The Newcomes

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