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“I suppose,” said Mrs. Montgomery, with a sigh, “I must have laid it down without opening, and forgotten it.”
Mr. Jackson observed, that from the expression, “over seas to the harvest,” and also the man’s appearance, it was very evident he must be one of those poor creatures who come over in shiploads from the north of Ireland to Whitehaven, during the reaping season; and that this fact, once admitted, seemed to render it more than probable, that the noble family spoken of were Irish. As to the important particulars of names and titles, there seemed but one chance of obtaining them; which was, to institute an immediate search after the young man who had brought the letter. Every inquiry was accordingly made, but in vain.
After some months, Mr. Jackson himself, in the warmth of his zeal, undertook a journey to Ireland; but returned, without having been able to discover any clue to the business. Advertisements were next resorted to, but no one claimed Edmund. The letter had said, that “those it concerned most were,” in the nurse’s phraseology, “not to the fore.” Whether death, or absence from the kingdom was meant, it was impossible to say.
The harvest season of the next year came and went, but the wandering knight of the reaping-hook was heard of no more; and Mrs. Montgomery, while her better judgment condemned the feeling, could not conceal from herself, that she experienced a sensation of reprieve, on finding that she was not immediately to be called upon to resign her little charge. Poor Edmund had now become to her a kind of sacred pledge; every thought and feeling that regarded him, was associated with the memory of her dear departed child, who had taken so benevolent a delight in protecting and cherishing the helpless being she had rescued from misery, and almost certain death. Could the mourning mother then leave undone any thing that that dear child, had she lived, would have done? The absolute seclusion too, in which grief for the loss of her daughter, induced Mrs. Montgomery to live, gave all that concerned this object, of an interest thus connected with the feelings of the time, an importance in her eyes, which, under any other circumstances, would scarcely, perhaps, have been natural.
Gradually, however, the prospect of discovering who Edmund’s parents were, faded almost entirely away; but the conviction that they must be noble was, from the period of the receipt of the nurse’s packet, firmly fixed on the mind, both of his benefactress and of Mr. Jackson. The style, indeed, of the letter itself, left no doubt of the veracity of the writer; while the manners of him who had been the bearer of the strange epistle, the conversation of the man and woman on the Keswick road, nay, the very state in which the poor child was first found—were all corroborating evidences.
CHAPTER XX.
“Thy fame, like the growing tree of the vale,
Shall arise in its season, and thy deeds
Shine like those of thy fathers. But go not
Yet to the bloody strife; for thy young arm
scarce can draw the heavy sword of Artho,
Or lift Temora’s spear.”
“The blue arms of the lovely boy
Invest him, as grey clouds the rising sun.”
Lord L. remembered, and even experienced, something of a consolatory feeling, in faithfully performing the promise which, within the first happy year of his marriage, he had made to his beloved wife, and which had seemed to give her so much pleasure: we mean that which respected placing and advancing Edmund in the navy. His lordship accordingly wrote from abroad to his friend, Lord Fitz Ullin, and Edmund, at the age of twelve, was received into the naval college at Portsmouth.
This was, no doubt, a very wise and proper arrangement; yet there were those to whom it caused infinite grief: we speak of the twins, who, though they had never been expressly told that Edmund was their brother, had learned to love him as such; and whether they really thought he was so, or never thought about the matter, were in the habit, in all their little plays and pastimes, of calling him brother Edmund, and fancying that nothing could be done without him.
His vacations, however, were all spent at Lodore House, and were joyful in proportion to the sorrows of parting. On the first of those memorable occasions, Mrs. Montgomery absolutely wept over him; Frances frolicked round him, as if obliged to exhaust herself by fatigue, to moderate her transports; while little Julia stood silently, and with a pensive expression, quite close to him; and when, after performing any extraordinary new feat for the amusement of Frances, he would stoop, and ask of his little favourite what he should do for her, she would answer, with a glow of enthusiasm, “Stay always with me!”
He generally brought some tasks home, which were to be learned before his return to college. When he sat at these, Frances would fidget round the table, in visible discontent—stop straight opposite to him, put her head on one side, watch to meet his eye, and make him laugh; failing in this, try to play alone; and finding this also dreadfully stupid, return to the charge; while Julia would get on a part of his chair, hold his hand and remain perfectly still, till the hand was borrowed to turn over a leaf, when she would follow it with an appealing look, which look, being repaid by a fond caress, she would retake the hand, and sit again as motionless as before. At length, poor Lady Frances, infected by the dullness of her companions, would sometimes bring a chair on the other side, and insist on having the other hand, which would reduce Edmund to the necessity of fastening his book open on the table with another book; after which arrangement, we must confess, that, however unjust the proceeding, and notwithstanding the remonstrances of the injured party, it was always the hand which Frances held, which was borrowed to turn over leaves, &c. &c.
But there was something in little Julia’s enthusiastic manner of showing attachment, which won upon the affections in an extraordinary degree, and made her almost unjustly the favourite; poor Frances, considering her lively temper, loved brother Edmund full as well, in her own way.
Thus passed two years; and at fourteen, Edmund was appointed to the same ship on board which Henry then happened to be. The vessel was ready for sea, and going on a foreign station, on which it was to remain for three years. Our hero, after joining, obtained a few days’ leave, that he might pay a farewell visit to Lodore. Arrived at the last stage of his journey, he stopped at the little inn, and put on his midshipman’s dress, which he had brought with him, from a boyish wish to surprise his two little sisters, as he called the twins, now about seven years old. Accordingly, he entered the domestic circle fully equipped, and produced, at least, as great a sensation as his beating heart, while jumping out of the carriage, and hastening across the lawn, had anticipated.
As soon as the first clamorous joy of meeting, as well as the first public examination of every part of his dress was over, Frances possessed herself of his cocked-hat, dirk, and belt, and began arraying herself in the spoils. While Mrs. Montgomery, drawing him near her chair, began to question him as to how long he could now remain with them, and when he thought he should be able to return. Little Julia stood close СКАЧАТЬ