Romance and Reality (Landon)/Chapter 36
CHAPTER XII.
"'Tis he!
What doth he here?"—Byron.
"What! loitering still, Emily?" said Lady Mandeville, when on entering the breakfast-room, she found her and Edward Lorraine employed, apparently, in looking over some scattered drawings—in reality in talking. Emily, happy without thinking it at all necessary to analyse, and so destroy her happiness; and Edward, if not exactly thinking, yet feeling, it a very pleasant thing to have a most absorbed listener, who was not the less agreeable for being young and pretty. He was engaged in turning the leaves, occasionally referring to his companion. Edward possessed one great fascination in discourse. He had the air of truly valuing the opinion he asked.
"Nous ne nous aimions pas, mais notre indifférence
Avait bien les symptômes de l'amour,"
thought Lady Mandeville. "I must disturb the study of one branch of the fine arts for the sake of another. You must leave the picture for the mirror—be most devout in the sacrifice you offer to the Graces to-day."
"What conquest," replied Emily, smiling, "do you meditate for me?"
"What conquest? What a young-lady question! None: this is an affair of glory, not of sentiment. Mr. Lara Trevyllian dines here to-day. You must dress for his suffrage, not his heart. Most persons are born with a genius for some one thing: Mr. Lara Trevyllian is born with a genius for two;—he piques himself on his knowledge of gastronomy, and his knowledge of women."
Edward Lorraine. "I should be more inclined to defer to his knowledge of the science than of the sex."
Lady Mandeville.—"Ah, now—to use an expression of his own—'you men never will allow any merit to each other.'"
Edward Lorraine.—"It was not with a view to detract from his powers of feminine analysation that I spoke; but because I think that either man's or woman's character stand in a relative position to each other, like the covered statue of Isis, whose veil mortal hand hath not raised. We never see each other but through the false mediums of passion, or affection, or indifference—all three equally bad for observation."
Lady Mandeville.—"I differ from you; but truly, I cannot sacrifice myself to my opinions. It is too late in the day to dispute; for haste and perfection no toilette ever yet united."
Edward Lorraine.—"Unhappy is he who relies on female friendship! You sacrifice my argument to a curl. Well might the old poet say:
'Oh, take, if you would measure forth the worth of woman's mind,
A scale made of the spider's web, and weights made of the wind.'"
The party was very small, and the fire very large; therefore the half hour before dinner was not so dull as it is generally said to be. By the by, that half hour has always seemed to me to be peculiarly ill treated. Some evil-disposed person has called it stupid. An invidious epithet is always remembered and reapplied: and that one half hour will go to its grave with its appellation of stupid; no exceptions made in its favour—no pleasant reminiscences, not even a single flirtation, brought, like a solitary witness, to give it a good character. Alas; a cruel and striking epithet is
"One fatal remembrance, one shadow that throws
Its bleak shade alike o'er our joys and our woes."
Now, really the half hour to-day was rather agreeable; we should have said "very," of any other of the forty-eight. Lord Mandeville and Mr. Morland were deciding, to their mutual satisfaction, that a neighbouring gentleman, on whom they had been calling that morning to suggest an improvement in an adjacent road, was certainly the most singular mixture of silliness and stolidity they had ever encountered. Now these qualities do not often go together—the frivolity of the one interfering with the heaviness of the other: stupidity is the masculine of silliness. But the Rev. Dr. Clarke had at once vague and stubborn ideas respecting his own dignity and his own interests; the one he supported by disdain, the other by selfishness; and in his own mind identified both with church and state. The little boy, who, in the hurry of a game of marbles, forgot to take off his ragged cap to him, he foresaw would come to the gallows; and the farmer, whom hard necessity forced to delay the payment of his tithes, he denounced as committing sacrilege, and as nothing better than an atheist. Surely the time passed in expatiating on the reverend Doctor's faults was rather profitably passed than otherwise.
Edward Lorraine and Emily were a little out of the circle carrying on one of those conversations, "low-voiced and sweet," whose nothings have often a charm which defies the writer, but which the reader's memory may perchance supply. Lady Mandeville and Mr. Lara Trevyllian were seated together on the sofa. He had just arrived from London, and was detailing its novelties with a novelty essentially his own.
The days of description (personal and panegyrical) are passing rapidly away. No one now ushers in a new character by dwelling on "his large blue eyes, beaming with benevolence," or with "raven curls on a brow of marble whiteness." All that is necessary is to state that Mr. Trevyllian had l'air bien distingué; which means, that he was slight, pale, well dressed, and that his manners united much grace with more nonchalance.
The essence of Mr. Trevyllian's existence belonged to a highly polished state of society. His habits, tastes, opinions, feelings, were all artificial, and in this consisted his most striking peculiarity; for it was singular how a character, which was so much an acquired one, could yet be so original. He possessed great knowledge, both that acquired from books—for he had read largely,—and that acquired from observation—for he had seen much of society. His reasoning, rather than his imaginative faculties were developed. He soon exhausted pleasure, and then reasoned upon it: he soon exhausted it, because he wanted that colouring enthusiasm which creates more than half of what it enjoys; and he reasoned upon it, because his activity of mind, not having been employed on fancies, remained entire for realities.
His perception of the ridiculous was as keen as it was investigating. He set forth absurdity, cause and effect; and the absurdity grew doubly absurd from having its motive placed by its side. He possessed self-appreciation rather than vanity; he was too suspicious to be vain. Vanity seeks for, and believes in, praise; he would certainly have doubted the motive or the sincerity of the praise he was offered—and disbelief takes refuge in disdain.
It may be questioned whether he was generally popular. There were two reasons against it: first, he was not always understood—and whatever people in general do not understand, they are always prepared to dislike; the incomprehensible is always the obnoxious. Secondly, he often and openly expressed his contempt of the selfishness, meanness, and littleness, that enter so largely into the composition of the present: now, a general compliment is utterly thrown away, but a general affront every one individualises. Yet no person could be more delightful in conversation: it was amusement, to whose service various powers paid tribute; there was observation, thought, mirth, and invention. Mr. Trevyllian was witty, though certainly not what is so often called a wit: he made no puns—he gave no nicknames—and was not particularly ill-natured.
One sweeping censure, in passing, on our now-a-days style of conversation. Its Scylla of sarcasm, its Charybdis of insincerity, which, one or other, bid fair to engulf its all of originality or interest. Ridicule is suspended, like the sword of Damocles, in every drawing-room—but, unlike that sword, is over every head; hence every one goes into society with the armour of indifference, or the mantle of deceit. None say either what they think or what they feel. We are the Chinese of conversation; and, day by day, the circle grows less and less. A flippant, vapid discourse, personal in all its bearings, in which "who peppers the highest is surest to please," and from which all intellectual subjects are carefully excluded—who shall deny, that if dialogues of the living were now to be written, such would be the chief matériel?
Books, works of art, the noble statue, the glorious picture, how rarely are any of these the subjects of conversation? Few venture to speak on any topic that really interests them, for fear they should be led away by the warmth of speaking, and, by saying more than they intended, lay themselves open to the sarcasm which lies, like an Indian in ambush, ready to spring forth the moment the victim is off his guard. Take one instance among many. Beyond the general coarse and false compliment which it is held necessary to address with a popular author, and which is repaid by an affected and absurd indifference, what vein of conversation is afterwards started? Assuredly something which interests neither: the mind of the one receives no impression—that of the other puts forth no powers. The natural face may be a thousand times more attractive, still a mask must be worn. No one has courage to be himself. We look upon others, and our eyes reflect back their images. It is the same with the mind. Even thus in society do we mirror the likeness of others. All originality being destroyed, our natural craving for variety asks some stimulant, and we are obliged to relieve the insipidity by bitters and acids. Who would dare to be eloquent in the face of a sneer? or who express a sentiment which would instantly be turned to shame and laughter? Ridicule is the dry-rot of society.
But to return to Mr. Trevyllian. Though more original, it is not to be supposed he was more natural than people in general. On the contrary, his character was essentially artificial—the work of man's hands—one that belonged to society and education. His manners and opinions were equally polished. His reading had been extensive—so had his observation; but both his reading and his observation had a worldly cast. As to feeling, he had as much as most have, perhaps more—though generally people have more than they get credit for; but he had no sentiment. Sentiment, by the by, is one of those ill-used words which, from being often misemployed, require a definition when properly applied. Sentiment is the poetry of feeling. Feeling weeps over the grave of the beloved—sentiment weeps, and plants the early flower and the green tree, to weep too. The truth is, Mr. Trevyllian was deficient in one faculty—that of the imagination.
He would have said, "Why, what should it be but a simple and pretty flower?" Now, an imaginative individual finds out likenesses to human thoughts, connects its soon perishing with the speedy decay of hopes that open when the heart has a spring like the year; or some loved face has left on it the memory of its smile, and hence its green birth is "a divinely haunted place."
The same lights and shadows which imagination flings over the primrose, it flings also over every other reality in life; and it may be doubted whether these were not "hidden mysteries" to Mr. Trevyllian. He was luxurious in his habits, and fastidious in his tastes, upon principle. He held that enjoyment was a duty owed to yourself. It may be questioned whether making pleasure a duty will add either to its flavour or its longevity. However, he was an alchemist of happiness, and considered a delight an experiment.
Mr. Trevyllian affected la gastronomie: he studied it as a science; thus vanity assisted luxury—for what professor of any science but has the pride of art? Nothing could be more eloquent than his disdain—unless it were his pity for the uncultivated palates that rejoiced in tender beefsteaks—mouths that champed at raw celery like horses at a bit—people who simply boiled their pease, and ate apples and pears, or, as he sweepingly phrased it, "other crude vegetables."
Dinner arrived, and with it soup, salmon, and silence. A person who talks at the commencement of the course must either have no feelings of his own, or no regard for those of others. At length light observations leaped up on the sunny tides of the French wines, and the more solid remark might be supposed to come with the sherry, bringing with it something of the gravity of its native Spain; while the wisdom floated in with the Madeira, which, having been twice round the world, must have acquired some experience by the way. Conversation commenced by Lady Mandeville's refusing some lampreys,—a dish, en passant, greatly resembling stewed adders.
Mr. Trevyllian—"What! a negative? Ah, you ladies terribly neglect the sources of happiness! But you have so many within yourselves, that you may well slight some of those to which our unfortunate sex is obliged to have recourse."
Lady Mandeville—"What! still retaining your Utopian visions of female felicity? To talk of our happiness!—ours, the ill-used and oppressed! You remind me of the ancient tyrant, who, seeing his slaves sink under the weight of their chains, said 'Do look at the indolent repose of those people!'"
Mr. Trevyllian.—"You take white sauce, Miss Arundel? I was sure you would. That preference of white sauce to brown is a singular proof of female inferiority."
Lord Mandeville.—"Inferiority! I thought, Mr. Trevyllian, you had been a devout believer in the perfection of the fairer world."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"And so I am. I quite agree with the eastern sage who said, 'the rose was made from what was left of woman at the creation.' I do not conceive that their excellence is much impaired by this neglect of mental cultivation."
Lady Mandeville.—"Nay, now, you do not rank gastronomy among the sciences born 'of the immortal mind?'"
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Indeed I do, and as one of the highest and most influential. There are three things the wise man sedulously cultivates—his intellect, his affections, and his pleasures. Who will deny how much it brightens the intellect? When does the mind put forth its powers? when are the stores of memory unlocked? when does wit 'flash from fluent lips?'—when but after a good dinner? Who will deny its influence on the affections? Half our friends are born of turbots and truffles. What is modern attachment but an exhalation from a soup or a salmi? And as to its plea sure, I appeal to each one's experience—only that the truth of experience is so difficult to attain. It is one of those singular prejudices with which human nature delights to contradict itself, that while we readily admit the enjoyment given by the fair objects which delight our sense of seeing—the fragrant odours which delight our sense of smelling—we should deny that given by the exquisite flavours which delight our sense of tasting."
Mr. Morland.—"The rights of the mouth are as little understood as those of the people. There is a great deal of natural incapacity in the world."
Edward Lorraine.—"There still remains in us so much of the heavy clay of which we were originally compounded. We are ourselves the stumbling-blocks in the way of our happiness. Place a common individual—by common, I mean with the common share of stupidity, custom, and discontent—place him in the garden of Eden, and he would not find it out unless he were told, and when told, he would not believe it."
Lord Mandeville.—"We soon live past the age of appreciation; and on common minds first impressions are indelible, because they are not the result of reflection, but of habit."
Mr. Morland.—"It is very difficult to persuade people to be happy in any fashion but their own. We run after novelty in little things—we shrink from it in great. We make the yoke of circumstance a thousand times heavier, by so unwillingly accommodating ourselves to the inevitable."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Herein, Lady Mandeville, is the superiority of your sex so manifest. Women bend to circumstances so easily and so gracefully."
Lady Mandeville.—"Because we are so early taught to yield to strong necessity. They who are never accustomed to have a will of their own, rarely think of opposition:
'We do content ourselves with discontent.'"
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Discontent for what?—because, how ever harsh or rough may be the ways of life, the fairest and smoothest are reserved for you. Ours is the fever of politics, the weariness of business, the bitterness of contention: while to you is left the quiet of home, where you rule, or the gaiety of amusement, where you conquer."
Lady Mandeville.—"This is truly a man's logic, 'making the worse appear the better reason.'"
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Then look at the fund of good spirits you possess. Take, for example, a wet day, such as this has been. Debarred from the air and exercise, we have wandered from room to room in gloomy silence or in sad discourse—our health and our vivacity equally impaired; while you were as buoyant in step, as bright in eye, and as gay in words, as if the sun had been shining. Nay, I even heard you laugh—laugh during an east wind!—let no woman talk of her evil fate after that."
Lady Mandeville.—"I may be silenced, but am not convinced. Power, wealth, and love, are not these the great enjoyments in life, and have you not retained these to yourselves? The power you have arrogated—the wealth you have engrossed—and of love you have only left us its constancy and its sorrow."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Too many charges at once. I will reply to the last first; indeed, that will be an answer to all—for through love our power is at your feet, and our wealth is in your hands. As for constancy, it is the veriest falsehood poet or novelist ever invented, either to heighten a sentiment or turn a phrase, when he ascribed it as the especial merit of your sex. We are a thousand times more constant. A woman has so many things that divide her heart with her lover. Alas! the diamonds we give are our rivals—they take up the thoughts we want to engross. Then the horror to think how soon the affection inspired by oneself is merged in that inspired by your children! The husband dies—the wife piously submits to the Divine will—Providence supports her wonderfully through it—her child dies of the measles or hooping-cough—and the mother goes to Hastings and dies too."
Lord Mandeville.—"What is the reason that many die of the loss of a beloved object before marriage, but never after? The lover cannot survive the mistress, nor the mistress the lover: but the husband or the wife survive each other to a good old age."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Curiosity is its own suicide; and what is love but curiosity? Marriage enables us to make proof of the happiness which was but an idea before. With love, knowledge is destruction; and as for the individuals, who can expect them to die of a disease that is extinct?"
Edward Lorraine.—"No sin in love is so great as inconstancy, because it unidealises it. The crime of sacrilege is not in the mere theft of the golden images from the high places—it is in afterwards applying them to base and common uses. Love and faith both require the ideal to make them holy."
Lady Mandeville (whispering Edward).—"We never understand the full heinousness of a crime unless we commit it."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"There is something absurd in vowing constancy in love. Love depends on impulses and impressions: now, over neither of these have we any control. The only security is, that we soon exhaust our impulses, and grow callous to impressions; and the attachment has then become a habit, whose chains are, of all others, the most difficult to break."
Edward Lorraine.—
"And custom lie upon you with a weight
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Some author or other well defines love to be 'an egotism in two persons;' and I recollect three lines which contain the whole essence of love-making:
'O moi que j'adore,
O toi qui m'adore,
O nous que nous nous adorons!'"
Mr. Morland.—"In this exaltation of constancy there is something of that self-deception which attends all our imaginings of every species of virtue. We make them so beautifully perfect, to serve as an excuse for not attaining thereunto. 'Perfection was not made for man.'"
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Only that truth is like the philosopher's stone, a thing not to be discovered, it were curious to observe how practice and theory accord. The omnipotence and unity of first love are usually and eloquently insisted upon. No person pleads guilty to more than a second, and that only under peculiar circumstances. Now, I hold that love-affairs in the human heart are like the heads of the hydra; cut one off, another springs up in its place. First would come passing attractions—innumerable; then such as a second interview have made matter of memory—these would task the calculating boy himself; next, such as further, though slight, intercourse has deepened into a tinge of sentiment—these would require slate and pencil to cast up. Again, such as wore the name of friendship—these might be reckoned for as the French actress said, upon being asked if she could enumerate her adorers: Aisement; qui ne sait compter jusqu'au mille? Encore, attachments thwarted by circumstance, or such as died the natural death of absence—these would be not a few; to say nothing of some half-dozen grand passions."
Lady Mandemlle.—"Now, in spite of your knowledge of our sex—a knowledge, as I once heard you say, founded on much study, and more experience—I think you are confounding vanity and love."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"I own I see little difference between them."
Lady Mandeville.—"On the contrary, I hold that vanity is to love what opium is to the constitution,—exciting, but destroying."
Edward Lorraine.—"I must own I allow to this 'religion of the heart' a more exalted creed than you seem inclined to do. Love is of all others the principle in our nature which calls forth 'its higher and its better part.' Look at the disinterestedness of love, the sacrifices it even delights in making! Think how lightly are all worldly advantages held when thrown into the balance with affection."
Lady Mandeville.—
"Puisqu'il a peint Didon,
Virgile avait aimé."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Pardon: Mr. Lorraine is under the influence of hope, not memory: he paints the passion he expects to inspire."
Mr. Morland.—"What an interesting subject for conversation are these varieties of la belle passion! Sentiment meets with a deal of sympathy."
Lady Mandeville. "As far as words go."
Mr. Trevyllian.—"Does sympathy often go much further?"
Mr. Morland.—"Look at the daily papers: to what eloquence do they attain when an affair of the heart becomes an affair of the police!"
Mr. Trevyllian.—"My way hither lay through the county town, where I stopped to take 'mine ease at mine inn,' of which I soon grew tired enough. One does many rash things from idleness. The assizes were being held, and I demolished a fragment of our great enemy, Time, in court. The case being tried was what is called, par distinction, an interesting case. A man, in the desperation of a refusal (common people take those things strangely to heart), had stabbed the obdurate fair one with his knife. She was herself the prosecutrix. The counsel denounced the crime: he should have denounced the criminal's taste. As the evidence proceeded, one thing was in his favour—that, after stabbing the woman, he ran and fetched the doctor: 'a manifest proof,' as the judge observed, 'of his good heart.' Well, the jury could not agree, and accordingly were shut up to their dinnerless discussion—a method of proceeding, by the by, enough to produce affection ate unanimity between the rival queens themselves. When—
'Hark! there are murmurs in the crowded hall!
A sound—a voice—a shriek—a fearful call!'
The prisoner had hurried verdict and catastrophe—he had stabbed himself. Heavens! the sympathy he excited! 'Such strong feelings'—'ruin of his happiness'—'blighted affections'—in short, there was not a man in the court who would not have asked him to dinner, nor a woman who would not have married him."
Edward Lorraine.—
"An equal sympathy they both confessed."
Lady Mandeville.—"An equal sympathy do you call it? Come, Emily, we must teach them to value us higher—we must leave them, that 'distance may lend enchantment to the view.'"