CHAPTER V.
1859.
Visits from friends and relatives.—A Frenchman in the Highlands.—
Project of buying the island of Innistrynich.
When we arrived at Innistrynich from the Continent, all our neighbors had left Loch Awe, and we had only as occasional visitors the doctor and our landlord—the rare and far-between calls of the minister ceasing with the fine days; but we were not afraid of our solitude à deux, and we had the pleasant prospect of entertaining Aunt Mary and Anne Hamerton early in the summer, as well as the husband of my godmother, M. Souverain, a well-known Parisian publisher, whose acquaintance Mr. Hamerton had made through my father, and who had promised to come to see us. Meanwhile, we resumed our usual rules of work, and my husband began several oil pictures at once, so as to lose no time in having to wait for the drying of the colors.
As he had made great progress in his French, he proposed that we should change our parts, and that nothing but English should be spoken, read, or written by me, except my letters to French correspondents. I delayed my submission a while, for it seemed that if I could not speak—even to him—confidentially and with perfect ease, that indeed would be solitude. At last I yielded to his entreaties, strengthened by my father's remonstrances, and some months of constantly renewed endeavors not always successful, and sometimes accompanied by weariness, discouragement, and tears—began for me, my teacher never swerving from his rule, not even when, despairing of making myself understood, I used a French word or expression. On such occasions he invariably shook his head and said: "I do not understand French; speak English," at the same time helping me out of my difficulty as much as he could.
Aunt Mary and Anne Hamerton had promised to come to see us during the summer, and we had repeated our invitation in the beginning of the spring of 1859, but Aunt Mary wrote to her nephew: "I am looking forward with great pleasure to my visit to you and Eugénie, but I think I had better NOT come till the little cherub has come, because anybody would know better what to do than I should."
She wrote again on June 6, 1859: "I am very glad indeed that Eugénie and the dear little boy are doing well; give my very best love to Eugénie, and tell her that now Anne and I are looking forward with great pleasure to visiting you as soon as we can."
They came in July, and Aunt Mary was delighted with the beauty of the scenery, with the strong and healthy appearance of her little grand-nephew, whom she held in her arms as much and as long as her strength allowed, but especially by the recovered affectionate intimacy with my husband, and also by the certainty of our domestic happiness.
Anne Hamerton greatly enjoyed the excursions on land and water, and so the days passed pleasantly. When my husband was painting, either in his studio or out-of-doors, we sat near him and read aloud by turns. Aunt Mary was very fond of Moore's poetry, and read it well and feelingly, though her voice was rather tremulous and weak. To Anne were given passages of "Modern Painters" as examples of style, and Lamartine's "Jocelyn" for French pronunciation. I fear that Aunt Mary's appreciation of it was more imaginary than real. "The Newcomes" fell to my lot, being easier than poetry, and gave rise to many a debate about its superiority or inferiority to Thackeray's other works. As an author he was not justly appreciated by Aunt Mary, who, on account of her aristocratic loyalty, did not forgive him for "The Four Georges."
We had also a good deal of music; my husband, having been accustomed to play duets with his cousin, soon resumed the practice, and though I had not encouraged him as a solo-player, I liked well enough to listen to his violin with a piano accompaniment. Anne's playing was only mediocre, but as she did not attempt anything above her skill, it was pleasant enough; she accompanied all the French songs I had brought with me, and they were numerous, for at that time there was no soirée in Paris—homely or fashionable—without romances; the public taste was not so fastidious as it has since become, and did not expect from a school-girl the performance of an operatic prima donna. When out in the boat on a peaceful and serene night, my husband rowing us slowly on the glassy water, it seemed that the melodies which rose and spread in the hazy atmosphere were the natural complement to these enchanted hours. Anne often sang "Beautiful Star" or "Long Time Ago," and I was always asked for "Le Lac" or "La Chanson de Fortunio."