University of Virginia Library

3. CHAPTER III.

The day fixed for one of the stated visits
of Mr. Benfield had now arrived, and John,
with Emily, who was the old bachelor's favourite
niece, went in the baronet's post
chaise to the town of F—, a distance of
twenty miles, to meet him, and convey him
the remainder of his journey to the Hall, it
being a settled rule with the old man, that his
carriage horses should return to their own
stables every night, where he conceited they
could alone find that comfort and care, their
age and services gave them a claim to. The
day was uncommonly pleasant, and the young
people in high spirits, with the expectation
of meeting their respected relative, whose
absence had been prolonged a few days by a
severe fit of the gout.

“Now, Emily,” cried John, as he fixed
himself comfortably by the side of his sister
in the chaise, “let me know honestly, how
you like the Jarvis's and the handsome colonel.”

“Then, John, honestly, I neither like nor
dislike the Jarvis's or the handsome colonel,
if you must know.”

“Well, then, there is no great diversity in
our sentiments, as Jane would say.”

“John!”

“Emily!”

“I do not like to hear you speak so disrespectfully
of our sister, and one I am sure
you love as tenderly as myself.”

“I acknowledge my error,” said the brother,
taking her hand affectionately, “and
will endeavour to offend no more; but this
Colonel Egerton, sister, he is certainly a gentleman,
both by blood and in manners, as
Jane”—Emily interrupted him with a laugh
at his forgetfulness, which John took very
good-naturedly, as he repeated his observation
without alluding to their sister.

“Yes,” said Emily, “he is genteel in his
deportment, if that be what you mean; I
know nothing of his family.”

“Oh, I have taken a peep into Jane's Baronetage,
and I find him set down there as Sir
Edgar's heir.”

“There is something about him,” said
Emily, musing, “that I do not much admire;
he is too easy—there is no nature; I always
feel afraid such people will laugh at me as
soon as my back is turned, and for those very
things they seem most to admire to my face.
If I might be allowed to judge, I should say
his manner wants one thing, without which
no one can be truly agreeable.”

“What's that?”

“Sincerity.”

“Ah! that's my great recommendation,”
cried John, with a laugh; “but I am afraid I
shall have to take the poacher up, with his
quails and his pheasants indeed.”

“You know the colonel explained that to
be a mistake.”

“What they call explaining away; but unluckily
I saw the gentleman returning with
his gun on his shoulder, and followed by a
brace of pointers.”

“There's a specimen of the colonel's manners
then,” said Emily, with a smile; “it will
do until the truth be known.”

“And Jane,” cried her brother, “when
she saw him also, praised his good nature
and consideration, in what she was pleased to
call, relieving the awkwardness of my remark.”

Emily finding her brother disposed to dwell
on the foibles of Jane, a thing at times he
was rather addicted to, was silent; and they
rode some distance before John, who was
ever as ready to atone as he was to offend,
again apologised, again promised reformation,
and during the remainder of the ride,
only forgot himself twice more in the same
way.

They reached F—two hours before the
lumbering coach of their uncle drove into the
yard of the inn, and had sufficient time to
refresh their own horses for the journey
homeward.

Mr. Benfield was a bachelor of eighty, but
retained the personal activity of a man of
sixty. He was strongly attached to all the
fashions and opinions of his youth, during
which he had sat one term in parliament, and

had been a great beau and courtier in the
commencement of the reign. A disappointment
in an affair of the heart, had driven him
into retirement, and for the last fifty years,
he had dwelt exclusively at a seat he owned
within forty miles of Moseley Hall, the mistress
of which was the only child of his only
brother. In his figure, he was tall and spare,
very erect for his years, and he faithfully
preserved in his attire, servants, carriages,
and indeed every thing around him, as much
of the fashions of his youth, as circumstances
would admit of: such then was a
faint outline of the character and appearance
of the old man, who, dressed in a cocked
hat, bag wig and sword, took the offered arm
of John Moseley to alight from his coach.

“So,” cried the old gentleman, having
made good his footing on the ground, as he
stopped short and stared John in the face,
“you have made out to come twenty miles
to meet an old cynic, have you, sir; but I
thought I bid you bring Emmy with you.”

John pointed to the window, where his
sister stood anxiously watching her uncle's
movements. On catching her eye, he smiled
kindly, as he pursued his way into the house,
talking to himself.

“Ay, there she is indeed; I remember
now, when I was a youngster, of going with
my kinsman, old Lord Gosford, to meet his
sister, the Lady Juliana, when she first came
from school, (this was the lady whose infidelity

had driven him from the world;) and a
beauty she was indeed, something like Emmy
there, only she was taller, and her eyes were
black, and her hair too, that was black, and
she was not so fair as Emmy, and she was
fatter, and she stooped a little—very little;
oh! they are wonderfully alike though; don't
you think they were, nephew?” as he stopped
at the door of the room; while John, who in
this description could not see a resemblance,
which existed no where but in the old man's
affections, was fain to say, “yes; but they
were related, you know, uncle, and that explains
the likeness.”

“True boy, true,” said his uncle, pleased
at a reason for a thing he wished, and which
flattered his propensities; for he had once before
told Emily she put him in mind of his
housekeeper, a woman as old as himself, and
without a tooth in her head.

On meeting his niece, Mr. Benfield, (who,
like many others that feel strongly, wore in
common the affectation of indifference and displeasure,)
yielded to his fondness, and folding
her in his arms, kissed her affectionately as a
tear glistened in his eye; and then pushing her
gently from him, he exclaimed, “come, come,
Emmy, don't strangle me, don't strangle me,
girl; let me live in peace the little while I
have to remain here—so,” seating himself
composedly in an arm chair his niece had
placed for him with a cushion, “so, Anne
writes me, Sir William Harris has let the

deanery.” “O yes, uncle,” cried John. “I'll
thank you, young gentleman,” said Mr. Benfield
sternly, “not to interrupt me when I
am speaking to a lady; that is, if you please,
sir: then Sir William has let the deanery to
a London merchant, a Mr. Jarvis; now, I
knew three people of that name—one was a
hackney coachman when I was a member of
the parliament of this realm, and drove me
often to the house; the other was valet-de-chambre
to my Lord Gosford; and the third,
I take it, is the very man who has become
your neighbour. If it be the person I mean,
Emmy dear, he is like—like—ay, very like
old Peter, my steward.” John, unable to contain
his mirth at this discovery of a likeness
between the prototype of Mr. Benfield himself
in leanness of figure, and the jolly rotundity
of the merchant, was obliged to leave
the room; while Emily, smiling at the comparison,
said, “you will meet him to-morrow,
dear uncle, and then you will be able to
judge for yourself.”

“Yes, yes,” muttered the old man to himself,
“very like old Peter; as like as two
peas;” and the parallel was by no means as
ridiculous as might be supposed.

Mr. Benfield had placed twenty thousand
pounds in the hands of a broker, with positive
orders for him to pay it away immediately
for government stock, bought by the
former on his account; but disregarding this
injunction, the broker had managed the transaction

in such a way, as to postpone the
payment, until, on his failure, he had given up
that and a much larger sum to Mr. Jarvis, to
satisfy what he called an honorary debt, a
short time before his stoppage. It was in
elucidating the transaction Mr. Jarvis had
paid Benfield Lodge a visit, and restored the
bachelor his property. This act, and the
high opinion he entertained of Mrs. Wilson,
with his unbounded love for Emily, were the
few things which prevented his believing some
dreadful judgment was about to visit this
world, for its increasing wickedness and follies.

The horses being ready, the old bachelor
was placed carefully between his nephew
and niece, and in that manner they rode on
quietly to the Hall, the dread of accident
keeping Mr. Benfield silent the most of the
way. On passing, however, a stately castle,
about ten miles from the termination of their
ride, he began one of his speeches with,
“Emmy dear, does my Lord Bolton
come often to see you?” “Very seldom, sir;
his employment keeps him much of his time
at St. James's, and then he has an estate in
Ireland.” “I knew his father well—he was
distantly connected by marriage with my
friend Lord Gosford; you could not remember
him, I expect:” (John rolled his eyes at
this suggestion of his sister's recollection of
a man who had been forty years dead, as his
uncle continued;) “he always voted with me

in the parliament of this realm; he was a
thorough honest man; very much such a
man to look at, as Peter Johnson, my steward:
but I am told his son likes the good
things of the ministry—well, well—William
Pitt was the only minister to my mind.
There was the Scotchman they made a Marquis
of, I never could endure him—always
voted against him”—“right or wrong, uncle,”
cried John, who loved a little mischief in his
heart.

“No, sir—right, but never wrong. Lord
Gosford always voted against him too; and
do you think, jackanapes, that my friend the
Earl of Gosford and—and—myself were
ever wrong? No, sir, men in my day were
different creatures from what they are now:
we were never wrong, sir; we loved our
country, and had no motive for being in the
wrong.”

“How was it with Lord Bute, uncle?”

“Lord Bute, sir,” cried the old man with
great warmth, “was the minister, sir—he was
the minister; ay, he was the minister, sir,
and was paid for what he did.”

“But Lord Chatham, was he not the minister
too?”

Now, nothing vexed the old gentleman
more, than to hear William Pitt called by his
tardy honours; and yet, unwilling to give up
what he thought his political opinions, he
exclaimed, with an unanswerable positiveness
of argument, “Billy Pitt, sir, was the minister,

sir; but—but—but—he was our minister,
sir.”

Emily, unable to see her uncle agitated by
such useless disputes, threw a reproachful
glance on her brother, as she observed timidly,
“that was a glorious administration, sir,
I believe.”

“Glorious indeed! Emmy dear,” said the
bachelor, softening with the sound of her
voice and the recollections of his younger
days, “we beat the French every where—in
America—in Germany;—we took—(counting
on his fingers)—we took Quebec—yes, Lord
Gosford lost a cousin there; and we took
all the Canadas; and we took their fleets:
there was a young man killed in the battle
between Hawke and Conflans, who was
much attached to Lady Juliana—poor soul!
how she regretted him when dead, though
she never could abide him when living—ah!
she was a tender-hearted creature!” For Mr.
Benfield, like many others, continued to
love imaginary qualities in his mistress, long
after her heartless coquetry had disgusted
him with her person: a kind of feeling which
springs from self-love, that finds it necessary
to seek consolation in creating beauties, that
may justify our follies to ourselves; and which
often keeps alive the semblance of the passion,
when even hope or real admiration is
extinct.

On reaching the Hall, every one was rejoiced
to see their really affectionate and

worthy relative, and the evening passed in
the tranquil enjoyment of the blessings which
Providence had profusely scattered around
the family of the baronet, but which are too
often hazarded by a neglect of duty, that
springs from too great security, or an indolence
which renders us averse to the precaution
necessary to insure their continuance.