DE VERE. CALIFORNIA CHAPTER I. FEMALE DELICACY. A woman scorns sometimes what best contents her. SHAKSPEARE. Was it possible for De Vere to quit England without wishing to see Constance? He both wished and sought it; but, extraordinary as it may seem, it was not now so easy. It may be supposed that, after all we have recorded, the pleasure (never very great) which his uncle had in seeing him had not lately been increased. With Clayton he had terminated, not merely friendship, but acquaintance; and the delicate feelings of that gentleman were so VOL. III. B MG6777 overpowered at the sight of the man he had injured, that he always endeavoured to avoid a meeting, which was not indeed more pleasant to De Vere himself. But Clayton was almost always with Lord Mowbray. The morning calls of De Vere had, therefore, been chiefly confried to inquiries after his cousin; and his cousin was, somehow or another, seldom to be séen. The dinner, as well as the evening invitations, also became much less frequent than they had been. We have observed, that there are motives for every thing; but Lord Mowbray was too glad to shroud his fear of seeing a man he had injured, under another fear that that man might injure him. In fact, after having given the utmost latitude to the intimacy between his daughter and De Vere, he was taken with a sudden fit of prudence, and thought there was a danger in it, which on every account he ought to avoid. To do him justice, he possibly never would have thought of this himself. But Lord Cleveland, of whom we have so long lost sight, put it in his head. The undeviating coldness of Constance, had completely estranged this great aristocrat in love, as well as every thing else, from pursuing the only real affair of heart he had ever had. His pride as well as his love, had sustained bitter mortification, which, added to his disappointments at court, cankered his bosom; though he understood the demands of pride far too well to let it appear. He carried about with him, therefore, more than ever, that internal gnawing, which, though the vulture did not appear, was not less keen than that of Prometheus itself. His misery was so complete, that, though of success with Constance he had begun to despair, his love itself had not, therefore, abandoned him, and he felt that the success of a rival would have driven him to madness. Against this, therefore, it was his active study to guard. As to his disappointment in politics, he had made a tolerable compromise, in no where suffering himself to appear as the subordinate supporter of Lord Oldcastle's ministry, but as the head of a party, powerful in itself, which Lord Oldcastle was supposed to court, under the name of the king's friends. And though for some of those friends, the monarch, whose name was usurped, had not the highest respect, yet it was convenient for many to erect a standard for themselves, who either thought they were above serving under the banners of another, or whom no other was very eager to receive. With this standard in his hand, and with some followers, Lord Cleveland contrived to blind the world on the point of his personal consequence with the highest personage in the state; and while that world believed that Lord Oldcastle was no more than his coequal, and only more than his co-ordinate from his own suffrance, things did pretty well. Not so with the love of this ambitious person: -he had desisted from his pursuit, because too proud to continue it; but, with all his tact, he could not resist the bad taste which now got possession of him, in disparaging the former object of his adoration. But his attempts were ill enough concealed; and men, and women too, drew their own conclusions from the sneering tone he affected. Poor Constance !-But no! she was not poor! The dignified and unresenting manner with which she received accounts of this behaviour, and even sometimes personally perceived it, set her far higher than ever in the approbation of mankind; and Lord Cleveland was forced at last to say, that he would no longer raise her into consequence, by making her the object of his criticism. |