Chapter 20

MRS. DALTON.

It was midnight when Mrs. Lyndsay awoke. A profound stillness reigned in the cabin; the invalids had forgotten their sufferings in sleep,--all but one female figure, who was seated upon the carpeted floor, just in front of Flora's berth, wrapped in a loose dressing-gown, and engaged in reading a letter. Flora instantly recognised in the watcher the tall, graceful figure of Mrs. Dalton.

Her mind seemed agitated by some painful recollections; and she sighed frequently, and several tears stole slowly over her cheeks, as she replaced the paper carefully in her bosom, and for many minutes appeared lost in deep and earnest thought. All her accustomed gaiety was gone; and her fine features wore a sad and regretful expression, far more touching and interesting than the heartless levity by which they were generally distinguished.

"Is it possible, that that frivolous mind can be touched by grief?" thought Flora. "That that woman can feel?"

Mrs. Dalton, as if she had heard the unuttered query, raised her head, and caught the intense glance with which Mrs. Lyndsay was unconsciously regarding her.

"I thought no one was awake but myself," she said; "I am a bad sleeper. If you are the same, we will have a little chat together; I am naturally a sociable animal. Of all company, I find my own the worst, and above all things hate to be alone."

Surprised at this frank invitation, from a woman who had pronounced her _nobody_, Flora replied, rather coldly, "I fear, Mrs. Dalton, that our conversation would not suit each other."

"That is as much as to say, that you don't like me; and that you conclude from that circumstance, that I don't like you?"

"To be candid then,--you are right."

"I fancy that you overheard my observations to Major F.?"

"I did."

"Well if you did, I can forgive you for disliking me. When I first saw you, I thought you a very plain person, and judged by your dress, that you held a very inferior rank in society. After listening a few minutes to your conversation with Miss Leigh, who is a highly educated woman, I felt convinced that I was wrong; and that you were far superior to most of the women round me. Of course you thought me a very malicious, vain woman."

Flora smiled, in spite of herself.

"Oh, you may speak it out. I shan't like you a bit the less for speaking the truth. I am a strange, wayward creature, subject at times to the most dreadful depression of spirits; and it is only by affecting excessive gaiety that I hinder myself from falling into the most hopeless despondency."

"Such a state of mind is not natural to one of your age, and who possesses so many personal attractions. There must be some cause for these fits of gloom."

"Of course there is. I am not quite the heartless coquet I seem. My father was an officer in the army, and commanded a regiment in the West Indies, where I was born. I was an only child, and very much indulged by both my parents. I lost them while I was a mere child, and was sent to Scotland to be educated by my grandmother. I was an irritable, volatile, spoilt child, and expected that everybody would yield to me, as readily as my slave attendants had done in Jamaica. In this I was disappointed. My grandmother was a proud, ambitious woman, and a strict disciplinarian; and it was a constant battle between us who should be master. I was no match, however, for the old lady, and I fretted constantly under her control, longing for any chance that might free me from her rule. It was a joyful day for me, when I was sent to finish my education at one of the first schools in Edinburgh, which I did not leave until I was sixteen years of age. I found grandmamma several years older, and many degrees more exacting than she was before. She was so much alarmed lest I should make an unsuitable alliance, that she never suffered me to go out without I was accompanied by herself, or an old maiden aunt, who was more rigid and stiff than even grandmamma herself.

"At this period of my girlhood, and before I had seen anything of the world, or could in the least judge for myself, a very wealthy clergyman, who had been a great friend of poor papa's, called to see me, before he returned to Jamaica; where he had a fine living, and possessed a noble property. Unfortunately for me, he fell desperately in love with the orphan daughter of his friend, and his suit was vehemently backed by grandmamma and aunt. He was a handsome, worthy kind man, but old enough to have been my father. I was so unhappy and restless at home, that I was easily persuaded to become his wife; and I, who had never been in love, thought it was a fine thing to be married, and my own mistress at sixteen. Our union has not been a happy one. I much question if such unions ever are. He is now an aged man, while I am in the very bloom of life, and consequently exposed to much temptation. Thank God! I have never acted criminally, though often severely tried. My home is one of many luxuries, but it has no domestic joys. My children are the only tie that binds me to a man I cannot love; and I have been so long used to drown my disappointment and regret in a whirl of dissipation, that it is only in scenes of gaiety that I forget my grief.

"My own sex speak slightly of me; but I do not deserve their severe censures. My fellow-passengers, I heard from Hector, made a thousand malicious remarks about me yesterday, and that you and Miss Leigh were the only ladies who took my part."

"My conduct," replied Flora, "was perfectly negative. I said nothing either in praise or blame. I may have injured you by thinking hardly of you."

"I thank you for your forbearance, in keeping your thoughts to yourself, for I did not deserve that from you. If I did flirt a little with Major F., it was done more to provoke the spleen of that ill-natured old maid, who acts the part of Cerberus for his proud, pompous wife, than for any wish to attract his attention."

"It is better," said Flora, her heart softening towards her companion, "to avoid all appearance of evil. Superficial observers only judge by outward appearance, and your conduct must have appeared strange to a jealous woman."

"She was jealous of me then?" cried the volatile Mrs. Dalton, clapping her hands in an ecstasy of delight. "Oh, I am so glad that it annoyed her."

Flora could not help laughing at the vivacity with which she turned her words to make them subservient to her own vanity. But when she described the consternation felt by Miss Mann, on discovering Hector under the table, her eccentric companion laughed until the tears ran down her cheeks.

The introduction of Hector insensibly turned the conversation upon the state of the slaves in the West Indies. The excitement of the slave question was just then at its height; but the bill for their emancipation had not yet passed the Houses of Parliament. Upon Flora expressing her abhorrence of the whole system, Mrs. Dalton proceeded to defend it with no little warmth.

"Ah, I perceive that you know nothing about it. You are infected with the bigotry and prejudices of the Anti-slavery advocates. Negroes are an inferior race; they were made to work for civilized men, in climates where labour would be death to those of a different complexion."

"This is reducing the African to a mere beast of burthen--a machine in the form of man. The just God never made a race of beings purposely to drag out a painful existence in perpetual toil and degradation."

"They are better off than your peasants at home," continued Mrs. Dalton, indignantly;--"better fed, and taken care of. As to the idle tales they tell you about flogging, starvation, and killing slaves, they are fearful exaggerations, not worthy of credit. Do you think a farmer would kill a horse, that he knew was worth a hundred pounds, out of revenge for his having done some trifling injury to his harness? A planter would not disable a valuable slave, if by so doing he injured himself. But your slave adorers will not listen to reason and common sense. I have been the owner of many slaves; but I never ill-used one of them in my life."

"Hector is an example of over-indulgence," said Flora. "But still he is only a pet animal in your estimation. Tell me truly, Mrs. Dalton, do you believe that a negro has a soul to be saved?"

"I think it doubtful!"

"And you the wife of a Christian minister?" said Flora, reproachfully.

"If they had immortal souls and reasoning minds, we should not be permitted to hold them as slaves. Their degradation proves their inferiority."

"It only proves the brutalizing effects of your immoral system," said Flora, waxing warm. "I taught a black man from the island of St. Vincent to read the Bible fluently in ten weeks. Was that a proof of mental incapacity? I never met with an uneducated white man who learned to read so rapidly, or who pursued his studies with the ardour of this despised, soulless black. His motive for this exertion was a noble one, which I believe cost him his life--the hope of carrying the glad tidings of salvation to his benighted countrymen, which he considered the best means of improving their condition, and rendering less burdensome their oppressive yoke."

"This was all very well in theory; but it will never do in practice. If the British Government, urged on by a set of fanatics, who, in reality are more anxious to bring themselves into notice, than to emancipate the slaves, madly persist in adopting their ridiculous project, it will involve the West Indies in ruin."

"It were better that the whole group of islands were sunk in the depths of the sea," said Flora, vehemently, "than continue to present to the world a system of injustice and cruelty, which is a disgrace to a Christian community--a spectacle of infamy to the civilized world. And do not think that the wise and good men who are engaged heart and hand in this holy cause, will cease their exertions until their great object is accomplished, and slavery is banished from the earth."

Mrs. Dalton stared at Flora in amazement. She could not in the least comprehend her enthusiasm. "Who cares for a slave?" she said, contemptuously. "You must live among them, and be conversant with their habits before you can understand their inferiority. One would think that you belonged to the Anti-Slavery Society to hear the warmth with which you argue the case. Do you belong to that odious society? for I understand that many pious women make themselves vastly busy in publicly discussing the _black_ question."

"I have many dear friends who are among its staunch supporters, both men and women; whose motives are purely benevolent; who have nothing to gain by the freedom of the slaves, beyond the satisfaction of endeavouring to forward a good work, which if it succeeds, (and we pray God that it may,) will restore a large portion of the human family to their rights as immortal and rational creatures."

"Mere cant--the vanity of making a noise in the world. One of the refined hypocrisies of the present age. By-the-bye, my dear Madam, have you read a tract published lately by this disinterested society, called the History of Mary P.? It is set forth to be an authentic narrative, while I know enough of the West Indies, to pronounce it a tissue of falsehoods from beginning to end."

"Did you know Mary P.?"

"I wonder who does. It is an imaginary tale got up for party purposes."

"You are mistaken," said Flora quietly. "That narrative is strictly true. I was staying the winter before last, with her mistress in London, and I wrote it myself from the woman's own lips."

"You!" and Mrs. Dalton started from the ground as though she had been bitten by a serpent--"and I have been talking all this time to the author of Mary P. From this moment, Madam, we must regard ourselves as strangers. No West Indian could for a moment tolerate the writer of that odious pamphlet."

Mrs. Dalton retired to her berth, which was in the state cabin; and Flora lay awake for several hours, pondering over their conversation, until the morning broke, and the steamer cast anchor off Newhaven.