Mr. Dowlas rose, and said he would take a short stroll in the garden before tea. Mrs. Sangster re-seated herself with Roderick, and proceeded to make herself busy with the worldly affairs and spiritual state of many members of his flock, giving much valuable advice, as of a mother in Israel to her youngest son. Her eye, however, rested not on his comely face, but peered over his shoulder to see how it sped with Sophia and Mr. Wallowby, for she was resolved that no detrimental influence should come between that wealthy man of Manchester and her daughter's charms, if perchance she might find favour in his eyes.
Alas! the rich man's eyes were fixed on Mary Brown, whose lively talk engaged both himself and Peter, while Sophia, resplendent embodiment of repose and still life, completed the group, but contributed nothing to the conversation. Mrs. Sangster grew restless as she watched, lost the thread of her discourse more than once, resumed in the wrong place, and wondering what her interlocutor would think, grew more and more confused. Had she looked in his face instead of past him, she would have been reassured. He had moved his chair a little so as to see, by turning his eye, in the same direction to which her looks were directed, and he sat regarding her with a smile of reposeful content. He probably knew nothing of what she was saying, and in truth he bestowed only so much attention as enabled him to smile or bow when a pause in the current of words seemed to call for a sign of assent. The young man's soul was steeped in tranquil satisfaction. He breathed the same air, he occupied the same room with Sophia,--the Sophia ever present in his thoughts by day and his dreams by night, and when he raised his eyes they rested on her form.
Sophia Sangster--the name is prosaic enough. Not Romeo himself could have taught the nightingales to warble it. But there are no nightingales in the North, and the name of the girl he loved best had never struck Roderick as wanting in melody. She was about the same age as his sister, but taller and larger in every way. Indeed, she was on as large a scale as a woman can well be, without disturbing the sense of fitness and harmony; but the proportion was so fine, that unless when some one was near with whom to compare her, she would have passed for the medium height. Perfectly modelled, and in the finest health, she lent to each movement a rhythmical repose, while rest was in her the suspended action we see in a marble statue, all free from the limp flaccidity of lolling sloth. Her abundant hair was coiled in numberless braids about her head, whose low forehead reminded one of ancient sculpture. So also did the straight nose, full lips, and chin. The rich currents of exuberant health lent brilliant carnation tints to a soft and delicate skin, and nourished the cool shining of the large brown eyes beneath the shadow of their curving lids and long dark lashes-eyes into which poor Roderick had gazed with reverent wonder since long ago.
He saw in this maiden of the admirable physique, and the transparent well-coloured eyes, all that was responsive to his enthusiastic and imaginative nature. Another Pygmalion, he had breathed into her clay a life derived from his own, and now, heathen-like, he worshipped and rejoiced in the work of his own hands, and basked in the light of perfections which existed only in his fanciful desires. With her fine person and her talent for silence and repose, she was like a handsome wall, on which the magic lantern of his thoughts could disport itself in the gayest hues of imagination, and, for the present, with far more comfort and delight than had the Sophia of his worship been a real person, liable to be found wanting, and falling short of expectation. Being an ideal creature altogether, it wanted but a little more make-believe in a new place to fit her exactly to each varying mood.
A young child finds greater and more lasting amusement in the rough, coarse cuts to be found in a backstreet picture book, than in the daintiest illustrations of Caldecott or Kate Greenaway; and the reason, no doubt is, that art having realized less, there is more scope for imagination--more field for the young idea to play in. So too in heathendom, the worship of Isis continued a living cult long after that of the Latin gods had become merely a state ceremonial. The blank impersonal carving of the Egyptian idol left unlimited possibilities to the devout imagination, which each worshipper could work out according to his own needs, while the fully realized conceptions of Grecian art showed more to the worshipper than perhaps he could take in, and the bodily perfection displayed recalled rather the victor in some circus contest than suggested the mysteries of the unseen.
But while we have been talking of her daughter, Mrs. Sangster and her guests have gone to tea. Tea was a meal forty years ago. The company sat round the table, which was set out with plates of bread and butter, various kinds of cake, and sundry varieties of preserves, the work of Sophia all, and works whose excellence warranted the pride she took in them; for before all else Sophia was a notable housekeeper.
After tea there was music, but it being Saturday night, Sophia refrained from performing her last-learned polka, seeing it was an elder's house and two ministers were present; not that she feared to seduce these grave gentlemen into the levity of a dance, but that it was not consonant with the Sabbath exercises of the coming morrow. Mary therefore was called on to sing for them 'Angels ever bright and fair,' and such other morsels of Handel as she could recall without her music. After that, Mr. Sangster called for his favourite Psalm tunes, in which he and Mr. Dowlas joined with immense relish, and no small volume of sound. Mary's voice was completely overborne in the din, and Mr. Wallowby added a new experience in sacred song to his not very complimentary catalogue of the transgressions and shortcomings of the Scotch as measured by the standard of Manchester.
CHAPTER VII.
[JOSEPH].
If night follows brighter day in more sunny climes, the colder skies of Scotland enjoy at least the compensation of a lengthened gloaming. The crimson glory of sunset ebbs more slowly away, and a paler daylight lingers on and on, fading by imperceptible degrees, as the blue transparent vapours of the still and warm earth rise to meet the golden blue of heaven; it is hours before the two unite to wrap the world in the purple gloom of night.