Lilias, the Milliner's Apprentice ... With ... wood-engravings drawn by W. H. Thwaits

Front matter

LILIAS, THE MILLINER'S APPRENTICE. BY GABRIEL ALEXANDER, ACTHOB OF "WALLACE, THE HEEO OP SCOTLAND," "BRUCE, THE HEEO-KING OE SCOTLAND," &C, &C WITH BEAUTIFUL WOOD-ENGRAVINGS, DRAWN BY W. H. THWAITS. LONDON : 'UBLISHED, FOB THE PROPRIETOR, BY JOHN DICKS, AT THE OFFICE OF "EEYITOLDS'S MISCELLANY." No. 7, WELLINGTON STREET NORTH, STRAND. 1854. ILLUSTRATIONS, For Illustration on Pago 1 . . oeo pago 3 9 . .. „ 13 » 17 „ 22 i. 25 . . „ 32 33 . „ „ 40 41 . . „ 47 Lilias Winter pago 49 For Illustration on Page 57 . . bob page 03 i. G5 . . „ 67 73 . . n 70 » 81 . „ 81 .. 81) . „ 92 97 „ 98 » 105 . . „ 107 >. 113 . . „ 116 .. 121 . . „ 123 Winslow Strickland .... pagR 129 For IlltiEtration on Page 137 . . eea pago 144 .. 145 . . „ 151 .f 153 . . „ 1G0 181 . . „ 1G5 169 . . „ 175 Barbara Bryant page X77 For Illustration on Page 185 . . eoo page 187 193 . . „ 199 201 . . „ 207 209 . . f> 214 217 . . „ 218 .i 225 . .

H 223 233 . . „ 237 241 . ., n 245 249 . . „ 259 257 . . ■, 2C7 Fatheb Ignatius page 2G5 Mbs. Seymour 273 Mb. RocuEsteb f] 281 RUTHGLEN ,,289 E\>r Illustration on Pago 297 . . soo page 308 ■> 305 . „ illustrations. For Illustration on Page 313 . . see page 329 Lady Penelope Fitzallen . . pago 321 Fbederick.7D'Aroy .... ,, 329 For Illustration on Page 337 . . see page 339 „ 345 . . „ 352 353 . . „ 365 361 . . „ 380 Geobgiana Stbiokland . . . page 369 For Illustration on Page 377 . . see page 392 Lady Langley .... page 385 Me. Appleby „ 393 . For Illustration on Page 401 . • see page LILIAS THE MILLINER'S APPRENTICE. .though small for that age, who was running and [screaming wildly along the highway, ou seeing the enraged animal, which had been goaded to fury, making after her. "A minuto or two more and the beautiful creature would have been at the mercy of the savage brute, had we not galiopped forward to her rescue," added he, panting with the exertion of planting the terrified thing before him. She was indeed a handsome and lovely little

Chapter I

the threshold's three steps. "It is tho prettiest little girl in all England that I have saved from that maddened bull," cried Winslow Strickland to his companions, as he stooped from his saddle and plucked up into bis »*-ms a child of nine or ten years apparently, Bv this time the three young equestrians were abreast of the lane in which the little girl lived. Strickland stopped to let her down, whilst the others went on, they having paid small heed to the child's prattle. Not so he who had been the more immediate instrument in her rescue. " I will seek you out, Lilias, perhaps the next time I pass this way," said he, "but now we must part, after you have given me a kiss. " That I will," cried she with glee, and thank you too;" and having held up her pout ing ruby lips, and clasped the youth round the neck, the innocent gave him as hearty a smack as ever was lent by guileless humanity.

A moment after she was otf and down the lane to old Deborah, with the fullest budget of news the child ever brought to the good woman s fire side. . ,, It was a matter of course that Strickland s companions should have their banter out con cerning the foundling, as they designated the beautiful creature, the moment he made up to them ; a raillery, however, which he in no way resented, for nothing but pleasurable emotions were connected with her. But the near approach to the metropolis, and the many other things the young gentlemen had to think of, — their's being but a very shoit leave of absence from Eton, on. that occasion, — soon led to a change of discourse and of cogitation. Ere long their roads separated; they were striplings of family ; their urban homes were at distinct places in the aristocratic quarters of the towa ; and speedily was each receiving such welcome as parents, sisters, and dearest domestic kindred alone can bestow upon the youthful representative of their house on a visit from school.

Only one additional particular do we add to this para graph: Winslow Strickland, although his young heart beat with grateful recollections of what he had done for little Lilias, aud although with the oracular romance of youth his thoughts wandered far into dreamland concerning her, yet, some how, he never thought of narrating to the home circle the incident of her rescue. He felt that he could not have mentioned the circumstance with unsuffused cheeks, even though proud of his achievement. girl, beiDg beautifully fair,— a plump symme trical figure, and, as soon as her terror subsided, presenting such a cherub-like sweetness that the Eton scholar could not resist implanting a kiss upon her dimpled cheek, as he swathed her in his arms. She was clean, and tidily though plainly dressed, indicating that she belonged to people in humble life, and withal of such a charming aspect as forced the young gentleman to exclaim : — " Were I an old and confirmed bachelor, or married and despairing of children, I would be eager to adopt this little body, provided I had anything that I could probably bequeath her, that should be worth her acceptance."

"Hear him!" cried Frederick d'Arcy, ad dressing Edgar Seymour, the third of the com panion-scholars. " Strickland talks as if he were a daddy already, in place of his being but half through his teens. I'm sure he's not twice the child's age ; and, in fact, ten to one but he has naughtier thoughts in his head than what he chooses to give voice to." " Hush ! don't let the little girl hear you, Fred," muttered he to whom the light speech had been directed ; " but it is high time that we got rid of the trouble, now that the furious animal has taken another road and is out of sight ;" the child meanwhile paying heed with an eye of intelligent smartness to what was spoken. " Indeed I wont part with the little body until I see her home, for that cannot be far off, now that we are getting into straggling Kensington," said Strickland ; and without waiting to listen to anything which his friends might have to ad vance in the way of banter or impatience, he proceeded to put questions to the pretty girl, relative to her name, her parents, and her place of abode.

" They call me Lilias Winter, and I live in yonder lane where you see roofs of houses amongst the trees," answered she, pointing to the right Bide of the road, as they rode towards London. " Were I at the top of the' lane, I could run home in a minute." " They call you !" exclaimed Strickland : ■ do you not call yourself by the same name ?" " Oh, yes ; I have no other name that I know of," replied she ; " but still they say that since it is quite uncertain who were my parents, it is impossible to tell how I should be called, although it is not much matter." "What is not much matter?" inquired the young gentleman who had snatched her up into his arms out of dreadful danger, becoming more interested in the little girl. "Not much matter whether they call me Winter or Summer," replied she ; " for what's in a name ?

Yet I would fain learn who my father and mother ave or were, but that will never be. Still, old Deborah is both to me. Some call me the foundling, others the kidnapped child." " Who is old Deborah, then 7" rejoined Strickland. Nearly two years elapsed before ever Winslow Strickland found that he had an oppotunity in the manner that should be most agreeable to himself, of making inquiries after Lilias Winter ; and this was at the close of his schooling at Eton, shortly also prior to his preceding to Ox ford. He had not forgotten the touching inci dent concerning the pretty girl ; he had uften ruminated upon its particulars; and he determined to seek her out in the course of one of his evening strolls. Sauntering through Hyde Park and next into Kensington Gardens, he thence bent his steps towards the lano at the top of which he had last seen the interesting creature.

It was now quite dark ; and a drizzling rain which had begun to fall rendered hia path still gloomier. Ha stopped, after advancing a few paces down the lane, in the hope of some pa ser by being able to direct him to old Deborah's cottage, — for his memory had treasured the name ; but had not stood many moments before shriek upon shriek issued from some adjacent quarter ahead of him, — the cries appearing to be those of a female youthful voice, and to proceed " Everybody knows good old Deborah, I should think," cried the sharp girl ; " I live in her cottage and sleep in her bosom. I have been on an errand for her. Oh 1 will not grandmamma, as I call her, be frightened when I tel! her about the wild bull ?" from severe suffering. He bounded forward, — the surmise jumping into his mind at the same moment that it might be the charming foundling whose screams had torn his ear, stimulating him the more.

The cries still continued, inter mingled with piteous beseechings in the words of " Do not kill me outright ! Murder ! mur der !" guiding the young gentleman to the very dwelling whence the dreadful sounds eame, mingled with those of savage flagellation. Strickland's was not a nature to stand upon ceremonies in such circumstances ; his were not limbs and hands, though only a youth of seventeen, to be resisted by any ordinary impediment, when his robust and vigorous strength wa3 needed. Throwing himself with all his might and weight against the outer door, it flew from its hinges, and next instant he found himself between an hyena in the shape of a female and her victim in that of a girl writhing with pain. " Lilias Winter and none other !" exclaimed the young gentleman, as he held her up, for she had rushed to him for protection and succour without at first having any knowledge in her distraction that she had ever seen him before.

" But give me liberty for a moment until I dis arm the monster of her weapon," added he, accompanying the word with the wrenching action. know, is already endangered by this night's out rage. Hither with an officer immediately. The monster is drunk ; it is not safe to leave her at liberty even within her own house, if fire have any terrors for you." The young gentleman's resoluteness, aud the approval which happened to be heartily lent to what he said by one or two who listened to him, notwithstanding all the abuse and violence which the wretch displayed whom he was determined to see called to an account for her inhumanity, ere long brought a couple of policemen, who on hearing the particulars of the case, and observ ing the sorry condition to which Lilias waa re duced, took the drunken virago with them.

Strickland, with the poor girl leaning upon his arm, followed ; a safe and comfortable bed, with kindly treatment, beiug soon found for the desti tute creature till next day, when the prisoner, Barbara Bryant by name, was brought before the magistrate. A few words speedily put his worship in possession of the main facts of the case, and these came from the mouth of the foundling, as we shall often call her. " Good Deborah died, who had beeu always like the best of parents to me," said she ; " I was then without a home, but Barbara Bryant made a great ado to have me for a companion, as she said. She had been our neighbour, and although I knew little about her, 1 was glad to have a roof over my head ; so I went to her, to be her servant, as I thought, for my bed and board. And hard work I had of it.

This, however, I did not so much mind, so long as she did not beat me unmercifully, which was chiefly because I would not go out with her at night among the soldiers," To the question of how old she was, the answer given made the girl appear to be in her twelfth year. To whether she had ever gone out of nights with Bryant, the negative was un hesitating and direct in the following terms : — " I never went out with her after dark, nor did she ever ask me when she waa eober. But last night she was more drunken than usual, and I think it would have been my last, had some body not come to my assistance ; for she took fearful oaths that either dead or alive I should go with her before she -slept. But I had made up my mind to die, if my cries brought no deliverance, rather than follow her ways."

"Can snch things be in this land of law, justice, and liberty 1" exclaimed the magistrate, whilst sighs of sympathy, mingled with breathings of admiration, for Lilias, prevailed even over the groans of indignation against the pri soner, whose bearing, aspect, and figure every way answered the character which the poor girl's statement, sufferings, and appearance moBt clearly furnished relative to the polluted savage. " Six months with hard labour in the House of Correction is your doom, Barbara Bryant, for your most flagitious misconduct to Lilias Win ter," said the magistrate. "See to it that ye comport yourself properly after the close of these months, otherwise a much severer sentence may be your next for a like offence to that which you have so recently committed." " I'll see to it that I be avengsd onthe tell tale imp, no matter how many years intervene between now and then," muttered the virago, but not so as to distinctly reach the ear of officer "Ha!" sobbed the girl, "my deliverer a second time !

Heaven is on my side ; yet per mit me not to be left with that fearful woman alone : for she'll be my death. See, sir, how I am cut, bruised, and bleeding ; there is hardly a bit of me that is better than this." The girl bared her Bhoulders, first one and then another, although it was with difficulty, — for her hands were swollen and her arms stiff from the blows which a thick rod wielded by the virago had dealt her, when striving to shield her person and face, — and horrible to think, not only was she seen to have been barbarously mis used from the numerous purple weals that pre sented themselves, but by the blood that trickled from parts that had been trebly be laboured. Fortunately by this time the noise made by the forcing open of the door as well as by the shrieks had brought others to the scene of violence ; who, on beholding Strickland, and hearing him address the girl with marked tenderness as Lilias Winter, and also witnessing how cruelly she had been beaten, joined in their expressions of horror and indignation towards the savage, although, perhaps, had they been by themselves, their tone might have been milder. '•Is this wretch, Lilias, old Deborah, — the grandmamma, of whom you formerly told me ?" hurriedly inquired the young gentleman.

" Grandmamma has been in her grave these twelve months, sir," sobbed the girl ; " I know the number of the months well, my very skin has kept the account." " Is there no one here to bring an officer ?" was Winslow's next passionate demand. " Shame upon you that ye, neighbours, have allowed this murderous work to be going on under your very eyes. Where is your humanity, women ?" — (they were all females whom he addressed at the moment) — "How soon may your oimi offsprings be fatherless and motherless and as this trembler, whose life, for aught I AI'PBENTIOB. 4 While the beldame was thus purposing,— indeed, from the moment of her imprisonment she never repented of her wickedness to the foundling but seemed rather by frequent recurrence to the circumstances to be intent on cherishing its malignity— others of much greater conside , ration in the world indulged in speculations concerning the girl and her deliverer, although in diversified tones and to the arrival of differing conclusions.

The speculations to which we allude particularly had their origin in the fact that the newspapers reported the proceedings before the police-magistrate against Barbara Bryant for her horrid cruelty to Lilias Winter, in which reports Winslow Strickland's name and humane activity figured, — he having been examined at length, and the principal witness against the wretch. Nor sooner did the account in the daily press meet the eyes of Seymour and D'Arey, than they jumped to certain conclusions, according to their peculiar characters ; making no secret of what they knew and thought, to those arouud them concerning the somewhat romantic affair. " I should not woRder," said Edgar Seymour to his mother, — the widow of Colonel Seymour, " were Winslow to think of doing some very foolish thing by the rescued girl.

I saw tha little body perhaps two years ago ;— you may remember my telling you of Strickland's exploit in saving her from an enraged bull, and now this is the second service he has done for the creature. But then he would never have beon troubled on this latter occasion had he not gona to the low-lifed region where he expected to find the foundling ; and hence we see how he cherished the romantic notion that was begot within him not less than the years named relative to the girl. Depend upon it, the rash and extravagant young man is just as likely to make love to the creature, who promised to be pretty, before many summers pass over his head, for better or worse purposes, should she continue to be readily found by him. I wish he had a little more of the pride of hia mother and sisters ; although, take him all in all, he is by far the best of the family."

" My dear Edgar, never mind what Winslow Strickland does," observed the widowed Mrs. Seymour, Edgar being her only surviving child, "but show to the world how superior are your prudence and sense of honour. True, he is born to as good as seven thousand a year, of which he will be master when he comes of age. I know the rental of Spelhurst, Buckinghamshire, tha family estate for centuries past, to be not less than that handsome income. But, not to speak of your certain prospects, through aunt, Lady Langley, your own signal talents, perseverance, and enterprise will at length earn you a mitre, when you may look down upon the richest and haughtiest of those who despise yeur mother because she inhabits but a small mansion in May Fair, and is straitened to an annual income of scarce eight hundred."

" Capital ! the most entertaining news I have met with these six months," cried Frederick d'Arcy, half mad with glee, on reading the police report, and running to his only Bister, Eliza, to rehearse the particulars not only of -all he knew, but of all he conjectured concerning Strickland's interest iu behalf of the foundling. or magislrate ; "perdition to my soul, if I do not !" And those who best knew Barbara Bryant, — whom, however, to know and fathom was rare and difficult,— had they overheard the fiendish vow which she levelled against the innocent foundling,— might well have trembled for the girl's safety, even although she might experience twenty years' exemption from the threatened evil. Besides, if such was the wretch's malice and animosity toward the unharming little girl, whom for the good to look upon and listen to was to love, what must have been that which seethed within the beldame towards Winslow ""Strickland ?

Meanwhile it was well that the fury had to be sent to prison, and the girl to the workhouse ; the latter to be tenderly cared for, until some eligible situation might be found for her. In less than a mouth from that date she was installed in the establishment of Mrs. Temple, New Bond Street, as a little maid-of all-work ; that worthy lady deeming it prema ture to have the girl apprenticed to her in the millinery business, until she was a year or two, or perhaps still more, advanced in age. " Dear me !" said the matronly lady, when talking to the worthy magistrate who had taken a most kindly conoera in behalf of Lilias, a few weeks after receiving her iuto service, — " dear me, she is but such a little thing, — I should hardly tako her for being more than ten years old, guessing from her size.

But then, she is so compact, so active and vigorous, now that she's got out of the hands of the vile Kensington woman, that I can well credit she is twelve. I should not wonder were she to shoot up to a goodly height in due time. She is a most in teresting creature, and some dame's bairn, I can well imagine, who would toss her head at me were I to presume to think myself her equal." Widely different were the sentiments and notions of the virago Bryant, as she was hour after hour kept upon the treadmill ; for then not only would her debased and malign spirit in dulge in vowing vengeance against the innocent and helpless thing on some future day, but in recurring without compassion to the past wrongs done to the child. "When my vagrant dying sister, Marion, brought the brat with herself to my cot, wishing there to breathe her last and burden me with the baggage," the wretch would mutter, " I quickly bundled her out, advising her to seek some other body's fireside, — not forgetting to adviBe her to old Mother Deborah's, whose kindlier hearth was hard by ; but for her life, not to speak a word concerning me, or that Bhe knew there was such a being.

Humph ! sister was well nigh a croaker when I turned her out, being a corpse in a few hour*-. Was I to be troubled with the beggar's brat, — with Marion's kid ? Marion's, forsooth. Ha ! ha ! ha ! I have a notion whose the baggage was and is. As for Marion, Bhe never had a bairn of her own in all her born days, although she seldom, during her vagrancy, was without one in her arms. Yes, I got quit of the dying wretch and the brat, but I did not look upon the little thing's beauty without resolving to bide my time, should Bhe be spared ; and I will bide it too : she is not over-ripe, I trow. I'll have my re venge at the proper season." " I do declare to yon, sister,'' continued the boisterous youth, " I like Winslow twice aa well as before, and that waa well enough, for the com passion he feels for the forlorn thing, though I can very clearly see should he and she live till he is as old as you, Eliza,— and that is just five years more,— that, at the rate he has begun, the girl will either be made his wife, or something else; and what will his haughty and statelv mother, and hia proud sisters say then?

For my part, although I abhor all stinking pride, yet I should never think of mating myself with any damsel that was not at least my equal in station of life. Whatever they may do in Berkeley Square and at Spelhurst, Buckingham shire, never while I live shall thia spacious man sion of ours in Portland Place, nor the family Beat of Pursley Park, Surrey, be degraded by one of my bringing who ia not a fit companion in all respects for sister Eliza. How would our Tory father, the Hon. Joshua d'Arcy, M.P., Stomach a newspaper story like this about Lilias Winter, Barbara Bryant, and Master Wiuslow Strickland, were I the hero of the piece ?" "How you go on, Frederick," said Miss d'Arcy, a young lady of great beauty, but still more worthy of admiration on account of her head and heart, her tastes and accomplish ments, than of her external charms.

" You are getting into the habit of rattling away, without *me having the opportunity to set you right as you go wrong, or getting in a well-timed obser vation ; till, at least it is impossible to make the proper remark with effect. The main things, however, for me to say at present are these, first that I join with you in thinking better of V^ins low Strickland from what you have read and told me than before, much respected aa he haa always been by me ; but chiefly, in the second place, to let you know that most probably I may ;ook upon a very different standard of fitness of companionship for me than what you have a mind to set up, Fred. You know that my greater number of years than yours, though I'm not yet gray-headed, gives me a right, mother less as we are, to hint advice and reproof to you at times.

Forgive me, then, if I just say, with out talking more for the present about other people, that I shall expect on your return after your first release from Oxford, my brother Frederick, to show less care about mere externals and conventionalities than is the manner of many a young man. But I beg your pardon, rattler, as I must call you ; I, who am five years your senior, meant to blame you for your noisy loquacity, and here I am exceeding you by one half." them ? Iu order to enable the reader to con ceive more clearly of such a domestic scene, we shall preliminarizo a few things concerning tha parties alluded to. To begin with the mother :— The widow of Marmaduke Strickland was tha descendint of an ancient and renowned family ; and her notions were not less lofty and exclusive by reason of her patrician birth, than her natural and cherished modes of thinking.

She was at ■the period in question bordering on her fiftieth year, yet she retained in a great measure the beauty which at one period had rendered her celebrated. Her shape was still fine, and, indeed, it was usual for people to pronounce her a splendid womau of her age. What detracted chiefly from her agreeableness was the excess of haughtiness which characterized her bearing and countenance. She seemed to look upon herself as being a sort of Roman empress, as she strode about clad, as was generally the case on notable occasions, in a crimson velvet robe, and crowned with a shawl of some gold-wrought Indian fabric. Most stately was her mien as she walked in gay saloon, or did the honours in her own mansion, — her brow darkened with a saturnine pride, and her double-chin retreating to her pillar-like throat of marvellous erectness.

Georgiana, the eldest daughter, now twenty four years of age, was an admirable copy, with some amendments of what her mother must have been in her best and brightest days. She was tall, had a fine bust, shoulders sloping, neak long and graceful, complexion dark but cleat, eyes large and jet black, raven hair in great abundance worked into a sort of crown behind, while the glossiest curls shook and played in front. She delighted to dress in white, with certain relieving appendages in the shape of scarfs, fringes, and flowers. Like her mother, she had a powerful yet tuneful voice when 6he pleased ; though through affected pompousness, they both too frequently mouthed their words. Louise, who was two years younger, had neither the beauty nor the carriage of her sister ; although, while tall, she kept herself as erect as a poplar, which indeed ehe resembled for straight ness and Blenderness, thus doing her best to support the family fame.

She was not a whit more amiable thau the mother and Georgiana ; but dull and yet equally supercilious, if possible ; certainly far more taciturn and listless. Some people wondered where the heir of the Strick land race got or acquired his warmth, his gene rosity, and robust manliness. Much of the explanation lay in this, that while the daughters took after the mother, Winslow followed in a great measure hia father's model. With what a tornado wa8 it that Winslow Strickland found himself assailed, the first time he made his appearance in the presence of tha ladies of his family, after their ears had been stunned with the intelligence of his services in behalf of poor Lilias Winter ! Yet the encounter was not very different from what he had expected. Nay, he almost hailed the occasion , as he would fain have flattered himself, when he found it could not bo eluded; in order that he might demonstrate to his sisters, — ay, and to his mother, that he waa not the soft and simple lad they seemed to consider him, and that he had hitherto generally proved.