Lady Bertram

“ The rest is little matter."
"Little matter!" quoth the King, laughing. "Faith the best is to come." But Denis looked at Bertram and could not speak. Enid smiled at Bertram, and she, with a curtsy to the King, told his deeds.
"Nay, lady, much you make of little!" cried Bertram soon.
"If this be little, save me from his much!" cried the King. And Bertram, seeing him in happy temper, knelt and said—
"My lord, a boon! Twice Denis saved me. Once from the red iron. Once in the fight at the doorway. Pray you, my lord, pay him." And the Lady Elinor came forward and curtsied low. ”

“ You can't think how funny we old women are when we get together. There wasn't a gentleman in the room—except Mr. Fuzzybell; and he never seems to make any difference. But I tell you what, Sir Lionel; a certain friend of yours didn't seem to like it when we called Mrs. Shortpointz Lady Bertram."
"And were you that friend, Miss Todd?"
"I! Ha! ha! ha! No; not I, but Miss Baker. And I'll tell you what, Sir Lionel," said Miss Todd, intending to do a kinder act for Miss Baker than Miss Baker would have done for her. ”

“ His immediate communications were exhausted, and it seemed enough to be looking joyfully around him, now at one, now at another of the beloved circle; but the pause was not long: in the elation of her spirits Lady Bertram became talkative, and what were the sensations of her children upon hearing her say, "How do you think the young people have been amusing themselves lately Sir Thomas? They have been acting. We have been all alive with acting." ”

“ The Miss Bertrams were now fully established among the belles of the neighbourhood; and as they joined to beauty and brilliant acquirements a manner naturally easy, and carefully formed to general civility and obligingness, they possessed its favour as well as its admiration. Their vanity was in such good order that they seemed to be quite free from it, and gave themselves no airs; while the praises attending such behaviour, secured and brought round by their aunt, served to strengthen them in believing they had no faults.
Lady Bertram did not go into public with her daughters. ”

“ Lady Bertram cannot do without someone at hand to help and advise her continually. The Miss Bertrams do not care for the society of their mother, who has never interested herself in any of their pursuits; and, therefore, while they enter into all the society of the county under Mrs. Norris's chaperonage, Fanny spends her hours quietly at home, delighted to be unnoticed and of use.
Just as his children are alt grown up, Sir Thomas Bertram is obliged to go to the West Indies to see about some of his property there ”

“ George Bertram found himself seated next to a lady-like well-dressed Englishwoman of the middle age, whom he heard called Miss Baker; and next to her again sat—an angel! whom Miss Baker called Caroline, and whom an odious man sitting on the other side of her called Miss Waddington.
All my readers will probably at different times have made part of a table-d'hôte assemblage; and most of them, especially those who have travelled with small parties, will know how essential it is to one's comfort to get near to pleasant neighbours. ”

“ Whether she be now at Littlebath, or Baden, or Dieppe, or Harrogate, at New York, Jerusalem, or Frazer's River, matters but little. Where she was last year, there she is not now. Where she is now, there she will not be next year. But she still increases the circle of her dearly-loved friends; and go where she will, she, at any rate, does more good to others than others do to her. And so we will make our last bow before her feet.
We have only now to speak of George Bertram and of Lady Harcourt—of them and of Miss Baker, who need hardly now be considered a personage apart from her niece. ”

“ You marry this lady, of whom you are so unworthy, or you learn how a king can hate. Your answer?”
Bertram bowed low and said, “Your Majesty has ennobled the lady by your interest in her. I submit.”
“Take her by the hand,” said the King, “and tell her she is yours.”
Bertram obeyed, and with little delay he was married to Helena.
Fear of the King, however, could not make him a lover. Ridicule helped to sour him. A base soldier named Parolles told him to his face that now he had a “kicky-wicky” his business was not to fight but to stay at home. ”

“ Not at homing when I called, and then leaving their cards on the day when I was at the bazaar. Highty-tighty, says I, who's Mrs. Bertram that she should look down on us in this fashion? Isn't the widow of a good honest butter merchant who paid his way, and left a comfortable fortune behind him, fit to associate with any lady of the land? Mrs. Bertram, indeed! A nice way she has treated us all. It isn't every newcomer we Northbury folks would take up. ”

“ Reverently Bertram accepted the commands of his lady, and vowed to prove his devotion wherever hard blows were to be given and danger to be found. The lord of Alnwick straightway arranged for an expedition on to Scottish land, in requital of old scores, and assembled together a goodly company to ride against the Scots. Earl Douglas and his men opposed them, and blows were dealt thick and fast on both sides. Bertram was sorely wounded, after showing wondrous prowess in the fight; but being rescued by Percy, was borne to the castle of Wark upon the Tweed, to recover from his wounds in safety. ”

“ Miss Baker of course said something in opposition to this, but that something was not much. It might easily be understood that a young lady who had just lost her lover was not in a fit state to go to a Littlebath card-party.
And thus early in the evening Caroline contrived to be alone; and then for the first time she attempted to realize all that had come upon her. Hitherto she had had to support herself—herself and her goddess-ship,—first before George Bertram, and then with lighter effort before her aunt. But now that she was alone, she could descend to humanity. ”

“ You see, Lady Filson, Master Bertram is endowed with an exceptionally active brain; and when I gave those assurances to you and Sir Randle last June, it occurred to him that, in the event of my book failing to attract the market, there was a danger of my palming it off, with the kind aid of my publisher, as the out-and-out triumph I'd bragged of in advance; and the loud blasts of Titterton's trumpet strengthened Master Bertie's apprehensions. [Ottoline, unobserved, rises unsteadily and, with her eyes fixed fiercely upon Bertram, crosses the room at the back.] ”

“ Bertram replies stiffly: “I can assure you I have much more respect for Critchett than for any member of a St. James’ Street club.”
“And yet you give him carrot fritters!” cried Lady Southwold.
Bertram replies with great irritation: “He eats whatever he pleases, turtle and turbot for aught I know. I should never presume to impose upon him either my menu or my tenets, my beliefs or my principles.”
[60] “You do wisely if you wish to keep him!” says his aunt. “I hope you will keep him. He is your only link with civilised life.” ”

“ The motives by which men are actuated in their conduct are not only various, but mixed. As Bertram thought in this way concerning Lady Harcourt—the Caroline Waddington that had once belonged to himself—he proposed to himself no scheme of infamy, no indulgence of a disastrous love, no ruin for her whom the world now called so fortunate ”

“ She might have made just as good a woman of consequence as Lady Bertram, but Mrs. Norris would have been a more respectable mother of nine children on a small income. ”

“ But the king would not suffer his royal command to be so slighted, for the power of bestowing their nobles in marriage was one of the many privileges of the kings of France, and that same day Bertram was married to Helena, a forced and uneasy marriage to Bertram, and of no promising hope to the poor lady, who, though she gained the noble husband she had hazarded her life to obtain, seemed to have won but a splendid blank, her husband’s love not being a gift in the power of the King of France to bestow. ”

“ If a lady bids a gentleman wait awhile for his answer, he thinks himself quite justified in letting all the world know that she is his own. We all know what a reference to a parent's judgment means. A lady must be very decisive—very, if she means to have her "no" taken at its full meaning. Now Caroline Waddington had not been very decisive.
Whatever Bertram's thoughts or his hopes might be, he said nothing more on the present occasion. He walked silently down the hill by her side, somewhat moody-looking, but yet not with the hang-dog aspect of a rejected suitor. ”

“ Miss Crawford listened, and Edmund agreed to this. "The air of a gentleman's residence, therefore, you cannot but give it, if you do any thing. But it is capable of much more. (Let me see, Mary; Lady Bertram bids a dozen for that queen; no, no, a dozen is more than it is worth. Lady Bertram does not bid a dozen. She will have nothing to say to it. Go on, go on.) By some such improvements as I have suggested, I do not really require you to proceed upon my plan, though by the bye I doubt any body's striking out a better. You may give it a higher character. You may raise it into a place. ”

“ Stickatit, I caution you not to dispose, under that will, of anything of which Mr. Bertram may have died possessed." And so saying, he took up his hat, and left the house.
And what would he have done had Bertram told him that Lady Harcourt was staying at Mr. Jones's, in the red brick house on the other side of the Green? What can any man do with a recusant wife? We have often been told that we should build a golden bridge for a flying enemy. And if any one can be regarded as a man's enemy, it is a wife who is not his friend.
After a little while, Sir Lionel went away with Mr. Pritchett. ”

“ We know nothing of the outer world.”
“With pleasure!” said Bertram.
He kissed the old lady’s hand again, and at this sign of regard and sympathy her eyes moistened.
“You have seen the old régime in their poor hovels,” she said. “The others are like us or worse.”
“I have seen their courage,” said Bertram.
“Many of my friends have starved to death,” said the Princess. “It is Nadia and Alexis who have saved us. My daughter is a medical student. They still get rations, and she brings home most of them to us. Without that we should not be alive. ”

“ Fanny Price was at this time just ten years old, and though there might not be much in her first appearance to captivate, there was, at least, nothing to disgust her relations. She was small of her age, with no glow of complexion, nor any other striking beauty; exceedingly timid and shy, and shrinking from notice; but her air, though awkward, was not vulgar, her voice was sweet, and when she spoke her countenance was pretty. Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram received her very kindly; and Sir Thomas, seeing how much she needed encouragement, tried to be all that was conciliating: ”

“ It is not decent that a lady of high rank and my kinswoman should be spoken to kneeling by a Cornish knight of nowhere and yesterday, God help me, if he be ten times a King's spy!" And so she bade the lady, who was the Lady Margaret of Glororem, to fetch a stool from a corner of the room and set it by her throne on the step. And there she had the Lady Margaret sit beside her and that Sir Bertram fetch off his hat with the large feather and so stand before them. ”

“ Bertram was not at that moment in a condition to give him any information on the subject.
"I can tell you about the one," said the baron, as Sir Henry began his grace.
"An odd thousand is nothing," said Mr. Stistick, pausing for a second till the grace was over.
The judge and Mr. Stistick sat at Lady Harcourt's right and left, so that Bertram was not called upon to say much to her during dinner. The judge talked incessantly, and so did the member of Parliament, and so also did the solicitor-general. A party of six is always a talking party. ”

“ Shaughnessey. And on her other side, sat Captain M'Gramm, in despite of Mrs. Bangster's motherly care and of his own wife at home. On the following morning, Mrs. Price and Captain M'Gramm were walking the deck together just as they had been used to do on the other side of Suez.
And so things went on till the day before their arrival at Southampton. Mrs. Cox still kept her seat next to Bertram, and opposite to Wilkinson, though no other lady remained to countenance her. She and Bertram still walked the deck arm in arm ”

“ Godfrey Bertram.
Dennis Bertram, Donohoe Bertram, and Lewis Bertram, ancestors of Mr. Godfrey Bertram.
Captain Andrew Bertram, a relative of the family.—Sir W. Scott, Guy Mannering (time, George II.) .
Bertram, the English minstrel, and guide of lady Augusta Berkely; when in disguise she calls herself the minstrel's son.—Sir W. Scott, Castle Dangerous (time, Henry I.) .
Ber'tram, one of the conspirators against the republic of Venice. Having "a hesitating softness, fatal to a great enterprise," he betrayed the conspiracy to the senate.—Byron, Marino Faliero (1819) . ”

“ If you admire her so much, I shall beg you not to come to Littlebath any more."
"Perhaps I had better not. But, Bertram, I beg to congratulate you most heartily. There is this against your future happiness—"
"What?"
"Why, you will never be known as Mr. George Bertram; but always as Mrs. George Bertram's husband. With such a bride-elect as that, you cannot expect to stand on your own bottom. If you can count on being lord-chancellor, or secretary of state, you may do so; otherwise, you'll always be known as an appendage."
"Oh, I'll put up with that misery." ”