In no very pleasant frame of mind did Lord Aspenly retrace his steps toward the old house. His lordship had, all his life, been firmly persuaded that the whole female creation had been sighing and pining for the possession of his heart and equipage. He knew that among those with whom his chief experience lay, his fortune and his coronet were considerations not to be resisted; and he as firmly believed, that even without such recommendations, few women, certainly none of any taste or discrimination, could be found with hearts so steeled against the archery of Cupid, as to resist the fascinations of his manner and conversation, supported and directed, as both were, by the tact and experience drawn from a practice of more years than his lordship cared to count, even to himself. He had, however, smiled, danced, and chatted, in impregnable celibacy, through more than half a century of gaiety and frivolity—breaking, as he thought, hearts innumerable, and, at all events, disappointing very many calculations—until, at length, his lordship had arrived at that precise period of existence at which old gentlemen, not unfrequently, become all at once romantic, disinterested, and indiscreet—nobody exactly knows why—unless it be for variety, or to spite an heir presumptive, or else that, as a preliminary to second childhood, nature has ordained a second boyhood too. Certain, however, it is, that Lord Aspenly was seized, on a sudden, with a matrimonial frenzy; and, tired of the hackneyed schemers, in the centre of whose manoeuvres he had stood and smiled so long in contemptuous security, he resolved that his choice should honour some simple, unsophisticated beauty, who had never plotted his matrimony.
Fired with this benevolent resolution, he almost instantly selected Mary Ashwoode as the happy companion of his second childhood, acquainted Sir Richard with his purpose, of course received his consent and blessing, and forthwith opened his entrenchments with the same certainty of success
The little lover, absorbed in such tranquilizing reflections, arrived at the house, and entered the drawing-room. It was not unoccupied; seated by a spinet, and with a sheet of music-paper in her lap, and a pencil in her hand, was the fair Emily Copland. As he entered, she raised her eyes, started a little, became gracefully confused, and then, with her archest smile, exclaimed,—
‘What shall I say, my lord? You have detected me. I have neither defence nor palliation to offer; you have fairly caught me. Here am I engaged in perhaps the most presumptuous task that ever silly maiden undertook—I am wedding your beautiful verses to most unworthy music of my own. After all, there is nothing like a simple ballad. Such exquisite lines as these inspire music of themselves. Would that Henry Purcell had had but a peep at them! To what might they not have prompted such a genius—to what, indeed?’
So sublime was the flight of fancy suggested by this interrogatory, that Miss Copland shook her head slowly in poetic rapture, and gazed fondly for some seconds upon the carpet, apparently unconscious of Lord Aspenly's presence.
‘She is a fine creature,’ half murmured he, with an emphasis upon the identity which implied a contrast not very favourable to Mary— ‘and—and very pretty—nay, she looks almost beautiful, and so—so lively—so much vivacity. Never was poor poet so much flattered,’ continued his lordship, approaching, as he spoke, and raising his voice, but not above
The young lady looked modest, glanced coyly at the paper which lay in her lap, looked modest once more, and then arch again, and at length, with rather a fluttered air, she threw her hands over the keys of the instrument, and to a tune, of which we say enough when we state that it was in no way unworthy of the words, she sang, rather better than young ladies usually do, the following exquisite stanzas from his lordship's pen:—
- Tho' Chloe slight me when I woo,
And scorn the love of poor Philander;
The shepherd's heart she scorns is true,
His heart is true, his passion tender.
- But poor Philander sighs in vain,
In vain laments the poor Philander;
Fair Chloe scorns with high disdain,
His love so true and passion tender.
- And here Philander lays him down,
Here will expire the poor Philander;
The victim of fair Chloe's frown,
Of love so true and passion tender.
- Ah, well-a-day! the shepherd's dead;
Ay, dead and gone, the poor Philander;
And Dryads crown with flowers his head,
And Cupid mourns his love so tender.
During this performance, Lord Aspenly, who had now perfectly recovered his equanimity, marked the time with head and hand, standing the while beside the fair performer, and every note she sang found its way through the wide portals of his vanity, directly to his heart.
‘Brava! brava! bravissima!’ murmured his lordship, from time to time. ‘Beautiful, beautiful air—most appropriate—most simple; not a note that accords not with the word it carries—beautiful, indeed! A thousand thanks! I have become quite conceited of lines of which heretofore I was half ashamed. I am quite elated—at once overpowered by the characteristic vanity of the poet, and more than recompensed by the reality of his proudest aspiration—that of seeing his verses appreciated by a heart of sensibility, and of hearing them sung by the lips of beauty.’
‘I am but too happy if I am forgiven’ replied Emily Copland, slightly laughing, and with a heightened colour, while the momentary overflow of merriment was followed by a sigh, and her eyes sank pensively upon the ground.
This little by-play was not lost upon Lord Aspenly.
‘Poor little thing,’ he inwardly remarked, ‘she is in a very bad way—desperate—quite desperate. What a devil of a rascal I am to be sure! Egad! it's almost a pity—she's a decidedly superior person; she has an elegant turn of mind—refinement—taste—egad! she is a fine creature—and so simple. She little knows I see it all; perhaps she hardly knows herself what ails her—poor, poor little thing!’
While these thoughts floated rapidly through his mind, he felt, along with his spite and anger towards Mary Ashwoode, a feeling of contempt, almost of disgust, engendered by her audacious non-appreciation of his merits—an impertinence which appeared the more monstrous by the contrast of Emily Copland's tenderness. She had made it plain enough, by all the artless signs which simple maidens know not how to hide, that his fascinations had done their fatal work
‘Poor, poor little girl!’ said his lordship to himself; ‘I am very, very sorry, but it cannot be helped; it is no fault of mine. I am really very, very, confoundedly sorry.’
In saying so to himself, however, he told himself a lie; for, instead of being grieved, he was pleased beyond measure—a fact which he might have ascertained by a single glance at the reflection of his wreathed smiles in the ponderous mirror which hung forward from the pier between the windows, as if staring down in wondering curiosity upon the progress of the flirtation. Not caring to disturb a train of thought which his vanity told him were but riveting the subtle chains which bound another victim to his conquering chariot-wheels, the Earl of Aspenly turned, with careless ease, to a table, on which lay some specimens of that worsted tapestry- work, in which the fair maidens of a century and a half ago were wont to exercise their taste and skill.
‘Your work is very, very beautiful,’ said he, after a considerable pause, and laying down the canvas, upon whose unfinished worsted task he had been for some time gazing.
‘That is my cousin's work,’ said Emily, not sorry to turn the conversation to a subject upon which, for many reasons, she wished to dwell; ‘she used to work a great deal with me before she grew romantic—before she fell in love.’
‘In love!—with whom?’ inquired Lord Aspenly, with remarkable quickness.
‘Don't you know, my lord?’ inquired Emily Copland, in simple wonder. ‘May be I ought not to have told you—I am sure I ought not. Do not ask me any more. I am the giddiest girl—the most thoughtless!’
‘Nay, nay,’ said Lord Aspenly, ‘you need not be afraid to trust me—I never tell tales; and now that I know the fact that she is in love, there can be no harm in telling me the less important particulars. On my honour,’ continued his lordship, with real earnestness, and affected playfulness— ‘upon my sacred honour! I shall not breathe one syllable of it to mortal—! shall be as secret as the tomb. Who is the happy person in question?’
‘Well, my lord, you'll promise not to betray me,’ replied she. ‘I know very well I ought not to have said a word about it; but as I have made the blunder, I see no harm in telling you all I know; but you will be secret?’
‘On my honour—on my life and soul, I swear!’ exclaimed his lordship, with unaffected eagerness.
‘Well, then, the happy man is a Mr. Edmond O'Connor,’ replied she.
‘O'Connor—O'Connor—I never saw nor heard of the man before,’ rejoined the earl, reflectively. ‘Is he wealthy?’
‘Oh! no; a mere beggarman,’ replied Emily, ‘and a Papist to boot!’
‘Ha, ha, ha—he, he, he! a Papist beggar,’ exclaimed his lordship, with an hysterical giggle, which was intended for a careless laugh. ‘Has he any conversation—any manner—any attraction of that kind?’
‘Oh! none in the world!—both ignorant, and I think, vulgar,’ replied Emily. ‘In short, he is very nearly a stupid boor!’
‘Excellent! Ha, ha—he, he, he!—ugh! ugh!—very capital—excellent! excellent!’ exclaimed his lordship, although he might have found some difficulty in explaining in what, precisely the peculiar excellence of the announcement consisted. ‘Is he—is he—a—a—handsome?’
‘Decidedly not what I consider handsome!’ replied she; ‘he is a large, coarse-looking fellow, with very broad shoulders—very large—and as they say of oxen, in very great condition—a sort of a prize man!’
‘Ha, ha!—ugh! ugh!—he, he, he, he, he!—ugh, ugh, ugh!—de—lightful—quite delightful!’ exclaimed the earl, in a tone of intense chagrin, for he was conscious that his own figure was perhaps a little too scraggy, and his legs a leetle too nearly approaching the genus spindle, and being so, there was no trait in the female character which he so inveterately abhorred and despised as their tendency to prefer those figures which exhibited a due proportion of thew and muscle. Under a cloud of rappee, his lordship made a desperate attempt to look perfectly delighted and amused, and effected a retreat to the window, where he again indulged in a titter of unutterable spite and vexation.
‘And what says Sir Richard to the advances of this very desirable gentleman?’ inquired he, after a little time.
‘Sir Richard is, of course, violently against it,’ replied Emily Copland.
‘And what says Sir Richard to the advances of this very desirable gentleman?’ inquired he, after a little time.
‘So I should have supposed,’ returned the little nobleman, briskly. And turning again to the window, he relapsed into silence, looked out intently for some minutes, took more snuff, and finally, consulting his watch, with a few words of apology, and a gracious smile and a bow, quitted the— room.