Colonel Lennox's fortune was small; but such as it was, it seemed sufficient for all the purposes of rational enjoyment. Both were aware that wealth is a relative thing, and that the positively rich are not those who have the largest possessions but those who have the fewest vain or selfish desires to gratify. From these they were happily exempt. Both possessed too many resources in their own minds to require the stimulus of spending money to rouse them into enjoyment, or give them additional importance in the eyes of the world; and, above all, both were too thoroughly Christian in their principles to murmur at any sacrifices or privations they might have to endure in the course of their earthly pilgrimage.
But Lady Juliana's weak, worldly mind, saw things in a very different light; and when Colonel Lennox, as a matter of form, applied to her for her consent to their union, he received a positive and angry refusal. She declared she never would consent to any daughter of hers making so foolish, so very unsuitable a marriage. And then, sending for Mary, she charged her, in the most peremptory manner, to break of all intercourse with Colonel Lennox.
Poor Mary was overwhelmed with grief and amazement at this new display of her mother's tyranny and injustice, and used all the powers of reasoning and entreaty to alter her sentiments; but in vain. Since Adelaide's elopement Lady Juliana had been much in want of some subject to occupy her mind—something to excite a sensation, and give her something to complain of, and talk about, and put her in a bustle, and make her angry, and alarmed, and ill-used, and, in short, all the things which a fool is fond of being.
Although Mary had little hopes of being able to prevail by any efforts of reason, she yet tried to make her mother comprehend the nature of her engagement with Colonel Lennox as of a sacred nature, and too binding ever to be dissolved. But Lady Juliana's wrath blazed forth with redoubled violence at the very mention of an engagement. She had never heard of anything so improper. Colonel Lennox must be a most unprincipled man to lead her daughter into an engagement unsanctioned by her; and she had acted in the most improper manner in allowing herself to form an attachment without the consent of those who had the best title to dispose of her. The person who could act thus was not fit to be trusted, and in future it would be necessary for her to have her constantly under her own eye.
Mary found her candour had therefore only reduced her to the alternative of either openly rebelling, or of submitting to be talked at, and watched, and guarded, as if she had been detected in carrying on some improper clandestine intercourse. But she submitted to all the restrictions that were imposed and the torments that were inflicted, if not with the heroism of a martyr, at least with the meekness of one; for no murmur escaped her lips. She was only anxious to conceal from others the extent of her mother's folly and injustice, and took every opportunity of entreating Colonel Lennox's silence and forbearance. It required, indeed, all her influence to induce him to submit patiently to the treatment he experienced. Lady Juliana had so often repeated to Mary that it was the greatest presumption in Colonel Lennox to aspire to a daughter of hers, that she had fairly talked herself into the belief that he was all she asserted him to be—a man of neither birth nor fortune certainly a Scotsman from his name—consequently having thousands of poor cousins and vulgar relations of every description. And she was determined that no daughter of hers should ever marry a man whose family connections she knew nothing about. She had suffered a great deal too much from her (Mary's) father's low relations ever to run the risk of anything of the same kind happening again. In short, she at length made it out clearly, to her own satisfaction, that Colonel Lennox was scarcely a gentleman; and she therefore considered it as her duty to treat him on every occasion with the most marked rudeness. Colonel Lennox pitied her folly too much to be hurt by her ill-breeding and malevolence, but he could scarcely reconcile it to his notions of duty that Mary's superior mind should submit to the thraldom of one who evidently knew not good from evil.
Lady Emily was so much engrossed by her own affairs that for some time all this went on unnoticed by her. At length she was struck with Mary's dejection, and observed that Colonel Lennox seemed also dispirited; but, imputing it to a lover's quarrel, she laughingly taxed them with it. Although Mary could, suppress the cause of her uneasiness, she was too ingenuous to deny it; and, being pressed by her cousin, she at length disclosed to her the cause of her sorrow.
"Colonel Lennox and you have behaved like two fools," said she, at the end of her cousin's communication. "What could possibly instigate you to so absurd an act as that of asking Lady Juliana's consent? You surely might have known that the person who is never consulted about anything will invariably start difficulties to everything; and that people who are never accustomed to be even listened to get quite unmanageable when appealed to. Lady Juliana gave an immediate assent to Lord Glenallan's proposals because she was the first person consulted about them; and besides, she had a sort of an instinctive knowledge that it would create a sensation and make her of consequence—in short, she was to act in a sort of triple capacity, as parent, lover, and bride. Here, on the contrary, she was aware that her consent would stand as a mere cipher, and, once given, would never be more heard of. Liberty of opinion is an attitude many people quite lose themselves in. When once they attempt to think, it makes confusion worse confounded; so it is much better to take that labour off their hands, and settle the matter for them. It would have been quite time enough to have asked Lady Juliana's consent after the thing was over; or, at any rate, the minute before it was to take place. I would not even have allowed her time for a flood of tears or a fit of hysterics. And now that your duty has brought you to this, even my genius is a a loss how to extricate you. Gretna Green might have been advisable, and that would have accorded with your notions of duty; that would have been following your mamma's own footsteps; but it is become too vulgar an exploit. I read of a hatter's apprentice having carried off a grocer's heiress t'other day. What do you purpose doing yourself?"
"To try the effect of patience and submission," said Mary, "rather than openly set at defiance one of the most sacred duties—the obedience of a child to a parent. Besides, I could not possibly be happy were I to marry under such circumstances."
"You have much too nice a conscience," said Lady Emily; "and yet I could scarcely wish you otherwise than you are. What an angel you are, to behave as you do to such a mother; with such sweetness, and gentleness, and even respect! Ah! they know little of human nature who think that to perform great actions one must necessarily be a great character. So far from that, I now see there may be much more real greatness of mind displayed in the quiet tenor of a woman's life than in the most brilliant exploits that ever were performed by man. Methinks I myself could help to storm a city; but to rule my own spirit is a task beyond me. What a pity it is you and I cannot change places. Here am I, languishing for a little opposition to my love. My marriage will be quite an insipid, every-day affair; I yawn already to think of it. Can anything be more disheartening to a young couple, anxious to signalise their attachment in the face of the whole world, than to be allowed to take their own way? Conceive my vexation at being told by papa this morning that he had not the least objection to Edward and me marrying whenever we pleased, although he thought we might both have done better; but that was our own affair, not his; that he thought Edward a fine, good humoured fellow—excessively amusing; hoped he would get a ship some day, although he had no interest whatever in the Admiralty; was sorry he could not give us any money, but hoped we should remain at Beech Park as long as we liked. I really feel quite flat with all these dull affirmations."
"What! you had rather have been locked up in a tower—wringing your hands at the height of the windows, the thickness of the walls, and so forth," said Mary.