Lady Arabella

“ Such is the history of the Lady Arabella, who, from some circumstances not sufficiently opened to us, was an important personage, designed by others, at least, to play a high character in the political drama. Thrice selected as a queen; but the consciousness of royalty was only felt in her veins while she lived in the poverty of dependence. Many gallant spirits aspired after her hand, but when her heart secretly selected one beloved, it was for ever deprived of domestic happiness! She is said not to have been beautiful, and to have been beautiful ”

“ It were wise of you, ere you proceed, to send a messenger to his majesty, asking permission to wait upon him."
"Nay," exclaimed the Lady Arabella, "surely he will not refuse to receive his poor kinswoman?"
"Dear lady," replied her old counsellor, "you surely should know something of royal personages; and yet, methinks, you are ignorant of how small a thing with them may turn love into disliking. A light word spoken, an act of deference forgotten, the slightest disobedience, even when it springs from affection, may deprive one of favour, and never be forgiven. ”

“ I was tingling with the sense of beauty newly developed in me. I could not forget that exquisite vision of Lady Arabella Stormont, who seemed to my boyish mind more like a white rose-bush in full flower than anything I could call to memory. I made [Pg 8] my way instead to the plain, though clean lodgings, where I had spent the years since my parents’ death, with good Betty Green, the widow of Corporal Green, late of my father’s regiment.
These two excellent but humble creatures had brought me, an orphan, home from my birthplace, America, consigned to Sir Peter and Lady Hawkshaw. ”

“ The Lady Arabella H—— was the reigning belle and beauty of a court not excelled, in the long annals of its previous history, for accomplished and fascinating women. Many stars, of no little magnitude, sparkled in the regal diadem of female loveliness, but she outshone them all. In the graces of her person, in wit, in accomplishments, she appeared without a competitor—not to say without a rival. ”

“ I should say, though, if you are honest and deserving, and mind your book, and get a good word from the chaplain, you will probably one day be the husband of little Daphne, but not of Lady Arabella; no man shall marry her while I live, that you may be sure of; but when I marry her, you may be side-boy at my wedding.”
I thought this speech very cruel of Giles Vernon, and believed that he did not know what true love was, else he could not so trifle with my feelings, although there was an echo of earnestness in his intimation that he would kill any man who aspired to marry Lady Arabella. ”

“ Lady Arabella looked like a soulless, pitiless being, not human, unless it revived old legends of transformed human beings who had lost their humanity in some transformation or in the sweep of natural savagery. ”

“ My life to a jerkin of Cordovan, the King proposes to you the marriage himself.--Now, my Lord, what is your next difficulty?"
"That lies with the lady," answered Lord Rochester; "she has never shown the slightest sign of distinguishing me from all the crowd of the Court."
"Odds life! my Lord," interrupted Overbury, "do you expect a lady to woo you? did she do so, she were not worth your having; and the Lady Arabella is none such. Nay, more, my Lord, you will have to woo her, and zealously too; but the more difficult the attainment, the more worthy is the prize. ”

“ Arabella looked round, but the mate whom her heart would have fondly sought for that hour, or for the whole of life, was not near; and, fixing hastily upon good Sir Harry West, she advanced to the place where he stood, saying, "Come, my dear good friend, the Queen wills that I choose a partner for the evening's gossip, and so I will inflict myself on you."
"Alas, lady," replied the old knight, walking on by her side; "you might have chosen a younger and a gayer heart."
"A younger, but not a gayer," replied Arabella, in a cheerful tone; "for we will be as merry as skylarks together. ”

“ I trust not," replied Ida Mara, timidly, and not knowing what was to come next. "I have always heard the Lady Arabella express herself most submissively towards your majesty."
"That's right, that's right," said the King; "submission in words is something, but we must have submission in deeds too, before we grant favour. ”

“ Her companion cast a quick glance around the room to see that no one was near, and then replied in a low but emphatic tone, "I hope not--I hope not."
The blood came up into the lady's cheek, and after gazing in his face for an instant, she cast down her eyes again, and remained silent. Several of the dishes were removed, now others put upon the table; and then, as if accidentally, both the landlord and the serving-man quitted the room.
"How strange are the events of life," said the Baron de Mardyke.
"They are indeed," answered the Lady Arabella, "almost as strange as man's own heart." ”

“ She did not perceive that any one was in the room, but the moment after, she heard something move, and a voice say, "Oh, lady!" and looking round she saw the girl Ida Mara, whom she had consented to receive at the entreaty of Sir Harry West.
Arabella instantly started up and tried to wipe away the tears; but the girl looked down, as if she wished not to see them flow, and said in a quiet but sad tone, "Shall I leave you, madam? I know too well that, when one is sorrowful, it is better to be alone." ”

“ In the same vessel that brought Lady Arabella to the inhospitable shores of America there came another woman whose name better deserves memorial, as far as is concerned lasting influence of life, than does that of the saintly lady commemorated by Cotton Mather. Anne Dudley was the daughter of an old servitor of the Count of Lincoln, the father of Lady Arabella, and was herself married to Simon Bradstreet, destined to be governor of Massachusetts. She was as devout and devoted as Lady Arabella herself, and she was of yet finer stamp in that she was a poet. ”

“ Lady Arabella was a tall bony big woman, with the large hands and feet which are supposed to be the prerogative of the plebeian, an early Victorian coiffure, and an imposing skeleton religiously exhibited so far as decency permitted and fashion expected, whenever a court function demanded this sacrifice on the part of a loyal subject who suffered from chronic hay fever. ”

“ I am a very humble person, whom no one is bound to obey that I know of, but my good girl, Marian, here, and one or two trusty servants, who find the bond more in their affection than their duty."
"The Lady Arabella Stuart," answered the stranger, "is not to be mistaken; and surely one so near the crown of England may well command our duty."
"I am the king's most humble subject, though his kinswoman, sir," replied the Lady Arabella, coldly; for, young as she was, she had already been the object of ambitious designs on the part of some, and needless jealousy on the part of others. ”

“ But Arabella interposed, exclaiming, "Hush! hush! I beseech you, sir, refrain; if you have any of the feelings of a gentleman, you will not think of repeating, where it may do harm, the expression of a faithful servant's attachment to his unhappy mistress. Jane, I am glad to see you."
The girl replied with a discontented look, merely saying that she hoped her mistress was well, and then retired with Cobham and the King's officers to the rooms appropriated to the servants of the Lady Arabella, which were contiguous to her own.
"Alas! dear lady," said Ida Mara, as soon as they were gone. "Alas! ”

“ When detected, Lady Arabella professed to think the whole thing a joke, but as her adversary at the time was a very old lady whose eyesight was notoriously defective, it took all of Lady Arabella’s wit and youth to carry it off successfully, which, however, she did. As for her trinkets, Lady Arabella was always buying them, and always taking a distaste to them, so she alleged, and Lady Hawkshaw suspected they took the place of shillings at the card-table. Sir Peter groaned at this, and remarked that the earl, her [Pg 80] father, was the worst gamester he ever knew, except her grandfather. ”

“ Years passed on, and Arabella was made the centre of intrigues of all kinds, both abroad and at home; and she became the object of jealousy and suspicion. The Queen’s fury was roused by hearing her young kinswoman had betrothed herself to William Seymour, grandson to the Earl of Hertford, and the unfortunate Katherine Grey.
The alliance was most distasteful to Elizabeth, who was inimical to the whole house of Hertford. Arabella was arrested, and Her Majesty, much perturbed, fell sick; it was even reported that the illness was of the Lady Arabella’s contriving! ”

“ Accustomed as she had been for some years to see the monarch daily, Ida Mara easily judged that he was in no very placable humour, by the way in which he moved about in his chair, and lolled his tongue out of his mouth.
"What's this, my woman, what's this?" he said, when she appeared. "No sooner have we done with one pother about the Lady Arabella, our headstrong kinswoman, than there comes another. Our Lieutenant at the Tower sends us word that you have been carried off forcibly from Highgate. ”

“ Of course Lady Arabella could not suckle the young heir herself. Ladies Arabella never can. They are gifted with the powers of being mothers, but not nursing-mothers. Nature gives them bosoms for show, but not for use. So Lady Arabella had a wet-nurse. ”

“ Overton surveyed Lady Arabella and Sir Thomas with much contempt. Lady Arabella was the first to speak. She held up her head timidly, and said,—
“Will you not speak to me?”
“No,” replied Overton sternly. “Giles Vernon’s [Pg 226] life may be spared; but upon you is blood-guiltiness.” ”

“ His fine figure was nobly set off by the identical brown and silver suit which the poor fellow had bought for his wedding with Lady Arabella, and, in a flash, came back to me that strange vision I had had at his London lodgings on the night that this unfortunate elopement was first talked of between us. ”

“ How eagerly did I watch and inquire for any tidings respecting you; and then, when I heard that you were taken, I trembled lest they should debar me from seeing you."
"But how came they to send you?" asked Arabella; "it is indeed an act of favour which I did not expect."
"Why, lady, the King has deceived himself entirely respecting me," replied the fair Italian. "It is his own doing; for I said not one word to mislead him, though I took good care not to contradict him."
"You were wise," said Arabella; "he is not one to bear opposition. ”

“ Surely never was one young maiden made the centre of so many matrimonial speculations as the Lady Arabella. All kinds of husbands, of all countries, grades, religions, and ages, were selected for her; plots and schemes for the aggrandisement of the plotters, laid, while the unconscious object was still playing with the doll we saw at Hardwicke Hall. ”

“ But they were not much favored by [Pg 73] the gentlemen and ladies who played with her; for the chances of her marrying before her majority were so great, that her I O U’s were not considered of much value, and found few takers, even when accompanied by Lady Arabella’s most brilliant smiles; for your true gamester is impervious to smiles or frowns, insensible to beauty—in short, all his faculties are concentrated on the odd trick.
A great mob of fine people came and there was a supper, and many wax lights, and all the accessories of a fashionable rout. ”

“ But, what must be the fate, lady, of one who loves as deeply as man can love, yet sees the object far above his reach, without one cheering hope to lead him on, one cause to think the passion in his own heart has awakened any return in the being, for whom he could cast away his life, as a gambler does his coin?"
"It must be sad, indeed," said Arabella, in a low and hesitating tone,--"sad, indeed," she repeated. "But yet, perhaps--" and there she paused, leaving the sentence incomplete, while her colour varied like the morning sky as the sun rises in the east. ”

“ Thin, or whatever his name may be, are always difficult to please in the way of address. If you are familiar, they are affronted; and if you are reserved, they think you are making game of them.”
By this speech I discovered that although Lady Hawkshaw might rule her world, terrorize Sir Peter, and make the Lords of the Admiralty her humble servitors, she had one rebel in the camp, and that was Lady Arabella Stormont. I saw that her remarks displeased Lady Hawkshaw, but she endured them in silence. ”

“ The proceedings seemed to fill Lady Arabella with disgust. She haughtily refused my hand to assist her into the chaise, and announced that [Pg 175] she would go to the village of Springfield, near by, for rest and breakfast; and willy-nilly, Daphne and I had to follow in the post-chaise.
Never shall I forget that dismal wedding journey back to Scarborough. I began, for the first time, to fear the reproaches of the world in general, and Sir Peter and Lady Hawkshaw in particular, in regard to running away with an heiress. I had one comfort, however; Daphne fully believed in my disinterestedness ”

“ The lady who was skillful at draughts, was deemed something more worthy to aspire to distant rivalry with the Lady Arabella, and the man who excelled at the same, was thought more fitting to become, however unsuccessfully, her suitor. ”