Constance never seemed more lovely, and never before was she so winning.
The coldness and the arrogance of her manner had wholly vanished. To every one she spoke; and to every one her voice, her manner, were kind, cordial, familiar, but familiar with a soft dignity that heightened the charm. Ambitious not only to please but to dazzle, she breathed into her conversation all the grace and culture of her mind. They who admired her the most were the most accomplished themselves.
Now exchanging with foreign n.o.bles that brilliant trifling of the world in which there is often so much penetration, wisdom, and research into character; now with a kindling eye and animated cheek commenting, with poets and critics, on literature and the arts; now, in a more remote and quiet corner, seriously discussing, with h.o.a.ry politicians, those affairs in which even they allowed her shrewdness and her grasp of intellect; and combining with every grace and every accomplishment a rare and dazzling order of beauty--we may readily imagine the sensation she created, and the sudden and novel zest which so splendid an Armida must have given to the tameness of society.
The whole of the next week, the party at Erpingham House was the theme of every conversation. Each person who had been there had met the lion he had been most anxious to see. The beauty had conversed with the poet, who had charmed her; the young debutant in science had paid homage to the great professor of its loftiest mysteries; the statesman had thanked the author who had defended his measures; the author had been delighted with the compliment of the statesman. Every one then agreed that, while the highest rank in the kingdom had been there, rank had been the least attraction; and those who before had found Constance repellent, were the very persons who now expatiated with the greatest rapture on the sweetness of her manners. Then, too, every one who had been admitted to the coterie dwelt on the rarity of the admission; and thus, all the world were dying for an introduction to Erpingham House--partly, because it was agreeable--princ.i.p.ally, because it was difficult.
It soon became a compliment to the understanding to say of a person, "He goes to Lady Erpingham"s!" They who valued themselves on their understandings moved heaven and earth to become popular with the beautiful countess. Lady Delville was not asked; Lady Delville was furious: she affected disdain, but no one gave her credit for it. Lord Erpingham teased Constance on this point.
"You see I was right; for you have affronted Lady Delville. She has made Delville look coolly on me; in a few weeks he will be a Tory; think of that, Lady Erpingham!"
"One month more," answered Constance, with a smile, "and you shall see."
One night, Lady Delville and Lady Erpingham met at a large party. The latter seated herself by her haughty enemy; not seeming to heed Lady Delville"s coolness, Constance entered into conversation with her. She dwelt upon books, pictures, music: her manner was animated, and her wit playful. Pleased, in spite of herself, Lady Delville warmed from her reserve.
"My dear Lady Delville," said Constance, suddenly turning her bright countenance on the countess with an expression of delighted surprise, "will you forgive me?--I never dreamed before that you were so charming a person! I never conceal my sentiments: and I own with regret and shame that, till this moment, I had never seen in your mind--whatever I might in your person--those claims to admiration which were constantly dinned into my ear."
Lady Delville actually coloured.
"Pray," continued Constance, "condescend to permit me to a nearer acquaintance. Will you dine with us on Thursday?--we shall have only nine persons beside yourself: but they are the nine persons whom I most esteem and admire."
Lady Delville accepted the invitation. From that hour, Lady Delville--who had at first resented, from the deepest recess of her heart, Constance Vernon"s accession to rank and wealth,--who, had Constance deferred to her early acquaintance, would have always found something in her she could have affected to despise; from that hour, Lady Delville was the warmest advocate, and a little time after, the sincerest follower, of the youthful countess.
CHAPTER XXIII.
AN INSIGHT INTO THE REAL GRANDE MONDE;--BEING A SEARCH BEHIND THE ROSE-COLOURED CURTAINS.
The time we now speak of was the most brilliant the English world, during the last half century, has known. Lord Byron was in his brief and dazzling zenith; De Stael was in London; the Peace had turned the attention of rich idlers to social enjoyment and to letters. There was an excitement, and a brilliancy, and a spirituality, about our circles, which we do not recognise now. Never had a young and ambitious woman--a beauty and a genius--a finer moment for the commencement of her power.
It was Constance"s early and bold resolution to push to the utmost--even to exaggeration--a power existing in all polished states, but now mostly in this,--the power of fashion! This mysterious and subtle engine she was eminently skilled to move according to her will. Her intuitive penetration into character, her tact, and her grace, were exactly the talents Fashion most demands; and they were at present devoted only to that sphere. The rudeness that she mingled, at times, with the bewitching softness and ease of manner she could command at others, increased the effect of her power. It is much to intimidate as well as to win. And her rudeness in a very little while grew popular; for it was never exercised but on those whom the world loves to see humbled. Modest merit in any rank; and even insolence, if accompanied with merit, were always safe from her satire. It was the hauteur of foolish d.u.c.h.esses or purse-proud roturiers that she loved, and scrupled not, to abase.
And the independence of her character was mixed with extraordinary sweetness of temper. Constance could not be in a pa.s.sion: it was out of her nature. If she was stung, she could utter a sarcasm; but she could not frown or raise her voice. There was that magic in her, that she was always feminine. She did not stare young men out of countenance; she never addressed them by their Christian names; she never flirted--never coquetted: the bloom and flush of modesty was yet all virgin upon her youth. She, the founder of a new dynasty, avoided what her successors and contemporaries have deemed it necessary to incur. She was the leader of fashion; but--it is a miraculous union--she was respectable!
At this period, some new dances were brought into England. These dances found much favour in the eves of several great ladies young enough to dance them. They met at each other"s houses in the morning to practise the steps. Among these was Lady Erpingham; her house became the favourite rendezvous.
The young Marquis of Dartington was one of the little knot. Celebrated for his great fortune, his personal beauty, and his general success, he resolved to fall in love with Lady Erpingham. He devoted himself exclusively to her; he joined her in the morning in her rides--in the evening in her gaieties. He had fallen in love with her?--yes!--did he love her?--not the least. But he was excessively idle!--what else could he do?
Constance early saw the attentions and designs of Lord Dartington. There is one difficulty in repressing advances in great society--one so easily becomes ridiculous by being a prude. But Constance dismissed Lord Dartington with great dexterity. This was the occasion:--
One of the apartments in Erpingham House communicated with a conservatory. In this conservatory Constance was alone one morning, when Lord Dartington, who had entered the house with Lord Erpingham, joined her. He was not a man who could ever become sentimental; he was rather the gay lover--rather the Don Gaolor than the Amadis; but he was a little abashed before Constance. He trusted, however, to his fine eyes and his good complexion--plucked up courage; and, picking a flower from the same plant Constance was tending, said,--
"I believe there is a custom in some part of the world to express love by flowers. May I, dear Lady Erpingham, trust to this flower to express what I dare not utter?"
Constance did not blush, nor look confused, as Lord Dartington had hoped and expected. One who had been loved by G.o.dolphin was not likely to feel much agitation at the gallantry of Lord Dartington; but she looked gravely in his face, paused a little before she answered, and then said, with a smile that abashed the suitor more than severity could possibly have done:--
"My dear Lord Dartington, do not let us mistake each other. I live in the world like other women, but I am not altogether like them. Not another word of gallantry to me alone, as you value my friendship. In a crowded room pay me as many compliments as you like. It will flatter my vanity to have you in my train. And now, just do me the favour to take these scissors and cut the dead leaves off that plant."
Lord Dartington, to use a common phrase, "hummed and hawed." He looked, too, a little angry. An artful and shrewd politician, it was not Constance"s wish to cool the devotion, though she might the attachment, of a single member of her husband"s party. With a kind look--but a look so superior, so queen-like, so free from the petty and coquettish condescension of the s.e.x, that the gay lord wondered from that hour how he could ever have dreamed of Constance as of certain other ladies--she stretched her hand to him.
"We are friends, Lord Dartington?--and now we know each other, we shall be so always."
Lord Dartington bowed confusedly over the beautiful hand he touched; and Constance, walking into the drawing-room, sent for Lord Erpingham on business--Dartington took his leave.
CHAPTER XXIV.
THE MARRIED STATE OF CONSTANCE.
Constance, Countess of Erpingham, was young, rich, lovely as a dream, worshipped as a G.o.ddess. Was she happy? and was her whole heart occupied with the trifles that surrounded her?
Deep within her memory was buried one fatal image that she could not exorcise. The reproaching and mournful countenance of G.o.dolphin rose before her at all times and seasons. The charm of his presence no other human being could renew. His eloquent and n.o.ble features, living, and glorious with genius and with pa.s.sion, his sweet deep voice, his conversation, so rich with mind and knowledge, and the subtle delicacy with which he applied its graces to some sentiment dedicated to her, (delicious flattery, of all flatteries the most attractive to a sensitive and intellectual woman!)--these occurred to her again and again, and rendered all she saw around her flat, wearisome, insipid. Nor was this deep-seated and tender weakness the only serpent--if I may use so confused a metaphor--in the roses of her lot.
And here I invoke the reader"s graver attention. The fate of women in all the more polished circles of society is eminently unnatural and unhappy. The peasant and his dame are on terms of equality--equality even of ambition: no career is open to one and shut to the other;--equality even of hardship, and hardship is employment: no labour occupies the whole energies of the man, but leaves those of the woman unemployed. Is this the case with the wives in a higher station?--the wives of the lawyer, the merchant, the senator, the n.o.ble? There, the men have their occupations; and the women (unless, like poor f.a.n.n.y, work-bags and parrots can employ them) none. They are idle. They employ the imagination and the heart. They fall in love and are wretched; or they remain virtuous, and are either wearied by an eternal monotony or they fritter away intellect, mind, character, in the minutest frivolities--frivolities being their only refuge from stagnation. Yes!
there is one very curious curse for the s.e.x which men don"t consider!
Once married, the more aspiring of them have no real scope for ambition: the ambition gnaws away their content, and never find elsewhere wherewithal to feed on.
This was Constance"s especial misfortune. Her lofty, and restless, and soaring spirit pined for a sphere of action, and ballrooms and boudoirs met it on every side. One hope she did indeed cherish; that hope was the source of her intriguings and schemes, of her care for seeming trifles, the waste of her energies on seeming frivolities. This hope, this object, was to diminish--to crush, not only the party which had forsaken her father, but the power of that order to which she belonged herself; which she had entered only to humble. But this hope was a distant and chill vision. She was too rational to antic.i.p.ate an early and effectual change in our social state, and too rich in the treasures of mind to be the creature of one idea. Satiety--the common curse of the great;--crept over her day by day. The powers within her lay stagnant--the keen intellect rusted in its sheath.
"How is it," said she to the beautiful Countess of ----, "that you seem always so gay and so animated; that with all your vivacity and tenderness, you are never at a loss for occupation? You never seem weary--ennuyee--why is this?"
"I will tell you," said the pretty countess, archly; "I change my lovers every month." Constance blushed, and asked no more.
Many women in her state, influenced by contagious example, wearied by a life in which the heart had no share; without children, without a guide; a.s.sailed and wooed on all sides, in all shapes;--many women might have ventured, if not into love, at least into coquetry. But Constance remained as bright and cold as ever--"the unsunned snow!" It might be, indeed, that the memory of G.o.dolphin preserved her safe from all lesser dangers. The asbestos once conquered by fire can never be consumed by it; but there was also another cause in Constance"s very nature--it was pride!
Oh! if men could but dream of what a proud woman endures in those caresses which humble her, they would not wonder why proud women are so difficult to subdue. This is a matter on which we all ponder much, but we dare not write honestly upon it. But imagine a young, haughty, guileless beauty, married to a man whom she neither loves nor honours; and so far from that want of love rendering her likely to fall hereafter, it is more probable that it will make her recoil from the very name of love.
About this time the Dowager Lady Erpingham died; an event sincerely mourned by Constance, and which broke the strongest tie that united the young countess to her lord. Lord Erpingham and Constance, indeed, now saw but little of each other. Like most men six feet high, with large black whiskers, the earl was vain of his person; and, like most rich n.o.blemen, he found plenty of ladies who a.s.sured him he was irresistible.
He had soon grown angry at the unadmiring and calm urbanity of Constance; and, living a great deal with single men, he formed liaisons of the same order as they do. He was, however, sensible that he had been fortunate in the choice of a wife. His political importance the wisdom of Constance had quadrupled; at the least; his house she had rendered the most brilliant in London, and his name the most courted in the lists of the peerage. Though munificent, she was not extravagant; though a beauty, she did not intrigue; neither, though his inconstancy was open, did she appear jealous; nor, whatever the errors of his conduct, did she ever disregard his interest, disobey his wishes, or waver from the smooth and continuous sweetness of her temper. Of such a wife Lord Erpingham could not complain: he esteemed her, praised her, asked her advice, and stood a little in awe of her.
Ah, Constance! had you been the daughter of a n.o.ble or a peasant--had you been the daughter of any man but John Vernon--what a treasure beyond price, without parallel, would that heart, that beauty, that genius have been!
CHAPTER XXV.
THE PLEASURE OF RETALIATING HUMILIATION.--CONSTANCE"S DEFENCE OF FASHION.--REMARKS ON FASHION.--G.o.dOLPHIN"S WHEREABOUT.--f.a.n.n.y MILLINGER"S CHARACTER OF HERSELF.--WANT OF COURAGE IN MORALISTS.
It was a proud moment for Constance when the d.u.c.h.ess of Winstoun and Lady Margaret Midgecombe wrote to her, worried her, beset her, for a smile, a courtesy, an invitation, or a ticket to Almack"s.
They had at first thought to cry her down; to declare that she was plebeian, mad, bizarre, and a blue. It was all in vain. Constance rose every hour. They struggled against the conviction, but it would not do.
The first person who confounded them with a sense of their error was the late King, then Regent; he devoted himself to Lady Erpingham for a whole evening, at a ball given by himself. From that hour they were a.s.sured they had been wrong: they accordingly called on her the next day.
Constance received them with the same coldness she had always evinced; but they went away declaring they never saw any one whose manners were so improved. They then sent her an invitation! she refused it; a second!
she refused; a third, begging her to fix the day!!! she fixed the day, and disappointed them. Lord bless us!--how sorry they were, how alarmed, how terrified!--their dear Lady Erpingham must be ill!--they sent every day for the next week to know how she was!