Fortunately Mrs. Atheling had some dim perception of this condition, and without a.n.a.lysing her reasons, she was aware "it was best not to meddle" between two lives so surrounded by contradictious circ.u.mstances as were those of her daughter and Lord Exham. Besides, as she said to her husband, "It was no time for love-making, with the King dying, and the country on the quaking edge of revolution, and starvation and misery all over the land." And the Squire answered: "Exham has not one thought of love-making. He is far too much in with a lot of men who have the country and their own estates to save. He won"t bother himself with women-folk now, whatever he may do in idle times."
They had both forgotten, or their own love affair had been of such Arcadian straightness and simplicity that they had never learned Love"s ability to domineer all circ.u.mstances that can stir this mortal frame.
Exham had indeed enlisted himself with pa.s.sionate earnestness in the cause of his cla.s.s, which he called the cause of his country--but as the drop of
"lucent sirup tinct with cinnamon"
is forever flavoured and perfumed by the spice, so Exham"s life was coloured and prepossessed by the thought of the sweet girl who had been blended with so many of his purest and happiest hours.
It was then of Kate he thought as he wandered about the stately rooms and beautiful gardens of Exham Hall. He was not oblivious of his engagements with the Duke and the tenants; but he was considering how best to keep these engagements, and yet not miss a visit to her. The dying King, the riotous land, were accidentals of his life and condition; his love for Kate Atheling was at the root of his existence; it was a fundamental of the past and of the future. For five years of constant change and movement, it had lain in abeyance; but old love is a dangerous thing to awaken; and Piers Exham found in doing this thing that every event of the past strengthened the influence of the present, and fixed his heart more pa.s.sionately on the girl he had first found fair; the
--"rosebud set with little, wilful thorns, And sweet as English airs could make her,"
that had sung and swung herself into his affection when she was only twelve years old.
He was however quite aware that any proposal to marry Kate Atheling would meet with prompt opposition from his family; indeed the Duke had already mentioned a very different alliance; and in that case, he did not doubt but that Squire Atheling would be equally resolved never to allow his daughter to enter a home where she would be regarded by any member of it as an intruder. But he put all such considerations for the present behind him. He said to himself, "The first thing to do, is to win Kate"s love; with that sweet consciousness, I shall be ready for all opposition." For his heart kept a.s.suring him that every trouble and obstacle has an hour in which it may be conquered,--an hour when Fate and Will become One, and are then as irresistible as a great force of Nature. He was sure the hour for this conflict had not yet come.
It was the day for a different fight. His home, his estate, his t.i.tle, and all the privileges of his n.o.bility were in danger. When they were placed beyond peril, then he would fight for the wife he wanted, and win her against all opposition. And who could tell in what way the first conflict would bring forth circ.u.mstances to insure victory to the last?
He was deeply in love; he was full of hope; he was at Atheling some part of every day. If he came in the afternoon, Kate"s pony was saddled, and they rode far and away, to where the shadows and sunshine elbowed one another on the moors. The golden gorse shed its perfume over their heads; the linnets sang to them of love; they talked, and laughed, and rode swiftly until their pace brought them among the mountains that looked like a t.i.tanic staircase going up to the skies. There, they always drew rein, and went slower, and spoke softer, and indeed often became quite silent, and knew such silence to be the sweetest eloquence. Then after a little interval Piers would say one word, "_Kate!_" and Kate only answer with a blush, and a smile, and an upturned face. For Love can put a volume in four letters; and souls say in a glance what a thousand words would only blunder about. Then there was the gallop home, and the merry cup of tea, and the saunter in the garden, and the long tender "good-bye" at the threshold where the damask roses made the air heavy with their sweetness.
So Lord Exham did not find his politics hard to bear with such delicious experiences between whiles. And Kate? What were Kate"s experiences?
Oh, any woman who has once loved, any pure girl who longs to love, may divine them! For Love is always the same. The tale he told Kate on the Atheling moors and under the damask roses was the very same tale he told high in Paradise by the four rivers where the first roses blew.
As the summer advanced, startling notes from the outside world forced themselves into this heavenly solitude. On the twenty-sixth of June, King George died; and this death proved to be the first of a series of great events. Piers felt it to be a warning bell. It said to him, "The charming overture of Love, with its restless pleasure, its delicate hopes and fears, is nearly at an end." He had been with Kate for three divine hours. They had sat among the brackens at the foot of the mountains, and been twenty times on the very point of saying audibly the word "Love!" and twenty times had felt the delicious uncertainty of non-confession to be too sweet for surrender. Nay, they did not reason about it; they simply obeyed that wise, natural self-restraint which knew its own hour, and would not hurry it.
[Ill.u.s.tration:]
With a sigh of rapture, they rose as the sun began to wester, and rode slowly back to Atheling. No one was at the door to receive them, and Kate wondered a little; but when they entered the hall, the omission was at once understood. There was a large open fireplace at the northern extremity, and over it the Atheling arms, with their motto, "_Feare G.o.d! Honour the Kinge! Laus Deo!_" Squire Atheling was draping this panel with c.r.a.pe; and Mrs. Atheling stood near him with some streamers of the gloomy fabric in her hands. She pointed to the King"s picture--which already wore the emblem of mourning--and said, "The King is dead."
"The King lives! G.o.d save the King!" replied the Squire, instantly.
"G.o.d save King William the Fourth!"
Then all the clocks in the house were stopped, and draped, and when this ceremony was over, they had tea together. And as it is a Yorkshire custom to make funeral feasts, Mrs. Atheling gave to the meal an air of special entertainment. The royal Derby china added its splendour to the fine old silver and delicate damask. There were delicious cheese-cakes, and Queen"s-cakes, and savoury potted meats, and fresh crumpets; and the ripe red strawberries filled the room with their ethereal scent. No one was at all depressed by the news. If King George was dead, King William was alive; and the Squire thought, "Everything might be hoped from "The Sailor King." Why!" he said, "he is that good-natured he won"t say a bad word about the Reformers; though, G.o.d knows, they are a disgrace to themselves, and to all that back them up."
"There will now be a general election," said Exham positively.
"To be sure," answered the Squire. "And it is to be hoped we may get together a few men that will take the Bull of Reform by the horns, and put a stop to that nonsense forever in England."
"Before they do that," said Mrs. Atheling, "they will have to consider the swarms of people they have brought up in dirt, and rags, and misery.
For if they don"t, they will bring ruin to the nation that owns them."
"King William is a fighter. He will back the Law with bayonets, if he thinks it right," said the Squire.
Mrs. Atheling looked at him indignantly. Then, putting her cup down with unmistakable emphasis, she exclaimed, "The Lord forgive thee, John Atheling! I"ll say one thing, and I"ll say it now, and forever, it isn"t law backed with bayonets that has saved England so far; it is the bit of religion in every man"s heart, and his trust that somehow G.o.d will see him righted. If it wasn"t for that it would have been all up with our set long ago."
"That is just the way women talk politics," said the Squire, with some contempt. "If there was nothing else in this Reform business to make a man sick, the way they have given in to women, and got them to form clubs and make speeches, is enough to set any sensible person against Reform; and if there is no way of talking people into doing what is right--then they must be _made_ to do right; and that"s all there is about it."
"Very well, John; but there are two sides to play at making other people do right. I"ll tell you one thing, the Government will have to take a lot of things into consideration before they put their trust in backing law with bayonets. It won"t work! Let them start doing it, and we shall all find ourselves in a wrong box."
"I think there is much good sense in what Mrs. Atheling believes," said Lord Exham.
"And as for the Reformers getting round the women of the country,"
she continued, "that is as it should be. Men have done all the governing for six thousand years; and, in the main, they have made a very bad job of it. Happen, a few kind-hearted women would help things forwarder.
There is going to be some alterations, you may depend upon it, John."
"Father," said Kate, "you had better not argue with mother. She knows a deal more about the country than you think she does; and mother is always right."
"To be sure, Kate. To hear mother talk, she knows a lot; but if she would take my advice, she would forget a lot, and try and learn something better." Then touching his wife"s hand, he continued, "Maude, I always did believe thou wert in favour of the land, and the law, and the King."
"I don"t know that I ever said such a thing, John; but thou mayst have believed it. What I _thought_, was another matter. And I am beginning to think aloud now, that makes all the difference."
Such divided opinions were in every household; and yet, upon the whole, the death of the selfish, intolerant George was a hopeful event. When people are desperate, any change is a promise; and William had a reputation not only for good nature, but also for that love of fair play which is the first article of an Englishman"s personal creed. He came to the throne on the twenty-sixth of June; and on the twenty-ninth Parliament resumed its sittings. Mr. Brougham led the opposition, and violent debates and unmeasured language distinguished the short session. The Duke of Wellington, representing the Government, was prominently bitter against Reform of every kind; and Mr. Brougham boldly declared that any Minister now hoping to rule either by royal favour or military power would be overwhelmed. In less than a month the King prorogued Parliament in person, and in so doing, congratulated his country on the tranquillity of Europe. Forty-eight hours afterwards, France was insurgent, and Paris in arms. Three days of most determined fighting followed; and then Charles the Tenth was driven from his throne, and the white flag of the Bourbon tyranny gave place to the Tri-colour of Liberty.
Now if there had been a direct electric or magnetic current between England and the Continent, the effect could not have been more sympathetically startling; and these three memorable "Days of July" in Paris impelled forward, with an irresistible impetus, the cause of freedom in England. The n.o.bility and the landed gentry were gravely aware of this effect; and the great middle cla.s.s, and the working men in every county, were stirred to more hopeful and united action. Far and wide the people began anew to express, in various ways, their determination to have the Tory Ministers dismissed, and a Liberal Government in favour of Reform inaugurated.
For the first time the Squire was anxious. For the first time he saw and felt positive symptoms of insubordination among his own people.
Pickering"s barns were burnt one night; and a few nights afterwards, Rudby"s hay-ricks. Squire Atheling was a man of prompt action; one well disposed to do in his own manor what he expected the Government to do in the country,--take the Reform bull by the horns. He sent for all his labourers to meet him in the farm court at Atheling; and when they were gathered there, he stood up on the stone wall which enclosed one side of it and said in his strong, resonant voice,--
"Now, men of Atheling manor and village, you have been sulky and ugly for two or three weeks. You aren"t sulky and ugly without knowing _why_ you are so. If you are Yorkshiremen worth your bread and bacon, you will out with your grievance--whatever it is. Tom Gisburn, what is it?"
"We can"t starve any longer, Squire. We want two shillings a week more wages. Me and mine would hev been in t" churchyard if thy Missis hed been as hard-hearted as thysen."
"I will give you all one shilling a week more."
"Nay, but a shilling won"t do. Thy Missis is good, and Miss Kate is good; but we want our rights; and we hev made up our minds that two shillings a week more wage will n.o.bbut barely cover them. We are varry poor, Squire! Varry poor indeed!"
The man spoke sadly and respectfully; and the Squire looked at him, and at the stolid, anxious faces around with an angry pity. "I"ll tell you what, men," he continued; "everything in England is going to the devil. Englishmen are getting as ill to do with as a lot of grumbling, contrary, bombastic Frenchers. If you"ll promise me to stand by the King, and the land, and the laws, and give these trouble-making Reformers a dip in the horse-pond if any of them come to Atheling again--why, then, I will give you all--every one of you--two shillings a week more wage."
"Nay, Squire, we"ll not sell oursens for two shillings a week; not one of us--eh, men?" and Gisburn looked at his fellows interrogatively.
"Sell oursens!" replied the Squire"s blacksmith, a big, hungry-looking fellow in a leather ap.r.o.n; "no! no, Squire! Thou oughtest to know us better. Sell oursens! Not for all the gold guineas in Yorkshire! We"ll sell thee our labour for two shilling a week more wage, and thankful; but our will, and our good-will, thou can"t buy for any money."
There was a subdued cheer at these words from the men, and the Squire"s face suddenly lightened. His best self put his lower self behind him.
"Sawley," he answered, "thou art well nicknamed "Straight-up!" and I don"t know but what I"m very proud of such an independent, honourable lot of men. Such as you won"t let the land suffer. Remember, you were all born on it, and you"ll like enough be buried in it. Stand by the land then; and if two shillings a week more wage will make you happy, you shall have it,--if I sell the gold b.u.t.tons off my coat to pay it. Are we friends now?"
A hearty shout answered the question, and the Squire continued, "Then go into the barn, and eat and drink your fill. You"ll find a barrel of old ale, and some roast beef, and wheat bread there."
In this way he turned the popular discontent from Atheling, and doubtless saved his barns and hay-ricks; but he went into his house angry at the men, and angry at his wife and daughter. They had evidently been aiding and succouring these discontents and their families; and--as he took care to point out to Kate--evil and not good had been the result. "I have to give now as a right," he said, "what thee and thy mother have been giving as a kindness!" And his temper was not improved by hearing from the barn the noisy "huzzas" with which the name of "the young Squire" was received, and his health drank.
"Wife, and son, and daughter! all of them against me! I wonder what I have done to be served in such a way?" he exclaimed sorrowfully.
And then Kate forgot everything about politics. She said all kinds of consoling words without any regard for the Reform Bill, and, with the sweetest kisses, promised her father whatever she thought would make him happy. It is an unreasonable, delightful way that belongs to loving women; and G.o.d help both men and women when they are too wise for such sweet deceptions!
Yet the Squire carried a hot, restless heart to the Duke"s meeting that night; and he was not pleased to find that the tactics he had used with his labourers met with general and great disapproval. Those men who had already suffered loss, and those who knew that they had gone beyond a conciliating policy, said some ugly words about "knuckling down,"
and it required all the Duke"s wisdom and influence to represent it as "a wise temporary concession, to be recalled as soon as the election was over, and the Tory Government safely reinstalled."
Upon the whole, then, Squire Atheling had not much satisfaction in his position; and every day brought some new tale of thrilling interest. All England was living a romance; and people got so used to continual excitement that they set the homeliest experiences of life to great historical events. During the six weeks following the death of King George the Fourth occurred the new King"s coronation, the dissolution of Parliament, the "Three Days of July," and the landing of the exiled French King in England; all of these things being accompanied by agrarian outrages in the farming districts, the destruction of machinery in the manufacturing towns, and constant political tumults wherever men congregated.
The next six weeks were even more restless and excited. The French King was a constant subject of interest to the Reformers; for was he not a stupendous example of the triumph of Liberal principles? He was reported first at Lulworth Castle in Devonshire. Then he went to Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh. The Scotch Reformers resented his presence, and perpetually insulted him, until Sir Walter Scott made a manly appeal for the fallen tyrant. And while the Bourbon sat in Holyrood, a sign and a text for all lovers of Freedom, England was in the direst storm and stress of a general election. The men of the Fen Country were rising.
The Universities were arming their students. There was rioting in this city and that city. The Tories were gaining. The Reformers were gaining.
Both sides were calling pa.s.sionately on the women of the country to come to their help, without it seeming to occur to either that if women had political influence, they had also political rights.