The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1

by Various

THE DINNER PARTY.

Colonel Archdale with his hands behind him walked up and down his drawing-room in pleasant anticipation, with, it may be, a touch of the feeling which once animated an Eastern monarch over the great city that he had builded for the honor of his name. The Colonel had been like the monarch in one thing, that he had been born in wealth, not obliged to start at the very beginning of the race; he was like him in this also that he had made the very best of material opportunities; he had builded about himself, if not a great city, at least a great and profitable business, so that he had a reasonable expectation of leaving his son and his two surviving daughters—the latter still children—wealthier than his father had left him. The only drawback, and he had not yet found it a serious one, was that it was difficult to take as much money out of his profits as he would have liked to live upon, for his increasing business demanded always increasing capital. Also, he had done a great deal for Stephen, so that it required all his efforts to maintain the splendor in which he lived, outdoing his associates. All things considered, therefore, it was not so very strange that he should have resembled Nebuchadnezzar in the other respect of satisfaction in his own achievements. That day the cream of the society of Portsmouth and its neighborhood were to be at his house; most of them, without doubt, pleased to be invited. Peace and plenty were here. The war three thousand miles away, in which the brave young queen Maria Theresa was struggling for her inheritance, had just rolled a tidal wave across the Atlantic, and the news of the garrison taken from the English fort of Canso and carried prisoners to Louisburg had just reached Boston. This capture had been made before the Colonies had learned that war had been declared by France against Great Britain. Already there were signs of hostility among the Indians, and a movement of whole tribes toward Canada to join the French, whose old allies they were.

Still, so far, no heavy blow had been dealt, and this part of the coast had not even felt the shock of the wave. On the banks of the Piscataqua mirth and feasting might go on, at least for a time. The Colonel looked about him again at the fine pictures on the walls, at the rich furniture fantastically carved, at his pretty youngest daughter, a girl of twelve, as she sat at the spinnet going over some music that somebody might ask her to play; perhaps it would be Lady Dacre herself whom she had seen once and greatly admired. When a moment later Madam Archdale came into the room he looked at her face and figure, still handsome and graceful. Her flowing brocade was of a becoming color, and nothing richer, that he knew of, had been worn in the Colonies. He felt a faint anxiety, which Sir Temple would have set down as provincial, to see the attitude of the English guests, for he flattered himself that he could do the honors of a mansion better than Stephen whose perfect simplicity annoyed his father when it let slip opportunities to make a fine impression. With Stephen and Madam Archdale, who certainly did very well, the Colonel had no doubt that Sir Temple and Lady Dacre had taken everything they found as a matter of course, and had not looked for quite the sort of thing that they were accustomed to at home. But here he thought that they would be a little surprised, that it would be to them England over again, and for a few hours they would fancy themselves in some old mansion there. He felt that to hear them say this would make his cup of satisfaction brim over, and this in some unintentional way he expected to draw from them.

"It's very warm," said his wife panting a little, "and, after all, I need not have hurried; nobody has come yet, or will come this half-hour, I dare say."

"Stephen is always prompt," suggested the Colonel, pausing in his measured walk to glance down the road.

"Yes, but then there are the English people. To be sure, they fall into our ways as if they had been born here, and Lady Dacre is as easy as an old shoe."

"My dear," said her husband, "I hope that is not the phraseology you are going to indulge in before our guests." Madam Archdale laughed.

"It would not shock them half as much as it does you," she answered. "I heard Sir Temple say the very thing the other day, and you would think of it yourself if you had on a pair of new slippers, as I have." The Colonel waived discussion, and took up another part of her answer.

"You say they fall into our ways as if they had been born here," he began. "Doesn't it occur to you that they may find them perfectly natural?"

"No, it does not at all. Think of it. Struggling against the savageness of man and nature must have roughened our manners a little, just as working on the ground roughens one's hands. It is healthy exercise; but, then, it tells, and we must expect that." She looked at her husband with such serenity as she spoke that he had no difficulty in remembering that she was the granddaughter of a Scottish earl and that he had been proud to give his children a lady for their mother. It seemed odd to him that both she and Stephen should have such an air of high birth, and yet be so indifferent to its prerogatives, so unambitious. "It is their good breeding;" she went on, "if you put them out into the wigwams they would make the Indians feel that eating with one's fingers was quite a thing to be enjoyed."