PEVERIL OF THE PEAK
BY
SIR WALTER SCOTT, BART.
PEVERIL OF THE PEAK
CHAPTER I
When civil dudgeon first grew high,
And men fell out, they knew not why;
When foul words, jealousies, and fears,
Set folk together by the ears -
- BUTLER.
William, the Conqueror of England, was, or supposed himself to be, the
father of a certain William Peveril, who attended him to the battle of
Hastings, and there distinguished himself. The liberal-minded monarch,
who assumed in his charters the veritable title of Gulielmus
Bastardus, was not likely to let his son's illegitimacy be any bar to
the course of his royal favour, when the laws of England were issued
from the mouth of the Norman victor, and the lands of the Saxons were
at his unlimited disposal. William Peveril obtained a liberal grant of
property and lordships in Derbyshire, and became the erecter of that
Gothic fortress, which, hanging over the mouth of the Devil's Cavern,
so well known to tourists, gives the name of Castleton to the adjacent
village.
From this feudal Baron, who chose his nest upon the principles on
which an eagle selects her eyry, and built it in such a fashion as if
he had intended it, as an Irishman said of the Martello towers, for
the sole purpose of puzzling posterity, there was, or conceived
themselves to be, descended (for their pedigree was rather
hypothetical) an opulent family of knightly rank, in the same county
of Derby. The great fief of Castleton, with its adjacent wastes and
forests, and all the wonders which they contain, had been forfeited in
King John's stormy days, by one William Peveril, and had been granted
anew to the Lord Ferrers of that day. Yet this William's descendants,
though no longer possessed of what they alleged to have been their
original property, were long distinguished by the proud title of
Peverils of the Peak, which served to mark their high descent and
lofty pretensions.
In Charles the Second's time, the representative of this ancient
family was Sir Geoffrey Peveril, a man who had many of the ordinary
attributes of an old-fashioned country gentleman, and very few
individual traits to distinguish him from the general portrait of that
worthy class of mankind. He was proud of small advantages, angry at
small disappointments, incapable of forming any resolution or opinion
abstracted from his own prejudices - he was proud of his birth, lavish
in his housekeeping, convivial with those kindred and acquaintances,
who would allow his superiority in rank - contentious and quarrelsome
with all that crossed his pretensions - kind to the poor, except when
they plundered his game - a Royalist in his political opinions, and one
who detested alike a Roundhead, a poacher, and a Presbyterian. In
religion Sir Geoffrey was a high-churchman, of so exalted a strain
that many thought he still nourished in private the Roman Catholic
tenets, which his family had only renounced in his father's time, and
that he had a dispensation for conforming in outward observances to
the Protestant faith. There was at least such a scandal amongst the
Puritans, and the influence which Sir Geoffrey Peveril certainly
appeared to possess amongst the Catholic gentlemen of Derbyshire and
Cheshire, seemed to give countenance to the rumour.
Such was Sir Geoffrey, who might have passed to his grave without
further distinction than a brass-plate in the chancel, had he not
lived in times which forced the most inactive spirits into exertion,
as a tempest influences the sluggish waters of the deadest mere. When
the Civil Wars broke out, Peveril of the Peak, proud from pedigree,
and brave by constitution, raised a regiment for the King, and showed
upon several occasions more capacity for command than men had
heretofore given him credit for.
Even in the midst of the civil turmoil, he fell in love with, and
married, a beautiful and amiable young lady of the noble house of
Stanley; and from that time had the more merit in his loyalty, as it
divorced him from her society, unless at very brief intervals, when
his duty permitted an occasional visit to his home. Scorning to be
allured from his military duty by domestic inducements, Peveril of
the Peak fought on for several rough years of civil war, and performed
his part with sufficient gallantry, until his regiment was surprised
and cut to pieces by Poyntz, Cromwell's enterprising and successful
general of cavalry. The defeated Cavalier escaped from the field of
battle, and, like a true descendant of William the Conqueror,
disdaining submission, threw himself into his own castellated mansion,
which was attacked and defended in a siege of that irregular kind
which caused the destruction of so many baronial residences during the
course of those unhappy wars. Martindale Castle, after having suffered
severely from the cannon which Cromwell himself brought against it,
was at length surrendered when in the last extremity. Sir Geoffrey
himself became a prisoner, and while his liberty was only restored
upon a promise of remaining a peaceful subject to the Commonwealth in
future, his former delinquencies, as they were termed by the ruling
party, were severely punished by fine and sequestration.
But neither his forced promise, nor the fear of farther unpleasant
consequences to his person or property, could prevent Peveril of the
Peak from joining the gallant Earl of Derby the night before the fatal
engagement in Wiggan Lane, where the Earl's forces were dispersed. Sir
Geoffrey having had his share in that action, escaped with the relics
of the Royalists after the defeat, to join Charles II. He witnessed
also the final defeat of Worcester, where he was a second time made
prisoner; and as, in the opinion of Cromwell and the language of the
times, he was regarded as an obstinate malignant, he was in great
danger of having shared with the Earl of Derby his execution at
Bolton-le-Moor, having partaken with him the dangers of two actions.
But Sir Geoffrey's life was preserved by the interest of a friend, who
possessed influence in the councils of Oliver. - This was a Mr.
Bridgenorth, a gentleman of middling quality, whose father had been
successful in some commercial adventure during the peaceful reign of
James I.; and who had bequeathed his son a considerable sum of money,
in addition to the moderate patrimony which he inherited from his
father.
The substantial, though small-sized, brick building of Moultrassie
Hall, was but two miles distant from Martindale Castle, and the young
Bridgenorth attended the same school with the heir of the Peverils. A
sort of companionship, if not intimacy, took place betwixt them, which
continued during their youthful sports - the rather that Bridgenorth,
though he did not at heart admit Sir Geoffrey's claims of superiority
to the extent which the other's vanity would have exacted, paid
deference in a reasonable degree to the representative of a family so
much more ancient and important than his own, without conceiving that
he in any respect degraded himself by doing so.
Mr. Bridgenorth did not, however, carry his complaisance so far as to
embrace Sir Geoffrey's side during the Civil War. On the contrary, as
an active Justice of the Peace, he rendered much assistance in
arraying the militia in the cause of the Parliament, and for some time
held a military commission in that service. This was partly owing to
his religious principles, for he was a zealous Presbyterian, partly to
his political ideas, which, without being absolutely democratical,
favoured the popular side of the great national question. Besides, he
was a moneyed man, and to a certain extent had a shrewd eye to his
worldly interest. He understood how to improve the opportunities which
civil war afforded, of advancing his fortune, by a dexterous use of
his capital; and he was not at a loss to perceive that these were
likely to be obtained in joining the Parliament; while the King's
cause, as it was managed, held out nothing to the wealthy but a course
of exaction and compulsory loans. For these reasons, Bridgenorth
became a decided Roundhead, and all friendly communication betwixt his
neighbour and him was abruptly broken asunder. This was done with the
less acrimony, that, during the Civil War, Sir Geoffrey was almost
constantly in the field, following the vacillating and unhappy
fortunes of his master; while Major Bridgenorth, who soon renounced
active military service, resided chiefly in London, and only
occasionally visited the Hall.
Upon these visits, it was with great pleasure he received the
intelligence, that Lady Peveril had shown much kindness to Mrs.
Bridgenorth, and had actually given her and her family shelter in
Martindale Castle, when Moultrassie Hall was threatened with pillage
by a body of Prince Rupert's ill-disciplined Cavaliers. This
acquaintance had been matured by frequent walks together, which the
vicinity of their places of residence suffered the Lady Peveril to
have with Mrs. Bridgenorth, who deemed herself much honoured in being
thus admitted into the society of so distinguished a lady. Major
Bridgenorth heard of this growing intimacy with great pleasure, and he
determined to repay the obligation, as far as he could without much
hurt to himself, by interfering with all his influence, in behalf of
her unfortunate husband. It was chiefly owing to Major Bridgenorth's
mediation, that Sir Geoffrey's life was saved after the battle of
Worcester. He obtained him permission to compound for his estate on
easier terms than many who had been less obstinate in malignancy; and,
finally, when, in order to raise the money to the composition, the
Knight was obliged to sell a considerable portion of his patrimony,
Major Bridgenorth became the purchaser, and that at a larger price
than had been paid to any Cavalier under such circumstances, by a
member of the Committee for Sequestrations. It is true, the prudent
committeeman did not, by any means, lose sight of his own interest in
the transaction, for the price was, after all, very moderate, and the
property lay adjacent to Moultrassie Hall, the value of which was at
least trebled by the acquisition. But then it was also true, that the
unfortunate owner must have submitted to much worse conditions, had
the committeeman used, as others did, the full advantages which his
situation gave him; and Bridgenorth took credit to himself, and
received it from others, for having, on this occasion, fairly
sacrificed his interest to his liberality.
Sir Geoffrey Peveril was of the same opinion, and the rather that Mr.
Bridgenorth seemed to bear his exaltation with great moderation, and
was disposed to show him personally the same deference in his present
sunshine of prosperity, which he had exhibited formerly in their early
acquaintance. It is but justice to Major Bridgenorth to observe, that
in this conduct he paid respect as much to the misfortunes as to the
pretensions of his far-descended neighbour, and that, with the frank
generosity of a blunt Englishman, he conceded points of ceremony,
about which he himself was indifferent, merely because he saw that his
doing so gave pleasure to Sir Geoffrey.
Peveril of the Peak did justice to his neighbour's delicacy, in
consideration of which he forgot many things. He forgot that Major
Bridgenorth was already in possession of a fair third of his estate,
and had various pecuniary claims affecting the remainder, to the
extent of one-third more. He endeavoured even to forget, what it was
still more difficult not to remember, the altered situation in which
they and their mansions now stood to each other.
Before the Civil War, the superb battlements and turrets of Martindale
Castle looked down on the red brick-built Hall, as it stole out from
the green plantations, just as an oak in Martindale Chase would have
looked beside one of the stunted and formal young beech-trees with
which Bridgenorth had graced his avenue; but after the siege which we
have commemorated, the enlarged and augmented Hall was as much
predominant in the landscape over the shattered and blackened ruins of
the Castle, of which only one wing was left habitable, as the youthful
beech, in all its vigour of shoot and bud, would appear to the same
aged oak stripped of its boughs, and rifted by lightning, one-half
laid in shivers on the ground, and the other remaining a blackened and
ungraceful trunk, rent and splintered, and without either life or
leaves. Sir Geoffrey could not but feel, that the situation and
prospects were exchanged as disadvantageously for himself as the
appearance of their mansions; and that though the authority of the man
in office under the Parliament, the sequestrator, and the
committeeman, had been only exerted for the protection of the Cavalier
and the malignant, they would have been as effectual if applied to
procure his utter ruin; and that he was become a client, while his
neighbour was elevated into a patron.
There were two considerations, besides the necessity of the case and
the constant advice of his lady, which enabled Peveril of the Peak to
endure, with some patience, this state of degradation. The first was,
that the politics of Major Bridgenorth began, on many points, to
assimilate themselves to his own. As a Presbyterian, he was not an
utter enemy to monarchy, and had been considerably shocked at the
unexpected trial and execution of the King; as a civilian and a man of
property, he feared the domination of the military; and though he
wished not to see Charles restored by force of arms, yet he arrived at
the conclusion, that to bring back the heir of the royal family on
such terms of composition as might ensure the protection of those
popular immunities and privileges for which the Long Parliament had at
first contended, would be the surest and most desirable termination to
the mutations in state affairs which had agitated Britain. Indeed, the
Major's ideas on this point approached so nearly those of his
neighbour, that he had well-nigh suffered Sir Geoffrey, who had a
finger in almost all the conspiracies of the Royalists, to involve him
in the unfortunate rising of Penruddock and Groves, in the west, in
which many of the Presbyterian interest, as well as the Cavalier
party, were engaged. And though his habitual prudence eventually kept
him out of this and other dangers, Major Bridgenorth was considered
during the last years of Cromwell's domination, and the interregnum
which succeeded, as a disaffected person to the Commonwealth, and a
favourer of Charles Stewart.
But besides this approximation to the same political opinions, another
bond of intimacy united the families of the Castle and the Hall. Major
Bridgenorth, fortunate, and eminently so, in all his worldly
transactions, was visited by severe and reiterated misfortunes in his
family, and became, in this particular, an object of compassion to his
poorer and more decayed neighbour. Betwixt the breaking out of the
Civil War and the Restoration, he lost successively a family of no
less than six children, apparently through a delicacy of constitution,
which cut off the little prattlers at the early age when they most
wind themselves round the heart of the parents.
In the beginning of the year 1658, Major Bridgenorth was childless;
ere it ended, he had a daughter, indeed, but her birth was purchased
by the death of an affectionate wife, whose constitution had been
exhausted by maternal grief, and by the anxious and harrowing
reflection, that from her the children they had lost derived that
delicacy of health, which proved unable to undergo the tear and wear
of existence. The same voice which told Bridgenorth that he was the
father of a living child (it was the friendly voice of Lady Peveril),
communicated to him the melancholy intelligence that he was no longer
a husband. The feelings of Major Bridgenorth were strong and deep,
rather than hasty and vehement; and his grief assumed the form of a
sullen stupor, from which neither the friendly remonstrances of Sir
Geoffrey, who did not fail to be with his neighbour at this
distressing conjuncture, even though he knew he must meet the
Presbyterian pastor, nor the ghastly exhortations of this latter
person, were able to rouse the unfortunate widower.
At length Lady Peveril, with the ready invention of a female sharped
by the sight of distress and the feelings of sympathy, tried on the
sufferer one of those experiments by which grief is often awakened
from despondency into tears. She placed in Bridgenorth's arms the
infant whose birth had cost him so dear, and conjured him to remember
that his Alice was not yet dead, since she survived in the helpless
child she had left to his paternal care.
"Take her away - take her away!" said the unhappy man, and they were
the first words he had spoken; "let me not look on her - it is but
another blossom that has bloomed to fade, and the tree that bore it
will never flourish more!"
He almost threw the child into Lady Peveril's arms, placed his hands
before his face, and wept aloud. Lady Peveril did not say "be
comforted," but she ventured to promise that the blossom should ripen
to fruit.
"Never, never!" said Bridgenorth; "take the unhappy child away, and
let me only know when I shall wear black for her - Wear black!" he
exclaimed, interrupting himself, "what other colour shall I wear
during the remainder of my life?"
"I will take the child for a season," said Lady Peveril, "since the
sight of her is so painful to you; and the little Alice shall share
the nursery of our Julian, until it shall be pleasure and not pain for
you to look on her."
"That hour will never come," said the unhappy father; "her doom is
written - she will follow the rest - God's will be done. - Lady, I thank
you - I trust her to your care; and I thank God that my eye shall not
see her dying agonies."
Without detaining the reader's attention longer on this painful theme,
it is enough to say that the Lady Peveril did undertake the duties of
a mother to the little orphan; and perhaps it was owing, in a great
measure, to her judicious treatment of the infant, that its feeble
hold of life was preserved, since the glimmering spark might probably
have been altogether smothered, had it, like the Major's former
children, undergone the over-care and over-nursing of a mother
rendered nervously cautious and anxious by so many successive losses.
The lady was the more ready to undertake this charge, that she herself
had lost two infant children; and that she attributed the preservation
of the third, now a fine healthy child of three years old, to Julian's
being subjected to rather a different course of diet and treatment
than was then generally practised. She resolved to follow the same
regiment with the little orphan, which she had observed in the case of
her own boy; and it was equally successful. By a more sparing use of
medicine, by a bolder admission of fresh air, by a firm, yet cautious
attention to encourage rather than to supersede the exertions of
nature, the puny infant, under the care of an excellent nurse,
gradually improved in strength and in liveliness.
Sir Geoffrey, like most men of his frank and good-natured disposition,
was naturally fond of children, and so much compassionated the sorrows
of his neighbour, that he entirely forgot his being a Presbyterian,
until it became necessary that the infant should be christened by a
teacher of that persuasion.
This was a trying case - the father seemed incapable of giving
direction; and that the threshold of Martindale Castle should be
violated by the heretical step of a dissenting clergyman, was matter
of horror to its orthodox owner. He had seen the famous Hugh Peters,
with a Bible in one hand and a pistol in the other, ride in triumph
through the court-door when Martindale was surrendered; and the
bitterness of that hour had entered like iron into his soul. Yet such
was Lady Peveril's influence over the prejudices of her husband, that
he was induced to connive at the ceremony taking place in a remote
garden house, which was not properly within the precincts of the
Castle-wall. The lady even dared to be present while the ceremony was
performed by the Reverend Master Solsgrace, who had once preached a
sermon of three hours' length before the House of Commons, upon a
thanksgiving occasion after the relief of Exeter. Sir Geoffrey Peveril
took care to be absent the whole day from the Castle, and it was only
from the great interest which he took in the washing, perfuming, and
as it were purification of the summer-house, that it could have been
guessed he knew anything of what had taken place in it.
But, whatever prejudices the good Knight might entertain against his
neighbour's form of religion, they did not in any way influence his
feelings towards him as a sufferer under severe affliction. The mode
in which he showed his sympathy was rather singular, but exactly
suited the character of both, and the terms on which they stood with
each other.
Morning after morning the good Baronet made Moultrassie Hall the
termination of his walk or ride, and said a single word of kindness as
he passed. Sometimes he entered the old parlour where the proprietor
sat in solitary wretchedness and despondency; but more frequently (for
Sir Geoffrey did not pretend to great talents of conversation), he
paused on the terrace, and stopping or halting his horse by the
latticed window, said aloud to the melancholy inmate, "How is it with
you, Master Bridgenorth?" (the Knight would never acknowledge his
neighbour's military rank of Major); "I just looked in to bid you keep
a good heart, man, and to tell you that Julian is well, and little
Alice is well, and all are well at Martindale Castle."
A deep sigh, sometimes coupled with "I thank you, Sir Geoffrey; my
grateful duty waits on Lady Peveril," was generally Bridgenorth's only
answer. But the news was received on the one part with the kindness
which was designed upon the other; it gradually became less painful
and more interesting; the lattice window was never closed, nor was the
leathern easy-chair which stood next to it ever empty, when the usual
hour of the Baronet's momentary visit approached. At length the
expectation of that passing minute became the pivot upon which the
thoughts of poor Bridgenorth turned during all the rest of the day.
Most men have known the influence of such brief but ruling moments at
some period of their lives. The moment when a lover passes the window
of his mistress - the moment when the epicure hears the dinner-bell, -
is that into which is crowded the whole interest of the day; the hours
which precede it are spent in anticipation; the hours which follow, in
reflection on what has passed; and fancy dwelling on each brief
circumstance, gives to seconds the duration of minutes, to minutes
that of hours. Thus seated in his lonely chair, Bridgenorth could
catch at a distance the stately step of Sir Geoffrey, or the heavy
tramp of his war-horse, Black Hastings, which had borne him in many an
action; he could hear the hum of "The King shall enjoy his own again,"
or the habitual whistle of "Cuckolds and Roundheads," die unto
reverential silence, as the Knight approached the mansion of
affliction; and then came the strong hale voice of the huntsman
soldier with its usual greeting.
By degrees the communication became something more protracted, as
Major Bridgenorth's grief, like all human feelings, lost its
overwhelming violence, and permitted him to attend, in some degree, to
what passed around him, to discharge various duties which pressed upon
him, and to give a share of attention to the situation of the country,
distracted as it was by the contending factions, whose strife only
terminated in the Restoration. Still, however, though slowly
recovering from the effects of the shock which he had sustained, Major
Bridgenorth felt himself as yet unable to make up his mind to the
effort necessary to see his infant; and though separated by so short a
distance from the being in whose existence he was more interested than
in anything the world afforded, he only made himself acquainted with
the windows of the apartment where little Alice was lodged, and was
often observed to watch them from the terrace, as they brightened in
the evening under the influence of the setting sun. In truth, though a
strong-minded man in most respects, he was unable to lay aside the
gloomy impression that this remaining pledge of affection was soon to
be conveyed to that grave which had already devoured all besides that
was dear to him; and he awaited in miserable suspense the moment when
he should hear that symptoms of the fatal malady had begun to show
themselves.
The voice of Peveril continued to be that of a comforter until the
month of April 1660, when it suddenly assumed a new and different
tone. "The King shall enjoy his own again," far from ceasing, as the
hasty tread of Black Hastings came up the avenue, bore burden to the
clatter of his hoofs on the paved courtyard, as Sir Geoffrey sprang
from his great war-saddle, now once more garnished with pistols of two
feet in length, and, armed with steel-cap, back and breast, and a
truncheon in his hand, he rushed into the apartment of the astonished
Major, with his eyes sparkling, and his cheek inflamed, while he
called out, "Up! up, neighbour! No time now to mope in the chimney-
corner! Where is your buff-coat and broadsword, man? Take the true
side once in your life, and mend past mistakes. The King is all
lenity, man - all royal nature and mercy. I will get your full pardon."
"What means all this?" said Bridgenorth - "Is all well with you - all
well at Martindale Castle, Sir Geoffrey?"
"Well as you could wish them, Alice, and Julian, and all. But I have
news worth twenty of that - Monk has declared at London against those
stinking scoundrels the Rump. Fairfax is up in Yorkshire - for the King
- for the King, man! Churchmen, Presbyterians, and all, are in buff
and bandoleer for King Charles. I have a letter from Fairfax to secure
Derby and Chesterfield with all the men I can make. D - n him, fine
that I should take orders from him! But never mind that - all are
friends now, and you and I, good neighbour, will charge abreast, as
good neighbours should. See there! read - read - read - and then boot and
saddle in an instant.
'Hey for cavaliers - ho for cavaliers,
Pray for cavaliers,
Dub-a-dub, dub-a-dub,
Have at old Beelzebub,
Oliver shakes in his bier!'"
After thundering forth this elegant effusion of loyal enthusiasm, the
sturdy Cavalier's heart became too full. He threw himself on a seat,
and exclaiming, "Did ever I think to live to see this happy day!" he
wept, to his own surprise, as much as to that of Bridgenorth.
Upon considering the crisis in which the country was placed, it
appeared to Major Bridgenorth, as it had done to Fairfax, and other
leaders of the Presbyterian party, that their frank embracing of the
royal interest was the wisest and most patriotic measure which they
could adopt in the circumstances, when all ranks and classes of men
were seeking refuge from the uncertainty and varied oppression
attending the repeated contests between the factions of Westminster
Hall and of Wallingford House. Accordingly he joined with Sir
Geoffrey, with less enthusiasm indeed, but with equal sincerity,
taking such measures as seemed proper to secure their part of the
country on the King's behalf, which was done as effectually and
peaceably as in other parts of England. The neighbours were both at
Chesterfield, when news arrived that the King had landed in England;
and Sir Geoffrey instantly announced his purpose of waiting upon his
Majesty, even before his return to the Castle of Martindale.
"Who knows, neighbour," he said, "whether Sir Geoffrey Peveril will
ever return to Martindale? Titles must be going amongst them yonder,
and I have deserved something among the rest. - Lord Peveril would
sound well - or stay, Earl of Martindale - no, not of Martindale - Earl
of the Peak. - Meanwhile, trust your affairs to me - I will see you
secured - I would you had been no Presbyterian, neighbour - a
knighthood, - I mean a knight-bachelor, not a knight-baronet, - would
have served your turn well."
"I leave these things to my betters, Sir Geoffrey," said the Major,
"and desire nothing so earnestly as to find all well at Martindale
when I return."
"You will - you will find them all well," said the Baronet; "Julian,
Alice, Lady Peveril, and all of them - Bear my commendations to them,
and kiss them all, neighbour, Lady Peveril and all - you may kiss a
Countess when I come back; all will go well with you now you are
turned honest man."
"I always meant to be so, Sir Geoffrey," said Bridgenorth calmly.
"Well, well, well - no offence meant," said the Knight, "all is well
now - so you to Moultrassie Hall, and I to Whitehall. Said I well, aha!
So ho, mine host, a stoup of Canary to the King's health ere we get to
horse - I forgot, neighbour - you drink no healths."
"I wish the King's health as sincerely as if I drank a gallon to it,"
replied the Major; "and I wish you, Sir Geoffrey, all success on your
journey, and a safe return."
CHAPTER II
Why, then, we will have bellowing of beeves,
Broaching of barrels, brandishing of spigots;
Blood shall flow freely, but it shall be gore
Of herds and flocks, and venison and poultry,
Join'd to the brave heart's-blood of John-a-Barleycorn!
- OLD PLAY.
Whatever rewards Charles might have condescended to bestow in
acknowledgement of the sufferings and loyalty of Peveril of the Peak,
he had none in his disposal equal to the pleasure which Providence had
reserved for Bridgenorth on his return to Derbyshire. The exertion to
which he had been summoned, had had the usual effect of restoring to a
certain extent the activity and energy of his character, and he felt
it would be unbecoming to relapse into the state of lethargic
melancholy from which it had roused him. Time also had its usual
effect in mitigating the subjects of his regret; and when he had
passed one day at the Hall in regretting that he could not expect the
indirect news of his daughter's health, which Sir Geoffrey used to
communicate in his almost daily call, he reflected that it would be in
every respect becoming that he should pay a personal visit at
Martindale Castle, carry thither the remembrances of the Knight to his
lady, assure her of his health, and satisfy himself respecting that of
his daughter. He armed himself for the worst - he called to
recollection the thin cheeks, faded eye, wasted hand, pallid lip,
which had marked the decaying health of all his former infants.
"I shall see," he said, "these signs of mortality once more - I shall
once more see a beloved being to whom I have given birth, gliding to
the grave which ought to enclose me long before her. No matter - it is
unmanly so long to shrink from that which must be - God's will be
done!"
He went accordingly, on the subsequent morning, to Martindale Castle,
and gave the lady the welcome assurances of her husband's safety, and
of his hopes of preferment.
"For the first, may Almighty God be praised!" said the Lady Peveril;
"and be the other as our gracious and restored Sovereign may will it.
We are great enough for our means, and have means sufficient for
contentment, though not for splendour. And now I see, good Master
Bridgenorth, the folly of putting faith in idle presentiments of evil.
So often had Sir Geoffrey's repeated attempts in favour of the
Stewarts led him into new misfortunes, that when, the other morning, I
saw him once more dressed in his fatal armour, and heard the sound of
his trumpet, which had been so long silent, it seemed to me as if I
saw his shroud, and heard his death-knell. I say this to you, good
neighbour, the rather because I fear your own mind has been harassed
with anticipations of impending calamity, which it may please God to
avert in your case as it has done in mine; and here comes a sight
which bears good assurance of it."
The door of the apartment opened as she spoke, and two lovely children
entered. The eldest, Julian Peveril, a fine boy betwixt four and five
years old, led in his hand, with an air of dignified support and
attention, a little girl of eighteen months, who rolled and tottered
along, keeping herself with difficulty upright by the assistance of
her elder, stronger, and masculine companion.
Bridgenorth cast a hasty and fearful glance upon the countenance of
his daughter, and, even in that glimpse, perceived, with exquisite
delight, that his fears were unfounded. He caught her in his arms,
pressed her to his heart, and the child, though at first alarmed at
the vehemence of his caresses, presently, as if prompted by Nature,
smiled in reply to them. Again he held her at some distance from him,
and examined her more attentively; he satisfied himself that the
complexion of the young cherub he had in his arms was not the hectic
tinge of disease, but the clear hue of ruddy health; and that though
her little frame was slight, it was firm and springy.
"I did not think that it could have been thus," he said, looking to
Lady Peveril, who had sat observing the scene with great pleasure;
"but praise be to God in the first instance, and next, thanks to you,
madam, who have been His instrument."
"Julian must lose his playfellow now, I suppose?" said the lady; "but
the Hall is not distant, and I will see my little charge often. Dame
Martha, the housekeeper at Moultrassie, has sense, and is careful. I
will tell her the rules I have observed with little Alice, and - - "
"God forbid my girl should ever come to Moultrassie," said Major
Bridgenorth hastily; "it has been the grave of her race. The air of
the low grounds suited them not - or there is perhaps a fate connected
with the mansion. I will seek for her some other place of abode."
"That you shall not, under your favour be it spoken, Major
Bridgenorth," answered the lady. "If you do so, we must suppose that
you are undervaluing my qualities as a nurse. If she goes not to her
father's house, she shall not quit mine. I will keep the little lady
as a pledge of her safety and my own skill; and since you are afraid
of the damp of the low grounds, I hope you will come here frequently
to visit her."
This was a proposal which went to the heart of Major Bridgenorth. It
was precisely the point which he would have given worlds to arrive at,
but which he saw no chance of attaining.
It is too well known, that those whose families are long pursued by
such a fatal disease as existed in his, become, it may be said,
superstitious respecting its fatal effects, and ascribe to place,
circumstance, and individual care, much more perhaps than these can in
any case contribute to avert the fatality of constitutional distemper.
Lady Peveril was aware that this was peculiarly the impression of her
neighbour; that the depression of his spirits, the excess of his care,
the feverishness of his apprehensions, the restraint and gloom of the
solitude in which he dwelt, were really calculated to produce the evil
which most of all he dreaded. She pitied him, she felt for him, she
was grateful for former protection received at his hands - she had
become interested in the child itself. What female fails to feel such
interest in the helpless creature she has tended? And to sum the whole
up, the dame had a share of human vanity; and being a sort of Lady
Bountiful in her way (for the character was not then confined to the
old and the foolish), she was proud of the skill by which she had
averted the probable attacks of hereditary malady, so inveterate in
the family of Bridgenorth. It needed not, perhaps, in other cases,
that so many reasons should be assigned for an act of neighbourly
humanity; but civil war had so lately torn the country asunder, and
broken all the usual ties of vicinage and good neighbourhood, that it
was unusual to see them preserved among persons of different political
opinions.
Major Bridgenorth himself felt this; and while the tear of joy in his
eye showed how gladly he would accept Lady Peveril's proposal, he
could not help stating the obvious inconveniences attendant upon her
scheme, though it was in the tone of one who would gladly hear them
overruled. "Madam," he said, "your kindness makes me the happiest and
most thankful of men; but can it be consistent with your own
convenience? Sir Geoffrey has his opinions on many points, which have
differed, and probably do still differ, from mine. He is high-born,
and I of middling parentage only. He uses the Church Service, and I
the Catechism of the Assembly of Divines at Westminster - - "
"I hope you will find prescribed in neither of them," said the Lady
Peveril, "that I may not be a mother to your motherless child. I
trust, Master Bridgenorth, the joyful Restoration of his Majesty, a
work wrought by the direct hand of Providence, may be the means of
closing and healing all civil and religious dissensions among us, and
that, instead of showing the superior purity of our faith, by
persecuting those who think otherwise from ourselves on doctrinal
points, we shall endeavour to show its real Christian tendency, by
emulating each other in actions of good-will towards man, as the best
way of showing our love to God."
"Your ladyship speaks what your own kind heart dictates," answered
Bridgenorth, who had his own share of the narrow-mindedness of the
time; "and sure am I, that if all who call themselves loyalists and
Cavaliers, thought like you - and like my friend Sir Geoffrey" - (this
he added after a moment's pause, being perhaps rather complimentary
than sincere) - "we, who thought it our duty in time past to take arms
for freedom of conscience, and against arbitrary power, might now sit
down in peace and contentment. But I wot not how it may fall. You have
sharp and hot spirits amongst you; I will not say our power was always
moderately used, and revenge is sweet to the race of fallen Adam."
"Come, Master Bridgenorth," said the Lady Peveril gaily, "those evil
omenings do but point out conclusions, which, unless they were so
anticipated, are most unlikely to come to pass. You know what
Shakespeare says -
'To fly the boar before the boar pursues,
Were to incense the boar to follow us,
And make pursuit when he did mean no chase.'
"But I crave your pardon - it is so long since we have met, that I
forgot you love no play-books."
"With reverence to your ladyship," said Bridgenorth, "I were much to
blame did I need the idle words of a Warwickshire stroller, to teach
me my grateful duty to your ladyship on this occasion, which appoints
me to be directed by you in all things which my conscience will
permit."
"Since you permit me such influence, then," replied the Lady Peveril,
"I shall be moderate in exercising it, in order that I may, in my
domination at least, give you a favourable impression of the new order
of things. So, if you will be a subject of mine for one day,