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 and Mr. Decimus Oblong, whose greatest pride 
 it had been some ten years since to teach Miss 
 Mary to ride, and one of whose most onerous 
 duties it now was to accompany her on horse- 
 back, could have testified to the young lady's 
 possession of an amount of vigour and strength 
 which rather severely tested his own aged 
 powers of endurance. Sir Hildebrand was not 
 a horseman ; and it had come to be a recognized 
 part of Mr. Oblong's duties to be Mary's squire, 
 as he had been her riding-master; for Decimus 
 Oblong had in his younger days been a great 
 and famous horseman, and was still more at his 
 ease in the saddle than anywhere else. He 
 often declared that some twenty years ago 
 he should have liked nothing better than to 
 accompany such a rider as Miss Mary from one 
 side of the county to the other ; but he con- 
 fessed that her notions of a morning's ride were 
 beginning to be a little too much for him of 
 late. 
 
 Miss Agnes Artingale was, as the reader has 
 already had an opportunity of knowing, both a 
 large-hearted and a large-minded woman. The 
 two qualities can hardly exist apart indeed. 
 She was a woman of strong good sense and
 
 THE YOUNGER. 133 
 
 sound judgment ; but I think that her niece 
 Mary had the brighter intelhgence of the two. 
 There was a vein of humour in her composition 
 which did not enter into the graver character 
 of her aunt ; and I am not sure that this finer 
 element of character might not have so operated 
 as to cause Mary Artingale to follow a different 
 line of conduct from that which her aunt had 
 pursued on the occasion which has been narrated 
 at the close of the first book of this story, should 
 it ever happen to her to find herself placed in 
 similar circumstances. It was not that she was 
 less deeply conscious of the claims of duty, or 
 less capable of sacrificing inclination to those 
 claims ; but that I think it probable that she 
 might form for herself a somewhat different 
 theory of duty. 
 
 It may seem, indeed, that the adoption of a 
 line of conduct in a matter so important and so 
 thoroughly involving the entire constitution of 
 the character could hardly be supposed to depend 
 on the more or less humoristic views of life and 
 its concerns which the actor may be disposed 
 and enabled by nature to take. Yet I think 
 that it was this element in Mary Artingale's 
 character which would have led her to act
 
 134 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 differently from her aunt in such a crisis. It 
 enlarged her humanity — using that word in its 
 largest sense. It is the humorous man who 
 feels most keenly that ^'one touch of nature 
 makes all the world akin." The larger feehng 
 of what human nature expected of her would in 
 the case of Mary Artingale have limited in some 
 degree the omnipotence of the expectations of 
 " Artingale." 
 
 All such speculations, however, are super- 
 fluous — or at all events premature — as regards 
 Sir Hildebrand's daughter and heiress. One 
 thing was at all events certain at the time of 
 which I am now speaking, and that was the 
 very perfect accord and very close union which 
 existed between Mary and her aunt Agnes. 
 And it might have been very safely predicted 
 that, if ever ^ary should be unhappily called 
 upon to form a decision in any such case as that 
 which had led to her aunt's single life, that 
 aunt's counsel would have a great if not para- 
 mount share in the determining of it.
 
 135 
 
 CHAPTER y. 
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 
 
 " Is Sir Hildebrand at home, Richard, and in 
 his study, eh ?" said Mr. Farland to the old ser- 
 vant, as he entered the hall. 
 
 " Yes, sir ; his honour have been in the study 
 ever since breakfast. Mr. Oblong have been 
 with him a bit ; but I think the old man be gone 
 now." 
 
 ^^ And Miss Agnes is in the terrace-room, I 
 suppose ?" added Mr. Farland. 
 
 " Yes, sir ; Miss Agnes and Miss Mary be in 
 the terrace-room. I heard the pianer a-going as 
 I come to the door." 
 
 " Well, then, Richard, I will find my way to 
 the study, while you go and ask the ladies if 
 they will permit Mr. Farland, junior, to pay his 
 respects to them."
 
 136 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 And so saying, the elder gentleman proceeded 
 towards the well-known door of the study, 
 knocked, and entered, leaving his son to await 
 the reply which the ladies might send him. But 
 as Eichard, properly desirous of delivering the 
 message entrusted to him exactly as he received 
 it, told the ladies that Mr. Farland's " tutor" was 
 wishful to pay his respects to them, some little 
 time was lost in ascertaining the true sense of 
 the announcement, during which poor Felix, 
 with his magnificent bouquet in his hand, was 
 waiting in the hall — a delay which did not tend 
 to diminish the painful sensation of shyness with 
 which he at last entered their presence. 
 
 Mr. Farland, of Farlandstoke, senior, had no 
 such feeling to contend with in entering the 
 study of his old neighbour and crony. He found 
 the ponderous baronet sitting at his library table 
 busily occupied with, as it seemed^ a mass of 
 account-books. He got up, however, with as 
 much alacrity as it was in his nature to exhibit, 
 on the entrance of Mr. Farland, and stepped 
 forward to meet him, with some slight con- 
 sciousness at his heart of a desire to conceal the 
 fact that he had been anxiously expecting his 
 visitor.
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 137 
 
 " Ha ! Farland," he cried, " delighted to see 
 you. What a lovely morning ! no wonder you 
 were tempted out ! I am tied to my work here, 
 you see, as usual." * 
 
 " Not very busy, I hope, Sir Hildebrand ; else 
 I shall fear that I have chosen too early an hour 
 for my visit. But I wanted to be sure to find 
 you at home." 
 
 " Oh, no ! very glad you have come. Damn 
 the accounts ! I am tired of them." 
 
 " I have sent Felix, who rode over with me, 
 to make his bow to the ladies. I am afraid 
 they may think the interruption an unwarrant- 
 ably early one." 
 
 " Not at all. They will be delighted to see 
 him. So he has just returned from Bath ?" 
 
 " Yes ; the day before yesterday. And now 
 I hope he will have an opportunity of making 
 himself better known here than he has been 
 hitherto." 
 
 " Ay, to be sure. We have seen too little of 
 him." 
 
 '^ And how is my little friend Mary and Miss 
 Agnes? Her ladyship, I suppose, much as 
 usual ?" 
 
 " Yes, always suffering, poor thing ! the
 
 138 ARTIIS^GALE CASTLE. 
 
 others are all right. Mary was out on horse- 
 back with old Oblong before breakfast this morn- 
 ing. The old man's work in that respect is 
 getting a little too much for him, I am afraid, 
 though he will not hear of it. Mary will need 
 another squire before long, poor old fellow !" 
 
 '• Ay, we must try if we can provide her with 
 one, — not quite so old. Meantime, if she will 
 accept the escort of another senior, not quite so 
 far gone as old Oblong, I shall be only too happy 
 to put myself at her service." 
 
 '' That would do charmingly. I am sure Mary 
 would be most grateful. Won't you come nearer 
 the fire ?" 
 
 ' ' No, thank you ; I am warm with my ride — 
 such a delicious morning. And the park is 
 looking lovely as the spring comes on. What a 
 bit of land it is, Artingale ! If ever I envied a 
 man anything, I could find it in my heart to envy 
 ,you the possession of this park." 
 
 " And house," said the baronet, with a compla- 
 cent sort of melancholy in his tone. " Yes," he 
 added, '^ there are not many such places as Ar- 
 tingale in England — not many. But — " and 
 the baronet supplemented his word with a shrug 
 of his broad shoulders, and a deep sigh. " Ah,
 
 ARTIXGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 139 
 
 if you had Artingale, Farland," he added, with 
 a wistful look into his old neighbour's face, the 
 wistfulness of which he was too simple-hearted 
 and guileless to attempt to conceal ; " if Artin- 
 gale were yours, what a place you would make 
 of it ! But what can / do ?" 
 
 " Yes, I. think I could. I flatter myself that 
 I should know how to set about such a restora- 
 tion as should make Artingale Castle not one of 
 the finest, but the finest place in England — next 
 to Windsor. Perhaps I ought to say next to 
 Windsor." 
 
 " Of course, of course ! Though they have 
 no such staircase at Windsor as Artingale has — 
 or had once — had once. More's the pity that I 
 should have to say so. I declare to you, Far- 
 land, that the condition of that staircase has 
 been a heartache to me for twenty years. But 
 what can I do ?" 
 
 " I'll tell you what it is, Artingale : we must 
 see what we can do," said Farland, while the 
 whole of Sir Hildebrand's wide extent of pink 
 face became crimson with a flush of pleasure ; 
 " we must see what we can do. Artingale Castle 
 must be restored ; it would be a disgrace to 
 England to let it perish. And every year that
 
 140 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 passes tells terribly on the cost of the work to 
 be done. It ought to be done, and done at 
 once." 
 
 " But what is the use of talking in that way, 
 Farland, when it will take — when it must be 
 years yet before I can — in short, you know all 
 about it as well as I do," said the baronet, throw- 
 ing his bulky person back in his chair, and cross- 
 ing one Hessian-booted leg over the other. 
 
 '^ Yes, I know — I know," returned the elder 
 gentleman ; " and the fact is, the express pur- 
 pose of my ride over here this morning was to 
 have a conversation with you upon the subject, 
 and see whether we cannot hit upon some plan 
 by which the work might be begun at once." 
 
 " Would to Grod it might be possible ! Could 
 I live to see Artingale once again itself, I 
 declare to you, Farland, that I could lie down 
 and die a happy man." 
 
 " Well, now, look here. Sir Hildebrand," said 
 Farland, taking out his spectacles and putting 
 them on, though it did not seem as if he had 
 anything to look at which could need their aid ; 
 for he edged himself forward in his chair, and 
 resting his elbows on his knees, rubbed and 
 clapped his hands together as if he were washing
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 141 
 
 them, while, instead of looking at the baronet, 
 he gazed down at the carpet ; " look here. Sir 
 Hildebrand : I am almost as much interested in 
 the place as you are yourself from mere love of 
 it, and admiration for the grand old house. But, 
 of course, I do not mean to say that that inte- 
 rest alone would suffice to lead me to make to 
 you the proposals I have come here to talk over 
 with you. You will understand that ?" 
 
 " Of course, of course," said the larger man, 
 w^ith a slight touch of magnificence in his tone, 
 and getting up from his chair in his nervous 
 excitement to stand with his back to the fire on 
 the hearthrug. 
 
 " Nevertheless, my purely artistic and antiqua- 
 rian interest in the matter is great," continued 
 Mr. Farland, speaking deliberately and still 
 with an accompaniment of hand-washing ; " very 
 great. You know, however. Sir Hildebrand, 
 that I have another and further interest. Do 
 you understand me, and is it still your wish and 
 your purpose to give effect to those plans which 
 we have so often talked over together in this 
 room and at Farlandstoke ?" 
 
 " Unquestionably it is so, my dear Farland — 
 unquestionably both my wish and my purpose.
 
 142 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 What can I desire better for my Mary, what better 
 for Artingale — which latter ought indeed to be 
 the higher consideration — with me, as it would 
 be with the girl herself. A good girl is Mary, 
 Farland, and an Artingale every inch of her !" 
 
 " And I quite as unquestionably can desire 
 nothing better for my boy, and Felix could 
 desire nothing better for himself than such a 
 wife. As I was saying, therefore, I have of 
 course, looking forward to such a hope, a higher 
 and a nearer interest in Artingale and its for- 
 tunes than a merely general and antiquarian 
 one. Is it not so ?" 
 
 " Certainly, Farland ! Assuredly it must be 
 so. I will not deny that it has been a source of 
 sorrow and grief to me that Providence has not 
 seen good to bless me with a male heir to the 
 old name and the old house. It has been a long 
 and a sore grief to me. But being as it is, 
 I could wish for no better heir than a son of 
 yours, who should unite two such names and 
 two such shields." 
 
 The baronet somewhat Jesuitically got over, 
 by means of this wording of his sentiments, all 
 allusion to the vexed question of how the two 
 names were to be borne, making a mental
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF j^GAIN. 143 
 
 reservation on that important point. His old 
 friend did not fail to remark tliis, but contented 
 himself with making his mental reservation also, 
 and continued deliberately to wash his hands, 
 and gaze on the carpet at his feet, as he slowly 
 let fall, into the eager ears of the baronet, the 
 sequel of his communication. 
 
 " Feeling therefore this interest in Artingale, 
 and almost as anxious as you can be yourself, 
 my dear Sir Hildebrand, for the restoration of 
 the Castle ; well aware too, as I am, of the 
 extreme importance of not allowing the work of 
 repair to be longer delayed, it has seemed to 
 me, Sir Hildebrand, that some satisfactory 
 arrangement might be made, by virtue of which 
 I might be able to advance the funds necessary 
 for the work. Would such a scheme be agree- 
 able to you. Sir Hildebrand ?" 
 
 " My dear Farland, how can you ask such a 
 question ? Agreeable to me ! Why you know, 
 no man better, that it would be the fulfilment of 
 the dearest wish of my heart ! But — " and the 
 baronet reseated himself in his chair, let his 
 large hands fall with an expression of helpless- 
 ness on the arms of it, and shook his head slowly 
 as he added, " you also surely know, Farland,
 
 144 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 that I have no power of giving security for such 
 a sum as would be needed, without undoing that 
 clearing of the property which it has been the 
 work of my life to achieve." 
 
 " I know — I know all that ! I am, if you will 
 forgive my saying so, as well aware of the posi- 
 tion of the property as you can be yourself. I 
 am well aware of the admirable and persistent 
 efforts which you have made to restore the 
 property to its due status. But let us look how 
 the matter stands. It is my fervent hope — 
 yours too, as I gather from your words — that a 
 certain marriage settlement may be the com- 
 plete quittance in full for any money I may 
 bring forward for this purpose. This is our 
 hope and expectation. But life and its issues 
 are uncertain. The best laid plans will some- 
 times fail. We may be disappointed. It is 
 right that this contingency, improbable though 
 it be, should be provided for. Well ! this money 
 to be advanced is not going to be thrown into 
 the horsepond. It is not going to be spent in 
 riotous Hving. It is to be expended in restoring, 
 improving, and saving from destruction one of 
 the noblest mansions in England. What, ac- 
 cording to the vulgarest auctioneer's estimate,
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 145 
 
 may be the value of those old walls ? And what, 
 estimated in the same way, will be their value 
 when we shall have restored them ? I am quite 
 willing to find the needful funds for the work, 
 on the security of the restored building itself. 
 Of course I should not propose, and you would 
 not accept such an arrangement except under 
 the actual circumstances of the case, and the 
 almost certainty that the bond to be executed 
 will very shortly be destroyed as so much waste 
 paper. What say you, Sir Hildebrand, to my 
 proposition ?" 
 
 The portly and ponderous baronet was not 
 what is called demonstrative by nature, or 
 capable of giving way to any very lively ex- 
 pression of feeling. But Mr. Farland, looking 
 up at his neighbour from under his bushy eye- 
 brows with a shrewd glance, could see that again 
 his large face was suffused with a crimson flush 
 of emotion. 
 
 " My dear Farland," he said slowly^ " to you, 
 who have so much feeling in common with me 
 on this subject, I do not hesitate to confess that 
 the day which saw such an arrangement com- 
 pleted would be the happiest of my life. Of 
 course, under other circumstances, or to any 
 
 VOL. I, L
 
 146 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 other person than yourself, I could not admit 
 the idea of a mortgage on the Castle. But with 
 our views in prospect, the plan appears to be 
 perfectly unobjectionable." 
 
 " In that case " 
 
 " To be sure," interrupted the slower baronet, 
 " as you say, life is uncertain. Mary may -die 
 to-morrow, or your son may die. In the former 
 case, which God in his mercy forbid, why, I 
 should have done my best, I should have done 
 my duty by Artingale ; and those who come 
 after me — faith, I hardly know who they would 
 be, there are Artingales in the north, I believe 
 — those who come after me must do the best they 
 can. But in the latter case, should so heavy a 
 misfortune fall on us all, it would be hard " 
 
 " True, true, Sir Hildebrand ! Look here, 
 then. Should that calamity befall, I should have 
 so little care for any worldly pelf, that I am 
 quite willing that the bond should be so con- 
 ditioned that it shall be null and void in the case 
 of the death of my son before his marriage with 
 your daughter, or of his refusal to contract such 
 marriage." 
 
 " The terms, my dear Farland," said the 
 baronet, *' are more generous than I could have
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 147 
 
 ventured to propose. They are most generous. 
 But — are you well aware, Farland, of the 
 dimensions of the work to be undertaken, and 
 of the sum which will be necessary for the job ?" 
 
 "Tut, tut! that shall not be the difficulty! 
 But I think I have some tolerably correct ideas 
 upon the subject," said the elder gentleman, 
 with a slow motion of his head, which imparted 
 a pump-handle-like movement to the well- 
 barbered pigtail which stood out from the nape 
 of his neck at an angle of forty-five degrees. 
 
 " Oblong maintains that the work will go far 
 into six figures !" said the baronet, using the 
 phrase which he had heard often repeated from 
 the lips of the old steward. 
 
 "A hundred thousand!" said Mr. Farland, 
 putting his hands into his breeches pockets, 
 inclining his powdered head to one side, and 
 shutting one eye, " a hundred thousand pounds ! 
 I do not think it will cost quite that ; but if it 
 need a hundred and fifty the work shall not be 
 stinted for the lack of funds. Artingale shall be 
 restored to what it should be !" And the old 
 gentleman in his turn rose from his chair as he 
 spoke, and took his stand upon the hearthrug, 
 with his hands behind his coat-tails.
 
 148 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " You think that Oblong puts it above the 
 mark at a hundred thousand ?" inquired Sir 
 Hildebrand. 
 
 ''Well, yes! I think so. And I am not at 
 all disposed to stint the work, Sir Hildebrand; 
 far from it. But perhaps I may have better 
 data to go upon than my friend Oblong." 
 
 " Better data than Oblong !" said the baronet, 
 with a strong expression of incredulity. 
 
 " Yes, I think so — better data than Oblong 
 has; and, perhaps, I may venture to say, a 
 somewhat more competent acquaintance with the 
 subject-matter in hand. But I have not trusted 
 solely to my own knowledge and experience. 
 My old friend and crony^ Henningtree, from 
 Sillchester, has been staying with me for a few 
 days, and I have talked the matter over with 
 him. Henningtree, you know, is a very special 
 and superior man. The whole work of the 
 restoration of Sillchester Cathedral, which has 
 been about for so many years, and is now nearly 
 completed, has been in his hands. And it has 
 been done in a manner that has won golden 
 opinions from every competent judge in England. 
 I suppose that as a student of English mediaeval 
 civil and ecclesiastical architecture, Henningtree
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 149 
 
 has not his equal in the profession. He is a man 
 of large and liberal artistic culture, as well as 
 thoroughly competent practical experience. 
 Depend upon it, we could not have in all 
 England a more useful and valuable opinion upon 
 the subject than Henningtree's." 
 
 " I dare say — I dare say ! So you have 
 already consulted him ?" said the baronet, in a 
 tone which indicated a slight shade of annoy- 
 ance at what appeared to him an approach 
 towards an attempt to take the matter out of 
 his own hands. This, in truth, was exactly 
 what Mr. Farland was anxious to accomplish as 
 far as might be possible hereafter ; from no 
 other motive and with no other intention than 
 that the work should be done as well and as 
 judiciously as possible ; to which may be added 
 an unconscious desire to have for himself as large 
 a share as possible of the exceeding great plea- 
 sure of doing it. And he most unquestionably 
 was very far more competent to conduct such a 
 work than the baronet himself. But, of course. 
 Sir Hildebrand did not perceive or for an instant 
 admit any such thing. And the baronet had 
 more than enough real affection for the place, 
 and just enough of elementary notions on that
 
 150 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 and kindred subjects to be quite alive to the 
 pleasure of doing the work of restoration for 
 himself, and jealously anxious to keep it in bis 
 own bands. And eacb of tbe two gentlemen 
 knew tbe otber quite well enougb to be instinct- 
 ively aware tbat be would try bard to get for 
 bimself tbe biggest sbare of tbis very delicious 
 cake. Eacb bad bis point of vantage ground in 
 tbe contests tbat were likely to arise between 
 tbem on tbis subject. Artingale belonged to 
 Sir Hildebrand ; be was tbe master ; and en 
 dernier ressort bis will must, of course, be supreme. 
 But, on tbe otber band, Mr. Farland bad infi- 
 nitely more knowledge of tbe subject, infinitely 
 better taste^ and, in a word, all tbe advantages 
 wbicb a clever and bigbly-educated man bas 
 over a dull and very imperfectly educated one — 
 and be bad tbe power of tbe purse. Botb 
 gentlemen scented already tbe matters of con- 
 flict wbicb were likely to arise between tbem ; 
 but botb were far too eager for tbe work to be 
 begun to permit tbese prospects of disagreement 
 to stand in tbe way of tbeir purpose. 
 
 " Well, consulted — " said Farland, in reply to 
 tbe baronet's last words ; " of course it will be 
 for you to do tbat ; and mucb more of real con-
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 151 
 
 sultation must be had before anything can be 
 definitively decided on as to the method of attain- 
 ing the end we have in view. But it was 
 proper, you must feel, Sir Hildebrand, that I 
 should satisfy myself in some degree of the 
 feasibleness, the nature, and the extent of the 
 work to be undertaken before I made to you the 
 proposals which I have just laid before you." 
 
 " Yes, that is true, Farland — quite true," said 
 the baronet, while his slowly-moving mind began 
 to realize the truth that the work of restoring 
 the Castle would not be altogether so unmixedly 
 delightful in the doing as if he had the means 
 for carrying on the work in his own pocket ; 
 " but what did Mr. Henningtree say, and how 
 far had he gone into the matter ?" 
 
 " Well, of course very imperfectly as yet — 
 hardly can be said to have gone into it at all ; 
 but just forming a rough opinion from the plans 
 which I showed him " 
 
 " Plans of Artingale !" cried the baronet, 
 becoming crimson with a different feeling from 
 that which had flushed his face a few minutes 
 previously — " plans of Artingale ! Why, Far- 
 land, how came you to " 
 
 " Well, the fact is, Sir Hildebrand, that when
 
 152 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the idea I have been suggesting to you first 
 occurred to me, I obtained the existing plans of 
 the Castle from old Oblong. No doubt he 
 knew, or at least guessed my purpose ; and you 
 know, Sir Hildebrand, a hundred thousand 
 pounds, more or less, is no trifle ; and it was 
 necessary that before making you my offer I 
 should look before I leaped, you know — look 
 before I leaped, eh ?" 
 
 "Yes, that was right, too," said Sir Hilde- 
 brand ; " and what did Mr. Henningtree say ?" 
 
 " Oh ! his general remarks tended to bear me 
 out in my idea that the entire work might 
 probably be done for somewhat less than the 
 sum we talked of — perhaps for eighty thousand 
 or so. It would not be necessary, you know, to 
 bring forward all the money at once." 
 
 " No ; when one was sure that the needful 
 sums would be forthcoming as the works went 
 on. And that brings us to the question of the 
 interest, Farland," said the baronet. 
 
 " Ay ! the interest — hum ! Well, now, you 
 see, Sir Hildebrand, my interest in the matter is 
 not easily measured at so much per cent. My 
 interest is of a different kind. And look here. 
 Sir Hildebrand, my proposition would be that no
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 153 
 
 interest whatever should be iiiiderstood to accrue 
 till the entire work shall have been completed ; 
 and then the sum expended shall bear interest at 
 three per cent. ; all such interest to be deemed to 
 be satisfied and acquitted on the day of the 
 marriage between your daughter and my son. 
 Will that do ?" 
 
 " I can only say, again, Farland, that the 
 arrangement you propose is a most generous 
 one," said the baronet. 
 
 " Well,' then, we can direct Oblong and my 
 lawyer, young Hathaway, to prepare the ne- 
 cessary papers as soon as possible ; and there is 
 nothing to prevent our putting our shoulders to 
 the work to-morrow." 
 
 " To think," ejaculated the baronet, casting 
 up his eyes to the ceiling, " that I have lived 
 to begin the restoration of Artingale after all !" 
 
 " Live ! why, you are a young man yet, Sir 
 Hildebrand," said the senior, cheerily. 
 
 " Well, not a very old one, certainly ; but 
 somehow I have been longing — hopelessly long- 
 ing as far as I could see — for this day so long, 
 that I began to think it would never come to 
 me ; and now " 
 
 " It has come."
 
 154 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Thanks to you, my dear Farland — thanks to 
 your kindness and friendship." 
 
 "My dear Sir Hildebrand, not a word of 
 that ; we shall be working together for our 
 common interest — for our common interest. Of 
 course the first thing will be to have the Castle 
 thoroughly, well, and scientifically surveyed ; 
 then we shall obtain with some degree of ac- 
 curacy an idea of the nature of the results we 
 intend to produce, and then we shall be able to 
 decide where we had better begin." 
 
 '^ Just so, Farland — quite my own idea !" said 
 the baronet. 
 
 " Probably," resumed the elder gentleman, 
 " the grand hall and terrace front should receive 
 our first attention. When we have once got the 
 present heavy ceiling removed " 
 
 " Eemove the ceiling of the grand hall !" 
 cried Sir Hildebrand, aghast ; " why, that was 
 always considered a clief-d' oeuvre of the period of 
 the Restoration. Artists were brought from 
 Italy expressly for the execution of the work." 
 
 " But the house, my dear Sir Hildebrand, was 
 not built at the period of the Restoration. What 
 have we to do with the period of the Restoration 
 I should like to know — a period of utter deca-
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 155 
 
 dence as far as architecture is concerned ? When 
 we have got that ceiHng out of the way, I was 
 going to say " 
 
 " Farland, I cannot consent to any such thing. 
 All my life I have admired that fine ceiling ; 
 and I know that it has always been considered 
 one of the fine things about the Castle. Why, 
 I can remember, when I was a boy, that the old 
 housekeeper used to bid the people who came to 
 see the place to admire that ceiling, and tell 
 them that it was the work of Italian artists 
 brought to this country on purpose. I re- 
 member it as if it was yesterday." 
 
 " But don't you think, Artingale, that in 
 expending a hundred thousand pounds on the 
 restoration of the Castle we should do well to 
 be guided by some rather better authority than 
 the old housekeeper ? If the plasterers who 
 put up all that heavy ornamentation had 
 been brought from heaven instead of from 
 Italy, it would not go one inch towards showing 
 that a fourteenth-century hall ought to have a 
 seventeenth-century ceiling." 
 
 " I can't give up that ceiling, Farland ; in- 
 deed I can't. What on earth would you put in 
 the place of it ?"
 
 156 AUTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Probably nothing — probably we should find 
 the original timbers in perfectly good condition. 
 But if not they must be restored. We must 
 have the grand old rafters, to be sure." 
 
 " I never can consent to it, Farland," said 
 the liaronet, who was now heavily pacing up 
 and down the room in a fidgety state of distress. 
 
 " But consider the necessity, my dear Sir 
 Hildebrand, of keeping to some uniformity of 
 style in what we are going to do. I declare to 
 you that I do not think it would be worth while 
 to expend a hundred thousand pounds on the 
 production of some hybrid monstrosity such 
 as a millionaire brewer builds for himself when 
 he wants to do something very grand ; at least, 
 I for my part should not consider it to be worth 
 while." 
 
 The meaning of this was very plain ; and the 
 baronet began to perceive that he should by no 
 means be let to have his own way in the spend- 
 ing of the hundred thousand pounds. He had 
 a presentiment that this was but the first of 
 many a similar battle to be fought during the 
 progress of the work, and he was the more 
 anxious to hold his own, if it should be possible 
 to him to do so.
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 157 
 
 " Certainly, I understand that the style of the 
 work should be in some degree uniform," he 
 said, coming to a stand once more on the hearth- 
 rug ; " but if you consider, Farland, that that 
 handsome ceiling was put up at great cost just 
 because it was thought desirable to hide the 
 naked rafters, and that at a time when taste was 
 not at a low ebb " 
 
 " I don't know about that ! At all events, the 
 idea of those who put it up was to fashion the 
 grand old building of a grander time to the taste 
 of the day. Now we have learned better than 
 that. Artingale should show itself in every 
 feature to be the work of the age to which it really 
 belongs. Now what have you to do, you, Artin- 
 gale, who date in this land from the Conquest — 
 what have you to do with the taste of the period 
 of the Restoration ? Do you want your house to 
 look like the mushroom residence of some ducal 
 son of a Stuart king's mistress ? Leave Restora- 
 tion ceilings, plaster and whitewash to them, in 
 heaven's name, and let Artingale look like what 
 it is, the house of a gentleman, whose forefathers 
 were gentlemen in the land when their fathers, 
 if they had any, were — God only knows what !" 
 
 The heavy baronet could not resist this well-
 
 158 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 aimed flattery levelled at his weakest point. He 
 felt that he must yield, and that the fine Italian 
 ceiling was doomed. 
 
 " Well, Farland," he said, " I suppose you are 
 right, looking at it from that point of view ; I 
 suppose you are right. Have you spoken to 
 Mr. Henningtree on tJmt subject, too ?" he added, 
 with a slight remaining feeling of ill-humour. 
 
 " Oh, no ! but I quite know what I am talk- 
 ing of on that point, believe me. Sir Hildebrand, 
 without consulting anybody ; as^ indeed, you see 
 it yourself, Artingale, when you reflect on it. 
 But talking of Henningtree, it is very desirable 
 that we should both of us together have a talk 
 with him. You do not know him, I think ?" 
 
 " No ; I have been so little of late years at 
 Sillchester. I am not aware that I ever saw him 
 even." 
 
 " Well, then, will you come and dine with me 
 to-morrow, and make his acquaintance ; and 
 bring the ladies with you ? I have some of the 
 neighbours from Billiford coming to dine with me 
 — rather an omnium-gatherum party — but you 
 don't mind that. And we shall be able to have 
 some talk with Henningtree. I would name an- 
 other day, but he is away on some business of
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 159 
 
 his own to-day^ and he returns to Sillchester the 
 day after to-morrow." 
 
 " Thanks ! with all my heart ! Who have 
 you got ?" 
 
 '' Why, in the first place, Mrs. Henningtree, a 
 very clever little woman she is ; then the 
 Hathaways, father, son, and daughter. Let me 
 see, three — five — and ourselves, seven ; you and 
 Miss Agnes and Mary, ten ; — oh, and old Captain 
 Curling and an American friend of his will make 
 twelve. We shall be just a dozen. Ware 
 thirteen !" 
 
 " All right ! I rather like old Curling. As 
 for Hathaway, I think he lives half his life in 
 this house, worse luck !" sighed the husband of 
 an invalid wife. " Did you not say that the 
 young man was now your lawyer ?" 
 
 " Yes, young Hathaway is my lawyer since old 
 Barker died four months ago. Young Jonas 
 was brought up in Barker's oflSce, and then 
 went away to London, till his old master's death 
 seemed to make an opening for him at Billiford. 
 Since that time, he has transacted whatever 
 little business I have had to transact ; — a very 
 steady fellow, I fancy — and a competent lawyer." 
 
 " Yery good, we'll come. At least, I suppose
 
 160 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 my sister will have no objection. But I say, 
 Farland, I suppose that the old green seal won't 
 come out for such an omnium-gatherum party 
 as you call it, eh ?" 
 
 " Well, perhaps it might not have come out ; 
 but in your honour, it shall ; and old Hathaway 
 shall taste a glass of port that he will know to 
 be better wine than he ever drank before. 
 Hathaway understands a glass of wine as well 
 as any man in the county." 
 
 " Five o'clock, eh ?" 
 
 " Yes, five o'clock, as usual. And now I must 
 find my boy, and be off." 
 
 " Won't you go in and say how do you do to 
 the women ?" 
 
 " Well — no. I must not this morning," said 
 Mr. Farland, looking at his watch ; " I must be 
 at Billiford at one, and it is half-past twelve 
 now. Good-day, and good-bye till to-morrow. 
 I am deuced glad we have settled this business, 
 deuced glad ! Good-bye ! I will send Eichard, 
 by your leave, to call Felix." 
 
 So the two old neighbours parted, Mr. Farland 
 to ride at a brisk pace with his son to Billiford, 
 and the baronet to remain in his arm-chair 
 buried in thought and in pleasant dreams of
 
 ARTINGALE SHALL BE ITSELF AGAIN. 161 
 
 brick and mortar, and carpentry, and Artingale 
 itself again, till he was roused by the luncheon 
 bell, which always summoned him, not to join 
 his sister and daughter at that ladies' meal, but 
 to pay a visit to his invalid wife in her 
 chamber. 
 
 vol . I. M
 
 162 
 
 CHAPTER YI. 
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 
 
 " Well, Felix," said his father, as they trotted 
 through the park, " how did you speed with the 
 ladies ? I did my business very satisfactorily in 
 the study. How did you get on with yours in 
 the boudoir, eh ?" 
 
 " Well, you did not give me much time, sir," 
 said his son ; ' ' you must have done your busi- 
 ness with Sir Hildebrand very quick, for *' 
 
 " Oh ! you found the time short, eh ? Then 
 you liked your visit, T suppose ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir, I liked it ; they were very civil — 
 the ladies were !" 
 
 " Civil ! yes, I suppose they were civil !" 
 
 ** But I mean they were quite pleasant, you 
 know ; not a word of quizzing a chap, or any- 
 thing of that sort!"
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 163 
 
 " x\.nd the tip-toppers, and the number one-ers 
 of the Bath pump-room did sometimes indulge 
 in something of that sort, I conclude," said the 
 senior, with a grave smile. 
 
 " I don't know about that, sir !" rejoined his 
 son, blushing till his ears tingled ; '' I didn't say 
 that. But I do say that Miss Mary is the tip — 
 that is, the out-and-outerest — I mean, sir " 
 
 " I understand, Felix ; you mean that Mary 
 Artingale is the most charming girl that you 
 ever met with, and that your Bath acquaintances 
 are not fit to knot her shoe-tie ! That's about 
 it, isn't it ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir," said the young man, nodding his 
 head emphatically, '' that is it !" 
 
 " You're right, my boy. And she is as 
 good as she is charming ; as clever as she 
 is pretty." 
 
 " Clever 1" said Felix, alarmed ; " is she 
 clever ? Well, she didn't seem clever to me at 
 all. And that's a thing I generally find out in 
 a person at once too. I don't think there's any- 
 thing of that in her, father, I don't indeed ! 
 Why, bless your heart ! she never spoke of a 
 book all the time I was there ; and we were 
 a-talking all the while, she and I, just as if we
 
 164 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 were old friends. She did indeed ! I don't 
 think there can be much cleverness in her." 
 
 It was evident that Felix was already so 
 much smitten as to be most unusually eloquent 
 and enthusiastic in defence of Mary from so 
 injurious an imputation. Upon another occasion 
 his father would have been provoked to caus- 
 ticity by his son's anxiety to clear his lady-love 
 of all suspicion of cleverness ; but he was too 
 well pleased at the result of the interview be- 
 tween the young people to be caustic, so he 
 only said — 
 
 "• And what did you talk about_, then, that 
 showed Mary to be free from all taint of clever- 
 ness? 
 
 " Oh ! about the country, and about horses, 
 and riding, and — Miss Artingale is very fond of 
 riding, sir. And, law bless you, she knows ajl 
 the country side better twenty times than I do ! 
 She forded the Bill once, when the waters were 
 out, and her horse had to swim for it. She has 
 ridden up to the Moor many a day. She knows 
 the names of every Tor on the Moor. Then she 
 has been out for a sail in a revenue cutter ; and 
 she is very fond of dogs. Oh ! I don't believe 
 there's a bit of cleverness in her."
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 165 
 
 " Well, you'll see more of her to-morrow ; 
 for tliey are coming over to Farlandstoke to 
 dine, Sir Hildebrand, Miss Agnes, and Mary." 
 
 "What, with old Curling, and the Hath- 
 away s?" 
 
 " Yes, to be sure ! Why not ? Sir Hildebrand 
 is far too thorough a gentleman to find anything 
 disagreeable in dining with honest folk, his 
 neighbours, because they are not all of them 
 descended from companions of William the 
 Norman." 
 
 " And is Lady Lavinia coming ?" asked Felix, 
 who had been so much of an absentee from home 
 of late years as not to be aware of what all the 
 rest of the country side knew, that the Lady 
 Lavinia never, by any chance, left her home, or 
 was to be found (and that very rarely) further 
 from her chamber than the sunny flags of the 
 south terrace of the Castle. 
 
 " Lady Lavinia !" answered his father ; " oh 
 no, she is too much of an invalid ; she never 
 goes out." 
 
 "But Miss Agnes is coming? Do you know, 
 father, I shouldn't wonder if Miss Agnes was 
 rather clever. She seemed more like it, a precious 
 deal, than Miss Artingale."
 
 166 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Wliat, did she speak of a book in your 
 presence ? But never mind ! You need not 
 make an offer to her. I can't deny that I think 
 she is rather clever. You must bear with the 
 eccentricities of old folks, you know." 
 
 Felix knew that his father was laughing at 
 him, and coloured up accordingly. But he did 
 not feel sufficiently sure of quite comprehending 
 the gist of his satire to attempt any reply. So 
 he fell into a meditation on what he should say 
 to Mary on the following evening, and on her 
 appearance in evening dress. And the rest 
 of the ride to Billiford was accomplished by the 
 father and son in silence. 
 
 Meanwhile " Aunt Agnes " had been yet 
 more anxious to ascertain what impression 
 Mary's future suitor had made on her than 
 Mr. Farland had been to discover how his son 
 had been impressed by the heiress of the house 
 of Artingale. Miss Agnes was a sharer in all 
 her brother's plans, schemes^ hopes and wishes ; 
 and was perfectly aware of the family project of 
 alliance. She too was every inch an Artingale, 
 and was deeply anxious for the restoration of 
 the old Castle. She too was fully alive to the 
 duty of acting in all respects as Artingale
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 167 
 
 expected of her, and was ever ready, as has 
 already been abundantly seen, to consider the 
 claims of duty as paramount to every other con- 
 sideration. Assuredly she was not less so dis- 
 posed to consider them now, at forty, than she 
 had been on the terrace of the Moat House at 
 Sillchester when she was eighteen. Nevertheless, 
 I think it very doubtful whether she would now 
 have acted as she did on that occasion. Without 
 being one whit less leal in her allegiance to 
 conscience and to duty, I think it not improbable 
 that she might, at the latter period of life, have 
 judged differently as to the pre-eminence of the 
 conflicting claims of rival duties. She still held 
 in full force, however, the doctrine that man, and 
 in a yet greater degree woman, should be ready 
 at all times for self-sacrifice to whomsoever or 
 whatsoever had a just claim on such devotion. 
 And she held as ever to the belief that " Ar- 
 tingale " had very strong claims on all the sons 
 and on all the daughters of the race. She had 
 held^ in her own case, that these claims were 
 absolutely paramount. Was she prepared to 
 hold the same now in her niece's case ? 
 
 That all those same considerations which had 
 led her, more than twenty years ago, to refuse
 
 168 ARTIISTGALE CASTLE. 
 
 the suit of the Rev. Sandgate Perivale were 
 strongly in favour of Mary's h'stening to the 
 suit of the heir of Farlandstoke, Miss Agnes 
 was fully aware. And if only Mary could feel 
 towards Felix as she but too well remembered 
 herself to have felt towards the poor precentor, 
 all would be well. But if Miss Agnes had per- 
 haps learned to doubt how far her own decision 
 on her own case had been a wise and right one, 
 she was far clearer that at all events the great 
 and high claims of '"' Artingale " could not go to 
 the extent of making it right for Mary, or any 
 other girl, to accept a marriage in defiance of 
 the dictates of her heart. 
 
 Under these circumstances Aunt Agnes was, 
 as can be easily understood, not a little anxious 
 to ascertain what impression young Farland had 
 produced on her niece. 
 
 She herself had formed an estimate of the 
 young man quite as correct, and somewhat more 
 comprehensive, than his judgment of her had 
 been. His persuasion that Miss Agnes was to 
 be suspected of cleverness was exceeded by her 
 conviction that he was in no degree .open to any 
 such reproach. Miss Agnes, in truth, was more 
 than clever ; she was a woman of large intelli-
 
 LITTLE BERTHS. 169 
 
 gence and of (for that day) nnusually varied 
 culture ; and she had in a very few minutes 
 convinced herself that Felix Farland, junior, was 
 a young man of very limited intelligence, and 
 almost no culture at all. 
 
 But it did not, in her estimation, follow from 
 that that he might not be a very good, and in 
 all probability the best available husband for 
 Mary, if Mary could like him. He seemed to 
 be thoroughly good-natured, guileless and fresh- 
 hearted. As far as could be gathered from any 
 word that had fallen from him, his notions 
 seemed to be those of an honest-hearted, upright, 
 honourable and generous gentleman. Might not 
 Mary be as happy with such an one, and might 
 not such an one be as worthy a lord of Artingale 
 as if he were as much disposed to live in a world 
 of books as his father ? Literary culture was a 
 far more exceptional thing in those days than it 
 has become — some think not wholly happily — 
 in these latter days. Yery worthy country 
 gentlemen abounded who rarely opened a book 
 from year's end to year's end, save their prayer- 
 books in church time, and who would as soon have 
 thought of speaking of any literary subject as of 
 attempting the squaring of the circle. If Mary
 
 170 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 could like liim ? — that was the all-important 
 question. 
 
 " Well, Mary," asked the aunt, as soon as he 
 was gone, " what do you think of our new 
 neighbour ? Have you any recollection of him ?" 
 
 " Not the least bit ! I shouldn't have known 
 him if I had met him on the road. We were 
 but children when I last saw him. Indeed, he 
 seems but a big schoolboy still. What do I 
 think of him, aunt ? I don't know ! He seems 
 very good-natured, and full of spirits. I think I 
 like him. I was very much pleased by the 
 manner in which he spoke of poor little Bertha." 
 
 *' Yes, so was I, Mary ! I think his heart is 
 in the right place. And that reminds me that 
 Bertha was to come up to the Castle to make a 
 sketch this afternoon. We will go out and see 
 how she gets on, and say a word or two to her 
 after luncheon, poor little thing!" 
 
 " Why not go first, aunt, and bring her in to 
 lunch with us ?" said Mary, eagerly. 
 
 " No ; I think not, dear. It would not be 
 quite fitting. You see, Mary, Bertha's position 
 is a very exceptional one ; and that, indeed, 
 makes the greatest part of the sadness of Ker 
 lot, poor little thing. It would be to put her
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 171 
 
 mischievously out of her place to bring her to 
 lunch with us ; and it would be equally unfitting, 
 and, indeed, quite out of the question to ask 
 her to go into the servants' hall, and take a meal 
 with them." 
 
 " Oh, aunt ! Send little Bertha to eat with 
 the servants 1" 
 
 '' That is just what I say, my dear ! One 
 could not do it. That is the difficulty of her 
 position. Old Hannah, her grandmother, in 
 whose house she lives, would go into the ser- 
 vants' hall and dine with them, naturally, pro- 
 perly, and happily enough. Of course she 
 would, having been herself a servant." 
 
 ^' Was she ever in papa's service?" asked Mary. 
 
 '^ No : she had been placed in the cottage 
 where she now lives, and had a pension assigned 
 to her by Sir George, your grandpapa, before 
 his death. But for many years, for all the early 
 part of her life, Hannah was a servant in the 
 Castle. All the present servants, and all the 
 neighbourhood know that she was so. We could 
 not ask her to lunch with us. It would be no 
 kindness to her to do so. And how can we 
 treat her granddaughter, living in her house, 
 otherwise ?"
 
 172 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " I suppose you are right, aunt, as you always 
 are, you know. But I am quite sure of this ; 
 that our little Bertha is more fit to be the com- 
 panion of well-educated ladies than many who 
 are admitted into the drawing-rooms of gentle- 
 men and ladies. Compare her to Lucy Hath- 
 away, now ! Not that I mean to say anything 
 ill-natured of Lucy. I like Lucy well enough. 
 But which of the two is most like a lady ?" 
 
 " Well, dearest, I dare say that I should give 
 a judgment in accordance with yours on such a 
 point," replied her aunt ; "but for all that, Lucy, 
 whether justly or not, has the consciousness that 
 in a drawing-room she is in her right place ; 
 while poor little Bertha would have still more 
 strongly the consciousness that she was not 
 in her right place. That, as I said, is the 
 misfortune of her position. She has no right 
 place." 
 
 " Poor little darling !" rejoined Mary. "Well, 
 if we must not ask her to lunch with us, we will 
 go out to her afterwards, and have a chat with 
 her, and look at her drawing, and encourage 
 her, poor little thing ! I am sure she needs it. 
 And we may take out some fruit to her, mayn't 
 we, aunt? There can be no harm in that."
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 173 
 
 " No, I think there can be no harm in that," 
 acquiesced the elder lady. 
 
 Little Bertha, the subject of the above conver- 
 sation — she was never called otherwise than 
 " little Bertha " by every soul in the neighbour- 
 hood ; and I think that very few ever remem- 
 bered that her real name was Bertha Donne — 
 little Bertha was the daughter of one Richard 
 Donne, by his wife Bertha, the daughter of 
 Hannah Campbell, the old pensioned servant of 
 the Artingale family. Hannah's husband had 
 been Sir Greorge Artingale's butler. And in 
 the days of Sir George's prodigal life, the butler 
 and the laundry-maid had been quite sufficiently 
 well off to give their only child Bertha an 
 education much above their own rank in life. 
 Bertha Campbell had been sent to a good school, 
 where it had come to pass that the drawing- 
 master who attended the establishment had 
 fallen in love with her, and, somewhat against 
 the liking of the well-to-do servants, her parents, 
 had married her. They had hoped that their 
 child mio;ht do better than become the wife of a 
 poor artist. Bertha Campbell, however, looking 
 at the matter from a different stand-point, 
 thou2:ht the promotion from the laundry and
 
 174 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 butler's pantry to the atelier a great one, and at 
 all events desired no better. The event, how- 
 ever, went far to justify the views of her parents. 
 For Richard Donne was one of those luckless 
 men who, despite undeniable talent and the 
 absence of any very marked faults, seem destined 
 never to succeed. The story of him and his 
 young wife, their struggles, their defeats, and of 
 the gradual closing of the waters over their 
 heads was the common old one, that has so often 
 been told. The luckless couple had, however, 
 one piece of luck in their lives. They died 
 within a few weeks of each other! It may, 
 perhaps, be counted also as another piece of 
 good fortune that they had but one child, a little 
 girl, the *' little Bertha " of our story. This 
 child had from a very early age shown very 
 strong signs of inheriting her father's artistic 
 talent, and, indeed, her mother's ; for it had 
 been a similarity of tastes and tendencies in this 
 respect which had mainly tended to bring to- 
 gether Bertha Campbell and the poor drawing- 
 master. And throughout and despite all the 
 miseries and struggles of their life, the poor 
 artist and his wife had striven and contrived to 
 provide for the liberal and artistic education of
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 175 
 
 their little Bertha. And when they died, 
 leaving her wholly unprovided for, without a 
 relative in the world except her then widowed 
 grandmother, old Hannah Campbell, the pen- 
 sioned servant of the Artingales, though she 
 might hope that at some future day her talent 
 might be her bread-winner, she was not yet 
 either old enough in years to attempt becoming 
 a noun substantive in the world, or old enough 
 in art to obtain a livelihood by her pencil. 
 There was no course open to her save becoming 
 an adjective to her grandmother. There was no 
 great hardship in this to either of the parties 
 concerned. Old Hannah lived in a very pretty 
 cottage on the Artingale estate, comfortably 
 enough on a pension, which, together with the 
 product of her savings, m.ade one other mouth 
 to be fed — and especially that the mouth of little 
 Bertha — no evil. And the company of her 
 granddaughter was of course a great comfort to 
 the now very aged woman. Nor was Bertha's 
 life at all an uncomfortable one, as far as the 
 supply of her material wants was concerned. 
 Nor was old Hannah otherwise than kind to 
 her. But little Bertha's future prospect seemed 
 dark and dreary enough. Her grandmother
 
 176 AETINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 was now eighty-five ; and though a hale and 
 hearty old woman, could not be expected to last 
 much longer. What was to become of little 
 Bertha when she was gone ? Then the old 
 woman, though kind enough to her grand- 
 daughter, could not, or thought she could not, 
 afibrd to obtain for her the necessary means of 
 improving herself in her art. Indeed, could 
 she have paid the price of lessons, how were 
 they to be obtained there on the north coast of 
 Sillshire? So little Bertha had to make her 
 uphill way for herself as best she might, with 
 many sore misgivings as to what was to haj)pen 
 to her when her grandmother's life should drop. 
 And truly it would be difficult to imagine a 
 human being less fit to be left to fend for herself, 
 alone in the wide world, than poor little Bertha 
 Donne. Her sisters in unprotected isolation, 
 who have passed through similar trials, will 
 know that the fact that she was in her own way 
 extremely pretty was not calculated to make her 
 path a safer or more easy one. But she was in 
 every respect unfit to stand alone. She was the 
 tiniest, frailest-looking little creature ! Her 
 appearance suggested the idea that the wind of 
 a rough word would blow her away into the
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 177 
 
 farthest corner of the room. Then she was timid 
 and distrustful of herself beyond the ordinary 
 timidity of girls; her overweeningly humble 
 estimate of herself and her own value in the 
 world represented to her that she had no right 
 to claim or expect any place save the humblest 
 in the social scale. What was she good for? 
 The making of her grandmother's bed seemed to 
 her a function quite as high as she had any 
 business to aspire to ! And yet she was the 
 daintiest little creature, exquisite as the ermine 
 in her personal purity, with a transparent minia- 
 ture little hand, that seemed taxed to the extent 
 of its powers in manipulating a tiny palette and 
 a camel-hair brush. Light as a fairy, quick in 
 her movements, shy as a startled fawn, blushing 
 painfully at the merest word addressed to her by 
 any save the few whom she loved, almost unable 
 from excess of timidity to speak a word herself 
 in return, save when her heart was unlocked by 
 the golden key of affection — little Bertha was in 
 truth ill-calculated to face the future that to all 
 appearance was before her. 
 
 I have said that she was very pretty, and I 
 think that such would have been the almost uni- 
 versal male verdict on the question. But to 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 178 AKTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 hear Bertha Donne called pretty was one of the 
 things that Lucy Hathaway could not stand. 
 Perhaps Lucy fancied that if Bertha were pretty 
 she could not be so, being, as she was, the very 
 opposite of Bertha in almost every respect. But 
 this would have been an error arising from want 
 of due catholicity of taste ; for unquestionably 
 Lucy Hathaway was a very pretty girl also ; but 
 it riled her to be told that Bertha was pretty — 
 an insignificant, under-sized, skin-and-bone little 
 atom of a creature, with no features at all save 
 a great pair of eyes ever so much too big for 
 her weeny little face, and a huge mass of pale, 
 colourless curls ! 
 
 It was a wonderful head of hair for that tiny 
 person, absolutely reaching, when shaken down, 
 below her knees ; fine as the finest silk ; and 
 whatever Lucy might say and think, the sun, 
 when he shot his beams in and out, hither and 
 thither among the waves of it, did not find it 
 colourless. Why, there was every tint from 
 golden amber to the veritable " blonde cendree," 
 which Greuze loved to paint, to be found among 
 the lights and shades and reflections of it ! 
 
 Then as to those great, liquid, widely-opened 
 eyes, it was all very well for Lucy Hathaway,
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 179 
 
 with her bright, sparkling, flashing, black eyes, 
 to declare that little Bertha had no meaning in 
 her limpid blue ones. But if anybody had had 
 the luck to look into the depths of those same 
 blue eyes, when little Bertha, sittings sketch- 
 book on knee, in some safely-secluded haunt, 
 had been betrayed into idleness and reverie by 
 the song of a lark in the blue sky above her ; or 
 even when, standing by her grandmother's arm- 
 chair, she looked down on the old face feverish 
 with suffering, and strove with soft fingers and 
 softer tongue to charm away rheumatic pains — 
 why then, I think, such looker would have liked 
 to look again. 
 
 Then little Bertha had the most delicate com- 
 plexion ever seen on a human face. Was it 
 snowy-pale, or blush-rose pink^ or the colour of 
 the first faintest streak of a summer dawn ? 
 Hard to say ; for it changed with every passing 
 minute. A word, a thought, a sight, a sound, 
 was sufiScient to vary its tints, as capriciously as 
 the cloud- shadows flitting over a sunny sea 
 change the hues of it. Of course the bright, 
 brilliant, richly-tinted colouring of a sparkling 
 brunette like Lucy Hathaway — colouring such 
 as Titian knew how to paint — is a very lovely
 
 180 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 thing. But for all that, there are hearts, and 
 moods of the heart, to which the exquisite deli- 
 cacy of little Bertha's face might be found to 
 appeal more irresistibly. 
 
 This was the "poor little darling" who, ac- 
 cording to Aunt Agnes' judgment, could not be 
 asked into luncheon, but to whom fruit from 
 the luncheon-table might be taken out, and who 
 might be petted and protected, and encouraged 
 in any other way that could be devised, not in- 
 compatible with that eternal fitness of things 
 which placed so immense an interval between 
 the ladies of Artingale Castle and the grand- 
 daughter of an old servant of the family. 
 
 So as soon as the luncheon had been eaten, 
 Mary dressed up a little basket with fruit and 
 flowers as coquettishly as if it had been intended 
 for presentation to a queen, using, if the truth 
 is to be told, some of the beautiful hot-house 
 flowers which young Farland had brought her 
 for the purpose ; and the two ladies slipped out 
 upon the great southern terrace in quest of their 
 protegee. It was clear that Mary knew where 
 to find her, for she guided her aunt directly to 
 the spot which the little artist had chosen for 
 her work. Passing along the entire length of
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 181 
 
 the great terrace, till they reached the chapel at 
 the further end of it, they there descended into 
 the shrubbery which enclosed the lower garden 
 on that side, and entered a little path, which 
 wound through the shrubs round the eastern 
 end of the chapel till it came to a secluded little 
 clearing amid the trees of the rookery to the 
 westward of the chapel, from which spot a seat, 
 afforded by a felled tree, commanded an ex- 
 quisitely beautiful peep of one ivy-mantled 
 window of the chapel, of a portion of the terrace 
 with its imperfect and broken balustrades beyond' 
 and a glimpse of the spiiQ of Artingale Church 
 rising above the woods, which formed the 
 boundary of the park to the eastward. This 
 was the charming little bit of home- view which 
 Bertha had chosen to exercise her pencil on. 
 There were all the component parts of an almost 
 perfect landscape ; but the attempt was an 
 ambitious one. 
 
 The ladies came upon her as, seated on the 
 trunk of the prostrate tree, with her paper 
 stretched on a board on her knees, she was in- 
 tently measuring some of her distances by the 
 aid of her pencil upheld between the subject and 
 her eye. The rooks overhead were holding a
 
 182 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 very animated debate, in which very various 
 opinions prevailed as to what on earth she could 
 be about there in the midst of their rookery ; but 
 their chattering did not in the least disturb the 
 little artist, whose absorption in her work was 
 such that she was not aware of the coming of 
 her visitors till they were close to her. 
 
 The landscape on which she was at work was 
 a lovely one. But many an artist would have 
 deemed the sketcher herself, in the setting 
 around her, a yet more attractive subject. The 
 fairy-like little figure was dressed in a close- 
 fitting brown holland dress, made in the plainest 
 possible fashion from neck to foot, without a 
 scrap of ornament of any kind save a blue ribbon 
 for a belt at the tiny waist. It was a bright 
 sunny morning, and she had taken off her little 
 straw hat, and deposited it on the log beside 
 her ; so that the sunbeams straying among the 
 trees of the rookery played on her wealth of 
 curls, as they fell behind her head thrown back 
 for the better taking of the observation on which 
 she was engaged. 
 
 She started as Mary spoke to her, having been 
 so intent on her work as to have been unaware 
 of their coming.
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 183 
 
 " Hard at work, eh, Bertha ? And how does 
 the drawing come on ? Let me look, while you 
 eat some of this fruit Aunt Agnes and I have 
 brought you." 
 
 " Oh, Miss Artingale, how good of you ! How 
 can I thank you as I ought !" she said as she 
 rose hastily from her seat, blushing up to the 
 roots of her hair, while she made a deep curtsey 
 to the elder lady, adding as she did so, " Miss 
 Agnes, I am sure I can never tell you how 
 grateful I am for all your kindness to me. What 
 lovely, lovely fruit!" 
 
 " But you are to eat it, not look at it ; and I 
 am to look at the sketch-book meanwhile. Come, 
 let me see what progress has been made," said 
 Mary, stretching out her hand towards the book, 
 which the owner held shyly down on the other 
 side of her little person, as if she would fain 
 have concealed the nature of her occupation. 
 Thus pressed, she put the book into Mary's 
 hands, and thus had her own at liberty to take 
 the basket of fruit. 
 
 " Now you eat one of those pears^ and take no 
 heed of us, while we criticise your work," said 
 Mary, holding up the open sketch-book, so that 
 her aimt could also see the artist's work.
 
 184 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Upon my word, you have got on !" she con- 
 tinued ; " is not that window charming, aunt, and 
 the ivy so freely touched ! I declare I did 
 not think she could have managed the per- 
 spective of the terrace so well. It is really a 
 difficult bit of drawing. Has she not im- 
 proved, eh, aunt ?" 
 
 " Indeed I really think she has ! Perseverance 
 and labour, my dear child," said Miss Agnes, 
 with more of moral than artistic truth, " rarely 
 fail to insure improvement. I cannot doubt 
 that you will succeed in making yourself an 
 artist." 
 
 Bertha looked up into the face of the stately 
 figure, holding her sketch-book far above her 
 own little head, with a shy glance of gratitude^ 
 while a flush of pleasure came over her face. 
 
 " I have had a greater bit of encouragement," 
 she said timidly, " with this drawing than I ever 
 had before. It is sold," she added, quickly 
 withdrawing her eyes from the tall figure of 
 Miss Agnes, and casting them on the ground. 
 
 " Indeed !" cried Mary; " I congratulate you 
 with all my heart. ' Ce n'est que le premier pas 
 qui coute.' — The first step is always the most 
 difficult one," she added, thinking that the
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 185 
 
 French proverb miglit be unintelligible to little 
 Bertha. Bertha understood it, however, per- 
 fectly well, and would have pronounced the 
 words more like a Frenchwoman than Mary 
 Artingale did. For the little creature had all 
 the delicacy of perception which belongs to the 
 artistic idiosyncracy, and which, developing it- 
 self in the ear, as well as, in Bertha's case, in 
 the eye, produces facility in acquiring correctness 
 in the pronunciation of the sounds of other lan- 
 guages than her own. 
 
 " And pray who is the purchaser ?" said Mary, 
 with genuine curiosity. 
 
 " The worst is, that I am afraid that the pur- 
 chaser's motive for buying the drawing was pure 
 kindness and generosity, and not any real merit 
 in the drawing itself," replied Bertha, still fixing 
 her eyes on the ground, and playing nervously 
 with the ends of the blue strings of her hat, 
 which she had taken into her hand when rising 
 to salute her visitors. 
 
 " But who is the purchaser ?" insisted Mary. 
 
 " Young Mr. Farland," said Bertha, becoming 
 
 crimson all over, for no reason whatever that 
 
 she could have possibly guessed. " He has just 
 
 ''come home to Farlandstoke, and was riding past
 
 186 AKTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 grandmother's cottage, and got off his horse to 
 come in and ask how she did, as he used to do, 
 years ago when he was a boy. And I was. 
 sitting at the little table at the window, at work 
 correcting my perspective, and so he saw the 
 drawing. And he was very kind, and said it 
 was very pretty, and that if I would sell it, he 
 should very much like to have it. Was it not 
 kind of him ?" 
 
 " Yes ! it was kind," said Miss Agnes ; " but 
 I dare say that it was none the less true that he 
 thought it a very pretty drawing. I am sure I 
 think so." 
 
 " And how much is he to give you for it, my 
 pet ? I am so glad," said Mary. 
 
 " He wanted me to name the price, and I did 
 not know what to say ; and grandmother, who 
 was sitting over the fire, seeing the difficulty I 
 was in, said that perhaps he would not think ten 
 shillings too much. And Mr. Farland said that 
 that would be robbing me — that he knew that 
 the drawing was worth more — and that if I 
 would let him have it for a pound, he should 
 think he had made a very good bargain. But I 
 know that it was all said from kindness to help 
 me," added the little artist, again stealing a
 
 LITTLE BERTHA. 187 
 
 glance at the face of Miss Agnes, as she ceased 
 speaking. 
 
 Miss Agnes thought that she knew as much 
 also. She had a strong idea that our friend 
 Felix cared about as much for the poetry of the 
 pretty water-colour sketch as he would have 
 done for that of a page of Spenser. But she 
 was confirmed in her notion that Mary's suitor 
 was a thoroughly good fellow. 
 
 " I think that the purchase does great credit 
 to Mr. Farland's good taste," said Mary ; " and 
 I think that the drawing is worth the price he 
 named for it ; and I congratulate you on your 
 first earnings with all my heart. And now you 
 must finish the drawing as carefully as you pos- 
 sibly can, and we shall see what old Mr. 
 Farland, who is a real good judge, says to it." 
 
 '' Oh ! I shall be so afraid. I am afraid that 
 he will say that his son has made a very foolish 
 purchase. But he will know that it was done 
 out of kindness," said poor little Bertha, really 
 shaking at the idea of her poor drawing having 
 to undergo the criticism of the learned Mr. 
 Farland, and his spectacles and his pig-tail. 
 
 " Never fear, little one. Finish your drawing 
 as carefully as you can, and I have no doubt
 
 188 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 that it will find favour in the eyes of Mr. 
 Farland. I think Mr. Felix has made a very 
 good purchase, and I shall tell him so," said 
 Mary, with the least little bit of heightened 
 colour on her handsome face as she spoke. 
 
 " And now we will leave you to your work, 
 my dear," said the elder lady ; "we shall 
 come and look in upon you at the cottage before 
 long." 
 
 And with that the two ladies turned to con- 
 tinue their walk ; and little Bertha sat herself 
 down on her log to work at her drawing with 
 redoubled ardour.
 
 189 
 
 CHAPTER YII. 
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 
 
 On the following day the dinner party at Far- 
 landstoke came off according to the programme 
 Mr. Farland had given Sir Hildebrand when he 
 asked him to join it. But as a dinner of a 
 dozen country neighbours is apt to be a dull 
 affair to outsiders, who know nothing of the 
 social *' whos " and " whats " and social politics 
 of the neighbourhood, it will be well to let the 
 reader make some acquaintance with those mem- 
 bers of the party to whom he has not yet been 
 introduced. 
 
 The baronet of Artingale, his sister, and his 
 daughter, as well as the host, Mr. Farland, and 
 his son Felix — five of the party — are in some 
 degree already acquaintances. Of Mr. Henning- 
 tree also the reader knows, at least, who and
 
 190 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 what he was. Mr. Farland had in no degree 
 been blinded by partiaHty for his old friend and 
 fellow " virtuoso," — as the phrase was in those 
 days — when he had spoken to Sir Hildebrand in 
 the terms he had used of Cyril Henningtree, 
 F.S.A., and a great many other capital letters 
 to boot. 
 
 Henningtree was one of the earliest of that 
 race of scholars and men of taste who, towards 
 the close of the Greorgian era, discovered that 
 the birth of art did not date from the " i?^nais- 
 sance," that we in England, in one and perhaps 
 the noblest of the arts, possessed treasures of a far 
 higher order and value than aught that we had 
 ever succeeded in creating by attempting to 
 imitate Greek or Roman art. He had superin- 
 tended the thorough restoration of the grand old 
 cathedral of his native city in a spirit and with 
 a sympathetic feeling which had been for many 
 a long generation unknown in England, and 
 was now bringing the work to completion in a 
 manner that had won the admiration of every 
 competent judge in Great Britain. Had he 
 chosen to push his career as an architect in 
 London, he could have been yet more widely 
 known, and have left a more largely recognised
 
 WHOS WHO AT FARLANDSTOKE. J 91 
 
 reputation behind him. But quiet, modest, and 
 retiring in his nature, not altogether dependent 
 on his profession, which had been that of his 
 father before him — indeed it would be more 
 correct to say not at all dependent, for his 
 modest competence was sufficient for the needs 
 of himself and his wife, whom he had married 
 late in life, and who had borne him no children ; 
 — too much devoted to general culture to be 
 willing to give himself up entirely to the prac- 
 tice of his profession, and, moreover, an enthu- 
 siastic lover of his native city and his native 
 county, he had chosen the " fallentis semita 
 vitae" of a country town, and he had never 
 repented of his choice. He was one of those 
 men who indissolubly unite their names to that 
 of some locality. He was " Henningtree, of Sill- 
 chester," and was, beyond the sound of his own 
 much-loved cathedral bells, never spoken of 
 otherwise. And he was " of Sillchester " most 
 thoroughly and entirely. There was hardly a 
 human being in the city whom he did not know, 
 and certainly not one who did not know him. 
 For more than one generation had pushed up 
 from boyhood to manhood while the unchanging 
 figure of Cyril Henningtree was one of those
 
 192 ARTINGALB CASTLE. 
 
 best known in the close and on the High-street 
 of Sillchester. Indeed, the tall, spare figure of 
 the architect could hardly fail to be well known, 
 for it was a remarkable one. He wore powder 
 and pig-tail, and a broad-brimmed, low-crowned 
 hat, much like that of a Quaker. The resem- 
 blance to one of that society was increased by 
 the fashion of his coat, which was also cut after 
 the old fashion, collarless. But it was always 
 chocolate in colour, as were also the other habi- 
 liments, including long gaiters up to the knee. 
 Of course, shirt collars were unknown in that 
 day. Mr. Henningtree wore an unstarched 
 white cravat with no visible tie, and beneath it 
 a very abundant and rather elaborate shirt frill, 
 coming out from between the unbuttoned sides 
 of his waistcoat as far as half way between his 
 neck and his waistband. This rather specially 
 large show of , cambric was always of the finest 
 quality, and of the most exquisite purity of 
 colour and condition. And those who had ever 
 seen the old gentleman never forgot the elabo- 
 rate and dainty elegance of his precautions to 
 ward off from this model frill the slightest pos- 
 sible defilement from the snuff, which he con- 
 sumed in rather large quantities. If Mr. Hen-
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 193 
 
 ningtree made any difference in bis apparel in 
 summer and winter, the extra protection needed 
 was obtained by some means which was not 
 visible on the surface. For the outward appear- 
 ance of the tall, slim, and rather elegant figure 
 was always the same — always, except that at 
 dinner time the chocolate-coloured garments were 
 exchanged for a black suit of the same fashion, 
 and the gaiters for black silk stockings. 
 
 Such was for many a year Henningtree, of 
 Sillchester. The place he occupied in the city 
 was a marked, a well recognised, and an import- 
 ant one. It was difficult to imagine how Sill- 
 chester could go on without Cyril Henningtree. 
 Several constituent parts of it could not go on 
 without him — among others, a sort of ecclesio- 
 logicaland antiquarian printing society, of which 
 he had been the founder, and of whioh Dr. 
 Theophilus Lindisfarne, one of the canons, a 
 scholarly banker of the city named Falconer, 
 and Mr. Farland, were among the leading 
 members. 
 
 Dr. Theophilus Lindisfarne read from the 
 
 altar every Sunday the command which forbids 
 
 the coveting of one's neighbour's wife ; and I 
 
 have not the smallest suspicion that the canon 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 194 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 coveted his friend Henningtree's wife in any 
 such sense as to make him a breaker of the 
 commandment. But he did sometimes groan in 
 spirit over the difference of his own lot in this 
 matter from that of his friend and brother anti- 
 quary. For Httle Mrs. Henningtree was in all 
 respects a help meet for her husband, while the 
 canon's wife, the Lady Sempronia Lindisfarne, 
 was, as all Sillchester knew, in many respects a 
 thorn in the flesh to her husband, and especially 
 in her dislike of, and opposition to, his literary 
 dilettanteism. Mrs. Henningtree, on the other 
 hand, took the utmost interest in her husband's 
 pursuits, and had in many cases executed the 
 very able drawings which illustrated his contri- 
 butions to the printing society. 
 
 'Twas the difference, in fact, between brains 
 and n^D brains. The poor, peking, peevishly 
 pious Lady Sempronia was, I fancy, from all I 
 have ever heard of her, a fool. And unques- 
 tionably Mrs. Henningtree was a very clever 
 woman. She was a little bit of a creature, and 
 had not been without a fair share of personal 
 attractions when, some thirty years before the 
 time at which the reader is asked to make her 
 acquaintance, Mr. Henningtree had married her
 
 WHO*S WHO AT FARLANDSTOKE. 195 
 
 on the verge of old-maidenism, at the age of 
 three or four-and-thirty. She had been, and 
 indeed still was, a bright brunette, with dark, 
 piercing eyes, and black hair in abundant quan- 
 tity. She had been — and again, I may add, 
 still was — remarkable for her exceeding activity 
 and brisk, quick, almost brusque movements. 
 Her body, like her mind, had the almost light- 
 ning agility of some of the insect world, who 
 dart, flit, flash, and shoot hither and thither 
 with a rapidity which defies the slower human 
 eye to follow it. I do not quite mean that when 
 Mrs. Henningtree jumped from her writing- 
 table to consult some volume on the shelves at 
 the further side of the room, or when on a Sun- 
 day she flitted up the nave to her seat in the 
 choir of the cathedral, or when she shot into 
 her drawing-room to receive some visitor, as it 
 was her wont to do, and dashed into full talk 
 the instant she entered the room, the rapidity of 
 her motions did absolutely render her invisible, 
 but it was so quick, spasmodic, and spring-like, 
 that it really did suggest the mode of movement 
 of some dragon-fly or other flashing creature of 
 that sort. 
 
 The little lady had been the long motherless
 
 196 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 daughter of a late canon of Sillchester, and had 
 been for many years the pupil and companion of 
 her father, when at his death she was left almost 
 unprovided for, and when Henningtree made 
 her his wife. Her father, Dr. Blackridge, had 
 been a very learned man, and had made his 
 daughter a very learned woman in sundry very, 
 out-of-the-way and, many people will think, very 
 useless departments of learning — useless, at 
 least, to a young lady. Thus Miriam Blackridge 
 had been, and Miriam Henningtree still was, a 
 very competent Hebraist, largely read in matters 
 pertaining to Eastern history, philosophy, and 
 philology, a good Syriac scholar, and possessed 
 of a very considerable acquaintance with several 
 of the cognate languages. 
 
 Without being prepared to admit that they 
 were altogether useless to her, I am free to con- 
 fess that I do not think that any of these rare 
 gifts contributed much to the winning of Cyril 
 Henningtree's heart. He was a sufficiently 
 large-hearted and liberal-minded man, suffi- 
 ciently a lover of all intellectual culture, to 
 consider Miriam Blackridge not one whit a less 
 desirable wife because she was possessed of all 
 this out-of-the-way lore. He was pleased that
 
 who's who at faelandstoke. 197 
 
 slie should possess, or rather that he should pos- 
 sess in her behalf, the rich and valuable library 
 of her late father, which was nearly the whole 
 of her inheritance from him, and which, had he 
 not come forward with the offer of his hand, 
 must have been sold to find the means of procur- 
 ing the small modicum of daily bread that the 
 little lady required. He was pleased to see 
 Walton's Polyglott shouldering Piranesi on his 
 shelves, though he liked to complain to his in- 
 timates that Miriam's light literature really 
 turned his slimmer, though taller, folios out of 
 house and home. But the marriage between 
 Cyril and Miriam did not turn the former into a 
 student of Oriental philology, while it did turn 
 the latter into an ecclesiologist and architectural 
 antiquarian and draughtswoman. For the little 
 lady's intelligence was the more versatile of the 
 two. Indeed nothing, however remote from her 
 usual paths of study, nothing in the way of in- 
 formation, came amiss to her, or failed to be 
 seized on and assimilated by the omnivorous 
 agility of her mind. She was full of fun withal, 
 a capital caricaturist, always ready for and tho- 
 roughly enjoying a laugh, and as young in 
 mind, and apparently almost in body, as she had
 
 198 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 been thirty years ago. She was the very salt of 
 the best society at Sillchester — only that the 
 ladies of the Close and of the Castle Hill (that 
 is, the aristocratic quarter of the ancient cathedral 
 city) were rather afraid of her, and dreaded a 
 certain wicked twinkle that would come into 
 her bright dark eyes sometimes, on occasions 
 when they were totally unaware that any joke 
 was hovering in the drawing-room air. 
 
 On the whole, it may be said, that a better 
 choice of a wife, adapted for his special needs, 
 no man ever made than did Cyril Henningtree 
 when he selected Miriam Blackridge for his 
 partner in life. 
 
 Well, then, who have we next of the party 
 assembled in the long, low drawing-room at 
 Farlandstoke, waiting to go into dinner punctu- 
 ally at five, whether the last guest had arrived or 
 not ? There were the three from Artingale ; the 
 host and his son; the Henningtrees, staying in 
 the house ; Captain Curling and the stranger, 
 his friend, and old Hathaway and his daughter 
 —eleven. Young Jonas Hathaway, the lawyer, 
 had not yet made his appearance; but there 
 were yet three minutes before the bell would 
 ring, which at Farlandstoke irremissibly sum-
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 199 
 
 moned the guests to the dining-room as the 
 clock struck six. 
 
 Captain Curling and the stranger from the 
 other side of the Atlantic, his friend ! — what of 
 them ? Captain Curling, as invariably so called 
 as if he had been a post-captain in His Majesty's 
 service, was in fact a veteran and retired com- 
 mander of the merchant service. He was, how- 
 ever, a somewhat better educated man than was at 
 that time common in that station of life, and had 
 been a very efficient, a very useful, and highly 
 trusted man. Mercantile adventure in those 
 days threw men into situations of difficulty and 
 danger more frequently than in these more quiet 
 times, and Captain Curling had acquitted him- 
 self on some such occasions so as to merit the 
 high approbation and entire confidence of his 
 employers. He had also been a very successful 
 man, and now, at the age of sixty-six, had been 
 able, some seven or eight years ago, to settle 
 down on a very comfortable competence in a 
 pretty cottage within five minutes' walk of his 
 native town of Billiford, a widower and, to his 
 great sorrow, childless, but happy in the respect 
 and liking of the whole neighbourhood. 
 
 Now^ it had so happened, that Captain Cur-
 
 200 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 ling, on the occasion of one of his nnmerons 
 voyages across the Atlantic, had been thrown 
 into business relations with a merchant and 
 shipowner of the name of Fraser, of Salem, in 
 the new State of Massachusetts. This business 
 relation had, on that and on the occasion of sub- 
 sequent voyages, ripened into friendship. And 
 when, some ten years previous to the time of 
 which our story treats, Mr. Fraser, in conse- 
 quence of some of those sudden misfortunes to 
 which all commerce, and especially that of our 
 go-ahead cousins in their new country, is liable, 
 became an almost ruined man, his English friend, 
 Curling, was able to be of use to him in obtain- 
 ing a good berth for his only son, George Fraser, 
 on board a merchant ship, under a good captain. 
 The ruined Salem merchant did not long survive 
 his misfortunes, and George, who had lost his 
 mother years before, was left an orphan, with 
 his own way to make, in the world. 
 
 That way, however, he had appeared to be 
 very well able to make. Son of a shipowner, 
 and coming out of a boyhood passed among a 
 population of so seafaring a character as that of 
 his native town, George Fraser was as much of a 
 seaman as he was of a landsman when he began
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 201 
 
 his career as a mariner. He rapidly made him- 
 self master of his profession, and having gained 
 the goodwill and confidence of his employers, 
 was in the course of a few years, mainly in con- 
 sequence of his own merit, but in some degree 
 owing to the favour due to the friendship of the 
 English captain, his father's friend, promoted to 
 be mate of a first-class clipper. In that capacity 
 he still further advanced himself in the opinion 
 of his owners ; and it so happened that he had 
 the opportunity of doing so not only as a sea- 
 man, but as a shrewd and trustworthy man of 
 business. So that when, about seven or eight 
 months previously to the date of the dinner 
 party at Farlandstoke, a vessel belonging to 
 George Fraser's employers had been lost in the 
 Bristol Channel, and the business arising out of 
 that misfortune had necessitated the presence of a 
 clever, active, and entirely trustworthy agent on 
 the scene of the calamity. Eraser had been sent 
 on the errand. 
 
 He had in this manner been brought into the 
 near neighbourhood of his own and his father's old 
 friend. Captain Curling, who had thus the great 
 pleasure of welcoming George beneath his own 
 roof. And thus it came to pass that the Salem
 
 202 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 mate of an American merchantman was one of 
 the party assembled in Mr. Farland's drawing- 
 room. 
 
 '^ Bring him ! bring him with you by all 
 means, captain," Farland had said when the 
 worthy captain had assigned the presence of this 
 stranger within his gates as a reason for not 
 accepting on that occasion the invitation of his 
 neighbour. *' Felix will ride over and tell Mr. 
 Fraser, with my compliments, how happy we 
 shall be to see him. Faith, we shall be all 
 the livelier for having a new element among us !" 
 
 This had been said and settled before it had 
 occurred to Mr. Farland to ask the party from 
 Artingale to join his dinner-table on that day ; 
 or possibly he might not have invited the New 
 England mate to meet the Artingale ladies. 
 But, in truth, had he previously made acquaint- 
 ance with George Fraser, he need not, and 
 would not have hesitated on this score. Though 
 as unlike as could well be to any of the types of 
 social men whom it was at all probable he would 
 meet at Farlandstoke, and in many respects 
 devoid of the conventional manners of English 
 gentlemen, the American sailor was a man that 
 would not have disgraced any company.
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 203 
 
 In the first place he was remarkably hand- 
 some, and stood six feet two in his stockings ; 
 thus over-topping young Farland by an inch or 
 so. His features were not of the type which is 
 most familiar to us as that of our trans-atlantic 
 cousins in general. His face was more like the 
 face of a north-country Englishman. It was a 
 bright, genial, loveable face, with laughing deep- 
 blue eyes, which looked out frankly and joyously 
 on all the world around them ; a wide mouth, 
 well cut above a square and sturdy chin, and 
 ever ready to relax into a kindly smile, which 
 disclosed a perfect range of regular and bril- 
 liantly white teeth ; crisply curling light-brown 
 hair, and a ruddy clean complexion, naturally 
 clear and transparent, but well tanned and 
 bronzed by many a daily and many a nightly 
 exposure to the salt spray and cutting blasts of 
 the Atlantic. His limbs, both arms and legs, 
 seemed to be specially long ; and he had a kind 
 of loose litheness in his gait and movements 
 which had a sort of ready-for-anything expres- 
 sion in it, not without its charm. He wore no 
 beard or moustache — these appendages were not 
 so common in those days as now — and was 
 always scrupulously well-shaven, which added
 
 204 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 to the bright joviality of his whole appearance. 
 Always, apparently, in the highest spirits, and 
 in manner and bearing more like a great 
 joyous boy than a man, one would have said 
 that misfortune and sorrow could not enter 
 where George Fraserwas. Nevertheless he was 
 now eight-and-twenty years of age, and he had 
 known of sorrow and trouble a fair share in his 
 time. And lightsome and boyish as he seemed, 
 his employers could have certified that a 
 shrewder head and sounder judgment could not 
 readily be found than those of George Fraser. 
 A phrenologist would have guessed as much to 
 look at him ; for though his head was rather a 
 small one for his great height^ he had a brow 
 and forehead that gave promise of more than 
 one good gift, intellectual and spiritual. In a 
 word, no man could look on the young A merican 
 mate without trusting him; and no woman 
 without being attracted towards him. On the 
 evening in question he appeared in Mr. Farland's 
 drawing-room in a complete suit of light-blue 
 cloth_, coat, waistcoat, and trousers of the same 
 material. The solecism of his appearance in 
 such a costume was not at that day quite so 
 notable as it would be now ; for men did not
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 205 
 
 then confine themselves so scrupulously as in 
 these days to the costume of an undertaker's 
 man at a funeral. Sir Hildebrand, for instance, 
 always wore a blue coat with gilt buttons, and a 
 white waistcoat ; and young Farland was dressed 
 also in a blue coat, of a somewhat more recent 
 fashion. Mr. Farland and Mr. Henningtree 
 were dressed in scholarly black, with powder, 
 black silk stockings, and silver buckles. Mr. 
 Jonas Hathaway, in black also, but he wore no 
 powder nor buckles, and his hose were of 
 woollen. Captain Curling was dressed in a 
 snuff-coloured suit from head to ankle, with an 
 exhibition of shirt frill that outdid Mr. Henning- 
 tree himself. I am sure the captain, as a prudent 
 mariner, must have deemed it right to " take 
 in " some of all that flowing cambric, when- 
 ever there were any signs of wind in the sky. 
 
 As to the Hatha way s^ Jonas Hathaway, 
 generally called " the Doctor," though no diploma 
 had ever so dubbed him, was a " general 
 practitioner" of the old school, possessing no 
 very profound medical science, but a large dose 
 of mother wit ; a shrewd, long-headed, obser- 
 vant, coarse, humorous, upright man, taking a 
 rather coarse and vulgarly conventional view
 
 206 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 of his duty in that station of Hfe to which 
 Providence had called him, but acting up to that 
 view conscientiously ; well liked and esteemed 
 in the neighbourhood, and held to be a thorough 
 good fellow by high and low. 
 
 Miss Hathaway — Lucy Hathaway — the only 
 sister of her only brother Jonas, the younger, 
 was now understood by herself and everybody 
 else, except the parish register, to be four-and- 
 twenty years of age. But the last-mentioned 
 authority held her to be thirty. She has 
 already been in some measure described, as far 
 as outward appearance goes. For the rest, 
 Lucy was not a bad girl, in her way. She was 
 a very good daughter, and a very efficient 
 manager of her father's widowed household. 
 She was kind, too, to the poor of the parish, 
 and not only that, but useful among them. She 
 did a good deal of real hard work as a sort of 
 medical aide-de-camp to her father ; and was all 
 the more efficient for good, and all the more 
 acceptable to the objects of her care, in that she 
 did not attempt to extend her ministrations to 
 other than their material needs. I think, too, 
 that Lucy was naturally a good-natured girl, 
 even to her own equals and contemporaries, or,
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 207 
 
 at least, that she had been so once upon a time. 
 But I take it, those unacknowledged six years, 
 which could not be altogether cancelled from her 
 consciousness, had, in those days, the effect of 
 imparting a dash of spleen and acerbity to her 
 feelings towards her should-be contemporaries, 
 but real juniors of her own sex. Lucy Hath- 
 away did not wish to figure in the churchyard of 
 Billiford, when her time should have come, as 
 " Lucy Hathaway, spinster^ late of this parish ;" 
 and it may be feared, perhaps, that the increasing 
 probabilities that this might be the fate in store 
 for her were beginning to exercise an unfavour- 
 able influence on her character and temper. 
 Nevertheless, and for all that, Lucy Hathaway 
 was generally understood and admitted by the 
 world of Billiford and its neighbourhood to be 
 not a bad sort of girl. And I am sure that, as 
 she appeared in the drawing-room at Farland- 
 stoke on the occasion in question, in her simple 
 white muslin dress — a real Indian muslin, please 
 to observe, well known to be such by the rank 
 and fashion of Billiford — with a cherry-coloured 
 sash and neck ribands, a dress admirably setting 
 off her bright brunette style of beauty, she must 
 have been admitted to be a pretty one.
 
 208 ARTINOALE CASTLE. 
 
 To tell the truth, Lucy was very specially 
 anxious to look her best on the present occasion. 
 This dinner-party was an important occasion to 
 her. It is hardly fair to say in broad, plain 
 words what Lucy had never in such categorical 
 form avowed to herself, much less to any one 
 else in the world ; but I think that she was not 
 without a hope that the great and glorious pro- 
 motion of being made Mrs. Felix Farland might 
 fall upon her ; and I would by no means have 
 it supposed that such a latent and carefully- 
 hidden-away thought was conceived in such a 
 fashion as to involve any very censurable con- 
 duct or sentiment in pretty Lucy. Enough has 
 been said of Felix to show that he may well 
 have appeared a very Phoebus Apollo in the 
 eyes of poor little Lucy Hathaway. What knew 
 she of his inability to scale the heights, even the 
 lower slopes of knowledge ? And what would 
 she have cared if she had known ? Was he not 
 as good as gold, and as handsome as eye or 
 heart could desire ? Was he not the facile 
 princeps of all the youths she had ever seen ? I 
 do not think that Lucy was in love with Felix ; 
 it would, of course, be out of all rule and highly 
 improper for her to be so, until he had duly
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 209 
 
 asked her to love him. Nor do I imagine that 
 she would have worn the willow, or paled 
 her bright cheek, if so it were that Felix 
 should make no request of the kind. But 
 she was quite ready to be asked, and to 
 make him a good and loving wife if he had 
 the grace to do so. She also had been a 
 playfellow of his, though some years his senior, 
 in early days, and perhaps — perhaps there 
 might have been some one or two occasions 
 in the course of later years when Lucy might 
 have had some fair ground for thinking that 
 Felix looked on her not altogether with in- 
 difference. 
 
 At five precisely the dinner-bell was rung, and 
 Mr. Farland at once gave his arm to Mrs. Hen- 
 ningtree, while her husband offered his to Miss 
 Agnes Artingale. They had been old acquaint- 
 ances in former years, when Agnes had been an 
 inhabitant of her aunt's house in Sillchester, but 
 had seen little or nothing of each other in all 
 the long track of time since those days. The 
 baronet took Lucy Hathaway, who looked very 
 bright and pretty in her blushes at such promo- 
 tion ; and Mary was escorted by her old ac- 
 quaintance of many years and many days, " the 
 
 VOL. I. P
 
 210 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Doctor," Lucy's father. Captain Curling, his 
 friend Fraser, and Fehx followed. 
 
 " Hathaway, what has become of Jonas, eh ?'* 
 said Mr. Farland, as they went out of the draw- 
 ing-room. 
 
 " Don't give him up yet, sir !" said old Hath- 
 away ; "we have got to cross the hall and the 
 billiard-room yet ; and I should not wonder if 
 he were to save his credit for punctuality still." 
 
 And sure enough, the words were hardly out 
 of his mouth, when, as they were crossing the 
 inner hall, Mr. Jonas appeared, not coming from 
 the direction of the front door, but from the 
 opposite side, on which lay the offices of the 
 house. He came in silently and swiftly, a 
 slender, brisk, unexceptionably-dressed little 
 figure, with a very good-looking face on its 
 shoulders— a figure whom, in the absence of all 
 information on the subject^ one might perhaps 
 have guessed to be a dancing-master — and making 
 a deft and agile bow, with all a dancing-master's 
 grace, to the master of the house as he passed 
 with Mrs. Henningtree on his arm towards the 
 dining-room, said with a pleasant smile on his 
 pretty little features — 
 
 " Almost a minute, sir ! — apologize for not ap-
 
 who's who at farlandstoke. 211 
 
 pearing in the drawing-room! — hard-worked 
 
 man of business " 
 
 " Nay ! you are punctual as my old clock ; 
 you must have heard the bell ring !" answered 
 Mr. Farland, with a nod, as he passed on ; and 
 Jonas, bowing anew to the others as they passed, 
 fell into his place among the young men who 
 closed the procession.
 
 212 
 
 CHAPTER YIII. 
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 
 
 Mr. Farland took his place at the head of the 
 table, and placed Mrs. Henningtree on his right. 
 Next to her sat Sir Hildebrand, with Lucy at 
 his right hand. Next to her sat George Fraser, 
 with Jonas Hathaway on the other side of him. 
 Opposite to Mrs. Henningtree sat Miss Agnes, on 
 the left hand of Mr. Henningtree ; next to whom, 
 on the other side, was Mary, with the doctor on 
 her left. Next to old Hathaway was Captain 
 Curling ; and Felix took the bottom of the table. 
 And by good fortune, rare on such occasions 
 and under such circumstances^ everybody was 
 contented with their position. For if Mrs. 
 Henningtree found — as it cannot be denied that 
 she did find — the baronet on her left somewhat 
 ponderous and dull, Mr. Farland on her right
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 213 
 
 was a favourite of hers, and the only one of the 
 party, save her own husband, with whom she 
 could be said to be well acquainted. And if 
 Lucy was at first inclined to be a little dis- 
 contented with the fate which placed two inter- 
 vening persons between her and the young 
 master of Farlandstoke, she found some amends 
 in being placed next to the strikingly handsome 
 and lively stranger from the other side of the 
 Atlantic. Mary was well pleased to have an 
 opportunity of becoming better acquainted with 
 Mr. Henningtree, of whom she had often heard 
 her aunt speak. Old Hathaway and the captain 
 were old cronies ; and the others had nothing to 
 complain of. 
 
 For awhile the conversation was mainly con- 
 fined to talk between immediate neighbours. 
 
 " So, after all the talking about it, you have 
 removed the old screen from the cathedral ?" 
 said Miss Agnes to Mr. Henningtree ; " I con- 
 fess I can hardly bring myself not to regret the 
 change. But you were favourable to it, I 
 believe." 
 
 '' Yes, indeed. Miss Agnes ! And if blame 
 there be, I believe I must take it all upon my 
 own shoulders. For at first I had all the Chapter,
 
 214 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 except Dr. Lindisfarne, against me. The Dean 
 would not hear of it — looking more, I fancy, 
 to the snugness of his own stall than to 
 any architectural fitness. I had a hard fight 
 for it !" 
 
 " And you conquered ! Has the poor old 
 screen been already taken down ?" 
 
 " Yes, every vestige of the hideous old eye- 
 sore ! and I am sure, my dear madam, that when 
 you favour us with a visit to Sillchester you 
 will approve of the change." 
 
 " Oh ! I have no doubt that you are right, 
 Mr. Henningtree ; and I dare say the entire 
 effect of the building is improved. But it is so 
 difficult, you know, to think that a dear old 
 friend can be better otherwise than as one has 
 known him. And I did love the old church so, 
 as it used to be !" 
 
 " Yes, indeed, I can understand all that ! One 
 has to be very stern to old associations some- 
 times in the interest of real conservation. After 
 all, you know, it is restoration, and not innova- 
 tion. Miss Agnes." 
 
 '* Of course ; and I have no doubt at all that 
 it is right in an artistic, as well as in an anti- 
 quarian point of view. But it is innovation to
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FAKLANDSTOKE. 215 
 
 me ; I have so many memories attached to the 
 dear old church as it was." 
 
 " Of course, of course. Guess whether I have 
 not myself!" 
 
 " Do you remember my aunt, as she used to 
 come into her place in her pew immediately 
 under the Dean's stall ?" 
 
 " Do I not ! I could as easily forget Bishop 
 Landulph's tomb at the foot of the altar 
 steps!" 
 
 " And I suppose the old pew is gone too ?" 
 
 *' Yes, we have got rid of the pews. I am 
 sure you would go with us there. Miss Agnes." 
 
 " Oh yes ! no doubt. I am sure you are 
 right ; but that don't quite avail to cure one's 
 regrets for what was once so familiar, and is 
 now no more. Fancy my poor aunt's spirit 
 wandering, as it certainly would if it were per- 
 mitted to revisit earth at all, to the old church 
 to find all changed ! How I see her now, walk- 
 ing up the nave to morning service !" 
 
 '' Ah ! I remember it well. Miss Agnes 
 Artingale, of the Moat House, was almost as 
 much a part of the procession marching into the 
 choir as the Dean himself." 
 
 " And is the church quite open now, Mr.
 
 216 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 Henningtree, from the west door to the altar ?" 
 asked Mary on the other side of him. 
 
 " Perfectly open, at least as far as the view is 
 concerned," replied he. 
 
 " I don't wonder the Dean did not like the 
 alteration, poor old gentleman !" returned Mary. 
 " Surely it must be very cold, sitting out in the 
 middle of that great church !" 
 
 " Well, we have not left the stalls altogether 
 without some shelter at their back. You must 
 pay a visit to Sillchester, Miss Artingale, to see 
 how we have managed it. But you do not re- 
 member the old screen ?" 
 
 " Yes, I think I do. It is many years since I 
 was in Sillchester. But I fancy I remember how 
 the cathedral looked. I am afraid I thought the 
 old screen, with its carving and gilding, very 
 beautiful." 
 
 " I think you would like the church better 
 now," returned the architect. 
 
 " You don't get such mullet as these on the 
 southern coast of the county, Mr. Henningtree," 
 said old Hathaway, leaning forward and speak- 
 ing across Mary Artingale. 
 
 " No ; I don't think the red mullet is so fine 
 on our side. I am sure I do not know why it
 
 THE DIXXER-PARTY AT FARLAXDSTOKE. 217 
 
 should be so," replied Mr. Henningtree. " We 
 can get the fish from the northern coast, of 
 course ; but as there is plenty on our own side, 
 and the journey is rather a long one, I do not 
 think that much finds its way to Sillchester." 
 
 " I think that most of the fish on our coast is 
 better than what you get on the southern side," 
 said the baronet from across the table ; " I will 
 back Billmouth for fish against any port on the 
 southern side of the county !" he added, with 
 the genuine local prejudice of a territorial mag- 
 nate. 
 
 " Why, those fellows down on the south coast 
 don't go out in such weather as our BiUmouth 
 boatmen do. Sir Hildebrand. Why, I have seen 
 our Billmouth men put out when the boat could 
 scarcely get out of the harbour !" said young 
 Farland. 
 
 " So that the fish must be better !" said 
 little Mrs. Henningtree, with a laugh in her 
 eye. 
 
 " Certainly, ma'am ; the ablest and boldest 
 boatmen will catch the most fish," said old 
 Captain Curling, with a vague idea of up- 
 holding his own against the rival side of the 
 county.
 
 218 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 '' Only that rougli weather is not the best for 
 fishing," remarked the American. 
 
 " Pleasure of a glass of wine, Mr. Eraser ?" 
 said the host ; '' you do a great deal in that way 
 on your side of the water ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir ; we do a little fishing in our 
 country," answered George, with a bright smile 
 in his handsome blue eyes, and putting a some- 
 what stronger accent on the *• sir " than an 
 Englishman would have done. 
 
 * ■ There is a great stroke of fishing done by 
 boats that hail from Marble Head and other 
 ports near Salem — that's my friend Eraser's 
 native place," said Captain Curling. " They go 
 to work in earnest in such things in the colonies, 
 they do." 
 
 "What -colonies, captain?" asked George, 
 with a demure look. 
 
 " Why, I was speaking of the New England 
 colonies, to be sure," said the captain, inno- 
 cently; ^* did not 1 mention Salem, and who 
 don't know where Salem is ?" 
 
 " I am sorry to say I don't," said Mary ; 
 " where is Salem ?" 
 
 '' Salem, miss, is a thriving port of Massa- 
 chusetts, once a colony of Great Britain in the
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 219 
 
 days when my friend Captain Curling first knew 
 the place, but which somehow or other calls 
 itself an independent state now," said George, 
 blushing, and showing a magnificent range of 
 brilliant and regular teeth, in a frank, good- 
 humoured smile. 
 
 " Our friend from over the water had you 
 there. Captain !" said Hathaway ; " the world 
 has been jogging on since you have been laid 
 u|) in ordinary in Woodbine Cottage." 
 
 " Well, states or colonies, it is all one — much 
 of a muchness, I take it," said the captain ; " and 
 I don't suppose you know much more about the 
 rights of it, Doctor, than I do." 
 
 " Not quite the same thing, Captain," said 
 Fraser, laughing. 
 
 *' Not quite !" said Mr. Henningtree. " Sup- 
 pose we have a glass of wine together, Mr. 
 Fraser, and drink to ' Let bygones be bygones/ 
 and may Old England and New England be 
 always good friends for the future !" 
 
 " With all my heart, sir ! Quarrelling don't 
 contribute to commercial transactions anyway ; 
 and it's commerce speeds the keel I sail on." 
 
 " Are you very fond of the sea, Mr. Fraser ? 
 I suppose you could never make up your mind
 
 220 ARTIXaALE CASTLE. 
 
 to settle down on land ?" said Miss Lucy Hath- 
 away, with a sidelong, half-raised glance up at 
 the bright genial face beside her. 
 
 " Yes, miss, I like the sea. But as for settling 
 down, why not settle down ?" he said. 
 
 " Oh ! you sailors never do. You are such 
 ramblers ; and then it must be so tame and dull 
 after all your adventures at sea," said the lady. 
 
 " Ask Curling," replied he ; " yes, we are 
 most of us glad enough to settle down when the 
 time for it comes. But my time isn't come yet, 
 and won't come yet awhile, I'm thinking." 
 
 " Captain Curling ! But he is so different, 
 you know. Of course he is glad to rest, poor 
 old man ! But I should think you would find a 
 shore life very dull, Mr. Fraser," rejoined the 
 damsel. 
 
 " And no doubt I shall be just as glad to rest 
 as he when my time comes. The captain has 
 done a deal of hard work in his time, I can tell 
 you, miss, Captain Curling has." 
 
 But Lucy did not seem to be much interested 
 by this instance of the otium cum dignitate, and 
 made another attempt to bring back the con- 
 versation to more interesting personalities. 
 
 "I suppose you must find it very dull down
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 221 
 
 here in our little village ; there is so little to 
 interest you," she said, looking up at him a 
 little more openly this time. 
 
 " Not a bit of it," said he, briskly ; " quite 
 the contrary. You spoke just now, miss, of a 
 sailor being dull ashore. Now I can tell you 
 that there is nothing in life, so far as I know, so 
 dull as a middle watch on a calm night at 
 sea. 
 
 " What is a middle watch ?" asked Miss 
 Lucy. 
 
 " Well, the watch from midnight till four in 
 the morning. If it's rough weather there is 
 something to do ; but if it is quiet there is 
 nothing to do — nothing on earth — or rather," 
 he added, with a laugh, " nothing on the sea, 
 and that's more to the purpose. Many's the 
 time, miss, that I've envied the men sitting 
 forwards and spinning yarns. At least they 
 had somebody to speak to, and something to 
 while away the time. But an officer, you see, 
 miss, must hold himself apart, and keep himself 
 to himself. And very dreadful dull work it is 
 sometimes, I can assure you." 
 
 " And so you walk up and down the deck, I 
 suppose, and look at the stars and the moon."
 
 222 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Yes, just that, Miss Lucy ; tliat and thinking 
 of those we've left at home." 
 
 And here George's handsome and jovial 
 features assumed an expression which seemed to 
 promise a possibility that the conversation 
 might be made to take a somewhat more in- 
 teresting and sentimental turn than Lucy had 
 hitherto succeeded in imparting to it. 
 
 " Ah, yes, I can sympathize with you there," 
 said she ; " I can easily imagine that at such an 
 hour the heart would turn to those it loves the 
 best." 
 
 " Well, yes, it kinder does. But it ain't 
 ' those ;' it is but one in my case," said George, 
 looking a little sentimental in his turn. 
 
 The conversation was decidedly becoming 
 interesting, even though the revelations that 
 were apparently forthcoming might be of a 
 nature to interfere in some degree with the 
 probabilities of yet more interesting confidences 
 on the part of the undeniably amiable stranger. 
 Lucy was touched too by the poetical elegance 
 of the phrase in which he had, as she under- 
 stood him, said that his heart turned ' kinder ' 
 in thinking of the distant loved one ; being 
 unaware that by the sound so uttered the hand-
 
 THE DIN"NER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 223 
 
 some young Yankee intended to say that his 
 heart turned homewards in a " kind o' " manner. 
 
 " Ah ! one — one only ! It is the reply of a 
 true heart ! And it is sweet to you to speak of 
 her in a foreign land to ears that can sympathize 
 with your every feeling on the subject, is it not ? 
 I need not ask if she is beautiful ?" 
 
 All this had been said on the lady's part in 
 those sotto voce tones which, amid the clatter of 
 knives and forks, serve perfectly the purposes of 
 a tete-a-tete conversation between neighbours 
 at a dinner-table. But the gentleman would 
 persist, rather to his pretty examiner's discomfi- 
 ture, in replying to her with a clear and ringing 
 distinctness of utterance, which might have 
 sufficed for the issuing of orders on the quarter- 
 deck. 
 
 " Well !" he said, half musingly, " I have been 
 told that she was a right-down beautiful woman ; 
 and I can easily believe it." 
 
 ''Was !" said Lucy, much taken aback. 
 
 "Was when she was young, you know !" re- 
 turned the young man ; " and even now, that 
 she must be five-and- sixty if she is a day, she is 
 a remarkably fine-looking old woman, though I 
 am her grandson that says so.
 
 224 AKTINGALB CASTLE. 
 
 "Your grandmother!" said Lucy, with a 
 touch of disappointment in her tone — so dear to 
 the female heart is a bit of sentimental confi- 
 dence, even though the revelation of George's 
 sole-loved one reopened to Lucy a vista of pos- 
 sibilities which made him more interesting than 
 ever in her eyes. 
 
 " Yes, my grandmother, miss ; she is all I 
 have at home now, to think of or to love. I 
 lost my mother before I was old enough to 
 know her, and my father died when I was a lad. 
 His mother, bless her old heart, is all I have 
 left." 
 
 " Your father's mother. Then her name is 
 Fraser too !" said Lucy ; " and I suppose you 
 live with her when you are at home ?" 
 
 " Yes, miss, when I am at home. But I never 
 am at home long together. We sailors are at 
 home on board, you know, miss. I often wish 
 I was able to be with the old woman a little 
 more, for she is quite lonely in the world," he 
 added with a sigh, and lowering his voice a 
 Httle. 
 
 All this time the rest of the party had been 
 conversing in separate groups almost as exclu- 
 sively as Lucy and George Fraser. Miss Agnes,
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 225 
 
 Mr. Henningtree and Mary, had continued, the 
 two former their Sillchester reminiscences, and 
 all three their discussion on the restoration of 
 the cathedral ; and Mary had begun to take 
 quite a lively interest in the subject, and to con- 
 ceive a wish that she might be able to accept 
 Mr. Henningtree' s invitation, and go to Sill- 
 chester to see the improvements and have them 
 all explained to her by him. 
 
 At the top of the table Mrs. Henningtree had 
 passed an hour much to her satisfaction and 
 amusement, in drawing out her neighbours, Mr. 
 Farland, to the right, and Sir Hildebrand, on 
 the left, and contrasting the characters and 
 minds of the two men, so singularly dissimilar 
 in their similarity. 
 
 Old Hathaway and the captain had been per- 
 fectly happy in the discussion of the good things 
 before them, and in the chat of each other. 
 
 But Felix, at the bottom of the table, who had 
 thus been left to a tete-a-tete with Mr. Jonas, 
 was not equally contented with his lot. He had 
 at the beginning of dinner felt it incumbent on 
 him to improve the occasion by making some 
 progress in the task of winning the heart of 
 Mary Artingale ; and he had carried on the 
 
 VOL. I. Q
 
 226 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 work so far as to ask her to take wine with him. 
 But perceiving that she seemed to he quite taken 
 up by the conversation that was going on be- 
 tween Miss Agnes and Mr. Henningtree, and 
 judiciously considering that at least no harm 
 was being done in that quarter, he had been 
 content to defer all more active operations till 
 afterwards in the drawing-room. 
 
 Under these circumstances it was more con- 
 sistent with certain inconsistencies often observ- 
 able in male, and sometimes in female, human 
 nature than with reason, that Mr. Felix, some- 
 what bored by the attempts at conversation 
 between himself and the young lawyer, felt dis- 
 contented with the flirtation going on so pros- 
 perously to all appearance between the hand- 
 some stranger and his old playfellow pretty Lucy 
 Hathaway. So commencing his attack by ask- 
 ing Fraser to take a glass of wine with him — a 
 ceremony without the aid of which no man in 
 those days could get a glass of wine with his 
 dinner — he leaned across Mr. Jonas, and said, 
 " I suppose you are often obliged to be down at 
 Westport, Mr. Fraser ? Is your business nearly 
 settled ? I should think you must be wearying 
 to get away."
 
 THE DIXNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 227 
 
 " Wearying, sir ! Not a bit, sir ! I am 
 anxious to get back to my own work ; and to say 
 the truth, your people in the old country here 
 do take their time about things, they do, indeed ! 
 But else, for the matter of that, I never spent a 
 pleasanter time in my life." 
 
 " How long do you think it will be before you 
 get your affairs all settled ? " asked Felix. 
 
 " Well, upon my word I can't say ! It '11 be 
 a good bit yet, a couple of months or more, I 
 expect. Shouldn't wonder if we were to have 
 to go to law with the other ship." 
 
 " What other ship ?" asked Felix. 
 
 " Oh ! it was the old story ; a running-down 
 question, you know ! Which of them went his 
 own side of the road, and which went his wrong- 
 side ? Now our folks say " 
 
 " Side of the road ?" asked Felix. 
 
 " Yes ; which of them steered as he was 
 bound to steer, according to our sea rule of 
 the road." 
 
 And then the young mate went on to explain 
 what the maritime rule of the road was. 
 
 Presently, however, a diversion was effected 
 by Miss Agnes, who said aloud from tlie further 
 end of the table, '' I congratulate you, Mr. Felix,
 
 228 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 on your discriminating patronage of the fine 
 arts !" 
 
 " Ma'am ? Miss Agnes ?" returned Felix, 
 utterly taken aback by tbis unexpected attack, 
 *^ I don't understand what you mean, indeed I 
 don't ; I assure you I never patronized anything, 
 and I know nothing at all about the fine arts — 
 nothing whatever, upon my word !" 
 
 " Oh, fie ! Mr. Felix ; but I see that you are 
 one of those who ' do good by stealth, and blush 
 to find it fame !' " 
 
 And assuredly poor Felix was by this time 
 blushing scarlet up to the roots of his hair; 
 although in truth he had not the remotest idea 
 of what Miss Agnes was talking about, or 
 whether she was commending him, or blowing 
 him up for some unknown offence. 
 
 " I know nothing about it, upon my word and 
 honour, I don't indeed. Miss Agnes !" he asseve- 
 rated, with every appearance of truthfulness. 
 
 " Oh, come now, Mr. Felix ! Who was it that 
 found an artist at work on an unfinished water- 
 colour drawing, and was so struck by the merit 
 of the piece that he forthwith purchased it ?" 
 
 " Oh ! now I know what you mean ; but 
 indeed I did not know before," said Felix,
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 229 
 
 blushing worse than ever. " But I only bought 
 poor little Bertha Donne's picture because I 
 thought she was in want of the money, and so 
 to encourage her, you know, poor little thing ! 
 I did not know, and I don't pretend to know, 
 whether it was fine art, as you call it. Miss 
 Agnes ; I didn't, upon my word !" 
 
 " Well, I think it is a drawing that does 
 credit to the artist, and to the discrimination of 
 the purchaser. And Mary thought so, too, 
 when we came upon her by surprise, as she was . 
 putting the last touches to it, up on the west 
 side of the Castle. Did you not think it was 
 very good, Mary ?" 
 
 " I did, indeed," replied Mary, thus appealed 
 to ; " but I am no judge at all, you know. But 
 I thought it was very kind of Mr. Felix to 
 purchase it," she added simply, but still colour- 
 ing up as she spoke, and rather wishing, as soon 
 as the words were out of her mouth, that she 
 had not uttered them. 
 
 " Oh, Miss Mary ! I am so glad that you — 
 appro — that you thought it right — the right sort 
 of thing to do, you know," said Felix, with 
 reckless courage. 
 
 " But what is it all about ?" said his
 
 230 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 father; ''why have you not shown me the 
 drawing ?" 
 
 " I have not got it yet, sir," replied Felix, 
 still very ill at his ease ; " it was not finished.'* 
 
 " But what is your account of the matter, 
 Miss Agnes?" he continued, turning to that 
 lady. 
 
 "Simply this," said she; ''that Mary and I 
 went out after luncheon yesterday to pay a visit 
 to Mary's little protegee. Bertha, not at the 
 cottage, but in the rookery up at the Castle, 
 where Mary knew that she was going to sketch ; 
 and that we found her finishing a very pretty 
 drawing of the chapel and the terrace, which 
 she told us, with many expressions of gratitude, 
 that Mr. Felix Farland had seen in an un- 
 finished state when he had called at the cottage, 
 and had agreed to purchase, refusing to abide by 
 the valuation of ten shillings put on the drawing 
 by Bertha's grandmother, and insisting on pay- 
 ing twice that sum for it. That is an exact 
 account of all we know about the matter, is it 
 not, Mary ?" 
 
 " Yes, aunt, that is what little Bertha told us ; 
 and we both of us admired the drawing very 
 much," replied Miss Artingale.
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 231 
 
 " And we both tliought," added the elder 
 lady, " that whether or no Mr. Felix knew any- 
 thing about the fine arts, he knew very well how 
 to do a kind and generous action." 
 
 "Don't forget to let me see the drawing, 
 Felix, as soon as it comes home," said Mr. Far- 
 land. 
 
 " And so you have a promising young artist, 
 en cachette, down here among the shades of 
 Artingale ?" said Mrs. Henningtree. " At what 
 time are we to start on our way homewards 
 to-morrow morning, Cyril ?" she added, address- 
 ing her husband. 
 
 " Oh !" said he, " we need not be early, since 
 we have made up our minds to be two days 
 about it. I should say that ten, or half-past ten 
 would be early enough." 
 
 " Because I was thinking," rejoined the lady, 
 " that I should have liked to see the drawing- 
 Mr. Felix has bought, and the artist, too, if it 
 were possible." 
 
 "Nothing more easy!" said Mr. Farland. 
 " We will tell Thomas to go down to old 
 Hannah's cottage this evening, and ask little 
 Bertha to step up here with her drawing at nine 
 o'clock to-morrow morning. If there is really
 
 232 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 any promise in it, it will be good for her that 
 you and Henningtree should see it. Be so good 
 as to ring the bell, Felix." 
 
 "Do you think your father would let me come 
 up in the morning to see the drawing, too?" 
 said Fraser to young Farland ; " I should much 
 like to." 
 
 *' Delighted to see you, of course. Mr. Fraser, 
 sir, says that he should like to come up and see 
 little Bertha's drawing." 
 
 " Will you come and breakfast with us, my 
 dear sir ? we shall be delighted to see you ; eight 
 o'clock punctual. And you will see, let me tell 
 you, not only a drawing, but a pretty little 
 girl into the bargain. I consider Bertha Donne 
 to be very pretty." 
 
 " Most happy to come, sir, without any refer- 
 ence to the last inducement," said Fraser, with 
 his frank, sunny smile. 
 
 "The queerest little elf of a creature! the 
 granddaughter of an old servant of the Artin- 
 gales," whispered Lucy to Fraser. 
 
 So the bell was rung, and Thomas the groom 
 was sent with the message which was destined 
 to produce a terrible flurry of trepidation and 
 shyness in the poor little artist's bosom.
 
 THE DINNER-PARTY AT FARLANDSTOKE. 233 
 
 And then the ladies got up to leave the 
 dining-room ; and Mr. Farland^ the baronet, and 
 Mr. Henningtree congregated into a knot at the 
 head of the table, while the three young men 
 got together at the foot of it, and the captain and 
 the doctor — both so styled by courtesy — con- 
 tinued their chat and their potations together.
 
 234 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 
 
 We pretty well know already what was the sub- 
 ject of the conversation at the head of the table. 
 Of course it was not necessary to say anything 
 to Mr. Henningtree respecting the nature of the 
 arrangement which had been entered into be- 
 tween Mr. Farland and the baronet, with a view 
 to the restoration of Artingale Castle. Nor was 
 it necessary to explain to him the exact nature 
 of the interest Mr. Farland took in the work, 
 beyond that which he might naturally be sup- 
 posed to feel as a neighbour, and more especially 
 as one to whom such matters and subjects had, 
 as Henningtree well knew, been the objects of 
 life-long study. Indeed, as has been already 
 said, Mr. Farland had already spoken to Mr. 
 Henningtree in general terms upon the subject.
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENlSriNGTREE MAKE A BET. 235 
 
 It was therefore now only needful to say, 
 that Sir Hildebrand had finally determined on 
 putting* his hand to the work, which he had, as 
 was well known to all the county, been all his 
 life so desirous to undertake ; that he had done 
 Mr. Farland the honour of consulting him upon 
 the subject ; and that he (Farland) had men- 
 tioned to Sir Hildebrand the very great advan- 
 tage it would be to obtain the opinion and advice 
 of Mr. Henningtree. 
 
 " I have not however ventured," said Mr. 
 Farland, " to tell Sir Hildebrand that you could 
 undertake the work, Mr. Henningtree." 
 
 "The day has been," said Henningtree, 
 shaking his head, " when I should have desired 
 nothing better than such a chance. Artingale 
 is a noble pile, one of the most interesting, in 
 my opinion, in the kingdom ; and the work of 
 its restoration is one which any competent man 
 would be proud to undertake, and which ought 
 to suffice, when accomplished, to make the repu- 
 tation of any man. But — " and the old gentleman 
 paused, again shaking his head, and imparting 
 a corresponding oscillation to his well-powdered 
 pigtail. 
 
 *' But what, my dear sir ?" said Farland ;
 
 236 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " not that I expected, I tell you fairly, that you 
 would bring yourself to undertake so large a 
 work at such a distance from your beloved 
 Sillchester. I did not give Sir Hildebrand any 
 hope of it." 
 
 " No, I could not now undertake it. In the 
 first place, I am too old a man. A younger and 
 more active man is needed, and who may fairly 
 hope to see the work to its close. And then you 
 know, my dear Farland, my other avocations. 
 We are well on, it is true, with the work at the 
 cathedral, but there is still a great deal to be 
 done. You know that no day passes over my 
 head at Sillchester that does not see me many 
 hours in the cathedral." 
 
 *' Yes. And I believe," said Farland, " that 
 if the last stone was in its place, and the last bit 
 of carving completed, you would still spend as 
 many hours as ever in the church. Nay, I fancy 
 that heaven itself will be no heaven to you 
 unless it is permitted to your spirit to wander 
 in the nave of the old church now and then." 
 
 "But in the mean time the work is not 
 finished, and I flatter myself that I am still 
 needed there. No, I could not, at my time of 
 life and with my occupations, undertake so
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 237 
 
 great a work as the restoration of Artingale. 
 But as far as counsel and advice can be of any 
 service, Sir Hildebrand is mostw elcome to the 
 best which I can give, most welcome ; for it 
 would be a real pleasure to me to be allowed to 
 interest myself in the work." 
 
 " I beg to assure you, my dear sir," began the 
 baronet, pompously, " that I am very deeply im- 
 pressed with the value of any counsel with 
 which you could favour us, and very deeply 
 obliged " 
 
 " And I'll tell you what I can do for you," 
 added Mr. Henningtree, interrupting the slow 
 speech of the heavy baronet, " I'll tell you what 
 I can do — and I think it would be doing you a 
 greater service than if I were to put my own 
 worn-out old shoulders to the wheel — I can re- 
 commend you a man who would, I think, be 
 more adapted to your purpose than any other 
 available man in England. There are not too 
 many men in the profession to whom I should 
 like to entrust such a work as that we are talking 
 of in all England. The young man I have in 
 my thoughts has been educated and has prac- 
 tised his profession under my own eye. I know 
 him thoroughly, and I have the very highest
 
 238 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 opinion of him, both professionally and other- 
 wise. He is my right-hand man at the cathedral, 
 and I shall miss him sadly. But it would be a 
 great thing for him to have. such a work as that 
 of which we are speaking put into his hands, 
 and I truly believe that I should be rendering 
 you a valuable service also." 
 
 '' I think I know the man you mean, Hen- 
 ningtree. I have spoken to him in your office 
 before now — Purcell Lancaster, is not he the 
 man you mean ?" 
 
 " Purcell Lancaster is the man ; and I do not 
 think you could have a better." 
 
 " Rather of the youngest for a trust of such 
 magnitude, is he not ?" said Mr. Farland. 
 
 " Well, you know^ that all depends. One man 
 is older to all good purposes at twenty than 
 another is at thirty. If the work were mine to 
 do, I can only say that I could wish to put it 
 in no better hands ; that is all I can say." 
 
 " And I am sure I can desire no better recom- 
 mendation," said the baronet. " Who is the 
 young man — it seems to me as if I remembered 
 the name of Lancaster in connection with Sill- 
 chester ?" 
 
 ^^ Of course you do, my dear sir !" replied
 
 MR. AWD MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 239 
 
 Mr. Henningtree. "You must remember old 
 Lancaster as organist of the cathedral. He was 
 not old Lancaster when you first remember him, 
 Sir Hildebrand ; but he was well on in life when 
 he married a girl — she was not a girl, by-the-bye, 
 when he married her — who had not a shilHng in 
 the world ; a singing mistress she had been, in 
 Sillchester, for many a year, and got such a living 
 as a singing mistress in a country town could 
 get. They had been lovers for years. At last 
 they married, and poor Mrs. Lancaster died in 
 giving birth to her first child. Poor Lancaster 
 named the boy Purcell, after one of the favourite 
 masters of his art. The poor man never held 
 up his head after his wife's death, and died ^ve 
 years after her, leaving this boy Purcell an 
 orphan." 
 
 " What a melancholy story !" said Mr. Farland. 
 
 " Melancholy, indeed !" re-echoed the baronet ; 
 " and what a queer name, Purcell, to christen a 
 child by." 
 
 " Well, poor Lancaster had served the Chapter 
 well and faithfully for over forty years^ and of 
 course something was to be done for his orphan 
 boy, So the child was taken care of, and as 
 soon as he was old enough he was put into tlie
 
 240 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 chorister's school, and got an education, which is 
 a good one enough when it happens to fall on 
 favourable ground. The lad had a charming 
 voice, and as long as it lasted he served as a 
 chorister in the cathedral. When he lost his 
 voice the Chapter apprenticed him to me. I 
 never had an apprentice before ; but I had 
 known and liked old Lancaster well, and I had 
 watched and liked the boy. He came into my 
 office, worked in the way those work who mean 
 to conquer, and did conquer accordingly. And 
 now, gentlemen, you know as much as I can tell 
 you about Purcell Lancaster ; and I repeat that, 
 in my opinion, you could not put the work of 
 the restoration of Artingale Castle into better 
 hands." 
 
 " I suppose," said Mr. Farland, " that it 
 would be necessary, or at least desirable, that he 
 should be resident on the spot." 
 
 *' Unquestionably it would be necessary in the 
 •first instance, at all events. The first thing to be 
 done, you know, will be to make accurate plans 
 and drawings of every part of the Castle in its 
 present condition, and then to come to a clear 
 decision as to what it is intended to do with it, 
 and then make the necessary plans, drawings,
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 241 
 
 and estimates. All this must be done before a 
 single workman is put into the place ; and for 
 the doing of this it would be extremely desirable 
 that the architect entrusted with it should be 
 resident as near his work as possible. I suppose 
 there would be no difficulty in finding suitable 
 accommodation at no great distance from the 
 Castle?" 
 
 " Oh ! dear, none at all," said Sir Hilde- 
 brand. 
 
 *' And I suppose that we cannot do better, Sir 
 Hildebrand, than close at once with my friend 
 Henningtree's proposal. I remember being im- 
 pressed very favourably by the young man 
 when it occurred to me to speak with him at 
 Sillchester." 
 
 " Certainly, we can do no better," replied Sir 
 Hildebrand, " and I am very much obliged to 
 Mr. Henningtree for his recommendation and 
 for depriving himself in my favour of the 
 services of his assistant." 
 
 " Then, when the plans have been made, and 
 we have all the measurements and other neces- 
 sary information, I shall be most happy if I can 
 be of any use in suggesting what would be the 
 best course to pursue." 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 242 ARTINGALB CASTLE. 
 
 " Your assistance will be invaluable to us, my 
 dear sir. I shall not fail to use the liberty you 
 kindly give me of recurring to it," rejoined the 
 baronet. 
 
 " Would it be your idea, then, to take the 
 matter in hand at once ?" asked Henningtree. 
 
 " Oh, quite so — quite so !" replied Mr. Far- 
 land, feeling that the baronet might think that 
 the answer to this question depended more on 
 him — Farland — than on himself. " It would be 
 your wish, I think. Sir Hildebrand, to lose no 
 time in getting to work ?" 
 
 " Oh, quite so ; the sooner the better — the 
 sooner the better," said the baronet. 
 
 " Yery good ; then we may consider that as 
 settled. As soon as I get to Sillchester I will 
 speak to Lancaster, and let you have a line 
 by post to tell you how soon he can be with 
 you." 
 
 And then the three gentlemen rose and pre- 
 pared to go to the drawing-room, and the three 
 juniors immediately followed their example, as 
 did also the doctor and the captain, after linger- 
 ing a minute to take one more glass of the Far- 
 landstoke port. 
 
 Meanwhile in the drawing-room Miss Agnes
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 243 
 
 and Mary had been telling Mrs. Henningtree all 
 about little Bertha, who and what she was, and 
 her hopes to make herself capable of earning her 
 livelihood as an artist, in terms which had made 
 the active-minded little lady take quite an 
 interest in the visit she was expecting at break- 
 fast-time the next morning. And when the 
 gentlemen came in from the dining-room, and 
 Sir Hildebrand told his sister of the arrange- 
 ment that had been made with reference to Mr. 
 Purcell Lancaster, and mentioned that it would 
 be necessary to look out for some place in the 
 near neighbourhood of the Castle where that 
 gentleman could find a suitable lodging and 
 accommodation, it at once occurred to Miss 
 Agnes that old Hannah's cottage would be the 
 very thing. There was a decently-good upstairs 
 room which the inmates of the cottage did not 
 occupy ; the vicinity to the Castle was exactly 
 what was needed, and the price that would be 
 paid for the accommodation would be a material 
 comfort and assistance to the old woman and 
 her granddaughter. As for a working office, 
 that, as Mr. Henningtree pointed out, would be 
 far more conveniently and usefully arranged in 
 the Castle itself. The part of it occupied by the
 
 244 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 family of course need not be in any degree 
 intruded on. It would be easy to put into some 
 one of the old rooms the few articles that were 
 needed for all the purposes of a surveyor's and 
 architect's working office. So it was settled 
 that, when little Bertha should make her ap- 
 pearance with her drawing the next morning, 
 she should be charged with a proposal to her 
 grandmother to the above effect. 
 
 And then Mr. Farland's guests disposed them- 
 selves to return to their several homes. The 
 Artingale carriage was announced, as was Cap- 
 tain Curling's gig. The doctor and his son and 
 daughter had only to go to the neighbouring 
 village, and, as was +■ eir custom on similar occa- 
 sions, returned on foot. 
 
 " Jonas," said his father, as they walked in 
 the May moonlight under the fine old trees that 
 formed the Farlandstoke avenue, ^* I say, Jonas, 
 what did you think of that young American 
 sailor ?" 
 
 " Well, father, I don't know. I didn't think 
 much about him. He seems a good-natured 
 sort of chap enough. But you should rather ask 
 Lucy, for she was doing a fairish business in the 
 flirtation way with him."
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 245 
 
 " Don't be a fool, Jonas !" said his sister ; " as 
 
 if- 
 
 "But Jonas will be a fool," rejoined their 
 father ; " never mind him^ but tell me what you 
 observed of this stranger ?" 
 
 " Observe, sir ! I don't know ! he seemed 
 very well inclined to be civil and pleasant." 
 
 " Ugh ! what a thing it is to be devoid of the 
 faculty of observation !" cried the old doctor. 
 "Why, one would suppose," he continued, 'Hhat 
 you had neither of you eyes in your head ! As 
 for Jonas, it his business to look at and think of 
 words rather than things. But I do wonder that 
 you should not have observed anything, Lucy !" 
 
 '' La ! father ! what are you driving at ? 
 What could I observe ? He seemed, I say, a 
 very nice young man — very much so !" 
 
 " Yery nice young man ! Pooh ! Then you 
 neither of you had eyes enough to see the 
 remarkable likeness between him and Sir Hil- 
 debrand ?" 
 
 " Can't say that I saw anything of the kind, 
 sir," replied his son. 
 
 " La, father ! likeness between that young 
 man and old Sir Hildebrand ! I think it is you 
 that have no eyes !" cried Miss Lucy.
 
 246 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Yet I have been thought to have rather 
 specially good ones, in my day, miss. And I 
 was struck by the similarity of their features 
 directly I saw the two men together. Of course, 
 one is a young man and the other an old one, or 
 at least, old enough to be the other's father. 
 One is light and lithe, and the other bulky and 
 heavy. But all that does not prevent me from 
 seeing that the make of the face and features is 
 curiously similar. Humph !" continued the old 
 general practitioner, with a shrug and a sort of 
 inward chuckle, " if Sir Hildebrand had been a 
 man of the same sort as his father, I should 
 have fancied " 
 
 " Fancied what, sir ?" said Jonas. 
 
 " Why, fancied that there might have been a 
 relationship recognizable by the doctor, though 
 not by the lawyer — humph !" 
 
 " Only that this Mr. Fraser," returned his 
 son, " knows all about his own people — knew 
 his father, who died a few years ago in Massa- 
 chusetts, in America, and now lives with his 
 grandmother, of the same name — not a ghost of 
 a case, sir." 
 
 " Case ! of course not ! But I was struck by 
 the likeness. And he is like Miss Agnes, too,
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 247 
 
 and like Miss Mary, as well," persisted the 
 doctor. 
 
 "La! father, how can you talk such non- 
 sense !" said Miss Lucy. '' Mr. Fraser like Mary 
 Artingale ! Well, I'm sure !" 
 
 Nevertheless, Doctor Hathaway had not been 
 the only person present at the Farlandstoke 
 dinner-party who had been struck by the same 
 observation. For when Mr. and Mrs. Henning- 
 tree found themselves alone together in the 
 privacy of their chamber in the Farlandstoke 
 mansion, and the husband and wife had 
 compared notes on what had passed during 
 the evening, Mrs. Henningtree said to her 
 husband — 
 
 " Did it occur to you to remark, Cyril, that 
 that young American sailor — a very handsome 
 fellow he is, too — is like the Artingale family ; 
 like every one of them, more or less ? I could 
 not help staring at him to study the queerness 
 of the latent resemblance between him, a young 
 man, and Miss Agnes, an elderly woman." 
 
 " Such likenesses often do strike people, espe- 
 cially people as familiar with their pencil as you 
 are, Miriam ; but the resemblance was too latent, 
 as you call it, for me."
 
 248 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " To me it was curiously apparent ; and if I 
 had seen him, without knowing anything what- 
 ever about him, I should have supposed him to 
 be one of the Artingale family." 
 
 " Do you know, this affair of the restoration 
 of the old Castle will be a very fine thing for 
 Purcell." 
 
 *' And I am sure he will do honour to your 
 recommendation." 
 
 " If I had not been sure of that I should not 
 have recommended him. It will be a very large 
 affair. I take it — mind, I know nothing about 
 it, but I fancy — that Mr. Farland finds the 
 money, and that in all probability in consequence 
 of a marriage arrangement between young Far- 
 land and Miss Mary." 
 
 " But with all respect to our host, our young 
 friend Felix is as big a booby as I ever set eyes 
 on," said the little lady. 
 
 " My dear, those bright eyes of yours have a 
 greater capacity for discovering the boobyism 
 of those on whom they light than the eyes of 
 most other people. Felix Farland I believe to 
 be an honest-hearted, good sort of young fellow 
 as one could wish for a country gentleman. God 
 bless my soul ! if all men were fit to set the
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 249 
 
 Thames on fire, what would become of the in- 
 surance offices ?" 
 
 " Yery true, Cyril ; and there are plenty of 
 excellent good booby girls created on purpose to 
 be fitting mates for the good booby boys. But 
 is Mary Artingale one of them ? — that is the 
 question. I should say, as far as I can judge, 
 from one evening passed in her society, that she 
 is not !" 
 
 "Well, women mostly see further into such 
 matters than men ; but I'll tell you what, 
 Miriam ; if Felix Farland marries Mary Artin- 
 gale, you shall give me a copy of the Museum 
 Clementinum ; and if he does not, I will give 
 you that landscape on Sill Moor that you fell in 
 love with when we were in London." 
 
 " Done !" cried the little lady, eagerly, skip- 
 ping across the room to put her hand into that 
 of her husband, who was standing on the rug 
 with his back to the fire ; '' I'll hang the land- 
 scape opposite to the window in my boudoir." 
 
 " Done !" said her husband ; " I can find 
 room for the Museum on the lower shelf in my 
 study." 
 
 " We shall see/' retorted the lady. " And, 
 by-the-bye, talking of landscapes, I am curious to
 
 250 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 see the little Bertha they were talking about, 
 who is to come up with her drawing to-morrow 
 morning. They were telling me all about her. 
 It seems an interesting case of native talent." 
 
 "It is in her grandmother's cottage that they 
 propose to find a lodging for Pur cell, is it not ?" 
 said Mr. Henningtree. 
 
 " Yes; I understood so/' replied his wife. 
 
 " If this little Bertha should be an attractive 
 little personage, I hope we shall have no love 
 nonsense between her and Purcell. That 
 would be a great folly." 
 
 '' Oh ! no danger, I should think. I don't 
 think they seemed to speak of her as a person 
 likely to make any mischief of that kind. They 
 say she is a little bit of an elfin-like tiny crea- 
 ture." 
 
 " But I have known cases," said Mr. Henning- 
 tree, looking at the miniature little figure of his 
 wife, " in which tiny creatures have done mis- 
 chief of that kind ! Oh— oh !" 
 
 ''Hush — ! You will alarm the household! 
 What will the servants think we are doing ?" 
 
 '' Gruess, very likely^ that you are pinching me 
 black and blue."
 
 MR. AND MRS. HENNINGTREE MAKE A BET. 251 
 
 *' And they'll guess, no doubt, that you deserve 
 it/' said the little lady, as she stepped into bed. 
 
 Into his bed, Sir Hildebrand Artingale got 
 that night in a happier frame of mind than had 
 been the case for many a long year. For now 
 at last he was going to see fulfilled the long- 
 deferred desire of his heart : Artingale Castle 
 was going to shake off the long lethargy of 
 decay, and be itself again ; and when he should 
 be gathered to his fathers, Artingale would ad- 
 mit that he, at least, had done his duty by the 
 name.
 
 252 
 
 BOOK III. 
 
 The Eestoration of the Castle is begui^. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 the bed-eoom at the cottage. 
 
 " Come up and look at it, granny !" said little 
 Bertha, who had just descended into the stone- 
 flagged kitchen, where old Hannah was sitting 
 at the window, from the upper story of the 
 cottage, with her ordinarily pale face flushed 
 with exertion, and in some degree perhaps also 
 by excitement — " Come up and look at it, 
 granny ; I don't think that we can do anything 
 more. It really looks very nice and comfort- 
 able." 
 
 " Not I, lass ; I don't want to look at it. Do 
 anything more, quotha ? I should think not, 
 indeed ! You would not ha' done half so much
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 253 
 
 if I had my way. Why if it was one of the 
 quality themselves as was going to lodge here, 
 you could not make more fuss about it." 
 
 " You know, granny dear, the ladies told me 
 to make it as nice and comfortable as I could. 
 And if that dear, kind Miss Agnes had not had 
 the thought to lend us a bed from the Castle, I 
 don't know how we should have managed ; but 
 now it really looks as nice a little bed-room as a 
 gentleman need desire." 
 
 " Gentleman, indeed ! I don't know what the 
 world's coming to, not I !" rejoined the old 
 woman crossly ; " I don't understand anything 
 about it. And the Castle ladies, too ! Why this 
 chap, as is going to lodge here, is he as has got 
 the job to do up the Castle, isn't a ? Didn't you 
 tell me he was coming to work at the Castle ? 
 And what the dickens such a bother should be 
 for about finding a bed and a sup of victuals for 
 a working man passes me ! A bed from the 
 Castle, too ! My certy, it's a fine pass as things 
 is coming to !" 
 
 " But, granny, as far as I can understand, this 
 Mr. Lancaster is not just what you and I would 
 call a working man, though, no doubt, he is 
 coming here to work, and "
 
 254 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " He's a coming to do up the Castle, isn't he, 
 lass ? Didn't jou tell me that was what he was 
 a coming for ?" 
 
 '' Yes, granny dear ; to superintend the re- 
 storation of the Castle. That is what Miss 
 Agnes said. He is an architect by profession." 
 
 " And that I take it is what we used to call 
 a bricklayer by trade, in my time. And true 
 enough the Castle needs one. What time is a 
 a-coming here, lass ?" 
 
 '* The Sillchester coach don't get to Billiford 
 till seven, granny ; and it's only half-past five 
 now ; and I suppose it will be half-an-hour more 
 before he can get here." 
 
 " There it is again ! Sillchester coach quotha ! 
 In my time such folk travelled a-foot, or if not, 
 by the waggon. Coach, indeed, for the likes of 
 him !" grumbled the old woman, between whose 
 estimate of the coming guest and her grand- 
 daughter's there was evidently a wide divergence. 
 
 From the above conversation, which took 
 place just ten days after the day of the Farland- 
 stoke dinner-party, it will be seen that the 
 proposal for lodging the young architect in 
 Hannah's cottage had been made and accepted, 
 though not very graciously, by the old woman ,
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 255 
 
 that all little Bertha's fears lest she and her 
 grandmother should not be able to make the 
 vacant room as comfortable a bed-room as could 
 be wished had been overruled by Miss Agnes, 
 who had overcome the main difficulty in the 
 manner Bertha had referred to ; that the work 
 of restoring the Castle had been proposed by 
 Mr. Henningtree to his pupil, and under the 
 advice of that gentleman accepted by him ; and 
 that it had been decided by the different parties 
 concerned to begin the w^ork — or at least that 
 preliminary portion of it for which the services 
 of Mr. Lancaster were in the first instance 
 required — without any delay. 
 
 It was true, as Bertha had said, that when 
 Miss Agnes had first spoken to her on the 
 subject, on the occasion of her carrying her 
 drawing to Farlandstoke to be shown to the 
 party assembled there, she had said some word 
 about making the spare room at the cottage as 
 comfortable as circumstances would permit. But 
 in truth little Bertha had been scarcely capable 
 on her return to her grandmother's cottage of 
 giving a very clear and accurate account of 
 what had passed. The poor shy, shrinking 
 little artist had never been exposed to such an
 
 256 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 ordeal before — an assemblage of four gentlemen 
 and a lady to sit in judgment on her poor 
 drawing 1 Bertha had been tempted to wish her 
 work in the fire, and herself a hundred miles 
 off. Of course they were all very kind to her. 
 Mrs. Henningtree had praised her drawing 
 warmly, had given her much counsel, and had 
 strongly encouraged her to persevere with her 
 studies. Both Mr. Farland and Mr. Henning- 
 tree had said a kind word, and the former had 
 warmly commended his son's good taste in 
 purchasing the sketch, though he knew very 
 well that good taste had had nothing to do with 
 the motives which had prompted Felix. As for 
 Felix, Bertha dM nc. so much mind his per- 
 sence, for he s jemed almost as much abashed and 
 as shy as herself. But then that other strange 
 gentleman — taller than even Mr. Felix — Bertha 
 had felt more afraid of him than of all the others 
 put together. He had only spoken once to say 
 that the picture seemed to him a right-down 
 smart one ; and having pronounced that judg- 
 ment, he had transferred his attention from the 
 work to the artist herself with a pertinacity of 
 which she somehow could not help being con- 
 scious, though sbe tried hard to think only of
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 257 
 
 what the others were saying to her, and which 
 made her feel more painfully shy than ever. 
 She came away, however, at last with an order 
 from Mr, Farland for a companion drawing to 
 the one purchased by his son; and her heart 
 was so full of this and of all the excitement 
 of the ordeal through which she had passed, 
 that her grandmother was excusable if she had 
 been more than usually slow in comprehending 
 the message her granddaughter brought her 
 about the proposed lodger. 
 
 The ladies from the Castle, however, had paid 
 a visit to the cottage since, and had themselves 
 inspected the spare room, and pronounced it 
 perfectly satisfactory, and all that could be 
 wished for the purpose. It might indeed well 
 be considered so. 
 
 The cottage in which old Hannah had lived 
 on her pension from the Artingale family for 
 now more than a quarter of a century was in 
 truth most charmingly situated in an angle of 
 the park, and in close proximity to the village 
 of Artingale, which was however entirely on 
 the outside of the park palings, with the excep- 
 tion of the church, which stood on ground a 
 little lower than the knoll occupied by the 
 
 VOL. I. s
 
 258 AETINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 cottage, and a little farther down the valley of 
 the Bill, and therefore to the south of Hannah's 
 dwelling. 
 
 It was a cottage, really and essentially a cot- 
 tage, but one of the old-fashioned sort, roomy 
 and not scrimped for space, with much room 
 indeed wasted according to modern notions of 
 such things, but wasted in a fashion which those 
 who have occupied such dwellings well know 
 the comfort of It was thatched on a very high- 
 pitched roof; but the Sillshire thatchers are 
 good at their trade, and know how to make a 
 thatch tight against rain and wind, warmer than 
 any other covering within, and infinitely more 
 picturesque without. It had in front two gables 
 and a short space of intervening roof between 
 them ; and these three roof-trees supported the 
 covering of as many chambers, three on the 
 ground-floor and three above, nearly half the 
 height of the latter being in the roof. Of those 
 on the ground-floor the centre one, which was 
 the largest, and on which the outer door opened, 
 was called the kitchen, but was in fact the living 
 room of the family — i. e., of the old woman and 
 her granddaughter. It was a rather large 
 room, with a window on either side of the door ;
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 259 
 
 another door, opposite to the front door, leading 
 to the back of the honse and the staircase ; a 
 large fireplace in the centre of the wall to the 
 left of one entering the house ; a door in the far 
 corner of the same wall leading to the room 
 under the left-hand gable, which was the old 
 woman's bed-room, and a door in the correspond- 
 ing corner of the opposite wall leading to '' the 
 parlour," a sort of sacred apartment never used 
 for any purpose, save that Hannah and her 
 granddaughter always took a state tea there in 
 much discomfort on Sunday afternoons. This 
 room might have been of much service to little 
 Bertha as a workroom for her drawing ; but her 
 grandmother would not allow it to be thus 
 desecrated, and had peremptorily refused to 
 permit that it should be used for the accommo- 
 dation of the stranger. 
 
 On the upper floor the room over this parlour 
 was Bertha's bed-room ; the space over the 
 kitchen was somewhat lower than the two rooms 
 under the two front gables, and was used for 
 little else than a landing-place and a receptacle 
 for certain clothes-presses, containing a rather 
 large quantity of linen and other such articles, 
 which Hannah had persistently hoarded up
 
 260 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 during her long life. On the right-hand side 
 of this landing-place, looking from the front 
 windows of the cottage, and therefore over old 
 Hannah's bed-room, was the, spare room, the 
 known existence of which had given rise to 
 the idea of finding a lodging for the young 
 architect in the cottage. 
 
 It was by no means a very small room, ac- 
 cording to modern ideas, and certainly a pretty 
 one, despite the fact that the upper portions of 
 the lateral walls sloped inwards in obedience to 
 the exigences of the timbers of the roof. There 
 was a small window cut in the western wall, 
 to the right of a person looking from the front 
 of the cottage southwards, which was recessed 
 in the upper sloping part of the wall. But the 
 main window of the chamber was under the 
 front gable, looking southwards ; and from this 
 window the view was really charming. Imme- 
 diately below it was the tiny but bright flower- 
 garden of the cottage, with its porch covered 
 over with an abundant wealth of honeysuckle 
 and creeping roses. Then came a sunny slope 
 of the park^ and beyond that the little ivy-grown 
 church of Artingale, with its pretty spire and 
 its harmonious bells beneath it. To the right of
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 261 
 
 the church, far away up the -valley of the Bill, 
 the view was nearly the same as that from the 
 Castle terrace, with the same distant blue hills 
 and grey crags of the moor for the bounding line 
 of the horizon. 
 
 One little object, of singular beauty in the 
 landscape, was seen to great advantage from the 
 cottage which was not seen from the Castle. 
 This was the Artingale chapel attached to the 
 little church, and almost as large as all the rest 
 of the building, in which were the tombs of 
 many generations of the family. The chapel at 
 the Castle had never been used as a burying- 
 place. The Artingales had always buried their 
 dead in the Artingale chapel attached to the 
 parish church. It was a charming little building, 
 with three beautiful windows of Early English 
 Gothic under its steep grey roof, running out to 
 the westward, at right angles to the chancel of the 
 church. For at Artingale the chancel or altar 
 end of the church, which should have been to 
 the east, pointed almost directly due south ; so 
 that the right angle made by the nave of the 
 church and the Artingale chapel was in full 
 view of Hannah's cottage window. 
 
 The smaller western window of the room
 
 262 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 which was to be appropriated to the stranger 
 commanded a view of the western end of the 
 Castle terrace, and of the well-nigh ruined 
 chapel at the extremity of it. 
 
 Within the chamber everything had been 
 done that dainty female fingers, and intelligent 
 female care, could do to make it look a very 
 picture of neatness and cozy comfort. If Mr. 
 Purcell Lancaster was not abundantly contented 
 with the accommodation provided for him he 
 would indeed have been very hard to please. 
 
 Bertha was, it must be admitted, a little proud 
 of her handiwork, especially of a splendid bunch 
 of dog-roses, violets, and lilies of the valley, 
 culled and arranged by her own little fingers, 
 and placed in a vase (which when engaged in 
 more prosaic duties was called a jug) on the 
 little round table in the window. Bertha was 
 proud of the pretty appearance of the room, and 
 was disappointed that her grandmother was too 
 cross to come up and look at it. Perhaps, how- 
 ever, it was better as it was ; for Hannah might 
 have declared that flowers were altogether out 
 of place in a working man's bedroom, and have 
 insisted on their removal. 
 
 And now what more could be done ? Nothing ;
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 263 
 
 and yet it was still an hour and a half to the 
 time for the arrival of the Sillchester coach, even 
 if it should arrive at its due time. The boots at 
 the * Artingale Arms' had been fully instructed to 
 inquire for Mr. Lancaster on the arrival of the 
 coach, and to show him the way to the lodging 
 destined for him. What more was there that 
 could be done ? Bertha went into the back 
 kitchen (at the back of that part of the cottage 
 which has been described there was the staircase, 
 a back kitchen, and a wood-house) to satisfy 
 herself by another examination whether her 
 preparations for the stranger's evening meal 
 were all in due order. As for putting the kettle 
 on the fire for the tea, which she had for a 
 moment contemplated, the manifest absurdity 
 of doing so a good two hours before it would be 
 needed was too evident to permit any hope from 
 that resource yet awhile. Yes, there was the 
 loaf covered over with a coarse clean napkin, 
 the butter on a plate in a cool corner, the rashers 
 ready cut for popping on the fire at a minute's 
 notice. There absolutely was nothing more to 
 be done. So Bertha went to stand in the porch, 
 and watch the setting of the sun over the 
 Artingale woods, and speculate on the diversity
 
 264 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 of view respecting the social status of the 
 expected guest, involved in the words and 
 recommendations of Miss Agnes, and the com- 
 mentaries of her grandmother. 
 
 Though far too humble in spirit to say as 
 much, even to her own heart. Bertha could not 
 help an unrecognized conviction that Miss Agnes 
 would not have placed anybody that could be 
 properly called a mere workman to lodge in 
 their cottage. Then the remuneration which 
 had been agreed on seemed to Bertha's ignorance 
 much larger than could be paid by a bricklayer, 
 as her grandmother had called him. Master 
 bricklayers, however, no doubt made a good deal 
 of money. Mr. Bell, of Billiford, was a master 
 bricklayer ; and he lived in much better style 
 than anything that their cottage, even at the 
 best, could afford. But if nothing better than 
 Mr. Bell were needed at the Castle, why not 
 have employed him, a man well respected by all 
 Billiford? Then picturing to herself the un- 
 known stranger under the semblance of another 
 Mr. Bell, she blushed with a feeling of having 
 been guilty of an absurdity and incongruity in 
 the matter of the poor nosegay, so carefully 
 arranged in the best jug upstairs, and from that
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 265 
 
 fell to doubts as to the sufficiency of the quantity 
 of rashers prepared. 
 
 Probably even this newly suggested view of 
 the case might have availed to induce her to run 
 once more upstairs and remove the nosegay from 
 its place, had she not been just then interrupted 
 by a visitor. 
 
 It was Miss Lucy Hathaway, who had *^ just 
 walked over to ask how old Hannah was." 
 
 Lucy was not a frequent visitor at the old 
 woman's cottage. Hannah was much too com- 
 fortably off to need charitable assistance, even 
 in the matter of medicines. But at eighty-five 
 one is apt to be on terms of near acquaintance- 
 ship with the doctor, and the doctor's family. 
 And Lucy came to the cottage, now and then, 
 really as her father's aide-de-camp to see how 
 the old woman was, and whether there was any 
 need of a visit from her father. But there was 
 no sympathy or liking between the two girls. 
 Bertha was afraid of Lucy — twenty times more 
 afraid of her than she was of Miss Artingale, or 
 even of Miss Agnes ; she could not imagine why 
 it should be so, but so it was. Lucy on her part 
 had a contempt, and almost an aversion, for poor 
 little Bertha. She thought her a feckless, in-
 
 266 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 capable, helpless and useless creature ; whereas 
 she herself was essentially, not only in her own 
 opinion but in reality, the reverse of all this. 
 Then she felt a resentment, of the nature of 
 which she did not attempt to render any account 
 to herself, that a person occupying the social 
 position which Bertha avowedly did should 
 occupy herself as she did with " drawing and 
 painting and such like," and should absolutely 
 obtain praise and approbation by so doing. She 
 considered that such pursuits and ambitions 
 betokened a certain " uppishness " and presump- 
 tion which, taken in conjunction with the more 
 than modest bearing of the little artist, must be 
 held to involve a really disgusting amount of 
 hypocrisy and slyness. Then the people would 
 call her pretty. Pretty ! Why, if Bertha were 
 pretty, what could she, Lucy, be ? And yet she 
 had been an acknowledged belle at Billiford for 
 the last twelve years ; and therein was, I have 
 no doubt, the real gist of Lucy's grievance. But 
 she was wrong, for her brunette beauty was of 
 the durable kind ; and she had not been prettier 
 twelve years ago than she was still. 
 
 Then again — and this was perhaps the heaviest 
 of the counts against poor Bertha — one did not
 
 THE BED-ROOM AT THE COTTAGE. 267 
 
 Iviiow how to behave to her. She was neither 
 fish nor fowl ! Why should any difference he 
 supposed to exist between her and all the other 
 poor girls of the parish ? And yet the people 
 would suppose such difference to exist. She did 
 not expect, Lucy supposed, to be considered a 
 lady ! And yet one seemed to be compelled to 
 address the little creature and behave to her 
 very differently from what one did to all the 
 other poor girls, who were some of them better 
 off by a good bit than Bertha Donne. Why was 
 this ? Lucy could not understand it for the life 
 of her, for her part ! And yet she did always 
 behave to Bertha Donne very differently from 
 her manner to all the rest of those whom she 
 declared she considered Bertha's equals. 
 
 For all these reasons there was not much of 
 liking between the two girls, as has been said ; 
 and Miss Lucy was a less frequent visitor at the 
 cottage than she probably would have been if it 
 had been otherwise.
 
 268 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE ' HERO ' ARRIVES UP TO TIME. 
 
 However, Lucy had now " walked over to see 
 how old Hannah was, and how her rheumatism 
 was doing." 
 
 " Thank you very kindly. Miss Lucy," said 
 little Bertha ; "1 think my grandmother has 
 been rather better since this fine weather set in. 
 Indeed she has little to complain of." 
 
 Now it was rather an offence to Lucy to be 
 addressed by Bertha as the latter had spoken to 
 her. It seemed to her ears that Bertha Donne 
 had no right to call her " Miss Lucy." The 
 other girls of the parish, when she was perform- 
 ing her visits of charity, always called her 
 " Miss." Lucy had no clear theory on the 
 subject, but she had a sort of feeling that this 
 use of her Christian name implied an undue
 
 THE 'hero' arrives UP TO TIME. 269 
 
 assumption of equality on the part of the old 
 menial servant's granddaughter. 
 
 So she answered rather tartly, " Well, if she 
 has nothing the matter with her, perhaps I 
 might as well have spared myself my walk. 
 The poor people in the cottages rarely want to 
 see one, I suspect, unless they have need of one." 
 
 " Nay, Miss Lucy, I am sure grandmother is 
 much obliged to you for coming. Would you 
 like to step in and speak to her ?" 
 
 " What is the use if she is not ailing ? So, 
 Bertha," she added, suddenly, sitting down on 
 one of the seats of the porch as she spoke, " you 
 are going to have a lodger at the cottage, I am 
 told. Is it true ?" 
 
 Lucy had in vain striven to find some means 
 of making the conversation naturally lead up to 
 this, the real object of her visit, but she had 
 failed in the endeavour. She would fain also 
 have broached the matter graciously ; but her 
 usual habit of snubbing Bertha Donne, and her 
 dislike of her, had placed this too beyond her 
 power. So she had been driven to put her 
 question brusquely and suddenly as above, and 
 to indicate by means of what she felt to be a 
 condescension distasteful to her — the taking a
 
 270 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 seat in the porch — that she intended to have a 
 little conversation on the subject. 
 
 *' Yes, Miss Lucy. The ladies at Artingale 
 proposed it, and my grandmother thought that 
 it would be an assistance to us." 
 
 " Of course it will, if you make him pay well. 
 But who is it that wants to come and lodge at 
 Artingale, I should like to know ?" 
 
 Now Miss Lucy knew very well who the 
 expected lodger was, and what he was coming 
 to do at Artingale ; but she also had been 
 puzzled to understand the nature of the social 
 status of the person for whom this preparation 
 was made. Was he a " workman," as old 
 Hannah had said, or was he a " gentleman ?" 
 The two classes were very clearly divided by a 
 perfectly intelligible and unmistakable line in 
 Miss Lucy's mind. Was he, in fact — for this 
 was what she had in her thoughts — within the 
 sacred pale of " society," or without it ? This 
 was the question. Now Mr. Bell, the master 
 bricklayer, though understood to be a warm 
 man and a responsible, was clearly on the outside 
 of the barrier ; for at Billiford in those days the 
 limits of " society " were very well and clearly 
 defined. There had been a degree of doubt in
 
 THE ' HERO ' ARRIVES UP TO TIME. 271 
 
 the case of Captain Curling when he had first 
 come to pass the evening of his days at BilHford. 
 As the mere skipper of a merchant vessel he 
 would scarcely at that time have been admissible 
 within the charmed circle; but the owner of 
 Woodbine Cottage had always been very spe- 
 cially " in society." Then there was no Mrs. 
 Curling to complicate the case, and when he had 
 been once asked to dine at Farlandstoke the 
 captain was not only thenceforward a very 
 clearly recognized part of society, but was held 
 to be very good society too. Now was this Mr. 
 Lancaster, who was coming to '^ do the repairs " 
 of the Castle, a second Mr. Bell, or was he some- 
 thing of a quite different nature ? At first sight 
 it seemed clear that he must be a mere Mr. 
 Bell, possibly of a larger growth ; but then 
 Lucy had, as we have seen, met Mr. Henning- 
 tree at Farlandstoke at dinner ; and she had 
 heard that he was " doing the repairs " of the 
 cathedral at Sillchester. Now there could be 
 no doubt that Mr. Henningtree was " in so- 
 ciety." 
 
 In a word, was it or was it not the case that 
 Providence was about to bestow, in addition to 
 the amiable young American, yet another avail-
 
 272 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 able beau — I am afraid that was the phrase 
 that Miss Lucy would have used in speaking on 
 the subject — to the very limited resources of 
 Billiford in that article ? That was the question ; 
 and had Miss Lucy been in the company of one 
 of her own friends and equals, that question 
 would have been asked without the least beating 
 of the bush, and would have been answered with 
 most perfect intelligence and sympathy. But 
 with Bertha Donne propriety forbade any such 
 friendly communing of the spirit. So she had 
 to approach her object by a less direct route. 
 
 ** Who is it," she asked, " that can want to 
 lodge at Artingale ?" 
 
 " It is Mr. Lancaster, Miss Lucy, the gentle- 
 man who is going to superintend the repairs at 
 the Castle." 
 
 " Oh ! the gentleman who is going to super- 
 intend the repairs at the Castle," re-echoed 
 Lucy, with a slightly ironical emphasis on the 
 word " gentleman " and the grandiosity of the 
 subsequent phraseology, but with more of cu- 
 riosity and careful consideration. 
 
 " That is what Miss Agnes said — the very 
 words she used," said Bertha. 
 
 " Miss Agnes called him the gentleman who
 
 THE *HERO' ARRIVES UP TO TIME. 273 
 
 was coming to superintend the repairs of the 
 Castle ? Then he must be a gentleman, sure 
 enough," said Miss Lucy, more to herself than 
 to her companion. 
 
 And it seemed to become clear also to Bertha 
 that the new lodger could not be another Mr. 
 Bell. 
 
 " So it seems to me, Miss Lucy," she said ; 
 " though grandmother seemed to think that he 
 must be a bricklayer of some sort." 
 
 " A bricklayer !" cried her visitor, with in- 
 finite scorn. " A likely thing that Miss Agnes 
 Artingale would call a bricklayer a gentleman ! 
 But of course, so that he pays his board and 
 lodging honestly, it is no matter to you whether 
 he is a gentleman or a bricklayer. But to 
 us it is important to know whether he is 
 a sort of person that one can become ac- 
 quainted with." 
 
 " I am afraid. Miss Lucy, that I can't tell you 
 anything that will help you to find that out," 
 said little Bertha, with a grave demureness that 
 was not without a slight touch of irony in its 
 tone. 
 
 "You, child!" said Miss Lucy, quite uncon- 
 scious of any such thing ;" of course, you can- 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 274 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 not. I wonder if he will be received as a visitor 
 at the Castle !" 
 
 " Miss Agnes did not say anything about that, 
 Miss Lucy," returned Bertha, who was all the 
 time standing at the entrance of the porch with 
 her shoulder leaning against the rose-covered 
 arch of it, watching the deepening crimson tints 
 of the approaching sunset. 
 
 " No ; I should suppose not, child," said Miss 
 Lucy, with a great toss of the head. " We shall 
 see, I suppose, in good time ! What o'clock do 
 you expect him — what did you say his name is — 
 to arrive ?" 
 
 " His name is Mr. Lancaster ; he will arrive, 
 I believe, by the coach from Sillchester," said 
 Bertha. 
 
 " And the ' Hero ' gets in at seven !" Miss 
 Hathaway alluded to the six-inside post coach, 
 which was called the * Hero ' from its achievement 
 of the feat of accomplishing the journey between 
 Sillchester and Billiford in one day, and not to 
 the expected stranger. " And the ' Hero ' gets in 
 at seven," she said, looking at her watch. 
 
 " Will you tell me, please, what o'clock it is. 
 Miss Lucy ?" asked Bertha, with an unrecognized 
 consciousness that the application would not be
 
 THE 'hero* arrives UP TO TIME. 275 
 
 ill received by virtue of the admission it involved 
 of tlie fact that Miss Lucy Hathaway possessed 
 a watch, whereas she, Bertha Donne, had none. 
 
 " It wants but a minute or two to six. I sup- 
 pose that you are all ready for him ?" 
 
 " Yes, his room is ready," said Bertha, shortly. 
 
 " I suppose," said Miss Lucy^ after a pause, 
 "that I may go up and see how you have 
 managed — that is, if you have no objection." 
 
 " Oh dear, no ! you can go up, if you please, 
 Miss Lucy," replied Bertha. But, in truth, she 
 had some objection. For though she was by no 
 means unwilling that Miss Hathaway should see 
 how comfortable and nice-looking a room they 
 were able to offer to the expected stranger, she 
 had an instinctive dislike to expose the work of 
 her hands and all the evidences of her careful 
 devices to the certainly not-indulgent criticism of 
 her visitor. Especially she disliked that she 
 should see the nosegay on the table in the 
 window — why, she would have been puzzled 
 to say. 
 
 Lucy turned into the cottage door without 
 waiting for further invitation ; and as it chanced 
 that old Hannah had gone into her bedroom, 
 she was able to pass at once through the kitchen
 
 276 AETINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 to the staircase without having to stop to speak 
 to the old woman, as she must otherwise have 
 done. She was sufficiently acquainted with the 
 geography of the cottage to need no showing of 
 the way ; and she marched directly to the spare 
 room, while Bertha followed her. 
 
 On entering the room she was evidently struck 
 by the unexpected air of comfort it presented. 
 
 " Upon my word !" she exclaimed, " dimity 
 hangings at half-a-crown a-yard, if they cost a 
 penny ! A swing-glass on the dressing table ! 
 Candles — an easy chair — and flowers ! — upon 
 my word ! It's plain to see that 7/ou suppose 
 him to be a gentleman, any way !" 
 
 "As for the bed and the dimity hangings," 
 said Bertha, feeling that honesty demanded the 
 explanation, and at the same time not altogether 
 sorry to disclaim some of the too-great magni- 
 ficence which was so evidently astonishing her 
 visitor, " as for the bed and the dimity hangings, 
 Miss Agnes lent them to me from the Castle." 
 
 " — h ! Miss Agnes lent the bed ? I wonder 
 you liked to ask her for that." 
 
 " I did not ask her," replied Bertha ; " she 
 proposed it herself." 
 
 "0 — h! she offered to send down a bed!"
 
 THE 'hero' arrives UP TO TIME. 277 
 
 rejoined Miss Lucy, thoughtfully ; and it became 
 clearer to her than ever that the person who was 
 to " do the repairs " at the Castle would as- 
 suredly be ''in society." And the conviction 
 quite determined her to prolong her visit to the 
 cottage till the stranger should arrive. She had 
 " walked over to the cottage to see how old 
 Hannah did," with a half-formed intention of 
 doing so, but had been doubtful whether it would 
 be worth while. Now she was determined not to 
 quit her ground till she had seen the new comer. 
 
 " Well, I am sure," she said, as she turned to 
 the door to go down stairs again, " you could not 
 have done more if you had expected a prince. 
 I wonder," she added, as she passed out again 
 to the porch of the cottage while Bertha still 
 followed her, ''I wonder what sort of a person 
 he will be !" 
 
 Bertha had perfectly well understood the 
 motive of Miss Hathaway's visit to the cottage 
 on that particular evening, and had read very 
 accurately the course by which her thoughts had 
 travelled to the determination to be present (if 
 not at the death at least) at the breaking cover 
 of the anticipated addition to Billiford society. 
 She had, however, no objection to Miss Lucy's
 
 278 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 staying so as to be there when the stranger 
 should arrive, and if she had had an objection, 
 would have been far too timid to let Miss Hath- 
 away perceive it. On the contrary, she was 
 rather well pleased that it should be so. She 
 had been looking forward with much nervous 
 trepidation to the duty imposed upon her of 
 receiving the new comer, and installing him in 
 his lodging all by herself ; for her grandmother, 
 of course, could not count for much in the way 
 of assistance, and she thought that the presence 
 even of Miss Lucy Hathaway, uncongenial as it 
 might be under other circumstances, would be 
 an acceptable help. 
 
 So she said, *' The readiest way, Miss Lucy, 
 for you to find out what sort of person he is — at 
 least, what sort of looking person he is — would 
 be just to wait here till he comes, if that would 
 not be too great a trouble to you." 
 
 " Well ; I almost think I will, if I shall not be 
 in old Hannah's way. I can sit here in the 
 porch, you know. Don't let me detain you, if 
 you have anything to do," said Miss Lucy, a 
 thought more graciously than she had spoken 
 hitherto. 
 
 " Thank you, Miss Lucy. I have nothing
 
 THE 'hero arrives UP TO TIME. 279 
 
 more to do ; everything is ready. It is too dark 
 to sit down to my drawing, and grandmother 
 has gone into her own room for her evening 
 nap," said Bertha. 
 
 " Well, then, I think I will stay ; it can't be 
 very long now ; — half-past six !" she said, again 
 consulting her watch. " The ' Hero ' gets in at 
 seven ; it will be twenty minutes or so before he 
 can get his things and come here. I ought to 
 be at home to give papa his tea at eight — or a 
 quarter-past would do," continued Miss Lucy, 
 calculating the time at her disposition ; " yes, 
 that will do — if the ' Hero ' keeps its time. I think 
 it has been doing so since the fine weather set 
 in. Then I shall not be in your way, if I stay 
 till he arrives ?" 
 
 " Not at all. Miss Lucy ! Pray stay." 
 
 *' But how is he to know where he is to come 
 to, and how is he to find the cottage ?" asked 
 Lucy. 
 
 " Mr. Henningtree will have told him that he 
 is to lodge in grandmother's cottage in the park, 
 and boots at the ' Artingale Arms ' has been told 
 to ask for Mr. Lancaster as soon as the coach 
 arrives, and to show him the way and bring his 
 luggage here."
 
 280 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Everytliing arranged, upon my word ! Why 
 you are turning out quite a woman of business, 
 little Bertha. We shall have you managing the 
 affairs of the nation next !" 
 
 '' I hope not," said Bertha, with a little smile. 
 
 And so the two girls continued to chat, while 
 the twilight faded into darkness. Miss Hathaway 
 always scratchy, despite her wish to be civil 
 and conciliatory, and Bertha devoutly wishing 
 that the minutes would fly a little faster, and 
 bring the conversation and her nervous waiting 
 to an end. 
 
 Seven o'clock was heard to ring out musically 
 from Artingale steeple ; another quarter of an 
 hour was got through by dint of patience, and 
 then Miss Lucy's watch came into requisition 
 about once every minute. 
 
 At last a something that seemed to be the end 
 of a portmanteau was seen to rest on the top of 
 the stile in the wall that divided the park from 
 the churchyard, by which a path passed from 
 the village of Artingale to the cottage ; and in 
 the next instant a brown-gaitered leg was seen 
 to be thrown over the stile. But that was re- 
 cognised as belonging to Nick, the * Artingale 
 Arms ' boots, and was therefore interesting only
 
 THE *HERO' ARRIVES L^P TO TIME. 281 
 
 as a forerunner and announcer of more important 
 things. 
 
 Another second and boots himself stood in 
 the pathway on the park side of the stile, and 
 proceeded to shoulder the portmanteau anew. 
 And the next decisive moment sufficed to answer 
 both the girls who w^ere watching in the cottage 
 porch, that the stranger who was to " do the 
 repairs " at the Castle was certainly no Mr. Bell, 
 of larger or of smaller proportions. Mr. Bell, 
 indeed ! The first glimpse of the new comer's 
 figure completely convinced Lucy of the ab- 
 surdity of all doubts as to whether Mr. Lancaster 
 w^as to be admitted " into society," and Bertha 
 decided as summarily that the bed from the 
 Castle and the dimity hangings, and her other 
 preparations, were not a whit too grand for the 
 occasion, and that all fears respecting the con- 
 gruity and appropriateness of her own special 
 little contribution of the nosegay might be set 
 at rest.
 
 282 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 MR. PURCELL LANCASTER IS ADMITTED INTO 
 SOCIETY. 
 
 Other and more competent judges than either 
 Miss Lucy Hathaway or httle Bertha Donne — 
 though I do not think that the critical acumen 
 of the latter on the subject was altogether to be 
 despised — might have judged, as they did at 
 first sight, that Pur cell Lancaster was one 
 qualified to be admitted into '' society," not only, 
 indeed, into that of Billiford and Artingale, but 
 into any society whatever. Such judges, not 
 perhaps deeming it necessary to encounter the 
 horns of the dilemma that presented itself to 
 those damsels as to the " workman " or " gentle- 
 man " categories of humanity, might have said 
 of Purcell Lancaster that he was evidently every 
 inch a gentleman, and as evidently every inch 
 a workman.
 
 MR. LANCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 283 
 
 Many a man is tlioroughly a gentleman, of 
 whom the first sight is not sufficient to convince 
 a competent judge of the article that he is such. 
 In many cases a somewhat more protracted 
 inspection of the specimen, and in some a certain 
 amount of viva voce examination is needed for 
 decision on the point in question ; for it is not 
 on every thorough gentleman — whether he be 
 the normal inheritor of gentle nature from a 
 long line of gentle forefathers, or whether he be 
 the happy though less normal product of nature 
 in her most bounteous mood — that she has 
 bestowed those outward, visible, and unmistake- 
 able signs with which she marks her favourites, 
 and had marked Purcell Lancaster. 
 
 Still less does every true and genuine work- 
 man bear about with him, stamped on his out- 
 ward man, any certificate of the excellence that 
 is in him ; but in Lancaster's case there was ex- 
 pression of '* doing faculty," as the Germans 
 call it, on his ample brow, an active and quick 
 intelligence of eye, and a certain purpose-like 
 and brisk adroitness in his bearing, and well 
 designed adaptation of means to ends pervading 
 his every movement and action, which irresisti- 
 bly impressed the mind of any one in his com-
 
 284 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 pany with the notion, that there was a man who 
 could do, and would do well, whatever was set 
 before him to do. 
 
 The two girls who stood waiting for him at 
 the porch of the cottage as he came up the path 
 from the churchyard stile, preceded by boots 
 with the portmanteau, did not, either to their 
 own hearts or to each other, or to their ac- 
 quaintances afterwards, express their judgment 
 of the stranger exactly in the above terms. But 
 that judgment was not very diverse from the 
 description of the man which has been set before 
 the reader. The first verdict of both girls, 
 pronounced both aloud and in her own heart, 
 was that there was no mistake about his being a 
 gentleman. The next point in which their 
 opinions were equally in accord, but which was 
 expressed aloud only by Miss Lucy, was that 
 the new comer was a remarkably good-looking 
 fellow. Neither of them made any remark 
 either aloud or consciously to themselves re- 
 specting that remarkable expression of capacity 
 for doing which has been noticed as charac- 
 terizing young Lancaster, but each of them un- 
 consciously set him down in her mind as one of 
 those men who could be relied on for prompt
 
 MR. LANCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 285 
 
 and successful action in any case in whicli it 
 might be needed. It is one of the points of 
 character respecting which a woman most surely, 
 rapidly, and instinctively estimates a man, and 
 the marked presence of the quality in question 
 is one of the surest passports to her liking, 
 esteem, and respect. 
 
 The young architect then had already won 
 golden opinions from both these two girls, 
 strongly contrasted as they were in character 
 and disposition, before he had come near enough 
 to speak to them ; and when he did so his 
 address abundantly confirmed their favourable 
 prepossessions. Had he not been told by Mrs. 
 Henningtree, among other particulars, of the 
 remarkable smallness of the little girl, his land- 
 lady's granddaughter, he would probably have 
 fallen into the error of mistaking Miss Lucy 
 Hathaway for the person, or the granddaughter 
 of the person, whose house he was about to 
 inhabit — a mistake which would have greatly 
 tended to check the growth of the favourable 
 opinion which that young lady was disposed 
 to hold regarding him. But his immediate 
 recognition of the original of the portrait 
 Mrs. Henningtree had painted for him of the
 
 286 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 little artist saved him happily from this 
 blunder. 
 
 "Miss Bertha Donoe — Mr. Purcell Lan- 
 caster," he said, laughing and bowing to the 
 little artist ; " perhaps it would have been the 
 more correct thing for boots from the * Artingale 
 Arms ' to have presented me, but he didn't do it ; 
 so I had to do it for myself Will you accept 
 my own announcement of myself? But you 
 are prepared to expect such a person, I sup- 
 pose ? 
 
 • " Oh ! yes, sir," said Bertha, smiling, '' we 
 are quite prepared for you." 
 
 " And I, you see, was quite prepared to know 
 you at once. My dear old friend Mrs. Henning- 
 tree has told me all about you." Here he 
 looked with a slightly-inquiring glance towards 
 Lucy, who was still standing in her corner of 
 the porch, and feeling rather emharrassee de sa 
 personne, and bowed slightly to her. 
 
 " This is Miss Lucy Hathaway," said Bertha, 
 simply, in reply to his look of inquiry, and 
 certain that Miss Lucy would be angry imless 
 she found some means of enabling her to take 
 part in the conversation. 
 
 "• Happy to make the acquaintance of a friend
 
 MR. LANCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 287 
 
 of Miss Donne's," he said, bowing to her again 
 more markedly. 
 
 " My father," said Lucy, wheeHng round fully 
 towards him, so as to turn her shoulder towards 
 Bertha, and affecting to speak in a sort of stage 
 aside — " my father is the leading medical man 
 at Billiford, and I was here this evening to see 
 if old Hannah, this young person's grandmother, 
 you know, was in need of a visit from him." 
 
 Lancaster at once understood all that this 
 speech was intended to teach him, and one or 
 two things besides. He perfectly comprehended 
 the nature of the blunder he had made in calling 
 Miss Hathaway, the " principal medical man's " 
 daughter, the " friend " of Bertha Donne ; but 
 he did not think it necessary to take any trouble 
 to repair the error. 
 
 " Is your grandmother a sufferer, then ?" he 
 asked, turning round to Bertha. 
 
 ^' Not more, I suppose, than people of her age 
 generally are — much less so than many — only a 
 little rheumatism. My grandmother is several 
 years past eighty, sir." 
 
 " Yes ! that is a great age. What a lovely 
 position your cottage is in ! And close to my 
 work, too ! What a grand old pile the Castle
 
 288 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 is ! You may guess whether I am anxious to 
 have a good look at it." 
 
 " I am sure you will admire it the more, the 
 more you see of it," said Bertha, with the genuine 
 enthusiasm of a provincial for the recognized 
 lion of the neighbourhood. 
 
 " If your grandmother is awake now. Bertha, 
 I will speak a word to her before I go home, 
 but I cannot wait any longer," said Miss Hath- 
 away. 
 
 " I will go and see. Miss Lucy," said Bertha, 
 turning to go into the cottage, and thus leaving 
 Lancaster and Miss Lucy together. 
 
 Lucy lost not a moment in profiting by the 
 occasion to impress yet more clearly on the 
 stranger's mind the relative positions held by 
 herself and " little Bertha " in the world of 
 BilKford. 
 
 " Old Hannah and her granddaughter, Mr. 
 Lancaster, are not altogether in a position to 
 require charitable assistance. The old woman 
 has a pension from the Artingale family, where 
 she lived many years as a servant, which fortu- 
 nately keeps them from want. Nevertheless, you 
 know, people of that class always need looking 
 after more or less — they are so ignorant and so
 
 MR. LANCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 289 
 
 shiftless ; so my father, who is too busy to be 
 often able to do so himself, likes me to look in 
 on them and others of the poor people from time 
 to time." 
 
 Again the young architect understood every 
 word of this, and learned as before a little more 
 besides what it was intended to tell him ; but he 
 only said, " I have no doubt. Miss Hathaway, that 
 you are able to do much good in that manner." 
 
 " No, Miss Lucy, grandmother has not waked 
 yet. I should be sorry to detain you any 
 longer," said Bertha, returning from the cot- 
 tage. 
 
 " Very well ; then I will go home now, and 
 call again before long." 
 
 Bertha had no doubt at all as to Miss Lucy 
 keeping this promise ; but she only said, " Good 
 night. Miss Lucy ; I am sure grandmother will 
 take it very kindly of you." 
 
 " Good night, Mr. Lancaster," said Miss Hath- 
 away, making him an elaborate and formal 
 curtsey. 
 
 " Good night. Miss Hathaway," returned he, 
 with as formal a bow. And Lucy tripped down 
 the path to the stile in the churchyard wall, her 
 trim, well-built, and active figure looking very 
 
 VOL. I. u
 
 290 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 pretty in the light of the moon, which had risen 
 while they had been talking. 
 
 " You must be ready for your supper, Mr. 
 Lancaster, after your journey," said Bertha, 
 turning to him as soon as Miss Hathaway had 
 left them ; " I will go and see if my grand- 
 mother is awake. And you would like to see 
 your room ?" 
 
 " I am in no hurry to move from this spot, 
 Miss Donne. Let us wait a minute or two. 
 Do not wake your grandmother. How ex- 
 quisitely lovely the valley and the church look 
 in the moonhght !" 
 
 "It is very beautiful. But I have no means 
 of comparing the scenery around Artingale with 
 any other part of the country ; for I have no 
 knowledge of any other." 
 
 " Nor is my knowledge a wide one. But I 
 have seen nothing, and do not believe that the 
 world contains much that is more beautiful in 
 its way than the scene before us." 
 
 Bertha was very far from being insensible to 
 the charm of the scene, and of the beautiful 
 light which was then lying on it. But her 
 heart was full of cares and anxieties on a dif- 
 ferent subject, and she could not forbear from
 
 MR. LANCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 291 
 
 returning to it. Would this no Mr. Bell, but 
 very decided gentleman, be content witb the 
 accommodation provided for him ? Then boots 
 had escaped while Miss Hathaway had been 
 taking up her attention, leaving Mr. Lancaster's 
 portmanteau just inside the cottage door, instead 
 of taking it upstairs as he ought to have done ; 
 and how was she to get it to her guest's bed- 
 room ? Then again she had spoken of supper ! 
 Who knew whether tea and bread and butter, 
 and rashers of bacon, would at all fulfil the 
 promise of supper to the mind of the stranger ? 
 Poor little Bertha was in truth troubled about 
 many things. 
 
 " I hope you will like your room, Mr. Lan- 
 caster," she said timidly ; " but you know this is 
 merely a poor cottage ; and grandmother and I 
 are, as Miss Hathaway told you, very poor 
 people, and not able to do much to make you 
 comfortable. But Miss Agnes thought that 
 you would find it convenient to be near the 
 Castle ; and there is no other place so near as this." 
 
 " I am sure I shall be as comfortable here as I 
 could wish. It is as pretty a cottage as I ever 
 saw. The Miss Agnes you speak of is Miss 
 Artingale, I suppose ?"
 
 292 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 *' Not Miss Artingale. Miss Artingale's name 
 is Mary. Miss Agnes is Sir Hildebrand's sister," 
 replied Bertha, with an accuracy of precedency 
 which would have done Garter King-at-arms' 
 heart good. 
 
 " To-morrow morning I must wait upon the 
 baronet. I have had some account of my future 
 employer from my friend and old master, Mr. 
 Henningtree ; but I should like to hear your 
 account of the family, Miss Donne," said he, with 
 a pleasant smile. 
 
 Bertha blushed as if she had been caught in 
 some flagrante delictu of the most shocking kind, 
 and turned towards the cottage door as if, in the 
 excess of her shyness, she meditated running 
 away instead of replying to this direct demand 
 for her secret opinion on so important a subject. 
 But after a second or two, seizing her courage 
 with both hands, as the French say, she dashed 
 with headlong desperation into the thick of the 
 task before her. 
 
 " They are the kindest, best people in the 
 world — that is. Miss Agnes and Miss Artingale. 
 Lady Lavinia I have scarcely ever seen ; only 
 two or three times in my life. She is a great 
 invalid, you know ; and never goes out. But I
 
 MR. LAXCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 293 
 
 believe she is a very kind and good lady. But 
 nothing can exceed the goodness, the kindness, 
 the condescension of Miss Artingale and her 
 aunt. I do not think there can be better people 
 in the world !" and Bertha had suddenly grown 
 eloquent with the enthusiasm of her gratitude, 
 and her pretty features glowed with the earnest- 
 ness of her feelings. " Sir Hildebrand, of course, 
 I have seen less of," she continued ; '^ but I 
 believe he is a very good man. He is much 
 respected by all the neighbourhood. But — I 
 don't know why I think so," said Bertha, medi- 
 tatively, " but somehow I do not think Sir 
 Hildebrand is — how shall I say — not so clever 
 as Miss Agnes and Miss Artingale." 
 
 " Ah! you think they are clever. Miss Donne? 
 but it is unfortimate for me, if the baronet is less 
 so ; for my business will be with him, you know," 
 said Mr. Lancaster, much amused inwardly at 
 the similarity of the opinion arrived at con- 
 cerning the baronet and the account given of 
 him by Mr. and Mrs. Henningtree, and by little 
 Bertlia. 
 
 " But, dear me, Mr. Lancaster, I have no 
 right to say that Sir Hildebrand is not clever !" 
 protested Bertha, alarmed at the high treason
 
 294 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 which she had uttered. '' Of course I can know 
 nothing about it. Only I do think that the 
 ladies are veri/ clever !" 
 
 "Intelligent and appreciative art critics?" 
 said Mr. Lancaster, with a sly smile. 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Lancaster !" cried poor Bertha, 
 turning crimson far more painfully than before, 
 and feeling as if she should sink into the earth 
 under so dreadful an attack. " I am sure — of 
 course I don't know — it is very presumptuous in 
 me " 
 
 '' Not at all, Miss Donne ! I know all about 
 Mr. Felix Farland's picture, and your artistic 
 studies. We are fellow-students, for I have 
 attempted a little in that line myself; and we 
 must show each other our work, and establish a 
 mutual laudation society. But seriously I do 
 not know any surer means, and equally ex- 
 peditious, of ascertaining whether a person has 
 any brains in their head than is afforded by 
 hearing them attempt to criticise an artist's 
 work." 
 
 " But I am not an artist, Mr. Lancaster ; pray 
 do not fancy me one ! And pray, pray^ do not 
 imagine that I say that Sir Hildebrand has no 
 brains in his head !"
 
 MR. LANCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 295 
 
 " No, no ! we will leave Sir Hildebrand a fair 
 field and no favour, to sliow his brains himself." 
 
 " And now I am sure you must want your 
 supper, Mr. Lancaster: I call it supper," she 
 continued, feeling by this time a little more at 
 her ease with him ; " but all we have to give 
 you is a rasher of bacon." 
 
 " And what can man below want more ?" 
 said he. 
 
 " Then that will do for man below. But man 
 upstairs will want his portmanteau in his room, 
 and I am afraid, Mr. Lancaster, that I have no 
 means of getting it there, for that lazy boots has 
 left it in the kitchen," said Bertha, beginning to 
 blush again and to be terrified at her incredible 
 audacity in actually daring to joke with a strange 
 gentleman, then seen for the first time in her life. 
 
 " Man below, when he soars aloft;, should 
 carry his own portmanteau with him," rejoined 
 Lancaster, with a laugh, taking his by one handle 
 and swinging it on to his shoulder. 
 
 '' This way," said Bertha, tripping past him 
 to open the ojDposite door leading to the stair- 
 case. And so the portmanteau was carried up- 
 stairs, and Mr. Purcell Lancaster was introduced 
 to his room.
 
 296 ARTIXGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Oh ! what a beautiful room ! what a charm- 
 ing room ! That view of the Castle, and this 
 view of the village and the valley ! and the 
 moonlight streaming in ! and a nosegay on the 
 table ! If any one could dream of a pretty bed- 
 room it could be none other than this. I do 
 love a pretty room, Miss Donne." 
 
 " I am so glad you like this. We could not 
 have made it so comfortable without the bed, 
 which Miss Agnes lent us from the Castle !" said 
 Bertha, with a sort of feeling that honesty re- 
 quired this avowal. 
 
 " Beneficent Miss Agnes ! Keally, how very 
 kind ! though I must of course understand that 
 the kindness was shown to you." 
 
 " She is, indeed, a kind person. And now I 
 will run and see about getting your supper 
 ready." 
 
 " What a dear, deft, neat-handed little Phillis 
 of a maiden it is!" said Purcell to himself, as 
 soon as she was gone. " If I am not in luck in 
 the way of lodging I do not know who can be !" 
 he added, taking a more leisurely survey of his 
 apartment. 
 
 " What a very pleasant gentleman ! I seem 
 to know him quite well already !" said Bertha
 
 MR. LANCASTER ADMITTED INTO SOCIETY. 297 
 
 10 herself as she busied herself about the supper ; 
 ** and he called himself a fellow-artist ! I should 
 not wonder if he were to be kind enough to 
 teach me a little !" 
 
 Meantime Lucy Hathaway had announced at 
 her father's tea-table the decided and unquestion- 
 able admissibility of Mr. Purcell Lancaster — no 
 longer " the man who was to do the repairs " at 
 the Castle, but *' the architect to whom the re- 
 storation of the Castle was entrusted " — within 
 the pale of the most aristocratic Billiford society. 
 The young lady had even gone beyond the 
 judicial declaration of this fact, and had intimated 
 that she had been able to see " with half an 
 eye ;" but this was only to be considered as a 
 proverbial expression, for she had unquestion- 
 ably made the utmost use of two whole eyes, and 
 those very bright and sharp ones, on the occa- 
 sion in question ; but what she meant probably 
 was that she had had only a short period during 
 which to bring them to bear on the subject of 
 her investigation — that she had been able^ she 
 said, with half an eye to perceive that he would 
 be a very valuable addition to their social circle 
 of acquaintance. 
 
 Miss Lucy's undisputed verdict had been
 
 298 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 carried an hour later to Woodbine Cottage by 
 her father, who went that evening to enjoy a 
 game of cribbage and a glass of punch with his 
 old friend the captain ; and by her brother Jonas 
 to the " club-room " at the ' Artingale Arms/ a 
 social haunt of a kind which, in these days of 
 " Athenaeums," reading-rooms, and " institutes " 
 of all sorts, would hardly perhaps be honoured 
 by the presence of so correct, respectable, and 
 well-to-do member of the legal profession as Mr. 
 Jonas Hathaway, but which in those less in- 
 tellectual times, when the delights of sanded 
 floors, long clay pipes, liquor-stained mahogany 
 tables, and the flow of soul exhibiting itself in 
 " a song or a sentiment," at the choice of the 
 soul thus actively flowing, welled up into higher 
 levels of the social strata, constituted a centre, 
 from which the verdict that had gone forth re- 
 specting the new comer was conveyed with the 
 utmost speed to the whole community.
 
 299 
 
 CHAPTER lY. 
 
 bertha's visitoes. 
 
 The next morning Lancaster was awakened, 
 as he had intended that he should be, by the 
 earhest beams of the May morning shining 
 in directly upon him through his window, left 
 uncurtained that they might freely do so. His 
 first movement on jumping out of bed was to 
 run, not to the larger window, through which 
 the light was streaming, and which commanded 
 the view of the village and the valley, but to 
 the smaller window, from which, as lias been 
 said, a view of the western part of the Castle 
 terrace and the ruined chapel was to be seen. 
 He was longing for a sight of the building on 
 which his cares were to be employed. The 
 place had appeared to him in the moonhght of 
 the preceding evening even more beautiful than 
 he had been led to expect it. The work before
 
 300 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 him seemed to him to be everything that his 
 artistic instincts and his professional tastes and 
 interests could desire ; and the minntes seemed 
 to pass slowly till he could be on the spot and 
 make his first general survey of the castle and 
 its position. 
 
 But he had another small matter to attend to, 
 which he was bent on getting done the first thing 
 this morning. He had brought his portmanteau 
 with him to his lodging, but had left at the 
 Artingale Arms a much larger case, containing 
 all the necessary apparatus of his work — his 
 drawing-boards, his paper, his instruments, &c. 
 — saying that he would call the first thing in the 
 morning, and see it taken up to the castle, and 
 deposited in the room which was to be ap- 
 propriated to him as an ofiice. And this done, 
 he purposed waiting on the baronet. 
 
 He dressed himself therefore as noiselessly as 
 he could, thinking that the other inmates of the 
 cottage were probably still asleep, and crept 
 down to the kitchen, intending to let himself 
 out without disturbing anybody. But the first 
 thing he saw, on noiselessly opening the door 
 which led from the staircase to the front kitchen, 
 was little Bertha in her neat brown holland
 
 bertha's visitors. 301 
 
 working dress, sitting at a little table in front 
 of the window nearest to the sacred parlour, 
 jbusily bending over her drawing. Her back 
 was turned towards him, and he had entered so 
 silently that she was unaware of his approach. 
 So he stepped with a noiseless step across the 
 stone floor, and stood behind her looking over 
 her work before she was aware of his presence. 
 
 The drawing of the chapel and terrace had 
 been finished and sent home to its purchaser ; 
 and the work she was engaged on was a 
 drawing taken from the stile in the churchyard 
 path, which has been before mentioned, and 
 comprising the chancel and steeple of the 
 church, with the Artingale chapel standing at 
 right angles to it, and a group of fine elm-trees 
 which stood on the other side of the churchyard, 
 between it and the entrance to the village. It 
 was a drawing requiring considerable accuracy 
 and knowledge of perspective. Lancaster stood 
 looking at it — and, perhaps, a little at the artist 
 — for a minute or two, while she was still utterly 
 unconscious of his presence. 
 
 It was hardly fair. 
 
 At last he said, very quietly, "Upon my 
 word, Miss Donne "
 
 302 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 He could get no farther with the commenda- 
 tion he was about to utter ; for she sprang up 
 from the little table so violently as to throw th^ 
 water from the glass upon it all over the table, 
 and over her drawing, and uttering a cry which 
 was almost a shriek of terror. 
 
 '^ Oh ! Mr. Lancaster," she cried, pressing her 
 hand to her panting side, and looking piteously 
 up into his face, " how could you do so ! You 
 don't know how you terrified me." 
 
 She was trembling like an aspen leaf all -over ; 
 but Lancaster's first movement was to rescue 
 the drawing, and care for its restoration from 
 the damage it had received. 
 
 " I am so sorry," he said, in a tone which 
 indicated that he really was very sorry ; " it 
 never occurred to me that you would be so pain- 
 fully startled. Can you forgive me ? I do not 
 think the drawing will be permanently the 
 worse. That, indeed, would be a thousand 
 pities." 
 
 Bertha put out her hand to take the drawing 
 from him, and he let her do so. She had again 
 seated herself in her chair, but her heightened 
 colour and panting breath showed how greatly 
 she had been startled.
 
 bektha's visitors. 303 
 
 " Will you not forgive me ?" lie asked again, 
 really very penitently. 
 
 "If you will promise never to do so any 
 more," she said, smiling a very pretty smile 
 tlirough tlie tears wliich had begun to gather 
 in her eyes. 
 
 " Indeed, indeed, I never will ; it was very 
 foolish of me ; but, perhaps, the minute or two 
 that I stood looking at your drawing, before I 
 spoke to you, may be good for something after 
 all ; for an idea came into my head that I think 
 is a good one." 
 
 By this time Bertha was sitting again with 
 her drawing before her, and had in some degree 
 recovered herself. 
 
 " If it is a very useful idea, and frightening 
 me out of my wits was necessary for the think- 
 ing of it, I suppose I must be content to have 
 been frightened." 
 
 " But the frightening was not at all necessary, 
 and I have no such excuse to plead. What I 
 was thinking was this. It occurred to me last 
 night, after that one peep at the Castle in the 
 moonlight, that it would be a very interesting 
 thing to have a series of drawings of the Castle 
 in its present condition, before the restorations
 
 304 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 are commenced— drawings for publication, I 
 mean — to be engraved or lithographed, or, 
 perhaps, better still, etched. I was thinking a 
 good deal about it in the night ; and it came into 
 my head, while I was looking over your shoulder, 
 that you could help in such a scheme — that we 
 might do the work together, in short." 
 
 " Oh ! Mr. Lancaster, I do drawings for pub- 
 lication !" 
 
 " Certainly ; why not ? That before you is a 
 difficult drawing. I see how you have done it. 
 I see that one or two corrections would be 
 desirable. I could make those corrections in 
 ten minutes ; but I could not make that drawing 
 in as many hours." 
 
 " My drawings engraved !" said Bertha, sotto 
 voce, as if the enormity of the idea had taken 
 her breath away. 
 
 " Yes ; your drawings and mine together, 
 with a little letter-press, which we could do 
 together, or which I could supply. I think the 
 thing would answer. I will consult Mr. Hen- 
 ningtree and a friend I have in London on the 
 subject. We should probably bring it out by 
 subscription ; a five-guinea volume — say twenty 
 drawings."
 
 bertha's visitors. 305 
 
 Twenty drawings ! Subscription ! Five- 
 guinea volume ! Bertha's head seemed to be 
 going round. What manner of man was this ? 
 Was he the present owner of Aladdin's lamp, or 
 was he simply crazy ? Five-guinea volume ! — 
 say twenty drawings! All knocked off as 
 one might say a pot of tea and eggs — say a 
 couple of eggs for breakfast. 
 
 *' Turn the matter over in your mind, Miss 
 Donne. You know the place well, and will be 
 able to suggest subjects. That is the style of 
 work we should want/' he said, tapping his 
 forefinger three or four times on the drawing 
 before her — " a little more firmness in the out- 
 lines, perhaps." 
 
 " But, Mr. Lancaster " 
 
 '^ I must run away now ! I must go to the 
 Artingale Arms to get the case with all my 
 workshop furniture, and have it carried up to 
 the Castle; then I will be here to breakfast — 
 what time shall I say? — will eight do? — and 
 we will talk over our scheme at leisure. After 
 breakfast I must go and present myself to 
 Sir Hildebrand. Will eight o'clock do?" 
 
 " Yes," said Bertha, positively out of breath ; 
 " breakfast shall be ready at eight ; but Mr. " 
 
 VOL. I. X
 
 306 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " Good-bye. I'll be here at eight !" and be 
 was off, and bounding down the path to the 
 churchyard stile in a series of leaps rather than 
 a run, before she had recovered from the feeling 
 of being enveloped in a whirlwind. 
 
 Punctually at eight o'clock Purcell was back 
 at the cottage to breakfast, and found it ready 
 for him. Old Hannah was not yet out of her 
 room, and he was therefore all the more able to 
 talk to Bertha of his grand partnership publish- 
 ing scheme. He was delighted, he told her, 
 with the room they had assigned to him for a 
 workshop, as he phrased it. It was a room 
 which had served as a sort of anteroom to the 
 chapel, in passing to it from the interior of the 
 Castle, and looked, consequently, on the western 
 extremity of the terrace. 
 
 " I can see the window of it from the west 
 window of my room upstairs," he said. ''It is 
 a very eerie situation, next door to the ruined 
 chapel. What a pretty ruin it is ! — and with 
 all the uninhabited part of the Castle between 
 it and the nearest living creatures ! But I 
 shall like it none the worse for that. I have 
 the key of the outer door of the chapel, and can 
 enter and pass to my room by that way. From
 
 bertha's visitors. 307 
 
 the other side of the room, I can get at all the rest 
 of the building which is to be the scene of my 
 operations, and can wander about, and study 
 moonlight effects ad libitum'' 
 
 "How long do you think it will be before 
 workmen can be set to work on the building ?" 
 
 " Oh ! there will be a good month or six 
 weeks' work before we can get to that point. 
 I must survey the whole building accurately, 
 and make drawings, plans, and measurements of 
 every part and detail of it ; I must thoroughly 
 examine every portion of the structure, founda- 
 tions, walls, timbers, roof, and ascertain in 
 what condition they are. Then we shall come 
 to the work of planning, designing, and deter- 
 mining on the restorations, and making ac- 
 curate estimates of them ; and then we may 
 go to work with stone and brick and mortar." 
 
 " And you can really think of preparing 
 drawings for publication in the midst of all 
 that !" said Bertha. 
 
 " Oh, yes, plenty of time ! We'll do it 
 between us. I put down two subjects in my 
 mind this morning, the east end (that is south, 
 in reahty, as it stands) of the chapel interior view 
 — a charming morsel "
 
 308 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 *^I know it," said Bertha, nodding and smil- 
 ing. 
 
 «« and the old stair from the south-west 
 
 corner of the grand hall, a very interesting 
 specimen of old wood-work, but a difficult 
 drawing to make — you shall take that. And I 
 think that some of our subjects should be re- 
 served for the restored building, as it will be — 
 that in the interest of the architect, you know. 
 And I have been calculating, as I walked 
 from the inn with my case of tools to the Castle, 
 that we should be able, I think, to give twenty- 
 four drawings, if we have as good a subscription 
 as I hope for." 
 , " Oh, Mr. Lancaster, don't talk of ' we !' It 
 seems like laughing at me ; it does, indeed ! 
 And you go so quick ! just as if it was all 
 settled. It makes one feel as if one was being 
 carried away, despite one's own will, by a hurri- 
 cane." 
 
 '' Well, I won't be like a hurricane, if I can 
 help it. But I don't see the use of losing time. 
 I think the idea is a good one. Are you willing 
 to venture your labour in the execution of, say, a 
 dozen drawings in the style of that you were 
 occupied on this morning ? That is the ques-
 
 bertha's visitors. 309 
 
 tion. And remember that, if we fail, the 
 drawings would remain as saleable as before," 
 
 Bertha felt that she was being carried away 
 by the hurricane more than ever. But before 
 Lancaster had finished his breakfast, he had not 
 only obtained her assent to this plan, but had 
 talked her into almost as much enthusiasm for 
 it as he felt himself. 
 
 And, having done this, he set forth again on 
 his way to the Castle, to wait upon Sir Hilde- 
 brand ; and Bertha, after attending to what was 
 needed for the service of her grandmother, 
 giving the old lady her breakfast, and seeing 
 her safely into her easy-chair — so placed as to 
 command the view from the window — sat down 
 to the drawing she had been working at when 
 Lancaster had so alarmingly interrupted her. 
 
 But her work did not get on as well as it 
 usually did. Diligently as she strove to keep 
 her attention fixed upon it, she caught herself 
 again and again with her brush suspended idly 
 in her hand, and nearly dry, while her eyes were 
 wandering away down the valley in front of the 
 window at which she was sitting, and her thoughts 
 were castle-building with reference to the grand 
 and amazing conception of this wonderful lodger,
 
 310 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 and perhaps diverging from time to time a little 
 to the author of the conception himself. 
 
 It was during one of such pauses in her work, 
 while she was gazing absently out of the 
 window instead of on the sheet of paper before 
 her, that her eye lighted on the figures of two 
 men coming in the direction of the cottage from 
 the churchyard stile that has been spoken of. 
 And she thought that she recognized Mr. Felix 
 Farland, junior, in one of them. It was pretty 
 clear that he was coming to the cottage, for that 
 path through the churchyard would not have 
 been the shortest way from Farlandstoke to 
 Artingale Castle. Bertha guessed also in the 
 next minute that the other person could be no 
 other than the American gentleman who had 
 embarrassed her by looking at her so fixedly that 
 morning when she had taken her drawing to 
 Farlandstoke. His figure was not sufficiently 
 familiar to her for her to recognize him at the 
 distance he was from the cottage ; but the 
 person with young Mr. Farland was taller than 
 he ; and Bertha had remarked that the American 
 stranger was taller than Felix, and she did not 
 know of anybody else in that neighbourhood 
 who was so.
 
 bertha's visitors. 311 
 
 She was right in her guess. The two ad- 
 vancing figures were young Farland and the 
 American mate from Salem, Mr. George Fraser. 
 Since the morniog of the exhibition of Bertha's 
 drawing at the Farlandstoke breakfast-table, the 
 two young men had been a good deal together. 
 There was much that was alike, though perhaps 
 more that was contrasted in them. There was 
 the same frank, open-hearted, open-eyed, guile- 
 less nature and jovial temperament in both, the 
 same high spirits, the same perfection of animal 
 vigour and athletic form ; though Farland was 
 the heavier, and Fraser the lither man of the 
 two. There was the same thorough honesty of 
 heart, and straightforwardness of character. 
 But all the rest was contrast. And in all that 
 appertains to mental culture and intelligence 
 the difference was altogether in favour of the 
 American. They each had found somewhat 
 that was agreeable in the society of the other. 
 And young Farland assuredly had no other 
 object in seeking the society of the American 
 than this something, whatever it was. But, 
 though Fraser liked the companionship of the 
 young English squire, the study of whom opened 
 quite a new phase of human nature to his ob-
 
 312 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 servatlon, and thougli he could not fairly be 
 said to have consciously had a second view in 
 seeking it, yet I suspect that there was another 
 motive, which, more or less unconsciously to 
 himself, influenced him to feel that in coming 
 near to Farland he was approaching something 
 else which had attracted him. 
 
 There was nothing to surprise little Bertha 
 in a visit from young Mr. Farland. From the 
 time when she had first come to live with her 
 grandmother, Felix had been in the habit, when- 
 ever he was at home, of looking in at the cottage 
 from time to time on some kindly errand of 
 good neighbourship or other, — to ask after the 
 old woman, to bring her presents of snuff, or 
 some little comfort or other, sent by the house- 
 keeper at Farlandstoke. He had first fallen 
 into the habit from having come to the cottage 
 in company with Mary Artingale when they 
 were both children together; for of course it 
 was the more natural duty of Mary to look after 
 an old servant and pensioner of the family. But 
 Farlandstoke was a house kept with a more 
 largely liberal hand than Artingale ; and it was 
 easier for Felix to order the groom to follow 
 him with a couple of bottles of port, or any
 
 bertha's visitors. 313 
 
 such like present, than it was for Mary to ob- 
 tain a similar largesse from the grip of old 
 Bennet, the Castle butler. Thus it had become 
 an usual thing for Felix to look in at the cottage 
 when his walks or rides took him in that direc- 
 tion. And when he had recently returned 
 home he had resumed the old habit, and had 
 thus, as we have seen, been led to purchase 
 Bertha's drawing. Yes ; he was falling into 
 his old habit, and continuing the kindly atten- 
 tions of old times. But (and there were eyes 
 and tongues in Artingale and Billiford sure 
 to remark the fact, — those two sharp eyes of 
 Miss Lucy Hathaway among the surest and the 
 first) whereas in the old times there had been 
 nobody in the cottage but an old woman and 
 a little child, there were now an old woman 
 and a young girl, whom masculine obliquity of 
 vision and judgment at Billiford persisted in 
 deeming attractive. Moreover, it had been re- 
 marked that in those former years young Mr. 
 Felix and Miss Artingale were wont usually to 
 visit the cottage together. But now Mr. Felix 
 had been observed to make his visits there alone. 
 Of course it was very easy to imagine plenty of 
 reasons why this might very naturally be the
 
 314 ARTINGALE CASTLE, n 
 
 case; and Billiford had not been led by its 
 observations on the subject to say more than 
 " Humph !" But this *' humph " was said in a 
 tone which impHed that BilHford thought it 
 would be right — and meant — to keep an eye on 
 that portion of the domain of society. 
 
 Miss Lucy Hathaway said " Humph," and 
 promised herself to keep two very sharp and 
 bright eyes on that outlying spot of the Billiford 
 society. 
 
 Now I do not think that these ^^humphs" 
 had ever reached the ears of Felix ; but it 
 strikes me as possible that they might have 
 reached the ears of the young American stranger 
 within the Billiford gates. 
 
 In this wise. 
 
 When, on the day on which Bertha had 
 carried her drawing to Farlandstoke to be judged 
 by Mr. and Mrs. Henningtree_, George Fraser 
 met his friend and host Captain Curling at the 
 four o'clock dinner at Woodbine Cottage, he 
 had spoken to his old friend, as was natural, of 
 his breakfast at Farlandstoke, and of the little 
 artist and her drawing, and had, indeed, seemed 
 to the captain to be rather full of the subject. 
 
 " Who is she ?" inquired he of his old friend ;
 
 bektha's visitors. 315 
 
 "' for I could not rightly make out by what was 
 said among them." 
 
 ** Oh, I know ! Why, I've known her ever 
 since she was that high," said the captain ; 
 " and to tell the truth, she is not much higher 
 now," he added, looking at George with an 
 expression that seemed to claim applause for 
 the candour shown by such an admission. 
 
 "Well, then, captain," said George, "if you 
 know so well, maybe you can tell me. I want 
 to know who she is." 
 
 " Why, what can it matter to you, George, 
 who she is ? Who she is ! as if she was any- 
 body ! Why she is not, as one may say, rated 
 on the ship's books at all ! She is the grand- 
 daughter of that old woman she lives with. Old 
 Hannah, she had a rating — before the mast. 
 She was a servant at the Castle years ago. Her 
 daughter married a painter — educated for the 
 quarter-deck — painter died — she died ; little 
 Bertha left with nothing all the horizon 
 round to look to, save that old woman and her 
 pension ; — and she can't keep afloat much longer 
 — stands to reason !" 
 
 " Well, but she has got her art to look to 
 now." said George ; "a very pretty picture it
 
 316 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 was she had done, as I ever set eyes on. I don't 
 pretend to much judgment in that matter, but 
 all of them there said it was first-rate well fixed. 
 I should say she was educated for the quarter- 
 deck," he added, after a pause, " and that she 
 would be an ornament to any deck — or cabin 
 either, for that matter." 
 
 Captain Curling was in the act of helping his 
 guest to a slice of a beautiful little leg of moor- 
 land mutton (such mutton, my poor boys, victims 
 of a generation of progress, as you have neyer 
 eaten, such as we used to eat before scientific 
 breeding and agricultural economy had taught 
 men to kill their mutton at two years old instead 
 of four) ; he had already made one incision right 
 down through the pope's eye to the bone, when 
 the above observation of his young friend 
 arrested his hand. 
 
 '' Gleorge," he said, in a voice of deeply signi- 
 ficant warning, looking up at the handsome 
 young face opposite to him, over the rim of his 
 tortoise-shell spectacles, and using the carving 
 knife in his hand solely with a view to oratorical 
 effect and emphasis, — '* George, my boy, you have 
 an eye to your binnacle ; mind which tack you're 
 on, and keep in mind the port you are bound for."
 
 bertha's visitors. 317 
 
 Captain Curling, the simplest and kindliest of 
 men, especially prided himself on a fifty Roche- 
 foucauld power of insight into the human heart ; 
 and affected a tone of — usually ludicrously naive 
 — cynicism, which he conceived to indicate that 
 profundity of knowledge of human nature in all 
 its various forms — follies, vices, and weaknesses — 
 which, as the captain held, could be acquired in 
 no other walk of life but that of a skipper in the 
 merchant service. Being an old bachelor, he 
 considered himself an especially competent and 
 sagacious judge of women, and would often 
 point out how the calm vantage ground of that 
 position was absolutely essential to such looking 
 on at married life, as could enable a spectator to 
 form a sound judgment of the chances of the 
 game. The captain did not profess to be an 
 admirer of the sex. His friends said that a 
 petticoat was the only object in creation of 
 which Captain Curling had ever been afraid. 
 His enemies would probably have said (if he had 
 had any, but he had none, even among the sex 
 at which he so perseveringly shook his head), 
 his enemies would probably have said that the 
 captain had been a disappointed man, and that 
 the grapes he persisted in calling so sour had 
 hung too far above his reach.
 
 318 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 " George, my boy," continued the captain, 
 emphasizing his words so forcibly with the 
 carving knife, that a drop of dark brown gravy 
 was jerked off the point of it on to the snowy 
 tablecloth, ^' G-eorge, my boy, when you have 
 reason to think that you are shoaling your water, 
 never neglect the lead." 
 
 "Aye, aye, sir!" said the young man, from the 
 other side of the table ; '' but I have sea-room 
 enough, never fear." 
 
 " No man, sir, as knows his duty," rejoined 
 the captain, dogmatically,": "has sea-room enough 
 when he is lying off a lee coast in a gale, least- 
 ways not so as that some more room wouldn't 
 go to make his mind more comfortable. And, 
 George, a woman is. a lee coast, and a very 
 dangerous one ; when I hear a young man 
 speaking, as you was speaking, when your 
 words came between me and the mutton the 
 way they did just now, I know that a wind is 
 blowing as is likely to grow to a gale." 
 
 " Never fear, sir. I was born in Salem town, 
 and our folk mostly do have eyesight enough 
 to keep 'em from steering stem on into the 
 breakers." 
 
 "And, mind you, lad, no privateering in these 
 waters. Bertha Donne, poor little thing, is as
 
 bertha's visitors. 319 
 
 good a girl as ever stepped — that is, as far as 'tis 
 the nature of any of them to be — and if one 
 thing is bad, another may be worse, you under- 
 stand." 
 
 " All right, sir," said George ; " God forbid 
 that I should have any such evil in my thoughts. 
 But I am told that that young squire, the old 
 man's son, where we dined — and a strapping 
 fine young fellow he is too, though liedi be like 
 to starve, if he had to live on his wits —they tell 
 me that he is for ever going to the cottage where 
 that little girl lives." 
 
 " Stuff, George ! how can you talk in that 
 way, when I tell you that she is a good girl." 
 
 " Well, and why not ? what has that to do 
 with it?" said George, looking up from his 
 plate, surprised. 
 
 *' Got to do with it !" re-echoed the captain. 
 " Why, you don't suppose that if a youngster in 
 the position of young Mr. Felix Farland was to 
 be a running after such a girl as Bertha Donne, 
 in the way you intend, he could mean anything 
 but wickedness and mischief." 
 
 But the American could not see this at all. 
 It seemed to him likely enough that young 
 Farland might have thought little Bertha as 
 attractive as she had appeared to him, and might
 
 320 ARTINGALE CASTLE. 
 
 very naturally have the purpose of asking her 
 to be his wife. 
 
 It was under these circumstances that George 
 Fraser_, considering his old friend Curling to be 
 the best of good fellows, and a most excellent 
 ship's captain, yet none the less deeming him to 
 be absolutely and entirely ignorant of every- 
 thing appertaining to such matters as those 
 upon which the worthy captain had been 
 bestowing upon him his advice — it was under 
 these circumstances, I say, that George culti- 
 vated the acquaintance of young Farland, and 
 took an opportunity of asking him one day to 
 let him (Fraser) go with him on a visit to 
 old Hannah's cottage, being minded to judge 
 for himself on what terms Felix was received 
 there, and with what kind of objects he was in 
 the habit of going there. 
 
 And thus it came to pass that the two young 
 men were walking up to the cottage, when 
 Bertha looked up from her drawing, and was 
 roused from the reverie into which she had 
 fallen by seeing them. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON : PRINTED BY WnXIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET 
 AND CHARING CROSS.