to it every day. We have wax candles in the schoolroom,
and fires to warm ourselves with. Lady Crawley is made
to put on the brightest pea-green in her wardrobe, and
my pupils leave off their thick shoes and tight old
tartan pelisses, and wear silk stockings and muslin frocks,
as fashionable baronets' daughters should. Rose came in
yesterday in a sad plight--the Wiltshire sow (an
enormous pet of hers) ran her down, and destroyed a most
lovely flowered lilac silk dress by dancing over it--had
this happened a week ago, Sir Pitt would have sworn
frightfully, have boxed the poor wretch's ears, and put
her upon bread and water for a month. All he said was,
"I'll serve you out, Miss, when your aunt's gone," and
laughed off the accident as quite trivial. Let us hope his
wrath will have passed away before Miss Crawley's
departure. I hope so, for Miss Rose's sake, I am sure.
What a charming reconciler and peacemaker money is!
Another admirable effect of Miss Crawley and her
seventy thousand pounds is to be seen in the conduct
of the two brothers Crawley. I mean the baronet and
the rector, not OUR brothers--but the former, who hate
each other all the year round, become quite loving at
Christmas. I wrote to you last year how the abominable
horse-racing rector was in the habit of preaching clumsy
sermons at us at church, and how Sir Pitt snored in
answer. When Miss Crawley arrives there is no such thing
as quarrelling heard of--the Hall visits the Rectory, and
vice versa--the parson and the Baronet talk about the
pigs and the poachers, and the county business, in the
most affable manner, and without quarrelling in their
cups, I believe--indeed Miss Crawley won't hear of their
quarrelling, and vows that she will leave her money to
the Shropshire Crawleys if they offend her. If they were
clever people, those Shropshire Crawleys, they might
have it all, I think; but the Shropshire Crawley is a
clergyman like his Hampshire cousin, and mortally offended
Miss Crawley (who had fled thither in a fit of rage
against her impracticable brethren) by some strait-laced
notions of morality. He would have prayers in the house,
I believe.
Our sermon books are shut up when Miss Crawley
arrives, and Mr. Pitt, whom she abominates, finds it
convenient to go to town. On the other hand, the young
dandy--"blood," I believe, is the term--Captain Crawley
makes his appearance, and I suppose you will like to
know what sort of a person he is.
Well, he is a very large young dandy. He is six feet
high, and speaks with a great voice; and swears a great
deal; and orders about the servants, who all adore him
nevertheless; for he is very generous of his money, and
the domestics will do anything for him. Last week the
keepers almost killed a bailiff and his man who came
down from London to arrest the Captain, and who were
found lurking about the Park wall--they beat them,
ducked them, and were going to shoot them for
poachers, but the baronet interfered.
The Captain has a hearty contempt for his father, I
can see, and calls him an old PUT, an old SNOB, an old
CHAW-BACON, and numberless other pretty names. He has
a DREADFUL REPUTATION among the ladies. He brings his
hunters home with him, lives with the Squires of the
county, asks whom he pleases to dinner, and Sir Pitt
dares not say no, for fear of offending Miss Crawley,
and missing his legacy when she dies of her apoplexy.
Shall I tell you a compliment the Captain paid me? I
must, it is so pretty. One evening we actually had a
dance; there was Sir Huddleston Fuddleston and his
family, Sir Giles Wapshot and his young ladies, and I
don't know how many more. Well, I heard him say--
"By Jove, she's a neat little filly!" meaning your humble
servant; and he did me the honour to dance two country-
dances with me. He gets on pretty gaily with the young
Squires, with whom he drinks, bets, rides, and talks
about hunting and shooting; but he says the country
girls are BORES; indeed, I don't think he is far wrong.
You should see the contempt with which they look down
on poor me! When they dance I sit and play the piano
very demurely; but the other night, coming in rather
flushed from the dining-room, and seeing me employed
in this way, he swore out loud that I was the best dancer
in the room, and took a great oath that he would have
the fiddlers from Mudbury.
"I'll go and play a country-dance," said Mrs. Bute
Crawley, very readily (she is a little, black-faced old
woman in a turban, rather crooked, and with very
twinkling eyes); and after the Captain and your poor little
Rebecca had performed a dance together, do you know
she actually did me the honour to compliment me upon
my steps! Such a thing was never heard of before; the
proud Mrs. Bute Crawley, first cousin to the Earl of
Tiptoff, who won't condescend to visit Lady Crawley,
except when her sister is in the country. Poor Lady
Crawley! during most part of these gaieties, she is
upstairs taking pills.
Mrs. Bute has all of a sudden taken a great fancy to
me. "My dear Miss Sharp," she says, "why not bring
over your girls to the Rectory?--their cousins will be so
happy to see them." I know what she means. Signor
Clementi did not teach us the piano for nothing; at
which price Mrs. Bute hopes to get a professor for her
children. I can see through her schemes, as though she
told them to me; but I shall go, as I am determined to
make myself agreeable--is it not a poor governess's
duty, who has not a friend or protector in the world?
The Rector's wife paid me a score of compliments about
the progress my pupils made, and thought, no doubt, to
touch my heart--poor, simple, country soul!--as if I
cared a fig about my pupils!
Your India muslin and your pink silk, dearest Amelia,
are said to become me very well. They are a good deal
worn now; but, you know, we poor girls can't afford des
fraiches toilettes. Happy, happy you! who have but to
drive to St. James's Street, and a dear mother who will
give you any thing you ask. Farewell, dearest girl,
Your affectionate
Rebecca.
P.S.--I wish you could have seen the faces of the
Miss Blackbrooks (Admiral Blackbrook's daughters, my
dear), fine young ladies, with dresses from London,
when Captain Rawdon selected poor me for a partner!
When Mrs. Bute Crawley (whose artifices our ingenious
Rebecca had so soon discovered) had procured from
Miss Sharp the promise of a visit, she induced the all-
powerful Miss Crawley to make the necessary application
to Sir Pitt, and the good-natured old lady, who loved to
be gay herself, and to see every one gay and happy round
about her, was quite charmed, and ready to establish a
reconciliation and intimacy between her two brothers.
It was therefore agreed that the young people of both
families should visit each other frequently for the future,
and the friendship of course lasted as long as the jovial
old mediatrix was there to keep the peace.
"Why did you ask that scoundrel, Rawdon Crawley, to
dine?" said the Rector to his lady, as they were walking
home through the park. "I don't want the fellow. He looks
down upon us country people as so many blackamoors.
He's never content unless he gets my yellow-sealed wine,
which costs me ten shillings a bottle, hang him! Besides,
he's such an infernal character--he's a gambler--he's a
drunkard--he's a profligate in every way. He shot a man
in a duel--he's over head and ears in debt, and he's
robbed me and mine of the best part of Miss Crawley's
fortune. Waxy says she has him"--here the Rector shook
his fist at the moon, with something very like an oath,
and added, in a melancholious tone, "--, down in her will
for fifty thousand; and there won't be above thirty to
divide."
"I think she's going," said the Rector's wife. "She was
very red in the face when we left dinner. I was obliged
to unlace her."
"She drank seven glasses of champagne," said the
reverend gentleman, in a low voice; "and filthy champagne
it is, too, that my brother poisons us with--but you
women never know what's what."
"We know nothing," said Mrs. Bute Crawley.
"She drank cherry-brandy after dinner," continued his
Reverence, "and took curacao with her coffee. I
wouldn't take a glass for a five-pound note: it kills me
with heartburn. She can't stand it, Mrs. Crawley--she
must go--flesh and blood won't bear it! and I lay five to
two, Matilda drops in a year."
Indulging in these solemn speculations, and thinking
about his debts, and his son Jim at College, and Frank at
Woolwich, and the four girls, who were no beauties, poor
things, and would not have a penny but what they got from
the aunt's expected legacy, the Rector and his lady walked
on for a while.
"Pitt can't be such an infernal villain as to sell the
reversion of the living. And that Methodist milksop of an
eldest son looks to Parliament," continued Mr. Crawley,
after a pause.
"Sir Pitt Crawley will do anything," said the Rector's
wife. "We must get Miss Crawley to make him promise it
to James."
"Pitt will promise anything," replied the brother. "He
promised he'd pay my college bills, when my father died;
he promised he'd build the new wing to the Rectory;
he promised he'd let me have Jibb's field and the Six-
acre Meadow--and much he executed his promises! And
it's to this man's son--this scoundrel, gambler, swindler,
murderer of a Rawdon Crawley, that Matilda leaves the
bulk of her money. I say it's un-Christian. By Jove, it is.
The infamous dog has got every vice except hypocrisy,
and that belongs to his brother."
"Hush, my dearest love! we're in Sir Pitt's grounds,"
interposed his wife.
"I say he has got every vice, Mrs. Crawley. Don't
Ma'am, bully me. Didn't he shoot Captain Marker? Didn't
he rob young Lord Dovedale at the Cocoa-Tree? Didn't
he cross the fight between Bill Soames and the Cheshire
Trump, by which I lost forty pound? You know he did;
and as for the women, why, you heard that before me, in
my own magistrate's room "
"For heaven's sake, Mr. Crawley," said the lady, "spare
me the details."
"And you ask this villain into your house!" continued
the exasperated Rector. "You, the mother of a young
family--the wife of a clergyman of the Church of
England. By Jove!"
"Bute Crawley, you are a fool," said the Rector's wife
scornfully.
"Well, Ma'am, fool or not--and I don't say, Martha,
I'm so clever as you are, I never did. But I won't meet
Rawdon Crawley, that's flat. I'll go over to Huddleston,
that I will, and see his black greyhound, Mrs. Crawley;
and I'll run Lancelot against him for fifty. By Jove, I will;
or against any dog in England. But I won't meet that
beast Rawdon Crawley."
"Mr. Crawley, you are intoxicated, as usual," replied
his wife. And the next morning, when the Rector woke,
and called for small beer, she put him in mind of his
promise to visit Sir Huddleston Fuddleston on Saturday,
and as he knew he should have a wet night, it was agreed
that he might gallop back again in time for church on
Sunday morning. Thus it will be seen that the parishioners
of Crawley were equally happy in their Squire and in their
Rector.
Miss Crawley had not long been established at the Hall
before Rebecca's fascinations had won the heart of that
good-natured London rake, as they had of the country
innocents whom we have been describing. Taking her
accustomed drive, one day, she thought fit to order that
"that little governess" should accompany her to Mudbury.
Before they had returned Rebecca had made a conquest
of her; having made her laugh four times, and amused her
during the whole of the little journey.
"Not let Miss Sharp dine at table!" said she to Sir Pitt,
who had arranged a dinner of ceremony, and asked all the
neighbouring baronets. "My dear creature, do you
suppose I can talk about the nursery with Lady Fuddleston, or
discuss justices' business with that goose, old Sir Giles
Wapshot? I insist upon Miss Sharp appearing. Let Lady
Crawley remain upstairs, if there is no room. But little
Miss Sharp! Why, she's the only person fit to talk to in
the county!"
Of course, after such a peremptory order as this, Miss
Sharp, the governess, received commands to dine with the
illustrious company below stairs. And when Sir Huddleston
had, with great pomp and ceremony, handed Miss
Crawley in to dinner, and was preparing to take his
place by her side, the old lady cried out, in a shrill
voice, "Becky Sharp! Miss Sharp! Come you and sit by
me and amuse me; and let Sir Huddleston sit by Lady
Wapshot."
When the parties were over, and the carriages had
rolled away, the insatiable Miss Crawley would say,
"Come to my dressing room, Becky, and let us abuse the
company"--which, between them, this pair of friends did
perfectly. Old Sir Huddleston wheezed a great deal at
dinner; Sir Giles Wapshot had a particularly noisy manner
of imbibing his soup, and her ladyship a wink of the left
eye; all of which Becky caricatured to admiration; as well
as the particulars of the night's conversation; the politics;
the war; the quarter-sessions; the famous run with the
H.H., and those heavy and dreary themes, about which
country gentlemen converse. As for the Misses Wapshot's
toilettes and Lady Fuddleston's famous yellow hat, Miss
