Here the two must have lived Arcadian days, in all but lightness of heart. The lovely maid, for whom no labor had been too menial, reigned the queen, of this lavish domain. She was the mistress of negro slaves, she walked in silk attire; and local gossip assures us that her tastes and those of Sir Harry were in the most perfect harmony. They rode together through their own plantation or over the fascinatingly unbroken country without; they read the latest consignment of books from England; and Sir Harry hunted the fox and fished for trout in the cold streams, possibly while Agnes did a bit of graceful and ladylike sketching on her own account,—for it must not be forgotten that she belonged to that unexacting era when large eyes and sloping shoulders were much in vogue, and when the work of womankind was all the more attractive for being a trifle thin and “very pretty.” Probably her accomplishments were all the more entrancing for matching “lady’s Greek, without the accents.” Here in their primeval wilderness, primeval morals were more to be tolerated, and the autocrats of Boston did not disdain to visit them—undoubtedly without their wives! At least Sir Harry did not lack society; and there is a tale that at the banquets, enlivened by the choice wines which came in his way by virtue of his collectorship, he, canny man! drank from a glass cunningly made shallow, so that he could toss off an equal number of potations with his guests, and yet remain sober while they slid imperceptibly under the table. For in these days, it was almost incumbent upon gentlemen to conclude a banquet by lying reclined “like gods together, careless of mankind.”
