Chapter Three.
The Hunt-Supper.
“Alas! what haste they make to be undone!”
George Herbert.
Before he went away, Ephraim came up into the window where I sat with my knitting. Mr Parmenter was gone then, and Cecilia was up-stairs with Fanny and Amelia.
“Cary,” said he, “may I ask you a question?”
“Why, Ephraim, I thought you did that every day,” I said, feeling rather diverted at his saying such a thing.
“Ah, common questions that do not signify,” said he, with a smile. “But this is not an insignificant question, Cary; and it is one that I have no right to ask unless you choose to give it me.”
“Go on, Ephraim,” said I, wondering what he meant.
“Are you very fond of Miss Osborne?”
“I never was particularly fond of her,” I said, rather hotly, and I felt my cheeks flush; “and if I had been, I think this morning would have put an end to it.”
“She is not true,” he said. “She rings like false metal. Those who trust in her professions will find the earth open and let them in. And I should not like you to be one, Cary.”
“Thank you, Ephraim,” said I. “I think there is no fear.”
“Your Cousin Amelia is foolish,” he went on, “but I do not think she is false. She will grow out of most of her nonsense. But Cecilia Osborne never will. It is ingrain. She is an older woman at this moment than Mrs Kezia.”
“Older than my Aunt Kezia!” I am afraid I stared.
“I do not mean by the parish register, Cary,” said Ephraim, with a smile. “But she is old in Satan’s ways and wiles, in the hard artificial fashions of the world, in everything which, if I had a sister, I should pray God she might never know anything about. Such women are dangerous. I speak seriously, Caroline.”
I thought it had come to a serious pass, when Ephraim called me Caroline.
“It is not altogether a bad thing to know people for what they are,” he continued. “It may hurt you at the time to have the veil taken off; and that veil, whether by the people themselves or by somebody else, is often pulled off very roughly. But it is better than to have it on, Cary, or to see the ugly thing through beautiful coloured glass, which makes it look all kinds of lovely hues that it is not. The plain white glass is the best. When you do come to something beautiful, then, you see how beautiful it is.” Then, changing his tone, he went on,—“Esther Langridge sent you her love, Cary, and told me to say she was coming up here this afternoon.”
I did not quite wish that Esther would keep away, and yet I came very near doing it. She is not a beautiful thing—I mean in her ways and manners. She speaks more broadly than Sophy, and much worse than the rest of us, and she eats her peas with a knife, which Grandmamma used to say was the sure sign of a vulgar creature. Esther is as kind-hearted a girl as breathes; but—oh dear, what will Cecilia say to her! I felt quite uncomfortable.
And yet, why should I care what Cecilia says? She has shown me plainly enough that she does not care for me. But somehow, she seemed so above us with those dainty ways, and that soft southern accent, and all she knew about etiquette and the mode, and the stories she was constantly telling about great people. Sir George Blank had said such a fine thing to her when she was at my Lady Dash’s assembly; and my Lady Camilla Such-an-one was her dearest friend; and the Honourable Annabella This carried her to drive, and my Lord Herbert That held her cloak at the opera. It was so grand to hear her!
Somehow, Cecilia never said things of that kind when my Aunt Kezia was in the room, and I noted that her grand stories were always much tamer in Flora’s or Sophy’s presence. She did not seem to care about Hatty much either way. But when there were only Amelia, Fanny, Charlotte and me, then, I could not help seeing, she laid the gilt on much thicker. Charlotte used to sit and stare, and then laugh in a way that I thought very rude; but Cecilia did not appear to mind it. When Father came into the parlour, she did so change. Oh, then she was so sweet and amiable!—so delicately attentive!—so anxious that he should be made comfortable, and have everything just as he liked it! I did think, considering that he had four daughters, she might have left that to us. To Ephraim Hebblethwaite she was very attentive and charming, too, but in quite a different way. But she wasted no attention at all on Mr Parmenter, except for those side-glances now and then out of the tawny eyes, which seemed to say that they perfectly understood one another, and that no explanations of any sort were necessary between them.
I cannot make out what Mr Parmenter does for his living. He is not a man of property, for the Vicar told Father that his nephew, Mr Parmenter’s father, left nothing at all for his children. Yet Mr Anthony never seems to do anything but look through his eyeglass, and twirl his mustachios, and talk. I asked Amelia if she knew, for one of the Miss Parmenters, who is married now, lives not far from Bracewell Hall. Amelia, however, applied to Cecilia, saying she would be more likely to know.
“Oh, he does nothing,” said Cecilia; “he is a beau.”
“Now what does that mean?” put in Hatty.
“I’ll tell you what it means,” said Charlotte. “Emily, you be quiet. It means that his income is twenty pence a year, and he spends two thousand pounds; that he is always dressed to perfection, that he is ready to make love to anybody at two minutes’ notice—that is, if her fortune is worth it; that he is never at home in an evening, nor out of bed before noon; that he spends four hours a day in dressing, and would rather ten times lose his wife (when he has one) than break his clouded cane, or damage his gold snuff-box. Isn’t that it, Cicely?”
“You are so absurd!” said Amelia, languidly.
“I told you to keep quiet,” was Charlotte’s answer. “Never mind whether it is absurd; is it true?”
“Well, partly.”
“But I don’t understand,” I said. “How can a man spend two thousand pounds, if he have but twenty pence?”
“Know, ignorant creature,” replied Charlotte, with mock solemnity, “that lansquenet can be played, and that tradesmen’s bills can be put behind the fire.”
“Then you mean, I suppose, that he games, and does not pay his debts?”
“That is about the etiquette, (Note 1.) my charmer.”
“Well, I don’t know what you call that down in the South,” said I, “but up here in Cumberland we do not call it honesty.”
“The South! Oh, hear the child!” screamed Charlotte. “She thinks Derbyshire is in the South!”
“They teach the children so, my dear, in the Carlisle schools,” suggested Hatty.
“I don’t know what they teach in the Carlisle schools,” I said, “for I did not go there. But if Derbyshire be not south of Cumberland, I haven’t learned much geography.”
“Oh dear, how you girls do chatter!” cried Sophy, coming up to us. “I wish one or two of you would think a little more about what wants doing. Cary, you might have made the turnovers for supper. I am sure I have enough on my hands.”
“But, Sophy, I do not know how,” said I.
“Then you ought, by this time,” she answered. “Do not know how to make an apple turnover! Why, it is as easy as shutting your eyes.”
“When you know how to do it,” put in Hatty.
“That is more than you do,” returned Sophy, “for you are safe to leave something out.”
Hatty made her a low courtesy, and danced away, humming, “Cease your funning,” just as we heard the sound of horses’ feet on the drive outside. There were all sorts of guesses as to who was coming, and none of them the right one, for when the door opened at last, in walked Angus Drummond and Mr Keith.
“Well, you did not expect us, I suppose?” said Angus.
“Certainly not to-night,” was Sophy’s answer.
“We finished our business sooner than we expected, and now we are ready to begin our holiday,” said he.
Father came in then, and there was a great deal of kissing and hand-shaking all round; but my Aunt Kezia and Flora were not in the room. They came in together, nearly half an hour later; but I think I never saw such a change in any girl’s face as in Flora’s, when she saw what had happened. She must be very fond of Angus, I am sure. Her cheeks grew quite rosy—she is generally pale—and her eyes were like stars. I did not think Angus seemed nearly so glad to see her.
Essie Langridge was very quiet all the evening; I fancy she was rather frightened of Cecilia. She said very little.
Father had a long day’s hunting yesterday, and Angus Drummond went with him. Mr Keith would not go, though Father laughed about it, and asked if he were afraid of the hares eating him up. Neither would he go to the hunt-supper, afterwards. There were fourteen gentlemen at it, and a pretty racket they made. My Aunt Kezia does not like these hunt-suppers a bit; she would be glad if they were anywhere else than here; but Father being the squire, of course they cannot be. She always packs us girls out of the way, and will not allow us to show our heads. So we sat up-stairs, in Sophy’s chamber, which is the largest and most out of the way; and we had some good fun, first in finding seats, for there were only two chairs in the room, and then in playing hunt the slipper and all sorts of games. I am afraid we got rather too noisy at last, for my Aunt Kezia looked in with,—
“Girls, are you daft? I protest you make nigh as much racket as the gentlemen themselves!”
What Mr Keith did with himself I do not know. I think he went off for a walk somewhere. I know he tried to persuade Angus to go with him, but Angus said he wanted his share of the fun. I heard Mr Keith say, in a low voice,—
“What would your father say, Angus?”
“Oh, my father’s a minister, and they are bound to be particular,” said Angus, carelessly. “I can’t pretend to make such a fash as he would.”
I did not hear what Mr Keith answered, but I believe he went on talking about it. When I got up-stairs with the rest, however, I missed Flora; and going to our room to look for her, I found her crying. I never saw Flora weep before.
“Why, Flora!” said I, “what is the matter with you?”
“Nothing with me, Cary,” she said, “but a great deal with Angus.”
“You do not like his being at the supper?” I said. I hardly knew what to say, and I felt afraid of saying either too much or too little. It seems so difficult to talk without hurting people.
“Not only that,” she said. “I do not like the way he is going on altogether. I know my father would be in a sad way if he knew it.”
I told Flora what I had heard Angus say to Mr Keith.
“Ah!” she said, with another sob, “Angus would not have said that three months ago. I was sure it must have been going on for some time. He has been in bad company, I feel certain. And Angus always was one to take the colour of his company, just as a glass takes the colour of anything you pour in. What can I do? Oh, what can I do? If he will not listen to Duncan—”
“Ambrose Catterall says that young men must always sow their wild oats,” I said, when she stopped thus.
“That is one of the Devil’s maxims,” exclaimed Flora, earnestly. “God calls it sowing to the flesh: and He says the harvest of it is corruption. Some flowers seed themselves: thistles do. Did you ever know roses grow from thistle seed? No: ‘whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he reap.’ Ah me, for Angus’s harvest!”
“Well, I don’t see what you can do,” said I.
“There is the sting,” she replied. “It would be silly to weep if I did. No, in such cases, I think there is only one thing a woman can do—and that is to cry mightily unto God to loose the bonds of the oppressor, and let the oppressed go free. I don’t know—I may be mistaken—but I hardly think it is of much use for women to talk to such a man. It is not talking that he needs. He knows his own folly, very often, at least as well as you can tell him, and would be glad enough to be loosed from his bonds, if only somebody would come and tear them asunder. He cannot: and you cannot. Only God can. Some evil spirits can be cast out by nothing but prayer. Cary—” Flora broke off suddenly, and looked up earnestly in my face. “Don’t mention this, will you, dear? I should not have said a word to you nor any one if you had not surprised me.”
I promised her I would not, unless somebody first spoke to me. She would not come to Sophy’s room.
“Tell the girls,” she said, “that I want to write home; for I shall do it presently, when I feel a little calmer.”
Something struck me as I was turning away. “Flora,” I said, “why do you not tell my Aunt Kezia all about it? I am sure she would help you, if any one could.”
“Yes, dear, I think she would,” said Flora, gently; “but you see no one could. And remember, Cary!” she called me back as I was leaving the chamber, and came to me, and took both my hands; and her great sorrowful eyes, which looked just like brown velvet, gazed into mine like the eyes of a dog which is afraid of a scolding: “remember, Cary, that Angus is not wicked. He is only weak. But how weak he is!”
She broke down with another sob.
“But men should be stronger than women,” said I, “not weaker.”
“They are, in body and mind,” replied Flora: “but sex, I suppose, does not extend to soul. There, some men are far weaker than some women. Look at Peter. I dare say the maid who kept the door would have been less frightened of the two, if he had taunted her with being one of ‘this man’s disciples.’”
“Well, I should feel ashamed!” I said.
“I am not sure if women do not feel moral weakness a greater shame than men do,” replied Flora. “Men seem to think so much more of want of physical bravery. Many a soldier will not stand an ill-natured laugh, who would want to fight you in a minute if you hinted that he was afraid of being hurt. Things seem to look so different to men from what they do to women; and, I think, to the angels, and to God.”
I did not like to leave her alone in her trouble: but she said she wanted nothing, and was going to write to her father; so I went back to Sophy’s room, and gave Flora’s message to the girls.
“Dear! I am sure we don’t want her,” said Hatty: and Charlotte added, “She is more of a spoil-sport than anything else.”
So we played at “Hunt the slipper,” and “Questions and commands,” and “The parson has lost his cloak,” and “Blind man’s buff”: and then when we got tired we sat down—on the beds or anywhere—Hatty took off the mirror and perched herself on the dressing-table, and Charlotte wanted to climb up and sit on the mantel-shelf, but Sophy would not let her—and then we had a round of “How do you like it?” and then we went to bed.
In the middle of the night I awoke with a start, and heard a great noise, and Sam’s voice, and old Will’s, and a lot of queer talking, as if something were being carried up-stairs that was hard to pull along; and there were a good many words that I am sure my Aunt Kezia would not let me write, and—well, if He do look at what I am writing, I should not like God to see them neither. I felt sure that the gentlemen were being carried up to bed—such of them as could not walk—and such as could were being helped along. I rather wonder that gentlemen like to drink so much, and get themselves into such a queer condition. I do not think they would like it if the ladies began to do such things. I could not help wondering if Angus were among them. Flora, who had lain awake for a long while, and had only dropped asleep, as she told me afterwards, about half an hour before, for she heard the clock strike one, slept on at first, and I hoped she would not awake. But as the last lot were being dragged past our door, Flora woke up with a start, and cried,—
“What is that? O Cary, what can be the matter?”
I wanted to make as light of it as I could.
“Oh, go to sleep,” I said; “there is nothing wrong.”
“But what is that dreadful noise?” she persisted.
“Well, it is only the gentlemen going to bed,” said I.
Just then, sounds came through the door, which showed that they were close outside. Somebody—so far as I could guess from what we heard—was determined to sit down on the stairs, and Sam was trying to prevail upon him to go quietly to bed. All sorts of queer things were mixed up with it—hunting cries, bits of songs, invectives against Hanoverians and Dissenters, and I scarcely know what else.
“Who is that wretched creature?” whispered Flora to me.
I had recognised the voice, and was able to answer.
“It is Mr Bagnall,” said I, “the vicar of Dornthwaite.”
“A minister!” was Flora’s answer, in an indescribable tone.
“Oh, that does not make any difference,” I replied, “with the clergy about here. Mr Digby is too old for it now, but I have heard say that when he was a younger man, he used to be as uproarious as anybody.”
At last Sam’s patience seemed to be exhausted, and he and Will between them lifted the reverend gentleman off his feet, and carried him to bed despite his struggles. At least I supposed so from what I heard. About ten minutes later, Sam and Will passed our door on their way back.
“Yon’s a bonnie loon to ca’ a minister,” I heard Sam say as he went past. “But what could ye look for in a Prelatist?”
“He gets up i’ t’ pu’pit, and tells us our dooty, of a Sunda’, but who does hisn of a Monda, think ye?” was old Will’s response.
The footsteps passed on, and I was just going to relieve my feelings by a good laugh, when I was stopped and astonished by Flora’s voice.
“O Cary, how dreadful!”
“Dreadful!” said I, “what is dreadful?”
“That wretched man!” she said in a tone which matched her words.
“He does not think himself a wretched man, by any means,” I said. “His living is worth quite two hundred a year, and he has a little private property beside. They say he does not stand at all a bad chance for a deanery. His wife is not a pleasant woman, I believe; she has a temper: but his son is carrying all before him at college, and his daughters are thought to be among the prettiest girls in the county.”
“Has he children? Poor things!” sighed Flora.
“Why, Flora, I cannot make you out,” said I. “I could understand your being uncomfortable about Angus; but what is Mr Bagnall to you?”
“Cary!” I cannot describe the tone.
“Well?” said I.
“Is the Lord nothing to me?” she said, almost passionately; “nor the poor misguided souls committed to that man’s charge, for which he will have to give account at the last day?”
“My dear Flora, you do take things so seriously!” I said, trying to laugh; but her tone and words had startled me, for all that.
“It is well to take sin seriously,” said she. “Men are serious enough in Hell; and sin is its antechamber.”
“You don’t suppose poor Mr Bagnall will be sent there, for a little too much champagne at a hunt-supper?” said I. I did not like it, for I thought of Father. I have heard him singing “Old King Cole” and half a dozen more songs, all mixed up in a heap, after a hunt-supper. “Men always do it there. And I can assure you Mr Bagnall is thought a first-class preacher. People go to hear him even from Cockermouth.”
“That is worse than ever,” said Flora, “A man who preaches the truth and serves the Devil—that must be awful!”
“Flora, you do say the queerest things!” said I. “Does your father never do so?”
“My father?” she answered in an astonished, indignant voice. “My father! Cary! but,”—with a change in the tone—“you do not know him, of course. Why, Cary, if he knew that Angus had been for once in the midst of such a scene as that, I think it would break my father’s heart.”
I wondered how Angus had fared, and if he were singing snatches of Scotch songs in some bed-chamber at the other end of the long gallery, but I had not the cruelty to say it to Flora.
When we came down the next morning, I was curious to peep into the dining-room, just to see what it was like. The wreck of a ship is the only thing I can think of, which might look like it. Half the chairs were flung over in all directions, and two broken to pieces; a quantity of broken glass was heaped both on the floor and the table; dark wine stains on the carpet, and pools upon the table, not yet dry, were sufficient signs of what the night had been. Bessy stood in the window, duster in hand, picking up the chairs, and setting them in their places.
“Didn’t the gentlemen enjoy theirselves, Miss Cary?” said she. “My word, but they made a night on’t! I’d like to ha’ been wi’ ’em, just for to see!”
I made no answer beyond nodding my head. Flora’s words came back to me,—“It is well to take sin seriously.” I could not laugh and jest, as I dare say I should have done but for them.
When I came into the parlour, I only found three of all the gentlemen in the house,—Father, Mr Keith, and Ambrose Catterall. I thought Father seemed rather cross, and he was finding fault with everybody for something. Sophy’s hair was rough, and Hatty had put on a gown he did not like, and Fanny’s ruffle had a hole in it; and then he turned round and scolded my Aunt Kezia for not having us in better order. My Aunt Kezia said never a word, but I felt sure from her drawn brow and set lips, as she stood making tea, that she could have said a great many. Mr Keith was silent and grave. Ambrose Catterall seemed to think it his duty to make fun for everybody, and he laughed and joked and chattered away finely. I asked where old Mr Catterall was.
“Oh, in bed with a headache,” laughed Ambrose, “like everybody else this morning.”
“Speak for yourself,” said Mr Keith. “I have not one.”
“Well, mine’s going,” returned Ambrose, gaily. “A cup of Mrs Kezia’s capital tea will finish it off.”
“Finish what off?” asked my Aunt Kezia.
“My last night’s headache,” said he.
“That tea must have come from Heaven, then, instead of China,” replied she. “Nay, Ambrose Catterall; it will take blood to finish off the consequence of your doings last night.”
“Why, Mrs Kezia, are you going to fight me?” asked he, laughing.
“Young man, why don’t you fight the Devil?” answered my Aunt Kezia, looking him full in the face. “He does not pay good wages, Ambrose.”
“Never saw the colour of his money yet,” said Ambrose, who seemed extremely amused.
“I wish you never may,” quoth my aunt. “But I sadly fear you are going the way to do it.”
The more Ambrose laughed, the graver my Aunt Kezia seemed to grow. Before we had finished breakfast, Angus came languidly into the room.
“What ails you, old comrade?” said Ambrose; and Flora’s eyes looked up with the same question, but I think there were tears on the brown velvet.
“Oh, my head aches conf— I mean—abominably,” said Angus, flushing.
“Take a hair of the dog that bit you,” suggested Ambrose; “unless you think humble pie will agree with you better. I fancy Miss Drummond would rather help you to that last.”
I saw a flash in Mr Keith’s eyes, which gave me the idea that he might not be a pleasant person to meet alone in a glen at midnight, if he had no scruples as to what he did.
“You hold your tongue!” growled Angus.
“By all means, if you prefer it,” said Ambrose, lightly.
One after another, the gentlemen strolled in,—all but two who stayed in bed till afternoon, and of these Mr Catterall was one. Among the last to appear was Mr Bagnall; but he looked quite fresh and gay when he came, like Ambrose.
“We had to say grace for ourselves, Mr Bagnall,” said Father. “Sit down, and let me help you to some of this turkey pie.”
“Thanks—if you please. What a lovely morning!” was Mr Bagnall’s answer. “The young ladies look like fresh rosebuds with the dew on them.”
“We have not you gentlemen to thank for it, if we do,” broke in Hatty. “Our slumbers were all the less profound for your kind assistance. Oh yes, you can look, Mr Bagnall! I mean you. I heard ‘Sally in our Alley’ about one o’clock this morning.”
“No, was I singing that, now?” said Mr Bagnall, laughing. “I did not know I got quite so far. But at a hunt-supper, you know, everything is excusable.”
“Would you give me a reference to the passage which says so, Mr Bagnall?” came from behind the tea-pot. “I should like to note it in my Bible.”
Mr Bagnall laughed again, but rather uncomfortably.
“My dear Mrs Kezia, you do not imagine the Bible has anything to do with a hunt-supper?”
“It is to be hoped I don’t, or I should be woefully disappointed,” she answered. “But I always thought, Mr Bagnall, that the Word of God and the ministers of God should have something to do with one another.”
“Kezia, keep your Puritan notions to yourself!” roared Father from the other end of the table; and he put some words before it which I would rather not write. “I can’t think,” he went on, looking round, “wherever Kezia can have picked up such mad whims as she has. For a sister of mine to say such a thing to a clergyman—I declare it makes my hair stand on end!”
“Your hair may lie down again, Brother. I’ve done,” said my Aunt Kezia, coolly. “As to where I got it, I should think you might know. It runs in the blood. And I suppose Deborah Hunter was your grandmother as well as mine.”
Father’s reply was full of the words I do not want to write, but it was not a compliment to his grandmother.
“Come, Mrs Kezia,” said Mr Bagnall, “let us make it up by glasses all round, and a toast to the sweet Puritan memory of Mrs Deborah Hunter.”
“No, thank you,” said my Aunt Kezia. “As to Deborah Hunter, she has been a saint in Heaven these thirty years, and finely she’d like it (if she knew it) to have you drinking yourselves drunk in her honour. But let me tell you—and you can say what you like after it—she taught me that ‘the chief end of man was to glorify God, and to enjoy Him for ever.’ Your notion seems to be that the chief end of man is to glorify himself, and to enjoy him for ever. I think mine’s the better of the two: and as to yours, the worst thing I wish any of you is that you may get mine instead of it. Now then, Brother, I’ve had my say, and you can have yours.”
And not another word did my Aunt Kezia say, though Father stormed, and the other gentlemen laughed and joked, and paid her sarcastic compliments, all the while breakfast lasted. There were two who were silent, and those were Angus and Mr Keith. Angus seemed too poorly and unhappy to take any interest in the matter; and as to Mr Keith, I believe in his heart (if I read it right in his eyes) that he was perfectly delighted with my Aunt Kezia.
“The young ladies did not honour us by riding to the meet,” said Mr Bagnall at last, looking at that one of us who sat nearest him—which, by ill luck, happened to be Flora.
“No, Sir. I do not think my aunt would have allowed it; but—” Flora stopped, and cast her eyes on her plate.
“But if she had, you would have been pleased to come?” suggested Mr Bagnall, rubbing his hands.
He spoke in that disagreeable way in which some men do speak to girls—I do not know what to call it. It is a condescending, patronising kind of manner, as if—yes, that is it!—as if they wanted to amuse themselves by hearing the opinion of something so totally incapable of forming one. I wish they knew how the girls long to shake the nonsense out of them.
But Flora did not lose her temper, as I should have done: she held her own with a quiet dignity which I envied, but could never have imitated.
“Pardon me, Sir. I was about to say the direct contrary—that if my aunt had allowed it, I for one would rather not have gone.”
“Afraid of a fall, eh?” laughed Mr Bagnall. “Well, ladies are not expected to be as venturesome as men.”
Now, why do men always fancy that it is a woman’s duty to do what men expect her? I cannot see it one bit.
“I was not afraid of that, Sir,” said Flora.
Father, with whom Flora is a favourite, was listening with a smile. I believe Aunt Drummond was his pet sister.
“No? Why, what then?” said Mr Bagnall, shaking the pepper over his turkey pie until I wondered what sort of a throat he would have when he had finished it.
“I am afraid of hardening my heart, Sir,” said Flora, in her calm decisive way.
“Hardening your heart, girl! What do you mean?” said Father. “Hardening your heart by riding to hounds!”
“A little puzzling, certainly,” said Sir Robert Dacre, who sat opposite. “We must ask Miss Drummond to explain.”
He did not speak in that disagreeable way that Mr Bagnall did; but Flora flushed up when she found three gentlemen looking at her, and asking her for an explanation.
“I mean,” she answered, “that one hardens one’s heart by taking pleasure in anything which gives another creature pain. But I beg your pardon; indeed I did not mean to put myself forward.”
“No, no, child; we drew you forward,” said Father, kindly. He gets over his tempers in a moment, and he seemed to have quite forgotten the passage at arms with my Aunt Kezia.
“Still, I do not quite understand,” said Sir Robert, not at all unkindly. “Who is the injured creature in this case, Miss Drummond?”
Flora’s colour rose again. “The hare, Sir,” she said.
“The hare!” cried Mr Bagnall, leaning back in his chair to laugh. “Well, Miss Flora, you are quixotic.”
“May I quote my father, Sir?” was her reply. “He says that Don Quixote (supposing him a real person, which I take it he was not) was one of the noblest men the world ever saw, only the world was not ready for him.”
“The world not ready for him? No, I should think not!” laughed Father. “Not just yet, my little lady-errant.”
Flora smiled quietly. “Perhaps it will be, some day. Uncle Courtenay,” she said.
“When the larks fall from the sky—eh, Miss Flora?” said Mr Bagnall, rubbing his hands again in that odious way he has.
“When ‘they shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain,’” was Flora’s soft answer.
“Surely you don’t suppose that literal?” replied Mr Bagnall, laughing. “Why, you must be as bad—I had nearly said as mad—as my next neighbour, Everard Murthwaite (of Holme Cultram, you know,” he explained aside to Father). “Why, he has actually got a notion that the Jews are to be restored to Palestine! Whoever heard of such a mad idea? Only think—the Jews!”
“Ridiculous nonsense!” said Father.
“Is it not usually the case,” asked Mr Keith, who till then had hardly spoken, “that the world counts as mad the wisest men in it?”
“Why, Mr Keith, you must be one of them!” cried Mr Bagnall.
“Of the wise men? Thank you!” said Mr Keith, drily.
There was a laugh at this.
“But I can tell you of something queerer still,” Mr Bagnall went on. “Old Cis Crosthwaite, in my parish, says she knows her sins are forgiven.”
Such exclamations came from most of the gentlemen at that! “Preposterous!” said one. “Ridiculous!” said another. “Insufferable presumption!” cried a third.
“Cis Crosthwaite!” said Sir Robert Dacre, more quietly.
“Yes, Cis Crosthwaite,” repeated Mr Bagnall; “an old wretch of a woman who has never been any better than she should be, and whom I met sticking hedges only last winter. Her son Joe is the worst poacher in the parish.”
All the gentlemen seemed to think that most dreadful. I do not know why it is they always appear to reckon snaring wild game which belongs nobody a more wicked thing than breaking all the Ten Commandments. Would it not have been in them if it were?
Only Sir Robert Dacre said, “Poor old creature! don’t let us saddle her with Joe’s sins. I dare say she has plenty of her own.”
“Plenty? I should think so. She is a horrid old wretch,” answered Mr Bagnall. “And do but think, if this miserable creature has not the arrogance and presumption to say that her sins are forgiven!”
“I suppose Christ died that somebody’s sins might be forgiven?” said Mr Keith, in his quiet way.
“Of course, but those are respectable people,” Mr Bagnall said, rather indignantly.
“Before or after the forgiveness?” asked Mr Keith.
“Sir,” said Mr Bagnall, rather stiffly, “I am not accustomed to discuss such matters as these at table.”
“Are you not? I am,” said Mr Keith, quite simply.
“But,” continued Mr Bagnall, “I thought every one understood the orthodox view—namely, that a man must do his best, and practise virtue, and lead a proper sort of life, and then, when God Almighty sees you a decent and fit person, and endeavouring to be good He helps you with His grace.” (Note 2.)
“Of course!” said the Vicar of Sebergham—I suppose by way of Amen.
“Men are to do their best, then, and practise these virtues, in the first instance, without any assistance from God’s grace? That Gospel sounds rather ill tidings,” was Mr Keith’s answer.
Everybody was listening by this time. Sir Robert Dacre, I thought, seemed secretly diverted; and Hatty’s eyes were gleaming with fun. Father looked uncomfortable, and as if he did not know what Mr Keith would be at. From my Aunt Kezia little nods of satisfaction kept coming to what he said.
“Sir,” demanded Mr Bagnall, looking his adversary straight in the face, “are you not orthodox?”
He spoke rather in the tone in which he might have asked, “Are you not honest?”
“May I ask you to explain the word, before I answer?” was Mr Keith’s response.
“I mean, are you one of these Methodists?”
“Certainly not. I belong to the Kirk of Scotland.”
Mr Bagnall’s “Oh!” seemed to say that some at any rate of Mr Keith’s queer notions might be accounted for, if he were so unfortunate as to have been born in a different Church.
“But,” pursued Mr Keith, “seeing that the Church of England, and the Kirk of Scotland, and the Methodists, all accept the Word of God as the rule of faith, they should all, methinks, be sound in the faith, if that be what you mean by ‘orthodox.’”
“By ‘orthodox,’” said the Vicar of Sebergham, after a sonorous clearing of his throat, “I understand a man who keeps to the Articles of the Church, and does not run into any extravagances and enthusiasm.”
“Hear him!” cried Mr Bagnall, as if he were at a Tory meeting. Hatty burst out laughing, but immediately smothered it in her handkerchief.
“I do hear him, and with pleasure,” said Mr Keith. “I am no friend to extravagance, I assure you. Let a Churchman keep to the Bible and the Articles, and I ask no more of him. But excuse me if I say that we are departing from the question before us, which was the propriety, or impropriety, of one saying that his sins were forgiven. May I ask why you object to that?—and is the objection to the forgiveness, or to the proclamation of it?”
“Sir,” said Mr Bagnall, warmly, “I think it presumption—arrogance—horrible self-conceit.”
“To have forgiveness?—or to say so?”
“I cannot answer such a question, Sir!” said Mr Bagnall, getting red in the face, and seizing the pepper-box once more, with which he dusted his pie recklessly. “When a man sets himself up to be better than his neighbours in that way, it is scandalous—perfectly scandalous, Sir!”
“‘Better than his neighbours!’” repeated Mr Keith, as if he were considering the question. “If a pardoned criminal be better than his neighbours, I suppose the neighbours are worse criminals?”
“Sir, you misunderstand me. They fancy themselves better than others.” Mr Bagnall was getting angry.
“But seeing all are criminals alike, and they own it every Sunday,” was Mr Keith’s answer, “does it not look rather odd that an objection should be made to one of them stating that he has been pardoned? Is it because the rest are unpardoned, and are conscious of it?”
“Come, friends!” said Sir Robert, before Mr Bagnall could reply. “Let us not lose our tempers, I beg. Mr Keith is a Scotsman, and such are commonly good reasoners and love a tilt; and ’tis but well in a young man to keep his wits in practice. But we must not get too far, you know.”
“Just so! just so!” saith Father, who I think was glad to have a stop put to this sort of converse. “Mr Bagnall, I am sure, bears no malice. Sir Robert, when do the Holme Cultram hounds meet next?”
Mr Bagnall growled something, I know not what, and gave himself up to his pie for the rest of the time, Mr Keith smiled, and said no more. But I know in whose hands I thought the victory rested.
Note 1. The word “ticket” was still spelt “etiquette.”
Note 2. These exact expressions are quoted in Whitefield’s sermons.