John Smith. A novel

Chapter I

It was the month of May — a cruel month to be spent in a town, all the sweet sights and sounds of that balmiest of seasons shut out by the dull atmosphere of smoke ; rows of houses, dry, hard, and impassive, forming a great blockade against the soft tender influences of the beautiful country, radiant with sunshine, fragrant with flower and leaf and herbage ; dewy, fresh, and invigorating. In a large handsome room in Berkeley Square sat its owner, Mr. Johnstone, old and rich, looking weary and languid. vol. i. "Indeed, sir," said his doctor, "you must get a little change. What do you say to a week or so at Brighton ? " "No, I cannot bear Brighton. It is noisy and glaring," and the languid look remained. " Hastings, Folkestone, or the Isle of Wight?" Still Mr. Johnstone shook his head " I am quite as well here.

I should hate the trouble and fatigue." " What do you say to Malvern then 1 " said the persevering doctor. At that moment Mr. Johnstone's two grand daughters came into the room, and as Alice, a lively child of eleven, caught the sound 'Malvern,' she exclaimed. " Oh! delightful." The needed stimulus was given. " You are right, Alice," said Mr. Johnstone. " Yes," said the doctor, " the air at Great Malvern is remarkably pure — " " Great Malvern!" said Mr. Johnstone; "no, it was not of Great Malvern 1 was thinking, but of that pretty Uttle village or hamlet halfway up the hill on the west side. It is more than twenty years since I was there, but I shall never forget the sunset that evening. The full radiance of the sun seemed to expand itself over the whole of that beautiful Here fordshire landscape and the distant Welsh mountains.

" I should like to see it again, though now, indeed," he added, sinking back once more, " everything has lost its charm to me." But his eldest grand-daughter Mary, made quick-sighted by her love for her grandfather, came to the rescue. She spoke in such a lively way of the delight it would be to Alice and herself to see the Malvern Hills that Mr. Johnstone revived. He took the idea as an offering to his grand daughter's amusement ; and all was soon settled to every one's content ; and in this same merry month of May, rich Mr. Johnstone, of Hawthornden Park and of Berkeley Square, 1-2 with his two grandchildren, Mary aud Alice Johnstone, arrived at West Malvern. It is very well for doctors to order change of air and scene, and no doubt they are often beneficial ; but elderly people used to the occupations incident to home life, as well as to its comforts aud luxuries, find it rather per plexing to know how to pass the long day in small lodging-house rooms, even when the windows look to the west.

Mr. Johnstone gazed at the glorious sunset for two evenings, but on the third there was plenty of rain and no sun to gaze at ; and though he had armed himself with a large heap of books and magazines and papers, he certainly missed his own arm-chair, his French cook (though he was by no means a gour mand), but above all he missed the society to which he was accustomed — those droppers in, who come so naturally in London that we scarcely know how frequent and how pleasant they are, till we are out of their reach. However, to Mr. Johnstone there was great compensation not only in the pure bright air itself, but in seeing its good effects on his two grandchildren. There was no doubt of their enjoyment. They rushed up the hills and down into the valleys, and explored wonderful deep lanes with tangled hedge banks, and cared neither for rain nor wind.

Mary Johnstone was seventeen, and Alice was eleven, and at those ages easy-chairs and French cookery are not necessary to happiness. Habit does much for all of us, and especially for the old ; and after a day or two had accustomed Mr. Johnstone to the small rooms and different mode of life, he began to feel that the change was good and useful ; he liked his lodgings, and with the amiable tenacity of a sensible man, who has taken a whim and wishes to prove to himself that it was a wise one, he insisted on believing West Malvern to be a sort of paradise. As to Mary and Alice, they found a whole JOHN SMITn. store of delight in rambling about tho hills and the valleys and the wild coppices, and explor ing new paths ; and if the birds as they sung on the branches had an eye for beauty, they might have been well phased that Mary and Alice should be wandering about their haunts, for they wore both so pretty that even a stupid blinking owl might open its eyes to admire them ; though the birds could scarcely appreciate Mary's beauty, as the charm of an expressive countenance would be but a puzzle to them, however clever they7 might be in their own peculiar line.

To speak in common-place language, both Mary and Alice were very pretty girls of their respective ages, and it was to be hoped that they would not run about these romantic Herefordshire hills and vales to be seen and admired by the birds alone, but that in due course of time a hero should appear. To meet with an adventure was Alice's constant hope, quite independent of a hero. A wild bull attacking them would be some thing, but rather disagreeable and not very romantic. A runaway donkey — that, too, would be disagreeable and not romantic at all. At last the very thing, nay, far better than anything Alice had ventured to expect, did really occur. She and Mary were scrambling through one of those delightful tangled hazel woods, spreading far down into the valley, when they were startled by the sight of a set of gipsies.

They were trying to struggle back into a sort of rough cart-track that led through the wood, before the gipsies should catch sight of them, when they almost stumbled over a young man who was coming down the path. Alice forgot everything but her fear of the gipsies, and cried out to the stranger, " Please, please help us ! There are a whole set of gipsies just down there. They may have seen us and be coming after us ; and we are so frightened ! Oh ! if you would please take care of us ! " The young man looked rather amused by the appeal, and perhaps did not quite recognize the danger, but he was most ready and good natured in offering his help. He told Alice he thought she need not fear the gipsies, who were a very harmless set, and then, bowing with great civility to Mary, said, if she would allow it, he should be most happy to escort them as far as the road.

As Alice had appealed to the stranger and not the stranger to Alice, Mary could only submit to the dilemma as best she might. So with the air of a princess in distress, she said something of apology for her sister's forward ness, and then there was nothing for it but to be really thankful for his help. In short, he attended them till they were safely on the high-road, and then he bowed and left them. He was tall and good-looking — a thorough JOHN S1IITH. gentleman in manner and appearance — and during his short walk with them, he conveyed the impression that he was clever and pos sessed of a lively sense of the ludicrous. In fact, he had all the attributes of a hero, with one exception, at that time hidden from Alice's knowledge. She was delighted. She said he was charming. " I don't mind your scolding me, Mary, for I really was frightened to death ; and there he was just at the very moment to save us ; and I am sure he is as nice as ever he can be; and he was quite glad to take care of us, I know ; and I liked every word he said, and his grey dress (I like grey), and how prettily he took off his hat, and he looked so handsome and gave us such a bright smile when he did it ! and at last, you see, Mary, we have had an adventure — quite an adventure ! and we never had one before ; and I wished for one so much ! and this was better than being run away with in a carriage, and not so dangerous, you see ! and we must make haste home and tell grandpapa all about it !

And you see those gipsies might have come all round us, and stripped off our good clothes aud put on us their old dirty shabby clothes (it makes me shiver to think of it), and carried us off with our hands tied behind our backs and our tongues gagged for fear of our screaming, and no one would ever have heard of us again ; never, only think, Mary ! and how unhappy poor grandpapa would have been ; for it might really and truly have happened but for this hero ! and I am sure he is a hero ! For, you see, we can't expect heroes in armour or in velvet with green plumes in these days. So the most we can hope for is a tall man in a becoming suit of grey." " Alice," said Mary half laughing, but almost ready to cry, " what a silly child you are ! I shall really be very angry if you do such a rude pushing thing again.

Pray don't, Alice." " We are not so lucky as to meet heroes every day," retorted Alice. "I dare say he will be at church," she added, too much occupied by her hero, as she chose to call him, to attend very much to her sister's words. " If he is at church we can find out who he is, and I know he is Ronald, or Theodore, or Alphonso de Montalavero, or some such lovely name." "Nonsense!" said Mary, "what does it matter to us ! " but while she said this, she also wondered a little who he was.

Chapter II

And now let us go with Alice's hero to a small lodging in North Malvern. " My dear mother," he said, as he entered the sitting-room, "you will be delighted to hear that I have had an adventure ! I have rescued two lovely and distressed damsels from a troop of savage gipsies." "Are you serious or jesting ? " said his mother, who (alas ! for poor Alice !) was only Mrs. Smith ! " Serious, as I always am. Why should you doubt it ? " Then he told his mother what had really happened. The little girl, he said, was the perfection of childish beauty, and the elder sister just as tall and graceful as a distressed damsel was in duty bound to be. "But," he added, "it is time for me to set to work and not to dwell on the charms of beautiful damsels." "Yes," said his mother, "you must work, as you say," and there was a good deal of bitterness in her tone.

" I do not pity those who have to work, nor do I envy the rich or the idle ; but I feel angry for their frequent want of consideration. For instance, in this little hamlet everything has become costly. Rich people come to these small country places for mere whims ; they raise the price of neces saryT food because it saves them trouble to let butchers and grocers cheat them. They never think or care for the evil to their poorer neighbours, or the sufferings they may wan tonly create." " And, perhaps, neither you nor I would care a bit more if we were in their place," was her son's reply. "As it is I feel any thing but suffering j I never had a more en joyable ramble. Oh ! for those blue-bells and hazel woods. And now to my papers and books. When I get my fellowship we may both revel in the luxuries of the wealthy if we care for them."

Mrs. Smith shook her head, but she smiled. If she was sometimes hard aud unjust in her feelings towards others, her heart was always warm and tender towards her son. She loved him almost passionately. Young as he was, the strength and vigour of his intellect, and the broad integrity of his character, made her respect as well as love him. She took his implied rebuke at her murmuring speech very patiently, therefore, and yet in her heart the murmur remained. In deed she almost chose it should. With a sort of wilful anger, that seemed to relieve the feelings surging through her heart, she chose to let them forth in angry form to herself. She asked, " Why was such an one doomed to poverty ! Why, with his undefinable charm — his talents, his virtues — why was he to toil and to slave, perhaps to the end, and succeed, aud yet live and die unknown and poor ?

Yes ! he might and would get this fellowship, no doubt ! And what then? Who would discover his great and good qualities, his talents, his charm, his wit ? That pittance from the fellowship would be all. If he chose the Church he might get a small living at the end of twenty years ; if the bar, equally for years he might toil on, while those for beneath him in talent would rise above him, because they had connections — wealth — or even luck, but he !— " She sighed, and her face resumed its bitter ness, as she silently watched him bending over his papers. There was entire contentment and happiness in his look ; he was certainly working hard, but there were no ruffles of care, no fretful lines about his face. What lessons may be learnt even by the expression in a countenance ! Mrs. Smith took part of the lesson as she looked at her son, and felt ashamed of her own murmuring spirit.

Her son's respect for her would be lowered, and justly lowered, if he knew the thoughts that had just been jarring and clanging about her heart. She patiently took up her work. It was plain work, beautifully executed for a poor woman's first baby, and the gentle smile that soon came on her face was compounded out of these two ideas — the poor mother's de light on seeing the small well-stitched garment for her first-born, and the look on her own first-born's face as he sat there in the little room which was always made bright to her by his presence.

Chapter III

Meantime there was nothing of bitterness or despondence about Mary and Alice Johnstone as they returned home ; but then, as they were rich and fortunate, it was not to be expected ; besides which, who could be bitter or despond ing when they had just met with an adventure ? Alice rushed up at once to her grandpapa open-mouthed to tell him of their good for tune. "Oh, grandpapa! such a delightful walk, and such a delightful adventure ! " And then she told the story of the gipsies, and she convol. i. tinued, " At the very moment of the greatest danger there came up a beautiful young man in a suit of grey and saved us, and then he brought us to the road in perfect safety, and then he bowed in the most graceful manner, and left us, and here we are you see, grandpapa, quite safe and not hurt at all."

" What ! what ! what is all this, child ? Beautiful young man ! Mary, child, what is this ? Do you mean you walked home with a young man — a stranger ? " Mary's colour rose. She tried to explain how it happened. "Yes — yes," said Mr. Johnstone, "this is all very well, and I see it was no fault of yours, Mary ; but if you are to meet youths in grey in the woods, Hunt had better walk out with you in future." " Oh, grandpapa ! " Alice cried out, " you don't mean taat ! why, poor dear darling old Hunt could not walk two steps, and then if she did, she would always be scolding us for splashing our petticoats ! " "Well, well; perhaps you need not have Hunt. You, Mary, are steady enough, and so I suppose I must let this wild goose and you go alone as before, only don't let this stranger join you again."

"Oh! certainly not," said Mary. "I was very much annoyed when Alice spoke to him. He was, however, perfectly gentlemanlike, and left us the moment we got out of that muddy path, and I am sure would never offer to join us again unless we were properly introduced." And so the matter ended, and Mr. John stone forgot all about the youth in grey. But not so Alice. " He is sure to be at church on Sunday," she said to Mary, "and then we shall find out who he is." " Perhaps he is a Dissenter," said Mary. " A Dissenter ! Oh ! Mary, how can you say so ? I am sure he is a gentleman ! " 2—2 "Well," said Mary, "and why not, if he were a Dissenter ? " " Oh ! he might certainly," said Alice doubtfully ; " but I know he will be at church on Sunday." But Alice was wrong ; her hero did not appear at church. Weeks passed, and Alice vainly looked for him, until at last she almost forgot him.

Chapter IV

The longest day came — nominally and actually the longest I mean — but often to our feelings and imaginations the very shortest and sweetest in the calendar. Not like that really long day, when a so-called friend comes accidentally in the middle of our pleasantest and busiest times to spend, as she truly says, a long day with us — and it is a long day ! The clock is glanced at — surely it has stopped ? But at length the hour of relief, the promised six o'clock draws near. " I could stay till seven or even eight," are the agonizing words when forbearance is all but at an end. At that crisis we wish to believe it a Christian duty always to speak the truth — but courage fails — the carriage is delayed till eight. Not so the glorious longest day of June ; tho chariot wheels of the sun linger to carry it away ; but we would still say, " Not yet ! not yet ! '' especially as that glowing sun sinks down behind the faint purple range of the Welsh mountains as seen from West Malvern.

Mary Johnstone stood on the hill above the house — the delightful Malvern nill — and watched the last little streaks of rosy, or crimson, or orange light. She was just be ginning the long day of life, full of poetic imagination, full of hope, full of aspirations. Life lay before her imagination, as that beautiful landscape lay th«re beneath and around her, bathed in the rosy light of a sun ; typical of that sun which illumines the path of imagi native high-spirited youth. Mary Johnstone was not one of those everyday, well-informed, well-dressed youug girls of the present time, who can talk fluently and without diffidence on every subject, but in whose hearts and minds all grandeur of feeling is absent. She had her individualities ; her own original sentiments and opinions and hopes. And now what dreams for the future were there ?

A beautiful prospect of universal good and happiness, with power and courage to bear suffering and pain, if needed, for the sake of ultimate good ; vague ideas perhaps, but the whole imbued and permeated with that feeling of intense admiration and grati tude and love which glows through the soul of healthful, ardent youth in such moments of nature's glories. And as the sun glided down on this, the longest day of the year, in the full glory of the finest sunset that even West Malvern can boast, rich Mr. Johnstone still remained in oc cupation of the best lodging-house of the place, and poor Mrs. Smith in one of the small ones of what may be called either West or North Malvern ; that district stretching down the road towards the Link, and also towards that mother of the Malverns, proudly calling itself Great.

It was not at all likely rich Mr. Johnstone should known anything of poor Mrs. Smith in the small lodging ; and as Mrs. Smith lived a secluded life, and did not even take in the Malvern paper with the list of visitors to that far-famed watering-place, she knew nothing of the various neighbours who might be revel ing in luxuries within a stone's throw of her, or who might be gazing at the same glorious sunsets and breathing the same pure mountain air. She purposely avoided society ; she lodged at Malvern to economise and to save all she could for the one idol ; the one object of interest in her life — her only son. With the usual good fortune of the fortunate like the accumulation of riches to the rich, Mr. Johnstone had another advantage besides his wealth over poor Mrs. Smith. She was lonely, she had only occasional visits from her son to cheer her ; whereas Mr. Johnstone had two merry grand-daughters always with him, and by a lucky chance two old friends had happened to light on West Malvern as a tem porary residence while their own country home was under repair.

These friends were two elderly Miss Lyntons, sisters to Mr. John stone's friend, Lord Lynton. They were cheerful, sociable old maids, always ready to look after Mr. Johnstone if Mary told them he was dull or low; and always delighted that Mary and Alice should run in to see them at any time. Mr. Johnstone was certainly privileged to be dull and low at times for he had had much sorrow. His only son Arthur and his wife were both dead, leaving their two children, Mary and Alice, to the care of their grand father and his wife Lady Mary. Lady Mary Johnstone was one of those women whose loss in a family must be felt at every moment. She was not a brilliant person, but she was gifted with that true womanly quality, unselfish strong affection ; guided by the rare virtue of good common sense. She managed her household well ; her voice was not heard in the streets — but her quiet word was law to those around her.

Though not a learned woman, her ready tact and enlarged sympathy enabled her to take an intelligent interest in her husband's pursuits. He was a man of literary tastes ; a lover of poetry and music ; something of a dilettante in the fine arts. He read aloud, and he was satisfied with his Mary as a listener, for her taste and judgment were correct, even if her learning was not profound. He was satisfied with her judgment in all matters of conduct, for she was sure to view everything in a sensible way. What her love was, that he alcne could tell ; for she was not a person to parade her affection. It was that deep, hidden, sacred feeling which pervaded her soul and influenced all her actions. As she loved God supremely, so she loved her husband next to Him ; and so she loved all around her, and never believed in the sins or faults of others if she could possibly help it.

Mary was still a child when Mr. Johnstone lost her, and Alice was too young to remember her, but a reverent mysterious feeling remained concerning her, as of one who was a model in every respect for her grandchildren. These two orphan girls had been fortunate in the excellent governess, Miss Wright, who had lived from her girlhood with their grand mother. Lady Mary Johnstone had taught and trained her. She had taken charge of her at first out of kindness, as she was penniless and an orphan ; and by degrees she found the com panionship almost essential to her comfort. Miss Wright wrote letters, arranged household matters, made tea, and did all those things which a wealthy lady at the head of a large establishment, finds it very pleasant to have done for her; especially where there are no daughters to take these cares of wealth off her hands.

But, above all, Lady Mary felt the comfort of having a well-informed, judicious companion. Quiet and undemonstrative as Miss Wright was in manner, she had at her heart such strong steady affection for Mr. and Lady Mary Johnstone as to make all she did for them a pleasure instead of a dry duty. Her pleasing sensible countenance made every one forget that she was plain. She had the merit of never being in the way, and never out of it when wanted. The poor widower felt the comfort of her presence in his desolate home, and she remained as governess to Mary and Alice ; quiet and unassuming as ever, giving her whole heart to the charge intrusted to her. Mr. Johnstone was the head of the younger branch of the Johnstones Barons of Handsacre. His grandfather had married a distant cousin, as it would be called advantageously, for she was an heiress, owner of Hawthornden Park, and a large house in Berkeley Square, with various other possessions, all of which had now descended to Mr. Johnstone.

Mr. Johnstone had his faults and weaknesses — who has not ? He was a thorough aristocrat, with very little toleration for the society of second-rate gentility. But, on the whole, he was an excellent and highly cultivated English gentleman ; and as he had the virtues of his class, we may allow him some of its faults and prejudices likewise. Among these we must say exclusiveness, that curious eccentric folly of highly civilised life, which equally exists — as extremes meet, it is said — among the native chiefs of sunny regions, who delight in feasts of human flesh, and the very fine gentlemen of civilised Europe. Mr. Johnstone thought it right and natural to associate only with those who were born and educated in the same society as himself; but he possessed to the full that quality of politeness or courtesy which is old-fashioned, we fear, not only as a term but in reality.

There is an abundance of self-assertion and assurance ; but, alas ! very little of that simple modest dignityT which is the seemly result of proper self-respect, and which pays to others what it justly claims in return. Though Mr. Johnstone was kind and courteous to all, he could not admit of any social equality ; and both in London and in the country he kept to his own little set in society as a natural and inevitable state of things. But breadth was not so much the fashion in those days, and his narrowness must be excused, as he had not been trained in the doctrines of that wide-spreading benevolence which makes every one a neighbour, excepting those few who are living close to us. They, of course, have so many antagonistic faults, as to make it impossible to view them with that grand expansive benevolence which irradiate the great unknown multitude who dwell at a convenient distance.

Chapter V

Next to the month of May there is nothing so charming as the month of June, though it has a trick of being cold and wet at times ; but that is not its rule, and a fine June has a consummation of charms not to be described, but felt. The hopefulness and freshness of youth still linger about it, with a touch of the sedate completeness of maturer years. The luxuriance of foliage of every forest tree and the first gush of roses in every En glish garden have nothing to equal them, and the eye and all the senses are refreshed by the rich green of the pastures in the valleys, and on the hills by the short turf inlaid with the little purple thyme, sending forth a delicate fragrance at every footfall. Thus it was on the Malvern hills on that real, excellent, typical June day, when the sociable Miss Lyntons had planned a walking and driving expedition through woods and lanes and grassy paths.

Their nephew and niece had just come to stay with them, and young people are a de lightful excuse for everything pleasant and enterprising. There had been a previous exciting con ference with Mary and Alice to settle everything for the entire enjoyment of the day, and after this conference Alice's feet could scarcely carry her back fast enough to her grandpapa's arm-chair to tell him all and everything that could possibly be told. vol. i. " You see, grandpapa, dear Alfred and Florry will be here to-morrow, and then it is next day — next day that ever is, and there is first to be tea so that it may not be too hot when we set out, but early, so that it may not be too late getting back, and then we young people are to walk and Miss Lynton and Miss Betty to have that dear little pony carriage — just for them or for any who are tired (not that any one need be), and we are to go down into the woods — quite deep down, and sketch (those who can) and sit down in the shade or the sun as it happens, and sing glees perhaps, and walk and hunt for wild flowers and birds' nests if there are any still (and there might be), and stop at a farm-house to see some young puppies, and then see the pigs fed and the cows milked (and have some new milk too if we like it), and then, and then — Oh !