Amelia Bloomer

“ Amelia, who had been highly delighted all the morning with the excessive pleasure which her children enjoyed, when she saw Colonel James with her husband, and perceived the most manifest marks of that reconciliation which she knew had been so long and so earnestly wished by Booth, became so transported with joy, that her happiness was scarce capable of addition. Exercise had painted her face with vermilion; and the highest good-humour had so sweetened every feature, and a vast flow of spirits had so lightened up her bright eyes, that she was all a blaze of beauty. ”

“ I warrant you, we will contrive some method to repair such a loss."
"Thou heavenly angel! thou comfort of my soul!" cried Booth, tenderly embracing her; then starting a little from her arms, and looking with eager fondness in her eyes, he said, "Let me survey thee; art thou really human, or art thou not rather an angel in a human form? O, no," cried he, flying again into her arms, "thou art my dearest woman, my best, my beloved wife!"
Amelia, having returned all his caresses with equal kindness, told him she had near eleven guineas in her purse, and asked how much she should fetch him. ”

“ Atkinson answered, "Upon my honour, sir, I know nothing of it. Something hath passed between madam and my wife; but what it is I know no more than your honour."
"Your wife," said Mrs. Atkinson, "hath used me cruelly ill, Mr. Booth.
If you must be satisfied, that is the whole matter."
Booth rapt out a great oath, and cried, "It is impossible; my wife is not capable of using any one ill."
Amelia then cast herself upon her knees to her husband, and cried, "For Heaven's sake do not throw yourself into a passion—some few words have past—perhaps I may be in the wrong." ”

“ Too true it is, I am afraid, my dearest creature, that the highest human happiness is imperfect. How rich would be my cup, was it not for one poisonous drop which embitters the whole! O, Amelia! what must be the consequence of my ever having the honour to call you mine!—You know my situation in life, and you know your own: I have nothing more than the poor provision of an ensign's commission to depend on; your sole dependence is on your mother; should any act of disobedience defeat your expectations, how wretched must your lot be with me! O, Amelia! ”

“ Booth! there is a speck of white in her fortune, which, when it falls to the lot of a sensible woman, makes her full amends for all the crosses which can attend her. Perhaps she may not be sensible of it; but if it had been my blest fate—O Mr. Booth! could I have thought, when we were first acquainted, that the most agreeable man in the world had been capable of making the kind, the tender, the affectionate husband—happy Amelia, in those days, was unknown; Heaven had not then given her a prospect of the happiness it intended her ”

“ Mrs. Atkinson, the moment she came home, ran upstairs to the nursery, where she found Amelia, and told her in haste that she might very easily carry on the deceit with her husband; for that she might tell him what she pleased to invent, as they had not been a minute together during the whole evening.
Booth was no sooner satisfied that his wife had not been from home that evening than he fell into raptures with her, gave her a thousand tender caresses, blamed his own judgment, acknowledged the goodness of hers, and vowed never to oppose her will more in any one instance during his life. ”

“ Make yourself easy, therefore, my dear love; for you have a wife who will think herself happy with you, and endeavour to make you so, in any situation. Fear nothing, Billy, industry will always provide us a wholesome meal; and I will take care that neatness and chearfulness shall make it a pleasant one.”
Booth presently took the cue which she had given him. He fixed his eyes on her for a minute with great earnestness and inexpressible tenderness; and then cried, “O my Amelia, how much are you my superior in every perfection! how wise, how great, how noble are your sentiments! ”

“ Atkinson recovered her breath she cried out, “O, Mrs. Booth! I am the most miserable of women—I have lost the best of husbands.”
Amelia, looking at her with all the tenderness imaginable, forgetting, I believe, that there had ever been any quarrel between them, said—“Good Heavens, madam, what’s the matter?”
“O, Mrs. Booth!” answered she, “I fear I have lost my husband: the doctor says there is but little hope of his life. O, madam! however I have been in the wrong, I am sure you will forgive me and pity me. I am sure I am severely punished; for to that cursed affair I owe all my misery.” ”

“ When Booth found himself alone with his wife, and had vented the first violence of his rapture in kisses and embraces, he looked tenderly at her and cried, "Is it possible, Amelia, is it possible you can have this goodness to follow such a wretch as me to such a place as this— or do you come to upbraid me with my guilt, and to sink me down to that perdition I so justly deserve?" ”

“ All that awakes, all that inflames desires, All that sweetly commands, all that beguiles, He does into one pair of eyes convey, And there begs leave that he himself may stay.
Such was Amelia at this time when she entered the room; and, having paid her respects to the colonel, she went up to her husband, and cried, “O, my dear! never were any creatures so happy as your little things have been this whole morning; and all owing to my lord’s goodness; sure never was anything so good-natured and so generous!” ”

“ Nay, I entreat you for your own sakes, for here is one coming who will talk to you in a very different stile from ours."
"One coming!" cries my lord; "what care I who is coming?"
"I suppose it is the devil," cries Jack; "for here are two of his livery servants already."
"Let the devil come as soon as he will," cries my lord; "d—n me if I have not a kiss!"
Amelia now fell a trembling; and her children, perceiving her fright, both hung on her, and began to cry; when Booth and Captain Trent both came up. ”

“ She was a dull, spiritless child, yet a close observer could perceive that there was not so much lack of talent, as want of development. Her mother was too broken-hearted to infuse much animation, which was very essential to such a passive nature as Amelia's. She was shy of every body, and her home, poor as it was, constituted her world, for it was all she knew of it. Mr. Crawford was now an abject of constant terror. Unfit for any regular occupation, no hour of the day was secure from his intrusion, and, as if to vex his wife to the utmost, ho sought every means to annoy and abuse Amelia. ”

“ Yes, there is sunshine out of doors and sunshine in my heart. So much sunshine, that in my exuberance I have only just refrained from embracing Amelia, in spite of her down-at-heel, squeaky shoes, rakish cap, and one-and-three-ha'penny pearl necklace.
You will surmise I have had a fortune left me by my great-uncle. I don't possess a great-uncle. That I have been the recipient of a new Paris hat. Wrong. That someone has said I am the prettiest girl in the county. Bosh! That Peter has ceased to bully mother. That will happen when the millennium arrives. ”

“ Suddenly he spoke, haltingly, voicing her own conviction.
"Don't seem but a minute, 'Melia, sence we set talkin' things over, much as we do now. Seems if we hadn't been so fur separated all these years."
"No," said Amelia, with her beautiful sincerity, "I don't believe we have been, Jared. Maybe that's how it is when folks die. We can't see 'em nor speak to 'em, but maybe they go right along bein' what we like best. I know 'tis so with mother. Seems if, if she walked in here this minute, we shouldn't have so very many stitches to take up. ”

“ Well, I declare upon my soul then, that, if I was a man, rather than be married to a woman who makes such a fuss with her virtue, I would wish my wife was without such a troublesome companion.”
“Very possibly, madam, these may be your sentiments,” cries Amelia, “and I hope they are the sentiments of your husband.”
“I desire, madam,” cries Mrs. Atkinson, “you would not reflect on my husband. He is a worthy man and as brave a man as yours; yes, madam, and he is now as much a captain.” ”

“ Booth! can you not guess it?—I was indeed polluted by the villain—I had infected my husband.—O heavens! why do I live to relate anything so horrid—I will not, I cannot yet survive it. I cannot forgive myself. Heaven cannot forgive me!"
Here she became inarticulate with the violence of her grief, and fell presently into such agonies, that the frighted Amelia began to call aloud for some assistance. Upon this a maid-servant came up, who, seeing her mistress in a violent convulsion fit, presently screamed out she was dead. ”

“ His eyes, indeed, were now and then guilty of the contrary distinction, but this was only by stealth; for they constantly withdrew the moment they were discovered. In short, he treated Amelia with the greatest distance, and at the same time with the most profound and awful respect; his conversation was so general, so lively, and so obliging, that Amelia, when she added to his agreeableness the obligations she had to him for his friendship to Booth, was certainly as much pleased with his lordship as any virtuous woman can possibly be with any man, besides her own husband. ”

“ She would make an enchanting shepherdess, but is not fitted to be a queen. She has no majesty, no presence. She has not by nature that imposing gravity, which is the gift of Providence, and cannot be acquired, and without which the queen is sometimes forgotten in the woman. Amelia can never attain that eternal calm, that exalted composure, which checks all approach to familiarity, and which, by an almost imperceptible pressure of the hand and a light smile, bestows more happiness and a more liberal reward than the most impassioned tenderness and the warmest caresses of a commonplace woman. ”

“ Poor little Amelia went clad in severe simplicity; durable woolen frocks in winter, and washable, unfadable, and non-soil-showing frocks in summer. She, although her mother had perhaps more money wherewith to dress her than had any of the other mothers, was the plainest-clad little girl in school. Amelia, moreover, never tore a frock, and, as she did not grow rapidly, one lasted several seasons. Lily Jennings was destructive, although dainty. Her pretty clothes were renewed every year. Amelia was helpless before that problem. ”

“ She would then repeat the compliments which others had made to her own beauty, and could not forbear once crying out, "Upon my soul, my dear Billy, I believe the chief disadvantage on my side is my superior fondness; for love, in the minds of men, hath one quality, at least, of a fever, which is to prefer coldness in the object. Confess, dear Will, is there not something vastly refreshing in the cool air of a prude?" Booth fetched a deep sigh, and begged her never more to mention Amelia's name. ”

“ Nevertheless, Amelia stands the recognized Queen of the Harem. She leads the ton, and is the model woman for the saints. Thousands bow low as she passes, and think [210] themselves happy to receive her passing recognition. She is now a queen, and is to be a goddess in the celestial world. The new wife sometimes becomes restive and impatient, and treats her liege lord rather shabbily. She is at times notional and imperious, and somewhat coquettish,—to all of which her husband submits with good grace for the present, and pets her as a child. ”

“ Amelia is still the finest woman in England of her age. Booth himself often avers she is as handsome as ever. Nothing can equal the serenity of their lives. Amelia declared to me the other day, that she did not remember to have seen her husband out of humour these ten years ”

“ We were now impatiently expecting the arrival of the doctor; our messenger had been gone much more than a sufficient time, which to us, you may be assured, appeared not at all shorter than it was, when nurse, who had gone out of doors on some errand, came running hastily to us, crying out, 'O my dear young madam, her ladyship's coach is just at the door!' Amelia turned pale as death at these words; indeed, I feared she would have fainted, if I could be said to fear, who had scarce any of my senses left, and was in a condition little better than my angel's. ”

“ By degrees Amelia drew from her a sketch of her life, degraded enough, yet free from actual guilt or personal dishonor and extremely touching. Amelia related some of the leading incidents to Mr. Brewster and his wife, and also to James Morgan, all of whom felt a deep interest in the prisoner, and a strong desire that she should have able counsel. To this, however, she seemed perfectly indifferent, refusing to communicate to any one but Amelia. ”

“ I may say with the poet,
“The blackest ink of fate was sure my lot, And when fate writ my name, it made a blot.”
“Nay, nay, dear Miss Matthews,” answered Booth, “you must and shall banish such gloomy thoughts. Fate hath, I hope, many happy days in store for you.”—“Do you believe it, Mr. Booth?” replied she; “indeed you know the contrary—you must know—for you can’t have forgot. No Amelia in the world can have quite obliterated—forgetfulness is not in our own power. ”

“ Believe me, Amelia, a sublime misfortune is better, more glorious, than a petty happiness. To have the brow wounded, because the crown presses too heavily upon the temples, is more desirable than to breathe out your sorrows in the midst of poverty and vulgarity, then sink into a dark and unknown grave. God, who has, perhaps, denied us the blessing of love, gives fame as a compensation. If we are not happy, we are powerful!"
"Ah, my brother, these are the views of a man and a king," said Amelia. "I am a poor, weak woman. For me there is no fame, no power!" ”