Tales and Novels Volume V Part 30

The address, simple as it was, came so home to Almeria's experience, and so many recollections rushed at once upon her memory, that all her fact.i.tious character of a fine lady gave way to natural feeling, and suddenly she burst into tears.

"Good heavens! my dear Miss Turnbull," cried Mrs. Ingoldsby, "what is the matter?--Are not you well?--Salts! salts!--the heat of the room!--Poor thing!--she has such weak nerves.--Mr. Elmour, may I trouble you to ring the bell for our carriage? Miss Turnbull has such sensibility! This meeting, so unexpected, with so many old friends, has quite overcome her."

Miss Turnbull, recalled to herself by Mrs. Ingoldsby's voice, repeated the request to have her carriage immediately, and departed with Mrs.

Ingoldsby as soon as she possibly could, utterly abashed and mortified; mortified most at not having been able to conceal her mortification.

Incapable absolutely of articulating, she left Mrs. Ingoldsby to cover her retreat, as well as she could, with weak nerves and sensibility.

Even the charitable Mrs. Wynne was now heard to acknowledge that she could neither approve of Miss Turnbull's conduct, nor frame any apology for it. She confessed that it looked very like what she of all things detested most--_ingrat.i.tude_. Her nephew, who had been a cool observant spectator of this evening's performance, was glad that his aunt's mind was now decided by Almeria's conduct. He exclaimed that he would not marry such a woman, if her portion were to be the mines of Peru.

Thus Miss Turnbull lost all chance of the esteem and affection of another man of sense and temper, who might even at this late period of her life have recalled her from the follies of dissipation, and rendered her permanently happy.

And now that our heroine must have lost all power of interesting the reader, now that the pity even of the most indulgent must be utterly sunk in contempt, we shall take our leave of her, resigning her to that misery which she had been long preparing for herself. It is sufficient to say, that after this period she had some offers from men of fas.h.i.+on of ruined fortunes; but these she rejected, still fancying that with her wealth she could not fail to make a splendid match. So she went on coquetting; and coquetting, rejecting and rejecting, till at length she arrived at an age when she could reject no longer. She ceased to be an object to matrimonial adventurers, but to these succeeded a swarm of female legacy-hunters. Among the most distinguished was her companion, Mrs. Ingoldsby, whose character she soon discovered to be artful and selfish in the extreme. This lady's flattery, therefore, lost all its power to charm, but yet it became necessary to Almeria; and even when she knew that she was duped, she could not part with Mrs. Ingoldsby, because it was not in her power to supply the place of a flatterer with a _friend_.--A friend! that first blessing of life, cannot be bought--it must be deserved.

Miss, or as she must now be called, _Mrs_. Almeria Turnbull, is still alive--probably at this moment haunting some place of public amus.e.m.e.nt, or stationary at the card-table. Wherever she may be, she is despised and discontented; one example more amongst thousands, that wealth cannot purchase, or fas.h.i.+on bestow, real happiness.

"See how the world its veterans rewards--youth of folly, an old age of cards!"

_Edgeworth's-Town_, 1802.

_VIVIAN_.

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.

Miss Edgeworth's general views, in these stories, are explained in the preface to the first volume. I cannot, however, omit repeating, that public favour has not yet rendered her so presumptuous as to offer hasty effusions to her readers, but that she takes a longer time to revise what she writes than the severe ancients required for the highest species of moral fiction.

Vivian exposes one of the most common defects of mankind. To be "infirm of purpose" is to be at the mercy of the artful or at the disposal of accident. Look round, and count the numbers who have, within your own knowledge, failed from want of firmness.

An excellent and wise mother gave the following advice with her dying breath: "My son, learn early how to say, No!"--This precept gave the first idea of the story of Vivian.

THE ABSENTEE is not intended as a censure upon those whose duties, and employments, and superior talents, lead them to the capital; but to warn the thoughtless and the unoccupied from seeking distinction by frivolous imitation of fas.h.i.+on and ruinous waste of fortune.

A country gentleman, or even a n.o.bleman, who does not sit in parliament, may be as usefully and as honourably employed in Yorks.h.i.+re, Mid Lothian, or Ireland, as at a club-house or an a.s.sembly in London.

Irish agents are here described as of two different species. That there have been bad and oppressive Irish agents, many great landed English proprietors have felt; that there are well-informed, just, and honourable Irish agents, every-day experience can testify.

MADAME DE FLEURY points out some of the means which may be employed by the rich for the real advantage of the poor. This story shows that sowing gold does not always produce a golden harvest; but that knowledge and virtue, when early implanted in the human breast, seldom fail to make ample returns of prudence and felicity.

EMILIE DE COULANGES exposes a fault into which the good and generous are liable to fall.

Great sacrifices and great benefits cannot frequently be made or conferred by private individuals; but, every day, kindness and attention to the common feelings of others is within the power, and may be the practice, of every age, and s.e.x, and station. Common faults are reproved by all writers on morality; but there are errors and defects that require to be treated in a lighter manner, and that come, with propriety, within the province of essayists and of writers for the stage.

R. L. EDGEWORTH. _May_, 1812.

CHAPTER I.

"To see the best, and yet the worse pursue."

"Is it possible," exclaimed Vivian, "that you, Russell, my friend, my best friend, can tell me that this line is the motto of my character!--'

To see the best, and yet the worse pursue.--Then you must think me either a villain or a madman."

"No," replied Russell, calmly; "I think you only weak."

"Weak--but you must think me an absolute fool."

"No, not a fool; the weakness of which I accuse you is not a weakness of the understanding. I find no fault either with the logical or the mathematical part of your understanding. It is not erroneous in either of the two great points in which Bacon says that most men's minds be deficient in--the power of judging of consequences, or in the power of estimating the comparative value of objects."

"Well," cried Vivian, impatiently, "but I don't want to hear just now what Bacon says--but what _you_ think. Tell me all the faults of my character."

"All!--unconscionable!--after the fatigue of this long day's journey,"

said Russell, laughing.

These two friends were, at this time, travelling from Oxford to Vivian Hall (in ----s.h.i.+re), the superb seat of the Vivian family, to which Vivian was heir. Mr. Russell, though he was but a few years older than Vivian, had been his tutor at college; and by an uncommon transition, had, from his tutor, become his intimate friend.

After a pause, Vivian resumed, "Now I think of it, Russell, you are to blame, if I have any faults. Don't you say, that every thing is to be done by education? And are not you--though by much too young, and infinitely too handsome, for a philosopher--are not you my guide, philosopher, and friend?"

"But I have had the honour to be your guide, philosopher, and friend, only for these three years," said Russell. "I believe in the rational, but not in the magical, power of education. How could I do, or undo, in three years, the work of the preceding seventeen?"

"Then, if you won't let me blame you, I must blame my mother."

"Your mother!--I had always understood that she had paid particular attention to your early education, and all the world says that Lady Mary Vivian, though a woman of fas.h.i.+on, is remarkably well-informed and domestic; and, judging from those of her letters which you have shown me, I should think that, for once, what all the world says is right."

"What all the world says is right, and yet I am not wrong:--my mother is a very clever woman, and most affectionate, and she certainly paid particular attention to my early education; but her attention was too particular, her care was too great. You know I was an only son--then I lost my father when I was an infant; and a woman, let her be ever so sensible, cannot well educate an _only_ son, without some manly a.s.sistance; the fonder she is of the son the worse, even if her fondness is not foolish fondness--it makes her over-anxious--it makes her do too much. My mother took too much, a great deal too much, care of me; she over-educated, over-instructed, over-dosed me with premature lessons of prudence: she was so afraid that I should ever do a foolish thing, or not say a wise one, that she prompted my every word, and guided my every action. So I grew up, seeing with her eyes, hearing with her ears, and judging with her understanding, till, at length, it was found out that I had not eyes, ears, or understanding of my own. When I was between twelve and thirteen, my mother began to think that I was not sufficiently manly for my age, and that there was something too yielding and undecided in my character. Seized with a panic, my mother, to make a man of me at once, sent me to ---- school. There I was, with all convenient expedition, made ashamed of every thing good I had learned at home; and there I learned every thing bad, and nothing good, that could be learned at school. I was inferior in Latin and Greek; and this was a deficiency I could not make up without more labour than I had courage to undertake. I was superior in general literature, but this was of little value amongst my compet.i.tors, and therefore I despised it; and, overpowered by numbers and by ridicule, I was, of course, led into all sorts of folly, by mere _mauvaise honte_. Had I been in the habit of exercising my own judgment, or had my resolution been strengthened by degrees; had I, in short, been prepared for a school, I might, perhaps, have acquired, by a public education, a manly, independent spirit. If I had even been wholly bred up in a public school, I might have been forced, as others were, by early and fair compet.i.tion, to exercise my own powers, and by my own experience in that microcosm, as it has been called, I might have formed some rules of conduct, some manliness of character, and might have made, at least, a good schoolboy. Half home-bred, and half school-bred, from want of proper preparation, one half of my education totally destroyed the other. From school, of course, I went to college, and at college, of course, I should have become one of the worst species of college lads, and should have had no chance, in my whole future life, of being any thing but a dissipated fool of fas.h.i.+on, one of the _Four-in-Hand Club_, or the _Barouche Club_, or the _Tandem Club_, or the _Defiance Club_, had not I, by the greatest good fortune, met with such a friend as you, and, by still greater good fortune, found you out for myself; for if my mother had recommended you to me, I should have considered you only as a college tutor; I should never have discovered half your real merit; I doubt whether I should have even seen that you are young and handsome: so prejudiced should I have been with the preconceived notion of a college tutor, that I am not certain whether I should have found out that you are a gentleman as well born and well bred as myself; but, be that as it may, I am positive that I never should have made you my companion and friend; I should never have thrown open my whole soul to you, as I have done; nor could you ever have obtained such wondrous power as you possess over my mind, if you had been recommended to me by my mother."

"I am sorry," said Russell, smiling, "that, after so many wise reflections, and so many fine compliments, you end by proving to me that my wondrous power is founded on your wondrous weakness. I am mortified to find that your esteem and friends.h.i.+p for me depended so much upon my not having had the honour of your mother's recommendation; and have not I reason to fear, that now, when I have a chance of becoming acquainted with Lady Mary Vivian, and, perhaps, a chance of her thinking me a fit companion and friend for her son, I must lose his regard and confidence, because I shall labour under the insuperable objection of an affectionate mother's approbation?"

"No, no," said Vivian; "my wilful folly does not go quite so far as that. So that I maintain the privilege of choosing my friends for myself, I shall always be pleased and proud to find my mother approve my choice."

After a few moments' pause, Vivian added, "You misunderstand, quite misunderstand me, if you think that I am not fond of my mother. I respect and love her with all my soul:--I should be a most ungrateful wretch if I did not. I did very wrong to speak as I did just now, of any little errors she may have made in my education; but, believe me, I would not have said so much to any one living but yourself, nor to you, but in strict confidence; and, after all, I don't know whether I ought not to lay the blame of my faults on my masters more than on my poor mother."

"Lay the blame where we will," said Russell, "remember, that the punishment will rest on ourselves. We may, with as much philosophic justice as possible, throw the blame of our faults on our parents and preceptors, and on the early mismanagement of our minds; yet, after we have made out our case in the abstract, to the perfect satisfaction of a jury of metaphysicians, when we come to _overt_ actions, all our judges, learned and unlearned, are so awed, by the ancient precedents and practice of society, and by the obsolete law of common sense, that they finish by p.r.o.nouncing against us the barbarous sentence, that every man must suffer for his own faults."

"'I hope I shall be able to bear it, my lord,' as the English sailor said when the judge----But look out there! Let down that gla.s.s on your side of the carriage!" cried Vivian, starting forward. "There's Vivian Hall!"

"That fine old castle?" said Russell, looking out of the window.

"No; but farther off to the left, don't you see amongst the trees that house with wings?"