At a table covered with dark cloth sat Lady Lothrop, dressed entirely in black, with a great Book of Common Prayer spread out before her. The light from the heart-shaped hole streamed down upon this prayer-book in a sort of dusky shaft, and I was the more struck and impressed because it was not an ordinary volume, but a great folio bound in parchment, with heavy brass knobs and clasps, printed in black-letter, of that identical old edition first prepared in King Edward’s time, and appointed to be read in churches. Its very unusual and antique appearance impressed me with a kind of awe.
There was at the other end of the room a tall, full-length mirror, which, as we advanced, duplicated the whole scene, giving back faithfully the image of the spare figure of Lady Lothrop, her grave and serious face, and the strange old book over which she seemed to be bending, with a dusky gleaming of crimson draperies in the background.
“Come here, my children,” she said, as we hesitated; “how is your grandfather?”
“He is not so well to-day; and grandmamma said – “
“Yes, yes; I know,” she said, with a gentle little wave of the hand; “I desired that you might be sent for some wine; Pompey shall have it ready for you. But tell me, little boys, do you know what day this is?”
“It ‘s Friday, ma’am,” said I, innocently.
“Yes, my child; but do you know what Friday it is?” she said.
“No, ma’am,” said I, faintly.
“Well, my child, it is Good Friday; and do you know why it is called Good Friday?”
“No, ma’am.”
“This is the day when our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ died on the cross for our salvation; so we call it Good Friday.”
I must confess that these words struck me with a strange and blank amazement. That there had been in this world a personage called “Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,” I had learned from the repetition of his name as the usual ending of prayers at church and in the family; but the real literal fact that he had lived on earth had never presented itself to me in any definite form before; but this solemn and secluded room, this sombre woman shut out from all the ordinary ways of the world, devoting the day to lonely musing, gave to her words a strange reality.
“When did he die?” I said.
“More than a thousand years ago,” she answered.
Insensibly Harry had pressed forward till he stood in the shaft of light, which fell upon his golden curls, and his large blue eyes now had that wide-open, absorbed expression with which he always listened to anything of a religious nature, and, as if speaking involuntarily, he said eagerly, “But he is not dead. He is living; and we pray to him.”
“Why, yes, my son,” said Lady Lothrop, turning and looking with pleased surprise, which became more admiring as she gazed, – “yes, he rose from the dead.”
“I know. Mother told me all about that. Day after to-morrow will be Easter day,” said Harry; “I remember.”
A bright flush of pleased expression passed over Lady Lothrop’s face as she said, “I am glad, my boy, that you at least have been taught. Tell me, boys,” she said at last, graciously, “should you like to go with me in my carriage to Easter Sunday in Boston?”
Had a good fairy offered to take us on the rainbow to the palace of the sunset, the offer could not have seemed more unworldly and dream-like. What Easter Sunday was I had not the faintest idea, but I felt it to be something vague, strange, and remotely suggestive of the supernatural.
Harry, however, stood the thing in the simple, solemn, gentlemanlike way which was habitual with him.
“Thank you, ma’am, I shall be very happy, if grandmamma is willing.”
It will be seen that Harry slid into the adoptive familiarity which made my grandmother his, with the easy good faith of childhood.
“Tell your grandmamma if she is willing I shall call for you in my coach to-morrow,” – and we were graciously dismissed.
We ran home in all haste with our bottle of wine, and burst into the kitchen, communicating our message both at once to Aunt Lois and Aunt Keziah. The two women looked at each other mysteriously; there was a slight flush on Aunt Lois’s keen, spare face.
“Well, if she ‘s a mind to do it, Kezzy, I don’t see how we can refuse.”
“Mother never would consent in the world,” said Aunt Keziah.
“Mother must,” said Aunt Lois, with decision. “We can’t afford to offend Lady Lothrop, with both these boys on our hands. Besides, now father is sick, what a mercy to have ’em both out of the house for a Sunday!”
Aunt Lois spoke this with an intensive earnestness that deepened my already strong convictions that we boys were a daily load upon her life, only endured by a high and protracted exercise of Christian fortitude.
She rose and tapped briskly into the bedroom where my grandmother was sitting reading by my grandfather’s bed. I heard her making some rapid statements in a subdued, imperative tone. There were a few moments of a sort of suppressed, earnest hum of conversation, and soon we heard sundry vehement interjections from my grandmother, – “Good Friday! – Easter! – pish, Lois! – don’t tell me – old cast-off rags of the scarlet woman, – nothing else.
‘Abhor the arrant whore of Rome,
And all her blasphemies;
Drink not of her accursed cup,
Obey not her decrees.'”
“Now, mother, how absurd!” I heard Aunt Lois say. “Who’s talking about Rome? I ‘m sure, if Dr. Lothrop can allow it, we can. It ‘s all nonsense to talk so. We don’t want to offend our minister’s wife; we must do the things that make for peace”; and then the humming went on for a few moments more and more earnestly, till finally we heard grandmother break out: –
“Well, well, have it your own way, Lois, – you always did and always will, I suppose. Glad the boys ‘ll have a holiday, anyhow. She means well, I dare say, – thinks she ‘s doing right.”
I must say that this was a favorite formula with which my grandmother generally let herself down from the high platform of her own sharply defined opinions to the level of Christian charity with her neighbors.
“Who is the whore of Rome?” said Harry to me, confidentially, when we had gone to our room to make ready for our jaunt the next day.
“Don’t you know?” said I. “Why, it ‘s the one that burnt John Rogers, in the Catechism. I can show it to you”; and, forthwith producing from my small stock of books my New England Primer, I called his attention to the picture of Mr. John Rogers in gown and bands, standing in the midst of a brisk and voluminous coil of fire and smoke, over which an executioner, with a supernatural broadaxe upon his shoulders, seemed to preside with grim satisfaction. There was a woman with a baby in her arms and nine children at her side, who stood in a row, each head being just a step lower than the preceding, so that they made a regular flight of stairs. The artist had represented the mother and all the children with a sort of round bundle on each of their heads, of about the same size as the head itself, – a thing which I always interpreted as a further device of the enemy in putting stones on their heads to crush them down; and I pointed it out to Harry as an aggravating feature of the martyrdom.
“Did the whore of Rome do that?” said Harry, after a few moments’ reflection.
“Yes, she did, and it tells about it in the poetry which he wrote here to his children the night before his execution,” and forthwith I proceeded to read to Harry that whole poetical production, delighted to find a gap in his education which I was competent to fill. We were both wrought up into a highly Protestant state by reading this.
“Horace,” said Harry, timidly, “she would n’t like such things, would she? she is such a good woman.”
“What, Lady Lothrop? of course she ‘s a good woman; else she would n’t be our minister’s wife.”
“What was grandma talking about?” said Harry.
“O, I don’t know; grandmother talks about a great many things,” said I. “At any rate, we shall see Boston, and I ‘ve always wanted to see Boston. Only think, Harry, we shall go in a coach!”
This projected tour to Boston was a glorification of us children in the eyes of the whole family. To go, on the humblest of terms, to Boston, – but to be taken thither in Lady Lothrop’s coach, to be trotted in magnificently behind her fat pair of carriage-horses, – that was a good fortune second only to translation.
Boston lay at an easy three hours’ ride from Oldtown, and Lady Lothrop had signified to my grandmother that we were to be called for soon after dinner. We were to spend the night and the Sunday following at the house of Lady Lothrop’s mother, who still kept the old family mansion at the north end, and Lady Lothrop was graciously pleased to add that she would keep the children over Easter Monday, to show them Boston. Faithful old soul, she never omitted the opportunity of reminding the gainsaying community among whom her lot was cast of the solemn days of her church and for one I have remembered Easter Sunday and Monday to this day.
Our good fortune received its crowning stroke in our eyes when, running over to Miss Mehitable’s with the news, we found that Lady Lothrop had considerately included Tina in the invitation.
“Well, she must like children better than I do,” was Aunt Lois’s comment upon the fact, when we announced it. “Now, boys, mind and behave yourselves like young gentlemen,” she added, “for you are going to one of the oldest families of Boston, among real genteel people.”
“They ‘re Tories, Lois,” put in Aunt Keziah, apprehensively.
“Well, what of that? that thing ‘s over and gone now,” said Aunt Lois, “and nobody lays it up against the Kitterys, and everybody knows they were in the very first circles in Boston before the war, and connected with the highest people in England, so it was quite natural they should be Tories.”
“I should n’t wonder if Lady Widgery should be there,” said Aunt Keziah, musingly, as she twitched her yarn; “she always used to come to Boston about this time o’ the year.”
“Very likely she will,” said my mother. “What relation is she to Lady Lothrop?”
“Why, bless me, don’t you know?” said Aunt Lois. “Why, she was Polly Steadman, and sister to old Ma’am Kittery’s husband’s first wife. She was second wife to Sir Thomas; his first wife was one of the Keatons of Penshurst, in England; she died while Sir Thomas was in the custom-house; she was a poor, sickly thing. Polly was a great beauty in her day. People said he admired her rather too much before his wife died, but I don’t know how that was.”
“I wonder what folks want to say such things for,” quoth my grandmother. “I hate backbiters, for my part.”
“We are n’t backbiting, mother. I only said how the story ran. It was years ago, and poor Sir Thomas is in his grave long ago.”
“Then you might let him rest there,” said my grandmother. “Lady Widgery was a pleasant-spoken woman, I remember.”
“She ‘s quite an invalid now, I heard,” said Aunt Lois. “Our Bill was calling at the Kitterys’ the other day, and Miss Deborah Kittery spoke of expecting Lady Widgery. The Kitterys have been very polite to Bill; they ‘ve invited him there to dinner once or twice this winter. That was one reason why I thought we ought to be careful how we treat Lady Lothrop’s invitation. It ‘s entirely through her influence that Bill gets these attentions.”
“I don’t know about their being the best thing for him,” said my grandmother, doubtfully.
“Mother, how can you talk so? What can be better than for a young man to have the run of good families in Boston?” said Aunt Lois.
“I ‘d rather see him have intimacy with one godly minister of old times,” said my grandmother.
“Well, that ‘s what Bill is n’t likely to do,” quoth Aunt Lois, with a slight shade of impatience. “We must take boys as we find ’em.”
“I have n’t anything against Tories or Episcopalians,” said my grandmother; “but they ain’t our sort of folks. I dare say they mean as well as they know how.”
“Miss Mehitable visits the Kitterys when she is in Boston,” said Aunt Lois, “and thinks everything of them. She says that Deborah Kittery is a very smart, intelligent woman, – a woman of a very strong mind.”
“I dare say they ‘re well enough,” said my grandmother. “I ‘m sure I wish ’em well with all my heart.”
“Now, Horace,” said Aunt Lois, “be careful you don’t sniff, and be sure and wipe your shoes on the mat when you come in, and never on any account speak a word unless you are spoken to. Little boys should be seen and not heard; and be very careful you never touch anything you see. It is very good of Lady Lothrop to be willing to take all the trouble of having you with her, and you must make her just as little as possible.”
I mentally resolved to reduce myself to a nonentity, to go out of existence, as it were, to be nobody and nowhere, if only I might escape making trouble.
“As to Harry, he is always a good, quiet boy, and never touches things, or forgets to wipe his toes,” said my aunt. “I ‘m sure he will behave himself.”
My mother colored slightly at this undisguised partiality for Harry, but she was too much under Aunt Lois’s discipline to venture a word.
“Lordy massy, Mis’ Badger, how do ye all do?” said Sam Lawson, this moment appearing at the kitchen door. “I saw your winders so bright, I thought I ‘d jest look in and ask after the Deacon. I ben into Miss Mehitable’s, and there ‘s Polly, she telled me about the chillen goin’ to Boston to-morrow. Tiny, she ‘s jest flying round and round like a lightning-bug, most out of her head, she ‘s so tickled; and Polly, she was a i’nin’ up her white aprons to get her up smart. Polly, she says it ‘s all pagan flummery about Easter, but she ‘s glad the chillen are goin’ to have the holiday.” And with this Sam Lawson seated himself on his usual evening roost in the corner, next to black Cæsar, and we both came and stood by his knee.
“Wal, boys, now you ‘re goin’ among real, old-fashioned gentility. Them Kitterys used to hold their heads ‘mazin’ high afore the war, and they ‘ve managed by hook and crook to hold on to most what they got, and now by-gones is by-gones. But I believe they don’t go out much, or go into company. Old Ma’am Kittery, she ‘s kind o’ broke up about her son that was killed at the Delaware.”
“Fighting on the wrong side, poor woman,” said my grandmother. “Well, I s’pose he thought he was doing right.”
“Yes, yes,” said Sam, “there ‘s all sorts o’ folks go to make up a world, and, lordy massy, we must n’t be hard on nobody; can’t ‘spect everybody to be right all round; it ‘s what I tell Polly when she sniffs at Lady Lothrop keepin’ Christmas and Easter and sich. ‘Lordy massy, Polly,’ says I, ‘if she reads her Bible, and ‘s good to the poor, and don’t speak evil o’ nobody, why, let her have her Easter; what ‘s the harm on’t?’ But, lordy massy bless your soul an’ body! there ‘s no kind o’ use talkin’ to Polly. She fumed away there, over her i’nin’ table; she did n’t believe in folks that read their prayers out o’ books; and then she hed it all over about them tew thousan’ ministers that was all turned out o’ the church in one day in old King Charles’s time. Now, raily, Mis’ Badger, I don’t see why Lady Lothrop should be held ‘sponsible for that are, if she is ‘Piscopalian.”
“Well, well,” said my grandmother; “they did turn out the very best men in England, but the Lord took ’em for seed to plant America with. But no wonder we feel it: burnt children dread the fire. I ‘ve nothing against Lady Lothrop, and I don’t wish evil to the Episcopalians nor to the Tories. There ‘s good folks among ’em all, and ‘the Lord knoweth them that are his.’ But I do hope, Horace, that, when you get to Boston, you will go out on to Copps Hill and see the graves of the Saints. There are the men that I want my children to remember. You come here, and let me read you about them in my ‘magnaly’ * here.” And with this my grandmother produced her well-worn copy; and, to say the truth, we were never tired of hearing what there was in it. What legends, wonderful and stirring, of the solemn old forest life, – of fights with the Indians, and thrilling adventures, and captivities, and distresses, – of encounters with panthers and serpents, and other wild beasts, which made our very hair stand on end! Then there were the weird witch-stories, so wonderfully attested; and how Mr. Peter So-and-so did visibly see, when crossing a river, a cat’s head swimming in front of the boat, and the tail of the same following behind; and how worthy people had been badgered and harassed by a sudden friskiness in all their household belongings, in a manner not unknown in our modern days. Of all these fascinating legends my grandmother was a willing communicator, and had, to match them, numbers of corresponding ones from her own personal observation and experience; and sometimes Sam Lawson would chime in with long-winded legends, which, being told by flickering firelight, with the wind rumbling and tumbling down the great chimney, or shrieking and yelling and piping around every corner of the house, like an army of fiends trying with tooth and claw to get in upon us, had power to send cold chills down our backs in the most charming manner.
For my part, I had not the slightest fear of the supernatural; it was to me only a delightful stimulant, just crisping the surface of my mind with a pleasing horror. I had not any doubt of the stories of apparitions related by Dr. Cotton, because I had seen so many of them myself; and I did not doubt that many of the witnesses who testified in these cases really did see what they said they saw, as plainly as I had seen similar appearances. The consideration of the fact that there really are people in whose lives such phenomena are of frequent occurrence seems to have been entirely left out of the minds of those who have endeavored to explain that dark passage in our history.
In my maturer years I looked upon this peculiarity as something resulting from a physical idiosyncrasy, and I have supposed that such affections may become at times epidemics in communities, as well as any other affection of the brain and nervous system. Whether the things thus discerned have an objective reality or not, has been one of those questions at which, all my life, the interrogation point has stood unerased.
On this evening, however, my grandmother thought fit to edify us by copious extracts from “The Second Part, entituled Sepher-Jearim, i.e. Liber Deum Timentium; or, Dead Abels; – yet speaking and spoken of.”
The lives of several of these “Dead Abels” were her favorite reading, and to-night she designed especially to fortify our minds with their biographies; so she gave us short dips and extracts here and there from several of them, as, for example: “Janus Nov.-Anglicus; or, The Life of Mr. Samuel Higginson”; – “Cadmus Americanus; or, Life of Mr. Charles Chauncey”; – “Cygnea Cantio; or, The Death of Mr. John Avery”; – “Fulgentius; or, The Life of Mr. Richard Mather”; and “Elisha’s Bones; or, Life of Mr. Henry Whitefield.”
These Latin titles stimulated my imagination like the sound of a trumpet, and I looked them out diligently in my father’s great dictionary, and sometimes astonished my grandmother by telling her what they meant.
In fact, I was sent to bed that night thoroughly fortified against all seductions of the gay and worldly society into which I was about to be precipitated; and my reader will see that there was need enough of this preparation.
All these various conversations in regard to differences of religion went on before us children with the freedom with which older people generally allow themselves to go on in the presence of the little non-combatants of life. In those days, when utter silence and reserve in the presence of elders was so forcibly inculcated as one of the leading virtues of childhood, there was little calculation made for the effect of such words on the childish mind. With me it was a perfect hazy mist of wonder and bewilderment; and I went to sleep and dreamed that John Rogers was burning Lady Lothrop at the stake, and Polly, as executioner, presided with a great broadaxe over her shoulder, while grandmother, with nine small children, all with stone bundles on their heads, assisted at the ceremony.
Our ride to Boston was performed in a most proper and edifying manner. Lady Lothrop sat erect and gracious on the back seat, and placed Harry, for whom she seemed to have conceived a special affection, by her side. Tina was perched on the knee of my lady’s maid, a starched, prim woman who had grown up and dried in all the most sacred and sanctified essences of genteel propriety. She was the very crispness of old-time decorum, brought up to order herself lowly and reverently to all her betters, and with a secret conviction that, aside from Lady Lothrop, the whole of the Oldtown population were rather low Dissenters, whom she was required by the rules of Christian propriety to be kind to. To her master, as having been honored with the august favor of her mistress’s hand, she looked up with respect, but her highest mark of approbation was in the oft-repeated burst which came from her heart in moments of confidential enthusiasm, – “Ah, ma’am, depend upon it, master is a churchman in his heart. If ‘e ‘ad only ‘ad the good fortune to be born in Hengland, ‘e would ‘ave been a bishop!”
Tina had been talked to and schooled rigorously by Miss Mehitable as to propriety of manner during this ride; and, as Miss Mehitable well knew what a chatterbox she was, she exacted from her a solemn promise that she would only speak when she was spoken to. Being perched in Mrs. Margery’s lap, she felt still further the stringent and binding power of that atmosphere of frosty decorum which encircled this immaculate waiting-maid. A more well-bred, inoffensive, reverential little trio never surrounded a lady patroness; and as Lady Lothrop was not much of a talker, and, being a childless woman, had none of those little arts of drawing out children which the maternal instinct alone teaches, our ride, though undoubtedly a matter of great enjoyment, was an enjoyment of a serious and even awful character. Lady Lothrop addressed a few kind inquiries to each one of us in turn, to which we each of us replied, and then the conversation fell into the hands of Mrs. Margery, and consisted mainly in precise details as to where and how she had packed her mistress’s Sunday cap and velvet dress; in doing which she evinced the great fluency and fertility of language with which women of her class are gifted on the one subject of their souls. Mrs. Margery felt as if the Sunday cap of the only supporter of the true Church in the dark and heathen parish of Oldtown was a subject not to be lightly or unadvisedly considered; and, therefore, she told at great length how she had intended to pack it first all together, – how she had altered her mind and taken off the bow, and packed that in a little box by itself, and laid the strings out flat in the box, – what difficulties had met her in folding the velvet dress, – and how she had at first laid it on top of the trunk, but had decided at last that the black lutestring might go on top of that, because it was so much lighter, &c., &c., &c.
Lady Lothrop was so much accustomed to this species of monologue, that it is quite doubtful if she heard a word of it but poor Tina, who felt within herself whole worlds of things to say, from the various objects upon the road, of which she was dying to talk and ask questions, wriggled and twisted upon Mrs. Margery’s knee, and finally gave utterance to her pent-up feelings in deep sighs.
“What ‘s the matter, little dear?” said Lady Lothrop.
“O dear! I was just wishing I could go to church.”
“Well, you are going to-morrow, dear.”
“I just wish I could go now to say one prayer.”
“And what is that, my dear?”
“I just want to say, ‘O Lord, open thou my lips,'” said Tina with effusion.
Lady Lothrop smiled with an air of innocent surprise, and Mrs. Margery winked over the little head.
“I ‘m so tired of not talking!” said Tina, pathetically; “but I promised Miss Mehitable I would n’t speak unless I was spoken to,” she added, with an air of virtuous resolution.
“Why, my little dear, you may talk,” said Lady Lothrop. “It won’t disturb me at all. Tell us now about anything that interests you.”
“O, thank you ever so much,” said Tina; and from this moment, as a little elfin butterfly bursts from a cold, gray chrysalis, Tina rattled and chattered and sparkled, and went on with verve and gusto that quite waked us all up. Lady Lothrop and Mrs. Margery soon found themselves laughing with a heartiness which surprised themselves; and, the icy chains of silence being once broken, we all talked, almost forgetting in whose presence we were. Lady Lothrop looked from one to another in a sort of pleased and innocent surprise. Her still, childless, decorous life covered and concealed many mute feminine instincts which now rose at the voice and touch of childhood; and sometimes in the course of our gambols she would sigh, perhaps thinking of her own childless hearth.
CHAPTER XXIV.
WE BEHOLD GRANDEUR.
IT was just at dusk that our carriage stood before the door of a respectable mansion at the north end of Boston.
I remember our alighting and passing through a wide hall with a dark oaken staircase, into a low-studded parlor, lighted by the blaze of a fire of hickory logs, which threw out tongues of yellow flame, and winked at itself with a thousand fanciful flashes, in the crinkles and angles of a singularly high and mighty pair of brass andirons.
A lovely, peaceful old lady, whose silvery white hair and black dress were the most striking features of the picture, kissed Lady Lothrop, and then came to us with a perfect outgush of motherly kindness. “Why, the poor little dears! the little darlings!” she said, as she began with her trembling fingers to undo Tina’s bonnet-strings. “Did they want to come to Boston and see the great city? Well, they should. They must be cold; there, put them close by the fire, and grandma will get them a nice cake pretty soon. Here, I ‘ll hold the little lady,” she said, as she put Tina on her knee.
The child nestled her head down on her bosom as lovingly and confidingly as if she had known her all her days. “Poor babe,” said the old lady to Lady Lothrop, “who could have had a heart to desert such a child? and this is the boy,” she said, drawing Harry to her and looking tenderly at him. “Well, a father of the fatherless is God in his holy habitation.” There was something even grand about the fervor of this sentence as she uttered it, and Tina put up her hand with a caressing gesture around the withered old neck.
“Debby, get these poor children a cake,” said the lady to a brisk, energetic, rather high-stepping individual, who now entered the apartment.
“Come now, mother, do let it rest till supper-time. If we let you alone, you would murder all the children in your neighborhood with cake and sugar-plums; you ‘d be as bad as King Herod.”
Miss Debby was a well-preserved, up-and-down, positive, cheery, sprightly maiden lady of an age lying somewhere in the indeterminate region between forty and sixty. There was a positive, brusque way about all her movements, and she advanced to the fire, rearranged the wood, picked up stray brands, and whisked up the coals with a brush, and then, seating herself bolt upright, took up the business of making our acquaintance in the most precise and systematic manner.
“So this is Master Horace Holyoke. How do you do, sir?”
As previously directed, I made my best bow with anxious politeness.
“And this is Master Harry Percival, is it?” Harry did the same.
“And this,” she added, turning to Tina, “is Miss Tina Percival, I understand? Well, we are very happy to see good little children in this house always.” There was a rather severe emphasis on the good, which, together with the somewhat martial and disciplinary air which invested all Miss Deborah’s words and actions, was calculated to strike children with a wholesome awe.
Our resolution “to be very good indeed” received an immediate accession of strength. At this moment a serving-maid appeared at the door, and, with eyes cast down, and a stiff, respectful courtesy, conveyed the information, “If you please, ma’am, tea is ready.”
This humble, self-abased figure – the utter air of self-abnegation with which the domestic seemed to intimate that, unless her mistress pleased, tea was not ready, and that everything in creation was to be either ready or not ready according to her sovereign will and good pleasure – was to us children a new lesson in decorum.
“Go tell Lady Widgery that tea is served,” said Miss Deborah, in a loud, resounding voice. “Tell her that we will wait her ladyship’s convenience.”
The humble serving-maid courtesied, and closed the door softly with reverential awe. On the whole, the impression upon our minds was deeply solemn; we were about to see her ladyship.
Lady Widgery was the last rose of summer of the departed aristocracy. Lady Lothrop’s title was only by courtesy; but Sir Thomas Widgery was a live baronet; and as there were to be no more of these splendid dispensations in America, one may fancy the tenderness with which old Tory families cherished the last lingering remnants.
The door was soon opened again, and a bundle of black silk appeared, with a pale, thin face looking out of it. There was to be seen the glitter of a pair of sharp, black eyes, and the shimmer of a thin white hand with a diamond ring upon it. These were the items that made up Lady Widgery, as she dawned upon our childish vision.
Lest the reader should conceive any false hopes or impressions, I may as well say that it turned out, on further acquaintance, that these items were about all there was of Lady Widgery. It was one of the cases where Nature had picked up a very indifferent and commonplace soul, and shut it up in a very intelligent-looking body. From her youth up, Lady Widgery’s principal attraction consisted in looking as if there was a great deal more in her than there really was. Her eyes were sparkling and bright, and had a habit of looking at things in this world with keen, shrewd glances, as if she were thinking about them to some purpose, which she never was. Sometimes they were tender and beseeching, and led her distracted admirers to feel as if she were melting with emotions that she never dreamed of. Thus Lady Widgery had always been rushed for and contended for by the other sex; and one husband had hardly time to be cold in his grave before the air was filled with the rivalry of candidates to her hand; and after all the beautiful little hoax had nothing for it but her attractive soul-case. In her old age she still looked elegant, shrewd, and keen, and undeniably high-bred, and carried about her the prestige of rank and beauty. Otherwise she was a little dry bundle of old prejudices, of faded recollections of past conquests and gayeties, and weakly concerned about her own health, which, in her view and that of everybody about her, appeared a most sacred subject. She had a somewhat entertaining manner of rehearsing the gossip and scandals of the last forty years, and was, so far as such a person could be, religious: that is to say, she kept all the feasts and fasts of the Church scrupulously. She had, in a weakly way, a sense of some responsibility in this matter, because she was Lady Widgery, and because infidelity was prevailing in the land, and it became Lady Widgery to cast her influence against it. Therefore it was that, even at the risk of her precious life, as she thought, she had felt it imperative to come to Boston to celebrate Easter Sunday.
When she entered the room there was an immediate bustle of welcome. Lady Lothrop ran up to her, saluting her with an appearance of great fondness, mingled, I thought, with a sort of extreme deference. Miss Deborah was pressing in her attentions. “Will you sit a moment before tea to get your feet warm, or will you go out at once? The dining-room is quite warm.”
Lady Widgery’s feet were quite warm, and everybody was so glad to hear it, that we were filled with wonder.
Then she turned and fixed her keen, dark eyes on us, as if she were reading our very destiny, and asked who we were. We were all presented circumstantially, and the brilliant eyes seemed to look through us shrewdly, as we made our bows and courtesies. One would have thought that she was studying us with a deep interest, which was not the case.
We were now marshalled out to the tea-table, where we children had our plates put in a row together, and were waited on with obsequious civility by Mrs. Margery and another equally starched and decorous female, who was the attendant of Lady Widgery. We stood at our places a moment, while the lovely old lady, raising her trembling hand, pronounced the words of the customary grace: “For what we are now about to receive, the Lord make us truly thankful.” Her voice trembled as she spoke, and somehow the impression of fragility and sanctity that she made on me awoke in me a sort of tender awe. When the blessing was over, the maids seated us, and I had leisure to notice the entirely new scene about me.
It was all conducted with an inexpressible stateliness of propriety, and, in an undefined way, the impression was produced upon my mind that the frail, shivery, rather thin and withered little being, enveloped in a tangle of black silk wraps, was something inexpressibly sacred and sublime. Miss Deborah waited on her constantly, pressingly, energetically; and the dear, sweet old white-haired lady tended her with obsequiousness, which, like everything else that she did, was lost in lovingness; and Lady Lothrop, to me the most awe-inspiring of the female race, paled her ineffectual fires, and bowed her sacred head to the rustling little black silk bundle, in a way that made me inwardly wonder. The whole scene was so different from the wide, rough, noisy, free-and-easy democracy of my grandmother’s kitchen, that I felt crusted all over with an indefinite stiffness of embarrassment, as if I had been dipped in an alum-bath. At the head of the table there was an old silver tea-urn, looking heavy enough to have the weight of whole generations in it, into which, at the moment of sitting down, a serious-visaged waiting-maid dropped a red-hot weight, and forthwith the noise of a violent boiling arose. We little folks looked at each other inquiringly, but said nothing. All was to us like an enchanted palace. The great, mysterious tea-urn, the chased silver tea-caddy, the precise and well-considered movements of Miss Deborah as she rinsed the old embossed silver teapots in the boiling water, the India-china cups and plates, painted with the family initials and family crest, all were to us solemn signs and symbols of that upper table-land of gentility, into which we were forewarned by Aunt Lois we were to enter.
“There,” said Miss Deborah, with emphasis, as she poured and handed to Lady Widgery a cup of tea, – “there ‘s some of the tea that my brother saved at the time of that disgraceful Boston riot, when Boston Harbor was floating with tea-chests. His cargo was rifled in the most scandalous manner, but he went out in a boat and saved some at the risk of his life.”
Now my most sacred and enthusiastic remembrance was of the glow of patriotic fervor with which, seated on my grandfather’s knee, I had heard the particulars of that event at a time when names and dates and dress, and time, place, and circumstance, had all the life and vividness of a recent transaction. I cannot describe the clarion tones in which Miss Deborah rung out the word disgraceful, in connection with an event which had always set my blood boiling with pride and patriotism. Now, as if convicted of sheep-stealing, I felt myself getting red to the very tips of my ears.
“It was a shameful proceeding,” sighed Lady Widgery, in her pretty, high-bred tones, as she pensively stirred the amber fluid in her teacup. “I never saw Sir Thomas so indignant at any thing in all my life, and I ‘m sure it gave me a sick-headache for three days, so that I had to stay shut up in a dark room, and could n’t keep the least thing on my stomach. What a mysterious providence it is that such conduct should be suffered to lead to success!”
“Well,” said Lady Lothrop, sipping her tea on the other side, “clouds and darkness are about the Divine dispensations; but let us hope it will be all finally overruled for the best.”
“O, come,” said Miss Debby, giving a cheerful, victorious crow of defiance from behind her teapots. “Dorothy will be down on us with the tip-end of one of her husband’s sermons, of course. Having married a Continental Congress parson, she has to say the best she can; but I, Deborah Kittery, who was never yet in bondage to any man, shall be free to have my say to the end of my days, and I do say that the Continental Congress is an abomination in the land, and the leaders of it, if justice had been done, they would all have been hanged high as Haman; and that there is one house in old Boston, at the North End, and not far from the spot where we have the honor to be, where King George now reigns as much as ever he did, and where law and order prevail in spite of General Washington and Mrs. Martha, with her court and train. It puts me out of all manner of patience to read the papers, – receptions to ’em here, there, and everywhere; – I should like to give ’em a reception.”
“Come, come, Deborah, my child, you must be patient,” said the old lady. “The Lord’s ways are not as our ways. He knows what is best.”
“I dare say he does, mother, but we know he does let wickedness triumph to an awful extent. I think myself he ‘s given this country up.”
“Let us hope not,” said the mother, fervently.
“Just look at it,” said Miss Deborah. “Has not this miserable rebellion broken up the true Church in this country just as it was getting a foothold? has it not shaken hands with French infidelity? Thomas Jefferson is a scoffing infidel, and he drafted their old Declaration of Independence, which, I will say, is the most abominable and blasphemous document that ever sinners dared to sign.”
“But General Washington was a Churchman,” said Lady Widgery, “and they were always very careful about keeping the feasts and fasts. Why, I remember, in the old times, I have been there to Easter holidays, and we had a splendid ball.”
“Well, then, if he was in the true Church, so much the worse for him,” said Miss Deborah. “There is some excuse for men of Puritan families, because their ancestors were schismatics and disorganizers to begin with, and came over here because they did n’t like to submit to lawful government. For my part, I have always been ashamed of having been born here. If I ‘d been consulted I should have given my voice against it.”
“Debby, child, how you do talk!” said the old lady.
“Well, mother, what can I do but talk? and it ‘s a pity if I should n’t be allowed to do that. If I had been a man, I ‘d have fought; and, if I could have my way now, I ‘d go back to England and live, where there ‘s some religion and some government.”
“I don’t see,” said the old lady, “but people are doing pretty well under the new government.”
“Indeed, mother, how can you know anything about it? There ‘s a perfect reign of infidelity and immorality begun. Why, look here, in Boston and Cambridge things are going just as you might think they would. The college fellows call themselves D’Alembert, Rousseau, Voltaire, and other French heathen names; and there ‘s Ellery Davenport! just look at him, – came straight down from generations of Puritan ministers, and has n’t half as much religion as my cat there; for Tom does know how to order himself lowly and reverently to all his betters.”
Here there was such a burst of pleading feminine eloquence on all hands as showed that general interest which often pervades the female breast for some bright, naughty, wicked prodigal son. Lady Widgery and old Mrs. Kittery and Lady Lothrop all spoke at once. “Indeed, Miss Deborah,” – “Come, come, Debby,” – “You are too bad, – he goes to church with us sometimes.”
“To church, does he?” said Miss Debby, with a toss; “and what does he go for? Simply to ogle the girls.”
“We should be charitable in our judgments,” said Lady Widgery.
“Especially of handsome young men,” said Miss Debby, with strong irony. “You all know he does n’t believe as much as a heathen. They say he reads and speaks French like a native, and that ‘s all I want to know of anybody. I ‘ve no opinion of such people; a good honest Christian has no occasion to go out of his own language, and when he does you may be pretty sure it ‘s for no good.”
“O, come now, Deborah, you are too sweeping altogether,” said Lady Lothrop; “French is of course an elegant accomplishment.”
“I never saw any good of the French language, for my part, I must confess,” said Miss Debby, “nor, for that matter, of the French nation either; they eat frogs, and break the Sabbath, and are as immoral as the old Canaanites. It ‘s just exactly like them to aid and abet this unrighteous rebellion. They always hated England, and they take delight in massacres and rebellions, and every kind of mischief, ever since the massacre of St. Bartholomew. Well, well, we shall see what ‘ll come of these ungodly levelling principles in them. ‘All men created free and equal,’ forsooth. Just think of that! clearly against the church catechism.”
“Of course that is all infidelity,” said Lady Widgery, confidently. “Sir Thomas used to say it was the effect on the lower classes he dreaded. You see these lower classes are something dreadful; and what ‘s to keep them down if it is n’t religion? as Sir Thomas used to say when he always would go to church Sundays. He felt such a responsibility.”
“Well,” said Miss Deborah, “you ‘ll see. I predict we shall see the time when your butcher and your baker, and your candle-stick-maker will come into your parlor and take a chair as easy as if they were your equals, and every servant-maid will be thinking she must have a silk gown like her mistress. That ‘s what we shall get by our revolution.”
“But let us hope it will be all overruled for good,” said Lady Lothrop.
“O, overruled, overruled!” said Miss Deborah. “Of course, it will be overruled. Sodom and Gomorrah were overruled for good, but ‘t was a great deal better not to be living there about those times.” Miss Debby’s voice had got upon so high a key, and her denunciations began to be so terrifying, that the dear old lady interposed.
“Well, children, do let ‘s love one another, whatever we do,” she said; “and, Debby, you must n’t talk so hard about Ellery, – he ‘s your cousin, you know.”
“Besides, my dear,” said Lady Widgery, “great allowances should be made for his domestic misfortunes.”
“I don’t see why a man need turn infidel and rebel because his wife has turned out a madwoman,” said Miss Debby; “what did he marry her for?”
“O my dear, it was a family arrangement to unite the two properties,” said Lady Widgery. “You see all the great Pierrepoint estates came in through her, but then she was quite shocking, – very peculiar always, but after her marriage her temper was dreadful, – it made poor Ellery miserable, and drove him from home; it really was a mercy when it broke out into real insanity, so that they could shut her up. I ‘ve always had great tenderness for Ellery on that account.”
“Of course you have, because you ‘re a lady. Did I ever know a lady yet that did n’t like Ellery Davenport, and was n’t ready to go to the stake for him? For my part I hate him, because, after all, he humbugs me, and will make me like him in spite of myself. I have to watch and pray against him all the time.”
And as if, by the odd law of attraction which has given birth to the proverb that somebody is always nearest when you are talking about him, at this moment the dining-room door was thrown open, and the old man-servant announced “Colonel Ellery Davenport.”
“Colonel!” said Miss Debby, with a frown and an accent of contempt. “How often must I tell Hawkins not to use those titles of the old rebel mob army? Insubordination is beginning to creep in, I can see.”
These words were lost in the bustle of the entrance of one on whom, after listening to all the past conversation, we children looked with very round eyes of attention. What we saw was a tall, graceful young man, whose air and movements gave a singular impression of both lightness and strength. He carried his head on his shoulders with a jaunty, slightly haughty air, like that of a thorough-bred young horse, and there was quality and breeding in every movement of his body. He was dressed in the imposing and picturesque fashion of those times, with a slight military suggestion in its arrangements. His hair was powdered to a dazzling whiteness, and brushed off his low Greek forehead, and the powder gave that peculiar effect to the eye and complexion which was one of the most distinctive traits of that style of costume. His eyes were of a deep violet blue, and of that lively, flashing brilliancy which a painter could only represent by double lights. They seemed to throw out light like diamonds. He entered the room bowing and smiling with the gay good-humor of one sure of pleasing. An inspiring sort of cheerfulness came in with him, that seemed to illuminate the room like a whole stream of sunshine. In short, he fully justified all Miss Deborah’s fears.
In a moment he had taken a rapid survey of the party; he had kissed the hand of the dear old lady; he had complimented Lady Widgery; he had inquired with effusion after the health of Parson Lothrop, and ended all by an adroit attempt to kiss Miss Deborah’s hand, which earned him a smart little cuff from that wary belligerent.
“No rebels allowed on these premises,” said Miss Debby, sententiously.
“On my soul, cousin, you forget that peace has been declared,” he said, throwing himself into a chair with a nonchalant freedom.
“Peace! not in our house. I have n’t surrendered, if Lord Cornwallis has,” said Miss Debby, “and I consider you as the enemy.”
“Well, Debby, we must love our enemies,” said the old lady, in a pleading tone.
“Certainly you must,” he replied quickly; “and here I ‘ve come to Boston on purpose to go to church with you to-morrow.”
“That ‘s right, my boy,” said the old lady. “I always knew you ‘d come into right ways at last.”
“O, there are hopes of me, certainly,” he said; “if the gentler sex will only remember their mission, and be guardian angels, I think I shall be saved in the end.”
“You mean that you are going to wait on pretty Lizzie Cabot to church to-morrow,” said Miss Debby; “that ‘s about all the religion there is in it.”
“Mine is the religion of beauty, fair cousin,” said he. “If I had had the honor of being one of the apostles, I should have put at least one article to that effect into our highly respectable creed.”
“Ellery Davenport, you are a scoffer.”
“What, I? because I believe in the beautiful? What is goodness but beauty? and what is sin but bad taste? I could prove it to you out of my grandfather Edwards’s works, passim, and I think nobody in New England would dispute him.”
“I don’t know anything about him,” said Miss Debby, with a toss. “He was n’t in the Church.”
“Mere matter of position, cousin. Could n’t very well be when the Church was a thousand miles across the water; but he lived and died a stanch loyalist, – an aristocrat in the very marrow of his bones, as anybody may see. The whole of his system rests on the undisputed right of big folks to eat up little folks in proportion to their bigness, and the Creator, being biggest of all, is dispensed from all obligation to seek any thing but his own glory. Here you have the root-doctrine of the divine right of kings and nobles, who have only to follow their Maker’s example in their several spheres, as his blessed Majesty King George has of late been doing with his American colonies. If he had got the treatise on true virtue by heart, he could not have carried out its principles better.”
“Well, now, I never knew that there was so much good in President Edwards before,” said Lady Widgery, with simplicity. “I must get my maid to read me that treatise some time.”
“Do, madam,” said Ellery. “I think you will find it exactly adapted to your habits of thought, and extremely soothing.”
“It will be a nice thing for her to read me to sleep with,” said Lady Widgery, innocently.
“By all means,” said Ellery, with an indescribable mocking light in his great blue eyes.
For my own part, having that strange, vibrating susceptibility of constitution which I have described as making me peculiarly impressible by the moral sphere of others, I felt in the presence of this man a singular and painful contest of attraction and repulsion, such as one might imagine to be produced by the near approach of some beautiful but dangerous animal. His singular grace and brilliancy awoke in me an undefined antagonism akin to antipathy, and yet, as if under some enchantment, I could not keep my eyes off from him, and eagerly listened to everything that he had to say.
With that quick insight into human nature which enabled him, as by a sort of instinct, to catch the reflex of every impression which he made on any human being, he surveyed the row of wide-open, wondering, admiring eyes, which followed him at our end of the table.
“Aha, what have we here?” he said, as he advanced and laid his hand on my head. I shuddered and shook it off with a feeling of pain and dislike amounting to hatred.
“How now, my little man?” he said; “what ‘s the matter here?” and then he turned to Tina. “Here ‘s a little lady will be more gracious, I know,” and he stooped and attempted to kiss her.
The little lady drew her head back and repulsed him with the dignity of a young princess.
“Upon my word,” he said, “we learn the tricks of our trade early, don’t we? Pardon me, petite mademoiselle,” he said as he retreated, laughing. “So you don’t like to be kissed?”
“Only by proper persons,” said Tina, with that demure gravity which she could at times so whimsically assume, but sending with the words a long mischievous flash from under her downcast eyelashes.
“Upon my word, if there is n’t one that ‘s perfect in Mother Eve’s catechism at an early age,” said Ellery Davenport. “Young lady, I hope for a better acquaintance with you one of these days.”
“Come Ellery, let the child alone,” said Miss Debby; “why should you be teaching all the girls to be forward? If you notice her so much she will be vain.”
“That ‘s past praying for, anyhow,” said he, looking with admiration at the dimpling, sparkling face of Tina, who evidently was dying to answer him back. “Don’t you see the monkey has her quiver full of arrows?” he said. “Do let her try her infant hand on me.”
But Miss Debby, eminently proper, rose immediately, and broke up the tea-table session by proposing adjournment to the parlor.
After this we had family prayers, the maid-servants and man-servant being called in and ranged in decorous order on a bench that stood prepared for exactly that occasion in a corner of the room. Miss Deborah placed a stand, with a great quarto edition of the Bible and prayer-book, before her mother, and the old lady read in a trembling voice the psalm, the epistle, and the gospel for Easter evening, and then, all kneeling, the evening prayers. The sound of her tremulous voice, and the beauty of the prayers themselves, which I vaguely felt, impressed me so much that I wept, without knowing why, as one sometimes does at plaintive music. One thing in particular filled me with a solemn surprise; and that was the prayers, which I had never heard before, for “The Royal Family of England.” The trembling voice rose to fervent clearness on the words, “We beseech Thee with Thy favor, to behold our most Sovereign Lord, King George, and so replenish him with the grace of Thy Holy Spirit, that he may always incline to Thy will, and walk in Thy way. Endue him plenteously with heavenly gifts, grant him in health and wealth long to live, strengthen him that he may vanquish and overcome all his enemies, and finally after this life may attain everlasting joy and felicity, through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
The loud “Amen” from Miss Debby which followed this, heartily chorussed as it was by the well-taught man-servant and maid-servants, might have done any king’s heart good. For my part, I was lost in astonishment; and when the prayer followed “for the gracious Queen Charlotte, Their Royal Highnesses, George, Prince of Wales, the Princess Dowager of Wales, and all the Royal Family,” my confusion of mind was at its height. All these unknown personages were to be endued with the Holy Spirit, enriched with heavenly grace, and brought to an everlasting kingdom, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. I must confess that all I had heard of them previously, in my education, had not prepared me to see the propriety of any peculiar celestial arrangements in their favor; but the sweet and solemn awe inspired by the trembling voice which pleaded went a long way towards making me feel as if there must have been a great mistake in my bringing up hitherto.
When the circle rose from their knees, Ellery Davenport said to Miss Debby, “It ‘s a pity the king of England could n’t know what stanch supporters he has in Boston.”
“I don’t see,” said the old lady, “why they won’t let us have that prayer read in churches now; it can’t do any harm.”
“I don’t, either,” said Ellery. “For my part, I don’t know any one who needs praying for more than the King of England; but the prayers of the Church don’t appear to have been answered in his case. If he had been in the slightest degree ‘endowed with heavenly gifts,’ he need n’t have lost these American colonies.”
“Come, Ellery, none of your profane talk,” said Miss Debby; “you don’t believe in anything good.”
“On the contrary, I always insist on seeing the good before I believe; I should believe in prayer, if I saw any good comes from it.”
“For shame, Ellery, when children are listening to you!” said Miss Debby. “But come, my little folks,” she added, rising briskly, “it ‘s time for these little eyes to be shut.”
The dear old lady called us all to her, and kissed us “good night,” laying her hand gently on our heads as she did so. I felt the peaceful influence of that hand go through me like music, and its benediction even in my dreams.
CHAPTER XXV.
EASTER SUNDAY.
FOR a marvel, even in the stormy clime of Boston, our Easter Sunday was one of those celestial days which seem, like the New Jerusalem of the Revelations, to come straight down from God out of heaven, to show us mortals what the upper world may be like. Our poor old Mother Boston has now and then such a day given to her, even in the uncertain spring-time; and when all her bells ring together, and the old North Church chimes her solemn psalm-tunes, and all the people in their holiday garments come streaming out towards the churches of every name which line her streets, it seems as if the venerable dead on Copps Hill must dream pleasantly, for “Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord,” and even to this day, in dear old Boston, their works do follow them.
At an early hour we were roused, and dressed ourselves with the most anxious and exemplary care. For the first time in my life I looked anxiously in the looking-glass, and scanned with some solicitude, as if it had been a third person, the little being who called himself “I.” I saw a pair of great brown eyes, a face rather thin and pale, a high forehead, and a great profusion of dark curls, – the combing out of which, by the by, was one of the morning trials of my life. In vain Aunt Lois had cut them off repeatedly, in the laudable hope that my hair would grow out straight. It seemed a more inextricable mat at each shearing; but as Harry’s flaxen poll had the same peculiarity, we consoled each other, while we labored at our morning toilet.
Down in the sunny parlor, a little before breakfast was on the table, we walked about softly with our hands behind us, lest Satan, who we were assured had always some mischief still for idle hands to do, should entice us into touching some of the many curious articles which we gazed upon now for the first time. There was the picture of a very handsome young man over the mantel-piece, and beneath it hung a soldier’s sword in a large loop of black crape, a significant symbol of the last great sorrow which had overshadowed the household. On one side of the door, framed and glazed, was a large coat of arms of the Kittery family, worked in chenille and embroidery, – the labor of Miss Deborah’s hands during the course of her early education. In other places on the walls hung oil paintings of the deceased master of the mansion, and of the present venerable mistress, as she was in the glow of early youth. They were evidently painted by a not unskilful hand, and their eyes always following us as we moved about the room gave us the impression of being overlooked, even while as yet there was nobody else in the apartment. Conspicuously hung on one side of the room was a copy of one of the Vandyck portraits of Charles the First, with his lace ruff and peaked beard. Underneath this was a printed document, framed and glazed; and I, who was always drawn to read any thing that could be read, stationed myself opposite to it and began reading aloud: –
“The Twelve Good Rules of the Most Blessed Martyr, King Charles First, of Blessed Memory.”
I was reading these in a loud, clear voice, when Miss Debby entered the room. She stopped and listened to me, with a countenance beaming with approbation.
“Go on, sonny!” she said coming up behind me, with an approving nod, when I blushed and stopped on seeing her. “Read them through; those are good rules for a man to form his life by.”
I wish I could remember now what these so highly praised rules were. The few that I can recall are not especially in accordance with the genius of our modern times. They began –
“1st. Profane no Divine Ordinances.
“2d. Touch no State Matter.
“3d. Pick no Quarrels.
“4th. Maintain no ill Opinions.”
Here my memory fails me, but I remember that, stimulated by Miss Deborah’s approbation, I did commit the whole of them to memory at the time, and repeated them with a readiness and fluency which drew upon me warm commendations from the dear old lady, and in fact from all in the house, though Ellery Davenport did shrug his shoulders contumaciously and give a sort of suppressed whistle of dissent.
“If we had minded those rules,” he said, “we should n’t where we are now.”
“No, indeed, you would n’t; the more ‘s the pity you did n’t,” said Miss Debby. “If I ‘d had the bringing of you up, you should be learning things like that, instead of trumpery French and democratic nonsense.”
“Speaking of French,” said Ellery, “I declare I forgot a package of gloves that I brought over especially for you and Aunty here, – the very best of Paris kid.”
“You may spare yourself the trouble of bringing them, cousin,” said Miss Deborah, coldly.” Whatever others may do, I trust I never shall be left to put a French glove on my hands. They may be all very fine, no doubt, but English gloves, made under her Majesty’s sanction, will always be good enough for me.”
“O, well, in that case I shall have the honor of presenting them to Lady Lothrop, unless her principles should be equally rigid.”