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 http://www.archive.org/details/walterevelynorlo01lond
 
 B-^ 
 
 L I B RARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N IVERSITY 
 
 or ILLINOIS 
 
 82/3 
 
 Wn\z 
 
 1853 
 
 (>-■
 
 -^ yy"^^^- 
 
 WALTER EVELYN; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE LONG MINORITY 
 
 IN THKEE VOLUMES. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 VOL. L 
 
 LONDON : 
 RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 
 
 1853.
 
 WESTMINSTER : 
 PRINTED BY J. B. NICHOLS AND SONS, 
 25, PARLIAMENT STREET.
 
 
 AVALTER EVELTK 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 " I saw a troop 
 Of lords and ladies gay 
 As I lay a thynkyne, a thynkyne, a thynkyne, — 
 As I lay a thynkyne they went upon their way." 
 
 How do you do, my Public ? We have not 
 met for some time. Fatter, eh, my Public ? 
 Looking well, too. Manchester pretty quiet ? 
 So, that^s right ! Farmers not so well, eh ? 
 Dissatisfied because they have not got Lord 
 Derby now ? I do not see that it is any 
 business of yours, my PubHc, how I came 
 by this manuscript, but I will tell you, too, if 
 you hke. I went out to California, made my 
 fortune in three days of course, three million 
 
 ^- VOL. I. B
 
 2 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 sterling, robbed of it all in Panama, that is, 
 paid it all to a doctor, who cured me of the 
 yellow fever, caught in the mines ; worked my 
 passage home. My wife did not know me, 
 said she did not like yellow people ; went away 
 in despair to Homburg, to get back my com- 
 plexion and regain my wife, who had serious 
 thoughts of marrying again. — (Mem^ Curate 
 very assiduous in his attendance.) Shown 
 into a room at the hotel, just vacated by a 
 remarkably fresh-coloured gentleman, thought 
 it was a good omen, determined to take up my 
 quarters there ; looked in the pigeon-holes of 
 the incomprehensible table you always find in 
 a German hotel and break your nose against, 
 under the impression that it is a washhand- 
 stand. Well, there it lay in a pigeon-hole on 
 the right side, I mean the manuscript, evi- 
 dently left there by fresh-coloured gentleman. 
 Pigeon-hole would not open at first — I pulled 
 at it, it resisted ; I pulled harder, got excited, 
 handle gave way, fell down, knocked my head 
 against another piece of incomprehensible fur- 
 niture with marble top standing against the bed. 
 Incomprehensible piece of furniture rattled as 
 if there was something inside. Never mind
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 3 
 
 now, look into it by-and-bye, perhaps a treasure 
 also left by fresh-coloured gentleman. Well, 
 up again, would not be discouraged (bump on 
 my head not very large after all), attacked 
 pigeon-hole again with German pocket-knife, 
 German pocket-knife broke, cut my fingers — 
 hot work — bound up my finger, — never say die; 
 tried English corkscrew screwed up to the hilt 
 into the place where the handle was ; German 
 wood-work gave way; another bump on the 
 head, but victory ! victory ! first incomprehen- 
 sible piece of furniture tumbled all down to- 
 gether ; hurt my knee a little in falling ; never 
 mind, get at drawer now from behind. Put 
 my foot against it to push it out from the 
 other side, back gave way, would not open to 
 the last, any more than a Spanish window will. 
 At last, then, cried I, here we are! Pooh, 
 only a bundle of old bills! Eh? No! What's 
 this ! Walter Evelyn ! A literary discovery 
 — a second Rowley ! No, it's not of the 
 fifteenth century either. Never mind, I shall 
 be a second Chatterton in all except Mrs. 
 Angel and the arsenic water. Hollo ! though, 
 I forgot all about fresh-coloured gentleman. 
 Run after him, quite breathless ; caught 'him 
 B 2
 
 4 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 just getting into his carriage in the inn-yard ; 
 caught hold of him. Sir ! Sir ! Rowley ! Chat- 
 terton ! Walter Evelyn left behind. Here 
 fresh-coloured gentleman sung out wildly ; evi- 
 dently thought I was mad. Valet came run- 
 ning up (an Englishman named Thomas, I 
 hear) ; felt a sudden jerk ; something disturbed 
 the skirts of my coat ; lifted at least two 
 inches off the ground ; recovered myself in 
 time to see fresh-coloured gentleman driving 
 away, English Tom, grinning in the rumble, 
 and mumbhng something about having " done 
 for that 'ere Dutchman .'' Well, I am free to 
 confess I do look something like a foreigner, 
 distingue as it were, but not like a Dutch- 
 man. And now, my Public, 1 hope you 
 are satisfied that I did everything an honest 
 man could do to restore the manuscript to its 
 rightful owner. I may add, all that unusual 
 energy under great difficulties could accomplish 
 I did ; notwithstanding the application of what 
 it has been hinted to me was the foot (?) of 
 English Tom. And if during the publication 
 of these pages the fresh-coloured gentleman 
 should turn up and claim his own, I shall first 
 demand compensation for the indignity put
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 5 
 
 Upon me, and then deliver up the manuscript, 
 that is, for a con-si-de-ra-ti-on, as Mr. Trapbois 
 used very wisely to say. 
 
 Eh ? what, my Public ? you don^t believe a 
 word of it ? Why, what can be more likely. 
 Pooh ? You may say " pooh '' if you like, but 
 I have got the manuscript, and here it is ; and 
 if you consider the fresh-coloured gentleman 
 an imaginary personage, all I can say is that 
 the first night I slept in the room he had pre- 
 viously occupied I got up with such a red face 
 that I thought I had caught the scarlet fever. 
 Little Tom Gluidnunc, the doctor from Brigh- 
 ton, who was staying in the house, would have 
 it that the redness (which I am bound to con- 
 fess went off afterwards) was brought on by 
 sleeping too soundly between two feather beds 
 after a supper of black puddings ; but I am 
 convinced, and am no more likely to alter my 
 opinion than a Protectionist in office, that the 
 extraordinary red colour which I saw while 
 shaAnng in the looking-glass that morning was 
 occasioned by sleeping in the same bed which 
 had been occupied by the fresh-coloured gen- 
 tleman. — Mem. They never change the coun- 
 terpanes in Germany ! A convincing fact !
 
 6 WALTER EVELYN ; OR^ 
 
 What, still incredulous? Well, verbum per- 
 sonale, or, as I once heard those words trans- 
 lated by a hedge schoolmaster in Ireland — 
 
 ' * A man convinced against his will 
 Is of the same opinion still." 
 
 At all events, I've got the MS. and mean to 
 make my publisher's fortune with it ; in fact, 
 I have been thinking of giving the copyright 
 to his eldest son, if he asks me to stand god- 
 father, as I have no doubt he will be dazzled 
 at my literary reputation as Editor of these 
 papers. Meantime, if he likes to do my bank- 
 ing business, why I can draw upon him, and 
 of course he can deduct the money paid to 
 my order from the sale of my next poem. 
 Verbum sat.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 SMALL BEGINNINGS. 
 
 My father was the younger son of a poor 
 Marquis, who flourished during the gay times 
 of the regency of his late sacred Majesty King 
 George the Fourth, who deserves for ever to 
 be embalmed in the memory of the entire tailor 
 population of these kingdoms. My grand- 
 father, the Marquis of Arramore, had an estate 
 which was wholly swallowed up by encum- 
 brances, and which cost him about three thou- 
 sand a-year to keep up. It was the very 
 bugbear of his life, this estate. It got him into 
 law-suits, election squabbles, county subscrip- 
 tions, and botherations without end; and I
 
 8 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 fancy he had never gone to bed nor got up 
 again since the time of the last mortgage 
 (which was, by the way, all swallowed up in 
 costs) without cursing it, with the whole staff 
 of bailiffs, agents, gardeners, stewards, and 
 harpies belonging to it. He quarrelled with 
 Staunton, his eldest son, about it, because he 
 would not cut off the entail, and bring it to 
 the hammer. Lord Staunton was, however, 
 in Parliament, Under-Secretary for some de- 
 partment or other, and a rising man. The 
 place cost him nothing, and he knew very well 
 the importance it gives a man in public life 
 to be the reputed heir to a fine estate. Lord 
 Staunton was asked out to dinner every day 
 in the year as the future heir of Evelyn Abbey. 
 Ministers had a proper respect for their young 
 colleague, and for his interest in the county; 
 and everybody looked upon Lord Staunton as 
 a young nobleman of high abilities and great 
 expectations, who had a right to look forward 
 to the grand prizes of a public life. It would 
 never have done for him to sell Evelyn Abbey, 
 — the world^s opinion of him would have dwin- 
 dled to nothing at once. He would have been, 
 *' Poor fellow ! Quite ruined, I hear. Creditors
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 9 
 
 allow him two hundred pounds a-year to look 
 
 after the property/^ " Lord with a broken 
 
 fortune:^' and so forth. So Lord Staunton 
 was determined his father should still have 
 the pleasure of keeping up the place in Lin- 
 colnshire and the county interest. Moreover, 
 he had some reason to complain ; for Lord 
 Arramore, who had never thought all his life 
 about any one but himself, had upon his wife^s 
 death invested the whole of her property, which 
 she, with woman's trust, had bequeathed to 
 him, in the purchase of an annuity during his 
 own life. Staunton was very angry : he said 
 it ought to have gone to pay off the encum- 
 brances and portion his brothers. But the 
 Marquis only put on an extra air of dignity ; 
 wondered what a man's children would want 
 him to do next; hired a French cook and a 
 house in Stanhope Street ; gave the best din- 
 ners in London ; and tried at least to let that 
 dreary old Penitentiary, as he used to call it, 
 down in Lincolnshire, which had been the 
 plague of his life. 
 
 Staunton made it up with his father after 
 some time : he found him useful. The old 
 gentleman did not care two straws about his 
 B 5
 
 10 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 vote ; and when Staunton plied him one day 
 with a long harangue after dinner, the object 
 of which was to persuade him to leave his proxy 
 in the hands of Government (there had been a 
 split in the Cabinet, and the party had gone 
 out to which it was supposed the Marquis of 
 Arramore especially belonged), the Marquis 
 assented with the most charming air of indiffer- 
 ence in the world. Then he had a good deal 
 of influence in a certain kind of society, and in 
 those days it was just that kind which was 
 uppermost. The Regent was always delighted 
 to see the witty old gentleman at Brighton and 
 Windsor, whose fat stories and salt jokes were 
 the laughter of every dinner-table in London. 
 
 Staunton found that by dining with his father 
 he could learn what was really going on at court 
 better than anybody; and sometimes it was use- 
 ful to know what others did not. Then the 
 Marquis would always ask anybody who was 
 really a pleasant fellow, and did not bore him, 
 so that Staunton gave up his ow^n cook ; he 
 intended, indeed, at one time to give up his 
 chambers at the Albany too, and live in Stan- 
 hope Street altogether. But the very hint of 
 such a thing so discomposed his father, that he
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. H 
 
 went off to Paris for six weeks, and when he 
 came back, Staunton did not think it expedient 
 to renew the proposal. 
 
 So the Marquis ghded into his own style of 
 life, belonged to all the clubs that were worth 
 belonging to, and his cheery face, and quiet 
 chocolate-coloured demi fortune, were as well 
 known to the link-boys at the theatres and the 
 opera (for people went to the theatres in those 
 days) as could be. He led one of those plea- 
 sant, busy, do-nothing sort of lives which we 
 sometimes find elderly gentlemen enjoying, very 
 much to their own satisfaction, and apparently 
 to that of other people. Some people grumbled 
 a little, a poor relation or two were dissatisfied; 
 one who was curate of Little Twaddhngton, 
 which living was in the gift of the Marquis, 
 preached a sermon against him, when it was 
 announced that the advowson had been sold ; 
 and he learned in the newspapers that he had 
 been burnt in efiigy. This did not please the 
 peer at all ; he hated publicity of all kinds, and 
 had the most forgiving temper of any man alive. 
 So he asked the curate to dinner to meet the 
 Bishop of Blazes, presented him to my lord, 
 and took occasion to remark incidentally on his
 
 12 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 close relationship. The Bishop liked good din- 
 ners, the poor relation was an excellent toady, 
 and putting this and that together, the Bishop 
 promoted the troublesome fellow to be his own 
 chaplain, and the Marquis got praised up to the 
 skies for his magnanimity, and, what was better, 
 got quit of some proceedings which had been 
 taken against him in one of the ecclesiastical 
 courts, and which had hitherto prevented his 
 touching the produce of the sale of the ad- 
 vowson. My father. Lord Herbert Evelyn, 
 and two other brothers (one of whom fortu- 
 nately for me went out shortly after to India), 
 lived with their father on excellent terms. They 
 might dine with him, one at a time, when- 
 ever they liked, and provided they did not ask 
 for anything ; and they had each five thousand 
 pounds, which had been left them by Lady 
 Tabitha Evelyn, who died while they were 
 children. This five thousand pounds had, in- 
 deed, accumulated so considerably by the time 
 they were of age that the Marquis wished them 
 to lend him the principal, secured on the 
 estate, and promising to pay them four per cent., 
 that he might add to his annuity, which paid 
 him ten; and that thus he might be a gainer
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 13 
 
 of six per cent. The only son who fell into 
 this little trap was Lord Walter, and he soon 
 had reason to repent it. The Marquis wanted 
 him to live down at Evelyn Court, and manage 
 the estates, instead of receiving his interest. 
 *' There is the hay-crop, and the grapes, you 
 know ; and all that wall-fruit (after my table 
 has been supplied, of course), which will pay 
 you much more than you wish me ; and I tell 
 you, my dear 1)oy, I've not got it, — I really have 
 not got it — upon my soul I have not — that is 
 to say, not without inconvenience,^' said the 
 Marquis. So Lord Walter, who was very quiet 
 and reserved, smiled sadly when his father had 
 finished, and never asked him any more. My 
 uncle Howard, who can never to this day speak 
 of Lord Walter without a moist eye, says he 
 was the finest fellow that ever put on a boot. 
 Slight and dark, very pale, and rather sad look- 
 ing, — but " with the sweetest smile ever seen," 
 adds my aunt Lady Mary, stifling a sigh. "Well, 
 this was all Walter got by lending his money 
 on the estates,^^ my uncle would say ; '*and he 
 soon sold his horses, and paid his debts ; which 
 was more than any of you besides ever did 
 (except Staunton), and got Staunton to have
 
 14 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 him appointed secretary to some one who was 
 going out to India. We heard great accounts of 
 Walter after that/^ So my uncle tells the story. 
 " He changed from the civil service into the 
 army, and every gazette mentioned him honour- 
 ably. I was in the Guards, and he did not 
 forget me. The first time I heard from him 
 was tliat he had lodged money at the agent's 
 for my captaincy ; he tried to do it on the sly 
 — dear Walter ! — and lodged it in my father's 
 name, for I had had a quarrel with him before 
 he went .away. And to your father, who was 
 the youngest of his brothers, he sent five hun- 
 dred pounds, promising to continue it every 
 year, if he liked to go into the church or the 
 army. Herbert, however, would not do either, 
 but got married." And Lord Walter ? I asked, 
 I remember, when my uncle first told this 
 story : " Poor Walter,^' my uncle would say, 
 '^ He died of the climate just as he was return- 
 ing home loaded with honour and prize-money." 
 "And then Helen Lascelles died broken-hearted, 
 too,'^ said aunt Mary, quietly ; " and we heard 
 they had been engaged all along.^' 
 
 But this story of Uncle Walter is only an 
 episode, and ought not to have been introduced
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 15 
 
 here at all, save that he left his fortune to my 
 father Lord Herbert Evelyn^s eldest son, and 
 that is why I got the name of Walter. Let 
 us now however return to my father. He was 
 almost the last of a race of dandies now rapidly 
 becoming extinct. The little fortune he had, 
 and the annuity sent to him by Lord Walter, 
 was soon squandered in driving curricles, and 
 unicorns, and tandems, and wearing the skins 
 of unborn foals, at thirty guineas each, upon 
 his coat-collars, and committing all the grace- 
 less, hard-drinking, inelegant debaucheries of 
 the time. He had wit too in his way, wit 
 which, if cultivated and properly restrained, 
 would have made him a brilliant and a useful 
 man ; as it was, he became nothing but a man 
 of fashion, and hved altogether with the wild 
 young bloods of the day. Lord Staunton tried 
 very hard to reform him, and got him, for one 
 Session, into Parliament; but my father only 
 astonished everybody by a brilliant ; showy 
 speech or two, and then could never afterwards 
 be got away from the gaming-table ; at last he 
 married. Staunton heard that Lord Yarmouth 
 was to give away the bride, and would not go 
 to the wedding. He tried indeed to stop the
 
 16 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 match, but my father would not listen to him. 
 Staunton never spoke to him afterwards, and 
 the Marquis did not ask him to dinner. My 
 mother had about thirty thousand pounds how- 
 ever, which was believed to be much more, and 
 my father cared no more for his relations than 
 he did for anything else. They all cut him — 
 all except Lord Walter, who wrote them a 
 letter which my mother treasured up in her 
 jewel-case, and I once saw her read it through 
 her tears. They always kept up a correspond- 
 ence afterwards. And my mother got intro- 
 duced to Helen Lascelles, who was a cousin of 
 my father^s, and Helen used to come to us, 
 and was, I believe, the only woman my mother 
 ever sincerely liked. My mother and she were 
 inseparable ; Lord Walter said he wished it; and 
 my mother long afterwards used to say that 
 this was the sweetest time of her life. When 
 Lord Walter died she tended Helen night and 
 day the little time she lived after him, for her 
 health had been long broken by those cruel 
 years of absence. Her last sigh was breathed in 
 my mother's arms, and a little before her death 
 she gave her a portrait of Lord Walter which 
 she had always worn round her neck, and said
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. l7 
 
 feebly, " I meant to have it buried with me, dear 
 Lucy ; but take it. It is the only thing I 
 value in the world/' This portrait my mother 
 always after wore next her heart ; and, when I 
 was a very little boy, I once remember hearing 
 her pray to it. She used to say, " There never 
 was but one good man in the world, and that 
 was Walter Evelyn, who could not live in it.'' 
 Praying, indeed, was not generally much a part 
 of my mother's character ; nor, indeed, did she 
 do anything else except dress her hair, which 
 was very beautiful, and read novels, and go to 
 the theatre, which she did very constantly, and 
 with never-ending enjoyment. My mother 
 never would believe that I could remember 
 certain things, which I do remember perfectly 
 well, nevertheless. 1 remember them as well 
 as if they had passed yesterday. I remember 
 my father's house in town — a large house in 
 Clarges- street, full of buhl, and marble, and 
 indifferent pictures, which had been sold to 
 him as originals of value. I remember the 
 very ceiling, painted sky-blue, with birds, of 
 which one was a bird of paradise flying about 
 in the middle. I remember the cupboards in 
 my mother's bed-room, where I used to hide
 
 ]8 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 when I was frightened of being whipped by 
 the nurse for crying at being left alone. I 
 remember even the nurse^s gin-bottle in one 
 corner of it, — she kept it under the clothes. 
 My mother used to say languidly to her,, when 
 she brought me down to her, " There, there, 
 nurse, let Master Walter come to me, and put 
 him down, please, and stand at the door; you 
 smell like the places where we change horses 
 on our way to the Hall. Does not she, Taylor?" 
 my mother would add to her maid ; and Taylor 
 would say, *^ La ! bless me, my lady, you 
 know them nusses always does." A.11 this my 
 mother would never believe I could remember, 
 and would open her large blue surprised eyes, 
 and say, " Nonsense ! Walter, you were a baby 
 then." I remember, when I was a little older, 
 — I might have been six years old then, — get- 
 ting permission to sit up on my birthday till 
 mamma came home from the theatre. I was 
 very sleepy, but it was a point of honour not 
 to give in, so I sat bolt upright upon my little 
 chair, with my eyes aching, and every now and 
 then closing themselves of their own accord; 
 but I would not go to bed, and constantly as- 
 sured the housemaid (a kind of Peggotty), and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 19 
 
 the butler, and the cook, who were all sitting 
 up (for my mother always took supper), that 
 I was wide awake, whereat they all laughed, 
 and the housemaid said, " Bless you ! so you 
 are ;'^ and on one occasion gave me such a 
 hugging, that my ears tingled for I donH know- 
 how long afterwards ; upon which demonstra- 
 tion of the tenderness of her disposition I re- 
 member the butler sang something about — 
 
 " Oh ! what appy days we'll see, 
 With our childring on our knee ;" 
 
 and the cook laughed, and the housemaid grew 
 red, but seemed to like it too ; and I could not 
 think for the life of me what it all meant. At 
 length came a rumbling of wheels, and a knock 
 at the door, that made the very plates, ranged 
 in rows on the shelves (for we were in the 
 kitchen), to rattle again. ''^ There's my lady," 
 they all cried out. " Oh, there's mama ! oh, 
 do let me go ! Oh, please let me go to meet 
 her when she comes in," cried I. " Don't 'ee, 
 don't 'ee, Master Walter," said the butler, who 
 was a good-natured fellow, " I should think 
 my lady '11 be angry with Jeames if I lets you 
 go to the door." " Oh no, James !" said I, 
 struggling up into his arms, while he was just
 
 20 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 giving a touch of powder to his hair. "Oh no, 
 James ! I will beg you off, I v/ill indeed V 
 
 Rat ! tat ! tat ! tara ! tara ! Rat ! tat ! tat ! 
 tat ! tat ! went the knocker again, as if the 
 house was to be knocked down ; and we heard 
 a voice outside saying, " The lazy rascals ! I^ll 
 horsewhip every one of them. E — very one of 
 them— Fll be hanged if I don't.'' " Oh, its 
 papa ! its papa !" said I, climbing up stairs, " I 
 will see him ; dear, dear papa !" 
 
 '^Here's my lord back from Newmarket! 
 Look alive !" said James, rushing up stairs, quite 
 forgetting me, who followed close at his heels. 
 
 Wide swung the door upon its hinges — a 
 post-chaise, with four reeking posters, stood 
 before it. My father, the handsomest of men, 
 the very picture of a gallant dare-devil reckless 
 blood of the day, got out. He was covered 
 with mud from head to heel, and had evidently 
 posted up in the same dress he had worn on 
 the course. It was a dress of which we saw 
 the last on Sir Francis Burdett, the late Lord 
 Westmorland, and the Duke of Dorset. Blue 
 coat, leather breeches, top boots, and a high 
 white cravat, and under-waistcoat. 
 
 As my father got out of the chaise, child as
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 21 
 
 I was, I saw that there was something unusual 
 about him, and that he looked strangely flushed 
 and disordered. He came unsteadily up the 
 steps ; drew himself up to his full height. 
 " I will/^ said he, striking his heavy riding- 
 whip on his boot, and looking the very soul 
 of sly wit and good humour, as he always 
 did, '^ I will flog e — ve — ry scoundrel in the 
 ha — a — use," and the next moment he mea- 
 sured his full length upon the hall floor. It 
 was of stone, and it stunned him. 
 
 There was a tremendous bustle and running 
 about for hot vinegar and such simple remedies 
 as could be applied till the doctor came; and 
 I don^t know how it became clear to my mind 
 that my father had fallen down simply because 
 he was tipsy. I clung to him wildly, and 
 would not be torn away, and cried till my 
 face was quite blistered, for I loved him 
 dearly, that reckless, selfish, good-natured 
 saunterer throuofh life that I now know he 
 was. He slowly recovered himself, and was 
 seated in the great chair in the dining-room 
 hiccoughing out jokes to me, and making me 
 laugh through my tears as he tossed me about 
 on his knee. I do not even now know how
 
 22 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 it was that everybody loved my father, and 
 that he exercised a species of fascination over 
 all with whom he came in contact; but so it 
 was, and so it remained long afterwards, when 
 he was changed indeed. 
 
 It must have surprised my mother a good 
 deal when she came home, as she did shortly 
 afterwards, to find the scene that presented 
 itself to her in the dining-room. Instead of 
 the roast plovers she had ordered for supper, 
 there sat my father with his dress all in 
 disarray, and bedabbled with blood; beside 
 him stood Mary the housemaid, wetting a large 
 patch of brown paper on his forehead with 
 vinegar, and cook holding the basin which 
 supplied it. There sat my father, flushed and 
 bright-eyed, and hiccoughing out jokes, first to 
 me and then to the servants, and none of us 
 able for the lives and souls of us to help 
 laughing till the room rang again. On the 
 table lay a handful of sovereigns and bank- 
 notes, and a pocket-book apparently pretty well 
 stufi'ed, which had fallen from my father's 
 pocket. I do not know what my mother 
 thought of us altogether, or of my father and 
 the servants, and the blood, and the vinegar
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 23 
 
 and brown paper, and the laughter separately. 
 She was not a sort of person to shew herself 
 astonished at anything: ^* Leave the room,'^ 
 said she to the servants, '^ Go away ;" and then 
 she went up and kissed him silently, for she 
 saw how it was, and said, "Oh, Herbert!" 
 There was something very touching in the 
 manner in which my mother said " Oh, Her- 
 bert \" It said so much and seemed to say so 
 little. "Lucy Bird,'^ said my father, "don't 
 be angry with me." 
 
 " I am not angry," she answered, " Oh, no." 
 " I know you are now, Lucy Bird." 
 " Indeed I am not, you dear, dear naughty 
 boy ; — but who is that they tell me is waiting 
 up in the drawing-room, dear Herbert ?" 
 
 " Lucy Bird," said my father again and this 
 time his handsome mouth twitched painfully, 
 and he was quite sober. '• Lucy Bird, give me 
 a glass of cura9oa/' 
 
 '^ Not to-night — not before supper." 
 " Why not, Lucy Bird ? the sooner I die the 
 sooner you will be a blooming widow ; and — 
 and — Harkaway has lost the cup — and I'm ar- 
 rested for seven thousand pounds. The man 
 upstairs is a bailiff, and we shall not sup to-
 
 24 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 gether to-night, Lucy." My mother turned 
 ghastly pale, and then fell upon his neck (that 
 cold, languid woman), and cried, as if her heart 
 was breaking. '• Oh, my husband ! my dear, 
 dear husband ! ^' I nestled between them, and 
 took my father's hand, which was as cold as 
 ice.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 25 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 My mother's efforts were all in vain ; she had 
 sold and sacrificed, till she could sell and sa- 
 crifice no longer. Her plate and jewels were 
 long gone ; and he had sold many a year ago 
 his reversionary life-interest in her property. 
 The fortune Lord Walter had left to me was 
 not to be got at ; though my father promised 
 liberally enough in my name that I should 
 ratify any security given on it when I came of 
 age. There was no getting at the precise 
 amount of my father^s debts, either. He ab- 
 solutely and entirely forgot every creditor who 
 
 VOL. I. C
 
 26 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 was not hotly pressing him for money ; and 
 would pledge his honour he did not owe them 
 a farthing. Unfortunately, he had been through 
 life so extremely ready to pledge his honour, 
 that it was not worth redeeming any longer. 
 
 So Lord Herbert Evelyn went to prison, to 
 the King's Bench, — and a very gentlemanly 
 place it was in those days. He had a hand- 
 some apartment in that division of the build- 
 ing which used to be called the State House : 
 an obstinate Baronet, of large fortune, who 
 could pay his creditors and would not, lived in 
 great style in the next chamber, keeping two 
 powdered footmen, and receiving visits from 
 his astonished tenantry all day long, — for it was 
 in the golden days of the old law. Subse- 
 quently this old gentleman got lodgings in the 
 Rules, and lived in great glory, defying his cre- 
 ditors for many years, till better legislation 
 forced him into honesty, — and then he died. 
 There were also two or three heirs to peerages 
 living in the State House, which was the Bel- 
 gravia of the place ; and innumerable ex-Cap- 
 tains of the Guards and fashionable men about 
 town, under a cloud, — yes, that was the cant 
 term, — -kept up a perpetual exchange of civi-
 
 • THE LONG MINORITY. 27 
 
 lities, and a round of conviviality from twelve 
 o'clock one day, which was about the time they 
 got up, till the small hour of the next, when 
 they went to bed again. 
 
 I blush to record that my father was a great 
 deal too much in his element in this sort of 
 society ; and he soon became the very life and 
 soul of it. Where he got money, or where he 
 got credit, it was impossible to say, and, three 
 days afterwards, he could not have told you 
 himself ; but he did get both, and used to give 
 dinners at three guineas a-head to a knot of 
 choice fellows like himself, and lose a "cool" 
 (why " cool ?") hundred or two afterwards at 
 chicken-hazard (the great game in those days) 
 with the best grace in the world. 
 
 It was a touching thing to see the wives, and 
 mothers, and sisters of these " gay dogs" come 
 in to see them. Elegant and lovely women, 
 upon whose cheeks the very winds of heaven 
 had been never before suffered to blow too 
 rudely, — who had ridden in coronetted car- 
 riages, till they had almost forgotten how to 
 walk, used to come tripping down on their 
 errand of love, through rain and rough weather, 
 and often many a good mile on foot, to bring 
 c 2
 
 28 WALTER EVELYN ', OR, . 
 
 but one extra guinea to those thankless pro- 
 digals, or save ever so little from the wreck at 
 home. I knew one dear lady, one of the best 
 and brightest who ever gladdened the home of 
 a worthless husband, — she afterwards wore the 
 coronet of an Irish marchioness ; but then she 
 used to bring the Honourable Phelim (her hus- 
 band) little veal patties of her own making, 
 thinking (bless her innocence !) that he had no 
 dinner. Running into their room too one day, 
 I saw her stealthily mending his stockings. I 
 know she kept no servant, and she lived in a 
 quiet obscure street in Lambeth, full of jour- 
 neyman cabinet-makers and musicians, where 
 she had a little lodging at seven or eight shil- 
 lings a week : while the Honourable Phelim 
 had never had so much money in his life as 
 he was then making (to lose it again) by a run 
 of luck at the accursed table. 
 
 My mother and I, and a maid-servant, lived 
 in Melina Place, after the breaking up of the 
 great house in Clarges Street. It was a row 
 of lodging-houses in the Rules, and full as a 
 rabbit-warren of the relatives of prisoners. 
 She visited my father every day, and I was 
 sent on such frequent errands to and fro that
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 29 
 
 my feet learned the way by instinct, and often 
 when very tired I used to enjoy a quiet nap 
 on the road ; when I awoke 1 was always sure 
 to find myself before the doors. I got into 
 terrible habits too, for I had nobody to control 
 me, my mother reading novels and writing 
 letters alternately, and my father being occu- 
 pied far otherwise than in attending to me. I 
 made many street acquaintance, and went out 
 to places to take tea, from whence it is a 
 wonder that I ever came safe back again to our 
 mockery of a home. We never had any regu- 
 lar meals after my mother's breakfast of a 
 morning, which she took in bed, and I grew to 
 have a fondness for cookshop plum-pudding 
 at a penny a slice, and knew where it was to 
 be found richest, and with the most plums in 
 it. I soon got over the shame of asking for it, 
 and ate it in the street with a gipsy relish. 
 What an abandoned ruined little child I must 
 have looked, so small, so young, with the un- 
 mistakeable dress and air of a little gentleman, 
 wandering about the streets alone. It is per- 
 haps lucky for me to this day that I was upon 
 the whole an unsocial boy ; and, though I had 
 a sort of patronising acquaintance with a one-
 
 30 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 eyed pieman, who carried on his commerce in 
 Fleet Market, I knew very few of his customers 
 except by sight. 
 
 Once I was carried off, by the abandoned 
 son of an old prisoner, who had been a colonel 
 in the army, and left in pawn at his lodgings 
 while he got his things away. It was late at 
 night when I was carried home, and my mother 
 borrowed the money of her landlady to ransom 
 me, yet I had never been missed. 
 
 How well I remember all this, and being 
 sent afterwards to the room of the haggard old 
 colonel, terrible in his misery, to get back this 
 money half-a-guinea at a time. 
 
 I used to dream of that grey-haired old man, 
 with his grand unhappy face, and fancied he 
 was like a picture of Ugolino starving in his 
 prison, which my father took once as part of 
 the discount of a bill, and which had been 
 explained to me, and had fascinated my childish 
 imagination amazingly. 
 
 I remember also another event which hap- 
 pened at this time, though I am hardly able to 
 say why, except for the running about it cost 
 me ; for my dear mother, much as she loved 
 me, used me very much like an errand-boy.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 31 
 
 perhaps without thinking at all about it, and 
 for my part I would sooner have done any 
 thing than go to school. My mother wished 
 very much to buy the Rules, as a surprise to 
 my father on his birthday, and I am sadly 
 afraid that many of the letters I took about 
 this time, and left at the houses of our former 
 friends, were little better than begging-letters. 
 However no good came of them. My mother 
 had not learned how to beg properly, and, as 
 she still frittered away a great deal of money, 
 all she could muster when the eventful day 
 came was only eight sovereigns (I believe the 
 Rules cost ten), and these she spent a long time 
 in doing up in the most lady-like way, and 
 writing a letter with them that might have 
 touched the heart of a stone. It did not touch 
 that of the Warden, however, and the next 
 morning brought back the card and the money, 
 with a brief refusal. What a disappointment 
 it was to us ! My father, however, took the 
 affair very philosophically, and, though he would 
 perhaps have liked very well to be at large 
 again I dare say, starring it about at races and 
 steeple-chaces, yet he made himself comfort- 
 able enough under the circumstances, and whe^
 
 32 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 my mother was not there his room became one 
 of the noisiest and joUiest in the prison. 
 
 My father got a good deal mixed up with my 
 mother^s relations a little after this, and in- 
 deed it was through their instrumentality that 
 he was eventually released. One of them 
 especially, — I think he was a farmer, — became a 
 great man with him, and used to come down 
 to our lodgings in Melina Place, and swear he 
 would see " my Lord out of it ; ay, that he 
 would, thof ' he mortgaged the farm ; which he 
 was come up to London for to do.^^ 
 
 I am sorry to say my mother praised this 
 resolution very much, and I extended my pa- 
 tronage to him in such a condescending way 
 that he proposed to take me home with him ; 
 an offer however which I abruptly declined. 
 
 It makes me sad even now to think of my 
 father^s meanness to these good people. How 
 he grasped at their little savings, and took one 
 hundred pounds from one and five hundred 
 pounds from another — their little all ; and how 
 he persuaded a retired old sea captain, a simple- 
 hearted man, the Nelson of the family, to sell 
 his annuity ; how civil he was to them. With 
 what inimitable and instinctive knowledge of
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. oo 
 
 what would please them most he called one 
 Tom and the other Harry, and was "hail, fellow, 
 well met!" with them; and how utterly and 
 miserably, I know, he despised them all. As 
 for them, they all swore by " My Lord,'^ till 
 they fomid themselves half ruined by him ; and 
 then each thought and called the other every- 
 thing that was bad. My mother, of course, 
 joined with her husband, and hated them with 
 the utmost readiness with him, when they 
 wanted their money back again. 
 
 My grandfather would, of course, do nothing. 
 He toddled about to the clubs and to dinners, 
 saying how ill he had been used, and how he 
 had spent his fortune upon thankless sons ; but 
 he generally dismissed the subject with the 
 good-humoured shrug of the shoulders for 
 which he was famous, and never thought about 
 us any further. 
 
 At last, however, my father got out of the 
 Bench somehow or other^ for even his creditors 
 liked him ; and, when they saw nothing was to 
 be got but promises, agreed to take them instead 
 of their money, without any very fierce oppo- 
 sition, especially as he assured them separately 
 and in the confidence of affectionate intimacy 
 c 5
 
 34 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 that he " would have some money (some of my 
 boy^s fortune, you know, but keep it quiet, 
 there's a good fellow) in three months, and 
 then I will take care, Smith, you shall have 
 your money, let who will go without, for I 
 must say no one could have behaved better than 
 you have done throughout '' — (perhaps Smith 
 was the very man who had arrested him) ; — 
 " and 1 must and will say, I feel deucedly grateful/' 
 By the way, here my father would go up confi- 
 dentially, and speak in a low tone of voice, and 
 as if talking to his brother or his dearest intimate 
 friend, " You may fancy I am rather hard run 
 with all this bother on my hands, and if you know 
 anybody who wants to place a few hundreds, 
 or even less '' — (he always added this saving 
 clause), — "at good interest, why, I pledge you 
 my honour, he shall have his money back punc- 
 tually, and any discount and per cent, he likes/' 
 My father used to speak so seriously and good- 
 naturedly that he seemed to be conferring a 
 favour, and many and many a time he has car- 
 ried the day against stronger odds than steady- 
 going people would believe. He Had a sort of 
 abstract passion for money, too, and whatever he 
 had about him he was always ready to borrow
 
 THE LOXG MINORITY. 35 
 
 more. He would pay, too, as freely as he bor- 
 rowed, when he could. He liked the mere 
 manipulation of money, the chink of sove- 
 reigns, and the crisp rustling of bank-notes. 
 
 The same day that he came out of prison he 
 had a four-in-hand and apartments at Mivart's. 
 My mother, too, got back her jewellery, I rather 
 think with her relations money, for I never 
 heard that any of it went to pay the debts. 
 Once more Lord Herbert Evelyn blazed upon 
 Pall Mall and St. James's Street, the best 
 dressed and the best appointed man in London; 
 and that season my mother had an Opera box, 
 one of the best in the house, too, for my fath^^r 
 always did things well when he did them at all. 
 Upon the whole, perhaps a week after Lord 
 Herbert Evelyn came out of the King's Bench, 
 he was spending at the rate of about twelve 
 thousand pounds a-year. Alas ! for the hard- 
 earned savings of my mother's relations ! I was 
 sent to school.
 
 36 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 It was a preparatory school, and was kept by 
 a Miss NichoUs, who had great faith in the 
 efficacy of putting us in the corner, and making 
 us stand on a stool placed in the middle of the 
 room with a foolscap on our heads. This was 
 very painful to me at first, for I had been 
 treated at home lately as if I had been so much 
 older than I really was, that my dignity was 
 very severely wounded ; but I soon grew accus- 
 tomed to it as the others did, and then we 
 thought it very good fun, and used to make
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 37 
 
 mouths at Miss Nicholls when she had her 
 back turned. 
 
 Our school-room was a large gloomy old 
 house, situated in one of those melancholy 
 squares in the suburbs which were probably 
 built in the reign of Queen Anne, and had all 
 the joyless character of the architecture of the 
 period, high small windows and underground 
 rooms, low doors and wainscotted walls. How 
 I used to hate it ! It was pervaded, I remem- 
 ber, by such a peculiar and penetrating smell 
 that our very meat was tainted with it when 
 cold ; and I could never eat any dinner on Sun- 
 days for this reason, as no cooking was allowed 
 to go on in the house on that day. I now think 
 the abominable smell must have been simply 
 confined air, which probably had found no 
 egress for half a century ; but it was the nuisance 
 of my whole life there. We were kept very 
 strictly, unhappy little wretches that we were, 
 though Miss Nicholls's was a first-class esta- 
 blishment of the kind. We were routed out of 
 bed at seven o^clock on cold winter mornings, 
 and taken down to those dreary kitchens under 
 ground to be scrubbed, till the whole place was 
 a scene of crying and lamentation. A lusty
 
 38 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 servant-maid performed the operation, and we 
 dreaded it as much as older people do tooth- 
 drawing. The soap, a horrid, mottled, bad 
 smelling soap, was forced into our eyes and 
 mouths, and we were rubbed so energetically 
 with a jack-towel that the ears of a new boy 
 immediately acquired an inveterate soreness 
 from which he did not recover till the holidays. 
 Then the combing of our hair was dreadful ; 
 this terrible ogre of a girl must have had a 
 very heavy hand, among her other qualifica- 
 tions for dealing with children, for she used to 
 force the teeth of the small-tooth comb into 
 our heads till it cut them like a knife, and tore 
 out so much skin that we were almost sure to 
 get slapped for being dirty. 
 
 This ceremony was however nothing at all 
 compared with the dreadful affair of Saturday 
 nights, when we were caught, one by one, and 
 brought down to a damp stone kitchen to be 
 washed all over, one after the other, in the 
 same water. Oh, Miss NichoUs, you may have 
 been a very good elderly maiden lady, and, in- 
 deed, I know you were, but you never ought to 
 have kept a school, and I strongly recommend 
 all whom it may concern to learn something of
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 39 
 
 your household arrangements before they are 
 won by your virtuous and injured appearance 
 to suffer little children to go unto you. 
 
 We were stripped, I remember, on cold 
 rainy winter nights, and stood upright in tepid 
 water to be rubbed down and scoured with 
 flannels till we had not a whole place in our 
 little bodies, and our eyes were inflamed for 
 two days afterwards, and, oh, what colds and 
 coiighs we got ! This, however, we considered, 
 upon the whole, as a fortunate thing, for it was 
 *' nuts" to be ill at Miss Nicholls^s, and we 2:ot 
 chicken broth and possets, and nursing without 
 end, on those happy occasions. 
 
 There was another piece of miserable cruelty 
 too to which I recollect we were subjected 
 regularly every Monday morning, and which 
 has made me consider that an unlucky day ever 
 since. Miss NichoUs was firmly persuaded 
 that we all wanted a small wine-glass full of 
 senna tea once a week, and she gave it to us 
 with such scrupulous exactitude that it has 
 probably had a hand in making many of her 
 young friends more or less invalids for the rest 
 of their lives. 
 
 In other respects we got on well enough ; our
 
 40 WALTER EVELYN ; OR^ 
 
 lessons were light enough, as easy as they 
 ought to be for such small children, and, ex- 
 cept that we learned an uncompromising hatred 
 for the French language by being forced to 
 speak it at refreshment time, we had little 
 cause to complain of this part of our lives. But 
 the system was radically bad ; we had not play 
 enough, we had not healthy exercise, and 
 laughter and fun enough, for children ; we were 
 marched out in file, two and two, to Kensing- 
 ton Gardens or elsewhere, but woe to the 
 urchin (I say urchin, for there were both boys 
 and girls amongst us, — another mistake) who 
 broke the ranks, or tried to vary the monotony 
 of his march by a gambol on the grass. Miss 
 NichoUs beheved that grass made the feet 
 damp, and that urchin was as sure of the stool 
 and foolscap, or the corner, as if it had been 
 bespoken for him. 
 
 Sundays, however, were our especial abomi- 
 nation, and I regularly feared the return of that 
 dreadful day. On Sunday mornings we were 
 scrubbed harder and got more soap into our 
 eyes and between our teeth than on any other ; 
 we were combed till our heads felt quite raw 
 for the rest of the day, and yet this was but the
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 41 
 
 beginning of our troubles. Before breakfast 
 we were set to learn a collect which we did not 
 understand, and which was not explained to 
 us, and repeat it by heart. Then came a 
 breakfast of stale bread, sour and mouldy, with 
 that damp and dreadful smell, butter that had 
 little right to be called fresh, and cold milk and 
 water. Then we had to learn the Gospel and 
 Epistle for the day. Then came another fiery 
 combing that made our heads tingle again, and 
 arrayed in stiff turn-down collars or frills that 
 scratched our necks like a wire necklace, and, 
 buttoned up and belted in within an inch of 
 our lives, we were marched to church. Oh, that 
 church ! it is a wonder any of us ever had cou- 
 rage to enter one afterwards. It was a gloomy, 
 dark, fearful place, smelling just like Miss 
 Nicholls's back kitchen. It had a mournful 
 organ that might have put the most cheerful man 
 out of spirits ; and a clergyman who denounced 
 us every Sunday with such energy, and looked 
 at us so awfully, that we were quite frightened 
 of him. The very clerk seemed to menace us 
 with the beadle when he looked at us ; and of all 
 that two hours' churching all we got were cramps 
 and headaches, and stealthy shakings from Miss
 
 1"^ WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 Nicholls and the ushers if we went to sleep. 
 On one occasion, indeed, I was shaken so vio- 
 lently that I determined to provide myself with 
 a copy of the Arabian Nights as an anti-sopo- 
 rific in future, but, being detected, I was made 
 such a warning that two birches were used up 
 upon the tremendous occasion. I think at last 
 I used to go to sleep with my eyes open, and, 
 at all events, I am sure that neither I nor one 
 single urchin among us understood any thing of 
 the service, except the beautiful simplicity of 
 the Lord^s Prayer, and one or two others. Our 
 Church Service, indeed, most excellent and 
 subhme as it is, is not adapted for the com- 
 prehension of little children, and those who 
 have care of them would do much better to 
 read a few chapters of the New Testament to 
 them, with a simple explanation, than take 
 them to hear that they are miserable sinners. 
 
 Even after church our griefs were not ended ; 
 before dinner we had to repeat the text and give 
 the chapter and verse of it, though very likely 
 by that time the clergyman himself could not 
 have remembered them. If we did not know 
 this, which we never did unless it was very 
 short, we were put to learn it, and again a
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 43 
 
 collect after dinner; then afternoon service; 
 then bread and butter and cold milk and water 
 for tea ; after which we had to read each a 
 chapter of the Old Testament aloud, hard 
 words and all, and so go mortified and confused 
 with it all to bed, hardly knowing if Saint 
 Peter was King of Bashan, or Og was the 
 disciple who betrayed his master thrice before 
 the cock crew. 
 
 Some of us used to lie awake too, or have 
 disturbed dreams, and cry out in our sleep 
 frightened by the strong language and stern 
 metaphors of the denouncing clergyman ; or 
 with our little brains painfully bewildered with 
 fear of awful death and hell fire. Oh ! Miss 
 NichoUs, when you sat upstairs on Sunday 
 evenings over your tea, talking scandal with 
 your injured air among your friends, did you 
 never think of tiiis when you rejoiced over the 
 well-spent day, and the pious education you 
 were giving to the little people entrusted to 
 you? 
 
 We had an usher named Miss Foss, a tall 
 yellow looking woman, who dressed always in 
 black bombasin, with white collars and cuffs ; 
 and the black was so black, and the white was
 
 44 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 SO white, and they appeared in such startling 
 contrasts to each other, that she gave people 
 the idea of a respectable female magpie. She 
 was a perfect cavern of Engligh grammar and 
 lessons of all kinds, and spoke exactly like a 
 copy-book, in pithy little sentences, with a 
 great stress on every word, as if it was written 
 in large hand, or round text at least. We 
 liked her too, and I am sure she was fond of 
 us, for she used to do us all sorts of little 
 stealthy imprudent kindnesses ; and so sure as 
 any urchin got punished by Miss Nicholls 
 Miss Foss was sure to take that urchin under 
 her protection for the rest of the day. In fact, 
 her principal occupation appeared to be to 
 undo whatever was done by her superior in 
 office. 
 
 Poor Miss Foss ! There was a prevalent 
 impression among us that she was unhappy, 
 and that she was a poor relation of Miss 
 Nicholls, and not very well used by her ; and 
 that there was a surgeon who had gone out to 
 Jamaica who had, at some period or other, 
 paid her great attention; though how we 
 became possessed of any of these ideas I can- 
 not remember. I have often stolen into her
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 45 
 
 room of an evening, for 1 was a great favourite 
 with her, and seated myself at her feet with 
 the affectionate gravity of a child, while she 
 would remain drearily by the piano, touching 
 the keys with an absent air, and her gaze fixed 
 somewhere far away ; and then, after a little 
 while, I could often feel the large tears falling 
 one by one on my hand, and Miss Foss would 
 lay her long wasted hand on my little head, 
 and toy with my hair, and talk to me in such 
 a different manner to her schoolroom way, that 
 we used often to end by having a good hearty 
 cry together. As this was always a prelude to 
 the introduction of some cake or sweetmeats, 
 which she kept in a cupboard, I wonder that 
 it did not make me a lachrymose little humbug 
 for the rest of my life. In short, there was 
 nothing buoyant or healthy and cheerful about 
 Miss Foss ; and, I am afraid, her affection and 
 little kindnesses did not do any of us much 
 good. We were pitied when we ought to have 
 been laughed at, and sometimes encouraged, 
 from a mistaken and mischievous good nature 
 in doing what was positively wTong. Indeed 
 she would go so far as to tell little fibs for us, 
 or advise us to do so ourselves, and support us
 
 46 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 in it, if we had done anything that was at all 
 likely to bring the birch in requisition ; though, 
 I am afraid, she had a little weakness for the 
 corner and the fool's-cap, subjecting us fre- 
 quently to this discipline when she wished to 
 get rid of one or two of us who might have 
 been left at home in her charge while the rest 
 were gone for a walk. 
 
 There are two other things which I must 
 notice while I remember them, before taking 
 leave of my school life. The one was, that we 
 had too much pocket-money, and were allowed 
 to spend it altogether in little selfish gluttonies. 
 I am afraid Miss Nicholls found her own ac- 
 count in this, for the pastry-woman always ap- 
 peared just before dinner, and when she went 
 away very few of us had much appetite for the 
 boiled mutton and rice pudding, which were 
 the standard dainties of Miss NichoUs's board, 
 for she fell into another capital error of schools, 
 that of not varying our diet sufficiently. We 
 had no education of the heart ; we were never 
 taught to understand the suiFerings of others, 
 or shown how they might be alleviated by the 
 kind deed and the kinder word. It was a 
 principle with Miss Nicholls that all poor
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 47 
 
 people and beggars ought to be sent to the 
 treadmill, and a gentle refusal or a little charity 
 was an example never oflPered to us. Miss 
 Foss taught us plenty of false sentiment, but 
 no one cultivated real and healthy feelings in 
 us. If only one tenth part of the crying done 
 by Miss Foss privately, and on her own account, 
 had been expended on any proper object of 
 sympathy, it would have done us less harm 
 and corrected the natural selfishness of chil- 
 dren, instead of making us little snivellers ; 
 and if we had been taught to apply properly 
 only the same proportion of that money which 
 we squandered in trash, to the diminution of 
 Miss Nicholls^s butcher's bills, it might have 
 learned us the value of money and the only 
 noble quality it has, that of doing good and 
 healing affliction. We were all more or less 
 rich people's children, and we might have been 
 taught, with great benefit to our future charac- 
 ters, the Godlike power which lies in every 
 mite well spent, and what a plentiful harvest 
 of happiness a wise charity will yield to the 
 receiver and the giver. Did Miss Nicholls 
 know of no neglected little children, orphans 
 and desolate, whose forlorn position we might
 
 48 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 have understood and sympathized with, and to 
 whom we might without prompting have given 
 a tithe of our abundance to be expended on 
 their education by some worthy poor person 
 recommended by the clergyman^ so that it 
 might do good in two ways, or in any other 
 useful way, for their benefit ? Would there 
 not have been an opportunity, too, to teach us 
 prudence as well as charity, and impress plea- 
 santly and cheerfully on our young minds some 
 little practical moral on every such occasion ? 
 Let us suppose just for the sake of argument 
 that there would. 
 
 The other great abuse to which I have to 
 refer in Miss Nicholls's establishment, was 
 that of receiving parlour boarders, or having a 
 sort of aristocracy and democracy in her school, 
 to the mental injury of us all. I was a parlour 
 boarder, and I was hated for it. It is to this 
 fact that I owe the early intelligence I received 
 of having thin legs, a fact which my own 
 unaided ingenuity had not enabled me to dis- 
 cover. It is to that I owe the nickname of 
 Spider, which clung to me till I left the school, 
 and that the other children complained I was 
 a " favourite,^^ and tried to get me into diffi-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 49 
 
 culties with the lessons, and took me down, 
 rejoicing, when I did not know them. I do 
 not think, however, I had any real advantage 
 in being a parlour boarder, except that of dining 
 ill a separate room with Miss Nicholls when 
 she had not company, and being required at 
 that solemn time to sit more prim and bolt 
 upright and silent than was at all necessary, 
 and to which I can even now trace a sort of 
 absence of mind that has come over me occa- 
 sionally at dinner ever since ; for the mind will 
 be busy, and if children may not prattle they will 
 think of what others say. I would rather, 1 
 confess, that mine prattled than began to think 
 of some things that grown people talk about 
 too early, and especially at dinner time. 
 
 I was at Miss Nicholls's certainly much 
 longer than was good for me, but at last I for- 
 tunately caught the croup after one of those 
 terrible Saturday night^s washings, and on 
 Sunday morning it was found I could not with 
 safety be put through the severe exercise of 
 that day, and was sent to bed again, which was 
 a great relief to me, and I recollect was looked 
 upon by the others as another proof of that 
 favouritism with which I was treated as a par- 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 50 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 lour boarder. Finding that I got worse in 
 spite of senna tea and chicken broth, the doctor 
 was summoned. This doctor was a jocular man, 
 who addressed me as " Young rag-a-muffin,'^ 
 and expressed his opinion that I was sham- 
 ming, though I was quite quick enough to 
 notice that he shook his head gravely to Miss 
 Nicholls, and said something about a " long 
 business.'^ So my mother was sent for, and, 
 as I lay broad awake and feverish in my little 
 bed that evening, she came, pale and in disha- 
 bille, for she had been ill herself, and took me 
 in her arms tenderly, and fearless of infection, 
 as a mother is ; and, as she could not be per- 
 suaded to overlook the doctor^s familiarity, he 
 lost the practice of Miss Nicholls's estabhsh- 
 ment, and I was immediately taken home.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 51 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 From Miss Nicholls I was subsequently re- 
 moved to Harrow ; but, as I am not writing a 
 regular autobiograpy, but only jotting down at 
 random some of the passages in my life which 
 I can recall the readiest to my memory, I shall 
 not tell you, my dear Public, how I learned to 
 write in different Latin, and to misconstrue Greek 
 plays. I am afraid, however, that the training 
 I underwent there made me a pretty good 
 schoolboy, but did not endow me with many 
 useful qualifications for the business of after- 
 life. Our best boys indeed nearly all turned 
 D 2 
 
 UNIVERSITY Of 
 
 ILLINOIS LIBRARY
 
 52 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 out dullards or mere pedants, and our worst 
 have since become in many cases very bright 
 men indeed. That for which I have princi- 
 pally to thank Harrow is, for having made 
 me a good cricketer, and for giving me a com- 
 munity of feeling and reminiscences with many 
 whom I have met with in other scenes, and 
 long afterwards. It is for this reason that I 
 would send my own son there, or to some other 
 public school of equal repute, Eton or West- 
 minster. A boy who has been educated there 
 is generally a bold^ hardy little fellow, above 
 lies and meanness, and he grows up with the 
 same ideas and feelings as the other young 
 men of his age and generation. After all, too, 
 there is nothing like the feeling one has for an 
 old schoolfellow, even when one did not quite 
 like him, and he was not in our own set. In 
 other lands, and in the changing scenes of life, 
 how my heart has always warmed towards a 
 Harrow boy ; and what a strong claim we have 
 always seemed to have on each other in any 
 time of difficulty or danger ! I except the few 
 of course who have grown up to wear stiff neck- 
 cloths and have become prigs, or enlarged the 
 borders of their garments, till if one meet them
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 53 
 
 in the street one is obliged to stand in the 
 gutter to talk to them. 
 
 I liked Harrow a great deal better than the 
 holidays, and I looked at my old street and 
 prison life with shame and disgust. I had an 
 immense suppl}" of pocket-money too about 
 this time ; much more than was good for me. 
 For while the money of my mother's relations 
 lasted I had at least my share of it, and it 
 lasted a good while, for the establishment at 
 Mivart's was carried on altogether upon credit, 
 and besides my father had a run of luck on the 
 turf, and sold Harkaway for the largest price 
 that had ever been given for a horse, — eight 
 thousand pounds. 
 
 This put us all in high feather for a time, 
 and, with our relations^ money, which there was 
 never any intention, I fear, of repaying, might 
 have kept my father above water as long as he 
 lived, but the evil day came again, and often 
 enough, as we shall see bye-and-bye. 
 
 I recollect one holiday, especially, which I 
 looked forward to with no pleasurable feeling 
 and it was not with a very cheerful heart that I 
 prepared to pass it at Marsden Court, a 
 place which had been bought with part of Lord
 
 54 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 Walter^s fortune, and was to become mine when 
 I attained my twenty-first birthday. My mother 
 and father were gone to Paris, and from thence 
 were going to Home, so that I should have 
 been in the way, and was left to pass the vaca- 
 tion how I could alone. Both of them loved 
 me too in their way, my mother was even 
 proud of me, and my father looked on me as 
 the goose with the golden egg, who was one 
 day to set him right with the world. But nei- 
 ther of them looked after me at all, and seemed 
 to treat me as if I was grown up and independ- 
 ent of them. I think this partly resulted from 
 the position in which Lord Walter's will had 
 placed me. Parents seldom look with the same 
 feeling on a child whose fortune is independent 
 of them as they do on one who is to owe them 
 everything. It destroys the great bond of pro- 
 tection, which is the strongest of all in families; 
 though, Heaven knows, if my fortune had been 
 left at the disposal of my mother and father, it 
 would have been spent on the turf and at the 
 opera in five years, perhaps in one. They had 
 nothing to restrain them; no fear of the world's 
 censure; for my mother never mixed in it, and 
 mv father lived among a set who attached blame
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 55 
 
 to nothing, so that a man paid his gambling 
 debts. 
 
 So there I went at the end of my first half to 
 spend my holidays all alone at Marsden Court, 
 a lonely little monarch of all I surveyed, and 
 though the time T spent there alone was fortu- 
 nately short enough, or it would have made me 
 a dreamer for life, it is to those holidays that 
 I trace the habits of thought, and the love of 
 solitude, which has clung to me ever since. I 
 never liked the place ; it had no old family asso- 
 ciations, such as make ayoung heart throb; none 
 of our ancestors or kindred had ever inhabited 
 it. Lord Winnington, my guardian, received 
 it as part of his mother's fortune, and she had 
 been the daughter of a brewer, grown rich in 
 trade. Becoming embarrassed, the title-deeds 
 of Marsden Court took the place of some of 
 Lord Walter's India bonds, and the place be- 
 came mine, a slight increase of the allowance 
 for my education purchasing my father's con- 
 sent ; as it would have done to any thing under 
 the sun, if he had wanted money at the time 
 it was proposed. 
 
 It was arranged that my father should live 
 in it too, and keep it in repair till I came of
 
 56 WALTER-EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 age ; and, as he liked the credit of having a large 
 place in the country, he readily consented to 
 do this, and of course neglected it. It would 
 have made the old brewer uneasy in his very 
 grave, if he could have seen how his darling 
 property was mismanaged. The right of free 
 warren over the manor had been sold by my 
 father to a sporting lawyer for the price of his 
 bill, the gardens were underlet, and the rent 
 for many a year paid and spent, or mortgaged ; 
 the very right in the grass on the lawn did not 
 belong to us ; and if I picked a daisy it was 
 a theft. Long lean horses and starved donkeys 
 and cows used to walk up and look in at the 
 windows, wondering who I was, very likely ; 
 and sheep browsed in scores upon the lawn 
 when they did not walk in through the broken 
 French windows, and perambulate the ball- 
 room. In the whole place there were only 
 three rooms furnished, the rest having been 
 swept clear, little by little, in repeated seizures 
 for King's taxes, and the man who rented the 
 garden, with his wife and an endless family of 
 children, were the only tenants of the melan- 
 choly solitude. One thing, however, happened 
 luckily for me. The stables had been let to a
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 5/ 
 
 training groom, and though I was at first rigor- 
 ously denied admittance, my last five pound 
 note, spent in paying my footing, won respect 
 and an entree for me. A few days after my 
 arrival, also, the training groom^s master, who 
 was a friend (?) of my father's, came down to 
 look at one of his horses, and learning that I 
 was there, paid me a visit, and ordered a pony 
 he had to be kept for me. 
 
 I used to ride about in the still mornings 
 and quiet evenings, fancying that I was the 
 Sultan Saladin, or Richard of the Lion Heart, 
 or William Wallace, for my sole reading was 
 an old copy of the " Talisman,^' with some of 
 the leaves torn out. At first, too, I tried to 
 give reality to the battles in which T was per- 
 petually engaged while sustaining these charac- 
 ters, by making onslaughts on the poppies, and 
 decapitating them with great ceremony when I 
 had any one to put to death ; such as the base 
 Menteith, or him of Montserrat. I suppose, 
 however, that even the puppies were sold at my 
 Castle Rackrent, for a fierce man with a wooden 
 leg, who might have bought them or might 
 not, for there was nobody who could tell me, 
 reproved me very sharply on the subject, and 
 D 5
 
 58 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 I was sternly warned off the grass. If I had not 
 been so lavishly supplied with pocket money 
 (at uncertain intervals my mother would send 
 me fifty pounds at a time, or my father would tell 
 somebody to pay a lost bet to me), I should have 
 had nothing to eat. Not a tradesman for miles 
 would give me credit, for we owed money to 
 them all. I was obhged to arrange, therefore, 
 with Mrs. Peacock, the gardener's wife, to 
 send me what I wanted, and I generally had a 
 baked shoulder of mutton and potatoes, or a 
 large grisly meat pie all to myself, at one 
 o^clock, the Peacocks dining on it afterwards. 
 Many a boy left to himself as I was, without 
 guide, philosopher, or friend, would have been 
 hopelessly ruined, and would have acquired a 
 taste for low society that would have ranked 
 him with grooms and gardeners for the rest of 
 his life. I kept up my state, however, and 
 dined very grandly all alone, nor, after the first 
 week, did anybody except the man with the 
 wooden leg venture to address me without 
 respect, and he always got out of my way, save 
 when he was drunk, and then he hallooed at 
 me. 
 
 But what annoyed me most were the visits
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 59 
 
 of philanthropic ladies, who kept calling all 
 day long, and wanted to rescue me from perdi- 
 tion. I could not put my foot outside the 
 door either, when I had learned to lock myself 
 in at home, without being waylaid by one of 
 them, and reproved as a wayward boy, who 
 was going the way of evil things, or caressed, 
 and humoured, and pitied by people I had 
 never seen before, and whom I heartily wished 
 I might never see again. 
 
 '^ Why do you all worry me in this way ? '' 
 I asked of a pretty little girl about my own 
 age, who was dragging me in the wake of her 
 mamma, a philanthropic lady of the first class. 
 
 " Because you are a bad boy, and we want 
 to make you good." 
 
 " Who told you I was a bad boy ?" 
 
 " Oh, Miss Slater and Mrs. Stapleton,— and 
 — and ever so many people." 
 
 " I wish you would all leave me alone," said 
 I, more ungraciously than I ought to have 
 done with such a bright pair of eyes, looking at 
 me so wickedly. 
 
 " But we won't leave you alone ; we don't 
 want to leave you alone ; we want you to come
 
 60 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 and stay with us, and get tame, and be a good 
 boy/^ 
 
 " Who are you, girl ?" said I, rudely, " and 
 who is your mamma ? I don't know her." 
 
 " Oh, fie ! you are a rude boy ; and cousin 
 Harry told us you were so nice and clever. 
 Why won't you be a nice boy to us ?" 
 
 " I am not a nice boy," said I, sulkily, " and 
 
 if you don't leave me alone, I will eat you up." 
 
 "You can't do that, because your teeth are 
 
 not long enough, and mamma would eat you 
 
 up first." 
 
 "Who is your cousin, girl ? " 
 " Why, little Harry Howard, to be sure, 
 who is with you at your school ; oh, you wild 
 boy ! I will tell mamma you pretend not to 
 know cousin Harry, and she will tell you not 
 to tell fibs." 
 
 " I did not say I did not know Harry How- 
 ard ; he is in my form. I said I did not know 
 you ; but if you are Harry Howard's cousin, 
 of course I do know you. What is your 
 name ?" 
 
 " Why, Emily Howard, to be sure, you silly 
 wild boy. You are not a clever wild boy, after
 
 I'HE LONG MINORITY. 61 
 
 all, though you do help cousin Harry in his 
 lessons. Why won't you be our friend ?" 
 " Because you call me a wild boy." 
 At this point of the conversation, Mrs. 
 Howard stopped for us to come up, for we had 
 got a good deal behind, and walked slowly, 
 like older people. 
 
 " Well, Emily," said that lady, " is Walter 
 coming to dine with us to day ?" 
 
 " No, ma'am," said I, '^ if you please." 
 "Oh! yes he will, mamma," cried Emily; 
 " he is not such a very wild boy after all, and I 
 have not told him yet that you found out in 
 the big red book that we are relations, and 
 that you and his papa were cousins." 
 
 I suppose there was no getting over the 
 argument of the big red book, and I rather 
 think 1 expressed an opinion to that effect, 
 and said, that if it was written in a book that 
 we were relations, I supposed they were also 
 relations of William Wallace, and that therefore 
 I would go and see them ; and I did so. W^e 
 became great friends after this ; pretty little 
 Emily and 1 were always together, and walked 
 out with Mrs. Howard, philanthropizing, the 
 only difference being that while she lectured
 
 62 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 cottagers' wives, and gave them flannel in July, 
 little Emily and I lagged behind and gathered 
 daisies, and played together. They were plea- 
 sant days.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 63 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 A LOST LIFE. 
 
 I SOON felt at home with General Howard, 
 who had married a distant cousin of my 
 father's, and insisted that he was my uncle in 
 consequence; he had a brother, a clever, 
 thoughtful man, with a quaint, lettered mind, 
 however, whom I liked still more. Like Sir 
 Clifton he had been, in early life, in the army, 
 for it was the family profession, and his race 
 had been soldiers for centuries. Howards had 
 come over with WiUiam of Orange, and fought 
 in the ranks of James. There were Howards 
 who were Counts in the Austrian and Prus-
 
 64 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 sian military services, and Princes in Russia. 
 Howards had gone over to instruct the troops 
 of the Grand Sultan in civilised warfare, and 
 to train the hordes of the Bey of Algiers, and 
 wherever they had been they had distinguished 
 themselves. Maurice was the first Howard, 
 time out of mind, who had broken through the 
 family tradition, and he in early life had taken 
 to himself a wife, sold his commission, and 
 began to prepare resolutely for the Church. 
 Some difference, however, with the college 
 authorities, owing to a dispute, it was said, 
 with a Tuft of Christchurch, caused him to 
 abandon his new profession, and he had subse- 
 quently settled in the country on a small pro- 
 perty left to him by a distant relative. He 
 rented and subsequently purchased one of the 
 prettiest cottages in Hampshire, with a few 
 acres of land round it. He became an oracle 
 among small farmers, and corresponded with 
 the local paper and the Gardener's Gazette on 
 subjects connected with the management of a 
 flower garden. He grew a peculiar kind of 
 mangold worzel, of which he was very proud, 
 and improved the potato considerably by the 
 introduction of several foreign and more pro-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 65 
 
 ductive plants. At the flower show he inva- 
 riably carried away the prize, and his nectarines 
 received honourable notice as regularly as the 
 time for exhibiting them came round. His 
 little crop-eared pony even was a rarity, and 
 such a dog as he had for a companion had 
 never been seen, surely, in the world before. 
 He was churchwarden, chairman of the vestry, 
 the infallible resource of any one (that is to say, 
 among the good and the simple) who required 
 advice or counsel, or wanted the services of 
 godfather, executor, trustee, or protector. The 
 quaint, kindly scholar ! how patiently and 
 nobly, with what good heart and cheerful pur- 
 pose, did he labour in his little vineyard, and 
 
 " Surely th' eternal Master found 
 His single talent well employed." 
 
 Yet Maurice Howard was no common man, 
 no parish busy-body. Had he gone into the 
 ('hurch he would, likely enough, have died 
 Archbishop of Canterbury; his simple elo- 
 quence was so touching, and, schoolman as he 
 was, so unadorned, his piety so pure and un- 
 affected, his life so amiable and so blameless. 
 I believe to this day that if any little of good
 
 66 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 be in me, it is to him I owe it. The mind of 
 youth is so impressionable to good and evil 
 that I could hardly have made so valuable a 
 friend at this period of my life. 
 
 There were not wanting indications enough, 
 however, to a close observer, that the early 
 character of Maurice Howard had been marked 
 with strong traits of passion and deep-seated 
 energy. Glimpses, sometimes, of an ambition 
 which has made popes and cardinals, broke out 
 from that mind usually so subdued and calm, 
 and then a smile, which was half sadness, half 
 content, would flit for a moment across his 
 noble features, and the heart of Maurice 
 Howard was again with his garden. 
 
 There was a singular attraction in his 
 manner, it was so earnest yet so playful, and 
 he had that happy art of pleasing children 
 which is so often a characteristic of superior 
 men. I am sure that when he first knew me 
 I should have disgusted many men, and either 
 met with harsh reproof, or been altogether 
 passed over by them as a rude, troublesome 
 little fellow. I had had the misfortune, and it 
 always is a very great one, to live very little 
 with children of my own age, and I had, therei-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 67 
 
 fore, that precocious maturity of mind which is 
 very unpleasant in a child. I knew everything 
 that I ought not to have known while I was 
 the last boy on the lowest form at Harrow. I 
 was familiar with stable slang, with the jokes 
 of the London theatres, the last new novel 
 read in the Bench ; I could hum the airs of 
 several operas, and knew all the stars of the 
 theatrical world by name, as well as several 
 anecdotes of their private lives, which I had 
 picked up from conversations between my 
 mother and her maid while she was having her 
 hair dressed. I was fond, too, of displaying 
 these stores of knowledge on very inappropriate 
 occasions, and, little wretch that I was, I openly 
 evinced my contempt for those who were not 
 equally well informed in these respects. 
 
 Then I was arrogant, rude, self-willed, every- 
 thing that I should not have been; yet I 
 cannot remember one single instance in which 
 Mr. Howard ever lost temper with me; and he 
 had his own way of correcting my faults, 
 handling the curb so Hghtly, that it was im- 
 possible for my boy-pride to feel wounded. 
 
 " By the way, Walter," said he to me one 
 day, addressing me as if I had been in every
 
 68 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 respect a grown-up man (people were apt to 
 treat me in this way), "can you tell me 
 where John signed the Magna Charta? I know 
 you are fond of history." 
 
 ^' No, sir/' I answered ; " but I can tell you 
 about the institution of the Order of the Garter 
 (I had read it in a novel). A certain Countess 
 of Salisbury" — and I went all through the 
 popular story upon that order of knighthood. 
 
 " Thank you, Walter. Where did you learn 
 this?" 
 
 I mentioned some old historian which had 
 been quoted by the novehst, but perhaps 
 my memory had failed me, for Mr. Howard 
 raised his eyebrows, and answered, with a slight 
 smile, — " Oh, I thought the author you men- 
 tion had written in Latin, and I did not know 
 you could read Latin yet." 
 
 " No," said I, " I can't read Latin ; but I 
 suppose Dr. Scriblerus can." 
 
 " So, then, it was from the Doctor's novel 
 about Stonehenge that you got your story ?" 
 
 " Yes," said I, feeling very little. 
 
 " And now about the Magna Charta ?" 
 
 " Oh," 1 said, " I can't tell you anything 
 about that ; but the Countess of Essex," — and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 69 
 
 I was flying off to some scandal about Queen 
 Elizabeth, when he stopped me by telhng his 
 son, a sly little fellow about my own age, to go 
 and ask his little sister for Pinnock's History 
 of England ; a literary work bound in a paper 
 cover, and which was much thumbed in prepa- 
 ratory schools when I was a boy, though, I 
 believe, it has now been superseded. 
 
 " Let us look for the reign of King John, 
 Walter," said he ; " though this is not so great 
 an authority as the one you mention, I dare 
 say you can find me what I want in it/' 
 
 "It was at Runnyraede," said I, selecting 
 my information readily enough. 
 
 "Thank you, Walter," answered Mr. 
 Howard, trimming his vine ; " the Magna 
 Charta was a great event in English History, 
 and I wanted to know something about it.'' It 
 was thus that the scholar condescended to re- 
 prove the ignorance and vanity of a child. 
 
 He had a charming talent too of drawing 
 little morals from slight events ; and, I think, 
 I hardly took a single walk with him without 
 having it impressed on my mind by some 
 trifling circumstance, which has remained fixed
 
 70 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 on my memory ever since. It was a great 
 privilege for little Emily and I to accompany 
 him from the lodge to his cottage ; and he had 
 an old servant, named Hodge, a character too 
 in his way, who always saw us home again. 
 The fruit in his garden tasted pleasanter than 
 that anywhere else, and it was with his children 
 that I first knew what children were naturally 
 and at home, and so became a child myself. 
 
 I remember one walk especially. It was on a 
 fine summer evening, one of those soft mellow 
 evenings almost peculiar to our English climate. 
 The grass had been mowed, and soft summer 
 rains causing it to begin to spring again, every 
 meadow looked hke a velvet carpet, with here 
 and there some wild-flower peeping out, which, 
 having bowed its pliant stem, had escaped the 
 scythe. 
 
 " See, little lads and lasses," said Mr. 
 Howard, pointing to one of them, " that pretty 
 little flower must have been in great danger 
 the other day when the mowers were here, yet 
 it escaped because it was a good little flower, 
 and got out of the way. It is one thing to 
 bear anything that God sends, as this little
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 'Jl 
 
 flower did the storm and the rain, and another 
 to get wilfully in the way of danger. A silly 
 flower might have stood still too, and said, 
 ' Oh, 1 am sure to have my head cut off ;' but 
 this one knew that it was not sure, and that 
 no evil ever is sure if we are brave and 
 prudent." 
 
 We laughed at his making the little flower 
 one of us in this way, but I have often thought 
 of the moral since. 
 
 On we roamed over the meadows, chattering 
 and playing round the kindly gifted man. I 
 recollect the whole afternoon as if it were yes- 
 terday. The leaves of the trees rustled sport- 
 ively over our heads, as if they were children 
 too of an airier growth than we, and playing 
 with each other. Men and lads driving home 
 overloaded hay carts and whistling as they 
 went, wound along the lanes, and at a little 
 distance from us the night coach to London 
 was putting to, at a rural looking inn, called 
 "The Barley Mow,^' kept by its proprietor, 
 and, when it was ready, the coachman mounted 
 his box to call at the houses of the neighbour- 
 ing gentry and ask if there was any thing for
 
 72 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 "Lunnun.'^ He touched his hat as he passed us 
 with his high conditioned horses and ghttering 
 harness. What a gentleman he looked too 
 with his immense black whiskers, his white 
 coat, and showy shawl tied round his neck, for 
 though it was summer many a black heath lay 
 between Marsden and London. I almost en- 
 vied him, and, full of the sort of excitement 
 which I well remember the passing of a stage 
 coach always occasioned in me when I was a 
 lad, I suppose my feeling appeared visibly 
 enough to one who was a keen reader of the 
 human face. Little William Howard shared 
 my opinion too, and cried out, ^' Oh, papa, I 
 should so like to be a coachman.^' 
 
 ^'Should you, my boy?" said his father, with 
 the tranquil smile that was habitual to him , 
 " so would Walter, I am sure, just now. But 
 look, do you see that cock pluming himself on 
 yonder gate and crowing out so bravely? I dare 
 say he thinks himself a very fine fellow and 
 perched very high. But I cannot say that I 
 think so much of him as I do of an eagle, in 
 spite of his showy feathers ; do you ?" 
 
 " Oh, no, papa."
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 73 
 
 '' Well, my boys, you will understand what I 
 mean some day. I dare say you would both 
 like very well to be coachmen now. But be- 
 ware of little eminences in life, and fine posi- 
 tions easily won and which promise a vast deal 
 of the kind of pleasure you are fond of. When 
 you get older, you will see that there are many 
 men in life whose useful and noble pursuits 
 entitle them to rank with the eagle when com- 
 pared with a stage coachman.^^ 
 
 I have never wished to be a professional 
 Phaeton since then; yet the profession was 
 popular enough in that day, and numbered one 
 or two lords among its members. Mr. Howard, 
 however, made it appear vulgar, even to chil- 
 dren, in a minute. 
 
 We continued our walk, and presently got 
 into one of those long shady interminable lanes 
 that are a peculiar characteristic of the county 
 of Hampshire. Now, General Howard had 
 brought William and me two whips the last 
 time he went to London ; they had remained 
 our grandest treasures ever since, and we went 
 popping them about so vigorously all day that 
 we seemed to be always accompanied by a 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 74 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 discharge of small arms. We had not gone far 
 down the lane when we met a hay cart belong- 
 ing to some small farmer, and accompanied by 
 a dirty, a very dirty boy, all rags and ruddiness, 
 with white hair and blue eyes, and an expres- 
 sion half surly, half stupid. 
 
 Mr. Howard was fond of talking to the 
 country people, and, as we passed, said to the 
 young waggoner, " You have got a fine load of 
 hay, my little man.'^ 
 
 " Noa, I aint," roared the boy ; " it aint 
 ourn.'^ 
 
 '' Where are you going with it, then ?'' 
 
 '^ To Squire Greaves, to be sheure,'' cried 
 the boy ; " whear shud I be a-goin ? I aint 
 your little mon, neither.'^ So saying, he drove 
 defiantly away. 
 
 As we walked on we all gave vent to our 
 opinions about the little waggoner. 
 
 " What a rude boy ! '^ said William. 
 
 " What a naughty, bad boy ! '^ chimed in 
 little Emily. 
 
 But I went farther, and said that " Some 
 people were naturally envious of gentlemen, 
 and that it was to be expected," with some
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 75 
 
 other commentaries on our own superiority ; 
 sentiments which I had probably read in some 
 novel. 
 
 Mr. Howard smiled, and answered, " I dare 
 say he thinks himself quite as good as we are, 
 and it is very proper that he should, though 
 he need not have been so rude.'^ 
 
 " Oh ! he can't be such a silly boy as to 
 think he is as good as we are,^^ said I, smack- 
 ing my whip. 
 
 It was an unlucky illustration, however, of 
 my argument, for the sturdy little waggoner 
 answered the smack of my whip by lengthen- 
 ing his own, and cracking it till you might have 
 heard the noise for a quarter of a mile. 
 
 I felt this as an insult, and popped my whip 
 again and again in the vain attempt to eclipse 
 him, but every time I did so he let off such a 
 volley with his as effectually silenced and 
 brought me to shame. I heard, indeed, the 
 little rogue^s impudent laugh of contemptuous 
 triumph when he found that he had silenced 
 me, and he cracked his whip again and again 
 in insolent victory. 
 
 Mr. Howard, however, was amused by the 
 E 2
 
 76 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 contest, and let me go on quietly till my arm 
 ached, and I gave in silently. " You see, 
 Walter," said he, then, ^^ that there are some 
 things in which even that little waggoner has 
 the best of us/^
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. ^'] 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Muss i dano, muss i dann, zutn stadte hinaus, 
 
 Und du mein schatz bleibst hier, 
 
 Wann i komm, wann i komm, wann i wider kotnm, 
 
 Kehr i ein, mein schatz bei dir. 
 
 Kann i auch nicht alle weile bei dir seyn, 
 
 Hab i docb mein freud an dir, 
 
 Wann i komm, wann i komm, wann i wider komm. 
 
 Kehr i ein, mein schatz bei dir. 
 
 Yes, those were pleasant days, wandering 
 about with httle Emily Howard, gathering 
 daisies, and talking about William Wallace (or 
 listening to the gentle wisdom of the scholar), 
 and, were I not very firmly persuaded that 
 " whatever is, is right," and that nothing hap- 
 pens here below without a wise purpose, I 
 should still think it would have been better for 
 me if they had lasted longer. Nothing does a
 
 78 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 boy more good than the society of girls ; and 
 I have been a shy man with ladies all my life, 
 for the want of this early training. Without 
 having been brought up constantly with ladies 
 in childhood, a man may, indeed, afterwards 
 become a sort of hero with the fair ones, and 
 may have a good deal of success ; but he will 
 never be a real favourite with ladies generally, 
 or feel entirely at his ease among them. Many 
 a man with the reputation of a Lovelace would 
 almost as soon have a tooth drawn as be pre- 
 sented to a stranger lady. 
 
 My holiday-time alone at Marsden Court 
 was, however, destined to come rather suddenly 
 to an end ; for, all at once, my guardian began 
 to remember my existence, and, one evening, 
 just after tea, at Mrs. Howard's, and as I was 
 sitting down beside Emily on a little form, and 
 preparing to tell her the story of the Red 
 Comyn, Tom Rogers, the training groom, can- 
 tered down the carriage-sweep, and, seeing me 
 at the open window, pulled up suddenly, and, 
 taking off his hat, drew a letter from under the 
 yellow silk handkerchief, which, besides his 
 head, it habitually contained. 
 
 " Do you want me, Mr. Rogers V said I,
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 79 
 
 not knowing what to make of his important 
 appearance ; " How is the bay colt ? " 
 
 " Why/' replied Mr. Rogers, " the bay colt 
 is neither here nor there ; he's middlin' ; he is 
 or was this raornin', when I see him last. But 
 there's this here letter, as I found comin' 'ome, 
 and seeing 'mediate on it, why, I thinks, thinks 
 I, I'll just ride over to General Howard's with 
 it, as I'm goin' that way." 
 
 Tom Rogers would not have confessed upon 
 any account that he had gone out of his way 
 to do a civil thing, as, in reality, he had in this 
 instance, and very often did in others. 
 
 " Thank you, Mr. Rogers," said I ; " will 
 you give me the letter, if you please, and 
 accept this for coming over?" and I handed 
 him the now almost obsolete coin called a 
 crown-piece. 
 
 Tom did not take the money at first ; I 
 rather think he was ashamed to do so ; I was 
 still such a little boy ; but at last he suffered 
 me to put it into his hand, while pretending to 
 stroke his cob's mane. But even then he 
 twisted it about awkwardly between his finger 
 and thumb, as if it burned them, and said, 
 " Well, Master Evelyn, I did not come over.
 
 80 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 not expecting anything/' But at this moment, 
 Mrs. Howard, coming to the window, asked 
 him to go into the servants' hall, and get 
 supper. So Tom touched his hat, rather as if 
 by accident than otherwise, pocketed his crown- 
 piece by mistake, and, five minutes afterwards, 
 had become the oracle of General Howard^s 
 stable. Meantime, I looked at my letter. 
 
 What a wondrous letter it was ! alaiost the 
 first I had ever received from a stranger. It 
 was written on and enclosed in paper about the 
 consistence of stout cardboard, and it actually 
 cracked at the folds, in the excess of its im- 
 portance. It had a seal as large as the crown- 
 piece I had just given to Tom Rogers, but was 
 directed in a small, cramped hand, which, I 
 remember, made me laugh, and suggested a 
 comparison not very flattering to the writer. 
 The address ran, — " To (this word was up at 
 the extreme corner, on the left) Master Walter 
 Evelyn, Marsden Court, Hants ^^ (and pushed 
 up in a corner, as if it had tumbled there, was 
 the august name of my guardian), the fifteenth 
 Earl of Winnington. Every letter, even, of 
 the name, however, was misplaced, and all of 
 them seemed to have got excited at their po-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 81 
 
 sition^ and tumbled one over the other, in the 
 most entangled and absurd way possible. No- 
 body but the inspector of franks could ever 
 have read that signature properly without know- 
 ing it. 
 
 " Why don't you open your letter, child ? " 
 said Mrs. Howard; "I see it is from Lord 
 Winnington. Bring it to me, and I will read 
 it for you ; and you must give me the cover, — 
 I can use the seal, to help make a card-case ; 
 and the signature in the corner I should like to 
 have, for an autograph, — Lord Winnington is 
 a very great man. Let me see his letter. '' 
 
 I took it up to her, and resumed my place 
 by Emily, intending to begin the history of the 
 Red Comyn without further delay. 
 
 "Walter!" cried Mrs. Howard, presently, 
 " what an odd boy you are ! don't you want to 
 know what your guardian sayis to you ? '^ 
 
 " No,'' answered I ; "I am going to tell 
 Emily the story of the Red Comyn." 
 
 '^ Nonsense ; leave the Red Comyn alone 
 to-night, and come here. Lord Winnington 
 wishes you to go and see him ; at least so I 
 read his letter, though it is not very clear/' 
 
 "And must I go ?" 
 
 E 5
 
 82 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 " To be sure you must, if he asks you, as I 
 think he does; stay, let me read the letter 
 again, — it is all parenthcvsis/^ 
 
 "Really," she continued, after another at- 
 tentive perusal, " I think he must mean you to 
 go. General, will you read this letter }" 
 
 " What, a letter from Winnington ! Why, 
 my dear, it must be as difficult to decipher as 
 an inscription on an Egyptian monument ; 
 and when you have read it, you will find it still 
 harder to understand/^ 
 
 " But I really cannot make out if Walter is 
 to go to him, or if he is not. Had not we 
 better write to him, and say the child is staying 
 with us, and that we will bring him over, if he 
 wishes it ? '' 
 
 " What ! write to a man, to explain his own 
 letter, and, perhaps, be obliged to eat one of 
 Winnington^s dihners, besides ! That would 
 never do. He is Walter's guardian ; so, at all 
 events, the lad can do him no harm in paying 
 him a visit. He had better go in our carriage 
 to-morrow ; it is not above fifteen miles oflf.** 
 
 This being decided, — let me pause a mo- 
 ment, to introduce his lordship to the reader^s 
 notice. He is quite important enough to have
 
 , THE LONG MINORITY. 83 
 
 a fresh chapter all to himself ; but he has had 
 such a very long and grand chapter all to him- 
 self in real life, that suppose he comes in for 
 the fag-end of this in our mimic one. 
 
 Lord Winnington therefore was a great man, 
 a very great man. The fact of his greatness 
 was the first thing that was impressed upon 
 everybody who was at all ductile. There were 
 not twenty men in England who had such a 
 wide repute, or, perhaps, who were in reality 
 more utterly and completely undeserving of it 
 He had been everything that was grand or gay, 
 and had filled the highest offices in the gift of 
 the Crown. He was decorated with nearly 
 every order of knighthood in Europe, without 
 having ever done one great or distinguished 
 act in his whole life. The fact was, he had 
 lived all his life on the reputation of other 
 people, and had been pushed into high positions, 
 in which, having done nothing, he had got on. 
 He was a general who had never smelt powder, 
 a minister who could not write or speak three 
 sentences of EngUsh intelUgibly. This, how- 
 ever, is common enough; but he aspired to 
 more. Fie was a connoisseur in the fine arts, 
 who could not, without prompting, have dis-
 
 84 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 tinguished a Rubens from a Titian. He was a 
 composer, of whom, it was no libel to say, he 
 did not understand a note of music ; but he 
 was fifteenth Earl of Winnington, and, though 
 not himself of very pure descent, was connected 
 by marriage with some of the very highest 
 families in England. His father too had dis- 
 inherited him, and, as Government very pro- 
 perly do not like poor peers, and as he had no 
 opinions of politics save that he, the fifteenth 
 Earl of Winnington, ought to come in for any 
 good things that were to be had, successive 
 ministries took his proxy, and agreed with him. 
 He had a certain manner too with him that 
 was taking and popular with people who did 
 not know him well. He was always ready to 
 shake hands and speak to everybody, and as 
 no one could by any possibility understand 
 what he said, they put their own construction 
 on it, and liked him none the worse for that. 
 Then he had given bad dinners to almost every 
 person of note who was to be met with ; and, 
 although people do not like to eat bad dinners, 
 they like them better than none; and there are 
 a great many tuft-hunters in the world who 
 think it a great thing to dine with an Earl and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 85 
 
 become his claqueurs ever afterwards. At the 
 first glance he looked quite an imposing per- 
 son, but, if the eye of an observer travelled from 
 the dress to the face, the twaddler and pre- 
 tender stood revealed. His forehead was nar- 
 row and his nose long and shapeless, which 
 gave him something the appearance of a snipe. 
 His mouth would have told his character in a 
 moment, and his eyes, which had a peculiar 
 twist in them, were the most dishonest looking 
 eyes ever set in a human head ; they could not 
 have belonged to a good man. His actions too 
 were all sprawling and ungainly. Stooping, 
 narrow-chested, large in the girth, straddling 
 and rather knock-kneed, a more unknightly 
 figure never wore a coronet. Many a young 
 man left his presence wiser and sadder, and 
 with his hopes and illusions chilled for many 
 a day. Was fame worth having, when such as 
 he were among the famous ? That miserable 
 incapable old man, who went about the world 
 a shame to it ! That borrower of other men's 
 brains, bully, humbug, mountebank, driveller, 
 impostor, blasphemer ; faugh ! He was great 
 in blasphemy, — really great, I mean. He had as 
 great a variety of oaths as any man living, and 
 would utter them in a high, cracked voice, yet.
 
 86 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 without the least excitement, till flesh and 
 blood quivered with indignation at him. It is 
 really a wonder the world did not find him out 
 sooner ; but it is a great thing, and very pro- 
 perly a great thing, to be fifteenth Earl of Win- 
 nington, and fortunately there are not many 
 such as he who once bore that title, or the 
 most rational and enlightened aristocracy that 
 ever existed in the world would become a 
 mockery and a bye word. 
 
 I never could understand how he could have 
 been a friend of my uncle's, except from that 
 unaccountable liking which all men have for 
 those most opposite to themselves, and Lord 
 Winnington was at that time Secretary to the 
 Governor-General in India, and at the first 
 budding of that stolen renown which after- 
 wards blossomed so luxuriantly. Besides, Lord 
 Walter knew nothing whatever of business, 
 and probably thought, like many other worthy 
 people, that there existed (as there ought to 
 do) some wonderful Government machine or 
 other to keep trustees and executors in order. 
 I am inclined to think, however, that he knew 
 Lord Winnington very slightly, and, as he had 
 never gone much into society in London, and 
 had therefore few acquaintances, when he found
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 87 
 
 himself dying he had confided his affairs to 
 the first man of fair worldly repute whom he 
 thought would undertake the care of them. 
 It was but another in the chain of those lucky 
 chances by which Lord Winnington had some- 
 times acquired the esteem even of the wise and 
 good. 
 
 What a rich clutch it must have been for a 
 needy man, — the uncontrolled management of 
 an Indian hero's fortune for twenty years, 
 and then only an executor's account to render 
 afterwards, supposing I survived, or, still better, 
 a disputed succession if I did not. How many 
 times Lord Walter's fortune had saved him 
 from disgrace and infamy nobody could have 
 told but himself, though many might have 
 guessed it. He treated it, however, as I after- 
 wards found out, altogether as his own, and an 
 excellent thing he made of it. His mortgaged 
 estates were cleared. The increased parlia- 
 mentary interest which it gave him earned the 
 gratitude of successive Governments. And as 
 for me, the future heir, he never once thought 
 about me till some circumstances, which I shall 
 hereafter relate, forced me upon his notice.
 
 88 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Er hat mir's oft gesaght 
 
 Wenn ich ihn so geplaght 
 
 " Du Wirst noch oft-mals an mir weinen 
 
 Wenn ich gezogen bin 
 
 Ins feme Ausland hin 
 
 Und bist alleine 
 
 So wirst du weinen." 
 
 A MORE charming woman than Lady Wiining- 
 ton, however, never graced a court. She wis 
 almost all that her husband pretended to De, 
 and, though he treated her very ill, she had been 
 his providence and guardian angel through life. 
 She was the most perfect and high bred 
 English lady I have ever seen ; and did not 
 you, my dear Public, know very well how 
 marriages are made up, you would think I am 
 filling my book with improbabilities in bringing
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 89 
 
 them together. She was beautiful ! oh, how 
 beautiful ! without coquetry ; gentle and re- 
 fined, without affectation. She had real genius, 
 without allowing you even to suspect it, till 
 you knew her very intimately, and then it 
 appeared, — she did not shew it. Scandal had 
 touched her name, — whose does it leave free ? 
 but never did a high-born and nobly-mated 
 lady better understand the duties of her posi- 
 tion. She was a model to follow and to wonder 
 at in every relation of life. In her presence 
 even her husband ceased to be half knave, half 
 goose, and became almost respectable. Indeed 
 you forgot him — his stars, importance, fiddling, 
 and all about him, save when his name was 
 gravely and affectionately invoked for doing 
 just the thing that ought to be done, and then 
 you turned to admire the exquisite tact with 
 which she brought him out and masked his 
 utter futility. 
 
 There was none of that fulsome display of 
 unfelt tenderness which marks the efforts of a 
 vulgar woman who wishes to hide an aching 
 heart, and a husband^s worthlessness, for very 
 pride, from the world. It must have been a 
 keen eye and a close observer indeed who
 
 90 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 could detect that Lady Winnington was un- 
 happy, under that quiet, subdued, yet sunny 
 smile, that graceful and composed manner, 
 and perfect self-possession. Yet her attention 
 was never off him ; and before you had time to 
 laugh in ridicule at his absurdity, or in scorn at 
 his meanness, my lady had redeemed both by 
 some happy turn in the conversation. He did 
 not really like her, and he treated her with deli- 
 berate and systematic cruelty, even with con- 
 tempt ; but in secret he followed her counsel 
 implicitly ; and thus an establishment, which 
 any other woman would have left angry or 
 broken-hearted in a month, came to be looked 
 upon throughout the land as a model of 
 domestic happiness and propriety. The exqui- 
 site economy of its mistress enabled my Lord 
 to indulge in every graceless and contemptible 
 folly that suited the taste of a trifler and 
 buffoon, and yet to keep up one of the most 
 elegant homes in England ; and his daughters 
 married nobly, and his sons came to honour, 
 for her sake. Dear, dear, and peerless lady ! 
 
 I did not much enjoy my stay at Cleveland 
 Park, for all my life I have had a sort of intui- 
 tive idea of people, which has seldom deceived
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 91 
 
 me ; and from the first 1 liked Lord Winning- 
 ton little more than he liked me, and avoided 
 him instinctively. I liked the morning drix^es, 
 however, very well, with Lady Winnington and 
 Anne Stanley, her only unmarried daughter, 
 who was about my own age ; but I could not 
 forget Emily, and I would much rather have 
 been back with her. However, it appeared to 
 be a decided thing that Cleveland Park was 
 henceforth to be my home, and Lord Winning- 
 ton began to talk of persuading my father to 
 let Marsden Court on a repairing lease, to pre- 
 vent it tumbling down. He never mentioned 
 my father, however, but once, and then it was 
 upon this subject, and he called him "Lord 
 Walter.^^ 
 
 " My papa's name is Herbert, my lord,^^ 
 said L 
 
 " Henry ! ay, so it is : I said Henry,'* 
 replied Lord Winnington. 
 
 " Do you know, little Walter," said her lady- 
 ship to me that evening, when she came into 
 my little dressing-room, as usual, to see that I 
 was comfortable before going to bed herself, 
 "Do you know that it was very wrong of you to 
 take up my lord so rudely to-day about your papa?"
 
 92 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 " But he called my papa Lord Walter/' said 
 1, " and then said his name was Henry/' 
 
 " No, Herbert ! Herbert is your papa's 
 name, to be sure,'' returned Lady Winnington, 
 with her sweet, sweet, smile ; " but you won't 
 be naughty again, will you ? You see, I am 
 going to take your dear mamma's place, and 
 give you a lecture. Do you think she will 
 be jealous of me ? " 
 
 '^ Oh, no ! " said I, with sparkling eyes ; 
 " do tell me, dear Lady Winnington, when I 
 do wrong ; I will always do what you tell me." 
 
 " I knew you would, and I told my lord 
 what a dear good boy you were, and hoped he 
 would not be angry with you this time ; but if 
 he is, you know, you must be very good, and 
 not answer him again ; won't you, now ? " 
 
 " Yes," said L 
 
 "And now, good night, and go to sleep, and 
 get up in the morning, and go out with Anne," 
 and then she kissed me, and that dear presence 
 which was like a good angel about the house, 
 glided softly from the room, leaving her smile 
 behind her. 
 
 I think Lady Winnington, with a presenti- 
 ment of what was to follow, threw me pur-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 93 
 
 posely a good deal with her daughter Anne ; 
 indeed we were hardly ever apart. I walked 
 beside her pony every morning, and then she 
 would pretend he was naughty, and make me 
 help her oif and get on and give him a gallop, 
 which I liked very much, and used to return to 
 her quite proud of my horsemanship. Then 
 we used to go into the hot-houses together, 
 and gather fruit for my Lord^s breakfast 
 (everything was done for "my Lord^^ in that 
 house), though I cannot say we were of much 
 use, for the gardener cut it and took it in ; but 
 we served as an escort, and that pleased us quite 
 as well as anything else. 
 
 What a fine boisterous girl she was, too, 
 Anne Stanley ! more like a schoolboy than a 
 mealy-faced young lady. It was like washing 
 in cold water to talk to her, and she never left 
 me in peace five minutes in the day. She 
 played me tricks from morning to night, and 
 laughed at my little white hands and girlish 
 ways, telling me to look at hers, which were 
 the despair of her mother. She used to say 
 she ought to have been a gamekeeper^s son, and 
 insisted on being called "Stanley,^^ while I 
 never could persuade her to give me any name
 
 94 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 but Miss, or to talk to me without making faces. 
 She was rather stronger than me, too, and used 
 to dehght in shewing it. She would provoke 
 me to battle upon no pretence at all, and beat 
 me soundly ; but what she delighted in most 
 was hunting me with her little dog " Fan," as 
 vicious a terrier as ever had his tail bitten oflF, 
 and entertained a spite against the world ever 
 afterwards. They would soon overtake me, 
 and then I was thrown down without ceremony 
 and cut up like a deer, the wretched dog yelp- 
 ing and galloping over my face like a mad thing. 
 What ticklish work that cutting-up was ! It 
 was generally performed with a drawing pencil, 
 which was thrust into my ribs and under my 
 arms (she knew all the tickhsh places) till I 
 roared again, and would make such a noise that 
 Lady Winnington would send her maid to see 
 what was the matter, and then I was ashamed. 
 Anne, however, had not a grain of spite in her, 
 and it was all done from sheer animal high 
 spirits. She was a favourite with every one in 
 the house, and the only natural person in it. 
 She used to go and forage for us in the pantry 
 and the store-room, and, as neither of us liked 
 the seven o'clock dinner, we used to have a
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 95 
 
 feast usually of bread and jam under the trees, 
 and she would tie my legs firmly together lest 
 I should run away, and go laughing to fetch it, 
 and then set her dog at me when she came 
 back, till I yelled with fright, and learned to 
 roll myself and tumble over like a squirrel at a 
 surprising speed. When this had lasted long 
 enough, the dog was called off, and my legs 
 untied, and we set down (the dog between us 
 on his hind legs) and devoured her feast, she 
 treating me with great attention as the young 
 lady of the party, and calling me all sorts of 
 ridiculous names. Then, at night, if I escaped 
 an apple-pie bed, there was sure to be salt, or 
 cut brush or thistles in it. She put ghosts and 
 phosphorus too about my room, and gave me 
 cold pig every morning long before I wanted 
 to get up. 
 
 After a week or two, however, I got as strong 
 and as hardy as she was, and one day after having 
 been hunted with great glee till I could scarcely 
 stand, I got my back against a tree and stopped. 
 She closed with me in a moment, like a little 
 Diana, pencil in hand (the hunt always took 
 place after her drawing lesson, which was at 
 twelve o^clock, and the conclusion of which
 
 96 WALTER EVELYN J OR, 
 
 was the signal for romps for the rest of the 
 day) ; the struggle was long and boisterous, 
 and, to give it additional vivacity, she barked 
 like a dog. This gave me an advantage, by 
 helping to exhaust her sooner, and at length, 
 " Oh, Walter ! dear Walter ! let me get up, 
 and I won't call you a girl any more," told me 
 I was victor; and fortunately she never dis- 
 puted my superiority afterwards, or I might 
 perhaps even now lose the laurel.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 97 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 I WAS making good progress at Harrow. I 
 had got through the thorns and brambles that 
 choke up the gateways of knowledge, and was 
 already in the temple. My work was a real 
 pleasure to me ; I could make Latin verses as 
 fast as Mr. Moses' poet can English ones, and 
 I was generally looked upon as a promising 
 boy, who would take high honours at the univer- 
 sity. Unluckily, however, my mother, who 
 had begun to live almost constantly in Paris 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 9*^ WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 found she could not be happy any longer with- 
 out me. At the end of one Christmas holi- 
 day, therefore, I did not return. In vain the 
 masters wrote and represented the life-long 
 injury it would be to me if removed so early; 
 in vain even the kind-hearted head master 
 personally added a warning, which was half an 
 entreaty — I never went back. 
 
 Oh, those takings away from school, how 
 they do ruin a boy ! and how many a brilhant 
 scholar who might have been an honour to his 
 age and country has been spoiled by them ! 
 Regular hard work at school keeps boys of 
 fourteen or fifteen out of a thousand scrapes, 
 and if allowed to become men too soon they 
 will regret it bitterly enough when they feel 
 themselves old at thirty. It is surprising, t&o, 
 how soon they forget all they have learned at 
 school, and, to whatever gifts they attain after- 
 wards, this loss is never regained. Very few 
 boys, too, who are not kept hard at their books 
 till they go up can obtain university honours, 
 and they are very well worth having (let re- 
 formers say what they will) as a sort of patent 
 of ability through life, whatever may be their 
 intrinsic value as a gauge of talent.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 99 
 
 Youths, too, are almost invariably idle if left 
 to themselves, and, though intolerable to others 
 in society, and always in the way, they like it 
 amazingly ; and the intellects of the very 
 brightest men often seem to lie fallow during 
 some years at this period of their lives. When 
 a young man of eighteen says adieu to boyish 
 studies for once and for aye, well and good. 
 Leave him alone, he will have his brief hunt 
 after what he has been told is pleasure, and 
 then, weary and disgusted enough with the 
 chase, he will return to them with increased 
 zest, and commence applying what he has 
 learned to some practical end, or he is a mere 
 dunce, and will go about bored and boring all 
 his days, and it is not worth wasting an argu- 
 nient about him. What I am now denouncing 
 is woe to parents who, from selfishness, mis- 
 placed tenderness, or any other motive, take 
 a clever boy away from his studies before he is 
 ripe for the world. They are doing him an 
 injury never to be repaired. 
 
 Paris in 18 — had not yet become what it 
 
 now is, a mere after-breakfast journey from 
 
 London, and it was full of such people as Lord 
 
 and Lady Herbert Evelyn. My mother, who, 
 
 F 2
 
 100 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 from some reason or other^ was not generally 
 received in London, went a great deal into 
 society in Paris, and was on terms of intimacy 
 with half the duchesses of the Quartier St. 
 Germain. My father, too, got very much into 
 his element after a little time ; became one of 
 the lights of the Jockey Club and an oracle at 
 Chantilly. For a long time, too, he was never 
 bothered with duns in Paris, and seemed to be 
 living his youth over again of unlimited credit 
 and boundless expense. An English lord was 
 a great man in France in 18 — , but an English 
 lord who lived like Lord Herbert Evelyn was 
 quite a lion. We had a magnificent suite of 
 rooms, I remember, and servants, carriages, 
 and horses without end. My father's tastes 
 and habits were such as prevented our receiv- 
 ing much company, for he dined almost always 
 with his own set, and we did not see hira 
 sometimes for days, except on the box of his 
 four-in-hand. My mother, however, went 
 everywhere, and thus, on my arrival, I was 
 promptly inducted into a tail-coat and 
 a white cravat, that I might attend her. I 
 found a good many boy-men of my own age, 
 and we had it very much our own way, for
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 101 
 
 from twenty to fifty the modern French gen- 
 tleman disappears altogether from the salons. 
 
 What a terrible tone French society has 
 acquired since it was the school of all Europe 
 for grace and chivalry ! What squabbling and 
 disputing I used to see go on in hotels that 
 had echoed to the step of Grammonts and 
 Richelieus ! What systematic want of atten- 
 tion and even rudeness to ladies ! and what 
 deep-seated and inelegant depravity of morals ! 
 There was neither religion, or the faith, love, 
 and truth which are born of it ; all was puerile 
 superstition, absurd fatahsm, or monstrous 
 materialism. A scepticism of all things holy, 
 which, unlike that of the eighteenth century, 
 disdained even to vaunt. Licence and passion 
 had driven love from the hearts of men, and 
 almost from the imaginations of women, and 
 all was utter vanity and selfishness, exaggera- 
 tion and emptiness, and neither honest purpose 
 or lofty thought seemed to breathe throughout 
 the land. Such was the school in which I 
 learned my first lesson of life and the world. 
 Happy for us that our world is different. 
 
 It was not enough, however, that my poor 
 mother did her best to spoil me by introducing
 
 102 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 me into scenes unsuited to my age; but my 
 father also wished to try his hand at it, and 
 did so after his own heedless way. I have 
 remained all my life a slight man, but I was 
 a very shadow of a boy; and once, when my 
 father had some heavy bets upon a race, he 
 determined that I should ride it instead of 
 himself. From that moment I was never free 
 from some engagement of the kind ; for, riding 
 pretty well, I generally won, and that got my 
 name up in such a way that my reputation 
 almost eclipsed my father^s, to his excessive 
 delight and amusement. 
 
 I got into all sorts of bad habits. I got 
 money from my mother, who was never tired 
 of giving it ; and I had bachelor dinners of my 
 own, to which men old enough to have grown 
 wiser and better came, and initiated me into 
 everything I ought not to have known, and 
 sat down to play at ecarte with me till morning 
 afterwards. But my father's crowning glory 
 was when I took his four-in-hand away from 
 him, and drove up with it to the Jockey Club. 
 His delight was unbounded, and we became in- 
 separable companions for six weeks afterwards 
 What an insufferable little dog I must have been !
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 103 
 
 It was in the midst of all this that I made 
 one of those romantic friendships which some- 
 times spring up between boys with Simonet 
 De Beaumont, and it is to him that I perhaps 
 owe my rescue from an abyss of which I only 
 now see the dark and dreadful depth. Another 
 year of the life I was then leading would have 
 ruined me irretrievably, and given me the tastes 
 of the gambler and the jockey for the rest of 
 my life,— or at best made me a bad copy of 
 my father. 
 
 Let me try to describe a friend whom I think 
 of affectionately while I am writing these lines, 
 far as we may be separated by land and water. 
 I say may be, because my friend is a sailor, 
 and while I am describing him may likely 
 enough come home from a voyage, and walk 
 in and look over my shoulder. I wish I could 
 hear his hearty, manly voice, scolding my ser- 
 vant in laughing interjectional phrases, as he 
 always does while coming up stairs, and then 
 his frank smile, and cheery " M\^'ci mon p'tit 
 Evelyn. Jeviens tout droit du bord, et, sauf 
 que j'ai embrasse ma mere et ma soeur, je viens 
 te voir. Eh bien, que fait tu de beau?'^ 
 
 Simonet de Beaumont was like no other of
 
 104 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 his countrymen I have ever known. He was 
 a man, open-hearted, bold, generous, gifted, 
 and loyal. His every word bore the tones of 
 the heart with it. In his whole composition 
 there was not one grain of affectation or thea- 
 trical nonsense. If anything, he was too na- 
 tural^ and to those who did not know him 
 seemed almost playing a part. Five minutes 
 in his presence, however, was enough to unde- 
 ceive them. I never knew any one who kept 
 so firm hold of an opinion with such manly 
 grace, and his opinions were very well worth 
 retaining. He was even as a boy enthusias- 
 tically attached to his profession, and has since 
 done more than any man in the service to 
 improve it. Yet no man could be essentially 
 less dogmatic or merely utilitarian ; for his life 
 has been a long poem, and his tone of thought 
 that of a hero of old romance. 
 
 I used to liken him as a boy, and have often 
 done so since, to Cortez without his licen- 
 tiousness. In person, if you fancy the shape 
 of a Hercules and the head of some valiant 
 Norman knight, Simonet de Beaumont is before 
 you. His light auburn hair, falling almost to 
 his shoulders ; the delicately-formed nose and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 105 
 
 high-bred nostril ; the frank, sagacious, blue 
 eye ; the beautifully-arched brows and royal, 
 open forehead : you might have taken him 
 when he smiled for a personification of Friend- 
 ship ; and his laugh was the most joyous that 
 ever came from healthy lungs and a clear con- 
 science. He persuaded you into his own way 
 of thinking upon any subject (and it was always 
 a right and manly one) with such a winning 
 grace, that you were carried away at once. 
 His natural eloquence was wonderful, perhaps 
 because he was and is so earnest, and so sin- 
 cere and single-minded. 
 
 I am sensible that I am mingling some traits 
 of the man with those of the youth; but I have 
 lived with him ever since on terms of such 
 affectionate intimacy that I find it difficult to 
 separate what he is from what he was ; and, 
 indeed, little is lost in abandoning the task, for 
 he has hardly changed at all since I first knew 
 him. He is one of those happy fellows who 
 seem to enjoy eternal youth, and it is impos- 
 sible to associate the idea of age or change with 
 Simonet De Beaumont. 
 
 I do not know why he took a fancy to me, 
 but from the time I first met him in his 
 F 5
 
 106 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 mother's house we were drawn instinctively 
 towards each other ; yet I felt then, as I feel 
 now, unworthy the friendship of such a heart 
 as his. Few lads could certainly have been 
 more different, and I must have looked con- 
 temptible enough with my airs and dress, half 
 jockey, half petit maitre, beside the grand, 
 simple Simonet. 
 
 He lost no time in making a very con- 
 siderable alteration in me however, for I 
 soon yielded to his influence; as we do to 
 those in whom we have implicit faith and re- 
 liance. 
 
 " Ah 9a V' said he to me one day, after I had 
 invited him to one of my dinners, " Voyons ! 
 Es tu done miUionaire plusieurs fois, mon petit 
 Evelyn?'^ 
 
 I explained to him that I had good expecta- 
 tions, and that Lord Winnington was my 
 guardian. 
 
 " Winnington — Winnington,'^ returned he 
 musingly, " I ought to know that name. — 
 Mon enfant, ta fortune est en mauvaises mains. 
 Je connais cet homme-la. Et quand meme tu 
 mange ton ble en herbe.^^ 
 
 It was in vain I told him of Lord Winning-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 107 
 
 ton's rank and high place, and assured him my 
 fortune would be large and certain. 
 
 To the first he answered, that he knew more 
 of " ce lord " than he could say, as the affair 
 was not his secret. " Et, au reste, si tu as 
 une grande fortune, faites en meilleure usage ; 
 soyez la Providence de ceux qui n'en ont 
 pas.'' 
 
 From this time there was an end of my 
 dinners and ecarte parties ; and, instead of 
 spending my evenings at the Jockey Club and 
 my mornings on the coach-box, we passed the 
 latter at the gymnastic school and visiting 
 artists' studios. He was no contemptible 
 painter himself, and generous as the day, so 
 that we were always welcome ; and we spent 
 our evenings with an old coloneFs widow, Ma- 
 dame D'Epernay, whose daughter he informed 
 me, at a very early period of our acquaint- 
 ance, he intended to marry when he got 
 his captaincy. — Alas ! — But I will not an- 
 ticipate. 
 
 In the house of Madame D'Epernay there- 
 fore we were always quite at home. Her 
 husband had been killed in the wars of the 
 Empire, and she was full of stirring stories of
 
 108 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 that brilliant period. Often and often have 
 we sat listening to her till morning broke in 
 upon us, Simonet sitting with his one arm 
 round Nathalie's waist, and the hand of his 
 other clasping mine ; nor would he allow either 
 of us to move an inch from him, and kept us 
 m great order. He insisted also on making 
 me drink tea with lemon-juice in it, a compo- 
 sition which he prided himself on making 
 a I'Anglaise, but which did not quite agree 
 with me, in spite of my nationality. I drank 
 it, however, to please him, as 1 would have 
 done anything else; and he held his little 
 court in great state, except that we all three sat 
 generally on the floor to be nearer the wood 
 fire. I think I see his knightly figure ex- 
 tended there now, with his head raised, the 
 long hair floating back, and his earnest, listen- 
 ing look. 
 
 I am not quite sure that Nathalie exactly 
 liked this way of passing the time, and she cer- 
 tainly did not take the same interest in good 
 Madame D'Epernay's stories as might have 
 been expected in the daughter of their hero ; 
 for all of them related more or less to the 
 exploits of the deceased, who must have been
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 109 
 
 a gallant soldier. However, she bore it all 
 very well, for Simonet's sake, and, no wonder, 
 for it was his birthright to be loved — almost 
 to idolatry. 
 
 I could not help thinking sometimes as I 
 looked at Nathalie that, pretty as she was, she 
 was scarcely worthy of such a conquest as De 
 Beaumont. But I have often observed that 
 men of his character are unlucky in their choice 
 of a wife. It was not very easy to explain the 
 love of that great noble heart for a maid that 
 was so far beneath him in that nobility of 
 mind which was the only one he bowed to, and 
 I could not help suspecting that he had done 
 her and her mother some great kindness, and 
 loved her because of it. 
 
 Subsequently Madame D'Epernay confirmed 
 this, and when I went there one evening alone 
 we did nothing at all but speak of him, and the 
 late Colonel was not once mentioned. She 
 said she owed everything in life, and life itself, 
 to him. If she novr had a roof over her head 
 and bread to eat, both came from Simonet de 
 Beaumont and Nathalie. 
 
 But it was strange how little she spoke of 
 Nathalie, and never once called her her
 
 110 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 daughter; she seemed even to love her own 
 child for his sake, which puzzled me, though I 
 began to understand what he meant, when he 
 said " Si tu as une grande fortune, soyez la Pro- 
 vidence de ceux qui n^en ont pas/^
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. Ill 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 Among the artists whom De Beaumont 
 knew most intimately was a young man named 
 Adolphe Money. He was a wild^ erratic fellow ; 
 but Simonet, with the enthusiastic appreciation 
 of talent which belonged to him, loved the 
 artist only second to me, and we paid a visit 
 almost daily to his studio. 
 
 If Adolphe had consented to work even 
 moderately he might have become one of the
 
 112 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 first portrait-painters of the day. I never saw 
 any man who had such a wonderful facility 
 for striking off liknesses by a few bold happy 
 touches. But nothing could persuade him to 
 settle to his easel, and he sold as caricatures, 
 and for a few louis, work that, if finished with 
 moderate care as portraits, would have brought 
 him hundreds. He lived literally from hand to 
 mouth. When he wanted a new coat, or got 
 into debt with his washerwoman, he would paint 
 away a whole morning, or perhaps a whole day 
 if the necessity was greater than usual ; but he 
 never returned to the same work twice ; and, 
 though he was always sketching upon the walls 
 of his room, or on the backs of love-letters, he 
 never touched pencil or canvas to any useful 
 purpose till driven to it. 
 
 Besides, he hated portrait-painting; and when 
 he got a rare sitter, sent to him probably by 
 De Beaumont, he made such an impudent 
 caricature that it inevitably offended the object 
 of it. It was instinct in the man, that invete- 
 rate habit of ridicule, and he touched the 
 oddity, which every one has, as if by magic. 
 He never would sketch even De Beaumont in 
 any other costume than that of a sentimental
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 113 
 
 pirate ; and he insisted that my face did not 
 look complete without spectacles. 
 
 His room, which served for studio, bedroom, 
 and everything else, had a comical little mat- 
 trass in one corner, which, together with a 
 couple of tiger-skins sent him from Algeria, 
 and an immense bournous from the same 
 country, served him for bed and bedding ; and 
 I suppose he must always have slept in his 
 clothes — a fact that did not much matter, as he 
 never, except by accident, came home till morn- 
 ing. There was not a chair in the room ; and 
 in winter we sat upon his basket of fire-wood, 
 turning it upside down when it was empty, and 
 on the top of its contents if it were not. A chest 
 of rickety drawers made a seat for himself, on 
 which he always perched in some eccentric 
 shape, smoking a long pipe, which reached the 
 ground. The only furniture besides was a 
 canvas and a three-legged stool. The canvas 
 was always intended to become a great picture, 
 and he would describe his subject to us with 
 such marvellous eloquence, and tell us the ex- 
 quisite details that he meant to throw in, till 
 De Beaumont's fine earnest eyes would rest 
 upon him lit up with admiration, and then all
 
 114 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 of a sudden he would laugh and yell like a 
 madman, or begin playing with the bones — a 
 species of musical instrument upon which he 
 was a great adept. As for the picture, perhaps 
 the judgment of Brutus, or Belshazzar's feast 
 (he always chose some stupendous subject of 
 the kind), was scarcely sketched when the ground 
 was filled in with monkeys playing at leapfrog 
 (each having the face of some acquaintance), or 
 some other wilful fancy of the kind. 
 
 Then he smoked always night and day till 
 the air of the room was like a fog ; and he 
 boasted that his only food was fried potatoes. 
 In personal appearance he was as singular as 
 in everything else ; that is to say, as different 
 from the generality of mankind, though he is 
 but a type of hundreds of young artists in 
 Paris. He had the head of Socrates on a body 
 scarcely more than four feet and a half high, 
 with large feet and hands. His great delight 
 was, however, in making himself uglier than 
 he was ; and he used to twist his face and body 
 into such strange contortions that he looked 
 like an imp of darkness, and he would make 
 children in the street often scream with fright. 
 He had a remarkable power of language, and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 115 
 
 spoke when he Hked with a playful grace and 
 purity of accent that was positively charming. 
 His mind seemed too to have all shapes, and 
 he could pursue any train of thought with pre- 
 cisely the arguments and allusions calculated to 
 illustrate it. I often fancied he would have 
 been a great man in the first Revolution. 
 
 He had wild traits of generosity about him — 
 all Frenchmen have — and I think De Beau- 
 mont first took a fancy to him from learning 
 that he had used the largest sum he had ever 
 earned in his life (in consequence of an ill- 
 ness) to portion the orphan sister of one of his 
 rackety acquaintances, who had been drowned. 
 Then he was brave in his way, and had a scorn 
 for the world and for appearances, which pleased 
 De Beaumont, though he laughed at it in his 
 frank joyous way. He loved too to talk to 
 him on abstruse and difficult subjects, and he 
 lit up De Beaumont's grand ideas with such 
 happy remarks and illustrations (when he was 
 in the humour) that they seemed his own : and 
 indeed a fellow so gifted and amusing, yet more 
 thoroughly worthless, hardly existed even in 
 Paris. 
 
 He soon grew to form one of our party at
 
 116 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 Madame D'Epernay's, and, though the old lady 
 was a little frightened at his grimaces and odd 
 ways, she paid him great respect, for he was 
 De Beaumont's friend. Before he had been 
 there three times, also, he had a caricature of 
 our party, which drove Madame D'Epernay to 
 despair, and annoyed me. But De Beaumont 
 only laughed at it, and I thought Nathalie was 
 actually pleased. It was a scene from Faust, 
 however, in which they had the best of the 
 picture, while Madame D^Epernay and I were 
 very roughly handled indeed. I do not hesitate 
 either to say that Nathalie's portrait was flat- 
 tered, though his sharp pencil seldom conde- 
 scended to pay compliments. 
 
 But De Beaumont was the least sensitive of 
 any man in the world where he loved, and was 
 one of those fortunate fellows who can, and 
 who can afford to, laugh at ridicule. His fine 
 loyal, unsuspecting nature could not entertain 
 the idea of any unkindness to him being meant, 
 and either I or the painter might have offered 
 this man, who was the very soul of chivalry, 
 almost any affront positively unheeded. He 
 could not have been brought to understand it. 
 
 Adolphe Money, however, gave an additional
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. Il7 
 
 zest to our parties by his talents for music, 
 and we soon had a piano^ on which he played 
 even brilliantly; and I believe he often gave 
 lessons in the morning to Nathalie, whose play 
 improved a great deal. De Beaumont sang 
 capitally, too ; and, as I had a gift for the 
 cornet, we got on at a great rate. 
 
 But I observed with uneasiness a certain 
 understanding growing up between Nathalie 
 and the painter, which boded little good to De 
 Beaumont. Simonet was the very model of a 
 knight of romance with women — all grace and 
 manly tenderness, but he was rather too silent, 
 and he never spoke of his love, though it ap- 
 peared in every thought and action. He had 
 none of that whiffling activity about women, 
 and those constant little attentions, of which 
 the painter was so prodigal. The painter, 
 however, watched her like a monkey, and 
 before she could stretch out her hand or rise 
 from her chair to fetch anything, he had 
 divined what it was, and presented it. He 
 was lavish, too, of the most brilhaut and witty 
 flatteries, sometimes far-fetched enough to 
 make De Beaumont laugh, but he was pleased 
 and flattered at the attention paid by his friend
 
 118 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 to Nathalie, and expressed his loud frank ad- 
 miration of him at every fresh sally. Some- 
 how or other I could not join in those praises, 
 though I often acknowledged readily enough to 
 myself the wit or happy turn of the compli- 
 ment. I began to look upon the painter with 
 an ill-defined suspicion. I did not like his 
 manner to Nathalie, and I fancied these flatte- 
 ries pleased her more than they ought to have 
 done. I told her so one day, and she told 
 Simonet, who laughed heartily at it, and threw 
 them together more than ever, without one 
 thought of suspicion in his clear sunny mind. 
 
 It was was about this time that Simonet de 
 Beaumont went to sea. Thirsting after distinc- 
 tion, and of a temperament naturally bold and 
 adventurous, he volunteered upon a voyage 
 of discovery to the Arctic Regions, for which 
 an expedition was then about to be equipped 
 by the Government. I had many misgivings 
 about this voyage ; and, knowing better than 
 Nathalie, perhaps, how deeply and truly he 
 loved her with his whole strong heart, I 
 besought him, if he was determined on going, 
 to send her at least away from Paris for a time, 
 and confided to him the dislike which was
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 119 
 
 gradually mastering me for Adolphe and its 
 cause. He listened gravely and kindly; I saw 
 that he was even touched by my anxious friend- 
 ship ; he could appreciate that well enough; but 
 even I could not turn him against another friend 
 or shake his faith one iota in the loyalty of a 
 man I felt almost by instinct to be false. 
 
 How well I remember our last evening toge- 
 ther before his departure. He gave such a 
 manly and glowing description of the adventure 
 in which he was about to be engaged, and had 
 such an earnest and intelhgent conviction of 
 the practical utility of its objects. Then he 
 spoke with such chastened and feeling sadness 
 about leaving Nathalie behind him, and with 
 such cheerful hope of returning worthy of her. 
 Throughout the evening his eyes rested on her 
 with such unutterable tenderness, and every 
 word sounded to me like what might have been 
 a hero's farewell to his bride while buckling on 
 his harness for battle. Nathalie seemed, how- 
 ever, to take his going away very philosophi- 
 cally, and Adolphe spoke about his voyage in a 
 flippant jesting tone that jarred upon my own 
 overstrung nerves inexpressibly. But Simonet, 
 I do believe, thought her quite a heroine for
 
 120 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 behaving so well, and construed Adolphe 
 Money's ill-timed laughter into a charitable 
 effort on his part to keep up the spirits of the 
 party, calling upon me to take example by him. 
 
 It had got pretty deep into the night, when 
 Simonet gave the signal for leaving the widow^s 
 house. I saw him glide a heavy packet into 
 Madame D'Epernay's lap as he took leave of 
 her, and he kissed Nathalie on the forehead 
 with the touching and respectful tenderness of 
 a Bayard. There was nothing but a slight 
 tremour in his voice to shew that he was 
 deeply affected at the farewell ; but when we 
 got out in the street he clutched my arm with 
 the strength of a vice, and I saw something 
 glitter in his eyes by the lamplight, which was 
 certainly a tear. 
 
 " Eh bien," he said, with a slight sort of 
 spasm. *' Tu vois ce que je sens, je ne te le 
 cache pas a toi. Mais j'ai ete brave aupres 
 d^elle, n^est ce pas ? Mais, ou est Adolphe V^ 
 
 " Me voici, me voici P' cried the painter, 
 joining us. 
 
 '' Eh bien, mes amis, une cigarre chez moi, 
 et puis adieu. Demain matin a sept heures je
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 121 
 
 " Eh bien, va pour le cigarre et un bon 
 ponch," said the painter, shivering. 
 
 *^ I take leave of you at Toulon/^ said 1, " and 
 on board the Triton.'^ So thither next day we 
 journeyed together. I was the last friend who 
 shook hands with him before the ship sailed, 
 and, with a broken voice, he confided Nathalie 
 to my charge, and placed a little portrait of 
 himself in my hand to give to her when I got 
 back. " I do not ask you," were the last 
 words he said, " to provide for her if anything 
 should happen to me, because I know you will 
 do so.^' Such was his noble confidence in all 
 he loved. 
 
 I could only press his hand in answer as the 
 boat pushed otF, and the splendid vessel, which 
 was to bear my friend to the regions of eternal 
 snow, began to hoist her anchor and spread 
 her sails. 
 
 "Farewell, gallant hearty' I murmured to 
 myself, as my boat neared the shore; "you 
 have chosen the right path. He who thinks 
 only of love, and so dreams his youth away, is 
 therefore of love unworthy. Better far is thy 
 stirring useful career, and scorn of idle dalliance, 
 and nobler will be its reward .^^ 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 122 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 I Spent the rest of the day wandering about 
 the narrow streets of Toulon, and visitmg the 
 ships in port and the arsenals, which, it is 
 needless to add, are in every respect inferior 
 to our own, though some of the larger men-of- 
 war were admirably appointed and only inferior 
 to ours. I do not think I was ever in a town 
 which had such an oppressive and saddening 
 influence on my spirits, and this altogether 
 apart from my recent separation from De Beau- 
 mont, to which I was not only reconciled, but 
 I was proud of my friend for understanding so 
 well and fulfilling so truly his duty in life ; and 
 it seemed to me almost an insult to him, for 
 me, his friend, to sit down idly and regret that 
 he was at his post, and that, in consequence of 
 the voyage he was now making, his name might 
 one day be destined to rank with those of 
 Columbus and Cortez. 
 
 A strong and penetrating wind, called "le 
 Mistral," blew all day long, and carried about 
 with it a fine dust that choked up the pores of 
 the skin, and occasioned a most distressing 
 irritation ; though the month of May, too, it 
 was cruelly cold — a cold from which great-coats 
 could not protect you, and fires, or French
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 123 
 
 fires at least, would not warm. But what I 
 had leisure to observe most was the curious 
 unfitness of a Frenchman for salt water. There 
 may be of course exceptions to this. De Beau- 
 mont was as fine a sailor as ever trod a deck, 
 but the generality of the nautical gentlemen 
 whom I met with at Toulon looked very much 
 like theatrical seamen, and very little like real 
 ones. None seemed to have a hearty liking 
 for the profession, which, in spite of the military 
 conscription, is almost hereditary in the families 
 on the coast, and is seldom chosen by any 
 others. There are families at Toulon who have 
 been sailors from generation to generation as 
 far back as tradition reaches. But France will 
 never become a naval power. Her citizens ^re 
 no friends of the sea. 
 
 A strange story was going about, I remember, 
 while I was at Toulon, and shows sufficiently 
 the widespread corruption which existed every- 
 where under the government of the day. A 
 capitaine de corvette, while out on a voyage, 
 captured a prize engaged in the slave-trade, and 
 selling his own vessel put the money in his 
 pocket. He returned, however, coolly enough 
 to Paris, secure probably of strong protection. 
 G 2
 
 124 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 and called on the Minister of Marine, who in- 
 quired, as a matter of course, after the state of 
 his vessel. 
 
 " I have sold it," said the Captain. 
 
 " Sold it \" answered the Minister, aghast 
 with astonishment. 
 
 " Franchement, oui.'' 
 
 " Miserable ?' 
 
 "Ecoutez, mon Ministre. I have sold the 
 corvette, but I have taken a larger vessel. Eh 
 bien. Fun vaut Tautre. If you punish me you 
 will be called in question for having given me 
 the command in the first instance; whereas, 
 if you give me another grade and make me 
 capitaine de vaisseau, everybody will say,' What 
 a meritorious officer ! and what a Minister ! 
 He has captured a prize, and voyez sa 
 recompense.' " 
 
 " But the money ? — les Chambres V 
 
 '^ A bagatelle ! the corvette was no longer 
 sea-worthy, and the price of an old hulk has 
 given to France a first-class vessel perfectly 
 equipped. Convenez, M. le Ministre, que j'aie 
 raison." 
 
 Whatever reason the Minister might have 
 seen in it, the fact is certain enough that the
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 125 
 
 capitaine de corvette very speedily changed his 
 epaulettes for those of a capitaine de vaisseau ; 
 and what is more, the whole navy did not feel 
 outraged and insulted by it, but thought the 
 whole thing a capital story.
 
 126 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 For who would trust the seeming sighs 
 
 Of wife or paramour ? 
 Fresh feres will dry the bright blue eyes 
 
 We late saw streaming o'er. 
 
 Childe Harold. 
 
 I LOST no time, on my return to Paris, in 
 going to Madame D'Epernay's to give Nathalie 
 the last love-token of him who was then upon 
 the waters far away. I found the old widow 
 still much distressed, and even drinking tea 
 (with lemon in it) in a toilette only fit for the 
 dressing-room, an infallible sign of utter pros- 
 tration even in the oldest Frenchwoman. I 
 was pained, however, to find that Nathalie had 
 gone to the Louvre to see a grand picture
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 127 
 
 which Adolphe Money had been talking him- 
 self into the idea that he intended to copy. I 
 could not help letting this regret appear, though 
 I did all I could to hide it, and Madame 
 D'Epernay swayed herself too and fro in her 
 chair, and at last confessed that she had done 
 all she could to prevent Nathalie going with the 
 painter, but in vain. I saw, too, that her dislike 
 for him was as strong as my own, but that she 
 did not like to confide in me the full extent of 
 her suspicions, hoping, perhaps, that all might 
 yet be well. 
 
 I did not understand then, though afterwards 
 it was made plain enough to me, why she did 
 not exert her maternal authority over her own 
 daughter and insist upon being obeyed ; but 
 when I mildly hinted that she, perhaps, did 
 not hold Nathalie in sufficient restraint, she 
 only shook her head despondingly. There was 
 evidently some secret with which I was not to 
 be entrusted, and as De Beaumont had not 
 confided it to me I felt that I had no right to 
 seek to become possessed of it through any one 
 else. A very little pressing I saw would bring 
 it all out, for, though Frenchwomen can often 
 keep a secret for those they love with wonder-
 
 128 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 ful tenacity, yet the old lady was depressed and 
 sorrowful, and I felt that she even wanted to 
 confide in me. It became my duty therefore 
 purposely to turn the subject, and 1 did so. 
 
 Few persons could have been more unlike 
 each other than Madame D'Epernay and her 
 daughter. Yet the widow had been pretty in 
 the heyday of her life, and still seemed to 
 remember her conquests by the unfailing grace 
 and neatness of her toilette ; but she must have 
 been always rather serious, one of those people 
 who are fond of what is called scenes in life, 
 and are always having imaginary quarrels with 
 people about nothing, and making it up with 
 effusion. The death of her husband also and 
 two sons (one among the snows of Russia and 
 the other at Quatre Bras) had deepened, and 
 given some excuse for, her natural sadness. 
 When she was not telling stories, therefore, or 
 doing good for somebody, for she was very 
 active and charitable, she invariably had the 
 toothache, or '^ mal aux nerfs.^' 
 
 Nathalie, however, had all the wild vivacity 
 of the South, and was more like an Italian 
 than a French woman ; tall and slender, with 
 large bright black eyes gleaming with passion.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 129 
 
 yet void of thought, or what the French call 
 " esprit,'' large, and not very well formed 
 features, and hair dark and glossy, but some- 
 what thin and scanty. That which, however, 
 in her seemed to repel love and always chilled 
 me in her society, was a certain habit of deceit 
 in trifles, which seemed almost second nature 
 in her. I could not divest myself of the idea 
 that she might one day commit some terrible 
 crime, and, though I banished the thought 
 sternly as a kind of treason to my friendship for 
 De Beaumont, it would recur to me at intervals 
 and at the fiiost unexpected times. 
 
 However, as she did not like me, I was per- 
 petually fearing that this might have some 
 influence in my judgment of her, and I there- 
 fore forced myself to treat her with almost 
 brotherly kindness, in trying to fulfil the trust 
 De Beaumont^s last words had confided to me. 
 
 " Dear Nathalie " said I to her, one day, 
 about a month after De Beaumont sailed, 
 " should you not like to go to Dieppe this fine 
 summer weather ? My mother is going, but, if 
 you would rather stay in Paris, why I will stay 
 too, and take care of you." 
 
 My proposal I saw took her by surprise, but 
 G 5
 
 130 WALTER EVELYN J OR, 
 
 however I repeated it, and dwelt upon the 
 pleasure of the trip. It was impossible to get 
 a direct answer from her. She was " Very 
 grateful, she felt my kindness ; perhaps — but 
 Madame D'Epernay was ailing, and she could 
 not leave her dear little cabbage of a mamma," 
 she said. 
 
 In vain the widow protested that she was as 
 well as ever she could expect to be. Nathalie 
 only danced about the room, and plagued the old 
 lady into leaving it an open question. When 
 1 returned, however, in the evening, she men- 
 tioned the subject herself, hoped I would not 
 think her a naughty capricious little girl, and 
 found out that her dear little cabbage of a 
 mamma was in excellent health, and that the 
 journey to Dieppe would make her still better. 
 It was therefore arranged at once that we 
 should go on the following Thursday (it was 
 then Monday), and I was heartily glad to be 
 able thus to get her beyond the influence and 
 society of the painter ; hoping to persuade her 
 subsequently to make a trip into England, or 
 elsewhere, and thus keep her away from Paris 
 till De Beaumont returned, and then all danger 
 would be over. I congratulated myself not a
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 131 
 
 little on this diplomacy, and thought I had 
 concealed my object admirably, and accom- 
 plished it with great address. 
 
 Let the gentleman who ever hereafter plumes 
 himself on any such victory look warily into 
 the matter before he rejoices. My little plan 
 had been not only perfectly divined, but I 
 found out afterwards that I was actually doing 
 the very thing I wished most to avoid, and 
 playing into the hands of De Beaumont^s rival. 
 Unfortunately too it turned out that I could 
 not accompany Madame D'Epernay and her 
 daughter to Dieppe ; but they went, and found 
 Adolphe Money already there.
 
 132 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Les femmes voient plus loin que les hommes. 
 
 My mother always had an idea that I should 
 make a great man, and though she fancied, I 
 think, that my acquaintance with De Beaumont 
 was making me a little too serious, yet upon 
 the whole she was glad to see me gradually 
 withdrawing myself from the race-course and 
 the gaming-table. She did not, however, like 
 my connection with Madame D^Epernay and 
 her daughter at all, and both she and the 
 Countess de Beaumont did all they possibly
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 133 
 
 could to estrange me from it, thinking that 
 they were low people, who had duped my 
 friend into a boyish passion which would have 
 passed away long before he returned^ and that 
 meantime they would endeavour to entrap me. 
 It was impossible to persuade either of them 
 out of this fixed idea ; for women, I have always 
 remarked, judge harshly of each other. 
 
 When I told my mother, therefore, that 
 Madame D^Epernay and her daughter w^ere 
 going also to Dieppe, and begged her to be 
 kind to them while we were all there, she kept 
 her own counsel, but determined in her own 
 way to frustrate my plans. I think too that, 
 independently of the ineligible connection into 
 which she fancied I was being drawn, she had 
 a horror of early marriages, and her own life, 
 perhaps, warned her sadly enough that a man's 
 character should have become formed and 
 steady before he takes upon himself the grave 
 responsibility of a household. It was to some 
 silent manoeuvre of hers, therefore, that I was 
 probably indebted for the following letter from 
 Lady Winnington, though there were circum- 
 stances enough that might have produced it, and 
 probably would, even if she had remained quiet.
 
 134 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 " My dear Walter, 
 '•' I am afraid you have quite forgotten us, 
 and Anne is wondering what has become of 
 you. Do you mean to grow a Frenchman 
 altogether, and come back some day and 
 frighten us with a beard and a chapeur ? We 
 are here now all alone, and it would be but 
 kind to pay us a visit, now the season is over 
 and the country so pleasant. Lord Winning- 
 ton is still detained in London by the sitting of 
 Parliament, and, as I believe, he has, after a 
 great deal of pressing, consented to go as Am- 
 bassador to . We shall remain here 
 
 most likely all the summer and autumn, or 
 perhaps not even join him till the spring. We 
 have a nice little party here, however, and just 
 the sort of people you like. There is Captain 
 Ireton, who has distinguished himself so much 
 lately in India ; and Arthur Sinclair, the poet, 
 who has been making " fureur " in London 
 this season. Tell me you will come ; we are 
 all dying to hear from you; Anne especially, 
 though she pretends not to care about it ; and, 
 as you were such old playmates, I should take 
 her part if she was angry with you for not 
 writing these six months. Your old room,
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 135 
 
 looking out on the park, is all ready for you, 
 and Anne has been making it quite gay with 
 some water-coloured drawings of her own. 
 Among them is a view of Harrow, where we 
 passed a whole day, in the season too, while 
 she was taking it. But this was to be a secret. 
 Adieu ! 
 
 " Yours, sincerely, 
 
 " Catherine Winnington. 
 " P.S. — I had almost forgotten that my lord 
 told me to acknowledge the receipt of a letter 
 from Lady Herbert Evelyn, and to say that he 
 will have the pleasure of calling upon her on 
 his way through Paris.'^ 
 
 " Of course you must go, Walter,^^ said my 
 mother, with a decision rather unusual to her. 
 
 " But, my dear mother, I had engaged to 
 spend the summer with you at Dieppe." 
 
 " No, no, indeed you must go. The Countess 
 De Beaumont and I shall do very well together, 
 and she is a far more proper person than you 
 are to look after Mademoiselle Nathahe ; and 
 I will promise you myself to visit her con- 
 stantly, and — and take her to the theatre, if 
 there is one," added Lady Herbert, laughing,
 
 136 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 and trying to dispose of the question, for she 
 was altogether unequal to anything like an 
 argument. 
 
 I did not very much like the arrangement, 
 but I was getting a little tired of Paris, and 
 conscience reproached me with not having 
 behaved quite so attentively as I ought to 
 Lady Winnington. Besides, in any case I 
 should not be long away, and, as I thought, by 
 arranging the journey to Dieppe, I had sepa- 
 rated Nathalie from the painter, and that under 
 the protection and surveillance of Madame De 
 Beaumont and my mother little harm could 
 come to her, I reluctantly agreed to accept 
 Lady Winnington's invitation ; and my mother 
 put it out of my power to retract, by making 
 me write an answer immediately, naming the 
 day when I would arrive there, and herself su- 
 perintending the arrangement of my journey. 
 
 Lord Herbert did not like it at all, however. 
 1 was a pleasant companion for him ; and, 
 though we were not very much together, he 
 liked to know I was with him, and to talk 
 about me and my great expectatiT)ns, and make 
 bets about my riding. Latterly, too, I had 
 had a good many interviews with showy, whis-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 137 
 
 kered gentlemen, who spoke with a nasal in- 
 tonation, more or less remarkable; and my 
 father would push a parchment deed, or a few 
 stamped pieces of paper, across the table to me, 
 " to witness, Wat, my boy,'^ as he used to say. 
 Though what there was to witness did not 
 always appear quite clear to me. However, I 
 used to sign my name always with great con- 
 sciousness of importance and satisfaction. I 
 rather prided myself upon my signature, and 
 added dots and flourishes to it without end, in 
 case it should be forged, a precaution which my 
 father highly commended ; and he used to hand 
 me sometimes even strips of blank paper, 
 purely for the pleasure of seeing me sign them, 
 after which he always had an extraordinary 
 flow of high spirits, and used to brag about 
 that poor rickety old manor-house, Marsden 
 Court, as if it had been Houghton or Eaton Hall. 
 My poor father ! I found out the meaning of all 
 those signatures clearly enough afterwards. He 
 set his face resolutely against my going away, 
 therefore, till persuaded into it by my mother, 
 on the plea that I ought to see what was doing 
 with my property, when he yielded readily 
 enough; affectionately warning me, however.
 
 138 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 not to take up with Winnington : '^ A fellow," 
 said he, " who rides like a dancing-master, and 
 never had a good horse in his life. He is a 
 deuce of a whist player, however, and if you 
 play have him on your side, Wat. Conyers 
 used to swear he cheated.^^
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 139 
 
 CHAPTER XIIL 
 
 II faut dans le commerce des pieces d'or et de la monnaie.- 
 
 La Bruyere. 
 
 The very first person I met at the end of 
 that miserable little passage from Calais to 
 Dover was a young gentleman with a most un- 
 healthy pair of light moustaches, and the very 
 last Paris fashion of waistcoats and cravats. 
 He had arrived in the same boat, confining 
 himself, however, in his luxuriously fitted up 
 travelling-carriage, and was now giving some 
 directions to his courier, in a language that 
 would have been totally unintelligible to any 
 one else.
 
 140 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 " A London, damme ! no, Londres, that's 
 it : a Londres, and be quick about it ; depechez ; 
 ne pas arretez, — I shan't stop in this hole." 
 
 Seeing me when he had got as far as this, he 
 stopped short, and, looking at me attentively, 
 cried out, " Why, Walter Evelyn, that cannot 
 be you ?" 
 
 " What, Berkeley ! To be sure it is. Well, 
 how are you ?" 
 
 "Pwetty well, pwetty well; but my con- 
 fownded couwier dwives me nearly mad. I 
 suspwect he has been smwuggling fwings ; and 
 that's why he does not like to gwo on at 
 wonce. But how did you leave Hawwow ?" 
 
 '* I have been gone more than a year." 
 
 " And qwite wight too. Much better being 
 in London and Pawis, isn't it? What a jolly 
 thing it is we have met. Shall we make a 
 night of it at the ' Ship ?' or will you come on 
 in my cawwage to London ? You always get 
 bad salmon at the ' Ship :' let us go on, eh ?" 
 
 " With all my heart," said I : and, post- 
 horses being ordered, I found myself with an 
 old school-fellow whom I had not seen for two 
 years, for he had left Harrow before me ; and 
 we were soon as cordial and boisterous as boys
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 141 
 
 just loose from school usually are under the 
 circumstances. 
 
 But let me describe my companion. Sir 
 Harcourt Berkeley was the son of one of our 
 oldest north-country baronets ; and, having 
 had a very long minority, would come into a 
 immense fortune as soon as the law placed it 
 at his disposal. Something of a dullard at 
 school, though always popular, he had now 
 blossomed into a dandy of the first water ; and, 
 having entered the First Life Guards, had ac- 
 quired a reputation, even in that regiment, for 
 his good humour and boundless extravagance ; 
 and there was every probability that his fine 
 estates would pay somewhat heavily for the 
 experience of life which he was now courting 
 so eagerly. For the rest, he was a fine, power- 
 fully-built fellow, excelhng in all athletic exer- 
 cises, and with an open, manly expression of 
 countenance. His peculiarity — everybody has 
 a peculiarity — was a voice pitched in a key 
 rather too high, and an unconquerable lisp. 
 
 Young men who have been a little while in 
 the world are as fond of patronising those who 
 have not, as young wives are of chaperoning 
 girls in their first season. It was broad daylight
 
 142 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 when we got into London, for we had travelled 
 all night ; and, though the excitement of our 
 meeting had driven away all thoughts of sleep, 
 Sir Harcourt insisted on my going at once with 
 him to the barracks to make the acquaintance 
 of his brother officers over a breakfast which 
 he assured me had been ordered these " thwee 
 days." 
 
 After breakfast was over, at the commence- 
 ment of a London day, that is, at about five 
 o^clock in the afternoon, we sallied out again, 
 and I think in the course of about two hours 
 I had my name written down at seven or eight 
 clubs, to which Harcourt assured me I must 
 belong, and made the acquaintance of every 
 fashionable tailor, boot-maker, saddler, and 
 money-lender between Belgravia and Cockspur 
 Street. And then we drove back to barracks 
 at a pace that kept the blood mantling in my 
 cheeks, while my brain was on fire almost with 
 the whirl and excitement I had undergone 
 since I stepped on English ground the day 
 before. 
 
 The mess dinner finished me; and I have 
 never felt in such a maddening flow of spirits 
 since, as when I found myself once more seated
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 143 
 
 in Harcourt's cab, and driving down to the 
 Opera at about eleven o^ clock in the evening. 
 How bracing and delightful the cool air felt, 
 and how gay the lamps and many carriages, 
 flashing their lights upon us and receiving ours 
 when we passed each other, as though exchang- 
 ing salutes ! 
 
 "We shall be just in time for the ballet,'^ 
 said Sir Harcourt ; " the opewa^s a baw.^^ How 
 our tastes alter : a year afterwards he was music 
 mad. 
 
 It is a pleasant moment for a novice, that 
 first time of going behind the scenes, though 
 I got tired enough of it afterwards. Harcourt 
 introduced me to so many people, that 1 soon 
 despaired of ever recollecting their names or 
 faces again ; and, having whispered something 
 to a gentleman with the showy style of whisker 
 which I had so frequently seen of late with my 
 father in Paris, that gentleman obligingly at- 
 tached himself to me for the rest of the 
 evening. 
 
 " Do you see that tall, awkward-looking old 
 gentleman with the star on his breast ?" said 
 my new acquaintance, " there, talking to Mrs. 
 Tyndal, who, under the name of Giulia Tari-
 
 144 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 nelli, is going on presently to dance the pas 
 seul? He is a great friend of mine — Lord 
 Winnington, our new Ambassador at .*' 
 
 " My guardian !'^ said I, surprised at finding 
 him there : I should be surprised at nothing 
 under the sun now. 
 
 "Your guardian?" said Harcourt, turning 
 rounds '^ how cuwious : so he is mine. Poor 
 old Win ! he is getting shaky, and the Tyndal 
 bleeds him, they say, to a fine tune. You 
 ought to know something about that, Lewis : 
 don't you }" 
 
 " I know nothing,'^ said Lewis, with a self- 
 satisfied air, in which impudence and fawning 
 were strangely blended ; " but I dare say the 
 little house in Bolton Street is not kept- up for 
 nothing, and the Giuha has got the lease of it, 
 I hear." 
 
 ^•' You hear T^ returned Harcourt, laughing : 
 " you know, I dare say you dwew it yourself. 
 But, Evelyn, I forgot to pwesent you. Mr. 
 Ephwaim Lewis, Mr. Walter Evelyn ; a young 
 gentleman coming into a gweat pwoperty. 
 Walter, Mr. Ephwaim Lewis, the gweatest 
 wogue in London. We call him the Sewaphim, • 
 because he knows evewv thing. You never
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 145 
 
 saw such a fellow/^ added poor Harcourt, con- 
 cluding a speech that was one day remembered 
 against him. 
 
 The Seraphim thus presented shewed a mag- 
 nificent set of gUttering teeth, and saying, 
 ^^ Oh ! no ; you flatter me : I know nothing. 
 But, if Mr. Evelyn should want a few thou- 
 sands, as I hear he is just come to London, 
 why, you know, Sir Harcourt, I can oblige him." 
 
 " Why, you wolf," said Harcourt, " you don^t 
 expect me to deliver an innocent young lamb 
 like this into your clutches, I hope ? Come 
 along, Walter, and eschew the society of the 
 Sewaphim as you value your acwes. Let us go 
 to the Giulia:" and, dragging me unceremo- 
 niously from the bowing Mr. Lewis, we were 
 just in time to congratulate the Giulia as she 
 made her last pirouette and quitted the stage. 
 
 " Beautiful ! glowious ?' cried Sir Harcourt, 
 " I never saw you dnnce so glowiously.^' 
 
 " Why, what a goose you are," returned the 
 Giulia, mimicking him ; "I dance as glowiously 
 evewy night, don't I ?'' 
 
 " Oh ! yes, of cawse you do, — of cawse — you 
 know that's what I meant,'' said the baronet, 
 uneasily twiddling his fingers, and looking for 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 146 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 an outlet to end the conversation; for the 
 guardsman was not equal to the light skir- 
 misher whom he had engaged. 
 
 "Well, if you meant it/^ continued the 
 Giulia, "why didn't you say it? And now, 
 why don't you go and get up my carriage ? and 
 you shall come to supper. Old Win. is going 
 to talk nonsense in the House instead of to me, 
 and I want to be amused. But stay; what are 
 you running away so fast for ? Who is your 
 friend with the fine eyes? You should tell 
 him white cravats do not become him. They 
 never do dark faces like his.'' 
 
 " Mr. Walter Evelyn, Mrs. Tyndal." (Aside 
 to me, " The finest woman in London.") 
 
 " Come !" said the Giulia, " I will have no 
 whispering. Run away and get up the car- 
 riage, while I talk to your friend ; and, when 
 I have made ' ma toilette,' I shall take him 
 home with me : so you must get down to Bol- 
 ton Street how you can. I like people with 
 fine eyes ; don't you, Mr. Evelyn ? What a 
 pretty name you have. Do you know my ' cher 
 ami,' Lord Winnington ?" 
 
 " Which question do you wish me to an- 
 swer? that about the eyes, or his Lordship ?"
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 147 
 
 " Oh ! the eyes, of course. His Lordship is 
 not worth talking about. Do tell me what you 
 think of ray eyes. I should so like to know.'^ 
 
 "What could I think of them?" 
 
 " Capital ! that's very well indeed, not com- 
 mitting yourself, like old Rigmarole. (I mean 
 Lord Winnington, but I call him old Rigma- 
 role.) Let him say what he will, he never 
 means anything. But then, poor fellow, he 
 can^t; it^s not his fault, you know, it's his mis- 
 fortune. And now come with me, and I will 
 show you where you are to stand till I am 
 ready to let you put my shawl on." 
 
 Mrs. Tyndal had one of the best cooks in 
 London, and her supper was my initiation into 
 London life. It was nearly four o^cJock when 
 we separated, but then we were disposed of 
 rather unceremoniously ; for, a servant coming 
 in to announce the Earl of Winnington, the 
 Giulia jumped up in a fright. " Oh ! that 
 horrid old Rigmarole ! I thought I had got rid 
 of him. Lawk ! what shall I do with you ? 
 Denis, show him into the drawing-room, and 
 say I have got a headache, and laid down. I 
 will come down to him presently. And now, 
 Sir Arcourt (the Giulia always made mistakes 
 H 2
 
 148 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 of this kind when excited), 1 ope your cab 
 isn't in my street, because old Rigmarole don't 
 like me to have young fellers here to supper. 
 You must go down the servants' staircase, too, 
 and let yourselfs out. Good bye, Mr. Eavylin, 
 au revau^ How monstrously fond these sort 
 of ladies are of mangling French. 
 
 " By Jove !" said Harcourt, drowsily, as we 
 drove home in the glorious sunrise of a sum- 
 mer morning, " old Rigmarole is going the 
 whole hog with the Giulia, and Lewis says he 
 hasn't got a rap, and has been obliged to get 
 his ambassador's pay in advance. Haw ! haw ! 
 Fancy old Win. an ambassador ! What a lark !" 
 
 " I wish I could have spoken to him,'' said I, 
 with tipsy gravity. 
 
 " Spoken to him ! Why he would talk a 
 horse's hind leg off. I always want not to 
 speak to him." 
 
 " But how do you manage about your affairs, 
 then ?" I bored drearily on. 
 
 " Oh, Lady Win. manages all that for me, 
 and gets my allowance. By the way, she has 
 asked tne to go down to Cleveland Park. Let 
 us go together — I like Lady Anne — the best 
 fun in the world."
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 149 
 
 Among those who began to patronize me 
 about this time also may be mentioned my 
 grandfather, from whom I found a kind note, 
 asking me to dinner, about three days after my 
 arrival in London. There was a pleasant party 
 assembled at the Marquis's table, and among 
 them was my immaculate uncle Lord Staunton, 
 whom I had never yet seen. He was a 
 grave man, very unpleasantly and unnecessarily 
 formal, even with his father, and dressed very 
 ill. He had risen, however, in official life, and 
 was now in the ministry. He asked me ab- 
 ruptly if I intended to come into Parliament 
 when I was of age, and that, if so, he would 
 speak to Lord Winnington to take some extra- 
 ordinary steps to get up a strong interest at 
 Marsden ; or, with my fortune, I might perhaps, 
 he added, with proper management, get re- 
 turned for the county, which would bring our 
 family interest up to seven votes. 
 
 " I would rather not go into Parliament for 
 some years at least after I come of age." said I, 
 remembering the subject of one of my conver- 
 sations with De Beaumont. 
 
 " Not go into Parliament for some years ?" 
 returned my uncle, aghast. '^ Nonsense ! you
 
 150 WALTER EVELYN OR, 
 
 can't take your seat too soon. Besides, there's 
 an Opposition man sitting for Marsden, owing 
 to your father having let the land. Depend 
 upon it,"' he added severely, "if you do not 
 enter the House of Commons early there is a 
 great chance against your having much success 
 afterwards :" and I think now my uncle was 
 right. 
 
 '^ What is this conversation about Parlia- 
 ments ?" said my grandfather. ^' Staunton is 
 always in harness. Don't listen to him, 
 Walter, it will take away your appetite ; and it 
 is a great thing to sit down to dinner with an 
 unclouded mind.'^ 
 
 " Very properly said, my Lord," remarked 
 one of the most active members of the late 
 ministry ; for men of all parties were welcome 
 in Stanhope Street, if they kept good cooks, 
 and knew how to appreciate them. " By the 
 way, Mr. Evelyn, are you anything of a shot ? 
 I have some very good covers in Norfolk, if 
 you would like to try them this autumn." 
 
 " Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes," muttered 
 my uncle. 
 
 " Ce qui veut dire, Je crains les Danois et — 
 et Donna Ferentes ! Ma foi ! Mais pas de
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 151 
 
 Grec," said the old Marquis de Courtrailles, 
 whose chef de cuisine was his most intimate 
 friend on earth. 
 
 " Marquis,'^ said my grandfather, looking 
 pensively at the contents of his plate, " your 
 scholarship does you honour ; but do not let 
 us inquire after the Greek for truffles, since we 
 cannot translate their flavour." 
 
 " For my part,^^ said the ex-ministerj " I 
 never invite wits or scholars to dinner except 
 upon field days. They make one's head ache, 
 and the very wine acid by their presence." 
 
 " I never would know a wit in my life," said 
 my grandfather : " they all bolt their dinners." 
 '' So do great politicians/' added the ex- 
 minister. " Look at Staunton." 
 
 " I eat to live. I do not live to eat," said 
 my uncle, stiffly. 
 
 "I do," replied my grandfather, "and find 
 it much better than living for the House of 
 Commons." 
 
 "Intolerable idea!" quoth the statesman. 
 " but who does live for the House of Com- 
 mons ? not even Staunton. Yet there was a 
 time when the House of Commons must have 
 been very well worth living for. To hear
 
 152 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 Charles Townshend's jokes, and Sheridan's 
 sallies, and glorious Fox reeling from New- 
 market or the gaming-table, must have been 
 very good fun indeed/^ 
 
 " Yes,^^ said my grandfather, "it was a gen- 
 tlemanly place enough in those days, but I 
 always heard Burke was a bore, and so was 
 Pitt." 
 
 " It is frightful to think even now how the 
 Bottomless Pitt devoured his half-raw chops. 
 Fancy the Prime Minister of England eating 
 chops !" returned the statesman, with what I 
 had discernment enough to see was a fine but 
 not very good-natured mockery of his host. 
 
 " C'est tres bien, cela — le Pitt sans fin, Botomly 
 Pitt," cried De Courtrailles, proving how im- 
 possible it is to translate a bon-mot, and 
 thinking that the English had at last found out 
 that the enemy of France was their own. 
 
 ^^ A very long catalogue, however, might be 
 made of ministers who have been bon-vivants, 
 even in our own day," said my liberal uncle : 
 " it might end with Lord A .^^ 
 
 " A very pretty compliment, indeed/^ replied 
 the statesman, ^* and I thank you for it. The 
 very soul of business is a good dinner. I re-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 153 
 
 member getting out of the greatest difficulty of 
 my administration by means of one/' 
 
 " Ah ! " answered my uncle, " I did not 
 know there was a greatest : they seemed so 
 much aUke/^ 
 
 " They were," returned the statesman, " and 
 all trifles. The only things that ever bothered 
 us really were your newspapers. You had 
 some clever scribblers supporting you." 
 
 " Ah !'' said my uncle, with whom the press 
 was a sore subject, and who had rendered his 
 government unpopular by a series of blunder- 
 ing attacks against the newspapers, ^' it is my 
 opinion that the liberty of the press, as it is 
 called, has been suffered to get too much 
 a-head in this country, and it ought to be put 
 down." 
 
 " I am quite sure it will put down all who 
 are silly enough to try their strength against 
 it," replied the ex-minister, who had a sort of 
 delight in worrying my uncle. " I am glad to 
 see your Solicitor-general has dropped that 
 persecution against * The Flying Post.'" 
 
 " Persecution ! prosecution you mean, m"y 
 Lord. Why, they said that . . . ." 
 
 " And wasn^t it true ?" 
 H 5
 
 154 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 " That is not the question. The secrecy of 
 Government must be respected/^ 
 
 "You may depend upon one thing/' re- 
 turned the statesman, "and that is, that the 
 time for secrecy of any kind is long gone 
 by. The question between governments and 
 the press is not, as it was once, a question 
 between wise and powerful ministers and half- 
 a-dozen Grub Street hirelings. All ministers 
 of modern times are obliged to keep up a close 
 connexion with, at least, a portion of the press, 
 and it numbers nearly all the first men in this 
 country among its habitual contributors. Be- 
 sides the majority of the higher classes, the 
 readers of politics are quite as well instructed 
 on all great questions as any minister can be, 
 and they will know the probable course that 
 he means to take, that they may judge if it be 
 the right one. I consider the press to be the 
 true parliament of this country ; the great or- 
 gan of the many classes and interests which 
 are unrepresented in St. Stephen^s ; the sole 
 thing that does away with the absolute neces- 
 sity of universal suffrage in a free country, be- 
 cause every man who has an opinion may 
 freely express it where it will be heard and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 155 
 
 weighed. No newspaper can now keep up a 
 merely factious opposition against any govern- 
 ment: its readers are, as a body, too wise and 
 unprejudiced. Good measures will always have 
 supporters enough^ and all the writing- down in 
 the world would not injure them, if it could 
 even be tried. But the truth is, it fortunately 
 cannot, for newspapers must make themselves 
 readable to intelligent and unprejudiced people, 
 or they will not sell. Not one newspaper in 
 London, however, I believe, pays anything 
 like its expenses. When, therefore, a body of 
 men representing some particular principle 
 (which it would be absurd to call place-hunt- 
 ing) can be found to club together, and to pay 
 from their private fortunes the enormous ex- 
 penses of a first-class journal to explain it, it 
 is perfectly clear that whatever their convic- 
 tions may be, they are, at least, sincere, and 
 therefore entitled to consideration ; such men, 
 when they court controversy, should be com- 
 bated with their own weapons, if their ideas 
 are unsound. This is what any government 
 owes to the nation it rules — that all proposi- 
 tions for the welfare of the state should be 
 fairly and fully discussed. People, now-a-
 
 156 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 days, will not suffer ministers to grope about 
 in the dark, or refuse to be enlightened. News- 
 papers diminish the talking in parliament by 
 one-half, and many a speaker, tiresome and 
 tedious in the House, does good service to his 
 country by throwing his ideas on paper, and 
 sending them to the papers. I go farther: I 
 look upon the press as a substitute for the 
 only advantage that was ever alleged in favour 
 of rotten boroughs, viz. that they enabled 
 the great and wealthy men who possessed them 
 to bring forward rising talent. Formerly, how- 
 ever, they were often enough deceived, and many 
 a youth wofully disappointed the expecta- 
 tions of his friends. Now the public is never 
 deceived ; the press is free to all ; and, what is 
 better, is a field for every possible variety of 
 literary or political talent. It is not merely 
 the connection of wealthy peers, or university 
 men, placed in a position in life to attract the 
 attention of some powerful patron, who have 
 the chance of distinguishing themselves. The 
 public care little whether the man who talks 
 to them wisely is a dressing-case maker or the 
 Prince Consort ; and they have the proper 
 meed of praise for each. Purifier of morals.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 157 
 
 enlightener of minds, pioneer of truths unnum- 
 bered, supported by the great, and the good, 
 and the gifted, as it is, — I look upon the press 
 of this country to be the most respectable and 
 noble institution that ever belonged to a free 
 people. I heartily wish that all connected 
 with it had, as they seem to be getting, a pro- 
 per conviction of the high nature of their 
 duties, and the responsible and elevated posi- 
 tion which they have a right to claim in the 
 scale of society, and which, some day, the able 
 political essayists of their time will be gene- 
 rally understood to fill. A writer for the press 
 should no more be branded with the title of 
 adventurer, than a churchman or a soldier ; 
 and if he fulfils his duties with inteUigence and 
 discretion, he is the equal of the one, for he is 
 the very shield and buckler of morality and 
 religion, and the sword of Gideon against 
 offenders, while he is incomparably the supe- 
 rior of the other. And, as for the name of 
 adventurer, if it means a man who, starting in 
 life without friends or fortune, has honourably 
 won name and fame by his intellects, it is a 
 title, a badge of honour, that should be held 
 higher, in a country hke England, than the
 
 158 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 highest hereditary coronet which ever sat upon 
 the unworthy brows of a rake, an idiot, or a 
 buffoon. One thing is certain, that whatever 
 minister quarrels with the press will be obliged 
 to make it up again if he can, or go to the wall 
 if he cannot, and drift away into chaos unla- 
 mented and unsung : 
 
 ** Baron's race throve never well, 
 Where the curse of Minstrel fell.'' 
 
 What minstrel of old times ever sung a hero 
 into fame like a line in the Gazette, or a lead- 
 ing article in the Times ? Whatever minister 
 therefore chooses to buckle on his armour 
 against the newspapers, will find that he has 
 not to deal with a few panic and poverty stricken 
 scribblers, but with the might, and the right, 
 and the intellect, of the first men in the land/^ 
 
 " How the habit of public speaking grows 
 upon us," said my grandfather, with a slight 
 but well-bred yawn. " My dear Lord A. you 
 have been talking exactly twenty minutes : I 
 am afraid we shall lose the divine Giulia.'^ 
 
 " Never mind the divine Giulia,'^ replied 
 Lord Staunton ; '^ I shall be glad to hear any- 
 thing more Lord A. may have to say about his
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 159 
 
 friends the newspapers. We may find it 
 useful. By the way, was that article in the 
 Times yesterday, on the Oregon question, 
 yours ?" 
 
 ^"Ha ! ha!^' laughed Lord A. '^ the secrets of 
 Government must be respected.^' 
 
 " Ah, 1 thought so, but how do you defend V 
 
 " Nay, my dear Staunton, we are not in the 
 House of Commons, when we are I will answer 
 you ; but as for the article, if you really wish 
 to know, I believe your own Chancellor could 
 tell you more about it than I. Besides, The 
 Times has been supporting you lately, and I 
 hear you are divided on this very question.'^ 
 
 '* Humph !'^ growled my uncle ; " then your 
 informant was mistaken. Walter, ]jady Staun- 
 ton wishes you to be presented to her, and has 
 requested me to take you home to-night, as she 
 has a reception.^^ 
 
 " You had better come and see the Giulia,^^ 
 said my grandfather ; " I hear Winnington is 
 going to carry her off with him to ,'' 
 
 " Is Lord Winnington really going to }" 
 
 asked the ex-minister, " what a pity !" 
 
 " Lord Winnington is a great man, and 
 never commits himself/^ replied my uncle, and
 
 160 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 an ornament to our side of the House. He 
 leaves his proxy with ." 
 
 " How ungrateful !" answered A. " His 
 first friend in pubUc life was poor Kennington, 
 whom he displaces. As for his committing 
 himself, however, I am not quite sure you will 
 have much reason to be pleased with your 
 bargain. He is the very man to get you into 
 
 a scrape, not at , but at home. The press 
 
 has sharp eyes there, if he trips, and ' My 
 Lord* is no favourite with the knights of the 
 quill." 
 
 " We shall know how to silence them," said 
 my uncle. 
 
 " You will not find it so easy," returned A. 
 
 " Only to think, mon cher Marquis," quoth 
 my grandfather, entering his box at the 
 opera with that nobleman, "of my having a 
 political discussion at a dinner of mine. It is 
 all from asking my son. Lord A. is a very 
 good fellow if left alone, but the other will tilt 
 with him, and when unhorsed he gets angry." 
 
 " Tant pis pour lui,'^ said the Marquis, " a 
 la bonne heure v'la la Giulia, qui danse."
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 161 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Yet, o'er that house there hung a solemn gloom; 
 The step fell timid in each gorgeous room, 
 Vast, sumptuous, dreary as some Eastern pile, 
 Where mutes keep watch — a home without a smile. 
 
 My uncle was one of those extremely good 
 people of cold regulated feelings who had 
 hardly ever been betrayed into a folly through- 
 out the whole of his private life, and he had 
 neither sympath)" nor mercy for those who had. 
 His house was the most serious in London. 
 He was hated by all the apple-women in St. 
 Giles's^ and was the absolute terror of all the 
 petty shopkeepers in his neighbourhood. His 
 servants were worried to death by him all the 
 week with long unintelligible prayers morning 
 and evening, and lectures upon moral conduct
 
 162 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 on the most ill-chosen occasions. On Sunday, 
 however, they were amply indemnified; instead 
 of being tied down to the dull business of 
 cooking and serving dinner, they had their 
 time all to themselves from the breakfast of 
 cold tea till as late as they pleased in the even- 
 ing. It was the only quiet day of their lives, 
 so that perhaps they had a right to it. 
 
 Oh, what a weary man he was ! Stately and 
 immaculate even to his own children. They 
 could have seen nothing possible in him but 
 a sterner kind of schoolmaster. He never 
 laughed and played with them, and his smile 
 was like vinegar, his caress a contortion. 
 
 I was introduced into an immense imposing 
 sort of house, (Lord Staunton thought it be- 
 coming for a man of his rank to live in a large 
 house now that he was married,) but it gave 
 you the sensation of entering a vault to go 
 into it. The porter, who was dressed in sombre 
 livery, and was (as servants get to be) a bad 
 copy of his master, looked like a sexton. He 
 was relieved at the foot of the staircase by a 
 man who might easily have been taken for an 
 undertaker, while mutes seemed to stand drawn 
 up on each landing instead of footmen. Then
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 163 
 
 the hall was ill lighted, and smelt like a book- 
 seller's shop of tracts and parliamentary papers, 
 whose essence was wafted from the library. 
 The staircase was ill lighted, and the drawing- 
 room was worse. My uncle, however, ma- 
 naged to pilot me through all these difficulties, 
 till we arrived before a tall, faded lady dressed 
 in black velvet and diamonds, but who seemed 
 to have been keeping Lent all her life, and to 
 this apparition I was presented. 
 
 " Charlotte, our nephew Walter. Walter, 
 your aunt.'' 
 
 The lady in black velvet acknowledged the 
 introduction more coldly and formally than 
 was quite graceful, but I saw she meant kindly, 
 and she bade me sit down beside her. 
 
 " I am expecting an old acquaintance of 
 yours here this evening," she said, '•' and I dare 
 say you will be both glad to meet each other. 
 But why have you not been here before? I hear 
 you have been in London some time." 
 " Only three days," I answered. 
 " But three days in London without caUing 
 upon your uncle is long enough, is it not ? 
 However, now of course you will remain with
 
 164 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 I could see from this little sentence that my 
 uncle was really a good man, though he made 
 too much show of it, and thought I detected a 
 kindly desire to make up for his life-long cold- 
 ness to my father by protection and good will 
 to me. I felt touched by this, and forgot all 
 about the parliamentary conversation, as I was 
 quite sure, whatever Lord Staunton's views 
 regarding me might be, they had nothing 
 at all to do with the invitation I had just re- 
 ceived. 
 
 " My dear lady,'' I began — 
 
 " Why do you not call me your aunt ?" 
 
 " Why, then, my dear aunt, I am going down 
 to Cleveland Park to Lord Winnington's, who 
 you know is my guardian." 
 
 ^'Very proper, very right and proper. T 
 hope you will do all you possibly can to please 
 him. We expect his excellency here also this 
 evening. It is quite an honour to you to have 
 such a guardian." 
 
 " Do you know Lord Winnington well, 
 aunt?" I asked. 
 
 " No, not very well : he was only presented 
 to me a few days since ; but he is a man very 
 much considered in society, and every one
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 165 
 
 tells me he is a most distinguished personage. 
 He is to be our new Ambassador at " 
 
 The world of which such persons as Lady 
 Staunton are the prime arbiters always judge a 
 man by his success in life : only be lucky, 
 and their suffrages are sure. 
 
 I make this reflection now as I am retracing 
 the faint picture of the occurrences of the 
 evening in question as they rise up in my me- 
 mory< At the time, however, I believe I made 
 none at all, for my aunt had scarcely brought 
 the praises of my guardian to a close, when 
 one of the sepulchral servants threw the doors 
 open and announced 
 
 " General Sir Chfton Howard, Lady How- 
 ard, and Miss Howard." 
 
 My aunt had only time to whisper, "The 
 great general who has just returned from 
 India. He is to be Governor of Malta, but you 
 know, of course" (even ministers' wives talk 
 shop) — when my old friends stood before me. 
 
 I have seldom seen such a lovely and per- 
 fectly lady-like looking girl as Emily Howard. 
 She was tall and slender, with a grave earnest 
 expression of countenance, but there was a 
 kind, homelike light in the eyes that redeemed
 
 166 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 them from any touch of sadness. She was the 
 sort of girl you would pick out from a thou- 
 sand, as one certain to fulfil her duties, what- 
 ever they might be. A girl whom rudeness 
 could not approach or levity trifle with. Yet 
 the very soul of mirth was in her smile, it 
 seemed the outward symbol of such true inno- 
 cent happiness of heart. Her step was light 
 as a fawn's, and — oh, rarity in English women — 
 her carriage was exquisitely graceful, so that 
 when entering a room she did not look like a 
 grenadier advancing to attack a redoubt, or a 
 dancing mistress. 
 
 We recognised each other at a glance ; boys^ 
 faces do not change much till they get whis- 
 kers, and mine was a face not diflicult to re- 
 member. The general greeted me roughly 
 and kindly, still holding stoutly to the fiction 
 that he was my uncle. Mrs. Howard forgot 
 her philanthropical tendencies in the pleasure 
 of the meeting, and Emily stretched out her 
 little hand with all the frankness and aflPection 
 of a child ; so that we were soon talking to- 
 gether as pleasantly as in the days when we 
 gathered daisies, and roamed over the meadows 
 at Marsden.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 167 
 
 ^' How you have grown, Walter ?^ she said ; 
 "but I should have known you again any- 
 where." 
 
 " How ?" asked I vainly. 
 
 " How ? What a question ! By yourself to 
 be sure ; no two people are alike." 
 
 " No," said I, " but I was a boy then." 
 
 " Then ?" 
 
 " Yes, and now ^' 
 
 " You are a man to be sure, I had for- 
 gotten that," she added, laughing archly ; " but 
 still I should have known you, Walter, any- 
 where." 
 
 " I have often thought of you, Emily," said 
 I frankly, '^ and laughed over our first meeting 
 on the common round the old house." 
 
 " The park, you mean !" 
 
 " Well then, the park, if you like. And yo u 
 called me a wild boy. Am I tamer now ?" 
 
 "Why, let me consider. In the first place, 
 sit straight before I answer you. Your aunt 
 is very particular about her sofas, and then — " 
 
 "What?" 
 
 " My fan was not made to be broken ; but 
 of course if you will break it by twisting it 
 about in that way, I suppose you must, as you
 
 168 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 are the strongest, and may be still as wild a boy 
 as ever." 
 
 I did not much like this kind of conversa- 
 tion, for it was the fashion at the time of which 
 I am writing for the dandies of the day to 
 wear ringlets on each side of their face, and I 
 had cultivated mine with such assiduity that I 
 began to fancy they were whiskers, and ex- 
 pected to be treated as though I owned those 
 glorious insignia of manhood. 
 
 " I see you are angry about something,^' said 
 Emily, " and, as nobody may be angry in a 
 London drawing-room any more than they 
 may be pleased, may I ask what it is 
 about ?'' 
 
 " I have not seen you so long, and you treat 
 me so strangely." 
 
 " Strangely V said Emily, " nay, I treat you 
 just as if we had parted yesterday, and so I 
 feel, Walter, excepting always the regret that 
 we have not met oftener/' 
 
 "Do you really regret it ?^ 
 
 "To be sure I do/' 
 
 " And do you think I should be welcome if 
 I came over to you from Cleveland this sum- 
 mer ?''
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 169^ 
 
 " Welcome ! and why not ? It is you who 
 are behaving strangely/^ 
 
 "Yet I could not know how years might 
 have altered you, and there are many things I 
 should not have liked if 1 had paid you a visit 
 too suddenly. For instance, you might have 
 been going to be married.^' 
 
 For the first time Emily blushed; a quick, 
 pleased, fleeting blush, but still a blush. " Oh, 
 no ! I am only seventeen, and I have not a 
 single lover, except General Beevor, who pro- 
 poses to me every time we go there." 
 
 "And has only one leg. Ah ! then I need 
 not be jealous of my playmate.^^ 
 
 " And will come and stay with us ?" 
 
 " And we will go out and pick flowers, and 
 visit mammals cottagers with her, and read 
 those wonderful books together as we used to 
 do." 
 
 " I shall be so happy :'' and when she told 
 the General and Mrs. Howard that I was 
 coming down to see them this summer, they 
 looked so pleased and cordial it quite warmed 
 my heart. 
 
 " You do quite right," said my uncle gravely, 
 " to make up to Sir Clifton Howard. He 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 170 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 has been buying a great deal of land in your 
 county, and his daughter will be an heiress." 
 
 " To-morrow I shall expect you to come and 
 stay here while you are in town. It is better 
 for you than being at an hotel, and— and more 
 respectable/^ added my uncle. "And now, 
 good night, for I have some official instruc- 
 tions to give Lord Winnington in consequence 
 of information which I learn has just been re- 
 ceived by telegraph." 
 
 Poor Lord Winnington ! with bis head full 
 of fiddling and operas, and the Giulia, to be 
 obliged to undergo a midnight lecture from my 
 uncle ! He, too, had to pay for his whistle. 
 He was just getting out of his carriage as I 
 got into the street, and was cursing his foot- 
 man as his name and titles were being an- 
 nounced t lirough half a dozen better men in 
 the most m .ral house in London. 
 
 " Oy, oh. ah, ay. Is that you Walter, eh, 
 humph, so,'' said his lordship, who had the 
 reputation of great conversational powers, 
 " Well, where are you going to this time of 
 night ?" (This was his Excellency's way of 
 being funny.) 
 
 " I am going home, my Lord," said I, laugh-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. l7l 
 
 ing more at the man than his words, for he 
 had a confused look, and swayed himself about 
 and reared his long body in a manner that was 
 remarkable to see. Then, as the door of my 
 uncle's house remained standing wide open and 
 was full of bowing servants, a crowd began to 
 collect round us, and I was rather afraid his 
 lordship intended to try his conversational 
 powers on somebody among it, but suddenly 
 recollecting himself, (what a hard task it must 
 have been !) he heighM, and oh*d, and ah'd, and 
 um'd, and rolled his wicked eyes about a little 
 longer, and then wishing me suddenly good 
 night, went grandly up the steps. 
 
 All the old ladies in London thought my 
 guardian had wonderful conversational powers ; 
 but I could not help thinking, after pretty close 
 observation, that their opinion arose from their 
 always talking to him at cross purposes, which 
 sometimes made his answers seem witty, or, 
 still better, incomprehensible; and I noticed 
 with admiration that he never paid the least 
 attention to what was said to him, so that he 
 could stand any amount of boring. Is not 
 this, perhaps, the secret of some other conver- 
 I 2
 
 172 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 sational reputations besides Lord Winning- 
 ton^s ? I have often found great wits in ball- 
 rooms, and very delightful talkers, mere impu- 
 dent dullards when pressed home. But then 
 it costs the veriest blockhead in high place so 
 little to get a reputation of any kind he likes 
 to give himself, provided he does not actually 
 outrage and stamp uj^on people; and, even 
 should he do this, he will have his admirers, 
 especially among the ladies. 
 
 I was walking leisurely from my uncle^s to 
 Long's, counting the echoes of my footsteps in 
 the summer night, and occasionally stopping 
 to listen to a ballad singer^ a vagabond habit 
 that I have practised all my life, when my at- 
 tention was attracted by two persons who were 
 sauntering along immediately in front of me. 
 In the one I had no difficulty in recognizing 
 Mr. Ephraim Lewis, and the other was a 
 gentleman of the same persuasion, whom I 
 fancied that I had seen before with my father 
 in Paris. They were talking earnestly, and, 
 though I coughed once or twice to attract their 
 attention, they either did not heed, or did not 
 hear me, and I thus became a listener to their 
 conversation.
 
 THE LOXG MINORITY. 173 
 
 " Done much with the swells lately ?" said 
 the gentleman from Paris. 
 
 " Yes, pretty well. We have done Sir Har- 
 court Berkeley's paper to a considerable tune, 
 I can tell you. He will have to raise a heavy 
 mortgage when he comes of age.^' 
 
 " Ah/' returned the other with an eager 
 sigh, "Vat large fortunes you have to pick over 
 here! Paris aint nothing like it; I should 
 shettle in London myself, if it was'nt for two 
 or three of my friends at the Jockie Club. 
 You have not got any of Sir Harcourt's paper 
 to shell, have you ?" 
 
 " Why," returned the Seraphim, " I don't 
 know. I may be wanting a good deal of money- 
 soon, and the New London and Westminster, 
 where I bank, don't know me yet, and are not 
 good for more than a few hundreds over my 
 account." 
 
 " Wot have you got ? Tell us wot have you 
 got. I can let you have two or three thousand, 
 or more — much as you want — to-morrow. Eh I 
 tell us now." 
 
 • " Why," rephed the Seraphim, " his paper 
 will be in the market soon enough, I dare say, 
 and you ought to know him, as it is, if vou
 
 174 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 had kept your eyes about you. It's young 
 Walter Evelyn, Lord Herbert's son ; he is to 
 have a fine fortune from an uncle who died in 
 India/' 
 
 ^^ Know him," cried the other, in a tone of 
 great contempt, " I have knowed him this — 
 more than a year. I knowed him as soon as 
 he got to Paris .'^ 
 
 " Is he in for much ?" asked the Seraphim. 
 
 " About seventy thousand pounds," returned 
 the other, " and its running on ; no chance of 
 being paid these four years.'^ 
 
 " Humph/' returned the Seraphim. '^ I 
 must be cautious. Do you mean to let him 
 have any more ?" 
 
 " P'r'aps" answered the other, " now Old 
 Winnington's made an ambassador ; otherwise 
 he was'nt good for much, and he's executor." 
 
 " No chance of any dispute about his mi- 
 nority^ I suppose ?" 
 
 " Oh, no ! we've got his father too tight for 
 that." 
 
 Impudent liar ! thought I, as I went chuck- 
 ling to myself down Bond Street, when he 
 knows I don't owe him sixpence. Seventy 
 thousand pounds, indeed — and running on.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 175 
 
 Ha ! ha ! ha ! I must beware of that rogue 
 they call the Seraphim ; and turning into bed I 
 slept the sleep of youth and health, dreaming 
 of Emily Howard, and that my uncle's was 
 not such a very sepulchral house after all.
 
 176 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Oh, that fairy form is ne'er forgot 
 
 Which first love traced ; 
 Still it lingering haunts the greenest spot 
 
 On memory's waste ! 
 
 Moore. 
 
 I WAS two or three days more in London, 
 and stayed at my uncle^s house, where Mrs. 
 Howard and her daughter came frequently. I 
 think I prolonged my stay in London partly on 
 their account. Emily was so easy and unem- 
 barrassed with me, so unlike anybody with 
 whom I had been thrown for years, that it 
 made me happy only to be with her. We were 
 very silent and thoughtful usually when together, 
 for memory was busy with us ; but our silence 
 seemed to say more than words, and our 
 thoughts were very pleasant ones. I do not
 
 THE LOXG MINORITY. I 77 
 
 know, dear reader, whether you have ever known 
 anybody you loved very much, and with whom 
 you kept silent company in this way, feeling 
 perfectly sure that the inmost thoughts of 
 your heart needed no translating into words to 
 make them understood. If you have not 
 known such a companion, the worst I wish 
 you is, that you some day may ; if you have, I 
 am sure you will agree with me, that you hp.ve 
 seldom had a happiness so perfect. 
 
 Though our thoughts ran a good deal upon 
 love, and the sweet dreams that young Romance 
 loves to dwell upon, I do not think that either 
 of us knew that we loved each other. I used 
 to tell Emily she would be married to some 
 great general, at which she used to shake her 
 head wisely, and say that would never be. 
 And then I used to tell her what sort of wife I 
 intended to choose. Somehow or other I 
 always described some one very much hke her- 
 self ; but she neither saw the resemblance, nor 
 did I. 
 
 Mrs. Howard let things go on very quietly 
 
 in this way. I was always welcome in Brook 
 
 Street, where they lived during their stay in 
 
 London, and the General regularly asked after 
 
 I 5
 
 178 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 me if I did not appear at dinner time. No 
 man was more truly kind or unaffectedly hos- 
 pitable than General Howard, and in his way 
 he loved young people as much as his brother, 
 and liked to have them about him. He was 
 quite a Providence to his aides-de-camp, and 
 never could any man's table boast of more 
 guests than were habitually and heartily wel- 
 come to it. This I must say did not always 
 please Lady Howard ; and most wives will feel 
 with her that she was hardly used, for, when 
 dinner had been ordered for six, it was no un- 
 common thing that twelve or fifteen people sat 
 down to it, and the General's friends had 
 mostly good appetites. However they were 
 not very fastidious, and, as he always alluded 
 to his delinquency himself during the enter- 
 tainment, and was sure to joke about the 
 toughness of the dish or two that had to be 
 added in haste, his dinners were upon the whole 
 the merriest, most unformal affairs possible. 
 
 My uncle dined there sometimes, but not 
 frequently; his wife however often, she and 
 Lady Howard agreeing together admirably, 
 and both excellent women, full of all the house- 
 hold virtues, and all kindnesses. They had
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 1 7^ 
 
 always more to talk about than I should like 
 to be obliged to hear. 
 
 Innumerable were the recipes for different 
 delicacies of the table which passed between 
 them, and their husbands might bless their 
 stars over their conferences for many a golden 
 guinea saved. They were both great breakers 
 in and quellers of servants, and the characters 
 of those who had once lived with them was 
 made for ever. It was a pleasant sight to 
 watch those two exemplary ladies relating 
 their triumphs in this respect. How they had 
 straightened the crooked minds, and utterly 
 subdued the restiveness, of various obdurate 
 maids and untractable footmen. How they 
 allowed no followers (dear innocent ladies !), and 
 no perquisites, and no anything else, and yet 
 always had the best and most intelligent ser- 
 vants that were to be found. Lady Staunton 
 would tell such stories of her own maid as 
 would lead you to infer that if that exem- 
 plary young lady met with her deserts she 
 would be married to no one less than the Lord 
 Chancellor sitting in full robes upon the wool- 
 sack, and cheap at the bargain, ermine and all : 
 while Sir Clifton^s butler, who had been with
 
 180 WALTER EVELYN; OR, , 
 
 the General from the time he first wielded 
 a wooden sword up to the present — why 
 there never was such a man ! His sayings 
 passed into positive proverbs about the house, 
 and I often used to think that dear good Lady 
 Howard stood a little in awe of him, as some 
 one belonging to the remote and mysterious 
 period of her husband's bachelor's establish- 
 ment. 
 
 The General and my uncle however did not 
 get on quite so well together, though their 
 friendship was of old date, and they had a cordial 
 esteem for each other it did one good to see. 
 But my uncle was a great formalist, and the 
 General, when off duty, did not know what 
 forms meant. My uncle was always shocked at 
 hearing things called by their right names, and 
 the General never called them by any other. 
 Then he had a way of being funny which was 
 not quite to my uncle's taste, and it was as 
 good as a play to observe the Minister's uneasy 
 smile when the General made one of his knock- 
 down sallies, and to see with what anxiety and 
 alarm he would sit watching for the next, 
 frightened out of his wits to catch his old 
 friend's eye, because he knew the circumstance
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 181 
 
 would be immediately followed by some jest 
 that would make his hair stand on end, and 
 shock his sense of dignity for the rest of the 
 evening. General Howard too was one of those 
 happy fellows who have not one atom of sensi- 
 tiveness in their whole composition, and take 
 amusement in worrying those who have. He 
 was sure to find out anybody's sore place, and 
 would keep on tickling it under the impression 
 that he was affording great delight to the com- 
 pany as well as to the person so operated on 
 and himself. He mistook their forced and 
 wretched smiles for trophies won by his wit, 
 and woe to the miserable man who dreaded 
 raillery and dined with General Howard. He 
 was certain to find him out, and then if he got 
 peace for five minutes during dinner he was a 
 lucky man indeed. My uncle, however, was 
 his favourite game, and, like a fox that has 
 often stole away from huntsmen and hounds, 
 he gave increased excitement with every suc- 
 cessive chace. I remember one occasion par- 
 ticularly when the General started his game in 
 great style, my uncle having accepted an invi- 
 tation to dine with him. " Aw, my Lord," 
 began Sir Clifton with a ghtter in his eye that
 
 182 
 
 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 evidently meant sport, and mimicking my un- 
 cle's inflated manner, " Shall I aw-send you a 
 piece of this beef ? it is as tender as a minister's 
 conscience." The General always did the 
 honours at his own table himself, and would not 
 have felt at home without his carving-knife. 
 
 " Thank you. General,'' replied my uncle, 
 with a desperate attempt to be cheerful. " A 
 glass of wine ?" 
 
 " Too much honour, my Lord, aw ! Sherry, 
 Christie, to the right honourable Lord Staun- 
 ton." Then changing his maimer into one of 
 pleasant pathos, he added, " Your health, old 
 boy. We can't drink so much wine now as 
 we could twenty years ago, can we ? We are 
 getting old fogies, I'm afraid, both of us." 
 
 Now if there was one thing more than ano- 
 ther upon which my sore uncle was sorest it 
 was about his age. He could not bear to have it 
 touched upon. You might almost as well jest 
 with him about his ofiSce ; and, pluming him- 
 self up, he assured the General he never felt 
 younger or better in his life, and that his 
 father, whom he was fond of mentioning on 
 such occasions, said that he felt precisely the 
 same.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 183 
 
 " Ah \" answered the General, " it's all very 
 well, my Lord, aw, but neither your right 
 honourable lordship, aw, aw, nor I either 
 can hold out much longer to be of any use. I 
 feel it myself. I am getting weak here, here 
 in the upper story,'^ he would add, with an 
 air of pathetic conviction in the truth of his 
 own words. '' So you had better make hay 
 while the sun shines, and get your old father 
 made a duke at once, if he is to be one.'' 
 
 Now this, as I learned long afterwards, was 
 the most cherished, and, as he fancied, secret 
 aim my uncle had in life. He would not have 
 divulged his hopes even to his own shadow till 
 he fancied the time was ripe for their accom- 
 plishment ; and there the General had struck 
 him home, divined his very inmost thoughts, 
 and spoken them out among twenty guests, 
 who next day would carry them all over the 
 town, and perhaps laugh at his preposterous 
 ambition, for he had lived quite long enough in 
 the world to know that it makes very little 
 difference in its commentaries on a mere un- 
 supported assertion and a well-authenticated 
 fact ; while the veriest absurdity, or the 
 merest guess thrown out at random, is quite as
 
 184 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 likely to obtain currency and belief as the ipse 
 dixit of a bishop. Perhaps he would have 
 given a year of his Ufe not to have dined with 
 the General on that day, for, his friend having 
 hit upon a new topic, was sure to recur to 
 it without mercy. 
 
 " But, tell me, Staunton,'^ he repeated in a 
 more serious and friendly tone, '^ is your father 
 really to be made a duke ?" 
 
 " I have not heard anything about it. 
 Though to be sure my father is one of the old- 
 est marquesses,'^ returned my uncle, trying to 
 hide his vexation. 
 
 " Aw, yes, an old marquess, aw, is he ? We 
 descend from the Conqueror, of course, and 
 are to be made a duke because our ances- 
 tors stole some honest man's lands with that 
 rascal William the First. Very pretty, my 
 Lord, very pretty ; is that the way you lords 
 carry on the government ? All very snug and 
 nice to be sure I But take care the W^hisrs 
 
 o 
 
 don^t get in and spoil your game ! Lord John 
 is looking out, Sir, Lord John is looking out, 
 you may take my word for it. Besides you 
 will have to give up soon ; you're getting an 
 old man, my Lord. I feel myself getting
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 185 
 
 stiffer ai>d stifFer every day, and you are two 
 years older than I am/^ 
 
 This was a sort of argument from which 
 there was no escape ; and, if Lady Howard or 
 somebody else had not made a diversion in my 
 uncle's favour, Sir Clifton would have gone on 
 repeating it in some form or other all the 
 evening. The worst of it was too, that the 
 other guests, young aides-de-camp and cap- 
 tains in the Guards, began to smell the game ; 
 and the General, encouraged by their smo- 
 thered laughter, and delighted with his own 
 wit, continued to worry his chace almost into 
 a fever; and so sure as the stately Minister 
 made any return to dignity and good spirits in 
 conversation with somebody else, his hearty 
 old friend was certain to see some pretext for 
 renewing the sport. " My friend, aw, aw, 
 my Lord there, the right honourable privy 
 councillor, &c. &c. &c. Sir, very merry for his 
 age. Don't you think, so now ?" said he to 
 Lady Staunton. " I must point him out to our 
 young friends as an example to be followed." 
 Here he looked towards a love-stricken lieu- 
 tenant of two-and-twenty, who had scarcely 
 spoken a word all the evening. " It would be
 
 18^ WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 no wonder, however, if my friend the right 
 honourable lord, &c. &c. &;c. were to look seri- 
 ous with the cares of the nation on his shoul- 
 ders ; besides, he is getting an old fellow, like 
 myself," added Sir Clifton ; " but for young 
 fellows (meaning the love-stricken lieutenant) 
 to look so melancholy, why how do they 
 expect to look when they are as old as my 
 friend the right honourable Lord Staunton, &c. 
 &c. &c. ? '' 
 
 I often thought it spoke greatly in my 
 uncle's favour that he had been Sir Clifton's 
 firm friend in good and evil fortune since boy- 
 hood ; and if ever any Member was venturous 
 enough to attack any of his operations in 
 India or elsewhere, up rose the awful person 
 and authoritative voice of my uncle, and extin- 
 guished that Member forthwith. He was the 
 only person of whom my uncle was ever known 
 to speak with affection, and, though not gene- 
 rally a very eloquent or effective speaker, he had 
 once at least touched every heart in the House 
 when moving the thanks of Parliament for a 
 General " whom every Englishman might be 
 proud to call his countryman, and by whom he 
 was especially honoured in being able to num-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 187 
 
 ber among his friends/' This was very great 
 praise indeed from my immaculate uncle. Yet 
 I am quite sure when next they met, the Gene- 
 ral, with a tear in one eye and a smile in the 
 other, took as much delight in worrying him 
 as ever. 
 
 As for me, the General used to joke with me 
 very unceremoniously about his daughter, and 
 say, "Aw, Master Walter, we shall be expecting 
 a wedding between you and Emily by and by, or 
 I shall call you out. Sir, for trifling with my 
 daughter's affections." This used to make the 
 love- stricken lieutenant glare daggers at me, 
 and amused my uncle greatly, as he always re- 
 joiced when it was anybody's turn but his own, 
 and he would spur him on with extreme delight 
 to hunt me. But I did not give sport enough 
 to please the General, and after a brief run 
 with me, he would always return to my uncle 
 with additional zest.
 
 188 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Forth from the crowded streets, one summer day, 
 Rode the two friends ; and cool and silent lay 
 Through shadowy lanes the chance-directed way. 
 
 At length, General Howard and his family 
 having left London, one sunny morning Berke- 
 ley and I prepared to follow them, and towards 
 the afternoon we found ourselves driving rapidly 
 down the fine avenue of beeches that led to 
 Cleveland. As we passed the lodge gates a 
 gay party of ladies and cavaliers were riding 
 out, and, though I had no time to exchange 
 more than a parting glance as our britzska 
 whirled on, I thought I recognized more than 
 one of the party. There was certainly Lady 
 Anne reining in that high-bred galloway, and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 189 
 
 a pale romantic looking young man who rode 
 beside her I thought as surely must be Arthur 
 Sinclair, the poet. 
 
 " That burly fellow on the heavy cob must 
 be Captain Ireton, though he don't look much 
 like a hero/^ said I, addressing Berkeley. 
 
 "No, Ireton 's much younger/' answered 
 the guardsman, " one of the youngest captains 
 in the service ; I believe not above twenty.^' 
 
 We arrived, at a fortunate moment, in a 
 country house. Everybody was out. Lady 
 Winnington and the elder guests were gone to 
 visit some local curiosity or other which was 
 being exhibited in the neighbouring town, and 
 the younger members of the party assembled 
 at Cleveland Park we had just met going for 
 an afternoon ride, so that we were safe for our 
 toilette and a bath before being introduced to 
 the company. I don't know anything more 
 annoying than to arrive at a great country 
 house on a wet day, and when people have 
 nothing better to do than to look out of window 
 and quiz you as you get out of a miserable, 
 cramped post chaise, perhaps covered with 
 dust, and wearing a cloak and travelling cap, 
 which you would by no means wish should
 
 190 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 give their impression to your first appearance 
 amongst strangers. I have known a visitor 
 never able to get over a ridiculous arrival of 
 this kind, and the most careful toilette in the 
 world could not prevent his being looked upon 
 as a quiz afterwards. 
 
 We had the advantage however of having 
 already arrived, when the party returned, and 
 of being expected, so that our descent during 
 the uncomfortable half-hour before dinner was 
 not looked upon as an intrusion even by those 
 testy, gouty, dinner-loving old gentlemen who 
 always consider a new arrival a bore. 
 
 Lady Winnington greeted me with all her 
 old charm of manner, and her eyes lit up so 
 kindly while she pressed my hand that I felt 
 sorry I had delayed my visit so long. 
 
 Anne Stanley was however altogether changed; 
 she advanced coldly and constrainedly towards 
 me, awkwardly breaking off her conversation 
 with the poet to do so, and then she stood 
 quite silent, as if awaiting what I was going to 
 say. I even thought I saw a frown on those 
 frank, laughing brows. The poet too looked 
 uncomfortable, and eyed me with a glance by 
 no means friendly.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 191 
 
 Lady Winnington hastened to the rescue. 
 " Let me present you to our guests, Walter/' 
 she said, " at least to two of them, for I believe 
 you know the rest — Captain Ireton.'' 
 
 The poet advanced and bowed stiffly. 
 
 '' Mr. Arthur Sinclair." 
 
 Mr. Sinclair (my burly friend lately on the 
 cob) bowed pleasantly, and I found myself in 
 conversation with the poet, — so much for 
 judging by appearances. 
 
 Captain Ralph Treton was a young man of 
 good family and an ancient name, ranking with 
 the Hampdens and Bradshaws, the rough sol- 
 diers of the civil wars. At sixteen he had 
 received his commission in a marching regi- 
 ment, which fortunately for him was ordered 
 out to India, and went almost immediately into 
 action. So that the young ensign, instead of 
 becoming the handsome hero of country quar- 
 ters, destined to be arrested by a saddler, and 
 finish a lost life at Boulogne, advanced rapidly 
 by dint of sheer merit and hard service, got 
 upon the staiF of one of the most active generals 
 in the army, and, circumstances favouring him, 
 had attained his captaincy, and sent his name 
 ringing all over Europe before his twenty-first
 
 192 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 birth-day. Military men predicted a famous 
 career for him ; and his strict habits of order 
 and discipHne, his enthusiasm for his profes- 
 sion, his keen eye, and calm and temperate 
 courage in time of danger, as well as his popu- 
 larity with his comrades (a great element of 
 success in life), seemed to augur that these 
 predictions would be accomplished. 
 
 Yet I do not think I ever saw a man look 
 more unlike a soldier at first sight. He re- 
 minded me of Kirk White. Though his pro- 
 fession had made him generally upright, he 
 had naturally that slight stoop in the shoulders 
 which usually marks the scholar, and the high, 
 pale forehead, prominent eye, and delicately 
 formed features that would have appeared to 
 confirm this opinion in any one who did not 
 know him. He had not the least sign of beard 
 either, and had hands small, white, and delicate 
 as a woman^s. It was only when he was much 
 excited that you might have remarked a rigidity 
 about the muscles of the mouth, and a stern- 
 ness in the eye, which separated the man of 
 action from the dreamer, and seen that, though 
 the man might feel and understand a poem, 
 though his own life might be more like a
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 193 
 
 romance than a reality, he would never write 
 one. Simple and curt, too, in his manners and 
 address, he seldom said more than was abso- 
 lutely necessary, and he despised all ornament 
 or exaggeration in common conversation. His 
 mind was rather collected and practical than 
 fine or acute, and a very little knowledge of 
 my new acquaintance was sufficient to shew 
 me that (despite first impressions) in him was 
 to be found the true type of the hero — of the 
 men wdio have conquered or fallen in their 
 duty since the world began. 
 
 Arthur Sinclair one might easily have mis- 
 taken for a wealthy tradesman. He had a 
 large ungainly body, the members of which did 
 not at all times appear to live on a good under- 
 standing with each other ; a large head, rather 
 awkwardly set on, splay feet, and large hands ; 
 his clothes were all too large for him, and their 
 colours badly chosen. He had a confirmed 
 stoop, and a voice pitched in the most unlucky 
 and varying key ; which qualifications, together 
 with shy, uncertain eyes, complete the portrait 
 of a great poet, and, perhaps, to a philosopher, 
 would explain why he was one. 
 
 When you studied his face, however, the 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 194 WALTER EVELYN ; OR^ 
 
 mind shone out of it at every glance, though 
 you must have acquired considerable intimacy 
 with him to be enabled to judge of it. His 
 manner was singular, for, really happy only in 
 his library, he went seldom into society, and, 
 knowing few people, he had a way of grasping 
 at any one who was presented to him in a 
 nervous and rather troublesome manner, while 
 half an hour afterwards, when they had been 
 replaced by somebody else, he would scarcely 
 recollect them. 
 
 Once at home with him, however, once get 
 him at his ease with you, and his conversation 
 was as pleasant as healthy weather. The bright 
 grey eye twinkled with wit and humour, or 
 softened with pathos, and its shy uncertainty 
 of glance vanished, while the odd voice became 
 rich and melodious. His manner to ladies he 
 knew was perfect in its innate and graceful 
 courtesy and kindness ; with those he did not 
 know, however, it was the awkwardest thing in 
 the world (all compUments and blunders). And 
 so, shunning the world for which he was unfit 
 by nature and by habit, the high-born and 
 wealthy Arthur Sinclair shut himseK up in the 
 land of dreams and became a poet.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 195 
 
 When I was introduced to him, therefore, 
 he would have got away from me as he did 
 from everybody else in a few minutes, but, 
 fortunately, dinner was announced, and as I 
 had the good luck to be placed next to him, 
 with Lady Anne on the other side, and as she 
 did not speak to me, while his neighbour was 
 equally pre-occupied flirting with Berkeley, we 
 were forced into conversation, and date from 
 this moment a friendship that has never since 
 been interrupted. Before dinner was over I 
 had acquired quite a taste for rare copies of 
 old books, and had remarked the strong, 
 almost involuntary habit of observation, of 
 getting sermons out of stones, which distin- 
 guishes all imaginative men. His conversation 
 soon became richly tinted with the prevailing 
 colour of his mind, and I saw that not a cir- 
 cumstance had escaped him, from the character 
 of the blossoms of the heather, passed in his 
 morning's ride on the stout cob, to the spasm, 
 half delight, half pain, which had convulsed the 
 features of a beggar-woman, to whom he had 
 given a guinea. The talent I mean, indeed, 
 can scarcely be called observation, — it was re- 
 flection. His mind was like a mirror, whose 
 K 2
 
 196 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 nature it is to receive all the images that are 
 presented to it, and he seized any peculiarity 
 of character or striking circumstance, to remain 
 daguerreotyped on his memory for ever. 
 
 For my own part I had no time to remark 
 that the dinner passed off dully ; but Berkeley 
 informed me, confidentially, while smoking a 
 cigar in the park before going to bed, that he 
 had been bored to death ; for a guardsman 
 always being a great person in the country, a 
 troublesome little lady, the widow of one of 
 the county members, and nearly allied to the 
 Winningtons, both by blood and marriage, had 
 taken him prisoner bodily and mentally, and 
 kept him in close custody by her side the whole 
 evening. '^ To tell you the twooth too, Wal- 
 ter," said my goodnatured schoolfellow, " I 
 wanted to talk to Anne. I like her yewj 
 much ; and that fellow fwom India is making 
 up to her wather too stwong." 
 
 With what profound contempt the guards- 
 man spoke of "that fellow from India!" It 
 was the sneer of the butterfly at the bee. 
 
 " To tell you the truth," in my turn, answered 
 I, ^^ I can't understand Anne Stanley at all ; 
 she would not speak to me all the evening."
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 19? 
 
 '^ Anne is a very cuwious gal," said Berkeley, 
 with the air of a philosophic Lovelace, " and 
 she dont't take a fancy to everybody; she did'nt 
 to me, at first. You will get on better with her 
 by-and-bye when you begin to understand 
 her." 
 
 " At first !" exclaimed I, rather nipped, for 
 this tone of superiority will put a saint out of 
 humour, " why I have known her nearly all 
 my life, and when I was a boy she used to 
 thrash me like a sack." 
 
 " Hooway !" cried the guardsman, " did she, 
 though ? Anne 's a capital gal ; I Hke her better 
 than any gal I know, she 's got so much pluck 
 and go about her." 
 
 ^^ Hush !" said I, 'Hiere comes the captain.'* 
 
 "And, by Jove!" added Harcourt, "there 
 goes Anne. What the dooce can they have 
 been about on the tewwace ? I shall watch 
 that fellow." 
 
 " Good night !" said Ireton, coming up to 
 join us, and taking out a cigar. 
 
 " What a glorious evening 1" exclaimed I, 
 looking up. 
 
 " It is a fine night," returned Ireton, uncon- 
 sciously modifying my remark.
 
 198 WALTER EVELYN; OR^ 
 
 " I shall go to bed/^ cried Berkeley, rudely. 
 " Come along, Evelyn." 
 
 Now I instinctively felt that Ireton was not 
 the sort of man with whom it was either 
 prudent or proper to act rudely, and wishing to 
 break the force of Harcourt's " cut direct," I 
 said I preferred remaining out a little longer. 
 
 " Well then, I shall say good night. Look 
 into my woom, Evelyn, before you turn in, 
 however ; I have something to say to you." 
 With which speech Harcourt threw away his 
 cigar, which, to say truth, did not always agree 
 with him, and lounged sulkily towards the 
 house. 
 
 " Your friend seems capricious, Mr. Evelyn,'^ 
 said Captain Ireton. 
 
 "Do you find him so?" answered I, dryly; 
 for, though unwilling to commit a rudeness, I 
 was not very anxious for a tete-a-tete with a 
 man I did not know, and who, it was plain to 
 perceive, had, from some reason or other, taken 
 a dislike to me. 
 
 Captain Ireton smoked his cigar for some 
 time in silence, and the pause became so awk- 
 ward, that I said, at last, with a half affected 
 shiver, " It is getting chilly, and I think I shall
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 199 
 
 follow Sir Harcourt ; so, good evening, Cap- 
 tain Ireton/' 
 
 " Will you allow me, Mr. Evelyn," returned 
 the soldier, gravely, " to have a few minutes^ 
 conversation with you ?" 
 
 " Certainly," said I, stiffly, and surprised to 
 my fingers' ends. 
 
 Captain Ireton smiled slightly. ^^ You may 
 have observed this evening," he said, '^that 
 Lady Anne Stanley has hardly behaved to you 
 with that cordiality that the old friendship, 
 which she tells me exists between you, might 
 warrant you to expect." 
 
 '' Lady Anne Stanley is mistress of her own 
 actions," I answered ; " and I do not see what 
 either you or I have to do with them.^^ 
 
 " And have you no idea of the reason of this 
 coldness ?" he continued, without heeding my 
 interruption, and going straight to his point as 
 if he was storming a battery. 
 
 " None whatever,'' I answered ; '' and, how- 
 ever I may feel pained by it, I can accuse my- 
 self of nothing to merit it; but I can still less 
 understand by what right you address me such 
 a question.^^ 
 
 " Simply at her request,^^ replied the soldier.
 
 200 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 " But surely she could speak to me herself?" 
 
 " She could/^ he answered, " but she would 
 not, so I did. The truth is, Mr. Evelyn, I 
 learn that Lord Winnington is your guardian, 
 that you are a man of large fortune, and finally, 
 that it is intended by her family that you and 
 Lady Anne Stanley should some day be mar- 
 ried/' 
 
 ^^ I know nothing whatever of any such in- 
 tention,'' said I, " and your addressing me upon 
 it is—'' 
 
 " Stay, Mr. Evelyn," returned the soldier, 
 '^ do not say any thing which I should be 
 obliged to notice in a hostile manner. It is far 
 from my intention to offend you. Enough that 
 you know nothing of such an intention. It 
 could never be realized, for the best possible 
 reason, that Lady Anne Stanley is betrothed 
 to me." 
 
 " Well," I answered, " Lady Anne was free 
 to choose, and — and I am glad she has chosen 
 worthily," I added, with an effort. 
 
 ^^ Thank you. Sir," returned Captain Ireton, 
 stretching out his hand, "and now I hope we 
 shall be friends. There has been a little mis-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 201 
 
 understanding, and Anne is self-willed, — I am 
 glad I spoke so frankly/' 
 
 " Are Lord and Lady Winnington aware of 
 your intentions?" I asked. 
 
 " Not yet/^ returned the captain, with the 
 only momentary hesitation I ever noticed in 
 his manner ; '* but I shall of course take care 
 to inform them. And to be frank," he added, 
 smiling, " it was only half an hour ago that I 
 was in a position to do so.^' 
 
 '^ And do you wish me to remain silent on 
 this subject?^' I asked. 
 
 " Till the arrival of Lord Winnington," re- 
 turned the soldier. 
 
 K 5
 
 202 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 My mother pressed me sair, my father did na speak, 
 But he looked in my face as though his heart would break : 
 So they ga'ed him my hand, though my heart was on the sea, 
 And Auld Robin Grey was guid man to me. 
 
 Every trace of coldness had disappeared 
 from Anne's manner the next mornings when 
 she met me at breakfast. Her eyes had lost 
 that rebellious and indignant look of the eve- 
 ning before, and we quite renewed our old 
 alliance. Poor Anne ! she felt quite relieved in 
 having a confidant, and told me the little his- 
 tory of her love, and almost all that had hap- 
 pened to her of one kind and another since our 
 last meeting, as I stood beside her, in what had 
 once been her school-room, turning over the 
 leaves of her music, and pretending to listen to
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 203 
 
 half a dozen antediluvian airs, which she sat 
 absently thrumming upon a cracked and jaded 
 old piano she used to practise on. 
 
 " And now, Wat," said she, when she had 
 brought her story to an end, " how shall I 
 behave?'^ 
 
 " I would speak to mamma at once," re- 
 turned I, " if I were you." 
 
 The girl's face darkened. '* Do you know, 
 Walter, the said mamma has frightened me 
 sometimes lately ; I cannot understand her. I 
 know she would like us to be married, that is, 
 you and me ; but why should she insist upon 
 it so earnestly? Then she never seems to 
 dream of any objection on my part; and you 
 know, Wat, I have always looked upon you 
 like a brother, and don't think I could have 
 married you if I had tried." 
 
 " Very flattering," said L. 
 
 " Don't be so silly, now," laughed Lady Anne. 
 ^* It is, perhaps, because you are such a dear good 
 fellow, and we were always so happy together, 
 that I never thought of you as a husband, and, 
 do you know, I fancied it would be like taking 
 you in." 
 
 " What on earth do you mean, Anne ?" said I.
 
 204 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 '' Why — there — I don't know exactly what I 
 mean ; but you are so rich, and mamma tells 
 me I have nothing at all, and that is why I was 
 to have married you ; which I cannot under- 
 stand, Wat, and never could/' 
 
 " And are you very fond of Captain Ireton }" 
 asked I, to turn the subject. 
 
 "Yes I am, Wat,^' she answered, simply, 
 " so fond of him, that I should never be happy 
 again if we were to be separated ; and he loves 
 me too, Wat, though I am not worthy of him, 
 and neither of us have ever loved any body 
 before, or ever will again," She spoke so 
 simply, and looked so truthful, as it was her 
 fine frank nature to be, that it was impossible 
 to doubt the truth of what she said, and I be- 
 lieved it then, as, unhappily, I believe it now. 
 
 " Be advised, dear Anne," said I ; " it will be 
 better to tell your mamma openly.^' 
 
 " But, Wat, dear Wat, mamma frightens me, 
 she is so grave and sadly earnest when she 
 speaks of you, and seems to have such a pur- 
 pose in what she says about you. It was only 
 just now, when she met me in the hall after 
 breakfast, she called me to her, and kissing me 
 on the forehead, said, ^ I am very much pleased
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 205 
 
 with yoUj this morning, dear Annie ; you will 
 V be very happy with him ; a kinder hearted, 
 better gentleman than Walter Evelyn never 
 came into a drawing room.' Now, you know, 
 I know that very well, dear Wat, but that is no 
 reason why we should be married.'^ 
 
 " And then," continued Lady Anne, after a 
 moment's pause, " she saw in a moment I was 
 not kind to you last night, for you know I was 
 determined to have it out at once, and told 
 Ralph to speak to you, for I could not bear to 
 see you looking at me as if so hurt and surprised. 
 Well, when I got up in my room, to go to bed, 
 mamma came in, and she was very pale and 
 trembled a little; ^ Annie,' she said, 'I am 
 come in to talk to you while you go to sleep. 
 I do not feel disposed to go to bed myself.' So 
 she sat down by my bed side and began play- 
 ing with my hand very tenderly, and I felt that 
 she was crying. 
 
 " Mamma, dear mamma,'' I asked, " what is 
 the matter ? it breaks my heart to see you so 
 unhappy." 
 
 "It is nothing, my darUng,'"' she said ; " the 
 air is oppressive, I think, and my nerves are a
 
 206 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 little unstrung ; besides, you know, I am 
 getting an old woman." 
 
 " My dear, beautiful mamma,'' said I, '" I 
 will not hear you talk so ; for you know 
 mamma is not at all old, is she now ?'' 
 
 " No,'' said I, and indeed it was the case ; 
 Time seemed to have dealt lightly indeed with 
 the lovely face and form of the Countess of 
 Winnington. 
 
 ^' Well, Wat,'' continued Anne, " I put my 
 arms round her neck, and tried to soothe her, 
 till she fairly laid her head down on my pillow, 
 and we both cried together for perhaps half an 
 hour. Dear mamma, said I, when she grew a 
 little calmer, and as I spoke I tried to warm her 
 hand, which was icy cold, do tell me what 
 is the matter ; has any thing happened to 
 papa ?" 
 
 ^^No, my love," she said, trying to smile, 
 "no, that is, not now, but I fear long 
 ago something happened, which makes me 
 hope that you will try and love Walter 
 Evelyn/' 
 
 '^ Dear mamma," I answered, " but I always 
 did love him, only I cannot, cannot marry him.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 207 
 
 It is quite a different feeling I have for Wal- 
 ter.'^ 
 
 ^^ Why will you not try to change your opi- 
 nion of him?" answered mamma, "promise me 
 you will, love ; it would make me so happy." 
 
 " Dear mamma, I began, and I was just 
 going to tell her about Ralph at once, when she 
 stopped me. ' We will jiot talk any more 
 about it to night, Annie,^ said she, ' but I am 
 sure Walter would make you very, very happy, 
 and you must promise me, at least, not to treat 
 him so coldly and unkindly. I saw he looked 
 quite unhappy about it all the evening;' and 
 then she kissed me and bade me good night. 
 And now, dear Wat, you know all about it. 
 I ought not to have told you ; but I have no 
 one else to confide in," added the young girl 
 sadly, " and no one to give me any advice.'' 
 
 " I confess to you," I answered, " that I do 
 not understand it all any better than you do, 
 Anne. Perhaps mamma judges too kindly of 
 me, and, not knowing of your feelings towards 
 Captain Ireton, wishes to see you happy and 
 settled. That must be all ; and in any case tell 
 her, Anne, tell her frankly, what you have told
 
 208 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 Our conversation was here broken off by the 
 entrance of Captain Ireton, who advanced to- 
 wards me with great cordiaUty, and in his usual 
 way came to what he had to say with military 
 brevity. 
 
 ^' I am glad to be able to release you from 
 your promise of secrecy about Anne and me," 
 said he, " for I hate secrecy myself, and I believe 
 it to be irksome to the feelings of any gentle- 
 man/' 
 
 " Is my Lord arrived, then ?'' asked I, with a 
 sort of presentiment that something unpleasant 
 was to follow, which pained me while looking 
 at the frank open face of the soldier. 
 
 ^^ Not come," repUed Captain Ireton, " but 
 coming. A courier has just arrived to say he 
 will be here at three o'clock this afternoon." 
 (Lord Winnington could not even return to his 
 own house like a common man, but must have 
 couriers and telegraphs and all manners of fuss 
 to announce his arrival.) '^ I need scarcely 
 add,^' continued the Captain, '^ that I shall 
 speak to him at once, and that I hold you ab- 
 solved from your promise of last night.^* 
 
 Anne looked at him so admiringly, with all 
 her girlish loving heart beaming from her eyes.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 209 
 
 Their affection seemed such a very simple, 
 earnest affair, so unlike the sickly dream of too 
 much youth and reading, which usually haunts 
 the heads of silly cornets and sweet seventeen, 
 that I wished him success with all my heart. 
 I was not at that time, in spite of my precocity 
 and French experience, either old enough or 
 wise enough to think much of their worldly 
 prospects, the absolute ease of which always 
 forms a very large ingredient in the permanent 
 happiness of married life. But at this distance 
 of time, even looking back on that young, 
 hopeful pair, I do not see why his suit should 
 not have prospered, and their marriage have 
 been followed by as much content as can ever 
 be hoped for in hfe. He was young, and on 
 the highway to the great fame and fortunes he 
 afterwards attained. He was a captain attached 
 to the staff of a general in India, and his pay 
 and allowances could have been little short of 
 a thousand a year, with every prospect of 
 speedy increase. His orderly, soldierly habits, 
 too, had enabled him already to save some 
 money; quite enough to have paid their passage 
 out and established them as befits the house- 
 hold of a man who marries a peer's daughter.
 
 210 WALTER EVELYN; OR^ 
 
 for whom quarters in barracks and a soldier 
 servant will never do. Then Lady Anne her- 
 self had the usual fortune of a daughter of a 
 noble house secured to her under her mother's 
 settlement; some five or ten thousand pounds^ 
 I do not remember which. Upon the whole^ 
 therefore, few young people could have had a 
 better prospect of worldly happiness^ if not 
 positively mad about operas and race-horses, 
 routs, and milliners^ bills ; if they had good 
 sense enough to be able to breathe pure air 
 elsewhere than in Grosvenoria, and believed at 
 all in the touching proverb which speaks of the 
 " feast where love is/^ 
 
 Few girls either were better fitted to be a 
 soldier's wife than Anne Stanley, who would 
 positively have enjoyed the roughing and ad- 
 venture of it, and few were more totally unfit 
 for the maudlin nonsense of what is called 
 fashionable life, as if in contradistinction to 
 reasonable life. A fine young woman, all high 
 health and elastic spirits, with no nonsense or 
 affectation about her, she seemed made to be 
 the mother of heroes, and to gird on her hus- 
 band's sword when he went forth to battle. 
 She would have been the very Providence of
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 211 
 
 an Indian soldier^s home, and would have be- 
 come as famous in a severe campaign as Lady 
 Sale or the Maid of Saragossa. All energy^ 
 youth, and good humour, she would have been 
 the life of the insipid society of India, idolized 
 by her husband^s comrades, toasted at every 
 mess table, and remembered kindly by every 
 common soldier upon his night watch for some 
 act of womanly goodness ; and she would have 
 been happy sharing in her husband^s successes, 
 wearing his laurels and rendering them worth 
 winning to him. Alas ! it is very seldom in- 
 deed that those who seem most fortunate in 
 life are among the happy. And certainly one 
 who afterwards became the greatest soldier 
 who ever drew his sword on the plains of 
 India, and who, before middle Hfe, became the 
 pride of his country, was little to be envied by 
 the poorest cadet, for the chill of loneliness and 
 disappointed affection was at his heart for 
 evermore. 
 
 We thought it best to leave Captain Ireton 
 alone, to have his interview with Lord Win- 
 nington, that, being the only guest left at home, 
 it might come about more naturally ; and so, 
 much to the satisfaction of the Countess (my
 
 212 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 heart smote me when I saw her smile), it was 
 arranged that Anne, Mr. Sinclair, and I, should 
 go for a ride together to visit a ruin in the 
 neighbourhood, which had interested the poet 
 from a description of it he had read in some 
 local history. I shall never forget that ride, 
 which was the last I ever took at Cleveland 
 park. It was a lovely afternoon. The sum- 
 mer seemed to be taking leave of us with a 
 smile, but "the breath of Winter came from far 
 away," and a pleasant northerly breeze rustled 
 about the elms, and the rich, ripening corn 
 lay upon the land, looking like fairy gold, 
 which had life in it, as the long yellow ears 
 danced in the sunshine, and the loud grass- 
 hopper went springing from stalk to stalk. 
 
 The poet was in his glory, for he liked us 
 both, and felt at his ease with us. How de- 
 lightfully he talked ! what fine old legends of 
 the county famihes he told us as we rode by 
 the noble country houses which are the pecu- 
 liar and most striking feature of an English 
 landscape ! Then he knew all the local tradi- 
 tions and bygone customs of the simple coun- 
 try folk, and was as learned and amusing as a 
 page of Strutt or Stow. His language was so
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 213 
 
 well chosen, so suited to his theme, he lighted 
 up so as he talked, and his plain countenance 
 grew so handsome in its noble expression of 
 intellect and high thought as he warmed with 
 the fire of his own genius, that one could hardly 
 fancy him the same Arthur Sinclair who came 
 shuffling into a drawing-room, looking all ways 
 at once, and piteously shifting about his awk- 
 ward hands, as if not knowing how to get rid of 
 them. 
 
 I could see that Anne was very much ex- 
 cited, as it was natural that she should be, and 
 I was glad the poet kept talking on, for we 
 were both in a humour that made excellent 
 listeners. 
 
 We prolonged our ride, therefore, rather 
 more than was necessary, for none of us cared 
 to return, the poet being fascinated with his 
 subject, and busy wandering in dreamland, 
 while Anne was growing sick with anxiety, yet 
 feared to clear up her doubts. For my part, I 
 could have enjoyed that lovely summer day, 
 and listened to the spell of the gifted poet's 
 words till now, and I had a kind of foreknow- 
 ledge that poor Annie was going home to cold 
 news. At length, however, the wise little clock
 
 214 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 of a village church striking the hour in quite a 
 remonstrative sort of way, warned us home, 
 and putting our horses into a canter, we heard 
 the clanging summons of the first dinner-bell 
 as we passed the lodge gates. Poor Annie, I 
 think I see her now, the rosy colour of her 
 cheeks had faded to an ashy paleness, her eye 
 burnt with a feverish fire, and her lips were 
 slightly parted to admit the breath which came 
 quicker and quicker. 
 
 A postchaise stood before the door ready 
 packed, and with the boys mounted ; and a 
 quick spasm passed over Anne's face as her 
 keen eye had read long before mine the name 
 painted in large white letters upon the trunks 
 which were fastened behind. It was that of 
 " Captain R. Ireton, — th regiment;" and the 
 next moment she fell fainting from her horse. 
 
 We were down and at her side in a moment, 
 and as Arthur Sinclair stood beside her, and I, 
 sunk on one knee, supported her head, while 
 the hue of death was upon her face, and her 
 long hair fell in wild disarray about her shoul- 
 ders, the postchaise drove by us. 
 
 It contained but one traveller, a young man 
 in an undress military uniform, and he never
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 215 
 
 held up his head as he passed. He sat with 
 folded arms, like a man of iron, looking straight 
 forward, but seeing, feeling nothing ; and the 
 face of the soldier was terribly stern. 
 
 '^ Ah ! ^' said the poet, who I fancied had not 
 even guessed at what had been passing during 
 his stay at Cleveland, " ah ! I thought so, and 
 I have been trying to keep up her spirits all 
 the afternoon, though I saw it was of little use. 
 Thus end the dreams of young hearts. Why, 
 why is life so sad ?" 
 
 It was a joyless dinner that day at Cleve- 
 land, though the master of the feast presided 
 for the first time for long months at his 
 own table. Lady Winnington kept her room, 
 and the arrival of a physician from the county 
 town, and the hushed steps of the servants 
 about the house, seemed to announce that 
 Lady Anne must be very ill indeed. Yet there 
 sat that debauched man over his wine, long after 
 dinner, relating obscene stories, culled from the 
 side-scenes of the opera, and glorying in the 
 sins of his youth. Not one sigh for his wife, 
 who sat wringing her hands over his broken- 
 hearted daughter, passed his lips, bloated and 
 livid with excess. A profound expression of
 
 216 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 disgust shadowed the face of Arthur Sinclair as 
 he announced his departure for the following 
 day, and gave a cold ear to his host ; and what 
 I felt is so mixed up and mingled with the 
 greater contempt and abhorrence I had for 
 my guardian afterwards, that I do not trust 
 myself to dwell upon it now. 
 
 Strange to say, Lord Winnington seemed 
 anxious, however, to get rid of me, and treated 
 me with marked rudeness ; and, although I 
 knew there was but scant liking between us, I 
 felt rather surprised at this after Lady Anne^s 
 confidence of the preceding day. I had little 
 wish, though, to stay, and determined to take 
 my departure on the following morning, and 
 share the postchaise of Mr. Sinclair, who was 
 also going on a visit to General Howard. 
 
 In the night, I remember there was a great 
 commotion and hurrying to and fro of foot- 
 steps. Cleveland was a sad house next morn- 
 ing, for the Earl had been seized in the night 
 by a stroke of apoplexy, brought on by ex- 
 cesses, and, when dear Lady Winnington ap- 
 peared to take leave of us, she looked ten years 
 older than on the previous morning. I would 
 willingly have remained if I could have been
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 2l7 
 
 any comfort to her, but she also seemed re- 
 lieved by my going away ; so, taking an affec- 
 tionate farewell of her, and exchanging a warm 
 grasp of the hand with Sir Harcourt Berkeley, 
 who stayed behind, the poet and I were soon 
 upon the road. 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 218 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 I'd be thy true lover, dearest, 
 Could'st thou smile on me. 
 
 A PLAIN English gentleman's country house 
 — there is positive music in the words ; and 
 such was The Lodge where the Howards lived. 
 Passing Marsden Court, the gloomy deserted 
 pile which belonged to me, we hastened on- 
 wards, and, just as the afternoon shadows were 
 lengthening into those fantastic shapes which 
 seem to make sport for the sunshine, we 
 stopped at the low porch of the kind-hearted 
 GeneraPs comfortable house, 
 
 '^ Well, gentlemen, Mr. Sinclair and Mr. 
 Waiter, glad to see you in my humble dwelling. 
 I dare say we shall be able to find some place
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 219 
 
 to put you, though my brother and his son 
 are here. But why did you not come sooner, 
 we have had dinner thes3 two hours.'' 
 
 This was rather a blank announcement for 
 travellers till the General continued : — 
 
 " Mary (that's my wife as you know) have 
 something got ready for tea. I dare say Mr. 
 Sinclair and young Walter here are hungry. 
 They have had a long drive." (Then turning to 
 us) ^'- How did you leave those grand folks at 
 Cleveland?" 
 
 We told our cold news as briefly as 
 possible, and the kind old soldier, who had 
 not a single squeeze of lemon in his whole 
 nature, looked touched. 
 
 " I am sorry for poor Lady Winnington and 
 Anne, who is a good girl, a very good girl, and, 
 though my Lord is no friend of mine, for 
 he once tried to do me a great injury, and, I 
 believe, behaved ill to my brother, it is a sad 
 thing his being taken ill too at such a time. 
 By the way. Captain Ireton, of the — th, who 
 was one of your party, has just written to 
 refuse an appointment I had offered him on 
 my staff if I go out to Malta, as I suppose I 
 shall, and he tells me he is going back to India 
 L 2
 
 220 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 again immediately. He is a fine soldier, and 
 will do well there/' 
 
 We felt little inclination to prolong the 
 conversation, for I felt that as matters had 
 turned out it would be indelicate to betray the 
 confidence the lovers had reposed in me, and 
 Sinclair, of course, had no right to allude to 
 facts which, after all, were only conjectured by 
 him ; so we changed the subject by asking 
 after Emily. 
 
 " My daughter is very well, very well, thank 
 you, Walter," said General Howard with a sly 
 look at Mr. Sinclair, that told me I was 
 marked out as special game during my visit to 
 the Lodge ; " she is gone for a walk with her 
 uncle and my nephew William, who has taken 
 it into his head that he would like to go into 
 the Austrian service." 
 
 "The Austrian service V quoth Mr. Sinclair, 
 '^ that is a bad business.'' 
 
 " I don't know," answered the General; "it 
 is a fine service, too. They turn out very good 
 soldiers ; I believe Englishmen are very well 
 looked upon, too, and tolerably certain of pro- 
 motion if they behave well. I have one or 
 two relations in it who have got on capitally."
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 22l 
 
 Mr. Sinclair shook his head. "I thouorht 
 
 o 
 
 my godson William was going into the Church/^ 
 said he, " and I had some ideas of my own 
 about him." 
 
 " Were you going to give him your living ? '^ 
 asked the General bluntly. ^^ Well I must 
 speak to his father about that, and, to tell you 
 the truth, my brother would rather William 
 would do any thing else. But he is a head- 
 strong lad, as I was, myself, at his age. Here 
 they are, however, coming across the lawn, I 
 see, so you can talk to them yourself." 
 
 William Howard, who entered a moment 
 after with his father and Emily, was a fine, 
 tall, fair young man, whose countenance and 
 bearing would have stamped him as an 
 Englishman all the world over. It was the 
 countenance, however, of an Englishman of 
 the higher order, and not of the ruddy-faced 
 lad with flaxen hair and laughing eyes, who is 
 generally supposed most likely to be captivated 
 with the pomp and circumstance of a military 
 life. He had rather the air of some Highland 
 chief, bold, adventurous, and ambitious, but 
 with a wild poetry of feeling, and intellect of a 
 rare order. In middle life he was, perhaps.
 
 222 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 destined to ripen into a famous soldier, and a 
 glance would tell you that, whatever career he 
 might choose, he was not likely to remain long 
 in a subordinate post in it. But, at present, 
 there was something which augured ill for the 
 commencement of his fortunes. There was an 
 unsettled look about him, a want of steadiness 
 in every thing he did or said, which might 
 have made a Scotchman think he had a bee in 
 his bonnet. His ideas were hopelessly wrong 
 on most subjects, but he had a way of de- 
 fending his opinions with an acuteness and 
 power of reasoning, which startled common 
 people, and, though they knew he was not 
 right, they were silenced in no time. He had 
 a habit I have often remarked in young men 
 of superior intellect, who have not yet learned 
 the necessity of respecting the world's opinion 
 — it was that of setting himself totally above 
 all the usual considerations which influence 
 ordinary people, and talking of himself as if he 
 were a third person, and the representative of 
 some mere abstract idea. His mind had too 
 many sides to it, and he could never bring 
 himself to decide firmly upon any subject 
 because his acute hair-splitting habit of reason-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 223 
 
 ing told him how much was to be said on both 
 sides. Then his imagination was stronger 
 than usually coincides with absolute mental 
 health. He idealized everything. Like the 
 Practical Man in the farce^ he always jumped 
 high and wide over means, and saw nothing 
 but ends. When any proposition was made 
 to him, he seized its advantages at once, and 
 exaggerated them after his own manner. He 
 saw not what would be in life, but what 
 might be. 
 
 "Suppose a man enters the army at seven- 
 teen,'' he would say, — "that's just my age, 
 though I leave myself out of the question, — 
 well, with anything like luck or active service 
 he is a captain at two-and-twenty, or say 
 twenty-five, a major at thirty, and then he goes 
 by seniority, and may reasonably hope to die a 
 general, grand cross. Sic. ; while, if he enters 
 the Church, there he is — a fixture for fife, a 
 curate on fifty pounds a year for ever ; or, if 
 he is lucky, he may get a hundred, and there 
 is an end of him." 
 
 Supposing, however, he was in the humour 
 to take a different view of the question, he 
 would assure you gravely that some celebrated
 
 22.4 WALTER EVELYX ; OR, 
 
 person whom he had read of had become a 
 bishop at twenty-two, and that there was once 
 a Pope of Rome a minor; but, he would add, 
 with an air of candour that used to make his 
 father and Mr. Sinclair smile, though it carried 
 absolute conviction to the mind of the General, 
 "But take more modern instances, there is the 
 
 Bishop of W and even the Archbishop of 
 
 B , they had no interest, nothing but their 
 
 own talents ; yet see, the one, not yet forty, has 
 become one of the great lights of the Church, 
 and the other promises some day to eclipse 
 him." 
 
 So he would go on. At the Bar he inva- 
 riably saw himself Lord Chancellor, and in 
 literature Sir Walter Scott, and it thus became 
 an uncertain question what course of life he 
 would eventually adopt. He would have made 
 an excellent soldier but for an indomitable 
 hankering after literature, and he might, per^ 
 haps, some day have rivalled even his great 
 model. Sir Walter, if any object could ever 
 have kept him to one subject for a whole hour, 
 or persuaded him to adopt a consecutive course 
 of reading. For the Church or the Bar, how- 
 ever, he was totally unfitted, having neither
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 225 
 
 the steadiness and self-denial required by the 
 one, or the application and obstinate study 
 necessary to succeed in the other. 
 
 To mere acquaintances William Howard 
 appeared a kind of Admirable Crichton^ and 
 there seemed nothing above or beneath his 
 ability. His art of making everything he read 
 his own, and his having read a page or two of 
 every book he had ever seen, made him appear 
 surprisingly informed upon an astonishing 
 variety of subjects ; and while you were won- 
 dering how in the world a lad of his age had 
 become acquainted with some dry argument of a 
 Saxon chronicler or witty aphorism of a French 
 moralist, he would startle you by turning a 
 kind of mental summerset, and giving you a 
 criticism on a modern novel that might have 
 come from the pen of A himself, and pro- 
 bably did, for Master William's favourite read- 
 ing was reviews ; they suited the natural impa- 
 tience of his mind for final results, and what 
 he read he remembered. Then he was a bold 
 and clever horseman, riding up to hounds 
 straight as the crow flies, an enthusiastic sports- 
 man, perfect in everything, from drawing a 
 badger to tickling a trout, and was equally at 
 L 5
 
 226 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 home in a conversation with Mr. Sinclair or 
 Will Smith, the gamekeeper. 
 
 Emily did not quite like him, or rather he 
 was always offending her, making wild love to 
 her one minute, and uttering wilder sarcasms 
 on all love the next; then he was a little bit 
 of a buffoon, his wit ran on too fast and 
 extreme in everything, he was always slashing 
 about right and left with his remarks, and 
 struck sometimes very hard in the wrong place. 
 Yet it was hardly possible to help liking him, 
 he was the most affectionate and obliging fellow 
 that ever did silly things. He would have 
 walked a score of miles in rough weather to do 
 any one a service, or even to please them, and 
 he was the most graceful rememberer of birth- 
 days and the little holidays of life I have ever 
 known. Vain himself, he was fond of pleasing 
 the vanity of others, and would serenade Emily 
 with his fine rich voice, and in verses of his 
 own, glowing with tenderness enough to set 
 fire to the hearts of all the boarding-schools in 
 Highgate ; and he had a pitched battle with 
 the gardener of a testy old West Indian settled 
 in the neighbourhood, because he would jump 
 over his wall to gather a pretty kind of wild
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 22/ 
 
 flower which grew near it for Emily, who 
 had a little bunch of them laid before her 
 at breakfast as surely as the morning came 
 round. 
 
 We got on very well altogether, and made 
 one of the pleasantest country parties possible. 
 We would go out in the morning, while the 
 General was reading his newspapers or arranging 
 the many preparations for his departure to his 
 new command, which was to take place in the 
 autumn, and sit down under the shadow of 
 some glorious old English oak-tree, and live 
 away the whole morning in cloud-land. It 
 might have been a pretty picture to see Emily 
 and me seated on the short velvet grass, she 
 with her work-basket, and I watching the rapid 
 motions of her white little fingers from under 
 the shadow of an enormous straw hat. Above 
 us sat Mr. Sinclair on a camp-stool, and 
 leaning on a stout stick, with a pleased, 
 thoughtful look which made you better to feel 
 was watching you 3 and beside us was William, 
 supporting himself gracefully against a tree, 
 and reading from some book, the very king of 
 his company. 
 
 I do not know how it was that about this
 
 228 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 time a coldness grew up between Emily and 
 me. She never seemed quite at her ease when 
 we were alone, and, if it ever chanced by acci- 
 dent, she always took some opportunity of 
 leaving me. Then she seldom spoke to me, 
 and when she did it was with a kind of reserve 
 foreign to her character, while she would talk 
 and laugh with Mr. Sinclair, or even William, 
 for hours, the very soul of cheerful good hu- 
 mour and innocent gaiety. I thought too I 
 perceived a growing affection between her and 
 the poet; and, though if any one had hinted 
 such a thing to me a month previously as 
 probable I should have laughed the idea to 
 scorn, I had since seen too much of his gentle 
 winning manners, and the rich stores of his 
 mind, to doubt that even a young girl like 
 Emily might love him very dearly. With a 
 bitter sigh enough, therefore, I resigned myself 
 to the belief that she actually did so. In- 
 deed she never seemed happy away from him, 
 and was always at work to make him some 
 playful little present, which he used to receive 
 with great delight; and at last, from his pretty 
 little silk watch-chain to his wrist-mittens for 
 the coming winter and the initials on his large
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 22.9 
 
 yellow silk pocket-handkerchiefs, he was made 
 quite a dandy by her handiwork. This, indeed, 
 soon grew into a species of barter ; for Arthur 
 Sinclair was enormously rich, and scarcely a 
 mail arrived without bringing some pretty orna- 
 ment for Emily, of which she could not even 
 have guessed the cost; and at last she ev^en 
 asked for his |)icture : and I never knew how 
 handsome the poet was till a beautiful minia- 
 ture, taken some years previously by Chalon, 
 arrived from his place in Scotland, and he 
 handed it to her, much affected, one morning, 
 as we took our old places under the oak tree. 
 
 " It was done for my poor mother," said he, 
 with a slight tremor in his voice ; " and I 
 would not have given it to any one in the world 
 besides." 
 
 " 1 shall be very proud of it," answered 
 Emily, with tears in her eyes, " and will wear 
 it always round my neck." 
 
 "Nay," answered the poet, gracefully, "I 
 have not condemned you to that, Emily, for 
 here is a new setting I have had made for it, 
 so as to make a bracelet, a brooch, or a sash- 
 buckle for you ; and, what is better, I shall be 
 hidden, and you need not show me unless vou
 
 230 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 like. See, this false back makes a pretty 
 enamel." 
 
 " I will never wear it so/^ said Emily. 
 
 "Dear Emily/' said I, miable to bear this 
 conversation, " I have been thinking of going 
 abroad again. My mother writes to me to 
 return to Paris ; and then — then I think I shall 
 travel, for some years perhaps.'' 
 
 " You will do well," said Mr. Sinclair ; " all 
 young men destined to play a great part in life, 
 as I trust you are, should see and understand 
 foreign countries before they settle down in 
 their own. It removes all sorts of narrow- 
 minded prejudices." 
 
 Emily did not answer me at first; and, 
 though it might have been fancy, I thought 
 she grew strangely paler. After a short pause 
 she said, however, ^* We shall be sorry to lose 
 you, Walter." 
 
 The poet smiled — a smile I did not under- 
 stand ; for my heart was blind with sorrow, 
 and a kind of cloud was over me. " I am 
 thinking too of going abroad ere long," said he ; 
 " and, as the General and I have been laying 
 our heads together, and getting up a very pretty 
 little plan in which Emily is to play a great
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 231 
 
 part, who knows but what we may all meet 
 again on the great wall of China ? '* 
 
 ^^ Well, I hope you won't forget me in going 
 through Hungary!" exclaimed William; "I 
 hear all the Austrian cavalry regiments nearly 
 are quartered in Hungary. Perhaps I shall be 
 a captain, too, by that time, and will have the 
 band to play under your windows, after the 
 manner of the Germans." 
 
 " So, then, you have not given up your plan, 
 Will?'' asked Mr. Sinclair. 
 
 " Given it up ! I should think not, indeed. 
 It is much better to be a count and a general 
 in j^e Austrian service than to finish as a half- 
 pay captain in ours. Besides, I cannot get 
 even a commission; and if I could my father 
 cannot give me enough to live on in our cavalry, 
 and I hate infantry. The French say an 
 infantry officer always gives you omelette and 
 rum for dinner." 
 
 " But, by the way, Will, you will want an 
 allowance in the Austrian service ; a cadet 
 does not get more than eight pounds a year." 
 
 " Oh, yes, a cadet, I know, doesn't ; but of 
 course I shan't be a cadet more than a week 
 or two ; perhaps not at all ; and the allowance
 
 232 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 wanted by an officer is only sixty pounds a 
 year, with about fifty pounds for an outfit." 
 
 " I believe, Will/^ said Mr. Sinclair, gravely, 
 "you will find things there rather different to 
 what you think them. I am told that young 
 men who have not had an education at one of 
 the regular Austrian military schools often 
 remain cadets for ten or twelve years ; and 
 that those who by some back-stairs influence 
 are made officers at once do not turn out 
 such good soldiers as those who work their 
 way.'^ 
 
 " Oh, no, of course not; and I am perfectly 
 willing to work my way/^ returned the lad ; 
 "but then there is so much humbug in all 
 professions that what one has to learn is really 
 very little.'^ 
 
 "A bad princi])le to work on, Will," retorted 
 Mr. Sinclair. " There are indeed a good many 
 forms in all professions, which those who do 
 not understand them are apt to call humbug ; 
 but 1 would have you be cautious in viewing 
 them in that light. These forms are very useful 
 things. Try to learn any profession you take 
 to as it is understood by the m.en who have 
 been most eminent in it. But I still hope we
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 233 
 
 shall persuade you to give up the Austrian 
 scheme/^ 
 
 " Why, sir," answered the youth, " would 
 you have me dream away my life in idleness 
 here when I may win distinction and high 
 name far away ? In England every career is 
 choked up/' 
 
 ^^ Stay, Will, not so much as in x\u stria, be- 
 lieve me,'' interrupted Mr. Sinclair; "besides, 
 what is the fame you are running after, even 
 if most successful — a name in a foreign service, 
 an unconsidered title, and a few bits of rib- 
 bon, in exchange for hberty and the name of 
 Englishman."' 
 
 " It is," answered William Howard, with a 
 restless and kindling eye, " the fame which 
 men have envied and ladies smiled on since 
 the world began, and the blood now burning 
 in my veins is that which has ever kindled the 
 hearts of heroes. What I seek is something 
 out of the dull routine of ordinary life ; the 
 companionship of the brave and adventurous ; 
 a wedding with the saddle and the sword, 
 with all the world has yet left of romance and 
 chivalry. Besides, an xlustrian ofl&cer in Hun-
 
 234 WALTER EVELYN; OB, 
 
 gary is a great man ; though poor^ his wants 
 are few, and he has enough to supply them ; 
 though but a subaltern, he is the companion of 
 princes and nobles, and welcome in every hall 
 and bower throughout the land. Here, I am 
 nothing/' 
 
 " You defend your choice eloquently, but 
 you do not convince me. Will," said Mr. Sin- 
 clair. "Think again about it. A mercenary 
 soldier in the ranks of a foreign sovereign, who 
 may some day stand in arms against his native 
 land, is, to my thinking, no hero.'' 
 
 " I would never fight against England," said 
 William Howard. 
 
 "Then you might have to give up your 
 career when it promised best ; though I hear 
 that generously and wisely in the numerous 
 nations that give their quota to the Austrian 
 army, troops are never sent in arms agains^ 
 their own native land.'' 
 
 *' As for being mercenary," said the young 
 man, '' I would give up all prospect of pay ; 
 I ask for the renown of the soldier, not his 
 spoil." 
 
 " You can take the one with the other,
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 235 
 
 without shame/* replied Mr. Sinclair. " Few 
 have a better title to their scanty allowances 
 than soldiers ; and the reward of hard service 
 stains no man^s hand.^' 
 
 "Then, after all, yoa acknowledge my choice 
 to be at least a noble one, worthy of a gentle- 
 man and a Howard ? " 
 
 "There is certainly no disgrace in it," re- 
 turned the poet ; " it is simply wild and im- 
 prudent. You will regret it sadly enough at 
 my age, and with your abilities." 
 
 " Now that is just what I think I shall not," 
 returned the youth. " To wear my life away 
 as I should be obliged to do in England, and 
 to grow into an old man who has done nothing, 
 would make an idiot of me. The very thought 
 sends a chill over me." 
 
 " You would never do that,'^ said Mr. Sin- 
 clair, looking kindly at the impetuous and high- 
 couraged youth before him. 
 
 " I never will do it, sir,'^ answered he ; " and 
 so I am going into the Austrian service, where 
 my own right arm, and a stout heart, may win 
 for me — 
 
 High place in royal court, 
 High place in battled line."
 
 236 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 " And/' replied the poet, continuing the 
 quotation with a doubting smile, — 
 
 " Where beauty sees the brave resort, 
 The honoured meed be thine." 
 
 " Well ! well ! we shall see."
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 23', 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 SoufFrir est le partage de la vie." 
 
 Madame de Genlis. 
 
 1 RENEWED my boyish friendship with Mau- 
 rice Howard, who was almost constantly with 
 his brother during the time of our visit ; and 
 now I had grown old enough to understand 
 him better than I did in my childish days my 
 respectful and admiring affection for him be- 
 came every day stronger and stronger. It was 
 plain to me that he was unhappy, though I 
 could not divine why or how, — for it seemed 
 to my unthinking and boyish mind, so little 
 accustomed to consider the designs of Pro-
 
 238 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 vidence, that one who did so much good, and 
 whose life was hke a lesson to niankind, in the 
 moderation of wishes, and the practice of all 
 virtue, should, while blessing others, have been 
 also blessed. But some have their reward in 
 one way, and some in another ; and there are 
 those who are tried to the last, and whose 
 reward is not here. 
 
 Time had not dealt harshly with the recluse, 
 however, though his hair had grown grayer, 
 and his stoop more confirmed. There was no 
 discontent, none of the sternness of misery, 
 visible on that subdued, pensive face ; and it 
 was plain that, whatever might be the secret 
 sorrow that lay deep in his heart, its pain was 
 subdued by the peace which passeth all under- 
 standing, and which kept it evermore. 
 
 He did not like his son^s leaving him, and 
 he, perhaps, liked his errand still less ; but he 
 appeared to have made up his mind to it : so 
 that, when Mr. Sinclair spoke to him seriously 
 to endeavour to dissuade William from his 
 wild idea, and mentioned it simply as the fancy 
 of a lad captivated by the thoughts of a uni- 
 form ; when he kindly promised to give him 
 one of the best livings in England, and even
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 239 
 
 to bear the expense of his education up at the 
 university (for the Howards and St. Clairs 
 were near kinsmen), the scholar smiled sadly, 
 but said, " From his own experience, he feared 
 no Howard ought to choose any other life than 
 a soldier's.^^ 
 
 '' But you," answered Mr. Sinclair, '^ surely 
 you, ray dear Maurice, would scarcely have 
 done for the rough life of camps^ and the vulgar 
 pleasure of a mere grenadier; and, though I 
 know you were in the army for a little while, 
 agree with me that you retired in something 
 very like disgust from a profession so little 
 congenial to your tastes and habits.^' 
 
 The sad smile returned, rare as it was, and 
 Maurice Howard answered, ^- 1 retired, indeed ; 
 but perhaps it would have been better if I had 
 not. Trust me, Arthur, the Howards were 
 made for soldiers ; ^tis our vocation, Hal." 
 
 Everything he did was characterised by the 
 same utter disregard of himself. He had 
 schooled himself into that state of feeling, 
 which never thinks if a thing is agreeable, but 
 only if it ought to be, or is to be, and then 
 accepts it, come what will, without a murmur. 
 
 I grew gradually very much into his con-
 
 240 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 fidence, for, fancying Emily had taken a dislike 
 to me, I spent more time at the scholar's 
 cottage than at the Lodge; and we used to 
 take long rambles together in the summer 
 evenings. I was often surprised to notice his 
 clear knowledge of men and things on these 
 occasions, and how well he understood the 
 world he had quitted so long. 
 
 " Your uncle was quite right,^' he said to me 
 one day, " when he told you that you will do 
 well to enter the House of Commons early. 
 The sooner you get familiarized with the routine 
 of business the better ; but do not be carried 
 away by the vanity of making a brilliant maiden 
 speech, or, ten chances to one, you will fail. 
 Above all, too, speak absolutely, never without 
 fully understanding your subject, and without 
 having well considered what you are going to 
 say ; for it is much easier to create a reputa- 
 tion, than to regain a lost one.^^ 
 
 " I am afraid,^^ answered I, " my talent does 
 not lie in oratory ; and I shall never make a 
 good speaker. Once, when I wished to say 
 something after a dinner, on my birthday, my 
 tongue clave to the roof of my mouth, and not 
 a word would come.^'
 
 THE LONG MIxNORITY. 24 1 
 
 " Don^t be discouraged by that/' replied the 
 scholar ; " few young men speak even tolerably, 
 and nothing requires such long and frequent 
 practice, and such careful study, as good 
 oratory. Take every opportunity, however, 
 that presents itself to you of addressing an 
 audience ; and then, when you have got over 
 your embarrassment, as you soon will, the words 
 willcome easily enough; the only fear is of having 
 too many, and smothering your meaning in 
 them. Another thing I would strongly advise 
 you,^' continued he, " is, not to be led away by 
 friendships or family connections to join any 
 distinct party in politics, and so lose your 
 freedom of action. All men who adhere fixedly 
 to one set of ideas must sometimes be wrong ; 
 and you will not be for many years capable of 
 forming opinions that you may like to advocate 
 in after-life. A man who belongs to a party, 
 also, is sure to acquire narrow notions and class 
 prejudices, or, if he does not, will find himself 
 sometimes forced, by our odd code of political 
 consistency, to act with his friends when his 
 judgment tells him they are in the wrong, 
 while a perfectly independent Member of the 
 House of Commons has a noble part in life, if 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 242 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 he understands it well. Beware^ however, of 
 rushing into action, or taking up any par- 
 ticular class of grievances, and never let the 
 enthusiasm of your leader or followers carry 
 you farther in any direction than you wish 
 to go." 
 
 " Shall I keep Marsden Court/' said I, 
 " when I come of age ? It is terribly dilapi- 
 dated, a miserable place, and I have no affec- 
 tion for it. 
 
 " Yet keep it,'^ answered the scholar. " If 
 you mean to enter public life you will find that, 
 being a landed proprietor, and having a good 
 estate, will add a great deal to your influence, 
 and even to your utility ; but contrive, if you 
 can, not to be wholly dependent on your land 
 for your income. If you asked me as a mere 
 idler, I might answer you differently ; then, 
 money is better than land. Do not, however, 
 keep your estate one day longer than you can 
 do justice to all who live on it, for you would 
 be guilty of a great evil." 
 
 '^ I am wholly ignorant of what I shall have," 
 said I ; " my guardian has never spoken to me 
 about it." 
 
 " You will be very rich — ^very rich,'^ returned
 
 THE LONG MINORirV. 243 
 
 the scholar, musingly ; " Lord Walter Evelyn 
 must have left a great fortune ; he died just 
 after one of our most important conquests in 
 India, and, as he had already attained a high 
 rank in the service, and had a separate com- 
 mand, his share of prize-money was immense. 
 Poor Helen Lascelles ! the news of his intended 
 return home, and of his death, reached her by 
 the same mail. I believe I first took so strong 
 an interest in you for his sake, Walter, though 
 I learned only lately, and by accident, through 
 Lord Staunton, that I owed my first commis- 
 sion to his interest at the Horse Guards. He 
 was one of the most simple and pure-hearted men 
 I remember, in a time when I knew many.^^ 
 
 " I wonder how it was,^^ said I, recurring to 
 a thought that was constantly growing stronger, 
 as I knew my guardian better, " that my uncle 
 Walter and Lord Winnington ever became in- 
 timate with each other ? I should have thought 
 anything like friendship between two such men 
 was impossible. Or am I wrong ? is Lord Win- 
 nington, after all, only like the rest of the 
 world, and are my uncle and you, and some 
 others, the bright and rare exceptions ?'^ 
 
 The scholar's face moved painfully ; he 
 M 2
 
 244 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 stopped for a moment, and pressed his hand 
 tightly over his brows. 
 
 "Are you unwell?" said I; "for Heaven^s 
 sake, lean upon me, or let us rest a little.'' 
 
 "No,^' said he, recovering himself by a visi- 
 ble effort, and his face resumed its calm, sad 
 expression. "No, I am quite well again, it 
 was only a slight spasm ; but I had forgotten 
 that Lord Winnington was your guardian.^' 
 
 " Yes,^' said I ; "he has the absolute con- 
 trol of everything I am to have, and I shall be 
 glad when his rule is over, for I have a dislike 
 to him, of which I cannot get the better. Am 
 I unjust ? tell me, if you know him well, and I 
 will try to conquer it." 
 
 '^ I cannot judge Lord Winnington," an- 
 swered the recluse ; and I saw that he was still 
 very pale. 
 
 "You will not judge him,^' said I, " because 
 he once behaved ill to you. The General was 
 saying so the other day." 
 
 " Saying so ? saying what ? what did my 
 brother say ?" asked the recluse, violently 
 agitated. 
 
 " Simply, that he had heard Lord Winning- 
 ton had behaved ill to you."
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 245 
 
 " Was that all ?" returned Mr. Howard^ ob- 
 viously relieved. 
 
 "Yes, all," answered I; "although I am 
 quite sure, if there was any dispute between 
 you and hini he must have been in the wrongs 
 and not you ; for I am as sure he is a bad man 
 as I know you are a good one. Was it any- 
 thing serious ?" I continued, unconscious of the 
 wound I was probing. 
 
 " Walter !" replied the recluse, in an agitated 
 voice, " spare, spare me ;" and again he pressed 
 his hand upon his forehead, and I saw the large 
 drops of agony gather upon it. 
 
 " Forgive me,'^ said I, "my dear Mr. Howard! 
 I would not have distressed you for the world 
 if I had known that there was anything wrong- 
 er indelicate in my question ;" and I thought, 
 while looking upon the terrible anguish of the 
 good man, of a sentence I had lately read 
 somewhere, "That few men know all the ill 
 they do." It was evident that the distress of 
 the recluse was occasioned by some event in 
 which Lord Winnington must have been con- 
 cerned years and years ago ; and, remembering 
 the story I had heard of an unpleasant affair 
 with a young nobleman at Oxford, I imme-
 
 246 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 diately divined that Lord Wilmington must 
 have been the man who had thus shadowed 
 Maurice Howard's whole life ; and when I re- 
 flected how I had last seen my guardian, so 
 full of the world's honour — so loaded with the 
 good things of life, and then looked at the 
 scholar, whose shoes he was not worthy to 
 untie — thus bowed down with some sorrow in- 
 flicted by him — I felt inexpressibly touched 
 with the contrast. 
 
 I think it was about this time that I learned 
 the sad truth (partly from the confidence which 
 had grown up between us, and partly from 
 other circumstances), and the heavy load that 
 the patient scholar bore over his heart so nobly 
 and so uncom pleiningly; but it was not till year 
 afterwards that I understood how perfect must 
 that Christian charity have been which forbore 
 to speak evil of one who had wasted the hopes 
 of a whole life, and scattered its love and ambi- 
 tion to the winds. But as, in the course of my 
 story, I may not have another place to tell the 
 reader what I then learned, let me try to do so 
 now.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 24/ 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 " 'Tis saJ, 'tis sad to number o'er 
 The faces glad and gay 
 That we have known ; some smile no more 
 Around us, as they did of yore, 
 And some have turned away." 
 
 There was a brilliant dinner-table in Edin- 
 burgh, and the lawyers and the statesmen of 
 the land were gathered round it. The rising 
 talent of Brougham may have enlivened it, and 
 Jeffrey's light wit, and Scott's fund of anec- 
 dotes and rich fancy. These, and many more, 
 were making what is certainly the most beau- 
 tiful town in the world a modern Athens 
 indeed — the very centre of wit, hospitality, 
 and the highest order of intellectual society. 
 Among the guests, however, was a young 
 officer in a marching regiment, who was just
 
 248 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 married, yet who possessed nothing but his 
 sword, and the prestige of a name that had 
 been distinguished in the mihtary annals of 
 many generations, to push his fortunes. Though 
 bearing an English name, which had been 
 taken by the branch of the family to which he 
 belonged on their accession to some Enghsh 
 estates, he was both by birth and descent a 
 Scotchman — of the bold line of the old Mac- 
 gregors. I need scarcely add that it was him 
 whom the reader knows as Maurice Howard ; 
 and little did he think that that evening was 
 to decide the whole fortunes of his after-life. 
 
 The Scotchmen of a former generation were 
 extremely fond of literary discussion, and I do 
 not think they have lost much of their old 
 habit in our own. During dinner, therefore, a 
 discussion arose on the right construction to 
 be put upon a passage in Aristophanes which 
 had been used by one of them in a review; and 
 the opinions of those at table, every one of 
 whom was a scholar of high attainments, were 
 almost equally divided between two opposite 
 readings, each conveying a different sense. 
 Here was one of those opportunities by which 
 a man's fame is sometimes fixed for a lifetime ;
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 249 
 
 and the young soldier had the final honour of 
 settling the question, illustrating and support- 
 ing his opinion so modestly, yet so clearly, as 
 to put an end to all doubt upon the point. It 
 rather astonished the scholars, men who had 
 spent their lives in libraries and in poring over 
 books with a diligence to which none but 
 Scotchmen and Germans are equal, to be thus 
 set right by an officer in the army — a class of 
 men who at that time, brave and able as they 
 have always proved in the field, were often 
 painfully at a loss on subjects unconnected 
 with their profession. Many of them, there- 
 fore, subsequently paid great attention to the 
 young soldier ; and, as in Scotland the pro- 
 fession of arms has always yielded precedence 
 to the robe in public estimation, there were not 
 wanting kind and zealous friends to urge him 
 to abandon the army for the bar ; and happy 
 would it have been for Maurice Howard if 
 their advice had prevailed. He had fallen, 
 however, into a state of mind common enough 
 among young Scotchmen, and fancied he had a 
 call for the Church; his opinions being probably 
 strengthened in that direction by the pious and 
 excellent lady whom he had married. She was 
 M 5
 
 250 
 
 WALTER EV^ELYN ; OR^ 
 
 an Englishwoman, however, and her religious 
 tenets not being those of the Presbyterian 
 Church, combined with the fact that the 
 Howard family possessed the patronage of 
 several valuable livings, induced Maurice, after 
 a short hesitation, to dispose of his commis- 
 sion and enter himself as a Gentleman Com- 
 moner at one of the Halls at the University of 
 Oxford. 
 
 Here he speedily distinguished himself, as he 
 would have done anywhere, and prize after 
 prize rewarded his obstinate and well-directed 
 studies. Had he been unmarried he would 
 certainly have obtained a fellowship ; as it was, 
 he was sure of those high University honours 
 and subsequent preferment in the Church, which 
 never fail a man of high attainments who has 
 graduated at either of our noble Universities. 
 
 The position of an undergraduate, with a 
 v/ife and family, though not altogether un- 
 known, is uncoPiimon ; for men are too apt 
 to look on marriage as the grave of hope, and^ 
 sinking with many bitter repinings into slippers 
 and an easy chair, cease from struggling for 
 place and powder in the world, if they have not 
 alreadv attained it. Mrs. Howard however was
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 251 
 
 fortunately a woman of an ambitious and some- 
 what masculine mind, and instead of complain- 
 ing of the sacrifice of her dignity, and worrying 
 her husband over his lexicons and Euclid with 
 the petty details of household affairs, she 
 stimulated him with the noblest affection and 
 self-devotion in the race that he was running. 
 She never repined at the almost total loss of 
 society to which an undergraduate's wife is 
 condemned by the families of dons over-jealous 
 of their dignity ; and her heart was satisfied and 
 happy in the rich affection of her husband, who 
 loved her as men of rare intellects and gentle 
 hearts always do love their wives. She went 
 about her daily duties cheerful and contented 
 therefore ; instructed her children, to save the 
 expense of their schooling ; ordered dinner and 
 made tea in such peace and good order, that 
 Maurice Howard's home became a little para- 
 dise ; and, withdrawing him altogether from the 
 society of the other students, he became un- 
 questionably the first man of his year ; for 
 where others worked two or three hours a- day? 
 amid the fumes of tobacco and the harassing of 
 duns, he read gaily for sixteen at his open 
 window, cheered by the breath of flowers and
 
 252 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 the sound of loving voices, and lie kept no long 
 vacation. 
 
 Suddenly, however, very suddenly, the ma- 
 chine gave way. A slight pain at the heart, 
 arising probably from some shght indigestion 
 or working too soon after dinner, was the first 
 symptom, and (as all men of strong minds are 
 too apt to do) he paid no attention to it till his 
 illness increased so dangerously, as to force him 
 reluctantly to summons a doctor, and lay up. 
 Had he taken remedies only a few days sooner 
 he might have got quit for a little more exer- 
 cise, a ride in the morning and a walk in the 
 afternoon, with a journey to London, and a visit 
 to the theatres ; but he had gone on hoping to 
 get better every day, and despising the many 
 warnings of nature, till the machine came to a 
 dead stop, and masters and tutors heard with 
 dismay that the great scholar and kindly gen- 
 tleman, Maurice Howard, whom they looked 
 upon as about to confer the distinction of a 
 double-first on their hall, lay delirious, raving 
 about Greek roots and logical demonstrations. 
 
 Fortunately, however, this did not last long ; 
 the bow was strained, not broken; and after a 
 few days Maurice Howard might be seen seated
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 253 
 
 with his wife and children, listening to her 
 while she played and sang little simple airs to 
 him, and to the boisterous prattle of the 
 youngsters, as they sprawled over his knees 
 and invalid chair. This was succeeded by a 
 few attendances on the part of the local artist 
 in hair; and then his wife, half laughing, and 
 half crying, while her very heart was over- 
 flowing with love and pride, w^as enabled to 
 watch him as he mounted a hired hack, and 
 cantered oif to BuUington or Woodstock in 
 search of his lost health. The doctor, however, 
 obstinately forbade any renewal of the intimacy 
 between the scholar and his books for some 
 weeks. The very children ceased prattling 
 Latin (how they catch our ways !), and the 
 names of Homer and Euripides were no longer 
 heard among the simple family. After a few^ 
 weeks of this perfect cessation from study, the 
 doctor, who had been called in, seeing that 
 Howard was beginning to fret over his inac- 
 tivity, allowed him to resume his studies, but 
 concluded his permission with a very sensible 
 caution. 
 
 " If,^^ said he, " you persist in working too 
 hard, in spite of this warning, your health will
 
 254 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 certainly break down again ; and you will be 
 condemned to Italy and nursing for the rest of 
 your life. Limit yourself to eight hours^ study 
 a day ; it is enough for the strongest ; and if 
 you sit over your books longer you will not do 
 more, perhaps not so much ; employ the rest of 
 your time pleasantly. Go out, take exercise, 
 make little excursions, and, above all, spend 
 your evenings in society, that the brain may 
 not be over harassed when you go to bed. 
 For the rest, rise early, take a cold bath directly 
 you get up — it makes an immense difference to 
 the nervous system — and, if you do this, I think 
 1 can answer for you now, though you have had 
 a narrow escape/' 
 
 So Howard, with a groan, promised to com- 
 ply, and his wife determined that he should 
 do so. Every day, when the time allotted by 
 the doctor was expired, she took the scholar 
 into custody, and carried him out for a walk, 
 or he found his horse was at the door, " and as 
 it is hired by the hour, it must not be kept 
 waiting you know, my dear," would urge the 
 thoughtful little lady ; or the dinner was ready, 
 or the laughing mother and children came in 
 and swarmed over his books, and ran away with
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 255 
 
 his lexicon, or bandaged his eyes for a romp at 
 blind man's -buff. In short, Mrs. Howard was 
 determined that her husband should not have 
 to be waited on a second time by the local 
 artist in hair, though he was the best-mannered 
 tradesman, she used to say, she had ever seen, 
 wore a white cravat, and looked like the Dean 
 of Christchurch, only pleasanter. Perhaps, 
 dear reader, if you and I had had such an active 
 little nurse, we should not be plagued, as we 
 are, with chronic gout and dyspepsia. 
 
 I am now coming rapidly to the sad part of 
 the story. In pursuance of the physician's 
 advice that he should see society, Howard had 
 began gradually to ask some of his fellow 
 students to spend the evening with him, and 
 as his wife was a very accomplished musician 
 they gradually formed a little company of 
 similar tastes, and once or twice performed 
 little concerts which had even been attended 
 by the Principal, — the worthiest little man who 
 ever wore cap and gown. I do believe, not 
 only from what is about now to follow, but 
 from the experience of my whole life, that the 
 precipices down which we fall most fatally are 
 almost always covered with flowers ; and thus
 
 256 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 it happened that Maurice Howard's musical 
 parties were the source of the unhappiness 
 which darkened the remainder of his career. 
 
 It was the last term of his residence at the 
 University, and he was the pride and example 
 of the whole hall. The students who knew him 
 boasted of his acquaintance in their letters 
 home. He was the friend of the Principal and 
 tutors, who broke through all the rules of 
 college etiquette to pay him visits and receive 
 from him in turn. Since it had become known 
 that he was ordered to go into society, he was 
 invited to all their dinners and parties, and 
 already high preferment had been promised him, 
 since he could not obtain a fellowship. He was 
 sure of a double first, for all the examiners 
 knew him personally, and knew that modest as 
 he was he could have posed any of them. And 
 it was thus after three years of honourable and 
 successful toil, and on the very termination of 
 the labours that might have classed his name 
 with the great men of his age, that the blow 
 came. 
 
 Among the young men who entered at 
 Christchurch during Maurice's last term was 
 Lord Brandon, the son of the Earl of Winning-
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 257 
 
 ton, a nobleman who, as his son did after him, 
 had attained almost every honour in the country 
 without being worthy of any, and who had had, 
 by turns, everything that ministers could give 
 away. He was known to be poor ; for, though 
 young, he had quarrelled irreconcilably with 
 his father; but he maintained a lavish expense, 
 and, though a Tuft, the manner of his life was 
 such as to draw down the grave censure of the 
 Dean. Among all his tastes, his most inveterate 
 was that of fiddling. Low musicians, men of 
 talent whose disorders had reduced them to 
 beggary or toadyism, came down from London* 
 and were the constant companions of the young 
 noble; while some of the most beautiful ballad 
 airs we have were first presented to the world as 
 compositions of Lord Brandon, whose stolen 
 fame was certainly carried from bower to bower, 
 and from land to land, on the wings of that 
 Mercury who is fabled to have been the God 
 of Thieves ; for to whomsoever the music owed 
 its origin it was not to Lord Brandon, he 
 could not even have copied it correctly. 
 
 These airs, however, bore the undoubted 
 stamp of genius (for how much of the finest 
 runs wild away to ruin !) and ushered into the
 
 258 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 world as " the hours of idleness of a young 
 lord/^ the heir of an ancient title, and still at 
 college, — they instantaneously became popular. 
 Now it happened that the Principal's daughter, 
 a mature young lady of thirty- six, was as in- 
 veterate a tuft-hantress and as studious a reader 
 of the silly romances of the day as any who 
 could be found between Woodstock and Wal- 
 lingford. She was dying therefore to make the 
 acquaintance of Lord Brandon, doubting no- 
 thing that she should captivate him at first 
 sight if she could only accomplish an introduc- 
 tion. But how was it to be managed ? Her 
 father would not ask him, because he said he 
 was a disgrace to his college (''As if," she asked, 
 scornfully, " a lord could be a disgrace to any- 
 thing^'), and most of the stately old dons whose 
 houses she frequented, so far from thinking 
 about asking her hero to dinner, an honour 
 often vouchsafed to a Tuft, were seriously dis- 
 cussing his expulsion from the University 
 altogether. Unluckily, in her despair she 
 thought of Mrs. Howard and her musical 
 soirees ; there might be a means of effecting her 
 object if the young noble was really fond of 
 music; and who could doubt it, who heard the
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 259 
 
 airs he was daily giving to the world, sung 
 in every street, and ground on every barrel 
 organ ? 
 
 Armed, therefore, with a pile of his Lord- 
 ship's (save the mark !) newest compositions, 
 she marched down to the house of the fated 
 scholar, resolved to open her trenches and com- 
 mence the siege in form, unless the place was 
 to be carried by a coup de main. 
 
 " Oh, my dear Mrs. Howard ! '' cried the 
 enemy, in affected raptures ; " I have brought 
 you some such beautiful music/' 
 
 " You are very kind,^^ replied Mrs. Howard ; 
 " I am afraid all mine is sadly humdrum, and I 
 am almost tired of it." 
 
 '' Well, my dear, you won't be tired of this 
 very soon, for it is all composed by Lord Bran- 
 don, the young nobleman who has just entered 
 at Christchurch.'^ 
 
 '^ What, a student do you mean, dear ?" How 
 tender ladies are when they do not even care 
 two buttons about each other. 
 
 "Yes, to be sure; do you not know him, 
 dear?" 
 
 " It is an ancient title,^' said Howard, who, 
 like all Scotchmen, loved a lord.
 
 260 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 " Oh, yes, a very ancient title, and his father 
 is the Earl of Winnington, and I don't know 
 what besides. What strange people you are 
 not to ask him here of an evening/' 
 
 " Why, my dear, we do not even know him," 
 said Mrs. Howard. 
 
 " Oh, nonsense; you do not want to know 
 a fellow student. I will tell Mr. Sap you have 
 commissioned me to tell him to bring his Lord- 
 ship here to-morrow evening, and I am sure he 
 will be delighted.'' 
 
 " Well, my dear, if you really think so we 
 shall be very glad to see him," returned Mrs. 
 Howard, seeing, as ladies are apt to do, some 
 unknown prospect of advantage to her husband 
 in making the acquaintance of a lord. " But 
 remember it is your own proposal : / should 
 never have thought of it," added the prudent 
 little lady. 
 
 " Oh, yes, leave it to me, and I will see thai 
 Mr. Sap manages it all nicely." Poor Mr. Sap ! 
 He was one of the hall tutors, and not being 
 independent and wise enough to trust to his 
 own exertions, and follow the certain and re- 
 spectable career of those who hold fast to their 
 alma mater, was always hankering after Tufts
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 26"i 
 
 and toadying for livings, often long given away 
 two or three deep to the relations or other 
 dependents of those before whom he was con- 
 tented to degrade himself into a sycophant. 
 But he Avas one of those poor sneaking fellows 
 who always must be trying to curry fav^our with 
 somebody, and he was therefore in perfect sub- 
 jection and thraldom even to Miss Syntax, who 
 had nothing to give him but her withered hand 
 and thirty-six years in return, unless it was that 
 he now and then got an invitation to dine with 
 her father. 
 
 Our mature young lady's object being now 
 therefore obtained, she took leave of her dear 
 friend with many assurances of affection, even 
 promising, as Mrs. Howard was fond of keep- 
 ing up appearances, to supply several minor 
 deficiencies in her little household from the 
 PrincipaFs plate-chest, in order that the Lord 
 might be received with a silver tea-pot and 
 waiters, as became his condition. 
 
 It is painful to remember how even the 
 scholar, who, it must be remarked, knew nothing 
 more of his guest than the music he was said 
 to have composed, interested himself about the
 
 262 WALTER EVELYx\ ; OR, 
 
 arrangements for that evening, which was to be 
 for him the darkest upon which the sun ever 
 set. How he placed some fruit and wine him- 
 self on a side-table, laying aside hisTheophrastus 
 to do so, and engaged the services of the green- 
 grocer, who was in the habit of officiating on 
 similar august occasions, that the ancient blood 
 of the Howards might not be disgraced before 
 an equal. 
 
 His wife, too, was the busiest of the busy all 
 day, especially with some mysterious arrange- 
 ments about the children's dresses, for even 
 their appearance on the scene formed part of 
 the programme (who knew but what the loving 
 lord might take a fancy to them, and befriend 
 them through life ?) ; and she read up the family 
 history of the Earls of Winnington in the peer- 
 age, till her silly little head got quite confused 
 among collateral branches and great-great-great- 
 grandfathers, with uncles of the third peer, and 
 cousins in the sixth remove, till in the end I 
 will be bound she did not know wliether "gules 
 or'' and "cerf passant" had not been ancestors 
 of that distinguished race in former generations ; 
 and she startled Maurice (deep in a Greek
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 26*3 
 
 chorus) by asking him if " field argent^' did 
 not infer that a Winnington had been present 
 at the famous meeting between the first Francis 
 and bluff Harry on the cloth of gold. 
 It sickens me to write what follows.
 
 264 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 Nel mondo 
 
 O virtu Don si trova, 
 
 Oe sol virtu quel che diletta e giova." 
 
 Metastasio. 
 
 We are in the college-rooms of a young Tuft 
 more years ago than I should like to remember. 
 They are spacious lofty rooms, with a roomy 
 fireplace that may date from the reign of Eli- 
 zabeth, and beside which many a noble scho- 
 lar may have pored and pondered. A fine 
 window, set in Gothic carvings of stone, looks 
 out into the tranquil quadrangle, the very 
 pavement of which is worn away by the steps 
 of studious men. The room is filled with that 
 tempered mystic light which suits the thought-
 
 THE LONG MINOllITY. 265 
 
 ful. In such a room Gray and Johnson, Prior, 
 Wotton, or Temple, may have felt the first 
 promptings of their genius, and Kirk White 
 burnt his life's lamp out. 
 
 Here are books, too. Let us examine them. 
 Faugh ! The Racing Calendar, Boxiana, a vo- 
 lume of obscene songs ; what do these things 
 do here ? Let us look round the room. There 
 are various musical instruments strewed about 
 it, with some manuscript notes, lying scattered 
 and disorderly on a side-table. Come, that is 
 not so bad. For, alas ! a bright man may be a 
 sloven. But what have we here ? — prints of 
 dancing-women in every variety of indecent 
 posture. Well ! '^ young men will be young 
 men ; custom is custom." Perhaps our young 
 Tuft took them with the reading-desk and the 
 easy chair from the last tenant. But that can- 
 not be, either, for under one of the most florid 
 we see — "To the Viscount Brandon, &C.5 &c., 
 &c., this print is respectfully dedicated,'' &c. 
 Fie ! my Lord. Let us look into yonder port- 
 folio ; doubtless it contains some rare old 
 engravings. No ; they are French coloured 
 prints, and of the very worst school of the 
 Palais Royal. A collection of pipes, a quantity 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 266 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 of cigar-boxes, half empty, a broken cham- 
 pagne bottle with a soiled white kid glove 
 twisted round the neck, a pair of muddy 
 hunting boots, a broken whip, and a crushed 
 hat, which my Lord^s servant has not had time 
 to clear away, tell loudly enough the history of 
 the previous day. 
 
 In the centre of the room is a table laid for 
 breakfast with the good cheer of college bat- 
 tels, and by the fire are stretched some dogs 
 of various breeds and sizes. But here comes 
 the Tuft. He is just out of bed, and in the most 
 violent coloured dressing-gown ever sold at the 
 *^ ruination shop." He has a top-boot on one 
 leg, and a slipper on the other. His boot 
 pinches him, however— Friar Tuck wmII even 
 teazeaTuft sometimes; and he enters the room 
 uttering curses that it is horrible to hear pass- 
 ing those boyish lips. He has missed chapel, 
 of course, and the first thing he hears is that 
 the Dean wishes to see him at nine o'clock. 
 
 " Haw ! haw ! a good catch,^' grins the Tuft to 
 his servant; '^ take in an CEger and keep the 
 oak sported all day." Sporting the oak being 
 University slang for keeping the door shut. 
 
 Our Tuft is a long gawky lad, with goose and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 26? 
 
 knave written as legibly upon every feature as 
 the band of nature can write it. A small nar- 
 row bead, like a snipers, with a long pointed 
 nose that alone redeems the expression of the 
 face from absolute idiotcy, by giving it one of 
 low tricky cunning ; small eyes, half cunning, 
 half savage, thin straggling hair, and a sensual 
 mouth, complete the upper portion of the pic- 
 ture. The body is chiefly remarkable for its 
 extreme awkwardness, the hands always seem 
 in search of something, and the feet, which 
 turn out preposterously, have different opinions 
 as to the place to which they are required 
 to go. 
 
 Before the Tuft has half got through his 
 breakfast, a boisterous descent from half a 
 dozen of the wildest lads in college is made 
 upon the room. 
 
 " Holloa, Brandon 1" roars a stentorian voice; 
 " we shall be late for the meet. I have been 
 doing a chapel this morning to be able to send 
 in an CEger for the rest of the week. Are you 
 going to turn out in pink to-day ? " 
 
 " Yoicks ! tallyho !" answers the Tuft, " that's 
 your time of day.'' For even at this period he 
 could never speak inteUigibly. 
 N 2
 
 2fj8 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 " Hoigh, you slavey/^ he goes on, discharg- 
 ing a boot-jack at his servant's head as a proof 
 of his playful wit, '""' bring my — hoigh^ you 
 know what I want, d — ye." 
 
 " Here is your left boot, my Lord," says the 
 servant, meekly, and kneeling to divest his foot 
 of the odd slipper, for he is the son of an old 
 retainer of the Winningtons. 
 
 " Then why did'nt you bring it before/^ roars 
 my Lord, lengthening his loose wayward leg 
 and laying his servitor prostrate, " Hay ?" 
 
 " I was a going so for to do, my Lord,'^ 
 answers the unhappy wretch. 
 
 " Hay?" roars the tuft again, and his rough, 
 boisterous companions are in ecstacy (lads like 
 them are very unfeeling). " Go it, Brandon, 
 pitch into him, pitch into him, he's got no 
 friends;" and thus adjured the Tuft does not 
 disdain to have a few rounds with his slavey, 
 all the knocking down being on his own side. 
 
 Poor old Tom Bowyers ! When your son 
 went away with your young Lord that fine 
 morning from Cleveland Park, and you and 
 your " old Missus" were so glad about it^ you 
 little thought how my Lord would train him ; 
 till, at last, he was sent for fifteen years across
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 269 
 
 the water, and you broke your honest old heart 
 about him. 
 
 A faint tap is heard at the door. " Come 
 
 in, and be d to you/' shouts my Lord, " if 
 
 you're not a dun," and a palHd miserable look- 
 ing fellow crawls in. He is a musician, a man 
 of talent, who has taken to bad courses, and 
 lost himself hopelessly. He supped with my 
 Lord and his party the night before, and has 
 now all the remorse of the next morning upon 
 him, with the shame of having been played 
 tricks with, and insulted, and with the greater 
 shame of having merited it. 
 
 " Well, old kettle-drum, what do you do 
 here ? " asks one of the party : " come to make 
 some more songs for Brandon ?" 
 
 " Hoigh ! " shouts the incensed Tuft, " You, 
 you, you dog, you have not been telling you do 
 my songs. It's a lie, it's a lie ! " 
 
 But the Tuft's reproaches, and the laughter 
 of his friends, are both cut short by another rap 
 at the door, and enter Mr. Sap, the very per- 
 sonification of a toady. 
 
 Lord Brandon. — " Oigh ! oh, good morning, 
 Sap," stretches out two fingers to him, while 
 the other students are mimicking his bowing
 
 270 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 and grimaces behind him, for he is not a tutor 
 of their college. 
 
 Mr. Sap (bowing, and showing a very white 
 set of teeth, reaching on each side to the curls 
 of his elaborately cultivated whiskers). — " Good 
 morning, my Lord, I hope I have the honour 
 of seeing you well/' 
 
 Lord Brandon. — " Yes. That is, oigh, — set 
 down, Sap/^ 
 
 Mr. Sap. — " Thank you, my Lord, but 1 am 
 busy (sitting down nevertheless) ; my class 
 comes on at ten, and I see your Lordship is 
 going hunting.^' 
 
 Lord Brandon (with a sparkle of his cunning 
 eyes). — ^^ Yes. No objection on the part of 
 the college authorities, is there, hay?" 
 
 Mr. Sap. — " None in the least, my Lord ; a 
 fine sport, and I always say we ought to do 
 all we can to encourage it.^' 
 
 " Bravo, Sap ! '^ shouts a young gentleman 
 commoner, whose father is a master of hounds. 
 " You should be our Vicar, by Jove, if it wasn't 
 for that little ass of a brother of mine.^' 
 
 Mr. Sap (rising and feeling that his title for 
 church patronage is at least beginning to be 
 understood among the young nobility). — " Well,
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 2?! 
 
 my Lord, I must be going, and will leave you to 
 your sport. By the way, is your Lordship 
 engaged this evening ? If not, I have been 
 begged to bring your Lordship to a little musical 
 party — at Mrs. Howard's. Her husband is the 
 brother of Colonel Howard." 
 
 Lord Brandon. — " Oh, never mind Colonel 
 Howard. Is the woman pretty. Sap ? '' 
 
 " Mr. Sap, is the woman pretty. Lord Bran- 
 don wishes to know ? '^ shrieks a little top-booted 
 wretch in the tutor's ear. 
 
 Mr. Sap (blushing). — " Yes, my Lord, Mrs. 
 Howard is a — a — yes, very pretty indeed." 
 
 Lord Brandon. — " Oh, very happy, I'm 
 sure." 
 
 Mr. Sap. — " What time shall I have the 
 honour of coming for your Lordship ? " 
 
 Lord Brandon. — " Why, say after dinner. 
 Hay?" 
 
 Mr. Sap. — " To be sure, my Lord. After 
 dinner — at eight o'clock.'^ 
 
 And so, as Pepys would say, my Lord to his 
 hunting and Mr. Sap to his books. I have 
 neither heart or wish to trace the subsequent 
 intimacy of the young noble with the scholar's 
 familvj and how little Mrs. Howard at first
 
 272 s WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 boasted of their intimacy with him, and then 
 suddenly became altogether silent about it, 
 though he still went to her house, if not so 
 often as before. It is sad to remember with 
 what open-hearted hospitality and kindness 
 Howard received the young student, and how 
 gently he tried to lead him into studies and 
 good conduct. And when he found how empty 
 the young man^s head really was, how good- 
 naturedly he tried to find excuses for him, and 
 defended him whenever some don passed a 
 harsh sentence upon his conduct. Though, if he 
 could have heard the conversation of the Tuft 
 and his wild companions, he would have felt 
 contempt for him indeed. 
 
 Time went on, and this unlucky intimacy 
 continued ; while Howard, constant in his 
 chapels, and at his books, never dreamt that his 
 wife was waylaid in her walks, and that even 
 his servants were in the pay of the base young 
 man, who was endeavouring to render his 
 hearth cold, and his heart void for ever, ever 
 more. 
 
 The day of examination drew nigh, and 
 Howard, in defiance of his physician^s injunc- 
 tions, spent night and day over his books, and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 273 
 
 his hopes rose high at the happy prospect be- 
 fore him. Alas ! let us be careful of laying 
 plans, and counting on happiness for the time 
 to come, when we cannot see one day into the 
 future. A few days before that fixed for the 
 examination, Howard made a journey to Lon- 
 don, to sell out a small sum he had invested in 
 the funds, in order that he might be able to 
 pay the fees on taking his degree, and the few 
 bills for college expenses, w^hich, in spite of 
 the most rigid economy, he had gradually con- 
 tracted during his residence. There was another 
 reason also for his doing this. He had several 
 times within the previous week felt warnings 
 of the return of his former illness ; and he was 
 anxious to leave the University for some 
 months immediately after his examination, for 
 he felt that his health was about to give way a 
 second time, and the doctor assured him that 
 nothing but an immediate journey to Italy 
 would give him any chance of a permanent re- 
 covery. It was arranged, therefore, that he 
 was to start for London one day and be back 
 the next, for, like all men of retired habits, he 
 had an exaggerated idea of the time required to 
 N 5
 
 274 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 transact any business of importance. Starting, 
 therefore, by an early coach, he found himself 
 towards the middle of the day with his affairs 
 concluded, and the whole afternoon hanging 
 idle on his hands. Even London, however, is 
 a dull place for a man whose heart is elsewhere ; 
 and, after vainly endeavouring to hit upon some 
 means of spending his time satisfactorily, he 
 determined to take a simple dinner and return 
 by the mail. 
 
 It was nearly midnight when he arrived at 
 Oxford and found himself before his own door. 
 The street was dark and silent, save for a post- 
 chaise that stood waiting in the dark shadow 
 of one of the neighbouring colleges. Was that 
 a light which flashed out for a moment from 
 his bed-room window ? No ! all was dark and 
 silent ; so, letting himself in quietly with a latch- 
 key, he paused for a moment on the staircase, 
 and then turned into his study. 
 
 " Dear Helen ! " said he. " She is asleep, I 
 will not disturb her ;^^ so taking down one of 
 his examination books he prepared to' read 
 away the night. 
 
 " What was that noise — a muffled step, and
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 275 
 
 a door softly closed ; and then that light, flash- 
 ing again for a moment in the passage ; and 
 then all dark/' 
 
 " Helen ! '^ called the scholar, starting up : 
 " is that you, Helen ? '^ 
 
 No answer. Howard rose, and flung the 
 door wide open. " Helen ! " 
 
 All was silent as before. 
 
 '' Pshaw ! " cried the scholar, " the whim of 
 a sick brain. I hope I have not disturbed her. 
 But hark ! that step again/' 
 
 Another moment, and Howard was in the 
 passage, lamp in hand. The click of a pistol, 
 and then the snapping of a cap ; an oath ; and 
 the light fell upon the gaunt form of Lord 
 Brandon. The pallor of the craven was on his 
 cheek, and the irresolution of the evil-doer in 
 his heart. 
 
 " Villain ! " cried Howard, closing with him, 
 " what do you do here at such an hour ? '' 
 
 A wild shriek from the top of the staircase 
 told the story too well. His wife, the pride of 
 his heart, the partner of his hearth, the one 
 sole joy of his life, was about to fly with the 
 unworthy noble ; and she stood before him in 
 her travelling dress, preparing to leave home
 
 276 WALTER EVELYN ', OR, 
 
 and children, the guilty wife before a husband 
 who had never spoken to her but in tender- 
 ness. 
 
 The blood of a race of soldiers mantled in 
 the cheek of Maurice Howard, as with one 
 groan of despair he sprung upon the man who 
 had dishonoured him. The struggle, however, 
 was long and fierce, and his wife clung to him, 
 shrieking for mercy and pardon, or there had 
 been murder done that night. 
 
 " Woman ! " cried the scholar, standing over 
 his prostrate betrayer, ^* have I deserved this ? " 
 And then the sharp pain took him at the heart 
 again, and he staggered, and fell fainting. When 
 he recovered himself Lord Brandon was gone. 
 But the terrible and gloomy vengeance of the 
 outraged man pursued him. Days and days 
 he followed his uncertain traces, and at length 
 came Up with him. There was no escape for 
 that miserable seducer then ; and, after a vain 
 attempt to evade a duel on the part of Lord 
 Brandon, they fought. Sickness and excite- 
 ment, however, rendered Howard's aim uncer- 
 tain, and his first fire took no effect upon his 
 antagonist. The seconds now wished to stop 
 the affair, but Howard fiercely refused.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 277 
 
 " If Lord Brandon attempt to quit the 
 ground/^ said he, " I will follow and shoot him 
 like a dog/^ 
 
 " Then I have to warn you," replied Colonel 
 Cochrane, who acted as Lord Brandon's second, 
 ' that my principal will return your fire ; he 
 has satisfied the laws of honour/' 
 
 " If he does not return my fire I will walk 
 deliberately up and kill him," returned Howard. 
 
 The colonel shuddered, and was observed 
 to give some directions to his principal on 
 handing him the second pistol, and at the 
 second fire Howard fell, shot through the 
 shoulder, and the noble fled. 
 
 He recovered to find his hearth lonely. His 
 wife, unable to look upon him again, had fled 
 with her betrayer, and the scholar felt that 
 with her were gone every hope and joy he had 
 in the world. He would no longer enter the 
 Church, for he thought, when calmer, that 
 much as he had been wronged, a Christian 
 minister should have acted difl^erently. He 
 would not even go up to examination ; for life 
 and its objects had lost all attraction in his 
 eyes. Henceforth he became what you have 
 known him, dear reader, — not a moody and
 
 2/8 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 unbearable man, but a recluse, endeavouring 
 however to do his duty in that state of life to 
 which it pleased God to call him. And this is 
 the history of the lost life. He never spoke of 
 his wife afterwards ; and few or none knew the 
 true story of his wrongs, though, when he 
 learned she had been abandoned in Italy by 
 her lover, he sought her out to offer his for- 
 giveness and help in trouble, but in vain. 
 They never met afterwards.
 
 THE L.ONG MINORITY. 2^0 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Sad memory brings the light 
 Of other days around me, 
 
 The smiles, the tears 
 
 Of boyhood's years, 
 The words of love then spoken ; 
 
 The eyes that shone, 
 
 Are dimmed and gone, 
 The cheerful heart now broken. 
 
 If descriptions of localities were ever worth 
 the paper they are written on, and if, after, the 
 most careful reader carried away the smallest 
 idea of the place described, I should certainly 
 try to describe the cottage where Maurice 
 Howard had sought a retreat from the coarse 
 pity of the world in the depth of his great 
 sorrow. 
 
 Tread softly, reader ! we are in the scholar's 
 library, a little room, but well stocked with
 
 280 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 books of a rare choice. The light of a single 
 lamp is shed upon the pale face of the recluse, 
 as he sits reading some old letters, yellow with 
 time. How handsome he must have been ! 
 what chiselled features and what a noble ex- 
 pression ! Oh that wavy hair, now grey with 
 time and grief, what a net it must have been to 
 catch a maiden^s heart ! A flush, growing 
 deeper and deeper, is on the scholar's cheek, 
 and his eye glistens with an unwonted dew as 
 he reads those letters. They are the last he 
 ever received from his wife, whom he is said to 
 have loved dearly, and who died long ago in 
 Italy. At length he pauses and presses his 
 hand tight to his heart as he takes out one 
 more soUtary letter. It contains a lock of 
 golden hair, silken and glossy, and is written 
 in a trembling hand, as if by an invalid ; it bears 
 a foreign postmark. 
 
 " Cease to seek for me, dear Maurice,^' says 
 the writer, " never so dear, so wildly beloved as 
 now, when the cold hand of death is upon me, 
 for, before you receive this, they tell me, oh, 
 my wronged and noble husband, I shall have 
 ceased to be. I have no right to address you 
 thus. I forfeited the title to call you husband
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 281 
 
 on the night I outraged the sanctity of your 
 roof; but perhaps now, with the grave so near, 
 you will let me write to you once more in the 
 language of affection without thinking it pol- 
 luted by the source from which it comes. Mau- 
 rice, Maurice, I am dying, broken-hearted. 
 Little have you known, while seeking me so 
 long and generously, that I have been often in 
 the same house with you, and that I have crept 
 out at nights to see only your shadow pass to 
 and fro, as you paced your chamber, and then, 
 when you have retired to rest, I have blessed 
 you in my heart of hearts, and prayed for you, 
 Maurice, as in the old days, when I used to lay 
 my girlish head on your breast, and sink gently 
 into happy dreams. Yet I dared not speak to 
 you ; I would not have lifted my dishonoured 
 head in your presence for worlds, oh, my hus- 
 band ; and I felt that we were to meet on earth, 
 never — never more. 1 have loved you always 
 — always, 1 may tell you so now that my last 
 strength will be perhaps spent in tracing these 
 words. But I will not wring your heart by 
 opening an old wound, which I pray to God 
 time may now have healed, and may you still be
 
 282 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 happy-chappy Maurice, with some one wor- 
 thier of you than I have been/' 
 
 Oh ! groaned the scholar, and the great drops 
 of agony gathered Hke dew upon his forehead, 
 and he hid his head in his hands, and sobbed 
 with a mighty grief. 
 
 " May you see a fairer wife than me, Mau- 
 rice, again by your side, and laughing children 
 gathered round your knee once more, and may 
 the blessing of her fall upon your hearth who 
 once brought desolation to it. Grieve for me 
 no longer, my husband, though it is sweet to 
 me, even in the hour of death, to know how 
 you did grieve, and that I, once at least, did 
 make you happy, and was fair in your eyes (you 
 see I am vain even now), and you regretted me. 
 I was not so guilty either as you thought me, 
 Maurice. I did not wrong you willingly. Be- 
 fore Him who knows all secrets and all hearts, 
 and in whose presence I shall soon be, I swear 
 that I did not wrong by mine own act and free 
 will. Our servants were bribed, Maurice, and 
 the day that you left me I was taken suddenly 
 ill after drinking a glass of water given me by 
 Janfr (you remember my old maid ?) and — and.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 283 
 
 spare me the rest Maurice; enough, that I 
 woke to shame and anguish unutterable ; and, 
 unable to bear your return, I agreed to fly with 
 my betrayer. Oh Maurice, to hear you say 
 that you forgive me now, that you pity me, to 
 know that I have plucked away a single thorn 
 of the many that I planted in your heart that 
 day, would make me happy. But you are far 
 away, pursuing your thankless search, for her 
 who would live a thousand years in purgatory 
 but to touch your hand, and weep her burning 
 tears upon your bosom but for one hour. 
 
 " And now, Maurice, comes the last prayer of 
 one who has loved you so fondly. Will you 
 grant it? I must have great faith in your 
 nobleness of heart, even to ask. I have a 
 daughter, Maurice, by him it would make ray 
 dying cheek blush crimson even to name. Will 
 you see that she is not cast away, Maurice, and 
 give her the little fortune that was mine, and 
 which you wrote to me that you had placed 
 again at my disposal in the bank untouched ? 
 I have left it there, Maurice, but she, poor girl, 
 nameless and penniless ! Oh, my dear hus- 
 band, forget her birth and take her by the 
 hand now that I am gone. Let her be your
 
 284 WALTER EVELYN; OR, 
 
 servant, even so that she be with you, and 
 never know who were her parents. It is a 
 dreadful doom, Maurice, that my name and 
 memory must be forgotten by my own child ; 
 but it is better thus. 
 
 " And now, farewell, for the last time, dear 
 Maurice ! Think of me sometimes, with your 
 new bride and in your happy home. Think of 
 me as I used to be, ere sin and shame had 
 blotted out all that may have been once fair in 
 your unhappy Helen. Think of me as I was 
 on our wedding-day, when friends were round 
 us, and the whole world seemed to smile. 
 Think of me as when I was first made a 
 mother, and forgot my own pain in seeing you 
 so happy, and smiled so often lest you should 
 think I was suffering. Think of me as when I 
 clung round your neck at parting on that fatal 
 day, and knew not that before the cock crew 
 again 1 should have betrayed you. Think of 
 me, Maurice, not as I am now, and try to blot 
 these five dreadful years from your memory 
 for ever.'^ 
 
 '^ So young, so good, so beautiful,'" groaned 
 the scholar, •'^ and to perish thus! And the 
 child, too, how strange that there should be no
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 285 
 
 trace of her, for I never believed that Italian 
 innkeeper's story of her death. Oh ! my wife, 
 why did you not return to me ? All could not 
 have been with us as once it was, but we might 
 have been friends, and you might have lived to 
 close my eyes instead of dying so far away and 
 among strangers. And I would have believed 
 you had you said but one word. Worms that 
 we are, what right have we to judge and to 
 condemn each other? And you, too, were 
 guiltless, guiltless in the sight of God, and now 
 in mine. Alas I that despair should have 
 seized you so strongly, and that despairing you 
 were lost.'^ 
 
 So ran the thoughts of Maurice Howard as 
 he sat that still midnight, watching the dying 
 embers of the lire, and heedless of the lamp 
 that was flickering, untrimmed and unfed, its 
 last feeble ray in the socket. 
 
 *' And I shall soon be a lonely man. First, 
 my wife left me, and now my son. And how 
 like he is to her ; the beauty of feature, the 
 same restlessness, and the same affectionate 
 heart. I wish I could persuade him to remain 
 here.'' 
 
 So the night passed away, and the scholar
 
 286 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 communed with his own heart, and called up 
 the memories of his youth one by one. And 
 from the mist of many things, and thoughts, 
 and fancies long forgotten, the image of his 
 lost wife still stood clearly out, every trait, 
 every feature remembered ; the songs she had 
 sung, and the words she had spoken from the 
 time when she first barkened to his wooing till 
 their last farewell. The light laugh rung again 
 upon her lips, cheerful as healthy weather, and 
 the jest came sparkling from her lips once 
 more. The light of his hearth and the joy of 
 his heart was with him as in his old college 
 days. He could hear her as she came in like 
 some queen of the flowers, with her laughing 
 children, now all dead but the son who was 
 ofoino^ to leave him. He could feel her warm 
 hand laid playfully in his own, and looked into 
 her bright loving eyes, with their arch warning, 
 as they summoned him from his books. Oh, 
 God ! was it her pardoned spirit made happy 
 in heaven, which was permitted, through her 
 prayers, to sit beside the lonely scholar on that 
 night, and speak sweet words of hope and 
 comfort to him ? 
 
 There his son found him in the morning,
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 287 
 
 not asleep, but dreaming, with his cold hand 
 pressing still that lock of golden hair, and 
 with a heavenly smile upon his lips, like one 
 who might have been holding communion with 
 angels. 
 
 He was unconscious of his son's entrance 
 into the room, but soon recovered himself; 
 though it was observed by those about him, 
 that from that time he seemed to grow old sud- 
 denly ; his hair changed rapidly from grey to 
 white, and his voice took a softer tone when 
 speaking to anybody than it had before. 
 Those who were long with him, too, felt im- 
 pressed with a sort of awe when they left him, 
 as if Maurice Howard was no longer one of 
 them, and that his pure spirit was finding 
 itself the wings of the bird, and would soon 
 " fly away, and be at rest." 
 
 Perhaps a sort of warning from the moral of 
 his own life prevented his changing persuasion 
 into command, in trying to alter his son's de- 
 termination, and he might indeed have had a 
 conviction that his race were better fitted for 
 the stirring and adventurous than the more 
 quiet occupations of life. 
 
 " I will not try to influence your inchna-
 
 288 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 tions too strongly then, William,'' he said, " if 
 you wish to go; but if you do not find things 
 all that you desire them to be, and any thing 
 should happen to me while you are away, I 
 have left every thing here to you, our little all. 
 And here, in this drawer which you see opens 
 with a secret spring, you will find a letter con- 
 taining the only instructions I have to leave. 
 It refers to a small sum of money, sufficient 
 for a modest living, invested in the Bank of 
 England, and you must promise me never to 
 touch it for twenty years, in case during that 
 time you should be able to carry out the wishes 
 which you will find contained in this letter. 
 God bless you, my son !" 
 
 " Do not talk so sadly. Sir," replied William 
 Howard. "You will live many happy years 
 yet, I trust; live to see me a distinguished man, 
 and worthy of your affection." 
 
 " Perhaps it may be so,'' returned the scho- 
 lar ; " we may hope, but, should it be otherwise, 
 you will remember my instructions. I shall be 
 able to spare you a greater allowance than the 
 regulations of the Austrian service absolutely 
 require, though I dare say you will not find it 
 too much, and my wants here alone will be few.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 289 
 
 and easily supplied. For the rest, you had bet- 
 ter draw on Coutts for what we fix on monthly ; 
 and if you get in debt, write to me frankly and 
 at once. Remember, there is little hope of 
 distinction for the debtor: otherwise I would 
 rather your letters to me did not contain allu- 
 sions to money. What I have is yours ; take 
 it freely, but never degrade yourself or me into 
 beggar or banker." 
 
 Once more we met altogether under General 
 Howard^s hospitable roof ere we separated, — 
 the one to the East, and the other to the West. 
 General Howard's preparations for his depar- 
 ture were completed, and he only awaited his 
 last interview with the Commander in Chief 
 and the Colonial Secretary, to sail by the first 
 packet for his government, whither he had 
 half persuaded his brother to accompany him. 
 Mr. Sinclair, as the reader is aware, was also 
 meditating a journey abroad, and, as I fancied, 
 would probably be accompanied by his young 
 wife in Emily Howard, who sat looking at him 
 so affectionately, though she seemed very sad 
 and heavy-eyed. William Howard was all fire 
 and expectation ; and though he read us some 
 very pathetic verses, full of the pain which he 
 
 VOL. I. O
 
 290 
 
 WALTER EVELYN ; OR, 
 
 declared it gave him to speak the word " Fare- 
 well V it was plain enough that his heart was 
 already in Hungary, with his gay hussar jacket 
 and prancing horse. 
 
 I was the only one who seemed to hang 
 loose on the party, and whose going away in- 
 terested no one, whom no kind hand was 
 stretched forth to stay, — a very painful species 
 of freedom. I sat down near Emily, as I 
 fancied for the last time I should see her un- 
 wedded, and began to talk to her about her 
 cousin Wilham, but I saw that the tears came 
 into her eyes, and she could not listen to me. 
 I felt very sad too, myself. I was just at that 
 age when the heart is overflowing with love ; 
 and, though at that time I certainly could not 
 be said to have more than a brotherly afi'ection 
 for Emily, very little would have made it other- 
 wise, and I wished that little had been. 
 
 " Good bye, Emily,'^ said I, as we were pre- 
 paring to separate for the night, " I shall be 
 gone before you are up to-morrow."^ 
 
 " Good bye, Walter,'^ she said, crying. 
 
 " May you be very, very happy, Emily,^' said 
 I. — " may you both be happy .^' 
 
 " Who do you mean, Walter?" she asked.
 
 THE LONG MINORITY. 291 
 
 " Mr. Sinclair/' said I. 
 
 " You don't know how kind he has been to 
 me, dear Walter/' she answered, '^ and how he 
 speaks of you when you are not here." 
 
 " Good bye, then, once more, Emily," said 
 I, — " I hope you may be happy with him." 
 
 " Thank you, thank you, Walter," she 
 sobbed, " I am sure we shall be, — I hope we 
 shall see you." 
 
 " Do not hope that," answered 1 gloomily, 
 and so we parted, 
 
 " Love, how it mocks poor Bliss, 
 For sad Despair !" 
 
 END or VOL. I. 
 
 J. B. Nichols and Sons, 25, Parliament- street, Westminster.