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CIRCASSIA;

OR, A TOUR TO THE CAUCASUS.

BY G. L. DITSON, ESQ.

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SEVEN YEARS’ SERVICE ON THE
SLAVE COAST OF AFRICA.

BY SIR HENRY HUNTLEY.

“The Author’s views of the Slave Trade and its results are borne out by
the facts which have been adduced. We could fill our pages with the horrors
which stare us in the face almost in every page of his book.”—Naval and
Military Gazette.

[1]

CLOUDS ON THE HORIZON.

It would give a very false idea of Kate Vernon’s
character, were we to say that Captain
Egerton’s departure did not leave a blank in
the quiet routine of her life. Indeed, she was
rather surprised to find how closely he had
linked himself with the pleasures and occupations
of the secluded little circle amongst
whom accident had thrown him. She missed
his ready companionship, and the amusing[2]
contrariety of his opinions and prejudices; she
missed the interested attention with which he
listened to every word that fell from her lips,
and her eye, peculiarly alive to beauty in every
form, missed his distinguished, soldierly figure,
and bold, frank, open face. But her regrets
did not even border on the sentimental, and
were spoken as openly as her grandfather’s,
who every hour in the day, for a week, at
least, after his departure, might be heard to
say—”If Fred Egerton was here, he would
do this, or that, for me.” In short, Kate had
never dreamt of Egerton as a lover. Marriage
was to her a distant possibility—desirable, certainly,
in due time, as she always considered
it, if happy, the happiest state of life; but
marriage with a soldier, who could not be
always near her grandfather, was something
so utterly beyond the powers of her imagination
to conceive, that it gave her all the ease
and security she might have felt with a
brother.

[3]

So the winter wore steadily away. The
morning’s study—the afternoon walk with her
grandfather—often to visit the sick and needy—the
interchange of contrasting thought with
Winter and the organist, kept Miss Vernon too
wholesomely active both in mind and body to
permit the pleasant monotony of her life to degenerate
into stagnation.

But the half-hour in the evening, while her
grandfather dosed, was the happiest portion of
the day to her; when she leaned back in her
chair gazing at the fire-light as it danced upon
the wall and cast uncouth shadows, and, following
some train of thought suggested by the
reading, or occurrences of the day, dreamed of
the future, or conjured up the past! And often
did she feel surprise, at the frequent recurrence
of the ball at Carrington—of Egerton’s
farewell—among these visions—though, at this
point, she ever turned resolutely away.

Then Colonel Vernon was laid up for a
month with a feverish cold, which made Kate[4]
rather anxious, and banished every thought
not connected with the invalid.

So-came on the lengthening days’ warmer
sun, and more piercing winds of early spring;
and one morning, towards the end of March,
Mrs. O’Toole laid two letters before the Colonel;
one directed to him in a clear, bold hand, bearing
the Marseilles’ post-mark, the other to
Kate.

“I really think this is from Fred Egerton,”
said the Colonel, feeling in every pocket for
glasses. “Kate, my dear! they were hanging
round my neck before breakfast?”

“Oh! here they are, dear grandpapa,” exclaimed
she, eagerly; “do not mind looking
at the outside—open it.”

And she laid aside her own.

With many a break, and many a tantalising
pause, the Colonel slowly doled forth Egerton’s
letter, it was short, and contained little more
than a report of his safe arrival, after a tedious
journey, many expressions of sincere regard,[5]
and kind enquiries for his friends at A——,
but breathed an indefinable tone of despondency,
and restlessness of spirit, unlike anything
they had hitherto observed in him.

The Colonel, at length, concluded, in a sort
of surprised accent, as though he expected
something more; and Kate exclaimed—

“Is that all? Do you know, grandpapa, I
expected much greater things from Captain
Egerton’s first letter from India. Do you not
think he writes dejectedly.”

“I cannot quite make him out,” he replied,
in an absent manner; “but I am obliged to him
for his kind remembrance of us. We must
tell Winter and Gilpin—he was such a favorite
with them. Now open your despatch, my dear.
I see it is from Georgina.”

“What a charming letter!” cried Kate, as
she concluded. “Is it not delightful, to read
such a candid, warm-hearted acknowledgement
of error? I am so glad to have heard
from her at last. It is so dreadful to feel that[9]
any chilling cloud of doubt intervenes between
you and one you love!”

“Yes, indeed,” said the Colonel; “what a
rash impulsive creature Georgy has ever been!
rushing into injustice one moment, and atoning
for it with such graceful self-abasement the
next; it would be better if she could steer
clear of both extremes; but let me look at that
postscript again; she is as distinct as ladies
usually are on legal subjects.”

Kate handed him the letter, and he continued
to read and re-read the postscript for
some minutes, with a look of concentrated attention,
then, raising his eyes and speaking
more to himself than to his grand-daughter—

“I am astonished, that Moore has not
written to me on this matter,” he said, in a
displeased tone. “If this Taaffe, be the
nephew of old Arthur Taaffe, and the papers
required, those connected with that judgment;”
he stopped abruptly, and sat for a few moments
in deep thought, looking very grave. Kate[10]
also kept a respectful silence, feeling little
interest in any legal matter, till her grandfather
rousing himself, and with his old contented
look returning, observed, “no, no! no man
could act such a villanous part, he must be
perfectly aware it was paid years ago.”

“What was paid, grandpapa?”

“That debt to old Taaffe; he advanced my
father money on Knockdrum, and got me to
join in the bond, on which, of course judgments
were entered against us both. I paid it
years ago, and simply got an acknowledgement
from him, but did not go through some
other form, satisfying the judgment, I think
they term it.”

“Well, I am sure no one would ever doubt
your word,” cried Kate, “even if these papers
cannot be found.”

“I am afraid, my dear child, the great mass
of legal and money-lending people do not come
within the category of christians, who ‘believe
all things.’ I must write to Moore this very[11]
day, I’ll be in time for the Irish post, give me
my desk, Kate.”

“But suppose this man insists on the production
of these papers, and you cannot satisfy
him?” asked Kate, as she was leaving the
room after arranging the Colonel’s writing
materials.

He looked up with a sudden expression of
pain in his noble, benevolent countenance.

“We shall be beggars, my child! that’s
all.”

Miss Vernon walked into the drawing-room,
and opened the piano mechanically; while her
thoughts were busily engaged in conjecturing
whether the lingering debility of indisposition,
rather than justly grounded fears, prompted her
grandfather’s gloomy view of Lady Desmond’s
intelligence.

“Shall we then really know the poverty,
nurse talks of? Shall I be strong enough to say,
in sincerity, ‘Thy will be done!‘”

But soon these gloomy speculations gave[12]
place to the pleasanter topic of her cousin’s
invitation, which seemed to have escaped her
grandfather’s notice.

She had been thus meditating for some time,
when nurse entered with a letter in her hand.

“The master’s love, Miss Kate, and if it’s
not too early he’d like you to go out wid him,
he says he does not feel so well!”

“Yes, nurse, I will go and get my bonnet
and shawl, when I have settled this music.”

“Faith now, alannah, I’m not plaised at all
with the looks iv him!”

“How?” said Kate, suspending her occupation
of replacing the books in the music-stand,
and looking up anxiously in Mrs.
O’Toole’s face, which wore an unusual look of
care, especially about the depressed corners of
her expressive mouth.

“Sorra one iv me can tell why, but he
looks like as when a big black cloud is beginin’
to be dhrawn over the sun in a fine summer’s
day; he just sits in the chair tired like; an ses[13]
he, ‘only one letther for the post, nurse,’ ses
he, ‘but be sure it’s in time for the Irish maal,’
and then he give me the message, I gave yes.
The Cross iv Christ betune us an harum, ses I,
as soon as I see ‘J. Moore, Esquire,’ on the
letther; how are we to have luck or grace when
we have any thing to say to the man that
sould Dungar, an give it up to the spalpeen
that has it now; look Miss Kate, thim’s the
Esquires that’s going now! Faith an I remember
Paddy Moore, his father, carrying
sacks iv corn to the mill, an meself own maid
up at the big house! Ay, then, J. Moore,
Esquire, ye’r the first esquire in yer family,
any ways, an there was ever an always sorra to
sup when there was letthers goin back an forward
betune you an the masther!”

“But, nurse, I have always heard that Mr.
Moore was an upright honourable man, and I
hope grandpapa’s letter will be only productive
of good.”

“Well, well, may be so, but I’d a mighty[14]
quare dhrame both last night an the night
afore. Oh, ye may laugh now, Miss Kate,
but no matther! I seen the masther as plain
as I see yer own sweet face forenent me,
slippin, slippin down a steep slim place wid
the say roarin mad ondher, an you houlding
him for the dear life, an yer round white
arms all strained an tremblin wid the weight
that was too much for yez, an I couldn’t help
yez, tho’ I struve an struve to run to yez; an
in the struggle I woke up, all in a shake; an
God forgive the word, but it’s a mighty bad
dhrame intirely!”

“No, Nurse—you say dreams go by contraries,
so it is grandpapa that will be ascending
some lofty eminence and dragging me after
him.”

“It was in the mornin’, asthore, in the
mornin’ I dhreamt it.”

“Never mind, nurse, if so, God will lend
these slight arms strength for all that may be[15]
required of them—do not tell me any more
dreams now, I must go to grandpapa.”

“Sweet Mary, shield ye darlint!” ejaculated
Mrs. O’Toole, as she looked after her nursling,
“but we’ve rested so long widout them thieving
attorneys, I don’t like to see them beginin’
their letthers agin. J. Moore, esquire! the
divil go wid such esquires! amen.”

Fearful and wonderful indeed is our spiritual
organisation. Reason may smile at fears, unsubstantiated
by any tangible motive, but the
instant her accents of reproof have ceased, lo!
the same formless and gnawing terror steals
back, undiminished by one iota of its influence,
to depress the soul, until again routed by reason’s
disciplined troops; a true guerilla warfare in
which the irregular forces, ever ready to disperse
and reassemble, always repulsed, but
never conquered, are sure to wear out resistance
in the end.

So Kate Vernon, in spite of her clear and[16]
cultivated intellect, her sound judgment, and
her sense of the ridiculous, could not keep
nurse’s evil omen from dwelling on her mind;
more, ay, a thousand times more, than her
grandfather’s apparent anxiety about the intelligence
communicated by Lady Desmond,
and they accomplished the circuit of the walls,
silently, or, exchanging occasional remarks
very foreign from the subject occupying both
their minds.

At length the Colonel said abruptly—

“Kate, my child, what do you think of Lady
Desmond’s invitation?”

“Oh! I think it a delightful plan; but you,
grandpapa, do you think we shall be able to
accept it?”

“At present decidedly not. I must not be
farther from Dublin than I am—I fear I shall
have much letter writing, if indeed I am not
obliged to go to Ireland myself; if matters
come right again, I shall certainly endeavour[17]
to let the Priory, and take you to Italy; this
complete retirement is not good or safe.”

“Safe!” said Kate, laughing. “Why I
thought it was quite selon les regles, of all romances,
that a dethroned prince, and his lovely
and interesting daughter, like you and I,
should be safe only while in obscurity.”

“According to old romances, I grant; but
according to reality, there is more danger in
the strong contrasts which the occasional
breaks in a life of retirement present, in the
tone of mind it engenders, than in the action
of society, at least to you, Kate.”

“Danger! Oh, tempt me not to boast,”
cried Kate, endeavouring to draw her grandfather
from his moralising mood. “You may
despise old romances, but you are nevertheless
assuming the tone of some melancholy Count
Alphonso, warning a sensitive and angelic
Lady Malvina, against the world in general:
dearest and best,” she continued, in graver and[18]
tenderer tones, “I must swim down the troubled
current of life, as you have done before
me, and meet its difficulties and trials—leave
me then to the same guide by whose aid, you
have passed many a dangerous rapid safely,
to float in a smooth, though diminutive haven
at last.”

“You are right, Kate, quite right; but how
much longer the smoothness will last, God
only knows.”

“Well, there is a God, to know all, and
direct all, and that consciousness, must rob the
future of all apprehension. Shall I write to
Lady Desmond, on our return, and tell her of
our indecision and its causes?”

“By all means. Yet, dear child, I wish you
would accept her invitation, you want change,
and I could remain quite comfortably with
nurse and—”

“Do not utter such treason! Leave you!
and to amuse myself in Italy, when there is a[19]
chance that so far from being able to do without
me, you may peculiarly want me.”

“My dear, dear, unselfish child.”

“Not a bit unselfish—tout au contraire. I
should be miserable away, besides—but here
are our friends, Winter and Gilpin, so, dearest
grandpapa, leave the future to take care of itself;
all will be arranged for the best.”

There was no time to say more, as the
painter and organist approached; but though
the Colonel made no reply, some unexplained
current of feeling induced him to pass his arm
through Kate’s, instead of offering it, as was
his habit, for her support.

“Ha! Miss Vernon, I see you have taken
advantage of a stray gleam of sun, to seduce
the Colonel into risking another cold—the
wind is truly detestable, but as I could not
keep Gilpin in doors, I came out with him, he
has not a grain of prudence!”

“My dear Winter, it is a remarkable fine[20]
day for March, I am glad, Gilpin, you felt
equal to a walk.”

“I think you look better,” observed Kate.

“Yes: I think I am better, I feel to revive
at the approach, however boisterous, of
spring.”

“Cospetto! three months in Italy would
make you a new man; but here, the great
mystery to me is, how any one who catches a
cold ever loses it.”

“The remedy is worse than the disease;
imagine a depressed invalid in a strange
country, without a single friend, or, even acquaintance,
and ignorant of its language,” returned
Gilpin.

“Wretched indeed! but wait for me, Mr.
Gilpin, we have some thoughts of taking a
flight to Italy, this summer,” said Miss Vernon.

“Corpo di Baccho! I’ll not be left behind:
to act as Miss Vernon’s cicerone, would be[21]
something more than commonly delightful—what
a state of enjoyment you would be in;
but what put such a move into your head,
Colonel?”

“An invitation from Lady Desmond, who
is at Florence,” said Colonel Vernon, “Our
acceptance of it however is very uncertain,
though I see Kate is full of the project. I
had another letter, Messieurs, which I think
will give you pleasure—here; read it, Winter.”

“Bombay—Fred Egerton—che gusto.”

A quick glance at Kate. The whole party
moved slowly towards Abbey Gardens, the
Colonel and Winter, who read the letter aloud,
and Gilpin close behind with Kate.

“Ad ogni uccello suo nido é bello,” said Winter,
as he concluded the epistle, “here am I
shivering and pining for a warm sun, which
many years’ custom has made natural to me,
and there is that young scape-grace, revelling
in baths; and slaves, and sunshine, dying to be
back among east winds and consumption!”

[22]

“Captain Egerton does not forget his friends—as
soldiers are said to do,” said Gilpin.

“Pooh, pshaw!” cried Winter, “he was
bored by a bad sea voyage; sea-sickness is at
the bottom of half the sentimental adieus
to my native shores, that you read in albums
and annuals, wait until he gets among his
tiger-shooting brother officers, or the Bombay
belles, he’ll soon forget the sum-total of all he
left behind—stuff!”

“I do not quite agree with you, Mr. Winter,”
replied Kate. “I think Captain Egerton
will always remember our little circle, kindly,
and be delighted to see any member of it
again. Beyond this we have no right to
expect; he would not charge his memory with
regrets for people, who do not let his absence
interfere with their pleasures or occupations.”

“Bravo, Miss Vernon! if he was some
worthy curate, in a white tie and spectacles,
you would not bustle up so warmly in his defence;
but a handsome light dragoon, with[23]
moustache, and a long sword and spurs, and
saucy ‘make way for me look,’ is another affair.”

“Wrong again, Mr. Winter,” said Kate.
“I see no reason why a Lancer’s cap may not
cover as good qualities, as a clerical broad-brim—and
I have been too long your pupil, not to
appreciate form and color.”

“Good; and if every Lancer was like Captain
Egerton, I, for one, would prefer trusting
them, even in a confessional, to the white neck-clothed
curates,” chimed in the organist.

“In truth, though Egerton is the type of
a class I have always disliked, I cannot help
liking him—especially when I think of his—pooh,
pooh—I was forgetting—” And Winter
stopped abruptly.

“You are mysterious,” said the Colonel.
“But let me see the Times, at your house; I
want to read the Indian news, that came by
the last mail; and to see Mrs. Winter.”

“Do you really think you will go to Italy,
Miss Vernon?” asked Gilpin.

[24]

“I fear it is problematical. I long to
travel; but grandpapa has some business, and
nurse has had a dream, which bodes evil for
my wishes.”

“Oh, the dream ought not to be classed with
the business.”

“I dare confess to you, and to you only,”
returned Kate, with a smile, “that it seems to
shake my hopes far more than the business.”

“The philosophic Miss Vernon—superstitious!”

“No, no! yet, you know—

“Winter would say it was the east wind.”

“Perhaps so,” said Miss Vernon, “for alas!
how ignominiously physical are the causes of[25]
many a tenderly poetic mood! not that I am
at all addicted to such, but—”

“I think it is a mistake to consider everything
physical, as despicable,” observed Gilpin;
“we hear of mere physical force, mere
physical wants; but the same hand made and
blended our two natures, and we shall be happy
and healthy, in proportion as we train both to
work in harmony, without giving undue preference
to either.”

“I often think we have a species of trinity
within us,” said Miss Vernon. “We have
sense with all its powerful tendencies in one
direction, and spirit with its aspirations in
another, while the heart and its affections seem
to be neutral ground, where the claims of both
may be adjusted.”

“I like the fancy; but sense gets the upper
hand in many a heart.”

“No,” interrupted Kate, “the heart may
be destroyed in the struggle, but while it
exists, the spirit always has fair play.”

[26]

“Your sentence is too sweeping; in all such
warfare, the variations are so delicately shaded
that—”

“Walk in, Colonel,” broke in Winter;
“never mind if Mrs. Winter is in or not;
Gilpin, we’ll have some Scotch broth for luncheon,
that will set you up. I give you no
choice—in you must come.”

“Sense must carry the day, Mr. Gilpin,”
said Kate, smiling.

Some days elapsed after this conversation
before a reply from Mr. Moore reached the
Colonel; and the anxiety he and Kate had
experienced, died away into a half-forgetfulness.

It is strange how events, which at first
strike us with such keen force, lose their
sharpness of outline as the mind becomes accustomed
to what was at first a novel aspect of[27]
affairs; and, as nothing fresh arises, we gradually
sink back into our former frame of mind,
or recur to that which distressed it, in momentary
spasms of anxiety.

So Kate and her grandfather had quite recovered
their usual serenity, and the former had
written to Lady Desmond, long and affectionately;
rejoicing that the cloud which had for a
while interposed between them, had been dispersed;
merely mentioning the obstacle to their
journey, as a temporary annoyance, and speaking
of its removal as a matter of certainty.

But she did not allude to it when in conversation
with the Colonel, as she fancied he
avoided the subject.

Such was their frame of mind when, at the
usual post hour, one morning, Mrs. O’Toole
entered.

“A letther for the masther,” a large, blue,
pitiless looking envelop, such as emanate
from attorneys’ and merchants’ offices, implacable
places, sacrificial alters, where youth and[28]
joy, tenderness and the pleasant amenities of
life are immolated at the shrine of the English
juggernaut “business.”

The Colonel, keeping his eye fixed on it,
felt in his pockets for his spectacles, silently,
with a certain determination of manner, very
different from the joyous confusion with which
he sought for them, when opening Fred Egerton’s
letter; then with a loud hem, as if he
wished to clear both throat and brains, he tore
open the missive.

Kate sat opposite gazing at him, as if she
could read the contents through his countenance;
and although that morning she had
risen with the full conviction that the anticipated
letter would only prove their anxiety to
be groundless, she now felt the terrible, creeping,
gnawing, sickening sensation of doubt and
dread which makes the hand so cold, and the
eye so dim, when felt in its full force.

This however was her first and but slight experience
of care, so she sat quite still, not know[29]ing
of what she thought, until her grandfather
had turned over the second page of the rather
lengthy epistle; and she could see the flourishing
signature at the end of it. Still the Colonel
did not speak, but turned back to re-read
some passage, and Kate was surprised to find
she had not courage to ask “what news?”

At last her grandfather without looking up,
handed her the letter, observing—

“Much what I ought to have anticipated;
read it, my dear.”

Kate, with a sensation of extreme repugnance,
took the letter and read as follows:—

Kate’s first feeling was that of indignant
scorn at such, to her imagination, unheard of
villany as that recorded in the letter she had
just perused; but she suppressed the expression
of it, in order to put the least gloomy view
of the matter, her simple sense presented, before
her grandfather.

[32]

“After all it is not so bad,” she said, “you
see, Mr. Moore, only anticipates, ‘some trouble,’
and surely there can be no doubt your word
would be taken, especially in Ireland, before
any other man’s oath!”

“My dear Kate, ‘some trouble,’ has a very
vague meaning from a solicitor; it may be a
month’s quibbling or forty years’ litigation; and
in law there is no such thing as honour; every
thing must be proved; and though judge and
jury may believe me incapable of wronging
Mr. Taaffe of one sou; yet, if I cannot bring
legal proof, he must succeed.”

“What a dishonest wretch he must be!
but I always had a horror of the name of
Taaffe!” cried Kate, the proud, indignant blood
mounting to her forehead.

“Some association of ideas with Taffy’s
thieving propensities?” observed the Colonel,
with an effort to be cheerful.

“But, dear grandpapa, what is to be done?[33]
this letter leaves us just in the same state of
uncertainty we were in before.”

“We must search amongst all my papers,
dear child, as Moore advises; if I find any thing
bearing on the subject, I will send it to him;
but I much fear I shall find nothing; I destroyed
a great many papers, as useless, on
leaving Dungar, and although I do not recollect
any connected with Taaffe’s business among
them, there may have been; for I considered
it so completely settled beyond dispute, that I
should have burnt them, unhesitatingly, had I
come across any. And then, Kate, we must bide
our time.”

“And are there no more active steps to be
taken? Could you not write to this nephew;
assure him you have paid the money, and
advise him not to expose himself to universal
opprobrium by acting so base a part.”

“Ah, Kate, my own warm hearted child!”
said her grandfather, sadly, “God grant you[34]
may not have to struggle with the world of
which you are so ignorant. “Universal
opprobrium,” is an expression frequently
and flourishingly put forth by newspaper
editors; and it may be occasionally drawn
down by the singularly flagrant acts of
some public characters, but the dread of it
never yet withheld any man, so inclined, from
preying on his fellows in private life; and it
will take many more years’ experience to convince
you how utterly fruitless and unorthodox
such a proceeding would be.”

“Well, grandpapa, if I am useless as a
counsellor can I not be an agent and assist you
in your search.”

“Yes, send away the breakfast things and
tell nurse to bring me the tin box, and oak
brass-bound cabinet that are in my room;
make Susan help her, they are too heavy for
her unassisted strength.”

True to his character, D’Arcy Vernon had[35]
room in his heart to think for another, though
borne down by the weight of a deeper anxiety
than he had ever felt before. His former reverse
of fortune, obliged him to renounce the
pomps and vanities of high life, and soon custom
proved them to be, trifles indeed; but here
was a question involving the possibility, nay
he could scarcely hide it from himself, the
probability of beggary.

“Athen, mavourneen; it’s the sore heart’s
within me this day to be carryin down thim
onlooky boxes; sure, I ses to meself the minit
I set eyes on that big baste iv a blue letther,
faith mee dhrame’s out sure enough; an it’s not
for the likes iv mee to be spaken to quolity,
but it was just on the tip iv mee tongue to
say ‘throw it in the fire, Kurnel jewel, an
don’t meddle or make with the likes iv it at all,
at all.’ Sure I knew at oncet it kem from
Moore’s place, be the look iv it. Oh, what was
in it, good or bad Miss Kate, avourneen?”

Nurse was too old and devoted a friend to be[36]
excluded from the family councils, and Miss
Vernon was too well acquainted with her affectionate
self-forgetful nature to consider her
question intrusive.

“Only some business, dear nurse; it may be
troublesome or may not, but cannot be avoided,
even by your good advice; so just bring down
the boxes, and you shall hear more when I
have more to tell, and, nurse,” turning back
from the dining-room door, “should Mr.
Winter or Mr. Gilpin, or any one call, you had
better say that grandpapa and I are particularly
engaged.”

“The Lord look down on me!” soliloquised
Mrs. O’Toole, as she crossed herself, with an
air of alarm, “not see Winther nor the crather
iv an Organist. Faith there is throuble
gotherin sure enough, I knew be the darlint’s
two eyes there was throuble in her heart this
week past; sure we were too long quiet an
happy, that thim divils iv attorneys should remember
us. I’ll go bail, it was thim that druv
[37]the captin off to that murtherin hot counthry,
an I thinkin he an mee sweet child id make it
up betune thim. The masther’s as innocent
as a lamb, but lave ould nurse alone for seein
as far into a mill stone as her naybors ow
wow; many a time, I seen him takin the full
iv his eye, out iv her, an I removin the tay
things. Och! bud it’s the wearisome world!
Susy yer idle gowk, are ye goin to lave me to
pull the arrums out of mee, liftin a ton weight
here, widout puttin a finger to help me?”

And diligently did the Colonel and his
granddaughter untie, read, and examine, and
re-tie the numerous bundles of papers and
letters.

Now a packet in Lady Desmond’s clear firm
writing was laid aside, now a smaller one in
Kate’s own hand; rapturous letters, describing
the enjoyments of her memorable visit to London,
the only time she had ever been away
from her grandfather; now turning over large[38]
yellow parchments, with red seals hanging
from them, now eagerly examining a pile of
papers whose crabbed writing bespoke business.
It was weary work; Kate, with all the
hopeful energy of youth, rapidly searching
through each of the packets at all likely to contain
a solicitor’s letter, and handing them to
her grandfather, who, latterly, leaned wearily
back in his chair, and examined them languidly.
Once his arm stole round her, as she knelt beside
the pile of papers on the floor, and she
felt how eloquent of despondency, was the
close embrace with which he held her to him;
but she constrained herself to receive it in
silence, and took no further notice than to
kiss, warmly, the hand which pressed her to
his heart, as the last and best treasure left
him.

“You are tired and cold,” said she, rising,
“I will stir the fire, and then, come and put your
feet on the fender, and I will replace these[39]
packets we have examined in the box, and
open all Lady Desmonds’ letters, some such
paper may have got among them.”

“As you like, as you like, my dear child.”

There was a long silence, broken only by
the rustling of the papers. Half an hour
elapsed, and at length Vernon, rousing himself,
said—

“Do not tire yourself longer, give me my
desk, I had better tell Moore there is not a
symptom here of what we want.”

“Wait a very little longer, there is only one
packet more, of Georgina’s; let us not give up
too soon, dear grandpapa.” A few minutes
after she came over to him with an old-looking
letter in her hand. “This is signed, ‘A.
Taaffe,’ look at it.”

Vernon took it eagerly.

“Ha, this may be useful, how could it have
got among Georgina’s letters?”

Kate read over his shoulder.

[40]

“Victoria! Dearest of grandfathers will
not that utterly annihilate Mr. Taaffe?”

“Well, I think it must be sufficient; thank
Heaven, my love, you thought of searching
among Georgy’s letters; now I must write im[41]mediately,
to Moore, and I have scarce time.
You can put away all these papers.”

With a lightened heart Kate prepared to
obey, and so visible was the change from darkness
to light, in her countenance, that nurse
exclaimed, on receiving from her the letter for
the post.

“Faith, an sure, Miss Kate, you’ve been
makin the masther tell Misther Moore to hold
his prate an lave off pinin’ any more of his
three an four pinnys to him.”

“No; not exactly that nurse, but I think
we shall soon have done with him.”

“The Lord send! And I forgot to tell
ye, Mr. Winther called; an faith, I could
hardly keep him from walkin’ in, widout ‘by
yer lave or wid yer lave,’ an thin he kim back
wid that bit iv a note.”

“Thank you, now run to the post-office,
dear nurse. An invitation to tea from Mr.
Winter,” said Kate, returning to the dining-room,
where the Colonel was putting away[42]
his writing materials. “Do you feel equal to
it?”

“Decidedly, my dear—I want to have a
little kindly, honesty, after having had a
scoundrel before my mind’s eye all the morning;
we will go and have a rubber, and a song.
How poor Egerton used to enjoy our little
parties.”

“And how much more he would enjoy
horse-whipping, Mr. Taaffe,” cried Kate, as
she locked the tin box.

“I believe he would,” said the Colonel,
laughing. “You and Egerton certainly understood
each other.”

[43]

UNCERTAINTY.

Welcome indeed was the gleam of hope,
afforded by this discovery, to the Colonel and
Kate.

To their non-legal minds, it appeared that
any acknowledgment of money received, was
sufficient, although no sum was mentioned;
and Kate even felt remorse for her hasty condemnation
of Mr. Taaffe; as she concluded the
production of the newly found letter, would
settle the question at once, and for ever, and
draw forth an humble apology from the
offender; her spirits rose even above their[44]
usual height, and overleaping, with the sanguine
vivacity of her age and race, all intervening
probabilities, she revelled in her
anticipated visit to Italy, and spent many a
pleasant half-hour in endeavouring to overcome
nurse’s inveterate antipathy to “thim
rampagin divils, the Frinch” (under which
name she classed all foreign nations and
foreigners), and in exercising her powers of
persuasion to induce the Winters and Gilpin to
join in the pilgrimage.

“You know we would not travel in any extravagant
style, Caro Maestro,” she said, to
Winter, as they were enjoying an April day,
which seemed to have borrowed the balmy air
of early summer. They had crossed the ferry,
and were strolling side by side, her tall, graceful
form, and elastic step, contrasting strongly
with his stout puffy figure.

“You had better tie a knapsack on your
shoulder at once, and trudge it—humph! ha!
not so fast if you please—you walked me up
that hill at a killing pace.

[45]

“But seriously—let us consider the best
method of setting to work, for you cannot think
how eagerly I look forward to the journey;
and if we go cheaply to work, Mr. Gilpin
might join us, and—”

“Signorina Carrissima, yes! I want to
speak seriously,” replied Winter, in a kinder
accents than usual. “Are you not too sanguine
about this journey, You make too little of the
law’s uncertainties. Mr. Moore’s letters seem
to promise well, as you read them. Your grandfather
and I see only, and at best, the promise
of a long, perhaps ruinous litigation. I felt so
convinced that this will be the case, that, from
the first, I strongly advised Colonel Vernon to
endeavour to effect a compromise. It is
true you have not much to divide, but remember
chi lascia il poco per haver l’assai nè l’uno
nè l’altro avera mai,”. I see I am acting as
usual like a brute,” he continued, thickly. “I
intended to say all this by degrees, and tenderly—but
I plunged into it at last too[46]
abruptly. My dear child, it cuts me to the
heart, to hear you anticipating such unalloyed
enjoyment, and forming such plans, when perhaps
the reverse is before you; and I fancy
your grandfather feels somewhat as I do,
though he is more sanguine than I am.”

They walked on a few paces, in silence—Kate’s
color varying, and her heart, after feeling,
for a second or two, to stand still (at this
sudden and rude shock, to her bright dreams),
throbbing as though it would burst its prison.

“Bella mia, dear child, are you angry with
me?” cried Winter anxiously. “Why do you
not speak?”

“Simply, kind friend,” returned she, putting
her arm through his, “because I could
not—angry with you? no; I am obliged to
you,” she added, with an effort to smile.
“And now tell me all you think, and what we
ought to do.”

“Humph! you are a good girl; you see, my
dear, it is more than a month since this busi[47]ness
began; if it could have been settled
quickly, it would be settled before this, and
successful or unsuccessful, a chancery suit is
ruin. There, you had better know it all.”

“And are we absolutely embarked in this
ruinous course?” asked Kate, faintly.

“I fear so. Did you not see Moore’s last letter.”

“No; grandpapa said there was nothing new
in it.”

“Ha! a mistaken tenderness; there certainly
was nothing new in it; but the plot
thickens; and, I fear there is no case at present,
to preven Mr. Taaffe proceeding to revive
the judgment, and ultimately obtain a receiver
over your grandfather’s remaining property.”

“A receiver—what for?”

“To receive the rents in payment of the
debt, if debt there be.”

“What, all of them?”

“Yes all; but, do not be too much cast
down, remember you have, few, but friends
sincere; who will stick by you, and—”

[48]

“Dear Mr. Winter, let us be silent for a
moment, I want to collect my thoughts.”

They walked on in silence for some time.

“Then from what you tell me, before long
we may be left quite penniless! Are you sure
that this is a true picture of our case? and
that your hatred of law does not color it!”

“Heaven grant your conjecture may be
right,” cried Winter. “I only tell you my
own, and I think your grandfather’s, real view
of the matter. I have been long wishing for
an opportunity to do so. I dreaded the effect
of the shock on your sensitive and imaginative
nature, and intended to have broken it to you
gradually.”

“But,” continued Kate, not noticing the
latter part of his speech, “shall we have
nothing left? no money at all! good God!
And grandpapa, what am I to do for him—and
nurse? Do not think me very weak, but
I cannot help the terror I feel.”

“Miss Vernon, I vow to Heaven, I only[49]
intended just to prepare you a little for the
worst; perhaps matters may not be so bad as
your alarmed imagination paints. My great
object in speaking thus to you is to show the
necessity for endeavouring to effect a compromise,
or at least, to come to some understanding
with your grandfather as to future plans,
you cannot look about you too soon; I know
the first shock of a thing of this kind is terrible—but
you are not one of those cowards who
defer looking danger in the face, until it is too
late.”

“Yes, I know, but what plan can we possibly
think of, if we are to have all our money
taken from us, what are we to do?”

“Dear child, be prepared for it. I would
in the first place, begin at once to curtail
every possible outlay—look out for a tenant
for the Priory. Take a smaller, humbler abode,
or, a thousand times better, make our house
your home, till matters are more decided.”

“Always kind and good,” murmured Kate,[50]
“and there is nothing more you would suggest?”

“No; except to speak freely of it all to the
Colonel, and, by so doing, creep into his complete
confidence.”

“Oh! Mr. Winter,” cried Kate, with an
irrepressible burst of tears, “and is this to be
his end? I always hoped that something, I knew
not what would happen to restore him to his
old position; and now to think of his being
obliged to live and end his days in some mean
and unsightly place.”

“Courage Kate—you know not what good
may be hidden up in store for you, behind
this sterner dispensation; I have experienced
severe poverty, and I tell you, none but those
who have felt it, can know how few, how
simple, and yet, how satisfying are the wants
and pleasures of life.”

“For you and I, yes; but for grandpapa, at
his age, after youth and manhood spent in the[51]
possession and enjoyment of wealth and a
dignified proposition.”

“If I mistake not, Colonel Vernon’s greatest
concern will be on your account, and if he
sees you content, or at least, resigned, he will
be the same.”

“Well, we can say no more now; I feel how
necessary it was, I should be roused from my
false security, and that you have acted as a
true friend in undertaking, what I know, must
have been so painful a task. I must try and
think clearly and deeply; and will speak to
you about my cogitations; meanwhile, as we
shall soon be home, let us change the subject,
and I will endeavour to recover my serenity
before I meet grandpapa.”

Winter pressed the hand she held out to
him, with a feeling of sincere respect and admiration,
for the manner in which she had
borne his communications, and an earnest wish
that the platform, at the next Jews’ meeting,[52]
might prove insecure, and so open the ranks of
the peerage to Fred Egerton—

“Though,” he added, mentally, “there is
no knowing the effects of prosperity on him.”

“Is grandpapa at home, nurse?” asked Kate.

“No, miss, he said he felt lonesome, and
walked out to see Mr. Gilpin.”

Thankful for a few minutes’ solitary reflection,
she ran to her room, and hastily fastening
the door, threw herself into a chair—not to
think, that would be by no means a correct
term to apply to the confusion of ideas, and
images, which presented themselves to her
mind; some most foreign to the subject of the
conversation with Winter. Dungar, and her
early days, with their bright anticipations rose
painfully clear before her eyes—the dreadful
possibility of seeing her grandfather in poverty—and
the insurmountable difficulty of making
nurse understand the necessity for retrenchment—the
distressing consciousness of the[53]
necessity to think deeply, struggling with the
impossibility of fixing her thoughts; and a dim
feeling that an impassable barrier was about to
be raised between her and the class of which
Fred Egerton was a representative.

All these and a thousand more undefined,
shadowy, outlines swept across her mind, while
she sat so still that she felt the throbbing of
her heart, as if echoed in her head, and she
could almost almost hear the pulses that vibrated
through her slight frame.

Frightened at this continued rebellion of her
thoughts, against her will, she threw herself
on her knees, silently laying the painful chaos
before the Almighty ruler and searcher of
hearts!

“If accepted as coming from God,” she
murmured, “and therefore good, nothing is
unbearable, Mr. Gilpin says, and he is right;
perhaps we may succeed in this business after
all, though I feel quite hopeless, after what
Mr. Winter has said—but if we have no[54]
money, could I not earn it? I have a good
knowledge of music—ah, delightful! how
proud I should be, to earn it for grandpapa,
who has always taken such care of me; and
nurse would not mind it much. I like teaching.
Ah! we may be happy yet—I must
speak to Mr. Winter about it. Ah! nurse’s
dream may come true, but by contraries, after
all; who can tell what strength love, and God’s
good help may lend even to these weak arms,”
and she stretched them out. “Enough to
support dear grandpapa, perhaps—that would
be a proud achievement!” she said almost
aloud, as a feeling of quiet courage swelled her
heart.

She proceeded to bathe her eyes and make
her simple toilette, interrupted, it is true, by a
delicious vision that would intrude itself, of
Fred Egerton wealthy and powerful, flying to
save her and hers, and interposing the shield
of his affectionate care between them and
every earthly ill; in vain she chided herself for[55]
so far-fetched a thought; instinctively she felt
how readily and rapturously he would perform
such a part; and however impressively
she told herself she was absurd and visionary the
idea would return. It was the nearest approach
to love that had ever connected itself with him
in her mind, and his image, once invested with
this hue, never again lost it.

There has been so much said, and said with
eloquence, pathos and truth, of the heroism of
every day life, that I fear to approach ground
already so well occupied; yet I cannot pass, in
silence, the resolution with which Kate calmed
herself to meet her grandfather at dinner; and,
her attention now fully roused, preserved that
composure even while observing a thousand
minute indications of despondency, which cut
her to the heart.

“Shall I speak to him of business to-night?”
she asked herself more than once; anxious to
begin that line of conduct which Winter had
pointed out to be her duty; and, each time as[56]
she looked at the worn expression of that beloved
and venerated face, her heart answered,
“No, not to-night, let him have a good night’s
rest, and to-morrow, to-morrow, I will unflinchingly
approach the subject.”

So she brought him his footstool and moved
his chair to the right angle with the fire.

“Are you quite well darling?” said he,
gazing up at her as she arranged a cushion at
his back, “I thought you looked pale at dinner.”

Ah! Fred Egerton, dashing and fearless as
you are, could you brave danger and death
with nobler courage than that which steadied
Kate’s voice, when, instead of yielding to the
almost irresistible inclination to throw herself
into her grandfather’s arms and pour forth
passionate and tearful assurances, that, come
what may, there was a world of inexhaustible
love and energy, all his own in her heart, she
said gently, but with a certain cheering steadiness—

[57]

“Well, always quite well, dear grandpapa.
Now take a nice sleep.”

“God bless you, Kate.”

Seating herself, book in hand, in the window,
away from the fire, for which the evening
was almost too warm, but which the Colonel
could not bear to give up, she gazed long
and fixedly at the river, and the broken bank,
the fields, the copse, and an orchard to the
right, now one sheet of blossom; the sturdy old
oak, which had looked like a rugged skeleton
all the winter, now bursting into leaf; at the
general flush of delicate, yellowish green which
seemed to pervade all vegetable nature; yet the
gradual close of evening, beautiful as it was,
impressed her with a feeling of sadness, partly
caused by the emotions of the day, and partly
by the mournful tenderness, which is so often
and so strangely induced, by the contemplation
of coming night in early spring.

As Kate sat leaning her head against the
window frame, her book hanging negligently[58]
from her hand, thinking of the rich autumn
scene this view had presented, when Fred
Egerton sketched it for her, some little bustle
outside the drawing-room door attracted her
attention, it was opened, and nurse announced,

“Misther and Missis Winther, Miss Kate.”

Seldom had visitors been more heartily
welcome, their coming was an inexpressible
relief to Kate, and helped her well over the
evening she had almost dreaded.

Few in this trying world of ours, do not
know that there are times when a tête-à-tête
with the person we love most on earth is an
ordeal we would fain escape; when we shun
the slightest expression of tenderness, lest it
should betray the deep and yearning affection
which swells the heart with sadness, not for
ourselves, but for those for whom no sacrifice
would seem painful, could we but save them
them from suffering.

[59]

“Shall I brush yer hair asthore?” said Mrs.
O’Toole, as she followed Kate into her room.

“No, dear nurse, only I want a little rest.”

“There’s a shadow on yer face, darlint, an
wont ye spake it out to yer own ould nurse,
that held ye in her arms an ye a dawshy little
craythure, widout a mother. May be, it’s bad
news of the Captin?”

“Of the Captain! No, we have heard nothing
of him; but, good night, I will tell you
all to-morrow, dear nurse—I am weary now.”

Kate might have spared herself the anxious
thoughts that kept her waking, as to how she
should approach the painful subject of their
difficulties with her grandfather. It was done
for her rudely enough, by a letter from Mr.
Moore, announcing in legal terms, the appointment
of a receiver over their remaining
property.

She knew by the rigidity with which the
Colonel’s left hand grasped the arm of his[60]
chair as he read; that some more than usual
bad news was contained in the letter.

“I must see Winter,” said he, after a short
pause, “I must see him immediately,” he repeated,
rising.

“If there is bad news, had you not better
tell me first, dear grandpapa,” said Kate,
boldly and calmly.

“My dear child, you are unfit for such discussions,
they would only fret you.”

“Grandpapa, I am surely old enough to be
your confidante, if not wise enough to be your
counsellor; if we are to meet with reverses, it
is only in union we can find strength to bear
them. Oh, dear grandpapa, come what may,
let us avoid the pangs of concealment; let me
read that letter.”

With a mute expression of surprise, at the
tone she had assumed, he handed her the letter,
which but for Winter’s communications the
day before, would have enlightened her but[61]
little; as it was, she felt a curious sensation of
relief, that the dreaded moment was no longer
to be anticipated, and that from the present
hour a mutual confidence would be established
between her and her grandfather.

“We must leave this house of course,” she
said, musingly, as she returned the letter. “Shall
we receive any more money from Ireland?”

“Not a shilling! Resistance is, I fear,
useless, except for my character’s sake; my
child, my bright Kate, what will become of
you? I can do nothing.”

Never before had she seen the old man’s
firmness shaken. The low moan, with which
he turned away, covering his face with both
his hands, as if oppressed with the sense of his
own helplessness, struck terror into her heart,
while it seemed to arm her with indomitable
resolution to uphold and cherish her beloved
parent, round whose declining years such heavy
shadows were gathering. Steadying her voice[62]
by an immense effort, and striving to still the
throbbing pulses that shook her frame, she
raised and tenderly kissed the hand that hung,
in nerveless despondency, over the back of a
chair near which the Colonel stood.

“My own dear grandpapa, I know how sad
all this is, but for my sake do not be so cast
down, do not give way to despair. You have
been my guide, my model all my life! show
me how to bear misfortune now!”

She paused to regain command over her
traitor voice, that would tremble.

“But, Kate, we are beggars; in another
month I shall not know where to find the price
of our daily food; and though Georgina Desmond
is wealthy and generous, dependency is
wretchedness.”

“Right, dear grandpapa,” she replied, almost
gladly, at this opening to the proposition
she feared to make, “and we will scorn it.
See, I can play well, and I love to teach, oh,
very much; you will let me try and be so[63]
happy as to earn a little for you—I should be
so proud! Not here, but in London, and then
we shall be always together, and so happy! and
independent, and—”

“You teach! never,” cried the old man,
turning from her, excitedly. “You were born
for a different fate. Would to God you had
married that wealthy Englishman, as Georgy
wished, but—”

“No, no,” interrupted Kate, “is poverty,
is earning one’s own bread so miserable a lot,
that one should prefer the unutterable wretchedness
of a marriage without affection? But
why, dearest and best, am I not to teach? how
many, born to as good a position as mine, have
done so, and, if I do not, what is to become of
us?”

“What indeed!” groaned Vernon.

There was a mournful pause. Kate, not
daring to break the thread of her grandfather’s
thoughts, and silently pressing her smooth,
soft cheek against his wrinkled hand.

[64]

“My own consoling angel!” said he at last.
“It is a sad lot for you, at your age, to sink
at once into oblivion, and—”

“How do you know that I am to sink into
oblivion? how can you tell to what brilliant
destiny this dark passage may be but an
entrance? Dear grandpapa, ‘Time and the
hours run through the darkest day,’ let us bear
the present expecting a brighter future, and
now, shall I send for Mr. Winter?”

“Yes,” with a deep sigh, “we cannot act
too quickly.”

Trembling in every nerve, yet not without a
feeling of relief, that the dreaded explanation
was over. Kate penned a hasty note to Mr.
Winter, which he quickly responded to in
person.

The long conference that followed placed
Winter, ‘au fond,’ of the position of his
friend.

The farms of Knockdrum, worth little over
two hundred pounds per annum, were all that[65]
was left to the Colonel, of the wreck of his
property, and this poor remainder was barely
sufficient to meet the claim of Mr. Taaffe.

We will not follow the long, desultory conversation
that ensued; nor record the energy
with which Winter poured forth proverbs,
Spanish, French, and Italian, to prove the
Satanic origin of law; nor the sweet endurance
with which Kate endeavoured to accustom
her grandfather’s mind to her project
of her teaching.

It was decided that the Priory house and
its furniture should be disposed of at once, and
that the Colonel and Kate should take up their
abode at Winter’s, till matters could be a little
more arranged, and an answer received from
Lady Desmond to Kate’s last letter, which informed
her of the delay occasioned by Taaffe’s
proceedings.

“Remember, Colonel, though I think it too
soon to consider Miss Vernon’s proposition,
when the time comes I shall be on her side.[66]
Kate, we must have a talk about it—and pray
dine with us; when thinking is of no use it is
better to have a rubber; do not be too much
cast down; this ‘diluvio‘ has shown you the
crown jewel you have still left; it is only the
diamond that sparkles in the dark. And now,
come and see poor Gilpin with me. You may
as well, when you have answered that confounded
letter. Here’s your desk.” Aside to
Kate, as the old man settled himself to write.
“We must not leave him too much by himself.”

Light and pleasant is the task to paint the
the various phases of joy, for whatever light
touches it beautifies; but rare is the skill that
can truly depict the gloom of sorrow, and fascinate
the eye, by a depth of shadow that
admits of little variation! For those who are
gliding along on the smooth waters of prosperity,
turn from a picture with which they
cannot sympathise, and whose most exquisite
touches, uninstructed by care or adversity, they[67]
pronounce overdrawn; and even the treaders
of rough paths, wearied with ‘the burden and
heat of the day,’ give but a reluctant glance,
at what only reminds them of their own griefs,
and exclaim; “this we know, this we have
felt, tell us of joy, of hope, of true friends,
and tender hearts; cheat us into a happy dream,
even though it lull us but for a moment, even
though the waking be bitter, and our souls
will bless you.”

[68]

PREPARATIONS.

The day but one after the above conversation,
another summons brought Winter to the little
dining-room of the Priory, the scene of so
many consultations.

The Colonel welcomed him with his usual
empressement, but a tremour of the hands, as he
waved towards a seat, with an old-fashioned
and urbane grace, which scarcely the shock of
an earthquake could have made him forget,
indicated some excitement; Kate’s color too
was heightened, and her eyes, though bright,
had an anxious expression.

[69]

“You see we cannot get on without you,
my dear sir,” began the Colonel, “your
prompt compliance with my request for an
interview, is most gratifying—ah! The subject
I wish to speak to you on is far from unpleasant,
I want your opinion on a rather
momentous question. In short, show Mr.
Winter that letter, Kate.”

“Ha, hum! Lady Desmond, I see. What
a firm hand the woman writes.”

It was hurriedly written, and short; after
a few desultory remarks, apparently in reply
to Kate’s last letter, it concluded thus, “Of
law and its probable delays, I can form no
judgment, but why they should prevent your
visit to me I cannot and will not understand;
they are additional reasons, I think, why you
should at once take up your abode with me,
at least until affairs are arranged, and that low-bred
knave’s vile scheme is defeated; I know
not, dearest Kate, how far these proceedings
may affect the great tidal wave, which ebbs[70]
and flows in men’s pockets. Therefore, whatever
you may decide upon, and whenever you
require it, I trust your dear grandfather will
not refuse, to fill up the enclosed check on my
banker for whatever sum he may want; it will
be a gratification to his old protégée to think
she can be of use to him, and if you will use
it to facilitate your journey here, you will
leave scarce a wish unfulfilled to yours, as
ever.—G. D.”

“Ha! done like a princess! a generous,
headstrong woman, I’ll lay my life; and now
a journey or not a journey, that’s the question;
let me hear your opinion, Kate?”

“Oh! Mr. Winter, I have none; my only
clear idea is, that this world is not such a bad,
unhappy world, where we have a Lady Desmond
and a Mr. Winter to leaven the whole
lump. It is a most tempting offer; but you
will call me perverse; I do not feel half so
inclined to accept it as when—as when we
were more independent of it.”

[71]

“And you, Colonel Vernon?”

“I am very anxious,” said the Colonel, in
a hesitating manner, not usual with him, “at
all events, that Kate should avail herself of
such an invitation. Nurse might travel with
her, I shall probably visit Dublin, look in upon
you, and—”

“Pray where is the money to come from to
do all this?” said Winter, bluntly.

“My dear sir, you forget we shall sell our
furniture, and let this house.”

“And when that is all gone you will be just
where you were, except that your chief comforter
will be many a league away, and Lady
Desmond’s gratitude immersed in that lethe in
which impulsive people’s noblest sentiments
most frequently lose themselves.”

“You wrong my cousin,” cried Miss Vernon.

“In truth I feel incapable of deciding,” said
the Colonel. “I do not like the idea of throwing
ourselves on Lady Desmond; but, Winter,[72]
you cannot comprehend the horror with which
I contemplate my Kate’s teaching—walking
out alone, meeting insolence—Great God!”

He covered his face with his hands, and
Kate, half appalled by the dismal picture he
had drawn, clasped hers together with an appealing
look to Winter, who said, huskily and
oracularly,

“Hear me, Colonel. I can easily comprehend
your feelings, though I am a plebeian;
but I tell you there is another side of the
picture. At present you are in perfect sympathy
with your cousin, and the electricity of
mutual obligation and kindness runs freely back
and forward between you; but when you have
been for six months her inmate, feeling yourself
dependent on her bounty for the bread
you eat; when a wish for variety may tempt
her to covet the rooms you occupy for some more
amusing guest, less weighed down by care;
and when the freshness and excitement of a
generous act, shall have ceased to interest; a[73]
thousand mortifying slights, a thousand unimportant
trifles, will make your life wretched,
and wear away the links that now seem to
bind you so close together.”

“Oh, no, no, Georgy could never act unkindly,”
cried Kate.

“My dear young lady,” resumed Winter,
“there are few in this curious world of ours
that cannot, once or twice in their lives, do a
kind and a generous action; but there is not
one in a thousand, or a hundred thousand, that
can act with uniform kindness, courtesy and
justice to a dependent, a creature in their
power—power! it is the forcing house of evil!
The woman who could quarrel with you because
you would not be happy her way, is not
one of these exceptions; she would wound
you one day, and beg your forgiveness, in abject
terms, the next; and you, doubly sensitive
from feeling the impossibility of freedom, would
live in a state of slavery! Pah! never shut
yourselves out from the chance of earning in[74]dependence
here, for such a prospect, however
riant, the aspect at present.”

“Ha!” said Colonel Vernon, walking up
and down. “There is a great deal of truth in
what you say, but Lady Desmond is a woman
of warm and generous feeling, and Kate, at
least, would be safe with her, so—”

“You know, grandpapa, I will never leave
you—it is useless and cruel to talk about it!”

“It is both, my dear Colonel,” urged Winter,
“Kate would be wretched without you;
nor do I think this a fitting time for you to
separate; and, be warned by me, live on a
crust and cold water, if you can earn no more,
rather than doom yourselves to a life of dependence.”

“Dear Mr. Winter, you are right,” said Kate,
earnestly, “my own grandpapa, let us make
up our minds, to bear all hardships, provided
we are together. If I must teach, do
not make my path more difficult by taking it
so much to heart. We have long lived inde[75]pendent
of any pleasures but those of our
home; these we can still have; the worst pang
will be to bid this kind friend farewell; but he
will come and see us sometimes. And after all
we may win the lawsuit and enjoy our little fortune
doubly. I will write to dear Georgy, and
affectionately decline her kind offer; and then
let us set to work at once about what must be
done—shall we, dearest and best?” kissing his
hand.

“It must be so,” said the Colonel, after a
pause. “It must be so, and I will never fret
you more, my love, by opposition to your
wishes; I thought it right, at all events, to
consider the advantages Lady Desmond’s invitation
might offer for you, though I shrink
from the idea of living on any one—and to
think of parting with you! ah!”

“Now you talk like a man of sense,” said
Winter. “I will tell you, what I think you
ought to write; I think Lady Desmond will
be affronted if you reject all her offers, and[76]
justly; so split the difference, keep that blank
check, (she has sent it unconditionally) against
a rainy day; tell her, though you have no
want of it, at present, you may, and do
not mention your intention of teaching; she
would be hurt at your preferring such an
alternative to residing with her; next year she
may return, and find you happy, comfortable
and independent; I trust things will wear a
very different aspect from that presented
by the bare announcement, ‘I am going
to teach.’ Hum,” he added, musingly. “Langley
used to keep up a good connection in
the musical world, and Herman, he bears
an excellent character, and holds a good
place; you must look up your old music-master,
my dear. Then, Colonel, I have known
so many people ruined before they could
make the necessary changes; they get into
a procrastinating habit, waiting for this
to be sold, and that to be paid, before the
totally new system of life can be commenced,[77]
which is so essential. Now I’ll tell you what
I’ll do. Leave the Priory and its furniture in
my hands; I’ll get a tenant for it, or make the
fat Rector take it off your hands. The furniture
shall be disposed of by auction, and I’ll
advance you a hundred pounds upon it; if it
sells for more, I’ll remit you the difference, if
for less, you can pay me when you have pitched
Taaffe to the ‘Inferno;’ but I am quite certain
it will bring more. Then you can start when
you please, quietly; and when you begin to like
London, direct me to sell your belongings.
Hey! anything to stop the infernal chatter of
Miss Araminta Cox—the Mrs. Grundy of
A——. What say you, Colonel?”

“That you are a friend indeed! I will be
entirely guided by your counsels; but remember,
you must not wrong yourself. I must
have all the auctioneer’s accounts forwarded to
me. I can hardly describe to you the relief
your thus smoothing matters affords me.”

[78]

“You give me strength and courage,” said
Kate.

“Hum,” resumed Winter. “Langley—yes,
he can engage lodgings for you where you
are going. When do you think you can
start?”

“Oh!” said Kate, shrinkingly, “not sooner
than a fortnight or three weeks.”

“A fortnight or three weeks,” cried the
Colonel, “impossible!”

“You are a real, earnest worker, Miss
Vernon,” interposed Winter. “I expected a
much longer date; what will become of me
when you are gone? and gone on such an
errand. ‘Dio buono! le sciagure e le allegrezza
non vengono mai sole;’ but what do you think
of doing with Mrs. O’Toole?”

“Oh, she goes with us, of course,” replied
Kate.

“Well, you know best how much you pay
her, and whether you can afford it?” returned
Winter.

[79]

“But nurse is not like a servant, she is a
friend, she could never live with any people
but us? Oh, do not tell me, we must leave
nurse!” said Miss Vernon.

“We cannot accept her services for nothing,”
observed the Colonel.

“I will gladly engage her as cook and
house-keeper, at whatever wages you give
her.”

“Her wages are small,” said Kate, “she
would not accept higher, since we left Dungar!”

“Well, you must settle all that with her,”
returned Winter. “I am ready to ratify any
arrangement you may make; and now write to
Lady Desmond, as I suggested, Kate; ma belle et
bonne enfant, you are wearied by this long,
gloomy talk, and I am an old bear. I know it,
Colonel; but my heart is like the coat of my
prototype, rough and warm.”

After some more general conversation, they
separated, Winter and the Colonel, to visit[80]
some land the former wished to purchase,
and about which he affected great anxiety
to have the Colonel’s opinion. Kate
to walk in solitary meditation by the
river, to try and collect her thoughts, before
the dreaded explanation with nurse. Mournfully
she gazed at all the well-known objects
she had learned to love, in her tranquil, happy
retirement; and her bright, quick, fancy
painted in strong contrast the life she was
henceforth to lead.

“Even if I am successful, grandpapa will
be so much alone,” she thought; “and what a
crowded, busy, terrifying place London is! I
am glad Fred Egerton is in India, I could not
bear that he should meet me, perhaps, walking
alone in London.”

And the large tears stole down her cheeks,
at the mixture of feelings this vision aroused.
Turning slowly round, she approached the
little landing place, intending to speak a few
words to Elijah Bush; a little, rosy, curly-[81]headed
boy, was seated in the boat instead of
its shaggy owner; he rose, as Kate stopped at
the end of the landing.

“Where is Elijah?” she enquired.

“Please, ma’am, he’s been sick these three
days back.”

“I am sorry to hear it; what is the matter
with him?”

“Oh, ma’am, he’s got the rheumatics drefful
bad.”

“And is there no one to mind the boat but
you, my little man?”

“No, ma’am.”

“You cannot row it?”

“No, ma’am; but whiles the men rows
the’selves, and gives me the money.”

“And have you had many passengers?”

“One yesterday, ma’am; and none at all
the day.”

“Then poor Elijah must be but badly off;
has he any money?”

“Oh dear no, ma’am.”

[82]

“Where does he live?”

“In the Piper’s lane, nigh St. Winefred’s
Tower, ma’am.”

“Will you show me the way to him?”

“Oh yes, ma’am; I often hear him speak
of ye, ma’am; he’ll be main glad to see ye,
ma’am.”

“What is your name, my little man?”

“Willy Bush, ma’am.”

“Are you Elijah’s grandson?”

“No, ma’am, he’s my gran-uncle.”

“Well, I will just go up to the Priory, and
return to you immediately; and then you shall
show me the way to him.”

Called away from the contemplation of her
own trials, Kate, feeling her usual elasticity
return, ran lightly up the steep path, and called
nurse, to arm herself with broth and flannel
for the invalid.

“Is it Piper’s lane? Now, Miss Kate, I
cannot let you go to sich a place. Set up the
old Methody, to have Miss Vernon nurse and[83]
tending iv him—I can take the tay and the
broth, and them flannels just as well.”

“But, nurse, he would like to see me.”

“I’ll go bail he would.”

“And I would like to see him; besides, I
want to talk to you, dear nurse.”

“Faix, it’s a wax modial I am in yer hands,
ye turn an’ twist me what way ye will; but to
think iv yer takin’ the illigant mutton broth I
was cooking for the masther’s own self, bangs
Banaher.”

“There will be quite enough left for us,”
laughed Kate; “and I am afraid the poor
man wants it much more than we do.”

“It’s not the likes iv me ‘ud begrudge him
a taste iv broth,” said nurse, tying a capacious
tin-can up very carefully. “Now are yes
ready, avourneen. It’s yerself has the heart
for the poor! an’ the Lord ‘ill remimber it to
you in the hour of need, amin.”

The little boy guided them through many
narrow, winding ways, to a wretched habita[84]tion
outside the walls, and almost under the
half-ruined tower of St. Winefred. It was a
miraculous place, for although all the pools
seemed to be, at least partly, composed of
soap suds, nothing looked as if it had ever been
washed.

Here, in a tolerably clean room, at least by
comparison, they found Elijah, looking more
shaggy than ever, stretched on some straw,
and covered with a tattered pea-jacket. After
a little kindly talk and friendly enquiries as to
the old man’s resources, which proved to be
indeed scanty, Kate left him, telling the small
boy to call at the Priory, in half an hour,
when she said she would give him a note to
the doctor.

“So good bye, Elijah, I hope you will be
better to-morrow; in the mean time take this,
till you are able to earn some more yourself.”

“I’m a poor hand at returning thanks, Miss
Vernon,” said Elijah, with evident feeling,
“but,” he added, solemnly, “The Lord hear[85]
thee in the day of trouble, the name of the
God of Jacob defend thee!”

“Amen,” said Kate, fervently, bending her
head to the benediction.

Mrs. O’Toole, pausing in her occupation of
transferring the broth to an earthen vessel,
crossed herself, and the next moment they left
the place silently.

“He’s a mighty quare man,” said Mrs.
O’Toole, meditatively, after they had almost
reached the river side, without breaking a
pause of unusual duration. “Faith, he blessed
ye like a clargy.”

“And well he might, he little knows how
soon his kindly wishes may be required.”

“Why, avourneen?”

“Nurse,” said Kate, after a minute of
troubled thought, “we must leave this place.”

“Is it to go sthreelin’ over thim furrin’
parts, among dirt and flays, an’ the Lord knows
what?”

“No, nurse, nothing half so agreeable.”

[86]

“Ah! thin, what is it, agrah? spake out
to your poor ould nurse.”

“Ah, dear nurse, there are sad times
coming; poor, dear grandpapa, through some
terrible law business, has no money left, none
at all!”

“Miss Kate, is it the truth yer afther
tellin’ me?”

“Too, too true! I cannot explain, indeed I
cannot understand, but there is a Mr. Taaffe,
who says grandpapa owes him a great deal of
money, which was really paid long ago; but
which, as we have lost some papers, we cannot
prove, and he has got Knockdrum, and we—we
have nothing!”

“Oh, blessed queen of heaven! that iver I
should live to see the day; not even the next
gale?”

Kate shook her head, and Mrs. O’Toole,
placing the can beside her, sat down on a log
of timber by the river, as if unable to support
herself under such intelligence.

[87]

“An’ you so tinderly rared, an’ the masther!
Ah! sweet Mary, what’ill become iv
us at all, at all? Taaffe, sure I remimber him,
the desavin’ vagabone, ye wor Arthur Taaffe,
wid a hard word for the poor, an’ yer cap in
yer hand to the quolity ye wor ruinatin’; faith,
it’s a miserable pity the masther let it go so
asy; sure the wind iv a word to my sisther’s
husband’s son, Denny Doolan ‘ud have riz the
boys on Knockdrum; an’ I’d like to see the
process sarver that ‘ud get the tip of his toe
on the lands.”

“You know, nurse, that is a sort of thing
happily gone by.”

“More’s the pity if it is; how are yez to
deal with thaves an’ ruffins, if it is’nt with the
sthrong hand?”

There was a pause, during which, nurse,
her hands clasped and embracing her knees,
rocked herself to and fro, and Kate, leaning
against an old thorn, (now bursting into pri[88]meval
youth and beauty,) gazed sadly down
upon her.

“Six an’ four is ten, an’ four is fourteen,”
now burst out Mrs. O’Toole, abruptly. “Ye
see, Miss Kate, me daughther is doin’ well in
Ameriky, wid her husband; an’ Denis in the
hoigth iv grandure wid the Captin in Ingee,
an’ I, aitin’ an’ dhrinkin’ iv the best iv
vittles, an’ doin’ just what I like in the Curnel’s
house, wid shawls, an’ gowns, an’ lace
caps, guve me by the thrunkful; faith, me
wages is just so much dhross; I’d as lieve light
the candles with the notes; so, Miss Kate,
avick! if the Masther ud keep the money for
me till betther times, I’d be greatly behoulden
to him, he’d save me from bein’ chated; any
ways it’s a murtherin’ shame to have it lyin’
there useless.”

“Nurse, my own, dear nurse,” said Kate,
clasping her arms round her, “where is there
so true a heart as yours? No, no, this will not[89]
do.” Then, (as nurse reddened a little,)
“should we want it you shall be the first I
apply to; but we shall have a hundred pounds
to go on with; and Lady Desmond has offered
us all we want; and besides, (approaching the
last dreaded communication, with a desperate
attempt at gaiety) besides, I am going to earn
quite a fortune.”

“Airn a fortune, Miss Kate! ah, how,
jewel?”

“I am, you know, a good musician, and in
London there is money to be got for teaching
music, and—”

“Miss Vernon, is it a tacher ye’d be afther
makin’ iv yerself? You that was born iv as
ould a stock as any in all Ireland, ay oulder.
Och! what’s come to ye at all, at all, you that
used to be like a princess wid yer aiquals, an’
a angel wid yer infariors? I niver thought
I’d live to see the day I could say, I’m
ashamed iv ye! ochone! ochone!”

“Nor will you, if you will think for a[90]
moment,” said Kate, affectionately taking Mrs.
O’Toole’s hand between both her own. “Listen
to me: suppose I had been born your own
daughter, instead of your having adopted me,
would you think me mean if I worked for the
support of my grandfather, or, would you approve
of my leaving him and myself to live on
what we could get from the charity of others?
No, I thought not. Will the good and gracious
God regard me with less favour, for
endeavouring to submit and bow before the
sentence He has, in His wisdom, pronounced on
our first parents? ‘In the sweat of thy brow
shall thou eat thy bread.'”

“No, ochone no, alanah!” sobbed nurse, “sure
I’m the unfortunate ould woman to live to this
day—to see mee beautiful child, that shu’d
have married to a prence, tachin’ thim thaves
iv English the piania—an the masther! what
‘ill become iv him? The Lord look down on
him! Sweet Jesus pity us!”

“Now, nurse,” resumed Kate, tremulously,[91]
“I know how you could do me a service—I
will tell you, how you may be my support; I
shall have enough to do with grandpapa—help
me to cheer him—make light of our troubles
to him; and—” clasping her hand, “Oh, dear!
old friend, do not scare away the courage so
necessary to me—by these sad lamentations.
There is one thing more I must say to you; we
have no right to induce you to come along
with us in ignorance, and, God knows, if we
shall be able to pay you, even the small wages
you so generously insisted on, when we left
Dungar. Mr. Winter offers you higher terms,
and a comfortable home, and—”

“Och! what have I done, that ye should
think I’m not desarvin’ iv being wid yez, in
throuble? Is id at this time of day ye want
to be tould that I’d lave thousands to beg
through the world wid yez—lave ye! och,
where would I go? Sure yez the whole
world to ould nurse! Lave ye, an ye in
throuble. Oh! what have I done that ye[92]
would spake that way to me?” And covering
her face in the folds of her cloak—poor
nurse sobbed aloud!

“Hear me, my own dear, earliest friend,”
cried Kate, kneeling beside her, and endeavouring
to take her hand, “I have said this,
simply, because I was told to do so—I never
dreamt—I never could dream of parting from
you, and that subject is at rest between us
for ever—come what may, we will be together.
Do you hear me? Put your arms round me,
and say you forgive your own Kate.”

And nurse folded her to her heart fervently,
exclaiming—

“The blessin’ iv Christ on ye, avourneen!”

There was a pause for some moments—broken
at length by the sound of footsteps,
seldom heard in that unfrequented spot.

“We must go home now,” said Kate, wiping
away her tears. Nurse, still silent, rose, and
lifted her can.

“An where is it yer going to tache? that[93]
iver I should say the word!” she asked with a
fresh burst of grief. “In London—in London,
musha, but it’s a big place, and sure the
house o’ Lords is there, an I’ll go bail the
masther—’ill meet many a one that heard tell
iv D’Arcy Vernon in Dungar—who knows Miss
Kate; but some iv thim ‘ill spake to the
Queen, to make him a jidge or a gineral, or
the like, any ways; it’s sich a tunderin’ big
place, that ye might be tachin’ in one corner,
and livin’ like a prencess in another, an no
one a bit the wiser; sure, yer right hand
wouldn’t know what the lift was doin’, in a big
place like that.”

“Very true, nurse, I dare say no one will
know what I am about.”

“The Lord send!” said Mrs. O’Toole,
heartily, as the fact of Kate’s teaching for
money began to lose half its horrors in
the fancied possibility of concealing the inglorious
occupation.

“Now, nurse,” said Kate, pausing at the[94]
gate of their little domain, “remember our
agreement, you must not make bad worse to
grandpapa.”

“Niver you fear, darlint, I’d bite the
tongue out iv me head, afore I’d spake the
word, that id vex yer; only dont send me from
ye, mavourneen.”

True to her word, when the Colonel, after
dinner—in consequence of Kate’s having intimated
that nurse knew how affairs stood—said—

“Bad times, Nelly—bad times—worse than
I ever thought I should live to see.”

She replied cheerfully, and steadily—

“Thrue, for ye, sir; but there’s good luck
afore yez, for all that—an’ Miss Kate an meself’s
goin’ to be as bould as lions, so we are
faith, I’ll see yez give the go-bye to thim
thavin’ attornies, yet.”

Swiftly sped the interval that remained
before they left their peaceful dwelling; numerous
were the arrangements to be made before[95]
the final move, and the selections of those
peculiarly sacred treasures, that could not be
left behind, the number of which was daily
swelled. Winter took charge of the Colonel’s
picture, but, “John Anderson,” was packed
for removal—music and drawings—a pet vase
or two—her books, and some cushions for the
Colonel, was all that Kate could take with her
of her pleasant, pretty home; but the sofa and
prie dieu, at which she had so diligently
worked, to give an air of greater elegance to
their little drawing-room—the arm chair, so
associated in her mind’s eye with the noble,
venerable form of her grandfather—the flower
garden, now bursting into radiant beauty, and
which Fred Egerton used so much to admire,
even in its autumn garb—all these must pass
away into strange hands; she must not only
leave her ark, but ever think of it as desecrated!
And, Elijah Bush, too, he must be left;
and the navigator’s little orphan; and the
keeper’s sickly boy—all her poor people—the[96]
various objects to which her full, rich sympathies
so freely flowed.

Yes; many a link that bound her, closely
and pleasantly, to her calm and quiet life, in
their ecclesiastical retreat, she was compelled
to break; and still through all the saddening
occupations which preceded their dreaded
journey, Kate endeavoured to keep her mind
fixed upon the future she had laid down for
herself, with a steadiness which, exhibited in
some more high sounding and attractive cause
than the mere common-place duty of earning
bread for her parent, would have drawn forth
odes and laudations from many a potent pen.

Nurse’s conduct was beyond all praise; not
even when alone with Kate, did she indulge in
anything beyond a passing condemnation of
attorneys, generally; and good little Mrs.
Winter, only half enlightened as to the real
motives of her friends’ departure, was invulnerable
to the prying of Miss Araminta
Cox.

[97]

Matters stood thus and time had run by, to
within a week of the removal to London, when
Gilpin, now very weak, interrupted Kate’s
practice one morning.

“My dear Mr. Gilpin,” said she, rising to
receive him, with some surprise, “this is most
imprudent!”

“I could not let you go without paying one
more visit to the Priory.” His cough interrupted
him.

“But we should have called on you, I intended
doing so with grandpapa; indeed you
were wrong to venture out, but, as you are
here, how glad I am to see you, and the day is
so fine.”

“When do you start?” he asked, feebly;
sinking back exhausted into an arm chair Kate
had drawn forward.

“Ah, do not talk of that; Tuesday or Wednesday.
Now the time draws near I feel my
heart sink at the idea of leaving all we are
accustomed to, to cast ourselves like ship-[98]wrecked
mariners on the great troubled ocean of
London.”

“And I have almost prayed that you might
remain a little longer; but it is not to be so.
I have crawled out to-day, my dear Miss Vernon,
for I knew I should find you alone, and I
wanted to speak a few quiet words with you.
I almost feared to meet you after this sad
change in all our hopes for you; I have so deplored
it, that, judging by myself, I dreaded
its effects on you, but your face re-assures me,
there is no grief, scarce a grave look there.
I have so much wished to speak with you.”

“And I with you, dear Mr. Gilpin, I feel it
is so long since I saw you.”

“But let us speak at once of all that has
occurred, I shall soon be so weary. How is it
that there is none of the languor of sorrow,
the fever of anxiety in your face?”

“Because I feel neither—do you know, I
am half surprised to find how the first feeling
of dread at the idea of earning money, has[99]
worn away by steadfastly looking at it. It reminds
me of those double pictures which appear
wintry when you first look at them, but,
hold them to the light, and the deeper, richer
colors of summer, painted beneath, shine
forth! Then, dear grandpapa has borne up so
wonderfully, and poor nurse has been so manageable,
and you and Mr. Winter so—so kind,
that I should be an ungrateful coward to let
myself feel sad, except,” she added, as the
tears sprang to her eyes, “at the thought of
parting from you all.”

Gilpin was silent, for a few moments, and
then said,

“My dear young lady, forgive me, for not
knowing your noble nature better! I ought
to have been certain you would be above the
common grief that mourns the possibility of
losing caste, as the worst of earthly woes; my
chief anxiety to see you, and to see you alone,
was to hear fully, from your own lips, all the
plans of which I do not like to question the[100]
Colonel too closely, and to offer you a few
hints, which, (excuse me if I presume too far)
may be useful to you.”

“Our plans are simple enough. To remove
to London, where, through the interest of my
old music master and one or two friends, to
whom Mr. Winter offers me introductions, I
hope to obtain pupils in music, who will pay
me for instruction, that is all.”

“If you will allow me I will add one, to
an old master of mine. And these are all the
introductions you will take with you?”

“Yes, all. Mr. Winter mentioned the
bishop’s wife as likely to be of use; but,
to say the truth, I shrunk from the idea
of asking her; I do not like to have the matter
talked over at the little clerical tea-parties of
A——. So much for my high-mindedness.”

“Very natural, and a few good professional
introductions are worth scores of mere recommendations
to fashionable ladies, who consider
they fulfil their promise if they mention your[101]
name to any acquaintance who may happen to
make enquiries for an instructress. Now if
Herman, (I think he was your master,) will
really back you up, and give you his junior
pupils, you may be very successful. I am
afraid my recommendation will not prove very
effectual, but try it.”

“And, Mr. Gilpin, what should you—that
is have you any idea what I ought to ask for
my services?”

“You must learn all that from Herman, or
Winter’s friends; as to the terms on which
you and your pupils’ families will meet, accept
some hints, which experience enables me to
give; God knows you will teach under very
different circumstances from what I did. Novels
and magazines teem with the most revolting
instances of the slights shown to lady teachers.
In my opinion all this may be very much, if
not altogether avoided, except by the resident
governess; occasional teachers have only to
observe this rule; treat those with whom you[102]
come in contact, professionally, as men of
business do those whom they encounter on
‘Change, or in their offices; once a lesson is
given, the relations between pupil and teacher
are at an end, and you have no more to say to
each other; for this purpose resist any advance
towards intimacy, which may—which will be
sure to be made to you. Am I speaking too
freely, Miss Vernon, in thus placing the reality
of your future before you?”

“No,” said Kate, firmly, and holding out
her hand to him. “No, I feel the need of
such suggestions, and I like to talk of what
must be; it is good for me, and there is no use
in making grandpapa think of it at all more
than necessary; I hope to manage so as often
to cheat him into forgetfulness of my occupation;
only I do trust Mr. Winter’s friend may
not engage apartments for us in a wretched,
narrow street. Lady Desmond used to live in
Berkeley street, and it was reckoned a good
situation, I thought it horrible.”

[103]

“You might try the Kensington or Bayswater
side.”

“Any trees or flowers to be seen there?”

“Oh, yes, plenty.”

“Then I will beg of Mr. Winter to suggest
that locale.”

“Mrs. O’Toole of course goes with you?”

“Of course. Dear nurse, she is so true
and self-forgetful!”

“And Cormac, what will you do with him?
You can hardly take that huge animal with
you.”

“Not just yet; he remains with the Winters;
but will follow us when we can arrange
to have him. Mr. Winter said no one would
take us in, at first, with so formidable a looking
companion.”

“I should fear not, but—”

The entrance of the Colonel here cut short
their private conference; he, like his granddaughter,
expressed surprise and pleasure, not
unmingled with uneasiness, at the organist’s[104]
appearance, and, after some discussion, he
agreed to dine with them, at a somewhat
earlier hour than usual; as the softness of a
June evening could not possibly, they all
agreed, be more injurious than the morning
air.

“And let us send for Winter and his wife,”
concluded the Colonel.

Once more the little circle met round the
hospitable board in the Priory dining-room,
and though the absence of many familiar ornaments,
already packed, gave a look of barrenness
to the pretty sitting room, and bespoke
the approaching departure, the party was not
a sad one; each tried to cheer the others, and
in so doing roused himself.

So ended the last dinner at the Priory, and
never again did the same party meet under
the same roof.

Some such presentiment touched Kate’s
heart, and gave a tenderness to her attentions,
an under current of feeling even to the fanciful[105]
sallies and playful arguments with which she
strove to enliven her guests, which, gracefully
as she ever played the part of hostess, lent an
inexpressible charm to all she uttered; and
even Mrs. Winter, usually unobservant, seemed
impressed by the peculiar sweetness of her
voice and manner; and often, in after life, did
Kate look back to that last evening as singularly
agreeable, despite the approaching separation.

The last! Oh, how much of tenderness
clings round that word—the last word or look,
the last even of suffering, what a grasp, they
take of the memory; as though the soul, in
itself immortal, cannot familiarise its faculties
with any thing so finite, so sad, so passing as
the last.

[106]

A NEW WORLD.

However kind and true by nature, a man who
has risen to, can never quite understand the
feeling, of one who has fallen from higher
fortunes; the seeming trifles which can elate,
or depress, are but trifles to the former; nor
can any amount of sincere friendship ever
reveal to him the saddening effect which some
insignificant occurrence, he would scarcely
perceive, produces on the other; he cannot dream
with what terrible and intense conviction, the
sudden consciousness of total change, flashes on
the mind that had happily half-forgotten it, at[107]
some accident of daily life, to him, nothing,
in itself, a mere “contretemps,” which, in
brighter days would have only raised a smile,
but which is now too sure an indication of the
current; straw though it be.

And Winter, with all his real, steady affection,
for Kate, felt half angry with her for
the obstinacy with which she adhered to her
intention of travelling by the first class in the
railway. He could not comprehend, what she
could so well feel, that the moral effect produced
on her grandfather, by a long journey
in a conveyance, which would, every moment,
bring the utter change of his fortunes and
position, so forcibly before him, would far
more than counterbalance the few pounds
saved.

“But,” reiterated Winter, “the colonel is
well and remarkably strong for his age, he
would not find the journey in the least fatiguing
by the second class; and, my dear girl, I want
to impress on you the necessity of conforming,[108]
at once, to the changes Heaven has been
pleased to send you. Procrastination is always
bad, but in the present case peculiarly injurious.”

“Yes, Mr. Winter, I know all that, and as
to the fatigue, that is not what I think of; but
imagine how wretched grandfather would feel—no,
you cannot imagine—but would it be worth
while, for the sake of the difference, to let him
receive so bad an impression of his new
position at the very outset, and so rudely. He
will have enough to suffer. Let him have an
easy start; in short this is one of the very few
points on which I cannot accept of your guidance;
and all I will add is, I hope you will,
though unconvinced, acquiesce in my decision,
and not mention this controversy to grandpapa.”

“‘Pon my word, Miss Vernon, you put me
down, right royally,” said he, laughing, and
yet surprised at the air of quiet firmness with
which she announced her determination.

[109]

“My own, dear, kind master! Ah, when
shall I have an argument with you again?
But you will write to me often, and sometimes
come to London.”

“I will, I will indeed. Ah, Kate, I did
not know how much you had twined yourself
round this tough old heart of mine, till I
found I was to lose my bright pupil. You
had better make over Cormac to me, till you
have a house of your own?”

“Oh, no, no, we should be incomplete without
my dear old dog! Besides, I promised
him he should join us as soon as possible.”

“Promised the dog; and you look as grave
as a judge.”

“Yes, I said to him yesterday, ‘I am not
going to leave you long behind, dear Cormac,’
and he looked up at me with his honest eyes,
as though he trusted me so implicitly; I could
not deceive him.”

“Kate, you have too much imagination for[110]
the battle of life, get rid of some of it, I advise
you.”

“Get rid of it! And shall I pursue my way
more successfully, if I clip the wings that
might sometimes help to waft me over rough
places.”

“You are incorrigible! You see your
fancy is going to cheat you out of nearly five
pounds in this railroad business. I wish you
would be advised by me; and, indeed, strictly
speaking, it is your duty to conform as soon as
possible to circumstances.”

“My strict duty! Oh, Mr. Winter, I abjure
strictness, it is a thing of mathematical
precision, gone, vanished with the old dispensation;
which, providing rules for all and every
thing, left no room for those exquisite shades
and tints without which, life, as well as
pictures, would have neither truth nor beauty.
I never like to think how much or how little
I ought to do; there is one maxim on this[111]
point, that supplies to me the absence of every
other. ‘Freely ye have received, freely give,’
Why should I pain another, to fulfil to the
letter, an unimportant duty? But, I have
settled that point.”

“Well, well, you are right in intention at
all events, and now I must say good morning,
what are you going to do?”

“Why, I have finished my preparations;
and as grandpapa is going with you about the
luggage, I intend hearing the evening service
in the Cathedral; vespers, (I like the name,
popish though it be) for the last time. Ah,
Maestro mio, to-morrow.”

“Don’t talk of it, but I’ll tell Mrs. Winter
she may expect you in an hour. Au revoir.“

Kate strolled slowly through the churchyard,
and mounted the steps; stood for some
minutes gazing at the well-known scene from
the city wall, thinking, “how and when shall
I see it again! What awaits me in the new
world into which I am about to plunge!”[112]
Then turning to the right, she followed the rather
tortuous way, formed by the time worn ramparts,
until she reached the narrow alley which
led to the cathedral. The entrance to the
cloisters at this spot, was a low vaulted passage,
which communicated, in ancient times, with
the servants’ offices, and formed an angle with
a lofty chapel, now used as an ante-room;
and here Kate again paused, as if to take the
scene into her memory. To the Chapter house,
opposite the end opening on the cloisters, was
a beautiful window, showing through its lace-like
and still perfect tracery, the soft, green grass
which clothed the quadrangle formed by the
cloisters, and a thorn tree grew close against
its mullions, and even thrust its branches, so
delicately green, with the first fresh and unspeakable
tints of spring, through their many
openings; contrasting its fair youth, with the
solemn grey and massive stones around it. A
bright gleam of sunshine, which fell slanting,
it up one half the chapel, through which Kate
advanced, leaving the other in shadow. The[113]
unbroken stillness, the air of deep repose,
which pervaded the old pile, gave something
of its own calm to her feelings, which had
been a little ruffled by the thousand anticipations
her argument with Winter had called up.
The hour of evening prayer was not yet arrived,
and she stood for a while gazing at the
exquisite effects of light and shade, till the
perfect silence woke up her fancy, and she
smiled to think, that it would scarce surprise
her, to see a plumed and helmetted shadow
fall on the stream of sunshine, which bathed
the pavement with a flood of gold, and even
were the shadow followed by a substantial
mailed form, with knightly spurs, and cross-hilted
sword, it would seem but natural, here.

The distant sound of the organ warned her
that the service was about to begin, and she
was soon kneeling in the quiet nook she usually
occupied.

The next morning they left A——.

[114]

“The last journey I made by rail-road was
with you to Carrington,” said Kate to Winter.

She was looking a little pale, and a certain
anxious nervousness made her tremble in every
limb; but she kept up very cheerfully.

They were standing on the platform at the
railway station, waiting for the train, which,
starting from some newer and more important
place, only gave a few hurried, breathless moments
to poor old anti-locomotive A——.

The Colonel was looking a shade more
elegant even than usual, in a large cloak,
which hung gracefully round his tall, erect
form. There was their luggage all ticketed
and piled up, all of home that could be packed
into trunks; and Kate felt singularly desolate
at the idea of being thus, for the first time,
without any sanctuary, however humble, to
which, as to an ark, she might retreat, when
the fountains of the great deep, of sorrow or of
disappointment, were broken up; and Mrs.[115]
Winter was there with a well-packed basket
of sandwiches, and wine and water; but poor
Gilpin had been so unwell since his imprudent
visit to the Priory, that he had been obliged
to leave the Winters to do the parting honours,
alone, to their valued friends. Nor can
we omit to mention Mrs. O’Toole, who, in a
black silk bonnet, snowy cap, and substantial
cloth cloak, albeit it was early June, looked
the very model of a respectable old family-servant;
over one arm hung Miss Vernon’s
shawl, and, in her left hand, she carried a blue
band-box, containing divers and sundry articles
thrust into it, at the last moment, and secured
by a red silk handkerchief.

“Yes,” returned Winter, in reply to Kate’s
observation, “we were a merry trio; but we
little anticipated the adventure you contrived
to get up.”

“It was all very curious,” said Kate, with a
sigh, as her thoughts flew back to that pleasant
evening, and its still pleasanter dénouément.

[116]

A shrill, piercing whistle! The porters
stood, not to their arms, but to their trunks.

“Up-train coming,” said one of them, warningly,
to our little party.

“Now then, don’t be in a hurry, Colonel—get
the tickets all right,” said Winter; and the
huge, hissing, relentless monster of an engine,
rushed panting by the platform. “Do you
get in and settle yourselves, Colonel; Mrs.
O’Toole and I will see to the luggage.”

The Colonel obeyed; but Kate stood by the
carriage door. Winter soon bustled back, and
in more than usually husky tones, observed—

“All right—there goes the bell.”

“Dearest Mrs. Winter,” cried Kate, clasping
that worthy little woman in her arms;
“good bye;” and the tears she had long, with
difficulty, restrained, poured down her cheeks;
then turning to the kind, rough artist, she,
somewhat to his surprise, bestowed an equally
affectionate embrace on him, with such childlike
simplicity and sincere feeling, that he was[117]
inexpressibly touched. “My kind love to Mr.
Gilpin; and, I need hardly say, take care of
Cormac.”

“God bless you, dear Kate,” from both the
Winters, and she was hurried into the carriage,
where nurse was already seated. A jerk back,
and then forward, and they were swept away
from the kind faces that looked so eagerly after
them.

As long as the neighbouring scenery presented
any familiar features, Kate looked
mournfully and wistfully through the window;
but soon, too soon, they were flying
beyond the limits of her longest walks; and
when the distant height, crowned by Mowbray
Castle, longest visible, because the highest
point in the surrounding country, disappeared,
she dismissed her regrets, turned resolutely
from the contemplation of past happiness, and
determined to let no selfish grief, no personal
consideration whatever intervene between her[118]
heart and its great task. Comforting and supporting
her grandfather.

“And you feel quite well, quite comfortable,
dear grandfather.”

“Yes, love. Why, this is as good as any
private carriage; you know I am quite a
novice in rail-road travelling. How do you
like it, Nelly?”

“Faith, an’ it’s an illigant coach intirely;
but, Miss Kate, jewel, did iver ye see anything
so fast as the hedges do be runnin’?”

“Yes,” laughed the Colonel, “London will
be down here presently!”

There is little ever to relate of a journey by
rail—at least, at the time of which we write,
when excursion trains and concussions were
not quite such every-day events as in 1851-2.
Little occurred to vary the even tenor of their
course. Speed was slackened, bells rung, and
incomprehensible names bawled out at the due
number of stations. One or two companions[119]
were added to, and diminished from their
number, with whom the Colonel entered, urbanely,
into conversation, and, about two
o’clock, offered them refreshment, from Mrs.
Winter’s well-stored basket, which was thankfully
accepted by his fellow-travellers, who set
him down, in their private opinions, as some
condescending nobleman of philanthropic
habits, and enjoyed his sandwiches and sherry
with redoubled goût. Could they have known,
he was a broken gentleman, and an Irish one
to boot, how soon “urbane condescension”
would have changed, to pushing forwardness,
and the gracious offer of a sandwich, to some
deep design of getting up an acquaintance,
with ulterior objects possibly still more dreadful.

At length, the closer ranks of houses and
increasing hubbub of hissing engines, and departing
trains, warned them, they were fast
approaching the great metropolis.

The quiet and ease of their journey was at[120]
an end, the moment they stepped from the retirement
of the carriage into the bustling confusion
of the platform, beyond which a line of
cabs were drawn up, the length of which positively
appalled Kate, as indicative of the immense
crowd amongst whom they would have
to struggle for their luggage. The additional
difficulty of darkness was superadded to those
already arising from crowd and hurry; for they
had not left A—— until considerably past
noon.

“Och, Holy Virgin! how are we iver to get
the thrunks in sich a scrimmige!” ejaculated
Mrs. O’Toole.

“We must look for the van they put them
in at A——,” said Kate, who was trembling
with nervous anxiety, and depressed, at feeling
how unfitted she was for so bustling a scene.

“Jest don’t be walkin off wid the masther’s
portmanty,” said Mrs. O’Toole, laying a vigorous
grasp on the arm of a railway porter.

“Is this here yer’s?”

[121]

“Yes, an’ so is the black wan, an’ the wan
wid the leather cover in the van, &c.”

And soon the civil and expeditious porters
had placed all their luggage in a goodly pile.

“Now,” said the Colonel, “for the transit
to Bayswater.”

“Cab, sir?”

“Yes, two.”

The Colonel and Kate led the way with their
light parcels, and nurse followed with an overflowing
cargo.

It is a strange sensation, that of whirling
through unknown streets by gas light. The
complete ignorance of where you are going,
the seemingly miraculous facility with which
you are whisked round innumerable turnings,
the flaring gas-light before the meaner shops,
and short intervals of gloomy, respectable
quarters.

Kate felt all this strongly, and sat gazing at
the busy crowded streets, holding her grandfather’s
hand, and scarcely breathing. It[122]
seemed as though she had never felt the changes
that had occurred in their lot before, and
wearied by the journey, and the busy days that
preceded it, she experienced that dread fluttering
sensation, half fear, half excitement that
made her long, oh, how intensely, for some
familiar face to welcome them, some strong
calm friend into whose arms she might throw
herself, and feel safe.

But, “fate forbid such things to be,” and a
curtseying landlady received them in all the
glories of an “afternoon toilette,” with an
elaborate front, cunningly secured with three
rows of narrow black velvet round the head,
and a profusion of cherry-colored ribbons in
her cap.

“Here, Hester, carry up the carpet bags;
Mr. Langley was here to-day ma’am, and said
we might hexpect you about height o’clock,
but it’s near nine now; what would you please
to take? I’ll have candles lighted in a moment.”

[123]

And she ushered them into a small parlour,
furnished with a most obdurate looking horse-hair
sofa, six horse hair chairs, ranged round
the walls, an impracticable arm chair, and a
small round table, covered with a bright red
cloth; a diminutive looking glass over the mantel-piece,
on which were displayed a few cheap
ornaments, and a chiffonnier of mock rose-wood,
with warped doors, completed the inventory.

“Tea, I think, Kate, will be the most acceptable
refreshment. If you will be so good
as to let us have some tea, Mrs. Mrs. ——.”

The Colonel paused.

“Crooks,” said the amiable lady.

“Ah, yes, Mrs. Crooks.”

“Certainly, sir,” and she retired, as the
servant entered, with two tall candles, unsteadily
thrust into very short candlesticks.

It is unnecessary to describe the wretchedness
of such an arrival, the total derangement
of all established comforts, and London lodging-house
tea and milk! and the professional ra[124]pidity,
with which the servant clatters down
the plates, and deals out the knives, the ill-cleaned
Britannia metal tea-pot, the pale, market
looking butter, all, all so unlike home.

Nurse, who had taken Miss Vernon’s sac
de nuit, to her room, now came to the rescue.

“Ah, don’t be breakin yer heart sthrivin to
make tay, an’ the wather not half biled. There,”
smelling the tea which Kate had put out, and
setting it down with a look of disgust.
“Athen, ’tis little iv ye kem from Chayney, any
how. Sure I put a dust iv the rale sort into
me ban-box the last thing, an it’s well them
villains at that moiderin Station, didn’t lose it
an’ me box’ an all, have a taste iv buthered
toast, here, me good girl, just bile up that
kittle, an when it’s bilin mad, run up wid it;
stay, I’ll go down meself.”

And Mrs. O’Toole prepared them a very refreshing
cup of tea, which they insisted on her
sharing; and largely did she contribute to
enliven their first repast in the mighty metro[125]polis,
by her shrewd, caustic remarks on the
various little events of their journey.

“Sure it’s so quiet, we might think ourselves
in the Priory,” she said, after a pause.
“Another bit of toast, Miss Kate, ye’r white
wid the journey, and the scrimmage, alanah.”

“Yes,” replied the Colonel, “it is singularly
quiet here.”

“But listen to that distant, continuous roar,”
said Kate, “what is it?” she asked of the girl,
who was removing the tea things.

“Plase ma’am it’s the ‘busses.”

They were located in one of the numerous
“Albert Groves,” or “Victoria Terraces,” which
congregate near, and diverge from the main
Bayswater Road.

After some more desultory conversation, the
little party retired to the rest they so much
needed. Kate and nurse first carefully arranging
the Colonel’s room; but long after she
had laid her head on the hard and diminutive
lodging-house pillow, Kate’s busy fancy kept[126]
sleep aloof—the fact that she was actually in
London, was almost incredible, that the dreaded
parting with the Winters, and the Priory—the
terrible exchange of all the sweet sanctities
of home, for the uncertainties and insecurity
of lodgings—that all this so long anticipated,
was absolutely accomplished; and
that from this time forward, a new world of
action—of reality—of sober, stern existence,
lay before her. Such thoughts as these were
potent enemies to sleep. Then her last visit
to the great city, and its gaieties, and studies
presented themselves; and Lady Desmond’s
probable return—followed by a natural chain
of associations; and finally, the Priory, with
its pretty garden; and the neighbouring
woods, in all their glories of autumn—as they
looked the day she found Fred Egerton seated
with her grandfather, rose before her mind’s
eye; and all the pleasant incidents of that
happy time, unrolled themselves before her—clearly
at first, but, at length strangely mingled[127]
with memories of Dungar, and older days
still. Once or twice she strove to reunite
the broken chain of thought; but slowly they
all faded, and the hours of a short summer’s
night sped on their way; and gradually her
spirit woke from the first, deep sleep that fell
upon it; and wearied by the heaviness that
had of late weighed it down, fled joyously to
the scenes of its early childhood; and summoned
to its side, the friends it loved—until a
flood of morning sunshine pouring into her
room, woke her; and her eyes fell upon the
broad comely countenance of Mrs. O’Toole.

“Athen, the blessin’ iv Christ on ye,
jewel; sure the angels was whisperin’ to ye
in Heaven—ye wor smilin’ so swate in your
sleep.”

“Oh, nurse, why did you awake me? so
soon I mean.”

“Soon,” ejaculated Mrs. O’Toole, “sure
it’s nine o’clock, so it is, an’ you that was always
up at seven—”

[128]

“Nine! is it possible? But, nurse, are
morning dreams always true?”

“Sure, I told ye so a hundred times, an’ ye
always laughed at me, was it dreamin’ ye wor,
alanah?”

“Yes; of Dungar, and of such strange—but
go, dear nurse—I will ring soon for you.
Have you seen grandpapa this morning? How
did you sleep yourself?”

“He’s not rung his bell yet; an’ I was as
snug as any duchess.”

To Kate’s infinite delight, morning displayed
a garden, some ten feet square, in front of their
new abode, sufficient to satisfy the elastic conscience
of the builder, in calling the row of
houses, in which it was situated, “Victoria
Gardens.” True, it was not in that perfection
of keeping, so grateful to eyes susceptible of
the beautiful; but still the green of a few
ragged lilacs, and laburnums, with the perfume
of a mignionette bed, was most refreshing;
and so much better than anything she[129]
had ventured to hope for—that she felt inexpressibly
cheered.

The Colonel too, had slept well—at least,
till daylight, when he had been rather disturbed
by the screams of a parrot, a great pet,
Mrs. O’Toole informed them, of their landlady.
Breakfast over, and the Times, secured
for her grandfather, Kate was soon immersed in
a long, confidential letter to Winter and his
wife.

Their late breakfast had encroached, more
than she thought, upon the morning, and she
felt surprise when the landlady announced Mr.
Langley; and Winter’s old friend entered. He
was a long, pale man, with lightish hair, and
whey coloured whiskers; his manners, cold
and shy, impressed Kate with an uneasy feeling,
that it would be impossible to set him at
ease.

“Very much obliged by your early visit,”
said the Colonel, rising, with his usual suave
cordiality. “We have to thank you for pro[130]curing
for us, such comfortable apartments—my
granddaughter, Miss Vernon.”

Mr. Langley bowed, and in so doing, upset
a ricketty chair, whereupon, he endeavoured
to restore it to its former position, and in the
struggle, dropped his hat and gloves; at last
his composure a little restored, by the graciousness
of his new acquaintances, he gathered
courage to ask, coldly, after Winter, and still
more slightly for his wife, to which the
Colonel replied, by giving very copious details,
of their friends, and Kate thought he listened
with more interest than he ventured to express
in words; some general conversation
then ensued—their journey, and the old city
of A——, were discussed. Mr. Langley
glanced once or twice at his hat, which had
unfortunately got into an inaccessible corner,
and Kate began to fear that this first interview,
to which she had looked, as to a mine of
information, whereby to form her plans, and
guide her future proceedings, would pass away[131]
in the vain repetition of polite nothings; while
the Colonel, in his high-bred anxiety to entertain
his visitor, seemed to forget there was any
more serious subject to discuss, beyond the
decline of the drama, or the prospects of the
ministry.

It was always with extreme reluctance that
Kate, ever broached any subject, connected
with the realities of their position, in the presence
of her grandfather, now that all the
necessary changes had been made; and to this
natural difficulty, was added the awkwardness
of introducing important queries, apropos to
nothing. At last, taking advantage of a
pause in the Colonel’s eloquence, of which Mr.
Langley seemed inclined to avail himself, to
depart, she plunged boldly, because desperately,
into the subject uppermost in her
thoughts.

“I am most anxious to lose no time in endeavouring
to get pupils. Mr. Winter mentioned
to you, I suppose?”

[132]

“Yes;” said Langley, turning to her with
more of complacency, than his manner had hitherto
exhibited, his painter’s eye, probably
caught by her expressive countenance, and
graceful figure. “Yes, he mentioned your intention—and
I—that is, I hope you will not
disapprove; I told some friends of mine, professors
of music, and they wish to hear you
play; and then they will be able to judge how
far they can forward your views.”

“Thank you,” cried Kate, glancing nervously
at the Colonel, to whose high and
usually pale forehead the color rose at this proposed
exhibition of his refined, noble, and
graceful grandchild; “you are most kind to
have anticipated my arrival; but,” she added,
covering her face playfully with her hands,
“I never shall have courage for such an exhibition,
such an ordeal!”

“But if they never hear you perform, how
can they recommend you?” asked Langley, in
a matter-of-fact tone.

[133]

“I did but jest,” replied Kate, “and am
ready to do whatever you may recommend.”

“Of course, if it is repugnant to Miss Vernon,
however friendly and judicious your suggestion,
Mr. Langley, I cannot permit her,”
began the Colonel, in disturbed accents.

“Dearest grandpapa, this matter is between
Mr. Langley and myself—you may listen—but
are not to interfere. Am I not right, Mr.
Langley?”

He bowed, startled into silent admiration,
by the extreme beauty of her smile.

“I am silenced,” said the Colonel.

“Winter mentioned,” resumed Langley,
after a moment’s pause, “that you were a
pupil of Hermann’s; I would advise your renewing
your acquaintance with him; he is one
of the first masters, in the fashionable world,
at present.”

“I fully intend writing to him to-morrow,
and—”

“Why not to-day?” interposed Langley,[134]
with increasing warmth. “And merely ask
him to appoint an interview—be sure you see
him—writing is of little use—besides he has
a daughter—I mean two—amiable girls, I am
told—indeed I know one of them. Miss Vernon,”
addressing the Colonel, “can, therefore,
call on him with perfect propriety, for he could
never otherwise see her, his time is so much
occupied.”

The Colonel, again reddening to the roots of
his hair, made a silent inclination of his head,
too much overcome at the idea of Kate’s being
compelled to call on any man, to be able to infringe
upon her injunction.

“Unfortunately,” resumed Langley, “I
have no one to do the honors of my house; but
my sister, who lives close by here, intends to
do herself the pleasure of calling on you, Miss
Vernon, and hopes to fix some evening, when
I can introduce you to some professional friends—but
I see you have no piano.”

“We shall be most happy to make your[135]
sister’s acquaintance; my piano is still at
A——; but I hope to have it early next week—only
I am sure I cannot think where it can
stand in this diminutive chamber.”

“But it is essential; you so soon lose the
facility of execution. Winter tells me, you
play well; and he is no mean judge.”

“I trust you may be of the same opinion;
but the degree of perfection required from
musicians appals me!”

“Nothing mediocre goes down now,” returned
Langley, with an emphasis, not very
encouraging. “And as I believe I have paid
you a long visit,” rising nervously; “my
sister would have accompanied me, but one of
her little boys is ill. I hope she may soon be
released—I mean, be able to call on you. She
knows several people about here, all with
young families. Ah, good morning, Miss
Vernon, good morning, sir.”

“I shall take an early opportunity of re[136]turning
your visit,” said the Colonel, accompanying
him to the door.

“Pray do; and as Mr. Winter tells me,
Miss Vernon is a lover of paintings, perhaps
she might like to take a look at my studio?”

“Oh, thank you,” cried Kate, who had followed
them. “I shall be delighted.”

“Good morning, then.”

“This seems promising, dear grandpapa,”
said Kate, settling back to her writing, with a
sunny smile. “I am so glad I saw Mr. Langley,
before I closed my letter; he appears
friendly, though certainly not brilliant.”

“Promising, Kate,” cried the Colonel, playing
nervously with his glasses, and holding
the paper aside in one hand, “promising! It
is unutterably repugnant to my feelings to
think, that you will have to exhibit your
paces, or your performance rather, to secure
the suffrages of a set of fiddlers, and to wait
upon a fat German, who, I remember, used to[137]
seem to abjure water, and wore a ring on his
thumb. This Mr. Langley seems to forget
what is due to a gentlewoman altogether, or to
be totally ignorant of it. And, only that I was
afraid of vexing you, my love, I would have
told him so. Cold-blooded John Bull!”

“I should indeed have been greatly distressed
had you done so,” said Kate. “You
know, dearest and best, I am only known to
him in my new character; and is it not unreasonable
to be displeased with him, because
he endeavours, according to his judgment,
which I believe to be the true one, to forward
my views!”

“Instinct might have told him, yours was a
peculiar case! to tell you to call on a German
music-master!”

“Pooh, grandpapa, as Mr. Winter would
say, if you and I were staying at the ‘Clarendon,’
en route to Paris, you would be the
first to encourage me in paying a visit to my
old master, why—”

[138]

“It is a totally different thing, this old
German—”

“True, and it may be prejudice; but, under
the circumstances, I would prefer visiting a
German to an English music-master. My own,
dear grandpapa, we must be content to lose the
shadow, if we can secure the substance; and
now I must proceed to finish my letter.”

Hastily finishing her long, crossed epistle to
the Winters, she proceeded to pen a billet to
Hermann, recalling herself to his recollection,
and expressing a strong desire for an interview
with him; this was placed selon les
règles in an envelop, when a grand difficulty
presented itself—the address—”He used to
live in Baker Street, but I forget the number.”
She rung.

“Would Mrs. Crooks be so good as to let
me see a directory?”

“Please ’em, she’s not got one.”

“How provoking! and it is just post
hour!”

[139]

“Send that note on chance,” suggested the
Colonel; “and we can get the right address
from Langley, if it fails.”

“Good,” she replied; and sent both her
epistles at once to the post.

The day, notwithstanding the promise of the
morning, proved wet; but Langley’s long
visit, and her long letter, made it pass quickly
to Kate. She now put away her writing materials,
singing snatches of her favourite songs,
to her grandfather’s surprise, and looking
bright as an embodied gleam of sunshine; the
idea of speedy action was cheering beyond
measure, to her energetic, earnest spirit; and
though it may lower her in the estimation of
sentimentalists and evangelicals, she was too
young and too light-hearted, not to feel considerable
pleasure, at the idea of a soirée at Langley’s
sister’s.

“Are ye ready for yer dinner, Miss Kate?
an’ would the masther mind the girl layin’[140]
the cloth?” enquired Mrs. O’Toole, putting in
her head.

“Certainly not,” replied the Colonel.

“I have not seen you all day, nurse,” said
Kate, “what have you been doing.”

“I wint out to get some chops for yer dinners,
an’ the thief iv a butcher asks me nine-pince
a pound for thim. ‘Is it jokin’ ye are,’
ses I, ‘mum,’ ses he, as if he was bothered.
‘Is it plum cake ye do be feedin’ yer sheep
on,’ ses I, ‘to go be afther askin’ nine-pince a
pound for thim chops,’ ses I, wid that he ups
and he ses, his mate was the best an’ the
chapest in the place, an’ I’d get nothin’ ondher
it; an’ sure enough I wint to ivery butcher
widin’ two miles, an’ sorra one iv thim ud give
the chops for less, an’ some asked more; there’s
London for ye! But it ud break yer heart to
see the woman sthrivin’ to brile thim on the
hanful iv coals in wan corner iv the grate, I
wish ye’d spake to her to let me cook for yes,[141]
but—” Nurse suddenly paused, and held up
her hand to enforce silence, as an approaching
jingle announced the coming dinner apparatus.

“Have you dined yourself, dear nurse?”
asked Kate.

“Sure I tuck a cup iv tay, an’ an egg, sorra
sich an egg iver I seen! Ye know it’s a fast
day, Miss Kate.”

Their dinner was soon despatched; the half
cold, half raw chops, so different from their
simple yet tempting fare at home, offering
little to induce its prolongation. After its removal,
Kate looked wistfully from the window.

“It does not rain now, grandpapa, would
you not like a stroll into Kensington Gardens?
I should like so much too, to find out some
library, for how shall we get over this evening
without music, or work, or books, or chess.
Oh, I forgot, nurse has unpacked the chess-board.”

“I am not inclined for walking, or chess,[142]
either, my love; indeed I am singularly
knocked up; I should like a book, however.”

“But I am sure a little walk would do you
good, dear grandpapa.”

“No, my dear, I will take a sleep, and, if
you like to go out, nurse can go with you, it
will be a pleasure to her too.”

After settling the Colonel to the best of her
ability in the impracticable arm-chair; Kate
summoned Mrs. O’Toole, who most readily
obeyed her call, heartily tired of the society
of Mrs. Crooks, for, as she said emphatically,
“there’s no divarshin in thim
English!”

After enquiring their way to the nearest circulating
library, Kate and Mrs. O’Toole set out
on their exploring expedition. The rain had
ceased, and a rich, yellow, evening sun shone
out in full lustre.

“How new everything looks here, nurse,”
said Kate, when they had walked a few[143]
minutes in silence, “how different from dear
old A——.”

“In troth it does, Miss Kate; but thim
gardens, as they call thim, is mighty fine, an’
did ye iver see sich dawshy little houses, wid
balconies afore?”

“Never, indeed, they give me the idea of
handsomely ornamented mansions, seen through
an inverted telescope, for there is a little of
everything about them.”

“Athen wan, good, ould, red stone house,
like what was in A——, is worth a score iv
thim.”

The extreme newness of everything, notwithstanding
its prettiness and neatness, was
displeasing to Kate’s eye, accustomed, as it
had been, to the mellow tints and picturesque
irregularity of A——.

It is remarkable how much more congenial,
both to heart and mind, are indefinite and irregular
outlines; as if the more perfect finish,[144]
was all too cramped, too finite to satisfy the
boundless and formless imaginations of man’s
heart; as Tupper beautifully says,

The library was, without much difficulty,
found, and the demure damsel, who there represented
the muses, in reply to Kate’s enquiries,
handed her a catalogue, in which she
soon lost herself, as one usually does in the
vain attempt to discover favorite authors,
widely separated by an inexorable alphabetical
arrangement.

“Have you nothing by the authoress of
‘The Cup and the Lip?'” asked Kate.

[145]

“Yes, ma’am, but it’s out; this work is a
good deal called for,” presenting a volume
open at the title page.

Kate glanced at it, ‘Zarifa, a Tale of the
Passions.’

“No, thank you,” said Miss Vernon.

“Just got this in, ma’am; ‘Trials and
Trifles, by one who has experienced both.'”

“Let me look at it, if you please. Ah, this
is rather too sentimental. Have you the
‘Knight of Gwynne’?”

“Yes’m.”

“Then I will take it; and pray send the
‘Times’ every morning, to No. — Victoria
Gardens, for Colonel Vernon, if you please.”

A rather stout gentleman, with longish fair
hair, and an umbrella under his arm, who had
entered the shop a few minutes before, and
stood with two letters in his hand, waiting
until the shopwoman was at leisure to attend
to him, and in a position that commanded an[146]
excellent view of Kate’s profile; started at
these words.

“Vernon,!” said he, in good English, but
with a foreign accent. “Do I speak to my
gentle pupil? Ah, you remember.”

“Mr. Herman!” she exclaimed, after a
moment’s hesitation, “how fortunate! how
happy I am to have met you; I have just
written to you.”

“It is most curious,” resumed her ci-devant
master, shaking her hand warmly and respectfully,
“I do not think I ever entered a shop in
this neighbourhood before, but I have just
come from Madame M——’s establishment,
where I, for my sins, give lessons once a-week;
and you, have you been long in town? How
is the Graffin, your cousin? I suppose with
you?”

“No, she is at Florence, I am with grandpapa,
close to this. We only arrived in London,
yesterday, and I have already written a[147]
note to you, though I had forgotten your precise
address.”

“Oh, the old place, Baker Street, No. 33.
And you want lessons again? Well, you did
me great credit, and though I have not one
moment in the day disengaged, except to
snatch a hasty meal, I’ll break through my
regulations, and give you the evening hour.”

“Thank you very much,” said Kate, interrupting,
with difficulty, the flow of his eloquence,
“but I do not want to take lessons; I wrote to
ask you to appoint a day and hour, when I might
call on you—any hour will suit me—then I will
tell you the object of my visit.”

“Call upon me!” repeated Hermann, with
surprise, “well, well, I am afraid I must not
offer to save you that trouble, for I am in such
request just at present. Ah, if you would not
mind calling so early as twelve o’clock, I generally
snatch a hasty lunch, at that hour. If I
am not at home when you come, my daughter[148]
will endeavour to entertain you until my return,
and now I must run away.”

“But what day, Mr. Herman?” cried Kate,
anxiously.

“Oh, the day after to-morrow, I shall have
a little more time; infinitely pleased to have
met you, dear lady, and to perceive you have
the same appearance of good health as——.
Hey! ho!” shouted the good natured musico,
rushing breathlessly after an omnibus, into
which an active conductor, rapidly crammed
him, and he was swept off.

This little adventure quite excited Kate, and
although capable of exerting great self-command,
her temperament was too finely organised,
not to be both nervous and sensitive;
so the arm she passed through nurse’s was
not the steadiest, as they turned to leave the
shop.

“Och, what makes ye thrimble so, agra?”

“Do I tremble, nurse? I suppose it must[149]
be the surprise of meeting Mr. Herman; how
fortunate? I accept it as a good omen!”

“Faith, he’s mighty like a pear—so big at
one end, an’ small at the other. Sure he’s like
the side iv a house round the shoulders, an’
his two little feet u’d stand in a tay cup, an’
what wide throwsers he has!”

“Do you not remember him when we were
at Lady Desmond’s three years ago?”

“Och now, was that the Garman that used
to be tachin ye the piania?”

Kate nodded.

“Och then, my gracious, but he’s grawn
very fat.”

Miss Vernon was too much engrossed
by her own reflections on the probable result
of this rencontre, to encourage nurse’s
garrulity, till the beauty of the magnificent
old trees in Kensington, drew her from
her thoughts, and she pointed her companion’s
attention to the long alleys, with their graceful[150]
leafy arches, that stretch along each side of
the broad walk from the Bayswater entrance.

And deeply did Mrs. O’Toole enjoy the confidential
chat in which her idolized nurseling
indulged her, especially the perspective of an
evening party.

“Sure it’s taydious to be always alone with
an ould gintleman like the master. God bless
him any how, though faith it’s himself is the
height of good company.”

“I never tire of him, nurse.”

“No, in coorse not; but, Miss Kate, jewel,
ye’ll be lavin him some day, with some grand
lord, ye’ll see at thim parties.”

“I do not fancy lords are so very plentiful
at the Bayswater soirées,” replied Kate,
laughing at nurse’s simplicity.

“A then, ye’ll never see wan that’s grander
or pleasanter, nor the Captin; I niver tuck to
any one as I tuck to him; to see the illigant
bould step iv him, an the bright face iv him,[151]
an’ he as tindher hearted as an infant. Och
sure, Miss Kate, there’s some fairy gift about a
rale gentleman! Jist hear wan say, ‘how
are ye,’ an ye feel the better iv it, as if he was
in airnest, an plaised to see ye. But wan iv
thim squireens! faith it’s like rubbin the coat
iv a cat the wrong way, to hear wan iv thim
sthrivin to spake civil!”

“Very true nurse, there is some mysterious
charm about good manner, but it must spring
from the heart, and I believe when all are true
christians, all will be real gentlemen.”

“Athin, is it sarious ye are, Miss Kate?”

After a little more conversation, they returned
to the Colonel, whom they found awake,
but still reclining with an air of lassitude, in
the arm chair. Kate at once, and with much
animation, commenced an account of her
meeting with Herman, but the indifference
with which her grandfather received the intelligence,
so important in her estimation,
checked her ardour, and seemed to throw her[152]
back on herself; it is indeed wonderful the
effect which sympathy or no sympathy produces.

The Colonel’s coldness did not alter the fact
of the lucky rencontre, or of Herman’s kindness
of manner, and yet it seemed to dissolve her
air castles, about numerous pupils, friendly
associates, and a happy busy life of useful
occupation, not unmingled with amusement,
into a chilling mist, as night winds condense
the vapours, which have been spread by the
sun’s heat.

“Well let us have tea my dear, what book
did you get?”

“‘The Knight of Gwynne,’ grandpapa.”

“Ah, I suppose that is meant for my old
friend, Maurice Fitzgerald, it will remind me
forcibly of days I had better forget.”

“I hope it will amuse you,” said poor Kate,
the tears springing to her eyes, at such unwonted
depression and contrariety, on her
grandfather’s part.

[153]

Tea over; and the remaining day-light of a
summer’s evening—which, in town, has anything
but a cheering effect—shut out, Miss
Vernon lit the candles, and, after a diligent
search, unearthed a small and rather delapidated
footstool, from beneath the sofa, which
she placed under the Colonel’s feet, endeavouring,
with unwearied sweetness, to cheer him,
and draw him from himself, and his position,
till, at length, he gave the wished-for command—

“Read some of that book for me, my dear.”

“Yes, dearest grandpapa; and as poor nurse
is all alone, among strangers, may I ask her
to bring in her work, and listen too?”

“Certainly—certainly.”

This was quickly done; and Kate’s object,
to provide amusement for the Colonel, fulfilled,
as nurse’s shrewd remarks on whatever subject
was brought before her, were sure to interest
and amuse her indulgent master.

He leaned back his head, and closed his[154]
eyes, as if but half inclined to listen; soon,
however, the varied modulations of Kate’s musical,
intellectual voice, and the sound of
familiar names, fixed his attention, and transported
him, in imagination, to other scenes and
other times; and, at length, fully drawn from
the contemplation of the present, it was with
something of his old brightness of eyes, and
lightness of step, that the Colonel retired for
the night.

“Well, Nelly, those were pleasant times, and
right good fellows. I think Lever has hit off
some of them capitally; yet I could give him
a few hints, hey? Kate, good night, my love—I
will take a walk with you to-morrow.”

And Kate laid her head on her pillow, blessing
Lever for having effected by his light-hearted,
familiar style, what no writer, however
profound, or grand, pathetic, or even
religious, would in all probability have accomplished.

[155]

THE NEW WORLD CONTINUED.

The morning of Miss Vernon’s visit to her
ci-devant music-master rose bright and clear;
and smiling at her own care, it was with
rather more than usual attention to her appearance,
she arranged her simple toilette; for,
thought she, “I am to meet his daughter—and
women judge so much more critically of
dress than men.”

The Colonel’s announcement of his intention
to accompany her, called forth all her
tact to avoid the escort. She remembered
keenly, the effect produced on him, by Mr.[156]
Langley’s plain, unvarnished communications;
and, as he had now apparently forgotten them,
and returned to his usual happy, easy frame of
mind, she dreaded the renewal of those unpleasant
sensations, which had so disturbed
him, by the discussion of the important questions
of pounds, shillings, and pence, which
she was nerving herself to approach boldly;
besides, she did not feel quite certain, how
Herman would take the intelligence she had
to communicate. Then she dreaded that the
kind old man might fancy himself de trop.

“I am afraid, dear grandpapa, we must
start so early, you will not have time to read
the paper comfortably.”

“It cannot take more than half-an-hour to
drive from this to Baker Street?”

“I intended walking. Cabs are so expensive.”

“Why, Kate, my love, you are grown quite
miserly.”

Finally, she managed to insinuate a strong[157]
necessity that he should return Mr. Langley’s
call, and fix a day for her to visit his studio,
and carried her point, that she and Mrs.
O’Toole should walk to Baker Street, by the
Park, while the Colonel was pacified, by the
paper, and the projected visit to Langley.

“Good bye, my own, dear grandpapa—am
I looking nice?”

“Yes, darling, like a rose-bud, as you are.”

And he gazed proudly at her, over his
glasses, as she stood before him in her simple,
elegant, muslin dress, straw bonnet, with plain
white ribbon, and large, soft barège shawl.

“There isn’t the like iv her in Buckingham
Palace!” said Mrs. O’Toole, with a confidential
nod, as she followed her out of the room.

“Keep to the Parks, till you come to the
Marble Arch, then down Oxford Street—any
one will show you the way to Portman Square,
and—”

“Oh, thank you, Mrs. Crooks, once I am in
Portman Square, I shall know my way.”

[158]

Kate was not quite so agreeable a companion
as usual during this walk, as she felt
considerable nervousness about the approaching
interview.

Nurse, too, greatly disliking the errand on
which they were bound, spoke little, except
an occasional ejaculation of pious discontent,
or a growl at the various conductors, who
kindly invited them to ride in their omnibusses.

Their walk was, therefore, silent and fatiguing;
but Baker Street was gained at last.

“Not at home, ‘m,” said a smart girl, with
a cap at the back of her head, in reply to Miss
Vernon’s enquiries.

“And Miss Herman?”

“Oh, Miss Herman is at home, ‘m—please
walk this way.”

“Nurse, will you wait for me.”

And Kate followed the servant up a handsomely
carpeted stair-case.

Miss Herman was working something in a
frame; she was more English-looking than her[159]
father, with a profusion of fair hair, and in a
very handsome morning costume.

“I have expected to see Miss Vernon,” she
said, rising to receive her visitor, with much
graciousness, and rather too much ease. “My
father told me, he expected a visit from one
of his former pupils.”

“I was so fortunate as to meet him accidentally,
the day before yesterday, and was
delighted to renew my acquaintance with him.”

“I have often heard my father speak of
you, and of your great taste for music; you
were quite one of his pet pupils. I expect him
in immediately.”

And the two young ladies were soon excellent
friends, the more so, as Kate’s new acquaintance
was quite able to make up for any
silence or pre-occupation, on her part, caused
by the nervous anxiety with which we watch
for an important interview.

Miss Herman was evidently rather curious[160]
as to the object of Kate’s visit to her father;
and Kate saw no reason why she should not
gratify her curiosity; for, pre-occupied as she
was, any other topic was irksome; and though
not exactly of the stamp she had been accustomed
to, it was so long since she had enjoyed
a conversation with a lady, at all near her own
age, that she found it a pleasant variety. Yet
it was with a sensation of relief, that poor
Kate hailed her exclamation—

“There is my father’s knock.”

In another moment, he bustled into the
room.

“Rather late, dear lady; but much pleased
to see you.”

“Luncheon directly, Gertrude.”

Then seating himself by Kate, as his daughter
left the room—

“Now let me hear in what I can serve you,
my dear Miss Vernon, for I got your note all
safe.”

[161]

Kate hesitated a moment, and then, her
color rising, yet with a certain playfulness, and
without any preface, said—

“You thought I wanted to take lessons
from you, my dear sir—no; I want pupils myself.”

Herman uttered a slight groan.

“I was apprehensive of something of the
kind, when I read your note; yet I turned
from the idea, as quite preposterous; and your
noble relative!”

“She knows nothing of my intention. But
my dear Mr. Herman,” continued Kate, with
a firmness and decision, that surprised even
herself, “let us not waste time in deploring
what is inevitable; believe me, there is a
strong necessity for the step I am about to
take, which does not, considered in the abstract,
offer any great attractions; the question
is, can you, and will you, kindly put me
in the way of carrying out my views; to say
that I have been your pupil, would, I am sure[162]
be greatly in my favour; but I want more
than that; to introduce me, in my new career.”

“Dear lady: I happen, it is true, to be
rather the fashion as a musical teacher, just at
present; and I should be most happy to serve
you; but, though I gave you lessons for three or
four months, I cannot say I trained you; and I
have some pupils, brought up to music as their
profession, whom I must consider first; besides
though you had great talent, as an amateur, it
is a different thing for a teacher, ah—have you
kept up your music?”

“Yes, most diligently,” replied Kate, who
felt her cheeks hot, and her hands cold, during
this speech of Herman’s.

“Well then,” rising, and opening a grand
piano, “let me hear you play, and I will tell
you exactly what I think; now you must hear
the truth.”

“It is all ask.”

Miss Vernon, threw aside her bonnet and
shawl, and seated herself at the piano; but her
memory seemed suddenly clouded, by the very[163]
necessity for clearness, nay, her physical
vision, by the intense anxiety to acquit herself
well, and while the room swam before her, the
only distinct image she could perceive, was
Hermann, standing opposite, with a look of
severe criticism on his countenance; but this
moment of suffering did not last—Kate was
making rapid strides in the acquirement of that
self-command, without which, the empire of
the world is but a wider range for the sceptred
slave. “I must be calm—I will not be false
to myself,” she thought, and pressing her
hands to her eyes for an instant, she conjured
up the organist’s pale, benevolent face, as it
used to look, when he listened to her playing,
and thus placed her spirit once more within
the calm influence of her old cloistered home;
then with a true and steady finger, began a
fantasia, composed by Hermann himself. He
started at the first notes—and listened with
wrapt attention, quite as much the effect of her
performance, as his own will. His daughter[164]
entered—he held up a warning finger, to enjoin
silence—she came to listen; but whether
there was one listener or a thousand, was now
a matter of indifference to Kate, who absorbed
in the music, and revelling in the tones of a
magnificent instrument, after nearly a week’s
fast, poured forth the really beautiful composition,
with a fervour of feeling, and a perfection
of execution, that quite astonished her hearers;
and when at length, after some beautiful and
difficult runs, the piece ended with sustained
chords, the German burst into exclamations
of delight, in his native tongue—echoed by
his daughter; while Kate, agitated by her
success, stood quite still—silent from her utter
inability to articulate.

“But it is wonderful how well you have
remembered my instructions, I shall certainly
mention you everywhere, as my pupil—my advanced
pupil. And now we will have our
luncheon—let me offer you my arm. Do you
sing?”

[165]

“Yes.”

“Ah, then, we will first have a song.”

“No, no, Mr. Herman, I was foolishly
nervous about playing, and now I feel hardly
able to speak much less to sing.”

“Well then, you must come and have a
glass of wine to restore you.”

During the progress of the luncheon, Kate
learned many particulars, as to the usual rates
of remuneration, &c.; and was surprised to find
it so low.

“As a beginner you can hardly hope to get
much,” said Hermann, who was devouring
veal pie and pickled cabbage, with great
appetite; “but I hope to be of use to you
here too; I will try to get you the best
terms I can, and you will agree to whatever I
arrange?”

“Of course; you are most kind, my dear
sir; but how soon do you think you will be
able to get me some pupils?”

“We shall see—we shall see—you must not[166]
be in a hurry; and Gertrude, give me that
portfolio. Here,” said he, “here is a simple
air, harmonise it in four parts, at your leisure,
and enclose it to me, that will show me what
you know of theory; if you would consent to
play and sing at private concerts, you might
make a very good thing of it; and with your
figure and face, I—”

“Hush, hush,” cried Kate, with an involuntary
action, and holding up her hand, as if to
repel by physical force, the idea suggested by
Herman, “it is useless to mention such a
plan.”

“Well well, as you like—but it is the pleasantest
and most lucrative line by far; and
now, dear lady, I must run away—I am beyond
my time, and the old Duchess of L——
is as sharp as a needle about a minute more or
less of the lesson. God bless you—write your
address in my book, I might lose your note—you
are a pupil I may well be proud of. Good
bye,” and he bustled off.

[167]

After a few more civil words with Miss
Herman; and writing her name and address
in the book, Herman kept for the purpose,
Kate took her leave.

“I hope to have the pleasure of calling on
you,” said Miss Herman.

“I shall be most happy to see you, and to
introduce you to grandpapa.”

“If I do not call soon, pray excuse me, as
I have many engagements. Are there any
omnibusses pass near your house?”

“Oh, yes, several. I think I had better
take one going back—they are not very disagreeable—are
they?”

“Why, have you never been in an omnibus?”
said Miss Herman, with some surprise.

“Never as yet.”

And (nurse having appeared from the lower
regions,) Kate shook hands once more with
her lively, good-humoured, new acquaintance,
and departed in high spirits at the result of her
visit.

[168]

“I am very tired, nurse, and I am sure so are
you.”

“Is it tired, Miss Kate? not a bit iv it;
sure was’nt I aitin the best iv cauld beef, an’
dhrinkin’ the best iv ale, down in the house-keeper’s
parlour, they seem mighty nice kind
of people, an’ there was wan of thim with the
quarest cap.”

“There, dear nurse, call that omnibus.”

“Och, sure, Miss Kate, ye would’nt be
afther goin’ into wan iv the like iv thim; its
nothin’s but the counter-jumpers goes in thim.”

“No matter, the sooner I get used to them
the better,” said Miss Vernon, resolute not to
do things by halves but to descend freely, and,
therefore, gracefully. “So do not let another
pass, nurse, for indeed I am very tired.”

“Oh, blessed Bridget! Oh, marciful Moses,
look at this! did iver I think to—Stop, will
ye, have ye no eyes in yer head, ye thief? ye
wor niver tired bawlin’ to us to go wid yez
whin we did’nt want ye.”

[169]

“Bayswater, mum—yes, mum,” and Kate
and Mrs. O’Toole were crammed into a vehicle,
apparently full to overflowing; at least so Kate
thought, though the conductor assured them
he had not got his number. The occupants, as
usual, would not at first open their ranks, and
it was not until after some moments of uneasy
balancing and staggering, that our two novices
in omnibus travelling, were accommodated
with seats, as far as possible from the door of
the carriage. Nurse, who was of tolerable dimensions,
reducing two angular old maiden
ladies to scarcely visible lines; while poor
Kate, with a feeling of deep repugnance, was
squeezed between a fat, elderly man and the
upper end of the conveyance; the road appeared
interminable, and, owing to their unacquaintance
with it, and their inexperience of
omnibus travel, they were carried far beyond
their destination.

Never had the sight of her grandfather’s face[170]
been so welcome to Kate, as when she saw him
looking from the window on their return; after
the various small, but not the less trying, trials
of the day; and joyous was the tone, in which
she exclaimed—”victoria, dearest grandpapa,”
as she threw off her bonnet and shawl.

“Come and tell me all about it, dearest,”
said he, holding out his hand to her.

She seated herself beside him, and detailed
her interview with Herman, brightening the
brighter parts, and subduing the darker, with
exquisite pious tact; and then, turning from
the subject of her own plans, which always
fretted the old gentleman, enquired what his
movements had been, and if there was a letter
from the Winters?

“No, none,” said the Colonel.

“Well, I will go and get ready for dinner,
and afterwards we will have a short stroll in
the gardens. Perhaps this evening’s post may
bring us a letter from our friends. Nurse is[171]
a capital chaperone, and I am glad you did not
go, dear grandpapa, it would have been
quite too much for you.”

After this nothing could surpass the unbroken
but rather gloomy quiet, in which
Kate’s days slipped by; her piano having arrived,
was a great source of enjoyment to her,
and lent wings to many a heavy hour.

Winter, though kind, was like most men, a
tardy correspondent, and Kate was ashamed of
writing as often as her heart dictated. Lady
Desmond, too, engrossed by some new pleasure
or occupation, wrote, though affectionately,
but seldom; and at times the sad feeling, that
to the friends who are afar, we are as nothing,
scarcely missed, and merely remembered,
through the importunate efforts of our own
pen, would steal over Kate’s mind in spite of
every effort of reason and common sense; for
hers was a nature too noble, too unexacting,
to doubt the kindness or the truth of those
who professed either. Yet it is hard, very[172]
hard, not to become restless and complaining,
when, day after day, the letter carrier hurries
past, or worse still, his startling, though hoped
for, knock, thrills every pulse, and there is
nothing for you. Oh, you who are still left in
peace and security, amongst all that has been
endeared to you in childhood and in youth;
amongst kindred and familiar faces; and scenes
of beauty associated with happiness, and disregarded
in the full certainty of possession;
think well before you charge the absent with
querulous avidity for letters; you cannot know,
you cannot dream the intense longing with
which we turn from the looks and tones, the
places and the people around us, and conjure
up old scenes and voices, long unheard; and
then ask again, and again, with a mournful
tenderness, unspeakable in its depth, “Shall I
never see them more?” while a gloomy echo from
our own unspoken presage answers, “they are
gone—they are all passed by;” ay, passed indeed,
for what is gone is eternally passed by.[173]
“Speak to them that they go forward,” is the
message of God to mankind, as to the Israelites
of old; forward we must go, on—on, in sin
or in righteousness; there is no pause, and
what is left is left for ever!

Kate felt an extraordinary longing to have
the old hound, Cormac, with her once more,
and wrote on the subject to Mr. Winter. As
usual, when any positive question was to be
answered, his reply was prompt.

“Cannot you leave the dog where he is?”
wrote the testy little artist, “I tell you he will
be a troublesome customer; even here he is
quite savage, and we have to throw him his
meat from a civil distance.”

“Poor Cormac!” sighed Kate, who was
reading the letter aloud to her grandfather,
“how unhappy he must be, when he is so
cross; he will become irretrievably savage if we
do not remove him; may I write about him,
dear grandpapa, at once?”

[174]

“Oh, yes, my dear,” said the Colonel.

“Besides,” resuming the letter, “your
lodgings are too dear already, and Cormac will
be an addition to them. I dare say you find
your money slipping away fast enough; I hope
you remember you have a balance of thirty
pounds in my hands, after the sale of the furniture,
so do not think about Cormac at present.
Poor Gilpin is very ill, and cannot last long.
What is Herman about? I think he is a
humbug; and what’s become of Langley’s
sister, that was to have called on you. I remember
her a good humoured woman, that
murdered the King’s English, her husband is
very well off, she ought to have some girls to
be taught.”

The letter ended with a kind message from
Mrs. Winter, who seldom wrote, and left an
uneasy unpleasant impression on Kate’s mind.

“Well, I will write about Cormac, I so
long to have him to walk with me,” she said,[175]
after a moment’s thought. Beginning her
letter with excuses for so imprudent a proceeding,
to her terrible mentor, she continued—

“The complete disappearance of all the
agents through whom I hoped to achieve, such
great things from the little stage of my
life, is indeed marvellous, and so dispiriting
that I felt inclined to most unbecoming impatience
when I read your letter, in which you,
as usual, set forth, so forcibly, important points;
but second thoughts are best maestro mio. Let
us give them the benefit of our doubts; both
Miss Herman and Mrs. Storey may be out of
town, or unwell, or any thing you like, and
while it is better for my heart and spirits to
fancy my ci-devant music-master moving heaven
and earth, though unsuccessful in my behalf,
than to imagine him playing me false, by culpable
negligence, let me think so; I must
wait; so let the imagination I so often indulged,
in happier days, show her gratitude by lightening
the interval of wretched doubt. Is this[176]
right? If you think so, say it, for I am not,
heaven knows, so strong that I can dispense
with the wholesome encouragement of friendly
approbation; and though there is great support
in the whisperings of an approving conscience,
yet it is wonderfully comforting to
have its accents echoed by a voice one loves.
By the arrangements I have made here, Cormac’s
advent will add nothing to our expenses,
and I am sure his absence will be a relief to
you.”

Miss Vernon went to Euston Square, accompanied
by Mrs. O’Toole, to meet him, and the
joy of the old hound, at sight of her, was quite
touching.

“We are afraid to go near him, ma’am,”
said the porter, who led them to where he was
chained, “he’s the fiercest dog we ever had
charge on.”

But Kate fearlessly went up to him, and
unfastened his chain, while he almost overpowered
her by his uncouth caresses, to the[177]
dread of the beholders. Then sitting close by
her, his head stretched up that he might look
in her face, and only noticing Mrs. O’Toole, by
an occasional lick, he remained as docile as a
lamb.

Kate and nurse walked gaily home with
him, feeling they had gained the addition of a
friend to their society; indeed Cormac conducted
himself with so much discretion, that
the smiling, because regularly paid, landlady
observed, he was, “a perfect hangel in disposition.”

As if pleasures and pains were equally gregarious,
Mr. Langley called just as they were
going to tea. He was livelier than usual, and
explained his own and his sister’s apparent inattention,
by informing them that she had been
obliged to take her little boy to the Isle of
Wight, for change of air; that he had accompanied
them for the same purpose, and had
there met Miss Herman, who was on a visit to
her married sister. Thus were all Kate’s[178]
doubts satisfactorily cleared up, and the very
lightness of heart which these few words of
explanation produced, proved to her how
heavily their silence and apparent neglect had
preyed upon her spirits. It was no wonder
therefore that Langley felt surprised he had
not before been struck by the brilliancy as
well as the sweetness of her face; she played,
and sang for him too, for the first time, and
although he said little, was evidently charmed
by a degree of excellence he was in no wise
prepared for.

He left them at an early hour (after an offer
of books from his collection), considerably
cheered by his visit. He had been much
more agreeable than usual, indeed there was
something in the noble manner of Colonel
Vernon, in the grace and piquancy of his
grandchild, in her perfect freedom from all idea
of self; and spirited intelligent assumption of
her right to think for herself—that attracted
the taciturn, though well informed, Langley,
in no common degree. He had a bad opinion[179]
of women in general—like many men, he divided
them into two classes, fools and knaves;
and could not imagine the combination of
heart and intellect—yet Kate’s original observations,
surprised him by their freshness,
while it was impossible to look upon her
sweet, but noble countenance—and doubt
that if ever the spirit of truth had stamped
its impress on a human soul, that soul was
hers.

[180]

RESIGNATION.

Nearly two months had elapsed since the Vernons
left A——; and affairs wore much the same
aspect as the first days of their arrival in town.
Miss Herman had called on Kate, on her return
from the Isle of Wight, and Kate had,
selon les regles, returned the visit; and not
liking to trespass on Herman’s time, unnecessarily,
had written merely to ask some
trifling question, and thus, remind him of his
promise; in reply to which, she received a
vague assurance of his readiness to serve her,
and a recommendation to patience.

[181]

Meantime, parliament was within a few days
of its prorogation—town fast thinning—and
the season, to all intents and purposes, over.
This was indeed a trying time; and no portion
of it so trying, as when the Colonel sunk into his
evening sleep. Kate then ventured to release her
thoughts from the books, or work, on which
she always endeavoured to fix them, in his
presence, lest he should think her pre-occupied
or depressed; and sometimes gazing from the
window, at the slowly closing evening—sometimes
fixing her eyes on the beloved face,
which, freed from constraint, bore a pained expression—too
truly indicative of internal feeling—occasionally
an uneasy sigh would
escape him, or some muttered word; and, oh!
the inexpressible tenderness and anguish that
would then swell his grandchild’s heart.

Did you ever watch one you loved, asleep?
if not, you never knew of how much love your
nature was capable; yet these communings
with self, like Jacob’s wrestling with the[182]
angel, left a blessing behind—though the frequent,
bitter, passionate questions—”Why is
it so? Why is he, who would turn aside,
rather than tread upon a worm; whose strong,
warm heart, was chiefly pleased in shewing
mercy and pity—why is he thus tried, and left
desolate, now when the years are come in
which he has no pleasure?” would rise to her
lips; and, hard, hard was it to suppress them,
for Kate Vernon’s heart beat with too strong, too
passionate a pulse, not to feel that chastening
was very grievous; nor could she frame unreal
words of resignation—when the strong turmoil
of her breast, lay open to the All-seeing—she
could but cry, from out its troubled depths—”Behold,
O Lord, and see!”

One morning, her grandfather was reading
aloud to her—she sometimes made him do so—it
fixed his attention more—when the door
was opened suddenly, and a lady presented
herself, unannounced. She was richly dressed
in rather showy colors, and held a large em[183]broidered
lace-edged handkerchief in her hand.
The Colonel and Kate both rose.

“Miss Vernon, I presume!”

“Yes,” she replied, advancing.

The visitor presented a card; and Kate,
glancing at it, exclaimed—

“Ah! Mrs. Storey—grandpapa—Mr. Langley’s
sister.”

And mutual civilities were exchanged.

The new comer was slightly consequential,
inclined to talk of her husband’s firm, as of a
subject of universal and recognized interest;
she was a little patronising too; but evidently
charmed and subdued by the inexpressible
tone of deference and esteem which characterised
the Colonel’s manner to women, and
to which few ladies, connected with even the
most eminent firms, are accustomed.

“I am come on a double errand,” said she,
to Kate, after explaining about her long delayed
visit—”one, to hand you this note; the[184]
other, to beg you and Colonel Vernon will
kindly consent to join a small circle of friends,
at my house, on Thursday evening, though I
have made the request rather unceremoniously.”

“You are very kind; I am sure, grandpapa,
and myself will have great pleasure—”

“Yes, certainly,” chimed in the Colonel;
“though I seldom do so gay a thing, as to appear
at a soiree.”

“Then I shall expect you at half-past eight,
as it is to be an early party, of a few friends
only; and now, Miss Vernon, read that note.”

Kate opened it, and read as follows—

“I am very glad to get a summons, at last,”
said Kate, smiling. “I was beginning to fear
pupils were an unattainable good. The note
is from a friend of Mrs. Storey’s, grandpapa,”
she continued, anxious to prevent the old gentleman
from reading it, as, she justly thought,
the wording of it might ruffle his pride, “who
requires instruction in music for her two
daughters, and wishes me to call upon her on
Tuesday. How do you go to Brompton from
hence, Mrs. Storey?”

[186]

“The most agreeable way is through Kensington
Gardens, then across the Knightsbridge
Road.”

“Thank you; that sounds as if it would be
a pleasant walk.”

“Oh, very pleasant, indeed; will you excuse
me for running away very abruptly? but
I do not think I should have made time to call
only for Mrs. Potter’s note; another time, I
hope we shall be able to improve our acquaintance,
Miss Vernon. Good morning; pray don’t
come to the door. Half-past eight, Miss Vernon;
a few friends; my brother brings some
professors of music;” and she chattered out of
the room, overpowering Kate’s every effort to
thank her for her kindness.

Nurse was in readiness to open the hall
door, with a look of extreme displeasure on her
countenance.

“I niver seen the like iv thim English,”
she said, indignantly. “Hesther was washin’
the steps whin she come up—’Is Miss Vernon[187]
at home?’ ses she. ‘Yes,’ ses Hesther; ‘I’ll
call Mrs. O’Toole.’ An’ away she runs for me;
but me lady couldn’t wait, I suppose; so in
she walks widout—’By yer lave, or with yer
lave,’ instead of waiting to be announced like
a christian.”

“No matter, nurse, she brought me good
news,” replied Kate.

“Well, my love, I congratulate you, that
your pious wishes are likely to be accomplished,”
said the Colonel, as she returned to
the room. “This Mrs. Storey appears to be
a good sort of woman.”

“Oh, I am delighted with her! and no
wonder; she has rekindled the almost extinct
flame of hope; I do trust I may succeed with
her friend. Do come out, dearest grandpapa,
I feel too glad to stay in the house.”

The next day was Tuesday, and Kate, escorted
by Mrs. O’Toole and Cormac, started at
an early hour—to keep Mrs. Potter’s appointment—as
they had to explore their way—this[188]
they accomplished without much difficulty;
and, leaving nurse and Cormac to wait her
return, Kate followed a rather seedy man-servant,
in plain clothes, up a dingy stair-case,
into a very handsomely-furnished, but uninhabited-looking
drawing-room, with richly-bound
books, geometrically placed on round
tables, vases filled with wax flowers, alabaster
Cupids, and a grand, rosewood piano.
She had hardly glanced at all this finery, when
the door was opened hastily, and a fat and
rather red-faced woman, her hair done up into
little round, flat curls, secured with pins, who
breathed audibly, after mounting the stairs,
came quickly into the room.

“Ah, I beg pardon,” she involuntarily exclaimed,
as Kate’s slight, elegant figure met
her eye; “I understood Miss Vernon was
here.”

“I am Miss Vernon,” replied Kate, quietly.

“Oh!” or, as she pronounced it, ‘ho,’
“indeed! then will you just step down to the[189]
front parlour? that stupid man did not know
who you were.”

“Indeed!”

The front parlour at No. ——, St. Cecilia
Terrace, was like all other front parlours of its
class; there were horse-hair chairs and sofa,
dyed moreen curtains, and the cast off furniture
of humbler days, a former and less
splendid house; no books, and a large work-basket;
two young ladies that might be twelve
and sixteen years of age, rose on their entrance;
but did not long suspend the labours
of their busy needles. There was a third
person, whose semi-genteel dress, and hurried,
anxious expression of face, and surrounding
circle of shreds, of every hue and texture, declared
her to be—”The very reasonable girl
who goes out dress-making.”

“Now, Miss Vernon,” began Mrs. Potter,
rapidly, almost before she was seated, “I want
these two young ladies to be taught music. I
understand you were a pupil of Herman’s?”

[190]

“I was.”

“And can you teach singing?”

“Yes.”

“Well?”

“Why,” said Kate, “I cannot possibly be
considered a fair judge.”

“Well, I should like some reference as to
your capabilities.”

“I have none to offer, if you are not satisfied
with Mr. Langley’s opinion.”

“Oh, yes; he is a very good judge.”

“Perhaps you will let me hear you play,”
returned Mrs. Potter, sweeping off a mingled
pile of silk merino and fringe, from a very
antique piano.

“Of course,” replied Kate, drawing off her
gloves.

“Ah!” she exclaimed, shrinking back at
the discordant tones, which her first touch
drew forth. “This is rather out of tune, and
has not got the additional keys; I could not
play anything on this instrument.”

[191]

“Well, there’s the grand up-stairs,” said
Mrs. Potter, with more respect than her
manner had yet testified, at this raising of
difficulties on the part of Kate. “Come along,
girls.”

They ascended to the decorated apartment
before described; and there, although she
found the “grand rose-wood,” as it was
termed by the family, to be deplorably out of
tune also, Kate performed a noisy introduction
and march, which she guessed would be most
likely to suit her auditors; a song was then
demanded, and given; and mother and daughters
exchanged glances, which said very
plainly—”We’ve drawn a prize!”

“Well, I’m sure that’s very nice,” began
Mrs. Potter. “I have no objection to engage
you.”

Then came the discussion of terms; the
greatest trial poor Kate had yet encountered.
It was so difficult to name her price, so hard[192]
to bear the attempt to beat her down; yet all
things must have an end; and, at length, she
was finally engaged. Then, with what a feeling
of relief she walked briskly on to meet
Mrs. O’Toole, who was loitering about in waiting
for her young mistress.

“How valuable poor Mr. Gilpin’s hints have
been to me,” thought she; “what exquisite
torture that whole interview would have been,
had I not, by his advice, made up my mind to
treat and think of the whole affair as a business
transaction, which could not touch me
really.”

Nurse was less curious than usual—the subject
was one that could only give her pain and
grief, so she contented herself with Kate’s
general assurance that all was satisfactorily
settled. The Colonel, notwithstanding all his
consideration for his loving, self-forgetting
child, could not suppress a groan, when he
heard all the particulars she thought fit to
give.

[193]

“Ah, dear Kate! what costs us so dear,
brings but little into our exchequer.”

“But I shall get more pupils, you know,
and then—”

“Well, God’s will be done!”

The lessons at Brompton began the next
day; and Kate was surprised to find how
rapidly the time flew in the endeavour to
convey her own knowledge to her pupils; then
the walk back, accompanied by Cormac, who
lay outside the hall door, like a chiselled effigy
of watchfulness, all the time the lesson lasted,
was charming. The welcome from nurse and
grandpapa! how grateful the task to work for
them. “All I ask of Thee, oh Mighty Parent!
is abundance of work!” she often murmured,
almost aloud.

Thus cheered, she wrote in a strain of unwonted
gaiety to Winter, promising him an
account of Mrs. Storey’s soirée, at which nurse
was determined her darling should appear in
most recherché costume; but, to her dismay,[194]
the object of all this care, refused to appear in
anything but “a demi-toilette.”

“An’ why won’t ye show yer illigant white
neck, an’ arums, just to let them see what
we’ve got in ould Ireland?”

“You see, it will be a small party, nurse;
and, at all events, I would rather look too
little, than too much, dressed; besides, it is of
no consequence; yet, that is not quite true,”
she added, with a frank smile, “I should not
like to look frightful.”

So she had her own way, and wore the style
of dress she preferred. Nurse produced a very
handsome bouquet, just at the critical moment
when the toilette was “un fait accompli,” and
Kate was thinking how unfinished her costume
looked without what had hitherto been, with
her, an invariable accompaniment.

“Oh, nurse, how lovely! and you have got
these for me! Ah, you spoil your child! but
I am so glad to have them! Now I am indeed
mise a ravir; and shall value them a thou[195]sand
times more as your gift, than if they
were from—”

“The Captin?” put in Mrs. O’Toole,
slily.

“Yes, far more,” said Kate, and she spoke
the truth, for the moment.

Some slight delay in procuring a cab, rendered
their appearance at Mrs. Storey’s later
than they had intended, and her rooms were
more than half full when they entered. There
was the usual group of gentlemen near the
door, conversing in under tones with each
other; there was the same spare sprinkling of
broad cloth, amongst the silks, satins, and
muslins, seated stiffly round the walls, or
rigidly enthroned on ottomans; the same half
dozen of bolder spirits, more at home with the
company than those about the door, amongst
whom the facetious man, (for there is always
such at third rate parties), shone conspicuous,
entreating the ladies to teach him the language
of flowers, or propounding far-fetched conun[196]drums,
ending, invariably, with, “do you give
it up?”

Tea and coffee was being handed round by
two most respectable-looking men, whose faces
seemed strangely familiar to Kate, until she remembered
that she saw them almost daily, at
the gate of Kensington Gardens, mounting
guard over the Bath chairs, which they had
there for hire; and young ladies were gently
nibbling small squares of cake, and then depositing
them in their saucers, as if ashamed of
being guilty of so sublunary an occupation; in
short, there was every thing that could possibly
be expected at a soirée of the class we are describing.

The appearance of Colonel Vernon, with his
elegant-looking granddaughter, drew general
attention; and a whisper of curiosity ran round
the room, as each one felt, instinctively, there
was something in the newly arrived guests,
different from themselves. Miss Vernon advanced
through the numerous company, to her[197]
total strangers, with the quiet self-possession
which so peculiarly distinguished her, and
which had struck Egerton so forcibly, at the
memorable ball, where they had first met. It
was so different from the assured manner of a
veteran society hunter, or the “look at me,”
air of a professed beauty, and seemed to say,
“there is no position so lofty, where I should
be out of place.”

Mrs. Storey welcomed her new acquaintance
with great warmth, advancing rapidly to meet
them, with a huge bouquet held fiercely in
her hand like a Lancer charging the foe.

“Very glad to see you, Miss Vernon, and
your grandpa, looking so well—Mr. Storey,
Colonel Vernon, Miss Vernon, &c.”

Mr. Storey was a rubicund, jolly looking
man, not yet absolutely fat, but promising
well for the time to come; slightly bald, with
small twinkling eyes, and an inveterate affection
for the letter R; moreover, he constantly held
his hands in his trowsers’ pockets; laughed[198]
often a fat laugh, had an unmistakeable air of
prosperity, and was altogether what Mrs.
Storey, called, “very good company.”

“Happy to see you, Miss Vernon, happy to
see you, sir; just a few friends, what my friend
Jones calls a “tea fight,” that’s his interpretation
of “a soirée.”

Langley here disengaged himself, rather abruptly,
from a group of two or three bold, confident-looking
girls, and pale dishevelled men,
evidently artistic, to greet the Vernons, very
warmly for him.

“Let me get you a seat, Miss Vernon,” said
Mrs. Storey, drawing Kate towards the group
Mr. Langley had just left. “Sorry I was out
when you called yesterday. Did you arrange
with Mrs. Potter?”

“Yes, and I have to thank you and Mr.
Langley for procuring me my first pupils.”

“Oh, I was very glad.”

“Miss Dent,” said Mrs. Storey to one of the
dashing looking young ladies, before mentioned,[199]
“let me introduce Miss Vernon, you are both
very musical; Miss Vernon plays beautifully,
I am told; we hope to hear her farther on in
the evening—Miss Charlotte Dent.”

And Kate, to her dismay, was left to the
tender mercies of these evidently “very fashionable,”
girls, who were, “en grande tenue,”
with the lowest cut dresses, and shortest
sleeves permissible in society.

“Been long in town?” said the eldest,
(after a deliberate survey of Miss Vernon’s
simple costume,) in a bold and rather deep
toned voice.

Kate replied courteously, and turned to see
what had become of the Colonel; he was engaged,
apparently, in interesting conversation
with Mr. Langley, and satisfied that he did
not feel lonely, she gave her attention to the
people round her.

“Were you ever in town before?” continued
her examiner.

“Oh, yes, for some time, three years ago.”

[200]

“Horrid place at this time of year. I am
counting the days until I start for Germany.”

Here one of Langley’s dishevelled friends, from
some change in the surrounding group (for the
rooms were now almost crowded), suddenly
stepped back, and in so doing, trod on Miss
Vernon’s dress; he begged pardon with much
empressement, in a manner which bespoke him
to be no common man; he was pale, thin and
foreign-looking, with deep sunk, flashing eyes,
wild hair, and an unsteady expression of countenance.

“I am always doing these sort of things,
and have vowed a hundred times never to
brave the dangers of a soirée again; but,” he
shrugged his shoulders.

“Passato l’pericolo gabbato l’santo,” said
Kate, gaily and archly; judging from his air
and manner, that this scrap of poor Winter’s
lore would be understood.

“La Signorina parla l’Italiano,” he exclaimed,
joyously.

[201]

“So little that I dare not venture to begin
a conversation in it,” she replied, as she did
not consider it impossible to speak to a stranger
without a formal introduction.

“Yet you pronounce it correctly,” said the
wild looking man.

“You think so?”

“Yes, and although it is not my native
tongue, I love it, as if it were.”

“So did the friend from whom I learned
what little I know of it, and the proverb I
have just said; yet no; not quite so well as his
own tongue, for he was English.”

“Your emphasis would imply that you think
I am not, nor am I.”

“Mr. Winter used to say——”

“Winter!” he interrupted, “is he the
painter who has buried himself so strangely in
some monastic tomb, some old city, “en
Province?””

“The same.”

[202]

“Then you are the young lady Langley
spoke of?”

“Yes.”

“Maraviglia!“

“Why are you surprised?” asked Kate,
smiling.

He only repeated, “maraviglia!“

“Miss Dent, will you kindly play us something,”
said Mrs. Storey, sailing up, bouquet in
hand.

“With pleasure, Mrs. Storey, but really you
must send for my music, for Mr. Jones has
been making me laugh so, I could not remember
a note if I was to die for it; it is in the
cloak room.”

While Miss Dent was making numerous
preparations for the proposed exhibition, Langley
for the first time, left Vernon, and came over to
Kate, who, feeling pleased to speak to her only
acquaintance, at least of any standing, received
him with a brilliant smile, making room for
him beside her on the sofa, with her usual
unpremeditated grace.

[203]

“I see my friend Galliard has made your
acquaintance, Miss Vernon, without my assistance.”

“Ah, out of evil cometh good, thanks to
Mademoiselle!” said the man he called Galliard,
gaily. “Tore her dress, she pardoned the
penitent, and permitted him to speak, voilà
tout.”

A warning hus-sh-sh silenced him, and
taking a large pinch of snuff, he assumed a
critical air as Miss Dent struck a powerful
blow on an unfortunate chord, and started off
at a brisk gallop up the keys; her execution
was really remarkable, and the music she performed
full of physical difficulties; there were
interminable shakes, and thundering chords;
crossing of the hands and rushing from one
extreme of the keys to the other; at last the
performance, amid a crash of chords, came to a
sudden end, upon which the talkers, startled at
hearing their own voices, all at once, so loud,
stopped too, and clapped their hands.

[204]

Miss Dent rose with a triumphant air,
gathered together her gloves, fan and bouquet,
and stood at the end of the “instrument,” as
Mrs. Storey called it, laughing and talking
noisily, with the numerous beaux who surrounded
her.

“Now, Miss Vernon, may I call upon you?”
said the lady of the house, approaching.

Kate rose with a smile, and addressing
Langley, in a low tone, said—

“Will you kindly stay with grandpapa,
while I play, and do not let him come near
me.”

She took Mr. Storey’s arm, as she spoke,
and moved to the piano. Galliard and two or
three more of Langley’s friends followed, with
every appearance of interest, very different
from the degree of attention they bestowed on
Miss Dent. Kate felt little or no nervousness;
her trial and success, at Herman’s, had set her
mind at ease, and she at once began a very
lovely Fantasia, composed by Gilpin, at her[205]
request, and meant to convey the feeling of
sweet peacefulness she had described to
him, as often stealing over her heart, when,
after the last notes of the evening service
had scarce died away, she stood in the
Priory church yard, where it overlooked the
river, and saw its waters silvered by the moonbeams.

The music was of the Mendelssohn school,
of which the organist was a great admirer,
and Kate played it well; she knew every note
by heart, from the first solemn sustained
chords, to the noble march and tender aria
with which it concludes.

The talkers frequently begun, but were as
frequently hushed by the indignant “chut,
chut” of the connoisseurs; and when she
quietly rose from the piano, the emphatic
“good, very good!” “she can play!” “a remarkable
composition!” testified the satisfaction
of Langley’s professional friends; while[206]
they left the task of noisy plaudits to the indiscriminating
multitude.

Kate now in her turn, the centre of a little
group, had to answer many questions as to the
author of the music she had played, and, with
her usual eagerness to exalt a friend, she pronounced
a glowing eulogium on the organist
as a man, and a musician.

“He has genius, undoubtedly,” said Galliard,
“but can genius be satisfied with the
obscurity of a little provincial town?”

“He is happy there,” said Kate.

“Happy!” Galliard repeated, with a cynical
accent.

“A man must be very happy when he
allows it,” replied Miss Vernon.

“E vero,” cried Galliard, laughing.

“Or so very proud that he will not admit
the contrary,” suggested Langley.

“If you knew Mr. Gilpin,” began Kate,
when their hostess advancing, interrupted her,[207]
and begged for a song, to which request Kate
at once acceded.

Then the hostess proposed a quadrille, and
introduced a young gentleman, redolent of
eau de mille feurs, with an elaborately worked
shirt front, lined with pink, and a white pastry
face, to Kate, whispering, in a jocose manner,
“is quite a catch, junior partner in the great
firm of Jones, Brown and Tuckett;” and, with
a knowing nod, she walked away, leaving Kate
half amused at the extraordinary confidences
of her communicative hostess; but feeling
through all that, had she still been heiress of
Dungar, and any strange chance had thrown
Mrs. Storey in her way, the acquaintanceship
would have been conducted on very different
terms.

She stood up very good-humouredly, however,
and replied to all her partner’s vapid remarks,
very readily; yet, somehow, Tuckett,
junior, though he was “the glass of fashion
and the mould of form,” to Hammond-court,[208]
Mincing-lane, did not feel at his ease with
her; and she, in the innocence of her heart,
believing that all firms dwelt in the city, and
never dreaming that a man could be so silly as
to blush because he was a worker instead of
an idler, put him to torture by her unconscious
questions.

“I am anxious to explore the city,” she
said, while the side couples were dancing La
Poule. “I suppose you know all its charming
nooks by heart.”

“Aw, no, indeed, it’s a place I have too
great a distaste for, to stay in, except when
obliged.”

“For shame,” said Kate, “A citizen of
‘famous London Town,’ ought to know, and
prize the various interesting ‘locales’ in the
mighty capital.”

“Shall I get you an ice?” said her partner,
sullenly.

“No, no, thank you,” replied Kate, shaking
her head rather mournfully, as she remembered[209]
the last time a similar question had been put
to her; and taking her seat near the Colonel,
who was standing with Langley and Galliard;
she dismissed Tuckett, junior, with a gracious
inclination of the head.

Soon after, the Colonel complaining of
fatigue, and Kate, glad to escape her good-humoured
host’s frequently expressed wish
that she would ‘polkar,’ took her leave of the
soirée. Langley and Galliard attended them
to the carriage, which awaited them.

“Mr. Langley tells me he saw our friend
Egerton’s name, in some paper, promoted to a
majority,” said the Colonel.

“Did he! oh, where?” cried Kate.

“It was in the Gazette, I took it up while
waiting for Lord H— —, whose portrait I am
painting.”

“What did it say?” asked Kate, folding
her shawl round her.

“Oh,—’The Honourable Frederic Egerton
to be Major in the Lancers, without purchase,[210]
vice,’ some one, I forget the name, ‘deceased.'”

“I dare say it cost him some hard cash,
though it is there stated ‘without purchase;’
I understand all that. Come, Kate. Good
night, Mr. Langley. Bon soir, monsieur, au
plaisir de vous voir,” said the Colonel.

The Frenchman bowed profoundly, and they
drove away.

The Colonel was not animated after this
piece of gaiety, as he used to be in former
days; it seemed to have depressed him, and
he complained of slight cold. Mrs. O’Toole
was woefully disappointed to find that there
was “ne’er a lord, nor even an honourable,
good or bad, at the party.”

“To think iv yer playin’ an’ singin’ for the
likes iv thim!” she exclaimed, indignantly.

“What have I said to make you think so
contemptuously of the very respectable people,
amongst whom we have spent (I confess) ‘a[211]
rather slow evening,’ as my eloquent partner
would term it?”

“Och no matther, sure it’s thim that’s the
only quolity goin’ now; well, niver mind,
Miss Kate, we’ll lave thim all yet.”

“I hope so,” sighed Kate.

[212]

LETTERS.

The next morning, just as Kate was preparing
to write a long letter to the Winters, one from
the kind-hearted little artist was put into her
hand. It was sealed with black wax, and
announced the death of poor Gilpin. He had
suffered a good deal; but, towards the last,
fell into a calm, sweet sleep, out of which he
suddenly awoke with a look of bright happiness,
such as they had never seen on his face
before, as if had heard a summons inaudible to
their ears.

“I come,” he said, and, feebly laying his[213]
hand on Winter’s, passed to “where his treasure
was,” without a sigh.

There was little in the letter besides the
account of the good man’s death; he had left
a memorandum of the persons amongst whom
his books and music were to be distributed.
He had desired, kindly messages, to one or
two friends, and the last name he uttered was
that of Kate Vernon.

She read the letter aloud, calmly, but the
intonation of her voice indicated deep emotion;
at its conclusion there was a pause, which
neither the Colonel nor his granddaughter were
inclined to break; both were hushed and awed
by this description of their friend’s passage to
the World of Spirits.

The large, round, pearly tears weighed down
Kate’s long lashes, and slowly rolled over her
cheeks, without any effort on her part to restrain
them. She was unconscious that she
wept.

At last the old man broke the silence, saying,

[214]

“Let me die the death of the righteous, and
let my last end be like his!”

“Amen,” replied his granddaughter. “Oh,
dearest grandpapa,” she continued at length,
“he has entered into his rest, and though it is
an awful thought to us, that he still exists,
but where no mortal eye can see him; what
an exchange from the many woes and struggles
of his warfare here, to the boundless bliss of
heaven! He had many sorrows, and yet
surely the coming shadow of a great deliverance
rested on his spirit, long before he was
freed! How sensitive he was—about his appearance
I mean—how keenly alive to every
glance, and yet how resolutely he used to brace
up his soul to love, and to endure!”

“I suppose we shall soon hear from Winter
again,” said the Colonel, after another pause.

“I suppose so,” returned Kate, dreamily.
“Ah, nurse,” she exclaimed, a few moments
after, as Mrs. O’Toole entered, about some[215]
household matter, “he is gone—he is happy—our
kind, gentle friend, Mr. Gilpin.”

“The heavens be his bed,” said Mrs.
O’Toole, crossing herself. “Och, whin was he
taken, Miss Kate?”

“Two days ago.”

“Athin ’twas he was fit to go! faith, he
was worth a score iv clargy to the poor; an’, at
the first goin’ to A—, I used to think it beneath
ye, to be talkin’ an’ walkin, wid a poor crathure
iv an organist; but I was proud to spake
to him aftherwards meself; for he always
looked as if he’d a taste iv heaven inside iv
him, so he did. Sure, it’s no wondher, this is
such a miserable place to be in, wid sich min as
Misther Gilpin an’ the masther, whipt off like—like
a pooff, or robbed iv their own; an’
sich chaps as Taaffe an’ Moore, or thim in
their coaches, an’ desavin’ the world! faith,
it’s beyant me entirely, so it is.”

“And beyond many a wiser head than either[216]
yours or mine, Nelly,” said the Colonel, kindly.
“We must leave all that to God.”

“Thrue for ye, sir.” And she retired, murmuring—”Och,
blessed Jasus! resave yer
soul, mee poor Gilpin! It’s a saint on airth
ye wur!”

So Kate’s letter was written, in a very different
strain from what she had intended; and
then she strolled with her grandfather in Kensington
Gardens. The old man seemed feeble
and depressed; he took Kate’s arm, as he
often did of late, and spoke much of his own
advancing years, and his anxiety, in the event
of his death, for her in a tone that thrilled
her heart with fear and anguish. She strove
to turn the conversation—but it would not do.

“I have no doubt, that you alone would
find a happy home under Georgina’s roof; but
I wish I might see you happily married, and
in a house of your own, before I am called
away. I fear from Moore’s intelligence, brief[217]
and scanty as it is, there is no chance of our
gaining this fatal lawsuit, so that you will be
totally unprovided for;” and he sighed deeply.
“Our relations are so few, and—”

“Oh, hush, hush, dearest and best!” cried
Kate; “you cannot dream what pain you inflict
on me, by such words; do not fear for
me; I never know dread on my own account,
for the future; you do not know the strong
courage of my heart—I did not know it myself
till of late; we cannot provide against
future ills; why then darken the present by
anticipating them. Let us leave it all to God,
as you told nurse this morning; believe me, I
fear nothing, except hearing you speak in this
manner.”

The old man was silent for a while, and
then resumed—

“We little thought, the day Fred Egerton
rushed back so gallantly to rescue our poor
friend, how soon that pleasant little party
would be scattered.”

[218]

“Little indeed,” echoed Kate; “next week
it will be a year since the ball at Carrington,
where I first met him.”

The Colonel smiled, and sighed.

“He will be sorry to hear of poor Gilpin’s
death. I wonder he has not written.”

“Good morning, Miss Vernon,” said Langley,
coming up behind them. “I hope you
caught no cold last night? How do you do,
Colonel Vernon?”

The Colonel informed him of Gilpin’s death;
and he seemed rather interested, as the compositions
of the organist, which Kate had
played the night before, had pleased him
greatly. Then they talked of great musicians,
and Mozart’s Requiem, and the strange circumstances
under which it is said to have been
composed.

“How much I love those wild, mysterious
German stories, they have an indescribable
charm for me,” said Kate.

[219]

“Why?” asked Langley, in his blunt
manner.

“That is exactly what I cannot answer.”

“I never like what I do not understand.”

“How is it you are a painter then?” asked
Kate, in her turn.

“I do not see what that has to do with the
subject on which we were speaking,” he returned,
startled at this attack.

“How is it that you can give expression to
a face with your pencil, which you could not
convey in words? Even a landscape may speak
the painter’s soul, far more than the most
eloquent description; so it is that glimpses of
what is far beyond our nature to comprehend,
faint though they be, give us an idea of space
and might far more than any even perfectly
comprehended explanation, as mist-wreaths
hide but magnify the depths seen from a mountain.”

“A very poetical definition, Miss Vernon.”

[220]

“I speak but my thoughts,” said Kate,
steadily, though she blushed, and felt uneasy;
as enthusiasts always do, when the quick current
of their imagination is checked by some
son of earth, who dignifies his dulness by the
name of strong common sense.

“Well, Miss Vernon, I must think of what
you say about painting.”

“Ah, you must have enthusiasm and imagination
to be a painter, though you are too
English not to be ashamed of your better self.”

“That is what Galliard says.”

“Who is this Monsieur Galliard?” asked
the Colonel.

“Oh, a very curious medley—his father was
French, his mother English—and his life has
been divided between France, Italy, and England—he
is half a musician, half a painter, but
wholly a writer for newspapers and reviews,
foreign and domestic; he is well thought of,
however, notwithstanding some vulnerable[221]
points—knows lots of people, and is a very
likely person to push you on well, Miss Vernon.”

The Colonel winced at this conclusion.

“You are very kind,” said Kate; “I quite
begin to think you a real friend, now I am
more accustomed to you.”

Langley stared, astonished! Old enough to
be Miss Vernon’s father, it was extraordinary
the influence this fair, bright, noble creature,
whose every word and thought were so at
variance with the maxims of his work-a-day
world, was gaining over him.

Meanwhile, they had reached the Vernon’s
lodgings before he had recovered the fit of musing
into which Kate’s words had thrown him.

“I am glad you think me your friend,” he
said, at length, interrupting an exposition of
the state of the Ancienne Regime, as it existed
when he was in France, into which the Colonel
had diverged, apropos to Galliard.

“I am quite sure you are ‘no humbug,’ as[222]
my partner of last night would say,” returned
Kate, laughing.

And they parted.

Lady Desmond’s letters were rather more
frequent at this time, and though they evinced,
as usual, warm affection and sincere interest in
the fortunes of her relatives, there was a restlessness
and despondency in their tone which
spoke of a spirit ill at ease. She frequently said
she would return to them, as they would not
come to her; but months flew by, and still she
was among the “distinguished English at present
in Florence.” And Kate, who, in spite
of herself, yearned for her return, as for the
first beam of the rising sun, as something that
would create a change for the better in the
face of affairs, and also longed to see the fair
face of a much loved relative, felt that the only
reason why she did not quite despair of seeing
Lady Desmond’s promises fulfilled, was because
she dared not deprive herself of that
hope. The Colonel, too, clung to it, with an[223]
eagerness almost painful, at times; and it was
evident, this feverish anxiety was connected
with some intention of putting Kate under her
guardianship.

And so their life rolled on—the only break
in its monotony was a slight difference between
Mrs. Crooks, the landlady, and Mrs. O’Toole,
which arose from their mutual affection for the
parrot. Nurse asserted “it was a mighty knowledgeable
craythur iv a bird;” and Poll verified
the statement of her admirer, by repeating
various phrases she learnt from Mrs. O’Toole,
in a rich County Clare brogue. The poverty
of the kitchen fire was a constant source of
vexation to Mrs. O’Toole.

“Hesther, och! girl alive—will ye rouse up
that fire a bit,” was her constant cry; and
Poll never beheld the much enduring handmaid
of Mrs. Crooks, without screaming.
“Hesther, Hesther, rouse up the fire a bit.”
“Hesther ye divil!” “Ah, speak pretty,
Poll,” Mr. Crooks would then exclaim, “don’t[224]
say such ugly words—say dear mistress.” “Ye
divil,” Poll would reply.

“Faith it would make ye break yer heart
laughing, sir,” said nurse, who was detailing
the events of their warfare, to the Colonel and
Kate, one evening. ‘Spake pretty,’ ses she,
‘an don’t be hollowin’ out thim vulgar Hirish
words,’ ses she. ‘Och, God help ye woman,’
ses I, ‘it’s little ye know the differ between
what’s vulgar, an what’s genteel in this counthry,’
ses I. ‘Ye’d lave a poor Queen, to go
sarve a rich tinker, any hour of the twinty-four;
an ye’d rummage through the blackest
dirt iv London for a halfpenny, though yer
pocket was full iv goold guineas, all the time—that’s
yer gintility in England,’ sis I; ‘an
as for style, an rale quolity, faith it’s so
little—'”

“Dear nurse,” interrupted Kate, gravely,
“I wish you had not made such a long and
irritating speech, to Mrs. Crooks; you must
let me settle your differences, and in future[225]
turn a deaf ear to any casual remarks that may
hurt your national vanity—they are not worth
noticing.”

“Och, my gracious, Miss Kate, is an impident
thief iv a lodging-house keeper, to be
let to have her talk about her betthers an—be
the powers! there’s the post,” cried nurse interrupting
herself, “an I dhreamt, I had a
letther from—” she ran out hastily, and returned
almost immediately, with a disappointed
look, “It’s for the masther.”

“From Winter,” said he, opening it. An
enclosed letter, with the Indian post-mark fell
from it. “From Egerton, I do believe,” cried
the Colonel; but no—within that again was
another enclosure, the address, written in an
intoxicated looking hand, and much blotted.
“For Mrs. O’Toole, at the Kurnel’s in England.”

“It’s for you, nurse,” said Kate, with a
heavy sensation of deep disappointment weighing
down her heart.

[226]

“I’ll engage it’s from Dinny; athin read it
for me, jewil!”

So Kate, disengaging its folds from the stiff
adhesion of a large red wafer, and taking the
liberty of correcting some very prominent
errors of orthography, and transferring small
into capital I’s, read as follows:—

[230]

“The Queen in Heaven reward ye, Captin,”
cried Mrs. O’Toole, the tears rolling down her
cheeks. “Och, Dinny, it’s you’s in luck—an’
he’s the Captin’s own man; an’ give up dhrink—glory
be to God!”

“Well, it’s a very pleasing, satisfactory
letter, Nelly,” said the Colonel, “and I am
heartily glad to hear so good an account from
your son. Eh, Kate, is there a postscript?”

“No; but I was reading over the concluding
part—it is rather confused—Corporal Morrisson,
appears to write for Dennis in the third
person, and then Dennis himself comes in
again, in the first person; but, dear nurse, I
congratulate you, with all my heart, I think
my foster-brother will now get on remarkably
well.”

“Sorra fear iv him now. Sure there was
always luck in the Captin’s face, an’ he’ll be
back yet wid a pocket full iv goold, and set us
all right, I pray, God, amin. Now I’ll just
get the specks, an’ read it all over meself, sure[231]
I can make it out beautiful afther Miss Kate
readin’ it.”

And so after a few more ejaculations, nurse
retired.

“It is very curious,” began the Colonel.

“That Captain Egerton did not write himself,”
interrupted Kate, quickly.

“Yes, I cannot understand it, that letter indicates
the kindliest feelings towards us, and
yet I wonder he would not wish for some more
direct communication with us, than through
Dennis O’Toole.”

“Do letters ever go astray?”

“Oh, scarcely; this one you see has arrived
safe, but what surprises me is that he enclosed
it without a line.”

“Indolence about writing, I suppose,” said
Kate, with a sigh.

“But now I have the address, I shall certainly
write.”

“Will you, dear grandpapa?”

“Well, perhaps it would be better, decidedly[232]—let
me see what days the Indian mail leaves,
we can find it out at the post-office; you must
remind me, my love.”

“Yes, grandpapa.”

Then she went to the piano, and played
dreamily for a long time, seeing neither notes
or music, but a tableau—Dennis O’Toole and
Captain Egerton, while the words of the latter
“I will not have Kate Vernon’s foster brother,
a drunkard,” seemed to meet her eye, wherever
she turned it, and brought the speaker too
vividly before her. One of Egerton’s most
distinguishing characteristics was a chivalrous
delicacy of feeling towards women, generally;
Kate had often observed it, with silent, but
profound approbation, and she could well
imagine the tender consideration with which
he would treat even a dog that had belonged
to one he loved, and something whispered to
her that she was this one—it was but very rarely
that such a thought flashed across her mind.
Yet although she felt that the course of proba[233]bilities
held out little or no chance of their
again meeting till the lapse of many years had
fixed their destinies wide apart, still the conviction
that she was loved and not forgotten,
thrilled through her heart, with an ecstasy so
exquisite, so strange that she shrunk from it,
startled at the depths of her own nature, thus
revealed, even while she thanked God that he
had never become necessary to her happiness.

“No, there is much of joy in life for me,
and much of peace, though, in all human probability,
we shall never meet again. No, I do
not love him, but I could, ah, heavens, yes,
how much!”

And she lay down to sleep perfectly resigned
that their lots in life should be cast widely
separate; yet the vision conjured up by Denny’s
letter, of Egerton’s evidently unaltered interest
in all that concerned her, contributed largely
to the dilation of heart with which she poured
forth her prayers and thanksgivings to her
“Father which is in heaven.”

[234]

AN ADVENTURE AND A SURPRISE.

Autumn was now rapidly merging into
winter, the unbroken routine of Kate’s life only
lent swifter wings to time, for events like
marked distances serve often but to show our
tardy progress. Sometimes Langley would
look in for half an hour’s chat, and Galliard
still more rarely; but though formerly so fond
of society, their visits seemed now more than
the Colonel wished for, or was equal to; and
although she never permitted the dreadful
thought to dwell on her mind, yet the consciousness
that he was unusually silent, and[235]
averse to move, that his cheek had lost its firm,
round, ruddy look; and that he often sent his
dinner away untouched, would seize her,
with a sense of anguish. Nurse, with love’s
quick perception, always stoutly denied that
any thing ailed him.

“It ‘ill do nayther iv thim any good to be
thinkin that a way,” she would say to herself.
“Miss Kate the crayther, has enough to put up
with, an’ as to me poor darlin’ masther, it ‘ud
take a better cordial than iver kem out iv a
‘poticary’s shop to do him any good.”

These apprehensions about her grandfather
were weighing heavily on Kate’s heart. One
humid, gloomy afternoon she was returning
home after giving some music lessons, escorted,
as usual, by her faithful Cormac; as she hurriedly
crossed the road, (for it was late), at
Kensington Gore, to enter the gardens by the
gate near the ancient and diminutive barrack,
usually occupied by a small party of Light
Dragoons, two gentlemen stopped opposite to[236]
it. One a large, heavy, man, mounted on a
splendid, dark chesnut horse, whose broad chest
and clean, strong muscular limbs showed him
to be a weight carrier; the rider’s back was to
the gardens, and his eyes fell on Kate and her
companion, as she came up; the other, about
middle height, slight, distinguished looking,
but simply dressed, stood on the footway leaning
his right arm on the neck of his friend’s
horse, and occasionally waving his left hand as
if to enforce his words; the peculiar turn of
this last described individual’s head, and the
careless arrangement of his wavy hair reminded
Kate of Egerton, or rather stamped him as belonging
to Egerton’s class; for one of the indications
of gentlemanlike appearance is the turn
of the head and the manner of wearing the
hat.

“By George! what a splendid dog!” exclaimed
the equestrian, interrupting his companion,
who turning slowly round, caught a
glimpse of Kate, as she passed; her color[237]
heightened by her rapid walk, and Cormac, as
usual, keeping close to her side. A new
keeper was standing at the gate, as she was
about to enter, and said, civilly, though
authoritatively—

“No dogs admitted, ma’am.”

“But he always accompanies me,” said
Kate, “and never frightens any one, not even
the birds, the last keeper never objected to his
coming through.”

“But my orders are strict; and he is such
a large dog.”

“Well, I really cannot go back again,” continued
Miss Vernon, smiling, and shaking her
head. “I saw a lady go in just before me,
with a dog.”

“Yes, but she had a string to him.”

“Oh, I can soon manage that,” cried Kate,
fastening one end of her handkerchief to Cormac’s
collar. “Now may I go through?”

The man smiled, and made way for her.

While stooping, to fasten the handkerchief,[238]
the gentleman we have above described, as
leaning across the neck of his friend’s horse,
walked past, glancing at Kate, quickly and
keenly; she did not observe him, but turning
up the broad walk proceeded towards home,
lost in a wandering maze of sweet and bitter
thought. As she approached the water near
the Palace, she paused a moment to notice a
peripatetic duck of large dimensions, and
brilliant plumage, for whom she generally carried
a bit of bread or biscuit, and who made
long marches in quest of dainties, that might
possibly be missed by adhering closely to his
more natural element. Cormac sat down
gravely, while his mistress addressed a few
words of apology to her feathered pensioner.

“No bread or biscuit to-day, poor duck, but
I will not forget you to-morrow.”

And she stood looking at the creature, as it
waddled awkwardly round and round her, quite
regardless of the dog. At that moment the gentleman
before mentioned came up beside her,[239]
and slightly raising his hat, said, politely and
easily—

“How is it that you are alone?”

Kate turned quickly, and met a piercing
gaze from a pair of deep set, but stern looking
black eyes. She was naturally courageous,
and the idea of any one intentionally insulting
her never occurred to her mind; the stranger’s
tone too, was perfectly well-bred, and his
words, such as might be addressed to some
familiar acquaintance; so, without hesitation,
or the slightest apprehension or embarrassment,
and meeting his bold glance steadily,
she replied, calmly, with a slight inclination of
the head—

“You mistake me, I do not know you,” and
moved on towards home. To her surprise, however,
the stranger kept by her side, and after a
moment’s silence, apparently somewhat surprised
at her composure, he resumed, softening
still more a very musical and refined
voice—

[240]

“You are both right and wrong; I do not
mistake you for any other person, but I am
unfortunately unacquainted with you, and unless
I take a bold step, such as I have now
done, may remain so; therefore, pray forgive
me.”

Kate walked on in silence, her heart throbbing
with indignation; to be addressed by a
stranger, and one too, apparently, of her own
rank in life; one whom, under different circumstances,
would, perhaps, have been presented
by some smiling or dignified hostess.
These thoughts flashed liked lightning through
her brain, and left no room for fear, as she
kept a resolute silence. After another short
pause, the stranger again turning his cold,
sallow, but intellectual countenance towards
hers resumed—

“It is absurd your persevering in this unbroken
silence; I generally carry out my resolves;
and to exchange a few sentences with
a person not formally introduced to you, cannot[241]
possibly be an injury; speak, I entreat you,
give me but the slightest clue to your name
and position, and I will speedily contrive the
necessary introduction—will not that satisfy
you?” he added, in a slightly sarcastic tone,
and suddenly placing himself in her way: she
stopped, and keeping still silent, for a moment
more, to collect her thoughts, and get the fiery
indignation that swelled her heart under controul.

“Sir,” said she, deliberately, and with a
determination of tone and manner that surprised
him, “unless your appearance sadly
belies you, you should be too much a gentleman
not to feel by instinct that I am a lady;
your excuses for your presumptuous insolence
only adds to it, but,” she continued, with a
curl of the lip, and a flash of indignant contempt
from her dark grey eyes, that deepened
them to blue, “I laugh at your attempt to
stop me! Here, Cormac,” to the hound, who
had already uttered one or two ominous growls,[242]
she untied the handkerchief; “watch him,
good dog, and if he stirs—” she stopped, and
looking once more full in the stranger’s face,
turned suddenly, so as to place the hound
between them, and walked lightly away,
yet not too fast. The stranger, thus left
planted, bit his lip, then laughing slightly, attempted
to pass the dog, who, in heraldic
attitude ‘couchant,’ kept his fierce eyes fixed
on his charge, at whose slightest movement he
displayed his sharp, white fangs.

“Pshaw! what a mistake, to address such
a girl, sans ceremonie; what an awkward predicament!
It would be absurd to enter into a
contest with such a brute, unarmed, for nothing,”
muttered Kate’s admirer, who did not
look like a man deficient in courage. “Here,
good dog, I say,” and he again attempted to
pass, but Cormac sprang to his feet with a
savage growl, and again the haughty looking
‘elegant’ was baffled.

Meantime Kate’s slight figure disappeared[243]
in the distance, and, a moment after, Cormac
pricking his ears at some sound, unheard by
his opponent, with a final growl, darted at full
speed down the walk by which his mistress
had vanished. She was waiting a few paces
beyond the gate, where she had, to the best
of her ability, uttered the whistle, which had
recalled her faithful guardian; and now hurrying
her pace almost to a run, they speedily
reached home, but not before the persevering
stranger had caught sight of the flutter of her
dress, as she turned the corner of Victoria
Gardens.

“How late you are, my child! you seem
flushed and breathless.”

“Yes, dear grandpapa, I was detained at
Mrs. Potter’s, and of course that made me late
with my other pupils; then I walked so fast;
but I will run up stairs and take off my bonnet.”

“Oh, nurse!” she exclaimed, throwing herself
into Mrs. O’Toole’s arms, “I have had[244]
such a fright—no, not a fright, but I am so
indignant to think that he should dare to—”

“Och, what is it, good or bad? take breath,
asthore!”

And Kate, with many charges not to tell her
grandfather, recounted her adventure to nurse.

“Och, bad manners to him,” exclaimed that
sympathising confidante. “The rale divil he
was to go spake that away to a lady like you;
bad luck to his impidence; did he think ye’d
thank him for wantin’ to know ye? I wish I
come across him, faith I’d make his hair stand
on ind, the schamin’ vagabone. But why are ye
cryin’, avick, about a thief iv a pickpocket?
I’ll go bail it’s yer purse he wanted; sure a
rale gintleman ud know betther!”

“I can’t help it, nurse! they are the bitterest
tears I ever shed, not on account of that
wretched man, but to think that such a thing
ever occurred, and may occur again.”

“Sorra bit iv it, I’ll go wid ye me own self
ivery day to Potter’s an’ the other place, an’[245]
let me see if me gintleman dare say pays to
ye! Whist! och, jewel, there’s the masther
callin—dhry yer eyes.”

For several days the faithful Nelly escorted
her young mistress in her walks, but the adventurous
stranger never appeared; and, by
degrees, Kate began to look upon her fright
and indignation as an unpleasant but unreal
phantom.

One evening Kate had yielded to the entreaties
of Mrs. Storey and her juvenile olive
branches, to join a birth-day merry-making, in
honor of the son and heir having attained his
eighth year; and for once she left her grandfather
to read alone. Nurse, of course, guarded
her during her short transit between their
abode and that of her host’s, and having carefully
removed her nursling’s shawl and bonnet,
plodded slowly homeward, to make the ‘masther’s
tay,’ for the birth-day fête began at half-past
six; thinking sadly enough of the past,[246]
and of her dear master’s sinking strength and
spirits, she turned into the little street or terrace
in which they lived.

“Pray,” said a very languid, gentlemanlike
voice, close beside her. “Pray, do you
not live at No. — down here?”

“May be I do, may be I don’t,” replied
Mrs. O’Toole, eyeing the speaker sharply, and
with, what she considered, consummate caution.

“Well,” returned her interrogator, whom,
it is needless to say, was the same individual
whose insolence had so annoyed Kate, and
whose really elegant appearance would have
enlisted her in his favour, but for her prepossessions
against him; “I presume you know
your own residence; at all events I shall feel
obliged to you if you will let me know the
name of the young lady, whom you sometimes
escort through Kensington Gardens? Of
course, as the utterance of it will cause considerable
wear and tear of your lungs, accept
this remuneration.”

[247]

“What is it ye want with her name?” asked
Mrs. O’Toole.

“That cannot possibly concern you; tell it
to me, and take this.”

“Keep yer money,” replied Mrs. O’Toole,
with supreme disdain, “divil another word,
good nor bad, will ye get from me, till ye tell
me what ye want her name for.”

“Ah,” said the gentleman, musingly, “you
seem so respectable a person, I have no objection
to tell you, that having unfortunately
offended the lady, by speaking to her in the
Gardens, I am anxious this apology should
reach her hand,” and he showed a note he
held, “will you be the bearer of it?” he continued,
insinuatingly.

“I’ll tell ye what it is,” returned nurse,
firing up in spite of her determination to be
cool and cautious, “I’ll bear nayther yer notes
nor yer impidince; I’d like to see the man,
woman, or child that daur be carryin’ notes
for ye to Miss— No matther,” she continued,[248]
hastily checking herself, “it’s not the likes iv
ye, an oudacious chap, that daured to spake to
yer betthers, widout, ‘by yer lave or wid yer
lave,’ she’d so much as look at. Faith, if I
see a sign iv ye about the place, to frighten
me darlint, I’ll just give ye up to the polis;
I’ll go bail it’s the spoons ye’r more used to be
lookin’ afther than the ladies, though ye have
a good coat on yer back, an’ look as if it wasn’t
a stranger to ye.”

“My good woman,” said the object of this
tirade, with a half-surprised, half-amused air,
as Mrs O’Toole paused for breath, “You are
the most impracticable person I ever met; I do
not understand you.”

“Well then, I’ll spake plain enough for ye.
If ye were a gintleman, ye’d niver have gone
to spake to me darlin’ young lady, in the way
ye did, the other day—ye’d have known yer
own sort, an’ the differ betune a bit iv a dressmaker,
and a raale lady; an’ ye may look as
fine, an’ as proud as ye like, but I’ll see ye[249]
yet, gettin’ up stairs to the tune of Turn the
Mill—so good-by te ye, an’ ye may put yer
note in the fire; but if I see ye about here, be
this book,” kissing her hand, “I’ll give ye up
to the polis, for a suspicious characther, that
has his eye on the plate!” And off walked
Mrs. O’Toole, glowing with triumph and
honest indignation.

The stranger muttered something very like
a curse; then, laughing slightly, he said, half
aloud, as if in the habit of speaking his
thoughts—

“The most extraordinary specimen of indignant
virtue I ever encountered—why, she is as
incorruptible as the hound, and just as fierce.
So adieu, ma belle,” tearing the note. “A
Houri would not be worth the trouble such
guardianship entails; besides the ridicule of
appearing to the charges her eloquent duenna
threatens.” He thought a moment, turned,
and walked slowly back to the main road,
where a plainly appointed cab, with a horse of[250]
great beauty and value, and an irreproachable
tiger awaited him.

Kate thought nurse’s movements unusually
rapid, as they returned from Mrs. Storey’s, but
that considerate personage said not a syllable
of her interview with the unknown, until that
most confidential moment, when the stiffness
of drawing-room manner and costume is exchanged
for a robe de chambre, and Kate’s long
rich, brown tresses were submitted to Mrs.
O’Toole, and the brush.

“Sure, that dark browed divil was spyin’
about whin I kem back fum Storey’s.”

“What that dreadful man? who spoke?”

“Yes, agra, an’, Miss Kate, fur all I tould
him, I thought him a pick-pocket—faith, I
believe he’s a gran’ gintleman; I know be the
look iv him; see now, if he is’nt a lord, I
never seen one, an’ they were as thick as
parsley at Dungar. I was frightened to have
the likes iv him ramblin’ about here, so I jist
spoke up bould, an’ pretended to think he was[251]
a pick-pocket or the like, an’ threatened him
wid the polis, an’ I think I settled him any
how.”

“I have no doubt you acted quite right,
dearest nurse, and I should like to have heard
you giving him ‘his tag,’ as you would term
it; but surely he will never take the trouble
to come here again. I thought it was only a
passing impertinence—perhaps he was really
sorry, and wished to apologise—let us give
him ‘the benefit of a doubt;'” and so they
dismissed the subject, which slumbered for
many months before—but we must not anticipate.

Not many days after this break in the
routine of their lives, as Kate and the Colonel
were one evening talking by the fire-light, of
A——, and the Winters—the sound of approaching
wheels, broke the stillness, which
generally settled over Victoria-gardens, at the
close of day. The sound drew nearer, and suddenly
ceased at their house.

[252]

“Some mistake,” said Miss Vernon, as both
she and her grandfather paused in their conversation,
to listen to that vague watchfulness,
so often felt by those whose hearts are full of
the future, because the present is sad; then
the garden-gate creaked on its hinges, and
heavy steps approached rapidly, the bell was
rung loudly, and though she could not tell
why, Kate’s heart beat more quickly, as she
listened for the next sounds, for each movement,
is clearly audible through the slight
walls of a modern built house in the outlets of
London. The door was opened, and a husky
whispering ensued, to which the servant’s
voice replied—”Yes, Mr. Vernon’s at home;”
and in another moment Mrs. O’Toole’s hearty
tones were heard in joyous welcome.

“Athen, is it yerself that’s in it? Masha,
but it’s the masther, an’ Miss Kate, will be
proud to see ye. Walk in, ma’am—I’ll settle
the cabman.” Then the parlour-door was
thrown wide open, and in walked Mrs. Winter,[253]
in a large, plaid cloak—followed by a mass of
coats and comforters, over which twinkled joyously,
the artist’s little bead-like eyes.

Then came the joyous confusion of question
and answer, and wonder and welcome; and
Kate felt a sudden accession of life and
strength.

“But to what do we owe this happy surprise?”
she reiterated, as she knelt at Mrs.
Winter’s feet, to change her boots, for a pair of
warm slippers.

“Indeed, my dear, it is one of Winter’s fits;
he would not let me write, nor write himself—he
said we might disappoint you, and ourselves.”

“Yes,” broke in Winter, disencumbering
himself of his numerous wrappings, “I knew
you—you would have been killing the fatted
calf, and roasting turkeys, and all sorts of
things; and we should have been late, and
teased you with expectation, so I said, leave[254]
your pen alone, Sue, and here we are; stopped
at the first house with “furnished apartments,”
on it, engaged them—then all right,
ready for a dish of tea, and chat; and then
turn in—close here—Albert-place. Why,
Colonel, you do not look as if London agreed
with you, but you bella miâ, you look quite
yourself.”

“But what has induced you to visit the
great Babylon?” said the Colonel, when the
first hubbub of welcome was over, and they
were assembled round the tea-table.

“We are going on the continent,” said Mrs.
Winter, with some importance.

“Is it possible?” cried Kate.

“You do not speak seriously?” said the
Colonel.

“Why not? I’ve got a cold, and I’ve no
idea of remaining to be cut off, like poor Gilpin,
by the east winds,” returned Winter.

“Is that your only reason?” asked Kate.

[255]

“Why not exactly; but A—— has become
such a desert, now that you and Gilpin are
gone; life is not worth having there.”

“I do not like the idea of having the sea
between us,” said the Colonel.

“Nor I,” added his grand-daughter,

“Nor I; but we will not be long away, and
I intend to paint, while abroad, such a picture,
as will make the Royal Academicians die of
envy,” said Winter.

“And,” added Mrs. Winter, “we have let
our house very advantageously to a cousin of
Canon Jones’s, who commands the new regiment.”

“But you will not run away too soon?”
asked Kate.

“No, we shall remain three or four weeks
in London.”

“I am rejoiced to hear it,” said the Colonel.

“Oh, delightful,” cried Kate.

“We will talk over our plans to-morrow,”[256]
said Winter, to-night, let us hear of your own
proceedings. How do you like my friend
Langley?”

“Oh, I like him very much,” returned Kate,
“I am sure there is much good in him, though
he won’t show it, and seems so cold and cautious
even with himself, that I dare not take it upon
myself to say he will be glad to see even
you.”

“Well, I can tell you he writes enthusiastically
of you,” replied Winter.

“Non e possibile!“

And so the conversation flowed on in a
thousand interrogative channels, all indicative
of the same warm and friendly interest, which,
still unabated, linked the quartette. Oh, how
much more closely than the ties of blood.

Winter, in obedience to a warning glance
from Kate, reserved his questionings, as to her
success in teaching, for a tête-à-tête, and his
good little wife followed his example on this,
as on all other subjects. The poor organist’s[257]
deathbed was re-described, and the “grand
following,” as Mrs. O’Toole would term it,
that graced his funeral, discussed, and, in spite
of the, to them, unaccustomed fatigue of a
journey, the interchange of intelligence was
prolonged to a late hour for travellers, and
when they parted for the night, Kate felt her
own hopeful joyous self again; to think that
such true and tried friends were near, that she
should meet them in the morning, and once
more be able to pour out the fears and anxieties
which no want of confidence in her grandfather,
but a tenderness of affection too considerate to
grieve him, kept pent up within her own bosom,
till their weight oppressed her. Once more
she would take counsel of that clear, strong,
warm-heart, which no self-interest, no conventional
falsity clouded or obscured. “And
though their stay is but short,” was her concluding
thought, as sleep closed her snowy
lids, with its downy weight, “thank God
they are come, I will enjoy their presence, and[258]
not think of the sorrow of parting, until it
comes.”

But a young spirit must be somewhat initiated
in grief, before it can attain this philosophy,
if it ever can be attained, for however the
heart may purpose to enjoy the present, and
disregard the future, there is still something
of omnipresence in its nature, that gives an
actuality to anticipated joy or sorrow, it cannot
wile away.

The period of the Winters’ stay in London
was one of great enjoyment to Kate, for though
what is termed the dead season, there were
quite enough of pictures to be seen and concerts
to be heard to employ the mornings, and
sometimes the evenings, most agreeably, and
until their arrival, Kate had seen nothing of
the Great Metropolis.

It seemed as if the advent of the warm-hearted,
practical little artist had broken the
sad depressing spell which had been gathering
closer and closer round her spirit since she had[259]
left A——. Winter was a stout and active
pedestrian, and leaning on his arm, Kate bade
defiance to the most persevering and mysterious
stranger that ever crossed heroine’s path.
The Colonel too was wonderfully revived by
the presence of his kind and valued friends,
and, strange to say, even Cormac, who when
left at A—— was too savage to be approached
by his temporary keeper, was most sociable
and condescending with him in London.

One morning, Mr. Langley called, and after
sitting in a sort of preoccupied silence for some
time, with some hesitation and much awkwardness,
suggested that he wished to invite his
friend Winter and his wife to dinner, and as
the Colonel and Miss Vernon were so fond of
their society, perhaps they would consent to encounter
the discomfort of a bachelor’s ménage
and meet them.

The Colonel and Kate assented most graciously,
and the party, reinforced by Galliard and[260]
Mr. and Mrs. Story, met the next day at what
Winter termed “grub hour.”

Contrary to her expectations Kate spent a
most agreeable day; Langley, like many shy
persons, shone in his own house, Winter was
most amusingly argumentative, Galliard witty,
and the Colonel cheerful and urbane as usual;
while Mrs. Storey’s repeated apologies for the
irregularities of a bachelor’s ménage, and Mr.
Winter’s reiterated assurances that every thing
was in admirable order, kept up an under current
of polite common-place, that amused
Kate exceedingly, by its contrast to the prevailing
tone of the conversation.

“You have visited the British Museum?”
enquired Galliard.

“Only, once,” said Kate, “and that hurriedly,
I long to go again.”

“There is a great lot of trash there,” observed
Winter.

“What treason,” returned Galliard, “it has
all cost money, and John Bull is content.”

[261]

“Of course,” said Langley, “you will have
your sneer at John Bull.”

“Why not? I am, you know, half English.”

“Come, Mr. Langley,” said Kate, “the
English you will admit, are not very sparing
of their neighbours.”

“They do not make much allowance for any
peculiarities, except their own, certainly,”
remarked Colonel Vernon.

“You are in such a decided minority, you
Celts, you had better hold your tongues,”
cried Winter.

“But what is it you call trash, at the British
Museum?” asked Kate.

“Oh, the mummies, and the wigs, and all
that; such an embarras of mummies can hardly
be conceived!” said Winter.

“I wish we could bring the Gheber mode
of disposing of the dead into fashion again; I
shall certainly leave a clause in my will that
my body shall be burned,” observed Galliard.

[262]

“Law, Mr. Galliard, what an idea,” said
Mrs. Storey.

“Why not? my dear madam.”

“I always liked Zoroaster and the fire
worshippers,” said Kate, “their system appears
to me the least degrading of all ancient religions.”

“Humph! Miss Vernon used to insist that
the round towers of Ireland were built by the
Western Ghebers,” remarked Winter.

“It is quite possible!” responded Galliard.

“Any thing so far beyond our historical
period may be possible,” observed Langley.

“Ah,” said Galliard, “you consider them
anterior to the Celtic invasions, Miss Vernon?”

“The author, whose writings on the subject
I have read, thought so,” replied Kate.

“Galliard’s strong point is Celtic antiquity,”
said their host.

“It is a subject full of profound and melancholy
interest,” he replied.

[263]

“Why melancholy?” asked Winter.

“Because,” rejoined Galliard, “of the contrast
between their past and present.”

“The strongest proof they were an inferior
race,” said Langley, “otherwise they would
not have given way so rapidly before the
Saxons.”

“A thoroughly English observation,” cried
Galliard. “You are poor and powerless, therefore
you deserve to be so.”

“That’s not a fair commentary,” said Langley.

“There are two causes, which, to a reflective
mind, sufficiently explain, the deterioration of
the Celtic race, morally and physically,” observed
Galliard, thoughtfully.

“And they are?” asked Kate.

“Their quick fancy, and unselfish nature.”

“How do you make that out?” said Winter.

“First, the Saxon sees distinctly but one
end or object, to the attainment of which his[264]
every faculty is devoted. The Celt’s livelier
imagination presents him with half a dozen,
at all of which he grasps with equal eagerness,
and thus his powers are divided and dispersed.
Secondly, a Saxon’s first thought is of himself,
and in this he is consistent; while, owing to
the peculiarity of fallen humanity, the Celt’s
self-forgetfulness is inconsistent; thus, place
a Saxon where you will, he possesses in himself
a nucleus round which all his energies,
hopes, and projects centre; and having a
centre, stands. While the Celt works one day
for himself, the next for a friend, the next to
spite an enemy, the next to do him a service,
and so he is, finally, nowhere. Your Saxon
will have no objection to do all this in a lump,
if it does not interfere with his own interests,”
and Galliard leaned back and took snuff.

“So,” said Colonel Vernon, “our greatest
errors spring from our noblest qualities!”

“The noblest qualities of mankind! It is
man’s fate!” returned Galliard.

[265]

“You argue ingeniously; but—” said
Langley.

“But truly,” interrupted Galliard. “What
was it chained the French nation to Napoleon?
Imagination! What enabled Bruce to conquer
Edward at Bannockburn? Imagination! What
rivets the heart of the Irish peasant to the
flattering demagogue, or arms his hand against
his landlord? Imagination!”

“And the want of a Cogitative nose,” put
in Winter.

“There’s an upset for you, mounseer,” said
Mr. Storey.

“Really,” said Mrs. Storey, “I think, Mrs.
Winter, we had better leave the gentlemen to
fight it out.”

They all rose.

“And,” continued Galliard, as he opened
the door, “though the want of imagination
may render the Saxon successful, its presence
always makes the Celt beloved.”

[266]

“You are right,” said Miss Vernon, as she
passed him, with a bow.

But pleasant intervals soon come to an end,
and the last week of Mr. and Mrs. Winter’s
intended stay approached. Before it arrived,
however, Miss Herman paid Kate a visit,
and introduced her to some additional pupils,
with whom, however, she agreed not to begin
her lessons until after her friends’ departure.

“I cannot bear to think of losing you,” said
Kate, one cold, sharp evening, Winter had
walked to meet her, on her way back from
Brompton. “Do pray put off your departure
till after Christmas, I have so dreaded Christmas,
alone in London, and you have nothing to
hurry you away.”

“Hum, let me see; I have already delayed
a fortnight longer than I intended, another
week will not make much difference. Ha,
you little witch, I cannot say you nay; but
after that not an hour.”

[267]

“Ten thousand, thousand thanks, dear, kind
friend; you have made me so happy.”

“Now we are tête-à-tête, tell me how affairs
go on; any news of the lawsuit?”

“Why yes, grandpapa gets frequent letters
from Mr. Moore, who, it seems, is always filing
bills, and making motions, very slow ones, I
fear, for they never seem to produce any result.”

Winter groaned.

“And yourselves? how is—how is—you
know I am a bear—how is the purse?”

Marvellously, considering how fast your
hundred went; but nurse has got quite into
the London ways, and quite saves us a fortune
now; and my pupils, and the new ones! Oh,
we shall do very well—if—if dear grandpapa
only could look like his own old self.”

“Well, I have thirty pounds of his I must
not run away with. Have you Lady Desmond’s
cheque?”

“Yes, quite safe.”

[268]

“Well, be sure you keep it; sickness may
come, a thousand things. How is your lady
cousin?”

“Quite well; always, in her letters, talking
of coming home, and never coming.”

“Just as I expected.”

“And you are bent on wintering at Pau?”

“Yes, and in the spring we intend crossing
the Pyrenees; I long to see more of Spain;
but, Kate, if you want me really, if, in short,
illness should—that is, should the time ever
come, you might want a home, Sue and myself
look upon you as a daughter, write to me,
at once, wherever I may be.”

“Good God! Mr. Winter, do you think
grandpapa so ill? do you anticipate—”

“Dear child, no, a thousand times no; but
at parting I should like you to feel that it is
only distance that can separate us, and that at
any, and every time, I shall feel as a father
towards you, and a proud father!”

“My dear, dear friend! surely God has[269]
been very gracious to me; I will not try to
thank you in words, they sound so cold!”

They walked on in silence, which Winter
broke, by exclaiming abruptly.

“That letter of nurse’s son was most characteristic!
There is some good stuff in the
writer.”

Then, after another pause, as if he had expected
some remark from Kate.

“It is odd Egerton should send it without
a line; I cannot make it out; only that letters
seldom miscarry, I should say he had written a
despatch himself, independent of the other; but
pooh, that is highly improbable. Has Mrs.
O’Toole replied to her son’s epistle?”

“Yes, that is I acted as her secretary, last
week; when do you think the letter will reach
Dennis?”

“Oh, heaven knows, they are up the country,
and, I fancy, not very settled; perhaps in
two or three months.”

Kate sighed.

[270]

“Hey! Miss Vernon, what was that sigh
for?”

“Oh, I was thinking of last Christmas, we
were a very pleasant party, though poor Captain,
I mean Major Egerton, was so terribly in
the blues about leaving England; and now
how different everything is! how silently and
gradually a great gulf has been opened between
the past and the present!”

“Well, well, it is melancholy enough, not
to be either a pleasant or a profitable subject of
cogitation. Forward, forward, as your favourite,
Longfellow, says,

“A word in season, how good it is!” returned
Miss Vernon, smiling pensively.

“Well, here we are, I wonder what Mrs.[271]
Winter will say to your powers of persuasion?”

“She will be delighted—she dreads the
journey.”

“Pooh, not she; as long as I am with her,
she thinks all must go well.”

“A pattern wife!” sighed Kate.

“Yes; no wife can be happy if she does
not feel this. Ah, Kate, Kate, I wish you had
a good husband!”

“Like yourself! eh, Mr. Winter! but
alas!”

“Now, no quizzing, if you please! I’m
glad we are at the end of our trajet, if you
are going to laugh at me.”

The gradually silent change in the Colonel’s
health and spirits, which had escaped the
every-day watchfulness of even Kate’s tender
guardianship, struck Winter, whose perception
was quickened by the, to him, unshaded transition
from light to gloom, caused by the cessation
of their daily intercourse, with grief and[272]
dismay; nor did he rest until he had persuaded
his venerated friend to accompany him
to an eminent physician, though the Colonel
protested, he had not a single symptom of
which he could reasonably complain. The
doctor felt his pulse, looked at his tongue, and
tried his lungs, asked a good many questions,
seemingly irrelevant, as to his spirits, &c.,
wrote a short prescription, recommended horse
exercise, took his fee, and bowed them out.
Winter looked dissatisfied; and as he handed
the Colonel into the cab, which was waiting
for them, suddenly recollected he had forgotten
his snuff-box, he returned to the room, but in
vain, for the bland physician merely repeated—”Nothing
physical, I assure you, sir—mental
depression—imaginative disorder.”

“Have you found your box?” asked the
Colonel, with a significant smile, at least, to
Winter’s conscience it appeared so. The worthy
artist reddened, and replied, gruffly, in the
affirmative.

[273]

Kate never before felt so profoundly sad, as
the day the Winters started for Dover. When
she had parted from them at A——, there
was the bustle and excitement of the journey,
and the expected arrival at a new place, to
divert her thoughts. Now she had full time
to feel, how much alone she was, how much
dependent on her own judgment, her own
strength, her own efforts.

The travellers did not leave till after an
early dinner, and the long, desolate evening,
its usual occupations broken in upon and deranged,
dragged its weary length slowly by,
though the Colonel, by a brave effort, seemed
more cheerful than usual, and talked of Paris,
and the people he had known there, and of
Bordeaux, and how the claret used to be
smuggled into the west of Ireland, of Hoche,
and of the French invasion. And Mrs. O’Toole
brought in her work, and both endeavoured to
keep up their darling’s heart.

She could only remember that it was the[274]
anniversary of Egerton’s departure for India,
and that to-morrow she was to give an early
lesson to her new pupils.

“Good night, dearest grandpapa, and do not
forget to take your bottle, you coughed a great
deal to-day.”

[275]

TRIALS.

Before entreating the reader to imagine the
lapse of some months, unbroken by any event,
we must record one which was a fertile theme
of conversation and conjecture to our recluses.
Kate was met by Mrs. O’Toole, almost at the
garden gate, one morning, about a fortnight
after the Winters had left them, as she returned
from her daily perambulations.

“Och! come in, Agra! sure there’s great
news entirely! there’s the Captin’s been murthuring
all afore him, in Ingee, an’ such a[276]
tundherin’ battle! the masther’s tired waitin’
for ye.”

“What’s all this nurse is telling me, grandpapa?”

“Oh, the Indian mail is in, and has brought
an account of a hard-fought battle between
our fellows and those desperate Sikhs. Egerton’s
name is most honourably mentioned.
Langley has very kindly sent me the second
edition of the “Times,” there it is, read it for
yourself.”

And Kate, untying her bonnet, seized the
paper, and throwing herself into the nearest
chair, read the official account, which, dry as it
was, sufficed to flush her cheek, and set all her
pulses throbbing.

“Ah, that is delightful; I dare say Captain
Egerton does not regret having gone to India
now! It does not say if he was wounded?
Are there any private letters?” turning the
paper in every direction.

“No, not until next mail, I fancy.”

“What news for Mr. and Mrs. Winter,” she
continued; “how he will rejoice, and grumble,
and pooh, pooh, over it.”

“Och, the crathure!” exclaimed Mrs.
O’Toole, who, as usual, on any occasion of excitement,
was always at hand; “his soul ‘ud
niver rouse up at the word iv a fight; he’s not[278]
got the blood in his vains for it. Sure, it’s
only the ould stock that’s niver to say in rale
pleasure, if they’re not in the middle iv divilmint
an’ danger, jest look at Miss Kate’s eyes,
like two dimints, this minit. Though I’ll go
bail she’s as white as a sheet at the sight iv a
cut-finger, her heart’s chargin the Sicks with
the Captin. Sicks indeed! faith, he sickened
thim sure enough; but it was on a boy’s milk
ye wor rared, avourneen, so it’s no wondher.”

“I do feel excited,” said Kate, laughing;
“some strange sympathy with—I do not
know what! for in how many things I am a
coward?”

“I believe it is the blood in your veins,
Kate,” returned the Colonel. “Nurse is
right.”

“Athen, if poor little Misther Gilpin, (the
heavens be his bed,) was alive now, what a
power iv rale sinse he’d talk about it; wouldn’t
he lay all the battles to the divil’s door; well,
they’re terrible heart-breakin’ things, entirely;[279]
an’ the dear knows where me poor Dinny is
this blessed night—may be, asleep in a ditch,
or—but faith, any ways he’s alive, I feel that
as sure as if I seen him livin’ fornent me!”

The great news occupied many a circle
beside that which we are attempting to describe,
and day after day brought further particulars,
private letters, and all the copious information
so abundantly supplied by that
fourth estate of the British Empire, the public
press. In many of these, Egerton’s name was
mentioned, always with praise, often with enthusiasm;
his coolness and undaunted gallantry
in some hand to hand encounters; and
the desperate stand made by the regiment he
commanded, under great disadvantages, left an
impression of something chivalrous and heroic,
even on the minds of strangers. Kate, indeed,
calling to mind the maxims of Winter, and
the organist, sometimes felt that she ought not
to feel so much delight in a courage that, after
all, is generally shared by every healthy man;[280]
still, in spite of her reasoning, Egerton’s
image, invested with a prestige it never before
possessed, constantly occupied her mind. Perhaps
she did not know how dauntless was her
own nature, and that there is irresistible attraction
even to the most intellectual, in the
courage, physical though it be, than can face
death and danger, as if at home and at ease in
the midst of both—this contempt of what it
is natural to dread must partake more of the
soul than philosophers allow, and is one certain
element of greatness.

And so the winter slipped rapidly over;
there was little to mark its flight; the constant
sameness of occupation, without any incident
to mark it, lent its wings to time; yet
was it not all heaviness. A day of somewhat
lighter spirits, and greater strength, would
sometimes lend its brightening influence to the
Colonel; and Kate revelled in the unwonted
sunshine; or Langley would lend her some
new work suggestive of much thought; and[281]
clearing, for the moment, the mist which
wraps itself round spiritual things, granting a
passing glimpse, catching a faint echo of the
glorious harmony with which all nature blends
in the Great Creator’s scheme of happiness;
and then the sameness or obscurity, which an
hour before seemed oppressive in its meanness,
acquired dignity from the thought, that it had
its place allotted in the mighty whole. And
she would turn with perfect content to bend
her bright intelligence to the perfect comprehension
and performance of those every-day
duties which act to society as mortar to a wall,
filling up the crevices, binding the unadhesive
parts, and keeping the whole together.

Two months had fully elapsed, since the
news of the battle of —— had reached England;
letters from the Winters had announced
them safely settled at Pau, and charmed with
it. And one cold, bleak evening, Kate was
engaged arranging some lines she had selected
from amongst many, written by Gilpin’s sister,[282]
to a very beautiful air bequeathed to her by
the organist; the work did not progress as
rapidly as it seemed, as her thoughts were
divided by many mundane subjects, principally
the necessity for looking out for cheaper lodgings.

“Nurse says it is so hard to manage; I
must ask her to meet me to-morrow on my
way home, and look for some other house—I
mean rooms. I am afraid to mention it to
dear grandpapa, he is so ill, and worn out
with that dreadful cough—it is much worse to-day.
How I wish Georgina would write! it
is nearly a year since she invited us to join
her at Florence, and talked of returning. Oh!
how alone we are! I wonder shall I ever, ever
live near my old friends, or among my own
people again! God forgive the murmuring
thought.”

And here her reflections were broken by the
Colonel, who suddenly starting from an uneasy
slumber, coughed with more than usual[283]
violence; then as Kate, with some vague idea
of assisting him, flew to his side, it suddenly
stopped, with a choking sound, and he fell
back, the blood pouring from his mouth.

To summon nurse, to send for a doctor, was
the work of a moment; and before their
anxious efforts to recall the Colonel to consciousness
were successful, he arrived; then
there were innumerable questions to answer,
and various restoratives to be procured; and
Kate had literally no time to feel the terror
and dismay which afterwards rushed upon her
mind.

The old man lay long insensible; and it was
during a pause, occasioned by the exhaustion
of every remedy that could possibly be applied
in haste, that he breathed faintly, at last, and
opening his eyes, smiled, when he met those of
his beloved grandchild. The doctor immediately
forbad his speaking, and directed that
every precaution for the preservation of extreme
quiet around him should be taken.

[284]

“This is the great point,” he observed,
when, after a lengthened visit, he was about
to take leave. “I will write a prescription,
and see it made up myself; he must take it
every two hours, in a glass of port wine; but
if he should be very sound asleep, do not disturb
him; his strength must be kept up.”

Kate took her station by her grandfather’s
bed-side. Nurse stationed herself in the next
room; and the long watches of the night
passed slowly over.

The Colonel lay motionless and deadly pale;
but he did not sleep; for whenever Kate stole
softly to his side, at the appointed times for
his taking the medicine, he always, as if by
instinct, opened his eyes; and who can tell,
who can venture to depict the crowd of
images, too vague for thought, too clear for
dreams, which thronged Kate’s mind, as she
sat listening now to each scarce audible breath,
from the invalid, now to the loud beating of
her own heart; it was not fear or sorrow that[285]
seemed to hold her faculties in a strange tension,
but an agonised absorption in the present
danger, a dread, none the less intense because
it was vague, that her darkest hour was at
hand! connected prayer was out of the question;
but frequent ejaculations for help, for
strength, rose unconsciously to her lips. Towards
morning, the Colonel sank into a quiet,
profound sleep, and leaving nurse in charge of
him, with directions to call her the moment he
awoke, Kate threw herself into his vacant
chair, and strove to still her throbbing pulses,
and hush her troubled spirit to repose.

When she had left her grandfather’s room,
she thought sleep was too effectually frightened
away by the terrors of the past night; but the
strength and vigor of youth cannot be so soon
unstrung, rest is too natural to that age; and,
though it was disturbed, slumber stole over
her unconsciously, and day had dawned fully,
when, waking with a start, and feeling as
though her short absence from him was a neg[286]lect
of a sacred duty, she stole softly and
quickly to his room.

He had but just awoke, Mrs. O’Toole said;
and now lay gazing with a troubled expression
in his eyes, towards the door. He smiled when
he saw Kate, and his lips moved; she stooped
to hear, and he whispered, faintly but earnestly—”Write—Georgina,”
with a pause between each word.

“I understand, dearest grandpapa,” said
Kate, quickly, to relieve his evident anxiety.
“I will write to Georgina Desmond by this
day’s post.”

And a look of greater contentment gradually
composed the invalid’s countenance, which appeared
so worn and haggard, that Kate’s eyes
filled with tears every time she looked at him.

The doctor called early, and expressed himself
quite satisfied with Kate’s account of the
patient’s past night; his pulse, too, was a little
stronger.

“Endeavour to keep him quiet, and free[287]
from anxiety; he is at present free from fever,
and I should find some difficulty had we both
fever and weakness to contend with; do not
let him talk much.”

The day wore slowly over, like the night,
diversified only by the writing of the promised
letter to Lady Desmond; and the Colonel
seemed much easier when he was told it had
been despatched.

Soon the cares and duties of the sick-room
became matters of course; the Colonel decidedly
gathered strength. He was able to
converse a little with his grandchild without
much exhaustion; and frequently made her
read aloud to him. He never wearied of the
Gospel of St. John, of the Psalms, and the
seventh and concluding chapters of Revelation.

Nurse and Kate divided the night into two
watches, the former taking the first watch,
when the Colonel was most likely to sleep, and
Kate, the remainder, to be ready with a few[288]
sympathising words, when, after his broken
sleep, his restless weakness caused him to move
uneasily on his pillow; or to repeat in her
low, soft tones, his favorite Psalms, and passages
of the Gospels, when his eyes met hers
with that anxious gaze which made her heart
ache, so well did she understand its source.
As for the apprehension of losing him, it was
a thought on which she never dwelt for an instant.
She felt instinctively, how utterly it
would unfit her for the preservation of that
calm, cheerful aspect so necessary to her beloved
grandfather’s well being; yet the terror-striking
thought would press upon her mind in
spite of all her efforts to repel it, when that
troubled glance met hers by the dim, uncertain
watch-light, and her lips almost of themselves
whispered the words of comfort and of strength
to which her heart turned, as much to still its
own dread, as to calm the anxiety she feared
would injure her grandfather!

Poor, faithful Mrs. O’Toole never told her[289]
beads so fervently, and so often before; for
loving both master and nurseling, she could
fear for the future, to which Kate never gave
a thought; her round, comely face faded from
its bright rose to a yellowish tinge, and the
corners of her mouth were drawn down lower
than ever, while her aspirations to “Hesther,”
and her denunciations of “Hesther’s stupidity,”
were rather encreased than lessened
in acerbity, as if to make up for the enforced
softness with which they were whispered.

It was about a fortnight after the Colonel
was first taken ill, and he had begun to ask
anxiously for letters, when he astonished the
doctor, by expressing a desire to get up, and
go into the sitting-room.

“My dear sir, it is much too soon; do you
feel greater strength?”

“Sometimes I think I am stronger, and
sometimes weaker,” replied the old man, with
a sigh; “but I feel I should be quite as com[290]fortable
and quiet in my arm-chair, as in bed,
and more cheerful, more like myself; you may
as well humour me,” he added, with a sad
smile, and paused, exhausted by so long a
speech.

“Well,” returned the doctor, after a prolonged
feeling of his pulse, in order to give
himself time to think, “perhaps, as you feel
in this way, it may do you no harm; wait till
the day after to-morrow; and take plenty of
arrow-root, and wine, and beef tea, in the interval.”

Kate could scarcely believe her ears, when
she heard the welcome permission given; she
was not present when the Colonel asked for it,
and considered it an undoubted proof of amendment.
She looked so bright, and spoke so
cheerily, when she announced the fact to nurse,
that Mrs. O’Toole took courage to make a disclosure,
she had withheld for several days.

“Ye know, Miss Kate,” she began, her[291]
apron folded round one arm, and rubbing the
other hand confusedly up and down the table,
“it’s three days since last Sathurday.”

“Yes, nurse. Well, what then?”

“Sathurday’s rint day, alanah.”

“Well, didn’t you pay Mrs. Crooks?”

“Why ye see, Miss Kate, what wid the
sickness, an’ the arra-root, an’ the beef tay,
an’ all that, though maisther Langley, the
queen iv Heaven remimber it to him, sent in a
sight of wine, what couldn’t be bought for
money, the purse is niver out iv yer hand;
an’ to spake the thruth, Miss Kate, last
Sathurday, there was a fortnight’s rint due; I
niver thought a Christhian would go botherin’
about sich a thrifle iv rint, an’ sickniss an’
sorra in the place; but they’re quare Christhians
here! Sure they’d hand you their
‘little account,’ if ye were sayin’ mass for yer
mother’s sawl; it’s a long account some iv
thim will have to settle yet, any ways! an’
that’s the way it is, Miss Kate.”

[292]

“But, nurse, why did you let it go so far
without——.”

“Sure,” interrupted, Mrs. O’Toole, in a
whisper, and pointing her finger towards the
door, as a caution to extreme secresy, “sure I
hadn’t it, agrah! d’ ye think I’d be wastin
yer money payin that naggur iv a woman, an’
the dear masther wantin every thing? ‘Och,
keep yer bills to yerself, woman,’ ses I, ‘don’t
be tasing Miss Vernon, an’ she breakin’ her
heart, sure ye’ll be paid over an over as soon
as she has time to write an ordher on the
bank,’ ses I, an’ she kept quite a whole week,
but to-day, she ses, ‘The ould gentleman’s
better,’ ses she, spakin small, as if she begrudged
the words that would bring her ‘no
return,’ as they say, ‘an’ I’ll spake to Miss
Vernon meeself,’ ses she. Och, if I had mee
own notes ye made Mr. Winter put in the
savins’ bank out iv the way, I’d have paid her
at wancet, an’ not be botherin ye.”

[293]

“Show me what you have,” said Kate,
rather nervously.

Mrs. O’Toole emptied the purse, she always
kept; a half sovereign and some silver was all
that appeared.

“Ah,” said Miss Vernon, compressing her
lips; “and I have only five shillings. We must
fill up that cheque! How glad I am I kept it
in my own desk!”

“What cheque, jewel?”

“Oh, I forgot you did not know.”

And Kate hurriedly told Mrs. O’Toole of
Lady Desmond’s generosity.

“Och! then there’s the raale lady for ye!
none iv yer naggurs, sure it’s she has the right
to do it any how. Wasn’t the Kurnel like a
father to her, an it’s not every wan would remember
it; may the blessin iv heaven go with
her! faith we’re made up now, agrah, an how
‘ill ye turn it into money?”

“I will enclose it with a note to Mr. Langley,
and he is so kind, I am sure he will get it[294]
cashed (that is the word,) for me; but, nurse,
how much money ought I to write down, I do
not like to put too much—twenty pounds?”

“Och! botheration, Miss Kate, sure ye’r a
babby about money. Twenty pounds is just a
dhrop in the say, an’ sickness in the house,
write fifty pounds asthore, when ye’re about it,
God knows it’s not so easy to get the money.”

“But fifty pounds, nurse, is such a large
sum, I am afraid—besides, I am certain Georgy
herself will be here immediately, as she does
not write, she must be on the road home, and
twenty pounds, I am sure, will do ’till she
arrives.”

“Bother, be on the sure side, Miss Kate, an’
if she comes so soon, give her what’s left; just
do as I bid ye, asthore; sure I know what’s
wantin better than you do.”

“Well, I suppose so, put on your bonnet, I
will write to Mr. Langley at once.”

“Wait a bit,” said Mrs. O’Toole, with an
air of intense meaning; she rung the bell;[295]
“Hesther,” as that functionary appeared,
“bring Miss Vernon her desk, out iv her
room, I was tellin her, yer mistress wants her
rint, an she’s goin to write an ordher on the
bank; I’ll post it meself. That ‘ill do for Mrs.
Crooks, I think, an’ I’ll give her a piece iv me
mind to-morrow, about her English ways,
as——.”

“No, no, pray do not, it would be both
wrong and foolish, I am sure we have met such
true friendship from English people, we may
well have patience with a poor woman, who,
after all, may want her money.”

“Musha, God help yer heart! She has
twicet as much as you have, an’ what’s more,
she needn’t be payin for what she can do for
herself, an’ a lady mustn’t do; well, well, it’s
a quare world; but any ways, the masther’s
better, glory be to God.”

The Colonel persisted in his intention of
getting up, on the appointed day, and though
he almost fainted, when the transit to the[296]
sitting-room was accomplished, he seemed
more cheerful, at least he listened with more
seeming attention and interest to Kate’s conversation,
for he was too weak to converse
himself.

From this period, he rose, each day, about
noon, and Kate was grieved to observe how
much his anxiety about the past exhausted
his little strength; she asserted her conviction
that Lady Desmond was on her homeward
road, and though that generally quieted him
for the moment, it was only to be done over
again the next day.

Nurse kept watch at the hall door, to anticipate
that dreadful short sharp knock, that
has made, and will make, many a heart stand
still with nameless dread; and still Kate’s
daily report was—

“The post has just come, dear grandpapa,
no letters for us.”

So time slipped by, and both nurse and Kate
began to share the Colonel’s uneasiness, at[297]
Lady Desmond’s silence and non-appearance,
though, of course, they suppressed all expression
of it, before him.

At length, the post did bring a letter for
Colonel Vernon, but it was from Winter, a few
lines only, expressing surprise at Kate’s long
silence, and enclosing one directed to his care,
for the Colonel. It bore the Southampton
post-mark, and was from Fred Egerton. The
Colonel was at first so much affected by the
extreme disappointment he experienced at not
receiving any letter from Lady Desmond, that
was some before he desired to have Egerton’s
despatch read to him, not until he was fairly
established in his easy chair, and recovered
from the fatigue of dressing, which Kate
noticed, sadly, continued the same from day to
day, no visible improvement of strength taking
place.

“Now, my love, let me hear this disappointing
letter, though it is very ungracious in me
to call it so.”

[298]

And Kate, who had had no time of late to think
of Fred Egerton, felt her voice trembling with
the strange gush of delight that filled her
whole heart with a sudden and delicious life,
when the long looked for writing met her eye,
and which she had not yet succeeded in stilling.

The letter was too long for a full insertion
here; after expressing a hope that the Colonel’s
silence did not proceed from any intention to repudiate
his acquaintance, and that he would
not consider a third attempt at a correspondence
importunate, Fred Egerton proceeded to give a
short but clear description of the country round
him, alluding briefly to the battle of ——,
an account of which he supposed had reached
them. He enquired kindly for the Winters,
and said he had heard from Burton, (who had
passed through A——, in the summer) of
Gilpin’s death, and that they (Colonel and
Miss Vernon) had left the old city. I presume
therefore that my last letter, as well as one I[299]
enclosed for Mrs. O’Toole, from her son, were
delayed in reaching you, if they ever did
reach you. Pray remember me kindly to my
good nurse; many a time I have longed to
hear her rich brogue near me, when I lay
parched with fever. By the way, will you
tell Miss Vernon, I am busily engaged training
her foster-brother in the way he should go.
I’ll not say any thing of his past, but I anticipate
great things for his future.

“A kind, warm-hearted letter,” said the
Colonel, at its conclusion, in the slow, faint
tone, now usual with him. “I am gratified to[301]
find him so thoughtful of the past. Ah! if—”
he stopped.

“If what?” asked Kate, carelessly, as she
was re-reading the letter.

“Nothing, dear child,” he returned, despondingly.
“You had better tell nurse, she
will like to hear of Denny.”

“Glory be to God!” ejaculated Mrs. O’Toole,
as Kate read the passage relating to her
son, aloud. “An’ so they’re comin’ home?”

“No, dear nurse, Captain Egerton says, ‘if
I ever re-visit England.'”

“Well, sure it’s all the same; whin people
niver intend a thing they niver talk iv it, but
whin they begin to wish for it, they begin to
talk iv it, an’ whin they’ve talked a bit, they
must do it.”

The Colonel smiled at Mrs. O’Toole’s
logic. And not many minutes after the Doctor
came in.

“Pulse very unsteady,” said he, gravely[302]
and interrogatively to Kate, “any disturbing
cause?”

“He has been disappointed about a letter,
he hoped to receive.”

“Ah, these letters are bad, very bad; he is
not getting on as I could wish,” added the
doctor to Mrs. O’Toole, as she followed him to
the hall door to receive his parting instructions,
“could you not get up some pious fraud about
this letter? invent one, eh?”

“Oh, God bless ye, docther, it’s not possible,
any ways, sure if it was I’m the woman would
do it.”

“Well, I suppose so; but, I tell you, I
dread another bursting of a blood vessel, and
then.” The doctor paused, shook his head,
drew on his glove, and departed in the
teeth of a bitter March wind, and a cloud of
dust.

“It seems a very cold, wretched day,” said
the Colonel, as Kate took up her work; “is
poor Cormac never let into the house now?”

[303]

“Oh, yes, grandpapa, he generally lies outside
the door, but I did not like to let him in
for fear of disturbing you?”

“He would not disturb me, I wish to see him.”

Miss Vernon rose, and opening the door,
admitted Cormac, who testified his joy at beholding
his master, in a quiet, subdued manner,
and the Colonel welcomed his faithful
follower with a warmth, that Kate feared
would be too much for his strength, stroking
the dog’s head, feebly, from time to time, and
gazing at him abstractedly, as if his spirit had
flown back to the scenes and time, when he
was still vigorous, and Cormac gambolled
with all the vivacity of youth. Now the old
hound sat grave and still, his dull, filmy eye
returning his master’s gaze; and Kate suppressed
the deep sighs which rose from her
heart, as she saw these old companions, side
by side, thus changed, thus sinking in the
unequal conflict with time and adversity! And
behind them memory raised the dark curtain
of the present, and the bright, happy past[304]
broke forth with more than its pristine freshness;
she saw those two languid forms, instinct
with life, glowing with animation; she heard
her grandfather’s clear musical laugh, ring
forth as he sprang upon his favourite horse,
and held him steady with a powerful hand;
she heard the hound’s deep, joyous bark, as,
after a few gambols round the impatient horse,
he bounded forward in a swift and sudden
race, only to return with headlong speed; she
saw her grandfather’s stately form, with those
of his high-born, gay companions, sweep round
a bend of the avenue, and as the sound of
their voices and the tramp of their horses died
away in the distance, she heard the dash and
roar of the restless Atlantic against the cliffs;
she saw the park-like lawn, the stately wood,
the bold, blue hills and—a faint voice, like the
echo of her grandfather’s, from another world
recalled her to the present.

“Give Cormac, poor fellow, some bread and
milk before he goes away.”

[305]

A few days passed, and still no letter.
One evening, pleased to see the Colonel
sleeping peacefully in his chair, Kate dropped
her work and gave herself up to reverie. She
had hardly had time to think of Fred. Egerton’s
letter, and the tone of warm remembrance
it breathed.

“I wonder shall I ever see him again! Ah,
no, what folly to think of it! Yet if he was
here, he would give grandpapa hope and
courage, and to me! He is so bright and strong.
But thank God his letter came, with its cheering
words, just when I most wanted something
to raise my heart a little! Nurse thinks he
will come back, but that is only a dream; and,
after all, if he did, it would make no difference
to me!”

Her thoughts rambled on in this way for
some time, over many a varied topic, till she
was roused by Cormac’s very unusual efforts
to gain admittance without leave. “Well[306]
come in, good dog, but be quiet,” and the
hound immediately placed himself by his master’s
chair; and Kate was speaking to him in
a low voice, when the postman’s knock, they
had so long guarded against, but did not expect
at that unaccustomed hour, shook the
frail walls of the habitation, and Kate rose
from her chair, trembling for her grandfather.

He woke suddenly, startled, but not so much
as Kate had feared, and at the same moment
nurse entered with a letter.

“From Georgina,” cried Kate, opening it
with trembling haste; she read aloud.

“‘Good heavens, dearest Kate, how unfortunate
that I should have come here.’

“She writes from Lucca.

“‘Your letter was not forwarded to me for
ten days after I left Florence. I start to-morrow
for England, and God grant the passes
may not be snowed up; I hope to reach you
as soon almost as this does; keep up your
spirits; tell the Colonel I know his wishes,[307]
I fully understand his anxiety for your writing.
The courier waits for my letter. God bless
you—Yours in haste and much affliction.—G.
Desmond.'”

“What is the date?” asked the Colonel,
feebly.

“It has none, except the place; she evidently
writes in the greatest haste.”

“Look at the cover.”

“It is so rubbed and soiled I can make
nothing out, but a ‘Fir’ and ‘Marzo.'”

“She will be here to-morrow,” said the
Colonel, with sudden decision. “My God,
I thank thee!” he murmured. “Kate, my
love, I feel exhausted, some wine.”

She flew to get it, and, after taking a little,
he leaned back, drowsily, she settled the
cushions for his head, and knelt down to feel if
his feet were cold; he stretched out his hand
feebly, and laid it on her head; the old hound,
whom they had not noticed, drew closer, and[308]
licked the hand that had so often caressed
him.

“God bless you darling, from the hour of
your birth, you have been an unalloyed blessing
to me.”

Kate rose, and kissed him fondly—

“Go to sleep, dearest grandpapa.”

“Yes, for she will be here to-morrow. I feel
so happy, Kate!”

“Thank Heaven!” she ejaculated; and returning
to her seat, watched the sleeper for
some time, rejoicing to see an expression of
almost heavenly happiness and calm gradually
stealing over his features. The old hound,
too, shared her vigil, laying his head
couched on his fore-paws, his eyes fixed on
his master. So she sat, sometimes, raising her
heart to God, with a feeling of thankfulness,
though she knew not why, except that she
ever looked, in spite of her cooler reason, to
Lady Desmond’s return as to a great deliverance.

[309]

The evening closed in, and still her grandfather
lay in calm, unbroken repose. The old
dog, at length, grew restless, he raised his
head, and half rose up, as if to approach his
master, and when Kate spoke to him, lay
down again, with a low, complaining whine.
Miss Vernon rung—

“I wish,” said she, as Mrs. O’Toole entered,
“you would take Cormac away, I never saw
him so troublesome before. I am afraid he
will disturb grandpapa from that sweet sound
sleep.”

“Come with me, Cormac.”

The hound wagged his tail, turning his dull
eyes on her for a moment, but immediately refixing
them on his master, with a watchful air,
his ears erected, as if in expectation. Mrs.
O’Toole crossed the room quickly, and stooping
to look into the old man’s face, started back,
clasping her hands, with an expression of awe
and terror on her countenance.

[310]

“Nurse!” exclaimed Kate, springing to her
side; “what, what is the matter?”

“Hush, hush, mee own darlint child,” whispered
Mrs. O’Toole. “He’s not there—he’s
with the blessed saints in Heaven!”

END OF VOL. II.