The Virginians by William Makepeace Thackeray (top books to read txt) 📕

The Hampshire folks were determined that it was a great benefit to the country to have Castlewood House once more open, with beer in the cellars, horses in the stables, and spits turning before the kitchen fires. The new lady took her place with great dignity, and 'twas certain she had uncommon accomplishments and wit. Was it not written, in the marriage advertisements, that her ladyship brought her noble husband seventy thousand pounds? On a beaucoup d'esprit with seventy thousand pounds. The Hampshire people said this was only a small portion of her wealth. When the grandfather should fall, ever so many plums would be found on that old tree.

That quiet old man, and keen reckoner, began quickly to put the dilapidated Castlewood accounts in order, of which long neglect, poverty, and improvidence had hastened the ruin. The business of the old gentleman's life now, and for some time henceforth, was to advance, improve, mend my lord's finances; to screw the rents up where practicable, to pare the expenses of the establishment down. He could, somehow, look to every yard of worsted lace on the footmen's coats, and every pound of beef that went to their dinner. A watchful old eye noted every flagon of beer which was fetched from the buttery, and marked that no waste occurred in the larder. The people were fewer, but more regularly paid; the liveries were not so ragged, and yet the tailor had no need to dun for his money; the gardeners and grooms grumbled, though their wages were no longer overdue: but the horses fattened on less corn, and the fruit and vegetables were ever so much more plentiful—so keenly did my lady's old grandfather keep a watch over the household affairs, from his lonely little chamber in the turret.

These improvements, though here told in a paragraph or two, were the affairs of months and years at Castlewood; where, with thrift, order, and judicious outlay of money (however, upon some pressing occasions, my lord might say he had none), the estate and household increased in prosperity. That it was a flourishing and economical household no one could deny: not even the dowager lady and her two children, who now seldom entered within Castlewood gates, my lady considering them in the light of enemies—for who, indeed, would like a stepmother-in-law? The little reigning Countess gave the dowager battle, and routed her utterly and speedily. Though educated in the colonies, and ignorant of polite life during her early years, the Countess Lydia had a power of language and a strength of will that all had to acknowledge who quarrelled with her. The dowager and my Lady Fanny were no match for the young American: they fled from before her to their jointure house in Kensington, and no wonder their absence was not regretted by my lord, who was in the habit of regretting no one whose back was turned. Could cousin Warrington, whose hand his lordship pressed so affectionately on coming and parting, with whom cousin Eugene was so gay and frank and pleasant when they were together, expect or hope that his lordship would grieve at his departure, at his death, at any misfortune which could happen to him, or any souls alive? Cousin Warrington knew better. Always of a sceptical turn, Mr. W. took a grim delight in watching the peculiarities of his neighbours, and could like this one even though he had no courage and no heart. Courage? Heart? What are these to you and me in the world? A man may have private virtues as he may have half a million in the funds. What we du monde expect is, that he should be lively, agreeable, keep a decent figure, and pay his way. Colonel Esmond Warrington's grandfather (in whose history and dwelling-place Mr. W. took an extraordinary interest), might once have been owner of this house of Castlewood, and of the titles which belonged to its possessor. The gentleman often looked at the Colonel's grave picture as it still hung in the saloon, a copy or replica of which piece Mr. Warrington fondly remembered in Virginia.

“He must have been a little touched here,” my lord said, tapping his own tall, placid forehead.

There are certain actions, simple and common with some men, which others cannot understand, and deny as utter lies, or deride as acts of madness.

“I do you the justice to think, cousin,” says Mr. Warrington to his lordship, “that you would not give up any advantage for any friend in the world.”

“Eh! I am selfish: but am I more selfish than the rest of the world?” asks my lord, with a French shrug of his shoulders, and a pinch out of his box. Once, in their walks in the fields, his lordship happening to wear a fine scarlet coat, a cow ran towards him; and the ordinarily languid nobleman sprang over a stile with the agility of a schoolboy. He did not conceal his tremor, or his natural want of courage. “I dare say you respect me no more than I respect myself, George,” he would say, in his candid way, and begin a very pleasant sardonical discourse upon the fall of man, and his faults, and shortcomings; and wonder why Heaven had not made us all brave and tall, and handsome and rich? As for Mr. Warrington, who very likely loved to be king of his company (as some people do), he could not help liking this kinsman of his, so witty, graceful, polished, high-placed in the world—so utterly his inferior. Like the animal in Mr. Sterne's famous book, “Do not beat me,” his lordship's look seemed to say, “but, if you will, you may.” No man, save a bully and coward himself, deals hardly with a creature so spiritless.