Nature and Art Part 3

While young Henry was walking up the stairs, the dean's wife was weighing in her mind in what manner it would most redound to her honour to receive him; for her vanity taught her to believe that the whole inquisitive world pried into her conduct, even upon every family occurrence.

Young William was wondering to himself what kind of an unpolished monster his beggarly cousin would appear; and was contemplating how much the poor youth would be surprised, and awed by his superiority.

The dean felt no other sensation than an impatient desire of beholding the child.

The door opened--and the son of his brother Henry, of his benefactor, entered.

The habit he had on when he left his father, having been of slight texture, was worn out by the length of the voyage, and he was in the dress of a sailor-boy. Though about the same age with his cousin, he was something taller: and though a strong family resemblance appeared between the two youths, he was handsomer than William; and from a simplicity spread over his countenance, a quick impatience in his eye--which denoted anxious curiosity, and childish surprise at every new object which presented itself--he appeared younger than his well-informed and well- bred cousin.

He walked into the room, not with a dictated obeisance, but with a hurrying step, a half pleased, yet a half frightened look, an instantaneous survey of every person present; not as demanding "what they thought of him," but expressing almost as plainly as in direct words, "what he thought of them." For all alarm in respect to his safety and reception seemed now wholly forgotten, in the curiosity which the sudden sight of strangers such as he had never seen in his life before, excited: and as to _himself_, he did not appear to know there was such a person existing: his whole faculties were absorbed in _others_.

The dean's reception of him did honour to his sensibility and his grat.i.tude to his brother. After the first affectionate gaze, he ran to him, took him in his arms, sat down, drew him to him, held him between his knees, and repeatedly exclaimed, "I will repay to you all I owe to your father."

The boy, in return, hugged the dean round the neck, kissed him, and exclaimed,

"Oh! you _are_ my father--you have just such eyes, and such a forehead--indeed you would be almost the same as he, if it were not for that great white thing which grows upon your head!"

Let the reader understand, that the dean, fondly attached to every ornament of his dignified function, was never seen (unless caught in bed) without an enormous wig. With this young Henry was enormously struck; having never seen so unbecoming a decoration, either in the savage island from whence he came, or on board the vessel in which he sailed.

"Do you imagine," cried his uncle, laying his hand gently on the reverend habiliment, "that this grows?"

"What is on _my_ head grows," said young Henry, "and so does that which is upon my father's."

"But now you are come to Europe, Henry, you will see many persons with such things as these, which they put on and take off."

"Why do you wear such things?"

"As a distinction between us and inferior people: they are worn to give an importance to the wearer."

"That's just as the savages do; they hang bra.s.s nails, wire, b.u.t.tons, and entrails of beasts all over them, to give them importance."

The dean now led his nephew to Lady Clementina, and told him, "She was his aunt, to whom he must behave with the utmost respect."

"I will, I will," he replied, "for she, I see, is a person of importance too; she has, very nearly, such a white thing upon her head as you have!"

His aunt had not yet fixed in what manner it would be advisable to behave; whether with intimidating grandeur, or with amiable tenderness.

While she was hesitating between both, she felt a kind of jealous apprehension that her son was not so engaging either in his person or address as his cousin; and therefore she said,

"I hope, Dean, the arrival of this child will give you a still higher sense of the happiness we enjoy in our own. What an instructive contrast between the manners of the one and of the other!"

"It is not the child's fault," returned the dean, "that he is not so elegant in his manners as his cousin. Had William been bred in the same place, he would have been as unpolished as this boy."

"I beg your pardon, sir," said young William with a formal bow and a sarcastic smile, "I a.s.sure you several of my tutors have told me, that I appear to know many things as it were by instinct."

Young Henry fixed his eyes upon his cousin, while, with steady self-complacency, he delivered this speech, and no sooner was it concluded than Henry cried out in a kind of wonder,

"A little man! as I am alive, a little man! I did not know there were such little men in this country! I never saw one in my life before!"

"This is a boy," said the dean; "a boy not older than yourself."

He put their hands together, and William gravely shook hands with his cousin.

"It _is_ a man," continued young Henry; then stroked his cousin's chin.

"No, no, I do not know whether it is or not."

"I tell you again," said the dean, "he is a boy of your own age; you and he are cousins, for I am his father."

"How can that be?" said young Henry. "He called you _Sir_."

"In this country," said the dean, "polite children do not call their parents _father_ and _mother_."

"Then don't they sometimes forget to love them as such?" asked Henry.

His uncle became now impatient to interrogate him in every particular concerning his father's state. Lady Clementina felt equal impatience to know where the father was, whether he were coming to live with them, wanted anything of them, and every circ.u.mstance in which her vanity was interested. Explanations followed all these questions; but which, exactly agreeing with what the elder Henry's letter has related, require no recital here.

CHAPTER XII.

That vanity which presided over every thought and deed of Lady Clementina was the protector of young Henry within her house. It represented to her how amiable her conduct would appear in the eye of the world should she condescend to treat this dest.i.tute nephew as her own son; what envy such heroic virtue would excite in the hearts of her particular friends, and what grief in the bosoms of all those who did not like her.

The dean was a man of no inconsiderable penetration. He understood the thoughts which, upon this occasion, pa.s.sed in the mind of his wife, and in order to ensure her kind treatment of the boy, instead of reproaching her for the cold manner in which she had at first received him, he praised her tender and sympathetic heart for having shown him so much kindness, and thus stimulated her vanity to be praised still more.

William, the mother's own son, far from apprehending a rival in this savage boy, was convinced of his own pre-eminence, and felt an affection for him--though rather as a foil than as a cousin. He sported with his ignorance upon all occasions, and even lay in wait for circ.u.mstances that might expose it; while young Henry, strongly impressed with everything which appeared new to him, expressed, without reserve, the sensations which those novelties excited, wholly careless of the construction put on his observations.

He never appeared either offended or abashed when laughed at; but still pursued his questions, and still discovered his wonder at many replies made to him, though "simpleton," "poor silly boy," and "idiot," were vociferated around him from his cousin, his aunt, and their constant visitor the bishop.

His uncle would frequently undertake to instruct him; so indeed would the bishop; but Lady Clementina, her son, and the greatest part of her companions, found something so irresistibly ridiculous in his remarks, that nothing but immoderate laughter followed; they thought such folly had even merit in the way of entertainment, and they wished him no wiser.

Having been told that every morning, on first seeing his uncle, he was to make a respectful bow; and coming into the dean's dressing-room just as he was out of bed, his wig lying on the table, Henry appeared at a loss which of the two he should bow to. At last he gave the preference to his uncle, but afterwards bowed reverently to the wig. In this he did what he conceived was proper, from the introduction which the dean, on his first arrival, had given him to this venerable stranger; for, in reality, Henry had a contempt for all finery, and had called even his aunt's jewels, when they were first shown to him, "trumpery," asking "what they were good for?" But being corrected in this disrespect, and informed of their high value, he, like a good convert, gave up his reason to his faith; and becoming, like all converts, over-zealous, he now believed there was great worth in all gaudy appearances, and even respected the earrings of Lady Clementina almost as much as he respected herself.

CHAPTER XIII.

It was to be lamented that when young Henry had been several months in England, had been taught to read, and had, of course, in the society in which he lived, seen much of the enlightened world, yet the natural expectation of his improvement was by no means answered.

Notwithstanding the sensibility, which upon various occasions he manifested in the most captivating degree, notwithstanding the seeming gentleness of his nature upon all occasions, there now appeared, in most of his inquiries and remarks, a something which demonstrated either a stupid or troublesome disposition; either dulness of conception, or an obstinacy of perseverance in comments and in arguments which were glaringly false.

Observing his uncle one day offended with his coachman, and hearing him say to him in a very angry tone,

"You shall never drive me again"--

The moment the man quitted the room, Henry (with his eyes fixed in the deepest contemplation) repeated five or six times, in a half whisper to himself,