desired that his children should have the best of everything: ordered
about upholsterers, painters, carriage-makers, in his splendid Indian
way; presented pretty Rosey with brilliant jewels for her introduction at
Court, and was made happy by the sight of the blooming young creature
decked in these magnificences, and admired by all his little circle. The
old boys, the old generals, the old colonels, the old qui-his from the
club, came and paid her their homage; the directors' ladies, and the
generals' ladies, called upon her, and feasted her at vast banquets
served on sumptuous plate. Newcome purchased plate and gave banquets in
return for these hospitalities. Mrs. Clive had a neat close carriage for
evenings, and a splendid barouche to drive in the Park. It was pleasant
to see this equipage at four o'clock of an afternoon, driving up to
Bays's, with Rosey most gorgeously attired reclining within; and to
behold the stately grace of the old gentleman as he stepped out to
welcome his daughter-in-law, and the bow he made before he entered her
carriage. Then they would drive round the Park; round and round and
round; and the old generals, and the old colonels, and old fogies, and
their ladies and daughters, would nod and smile out of their carriages as
they crossed each other upon this charming career of pleasure.
I confess that a dinner at the Colonel's, now he appeared in all his
magnificence, was awfully slow. No peaches could look fresher than
Rosey's cheeks,--no damask was fairer than her pretty little shoulders.
No one, I am sure, could be happier than she, but she did not impart her
happiness to her friends; and replied chiefly by smiles to the
conversation of the gentlemen at her side. It is true that these were for
the most part elderly dignitaries, distinguished military officers with
blue-black whiskers, retired old Indian judges, and the like, occupied
with their victuals, and generally careless to please. But that solemn
happiness of the Colonel, who shall depict it:--that look of affection
with which he greeted his daughter as she entered, flounced to the waist,
twinkling with innumerable jewels, holding a dainty pocket-handkerchief,
with smiling eyes, dimpled cheeks, and golden ringlets! He would take her
hand, or follow her about from group to group, exchanging precious
observations about the weather, the Park, the exhibition, nay, the opera,
for the old man actually went to the opera with his little girl, and
solemnly snoozed by her side in a white waistcoat.
Very likely this was the happiest period of Thomas Newcome's life. No
woman (save one perhaps fifty years ago) had ever seemed so fond of him
as that little girl. What pride he had in her, and what care he took of
her! If she was a little ailing, what anxiety and hurrying for doctors!
What droll letters came from James Binnie, and how they laughed over
them: with what respectful attention he acquainted Mrs. Mack with
everything that took place: with what enthusiasm that Campaigner replied!
Josey's husband called a special blessing upon his head in the church at
Musselburgh; and little Jo herself sent a tinful of Scotch bun to her
darling sister, with a request from her husband that he might have a few
shares in the famous Indian Company.
The Company was in a highly flourishing condition, as you may suppose,
when one of its directors, who at the same time was one of the honestest
men alive, thought it was his duty to live in the splendour in which we
now behold him. Many wealthy City men did homage to him. His brother
Hobson, though the Colonel had quarrelled with the chief of the firm, yet
remained on amiable terms with Thomas Newcome, and shared and returned
his banquets for a while. Charles Honeyman we may be sure was present at
many of them, and smirked a blessing over the plenteous meal. The
Colonel's influence was such with Mr. Sherrick that he pleaded Charles's
cause with that gentleman, and actually brought to a successful
termination that little love-affair in which we have seen Miss Sherrick
and Charles engaged. Mr. Sherrick was not disposed to part with much
money during his lifetime--indeed, he proved to Colonel Newcome that he
was not so rich as the world supposed him. But, by the Colonel's
interest, the chaplaincy of Boggley Wollah was procured for the Rev. C.
Honeyman, who now forms the delight of that flourishing station.
All this while we have said little about Clive, who in truth was somehow
in the background in this flourishing Newcome group. To please the best
father in the world; the kindest old friend who endowed his niece with
the best part of his savings; to settle that question about marriage and
have an end of it;--Clive Newcome had taken a pretty and fond young girl,
who respected and admired him beyond all men, and who heartily desired to
make him happy. To do as much would not his father have stripped his coat
from his back,--have put his head under Juggernaut's chariot-wheel, have
sacrificed any ease, comfort, or pleasure for the youngster's benefit?
One great passion he had had and closed the account of it: a worldly
ambitious girl--how foolishly worshipped and passionately beloved no
matter--had played with him for years; had flung him away when a
dissolute suitor with a great fortune and title had offered himself. Was
he to whine and despair because a jilt had fooled him? He had too much
pride and courage for any such submission; he would accept the lot in
life which was offered to him, no undesirable one surely; he would fulfil
the wish of his father's heart, and cheer his kind declining years. In
this way the marriage was brought about. It was but a whisper to Rosey in
the drawing-room, a start and a blush from the little girl as he took the
little willing hand, a kiss for her from her delighted old father-in-law,
a twinkle in good old James's eyes, and double embrace from the
Campaigner as she stood over them in a benedictory attitude;--expressing
her surprise at an event for which she had been jockeying ever since she
set eyes on young Newcome; and calling upon Heaven to bless her children.
So, as a good thing when it is to be done had best be done quickly, these
worthy folks went off almost straightway to a clergyman, and were married
out of hand--to the astonishment of Captains Hoby and Goby when they came
to hear of the event. Well, my gallant young painter and friend of my
boyhood! if my wife chooses to be angry at your marriage, shall her
husband not wish you happy?
Suppose we had married our first loves, others of us, were we the happier
now? Ask Mr. Pendennis, who sulked in his tents when his Costigan, his
Briseis, was ravished from him. Ask poor George Warrington, who had his
own way, Heaven help him! There was no need why Clive should turn monk
because number one refused him; and, that charmer removed, why he should
not take to his heart number two. I am bound to say, that when I
expressed these opinions to Mrs. Laura, she was more angry and provoked
than ever.
It is in the nature of such a simple soul as Thomas Newcome, to see but
/>
one side of a question, and having once fixed Ethel's worldliness in his
mind, and her brother's treason, to allow no argument of advocates of the
other side to shake his displeasure. Hence the one or two appeals which
Laura ventured to make on behalf of her friend, were checked by the good
Colonel with a stern negation. If Ethel was not guiltless, she could not
make him see at least that she was not guilty. He dashed away all excuses
and palliations. Exasperated as he was, he persisted in regarding the
poor girl's conduct in its most unfavourable light. "She was rejected,
and deservedly rejected, by the Marquis of Farintosh," he broke out to me
once, who was not indeed authorised to tell all I knew regarding the
story; "the whole town knows it; all the clubs ring with it. I blush,
sir, to think that my brother's child should have brought such a stain
upon our name." In vain, I told him that my wife, who knew all the
circumstances much better, judged Miss Newcome far more favourably, and
indeed greatly esteemed and loved her. "Pshaw! sir," breaks out the
indignant Colonel, "your wife is an innocent creature, who does not know
the world as we men of experience do,--as I do, sir;" and would have no
more of the discussion. There is no doubt about it, there was a coolness
between my old friend's father and us.
As for Barnes Newcome, we gave up that worthy, and the Colonel showed him
no mercy. He recalled words used by Warrington, which I have recorded in
a former page, and vowed that he only watched for an opportunity to crush
the miserable reptile. He hated Barnes as a loathsome traitor, coward, and
criminal; he made no secret of his opinion; and Clive, with the
remembrance of former injuries, of dreadful heart-pangs; the inheritor of
his father's blood, his honesty of nature, and his impetuous enmity
against wrong; shared to the full his sire's antipathy against his
cousin, and publicly expressed his scorn and contempt for him. About
Ethel he would not speak. "Perhaps what you say, Pen, is true," he said.
"I hope it is. Pray God it is." But his quivering lips and fierce
countenance, when her name was mentioned or her defence attempted, showed
that he too had come to think ill of her. "As for her brother, as for
that scoundrel," he would say, clenching his fist, "if ever I can punish
him I will. I shouldn't have the soul of a dog, if ever I forgot the
wrongs that have been done me by that vagabond. Forgiveness? Pshaw! Are
you dangling to sermons, Pen, at your wife's leading-strings? Are you
preaching that cant? There are some injuries that no honest man should
forgive, and I shall be a rogue on the day I shake hands with that
villain."
"Clive has adopted the Iroquois ethics," says George Warrington, smoking
his pipe sententiously, "rather than those which are at present received
among us. I am not sure that something is not to be said, as against the
Eastern, upon the Western, or Tomahawk, or Ojibbeway side of the
question. I should not like," he added, "to be in a vendetta or feud, and
to have you, Clive, and the old Colonel engaged against me."
"I would rather," I said, "for my part, have half a dozen such enemies as
Clive and the Colonel, than one like Barnes. You never know where or when
that villain may hit you." And before a very short period was over, Sir
Barnes Newcome, Bart., hit his two hostile kinsmen such a blow, as one
might expect from such a quarter.
CHAPTER LXIII
Mrs. Clive at Home
Clive and his father did not think fit to conceal their opinions
regarding their kinsman, Barnes Newcome, and uttered them in many public
places when Sir Barnes's conduct was brought into question, we may be
sure that their talk came to the Baronet's ears, and did not improve his
already angry feeling towards those gentlemen. For a while they had the
best of the attack. The Colonel routed Barnes out of his accustomed club
at Bays's; where also the gallant Sir George Tufto expressed himself
pretty openly with respect to the poor Baronet's want of courage: the
Colonel had bullied and browbeaten Barnes in the parlour of his own bank,
and the story was naturally well known in the City; where it certainly
was not pleasant for Sir Barnes, as he walked to 'Change, to meet
sometimes the scowls of the angry man of war, his uncle, striding down to
the offices of the Bundelcund Bank, and armed with that terrible bamboo
cane.
But though his wife had undeniably run away after notorious ill-treatment
from her husband; though he had shown two white feathers in those
unpleasant little affairs with his uncle and cousin; though Sir Barnes
Newcome was certainly neither amiable nor popular in the City of London,
his reputation as a most intelligent man of business still stood; the
credit of his house was deservedly high, and people banked with him, and
traded with him, in spite of faithless wives and hostile colonels.
When the outbreak between Colonel Newcome and his nephew took place, it
may be remembered that Mr. Hobson Newcome, the other partner of the firm
of Hobson Brothers, waited upon Colonel Newcome, as one of the principal
English directors of the B. B. C., and hoped that although private
differences would, of course, oblige Thomas Newcome to cease all personal
dealings with the bank of Hobson, the affairs of the Company in which he
was interested ought not to suffer on this account; and that the Indian
firm should continue dealing with Hobsons on the same footing as before.
Mr. Hobson Newcome represented to the Colonel, in his jolly frank way,
that whatever happened between the latter and his nephew Barnes, Thomas
Newcome had still one friend in the house; that the transactions between
it and the Indian Company were mutually advantageous; finally, that the
manager of the Indian bank might continue to do business with Hobsons as
before. So the B. B. C. sent its consignments to Hobson Brothers, and
drew its bills, which were duly honoured by that firm.
More than one of Colonel Newcome's City acquaintances, among them his
agent, Mr. Jolly, and his ingenuous friend, Mr. Sherrick, especially,
hinted to Thomas Newcome to be very cautious in his dealings with Hobson
Brothers, and keep a special care lest that house should play him an evil
turn. They both told him that Barnes Newcome had said more than once, in
answer to reports of the Colonel's own speeches against Barnes. "I know
that hot-headed, blundering Indian uncle of mine is furious against me,
on account of an absurd private affair and misunderstanding, which he is
too obstinate to see in the proper light. What is my return for the abuse
and rant which he lavishes against me? I cannot forget that he is my
grandfather's son, an old man, utterly ignorant both of society and
business here; and as he is interested in this Indian Banking Company,
which must be preciously conducted when it appointed him as the guardian
and overseer of its affairs in England, I do my very best to serve the
Company, and I can tell you, its blundering, muddleheaded managers, black
and whi
te, owe no little to the assistance which they have had from our
house. If they don't like us, why do they go on dealing with us? We don't
want them and their bills. We were a leading house fifty years before
they were born, and shall continue to be so long after they come to an
end." Such was Barnes's case, as stated by himself. It was not a very bad
one, or very unfairly stated, considering the advocate. I believe he has
always persisted in thinking that he never did his uncle any wrong.
Mr. Jolly and Mr. Sherrick, then, both entreated Thomas Newcome to use
his best endeavours, and bring the connexion of the B. B. C. and Hobson
Brothers to a speedy end. But Jolly was an interested party; he and his
friends would have had the agency of the B. B. C., and the profits
thereof, which Hobsons had taken from them. Mr. Sherrick was an outside
practitioner, a guerilla amongst regular merchants. The opinions of one
and the other, though submitted by Thomas Newcome duly to his
co-partners, the managers and London board of directors of the Bundelcund
Banking Company, were overruled by that assembly.
They had their establishment and apartments in the City; they had their
clerks and messengers, their managers' room and board-room, their
meetings, where no doubt great quantities of letters were read, vast
ledgers produced; where Tom Newcome was voted into the chair, and voted
out with thanks; where speeches were made, and the affairs of the
B. B. C. properly discussed. These subjects are mysterious, terrifying,
unknown to me. I cannot pretend to describe them. Fred Bayham, I
remember, used to be great in his knowledge of the affairs of the
Bundelcund Banking Company. He talked of cotton, wool, copper, opium,
indigo, Singapore, Manilla, China, Calcutta, Australia, with prodigious
eloquence and fluency. His conversation was about millions. The most
astounding paragraphs used to appear in the Pall Mall Gazette, regarding
the annual dinner at Blackwall, which the directors gave, and to which
he, and George, and I, as friends of the court, were invited. What
orations were uttered, what flowing bumpers emptied in the praise of this
great Company; what quantities of turtle and punch did Fred devour at its
expense! Colonel Newcome was the kindly old chairman at these banquets;
the prince, his son, taking but a modest part in the ceremonies, and
sitting with us, his old cronies.
All the gentlemen connected with the board, all those with whom the
B. B. C. traded in London, paid Thomas Newcome extraordinary respect. His
character for wealth was deservedly great, and of course multiplied by
the tongue of Rumour. F. B. knew to a few millions of rupees, more or
less, what the Colonel possessed, and what Clive would inherit. Thomas
Newcome's distinguished military services, his high bearing, lofty
courtesy, simple but touching garrulity;--for the honest man talked much
more now than he had been accustomed to do in former days, and was not
insensible to the flattery which his wealth brought him,--his reputation
as a keen man of business, who had made his own fortune by operations
equally prudent and spirited, and who might make the fortunes of hundreds
of other people, brought the worthy Colonel a number of friends, and I
promise you that the loudest huzzahs greeted his health when it was
proposed at the Blackwall dinners. At the second annual dinner after
Clive's marriage some friends presented Mrs. Clive Newcome with a fine
testimonial. There was a superb silver cocoa-nut tree, whereof the leaves
were dexterously arranged for holding candle and pickles; under the
cocoa-nut was an Indian prince on a camel, giving his hand to a cavalry
officer on horseback--a howitzer, a plough, a loom, a bale of cotton, on
which were the East India Company's arms, a Brahmin, Britannia, and
Commerce with a cornucopia were grouped round the principal figures: and