The Virginians

  CHAPTER LX. Which treats of Macbeth, a Supper, and a Pretty Kettle ofFish

  When the performances were concluded, our friends took coach for Mr.Warrington's lodging, where the Virginians had provided an elegantsupper. Mr. Warrington was eager to treat them in the handsomestmanner, and the General and his wife accepted the invitation of the twobachelors, pleased to think that they could give their young friendspleasure. General and Mrs. Lambert, their son from college, their twoblooming daughters, and Mr. Spencer of the Temple, a new friend whomGeorge had met at the coffee-house, formed the party, and partook withcheerfulness of the landlady's fare. The order of their sitting I havenot been able exactly to ascertain; but, somehow, Miss Theo had a placenext to the chickens and Mr. George Warrington, whilst Miss Hetty and aham divided the attentions of Mr. Harry. Mrs. Lambert must have been onGeorge's right hand, so that we have but to settle the three places ofthe General, his son, and the Templar.

  Mr. Spencer had been at the other theatre, where, on a former day, hehad actually introduced George to the greenroom. The conversation aboutthe play was resumed, and some of the party persisted in being delightedwith it.

  "As for what our gentlemen say, sir," cries Mrs. Lambert to Mr. Spencer,"you must not believe a word of it. 'Tis a delightful piece, and myhusband and Mr. George behaved as ill as possible."

  "We laughed in the wrong place, and when we ought to have cried," theGeneral owned, "that's the truth."

  "You caused all the people in the boxes about us to look round and cry'Hush!' You made the pit folks say, 'Silence in the boxes, yonder!' Suchbehaviour I never knew, and quite blushed for you, Mr. Lambert!"

  "Mamma thought it was a tragedy, and we thought it was a piece of fun,"says the General. "George and I behaved perfectly well, didn't we,Theo?"

  "Not when I was looking your way, papa!" Theo replies. At which theGeneral asks, "Was there ever such a saucy baggage seen?"

  "You know, sir, I didn't speak till I was bid," Theo continues,modestly. "I own I was very much moved by the play, and the beauty andacting of Mrs. Woffington. I was sorry that the poor mother should findher child, and lose him. I am sorry, too, papa, if I oughtn't to havebeen sorry!" adds the young lady, with a smile.

  "Women are not so clever as men, you know, Theo," cries Hetty from herend of the table, with a sly look at Harry. "The next time we go to theplay, please, brother Jack, pinch us when we ought to cry, or give us anudge when it is right to laugh."

  "I wish we could have had the fight," said General Lambert, "the fightbetween little Norval and the gigantic Norwegian--that would have beenrare sport: and you should write, Jack, and suggest it to Mr. Rich, themanager."

  "I have not seen that: but I saw Slack and Broughton at MaryboneGardens!" says Harry, gravely; and wondered if he had said somethingwitty, as all the company laughed so? "It would require no giant," headded, "to knock over yonder little fellow in the red boots. I, for one,could throw him over my shoulder."

  "Mr. Garrick is a little man. But there are times when he looks agiant," says Mr. Spencer. "How grand he was in Macbeth, Mr. Warrington!How awful that dagger-scene was! You should have seen our host, ladies!I presented Mr. Warrington, in the greenroom, to Mr. Garrick and Mrs.Pritchard, and Lady Macbeth did him the honour to take a pinch out ofhis box."

  "Did the wife of the Thane of Cawdor sneeze?" asked the General, in anawful voice.

  "She thanked Mr. Warrington, in tones so hollow and tragic, that hestarted back, and must have upset some of his rappee, for Macbethsneezed thrice."

  "Macbeth, Macbeth, Macbeth!" cries the General.

  "And the great philosopher who was standing by Mr. Johnson, says, 'Youmust mind, Davy, lest thy sneeze should awaken Duncan!' who, by the way,was talking with the three witches as they sat against the wall."

  "What! Have you been behind the scenes at the play? Oh, I would giveworlds to go behind the scenes!" cries Theo.

  "And see the ropes pulled, and smell the tallow-candles, and look at thepasteboard gold, and the tinsel jewels, and the painted old women, Theo?No. Do not look too close," says the sceptical young host, demurelydrinking a glass of hock. "You were angry with your papa and me."

  "Nay, George!" cries the girl.

  "Nay? I say, yes! You were angry with us because we laughed when youwere disposed to be crying. If I may speak for you, sir, as well asmyself," says George (with a bow to his guest, General Lambert), "Ithink we were not inclined to weep, like the ladies, because we stoodbehind the author's scenes of the play, as it were. Looking close up tothe young hero, we saw how much of him was rant and tinsel; and as forthe pale, tragical mother, that her pallor was white chalk, and hergrief her pocket-handkerchief. Own now, Theo, you thought me veryunfeeling?"

  "If you find it out, sir, without my owning it,--what is the good of myconfessing?" says Theo.

  "Suppose I were to die?" goes on George, "and you saw Harry in grief,you would be seeing a genuine affliction, a real tragedy; you wouldgrieve too. But you wouldn't be affected if you saw the undertaker inweepers and a black cloak!"

  "Indeed, but I should, sir!" says Mrs. Lambert; "and so, I promise you,would any daughter of mine."

  "Perhaps we might find weepers of our own, Mr. Warrington," says Theo,"in such a case."

  "Would you?" cries George, and his cheeks and Theo's simultaneouslyflushed up with red; I suppose because they both saw Hetty's brightyoung eyes watching them.

  "The elder writers understood but little of the pathetic," remarked Mr.Spencer, the Temple wit.

  "What do you think of Sophocles and Antigone?" calls out Mr. JohnLambert.

  "Faith, our wits trouble themselves little about him, unless an Oxfordgentleman comes to remind us of him! I did not mean to go back fartherthan Mr. Shakspeare, who, as you will all agree, does not understandthe elegant and pathetic as well as the moderns. Has he ever approachedBelvidera, or Monimia, or Jane Shore; or can you find in his comicfemale characters the elegance of Congreve?" and the Templar offeredsnuff to the right and left.

  "I think Mr. Spencer himself must have tried his hand?" asks some one.

  "Many gentlemen of leisure have. Mr. Garrick, I own, has had a piece ofmine and returned it."

  "And I confess that I have four acts of a play in one of my boxes," saysGeorge.

  "I'll be bound to say it's as good as any of 'em," whispers Harry to hisneighbour.

  "Is it a tragedy or a comedy?" asks Mrs. Lambert.

  "Oh, a tragedy, and two or three dreadful murders at least!" Georgereplies.

  "Let us play it, and let the audience look to their eyes! Yet my chiefhumour is for a tyrant," says the General.

  "The tragedy, the tragedy! Go and fetch the tragedy this moment,Gumbo!" calls Mrs. Lambert to the black. Gumbo makes a low bow and says,"Tragedy? yes, madam."

  "In the great cowskin trunk, Gumbo," George says, gravely.

  Gumbo bows and says, "Yes, sir," with still superior gravity.

  "But my tragedy is at the bottom of I don't know how much linen,packages, books, and boots, Hetty."

  "Never mind, let us have it, and fling the linen out of window!" criesMiss Hetty.

  "And the great cowskin trunk is at our agent's at Bristol: so Gumbo mustget post-horses, and we can keep it up till he returns the day afterto-morrow," says George.

  The ladies groaned a comical "Oh!" and papa, perhaps more seriously,said, "Let us be thankful for the escape. Let us be thinking of goinghome too. Our young gentlemen have treated us nobly, and we will alldrink a parting bumper to Madam Esmond Warrington of Castlewood, inVirginia. Suppose, boys, you were to find a tall, handsome stepfatherwhen you got home? Ladies as old as she have been known to marry beforenow."

  "To Madam Esmond Warrington, my old schoolfellow!" cries Mrs. Lambert."I shall write and tell her what a pretty supper her sons have given us:and, Mr. George, I won't say how ill you behaved at the play!" And,with this last toast, the company took leave; the General's coach andservant, with a flambeau, being in waiting to carry his family home
.

  After such an entertainment as that which Mr. Warrington had given, whatcould be more natural or proper than a visit from him to his guests,to inquire how they had reached home and rested? Why, their coach mighthave taken the open country behind Montague House, in the directionof Oxford Road, and been waylaid by footpads in the fields. The ladiesmight have caught cold or slept ill after the excitement of the tragedy.In a word, there was no reason why he should make any excuse at all tohimself or them for visiting his kind friends; and he shut his booksearly at the Sloane Museum, and perhaps thought, as he walked awaythence, that he remembered very little about what he had been reading.

  Pray what is the meaning of this eagerness, this hesitation, thispshaing and shilly-shallying, these doubts, this tremor as he knocksat the door of Mr. Lambert's lodgings in Dean Street, and survey thefootman who comes to his summons? Does any young man read? does anyold one remember? does any wearied, worn, disappointed pulseless heartrecall the time of its full beat and early throbbing? It is ever so manyhundred years since some of us were young; and we forget, but do not allforget. No, madam, we remember with advantages, as Shakspeare's Harrypromised his soldiers they should do if they survived Agincourt andthat day of St. Crispin. Worn old chargers turned out to grass, if thetrumpet sounds over the hedge, may we not kick up our old heels, andgallop a minute or so about the paddock, till we are brought up roaring?I do not care for clown and pantaloon now, and think the fairy ugly, andher verses insufferable: but I like to see children at a pantomime. Ido not dance, or eat supper any more; but I like to watch Eugenio andFlirtilla twirling round in a pretty waltz, or Lucinda and Ardentiopulling a cracker. Burn your little fingers, children! Blaze out littlekindly flames from each other's eyes! And then draw close together andread the motto (that old namby-pamby motto, so stale and so new!)--Isay, let her lips read it, and his construe it; and so divide thesweetmeat, young people, and crunch it between you. I have no teeth.Bitter almonds and sugar disagree with me, I tell you; but, for allthat, shall not bonbons melt in the mouth?

  We follow John upstairs to the General's apartments, and enter with Mr.George Esmond Warrington, who makes a prodigious fine bow. There isonly one lady in the room, seated near a window: there is not often muchsunshine in Dean Street: the young lady in the window is no especialbeauty: but it is spring-time, and she is blooming vernally. A bunchof fresh roses is flushing in her honest cheek. I suppose her eyes areviolets. If we lived a hundred years ago, and wrote in the Gentleman'sor the London Magazine, we should tell Mr. Sylvanus Urban that her neckwas the lily, and her shape the nymph's: we should write an acrosticabout her, and celebrate our Lambertella in an elegant poem, still to beread between a neat new engraved plan of the city of Prague and the Kingof Prussia's camp, and a map of Maryland and the Delaware counties.

  Here is Miss Theo blushing like a rose. What could mamma have meant anhour since by insisting that she was very pale and tired, and had bestnot come out to-day with the rest of the party? They were gone to paytheir compliments to my Lord Wrotham's ladies, and thank them for thehouse in their absence; and papa was at the Horse Guards. He is in greatspirits. I believe he expects some command, though mamma is in a sadtremor lest he should again be ordered abroad.

  "Your brother and mine are gone to see our little brother at his schoolat the Chartreux. My brothers are both to be clergymen, I think," MissTheo continues. She is assiduously hemming at some article of boyishwearing apparel as she talks. A hundred years ago, young ladies were notafraid either to make shirts, or to name them. Mind, I don't say theywere the worse or the better for that plain stitching or plain speaking:and have not the least desire, my dear young lady, that you should makepuddings or I should black boots.

  So Harry has been with them? "He often comes, almost every day," Theosays, looking up in George's face. "Poor fellow! He likes us better thanthe fine folks, who don't care for him now--now he is no longer a finefolk himself," adds the girl, smiling. "Why have you not set up for thefashion, and frequented the chocolate-houses and the racecourses, Mr.Warrington?"

  "Has my brother got so much good out of his gay haunts or his grandfriends, that I should imitate him?"

  "You might at least go to Sir Miles Warrington; sure his arms are opento receive you. Her ladyship was here this morning in her chair, andto hear her praises of you! She declares you are in a certain way topreferment. She says his Royal Highness the Duke made much of you atcourt. When you are a great man will you forget us, Mr. Warrington?"

  "Yes, when I am a great man I will, Miss Lambert."

  "Well! Mr. George, then----"

  "--Mr. George!"

  "When papa and mamma are here, I suppose there need be no mistering,"says Theo, looking out of the window, ever so little frightened. "Andwhat have you been doing, sir? Reading books, or writing more of yourtragedy? Is it going to be a tragedy to make us cry, as we like them, oronly to frighten us, as you like them?"

  "There is plenty of killing, but, I fear, not much crying. I have notmet many women. I have not been very intimate with those. I daresay whatI have written is only taken out of books or parodied from poems whichI have read and imitated like other young men. Women do not speak to me,generally; I am said to have a sarcastic way which displeases them."

  "Perhaps you never cared to please them?" inquires Miss Theo, with ablush.

  "I displeased you last night; you know I did?"

  "Yes; only it can't be called displeasure, and afterwards thought I waswrong."

  "Did you think about me at all when I was away, Theo?"

  "Yes, George--that is, Mr.--well, George! I thought you and papa wereright about the play; and, as you said, that it was no real sorrow, onlyaffectation, which was moving us. I wonder whether it is good or illfortune to see so clearly? Hetty and I agreed that we would be verycareful, for the future, how we allowed ourselves to enjoy a tragedy.So, be careful when yours comes! What is the name of it?"

  "He is not christened. Will you be the godmother? The name of the chiefcharacter is----" But at this very moment mamma and Miss Hetty arrivedfrom their walk; and mamma straightway began protesting that she neverexpected to see Mr. Warrington at all that day--that is, she thought hemight come--that is, it was very good of him to come, and the play andthe supper of yesterday were all charming, except that Theo had a littleheadache this morning.

  "I dare say it is better now, mamma," says Miss Hetty.

  "Indeed, my dear, it never was of any consequence; and I told mamma so,"says Miss Theo, with a toss of her head.

  Then they fell to talking about Harry. He was very low. He must havesomething to do. He was always going to the Military Coffee-House, andperpetually poring over the King of Prussia's campaigns. It was not fairupon him, to bid him remain in London, after his deposition, as it were.He said nothing, but you could see how he regretted his previous uselesslife, and felt his present dependence, by the manner in which he avoidedhis former haunts and associates. Passing by the guard at St. James's,with John Lambert, he had said to brother Jack, "Why mayn't I bea soldier too? I am as tall as yonder fellow, and can kill with afowling-piece as well as any man I know. But I can't earn so much assixpence a day. I have squandered my own bread, and now I am eating halfmy brother's. He is the best of brothers, but so much the more shamethat I should live upon him. Don't tell my brother, Jack Lambert." "Andmy boy promised he wouldn't tell," says Mrs. Lambert. No doubt. Thegirls were both out of the room when their mother made this speech toGeorge Warrington. He, for his part, said he had written home to hismother--that half his little patrimony, the other half likewise, ifwanted, were at Harry's disposal, for purchasing a commission, or forany other project which might bring him occupation or advancement.

  "He has got a good brother, that is sure. Let us hope for good times forhim," sighs the lady.

  "The Danes always come pour qui scait attendre," George said, in a lowvoice.

  "What, you heard that? Ah, George! my Theo is an----Ah! never mind whatshe is, George Warrington," cried the
pleased mother, with brimful eyes."Bah! I am going to make a gaby of myself, as I did at the tragedy."

  Now Mr. George had been revolving a fine private scheme, whichhe thought might turn to his brother's advantage. After George'spresentation to his Royal Highness at Kensington, more persons thanone, his friend General Lambert included, had told him that the Duke hadinquired regarding him, and had asked why the young man did not come tohis levee. Importunity so august could not but be satisfied. A day wasappointed between Mr. Lambert and his young friend, and they went to paytheir duty to his Royal Highness at his house in Pall Mall.

  When it came to George's turn to make a bow, the Prince was especiallygracious; he spoke to Mr. Warrington at some length about Braddock andthe war, and was apparently pleased with the modesty and intelligenceof the young gentleman's answers. George ascribed the failure of theexpedition to the panic and surprise certainly, but more especially tothe delays occasioned by the rapacity, selfishness, and unfair dealingof the people of the colonies towards the King's troops who were cometo defend them. "Could we have moved, sir, a month sooner, the fortwas certainly ours, and the little army had never been defeated,"Mr. Warrington said; in which observation his Royal Highness entirelyconcurred.

  "I am told you saved yourself, sir, mainly by your knowledge of theFrench language," the Royal Duke then affably observed. Mr. Warringtonmodestly mentioned how he had been in the French colonies in his youth,and had opportunities of acquiring that tongue.

  The Prince (who had a great urbanity when well pleased, and the finestsense of humour) condescended to ask who had taught Mr. Warrington thelanguage; and to express his opinion, that, for the pronunciation, theFrench ladies were by far the best teachers.

  The young Virginian gentleman made a low bow, and said it was not forhim to gainsay his Royal Highness; upon which the Duke was good enoughto say (in a jocose manner) that Mr. Warrington was a sly dog.

  Mr. W. remaining respectfully silent, the Prince continued, most kindly:"I take the field immediately against the French, who, as you know, arethreatening his Majesty's Electoral dominions, If you have a mind tomake the campaign with me, your skill in the language may be useful,and I hope we shall be more fortunate than poor Braddock!" Every eyewas fixed on a young man to whom so great a Prince offered so signal afavour.

  And now it was that Mr. George thought he would make his very cleverestspeech. "Sir," he said, "your Royal Highness's most kind proposal doesme infinite honour, but----"

  "But what, sir?" says the Prince, staring at him.

  "But I have entered myself of the Temple, to study our laws, and to fitmyself for my duties at home. If my having been wounded in the serviceof my country be any claim on your kindness, I would humbly ask that mybrother, who knows the French language as well as myself, and has farmore strength, courage, and military genius, might be allowed to serveyour Royal Highness; in the place of----"

  "Enough, enough, sir!" cried out the justly irritated son of themonarch. "What? I offer you a favour, and you hand it over to yourbrother? Wait, sir, till I offer you another!" And with this the Princeturned his back upon Mr. Warrington, just as abruptly as he turned it onthe French a few months afterwards.

  "Oh, George! oh, George! Here's a pretty kettle of fish!" groanedGeneral Lambert, as he and his young friend walked home together.