A Lady of England 15

A Lady of England 15

CHARLES. No anger, fair Miss Ratty, we had enough of this

indignation at the brink of the vault, when you were near

falling out with me because I would not fall in with your ideas,

and fall into the vault.

 

DARESBY. Ah, Sophy, how you treated me!

 

SOPHIA. I thought it my duty, dearest.

 

DARESBY. I can pardon you anything; but that deceiving Ratty,

whose word I can never again believe....

 

CHARLES. No more of that, Daresby. The farce is ended, the mists

of mistake are clearing up, the reign of Folly must fall, let

not Anger survive its cause!

 

Now that we have ended all this War of Words,

And fall to drawing corks instead of swords,

Now the Pretender may his Captors mock,

And view with glee a match without the lock,

Let each resentful thought and feeling cease,

And General Harmony conclude the Piece!

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER V

 

A.D. 1847-1849

 

HOME LIFE

 

 

In 1847 a new interest entered the life of Charlotte Tucker. The three

little ones of her brother Robert and his wife,--Louis, Charley, and

Letitia,--came to live at No. 3, and were made her especial charge. All

of them, but particularly the pretty little dark-eyed Letitia, then only

two years old, were thenceforward as her own; first in her thoughts,

and among the first in her love. She taught them, trained them, devoted

herself to them; and their names will often be found in her letters. The

death of Letitia, nearly twenty years later, was one of the heaviest

sorrows she ever had to endure. One is disposed to think that the care

and responsibility of three little ones, undertaken in the midst of a

full and busy family life, and in addition to all the duties of that

life, could have been no sinecure, and must have been fraught with many a

difficulty.

 

The Tuckers were much in society, as may indeed have been already

gathered. Mr. Tucker was a man greatly sought after, alike on account of

his position and influence, and because of his personal attractiveness.

Open house was kept; and the large circle of friends and acquaintances

never failed to find a welcome. So many indeed would drop in and out,

that three lunches in succession were occasionally known to take place

at No. 3; and so frequent were the ‘parties’ to which the family was

invited, that sometimes they would appear at three different houses

in the course of one evening. ‘Party’ in those days was a wide term,

embracing divers kinds of entertainment, from a simple musical gathering

to a large ball.

 

Dinner-parties also were numerous. In reference to these, Charlotte

Tucker wrote rather drolly to her sister late in life, speaking

of--‘those formal affairs, which you and I remember in our earlier

days. We _must_ ask So-and-so; and how shall we find gentlemen to

counterbalance Mrs. and Miss out of one house? Slow concerns those great

dinner-parties were; a kind of social duty, which cost much trouble and

expense, and gave not much pleasure. A kind of very stiff jelly, with not

many strawberries in it.’

 

An amusing story is told about these large dinners. In those days

the custom of ‘drinking healths’ had gained sway to an absurd and

objectionable extent; gentlemen being expected to respond to every toast,

and not only to sip their wine, but very often to empty their glasses,

under pain of giving serious offence. Mr. Tucker always had by his side

a decanter of toast and water, from which his glass was filled for the

various toasts; and probably those not in the secret counted him a

marvellously hard-headed man. One day a guest requested leave to taste

this especial wine, which was kept for the host alone, supposing it to

be of some very rare and choice vintage. His request was immediately

complied with; and the face of the _bon-vivant_ may be imagined when he

discovered himself to be drinking toast-and-water.

 

No doubt these dinners _were_ a ‘social duty’; and no doubt some of them

may have been extremely dull. Yet it must not be supposed that Charlotte

did not thoroughly enjoy London society, and did not fully appreciate

intercourse with polished and intellectual minds. That which in her

old age would have been a mere weariness to her, was no weariness in

youth and early middle age. One of her brothers remarks: ‘She was very

sociable, lively, and threw her whole heart into the kindly entertaining

of guests of all ages.’ Such powers of entertaining as she possessed

could not but have gone with enjoyment in the use of those powers.

 

Moreover, the study of different characters, the drawing out of other

people’s thoughts, the gaining of new ideas for herself, must have had

some fascination. And, despite all her kindness, all her readiness to see

the best in everybody, she could not, with her keen sense of humour, have

failed to be a good deal amused with the various foibles and absurdities

which certain people are wont to display, even in the best society, and

when upon their most circumspect behaviour.

 

Ever merry, and ever making others merry, she could, as one friend

says, ‘keep a whole tableful laughing and talking,’ without difficulty.

In fact, whatever the dinner-parties may have seemed to herself, her

own presence, her bright smile and sparkling conversation, effectually

prevented sensations of dulness on the part of others who were there.

 

Whether Charlotte ever had what, in the language of fifty or sixty years

ago, was delicately termed a ‘preference’ for anybody, cannot be known.

Her hand was at least once sought in marriage, while she was still a

girl; and some signs seem to have been visible that she was disposed to

‘like’ the gentleman in question. Her parents, however, disapproved of

the match, and it came to nothing. If at any time she really were in

love, it is pretty certain that she never would have revealed the fact

to any mortal being until sure that her ‘preference’ was returned. The

reticence which was so marked a feature in her otherwise frank and open

nature would undoubtedly have had sway in this direction.

 

Speaking to a friend, long after in old age, she said that in her young

days ‘at home,’ when a certain nameless gentleman was supposed to be

paying his addresses to Fanny, the other sisters were ‘very indignant’

at the idea of any man wishing to break into their sisterly circle. This

probably preceded her own little affair, since Fanny was four years her

senior. The pretty notion of home-life and of the unbroken sisterly

circle had in time to yield before stern facts, as first one sister and

then a second proved faithless to nursery traditions.

 

Wide as was the circle of family acquaintances, the girls possessed few

intimate outside friends. Mr. Tucker rather discouraged such intimacies,

considering that his five daughters ought to be content with the close

companionship of one another. Charlotte had above all her Laura, whom she

devotedly loved; and so satisfying was this friendship that she probably

cared little for others by comparison.

 

Mrs. Tucker, in her quiet way, was no less a power in the house than was

her husband. Though less brilliantly gifted, she was very observant,

very quaint, very wise, a most affectionate Mother, intensely loved and

revered by all her children. She had her own peculiar mode of looking

upon things. For instance,--having noticed that girls in an evening

party, glancing at a mirror, were apt to be disquieted to find their

dresses disorganised, she resolved to have no mirrors at all in her

rooms, hoping thereby to secure greater peace of mind among her guests.

It does not seem to have occurred to her, that a vague uneasiness about

the state of their attire might possibly trouble them quite as much as

even an uncomfortable certainty.

 

Another short story of Mrs. Tucker, showing her quiet, incisive force

of character, may well come in here. She had a very strong objection

to unkind discussion of people behind their backs. On one occasion,

when in the drawing-room of a certain lady, other callers beside

herself were present, and one of the latter rose to leave. No sooner

was the unfortunate lady gone, than the hostess began to speak of her

in disparaging terms. Mrs. Tucker made no immediate observation; but

presently, turning to the hostess, she said mildly, ‘I ought to be

going,--but I really am afraid to do so.’ Much surprised, the other asked

why. ‘Because,’ Mrs. Tucker replied, ‘I am afraid that when I have left

the room you will begin to speak of me as you did just now of Mrs. ----.’

The courteously uttered reproof--a pretty sharp one, however gently

bestowed--was accepted in an equally courteous spirit; and the hostess

earnestly assured her that nothing of the kind should take place.

 

There is no need to imagine, because Charlotte was gay and bright in

society, that she never knew the meaning of depression. Shadows of loss

and sorrow had not yet begun to fall across her pathway; yet even in

those happy days she must have grasped the meaning of ‘down’ as well as

‘up.’ Rather curiously, she spoke of herself in old age as having been

when young ‘subject to very low spirits’; or more strictly, she said that

she would have been so subject, but for the counteracting influences of

‘religion’ and ‘work,’ the latter arising from the former. High spirits

seldom exist without some tendency to occasional re-action. But certainly

the sense of depression, whenever it may have assailed her, was not

allowed to be a weight upon others in her everyday life.

 

It was most likely somewhere between 1847 and 1849 that she began to feel

uneasy about going to certain kinds of amusement. Fanny was the first to

dwell upon this subject, and to be unhappy as to exactly what she ought

or ought not to do. Long years after Charlotte Tucker wrote: Sweet Fanny

suffered _much_ from her sensitiveness of conscience’; and the words may

perhaps in part have borne reference to such debatings as these.

 

Fanny’s gentle, yielding nature went no farther than being troubled. She

did not speak out. But when the same questionings spread to the younger

sister, matters were different. Charlotte was not one who would hesitate

as to action, in the face of her own conscience. To some extent here lies

the gist of the matter. While she could go with a clear and perfectly

easy conscience, able to enjoy herself, and untroubled by doubts, she

probably did so without harm to herself, so long as her life was not

‘given to pleasures,’ that is to say, so long as she did not unduly

_love_ these things, or allow them to occupy a wrong place in her life.

The moment conscience became uneasy, however, there was nothing for her

but to stand still and carefully to consider her next step. For ‘he that