Home as Found, James Fenimore Cooper [bookreader txt] 📗

between Templemore and Howel,"

rejoined John Effingham; "and sundry wordy wars between the latter

and Miss Effingham."

 

"In this you do me injustice, cousin Jack. I remember Mr. Howel well,

and kindly; for he was ever wont to indulge my childish whims, when a

girl."

 

"The man is a second Burchell, and, I dare say never came to the

Wigwam when you were a child, without having his pockets stuffed with

cakes, or _bonbons_."

 

The meeting was cordial, Mr. Howel greeting the gentlemen like a warm

friend, and expressing great delight at the personal improvements

that had been made in Eve, between the ages of eight and twenty. John

Effingham was no more backward than the others, for he, too, liked

their simple-minded, kind-hearted, but credulous neighbour.

 

"You are welcome back--you are welcome back," added Mr. Howel,

blowing his nose, in order to conceal the tears that were gathering

in his eyes. "I did think of going to New-York to meet you, but the

distance at my time of life is very serious. Age, gentlemen, seems to

be a stranger to you."

 

"And yet we, who are both a few months older than yourself, Howel,"

returned Mr. Effingham, kindly, "have managed to overcome the

distance you have just mentioned, in order to come and see _you!_"

 

"Ay, you are great travellers, gentlemen, very great travellers, and

are accustomed to motion.--Been quite as far as Jerusalem, I hear!"

 

"Into its very gates, my good friend; and I wish, with all my heart,

we had had you in our company. Such a journey might cure you of the

home-malady."

 

"I am a fixture, and never expect to look upon the ocean, now. I did,

at one period of my life, fancy such an event might happen, but I

have finally abandoned all hope on that subject. Well, Miss Eve, of

all the countries in which you have dwelt, to which do you give the

preference?"

 

"I think Italy is the general favourite," Eve answered, with a

friendly smile; "although there are some agreeable things peculiar to

almost every country."

 

"Italy!--Well, that astonishes me a good deal! I never knew there was

any thing particularly interesting about Italy! I should have

expected _you_ to say, England."

 

"England is a fine country, too, certainly; but it wants many things

that Italy enjoys."

 

"Well, now, what?" said Mr. Howel, shifting his legs from one knee to

the other, in order to be more convenient to listen, or, if

necessary, to object. "What _can_ Italy possess, that England does

not enjoy in a still greater degree?"

 

"Its recollections, for one thing, and all that interest which time

and great events throw around a region."

 

"And is England wanting in recollections and great events? Are there

not the Conqueror? or, if you will, King Alfred? and Queen Elizabeth,

and Shakspeare--think of Shakspeare, young lady--and Sir Walter

Scott, and the Gun-Powder Plot; and Cromwell, Oliver Cromwell, my

dear Miss Eve; and Westminster Abbey, and London Bridge, and George

IV., the descendant of a line of real kings,--what, in the name of

Heaven, can Italy possess, to equal the interest one feels in such

things as these?'

 

"They are very interesting no doubt;" said Eve, endeavouring not to

smile--"but Italy has its relics of former ages too; you forget the

Caesars."

 

"Very good sort of persons for barbarous times, I dare say, but what

can they be to the English monarchs? I would rather look upon a _bona

fide_ English king, than see all the Caesars that ever lived. I never

can think any man a real king but the king of England!"

 

"Not King Solomon!" cried John Effingham.

 

"Oh! he was a Bible king, and one never thinks of them. Italy! well,

this I did not expect from your father's daughter! Your great-great-

great-grandfather must have been an Englishman born, Mr, Effingham?"

 

"I have reason to think he was, sir."

 

"And Milton, and Dryden, and Newton, and Locke! These are prodigious

names, and worth all the Caesars put together. And Pope, too; what

have they got in Italy to compare to Pope?"

 

"They have at least _the_ Pope," said Eve, laughing.

 

"And, then, there are the Boar's Head in East-Cheap; and the Tower;

and Queen Anne, and all the wits of her reign; and--and--and Titus

Oates; and Bosworth field; and Smithfield, where the martyrs were

burned, and a thousand more spots and persons of intense interest in

Old England!"

 

"Quite true," said John Effingham, with an air of sympathy--"but,

Howel, you have forgotten Peeping Tom of Coventry, and the climate!"

 

"And Holyrood-House; and York-Minster; and St Paul's;" continued the

worthy Mr. Howel, too much bent on a catalogue of excellencies, that

to him were sacred, to heed the interruption, "and, above all,

Windsor Castle. What is there in the world to equal Windsor Castle as

a royal residence?"

 

Want of breath now gave Eve an opportunity to reply, and she seized

it with an eagerness that she was the first to laugh at herself,

afterwards.

 

"Caserta is no mean house, Mr. Howel; and, in my poor judgment, there

is more real magnificence in its great stair-case, than in all

Windsor Castle united, if you except the chapel."

 

"But, St. Paul's!"

 

"Why, St. Peter's may be set down, quite fairly, I think, for its

_pendant_ at least."

 

"True, the Catholics _do_ say so;" returned Mr. Howel, with the

deliberation one uses when he greatly distrusts his own concession;

"but I have always considered it one of their frauds. I don't think

there _can_ be any thing finer than St. Paul's. Then there are the

noble ruins of England! _They_, you must admit, are unrivalled."

 

"The Temple of Neptune, at Paestum, is commonly thought an interesting

ruin, Mr. Howel."

 

"Yes, yes, for a _temple_, I dare say; though I do not remember to

have ever heard of it before. But no temple can ever compare to a

ruined _abbey_ /"

 

"Taste is an arbitrary thing, Tom Howel, as you and I know when as

boys we quarrelled about the beauty of our ponies," said Mr.

Effingham, willing to put an end to a discussion that he thought a

little premature, after so long an absence. "Here are two young

friends who shared the hazards of our late passage with us, and to

whom, in a great degree, we owe our present happy security, and I am

anxious to make you acquainted with them. This is our countryman, Mr.

Powis, and this is an English friend, who, I am certain, will be

happy to know so warm an admirer of his own country--Sir George

Templemore."

 

Mr. Howel had never before seen a titled Englishman, and he was taken

so much by surprise that he made his salutations rather awkwardly. As

both the young men, however, met him with the respectful ease that

denotes familiarity with the world, he soon recovered his self-

possession.

 

"I hope you have brought back with you a sound American heart, Miss

Eve," resumed the guest, as soon as this little interruption had

ceased. "We have had sundry rumours of French Marquisses, and German

Barons; but I have, all along, trusted too much to your patriotism to

believe you would marry a foreigner."

 

"I hope you except Englishmen," cried Sir George, gaily: "we are

almost the same people."

 

"I am proud to hear you say so, sir. Nothing flatters me more than to

be thought English; and I certainly should not have accused Miss

Effingham of a want of love of country, had----"

 

"She married half-a-dozen Englishmen," interrupted John Effingham,

who saw that the old theme was in danger of being revived. "But,

Howel, you have paid me no compliments on the changes in the house. I

hope they are to your taste."

 

"A little too French, Mr. John."

 

"French!--There is not a French feature in the whole animal. What has

put such a notion into your head?"

 

"It is the common opinion, and I confess I should like the building

better were it less continental."

 

"Why, my old friend, it is a nondescript--original--Effingham upon

Doolittle, if you will; and, as for models, it is rather more

_English_ than any thing else."

 

"Well, Mr. John, I am glad to hear this, for I do confess to a

disposition rather to like the house. I am dying to know, Miss Eve,

if you saw all our distinguished contemporaries when in

Europe?--_That_ to me, would be one of the greatest delights of

travelling!"

 

"To say that we saw them _all_, might be too much; though we

certainly did meet with many."

 

"Scott, of course."

 

"Sir Walter we had the pleasure of meeting, a few times, in London."

 

"And Southey, and Coleridge, and Wordsworth, and Moore, and Bulwer,

and D'Israeli, and Rogers, and Campbell, and the grave of Byron, and

Horace Smith, and Miss Landon, and Barry Cornwall, and--"

 

"_Cum multis aliis_" put in John Effingham, again, by way of

arresting the torrent of names. "Eve saw many of these, and, as Tubal

told Shylock, 'we often came where we did hear' of the rest. But you

say nothing, friend Tom, of Goethe, and Tieck, and Schlegel, and La

Martine, Chateaubriant, Hugo, Delavigne, Mickiewicz, Nota, Manzoni,

Niccolini, &c. &c. &c. &c. &c. &c."

 

Honest, well-meaning Mr. Howel, listened to the catalogue that the

other ran volubly over, in silent wonder; for, with the exception of

one or two of these distinguished men, he had never even heard of

them; and, in the simplicity of his heart, unconsciously to himself,

he had got to believe that there was no great personage still living,

of whom he did not know something.

 

"Ah, here comes young Wenham, by way of preserving the equilibrium,"

resumed John Effingham, looking out of a window--"I rather think you

must have forgotten him, Ned, though you remember his father, beyond

question."

 

Mr. Effingham and his cousin went out into the hall to receive the

new guest, with whom the latter had become acquainted while

superintending the repairs of the Wigwam.

 

Mr. Wenham was the son of a successful lawyer in the county, and,

being an only child, he had also succeeded to an easy independence.

His age, however, brought him rather into the generation to which Eve

belonged, than into that of the father; and, if Mr. Howel was a

reflection, or rather a continuation, of all the provincial notions

that America entertained of England forty years ago, Mr. Wenham might

almost be said to belong to the opposite school, and to be as ultra-

American, as his neighbour was ultra-British.--If there is _lajeune

France_, there is also _la jeune Amerique_, although the votaries of

the latter march with less hardy steps than the votaries of the

first. Mr. Wenham fancied himself a paragon of national independence,

and was constantly talking of American excellencies, though the

ancient impressions still lingered in his moral system, as men look

askance for the ghosts which frightened their childhood on crossing a

church-yard in the dark. John Effingham knew the _penchant_ of the

young man, and when he said that he came happily to preserve the

equilibrium, he alluded to this striking difference in the characters

of their two friends.

 

The introductions and salutations over, we shall resume the

conversation that succeeded in the drawing-room.

 

"You must be much gratified, Miss Effingham," observed Mr. Wenham,

who, like a true American, being a young man himself, supposed it _de

rigueur_ to address a young lady in preference to any other

present,--"with the great progress made by _our_ country since you

went abroad."

 

Eve simply answered that her extreme youth, when she left home, had

prevented her from retaining any precise notions on such subjects.

 

"I dare say it is all very true," she added, "but one, like myself,

who remembers only older countries, is, I think, a little more apt to

be struck with the deficiencies, than with what may, in truth, be

improvements, though they still fall short of excellence."

 

Mr. Wenham looked vexed, or indignant would be a better word, but he

succeeded in preserving his coolness--a thing that is not always easy

to one of provincial habits and provincial education, when he finds

his own _beau ideal_ lightly estimated by others.

 

"Miss Effingham must discover a thousand imperfections." said Mr.

Howel, "coming, as she does, directly from England. That music,

now,"--alluding to the sounds of a flute that were heard through the

open windows, coming from the adjacent village--"must be rude enough

to her ear, after the music of London."

 

"The _street_ music of London is certainly among the best, if not the

very best, in Europe," returned Eve, with a glance of the eye at the

baronet, that caused him to smile, "and I think this fairly belongs

to the class, being so freely given to the neighbourhood."

 

"Have you read the articles signed Minerva, in the Hebdomad, Miss

Effingham," inquired Mr. Wenham, who was determined to try the young

lady on a point of sentiment, having succeeded so ill in his first

attempt to interest her--"they are generally thought to be a great

acquisition to American literature."

 

"Well, Wenham, you are a fortunate man," interposed Mr. Howel, "if

you can find any literature in America, to add to, or to substract

from. Beyond almanacs, reports of cases badly