Mary Arden

“ John Shakespeare married (presumably in 1557) Mary Arden, youngest daughter of Robert Arden, a wealthy landowner of Wilmecote, a couple of miles north of Stratford. Robert Arden, who had died in 1556, was the son of Thomas Arden (the poet’s maternal great-grandfather) , who was living at Wilmecote in 1501 and who probably belonged to the aristocratic family of the Ardens of Park Hall. [1] Mary Shakespeare, the poet’s mother, was buried at Stratford, September 9, 1608. ”

“ One stood before a large white-covered table ironing fine linen, while the old nurse sat by in her big chair, spectacles on nose, and a piece of coarse needlework in hand, superintending the process, with many comments, which, added to the heat of the day and the irons, had heightened Mary Smith’s complexion to a brilliant crimson. The other sat working in the shady background, the object of Mary’s intensest envy, unremarked and unreproved. It was the unfortunate clear-starcher who had to make her bob to the gentlefolks, and called forth Miss Arden’s questions. ”

“ Fortunately, Mary knew nothing about it, but sat by the other Arden, and chattered as much as Gussy Thornleigh had done, and could not help thinking what a pity it was so handsome a man, and one so like the family, should not be the true heir. ”

“ Arden? They are like pearls. My Alice has nice teeth, but I always say they are nothing to compare to Mary Molyneaux’s. And that’s Mr. Arden, your namesake, beside her. He is considered a very handsome man.”
“Do you approve of personal gossip, Mr. Arden?” said Mrs. Buxton, breaking in; but Edgar was too much interested to be stopped, even by motives of civility.
“Mr. Arden, my namesake! Then that explains it.” He said these last words, not aloud, but within himself, for now he could see that the face which this man’s face recalled to him was that of his own sister, Clare. ”

“ Granger might come in at some awkward moment. At half-past five Jane Target went to the nursery and fetched the year-old heir of Arden Court.
He was always glad to go to his mother; and he came to-night crowing and laughing, and kicking his little blue shoes in boisterous rapture. Jane kept guard at the door while Clarissa put on her bonnet and jacket, and wrapped up the baby—first in a warm fur-lined opera-jacket, and then in a thick tartan shawl. They had no hat for him, but tied up his pretty flaxen head in a large silk handkerchief, and put the shawl over that. ”

“ So, on a brilliant June morning, the Grangers left the Great Western station by special train, and sped through the summer landscape to Henley. This garden-party at Mr. Wooster's villa was almost their last engagement. They were to return to Arden in two days; and Clarissa was very glad that it was so. That weariness of spirit which had seemed to her so strange in some of the young ladies at Hale Castle had come upon herself. She longed for Arden Court and perfect rest ”

“ So sure was Mary of her indifference to Bothwell that she urged the earl to marry, and he did marry a girl of the great house of Gordon.
Mary's self-suggested love for Darnley was extinguished almost on her wedding-night. The man was a drunkard who came into her presence befuddled and almost bestial. He had no brains. His vanity was enormous. He loved no one but himself, and least of all this queen, whom he regarded as having thrown herself at his empty head.
The first-fruits of the marriage were uprisings among the Protestant lords. Mary then showed herself a heroic queen. ”

“ A great many people who live in little country towns get narrow views of things, breathe them in the atmosphere which surrounds them; but that is no reason they should hold to them when they get a chance to see the world. I don't know what you mean, Ben; I'm sure papa has never forbidden us to play cards. I am going to have a game—I know that; and if Elsie won't play, I'll call Mary down. She will like the fun of joining us."
"Mary" was the fourteen-year-old sister who was tolerated only occasionally among the older young people.
As Carrie arose to summon her, Mr. ”

“ To take back to his home and his heart the woman who had confessed her affection for another man, was hardly in Daniel Granger's nature. Had he not loved her too much already—degraded himself almost by so entire a devotion to a woman who had given him nothing, who had kept her heart shut against him?
"She married Arden Court, not me," he said to himself; "and then she tried to have Arden Court and her old lover into the bargain. Would she have run away with him, I wonder, if he had had time to persuade her that day? Can any woman be pure, when a man dares ask her to leave her husband?" ”

“ You can live anywhere you please; you will have a fair income, a liberal one, I daresay. You are very well off, upon my word, Clarissa, taking into consideration the fact of your supreme imprudence—only you have lost your husband."
"And I have lost Arden Court. Does not there seem a kind of retribution in that? I made a false vow for the love of Arden Court—and—and for your sake, papa."
"False fiddlestick!" exclaimed Mr. Lovel, impatiently; "any reasonable woman might have been happy in your position, and with such a man as Granger; a man who positively worshipped you. ”

“ Lovel shrugged his shoulders with a deprecating air.
"C'est son métier," he said. "I suppose she does find it rather dismal at times; but there are the children, you see—it is a woman's duty to find all-sufficient society in her children. And now, Clary, tell me about yourself. You have made a brilliant match, and are mistress of Arden Court. A strange stroke of fortune that. And you are happy, I hope, my dear?" ”

“ We had a good deal to learn when we first went to Arden; in fact, we still have a great deal to learn about this wonderful country, in which so many of the ideals and standards with which we were once familiar are reversed. It is one of the blessed results of living in the Forest that one is more and more conscious that he does not know and more and more eager to learn. There are no shams of any sort in Arden, and all pride in concealing one's ignorance disappears; one's chief concern is to be known precisely as he is. ”

“ The child's love for her father has not grown any less morbid in its intensity since Edward Arundel's departure for India; nor has Mary become more childlike since her coming to Marchmont Towers, and her abandonment of all those sordid cares, those pitiful every-day duties, which had made her womanly. ”

“ Some, too, are cooks and kitchen men."
"We are ten," said Arden, musing. "That is quite enough; but yet we must have recourse to stratagem, in order to make sure that no rash opposition brings on violence. Leave it to me, dear Constance, leave it to me. You go to your own little chamber, say your prayers, and, when your hour is expired, go to your pretty cousin, and tell her, old William Arden says that they shall not marry her to any one against her will. So let her keep a good heart, be firm, and fear not." ”

“ With a bitter cry Mary threw herself upon her mother's grave, and wept for a long, long time.
"It would not be so bad," said Mary, "if there was any body left, but I am all alone in the world. Ella does not love me—nobody loves me."
It was in vain that Jenny told her of Billy Bender's love, of her own, and George Moreland's too. Mary only wept the more, wishing that she had died, and Allie too. ”

“ If I do not find happiness within the next five years, I am never likely to find it at all. At three-and-thirty a man has done with a heart, in a moral and poetic sense, and begins to entertain vague alarms on the subject of fatty degeneration."
Clarissa smiled faintly, as if the stranger's idle talk scarcely beguiled her from her own thoughts.
"You said you had been at Arden," she began rather abruptly; "then you must know papa."
"No, I have not the honour to know Mr. Lovel," with the same embarrassed air which he had exhibited before in speaking of Arden Court. ”

“ But it was not from the Ardens that any difficulty arose. Before the death of Mrs. Agnes Arden, she was called to support her claim and that of all her stepdaughters, based on a supposition of entail, against [Pg 45] the descendants of the Mayowe who had sold his property to Thomas and Robert Arden in 1501. Being described as old and infirm, a Commission was directed to Bartholomew Hales, Lord of the Manor of Snitterfield, and Nicholas Knolles, Vicar of Alveston, to take her deposition concerning it, in July, 1580. ”

“ That the relationship is imaginary and impossible, and those who assert it in error. (2) That the Ardens were connected with nobility, while Robert Arden was styled “husbandman.” (3) That the heralds knew the claim was unfounded when they scratched out the arms of Arden of Park Hall, and inserted the arms of Arden of Alvanley, in Cheshire. Though this was equally unjustifiable, the family being further off, there was less likelihood of complaint. ”

“ With all these excitements and anxieties, we cannot wonder that the nine or ten months which have passed away since she stood at the window in Park Lane, have changed her appearance.
Mary Armstrong, however, has lost nothing by this change. The face, though slightly thinner, still retains its delicate oval. The eyes are as large and bright, and the hair as glossy and luxuriant as ever. The rich colour on her check is softened down to the bloom of a peach, and the figure, though more fully developed, is still slender and graceful in every movement. ”

“ Life is meant to be hard work. You may have occasion to make use of your education some day, Clary."
"Yes," the girl answered with a sigh; "I know that we are poor."
"I suppose so; but perhaps you hardly know how poor."
"Whenever the time comes, I shall be quite ready to work for papa," said Clarissa; yet she could not help wondering how the master of Arden Court could ever bring himself to send out his daughter as a governess; and then she had a vague childish recollection that not tens of pounds, but hundreds, and even thousands, had been wanted to stop the gaps in her father's exchequer. ”

“ CHAPTER XI. EDWARD ARUNDEL'S DESPAIR. Yes; Edward Arundel could believe the worst now. He could believe now that his young wife, on hearing tidings of his death, had rushed madly to her own destruction; too desolate, too utterly unfriended and miserable, to live under the burden of her sorrows.
Mary had talked to her husband in the happy, loving confidence of her bright honeymoon; she had talked to him of her father's death, and the horrible grief she had felt; the heart-sickness, the eager yearning to be carried to the same grave, to rest in the same silent sleep. ”

“ They bent wisely at length before the mysterious power of genius which shone out in the beautiful child long before she was able fully to understand whither the resistless promptings to tread the “mimic stage of life” were leading her. In the end the New World gained an actress of whom it may be well proud, and the Old World has been fain to confess that it has no monopoly of the highest types of histrionic genius.
Mary Anderson was born at Sacramento, on the Pacific slope, on the 28th of July, 1859, but removed with her parents to Kentucky, when but six months old. ”

“ And now I must go back to papa, if you please, or he will be sending some one to look for me."
"And I shall be discovered in Mr. Capulet's orchard. Ten minutes more, Clarissa, and I vanish amidst the woods of Arden, through which I came like a poacher in order to steal upon you unawares by that little gate. And now, my darling, since we have wasted almost all our time in fencing with words, let us be reasonable. Promises such as you speak of are pledges given to the winds. They cannot hold an hour against true love. Listen, Clary, listen." ”

“ A thousand good wishes, dear, both for yourself and your papa. We hope to spend the autumn at Hale, and I suppose I shall then have the pleasure of seeing you begin your reign as mistress of Arden Court. You must give a great many parties, and make yourself popular in the neighbourhood at once. Entre nous, I think our friend Miss Granger is rather fond of power. It will be wise on your part to take your stand in the beginning of things, and then affairs are pretty sure to go pleasantly. Ever your affectionate
"LAURA ARMSTRONG." Not a word about George Fairfax. Clarissa wondered where he was ”

“ Martin’s summer of their days the harvest sown amid the chill tears of spring, looked in each other’s eyes with a smile of deep content. The woman was the first to set self aside, and cried,—
“Come, come, Sir Governor! To business! Mistress Allerton, and her daughters, Mary and Remember, [Pg 44] Bartholomew, and the Prences, Constance Hopkins with Nicholas Snow, whom she will marry, the Aldens, the captain and his wife”—
“He is hardly to be ranked with the young folk, is he?” ”

“ Darnley had shrunk from the hardships of battle. He was steeped in low intrigues. He roused the constant irritation of the queen by his folly and utter lack of sense and decency. Mary felt she owed him nothing, but she forgot that she owed much to herself.
Her old amorous ways came back to her, and she relapsed into the joys of sense. The scandal-mongers of the capital saw a lover in every man with whom she talked. She did, in fact, set convention at defiance. She dressed in men's clothing. She showed what the unemotional Scots thought to be unseemly levity. ”

“ Cross, loomed dimly in the distance; the bubbling plash of a mill-stream sounded like some monotonous lullaby in the drowsy summer atmosphere. Mary looked from the face she loved to the fair landscape about her, and a tender solemnity crept into her mind—a reverent love and admiration for this beautiful earth, which was almost akin to awe. ”