Half a Life

Front matter

HALF A LIFE BY GEORGE WEBBE DASENT, D.C.L., AUTHOR OF "ANNALS OF AN EVENTFUL LIFE," "THREE TO ONE," etc., etc. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. III. LONDON : CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 1874. [AU rights reserved.] CONTENTS OF VOL. III. CHAPTER PAGE I GO BACK TO BUTTERSTEEP, AND OF MB. LIMPUS 1 I. II. OF MR. LIMPUS AND MR. BALL . . .12 III. GRIMDITCH A DANGEROUS DEMOCRAT . . 28 IV. HOAV I AVENT TO A'ENTNOR . . . .42 V. OF LIMPUS AND MARY BALL . . . .57 VI. ANOTHER YOUNG LADY MAKES HER APPEAR ANCE 74 VII. AVHAT MARY BALL AND I DID . . .88 VIII. AVE SEE SOMETHING MORE OF HONORA . . 102 IX. GRIMDITCH TELLS US MORE STORIES . . 122 X. SOMETHING PASSES BETAVEEN MARY AND ME 141 XI. THE PICNIC AND WHAT HAPPENED AT IT . 154 XII. SALAD OIL AND VIPERS 167 XIII. WHAT HAPPENED AFTER THE PICNIC . . 178 THE OINTMENT, AND WHAT CAME OF IT .193 CONTENTS.

CHAPTEB PAGE XV. WHAT HAPPENED THE DAY AFTER . .211 XVI. MR. LIMPUS RE-APPEARS ON THE SCENE . 226 XVII. I TELL MY MOTHER 243 XVIII. HOW I AVROTE TO MR. BALL, AND HOW HONORA LEFT US 256 XIX. WHAT MR. BALL SAID AND THOUGHT . . 271 XX. LIMPUS AND HONORA 282 XXI. OUR SECRET COMES OUT, AND THE DAY IS FIXED 290 XXII. HOAV MARY DEPARTED, AND HOW I WENT UP TO TOWN 302 XXIII. THE END OF ALL THINGS ....

Chapter I

I GO BACK TO BUTTEESTEEP, AND OF MR LIMPUS. After Irwin was gone, Oxford was hateful to me. It was as if one had a darling friend aAvhile, and revelled in his beauty and goodness only to find out on a sudden that he was base and de spicable. I loathed the place where I had been so happy with him, and fled from it as soon as I could. Even before he was buried I sent and with drew my name from the Proctor's list, which was done by scratching it out as it stood posted up on a board near the schools. I could not do it my self; one of my friends did it, for how could I bear to see just after mine, Irwin, Georgius, ex Æde Xti glaring me in the face. When the next examination came, some months vol. in. after, in May, I went in for a pass, and the exami ners gave me an Honorary Fourth. Why they did it I cannot tell, for I am sure my answers were wild and vague.

Then I took my degree, put on my Bachelor's gown, and left Oxford, and the House knew me no more, except Avhen I Avent, as I do still, by stealth, to see IrAvin's grave, on which is engraved, " George Irwin, born , died ." Dear me ! and to think that there he des, a grinning skeleton, beneath, while I am fud of life and strength above on earth. His friends put up a monument to him, close by his grave, and there he rests, in the hope of a blessed resurrection, till the day of doom, when all secrets wid be revealed. But of Irwin I have said enough. We were parted and he was gone ; and I had to tread the path of Use, now so thorny, and before so flowery, as I best could by myself. If I have not told you anything about my mother and Mr. Chrysostom aU this while, it is not because they were not most kind and loving.

My mother wished to come up to Oxford and be with me, but I would not suffer it. Her presence and her sorrow would, I knew, only add to mine, and I wished to drink that bitter cup ad alone. Even in the case of the guardians, I would far rather they had not come, but there was no help for it, and, as you saw, they came. Mr. Chrysostom would have come, and I should have been glad, for he and his counsel and conso lations would have been always welcome, but hi3 lungs kept him a close prisoner at Ventnor,where he had finally settled down; and though he wrote me beautiful letters, it was the presence and the voice and words of Mr. Chrysostom, as I have already told you, that were so remarkable. When he put pen to paper, half his power seemed to have gone out of him. His letters were human, but his words divine.

But those two did all they could to comfort me, and I was grateful for it. As soon as I had arranged my poor friend's affairs, paying, amongst other things, that fifty shillings deodand on Faugh-a-badagh, and then sending him over to the uncle in the Queen's County, who acknowledged the poor beast's arrival in a letter, in which he said, "he was a grate horse entirely," and repeated that he was "an excedent lepper" — as soon as I had settled these matters, and got Irwin's thirds from the man who was to have his rooms, and, in fact, done those odious accounts, I went down and re mained several weeks at Buttersteep with my mother, very dud, and thinking day and night of Irwin. How I lived through it I do not quite know, for I got little sleep, and was altogether worn down by care and grief. In this frame of mind I was well fitted to be the companion of melancholy Limpus, who, no doubt, thought my affliction sent to be a consola- 1—2 tion to him.

Yet I never knew a man who was so all outside as our clergyman, and as I walked about the woods and glades of Swinley with him day by day, I could not conceive it possible that anything bearing the face and form of a man should be so unlike Irwin. All through that winter and the next spring he Avalked with me, and maundered about this and that, but I never saw any further into him than his skin, and I very much doubt whether his selfishness — for hypochondria is often nothing more — lay lower than the surface. He was, I believe, one of those people Avho say they never eat, and yet are always eating with the heartiest appetite, only they seem not to know it, and who always have good rest at night, only they declare they never can get a wink of sleep. In this way they impose upon themselves and others ad their lives, and at last die at a good old age, having en joyed a lifetime of excedent health.

In this re spect they are like the idiots, whose minds are weak and their bodies strong; year after year they live on, well cared for by others, and with no cares of their own, and at last die, after having outlived the income from which they derive their support. Yes, I should put idiots, annuitants, and hypo chondriacs in a first class of their own as to longevity, and I would very much object, if I had a small income, to be bound to provide for any one of the class. That winter Mary Ball came down to see us, groAvn, I belieA'e, into a Avoinan of nineteen, but for all the notice I took of her she might haA'e been ninety. Once, Avhen Ave Avere taking one of those melancholy Avalks, Mr. Limpus said, in his shambling manner — " Miss Ball is a charming girl." " Oh yes, of course," I said, ready to have gone on, if need were, Avith a whole string of useless expletives and ejaculations.

" Do you think she would make a good wife ." he went on. " How can I tell ," I said. " Your friend Irwin liked her," said Limpus. " Indeed," I said, reviving at Irwin's name, though it was very inconsiderate in Mr. Limpus to drag him from his graA'e as a Avitness to such a trivial conversation — " indeed !" " Yes," said Limpus ; " he once told me he thought she would make an excellent wife." " For whom . Not for him ; he never thought of marrying, I am sure." " Oh, dear, no," said Mr. Limpus, "not for him self ; it was for me." " Oh !" I said ; " and pray, why for you ?" It was an idle question, but unless one asked Limpus questions, our conversations would have neither been colloquy nor soliloquy. " He thought," said Limpus, confidingly, " that she would be just the woman to make me com fortable in my rectory. 'That girl,' he said, pointing out Miss Ball while you and she were once walking before us in this very wood, ' that girl would make a capital nurse for you in your infirm health, she seems so kind and considerate.' " This speech of Mr. Limpus really made me laugh, for I saw that Irwin, in his ironical way, had been making game of poor Mr. Limpus and his ailments.

For though Mary Ball was A'ery kind and considerate and nice, I was quite sure it never would have entered into her head to marry Mr. Limpus that she might nurse him on his imaginary sick-bed. I am sure I don't know what made me carry on Irwin's joke ; perhaps I considered that he had bequeathed that and other duties to me. At any rate I said — " Then why don't you try, Limpus ? — why don't you ask her ?" " So I AA'dl," said Limpus, " and I Avill do it at once." " If you are sure the iron is hot," I said, after the fashion of Polonius and as though I were seventy years old at least, " there is nothing like striking at once." " Oh, yes ! what a pretty idea '" as though likening Mary Ball to a red-hot poker, or a horse-shoe, or an anchor-stock was so very pretty ; aud then he added, with a piece of conceit rarely found except among the clergy of the Established Church, " To a man of my profession and position the iron is always hot."

" If so, you had better strike at once." "So I Avill," said Limpus, and then he left me at our lodge gate, and strode off home, de lighted at the prospect of soon having a wife to nurse him. I neA'er thought anything would come of it, but I am sure eA'ery curate thinks that every young lady is a lucifer-match, and that he has only to rub against her to throw her into a flame. But if eA'ery curate thinks this, how much more must rectors, and young rectors like Limpus, who, as I have told you, was tad and handsome. That evening — it was when Irwin had been gone about two months — that is to say, it was when January was drawing to an end — that evening I told my mother Avhat had passed be tween us. She said at once — " I am so glad." "Why?" I asked. " Not at all," she said, " because I care to get a wife for Mr. Limpus, but because I am glad to see you take interest for the first time in any thing except your great affliction."

" Yes," I said ; " it is A-erj' wrong of me, I knoAV, but you see, mother, Irwin comes into this too." And then I went on, merely for the sake of pleasing my mother : " But I am sure nothing Avid come of it; he cannot be so silly." " I am not so sure of that," said my mother. " When a man is in love he wdl do anything, however absurd, and find an excuse for flying to the moon if he needed it." " But he isn't in love." " Not in love ? of course he is in love Avith himself, and that is the worst and most dan gerous feedng which the human heart can har bour." While we had this confidential discussion on Mary's prospects in life, that innocent object was seated at the piano filling the room Avith Avonder ful melody, Avhich Ave used as a cloak to conceal our designs upon her peace. " Thank you, my dear ! charming, I am sure !

I never heard even you sing ' Wapping Old Stairs' so beautifully," said that crocodile, my mother, Avhen I really believe if she knew what the song was it was as much as she did. It is quite amusing to see how the very mention of a marriage inflames women's minds. Here Avas my mother, one of the most staid and thoughtful of women, quite excited by the proposition of that idiot, Limpus, that he should many a charming young Avoman of nineteen, merely that she might nurse him in his fancied illnesses. As Avith the Frenchman in the Crimea, Avho stuffed a dead frog into his knapsack with the words, " C'est toujours du gibier," so it is with all Avomen about marriage. It may be the most ridiculous and preposterous match in the world, but stdl it is a match, and something may come of it. I am quite sure that my mother went to bed that night with a very different feeling towards Mary Ball.

Here she had a young lady under her roof who had excited passion in the rector's heart, eA'en though it Avere only a desire for a nurse. In a little Avhile I believe she would have convinced herself that it was a very reasonable expectation on the part of Mr. Limpus, and that Mary ought to accept him on his OAvn terms. As for me, I Avent to bed saying to myself, " What an ass that Limpus is, and Avhat a goose he must haA'e been not to see that Irwin was laughing at him ad the Avhile." Still I ne\*er thought he Avould come and try to carry out his words in deeds. But I was mistaken, and ny mother Avas right, as women generally are in affairs of this kind. They invariably see, as it were by instinct, what a man Avill or not do in what concerns the heart. And even in cases of sham affection and mockeries of love, they are seldom wrong, for they knoAV so much of the true, that they can prognosticate rightly of the form which the false, affection will take.

I, therefore, could scarcely believe my eyes — though my mother gave me a look Avhich said plainly, " I told you so " — when, not so very long after breakfast, I saw Limpus striding up to our house at a pace which proved that his lungs and heart Avere ad right, whatever other ailments his poor body might be afflicted with. And first he asked for my mother, telling me he had something to say to her. It Avas not for me to ask him what his errand AA'as ; it seemed so very ridiculous. So he saw my mother, and what he said to her I never quite knew, except that it Avas about Mary Ball, but he Avent away in a little while, and then my mother took a turn with me in the plantations, and said very shortly that he had come to propose to Mary, but that she had told him she would not hear of such a thing Avhile Miss Bad Avas under her roof, but that if he aspired to her hand he was to write to her father, or see him, to obtain his consent.

"How very right of you!" I said; "that will settle him. He Avid think better of it, and not pursue it." " I think he will," said my mother. " To hear him talk, one would think it was the greatest honour in the world to marry Mr. Limpus, Rector •of Broadmoor, even though the fortunate woman Avould have to do nothing but swathe him up in flannel, and mix him Avater gruel all the days of her life." "But, you see, mother," I said, "whoever does marry Mr. Limpus — if he ever finds a wife — will discover that he has excellent health, and so her lot Avdl not be so bad, after all." " I am sure I can't say," said my mother ; " marriage, like travel, tries both men and women. I am not at all sure' that I would not prefer a real doAvnright inA-alid to a man like Mr. Limpus, for the simple reason that ailments of the body are casier to cure or to bear than maladies of the mind."

So Mr. Limpus went away, and Mary kneAv nothing of the honour that he had intended for her, and in a day or two we had almost forgotten the subject, for though Mr. Limpus came to walk with me as before, he said never a word about Mary Ball.

Chapter II. Of Mr

LIMPUS AND MR. BALL. At last, in about a week, I remember it well, for it was on Candlemas Day, February 2nd, that something happened Avhich threAV our household into a flutter. It Avas after breakfast, and I had fished out of Bishop Had's sermons — one of my dear old books — the following sentence for the edification of my mother and Mary. It was just a little distraction from my grief, and they were both glad at it : — "It hath been an old — I say not true — note that hath Avont to be set on this day, that if it be ' clear and sunshiny, it portends a hard weather to come ; if cloudy and lowering, a mild and gentle season ensuing." And then I dragged out Sir Thomas Browne's " Vulgar Errors," and read to them the fodoAving. " There is a general tradition in some parts of Europe that inferreth the coldness of each succeeding day from the shining of the sun on Candlemas Day, according to the proverbial distich : — " ' Si sol splendeseat Maria purificante, Major erit glacies post festum quam suit ante,' thus paraphrased in 'Ray's Proverbs' : — " ' The hind had as lief see his wife on the bier, As that Candlemas Day should be pleasant and clear,' or, as an old almanack says :— ' If Candlemas Day be fair and bright, Winter will have another flight ; But if Candlemas Day be clouds and rain, Winter is gone, and will not come again.' " It so happened that the morning was clear, and bright, and nidd, and Ave could see away across the Avoods and hills from our dining-room Avindow.

The season, as I have already told j*ou, had been very open, and outside the birds sang as though St. Valentine had long come and gone, while ad the spring flowers Avere out six weeks before their time. " If this be true," said my mother—" and these old saws have generally truth in them, our winter is still to come." " Mine came in November," I said, " and has lasted ever since." "Do not think of that," said my mother. " The past is done and over. Make the best use HALF A LLFE. 14 you can of the present, and leave the future to Him who knows what is best for us." "It will be very sad for the birds and the flowers," said Mary, " if frost is now to come, and kid their broods, and cut the buds off." " Let us ask Grimditch what he thinks of the proverb," said my mother, " and that at least Avill be an excuse for going out early this delicious morning."

So we three went out, and down in the bottom we saw Grimditch the indefatigable, and the sworn foe of rabbits, ploughing away for bare life. As soon as we came up to him, after a bob to the ladies, he called out to me. " This is a bad job, Muster Frank ; just see how fine and bright it is !" " What ! you know ad about it, then, Grim ditch ?" said my mother. " Know ad about it ! I should think I did," said Grimditch ; " and though I hearn some people say they don't believe it, and that it don't come true, I say it is true nineteen years out of twenty. But I ted you what it is, Muster Frank, there's a set of wosbirds now about as deny everything that we've been taught to bedeve, and this is one thing that I bedeve and they deny." As he said this, he stuck his hat on his head in a resolute way, as though the belief in Candle mas Day and its regulating the weather were as sacred as any of the commandments.

" Yes !" he went on, " that's the ways of it ; there's a set of cadddng fellows who will never see the signs of the times and seasons, and thinks themselves a main Aviser than their fathers before them. And so they sow when they ought to plough, and plough when they ought to sow, and then they looks to reap." " You seem in a hurry with your ploughing, Grimditch," said my mother. " Hurry ! and wed I may be, ma'am," said Grimditch. " Now the weather is nice and open and for a mercy dry, I wants to plough the land up rough, and leave it to be mellowed by the frost, which is coming as sure as you stand there. No, no!" he muttered as he turned the plough for another furrow — "no ! no ! other folk may do as they please, but I wdl mind the signs and times and seasons so long as my name is John Grim ditch."

" There's a true believer, at least, in Candlemas Day," said my mother. What more she might have said I cannot say, for as she spoke this we heard a call from the hill above, and turning we saAv Thomas running down the path. " What can it be V said my mother ; " no sad accident, again, I trust !" " Please, ma'am," said Thomas, " 'ere's Mr. Ball come down from town, and wishes to see you perticular." " Mr. Ball !" " Papa !" exclaimed my mother and Mary in one breath ; " Avhatever can have brought him down ?" "We shall soon see," said I, and then we walked back to the hid, where we found Mr. Ball waiting for us in the garden. We had not long to wait to know what he came about, for he burst out, evidently in a great passion : " I have had such a ridiculous letter, Mrs. Franklin, that though it put me to the greatest ineonA-enience I got up very early and posted down to show it to you.

I must be back in the city before four, when 'Change closes, and so I have very little time to spend here." "We are very glad to see j'ou, I am sure," said my mother, who, with me, noAV knew, or at least could guess what sort of letter it was, while Mary stood there a perfect Agnes, and as innocent as any lamb. "What was the letter ?" I asked, to lead him on. "From Mr. Limpus," said Mr. Bad, boiling over again at the name — "Mr. Limpus, your rector, whom I once saw here." " Oh, yes !" said my mother, " we know him very wed." " Yes !" said Mary, most unfortunately, " such an interesting man, papa" " Such an interested man, I should rather say," V retorted her slither. " Upon my word I think he must be mad." " Why what has he done ?" asked my mother very demurely. "Just read his letter and see," said Mr. Bad, " or, better, as we are all friends, and haA'e no secrets, I will read it to you.

Just listen to what he says." Then producing the letter , he began : — " 'Broadmoor Bectory, , " ' January — , 183 — . "'Dear Sir,— " ' I have a proposal to make, which I trust Avid meet with your approbation. I am, as I be deve you know, rector of this parish, and for some time past I have felt it to be my duty to seek for one who may be at once the object of my affections and the prop of my fading health. I Avish it were possible to offer the woman of my choice the advantages of a sound body as Aved as those mental and social satisfactions which my Avife would necessarily derive from our union. My only excuse is that I offer her the best I haA'e, and the best can do no more. Having thus ex plained my position, I have only to add that I hope, Avith your kind sanction, to find in Miss Ball, your daughter, one suited in every way to be my wife.

Should this proposal meet your wishes, I wid at once plead my suit Avith your A'OL. III. 2 //y daughter in the confidence and assurance that my desire to make her my Avife will not be heard in vain. " ' BelieA-e me, " ' My dear Sir, " ' Very truly yours. " ' Theodore Limpus. " There, Mary, what do you say to that ?" cried her father, in great indignation. " You must haA'e given him some encouragement before he could dare to write me such a letter." " I give him encouragement !" cried Mary, bridling up, and her eyes flashing much more in dignantly than her father's — " I give him any encouragement, papa ! Why this is the first I have heard of it. I am sure I would not marry Mr. Limpus for anything in the whole world." And with these words she fled into the house and we saAv her no more. " Is the man mad, I ask again ." said Mr. Bad.

" To send me such a letter ! I declare I can make neither head nor tail of it." " No harm has been done, Mr. Ball," said my mother. " Mr. Limpus is a hypochondriac, and I dare say Avishes for a Avife, and admires Mary, as every one must who sees her. It is a ridiculous proposition, and you will deal with it as you please, so far as we are concerned. Mary is quite right when she says she never gave him any encouragement, and, though I can't say that I never heard of his suit, both Frank and I can say Avith truth that we gave him no encouragement either; and as for myself, as soon as eA'er I heard of his intention from Mr. Limpus, I desired him not to mention it to Mary, but to write direct to you, which he has done, it seems, in a very absurd way ; but that is the nature of the man, and not at all our fault."

" What a fool the man must be," said Mr. Bad. " That," I said, " you have already told us, Mr. Ball, more than once. You may leaA'e us to draw our OAvn conclusions about Mr. Limpus ; and all the more so, because, as you see, Miss Ball, by my mother's prudence, has not been mixed up in it in the least." " But what is to be clone ?" said Mr. Ball, " Nothing is easier," I replied. " Now that you have ascertained the true state of affairs, go back to toAvn and write Mr. Limpus Avhatever answer you please. That we cannot interfere in in any way." By this time, to do him justice, Mr. Ball was fully convinced that no one Avas to blame but Mr. Limpus, and besides that, the Avhole affair was ridiculous, and he was quite shrewd enough to see that no one gains anything in life by being laughed at. All that Avas to be done was to ex tinguish the aspirations of Mr. Limpus to hi3 o daughter's hand, and in order to do this to return to toAvn at once.

" Well, my dear Mrs. Franklin," he said, " I cannot thank you enough for acting so discreetly. When I got this absurd letter it distressed me A'ery much, for I could not all at once convince myself that Mary might not be mixed up with this monomaniac in some way or other. But now that I see how the whole case stands my mind is easy ; and to show both you and Mr. Limpus that I have no fear of his advances, I will, if you are so willing, adow Mary to stay with you a little longer. Poor child ! it is very hard upon her to be sought out by a hypochondriac as his intended Avife." " Had you not better see Mary before you go ?" asked my mother. " Of course, of course," said Mr. Ball, and so my mother took him indoors, and Mary was brought down from her own room and had an interview with her father, and then she came out with him, her eyes rather red and her cheeks gloAving, and old Bad kissed her, and shook hands Avith us, and got into his postchaise, and drove off towards Sunningdale and Staines, and I have no doubt reached London in time for 'Change, which ready seemed, even before Mary, to be the object of his life.