← catalogue

The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations

by Charlotte M. Yonge · English · Gutenberg #3610 · 1,658,742 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations

Author: Charlotte M. Yonge


        
Release date: January 1, 2003 [eBook #3610]
                Most recently updated: January 16, 2018

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3610

Credits: Produced by Sandra Laythorpe, and David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DAISY CHAIN, OR ASPIRATIONS ***




Produced by Sandra Laythorpe





THE DAISY CHAIN, OR ASPIRATIONS

By Charlotte Yonge




PREFACE.


No one can be more sensible than is the Author that the present is an
overgrown book of a nondescript class, neither the “tale” for the young,
nor the novel for their elders, but a mixture of both.

Begun as a series of conversational sketches, the story outran both
the original intention and the limits of the periodical in which it was
commenced; and, such as it has become, it is here presented to those who
have already made acquaintance with the May family, and may be willing
to see more of them. It would beg to be considered merely as what it
calls itself, a Family Chronicle--a domestic record of home events,
large and small, during those years of early life when the character
is chiefly formed, and as an endeavour to trace the effects of those
aspirations which are a part of every youthful nature. That the young
should take one hint, to think whether their hopes and upward-breathings
are truly upwards, and founded in lowliness, may be called the moral of
the tale.

For those who may deem the story too long, and the characters too
numerous, the Author can only beg their pardon for any tedium that they
may have undergone before giving it up. Feb. 22nd, 1856.





THE DAISY CHAIN




PART 1.



CHAPTER I.



     Si douce est la Marguerite.--CHAUCER.



“Miss Winter, are you busy? Do you want this afternoon? Can you take a
good long walk?”

“Ethel, my dear, how often have I told you of your impetuosity--you have
forgotten.”

“Very well”--with an impatient twist--“I beg your pardon. Good-morning,
Miss Winter,” said a thin, lank, angular, sallow girl, just fifteen,
trembling from head to foot with restrained eagerness, as she tried to
curb her tone into the requisite civility.

“Good-morning, Ethel, good-morning, Flora,” said the prim, middle-aged
daily governess, taking off her bonnet, and arranging the stiff little
rolls of curl at the long, narrow looking-glass, the border of which
distorted the countenance.

“Good-morning,” properly responded Flora, a pretty, fair girl, nearly
two years older than her sister.

“Will you--” began to burst from Etheldred’s lips again, but was stifled
by Miss Winter’s inquiry, “Is your mamma pretty well to-day?”

“Oh! very well,” said both at once; “she is coming to the reading.” And
Flora added, “Papa is going to drive her out to-day.”

“I am very glad. And the baby?”

“I do believe she does it on purpose!” whispered Ethel to herself,
wriggling fearfully on the wide window-seat on which she had
precipitated herself, and kicking at the bar of the table, by which
manifestation she of course succeeded in deferring her hopes, by a
reproof which caused her to draw herself into a rigid, melancholy
attitude, a sort of penance of decorum, but a rapid motion of the
eyelids, a tendency to crack the joints of the fingers, and an
unquietness at the ends of her shoes, betraying the restlessness of the
digits therein contained.

It was such a room as is often to be found in old country town houses,
the two large windows looking out on a broad old-fashioned street,
through heavy framework, and panes of glass scratched with various names
and initials. The walls were painted blue, the skirting almost a third
of the height, and so wide at the top as to form a narrow shelf. The
fireplace, constructed in the days when fires were made to give as
little heat as possible, was ornamented with blue and white Dutch
tiles bearing marvellous representations of Scripture history, and was
protected by a very tall green guard; the chairs were much of the same
date, solid and heavy, the seats in faded carpet-work, but there was a
sprinkling of lesser ones and of stools; a piano; a globe; a large table
in the middle of the room, with three desks on it; a small one, and a
light cane chair by each window; and loaded book-cases. Flora began, “If
you don’t want this afternoon to yourself--”

Ethel was on her feet, and open-mouthed. “Oh, Miss Winter, if you would
be so kind as to walk to Cocksmoor with us!”

“To Cocksmoor, my dear!” exclaimed the governess in dismay.

“Yes, yes, but hear,” cried Ethel. “It is not for nothing. Yesterday--”

“No, the day before,” interposed Flora.

“There was a poor man brought into the hospital. He had been terribly
hurt in the quarry, and papa says he’ll die. He was in great distress,
for his wife has just got twins, and there were lots of children before.
They want everything--food and clothes--and we want to walk and take
it.”

“We had a collection of clothes ready, luckily,” said Flora; “and we
have a blanket, and some tea and some arrowroot, and a bit of bacon, and
mamma says she does not think it too far for us to walk, if you will be
so kind as to go with us.”

Miss Winter looked perplexed. “How could you carry the blanket, my
dear?”

“Oh, we have settled that,” said Ethel, “we mean to make the donkey a
sumpter-mule, so, if you are tired, you may ride home on her.”

“But, my dear, has your mamma considered? They are such a set of wild
people at Cocksmoor; I don’t think we could walk there alone.”

“It is Saturday,” said Ethel, “we can get the boys.”

“If you would reflect a little! They would be no protection. Harry would
be getting into scrapes, and you and Mary running wild.”

“I wish Richard was at home!” said Flora.

“I know!” cried Ethel. “Mr. Ernescliffe will come. I am sure he can walk
so far now. I’ll ask him.”

Ethel had clapped after her the heavy door with its shining brass lock,
before Miss Winter well knew what she was about, and the governess
seemed annoyed. “Ethel does not consider,” said she. “I don’t think your
mamma will be pleased.”

“Why not?” said Flora.

“My dear--a gentleman walking with you, especially if Margaret is
going!”

“I don’t think he is strong enough,” said Flora; “but I can’t think
why there should be any harm. Papa took us all out walking with him
yesterday--little Aubrey and all, and Mr. Ernescliffe went.”

“But, my dear--”

She was interrupted by the entrance of a fine tall blooming girl
of eighteen, holding in her hand a pretty little maid of five.
“Good-morning. Miss Winter. I suppose Flora has told you the request we
have to make to you?”

“Yes, my dear Margaret, but did your mamma consider what a lawless place
Cocksmoor is?”

“That was the doubt,” said Margaret, “but papa said he would answer for
it nothing would happen to us, and mamma said if you would be so kind.”

“It is unlucky,” began the governess, but stopped at the incursion of
some new-comers, nearly tumbling over each other, Ethel at the head
of them. “Oh, Harry!” as the gathers of her frock gave way in the
rude grasp of a twelve-year-old boy. “Miss Winter, ‘tis all right--Mr.
Ernescliffe says he is quite up to the walk, and will like it very much,
and he will undertake to defend you from the quarrymen.”

“Is Miss Winter afraid of the quarrymen?” hallooed Harry. “Shall I take
a club?”

“I’ll take my gun and shoot them,” valiantly exclaimed Tom; and while
threats were passing among the boys, Margaret asked, in a low voice,
“Did you ask him to come with us?”

“Yes, he said he should like it of all things. Papa was there, and said
it was not too far for him--besides, there’s the donkey. Papa says it,
so we must go, Miss Winter.”

Miss Winter glanced unutterable things at Margaret, and Ethel began to
perceive she had done something wrong. Flora was going to speak, when
Margaret, trying to appear unconscious of a certain deepening colour in
her own cheeks, pressed a hand on her shoulder, and whispering, “I’ll
see about it. Don’t say any more, please,” glided out of the room.

“What’s in the wind?” said Harry. “Are many of your reefs out there,
Ethel?”

“Harry can talk nothing but sailors’ language,” said Flora, “and I am
sure he did not learn that of Mr. Ernescliffe. You never hear slang from
him.”

“But aren’t we going to Cocksmoor?” asked Mary, a blunt downright girl
of ten.

“We shall know soon,” said Ethel. “I suppose I had better wait till
after the reading to mend that horrid frock?”

“I think so, since we are so nearly collected,” said Miss Winter; and
Ethel, seating herself on the corner of the window-seat, with one leg
doubled under her, took up a Shakespeare, holding it close to her
eyes, and her brother Norman, who, in age, came between her and Flora,
kneeling on one knee on the window-seat, and supporting himself with one
arm against the shutter, leaned over her, reading it too, disregarding a
tumultuous skirmish going on in that division of the family collectively
termed “the boys,” namely, Harry, Mary, and Tom, until Tom was suddenly
pushed down, and tumbled over into Ethel’s lap, thereby upsetting
her and Norman together, and there was a general downfall, and a loud
scream, “The sphynx!”

“You’ve crushed it,” cried Harry, dealing out thumps indiscriminately.

“No, here ‘tis,” said Mary, rushing among them, and bringing out a green
sphynx caterpillar on her finger--“‘tis not hurt.”

“Pax! Pax!” cried Norman, over all, with the voice of an authority,
as he leaped up lightly and set Tom on his legs again. “Harry! you had
better do that again,” he added warningly. “Be off, out of this window,
and let Ethel and me read in peace.”

“Here’s the place,” said Ethel--“Crispin, Crispian’s day. How I do like
Henry V.”

“It is no use to try to keep those boys in order!” sighed Miss Winter.

“Saturnalia, as papa calls Saturday,” replied Flora.

“Is not your eldest brother coming home to-day?” said Miss Winter in a
low voice to Flora, who shook her head, and said confidentially, “He
is not coming till he has passed that examination. He thinks it better
not.”

Here entered, with a baby in her arms, a lady with a beautiful
countenance of calm sweetness, looking almost too young to be the mother
of the tall Margaret, who followed her. There was a general hush as she
greeted Miss Winter, the girls crowding round to look at their little
sister, not quite six weeks old.

“Now, Margaret, will you take her up to the nursery?” said the
mother, while the impatient speech was repeated, “Mamma, can we go to
Cocksmoor?”

“You don’t think it will be too far for you?” said the mother to Miss
Winter as Margaret departed.

“Oh, no, not at all, thank you, that was not--But Margaret has
explained.”

“Yes, poor Margaret,” said Mrs. May, smiling. “She has settled it by
choosing to stay at home with me. It is no matter for the others, and he
is going on Monday, so that it will not happen again.”

“Margaret has behaved very well,” said Miss Winter.

“She has indeed,” said her mother, smiling. “Well, Harry, how is the
caterpillar?”

“They’ve just capsized it, mamma,” answered Harry, “and Mary is making
all taut.”

Mrs. May laughed, and proceeded to advise Ethel and Norman to put away
Henry V., and find the places in their Bibles, “or you will have the
things mixed together in your heads,” said she.

In the meantime Margaret, with the little babe, to-morrow to be her
godchild, lying gently in her arms, came out into the matted hall, and
began to mount the broad shallow-stepped staircase, protected by low
stout balusters, with a very thick, flat, and solid mahogany hand-rail,
polished by the boys’ constant riding up and down upon it. She was only
on the first step, when the dining-room door opened, and there came out
a young man, slight, and delicate-looking, with bright blue eyes, and
thickly-curling light hair. “Acting nurse?” he said, smiling. “What
an odd little face it is! I didn’t think little white babies were so
pretty! Well, I shall always consider myself as the real godfather--the
other is all a sham.”

“I think so,” said Margaret; “but I must not stand with her in a
draught,” and on she went, while he called after her. “So we are to have
an expedition to-day.”

She did not gainsay it, but there was a little sigh of disappointment,
and when she was out of hearing, she whispered, “Oh! lucky baby, to
have so many years to come before you are plagued with troublesome
propriety!”

Then depositing her little charge with the nurse, and trying to cheer up
a solemn-looking boy of three, who evidently considered his deposition
from babyhood as a great injury, she tripped lightly down again, to take
part in the Saturday’s reading and catechising.

It was pleasant to see that large family in the hush and reverence of
such teaching, the mother’s gentle power preventing the outbreaks of
restlessness to which even at such times the wild young spirits were
liable. Margaret and Miss Winter especially rejoiced in it on this
occasion, the first since the birth of the baby, that she had been able
to preside. Under her, though seemingly without her taking any trouble,
there was none of the smothered laughing at the little mistakes, the
fidgeting of the boys, or Harry’s audacious impertinence to Miss Winter;
and no less glad was Harry to have his mother there, and be guarded from
himself.

The Catechism was repeated, and a comment on the Sunday Services read
aloud. The Gospel was that on the taking the lowest place, and when they
had finished, Ethel said, “I like the verse which explains that:


       ‘They who now sit lowest here,
        When their Master shall appear,
        He shall bid them higher rise,
        And be highest in the skies.’”


“I did not think of that being the meaning of ‘when He that bade thee
cometh,’” said Norman thoughtfully.

“It seemed to be only our worldly advantage that was meant before,” said
Ethel.

“Well, it means that too,” said Flora.

“I suppose it does,” said Mrs. May; “but the higher sense is the
one chiefly to be dwelt on. It is a lesson how those least known and
regarded here, and humblest in their own eyes, shall be the highest
hereafter.”

And Margaret looked earnestly at her mother, but did not speak.

“May we go, mamma?” said Mary.

“Yes, you three--all of you, indeed, unless you wish to say any more.”

The “boys” availed themselves of the permission. Norman tarried to put
his books into a neat leather case, and Ethel stood thinking. “It means
altogether--it is a lesson against ambition,” said she.

“True,” said her mother, “the love of eminence for its own sake.”

“And in so many different ways!” said Margaret.

“Ay, worldly greatness, riches, rank, beauty,” said Flora.

“All sorts of false flash and nonsense, and liking to be higher than one
ought to be,” said Norman. “I am sure there is nothing lower, or more
mean and shabby, than getting places and praise a fellow does not
deserve.”

“Oh, yes!” cried Ethel, “but no one fit to speak to would do that!”

“Plenty of people do, I can tell you,” said Norman.

“Then I hope I shall never know who they are!” exclaimed Ethel. “But
I’ll tell you what I was thinking of, mamma. Caring to be clever, and
get on, only for the sake of beating people.”

“I think that might be better expressed.”

“I know,” said Ethel, bending her brow, with the fullness of her
thought--“I mean caring to do a thing only because nobody else can do
it--wanting to be first more than wanting to do one’s best.”

“You are quite right, my dear Ethel,” said her mother; “and I am glad
you have found in the Gospel a practical lesson, that should be useful
to you both. I had rather you did so than that you read it in Greek,
though that is very nice too,” she added, smiling, as she put her hand
on a little Greek Testament, in which Ethel had been reading it, within
her English Bible. “Now, go and mend that deplorable frock, and if you
don’t dream over it, you won’t waste too much of your holiday.”

“I’ll get it done in no time!” cried Ethel, rushing headlong upstairs,
twice tripping in it before she reached the attic, where she slept, as
well as Flora and Mary--a large room in the roof, the windows gay with
bird-cages and flowers, a canary singing loud enough to deafen any one
but girls to whom headaches were unknown, plenty of books and treasures,
and a very fine view, from the dormer window, of the town sloping
downwards, and the river winding away, with some heathy hills in the
distance. Poking and peering about with her short-sighted eyes, Ethel
lighted on a work-basket in rare disorder, pulled off her frock, threw
on a shawl, and sat down cross-legged on her bed, stitching vigorously,
while meantime she spouted with great emphasis an ode of Horace, which
Norman having learned by heart, she had followed his example; it being
her great desire to be even with him in all his studies, and though
eleven months younger, she had never yet fallen behind him. On Saturday,
he showed her what were his tasks for the week, and as soon as her rent
was repaired, she swung herself downstairs in search of him for this
purpose. She found him in the drawing-room, a pretty, pleasant room--its
only fault that it was rather too low. It had windows opening down to
the lawn, and was full of pretty things, works and knick-knacks. Ethel
found the state of affairs unfavourable to her. Norman was intent on
a book on the sofa, and at the table sat Mr. Ernescliffe, hard at work
with calculations and mathematical instruments. Ethel would not for the
world that any one should guess at her classical studies--she scarcely
liked to believe that even her father knew of them, and to mention them
before Mr. Ernescliffe would have been dreadful. So she only shoved
Norman, and asked him to come.

“Presently,” he said.

“What have you here?” said she, poking her head into the book. “Oh! no
wonder you can’t leave off. I’ve been wanting you to read it all the
week.”

She read over him a few minutes, then recoiled: “I forgot, mamma told me
not to read those stories in the morning. Only five minutes, Norman.”

“Wait a bit, I’ll come.”

She fidgeted, till Mr. Ernescliffe asked Norman if there was a table of
logarithms in the house.

“Oh, yes,” she answered; “don’t you know, Norman? In a brown book on the
upper shelf in the dining-room. Don’t you remember papa’s telling us the
meaning of them, when we had the grand book-dusting?”

He was conscious of nothing but his book; however, she found the
logarithms, and brought them to Mr. Ernescliffe, staying to look at his
drawing, and asking what he was making out. He replied, smiling at the
impossibility of her understanding, but she wrinkled her brown forehead,
hooked her long nose, and spent the next hour in amateur navigation.

Market Stoneborough was a fine old town. The Minster, grand with the
architecture of the time of Henry III., stood beside a broad river, and
round it were the buildings of a convent, made by a certain good Bishop
Whichcote, the nucleus of a grammar school, which had survived the
Reformation, and trained up many good scholars; among them, one of
England’s princely merchants, Nicholas Randall, whose effigy knelt in
a niche in the chancel wall, scarlet-cloaked, white-ruffed, and black
doubletted, a desk bearing an open Bible before him, and a twisted
pillar of Derbyshire spar on each side. He was the founder of thirteen
almshouses, and had endowed two scholarships at Oxford, the object of
ambition of the Stoneborough boys, every eighteen months.

There were about sixty or seventy boarders, and the town boys slept at
home, and spent their weekly holiday there on Saturday--the happiest
day in the week to the May family, when alone, they had the company at
dinner of Norman and Harry, otherwise known by their school names of
June and July, given them because their elder brother had begun the
series of months as May.

Some two hundred years back, a Dr. Thomas May had been headmaster, but
ever since that time there had always been an M. D., not a D. D., in
the family, owning a comfortable demesne of spacious garden, and field
enough for two cows, still green and intact, among modern buildings and
improvements.

The present Dr. May stood very high in his profession, and might soon
have made a large fortune in London, had he not held fast to his
home attachments. He was extremely skilful and clever, with a boyish
character that seemed as if it could never grow older; ardent,
sensitive, and heedless, with a quickness of sympathy and tenderness of
heart that was increased, rather than blunted, by exercise in scenes of
suffering.

At the end of the previous summer holidays, Dr. May had been called one
morning to attend a gentleman who had been taken very ill, at the Swan
Inn.

He was received by a little boy of ten years old, in much grief,
explaining that his brother had come two days ago from London, to bring
him to school here; he had seemed unwell ever since they met, and last
night had become much worse. And extremely ill the doctor found him;
a youth of two or three and twenty, suffering under a severe attack of
fever, oppressed, and scarcely conscious, so as quite to justify his
little brother’s apprehensions. He advised the boy to write to his
family, but was answered by a look that went to his heart--“Alan”
 was all he had in the world--father and mother were dead, and their
relations lived in Scotland, and were hardly known to them.

“Where have you been living, then?”

“Alan sent me to school at Miss Lawler’s when my mother died, and there
I have been ever since, while he has been these three years and a half
on the African station.”

“What, is he in the navy?”

“Yes,” said the boy proudly, “Lieutenant Ernescliffe. He got his
promotion last week. My father was in the battle of Trafalgar; and
Alan has been three years in the West Indies, and then he was in the
Mediterranean, and now on the coast of Africa, in the Atalantis. You
must have heard about him, for it was in the newspaper, how, when he was
mate, he had the command of the Santa Isabel, the slaver they captured.”

The boy would have gone on for ever, if Dr. May had not recalled him to
his brother’s present condition, and proceeded to take every measure
for the welfare and comfort of the forlorn pair. He learned from other
sources that the Ernescliffes were well connected. The father had been
a distinguished officer, but had been ill able to provide for his sons;
indeed, he died, without ever having seen little Hector, who was born
during his absence on a voyage--his last, and Alan’s first. Alan, the
elder by thirteen years, had been like a father to the little boy,
showing judgment and self-denial that marked him of a high cast of
character. He had distinguished himself in encounters with slave ships,
and in command of a prize that he had had to conduct to Sierra Leone,
he had shown great coolness and seamanship, in several perilous
conjunctures, such as a sudden storm, and an encounter with another
slaver, when his Portuguese prisoners became mutinous, and nothing but
his steadiness and intrepidity had saved the lives of himself and his
few English companions. He was, in fact, as Dr. May reported, pretty
much of a hero. He had not, at the time, felt the effects of the
climate, but, owing to sickness and death among the other officers, he
had suffered much fatigue and pressure of mind and body. Immediately on
his return, had followed his examination, and though he had passed with
great credit, and it had been at once followed by well-earned promotion,
his nervous excitable frame had been overtasked, and the consequence was
a long and severe illness.

The Swan Inn was not forty yards from Dr. May’s back gate, and, at
every spare moment, he was doing the part of nurse as well as doctor,
professionally obliged to Alan Ernescliffe for bringing him a curious
exotic specimen of fever, and requiting him by the utmost care and
attention, while, for their own sakes, he delighted in the two boys with
all the enthusiasm of his warm heart. Before the first week was at
an end, they had learned to look on the doctor as one of the kindest
friends it had been their lot to meet with, and Alan knew that if he
died, he should leave his little brother in the hands of one who would
comfort him as a father.

No sooner was young Ernescliffe able to sit up, than Dr. May insisted on
conveying him to his own house, as his recovery was likely to be tedious
in solitude at the Swan. It was not till he had been drawn in a chair
along the sloping garden, and placed on the sofa to rest, that he
discovered that the time the good doctor had chosen for bringing a
helpless convalescent to his house, was two days after an eleventh child
had been added to his family.

Mrs. May was too sorry for the solitary youth, and too sympathising
with her husband, to make any objection, though she was not fond of
strangers, and had some anxieties. She had the utmost dependence on
Margaret’s discretion, but there was a chance of awkward situations,
which papa was not likely to see or guard against. However, all seemed
to do very well, and no one ever came into her room without some degree
of rapture about Mr. Ernescliffe. The doctor reiterated praises of his
excellence, his principle, his ability and talent, his amusing talk; the
girls were always bringing reports of his perfections; Norman retracted
his grumbling at having his evenings spoiled; and “the boys” were
bursting with the secret that he was teaching them to rig a little ship
that was to astonish mamma on her first coming downstairs, and to be
named after the baby; while Blanche did all the coquetry with him, from
which Margaret abstained. The universal desire was for mamma to see him,
and when the time came, she owned that papa’s swan had not turned out a
goose.

There were now no grounds for prolonging his stay; but it was very hard
to go, and he was glad to avail himself of the excuse of remaining for
the christening, when he was to represent the absent godfather. After
that, he must go; he had written to his Scottish cousins to offer a
visit, and he had a promise that he should soon be afloat again. No
place would ever seem to him so like home as Market Stoneborough. He was
quite like one of themselves, and took a full share in the discussions
on the baby’s name, which, as all the old family appellations had been
used up, was an open question. The doctor protested against Alice and
Edith, which he said were the universal names in the present day. The
boys hissed every attempt of their sisters at a romantic name, and
then Harry wanted it to be Atalantis! At last Dr. May announced that
he should have her named Dowsabel if they did not agree, and Mrs. May
advised all the parties concerned to write their choice on a slip of
paper, and little Aubrey should draw two out of her bag, trusting that
Atalantis Dowsabel would not come out, as Harry confidently predicted.

However, it was even worse, Aubrey’s two lots were Gertrude and
Margaret. Ethel and Mary made a vehement uproar to discover who could
have written Margaret, and at last traced it home to Mr. Ernescliffe,
who replied that Flora, without saying why, had desired him to set down
his favourite name. He was much disconcerted, and did not materially
mend the matter by saying it was the first name that came into his head.




CHAPTER II.



    Meadows trim with daisies pied.--MILTON.


Ethel’s navigation lesson was interrupted by the dinner-bell. That long
table was a goodly sight. Few ever looked happier than Dr. and Mrs. May,
as they sat opposite to each other, presenting a considerable contrast
in appearance as in disposition. She was a little woman, with that
smooth pleasant plumpness that seems to belong to perfect content and
serenity, her complexion fair and youthful, her face and figure very
pretty, and full of quiet grace and refinement, and her whole air and
expression denoting a serene, unruffled, affectionate happiness, yet
with much authority in her mildness--warm and open in her own family,
but reserved beyond it, and shrinking from general society.

The doctor, on the contrary, had a lank, bony figure, nearly six feet
high, and looking more so from his slightness; a face sallow, thin,
and strongly marked, an aquiline nose, highly developed forehead, and
peculiar temples, over which the hair strayed in thin curling flakes.
His eyes were light coloured, and were seldom seen without his
near-sighted spectacles, but the expressions of the mouth were
everything--so varying, so bright, and so sweet were his smiles that
showed beautiful white teeth--moreover, his hand was particularly well
made, small and delicate; and it always turned out that no one ever
recollected that Dr. May was plain, who had heard his kindly greeting.

The sons and daughters were divided in likeness to father and mother;
Ethel was almost an exaggeration of the doctor’s peculiarities,
especially at the formed, but unsoftened age of fifteen; Norman had his
long nose, sallow complexion, and tall figure, but was much improved by
his mother’s fine blue eyes, and was a very pleasant-looking boy, though
not handsome; little Tom was a thin, white, delicate edition of his
father; and Blanche contrived to combine great likeness to him with a
great deal of prettiness. Of those that, as nurse said, favoured their
mamma, Margaret was tall and blooming, with the same calm eyes, but with
the brilliance of her father’s smile; Flora had greater regularity of
feature, and was fast becoming a very pretty girl, while Mary and
Harry could not boast of much beauty, but were stout sturdy pictures of
health; Harry’s locks in masses of small tight yellow curls, much given
to tangling and matting, unfit to be seen all the week, till nurse put
him to torture every Saturday, by combing them out so as, at least, to
make him for once like, she said, a gentleman, instead of a young lion.

Little Aubrey was said by his papa to be like nothing but the full moon.
And there he shone on them, by his mamma’s side, announcing in language
few could understand, where he had been with papa.

“He has been a small doctor,” said his father, beginning to cut the
boiled beef as fast as if his hands had been moved by machinery. “He has
been with me to see old Mrs. Robins, and she made so much of him, that
if I take him again he’ll be regularly spoiled.”

“Poor old woman, it must have been a pleasure to her,” said Mrs.
May--“it is so seldom she has any change.”

“Who is she?” asked Mr. Ernescliffe.

“The butcher’s old mother,” said Margaret, who was next to him. “She
is one of papa’s pet patients, because he thinks her desolate and
ill-used.”

“Her sons bully her,” said the doctor, too intent on carving to perceive
certain deprecatory glances of caution cast at him by his wife, to
remind him of the presence of man and maid--“and that smart daughter is
worse still. She never comes to see the old lady but she throws her into
an agitated state, fit to bring on another attack. A meek old soul, not
fit to contend with them!”

“Why do they do it?” said Ethel.

“For the cause of all evil! That daughter marries a grazier, and wants
to set up for gentility; she comes and squeezes presents out of her
mother, and the whole family are distrusting each other, and squabbling
over the spoil before the poor old creature is dead! It makes one sick!
I gave that Mrs. Thorn a bit of my mind at last; I could not stand the
sight any longer. Madam, said I, you’ll have to answer for your mother’s
death, as sure as my name’s Dick May--a harpy dressed up in feathers and
lace.”

There was a great laugh, and an entreaty to know whether this was really
his address--Ethel telling him she knew he had muttered it to himself
quite audibly, for which she was rewarded by a pretended box on the ear.
It certainly was vain to expect order at dinner on Saturday, for the
doctor was as bad as the boys, and Mrs. May took it with complete
composure, hardly appearing sensible of the Babel which would sometimes
almost deafen its promoter, papa; and yet her interference was
all-powerful, as now when Harry and Mary were sparring over the salt,
with one gentle “Mary!” and one reproving glance, they were reduced to
quiescence.

Meanwhile Dr. May, in a voice above the tumult, was telling “Maggie,” as
he always called his wife, some piece of news about Mr. Rivers, who had
bought Abbotstoke Grange; and Alan Ernescliffe, in much lower tones,
saying to Margaret how he delighted in the sight of these home scenes,
and this free household mirth.

“It is the first time you have seen us in perfection,” said Margaret,
“with mamma at the head of the table--no, not quite perfection either,
without Richard.”

“I am very glad to have seen it,” repeated Alan. “What a blessing it
must be to your brothers to have such a home!”

“Yes, indeed,” said Margaret earnestly.

“I cannot fancy any advantage in life equal to it. Your father and
mother so entirely one with you all.”

Margaret smiled, too much pleased to speak, and glanced at her mother’s
sweet face.

“You can’t think how often I shall remember it, or how rejoiced I--” He
broke off, for the noise subsided, and his speech was not intended for
the public ear, so he dashed into the general conversation, and catching
his own name, exclaimed, “What’s that base proposal, Ethel?”

“To put you on the donkey,” said Norman.

“They want to see a sailor riding,” interposed the doctor.

“Dr. May!” cried the indignant voice of Hector Ernescliffe, as his
honest Scottish face flushed like a turkey cock, “I assure you that Alan
rides like--”

“Like a horse marine,” said Norman.

Hector and Harry both looked furious, but “June” was too great a man in
their world for them to attempt any revenge, and it was left for Mary
to call out, “Why, Norman, nonsense! Mr. Ernescliffe rode the new black
kicking horse till he made it quite steady.”

“Made it steady! No, Mary, that is saying too much for it,” said Mr.
Ernescliffe.

“It has no harm in it--capital horse--splendid,” said the doctor; “I
shall take you out with it this afternoon, Maggie.”

“You have driven it several times?” said Alan.

“Yes, I drove him to Abbotstoke yesterday--never started, except at a
fool of a woman with an umbrella, and at the train--and we’ll take care
not to meet that.”

“It is only to avoid the viaduct at half-past four,” said Mrs. May, “and
that is easily done.”

“So you are bound for Cocksmoor?” said the doctor. “I told the poor
fellow you were going to see his wife, and he was so thankful, that it
did one’s heart good.”

“Is he better? I should like to tell his wife,” said Flora.

The doctor screwed up his face. “A bad business,” he said; “he is a shade
better to-day; he may get through yet; but he is not my patient. I only
saw him because I happened to be there when he was brought in, and Ward
was not in the way.”

“And what’s his name?”

“I can’t tell--don’t think I ever heard.”

“We ought to know,” said Miss Winter; “it would be awkward to go
without.”

“To go roaming about Cocksmoor asking where the man in the hospital
lives!” said Flora. “We can’t wait till Monday.”

“I’ve done,” said Norman; “I’ll run down to the hospital and find out.
May I, mamma?”

“Without your pudding, old fellow?”

“I don’t want pudding,” said Norman, slipping back his chair. “May I,
mamma?”

“To be sure you may;” and Norman, with a hand on the back of Ethel’s
chair, took a flying leap over his own, that set all the glasses
ringing.

“Stop, stop! know what you are going after, sir,” cried his father.
“What will they know there of Cocksmoor, or the man whose wife has
twins? You must ask for the accident in number five.”

“And oh, Norman, come back in time!” said Ethel.

“I’ll be bound I’m back before Etheldred the Unready wants me,” he
answered, bounding off with an elasticity that caused his mother to say
the boy was made of india-rubber; and then putting his head in by the
window to say, “By-the-bye, if there’s any pudding owing to me, that
little chorister fellow of ours, Bill Blake, has got a lot of voracious
brothers that want anything that’s going. Tom and Blanche might take it
down to ‘em; I’m off! Hooray!” and he scampered headlong up the garden,
prolonging his voice into a tremendous shout as he got farther off,
leaving every one laughing, and his mother tenderly observing that he
was going to run a quarter of a mile and back, and lose his only chance
of pudding for the week--old Bishop Whichcote’s rules contemplating no
fare but daily mutton, to be bought at a shilling per sheep. A little
private discussion ensued between Harry and Hector on the merits of the
cakes at Ballhatchet’s gate, and old Nelly’s pies, which led the doctor
to mourn over the loss of the tarts of the cranberries, that used to
grow on Cocksmoor, before it was inhabited, and to be the delight of the
scholars of Stoneborough, when he was one of them--and then to enchant
the boys by relations of ancient exploits, especially his friend Spencer
climbing up, and engraving a name on the top of the market cross, now no
more--swept away by the Town Council in a fit of improvement, which had
for the last twenty years enraged the doctor at every remembrance of
it. Perhaps at this moment his wife could hardly sympathise, when she
thought of her boys emulating such deeds.

“Papa,” said Ethel, “will you lend me a pair of spectacles for the
walk?”

“And make yourself one, Ethel,” said Flora.

“I don’t care--I want to see the view.”

“It is very bad for you, Ethel,” further added her mother; “you will
make your sight much shorter if you accustom your eyes to them.”

“Well, mamma, I never do wear them about the house.”

“For a very good reason,” said Margaret; “because you haven’t got them.”

“No, I believe Harry stole them in the holidays.”

“Stole them!” said the doctor; “as if they weren’t my property,
unjustifiably appropriated by her!”

“They were that pair that you never could keep on, papa,” said
Ethel--“no use at all to you. Come, do lend me them.”

“I’m sure I shan’t let you wear them,” said Harry. “I shan’t go, if you
choose to make yourself such an object.”

“Ah!” said the father, “the boys thought it time to put a stop to it
when it came to a caricature of the little doctor in petticoats.”

“Yes, in Norman’s Lexicon,” said Ethel, “a capital likeness of you,
papa; but I never could get him to tell me who drew it.”

Nor did Ethel know that that caricature had been the cause of the black
eye that Harry had brought home last summer. Harry returned, to
protest that he would not join the walk, if she chose to be seen in
the spectacles, while she undauntedly continued her petition, though
answered that she would attract the attacks of the quarrymen, who would
take her for an attenuated owl.

“I wish you were obliged to go about without them yourself, papa!” cried
Ethel, “and then you would know how tiresome it is not to see twice the
length of your own nose.”

“Not such a very short allowance either,” said the doctor quaintly, and
therewith the dinner concluded. There was apt to be a race between the
two eldest girls for the honour of bringing down the baby; but this time
their father strode up three steps at once, turned at the top of the
first flight, made his bow to them, and presently came down with his
little daughter in his arms, nodded triumphantly at the sisters, and set
her down on her mother’s lap.

“There, Maggie, you are complete, you old hen-and-chicken daisy. Can’t
you take her portrait in the character, Margaret?”

“With her pink cap, and Blanche and Aubrey as they are now, on each
side?” said Flora.

“Margaret ought to be in the picture herself,” said Ethel. “Fetch the
artist in Norman’s Lexicon, Harry.”

“Since he has hit off one of us so well,” said the doctor. “Well! I’m
off. I must see old Southern. You’ll be ready by three? Good-bye, hen
and chicken.”

“And I may have the spectacles?” said Ethel, running after him; “you
know I am an injured individual, for mamma won’t let me carry baby about
the house because I am so blind.”

“You are welcome to embellish yourself, as far as I am concerned.”

A general dispersion ensued, and only Mrs. May, Margaret, and the baby,
remained.

“Oh, no!” sighed Margaret; “you can’t be the hen-and-chicken daisy
properly, without all your chickens. It is the first christening we ever
had without our all being there.”

“It was best not to press it, my dear,” said her mother. “Your papa
would have had his thoughts turned to the disappointment again and it
makes Richard himself so unhappy to see his vexation, that I believe it
is better not to renew it.”

“But to miss him for so long!” said Margaret. “Perhaps it is best, for
it is very miserable when papa is sarcastic and sharp, and he cannot
understand it, and takes it as meaning so much more than it really does,
and grows all the more frightened and diffident. I cannot think what he
would do without you to encourage him.”

“Or you, you good sister,” said her mother, smiling. “If we could only
teach him not to mind being laughed at, and to have some confidence in
himself, he and papa would get on together.”

“It is very hard,” cried Margaret, almost indignantly, “that papa won’t
believe it, when he does his best.”

“I don’t think papa can bear to bring himself to believe that it is his
best.”

“He is too clever himself to see how other people can be slow,” said
Margaret; “and yet”--the tears came into her eyes--“I cannot bear
to think of his telling Richard it was no use to think of being a
clergyman, and he had better turn carpenter at once, just because he
failed in his examination.”

“My dear, I wish you would forget that,” said Mrs. May. “You know papa
sometimes says more than he means, and he was excessively vexed and
disappointed. I know he was pleased with Ritchie’s resolve not to come
home again till he had passed, and it is best that it should not be
broken.”

“The whole vacation, studying so hard, and this christening!” said
Margaret; “it is treating him as if he had done wrong. I do believe Mr.
Ernescliffe thinks he has--for papa always turns away the conversation
if his name is mentioned! I wish you would explain it, mamma; I can’t
bear that.”

“If I can,” said Mrs. May, rather pleased that Margaret had taken on
herself this vindication of her favourite brother her father’s expense.
“But, after all, Margaret, I never feel quite sure that poor Ritchie
does exert himself to the utmost, he is too desponding to make the most
of himself.”

“And the more vexed papa is, the worse it grows!” said Margaret. “It is
provoking, though. How I do wish sometimes to give Ritchie a jog, when
there is some stumbling-block that he sticks fast at. Don’t you remember
those sums, and those declensions? When he is so clear and sensible
about practical matters too--anything but learning--I cannot think
why--and it is very mortifying!”

“I dare say it is very good for us not to have our ambition gratified,”
 said her mother. “There are so many troubles worse than these failures,
that it only shows how happy we are that we should take them so much to
heart.”

“They are a very real trouble!” said Margaret. “Don’t smile, mamma. Only
remember how wretched his schooldays were, when papa could not see any
difficulty in what to him was so hard, and how all papa’s eagerness only
stupified him the more.”

“They are a comfort not to have that over again! Yet,” said the mother,
“I often think there is more fear for Norman. I dread his talent and
success being snares.”

“There is no self-sufficiency about him,” said Margaret.

“I hope not, and he is so transparent, that it would be laughed down at
the first bud: but the universal good report, and certainty of success,
and being so often put in comparison with Richard, is hardly safe. I was
very glad he heard what Ethel said to-day.”

“Ethel spoke very deeply,” said Margaret; “I was a good deal struck by
it--she often comes out with such solid thoughts.”

“She is an excellent companion for Norman.”

“The desire of being first!” said Margaret, “I suppose that is a form
of caring for oneself! It set me thinking a good deal, mamma, how many
forms of ambition there are. The craving for rank, or wealth, or beauty,
are so clearly wrong, that one does not question about them; but I
suppose, as Ethel said, the caring to be first in attainments is as
bad.”

“Or in affection,” said Mrs. May.

“In affection--oh, mamma, there is always some one person with whom one
is first!” said Margaret eagerly; and then, her colour deepening, as
she saw her mother looking at her, she said hastily, “Ritchie--I never
considered it--but I know--it is my great pleasure--oh, mamma!”

“Well, my dear, I do not say but that you are the first with Richard,
and that you well deserve to be so; but is the seeking to be the first
even in that way safe? Is it not self-seeking again?”

“Well, perhaps it is. I know it is what makes jealousy.”

“The only plan is not to think about ourselves at all,” said Mrs. May.
“Affection is round us like sunshine, and there is no use in measuring
and comparing. We must give it out freely ourselves, hoping for nothing
again.”

“Oh, mamma, you don’t mean that!”

“Perhaps I should have said, bargaining for nothing again. It will
come of itself, if we don’t exact it; but rivalry is the sure means of
driving it away, because that is trying to get oneself worshipped.”

“I suppose, then, you have never thought of it,” said Margaret, smiling.

“Why, it would have been rather absurd,” said Mrs. May, laughing, “to
begin to torment myself whether you were all fond of me! You all have
just as much affection for me, from beginning to end, as is natural,
and what’s the use of thinking about it? No, no, Margaret, don’t go
and protest that you love me, more than is natural,” as Margaret looked
inclined to say something very eager, “that would be in the style of
Regan and Goneril. It will be natural by-and-by that you should, some
of you, love some one else better, and if I cared for being first, what
should I do then?”

“Oh, mamma! But,” said Margaret suddenly, “you are always sure of papa.”

“In one way, yes,” said Mrs. May; “but how do I know how long--” Calm as
she was, she could not finish that sentence. “No, Margaret, depend upon
it, the only security is not to think about ourselves at all, and not
to fix our mind on any affection on earth. The least share of the Love
above is the fullness of all blessing, and if we seek that first, all
these things will be added unto us, and are,” she whispered, more to
herself than to Margaret.




CHAPTER III.



     Wee modest crimson-tipped flower,
     Thou’st met me in an evil hour,
     For I maun crush amang the stoure
       Thy slender stem.
     To spare thee now is past my power,
       Thou bonnie gem.
                               BURNS.


“Is this all the walking party?” exclaimed Mr. Ernescliffe, as Miss
Winter, Flora, and Norman gathered in the hall.

“Harry won’t go because of Ethel’s spectacles,” answered Flora; “and
Mary and he are inseparable, so they are gone with Hector to have a
shipwreck in the field.”

“And your other sisters?”

“Margaret has ratted--she is going to drive out with mamma,” said
Norman; “as to Etheldred the Unready, I’ll run up and hurry her.”

In a moment he was at her door. “Oh! Norman, come in. Is it time?”

“I should think so! You’re keeping every one waiting.”

“Oh, dear! go on; only just tell me the past participle of ‘offero’, and
I’ll catch you up.”

“‘Oblatus.’”

“Oh, yes, how stupid. The ‘a’ long or short? Then that’s right. I had
such a line in my head, I was forced to write it down. Is not it a
capital subject this time?”

“The devotion of Decius? Capital. Let me see!” said Norman, taking up
a paper scribbled in pencil, with Latin verses. “Oh, you have taken up
quite a different line from mine. I began with Mount Vesuvius spouting
lava like anything.”

“But Mount Vesuvius didn’t spout till it overthrew Pompeii.”

“Murder!” cried Norman, “I forgot! It’s lucky you put me in mind. I must
make a fresh beginning. There go my six best lines! However, it was
an uncanny place, fit for hobgoblins, and shades, and funny customers,
which will do as well for my purpose. Ha! that’s grand about its being
so much better than the vana gloria triumphalis--only take care of the
scanning there--”

“If it was but English. Something like this:


        “For what is equal to the fame
         Of forgetting self in the aim?


That’s not right, but--”

“Ethel, Norman, what are you about?” cried Flora. “Do you mean to go to
Cocksmoor to-day?”

“Oh, yes!” cried Ethel, flying into vehement activity; “only I’ve lost
my blue-edged handkerchief--Flora, have you seen it?”

“No; but here is your red scarf.”

“Thank you, there is a good Flora. And oh! I finished a frock all but
two stitches. Where is it gone? Go on, all of you, I’ll overtake you:


        “Purer than breath of earthly fame,
         Is losing self in a glorious aim.


“Is that better, Norman?”

“You’ll drive us out of patience,” said Flora, tying the handkerchief
round Ethel’s throat, and pulling out the fingers of her gloves, which,
of course, were inside out; “are you ready?”

“Oh, my frock! my frock! There ‘tis--three stitches--go on, and I’ll
come,” said Ethel, seizing a needle, and sewing vehemently at a little
pink frock. “Go on, Miss Winter goes slowly up the hill, and I’ll
overtake you.”

“Come, Norman, then; it is the only way to make her come at all.”

“I shall wait for her,” said Norman. “Go on, Flora, we shall catch you
up in no time;” and, as Flora went, he continued, “Never mind your aims
and fames and trumpery English rhymes. Your verses will be much the
best, Ethel; I only went on a little about Mount Vesuvius and the
landscape, as Alan described it the other day, and Decius taking a last
look, knowing he was to die. I made him beg his horse’s pardon, and say
how they will both be remembered, and their self-devotion would inspire
Romans to all posterity, and shout with a noble voice!” said Norman,
repeating some of his lines, correcting them as he proceeded.

“Oh! yes; but oh, dear, I’ve done! Come along,” said Ethel, crumpling
her work into a bundle, and snatching up her gloves; then, as they ran
downstairs, and emerged into the street, “It is a famous subject.”

“Yes, you have made a capital beginning. If you won’t break down
somewhere, as you always do, with some frightful false quantity, that
you would get an imposition for, if you were a boy. I wish you were. I
should like to see old Hoxton’s face, if you were to show him up some of
these verses.”

“I’ll tell you what, Norman, if I was you, I would not make Decius
flatter himself with the fame he was to get--it is too like the
stuff every one talks in stupid books. I want him to say--Rome--my
country--the eagles--must win, if they do--never mind what becomes of
me.”

“But why should he not like to get the credit of it, as he did? Fame and
glory--they are the spirit of life, the reward of such a death.”

“Oh, no, no,” said Ethel. “Fame is coarse and vulgar--blinder than
ever they draw Love or Fortune--she is only a personified newspaper,
trumpeting out all that is extraordinary, without minding whether it
is good or bad. She misses the delicate and lovely--I wished they would
give us a theme to write about her. I should like to abuse her well.”

“It would make a very good theme, in a new line,” said Norman; “but I
don’t give into it, altogether. It is the hope and the thought of fame,
that has made men great, from first to last. It is in every one that
is not good for nothing, and always will be! The moving spirit of man’s
greatness!”

“I’m not sure,” said Ethel; “I think looking for fame is like wanting
a reward at once. I had rather people forgot themselves. Do you think
Arnold von Winkelried thought about fame when he threw himself on the
spears?”

“He got it,” said Norman.

“Yes; he got it for the good of other people, not to please himself.
Fame does those that admire it good, not those that win it.”

“But!” said Norman, and both were silent for some short interval, as
they left the last buildings of the town, and began to mount a steep
hill. Presently Norman slackened his pace, and driving his stick
vehemently against a stone, exclaimed, “It is no use talking, Ethel, it
is all a fight and a race. One is always to try to be foremost. That’s
the spirit of the thing--that’s what the great, from first to last, have
struggled, and fought, and lived, and died for.”

“I know it is a battle, I know it is a race. The Bible says so,” replied
Ethel; “but is not there the difference, that here all may win--not
only one? One may do one’s best, not care whether one is first or last.
That’s what our reading to-day said.”

“That was against trumpery vanity--false elevation--not what one has
earned for oneself, but getting into other people’s places that one
never deserved. That every one despises!”

“Of course! That they do. I say, Norman, didn’t you mean Harvey
Anderson?”

Instead of answering, Norman exclaimed, “It is pretension that is
hateful--true excelling is what one’s life is for. No, no, I’ll never be
beat, Ethel--I never have been beat by any one, except by you, when you
take pains,” he added, looking exultingly at his sister, “and I never
will be.”

“Oh, Norman!”

“I mean, of course, while I have senses. I would not be like Richard for
all the world.”

“Oh, no, no, poor Richard!”

“He is an excellent fellow in everything else,” said Norman; “I could
sometimes wish I was more like him--but how he can be so amazingly slow,
I can’t imagine. That examination paper he broke down in--I could have
done it as easily as possible.”

“I did it all but one question,” said Ethel, “but so did he, you know,
and we can’t tell whether we should have it done well enough.”

“I know I must do something respectable when first I go to Oxford, if
I don’t wish to be known as the man whose brother was plucked,” said
Norman.

“Yes,” said Ethel; “if papa will but let you try for the Randall
scholarship next year, but he says it is not good to go to Oxford so
young.”

“And I believe I had better not be there with Richard,” added Norman. “I
don’t like coming into contrast with him, and I don’t think he can like
it, poor fellow, and it isn’t his fault. I had rather stay another year
here, get one of the open scholarships, and leave the Stoneborough ones
for those who can do no better.”

In justice to Norman, we must observe that this was by no means said as
a boast. He would scarcely have thus spoken to any one but Etheldred, to
whom, as well as to himself, it seemed mere matter-of-fact. The others
had in the meantime halted at the top of the hill, and were looking back
at the town--the great old Minster, raising its twin towers and long
roof, close to the river, where rich green meadows spread over the
valley, and the town rising irregularly on the slope above, plentifully
interspersed with trees and gardens, and one green space on the banks
of the river, speckled over with a flock of little black dots in rapid
motion.

“Here you are!” exclaimed Flora. “I told them it was of no use to wait
when you and Norman had begun a dissertation.”

“Now, Mr. Ernescliffe, I should like you to say,” cried Ethel, “which
do you think is the best, the name of it, or the thing?” Her eloquence
always broke down with any auditor but her brother, or, perhaps,
Margaret.

“Ethel!” said Norman, “how is any one to understand you? The argument is
this: Ethel wants people to do great deeds, and be utterly careless of
the fame of them; I say, that love of glory is a mighty spring.”

“A mighty one!” said Alan: “but I think, as far as I understand the
question, that Ethel has the best of it.”

“I don’t mean that people should not serve the cause first of all,” said
Norman, “but let them have their right place and due honour.”

“They had better make up their minds to do without it,” said Alan.
“Remember--


       ‘The world knows nothing of its greatest men.’”


“Then it is a great shame,” said Norman.

“But do you think it right,” said Ethel, “to care for distinction? It
is a great thing to earn it, but I don’t think one should care for the
outer glory.”

“I believe it is a great temptation,” said Alan. “The being over-elated
or over-depressed by success or failure in the eyes of the world,
independently of the exertion we have used.”

“You call it a temptation?” said Ethel.

“Decidedly so.”

“But one can’t live or get on without it,” said Norman.

There they were cut short. There was a plantation to be crossed, with a
gate that would not open, and that seemed an effectual barrier against
both Miss Winter and the donkey, until by persuasive eloquence and great
gallantry, Mr. Ernescliffe performed the wonderful feat of getting the
former over the tall fence, while Norman conducted the donkey a long way
round, undertaking to meet them at the other side of the plantation.

The talk became desultory, as they proceeded for at least a mile along
a cart-track through soft-tufted grass and heath and young fir-trees.
It ended in a broad open moor, stony; and full of damp boggy hollows,
forlorn and desolate under the autumn sky. Here they met Norman again,
and walked on along a very rough and dirty road, the ground growing
more decidedly into hills and valleys as they advanced, till they found
themselves before a small, but very steep hillock, one side of which was
cut away into a slate quarry. Round this stood a colony of roughly-built
huts, of mud, turf, or large blocks of the slate. Many workmen were
engaged in splitting up the slates, or loading wagons with them, rude
wild-looking men, at the sight of whom the ladies shrank up to their
protectors, but who seemed too busy even to spare time for staring at
them.

They were directed to John Taylor’s house, a low mud cottage, very
wretched looking, and apparently so smoky that Mr. Ernescliffe and
Norman were glad to remain outside and survey the quarry, while the
ladies entered.

Inside they found more cleanliness and neatness than they had expected,
but there was a sad appearance of poverty, insufficient furniture, and
the cups and broken tea-pot on the table, holding nothing but toast and
water, as a substitute for their proper contents. The poor woman was
sitting by the fire with one twin on her lap, and the other on a chair
by her side, and a larger child was in the corner by the fire, looking
heavy and ill, while others of different ages lounged about listlessly.
She was not untidy, but very pale, and she spoke in a meek, subdued way,
as if the ills of life were so heavy on her that she had no spirit even
to complain. She thanked them for their gifts but languidly, and did not
visibly brighten when told that her husband was better.

Flora asked when the babes would be christened.

“I can’t hardly tell, Miss--‘tis so far to go.”

“I suppose none of the children can go to school? I don’t know their
faces there,” said Flora, looking at a nice tall, smooth-haired girl of
thirteen or fourteen.

“No, Miss--‘tis so far. I am sorry they should not, for they always was
used to it where we lived before, and my oldest girl she can work very
nicely. I wish I could get a little place for her.”

“You would hardly know what to do without her,” said Miss Winter.

“No, ma’am; but she wants better food than I can give her, and it is a
bad wild place for a girl to grow up. It is not like what I was used to,
ma’am; I was always used to keep to my school and to my church--but it
is a bad place to live in here.”

No one could deny it, and the party left the cottage gravely. Alan and
Norman joined them, having heard a grievous history of the lawlessness
of the people from a foreman with whom they had met. There seemed to be
no visible means of improvement. The parish church was Stoneborough, and
there the living was very poor, the tithes having been appropriated
to the old Monastery, and since its dissolution having fallen into
possession of a Body that never did anything for the town. The
incumbent, Mr. Ramsden, had small means, and was not a high stamp of
clergyman, seldom exerting himself, and leaving most of his parish work
to the two under masters of the school, Mr. Wilmot and Mr. Harrison, who
did all they had time and strength for, and more too, within the town
itself. There was no hope for Cocksmoor!

“There would be a worthy ambition!” said Etheldred, as they turned their
steps homeward. “Let us propose that aim to ourselves, to build a church
on Cocksmoor!”

“How many years do you give us to do it in?” said Norman.

“Few or many, I don’t care. I’ll never leave off thinking about it till
it is done.”

“It need not be long,” said Flora, “if one could get up a subscription.”

“A penny subscription?” said Norman. “I’d rather have it my own doing.”

“You agree then,” said Ethel; “do you, Mr. Ernescliffe?”

“I may safely do so,” he answered, smiling. Miss Winter looked at
Etheldred reprovingly, and she shrank into herself, drew apart, and
indulged in a reverie. She had heard in books of girls writing poetry,
romance, history--gaining fifties and hundreds. Could not some of the
myriads of fancies floating in her mind thus be made available? She
would compose, publish, earn money--some day call papa, show him her
hoard, beg him to take it, and, never owning whence it came, raise the
building. Spire and chancel, pinnacle and buttress, rose before her
eyes, and she and Norman were standing in the porch with an orderly,
religious population, blessing the unknown benefactor, who had caused
the news of salvation to be heard among them.

They were almost at home, when the sight of a crowd in the main street
checked them. Norman and Mr. Ernescliffe went forward to discover the
cause, and spoke to some one on the outskirts--then Mr. Ernescliffe
hurried back to the ladies.

“There’s been an accident,” he said hastily--“you had better go down the
lane and in by the garden.”

He was gone in an instant, and they obeyed in silence. Whence came
Ethel’s certainty that the accident concerned themselves? In an agony
of apprehension, though without one outward sign of it, she walked home.
They were in the garden--all was apparently as usual, but no one was in
sight. Ethel had been first, but she held back, and let Miss Winter go
forward into the house. The front door was open--servants were standing
about in confusion, and one of the maids, looking dreadfully frightened,
gave a cry, “Oh! Miss--Miss--have you heard?”

“No--what? What has happened? Not Mrs. May--” exclaimed Miss Winter.

“Oh, ma’am! it is all of them. The carriage is overturned, and--”

“Who’s hurt? Mamma! papa! Oh, tell me!” cried Flora.

“There’s nurse,” and Ethel flew up to her. “What is it? Oh, nurse!”

“My poor, poor children,” said old nurse, passionately kissing Ethel.
Harry and Mary were on the stairs behind her, clinging together.

A stranger looked into the house, followed by Adams, the stableman.
“They are going to bring Miss May in,” some one said.

Ethel could bear it no longer. As if she could escape, she fled upstairs
into her room, and, falling on her knees, hid her face on her bed.

There were heavy steps in the house, then a sound of hasty feet coming
up to her. Norman dashed into the room, and threw himself on a chair. He
was ghastly pale, and shuddered all over.

“Oh, Norman, Norman, speak! What is it?” He groaned, but could not
speak; he rested his head against her, and gasped. She was terribly
frightened. “I’ll call--” and she would have gone, but he held her.
“No--no--they can’t!” He was prevented from saying more, by chattering
teeth and deadly faintness. She tried to support him, but could only
guide him as he sank, till he lay at full length on the floor, where she
put a pillow under his head, and gave him some water. “Is it--oh, tell
me! Are they much hurt? Oh, try to say!”

“They say Margaret is alive,” said Norman, in gasps; “but--And papa--he
stood up--sat--walked--was better-”

“Is he hurt--much hurt?”

“His arm--” and the tremor and fainting stopped him again.

“Mamma?” whispered Ethel; but Norman only pressed his face into the
pillow.

She was so bewildered as to be more alive to the present distress of his
condition than to the vague horrors downstairs. Some minutes passed in
silence, Norman lying still, excepting a nervous trembling that agitated
his whole frame. Again was heard the strange tread, doors opening and
shutting, and suppressed voices, and he turned his face upwards, and
listened with his hand pressed to his forehead, as if to keep himself
still enough to listen.

“Oh! what is the matter? What is it?” cried Ethel, startled and recalled
to the sense of what was passing.

“Oh, Norman!” Then springing up, with a sudden thought, “Mr. Ward! Oh!
is he there?”

“Yes,” said Norman, in a low hopeless tone, “he was at the place. He
said it--”

“What?”

Again Norman’s face was out of sight.

“Mamma?” Ethel’s understanding perceived, but her mind refused to grasp
the extent of the calamity. There was no answer, save a convulsive
squeezing of her hand.

Fresh sounds below recalled her to speech and action.

“Where is she? What are they doing for her? What--”

“There’s nothing to be done. She--when they lifted her up, she was--”

“Dead?”

“Dead.”

The boy lay with his face hidden, the girl sat by him on the floor, too
much crushed for even the sensations belonging to grief, neither moving
nor looking. After an interval Norman spoke again, “The carriage turned
right over--her head struck on the kerb stone--”

“Did you see?” said Ethel presently.

“I saw them lift her up.” He spoke at intervals, as he could get breath
and bear to utter the words. “And papa--he was stunned--but soon he
sat up, said he would go to her--he looked at her--felt her pulse, and
then--sank down over her!”

“And did you say--I can’t remember--was he hurt?”

The shuddering came again, “His arm--all twisted--broken,” and his voice
sank into a faint whisper; Ethel was obliged to sprinkle him again
with water. “But he won’t die?” said she, in a tone calm from its
bewilderment.

“Oh! no, no, no--”

“And Margaret?”

“They were bringing her home. I’ll go and see. Oh! what’s the meaning of
this?” exclaimed he, scolding himself, as, sitting up, he was forced to
rest his head on his shaking hand.

“You are still faint, dear Norman; you had better lie still, and I’ll go
and see.”

“Faint--stuff--how horridly stupid!” but he was obliged to lay his head
down again; and Ethel, scarcely less trembling, crept carefully towards
the stairs, but a dread of what she might meet came over her, and she
turned towards the nursery.

The younger ones sat there in a frightened huddle. Mary was on a low
chair by the infant’s cot, Blanche in her lap, Tom and Harry leaning
against her, and Aubrey almost asleep. Mary held up her finger as Ethel
entered, and whispered, “Hush! don’t wake baby for anything!”

The first true pang of grief shot through Ethel like a dart, stabbing
and taking away her breath, “Where are they?” she said; “how is papa?
who is with him?”

“Mr. Ward and Alan Ernescliffe,” said Harry. “Nurse came up just now,
and said they were setting his arm.”

“Where is he?”

“On the bed in his dressing-room,” said Harry.

“Has he come to himself--is he better?”

They did not seem to know, and Ethel asked where to find Flora. “With
Margaret,” she was told, and she was thinking whether she could venture
to seek her, when she herself came fast up the stairs. Ethel and
Harry both darted out. “Don’t stop me,” said Flora--“they want some
handkerchiefs.”

“What, is not she in her own room?”

“No,” said Harry, “in mamma’s;” and then his face quivered all over,
and he turned away. Ethel ran after her sister, and pulling out drawers
without knowing what she sought, begged to hear how papa and Margaret
were.

“We can’t judge of Margaret--she has moved, and made a little
moaning--there are no limbs broken, but we are afraid for her head. Oh!
if papa could but--”

“And papa?”

“Mr. Ward is with him now--his arm is terribly hurt.”

“But oh! Flora--one moment--is he sensible?”

“Hardly; he does not take any notice--but don’t keep me.”

“Can I do anything?” following her to the head of the stairs.

“No; I don’t see what you can do. Miss Winter and I are with Margaret;
there’s nothing to do for her.”

It was a relief. Etheldred shrank from what she might have to behold,
and Flora hastened down, too busy and too useful to have time to think.
Harry had gone back to his refuge in the nursery, and Ethel returned to
Norman. There they remained for a long time, both unwilling to speak
or stir, or even to observe to each other on the noises that came in to
them, as their door was left ajar, though in those sounds they were so
absorbed, that they did not notice the cold of a frosty October evening,
or the darkness that closed in on them.

They heard the poor babe crying, one of the children going down to call
nurse, and nurse coming up; then Harry, at the door of the room where
the boys slept, calling Norman in a low voice. Norman, now nearly
recovered, went and brought him into his sister’s room, and his tidings
were, that their father’s arm had been broken in two places, and the
elbow frightfully injured, having been crushed and twisted by the wheel.
He was also a good deal bruised, and though Mr. Ward trusted there was
no positive harm to the head, he was in an unconscious state, from
which the severe pain of the operation had only roused him, so far as to
evince a few signs of suffering. Margaret was still insensible.

The piteous sound of the baby’s wailing almost broke their hearts.
Norman walked about the room in the dark, and said he should go down,
he could not bear it; but he could not make up his mind to go, and after
about a quarter of an hour, to their great relief, it ceased.

Next Mary opened the door, saying, “Norman, here’s Mr. Wilmot come to
ask if he can do anything--Miss Winter sent word that you had better go
to him.”

“How is baby?” asked Harry.

“Nurse has fed her, and is putting her to bed; she is quiet now,” said
Mary; “will you go down, Norman?”

“Where is he?”

“In the drawing-room.”

Norman paused to ask what he was to say.

“Nothing,” said Mary, “nobody can do anything. Make haste. Don’t you
want a candle?”

“No, thank you, I had rather be in the dark. Come up as soon as you have
seen him,” said Etheldred.

Norman went slowly down, with failing knees, hardly able to conquer the
shudder that came over him, as he passed those rooms. There were
voices in the drawing-room, and he found a sort of council there, Alan
Ernescliffe, the surgeon, and Mr. Wilmot. They turned as he came in, and
Mr. Wilmot held out his hand with a look of affection and kindness that
went to his heart, making room for him on the sofa, while going on with
what he was saying. “Then you think it would be better for me not to sit
up with him.”

“I should decidedly say so,” replied Mr. Ward. “He has recognised
Mr. Ernescliffe, and any change might excite him, and lead him to ask
questions. The moment of his full consciousness is especially to be
dreaded.”

“But you do not call him insensible?”

“No, but he seems stunned--stupified by the shock, and by pain. He spoke
to Miss Flora when she brought him some tea.”

“And admirably she managed,” said Alan Ernescliffe. “I was much afraid
of some answer that would rouse him, but she kept her self-possession
beautifully, and seemed to compose him in a moment.”

“She is valuable indeed--so much judgment and activity,” said Mr. Ward.
“I don’t know what we should have done without her. But we ought to have
Mr. Richard--has no one sent to him?”

Alan Ernescliffe and Norman looked at each other.

“Is he at Oxford, or at his tutor’s?” asked Mr. Wilmot.

“At Oxford; he was to be there to-day, was he not, Norman?”

“What o’clock is it? Is the post gone--seven--no; it is all safe,” said
Mr. Ward.

Poor Norman! he knew he was the one who ought to write, but his icy
trembling hand seemed to shake more helplessly than ever, and a piteous
glance fell upon Mr. Wilmot.

“The best plan would be,” said Mr. Wilmot, “for me to go to him at once
and bring him home. If I go by the mail-train, I shall get to him sooner
than a letter could.”

“And it will be better for him,” said Mr. Ward. “He will feel it
dreadfully, poor boy. But we shall all do better when we have him. You
can get back to-morrow evening.”

“Sunday,” said Mr. Wilmot, “I believe there is a train at four.”

“Oh! thank you, sir,” said Norman.

“Since that is settled, perhaps I had better go up to the doctor,” said
Alan; “I don’t like leaving Flora alone with him,” and he was gone.

“How fortunate that that youth is here,” said Mr. Wilmot--“he seems to
be quite taking Richard’s place.”

“And to feel it as much,” said Mr. Ward. “He has been invaluable with
his sailor’s resources and handiness.”

“Well, what shall I tell poor Richard?” asked Mr. Wilmot.

“Tell him there is no reason his father should not do very well, if
we can keep him from agitation--but there’s the point. He is of so
excitable a constitution, that his faculties being so far confused is
the best thing, perhaps, that could be. Mr. Ernescliffe manages him very
well--used to illness on that African coast, and the doctor is very
fond of him. As to Miss May, one can’t tell what to say about her
yet--there’s no fracture, at least--it must be a work of time to judge.”

Flora at that moment half-opened the door, and called Mr. Ward, stopping
for a moment to say it was for nothing of any consequence. Mr. Wilmot
and Norman were left together. Norman put his hands over his face and
groaned--his master looked at him with kind anxiety, but did not feel as
if it were yet time to speak of consolation.

“God bless and support you, and turn this to your good, my dear boy,”
 said he affectionately, as he pressed his hand; “I hope to bring your
brother to-morrow.”

“Thank you, sir,” was all Norman could say; and as Mr. Wilmot went
out by the front door, he slowly went up again, and, lingering on the
landing-place, was met by Mr. Ward, who told him to his relief--for the
mere thinking of it renewed the faint sensation--that he had better not
go to his father’s room.

There was nothing to be done but to return to Ethel and Harry, and tell
them all; with some humiliation at being helpless, where Flora was doing
so much, and to leave their father to be watched by a stranger. If he
had been wanted, Norman might have made the effort, but being told that
he would be worse than useless, there was nothing for him but to give
way.

They sat together in Ethel’s room till somewhere between eight and nine
o’clock, when good old nurse, having put her younger ones to bed, came
in search of them. “Dear, dear! poor darlings,” said she, as she found
them sitting in the dark; she felt their cold hands, and made them all
come into the nursery, where Mary was already, and, fondling them, one
by one, as they passively obeyed her, she set them down on their little
old stools round the fire, took away the high fender, and gave them each
a cup of tea. Harry and Mary ate enough to satisfy her, from a weary
craving feeling, and for want of employment; Norman sat with his elbow
on his knee, and a very aching head resting on his hand, glad of drink,
but unable to eat; Ethel could be persuaded to do neither, till she
found old nurse would let her have no peace.

The nurse sent them all to bed, taking the two girls to their own room,
undressing them, and never leaving them until Mary was in a fair way of
crying herself to sleep--for saying her prayers had brought the tears;
while Ethel lay so wide awake that it was of no use to wait for her, and
then she went to the boys, tucked them each in, as when they were little
children, and saying, “Bless your dear hearts!” bestowed on each of them
a kiss which came gratefully to Norman’s burning brow, and which even
Harry’s boyish manliness could not resist.

Flora was in Margaret’s room, too useful to be spared.

So ended that dreadful Saturday.




CHAPTER IV.



     They may not mar the deep repose
       Of that immortal flower:
     Though only broken hearts are found
       To watch her cradle by,
     No blight is on her slumbers found,
       No touch of harmful eye.
                                    LYRA INNOCENTIUM.


Such a strange sad Sunday! No going to church, but all the poor children
moving in awe and oppression about the house, speaking under their
breath, as they gathered in the drawing-room. Into the study they might
not go, and when Blanche would have asked why, Tom pressed her hand and
shuddered.

Etheldred was allowed to come and look at Margaret, and even to sit in
the room for a little while, to take the place of Miss Winter; but she
was not sensible of sufficient usefulness to relieve the burden of fear
and bewilderment in the presence of that still, pale form; and, what was
almost worse, the sight of the familiar objects, the chair by the fire,
the sofa, the books, the work-basket, the letter-case, the dressing
things, all these were too oppressive. She sat crouched up, with her
face hidden in her hands, and the instant she was released, hastened
back to Norman. She was to tell him that he might go into the room, but
he did not move, and Mary alone went in and out with messages.

Dr. May was not to be visited, for he was in the same half-conscious
state, apparently sensible only of bodily suffering, though he answered
when addressed, and no one was trusted to speak to him but Flora and
Ernescliffe.

The rest wore through the day as best they might. Harry slept a good
deal, Ethel read to herself, and tried to get Norman to look at passages
which she liked, Mary kept the little ones from being troublesome, and
at last took them to peep behind the school-room blinds for Richard’s
coming.

There was a simultaneous shout when, at four o’clock, they caught sight
of him, and though, at Ethel’s exclamation of wonder, Mary and Tom hung
their heads at having forgotten themselves, the association of gladness
in seeing Richard was refreshing; the sense of being desolate and
forsaken was relieved, and they knew that now they had one to rely on
and to comfort them.

Harry hastened to open the front door, and Richard, with his small
trim figure, and fresh, fair young face, flushed, though not otherwise
agitated, was among them, almost devoured by the younger ones, and
dealing out quiet caresses to them, as he caught from the words and
looks of the others that at least his father and sister were no worse.
Mr. Wilmot had come with him, but only stayed to hear the tidings.

“Can I see papa?” were Richard’s first audible words--all the rest had
been almost dumb show.

Ethel thought not, but took him to Margaret’s room, where he stood for
many minutes without speaking; then whispered to Flora that he must go
to the others, she should call him if--and went down, followed by Ethel.

Tom and Blanche had fallen into teasing tricks, a sort of melancholy
play to relieve the tedium. They grew cross. Norman was roused to
reprove sharply, and Blanche was beginning to cry. But Richard’s
entrance set all at peace--he sat down among them, and, with soft voice
and arm round Blanche, as she leaned against him, made her good in a
moment; and she listened while he talked over with Norman and Ethel all
they could bear to speak of.

Late in the day Flora came into her father’s room, and stood gazing
at him, as he lay with eyes closed, breathing heavily, and his brows
contracted by pain. She watched him with piteous looks, as if imploring
him to return to his children. Poor girl, to-day’s quiet, after the last
evening’s bustle, was hard to bear. She had then been distracted from
thought by the necessity of exertion, but it now repaid itself, and she
knew not how to submit to do nothing but wait and watch.

“No change?” enquired Alan Ernescliffe; looking kindly in her face.

“No,” replied she in a low, mournful tone. “She only once said, thank
you.”

A voice which she did not expect, asked inquiringly, “Margaret?” and her
heart beat as if it would take away her breath, as she saw her father’s
eyes intently fixed on her. “Did you speak of her?” he repeated.

“Yes, dear papa,” said Flora, not losing presence of mind, though in
extreme fear of what the next question might be. “She is quiet and
comfortable, so don’t be uneasy, pray.”

“Let me hear,” he said, and his whole voice and air showed him to be
entirely roused. “There is injury? What is it--”

He continued his inquiries till Flora was obliged fully to explain her
sister’s condition, and then he dismayed her by saying he would get up
and go to see her. Much distressed, she begged him not to think of it,
and appealed to Alan, who added his entreaties that he would at least
wait for Mr. Ward; but the doctor would not relinquish his purpose, and
sent her to give notice that he was coming.

Mr. Ernescliffe followed her out of the room, and tried to console her,
as she looked at him in despair.

“You see he is quite himself, quite collected,” he said; “you heard now
clear and coherent his questions were.”

“Can’t it be helped? Do try to stop him till I can send to Mr. Ward.”

“I will try, but I think he is in a state to judge for himself. I do,
upon my word; and I believe trying to prevent him would be more likely
to do him harm than letting him satisfy himself. I really think you need
not be alarmed.”

“But you know,” said Flora, coming nearer, and almost gasping as she
whispered and signed towards the door, “she is there--it is mamma’s
room, that will tell all.”

“I believe he knows,” said Alan. “It was that which made him faint
after the accident, for he had his perceptions fully at first. I have
suspected all day that he was more himself than he seemed, but I think
he could not bear to awaken his mind to understand it, and that he was
afraid to hear about her--your sister, so that our mention of her was a
great relief, and did him good. I am convinced he knows the rest. Only
go on, be calm, as you have been, and we shall do very well.”

Flora went to prepare. Ethel eagerly undertook to send to Mr. Ward, and
hastened from the room, as if in a sort of terror, shrinking perhaps
from what might lead to an outburst of grief. She longed to have seen
her father, but was frightened at the chance of meeting him. When she
had sent her message, and told her brothers what was passing, she went
and lingered on the stairs and in the passage for tidings. After what
seemed a long time, Flora came out, and hastened to the nursery, giving
her intelligence on the way.

“Better than could be hoped, he walked alone into the room, and was
quite calm and composed. Oh! if this will not hurt him, if the seeing
baby was but over!”

“Does he want her?”

“Yes, he would have come up here himself, but I would not let him.
Nurse, do you hear? Papa wants baby; let me have her.”

“Bless me, Miss Flora, you can’t hold her while you are all of a
tremble! And he has been to Miss Margaret?”

“Yes, nurse, and he was only rather stiff and lame.”

“Did Margaret seem to know him?” said Ethel.

“She just answered in that dreamy way when he spoke to her. He says
he thinks it is as Mr. Ward believes, and that she will soon come to
herself. He is quite able to consider--”

“And he knows all?”

“I am sure he does. He desired to see baby, and he wants you, nurse.
Only mind you command yourself--don’t say a word you can help--do
nothing to agitate him.”

Nurse promised, but the tears came so fast, and sobs with them, as
she approached her master’s room, that Flora saw no composure could
be expected from her; and taking the infant from her, carried it in,
leaving the door open for her to follow when wanted. Ethel stood by
listening. There was silence at first, then some sounds from the baby,
and her father’s voice soothing it, in his wonted caressing phrases and
tones, so familiar that they seemed to break the spell, drive away her
vague terrors, and restore her father. Her heart bounded, and a sudden
impulse carried her to the bedside, at once forgetting all dread of
seeing him, and chance of doing him harm. He lay, holding the babe close
to him, and his face was not altered, so that there was nothing in the
sight to impress her with the need of caution, and, to the consternation
of the anxious Flora, she exclaimed, abruptly and vehemently, “Papa!
should not she be christened?”

Dr. May looked up at Ethel, then at the infant; “Yes,” he said, “at
once.” Then added feebly and languidly, “Some one must see to it.”

There was a pause, while Flora looked reproachfully at her sister, and
Ethel became conscious of her imprudence, but in a few moments Dr. May
spoke again, first to the baby, and then asking, “Is Richard here?”

“Yes, papa.”

“Send him up presently. Where’s nurse?”

Ethel retreated, much alarmed at her rash measure, and when she related
it she saw that Richard and Mr. Ernescliffe both thought it had been a
great hazard.

“Papa wants you,” was a welcome sound to the ears of Richard, and
brought a pink glow into his face. He was never one who readily showed
his feelings, and there was no danger of his failing in self-command,
though grievously downcast, not only at the loss of the tender mother,
who had always stood between him and his father’s impatience, but by
the dread that he was too dull and insignificant to afford any help or
comfort in his father’s dire affliction.

Yet there was something in the gentle sad look that met him, and in the
low tone of the “How d’ye do, Ritchie?” that drove off a thought of not
being loved; and when Dr. May further added, “You’ll see about it all--I
am glad you are come,” he knew he was of use, and was encouraged and
cheered. That his father had full confidence and reliance in him, and
that his presence was a satisfaction and relief he could no longer
doubt; and this was a drop of balm beyond all his hopes; for loving
and admiring his father intensely, and with depressed spirits and a low
estimate of himself, he had begun to fancy himself incapable of being
anything but a vexation and burden.

He sat with his father nearly all the evening, and was to remain with
him at night. The rest were comforted by the assurance that Dr. May was
still calm, and did not seem to have been injured by what had passed.
Indeed, it seemed as if the violence and suddenness of the shock,
together with his state of suffering, had deadened his sensations; for
there was far less agitation about him than could have been thought
possible in a man of such strong, warm affections and sensitive
temperament.

Ethel and Norman went up arm-in-arm at bedtime.

“I am going to ask if I may wish papa good-night,” said Ethel. “Shall I
say anything about your coming?”

Norman hesitated, but his cheeks blanched; he shuddered, shook his head
without speaking, ran up after Harry, and waved her back when she would
have followed.

Richard told her that she might come in, and, as she slowly advanced,
she thought she had never seen anything so ineffably mournful as
the affectionate look on her father’s face. She held his hand and
ventured--for it was with difficulty she spoke--to hope he was not in
pain.

“Better than it was, thank you, my dear,” he said, in a soft weak tone:
then, as she bent down to kiss his brow; “you must take care of the
little ones.”

“Yes, papa,” she could hardly answer, and a large drop gathered slowly
in each eye, long in coming, as if the heart ached too much for them to
flow freely.

“Are they all well?”

“Yes, papa.”

“And good?” He held her hand, as if lengthening the interview.

“Yes, very good all day.”

A long deep sigh. Ethel’s two tears stood on her cheeks.

“My love to them all. I hope I shall see them to-morrow. God bless you,
my dear, good-night.”

Ethel went upstairs, saddened and yet soothed. The calm silent sorrow,
too deep for outward tokens, was so unlike her father’s usually
demonstrative habits, as to impress her all the more, yet those two
tears were followed by no more; there was much strangeness and confusion
in her mind in the newness of grief.

She found poor Flora, spent with exertion, under the reaction of all she
had undergone, lying on her bed, sobbing as if her heart would break,
calling in gasps of irrepressible agony on “mamma! mamma!” yet with
her face pressed down on the pillow that she might not be heard. Ethel,
terrified and distressed, timidly implored her to be comforted, but it
seemed as if she were not even heard; she would have fetched some one,
but whom? Alas! alas! it brought back the sense that no mother would
ever soothe them--Margaret, papa, both so ill, nurse engaged with
Margaret! Ethel stood helpless and despairing, and Flora sobbed on, so
that Mary awakened to burst out in a loud frightened fit of crying; but
in a few moments a step was at the door, a knock, and Richard asked, “Is
anything the matter?”

He was in the room in a moment, caressing and saying affectionate things
with gentleness and fondling care, like his mother, and which recalled
the days when he had been proud to be left for a little while the small
nurse and guardian of the lesser ones. Mary was hushed in a moment, and
Flora’s exhausted weeping was gradually soothed, when she was able
to recollect that she was keeping him from her father; with kind
good-nights, he left Ethel to read to her till she could sleep. Long did
Ethel read, after both her sisters were slumbering soundly; she went on
in a sort of dreamy grief, almost devoid of pain, as if all this was too
terrible to be true: and she had imagined herself into a story, which
would give place at dawn to her ordinary life.

At last she went to bed, and slept till wakened by the return of Flora,
who had crept down in her dressing-gown to see how matters were going.
Margaret was in the same state, papa was asleep, after a restless
distressing night, with much pain and some fever; and whenever Richard
had begun to hope from his tranquillity, that he was falling asleep,
he was undeceived by hearing an almost unconsciously uttered sigh of
“Maggie, my Maggie!” and then the head turned wearily on the pillow,
as if worn out with the misery from which there was no escape. Towards
morning the pain had lessened, and, as he slept, he seemed much less
feverish than they could have ventured to expect.

Norman looked wan and wretched, and could taste no breakfast; indeed
Harry reported that he had been starting and talking in his sleep half
the night, and had proceeded to groaning and crying out till, when it
could be borne no longer, Harry waked him, and finished his night’s rest
in peace.

The children were kept in the drawing-room that morning, and there were
strange steps in the house; but only Richard and Mr. Ernescliffe knew
the reason. Happily there had been witnesses enough of the overturn to
spare any reference to Dr. May--the violent start of the horses had been
seen, and Adams and Mr. Ernescliffe agreed, under their breath, that the
new black one was not fit to drive, while the whole town was so used to
Dr. May’s headlong driving, that every one was recollecting their
own predictions of accidents. There needed little to account for the
disaster--the only wonder was that it had not happened sooner.

“I say,” announced Harry, soon after they were released again, “I’ve
been in to papa. His door was open, and he heard me, and called me. He
says he should like any of us to come in and see him. Hadn’t you better
go, Norman?”

Norman started up, and walked hastily out of the room, but his hand
shook so, that he could hardly open the door; and Ethel, seeing how it
was with him, followed him quickly, as he dashed, at full speed, up the
stairs. At the top, however, he was forced to cling to the rail, gasping
for breath, while the moisture started on his forehead.

“Dear Norman,” she said, “there’s nothing to mind. He looks just as
usual. You would not know there was anything the matter.” But he rested
his head on his hand, and looked as if he could not stir. “I see it
won’t do,” said Ethel--“don’t try--you will be better by-and-by, and he
has not asked for you in particular.”

“I won’t be beat by such stuff,” said Norman, stepping hastily forwards,
and opening the door suddenly. He got through the greeting pretty well,
there was no need for him to speak, he only gave his hand and looked
away, unable to bring himself to turn his eyes on his father, and afraid
of letting his own face be seen. Almost at the same moment, nurse
came to say something about Margaret, and he seized the opportunity of
withdrawing his hand, and hurrying away, in good time, for he was pale
as death, and was obliged to sit down on the head of the stairs, and
lean his head against Etheldred.

“What does make me so ridiculous?” he exclaimed faintly, but very
indignantly.

The first cure was the being forced to clear out of Mr. Ward’s way,
which he could not effect without being seen; and Ethel though she knew
that he would be annoyed, was not sorry to be obliged to remain, and
tell what was the matter with him. “Oh,” said Mr. Ward, turning and
proceeding to the dining-room, “I’ll set that to rights in a minute, if
you will ask for a tumbler of hot water Miss Ethel.”

And armed with the cordial he had prepared, Ethel hunted up her brother,
and persuaded him, after scolding her a little, to swallow it, and take
a turn in the garden; after which he made a more successful attempt at
visiting his father.

There was another room whither both Norman and Etheldred wished to go,
though they dared not hint at their desire. At last Richard came
to them, as they were wandering in the garden, and, with his usual
stillness of manner, shaded with additional seriousness, said, “Would
you like to come into the study?”

Etheldred put one hand into his, Norman took the other, and soon
they stood in that calm presence. Fair, cold, white, and intensely
still--that face brought home to them the full certainty that the warm
brightening look would never beam on them, the soft blue eyes never
guide, check, and watch them, the smile never approve or welcome them.
To see her unconscious of their presence was too strange and sad,
and all were silent, till, as they left the room, Ethel looked out at
Blanche and Aubrey in the garden. “They will never remember her! Oh! why
should it be?”

Richard would fain have moralised and comforted, but she felt as if she
knew it all before, and heard with languid attention. She had rather
read than talk, and he sat down to write letters.

There were no near relations to be sent for. Dr. May was an only son,
and his wife’s sister, Mrs. Arnott, was in New Zealand; her brother
had long been dead, and his widow, who lived in Edinburgh, was scarcely
known to the May family. Of friends there were many, fast bound by
affection and gratitude, and notes, inquiries, condolences, and offers
of service came in thickly, and gave much occupation to Flora, Richard,
and Alan Ernescliffe, in turn. No one from without could do anything for
them--they had all the help they wanted in Miss Winter and in Alan, who
was invaluable in sharing with Richard the care of the doctor, as well
as in giving him the benefit of his few additional years’ experience,
and relieving him of some of his tasks. He was indeed like one of
themselves, and a most valuable help and comforter. Mr. Wilmot gave them
all the time he could, and on this day saw the doctor, who seemed to
find some solace in his visit, though saying very little.

On this day the baby was to be baptized. The usual Stoneborough fashion
was to collect all the christenings for the month into one Sunday,
except those for such persons as thought themselves too refined to see
their children christened before the congregation, and who preferred
an empty church and a week-day. The little one had waited till she was
nearly six weeks old for “a Christening Sunday,” and since that had been
missed, she could not be kept unbaptized for another month; so, late in
the day, she was carried to church.

Richard had extremely gratified old nurse, by asking her to represent
poor Margaret; Mrs. Hoxton stood for the other godmother, and Alan
Ernescliffe was desired to consider himself absolutely her sponsor, not
merely a proxy. The younger children alone were to go with them: it
was too far off, and the way lay too much through the town for it to
be thought proper for the others to go. Ethel wished it very much, and
thought it nonsense to care whether people looked at her; and in spite
of Miss Winter’s seeming shocked at her proposing it, had a great mind
to persist. She would even have appealed to her papa, if Flora had
not stopped her, exclaiming, “Really, Ethel, I think there never was a
person so entirely without consideration as you are.”

Much abashed, Ethel humbly promised that if she might go into papa’s
room, she would not say one word about the christening, unless he should
begin, and, to her great satisfaction, he presently asked her to read
the service to him. Flora came to the doorway of Margaret’s room, and
listened; when she had finished, all were silent.

“How shall we, how can we virtuously bring up our motherless little
sister?” was the thought with each of the girls. The answers were, in
one mind, “I trust we shall do well by her, dear little thing. I see, on
an emergency, that I know how to act. I never thought I was capable of
being of so much use, thanks to dear, dear mamma’s training. I shall
manage, I am sure, and so they will all depend on me, and look up to me.
How nice it was to hear dear papa say what he did about the comfort of
my being able to look after Margaret.”

In the other, “Poor darling, it is saddest of all for her, because she
knows nothing, and will never remember her mamma! But if Margaret is but
better, she will take care of her, and oh how we ought to try--and I,
such a naughty wild thing--if I should hurt the dear little ones by
carelessness, or by my bad example! Oh! what shall I do, for want of
some one to keep me in order? If I should vex papa by any of my wrong
ways!”

They heard the return of the others, and the sisters both sprang up,
“May we bring her to you?” said Flora.

“Yes, do, my dears.”

The sisters all came down together with the little one, and Flora put
her down within the arm her father stretched out for her. He gazed into
the baby face, which, in its expressionless placidity, almost recalled
her mother’s tranquil sweetness.

“Gertrude Margaret,” said Flora, and with a look that had more of
tenderness than grief, he murmured, “My Daisy blossom, my little
Maggie.”

“Might we?” said Ethel, when Flora took her again, “might we take her to
her godmother to see if she would notice her?”

He looked as if he wished it; but said, “No, I think not, better not
rouse her,” and sighed heavily; then, as they stood round his bed,
unwilling to go, he added, “Girls, we must learn carefulness and
thoughtfulness. We have no one to take thought for us now.”

Flora pressed the babe in her arms, Ethel’s two reluctant tears stood
on her cheeks, Mary exclaimed, “I’ll try not to be naughty;” and Blanche
climbed up to kiss him, saying, “I will be always good papa.”

“Daisy--papa’s Daisy--your vows are made,” whispered Ethel, gaining sole
possession of the babe for a minute. “You have promised to be good and
holy. We have the keeping of you, mamma’s precious flower, her pearl
of truth! Oh, may God guard you to be an unstained jewel, till you come
back to her again--and a blooming flower, till you are gathered into the
wreath that never fades--my own sweet poor little motherless Daisy!”




CHAPTER V.



     “Through lawless camp, through ocean wild,
     Her prophet eye pursues her child;
     Scans mournfully her poet’s strain,
     Fears for her merchant, loss alike and gain.”
                                           LYRA INNOCENTIUM.


Dr. May took the management of himself into his own hands, and paid
so little attention to Mr. Ward’s recommendations that his sons and
daughters were in continual dread of his choosing to do something that
might cause injurious agitation.

However, he did not go further than Margaret’s bedroom where he sat
hour after hour his eyes fixed upon her, as she continued in a state
bordering on insensibility. He took little notice of anything else,
and hardly spoke. There were heavy sighs now and then, but Richard and
Flora, one or other of whom were always watching him, could hardly tell
whether to ascribe them to the oppression of sorrow or of suffering.
Their great fear was of his insisting on seeing his wife’s face, and it
was a great relief that he never alluded to her, except once, to desire
Richard to bring him her ring. Richard silently obeyed, and, without a
word, he placed it on his little finger. Richard used to read the Psalms
to him in the morning, before he was up, and Flora would bring little
Daisy and lay her by his side.

To the last moment they dreaded his choosing to attend the funeral, and
Flora had decided on remaining at home, though trembling at the thought
of what there might be to go through. They tried to let him hear nothing
about it, but he seemed to know everything; and when Flora came into
Margaret’s room without her bonnet, he raised his head, and said, “I
thought you were all going.”

“The others are--but may I not stay with you and her, papa?”

“I had rather be alone, my dears. I will take care of her. I should wish
you all to be there.”

They decided that his wishes ought to be followed, and that the patients
must be entrusted to old nurse. Richard told Flora, who looked very
pale, that she would be glad of it afterwards, and she had his arm to
lean upon.

The grave was in the cloister attached to the minster, a smooth green
square of turf, marked here and there with small flat lozenges of stone,
bearing the date and initials of those who lay there, and many of them
recording former generations of Mays, to whom their descent from the
headmaster had given a right of burial there. Dr. Hoxton, Mr. Wilmot,
and the surgeon, were the only friends whom Richard had asked to be
with them, but the minster was nearly full, for there was a very
strong attachment and respect for Dr. and Mrs. May throughout the
neighbourhood, and every one’s feelings were strongly excited.

“In the midst of life, we are in death--” There was a universal sound
as of a sort of sob, that Etheldred never disconnected from those words.
Yet hardly one tear was shed by the young things who stood as close as
they could round the grave. Harry and Mary did indeed lock their hands
together tightly, and the shoulders of the former shook as he stood,
bowing down his head, but the others were still and quiet, in part from
awe and bewilderment, but partly, too, from a sense that it was against
her whole nature that there should be clamorous mourning for her. The
calm still day seemed to tell them the same, the sun beaming softly on
the gray arches and fresh grass, the sky clear and blue, and the trees
that showed over the walls bright with autumn colouring, all suitable to
the serenity of a life unclouded to its last moment. Some of them felt
as if it were better to be there than in their saddened desolate home.

But home they must go, and, before going upstairs, as Flora and
Etheldred stood a moment or two with Norman, Ethel said in a tone of
resolution, and of some cheerfulness, “Well, we have to begin afresh.”

“Yes,” said Flora, “it is a great responsibility. I do trust we may be
enabled to do as we ought.”

“And now Margaret is getting better, she will be our stay,” said Ethel.

“I must go to her,” and Flora went upstairs.

“I wish I could be as useful as Flora,” said Ethel; but I mean to try,
and if I can but keep out of mischief, it will be something.

“There is an object for all one does, in trying to be a comfort to
papa.”

“That’s no use,” said Norman, listlessly. “We never can.”

“Oh, but, Norman, he won’t be always as he is now--I am sure he cares
for us enough to be pleased, if we do right and get on.”

“We used to be so happy!” said Norman.

Ethel hesitated a little, and presently answered, “I don’t think it can
be right to lament for our own sakes so much, is it?”

“I don’t want to do so,” said Norman, in the same dejected way.

“I suppose we ought not to feel it either.” Norman only shook his head.
“We ought to think of her gain. You can’t? Well, I am glad, for no more
can I. I can’t think of her liking for papa and baby and all of us to
be left to ourselves. But that’s not right of me, and of course it all
comes right where she is; so I always put that out of my head, and think
what is to come next in doing, and pleasing papa, and learning.”

“That’s grown horrid,” said Norman. “There’s no pleasure in getting on,
nor in anything.”

“Don’t you care for papa and all of us being glad, Norman?” As Norman
could not just then say that he did, he would not answer.

“I wish--” said Ethel, disappointed, but cheering up the next minute. “I
do believe it is having nothing to do. You will be better when you get
back to school on Monday.”

“That is worst of all!”

“You don’t like going among the boys again? But that must be done some
time or other. Or shall I get Richard to speak to Dr. Hoxton to let you
have another week’s leave?”

“No, no, don’t be foolish. It can’t be helped.”

“I am very sorry, but I think you will be better for it.”

She almost began to fancy herself unfeeling, when she found him so much
more depressed than she was herself, and unable to feel it a relief to
know that the time of rest and want of occupation was over. She thought
it light-minded, though she could not help it, to look forward to
the daily studies where she might lose her sad thoughts and be as if
everything were as usual. But suppose she should be to blame, where
would now be the gentle discipline? Poor Ethel’s feelings were not such
as to deserve the imputation of levity, when this thought came over
her; but her buoyant mind, always seeking for consolation, recurred to
Margaret’s improvement, and she fixed her hopes on her.

Margaret was more alive to surrounding objects, and, when roused, she
knew them all, answered clearly when addressed, had even, more than
once, spoken of her own accord, and shown solicitude at the sight of her
father’s bandaged, helpless arm, but he soon soothed this away. He was
more than ever watchful over her, and could scarcely be persuaded to
leave her for one moment, in his anxiety to be at hand to answer, when
first she should speak of her mother, a moment apprehended by all the
rest, almost as much for his sake as for hers.

So clear had her perceptions been, and so much more awake did she
appear, on this evening, that he expected the inquiry to come every
moment, and lingered in her room; till she asked the hour, and begged
him to go to bed.

As he bent over her, she looked up in his face, and said softly, “Dear
papa.”

There was that in her tone which showed she perceived the truth, and he
knelt by her side kissing her, but not daring to relax his restraint of
feeling.

“Dear papa,” she said again, “I hope I shall soon be better, and be some
comfort to you.”

“My best--my own--my comfort,” he murmured, all he could say without
giving way.

“Baby--is she well?”

“Yes, thank Heaven, she has not suffered at all.”

“I heard her this morning, I must see her to-morrow. But don’t stay,
dear, dear papa, it is late, and I am sure you are not at all well. Your
arm--is it very much hurt?”

“It is nothing you need think about, my dear. I am much better than I
could have imagined possible.”

“And you have been nursing me all the time! Papa, you must let me take
care of you now. Do pray go to bed at once, and get up late. Nurse will
take good care of me. Good-night, dear papa.”

When Dr. May had left her, and tried to tell Richard how it had been,
the tears cut him short, and had their free course; but there was much
of thankfulness, for it might be looked on as the restoration of his
daughter; the worst was over, and the next day he was able to think of
other things, had more attention to spare for the rest, and when the
surgeon came, took some professional interest in the condition of his
own arm, inquired after his patients, and even talked of visiting them.

In the meantime, Margaret sent for her eldest brother, begging him to
tell her the whole, and it was heard as calmly and firmly as it was
told. Her bodily state lulled her mind; and besides it was not new; she
had observed much while her faculties were still too much benumbed for
her to understand all, or to express her feelings. Her thoughts seemed
chiefly occupied with her father. She made Richard explain to her
the injury he had suffered, and begged to know whether his constant
attendance on her could do him harm. She was much rejoiced when her
brother assured her that nothing could be better for him, and she
began to say, with a smile, that very likely her being hurt had been
fortunate. She asked who had taken care of him before Richard’s arrival,
and was pleased to hear that it was Mr. Ernescliffe. A visit from the
little Gertrude Margaret was happily accomplished, and, on the whole,
the day was most satisfactory--she herself declaring that she could not
see that there was anything the matter with her, except that she felt
lazy, and did not seem able to move.

Thus the next Sunday morning dawned with more cheerfulness. Dr. May came
downstairs for the first time, in order to go to church with his whole
flock, except the two Margarets. He looked very wan and shattered, but
they clustered gladly round him, when he once more stood among them,
little Blanche securing his hand, and nodding triumphantly to Mr.
Ernescliffe, as much as to say, “Now I have him, I don’t want you.”

Norman alone was missing; but he was in his place at church among the
boys. Again, in returning, he slipped out of the party, and was at
home the first, and when this recurred in the afternoon Ethel began
to understand his motive. The High Street led past the spot where the
accident had taken place, though neither she nor any of the others knew
exactly where it was, except Norman, on whose mind the scene was branded
indelibly; she guessed that it was to avoid it that he went along what
was called Randall’s Alley, his usual short cut to school.

The Sunday brought back to the children that there was no one to hear
their hymns; but Richard was a great comfort, watching over the little
ones more like a sister than a brother. Ethel was ashamed of herself
when she saw him taking thought for them, tying Blanche’s bonnet,
putting Aubrey’s gloves on, teaching them to put away their Sunday toys,
as if he meant them to be as neat and precise as himself.

Dr. May did not encounter the family dinner, nor attempt a second going
to church; but Blanche was very glorious as she led him down to drink
tea, and, before going up again, he had a conversation with Alan
Ernescliffe, who felt himself obliged to leave Stoneborough early on the
morrow.

“I can endure better to go now,” said he, “and I shall hear of you
often; Hector will let me know, and Richard has promised to write.”

“Ay, you must let us often have a line. I should guess you were a
letter-writing man.”

“I have hitherto had too few friends who cared to hear of me to write
much, but the pleasure of knowing that any interest is taken in me
here--”

“Well,” said the doctor, “mind that a letter will always be welcome, and
when you are coming southwards, here are your old quarters. We cannot
lose sight of you anyway, especially”--and his voice quivered--“after
the help you gave my poor boys and girls in their distress.”

“It would be the utmost satisfaction to think I had been of the smallest
use,” said Alan, hiding much under these commonplace words.

“More than I know,” said Dr. May; “too much to speak of. Well, we shall
see you again, though it is a changed place, and you must come and see
your god-daughter--poor child--may she only be brought up as her sisters
were! They will do their best, poor things, and so must I, but it is sad
work!”

Both were too much overcome for words, but the doctor was the first to
continue, as he took off his dimmed spectacles. He seemed to wish to
excuse himself for giving way; saying, with a look that would fain have
been a smile, “The world has run so light and easy with me hitherto,
that you see I don’t know how to bear with trouble. All thinking and
managing fell to my Maggie’s share, and I had as little care on my hands
as one of my own boys--poor fellows. I don’t know how it is to turn out,
but of all the men on earth to be left with eleven children, I should
choose myself as the worst.”

Alan tried to say somewhat of “Confidence--affection--daughters,” and
broke down, but it did as well as if it had been connected.

“Yes, yes,” said the doctor, “they are good children every one of them.
There’s much to be thankful for, if one could only pluck up heart to
feel it.”

“And you are convinced that Marga--that Miss May is recovering.”

“She has made a great advance today. The head is right, at least,” but
the doctor looked anxious and spoke low as he said, “I am not satisfied
about her yet. That want of power over the limbs, is more than the mere
shock and debility, as it seems to me, though Ward thinks otherwise,
and I trust he is right, but I cannot tell yet as to the spine. If
this should not soon mend I shall have Fleet to see her. He was a
fellow-student of mine very clever, and I have more faith in him than in
any one else in that line.”

“By all means--Yes,” said Alan, excessively shocked. “But you will let
me know how she goes on--Richard will be so kind.”

“We will not fail,” said Dr May more and more touched at the sight of
the young sailor struggling in vain to restrain his emotion, “you shall
hear. I’ll write myself as soon as I can use my hand, but I hope she may
be all right long before that is likely to be.”

“Your kindness--” Alan attempted to say, but began again. “Feeling as I
must--” then interrupting himself. “I beg your pardon, ‘tis no fit time,
nor fit--But you’ll let me hear.”

“That I will,” said Dr May, and as Alan hastily left the room, he
continued, half aloud, to himself, “Poor boy! poor fellow. I see. No
wonder! Heaven grant I have not been the breaking of their two young
hearts, as well as my own! Maggie looked doubtful--as much as she ever
did when my mind was set on a thing, when I spoke of bringing him here.
But after all, she liked him as much as the rest of us did--she could
not wish it otherwise--he is one of a thousand, and worthy of our
Margaret. That he is! and Maggie thinks so. If he gets on in his
profession, why then we shall see--” but the sigh of anguish of mind
here showed that the wound had but been forgotten for one moment.

“Pshaw! What am I running on to? I’m all astray for want of her! My poor
girl--”

Mr Ernescliffe set out before sunrise. The boys were up to wish him
good-bye, and so were Etheldred and Mary, and some one else, for while
the shaking of hands was going on in the hall there was a call, “Mr
Ernthcliffe,” and over the balusters peeped a little rough curly head, a
face glowing with carnation deepened by sleep, and a round, plump, bare
arm and shoulder, and down at Alan’s feet there fell a construction of
white and pink paper, while a voice lisped out, “Mr Ernthcliffe, there’s
a white rothe for you.”

An indignant “Miss Blanche!” was heard behind and there was no certainty
that any thanks reached the poor little heroine, who was evidently borne
off summarily to the nursery, while Ethel gave way to a paroxysm of
suppressed laughter, joined in, more or less, by all the rest, and thus
Alan, promising faithfully to preserve the precious token, left Dr May’s
door, not in so much outward sorrow as he had expected.

Even their father laughed at the romance of the white “rothe,” and
declared Blanche was a dangerous young lady; but the story was less
successful with Miss Winter, who gravely said it was no wonder since
Blanche’s elder sister had been setting her the example of forwardness
in coming down in this way after Mr. Ernescliffe. Ethel was very angry,
and was only prevented from vindicating herself by remembering there
was no peacemaker now, and that she had resolved only to think of Miss
Winter’s late kindness, and bear with her tiresome ways.

Etheldred thought herself too sorrowful to be liable to her usual faults
which would seem so much worse now; but she found herself more irritable
than usual, and doubly heedless, because her mind was preoccupied. She
hated herself, and suffered more from sorrow than even at the first
moment, for now she felt what it was to have no one to tame her, no eye
over her; she found herself going a tort et a travers all the morning,
and with no one to set her right. Since it was so the first day, what
would follow?

Mary was on the contrary so far subdued, as to be exemplary in goodness
and diligence, and Blanche was always steady. Flora was too busy to
think of the school-room, for the whole house was on her hands, besides
the charge of Margaret, while Dr. May went to the hospital, and
to sundry patients, and they thought he seemed the better for the
occupation, as well as gratified and affected by the sympathy he
everywhere met with from high and low.

The boys were at school, unseen except when at the dinner play-hour
Norman ran home to ask after his father and sister; but the most trying
time was at eight in the evening, when they came home. That was wont to
be the merriest part of the whole day, the whole family collected,
papa at leisure and ready for talk or for play, mamma smiling over her
work-basket, the sisters full of chatter, the brothers full of fun, all
the tidings of the day discussed, and nothing unwelcome but bedtime. How
different now! The doctor was with Margaret, and though Richard tried to
say something cheerful as his brothers entered, there was no response,
and they sat down on the opposite sides of the fire, forlorn and silent,
till Richard, who was printing some letters on card-board to supply the
gaps in Aubrey’s ivory Alphabet, called Harry to help him; but Ethel,
as she sat at work, could only look at Norman, and wish she could devise
anything likely to gratify him.

After a time Flora came down, and laying some sheets of closely written
note-paper before her sister, said, “Here is dear mamma’s unfinished
letter to Aunt Flora. Papa says we elder ones are to read it. It is a
description of us all, and very much indeed we ought to learn from it. I
shall keep a copy of it.”

Flora took up her work, and began to consult with Richard, while Ethel
moved to Norman’s side, and kneeling so as to lean against his shoulder,
as he sat on a low cushion, they read their mother’s last letter by
the fire-light, with indescribable feelings, as they went through the
subjects that had lately occupied them, related by her who would never
be among them again. After much of this kind, for her letters to Mrs.
Arnott were almost journals, came,


“You say it is long since you had a portrait gallery of the chicken
daisies, and if I do not write in these leisure days, you will hardly
get it after I am in the midst of business again. The new Daisy is like
Margaret at the same age--may she continue like her! Pretty creature,
she can hardly be more charming than at present. Aubrey, the moon-faced,
is far from reconciled to his disposition from babyhood; he is a sober,
solemn gentleman, backward in talking, and with such a will of his own,
as will want much watching; very different from Blanche, who is Flora
over again, perhaps prettier and more fairy-like, unless this is only
one’s admiration for the buds of the present season. None of them has
ever been so winning as this little maid, who even attracts Dr. Hoxton
himself, and obtains sugar-plums and kisses. ‘Rather she than I,’ says
Harry, but notice is notice to the white Mayflower, and there is my
anxiety--I am afraid it is not wholesome to be too engaging ever to get
a rebuff. I hope having a younger sister, and outgrowing baby charms may
be salutary. Flora soon left off thinking about her beauty, and the fit
of vanity does less harm at five than fifteen. My poor Tom has not such
a happy life as Blanche, he is often in trouble at lessons, and bullied
by Harry at play, in spite of his champion, Mary; and yet I cannot
interfere, for it is good for him to have all this preparatory teasing
before he goes into school. He has good abilities, but not much
perseverance or energy, and I must take the teaching of him into my
own hands till his school-days begin, in hopes of instilling them.
The girlishness and timidity will be knocked out of him by the boys,
I suppose; Harry is too kind and generous to do more than tease him
moderately, and Norman will see that it does not go too far. It is a
common saying that Tom and Mary made a mistake, that he is the girl,
and she the boy, for she is a rough, merry creature, the noisiest in the
house, always skirmishing with Harry in defence of Tom, and yet devoted
to him, and wanting to do everything he does. Those two, Harry and Mary,
are exactly alike, except for Harry’s curly mane of lion-coloured wig.
The yellow-haired laddie, is papa’s name for Harry, which he does not
mind from him, though furious if the girls attempt to call him so.
Harry is the thorough boy of the family, all spirit, recklessness, and
mischief, but so true, and kind, and noble-hearted, that one loves him
the better after every freely confessed scrape. I cannot tell you how
grateful I am to my boy for his perfect confidence, the thing that
chiefly lessens my anxiety for him in his half-school, half-home life,
which does not seem to me to work quite well with him. There are two
sons of Mrs. Anderson’s at the school, who are more his friends than I
like, and he is too easily led by the desire not to be outdone, and to
show that he fears nothing. Lately, our sailor-guest has inspired him
with a vehement wish to go to sea; I wish it was not necessary that the
decision should be made so early in life, for this fault is just what
would make us most fear to send him into the world very young, though in
some ways it might not do amiss for him.

“So much for the younger bairns, whom you never beheld, dear Flora.
The three whom you left, when people used to waste pity on me for their
being all babies together, now look as if any pair of them were twins,
for Norman is the tallest, almost outgrowing his strength, and Ethel’s
sharp face, so like her papa’s, makes her look older than Flora. Norman
and Ethel do indeed take after their papa, more than any of the others,
and are much alike. There is the same brilliant cleverness, the same
strong feeling, not easy of demonstration, though impetuous in action;
but poor Ethel’s old foibles, her harum-scarum nature, quick temper,
uncouth manners, and heedlessness of all but one absorbing object, have
kept her back, and caused her much discomfort; yet I sometimes think
these manifest defects have occasioned a discipline that is the
best thing for the character in the end. They are faults that show
themselves, and which one can tell how to deal with, and I have full
confidence that she has the principle within her that will conquer
them.”

“If--” mournfully sighed Ethel; but her brother pointed on further.

“My great hope is her entire indifference to praise--not approval, but
praise. If she has not come up to her own standard, she works on, not
always with good temper, but perseveringly, and entirely, unheeding of
commendation till she has satisfied herself, only thinking it stupid not
to see the faults. It is this independence of praise that I want to see
in her brother and sister. They justly earn it, and are rightly pleased
with it; but I cannot feel sure whether they do not depend on it too
much. Norman lives, like all school-boys, a life of emulation, and has
never met with anything but success. I do believe Dr. Hoxton and
Mr. Wilmot are as proud of him as we are; and he has never shown any
tendency to conceit, but I am afraid he has the love of being foremost,
and pride in his superiority, caring for what he is, compared with
others, rather than what he is himself.”


“I know,” said Norman; “I have done so, but that’s over. I see what it
is worth. I’d give all the quam optimes I ever got in my life to be the
help Richard is to papa.”

“You would if you were his age.”

“Not I, I’m not the sort. I’m not like her. But are we to go on about
the elders?”

“Oh! yes, don’t let us miss a word. There can’t be anything but praise
of them.”


“Your sweet goddaughter. I almost feel as if I had spoken in
disparagement of her, but I meant no such thing, dear girl. It would be
hard to find a fault in her, since the childish love of admiration was
subdued. She is so solid and steady, as to be very valuable with the
younger ones, and is fast growing so lovely, that I wish you could
behold her. I do not see any vanity, but there lies my dread, not
of beauty--vanity, but that she will find temptation in the being
everywhere liked and sought after. As to Margaret, my precious companion
and friend, you have heard enough of her to know her, and, as to telling
you what she is like, I could as soon set about describing her papa.
When I thought of not being spared to them this time, it was happiness
indeed to think of her at their head, fit to be his companion, with so
much of his own talent as to be more up to conversation with him, than
he could ever have found his stupid old Maggie. It was rather a trial
of her discretion to have Mr. Ernescliffe here while I was upstairs,
and very well she seems to have come out of it. Poor Richard’s last
disappointment is still our chief trouble. He has been working hard with
a tutor all through the vacation, and has not even come home to see his
new sister, on his way to Oxford. He had made a resolution that he would
not come to us till he had passed, and his father thought it best that
it should be kept. I hope he will succeed next time, but his nervousness
renders it still more doubtful. With him it is the very reverse of
Norman. He suffers too much for want of commendation, and I cannot
wonder at it, when I see how much each failure vexes his father, and
Richard little knows how precious is our perfect confidence in him, how
much more valuable than any honours he could earn. You would be amused
to see how little he is altered from the pretty little fair fellow,
that you used to say was so like my old portrait, even the wavy rings of
light glossy hair sit on his forehead, just as you liked to twist them;
and his small trim figure is a fine contrast to Norman’s long legs and
arms, which--”


There the letter broke off, the playful affection of the last words
making it almost more painful to think that the fond hand would never
finish the sentence.




CHAPTER VI.



     A drooping daisy changed into a cup,
     In which her bright-eyed beauty is shut up.
                                          WORDSWORTH.


“So there you are up for the day--really you look very comfortable,”
 said Ethel, coming into the room where Margaret lay on her bed,
half-raised by pillows, supported by a wooden frame.

“Yes, is not it a charming contrivance of Richard’s? It quite gives me
the use of my hands,” said Margaret.

“I think he is doing something else for you,” said Ethel; “I heard him
carpentering at six o’clock this morning, but I suppose it is to be a
secret.”

“And don’t you admire her night-cap?” said Flora.

“Is it anything different?” said Ethel, peering closer. “Oh, I see--so
she has a fine day night-cap. Is that your taste, Flora?”

“Partly,” said Margaret, “and partly my own. I put in all these little
white puffs, and I hope you think they do me credit. Wasn’t it grand of
me?”

“She only despises you for them,” said Flora.

“I’m very glad you could,” said Ethel, gravely; “but do you know? it
is rather like that horrid old lady in some book, who had a paralytic
stroke, and the first thing she did that showed she had come to her
senses was to write, ‘Rose-coloured curtains for the doctors.’”

“Well, it was for the doctor,” said Margaret, “and it had its effect. He
told me I looked much better when he found me trying it on.”

“And did you really have the looking-glass and try it on?” cried Ethel.

“Yes, really,” said Flora. “Don’t you think one may as well be fit to be
seen if one is ill? It is no use to depress one’s friends by being more
forlorn and disconsolate than one can help.”

“No--not disconsolate,” said Ethel; “but the white puffiness--and the
hemming--and the glass!”

“Poor Ethel can’t get over it,” said Margaret. “But, Ethel, do you think
there is nothing disconsolate in untidiness?”

“You could be tidy without the little puffs! Your first bit of work too!
Don’t think I’m tiresome. If they were an amusement to you, I am sure I
am very glad of them, but I can’t see the sense of them.”

“Poor little things!” said Margaret laughing. “It is only my foible for
making a thing look nice. And, Ethel,” she added, drawing her down close
over her, “I did not think the trouble wasted, if seeing me look fresher
cheered up dear papa a moment.”

“I spoke to papa about nurse’s proposal,” said Margaret presently to
Flora, “and he quite agrees to it. Indeed it is impossible that Anne
should attend properly to all the children while nurse is so much
engaged with me.”

“I think so,” said Flora; “and it does not answer to bring Aubrey into
the school-room. It only makes Mary and Blanche idle, and Miss Winter
does not like it.”

“Then the question is, who shall it be? Nurse has no one in view, and
only protests against ‘one of the girls out of the school here.’”

“That’s a great pity,” said Flora. “Don’t you think we could make her
take to Jane White, she is so very nice.”

“I thought of her, but it will never answer if we displease nurse.
Besides, I remember at the time Anne came, dear mamma thought there was
danger of a girl’s having too many acquaintances, especially taking the
children out walking. We cannot always be sure of sending her out with
Anne.”

“Do you remember--” said Ethel, there stopping.

“Well,” said both sisters.

“Don’t you recollect, Flora, that girl whose father was in the
hospital--that girl at Cocksmoor?”

“I do,” said Flora. “She was a very nice girl; I wonder whether nurse
would approve of her.”

“How old?” said Margaret. “Fourteen, and tall. Such a clean cottage!”

The girls went on, and Margaret began to like the idea very much, and
consider whether the girl could be brought for inspection, before nurse
was prejudiced by hearing of her Cocksmoor extraction. At that moment
Richard knocked at the door, and entered with Tom, helping him to bring
a small short-legged table, such as could stand on the bed at the right
height for Margaret’s meals or employments.

There were great exclamations of satisfaction, and gratitude; “it was
the very thing wanted, only how could he have contrived it?”

“Don’t you recognise it?” said he.

“Oh, I see; it is the old drawing-desk that no one used. And you have
put legs to it--how famous! You are the best contriver, Richard!”

“Then see, you can raise it up for reading or writing; here’s a corner
for your ink to stand flat; and there it is down for your dinner.”

“Charming, you have made it go so easily, when it used to be so stiff.
There--give me my work-basket, please, Ethel; I mean to make some more
white puffs.”

“What’s the matter now, Ethel?” said Flora; “you look as if you did not
approve of the table.”

“I was only thinking it was as if she was settling herself to lie in bed
for a very long time,” said Ethel.

“I hope not,” said Richard; “but I don’t see why she should not be as
comfortable as she can, while she is there.”

“I am sure I hope you will never be ill, Ethel,” said Flora. “You would
be horrid to nurse!”

“She will know how to be grateful when she is,” said Margaret.

“I say, Richard,” exclaimed Ethel, “this is hospital-meeting day, so you
won’t be wanted to drive papa.”

“No, I am at your service; do you want a walk?”

So it was determined that Richard and Ethel should walk together to
Cocksmoor.

No two people could be much more unlike than Richard and Etheldred May;
but they were very fond of each other. Richard was sometimes seriously
annoyed by Ethel’s heedlessness, and did not always understand her
sublimities, but he had a great deal of admiration for one who partook
so much of his father’s nature; and Ethel had a due respect for her
eldest brother, gratitude and strong affection for many kindnesses,
a reverence for his sterling goodness, and his exemption from her own
besetting failings, only a little damped by compassionate wonder at
his deficiency in talent, and by her vexation at not being always
comprehended.

They went by the road, for the plantation gate was far too serious an
undertaking for any one not in the highest spirits for enterprise. On
the way there was a good deal of that desultory talk, very sociable and
interesting, that is apt to prevail between two people, who would never
have chosen each other for companions, if they were not of the same
family, but who are nevertheless very affectionate and companionable.
Ethel was anxious to hear what her brother thought of papa’s spirits,
and whether he talked in their drives.

“Sometimes,” said Richard. “It is just as it happens. Now and then he
goes on just like himself, and then at other times he will not speak for
three or four miles.”

“And he sighs?” said Ethel. “Those sighs are so very sad, and long, and
deep! They seem to have whole volumes in them, as if there was such a
weight on him.”

“Some people say he is not as much altered as they expected,” said
Richard.

“Oh! do they? Well! I can’t fancy any one feeling it more. He can’t
leave off his old self, of course, but--” Ethel stopped short.

“Margaret is a great comfort to him,” said Richard.

“That she is. She thinks of him all day long, and I don’t think either
of them is ever so happy as in the evening, when he sits with her. They
talk about mamma then--”

It was just what Richard could not do, and he made some observation to
change the subject, but Ethel returned to it, so far as to beg to know
how the arm was going on, for she did not like to say anything about it
to papa.

“It will be a long business, I am afraid,” said Richard. “Indeed, he
said the other day, he thought he should never have the free use of the
elbow.”

“And do you think it is very painful? I saw the other day, when Aubrey
was sitting on his knee and fidgeting, he shrank whenever he even came
towards it, and yet it seemed as if he could not bear to put him down.”

“Yes it is excessively tender, and sometimes gets very bad at night.”

“Ah,” said Ethel; “there’s a line--here--round his eyes, that there
never used to be, and when it deepens, I am sure he is in pain, or has
been kept awake.”

“You are very odd, Ethel; how do you see things in people’s faces, when
you miss so much at just the same distance?”

“I look after what I care about,” said Ethel. “One sees more with one’s
mind than one’s eyes. The best sight is inside.”

“But do you always see the truth?” said Richard gravely.

“Quite enough. What is less common than the ordinary world?” said Ethel.

Richard shook his head, not quite satisfied, but not sure enough that he
entered into her meaning to question it.

“I wonder you don’t wear spectacles,” was the result of his meditation,
and it made her laugh by being so inapposite to her own reflections: but
the laugh ended in a melancholy look. “Dear mamma did not like me to use
them,” she said, in a low voice.

Thus they talked till they arrived at Cocksmoor, where poor Mrs. Taylor,
inspirited by better reports of her husband and the hopes for her
daughter, was like another woman. Richard was very careful not to raise
false expectations, saying it all depended on Miss May and nurse, and
what they thought of her strength and steadiness, but these cautions
did not seem capable of damping the hopes of the smooth-haired Lucy,
who stood smiling and curtseying. The twins were grown and improved, and
Ethel supposed they would be brought to church on the next christening
Sunday, but their mother looked helpless and hopeless about getting
them so far, and how was she to get gossips? Ethel began to grow very
indignant, but she was always shy of finding fault with poor people
to their faces when she would not have done so to persons in her own
station, and so she was silent, while Richard hoped they would be able
to manage, and said it would be better not to wait another month for
still worse weather and shorter days.

As they were coming out of the house, a big, rough-looking, uncivilised
boy came up before them, and called out, “I say--ben’t you the young
doctor up at Stoneborough?”

“I am Dr. May’s son,” said Richard; while Ethel, startled, clung to his
arm, in dread of some rudeness.

“Granny’s bad,” said the boy; proceeding without further explanation to
lead the way to another hovel, though Richard tried to explain that the
knowledge of medicine was not in his case hereditary. A poor old woman
sat groaning over the fire, and two children crouched, half-clothed, on
the bare floor.

Richard’s gentle voice and kind manner drew forth some wonderful
descriptions--“her head was all of a goggle, her legs all of a fur, she
felt as if some one was cutting right through her.”

“Well,” said Richard kindly, “I am no doctor myself, but I’ll ask
my father about you, and perhaps he can give you an order for the
hospital.”

“No, no, thank ye, sir; I can’t go to the hospital, I can’t leave these
poor children; they’ve no father nor mother, sir, and no one to do for
them but me.”

“What do you live on, then?” said Richard, looking round the desolate
hut.

“On Sam’s wages, sir; that’s that boy. He is a good boy to me, sir, and
his little sisters; he brings it, all he gets, home to me, rig’lar, but
‘tis but six shillings a week, and they makes ‘em take half of it out in
goods and beer, which is a bad thing for a boy like him, sir.”

“How old are you, Sam?”

Sam scratched his head, and answered nothing. His grandmother knew he
was the age of her black bonnet, and as he looked about fifteen, Ethel
honoured him and the bonnet accordingly, while Richard said he must be
very glad to be able to maintain them all, at his age, and, promising to
try to bring his father that way, since prescribing at second hand
for such curious symptoms was more than could be expected, he took his
leave.

“A wretched place,” said Richard, looking round. “I don’t know what help
there is for the people. There’s no one to do any thing for them, and it
is of no use to tell them to come to church when it it so far off, and
there is so little room for them.”

“It is miserable,” said Ethel; and all her thoughts during her last walk
thither began to rush over her again, not effaced, but rather burned in,
by all that had subsequently happened. She had said it should be her aim
and effort to make Cocksmoor a Christian place. Such a resolve must not
pass away lightly; she knew it must be acted on, but how? What would her
present means--one sovereign--effect? Her fancies, rich and rare,
had nearly been forgotten of late, but she might make them of use in
time--in time, and here were hives of children growing up in heathenism.
Suddenly an idea struck her--Richard, when at home, was a very diligent
teacher in the Sunday-school at Stoneborough, though it was a thankless
task, and he was the only gentleman so engaged, except the two
clergymen--the other male teachers being a formal, grave, little baker,
and one or two monitors.

“Richard,” said Ethel, “I’ll tell you what. Suppose we were to get up
a Sunday-school at Cocksmoor. We could get a room, and walk there every
Sunday afternoon, and go to church in the evening instead.”

He was so confounded by the suddenness of the project, that he did not
answer, till she had time for several exclamations and “Well, Richard?”

“I cannot tell,” he said. “Going to church in the evening would
interfere with tea-time--put out all the house--make the evening
uncomfortable.”

“The evenings are horrid now, especially Sundays,” said Ethel.

“But missing two more would make them worse for the others.”

“Papa is always with Margaret,” said Ethel. “We are of no use to him.
Besides these poor children--are not they of more importance?”

“And, then, what is to become of Stoneborough school?”

“I hate it,” exclaimed Ethel; then seeing Richard shocked, and finding
she had spoken more vehemently than she intended--“It is not as bad
for you among the boys, but, while that committee goes on it is not
the least use to try to teach the girls right. Oh! the fusses about the
books, and one’s way of teaching! And fancy how Mrs Ledwich used us.
You know I went again last Sunday, for the first time, and there I found
that class of Margaret’s, that she had just managed to get into some
degree of nice order, taken so much pains with, taught so well. She
had been telling me what to hear them--there it is given away to
Fanny Anderson, who is no more fit to teach than that stick, and all
Margaret’s work will be undone. No notice to us--not even the civility
to wait and see when she gets better.”

“If we left them now for Cocksmoor, would it not look as it we were
affronted?”

Ethel was slightly taken aback, but only said, “Papa would be very angry
if he knew it.”

“I am glad you did not tell him,” said Richard.

“I thought it would only tease him,” said Ethel, “and that he might
call it a petty female squabble; and when Margaret is well, it will come
right, if Fanny Anderson has not spoiled the girls in the meantime. It
is all Mrs. Ledwich’s doing. How I did hate it when every one came up
and shook hands with me, and asked after Margaret and papa, only just
out of curiosity!”

“Hush, hush, Ethel, what’s the use of thinking such things?”

A silence,--then she exclaimed, “But, indeed, Richard, you don’t
fancy that I want to teach at Cocksmoor, because it is disagreeable at
Stoneborough?”

“No, indeed.”

The rendering of full justice conveyed in his tone so opened Ethel’s
heart that she went on eagerly:--“The history of it is this. Last time
we walked here, that day, I said, and I meant it, that I would never put
it out of my head; I would go on doing and striving, and trying, till
this place was properly cared for, and has a church and a clergyman. I
believe it was a vow, Richard, I do believe it was,--and if one makes
one, one must keep it. There it is. So, I can’t give money, I have but
one pound in the world, but I have time, and I would make that useful,
if you would help me.”

“I don’t see how,” was the answer, and there was a fragment of a smile
on Richard’s face, as if it struck him as a wild scheme, that Ethel
should undertake, single handed, to evangelise Cocksmoor.

It was such a damper as to be most mortifying to an enthusiastic girl,
and she drew into herself in a moment.

They walked home in silence, and when Richard warned her that she was
not keeping her dress out of the dirt, it sounded like a sarcasm on
her projects, and, with a slightly pettish manner, she raised the
unfortunate skirt, its crape trimmings greatly bespattered with ruddy
mud. Then recollecting how mamma would have shaken her head at that very
thing, she regretted the temper she had betrayed, and in a larmoyante
voice, sighed, “I wish I could pick my way better. Some people have the
gift, you have hardly a splash, and I’m up to the ankles in mud.”

“It is only taking care,” said Richard; “besides your frock is so long,
and full. Can’t you tuck it up and pin it?”

“My pins always come out,” said Ethel, disconsolately, crumpling the
black folds into one hand, while she hunted for a pin with the other.

“No wonder, if you stick them in that way,” said Richard. “Oh! you’ll
tear that crape. Here, let me help you. Don’t you see, make it go in and
out, that way; give it something to pull against.”

Ethel laughed. “That’s the third thing you have taught me--to thread a
needle, tie a bow, and stick in a pin! I never could learn those things
of any one else; they show, but don’t explain the theory.”

They met Dr. May at the entrance of the town, very tired, and saying
he had been a long tramp, all over the place, and Mrs. Hoxton had been
boring him with her fancies. As he took Richard’s arm he gave the long
heavy sigh that always fell so painfully on Ethel’s ear.

“Dear, dear, dear papa!” thought she, “my work must also be to do all I
can to comfort him.”

Her reflections were broken off. Dr. May exclaimed, “Ethel, don’t make
such a figure of yourself. Those muddy ankles and petticoats are not
fit to be seen--there, now you are sweeping the pavement. Have you no
medium? One would think you had never worn a gown in your life before!”

Poor Ethel stepped on before with mud-encrusted heels, and her father
speaking sharply in the weariness and soreness of his heart; her
draggle-tailed petticoats weighing down at once her missionary projects
at Cocksmoor, and her tender visions of comforting her widowed father;
her heart was full to overflowing, and where was the mother to hear her
troubles?

She opened the hall door, and would have rushed upstairs, but nurse
happened to be crossing the hall. “Miss Ethel! Miss Ethel, you aren’t
going up with them boots on! I do declare you are just like one of the
boys. And your frock!”

Ethel sat submissively down on the lowest step, and pulled off her
boots. As she did so, her father and brother came in--the former
desiring Richard to come with him to the study, and write a note for
him. She hoped that thus she might have Margaret to herself, and hurried
into her room. Margaret was alone, maids and children at tea, and Flora
dressing. The room was in twilight, with the red gleam of the fire
playing cheerfully over it.

“Well, Ethel, have you had a pleasant walk?”

“Yes--no--Oh, Margaret!” and throwing herself across the bottom of the
bed, she burst into tears.

“Ethel, dear, what is the matter? Papa--”

“No--no--only I draggled my frock, and Richard threw cold water. And I
am good for nothing! Oh! if mamma was but here!”

“Darling Ethel, dear Ethel, I wish I could comfort you. Come a little
nearer to me, I can’t reach you! Dear Ethel, what has gone wrong?”

“Everything,” said Ethel. “No--I’m too dirty to come on your white bed;
I forgot, you won’t like it,” added she, in an injured tone.

“You are wet, you are cold, you are tired,” said Margaret. “Stay here
and dress, don’t go up in the cold. There, sit by the fire pull off your
frock and stockings, and we will send for the others. Let me see you
look comfortable--there. Now tell me who threw cold water.”

“It was figurative cold water,” said Ethel, smiling for a moment. “I was
only silly enough to tell Richard my plan, and it’s horrid to talk to
a person who only thinks one high-flying and nonsensical--and then came
the dirt.”

“But what was the scheme, Ethel?”

“Cocksmoor,” said Ethel, proceeding to unfold it.

“I wish we could,” said Margaret. “It would be an excellent thing. But
how did Richard vex you?”

“I don’t know,” said Ethel, “only he thought it would not do. Perhaps he
said right, but it was coldly, and he smiled.”

“He is too sober-minded for our flights,” said Margaret. “I know the
feeling of it, Ethel dear; but you know if he did see that some of
your plans might not answer, it is no reason you should not try to do
something at once. You have not told me about the girl.”

Ethel proceeded to tell the history. “There!” said Margaret cheerfully,
“there are two ways of helping Cocksmoor already. Could you not make
some clothes for the two grandchildren? I could help you a little,
and then, if they were well clothed, you might get them to come to the
Sunday-school. And as to the twins, I wonder what the hire of a cart
would be to bring the christening party? It is just what Richard could
manage.”

“Yes,” said Ethel; “but those are only little isolated individual
things!”

“But one must make a beginning.”

“Then, Margaret, you think it was a real vow? You don’t think it silly
of me?” said Ethel wistfully.

“Ethel, dear, I don’t think dear mamma would say we ought to make vows,
except what the church decrees for us. I don’t think she would like the
notion of your considering yourself pledged; but I do think, that, after
all you have said and felt about Cocksmoor, and being led there on that
day, it does seem as if we might be intended to make it our especial
charge.”

“Oh, Margaret, I am glad you say so. You always understand.”

“But you know we are so young, that now we have not her to judge for us,
we must only do little things that we are quite sure of, or we shall get
wrong.”

“That’s not the way great things were done.”

“I don’t know, Ethel; I think great things can’t be good unless they
stand on a sure foundation of little ones.”

“Well, I believe Richard was right, and it would not do to begin on
Sunday, but he was so tame; and then my frock, and the horrid deficiency
in those little neatnesses.”

“Perhaps that is good for you in one way; you might get very high-flying
if you had not the discipline of those little tiresome things,
correcting them will help you, and keep your high things from being all
romance. I know dear mamma used to say so; that the trying to conquer
them was a help to you. Oh, here’s Mary! Mary, will you get Ethel’s
dressing things? She has come home wet-footed and cold, and has been
warming herself by my fire.”

Mary was happy to help, and Ethel was dressed and cheered by the time
Dr. May came in, for a hurried visit and report of his doings; Flora
followed on her way from her room. Then all went to tea, leaving
Margaret to have a visit from the little ones under charge of nurse. Two
hours’ stay with her, that precious time when she knew that sad as the
talk often was, it was truly a comfort to him. It ended when ten o’clock
struck, and he went down--Margaret hearing the bell, the sounds of
the assembling servants, the shutting of the door, the stillness
of prayer-time, the opening again, the feet moving off in different
directions, then brothers and sisters coming in to kiss her and bid her
good-night, nurse and Flora arranging her for the night, Flora coming
to sleep in her little bed in the corner of the room, and, lastly, her
father’s tender good-night, and melancholy look at her, and all was
quiet, except the low voices and movements as Richard attended him in
his own room.

Margaret could think: “Dear, dear Ethel, how noble and high she is! But
I am afraid! It is what people call a difficult, dangerous age, and the
grander she is, the greater danger of not managing her rightly. If those
high purposes should run only into romance like mine, or grow out into
eccentricities and unfemininesses, what a grievous pity it would be! And
I, so little older, so much less clever, with just sympathy enough not
to be a wise restraint--I am the person who has the responsibility, and
oh, what shall I do? Mamma trusted to me to be a mother to them, papa
looks to me, and I so unfit, besides this helplessness. But God sent it,
and put me in my place. He made me lie here, and will raise me up if it
is good, so I trust He will help me with my sisters.”

“Grant me to have a right judgment in all things, and evermore to
rejoice in Thy holy comfort.”




CHAPTER VII.



     Something between a hindrance and a help.
                                    WORDSWORTH.


Etheldred awoke long before time for getting up, and lay pondering over
her visions. Margaret had sympathised, and therefore they did not seem
entirely aerial. To earn money by writing was her favourite plan, and
she called her various romances in turn before her memory, to judge
which might be brought down to sober pen and ink. She considered till it
became not too unreasonably early to get up. It was dark, but there was
a little light close to the window: she had no writing-paper, but she
would interline her old exercise-book. Down she ran, and crouching
in the school-room window-seat, she wrote on in a trance of eager
composition, till Norman called her, as he went to school, to help him
to find a book.

This done, she went up to visit Margaret, to tell her the story, and
consult her. But this was not so easy. She found Margaret with little
Daisy lying by her, and Tom sitting by the fire over his Latin.

“Oh, Ethel, good-morning, dear! you are come just in time.”

“To take baby?” said Ethel, as the child was fretting a little.

“Yes, thank you, she has been very good, but she was tired of lying
here, and I can’t move her about,” said Margaret.

“Oh, Margaret, I have such a plan,” said Ethel, as she walked about with
little Gertrude; but Tom interrupted.

“Margaret, will you see if I can say my lesson?” and the thumbed Latin
grammar came across her just as Dr. May’s door opened, and he came in
exclaiming, “Latin grammar! Margaret, this is really too much for you.
Good-morning, my dears. Ha! Tommy, take your book away, my boy. You must
not inflict that on sister now. There’s your regular master, Richard, in
my room, if it is fit for his ears yet. What, the little one here too?”

“How is your arm, papa?” said Margaret. “Did it keep you awake?”

“Not long--it set me dreaming though, and a very romantic dream it was,
worthy of Ethel herself.”

“What was it, papa?”

“Oh, it was an odd thing, joining on strangely enough with one I had
three or four and twenty years ago, when I was a young man, hearing
lectures at Edinburgh, and courting--” he stopped, and felt Margaret’s
pulse, asked her a few questions, and talked to the baby. Ethel longed
to hear his dream, but thought he would not like to go on; however, he
did presently.

“The old dream was the night after a picnic on Arthur’s Seat with the
Mackenzies; mamma and Aunt Flora were there. ‘Twas a regular boy’s
dream, a tournament, or something of that nature, where I was victor,
the queen--you know who she was--giving me her token--a Daisy Chain.”

“That is why you like to call us your Daisy Chain,” said Ethel.

“Did you write it in verse?” said Margaret. “I think I once saw some
verses like it in her desk.”

“I was in love, and three-and-twenty,” said the doctor, looking drolly
guilty in the midst of his sadness. “Ay, those fixed it in my memory,
perhaps my fancy made it more distinct than it really was. An evening
or two ago I met with them, and that stirred it up I suppose. Last
night came the tournament again, but it was the melee, a sense of being
crushed down, suffocated by the throng of armed knights and horses--pain
and wounds--and I looked in vain through the opposing overwhelming
host for my--my Maggie. Well, I got the worst of it, my sword arm was
broken--I fell, was stifled--crushed--in misery--all I could do was to
grasp my token--my Daisy Chain,” and he pressed Margaret’s hand as he
said so. “And, behold, the tumult and despair were passed. I lay on the
grass in the cloisters, and the Daisy Chain hung from the sky, and was
drawing me upwards. There--it is a queer dream for a sober old country
doctor. I don’t know why I told you, don’t tell any one again.”

And he walked away, muttering. “For he told me his dreams, talked of
eating and drinking,” leaving Margaret with her eyes full of tears, and
Ethel vehemently caressing the baby.

“How beautiful!” said Ethel.

“It has been a comfort to him, I am sure,” said Margaret.

“You don’t think it ominous,” said Ethel with a slight tremulous voice.

“More soothing than anything else. It is what we all feel, is it not?
that this little daisy bud is the link between us and heaven?”

“But about him. He was victor at first--vanquished the next time.”

“I think--if it is to have an interpretation, though I am not sure we
ought to take it so seriously, it would only mean that in younger days
people care for victory and distinction in this world, like Norman, or
as papa most likely did then; but, as they grow older, they care less,
and others pass them, and they know it does not signify, for in our race
all may win.”

“But he has a great name. How many people come from a distance to
consult him! he is looked upon, too, in other ways! he can do anything
with the corporation.”

Margaret smiled. “All this does not sound grand--it is not as if he had
set up in London.”

“Oh, dear, I am so glad he did not.”

“Shall I tell you what mamma told me he said about it, when Uncle
Mackenzie said he ought? He answered that he thought health and happy
home attachments were a better provision for us to set out in life with
than thousands.”

“I am sure he was right!” said Ethel earnestly. “Then you don’t think
the dream meant being beaten, only that our best things are not gained
by successes in this world?”

“Don’t go and let it dwell on your mind as a vision,” said Margaret. “I
think dear mamma would call that silly.”

An interruption occurred, and Ethel had to go down to breakfast with a
mind floating between romance, sorrow, and high aspirations, very unlike
the actual world she had to live in. First, there was a sick man walking
into the study, and her father, laying down his letters, saying, “I must
despatch him before prayers, I suppose. I’ve a great mind to say I never
will see any one who won’t keep to my days.”

“I can’t imagine why they don’t,” said Flora, as he went. “He is always
saying so, but never acting on it. If he would once turn one away, the
rest would mind.”

Richard went on in silence, cutting bread and butter.

“There’s another ring,” said Mary.

“Yes, he is caught now, they’ll go on in a stream. I shall not keep
Margaret waiting for her breakfast, I shall take it up.”

The morning was tiresome; though Dr. May had two regular days for seeing
poor people at his house, he was too good-natured to keep strictly to
them, and this day, as Flora had predicted, there was a procession of
them not soon got rid of, even by his rapid queries and the talismanic
figures made by his left hand on scraps of paper, with which he sent
them off to the infirmary. Ethel tried to read; the children lingered
about; it was a trial of temper to all but Tom, who obtained Richard’s
attention to his lessons. He liked to say them to his brother, and was
an incentive to learn them quickly, that none might remain for Miss
Winter when Richard went out with his father. If mamma had been there,
she would have had prayers; but now no one had authority enough, though
they did at last even finish breakfast. Just as the gig came to the
door, Dr. May dismissed his last patient, rang the bell in haste, and
as soon as prayers were over, declared he had an appointment, and had no
time to eat. There was a general outcry that it was bad enough when he
was well, and now he must not take liberties; Flora made him drink some
tea; and Richard placed morsels in his way, while he read his letters.
He ran up for a final look at Margaret, almost upset the staid Miss
Winter as he ran down again, called Richard to take the reins, and was
off.

It was French day, always a trial to Ethel. M. Ballompre, the master,
knew what was good and bad French, but could not render a reason,
and Ethel, being versed in the principles of grammar, from her Latin
studies, chose to know the why and wherefore of his corrections--she did
not like to see her pages defaced, and have no security against future
errors; while he thought her a troublesome pupil, and was put out by
her questions. They wrangled, Miss Winter was displeased, and Ethel felt
injured.

Mary’s inability to catch the pronunciation, and her hopeless dull look
when she found that coeur must not be pronounced cour, nor cur, but
something between, to which her rosy English lips could never come--all
this did not tease M. Ballompre, for he was used to it.

His mark for Ethel’s lesson was “de l’humeur.”

“I am sorry,” said Miss Winter, when he was gone. “I thought you had
outgrown that habit of disputing over every phrase.”

“I can’t tell how a language is to be learned without knowing the
reasons of one’s mistakes,” said Ethel.

“That is what you always say, my dear. It is of no use to renew it all,
but I wish you would control yourself. Now, Mary, call Blanche, and you
and Ethel take your arithmetic.”

So Flora went to read to Margaret, while Blanche went lightly and
playfully through her easy lessons, and Mary floundered piteously over
the difficulties of Compound Long Division. Ethel’s mind was in too
irritated and tumultuous a state for her to derive her usual solace from
Cube Root. Her sum was wrong, and she wanted to work it right, but Miss
Winter, who had little liking for the higher branches of arithmetic,
said she had spent time enough over it, and summoned her to an
examination such as the governess was very fond of and often practised.
Ethel thought it useless, and was teased by it; and though her answers
were chiefly correct, they were given in an irritated tone. It was of
this kind:--


        What is the date of the invention of paper?
        What is the latitude and longitude of Otaheite?
        What are the component parts of brass?
        Whence is cochineal imported?


When this was over, Ethel had to fetch her mending-basket, and Mary her
book of selections; the piece for to-day’s lesson was the quarrel of
Brutus and Cassius; and Mary’s dull droning tone was a trial to her
ears; she presently exclaimed, “Oh, Mary, don’t murder it!”

“Murder what?” said Mary, opening wide her light blue eyes.

“That use of exaggerated language,--” began Miss Winter.

“I’ve heard papa say it,” said Ethel, only wanting to silence Miss
Winter. In a cooler moment she would not have used the argument.

“All that a gentleman may say, may not be a precedent for a young lady;
but you are interrupting Mary.”

“Only let me show her. I can’t bear to hear her, listen, Mary.


        “What shall one of us
         That struck the foremost”--


“That is declaiming,” said Miss Winter. “It is not what we wish for in a
lady. You are neglecting your work and interfering.”

Ethel made a fretful contortion, and obeyed. So it went on all the
morning, Ethel’s eagerness checked by Miss Winter’s dry manner,
producing pettishness, till Ethel, in a state between self-reproach
and a sense of injustice, went up to prepare for dinner, and to visit
Margaret on the way.

She found her sister picking a merino frock to pieces. “See here,” she
said eagerly, “I thought you would like to make up this old frock for
one of the Cocksmoor children; but what is the matter?” as Ethel did not
show the lively interest that she expected.

“Oh, nothing, only Miss Winter is so tiresome.”

“What was it?”

“Everything, it was all horrid. I was cross, I know, but she and M.
Ballompre made me so;” and Ethel was in the midst of the narration of
her grievances, when Norman came in. The school was half a mile off, but
he had not once failed to come home, in the interval allowed for play
after dinner, to inquire for his sister.

“Well, Norman, you are out of breath, sit down and rest. What is doing
at school; are you dux of your class?”

“Yes,” said the boy wearily.

“What mark for the verses?” said Ethel.

“Quam bene.”

“Not optime?”

“No, they were tame,” Dr. Hoxton said.

“What is Harry doing?” said Margaret.

“He is fourth in his form. I left him at football.”

“Dinner!” said Flora at the door. “What will you have, Margaret?”

“I’ll fetch it,” said Norman, who considered it his privilege to wait
on Margaret at dinner. When he had brought the tray, he stood leaning
against the bed-post, musing. Suddenly, there was a considerable clatter
of fire-irons, and his violent start surprised Margaret.

“Ethel has been poking the fire,” she said, as if no more was needed to
account for their insecurity. Norman put them up again, but a ringing
sound betrayed that it was not with a firm touch, and when, a minute
after, he came to take her plate, she saw that he was trying with effort
to steady his hand.

“Norman, dear, are you sure you are well?”

“Yes, very well,” said he, as if vexed that she had taken any notice.

“You had better not come racing home. I’m not worth inquiries now, I am
so much better,” said she, smiling.

He made no reply, but this was not consenting silence.

“I don’t like you to lose your football,” she proceeded.

“I could not--” and he stopped short.

“It would be much better for you,” said she, looking up in his face with
anxious affectionate eyes, but he shunned her glance and walked away
with her plate.

Flora had been in such close attendance upon Margaret, that she needed
some cheerful walks, and though she had some doubts how affairs at
home would go on without her, she was overruled, and sent on a long
expedition with Miss Winter and Mary, while Ethel remained with
Margaret.

The only delay before setting out, was that nurse came in, saying, “If
you please, Miss Margaret, there is a girl come to see about the place.”

The sisters looked at each other and smiled, while Margaret asked whence
she came, and who she was.

“Her name is Taylor, and she comes from Cocksmoor, but she is a nice,
tidy, strong-looking girl, and she says she has been used to children.”

Nurse had fallen into the trap most comfortably, and seemed bent upon
taking this girl as a choice of her own. She wished to know if Miss
Margaret would like to see her.

“If you please, nurse, but if you think she will do, that is enough.”

“Yes, Miss, but you should look to them things yourself. If you please,
I’ll bring her up.” So nurse departed.

“Charming!” cried Ethel, “that’s your capital management, Flora; nurse
thinks she has done it all herself.”

“She is your charge though,” said Flora, “coming from your own beloved
Cocksmoor.”

Lucy Taylor came in, looking very nice, and very shy, curtseying low, in
extreme awe of the pale lady in bed. Margaret was much pleased with her,
and there was no more to be done but to settle that she should come on
Saturday, and to let nurse take her into the town to invest her with the
universal blackness of the household, where the two Margarets were the
only white things.

This arranged, and the walking party set forth, Ethel sat down by her
sister’s bed, and began to assist in unpicking the merino, telling
Margaret how much obliged she was to her for thinking of it, and how
grieved at having been so ungrateful in the morning. She was very happy
over her contrivances, cutting out under her sister’s superintendence.
She had forgotten the morning’s annoyance, till Margaret said, “I have
been thinking of what you said about Miss Winter, and really I don’t
know what is to be done.”

“Oh, Margaret, I did not mean to worry you,” said Ethel, sorry to see
her look uneasy.

“I like you to tell me everything, dear Ethel; but I don’t see clearly
the best course. We must go on with Miss Winter.”

“Of course,” said Ethel, shocked at her murmurs having even suggested
the possibility of a change, and having, as well as all the others, a
great respect and affection for her governess.

“We could not get on without her even if I were well,” continued
Margaret; “and dear mamma had such perfect trust in her, and we all know
and love her so well--it would make us put up with a great deal.”

“It is all my own fault,” said Ethel, only anxious to make amends to
Miss Winter. “I wish you would not say anything about it.”

“Yes, it does seem wrong even to think of it,” said Margaret, “when she
has been so very kind. It is a blessing to have any one to whom Mary and
Blanche may so entirely be trusted. But for you--”

“It is my own fault,” repeated Ethel.

“I don’t think it is quite all your own fault,” said Margaret, “and that
is the difficulty. I know dear mamma thought Miss Winter an excellent
governess for the little ones, but hardly up to you, and she saw that
you worried and fidgeted each other, so, you know, she used to keep the
teaching of you a good deal in her own hands.”

“I did not know that was the reason,” said Ethel, overpowered by the
recollection of the happy morning’s work she had often done in that
very room, when her mother had not been equal to the bustle of the
whole school-room. That watchful, protecting, guarding, mother’s love,
a shadow of Providence, had been round them so constantly on every side,
that they had been hardly conscious of it till it was lost to them.

“Was it not like her?” said Margaret, “but now, my poor Ethel, I don’t
think it would be right by you or by Miss Winter, to take you out of the
school-room. I think it would grieve her.”

“I would not do that for the world.”

“Especially after her kind nursing of me, and even, with more reason, it
would not be becoming in us to make changes. Besides, King Etheldred,”
 said Margaret, smiling, “we all know you are a little bit of a sloven,
and, as nurse says, some one must be always after you, and do you know?
even if I were well, I had rather it was Miss Winter than me.”

“Oh, no, you would not be formal and precise--you would not make me
cross.”

“Perhaps you might make me so,” said Margaret, “or I should let you
alone, and leave you a slattern. We should both hate it so! No, don’t
make me your mistress, Ethel dear--let me be your sister and play-fellow
still, as well as I can.”

“You are, you are. I don’t care half so much when I have got you.”

“And will you try to bear with her, and remember it is right in the
main, though it is troublesome?”

“That I will. I won’t plague you again. I know it is bad for you, you
look tired.”

“Pray don’t leave off telling me,” said Margaret--“it is just what I
wish on my own account, and I know it is comfortable to have a good
grumble.”

“If it does not hurt you, but I am sure you are not easy now--are you?”

“Only my back,” said Margaret. “I have been sitting up longer than
usual, and it is tired. Will you call nurse to lay me flat again?”

The nursery was deserted--all were out, and Ethel came back in
trepidation at the notion of having to do it herself, though she knew
it was only to put one arm to support her sister, while, with the other,
she removed the pillows; but Ethel was conscious of her own awkwardness
and want of observation, nor had Margaret entire trust in her. Still she
was too much fatigued to wait, so Ethel was obliged to do her best. She
was careful and frightened, and therefore slow and unsteady. She trusted
that all was right, and Margaret tried to believe so, though still
uneasy.

Ethel began to read to her, and Dr. May came home. She looked up
smiling, and asked where he had been, but it was vain to try to keep him
from reading her face. He saw in an instant that something was amiss,
and drew from her a confession that her back was aching a little. He
knew she might have said a great deal--she was not in a comfortable
position--she must be moved. She shook her head--she had rather
wait--there was a dread of being again lifted by Ethel that she could
not entirely hide. Ethel was distressed, Dr. May was angry, and, no
wonder, when he saw Margaret suffer, felt his own inability to help,
missed her who had been wont to take all care from his hands, and was
vexed to see a tall strong girl of fifteen, with the full use of both
arms, and plenty of sense, incapable of giving any assistance, and only
doing harm by trying.

“It is of no use,” said he. “Ethel will give no attention to anything
but her books! I’ve a great mind to put an end to all the Latin and
Greek! She cares for nothing else.”

Ethel could little brook injustice, and much as she was grieving, she
exclaimed, “Papa, papa, I do care--now don’t I, Margaret? I did my
best!”

“Don’t talk nonsense. Your best, indeed! If you had taken the most
moderate care--”

“I believe Ethel took rather too much care,” said Margaret, much
more harassed by the scolding than by the pain. “It will be all right
presently. Never mind, dear papa.”

But he was not only grieved for the present, but anxious for the future;
and, though he knew it was bad for Margaret to manifest his displeasure,
he could not restrain it, and continued to blame Ethel with enough
of injustice to set her on vindication, whereupon he silenced her, by
telling her she was making it worse by self-justification when Margaret
ought to be quiet. Margaret tried to talk of other things, but was in
too much discomfort to exert herself enough to divert his attention.

At last Flora returned, and saw in an instant what was wanted. Margaret
was settled in the right posture, but the pain would not immediately
depart, and Dr. May soon found out that she had a headache, of which he
knew he was at least as guilty as Etheldred could be.

Nothing could be done but keep her quiet, and Ethel went away to be
miserable; Flora tried to comfort her by saying it was unfortunate, but
no doubt there was a knack, and everyone could not manage those things;
Margaret was easier now, and as to papa’s anger, he did not always mean
all he said.

But consolation came at bedtime; Margaret received her with open arms
when she went to wish her goodnight. “My poor Ethel,” she said, holding
her close, “I am sorry I have made such a fuss.”

“Oh, you did not, it was too bad of me--I am grieved; are you quite
comfortable now?”

“Yes, quite, only a little headache, which I shall sleep off. It has
been so nice and quiet. Papa took up George Herbert, and has been
reading me choice bits. I don’t think I have enjoyed anything so much
since I have been ill.”

“I am glad of that, but I have been unhappy all the evening. I wish I
knew what to do. I am out of heart about everything!”

“Only try to mind and heed, and you will learn. It will be a step if you
will only put your shoes side by side when you take them off.”

Ethel smiled and sighed, and Margaret whispered, “Don’t grieve about me,
but put your clever head to rule your hands, and you will do for home
and Cocksmoor too. Good-night, dearest.”

“I’ve vexed papa,” sighed Ethel--and just then he came into the room.

“Papa,” said Margaret, “here’s poor Ethel, not half recovered from her
troubles.”

He was now at ease about Margaret, and knew he had been harsh to another
of his motherless girls.

“Ah! we must send her to the infant-school, to learn ‘this is my right
hand, and this is my left,’” said he, in his half-gay, half-sad manner.

“I was very stupid,” said Ethel.

“Poor child!” said her papa, “she is worse off than I am. If I have but
one hand left, she has two left hands.”

“I do mean to try, papa.”

“Yes, you must, Ethel. I believe I was hasty with you, my poor girl. I
was vexed, and we have no one to smooth us down. I am sorry, my dear,
but you must bear with me, for I never learned her ways with you when I
might. We will try to have more patience with each other.”

What could Ethel do but hang round his neck and cry, till he said, but
tenderly, that they had given Margaret quite disturbance enough to-day,
and sent her to bed, vowing to watch each little action, lest she should
again give pain to such a father and sister.




CHAPTER VIII.



     “Tis not enough that Greek or Roman page
      At stated hours, his freakish thoughts engage,
      Even in his pastimes he requires a friend
      To warn and teach him safely to unbend,
      O’er all his pleasures gently to preside,
      Watch his emotions, and control their tide.”--COWPER.


The misfortunes of that day disheartened and disconcerted Etheldred. To
do mischief where she most wished to do good, to grieve where she longed
to comfort, seemed to be her fate; it was vain to attempt anything for
anyone’s good, while all her warm feelings and high aspirations were
thwarted by the awkward ungainly hands and heedless eyes that Nature had
given her. Nor did the following day, Saturday, do much for her
comfort, by giving her the company of her brothers. That it was Norman’s
sixteenth birthday seemed only to make it worse. Their father had
apparently forgotten it, and Norman stopped Blanche when she was going
to put him in mind of it; stopped her by such a look as the child never
forgot, though there was no anger in it. In reply to Ethel’s inquiry
what he was going to do that morning, he gave a yawn and stretch, and
said, dejectedly, that he had got some Euripides to look over, and some
verses to finish.

“I am sorry; this is the first time you ever have not managed so as to
make a real holiday of your Saturday!”

“I could not help it, and there’s nothing to do,” said Norman wearily.

“I promised to go and read to Margaret while Flora does her music,” said
Ethel; “I shall come after that and do my Latin and Greek with you.”

Margaret would not keep her long, saying she liked her to be with
Norman, but she found him with his head sunk on his open book, fast
asleep. At dinner-time, Harry and Tom, rushing in, awoke him with a
violent start.

“Halloo! Norman, that was a jump!” said Harry, as his brother stretched
and pinched himself. “You’ll jump out of your skin some of these days,
if you don’t take care!”

“It’s enough to startle any one to be waked up with such a noise,” said
Ethel.

“Then he ought to sleep at proper times,” said Harry, “and not be waking
me up with tumbling about, and hallooing out, and talking in his sleep
half the night.”

“Talking in his sleep! why, just now, you said he did not sleep,” said
Ethel.

“Harry knows nothing about it,” said Norman.

“Don’t I? Well, I only know, if you slept in school, and were a junior,
you would get a proper good licking for going on as you do at night.”

“And I think you might chance to get a proper good licking for not
holding your tongue,” said Norman, which hint reduced Harry to silence.

Dr. May was not come home; he had gone with Richard far into the
country, and was to return to tea. He was thought to be desirous of
avoiding the family dinners that used to be so delightful. Harry was
impatient to depart, and when Mary and Tom ran after him, he ordered
them back.

“Where can he be going?” said Mary, as she looked wistfully after him.

“I know,” said Tom.

“Where? Do tell me.”

“Only don’t tell papa. I went down with him to the playground this
morning, and there they settled it. The Andersons, and Axworthy, and he,
are going to hire a gun, and shoot pee-wits on Cocksmoor.”

“But they ought not; should they?” said Mary. “Papa would be very
angry.”

“Anderson said there was no harm in it, but Harry told me not to tell.
Indeed, Anderson would have boxed my ears for hearing, when I could not
help it.”

“But Harry would not let him?”

“Ay. Harry is quite a match for Harvey Anderson, though he is so much
younger; and he said he would not have me bullied.”

“That’s a good Harry! But I wish he would not go out shooting!” said
Mary.

“Mind, you don’t tell.”

“And where’s Hector Ernescliffe? Would not he go?”

“No. I like Hector. He did not choose to go, though Anderson teased him,
and said he was a poor Scot, and his brother didn’t allow him tin enough
to buy powder and shot. If Harry would have stayed at home, he would
have come up here, and we might have had some fun in the garden.”

“I wish he would. We never have any fun now,” said Mary; “but oh! there
he is,” as she spied Hector peeping over the gate which led from the
field into the garden. It was the first time that he had been to Dr.
May’s since his brother’s departure, and he was rather shy, but the
joyful welcome of Mary and Tom took off all reluctance, and they claimed
him for a good game at play in the wood-house. Mary ran upstairs to beg
to be excused the formal walk, and, luckily for her, Miss Winter was
in Margaret’s room. Margaret asked if it was very wet and dirty, and
hearing “not very,” gave gracious permission, and off went Mary and
Blanche to construct some curious specimens of pottery, under the
superintendence of Hector and Tom. There was a certain ditch where
yellow mud was attainable, whereof the happy children concocted marbles
and vases, which underwent a preparatory baking in the boys’ pockets,
that they might not crack in the nursery fire. Margaret only stipulated
that her sisters should be well fenced in brown holland, and when Miss
Winter looked grave, said, “Poor things, a little thorough play will do
them a great deal of good.”

Miss Winter could not see the good of groping in the dirt; and Margaret
perceived that it would be one of her difficulties to know how to
follow out her mother’s views for the children, without vexing the good
governess by not deferring to her.

In the meantime, Norman had disconsolately returned to his Euripides,
and Ethel, who wanted to stay with him and look out his words, was
ordered out by Miss Winter, because she had spent all yesterday indoors.
Miss Winter was going to stay with Margaret, and Ethel and Flora coaxed
Norman to come with them, “just one mile on the turnpike road and back
again; he would be much fresher for his Greek afterwards.”

He came, but he did not enliven his sisters. The three plodded on,
taking a diligent constitutional walk, exchanging very few words, and
those chiefly between the girls. Flora gathered some hoary clematis,
and red berries, and sought in the hedge-sides for some crimson “fairy
baths” to carry home; and, at the sight of the amusement Margaret
derived from the placing the beauteous little Pezizas in a saucer of
damp green moss, so as to hide the brown sticks on which they grew,
Ethel took shame to herself for want of perception of little attentions.
When she told Norman so, he answered, “There’s no one who does see what
is the right thing. How horrid the room looks! Everything is nohow!”
 added he, looking round at the ornaments and things on the tables, which
had lost their air of comfort and good taste. It was not disorder, and
Ethel could not see what he meant. “What’s wrong?” said she.

“Oh, never mind--you can’t do it. Don’t try--you’ll only make it worse.
It will never be the same as long as we live.”

“I wish you would not be so unhappy!” said Ethel.

“Never mind,” again said Norman, but he put his arm round her.

“Have you done your Euripides? Can I help you? Will you construe it with
me, or shall I look out your words?”

“Thank you, I don’t mind that. It is the verses! I want some sense!”
 said Norman, running his fingers through his hair till it stood on end.
“‘Tis such a horrid subject, Coral Islands! As if there was anything to
be said about them.”

“Dear me, Norman, I could say ten thousand things, only I must not tell
you what mine are, as yours are not done.”

“No, don’t,” said Norman decidedly.

“Did you read the description of them in the Quarterly? I am sure you
might get some ideas there. Shall I find it for you? It is in an old
number.”

“Well, do; thank you.”

He rested listlessly on the sofa while his sister rummaged in a
chiffonier. At last she found the article, and eagerly read him the
description of the strange forms of the coral animals, and the beauties
of their flower-like feelers and branching fabrics. It would once
have delighted him, but his first comment was, “Nasty little brutes!”
 However, the next minute he thanked her, took the book, and said he
could hammer something out of it, though it was too bad to give such an
unclassical subject. At dusk he left off, saying he should get it done
at night, his senses would come then, and he should be glad to sit up.

“Only three weeks to the holidays,” said Ethel, trying to be cheerful;
but his assent was depressing, and she began to fear that Christmas
would only make them more sad.

Mary did not keep Tom’s secret so inviolably, but that, while they were
dressing for tea, she revealed to Ethel where Harry was gone. He was
not yet returned, though his father and Richard were come in, and the
sisters were at once in some anxiety on his account, and doubt whether
they ought to let papa know of his disobedience.

Flora and Ethel, who were the first in the drawing-room, had a
consultation.

“I should have told mamma directly,” said Flora.

“He never did so,” sighed Ethel; “things never went wrong then.”

“Oh, yes, they did; don’t you remember how naughty Harry was about
climbing the wall, and making faces at Mrs. Richardson’s servants?”

“And how ill I behaved the first day of last Christmas holidays?”

“She knew, but I don’t think she told papa.”

“Not that we knew of, but I believe she did tell him everything, and I
think, Flora, he ought to know everything, especially now. I never could
bear the way the Mackenzies used to have of thinking their parents must
be like enemies, and keeping secrets from them.”

“They were always threatening each other, ‘I’ll tell mamma,’” said
Flora, “and calling us tell-tales because we told our own dear mamma
everything. But it is not like that now--I neither like to worry papa,
nor to bring Harry into disgrace--besides, Tom and Mary meant it for a
secret.”

“Papa would not be angry with him if we told him it was a secret,” said
Ethel; “I wish Harry would come in. There’s the door--oh! it is only
you.”

“Whom did you expect?” said Richard, entering.

The sisters looked at each other, and Ethel, after an interval,
explained their doubts about Harry.

“He is come in,” said Richard; “I saw him running up to his own room,
very muddy.”

“Oh, I’m glad! But do you think papa ought to hear it? I don’t know
what’s to be done. ‘Tis the children’s secret,” said Flora.

“It will never do to have him going out with those boys continually,”
 said Ethel--“Harvey Anderson close by all the holidays!”

“I’ll try what I can do with him,” said Richard. “Papa had better not
hear it now, at any rate. He is very tired and sad this evening! and
his arm is painful again, so we must not worry him with histories of
naughtiness among the children.”

“No,” said Ethel decidedly, “I am glad you were there, Ritchie; I never
should have thought of one time being better than another.”

“Just like Ethel!” said Flora, smiling.

“Why should not you learn?” said Richard gently.

“I can’t,” said Ethel, in a desponding way.

“Why not? You are much sharper than most people, and, if you tried, you
would know those things much better than I do, as you know how to learn
history.”

“It is quite a different sort of cleverness,” said Flora. “Recollect Sir
Isaac Newton, or Archimedes.”

“Then you must have both sorts,” said Ethel, “for you can do things
nicely, and yet you learn very fast.”

“Take care, Ethel, you are singeing your frock! Well, I really don’t
think you can help those things!” said Flora. “Your short sight is the
reason of it, and it is of no use to try to mend it.”

“Don’t tell her so,” said Richard. “It can’t be all short sight--it is
the not thinking. I do believe that if Ethel would think, no one would
do things so well. Don’t you remember the beautiful perspective drawing
she made of this room for me to take to Oxford? That was very difficult,
and wanted a great deal of neatness and accuracy, so why should she not
be neat and accurate in other things? And I know you can read faces,
Ethel--why don’t you look there before you speak?”

“Ah! before instead of after, when I only see I have said something
malapropos,” said Ethel.

“I must go and see about the children,” said Flora; “if the tea comes
while I am gone, will you make it, Ritchie?”

“Flora despairs of me,” said Ethel.

“I don’t,” said Richard. “Have you forgotten how to put in a pin yet?”

“No; I hope not.”

“Well, then, see if you can’t learn to make tea; and, by-the-bye, Ethel,
which is the next christening Sunday?”

“The one after next, surely. The first of December is Monday--yes,
to-morrow week is the next.”

“Then I have thought of something; it would cost eighteenpence to hire
Joliffe’s spring-cart, and we might have Mrs. Taylor and the twins
brought to church in it. Should you like to walk to Cocksmoor and settle
it?”

“Oh yes, very much indeed. What a capital thought. Margaret said you
would know how to manage.”

“Then we will go the first fine day papa does not want me.”

“I wonder if I could finish my purple frocks. But here’s the tea. Now,
Richard, don’t tell me to make it. I should do something wrong, and
Flora will never forgive you.”

Richard would not let her off. He stood over her, counted her shovelfuls
of tea, and watched the water into the teapot--he superintended her
warming the cups, and putting a drop into each saucer. “Ah!” said Ethel,
with a concluding sigh, “it makes one hotter than double equations!”

It was all right, as Flora allowed with a slightly superior smile. She
thought Richard would never succeed in making a notable or elegant woman
of Ethel, and it was best that the two sisters should take different
lines. Flora knew that, though clever and with more accomplishments,
she could not surpass Ethel in intellectual attainments, but she was
certainly far more valuable in the house, and had been proved to have
just the qualities in which her sister was most deficient. She did not
relish hearing that Ethel wanted nothing but attention to be more than
her equal, and she thought Richard mistaken. Flora’s remembrance of
their time of distress was less unmixedly wretched than it was with the
others, for she knew she had done wonders.

The next day Norman told Ethel that he had got on very well with the
verses, and finished them off late at night. He showed them to her
before taking them to school on Monday morning, and Ethel thought
they were the best he had ever written. There was too much spirit and
poetical beauty for a mere schoolboy task, and she begged for the foul
copy to show it to her father. “I have not got it,” said Norman. “The
foul copy was not like these; but when I was writing them out quite
late, it was all I don’t know how. Flora’s music was in my ears, and the
room seemed to get larger, and like an ocean cave; and when the candle
flickered, ‘twas like the green glowing light of the sun through the
waves.”

“As it says here,” said Ethel.

“And the words all came to me of themselves in beautiful flowing Latin,
just right, as if it was anybody but myself doing it, and they ran off
my pen in red and blue and gold, and all sorts of colours; and fine
branching zig-zagging stars, like what the book described, only
stranger, came dancing and radiating round my pen and the candle. I
could hardly believe the verses would scan by daylight, but I can’t find
a mistake. Do you try them again.”

Ethel scanned. “I see nothing wrong,” she said, “but it seems a shame to
begin scanning Undine’s verses, they are too pretty. I wish I could copy
them. It must have been half a dream.”

“I believe it was; they don’t seem like my own.”

“Did you dream afterwards?”

He shivered. “They had got into my head too much; my ears sang like the
roaring of the sea, and I thought my feet were frozen on to an iceberg:
then came darkness, and sea monsters, and drowning--it was too horrid!”
 and his face expressed all, and more than all, he said. “But ‘tis a
quarter to seven--we must go,” said he, with a long yawn, and rubbing
his eyes. “You are sure they are right, Ethel? Harry, come along.”

Ethel thought those verses ought to make a sensation, but all that
came of them was a Quam optime, and when she asked Norman if no special
notice had been taken of them, he said, in his languid way, “No; only
Dr. Hoxton said they were better than usual.”

Ethel did not even have the satisfaction of hearing that Mr. Wilmot,
happening to meet Dr. May, said to him, “Your boy has more of a poet
in him than any that has come in my way. He really sometimes makes very
striking verses.”

Richard watched for an opportunity of speaking to Harry, which did not
at once occur, as the boy spent very little of his time at home, and, as
if by tacit consent, he and Norman came in later every evening. At last,
on Thursday, in the additional two hours’ leisure allowed to the boys,
when the studious prepared their tasks, and the idle had some special
diversion, Richard encountered him running up to his own room to fetch a
newly-invented instrument for projecting stones.

“I’ll walk back to school with you,” said Richard. “I mean to run,”
 returned Harry.

“Is there so much hurry?” said Richard. “I am sorry for it, for I wanted
to speak to you, Harry; I have something to show you.”

His manner conveyed that it related to their mother, and the sobering
effect was instantaneous. “Very well,” said he, forgetting his haste.
“I’ll come into your room.”

The awe-struck, shy, yet sorrowful look on his rosy face showed
preparation enough, and Richard’s only preface was to say, “It is a
bit of a letter that she was in course of writing to Aunt Flora, a
description of us all. The letter itself is gone, but here is a copy of
it. I thought you would like to read what relates to yourself.”

Richard laid before him the sheet of notepaper on which this portion of
the letter was written, and left him alone with it, while he set out on
the promised walk with Ethel.

They found the old woman, Granny Hall, looking like another creature,
smoke-dried and withered indeed, but all briskness and animation.

“Well! be it you, sir, and the young lady?”

“Yes; here we are come to see you again,” said Richard. “I hope you are
not disappointed that I’ve brought my sister this time instead of the
doctor.”

“No, no, sir; I’ve done with the doctor for this while,” said the old
woman, to Ethel’s great amusement. “He have done me a power of good, and
thank him for it heartily; but the young lady is right welcome here--but
‘tis a dirty walk for her.”

“Never mind that,” said Ethel, a little shyly, “I came--where are your
grandchildren?”

“Oh, somewhere out among the blocks. They gets out with the other
children; I can’t be always after them.”

“I wanted to know if these would fit them,” said Ethel, beginning to
undo her basket.

“Well, ‘pon my word! If ever I see! Here!” stepping out to the door,
“Polly--Jenny! come in, I say, this moment! Come in, ye bad girls, or
I’ll give you the stick; I’ll break every bone of you, that I will!” all
which threats were bawled out in such a good-natured, triumphant voice,
and with such a delighted air, that Richard and Ethel could not help
laughing.

After a few moments, Polly and Jenny made their appearance, extremely
rough and ragged, but compelled by their grandmother to duck down, by
way of courtesies, and, with finger in mouth, they stood, too shy to
show their delight, as the garments were unfolded; Granny talking so
fast that Ethel would never have brought in the stipulation, that the
frocks should be worn to school and church, if Richard, in his mild, but
steady way, had not brought the old woman to listen to it. She was full
of asseverations that they should go; she took them to church sometimes
herself, when it was fine weather and they had clothes, and they could
say their catechiz as well as anybody already; yes, they should come,
that they should, and next Sunday. Ethel promised to be there to
introduce them to the chief lady, the president of the Committee, Mrs.
Ledwich, and, with a profusion of thanks, they took leave.

They found John Taylor, just come out of the hospital, looking weak and
ill, as he smoked his pipe over the fire, his wife bustling about at
a great rate, and one of the infants crying. It seemed to be a great
relief that they were not come to complain of Lucy, and there were many
looks of surprise on hearing what their business really was. Mrs. Taylor
thanked them, and appeared not to know whether she was glad or sorry;
and her husband, pipe in hand, gazed at the young gentleman as if he
did not comprehend the species, since he could not be old enough to be a
clergyman.

Richard hoped they would find sponsors by that time; and there Mrs.
Taylor gave little hope; it was a bad lot--there was no one she liked to
ask to stand, she said, in a dismal voice; but there her husband put in,
“I’ll find some one if that’s all; my missus always thinks nobody can’t
do nothing.”

“To be sure,” said the lamentable Mrs. Taylor, “all the elder ones was
took to church, and I’m loath the little ones shouldn’t; but you see,
sir, we are poor people, and it’s a long way, and they was set down in
the gentleman’s register book.”

“But you know that is not the same, Mrs. Taylor. Surely Lucy could have
told you that, when she went to school.”

“No, sir, ‘tis not the same--I knows that; but this is a bad place to
live in--”

“Always the old song, missus!” exclaimed her husband. “Thank you kindly,
sir--you have been a good friend to us, and so was Dr. May, when I was
up to the hospital, through the thick of his own troubles. I believe you
are in the right of it, sir, and thank you. The children shall be ready,
and little Jack too, and I’ll find gossips, and let ‘em christened on
Sunday.”

“I believe you will be glad of it,” said Richard; and he went on to
speak of the elder children coming to school on Sunday, thus causing
another whining from the wife about distance and bad weather, and no
one else going that way. He said the little Halls were coming, but Mrs.
Taylor begun saying she disliked their company for the children--granny
let them get about so much, and they said bad words. The father again
interfered. Perhaps Mr. Wilmot, who acted as chaplain at the hospital,
had been talking to him, for he declared at once that they should come;
and Richard suggested that he might see them home when he came from
church; then, turning to the boy and girl, told them they would meet
their sister Lucy, and asked them if they would not like that.

On the whole, the beginning was not inauspicious, though there might be
a doubt whether old Mrs. Hall would keep all her promises. Ethel was so
much diverted and pleased as to be convinced she would; Richard was a
little doubtful as to her power over the wild girls. There could not be
any doubt that John Taylor was in earnest, and had been worked upon just
at the right moment; but there was danger that the impression would
not last. “And his wife is such a horrible whining dawdle!” said
Ethel--“there will be no good to be done if it depends on her.”

Richard made no answer, and Ethel presently felt remorseful for her
harsh speech about a poor ignorant woman, overwhelmed with poverty,
children, and weak health.

“I have been thinking a great deal about what you said last time we took
this walk,” said Richard, after a considerable interval.

“Oh, have you!” cried Ethel eagerly; and the black peaty pond she was
looking at seemed to sparkle with sunlight.

“Do you really mean it?” said Richard deliberately.

“Yes, to be sure;” she said, with some indignation.

“Because I think I see a way to make a beginning, but you must make
up your mind to a great deal of trouble, and dirty walks, and you must
really learn not to draggle your frock.”

“Well, well; but tell me.”

“This is what I was thinking. I don’t think I can go back to Oxford
after Christmas. It is not fit to leave you while papa is so disabled.”

“Oh no, he could not get on at all. I heard him tell Mr. Wilmot the
other day that you were his right hand.”

Ethel was glad she had repeated this, for there was a deepening colour
and smiling glow of pleasure on her brother’s face, such as she had
seldom seen on his delicate, but somewhat impassive features.

“He is very kind!” he said warmly. “No, I am sure I cannot be spared
till he is better able to use his arm, and I don’t see any chance
of that just yet. Then if I stay at home, Friday is always at my own
disposal, while pap

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/3610