"What was the colour of Cupid"s?"
"Blue, certainly!"
"Miss Derrick!"--said the doctor,--"let us have your opinion."
Faith gave him at least a frank view of her own, all blushing and laughing as she was, and answered readily,--"As to the colour of Cupid"s eyes?--I have never seen him, sir."
The doctor was obliged to laugh himself, and the chorus became general, at something in the combination of Faith and her words. But Faith"s confusion thereupon mastered her so completely, that perhaps to shield her the doctor requested silence and attention and began to read; of a lady who, he said he was certain, had borrowed of n.o.body--not even of Cupid.--
""Whoe"er she be, That not impossible she, That shall command my heart and me.""
"I believe she _is_ impossible, to begin with," said Miss Essie. "You will never let any woman command you, Dr. Harrison."
"You don"t know me, Miss Essie," said the doctor, with a curiously grave face, for him.
"He means--
"Who shall command my heart--_not_ me.""
said Mr. Linden.
"If she can command my heart--what of me is left to rebel?" said the doctor.
"Sophy," said Mrs. Somers, "how long has Julius been all heart?"
"Ever since my aunt Ellen has been _all_ eyes and ears. Mr. Somers, which portion of your mental nature owns the supremacy of your wife?
may I inquire, in the course of this investigation?"
"Ha!" said Mr. Somers blandly, thus called upon--"I own her supremacy, sir--ha--in all proper things!"
"Ha! Very proper!" said the doctor.
"That is all any good woman wants," said the old Judge benignly. "I take it, that is all she wants."
"Then you must say which are the proper things, father!" said Miss Sophy laughing.
"You"ll have to ask every man separately, Sophy," said Mrs.
Somers,--"they all have their own ideas about proper things. Mr. Somers thinks milk porridge is the limit."
"Mr. Stoutenburgh," said the doctor, "haven"t you owned yourself commanded, ever since your heart gave up its lock and key?"
"Yes indeed," said the Squire earnestly,--"I am so bound up in slavery that I have even forgotten the wish to be free! All my wife"s things are proper!"
"O hush!" his wife said laughing, but with a little quick bright witness in her eyes, that was pretty to see. Dr. Harrison smiled.
"You see, Miss Derrick!" he said with a little bow to her,--"there is witness on all sides;--and now I will go on with my _not impossible_ she."--
He got through several verses, not without several interruptions, till he came to the exquisite words following;--
""I wish her beauty, That owes not all his duty To gaudy tire or glistring shoetye.
"Something more than Taffeta or tissue can, Or rampant feather, or rich fan.
"More than the spoil Of shop, or silk-worm"s toil, Or a bought blush, or a set smile.""
While Miss Essie exclaimed, Miss Harrison stole a look at Faith; who was looking up at the doctor, listening, with a very simple face of amus.e.m.e.nt. Her thoughts were indeed better ballasted than to sway to such a breeze if she had felt it. But the real extreme beauty of the image and of the delineation was what she felt; she made no application of them. The doctor came to this verse.
""A well-tamed heart, For whose more n.o.ble smart Love may be long choosing a dart."--
What does that mean, Linden?--isn"t that an error in the description?"
"Poetical license," said Mr. Linden smiling. "Psyche will give you trouble enough, wings and all,--there is no fear you will find her "tamed"."
"How is Campaspe in that respect?"
"She has never given me much trouble yet," said Mr. Linden.
"What I object to is the "long choosing"," said the doctor. "Miss de Staff--do you think a good heart should be very hard to win?"
"Certainly!--the harder the better," replied the lady. "That"s the only way to bring down your pride. The harder she is, the more likely you are to think she"s a diamond."
"Mrs. Stoutenburgh!"--
"What has been the texture of yours all these years, doctor?"
"He thinks that when he has dined the rest of the world should follow suit--like the Khan of Tartary," said Mrs. Somers.
"Miss Derrick!" said the doctor--"I hope for some gentleness from you.
Do you think such a heart as we have been talking of, should be very difficult to move?"
Faith"s blush was exquisite. Real speech was hard to command. She knew all eyes were waiting upon her; and she could not reason out and comfort herself with the truth--that to them her blush might mean several things as well as one. The answer came in that delicate voice of hers which timidity had shaken.
"I think--it depends on what there is to move it."
"What do you call sufficient force?" said Mrs. Somers.
"I?"--said Faith.--
"Yes, you," replied the parson"s wife with a look not unkindly amused.
"What sort and degree of power should move "such a heart"?--to quote Julius."
Faith"s blush was painful again, and it was only the sheer necessity of the case that enabled her to rally. But her answer was clear.
"Something better than itself, Mrs. Somers."
"I should like to know what that is!" said Mrs. Somers.