LADY ARTHUR EILDON'S DYING LETTER.
I.
Lady Arthur Eildon was a widow: she was a remarkable woman, and her husband, Lord Arthur Eildon, had been a remarkable man. He was a brother of the duke of Eildon, and was very remarkable in his day for his love of horses and dogs. But this passion did not lead him into any evil ways: he was a thoroughly upright, genial man, with a frank word for every one, and was of course a general favorite. "He'll just come in and crack away as if he was ane o' oorsels," was a remark often made concerning him by the people on his estates; for he had estates which had been left to him by an uncle, and which, with the portion that fell to him as a younger son, yielded him an ample revenue, so that he had no need to do anything.
What talents he might have developed in the army or navy, or even in the Church, no one knows, for he never did anything in this world except enjoy himself; which was entirely natural to him, and not the hard work it is to many people who try it. He was in Parliament for a number of years, but contented himself with giving his vote. He did not distinguish himself. He was not an able or intellectual man: people said he would never set the Thames on fire, which was true; but if an open heart and hand and a frank tongue are desirable things, these he had. As he took in food, and it nourished him without further intervention on his part, so he took in enjoyment and gave it out to the people round him with equal unconsciousness. Let it not be said that such a man as this is of no value in a world like ours: he is at once an anodyne and a stimulant of the healthiest and most innocent kind.
As was meet, he first saw the lady who was to be his wife in the hunting-field. She was Miss Garscube of Garscube, an only child and an heiress. She was a fast young lady when as yet fastness was a rare development:—a harbinger of the fast period, the one swallow that presages summer, but does not make it—and as such much in the mouths of the public.
Miss Garscube was said to be clever—she was certainly eccentric—and she was no beauty, but community of tastes in the matter of horses and dogs drew her and Lord Arthur together.
On one of the choicest of October days, when she was following the hounds, and her horse had taken the fences like a creature with wings, he came to one which he also flew over, but fell on the other side, throwing off his rider—on soft grass, luckily. But almost before an exclamation of alarm could leave the mouths of the hunters behind, Miss Garscube was on her feet and in the saddle, and her horse away again, as if both had been ignorant of the little mishap that had occurred. Lord Arthur was immediately behind, and witnessed this bit of presence of mind and pluck with unfeigned admiration: it won his heart completely; and on her part she enjoyed the genuineness of his homage as she had never enjoyed anything before, and from that day things went on and prospered between them.
People who knew both parties regretted this, and shook their heads over it, prophesying that no good could come of it. Miss Garscube's will had never been crossed in her life, and she was a "clever" woman: Lord Arthur would not submit to her domineering ways, and she would wince under and be ashamed of his want of intellect. All this was foretold and thoroughly believed by people having the most perfect confidence in their own judgment, so that Lord Arthur and his wife ought to have been, in the very nature of things, a most wretched pair. But, as it turned out, no happier couple existed in Great Britain. Their qualities must have been complementary, for they dovetailed into each other as few people do; and the wise persons who had predicted the contrary were entirely thrown out in their calculations—a fact which they speedily forgot; nor did it diminish their faith in their own wisdom, as, indeed, how could one slight mistake stand against an array of instances in which their predictions had been verified to the letter?
Lord Arthur might not have the intellect which fixes the attention of a nation, but he had plenty for his own fireside—at least, his wife never discovered any want of it—and as for her strong will, they had only one strong will between them, so that there could be no collision. Being thus thoroughly attached and thoroughly happy, what could occur to break up this happiness? A terrible thing came to pass. Having had perfect health up to middle life, an acutely painful disease seized Lord Arthur, and after tormenting him for more than a year it changed his face and sent him away.
There is nothing more striking than the calmness and dignity with which people will meet death—even people from whom this could not have been expected. No one who did not know it would have guessed how Lord Arthur was suffering, and he never spoke of it, least of all to his wife; while she, acutely aware of it and vibrating with sympathy, never spoke of it to him; and they were happy as those are who know that they are drinking the last drops of earthly happiness. He died with his wife's hand in his grasp: she gave the face—dead, but with the appearance of life not vanished from it—one long, passionate kiss, and left him, nor ever looked on it again.