During this little debate, Sir John maintained the most invincible silence. His countenance bore not the least mark of ill-humor or impatience, but it was serious and thoughtful, except when his wife got into any little difficulty; he then encouraged her by an affectionate smile, but listened like a man who has not quite made up his mind, yet thinks the subject too important to be dismissed without a fair and candid hearing.
CHAPTER XXV.
While we were at breakfast the next morning, a sweet little gay girl flew into the room almost breathless with joy, and running to her mother, presented her with a beautiful nosegay.
"O, I see you were the industrious girl last week, Kate," said Mrs. Stanley, embracing her, and admiring the flowers. Lady Belfield looked inquisitively. "It is an invention of Lucilla's," said the mother, "that the little one who performs best in the school-room, instead of having any reward which may excite vanity or sensuality, shall be taught to gratify a better feeling, by being allowed to present her mother with a nosegay of the finest flowers, which it is reward enough to see worn at dinner, to which she is always admitted when there is no company."
"Oh pray do not consider us as company; pray let Kate dine with us to-day," said Lady Belfield. Mrs. Stanley bowed her assent and went on. "But this is not all. The flowers they present, they also raise. I went rather too far, when I said that no vanity was excited; they are vain enough of their carnations, and each is eager to produce the largest. In this competition, however, the vanity is not personal. Lucilla has some skill in raising flowers: each girl has a subordinate post under her. Their father often treats them with half a day's work, and then they all treat me with tea and cakes in the honey-suckle arbor of their own planting, which is called Lucilla's bower. It would be hard to say whether parents or children most enjoy these happy holidays."
At dinner Mrs. Stanley appeared with her nosegay in a large knot of ribbons, which was eyed with no small complacency by little Kate. I observed that Lucilla, who used to manifest much pleasure in the conversation after dinner, was beckoned out of the room by Ph[oe]be, as soon as it was over. I felt uneasy at an absence to which I had not been accustomed; but the cause was explained, when, at six o'clock, Kate, who was the queen of the day, was sent to invite us to drink tea in Lucilla's bower: we instantly obeyed the summons.
"I knew nothing of this," said the delighted mother, while we were all admiring the elegant arrangements of this little fête. The purple clematis, twisting its flexile branches with those of the pale woodbine, formed a sweet and fragrant canopy to the arched bower, while the flowery tendrils hung down on all sides. Large bunches of roses, intermixed with the silver stars of the jessamine, were stuck into the moss on the inside as a temporary decoration only. The finest plants had been brought from the green-house for the occasion. It was a delicious evening, and the little fairy festivity, together with the flitting about of the airy spirits which had prepared it, was absolutely enchanting. Sir John, always poetical, exclaimed in rapture,
"Hesperian fables true,
If true, here only."
I needed not this quotation to bring the garden of Eden to my mind, for Lucilla presided. Ph[oe]be was all alive. The other little ones had decorated Kate's flaxen hair with a wreath of woodbines. They sung two or three baby stanzas, which they had composed among themselves, in which Kate was complimented as queen of the fête. The youngest daughter of Lady Aston, who was about Kate's age, and two little girls of Dr. Barlow's, were of the children's party on the green. The elder sisters of both families made part of the company within.