Evenings At Donaldson Manor Part 18

"I agree with him--of _mind_, mark--but there is a want of conventional refinement which would make itself felt in society."

"There is no want even of this in his son," said Lilian with a trembling voice, and turning away to hide the blush that burned upon her cheek.

"Probably not, for Michael Grahame has been for years at the best schools, with the sons of our first families--but we cannot separate him from his father, and from the a.s.sociates which his trade has given him."

Neither Mr. Trevanion nor Lilian ever spoke on this subject again; but the former resolved that no effort should be lost on his part to restore one so beautiful and so accomplished as his young ward to what he considered her true place in society, and the latter was as firmly determined that nothing should make her forgetful of the friends of her childhood. In furtherance of this resolve, Mr. Trevanion, instead of retiring to his country-seat with his family on the approach of summer, sent his younger children thither under the care of their faithful and intelligent nurse; and with Mrs. and Miss Trevanion, and Lilian, set out for Saratoga, at that season the great focus of fas.h.i.+on. Mrs. Trevanion, entering fully into his designs, had attended to Lilian's equipments for this important campaign, with no less care than to Anna's, and the result equalled their fondest expectations. Lilian was _the beauty_, _the heiress_, the belle of the season. Report exaggerated her fortune, appended all sorts of romantic incidents to her history and her connection with the Trevanions, and thus increased the interest which her own beauty and modest elegance was calculated to awaken. Admirers crowded around her, and to render her triumph complete, one who had hitherto found no charms in America worthy his homage, bowed at her shrine. This was Mr. Derwent, an Englishman of high birth and large fortune, whose elegant exterior, and the perfect _savoir faire_ which marked his manners, made him at Saratoga,

"The observed of all observers, The gla.s.s of fas.h.i.+on and the mould of form."

Mr. Trevanion looked on with scarcely concealed delight.

"Why, father! do you wish to see Lilian leave us for England?" cried Anna Trevanion, to whom he had expressed his satisfaction.

"Certainly, my daughter, if only in that way I can see her take that position which is hers by inheritance, and from which only her father's misfortunes have estranged her."

But Mr. Trevanion's hopes of so desirable a termination of his cares for Lilian faded, as he saw the reserve with which she met the attentions of her admirers--not excepting even the admired Mr. Derwent.

"Among the beauties at this place, Miss L---- D----, the ward of Mr.

T----, stands unrivalled. She is an heiress as well as a beauty, but the report is that both the fortune and the beauty are to be borne to another land, in the possession of the Honorable Mr. D----, whose personal qualities, united to his station and fortune, render him, in the opinion of the ladies at least, irresistible."

Such was the paragraph in a New-York daily paper, which Mr. Trevanion one morning handed to Lilian with a smile. She read it silence, and laid it down without a comment, except that which was furnished by the proud erection of her figure, and the almost scornful curl of her lip.

When next she met Mr. Derwent, Mr. Trevanion's eye was on her, for he thought, "She cannot preserve her perfect indifference of manner with the consciousness that their names have been thus a.s.sociated." He was mistaken. The color on Lilian's cheek deepened not at Mr. Derwent's approach, nor did her hand tremble as she laid it upon the arm he offered in attending her to dinner. "Her heart must be already occupied," said Mr. Trevanion to himself, and perhaps he was right in believing that nothing but a deep and true affection--one which was founded on no advent.i.tious circ.u.mstances, but on the immovable basis of esteem--could have enabled her to resist the blandishments which surrounded her in her present position. But she did resist them, and still, from the luxurious elegancies, the gay entertainments and the flatteries of fas.h.i.+onable life, her heart turned with undiminished tenderness to the tranquil shades of Mossgiel, and still paid there its willing homage to the loftiest intellect and the n.o.blest heart, in her estimation, with which earth was blessed.

September, with its cool, invigorating freshness, had come, when Mr.

Trevanion's family returned to the city. To Lilian's great, though unspoken disappointment, the children met them there, and no thought seemed to be entertained of a visit to the country. Carefully she had kept the date of Mr. Grahame's conversation, in which he had demanded that she should make a six months' trial of life, freed from the a.s.sociations which her early poverty had fastened on her. In a few weeks after her return to New-York, the six months were completed. On the day preceding its exact completion, Lilian expressed to Mr. Trevanion her wish to visit Mossgiel. "It is now six months," she said with a blush and a smile, "since I saw Mr. Grahame."

Whatever might have been Mr. Trevanion's wishes for his ward, he had neither the right nor the will to control her actions, and he not only consented to her going, but went down with her himself to Trevanion Hall, where they arrived late in the evening.

Lilian knew that the inhabitants of Mossgiel kept early hours, and the gay pink and blue and white convolvuluses, which arched the rude gate leading from the more public road into the rural lane by which their house was approached, had just unfolded their petals, when she rode through it on the morning succeeding her arrival at Trevanion Hall. She had declined the attendance of a servant, and set off at a brisk canter, but soon reined in her horse and proceeded at a slower pace. Hope and fear were busy at her heart. Six months! What changes might not have taken place in that time! Again Lilian touched her horse with her light riding-whip, and rode briskly on till she reached the gate of which we have spoken. Here she alighted to open the gate. As she entered the lane she saw, not far in advance of her, a boy who had been hired to a.s.sist Mr. Grahame in the garden. She called to him, and giving him her bridle to lead her horse to the stable, walked on herself towards the house, which was little more than a hundred yards distant. After walking a few steps, she turned to ask, "Are Mr. and Mrs. Grahame well?"

Another question trembled on her lips--but she could not speak it. "If _he_ love me, he will be here," she whispered to herself, and again pa.s.sed on. The road wound around the house, and led to the entrance on the river front. There was a side gate leading to the garden, and there, at that hour, Lilian knew she would most probably meet the elder Mr.

Grahame, while his wife was almost certain to be found in the dairy, to which the same gate would give her access; but the gate was pa.s.sed with a light, quick step, and Lilian entered the house at the front. With a fluttering heart, but a steady purpose, she pa.s.sed on, without meeting any one, or hearing a sound, to the usual morning room. The door was open; she entered, and her heart throbbed exultingly, for _he_ was there. Michael Grahame sat at a table writing. His back was towards the door, and her light step had given no notice of her presence. Agitated by a thousand commingled emotions, wis.h.i.+ng, yet dreading to meet his eye, she stood gazing on his face as it was reflected in an opposite mirror. It seemed to her paler and graver than of yore. Manhood had stamped its lines more deeply on the brow since last they parted. But some movement, a sigh, perhaps, from her, has startled him. He raises his head, and in the mirror their eyes meet. In that glance her whole soul has been revealed, and with one glad cry of "Lilian! my Lilian!" he turns, and she is folded in his arms.

There was no more doubt, no more fear, on her part--no concealment on his. She had chosen freely and n.o.bly, and she was rewarded by love as deep, as devoted, and as unselfish as ever woman inspired, or man felt.

The marriage of Lilian, which took place in three months after her return to Mossgiel, could not but excite some interest in the world in which she had so lately occupied a conspicuous place. When, however, to the great question--"Who is this Mr. Grahame?" the answer, "Nothing but a mechanic," was received--the interest soon faded away, and in the winter Lilian found herself in New-York, with scarcely an acquaintance, except the Trevanions, and she could easily perceive that something of pity was mingled with their former kindness. Yet never had Lilian been less an object of pity. Every day increased not only her affection to her husband, but her pride in him, by revealing to her more of his high powers and n.o.ble qualities. Those powers had received a new spring from his desire to prove himself worthy of his cherished wife. He had long been occupied with a problem whose solution, he believed, would enable him to increase greatly both the speed and safety of steam navigation.

In the early part of the winter succeeding his marriage, with a glad spirit, with which Lilian fully sympathized, he cried "Eureka." Before the winter concluded he had been to Was.h.i.+ngton, and explaining to the officers of our own government the importance of his invention, sought permission to test it on a government vessel. After many delays, with that short-sighted policy which cannot look beyond the present expense to the overpaying results, the proposition was declined. During his stay in Was.h.i.+ngton, his object had become noised abroad, and the Russian Minister had opened a correspondence with him and with his own court on the subject. The result of this correspondence was, that in the following spring Michael Grahame sailed for Russia, to test his invention first in the service of its emperor. He was accompanied by Lilian. Their departure and its object were talked of for awhile, but soon ceased to be remembered, except by men of science, and those immediately interested in the result of his experiment.

In the mean time Anna Trevanion married. Her husband, Mr. Walker, was a man of large property, and of social position equal to her own. They spent the first two years of their married life abroad. It was in the second of these two years, and when Lilian had been four years in St.

Petersburgh, that Mr. and Mrs. Walker entered that city. One of their first inquiries of the American Minister was, "What Americans are here?"

and at the head of the list he presented, stood Mr. and Mrs. Grahame.

"And who are Mr. and Mrs. Grahame?" asked Mr. Walker. "You say they are from New-York, and I remember no such names of any consequence in society there."

"I do not know what their consequence was there, but I a.s.sure you it is as great here as the partiality of the Emperor, the favor of the Imperial family, and their a.s.sociation with the highest rank, can make it."

"But how did people unknown at home work themselves into such a position?"

"They did not work themselves into it all--they took it at once, by the only right which Americans have to any position abroad--the right of their own fitness for it. Mr. Grahame, besides his high attainments in science, and his skill in mechanics, which first introduced him to the Emperor, is a man of fine appearance, of very extensive information, and very agreeable manners, and Mrs. Grahame is one of the most beautiful and cultivated women I know. I repeat, you cannot enter society here under better auspices than theirs."

And thus the long-severed friends met in reversed positions; and if something of triumph did flash from Lilian's eyes, as she saw her husband, day after day, procuring from the Emperor's favor, privileges for Mr. and Mrs. Walker, not often enjoyed by strangers, her triumph was for him, and may be excused.

After eight years spent in Russia, during which he had acquired fortune as well as fame, Michael Grahame returned to America, with his wife and three lovely children, and retired to a beautiful country seat within a mile of Mossgiel, purchased and furnished for him during his absence.

His father still cultivates his garden, though he has ceased to sell its produce, and through those flowery walks Lilian and her husband still delight to wander, recalling the happy memories with which they are linked, with grateful and adoring hearts.

"I shall never object again to any woman in whom I am interested, marrying the man of her choice, because he is only a mechanic," said Mrs. Trevanion to her husband, as they were returning one day from a visit to Mr. and Mrs. Grahame.

"There, my dear, in those words, _only a mechanic_, lies our mistake, the world's mistake, in such matters. No man is _only_ what his trade, his profession, or his position in life makes him. Every man is something besides this, something by force of his own inherent personal qualities. By these the true man is formed, and by these he should be judged."

CHAPTER XII.

Again we were all a.s.sembled in the parlor in which so many of our cheerful evenings had been spent, but a shadow seemed to have fallen on our little circle. The New-Year was now close in its approach, and immediately after the commencement of the New-Year we must separate. Mr.

and Mrs. Dudley, with their children, and Mr. and Mrs. Seagrove, with theirs, and Mr. Arlington and I, must all leave within a day or two of each other, and a year, with all its chances and changes, will probably intervene before we meet again. The very thought, as I have said, threw a shadow upon us; but Col. Donaldson, who is a most inveterate foe to sadness, would not suffer us to yield unresistingly to its influence. If our time was short, the greater the necessity for crowding enjoyment into its every moment, he said: we could spare none of it for lamentations.

"Now, Aunt Nancy," he continued, "if I am not mistaken, you can match Mr. Arlington's story with one quite as romantic, of an extraordinary marriage in high life. Do you remember Lady Houstoun and her son Edward Houstoun--"

"Oh, yes!" I cried, interrupting him, "and the beautiful Lucy Watson too."

"Then I am sure you must have their story somewhere in your bundle of romances."

"I believe I have," I replied, as opening my desk I drew out package after package, the amus.e.m.e.nt of many an hour, which but for such a resource might have been sad in its loneliness. Some were looking fresh and new, and others yellow from age. Among the latter was that for which I was searching, and which Annie insists that I shall give to the reader, under the t.i.tle of

LOVE AND PRIDE.

A proud and stately dame was Lady Houstoun, as she continued to be called after the independence of America had rendered such t.i.tles valueless in our land. Sir Edward Houstoun was an English baronet, whose estates had once been a fit support to his ancient t.i.tle, but whose family had suffered deeply, both in purse and person, by their loyalty to Charles the First, and yet more by their obstinate adherence to his bigot son, James II. By a marriage with Louisa Vivian, an American heiress possessed of broad lands and a large amount of ready money, Sir Edward acquired the power of supporting his rank with all the splendor that had belonged to his family in the olden time; but circ.u.mstances connected with the poverty of his early years had given the young baronet a disgust to his own circle, which was not alleviated by the rapid changes effected by his newly-acquired wealth, and he preferred returning to America with his young bride, and adopting her country as his own. Here wealth sufficient for their most extravagant desires was theirs--houses in New-York, and fertile acres stretching far away from the city, now sweeping for many a rood the banks of the fair Hudson, and now reaching back into the rich lands that lie east of that river. When the separation of this country from England came, the representative of her most loyal family, whose motto was "_Dieu et mon Roi_" was found in the ranks of republican America. "He could not," he said, "recognize a divine right in the House of Hanover to the throne of the Stuarts, or justify by any human reason the blind subservience of Americans to the ruinous enactments of an English parliament, controlled by a rash and headstrong minister and a wayward king." Ten years after the proclamation of peace Sir Edward died, leaving one son who had just entered his twentieth year.

Young as Edward Houstoun was, he had a man's decision of character; and when the question of his a.s.suming his father's t.i.tle, and claiming the estates attached to it in England, was submitted to him, he replied that "his proudest t.i.tle was that of an American citizen, and he would not forfeit that t.i.tle to become a royal duke." He could therefore inherit only his father's personal property, consisting princ.i.p.ally of plate, jewels and paintings. The property thus received was all which the young Edward Houstoun could call his own. All else was his mother's, and though it would doubtless be his at her death, the Lady Houstoun was not one to relinquish the reins of government before that inevitable hour should wrest them from her hand. She made her son a very handsome allowance, however, and, with a higher degree of generosity than any pecuniary grant could evince, she never attempted to control his actions, suffering him to enjoy his sports in the country and amus.e.m.e.nts in the city without constraint. The Lady Houstoun was a wise woman, as well as an affectionate mother. She saw well that her son's independent and proud nature might be attracted by kindness to move whither she would, while the very appearance of constraint would drive him in an opposite direction. On one subject he greatly tried her forbearance--the unbecoming levity, as she esteemed it, with which he regarded the big-wigged gentlemen and hooped and farthingaled ladies whose portraits ornamented their picture gallery. For only one of these did Edward profess the slightest consideration. This was that of the simple soldier whose gallantry under William the Conqueror had laid the foundation of his family fortunes and honors.

"Dear mother," said he one day, "what proof have we that those other fine gentlemen and ladies deserved the wealth and station which, through his n.o.ble qualities, they obtained?"

"Sir James Houstoun, my son, who devoted life and fortune to his king--"

"Pardon me, n.o.ble Sir James," interrupted Edward, bowing low and with mock gravity to the portrait, "I will place you and your stern-looking son there at your side next in my veneration to our first ancestor. Yet you showed that, like me, you had little value for wealth or station."

"Edward!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Lady Houstoun, in an accent of displeasure, "that we are willing to sacrifice a possession at the call of duty does not prove us insensible of its value."

"Nay, mother mine, speak not so gravely, but acknowledge that you would be prouder of your boy if you saw him by his own energies winning his way to distinction from earth's lowliest station, than you can be of him now--idler as he is."

"There is no less merit, Edward, in using aright the gifts which we inherit, than in acquiring them. There is as much energy, I can a.s.sure you, demanded in the proper management of large estates, and the right direction of the influence derived from station--ay, often more energy, the exercise of higher powers, than those by which a fortunate soldier, in time of war, may often spring in a day from nameless poverty to wealth and rank."

The Lady Houstoun's still fine figure was elevated to its utmost height as she spoke, and her dark eye flashed out from beneath the shadow of the deep borders of her widow's cap. A stranger would have gazed on her with admiration, but her son turned away with a slight shrug of the shoulders and a curling lip, as he said to himself, "My mother may feel all this, for she manages the estates, and she bestows the influence--while I _amuse myself_. Mother," he added aloud, "they say there is fine sport in the neighborhood of the Glen, and I should like to see the place. I will take a party thither next week, if you will write to your farmer to prepare the house for us."

"I will, Edward, certainly, if you desire it, but it has been so long since any of us were there, that I fear you will find the house very uncomfortable."