"'Yes, papa, but you were a commandant then.'
"'So I will be now, Miss Mannering--in my own family at least.'
"'Certainly, sir--but will he read us the Church of England service?'
"The apparent simplicity with which I asked this question got the better of his gravity. 'Come, Julia,' he said, 'you are a sad girl, but I gain nothing by scolding you.--Of these two strangers, the young lady is one whom you cannot fail, I think, to love--the person whom, for want of a better term, I called chaplain, is a very worthy, and somewhat ridiculous personage, who will never find out you laugh at him, if you don't laugh very loud indeed.'
"'Dear papa, I am delighted with that part of his character. --But pray, is the house we are going to as pleasantly situated as this?'
"'Not perhaps as much to your taste--there is no lake under the windows, and you will be under the necessity of having all your music within doors.'
"This last coup de main ended the keen encounter of our wits, for you may believe, Matilda, it quelled all my courage to reply.
"Yet my spirits, as perhaps will appear too manifest from this dialogue, have risen insensibly, and, as it were, in spite of myself. Brown alive, and free, and in England! Embarrassment and anxiety I can and must endure. We leave this in two days for our new residence. I shall not fail to let you know what I think of these Scotch inmates, whom I have but too much reason to believe my father means to quarter in his house as a brace of honourable spies; a sort of female Rozencrantz and reverend Guildenstern, one in tartan petticoats, the other in a cassock. What a contrast to the society I would willingly have secured to myself! I shall write instantly on my arriving at our new place of abode, and acquaint my dearest Matilda with the further fates of--her"Julia Mannering."CHAPTER XIX.
Which sloping hills around enclose, Where many a beech and brown oak grows, Beneath whose dark and branching bowers, Its tides a far-fam'd river pours, By nature's beauties taught to please, Sweet Tusculan of rural ease!--Warton.
Woodbourne, the habitation which Mannering, by Mr. Mac-Morlan's mediation, had hired for a season, was a large comfortable mansion, snugly situated beneath a hill covered with wood, which shrouded the house upon the north and east; the front looked upon a little lawn bordered by a grove of old trees; beyond were some arable fields, extending down to the river, which was seen from the windows of the house. A tolerable, though old-fashioned garden, a well-stocked dovecot, and the possession of any quantity of ground which the convenience of the family might require, rendered the place in every respect suitable, as the advertisements have it, "for the accommodation of a genteel family."Here, then, Mannering resolved, for some time at least, to set up the staff of his rest. Though an East-Indian, he was not partial to an ostentatious display of wealth. In fact, he was too proud a man to be a vain one. He resolved, therefore, to place himself upon the footing of a country gentleman of easy fortune, without assuming, or permitting, his household to assume, any of the faste which then was considered as characteristic of a nabob.
He had still his eye upon the purchase of Ellangowan, which Mac-Morlan conceived Mr. Glossin would be compelled to part with, as some of the creditors disputed his title to retain so large a part of the purchase-money in his own hands, and his power to pay it was much questioned. In that case MacMorlan was assured he would readily give up his bargain, if 'tempted with something above the price which he had stipulated to pay. It may seem strange,--that Mannering was so much attached to a spot which he had only seen once, and that for a short time, in early life. But the circumstances which passed there had laid a strong hold on his imagination. There seemed to be a fate which conjoined the remarkable passages of his own family history with those of the inhabitants of Ellangowan, and he felt a mysterious desire to call the terrace his own, from which he had read in the book of heaven a fortune strangely accomplished in the person of the infant Heir of that family, and corresponding so closely with one which had been strikingly fulfilled in his own. Besides, when once this thought had got possession of his imagination, he could not, without great reluctance, brook the, idea of his plan being defeated, and by a fellow like Glossin. So pride came to the aid of fancy, and both combined to fortify his resolution to buy the estate if possible.
Let us do Mannering justice. A desire to serve the distressed had also its share in determining him. He had considered the advantage which Julia might receive from the company of Lucy Bertram, whose genuine prudence and good sense could so surely be relied upon.
This idea had become much stronger since Mac-Morlan had confided to him, under the solemn seal of secrecy, the whole of her conduct towards young Hazlewood. To propose to her to become an inmate in his family, if distant from the scenes of her youth and the few whom she called friends, would have been less delicate; but at Woodbourne she might without difficulty be induced to become the visitor of a season, without being depressed into the situation of an humble companion. Lucy Bertram, with some hesitation, accepted the invitation to reside a few weeks with Miss Mannering. She felt too well, that however the Colonel's delicacy might disguise the truth, his principal motive was a generous desire to afford her his countenance and protection, which his high connections, and higher character, were likely to render influential in the neighbourhood.
About the same time the orphan girl received a letter from Mrs.