“And that fellow isn’t Philip Greyson, I guess,” said her grandfather, who, on the opposite side of the fire, was calmly knocking the ashes from his pipe. “Phil is one of those chaps that have no lack of words in any company, if I may judge from the way in which I have heard him chatter at his own father’s table.”
“Chatter! that he can, like a magpie, and with but little more sense, to my mind,” said the old lady. “If Archie Harris speaks but seldom, his words are always to some purpose, and he doesn’t think it amiss to be civil to old people either. Philip has enough and enow to prate about to young folks, but if an elderly person comes by, he is at no pains to entertain him. Times have changed since my day, when young men and women were taught to reverence their betters. Ah! well,” and Mrs. Middleton drew a long deep sigh, and shook her head significantly as she leaned over to mend the fire.
It was in the prettiest, neatest white house, in the main street of a pretty village, somewhere in the Empire State, that Sophy Middleton and her grand-parents resided. Samuel Middleton, who from his silvery hair, and general knowledge of past events, together with the melancholy fact that he is totally blind, has long been dignified with the title of “the oldest inhabitant,” which title, by the way, the old gentleman particularly glories in, being fond of relating anecdotes of the place, which happened when he was a boy, and adventures with persons long since dead, and though Brookville has not improved materially during the last twenty years—being off the rail-road—yet the old man imagines in his blindness that great changes have taken place, because the Episcopalians have built a church, and Squire Edgewood a new house and barn, and descants largely upon the good old times, when Brookville was just settled, and “no folly or fashion had got into it.”
A youth of industry—for it was not until advancing years that darkness fell upon him—had secured for Samuel Middleton a moderate competency, and at the old homestead, with the kind partner of his joys and sorrows, and the orphan child of an only son, he had learned to bear with patience and fortitude the sore trial which it had pleased God to send him; thankful for the past, contented with the present, and fearless of the future.
Sophy, so early orphaned as scarcely to remember any other care than that of her grand-parents, was the life and light of the old man’s home. Her cheerfulness beguiled very many of his wearisome hours, and her merry voice, and mirth-inspiring laughter, seemed to cheat him of half his sorrow. He knew her step upon the gravel walk when she came in from school, as readily as if his sightless eyes could have looked upon her face, and felt only too proud and happy when his friends said “that Sophy was growing up a comely girl, and would be a beauty one of these days.” As his beloved child grew older, this prophecy seemed likely to prove true. Sophy’s blue eyes were full of vivacity, and her oval cheeks and sweet lips were colored with Nature’s pure carnation. By degrees the scrawny figure of the school girl was moulded to the grace of early womanhood, and we introduce Sophy Middleton to our readers, at this particular moment, a blooming country maiden of nineteen summers, very much petted at home, sufficiently admired abroad, and therefore a little, very little bit spoiled.
But who is Archie Harris, that we find the old lady eulogizing so warmly? Why, Archie Harris and our Sophy went to the same school; sat on the same bench; learned out of the same book, and were friends from the time they were “no bigger than a midge’s wing.” Being next door neighbors, this friendship had strengthened with their years rather than diminished. Sophy had found a sister in Mary Harris, and, in the natural course of things, a lover in Archie; and although no positive engagement existed between them, it seemed such a matter of course that they should love each other, and so desirable a connection on both sides, that everybody—that wise person found in all villages—said it would certainly be a match at some future day.
Philip Greyson, too, was a Brookville boy, and had been a schoolmate of Sophy’s years ago. But Philip’s ambition soared higher than a life of usefulness at home. He longed to see the world; to brave the ocean; to tread on foreign shores; and when, through the influence of friends at Washington, he procured a midshipman’s warrant, and left Brookville to join his vessel at Norfolk, what cared he for aught he was leaving, when the future stretched so brightly before him? His parents, teachers, school-fellows, he bade them good-bye without a moment’s regret; and as to Sophy Middleton, if he thought of her at all, it was but as an unformed girl, rather more indifferent to him than his own sisters, and whom he might perhaps never see again. On his return, however, after a three years’ cruise, Philip found, to his surprise, this same little Sophy grown a young lady, and a pretty one, too; and, charmed at the sight of so much beauty where he least expected it, renewed his acquaintance with delight, while Sophy, pleased and flattered by his attentions, and dazzled by the glitter of his gilt buttons, danced and flirted with the young midshipman to her heart’s content, exciting the envy of sundry other damsels to whom nature had denied bright eyes and rosy lips, and vexing poor Archie, by her unwonted vanity, in the most uncomfortable degree.
Had Sophy related to her grandmother what passed between Archie and herself on the previous night, as they walked home from Mrs. Morgan’s tea-party, the old lady would have been inexpressibly distressed, for Archie, in the warmth of his feelings, upbraided Sophy for her coquetry and coldness, which Sophy’s high spirit would not brook. She bade him remember that no engagement had taken place, and therefore she was free to choose for herself, though everybody seemed to think—why she could not tell—that because they lived next door to each other, they were “as good as married.” Philip Greyson, she said, was an old friend as well as he, and she would not give up the pleasure of talking to him, if she liked, for anybody, and so at the garden-gate they parted, with a cold “good-night.” Archie to mourn over the fickleness of the girl he dearly loved, and Sophy to dream of—Philip Greyson.
Probably Mrs. Middleton suspected something of this, however, from her urgent appeal to her granddaughter in behalf of their neighbor’s son, and might, perhaps, have gone on still further to expostulate, had not a knock at the outer door interrupted the conversation; and Sophy, who had risen to answer the summons, returned in a few minutes with a letter directed to her grandfather.
“A letter for you, grandfather,” she said, placing it in the old man’s hand. “Mr. Norris sent it up from the post-office. It came by the late mail.”