It was a sad pang for Scott, when quitting home to seek for health abroad, and which he did not find, to leave the pet dogs which survived Maida. His last orders were that they should be taken care of. We may be permitted to join in the noble eulogium pronounced on Scott by Willie Laidlaw, who lived to mourn his loss, that Kindness of heart was positively the reigning quality of Sir Walter's character!
W. C.
[THE LAST OF THE HADDONS.]
CHAPTER XXI.—OUR EXPERIMENT.
I watched Lilian very anxiously for a few days after our visit to Fairview. But although it had given her a shock to find Arthur Trafford already upon such familiar terms there, whilst there had been no call at the cottage, nor even a message sent to inquire after our well-being, she was not permanently depressed in consequence. I must do Arthur Trafford the justice to say that I think he was ashamed of sending conventional messages under the circumstances, and felt that bad as silence was, it was in better taste than meaningless words. Nevertheless, his sister might have contrived a call, had she possessed the something besides blue blood, which, in dear Mrs Tipper's estimation, constitutes a gentlewoman, sufficiently to recollect past kindness, and act up to her former rôle of being Lilian's friend. Fortunately, Lilian did not depend upon her friendship.
'Do not fear for me, Mary,' she whispered, rightly interpreting my anxious looks.
I did not fear for her—in the long-run. I knew that in time she would come to be even ashamed of having given the name of love to her infatuation for Arthur Trafford. But to attain that end, she must not be allowed to dream over the past; and I was casting about in my mind in the hope of finding some plan for employing our time which would be sufficiently interesting to absorb the attention of her mind as well as her hands. Pupils Mrs Tipper would not hear of; nor would she allow us to render any assistance in the housekeeping, insisting that Becky and she had no more to do than they could very easily get through. Indeed Becky worked with a will; Mrs Tipper and she were the best of friends; and nothing would have pleased them better than keeping Lilian and me in the parlour in state, and waiting upon us.
Fortunately we neither of us inclined for that kind of state. Lilian knew as well as I did that hers was not a nature to be nursed and petted out of a trouble. As people thoroughly in earnest generally do, we soon found a way of filling up our time—a way which had a spice of novelty and adventure in it, specially adapted to our present frame of mind.
About a mile distant, on the high-road leading from the left of the village towards the town of Grayleigh, were a few cottages, which had been erected for the accommodation of the labourers upon some fruit and hop growing grounds in the vicinity. Lilian and I had come upon them in one of our walks; and their forlorn uncared-for aspect appealed to our sympathies, and set us thinking about the possibility of a remedy. At length an idea suggested itself to us. During the daytime, at this season of the year, they were all unoccupied but one, where dwelt an old woman past work, and who was, as she proudly informed us, kept out of the workhouse by her children. Through the medium of this old woman, we applied for permission to do what we could for the absent wives and mothers, in the way of making the desolate-looking hovels more like homes. There seemed some difficulty in obtaining leave. We afterwards found that there had been grave deliberations as to the expediency of allowing us the freedom of the place, there being all sorts of doubts and speculations as to our motives. But after two or three visits to old Sally Dent, during which she sharply questioned and cross-questioned us, she gave us to understand that it was agreed that we might try what we could do; though I believe permission was given more out of curiosity to see what our intention was, than from anything else; and she was cautious enough to inform us that they reserved to themselves the right of putting a summary stop to our visits whenever it should please them so to do. For the present, Sally Dent gave us the key of the end cottage, which was to be duly returned when what she ungraciously termed our 'rummaging' was over.