Patience, Barbara Hofland [readict books TXT] 📗

his passion,” Mr. Stancliffe would have

used a much better term for his feelings towards Dora, whom it is

certain he would at one time have purchased at any price, and whom he

continued to gaze upon with very considerable admiration. They were now

receiving company, and he so far conceded to Dora’s wishes, as to permit

her sisters to be generally with them; but it appeared as much with a

desire to place Dora above Catharine, and thereby vindicate his own

taste, as from a wish to oblige her; and the direct, or indirect

sparrings, which took place constantly between two persons of their

description, rendered every day a period of trial to Dora.

 

Scarcely had she been married two months, when other letters arrived

from Smyrna, by which they learnt that the necessity of a resident

partner at that place was so apparent, as to threaten the ruin of the

house if it were delayed. Stancliffe laid them before Dora, observing

“they only confirmed the former.”

 

“I will go with you any where, my love,” was the immediate reply of his

young wife.

 

“But I am not inclined to go:—our articles of partnership are equally

binding on your father—and in short, he must go, and shall.”

 

“I am afraid his health will suffer—it is too late in life for him to

change his climate and his habits, whereas, you are accustomed to it; my

dear, pray think, before you decide.”

 

“I have thought—I have decided—either he shall go, or find some

other person to lend him money on his bond, than the fool he sought to

cheat and circumvent.”

 

Stancliffe was as good, or rather as bad, as his word; and Mr.

Hemingford was compelled to see clearly that he must set out

immediately, for his partner still held him in his power:—indeed it was

evident, that as he had now no other stay but his business, he must

preserve it; whereas his youthful partner had the means of life should

the other fail.

 

Bitter were the lamentations this resolution caused in the family of Mr.

Hemingford; but to no person perhaps was the trial felt, so severe a one

as the father himself, since he saw that parting with his boy was for

the child’s sake inevitable, and his heart had been so long attached to

this, as the one object on which his affections rested, and to which

his hopes clung, that the loss of him appeared a pang almost as terrible

as death.

 

When every thing was finally arranged, Mr. Stancliffe’s heart evidently

softened towards the suffering family; and he not only readily agreed,

(according to Mr. Blackwell’s proposition,) that Frank should form a

part of his family, but gave an invitation to Harriet, also, upon her

leaving school, and seconded every contrivance suggested by the active

good will of Dora for their assistance and accommodation, with a

liberality that rendered him exceedingly dear to her. This was indeed

the kinder, because she had been compelled to see that, although

hospitable to profusion, and occasionally capable of squandering money,

yet Everton Stancliffe was not generous in general, and very frequently

he was careful even to parsimony.

 

This great change was felt by Frank with various sensations; he was

loath to part with his papa, whom he tenderly loved, but he was so much

more attached to Dora than to any human being, that he could scarcely be

sorry for any circumstance which placed him under the same roof with

her—he was also inclined to love his brother-in-law, for he admired him

exceedingly, and with the curiosity natural to his age, was delighted to

hear him relate circumstances, or describe places connected with his

travels; but yet Frank was also a little afraid of him, and could not

perfectly forgive him for having taken away his darling sister.

 

Though few daughters could have less to regret than Dora, yet the deep

consideration and pity, which led her to oppose their departure so far

as she dared, continued to affect her; and she bade them farewel under

great depression of spirits, in which her father evidently partook, as

he was extremely agitated, and repeatedly recommended her to the care

and love of her husband in the tenderest manner, together with Frank,

who was not present at their departure, lest his health should be

injured by the stimulus given to his sensibility.

 

The disorder under which this poor boy laboured, and which had proved

fatal to his brothers, was the occasional rupture of internal blood

vessels, by which his life was frequently placed in danger, and his

general health rendered extremely delicate, though free from pain and

particular complaint. On this account he could never be trusted at

school, or with any assemblage of children, since play would inevitably

be fatal to him, nor could he be subjected to reproof except very

gently administered, since a fit of crying might in his case become

fatal: his life was necessarily dull, and his attainments few; but he

was a child so full of kindness and intelligence, so grateful for

attention, and so humble from a consciousness of dependance, that he

seldom gave occasion for reproof since he had been under the guidance of

Dora, and was generally an object of pity or affection. The more than

feminine delicacy of his complection, and almost ethereal slightness of

his form, aided by his mild blue eyes, and a profusion of pale brown

ringlets, that flowed over his face, gave an idea of angelic beauty in

his person, at the same time that they bespoke the fragile tenure of a

life that was in perpetual jeopardy.

 

The first care of Mr. Stancliffe was to remove to the late dwelling of

his partner, on account of its convenience as a house of business; and

he appeared to enter on the duties which now rested solely upon him,

with the activity and ability for which Mr. Hemingford had ever given

him credit; but this zeal was of very short duration. Accustomed to

indulgences inconsistent with the daily routine required, as soon as he

became busy, it might truly be said he became indolent; for although he

entered with avidity into all extraordinary duties or pleasures, because

they necessarily proved his powers and excited him to exertions, he sunk

without that stimulus into positive inaction—he must do great things,

or do nothing at all.

 

Yawning away the morning on a sofa, and making late evenings in gay

parties—never seen on Change, seldom visible in his counting-house,

always willing to invite the foreign merchant to dinner, but never ready

to receive his commissions, or attend to his shipments—trusting all to

servants, yet treating them with a cold hauteur which rendered them

averse to his person, and indifferent to his interest, Mr. Stancliffe in

a very short time changed the tide of public opinion, and private

prosperity; and those who had pitied the young man who was tied to a

partner whose extravagant family had reduced his property, and injured

the credit of the house, now maintained that to the services of

Hemingford alone it had been indebted for stability, and that as the

elder Stancliffe had gained money through his diligence, the younger

must preserve it by the same medium, or lose it.

 

In the mean time Dora attended to her duties with that quiet, but

unremitting vigilance, which is ever effective; and finding that she

could not, consistent with the situation she filled in society, indulge

her love for reading and drawing, (which she held to be the greatest

pleasures of life,) she gave herself up to those pursuits most agreeable

to her husband, whose pleasure it was that she should be a busy

housekeeper in the early part of the day, and frequently take a part in

musical performances with parties in the evening. Mr. Stancliffe’s

mother had been much of a cook, and although her situation in life had

placed her above the necessity of such employments, had, partly from a

desire of pampering her son’s appetite, and partly to fill up the

vacuity of time, (heavy to an unfurnished mind and undirected taste,)

engaged herself much in culinary employments; and from her example, her

son concluded that all good wives ought to do the same, as he had now

ceased to gaze on Dora’s complection, or examine the form of her

fingers, and the pinkyness of her palms, he thought her cool hands might

be well employed in pastry, of which he was particularly fond.

 

To win his approbation, and feel rewarded by his smiles, was the first

apparent object of Dora’s life; but yet it is certain, that her heart

was silently engaged in higher hopes and expectations. She trusted that

her own activity would be the stimulant to his, and that her meekness

and self-controul, in the petty vexations and unceasing crosses, which

happen in every establishment, would lead him to endure those thwartings

of circumstances, which every man in business must submit to; and her

gentle admonitions to Frank were frequently of such a nature as to

awaken him to the exercise of the talents she praised, but she never

presumed to give advice, much less to remonstrate, with her husband.

 

Two hours in the day she constantly dedicated to Frank, who had also

masters to attend him, and now began to make rapid progress in his

education, which Stancliffe aided much by praise, saying frequently,

“aye, my boy, I will soon have you in the counting-house—I will make a

man of you by and bye,” words which Dora construed into general

encouragement; but she learnt with surprise and almost dismay, that he

really intended to place the poor child there, so soon as he could be

rendered in the least degree useful; and upon her proposing to engage a

person to supply her place to him as a governess, when the task became

too laborious for her, she was assured “that it was wholly unnecessary,

for that her sister Harriet might supply her place to him. These were

not times in which to increase the expences of the family beyond what

the necessity of the case required.”

 

From a young husband, about to become a father for the first time, these

words were cold, and almost harsh; and the heart of the young creature

to whom they were addressed, sunk, as she recollected that she had no

mother, or friend, to whom she could look for comfort or assistance, at

that awful period which every woman trembles to encounter, and which

calls imperatively for all the aids of kindness, and the supports of

consolatory love. The provisions made by a husband for the

accommodations of his beloved wife, and the expected claimant on his

tenderness, may be pardoned for partaking the character of extravagance,

but never ought to diverge in a contrary direction.

 

Happily for Dora, she was herself so disinterested and generous, that it

was scarcely possible for her to conceive the opposite principles could

operate in the mind of one she loved; and frequent as the proofs of

meanness and selfishness in Stancliffe’s conduct had already been, she

generally imputed them either to deficient consideration, or a habit

contracted from circumstances with which she was unacquainted. She

contrasted the trifling saving he now attempted, with the expence he had

perhaps incurred the day before; and not being aware that those who are

the most covetous, may from the same cause be the most profuse,

concluded, that when her dear Everton did wrong, it was from chance,

(either in saving, or spending,) whenever his action could be construed

into good, she registered it as proceeding from principle and

disposition.

 

If ever man could be flattered into virtue, Everton Stancliffe appeared

likely to become that man; for unconnected as his wife now was,