There was a lull in the storm as soon as the two Whig candidates were elected to represent the city of Bristol, and Mr. Hart-Davis withdrew quietly from the contest. The undercurrent, it is true, was still muttering and murmuring of evil times to come, and all thinking men who looked below the surface knew that it would but need a spark to kindle a great fire in Bristol, and that much wisdom, firmness, and decision, would be needed amongst the rulers.
Joyce Arundel, in her happy home life, soon lost the sense of insecurity, which after that memorable drive from Fair Acres, had at first haunted her.
Falcon's lessons, and the interest she felt in his rapid advancement, engrossed her every morning when her household duties were over; and then she would pace up and down the garden overlooking the city, with her baby in her arms, while Lota and Lettice played on the wide expanse of even, if rather smoke-dried, turf, which sloped down from the terrace walk at the back of the house, and tell herself a hundred times that no wife or mother in England was happier than she was.
The early married life of a mother whose chief interests centre in her own home, and who knows no craving for anything that lies beyond, is happy indeed. As years pass and her children vanish, and the sweetness of entire dependence on her ceases of necessity with infancy and childhood, the mother, weary with the battle of life, encompassed with difficulties, and overburdened with requirements which the failing strength of advancing years makes it hard to fulfil, can turn back to that fair oasis in her pilgrimage, when the children were with her day and night, when her hand had power to soothe a childish trouble, and her voice charm away a little pain or disappointment, or add, by her sympathy in joys as well as in sorrows, zest to all those simple pleasures in which children delight.
Sometimes, even to the best mothers, I know, there comes a sudden, sharp awakening. The son of much love and many prayers goes far astray; the daughter, her pride and joy in her early childhood, is apparently cold and heartless. But as a rule, I think, in the retrospect the cry is forced from many a mother's sad heart: "If only I had been more to him in early boyhood; cared for his games, and interested myself in all his play as well as work, it might have been different"; or, "If I had dealt more tenderly and patiently with her when she was standing on the threshold of womanhood, it might have been different!"
Vain regrets, vain laments for some of us; but the young mother, like Joyce Falconer, has the children and the father of the children still with her, and may, as Joyce did, sing to herself a sweet, low song of thanksgiving, which made Lettice stop in her play, and, running up to her side, say:
"What a pretty song mother is singing to baby!"
And now another voice was heard, rather a sad, querulous voice, which did not chime in well with the mother's song, or the baby's gentle coo of gladness, or the laughter of the two little sisters, as Falcon dashed out upon them from the open door of the hall with a big ball in his hand, which he threw down the grass with a merry "Halloo!"
Falcon's lessons, which his mother had left him to learn, were over, and he was free to run and jump to his heart's content.
"Joyce, are you not coming to get ready? Aunt Falconer never likes to be kept waiting."