Chapter 19

Ethel's mother was constantly falling in love with new acquaintances; so these raptures were no novelty to her daughter. Ethel had had so many governesses, all darlings during the first week, and monsters afterwards, that the poor child possessed none of the accomplishments of her age. She could not play on the piano; she could not speak French well; she could not tell you when gunpowder was invented; she had not the faintest idea of the date of the Norman Conquest, or whether the earth went round the sun, or vice versa. She did not know the number of counties in England, Scotland and Wales, let alone Ireland; she did not know the difference between latitude and longitude. She had had so many governesses; their accounts differed; poor Ethel was bewildered by a multiplicity of teachers, and thought herself a monster of ignorance. They gave her a book at a Sunday school, and little girls of eight years old answered questions of which she knew nothing. The place swam before her. She could not see the sun shining on their fair flaxen heads and pretty faces. The rosy little children, holding up their eager hands and crying the answer to this question and that, seemed mocking her. She seemed to read in the book, "Oh, Ethel, you dunce, dunce, dunce!" She went home silent in the carriage, and burst into bitter tears on her bed. Naturally a haughty girl of the highest spirit, resolute and imperious, this little visit to the parish school taught Ethel lessons more valuable than ever so much arithmetic and geography.

When Ethel was thirteen years old she had grown to be such a tall girl that she overtopped her companions by a head or more, and morally perhaps, also, felt herself too tall for their society. "Fancy myself," she thought, "dressing a doll like Lily Putland, or wearing a pinafore like Lucy Tucker!" She did not care for their sports. She could not walk with them; it seemed as if everyone stared; nor dance with them at the academy; nor attend the _Cours de Litterature Universelle et de Science Comprehensive_ of the professor then the mode. The smallest girls took her up in the class. She was bewildered by the multitude of things they bade her learn. At the youthful little assemblies of her sex, when, under the guide of their respected governesses, the girls came to tea at six o'clock, dancing, charades, and so forth, Ethel herded not with the children of her own age, nor yet with the teachers who sat apart at these assemblies, imparting to each other their little wrongs. But Ethel romped with the little children, the rosy little trots, and took them on her knees, and told them a thousand stories. By these she was adored, and loved like a mother almost, for as such the hearty, kindly girl showed herself to them; but at home she was alone, and intractable, and did battle with the governesses, and overcame them one after another.

While Lady Ann Newcome and her children were at Brighton, Lady Kew, mother of Lady Ann, was also staying there, but refused to visit the house in which her daughter was stopping for fear that she herself might contract the disease from which her grandchildren were recovering. She received news of them, however, through her grandson, Lord Kew, and his friend Jack Belsize, who enjoyed dining with the old lady whenever they were given the opportunity. Having met their cousins one day before dining with Lady Kew their news was most interesting and enthusiastic.

"That little chap who has just had the measles--he's a dear little brick," said Jack Belsize. "And as for Miss Ethel--"

"Ethel is a trump, mam," says Lord Kew, slapping his hand on his knee.

"Ethel is a brick, and Alfred is a trump, I think you say," remarks Lady Kew, "and Barnes is a snob. This is very satisfactory to know."

"We met the children out to-day," cries the enthusiastic Kew, "as I was driving Jack in the drag, and I got out and talked to 'em. The little fellow wanted a drive and I said I would drive him and Ethel, too, if she would come. Upon my word she's as pretty a girl as you can see on a summer's day. And the governess said, no, of course; governesses always do. But I said I was her uncle, and Jack paid her such a fine compliment that she finally let the children take their seats beside me, and Jack went behind. We drove on to the Downs; my horses are young, and when they get on the grass they are as if they were mad. They ran away, ever so far, and I thought the carriage must upset. The poor little boy, who has lost his pluck in the fever, began to cry; but that young girl, though she was as white as a sheet, never gave up for a moment, and sat in her place like a man. We met nothing, luckily; and I pulled the horses in after a mile or two, and I drove 'em into Brighton as quiet as if I had been driving a hearse. And that little trump of an Ethel, what do you think she said? She said: 'I was not frightened, but you must not tell mamma.' My aunt, it appears, was in a dreadful commotion. I ought to have thought of that."

There is a brother of Sir Brian Newcome's staying with them, Lord Kew perceives; an East India Colonel, a very fine-looking old boy. He was on the lookout for them, and when they came in sight he despatched a boy who was with him, running like a lamplighter, back to their aunt to say all was well. And he took little Alfred out of the carriage, and then helped out Ethel, and said, "My dear, you are too pretty to scold; but you have given us all a great fright." And then he made Kew and Jack a low bow, and stalked into the lodgings. Then they went up and made their peace and were presented in form to the Colonel and his youthful cub.

"As fine a fellow as I ever saw," cries Jack Belsize. "The young chap is a great hand at drawing--upon my life the best drawings I ever saw. And he was making a picture for little What-do-you-call-'im, and Miss Newcome was looking over them. And Lady Ann pointed out the group to me, and said how pretty it was."

In consequence of this conversation, which aroused her curiosity, Lady Kew sent a letter that night to Lady Ann Newcome, desiring that Ethel should be sent to see her grandmother; Ethel, who was no weakling in character despite her youth, and who always rebelled against her grandmother and always fought on her Aunt Julia's side when that amiable invalid lady, who lived with her mother, was oppressed by the dominating older woman.

From the foregoing facts we gather that Thomas Newcome had not been many weeks in England before he favoured good little Miss Honeyman with a visit, to her great delight. You may be sure that the visit was an event in her life. And she was especially pleased that it should occur at the time when the Colonel's kinsfolk were staying under her roof. On the day of the Colonel's arrival all the presents which Newcome had ever sent his sister-in-law from India had been taken out of the cotton and lavender in which the faithful creature kept them. It was a fine hot day in June, but I promise you Miss Honeyman wore her blazing scarlet Cashmere shawl; her great brooch, representing the Taj of Agra, was in her collar; and her bracelets decorated the sleeves round her lean old hands, which trembled with pleasure as they received the kind grasp of the Colonel of colonels. How busy those hands had been that morning! What custards they had whipped! What a triumph of pie-crusts they had achieved! Before Colonel Newcome had been ten minutes in the house the celebrated veal-cutlets made their appearance. Was not the whole house adorned in expectation of his coming? The good woman's eyes twinkled, the kind old hand and voice shook, as, holding up a bright glass of Madeira, Miss Honeyman drank the Colonel's health. "I promise you, my dear Colonel," says she, nodding her head, adorned with a bristling superstructure of lace and ribbons, "I promise you, that I can drink your health in good wine!" The wine was of his own sending, and so were the China firescreens, and the sandal-wood work-box, and the ivory card case, and those magnificent pink and white chessmen, carved like little sepoys and mandarins, with the castles on elephants' backs, George the Third and his queen in pink ivory against the Emperor of China and lady in white--the delight of Clive's childhood, the chief ornament of the old spinster's sitting-room.

Miss Honeyman's little feast was pronounced to be the perfection of cookery; and when the meal was over, came a noise of little feet at the parlour door, which being opened, there appeared: first, a tall nurse with a dancing baby; second and third, two little girls with little frocks, little trowsers, long ringlets, blue eyes, and blue ribbons to match; fourth, Master Alfred, now quite recovered from his illness and holding by the hand, fifth, Miss Ethel Newcome, blushing like a rose.

Hannah, grinning, acted as mistress of the ceremonies, calling out the names of "Miss Newcome, Master Newcome, to see the Colonel, if you please, ma'am," bobbing a curtsey, and giving a knowing nod to Master Clive, as she smoothed her new silk apron. Miss Ethel did not cease blushing as she advanced towards her uncle; and the honest campaigner started up, blushing too. Mr. Clive rose also, as little Alfred, of whom he was a great friend, ran towards him. Clive rose, laughed, nodded at Ethel, and ate ginger-bread nuts all at the same time. As for Colonel Thomas Newcome and his niece, they fell in love with each other instantaneously, like Prince Camaralzaman and the Princess of China.

"Mamma has sent us to bid you welcome to England, uncle," says Miss Ethel, advancing, and never thinking for a moment of laying aside that fine blush which she brought into the room, and which was her pretty symbol of youth and modesty and beauty.

He took a little slim white hand and laid it down on his brown palm, where it looked all the whiter; he cleared the grizzled moustache from his mouth, and stooping down he kissed the little white hand with a great deal of grace and dignity, after which he was forever the humble and devoted admirer of that bright young girl.

Raising himself from his salute, he heard a pretty little infantile chorus. "How do you do, uncle?" said girls number two and three, while the dancing baby in the arms of the bobbing nurse babbled a welcome. Alfred looked up for a while at his uncle in the white trousers, and then instantly proposed that Clive should make some drawings; and was on his knees at the next moment. He was always climbing on somebody or something, or winding over chairs, curling through bannisters, standing on somebody's head, or his own head; as his convalescence advanced, his breakages were fearful. Miss Honeyman and Hannah talked about his dilapidations for years after. When he was a jolly young officer in the Guards, and came to see them at Brighton, they showed him the blue dragon Chayny jar on which he would sit, and over which he cried so fearfully upon breaking it.

When this little party had gone out smiling to take its walk on the sea shore, the Colonel from his balcony watched the slim figure of pretty Ethel, looked fondly after her, and as the smoke of his cigar floated in the air, formed a fine castle in it, whereof Clive was Lord, and Ethel Lady. "What a frank, generous, bright young creature is yonder!" thought he. "How cheering and gay she is; how good to Miss Honeyman, to whom she behaved with just the respect that was the old lady's due. How affectionate with her brothers and sisters! What a sweet voice she had! What a pretty little white hand it is! When she gave it me, it looked like a little white bird lying in mine."

Thus mused the Colonel, upon the charms of the young girl who was henceforth to occupy the first place in his affection.

His admiration for her might have been still further heightened had he been at Lady Ann's breakfast table some four or five weeks later, when Lady Ann and her nursery had just returned to London, little Alfred being perfectly set up by a month of Brighton air. Barnes Newcome had just discovered an article in the Newcome Independent commenting warmly upon a visit which Colonel Newcome and Clive had recently paid to Newcome, the object of that visit having been the Colonel's desire to gladden the eyes of his old nurse Sarah with a sight of him. Inhabitants of Newcome, feeling that the same Sarah Mason, who was a much respected member of the community, was much neglected by her rich and influential relatives in London, took great delight in commenting upon the Colonel's attention to the aged woman. The article in the Independent on that subject was anything but pleasing to the family pride of Mr. Barnes, who remarked in a sneering tone, "My uncle the Colonel, and his amiable son, have been paying a visit to Newcome. That is the news which the paper announces triumphantly," said Mr. Barnes.

"You are always sneering about our uncle," broke in Ethel, impetuously, "and saying unkind things about Clive. Our uncle is a dear, good, kind man, and I love him. He came to Brighton to see us, and went out every day for hours and hours with Alfred; and Clive, too, drew pictures for him. And he is good, and kind, and generous, and honest as his father. Barnes is always speaking ill of him behind his back; and Miss Honeyman is a dear little old woman too. Was not she kind to Alfred, mamma, and did not she make him nice jelly?"

"Did you bring some of Miss Honeyman's lodging-house cards with you, Ethel?" sneered her brother, "and had we not better hang up one or two in Lombard Street; hers and our other relation's, Mrs. Mason?"

"My darling love, who _is_ Mrs. Mason?" asks Lady Ann.

"Another member of the family, ma'am. She was cousin--"

"She was no such thing, sir," roars Sir Brian.

"She was relative and housemaid of my grandfather during his first marriage. She has retired into private life in her native town of Newcome. The Colonel and young Clive have been spending a few days with their elderly relative. It's all here in the paper, by Jove!" Mr. Barnes clenched his fist and stamped upon the newspaper with much energy.

"And so they should go down and see her, and so the Colonel should love his nurse and not forget his relations if they are old and poor!" cries Ethel, with a flush on her face, and tears starting in her eyes. "The Colonel went to her like a kind, dear, good brave uncle as he is. The very day I go to Newcome I'll go to see her." She caught a look of negation in her father's eye. "I will go--that is, if papa will give me leave," says Miss Ethel, adding simply, "if we had gone sooner there would not have been all this abuse of us in the papers." To which statement her worldly father and brother perforce agreeing, we may congratulate good old nurse Sarah upon adding to the list of her friends such a frank, open-hearted, high-spirited young woman as Miss Ethel Newcome.

In spite of the notoriety given him in the newspapers by his visit to Nurse Sarah, at his native place, he still remained in high favour with Sir Brian Newcome's family, where he paid almost daily visits, and was received with affection at least by the ladies and children of the house. Who was it that took the children to Astley's but Uncle Newcome? I saw him there in the midst of a cluster of these little people, all children together, the little girls, Sir Brian's daughters, holding each by a finger of his hands, young Masters Alfred and Edward clapping and hurrahing by his side; while Mr. Clive and Miss Ethel sat in the back of the box enjoying the scene, but with that decorum which belonged to their superior age and gravity. As for Clive, he was in these matters much older than the grizzled old warrior his father. It did one good to hear the Colonel's honest laughs at Clown's jokes, and to see the tenderness and simplicity with which he watched over this happy brood of young ones. How lavishly did he supply them with sweetmeats between the acts! There he sat in the midst of them, and ate an orange himself with perfect satisfaction, and was eager to supply any luxury longed for by his young companions.

The Colonel's organ of benevolence was so large that he would have liked to administer bounties to the young folks his nephews and nieces in Brianstone Square, as well as to their cousins in Park Lane; but Mrs. Newcome was a great deal too virtuous to admit of such spoiling of children. She took the poor gentleman to task for an attempt upon her boys when those lads came home for their holidays, and caused them ruefully to give back the shining gold sovereigns with which their uncle had thought to give them a treat. So the Colonel was obliged to confine his benevolence to that branch of the family where it was graciously accepted.

Meanwhile the Colonel had a new interest to absorb his attention. He had taken a new house at 120 Fitzroy Square in connection with that Indian friend of his, Mr. Binnie. The house being taken, there was fine amusement for Clive, Mr. Binnie, and the Colonel, in frequenting sales, in inspection of upholsterers' shops, and the purchase of furniture for the new mansion. There were three masters with four or five servants under them. Irons for the Colonel and his son, a smart boy with boots for Mr. Binnie; Mrs. Irons to cook and keep house, with a couple of maids under her. The Colonel himself was great at making hash mutton, hotpot, and curry. What cosy pipes did we not smoke in the dining-room, in the drawing-room, or where we would! What pleasant evenings did we not have together.

Clive had a tutor--Grindley of Corpus--with whom the young gentleman did not fatigue his brains very much, his great talent lying decidedly in drawing. He sketched the horses, he sketched the dogs, all the servants, from the bleer-eyed boot-boy to the rosy cheeked lass whom the housekeeper was always calling to come downstairs. He drew his father in all postures, and jolly little Mr. Binnie too. Young Ridley, known to his young companions as J.J., was his daily friend now, to the great joy of that young man, who considered Clive Newcome to be the most splendid, fortunate, beautiful, high-born and gifted youth in the world. What generous boy in his time has not worshipped somebody? Before the female enslaver makes her appearance, every lad has a friend of friends, a crony of cronies, to whom he writes immense letters in vacation, whom he cherishes in his hearts of hearts; whose sister he proposes to marry in after life; whose purse he shares; for whom he will take a thrashing if need be; who is his hero. Clive was John James's youthful divinity; when he wanted to draw Thaddeus of Warsaw, a Prince, Ivanhoe, or some one splendid and egregious, it was Clive he took for a model. His heart leapt when he saw the young fellow. He would walk cheerfully to Grey Friars with a letter or message for C. on the chance of seeing him and getting a kind word from him or a shake of the hand. The poor lad was known by the boys as Newcome's Punch. He was all but hunchback, long and lean in the arm; sallow, with a great forehead and waving black hair, and large melancholy eyes. But his genius for drawing was enormous, which fact Clive fully appreciated. Because of J. J.'s admiration for Clive it was his joy to be with Clive constantly; and after Grindley's classics and mathematics in the morning, the young men would attend Gandish's Drawing Academy, together.

"Oh," says Clive, if you talk to him now about those early days, "it was a jolly time! I do not believe there was any young fellow in London so happy."

Clive had many conversations with his father as to the profession which he should follow. As regarded mathematical and classical learning, the elder Newcome was forced to admit that out of every hundred boys there were fifty as clever as his own, and at least fifty more industrious; the army in time of peace Colonel Newcome thought a bad trade for a young fellow so fond of ease and pleasure as his son. His delight in the pencil was manifest to all. Were not his school books full of caricatures of the masters? While his tutor was lecturing him, did he not draw Grindley instinctively under his very nose? A painter Clive was determined to be, and nothing else; and Clive, being then some sixteen years of age, began to study art under the eminent Mr. Gandish of Soho.

It was that well-known portrait painter, Andrew Smee, Esq., R.A., who recommended Gandish to Colonel Newcome one day when the two gentleman met at dinner at Lady Ann Newcome's. Mr. Smee happened to examine some of Clive's drawings, which the young fellow had executed for his cousins. Clive found no better amusement than in making pictures for them and would cheerfully pass evening after evening in that direction. He had made a thousand sketches of Ethel before a year was over; a year every day of which seemed to increase the attractions of the fair young creature. Also, of course Clive drew Alfred and the nursery in general, Aunt Ann and the Blenheim spaniels, the majestic John bringing in the coal-scuttle, and all persons or objects in that establishment with which he was familiar.

"What a genius the lad has," the complimentary Mr. Smee averred; "what a force and individuality there is in all his drawings! Look at his horses! Capital, by Jove, capital! And Alfred on his pony, and Miss Ethel in her Spanish hat, with her hair flowing in the wind! I must take this sketch, I positively must now, and show it to Landseer."

And the courtly artist daintily enveloped the drawing in a sheet of paper, put it away in his hat, and vowed subsequently that the great painter had been delighted with the young man's performance. Smee was not only charmed with Clive's skill as an artist, but thought his head would be an admirable one to paint. Such a rich complexion, such fine turns in his hair! Such eyes! To see real blue eyes was so rare now-a-days! And the Colonel too, if the Colonel would but give him a few sittings, the grey uniform of the Bengal Cavalry, the silver lace, the little bit of red ribbon just to warm up the picture! It was seldom, Mr. Smee declared, that an artist could get such an opportunity for colour. But no cajoleries could induce the Colonel to sit to any artist save one. There hangs in Clive's room now, a head, painted at one sitting, of a man rather bald, with hair touched with grey, with a large moustache and a sweet mouth half smiling beneath it, and melancholy eyes. Clive shows that portrait of their grandfather to his children, and tells them that the whole world never saw a nobler gentleman.

Well, then; Clive having decided to become an artist, on a day marked with a white stone, Colonel Newcome with his son and Mr. Smee, R. A., walked to Gandish's and entered the would-be artist on the roll call of that famous academy, and of J. J. as well, for the Colonel had insisted upon paying his expenses as an art student together with his son.