Chapter 5

"And thou wouldst be a fool for thy pains," said my lord. "Tut, tut, man. Go and see the world. Sow thy wild oats; and take the best luck that fate sends thee. I wish I were a boy again, that I might go to college and taste the Thumpington ale."

"Indeed, you are best away," said my lady, laughing, as she put her hand on the boy's head for a moment. "You shall stay in no such dull place. You shall go to college and distinguish yourself as becomes your name. That is how you shall please me best; and--and if my children want you, or I want you, you shall come to us; and I know we may count on you."

"May Heaven forsake me if you may not!" Harry said, getting up from his knee.

"And my knight longs for a dragon this instant that he may fight," said my lady, laughing; which speech made Harry Esmond start, and turn red; for indeed the very thought was in his mind, that he would like that some chance should immediately happen whereby he might show his devotion. And it pleased him to think that his lady had called him "her knight," and often and often he recalled this to his mind, and prayed that he might be her true knight, too.

My lady's bed-chamber window looked out over the country, and you could see from it the purple hills beyond Castlewood village, the green common betwixt that and the Hall, and the old bridge which crossed over the river. When Harry Esmond went away to Cambridge, little Frank ran alongside his horse as far as the bridge, and there Harry stopped for a moment, and looked back at the house where the best part of his life had been passed.

It lay before him with its grey familiar towers, a pinnacle or two shining in the sun, the buttresses and terrace walls casting great blue shades on the grass. And Harry remembered all his life after how he saw his mistress at the window looking out on him in a white robe, the little Beatrix's chestnut curls resting at her mother's side. Both waved a farewell to him, and little Frank sobbed to leave him. Yes, he _would_ be his lady's true knight, he vowed in his heart; he waved her an adieu with his hat. The village people had good-bye to say to him, too. All knew that Master Harry was going to college, and most of them had a kind word and a look of farewell. I do not stop to say what adventures he began to imagine, or what career to devise for himself before he had ridden three miles from home. He had not read the Arabian tales as yet; but be sure that there are other folks who build castles in the air, and have fine hopes, and kick them down, too, besides honest Alnaschar.

This change in his life was a very fine thing indeed for Harry, who rode away in company of my lord, who said he should like to revisit the old haunts of his youth, and so accompanied Harry to Cambridge. Their road lay through London, where my Lord Viscount would have Harry stay a few days to see the pleasures of the town before he entered upon his university studies, and whilst here Harry's patron conducted the young man to my lady dowager's house near London. Lady Isabella received them cordially, and asked Harry what his profession was to be. Upon hearing that the lad was to take orders, and to have the living of Castlewood when old Dr. Tusher vacated it, she seemed glad that the youth should be so provided for.

She bade Harry Esmond pay her a visit whenever he passed through London, and carried her graciousness so far as to send a purse with twenty guineas for him to the tavern where he and his lord were staying, and with this welcome gift sent also a little doll for Beatrix, who, however, was growing beyond the age of dolls by this time, and was almost as tall as Lady Isabella.

After seeing the town, and going to the plays, my Lord Castlewood and Esmond rode together to Cambridge, spending two pleasant days upon the journey. Those rapid new coaches that performed the journey in a single day were not yet established, but the road was pleasant and short enough to Harry Esmond, and he always gratefully remembered that happy holiday which his kind patron gave him.

Henry Esmond was entered at Trinity College, Cambridge, to which famous college my lord had also in his youth belonged. My Lord Viscount was received with great politeness by the head master, as well as by Mr. Bridge, who was appointed to be Harry's tutor. Tom Tusher, who was by this time a junior Soph, came to take Harry under his protection; and comfortable rooms being provided for him, Harry's patron took leave of him with many kind words and blessings, and an admonition to have to behave better at the University than my lord himself had ever done.

Thus began Harry Esmond's college career, which was in no wise different from that of a hundred other young gentlemen of that day. Meanwhile, while he was becoming used to the manners and customs of his new life and enjoying it thoroughly in his quiet way; at Castlewood Hall life was not so cheerful as it had been when he was there to note his mistress' sorrow or joy and act according to her need.

Coming home to his dear Castlewood in the third year of his academic course, Harry was overjoyed to see again the kind blue eyes of his mistress, when she and the children came to greet him. He found Frank shooting up to be like his gallant father in looks and in tastes. He had his hawks, and his spaniel dog, his little horse, and his beagles; had learned to ride and to shoot flying, and had a small court made up of the sons of the huntsmen and woodsmen, over whom he ruled as imperiously as became the heir-apparent.

As for Beatrix, Esmond found her grown to be taller than her mother, a slim and lovely young girl, with cheeks mantling with health and roses; with eyes like stars shining out of azure, with waving bronze hair clustered about the fairest young forehead ever seen; and a mien and shape haughty and beautiful, such as that of the famous antique statue of the huntress Diana.

This bright creature was the darling and torment of father and mother. She intrigued with each secretly, and bestowed her fondness and withdrew it, plied them with tears, smiles, kisses, caresses; when the mother was angry, flew to the father; when both were displeased, transferred her caresses to the domestics, or watched until she could win back her parents' good graces, either by surprising them into laughter and good-humour, or appeasing them by submissive and an artful humility. She had been a coquette from her earliest days; had long learned the value of her bright eyes, and tried experiments in coquetry upon rustics and country 'squires until she should have opportunity to conquer a larger world in later years.

When, then, Harry Esmond came home to Castlewood for his last vacation he found his old pupil shot up into this capricious beauty; her brother, a handsome, high-spirited, brave lad, generous and frank and kind to everybody, save perhaps Beatrix, with whom he was perpetually at war, and not from his, but her, fault; adoring his mother, whose joy he was. And Lady Castlewood was no whit less gracious and attractive to Harry than in the old days when as a lad he had first kissed her fair, protecting hand.

Such was the group who welcomed Henry Esmond on his return from college.

Not anticipating the future, not looking ahead, let us leave beautiful Beatrix, imperious young Frank, sweet Lady Castlewood, giving a glad welcome to their old friend and tutor. Truly we carry away a pretty picture as we finish this chapter of Esmond's youth.

THE VIRGINIANS

Henry Esmond, Esq., an officer who had served with the rank of Colonel during the wars of Queen Anne's reign, found himself at its close involved in certain complications, both political and private. For this reason Mr. Esmond thought best to establish himself in Virginia, where he took possession of a large estate conferred by King Charles I. upon his ancestor. Mr. Esmond previously to this had married Rachel, widow of the late Francis Castlewood, Baronet, by whom he had one daughter, afterwards Madame Warrington, whose twin sons, George and Henry Warrington, were known as the Virginians.

Mr. Esmond called his American house Castlewood, from the family estate in England. The whole customs of Virginia, indeed, were fondly modelled after the English customs. The Virginians boasted that King Charles II. had been king in Virginia before he had been king in England. The resident gentry were connected with good English families and lived on their great lands after a fashion almost patriarchal. For its rough cultivation, each estate had a multitude of hands, who were subject to the command of the master. The land yielded their food, live stock and game. The great rivers swarmed with fish for the taking. Their ships took the tobacco off their private wharves on the banks of the Potomac or the James River, and carried it to London or Bristol, bringing back English goods and articles of home manufacture in return for the only produce which the Virginian gentry chose to cultivate. Their hospitality was boundless. No stranger was ever sent away from their gates. The question of slavery was not born at the time of which we write. To be the proprietor of black servants shocked the feelings of no Virginian gentleman; nor, in truth, was the despotism exercised over the negro race generally a savage one. The food was plenty; the poor black people lazy and not unhappy. You might have preached negro-emancipation to Madame Esmond of Castlewood as you might have told her to let the horses run loose out of the stables; she had no doubt but that the whip and the corn-bag were good for both.

Having lost his wife, his daughter took the management of the Colonel and his estate, and managed both with the spirit and determination which governed her management of every person and thing which came within her jurisdiction.

After fifteen years' residence upon his great Virginian estate the Colonel agreed in his daughter's desire to replace the wooden house in which they lived, with a nobler mansion which would be more fitting for his heirs to inherit. His daughter had a very high opinion indeed of her ancestry, and her father, growing exquisitely calm and good-natured in his serene declining years, humoured his child's peculiarities and interests in an easy bantering way. Truth to tell, there were few families in England with nobler connections than the Esmonds. The Virginians, Madame Rachel Warrington's sons, inherited the finest blood and traditions, and the rightful king of England had not two more faithful little subjects than the young twins of Castlewood.

At Colonel Esmond's death, Madame Esmond, as she was thereafter called, proclaimed her eldest son, George, heir of the estate; and Harry, George's younger brother by half an hour, was instructed to respect his senior. All the household was also instructed to pay him honour, and in the whole family of servants there was only one rebel, Harry's foster-mother, a faithful negro woman who never could be made to understand why her child should not be first, who was handsomer and stronger and cleverer than his brother, as she vowed; though in truth, there was not much difference in the beauty, strength, or stature of the twins. In disposition, they were in many points exceedingly unlike; but in feature they resembled each other so closely that, but for the colour of their hair, it had been difficult to distinguish them. In their beds, and when their heads were covered with those vast ribboned nightcaps which our great and little ancestors wore, it was scarcely possible for any but a nurse or a mother to tell the one from the other child.

Howbeit, alike in form, we have said that they differed in temper. The elder was peaceful, studious and silent; the younger was warlike and noisy. He was quick at learning when he began, but very slow at beginning. No threats of the ferule would provoke Harry to learn in an idle fit, or would prevent George from helping his brother in his lesson. Harry was of a strong military turn, drilled the little negroes on the estate, and caned them like a corporal, having many good boxing-matches with them, and never bearing malice if he was worsted; whereas George was sparing of blows, and gentle with all about him. As the custom in all families was, each of the boys had a special little servant assigned him; and it was a known fact that George, finding his little wretch of a blackamoor asleep on his master's bed, sat down beside it and brushed the flies off the child with a feather-fan, to the horror of old Gumbo, the child's father, who found his young master so engaged, and to the indignation of Madame Esmond, who ordered the young negro off to the proper officer for a whipping. In vain George implored and entreated, burst into passionate tears and besought a remission of the sentence. His mother was inflexible regarding the young rebel's punishment, and the little negro went off beseeching his young master not to cry.

A fierce quarrel between mother and son ensued out of this event. Her son would not be pacified. He said the punishment was a shame--a shame; that he was the master of the boy, and no one--no, not his mother--had a right to touch him; that she might order _him_ to be corrected, and that he would suffer the punishment, as he and Harry often had, but no one should lay a hand on his boy. Trembling with passionate rebellion against what he conceived the injustice of the procedure, he vowed that on the day he came of age he would set young Gumbo free; went to visit the child in the slaves' quarters, and gave him one of his own toys.

The black martyr was an impudent, lazy, saucy little personage, who would be none the worse for a whipping, as the Colonel, who was then living, no doubt thought; for he acquiesced in the child's punishment when Madame Esmond insisted upon it, and only laughed in his good-natured way when his indignant grandson called out:

"You let mamma rule you in everything, grandpapa."

"Why so I do," says grandpapa. "Rachel, my love, the way in which I am petticoat-ridden is so evident that even this baby has found it out."

"Then why don't you stand up like a man?" says little Harry, who always was ready to abet his brother.

Grandpapa looked queerly.

"Because I like sitting down best, my dear," he said. "I am an old gentleman, and standing fatigues me."

On account of a certain apish drollery and humour which exhibited itself in the lad, and a liking for some of the old man's pursuits, the first of the twins was the grandfather's favourite and companion, and would laugh and talk out all his infantine heart to the old gentleman, to whom the younger had seldom a word to say. George was a demure, studious boy, and his senses seemed to brighten up in the library, where his brother was so gloomy. He knew the books before he could well-nigh carry them, and read in them long before he could understand them. Harry, on the other hand, was all alive in the stables or in the wood, eager for all parties of hunting and fishing, and promised to be a good sportsman from a very early age. The grandfather's ship was sailing for Europe once when the boys were children, and they were asked what present Captain Franks would bring them back? George was divided between books and a fiddle; Harry instantly declared for a little gun; and Madame Warrington (as she then was called) was hurt that her elder boy should have low tastes, and applauded the younger's choice as more worthy of his name and lineage.

"Books, papa, I can fancy to be a good choice," she replied to her father, who tried to convince her that George had a right to his opinion, "though I am sure you must have pretty nigh all the books in the world already. But I never can desire--I may be wrong--but I never can desire, that my son, and the grandson of the Marquis of Esmond, should be a fiddler."

"Should be a fiddlestick, my dear," the old Colonel answered. "Remember that Heaven's ways are not ours, and that each creature born has a little kingdom of thought of his own, which it is a sin in us to invade. Suppose George loves music? You can no more stop him than you can order a rose not to smell sweet, or a bird not to sing."

"A bird! A bird sings from nature; George did not come into the world with a fiddle in his hand," says Mrs. Warrington, with a toss of her head. "I am sure I hated the harpsichord when a chit at Kensington school, and only learned it to please my mamma. Say what you will, I cannot believe that this fiddling is work for persons of fashion."

"And King David who played the harp, my dear?"

"I wish my papa would read him more, and not speak about him in that way," said Mrs. Warrington.

"Nay, my dear, it was but by way of illustration," the father replied gently. It was Colonel's Esmond's nature always to be led by a woman, and he spoiled his daughter; laughing at her caprices, but humouring them; making a joke of her prejudices, but letting them have their way; indulging, and perhaps increasing, her natural imperiousness of character, which asserted itself to an unusual degree after her father's death.

The Colonel's funeral was the most sumptuous one ever seen in the country. The little lads of Castlewood, almost smothered in black trains and hat bands, headed the procession, followed by Madame Esmond Warrington (as she called herself after her father's death), by my Lord Fairfax, by his Excellency the Governor of Virginia, by the Randolphs, the Careys, the Harrisons, the Washingtons, and many others, for the whole county esteemed the departed gentleman whose goodness, whose high talents, whose unobtrusive benevolence had earned for him the just respect of his neighbours.

The management of the house of Castlewood had been in the hands of his daughter long before the Colonel slept the sleep of the just, for the truth is little Madame Esmond never came near man or woman but she tried to domineer over them. If people obeyed, she was their very good friend; if they resisted, she fought and fought until she or they gave in, and without her father's influence to restrain her she was now more despotic than ever. She exercised a rigid supervision over the estate; dismissed Colonel Esmond's English factor and employed a new one; built, improved, planted, grew tobacco, appointed a new overseer, and imported a new tutor for her boys. The little queen domineered over her little dominion, and over the princes her sons as well, thereby falling out frequently with her neighbours, with her relatives, and with her sons also.

A very early difference which occurred between the queen and crown prince arose out of the dismissal of the lad's tutor, Mr. Dempster, who had also been the late Colonel's secretary. Upon his retirement George vowed he never would forsake his old tutor, and kept his promise. Another cause of dispute between George and his mother presently ensued.

By the death of an aunt, the heirs of Mr. George Warrington became entitled to a sum of six thousand pounds, of which their mother was one of the trustees. She never could be made to understand that she was not the proprietor, but merely the trustee of this money; and was furious with the London lawyer who refused to send it over at her order. "Is not all I have my sons'?" she cried, "and would I not cut myself into little pieces to serve them? With the six thousand pounds I would have bought Mr. Boulter's estate and negroes, which would have given us a good thousand pounds a year, and made a handsome provision for my Harry." Her young friend and neighbour, Mr. Washington of Mount Vernon, could not convince her that the London agent was right, and must not give up his trust except to those for whom he held it.

George Esmond, when this little matter was referred to him, and his mother vehemently insisted that he should declare himself, was of the opinion of Mr. Washington and Mr. Draper, the London lawyer. The boy said he could not help himself. He did not want the money; he would be very glad to give the money to his mother if he had the power. But Madame Esmond would not hear of these reasons. Here was a chance of making Harry's fortune--dear Harry, who was left with such a slender younger brother's pittance--and the wretches in London would not help him; his own brother, who inherited all his papa's estate, would not help him. To think of a child of hers being so mean at _fourteen years of age_!

Into this state of mind the incident plunged Madame Warrington, and no amount of reasoning could bring her out of it. On account of the occurrence she at once set to work saving for her younger son, for whom she was eager to make a fortune. The fine buildings were stopped as well as the fine fittings which had been ordered for the interior of the new home. No more books were bought; the agent had orders to discontinue sending wine. Madame Esmond deeply regretted the expense of a fine carriage which she had from England, and only rode in it to church, crying out to the sons sitting opposite to her, "Harry, Harry! I wish I had put by the money for thee, my poor portionless child; three hundred and eighty guineas of ready money to Messieurs Hatchett!"

"You will give me plenty while you live, and George will give me plenty when you die," says Harry gaily.

"Not until he changes in _spirit_, my dear," says the lady grimly, glancing at her elder boy. "Not unless Heaven softens his heart and teaches him _charity_, for which I pray day and night; as Mountain knows; do you not, Mountain?"

Mrs. Mountain, Ensign Mountain's widow, who had been a friend of Rachel Esmond in her school days, and since her widowhood had been Madame Esmond's companion in Castlewood house, serving to enliven many dull hours for that lady and enjoying thoroughly the home which Castlewood afforded her and her child. Mrs. Mountain, I say, who was occupying the fourth seat in the family coach, said, "Humph! humph! I know you are always disturbing yourself about this legacy, and I don't see that there is any need."

"Oh, no! no need!" cries the widow, rustling in her silks; "of course I have no need to be disturbed, because my eldest born is _a disobedient son and an unkind brother;_ because he has an estate, and my poor Harry, bless him, but a _mess of pottage_."

George looked despairingly at his mother until he could see her no more for eyes welled up with tears. "I wish you would bless me, too, O my mother!" he said, and burst into a passionate fit of weeping. Harry's arms were in a moment round his brother's neck, and he kissed George a score of times.

"Never mind, George. I know whether you are a good brother or not. Don't mind what she says. She don't mean it."

"I do mean it, child," cries the mother. "Would to Heaven--"

"_Hold your tongue, I say_!" roars out Harry. "It's a shame to speak so to him, ma'am."

"And so it is, Harry," says Mrs. Mountain, shaking his hand. "You never said a truer word in your life."

"Mrs. Mountain, do you dare to set my children against me?" cries the widow. "From this very day, madam--"

"Turn me and my child into the street? Do," says Mrs. Mountain. "That will be a fine revenge because the English lawyer won't give you the boy's money. Find another companion who will tell you black is white, and flatter you; it is not my way, madam. When shall I go? I shan't be long a-packing. I did not bring much into Castlewood house, and I shall not take much out."

"Hush! the bells are ringing for church, Mountain. Let us try, if you please, and compose ourselves," said the widow, and she looked with eyes of extreme affection, certainly at one, perhaps at both, of her children. George kept his head down, and Harry, who was near, got quite close to him during the sermon, and sat with his arm round his brother's neck.