CHAPTER XXIII
Feb. 18, 1822. - Early this morning Arthur mounted his hunter and
set off in high glee to meet the - hounds. He will be away all
day, and so I will amuse myself with my neglected diary, if I can
give that name to such an irregular composition. It is exactly
four months since I opened it last.
I am married now, and settled down as Mrs. Huntingdon of Grassdale
Manor. I have had eight weeks' experience of matrimony. And do I
regret the step I have taken? No, though I must confess, in my
secret heart, that Arthur is not what I thought him at first, and
if I had known him in the beginning as thoroughly as I do now, I
probably never should have loved him, and if I loved him first, and
then made the discovery, I fear I should have thought it my duty
not to have married him. To be sure I might have known him, for
every one was willing enough to tell me about him, and he himself
was no accomplished hypocrite, but I was wilfully blind; and now,
instead of regretting that I did not discern his full character
before I was indissolubly bound to him, I am glad, for it has saved
me a great deal of battling with my conscience, and a great deal of
consequent trouble and pain; and, whatever I ought to have done, my
duty now is plainly to love him and to cleave to him, and this just
tallies with my inclination.
He is very fond of me, almost too fond. I could do with less
caressing and more rationality. I should like to be less of a pet
and more of a friend, if I might choose; but I won't complain of
that: I am only afraid his affection loses in depth where it gains
in ardour. I sometimes liken it to a fire of dry twigs and
branches compared with one of solid coal, very bright and hot; but
if it should burn itself out and leave nothing but ashes behind,
what shall I do? But it won't, it sha'n't, I am determined; and
surely I have power to keep it alive. So let me dismiss that
thought at once. But Arthur is selfish; I am constrained to
acknowledge that; and, indeed, the admission gives me less pain
than might be expected, for, since I love him so much, I can easily
forgive him for loving himself: he likes to be pleased, and it is
my delight to please him; and when I regret this tendency of his,
it is for his own sake, not for mine.
The first instance he gave was on the occasion of our bridal tour.
He wanted to hurry it over, for all the continental scenes were
already familiar to him: many had lost their interest in his eyes,
and others had never had anything to lose. The consequence was,
that after a flying transit through part of France and part of
Italy, I came back nearly as ignorant as I went, having made no
acquaintance with persons and manners, and very little with things,
my head swarming with a motley confusion of objects and scenes;
some, it is true, leaving a deeper and more pleasing impression
than others, but these embittered by the recollection that my
emotions had not been shared by my companion, but that, on the
contrary, when I had expressed a particular interest in anything
that I saw or desired to see, it had been displeasing to him,
inasmuch as it proved that I could take delight in anything
disconnected with himself.
As for Paris, we only just touched at that, and he would not give
me time to see one-tenth of the beauties and interesting objects of
Rome. He wanted to get me home, he said, to have me all to
himself, and to see me safely installed as the mistress of
Grassdale Manor, just as single-minded, as naive, and piquante as I
was; and as if I had been some frail butterfly, he expressed
himself fearful of rubbing the silver off my wings by bringing me
into contact with society, especially that of Paris and Rome; and,
more-over, he did not scruple to tell me that there were ladies in
both places that would tear his eyes out if they happened to meet
him with me.
Of course I was vexed at all this; but still it was less the
disappointment to myself that annoyed me, than the disappointment
in him, and the trouble I was at to frame excuses to my friends for
having seen and observed so little, without imputing one particle
of blame to my companion. But when we got home - to my new,
delightful home - I was so happy and he was so kind that I freely
forgave him all; and I was beginning to think my lot too happy, and
my husband actually too good for me, if not too good for this
world, when, on the second Sunday after our arrival, he shocked and
horrified me by another instance of his unreasonable exaction. We
were walking home from the morning service, for it was a fine
frosty day, and as we are so near the church, I had requested the
carriage should not be used.
'Helen,' said he, with unusual gravity, 'I am not quite satisfied
with you.'
I desired to know what was wrong.
'But will you promise to reform if I tell you?'
'Yes, if I can, and without offending a higher authority.'
'Ah! there it is, you see: you don't love me with all your heart.'
'I don't understand you, Arthur (at least I hope I don't): pray
tell me what I have done or said amiss.'
'It is nothing you have done or said; it is something that you are
- you are too religious. Now I like a woman to be religious, and I
think your piety one of your greatest charms; but then, like all
other good things, it may be carried too far. To my thinking, a
woman's religion ought not to lessen her devotion to her earthly
lord. She should have enough to purify and etherealise her soul,
but not enough to refine away her heart, and raise her above all
human sympathies.'
'And am I above all human sympathies?' said I.
'No, darling; but you are making more progress towards that saintly
condition than I like; for all these two hours I have been thinking
of you and wanting to catch your eye, and you were so absorbed in
your devotions that you had not even a glance to spare for me - I
declare it is enough to make one jealous of one's Maker - which is
very wrong, you know; so don't excite such wicked passions again,
for my soul's sake.'
'I will give my whole heart and soul to my Maker if I can,' I
answered, 'and not one atom more of it to you than He allows. What
are you, sir, that you should set yourself up as a god, and presume
to dispute possession of my heart with Him to whom I owe all I have
and all I am, every blessing I ever did or ever can enjoy - and
yourself among the rest - if you are a blessing, which I am half
inclined to doubt.'
'Don't be so hard upon me, Helen; and don't pinch my arm so: you
are squeezing your fingers into the bone.'
'Arthur,' continued I, relaxing my hold of his arm, 'you don't love
me half as much as I do you; and yet, if you loved me far less than
you do, I would not complain, provided you loved your Maker more.
I should rejoice to see you at any time so deeply absorbed in your
devotions that you had not a single thought to spare for me. But,
indeed, I should lose nothing by the change, for the more you loved
your God the more deep and pure and true would be your love to me.'
At this he only laughed and kissed my hand, calling me a sweet
enthusiast. Then taking off his hat, he added: 'But look here,
Helen - what can a man do with such a head as this?'
The head looked right enough, but when he placed my hand on the top
of it, it sunk in a bed of curls, rather alarmingly low, especially
in the middle.
'You see I was not made to be a saint,' said he, laughing, 'If God
meant me to be religious, why didn't He give me a proper organ of
veneration?'
'You are like the servant,' I replied, 'who, instead of employing
his one talent in his master's service, restored it to him
unimproved, alleging, as an excuse, that he knew him "to be a hard
man, reaping where he had not sown, and gathering where he had not
strawed." Of him to whom less is given, less will be required, but
our utmost exertions are required of us all. You are not without
the capacity of veneration, and faith and hope, and conscience and
reason, and every other requisite to a Christian's character, if
you choose to employ them; but all our talents increase in the
using, and every faculty, both good and bad, strengthens by
exercise: therefore, if you choose to use the bad, or those which
tend to evil, till they become your masters, and neglect the good
till they dwindle away, you have only yourself to blame. But you
have talents, Arthur - natural endowments both of heart and mind
and temper, such as many a better Christian would be glad to
possess, if you would only employ them in God's service. I should
never expect to see you a devotee, but it is quite possible to be a
good Christian without ceasing to be a happy, merry-hearted man.'
'You speak like an oracle, Helen, and all you say is indisputably
true; but listen here: I am hungry, and I see before me a good
substantial dinner; I am told that if I abstain from this to-day I
shall have a sumptuous feast to-morrow, consisting of all manner of
dainties and delicacies. Now, in the first place, I should be loth
to wait till to-morrow when I have the means of appeasing my hunger
already before me: in the second place, the solid viands of to-day
are more to my taste than the dainties that are promised me; in the
third place, I don't see to-morrow's banquet, and how can I tell
that it is not all a fable, got up by the greasy-faced fellow that
is advising me to abstain in order that he may have all the good
victuals to himself? in the fourth place, this table must be spread
for somebody, and, as Solomon says, "Who can eat, or who else can
hasten hereunto more than I?" and finally, with your leave, I'll
sit down and satisfy my cravings of to-day, and leave to-morrow to
shift for itself - who knows but what I may secure both this and
that?'
'But you are not required to abstain from the substantial dinner of
to-day: you are only advised to partake of these coarser viands in
such moderation as not to incapacitate you from enjoying the
choicer banquet of to-morrow. If, regardless of that counsel, you
choose to make a beast of yourself now, and over-eat and over-drink
yourself till you turn the good victuals into poison, who is to
blame if, hereafter, while you are suffering the torments of
yesterday's gluttony and drunkenness, you see more temperate men
sitting down to enjoy themselves at that splendid entertainment
which you are unable to taste?'
'Most true, my patron saint; but again, our friend Solomon says,
"There is nothing better for a man than to eat and to drink, and to
be merry."'
'And again,' returned I, 'he says, "Rejoice, O young man, in thy
youth; and walk in the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of
thine eyes: but know thou, that for all these things God will
bring thee into judgment."'
'Well, but, Helen, I'm sure I've been very good these last few
weeks. What have you seen amiss in me, and what would you have me
to do?'
'Nothing more than you do, Arthur: your actions are all right so
far; but I would have your thoughts changed; I would have you to
fortify yourself against temptation, and not to call evil good, and
good evil; I should wish you to think more deeply, to look further,
and aim higher than you do.'
