CHAPTER IV.
Parolles. My lord, I am a man whom fortune hath cruelly scratched.
Lafeu. Well, what would you have me to do? 'tis too late to pare her
nails now.
All's Well That Ends Well.
There never was yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass.
King Lear.
Julia Effingham was the only child of a rich merchant, who, like many others in these latter days, when scheming and speculation have superseded the good, old-fashioned habits of steady industry and unmoveable perseverance in the art of acquiring wealth, was dazzled by the one thousand and one bubbles that the South American revolution set afloat. He dipped pretty largely into Mexican mines, and was bit; he undertook to improve the breed of horses in Peru, and was bit; he attempted to establish steam cotton-factories in Colombia, and was bit; he bought largely into a Chilian Steam-boat Company, and was bit; till, finally, he resolved to visit South America himself, "to see," as he expressed it, "where the devil his fifty thousand pounds had gone to." He could obtain no tidings of a single farthing on the Atlantic side of that continent; but he learned one thing most thoroughly and satisfactorily, as thousands have done besides him, that if he had gone there in the first place, and seen the nakedness of the land, and the deplorable and remediless ignorance and superstition of the people, his fifty thousand pounds would have snugly remained in the three per cents. and India bonds. He was determined, however, now that he was fairly afloat, to "go the whole figure," and see the worst, if there was any thing worse to come. Accordingly he took passage for Valparaiso, where he found how, why, and wherefore his steam-boat concern had become a decided take-in; it is not very profitable running a boat of that kind in a country where wood sells at three cents per pound on the beach, and where the people have no idea of travelling except in the saddle.
Chili, then under the directorship of O'Higgins, was the only South American province that seemed to have changed for the better, by renouncing its allegiance to "Ferdinand the Beloved." Its ports were thrown open to foreign commerce; its navy was respectable, for the ships, the officers, and the seamen were English or Americans; its inhabitants had become quite civilized and tame, for the murdered foreigners in the streets of Valparaiso did not average much more than one or two per night; which, compared with Havana and Buenos Ayres, gave Chili a preponderance of refinement scarcely credible. Mr. Effingham was highly delighted with the country; and indeed Chili, setting aside the inhabitants, for the salubrity and mildness of its climate, the fertility of its soil, and the variety and delicacy of its fruits and vegetables, is certainly one of the finest countries in the world. He found many Englishmen established in various sections of the country, and the better sort of inhabitants very much disposed to treat them with kindness and urbanity.
He had been about eighteen months in St. Jago when he sent for his daughter, who now constituted the whole of his family; his English business he knew was safe in the management of his partner, and he sat himself down with the determination of making a magnificent fortune very much at his ease. Poor man! he little dreamed that the whole of South America is as infamous for revolutions as it is for earthquakes.
Having said thus much concerning the father of Julia Effingham, it is but fair to give the reader some idea of the lady herself. Indeed, in strict gallantry, I suspect that I ought to have introduced her first, but she has already been upon the stage, and "made her obedience," as sailors call it, to the audience; and, besides, age has claims that ought to be attended to.
In person, then, Julia was not remarkably tall, (I don't like tall women; "a man never ought to look up to his wife for a kiss or for advice;") her form had all that graceful and delicate roundness and fullness of outline so irresistibly pleasing to the eye. "Man," says an elegant writer upon natural history, contrasting the two sexes, "man is most angular, woman most round." Euclid himself could not have detected any thing angular in the faultless form of Julia Effingham; nothing resembling his "Asses' Bridge," or his "Windmill" problems, in the fall of her shoulders, the bend of her snowy neck, the delicate round of her chin, the delicious fulness of her ripe lip, the easy turn of her rosy cheeks, the graceful curve of her brow. Her nose was indeed a straight Grecian one, but not geometrically straight.
It must be admitted, by the way, that there are more decidedly good noses among women than among men. The latter are aquiline, Roman, parrot, pug, snub, thick, thin, long, short, peaked, bottle—some with a bump in the middle, some with a cleft, or fissure, and some with a button, or knob, at the end, like that on a man-of-war's boat-hook. In short, to describe all the various kinds of noses masculine, it would be necessary for philologians to create a new batch of adjectives, as the king of England does occasionally of peers.
I have already said, or meant to be understood to say, that Miss Effingham was somewhat inclined to embonpoint. I do not pretend to know the reason of this: perhaps leanness and emaciation were not considered genteel when she happened to be educated, as they are unfortunately by too many of my fair countrywomen; perhaps she never thought much about it; for I have always observed that very beautiful women, who prefer revolving in the quiet circle of domestic happiness and usefulness, are seldom or never very anxiously solicitous about their beauty; and the consequence is, that they are more beautiful, and stand the attacks of time far better, than those who choose a life of fashionable display, and court public admiration. Ladies may lace tight, eat pickles, and drink vinegar, to make them genteel; but it is free exercise in the open air, and simplicity of diet, provided it is nutritious, that confer gentility and grace, and preserve beauty. Will any man, married or single, and in the possession of his senses, say that he likes the looks of a horse whose ribs are visible and countable at half a mile's distance? I am confident the answer will be, no.