University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.
SUPPER AND PHILOSOPHY.

If, dear reader, you have been one of those luckless earthlings
to whom an indulgent providence has never permitted the enjoyment
of the hospitalities of a Southern plantation, the proprietors
of which have been trained to good performances, by long practice,
under generous tuition, derived from the habits, customs,
manners, tastes and wealth of long time ago,—I can only pity
your ignorance, for, it is not possible, in the brief space allotted to
me in this narrative, to undertake to cure it. You must gather
up from incidental suggestions and remarks, as I proceed, what
faint notion I may thus afford you, of the thousand nameless
peculiarities which so gratefully distinguish social life in the regions
through which we ramble together. It is not pretended,
mark me, that in this respect we have undergone no changes.
Far from it. The last thirty years have done much to render traditional,
in many quarters, those graces of hospitality which constituted
the great charm of our old plantations; and, in particular,
to lose for us the solid advantages of an English training and
education, as it was taught eighty years ago to our planters in Europe,
without giving to their descendants any corresponding equivalent
for it. Still there are tokens and trophies of the past,
making dear and holy certain ancient homesteads—an atmosphere
of the venerably sweet in the antique, the spells of which
have not entirely passed away. But these tokens no longer exhibit
the usual vitality, though they retain the familiar form. Their
traces may be likened to the withered rose leaves in your old cabinet,
that still faintly appeal to the senses, but rather recall what
they cannot restore, and pain you by the contrasts they force upon
you, rather than compensate you by their still lingering sweetness.

It was the pride and passion of Major Bulmer,—who was fully conscious
of the changes going on in the country,—that “Bulmer
Barony” should be the last to surrender those social virtues which
constituted the rare excellence of our old plantation life in the
South.

His home was a venerable brick mansion, after the old English
fashion in most respects,—a great square fabric, with wings. The
passage-way or hall was spacious, and the massive stair-flight that
ascended from it, was of mahogany of the most solid fabric. No
miserable veneering was the broad plate, and the elaborate moulding.
This great house was always kept in thorough repair;—
not looking fresh and shiny, with paint and plaster, and green
blinds,—but kept whole,—no decay suffered,—no sign of decay,
even though the ivy was suffered to creep and clamber, greeming
the whole north wall, leaving but narrow space for the windows
even, and stretching round and hanging over the corners of the
house on the east and west. Not a service or a servant was lessened,
or cut off from the establishment as it was known in the
days of his grandfather. The butler, the porter, the waiters, the
out-riders, the post-boy,—all were the same. He still drove his
coach and four, though he permitted himself a buggy with four
seats and driven by a pair, occasionally giving it a curse, not because
it did not exactly please him, but because it was an innovation.
Breakfast, dinner, lunch, supper—all after the old fashion—
recurred ever at the same period. The cook had been so regulated
that she herself had become a first rate time-piece. It was
surprising how admirably her time corresponded with that of the
hall clock, which was always kept in proper order. Then, there
could be no possible change in the character of the dishes. These
were rigidly old English,—nay, almost Saxon in their solidity.
“None of your French kickshows for me,” quoth the Major, when
his son spoke of pâté de foiè gras. What! eat the liver complaint!
and that of a goose too. May I swallow my own liver

first. No! Ned! none of that nonsense, boy. It is quite enough
to sicken me to see you with that d—d swallow-tailed republican
French coat, which you properly call a Lamartine.”

“Why, father, it is a mere elaboration of an English shooting
jacket.”

“Nonsense! You are speaking of the modern English, who are
nothing but continental apes and asses. The real old English,
before they became corrupted with their paltry affectations, would
have scorned such a popinjay fashion. At all events, if you will
wear such a monstrosity, and disfigure an otherwise good person,
you are at liberty to do so, but by — no French diseases shall
be employed as a substitute for wholesome human food, at the
Barony, while I am the master of it.”

Accordingly, the supper table of Major Bulmer exhibited no imported
meats, unless we include in this category a delicious Buffalo
tongue, of which I devoured more than a reasonable man's proportion.
Some excellent stuffed beef, part of a round from dinner,
a ham into which the first incisions were that day made, some
cold mutton, which I contend to be a specially good thing in
spite of Goldsmith's sneering reference, (in Retaliation,) and a
variety besides, made the table literally to groan under its burden;
and the reader will suppose a corresponding variety of bread
stuffs and cakes, jellies and other matters. Ask Major Bulmer, on
the subject, and he would readily admit the doubtful taste of such
arrangement and display. “But,” says he, “it is the old custom.
I inherited it—it is sacred as the practice of my ancestors,—and in
these days of democracy, which threaten to turn the world upside
down, in which old things are to become new, I do not feel myself
at liberty to question the propriety of the few antique fashions
which I am permitted to retain. I prefer to incur the reproach of
a deficient taste to that of a failing veneration.”

We did ample justice to the provisions—our appetite suffering
no censure from taste in respect to the arrangements of the table.

After supper we adjourned to the library,—Major Bulmer improving,
by the way, upon his grandfather, having contrived to
make a handsome collection of some three thousand volumes, all
in solid English bindings (done in New-York) and in massive
cases, manufactured out of our native forest growth. These, I am
happy to say, issued from the workshops of Charleston. Here,
with floor finely carpeted, books around us for every temper, a
rousing fire of oak and hickory in the ample fireplace, and each of
us disposed in great rocking chairs, we meditated through the
media of the best Rio Hondos—the Major excepted—who preferred
to send up the smokes of Indian sacrifice, from a native clay
pipe, which he had bought thirty years before from a Catawba.

“Life!” quoth the Major,—“Life!”—that was all. The smoke
did the rest, and each of us instinctively thought of vapour.

“Yes, life is not such a bad thing!” continued the Major.
“Nay! give a man enough to go upon, and life is rather a good
thing in its way. Indeed, I am not sure but I would rather live
than not. Somehow, I get on very well. I make good crops,
and I have a good appetite. I can back a horse against a regiment,
and I have a taste for Madeira. Yet I have had troubles,
and cares, and anxieties. That son, Dick, is one of my anxieties.
I want to see the fellow married.”

“I suspect,” said I, “that he would like to see himself married.”

“No, indeed!” quoth the Major quickly. “Why, the d—l,
should he wish to be married! What will marriage do for such a
fellow. He is quite too young, yet, to understand its importance.
He is too unsettled! He must sow his wild oats first.”

“He wants to settle;—and, as for sowing his wild oats, Major,
I see no reason why he should not sow them in his own grounds.”

“Every chap, now-a-days,” responded the Major, “before he
fairly chips the shell, wants to settle himself as his own master.
Ned has the same foolish hankerings. He talks of buying and
planting. Why not plant with me?”

“But you, sir, did not plant with your own father. You set
up for yourself, if I remember rightly, before you came of age;”
said Ned, with a chuckle, thinking he had caught the old man
between the ribs.

“So I did,” said he, “and lost by it. I lost, God knows how,
eleven thousand dollars in three years.”

“That was because you were so extravagant,” quoth Ned irreverently.
“Were you to follow my example now.”

“Get out, you young rascal! Follow your example! You
are looking at that place of old Gendron: but you could never
make anything there. It was worn out forty years ago.”

“I don't think it was ever worn at all,” answered Ned—“I
doubt if it was ever ploughed fairly in its life. The surface was
only scratched in those days. The good soil yet lies below, and
can bring first rate cotton under good cultivation.”

“And who made you a planter? What sort of cultivation
would you give it, do you think? Do you suppose I would trust
you with a crop of mine? Don't I know what will come of your
setting up for yourself? In six months you'll be coming to me
for money. In a year I shall have to step forward and assume
your responsibilities to the tune of two or three thousand dollars,
as I did only a year ago.”

“Well, father, you'll do it?”

“Will I, then? Perhaps—for I'm too indulgent to you by a
long shot, and have been ever since I broke your head with that
hickory—”

“Certainly, a decided proof of your indulgence!” cried Ned,
with a laugh.

“So it was, for you deserved to have not only your head but
every bone in your body broken; but when, in my passion I
knocked you down and your blood flooded my best carpet, I
thought I had killed you,—as if it were possible to kill such a fellow
by any hurt done to the head—and since then a proper consideration

of my own weight of arm and anger, have made me forbear
utterly, until now drubbing would do you no service. You
are ruined, I am afraid, for any future use.”

“A wife will cure him, Major;” said I.

“And perhaps punish him more effectually than anything I
can do; and I shouldn't object provided he could get the right
one. But there, again, he is not disposed to do as I want him.
He has a hankering after that pretty little Frenchified huzzy,
Paula Bonneau, and thinks I don't see—and don't suspect. Answer
honestly now, Ned Bulmer, is it not true what I say?”

“I own the soft impeachment, sir;” was the quiet response
of Ned, lighting a fresh cigar, and reversing the position of his
crossed legs.

“You own—and what a d—d mincing phrase is that. Do
you suppose it proper because it is taken from Shakspeare. You
own it! Well, sir, and why do you suffer yourself to hanker after
such a woman as that? Not a woman in fact—a mere child—a
doll—a pretty plaything—more like a breast pin than a woman—
a very pretty cut Italian cameo, sir; but not fit for a wife. What
sort of children, sir, do you suppose such a woman can bring you?
Such as will do credit to the name of your family—to the State—
able to wield a broad-sword—able to command respect and preside
with state and dignity in a parlour, or at a dinner table! Besides,
Ned, she's French, and we are English, and for a hundred
years there has been an antipathy between our two families!”

“High time to heal it, father;” said Ned, flushed and firing up.
“Don't speak unkindly, sir, of Paula Bonneau. You know, sir, it
is wrong—you wrong her as a lady, young, innocent, intelligent,
of good family, and very beautiful. You wrong yourself as a gentleman,
boastful of family, so to speak;—and you know it—and feel
it, sir. If Paula is petite, as I allow, she is not the less worthy to
be the wife of any man, nor will she fail to command respect any
where. There's no lady in the parish of better manners, more

dignified and amiable, polished and unaffected. As for these old
family antipathies and grudges, I do think, sir, that it's a disgrace
to common sense that you should entertain them. What if
she has French blood in her veins? So have half the English,
and the best half too. Your Normans who conquered England
infused into it all the vitality that made the race great. All that
their descendants have of the noble and the conquering came
from the Norman side of the house. The Saxon was a sullen boor,
whose sole virtue was his dogged bull-dog tenacity. But the
chivalry, the enterprise, the lofty adventure, and the superior
tastes, were borrowed from the Normans. Your own family, sir
was originally Norman, and you yourself, had you lived three hundred
years ago, might have been proud of your French tongue at
an English court. The fact is, sir, you too much underrate our
family, its antiquity no less than its character, in dating only from
the prejudices of your great-great-grandsire in America. It was
in his ignorance of his own origin that he imbibed those prejudices,
and from his personal rivalries with old Philip Bonneau. It
happened unfortunately that his son had a French rival in Paul
Bonneau, the son of Philip; and his son again, in your father
found an antagonist in the younger Philip. But you, sir, have no
such rival, and why you should, discrediting all gallantry, make a
woman, a girl, the object of your antipathy, simply to perpetuate
the silly personal prejudices of your ancestors, neither justice, nor
generosity, nor common sense, can well see! I protest, sir, it is
positively a reproach to your manhood that you should thus religiously
maintain an antipathy, when its object is a sweet, young,
artless, and unoffending woman!”

The Major was taken all aback.

“Take breath, Ned, take breath,—or let me breathe a little.
Well, sir, have you done?”

“Done!”

“By the powers, Dick Cooper, did you ever hear a father so
be-rated by a son!”

“Really, sir, he proves his legitimacy by the close resemblance
of his style to your own.”

“Good!—and now Master Edward Bulmer do you suppose that
I would not gladly welcome any man-antagonist of the Bonneau
family?”

“Nobody suspects you of fear, sir; but courage in the encounter
with an armed man, and an equal, is not the sole proof of
manliness. The courage, sir, which is just and magnanimous,
and which shrinks from the idea of wrong-doing, as from death
and shame, is the best proof that one can give of a true nobility.
How, sir, with your general sense of what is right—with your
pride and sense of honour,—can you reconcile it to yourself to
speak sneeringly and scornfully of such a pure, sweet, gentle creature
as Paula Bonneau—one who has never wronged you—one,
too, whom you know to be the object of the most earnest attachment
of your son.”

The Major was disquieted. Ned had caught him tripping. He
knocked the ashes out of his pipe—put fresh tobacco in—knocked
that out also—then stuck the empty pipe into his mouth, and began
drawing and puffing vigorously. Ned, meanwhile, had risen,
and was taking long strides across the floor. The old man, at
length, recovered his tone. He felt the home truths which he had
heard, and was manly enough to acknowledge them. He sprang
to his feet, with the elasticity of a boy of eighteen.

“Ned's right,” said he to me, “after all. He's rough, but he's
right. Ned, my son, forgive me. I have wounded you more
sorely than I meant.”

His arms were extended, and the son rushed into them. For a
moment the Major clasped him closely to his bosom. He was
proud of his boy—his only—he knew his real nobleness of character,

and he felt how much he had outraged it. I felt my eyes
suffused at the picture.

“You are right, Ned; but do me not the injustice to suppose
that I meant any wrong to Paula Bonneau. She is a good girl, I
verily believe, and a pretty one, I am willing to admit—but, Ned,
for all that, look you,—you shall never marry her with my consent.
There—enough! Good night, boys.”

Thus saying, the Major hurried off, evidently anxious to avoid
any more words.

“Something gained,” said I.

“You think so?”

“Decidedly.”

“Yet, you heard his last words?”

“It doesn't matter! With a magnanimous nature, the conviction
that it has wantonly done a wrong to another, and the desire
to repair it, lead always one or more steps beyond. I should not
be surprised if Paula Bonneau grows into favour after a while.”

“Heaven grant it; but you are tired. Let us to bed.”