LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 823 G66mi 1836 V.1 CENTRAL CIRCULATION AND BOOKSTACKS The person borrowing this material is re- sponsible for its renewal or return before the Latest Date stamped below. You may be charged a minimum fee of $75.00 for each non-returned or lost item. TlieH, mutilotton, or cUfacement of library matoriaU con be cau««s for student dixiplinary CKtion. All matsriols owned by tho Univer«jty of IllinoU Librory are the property of the Stote of Illinois and ore prote'as not avrare that he was at all active in the House?" " In, I don't know ; but out, he is particularly busy. Three or four members used to dine with him three or four times a-week, and they talked of nothing but bills, and motions, and divisions, and I can't tell what." " Nor they neither, I suspect I — Is Mr. Robsey with government ?" " He has no place under government." " I know. — But does he vote with mi- nisters ?" 92 FEMALE DOMINATION. *' I have not the least idea with whom he votes. But I know that he is constantly say- ing ' I am all for Railroads and Radical Re- form.* He repeats that sentence fifty times a-day, let people be talking of Avhat they please, as if it were an answer to everything ; with his little wheezing voice and short dry couffh, ' I am all for Railroads and Radical Reform,' you must have heard him say it a thousand times !" *' There is so much difficulty in hearing what he says, poor man ; — and I am afraid I never paid much attention to his sayings or doings." " You are very ungrateful^ then. My uncle took a fancy to you at first sight. I recollect his observing at breakfast, the morning after you were first introduced to us, and my aunt was telling him what a fine property you had in Yorkshire, ' Well, 1 hope, with all my heart, it may benefit by some of the new railroads.' " FEMALE DOxMlNATION. 93 A jealous pang shot through the heart of Arthur ! How very early in his acquaintance with Marian had his fine property in York- shire been discvissed ! How could he tell what share it might have had in hiassing her pre- ference ! "Mr. Dyke Robsey, then, is a Radical?" said he, in a petulant voice. " I do not exactly know, and I should think it was not of much consequence, to him- self or anybody else. Only I remember, that, at Brighton, my aunt was always lamenting he was something which prevented our being asked to the Pavilion." " What absurd nonsense !" " Yes, very absurd !— As she often said, why^should Mr. Robsey's politics affect her ? — and certainly many of our acquaintance went to the royal balls, who had not half so much right as my aunt, with all her fine diamonds, —and she a Baronet's daughter." Arthur smiled at the simplicity of his wife. 94 FEMALE DOMINATION. There is a period of married life when the simphcity of a wife is peculiarly attractive. " By-the-way," said he, " the O'Moran Baronetcy is extinct, I fancy? Had your grandfather Sir Emilius O'Moran more daugh- ters than your mother and Mrs. Robsey ?" " Oh ! there is my uncle Dominick, who lives always in Ireland ; — agent, you know, to Lord Ballina; — and then there is my poor uncle Bob, and poor Sir Marcus." '' What uncle Bob ?— what poor Sir Mar- cus T' '' Mamma and my aunt never talk of them if they can help it. My imcle Bob has been in the Limerick Lunatic Asylum these twenty years; and Sir Marcus, you know, has been obliged to reside in America ever since the Eebellion." " Is it possible V " My aunt has been very kind to him ; Mr. Eobsey settled an annuity on Sir Marcus when he married." FEMALE DOMINATION. 95 '' How very strange that no one should have mentioned their names to me ?" " Not at all. Mamma and aunt are natu- rally anxious to have them forgotten, for my uncle Dominick's sake ; because, perhaps, he might lose his situation, if the history of his family came to Lord Ballina's knowledge." •' I will answer for it,'' mused poor Arthur in secret, as he threw himself hack in the car- riage in no very en\dable mood of mind, " that by this time Wemmersley has managed to ferret out the whole O'Moran pedigree and to carry it to Holywell. And my mother, who will not even take an Irish servant into her house !" Another time, when Marian in high spirits had been recounting anecdotes of her gay winter at Brighton, her brilliant season in tovrn, Armytage had the vexation to perceive that her circle of acquaintance was of the class most disagreeable even to himself During the period of his courtship, the coterie in Port- land Place had been comparatively small, and 96 FEMALE DOMINATION. comparatively select; and either he had not perceived, or had not cared of what material it might be composed. He had, of course, never expected to find the best society frequent such a house as the Eobseys. But he was now mortified in the discovery that, as in most instances where great wealth is allied to great want of tact, Mrs. Dyke's good-nature had been imposed upon to accept the acquaintance of every tiger in town ; and that, in addition to these tinsel stars, she had been induced, by her unlucky appetite for finery and the fine, to compromise with the want of respec- tability of a certain number of persons of high birth, who affect to secede from the society of people of their own caste, from which they have been, in fact, ejected as unworthy. Poor Marian's Lords and Ladies were all of very questionable notoriety. Deeply hurt by the facts thus successively, and as it were, accidentally, brought to his knowledge, Arthur began to get somewhat FEMALK DOMINATION. 97 uneasy on the score of tlie former associations of his wife. Trusting that he now knew the worst, he wished to know no more — to hear no more. He checked her by a sudden change of subject whenever she recurred to home, and directed her attention with eagerness to- wards new scenes and nev/ objects, in hopes of storing her mind with new ideas ere she encountered the ordeal of an introduction to his mother. And the pretty little bride was easily in- fluenced. The moment Arthur expressed a desire that she would improve herself in French, and join with him in the study of German, she applied herself in right earnest ; and soon, if the truth must be told, outstepped the progress of her fellow-student. There was one point meanwhile, on which she needed no encouragement to application. Mrs. Arthur Armytage was, not by nature, but by art — strictly by art — a brilliant musician. Very few VOL. 1. F 98 FEMALE DOMINATION. professional performers exceeded her in execu- tion on the piano ; and though Arthur would have been content to lay Herz and Hummel and their works at the bottom of the Rhine or the Red Sea, he felt it his duty to commend a proficiency which must have cost his wife so much time and diligence to acquire. He only wished in his heart that her performance had not so much resembled the gabbling of a parrot. He admitted to himself, that the more Marian's temper and disposition developed themselves to his acquaintance, the more he saw in her that was honest and endearing ; but he also admitted, that it was scarcely possible for him to have selected a wife whose tastes were less congenial with his own, or whose connexions wese less eligible. He thought it strange that all this had never struck him pre- vious to his marriage ; but nothing now re- mained but to make the best of it. He would turn to the bright side of things ! Luckily, a bright side existed. Marian was the most docile FEMALE DOMINATION. 99 well as the as prettiest creature in the world : she needed only a little training ; and no one could be trained more easily. Under such circumstances, nothing could be more reasonable than Arthur's determination to pass the winter abroad, previously to soliciting the notice of his mother for his wife, and set- tling for life in his own country. Paris would be a very agreeable sejour for both of them : Marian might have as much music as she pleased, and mix in society both pleasant and profitable, without hurting his pride by con- tact with her own family and connexions ; and as to himself, "he knew lots of fellows in Paris ; he could easily get into the Club ; he should make it out very well." In Paris, therefore, they established them- selves, and in a handsome style. By the pru- dent forecast of guardians and solicitors, there is usually a loose sum of money left tangible when two young people marry, under the name F 2 100 FEMALE DOMINATION. of outfit, which enables them to acqmre, during their first year of independence, habits of ex- penditure they can never afterwards lay aside ; and accordingly, the money predestined to procure tables and chairs, plate and linen, for the box in the sporting country, with a good bottle of wine in its cellar, a good horse in its stable, and a spare bed for a friend, (or a father-in-law,) was fated gradually to melt away in Opera-boxes, finery, and the most pro- fitless of unprofitable hospitality. Still, Arthur fancied he was gaining time. His kind sister, unwilling to distress him by acknowledging the implacable spirit still main- tained against him by her mother, constantly wrote that, she trusted " a few more months would effect the re-union of the family ;" and aware that, as the winds blow where they list, Mrs. Armytage resented or relented at her own good time and pleasure, he waited — waited patiently. His Club was a pleasant Club — FEMALE DOMINATION. 101 liis wife an affectionate wife — his life agree- able — his prospects not hopeless. There could he no occasion for him to humble himself to the dust at the feet of Mrs. Ar- mytage. CHAPTER VIII. The gentleman is learn' d — a most rare speaker — To tutors none more bound ; his training such. That he may furnish and instruct great teachers. Shakspeare. At Holywell, meanwhile — sober, steady, so- lemn, oak-shaded Holywell — all proceeded with as much regularity as though its economy were part of the system of the universe. Old Hardywood received the rents for his lady, and Simmons his orders from her ; and the new park-wall between the west lodge and Wood- in's farm (commenced for the purpose of giving employment on the estate) was slowly proceeding ; the drainage of Maudsley Moor begun, and the planting of an adjoining heath prepared for. All the activity usually visible on the vast property of a wealthy and wise FEMALE DOMINATION. 103 proprietor, was perceptible in the occupations of Mrs. Armytage. It seemed almost sacri- lege to Sopliia, that things could go on so well while Arthui' was wandering on the Continent and at variance with her mother. "Do not make yourself uneasy, my dear young lady," had been Dr. Grant's consolatory admonition. " Your mother has resisted ex- postulation, has resisted persuasion; her en- lightenment must be the work of Providence ! and, believe me, the greater her harshness, the more flagrant her injustice, the warmer will be her return towards her son. Let her exhaust her mdignation. Mrs. Armytage will end by growing angrier with herself than with him.'" But Sophy's anxieties soon acquired a new stimulus. By the elevation of one of its sit- ting members to the peerage, a vacancy having occurred in the representation of the borough of Thoroton, Mrs. Armytage sent off an ex- press for the eldest son of her cousin. Sir John Maudsley, of Maudsley Hall, and established 10-4 FEMALE DOMINATION. his head-quarters at Holywell for the canvass, without the slightest allusion to her former parliamentary projects in favour of her son ! Now Reginald Maud si ey ^vas a person on many accounts most objectionable to poor Sophia. Mrs. Armytagc, strongly attached to her own family and its interests^ and regard- ing Sir John Maudsley as head of the house, and heir-presumptive to Holywell, in case of failure of her own issue, entertained a high regard for him and all his generation ; more especially for Reginald, a young gentleman brought up on the high-pressure-of-intellect system, to know more than the rest of the AYorld, and to despise it in proportion. Be- tutored fi'om his cradle, the little great man, the embryo Newton, the incipient Lord Cliat- ham, was the most pragmatical of pretenders ; dwarfed in his moral nature by the excessive interference of art. But his kinswoman at Holywell saw no faults in him. The regu- larity of his conduct at college had been no FEMALE DOMINATION. 105 less edifying than that of poor Arthur Army- tage was indiscreet ; and when, during their holidays and vacations, Reginald Maudsley joined their parties at Holywell, he was in- variably held up to his young cousins as an object for emulation and admiration; from which it naturally followed that Arthur could not endure the sight of his cousin. He called him a prig, — he thought him a hypocrite, — he detested his ostentatious habits of study and moderation. In process of time, Sophy began to dislike him too ; for her brother's lively friend, Edgar Rainsford, suspecting, and per- haps with reason, that Mrs. Armytage enter- tained a project of uniting her daughter with the representative of the elder branch of her family, spared no occasion of showing up the shallow egotism of young Maudsley. And this was the man who, now that Arthur was banished from Holywell, and his friend Rainsford an absentee from its threshold, was about to be established by her mother's fire- f3 106 FEMALE DOMINATION. side, as the rival of her son, and the opponent of Lord Leicester Spalding ! *' I wish you had seen Spalding's face this morning, my dear Miss Armytage," said Lord Greta, having accompanied his sister one morn- ing on a visit to Holywell. " As Laura and I rode hither, we met him with his electioneering cavalcade ; and when I told him your mother had just driven into Tlioroton with her tri- umphal coach and four, and Maudsley, like a man in buckram, by her side, conning a speech with four quotations from Horace, and three from Juvenal, my sister was obliged to throw him her salts-bottle, to save him from faint- ing." '' As if your sister carried one ! " exclaimed Lady Laura with indignation. " Allow her to leave such iine-ladyisms to Mrs. Wemmersley and the Duchess of Spalding." ''Or Leicester, himself; pray dont forget Lord Leicester — Leicester is the finest lady in the Riding — writes silken verses in the silken FEMALE DOMINATION. 107 Book of Beauty — and washes liis poodle in milk of roses. I quite enjoy the thoughts of X«eicester Spalding matched against that polyglot edition of Erasmus, your cousin Keginald ! '' " Don't abuse Mr. Maudsley to Sophia," observed Lady Laura. ''The Wemmersleys assured me yesterday that she is engaged to her cousin ; Mrs. Armytage having disinhe- rited Arthur, and entailed her whole property upon the son and heir of Sir John." " Under such circumstances, mamma would scarcely choose the Wemmersleys as her con- fidants," said Sophy, scarcely knowing what to answer. " Do you imagine," inquired Lord Greta, colouring highty on observing how small a portion of the report Miss Armytage thought proper to disavow, " that Wemmersley waits to be chosen as confidant ? No, no ! Wemmersley knows of every change of ministry before the King ; of every vacant mitre before the Arch- 103 FEMALE DOMINATION. bisliop of Canterbury ; of every decision in chancery before the mace and seals ! He is quicker in his intelligence than courier or king's messenger ; nay, when mischief is in the Avind, the very telegraph is a snail to him. I should not be much surprised if Wemmersley had already drawn out a draught of the mar- riage-settlements between the future member for Thoroton and Miss Sophia Armytage." *' I should be much surprised to hear of Miss Sophia Armytage signing them/' interrupted Lady Laura, perceiving from her brother's volubility that Wemmersley's report had ex- cited his uneasiness. " If you saw the Wemmersleys yesterday," interrupted Sophia, " perhaps you can inform me whether their relation, Mr. Lomax, has made his appearance at Mill Hill ? My cousin Reginald is anxious for his arrival. I believe they have been in correspondence for some months past concerning the state of prison- discipline in the United States." FEMALE DOMINATION. 109 *'Do you mean a long-limbed man, wlio wears an immense muslin neclvcloth ; speaks in aphorisms; maintains a perpetual single com- bat with what he calls the aristocratic usurpa- tion ; and cannot so much as take a YJinch of snufF without connecting the measure with some precept of political economy ? " " I never saw Mr. Lomax." '' There, Laura ! I told you that bore of a man at Wemmersley's left hand yesterday was a rich relation. I was certain no one less co- gently qualified would presume to be so dis- agreeable." " Disagreeable ? / thought him the plea- santest person I had ever met at Mill Hill ; so original ; so sturdily Yankee ; so imdisguised in his wonder at Lord Leicester Spalding's languid impertinence; so different from the old-world people, who are careful never to seem astonished ! But tell me, Sophia, what docs your mother say to Lord Leicester taking up his 110 FEMALE DOMINATION. quarters at Mill Hill during the election ? Is she not indignant against the Wemmersleys ?" " Not in the least. They are people whose offences she overlooks with the greatest indif- ference ; as if too small to excite her anger. When there was a report that Lord Rotherham had taken Lord Leicester Spalding by the hand, then she was indeed angry ! If your father had backed him against my cousin Maudsley, I think mamma would have risked half her fortune to secure Reginald's elec- tion." " Reginald /" — thought Lord Greta ; but he said nothing, though Lady Laura directed a significant glance towards him. " What news from your brother ?" was his well- imagined mode of changing the conver- sation. " None that I consider very satisfactory. Arthur and his wife appear to be entering eagerly into the dissipation of Paris, which is FEMALE DOMINATION. Ill the last thing likely to be satisfactory to my mother." "Wemmersley assures me he has taken to playing desperately. I never thought Arthur fond of play?" said Lord Greta. " 1 never heard of his touching a card !" exclaimed Sophia. '/ Play 9 No. I am quite certain he is not addicted to play. And yet," continued she, checking herself, '' how can I be certain of anything about him now, under the influence of a person with whom I am not even acquainted !" She had no time to inquire further. The Holywell carriage with its utmost complement of postiUons and outriders, covered with the ribbons of the ''Maudsley for ever" party, drove rapidly past the windows ; and the mo- ment her mother and cousin entered the room, Sophy saw by the countenances of both that something was wrong. '" The head-ache which prevented your ac- companying us to Thoroton does not appear 112 FEMALE DOMINATION. to have been very troublesome," said Mrs. Armytage, addressing Sophia in an angry voice, after she had gone through the usual greetings to her young visitors. " Pray, my dear madam, do not attribute our presence here either to Miss Armytage's convalescence, or her generosity !" hastily in- terrupted Lord Greta. " We were under the necessity of personally assaulting old Simmons in order to obtain admittance, and of assuring him that his pretext that ' Miss Sophia was lying down' was in every sense a lying one. The pun of course was Laura's, although she affects to look so scandahzed !" — he continued, not a little amused to perceive how much his harum-scarum mode of drawing off the enemy from Sophia provoked the lofty contempt of Mr. Candidate Maudsley. '' To own the truth," he added, — resolved to convert the scorn of Reginald into fury, — 'T was chiefly anxious to take the entrenchments of Holywell by storm, in order to secure Miss FEMALE DOMINATION. 113 Armytage's hand for the first dance of the ball •which I conclude we shall have at Thoroton in honour of Mr. Maudsley's return." " But at which, as a matter of course, Sophia would hold herself engaged to her cousin/' said Mrs. Armytage haughtily. " Pardon me ! — the prize is mine by all the rules of chivalry and Beau Nash /" cried Lord Greta, with a glance that defied Sophia to con- tradict his assertion. " Priority of demand, priority of assent, pre-engagement ! Besides, Miss Armytage was probably as well aware as myself, that Mr. Maudsley, the new member, and Mr. Mandsley, her cousin, are one, but not the same. The successftd candidate will, of course, belong to Miss Dip, the daughter of the Mayor, or Miss Gumption, the sister of his attorney, or Miss Eitherside, the cousin of the returning oflficer. A popular member forgets all kindred and its claims, and during Mr. jMandsley's election week, the majesty of Holy- 114 FEMALE DOMINATION. well must defer to the majesty of the Blue Boar." Sophia, dreading an explosion of the wrath which she saw lowering in her mother's coun- tenance, now attempted to conciliate Mrs. Ar- my tage by interesting herself in the result of their canvass. She could not have chosen a more unlucky topic ! By the intrigues of the same attorney who had contrived to sell Mill Hill to Mr. Wemmersley, Arthur Armytage had been actually put in nomination for Thoro- ton ! The strife between mother and son must now become apparent to the whole county ! A poll had been demanded ; and Maudsley ... 2 Spalding ... 34 Armytage . . . 109 was already officially registered ! CHAPTER IX. He draweth out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument. I abhor such fanatical phantasms, such point-device companions, such rackers of orthography ! Shakspeare. *' I AM free to admit that I cannot altogether reconcile to myself the discordant phases of your social and political phenomena !" observed Mr. Leonidas Lomax, the uncle from Carolina, as he sat sipping a cup of weak tea that even- ing at Mill Hill, with his pocket-handkerchief, a " stout cotton article," protectingly outspread over his nether habiliments, while he senti- mentally '^ coUoquized" with his kinsman Wem- mersley. '' You inform me, Sir, that under the operation of the Reform Bill, Thoroton has become a free and independent borough ; and 116 FEMALE DOMINATION. the inhabitants, 1 perceive, arrogate to them- selves the privileges of independence, by hold- ing meetings of a political tendency ; by drink- ing Eadical toasts, and venting free opinions upon the very parliament which has endowed them with a political existence." '' Nothing very new in popular ingratitude," replied Wemmersley, annoyed to perceive that his silly wife's wise uncle had set in for a prose. *' Nothing ! admitted ! fully admitted, my dear Sir. But that which is very new to me, and at present very incomprehensible, is that the individuals in question, born in a class of life which entitles us to believe them edu- cated, and if educated, enlightened, express week after week, month after month, year after year, their dissatisfaction at the insup- portable heaviness of taxation, the overwean- ing influence of the aristocracy, the corrup- subserviency of the press, the un- apostolic avidity of the clergy, the supine inactivity of FEMALE DOMINATION. 117 government ; yet the moment a lad in a showy coat, with white kid gloves, a full pocket, an empty head, such as the fribble who quitted Mill Hill this morning, stands half-laughing in their faces, half-holding his nose, to demand their sweet voices in favour of his return as their representative to parliament, — heujh I presto ! they are ready to toss up their caps in his honour, and to cry ' Spalding for ever !' — Twenty thousand souls ! — men with beards upon their faces, and accoimtable to posterity for the conservation of their rights and char- ters, to invest their civic authority in the per son of a gristle-boned, vellum-skinned, flute- voiced automaton ; whose business in life is to gild over the iron buttresses of despotism, which uphold the brazen statue of that Mo- loch, the English Oligarchy; and all, if I rightly interpret the information of my dear niece. Mistress Wemmersle}^ because the Duchess, his mother, purchases a few ells of fustian for her charity-school, and a few deal- 118 FEMALE DOMINATION. tables for her laundry, of tlie retail- traders of the borough! Such conduct is irreconcile- able with the impulses of rational man !" " The Duke of Spalding has the finest pro- perty in this part of the country," said Wem- mersley, as hastily as he dared. '' It is but natural that the people of Thoroton should consult his wishes concerning its parliamentary representation; or that he should prefer a member of his own family, as most devoted to the care of its interest." " To the care of his interests, you mean. To his interests, 1 can well understand this young gentleman, whom I can scarcely call a man, to be thoroughly devoted. I am yet to learn by what process his unstudious ignorance is to be enlightened ; or by what art his pre- sumptuous frivolity is to be rendered sedative." " We will leave it to the electors of Thoro- ton to determine," said Wemmersley, not ven- turing to contradict the rich relation whom he could not hope to convince. FEMALE DOMINATION. 119 " Each of whom mil leave it to the other," resumed Leonidas ; " and between the stu- pidity of some and the venality of the rest, your borough will be compromised in the eyes of the country, and contribute its mite to the gradual deterioration of the British character and the retardation of the march of federal- ism." " Oh ! my dear Sir," cried Mrs. W., snatch- ing at the word character, " indeed, you go too far ; Lord Leicester Spalding is a young man of the highest honour ; and you know it is something to be represented by a gentle- man." "My notions of the word gentleman, and yours, are somewhat at variance, my dear lady. Integrity, for instance, enters indis- pensably into my list of the characteristics of a gentleman ; yet, if I rightly understood your friend the young lord, yesterday, in the narra- tive of his proceedings at the last Newmarket meeting " 120 FEMALE DOMINATION. " Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?" cried Wemmersley. " The boastmgs of a vapourmg boy like Spalding are not to be measured by rule and compass. Besides, he saw your amazement, noted the solemnity of your commentary, and instantly set about mys- tifying you by a thousand exaggerations." " ' You gentlemen of England, who live at home at ease,' seem to derive wonderful plea- sure in insulting more laborious persons, and in misleading seekers after information," con- tinued Lomax, in the same didactic tone. " Since my arrival in the mother-country, whenever I have raised objections to the llightiness of this person's conversation, I am assured that he is quizzing me ; or expressed misgivings respecting that person''s veracity" — " Scarcely a safe subject on which to express mistrust," interrupted Wemmersley, enter- taining a shrewd suspicion that his Yankee kinsman alluded indirectly to himself. " To return^ however, to Lord Leicester Spalding. FEMALE DOMINATION. 121 " Pray set your heart at case respecting his parliamentary dignities — for, by the dextrous manoeuvres of one of the most blackguard attorneys in existence, both the Spalding and Maudsley parties are defeated, and Arthur Armytage placed at the head of the poll !" '• Arthur Armytage ? — Any relation to that handsome Semiramis-looking woman who called here the other day ?"'' " Her son, — her only son." " A young man ?" '•' Three-and-twenty." " And freely elected ! — Well, she has now just cause for her pride ; for proud enough she is, or I am considerably mistaken. I could plainly discern that she despised your house, and everything, and every one within it !" " Without losing time by proving you mis- taken in your last assertion, permit me to set you right concerning your first. Nothing could have been more galling to the pride VOL. r. G 122 FEMALE DOMINATION. of Mrs. AriTiytage, than the election of her son," " More quizzing, I calculate," said Lomax with a grim smile. " Mere matter of fact, I assure you. She was the means of bringing forward Mr. Maudsley, and will resent any injury offered to him as offered to herself. I should not be surprised if this electioneering manoeuvre of Gumption's were to be the means of perpe- tuating the dissensions between Mrs. Army- tage and her son." hey are on bad terms, then V '' So we have reason to conclude. But all we know in the neighbourhood of Mrs. Army- tage*'s private affairs is known but by infer- ence. She never unbends, never unfolds !" " And what motive does inference lead you to adduce for the ill-will subsisting between your arrogant neighbour, and her son and heir ? It cannot be the same natural pride^ FEMALE DOMINATION. 123 my clear Sir, which causes her, for instance, to look down upon yourself? The lineage of which slie boasts, is his also; the posses- sions in w^hich she glories, will one day be his own." •* Ca depend ! depend r interrupted Wem- mersley, with a fastidious smile. " I beg your pardon ?" " I meant to say that must depend on cir- cumstances," he rejoined, pettishly. " If you meant to say so, it is a pity but that you had said so. The English tongue is a fme and copious language, and needs no in- terpretation from French gibberish. Although no longer spoken here, with the degi'ee of pu- rity and precision we meet with in the States, where the ' pure well of English undefiled' has descended to us, limpid and uncontami- nated, from the Elizabethan age, still I have found many persons in the Old Country, speak- ing English with tolerable correctness.*' " They are infinitely obliged to your indul- G 2 124 FEMALE DOMINATION. gence !" observed Wemmersley, with a fiery glance, such as might ahnost have ignited the quid secretly cherished within the lanky cheek of uncle Lomax. '' But, to return to Mrs. Armytage and her family feuds. Has her son been convicted of any moral turpitude, to have provoked her unnatural enmity ?" " I am half afraid of guessing the meaning of your ^English undefilcd/" replied Wem- mersley. " Here, in England, perhaps we might be tempted to call the offence of spit- ting on a lady's carpet, an act of moral tur- pitude.'' " Did the new member for Thoroton offend his parent by spitting on her carpet?" calmly inquired Lomax, defying the sneer directed against him. " I calculate, then, that her abode is insufficiently furnished with spitting- boxes? It is amazing how many indispensa- ble articles of civilized enjoyment I observe wanting, even in the first-rate houses in this country." FEMALE DOMINATION. 125 " I meant only to observe, that such terms as ' moral turpitude' bear a local interpre- tation. Arthur Armytage's offence against his mother consisted in marrying a pretty girl." " Of disreputable character?" " Of worse ! — of obscure connexions — when she happened to have set her heart upon uniting him with a ladyship — the daughter of Lord Rotherham." " The nobleman whose aristocratic oaks overshade your pinery ? The OAvner of Greta Castle ?" " Precisely : the owner of one of those re- liques of feudal grandeur and national pride, which must so greatly startle and interest you Americans, on your first glance at the Mother Country." *' Naturally enough ! — as being the mansion- houses of our own ancestors, abandoned by us to the enjoyment of such of their descend- ants as can be content with the possession of 126 FEMALE DOMINATION. ancient halls and hoary forests, unenlianced by those glorious gifts of civil and religious liberty, Avhich we presume to regard as the noblest portion of their inheritance." '' And, after all," demanded Mrs. Wemmers- ley, growing fidgetty when she observed the discussion to be assuming so personal a turn, " how will all this end about Arthur Army- tage's election ?" '' That you must consult the stars or the sybils to determine," answered her husband. " The position of Mrs. Armytage is an unpre- cedented one ; but no doubt, with her lofty way of carrying things, she will contrive to make the whole county believe she has not been taken by surprise." '' I beg your pardon. What you call her lofty way of carrying things, is, after all, mere (jaucherieT " Mere what ?" interrupted pertinacious imcle Lorn ax. " Mere av/kwardness of mind and manners. FEMALE DOMINATION. 127 The Duchess of Spalding declares that Mrs. Armytage has no more tact tiian a Muscovy duck !" '" Not to cavil at her Grace's simile, of which I confess I do not perceive the aptitude, permit me to inquire whether it may not be possible that Mrs. Armytage despises tact .'"' aslced Lo- rn ax. '•' Tact,, I take to be the accomplishment of a narrow mind — indispensable, perhaps, to a Duchess ; but I do not see why the inde- pendent widow of an independent Squire should " '' Remember your promise, my dear Sir," interrupted Wemmcrsley, scarcely able to re- strain his indignation when he saw a sacri- legious hand outstretched to profane one of the molten calves, the objects of his gross idolatry ; — " pi'ay, remember your promise, and do not decide on points connected with the state of English society, till at least a few weeks'* experience of the stage, and acquaint- 128 FEMALE DOMINATION. ance with the actors, enables you to judge of the merits of the piece." " Men and women are but men and women, I calculate, although attired in hoop petticoats, and bags and swords," observed Lomax; " but since you appear so desirous to impress upon my mind that I have hitherto dwelt among savages, and can know nothing of the prac- tices of the civilized species — be it so ! I abide the issue. As Roscommon hath it — * A Satyr that comes staring from the woods Cannot at first speak hke an orator."" MeauAvhilc, the Lady of Holywell did, in- deed, find herself placed in an unprecedented situation ; and one from which even the sturdy good sense with which she was endowed, scarcely sufficed to disembarrass her. Slie had purposed, in sending for Mr. Maudsley to become the representative of the family inte- rest, to mark her sovereign displeasure against her son, and announce to the Avorld an irre- FEMALE DOMINATION. 129 parable breach between tliem. That the world should judge for itself in such a juncture, and, deciding the offence of young Armytage an insufficient provocation, pronounce a separa- tion of interests between parent and child im- possible, on grounds so slight, had not entered into her calculations. Her ' people ' had pre- sumed to know her intentions better than her- self, and to conclude that she could not but be secretly pleased that a son of her own should triumph at the expense of a cousin. They, good souls ! would not believe her capable of turning traitress to her flesh and blood — and were of too Christianly a nature to conjecture the existence of a Brutus in petticoats, at the head of one of the prettiest rent-rolls in the Riding ! And, perhaps, they were right. Perhaps, in the midst of Mrs. Armytage's storm of indig- nation on finding her plans defeated, and her candidate rejected, she was for a moment secretly gratified to observe the enthusiasm G 3 130 FEMALE DOMINATION. with which the people gathered to what they chose to consider the Holywell standard, and the warmth with which they lent their lungs and hands to acclamations of '" Army tage for ever ! " Aware of the character of the parties by whom Arthur's nomination had been ef- fected, she exonerated him from all share in the intrigue. But Reginald the Sapient had motives of his own for placing a different conclusion on the evidence. However irritated at having been drawn forth and shown up as a defeated man, without intention or desire on his own part, he resolved to turn his afflictions to ac- count, by assuming the character of a martyr in the cause of Mrs. Armytage. " He trusted it would eventually appear that Mr. Armytage had no share in the plots and manceuvi'es of such a fellow as Gumption. He trusted it would be satisfactorily proved to the world that his young relative was incapable of having coalesced with a blackguard attorney, for the FEMALE DOMINATION. 131 purpose of enlisting a party in the county against his mother. Family piques and fa- mily dissensions he could well understand ; but when family piques went the length of blazoning forth to the public every unfortu- nate " he checked himself; he was going too far; he recollected that Mrs. Armytage had been the first to call public attention to the disunion in her family. '" But, perhaps," he resumed, in a tone of affected candour, "perhaps, for the sake of all parties, the less said on such a subject, the better." But Mrs. Armytage's clear understanding was not to be confused by generalities so com- mon-place. She knew that, though the least said might be best for all parties, much would be said, and much to their disadvantage. It was a dull season of the year in the country ; just that heavy pause which intervenes be- tween the cessation of holiday hospitalities, and the migration of the principal families to London ; when winter pleasures are beginning 132 FEMALE DOMINATION. to lose their attraction, and spring gives no immediate promise of relief; when daylight daily increases, only to give to view the same leafless trees, the same brown fallows, the same sallow turf, which the obscurities of winter so advantageously tended to conceal. She knew, in short, that it was the most dis- agreeable month of the year, and felt that the recent events at Thoroton Avould be a god- send to the neighbourhood. The Duchess of Spalding, unblest with a villa near town, was unluckily in the habit of remaining in York- shire till after the Easter holidays, though sadl}^ in want of country entertainment. The Wemmersleys, her grace's obedient humble servants, would take care to supply her with a thousand particulars, real or imaginar}^ of the Holywell disasters, to console her for the defeat of her son. The Rotherhams and Maranhams would be sincerely concerned, the whole Riding would be busy with her family mis- arrangements ! FEMALE DOMINATION. 133 Nor did the conduct of her discountenanced protege tend to palliate her annoyance. Aware that she had unintentionally ill-used him, she discerned the whole extent of his want of generosity, in his mode of holding up the ill- usage to her sympathy, of parading his bleed- ing wounds ! A man of right feeling would have retired instantly from the field ; leaving it to her conscience to reward his magnani- mity. But Reginald had no magnanimity. He persisted in lingering on and on at Holy- well, looking injured and sullen, in the hope that Mrs. Armytagc would recompense him for having been sacrificed to her son, b}^ sacri- ficing to him her daughter. He did not even choose to perceive how greatly his presence must add to her embarrassments in the event of Arthur's arrival at Thoroton. And Arthur was daily expected ; at least so said the attornc}, who had been promising and vowing in his name ; and, if really ex- pected, dates and comparisons of dates 134 FEMALE DOMINATION. brought clearly to proof that he must have been a part}^ in all the manoeuvres of his political sponsor, Mr. Gumption. Sophia, in the teeth of almanacs and printed addresses, still persisted that the thing was impossible ; Mr. Maudsley ^^ hoped/' ^Hrusted," and, like Leonidas Lomax, " suspended his judgment ; " while Mrs. Armytage waited in silence, but not in tranquillity. Throughout her three- and-forty years' experience of the world, never had her mind been less at ease ! CHAPTER X. Here easy quiet, a secure retreat, A harmless life that knows not how to cheat. With home-bred plenty, the rich owners bless — And rural pleasures crown their happiness. Dhydkn. Though all the world admits that country- neigliboLirlioods in England are apt to bear a strong family resemblance, — that, with few exceptions, all have their grand family — their parvenu family — their pattern family; — their Sir Charles Grandison, or charming young man ; their Harriet Byron, or sweetest creature in the world ; their censorious old maid ; their book- worm, or their bore; — still, each has its pecu- liar cachet and characteristics. The very soil of county and county, parish and parish, does 136 FEMALE DOMINATION. not vary more curiously than the nature of its human produce. It is true, mail-coach roads, daily newspapers, and book-clubs, have done wonders to efface this individuality of organization; and the habits of the metropolis have diffused them- selves over the provinces with more celerity than may be wholly desirable. The readiness of communication from one end of the empire to the other, precludes all possibility of any nook or corner remaining shut out from the progress of civilization, as we sometimes find the case among the lesser towns of France or Germany. Still there are spots more secluded than the rest — remote from a high road, remote from the manufacturing districts — where the ways are rough and the means of improvement limited ; where the land, divided among a few great proprietors, gives no shelter to specula- tors, and small encouragement to innovation ; where human nature remains unsophisticated, and character, characteristic. FEMALE DOMINATION. 137 And precisely one of tlicse was the neigh- bourhood of Holywell. Mill Hill was its only duodecimo estate; while the town of Thoroton, situated at six miles' distance, and in a great measure the property of the family of Spalding, Greta, and Armytage. had too recently acquired political independence, to have become fully aware of the purposes of that Hydra-headed power conferred upon it by the liberality of government. Nor had the influences of fashion fallen like a mildew upon the land : distance from the capital, and other causes, conspired to perpetuate a certain old-fashioned quaintness, a sort of oaken-sturdincss of character^ nearly extinct in the conventionalized country of news- papers and rail-roads. The Spaldings were at too great a distance to exercise much influence ; the Ilotherhams were home-staying, unambi- tious,, matter-of-fact people: the AVemmersleys mere dots in the map; and Mrs. Armytage, (fox-hunting excepting), was little else than a 138 FEMALE DOMINATION. squire in petticoats, a beardless justice of the peace. But, between Holywell and Spalding Court, precisely as if to form an unassailable out-post of the cordon sanitairc destined to preserve the neighbourhood from the contagion of the times, was situated a certain maiior house, called The Grange ; very little altered in its outward show from the period when John of Gaunt is said to have made it his favourite residence ; and not in the slightest degree disturbed in its inte- rior distribution, from the days when Lady Mar- garet Maranham, widow of the thirteenth Baro- net of that name, retired in dudgeon from the fallen court of her gracious mistress. Queen Mary of Modena ; pursued even to her dower house on the banks of the Wharfe, by jealousy of the accession of a Protestant dynasty. Situated on the lowest level of a hollow, whose springs were collected in the moat that protected three sides of the house, thence FEMALE DOMINATION. 139 to find an unperceived issue towards the river, flowing at the distance of a few hundred 3'ards, The Grange consisted of a low quadrangular edifice of freestone, ornamented by a heavy, disproportionate battlement; with an infinity of tall fanciful Gothic chimneys, apparently running to seed. Facing the main entrance, on the side where a paved court-yard supplied the place of the moat, was a carved screen of stonework, rising to nearly half the height of the principal building, wdiich had been super- added to the Gothic Grange about the reign of First James; while closing in the court-yard, terminated at either side by a turfen ter- race, stood a double row of lofty trees ; — elms, beeches, sycamores — the down-drooping branches of which swept the grassy embank- ments of the terrace, while their elevated tops afforded shelter to a colony of woodpigeons, and spread a dense shade upon the walk ex- tending round the court, and crossing the arch- way of the old stone entrance gate, which 140 FEMALE DOMINATION. formed a prison-like approach to the ancient mansion-house of the Maranhams. In the moat might he discerned, from the terrace which at either extremity met and over- hung its precipitous channel, a shoal of vene- rable grey carp, coeval with the abdicated lady- in-waiting of the abdicated queen, disturbed in their lonely haunts only by the rivalry of a pair of veteran swans of unnumbered generations, with whom they waged a sort of half-amicable war — such as the friendly neighbours of an un- eventful country-parish are apt to cultivate, to while away the long summer days, and longer winter evenings. In the kennel of the adjoining offices, dwelt a species of obsolete mastiff, a; breed partaking of the blood-hound, and pecu- liar to the place ; and in the stables (the stalls of which bore, in worn-out capitals, the names of " Highflyer, " Pastorella," " Miss Prue," '' Jew-boy," and " Crocus,") stood at rack and manger, other Highflyers and Pastorcllas — great grandchildren of the original tenants of FEMALE DOMINATION. 141 the place. The oven was larger than the coach-house : beside the yawning kitchen fire- place was the turnspit's wheel; — the great hall was svirrounded with a music gallery or- namented with stags* heads, — the uneven floors being tcsselated with curious inlaying ; — the large Elizabethan windows admitted no air and little light, — far less indeed than the carved doors, shrunken within their shattered lintels ; — altogether, there was a degree of quaint antiquity about tlie place which would have transported to rapture even the molluscous natiu'e of an F. R. S. Such was the appropriate residence of three venerable spinsters, (like the Manor House, of vast antiquity, but in excellent preservation) co-heiresses of Sir Wolstan Maranham, last representative of one of the first-created Eng- lish baronetages. The founder of the family was said to be a certain gallant Captain Ma- ranham, who, in the time of King Edward VI. of catechismal memory, or thereabouts, shared 142 FEMALE DOMINATION. the bitter fortunes of that gallant Admiral, frozen with all his crew off the coast of Nor- way ; and, from the surviving offspring of the weather-beaten sailor, had arisen a race, appa- rently smitten with the curse of commemo- rating, in their manners and appearance, the miserable destinies of the originator of their house. With few exceptions, the members of the Maranham family might have passed for statues of ice. The principal of these exceptions, however, existed in the head of the house. Miss, or as she was usually termed in the neighbourhood Mrs. Di Maranham, who, succeeding on the decease of her father. Sir Wolstan, to the pre- sidency of the estate, had adopted at once, as a duty and a pleasure, all the habits and prac- tices of her predecessor. Mrs. Di was a Mrs. Armytage, cast in a coarser mould ; or rather, perhaps, what Mrs. Armytage might have been, had not matronhood and maternity chanced to recall her to the softer duties of her sex. FEMALE DOMINATION. 143 Mrs. Di had found no affectionate Arthur to share her destinies ; no caressing infants to inspire her with a taste for milder pleasures : her horses and dogs — nay, her kine and her oxen, were all- engrossing favourites ; she looked like a gToom, and talked like a grazier. Miss Margaret, the third sister, preserved, on the contrary, all the rigid immobility cha- racteristic of the Maranham family. A char- tered invalid, shawled to the teeth, and not allowing even the zephps of summer to " visit her cheek too roughly," she sat ensconced dur- ing the three summer months of the English year, in a bay-window of the parlour, rivalling, as far as the thickness of its lozenge-glazed casements would permit, the temperature of a modern hot-house ; and, during the nine vdn- ter months, in an oven-like chimney-nook of the same apartment. Her infirmities, real or imaginary, formed a pretext for avoiding even the limited circle of society frequented by her sisters ; and either genuine indisposition, or 144 FEMALE DOMINATION. the singular variety of distilments and decoc- tions with which, under the name of simples, she choose to irrigate her fertile field of ail- ments, certainly imparted a most spectral ap- pearance to features originally feminine and delicate. She was said to have been, in former days, the beauty of the family. Miss Avarilla, the second of the weird sis- ters, and (althougli, " by'r lady, inclining to three -score,") still treated by Miss Di, as a young thing not altogether to be trusted to its own discretion — was a being as rigidly cold and formal as the coldest and most formal of the Maranham kind, yet incessantly perplexed with business — always in a sort of solemn bustle. Horace Walpole has described the motions of the Duke of Newcastle as resembling " what one might fancy of a man hung in chains, trying to move from one place to ano- ther :' — those of Avarilla Maranham resembled what the fancy might conjecture of an auto- FEMALE DOMINATION. 145 maton wound up to seem in a liurry. Bus}-- ing herself with the cure of all the souls and bodies in the parish, foundress of half-a-dozen institutions of the kind called charitable, cor- responding with Dr. Jenner respecting the incubation of cuclvoos and the natural history of hedgehogs — with the * Gentleman's Maga- zine, ' under the name of ' Philalethea, ' con- cerning the Gothic origin of the Latin lan- guage — with Pestalozzi, touching the endoc- trinization of the naughty little boys and girls on the Maranham estate — with philanthropic Owen, respecting the re-moralization of man- kind — and with Professor Achtenmachten- gropischkeit of Jena, touching the magnetic origin of the universe — she remained cold, undemonstrative, and inaccessible, as one of the relentless Fates ; — dead to society, so called — forgetting the great world, and b}- the great world forgot : omitting, like Pope's ' Artemisia,' " To pare her nails and wear a cleaner smock," VOL. I. H 146 FEMALE DOMINATION. amid the contending interests of foreign and scientific labours. Although heartily despising Mistress Di as an unintellectualized materialist, Avarilla made it a point of conscience to treat her with the respect due to the head of the family; and, between the conscientious allegiance of the second, and the apathetic acquiescence of the third sister, Diana — chaste, but not fair — maintained undisputed sway at the Grange. Trotting along the high road to Thoroton on her favourite bay, sixteen hands high, with her straight grey hair escaping from a napless beaver, .she might have been mistaken for Talleyrand in a riding-habit ; — seated in her audit-room among deed-boxes, files of papers, plans, contracts, notices, circulars, and affi- davits, she resembled the spectre of her old father. Sir Wolstan— " Tricked in antique rufFand bonnet ! " And it was amid this cluster of rusty ever- greens, that the fairest blossom of the country FEMALE DOMINATION. 147 was opening into bloom and fragrance. It was at the Grange, surrounded by the re- verend Misses or Mistresses Maranham, that Rosamond Devonport was growing into the graces of womanhood; alternately chided and caressed by the three ungainly sisters ; cuffed by Mistress Di for a coward; mourned over by Miss Margaret for her wilful self-exposure to sun and shower ; and lectured unceasingly by Miss Avarilla for the mightiness of her ignorance, and the smallness of her powers of application. And yet they dearly loved her. All three took pleasure in her cheerfulness, and pride in her beauty ; and sooth to say, it 2cas as the brightness of a sunbeam, irradiat- ing that dilapidated abode. But Rosamond, or as she was commonly called. Rose Devonport, was not only the idol of the Grange, but the favourite of the whole neighbourhood ; for she afforded a never-fail- ing source of wonder and conjecture to the idle and the garrulous. h2 1.48 FKMALE DOMINATION. M^ho she was, or whence, still remained a mystery ; although for twenty years the sub- ject had afforded a text for scrutiny and com- mentation to the gossips, maid, wife, or widow, of the adjoining parishes. Somewhat before that period. Sir Wolstan Maranham, a martyr to hereditary gout, had translated himself to be killed or cured at the good city of Bath ; and been translated back again two years afterwards to the crowning honours of the family vault ; when the three spinsters, his daughters, took possession accordingly of his estate ; and dull enough appeared the tenour of their days, vmtil, in the course of a year or two, there suddenly and mysteriously ar- rived at the Grange, a nurse and child. Miss Avarilla, the habitual spokeswoman of the family, explained to those whom it might concern, that the little girl was the orphan of a distant relative who had died in the West Indies, bequeathing it to their guardianship. But old Lord Rotherham, femall: domination. 149 father to the present Earl, who was at that time resident at Greta Castle, and of what he considered a facetious turn of mind, swore he was intimately acquainted with every marriage and intermarriage of the Maranhams — every twig of the family tree, — not a leaf of which was blazoned ^^dth the name or designation of Devonport; and was fond of insinuating, that the bantling bore a nearer consanguinity to Di, the least starched of the co-heiresses of his friend Sir Wolstan, than comported with her maiden fame (at forty) to avow. For a time the notion gained ground. But when it was seen that Mistress Di evinced not the slightest embarrassment under Lord Ro- therham's inuendoes, that she made no secret of her affection for little Rose, nor any show of inclination to enlarge upon the child's West Indian origin, people began to give up their chimera. Rose certainly icas a kins- woman and ward bequeathed to the care of those who had little else to care for ; and 15Q FEMALE DOMINATION. even Mrs. Armytage, tlieir dear Mrs. Army- tage, the constant object of tlieir regard and admiration, knew no more of Miss Devonport's claims upon tlieir tenderness, than they had chosen originally to announce. It will scarcely, perhaps, have been implied from the foundership of the family under King Edward of blessed memory, that the Maranhams were adherents to the church of Rome. Yet so it had been, so it was, the ladies were staunch, rather than bigoted. Ca- tholics ; and a venerable man, their father's ancient chaplain and their own, resided in a comfortable house within a short distance fram the Grange, to minister to their spiritual wants ; and among the results of the non- conformity of the family, was the education bestowed upon Rose Devonport in the nun- nery at York. Notwithstanding the tender- ness of affection with which she w as regarded by her guardians, it seemed impossible to Mistress Di, that her young charge could be FEMALE DOMINATION. 151 trained in the way she should go, otherwise than on the spot, and after the manner that she and her sisters had received their princi- ples of instruction. From the age of ten years, therefore, to eighteen. Rose, except during her vacations, was lost to the Grange. Twice a -year she was welcomed within the old portal; and twice a-year the neighbourhood of Thoroton pronounced that she was fairer and more graceful than ever; and it was a subject of admiration to all that, while her accomplishments were beginning to rival those of Lady Laura Greta and Miss Army- tage, Rose Devonport retained the archness and simplicity of a child. Not all the scold- ing of all her three guardians could subdue her deportment into demureness ; and any one might have conjectured from the girlish liveli- ness alone, that her veins were wholly untem- percd by the ungenial currents flowing in direct descent from the frost-bitten Admiral. It was only the winter preceding Arthur 152 FEMALE DOMINATION. Armytage's imlucky marriage that Rosamond, emancipated from her conventual thraldom, came to settle at the Grange ; and Sophia had at present enjoyed little opportunity of exer- cising her kind and elder- sisterly intentions towards one who appeared at least half a cen- tury too young for the place and the people among whom her destinies were appointed. Mrs. Armytage luckily entertained a long- standing neighbourly regard for the elder dames ; and from the moment that Rose took her place among them, arrayed in the graces and importance of womanhood, had said to her daughter, '"Be kind to that poor girl, concern- ing whom the Wemmersleys have circulated such unjustifiable surmises." Rose had even once or twice been invited to pass a week at Holywell; although the Misses Maranham, two of whom were too busy, and one too idle, to quit home, would neither consent to act as her chaperons during the visit, nor suffer their precious charge to incur alone the perils FEMALE DOMINATION. 153 and dangers of eight days passed in such dissipated society as that of their stately friend Mrs. Armytage and her gentle- minded daughter. Had it been otherwise, had Rose been in- deed a frequent guest at Holywell, and the intimate companion of its heir-apparent, the indignation expressed by Di and Avarilla on hearing of his marriage would probably have been attributed, by the malignants at Mill Hill and elsewhere, to the disappointment of a speculation of their own, for uniting Miss Devonport with the richest proprietor of the neighbourhood. But as Rose had scarcely happened to meet with the delinquent from the time when, in childhood, they were occa- sionally holiday playmates, it was simply in- ferred by Wemmersley that the elderly spin-" sters desired to impress by inference, on the mind of the young lad}^ the madness of a love-match, and the heinousness of disobedi- H 3 154 FEMALE DOMINATION. ence against the authority of those appointed by law or nature as the governors of youth. Yet, harsh as they were, Rosamond dearly loved the three crabbed guardians of her infancy. She loved the Grange with all its quaint reminiscences. She loved to muse beneath the overshadowing trees of the old court-yard; she loved the venerable carp, swans, mastiffs, Highflyers, and Pastorellas, who, after every successive absence, seemed to welcome her home. She would follow Mrs. Di on her pony round the farm, whenever that lady's masculine vocations were such as to admit of the companionship of one of her own sex. She would indite letters and copies of letters, if not unweariedly, at least uncom- plainingly, to lighten the epistolary labours of the painstaking Miss Avarilla ; and, above all, she would place the easy chair, the footstool, the pillows, for the studied ease and comfort of Miss Margaret ; and try to entice her out, into FEMALE DOMINATION. 155 the sunshine of a gay summer's morning, or bring to the dreary table of the hypochondriac all the fairest products of her flower-garden. But Margaret was too apathetic, or too selfish, to requite her attentions, even by a smile. Of the three sisters, she was evidently the one who entertained least affection for her little rela- tive ; perhaps because the vivacious movement of the happy, healthy Rosamond reminded her too mortifyingly of her own habitual infirmi- ties, or disturbed the even current of her Lethean blood. It was on a chilly afternoon in April that the invalid was sitting, apparently dozing, in her arm-chair, her shovdders ^vrapt in an An- gola shawl, her feet covered with a quilt of eider-down ; while Rosamond Devonport, who had done her share of duty by reading her to sleep, sat demurely working at her tapestry, just far enough from the log fire roaring in the chimney, to escape actual roasting. Mis- tress Di had ridden over to Thoroton to ascer- 156 FEMALE DOMINATION. tain the progress of the election ; Avarilla was gone down to the village for the weekly ex- amination of her spinning-school ; and nothing but the hospitable practice of the Grange, which forbade all imagination of such a deed as to turn visitors from the gate on the lying plea of "Not at home," prevented the drowsy Margaret from protecting her own departure for the land of dreams, when the hobbling old serving-man entered the parlour to announce that Mr. Wemmersley and a strange gentle- man were dismounting in the courtyard. '* A strange gentleman ! Rose, my dear, — lay aside your work and go up stairs," mecha- nically responded the old maiden, rousing her- self by a gentle, — a very gentle shake. But Wemmersley was already on the threshold, to intercept the movements of Miss Devonport ; and no sooner did the half-open eyes of Miss Margaret Maranham rest upon the uncouth person of Mr. Leonidas Lomax, than she in- voluntarily ejaculated, " Rosamond, you may FEMALE DOMINATION. 157 remain." The strange gentleman was so very strange, — too strange to be dangerous. While Wemmersley was pouring forth his compli- mentary inquiries after her sisters, his con- o'ratulations on the amendment of her looks and the evident improvement of her state of health, — congratulations which he knew to be of all things most vexatious to the habitual invalid, — ^Rosa could scarcely take her eyes from the square-shouldered, sturdy, ungraceflil Carolinian, with his frost-puckered visage, and scrutinizing glances. She did not even notice the significant looks hazarded by Wemmersley at his companion, implying — " Did you ever see such a queer old place ? — did you ever meet with a more vapid old twaddle ?" " Mrs. Di rode into Thoroton, did you say?" was Wemmersley's first attempt at conversa- tion. " I trust, then, she will extend her ride as far as Holywell, to console poor dear Mrs. Armytage !" " Mrs. Armytage ! — What has happened to 158 FEMALE DOMINATION. her ?" inquired Miss Margaret, a slight tinge colouring her sallow cheek, and betraying the utmost warmth of sympathy she was ever known to lavish upon the disasters of her fel- low-creatures. '' Sophy is well, I hope ? " cried Rose, un- able to maintain the rigorous silence imposed upon her by the orders of her preceptresses during the presence of visitors. " Very well, I believe," replied Wemmers- ley, examining the point of his riding switch. " And the Captain ?" " As well as can be expected, I suppose." The sick woman coloured more deeply than before at the expression, apyjrehending some unpleasant double meaning. '' Has anything occurred to Arthur Army- tage ?" said Rosamond, unsuspiciously. '' Is he returned?" " By a majority of one hundred and thirty- four." " A majority?" FEMALE DOMINATION. 159 " Of a hundred and thirty-four." " I meant/' said Miss Devonport, still per- plexed, " to inquire whether Captain Army- tage was come back V " Not exactly come bach — he has come for- '' Come forward?" demanded Margaret, with a puzzled look. " In plain English," interrupted Leonidas, not perceiving the wit of prolonging the mu- tual misunderstanding of the parties, Mr. Ar- my tage, or Liou-iew^xii, or Captain Army tage, or whatever the young gentleman calls him- self, or is called by his friends " '' I beg your pardon for interrupting you, Mr. Lomax," said Wemmersley with a gi'ave face, '•' but his worst enemies never went so far as to call poor Arthur Lioutenant Armytage !" " We may waive the difficulty, I calculate," replied Leonidas^ sneeringly, by caUing him, at once. Member of Parliament for Thoroton ; for the representation of which loyal burgh 160 FEMALE DOMINATION. your sapient friend, my Lord Leicester Spal- ding, lias proved a rejected candidate." " Lord Leicester Spalding defeated ? I am heartily glad of it !" murmured Miss Mar- garet, in her usual feeble voice, but true to the political principles of her family. '' Arthur Armytage elected ? I am heartily glad of it !" cried Rose, in a far more cordial tone, but not more cordial spirit. " He must now settle in England; and Sophias happi- ness will be complete !" " Not unless she happen to find particular gratification in witnessing total estrangement between her mother and brother," snarled Mr. Wemmersley, mortified to perceive that the news he had communicated gave pain to nobody. " Oh ! but it will be impossible for Mrs. Armytage to keep up a show of resentment against her son, when she finds herself under the necessity of meeting him constantly, and seeing him well received by all the world !" FEMALE DOMINATION. 161 " That may not tend to smooth matters be- tween them, so long as he is ill-received by herself." '' But, after all, what sin has he committed V " Eose — Rose Devonport V^ faltered the guardian spinster, interdictingl}-. " Married at three-and-twenty, without his mother s consent !" continued Rose, not hear- ing, or not heeding the imputed injunction. " A very venial transgression, we may con- clude," observed Leonidas sententiously, " in the eyes of a young lady of sixteen !" " Eighteen, Sir, if you allude to myself," observed Rosamond, casting on her strange visiter a look of ineffable contempt. " Rose ! Rose Devonport !" again remon- strated the invalid, raising her withered hand with an air of impatience. *' You cannot surely think," cried Rosa- mond, turning towards her reprover with a glowing but unabashed face, '' that parents have a right to prolong, over persons grown 162 FEMALE DOMINATION. to years of discretion, all the wilfulness, all the caprice of their authority, in matters of such dear importance as a marriage choice ?" " The authority of parents over a child cannot be either wilful or capricious,'' replied Miss Margaret, with a degree of cold serenity affording a singular contrast to the ardour of her youthful pupil. '' But supposing it both, the first duty of a child is submission." *' But, my dearest granny," cried Rosamond, using, in the eagerness of her argument, a term of endearment sometimes permitted by the mild invalid during her earlier years ; " you surely do not mean that you consider it the duty of Mrs. Armytage's son, after obtain- ing the affections of a young lady of good conduct and good family, to throw her off on finding his mother express a vague disapproval of the engagement ?" " I do r said Miss Margaret. But her feeble accents were drowned in Wemmersley's scornful vociferation of '' Good family ! — Mag- FEMALE DOMINATION. 163 nificent consanguinity indeed, for one of the oldest Houses in the county of York ! — Cou- sin to some crackbrained Irish Baronet ! — her claim to gentility resting, pour tout pofage, upon her blood relationship to some Sir Emilius O'Moran O'Tasus O'Shaughnessy, of Ballynagibberish, in the county of Lime- rick !" "Rose ! Rose Devonport !'' again ejaculated the invalid. But as Rosamond was neither speaking nor intending to speak, nor even gesticulating the dislike she could not help entertaining for the sneering proprietor of Mill Hill, she could not exactly understand to what, in this instance, the disapprobation of Miss Margaret was directed. " Did you speak ? Do j'ou want anything that I can give you ?" said she, perceiving that the looks of her enfeebled companion were more wan and miserable than usual. " No child ! — no — nothing. — Go ! and see whether either of my sisters be returned. I 164 FEMALE DOMINATION. am hut a poor companion for these gentlemen. I am not equal to conversation, I — I — " And from the increasing and deadly pale- ness of her cheeks, Rosamond saw that she had indeed over-exerted herself " Come with me into the library to wait Mrs. Maranham's arrival," cried she abruptly to her guests ; ''we have been talking too loud and too inadvertently, considering Miss Mar- garet's nervous condition." She did not even pause, as she led the way into Avarilla's scholastic sanctum, to note the looks of pity and contempt exchanged between her brazen-hinged and iron-nerved guests. " Thank heaven we have no nervous ladies t'other side the Atlantic !" — was the whis- pered adjuration of the Rationalist. *' Thank heaven we have got rid of the old lady, even at the cost of a fainting fit !" — was the friendly rejoinder of his amiable nephew. '' But what the deuce could so strangely over- set her ?" CHAPTER XII. You call honourable boldness, impudent sauciness ; if a man will make court'sey and say nothintj, he in virtuous. SlIAKSPE.VIlE. The contempt exhibited by the man of the Western world, for the morbid sensibiUties of the ladies of the more civiUzed creation, would have " pretty considerably" increased, could he have surmised that, at this moment, not only the feeble Margaret Maranham, but even the lion-footed Mrs. Armytage vvas suffering from a disordered nervous system. Whenever a carriage was heard grating on the gravelled approach to Holywell, strange glances kindled in her eyes, in the apprehension that it must inevitably contain the new member for Tho- roton. Whenever an eastern gale (and such in a Yorkshire April are of no rare occur- 166 FEMALE DOMINATION rence) brought across the park uncertain snatches of certain chimes, she started, as if the church bells could no longer signalize any- thing more momentous than the arrival of the young M.P. After having implied rather than expressed to her servants and acquaintances a disincli- nation that Arthur's name should be uttered in her hearing, she now grew pettish at their servile acquiescence ; fancying that every one must be in league to withhold from her even the necessary intelligence concerning the movements of her son. She would have died rather than inquire, even of Sophia, whether any fresh intimations of Arthur's intentions had reached Thoroton • yet still she was dying to ask. Did Arthur purpose to treat her with utter contempt, with utter defiance ? — Did he mean to take her by surprise, with a view of forcing her into a reconciliation? — What did he, — what could he intend ? — Was he come ? — Was he coming ? FEMALE DOMINATION. 167 Alas ! the coming of the successful candi- date began to appear almost as problematical as the going of the defeated one; while Arthur stayed away, Reginald stayed on; assiduous to his cousin Armytage; thrice assiduous to his cousin Sophia ! — On the fifth day following the election, he was about to accompany them from the breakfast -room to the drawing-room, and pursue, by an observa- tion of the N.N.E. of the house, the weather- wise announcements he had been deducing from the aspect of the S.S.W., when the attention of all three was attracted by the sound of approaching wheels; and, for the fiftieth time, Sophy coloured crimson, Mauds- ley bit his lips, and Mrs. Armytage tried, fiurriedly, to look unconcerned, in the convic- tion that the vehicle advancing towards the portico of Holywell contained no less a per- sonage than him who had been so long re- garded as its heir ! In this belief, not one of them chose to move 168 FEMALE DOMINATION. towards the window, for the verification of their hopes and fears ; but each, though pretending to look elsewhere, soon discerned that the ex- pected chaise and four was nothing better than a knowing, natty gig, containing a stran- ger and his servant — a sporting-looking man, with a sporting-looking servant, and a poach- ing-looking prick-eared dog, on the look-out between them ; or it might be, two servants — or two sportsmen — or three poaching dogs — it was impossible exactly to determine in whom or what the party might consist. *' Mr. NebwelVs clerk, whom I am expecting down about the renewal of the Farringham lease," said Mrs. .Armytage, greatly relieved, and resuming her usual dignity of demeanour. " Rather, the tuner from York," observed Sophia, almost as well satisfied as her mother ; " I wrote yesterday to my old friend, Mr. Blow- pipe, the organist, to beg he would send one of his people to my piano." " Piano -forte tuners and attorney's clerks !'' FEMALE DOMINATION. 169 reiterated Mr. Maudsley with amazement. " My dear Miss Armytage, you must be blind : that was the finest horse I ever beheld in har- ness." " I did not look at the horse, I was thinking of the man.' " I did look at the horse," said Reginald, with a grim smile, '•' and, therefore, form my conclusion thai the man was a gentleman^ " Why not as easily a horse-dealer ? " said Sophia, who made it a point to dispute her cousin's dictatorial decrees. " Because," interrupted Mrs. Armytage, pe- tulantly, " Mr. Maudsley is probably aware that he is " " Mr. Baltimore !" interrupted a footman, throwing open the door; and in bustled the active Jack, the vivacity of whose movements had left old Simmons some quarter of a mile in the rear. " How are you. Ma am ? — Happy to make your acquaintance, Mrs. Armytage !— Thought VOL. I. I 170 FEMALE DOMINATION. to have been here last night ; but the people at the Blue Boar at Thoroton, where I put up, insisted that the road was not good travelling after dark. To be sure, there is a devil of a gravel-pit just before you turn into the lodge gates, where perhaps I might have foimd neat accommodation for man and horse, and if '* " Sir ?" interrupted Mr. Reginald Maudsley, advancing with solemn gesture towards the stranger, evidently with the intention of ask- ing him the nature of his business with Mrs. Armytage, whose astonishment and disgust at the intrusion were sufficiently manifest. " Mr. Baltimore — the father, I believe, of Mrs. Arthur Armytage ?'' inquired Sophia, timidly intercepting his movements, but judg- ing it necessary to interfere before further offence was given or taken. "Exactly! — Arthur's sister. Miss Sophy, I presume ?" demanded Jack, in return. " Ay, I guessed as much, by the likeness. And Mrs. Armytage, too — devilish strong resem- FEMALE DOMINATION. 171 blance to my friend Arthur — might swear to the breed as safely as to a foal of Gohamia's ! But I am keeping j^ou all standing," cried Jack, checking himself, and turning with un- suspecting good humour to look for a chair ; in which, having coolly seated himself, even Mrs. Armytage was not proof against the frankness of his self-possession. They all sat down, overmastered by his impudence. " You see. Ma'am," said he, (abruptly re- pelling the advances of Sophia's pet spaniel, a blemish in whose genealogy the knowing eye of Jack had mechanically detected,) '• you see. Ma'am, I have made my way here on a false scent : ran down to Newmarket t'other da}^ for the Spring meeting, with young Lord Hardup, and was persuaded by Tom Warley and Parson Longodds to push on to Croxton for the first day's running, as Tom's bay filly w^as " Mrs. Armytage no longer repressed her symptoms of impatience ; and Maudsley I 2 172 FEMALE DOMINATION. seemed only waiting her nod, to interfere with the sporting intelligence of her guest. '' When, as we were journeying it through Grantham at the rate of twelve miles an hour, and turnpikes paid," resumed the reckless Jack, " what should I see placarded in black and white, as large as ' Try Turner's,' on the outside of the Leeds Regulator, but ' Army- tage at the head of the poll !' Hailed coachee in a second — pvilled up — and in five words made out, to my great surprise, that my son- in-law, whom I fancied to be wasting his time and money yonder among the Johnny Cra- pauds, was electioneering here at home, among the Johnny Bulls — standing, as the saying is, in hopes of getting a seat. Ha ! ha ! ha I So, says I to myself — ' Are ye there, my hearty ?' and instead of keeping to time with Tom and the Parson, I turned in straight to the George, took a chop and a bed, and spanked on nor'ards at daylight, in the High- flyer as far as Doncaster, to my friend Light- FEMALE DOMINATION. 173 weight's, (a fellow pretty well known, I fancy, in these parts, and as good a jockey as ever crossed a horse !) and after a snack and a pint of Bvu'ton that made my ears tingle, he drove me over to Thoroton, where, as I said before, I found I had come eighty miles out of my way, on a fool's errand." " My brother is still in France," said Sophia hastily, dreading her mother's interposition. "Ay, so I hear from Mr. Gumption and the other gentlemen of his Committee ; and more's the pity," cried Baltimore; "for, as I said to 'em this morning, what business has a young chap with his prospects, heir to one of the finest estates in the county, to stay gam- bling and masquerading among such a set of outsiders as the fellows in Paris, a pack of snobs, that run their sham matches in a sand- pit, and hunt hedgehogs with buckhounds ! " " Have you heard lately from Mrs. Arthur Armytage ? " inquired Sophia, almost trem- bling as she spoke. 174 FEMALE DOMINATION. "Not these six weeks. Marian used to "be a tolerable correspondent when she was gad- ding about with her aunt Robsey to Chelten- ham and Weymouth, Margate and Broad- stairs. But Paris seems to have turned her little head." " You will not regret, then, any circumstance that tends to recall my brother to England?' " You mean about the election ? Not I ! As I said this morning to the gentleman at Tho- roton who acts as Arthur's factotum, — a know- ing sort of blade, that, and seems to have served my son-in-law con a mory, as they say in France, — if Arthur Armytage, of Holywell Park, hasn't a right to be in parliament, who has, I should like to know ? And, as Gumption observed in answer, the notion of pitting a mettled lad like Idm against such a cream- faced tailor as young Spalding — (whom they blackballed last year at the Cocoa Tree,) or such a spoony as " " We ought perhaps to have introduced yo\x FEMALE DOMINATION. 175 to ray cousin, Mr. Reginald Maudsley/' stam- mered Miss^^Armytage, hazarding anything rather than the personal commentary which was half escaping the lips of Jack Baltimore; and Jack, with an involuntary ''Whew ! " half arose from his seat, to duck a courteous bow to the defeated candidate, which the defeated candidate returned with a frozen salutation, such as might have done honour to the statue of the Commendatore in Don Juan. But Mrs. Armytage's disgust by this time exceeded all control ; and, rising from her seat with an air of dignified impatience, she ob- served to her daughter — '' If this gentleman have anything to acquaint me with, which it is necessary for me to know, you will find me in the library. I have business with Hardywood. Mr. Maudsley, do me the favour, I beg, to remain here with your cousin." And, scarcely curtseying, she withdi'ew all her majesty from the room. "Well — upon my honour!" ejaculated Jack, 176 FEMALE DOMINATION* as the door closed after her, " Royalty is a joke to Mrs. Army t age ! " "Yon will have the goodness to remem- ber, Sir, that you are in the presence of her daughter," said Maudsley. " I always heard she was as proud as Luci- fer/' continued Jack, in an angry voice, without noticing his interruption, " but this beats cock- fighting! What the devil does she take me for?" "Dear Mr. Baltimore ! " cried Sophia, clasp- ing her hands, while the tears stood in her eyes with terror, lest the elevated tone in which he spoke should reach her mother's cars ; " if you have the least regard for Arthur, let me entreat you to say and do nothing that may widen the breach between him and my mother. You are already aware that, without intending the slightest disrespect to your family, she greatly disapproved of his marrying so early in life." " And why the deuce should she ? " inter- rupted Jack. "What had Mrs. Armytage FEMALE DOMINATION. 177 ever done for Arthur to give her any right to interfere with his actions ? *" " She was his mother'' mildly remonstrated Sophia. ''And a pretty mother to boast of! — I can tell Mrs. Armytage, most people in the county are of opinion that she ought to have given up the Holywell estate to him on his coming of age. Why, the gentlemen of the committee at Thoroton were saying so only this morning ; and if / were in Arthur's shoes, I would take care to overhaul old Maudsley's will pretty sharply, and make sure that " '•' If you continue in this strain, I fear I must pvit an end to our interview, which would give me very great pain," said Miss Armytage, mildly ; " for, believe me, I have it deeply at heart that Arthur and his wife should be on comfortable terms with my mother, and live among us as they ought. Mamma has been accustomed to gi'eat respect from her children, 1 3 178 FEMALE DOMINATION. great deference from those around her; and should any unfortunate contrariety occur just now to incense her against my brother, the consequences might be fatal to his interests. I am sure you are too good-natured, too kind- hearted, to wish to inflame our family dissen- sions. Let us, on the contrary, all unite and do our best to bring things smooth again. I am expecting Arthur every day, every hour. Do not, pray do not, aggravate any unkind feelings he may harbour against my mother, by relating to him the unfortunate circum- stances that have occurred this morning ! " " Miss Army tage, you really humiliate your- self by these concessions," said Reginald, com- ing forward from the window, at which he had stationed himself, as if resolved not to sit down again in Mr. Baltimore's company. " It is an injustice to your family to •" " Who asked for your opinion, Sir ? " cried Jack, fiercely, and with a kindling eye. FEMALE DOMINATION. 179 " Sir, I am here by Mrs. Armytage's desire, for the protection of her daughter," repUed Maudsley, with ineffable disdain. '' The protection of her daughter, indeed ! What do you suppose her daughter has to fear ? Do you fancy that a sweet gentle creature like Miss Armytage could provoke a man to forget his manners, like yonder old termagant ? No, no ! Mr. Cousin ! your as- sistance is not wanted ; and unless I'm much at fault, you may chance to find yourself kicked out with the young lady as well as with the old borough ; at the tag end of the poll, here, there, and everywhere ! You under- stand me ? " " Sir ! " cried Reginald, in a voice that seemed to make the breakfast-china, still re- maining on the table, chime and jingle — " give me leave to say " " I shall give you leave to do no such thing ! You have heard my opinion. Make the most 180 FEMALE DOMINATION. of it, or make me answer for it. ' Rough and Ready ! ' is Jack Baltimore's motto; and " Sophia's tears now literally began to flow ; and Jack was pacified in a moment. " Come, come, my dear young lady," cried he, " I did not mean to say anything to annoy you ; God forbid ! If my bark has proved worse than my bite, you must pardon a straight-for- ward, plain- sailing fellow, whose pride is not a little touched by the way his girl and her family have been treated. Give me your hand. Miss Sophia, and I hope we may live to be- come better friends. I see I must wait for Arthur's return to learn all I want to learn, and know all I want to know ; but take this from me, meantime, and for as true a truth as that God is above us, — that I had rather ten million times have my child at home again among her brothers and sisters, happy and merry, and roughing it with the rest, than see her matched with the greatest lord in the FEMALE DOMINATION. J 81 land, to be looked down upon, she and her relations, as I see she is like to be, here at Holywell Park/' " No, no, no," cried Sophia. " All will eventually go right ; and I shall live to see my brother as happy as he deserves." Mr. Baltimore shook his head. He was already on his legs \ and now began to retreat towards the door. " You are going," added Sophia, " and I have not yet thought of offering you refresh- ments!" "Refreshments?" reiterated Jack, with a significant smile. " Thankee, thankee ! Mrs. Armytage's civilities have refreshed me enough for this week to come. I wish you good morn- ing ; ay, ay ! shake hands, and welcome. I wish you a very good morning ; and as to you, Sir, I \vish yoii better manners, and my service to you.'^ And away shuffled Jack, waiting for no announcement to the servants, no summons 182 FEMALE DOMINATION. to Lightweight, no bringing round of gigs; straight to the offices ; muttering curses be- tween his teeth, and totally indifferent even to the magnificent range of stabling ; even to the incomparable dog-yard and kennelling; even to the capital preserves and stretching wood- lands that met his eyes, forming part of the future domains of his dear little ill-used Ma- rian. He had no patience to admire anything belonging to Mrs. Armytage ! CHAPTER XIIl. She, of late, is froward. Reserved and sad, and vexed at little things ; "VVhich her great soul, ashamed of, strait shakes off, And is composed again. Dryden. During that day, although Mrs. Armytage maintained the strictest silence touching the extraordinary visitation with which she had been favoured^ it was plain that her indig- nation was overpowering. And yet, at times, Sophia could not help fancying that her mother seemed pleased ; pleased, perhaps, to find her vague prejudices against the odious family of Baltimore so fully justified. But if Tuesday had been unpropitious to the cause of the ill-starred Arthur, Wednesday did w onders in his favour. Wednesday brought the foreign post, and the foreign post a letter 184 FEMALE DOMINATION. for his mother ; which it would be unjust to his first efforts in parliamentary correspondence, to transfer to the dry periods of narrative. Let the new M.P. speak, — as new M.P.s should, — for himself. " Rue de Rivoliy April '2nd, "Dear Mother, " I have hitherto refrained from writing to you, solely in deference to what I concluded must be your wishes on the subject. If, there- fore, I do wrong in now addressing you, attri- bute it to my sincere desire of profiting by your judgment, and fulfilling your wishes. You must not suppose that, because I con- sulted only my own inclinations in an affair so nearly concerning my happiness as marriage, I am indifferent to yours on that or any other subject. But, without wearying you with pro- fessions, allow me to come at once to a point of business. "I have this day received a hurried letter FEMALE DOMINATION. 185 from a person of the name of Gumption, (whom I think I recollect as a scamp of an attorney, at Thoroton,) stating that, in consequence of old Arable's being raised to the peerage, and a vacancy unexpectedly occurring in the re- presentation of the borough, he had brought me forward and secured my election, ' in his great zeal for my interests, and those of the country ; ' in short, that he had done his officious best to thrust me into Parliament, whether I would or no. " This business has taken me altogether by- surprise. Conscious that I have deeply of- fended you, 1 foresee that I can scarcely stir in it without offending you further. I am aware that you formerly entertained a project of bringing me forward in political life as the representative of our family interest ; but it seems probable that your views on this point may have changed with circumstances. My own fortune does not place me in a situation to accept the honours so unsatisfactorily be- 186 FEMALE DOMINATION. stowed; nor am I desirous that they should be the means of marking to the world the differences existing between us. " Now, I appeal to your candour^ my dear mother, to acquit me of all intention of ma- noeuvring myself into a happier situation ; and if it be your desire that I should decline the seat offered, I will seize the pretext of health, or some other equally valid, to excuse myself, to my self-constituted constituency. Your silence will suffice to confirm me in this intention ; but if, on the contrary, I receive a word of encouragement from your hand, I own it will infinitely gratify me to return to Eng- land with the hope of restoring myself to your confidence and affection. Act, however, in your decision, as if this desire had not been expressed; and whatever your sentence may prove, believe in the unaltered respect of your affectionate son, " Arthur Maudsley Armytage." FEMALE DOMINATION. 187 This frank and unanticipated appeal went straight to the heart of Mrs. Armytage. Re- served people are peculiarly susceptible to the influence of frankness ; and, reserved or not, there was a vein of generosity in the impe- rious woman's nature, that glowed with sym- pathy towards the fine, free, forgiving temper of her son. Within the last few days, Regi- nald Maudsley''s cool, ungcnial inaccessibility had put her somewhat out of conceit with the pendencies and expediencies of life ; and now that Arthur had proved himself guiltless of all confederacy with her enemies, she w^as almost ready to pardon him for ha\ing been elected in opposition to the candidate of her choice. " Sophia," said she, addressing her daugh- ter, who sat anxiously watching the expression produced upon her countenance by the perusal of the letter ; while Maudsley, who was seated opposite, and equally scrutinizing, affected to give his whole attention to the decipherment 188 FEMALE DOMINATION. of the * Times ' — " I know you are eager to learn the result of your brother's explanations. You will rejoice to find that he has completely vindicated himself of coalition with the plots of Mr. Gumption." " I rejoice to find that you admit his excul- pation, dear mamma/' said Sophia, colouring; " for myself, believe me, 1 never for a moment doubted my brother's innocence." '' / did; and am sorry for it; nay, more, ashamed of it ;" continued Mrs. Armytage ; and the word '' ashamed" sounded strangely when pronounced by lips so stern as hers. '' It must assuredly afford you considerable consolation under the very awkward circum- stances in which you have been placed by the unhappy marriage contracted by my cousin," observed the sententious Reginald, " to find that he has disavowed all intention of entering into public opposition to your views and feel- ings ; for, as his father-in-law, Mr. Baltimore, was observing, yesterday morning " FEMALE DOMINATION. 189 '' We will not talk of Mr. Baltimore now," — hastily interrupted Sophia. " Tell me, dear mother, what are Arthur's intentions about the election ?" " To submit to mine." " And may I ask, what have you decided ? Is he likely to return to England?'' " Immediatel3\'' " To take his scat in the House of Com- mons?" demanded Maudsle}^ sneeringly. " To establish himself in mine,''' replied Mrs. Armytage, provoked into saying more than she intended, by the cold-blooded and ill- timed irony of her kinsman. " My dear, dear mamma !" cried Sophia, seizing and kissing her mother's hand. " You will write to-day and tell him so, will you not ?" " You are his habitual correspondent,'' said Mrs. Armytage, hesitatingly ; "audit will save a world of disagreeable explanations, if you undertake the task of expressing my desire 190 FEMALE DOMINATION. that he should return home without loss of thue." The word " home," thus applied to Arthur, produced a delightful effect on the ears of Sophia : but she resisted. " No, — mother ! — you must write to him yourself. Think what it will be for my bro- ther to receive a letter from your own hand, after so many months' silence. Pray v/rite to him yourself ! " " If / can be of the least use, my dear Ma- dam, as your amanuensis," — Reginald began. " Not in the slightest, I thank you," replied Mrs. Armytage, gradually recovering her self- possession. " Sophia is right ; it is my busi- ness to write to my son; I will despatch my letter instantly. — Sophy, my love, while I am in the library, order the carriage to drive over to Greta Castle. I shall request my friend Lord Rotheram to oblige me by announcing at Thoroton, that Mr. Armytage may be im- mediately expected." FEMALE DOMINATION. 191 " No doubt lie has already communicated his intention to Gumption," said Reginald, curious to discover exactly by what terms of submission Arthur had operated so sudden a revolution in the feelings of his mother. " I rather tliink 7iot /" said Mrs. Armytage, drily. " Poor Mr. Baltimore ! If he have not yet quitted the Blue Boar, how will he be charmed to learn this change in the prospects of his son-in-law !" persisted the disappointed man. " Not more than all our friends and neigh- boui's, to find Arthur once more restored to my mother's affections!'' cried Sophia; "the Gretas, the Maranhams, the Wemmersleys, all have taken the estrangement so much to heart." Mrs. Armytage stopped short as she was leading the room. Sophia had not benefited her brother's cause as she intended by this last observation. Mrs. Armytage scarcely liked to hear that the position of her son excited so 192 FEMALE DOMINATION. strong an interest among her '^friends and neighbours. — No doubt many of them had silently adjudged her to be in the wrong ! " Half the mischief that occurs in families/' she petulantly observed, " is occasioned by the undue interference of strangers; by the idle habit prevailing in the world of commenting on the business of others, of which we know nothing, and of which, did we know anything, delicacy should interdict the discussion." It was fortunate, perhaps, for Miss Army- tage that Maudsley had attempted to make so much of his advantages with his high-minded cousin ; — had he left his injuries to be re- dressed by a voluntary effort of her generosity, Mrs. Armytage would probably have con- firmed her early intentions in his favour. It had, in truth, been long her dearest desire to make him her son-in-law ; but she would not be dictated to, even for the furtherance of pro- jects of her own ; — and when, that evening, the mortified Reginald demanded an audience of FEMALE DOMINATION. 193 lier, insisted largely upon the injury already experienced by the Maudsley family at her hands, in her preference of a stranger to his father, and her infructuous election overtures to himself, and seemed to make the hand of Sophia a meed due to the reparation of his wrongs, rather than a generous concession, Mrs. Armytage's pride enlisted itself against his pretensions. She assured him she should leave the decision entirely to the discretion of her daughter. Nothing less than some very strong excite- ment would have wrung such a declaration from her lips ! so little, indeed, was she in the habit of vesting any right of option in her children, and so strong was the influence of the ruling passion in her" breast, that in her conference on the subject with Sophia, these generous intentions appeared to be already obliterated from her mind. " I have undertaken,''' said she, ceremo- niously, '' to lay before you the pretensions VOL. 1. K 194 FEMALE DOMINATION. of your cousin Reginald to your hand. As the eldest son of my nearest relative, Sir John Maudsley, no less than on account of the honourable character he has already attained in society, he has every claim to your con- sideration : when I add that his suit has ob- tained my fullest sanction, I trust I have said all that is necessary to say on the subject. I have been unfortunate in my recent attempts to promote the interests of my young relative ; I trust my aid may be more available in se- curing his happiness." " Not by a marriage with your daughter, my dear mother ! " cried Sophia. " Believe me, no measure would be more injudicious for all parties. Of all the men I have ever seen, Reginald Maudsley is the one I could least like, — ^least love, — least honour as a husband." '' My opinion, it seems, possesses consider- able value in your eyes ! " ejaculated Mrs. Armytage. '' Far be it from me to exercise authority over you on such a point ; but I did FEMALE DOMINATION. 195 hope my judgment might in some degree operate in the regulation of jour own." ''Judgment — ah! mother; it is too late to talk of judgment ! " replied Sophia. "Do you mean me to understand, then/' hastily interrupted Mrs. Armytage, " that pre- engagement renders impossible the alliance which;, for many years past, I have derived so much satisfaction from contemplating ? " '' Not an engagement. You cannot for a moment suppose I could have taken a step of so much importance \vithout reference to your advice. ' Mrs. Armytage's wTath was somewhat ap- peased by this declaration ; but she resolved to make the utmost use of Sophia's mood of submission. *' I am to understand, then," said she, *' that your objection to this match is per- sonally and exclusively to Mr. Maudsley." " Personally and exclusively." '' And that, on any similar occasion, I may esteem myself secure of holding a mother's k2 196 FEMALE DOMINATION. right of mfluence over your decision? — that you will not, in short, engage yourself without my approbation ? " " Certainly, certainly ! I will do more. 1 promise you, my dear mother, that no inclina- tioU;, no preference of my own, shall induce me to marry without your consent. All you have done, all yovi are still doing for me, all the authority which you derive over my con- duct from the laws of nature and of God, demand such a pledge. Do not insist upon my marrying my cousin Maudsley, or any other man objectionable to my feelings, and I leave all the rest in your hands. To your wishes I submit the absolute control of my prospects in life.'' Mrs. Armytage, no less surprised than de- lighted, imprinted a kiss on the forehead of her submissive child, ere she proceeded to acquaint Mr. Maudsley with the decision of Sophia. But, even prepared as she now was for the unamiable stiff-neckedncss of his ego- FEMALE DOMINATION. 197 tism, she had not anticipated the insolent reproaches with which her communication was received by her protege, the haughtiness of whose temper was only too unsatisfactorily congenial with her own. She felt herself irre- trievably offended ; and when the carriage of the indignant Reginald drove forth from the court-yard, his kinswoman hardened her heart with the most indignant resentment against even his contingent claims of succes- sion to the family inheritance. She was more enraged against her graceless favourite than she had ever been against her son. But while Sophia, elate with the prospect of Arthur's restoration to favour, w^atched exult- ingly from the window the final exit of the disappointed Maudsley, the rival at home of her lover and her brother, she did not suffici- ently reflect upon the infinite importance of the prerogative with which she had invested Mrs. Armytage. In the triumph of sisterly affection, she forgot that henceforth the control 198 FEMALE DOMINATION. of lier hopes and happiness was delegated to another ; that she was no longer, even nomi- nally, the arbitress of her own career ! Alas ! the first dark page of her destinies was already unfolding I CHAPTER XIV. a learned and a manly soul I purposed her, that should with even powers The rock, the spindle, and the shears control Of destiny, and spin her own free hours. Ben Jonson. The days passed on ; and at length, " 'twixt sun and shower/' arrived the morning which was to welcome back Arthur Armytage to the home of his infancy ; or rather, as Mrs. Army- tage considered the question, to the residence of his maternal ancestors. Sophia, when she opened her eyes full an hour earlier than usual, rejoiced to perceive that the skies shone auspiciously on the event ; and it struck her, when she looked forth from her window upon the noble park- scenery of Holywell, its turf sprinkled over by the first spring daisies, and 200 FEMALE DOMINATION. its plantations vivified by their earliest tinge of green, that the place had never looked so majestic or so gay before. The waters of the Wharfe were rippling in the sun ; the rooks circling hither and thitlier over the avenues, noisy and busy as the members of a new par- liament ; the gardeners had attempted their first mowing of the lawns which intersected (as at wood- encircled Dropmore) the groves, skirting one wing of the mansion; all was alive — all cheerful — and Sophia's heart was light within her bosom, as with the lightness of a bird. She was provoked, however, as the business of the day proceeded, to notice that " the sense of the house " was at variance with her own. The domestics of Holywell, like other ancient corporations, Avere apt to wax obstinate in their opinions; and the steward's-room having originally settled that Master Arthur was in the wrong, chose to abide by the decree; their mistress might see fit to change her FEMALE DOMINATION. 201 verdict, they were less versatile ; the visit of Jack Baltimore in his *' one-horse chay," had stereotyped their protest against their young master's matrimonial alliance. Old Hardy- wood, accordingly, with whom his lady's will was absolute, was the only one of the house- hold who chose to make the return of the offender an epoch of rejoicing. He invested himself in his yellow-white Marcella waist- coat, girded on his brown-black satin shorts, smoothed down his long white hair, and dis- posed his feelings for a holiday. But Sim- mons was sulky ; the lame, deaf, and blind ladies of the bed-chamber and still-room put on afflicted faces, inverted the corners of their mouths, and shook their heads whenever Mrs. Armytage came in sight. They would not understand anything ; and for all particulars of preparation connected with the expected guests, chose to demand a thousand unne- cessary instructions. Smooth as was the course of hospitality at K 3 202 FEMALE DOMINATION. Holywell on all other occasions, and arbitrary as old Mrs. Caudlecup's distribution of its chambers and bills of fare, she chose to be told not only what rooms were to be appro- priated to Master Arthur and his lady, but where Mrs. Arthur's maid was to sleep, and where the valet. She even took occasion to inquii'e whether the blue drawing-room was to be* got ready as a morning-room for Mrs. Arthur, in case it should not be agreeable to her to breakfast with the family ; and was as much puzzled what roast to provide for the second course, " now that game was out, and cliickens and ducklings not yet fit for the spit/' as if she had not been in the habit of meeting similar exigencies, every spring for her last fifty years of service. The head coachman, too, chose to under- stand that he had been ordered to take the set of bays to a post-town at fourteen miles distance, instead of a neighbouring village, enabhng Arthur to make his entry into Tho- FEMALE DOMINATION. 203 roton with suitable honours. The ofF-leader was accordingly announced to be in physic, and Jem Outrider to be dead lame — or the leader to be lame, and the groom in physic — no matter ! — it was some stable catastrophe, intending to prove to Mrs. Armytage the ex- treme inconvenience entailed upon her esta- blishment by Master Arthur's arrival. For a moment Sophia entertained a project of re- pairing to the offices and haranguing the factious members thus inopportunely striving to rekindle the embers of discord. But her usual prudent avoidance of all interference with her mother s absolute sway, warned her that she might do more harm than good to the cause ; and repeating to herself the oft- repeated axiom, that " Time and tide wear through the roughest day," she retreated shortly after breakfast to her own room, trust- ing that her mother's attention was engrossed by her usual avocations. But this was not likely. The event of the 204 FEMALE DOMINATION. day was a great event to Mrs. Armytage ; her conscience and her pride were equally uneasy. She felt that for years past she had acted somewhat harshly towards her only son : that she had excluded him from her confidence, and jealously repelled his participation in the ad- ministration of the family affairs. She would have given much for courage to deal more frankly, more generously, with him : but con- scious of her own weakness (a king-like sus- ceptibility to the encroachments of her suc- cessor), she dreaded to lay aside a sceptre which she knew her feelings would the next moment prompt her to re-assume ! Still, Mrs. Armytage hankered after a better frame of mind ; still she tried to fan her flickering virtue into a flame. In traversing the picture- gallery at the housekeeper's desire, to inspect the suite of rooms prepared for the young couple, she paused opposite the portrait of her husband — the husband of her youth — the hus- band of her choice — the father of her children FEMALK DOMINATION. 205 — of Arthur — the confiding, open-hearted, open-handed, reverential husband, uho had so readily surrendered all right and authority to the hands of the woman he honoured with his love. It was a spirited picture from the pencil of Gainsborough; full of animation — full of life and health — and full, too, of the peculiarly bland but joyous expression of countenance distinguishing her son. It re- called the days of her girlhood, of her first affections, her first consciousness of perfect happiness : tlie plighting of her virgin vows, the birth of her first-born child. Few widows, after so vast a lapse of years, could have gazed with s:) unaccusing a con- science on the resemblance of their husband. From the day of his untimely deatli, Mrs. Ar- mytage had, in truth, suffered no living man to produce even a momentary impression on her feelings. But she was not equally satisfied of her blamelessness in the discharge of the great duty he had committed to her hand. 206 FEMALE DOMINATION. Perhaps she ought to have done more for Arthur, and overcome her feehngs of resent- ment against his opposition to her views : but it was not yet too late. Tears rose in her eyes, as, still gazing upon her husband's pic- ture, she felt rejoiced that it -was not. She congratulated herself that her son was on his way home — that he would arrive that very day, and went her way to inspect the blazing fires in the chintz bed-room and its spacious dress- ing-rooms, with a lighter step, and brow less haughty than was the wont of Mrs. Armytage. Meanwhile, Sophia's reflections, if of a differ- ent, were scarcely of a less moving cast. Deep w^as her reverence for her mother ; dear and devoted her sisterly tenderness for Arthur; and the anticipation of their immediate re- union, and the restoration of family peace at Holywell, filled her mind with holy and grate- ful delight. All, henceforth, would be well with those whom her soul loved ! Like her mother, too, her thoughts were FEMALE DOMINATION. 207 straying back into the past — to nursery remi- niscences — to holiday recollections — to the girlish and boyish projects of herself and Ar- thur. It had been so often settled between them what wife he was to bring home to Holy- well, and how she was to be welcomed ; but the beau ideal sister-in-law did not, it must be admitted, resemble a Marian Baltimore. A gentle tap at the door at length disturbed her meditations, and Sophia started from her scat at the entrance of her friend Lady Laura Greta. " Do not let me disturb you," said she, stealing in on tiptoe, and placing herself with- out ceremony in the seat nearest to Sophia's musing chair : " I dare say you wdsh me away, I believe I ought not to have come; yet, in- deed, dearest Sophy, I could not bear to stay awa}', knowing how anxious you must be this morning. At what hour do you expect these people ?" " Every minute ; we hardly know. A few 208 FEMALE DOMINATION. hurried lines written by Arthur on landing at Dover, contain all we have learned of their intentions." ** He ought to have written again, knowing, as he does, the tenacity of Mrs. Armytage on all matters of family ceremony. Besides, the Thorotonians are kept in such sad suspense ! I have a suspicion they have been in waiting since daylight to be in readiness to draw the new member into town." " Poor Arthur cannot, of course, be apprized of that." " No ! but from many trifles I have noticed since his marriage (with respect to yourself in particular), I am convinced we shall find him less considerate than he used to be of the feelings of others." " No — no — I cannot listen to such a pre- diction !" " Ah ! Sophy ! you may rationalize as much as you will, and preach Christian humility or philosophical equality till you are tired ; but FEMALE DOMINATION. 209 trust me, there is nothing so demoraUzing in human nature as the influence of inferior so- ciety.' *' lliat is one of Lord Greta's notions." " His or mine, no matter — accept it for a truism." " First tell me what you mean by inferior society ?" "People without refinement — without en- lightenment." '' Refinement is so arbitrary a quality, so wholly dependent on individual views and station." " In one word, then, I mean low people, such as the Baltimores." " I thought so ; and you judge them prc- maturel}'. What do we know at present of the family ? Dearest Laura ! allow me to hope for the best !" *' Well, well — I dare say I am wrong; at all events wrong to come and plague you about them this morning, when I know you are feel- ing so uneasily.*" 210 P^EMALE DOMINATION. " I am^ indeed. The events of to-day will probably enable me to form an opinion of Arthur's prospects of happiness in life ; and, if that opinion should be unfavourable ! — such a dear good brother as he is !" " It is now my turn to sa}^ make the best of it. Bvit you look so worried, dear Sophy, that I hardly like to communicate the nature of my business at Holywell." " Business at Holywell! Have you any, besides the task of saying a cheering word to raise my spirits .f^" " I am come as an ambassadress for m}* mother. Mamma, in the warmth of her love for me, knowing how infinitely I dislike what is called ' going out ' in town, wants to recon- cile me to my fate by persuading you to accom- pany us to London for the season. She pro- mises to take the greatest possible care of you, and so forth; not to torment you to become more dissipated than suits your health and convenience ; and to bring you back safe to FEMALE DOMINATION. 21 L Holywell v/henever you may clioosc. You can take your own servants or not, as you will ; only papa and mamma are anxious that you should consider yourself completely one of the family. '' How very kind of Lady Rotherham !" — " Very kind towards her daughter. Oh ! my dear Sophy ! — do say yes ! I have set my heart upon 3'our going- with us to London." Sophia coloured to the temples ; but said nothing. For two years past particular motives had inspired her with the most ardent desire to visit London : and she knew there was no chance of persuading her mother to quit Holywell. But she was prudent enough to deliberate. " I came to consult your own wishes before mamma made her petition in form to Mrs. Armytage/' continued Lady Laura, "fearing she might be inclined to urge you to compli- 212 FEMALE DOMINATION. ance against your inclinations ; or to refuse her consent, in case you are inclined to gratify our hopes. So you have only to tell me sin- cerely your desire, and nothing shall be left un attempted to bring it to pass." "A thousand thanks! — Pray, then, beg Lady Rotherham, in my name, on no account to mention her kind invitation to my mother — I think she would wish my acceptance of so kind and friendly a proposal : but much as I should like the visit I must not just now quit Holywell. I may be w^anted as an adviser — as a peace-maker ; — I may — " *' That odious Mrs. Arthur Armytage again 1" -Hush!— hush!" '' And you are really going to make your- self a martyr, and sacrifice your prospects and inclinations to a stranger?". " Not to a stranger; but Arthur's temper is hastier than mine ; and many little disturb- FEMALE DOMINATION. 213 ances may occur at Holywell needing all ray influence to pacify. I should be miserable to be away from home just now." " But mamma will put off' her departure for London for a week or ten days, to enable you to smooth away the difficulties of your bro- ther's first arrival." " Dear Laura ! Can you indeed su])posG that a week will enable persons of such differ- ent ways of living and thinking as my mother and her daughter-in-law, to understand each other, and — " '' And what can yoa do to improve their temper or understanding?" " Something, at least, to tranquillize Ar- thur''s susceptibility ; * A soft answer,' you know, ' turneth away wrath ;' and how could 1 answer him otherwise than softly — I love him so dearly ! Hark ! I think I hear the sound of wheels — yes ! — they are certainly coming." " Do not agitate yourself, — sit down ; drink 214 FEMALE DOMINATION. this glass of water T' cried Lady Laura, her- self turning alternately pale and red, as a car- riage decidedly entered the sweep. But while Sophia, scarcely able to stand, was summoning courage to go down and welcome the new-comers. Lady Laura Greta exclaimed in a voice half- vexed, half- triumphant — " What a waste of our sensibiHty ! — It is only those odious Wemmersleys and their Yankee cousin, come to offer their congratulations, no doubt, to Mrs. Armytage ! Let us leave them to the full enjoyment of their malice. Unless we are summoned to the drawing-room, Sophy, re- main here, and conclude our negotiations. I cannot return home in peace till you have assented to mamma's proposal. You must, you really must accompany us to London." CHAPTER XV. Sweet Willie, the flower of LidJesdale, Had faken him o'er the saut sea faem, And uo\7 he's come fra' foreign land, And has woo'd a wife and brought her hame. And lovely sweet fair Alice wa<:, And bonnie yeilow was her hair ; And hapf.y, happy, might she ha' been, But his mother wrought her mickle care. 0:.D Ballad. While their attention was absorbed by the interesting subject of their conference, the visit of the Wemmersle3^s wore to an end ■ and even Lady Laura was at length obliged to ring and order her pony-carriage without further tidings of Arthur's arrival. Sophia grew anxious and fidgety. The sun was streaming down the western avenue, as Lady Laura took her departure. The river and the woods had already assumed their 216 FEMALE DOMINATION. sombre evening hue. The first dmner-bell rang ; the rooks were ah'ea(Jy at roost ; the " sheep were in the fauld, and the rye at hame," but still no Arthur. Sophia began to tremble. Twice had her mother referred to her son's last epistle ; and its hieroglyphics, although in other respects most Etonianly and Parliamentarily illegible, bore a distinct promise, that " On Thursday next, without fail, we shall be at Holywell" The engagement was positive ; but its rupture appeared only too probable. Still, the influ- ence of the picture, and of the compunctious visitings to which it had given rise, were all ascendant ; and when the turret clock of the offices chimed half-past seven, and old Sim- mons hobbled in for the fifth time to inquire whether dinner might be served, Mrs. Army- age answered in the affirmative, without any harsher commentary than an order that cer- tain dishes might be kept hot for the travel- lers. FEMALE DOMINATION. 217 Sophia now began to dread that, after all his procrastinations, Arthur would make his ap- pearance in the middle of dinner, a meal of some ceremony at Holywell ; — and w^ho does not hnow the awkwardness of such an inter- ruption ? — the dining party swallowing their hasty mouthfuls, laying aside their napkins, and hurriedly shaking off the evidence of their occupation — the arriving-party intro- duced into a room savouring of anchovy sauce, sherry, and divers ragouts, yet protesting, that amid this compound of villainous smells, there is not the slightest effluvium of dinner ! There was no cause, however, for alarm : the turbot boiled into wool — the lamb calcined into dust — the cutlets browned to the tint of umber — the much- injured teal — the asparagus be- headed of its verdant tops — were successively removed. Dessert was put on table; and a pine-apple of dimensions to win a horticultural prize, and especially destined by the head- gardener to do honour to the visit of Master VOL. 1. L 218 FEMALE DOMINATION. Arthur, instead of adding weight to his own pocket by following its fellows clandestinely to Covent Garden, was remorselessly or unwit- tingly cut by Mrs. Armytage, although she would not, and Sophia could not, taste it ! Then came coffee, and after coffee, tea ; and after tea, (dinner having been so unusually late,) came Simmons — officious Simmons ! with the bed candles. Yet why officious ? Eleven of the clock had struck, and half-past ten was Mrs. Armytage's usual hour for retiring. " I should think — I should trust,'' said she to her daughter, as she wished her good night, *' that they will not come now. However," she continued, turning to Simmons, and the footman waiting to extinguish the lights, " place a supper- tray in the dining-room, and let some one sit up. John, go down to the South Lodge, and tell Martindale it is my de- sire he should be on the watch till daylight." It was evident that she had not forgotten her son's last outrageous inbreak upon the sober FEMALE DOMINATION. 219 habits of Holywell; and Sophy had the mor- tification to perceive, while watching from her dressing-room ^\-indow, which overlooked those of her mother, that Mrs. Armytage had retired — but not to rest ; till one — till two — till three in the morning, the shutters of one window re- mained unclosed, from which the crimson cur- tain was, from time to time, cautiously drawn aside. It was evident that Arthur's arrival was still anxiously expected. Towards morn- ing, however, even the excited Sophia became over-w earied, and throwing herself on her bed, slept to dream of Arthur and his misdoings. It needs to have been spell-bound in the enthralling chain of ceremony existing in cer- tain formal English country-houses of the old school, to be aware of the importance assigned to a visit procrastinated, or a letter unan- swered. In those uneventful Castles of Indo- lence, where all the excitement is from with- out, even while the influence of public events is scarcely perceptible, the delaying guest be- L 2 220 FEMALE DOMINATION. comes a malefactor, and the negligent corre- spondent a suspicious character. Berlin might have been sacked and burnt, or China depo- pulated by the plague, and the event would have produced far less sensation at Holywell than the non-arrival of Master Arthur ! On the morrow, too, a transgression on the part of Miss Armytage increased the indig- nation of the steward's room. Almost for the first time in her life, Sophy was not ready for breakfast, and her mother sat down alone ! But the delinquent made her appearance in time to detect the mortified expression of her mother's countenance, when the daily papers were laid on the table, unaccompanied by the expected letter of apology from her son. An hour or two afterwards, however, old Hardywood, having exchanged his holiday black satins for quotidian kerseymere, claimed an audience of his lady, to acquaint her that the rider of one of the Thoroton tradesmen had just circulated intelligence in the servants' FEMALE DOMINATION. 221 hall, that, as he quitted the town. Captain Armytage was entering the High Street in a chaise and four — the no longer expectant populace having been unprepared to draw him to the Town Hall ! " They will be here, then, immediately," cried Mrs. Armytage, slightly colouring. " I rather think not. Madam,"" mumbled her ancient servitor, " for Lawyer Gumption was with Master Arthur, and I fancy there will be a deal of work for them to do at the Town Hall, before they can push on to Holywell." " What will become of Mrs. Arthur, mean- while?" involuntarily ejaculated Mrs. Army- tage. And Sophia, who Avas at her mother's elbow, as involuntarily replied, *' If I were to take the carriage, and go to Thoroton — and — and bring her here at once ?" Sophia was \vi'ong. She should have left so conciliatory a measure lo be proposed by 222 FEMALE DOMINATION. Mrs. Armytage. Anything resembling dicta- tion was fatal. '' I see no occasion for putting ourselves out of the way for those who put themselves so little out of the way for us,'' was her cold reply. " No doubt they will find their way here at their own time and pleasure." And, in the course of a few minutes, that time and pleasure became fully demonstrated. A French caleche, drawn by jaded posters, looking jaded as only posters can look, and smoking as only posters can smoke, drew up under the portico — having a courier, half French, half German, half Italian, and a sou- brette, wholly, entirely, and manifestly Parisian, for its outside passengers — within, a pretty Frenchified little doll of a woman, and an ugly- Frenchified little dog of a poodle. Sophy trembled ! She would have trembled still more had she been aware that Arthur's rash charge to his wife throughout their hurried FEMALE DOMINATION. 223 journey from Dover, had been — '' Above all things, beware of allowing" m}* mother to per- ceive that you are afraid of her : unless you appear perfectly free and at ease in her pre- sence, she will fancy that we are secretly re- senting the past. For my sake, pray exert your spirits to the utmost." Fortunately enough, the courier, the femme de chambre, and the poodle, escaped for a time the scrutinizing eyes of Mrs. Armytage, who stood awaiting, at the door of the library, her long-expected daughter-in-law and guest." " I trust you met with no accident ? We expected you yesterday," said she, bestoAving a solemn salutation on the cheek of the stran- ger ; when Marian, true to her recently ac- quired Parisian habits, familiarly offered the other a la Fran raise, for a reciprocation of the honour. " Oh ! no ; not the slightest accident : the foreign carriages are so safe — so formed for bad roads." 224 FEMALE DOMINATION. " Bad roads l" Mrs. Armytage regarding it as an established fact that the Great North Road was the triumph of Macadamization, was silent with surprise. " But I felt a little tired when we reached Wolverfield last night/' continued the stran- ger, throwing herself into the nearest arm- chair which the library afforded ; '' when Ar- thur, remembering that the inn at Wolverfield is what is called in England a crack inn, de- cided that we should stay and sleep, and so we were half suffocated in enormous feather- beds, and condemned to the nightmare by a dinner of eels, veal coUops, and wine-sour plums, which, it appears, are esteemed dainties in the county of York." Mrs. Armytage stood transfixed 1 " And after all," continued the inadvertent Marian, " we experienced the horror of getting up at seven o'clock this morning, entre chien et loup, in order to gratify the people at Thoro- ton with the notion that we had hastened our FEMALE DOMINATION. 225 journey to do them honour ; in consequence of which we arrived, abimes, hrises de fatigue, and poor Arthur in anything but a humour to do the agreeable to his constituents. Ah ! mon pauvre Mouton I je te croyais perdu!'' — cried Marian to the httle monster, which now frisked into the room, and jumped into her lap ; while YiYs. Armytage, half resentfully, half despair- ingly, led forward Sophia to the new-comer, with the simple presentation of — " My daughter." " Cela va sans dire ; I knew Miss Armytage at once, so strong a resemblance to yourself," replied Marian, too much frightened to observe that Sopliia was as fair as her mother was dark; but still labouring to disguise her own timidity under a mask of assurance. And, while Sophy's advance towards a sisterly salute was suffici- ently apparent, she threw herself back again in the chair, and applied herself to her flacmi. ** I conclude it will be late before we see my son ? " inquired Mrs. Armytage, resolved not to be disgusted. L 3 226 FEMALE DOMINATION. " Yes, indeed. Arthur gave me to under- stand that I should see no more of hhn till dinner-time." " And he gave no message ? " observed Mrs. Armytage, half interrogatively. " Nothing but his kind love to all at home." *' No appointment about sending the carriage for him ? " " None at all. I heard him settling it with Gumption and a lawyer's-clerk, (the clerk, I believe, of Nebwell, your solicitor,) that they would come on together.^' " Come on ? I do not exactly understand," said Mrs. Armytage. " To dinner. I heard Arthur invite them all to come and dine with him." ^^ There must be some mistake," faltered Sophia. " No, no mistake. I heard Arthur say, ' You must come and eat your mutton with me,' or some such words. Couche-la: couche done, mon petit Mouton!'' continued Mrs. Arthur, FEMALE DOMINATION. 227 addressing the poodle, ^Yllo was munching off the tassel of a sofa cushion. " If there is a plague on earth, it is a lap-dog." "If there is a plague on earth, it is the vulgar wife of one's onl}^ son ! " might, perhaps, be the secret response of Mrs. Armytage. " By the way," resumed Marian, as if struck by a bright idea, (her courage, like that of Macheath, being nearly 'run out ;') perhaps I had better go and see after Celestine and the things. It is quite shocking how foreign servants get imposed upon. You have no notion how horribly they were cheated on the roadl" "As you are now among my own people,'* observed Mrs. Armytage, with dignity, "I trust further precaution is needless." " Oh ! one never knows ! Only last night, at Wolverfield, they stole Ladislaw's case of cigars. And such a bill as they brought in, the moment they found it was for Mr. Armytage, of Holywell Park, the new mem- 228 FEMALE DOMINATION. ber for Thoroton ! One would liave tliought poor Artliur was come to take possession of Lis family estate, instead of a seat in parlia- ment ! I used to think uncle Robsey's bills at the Plough, at Cheltenham, beat anything ; but this was ten times worse, really a faire fremir! Three and sixpence for Mouton's supper ! " " I think you said you would like to see your room ? " interrupted Sophy, judging it prudent to anticipate the explosion of her mother s wrath. '' Oh ! no ceremony, thank you, I dare say I shall find my way. I have so often talked with Arthur over the plan of the house at Holy- well; and settled it where we should be, when we came to stay with you," replied Mrs. Arthur ; pausing at the door, to whistle to her dog, ere she disappeared from the wondering eyes of Mrs. Armytage. Having conducted her strange, her very strange sister-in-law to the chintz bed-room. FEMALE DOMINATION. 229 Sophia disappeared also. But, had she returned half an hour afterwards, she would have been struck with a strong vapour of ether and eau de Cologne, and the agitated demeanour of Mademoiselle Celestine ; for Marian, pale as death, was lying on the bed, half fainting and wholly exhausted by her ill-advised exer- tions ! Her only consolation, poor soul ! lay in the persuasion that she liad played to admira- tion the part of excellent dissembling, of self- possession and dauntlessness, imposed upon her b}^ the misjudging Arthur. She trusted she had at once done her duty to her husband, and imposed upon her imposing mother-in- law. CHAPTER XVI. What correspondence can I hold with you. Who are so near, and yet so distant too ? Fr07n Martial, by Steele, Mrs. Arthur (for the future we must be permitted to adopt this convenient abbrevia- tion) had mistaken the intentions of the one as completely as she had mistaken the cha- racter of the other. In due time arrived a note of apology and explanation from Arthur, informing Mrs. Armytage that " being under the necessity of dining with his constituents at the Blue Boar, he should not have the pleasure of seeing her till night ; and begging, in case he should be detained by the convivialities of the evening, that she would not break through her usual regular habits on his account." FEMALE DOMINATION. 231 '•' I was sure there was some misunderstand- ing," cried Sophia, after perusing the note. " I was satisfied, my dear mother, that Arthur could never have dreamed of introducing such a person as Mr. Gumption at your dinner- table." Mrs. Armytage was about to reply, but sud- denly checked herself. The rejoinder, thus repressed, evidently regarded her daughter- in-law ; for Sophy had already noticed her mother's determination to give no expression to her feelings on that head. She had not made a single remark on Mrs. Arthur; and Sophy rejoiced that she was spared the pain of defending so unpromising a cause. Dinner-time came, and w^ith it the French maid, with a request that her lady might be excused from the ceremony. "Madame was fatigued, and lying down." Mrs. Armytage's clouded countenance darkened to a still deeper shade. Fine-ladyism in every shape was her aversion ; but in the shape of preten - 232 FEMALE DOMINATION. sion and vulgarity, and in her own daughter- in-law, insupportable. Dinner-time passed, almost in silence ; and after dinner, Sophy went up to the dressing- room of the invalid, in the hope of persuading her to join the family party. And such was evidently Marian's intention; but no sooner had Sophia cast her eyes on the figure emerg- ing from the hands of Mademoiselle Celestine, than she almost repented her mission. " Will you not put on a shawl ?" said she; contemplating with a bli\sh the 'Parisian cos- tume of Mrs. Arthur, and recollecting with pain the disgust entertained by her mother towards all the varied vagaries of modern fashion. But Mademoiselle Celestine instantly negatived the shawl ; a shawl would ' ecraser les joUs nceuds de Madame.'' And down went Marian, leaning on the arm of the simply- attired and graceful Sophia; tricked out in all the fopperies which, during the last six months, custom had rendered natural to FEMALE DOMINATION. 233 her ; but entertaining no suspicion that tlic trifles she had seen in daily use, till they ap- peared indispensable, could seem monstrous and unprecedented in the eyes of the York- shire Yolumnia. Mrs. Armytage gazed upon her for a moment, as she \vculd have done upon an overdressed doll; then turned away her head as if resolved never to look at her again. " You spent a pleasant winter at Paris ?" inquired Sophia in a low voice, dreading the continuance of the dead silence which ensued. " Ah ! delightful, — charming ! — never was anything so gay. As I was saying to Arthur this morning, the country will appear liorribly dull after all our dissipation." '' I trust not ; we have a great deal to show you in the neighbourhood. Besides, you must need a little rest after so much gaiety." " No, indeed ; I am never tired of plea- sure. ^Yith my aunt Robsey, I was so accus- tomed to rattling about ! Lady Arabella 234 FEMALE DOMINATION. Quin used often to say at Paris, that she saw I was a rake at heart." " Lady Arabella ?" involuntarily demanded Mrs. Armytage. " Lady Arabella Quin. Do you know her ?" " I have not that honour/' replied Mrs. Ar- mytage, with significant emphasis. " Ah ! then, some day or other I must intro- duce you to her. I am sure you will like her, such a charming creature ! Such a fine flow of Irish spirits ! — We lived in the same hotel, and I went everywhere with her." *' You were peculiarly fortunate !" " Most fortunate ! — Lady Arabella is one of those people who know everybody. Her house is the resort of all the corps diploma' tique, and foreign travellers. Not a thing occurs in the most remote corner of Europe but you may hear of at Lady Arabella s. — And then all the ministers are at her feet. Old Talleyrand comes and plays dummy whist with her; and Pozzo di Borgo has an audience FEMALE DOMINATION. 235 every morning. I often used to tell Lady Arabella there Avould be scandal about her and Pozzo." *' liady Arabella must have become har- dened, as the herome of scandalous adven- tures/' observed Mrs. Armytage. " Five-and- twenty years' experience is a some\yhat long noviciate." " Oh ! you mean about that Sicilian Prince, with whom people said she eloped from Naples. — Never was anything so shameful ! I do assure you old Quin was travelling with them all the time. Only, to be sure, he went in the rumble, and Cagliabecchi inside. But it was not Lady Arabella's fault if her hus- band preferred the company of her maid.*" " I am not surprised at his preferring any society to that of the most dissolute woman in Europe." " Most dissolute woman in Europe ! — Surely you do not mean what you say ?" cried Marian. " But I know people who have lived all their 23G FEMALE DOMINATION. lives in England are apt to be so very preju- diced! There's papa, for instance, who used to tell us when we were children, that all the French people lived upon frogs ; and I declare when I was in Paris we could get them for dinner but once ; and that was in a vol-aa-vent at the Rocher de Cancale, which cost us a Napoleon : and so much for English J)^6J^' dices !" " I understand from my brother that you are very musical?" said Sophia, hoping to change the conversation. " Oh ! yes, — I doat upon music ! I think Arthur told me that you play yourself?"' '' I sing a little; — I am no great performer," replied Sophy. '' I suppose you can have had no advantage of masters down here ; and I understand you never go to town?" " Very rarely." " Poor thing ! — What a pity ! — Mamma could have recommended you a capital sing- FEMALE DOMINATION. 237 iiii^ master who attends my sisters ; — quite equal to Scappa; and only half-a-crown a lesson." " I took a few lessons of Pasta, when I was last in London/' said Miss Army t age. "Oh! Pasta's style is quite gone by, now. No one thinks any thing of Pasta at Paris. Grisi is twice as popular. We used to have the most capital little music parties every Sunday evening at Lady Arabella s ; — Ros- sini, Bellini, Mariani, Rubini, Santini, — just everybody you can think of; even Maupam, the new man who writes the ' Dance of Death' symphonies, with accompaniments of pick-axes and spades. Never was any thing so amus- ing ! — At first, Arthur hardly liked me to go, because of its being Sunday. But then, you know, as there was no Opera on that night, it was so particularly convenient to Lady Ara- bella and the professors. — Is that a good piano ?" " It is thought to be one of Broadwood's 238 FEMALE DOMINATION. best," replied Sophia. " It was a present to me from Arthur on my birth- day ; I hope you will try it to-morrow and give me your opinion." " Oh ! don't expect me to like it. I can't bear any instrument but Herz's or Petzold's ! — Petzold's last, with the organ stop and fla- geolet, and drums for military symphonies, are the most perfect in the world. Lady Arabella wanted Arthur to buy me one ; but, as he said, where had we got to put it? — So, all things considered, I determined to wait." " You have probably brought over a store of new music, which will be quite a treasure in this part of the world ? " " Yes ; lots of new music ! — A set of Ma- zurkas, written on purpose for me by Musard. You will see on the title-page, ' Respectfully dedicated to Mrs. Arthur Armytage, of Holy- well Park.' I had Holywell put, because there are so many Mrs. Armytages. Lady Trom- FEMALE DOMINATION. 239 bone has got a Mrs. Armytage for liernurscry- governess ; and Lord Wyndham Spalding swears that the housekeeper at his father's place in Ireland, is a Mistress Armytage. But I know he only used to say so to plague Ar- thur. By-the-by/' — she continued, after a mo- ment's pause, — " I suppose you know Lord Wyndham Spalding ? ' Winsome Wyn,' as they used to call him at Lady Arabella's. Is'nt he a charming creature ?" " Lord Wyndham Spalding is less in York- slure than the rest of his family," replied Sophia. " We are very little acquainted with him." " Oh ! but he wdll be here often enough now v:e are come ; for he is a great ally of ours, — of mine I should say, for Arthur thinks him a puppy." " It is well that my son judges him so leni- ently," said Mrs. Armytage, sternly. " By the rest of the world he is considered a mauvais sujei."' 240 FEMALE DOMINATION. " Oh ! but tliat is all over now. Wyn means to become a reformed rake. His father has promised to book up for him, and for the one-and-twenticth time, is going to pay his debts. It was a lucky thing for us ; for he had persuaded Arthur to put his name to bills for him, and all sorts of things." '' I should have scarcely thought Lord Wyndham Spalding a person likely to suit my brother/' said Sophia, mortified by all she was hearing. " I don't know about suiting ; but they lived with the same set of people, and were always hurdle-racing together in the Bois de Boulogne, or losing their money together at the Club, or playing the fool together at the hal de V Operas Mrs. Armytage groaned aloud. " But as I said before^, all that is over now. Arthur has got into Parliament, and Winsome Wyn has got out of his scrapes ; and they are going to settle down soberly into Yorkshire FEMALE DOMINATION. 241 Squires. Lord Wyndham has promised to introduce us to the neighbourhood, and to get me into his mother's exclusive set." " Sophia, my dear, you \Yill do me the favour of entertaining Mrs. Arthur Armytage," said the over-excited Lady of Holywell, to whom the very name of the Duchess of Spalding was poison, suddenly rising to retire for the night. '' I have some letters of importance which require my attention." And, with an assump- tion of dignity worthy of the immortal Siddons, she quitted the room. But was her attention likely to be engrossed by letters of importance, even had their con- sequence been vital to the peace of the nation ? Was her rest likely to be more placid than that of the preceding night ? Alas ! long before her disordered feelings had become subdued to even temperate heat, there was the tumult of a fresh arrival, and of a disagreeable scuffle on the stairs. Ladislaw, in French, German, and Italian, and John the footman, VOL. T. M 242 ■ FEMALE DOMINATION. in still more exquisite Yorkshire, were per- suading the new member for Thoroton, that the best thing he could do under existing cir- cumstances was to allow them to put him to bed. But poor Arthur's brain, long accustomed to the thin potations of France, was completely volcanized by the floods of Blue Boar port, sherry, and punch, by which he had been de- luged in the popular cause. And the last sounds heard by Mrs. Armytage as she closed the double doors of her dressing-room and bolted herself in, were — '' Shall I tamely sub- mit. Gen — gentlemen, free and independent elect — to — tors of Thoroton : I say, shall I t — tamely submit to the innovation, the — the aggressions of the hon — ^honourable gentle- man opposite in the fustian jac — jacket, with the red face and Stentorian lungs ? — ' Partu- riunt monies ' — Gen — gentlemen electors, as we say in the House — ^ Parturiunt monies, nascitur rid — rid — ridiculus nius .' ' " FEMALE DOMINATION. 243 '•' Better go up quoitly to bed^ Siirr : Missus '11 be quoite froiglited/' interrupted John, coaxingly. " Missus ! who the deuce is Missus ?" stam- mered Arthur, staggering against the wall. " I rise to explain that I have no Missus — that I admit no Missus ! Mr. Speaker ! I say, I accept no Missus — ' Timeo Danaos dono fer eli- tes ' as we say in the House — ' do — do — dona ferentes F Upon my soul and body ! — do — do — na ferentes /" Fortunately, nothing further was audible in the gallery. On entering the corridor leading to the chintz-bed room, canny Yorkshire dis- creetly closed the folding doors behind the young Squire and his misdemeanours. M 2 CHAPTER XVII. It is our duty not only to scatter benefits, but even to strew flowers for the sake of our fellow-travellers in the pathways of this wretched world. ClIESTEKFIELD. Without waiting for '' sermons and soda- water ^the day after ' his escapade, Arthur had just strength to rise and make his way at an early hour to Sophia's dressing-room ; and. in the happiness of meeting his dearly-loved sis- ter, all his vexations, headaches, and qualms of conscience were forgotten. " And now, dearest,**' cried he, after having expressed a thousandth part of his joy at the re-union, and slightly alluded to the intem- perance to which he had been most reluctantly coniYjelled by his stanch adherents, the faction of the Gumptionites — " tell me candidly, how FEMALE DOMINATION. 245 did my poor little wife get on with my mo- ther?" '' Not, perhaps, quite so well as if you had been present to bring them together," replied Miss Armytage ; " in a few days, no doubt, they will understand each other better." " Ah ! I see how it is — I knew how it would be ! '' replied Arthur, in a mortified tone ; " poor Marian's excessive timidity has made an unfavourable impression. My mother has found out how dreadfully the poor girl stands in awe of her." *•' Indeed, I think not," was Sophia's invo- luntary reply. " The truth is, that poor Marian's shyness amounts to an actual infirmity ; and the more she mixes in the world, the more it seems to grow upon her. To hear the sound of her own voice is quite a martyrdom to her !" Sophia had heard of the proverbial blind- ness of husbands, especially towards a young and pretty wife ; but she was not prepared to 246 FEMALE DOMINATION. find lier quick- sighted brother so soon and so completely a dupe. '• She did not strike me as particularly shy," was all that candour would allow her to reply. " Poor little soul ! I assure you I had the greatest difficulty in forcing her into society in Paris ; and when there, it was evident that she was on thorns. Here, however, I did hope she would feel more at ease ; as I have never ceased to impress upon her mind, my dear Sophy, how much she has to expect from your protection and kindness." '' And sisterly affection," added Miss Army- tage warmly. " But to say the truth, I fear she will have difficulties to encounter with my mother." '' I know it, my dear child — I know it — and so does she ; and that is the very reason why you see her so overawed in my mother's pre- sence." " And then that unlucky visit of her fa- ther s!'^ FEMALE DOMINATION. 247 " Jack Baltimore ? Heavens and earth ! Has he been here ? What unlucky wind blew him to Holywell?" " Unlucky, indeed ; for he has irrecoverably offended my mother. However, it was only natural that, believing his daughter to be here, he should be anxious to see her after so long a separation." " Then most assuredly we shall see him here again, for he is now aware of our arrival ; and, under all the circumstances, I was obUged to refuse Marian the pleasure of a visit to her family as we passed through town. We had only time to change horses." "1 hope you will be able to prevent his coming," observed Sophy, earnestly. " Indeed I cannot help thinking that his interview with my mother will secure us from his return. Nothing could be less encouraging." " I hope she was not rude to Baltimore ?" inq\iired Arthur, gravely. ''He is a rough 248 FEMALE DOMINATION. diamond, it is true, but a sterling one. Balti- more has excellent qualities." " You will admit that he has very disagree- able manners ? " " He is not a fine gentleman, I grant 3'ou ; but in former days, fine gentlemen were not the fashion at Holywell." "Mr. Baltimore appears so common, so un- educated ? " '' He is no pedant, like my mother's darling, Reginald Maudsley ; but he is quick, and has considerable knowledge of the world." Sophia saw that it was useless to argue with a man so prejudiced as her brother ; she^ therefore, proposed that they should avoid the danger of keeping Mrs. Armytage waiting for breakfast. " She won't expect Marian to breakfast with us, 1 hope ? " " Indeed I think she will.'** "Quite out of the question! Marian is just FEMALE DOMINATION. 249 now SO very delicate, that the Paris physicians have expressly interdicted early rising." " Let us hope that the Yorkshire air will do more for her than the Paris physicians," was Sophia's rejoinder, as she accompanied her brother to the breakfast-room. The brow of Mrs. Armytage was knit when they entered : but the cloud dispersed as soon as she found herself folded in the arms of her son : nature prevailed ! And then, Arthur's apologies were uttered so frankly, and so cor- dially ; his inquiries after herself were so warm from the heart ; the expression of his hopes that nothing would ever more occur to disturb the happy understanding of the family were so genuine, that his mother's more generous nature was touched. She pressed his hand affectionately, and begged that the past might be forgotten. During his absence, of nearly a year's dura- tion, Arthur had gained much in personal advantages; a more decided manner, a more M 3 250 FEMALE DOMINATION. independent frame of mind. He was the image of his father ; but eminently his father's supe- rior in manners and address. Mrs. Armytage gazed upon him with proud admiration, as he took his accustomed place opposite her at the breakfast table ; and was quite ready to for- give Mrs. Arthur the delicacy of constitution, real or imaginary, which made it indispensable for her to drink her chocolate in her own room, so she might for a time dispense with her com- pany. In her love for Arthur, Mrs. Armytage felt indulgent even towards Marian. But in the course of the day, a new cause of offence arose. The fatigue of her journey, and the agitation produced by her first introduction with her husband's family, were said to have operated so severely on her health, that Arthur, after a prolonged visit to Marian's apartment, requested the family apothecary might be summoned. Now the "family apothecary" at Holywell implied a very worthy practitioner living at Thoroton, who never did attend the FEMALE DOMINATION. 251 ''family." The steward's-room, with its lame, deaf, blind, and intemperate, had occasional recourse to his services ; more especially after the broacliing of a new twenty-years-old butt of October, or a visit from the Rotherhams and their people. But to the moderate, active, vigorous Mrs. Armytage, the very notion of his attendance, and the arrival of a daily basketfid of pink pill-boxes, and salmon-co- loured draughts, was a preventive remedy. Involuntarily she shut herself into the library when she knew that Mr. Senna was picking his stealthy sick-room-like steps towards her daughter-in-law's apartment ; and when Arthur announced, after his departure, that his wife was seriously indisposed, would require the greatest care, and daily attendance, Mrs. Ar- mytage became confirmed in her previous opinion of both physician and patient. She proposed, indeed, a visit of inquiry and con- dolence to the invalid; but Mr. Senna's last injunctions had been that she should be suf- 252 FEMALE DOMINATION. fered to see nobody ; slie was to be kept per- fectly quiet. The remainder of the day, and part of the following, were of necessity devoted by Arthur to the completion of his electioneering busi- ness ; and on his return, Marian appeared so much worse, and was pronounced to be so much worse by her medical attendant, that nothing less than sending off an express to Doncaster for further advice would satisfy the anxious husband. But when the eminent practitioner who at- tended the summons, an authority which not even Mrs. Armytage could venture to impugn, pronounced that the sufferer was not only seriously ill, but the life of her expected child imminently endangered, the lady of Holywell could scarcely forgive herself her former unbelief, or Arthur his remissness, in not acquainting her with the real state of the case. Marian now acquired a wholly new position in her sight. The future heir, — the FEMALE DOMINATION. 253 new Arthur, — the Armytage to come, — formed a link connecting her indissolubly with the family. The question henceforth was not to resent her faults or failings, but to amend, or at least, conceal them, from the world. But of what avail to concert future measures ? Ma- rian's life was said to he actually in peril. There was not a more solicitous inquirer after every change of sym^jtoms than Mrs. Armytage. Youth, however, will do muchj and judi- cious attendance and perfect tranquillity soon restored the invalid to more favourable pro- spects ; it was pronounced that, with great care, and perfect repose, she might go on well. And no^' came the worst trial : for a second journey in her present weak state was impossible ; and Arthur was under the immediate necessity of attending his duties in Parliament. Thoroton could not forego its claims upon its new mem- ber — it was plain, therefore, that Marian must. The first circumstance that impressed Sophia 254 FEMALE DOMINATION. Armytage with a really good opinion of her sister-in-law was the gentleness with which she submitted to this thwarting of her wishes. Eagerly as she desired to visit her family ; averse as she was from being left alone with that of her husband ; deeply, feelingly, as she was grieved by the prospect of parting at such a moment from Arthur, nothing could evince a more amiably unselfish disposition than the mildness with which she acquiesced in the plans imposed upon her. From that time, Sophy gave herself up without reserve to study the comfort and happiness of her new sister. Even with Mrs. Armytage, Marian now began to feel herself in some measure at home. Lying quietly and silently on her sofa, she could give no further offence ; and her youth and prettiness, under such circumstances, failed not to plead in her favour. The obligingness of her disposition gradually became manifest to her new relatives ; and by the time Arthur FEMALE DOMINATION. 255 had been gone a week, in spite of the poodle and the French maid, she was ahuost a fa- vourite. It had, in fact, been said in a few fluent words, and with so careless a smile to Marian, that, as the session was likely to be short, — scarcely of six weeks' longer continuance, — she had very little to regret in the medical sentence, which compelled her to remain in Yorkshire, while her husband was sojourning at Grillon's Hotel, — that she felt it would be in- decorous to express a contrary opinion. Nay, when Arthur himself joined in the assurance that " Six weeks would pass as a day," she actually tried to believe him. It was not till he was gone, and she could contrive to be quite alone, that she allowed a free course to her solitary tears, and to her feeling that she was very miserable; not perhaps the Zess miserable that her husband seemed to make so light of their separation. The truth was, — but a truth of too ungra- 25G FEMALE DOMINATION. cious a nature to disclose to Marian — that the regret he experienced in parting from his kind-hearted and loving little wife, was almost counterbalanced by his satisfaction at any pretext for prolonging her separation from the Robscy tribe, and the Jackishness of her father's establishment. He fancied, too, that thus left alone with his family, they would insensibly amalgamate; that Marian would learn to respect his mother and love his sister, as he himself loved and respected them ; while Marian's better qualities could not fail to secure their affections m return. Perhaps, too, the occupation afforded by his new duties and a something of attraction in the prospect of one more bachelor spring at a London hotel tended to facilitate the sacrifice of Marian's society. He did not consider, and even Marian her- self was at first scarcely aware, how wearily and slowly pass the days, every hour of which is devoted to an especial and distant object. FEMALE DOMINATION. 257 That third week in June on which it was humbly hoped by tlie denizens of liis gracious Majesty's Lower House, that their patriotic labours would be ended by the merciful inter- position of the King, engrossed every thought of her mind. Till then, all must be a blank. She still trembled when in the presence of Mrs. Armytage ; still entertained a reverential feel- ing for Sophia, as towards the lioness's whelp ; and with the heart-sickness of discontent^ be- gan to find even Mademoiselle Celestine and Mouton importunate and insupportable. The neighbourhood, too, — the hospitable neighbourhood — was just then completely broken up : no one remaining but the Mar an - hams, who were rare visitors, and the Wem- mersleys, who were unwelcome ones, at Holy- well, while Marian's feebleness prevented her from enjoying any active country diversion. A slow drive with Mrs. Armytage in her pony- chair, round the park, or a dull saunter 258 FEMALE DOMINATION. with Sophia round the still leafless shrub- beries, was her utmost stretch of exercise. It was a backward spring ; the scene was cheerless ; and Marian could not conceal her regrets for the cheerfulness and movement of Paris. " It was so very provoking to be obliged to come away, just as the Tuileries were coming into beauty !" — she exclaimed one day to Sophia, having returned from a country airing jalong the high road, where nothing but mile- stones and market-carts were visible; and unaware that Mrs. Armytage was still in the room. " The chmate of Paris is certainly a fortnight earlier than that of London, three weeks than that of chilly Yorkshire. I as- -sure you. Lady Arabella and I had begun to sit out of doors before I left Paris ; and I was longing to see the orange-trees brought out, and the lilacs and chestnuts in bloom." '• But you will see lilacs and chestnuts in FEMALE DOMINATION. 259 bloom at Holywell ; and when an orangery is placed in the cedar-garden, I assure you it makes a very respectable appearance." " Yes, for Yorkshire, and in the month of July, when one has grown tired of looking at green trees ; but, at best, so very inferior to those fine old Bourbon trees, four hundred years old, with the gay groups sitting chatting and flirting round them, and all the world full of life and animation !" " The scene possessed the charm of novelty to you," replied the sober Sophia. " Rely upon it you would have soon been tired of Paris, had you remained there longer." " Oh ! no, indeed : — it is impossible to grow tired of Paris. Lady Arabella has been there fifteen years, and likes it better every season. She says it is the post-house where all Eu- rope change horses ; and that, in the course of a year or two, you see the whole round of your acquaintance, in the pleasantest way ; for they 260 FEMALE DOMINATION. seldom stay long enough for one to become bored by tliem." Miss Armytage, aware of lier mother's in* surmountable objection to the word " bored,'* now became aware, by a certain impatient movement at the further end of the room, that the rigid purist was present. She strove to change the turn of conversation ; but Marian would not be checked. " And then, in Paris, one has so much more real comfort with so much less fuss and cere- mony ! Instead of sitting down to a stately dinner, with half a dozen servants to stare you out of countenance, you dine en cabinet at some cofe — the Rocher or the Freres Provencaux, twice as well, and at the hour you like : after which, instead of boring yourself with a dull evening at home, you scramble to one of the ten theatres, with the certainty of being amused." ~ " I fancied that the society of Paris did not FEMALE DOMINATION. 261 frequent tlic cafes and tlie petit spectacles f " said Sophia. " Oh ! — I don't know. Lady Arabella used to go to them all ; and I conclude she knows what is proper. Besides, the English are pri- vileged, and do all sorts of things. They are always getting caricatured as La famille Ancjlaise. There was one came out of Lady Arabella eating slices of melon on horseback at Tortoni's door, that would have made you die with laughing. Wyn Spalding sent it to her, p)^^'-^ ^'^* efrennes, on New Year's day." Sophia perceived with delight that her mother had now quitted the room. Such was Mrs. Armytage's progress in the art of tolera- tion towards Marian's little failings. Resolved not to be more disgusted with her than she could help, she now closed her eyes or ears, or absented herself, when she found that Mrs. Arthur s want of tact was endangering her for- bearance ; for Marian was a very important object in her eyes. That epoch to which the 262 FEMALE DOMINATION. young wife looked forward as destined to re- unite her with Arthur, was a moment of no less auspicious promise to Mrs. Armytage, as likely to afford an heir to the vast estates of Holywell— to exclude Reginald Maudsley at once and for ever! She recalled to mind every preparative to which the expected birth of her own Arthur had formerly given rise : — the bonfires on Holywell Hill— the beacon on Holywell Tower T — the ox roasted whole in Holywell Close— the labouring families feasted at Holywell Cross ; and secretly promised herself that all this parade should be revived for the arrival of the new heir. The whole neighbourhood should see that she experienced no mortification in the alliance formed by her son. Ale should be brewed, and acres of oaks planted, for the future benefit of her children's children, and the glory of Holywell. Marian was no longer the daughter of a Jack Baltimore — she was the wife of Arthur Maudsley Armytage, of FEMALE DOMINATION. 263 Holjwcll. She would meet the sneers of the Wemmersleys with a smile ; and defy even the impertinence of her county rival, the insolent Duchess of Spalding, — a proposed intimacy with, whom was, after all, one of the worst offences of her daughter-in-law, in the eyes of Mrs. Armytage. CHAPTER XVIII. Were I a man, — a Duke, — I would remove these tedious stumbling-blocks. Being a woman, I will not be slack To play my part in fortune's pageant. SlIAKSPEARE. The offending Duchess belonged to a class of women rare in our own limes and country, though not unfrequent at the more troublous epochs, or in less tranquil lands ; who, born to no earthly business, make the business of the whole world their own. Not that she was en- dowed with the far-sighted spirit of intrigue of a Princesse des Ursins — not that she boasted the coarse but vigorous energies of a Sarah of Marlborough — or even the persevering cun- ning of a Madame de Maintenon; — but she had all their activity — all their art in esta- FEMALE DOMINATION. 285 blishing a sway over the conduct of others ; and withal a certain fido:etiness of mind, whicli seemed to derive new stimulus from total want of occupation. She was an Avarilla Maran- hani, with wider opportunities. In girlhood, unable to resign lierself to the uneventful subordination of the nursery and the school-room, she was always plotting the dismissal of an undcr-governess, or trying to inspire the Viscountess her mother with a spirit of patronage for some pet drawing- master or mantua-maker. Introduced into the great world, her manoeuvres to avoid such and such a partner, or to achieve an invitation to such or such a ball, were of almost Machiavel- lian art ; and from the moment she discovered that the young Duke of Spalding was suspected to be on the eve of a matrimonial engage- ment with the daughter of one of his York- shire neighbours — marked him for her own ! She had cared little for him as England's premier Duke ; scarcely more as the inheritor VOL. I. N 266 FEMALE DOMINATION. of sixty thousand per annum ; but when she saw in the wealthy magnate a prize to be won per force of management, a captive to be trans- ferred from other nets to her own, there was no resisting the temptation ; and so skilfully were her projects conceived and executed, that very few months sufficed to render the strate- gist in hanging sleeves — her Grace the Duchess of Spalding. Perhaps it was the ready fruition of the scheme which soon rendered propensity a habit, and habit second nature ; for the Duchess now became a manceuvrer by voca- tion. Kich, noble, admired, she could not rest, for very restlessness ; but seemed to in- vent objects of desire for the mere labour of the attainment. Without interest in politics, she became a party woman ; without taste for the arts, a patroness ; without one pious or Christianly aspiration, a zealous high church- woman. The poor Duke whom she had finessed out of his first love, she now cheated out of his FEMALE DOMINATION. 267 jiereditary avocations ; trafficked in his behalf witli ministry ; chaffered with his interest ; paltered with his patronage. He could not promise a living, but her Grace contrived to induct some Tory 2^fotege of her own ; he could not renew the lease of a farm, but she managed to introduce a clause. Did he pre- sume to order new furniture for his library, he was sure to find it translated to one of the drav/ing- rooms ; or if he vras rash enough to purchase a picture, or give a commission for a statue, it was certain to be pounced upon for the Duchess's private suite of apartments ; where, of all the house, it was least likely to meet his eye. Not that he was an un affectionate husband ; but the overstrained activity of his wife fatigued him to death. The Duke of Spalding's con- stitutional indolence was even more than patri- cian, and he found himself wedded to a whirl- wind ! He was naturally fond of music ; but within two years of his marriage, her Grace be- N 2 268 FEMALK DOMINATIOxX. concerted him into abhorrence of all harmony. He took to hunting ; but the Duchess contrived to be ncclv-and-neck with him over every five- barred gate in the count}^ He sought refuge in agriculture ; but her Grace patent-ploughed him out of the field, and ran him to earth in a crop of ruta-baga. To whatever pastime or employment he addressed himself, her intention cast its shadow before ; and, scared by the pur- suit, Spalding's " occupation " was '' gone " in a moment! There was but one resource ! He became a club-man, and locked himself up in the dear delights of whist. The blue chambers of White's and Brookes's defy the intrusion of manoeuvring wives; and, within those sacred retreats, the hereditary legislator had for many years past shuffled, cut, and dealt away the session; a period for whose prolongation not even Bellamy himself could supplicate the gods more fervently than the hen-hunted Duke of Spalding. FEMALE DOMINATION. 269 Still there was Spalding Castle in the dis- tance, with its six or seven months of marital martyrdom ; and had not the Duchess one day, "When cursed uith many a granted prayer." suddenly hit upon a new object for which to persecute the ministry with little notes (marked •* private and confidential") of solicitation, the poor Duke might perhaps have ended his woes by suspending himself, for very weariness, to one of his ancestral oaks. But she had luckily become ambitious of fettering down her hus- band by a place at court, (Buckhounds, Mas- tership of the Horse, or new Lord Chamber- lainship, — what matters it to the reader ?) and, having assailed a chief clerk by the loan of her Opera-box to his wife ; a private secretary, by sides of venison and hampers of pine-apples ; and the private secretary's public master, by exaggerated representations of borough in- terest, church preferment, and local influence pertaining to the house of Spaldmg, her Grace's manoeuvres were eventually crowned 270 FEMALE DOMINATION. with success : from July to January, if not from January to Juty, tlie Duke was now no longer his own master ; while she became more than ever her own mistress. The joys of new cares, too, were added to her former pleasures : she had children ; and the children had nurses, governesses, tutors, masters, to be out- gen er ailed and outwitted. It was a triumph, for a nature such as hers, to manoeuvre a naughty child to the Opera, or a sickly one to a drive on a damp day. She taught the little creatures to plan, to plot, to deceive, to equivocate, to lie ; and the young lords consequently grew up into roues, and the young ladies into women of fashion. But w^hile this auspicious education was in progress, the Duchess did not slumber at her post. She had always some petty intrigue to carry on, some promising young clergyman, of high cha- racter and a ver}^ pretty vein for poetry, to manoeuvre into a prebend; some offending country neighbour of opposite politics, whose FEMALE DOMINATION. 271 daughters she had vowed should never enter the pale of Almack's; some nineteenth son of a nineteenth Scotch cousin, whom she was trying to get made attache at Kio Janeiro ; or some stripling of a political economist, whom she was bent upon having reviewed into noto- riety in the Quarterly. Nay, between the pauses of her grander movements, she would even busy herself with the welfare of such small- deer as pages or nursery- maids, set all her energies to work to expose the peccadilloes of some noble friend's groom of the chambers ; or congratulate herself upon getting one of Farmer Smith's Patagonian progeny promoted to be drum-major in the Blues. Between such a woman — such a Duchess — and Mrs. Armytage, there existed a moral antipathy. It was not that the Lady of Holy- well was less active, less domineering than the Lady of Spalding Court ; but Mrs. Armytage busied herself only with her own concerns and those of lier famil3% while the Duchess could 272 FEMALE DOMINATION. scarcely bear that a lamp should be extin- guished in one of the tin mines of Cornwall without her interference. Mrs. Armytage de- spised the Duchess as an ambitious intrigante ; the Duchess despised Mrs. Armytage as hornee, even in her despotism. Yorkshire, wide as it is, was scarcely large enough to contain their vast animosity ! And then the Armytage was a Whig, and the Spalding a Tory — the Army- tage a great lady of the country, the Spalding a great lady of the town. The Duchess could by no means mortify the 'Squiress ; for the 'Squiress was a firm and consistent contemner of rank-by-itself rank — never ventured a step beyond her station, and afforded no opportu- nity to the enemy of humiliating her by re- pulse. The Wemmersleys, indeed, had for a mo- ment rejoiced the busy Duchess with the hope of inflicting an humiliation on Holywell. The moment she discovered them to sail in the north of Mrs. Armytage\s opinion, she courted FEMALE DOMINATION. 273 them into the summer radiance of her smiles ; patronized them here — caressed them here, and exhibited them as the chief objects of her favour. But here ajjain she was mistaken. Whatever took the Wemmersleys to the other side of the county, Mrs. Armytage considered as a happy riddance to the neighbourhood of Holywell ; and she was under a real obligation to the Duchess for rendering Mill Hill so often tenantless. At length it occurred to the great lady, whose temper was not softened, nor her disposition ennobled by the practices of a long life of art and artifice, to allure Arthur Army- tage into her brilliant London circle, and attach him to the feet of one of her beautiful daughters, who might dismiss him with scorn when a nobler suitor should present himself. But by one of those unlooked-for entangle- ments which perplex the web of human des- tiny, at the very moment the Duchess of Spald- ing was courting the young Captain to her house, /?e was courting Jack Baltimore's daugh* n3 274 FEMALE DOMINATION. ter into his. The Morning Post announced Arthur's abrupt marriage, and the Duchess was defeated ; but the Morning Post also an- nounced the dejeuner in Portland Place — and the Duchess was avenged. What a marriage ! What a match ! What a blow for Mrs. Ar- my tage ! Nor had the Wemmersleys failed to feed the vast bonfire of her rejoicings with all the faggots they could make up of ill-natured rumours touching the Baltimore family. In return, her Grace favoured them with the im- pertinent comments transmitted from Paris by Lord Wyndham Spalding, in his letters to his sisters. She knew that Marian was shy and awkward — easily counselled, easily governed, and with no stronger shield than upright intentions to secure her from being counselled and governed ill. She knew that the timid Mrs. Arthur had fallen into the control of Lady Arabella Quin, and immediately resolved, should she ever visit Yorkshire, to convert her FEMALE DOMINATION. 275 into an implement of torture to her long-ofFend- ing mother-in-law. Her Grace's first measure towards the ac- complishment of her projects, was to obtain favour in the sight of Arthur. Although her sons were intimately acquainted with him, the Duchess knew little more of the young Life- Guardsman previous to his marriage, than is to be learned by a five minutes' colloquy at Almack's, where the interlocutors are a well- diamonded Duchess of fifty, and a shy young Cornet of twenty-one ; or by still briefer inter- views at the door of her Opera-box, where, in the absence of a more eligible escort, his assist- ance was tolerated in calling the carriage or tying on the snow-shoe. At that period, in- deed, she had felt a certain degree of hesita- tion in courting him to her house — his assi- duities might interfere with those of the young Marquis of Clydesdale, or annoy the highly- exclusive Duke of Witherby, whom she had 276 FEMALE DOMI^ATION. still hopes of securing for her daughter Ho- noria. But all was over now. Though Lady Ho- noria and Lady Amabel were still unmarried, the Duchess could, with perfect propriety, invite her young Yorkshire neighbour (who must of course be leading a comfortless bache- lor life) to dine in St. James's Square, or take a seat in their box, whenever he had no better engagement. Nothing could be more cha- ritable, nothing more kind than such atten- tions, particularly considering their political differences, and her son Leicester's recent de- feat at Thoroton. Even her charge to her daughters of " Pray, be very civil to young Armytage, but take care not to let Mm be in your way," can scarcely be considered a drawback on her well-meant hospitality ; while the secret rejoinder of Lady Amabel to her sister, — " Rely upon it, mamma intends to make him her firearuard, as she did FEMALE DOMINATION. 277 Wemmersley last season, whenever she wanted to interfere with our flirtations," need only be taken as an evidence of the success of their ladyships' distinguished education in the art and science of modern manners. CHAPTER XIX. Here comes the Briton. — Let liim be so entertained among you as suits a stranger of his quality. I beseech you all, be better known to this gentleman. Shakspeare. The Ducliess's calculation, that Arthur would only too eagerly accept her general invitation, proved erroneous. For a whole week the new member did not make himself visible in St. James's Square ; and her Grace, satisfied of the all-surpassing attractions of her gay house and brilliant societ}^, fancied that the sort of shy reserve so common to young Englishmen must be the cause of his absence : yet how to attribute shyness or reserve to the frank and well-bred Mr. Armytage, who had "fait fu- reur' in Paris, whose demeanour at his election FEMALE DOMINATION. 279 bear-baiting, and whose maiden speech in the House, were ah-eady cited as an honour to the county of York ? — Still less was her Grace in- clined to accept as an apology for his remiss- ness, the motive assigned by her son Lord Leicester, that ''Armytage was too well amused at his clubs and among his former brother-officers, to trouble himself with the intolerable nuisance of clressing to dine out." Intent on the accomplishment of her scheme, the Duchess next decided that Arthur was proud — proud with the susceptible pride of a 'squire; that her civilities had been too familiar ; and a vast card was accordingly de- spatched, inviting him for a solemn dinner- party at a fortnight's date, — a solemn dinner- party on an ex-senatorial Saturda}^ which left him no plea of evasion. He found one, how- ever, in spite of all her precaution. That one eventful and especial Saturday was the last day of Ascot Races; when profiting by the dies non, Arthur had engaged himself to dine 280 FEMALE DOMINATION, and sleep at Lord Rydal's, in the neighbour- hood of Windsor. The Duchess was excessively provoked ; the more so that the recusant object of her patronage could plead an engagement so much to the purpose. Her own sons, ay ! even her eldest, her Cupid of fifty descents, the irresistible Marquis of Downham, had ex- pressed in her hearing the most anxious desire to form part of the race-party at Lord Rydal's, and his consciousness of the inaccessibility of such a distinction. That Arthur Armytage had managed to penetrate the exclusive portal, she could neither understand nor forgive ! " I have been attacking this man only to get at his wife," — was the result of her se- rious meditations on the subject ; — " and I see that it is only t/trouyh his wife I can hope to attack him.'' And chance favoured the desijrn. On the following day there was what is called a '' pri- vate view" of a fashionable exhibition ; — that FEMALE DOMINATION. 281 is, an opportunity for the elect of the gay world to crush each other to death, in a mob of five hundred people ; instead of taking their ease, among the two or three indivi- duals of doubtful quality paying for tlieir admittance on the following day. In the thickest and hottest of this privileged mob was Arthur fated to encounter the Duchess, panting and ghastly, salts-bottle and vinai- fjrette in hand. " Delighted to see you, Mr. Armytage. — What a dreadful crowd ! — The heat is per- fectly overpowering. The directors ought to be more reserved in issuing tickets. Two 3^oung ladies already carried out fainting ; and old Lord Fussball, in an attack, which I trust may not prove apoplectic, — appearances were sadly against him." " Can I be of any use in assisting you to make your way towards the door ?" inquired Arthur good-naturedly ; compassionating her Grace's half-asphyxiated condition. 282 FExMALE DOMINATION. " Thank you, — no ! We are making our way regularly through the rooms. — I have scarcely seen the pictures in this room. Ho- noria, my love, there is Lord Edward Brere- ton just squeezing in at the door, and bowing to you." Arthur was about to profit by this aside, and turn away. But the Duchess was quick- sighted as a lynx. '' I hope you have satisfactory news from Holywell, Mr. Armytage ? — It is a very great disappointment to my daughters and myself — (Amabel ! — Lord Clydesdale going away, and you have not spoken to him !) — that Mrs. Arthur Armytage should have been prevented visitiniT town this season. We have heard so much of her from my son Wyndham, as to venture to look upon her as an acquaintance ; and I was in hopes we should have met very frequently in the course of the season!" Arthur bowed his acknowledgments. " As it is, I trust our intercourse will com- FEMALE DOMINATION. 283 nience on a still more friendly footing in the country. Mrs. Armytage, I know, is wedded to Holywell, and tlie thirty miles' distance be- tween us has proved an obstacle to intimac}'- between the families. You must persuade your wife to be more indulgent, — to suppose us neighbours ; and leave it to u-^ to induce her to look upon us as friends." The warm feelings of Arthur were touched ; they were particularly accessible to any kind- ness shown to Marian. He was fluent in his thanks ; — then, turning to Lady Honoria, whose eyes seemed riveted on a fine Claude, uttered some commonplace remarks on the merits of the collection, from her replies to which it was easy to be gathered that she did not know a Hogarth from a Tenicrs, a Rubens from a Reynolds. " If you are fond of pictures, Mr. Army- tage," said the Duchess, graciously, ''you should accompany me this evening to my bro- 284 FEMALK DOMINATION, Iher Lord Wildingliam's ; — his gallery is con-- sidered one of tlie most select in London." ? Artliur, again all gratitude, was compelled to admit that, if lie could get away from the house, he was engaged to join the Rotherharas at the Opera. " Join the Rotherhams !" And he had never once profited by the Duchess's invitation to her box ! " I did not know the Rotherhams were Opera-going people ! " said Lady Honoria, sneeringly. " In fact, one seldom sees them anywhere." • " Opera-going, but not ballet-staying peo- ple," replied Arthur with a smile. " Lady Rotherham's health does not admit of her keeping late hours." " Yes, I am aware that she is a sort of Madame Argan, who has been dying by half inches these one and twenty years," said the Duchess of Spalding. " I used to put her FEMALE DOMINATION. 2S5 name down for my footman's weekly circular of inquiries after the sick and convalescent ; but as slic was always ' as well as could be expected,' and as I expected nothing at all about the matter, I scratched her out at last as dead — or ought to be dead." Arthur did not laugh, though he saw it was expected of hlui. '' I fancy Willis pays an annuity to Lady Rothcrliam and her daughter for airing his rooms. There they are every Wednesday, I am told, as punctual as the candle-lighters ; — and, as one is going up the stairs two or three hours afterwards, one is sure to be bowed to from some odd corner by two mummies hooded up in their cloaks to wait for their carriage ; and to hear, when yours drives off, that Lady Rotherham's stops the way." '' Not always cpiite so early 1" said Arthur Armytage, piqued for his friends. " I assure you I was dancing with Lady Laura at Lady Rydal's ball, at three o'clock this morning." 286 FEMALE DOMINATION. " A very pretty story, upon my honour !" exclaimed a wheezy voice issuing from a fat iigare in a bright bhie pehsse, wedged in be- tween the Duchess of Spalding and Lady Amabel, and o ver power in gly scented with ver- ve'ine. " So this is the way you country gen- tlemen perform your duties in parliament ? Poor dear Dyke declares he never gets a glimpse of you in the House, not even when the Leeds railroad was brought forward last week. Well, well ! — if you don't make me some very fine promises and come and take your family- dinner with us on Sunda}^, trust to me for writing word of all your proceedings to your wife I" And poor Arthur found his hands heartily shaken by the good-humoured Mrs. Dyke Robsey, her elbows meanwhile protrud- ing themselves unmercifully into the shrinking sides of the Duchess and her daughter. But the Duchess was too discreet even to look her astonishment. " And what in the wide world have you been FEMALE DOMINATION. 287 doing with yourself ever since you have been in town?" pursued the bkie lady, alive to nothing but the good fortune of a meeting Avith her young relative. '• We Ve been ex- pecting and expecting you to call again, ever since the day you left your card ; and no end of dinner-parties, and always a knife and fork kept for you. You know you're a first fa- vourite with poor dear Dyke, — only he's rather in dudgeon just now about your name being in the majority against the Liskeard railroad. And between ourselves, my brother Baltimore is getting rather huffy about never being able to get sight of you. He says he calls and calls, and you are always out, or your servant says you are dining at Lord Rotherham's or Botherum's, or some great man's or other. Now you know Jack has a warm heart, and it's natural he should 1 beg your par- don, ma'am," cried Mrs. Robsey, interrupting herself to address the Duchess, "but your 2S8 FEMALE DOMINATION. voyl is sticking to my chain, and if we don't take care, there'll he a tear, — and tear is sometimes worse than wear, — as my sister Baltimore says to her bantlings." The Duchess did not, or would not, hear. A slight movement in the crowd favoured her escape ; and the magnificent demi-voile of ap- plication de Bruxelles soon hung in shreds round her supercilious face, while, with a lan- guid smile of adieu to Arthur, the Ladies Spalding passed on superior. " Well, if ever I saw such folly !" cried Mrs. Dyke Robsey. " Forty guineas, if it cost a shilling ; and just because she was too idle to help me disentangle it !" " Hush ! — the Duchess of Spalding will overhear you !" whispered Arthur, hoping to moderate her voice, if not her indignation. "The Duchess — who did you say? — the Duchess f' cried Mrs. Robsey, still louder than before. FEMALE DOMINATION. 289 " The Duchess of Spalding. — She is still close to us — be cautious," said Arthur. '' NoAv why didn't you tell me at once that it was the Duchess of Spalding ! " exclaimed Marian's aunt. " It would have been such a famous opportunity for getting acquainted ^vith her, and I've long been wanting to know her. We were all staying together at the York Hotel at Dover last summer. Do see if we can't push after her, and you can introduce me, and I can apologize." " The Duchess and her daughters, as you perceive, are in haste to leave the room," said Arthur in a low voice, perceiving, from the smiles evident on several strange faces around them, that their conversation had been over- heard. " Another time." " Ay, ay ! another time !" she replied, easily satisfied, and easily diverted from her object. '• We'll talk about it to-morrow at dinner. Six o'clock and punctual, please, as it's Sunday, on account of the servants. It's poor dear VOL. I. O 290 FEMALE DOMINATION, Dyke's rule, as you may remember, for tlie establishment to enjoy itself of a Sunday." " My dear Armytage/' whispered Lord Greta, who had accompanied Arthur to the gallery, and hastened to rejoin him as soon as he noticed the departure of the Duchess of Spalding, his " favourite aversion," — " I think I hear you making an engagement for Sunday, as if you were inclined to forget your promise of accompanying us to Petersham to-morrov\^ !" " I had indeed forgotten it," replied Army- tage ; " but pray let me present you to Mrs. Robsey, that you may assist me to plead my excuses." And an introduction to a Lord — a young and handsome Lord — certainly had its share in averting the good lady's displeasure ; while Greta, too gentlemanly to fancy himself irre- trievably lost in the eyes of the world, from being seen in conversation with a lady in a flashy pelisse, and too true to his political vocation not to profit by Arthur's whisper of — FEMALE DOMINATION. 291 *• wife to the Whig member for Perjureham/' explained the previous engagement of his friend with the most courteous deference. Escorted to her carriage by the two young men, her vast variety of chains and trinkets jingling at every step, Mrs. Robsey, after uttering very audible adieux to " his Lord- ship " from the door of her britschka, called aloud to bid Arthur " mind and come and take his mutton with them the first idle day, or poor dear Dyke would never forgive him. — It was shameful of him to give all his time to those Botherums." Luckily, Lord Greta w^as out of hearing. o2 CHAPTER XX. Was it kind, To Iea\e me like a turtle here alone, To droop and mourn the absence of my mate ? When thou art from me, every place is desert. And I, methinks, am savage and forlorn. Otway. To the Greta family, Arthur Armytage cer- tainly did devote the whole of his leisure. The house of Jack Baltimore it was impossible for him to enter without disgust : — noisy, as it was dirty, disorderly, and necessitous — fit home for a man who, his whole life long, had devoted himself to a horse ; and poignant was his rejjret that the nearest relatives of his wife should be so degraded in the eyes of society — so unattractive in his own. His father s nearest relative. Lord Armytage, occupied a post in the administration; and Arthur kept sedu- FEMALE DOMINATION. 293 lously aloof, lest he might be supposed to court his Lordship's patronage. But, at Lord Rotherham's, where he was welcomed like the Piccolomini to the hearth of Wallenstein, as the '' kind dcs hauscs,'' — where he found his earliest friends and playmates, friendly and lively as ever, and principles and habits con- genial with his own, — he was glad to take refuge from the solitary publicity of a London hoteL The Earl bade him remember, as he had been wont to do in his holidays and vaca- tions, that there was always a place for him at his table; and Arthur, who had always reve- renced Lord Rotherham as his father s most intimate friend — the afflicted witness of his untimely end — felt no scruple in accepting the hospitality thus cordially tendered by his Yorkshire neighbour. It was so easy, too, to walk home from the House arm-in-arm with his friend Greta, straight to St. James's Place ; and Lady Rotherham was so glad to see and welcome a 294 FEMALE DOMINATION. guest who knew her ten children name by name, and which of them had been run away with by his pony, and which had so narrowly escaped drowning in the reservoir, and whom one and all called '' Arthur," and romped with as a brother. Even Lady Laura, though somewhat haughty and reserved with casual visiters, had her old- standing jokes and friendly words of mutual understanding with him ; so that, after a fortnight passed in London, a par- ticular chair came to be apportioned as that of Arthur Armytage at Lord Eotherham's table, and a particular corner of a particular sofa, in Lady Rotherham's drawing-room, to bear his name. His worthy host and hostess consi- dered that they were doing not only what was kind, but what was right, in affording to the son of their old friend, placed in such a posi- tion as Arthur, a resource against the tempta- tions of idleness and dissipation. They left him no excuse for wasting his time and his money in barrack-rooms or clubs. FEMALE DOMINATION. 295 And in such a mode of life, it must be owned that there was something peculiarly agreeable to Arthur. He liked the stir of a large family, combined Avith the regularity of an orderly one. He liked the bonhommie of the Greta tribe — their cheerfulness — their cordiality. The whole thing came refreshingly to him after a prolonged residence at Paris; where, if he had found much to amuse, he had seen little to approve. But now, he was once more among people of his own caste and kind, he was very happy — perfectly happy — too happy perhaps, considering that in the first year of his marriage, he was for the first time sepa- rated from his wife. Marian's letters, however, arrived as regu- larly as the post, to remind him that if he was enjopng liimself, she was sad and a sufferer. She complained of the dulness of the time which was passing for him so pleasantly, in- treating him, however, and with perfect sin- cerity of heart, not to apply himself too severely 296 FEMALE DOMINATION. to the duties of his new vocation ; not to give np his thoughts too exclusively to politics — to seek the relaxation so indispensable for his health — to avoid the anxious fears for herself which she knew must be pressing on his mind. Arthur's heart almost reproached him with duplicity while he was perusing these affec- tionate and candid outpourings of Marian's feelings. Yet he had done no wrong ; had no conjugal backslidings with Avhich to re- proach himself; and to have volunteered to his wife a self- accusation of finding himself too prone to bachelor- enjoyments, and too happy in her absence, would have been at once an injury and an insult. He profited, therefore, by her often-repeated exhortations, to amuse himself during the in- tervals of his parliamentary duties : — dining with the Rotherhams, lounging in the Park with Greta, or dancing at Almack's with Lady Laura, whenever they were at the trouble of procuring him a subscription. June, with its FEMALE DOMINATION. 297 thorns ana its roses, its strawberries and its villa-dejednes, had akeady begun ; and though Arthur was not heartless enough to purpose prolonging his sojourn in town one hour beyond the necessities of the case, yet he did sometimes ahnost regret that the days passed so quickly, and that the hours were of imperceptible duration. The fault mi^ht in some measure lie with his mother. The atmosphere of Holywell was so apt to be a stormy one ! — foo stormy for a man of Arthur's indolent complexion and cheerful temper. He dreaded the fracasseries of the place — the testiness of the old servants — the dependence to which he found himself reduced. Grillon's Hotel wanted (he flattered himself that such was his conviction) only Marian's presence to be a perfect Paradise ; for with all the duplicity of this wicked world, few of us succeed in deceiving others so com- pletely as we succeed, without effort, in de- ceiving ourselves. 298 FEMALE DOMINATION. One person, meanwhile, was keenly alive to the moral dangers of Arthur's position. The clear-sighted Sophia felt that in Marian's place she should be less satisfied than Marian with the tenour of Arthur's correspondence ; and was beginning to count the days to the expected close of the session, almost as eagerly as her sister-in-law. She was better acquainted with the versatility of Arthur's disposition ; with his former familiarity in the Greta family, and the expectations to which it had given rise. She even thought her friend Lady Laura wrong, innocently and luiconsciously wrong, for continuing to dance with her brother ; more particularly when the fact had been pointed out to her notice in one of Mr. Wem- mersley's morning visits, by an observation of " So I see, by the Morning Post, that our new Member is taking his Wednesdaj^'s privilege of relaxation, and keeping ap his loves and friendships of old times ? " " I really do not understand you," said FEMALE DOMINATION. 299 Sophia, dreading that Marian, who was going through a course of fashions with Mrs. Wem- mersley, should overhear the insinuation. "Don't you? Have you not observed that his pairing off with Lady Laura Greta in the Ahnack quadrilles, is regularly announced?" "Very likely. The last time I was in town, I saw my own name coupled among the waltzers, with that of the Duke of Wetherby ; /, who never waltzed in my life, and never had the slightest acquaintance with the Duke." " And your brother, of course, has not the slightest acquaintance with Lady Laura ? " persisted Wemmersley, laughing significantly. " On the contrary, they have been friends from childhood ; and I fancy it is only on the score of such very old acquaintanceship, that a married man has a right to intrude on a young lady as a partner." " I thank you for the hint ! " he replied ; and Sophia was rejoiced that at any cost she had succeeded in diverting him from his object. 300 FEMALE DOMINATION. " I now understand why you received me so very coolly last year, when you accompanied the Rotherhams to the Doncaster Race hall ; and you shall find (at the ball which I con- clude our new Member means to give us at his return on his return,) that I have profited by the lesson. Trust me, I will not again inter- fere with Lord Greta's better pretensions." Sophia would have given a great deal to ascertain, after the departure of the Wem- mersleys, how much of this commentary on Arthur's conduct had reached the cars of her sister-in-law. But she could not hazard a direct inquiry ; and Marian's simplicity of mind was exactly calculated to defeat any other mode of attack. The moment she de- tected anv one trvinp; to discover her senti- ments, she made twice as ample a declaration as the occasion needed, often avowing much more than the manoeuvrer was bent on ascer- taining. Miss Armytage was almost afraid of learning, not only that Arthur's wife had over- FEMALE DOMINATION. 301 heard all, but to what extent that all affected her feelings, and was likely to influence her conduct. She noticed, however, that Marian that evening looked paler and sadder than usual ; and, on her retiring to rest, ventured to observe to her mother that Mrs. Arthur's strength and spirits were manifestly declining. But Mrs. Armytage, whose thoughts were engrossed by the splendid nursery-furniture and nurser}'- suits she had that morning received from town for the use of the little heir of Holywell, and purposed presenting on the morrow to her daughter-in-law, attributed her languor to the approach of the event so anxiously anticipated by the family. The morrow came ; the gifts, courteously offered and accepted, scarcely seemed for a moment to occupy the attention of the listless Marian. Old Mrs. Macklin, who had pre- sided over the birth of Arthur and Sophia, and ever since formed a sort of fixture among the 302 FEMALE DOMINATION. green and ever-springing olive branches at Greta Castle, was somewhat scandalized to see the young lady to whom she was now about to devote her services, so insensible to the beauty of the Valenciennes cockades, and the fineness of the cambric robing ; and felt per- suaded that Mrs. Armytage must be indig- nant at the ingratitude of her daughter-in-law. But she was mistaken. Mrs. Armytage liked Marian the better for her indifference to such things. — She began to hope that her mind was less vulgar and trivial than she had imagined. Time wore on. The days, long and Mid- summerish as they were, passed away. All the papers agreed in announcing the proro- gation of Parliament for the 21st ; and on the 23rd Arthur would be at Holywell! Still, Marian's depression was not diminished, nor Sophia's anxiety. The Duchess of Spalding who, on her annual journey northwards, was in the habit of dignifying Mill Hill by making it her sleeping inn, took the opportunity of FEMALE DOxMlNATION. 303 paying a morning visit to Mrs. Army tage^ on her progress home the following day ; apparently for the purpose of announcing her regret that Arthur's family engagements with the Eother- hams had prevented her the happiness of catching a glimpse of him in town : and when Mrs. Armytage drily replied that it gave her unfeigned pleasure to hear of her son being engrossed by such satisfactory connexions, the Duchess had no readier means of revenge than by redoubling her attentions to the sad and silent Marian ; and assuring her that Mr. Armytage had in some degree made the amende honourable, by promising that the first visit made by himself and his wife on her recovery, should be to Spalding Court. Ma- * rian smiled and bowed her ready acceptance. It was a solace to her to think that her first visit w as not already pledged to Greta Castle. But the information afforded by the gossip- ing Duchess, and incidentally confirmed in Lady Honoria s chit-chat with Miss Armytage, 304 FEMALE DOMINATION. that Arthur was the gayest of the gay, the most bachelor-hke of bachelor-husbands, did not prepare the family to receive with patience his announcement that, " very particular en- gagements in town w^ould prevent his being at home till the 25th, when Lord Greta had pro- mised him a place in his carriage." " Why not come in his own ?" exclaimed his proud mother. ''Why not come in the mail?" exclaimed the impatient Marian. *' Why not come at once ?" fhougJd even the forbearing Sophia. But they had no leisure for much thinking or saying on the subject. In the course of the day, Mrs. Macklin announced Marian to be seriously ill; and Mrs. Armytage again began to tremble at the prognostications which threatened a triumph to Reginald Maudsley. The old nurse, eager to enhance the merits of her services, hinted that children born under such circumstances seldom survived. Even FEMALE DOMINATION. 305 the doctors seemed discouraged. An express was hastily despatched for Arthur ; and, from the bell-ringers to the park-keepers and their bonfire, all was anxiety and suspense at Holy- well. END OF VOL. I. VOL. LONDON: Printed by William Clowes anc Sons,' Stamford Street.