William Clark Russell

“ I looked at Conny, who was watching me; her eyes fell when mine met them. There seemed a little more keenness and slyness in their glance than I should have thought such innocent, maidenly, tender, blue eyes capable of. But oh, Eugenio! what is there more deceitful in life than a pretty girl? Does thy heart bleed? Mine has bled. I have tried to pick a rose, and have pulled away nothing but four fingers and a thumb stuffed with thorns.
“You will dine with us to-day,” said my uncle. “Afterwards, James shall drive you to your quarters. There is no need to go to work before Monday. ”

“ I’ll live in lodgings. I suppose I shall be fearfully hardworked: but what time I have to myself, I mean to be free in. For anything I can tell, my aunt may hate the smell of tobacco. Perhaps uncle Tom is a one-pipe man, who blows his cloud up the kitchen-chimney. A pleasant look-out for a fellow like me, to find himself in a house, where, after tea, the wife pulls out ‘Emma,’ or ‘Cecilia,’ and reads aloud, whilst the husband snorts in an arm-chair, and the daughter works at an altar cloth! ”

“ Conny looked at me from under her parasol and smiled. What did she mean by smiling?
“There is a great deal of nonsense talked about marriage,” said my uncle. “My idea is, that every young man should get a wife as soon as he can.”
“That’s my idea, too,” said I.
“And mine,” exclaimed my aunt.
Thus fortified—how strong a man feels in his wife’s acquiescence! but then she must often contradict him—my uncle continued, “For what is a man without a home?”
“A vagabond,” cried my aunt. ”

“ Oh, Eugenio! either hold thy tongue, or agree with me instantly, that the spirit hath a voice which makes itself audible to the spirit of the beloved, albeit no human language is uttered. Of course the eyes can talk. They are faculties given to women to convey thoughts which all the terms and all the definitions in Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary put together, could never express. I had read a profound and inspiring truth in Conny’s eyes. Her [Pg 150] tongue could no more have said it than my eyes could have looked it, beautiful and piercing as my poor fat Pauline used to consider them. ”

“ My self-conceit was too tenacious of life to be [Pg 137] killed by a single blow, and my prejudices were of too old a growth to be tamed by a single wise reflection. I merely wish to exhibit myself as having been capable of sometimes thinking correctly, however long it may have taken me to bend my character into a conformity with my better thoughts.
I so thoroughly enjoyed the fresh air and the exquisite serenity of that May evening, that, though you may conceive I thought a good deal about Conny, I don’t remember once regretting that I had not gone to Grove End. ”

“ But I spared him: my idea being that every gentleman is bound to consider clergymen and women as being under his particular protection.
I awoke next morning thoroughly out of conceit with myself. My uncle had asked me to be at the bank at half-past nine; and, whilst I shaved, I reflected, with much bitterness, upon the indignity to which necessity obliged me to submit. Had anybody asked me which I would rather be, a groom or a banker’s clerk, I should have answered, a groom. Distressed noblemen had driven coaches, and hungry baronets had, before now, curried horses for hire. ”

“ Conny had no idea.
“Are any balls or dinner-parties ever given?”
“No,” answered my aunt, emphatically. “Society here is very mean and close. The only parties that are given are by new-comers. But they soon find out that it is a one-sided amusement, and drop it. A call is all the return people think of making.”
“At Longueville,” said I, “we are dancing all the year round. What with fêtes champêtres, and balls at l’Institution de Bienfaisance, and private parties, one never has an evening to one’s self.” ”

“ I left Mr. Curling still busy with his accounts, but he had told me there was no need for me to stay. I walked home to my lodgings and dined off a chop and half a pint of sherry, and then putting a pipe in my mouth, strolled out in the direction of the green lanes.
I was not much of a moralist in those days, but my mood happening to be a pliant one, certain thoughts seized the opportunity to intrude themselves and beget sundry reflections. I asked myself if I was not carrying my notions of gentility a little too far ”

“ Pauline was brown; Conny had a skin of snow, and hair of gold, and large, modest, dark blue eyes, and a sweet and saucy nose, and a small mouth, and a transporting figure. I can’t describe the dress she wore. No man but a shopkeeper ought to be able to describe a woman’s costume. Shall I tell you why? because a woman’s style ought to be too perfect for a man to notice details. Depend upon it, there is something gross in that woman’s taste, whose dress, after leaving her, a man is able to describe.
My aunt was a stout, healthy-looking woman, red-cheeked, with a most amiable cast of countenance. ”

“ There could be no doubt that her husband had inspired her with the most extravagant conceptions of the importance and splendour of his brother, the major. The pride of relationship, when there is anything to be proud of, is a sentiment, Eugenio, which springs eternal in all human breasts; it enables wives to snub their husbands with applause, and husbands to humiliate their wives with impunity; it gives importance to poverty and dignity to vulgarity ”

“ My relations received several bows during our progress through the streets, and—I say this without vanity—I was a good deal stared at. I know nothing more ludicrous than bucolic curiosity. I was incessantly laughing to see some old man or woman turn slowly to look after us, as if our carriage were a magnet, and their noses were steel, and gaze until we were out of sight.
“How do the people amuse themselves all day long?” ”

“ I should have instantly felt it had there been.
“Banking may have sunk low in other places,” said Conny, with a heightened colour, “but I am sure papa’s clerks are gentlemen.”
“I am not so sure,” replied my aunt, who every moment was proving herself to be a deliciously candid woman.
“Oh, Curling’s a gentleman,” said my uncle, “and so is Spratling, though his name might be grander.”
“Mr. Curling is gentlemanly, I admit, but I don’t consider him to be a gentleman,” exclaimed my aunt. ”

“ Fat annihilates idealism, and I might as well have hunted for a vision of loveliness in the lump of marble which the sculptor has not yet struck, as have sought for the Pauline of my youth, the Pauline of my moonlight boating trips, the Pauline of the black eyes and little waist, in the Dutch and shaking rotundity that filled me, as I gazed, with mingled emotions of alarm and amazement. ”

“ Before long my uncle bustled into the bank, and on catching sight of me called out in his cheery way, “There you are, Charlie! How are you?” and came behind the counter and shook hands.
“Now,” said he, taking me aside, “what I want to impress upon you is this: master the details of banking as [Pg 130] quickly as you can, and try and like your work. Before long I shall hope to be able to convince you that it will be well worth your while to apply yourself. In reality there is very little to learn. The mere clerkly portion of the business is nothing; any ploughboy could be taught it in a week. ”

“ But I was not so sure that Conny herself would share in their delirium. She rather puzzled me. Sometimes I thought her shy and simple. Sometimes she confounded me with a sudden sally—a smart retort—a pat allusion, apt, shrewd and well-timed enough to reverse my judgment, and set me [Pg 120] speculating on her real character. If she meant me to fall in love with her, she was going the right way to work. Pique your man, Clorinda, before you angle for him. The cleverest fishers among you always summon the sentiments with ground-bait before they throw the hook in. ”

“ I cannot express how much I liked the honest, homely amiability of his manner. He seemed to me the very essence of kindness. We had a long chat about my father, of whom he was very proud and fond, and asked me many questions about his habits and opinions and means. He then talked of my other uncle, Richard, and his daughter Theresa, whom he described as a very fine girl, but so eccentric in her conduct as to cause some uneasiness to her father, who was anxious to get her married.
“If she is handsome and has money,” I observed, “surely a husband ought to be easily got for her.” ”

“ Sink the Thing in the Man! Beau Brummel behind a counter showing scarves to gentlemen or silks to ladies, would make haberdasherising a gorgeous calling, fit for monarchs to pursue. If I were a banker’s clerk, the whole profession should feel themselves dignified by the accession of a man in whose rich and sumptuous individuality all paltry conditions of his employment should be merged, sunk, and annihilated! ”

“ What do you think of Conny?”
“She is a cousin to boast of. She is the prettiest girl I have ever seen.”
My uncle looked immensely gratified.
“Yes, yes,” said he with a broad smile. “She is pretty enough. I have nothing to complain of. An only child is not always so well favoured. When nature is mean, she is generally mean with a vengeance. But Conny is a sly puss; she has made her mamma and me a little uneasy latterly.”
“Indeed!”
“My cashier, Curling, is a rather good looking young fellow, and Mrs. Hargrave has got an idea in her head that Conny admires him.” ”

“ What a pity people mayn’t use their carriages on a Sunday!”
“No, no! we ought all to go afoot to God’s house,” said my uncle. “The day we dedicate to Him should be a levelling day—a reminder to rich and poor of their common mortality. But little piety will [Pg 165] be left in the bosom of a hard-working labourer who, on quitting his place in the free seats, comes out and sees the rich saints luxuriously rolling homewards in fine carriages.”
“Remember what your papa says, Conny,” remarked my aunt.
“I don’t see why poor people should feel more on Sundays than on week days,” answered Conny. ”

“ Hitherto the life-blood has been gradually chilling in your veins, as you sat aloof within your circle of gentility, while the rest of the world was fighting out its battle with one kind of necessity or another. Henceforth you will at least have the sense of natural and healthy effort for a purpose, and of lending your strength—be it great or small—to the united struggle of mankind. ”

“ For the rest of the week I was every day at Grove End. I took long walks with Conny and her mamma, drove with them, wandered about the grounds, which were tolerably extensive and well wooded, [Pg 122] smoked incessantly, listened to Conny playing the piano, read the papers, wrote to my father and to Lord Towers, whose reply I was anxious that my relations should see, and was, altogether, so perfectly contented, that I should have viewed my return to Longueville as a calamity.
But where is the ointment without a fly in it? Where is the feast without a death’s head? ”

“ No doubt I should be asked there as often as I cared to be; and I should certainly enjoy my kind-hearted relations’ hospitality not the less because I could combine my privileges with personal independence.
Conny ran in my head a good deal. What a little pet she was! I could love that girl, I thought. Who was Curling? Did she like him? He must be a very impertinent sort of fellow to think about her. ”

“ I was under an engagement to my aunt to dine at Grove End, but I felt so tired, after my long and unaccustomed confinement to one room, that I begged my uncle to excuse me to her. Why was I subdued? Perhaps because I was tired. Does physical weariness take the conceit out of one? ”

“ My aunt then told her husband to take me upstairs; it was nearly five, and dinner would soon be ready. So I followed my uncle to a bed-room, and there, as I brushed my hair and curled my mustache, I wondered what sort of an impression I had made on my relations. I thought of my father’s advice, and wished I knew how to be as magnificent as he. He had often told me that his brothers had a very high respect for him, and considered him the prop and decoration of the family name. I thought this quite likely. People in business do respect professional relations. ”

“ Curling does admire Conny? People can only be prevented from touching—not from looking.”
“Oh, Mr. Curling is welcome to admire,” replied my aunt, with pleasant disdain. “All that I want to be assured of is, that Conny doesn’t care about him.”
“I don’t think she does; at least,” I [Pg 154] added, with a twinge of jealousy, “she has never given me to understand by word or look that she cares a farthing for him. ”

“ Why, in all probability, Conny was already in love with me. Of course they were talking about me at Grove End. Couldn’t I hear my uncle exclaim, with pardonable exultation, “My nephew!” which meant, “See, my dears, what our side has produced!” And what could my aunt do but praise me and abuse Curling, and contrast my manners with the cashier’s (Oh, humiliating comparison!) , and wonder, with a sneer, whether Louis Napoleon would have pulled off his hat to Curling’s papa?
Risum teneatis, amici? asks Maunder’s Treasury of Knowledge. I was Mr. Bottom, of the ass’s ears, in those days. ”

“ Go! thou art not my wife. I would not own thee. The true, the faithful, the fond, sits at her husband’s feet, whilst he exhales the blue smoke in rings to the ceiling. I call a blessing on her. May her sons be honest men, and [Pg 81] may they never know the want of a good cigar!
It was eight o’clock, when my uncle suddenly sitting bolt upright, said,
“I don’t want to hurry you, Charlie; but as you have a two miles’ drive before you, and as I believe your landlady has been expecting you since eight o’clock this morning, what say if I order the phaeton to be got ready?” ”

“ My aunt sat near the table sewing, but not busily; and Conny occupied [Pg 79] a chair near her papa, with her hands folded on her lap, doing nothing. What could be more homely than such a scene? Oh, ladies, do you not know that your presence makes the cigar doubly soothing and fragrant, and choice beyond the wildest advertising dreams of the tobacconist? There are men—call them Ogres, Bluebeards, Turks, Ashantees—who profess to think that the one great charm of tobacco is, that it gives them an excuse to get away from your society. ”

“ But I used to be a lover of slashing commonplaces.
“I quite agree with you,” said Conny, [Pg 66] looking, as she spoke, a thorough child of sensibility.
“Mayn’t love and money be sometimes combined?” suggested my aunt deferentially, as if henceforth and for ever she never meant to be sure of anything until I had given judgment.
“I doubt it,” I replied, and I gave her my reasons: firstly, because, if the woman had money, she would always be suspicious of the man’s sincerity ”

“ My uncle’s reception of me had been overpowering; my aunt, it was plain, thought me a very fine and splendid person; my cousin was pretty enough to make Updown a paradise; and nothing could be more comfortable than [Pg 86] my lodgings. After tea I lighted a pipe and stretched myself along the sofa and thought over matters. It was, perhaps, all for the best that I had decided not to live at Grove End. I could keep up my dignity better by residing at a distance. ”