Manners Volume Iii Part 6

And where meantime were Lord Osselstone and Mordaunt?--It may be recollected, that they had left London, previous to Lady Eltondale's great ball, on a tour to the continent--a journey which was not undertaken solely from motives of amus.e.m.e.nt. One of Lord Osselstone's brothers had many years previous to that period left England; and though the Earl had, by means of a mutual friend, a Mr. Austin, learned from time to time that he was still in existence, he had never succeeded in discovering his retreat; but for the last eighteen months he could learn no tidings whatever of his brother, as during that time Mr. Austin had been at the Madeiras with an invalide daughter; and as from some circ.u.mstances he was induced to think he might gain satisfactory intelligence on this subject at Vienna, he, accompanied by Augustus, proceeded thither for the purpose of procuring it.

The late Lord Osselstone had married twice. His first wife brought him two sons, namely, the present Earl, and Charles Mordaunt, father to Augustus. But his second lady, a German by birth, only one child, called Reginald, who, becoming an orphan at the age of sixteen, was left by his father to the sole guardianship of his eldest brother.

Reginald, as his mother's heir, inherited German estates of considerable value, which unfortunately deprived him of the happy necessity of applying the powers of his ardent mind to any determinate pursuit, and also made him an object of speculation to those vicious beings, that lie in wait for the unwary youth, who is sufficiently wealthy to recompense the trouble of destroying him.

Never were two brothers more sincerely attached to each other than Reginald and Lord Osselstone. The Earl cherished a twin soul in the aspiring spirit and lofty genius of his youthful charge, whilst he was himself the model and the pride of his admiring ward. Though Lord Osselstone's father had, by sage precepts and example, compressed, rather than exalted the energies of his nature, yet he was unfortunately too young to serve as a Mentor to his brother, at the critical period in which he was confided to his care. In truth, his partiality saw in him no fault; but if he had, his experience was insufficient to teach him how to control his restless spirit: and thus, though the affections of Reginald's heart were excited by the warmth of fraternal love; though his talents were improved, and the deep feelings of his soul rendered still more intense by his strengthened intellect; yet his reason, as it regarded the conduct of life, was totally uncultivated; and in place of steady, well-defined principle regulating his thoughts and actions, he was _impelled_, rather than guided by his imagination and his feelings, which taught him to cherish a mistaken species of honour, that made him more tenacious of his _fame_ than careful of his conduct. As long as he was "no man's enemy but his own," he thought himself blameless. But no accountable being should dare to wage this civil war against itself. The man who is his own _enemy_, is n.o.body's _friend_, and almost always a pest of society.

Shortly after Reginald came of age, Lord Osselstone was grieved and terrified to see him follow the steps of Charles Mordaunt, who led the impetuous youth into a vortex of dissipation. The acuteness of the Earl's feelings giving a corresponding tone to his reproofs, their asperity only served to make Reginald shun his society, and seek, with more avidity, that of his second brother; by whom he was initiated into all the agitating, destructive pleasures of the gaming table; and soon became entangled with a set of gamblers, who, in a short time, brought his finances into a state of considerable embarra.s.sment. The chief of this depraved crew was a Mr. Mortimer, who, by the attractions of a beautiful daughter, lured young men to their destruction at the gaming-table, where she, with all the fascinations of the most accomplished Syren, favoured his schemes. But her charms were more generally acknowledged than her claims to respect; and her reputation being on the decline, her father was anxious to marry her to some of his victims, in order to give her, under another name, that station in society she was on the verge of forfeiting in her own. She made an easy conquest of Reginald, who was so bewitched by her attractions, that, playing with even less than his usual skill, he lost in a few nights at the faro table a sum he feared would complete his ruin, by rendering the sale of the greater part of his maternal inheritance absolutely necessary. He therefore lent a delighted ear to Mr. Mortimer's proposal of allowing this honourable debt as a portion to his captivating daughter. Reginald, overjoyed to obtain at once the woman he pa.s.sionately loved, and the relief of his embarra.s.sments, without a _public_ exposure of his follies, sought his brother Charles, to communicate to him the gratifying intelligence. Charles Mordaunt was horror-struck on hearing it, fearing it would be impossible now to withdraw Reginald from that labyrinth, into which he had unwarily led him; and knowing full well, that, if he was once connected with Mortimer, no effort could save him from entire destruction. However, concealing his distress from his unsuspicious brother, he immediately communicated the circ.u.mstance to Lord Osselstone, making a candid confession of his own share in the transaction, and painting, in the most forcible terms, the impending danger of Reginald. The Earl, without an hour's delay, discharged Mortimer's claim, threatening him with the utmost vengeance of the law if he ever admitted either of his brothers to his house again, and, in the most peremptory manner, insisted on his writing a letter, acknowledging the payment of Reginald's debt, and stating that Miss Mortimer declined the honour of his addresses. Lord Osselstone then repaired to Reginald, when, unfolding Miss Mortimer's true character, he accompanied his a.s.sertions with such "d.a.m.ning proof,"

that her hitherto infatuated lover could not refuse to acknowledge his conviction of their truth. But now, in a paroxysm of rage, accusing the Earl of the most savage cruelty in undeceiving him, he said, his honour was engaged, there was no retreat; but he must, like a second Decius, plunge into the gulf with his eyes opened to all its horrors.

Lord Osselstone suffered him for a time to _feel_ and express all his distraction; and when he had, in idea, raised himself to a pitch of insupportable misery, he gave him the letter he had extorted from Mortimer. Reginald's joy and grat.i.tude were then as unbounded as his anguish of mind had so lately been, and he willingly acceded to Lord Osselstone's propositions. These were, first, that he should accept a commission in a regiment, then stationed in distant country quarters, by which he hoped to separate him effectually from all his worthless a.s.sociates, and break the chain of his destructive habits. Secondly, that he should resign the conduct of his affairs to Mr. Austin, a lawyer of probity and talent, and consent to receive, for some years, only a limited stipend from his extensive German estates, of whose value the Earl was better informed than their possessor; but he wished, by this means, to make Reginald feel the deprivations his follies deserved; knowing also, that the most probable method of destroying his habit of prodigality would be to limit his power of expenditure. To gratify his brother's feelings, the Earl consented to receive, by yearly instalments, the large sum he had advanced for his benefit; but, at the same time, generously resolved to restore it at a future period, when the gift would run no risk of proving a curse.

Reginald rigidly kept his promise of for ever renouncing the gaming-table, giving, in the regularity of his conduct, the best proof of his lasting grat.i.tude to his brother, and the most delightful reward that brother could receive for his almost paternal solicitude. Three years after this period, Reginald's regiment was ordered to Ireland, where he was stationed at Limerick. He admired, in turn, several of the beautiful women that place was then famous for; but finally fixed his affections on Rose O'Sullivan, the only child of the present proprietor of Ballinamoyle. This lovely girl was at that time entrusted to the care of an aunt, who resided at Limerick, her father being anxious to vary the retirement of her home, by what was to her, from the effect of comparison, a scene of extreme gaiety. Perhaps few women could have boasted of equal beauty, the effect of which was to Reginald rendered irresistible by the vivacity of her artless manners. Soon seeing her innocent partiality to himself expressed in her speaking eyes, any doubt he had before entertained of the expediency of proposing for her was set aside by this discovery.

When she returned home, he followed her to Ballinamoyle; and on the day in which she completed her seventeenth year, he received her hand, which her father gave with mingled joy and sorrow. Happily his regrets at resigning his idolized Rose were not rendered insupportable, by foreseeing that this act would for ever deprive him of his blooming child, and condemn her to an untimely grave!

At no very distant period, Reginald's regiment was ordered to the neighbourhood of London; and the tears of heartfelt grief which Rose shed on bidding adieu to her father, and the scenes of her happy childhood, were dried by her husband's fondness, and by his descriptions of the pleasures London would afford her. But in proportion as Reginald's eye became familiarized to his wife's personal graces, he deplored, with keener perception, the rusticity of those very manners, which had at first delighted him from their bearing the stamp of unsophisticated nature, and forcibly contrasting with the artful blandishments of the worthless Miss Mortimer. His pride could not brook, that fastidious elegance should find aught in his wife to ridicule or disapprove. He therefore determined for some time to seclude her from the world, till he should, by the aid of the best masters and his own a.s.siduity, cultivate her talents and polish her manners; for which purpose he purchased a beautiful cottage in the neighbourhood of London.

Though her extreme quickness of parts, stimulated by her unceasing anxiety to please Reginald, enabled Rose to make a rapid progress in the various accomplishments her masters taught her; yet she reflected with sorrow, that she "never dreamed of having her schooling renewed by her marriage." When Reginald, with ill-concealed chagrin, criticized her every word, her slightest movement, she would say to herself, whilst her beautiful eyes swam in tears, "My poor father thought all I said was right; and so did Reginald too when I was at Limerick;" whilst the reflections that kept pace with these in his mind were, "By Heavens, her brogue is incurable! I despair of ever breaking her of calling me 'Reginald dear, and darling.' Thank G.o.d, Lord Osselstone is at Athens!--She never will be presentable!"

In short, he was still more weary of instructing than she was of learning; and it would be difficult to say, whether pride or mortification predominated, when he came at last to the conclusion, that there was no reason why he should seclude himself from the world, because his wife was not sufficiently polished to be introduced to those brilliant circles of fashion, in which alone he would suffer her to move. The result of these deliberations was, his establishing himself in the most fashionable lodgings in town, leaving the young and lovely Rose to improve her mind, and "mend her manners," in almost total solitude.

One day, in Bond-street, he accidentally met an old friend of the name of Montague, who took him home to introduce him to his new married lady; who proved, to Reginald's astonishment, to be no other than the _ci-devant_ Miss Mortimer.

The fascinations of her wit, the polished elegance of her manners, again bewitched him, and he indulged without restraint, though equally without design, in the dangerous pleasure of a.s.sociating with her. He became a constant guest at Montague's table, flattering himself "there could be no impropriety in their intercourse--she was married, and so was he."

The consequence of this renewed intimacy was the revival of their former attachment. His respect for the laws of honour, his regard for his friend, and some latent compa.s.sion, if not love, for his deserted wife, kept him for a short period hovering on the borders of virtue, sometimes slightly pa.s.sing its bounds, sometimes retiring far within. But Mrs.

Montague, led on by her pa.s.sion for him, as well as an undefined mixture of good and evil in her natural disposition, revealed the plan her husband, in conjunction with her father, was following, to make him once more a victim to his former pa.s.sion for gaming; for Mr. Montague's fortune and character were alike ruined by his connection with Mortimer.

Reginald's rage knew no bounds at this discovery of his supposed friend's perfidy; and hurried on by love and revenge, he persuaded Mrs.

Montague to elope with him. Montague was equally exasperated at being made the dupe of his own arts; and by the idea, that while he had employed his wife to delude his intended victim, she had only deceived, betrayed himself. Pursuing the fugitives without delay, he unfortunately overtook Reginald. Their mutual recriminations produced a duel, in which all the usual forms were set aside, and Montague's life fell a sacrifice to his own and his antagonist's dereliction of principle. All sparks of virtue were not yet extinct in Mrs. Montague's heart;--horror-struck at hearing the dreadful catastrophe, she told Reginald their guilty connection must from that moment cease, and enjoined him to seek his safety in immediate flight. Unknowing what course best to pursue; impelled at one moment, by his distracted conscience, to deliver himself up to justice; withdrawn the next from this resolution, by the love of life and the suggestions of pride; wavering between the two, he almost mechanically returned to his lodgings in London. Here retiring to his usual sitting-room, he threw himself in a state of distraction on a sofa, eyeing from time to time, with varying intent, a pair of pistols he had laid on the table. At last, startled by a noise he heard in an inner room, he sprung up, and was in a moment locked in the arms of his fond wife, who, alarmed at his long-protracted absence, had timidly ventured hither to seek him, and had just heard of his elopement with Mrs. Montague. "I _knew_ it wasn't true!" said she, "My darling Reginald, you could never have the cruelty to break my heart by leaving me: you will come back to Richmond with me, and then I shall be happy again." "Never, never!" exclaimed he, in an agony of despair: "No happiness for me, Rose!" Then, with a look and action bordering on madness, he whispered in her ear, "I have killed Montague!"

Rose was one of those women, whose fort.i.tude and strength of mind are scarcely even suspected, till they are called forth by the hour of trial. Though these few words had sent a death blow to her heart, as soon as she recovered from their first shock, she thought of them only as demanding immediate exertion for the preservation of her husband's life. As the first step, she proceeded to remove the pistols. Reginald, roused by the attempt, desired her to desist. "You do not _dare_ to die," said she, looking at him with steadfast earnestness. "You shall be satisfied; justice shall take its course, and then you will be sufficiently revenged! Rose, begone!--this is no scene for you!--Go!"

continued he, stamping with vehement fury on the floor--"By the eternal G.o.d I _will_ be obeyed." "No," said she, calmly, "never will I part from you more, Reginald. In breaking your marriage vows, you have forfeited your right to my obedience. Even to the grave will I follow you!" She then threw herself at his feet, imploring him, by every tender name, to consult his safety without delay; represented that, in a foreign country, he might, by years of future happiness, repay her for the sufferings of the dreadful present. Overcome by his feelings, he had not power to interrupt her; and at last, in a state of stupefaction, allowed himself to be disposed of as she pleased: he was conveyed from London that night, and by the exertions of Mr. Austin was enabled to reach Hamburgh in safety, where they took up their residence. Here Rose used every exertion to soothe the anguish of her miserable husband's mind.

Neither in thought, word, or look, did she make one selfish reproach; her very prayers were breathed more for him than for herself. His love and admiration far exceeded what he had ever before felt. When he looked back to the few preceding months, he wondered how he could, for a moment, have slighted this angelic being, whose superiority to himself he now with tears acknowledged; but his tenderness came too late. She had suppressed her feelings on hearing his fatal communication, to save the object who excited them; and she now, with merciful affection, concealed all those melancholy forebodings so natural to the timid female in her anxious situation, though she felt her health rapidly declining, and antic.i.p.ated with regret her approaching doom. She sighed to think she must, in all her blooming charms, bid adieu to the world, its brilliant pleasures yet untasted. She daily besought Heaven to spare her, to sweeten the bitter cup Reginald had prepared for himself; implored that she might again bless her father's eyes, once more receive the fervent benediction of the instructor of her early years, and confess her errors to his pious ear; and dearer than all, she longed to bestow a mother's love on her babe--to welcome its first smile, to return its endearing caresses. But with the patient resignation of a saint, she submitted to her fate. When Reginald beheld with rapture the tremulous l.u.s.tre of her eye, the fatal hue that glowed on her cheek, and crimsoned her love-breathing lip, he knew not what they too plainly indicated!

Three months after they reached Hamburgh, the innocent, lovely Rose expired a few hours after giving birth to a daughter, whom almost in her last moments she presented, with smiles of anxious pity, to her unfortunate husband, saying, "Be consoled; my child will love you as I do. You are dearer to me now than ever. You have been but too indulgent;--I have lately repented of many trifling offences--forgive them when I am gone." Here exhausted, she paused for a few minutes; then once again addressed him: "Don't weep, Reginald; 'tis fitting I should die; my erring fondness would have injured this dear babe.--Comfort my poor father!" She feebly pressed his hand, and her dying accents murmured a half audible "Bless you!"

She was lovely in death! The clay-cold hand he with unutterable anguish pressed to his lips, mocked the statuary's art. The ministering angel who received her parting spirit, seemed to have shed celestial light on her countenance, whilst the bloom of earthly beauty yet lingered on her soft cheek and smiling lip. One dark lock lay on her alabaster bosom.

Alas! motionless it lay--the warm heart had ceased to beat. Gaze, wretched Reginald, on thy heart's treasure! Soon shall the grave close for ever on all her charms! The despair of his soul, as he looked on her seraphic smile, and vainly watched to see her eye once more open with love's beam, was for a time lost in insensibility. When again, conscious that she was indeed no more, his agonized feelings led his mind to the very verge of frenzy.

In his first distraction, he wrote a letter of penitence and grief to his father-in-law, deploring his heart-rending loss, but omitting to state precisely, that this infant had survived her mother; and from the ambiguous expressions of this incoherent communication, the afflicted parent concluded, that Rose and her child had perished together.

Irritated by the misery her loss occasioned him, Mr. O'Sullivan made no reply, sending only a notification by Father Dermoody, that it had been received, with a request that his feelings might not again be wounded by further correspondence with the man, whom he not unjustly accused of having shortened his daughter's days by his unworthy conduct.

Reginald had in this letter humbled himself as much as it was in his nature to do to mortal man; and indignant at the asperity of such a reply, he made no second attempt to move O'Sullivan to forgiveness. The ill success of this endeavour to soften the heart of the most benevolent of human beings discouraging him from any further efforts, either of atonement or conciliation, he adopted the resolution of withdrawing himself from the knowledge of all his connections. To his brother, Lord Osselstone, of all mankind he could least brook making any overtures, now that he was "fallen, fallen from his high estate." When he pictured to himself how he had disappointed that brother's exalted hopes and anxious cares, his pride and his better feelings alike prevented his submitting to receive either reproof from the austerity of his virtues, or that compa.s.sion from his affection, "which stabs as it forgives."

As a preparatory step to avoiding any future intercourse with his native land, he entreated his friend Mr. Austin to meet him, without delay, at Meurs, on the Belgic frontiers of Westphalia, near which his estates were situated, that by disposing of some of them, he might finally arrange his affairs, and discharge all his English debts. Mr. Austin immediately obeyed the summons, and found Reginald in a state of the utmost wretchedness, occupied with the wildest schemes for carrying his ideas into execution; proposing, with feverish restlessness, to fly for ever from civilized society, in order to join some tribe of Bedouin Arabs, Mamelucks, Tartars, or North American Indians. The counsels of this wise and judicious friend did much to bring back his erring mind, to submit to the calm dictates of reason. Mr. Austin combated, in turn, all these chimeras; opened his eyes to his duties as a father; and finally finding him unalterable as to his determination of concealment, suggested the most advisable means of carrying it into effect, which were, to avail himself of the facilities circ.u.mstances afforded for adopting the name and character of a German subject. From his mother, Reginald had learned to speak the language with the fluency of a native; and his friend now reminded him of a circ.u.mstance he had informed him of a week before his fatal elopement from London, which at that time he slighted, namely, that one of his estates, being part of an ancient feudal tenure, ent.i.tled him to the rank of Baron by its own appellation; the adopting which would not only procure him station amongst a people of all others the most tenacious on the subject of birth, but effectually conceal him, as the circ.u.mstance was yet unknown to all his English friends.

On hearing this proposition, Reginald with vehement joy, exclaimed, "Thank you, thank you, Austin; I shall know something like peace when my ears are not tortured by the detested name I now bear. Though I am outlawed because Osselstone was not in England to interfere with his powerful interest, though that d.a.m.ned Gazette has declared me for ever incapable of serving in the British armies, though it has stamped my name with indelible disgrace, yet will I cover this new appellation with fame in the field of glory."

Reginald accordingly availed himself of this expedient; and all legal forms prescribed by German jurisprudence being gone through, his daughter at the Chateau of Wildenheim was enrolled on the family records by the name of Adelaide, which was that borne by the last heiress of that house; her mother's finding too sad an echo in her father's bosom, to be heard or p.r.o.nounced by him without the most afflicting feelings. All his estates, except the Barony of Wildenheim, were sold; and the surplus, which remained after discharging his various debts, was remitted to Vienna, where he repaired with his infant daughter, on parting with Mr. Austin. Here he felt himself completely alone in the world; and his feelings being too agonizing to render a life of inaction supportable, he entered the Austrian armies. His rank, his fortune, and his talents, soon procured him a command, which he filled with honour, and redeemed the promise he had made to cover his new appellation "with fame in the field of glory." Amongst the officers placed under his orders were Maurice O'Sullivan, the uncle of his wife, and Edward Desmond; he took a melancholy pleasure in serving the former with his purse and his interest, for the sake of his beloved Rose, and the virtues of the latter made Reginald no less zealously his friend; but from both he most carefully concealed his country and his parentage.

They fought side by side at the battles of Hohenlinden, Rastadt, and other desperate engagements, that fatally signalized the disastrous campaign, which was concluded by the peace of Luneville. Reginald's remaining estate was unfortunately situated in the territory ceded by that treaty to France, and was by its new masters bestowed on a soldier of fortune. He was by this event reduced from affluence to mediocrity, and broken in fortune, health, and spirits, he proceeded to Vienna to visit his daughter, then in her sixth year. He found her as beautiful as a cherub, and the image of her mother. When she twined her arms round his neck, calling him by the endearing appellations infancy bestows, he felt that the world yet contained a being that would fondly cherish him; and remembered, with sad delight, what now seemed the prophetic words of his dying Rose, "Be consoled; my child will love you as I do."

CHAPTER XIV.

When I am forgotten, as I shall be, And sleep in dull cold marble, where no mention Of me must be heard--say then I taught thee.

oeKING HENRY THE EIGHTHoe.

During the period Reginald had served in the Austrian armies, his mind had undergone a complete revolution. His proud spirit had been subdued by misfortune. In his professional career he had learned to submit to human control. In the field of danger the daring energies of his nature had been fully excited; and, by the frequency of that very excitation, exhausted, whilst the aspect of death, in its various horrors, led him to serious meditation. Often has he pa.s.sed from the stunning tumult of the field of battle, to the awful stillness of midnight solitude in his own tent; and here he first acknowledged the justice and mercy of Heaven, whose avenging arm had awakened him from the giddy dream of presumptuous pa.s.sion, to the dreadful consciousness that he had perverted the best gifts of Providence, intended for the benefit and ornament of society, to be its bane and its disgrace. He had previously thought more of forfeited reputation than of violated virtue; and, though what he might have been rose to his mind in agonizing contrast with what he was, yet he mourned rather for the internal sentiment of degradation than of guilt. But he gradually acquired a more fitting penitence, becoming at last resigned even to the ever present sense of his former misdeeds, and submitting to it as their just punishment; at the same time forming the virtuous resolution of endeavouring to atone, if possible, for the past by the future.

Accusing himself of having deprived his child of her inestimable mother, he felt in justice bound to fulfil towards her more than the common duty of a father, and therefore resolved to give up the profession of arms for her sake, in order to devote his existence to her welfare. He would often, as he pressed the little smiling Adelaide to his heart, put forth a prayer that the virtues of the daughter might plead at the bar of offended Heaven, in mitigation of the vices of the father; and would soothe his grief with the hope of giving her that virtuous firmness of character, the want of which had rendered all the blessings of his early lot of no avail to himself. Summoning religion and reason to his aid, he wisely executed the task he had laudably undertaken, of forming his daughter to emulate the perfections of her mother; whilst of the errors he instructed her to shun, he was too fatally enlightened by his intercourse with Mrs. Montague, on the causes of whose defects he had made many deep and painful reflections. Convinced by these that imagination, which is naturally too ardent in the generality of women, is cultivated to a fatal excess by the usual mode of education, confined, as this almost exclusively is, to the study of music, painting, and poetry; he therefore, after establishing the grand principles of religion and morality in his daughter's mind, directed his attention princ.i.p.ally to forming her _judgment_; limiting her fancy to the subordinate office of _attendant_ on reason, never suffering it to usurp the place of guide. He had also observed, that vanity is still more dangerous to the female mind than even imagination. But it is only a long and steadily pursued course of exertion that can reduce this pa.s.sion, so natural to the human heart, to exercise in its native kingdom only its just power. Solicitous that no latent vanity of his own should counteract his endeavours to limit its dangerous empire in his daughter's mind, he was sparing in the use of that powerful stimulant _praise_, which, though a very happy _consequence_, is too often a dangerous motive. As Adelaide had no domestic companion, her vanity was neither excited nor mortified by comparison; and it is one of those enemies to our peace, that suffer more from neglect than defeat. Nor was the baneful pa.s.sion of envy introduced to her heart under the specious name of _emulation_, of which all ought to know it is the illegitimate sister, though the friends of emulation do not acknowledge the relationship. Her mind was endowed with knowledge, extensive enough to enable her to estimate justly the insufficiency of all human science, and to show her how far short of the _acme_ of even that imperfect wisdom her own attainments fell. Being taught never to court display, she was thereby exempted from the torments of envious mortification, and early understood she was educated, not to bring forth her acquirements like a holiday suit, in which to shine occasionally, but to keep them in constant every-day use, to promote her own happiness, and the pleasures of those with whom she a.s.sociated.

Adelaide's docility, rather than her talents, enabled her to be every thing her father desired (for she was not, in truth, more highly endowed by nature than the generality of well-organized children); and he returned her enthusiastic love and veneration, by an affection little short of idolatry. But a father's too ardent love was beginning to wither in its bloom the plant it had so successfully reared; for Adelaide, when grown up, insensibly acquired an influence dangerous to a young female to possess over the mind of any man, and which is never so unlimited as over that of a father's in the decline of life. The virtues of the parent and child were alike dangerous to the future peace and well-being of the latter. He was too reasonable to subject her to those occasional acts of injustice, or fits of caprice, which every woman in her intercourse with mankind must expect and submit to, as inseparable from her condition. She, from the most laudable motives, was unceasingly occupied in the embellishment of her mind, which, though far preferable to an equally constant attention to externals, will, by a very different route, terminate one part of their course in the same end--_selfishness_. And as woman owes every thing that is admirable in her nature to a constant sacrifice of self, no acquirements can compensate for the perfection of character she can alone derive from this source. But in truth, the very best education a man alone can bestow on a woman must be defective. He may adorn her with the virtues of his own s.e.x, but he cannot teach her the charities, the decencies, the proprieties of life, which it is the peculiar lot of hers to exercise. A female mind adorned with greater virtues only, without their connecting links, resembles a beautiful country, where the traveller pa.s.ses from one bright region to another, over deep chasms, where, perhaps, he may fall to inevitable destruction. With all the generous virtues of her heart, with all the high endowments of her mind, Adelaide had yet one more necessary lesson to learn, which was painfully taught her when she lost her father; namely that, however imperative her welfare was to his happiness, she was of small consequence to the world in general, which would go on nearly as well whether she was living or dead, happy or miserable; and that she must thenceforward derive her felicity rather from her attention to the feelings of others, than from theirs to her own.

Until Adelaide was seventeen, Baron Wildenheim resided princ.i.p.ally at Vienna: here a.s.sociating with the most distinguished characters of the day, to whom his talents and his various knowledge made him an acceptable companion; a select number were admitted to his own house, in order to promote the improvement of his daughter by such intercourse.

Profiting by the facility which his German rank afforded for the purpose, he visited, in the short intervals of peace which Gallic ambition permitted, Italy, France, and most of the other Continental states; occasional change of scene being almost as necessary for the amus.e.m.e.nt of his mind, as advantageous for the improvement of his daughter's. But though for this latter purpose it was successful beyond his hopes, yet the slow but constant progress of disease was not thus to be warded off; and a residence in a mild and equable climate being p.r.o.nounced by the physicians of Vienna absolutely necessary for the preservation of his life, about two years before Adelaide's arrival in England they removed to Sicily, where he made choice of Catania for his residence.

Here for the first time in her life Adelaide enjoyed the pleasures and advantages of female society. The Catanese are amongst the most elegant women in Europe; and the attractive graces of their manners appearing to her with all the force of novelty, she quickly and involuntarily made them her own. Her youthful beauty--her artless elegance, and her cultivation of mind, caused her to be admired to an excess, which gave her father as much pain as pleasure, as he trembled lest it should call forth that vanity and inordinate desire of pleasing, which he had so earnestly laboured to repress, too well aware of its having been the cause of Mrs. Montague's destruction.

"_La bella Adelina_" was the object, to which the young Catanian n.o.bility paid the most flattering attention, the most exaggerated compliments. Luckily for her she felt so little awe of her father, that she told him without reserve all the feelings this new scene excited in her mind. And he, appealing to her good sense, pointed out to her notice the hyperbole of the praises she received, thus rendering them in a short time more tiresome than agreeable. The Baron had early suffered his daughter to know she was handsome. She had hitherto been as much accustomed and as indifferent to the beauty of the robe in which her soul was enveloped, as she was to the habitual elegance of her every-day apparel.

He now went still further; and as piety was the main spring of all her thoughts and feelings, he taught her to be religiously thankful for a gift, which pre-disposed her fellow creatures in her favour; representing also that it ought to make her still more desirous to retain an approbation thus gratuitously bestowed. By this means her very beauty made her humble; as, in her estimate of her own character, she always attributed the praises she received but to a premature and therefore exaggerated opinion of her merit, which she consequently endeavoured to make in intrinsic worth equal to its received value.

About this period in the formation of Adelaide's character, Frederick Elton arrived at Catania. Though he was perhaps the most ardent of her admirers, his peculiar ideas regarding women in general led him rather to call forth the powers of her mind by rational conversation, than to weaken it by flattery. He was luckily not able, like his Sicilian rivals, to write sonnets, or make improviso stanzas by the hour "to her eye-brow;" and therefore had the less inducement to emulate the laudable endeavours of his compet.i.tors, to make her frivolous and silly solely to display their own abilities.

Oh! that her guardian angel would sometimes whisper in exulting beauty's ear, that man is often only enraptured with his own genius, when he seems most to adulate her charms!

Baron Wildenheim directed all his penetration to the investigation of Frederick's character; and, fearing to trust entirely to his own observation on a point of so much importance, resumed his correspondence with Mr. Austin, from whom he received the most satisfactory confirmation of the honourable opinion his judgment had previously led him to form of the lover, on whom his daughter had unconsciously bestowed her affections. He therefore resolved, that whenever Mr. Elton should demand her hand, he would restore her to all her rights, by accomplishing her introduction to her mother's family and his own. His satisfaction at the prospect of securing Adelaide's happiness, by uniting her to a man worthy of his highest approbation, reconciled him to the idea of losing the only solace of that life, which he felt would not be much longer a burthen to him. Not less generous was his daughter--and from the moment she was aware of Frederick's love, she determined to discourage it, for the reasons he related to Sedley. The Baron's indignation at Frederick's abrupt departure was as great, as the satisfaction his love for Adelaide had afforded him. She endeavoured to preserve her usual cheerfulness; but his penetration soon discovered she had feelings, that were not communicated to him. One day, on perceiving her ill suppressed agitation, as the subject of conversation glanced on Elton, he muttered, "Villain! rascal! how he has abused my confidence!"

Adelaide, hurt at this undeserved censure, entered warmly into his defence, and her father soon extorted from her, that she had refused his offers, though she still concealed, or thought she concealed, her motives and her regrets. "Adelina!" exclaimed he, with unusual asperity, "is this the reward of an existence devoted to your welfare? I could not have believed that you would have set at naught my authority; nay worse, have _deceived_ me." When she however threw herself into his arms, imploring his forgiveness, all the tenderness of his feelings returned with redoubled force; and penetrating her motives, he pressed her fondly to his heart, making a silent vow that his "too generous child should not sacrifice her happiness to his." The name of Elton was never again articulated by either; but the rapid progress of Baron Wildenheim's complaint warned him he must quickly put his design in execution, or that his lovely daughter would shortly be left in a foreign country, without relation or protector; Sicily being perhaps of all others the most dreadful to leave her in thus situated, from the depravity of its inhabitants, and its corrupt, ill administered government.

When he informed Adelaide of his intention of taking her to England, her joy was extravagant; but on perceiving the mournful expression of her father's countenance, she ceased to display her pleasure, and affectionately embracing him, said, "You know, my beloved father, you are all the world to me; my greatest delight in the prospect of going to England is, that I shall there see you in your native country, with your own friends: I can never be happier than I have been with you; but I often mourn, that all my exertions are insufficient to make you so."

"Adelina, I charge you, be silent on that subject," replied the afflicted parent; and, overcome by the torturing reflections she had unconsciously conjured up, retired to compose his mind in solitude.

A few days after this conversation they proceeded to Paris. From whence Baron Wildenheim wrote an earnest request to Mr. Austin and Maurice O'Sullivan to meet him at Dover, for which place he immediately set out when their answers reached him; and there without delay delivered to the former a will, appointing him trustee to all that remained of the wreck of his fortune, for the benefit of Adelaide, with the exception of a small annuity reserved for his own life, but nominating Maurice O'Sullivan her guardian. The unhappy father then went through the distressing task of disclosing to his former friend and fellow soldier the princ.i.p.al events, which had marked his life previous to the commencement of their acquaintance, beseeching him to relate them hereafter to Adelaide as delicately as possible, and also to introduce her to her grandfather and Lord Osselstone. Both these injunctions Maurice willingly promised to fulfil, happy to have any means of serving a man to whom he owed many obligations. The Baron had never told his daughter the history of his early years: he could not in her childhood, and when she was capable of accurately distinguishing right from wrong, he feared it might irreparably injure her character, to have her respect diminished for the person engaged in forming it. Perhaps his reluctance to be his own accuser to his child was not the least powerful motive for silence on this subject: he could not bear to think she should ever in his presence be obliged to appeal to her affection, to silence the censures her judgment must pa.s.s on his conduct--such voluntary self-abas.e.m.e.nt, in a mind of this high tone, was indeed almost more than human nature is equal to. He therefore had contented himself with informing Adelaide, that some disagreeable circ.u.mstances had made him prefer residing in the country in which his estates were situated, to that of which he was a native. He would sometimes converse with her of Lord Osselstone, whom he early taught her to love and revere; but never made the most distant allusion to her mother's name or connexions, partly because the subject was too afflicting to himself, partly because he could not in that case account for his having concealed his relationship from the uncle of Rose, with whom he had been so many years a.s.sociated, and with whom he had subsequently maintained a constant correspondence, having resolved to resign his daughter, in the first instance, to the protection of Maurice, whenever the effects of unextinguishable grief should indicate the probable termination of his own life.

When Mr. Austin met the Baron at Dover, he entreated him to leave England as speedily as possible, lest the friends of Montague, who resided in the neighbourhood of that town, should, by some fortuitous occurrence, make out his ident.i.ty; a circ.u.mstance by no means improbable, as his person must be recognised should he meet the brother of his unfortunate antagonist, who not unfrequently visited the very hotel they inhabited, and which they could not quit without exciting observations that might prove dangerous in their consequences. Though Wildenheim cared not for life on his own account, and would willingly have resigned it to satisfy the laws of his country; yet he trembled in every nerve for his daughter's peace, should he fall a sacrifice to their justice; and therefore fixed the third day after their landing to bid her an eternal adieu!

Though he had sufficient strength of mind to resolve on tearing himself from his child, yet he felt totally unequal to the trial of witnessing her affliction on first hearing the dreadful intelligence. Mr. Austin therefore undertook the task; and on the morning preceding the day appointed, informed Adelaide of the indispensable necessity of their separation, and of the arrangement made with Maurice O'Sullivan, to introduce her to Lord Osselstone, presenting her with a packet of letters her father had written for her benefit, which she was to make use of when she came of age, in case any unforeseen occurrence should prevent her appointed guardian fulfilling his promise; adding, that should her relations refuse to receive her, he was in possession of the necessary testimonials of her birth. Of all these particulars the afflicted girl at the moment only understood she was to be deprived of her father! The thinking faculty within her was almost suspended by the agony of this idea. She offered no remonstrance to Mr. Austin; and making a sign of acquiescence, instantly sought her father, to try those powers of persuasion which never yet had failed in procuring from him every wish of her heart: but on seeing the despair of his countenance, she was wholly overcome; the hope, which had supported, now forsook her, and she sunk senseless in his arms.

When she revived, she implored his pity in the most moving terms; asked how she had merited this dreadful separation; and finding him, though deeply affected, inexorable in his determination, at last departed from her usual docility, saying, "Of what would promote your happiness, my dearest father, there can be no doubt; I am the best judge of my own and _will_ not leave you: to lose you in the course of nature would be sufficiently dreadful; but this living death is tenfold more horrible: oh! can you desert your child, who lives but in you, whose only joy is in your approving smiles?"

Her miserable auditor now did violence to his feelings, by a.s.suming, for the first time in his life, all the sternness of parental command.

Adelaide convulsively sobbed on his shoulder. "Pardon me, pardon me; I submit, though my heart will break: that angry look would kill me to think of; smile on me, my father." "Smile! oh, my G.o.d! I shall never smile again;" exclaimed the wretched parent: then fondly caressing her, said, "My child, have mercy on your unfortunate father; my own feelings are those of desperation; spare me the sight of yours. By your present affliction I secure your future happiness; but mine--Adelina, I entreat--in a few hours we part: do not speak of what is yet to come."

He was obeyed; and that day pa.s.sed in the sullen calm which precedes expected misery.