CHAPTER I. MULTUM IN PARVO. WITHIN a week after the date of my last chapter, Miss Hastings passed away to the land where there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage. Lord Carleton had several interviews with her before her death. From these, and from private letters and papers which passed into his hands as her executor, he found out how much he had misapprehended her character and conduct. His general rules for the judgment of men and women had all failed in this case. True, she had a strong will and vigorous intellectual faculties, but these she had made subservient to her first, last, only love-the love for himself. A love which she believed herself in conscience bound not to indulge in the ordinary way. She satisfied herself as to what was right for herself to do, and she did it, at all costs. Intellectual exercise and acts of beneficence became to her, as to every one who practises them, a source of pleasure, a solace, a comfort; and in the course of time she found in them compensation for her renunciation of woman's sweetest happiness. Those who did not know her well, did not think her amiable; while those who did, thought few women so worthy to be loved. Her parents and near kindred loved her the best in their family. Lady Carleton and Miss Price thought there could be no better friend. Lovers she lacked not at any period of her life. In youth, she had several besides Lord Carleton: in womanhood, Dr. Ward loved her always, though she was blind to the fact. This was the private history of a woman whom the world called "cold," "hard," "incapable of loving or inspiring love." The world makes many such mistakes, and would be astonished to hear of the love that has been accumulated by some of the people who are least in its good graces; and of the romances lived by the old maids and bachelors it laughs at, and cannot get up a sentiment about. It may be matter for surprise that the ambitious Lord Carleton should not seek a lady of higher rank and more influential connexion for his second wife; but, it must be remembered, that while Miss Hastings lived, he could scarcely do so. He was ambitious; but I have described him if the reader is not aware that he had a refined and truly noble nature, and that his ambition was neither vulgar nor headlong. very ill Even supposing no touch of romantic memory survived in his heart (which I do not believe), still there were many prudential and some affectionate reasons why Miss Hastings was the best wife he could select. After the death of Miss Hastings, Lord Carleton sought no other wife. A strange gloom and discontent overspread his character, and his interest in public affairs gradually declined during the next five years, and then ceased. Miss Hastings did not leave her property to her favourite niece, as it was believed she would. She left it to her brother, the Rector of Carleton, thinking that it was wiser to do so than to give it all to a young girl. Could Miss Hastings have foreseen that her brother would only survive her two years, and that he would leave all his children dependent upon their eldest brother, she would have made a different will. Her nephew, Henry, she judged rightly to be a grasping worldly-minded, respectable gentleman-who was only withheld by his fear of the world's opinion from taking every possible advantage of the rest of the family, after his father's death. James and Margaret were the two who suffered most from their father's will. Henry, who was by this time married, and in the full exercise of his prodigious talent for pushing on in the world, was not inclined to give them their fair share of the property, small as it was. He had so many objections to make to their wishes, that they ceased to express them; and James, whose prospects in Mr. Harrington's firm were good, hoped that the time would soon come when he and Margaret could set up housekeeping together. Tom, already a smart active youth, was being trained by Henry for a merchant. In the meantime, Margaret, whose natural home was her brother Henry's house, went there very little, as the spirit of the household was positively painful to her-it was so unlike that to which she had been accustomed at Sunny Bank and at Carleton Rectory. She sometimes stayed with Sophia in London, who had taken charge of their youngest sister, Clara,―occasionally with Mrs. Harrington, or with the Greys at Langford Grange; but the greatest part of her time during the first three years succeeding her father's death, was spent with a household dearer to her than any other-that of Lord Carleton. It was very different from what it had been. His two wards, Lady Alice and Lady Geraldine Trevor, gave a light and life to the old castle and the town house which they had long wanted. His sons were generally at home, and had friends to visit them. Lady Fortescue and her children were frequently in the house for weeks together-Lady Glengarry paid solemn visitations of a similar length. Miss Price was the darling of the young ladies, and was engaged in all their plans of amusement. But the highborn damsels loved Margaret Hastings, the Rector's daughter, “abune a' thing," as the ballad says. They had taken a fancy to her ardent yet spirituelle expression of face and unaffected manner, before they parted on that first night of meeting in Miss Price's room at Raby House; and delighted enough they were, when first domesticated at Carleton, to hear that "the girl with pale gold hair, and bonuie brown eyes," was their near neighbour; and that Lord Carleton particularly wished them to cultivate her acquaintance, as she was the late Lady Carleton's god daughter. Margaret was a general favourite at the castle. Lord Carleton grew exceedingly fond of her, and when her father died was desirous to have her installed in his house as companion to his wards, but Margaret objected to that, and compromised matters by spending several months of every year at Carleton Castle. Lord Merle and Arundel rejoiced to have her in the house; and Miss Price loved Margaret. Every one loved this girl except some of the visitors. Lady Glengarry, |
