Camilla; or, A Picture of Youth

Sir Hugh was going to answer for himself, when Lynmere, fatigued with so long a scene in which he had no share, had recourse to his friend the bell, calling out, at the same time, in a voice of impatience, 'No oysters yet!'

Sir Hugh now began to grow unhappy for his servants; for himself he not only could bear any thing, but still concluded he had nothing to bear; but his domestics began all to wear long faces, and, accustomed to see them happy, he was hurt to observe the change. No partiality to his nephew could disguise to him, that, long used to every possible indulgence, it was vain to hope they would submit, without murmuring, to so new a bondage of continual and peremptory commands. Instead of attending, therefore, to Mr. Dubster, he considered what apology to offer to Jacob; who suspecting by whom he was summoned, did not make his appearance till Lynmere rung again.

'Where are these oysters?' he then demanded; 'have you been eating them?'

'No, sir,' answered he surlily; 'we're not so sharp set; we live in Old England; we don't come from outlandish countries.'

This true John Bullism, Lynmere had neither sense to despise, nor humour to laugh at; and, seriously in a rage, called out, 'Sirrah, I'll break your bones!' and lifted up his riding switch, with which, as well as his boots, he had re-entered the parlour.

'The Lord be good unto me!' cried Sir Hugh, 'what new ways are got into the world! but don't take it to heart, Jacob, for as to breaking your bones, after all your long services, it's a thing I sha'n't consent to; which I hope my nephew won't take ill.'

Affronted with the master, and enraged with the man, Lynmere stroamed petulantly up and down the room, with loud and marked steps, that called, or at least disturbed the attention of every one, exclaiming, at every turning, 'A confounded country this! a villainous country! nothing to be had in it! I don't know what in the world to think of that there's any chance I can get!'

Sir Hugh, recovering, said he was sorry he was so badly off; and desired Jacob not to fail procuring oysters if they were to be had within a mile.

'A mile?.. ten miles! say ten miles round,' cried Lynmere, 'or you do nothing; what's ten miles for a thing of that sort?'

'Ten miles, nephew? what? at this time of night! why you don't think, with all your travelling, that when they've got ten miles there, they'll have ten miles to come back, and that makes count twenty.'

'Well, sir, and suppose it was forty; what have such fellows to do better?'

Sir Hugh blessed himself, and Mr. Dubster said to Camilla: 'So, ma'am, why you don't read your letter, neither, no more than the gentlewoman; however, I think you may as well see a little what's in it; though I suppose no great matters, being from a lady.'

'A lady! what lady?' cried she, and eagerly taking it from her pocket, saw the hand-writing of Mrs. Berlinton, and inquired how it came into his possession.

He answered, that happening to meet the lady's footman, whom he had known something of while in business, as he was going to put it to the post, he told him he was coming to the very house, and so took it to bring himself, the man being rather in a hurry to go another way; 'so I thought 'twas as well, ma'am,' he added, 'to save you the postage; for as to a day or so sooner or later, I suppose it can break no great squares, in you ladies letter-writing.'

Camilla, hastily running it over, found it contained a most pressing repetition of invitation from Mrs. Berlinton for the Southampton plan, and information that she should make a little circuit, to call and take her up at Cleves, if not immediately forbidden; the time she named for her arrival, though four days distant from the date of her letter, would be now the following morning.

This seemed, to the agitated spirits of Camilla, an inviting opening to her scheme. She gave the letter to her uncle, saying, in a fluttered manner, she should be happy to accompany Mrs. Berlinton, for a few days, if her father should not disapprove the excursion, and if he could himself have the goodness to spare one of the carriages to fetch her home, as Southampton was but sixteen miles off.

While Sir Hugh, amazed at this request, yet always unable to pronounce a negative to what she desired, stammered, Edgar abruptly took leave.

Thunderstruck by his departure, she looked affrighted, after him, with a sigh impossible to repress; she now first weighed the hazard of what she was doing, the deep game she was inconsiderately playing. Would it sunder … would it unite them?.. Tears started into her eyes at the doubt; she did not hear her uncle's answer; she rose to hurry out of the room; but before she could escape, the big drops rolled fast down her cheeks; and, when arrived at her chamber, 'I have lost him!' she cried, 'by my own unreflecting precipitance; I have lost him, perhaps, for ever!'

Dr. Marchmont now also took leave; Mr. Dubster desired he might speak with the baronet the next morning; and the family remained alone.

CHAPTER XII

Dilemmas

While the baronet was pondering, in the most melancholy manner, upon this sudden and unexpected demand of absence in Camilla, the grim goddess of Envy took possession of the fine features of Indiana; who declared she was immured alive, while her cousin went everywhere. The curiosity of Lynmere being excited, to inquire what was to be had or done at Southampton, he heard it abounded in good company, and good fish, and protested he must undoubtedly set out for it the next morning.

Indiana then wept with vexation and anger, and Miss Margland affirmed, she was the only young lady in Hampshire, who had never been at Southampton. Sir Hugh, concluding Edgar would attend Camilla, feared it might hurt the other match to part Eugenia from Clermont; and, after a little pause, though deeply sighing at such a dispersion from Cleves, consented that they should all go together. Camilla, therefore, was commissioned to ask leave of Mr. Tyrold for Eugenia, as well as for herself, and to add a petition from Sir Hugh, that he and Lavinia would spend the time of their absence at Cleves. The baronet then, of his own accord, asked Dr. Orkborne to be of the party, that Eugenia, he said, might run over her lessons with him in a morning, for fear of forgetting them.

A breach, however, such as this, of plans so long formed, and a desertion so voluntary of his house, at the very epoch he had settled for rendering its residence the most desirable, sent him in complete discomfiture to his bed. But there, in a few hours, his sanguine temper, and the kindness of his heart new modelled and new coloured the circumstances of his chagrin. He considered he should have full time to prepare for the double marriages; and that, with the aid of Lavinia, he might delight and amaze them all, with new dresses and new trinkets, which he could now choose without the torment of continual opposition from the documentising Miss Margland. Thus he restored his plastic mind to its usual satisfaction, and arose the next morning without a cloud upon his brow. The pure design of benevolence is to bestow happiness upon others, but its intrinsic reward is bringing happiness home!

But this sweetness of nature, so aptly supplying the first calls, and the first virtues of philosophy, was yet more severely again tried the next morning: for when, forgetting the caution he had solemnly promised, but vainly endeavoured to observe, he intimated to Lynmere these purposes, the youth, blushing at the idea of being taken for the destined husband of Eugenia in public, preferred all risks to being followed by such a rumour to Southampton; and, when he found she was to be of the party, positively declared the match to be out of all question.

Sir Hugh now stood aghast. Many had been his disappointments; his rage for forming schemes, and his credulity in persuading himself they would be successful, were sources not more fertile of amusement in their projection, than of mortification in their event: but here, the length of time since his plan had been arranged, joined to the very superficial view he had taken of any chance of its failure, had made him, by degrees, regard it as so fixed and settled, that it rather demanded congratulation than concurrence, rather waited to be enjoyed than executed.

Lynmere took not the smallest interest in the dismay of his uncle, but, turning upon his heel, said he would go to the stables, to see if he could find something that would carry him any better than the miserable jade he had mounted the preceding evening.

Sir Hugh remained in a kind of stupefaction. He seemed to himself to be bereft of every purpose of life; and robbed at once, of all view for his actions, all subject for his thoughts. The wide world, he believed, had never, hitherto, given birth to a plan so sagaciously conceived, so rationally combined, so infallibly secure: yet it was fallen, crushed, rejected!

A gleam of sunshine, however, ere long, [burst] upon his despondence; it occurred to him, that the learned education of Eugenia was still a secret to her cousin; his whole scheme, therefore, might perhaps yet be retrieved, when Lynmere should be informed of the peculiar preparations made for his conjugal happiness.

Fetching now a long breath, to aid the revival of his faculties and his spirits, he considered how to open his discourse so as to render it most impressive, and then sent for Clermont to attend him in his chamber.

'Nephew,' cried he, upon his entrance, 'I am now going to talk to you a little in your own way, having something to tell you of, that, I believe, you won't know how to hold cheap, being a thing that belongs to your studies; that is to say, to your cousin's; which, I hope, is pretty much the same thing, at least as to the end. Now the case of what I have to say is this; you must know, nephew, I had always set my heart upon having a rich heir; but it's what did not turn out, which I am sorry enough for; but where's the man that's so wise as to know his own doom? that is, the doom of his fortune. However, that's what I should not talk of to you, having so little; which, I hope, you won't take to heart. And, indeed, it in't much worth a wise man's thinking of, when he han't got it, for what's a fortune, at bottom, but mere metal? And so having, as I said before, no heir, I'm forced, in default of it, to take up with an heiress. But, to the end of making all parties happy, I've had her brought up in the style of a boy, for the sake of your marrying her. For which reason, I believe, in point of the classics…'

'Me, sir!' cried Lynmere, recovering from a long yawning fit, 'and what have I to do with marrying a girl like a boy? That's not my taste, my dear sir, I assure you. Besides, what has a wife to do with the classics? will they shew her how to order her table? I suppose when I want to eat, I may go to a cook's shop!'

Here subsided, at once, every particle of that reverence Sir Hugh had so long nourished for Clermont Lynmere. To hear the classics spoken of with disrespect, after all the pains he had taken, all the orders he had given for their exclusive study and veneration, and to find the common calls of life, which he had believed every scholar regarded but as means of existence, not auxiliaries of happiness, named with preference, distanced, at a stroke, all high opinion of his nephew, and made way, in its stead, for a displeasure not wholly free from disdain.

'Well, Clermont,' said he, after a pause, 'I won't keep you any longer, now I know your mind, which I wish I had known before, for the account of your cousin, who has had plague enough about it in her bringing up; which, however, I shall put an end to now, not seeing that any good has come from it.'

Lynmere joyfully accepted the permission to retire, enchanted that the rejection was thus completely off his mind, and had incurred only so slight a reproof, unaccompanied with one menace, or even remonstrance.

The first consternation of Sir Hugh, at the fall of this favourite project, was, indeed, somewhat lessened, at this moment, by the fall of his respectful opinion of its principal object. He sent therefore, hastily, for Eugenia, to whom he abruptly exclaimed, 'My dear girl, who'd have thought it? here's your cousin Clermont, with all his Greek and Latin, which I begin to bless God I don't know a word of, turning out a mere common nothing, thinking about his dinners and suppers! for which reason I beg you'll think of him no more, it not being worth your while; in particular, as he don't desire it.'

Eugenia, at this intimation, felt nearly as much relieved as disturbed. To be refused was, indeed, shocking; not to her pride, she was a stranger to that passion; but to her delicacy, which pointed out to her, in strong colours, the impropriety of having been exposed to such a decision: nevertheless, to find herself unshackled from an alliance to which she looked forward with dread, without offending her uncle, to whom so many reasons made it dear, or militating against her own heroic sentiments of generosity, which revolted against wilfully depriving her cousin of an inheritance already offered to him, removed a weight from her mind, which his every word, look, and gesture, had contributed to increase since their first meeting.

Dr. Marchmont had ridden to Beech Park, where he had spent the night, though uninvited by its agitated owner, whom the very name of Mrs. Berlinton, annexed to an accepted party of pleasure, had driven, in speechless agony, from Cleves.

'I wonder not,' cried he, 'at your disturbance; I feel for it, on the contrary, more than ever, from my observations of this evening; for I now see the charm, the potent charm, as well as the difficulties of your situation. This strange affair with Sir Sedley Clarendel cannot, in common foresight of what may ensue from it, be passed over without the most rigid scrutiny, and severest deliberation; yet, I sincerely hope, inquiry may produce some palliation: this young lady, I see, will not easily, for sweetness, for countenance, for every apparent attraction, be replaced: and, the first of all requisites is certainly in your favour; it is evident she loves you.'

'Loves me?' cried Edgar, his arms involuntarily encircling him as he repeated the magnetising words: 'Ah! Dr. Marchmont, could she then thus grieve and defy me? – And yet, so too said Jacob, – that good, faithful, excellent old servant…'

'Yes; I watched her unremittingly; and saw her so much hurt by your abrupt retreat, that her eyes filled with tears the moment you left the room.'

'O, Dr. Marchmont! – and for me were they shed? – my dear – dear friend! withhold from me such a picture – or reconcile me completely to viewing no other!'

'Once more, let me warn you to circumspection. The stake for which you are playing is life in its best part, 'tis peace of mind. That her manners are engaging, that her looks are captivating, and even that her heart is yours, admit no doubt: but the solidity or the lightness of that heart are yet to be proved.'

'Still, Doctor, though nearly in defiance of all my senses, still I can doubt anything rather than the heart of Camilla! Precipitate, I know, she has always been reckoned; but her precipitance is of kin to her noblest virtues; it springs but from the unsuspicious frankness of an unguarded, because innocent nature. And this, in a short time, her understanding will correct.'

'Are you sure it is adequate to the task? There is often, in early youth, a quickness of parts which raises expectations that are never realised. Their origin is but in the animal spirits, which, instead of ripening into judgment and sense by added years, dwindle into nothingness, or harden into flippancy. The character, at this period, is often so unstable, as to be completely new moulded by every new accident, or new associate. How innumerable are the lurking ill qualities that may lie dormant beneath the smiles of youth and beauty, in the season of their untried serenity! The contemporaries of half our fiercest viragos of fifty, may assure you that, at fifteen, they were all softness and sweetness. The present æra, however, my dear young friend, is highly favourable to all you can judiciously wish; namely, the entire re-establishment, or total destruction of all confidence… To a man of your nice feelings, there is no medium. Your love demands respect, or your tranquillity exacts flight from its object. Set apart your offence at the cultivation of an acquaintance you disapprove; be yourself of the party to Southampton, and there, a very little observation will enable you to dive into the most secret recesses of her character.'

'Steadiness, Doctor, I do not want, nor yet, however I suffer from its exertion, fortitude: but a plan such as this, requires something more; it calls for an equivocal conduct, which, to me, would be impracticable, and to her, might prove delusive. No!.. the openness I so much pine to meet with, I must, at least, not forfeit myself.'

'The fervour of your integrity, my dear Mandlebert, mistakes caution for deceit. If, indeed, this plan had any other view than your union, it would not merely be cruel, but infamous: the truth, however, is you must either pursue her upon proof, or abandon her at once, with every chance of repenting such a measure.'

'Alas! how torturing is hesitation! to believe myself the object of her regard … to think that first of all human felicities mine, yet to find it so pliant … so precarious … to see her, with such thoughtless readiness, upon the point of falling into the hands of another!.. receiving … answering … his letters!.. letters too so confident, so daring! made up of insolent demands and imperious reproaches … to meet him by his own appointment… O, Dr. Marchmont! all delicious as is the idea of her preference … all entwined as she is around my soul, how, now, how ever again, can I be happy, either to quit … or to claim her?..'

'This division of sentiment is what gives rise to my plan. At Southampton, you will see if Sir Sedley pursues her; and, as she will be uncertain of your intentions, you will be enabled to judge the singleness of her mind, and the stability of her affection, by the reception she gives him.'

'But if … as I think I can gather from her delivering me his letters, the affair, whatever it has been, with Sir Sedley, is over… What then?'