There he appeared to rally for a few days,—taking powerful exercise on horseback and on foot, and indulging but little in the luxury of the meerschaum. One day, however, the weather was so intemperate that he could not stir abroad; and he passed several hours in his "cabinet," with his favourite meerschaum. From that period the apathy which he had to some extent shaken off, returned with increased power: his manner seemed more lethargic and indifferent than it had yet been; and the companionship of his pipe grew more welcome to him than ever. He now spent the greater portion of each day in his cabinet, with positive orders that he was not to be disturbed; and there he enjoyed that baleful comfort which is experienced by the Teryaki, or oriental opium-eaters. Reclining in a capacious arm-chair, with the tube of his meerschaum between his lips, Lord Ravensworth forgot the world without,—remembered not his wife,—thought not of the infant that she bore in her bosom,—and even seemed insensible to the fearful wasting away which his physical strength was rapidly undergoing. He refused to allow his physician to prescribe for him; and though the work of enfeeblement and decay progressed with alarming velocity, he seldom appeared to reflect that he must shortly be numbered with the dead.
It is due to Adeline to state that,—attached to pleasure and gaiety, and fond of society as she was,—she endeavoured to arouse her husband as much as she could from that mortal apathy which, even in her presence, shrouded all his sensibilities as it were in a premature grave. His case presented the remarkable and mysterious anomaly of a man in the noon of lusty-hood, and without any apparent ailment of a specific kind, passing out of existence by a geometrical progression of decay.
Such was the condition of Lord Ravensworth at the period when we introduce our readers to the Hall.
A few words will explain the motive which had induced him to rise at so unusually early an hour on the 1st of February, and which also led him to a temporary, and, alas! very feeble exertion to shake off the torpor of listlessness and the opiate influence of his mortal apathy.
Lady Ravensworth's cousin, the Honourable Miss Maria Augusta Victoria Amelia Hyacintha Villiers, was, in fashionable language, "to be that morning led to the hymeneal altar." This young lady was rich only in her names: she was a portionless orphan; and the cold calculation of her guardian, Lord Rossville (Adeline's father), had induced him to consent to the sacrifice of the poor girl to a suitor whose wealth and title of Baronet were his only recommendations.
Miss Maria Augusta Victoria Amelia Hyacintha Villiers had been residing with her cousin Adeline, ever since the marriage of the latter with Lord Ravensworth; and it was to consummate the sacrifice ere now alluded to that all the grand preparations before mentioned were in progress. Lord and Lady Rossville and Lady Ravensworth all conceived that Lord Ravensworth would be benefited by the excitement attending the assemblage of a marriage party at the Hall; and their expectations appeared to be in some measure justified. His lordship descended at an unusually early hour to his cabinet, and, instead of having recourse to his meerschaum, he summoned the butler, to whom he gave instructions relative to the service of particular wines.
For nearly a month past his lordship had not meddled in any of the affairs of the household; and the venerable servant was overjoyed to think that his noble master was giving unequivocal signs of recovery. This idea seemed to acquire confirmation from the circumstance that the nobleman afterwards returned to his dressing-room without smoking a single pipe, and, aided by his valet, attired himself with unusual precision and care.
"Your lordship is better this morning," observed the valet, deferentially.
"Yes—I am a little better, Quentin," returned the nobleman; "and yet I hardly know that I have ever felt actually ill. Want of appetite is the principal ailment which affects me. It makes me grow thin, you perceive:—but am I so very thin, Quentin?"