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 B RAR.Y 
 
 OF THE 
 UNIVERSITY 
 OF ILLINOIS 
 
 82.3 
 B4I7 
 
 v.I
 
 BELLEGARDE, 
 
 ADOPTED INDIAN BOY. 
 
 A CANADIAN TALE. 
 
 A quoi bon vous mettre en courroux, 
 Si vous reconnaissez vos traits dans quelque fable ? 
 II n'est en pareil cas qu'un parti raisonnable ; 
 Ne dites mot : — corrigez vous. 
 
 Le Bailly. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. 
 
 1832.
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED BY LOW AND HARVEY, 
 
 Playhouse-yard, Blackfriars.
 
 ?A 3 
 
 INTRODUCTION, 
 
 Our original intention was to deliver " Belle- 
 garde" into the hands of our bookseller without 
 a preamble, and we owe an apology to our 
 reader for deviating from so commendable a 
 purpose, more especially as the introduction 
 may appear irrelative to the context. It is, 
 however, called for by a recent publication, in 
 which there are so many things at variance 
 with what we have written, relating to the 
 Americans, that it is incumbent on us to assert 
 our title to veracity, although our work be 
 
 b
 
 VI INTRODUCTION. 
 
 presented in the unauthentic, unpresumptuous 
 form of a romance. 
 
 " The fair authoress of u Domestic Man- 
 ners of the Americans," (we presume her 
 to be fair, since she gets so frequently out of 
 humour at being called " old woman !") will 
 forgive us in favour of our common origin, if we 
 declare, that, taken in a general sense, her work 
 is nothing more nor less than a libel : we will 
 not say, " false, scandalous, and malicious," 
 because we address ourselves to a lady, and 
 would not appear deficient in those paladine 
 manners she so much admires. But she de- 
 scribes what she had not seen — good society ; 
 and gives a picture of the American people, 
 without including the New England states, 
 that great, polished, cultivated, and learned 
 portion of the nation, which extends from the 
 east end of Long Island to the extreme boun-
 
 INTRODUCTION. Vll 
 
 dary of the district of Maine. She spent 
 some three years in the western forests, and 
 about as many months in scampering through 
 the large cities, and a few of the populous 
 states, which we have not been able to view and 
 study sufficiently in ten years. And she mo- 
 destly presents this flying sketch of her sickly 
 fancy, as an accurate delineation of the " Do- 
 mestic manners of the Americans ! !" She 
 " travelled from Dan to Eeersheba, and found 
 all barren." She only saw a degenerate, de- 
 graded, vulgar race. We, on the contrarv, 
 found a people worthy of their noble origin, 
 and proud too of being descendants of English- 
 men, of speaking their language, possessing 
 their literature, and being governed by the 
 common law of England. 
 
 We do do not pass the sober limits of truth 
 
 when we affirm, that the people of the New 
 
 62
 
 Vlll INTRODUCTION. 
 
 England states are much more conversant with 
 our best authors, than any equal number of the 
 inhabitants of any part of the British empire. 
 The cause is palpable : there are schools in 
 every parish, maintained by a tax on property ; 
 so that the rich and poor, without distinction, 
 give a good education to their children. There 
 are a great number of farmers in every one of 
 these States, who never employ an attorney or 
 scrivenor to make a deed of sale, mortgage, 
 lease, or exchange of property ; and it would 
 be impossible to find among them, one man of 
 full age and sound mind ignorant of the law of 
 the land. A little serious reflection upon the 
 forms of their governments will convince our 
 reader that it cannot be otherwise They are 
 for the most part democracies : now ignorance, 
 vice, and misery, in the mass of the people, 
 would not allow such a form of government one
 
 INTRODUCTION. IX 
 
 month's existence. Without equality of for- 
 tune, (taken in a concrete sense,) wisdom, mo- 
 deration, and general learning, their social con- 
 dition would be anarchy, pillage and rapine. 
 
 It is a new species of social combination, that 
 has no prototype in ancient Europe, nor can 
 ever be imitated in any population of the old 
 world, unless some hitherto unknown calamity 
 so reduce the number of inhabitants, that each 
 one might have as much land as he could culti- 
 vate ; consequently, all comparisons between 
 America and the States of Europe are mere 
 waste of time and words. To attempt any 
 approximation would be as absurd as to extend 
 the shores of Albion a thousand miles into the 
 Atlantic. 
 
 The squeamishness of our lady-author may be 
 dated from the moment she arrived in the muddy 
 waters of the Mississippi, where she got out
 
 X INTRODUCTION. 
 
 of temper with mosquitos, who stung her into 
 an acerbity of disposition that lasted some two 
 years and a half, until it was suddenly miti- 
 gated by a comforting cup of tea at the house 
 (mark reader!) of a countrywoman of her 
 own? Here then was found " balm in Gilead." 
 This heart-softening visit to Stonington awaken- 
 ed long-lost sympathies ; and " hogs, help, and 
 equality," were forgotten. 
 
 Such is the nature of woman everywhere, 
 when she consults her passions and prejudices. 
 She is capable only of exaggerating, and ayant 
 jette son bonnet par dessus le mur, sticks at 
 nothing. 
 
 We have here a new species of literary gla- 
 diator, who, with a reckless spirit, bids defiance 
 to truth, justice, and criticism, 
 
 And runs an Indian muck at all she meets, 
 
 provided they be Americans. Yet this "out
 
 INTRODUCTION'. XI 
 
 of the way curiosity" has become the lion of 
 the passing day, just (and only) because party 
 spirit renders the appetite for calumny keen 
 and voracious. 
 
 That the immense surface of the United 
 States is not peopled with what our country- 
 woman would denominate fine gentlemen, whose 
 manners might charm the soft habitute of a 
 Paris or London boudoir, ought only to sur- 
 prise a traveller, who like Sir Fopling in the 
 play, " stinks of sweets." To this insig- 
 nificant race, " an establishment " would be 
 more agreeable in the precincts of the Bois de 
 Boulogne, or Regent's Park, than on the bor- 
 ders of (what our authoress calls) " the eternal 
 forests ,•" for here she " found a rotten tree, 
 that sunk under her weight," and threw her 
 into an agony, that was not a little increased 
 by the sight of " Hogs fed and lodged in the
 
 Xll INTRODUCTION. 
 
 prettiest valleys, and" worse still, " slaugh- 
 tered beside the prettiest streams" God bless 
 her (as the great agitator would say) for find- 
 ing any thing pretty out of England. Her 
 querulous disposition reminds us of Peter Pin- 
 dar's "Margate Hoy," where the fastidious 
 Mistress Bacon, her exquisite prototype, 
 
 With fingers just like sausages, fat things, 
 
 scolded the captain, because he allowed the 
 passengers to be sea-sick. 
 
 As to " chewing tobacco and (the inevitable 
 result) spitting" we do not deny, that south of 
 the Delaware, this custom is not unfrequent, 
 even among the highest class of planters, who 
 all plant tobacco where the soil is suitable. As 
 Grumio says, "we confess the Cape;" but we 
 peremptorily deny, that the well-educated and 
 polite inhabitants of any of the large cities are
 
 INTRODUCTION. Xlll 
 
 addicted to it. If there be exceptions, they are 
 as rare as a wooden limb, or eyes that squint. 
 Even smoking is less a general habit in the 
 United States than in many nations of Europe. 
 Our fair authoress is a lover of aristocratical 
 customs. We sincerely partake of and com- 
 mend her taste ; but is she so utterly ignorant 
 of what she so much admires, as not to know, 
 that the most consummate aristocrats in Europe 
 are the most inveterate smokers ; or that the 
 great Spanish aristocrat never gives his hand to 
 be kissed, without communicating the condensed 
 effluvia of at least fifty " long royales," that he 
 smokes every day before he gives audience to 
 his adoring subjects ? — So much for the south, 
 where lords and ladies smoke tobacco. 
 
 In Germany, too, the meditative inhabitant, 
 whatever be his rank, (like the English landlord 
 with his ale,) eats his smoke, and drinks his
 
 XIV INTRODUCTION. 
 
 smoke, and lives on his smoke ; his pipe is only 
 laid on the table when he goes to sleep. He 
 seldom speaks, often grunts with satisfaction 
 procured by tobacco, and " haughty and huge," 
 would puff its noxious streams into the face of 
 our authoress, if she should venture to approach 
 him with any title implying less distinction than 
 that of baroness, — to which we confess we hold 
 her fairly entitled for her caricature of America. 
 Should such a mark of distinction be generously 
 bestowed upon her, we shall probably find her 
 treating smoking and spitting with compla- 
 cency, and forgiving, in the powerful and an- 
 cient Herzog of Waldeck or Saxe Gotha, 
 that which she censures in a republican of the 
 United States. 
 
 Another mortal sin in her eyes is the con- 
 stant occupation of the men, and the sewing 
 and knitting propensities of the women of the
 
 INTRODUCTION. XV 
 
 large cities in America. Why, the mother of 
 Alexander, who wove tunics of wool for the 
 conqueror of Asia, would be a vulgar bourgeoise 
 in the presence of our fair countrywoman. — 
 Then, forsooth, there are " so many different 
 opinions, and the churches and chapels are so 
 small." To speak seriously, did she go to the 
 country of " eternal forests" to seek cathedrals 
 like those of York and Canterbury, and blame 
 the pious who happen not to be members of 
 the " Established Church ?" This is tolerance 
 worthy of Saint Dominick, and knowledge of 
 the early history of the country, that would be- 
 come a beadle of St. Pancras. 
 
 We admit that the men are all occupied, and 
 that an idler would find it difficult to amuse 
 himself in the United States ;— but we did not 
 expect to find a grave writer of tours find 
 fault with men, among whom cannot be found
 
 XVI INTRODUCTION. 
 
 one who would maintain that the chief purpose 
 of creation is to lounge in Bond Street, hunt at 
 Melton Mowbray, and dance at Almack's. The 
 productive occupation so censured in the men 
 is the great element of national prosperity and 
 general happiness ; and we do not hold the 
 American ladies cheap because they are not 
 fond of gadding from post to pillar, and " bear- 
 ing false witness against their neighbours" 
 
 If the writer of " Domestic Manners of the 
 Americans" only intended to make a caricature, 
 she has succeeded. We assume no right to 
 find fault with her plan ; but we hold ourselves 
 bound to enter our protest against such stuff 
 passing current for conscientious narrative, so- 
 ber history, or fair criticism. Perhaps the 
 British public is even now of our opinion: — 
 " La raison se fait entendre" says Voltaire, 
 (i quand les passions sont lasses de crier"
 
 INTRODUCTION. XV11 
 
 Sismondi, the most impartial of historians, 
 affirms that no people is entitled to be called 
 respectable; and yet the very concessions 
 made to the Americans by those who dislike 
 their form of government, might authorise us 
 to assume, that they form an exception to the 
 general rule. It is admitted that they are 
 industrious, economical, and religious ; that 
 they have few, if any, paupers, and that such 
 things as police and tread-mills are unknown 
 even in the largest cities. But " they drink 
 drams," says our lady author. In the vicinity 
 of mephitic exhalations only, tonics of this 
 kind are in common use; but would not the 
 mere duty paid in London alone on " blue 
 uuin," furnish drams to the whole dram- 
 drinking population of the United States? 
 We put the question, not to our authoress, but 
 to those who know anything about the matter.
 
 XVlii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The assertion that the Americans have 
 shown little taste for monuments and the fine 
 arts, is to a limited extent true. But is it in 
 the " Asylum for Oppressed Humanity " 
 that a traveller in his senses would seek Saint 
 Peter's Church, the Pantheon, or Westminster 
 Abbey? Such monuments as the early Ro- 
 man's were proud of, — such as are commanded 
 by utility, — canals, roads, and aqueducts, are 
 not rare in America. When they have the 
 happiness to possess such a government as 
 our authoress would fain give them, temples, 
 obelisks, circuses, and hippodromes will be 
 added. 
 
 The fable of a late president and his al- 
 leged weaknesses (were they even true) soils her 
 book ; and we blush at the disgusting picture 
 she has drawn con amove. But what may not 
 be expected from an author who refuses the
 
 INTRODUCTION. XIX 
 
 Americans the virtue of a common conscript 
 called Courage ? This is too bad ; history 
 refutes this calumny : but we are not writing 
 an eulogium, and shall abstain from compari- 
 sons ; besides, we cannot forget that we are de- 
 fending the sons and grandsons of Englishmen ; 
 — that we are speaking of a mighty limb, cut 
 by unhallowed hands from the parent stock, 
 and planted in a rich soil, not yet watered 
 with the tears of misery, nor " blessed with 
 a national debt" that absorbs half its produce. 
 
 There are many customs in America very 
 little to our taste ; but civilization has marched 
 with such rapid steps, that we are more in- 
 clined to praise the people for all they have 
 done, than blame them for what may yet be 
 wanting to attain that point of social perfection, 
 which, after all, only exists in the dreams of 
 honest men.
 
 XX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 We conclude these introductory remarks 
 with a word to indicate the main object of the 
 following pages. 
 
 We have endeavoured to solve some impor- 
 tant problems in morals, manners, and educa- 
 tion. We censure without cynicism, and so 
 far veil real characters in fiction, that lynx- 
 eyed malevolence will lose its labour, in any 
 attempt to designate them by their real names. 
 
 We have introduced Love, not merely be- 
 cause it is necessary to the dramatical interest 
 of a novel, but because we paint it as it exists 
 in pure and honourable hearts, — a sublime 
 and powerful stimulant to virtuous and heroic 
 actions. 
 
 London, September, 1832.
 
 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 There is an hour, when mem'ry's potent spell 
 
 Divinely opens death's long sealed bier ; 
 When those who ruled, or wrote, or nobly fell 
 
 In scenes of fancied life once more appear. 
 
 Hafiz. 
 
 What the moral killing spirit of the French 
 revolution has left in a state of ruin of the 
 once celebrated monastery of Royaumont, is 
 placed in a retired valley between the ancient 
 town of Luzarches (distinguished in the fourth 
 century for the skill of its inhabitants in 
 archery,) and the magnificent castle of the 
 family of Conde, at Chantilly. This valley in 
 
 vol. i. b
 
 ri BELLEGARDE. 
 
 form of a large basin, is surrounded by the 
 forests of Lys, Carnel and Bonnet, which 
 cover the neighbouring hills. These forests 
 are intersected in every direction with smooth 
 avenues, for the convenience of amateurs of 
 the chase and shaded walks ; and as the soil 
 is a dark sandy loam, absorbs rain as fast as it 
 falls, and becomes more compact as the wea- 
 ther is more damp"; lovers of nature and exer- 
 cise find it agreeable at all seasons of the 
 year. Two small rivers meander through this 
 valley and meet at the wall of the monastery, 
 to refresh and embellish its park, and then 
 pay their joint tribute to the stately Oise. 
 
 At the meeting of these waters, f he monks 
 of Saint Benedict built a priory, dependant on 
 the diocess of Beauvais, These rich and 
 powerful ecclesiastics, made" the most judicious 
 selection of positions for their habitual re
 
 BELLEGARDE. 3 
 
 dence : they were Sybarites in their mode of 
 living, and could not be mistaken in what con- 
 stituted material comfort ; they had abundance 
 of wealth, and could purchase whatever the 
 generosity of the monarch might fail to sup- 
 ply ; hence we find, that the ancient sites of 
 their dwellings, are remarkable for the purest 
 air, the richest soil, the finest fruits, and the 
 fairest landscapes. All these are united in 
 the secluded valley of Royaumont, where 
 every object disposes the soul to repose and 
 meditation. Iu would be interesting to re- 
 mount to the first settlement of the monks in 
 this place ; but too much obscurity envelopes 
 their early history to permit us to give any 
 other account of them than traditional tales ; 
 and as we write an authentic history of real 
 events, we only employ fiction, where we con- 
 ceal names from a prying curiosity, that might 
 
 b 2
 
 4 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 give pain, for which we should be responsible 
 at least to our conscience. 
 
 In the Gallia Christiana, a work which is 
 now very rare, we find mention made of " Re- 
 galis moils" so named by St. Louis ; but in 
 the learned work of the Benedictines, " Gal- 
 lia antlqua et chilis," as well as the researches 
 of father Lebeuf, Herrissant and others skilled 
 in monastic lore, we can find no trace of this 
 interesting spot ; so that our readers must be 
 content to know, that in the year of grace, 
 1227, St. Louis purchased the grounds and 
 endowed the monastery with ample revenues ; 
 and in order to render this act of piety more 
 memorable, he summoned the feudal lords and 
 barons of the realm, to witness the homage 
 paid to religion, and the honours conferred 
 on its ministers. The celebrated Ermingard, 
 bishop of Beauvais, came to consecrate the
 
 BELLEGARDE. 5 
 
 ground ; and the surrounding towns and vil- 
 lages sent forth deputations to assist at the 
 solemn rite. These customs, and the piety 
 that accompanied them, are far from our 
 times ; we shall therefore give a brief sketch of 
 the ceremony. 
 
 An immense number of tents and marquees, 
 in form of a crescent, were pitched on the 
 plain ; that of the king, over which the royal 
 banner floated, divided it into two sections; on 
 his right and left, were placed the great digni- 
 taries of the church and state. The feudal ba- 
 rons, in full armour, with their squires and 
 pages, were placed according to their respec- 
 tive rank, and were known by their banners, 
 livery and retainers, who were ranged in order 
 of battle in front of their tents. A solemn 
 music was heard from afar, swelling upon the 
 light breeze ; it was that of the processions,
 
 G BELLEGARDE. 
 
 that approached preceded by troops of young 
 maidens, dressed in white, bearing baskets of 
 flowers on their heads. Next came the young 
 men of the first rank in their respective vil- 
 lages, with uncovered heads, followed by their 
 fathers and mothers. The deputations were 
 under the direction of the clergy, who regu- 
 lated the order of march and gave out the 
 hymn, to which the multitude responded. 
 Every cortege passed before the royal tent, 
 and then placed itself at the extremity of the 
 crescent, so that a circle of spectators enclosed 
 the plain, in the centre of which the new mo- 
 nastery was about to be erected. 
 
 From the royal pavillion issued the pontiff, 
 followed by the clergy in richly embroidered 
 costumes, some holding in their hands vases of 
 burning incense, others with branches of palm 
 and vases of holy water. The children, in
 
 BELLEGARDE. 7 
 
 white tunics, strewed the path of the bishop 
 with flowers, as he passed in front of the 
 assembled multitude, asperging them and pro- 
 nouncing such blessings as are customary on 
 the like occasions. The long and solemn 
 array, having arrived in presence of the king, 
 chanted a hymn of thanksgiving, and made 
 way for the royal founder, who, in robes of 
 state with the crown on his head, proceeded 
 to lay the first stone of the church. The ve- 
 nerable bishop pronounced a blessing on the 
 work, and dedicated it to the Holy Cross, as 
 we find it recorded in the book already cited. 
 
 The three succeeding days were spent in 
 festivity. The minstrels and musicians from 
 the most remote provinces, from Languedoc, 
 from Acquitaine, from the banks of the Loire, 
 the Rhone, and the Garonne, followed their 
 chiefs, to sing the praises of their houses, and
 
 8 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 do honour to a ceremony in which St. Louis 
 was the principal actor. We can easily con- 
 ceive that the magnificence of the spectacle 
 corresponded to the dignity of the monarch. 
 
 The partiality of the good king for this 
 monastery was so great, that he remembered 
 it in his will, and enriched its library with a 
 portion of his vast and valuable collection of 
 manuscripts; and Blanche, his queen, caused 
 to be built in the vicinity a small castle, a 
 tower of which now gives dignity to a modern 
 house, the property of a man of taste and eru- 
 dition, well known to the literary world as the 
 " Hermit of the Chaussee d'antin." 
 
 In this retreat, she retired from the cares 
 and fatiguing ceremonies of the Court, to 
 dwell with her own thoughts, and consecrate 
 to heaven those hours which prepare the 
 tired spirit for a future state, as well as give
 
 BELLEGARDE. 9 
 
 it new energy to discharge conscientiously the 
 duties of life. 
 
 The monastery of Koyaumont was, from the 
 period of its foundation, famous for the piety 
 and talents of its chiefs ; and bishops, cardi- 
 nals and princes of the church, deemed it an 
 honour to be thought worthy of having their 
 names placed on the list of holy men, who 
 were chosen to govern and direct the admi- 
 nistration of its revenues. 
 
 At the commencement of the revolution, 
 which destroyed not merely monks and mo- 
 nasteries, but declared religion to be a fable 
 and virtue a delusion, we had the good for- 
 tune to become intimate with the last director 
 of this establishment, and depositorv of his 
 papers and manuscripts, a short time before 
 he fell a victim to the political fanaticism of 
 the Marats and Robespierres. 
 
 b 5
 
 JO BELLEGARDE. 
 
 From these documents and personal know* 
 ledge of facts, we furnish this historical ro- 
 mance. 
 
 Our revered friend, Father Anatole, be- 
 longed as well to the aristocracy of nature as 
 of society. He had all the exterior marks of 
 personal superiority, a noble air, an elevated 
 stature, a head that one might worship as a 
 visible sign of deity. His learning was va- 
 rious, and his manner all dignity and benevo- 
 lence ; and such was his sedulous attention to 
 the morals and well-being of the rude people 5 
 who lived in his dependence and cultivated the 
 domains of the monastery, that misery was un- 
 known to them : were they sick, he was their 
 physician, for he had made medicine a favour- 
 ite study ; he was the enlightened and impar- 
 tial judge of their disputes and strife, and 
 none ever dreamed of appealing from his de-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 11 
 
 cisions ; to the obdurate and refractory he 
 was an object of terror, for he maintained, 
 that clemency towards the incorrigible was 
 cruelty towards the innocent ; so that those he 
 could not reclaim by reason, justice and reli- 
 gion, he banished from his flock, in order that 
 they might live in peace and enjoy the fruits 
 of that order and industry he had made fami- 
 liar to them. 
 
 Whilst he did so much for the comfort and 
 ease of others, he was indifferent to all those 
 enjoyments in which the monks of his convent 
 indulged ; he slept on a bed of straw, ate 
 sparingly of the simplest food, and only gave 
 to nature the repose necessary to renewed ex- 
 ertions of active benevolence. While his bre- 
 thren slumbered on beds of down, where there 
 reigned that happy indolence so well painted 
 by Boileau in the Lutrin, father Anatole
 
 12 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 prayed or studied ; not a moment of his time 
 was uselessly employed ; his fame was so well 
 established, that his jealous brethren of the 
 cowl ceased to cabal against him ; and the sur- 
 rounding population blessed Providence for 
 having placed them under the dominion of a 
 man, who was a castle of refuge to the mean- 
 est and poorest among them, and a scourge to 
 the wicked and disorderly. The origin of this 
 distinguished person was a secret ; and when- 
 ever his curious neighbours sought to sound 
 him on the subject of his birth, education and 
 early habits, the only answer he gave was, 
 that the faults and errors of his life admonish- 
 ed him to recur to them as rarely as possible. 
 If he cared about what the world calls consi- 
 deration, he trusted to his virtues and useful- 
 ness to obtain it. Many inquiries were set on 
 foot by the gentry who inhabited the neigh-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 bouring chateaux, to learn whether he was 
 M well born," in order that they might find a 
 rule to appreciate his worth; for they held, 
 that although the son of a peasant might be 
 entitled to their approbation, he could have no 
 pretension to their esteem or respect. Father 
 Anatole held their prejudices lightly; he nei- 
 ther courted the smiles of the great, nor the 
 popularity of the vulgar; his " kingdom was 
 not of this world/' he was consequently inde- 
 pendent of its frowns and its favours. As the 
 austerity of his life repressed and discounte- 
 nanced the levity and bad taste that was in- 
 dulged in before the clergy, who were admit- 
 ted to the tables of the nobility that inhabited 
 the neighbouring castles, he was never invited 
 to the circles of gay and dissolute society in 
 the vicinity of Chantilly. It was however 
 remarked, that he went every day to the
 
 14 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 chateau of Baillon, which had been some 
 years before purchased from the heir of the 
 too celebrated Madame de Pompadour, by an 
 aged lady, who, tired of the agitation and fol- 
 lies of fashionable life, and allured by the 
 agreeable walks and rides in the forest, select- 
 ed this spot for her habitual residence, and de- 
 voted all her time and attention to the educa- 
 tion of an interesting boy, the only remaining 
 member and representative of her ancient and 
 respectable family. This lady, who was at this 
 period past seventy, was not less than father 
 Anatole an object of busy curiosity, on ac- 
 count of the secluded life she had chosen to 
 lead, and the extensive works of charity she 
 performed, as well as her intimacy with father 
 Anatole, who gave to her and the child she 
 had adopted, all the time he could spare from 
 his ordinary avocations. Who the lady was,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 15 
 
 who the child, or whence came the monk, no 
 person could discover. The idle gossips spe- 
 culated and conjectured a perte de rue, with- 
 out being any wiser for their pains. What 
 they could not discover, the curious reader 
 will find in the following chapters,
 
 16 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Obsequium amicos, Veritas odium parit. 
 
 Cicero. 
 
 The lady of whom we have spoken in the fore- 
 going chapter, was of the powerful and ancient 
 family of Argenteuil, to whose ancestor Louis 
 the Fourteenth granted large tracts of land in 
 the province of Lower Canada. She had heen 
 educated in a convent in Paris, as was the cus- 
 tom with such of the Canadian gentry, as could 
 afford to send their children to the mother- 
 country. Even to this day, such families as 
 entertain the hope of emancipating that por*
 
 BELLEGARDE. 1 < 
 
 tion of North America from its dependence on 
 Great Britain, avoid carefully every kind of 
 alliance or community with the English set- 
 tlers, whom they consider as intruders. In 
 vain have gratuitous schools been formed in 
 every populous parish on the borders of the 
 St. Lawrence. In vain have places of trust, lu- 
 crative employments, and such other means, 
 as are in the gift of the British government, 
 been placed at the disposal of the old French 
 nobility in Canada, in order to reconcile them 
 to their new masters; they reject every thing 
 that might wean them from their love of 
 France; and fearing the influence that the 
 English language and literature might exer- 
 cise on their sympathies, affections, and morals, 
 there is not one in twenty of them who will 
 permit a word of English to be spoken in his 
 family; so that Lower Canada is perhaps the
 
 18 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 only spot on the globe, where can be found an 
 unmodified specimen of what the French were 
 in the days of Louis the Fourteenth. With- 
 out the power to expel the English, they obey 
 their laws, pay the taxes, and adopt the Cor- 
 gican maxim, " hate and wait" for an order of 
 things more in harmony with their interests or 
 their prejudices. 
 
 The family of D'Argenteuil, allied to the 
 ancient Counts of Soissons, had always been 
 at the head of the anti-English party; and 
 they stood the more aloof, as their pride of 
 ancestry could ill brook the airs of superiority 
 the English traders assumed in all their inter- 
 course with the conquered people; while on 
 the other hand, these considered them as a 
 pack of needy adventurers, without birth or 
 education to justify their pretensions to dis- 
 tinction, and whose only motives for crossing
 
 BELLEGARDE. 19 
 
 the Atlantic and fixing themselves in that rude 
 climate, was to monopolize the fur trade, and 
 exchange with the Indian tribes the refuse of 
 Manchester and Birmingham manufactures, 
 for the valuable skins of the beaver, the mar- 
 tin, the bear, and the blue fox. Moreover, it 
 must be admitted, that these fur traders, what- 
 ever may be said in their favour at the present 
 day, were not, at the period to which we al- 
 lude, a very polished or conciliating people : — 
 their object was gain ; their pleasures, if they 
 enjoyed any that merit the name, were those 
 of the table ; their conversation was limited to 
 the news of the day, or local interests and ri- 
 valities; in short, they were of the cast " thai 
 holdeth the plough, that glorieth in the goad, 
 and whose talk is of bullocks" They had that 
 kind of pride which money gives to men of low 
 education; that is to say, they carried theiF
 
 20 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 heads, rather than their hearts, very high, and 
 laid claims to distinction, which the obscurity 
 of their origin, enabled them to advance with- 
 out much apprehension of being detected. 
 Like most conquerors of a new world, from 
 Christopher Columbus to the Caique of Mus- 
 quito Island, they assumed a superiority over 
 the subdued natives, equally ridiculous and 
 impolitic ; as it prevents that bland assimilation 
 of the two people, so ardently desired by the 
 wisest statesmen of the British empire. 
 
 With such society the Baron D'Argenteuil 
 deemed it beneath his dignity to associate. 
 We have often remarked, that although the 
 urbanity of the French permits an apparent 
 equality between the highest nobleman and his 
 most humble neighbour, no people can more 
 adroitly avoid, without giving offence, all con- 
 tact with the vulgar. Tired and disgusted
 
 BELLEGARDE. 21 
 
 with a state of society so little in harmony with 
 his caste, D'Argenteuil determined to quit the 
 city of Montreal, and fix his habitual residence 
 on one of his larger estates. He had an only 
 daughter, deprived by early death of her mo- 
 ther; and the fond father, clinging to this rem- 
 nant of his ancient house, was desirous to de- 
 vote the remainder of his life to her education 
 and establishment. 
 
 He built a castle on the lordship of Saint 
 Ann, near the lake of the two mountains, well 
 known to transatlantic travellers for the beauty 
 of the position and the commodiousness of the 
 situation. 
 
 The site of the " Castle of the Lake of the 
 Two Mountains, " merits a particular descrip- 
 tion. — The lake, although large and beautiful, 
 is only a magnificent incident in the course of 
 the Black River, so called from the great depth
 
 22 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 and purity of its water, which enters into a 
 large basin formed by two hills on either side, 
 and to the eye exactly resembling each other. 
 The surrounding land is covered with lofty 
 trees ; — the oak, the sugar maple, the beautiful 
 American elm, so well known for the grace and 
 elegance of its form, mingled with a great va- 
 riety of evergreens, give a peculiar majesty to 
 the landscape; and although in most respects 
 trees resemble one another every where, the 
 amateur of these aristocrats of the vegetable 
 world, perceives as great a dissemblance be- 
 tween them, as between human faces. In 
 America too, nature seems to have formed 
 every thing on a larger scale than in Europe ; 
 there, mountains, rivers, lakes and plants, are 
 gigantic, compared with those of our country. 
 The fertility of the soil, enriched during a 
 countless succession of ages, by the constant
 
 BELLEGARDE. 23 
 
 accumulation on its surface of the decomposi- 
 tion of its own productions, untouched by the 
 hand of man, sends forth more vigorous plants 
 than our exhausted fields. The great extent 
 of the forests affords them on all sides repose 
 and shelter from the action of the tempests ; 
 and this contributes to the great elevation and 
 perfect proportions of the' trunks of the trees 
 throughout that vast region. There is in an 
 American forest, amidst its gigantic foliage 
 towering in the air, and the solemn silence that 
 reigns in it, unbroken even by the song of 
 birds, something that withdraws the soul from 
 the vain illusions of the world, and delivers 
 it to meditation and thoughts beyond the 
 miserable horizon of which man is the centre. 
 He feels how insignificant he is in the midst of 
 the wilderness, in the presence of nature, where 
 his habitual wants cannot be satisfied; and his
 
 24> BELLEGARDE. 
 
 mind, reacting upon itself, makes him feel that 
 dependence upon Deity, which is weakened or 
 forgotten amidst the resources and tumult of a 
 populous city. 
 
 The park and hunting grounds, which D'Ar- 
 genteuil had designed for the use and orna- 
 ment of his family residence, comprehended 
 the lake, the two mountains that held it in its 
 bed, a large quantity of cultivated lands and 
 meadows, and a small village, dependant upon 
 the domain of the castle; in all about twenty 
 thousand acres. This village had in ancient 
 times, ere a vessel had spread her sails on the 
 St. Lawrence, or the foot of a white man trod- 
 den its borders, been the site of an Indian 
 town. Laden with the spoils of the chase, a 
 tribe of the Algonquin nation, whose hunting 
 district extended itself nearly as far as Lake 
 Ontario, arrived every summer and reposed on
 
 BELLEGARDE. 25 
 
 this spot ; and although the numher of these 
 aborigines be now reduced to a few families, 
 from causes we shall hereafter examine, they 
 continue to assemble at the same place every 
 spring and summer, and subsist, during 
 the cessation of the chase, on the fish of the 
 lake and the Indian corn, which their wives 
 plant and gather in from such fields as the pre- 
 sent lord of the lake assigns for their use. 
 When these families reach " the field of re- 
 pose" after the fatigues of a severe winter, 
 they deposit their skins and furs in the store- 
 house of a trader, who supplies them with a 
 coarse blanket, a coloured cotton shirt, a quan- 
 tity of bread, and ammunition to recommence 
 the chase the coming winter. 
 
 Here the improvident Indian slumbers in a 
 state of nullity during the summer months; he 
 sees with indifference the white men till the 
 vol. i. c
 
 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 ground, build houses, enjoy property, taste the 
 sweets of domestic comfort and family affec- 
 tions, and live in the midst of abundance ; he 
 neither envies their prosperity nor admires 
 their skill; he will not make the least effort to 
 better his condition; he permits his wife to la- 
 bour to keep her children from starving; but 
 he himself disdains the use of any implement 
 except the gun, the arrow and the fishing 
 hook. Every thing in his nature is passion; 
 he does nothing with moderation; he either 
 slumbers in sloth and apathy, like the snake 
 when his appetite is satisfied, or when impelled 
 by hunger, hunts with the ardour and activity 
 of the wolf. Stripped by the white invaders 
 of his ancient domains, he has sunk into a state 
 of brutal stoicism, until roused by the call of 
 hunger or war; and having by the introduction 
 of fire arms lost his ancient skill in the usage
 
 BELLEGARDE. 27 
 
 of the bow and arrow, he is in a state of irre- 
 mediable dependence upon the fur trader, who 
 may refuse him that ammunition, upon the sup- 
 ply of which his subsistence and that of his 
 family depends. 
 
 The government of these growing colonies 
 sends the Indians annual donations; not so 
 much to keep them from perishing, as to con- 
 vert them into obedient vassals in time of war ; 
 but these gifts often tend to destroy them, by 
 affording them facilities to obtain ardent spi- 
 rits, which they drink to excess, and die of the 
 effects: — thus the liberality of the government 
 is converted into poison, and decimates annu- 
 ally the Indian population, wherever it comes 
 in contact with the children of civilization. 
 Emigration from the British isles changes fo- 
 rests into farms; the swamp of the otter and 
 musk rat is drained and converted into mea- 
 
 c 2
 
 28 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 dow and pasture ground; the bear, the fox 
 and the martin, escape into more savage re- 
 gions, and the ancient inhabitants, deprived of 
 that food which nature had placed within their 
 reach, and unskilled in the ways of living of 
 those who invade their territory, and whom 
 they call their " white brothers," lead a wretch- 
 ed and degenerate existence, and perish in a 
 state of misery, of which Rousseau was igno- 
 rant when he wrote his prize essay for the aca- 
 demy of Dijon: O! fiction! how seductive thy 
 empire, how fascinating its inhabitants; but 
 how far removed from sober reality and attain- 
 able happiness!
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 O my good Gonzalo, 
 My true preserver, and a loyal sir 
 To him thou follow'st; I will pay thy graces 
 Home both in word and deed. 
 
 Shak. Tempest, Act v. 
 
 D'Argenteuil had been a soldier, and 
 served under the banners of the unfortunate 
 Montcalm, who, listening to the voice of his 
 valiant spirit rather than his prudence, fell 
 outside the walls of Quebec, which he ought 
 to have remained within to defend with his 
 feeble army: he had been a spectator of that 
 conflict on the plain of Quebec, where Wolf 
 breathed his last word in the arms of victory;
 
 30 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 he had seen his country pass under a foreign 
 yoke; and upon every occasion had proofs of 
 the zeal, courage, and fidelity of the Indian 
 chiefs, who fought on the side of the French 
 troops. Many of those who survived were of 
 his own village and under his jurisdiction, for 
 in those days " haute and basse justice* was in 
 the hands of the seigneur of each district. 
 Anxious to meliorate their condition, and feel- 
 ing how much the mild lights of religion con- 
 tribute to render man better, he caused a mis- 
 sionary church, with a suitable habitation for 
 the clergy, to be erected at the little town of 
 St. Ann. He endowed this pious establish- 
 ment with a revenue, equal to the wants of 
 such zealous ecclesiastics as might feel disposed 
 to devote themselves to the religious and mo- 
 ral instruction of the youth of the Algonquin 
 tribe. One of these priests studied their Ian-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 31 
 
 guage and taught them the catechism; another 
 watched over the daily conduct of the families, 
 gave them good counsel, and administered re- 
 lief to such as were sick and unable to follow 
 their kindred to the chase, during their winter 
 excursions to the interior country; the most 
 eloquent of the fathers preached once a week 
 to the tribe, assembled in the church, and ex- 
 plained to them the Christian doctrine, and 
 the importance of religion to their present and 
 future happiness. Many of these savage men 
 were reclaimed from the errors and vices that 
 result from passion and instinct, unaided by 
 reason and a belief in future rewards and 
 punishments. These humane efforts were in 
 the commencement attended with great suc- 
 cess, and strong hopes were entertained, that 
 order, industry, and the arts of civilization, 
 might take root among them ; but in propor-
 
 32 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 tion as the white population increased in the 
 neighbouring villages, and with that increase 
 its concomitant evils, the Indians were not long 
 in discovering that in practical, every-day mo- 
 rality, there was very little difference between 
 their own notions of right and wrong, and 
 those of the white people, who had from in- 
 fancy been favoured with a religious education. 
 They found among the children of civilization 
 drunkards, liars and cheats, who stole their 
 furs when opportunity served, or gave them in 
 exchange for them damaged goods, which 
 soon wore out, although the ignorant savage 
 had given for them a commodity of an hun- 
 dred times the value : in short, they violated 
 all those obligations which the Indian had been 
 taught to respect as sacred, and conform- 
 able with the new doctrines he had been 
 commanded to observe. Finding themselves
 
 BELLEGARDE. 33 
 
 " duped by the bad men who crossed the great 
 lake, on purpose to diffuse comfort and light 
 among them,"* they lost much of their primi- 
 tive virtues, without putting any others in 
 their place, and became infinitely more cor- 
 rupt and degenerate than the worst tribes who 
 had never received instruction. The mission- 
 ary priests, however difficult they found it to 
 reconcile their precepts with the practices of 
 the white men, obtained from the young sa- 
 vages a great concession in the sacrifice of one 
 of their favourite customs: — they ceased to 
 torture prisoners of war, drink their blood, or 
 scalp them when slain in battle. A few of the 
 young men shewed great aptitude to learn 
 whatever the missionary priests thought it ex- 
 pedient to teach them; and one of them exhi- 
 bited such proofs of genius and elevation of 
 
 * Speech of Kahuta to Sir W. Johnstone. 
 
 c 5
 
 34 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 feeling and sentiment, that he attracted the 
 particular attention of his preceptors and the 
 affection of D'Argenteuil. He learned to 
 speak and write with ease and grace the 
 French language; composed themes in verse 
 that would have been cited as extraordinary 
 proofs of poetical genius at a Paris college; 
 and such was his docility and serious disposi- 
 tion, that he was selected from the multitude 
 of boys who received instruction at the mission 
 of St. Ann, to serve mass, wait on the priests, 
 and take care of their wardrobe and the sacred 
 vessels. He was confirmed at the age of fif- 
 teen, and D'Argenteuil, the better to com- 
 memorate the vigilance, fidelity and honour 
 which had marked all his conduct, named him 
 Bellegarde. 
 
 Nature had added to a mind so richly en- 
 dowed, a physical organization equally remark-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 35 
 
 able; he was tall, graceful, active and strong; 
 he possessed, as the Indians expressed it, the 
 " agility of the chipping squirrel," could swim 
 like a duck, and run for hours together with 
 the speed of a Canadian horse. The Indians 
 were proud of his superiority; and lest he 
 should leave them and become their enemy, 
 concealed from him, as long as they could, his 
 origin and birth. 
 
 Beilegarde was not of the Algonquin race. 
 The territory which had been from time im- 
 memorial exclusively occupied by the Ontario 
 nation, established on the banks of the lake 
 so named, was some twenty years before en- 
 tered upon by the young men of the Algon- 
 quins. The Ontario chiefs sent a deputation 
 to complain of this infringement of an ancient 
 right, but were treated with harshness and 
 contempt. The winter following a similar 
 aggression was repeated, and punished by a
 
 3G BELLEGARDE. 
 
 general massacre of the intruders. The Al~ 
 gonquins, to avenge this act, mustered all their 
 forces, and falling unawares on the Ontario 
 villages, during the summer months, when no 
 hostile expedition was expected, sacked and 
 burned them all. The chief of the Ontarios, 
 seeing his people destroyed, placed his only 
 son, then an infant, on his shoulders, and 
 attempted to escape to a neighbouring tribe, 
 but a shot from a rifle brought him to the 
 ground. The old Algonquin warrior who 
 killed him unloosed the bands of deer skin 
 which held the child to his body, and seeing a 
 smiling and beautiful boy, without any symp- 
 toms of alarm, hold out his hands towards 
 him, feit a movement of compassion, and, in- 
 stead of striking him with his tomahawk, laid 
 him on the ground whilst he scalped his father, 
 then carried him to the women who had fol-
 
 BELLEGARDE, 37 
 
 lowed from the lake of the mountains, and 
 ordered him to be adopted into the tribe. He 
 was brought up as one of his own children; 
 and the boy only learned these particulars 
 from the old cook at the house of the mission, 
 who used to amuse him in the long winter 
 evenings with such tales of war and adventure 
 as children love to listen to. To his own tale 
 he would seriously incline his attention; and, 
 as if he meditated at some future time to re- 
 turn and reclaim his birth right, and gather 
 together the scattered remnants of his race, 
 he besought the old servant not to say to the 
 Algonquins that she had disclosed to him the 
 fate of his father. 
 
 Soon after he had been confirmed at the 
 missionary church, D'Argenteuil took him into 
 his service, to accompany him and his daugh- 
 ter in their excursions on the lake, and assist
 
 38 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 in the amusements of the chase. His elevation 
 to a post in the household of the baron, who 
 was regarded by these simple people as next 
 in rank to ("their great father beyond the 
 big lake' ) the king, produced no jealousy 
 among his companions. The young girls se- 
 lected the finest skins for his mockasins, and 
 vied with one another in embroidering them 
 with porcupines' quills, steeped in the richest 
 and most brilliant colours. 
 
 The baron held him too high to offer him a 
 suit of livery, which, young as he was, he would 
 probably have refused to wear, the Indian 
 deeming every badge of servitude a degrada- 
 tion. A fancy dress, in shape and form not very 
 unlike the simple costume of the Indians, was 
 prepared for him. A cotton shirt, without a 
 collar, a doublet of light blue cloth, plaited 
 round the waist, and held with a long elastic 
 worsted sash, and buttoned to the throat,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 39 
 
 where it terminated in an embroidered collar ; 
 a copper bracelet round each wrist, and em- 
 broidered mockasins, distinguished Bellegarde 
 among his red brethern. His dress descend- 
 ed just low enough to leave the knee and part 
 of the limb naked, the Indian having the same 
 objection to conceal his legs, as the Turks to 
 have their beard pulled, or the Russian pea- 
 sants to have their faces smooth, according 
 to the ukase of the great Catharine. The 
 daughter of the baron placed a long dagger in 
 his "ceinture ; ,J and when his long raven-black 
 hair was braided, and hung as low as the bor- 
 der of his tunic, she fastened in it an eagle's 
 feather, to supply the want of hat or cap, 
 which nothing could induce an Indian to 
 wear. Thus equipped, Bellegarde entered 
 upon the important functions of body-guard 
 and attendant to the baron and his lovely 
 daughter.
 
 10 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 The castle of D'Argenteuil, although a mo- 
 dern building, was surrounded with bastions 
 and curtins, and its entrance secured by draw- 
 bridges and portcullises, over a large fo^e, 
 through which a small river, descending from 
 the neighbouring mountain, poured its stream. 
 before it entered into the lake that bathed one 
 front of the building. The entrance from the 
 lake was through a loft)' arched way, that ad- 
 mitted boats into the court, and might be 
 closed at will by a falling iron grated door, 
 moved up and down by a mechanical power 
 placed in the corridor above. Although this 
 elegant little fortress was without artillery, it 
 might serve as a place of refuge to the inha- 
 bitants of the vicinity, in case of any hostile 
 and sudden incursion of the Indians who in- 
 habited the borders of the lakes Ontario and 
 Erie. Such at least were the reasons given by 
 the owner for making a fort without, as he
 
 BELLEGARDE. 41 
 
 had made a castle within ; nevertheless, many 
 people gave it as their opinion, that a love of 
 feudal spendour entered into his project. 
 
 The family of the old Canadian nobleman, 
 was composed of his sister, a widow lady, who 
 did the honours of his table, his daughter Ma- 
 tilda, then in her seventeenth year, a domestic 
 chaplain, father Le Clerc, whose learning and 
 abilities not being seconded by the protection 
 of any powerful nobleman or high dignitary of 
 the church in France, of which country he 
 was a native, induced him to accept an offer 
 made to him by the relations of D'Argenteuil, 
 to remove to the colony and assist in the edu- 
 cation of the young heiress. A professor of 
 music and drawing, completed the circle of 
 this happy and affluent family. 
 
 D'Argenteuil lived in as great splendour as 
 a new country could admit; his revenues were 
 derived from mutation fines, equal to ten per
 
 42 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 cent, upon the value of every sale of real pro- 
 perty, made by the inhabitants of his vast es- 
 tates, and an annual rent of lands, let to far- 
 mers in the vicinity of the castle. The Indians 
 furnished venison and game from the forest, 
 and fish from the lake; and the house of 
 D'Argenteuil was the abode of abundance and 
 hospitality. The needy found relief at his 
 gate; the oppressed protection; the gentry of 
 the colony, with their families, came at stated 
 periods, every year, to pay him a visit, and his 
 dependants looked up to him as a father and 
 a friend. In his youth he had lived much in 
 the gay society of Paris, had perused with adV" 
 vantage to his heart and morals the great book 
 of human life, and sought the shade in his de- 
 clining age, that he might prepare himself to 
 quit the scene where he had acted his part 
 with dignity and honour.
 
 43 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Chi ha piu d'orgoglio e meno d'umanita, 
 Che un sciocco felice ? 
 
 Italian proverb. 
 
 Some fifteen or sixteen years after the pe- 
 riod when the voluptuous and inglorious Louis 
 XV. had ceded the Canadas to Great Bri- 
 tain, a sort of provincial Court was held at 
 Quebec. It has been a favourite custom for 
 that nation to " give just notions of its power 
 by the splendour of its representatives in fo- 
 reign countries ;"* and although the advan- 
 
 * See Lord Castlereagh's speech on the budget of 1816.
 
 44 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 tages of such prodigality of the national for- 
 tune are very questionable, it is not proba- 
 ble it will be discontinued, so long as the 
 aristocracy have children to saddle upon the 
 productive sources of the state, daughters 
 without portions to bestow on men in place, 
 and dowager mothers to pension, under the 
 head of " rewards for eminent services." 
 
 In conformity with this ostentatious spirit, 
 a Governor-General, with a large salary was 
 appointed to reside at Quebec. 
 
 It was natural to presume that the Cana- 
 dians could not easily forget that they were 
 Frenchmen, and that the humiliating treaty of 
 1763 could not convert them into Englishmen. 
 In order to insure their obedience, an im- 
 posing military establishment surrounded the 
 colonial governor, while orders were given to 
 conciliate the great landed proprietors, by ap-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 45 
 
 pearing to consult them on matters relating to 
 the local interests of the country. This was 
 the origin of what is still called the " Colonial 
 Council;" it was a faint imitation of the policy 
 of the famous Cardinal de Richelieu, who 
 obliged the nobles to live at Court, in order 
 that they might ruin themselves, and become 
 dependant on the Crown for places and pen- 
 sions, while this mode of living lessened their 
 influence over the people they were in the ha- 
 bit of governing and protecting. 
 
 Fortunately for the liberty of the Canadian 
 people, the British government did not select 
 Richelieus to govern them ; and if D'Argen- 
 teuil entertained any apprehensions of inroads 
 being made upon the rights and independence 
 of his countrymen, they were soon dispelled 
 by a close investigation of the new governor, 
 who invited him to visit the seat of govern-
 
 46 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 ment as a member of the provincial council. 
 This very important personage was the natu- 
 ral son of a Scotch duke, who when a school- 
 boy, had an unlucky intrigue with a Molly 
 Segrim of the village border, the offspring of 
 which, he in due time converted into an officer 
 of an infantry regiment, and pushed forward 
 in life by that kind of influence, on which 
 alone depends the success and advancement of 
 men in the civil and military departments of 
 the state. 
 
 When Sir Crowdie Mac Grosgutt was 
 named to the post of governor, with a civil 
 list of ten thousand pounds a year, by way of 
 indemnity for the coldness of the climate, he 
 was much advanced in years. He had been 
 long employed in warm climates; and as the 
 health of old bachelors gains little by such ser- 
 vice, he brought to his new appointment a
 
 BELLEGARDE. 47 
 
 shattered constitution, the peevish and irri- 
 table humour of incurable infirmities, and the 
 haughty port and contumelious manner, which 
 weak men employ as a mask to cover ignorance 
 and incapacity. We have already remarked 
 upon the stuff of which at that early period, 
 the English population was composed in Lower 
 Canada ; that of Quebec, was made up of peo- 
 ple from the highlands of Scotland. They 
 were true " children of the mist," few of them 
 being able to make themselves understood in 
 plain English. The levees and dinners of Sir 
 Crowdie were a little like those of Damocles, 
 for, with the exception of the secretary and 
 staff officers, no person breathed but in mo- 
 nosyllables : and the only sounds that were 
 heard at his festive board, were the moving of 
 plates and dishes ; but if the " feast of rea- 
 son'' was wanting, the proud host had the sa-
 
 48 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 tisfaction of seeing his viands and wine disap- 
 per like enchantment. The author of the 
 oi Almanack des G our mands* 'would have clap- 
 ped his hands with joy, at the sight of such 
 redoubtable trencher-men, whose digestive 
 powers had not in youth been impaired with 
 high living. They ate and drank as loyal sub- 
 jects ought to do at the vice-regal board ; and 
 if there were no French inhabitants present, 
 most cordially damned the Canadians, " for 
 wearing wooden shoes and calling hat cha- 
 peau."* Indeed they had nothing else to 
 allege against that happy and simple people, 
 who justly appreciating their position, care- 
 fully avoided every occasion of giving offence 
 to the friends and countrymen of " His ax- 
 
 * This is as good a reason as national prejudice can well offer 
 for national dislikes.' — Ed.
 
 BELLEGARDE. 49 
 
 At these reunions, (rather than society,) 
 the little, fat Sancho-like chief, paid no at- 
 tention to his guests ! the favour he conferred 
 by inviting them to his house, was in his opi- 
 nion, an act of condescension which dispensed 
 with all further ceremony. His principal at- 
 tention was bestowed upon a little favourite 
 pug-dog. When the dishes were removed, 
 the major-domo always placed this animal be- 
 fore his master, and nothing could equal the 
 smiles, caresses and compliments he received 
 from the guests. He marched round the ta- 
 ble, wagged his tail, and lapped a little wine 
 out of the glasses of those who sought the 
 approbation of the master, by indulging the 
 favourite. If any fastidious guest showed re- 
 luctance to lap out of the same can with the 
 dog, and called the servants to change his 
 glass, you would suppose that some outrageous 
 VOL. i. d
 
 50 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 act of ill breeding had been committed ; the 
 governor bridled up, his aid-de-camp mur- 
 mured, the secretary moved about upon his 
 chair, as if he sate on lighted coals, and a dead 
 silence ensued, until the governor rose and 
 gave the signal to retire to the drawing-room.* 
 The persons who were guilty of lese canini 
 usually slunk behind and escaped unobserved ; 
 and it required a long penitence and amende 
 honorable to be replaced on the eating and 
 drinking list of the chateau. D'Argenteuil 
 had been a spectator of some of these official 
 dinners, and a few days before his return to 
 his family, received a farewell invitation to 
 one, at which was assembled all the good com- 
 pany of the city. From the hotel where he 
 
 * Although we have placed this scene at Quebec, we have only 
 changed the name of the town; it was an every-day occurrence 
 at the table of a Mr. Gore, deputy governor of Upper Canada, 
 whose residence was at Kingstown. " What," says Junius, 
 " must be the congregation, when a monkey is the high priest."
 
 BELLEGARDE. 51 
 
 lodged to the government-house, the distance 
 was not more than a few hundred paces : but 
 the obstacles that were to be surmounted on 
 the way, became a work of time and labour, 
 owing to a tremendous gale that blew the 
 loose snow into heaps. To move about in a 
 carriage was impossible, and to proceed on 
 foot a matter of no small difficulty. In some 
 places, there was a snow drift of four or five 
 feet deep, in others less, but the whole surface 
 of the Place d'Armes was kept in motion by 
 the action of the storm. Such events are com- 
 mon in this rude climate ; and as they are fore- 
 seen, the inhabitants are prepared for them. 
 
 When a Canadian is full dressed, he draws 
 a pair of coarse woollen stockings over his 
 legs, made on purpose to cover them as 
 high as his waist ; he covers his head, ears 
 and face with a fur cap, then wraps his body 
 
 d 2 
 
 LJBRARY 
 
 IINIVPPfilTV' ns mid
 
 52 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 in a large pelisse, and thus equipped wades a« 
 he can from one place to another, too happy if 
 he be not smothered in a snow drift, or does 
 not find his nose frozen before he reach the 
 destined point. 
 
 As misfortune has need of company, D'Ar- 
 genteuil was glad to find a companion at 
 the hotel where he lodged, who had receiv- 
 ed an invitation to dine with the same so- 
 ciety. The landlord engaged them to keep 
 together and assist each other on the way. 
 The storm howled, and blew volumes of 
 snow with great violence in their faces as they 
 proceeded ; and so difficult did they find it to 
 buffet the waves of snow that rolled over them, 
 that they were compelled to stop and turn 
 their backs to the gale, in order to breathe, 
 after advancing a few steps. But the com- 
 panion of D Argenteuil was young and strong; 
 he held the old nobleman by the arm, and
 
 BELLEGARDE. 53 
 
 after a sharp struggle reached the governor's 
 door. They soon cast off their " snow-dress" 
 in the anti-chamber, and the footman having 
 demanded the name of the stranger, the Ba- 
 ron D'Argenteuil learned that he was in com- 
 pany with Captain De Courcy, of the 10th Re- 
 giment of foot. 
 
 Their names being announced several 
 times from the anti-chamber to the draw- 
 ing-room, they made the ceremonial bow to 
 his excellency, and retired into the circle 
 that stood at a respectful distance from his 
 chair. D'Argenteuil then turned to his com- 
 panion to thank him for the aid he had given 
 him to overcome " the pelting of the pitiless 
 storm." This was done in tolerably good Eng- 
 lish, to which the stranger replied in French, 
 with ease and dignity, and a deference in his 
 manner towards the old baron, that inspired a
 
 54 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 favourable opinion of his good breeding and 
 benevolence. 
 
 " Your name, sir," said the baron, " and 
 the facility with which you express yourself in 
 my language, would dispose me to believe, 
 that I have the honour of addressing one of 
 my countrymen, if I had not perceived you in 
 the uniform of a British officer." 
 
 " My name and family are of French origin ; 
 my ancestors inhabited the banks of the Seine, 
 and accompanied Duke William to England ; 
 but since the chivalrous days of Richard the 
 Lion-hearted, we have lived in a southern pro- 
 vince of Ireland." 
 
 " It is of ancient date, Captain De Courcy ; 
 I fancy you will not find many in this group 
 who can trace their family to so remote an 
 epoch." 
 
 " I am a stranger to the society, baron ; I 
 dine here for the first time."
 
 BELLEGARDE. 55 
 
 " And I," said the baron with a sigh, " al- 
 though a native of the colony, scarce know the 
 names of three persons in the room." 
 
 When dinner was announced, the two stran- 
 gers (attracted perhaps towards each other by 
 those congenial sympathies which the great 
 German author, Goethe, in his work on affini- 
 ties, considers as the source of all our actions,) 
 remained together, in order to cultivate an ac- 
 quaintance commenced in the snow-storm. 
 
 The governor was flanked by two brilliant 
 dames from Glengarry, with rosy faces and 
 rosy arms. As they spoke English but " in- 
 differently well," they were like two vases of 
 flowers on a parterre, more for ornament than 
 utility ; but they were the wives of two persons 
 of importance to the rising commerce of the 
 colony, a fur merchant and a dealer in masts 
 and spars for " the wooden walls of old 
 England." We have already said that these
 
 56 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 state dinners were too stately to be very gay. 
 Silence was once broken; but it was owing to 
 the favourite dog, who in passing before De 
 Courcy, stopped to drink out of his glass and 
 upset it, half filled with wine, on the table- 
 cloth. De Courcy pushed him gently away, 
 and provoked an impertinent question from 
 the host, who was displeased at the indiffer- 
 ence paid to the canine favourite, or else at 
 the stain occasioned by the spilling of his cla- 
 ret. Darting a fierce glance at the young sol- 
 dier he demanded, (on purpose, no doubt, to 
 embarrass him,) 
 
 " Pray, sir, where have you been brought 
 up?" 
 
 " In my father's house, sir, where there is 
 a clean table cloth every day," was the only sa- 
 tisfaction Sir Crowdie received. 
 
 The ladies burst into a roar of laughter,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 57 
 
 and the ill-timed mirth increased not a little 
 the embarrassment of the company, from 
 which they were released by his excellency 
 beating a retreat to the drawing-room, where, 
 after a few significant nods of protection to 
 the chosen few who were blessed with his inti- 
 macy, this grave magistrate withdrew. " The 
 cares of state forbade him to waste his time in 
 social pleasures, or perhaps the " dignity of 
 office" admonished him not to condescend to 
 familiar intercourse with people who might 
 think a kind word was a title to ask a favour. 
 The etiquette did not permit the company to 
 remain many minutes in the drawing-room 
 after the retreat of the master of the feast; 
 and as De Courcy had not the good fortune 
 to please, neither the colonial secretary, nor 
 the staff officers condescended to pay him 
 those attentions which are due to a stranger 
 
 d 5
 
 58 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 who happens for the first time to have a claim 
 on hospitality and benevolence ; as soon there- 
 fore as he saw signs of impatience in the looks 
 of the baron, he proposed to him to retrace 
 their steps to the hotel where they lodged. 
 The baron, charmed with his new acquaint- 
 ance, invited him to pass the evening in his 
 apartment, and learning that the young officer 
 w r as on his way to join his regiment, then 
 quartered at Montreal, he proposed to him to 
 take a place in his cariole, which was accept- 
 ed with pleasure. It is now time to make our 
 readers acquainted with Captain Eustace De 
 Courcy ; and to his introduction we shall ap- 
 propriate a portion of the following chapter.
 
 53 
 
 CHAPTER V, 
 
 Non, je ne suis point faible assez, 
 Pour regretter des jours steriles, 
 Perdus bien plutot que passes 
 Parmi tant de peines inutiles. 
 
 Old Poetry. 
 
 De Courcy was now at that happy age, 
 when the emotions of the soul are active and 
 tumultuous, when the living sources of senti- 
 ment and joy flow with impetuosity, when men 
 feel profoundly the impression of every object 
 with which they come into contact, and see 
 every thing with an interest, which becomes 
 calm as they advance in life. In a word he 
 was only twenty-two years old. He had
 
 60 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 letters to several officers of the staff of the 
 governor, which their conduct towards him at 
 dinner and in the drawing room, induced him 
 to throw into the fire in presence of D'Argen- 
 teuil, when they were together at the hotel ; 
 and in proportion as his disgust of his coun- 
 trymen and their servility of spirit increased, 
 his attachment to the kind, urbane, gentleman- 
 like old nobleman grew warm. 
 
 But it is necessary, to the satisfaction of at 
 least one third of our readers, that we speak of 
 his family before we describe his merit ; and 
 even the other two thirds, provided he have in- 
 spired them with the least interest, will not be 
 sorry to learn, that he was of a noble and 
 ancient family, whose fortune by no means 
 corresponded with its military renown, at 
 those periods of our history when courage 
 and virtue and physical strength were causes
 
 BELLEGARDE. 61 
 
 of illustration. De Courcy was the youngest 
 of seven children. The small remnant of the 
 ancient possessions of his father, was entailed 
 on the eldest son ; and the younger brothers 
 were left to shift for themselves as they could, 
 some in the army, some in the navy, and those 
 of a less enterprizing spirit, in professions 
 where more money and less glory are obtained. 
 His father, the Earl of Groveland, married a 
 second time late in life ; Eustace was the 
 offspring of this union ; and as the Earl was 
 impoverished by the efforts he had made to 
 establish his other sons, he had scarcely 
 sufficient income to keep up a modest estab- 
 lishment at the birth of his last child. He 
 therefore resolved to educate him at home, 
 watch the development of his faculties, and 
 study his disposition, before he decided upon 
 a suitable profession for him. He had lived
 
 62 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 long, and carefully observed the influence of 
 different modes of education, on the success 
 and happiness of young men, in their progress 
 through life. " Useful friendships," he would 
 say, " are formed at public schools and 
 colleges, and emulation, when the object is 
 praiseworthy and honourable, is a strong and 
 constant incentive to exertion and industry; 
 but has emulation always a laudable object in 
 view? are there not equally struggles between 
 boys, who shall be most daring in vice and 
 insubordination ? Besides, it is extremely 
 doubtful, whether emulation, so much eulo- 
 gized, be not a source of permanent evil ; it 
 renders the most highly gifted vain, intolerant 
 and ambitious, insolent, proud and turbulent ; 
 and these defects, though accompanied by 
 great personal superiority, render men more 
 frequently a scourge than an ornament to
 
 BELLEGARDE. 63 
 
 society. Ambition is cultivated as a means of 
 happiness ; but it seldom produces in the 
 breast of the man who possesses so pernicious 
 a gift, any thing but discontent, disorder and 
 disappointment. Caesar called it the " malady 
 of a great mind;" and it is that malady which 
 has given to the world conquerors, tyrants and 
 demagogues, but \ias rarely advanced the 
 material interests of mankind. 
 
 If we could distinguish in the early dawnings 
 of genius and intelligence, the moral direction 
 they receive in after life ; if we could select 
 from the mass of boys, such as are destined to 
 govern states, maintain their institutions and 
 defend their liberties, means might be taken to 
 inspire them with a useful ambition; but to ex- 
 cite it in every one, to make it the prime mover 
 of their actions and desires, is to give to every 
 boy his companion for an enemy or for a slave.
 
 6*1 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 Those who cannot raise themselves by 
 their talents, seek distinction by qualities 
 that degrade humanity ; by flattery, hypo- 
 crisy and baseness ; they hate those who 
 stand in their way, and injure them by all the 
 means that virtue and honesty reprove ; hence 
 those dispositions that render men unhappy 
 and contemptible through life, are warmed 
 into activity by a silly rule, that cannot receive 
 a just application to a multitude of boys, of 
 different powers and faculties derived from 
 nature and constitution. But such is the rage 
 for being classical, that we have borrowed 
 from the Greeks, that very emulation, which 
 making it the duty of every one to endeavour 
 to surpass others, rendered them all egotists 
 from the earliest period of their existence ; 
 was the cause of the broils and dissentions 
 with which their history is filled ; and which
 
 BELLEGARDE. 65 
 
 ended in their destruction and subjugation. 
 Like them our education only fits men for 
 war ; as if we stood in need of nothing but 
 heroes and gladiators; and in our youth we 
 have seen mothers, whose boys were destined 
 to be grave magistrates, pious clergymen, and 
 professors of the useful and ornamental 
 sciences, looking with complacency at the 
 '•' whiskers" they gave each other in the aca- 
 demies of Jackson, Gully, and Belcher. 
 
 The greatest men of Europe have not been 
 thus educated ; Milton, Shakspeare, Bacon, 
 Locke, Newton, Descartes, Montaigne, Vol- 
 taire, and Rousseau", were not thus instructed ; 
 nor did the greater part of them owe any part 
 of their celebrity to what we call apublic educa- 
 tion. The time a boy spends at a public school, 
 is the most wretched period of his existence ; 
 his brain is fatigued with grammar and Latin,
 
 66 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 and logic, which are fixed in his memory by 
 blows and tears and suffering ; in short, he 
 goes through his humaniores literce, with as 
 much pain as a galley slave performs his 
 quotidien task, with the additional irksomeness 
 of understanding more imperfectly the labour 
 assigned to him ; and this too at an age, when 
 his reason is incapable of comprehending any 
 thing complicated or abstruse. 
 
 " Of the benefit of words," says a writer of 
 celebrity, " no one will think lightly ; but words 
 are often used without thinking." Old as we 
 are, we sufficiently remember the hardships of 
 attending to what we did not understand, and 
 acquiring what we did not value, and which we 
 could not possibly imagine to be of any use, 
 but to furnish occasion for reproach and chas- 
 tisement. Distinct ideas of prepositions alone, 
 are only to be expected from deep reflection
 
 BELLEGARDE. 67 
 
 and mature study ; and when compounded, re- 
 quire in their just application, all that vigour of 
 intellect, which the common school boy does not 
 possess when he touches the age of manhood." 
 These reflections determined the Earl of 
 Groveland to adopt a different plan for 
 the education of Eustace. A good master 
 was engaged to teach him the common rudi- 
 ments of the English tongue, and give him a 
 sufficient knowledge of arithmetic and mathe- 
 matics ; the earl taught him (as Johnson says 
 of Shakspeare) just Latin enough to gram- 
 maticise his English and aid him in the study 
 of French and Italian. In the intervals of 
 mere efforts of memory, his mind was relieved 
 with history, geography, general notions of 
 chemistry, geology and botany ; and all these 
 were instilled into the memory, without im- 
 posing any rude task that might disgust or
 
 68 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 fatigue the pupil. The exercises necessary to 
 possess mens sana in corpore sano were not 
 forgotten. The principal occupation of an 
 Irish country gentleman, besides quarter ses- 
 sions and grand jury meetings, is hunting and 
 shooting ; and at fourteen Eustace was an 
 excellent horseman, cool, skilful, and resolute. 
 He had been taught that fear was an element 
 of danger ; and he astonished his companions 
 of the chase, by his self-possession in difficult 
 situations, and his address in extricating him- 
 self. He loved shooting not so much from a 
 taste for " la petite guerre" as the excitement 
 it gave him and the opportunity it furnished 
 of expending in long and painful marches that 
 superabundance of life which nature had so 
 liberally bestowed upon him. Constant occu- 
 pation made his days pass unobserved ; and 
 his evenings were devoted to reading and con-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 69 
 
 \ersation with his highly gifted and intelligent 
 parents : while his father gave him philoso- 
 phical views of the phenomena of nature and 
 the mechanism of society, his mother deve- 
 loped in him that " instinctive power, active 
 and strong, and feelingly alive to each fine 
 impulse " called taste. 
 
 At the age of seventeen he was sent to 
 St. Omer to learn to speak French, to dance, 
 and to fence ; and his time, up to nineteen, had 
 been so well employed, that he was farther 
 advanced in useful and disposable knowledge, 
 than are the greater part of men at twenty- 
 five. He only lacked the usage of courts and 
 camps to make him a living and faithful re- 
 presentation of that perfect character that 
 Addison calls a fine gentleman: for religion, 
 that rarest ingredient in the catalogue of 
 common accomplishments, was not wanting.
 
 70 EELLEGARDE. 
 
 For this blessing he was indebted to the pre- 
 cepts and example of his mother. In the 
 progress of a long and eventful life, he would 
 often recur to the influence this refined and 
 enlightened woman had exercised over his 
 early sensations : what man, he would say to 
 himself, who feels his heart beat high at the 
 call of virtue, or finds the tear of delight start 
 into his eye at the recital of a noble, generous, 
 or heroic action, cannot refer whatever is good 
 in him, to the warm and gentle influence of a 
 good mother ; sensibility, delicacy of taste, 
 courage without ferocity, resignation, so ne- 
 cessary in the painful and thorny path of 
 existence, all, all these flow from that holy 
 and sacred source. 
 
 " II faut que l'immortel qui touche ainsi notre ame 
 Ait suce la pitie, dans le lait d'une femme." 
 
 De la Martine.
 
 71 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 I rather would entreat thy company, 
 To see the wonders of the world abroad, 
 Than living dully sluggardized at home, 
 Wear out thy youth with shapeless idleness. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 When Eustace returned from the continent 
 to his father's house, he was every thing his 
 parents could desire. He spent a winter at 
 home, and was admired by all the neighbour- 
 ing gentry, for the grace and dignity of his 
 manner, as well as the goodness of his heart 
 and the devotion of his sentiments; he alone 
 seemed unconscious of his personal superiority. 
 
 It was painful to separate himself from his
 
 72 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 family, who had been his preceptors, friends 
 and companions ; but it was necessary to make 
 choice of a profession, and enter upon the ca- 
 reer of life. His inclination was consulted, a 
 commission obtained in the fortieth regiment 
 of foot, commanded by an old friend of his 
 father, and preparations made for his depar- 
 ture. Two of the best horses were selected 
 from his father's tenantry, who were all anxious 
 to " sell at his own price to the dear young 
 master," who had been from infancy an object 
 of respect and affection. 
 
 Those who are acquainted with the en- 
 thusiasm that glows in the bosom of Irish 
 peasants, will readily conceive the alacrity 
 with which they seek to render themselves 
 useful to those who treat them with kind- 
 ness and inspire in them either attachment 
 or admiration. " The horses will not be soon 
 paid for," said old mother Holdbrook, " but
 
 BELLEGARDE. 73 
 
 it's all one for that ; sure it's for the son of the 
 good ould stock, and the blessin of God be 
 wid im ; and you, Bill, you are his foster-bro- 
 ther, my jewel; and see that you sarve him 
 well, and keep yourself out of harm's way. 
 So, now go to mass, and get a mouthful of 
 prayers, and ask a blessin of father Coolaghan 
 before you start." 
 
 There is (we forget in what book), a very 
 pretty description of the departure of the 
 young Terrail, afterwards the Chevalier Ba- 
 yard, from his father's house in Dauphiny. 
 His father bestowed on him his best palfry, 
 and did him the honour of buckling on his 
 gilded spurs; his mother tied on the embroi- 
 dered scarf; his sword was girded on by an 
 old uncle, who had been distinguished as a 
 good man at arms; and the bishop of Gren- 
 oble, his maternal uncle, pronounced a pious 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 74 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 benediction on the equipped and valiant page, 
 as he set forth on his journey. Something 
 like this took place when Eustace De Courcy 
 left that sacred home, which he was neyer 
 more to behold; and amidst the tears and 
 blessings of the assembled multitude, bade 
 them farewell. 
 
 He journeyed with a heavy heart, followed 
 by Bill Holdbrook, his foster-brother, in a 
 neat but simple livery, and mounted on the 
 inferior nag of the two, that had been bred on 
 the farm his father held on the estate of the 
 old lord 
 
 Eustace was received by the officers of his 
 regiment with all the cordiality he could desire, 
 and applied himself with sedulous attention to 
 learn the duties of an officer, of the import- 
 ance of which his preconceived notions were 
 singularly exaggerated. Besides the mecha-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 75 
 
 nical affair of manoeuvring, and administration, 
 (which he had studied in France in a military 
 school, where a young man goes regularly 
 through every grade, from the private soldier 
 to the commander of a regiment, before he 
 can pretend to enter into the line as an ensign), 
 he had supposed that the elementary rules of 
 the military science would be studied and prac- 
 tised in the exercises of the garrison. In this he 
 was disappointed: he soon perceived that any 
 man, who had money or interest to obtain a 
 commission, and courage enough to execute 
 blindly and ignorantly the orders of his supe- 
 riors, was deemed fit to be an officer: — science, 
 knowledge of details, acquaintance with lan- 
 guages in which are found good works on the 
 art of war, a facility in sketching positions and 
 marking out an encampment, were all as unne- 
 cessary to a British officer as to a fashionable 
 
 e2
 
 76 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 tailor:- — to dress well, lounge about the streets, 
 make love to the chamber and shop maids of 
 the town, eat good dinners, and sit late at the 
 mess table, with an occasional bout of sparring 
 and Fencing, were the only qualifications ne- 
 cessary for " the defenders of the country." 
 Knowledge was voted a bore, learning pedan- 
 try, and writing a legible hand declared to 
 be ungentleman-like. This idle, sauntering, 
 time-killing existence, was not suited to the 
 ardent spirit and solid judgment of our hero; 
 he grew sick of it at the end of a couple of 
 years ; and having an opportunity of purchas- 
 ing a company in the tenth infantry, then sta- 
 tioned in Canada, he availed himself of it, and 
 landed at Quebec a few days before that on 
 which he became known to the Baron D'Ar- 
 genteuil. — We now return to our narrative. 
 The morning after the dinner at the house
 
 BELLEGARDE. 77 
 
 of Governor Mac Grosgutt, De Courcy re- 
 ceived an invitation from the baron to break- 
 fast in his apartments, in order that they might 
 arrange the details of their journey to Mon- 
 treal. 
 
 " You are going to be my travelling compa- 
 nion, sir," said he, addressing himself to Eus- 
 tace, "in a rude climate and at a very incle- 
 ment season: you will, perhaps, trust to my 
 experience to render it as agreeable as pos- 
 sible." 
 
 " I have only thought of the excessive 
 rigour of the weather and the fatigue of tra- 
 velling as they might incommode you, my lord. 
 I have a large stock of youth and health, to 
 enable me to bear the hardships and privations 
 inseparable from my profession; besides, if 
 you can resign yourself to support, without 
 murmuring, the incommodities of rough roads,
 
 78 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 bad inns, and jaded horses, it would ill become 
 me to complain of them." 
 
 "I am glad to find so much practical philoso- 
 phy in so young a man : yet I shall so manage 
 matters, that you will have little occasion to 
 call it to your aid. Our cold atmosphere must 
 appear tremendous to a native of a temperate 
 climate ; it has not, however, the inconveniences 
 attached to the winters of England and 
 France, where you have sometimes an Italian 
 morning and a Swedish evening ; sudden 
 changes, for which you are always unpre- 
 pared. Here, on the contrary, our cold and 
 warm seasons are uniform, and every thing is 
 ordered accordingly. Our horses, of the old 
 Norman race, are small, strong, fleet and vigo- 
 rous; our cariole (light covered sledge) lined 
 with wolf and bear skins, is as tight and more 
 proof against cold, than a Paris chariot; as to
 
 BELLEGARDE. 79 
 
 rough roads, we know not the inconvenience 
 of them in Canada; for as the snow lies frozen 
 on the ground, at least four months of the 
 year, our path will be as smooth as a polished 
 mirror, and we shall slide over the surface like 
 a birch bark canoe on an unruffled lake. The 
 air is tonic and disposes our people to sing, 
 dance and play. During the winter months, 
 they visit and feast at each others houses. 
 Their lands are rich and produce abundant 
 crops ; the rivers and lakes teem with various 
 kinds of excellent fish; and our poorest pea- 
 sants have venison and wild geese on their 
 tables. They are a happy, industrious, moral 
 race ; receive religious instruction from their 
 priests, who are their parents and friends ; pay 
 only a small " redevance" (mutation fine) to 
 the lords of the soil upon the transfer of pro- 
 perty ; and having no motive to commit crimes
 
 80 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 of any kind, are more exempt than any peo- 
 ple I have known from the evils that afflict 
 and demoralise society. Up to the present 
 moment, it has been the policy of our con- 
 querors to leave us free from taxes ; and a 
 wise policy it is; since an honest hard work- 
 ing man, can with difficulty comprehend, why 
 a large portion of his labour should be given 
 to those who govern him. Our people have 
 native magistrates to see the laws duly exe- 
 cuted ; they are left in the undisturbed enjoy- 
 ment of the religion of their fathers ; and only 
 see the strong arm of government, in the occa- 
 sional passage of troops, from one principal 
 town to another." 
 
 " You are then, my lord, in a very different 
 situation from that of many other conquered 
 portions of the British empire ; the land of my 
 fathers, its prosperity and tranquillity, are
 
 BELLEGARDE. 81 
 
 quite as important to that island called Eng- 
 land, as the population of half a million sca f - 
 tered over this vast colony at such an immense 
 distance; and yet the mode of administering 
 the laws, has a very different tendency : here 
 every thing is paternal; there, every thing is 
 rigour and severity ; here, every thing is kind, 
 indulgent, tolerant, in favour of the majority ; 
 there, every thing emanating from the go- 
 vernment is partial, intolerant and exclusive. 
 In Ireland the laws are made to favour one re- 
 ligion and reduce those who do not profess its 
 doctrines, to the condition of a helot. Even I, 
 who have his Majesty's warrant to serve in 
 Canada, am acting in violation of a law, which 
 imposes heavy penalties on a Catholic, who 
 serves in a British regiment in the capacity of 
 a commissioned officer out of Ireland ; but this 
 unjust and cruel statute, is allowed to slum- 
 
 e 5
 
 82 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 ber ; and history will probably mark it with 
 the same reprobation, as it has already marked 
 its authors. Prejudice and private interest 
 may add new links to our chain ; intolerance 
 may rivet it more closely, but we hope for a 
 better state of things; and with so many mo- 
 tives to revolt, leave our destiny in the hands 
 of Providence, and do our duty towards the 
 government, as if it did not treat us like slaves 
 and criminals." 
 
 " And yet, sir," said D'Argenteuil, his 
 thoughts passing rapidly to possible changes 
 in the happy condition of his own people, — 
 " and yet, sir, your country pass for brave and 
 chivalrous, prone to strife, sudden and quick 
 in quarrel, animated with strong passions, and 
 attached to their country and religion." 
 
 " I believe that to be a just view of their 
 disposition, my lord ; and yet every attempt
 
 BELLEGARDE. 83 
 
 they have made to emancipate themselves 
 has been rendered abortive, more, I should 
 hope, from want of prudence than want 
 of valour. Moreover, our leading patriots 
 doubt the utility, even though the attempt 
 might succeed, of breaking off our connec- 
 tion with England: one cannot "improvise' a 
 new state of society in the midst of an old 
 one ; it is impossible to have a fleet, com- 
 merce, political relations, and create the means 
 of maintaining them by a simple declaration of 
 independence: the anarchy that would inevi- 
 tably result from such a successful project of 
 separation, would only produce a change of 
 evils, more insupportable than those we en- 
 dure. The Italian proverb, old as the time of 
 Tacitus, applies very strictly to our case " il 
 tempo, e un gallant uomo ;" we will let him do 
 his work ; he will make us at no very distant
 
 84 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 day an integral part of the family of Great 
 Britain: and when we shall be treated like the 
 children of a common parent, we care little 
 whether he be an English or an Irishman ; 
 such a question would not be worth a cudgel- 
 ling match between two peasants at an Irish 
 fair." 
 
 " You will then fight as zealousy the battles 
 of England, as if you were born in Kent, a 
 member of the church militant ?" 
 
 " Unquestionably : my engagement has been 
 voluntary and leaves me no pretext to violate 
 it : besides, an universally admitted principle of 
 honour, must never be sacrificed to any specu- 
 lative notion of duty ; else confidence, faith 
 and morality, would be unsettled as the vari- 
 ous caprices and opinions of mankind. Pri- 
 vate, as well as public honour, compels a 
 
 SOLDIER TO DEFEND HIS STANDARD."
 
 BELLEGARDE. 85 
 
 i{ I admit the soundness of your doctrine, 
 Captain De Courcy, as much as I admire your 
 resignation; but if I were in your situation, I 
 am not sure that I could find inclination to 
 practise a virtue so painful." 
 
 " If duty and inclination, my lord, were al- 
 ways agreed, there would be no virtue in the 
 world ; men become great by the power they 
 possess to make great sacrifices and their 
 promptness to execute them. I have been 
 taught to attach no importance to my inclina- 
 tion, whenever I find it in opposition with a 
 self-evident duty." 
 
 There is no saying how far this conversation 
 might have been carried on, had not a ser- 
 vant entered, to announce that the cariole was 
 ready at the door. 
 
 Our travellers set out in high spirits, pleas- 
 ed with each other's conversation ; the little
 
 86 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 Canadian post-horses flew along the snow- 
 path, their bells jingled, and the sound seemed 
 lo animate them ; the conductor sang from one 
 relay to another, with the exception of pauses 
 made every time he came near one of the nu- 
 merous wooden crosses, that are planted on 
 the side of the highway, when he doffed his 
 woollen cap and remained silent, until he 
 thought himself out of the hearing of such spi- 
 rits as his faith taught him were placed to 
 guard its sacred symbol. They arrived at 
 Montreal on the third day. D'Argenteuil 
 only stopped to take refreshment and change 
 horses ; and although his general habits dis- 
 posed him to avoid all intimacies with the 
 English, he made our young soldier promise 
 to take an early opportunity to pay him a 
 isit at the Lake of the Two Mountains.
 
 87 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The noon tide sun call'd forth the mutinous winds, 
 A.nd 'twixt the green sea and the azured vault 
 Set roaring war. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 De Courcy saw the old Canadian lord 
 depart with emotion ; his age, dignity of 
 manner, opinions and disposition, inspired our 
 young soldier with veneration and affection. 
 
 As soon as he was fixed in his new quar- 
 ters, had paid his visit to the commanding 
 officer, and taken charge of his company, his 
 thoughts turned towards home, parents and 
 friends, and to these he consecrated his first
 
 88 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 moments of leisure, as we find by the follow- 
 ing letter to his father : 
 
 " My dearest Father, 
 
 " It is time, after so long an absence, to give 
 you des signes de vie; and I need scarce say 
 with how sincere delight my imagination trans- 
 ports me to your presence, where, seated in 
 your study, I can fancy your tender and 
 anxious curiosity, impatient to become ac- 
 quainted with my adventures since we parted. 
 I approach you with that familiarity, which 
 you taught me to feel by making me, as you 
 often said, your friend and companion, so as 
 to blend in one common sentiment, the filial 
 affection of a son, with the unconstrained 
 freedom of an equal. This completely re- 
 moved the awe with which children approach 
 the solemn big wig and shaggy eye-brows of
 
 BELLEGARDE. 89 
 
 age and authority, that so often discourage 
 confidence and estrange children from their 
 parents. 
 
 " For my part, I can scarcely comprehend 
 the fear of most of my young acquaintance for 
 their fathers and mothers, the care with which 
 they conceal from them their thoughts and 
 actions, and the consequent mystery and dissi- 
 mulation, which are mixed up with their every- 
 day intercourse. I love you too sincerely, and 
 value you too highly, to do any thing that 
 could lessen my claim to your affection, or my 
 title to your esteem, and shall write to you as 
 I would to my friends and brother officers of 
 the fortieth, Fortescue and Sommerville. 
 
 " I cannot say that I have been happy since 
 I left Ireland: resignation is not happiness, 
 since it supposes the existence of ills we 
 cannot avoid ; but you have taught me to con-
 
 90 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 sider it in the light of a virtue that I shall be 
 constantly called to exercise. I have at least 
 the satisfaction of obeying a precept in every 
 act of patient submission to the dispensations 
 of Providence. 
 
 " I embarked in the Joseph transport ship, 
 which was to carry me from the hospitable 
 shores of my native land. I shall not fill my 
 letter with the details of sea sickness, and all 
 those inevitable incommodities of a long pas- 
 sage. I had the satisfaction of witnessing a 
 tremendous storm, and as Zanga says in the 
 Revenge, it suited * the gloomy tenour of my 
 soul.' It occurred in the Gulph of St. Law- 
 rence, and surely the * whirlwinds of the 
 north * were all let loose on our crazy bark. 
 We were tossed about during two days with 
 an impetuosity that alarmed all the passengers; 
 the women screamed with terror, the men
 
 BELLEGARDE. 91 
 
 looked pale, the captain, though a brave man, 
 looked uneasy when he saw his boats struck 
 off the deck by a mountain-like wave that 
 broke upon it, and the main mast and running 
 rigging carried away and lying in a state of 
 ruin and confusion. During these scenes of 
 danger and desolation, I had an opportunity 
 of admiring the fearless countenances and 
 intrepid efforts of the gallant sailors, who, 
 beaten by the tempest and often enveloped«in 
 immense waves that broke through the stand- 
 ing rigging upon them, clung to the ropes, 
 resisted with spirit and vigour the storm with 
 all its attendant horrors, and although de- 
 prived of repose, food or refreshment during 
 the greater part of the day, did their duty 
 with a cheerfulness and alacrity, worthy the 
 proud title of ( British tars.' When * the 
 exulting demon of the tempest,' had ex-
 
 92 
 
 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 hausted its fury and seemed to repose its 
 mighty wings, as if tired of the struggle, these 
 brave fellows passed round a can of stiff grog, 
 and appeared as unconcerned as Newfound- 
 land dogs who had been amusing themselves 
 in the water. 
 
 " Man can have few opportunities like that 
 I have been describing, of shewing to ad- 
 vantage that instinctive intelligence and cou- 
 rage with which nature has distinguished him 
 above the lower animals. On land, if danger 
 assail him, he has a thousand ways of escaping 
 it; but on the wide abyss of waters, his 
 ordinary resources are wanting; he is confined 
 in a floating prison, upon which the elements 
 exhaust their fury ; * a false helm/ when he 
 flies before the gale, may immerge him in the 
 fathomless bosom of the deep, or a frail plank 
 let inevitable death into his dwelling ; and yet
 
 BELLEGARDE. 93 
 
 he seems as full of security and confidence as 
 if he were slumbering under the paternal roof 
 in the midst of his family. 
 
 " I love my profession, and hope to find 
 opportunities of proving to my family and my 
 country, that the De Courcy of the present 
 day is not unworthy of the privilege (of wear- 
 ing his hat in the royal presence) obtained by 
 the valour of his ancestor ; but if my edu- 
 cation had qualified me to be a sailor, I should 
 rejoice in the superiority of the navy over the 
 army, and the chances of gathering laurels on 
 an element where the hand of great courage 
 and perseverance alone can pluck them. In 
 the army, success, and consequently fame, may 
 be the fruit of accident ; the wisest generals 
 have been beaten, the best plans have failed 
 from the intervention of some unforeseen 
 event, and what is worse, the judgment of
 
 94 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 the world is often unjust towards brave men, 
 whose good fortune has not been equal to their 
 merit; but in the navy, you may quit the 
 scene, if destiny be unfavourable to you : the 
 commander who sinks or blows up his ship 
 rather than strike his flag, is never reproached 
 by his country. A profession that thus ren- 
 ders a man independent of events, and places 
 his reputation in his own keeping, is the one I 
 would prefer could I retrace my steps. — But 
 I am wandering from my object, which was 
 simply to render you an account of my 
 progress. — Thirty days after our departure 
 from Kingsale, we came to anchor under the 
 walls of Quebec, and, fortunately for our safety, 
 in time to avoid a second storm, accompanied 
 by cold severe enough to render our approach 
 impossible. 
 
 " The city is a good military position,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 95 
 
 rising almost perpendicularly from the water 
 to a great elevation. Our immortal Wolf, 
 aware of the inefficiency of an attack on the 
 side of the river St. Lawrence, landed his 
 army about two miles from the town ; and 
 aided by the sailors of the fleet, ascended a 
 steep ravine with his artillery and ammunition, 
 so as to be able to approach the fortress on 
 the land side. This movement was executed 
 with such secrecy and expedition, that he was 
 in order of battle on the plain of Quebec the 
 following day. You know his enviable fate. 
 If, as Montaigne supposes, ' a man's happiness 
 depends on the circumstances of his death,' 
 how much is Wolf to be envied ; he died with 
 the word victory on his lips, while Fame, with 
 her thousand trumpets, proclaimed his renown 
 to his admiring countrymen. 
 
 " I was received by the governor with the
 
 96 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 dignified reserve which he thought due to an 
 officer who wanted every thing which, in his 
 eyes, entitles a man to his notice, — namely, 
 two gold epaulets. I was even invited to din- 
 ner, merely because my father was an earl ; for 
 the people about him took care to make me 
 understand, that my rank did not procure so 
 high a mark of distinction. We have, my 
 dear father, often laughed together at the 
 squire of Don Quixotte, in his government of 
 Barataria; — but I see you frown at the com- 
 mencement of an irreverent comparison: — he 
 is what nature and habit have made him, sur- 
 rounded with hauteur, dulness, and mediocrity 
 in fine uniforms. 
 
 u 1 am indebted to this invitation for a very 
 kind and pleasing acquaintance, in the person 
 of an old Canadian nobleman, my " compagnon 
 de voijage" from Quebec to Montreal. My
 
 BELLEGARDE. 97 
 
 French name and facility of conversing in his 
 native language, inspired him with a desire to 
 make my acquaintance, and the Seigneur 
 D'Argenteuil has found in me a due sense of 
 gratitude. He resembles, too, my beloved fa- 
 ther. The fire of indignation sparkled in his 
 eye when I spoke of Ireland and her unhappy 
 sons; for he also is one of a conquered people, 
 and uncertain of the fate that awaits a colony 
 whose inhabitants have not the good fortune to 
 be members of the established church, which 
 I believe is the principal and unpardonable 
 crime of my countrymen.* Up to the present 
 hour D'Argenteuil has little reason to com- 
 plain, as every thing refused to Ireland, has 
 been very generously accorded to Canada. He 
 has made me promise to visit him at his castle, 
 
 * The author has forgotten that this crime has been pardoned 
 lately on earth, as it has been long since pardoned in heaven, — 
 Ed. 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 98 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 not many miles from Montreal, where my regi- 
 ment is stationed; and I feel so well disposed 
 to cultivate his friendship, that I shall keep 
 my word as soon as it may be decorous to ask 
 for leave of absence. 
 
 " I hope Stuart has finished and sent my por- 
 trait to my beloved mother; I wear her's next 
 my heart. You know all I would say to you 
 both, could I give utterance to the sentiments 
 that animate 
 
 " Your affectionate son, 
 
 " E. De C." 
 
 Before closing the dispatch he wrote the 
 following letter to his friend Sommerville : 
 
 " I know not, my dear Sommerville^ how the 
 general disposition of my soul may be changed 
 by this atrocious climate, but with all my de-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 99 
 
 sire to commune with you, I am incapable of 
 drawing, as I wish, a picture of my sensations. 
 It is cold enough to freeze the blood in my ar- 
 teries ; and if the temperature of my apartment 
 were left to the mercy of the atmosphere, I 
 should remain until next summer like the dead 
 monks of Mount St. Bernard, frozen until the 
 last trumpet shall call them to receive the final 
 reward of their pious hospitality. 
 
 " At the moment I write to you, this coun- 
 try presents to my view one uniform surface of 
 snow, four feet deep ; so that hunting, shoot- 
 ing, or, indeed, any kind of exercise, is impos- 
 sible. My society is neither elegant nor lite- 
 rary; and if I were not one of those who 
 always hope for better in the worst as in 
 the best circumstances, there are discomforts 
 enough here to damp the buoyancy of my spi- 
 rits. The only recreation here is at the mess 
 
 f2
 
 100 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 table; and you who know my taste and habits, 
 can judge of the value of this resource. 
 
 " My brother officers seem content with this 
 pleasure, as if man were made for no better 
 employment than eating and drinking. If there 
 be any sources of knowledge in the minds of 
 these gentlemen, they keep them locked up 
 from me ; so that I sit with sad civility and lis- 
 ten with indifference to the insignificant topics 
 discussed at our daily meetings. The interests 
 and pursuits of these officers must, I should 
 suppose, be similar to mine, and yet their so- 
 ciety is disagreeable to me. I cannot occupy 
 my mind with the puerilities that give them 
 pleasure. I am speechless among them: their 
 silly affected manners benumb my faculties. 
 I sometimes attribute this to my love of soli- 
 tude, when there is nothing really " soul stir- 
 ring" to excite me. Having for your instruc-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 101 
 
 tion passed the officers en masse in review, I 
 must enter a little into detail. The lieutenant- 
 colonel commanding is married ; has no private 
 fortune, and being the happy father of nine 
 children, and the husband of a sick wife, is 
 exclusively occupied with domestic affairs; so 
 that he is only visible at parades and inspec- 
 tion, and then looks shabby and unsoldier-like. 
 The two majors, and some of the captains, are 
 very much in the same state; they came here 
 several years ago, and having no taste for let- 
 ters or science, felt all the tediousness of sin- 
 gle blessedness, and took such yoke fellows as 
 the country produced. We are now at war; 
 and if the opinion of Prince Eugene be true, 
 " that married men are bad stuff to be led to 
 combat," there will be little glory in store for 
 our army; since, instead of feeling that intoxi- 
 cating excitement of a battle, these poor fel-
 
 102 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 lows will think of widows and orphans, that an 
 unlucky ball may deprive of bread and cast 
 upon the parish. As to the young unmarried 
 officers, I have not yet found one among them 
 of whom I could make a companion. 
 
 " I fear that my heart has been cast in a 
 mould that was broken by nature, when her 
 task was performed. I seek fellowship with 
 something like myself, and despair of finding 
 it; and as it is possible that the being I am in 
 search of is a creation of my own fancy, I shall 
 probably go on alone to the end of my life. 
 The want of agreeable company has laid me 
 open to the invasion of a very ordinary second- 
 rate person, whom you recollect to have seen 
 in the shape of an old young lieutenant of the 
 twenty-seventh — Mr. George Augustus Them- 
 wood. He has been all attention and kindness 
 to me since my arrival, and (as I might have
 
 BELLEGARDE. 103 
 
 expected, had I a little more experience,) got 
 me, as we say in Ireland, into a scrape. As 
 this affair has made some noise, and may be 
 reckoned among the nine-day wonders of a 
 garrison town, I shall fill the remainder of my 
 sheet with an account of it. 
 
 " If you paid any attention to this genius, 
 you will probably recollect his affected and ri- 
 diculous disposition. He was what my Lord 
 Chesterfield recommended to his son to be, 
 * every thing to every body; 5 he was ' gay with 
 the gay, grave with the grave,' and wished by 
 conforming- himself to every person's humour, 
 to make every one his friend. Knowing how 
 much importance the common herd attaches 
 to what Thornwood calls great acquaintance, 
 he pretended to be very intimate with every 
 high sounding name in England, and slily 
 gives you to understand that he has royal
 
 104 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 blood in his veins. He is here lodged in the 
 sinecure of town major, and sets the fashion, 
 a sort of arbiter elegantiarum of balls and din- 
 ners, having a turn for ordering suitable deco- 
 rations and petty embellishments, whenever 
 any of those who have more money than taste 
 wish to shine. He is called King of Montreal, 
 as Nash was called King of Bath; and nothing 
 can be more amusing than the airs of protec- 
 tion which he gives himself among the fat citi- 
 zens of the town. His fancied importance 
 renders him the happiest of mortals; and as he 
 is very harmless and amusing, people laugh at 
 him and indulge him in his self-delusion. He 
 is constantly on the look out for news and new 
 arrivals, and repeats every thing he learns with 
 an air of mystery: he often talks of books he 
 never read, and if he can catch a hard word, 
 employs it on every occasion, never troubling
 
 BELLEGARDE. 105 
 
 himself with the apropos of any thing. When- 
 ever a stranger arrives from England or the 
 neighbouring colonies, he contrives to learn 
 his name and every particular respecting him; 
 and if he be a titled person, or the fiftieth 
 cousin of any great man, Thornwood waits 
 upon him, shews him about like a wild beast, 
 and sometimes makes him out a relation of his 
 own, or at least an old friend, — so anxious is 
 he to conceal in a crowd of contradictory cir- 
 cumstances his birth and early associations. 
 
 " He lately caught one of those travelling 
 gentry who affect to be learned, and come 
 to Canada to cull simples and paint the curious 
 plants that may be found in the country, or 
 write the history of the Indian tribes: he in- 
 vited this genius to dine at the mess. He was 
 himself ill of an indigestion, of which his va- 
 nity had been the cause, inasmuch as fce had 
 
 f5
 
 106 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 undertaken to give a practical demonstration, 
 that the musk rat of Canada, cooked en civet, 
 was both exquisite and wholesome. 
 
 " He wrote a letter of excuse to his new 
 friend for not being able to attend at dinner, 
 and charged me to do the honours of the table 
 to his guest. The party was animated, and 
 the stranger extremely facetious; but to my 
 astonishment, he amused the company at the 
 expence of his host, whom (as he found the 
 officers disposed to be merry), he turned into 
 ridicule, caricaturing his weakness and singu- 
 larities without measure or moderation. 
 
 " I took occasion to observe, that although 
 ' every man had his faults,' I could not help 
 thinking the table to which the stranger had 
 been invited an unsuitable place to turn his en- 
 tertainment into ridicule, and that too in pre- 
 sence^ of the person who had been delegated to
 
 BELLEGARDE. 107 
 
 represent him, in shewing those hospitable at- 
 tentions which his own indisposition deprived 
 him of the pleasure of performing in person. 
 I protested against my own participation in 
 mirth so ill timed, which could not be indulged 
 in if Thornwood were present. 
 
 " Every one felt that the joke had been car- 
 ried too far, and the author seemed for a mo- 
 ment astounded at my observation; but instead 
 of admitting his error he lost his temper, and 
 said, 
 
 " Sir, I am not accustomed to receive a 
 lesson from so young a master. 
 
 " Then, sir, I replied, it will leave the better 
 impression on your memory; and I trust it will 
 not often fall to my lot to instruct pupils of 
 your age. He rose suddenly from the table, 
 hurried out of the room, and left me convince.! 
 that his indocility would compel me to abet
 
 108 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 with my sword, the expressions I had uttered. 
 " We sat late at table ; and as I was but 
 little acquainted with the officers, I remained 
 on purpose to hear their comments upon so 
 strange an occurrence. I expected to find the 
 stranger blamed, and Thornwood pitied for 
 his indiscriminate and unreflecting attention to 
 persons unknown to him; but I found that 
 the friend of every one has seldom any very 
 devoted friend in the hour of need ; that little 
 value is affixed to services that are not ex- 
 clusive, and that persons who have what the 
 French call a * cceitr banal! very rarely inspire 
 any better feeling than contempt. Nevertheless, 
 I was shocked at the indifference and cold- 
 heartedness of men, who ought to have felt a 
 species of humiliation cast on the corps, in the 
 person of one of its members, insulted and 
 turned into ridicule in their presence ; but I
 
 BELLEGARDEo 109 
 
 left their society, convinced that they were 
 more pleased with the wit, than offended at 
 the impropriety of the stranger's conduct. 
 
 " I naturally expected a message or a visit 
 from this learned traveller, and remained until 
 a late hour at my lodgings, without hearing 
 from him. I afterwards learned that he had 
 gone about to look for a second, and failing in 
 finding one, determined to seek a rencontre 
 without a witness. I had scarcely reached the 
 end of the street leading from my lodgings to 
 the parade, when he accosted me with a con- 
 strained and supercilious bow. He was 
 wrapped in a large cloak, and proposed to me 
 to accompany him without the walls of the 
 city. I wore my regimental sword, and it did 
 not occur to me, that his weapon might give 
 him an advantage. We soon arrived at a spot 
 where there was little danger of being ob-
 
 110 BELLEGARDI . 
 
 served ; he cast off his mantle and shewed a 
 good blade, broad towards the hilt, asked me 
 if I were disposed to make an apology in the 
 presence of the mess for the offensive ex- 
 pressions I had uttered, and as my answer 
 was not satisfactory, took his ground and ran 
 furiously at me, brandishing his weapon in a 
 theatrical style. I perceived that I had to do 
 with an adversary who was ignorant of 
 fencing, and shewed more temerity than skill ; 
 but I did not suspect that he sought rather to 
 intimidate me than to come to close quarters. 
 I stood tranquilly watching his movements, 
 and desiring rather to humiliate him than spill 
 his blood, sprang suddenly upon him, broke 
 his guard and disarmed him. He' flew off 
 like lightning, and when he felt far enough to 
 be out of danger, demanded whether I in- 
 tended to avail myself of an accident that
 
 BELLEGARDE. Ill 
 
 placed him at my mercy. By this time my 
 blood was up, and indignant at his impudence, 
 I offered him his sword if he would consent to 
 renew the combat and fight it out ; at the same 
 time I declared, that if he flinched or pre- 
 varicated, I would order my servant Bill Hold- 
 brook to cudgel him. He walked cautiously 
 towards the spot where his weapon lay, and 
 having seized it, walked deliberately a few 
 steps, as if he were about to recommence, then 
 fled as fast as his heels could carry him. 
 
 " I returned to my apartment, determined 
 to put my threat into execution. I armed my 
 servant with a smart rattan, and I need scarce 
 add, that this honest partisan's face glowed 
 with delight, as I gave him the order to seek 
 
 Mr. K , and lay it over his shoulders in 
 
 his master's name. But he was not to be 
 found; nor have X since learned what has
 
 112 BELLEGARDF. 
 
 become of him. A thousand conjectures were 
 aiioat as to the cause of his sudden disappear- 
 ance: you will readily conceive that i felt no 
 inclination to satisfy idle curiosity, or enter 
 into particulars ; for few things can be more 
 disagreeable, than to relate the part one may 
 have sustained in a quarrel, more especially 
 when your antagonist is of the family of 
 ' honest Jack.' 
 
 " Adieu, dear Sommerville, 
 
 " Ever yours, 
 
 "E. DeC. ,>
 
 m 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 It is in vain that we would coldly gaze 
 On such as smile upon us ; the heart must 
 Leap kindly back to kindness, though disgust 
 Hath weaned it from all worldlings. 
 
 Byron. 
 
 Time passed heavily with our young soldier : 
 he soon exhausted the stock of books he had 
 brought from home, and the scanty resources 
 of Montreal, offered little worth reading. The 
 only portion of society that had any pretensions 
 to learning was that of the law; but the ''Re- 
 pertoire de Jurisprudence," the " Coutume 
 de Paris," and the dull " Commentaries of De
 
 114 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 Ferriere," had no attractions for a mind like 
 that of Eustace. Sometimes one might find 
 the poems of Allan Ramsay, or the " fustian 
 of Macpherson" on the table of a lady from 
 the highlands; but at the period to which we 
 allude, literature had not found its way among 
 the English settlers in Lower Canada. In 
 such a state of society, the business of life lay 
 within very narrow limits : and the mind of 
 De Courcy, eager, ardent and studious of 
 change, acting and reacting upon his body, 
 deprived him of rest, and by degrees changed 
 the rose on his cheek to the feverish hue, 
 which is the offspring of struggles between a 
 sound body and a dissatisfied spirit. He cast 
 his eyes around him in search of social inter- 
 course or suitable occupation, but neither 
 could be found. His brother officers were a 
 set of dull dandies, or stupid domestic drudges,
 
 BELLEGABDE. 115 
 
 stamped with mediocrity; the traders had 
 their tin and blankets to barter for peltry ; the 
 lawyers and magistrates had neither time nor 
 fortune to bestow on the elegant amusements 
 of life ; and the old nobility had retired to their 
 estates in the country. 
 
 Formed by nature for active and perilous 
 enterprize, with ambition heated by family re- 
 nown, and his fortune to make, De Courcy 
 formed a thousand projects to escape from the 
 monotonous existence of a garrison lounger, 
 very much like the dull unvaried rotation of a 
 gold fish in a glass basin ; but the die was cast, 
 and he was compelled to resign himself to the 
 condition in which chance had placed him. 
 Sometimes he had thoughts of quitting the 
 army and joining those bold and hardy adven- 
 turers who penetrated the interminable forests 
 of North Amsrica, and by audacity and intelli-
 
 116 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 gence, carried the British name among savage 
 hordes, and made them the instruments as well 
 of commercial cupidity as political ambition. 
 But he was the son of an Earl, the offspring of 
 an ancient house ; he could not humiliate his 
 father: he considered commerce as a respect- 
 able occupation, but not such as might lead to 
 distinction ; nor had he any counting-house 
 qualities; he could deny himself any costly 
 gratification when his funds were low, but he 
 had no idea of the trade- of making money, in 
 which he saw the most narrow-minded and illi- 
 beral crowned with success, sycophants and 
 flatterers to those who are prosperous, hard- 
 hearted and pitiless to those who are unfor- 
 tunate. He could not, as Burke eloquently 
 expresses it, " make his money his god, his 
 ledger his bible, and his desk his altar of wor- 
 ship." The learned professions required him
 
 BELLEGARDE. 117 
 
 to begin life again ; and although there are 
 illustrious examples of men who have changed 
 Xenophon, Polybius, Montecuculi and Saxe, for 
 Coke upon Lyttleton, with advantage to society 
 and honour to themselves, Eustace did not find 
 in his nature, a disposition to plodding patient 
 industry. Like the high-mettled racer, impa- 
 tient to start on the course, the curb to which 
 his destiny had subjected his haughty and 
 ardent spirit, wearied and irritated him by 
 turns. He could not devise any means of 
 spending the superabundance of life and force 
 that spurred him on ; and chained as it were 
 to one spot, he passed his time in vain projects 
 and fruitless wishes. Too proud to solicit, too 
 modest to claim the advantages due to his me- 
 rit or his name, he sunk into a state of in- 
 action and despondency. 
 
 Weeks and months passed away and carried
 
 118 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 with them, like leaves wafted from a fair tree 
 by the chill winds of autumn, that stock of 
 gaiety which Eustace had once deemed ex- 
 haustless. He often thought of his amiable 
 travelling companion and the kind invitation 
 he had given him ; but he had lost his relish 
 for ordinary enjoyments. 
 
 Men of this description are more to be 
 pitied than envied : they are the heroes of na- 
 ture, endowed with faculties that render them 
 capable of conceiving and executing enter- 
 prizes foreign to the regular, sober movement 
 of society; and when accident fails to place 
 them in circumstances surrounded with dan- 
 ger and difficulty, their lives are passed like 
 that of an eagle cast into a common poultry- 
 yard with clipped wings and broken talons. 
 Of such stuff are Caesar, Tamerlaine and Na- 
 poleon, Robin Hood, Cartouche and Paul
 
 BELLEGARDE. 119 
 
 Jones. Their great passions are at once the 
 sources of their virtues and vices ; and the dif- 
 ference between a conqueror and a chief of a 
 banditti depends essentially on the direction 
 given to their energies, and the circumstances 
 in which they are placed. 
 
 " One murder makes a villain, 
 Millions a hero !" * 
 
 The return of spring, the melting of the 
 vast sheet of snow that covers for many 
 months the face of the country, the breaking 
 up of the ice that holds the lakes and rivers in 
 bondage, the warm winds that suddenly call 
 vegetation into action, and impart new life and 
 movement to every thing, is an interesting mo- 
 ment in this northern clime. New projects 
 are formed; the population abandons repose 
 and pleasure for the useful and necessary 
 
 * See prize poem on death, by Bishop Porteus.
 
 120 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 affairs of life, and nature, awaking from a long 
 lethargic slumber, marches with celerity to- 
 wards the festival of summer. In Canada 
 " winter" never " lingers in the lap of May." 
 The governor, determined not to leave to the 
 vernal sun, the task of gladdening the heart of 
 man, announced his intention of visiting Mon- 
 treal. 
 
 Preparations were made to lodge this great 
 personage ; and the garrison troops, awaking 
 from their lethargy, were seen brushing their 
 coats, scrubbing and polishing their arms, and 
 performing the customary exercises and evolu- 
 tions, in order to pass a review of inspection, 
 His arrival was a source of joy and hope, espe- 
 cially to those who had favours to ask, or who 
 wished to appear at his tiny court, which per- 
 sons of doubtful rank supposed would be a 
 sort of diploma of gentleman, and qualify them
 
 BELLEGARDE. 121 
 
 to enter into what was called good company. 
 Invitations were sent to the neighbouring gen- 
 try ; and although D'Argenteuil deemed such 
 duties and homage to be a disagreeable " cor- 
 v6e" he did not judge it prudent to be re- 
 marked among the absentees. His first in- 
 quiries were for Captain De Courcy, with 
 whom he renewed his acquaintance. He 
 chided him for his " smivagerie ;" such being 
 the gentle expression, which attributed to his 
 humour rather than his heart, the apparent 
 indifference he had shewn to the proffered 
 friendship of the good baron. Eustace re- 
 ceived him with affection, and candidly owned 
 that his conduct was not approved by his 
 heart. He had, he said, passed a sad and 
 solitary winter ; and although every day found 
 him disposed to avail himself of the opportu- 
 nity the kindness of the baron had furnished 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 122 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 to break through the apathy that had by de- 
 grees extended its influence over him, he could 
 not feel that he would be a fit companion for 
 an agreeable and happy family. The good 
 old baron saw that his young friend was fallen 
 into a state of melancholy, and that his imagi- 
 nation exaggerated the ills inseparable from 
 his situation in a strange land. 
 
 " Ask for leave of absence, my young 
 friend," said he, " accompany me to the Lake 
 of the Two Mountains, you will there find the 
 warm cordiality of home, and this, with pure 
 air and field sports, will soon dispel the gloom 
 that hangs over you." 
 
 Eustace could not resist such kindness ; and 
 as soon as Sir Crowdie Mac Grosgutt had 
 passed the garrison and militia in review, and 
 received the homage of the magistrates, our 
 young soldier obtained permission to quit his
 
 BELLEGARDE. 123 
 
 military duties and accompany his friend to 
 that mansion, where, unsuspected by him and 
 its inhabitants, lay in embryo, those latent 
 causes which soon ripened forth into events 
 intimately interwoven with his destiny. 
 
 Arrived at the village of St. Ann, De Courcy 
 had an opportunity of witnessing the affection 
 and devotedness of the inhabitants for their 
 landlord and friend : the bells rung a merry 
 peal, and the men, women and children, 
 crowded around the old nobleman with smil- 
 ing faces and kind greetings, and welcomed 
 him with that respectful familiarity which dig- 
 nity and benevolence inspire. 
 
 " Good day, my children, 5 ' (mes enfans.) 
 said the good man. With affectionate con- 
 descension he inquired after the health of the 
 wives, children, and fathers of the village, and 
 listened attentively to the tedious and circum- 
 
 g 2
 
 124 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 stantial detail of every bavard, who thought he 
 ought not to omit the most trifling event that 
 had befallen himself or his family. There 
 was no assumed superiority, no contumely in 
 his manner; he was not occupied with his self- 
 importance and the preservation of his dig- 
 nity, while he lent an ear to the tale of his 
 humble neighbours. He would have been dis- 
 tressed at the thought of inspiring awe or fear 
 in hearts that were devoted to him. He lived 
 and spent his fortune among them ; and the 
 revenue derived from their labour, returned, 
 like a refreshing shower, to its natural source, 
 to vivify and stimulate the authors of his opu- 
 lence and prosperity. They all were sensible 
 that they had a common interest to maintain. 
 The power of the chief served as a rampart to 
 the subordinate, and protected them in peace, 
 without making them acquainted with the ri-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 125 
 
 gours of servitude, while gratitude and de- 
 votedness, rendered that power permanent 
 and salutary. This was the way in which 
 D'Argenteuil interpreted what is commonly 
 called " the natural dependence between land- 
 lord and tenant. Honored for his virtues, and 
 luoked up to as a superior behlg for his know- 
 ledge and rank, and the useful purposes to 
 which both were applied, he was as happy as 
 friends, fortune, and a good conscience could 
 make him.* 
 
 Bellegarde in his war-dress, at the head of the 
 youth of his tribe, stood at the castle gate to 
 receive his master. They expressed their joy 
 in a sort of wild dance, common to the savages 
 when any happy event befals them. 
 
 De Courcy was delighted at this novel scene, 
 
 * We are curious to know whether the author intende* 
 mask a sarcasm on Irish and English landlords? — Ed. 
 
 to
 
 1%G BELLEGARDE. 
 
 equally touching and singular in the eyes of an 
 European spectator. 
 
 " These rude children of the forest," said 
 the baron, " render rne a spontaneous and 
 willing homage ; they would rejoice in au op- 
 portunity to risk their lives for my service or 
 that of my family. There is nothing sophisti- 
 cated in their sentiments; they pay kindness 
 with love to the knife, and as rarely forget a 
 good office as forgive an injury. They are 
 faithful in executing their engagements, and 
 never dream of pleading inconvenience, as an 
 excuse for a breach of promise ; and of these 
 savage virtues, or rather the inflexibility with 
 which they practise them, they are, unhappily, 
 too often the dupes, in their intercourse with 
 their white brethren."
 
 127 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Cuando los ojos ven lo que nunca vieron, el 
 Corazon sienre lo que nunca sintio. 
 
 De Gracian. 
 
 When the eyes behold what they had never seen, 
 The heart feels what it had never felt. 
 Anon. 
 
 The travellers proceeded to the great vesti- 
 bule of the castle, where they were received 
 by Madame de Belrose, the baron's only sis- 
 ter, and father Le Clerc, the confidential friend 
 and domestic chaplain of the family of D'Ar- 
 genteuil. When they reached the drawing- 
 room, the baron turned towards his sister, and 
 inquired for his daughter Matilda.
 
 128 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 '* She is in the garden, planting flowers in 
 the grass-plots, brother," said the lady. 
 
 " On the borders, you would say, my dear 
 sister." 
 
 " No, among the grass ; she thinks they 
 look more like wild flowers dispersed in the 
 grass than in regular beds; so you will find 
 roses, and pinks, and sweet william, with a 
 green ground to set off their beauty to ad- 
 vantage. And then she weeds, and plants, 
 and spoils her complexion. She is like a hum- 
 ming bird, eternally flying from leaf to leaf, 
 never a moment of repose." 
 
 " If it amuse and give her health, it is well, 
 good sister." 
 
 "As to her health, brother, you will find 
 her pretty much as you left her; she takes 
 exercise that would exhaust a highland fur 
 trader; she passed the whole of yesterday
 
 BELLEGARDE. 129 
 
 shooting on the lake, and brought home a 
 great quantity of ducks, and other wild fowl. 
 This morning, she spent an hour teaching 
 her pony to swim; he followed her like a 
 dog on terra firma; but she would put his 
 attachment to a severe trial, by running into 
 the lake, and calling him to follow her. The 
 poor animal ran up and down the shore, 
 and shewed much uneasiness when he saw 
 his mistress fairly afloat in the water ; but he 
 would venture no farther, until Matilda put a 
 long rein to his bridle, and made him swim 
 after her ; and now he would follow her across 
 the lake like a water-spaniel. She was so 
 pleased with his docility, that she recom- 
 pensed him with a meal of all the sweet cake 
 she could find in the house." 
 
 The baron was too much accustomed to the 
 loquacity of Madame de Belrose to pay much
 
 130 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 attention to these domestic details ; but, turn- 
 ing to De Courcy, said: 
 
 " Your English ladies, sir, would be shock- 
 ed at such pranks, played by a girl of seven- 
 teen. But I brought her up with other ideas : 
 I did not hesitate to repudiate the antiquated 
 notions of female education, transmitted to us 
 by our grandmothers ; who held, that a sound 
 mind in a sound body might be very useful 
 to a boy, but that a girl ought to be brought 
 up to be ignorant of every thing, except what 
 might just be necessary to make her afraid of 
 every thing: so that she ought to faint at the 
 report of a gun, scream if a mouse ran across 
 the room, and tremble and look pale if her 
 carriage jolted on a rough road. After being 
 mewed up in a convent, where they were 
 taught to consider every thing unclean and 
 sinful that passed without the walls, women
 
 BELLEGARDE. 131 
 
 entered upon the stage of life mere machines, 
 without knowledge, will, or judgment to guide 
 them. This durance vile, usually continued 
 until the family of a young lady found a suit- 
 able marriage for her; and the same hour that 
 emancipated her from the shackles of a clois- 
 ter, witnessed her transfer to a man she had 
 never seen or known, alike ignorant of her 
 duties as a wife, a mother, and a member of 
 society. This mode of treating a creature 
 that so much resembles man, and of whose 
 aid we stand so much in need, always seemed 
 to me both absurd and cruel; so I determined 
 to bring up Matilda in my own way. My 
 good sister here, who served her as a mother 
 since she was only three years old, was pre- 
 judiced in favour of the plan of education 
 adopted by our parents ; but I persisted in my 
 opinion, and have reason to be satisfied with 
 my conduct."
 
 132 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " I will venture to say, my lord, the young 
 lady has been much happier for the liberty 
 she has enjoyed." 
 
 "Yes, sir, and much better instructed; be- 
 sides, she has never been sick since she was 
 seven years old; and this is one great advan- 
 tage that seldom results from the inactive, 
 debilitating regimen prescribed for females; 
 or, if you please, a fortunate exemption from 
 the evils that beset the early stages of exist- 
 ence. In youth, it is physical power that 
 stands most in need of development ; and 
 ideas shoot forth with vigour, and take deeper 
 root in a strong soil, than in that which is 
 kept in order by artificial means. To learn 
 rapidly and comprehend clearly, the mind 
 ought to be free from care and pre-occupa- 
 tion about bodily ailments. 
 
 " We live, too, in an age, when women, re-
 
 EELLEGARDE. 133 
 
 quire pretty much the same instruction that 
 is deemed necessary for men; they have to 
 watch over our health in infancy, study our 
 faculties and propensities, and ' rear the ten- 
 der thought' in its first budding into form. 
 This can never be well done by a sickly doll, 
 who knows only how to dress for a ball, give 
 herself airs of fashion, and study the art to 
 please every one better than her husband. 
 Then our principles, whatever they be, we 
 owe them to our mother. If she leave us to 
 low people, we yield to the natural attraction 
 of similitude, and possess nothing noble but 
 the name; we become grooms and jockies, 
 instead of gentlemen; and carry through life, 
 if not the manners, at least the vulgar and 
 base opinions of our early associates. The 
 moral philosophy of the stable, or the ser- 
 vantsMiall, is all we gain by the ignorance
 
 134 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 or neglect of our mother. If we have the 
 misfortune to lose our father, the care of our 
 fortune, our establishment in life, our success 
 and destiny, depend on the knowledge and 
 good management of the surviving parent ; and 
 if her early years have been passed like those 
 of the far greater part of young women of 
 quality, with the kindest solicitude for our 
 welfare, she is incapable of discharging the 
 most sacred and most important of duties. In 
 general, a weak, nervous, and superficial wife, 
 is an incumbrance rather than a help to her 
 husband.*' 
 
 This was, as my uncle Toby would say, the 
 "hobby-horse" of the baron; and he would 
 have ridden it much farther, if the object of 
 his solicitude had not suddenly entered the 
 drawing-room. 
 
 Without paying the least attention to De
 
 BELLEGARDE. 135 
 
 Courcy, Matilda hung round her father's neck, 
 kissed both his cheeks, then holding his grey 
 head, between her little hands, looked earn- 
 estly in his face, to satisfy herself that he was 
 not in worse health since they had parted. 
 
 " In the ardour of your attentions to your 
 father, my love," said D'Argenteuil, " you 
 forget his friend, Captain De Courcy, who 
 does us the honour to spend a few weeks in 
 our solitude, which we must all -endeavour 
 to render as little monotonous as possible." 
 
 " The friend of my father," quickly replied 
 Matilda, " is sure of a kind welcome;" then 
 fixing her penetrating eyes on the stranger, 
 continued, 
 
 " My father calls this solitude, sir, only to 
 excite your surprise at the variety of our 
 amusements. Are you fond of hunting, shoot- 
 ing, fishing, and the rude exercises of the 
 Indians?"
 
 136 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " Whatever be the amusements of the inha- 
 bitants of the castle, I shall be happy to be 
 admitted to share in them; and from what the 
 baron has just now learned from Madame De 
 Belrose, of your love of the chase, I promise 
 myself much of an enjoyment of which I have 
 been lately deprived, and which constitutes 
 the principal occupation of our gentry in Ire- 
 land." 
 
 " What a happy people you must be ! health- 
 ful exercise, good appetite, sound sleep, cheer- 
 fulness and innocence." . 
 
 " The picture is flattering, " said Eustace; 
 " yet it was thus with me for many years. 
 The first thing we learn to do w r ell is to hunt 
 and shoot; and an Irish gentleman would be 
 more ashamed of being ignorant of the terms 
 of sporting, than of the common rules of gram- 
 mar. I assure you, Miss D'Argenteuil, that
 
 BELLEGARDE. ' 137 
 
 I have passed a great part of my life on horse- 
 back." 
 
 Eustace thought he was entering into the 
 spirit of the favourite pursuits of the sprightly 
 girl; but she stopped him short, by observing, 
 that he spoke her language too elegantly to 
 have devoted all his days to pastime in the 
 fields. " I will not believe," said she archly, 
 " that your countrymen set so little value on 
 the useful and ornamental branches of educa- 
 tion, as to neglect them for a pleasure that is 
 not worth the sacrifice of any serious or im- 
 portant duty." 
 
 " It ought to be a mere holiday sport to be 
 indulged in," said Eustace, (retracting a little 
 of his enthusiasm,) when we have nothing bet- 
 ter to do; and I cannot say I prefer it to a 
 good library and literary exercises." 
 
 " Well, sir, in this also you may be in-
 
 138 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 dulged; we have a large stock of books; you 
 may even study the art of attack and defence, 
 if you like it, for my father kept me for many 
 hours together with Vauban an Coehorn, when 
 he was forming the plan of the enclosure of 
 the castle; and although he did not intend 
 to make me a member of the corps of en- 
 gineers, he made me comprehend the use of 
 bastions and curtins and demi-lunes : — but 
 (looking at her feet, covered with dust), I 
 must retire, and cast off my Mameluke pan- 
 taloons and vest, which I wear in the morning 
 to please my father, and put on my French 
 costume, which I wear at dinner to please my 
 aunt." She then stepped out of the room as 
 lightly as a kitten, leaving De Courcy full of 
 admiration and curiosity. 
 
 When he retired to his apartment, he deli- 
 vered himself to a thousand conjectures on the
 
 BELLEGARDE. 139 
 
 singular being whom he had just seen, so un- 
 like the young ladies to whose society he had 
 been accustomed. She addresses me, said he, 
 with the unaffected ease of an old acquaint- 
 ance, without constraint or embarrassment; 
 and yet there is in her manner a mixture of 
 grace, vivacity, and dignity, which gives an in- 
 expressible charm to every word she utters. 
 She wears the mask of a gay and careless spi- 
 rit, whilst her physiognomy indicates deep re- 
 flection and melancholy. She has evidently 
 escaped the drill and exercise to which old 
 matrons subject their pupils. She has no 
 affectation, no coquetry; even her pantaloons, 
 short boots, tunic and velvet cap are not new 
 or fresh. 
 
 The dinner bell put an end to the medita- 
 tions of De Courcy, and summoned him to his 
 toilette. He ordered his servant to unpack
 
 140 
 
 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 his best suit, determined, probably, to appear 
 before this new acquaintance with all the ad- 
 vantages that a fine uniform imparts to beauty; 
 but a reflection shot across his mind, that as 
 the person he most wished to please might set 
 no value on such trifles, he hesitated ; but 
 after weighing the pros and cons of the matter, 
 and ashamed of the importance he gave it, 
 finished by executing his first intention. 
 
 He found Madame De Belrose in the cos- 
 tume of the French Court, with the exception 
 of the. pamer; the chaplain, father Le Clerc, 
 in his soutanne; the old baron in a velvet coat 
 and embroidered waistcoat; and Matilda in a 
 plain silk dress of the form of that which we 
 see in the picture of Raphael, called La belle 
 Jardiniire. Her fine dark hazel hair was ga- 
 thered in form of a large rose behind a lovely 
 picturesque head, and the only ornament she
 
 BELLEGARDE. 141 
 
 wore was a small embroidered band of velvet 
 round her head, fastened on the forehead with 
 an agraffe, presenting two very small like- 
 nesses, in miniature, of her father and mother. 
 Her person was neither tall nor short, but of 
 " the first order of fine forms," light, graceful 
 and energetic. Her forehead was spacious, 
 her features exquisitely traced and full of ex- 
 pression, rather of the Grecian form ; her eyes 
 dark and glowing, her skin of that ivory tone 
 which painters give to figures of imaginary 
 beings in landscapes of the Italian school. 
 There was something in her ensemble of orien- 
 tal beauty, which is rare in northern climates; 
 and it might have been this peculiarity that 
 engaged her father to recommend to her for a 
 morning dress the costume in which Eustace 
 first saw her. 
 
 There reigned in this ancient family an usage
 
 142 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 that the " march of intellect" has repudiated; 
 whether owing to the presumptuous manners 
 of dependants, or the pride of patrons, we 
 leave to the decision of our readers ; — it was, to 
 place at the dinner table such members of the 
 household as were above the rank of domes- 
 tics. The drawing-room society was select; 
 but at meals there was a series of subordinate 
 places, from the baron and his sister, to Belle- 
 garde, the adopted Indian boy of whom we 
 have spoken. The chaplain, the steward, the 
 music and drawing masters, were always ad- 
 mitted. Below the chaplain, the conversation 
 was confined to matters connected with the 
 duties of the respective guests; and this ar- 
 rangement had the advantage of making known 
 the wishes of the master, without the formality 
 of positive orders. 
 
 Madame De Belrose had been a distin-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 143 
 
 o-uished belle in the circles of Versailles and 
 Chantilly ; and recollecting to have often heard 
 that " the Graces never grow old," retained at 
 fifty a little of that amiable coquetry which, 
 at " a certain age" imparts to man and woman 
 (in France at least,) the desire to please. 
 
 Time had convinced her that the period of 
 conquest was passed; and she had renounced 
 in good earnest every pretension to inspire 
 that passion that delights the young, flatters 
 the middle aged, and sometimes astonishes 
 well-looking ladies and gentlemen who touch 
 the half century : but although her roses had 
 fled, and her flowing hair had been touched 
 with a young autumnal frost, she was sensible 
 that goodness and benevolence, embellished 
 every period of human existence, and more 
 especially that which has lost every other 
 power to excite interest and affection. She
 
 144 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 was constant in her attentions to the young 
 officer, and questioned him on every thing she 
 thought might please him ; his tastes, his 
 country, his family, and his friends, appeared 
 to be objects of her solicitude. 
 
 De Courcy replied with candour and polite- 
 ness, and was even prolix, seeing that Matilda 
 lent an attentive ear. He found that the good 
 lady liked to talk about France, and fre- 
 quently spoke of his residence in that coun- 
 try, in order that she might recur to passed 
 scenes, in which she had acted a part. She 
 dwelt minutely on the glorious festivals of Saint 
 Hubert, and of Chantilly; where a member of 
 the illustrious House of Conde had spent, in the 
 erection of stables, seven hundred thousand 
 pounds of our money! — She spoke with rap- 
 ture of the groves and forests of that princely 
 residence, through which roads and avenues
 
 BELLEGARDE. 145 
 
 are made in every direction, to permit ladies 
 and gentlemen to ride in carriages and on 
 horseback, enjoy the pursuit of the stag and 
 wild boar, as well as favour interviews be- 
 tween lovers, who sought such occasions with 
 an avidity only to be compared to that which 
 the present race feels to avail itself of the 
 immunities of a masked ball. 
 
 Eustace, in his turn, expatiated on the 
 pleasures of an Irish fox hunt ; where stout 
 hearts and good horses seek neither smooth 
 avenues nor open fields. He thought that 
 since we made sport of pursuing animals to 
 death, we ought to give them fair play, and 
 maintained that pleasure and excitement were 
 great in proportion to the danger and emu- 
 lation in surmounting such obstacles as walls, 
 double ditches, and five-barred gates. He 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 ]46 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 insinuated, that game was assassinated, in- 
 stead of being killed in fair strife, in France. 
 
 " I perceive, sir,' 5 said Madame De Belrose, 
 " that in your country ladies do not partake of 
 all your amusements; I have even heard, but 
 scarce believe, that they receive hints to retire 
 from table, as soon as they have dined, in 
 order that gentlemen may converse more free- 
 ly, and drink more wine." 
 
 This observation was rather an unkind cut: 
 Eustace had found fault with the Chantilly 
 hunt; and the lady was not sorry to remind 
 him that there were usages in Ireland less 
 susceptible of defence than that of hunting 
 in smooth avenues, where men, women, and 
 children, might enjoy the pleasures of the 
 chase, without running the risk of breaking 
 their necks.
 
 147 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 We would speak with thee farther anon. 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 The company retired to the drawing-room, 
 where the conversation was renewed. 
 
 " I should like to hear the opinion of Made- 
 moiselle," said Eustace, " on the customs of 
 the countries which have been the subject of 
 discussion at dinner." 
 
 . " As a matter of taste," said Matilda, " I 
 prefer your chase through a country where 
 obstacles are to be surmounted, and danger 
 incurred, to lying in wait at the corner of 
 
 H 2
 
 148 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 roads that intersect one another, to shoot 
 the stag or the boar; but I must confess that 
 I cannot approve of separating ladies and 
 gentlemen during that portion of the day 
 that, in civilized countries, is allotted to con- 
 versation. I do not know why women should 
 be deemed unfit to be members of an intel- 
 lectual re-union in their own houses. I have 
 read that in barbarous states of society, where 
 weakness is deprived of authority, and even 
 of its moral rights, women are treated like 
 slaves, unworthy to be the friend or com- 
 panion of men; but in a country that boasts 
 of its justice, refinement, and benevolence, 
 it is a curious anomaly to adore woman as 
 if she were an angel, and the next moment 
 to exclude her from the pleasures of rational 
 conversation." 
 
 " There can be no good reason," said Eu-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 149 
 
 stace, " for such an inconsequence, except 
 it be one to banish taste and sentiment from 
 familiar discussion ; and yet the education 
 usually given to women, makes them feel 
 little interest in such debates as take place 
 over the bottle." 
 
 This last observation was enough to set 
 the baron on his favourite hobby-horse. 
 
 " I know," said he, " only one description 
 of men who dislike modest witnesses to their 
 favourite discourses : it is composed of the 
 depraved and debauched, old and young, 
 who hide their profligacy in the dense po- 
 pulations of large cities :^— these know no other 
 science than that of lying, baseness, and per- 
 fidy. They are afraid to cheat and deceive 
 men as they do women; and their conversa- 
 tion is necessarily unfit for the ears of those 
 who are their dupes, or their victims. Let
 
 150 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 us give to woman an education suitable to 
 her rank, and the duties she is called upon 
 to perform, instead of one that renders her 
 ignorant and effeminate, and all parties will 
 gain by it. 
 
 " 'To suckle fools and chronicle small beer,' 
 may be very well for the mass of dull wives 
 as of dull husbands; but surely the sphere of 
 action that our tyranny has allotted to such 
 of them as are, to say the least, our equals 
 in intelligence, as they are our superiors in 
 feeling and sentiment, is by far ' too limited. 
 It is wonderful, under so many disadvantages, 
 that so great a number of women should have 
 risen to distinction in arts, and science, and 
 literature." 
 
 Matilda's face shewed that she was not in- 
 different to the remarks made by her father ; 
 and De Courcy, who watched its eloquent
 
 BELLEGARDE. 151 
 
 expression, hastened to approve of all the 
 opinions of the baron, upon a subject so in- 
 teresting, 
 
 " I trust, my lord/' said he, " that few men 
 of good sense, and good feeling, would dis- 
 sent from such self-evident truths. The ame- 
 liorations that learning and religion have made 
 in our institutions, have passed by the rights 
 of woman: the customs of feudality remain, as 
 regards her, unmitigated, as if in these days 
 she might be called upon to follow her lord 
 to the wars, and, failing to do so, lose all 
 her political, and many civil, privileges, which 
 the commonest hind is permitted to exercise." 
 
 " All this is very fine, and very flattering, 
 for our sex," said Madame De Belrose; "at 
 Chantilly, when I was some years younger, — " 
 
 " Let us take our coffee," said the baron; 
 but he could not escape an old " thrice-told 
 tale."
 
 152 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " My brother, you perceive, Captain De 
 Courcy, has his own notions about female 
 education, and will not believe, that all the 
 privileges he would grant to us may be sup- 
 plied by a little address and management on 
 our part. * Honour in war, fidelity in love,' 
 as our dear Prince of Conde used to say, 
 setting out for the chase, accompanied by all 
 the fair and the valiant of his Court. There, 
 sir, the cavalier wore a favour, the chosen 
 colour of his mistress; accident brought them 
 together during the tumult of the hunt, and 
 there they formed projects of happiness for 
 themselves, their families, and their friends. 
 I never can be convinced of the utility of 
 changing our old mode of doing things. Do 
 you suppose, sir, that La Valliere and Mon- 
 tespan, and all the celebrated beauties who 
 graced and adorned the Court of Louis le
 
 BELLEGARDE. 153 
 
 Grand, could ever have pleased and governed 
 that haughty monarch, had they been edu- 
 cated with the rude simplicity in which my 
 brother so much delights: to ride, to swim, 
 and work at flower beds like a common pea- 
 sant?" 
 
 " Perhaps not, madam; but pardon me if 
 I presume to question the utility of preparing 
 young ladies of quality to be the favourites 
 of any monarch : kings do not wed their sub- 
 jects; and the young women of my country 
 would not deem it an enviable distinction to 
 share their affections on any condition short 
 of matrimony." 
 
 " Very true, very true, sir, no doubt; but 
 as the lovely Duchess ole Clermont used to say 
 to me, — you know, sir, she married secretly, 
 what we call in France a mesalliance, — 'My 
 dear Belrose,' said the duchess, ' the king is 
 
 h5
 
 154 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 the visible representative of divinity upon 
 
 earth;' so, sir; when his favour fell upon any 
 
 lady, she was thought to be the happiest of 
 
 mortals; the women envied her; the princes 
 
 and cardinals, and great dignitaries of the 
 
 state, were at her feet; she dispensed the 
 
 bounties of the crown ; gave rank in the 
 
 army; livings in the church; had the public 
 
 treasury at her command, and did good offices 
 
 to all her friends. These, sir," continued the 
 
 good dame, with an air of triumph, " were 
 
 the usages of my country ; and nothing was 
 
 deemed so vulgar as to make an ill-natured 
 
 remark on such matters. " 
 
 " Or so dangerous, madam ; for, if I be 
 not mistaken, angry husbands, fathers, and 
 brothers, found a lodging in the Bastile if 
 they but murmured at the distinction to which 
 ladies were elevated."
 
 BELLEGARDE. 155 
 
 s< O yes, there have been some ridiculous in- 
 stances of incarceration and exile; but the 
 king always finished by forgiving and reward- 
 ing." 
 
 It was sufficiently evident that the opinions 
 which Madame De Belrose had cherished du- 
 ring fifty years, would not be modified by the 
 stern morality of Eustace : her notions were 
 sanctioned by the society in which she had 
 passed her youth ; and she took it for granted, 
 that it was no more a dishonour to be the 
 mistress of a king, than the second or third 
 wife of a sultan. She was a fair specimen of 
 the highest class of what French ladies were 
 before the death of Louis the Fifteenth, but 
 of which scarcely could now be found a trace, 
 even in that asylum of divine rights, the Fau- 
 bourg St. Germain. 
 
 Madame De Belrose had been shut up in a
 
 156 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 convent until she was fifteen, when she was 
 married to a colonel of cavalry, first aide-de- 
 camp to the Prince of Conde, in whose society 
 she was taught, that the first duty of woman 
 is to please, the second, to inspire a violent 
 passion, and the third, — to get out of the 
 scrape with as much address and as little noise 
 as possible. 
 
 It was a maxim in that class, to consider the 
 moral evil of conjugal infidelity as nothing, 
 and the discovery of it as a fault, if not a 
 crime. The Spartan boy, who stole the fox, 
 was a hero in the opinion of those ladies; not 
 because he stole it, but because he permitted 
 the animal to eat his flesh, rather than expose 
 the theft by opening his cloak to let him 
 escape. This offence against religion and mo- 
 rality, has been treated by the philosophers of 
 the French school with unpardonable levity;
 
 BELLEGARDE. j of 
 
 and the authority of Voltaire, who said " it 
 was nothing if it was not discovered, and next 
 to nothing if it were" has been often cited in 
 defence of this most mischievous of all the 
 vices that destroy social happiness; but, as the 
 old baron stoutly maintained, it was the natu- 
 ral and necessary consequence of a bad system 
 of education, and the disposal of young girls 
 in marriage to those who offered the best pro- 
 vision for their future maintenance. 
 
 Led from the side of the abbess, where her 
 sole knowledge was a little music, drawing and 
 embroidery, an innocent victim, was led to the 
 altar to vow eternal love, honour and obedi- 
 ence, to a being she saw for the first time, old 
 enough to be her father, and who, by virtue of 
 an engagement in which the heart had no 
 share, was authorized to raise with a rude 
 hand that veil, which ought only to be touched
 
 158 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 by timid, respectful, and devoted affection. 
 Innocent, passive, and obedient, she could 
 scarce comprehend that all the delicacy of her 
 nature, and all the sources of virtue, love, and 
 enthusiasm that lay dormant in her heart, were 
 outraged and violated. But she was not long 
 in making the discovery: — she had been igno- 
 rant of love and its terrible emotions; she 
 knew nothing of its rights and privileges; and 
 her first lessons in a corrupt society, only led 
 her to consider marriage as a mere family ar- 
 rangement, having no other object than to 
 make suitable alliances and augment the for- 
 tune of the contracting parties, but to which 
 she could not be morally bound, not having 
 exercised any free agency in making the com- 
 pact. 
 
 She continued, however, to conform herself 
 to the duties imposed upon her, until she
 
 BELLEGARDE. 159 
 
 found her husband tired of his interior, and 
 seeking amusement elsewhere; and when she 
 complained, heard for the first time, what her 
 lord and master called reason, " which is no- 
 thing more," says the eloquent author of Co- 
 rinna, " than the destruction of all the illusions 
 of life." Loved with apparent passion for two 
 or three months, and taught to believe that her 
 society alone rendered her husband the hap- 
 piest of mortals, she found out, that coldness 
 and ennui was all she could inspire; and while 
 she was required to repel as an insult, every 
 species of homage or tenderness shewn by 
 those who surrounded her in society, she was 
 given to understand, that her husband might 
 exercise without restraint, privileges which 
 were denied to the softer sex, in contempt of 
 the engagements so solemnly contracted at the 
 altar!
 
 160 BELLEGAHDE. 
 
 What a cruel and barbarous treaty! — what 
 a source of perfidy, dissimulation and despair ! 
 Such was, nevertheless, the condition to which 
 women were reduced at the period to which 
 we refer, by what is called a mariage de con- 
 venance. 
 
 Then came the seduction of example, and 
 the fascinations that console or lead astray, to 
 assail young women thus abandoned by their 
 natural protector; and to these they yielded, 
 or else took refuge in extravagant piety : — for 
 the latter they were turned into ridicule, while 
 they heard of nothing but the felicity of love, 
 gallantry, and tenderness enjoyed by the less 
 scrupulous and equally respected members of 
 their society. The opinion of Madame De 
 Belrose was not, therefore, so culpable as Eu- 
 stace might suppose, when she said " it was all 
 natural; just as it ought to be."
 
 BELLEGARDE. 161 
 
 It is the sad fate of those who pass a socia- 
 ble evening in a French family, to be con- 
 demned to listen to a family concert; and as it 
 is natural for the performers to be pleased 
 while they seek to please their friends, this 
 tiresome, because imperfect, source of amuse- 
 ment, generally taxes the patience of the 
 guests some two or three long hours. Eustace 
 was fond of music, but as mediocrity gave him 
 no pleasure, he saw with pain that Matilda and 
 her master were occupied in selecting some of 
 those airs she was in the habit of singing to 
 her father after dinner. Eustace was a good 
 performer ort the flute, but he expected so lit- 
 tle from the wood nymph, who passed a great 
 part of her time with her dogs and in her gar- 
 den, that he declined the invitation to take 
 a part in the entertainment. He was much 
 surprised to find that- her execution was
 
 162 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 more that of an artist than an amateur. Her 
 voice was fine, full and silky, and its tones ex- 
 pressed the sense and meaning of the words. 
 She sang Italian, because, said she, French 
 music requires such efforts as must in a short 
 time deprive the voice of its softness and elas- 
 ticity; — it is not singing, it is screaming. 
 
 The evening passed away with the entire 
 approbation of our young traveller, who was 
 equally surprised and delighted with the re- 
 finement and elegance he found in this se- 
 questered spot, where he had expected only 
 the simplicity of mere pastoral life. 
 
 When he retired to his chamber his mind 
 was full of Matilda. This lovely girl, said he, 
 seems not conscious of her great superiority ; 
 she unites very singular and contradictory qua- 
 lities: so much softness, so much energy, such 
 simplicity and fine talents. He did not per-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 168 
 
 haps reflect, that the great charm that attended 
 all the words and actions of Matilda, lay in 
 that undefinable power, which nature has given 
 to beauty and innocence, to attract and inte- 
 rest the heart. A practised coquette could 
 not fascinate De Courcy ; he sought not plea- 
 sure, but happiness; and this had for the first 
 time entered his mind in any other shape than 
 that of military fame. He thought of home; 
 he was convinced his family would admire 
 this singular plant of Canadian growth; and, 
 amused with the suggestions of his fancy, de- 
 livered himself to repose.
 
 1(34 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 II tombe ; le cor sonne, et sa mort qui s'apprete 
 L'enflamme de fureur ;-=-l'animal aux abois 
 Se montre digne encore de l'empire des bois. 
 
 Roucher, Les mois, cb. ix. 
 
 In the morning, Eustace was roused from 
 his dreams of happiness by a noise under his 
 window. It was occasioned by Bellegarde, 
 with the hounds and a company of young 
 Indians, preparing for the chase and making 
 the boats ready to convey the party across the 
 lake, whither horses had been sent to wait 
 their coming. 
 
 When Eustace descended, he found the ba-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 165 
 
 ron in his hunting-frock and belt, and a cou- 
 teau de chasse in his hand. Matilda had on 
 her Armenian dress, which was new. Her lit- 
 tle feet were enclosed in a pair of light mock- 
 asins, beautifully ornamented with porcupine- 
 quills, reaching above the instep, and sur- 
 mounted with gold fringe. Her dark hair was 
 gathered under a velvet hunting-cap, and she 
 held in her hand a short light fowling-piece. 
 Bellegarde, with her two favourite spaniels, was 
 in attendance upon her. He was armed with 
 a light steel tomahawk : it had been the wea- 
 pon of a celebrated Indian warrior, slain in 
 battle by his adopted father, the Algonquin 
 chief, and preserved as a trophy in his family, 
 until, at a solemn festival, held for the initia- 
 tion of Bellegarde, he received it from the old 
 man as a sign of manhood, corresponding with 
 the toga virilis of the Romans.
 
 166 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " Whilst thou art at peace, my son, 3 ' said 
 the chief, " let this weapon be so bright, that 
 its light may conduct a child after the sun has 
 folded himself in his blanket, and sunk to rest 
 in the bosom of the western waters : stain it 
 only with the blood of thine enemies ; on them, 
 let it fall like the lightning that rives the oak." 
 
 Bellegarde had yet no opportunity of em- 
 ploying this savage diploma of initiation ; he 
 knew of no enemies but such as might be hos- 
 tile to the house of Argenteuil; and as he 
 always accompanied the baron and his daugh- 
 ter in their excursions, he never failed to carry 
 this arm, which would have punished a look 
 that threatened either the one or the other 
 with danger or insult. The graceful form, re- 
 gular features, delicate long fingers painted of 
 a pink colour, dark blood-shot eye, darting me- 
 nacing looks through a bronze-coloured skin,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 167 
 
 his long raven hair, plaited into a braid that 
 hung as low as his girdle, riveted the attention 
 of De Courcy. 
 
 " This young man," said he, " would make 
 an admirable subject for a painter." He com- 
 plimented Matilda on the choice she had 
 made of so suitable an attendant. 
 
 Bellegarde, who had not learned to dissimu- 
 late, and who felt at the moment, that the 
 stranger might mistake his rank and preten- 
 sions to respect, and who, in reality, acknow- 
 ledged only the baron and his family as his su- 
 periors, replied to the observation addressed 
 by Eustace to Matilda, 
 
 " It is as much, sir, my own choice as that of 
 my lady; the lakes and forests, where my fa- 
 thers led their followers in pursuit of game, 
 are not closed against me ; the son of Ursus 
 Ferox, is no mercenary attendant!' 5
 
 168 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " This proud boy," said Matilda, patting 
 him on the cheek, " is my little knight, al- 
 ways ready to break a lance at my bidding ; 
 go, Bellegarde, seek thy bow and arrows, that 
 Captain De Courcy may judge of thy dex- 
 terity to-day as we cross the lake. I think 
 thou wilt bring down a wild-duck." 
 
 The boy, ever anxious to please his mis- 
 tress, soon appeared with such arms as the sa- 
 vages employed in the chase, before the white 
 men had introduced fire-arms among them. 
 
 Breakfast finished, the hunters descended 
 to the shore of the lake, where boats were 
 ready to convey them to the scene of action. 
 The horses and servants stood ready with all 
 the " equipage de chasse" on the opposite 
 side, and the favourite horse of Matilda an- 
 nounced his impatience at the absence of his 
 mistress, who had not forgotten to bring with
 
 BELLEGARDE. 169 
 
 her his accustomed allowance of cake. The 
 moment he perceived her approach, his ears 
 laid back, his inflated nostrils and restless 
 movements, were signs of joy, in which Eu- 
 stace thought there might be danger for his 
 fair companion. The Indian boy smiled at 
 his ignorance ; and Matilda assured him, that 
 she was accustomed to these marks of satisfac- 
 tion from an animal that was the constant com- 
 panion of her excursions. 
 
 The dogs were cast off, and in a short time 
 the sound of the horn announced that the 
 game was started. 
 
 " To horse ! to horse !" said Matilda, leaping 
 on her pony with the agility of a squirrel, and 
 setting off at full-gallop, Bellegarde, on foot, 
 bounding like a greyhound by her side, as she 
 proceeded towards a distant spot, where she 
 supposed the animal would pass. 
 
 VOL. i. i
 
 170 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 The baron, who rode at a slow pace, re- 
 commended to his companion to ride forward 
 in the direction his daughter had taken ; " she 
 always contrives," said he, " to fire the first 
 shot, and owing to the fleetness of her horse, 
 keeps up with the hounds." 
 
 u Do you not apprehend danger," said Eu- 
 stace, " from the young lady exposing herself 
 to the fury of a stag or a wild-boar, whom she 
 might meet in a narrow path ?" 
 
 " There may be a little, sir; but Bellegarde 
 has a hand and an eye so unerring, that he 
 never fails to disable or kill the animal by a 
 wound between the neck and the shoulder; 
 and he is so light of foot and cunning in tak- 
 ing positions, that he contrives to be close by 
 my daughter when she is exposed." 
 
 " I have never seen a wild-boar," said Eu- 
 stace, " and if you will permit me, I will 
 away and endeavour to assist at the death,"
 
 BELLEGARDE. 171 
 
 " Go on, sir," said the baron, " and be 
 careful, for the game is running." 
 
 Thus authorized to join Matilda, without 
 apprehending to be deemed obtrusive, De 
 Courcy set spurs to his horse, and following 
 the direction where the dogs gave tongue, 
 soon reached a narrow path, leading from the 
 wood to the open country. Here he perceived 
 at a great distance running towards him, an 
 enormous boar, foaming at the mouth, follow- 
 ed by the hunters and dogs in full cry. He 
 was armed with a rifle-gun and a couteau de 
 chasse ; and in order to do fit execution, jump- 
 ed from his horse, threw the bridle over the 
 branch of a tree, and placed himself directly in 
 front of the beast as it approached. We need 
 not inform such of our readers as are sports- 
 men, that persons accustomed to this spe- 
 cies of little war, never attack the enemy in 
 
 i 2
 
 172 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 front. Matilda saw the danger in which he 
 had placed himself, and presuming that he was 
 himself ignorant of it, called out to him with 
 all her force, making signs to let the hoar 
 pass. But Eustace was too intent on his ob- 
 ject to hear or see any thing else. He pointed 
 his gun, and waited till the animal came within 
 a few yards of him, and then fired. The ball 
 passed through the eye and neck, and cut 
 through the sinews of the shoulder of the 
 boar ; but such was his great strength and the 
 celerity of his pace, that the death-wound did 
 not prevent him from reaching Eustace, and 
 striking against him with such violence, that 
 he fell at the same moment with the animal 
 he had killed. He instantly recovered, and 
 seeing the boar struggling, drew his weapon, 
 and with a tremendous blow nearly severed 
 the head from the trunk. 
 
 " Bravo ! bravo !" cried Matilda, ( ' nobly
 
 BELLEGARDE. 173 
 
 done, — a lucky escape ! Don't you know, 
 Captain De Courcy, that an adversary of this 
 kind is seldom taken down at the first shot, 
 and that he never fails to wound the person 
 who attempts to stop his passage." 
 
 " Then I have been more fortunate than 
 prudent," said Eustace, " for I only fell from 
 the shock I received." 
 
 Bellegarde, who perceived his boot torn, 
 and, Indian like, concluding that he wished to 
 conceal his wound, told him in a low voice to 
 withdraw a moment, while Matilda conversed 
 with her father, who had by this time joined 
 the party. He assisted De Courcy to pull off 
 the boot, and finding that one of the tusks of 
 the boar had cut into his leg, bound it up with 
 a handkerchief, and then ran towards his mis- 
 tress, to inform her that the young officer had 
 received a slight scratch. 
 
 " Wild boars give no slight scratches," said
 
 174 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 Matilda, alarmed ; and instantly turning from 
 her father, rode towards De Courcy, who now 
 felt extreme pain, and leaned against a tree 
 with his leg raised. The anxiety with which 
 she inquired whether he had received much 
 injury, was undisguised and serious. 
 
 " It is but a trifle," said Eustace, i( and well 
 gotten, since it procures me your kind sym- 
 pathy." 
 
 " We will return home immediately and 
 have your wound dressed," said Matilda. 
 
 " I pray you do not deprive yourself of the 
 day's sport on account of such a trifling acci- 
 dent ; I will remount ; we shall have time to 
 dress the wound when we return to the castle 
 to dine." 
 
 " Bellegarde, bring the gentleman's horse," 
 said Matilda. 
 
 Bellegarde transmitted the order to a groom, 
 instead of obeying.
 
 BELLEGARDE. 175 
 
 " Why not execute my order ?" said Ma- 
 tilda with vivacity. 
 
 " i serve only my mistress/' said the proud 
 Indian, " there are grooms and domestics for 
 others." 
 
 " This shall not be forgotten, Bellegarde." 
 
 " If the scratch the Englishman has received 
 call forth so much kindness," muttered Belle- 
 garde, " I shall contrive to break my leg the 
 first favourable opportunity. " 
 
 Having asserted, what the unpolished and 
 unreflecting youth conceived to be his per- 
 sonal dignity, his natural kindness returned, 
 and he was unremitting in his attentions to De 
 Courcy. He helped him to reach the boat, 
 placed a bed of fern under his wounded limb, 
 and took so much pains to make him comfort- 
 able, that the cloud passed from the brow of 
 Matilda before the party reached the castle. 
 
 Although Bellegarde had a moment of re-
 
 176 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 pentance for having disobeyed his mistress, he 
 approved of his own conduct upon reflection. 
 His thoughts were perhaps natural in the 
 mind of a proud untutored boy. It was, how- 
 ever, the first time he felt displeased at any 
 order his mistress had given him, but he 
 deemed that order derogatory to his rank, of 
 which he was more tenacious than if he held a 
 position less dependant. It cost him a severe 
 pang to resist her commands ; but he held the 
 command unreasonable. Yielding to the con- 
 flict between love, devotion, pride and sorrow, 
 tears came to his relief; but he swallowed 
 them as he sat in the boat, in presence of the 
 stranger ; his haughty spirit repressed the tri- 
 bute his sensibility had made to the idol 
 he worshipped. Beliegarde was too young 
 to examine the true cause of his emotions ; he 
 had never presumed to think of his young pro-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 177 
 
 tectress as an equal; he served her as he had 
 served the image of Madona at the chapel of 
 St. Ann, when he strewed flowers before her 
 shrine on her festival-day. He was jealous of 
 every person who approached her, and he 
 would have tomahawked any person who 
 might venture to perform any^of those services 
 which usually belonged to his office. There 
 is nothing exaggerated in this picture of 
 Bellegarde; for notwithstanding that his reli- 
 gious instructors had taught him to comport 
 himself with humility, and keep in due subjec- 
 tion the vindictive notions of his tribe, the spi- 
 rit of his race dwelt in him, and was constantly 
 excited by the vaunting speeches of old war- 
 riors, who still continued to esteem courage as 
 the highest virtue, and revenge as the noblest 
 duty. He knew from the old cook at the mis- 
 sionary-house the secret of his birth, and he 
 
 i 5
 
 178 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 cherished, from the moment he became ac- 
 quainted with the fate of his family, vague 
 projects of returning, and gathering together 
 the scattered remains of the people of whom 
 his father had been chief. He felt himself 
 humiliated to be adopted amongst strangers? 
 and sought by every possible means to render 
 himself superior to the boys of his age. He 
 studied with the most painful assiduity, was 
 never a moment idle, nor contented himself 
 with a superficial knowledge of any thing he 
 undertook to learn. Whilst other boys were 
 at play, Bellegarde was exercising himself in 
 the use of arms ; he would fix a mark on the 
 highest tree, and discharge arrows at it, until 
 he could hit it with certainty ; and although 
 he knew nothing of the theory of projectiles, 
 he acquired by practice an efficient skill in 
 giving his arrow an angle of elevation, corres-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 179 
 
 ponding with the distance of the object at 
 which he aimed. He would pass whole days 
 in throwing his dagger and hatchet at a saplin, 
 until he could transfix it with certainty. He 
 was equally master of his movements in water 
 and on land ; and although he had shewn no 
 indications of cruelty or ferocity, he was an 
 object of terror to the youth of his own age, 
 and of admiration among the warriors of the 
 village. It is usual among the Indian tribes to 
 give every one a name, corresponding with the 
 qualities that distinguish him : that of Belle- 
 garde, was the " horned snake," a fabulous 
 creature, whose poison is supposed to be con- 
 tained in a horny substance that forms the 
 point of his tail, the insertion of which in any 
 living body, produces instant death ; even 
 plants are said to die, and trees to lose their 
 leaves, if struck by this formidable reptile.
 
 180 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 The Indians pretend, that to swim like a 
 fish, run like a hare, or climb like a squirrel, 
 are no security against the anger of the horn- 
 ed-snake when he pursues his victim ; and as 
 Bellegarde's superiority in all dangerous ex- 
 ercises was not contested by any competitor 
 for fame, the Indian name he received was not 
 unaptly applied. He was conscious of the 
 consideration he enjoyed among his red-breth- 
 ren, and although he was devoted to the 
 family of D'Argenteuil from habit and grati- 
 tude, nothing mean or servile entered into the 
 sentiments he entertained for them.
 
 181 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 0,'un ami veritable, est une douce chose ! 
 II cherche vos besoins au fond de votre cceur ; 
 
 II vous epargne la pudeur 
 
 De les lui decouvrir vous-meme: 
 
 Un songe, un rien, tout lui fait peur 
 
 Quant il s'agit de ce qu'il airae. 
 
 La Fontaine. 
 
 When the party reached the castle, Belle- 
 garde retired to his chamber, to meditate upon 
 the unlucky incident that provoked the dis- 
 pleasure of his mistress. His heart was ill at 
 ease, and would have willingly exchanged the 
 wound it had received, for that inflicted by 
 the tusk of the boar; for jealousy, produced by 
 the attentions of Matilda to the stranger, had
 
 182 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 shewn its green eyes to the poor boy, and 
 troubled the hitherto unruffled state of his 
 mind. Had I been wounded, said he, would 
 she have ordered this stranger to bring my 
 horse? — would she have shewn me so much 
 sympathy? — No. She then deems me his in- 
 ferior; and why? — what would he, nay, what 
 could he do for her which I am not ready to 
 perform. He killed the boar, and if he did 
 not perish, he owes his escape more to chance 
 than to skill. Then how many have I not 
 slain, and how many would I not encounter, 
 in a place where flight would be impossible, 
 merely to receive from her one look of appro- 
 bation. But oh! she humiliated me! that 
 frown has planted a barbed spear in my bosom. 
 — Fly, Bellegarde; quit these white people; 
 the shade of thy father points at thee the fin- 
 ger of scorn, and the reproachful denomina-
 
 BELLEGARDE. l&S 
 
 tion of " old woman, old woman" is buzzing in 
 thine ears! — But no; thou must first do such 
 deeds as shall extort thy praise from the most 
 unwilling tongues; and when thou goest forth. 
 thy steps shall be marked with blood! 
 
 The poor boy raved, and when the dinner 
 bell rung, he was in bed with a violent fever. 
 
 No notice was taken by the baron or Matil- 
 da of his absence from the table ; but the wor- 
 thy chaplain, with whom he was a great favou- 
 rite, went in quest of him, as soon as the fa- 
 mily had entered the drawing-room. The boy 
 explained in part the cause of his distress; and 
 the priest endeavoured to console him with as- 
 surances, that he had utterly misconceived the 
 intentions of his mistress, who, under similar 
 circumstances, would have given the order to 
 the nearest person, whatever might be his 
 rank. But the blood of the proud Ontario
 
 1 84 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 was not easily cooled; and as the village sur- 
 geon had been sent for to dress the wound of 
 De Courcy, it was deemed necessary to extract 
 a considerable quantity of blood from the arm 
 of Bellegarde. 
 
 The following morning he was calm, and 
 presented himself as usual to inquire if his 
 mistress had any orders to give him. 
 
 Matilda had learned from father Le Gere 
 the cause of the boy's absence from dinner, 
 and thinking him more than sufficiently pu- 
 nished for the frowardness of his conduct, re- 
 plied to his demand in a tone of kindness. 
 
 " I do not wish you to leave your chamber 
 to-day, good Bellegarde; father Le Clerc tells 
 me you have been unwell; take care of your 
 health; and if I should ride out St. Marcel 
 will attend me. 
 
 "St. Marcel will not venture, my lady, to
 
 BELLEGARDE. 185 
 
 do my duty, whilst I am able and willing to do 
 it myself." 
 
 " And why not, if I order him, Bellegarde?" 
 
 " Try him, lady, if you w T ill not believe 
 me." 
 
 " You are mysterious, Bellegarde; have I 
 not full authority over my servants? he dare 
 not disobey." 
 
 " He would pay too dearly for taking my 
 place near my mistress, whilst I am able to 
 follow her. 
 
 " Thou art mad, boy, to hold such language; 
 if it please me to select another person, how 
 can you pretend to oppose my will?" 
 
 " I pretend to do the will of my mistress; 
 but the privilege her goodness has accorded to 
 me up to this hour, cannot be infringed by 
 another without danger to his life." 
 
 Matilda suppressed her displeasure at the
 
 186 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 audacity of the young Indian: — it was exag- 
 gerated zeal; it was devotedness; besides he 
 was too young, and of too violent a disposi- 
 tion, to listen to cold reason on a point on 
 which he placed his happiness. He was nearly 
 of her own age, and habit had rendered him 
 sufficiently familiar with her to express his sen- 
 timents without reserve or hesitation. 
 
 He finished the sentence we have just re- 
 corded with a tone of resolution, that con- 
 vinced Matilda that it would be unwise to urge 
 him farther. She knew she had to do with a 
 pet tiger, whose natural ferocity was only co- 
 vered with the varnish of civilization; and al- 
 though he was in every respect superior to the 
 young men of his tribe, he was still an Indian. 
 Then, 
 
 " It was thy beauty that provoked me," 
 
 might he have urged, had he dared to speak 
 the truth, or quote Shakspeare to his lady.
 
 BELLEGARDE. 187 
 
 " I have no thought of replacing thee, Belle- 
 garde," said Matilda; nor have I any occasion 
 for an escort to-day; so follow the regimen 
 prescribed by the doctor." 
 
 She then walked away to continue the train 
 of reflection, that Bellegarde had for a moment 
 interrupted. — She had just quitted her aunt 
 Belrose, much perplexed to comprehend the 
 reluctance of the good lady to paying a visit to 
 De Courcy, whose inflamed limb and a slight 
 fever compelled him to remain in his chamber. 
 The baron had already paid him two visits, 
 and left him such books as might amuse his 
 solitude. The ladies had made lint to dress 
 his wound, and Matilda employed her elo- 
 quence in vain to persuade her aunt to visit 
 the sick room. 
 
 " Can you be so totally ignorant, my dear,'' 
 said Madame De Belrose, " of the usages of
 
 188 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 society, as to make me, seriously, such a pro- 
 position?" 
 
 " I am ignorant of the usages of the world, 
 my aunt, but I know what the laws of hu- 
 manity require; Captain De Courcy is our 
 guest, and the friend of my father, and in 
 these relations entitled to every thing we can 
 do for him." 
 
 " Bless me, good niece, how readily you 
 adopt this young gentleman; a young lady 
 can have no friends but her family until she 
 is married." 
 
 "And then," said Matilda, maliciously, "ac- 
 cording to the infallible laws of the Cbantilly 
 code, as many as may happen to please her, 
 since it does not always follow that a woman's 
 husband is her friend." 
 
 kt These matters, my dear, are regulated by 
 custom, to which you must conform yourself; 
 moreover, if no one else thought it wrong,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 189 
 
 the young gentleman himself would deem it 
 a strange innovation." 
 
 " If by strange you would say that it would 
 be contrary to the usages of his country, he 
 will have sense enough to perceive that we 
 are more humane and courteous in Canada 
 than they are in Ireland." 
 
 But it would not do. Madame De Belrose 
 recollected the wound the Duke of Melun 
 received at the chase, and the scruples of 
 Mademoiselle De Clermont; and piqued her- 
 self on the infallibility of her judgment in 
 matters of etiquette. 
 
 Dissatisfied with the decisidn of her aunt, 
 Matilda walked out on the terrace to reflect 
 upon the best means of gaining her father 
 to her own opinion, when she met with Belle- 
 garde, whose conversation did not tend to 
 diminish the vexations of the morning. 
 
 u Here,' 7 said the artless girl, "are two per-
 
 190 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 sons sincerely attached to me ; the one would 
 strike his tomahawk into any one who should 
 be employed to do his service, and already 
 shews symptoms of jealousy at the ordinary 
 civilities bestowed on Captain De Courcy ; 
 and the other imposes upon me the obliga- 
 tion to abstain from the common duties of 
 hospitality: the first, however, I can compre- 
 hend to be the result of inexperience and 
 exaggeration; but to make my conduct sub- 
 servient to the arbitrary rules of a society so 
 different from the simple, unsophisticated 
 existence of these remote forests, where we 
 have no guide but a moral conscience that 
 never deceives us, is equally absurd and in- 
 commodious. Now as I have always found 
 my father's notions at variance with those of 
 my aunt, I shall consult him on the propriety 
 of shewing this stranger all the attentions
 
 BELLEGARDE. 191 
 
 that can tend to make a sick chamber sup- 
 portable." 
 
 She found the baron in his study with the 
 family doctor, who soon left them together. 
 
 " My dear," said the baron, " our young 
 friend is doing well; and has charged me to 
 express his regret at being deprived of our 
 company at dinner." 
 
 M He must be lonesome," said Matilda; 
 would it not be our duty to read to him, 
 and converse with him, and endeavour to make 
 him forget he suffers?" 
 
 " It might not be right perhaps, my love, 
 to transport our drawing-room society to the 
 sick chamber; but a visit of benevolence is 
 due to him." 
 
 "All our society he cannot have," rejoined 
 Matilda ; " for my aunt will not be of the 
 party, nor even consent to my accompanying 
 you."
 
 192 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " She would first consult the records of 
 the etiquette of Chantilly," said the baron; 
 but we of the Lake of the Two Mountains 
 are free to make regulations more suitable 
 to our wants and condition; so I shall pro- 
 pose to our guest to pass an hour with him 
 after dinner." 
 
 The proposition was made, and accepted 
 with joy by De Courcy ; who already felt 
 desirous to become more intimate with the 
 lovely and interesting daughter of D'Argen- 
 teuil. 
 
 While this was passing, Madame De Bel- 
 rose, suspecting that this important question 
 (and what is not important in a castle remote 
 from the concerns and agitations of the busy 
 world ?) would be discussed at the dinner 
 table, resolved to have, if possible, the chap- 
 lain on her side. With this intent she paid
 
 BELLEGARDE. 193 
 
 him a friendly visit; but the shrewd philo- 
 sopher was on his guard after the first sen- 
 tence was pronounced. 
 
 " See now, my good father," said the dame, 
 with a serious face, "the effects of not fol- 
 lowing my counsel in the education of our 
 dear Matilda. I always told my brother that 
 a time would come when he would be con- 
 vinced, that to educate a young girl as if 
 she were to have the liberty of an officer of 
 light cavalry, was an error of which he would 
 
 repent." 
 
 The priest laid down his spectacles, and, 
 
 giving her a scrutinizing look, demanded if 
 
 any thing new had disturbed her. 
 
 " The most singular proposition, my good 
 
 father; it shocks all my notions of propriety; 
 
 but the dear girl is too happy that we have 
 
 no inquisitive cackling neighbours ; she would 
 vol. i. K
 
 194 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 be the object of general censure ; no one 
 Mould wed a young woman so ignorant of 
 the dignity of her sex. But it is all my bro- 
 ther's work; he has only to blame himself 
 for it. Mademoiselle De Clermont, who was, 
 you know, of royal blood, and privileged to 
 do as she pleased, without being accountable 
 to any person, would never have proposed 
 to pay a visit to any young man unless he 
 were her brother; and that would not be in 
 strict conformity with the usages of persons 
 of rank. Now, sir, you must know, that 
 Matilda has insisted upon my accompanying 
 her to the chamber of the sick officer." 
 
 The priest took a pinch of snuff. He had 
 a fixed dislike to exercise appellate jurisdic- 
 tion in disputed questions between the baron 
 and his sister. It was what the French call 
 putting one's finger betwixt the bark and the
 
 BELLEGARDE. 195 
 
 tree. Besides, he knew that if Matilda took 
 it into her head that she was doing her duty 
 towards the stranger, she would contrive to 
 gain her father's consent. So having settled 
 these points in his mind, he replied: 
 
 "I am aware, madame, that Matilda main- 
 tains, that to visit the sick is one of the car- 
 dinal works of mercy; and she probably makes 
 no distinction between a sick man who wears 
 a red coat and one who wears a black. More- 
 over, madame, as you justly observe, there are 
 no prying, ill-natured censors to blame a ge- 
 nerous feeling; so that no harm can come of 
 the proposal she has made to you. Have you 
 consulted the baron, madame?" 
 
 The good lady having failed to warm in the 
 priest a feeling corresponding with the ani- 
 mated and pathetic appeal she had made to 
 him, changed her tone, and replied, disdain- 
 fully: k2
 
 196 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 "No, Monsieur l'Abbe; if I had consulted 
 the baron, I would not have demanded coun- 
 sel. But I address myself to you, whose duty 
 it is to inform your pupil that a young lady 
 cannot be too circumspect." 
 
 " My duty, madame, is to inculcate in all 
 things a spirit of virtue and piety; and this 
 I have never failed in towards the daughter 
 of my friend. I know her secret thoughts 
 and disposition, and can answer for the purity 
 of both; but as to matters of etiquette, and 
 what might be suitable to particular condi- 
 tions of society, I have taken no pains to 
 examine them on any other ground than their 
 moral fitness. Besides, madame, you must 
 be aware, that the manners and morals of the 
 society at Chantilly were not submitted to 
 the control of the spiritual teacher." 
 
 " Then, Monsieur l'Abbe, I am to under-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 197 
 
 stand, that you do not disapprove of the pro- 
 posal of my niece?" 
 
 i( To visit the sick, madame, as I had the 
 honour of observing, is a duty; but you have 
 scruples that I am bound to respect." 
 
 " Well, monsieur, we will all go to this 
 sick person together; and thus the respon- 
 sibility will be removed from Matilda." 
 
 " As Matilda intended to perform a meri- 
 torious action, madame, she will, no doubt, 
 be pleased to be joined by you and her 
 father. " 
 
 Thus ended, to the great satisfaction of 
 the priest and the disappointment of Madame 
 De Belrose, one of those little domestic in- 
 trigues which so often disturb the placid sur- 
 face of a country life. The aunt of Matilda 
 was both a kind-hearted and well-meaning 
 woman, though weak in understanding, and
 
 198 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 wedded to opinions contracted in her youth, 
 in a society whose habits and opinions have 
 been carried by time into oblivion, as the 
 winds of autumn strip the trees of their fo- 
 liage. The revolutions that have taken the 
 place of the ancient quietism of the French 
 monarchy, have changed those usages which 
 formed the national character, and render such 
 a person as we are describing extremely rare at 
 the present day. And yet Madame De Belrose 
 only differed from ladies of the present day 
 in the manner of shewing her good qualities. 
 At dinner, Matilda was silent; Bellegarde 
 looked sullen; the chaplain inattentive to the 
 conversation at the head of the table ; and 
 the baron more than usually cordial towards 
 his sister, by way of indemnifying her before- 
 hand for the task he meant to impose on her. 
 When coffee was served, he said, with a tone 
 of authority, " Daughter, send your album to
 
 BELLEGAEtDE, 199 
 
 Captain De Courcy, to amuse him until we 
 come ; I have announced to him my intention 
 of paying him a visit this evening; and I 
 wonder, sister, you have not thought of going 
 to see our sick guest." 
 
 " Matilda thought of it for me, brother; 
 but I deemed it more regular that you should 
 accompany us." 
 
 " Ay, these are your Paris fancies, sister; 
 you remember the time when a lady dared not 
 go alone to a milliner's shop to choose a hat, 
 so little confidence had her parents and friends 
 in her sense of dignity and propriety. Even 
 now, the middling classes of unmarried fe- 
 males, who cannot afford to ensconce them- 
 selves in a carriage, escorted by two foot- 
 men, are accompanied by the cook or the 
 chamber-maid, to screen their reputation, or 
 watch their motions." 
 
 (i That, brother, is the fault of the men,
 
 200 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 who follow them and stare at them as if they 
 were wild beasts escaped from a menagerie." 
 
 " And yet, my good sister, you are conti- 
 nually boasting of the politeness and chival- 
 rous spirit of our people, and, in comparison 
 with them, hold all other very little removed 
 from a state of barbarity. How can men call 
 themselves civilized, whose demeanour, in the 
 street, compels a modest woman to go out 
 under the protection of a footman, armed with 
 a cane, if she be rich enough to pay such 
 an escort; or, if poor, to call the only ser- 
 vant in her family from the domestic labours, 
 to save her from the brutal obtrusion of per- 
 sons whom she may meet on her way." 
 
 " Indeed, I am very far from approving such 
 things, brother. I have often felt the inconve- 
 nience of being a woman when I walked in the 
 garden of the Thuilleries, or the park of Ver-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 201 
 
 sailles; I have been followed merely because 
 I had a small foot, and especially by officers 
 of cavalry, who never fail to walk round and 
 stare a lady out of countenance, as if they 
 sought to recognize an old acquaintance." 
 
 " Think of them as you may, good sister, 
 such officers as you describe, cowardly enough 
 to incommode a woman, whose weakness as- 
 sures impunity, would make but a poor figure 
 in front of an enemy, since men who have 
 much courage where there is no danger, make 
 the very worst of soldiers: brave men are 
 modest; and modest men protect, but never 
 insult, woman. If I were a legislator, such 
 petty offences should be within the reach of 
 the law; and if I were a woman, every man 
 convicted under the statute should find my 
 doors closed against him, whatever might be 
 his rank and condition in society." 
 
 k 5
 
 202 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " The question of guilt, then," said Ma- 
 dame De Belrose, " ought to be decided by 
 a tribunal where women should sit in judg- 
 ment; and upon the simple averment of the 
 party offended." 
 
 " Undoubtedly," said the baron; " they 
 should be treated like hackney coachmen, 
 who are fined for insolence upon the com- 
 plaint of any person who is sufficiently the 
 friend of good order to bring them to justice." 
 
 " If you were the sovereign prince of Paris, 
 or London, brother, you would deprive a 
 great number of your subjects of their prin- 
 cipal occupation." 
 
 " God be praised," said the baron, " we 
 live in Canada, where such impertinence would 
 not ' escape whipping.' " 
 
 " Corrupt as you may deem Paris," said 
 Madame De Belrose, determined to have the
 
 BELLEGARDE. 203 
 
 last word, " when our Canadians go there, 
 their friends and families may well write to 
 them about the virtues of a pastoral life, 
 and the freedom of the forest rangers; they 
 think the Opera and Palais Royale, the pub- 
 lic gardens, and, above all, the print shops 
 and caricatures, and little feet that they ad- 
 mire and stare at so impertinently, more agree- 
 able than the austerities of their native coun- 
 try." 
 
 To this the baron could not reply with a 
 clear conscience; for the seductions of that 
 little world, where scarce any desire can long 
 remain unsatisfied, had kept him from home 
 some years of his youth, the loss of which he 
 has often since regretted.
 
 204 
 
 CHAPTER XIIL 
 
 0! shame to manhood, and opprobrious 
 
 More to France, than all her losses and defeats. 
 
 Cowper. 
 
 The party proceeded to the chamber, where 
 they found Eustace in high spirits, in spite of 
 his inflamed limb. The conversation turned 
 on the event which led to the wound given by 
 ihe boar; and Matilda shewed a strong ten- 
 dency to praise the courage of the young 
 officer at the expence of his skill in such ex- 
 ercises. This gave an occasion to Madame 
 De Belrose, to renew the story of the St. Hu~
 
 BELLEGARDE. 205 
 
 bert hunt, to speak of times long passed, and 
 entertain the circle with anecdotes of a Court, 
 of which she had been a member. She had 
 once, said she, attracted the attention of the 
 king, but was saved from his farther importu- 
 nities by the appearance of a brighter star, in 
 the person of her friend, Madame D'Etioles, 
 better known as Duchess of Pompadour. 
 
 Cotemporary historians have attributed that 
 lady's connection with Louis the Fifteenth to a 
 Court intrigue, and disfigured the circumstances 
 that led to it; but Madame De Belrose, who 
 had been her friend before her elopement, and 
 allied to the family of her husband by mar- 
 riage, proposed to correct these discrepancies 
 by relating the facts, of which she had been a 
 personal witness. The baron had long been 
 tired of her " thrice-told tales," but on this 
 occasion, disposed to let her talk for the
 
 206 BELXEGARDE. 
 
 amusement of De Courcy, he encouraged her 
 to go on; and as the anecdote places in a 
 strong light the power of an absolute monarch 
 in France, and the impunity with which he 
 might trample on all the rights of his subjects, 
 and violate all the decencies of life, we give it 
 in the words of Madame De Belrose. 
 
 " Norman D'Etioles was one of the happiest 
 men in France ; he had a princely fortune, was 
 of a generous and lofty spirit, charitable, kind 
 and hospitable. He spared no pains nor ex- 
 pence to render his chateau agreeable and 
 splendid; and as it was situated on the bor- 
 ders of the forest of Lys, where the princes of 
 Conde and their noble companions hunted the 
 stag and the wild boar, D'Etioles was fre- 
 quently honoured with their company. It was 
 a rendezvous of repose; and the illustrious 
 guests made use of it without ceremony, deem-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 207 
 
 ing the visit an act of condescension, that am- 
 ply indemnified the host for the trouble they 
 gave and the cost of splendid collations, of 
 which the hospitable D'Etioles was not spar- 
 ing. 
 
 "He was not born of titled parents, and, con- 
 sequently, could not appear at Court, nor re- 
 ceive from his noble visitors any return of that 
 hospitality of which he was so prodigal; but 
 he was a convenient and useful friend to many 
 of the young noblemen, whose revenue was 
 not commensurate with their expenses. These 
 dined with him in rather secret select parties; 
 and in order to render their visits less liable to 
 animadversion, often recommended to him to 
 purchase at Court a place of pousse fauteuil, 
 or valet de garde robe. But D'Etioles was 
 not ambitious ; he loved the independence of a 
 private condition, and did not even seek in
 
 208 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 marriage an alliance that might have given him 
 pretensions to more consideration than his 
 birth entitled him to claim. He thought that 
 the first gentleman of a family was not more 
 noble than his ancestors; and as the father of 
 D'Etioles was only a banker, the son chose to 
 remain in the same condition in which he was 
 born and had made his fortune. 
 
 " Many projects of marriage were formed for 
 him, and the unlucky man had at one time an 
 opportunity of uniting himself with the daugh- 
 ter of the Marquis de la Garonne, who had no 
 money, and in consequence of a slight defect 
 in her shape, and the ravages the small pox 
 had made on a tolerably good face, could not 
 find a match suitable to her rank. He pre- 
 ferred pleasing his own fancy in the choice of 
 a wife, and selected Mademoiselle Poisson on 
 account of her beauty and accomplishments. —
 
 BELLEGARDE. £09 
 
 And assuredly if beauty, grace and talents, 
 could supply the wants of patrician birth, she 
 possessed them in a degree of perfection which 
 had no equal in our country. 
 
 "As my husband was a remote connection of 
 D'Etioles, I visited them frequently, and had 
 many opportunities of seeing and admiring 
 that splendid woman at her toilette, where 
 alone beauties and deformities cannot be con- 
 cealed. She was very playful and vain, and 
 would often throw her cloud of auburn hair 
 before her person, which it covered down to 
 her feet; she called it her screen; and it was 
 like a screen of unwrought silk, brilliant as po- 
 lished gold. Her eyes were large, and of the 
 colour of those given by poets to Minerva. 
 I have never seen such eyes ; her skin was like 
 white satin; her voice soft and musical, — that 
 is, its tones conveyed the meaning of the words
 
 £10 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 it expressed. There was something haughty 
 in the expression of her mouth and nose, 
 analogous to that of the Apollo Belvedere ; — 
 in short, she was the finest woman in France; 
 and as dear Mademoiselle De Clermont used 
 to say, nature had left nothing wanting to 
 render her perfect, had she been well born. 
 
 " Her husband had a large estate and a fine 
 castle near Melun, on the banks of the upper 
 Seine. It touched the forest of Senart, where 
 the king frequently went to hunt the stag ; 
 and although D'Etioles dare not present him- 
 self an unbidden spectator of the royal chase, 
 ladies might appear in their carriages without 
 giving offence, It was the good fortune of 
 Madame D'Etioles to be placed in an open 
 carnage at the entrance of the wood, where 
 the king passed. She had four beautiful grey 
 horses, which at first drew his attention to-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 211 
 
 wards us; his majesty supposed, from the 
 beauty of the equipage, that it belonged to 
 some of the princes. So he rode towards us 
 and looked at me as if he would speak. He 
 had seen me in company with the family of the 
 Prince of Conde, to whom the count De Bel- 
 rose was aid-de-camp. But his attention was 
 soon fixed upon Madame D'Etioles, to whom 
 he said, ' I did not know that our chase would 
 be honoured with the presence of beauty to- 
 day.' 
 
 ' Sire, we are intruders,' were the only 
 words she spoke; but in speaking she smiled, 
 and shewed the finest teeth you can imagine. 
 The king rode away and seemed in close con- 
 versation with his equerry, who in a moment 
 after galloped up to the carriage, and asked 
 her name. From this circumstance I was con- 
 vinced that his majesty was struck with her
 
 212 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 beauty, and on our return to dinner, I compli- 
 mented D'Etioles, on the honour his majesty 
 had shewn us ; at which he seemed less pleas- 
 ed than I expected. Ten days after a large 
 party was invited to dinner. I was with my 
 husband, who, although noble, was a relation 
 of D'Etioles, and notwithstanding the differ- 
 ence of our birth, permitted me to be intimate 
 with his wife. I remarked something extrava- 
 gantly gay in her manner: she treated the 
 company with an air of protection, "which I 
 thought unsuitable in a person of her condi- 
 tion. She spoke with levity of the dull rou- 
 tine of domestic life, and the happiness those 
 must enjoy who are admitted to the familiar 
 conversation of the king. In fine, no person 
 present, myself excepted, could divine the real 
 cause of her change of manner towards her 
 superiors; and yet I carried my speculations
 
 BELLEGARDE. 213 
 
 no farther than the mark of distinction shewn 
 by the inquiry of the king, which might as 
 well have been owing to the royal curiosity, 
 excited by the beauty of the equipage, as the 
 beauty of the lady. Her husband was amused 
 at all this, supposing that she only sought to 
 throw a tint of ridicule on things beyond our 
 reach. She called me several times i my 
 dear ? and as the Duchess of Clermont said, 
 after the great event was made public, f if I 
 had not been unusually dull, I ought to have 
 concluded, that some intended mark of roya) 
 favour was known to her, although others 
 might be yet ignorant of it; more especially 
 too, as her husband was uncommonly gay ; al- 
 though, as I afterwards learned, he was not 
 consulted upon the subject.' 
 
 " I should think reserve on that point," 
 said Eustace, " essential to the execution of 
 theTdng's projects."
 
 214 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " Truly, no," rejoined Madame de Belrose ; 
 " Etioles would have submitted with less re- 
 luctance, had the king honoured him by con- 
 sulting him ; but although his majesty intend- 
 ed to make a duchess of his wife, he probably 
 had no intention of conferring any favour on 
 her husband. In short, the day passed away 
 agreeably : and as the following was known to 
 have been fixed on by his majesty for hunting 
 in the forest of Senart, we were all engaged by 
 Madame D'Etioles to remain and see the king 
 pass. 
 
 " I remarked, before we set out, that she 
 had so arranged matters, that each lady went to 
 the chase in her own carriage, and that the 
 servants were directed to a rendezvous in a 
 quarter of the forest at a considerable distance 
 from that where we had seen the king before. 
 
 " We heard the horns and the cry of the
 
 BELLEGARDE. 215 
 
 hounds, but did not see the king, and after 
 waiting until all was silent, ordered our ser- 
 vants to return to the castle. As we arrived 
 later than the hour fixed for dinner, we found 
 the master of the mansion and some friends, 
 impatient, and dinner was instantly served. 
 Madame D 'Etioles was missing ; her husband 
 was out of humour ; and at the moment he was 
 about to send a groom on horseback to hasten 
 her return, her carriage entered the park -gate 
 and passed before the drawing-room windows 
 empty ! Etioles alarmed, ran towards the 
 door to inquire after his wife, and every one 
 looked with anxiety towards the carriage, and 
 saw distinctly the coachman put his finger on 
 his lips to impose silence, and without any 
 other answer drove past. 
 
 " In a few minutes Etioles entered with an air 
 of triumph, and bowing to the company assem-
 
 216 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 bled, said in a loud and distinct voice, ( Ma- 
 dame D'Etioles begs you will excuse her ab- 
 sence; SHE DINES WITH THE KING. She is 
 
 gone to Versailles in the royal carriage!' 
 
 " We all formed a group round him to learn 
 some particulars of the elopement ; but my 
 husband, who had a great deal of sagacity, 
 and whose father had been deputy-governor 
 of the Bastile, gave him a significant nod, and 
 asked him, by way of drawing his attention to 
 that formidable cage of angry husbands, whe- 
 ther he had lately been in the Faubourg St. 
 Antoine. This hint imposed silence, and we 
 sat down to dinner and conversed on indiffe- 
 rent topics, without once recurring to the 
 event of the day." 
 
 " I have," continued Madame De Belrose, 
 " often heard my husband praised for his pre- 
 sence of mind upon that occasion ; and the
 
 BELLEGARDE. 217 
 
 Duchess of Clermont often told me, that the 
 prince, her brother, did nothing without con- 
 sulting him, after he had become acquainted 
 with that proof of his wisdom and judgment." 
 
 " You remarked," said Matilda to her aunt, 
 '* that my uncle Belrose's relation, Mr. D'Eti- 
 oles, selected his wife on account of her 
 beauty. This was probably the reason why he 
 saw her departure and bore her loss with such 
 stoicism ?" 
 
 " He loved her passionately, on the con- 
 trary ; and during many months refused to see 
 his friends, and secluded himself from the 
 world in his castle. Every one who knew him 
 blamed the king, arid so great was his distress, 
 that news of it reached Versailles ; it became 
 an object of sympathy, and in the court-cir- 
 cles nothing else was spoken of. In conse- 
 quence of this, those who were near the king's 
 
 VOL. i. L
 
 218 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 person soon found a remedy for his grief. He 
 was ordered to fall in love with some new ob- 
 ject, or at least to affect a great tenderness for 
 some person of notoriety. An opera- dancer, 
 then in vogue, was pointed out as the person 
 the most suitable to divert public attention 
 from Madame D'Etioles ; and her husband had 
 the choice of taking this person to his castle to 
 replace his wife, or taking a lodging in the 
 Bastile for himself for the remainder of his 
 life. He chose the former ; and this opera- 
 girl gave him two children, and imposed upon 
 him the obligation to render them legitimate 
 in the eyes of the law." 
 
 " And how can children who are not born 
 in wedlock be rendered legitimate ?" said the 
 inquisitive niece. 
 
 " Very easily, my dear : the opera-girl was 
 a German; and as every man who has a little
 
 BELLEGARDE. 219 
 
 garden in that country, is at least a baron, she 
 found a poor baron of her own family, who for 
 a good sum paid to him by Etioles — enough, 
 probably, to make barons of all his kindred, — 
 consented to declare himself the husband of 
 the girl and the father of the two children, 
 and so it was registered in the church book at 
 Royaumont. But the better part of the his- 
 tory of poor D'Etoiles is to come." 
 
 " Let us have it all," said the baron, who 
 had been dosing while the young people lis- 
 tened with attention to the history of Mr. 
 D'Etioles. 
 
 " Well then, you must know that this Ger- 
 man lady was very beautiful, and at the end of 
 some three or four years, obtained a kind of 
 celebrity for her good conduct, her attach- 
 ment to D'Etioles and her children, and the 
 grace and elegance of her manners. In h<er 
 
 l 2
 
 220 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 society the poor man became by degress re- 
 conciled to the loss of his wife; and although 
 ladies were wanting at his entertainments, his 
 house was constantly filled with artists, men of 
 letters, and persons of wit and fashion. He 
 returned as usual to his castle near Melun, to 
 spend a few months of the autumn ; and one 
 day, riding out in an open carriage in the 
 avenues of the forest, the king passed, with a 
 cavalcade of gentry at his heels, some of whom 
 knew D'Etioles ; out of curiosity to examine 
 the lady, these stopped to speak to him, and 
 as every favourite has enemies at Court, those 
 of Madame De Pompadour declared that her 
 beauty was not to be compared to that of 
 the lady whom D'Etioles had chosen in her 
 place. Four years is a long period to hold 
 captive such a man as Louis the Fifteenth ; 
 and as a good book, which Madame de Pom-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 221 
 
 padour had not wholly forgotten, admonished 
 her, " to put not her trust in princes" she be- 
 came alarmed at the desire expressed by his 
 majesty to see this opera-girl, so much ad- 
 mired for her charms. A messenger was im- 
 mediately sent off to warn D'Etioles, that he 
 stood no other chance of preserving the lady, 
 than that of retreating to his chateau of Bail- 
 Ion, and giving the public to understand that 
 he had left the country. He took the hint, 
 but determined to vex his wife, he answered 
 the messenger, that he would be too happy to 
 contribute a second time to his majesty's plea- 
 sure and should not stir ; he nevertheless de- 
 camped precipitately, and lived in seclusion 
 until the death of the king." 
 
 " The king was a monster, and D'Etioles a 
 poltroon," said Matilda, 
 
 " He lost Canada," said the baron sighing.
 
 222 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " Your condition, my dear baron, is not the 
 worse for having, in lieu of a depraved and in- 
 glorious prince, a government of law and ra- 
 tional liberty, under which your personal ho- 
 nour and dignity are secure from the violence 
 and outrage that Madame De Belrose has just 
 described," said Eustace. 
 
 Madame De Belrose, to whom this observa- 
 tion was indirectly addressed, piqued by the 
 comparison between a British and a French 
 king, felt herself called upon to defend the 
 children of St. Louis. 
 
 " Your king/ 5 said she, is a simple kind of 
 bourgeois, without power or splendour, if I 
 mistake not, and does not govern subjects 
 quite so devoted and obedient as our French 
 people." 
 
 " Our affection for the king is not," said 
 Eustace smiling, " carried quite so far in
 
 BELLEGARDE. 223 
 
 England as in France : as the highest order of 
 the state, his rank and power are defined by 
 law ; as an individual, he could not, were he so 
 wickedly inclined, violate the sanctity of a ho- 
 vel. An English peasant would take personal 
 vengeance on any man, however elevated his 
 rank, who would insult his wife or daughter, 
 and that too, without the least apprehension 
 of being lodged in a Bastile." 
 
 " In every country/' said Matilda, u there 
 are individuals whose honour is secure in their 
 own hands ; for who can assail with impunity 
 the being that is not afraid to die in defend- 
 ing his personal dignity. If, in general, men 
 would resist the immoral exercise of power, 
 those who are destined to govern society, 
 would be more circumspect in the use they 
 make of their authority." 
 
 " These matters, my love," said the baron,
 
 224< BELLEGARDE* 
 
 " depend upon the habits and education of a 
 people. It does not necessarily follow, that 
 individual rights are at the mercy of a 
 king, because he acknowledges no control- 
 ing power, or that in a free government, like 
 that of England, they are always secure ; fa- 
 natical disciples of liberty, have produced 
 more calamity in one short year, than any 
 single ruler since the time of Nero. The vic- 
 tims of despotism are few, in comparison with 
 those of a lawless and infuriated mob, made 
 up of all the grosser materials of society, obey- 
 ing no impulse but their passions, and respect- 
 ing nothing that is marked with distinction or 
 superiority. Our kings in France have not al- 
 ways been wise and virtuous men ; but if we 
 compare the general mass of happiness enjoy- 
 ed by our people, with that of the most fa- 
 vourite periods of republican and democratic
 
 BELLEGARDE. 225 
 
 greatness, we shall have no reason to regret 
 that we were born in France. No tyranny is 
 so atrocious as that of the system-mongers, 
 who treat society as surgeons treat animals 
 upon whom they make experiments, in the name 
 of what they call principle ; they are equally 
 engaged in a continual succession of theories, 
 which leave neither man nor beast in a state of 
 repose, and sacrifice all present happiness to 
 some remote and speculative good. What say 
 you, Captain De Courcy, was England not as 
 great, and her children as happy under Alfred 
 and Elizabeth, as during the Commonwealth ? 
 and is it any indemnity for the privations and 
 misery of your working people, that they can 
 boast of being independent of a neighbouring 
 lord? It is not the fault of kings, that there 
 are inequalities in society ; let those who cry 
 out and clamour against them, call Providence, 
 
 l5
 
 226 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 not man, to account. If every thing in nature 
 be composed of dissimilar and unequal parts, 
 the evils that may result from such a state of 
 things, are not likely to be cured by the efforts 
 of those who seek to remodel and reduce to a 
 common standard, things that are in their na- 
 ture unchangeable, unequal, and dissimilar. 
 If the inequality of conditions be an evil, it 
 must be placed beside the other " infirmities 
 to which flesh is heir;" and whether it be 
 agreeable, or not, men must submit to it/ 5 
 
 " Well, brother," said Madame De Belrose, 
 " your opinions are just such as the good 
 Prince of Conde expressed, when he heard his 
 people criticising the conduct of a marshal of 
 France, who threatened Baron, the famous 
 actor, to administer to his shoulders twenty 
 blows of a cane, for persisting in his refusal to 
 recite before a company, invited on purpose to
 
 BELLEGARDE. 227 
 
 hear him ; so Baron put forth all his powers, 
 and every one was delighted." 
 
 This happy illustration produced a general 
 smile, and Madame De Belrose received it as 
 a mark of approbation of her favourite opi- 
 nions. 
 
 When the evening drew towards a close, 
 the little circle broke up, pleased with each 
 other's conversation. Matilda retired to re- 
 flect upon the different matters that had been 
 discussed ; and her first sentiment was that of 
 gratitude towards her father, for having edu- 
 cated her with sounder views of the duty and 
 destiny of woman, than those she might have 
 obtained from the prejudices and limited in- 
 telligence of her aunt.
 
 22B 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Physicians wisely make a speech, 
 Or to the food their fingers reach, 
 When silence would increase the ill, 
 Or abstinence their patients kill. 
 
 Rose Garden. 
 
 The elegance and urbanity of Captain De 
 Courcy left a pleasing, if not a deep, impres- 
 sion on the mind of Matilda. She remem- 
 bered Goldsmith's description of " the lord 
 of human kind;" but the if pride in his front 
 and menace in his eye" were so blended with 
 softness and condescension, that they seemed 
 to be secondary qualities, subordinate to 
 strong intellect and goodness of disposition.
 
 BELLEGARDE. 229 
 
 " For the amusement and pleasure of a 
 drawing-room," said Matilda, " I prefer my 
 countrymen; they study more sedulously the 
 art of pleasing ; they attach more "importance 
 to ease, grace, and politeness, and their edu- 
 cation is more made up of knowledge that em- 
 bellishes ; in short, they are formed for society. 
 But for every-day companionship, constancy, 
 and devotedness in all the varying scenes of 
 life, I would take a well-bred and highly 
 moral Englishman. " 
 
 Her early prejudices in favour of her coun- 
 trymen yielded, for the first time, to the 
 influence our young soldier exercised over 
 her. 
 
 While she was occupied with Eustace, he 
 was making up the account of the impressions 
 she had inspired during the evening visit: 
 " She possesses," said he, " the elegance and
 
 220 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 grace of her nation, with the good sense 
 and solid virtue of my countrywomen. Her 
 cousin, who it seems is destined to be her 
 companion through life, if he be capable of 
 appreciating her, will be a happy husband ; 
 if, on the contrary, he be dull or vicious, she 
 will be an incommodious wife." He felt a 
 restless curiosity to learn all the particulars 
 of this fortunate cousin; and if he had not 
 been afraid of exciting suspicion, and deliver- 
 ing himself to the indiscretion of a gossiping 
 imprudent man, he would have written to his 
 friend, Thornwood, who knew every man in 
 the colony, and every man's affairs, in order 
 to satisfy it. But he already felt too profound 
 a respect for her, to be the cause of making 
 her a topic of mess-table mirth. Perhaps no 
 stronger proof can be adduced of a commence- 
 ment of love in the bosom of Eustace, than
 
 BELLEGARDE. 231 
 
 the fear of hearing the name of Matilda pro- 
 nounced by unhallowed lips. The first effect 
 of respectful and virtuous affection, is to 
 awaken in the soul all its delicate and gene- 
 rous emotions; and the philosopher who pre- 
 tended that a man seriously in love was there- 
 by rendered incapable of committing a base 
 action, was not far from the truth. Now, 
 although Eustace might readily have obtained 
 every information that could be interesting 
 to him relating to the family of D'Argenteuil, 
 and the person selected by the baron to be- 
 come the husband of his daughter, he could 
 not resolve to expose such matters to the 
 gaze of the vulgar, by seeking to satisfy a 
 curiosity natural to a young man in his situ- 
 ation. 
 
 Bellegarde, who did not suspect that the 
 indisposition of the strange officer could be
 
 232 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 a motive for suspending the accustomed excur- 
 sions of his mistress, presented himself as 
 usual to receive her orders. She seemed 
 thoughtful and pre-occupied; but replied to 
 his demand in a manner so kind and conde- 
 scending, that she felt no disposition to go 
 abroad, that he ventured to expostulate. 
 
 " It is fine weather, my lady; there is plenty 
 of game; and your pony and spaniels would 
 be the better for exercise. " 
 
 " I cannot ride to-day, Bellegarde ; my 
 father wants me in his study; I have letters 
 to write; besides, I feel no inclination to be 
 amused." 
 
 The Indian bowed, and retired. 
 
 When Matilda was alone, she entered into 
 a self-examination. " Why," said she, " am I 
 so serious, so irresolute? I have nothing to 
 interrupt my customary avocations or amuse-
 
 BELLEGARDE. %33 
 
 ment. I have no duty to perform. I cannot 
 be of any use to the sick officer, nor even 
 visit him until evening." But it was in vain 
 she sought to disengage her thoughts from 
 the sick-room. She constantly recurred to 
 the expressions, the looks, and opinions of 
 De Courcy. He was the finest young man 
 she had ever seen, perhaps the only one who 
 had ever for a moment made any impression 
 upon her. Unaccustomed to question her 
 heart, she was at a loss to render herself the 
 least account of its sensations. The interest 
 excited by her family circle, and the objects 
 that surrounded her, in so remote a situation 
 as the Lake of the Two Mountains, had never 
 for a moment suspended her rides, walks, and 
 studies. It could not be these that gave a 
 new colour to her perceptions; these did not 
 make her grave, thoughtful, melancholy, or
 
 2.34 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 unwilling to be importuned. She had no dis- 
 tinct idea of her situation, for it was the com- 
 mencement of a new and unknown sensation. 
 
 Matilda had made, with the aid of good 
 masters, considerable progress in literature. 
 She had a fine memory, good taste, and a 
 poetical imagination. She had given many 
 proofs of this in birth-day odes, presented to 
 her aunt and father; but although the baron 
 was delighted with the feeling and harmony of 
 her compositions, he never encouraged such 
 efforts, but always met them with the chilling 
 question of the great French academician, 
 " What does that prove?" He directed his 
 daughter to serious studies; and, at eighteen, 
 she had become conversant with French, Eng- 
 lish, and Italian literature ; and could cite 
 upon every occasion such passages as illus- 
 trated and ornamented the subject of conver-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 235 
 
 sation. But all this was without excitement; 
 and she felt the loss of the moments that were 
 not spent in the conversation of the agreeable 
 and accomplished stranger. In the short 
 space of time she had passed in his society, 
 Eustace had but little opportunity of dis- 
 playing the riches of a mind highly culti- 
 vated ; but there was an eloquence in his 
 expressions, and a force and variety in his 
 reasoning that could not fail . to please and 
 captivate her. She wished that the hours 
 might pass rapidly away, and bring round 
 the interview of the evening. We leave cur 
 readers to divine the cause of this sudden 
 change of the daily habitudes of our young 
 and innocent inhabitant of the sequestered 
 castle of D'Argenteuil. We fear that the 
 
 " Enfant au vol leger, a la fleche rapide 
 Dont le rire est cruel et la gaite pernde."
 
 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 the eros ouranios of Plato had planted a poi- 
 soned arrow in a heart, hitherto accessible 
 only to filial affection and general benevolence. 
 The Indians tell us, that when a slight wound 
 is inflicted on a deer, it quits the herd and 
 seeks solitude and looks melancholy. We do 
 not pretend to establish a parallel; but certain 
 it is, that Matilda remained alone in her apart- 
 ment in a very thoughtful mood the remainder 
 of the day. She looked over her sketch book, 
 tried to read, changed her book often, — per- 
 haps thought much, and feared her own 
 thoughts, and awoke from her reveries little 
 satisfied with her waking dreams. But these 
 are secrets of the boudoir, which it is not ne- 
 cessary to pry into for the better understand- 
 ing of our history. 
 
 The cogitations of Eustace ran very nearly 
 in the same course, until he was interrupted
 
 BELLEGARDE. 237 
 
 by the family leech, who called to dress his 
 wound, and whose curiosity and communica- 
 tiveness being at least equal to his skill, gave 
 the patient a full hour's amusement. 
 
 He spoke with an air of superiority of the 
 cures he had performed, and the veneration in 
 which he was held by the inhabitants of the 
 country ; but expatiated on his intimacy with 
 the baron and his family, in such a manner as 
 to inspire a belief that his sagacity and judg- 
 ment were the guides of all the actions of any 
 moment that related to the old nobleman. 
 
 "I have, captain, with God's help, preserved 
 the whole family in health these twenty years ; 
 and the young lady would, but for my care, 
 have long since followed her mother to the 
 grave. She was delicate, sir, very delicate, 
 when young, and our climate, sir, is severe for 
 young ladies; they are subject to neurosis in 
 all its forms; to phthisis pulmonalis. She had
 
 238 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 an attack of atrophia ablactarorem, on account 
 of the too early death of her nurse; and this, 
 sir, is often fatal." 
 
 " The efficacy of your prescriptions, doc- 
 tor," said Eustace, " is very apparent in the 
 fine health of the young lady." 
 
 " Yes, sir; but it is out of friendship to the 
 baron that I have done so much, and I hope 
 to live to prescribe for his daughter's chil- 
 dren." 
 
 This observation opened a door into which 
 Eustace rushed like an arrow. 
 
 " It is extremely probable that you will pre- 
 scribe for her children, doctor, unless she be 
 an enemy to matrimony, since she is now of an 
 age to render such an event possible before 
 your death: and yet, in this secluded spot, it 
 would, methinks, — it would not be easy to find 
 a suitable match for so accomplished a young 
 woman?"
 
 BELLEGARDE. 239 
 
 " Oh, as to that matter, captain, the party 
 is already found." 
 
 " Already! doctor. She is very young to 
 have decided so important a step." 
 
 " Lord, captain, she never decided any 
 thing about it. She was never consulted. 
 The baron brought her up to believe, that a 
 young person of quality only wants a husband 
 to maintain her rank in society and manage 
 her fortune. So, sir, as he had no son, he 
 adopted his nephew, who is destined to be the 
 husband of Matilda, and perpetuate the family 
 name and honours. This young man, sir, is 
 now in England. He is very partial to your 
 country, sir ; — does not like solitude and rural 
 felicity; — is what you call a gay fellow." 
 
 Eustace, already too much interested in the 
 subject of conversation, and finding that the 
 doctor only wanted to be encouraged, ventured 
 to push his inquiries a little farther.
 
 240 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " Does the young cousin promise to be such 
 a companion for the young lady as her father 
 might desire?" 
 
 " On that matter," replied the leech, " the 
 baron keeps his opinion to himself. There is 
 a necessity that this union take place, the ba- 
 ron having no male relation, as I said before ; 
 and if his nephew's wild oats were all sown, 
 the marriage would not be long delayed; but 
 there are some obstacles that time will soon 
 remove." 
 
 " Some matters relating to fortune?" said 
 Eustace, whose curiosity was not satisfied. 
 
 " I perceive, sir, you have heard something 
 of this gentleman at Montreal. — Giddiness of 
 disposition; a good fortune all spent; — loves 
 boxing, horse-racing and good dinners; learned 
 all this from the military, — no offence, Captain 
 De Courcy — but he thought his own country-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 241 
 
 men unfashionable; so, sir, he gave what he 
 called i noble feeds' to the officers; lost his 
 money at play, and became the humble inti- 
 mate of a man of rank, who gave him hopes 
 of obtaining a place in England, where he 
 now lives as he can. The poor fellow, sir, 
 gave out that he left the country to become a 
 man of consequence in England; but the truth 
 is, Mr. De Bertinval was ashamed of the po- 
 verty he brought on himself, and went aw r ay 
 because he could no longer find means to live 
 as he had been accustomed to do with the offi- 
 cers at Montreal. He hopes to acquire new 
 habits, and profit of such lessons of adversity 
 as a very small income in a strange country 
 are likely to furnish. On this condition his 
 uncle will realize all the promises made on the 
 subject of the inheritance and the marriage." 
 " And pray, doctor, does the young lady 
 VOL i. m
 
 242 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 know these particulars relating to her future 
 husband?" 
 
 " She only knows he has spent his fortune; 
 his person, character, and disposition, she has 
 had no opportunity of judging. The baron 
 himself is but imperfectly informed on these 
 points, in consequence of his retired life and 
 unsuspicious disposition. The nephew has 
 been seldom at the castle since he came of age; 
 and for many years letters have been received 
 from him, which have been satisfactory to the 
 family." 
 
 " Then his want of fortune, doctor, seems 
 not to constitute an objection on the part of 
 the young lady?" 
 
 (i No, sir; she would pay no attention to his 
 poverty, provided every thing else pleased 
 her ; but she would rather bestow on him 
 half the inheritance of her family than marry
 
 BELLEGARDE. 243 
 
 him, if she had a bad opinion of his princi- 
 ples. 5 ' 
 
 " She probably likes him, since she enter- 
 tains the project of uniting herself to him?" 
 
 " I cannot say, sir. He was a fine-looking 
 , man before he went to Europe ; but as she 
 was" then too young to think of him as a hus- 
 band, it is probable the task of making a 
 conquest of her heart, remains to be per- 
 formed." 
 
 " He is probably a favourite with the other 
 members of the family?" 
 
 " Yes, sir, with the exception of the chap- 
 lain, father Le Clerc, who always shrugs up 
 his shoulders when he is named; but as the 
 baron is resolved to execute his plan, the priest 
 will not be consulted," 
 
 Eustace having obtained all the information 
 he wanted, thanked the doctor for his long 
 
 m 2
 
 244 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 visit, and promised to observe his instructions 
 for the cure of his wound. 
 
 Left alone, he resumed the train of his re- 
 flections. — What a pity, said he, that so fine, 
 so interesting a creature, should become the 
 property of such a man, by the simple right of 
 transfer, when her taste and affections are pro- 
 bably not, nor ever can be, a party to the con- 
 tract. I am not a candidate for wedlock; if I 
 were there is nothing I would so much desire, 
 as to render myself worthy of such a treasure. 
 ►Such a companion through life, to love, sym- 
 pathize with, and console me; such a fond ob- 
 ject, to whose pleasure every action would be 
 subservient, whose approbation and esteem 
 would be the most grateful reward of every 
 effort, and whose society would constitute the 
 principal charm of my existence, I could scarce 
 find in such perfection as the daughter of
 
 BELLEGARDE. 245 
 
 D'Argenteuil. But my trade is war; my sword 
 the only fortune I possess; and there is yet no 
 laurel wreath round it to make it balance the 
 possessions of Matilda D'Argenteuil. I am 
 too, a visitor in her father's house; and the 
 society of a being so fascinating, might soon 
 cause me to form wishes, alike unsuitable to 
 my pride, my poverty, and my duty towards a 
 family where I am treated with so much kind- 
 ness. 
 
 To yield to any strong passion would be an 
 act of weakness; to love would be worse than 
 weakness, — it would, in my situation, be crimi- 
 nal, especially if I could suppose it possible to 
 communicate it. Why should I permit myself 
 to utter a word or entertain a wish that could 
 possibly derange the projects of this noble fa- 
 mily. — Far from Eustace De Courcy be the 
 unworthy thought. I am their friend: in my
 
 246 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 social relations with them their happiness, not 
 mine, ought to be my guide; and this sentiment 
 is a thousand times more elevated, more pure 
 and disinterested, than any other beauty could 
 inspire. With Matilda I shall be circumspect, 
 — reserved ; my love for her shall be without 
 wings ; — friendship, — friendship only. 
 
 "With this heroic resolution did Eustace 
 combat the first invasion of an attachment, 
 from which it was difficult, if not impossible, to 
 escape at his age, under the same roof with 
 Matilda.
 
 24< 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 And hope— life's chequering moonlight — smiled asunder 
 The doubts that, cloud-like, o'er him sought to roll. 
 
 RULWER. 
 
 The family circle removed from the draw- 
 ing-room to the chamber of Eustace, and 
 Matilda, now more familiar with the stranger, 
 took a larger share of the conversation. De- 
 sirous to correct or ratify her own opinions, 
 she compared the literature of her nation 
 with that of England. 
 
 " I prefer your poets to our own, with the 
 single exception of your dramatic authors, 
 Captain De Courcy, and these I have been
 
 248 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 taught to consider equal in sublimity, greatly 
 superior in taste, and classical elegance. I 
 admire Shakspeare ; but his beauties can 
 scarcely redeem the vulgar, and often trivial, 
 coarseness with which they are mingled. It 
 is painful and disgusting to seek diamonds 
 in the mire, of which a certain portion will 
 stick to one's hands, whatever pains one may 
 take* to efface the stain. I believe you give 
 Milton the next rank on the scale of genius; 
 and yet there are many passages in his great 
 poem that are unworthy of so mighty a mind, 
 and of the subject itself. How could he send 
 the Messiah to a closet in the armoury of 
 heaven to look for a compass, to trace his 
 w r ork? How could he disguise Lucifer in the 
 shape of a toad, and fire off cannon in heaven, 
 with angels serving as bombardiers ? Then 
 the marriage of Death and Sin, and the ser-
 
 BELLEGARDE. 249 
 
 pent's issue of this amiable union ! National 
 vanity may embroider such things with its 
 favourite colours, but they are ignoble, in 
 spite of prejudice and popularity. In our 
 first-rate French poets, I can find none of 
 these abominations. They have, if you will, 
 less majesty, a more limited range of genius s 
 or the instrument they wield is less powerful 
 than that which your richer and graver lan- 
 guage places at the disposition of your lite- 
 rary men; and owing, probably, to this cause, 
 we have no monument of literary distinction 
 in the highest order of poetry, unless you 
 will allow us to call the Henriade an epic 
 poem. Of your English poets, Pope is the 
 favourite in France. His flight is very high, 
 and however long it may last, his wing re- 
 mains unwearied. He has passed through 
 various regions of intellectual glory, and al- 
 
 m 5
 
 250 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 ways returned laden with trophies of the 
 highest order and brightest colours. 
 
 " If the studies of woman were limited to 
 one language only, I would choose that of 
 England, especially for light reading, which 
 exercises so extensive an influence on the 
 morals of society. Your novels are greatly 
 superior to our silly and uninteresting, and 
 often disgusting, tales of real or fictitious 
 love; which, far from improving, only serves 
 to corrupt the mind, and which a lady cannot 
 acknowledge she has read, without blushing 
 as if she had committed an offence against 
 the decencies of life, or the precepts of reli- 
 gion; whereas the far greater part of your 
 romance writers inculcate virtue and moral 
 rectitude, and make both triumphant in their 
 struggles with vice and passion. But I am 
 giving you my father's, rather than my own,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 251 
 
 opinion on French novels: he always told me, 
 that the best written of them were vulgar 
 and indecent; and, as we do not seek for 
 what we are not willing to find, I have 
 scarcely any in my library. '' 
 
 " I cannot," said Eustace, " defend our 
 great national poet from the charge you 
 bring against him, in better language than 
 that employed by one of our greatest Eng- 
 lish moralists, who called his defects ( spots 
 in the sun." Shakspeare lived at an epoch 
 when custom authorized a great deal of what 
 is reprehensible in his writings. * Vice had 
 not then lost half its deformity by being de- 
 prived of all its grossness.' Had he violated 
 the laws of literary pudicity, sanctioned, or 
 rather formed by public taste and opinion, 
 he could not have been the favourite author 
 of a virgin queen, by whose special order
 
 252 BELLEGARDE- 
 
 he wrote one of the most exceptionable of 
 his plays, * The Merry Wives of Windsor.' 
 As to the puerile passages in ' Paradise Lost/ 
 Milton, like Homer and Virgil, sometimes 
 ' nodded.' Even Horace, the most correct of 
 all the ancient poets, tells us of bad dinners 
 on his journey, and the quarrel of the vulgar 
 Pupilius, whose words are pus and vinegar; 
 and when he tells his patron that if he place 
 him among the lyric poets, he will strike 
 the stars with his sublime forehead, we must 
 admit that such nonsense only escaped the 
 pen in the ardour of composition." 
 
 Matilda, like every good and well-bred 
 woman, was desirous to please her guest. 
 She had, however, ventured upon ticklish 
 ground ; for it is almost as dangerous to 
 attack favourite authors as national honour ; 
 but there was in her criticism such a spirit
 
 BELLEGARDE. 253 
 
 of good faith and impartiality, that Eustace 
 forgot, in his admiration of the speaker, all 
 his national susceptibilities. 
 
 During the indisposition of Eustace, his 
 kind friends held their evening conversation 
 in his chamber, and by the time his wound 
 was healed, he had become as intimate with 
 them as if he had been born in the castle. 
 Every interview he had with Matilda, left 
 on his mind a deeper sense of her noble 
 and exalted nature ; he was charmed with, 
 and attached to her, in proportion as he 
 had opportunity of judging her merits. He 
 endeavoured to convince himself, by all that 
 sophistry which love forges to palliate or dis- 
 guise the aberrations of the heart, that it 
 was only friendship, pure friendship, he en- 
 tertained for her: nevertheless, as the rea- 
 sonable period of his sojourn at the castle
 
 25l< BELLEGARDE. 
 
 drew near, he was nervous, discontented, and 
 irresolute. A man in ordinary circumstances 
 could easily render himself an account of these 
 emotions; but Eustace had resolved not to be 
 in love, and would not admit, even to him- 
 self, that his reluctance to leave the castle 
 had any cause stronger than his will and 
 his , reason. Still he felt that he had lost 
 much of the gaiety and cheerfulness he had 
 brought into their first meetings; he grew 
 embarrassed when he spoke to her; and his 
 mind often wandered from the subject of 
 conversation, and produced such disjointed 
 and irregular discourse, as the French very 
 pertinently denominate " conversation a baton 
 rompu" This was not unnoticed by Matilda, 
 who, true to the instinct of her sex, whether 
 in crowded city or lonely valley, perceived 
 the effect that her presence had upon the
 
 BELLEGARDE. 2oO 
 
 young soldier. In order to remove every 
 trace of doubt from her mind, she would 
 lead him to talk of his home, his family, his 
 profession; but nothing could bring him to 
 speak freely, nor, indeed, did he dare to 
 speculate on the cause of his apparent 
 sence and melancholy. He was in a false 
 position. He resolved, finally, to tear him- 
 self away; to make a great and reasonable 
 effort ; and as a review of his regiment had 
 been announced for the following week, he 
 boldly declared that his presence with his 
 company was indispensable. 
 
 This was decision, at least; it gave a mo- 
 mentary relief to his heart, and, proud of 
 his triumph, he descended the great stairs, 
 and entered the park. It was his first ap- 
 pearance without the castle walls since he 
 had been wounded, and he was joyfully greet-
 
 256 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 ed by Bellegarde, to whom he communicated 
 his intention of going to Montreal. The 
 brave Indian had forgotten the emotions of 
 jealousy to which an apparent preference of 
 Eustace by the young lady had contributed; 
 and proposed to conduct him down the rapids 
 of the Black River in his canoe, as the most 
 commodious and least fatiguing mode of con- 
 veyance. Eustace accepted the proposal with 
 pleasure ; and, in a conversation of an hour 
 during their walk in the park, conceived an 
 high opinion of the intelligence and princi- 
 ples of the young savage, who felt disposed 
 to love and admire the officer more than 
 any white person whom he had seen at the 
 castle on a visit to his protector. 
 
 Madame De Belrose soon joined them, and 
 entered into conversation with Eustace on the 
 misfortune that had deprived him of the ordi- 
 nary enjoyments of the country.
 
 BELLEGARDE. 257 
 
 " It has abridged the pleasures of the chase, 
 madame," said Eustace, " but it has more 
 than indemnified me, in drawing towards me 
 the kindness and attentions of the amiable in- 
 habitants of the castle." 
 
 " I am sorry your recovery, Captain De 
 Courcy, only serves to deprive us so soon of 
 your company.' ' 
 
 " A longer residence, madame, would only 
 render our separation more painful to me. As 
 a soldier, I ought to be ashamed of the reluc- 
 tance with which I return to my duty." 
 
 " Well, sir, this is amiable in you; more 
 especially as our life is without variety." 
 
 " It suits my taste and disposition, ma- 
 dame, and is, compared with the dull routine 
 of a garrison-town, a perfect paradise." 
 
 " A paradise without houris, sir ! but it will 
 be more animated in a few months : and now
 
 258 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 that you are a friend of the house I will tell 
 you the cause." 
 
 " I divine it, perhaps," said Eustace, great- 
 ly agitated, and employing all his force to con- 
 ceal his emotion. 
 
 " Very probable, captain ; every one knows 
 the intention of my brother ; but had he per- 
 mitted me to take my niece to France, I could 
 have made a very different match for a girl of 
 her fortune and rank." 
 
 " If the choice her father has made, be such 
 a one as will correspond with her own taste 
 and inclinations, madame, she may enjoy more 
 real happiness in this secluded spot, where 
 she possesses the influence and authority of a 
 sovereign, and uses both so benevolently as to 
 be loved and admired by all who surround 
 her, than in the circles of more ostentatious 
 and fashionable life, where virtue is derided,
 
 BELLEGARDE. 259 
 
 and intrigue and amusement push content and 
 tranquillity from their natural abode, — the 
 heart of a virtuous woman." 
 
 " Really, Captain De Courcy, your ideas 
 are those of another world : young ladies 
 marry to enjoy their liberty, to bid defiance to 
 scandal, and do something for society ; and I 
 am quite sure that my nephew will never be 
 satisfied to spend his life in this northern arca- 
 dia : dine with the curate and village doctor ; 
 settle family disputes among his farmers, and 
 rear little citizens for his Britannic Majesty. 
 But here comes Matilda. I will leave you to 
 finish your walk." 
 
 " So you leave us after to-morrow, Captain 
 De Courcy/' said the amiable girl. " The 
 Lake of the Two Mountains has no charms to 
 detain you a little longer on its shores." 
 
 " My destiny has so ordered, mademoiselle,
 
 200 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 and yet I beg you to be assured, that I leave it 
 with more regret than is perhaps reasonable 
 in a man, whose profession ought to wean him 
 from every thing like local affection." 
 
 " But you will soon return?" said she, as she 
 adjusted the leaves of a rose, on which she 
 fixed her eyes as she spoke. 
 
 " A soldier cannot indulge the hope of en- 
 joying the society of his friends for any length 
 of time : a thousand events may dispose of me 
 very differently from what I might wish ; and 
 yet," said he, hesitating, " if I could do as 
 I wish, I would pass my life here. It is an en- 
 viable existence." 
 
 " So I have told my aunt a thousand times," 
 said Matilda ; " but she sighs after France ; 
 compares our forest scenery and savage life 
 with the enchanted gardens of Versailles and 
 Chantilly; and for the last year, talks of no- 
 thing but returning to her favourite haunts."
 
 BELLEGARDE. 261 
 
 '* She has given me some reasons for be- 
 lieving such an event probable, if not immedi- 
 ately, at least before many years. Family ar- 
 rangements, she believes, will compel her to 
 leave Canada ; until they take place, she may 
 deem it her duty to remain with her niece." 
 This moment was big with interest, and Eu- 
 stace, looking full in her face, sought to disco- 
 ver what, no doubt, he would be unhappy to 
 learn. 
 
 " She is too kind, too anxious about me," 
 said Matilda, " and one of the effects of her 
 solicitude is to give herself and her niece 
 unnecessary pain." 
 
 This was not precisely the point upon which 
 Eustace wished Matilda to speak, therefore, 
 making a great effort, he continued, 
 
 "It is impossible, mademoiselle, that she 
 should be indifferent on a matter of such im- 
 portance, as your future establishment."
 
 262 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 " Bui I am the most happy being on earth, 
 and my aunt ought to reflect, that there can 
 be no motive to change a condition that leaves 
 me nothing to desire. My father imposes no 
 restraint upon my actions. In this retreat I 
 am not obliged to regulate my conduct by the 
 thousand rules that society has imposed on its 
 members. I cannot, it is true, hope that my 
 parents will live for ever ; and they urge this 
 as a reason why I should do something for the 
 interests of our house, and marry my cousin, 
 whom I scarce know; but as all this, in my 
 opinion, resolves itself into the question of my 
 happiness, I can yet comprehend none greater 
 than that which I enjoy.'' 
 
 " Then your heart," said De Courcy, 
 seems little inclined to second the project of 
 your family ?" 
 
 "My heart! if you mean by that word, a
 
 BELLEGARDE. 263 
 
 predilection in favour of my cousin Bertinval, 
 is perfectly ignorant of the matter. I have 
 been brought up with a belief, that he was 
 one day to be my husband, and that in such 
 matters my heart was not to be Consulted ; but 
 I scarcely remember the person of my cousin ; 
 nor have I examined seriously, whether I 
 ought to reject or adopt that dogma of pater- 
 nal authority, which disposes of a child as of 
 any other commodity of which one is pro- 
 prietor. All I know is, that I am perfectly 
 content, and that so long as I remain so, I 
 shall not be inclined to risk the loss of a posi- 
 tive, in pursuing a speculative, good." 
 
 " It is wisely resolved," said Eustace, " and 
 if I had the happiness of being your brother, I 
 would second you with all my power." 
 
 " Then you have friendship enough for me 
 to consult my personal satisfaction more than
 
 2G4 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 the cold, though perhaps, reasonable views of 
 my father ?" 
 
 " Undoubtedly I have, if I dare take the li- 
 berty to avow it." 
 
 " And why not avow," said the frank and 
 guileless girl, " what you feel?" 
 
 " Your father might disapprove such an in- 
 discretion, mademoiselle; might attach to it an 
 importance which you do not see." 
 
 " Then, sir, no person is to presume to like 
 me without first asking the permission of my 
 family. This is too rigorous. My father pre- 
 sented you as his friend; I approve of his 
 choice," said the fearless girl, " and when you 
 return to your garrison, do not forget the inha- 
 bitants of this wild place." 
 
 He took her tiny hand and raised it to his 
 lips. He was too deeply affected to say all he 
 felt. He might say too much for the peace of
 
 BELLEGARDE. 265 
 
 the angelic being, before whom he stood, and 
 the honesty of his intentions imposed silence 
 on his emotions. 
 
 It may be that some of our readers are 
 squeamish enough to blame Matilda for shew- 
 ing such kind attentions to De Courcy; and 
 we pray these to recollect the artless disposi- 
 tion and unsophisticated education of the noble 
 daughter of D'Argenteuil, to whom speech was 
 not given to conceal her thoughts. 
 
 When we consider the favourable impres- 
 sion the mind and person of Eustace had made 
 upon her, it is matter of surprise that she 
 kept within such sober limits ; but it is proba- 
 bly in the nature of woman, however candid 
 and innocent she may be, to be parsimonious 
 of professions she is the most inclined to make. 
 She had said enough to keep despair from 
 preying on the mind of De Courcy ; and where 
 
 VOL. i. n
 
 266 
 
 BELLEGARDE. 
 
 despair does not enter, hope takes root. Her 
 independent spirit, her utter indifference to the 
 success of the project of her father for her es- 
 tablishment; the possibility that many unknown 
 accidents might intervene, formed in the distant 
 horizon a rainbow, in whose tints Eustace saw r 
 enough to cheer and encourage him. Strange 
 inconsistency of the human heart, to seek that 
 which it dare not accept, were it attainable; to 
 hope for a position totally incompatible with 
 that in which we have voluntarily placed our- 
 selves, and still to demand of heaven, that 
 " cruel something unpossessed," whose posses- 
 sion would scarce fail to create new projects 
 and desires. 
 
 Eustace had blamed his brother officers for 
 incumbering themselves with families; he held 
 that a military, was incompatible with a domes- 
 tic life! that their respective duties must be in
 
 BELLEGARDE. 267 
 
 perpetual contradiction with one another : he 
 had even applied these reasons to his own con- 
 dition, and resolved to seek glory and distinc- 
 tion in the career of arms, and yet the fascina- 
 tion of the interesting Matilda, made him for- 
 get all his wise resolutions. He thought it was 
 only friendship he felt for her; — but is not 
 friendship at two-and-twenty, love, — love, per- 
 haps without wings, but at all events love? 
 Such self-delusion is so common an infirmity, 
 that we may excuse De Courcy; he is not the 
 first whose rectitude of intention has made a 
 treaty with tenderness, in which inflexibility 
 took no part. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED BY LOWE AND HARVEY, 
 
 Playhouse-yard, Blackfriars.
 
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