“Ah, yes!” said he, reading aloud; “‘I might have borne up better under this misfortune if it had not occurred at such a critical moment of my poor boy’s fate, for I am still uncertain what effect these tidings will have produced on you. I shall no longer have a home to offer the young people, when from reasons of health, or economy, or relaxation, they would like to have left the town and come down to rusticate with us. Neither will it be in my power to contribute—even in the humble shape I had once hoped—to their means of living. I am, in short, reduced to the very narrowest fortune, nor have I the most distant prospect of any better: so much for myself As for Joseph, he has been offered, through the friendly intervention of an old college companion, an appointment at the Calcutta Bar. It is not a lucrative nor an important post, but one which they say will certainly lead to advancement and future fortune. Had it not been for his hopes—hopes which had latterly constituted the very spring of his existence—such an opening as this would have been welcomed with all his heart; but now the offer comes clouded with all the doubts as to how you may be disposed to regard it. Will you consent to separate from the dear girl you have watched over with such loving solicitude for years? Will she herself consent to expatriation and the parting from her sister and yourself? These are the questions which torture his mind, and leave him no rest day or night! The poor fellow has tried to plead his cause in a letter—he has essayed a dozen times—but all in vain.
“My own selfishness shocks me,” he says, “when I read over what I have written, and see how completely I have forgotten everything but my own interests. If he remain at home, by industry and attention he may hope, in some six or seven years, to be in a position to marry; but six or seven years are a long period of life, and sure to have their share of vicissitudes and casualties. Whereas, by accepting this appointment, which will be nearly seven hundred a year, he could afford at once to support a wife, of course supposing her to submit willingly to the privations and wants of such straitened fortunes. I have offered to tell his story for him—that story he has no strength to tell himself—but I have not pledged to be his advocate; for, while I would lay down my life to secure his happiness, I cannot bring myself to urge, for his sake, what might be unfair or ungenerous to exact from another.
“‘Though my son’s account of your niece leaves us nothing more to ask or wish for in a daughter, I am writing in ignorance of many things I would like to know. Has she, for instance, the energy of character that would face a new life in a new and far away land? Has she courage—has she health for it? My wife is not pleased at my stating all these reasons for doubt; but I am determined you shall know the worst of our case from ourselves, and discover no blot we have not prepared you for.’” Calvert mattered something here, but too inaudibly to be heard, and went on reading: “‘When I think that poor Joe’s whole happiness will depend on what decision your next letter will bring, I have only to pray that it may be such as will conduce to the welfare of those we both love so dearly I cannot ask you to make what are called ‘sacrifices’ for us: but I entreat you let the consideration of affection weigh with you, not less than that of worldly interests, and also to believe that when one has to take a decision which is to influence a lifetime, it is as safe to take counsel from the heart as from the head—from the nature that is to feel, as from the intellect that is to plan.’
“I think I have read enough of this,” said Calvert, impatiently. “I know the old gent’s brief perfectly. It’s the old story: first gain a girl’s affections, and let her friends squabble, if they dare, about the settlements. He’s an artful old boy, that vicar! but I like him, on the whole, better than his son, for though he does plead in forma pauperis, he has the fairness to say so.”
“You are very severe, Mr. Calvert. I hope you are too severe,” said the old lady, in some agitation.
“And what answer are you going to give him?” asked he, curtly.
“That is exactly the point on which I want your advice; for though I know well you are no friend to young Loyd, I believe you to be our sincere well-wisher, and that your judgment will be guided by the honest feelings of regard for us.”
Without deigning to notice this speech, he arose and walked up and down the room apparently deep in thought He stopped at last, and said, abruptly, “I don’t presume to dictate to you in this business; but if I were the young lady’s guardian, and got such a letter as this, my reply would be a very brief one.”
“You’d refuse your consent?”
“Of course I would! Must your niece turn adventuress, and go off to Heaven knows where, with God knows whom? Must she link her fortunes to a man who confessedly cannot face the world at home, but must go to the end of the earth for a bare subsistence? What is there in this man himself, in his character, station, abilities, and promise, that are to recompense such devotion as this? And what will your own conscience say to the first letter from India, full of depression and sorrow, regrets shadowed forth, if not avowed openly, for the happy days when you were all together, and contrasts of that time, with the dreary dulness of an uncheered existence? I know something of India, and I can tell you it is a country where life is only endurable by splendour. Poverty in such a land is not merely privation, it is to live in derision and contempt. Everyone knows how many rupees you have per month, and you are measured by your means in everything. That seven hundred a year, which sounds plausibly enough, is something like two hundred at home, if so much. Of course you can override all these considerations, and, as the vicar says, ‘Let the heart take precedence of the head.’ My cold and worldly counsels will not stand comparison with his fine and generous sentiments, no more than I could make as good a figure in the pulpit as he could. But, perhaps, as a mere man of the world, I am his equal; though there are little significant hints in that very letter that show the old parson is very wide awake.”