“Yes, it is a bee,” says Miss Candituft, using her glass; and then staring at the baronet. “It is a bee. Ha, Sir Arthur! What an aquiline eye you have! Not even a bee escapes you! Well, it is a bee.”
“Really, a beautiful thing. So white, and pink, and smooth; so like Dresden china, you might put the wench upon a mantel-piece. Eh?” and Hodmadod looks for the lady’s opinion.
Miss Candituft stares at Sir Arthur; she did not expect to be appealed to upon so domestic an arrangement. And then, without winking, and with a fixed wondering face, Miss Candituft says, “I don’t know.”
“Charming thing!” And the uneasy Hodmadod turns in his saddle to look at Jenny. “A child of nature!”
“You think so?” asks Miss Candituft, with a searching emphasis, that somehow goes through the baronet.
Hodmadod finds himself put upon his proofs; and in his usual logical manner, hastily sets his meaning in its clearest, strongest light. “Quite a child of nature. That is, you know, when I say a child of nature, why I mean, of course, a—a perfect kitten.”
“Of course; that is evident,” says Miss Candituft, with her large, cold eyes in the brain of the baronet. Defenceless man! He feels his exposed condition—and touching his hat, speeds past the carriage. Well, we do not yet think him safe. Miss Candituft pursues him with such a look that, even now, we would not insure him from the life-long consequences of her resolution. However, let him flutter his hour while he may. We shall see.
On either side boys and girls set up so loud, so shrill a welcome, it is plain they have caught sight of some bit of bravery—some splendour that hitherto is the chief glory of the show. Quick and perceptive is the wit of childhood; and—they know it—the little ones have not spent their best cheer without good judgment. For look at that magnificent equipage. Four glorious horses, wearing the most superb caparison, with—it would seem—a full sense of its costliness, for everywhere it is set and bossed with precious silver—four horses, dancing—as though, like immortal steeds, they pawed the empyrean, not the Queen’s highway—draw a sky-blue phaeton. There is another shout, as the vehicle turns the corner; and horses, and postilions, and carriage and company, are revealed at full. The horses seem to toss their heads, as with a sense of beauty, coquetting with the public approbation; and the postilions, in their gold-coloured satin jackets, have an assured and knowing look, and very proud of their horse-flesh, pat the beasts, as though blood was immortal, and there was not a dog in the world. And who are the company who sit in the phaeton, drinking in, as at every pore of the skin, the looks of wonder and admiration that from all sides are cast upon them? It is difficult—we feel the task—very difficult to obtain belief for the assertion; nevertheless, as faithful chroniclers, we must at any peril make it. The ladies are Mrs. Jericho and her two daughters, Miss Monica and Miss Agatha Pennibacker; the gentleman is Mr. Solomon Jericho.
No, sir; we are not abashed at your look of incredulity; we expected it. We had no thought that, at the word, you would take our avowal for the truth; the folks are, every one of them, so changed; so refined, and yet withal so enlarged. Mrs. Jericho was always a woman of commanding presence; she could not, even when she most desired to unbend, she could not without very much ado, subside into the familiarity of gentleness. But now, she looks as though she had been passing a visit with Queen Juno, and had brought home the last large manners from Olympus. Albeit she only shares the phaeton with three others, she seems as though she filled, nay overflowed it; manner, manner does so much. The nasty children scream, and the horrid bumpkins shout; yet it is gratifying, very pleasant, indeed, that the phaeton (her taste,) and the postboys’ jackets (her taste,) are not lost upon the creatures. Nevertheless, Mrs. Jericho will not bow; no, not wink an eyelid in recognition of the applause; she will receive the homage as the fealty born to. And the young ladies are worthy of their majestic mother. They are wondrously changed. They have, with all the elasticity of the female character, so sympathized with fortune in her sudden good-nature, that already she seems to them a life-long acquaintance.
Solomon Jericho is only fourteen days older since he and the reader were last together. Fourteen days only have been filtered into the sea of the past since Solomon Jericho—with a strange musical tingling of every nerve of his body; with a lively, melodious flourish to Plutus—entered upon the mysterious cares of wealth. Whenever it pleased Solomon, he could lay his hand upon his heart, and find a hundred pounds of ready money there. Yes; we say it. When Solomon wanted real happiness, he had only to place his hand upon his heart, and he touched the ready felicity. He was mightily stirred by the first knowledge of the secret. The reader may haply remember, that ere Jericho—to his vast astonishment—drew forth the first note; ere the property of his bosom, like a dried autumn leaf, came off into his palm, he was raised to a state of ecstasy. He felt, without knowing the cause, all the blessedness of the triumph that makes man, by force of a golden sceptre, one of the kings of the world. Earth, with all its delights, was suddenly made to him little other than one huge market, whereat he might purchase whatever took his choice. Without knowing it, he celebrated his coming of age; the unexpected birth-day of a full-grown heir. Now this emotion passed almost as soon as Jericho was assured of possession. He himself could not have believed in the easiness of his self-accommodation to the boundlessness of money. Nevertheless, next morning he woke to fortune, as though she had always shared his pillow. Even Mrs. Jericho was astonished at the equanimity with which her husband received the gifts of luck, as vouchsafed to him from discovered veins of platina; for no, not even to the partner of his bosom, had Jericho revealed his bosom’s wealth. Little, indeed, did Mrs. Jericho know the value of the heart that beat—did it really beat?—beside her. It was, in truth, the one great secret of his breast that Jericho held undiscovered from the nominal mistress of that region.