Book: Marriage

S >> Susan Edmonstone Ferrier >> Marriage




"Certainly Sir Eneas must have been a most wonderful man--nobody can
deny that; and there can be no question but he had the second-sight to
the greatest degree--indeed, I never heard it disputed; many of his
prophecies, indeed, seem to have been quite incomprehensible; but that
is so much the more extraordinary; you know--for instance, the one with
regard to our family," lowering her voice; "for my part I declare I
never could comprehend it; and yet there must be something in it, too;
but how any branch from the Glenfern tree--of course, you know, that can
only mean the family tree--should help to prop Lochmarlie's walls, is
what I can't conceive. If Sir Sampson had a son, to be sure, some of the
girls--for you know it can't be any of us; at least I declare for my own
part--I'm sure even if any thing which I trust, in goodness, there is
not the least chance of, should ever happen to dear Lady Maclaughlan, and
Sir Sampson should take it into his head--which, of course, is a thing
not to be thought about--and indeed I'm quite convinced it would be very
much out of respect to dear Lady Maclaughlan, a friendship for us, if
such a thing was ever into his head."

Here the tender Grizzy got so involved in her own ideas as to the
possibility of Lady Maclaughlan's death, and the propriety of Sir
Sampson's proposals, together with the fulfilling of Sir Eneas the
seer's prophecy, that there is no saying how far she strayed in her
self-created labyrinth. Such as choose to follow her may. For our part, we
prefer accompanying the youthful Becky to her chamber, whither she was
also attended by the lady of the mansion. Becky's destiny for the night
lay at the top of one of those little straggling wooden stairs common in
old houses, which creaked in all directions. The bed was placed in a
recess dark as Erebus, and betwixt the bed and the wall, was a depth
profound, which Becky's eye dared not attempt to penetrate.

"You will find everything right here, child," said Lady Maclaughlan;
"and if anything should be wrong you must think it right. I never suffer
anything to be wrong here--humph!" Becky, emboldened by despair, cast a
look towards the recess; and in a faint voice ventured to inquire, "Is
there no fear that Tom Jones or Gil Blas may be in that place behind
the bed?"

"And if they should," answered her hostess in her most appalling
tone, "what is that to you? Are you a mouse, that you are afraid they
will eat you? Yes, I suppose you are. You are perhaps the princess in
the fairy tale, who was a woman by day and a mouse by night. I believe
you are bewitched! So I wish your mouseship a good night." And she
descended the creaking stair, singing,

"Mrs. Mouse, are you within?"

till even her stentorian voice was lost in distance. Poor Becky's heart
died with the retreating sounds, and only revived to beat time with the
worm in the wood. Long and eerie was the night, as she gave herself up
to all the horrors of a superstitious mind--ghosts, gray, black, and
white, flitted around her couch; cats, half human, held her throat; the
deathwatch ticked in her ears. At length the light of morning shed its
brightening influence on the dim opaque of her understanding; and when
all things stood disclosed in light, she shut her eyes and oped her
mouth in all the blissfulness of security. The light of day was indeed
favourable for displaying to advantage the beauties of Lochmarlie
Castle, which owed more to nature than art. It was beautifully situated
on a smooth green bank, that rose somewhat abruptly from the lake, and
commanded a view, which, if not extensive, was yet full of variety and
grandeur.

Its venerable turrets reared themselves above the trees which seemed
coeval with them; and the vast magnificence of its wide-spreading lawns
and extensive forests seemed to appertain to some feudal prince's lofty
domain. But in vain were creation's charms spread before Lady Juliana's
eyes. Woods and mountains and lakes and rivers were odious things; and
her heart panted for dusty squares and suffocating drawing-rooms.

Something was said of departing by the sisters when the party met at
breakfast; but this was immediately negatived in the most decided manner
by their hostess.

"Since you have taken your own time to come, my dears, you must take
mine to go. Thursday was the day I invited you for, or at least wanted
you for, so you must stay Thursday, and go away on Friday, and my
blessing go with you--humph!"

The sisters, charmed with what they termed the hospitality and
friendship of this invitation, delightedly agreed to remain; and as
things were at least conducted in better style there than at Glenfern,
uncomfortable as it was, Lady Juliana found herself somewhat nearer home
there than at the family chateau. Lady Maclaughlan, who _could _be
commonly civil in her own house, was at some pains to amuse her guest by
showing her collection of china and cabinet of gems, both of which were
remarkably fine. There was also a library, and a gallery, containing
some good pictures, and, what Lady Juliana prized still more, a billiard
table. Thursday, the destined day, at length arrived, and a large party
assembled to dinner. Lady Juliana, as she half reclined on a sofa,
surveyed the company with a supercilious stare, and without deigning to
take any part in the general conversation that went on. It was enough
that they spoke with a peculiar accent--everything they said must be
barbarous; but she was pleased once more to eat off plate, and to find
herself in rooms which, though grotesque and comfortless, yet wore an
air of state, and whose vastness enabled her to keep aloof from those
with whom she never willingly came in contact. It was therefore with
regret she saw the day of her departure arrive, and found herself once
more an unwilling inmate of her only asylum; particularly as her
situation now required comforts and indulgences which it was there
impossible to procure.




CHAPTER XVIII.

"No mother's care
Shielded my infant innocence with prayer:
* * * * *
Mother, miscall'd, farewell!"

Savage.

THE happy period, so long and anxiously anticipated by the ladies of
Glenfern, at length arrived and Lady Juliana presented to the house of
Douglas--not, alas! the ardently-desired heir to its ancient
consequence, but twin-daughters, who could only be regarded as
additional burdens on its poverty.

The old gentleman's disappointment was excessive; and, as he paced up
and down the parlour, with his hands in his pockets, he muttered, "Twa
lasses! I ne'er heard tell o' the like o't. I wonder whar their tochers
are to come frae?"

Miss Grizzy, in great perturbation, declared it certainly was a great
pity it had so happened, but these things couldn't be helped; she was
sure Lady Maclaughlan would be greatly surprised.

Miss Jacky saw no cause for regret, and promised herself an endless
source of delight in forming the minds and training the ideas of her
infant nieces.

Miss Nicky wondered how they were to be nursed. She was afraid Lady
Juliana would not be able for both, and wet-nurses had such stomachs!

Henry, meanwhile, whose love had all revived in anxiety for the safety,
and anguish for the sufferings of his youthful partner, had hastened to
her apartment, and, kneeling by her side, he pressed her hands to his
lips with feelings of the deepest emotion.

"Dearer--a thousand times dearer to me than ever," whispered he, as he
fondly embraced her, "and those sweet pledges of our love!"

"Ah, don't mention them," interrupted his lady in a languid tone. "How
very provoking! I hate girls so--and two of them--oh!" and she sighed
deeply. Her husband sighed too; but from a different cause. The nurse
now appeared, and approached with her helpless charges; and both
parents, for the first time looked on their own offspring.

"What nice little creatures!" said the delighted father, as, taking them
in his arms, he imprinted the first kiss on the innocent faces of his
daughters, and then held them to their mother; who, turning from them
with disgust, exclaimed, "How can you kiss them, Harry? They are so
ugly, and they squall so! Oh do, for heaven's sake, take them away! And
see, there is poor Psyche quite wretched at being so long away from me.
Pray, put her on the bed."

"She will grow fond of her babies by-and-by," said poor Henry to
himself, as he quitted the apartment, with feelings very different from
those with which he entered it.

At the pressing solicitations of her husband, the fashionable mother
was prevailed upon to attempt nursing one of her poor starving infants;
but the first trial proved also the last, as she declared nothing upon
earth should ever induce her to perform so odious an office; and as
Henry's entreaties and her aunts' remonstrances served alike to irritate
and agitate her, the contest was, by the advice of her medical
attendant, completely given up. A wet-nurse was therefore procured; but
as she refused to undertake both children, and the old gentleman would
not hear of having two such encumbrances in his family, it was settled,
to the unspeakable delight of the maiden sisters, that the youngest
should be entrusted entirely to their management, and brought up by
hand.

The consequence was such as might have been foreseen. The child, who
was naturally weak and delicate at its birth, daily lost a portion of
its little strength, while its continued cries declared the intensity of
its sufferings, though they produced no other effect on its unfeeling
mother than her having it removed to a more distant apartment, as she
could not endure to hear the cross little thing scream so for nothing.
On the other hand, the more favoured twin, who was from its birth a
remarkably strong lively infant, and met with all justice from its
nurse, throve apace, and was pronounced by her to be the very picture of
the _bonnie leddie, its mamma,_ and then, with all the low cunning of
her kind, she would launch forth into panegyrics of its beauty, and
prophecies of the great dignities and honours that would one day be
showered upon it; until, by her fawning and flattery, she succeeded in
exciting a degree of interest, which nature had not secured for it in
the mother's breast.

Things were in this situation when, at the end of three weeks, Mr. and
Mrs. Douglas arrived to offer their congratulations on the birth of the
twins. Lady Juliana received her sister-in-law in her apartment, which
she had not yet quitted, and replied to her congratulations only by
querulous complaints and childish murmurs.

"I am sure you are very happy in not having children," continued she, as
the cries of the little sufferer reached her ear; "I hope to goodness I
shall never have any more. I wonder if anybody ever had twin daughters
before, and I, too, who hate girls so!"

Mrs Douglas, disgusted with her unfeeling folly, knew not what to reply,
and a pause ensued; but afresh burst of cries from the unfortunate baby
again called forth its mother's indignation.

"I wish to goodness that child was gagged," cried she, holding her hands
to her ears. "It has done nothing but scream since the hour it was born,
and it makes me quite sick to hear it."

"Poor little dear!" said Mrs. Douglas compassionately, "it appears to
suffer a great deal."

"Suffer!" repeated her sister-in-law; "what can it suffer? I am sure it
meets with a great deal attention than any person in the house. These
three old women do nothing but feed it from morning to night, with
everything they can think of, and make such a fuss about it!"

"I suspect, my dear sister, you would be very sorry for yourself,"
said Mrs. Douglas, with a smile, "were you to endure the same
treatment as your poor baby; stuffed with improper food and loathsome
drugs, and bandied about from one person to another."

"You may say what you please," retorted Lady Juliana pettishly; "but I
know it's nothing but ill temper: nurse says so too; and it is so ugly
with constantly crying that I cannot bear to look at it;" and she turned
away her head as Miss Jacky entered red with the little culprit in her
arms, which she was vainly endeavouring to _talk _into silence, while
she dandled it in the most awkward _maiden-like_ manner imaginable.

"Good heavens! what a fright!" exclaimed the tender parent, as her child
was held up to her. "Why, it is much less than when it was born, an its
skin is as yellow as saffron, and it squints! Only look what a
difference," as the nurse advanced and ostentatiously displayed her
charge, who had just waked out of a long sleep; its checks flushed with
heat; its skin completely filled up; and its large eyes rolling under
its already dark eyelashes.

"The bonny wean's just her mamma's pickter," drawled out the nurse, "but
the wee missy's uncolike her aunties."

"Take her away," cried Lady Juliana in a tone of despair; "I wish I
could send her out of my hearing altogether, for her noise will be the
death of me."

"Alas! what would I give to hear the blessed sound of a living child!"
exclaimed Mrs. Douglas, taking the infant in her arms. "And how great
would be my happiness could I call the poor rejected one mine!"

"I'm sure you are welcome to my share of the little plague," said her
sister-in-law, with a laugh, "if you can prevail upon Harry to give up
his."

"I would give up a great deal could my poor child find a mother,"
replied her husband, who just then entered.

"My dear brother!" cried Mrs. Douglas, her eyes beaming with delight,
"do you then confirm Lady Juliana's kind promise? Indeed I will be a
mother to your dear baby, and love her as if she were my own; and in a
month--oh! in much less time--you shall see her as stout as her sister."

Henry sighed, as he thought, "'Why has not my poor babe such a mother of
its own?" Then thanking his sister-in-law for her generous intentions,
he reminded her that she must consult her husband, as few men liked to
be troubled with any children but their own.

"You are in the right," said Mrs. Douglas, blushing at the impetuosity
of feeling which had made her forget for an instant the deference due to
her band; "I shall instantly ask his permission, and he is so indulgent
to all my wishes that I have little doubt of obtaining his consent;"
and, with the child in her arms, she hastened to her husband, and made
known her request.

Mr. Douglas received the proposal with considerable coolness; wondering
what his wife could see in such an ugly squalling thing to plague
herself about it. If it had been a boy, old enough to speak and run
about, there might be some amusement in it; but he could not see the use
of a squalling sickly infant--and a girl too!

His wife sighed deeply, and the tears stole down her cheeks as she
looked on the wan visage and closed eyes of the little sufferer. "God
help the, poor baby?" said she mournfully; "you are rejected on all
hands, but your misery will soon be at a end;" and she was slowly
leaving the room with her helpless charge when her husband, touched at
the sight of her distress, though the feeling that caused it he did not
comprehend, called to her, "I am sure, Alicia, if you really wish to
take charge of the infant I have no objections; only I think you will
find it la great plague, and the mother is such a fool"

"Worse than a fool," said Mrs. Douglas indignantly, "for she hates and
abjures this her poor unoffending babe"

"Does she so?" cried Mr. Douglas, every kindling feeling roused within
him at the idea of his blood being hated and abjured; "then, hang me! if
she shall have any child of Harry's to hate as long as I have a house to
shelter it and a sixpence to bestow upon it," taking the infant in his
arms, and kindly kissing it.

Mrs. Douglas smiled through her tears as she embraced her husband, and
praised his goodness and generosity; then, full of exultation and
delight, she flew to impart the success of her mission to the parents of
her _protegee._

Great was the surprise of the maiden nurses at finding they were to
be bereft of their little charge.

"I declare, I think the child is doing as well as possible," said Miss
Grizzy. "To be sure it does yammer constantly--that can't be denied; and
it is uncommonly small--nobody can dispute that. At the same time, I am
sure, I can't tell what makes it cry, for I've given it two colic
powders every day, and a tea-spoonful of Lady Maclaughlan's carminative
every three hours."

"And I've done nothing but make water-gruel and chop rusks for it,"
quoth Miss Nicky, "and yet it is never satisfied; I wonder what it would
be at."

"I know perfectly well what it would be at," said Miss Jacky, with an
air of importance. "All this crying and screaming is for nothing else
but a nurse; but it ought not to be indulged. There is no end of
indulging the desires, and 'tis amazing how cunning children are, and
how soon they know how to take advantage of people's weakness," glancing
an eye of fire at Mrs. Douglas. "Were that my child, I would feed her on
bread and water before I would humour her fancies. A pretty lesson,
indeed! if she's to have her own way before she's a month old."

Mrs. Douglas knew that it was in vain to attempt arguing with her aunts.
She therefore allowed them to wonder and declaim over their sucking
pots, colic powders, and other instruments of torture, while she sent to
the wife of one of her tenants who had lately lain-in, and who wished
for the situation of nurse, appointing her to be at Lochmarlie the
following day. Having made her arrangements, and collected the scanty
portion of clothing Mrs. Nurse chose to allow, Mrs. Douglas repaired to
her sister-in-law's apartment, with her little charge in her arms. She
found her still in bed, and surrounded with her favourites.

"So you really are going to torment yourself with that little
screech-owl?" said she. "Well, I must say it's very good of you; but I
am afraid you will soon tire of her. Children are such plagues! Are they
not, my darling?" added she, kissing her pug.

"You will not say so when you have seen my little girl a month hence,"
said Mrs. Douglas, trying to conceal her disgust for Henry's sake, who
had just then entered the room. "She has promised me never to cry any
more; so give her a kiss, and let us be gone."

The high-bred mother slightly touched the cheek of her sleeping babe,
extended her finger to her sister-in-law, and carelessly bidding them
good-bye, returned to her pillow and her pugs.

Henry accompanied Mrs. Douglas to the carriage, and before they parted
he promised his brother to ride over to Lochmarlie in a few days. He
said nothing of his child, but his glistening eye and the warm pressure
of his hand spoke volumes to the kind heart of his brother, who assured
him that Alicia would be very good to his little girl, and that he was
sure she would get quite well when she got a nurse. The carriage drove
off, and Henry, with a heavy spirit, returned to the house to listen to
his father's lectures, his aunts' ejaculations, and his wife's murmurs.




CHAPTER XIX.

"We may boldly spend upon the hope of what Is to come in."

_Henry IV_.

THE birth of twin daughters awakened the young father to a still
stronger sense of the total dependence and extreme helplessness of his
condition. Yet how to remedy it he knew not. To accept of his father's
proposal was out of the question, and it was equally impossible for him,
were he ever so inclined, to remain much longer a burden on the narrow
income of the Laird of Glenfern. One alternative only remained, which
was to address the friend and patron of his youth, General Cameron; and
to him he therefore wrote, describing all the misery of his situation,
and imploring his forgiveness and assistance. "The old General's passion
must have cooled by this time," thought he to himself, as he sealed the
letter, "and as he has often overlooked former scrapes, I think, after
all, he will help me out of this greatest one of all."

For once Henry was not mistaken. He received an answer to his letter, in
which the General, after execrating his folly in marrying a lady of
quality, swearing at the birth of his twin daughters, and giving him
some wholesome counsel as to his future mode of life, concluded by
informing him that he had got him reinstated in his former rank in the
army; that he should settle seven hundred per annum on him till he saw
how matters were conducted, and, in the meantime, enclosed a draught for
four hundred pounds, to open the campaign.

Though this was not, according to Henry's notions, "coming down
handsomely," still it was better than not coming down at all, and with a
mixture of delight and disappointment he flew to communicate the tidings
to Lady Juliana.

"Seven hundred pounds a year!" exclaimed she, in raptures: "Heavens!
what a quantity of money! why, we shall be quite rich, and I shall have
such a beautiful house, and such pretty carriages, and give such
parties, and buy so many fine things. Oh dear, how happy I shall be!"

"You know little of money, Julia, if you think seven hundred pounds will
do all that," replied her husband gravely. "I hardly think we can afford
a house in town; but we may have a pretty cottage at Richmond or
Twickenham, and I can keep a curricle, and drive you about, you know;
and we may give famous good dinners."

A dispute here ensued; her ladyship hated cottages and curricles and
good dinners as much as her husband despised fancy balls, opera boxes,
and chariots.

The fact was that the one knew very nearly as much of the real value of
money as the other, and Henry's _sober_ scheme was just as practicable
as his wife's extravagant one.

Brought up in the luxurious profusion of great house; accustomed to
issue her orders and have them obeyed, Lady Juliana, at the time she
married, was in the most blissful state of ignorance respecting the
value of pounds, shillings, and pence. Her maid took care to have her
wardrobe supplied with all things needful, and when she wanted a new
dress or a fashionable jewel, it was only driving to Madame D.'s, or Mr.
Y.'s, and desiring the article to be sent to herself, while the bill
went to her papa.

From never seeing money in its own vulgar form, Lady Juliana had learned
to consider it as a mere nominal thing; while, on the other hand, her
husband, from seeing too much of it, had formed almost equally erroneous
ideas of its powers. By the mistake kindness of General Cameron he had
been indulged in all the fashionable follies of the day, and allowed to
use his patron's ample fortune as if it had already been his own; nor
was it until he found himself a prisoner at Glenfern from want of money
that he had ever attached the smallest importance to it. In short, both
the husband and wife had been accustomed to look upon it in the same
light as the air they breathed. They knew it essential to life, and
concluded that it would come some way or other; either from the east or
west, north or south. As for the vulgar concerns of meat and drink,
servants' wages, taxes, and so forth, they never found a place in the
calculations of either. Birthday dresses, fetes, operas, equipages, and
state liveries whirled in rapid succession through Lady Juliana's brain,
while clubs, curricles, horses, and claret, took possession of her
husband's mind.

However much they differed in the proposed modes of showing off in
London, both agreed perfectly in the necessity of going there, and Henry
therefore hastened to inform his father of the change in his
circumstances, and apprise him of his intention of immediately joining
his regiment, the ---- Guards.

"Seven hunder pound a year!" exclaimed the old gentleman; "Seven hunder
pound! O' what can ye mak' o' a' that siller? Ye'll surely lay by the
half o't to tocher your bairns. Seven hunder pound a year for doing
naething!"

Miss Jacky was afraid, unless they got some person of sense (which would
not be an easy matter) to take the management of it, it would perhaps be
found little enough in the long-run.

Miss Grlzzy declared it was a very handsome income, nobody could dispute
that; at the same time, everybody must allow that the money could not
have been better bestowed.

Miss Nicky observed "there was a great deal of good eating and drinking
in seven hundred a year, if people knew how to manage it."

All was bustle and preparation throughout Glenfern Castle, and the young
ladies' good-natured activity and muscular powers were again in
requisition to collect the wardrobe, and pack the trunks, imperial,
etc., of their noble sister.

Glenfern remarked "that fules war fond o' flitting, for they seemed glad
to leave the good quarters they were in."

Miss Grizzy declared there was a great excuse for their being glad, poor
things! young people were always so fond of a change; at the same time,
nobody could deny but that it would have been quite natural for them to
feel sorry too.

Miss Jacky was astonished how any person's mind could be so callous as
to think of leaving Glenfern without emotion.

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