Not many weeks afterwards we went to live at Longfield,which henceforth became the family home for many years.
Longfield!happy Longfield!little nest of love,and joy,and peace--where the children grew up,and we grew old--where season after season brought some new change ripening in us and around us--where summer and winter,day and night,the hand of God's providence was over our roof,blessing our goings out and our comings in,our basket and our store;crowning us with the richest blessing of all,that we were made a household where "brethren dwelt together in unity."Beloved Longfield!my heart,slow pulsing as befits one near the grave,thrills warm and young as I remember thee!
Yet how shall I describe it--the familiar spot;so familiar that it seems to need no description at all.
It was but a small place when we first came there.It led out of the high-road by a field-gate--the White Gate;from which a narrow path wound down to a stream,thence up a green slope to the house;a mere farm-house,nothing more.It had one parlour,three decent bed-rooms,kitchen and out-houses;we built extempore chambers out of the barn and cheese-room.In one of these the boys,Guy and Edwin,slept,against the low roof of which the father generally knocked his head every morning when he came to call the lads.Its windows were open all summer round,and birds and bats used oftentimes to fly in,to the great delight of the youthful inmates.
Another infinite pleasure to the little folk was that for the first year,the farm-house kitchen was made our dining-room.There,through the open door,Edwin's pigeons,Muriel's two doves,and sometimes a stately hen,walked in and out at pleasure.Whether our live stock,brought up in the law of kindness,were as well-trained and well-behaved as our children,I cannot tell;but certain it is that we never found any harm from this system,necessitated by our early straits at Longfield--this "liberty,fraternity,and equality."Those words,in themselves true and lovely,but wrested to false meaning,whose fatal sound was now dying out of Europe,merged in the equally false and fatal shout of "Gloire!gloire!"remind me of an event which I believe was the first that broke the delicious monotony of our new life.
It was one September morning.Mrs.Halifax,the children,and I were down at the stream,planning a bridge across it,and a sort of stable,where John's horse might be put up--the mother had steadily resisted the long-tailed grey ponies.For with all the necessary improvements at Longfield,with the large settlement that John insisted upon making on his wife and children,before he would use in his business any portion of her fortune,we found we were by no means so rich as to make any great change in our way of life advisable.
And,after all,the mother's best luxuries were to see her children merry and strong,her husband's face lightened of its care,and to know he was now placed beyond doubt in the position he had always longed for;for was he not this very day gone to sign the lease of Enderley Mills?
Mrs.Halifax had just looked at her watch,and she and I were wondering,with quite a childish pleasure,whether he were not now signing the important deed,when Guy came running to say a coach-and-four was trying to enter the White Gate.
"Who can it be?--But they must be stopped,or they'll spoil John's new gravel road that he takes such pride in.Uncle Phineas,would you mind going to see?"Who should I see,but almost the last person I expected--who had not been beheld,hardly spoken of,in our household these ten years--Lady Caroline Brithwood,in her travelling-habit of green cloth,her velvet riding-hat,with its Prince of Wales'feathers,gayer than ever--though her pretty face was withering under the paint,and her lively manner growing coarse and bold.
"Is this Longfield?--Does Mr.Halifax--mon Dieu,Mr.Fletcher,is that you?"She held out her hand with the frankest condescension,and in the brightest humour in the world.She insisted on sending on the carriage,and accompanying me down to the stream,for a "surprise"--a "scene."Mrs.Halifax,seeing the coach drive on,had evidently forgotten all about it.She stood in the little dell which the stream had made,Walter in her arms--her figure thrown back,so as to poise the child's weight.Her right hand kept firm hold of Guy,who was paddling barefoot in the stream:Edwin,the only one of the boys who never gave any trouble,was soberly digging away,beside little Muriel.
The lady clapped her hands."Brava!bravissima!a charming family picture,Mrs.Halifax.""Lady Caroline!"
Ursula left her children,and came to greet her old acquaintance,whom she had never once seen since she was Ursula Halifax.Perhaps that fact touched her,and it was with a kind of involuntary tenderness that she looked into the sickly face,where all the smiles could not hide the wrinkles.
"It is many years since we met;and we are both somewhat altered,Cousin Caroline.""You are,with those three great boys.The little girl yours also?--Oh yes,I remember William told me--poor little thing!"And with uneasy awe she turned from our blind Muriel,our child of peace.
"Will you come up to the house?my husband has only ridden over to Enderley;he will be home soon.""And glad to see me,I wonder?For I am rather afraid of that husband of yours--eh,Ursula?Yet I should greatly like to stay."Ursula laughed,and repeated the welcome.She was so happy herself--she longed to distribute her happiness.They walked,the children following,towards the house.
Under the great walnut-tree,by the sunk fence which guarded the flower-garden from the sheep and cows,Mrs.Halifax stopped and pointed down the green slope of the field,across the valley,to the wooded hills opposite.
"Isn't it a pretty view?"said Guy,creeping up and touching the stranger's gown;our children had lived too much in an atmosphere of love to know either shyness or fear.
"Very pretty,my little friend."