LI E) R.AR.Y 
 
 OF THL 
 
 U N IVER.SITY 
 
 or ILLINOIS 
 
 8:23 
 
 GrSSfPo 
 
 V.I
 
 THE 
 
 POPULAR MEMBER, 
 
 THE WHEEL OP FORTUNE, 
 
 ETC. 
 
 BY MRS. GORE, 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 "MOTHERS AND DAUGHTERS," "MRS. ARMYTAGE," 
 "THE BANKER'S WIFE," etc. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. L 
 
 LONDON: 
 RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 
 
 1844.
 
 London : 
 Printed by S. & J. Bentley, Wilson, and Flbv, 
 Bangor House, Shoe Lane.
 
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 ?Z3 
 
 V. , 
 
 THE 
 
 POPULAU MEMBER. 
 
 ,:«, VOL. I. B
 
 THE 
 
 POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Knights and dames, I sing, 
 Such as the times may furnish ! — 'Tis a flight 
 Which seems at first to need no lofty wing 
 
 Plumed by Longinus or the Stagy rite. 
 The difficulty lies in colouring 
 
 (Keeping the due proportions still in sight) 
 With nature, manners that are artificial, 
 And rendering general that which is especial. 
 
 Byron. 
 
 Your indulgence, gentle reader, towards 
 a frankly-avowed prejudice in favour of the 
 county of York ! Other English shires are 
 doubtless equally endowed with noble es- 
 tates, majestic castles and venerable man- 
 sions. But there is something in the sweep- 
 ing expanse of Yorkshire, — in its warm- 
 hearted population, — its open-handed hos- 
 pitality, — its dignified capital, — its stately
 
 4 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 minster, — its really noble nobility, — that 
 readily induces us to pardon the exultation 
 with which an estated son of the soil, stand- 
 ing upon its breezy wolds, contemplates the 
 widely-spreading horizon of the proud old 
 shire. 
 
 But while rendering honour due to the 
 patriotic spirit of its aristocracy, we are 
 forced to admit that nowhere has the might 
 of commercial England come to a closer 
 encounter with the rights of feudal inherit- 
 ance. While the ancestral distinctions of 
 the houses of Howard, Wentworth, Las- 
 celles, Dundas, and others of similar mag- 
 nitude, subsist untarnished, new estates have 
 concentrated themselves, and new names 
 arisen out of the manufacturing towns whose 
 forges roar and engines send forth their 
 fumes among the green valleys of the noble 
 county. The greater happiness of a greater 
 number has, by these means, been promoted ; 
 and if, in a few instances, mortification has 
 arisen from the transfer of the venerable 
 mansions of old county families to indivi- 
 duals hatched out of the golden eggs of 
 commercial prosperity, a real benefit has
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 5 
 
 been conferred in others, by the creation of 
 new properties, by the enclosure of heaths, 
 the draining of commons, the planting of 
 moors, — farms expanded into parks, and fa- 
 milies established into residence. 
 
 In spite of the popular proverb, that 
 " fools build houses, and wise men live in 
 them," a wiser man, perhaps, is he who con- 
 structs a habitation accordant with his means 
 and necessities, than one who, like the ass 
 arrayed in a cast-off lion's skin, establishes 
 himself in a family mansion, ungifted like 
 the giant's seven-leagued boots in the story 
 to contract in size to the wants of every 
 succeeding proprietor. No better specimens, 
 accordingly, are to be found of English 
 country-houses adapted to the enjoyment 
 of a modest competence, than in the neigh- 
 bourhood of our great manufacturing towns. 
 
 Some twenty years ago, for instance, few 
 travellers but were tempted to pause and 
 envy the proprietor of a sunny nook called 
 Stainhurst, situated in a noble valley, a few 
 miles from the noisy, noisome town of 
 R . The palings of the extensive pad- 
 dock, which did not presume to call itself
 
 6 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 a park, were, as yet, unmossed by lichens ; 
 nor were the fine groves sheltering the 
 freestone mansion-house, of half a century's 
 growth. It was evidently a new place ; 
 such as abound in the counties of Surrey, 
 Kent, and Herts, but are rarely met with 
 in Yorkshire, unless, as in the present in- 
 stance, in connexion with lofty chimneys of 
 brickwork, betraying the existence of an 
 adjacent factory. 
 
 Stainhurst, however, had claims to all 
 the honours of a country-seat. The house 
 was spacious and handsomely furnished, the 
 offices commodious, the gardens admirably 
 laid out, the neighbouring village of Stainton 
 a model of rural order. All was evidently 
 dependant on a proprietor wise in his ge- 
 neration, or inheriting from a generation 
 that was wise. 
 
 Such, indeed, was exactly the case. 
 Robert Myrton, the present owner, had re- 
 cently succeeded his father, a wealthy York- 
 shire manufacturer, by whom the estate had 
 been acquired and the factory founded ; a 
 man distinguished alike by industry and 
 merit. Enlightened by the liberal education
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 7 
 
 in which the old man was wanting, Robert 
 had devoted the full force of his acquire- 
 ments to the improvement of the branch of 
 industry, at once the source and vehicle of 
 his fortunes ; and verily he had his reward. 
 
 By nature contemplative and prudent, his 
 attention had been absorbed till nearly thirty 
 years of age, by the stirring and responsible 
 duties of the factory, and the erection of the 
 new mansion, destined by his father to the 
 glorification of his heirs for ever ; and, 
 though the deeply rooted prejudices of the 
 elder Myrton interfered with the enlarged 
 views entertained by his more scientific suc- 
 cessor, Robert had introduced so many 
 amendments into the administration, that, 
 while the goods of Myrton and Son stood 
 high as ever in the colonial markets, their 
 workmen were the best paid, and best cared 
 for, of any in the manufacturing population 
 of the county of York. 
 
 The seal of prosperity, in short, was upon 
 the place. From the moment the Myrtons 
 settled in their new mansion-house, every 
 year found Stainhurst more thriving, and left 
 it more lovely. No finer turf within the
 
 8 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 walls of the noblest park of the three Rid- 
 ings, than in the sloping pastures of that 
 happy valley. A rookery had established 
 itself in the grove surrounding the demolish- 
 ed old farm ; and the fine fruit of the new 
 forcing-houses carried off all the horticul- 
 tural prizes of the neighbourhood. 
 
 To such matters, indeed, the old people 
 attached little importance ; the interests of 
 " the business," remaining paramount in their 
 estimation. But Robert, a dear lover of 
 order and amelioration, delighted in the 
 exercise of improved principles in every 
 department ; and whether in the flue of 
 a steam-engine, or of a succession house, 
 watched eagerly the working of his sys- 
 tems. Prompt, firm, discerning, his hand 
 and eye were those of a master-spirit ; and 
 the qualities of such a mind, attempered by 
 the impulses of a benevolent heart, secured 
 a blessing to him and his. — 
 
 The " his," was, for a time, of somewhat 
 limited comprehension. He had no leisure 
 to think of marrying. The pursuits of his 
 active life occupied all his attention ; nor 
 was it till the union of his only sister with
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 9 
 
 a clergyman, whose benefice lay at a con- 
 siderable distance from Stainhurst, deprived 
 him of the solace of female companionship, 
 that it seemed to occur to him his social 
 condition was susceptible of improvement. 
 But there was not a family in the neigh- 
 bourhood into which he could marry. With 
 
 the bustling town of R , the Myrtons 
 
 kept up only a commercial connexion ; with 
 the great people of the county their inter- 
 course was a mere matter of electioneering ; 
 and the old folks, chilled by the gap occa- 
 sioned at their fireside by the loss of their 
 daughter, often expressed to each other a 
 painful apprehension, lest Robert should re- 
 main a bachelor. 
 
 A special Providence, however, seems 
 exercised over the re-peopling of the earth. 
 Scarcely had Myrton begun to admit to 
 himself, that it was * not good for man to be 
 alone,' when, by the death of the venerable 
 incumbent of Stainton, a new family came 
 to be installed at the parsonage ; a young 
 couple whom that humble provision of two 
 hundred and forty pounds per annum had 
 encouraged to settle in life ! It would have 
 
 B 5
 
 10 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 required, however, an immense stretch of 
 imagination to foresee in the awkward sallow 
 sister of sixteen by whom they were ac- 
 companied, the future lady of Stainhurst 
 Hall. 
 
 Mrs. Lichfield, the parson's wife, and 
 Caroline Hilliard her sister, were the daugh- 
 ters of a Northern squire, the cadet of an 
 old county family, inheriting the small patri- 
 mony apportioned to junior branches ; — Mr. 
 Hilliard having died, the preceding year, 
 — ruined, — not by speculation, or play, or 
 the turf, but by another common source of 
 English ruination, viz., superabundance of 
 progeny. He had left sixteen to divide a 
 property insufficient for the competence of 
 two. 
 
 The eldest daughter, a girl of uncommon 
 beauty, had fortunately captivated the affec- 
 tions of the head of her father's family ; and 
 become, some years before his death, the 
 lovely wife of Sir John Hilliard, of Hilliard 
 Park. But this event so rekindled the dor- 
 mant pride of the squire, that his death was 
 ill-naturedly attributed by envious country- 
 neighbours to the shock of learning the en-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. ]1 
 
 gagement of his second daughter, Louisa, to 
 the poor curate of the parish. — Lucky was 
 it for her that, before the expiration of her 
 mourning, the preferment conferred on her 
 lover by his college enabled her to quit a 
 home where, in consequence of this suspicion, 
 she was regarded with an unkindly eye ; nor 
 was her marriage considered the less bene- 
 ficial, when she petitioned for the company 
 of her sister Caroline ; who was supposed to 
 have encouraged her imprudent engagement, 
 and who could be readily spared from the 
 over-encumbered household at Elm Hill, to 
 hem the new dusters and window-curtains 
 of the parsonage. 
 
 To Robert Myrton, the arrival of the new 
 incumbent was of course a matter of para- 
 mount interest. Stainton was situated only 
 half a mile from his hall door ; and to find 
 a gentlemanly, sociable, intelligent compa- 
 nion there, in place of the late bed-ridden 
 vicar, was so pleasant a change, as readily to 
 account to his father and mother for the fre- 
 quency of his visits. For the evenings were 
 never too rainy for him to join the tea-table 
 of the Lichfields ; nor the business of the
 
 12 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 factory so urgent as to prevent his hurrying 
 after breakfast to the parsonage with a new 
 
 w^ork from the R book-club, — or a packet 
 
 of garden-seeds for Mrs. Lichfield, — or some 
 other of the usual pretexts for country neigh- 
 bourly communication. 
 
 The attraction on the part of the sister 
 did not appear very dangerous. Whenever 
 the Lichfields dined at the Hall she remained 
 cold, shy, and silent, — neither opening her 
 lips, nor turning her eyes in the direction of 
 Robert ; and though the old lady kindly in- 
 vited her to walk over and practise on the 
 grand piano left by Mrs. Wynter, or borrow 
 what books she chose from her library, 
 Caroline did not once profit by the permission. 
 
 A warm friendship was springing up, 
 meanwhile, between the new pastor and the 
 future proprietor of the Hall. — Myrton was 
 invaluable in assisting him in the improve- 
 ment of his premises; and both the house 
 and gardens of the parsonage were indebted 
 to the theoretical and practical aid of 
 the friendly neighbour. The little homely 
 party often worked, chatted, and enjoyed 
 themselves together; but when, at the close
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 13 
 
 of the autumn, Mrs. Lichfield's accouchement 
 confined Caroline entirely to her sister's sick- 
 room, Myrton was just as frequent in his 
 visits, and apparently as happy. Not a word 
 of love or courtship ! — On one occasion, 
 when Lichfield happened to observe that Mr. 
 Hilliard had been too poor to bestow much 
 education on his daughters, but that, with 
 ordinary advantages, Caroline might have 
 been made a very superior woman, Myr- 
 ton uttered not a syllable in reply; — and 
 but that, soon after the christening of 
 little Robert Lichfield, she was unexpectedly 
 summoned home to Elm Hill, to lend her 
 aid in nursing the children through the 
 whooping-cough, he might perhaps never 
 have discovered that her society was essen- 
 tial to his happiness. 
 
 Before she had been a week absent, how- 
 ever, he found it impossible to talk with- 
 out being listened to by Caroline Hilliard ; 
 impossible to support the dreariness of 
 Stainhurst, without knowing her to be ex- 
 ercising her housewifely virtues at the par- 
 sonage ; and, almost as much to his own 
 surprise as to that of the Lichfields, he re-
 
 14 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 quested them to forward a letter to Elm 
 Hill, soliciting her hand ! '* 
 
 But their surprise was far exceeded by 
 their joy, at the prospect of obtaining such 
 a neighbour at the Hall ; and Sir John Hil- 
 liard being equally pleased at getting an- 
 other indigent sister-in-law provided for, the 
 widowed mother readily gave her consent 
 to a match, in which Caroline's young heart 
 was found to have centred its affections. 
 
 Within two months she returned to 
 Stainhurst a bride; and so marvellous was 
 the influence upon her sensitive nature of 
 sympathy, happiness, and prosperity, that 
 the old Myrtons^ who had been a little 
 mortified that their son should select a wife 
 with so little to recommend her, were soon 
 reconciled to his choice. Smiles, blushes, 
 and rich attire, had converted her into a 
 very different creature from the dispirited 
 girl in the rusty bombazine gown ; and Ro- 
 bert, who had been attracted by her affec- 
 tionate and unassuming disposition, and 
 habits of active usefulness, contemplated her 
 change into a beauty, as the result of a 
 stroke of enchantment.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 15 
 
 In process of time, the lovely wife be- 
 came the happy mother, and the satisfaction 
 of the family was complete. — Two years 
 afterwards, old Myrton sank into the grave ; 
 thankful for having survived to witness the 
 domestic felicity of that excellent son, be- 
 tween whom and his beloved Caroline not 
 a cloud had ever arisen. 
 
 The happiness of the thriving manufac- 
 turer, of course, excited a little spite among 
 
 certain of his family connexions at R ; 
 
 who had been heard to say, that, after wait- 
 ing till thirty, he might have made a more 
 prudent choice, and that he had " stooped 
 to pick up nothing."^ — But their malicious 
 murmurs reached him not. Rich in do- 
 mestic joys, intoxicated by the sudden em- 
 bellishment conferred on his existence, he 
 seemed to have found a gold mine on his 
 estate, and in the pebble at his feet a gem 
 of the purest water. His passion for his 
 sweet Caroline was all the more devoted 
 for his previous disregard to female attrac- 
 tions. 
 
 Unable to espy or create dissension be- 
 tween the happy couple, Mrs. Myrton's sister,
 
 16 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 the widow Minchin of R , contented her- 
 self with finding fault with the testamen- 
 tary dispositions of the old gentleman. 
 
 " Not a guinea in the way of legacy to 
 any one of his relations — not so much as 
 a mourning ring, even to poor dear Mrs. 
 Wynter ! — As to the pitiful jointure of ^\e 
 hundred a year to the widow, it was too 
 crying a shame to be even mentioned ! 
 Pretty plain what had been the object of 
 the foolish old man ! He wanted his son 
 and heir to become somebody in the county, 
 — he wanted to create a Myrton of Stain- 
 hurst ! But with that view, Bob ought to 
 have been sent to London, or even the York 
 meeting or Doncaster, to look out for a 
 good connexion ; — not have sat himself down 
 contented with the poor sister-in-law of the 
 parson of the parish ! " 
 
 Even after the widow Minchin became 
 aware that her niece, Mrs. Wynter, had been 
 presented by her father with stock to the 
 amount of ten thousand pounds in order to 
 evade the legacy duty, and that it was ar- 
 ranged during his lifetime for the widow to 
 remain at the head of the establishment
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 17 
 
 for life, (the five hundred per annum be- 
 ing provided her only for pocket money,) 
 she found new grounds for condemnation. 
 
 " Ay ! ay ! — ah ! very well, for a time ! 
 But my young madam will get sick of such 
 a restraint on her proceedings. My poor 
 dear sister will soon find the house at Stain- 
 hurst too hot to hold her !" 
 
 In this opinion, indeed, Mrs. Minchin was 
 backed, not only by the vulgar gossips of 
 
 R , but even by Caroline's gentle sister 
 
 at the Parsonage. Herself so happy as the 
 queen and mistress of her humble home, Mrs. 
 Lichfield could scarcely understand domestic 
 life on any other terms. 
 
 " I really almost wish, my dear Car." said 
 she, the first time her sister was seated by 
 her parlour fire, after the reading of the will, 
 " that the old gentleman had trebled the 
 widow's jointure, and provided her with a 
 dower house; the Briary, or Haverfield, or 
 some other pleasant residence, within reach 
 of Stainhurst." 
 
 " Better as it is i*' was the frank reply. 
 " The establishment is far more likely to 
 prosper in Mrs. Myrton's hands. I know
 
 18 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 nothing of domestic management. At home 
 mamma regarded all interference as an in- 
 vasion of her rights. During the happy 
 months I spent with you^ dear Louisa, you 
 allowed me no insight into your domestic 
 cares." 
 
 " As if the petty economy of our Parson- 
 age would have afforded a precedent for the 
 liberal housekeeping of Stainhurst Hall." 
 
 " I only mean to say that you have con- 
 spired among you to keep me idle and igno- 
 rant !" continued Mrs. Myrton, with a smile ; 
 " I have been the spoilt child of fortune ; and 
 am only too thankful to my mother-in-law 
 for securing me ten years more leisure than 
 I am lawfully entitled to." 
 
 The young wife of the best of husbands 
 had happily sense enough to be aware of 
 the providential ordering of her destinies ! —
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 19 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 In a happy garden placed, 
 Reaping immortal fruits of joy and love ; 
 Uninterrupted joy, unrivall'd love, 
 In blissful solitude. 
 
 Milton. 
 
 The aiFectionate friendship of Mrs. Lich- 
 field and her sister seemed only strengthen- 
 ed by the growing prosperity of Caroline. 
 
 Scarcely a day but she quitted her own 
 luxuriant lawns and beautiful conservatory, 
 to visit the humble flower-beds of the Par- 
 sonage. She had always some question to 
 ask of Louisa, though little more expe- 
 rienced than herself, concerning the manage- 
 ment of her nursery ; or she had received 
 a letter from Lady Hilliard, the contents of 
 which were to be communicated to the less 
 prosperous sister, with whom the great lady 
 of the family did not deign to correspond ; or
 
 20 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 she wanted Lichfield's advice concerning a 
 present of books and clothes, about to be 
 despatched to Elm Hill for her little bro- 
 thers. 
 
 " Another note from Car. ? Why, surely, 
 it is the third to-day ?" said Lichfield, with 
 a smile, w^hen, one snowy night, a twisted 
 missive was brought in, relating to the pat- 
 tern of a baby's frock. " With all her fine 
 fortune, she finds it a hard matter to get 
 through the day, my dear Lou., without your 
 assistance ! I longed to say as much, the 
 other day, to that odious Aunt Minchin of 
 Myrton's, when she was visiting at the Hall." 
 
 " I saw you were piqued at her insinu- 
 ation about the advantages we derive from 
 living so near the great house. But what 
 signify the illiberal opinions of a vulgar wo- 
 man like that, — the widow of a clothier of 
 
 R — r 
 
 " Stop, stop, stop, — or I shall call 7/our 
 opinions as illiberal as hers !" cried Lichfield, 
 cheerfully. " No one ever taxed the Myr- 
 tons with vulgarity, whose condition of life 
 is only equal to hers. However, (not to 
 affect a fastidiousness we have so often ridi-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 21 
 
 culed in our friends at Hilliard Park,) I 
 must say, I consider your living so near 
 your sister a serious blessing to Caroline, 
 now that Myrton is so often away." 
 
 *' His father s affairs are nearly wound up ; 
 after which, there will be no further induce- 
 ment for his visits to town," observed Louisa, 
 repeating what she had heard from Mrs. 
 Myrton. 
 
 " Six months have elapsed since his fa- 
 ther's decease," replied Lichfield, signifi- 
 cantly ; " and six days would have sufficed 
 for the probate of the will." 
 
 "You do not think there is anything 
 amiss with his affairs?" inquired Louisa, 
 anxiously. 
 
 "Nothing worse than a flush of prospe- 
 rity ! Myrton, who is a man of stirring 
 mind, often used to lament to me, during his 
 father's lifetime, the contracted views of the 
 old man in the arrangements of the business. 
 Now that he is independent, unless I am 
 much mistaken, he will effect wonders at 
 Stainhurst. The other day he showed me 
 a plan for a new factory, the construction of 
 which will cost him forty thousand pounds !"
 
 22 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Mrs. Lichfield looked up from her work 
 with an air of stupefaction. 
 
 " At this very moment," resumed her hus- 
 band, " he is gone to inspect some works at 
 Glasgow, which it is essential he should see, 
 previous to the signature of his contract. 
 Two years, at least, are requisite for the 
 completion of his buildings ; during which, 
 Car. will find many hours hang heavy upon 
 her hands, which they have been in the 
 habit of passing together." 
 
 " But she has now her two children to 
 occupy her time." 
 
 " Not as Bob and the baby occupy yours ! 
 — Car. has nothing to do for her children, 
 but love them ; and, to a woman of hei 
 spirit, mere infants will not suffice as com- 
 panions." 
 
 Again did Mrs. Lichfield look up wist- 
 fully from her work. The little creatures 
 for whom she was stitching, indeed, sufficed 
 every craving of her mind. — Was this a 
 fault in the estimation of her husband ? 
 
 All he replied, however, to that mute 
 inquiry was, the expression of a hope that 
 they might be a comfort to Caroline
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 23 
 
 when Myrton was engaged with his brick- 
 layers. ^ 
 
 But when the grand secret transpired, 
 by means of the extent of the foundations 
 laid for the new factory, Caroline appeared 
 almost as much interested in its progress as 
 her husband. Accustomed to share his 
 walks, his rides, his missions of charity, it 
 was only natural she should take part in his 
 present occupations. She examined the 
 plans, plodded through the estimates, calcu- 
 lated the returns, laid the foundation stone 
 of the new building, and promised herself 
 to watch diligently over its daily advance- 
 ment. 
 
 But she soon found her part must be a 
 very ^subordinate one. Myrton was on foot 
 every morning at daybreak ; confabulating 
 with the clerk of the works, whose slightest 
 word was more important in his ears than 
 the strongest opinion expressed by his wife. 
 Under a burning sun, he would stand for 
 hours watching the progress of excavations, 
 or the arrival of building materials. A 
 practical man, he was interested in even 
 the mechanical execution of his gigantic
 
 24 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 plans ; and often remained motionless for 
 hours, over his shoes in clay, or daubed from 
 head to foot with mortar — 
 
 Like patience on a plank, 
 Smiling at scaffold-poles — 
 
 without noticing that Caroline, weary of 
 being perpetually alone with children who 
 could not yet speak, and an old lady who 
 could no longer hear, had strolled to the 
 spot, and was watching him with unheeded 
 admiration. 
 
 Even when he returned home to dinner, 
 his attention was absorbed by the operations 
 of the morning, or projects for the morrow. 
 He could think of nothing but his new fac- 
 tory ; the finest ever projected within hun- 
 dreds of miles of R ! 
 
 Caroline Myrton's discovery of the se- 
 condary position she had suddenly assumed 
 in the feelings of her husband, imparted one 
 of those bitter pangs which accompany our 
 initiation into the disappointments of life ! 
 The strange elevation of her fortunes, — the 
 impassioned tenderness of which she had 
 unexpectedly become the object, — had, per- 
 haps, inspired her with undue self-appreci-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 25 
 
 ation ; for, in her girlish infatuation, she had 
 expected Myrton's adoration to last for ever ! 
 Conjugal coolness is usually the result of the 
 interference of worldly pleasures and tempt- 
 ations ; and when contemplating the more 
 brilliant position of her sister Emily, she had 
 sometimes congratulated herself at not be- 
 ing forced, like Lady Hiljiard, into the peril- 
 ous vortex of London life, with all its mis- 
 chievous attractions of clubs, dinner-parties, 
 and theatres ; little prepared for rivalship 
 in her husband^s affections, with a brick- 
 layer's hod ! 
 
 The first time Caroline found her arm 
 petulantly unclasped from Myrton's, as she 
 was attempting to inveigle him away from 
 the works for a walk with herself and the 
 children, she hurried home and wept bitterly. 
 
 But even home was growing uncomfort- 
 able. The old lady, displeased to find the 
 system of her respected husband overturned, 
 and somewhat alarmed at the magnitude of 
 Robert's speculations, secretly accused the 
 high connexions of her daughter-in-law, of 
 prompting him to this enormous risk of pro- 
 perty. She allowed herself to be persuaded 
 
 VOL. I. c
 
 26 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 by her sister, the widow Minchin, that Bob 
 was chiefly anxious to aggrandize himself for 
 the paltry ambition of vying with the esta- 
 blishment of his opulent brother-in-law at 
 Hilliard Park. 
 
 " Why not be content with turning his 
 honest thousands a- year, like his worthy 
 father afore him?" cried the envious old aunt. 
 
 " All R is talking about his folly !— He 
 
 wants, it seems, to be a mountain, when he's 
 more likely to turn out a mouse ! — Trade 
 isn't what it was, — as he'll find to his cost. 
 
 Three families in R forced to lay down 
 
 their carriages last year, — to say nothing of 
 the smash of Cranns and Co., and the Smiths 
 of Lee Furnace in the Gazette ! — Master Bob 
 had better look sharp ! If he'd only married 
 some sensible woman, well to do in the 
 world, of his own age and condition in life, 
 these new-fangled fancies would never have 
 been put into his head ! But a miss with 
 ne'er a thing in her pocket but a pedigree, 
 makes bad ballast to a speculator." 
 
 Animadversions such as these, did not 
 tend to conciliate the feelings of the old lady 
 towards her daughter-in-law ; and, by her
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 27 
 
 own fireside, Caroline often found herself 
 sinning in trifles, where before, she had been 
 accounted faultless. 
 
 The Lichfields were mistaken, however, in 
 supposing that the mortified wife, less cared 
 for at home, would fly to the parsonage 
 for consolation ! In the overflowing of a con- 
 tented heart, she had warmly sympathized in 
 the domestic happiness of her sister. Now 
 that she fancied herself neglected, it was 
 painful to see the humble roof of Louisa 
 brightened by the unintermitting sunshine 
 of conjugal love ! — 
 
 On the return of Sir John and Lady Hil- 
 liard from their season in town, an invitation 
 to Hilliard Park promised some respite from 
 her grievances. Away from home, Robert 
 would become the same fond lover, the same 
 assiduous companion as of old. Alas ! three 
 days after quitting Stainhurst, he pleaded 
 the necessity of returning to look after his 
 workmen ; leaving Caroline and the children 
 to finish their visit to her sister alone. 
 
 " What a relief it must be to you, Car.," 
 was Lady Hilliard's obliging commentary on 
 his departure, " to have your husband's at- 
 
 c 2
 
 28 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 teiition engaged by an engrossing occupation ! 
 The moment the hunting season is over, 
 Hilliard hangs as heavy on my hands as a 
 pig of lead from his own mines ! I am 
 forced to go to town to get rid of him. If 
 he would only take to building factories ! 
 What a comfort it would be to have one's 
 time to one's-self !" 
 
 Thus congratulated, how was Caroline to 
 give utterance to her premeditated com- 
 plaints of being left to her own resources at 
 Stainhurst? She began almost to fancy her- 
 self in the wrong ; and on her return home, 
 instead of indulging, as before, in gloomy re- 
 flections and solitary husband-accusing ram- 
 bles, set about profiting by her leisure, and 
 enlarging her sphere of employment. Be- 
 fore the new factory was completed, she had 
 taught herself to paint miniatures, and was 
 one of the best musicians in the county. 
 
 Meanwhile the interests which had re- 
 laxed the stringency of his domestic union, 
 tended only to cement that of Myrton with 
 his brother-in-law. As a means of increas- 
 ing the prosperity of his parish, the new 
 factory was almost as important to Lich-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 29 
 
 field, as to himself. In several emergencies, 
 the advice of the Parsonage afforded power- 
 ful assistance ; and on the memorable day 
 when the arms of the gigantic monster 
 were first set in motion, Myrton himself 
 was scarcely more excited by the triumph of 
 the undertaking, than the good pastor, who 
 knew that the welfare of fifty poor families 
 depended on the prosperity of the concern. 
 
 " I heartily wish you joy, my dear Car." 
 cried he, — after witnessing the admirable 
 operations of the new machinery ; " the 
 event of this day will put some thousands 
 a-year into your pocket." 
 
 " Rather wish me joy," she retorted, 
 " that it will restore to me the company and 
 affections of my husband !" — For Mrs. Myrton 
 had yet to learn, that a man of active 
 mind, long absorbed in an arduous under- 
 taking, does not easily return to the un- 
 eventful and vapid monotony of his previous 
 life. The responsibility which had devolved 
 on Robert Myrton's shoulders at the death of 
 his father, was never more to be shaken off. 
 The services of his right hand were too often 
 in request in his house of business, to admit
 
 30 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 of its remaining enclasped, as of old, be- 
 tween those of liis lovely wife. 
 
 The vastness of the speculations in which 
 the house of Myrton and Son was now en- 
 gaged, and which he found from Aunt 
 Minchin and other persons of more account, 
 had drawn upon him the sneers of his ma- 
 nufacturing competitors, seemed to render 
 success a duty, as well as a delight. Every 
 nerve, therefore, was strained, every faculty 
 exercised to the utmost, in order to support 
 the firm in the high position it had long 
 maintained in the export trade of the 
 country. 
 
 Success, even beyond his hopes, soon 
 entitled him to claim the congratulations of 
 his wife. Unwilling as he had been to 
 weary the attention of a fair creature still 
 scarcely past the age of girlhood, with the 
 tedious details of his buildings and new 
 patent, no sooner was the product tangible, 
 than he called upon his beloved Caroline 
 to rejoice with him, and be glad. 
 
 And glad she was, — but not with the 
 perfect and heartwarm sympathy of other 
 .days. During the three years which had
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. SI 
 
 elapsed since the death of the old gentle- 
 man, Caroline Mjrton, deprived of her 
 husband's society and of active domestic 
 duties, had created employments for her 
 leisure which now satisfied her attention. An 
 expert artist, a fine musician, a good linguist, 
 her memory was stored with the choicest 
 works of imagination in her own and other 
 languages. — At two and twenty she was an 
 accomplished, as well as a beautiful, woman. 
 
 But she was no longer the idolizing 
 wife of the man of business, who com- 
 prehended all the joys of life in an even- 
 ing stroll by the river side, hand in hand 
 with her husband ! At present, indeed, 
 Robert was unconscious of what he had 
 lost or what she had gained ; nor, while 
 she remained so considerate and submissive 
 a daughter-in-law, and so affectionate and 
 gentle a mother, was he likely to notice 
 that she lent only a forced attention to his 
 perpetual exultations over the increase of 
 his traffic, and the superior quality of his 
 merchandise. 
 
 On the other hand, the superficial accom- 
 plishments she had acquired were as unim-
 
 32 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 portant in his eyes, as in hers the admirable 
 texture of his cloths. Her piano -forte and 
 water-colours appeared to him only the toys 
 of her grown-up play-hours ; and when, one 
 evening at Hilliard Park, he found himself 
 eagerly complimented, by a party of Lon- 
 don fashionables, on the exquisite taste 
 with which Mrs. Myrton executed her part 
 in one of Beethoven's symphonies, he 
 could scarcely refrain from a smile at hear- 
 ing so much enthusiasm wasted on an ex- 
 cellence so trivial. 
 
 It was enough, however, that there was 
 no cause for fault-finding with the new pur- 
 suits in which his wife was absorbed. She 
 neglected no duty for the prosecution of 
 her pleasures. The poor found as kind a 
 friend in the accomplished wife of the ma- 
 nufacturer, as in his silent bride ; and when, 
 twice on every Sabbath, she took her place 
 in the family pew, in the neat parish church 
 of Stainton erected at the sole cost of the 
 elder Myrton, the eyes of the workmen 
 and their families rested upon their patron- 
 ess with a degree of veneration almost 
 amounting to worship.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. -33 
 
 Mrs. Lichfield, however, began to perceive 
 that she saw less and less of her sister. 
 
 " Car. is sometimes days without coming 
 here !" — said she, complainingly. 
 
 " She is never one without sending, or 
 giving us some token of kindness,'' was 
 Lichfield's justice-dealing reply. 
 
 " A very different thing from dropping in 
 to chat away the morning, as she used to do," 
 — still pleaded the mortified sister. 
 
 " A far better one, in my opinion. She 
 has found wiser occupations. Besides, con- 
 versation, in this house, is out of the ques- 
 tion ; — the children are always in the room !" 
 
 " Surely Car. ought to be accustomed to 
 the noise of children. Remember, we were 
 sixteen at home !" 
 
 The parson remembered and trembled. 
 Four olive-branches in five years inspired 
 him with misgivings touching the fecundity 
 of the Hilliard family. 
 
 " Your sister was young when she quitted 
 home," he replied, evading the question ; 
 " and, strange to say, the little Myrtons are 
 never troublesome," — added he, with hus- 
 band-like injustice. 
 
 c 5
 
 34 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 " There are plenty of servants at Stain- 
 hurst, and Emily is three years old !" faltered 
 the parson's wife. — " It is poor baby's noise 
 of which you always complain.^^ 
 
 "Of course, — if you will persist in keeping 
 it in the room when I am writing — " 
 
 " Only to prevent its waking the other 
 children," interrupted his wife. " Our house 
 is so very small ! Caroline's children would 
 be quite as much of a nuisance as ours, if 
 equally confined ; except, indeed, that she is 
 too partial to her pursuits to submit to be 
 interfered with." 
 
 " I perceive that my little wife is a little 
 jealous of her sister s music and drawing !" 
 said Lichfield, affectionately patting her on 
 the cheek. 
 
 " I should as soon think of being envious 
 of her service of plate," retorted Louisa, 
 slightly colouring ; " only I cannot help feel- 
 ing that my sister's company would be as 
 great a comfort to me now, as mine was to 
 her, when she first settled at Stainhurst." 
 
 " Yet I verily believe, Lou.," persisted 
 Lichfield, " that one of your sister's motives 
 for seeking these occupations, was the con-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 35 
 
 sciousness that her idle hours hung heavy, 
 both upon us and upon Myrton. She often 
 found herself in the way, here ; still oftener, 
 when taxing her husband for companionship, 
 whose time is so precious. With too much 
 sense not to perceive this, Car. has wisely se- 
 lected a safe and honourable issue for her 
 leisure. How much better than if she had 
 become a peevish grumbler, like Lady Hil- 
 liard, or found a resource in idle gossip and 
 morning visits !'' 
 
 '''Much better !" — reiterated Mrs. Lichfield, 
 not quite so disposed as usual to echo with 
 an " amen," the domestic sermon of a hus- 
 band savage enough to discern no music in 
 the squalling of a baby. " Only one cannot 
 help fearing the time may come when Car. 
 will feel the want of an audience for the 
 display of the talents she values so highly. 
 Myrton has no more taste for that sort of 
 thing, than his own foreman ! The old lady 
 invariably goes to sleep after dinner; and 
 cares for nothing but the housekeeper's ac- 
 counts, and the reputation of her dairy. 
 The Wynters' annual visit casts a chill upon 
 the house, as though an iceberg had broken
 
 36 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 loose, and drifted to Stainhurst ; while, as 
 to that horrible Mrs. Minchin, Car. never 
 so much as deigns to address her." 
 
 " No wonder ! — a woman as malicious as 
 she is low-minded." 
 
 "At present/' resumed Mrs. Lichfield, 
 piqued at finding her husband determined 
 to side with her sister, — " Car. is content 
 with her happy home, as well she may be ! 
 But every year, she seems to look forward 
 more eagerly to the visits to Hilliard Park 
 she used to find so disagreeable ; and she 
 was delighted when an invitation arrived, 
 the other day, from Harringhurst Castle." 
 
 '' Because her husband was gratified ! 
 Myrton is beginning to interest himself 
 warmly in politics : and it is a compliment 
 to find his society courted in the county, by 
 the leading man of his party. At Myrton's 
 age, with such a stake in the country, aad 
 children for its perpetuation, his views of 
 public life becoming more serious, must na- 
 turally influence his private." 
 
 " I suppose it is in the course of things for 
 people who are growing richer and richer, 
 to be more and more sought in society, and
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER* 37 
 
 try to make themselves more and more ac- 
 ceptable in return !" sighed the parson's wife, 
 casting a wistful glance round the little par- 
 lour, which was not the brighter or fresher 
 of aspect for six years' constant use ; and re- 
 gretting, perhaps, at that moment, that her 
 husband's limited income was never likely to 
 proportion itself to their increasing family. — 
 " But I doubt, — I mry much doubt, — whether 
 Car. and Myrton will ever be half so happy 
 again, as they were with a quarter of their 
 present fortune ; before he became his own 
 master, or had any care in the world be- 
 yond the affection of his wife !" 
 
 " Honeymoons, my dear Lou. cannot last 
 for ever !" was the hasty retort of the parson ; 
 " more especially, with so matter-of-fact a 
 personage as a manufacturer employing four 
 hundred hands. Myrton is an excellent 
 master — an excellent friend — an excellent 
 man ; and since he and his wife are satis- 
 fied, why go in search of discontent ? — We, 
 I am sure, ought to be the last people on 
 earth to find fault with him. For were it 
 not for my brother-in-law's liberality, the 
 ends of my narrow income would find it
 
 38 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 a hard matter to meet, — far less so as to 
 enable me to lay by something for you and 
 the little ones." 
 
 " I was not complaining of their want of 
 generosity," interrupted his wife, with some 
 bitterness. — ""^ I merely expressed a hope, 
 that Caroline's altered habits of life might 
 not prove as great an interruption to the 
 happiness of her domestic life, as they have 
 to our sisterly intercourse." 
 
 And by hurrying away to hide her tears 
 in the nursery, she avoided further alterca- 
 tion with a husband, the steady equilibrium 
 of whose head secured such provoking con- 
 trol over all irregularity in the movements 
 of his heart.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 39 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 If female weakness melt my woman's mind, 
 At least, no weakness in the choice I find. 
 The only charm my inclination moves 
 Is such a virtue Heaven itself approves. 
 A soul superior to each vulgar view, — 
 Great, steady, gentle, generous, and true ! 
 
 Lady M. W. Montagu. 
 
 Except as the origin of occasional fits of 
 peevishness at Stainton Parsonage, and fre- 
 quent outbursts of impertinence on the part 
 of Aunt Minchin, there was nothing to he 
 regretted in the state of affairs at Stainhurst 
 Hall. All went well with the Myrtons. 
 Their fortune was increasing, — their family 
 was not. Their two handsome children 
 throve, and did them honour ; and every day 
 added to the activity of the factory and 
 beauty of the place. 
 
 It w^as not alone by comparison with the
 
 40 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 destinies of her struggling mother, or sister 
 Louisa prematurely haggard with family 
 cares, that Mrs. Myrton had cause for thank- 
 fulness to Providence. Even Hilliard Park 
 afforded ample pretext for exulting in the 
 superiority of her destinies. Sir John, whose 
 nominal income of twelve thousand a-year, 
 had exalted him into the Croesus of her 
 father's family, was a spendthrift and a gam- 
 bler on the turf; and his pretty silly wife 
 having no influence over his mind, half a 
 dozen seasons in town had sufficiently em- 
 barrassed him to render their life uneasy. 
 Though keeping up the hospitalities and re- 
 presentation inevitable to their situation in 
 life, money was more than scarce with them ; 
 and Sir John who, at the period of Caro- 
 line's marriage, had been so facetious on the 
 subject of an alliance between the ancient 
 family of Hilliard and the manufacturing 
 interests, had condescended to have recourse, 
 on more than one occasion, to the purse of 
 his plebian brother-in-law. 
 
 From motives of delicacy, this was care- 
 fully kept secret from his wife, by Robert 
 IVIyrton. But Caroline could not but notice,
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 41 
 
 on their annual arrival at Hilliard Park, 
 that, though able to boast of shining at 
 drawing-rooms and levees, royal balls and 
 fashionable fetes, Emily was as faded and 
 careworn as the laborious mother at the Par- 
 sonage ; and far less liberally provided than 
 herself with the minor luxuries of life. The 
 new books, new music, new furniture, new 
 toys for the children, which abounded at 
 Stainhurst, were wanting in the grand old 
 family mansion, whose owner had thousands 
 to throw away at Crockford^s or Newmarket, 
 but seldom a ten-pound note to bestow upon 
 his wife. But above all, her younger sisters 
 and brothers, and the little household at 
 Elm Hill, had been thrice as largely bene- 
 fited by her homely husband, as by the bro- 
 ther-in-law whose name and blood were 
 kindred with her own ! 
 
 The consciousness of all this swelled 
 proudly in her bosom, when occasionally 
 twitted by Lady Hilliard with the obscurity 
 of her lot. 
 
 " I was so sorry you could not prevail on 
 Myrton to let you spend a couple of days 
 at Harringhurst Castle, my dear Car. \" said
 
 42 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 she. " It often makes me sick at heart to 
 think of you, cooped up all the year round at 
 that odious Stainhurst ! '^ 
 
 "Odious? — why it is one of the most 
 beautiful spots in the county ! '' 
 
 " What has spot to do with it ? Bolton 
 Abbey, or Hackfall, or Studley, would be 
 odious, my dear, if, instead of old ruins, 
 there were a disgusting factory in the park ! 
 — Such a blemish, and the sort of population 
 it must bring about you, are insuperable 
 evils." 
 
 " The factory is not very unsightly, nor is 
 it seen from the house," replied her sister. 
 " As to the workmen, our people are as 
 quiet as any rural population. Their de- 
 pendence upon us, like that of the suzer- 
 ainty of feudal times, supplies, I assure you, 
 an agreeable interest to the monotonies of 
 countrv life." 
 
 Lady Hilliard shrugged her shoulders, — 
 half in pity, — half in derision. — 
 
 "After all, my dear Emily, in what do 
 they differ but name, from your own te- 
 nants V — cried Mrs. Myrton. " Not one of 
 them but would risk life and limb for his
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 43 
 
 employer !— Your miners could do no more 
 for Sir John." 
 
 "And are likely, I suspect, to do far less ; 
 for, between ourselves, the tenants here are 
 disgracefully screwed up. — But what can one 
 do ? — As it is, we can scarcely get on ! — It 
 was not, however, — of your poor wretches of 
 workpeople I am thinking ; it was of your- 
 self, confined all the year round with that 
 horrid old quiz of a mother-in-law, in her 
 black mode bonnet and cloak; without so 
 much as the power of ordering your chickens 
 boiled or roasted, according to your fancy. 
 And then, the visits of the vulgar people 
 
 from R , — some of whom, I fancy, are 
 
 your relations ! — " 
 
 " I am little troubled with visitors of any 
 kind," said Caroline gravely. 
 
 " So I find from Louisa. I was in hopes 
 the Brabazons and Childertons would have 
 called upon you; knowing, as they must, 
 your relationship to us. But having, of 
 course, never visited old Gaffer and Gamma 
 Myrton, and your husband's politics being 
 liberal, the precedent might have been dan- 
 gerous. However, I wall certainly speak
 
 44 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 about it to Sir Frederick Brabazon, if we 
 meet him at Doncaster." 
 
 '* Pray, my dear Emily, do nothing of the 
 kind," earnestly exclaimed Mrs. Myrton. — 
 " I have my own pursuits and pleasures, and 
 no wish to enlarge my acquaintance. I am 
 perfectly happy. I have neither heartburn- 
 ings, nor envyings, nor strife. How it might 
 be with me if we lived more in the world, I 
 cannot answer for. Even you, who hold so 
 much higher a position in society, were com- 
 plaining to me, last night, of slights received 
 in London from the Duchess of Ormskirk." 
 
 " Because (the Duke having election obli- 
 gations to Sir John) her conduct is most un- 
 grateful ; otherwise, I should not care a 
 rush about the matter. A ball is but a ball. 
 One fete nearly resembles another; and 
 whether invited or not to Ormskirk House 
 makes little difference, thank goodness, to 
 people who stand so high as ourselves. Your 
 position, Car., is quite another affair; and 
 when your children grow up, you will feel 
 as I do now, that with your fortune, appear- 
 ance, (and I might almost say, connexions,) 
 you ought to live among better people, — to
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 45 
 
 have a house in town, — or, at all events, 
 come up for a few weeks to an hotel." 
 
 "What possible pleasure could I find in 
 London, where I know no one ?" — 
 
 " Do you suppose acquaintances so hard to 
 be made?" — 
 
 " Such, perhaps, as / might consider worth 
 the trouble of making." 
 
 "Well, then, you, ma belle Corinne, who 
 pretend to a passion for the arts, can you 
 imagine no satisfaction in a good opera, — in 
 the Philharmonic, — the Ancient music, — the 
 public galleries? — to say nothing of society 
 a little more enlightened than Parson Lich- 
 field's, and a little better bred than Myr- 
 ton's country cousins !" — 
 
 " Why tax my imagination on the sub- 
 ject," said Mrs. Myrton, somewhat nettled, 
 " since my husband's avocations render as 
 impossible, as my habits of life would render 
 disagreeable, the mode of life you recom- 
 mend !" 
 
 Again did the faded beauty of Hilliard 
 Park elevate her shoulders with an air of 
 conscious superiority. In her estimation, 
 Stainhurst was extinction ! — A life uncon-
 
 46 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 nected with the London set in which she 
 moved, was undeserving to be called exist- 
 ence. She reconciled herself, however, to 
 the unambitious obstinacy of the Myrtons, 
 by calling to mind that, though produceable 
 enough at Hilliard Park, (more especially 
 now that Caroline's musical accomplishments 
 rendered her so agreeable an addition to a 
 country house,) she should find such near 
 relatives, utterly obscure, sadly a charge to 
 her in town. 
 
 How was so weak a woman as Lady Hil- 
 liard to conjecture that, among the person- 
 ages whom the chances of country neigh- 
 bourship assembled under her husband's 
 roof, were many to whom the strong sense 
 and local information of an independent man 
 like Robert Myrton, appeared first-rate re- 
 commendations? In those unreformed days 
 of British legislation, rarely did the highest 
 order of landed proprietors come in contact 
 with a man of enlightened mind, practically 
 familiar with the necessities and spirit of the 
 lowest. Myrton was, without enthusiasm, a 
 steady friend of the people; and, painfully 
 aware of the agitation beginning to ferment
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 47 
 
 in his own neighbourhood, felt deeply in- 
 terested in conciliating those in whose 
 hands abided the means of pacifying the 
 storm. 
 
 The lapse of years which had accom- 
 plished so much in polishing the manners 
 and refining the air of the shy girl, had, in 
 short, converted the reserved man into an 
 inly-pondering, outspoken patriot. The de- 
 spotic controul of a concern involving the 
 subsistence of hundreds, had unconsciously 
 inspired principles and habits of legislation, 
 which he was becoming ambitious of ex- 
 ercising on a broader basis. After treating 
 the welfare of his workmen as a sacred 
 deposit in his hands, and listening to their 
 benedictions, it was difldcult not to desire a 
 wider horizon for his endeavours. The pro- 
 sperity which is said to harden the heart, 
 hardens it only for the solitary and idle ; 
 and so happy a husband, father, son, and 
 citizen as Robert Myrton, in whose cup 
 adversity had never yet mingled a bitter 
 drop, could scarcely look abroad, between 
 his gleams of domestic enjoyment, without 
 aspiring to re-establish a golden age.
 
 48 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 But, however philanthropical his views, 
 the spirit of the century had not then pre- 
 pared the way for their adoption. 
 
 The rod of the prophet was yet unap- 
 plied to the rock ; and drought and hope- 
 lessness still prevailed in the land. Mankind 
 
 Had not yet felt their strength, or made it felt ; 
 
 and Myrton w^as one of the many serious 
 men, who contemplated with anxiety the 
 development of their expanding energies. 
 
 This watchfulness, and the principles in 
 which it had its rise, constituted the real 
 motive of the Myrtons' seclusion from coun- 
 try society, ^'c^^clusion it could not be call- 
 ed ; for, upon certain sacrifices, they would 
 have been eagerly welcomed into the circle 
 in which their education, fortune, and habits 
 of life, entitled them to move. But Lord 
 Childerton and Sir Frederick Brabazon, 
 abstained from all intercourse with Stain- 
 hurst, not because its present growth of 
 timber did not suffice to shut out the fac- 
 tory chimnies, but because the manly oratory 
 
 of Myrton on the hustings of R , if 
 
 unable to defeat their borough proprietor-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 49 
 
 ship, inspired the people with fervent faith 
 in the advent of a day, when that influence 
 would be overmastered by legislative Reform. 
 It was not their contempt for him as a manu- 
 facturer, but their dread of him as an agi- 
 tator, which closed their gates against Myr- 
 ton. 
 
 Politics, in short, ran as high in the 
 neighbourhood as is usually the case where 
 the property is divided between great land- 
 lords, such as Sir Frederick, and Lord 
 Childerton, who derive their estates and 
 principles from the middle ages ; regarding 
 English liberty as a blessing extorted from 
 the grasp of the throne by the order alone 
 worthy of its enjoyment, and too good a 
 thing to be frittered away among such bar- 
 barians as the people ; — and a man like 
 Myrton, whose territory is the creation of 
 the day, — reclaimed from the waste, to 
 engender a population hateful to the eyes 
 of the neighbouring landowners, and fatal 
 to their interests. 
 
 The Marquis of Harringhurst, the only 
 great Whig proprietor in that part of the 
 county, resided sixty miles off, — too far to be 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 50 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 fully cognizant of the value of Myrton as an 
 apostle of the Liberalism which he professed 
 as warmly as is compatible with a rentroll of 
 fifty thousand a-year ; — and had only recently 
 made the acquaintance of " the new man." 
 Myrton had consequently no support against 
 the agrarian innovations of Lord Childerton, 
 or the vexatious oppressions of Sir Frederick 
 Brabazon, — part proprietor of the borough of 
 
 R , and one of the members for the 
 
 county. 
 
 Lord Childerton's family, being resident 
 in the neighbourhood only a few weeks in 
 the year, were of less moment. But the Bra- 
 bazons spent, at their ancient seat of Holme- 
 dale, all the months they could spare from 
 London ; and were stirring, ostentatious peo- 
 ple, who filled the country round with the 
 the sounding of their brass, and tinkling of 
 their cymbals. 
 ' With the elder Myrtons, as a mere branch 
 
 of the manufacturing interests of R , 
 
 neither Childertons nor Brabazons had ever 
 come in contact. But on the marriage of 
 their son with the grand- daughter and sister- 
 in-law of a highly connected Yorkshire
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 51 
 
 baronet, they would certainly have deigned 
 to perceive that the beautiful estate of 
 Stainhurst lay within reach of their park- 
 gates, had not the public spirit of Myrton 
 fi^equently manifested itself in making head 
 against their local assumptions, prosecuting 
 their trespasses, and provoking election- 
 eering altercations of a serious nature. 
 
 The consequence was, that though within 
 fifty miles' distance there dwelt a sister of 
 Mrs. Myrton, by marriage and descent their 
 equal, Caroline was classed among the, 
 " unvisitable.'' In the social order of the 
 county, she was ranked among the manu- 
 facturers of R ! — 
 
 But for the secluded habits of the Stain- 
 hurst family, this absurd repugnance must 
 have subsided. The grace of mind and per- 
 son adorning Caroline Myrton, would have 
 exorcised even the evil spirit of politics. 
 But the sphere of her existence was so 
 circumscribed, and the upstart family so 
 destitute of branches or feelers in society, 
 that Stainhurst continued to be pointed out 
 from Childerton Court and Holmedale, as a 
 mere feature in the landscape: — "a new 
 
 d2 
 
 UBRARY 
 UNIVERSITY OF UtNO
 
 52 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 place belonging to rich manufacturers, — 
 good sort of people in their way, of whom 
 (the man being a terrible democrat !) we 
 know nothing !" — 
 
 Of this ostracism Caroline was, happily, 
 unconscious. Compared with Elm Hill, 
 Stainton Parsonage, or even Hilliard Park, 
 Stainhurst presented a garden of Eden. 
 Her destinies were invariably adverted to by 
 her mother, as those of a fairy princess, 
 (the benefits conferred on her family by 
 Myrton rendering him decidedly the favour- 
 ite of her three sons-in-law,) for Mrs. Hil- 
 liard, who, between her large progeny and 
 narrow income, had never found an idle 
 moment in her married life for the enjoy- 
 ment of society, could not ever be made to 
 understand the grievances pointed out by 
 Lady Hilliard in the lot of the fortunate 
 Caroline. The man who, after taking the 
 least good-looking of her daughters without 
 a shilling, made her the best of husbands, 
 and was unwearied in generosity towards all 
 belonging to her, was little less than a demi- 
 god in parental eyes. As Mrs. Hilliard's 
 homely phrase expressed it, " the mistress
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 53 
 
 of Stainhurst had only to be as happy as 
 a queen !" 
 
 Happy she certainly was, and in a degree 
 far greater than was dreamed of in the phi- 
 losophy of Elm Hill. The virtues of her 
 excellent husband, his active beneficence in 
 his neighbourhood, his conscientious adminis- 
 tration of justice among the multitude depen- 
 dent on him, his perfect fulfilment of all the 
 duties of an enlightened interpretation of 
 the Christian faith, reconciled her, almost, to 
 the loss of all her early illusions. 
 
 Meanwhile, in consequence perhaps of 
 the impertinent sympathy expressed by Lady 
 Hilliard in her sister's want of society, {Aug., 
 banishment from the pale of social life,) the 
 Myrtons showed themselves in no haste to 
 obtain a visit from their grand relations. 
 The manufacturer was conscious that he had 
 no sporting to offer Sir John equal to the 
 preserves he left at home ; and what hope 
 of getting her ladyship cheerfully through 
 the day, with no one to amuse her but two 
 sisters, the one ignobly, the other poorly 
 married, — a formal, deaf old woman for hos- 
 tess, — and the wives of a few R clothiers
 
 54 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 for morning visitors, when Hilliard Park, in 
 the midst of a brilliant Yorkshire neighbour- 
 hood, with a good library and billiard table, 
 and the house constantly full of guests, found 
 her a victim to ennui ? — 
 
 The hollow excuses of the Hilliards to 
 their ceremonious invitations, were conse- 
 quently received as cogent. Myrton could 
 not complain of want of brotherly cordiality 
 on the part of the man who, if he did not 
 make his house, made his purse his own, and 
 was studious to take in good part the apolo- 
 gies of the Baronet, lest he might suppose 
 that the consciousness of having conferred 
 obligation rendered him exacting. 
 
 A different, but equally serious motive, 
 induced Robert Myrton to decline the in- 
 vitation to Harringhurst Castle, which his 
 wife and brother-in-law had, at the time, 
 anxiously persuaded him to accept. 
 
 " The Marquis of Harringhurst," was his 
 argument, in reply to their counsels, " no- 
 tices me in his public capacity, and, in mine, 
 I am duly grateful. He is aware that, in our 
 several degrees, our principles concur; but 
 no one better knows how widely those de-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 55 
 
 grees lie apart. As a public man, therefore, 
 I am proud to cooperate with his lordship. 
 At county meetings or political dinners, I 
 shall always rejoice to find myself in his 
 company ; for, on that level, we meet with- 
 out concession on either side. But I should 
 feel that I merited the insults of a Sir Fre- 
 derick Brabazon, if I accepted the hospitali- 
 ties of a man to whom I could not presume 
 to offer mine in return. Trust me, insigni- 
 ficant as I am, I am too proud to expose my 
 wife and myself to toleration at Harringhurst 
 Castle !" 
 
 Aware that his brother-in-law's resolutions 
 were never lightly taken, Lichfield gave up » 
 the point : and Caroline, unable to argue 
 it unsupported, found herself obliged to 
 renounce, with a sigh, an introduction to 
 one of the most agreeable houses in the 
 county. But though convinced, in her own 
 mind, that her husband was to blame in neg- 
 lecting the advantages that might arise to 
 his cause from closer acquaintance with 
 the man by whom it was represented in the 
 county, — she could not but admire the man- 
 liness of his feelings. The false pride by
 
 56 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 which he was actuated, passed, in her par- 
 tial eyes, for magnanimity. She was almost 
 content to forfeit her access to the castle, in 
 favour of the virtuous dignity with which 
 it had been rejected. 
 
 One morning shortly before Easter, how- 
 ever, she was startled by her husband's sud- 
 den entrance into her sitting-room, at the 
 hour he was usually employed in the fac- 
 tory, with a certain degree of embarrassment 
 in his mien, and an open letter in his hand. 
 
 " No bad news, I hope, from Elm Hill, or 
 the Wynters ?" said she, alarmed by his un- 
 usually flurried manner. 
 
 " No, my dear Caroline, none whatever." 
 
 " An unpleasant letter of business, then ?" 
 
 " On the contrary. This letter is from 
 Lord Harringhurst.'' 
 
 " Lichfield was mistaken, then, in sup- 
 posing he would be offended by your refusal, 
 and never invite us again ? " — 
 
 " I did not tell you he had invited us 
 again. On the contrary, this letter is to 
 ask himself here ! " — 
 
 " To Stainhurst V exclaimed Caroline*
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 57 
 
 greatly surprised. " He suspected, then, the 
 motive of your refusal ? " 
 
 "I cannot pretend to interpret his lord- 
 ship's ; but read the letter V replied her 
 husband. " You will find he proposes to 
 sleep here a couple of nights, next week, 
 
 when the new Blind Asylum at R is to 
 
 be inaugurated, of which the Marquis is 
 Patron." 
 
 Caroline was deeply disappointed. Her 
 wifely pride had prompted a hope that the 
 advances of the venerable Peer proceeded 
 from a genuine desire to improve his ac- 
 quaintance with her husband. She saw, in 
 a moment, that Stainhurst was acceptable 
 only as a degree better than the inn ; and, 
 however ambitious of the entree of Harring- 
 hurst Castle, disdained it at the cost of such 
 an indignity. 
 
 " Fortunately, we have an excellent pre- 
 text for non-acceptance of this cool pro- 
 posal," said she. " The time of our spring 
 visit to the Wynters is still unfixed ; and 
 Easter week would suit them as well as 
 any other." 
 
 " But you have as yet made no arrange- 
 
 D 5
 
 58 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 ments with my sister ?" rejoined her hus- 
 band ; " and as I am a Governor of the new 
 Asylum, and the charity originated, indeed, 
 with myself, it would appear strange if I 
 absented myself from the opening." 
 
 The argument was plausible enough. But, 
 with the clear-sightedness of affection, Ca- 
 roline discerned from her husband's manner 
 that, behind it, lurked a strong inclination 
 to accept the advances of the Marquis. 
 
 " You think, perhaps, it would look equally 
 odd, were you to refuse your hospitality to 
 Lord Harringhurst ?" said she. 
 
 " It is more than a matter of appearance^'''' 
 he replied, frankly meeting the question ; 
 " I am really desirous to offer it. I shall not 
 be sorry to show a person at the head, in 
 this county, of a class by which we are dis- 
 paragingly considered, that Stainhurst is not 
 altogether the Hottentot's kraal they sup- 
 pose ; and his lordship's visit would put an 
 end to your sister Emily's insolent insinu- 
 ations concerning your forfeiture of caste 
 as ray wife." 
 
 Again, Caroline felt disappointed. The^e 
 motives appeared to her too trivial for the
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 59 
 
 proportions of a mind so lofty as her hus- 
 band's ! But a third remained to be adduced. 
 
 " I own, moreover," he resumed, " that I 
 am flattered by the esteem of a man like 
 Lord Harringhurst, and wish to retain it. 
 Much good might arise to the liberal cause 
 in this part of the county from a better 
 understanding between us ; and how are we 
 ever to become more intimate, without 
 breaking bread together ?" 
 
 " I quite agree with you. But you seemed 
 so positively resolved against more than a 
 political connexion with him !" — 
 
 "Because," interrupted Myrton, "I felt 
 it impossible to meet him on equal terms. 
 But consider how much he has done to level 
 the ground ! First, he invited me alone to 
 the castle, ignorant, perhaps, that I was a 
 family man. I declined. When made aware 
 of my connexions, he invited us together; 
 and, on my again refusing, unwilling to ac- 
 cept hospitalities that must remain unac- 
 knowledged, he actually invites himself to 
 my house. — Could a greater compliment be 
 paid ?" 
 
 Caroline was silent. A reiteration of the
 
 60 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 inquiry forced her to avow her conviction, 
 that the Marquis proposed a sojourn at 
 Stainhurst, as simply convenient to his plans. 
 
 The hectic of a moment overspread the 
 usually colourless face of Myrton. 
 
 " You wrong us both," said he, with en- 
 forced mildness ; — " nor is this the first time, 
 Caroline, you have betrayed your secret par- 
 ticipation in ' the contemptuous sentiments 
 entertained towards me at Hilliard Park !" 
 
 Startled by an accusation so unjust, she 
 was about to defend herself by entreating 
 him to cite a single instance in support of 
 the charge, when she was silenced by a stern 
 request from her husband that she would 
 read Lord Harringhurst's letter. 
 
 " You will find," said he, " that, instead of 
 treating me in the cavalier manner you sup- 
 pose, the Marquis proposes to bring with him 
 his granddaughter. Lady Mary De Bruce, 
 who would not have accompanied him to an 
 inn, and has no other errand in the neighbour- 
 hood of R , than that of making your ac- 
 quaintance. Lord Harringhurst expressly 
 begs she may remain with you here, while 
 ive proceed to open the Asylum."
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 61 
 
 Equally surprised and pleased, Caroline 
 did not carry her mistrust so far as to sur- 
 mise that the old man might be better satis- 
 fied to know his beautiful grandchild safe 
 with a Mrs. Myrton, than alone at the cas- 
 tle, during his absence. The prospect of 
 having to entertain a person she had heard 
 mentioned with such admiration by the 
 brilliant guests at Hilliard Park, already 
 occupied her mind. 
 
 " You intend, then," she inquired of her 
 husband, " to accept this proffered visit V — 
 
 " I have already accepted it. The servant 
 who brought Lord Harringhurst's letter, took 
 back my answer.'' 
 
 With the usual perversity of her sex 
 in such matters, no sooner did Caroline 
 find his plans settled without her parti- 
 cipation, than she felt inclined to oppose 
 them. 
 
 *' I am afraid all this will put your 
 mother sadly out of the way !" — said she. 
 
 " Not unless you make her feel herself 
 in yours,'''' drily answered her husband. " She 
 has every reason to be proud of a visit 
 intended as a tribute of approbation and
 
 62 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 respect towards her son, on the part of one 
 of the first men in the county." 
 
 Caroline had intended to say something 
 kind and complimentary; but so amazed 
 was she by this sudden self-assumption 
 on the part of her usually reserved hus- 
 band, that the words expired on her lips. 
 Involuntarily, she betrayed her disgust by 
 pleading to herself, in extenuation, his 
 value as an active member of the commu- 
 nity and an edile of the people. " He had, 
 certainly, some right to conceive himself 
 an object of interest to a patriotic noble- 
 man like the venerable Marquis of Harring- 
 hurst." 
 
 Attributing her reverie to mortification, 
 Myrton observed in a tone of chagrin, " At 
 all events, Caroline, however my mother 
 may be put out of her way, she must not 
 reckon, I see, on much aid from yourself in 
 this emergency ! — You do not so much as 
 interest yourself in the necessary prepara- 
 tions for what cannot but be a great event 
 at Stainhurst." 
 
 " You are aware how scrupulous I am 
 never to interfere with your mother's ar-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 63 
 
 rangements," pleaded his wife, startled from 
 her fit of absence by his unusual petulance ; 
 and insufficiently read in the human heart 
 to perceive that it arose from self-accu- 
 sation, — the pang of a capitulation of con- 
 science. — He could not forgive himself for 
 being tempted into the sacrifice of his 
 principles, in order to parade before the 
 public the notice of the great man of his 
 party. 
 
 "I was not alluding to household ar- 
 rangements," retorted he. " We can do no 
 more than offer the best our house affords ; 
 and, unless I am much mistaken, on that 
 point our guest is not the mah to be fas- 
 tidious. The difficulty I contemplate, is of 
 finding suitable persons to meet him." 
 
 " But since he comes to Stainhurst only 
 to pay a compliment to yourself?" — observed 
 Caroline, carelessly. 
 
 Again, the colour rose to Myrton's cheek 
 at what he supposed to be a covert taunt on 
 the part of his wife. 
 
 " It w^as to spare yourself the embarrass- 
 ment of a tete-a-tete with a fashionable Lon- 
 don girl, like Lady Mary De Bruce," said
 
 64 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 he, " that I concluded you would invite your 
 sister and brother-in-law." 
 
 " But it is not to be a tete-a-tete ! Mrs- 
 Myrton will assist me in entertaining Lady 
 Mary !" observed his wife, with a composure 
 peculiarly provoking to the perturbed man, 
 who saw in it only a contemptuous sangfroid. 
 "However," she resumed, (on noticing the 
 sudden kindling of his eye,) " if you think 
 it better to invite the Lichfields, of course 
 they will be at your orders. They have 
 never any engagements. We are sure of 
 them, even at the last moment." 
 
 Myrton surveyed her in silence, speech- 
 less from vexation. "My dear Caroline," 
 said he, after mastering his indignant emo- 
 tions, " I am as fully aware as you can wish, 
 of the inferiority of my family connexions. 
 I know that I am a manufacturer, — a single 
 degree removed from a tradesman ; — that my 
 father was a mechanic, — my grand-father I 
 know not what ; while yours was a baronet 
 of eminent family and vast estate. Still, as, 
 thanks to our alliance, I liam shared the 
 hospitalities of Hilliard Park, I should have 
 thought it no great stretch of condescension,
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 65 
 
 had you supposed it possible for Sir John 
 and Lady Hilliard to meet Lord Harringhurst 
 and his grand-daughter under my roof." 
 
 More and more astonished, Caroline had 
 scarcely self-command to assure him, that 
 her only doubt on the subject, regarded the 
 acceptability of Sir John and Lady Hillard 
 to the Marquis. 
 
 " Surely," said she, " a man so frivolous 
 and insignificant as my brother-in-law, and 
 a woman so flighty as Emily, would be any- 
 thing but congenial with a person of grave 
 purposes like Lord Harringhurst. I proposed 
 Lichfield as a more sensible and compa- 
 nionable man." 
 
 " There is nothing very congenial between 
 them, I admit," said Myrton, softened by 
 this unexpected explanation ; " but there is 
 such a thing as sympathy of condition, as 
 well as sympathy of taste. I, for instance, 
 who think and feel with Lord Harringhurst 
 on so many vital points, am so thoroughly 
 estranged from him by the habits of the 
 world, that the prospect of a familiar visit 
 from him, has, as you may perceive, unhin- 
 ged me. I am literally afraid of seeing him
 
 66 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 disappointed here ! I should be annoyed 
 beyond measure, if — but no matter. Be- 
 tween him and Sir John, there exists that 
 grand fine-gentleman bond of union — horse- 
 flesh ! — They are both on the turf" — 
 
 " Shall / write, then, or will t/ou ? " said 
 Caroline, fancying that Sir John alone was 
 to be invited. 
 
 " Your sister would consider it somewhat 
 strange to receive an invitation from me /" 
 said Myrton, half relapsing into his mis- 
 trustful moroseness. " I wish you not only 
 to write, but to write in such terms as will 
 ensure their coming. I fear you could 
 scarcely dispense with Emily's assistance, in 
 doing the honours of Stainhurst to Lady 
 Mary De Bruce ! " 
 
 Never had Aunt Minchin, in the utmost 
 flippancy of her impertinence, succeeded in 
 mortifying Mrs. Myrton to the degree ef- 
 fected in these few words by her usually con- 
 siderate and aflectionate husband. After 
 all then, his pretended humility concerning 
 the visit of the Hilliards, arose only from 
 terror lest her inexperience in the forms 
 and ceremonies of society, should cause her
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 67 
 
 to commit herself, and him, while play- 
 ing the hostess to an insignificant girl of 
 seventeen ! — 
 
 During that half hour's interview between 
 the wife and husband, Myrton sunk in 
 the estimation of Caroline by all the cubits 
 he appeared to have risen in his own : or ra- 
 ther by the amount he seemed desirous to 
 elevate himself in the esteem of that hollow 
 world of which, in their early days of con- 
 fidence, he had expressed such unbounded 
 contempt. — Alas alas ! by the hand of what 
 Dalilah had her Samson been thus cruelly 
 shorn of his strength ? —
 
 68 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Honour hath these things in it : — the vantage-ground to do 
 good, — the approach to kings and principal persons, — and the 
 raising of a man's own fortunes. — He that aspireth with the 
 best of these intentions, is an honest man. 
 
 Bacon. 
 
 It were as well, perhaps, could royal 
 and august personages sometimes obtain a 
 glimpse behind the scenes of the smooth 
 and smiling representations got up for 
 them, on occasion of their volunteer visits to 
 courts, cities, castles, and even the modest 
 home of a Yorkshire manufacturer! The 
 delight with which Lord Harringhurst 
 surveyed the happy valley of Stainhurst, 
 with its rich plantations, beautiful gardens, 
 and Flemish neatness of distribution, in 
 the departments walled off for the business 
 of the factory, (which contrasted strangely 
 with his preconceived notions of the tur-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 69 
 
 bulent populousness, and smothery atmo- 
 sphere of such a spot,) — would have been a 
 little deteriorated could he have surmised 
 the unpleasant feelings to which his arrival 
 had given rise, between the husband and 
 wife. 
 
 All Stainhurst was swept and garnished to 
 the neatness of a Dutch toy. — The workmen 
 had been admonished by the foreman to set 
 their houses in order, in emulation of that of 
 their employer. Not a cinder was to be 
 seen, — not a vat was left out of line, — not so 
 much as a straggling handful of wool defea- 
 tured the trimness of the place. For once, 
 Stainhurst presented rather the comic-opera- 
 scene edition of a manufactory, than a striv- 
 ing thriving place, where real business was 
 done, and varnish despised as frivolous and 
 vexatious. 
 
 But something more than Robert Myrton 
 calculated upon, had disappeared with the 
 rubbish. The deep veneration of a heart 
 to which he had been grappled with " hooks 
 of steel," — and which had hitherto believed 
 him incapable of getting up a dramatic
 
 70 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 scene for the entertainment of a Marquis, 
 — was gone for ever. 
 
 How often had Caroline heard her husband 
 inveigh aforetime, against the scenic effect 
 of the Hilliards' Christmas doles to the poor; 
 — the annual beef and pudding, pretending 
 to render the oaten cake and rye bread of 
 the remaining three hundred and sixty four 
 days of the year less bitter, — the condescen- 
 sions of tenants' dinners, and all the popula- 
 rity mummery practised by landlords who 
 find it necessary to anoint with sweet oint- 
 ment a palm whose gripe upon their depen- 
 dents is of strangulating harshness ! — And 
 now, Myrton himself was playing a scene of 
 excellent dissembling, fully equal to the 
 heirloom great landlordism of Hilliard Park ! 
 Grieved was she for his good sense, as 
 she saw huge packages of turtle, venison, 
 and silversmiths' chests, deposited in hurried 
 succession by the spring vans of Myrton and 
 
 Son, which had been despatched to R 
 
 to meet the London coaches ! All personal 
 dignity and self-possession seemed lost, in 
 the desire to greet the eyes of a noble guest 
 with what he saw so much better exhibited
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 71 
 
 at home, and certainly did not come to 
 admire at Stainhurst ! — 
 
 Not a reproving syllable, however, did she 
 hazard. It was tender ground. Myrton's 
 self-love was already deeply wounded by 
 the excuses he had received from Sir John 
 and Lady Hilliard, who, having a large party 
 in their house, were unable to travel fifty 
 miles for the purpose of playing walking 
 ladies and gentlemen in the Harringhurst 
 drama. To assist his wife, therefore, in 
 receiving her strange guests ; there were 
 only Lichfield and his silent wife, his 
 deaf, and formal little mother, (whose 
 methodical nature added to the abstraction 
 of her infirmity secured her from all dis- 
 composure from the grand event,) and a 
 certain old bachelor clergyman from an 
 adjoining parish, whose only personal dis- 
 tinction consisted in the, " Honourable," 
 prefixed to the " Reverend," before his name 
 to which Christian usage might be ex- 
 pected to assign precedence. 
 
 " One of the prettiest spots I ever be- 
 held in my life !" exclaimed Lord Harring- 
 hurst, as he gazed from the Elizabethan
 
 72 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 window of Myrton's study, upon the glassy 
 dam, whose waters seemed to bask with 
 pride in the sunshine, under the eye of 
 the master, ere they proceeded to the 
 mighty labour securing prosperity to him 
 and his ; — and the vivid green of the last 
 days of April, which converted the groves 
 round the house into " one entire and per- 
 fect emerald," and the rich turf into a 
 footcloth of velvet worthy for fairies to 
 tread on, certainly accredited the assertion. 
 
 Myrton of course modestly suggested, that 
 the lofty site which served to detach Har- 
 ringhurst Castle, as it were, in the sky, af- 
 fording only the atmosphere and a narrow 
 glacis for immediate prospect, and the in- 
 distinctness of an unmeasurable j)urple land- 
 scape beyond, must assign the charm of no- 
 velty to the snug home scene before him. 
 
 " Perhaps so. But I fear this green nook 
 of yours will put me sadly out of conceit 
 with the cold barrenness of my eagle's nest !" 
 — was the polite reply. — ** The Harring- 
 hurst avenue, the guide books tell me, is one 
 of the wonders of England. But if you had 
 been traversing those three tedious unin-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 73 
 
 cidental miles once a day, for the last sixty 
 years, you would be doubly aware, my dear 
 sir, of the charm existing in the snug little 
 hamlet, (the Myrtonville of your workmen, 
 I conclude?) through which I passed be- 
 tween Stainton and your lodge-gates. — It is 
 a perfect picture ! — Your newly erected cot- 
 tages put my old-fashioned hovels to the 
 blush ! — Mary w^as quite in ecstacies at the 
 beauty of the little gardens." 
 
 " My wife has instituted garden-pre- 
 miums," replied Myrton, '' and in a new 
 place like this, the assignment of plots of 
 ground to each, is no very difficult matter. 
 It is not half a century since that portion 
 of the estate was reclaimed from the waste ; 
 and Nature is not yet quite banished out 
 of the land." 
 
 Lord Harringhurst looked as much puz- 
 zled, as if he had fancied the gooseberry- 
 bushes, Scotch kail, and Crown imperials 
 of the factory-peoples' gardens a work of art ! 
 He contented himself with observing, that 
 the orchards skirting the stream, in their 
 fulness of bloom, produced an almost ma- 
 gic effect. 
 
 VOL. L E
 
 74 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 " I know nothing more sightly,'^ said the 
 old man, " than a cherry-orchard in blossom, 
 on a bright spring day." 
 
 Again, did Myrton contend that Lord 
 Harringhurst was enabled to admire at 
 Stainhurst, an object too far beneath him 
 at Harringhm'st to be even noticeable ; 
 thus suggesting to his visitor a contrast 
 and distance between the two, which would 
 not have entered his head. 
 
 Meanwhile, the hospitable cares of Caro- 
 line were at once easier and executed with 
 greater ease. Good-breeding is more in- 
 stinctive in women, than in men. Moreover, 
 she possessed over Lady Mary de Bruce, 
 the same superiority of age possessed by 
 the Marquis over her husband. 
 
 But what need to measure advantages 
 with rule and compass, as regards so com- 
 plete a child of nature as Lady Mary ! — 
 Before she had been half an hour installed in 
 the Stainhurst drawing-room, Caroline was 
 as little embarrassed by her presence as by 
 that of one of her own young sisters. For 
 though London experience might have 
 tempted Mrs. Myrton to inquire whether
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 75 
 
 the total defiance of usage exhibited by 
 Lady Mary de Bruce, arose from excess of 
 nature, or excess of art, — excessive humility 
 or excessive hauteur, — Caroline's unpractised 
 eye saw no further than the truth, — that it 
 arose from the wilfulness of a spoiled child. 
 Lady Mary was an orphan heiress, brought 
 up by a doating grandfather; who, for his 
 blind partiality, had the double excuse that 
 the only daughter of his only son was all 
 that remained to him on earth, as well as 
 one of the fairest and most gifted creatures 
 ever born for its adornment. 
 
 Caroline could not help feeling, when 
 she saw her noble boy climbing the knees 
 of Lady Mary, who, in her own childish- 
 ness, was passionately fond of children, — 
 that she had never beheld a creature more 
 exquisitely lovely than her guest. 
 
 Her glossy ringlets, so loosely flowing 
 and so little cared for, — her delicate com- 
 plexion, varying from paleness to bloom with 
 every movement, — her graceful figure, and 
 simple dress, rather that of a grown-up child, 
 than of a fashionable woman, — all conspired 
 to endow her with an inexplicable charm, 
 
 E 2
 
 76 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 enhanced bv an unwearied flow of cheer- 
 fulness. Lady Mary was, in short, one of 
 those happily constituted mortals, fated to 
 make friends or lovers w4ierever she went. 
 
 " I was so glad when grandpapa proposed 
 bringing me here with him !" said she, with 
 perfect unreserve to Mrs. Myrton, — whom 
 it proved a very agreeable surprise to 
 find a young and pretty woman. " I am so 
 bored at Harringhurst whenever he is away ! 
 — My governess is not to leave me till I am 
 presented ; and, though I manage to have 
 my way pretty well, so long as my kind, good 
 grandfather is at the castle, Mrs. Markham 
 thinks it necessary to institute severe disci- 
 pline during his absence. I believe she is 
 afraid I shall pass for a terrible romp, and 
 discredit her sage tuition." 
 
 Caroline expressed a proper degree of sa- 
 tisfaction at the arrangement ; but only to 
 be interrupted by the gleeful chatter of the 
 happy girl. 
 
 " Pleased as I was to get away from 
 home," she resumed, " I had no idea of find- 
 ing this part of the country so much pret- 
 tier than ours ! Harringhurst, you know, is
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 77 
 
 the most frightful place in England, — ^hills 
 and moors on one side, and a great un- 
 meaning forest on the other ! — And then the 
 house, — so dull, so dreadfully old-fashion- 
 ed ! — I hope we shall persuade you to 
 come and see us there one of these days; 
 and I am sure you will allow that the 
 painted hall and long galleries, are enough 
 to give any one the dolefuls ! Little friend 
 of mine, whose name I don't know !" cried 
 she, (pulling one of the chestnut curls of 
 Bob, to whom, while talking, she was giving 
 a ride upon her knee,) " will you come with 
 mamma to see me, and I will show you an 
 aviary full of birds, (not half so bright and 
 pretty as yourself!) and you shall help me 
 feed them, — and we will have a row together 
 on Harringwater lake." — 
 
 When the party assembled at the dinner- 
 table, Myrton and the Lichfields were sur- 
 prised to find Lady Mary established on a 
 footing of the greatest intimacy with her 
 hostess. Even the old Marquis became an 
 object of somewhat less formal deference to 
 his host, when he perceived the fond and 
 girlish familiarity with which he was treated
 
 78 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 by his grandchild ; and Perceval, a weak self- 
 sufficient man, who, in consequence of his 
 precedence in the neighbourhood, fancied 
 himself " somebody," and had arrived at 
 Stainhurst with the intention of making a 
 coterie apart with the Harringhurst party, 
 with whom he identified himself, like a 
 late Duke with the Emperor of Russia as 
 " nous autres souverains,''^ was surprised to 
 find that, having nothing to recommend him 
 to eye or ear, he was wholly overlooked by 
 Lady Mary ! 
 
 " Why can we not all go and see these 
 poor blind people settled in their new house, 
 to-morrow?^' she inquired, as soon as they 
 were seated at table. — " I have never seen 
 an Asylum. — Do take me ! " she continued, 
 addressing Mrs. Myrton ; and, on Caroline's 
 referring the question to the Marquis, she 
 added, " No, no ! — grandpapa is nothing and 
 nobody here ! — You are mistress, — you are to 
 decide.-— I am under your care so long as I 
 remain at Stainhurst. You will chaperon 
 me, won't you, — and your little boy too ? for 
 I cannot think of going without my cavalier!" 
 
 No opposition being made by Lord Har-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 79 
 
 ringhurst, the plan was easily arranged ; and 
 though Mr. Perceval offered himself in the 
 most flourishing terms as the escort of the 
 young beauty, she persisted in her right and 
 title to the hand of little Robert. The din- 
 ner, which Caroline was apprehensive might 
 prove silent and formal, passed gaily off, 
 amid a series of laughs provoked by the whims 
 of the naive Lady Mary ; a great relief to 
 Mrs. Myrton, whose fears were justified that 
 her husband would be too much absorbed by 
 the working of his new machinery, and dis- 
 play of his unwonted splendours, to assume 
 the leading part in conversation in which 
 he was so qualified to shine. Even Lichfield, 
 that day, distinguished himself more than his 
 brother-in-law, whose faculties seemed to 
 have been iced with the Plombieres and 
 Hock. 
 
 Next morning, however, Robert became 
 himself again ! — The unexpected triumph 
 secured for him by Lady Mary de Bruce? 
 
 of entering R with his own family 
 
 and that of the noble Patron whose arri- 
 val in the town was considered a matter 
 of such moment, thus closely united, excited
 
 80 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 him into unusual spirits. Sir Frederick and 
 Lady Brabazon, compelled to take part in 
 the public ceremonies of the borough, were 
 there before them, — little anticipating in 
 what ignoble company the Marquis of Har- 
 ringhurst was about to make his appearance ; 
 and the slight salutation vouchsafed to 
 their party by Lady Mary, as she entered 
 the grand hall of the Asylum leaning on the 
 arm of the manufacturer, scarcely mor- 
 tified them so much as to observe the 
 Honourable and Reverend Reginald Perce- 
 val, one of their habitual toadies of Holms- 
 dale, — one who had so often joined in their 
 sneers against Myrton as a Barnave, — d 
 Benthamite, — a Papineau, — following tamely 
 in the wake of the people thus unexpect- 
 edly promoted to the highest place. Still, 
 they chose to see in the companions se- 
 lected by the old Marquis for his grand- 
 daughter, the sisters of Lady Hilliard of 
 Hilliard Park ; — not the wife and sister-in- 
 law of Robert Myrton. 
 
 To Jiim alone, however, were decreed the 
 honours of the day ! Lord Harringhurst, 
 in addressing the hapless objects of the
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 81 
 
 institution collected around them, was care- 
 ful to point him out as the originator of the 
 charity ; and when deputed in his turn by 
 the life-governors to thank the noble Patron 
 for his attendance and liberality, Myrton 
 burst into one of- those explosions of elo- 
 quence with which he had occasionally 
 stimulated into enthusiam the hustings of 
 
 K , and obtained from the Childerton 
 
 party the insulting pseudonym of " the 
 Mirabeau of Stainhurst/' — The sneering 
 face of Sir Frederick Brabazon happening 
 to meet his eye, as he stood forward on the 
 platform covered with scarlet cloth which 
 had been fitted up with seats for the Patron 
 and his party, had the happiest effect upon 
 his nerves. 
 
 It was the first time Lord Harringhurst 
 had ever heard him play the orator ; and, 
 if a little disappointed the preceding day, 
 at finding the man he had seen so able 
 and efficient at county meetings, transform- 
 ed at his own table into an awkward em- 
 barrassed host, his expectations were now 
 exceeded — Such eloquence as Myrton's, 
 united with the circumstantial knowledge 
 
 £ 5
 
 82 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 and logical deductions he had elicited from 
 him early in their acquaintance, constituted, 
 indeed, an invaluable addition to their party ! 
 
 " You should have come with us," shouted 
 Lady Mary, on their return, into the ear of 
 the little prim old lady, who had not con- 
 ceived it possible the family arrangements 
 could proceed, if she absented herself on 
 the day of so grand a party. " It was such 
 an affecting sight ! — And Mr. Myrton made 
 a speech that caused our hearts to thrill 
 again. — I scarcely know, dear madam, which 
 made me cry most; the sight of all those 
 poor blind creatures, so happily provided for ; 
 or the noble things your son said to us on 
 the subject." 
 
 It was in vain Mr. Perceval interrupted 
 her ladyship by an accusation of " wish- 
 ing to make a conquest of the grandmo- 
 ther, as she had already done of the 
 grandson ; and as, indeed, her ladyship was 
 in the habit of doing, of all she condescend- 
 ed to address." — Florid compliments were 
 lost upon Lady Mary ! — Leaving him in the 
 midst of his flourish, she was off in a mo- 
 ment, with her arm locked in Caroline's to
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 83 
 
 beg for a brancli of a beautiful exotic she 
 had noticed in the conservatory, and which 
 she rejoiced the pride of the Stainhurst gar- 
 deners by entwining in her hair for dinner. 
 
 " How very provoking it is that I should 
 have made your acquaintance only just as 
 we are setting off to town for the season !'' 
 cried she, when, during the after-dinner doze 
 of the old lady, she found herself alone with 
 the two sisters. " I have long been looking 
 forward with joy to being presented ; because 
 of getting rid of Mrs. Markham, and her art 
 of needlework, and lectures on woman's mis- 
 sion, and all the rest of the governess-work, 
 which converts young ladies into cut and dry 
 herbs of grace, like the wholesome withered 
 hyssop in the herborists' shops ! — But now, 
 I do so wish we had another week to spare 
 for the country, that I might get you all 
 over to our old den ! — I am sure you have 
 Yery little here in the way of neighbourhood 
 to amuse you. Those Brabazons are such 
 tiresome heartless people that I always dread 
 their annual visit to the castle. Lady Brab's 
 affectations are so laughable, and his bitter- 
 ness so truly cryable ! The Childertons are
 
 84 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 seldom here; and, if they were less, would 
 scarcely be missed. As to the crowd of 
 over-smart folks one saw to-day, as they had 
 the grace to be affected by Mr. Myrton's 
 beautiful speech, we will say nothing about 
 them. — But I do not suppose they afford you 
 much society?" — 
 
 " With my children, and a sister living so 
 near me, I never feel the want of society," 
 said Caroline, pleased and amused by her 
 girlish recklessness of speech. 
 
 '' Come, come ! — be honest, and say, ' with 
 my books and piano ! '" retorted Lady Mary. 
 " No one could play so finely as you do, my 
 dear Mrs. Myrton, without giving up a great 
 deal of time to music, and taking great 
 delight in it. But you seem like Orpheus, 
 to have nothing but stocks and stones to play 
 to, and without teaching them to dance. 
 That parading prosy Mr. Perceval, for in- 
 stance, who has spent a day or two every 
 year at Harringhurst as long as I can re- 
 member, and grows stupider every visit, — 
 what was I saying ? — Oh ! about music ! I 
 was going to observe, that your performance 
 last night made me blush for my own idle-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 85 
 
 ness in practising, more than all Mrs. 
 Markham's lectures have done. — For years 
 and years, I have had the first masters, yet 
 play abominably. While you, who are almost 
 self-taught, are a Madame Dulcken ! Grand- 
 papa was saying to me this morning, that 
 he would far rather hear a duet such as 
 you and Mrs. Lichfield sang last night, — in 
 so simple and ladylike a style, than the 
 finest professional performance. — And shall 
 I tell you what I answered him? " 
 
 " That you blushed for his want of taste ?" 
 " No ! that if he had made us friends be- 
 fore, he might have had a grandaughter less 
 likely to disgrace him ; — that your talents 
 and industry would have stimulated my lazi- 
 ness, more effectually than the perpetual 
 blister of a governess ! — Well, well ! 'tis 
 never too late to mend. — When I return 
 from town, you must sometimes give me a 
 happy week with you here, alone, while 
 grandpapa goes to visit his Irish estates ; 
 and in return, bestow as many on us, as you 
 can spare from a home so charming." 
 
 Such were the pleasant and perhaps un- 
 conscious flatteries of Lady Mary ; nor was
 
 86 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 it wonderful that, on Mrs. Lichfield's return 
 to the parsonage that night, by a fine moon- 
 light, along the beautiful shrubbery formed 
 by Myrton through the grounds expressly to 
 facilitate the meeting of the sisters, she 
 should proclaim Lord Harringhurst's gran- 
 daughter to be all they could desire in the 
 heiress of a house possessing the finest 
 church preferment in the kingdom. While 
 relating to her husband, with a thousand 
 cheering prognostications, the invitation she 
 had received, she could scarcely do justice 
 to the fascinating frankness of Lady Mary, 
 who was, " so fond of children, that, had 
 not the Marquis been forced to return 
 home at early hour on the morrow, she 
 would have walked over to the parsonage, 
 for the express purpose of a sight of baby ! " 
 
 " They appear, indeed, to be kind and 
 amiable people !" replied her husband ; " and 
 to Myrton, the acquaintance is likely to be of 
 far more importance than I had conjectured." 
 
 " To Myrton ? — Why what can he want of 
 Lord Harringhurst ?" — exclaimed Mrs. Lich- 
 field, whose thoughts were just then of liv- 
 ings and chaplaincies.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 87 
 
 " Precisely what he has not only the 
 power, but the will to bestow ! I thought it 
 odd that, when Perceval spelt so hard this 
 morning at the Asylum to be asked back 
 to dine and sleep at Stainhurst, Myrton 
 turned a deaf ear, and Lord Harrington 
 looked so stiff and unencouraging ! The 
 truth was, he wanted some private conver- 
 sation with Myrton ; — on perceiving which, 
 I made an attempt to join you at coffee this 
 evening, sooner than you may have found 
 agreeable. — But Lord Harringhurst, in the 
 most friendly and handsome manner, would 
 not hear of my leaving them ; assuring me 
 it was most agreeable to him that so near a 
 connexion of Mr. Myrton should unite with 
 him in prevailing on my brother-in-law to 
 accept a seat in parliament for one of his 
 boroughs, for the purpose of devoting his 
 great parliamentary talents to the cause so 
 dear to them both." 
 
 " He wants to bring Robert Myrton into 
 parliament ?" — cried Louisa, aghast. 
 
 " He could make room for him this very 
 session, (in a seat held pro tempore, by one 
 of his nephews,) if Myrton would make up 
 his mind."
 
 88 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 " And what is there in his mind to make 
 up?" 
 
 " A very natural objection to being hoisted 
 into parliament by a particular interest, 
 which binds him Lord Harringhurst's slave 
 for ever ! — In my opinion, a man like Myr- 
 ton has no business in the House of Com- 
 mons, unless as an independent member." 
 
 " But if his principles are the same as 
 Lord Harringhurst's?" — 
 
 "They are both liberals; — but no man's 
 political opinions can be identical with those 
 of another ; and Myrton's liberalism, as com- 
 pared with Lord Harringhurst's, is as the 
 ocean compared with the lake of Geneva, or 
 a giant with a pigmy." 
 
 " Still, I suppose Lord Harringhurst would 
 be satisfied if the member for his borough 
 voted on the right side V 
 
 " There are a thousand minor interests, 
 concerning which they must come to a 
 split. For instance, the Marquis is an ex- 
 tensive owner of coal-mines ; and as most 
 people survey such questions through the eyes 
 of their pockets, he and Myrton regard it 
 in a diametrically opposite light.^'
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 89 
 
 "You think then," persisted his wife, 
 (deeply interested in the future good under- 
 standing of Myrton and his noble friend,) 
 " that my brother-in-law will not be brought 
 into parliament on the Harringhurst in- 
 terest?" 
 
 " On the contrary, —the only part of the 
 business that remains undecided, is whe- 
 ther it shall be this session, or next. — 
 Reform is the grand question on which he 
 seems to consider the exercise of Myrton's 
 eloquence a matter of the highest moment ; 
 with which view, next session would be time 
 enough. But Lord Harringhurst seems to 
 think (rather to the discomfiture of Myr- 
 ton's vanity,) that he ought to serve some 
 little apprenticeship to parliament, previous 
 to his debut as a speaker ; — the old gentle- 
 man being apprehensive of a stage panic !" 
 
 " But Myrton has spoken so often, and to 
 assemblages so much more numerous than 
 the House of Commons ! '^ — 
 
 " More numerous, but of a very different 
 complexion. Robert Myrton has succeeded 
 to admiration, as the popular speaker of a 
 popular meeting. But the hustings and the
 
 90 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 house, are as different as chalk and cheese ! 
 His success in parliamentary oratory, is still 
 doubtful. It remains to be proved; and 
 proved, I have no doubt, it will shortly be. 
 Before we came in to tea, he had all but 
 given his consent." 
 
 " Was there ever anything to equal the 
 luck of the Myrtons!" — ejaculated Mrs. Lich- 
 field, as they passed through the swing gate 
 of the parsonage, and hailed the fragrance of 
 its hedge of sweet-briar steeped in dew. "How 
 proud and happy Caroline will be at the 
 prospect of her husband getting into the 
 House ! — I envy her feelings to-night.^^ 
 
 The feverish emotions of Caroline's sleep- 
 less pillow, however, were far from enviable. 
 To her clear perceptions, there was little 
 cause for exultation in the fact, that her hus- 
 band had pledged himself to become the 
 dragoman of a party. What portion of the 
 nation had called upon him to express its 
 opinions, or advocate its interests? — The 
 Marquis of Harringhurst ! — Robert Myrton 
 —the apostle of parliamentary reform, was 
 about to creep into parliament through the 
 degraded issue of a rotten borough ! —
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 91 
 
 Thanks to this compromise with his con- 
 science, a new career, a brilliant world, had 
 suddenly developed itself before them. Fame 
 and distinction, or, at least the notoriety 
 which contemporaries so often mistake for 
 fame, would probably crown the efforts of 
 the man whose name she bore, and had 
 transmitted to his children. But would this 
 compensate for the loss of the tranquil pri- 
 vacy he was about to abjure, — the obscure 
 contentment of their previous life, — the sta- 
 tion to which they were born, and which 
 they were voluntarily renouncing? — 
 
 Alas ! the mere approach of such a change 
 exercised a deleterious influence ! — The mere 
 gales emitted from the gardens of Caprsea, 
 had intoxicated the senses of the mariner 
 nearing its port ! — 
 
 At that moment she recognized in Ambi- 
 tion the Dalilah whose baneful charms had 
 enervated the manly soul of her husband !
 
 92 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 I say unto you what he hath done famously, he did it 
 to that end ; though soft conscienced men can be content 
 to say it was for his country, he did it to please his mother, 
 and to be partly proud ; — which he is, even to the altitude 
 of his virtue. 
 
 CORIOLANUS. 
 
 The town of R and its Mrs. Minchins 
 
 would scarcely believe their eyes, when, ten 
 days afterwards, the London Gazette assured 
 them that the Honourable John de Bruce 
 had accepted the Chiltern Hundreds, and 
 that Robert Minchin Myrton, Esq., was pri- 
 vileged to prose in his stead ! Even after a 
 visit to Stainhurst, where his wife was found 
 condemned to temporary widowhood, — even 
 after the arrival of a letter to the Mayor, 
 made " free " by the magic of the name 
 figuring on his wagons and spring vans, — the 
 transition appeared impossible !
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 98 
 
 ) 
 
 " I assure you it cost him nothing," was 
 the old lady's reply to all who were candid 
 in the avowal of their surprise ; apprehen- 
 sive, perhaps, that the notorious outlay of 
 hundreds of thousands of pounds on York- 
 shire contests, might induce suspicions of 
 electioneering extravagance on the part of 
 her son, fatal to the credit of their firm. 
 After a few days, Caroline grew so irritated 
 at hearing the phrase repeated, and at being 
 obliged to account for not having accom- 
 panied her husband to town, that she took 
 the opportunity of his absence to pay one 
 of her occasional visits to her mother at 
 Elm Hill. 
 
 Harassed by innumerable contingencies 
 arising from his change of prospects, Myr- 
 ton had been the first to propose that for 
 the present his family should remain in 
 the country, while he took up his abode 
 at an hotel. It would annoy his mother, 
 he said, to be left unexpectedly alone: for 
 his inexperience recoiled from the eifort of 
 transferring his establishment to a new home, 
 at the moment of entering on his unaccus- 
 tomed duties.
 
 94 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 But for the conviction he had recently be- 
 trayed of her incompetency to do the honours 
 of Stainhurst to the Harringhurst party, 
 all this would have appeared plausible enough 
 to Caroline. But her mind now misgave her. 
 She was afraid that, dissatisfied with her 
 deportment and refusal to wear some splendid 
 jewels purchased for an occasion where 
 they would have been out of place, — he 
 considered her disqualified to do him ho- 
 nour in the fastidious eyes of the metro- 
 polis. 
 
 All irritation of feeling subsided, however, 
 on her arriving at her old home. The reve- 
 rential mention she there heard of Myrton's 
 name, the cordial sympathy of her warm- 
 hearted mother in the distinctions he was 
 attaining, the innumerable claims upon her 
 attention from old friends, old neighbours, 
 old pensioners, and the half dozen brothers 
 and sisters still remaining to rough it through 
 the privations and struggles of their nar- 
 row fortune, soon occupied every feeling of 
 her heart. Since her own happy marriage, 
 one younger sister had become the wife of 
 a neighbouring curate ; another, greatly to
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 95 
 
 the disgust of Lady Hilliard, of the apo- 
 thecary, by courtesy called doctor, of the 
 neighbouring town. One brother was in 
 Australia, — one (thanks to Myrton) in an 
 English counting house at New York, — one 
 articled to an attorney, — one at college pre- 
 paring for the Church. — 
 
 But even with these nine disposed of by 
 marriage or vocation, there were still two 
 cubbish lads at school ; two running wild 
 about the fields at Elm Hill ; and two girls, 
 — Mary scarcely out of the nursery, and 
 Esther nearly seventeen, and inheriting the 
 proverbial beauty of her eldest sister, to 
 make much of the little nephew and niece 
 who accompanied Mrs. Myrton to Elm Hill. 
 
 In such a house, the mistress of which, 
 compelled to habits of bustle and authority, 
 has little respect for the reveries of a se- 
 dentary life, what leisure for the indulgence 
 of morbid refinements of feeling ? — Caroline 
 had so much to do to prevent the limbs of 
 her darlings from being fractured by the 
 strenuous efforts to entertain them made 
 by their little uncles ; and so much to learn 
 from Esther concerning the households of
 
 96 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 the two young married sisters, who, as nearer 
 neighbours to Elm Hill, were objects of 
 greater solicitude than their grand connex- 
 ions at Hilliard Park and Stainhurst, — that 
 she almost wondered on repairing to her 
 weary pillow at night, how she had ever 
 allowed the hasty adieu of Myrton, and 
 the dread that he was unnecessarily ab- 
 sorbed by his new vocation, to produce so 
 choaking an effect upon her heart ! — Elm 
 Hill was busy with the real hardships and 
 boisterous recreations of life ; — the uproar of 
 animal spirits uncontrolled by refinement, and 
 tedious occupations discharged from a sense 
 of duty ; the very place to put to shame all 
 murmurs against the rumpling of a rose-leaf 
 in her happier fortunes ! 
 
 Instead, therefore, of indulging in bitter 
 anticipations, when the morning's post 
 brought no letter from Myrton, she im- 
 printed only a fonder kiss on the forehead 
 of her little frank-hearted, well-taught, well- 
 mannered son ; who, between her two shaggy 
 brothers looking and talking broad York- 
 shire, and inquiring whether London was 
 much farther off than Doncaster, seemed
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 97 
 
 born to a higher order of human happiness 
 and respect. 
 
 The probation which, in the interim, Myr- 
 ton was undergoing, was of a far more irk- 
 some nature. To stem alone the torrent of 
 political life, into the waves of which he 
 had been suddenly flung headlong, was an 
 arduous task. It was impossible to come 
 before the public with less support, or fewer 
 connexions. Though from his youth up- 
 wards habituated to extensive intercourse 
 with his fellow-creatures, they were fellow- 
 creatures he was entitled to address from an 
 eminence ; whereas, to his new associates, he 
 was naturally forced to look upward. Both 
 men and things consequently assumed a new 
 aspect in his eyes, and required an opposite 
 interpretation from his mind. 
 
 The Marquis of Harringhurst, aware of 
 the peculiar position of his protege, uncon- 
 sciously increased the evil by applying too 
 strong a remedy. On Myrton's arrival in 
 town, three grand political dinners were 
 given at Harringhurst House, for the pur- 
 pose of introducing the new member to the 
 heads of the party ; and, because conscious 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 98 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 of having drawn him out of his sphere, 
 almost against his will, the kind-hearted old 
 man was tempted into the use of exagge- 
 rated terms in alluding to Myrton's abili- 
 ties, as well as to his personal esteem for 
 the new member for Bruce town ; who was 
 thenceforward beset with deferences and 
 attentions, serving only to increase his em- 
 barrassment. 
 
 For, like Lord Harringhurst on the day of 
 his arrival at Stainhurst, these great men, 
 accustomed to the colloquial ease of the 
 great spirits of the age, were not a little 
 disappointed. In the awkward man before 
 them, there was little token of either bril- 
 liancy or power. To shine in such society, 
 a fluent command of the common-places of 
 conventional life is as essential as exten- 
 sive information, or strongly grounded opi- 
 nions on the great political questions of the 
 country : as the privates of an army are as 
 necessary to the gain of a battle, as gene- 
 rals of brigade. After compromising him- 
 self, therefore, by two or three betrayals of 
 gross ignorance of the technicalities of office, 
 they listened with the same bland benignity
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 99 
 
 of politeness to the protege of their friend, 
 the Marquis ; but their faith was gone. All 
 they recognized in the new idol of the poli- 
 tical temple, was its foot of clay. — The pre- 
 monitory flourish of trumpets had, as usual, 
 ushered in an impostor. 
 
 Not one of them, however, but left his 
 name at the hotel in St. James's Street, 
 where Myrton had taken up his quarters. 
 They were bound to support the man whom 
 Harringhurst, (a competent judge it might 
 be supposed of such matters, after half a 
 century's experience,) declared to be an im- 
 mense acquisition to the party ; and Myrton 
 had no reason to mistrust the sincerity or 
 the civilities of the dozen or two of Dukes, 
 Marquesses, and Earls, to whose visits he 
 slightly alluded in his first letter to his wife. 
 
 In the House of Commons, meanwhile. 
 Lord Harringhurst contrived to do him bet- 
 ter service than among the Lords. One 
 of the seats of which, since the death of Lord 
 de Bruce, the old man had enjoyed the 
 disposal, was filled by a shrewd and active 
 underling, by education a lawyer, and by 
 vocation a toady, the dme damn6 of the party 
 
 f2
 
 100 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 when in, and, when out, a sort of deputy 
 whipper-in, or valet de bourreau. To this 
 political turnspit did the noble Patron 
 entrust the debut of Myrton; and Silas 
 Horsemonger, on finding, to his infinite 
 delight, that the new proteg6 of the old peer, 
 on whom at first he had cast a jealous eye 
 as a brother sponge, pretending to a share 
 of the official broken victuals, — the crumbs 
 of the loaves and fishes of office, — was 
 a man in the enjoyment of eight or ten 
 thousand a-year, having the power of en- 
 tertaining toadies of his own, — fulfilled the 
 task with more than professional zeal. No 
 valet de place ever did the honours of a 
 foreign city with the assiduous thought- 
 fulness of Silas, while familiarizing Robert 
 Myrton with the personages and habits of 
 the House of Commons. Before a week had 
 elapsed, the new member was acclimatized. 
 His ears grew accustomed to a hubbub 
 more bewildering at first than the iron 
 clatter of his own wheels and cylinders ; 
 and his eyes were enabled to individualize 
 the sea of faces, so uninteresting in the 
 aggregate, so important through the names
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 101 
 
 he was at length able to apply to those 
 slouching forms, and unintellectual faces. 
 
 An occasional attendant in the gallery 
 when business called him to town, he had, 
 experienced, like most accidental auditors of 
 a debate, great disappointment in the ora- 
 tory and modes of business of the House ; 
 and a conviction that the great speakers 
 who have bequeathed such mighty traditions 
 to our parliamentary annals, must have been 
 of a very different calibre from any exist- 
 ing in the present day. But now that he 
 found himself an integral fraction of this 
 great, thoughtful, watchful, providential hu- 
 man mass, he began to regard it with higher 
 deference, — a deference nightly increasing. 
 
 The difficulty of presenting any new 
 opinion to the hundreds arrayed in opposi- 
 tion against it armed with strength of 
 argument, and bitterness of irony, assign- 
 ed prodigious importance to the task of 
 the orator ; and served to palliate the verbal 
 hesitation, or diffuse exposition, formerly 
 exciting his contempt. — Accustomed to 
 pelt with the first and hardest words that 
 came to hand, the thick heads of a mob, he
 
 102 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 foresaw that even his own presence of mind 
 might desert him, on hearing some ill-chosen 
 epithet suddenly italicized into a blunder 
 by the scornful cheers of the ministerial 
 benches. 
 
 Silas Horsemonger was provoked to find 
 that, after his days of initiation were fully 
 past, Myrton, instead of listening to his puns 
 and anecdotes, as became a new member to 
 whom they were as good as new, was disposed 
 to give his whole attention to the debate. 
 Without acquaintanceship in the House to 
 entice him into gossiping, without a " world 
 elsewhere " to tempt him into slackness of 
 attendance, he was one of the first and last 
 at his post. Nothing said or done within 
 those walls was without interest for him. 
 Silas, whose task as shepherd's dog to that 
 easily scattered flock, had taught him to 
 regard ex-oflScial parliamentary duty as a 
 matter of derision, was amused to observe 
 the good faith with which the new member 
 resigned the entire faculties of his mind to 
 the progress of debate. For Myrton had not 
 yet dieted long enough on the whipt cream 
 of London life, to treat with equal uncon-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 103 
 
 cern, and comprehend in the same category, 
 the levities of the coteries and the delibera- 
 tions of the concentrated mind of the United 
 Kingdom of Great Britain. 
 
 Such a mode of life was not likely to 
 assign a charm to the hurried and solitary 
 hotel dinners of a man who was at present 
 clubless: or to the lonely breakfast-table and 
 chamber, which, on his return from his duties, 
 and during the three holidays of his parlia- 
 mentary week afforded no smiling face, no 
 intelligent companion, for interchange of 
 thought or feeling. The usual sense of 
 solitariness oppressing every stranger in a 
 crowd, weighed with double heaviness on a 
 man accustomed to the dearest joys of do- 
 mestic life. Nor did the grand parties of 
 Lord Harringhurst effect much for his relief. 
 In that circle, he had already subsided into a 
 secondary object ; — and, isolated in his social 
 position, and beginning to despair of the dis- 
 tinctions he once fancied so easy of attain- 
 ment, his spirits failed him. Before the ex- 
 piration of the month of May, therefore, he 
 had engaged his sister Wynter and her hus- 
 band, to pass a month at Stainhurst with her
 
 104 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 mother, and additional apartments at Fen- 
 ton's Hotel, to enable his wife and children 
 to rejoin him in town. 
 
 But that he was apprehensive Caroline 
 might be tempted by the cross questioning 
 of Lady Hilliard, to confess the extent of his 
 mortification, he would have owned, in the 
 letter inviting her to London, how eagerly he 
 longed for her arrival. — As it was, he wrote 
 more to his mother apologizing for leaving 
 her alone, than to his wife, in expression of 
 a desire for her presence ; so that Caroline 
 forced back into her heart the feelings of 
 exultation arising from the summons. For a 
 moment, she had flattered herself that her 
 husband found himself unable to dispense 
 with her company. — But no ! — He probably 
 fancied that, during his absence, she made 
 herself troublesome to his mother ! 
 
 Throughout her preparations for her jour- 
 ney, she was noticed by the Lichfields to be 
 so sad and silent, that it almost reconciled 
 them to their dull obscurity, to witness the 
 affliction of their beloved Caroline at quit- 
 ting the place. 
 
 " Tell Myrton from me, that he is a lazy
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 105 
 
 dog !" — was Lichfield's jocular parting charge 
 to her, as he placed little Emily on her knee 
 in the travelling carriage. — " In return for 
 my almost daily bulletin of the proceedings 
 at Stainhurst, he gives me neither London 
 news, nor any excuse for the shortness of his 
 letters in the length of his speeches. The 
 papers have not yet hinted at so much as * a 
 few words from the honourable member for 
 Brucetown — inaudible in the gallery !' But, 
 good b'ye, dear Car. ! The post-boys are up^ 
 and all ready. — Give us news of your safe 
 arrival, and, once more, good b^ye !" 
 
 The continence of tongue thus com- 
 plained of by Lichfield, which enabled Aunt 
 
 Minchin to drive over daily from R , 
 
 and observe to her sister, that " some folks 
 who could speechify so glibly in the country, 
 seemed tongue-tied in London !'' — aiForded 
 additional proof of the strong sense of Myr- 
 ton. It had been arranged from the first, 
 between him and Lord Harringhurst, or 
 rather the little knot of exclusive politicians 
 with which Lord Harringhurst acted in con- 
 cert, for what question he should reserve his 
 maiden effort as an orator ; which, luckily, 
 
 f5
 
 106 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 as he now thought, was appointed for a late 
 period of the session. A day or two, how- 
 ever, before the arrival of his family, he 
 found Silas Horsemonger waiting for him 
 in the lobby, with a longer face than his 
 somewhat convivial features were accustom- 
 ed to assume. 
 
 " I am glad you are come, my dear sir," 
 said he. — " I was just thinking of hurrying 
 after you to Fenton's. Can you conceive 
 anything so absurd ! — Lord Corsham has got 
 the smallpox !" — 
 
 The singularity of the expression recalled 
 to the mind of Myrton the exclamation of 
 " How ridiculous," used by the Yankee 
 squatter, when he returned home to find 
 his log-house in ashes, and his wife and 
 children buried in the ruins. But he con- 
 tented himself with inquiring in what con- 
 sisted the absurdity of the case. 
 
 " Why, this is the second of June, you 
 know !" 
 
 The Honourable Member for Brucetown 
 still looked puzzled. 
 
 *' Surely you remember that ministers are 
 to bring forward to-night the duties on
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 107 
 
 foreign wool ? Corsham was to have opposed 
 them, and we have nobody now but Heg- 
 ginton, who is at all up in the question. But 
 Hegg. is as heavy as a four-wheeled waggon ; 
 and I am just come from Brookes's, where 
 they are in despair. — The absurdity of a man 
 of Corsham's age never having been vacci- 
 nated !"— 
 
 "Even vaccination no longer appears a 
 safeguard," replied Myrton in a vague and 
 absent manner, — already hoping for a post 
 dictum to Silas's communication, which was 
 not long wanting. 
 
 " Lord Harringhurst suggested, that the 
 subject must be peculiarly familiar to your- ' 
 self," continued he. " It is giving you but 
 short warning for a question of such mag- 
 nitude. But it would be highly acceptable 
 to all parties if you could take the reply into 
 your hands." 
 
 Myrton of course raised modest objections, 
 of course desiring no better ; for, but that 
 the question had been pre-appropriated to 
 the noble member for Leicester, it was just 
 such as he could have desired, as the touch- 
 stone of his powers. He suffered himself.
 
 108 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 therefore, to be persuaded ; and the sudden- 
 ness of the occasion being rather in his 
 favour than otherwise, as adding to his 
 excitement, the result was happily such as 
 fully to justify the acceptance of the Chil- 
 tern Hundreds by the Honourable John De 
 Bruce. 
 
 All who had predicted a fiasco on the 
 part of the silent guest of Harringhurst 
 House, w^ere put to confusion. Even those 
 who had expected much from him, were 
 agreeably disappointed. Myrton turned out 
 to be not only a very fine speaker, but 
 precisely the order of speaker they had not 
 been led to expect. From the nickname 
 circulated in the house by Sir Frederick 
 Brabazon, of " the Mirabeau of Stainhurst," 
 they had anticipated an impetuous flow of 
 florid oratory, — the ad captandum flourish of 
 a demagogue. But the style of the new 
 speaker was as mild and simple as it was 
 forcible and convincing. A certain square- 
 ness of diction, combined with the masterly 
 disposal of well-digested information, as- 
 sorted well with the manly homeliness of 
 his appearance. His opinions, and the mode
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 109 
 
 of their exposition, were alike characterised 
 by moderation and good sense. 
 
 " Twice the man we expected !" — was the 
 mutual gratulation of the Harringhurst party. 
 " If he can be as eloquent as you say on 
 a question of patriotic feeling, as well as 
 thus soundly argumentative on one of poli- 
 tical economy, Mr. Myrton is worth his 
 weight in gold !" — 
 
 And, as is always the case when a new 
 speaker makes a sensation in the house, a 
 few mummies coeval with Pitt and Fox, 
 Sheridan and Burke, were carefully unrolled, 
 and stimulated into their usual declaration, 
 that nothing so nearly approaching to ora- 
 tory had been heard since Hastings's trial. 
 Sir Frederick Brabazon had very much the 
 air of having swallowed a dose of asafoetida ; 
 while Silas Horsemonger was heard cackling 
 in the lobby, like an old goose who has un- 
 wittingly hatched an eagle, and is afraid it 
 may be mistaken for a gosling. But though 
 justified in his conviction that the fine 
 speech to which the house had listened for 
 two hours with the most admiring atten- 
 tion, was half of his own making, since it
 
 110 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 was at his sole suggestion the proposition 
 had been made to the new member to re- 
 place Lord Corsham, to Myrton alone were 
 addressed the compliments and thanks of his 
 party. Those who had not known him be- 
 fore, pressed forward, after a triumphant divi- 
 sion, to request an introduction. Those who 
 had, were prompt in making the most of 
 his acquaintance. 
 
 Of all possible gratifications of human 
 vanity, none is, perhaps, more complete and 
 home-striking than the success of a maiden 
 speech. The victorious general experiences 
 on his field of battle a thousand painful 
 drawbacks to his triumph. The successful 
 author has his laurels doled out to him, leaf 
 by leaf, and by hands from whose pressure 
 they escape with such difficulty, that already 
 the bitter essence is exuding. But the en- 
 thusiasm of the House produces an electric 
 effect on the ear and soul of the orator. — 
 No mistaking the meaning of those simulta- 
 neous acclamations ! — Such praise constitutes 
 the highest award of the highest judges 
 in the land. — 
 
 From the imbibement of this intoxicating
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. Ill 
 
 draught, Myrton had scarcely grown sober, 
 when called upon to welcome his wife. Joy 
 was still sparkling in his eyes as he folded 
 her in his arms ; and (so uncertain are all 
 human perceptions) Caroline, who had attri- 
 buted coldness to the letter of the dispirited 
 man really pining for her company, now 
 attributed to delight at seeing her again, 
 an elation of spirit solely produced by the 
 effervescence of selfish vanity ! 
 
 Not a syllable did he utter concerning 
 his speech ; and the visiting cards and in- 
 vitations she found upon his table, and the 
 new connexions and pleasures by which 
 she found him beset, appeared established 
 and habitual. Notwithstanding the warmth 
 of his welcome, she saw herself again re- 
 duced to a very subordinate position by his 
 side. 
 
 Before Lady Hilliard had found time even 
 to notice the intimation of her sister's arri- 
 val in town, Mrs. Myrton received an in- 
 vitation for a dinner at some days' distance of 
 date, to Harringhurst House, and a visit 
 from Lady Mary De Bruce. But even from 
 her she heard nothing of her husband's tri-
 
 112 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 umph. Lady Mary took it for granted that 
 all the frequenters of her grandfather's house 
 above thirty years of age, must be great 
 political characters ; and whether Mr. Myr- 
 ton's renown dated from this week or the 
 last, was a matter of no consequence. 
 
 Lady Mary had, moreover, every excuse 
 for being a little engrossed by her own af- 
 fairs. She was enjoying the furor of popu- 
 larity, peculiar to an heiress who is a beauty, 
 or rather, to a beauty who is an heiress. To 
 judge from the precedents of the day, had 
 she been hideous in person and ungracious 
 in manner as she was lovely and captiva- 
 ting, a fortune such as hers, and the ancient 
 barony of De Bruce in perspective, would 
 have secured her legions of admirers. But 
 with the monopoly of advantages she en- 
 joyed, it was not wonderful that half the 
 dowagers of the peerage should be paying 
 their addresses to her on behalf of their sons. 
 
 " How glad I am, dearest Mrs. Myr- 
 ton, that you decided upon coming to town !" 
 said she, warmly embracing Caroline, and 
 affectionately kissing her only male admirer 
 whose suit was disinterested. " I have
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 113 
 
 been tormenting your husband to death 
 about you, and this boy of mine. — I have 
 really wanted you sadly." — 
 
 " Even in London, where you have so 
 many friends ? " — said Caroline, with a half 
 incredulous smile. 
 
 " Even in London, where I have so many 
 friends that I have no faith in any one of 
 them!" — cried Lady Mary. "Each of the 
 thousand having nine hundred and ninety- 
 nine rivals arrayed in ill-nature and scandal 
 against him, her, or it, I cannot exhibit 
 the smallest liking without having it proved 
 to me that the object of my preference is 
 all that is vilest or wickedest in human 
 nature ! Not a favourable opinion have 
 I heard expressed by any human being of 
 another, (except by the mammas chaunting 
 the sons they want to dispose of) since I was 
 at Stainhurst. — And how did you leave the 
 old lady, pray ; — and the parsonage, and the 
 golden bantams ?" 
 
 " To think of your remembering them, 
 dear Lady Mary, at the close of a month !" 
 
 " Five weeks, if you please ! — I have 
 been more than a month in town. — I can
 
 114 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 certify the fact from having been twice in 
 love since my arrival ; and such is the 
 constancy of my nature, that I do not 
 change my mind oftener than once a fort- 
 night ; which I admit to be wrong,— for so 
 giddy a mind cannot be changed too often." 
 
 " I rejoice to see that if you have lost 
 your heart, you have not lost your spirits," 
 said Mrs. Myrton, cheerfully. 
 
 " No ; the only thing I have lost since 
 my arrival in town, (and that I trust, not 
 irretrievably,) is my complexion. I was 
 not aware of it till this moment. But 
 look in the glass yonder, as we sit toge- 
 ther here on the sofa, and you will see, 
 my dear Mrs. Myrton, that / look like 
 the woman of six-and-twenty, — you like 
 the girl of eighteen !" 
 
 Mrs. Myrton raised her eyes, not to the 
 looking-glass, but to the fair face of her 
 companion; and saw that she appeared, in- 
 deed, a little fatigued by the dissipations 
 of London. 
 
 " If our mouthing friend, Mr. Perceval, 
 were only here," resumed Lady Mary, 
 laughing, " he would find something to say
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 115 
 
 about the wing of Time having assumed 
 the sable plumage of the raven, instead of 
 the argentine feathers of the dove. But in 
 sober sense, I really do not feel half so 
 well or happy as I used in Yorkshire ; and 
 my eyes are getting as dim as my heart. 
 At present, you, who are a greater novice 
 in London than even myself, see things en 
 couleur de rose. By and by, you will esti- 
 mate all this noise as I do, at its real vul- 
 garity, — this heavy atmosphere at its true 
 oppression, — and the golden weights of 
 worldly pleasure, as fatal as the sack of coin 
 that weighed the life out of Correggio !" 
 
 " I am not spoiled as you are, by a 
 surfeit of society!" observed Mrs. Myrton. 
 " The secluded life I have led, assigns at 
 least the charm of novelty to the world." 
 
 " I suspect the charm will soon evaporate 
 for both of us," — cried the heiress, from whom 
 little Robert had struggled away, to survey 
 at the window the stir and tumult of St. 
 James's Street. " After all, which does one 
 enjoy most, the wilderness of flowers of a 
 vast garden, or the chosen bouquet in one's 
 hand? — These glaring mobs of London fashion
 
 116 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 weary both my eyes and heart. It is fatigu- 
 ing as a perpetual appearance on the stage ; 
 and in the end proves equally injurious. Al- 
 ready, I find myself contracting the hollow 
 laugh and stage grin of an actress. — I shall 
 come to rouge and pearl powder in time ! — 
 And now, good b'ye, dear Mrs. Myrton ; for 
 I have promised to take up grandpapa at 
 Brookes's, and drive him to the House of 
 Lords. To-morrow I will inquire about you, 
 if you are not able to call at Harringhurst 
 House. — But at all events, do not forget Sa- 
 turday, at eight. We have a large party, out 
 of which I will introduce numbers I. and II. 
 of my loves to you; and ask your advice 
 about adding a third to my list." 
 
 And with a kiss, en passant, to the curly- 
 haired boy, the joyous, prosperous, beauty 
 disappeared.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 117 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Toujours son ironie, infeconde et morose, 
 Jappait sur les talons de quelque grande chose, 
 
 Victor Hugo. 
 
 " If this be a fair specimen of the vaunted 
 London dinner parties," mused Mrs. Myrton, 
 on returning, two nights afterwards, from 
 a grand display at Sir John Hilliard's in 
 Grosvenor Square, " I see no great charm in 
 them !"— 
 
 No sooner had the Hilliards found the tide 
 of popularity setting in favour of Myrton, 
 than Sir John made an off-hand visit, affect- 
 ing surprise at Caroline's sudden arrival in 
 town, and insisting on their dining with him 
 that very day. Even when the honourable 
 member excused himself, on the ground of 
 his parliamentary duties, Caroline w^as not 
 to be let off, and, as Sir John persisted that
 
 118 THF POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 his brother-in-law might come if he liked, 
 (there being no chance of a division, nor any 
 question of consequence before the House,) 
 she went ill-disposed to be amused, in the 
 conviction that her husband, who had been 
 engaged the whole morning with business 
 connexions collected around him by the dis- 
 tinction he was acquiring, was prevented only 
 by want of inclination from bearing her com- 
 pany. 
 
 For already, the excitement of feeling in 
 which she had found Myrton on her arrival 
 in town, was subsiding. Already, he had 
 tasted the lees remaining after the effer- 
 vescence of sudden popularity. On the mor- 
 row of his triumph, the ministerial journals 
 were silent, from surprise and want of pre- 
 paration ; but the morrow's morrow, saw 
 them revive for reaction ; when everything 
 that could be arrayed against Myrton's 
 speech, in the way of argument by the 
 capable, or in the way of abuse by the scur- 
 rilous, was flung in his face. By some, he 
 was called an ass, by others an incendiary. 
 But the unkindest cut of all, was an inquiry 
 in a morning paper, of " who the Mr.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 119 
 
 Myrton, thus hired by a faction for its fla- 
 gitious purposes was?" — to which the even- 
 ing paper, with which the said morning paper 
 was in as close connexion as the tail with 
 the head of a serpent, of course replied, 
 
 " Our colleague of the inquires the 
 
 origin of the new member for Lord Har- 
 ringhurst's borough. We are happy in be- 
 ing able to inform him. Mr. Robert Min- 
 chin Myrton is the son of a travelling tinker, 
 who arrived, somewhere about the middle of 
 
 the last century, at R , with half-a-crown 
 
 in his pocket. The manufacturing interests, 
 it seems, converted this fellow's rags into 
 purple and fine linen ; or, more truly, into a 
 good frieze coat, for which the son is now 
 affording a suitable return. Such is the ori- 
 gin of the grandiloquent tool of the liberals ; 
 — a barber's basin, converted into the helmet 
 of a knight !" — 
 
 Unhardened by experience to such at- 
 tacks, Myrton felt inexpressibly annoyed by 
 the perusal of the papers obsequiously laid 
 on his table by the head waiter ; and so far 
 from having courage to join a state dinner 
 party at the house of his insolent brother-
 
 120 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 in-law, he betrayed to his wife, by sudden 
 change of humour, that the self-love now 
 so prostrated, was, when triumphant, the 
 origin of his previous mansuetude. 
 
 Even, however, had he accompanied Car., 
 and even had Caroline herself been in spirits, 
 Lady Hilliard's society afforded little to 
 gratify the cravings of a mind like hers. 
 Nothing could be colder, more formal, 
 or more unsatisfactory, than the circle in 
 Grosvenor Square: composed of a few of 
 their grand Yorkshire neighbours, and more 
 fashionable London acquaintance, — a hete- 
 rogeneous syllabub of wine and cream ! — 
 Ungifted with the intelligence requisite to 
 combine ingredients so opposite. Lady Hil- 
 liard made up in affectation for her want 
 of address ; and the conversation languished, 
 as it is sure to do among people who are 
 playing a part. No one paid the smallest 
 attention to Mrs. Myrton ; for Lady Hilliard 
 having occasionally younger sisters staying 
 with her in the capacity of poor relations, 
 Mrs. Myrton, slightly introduced, was un- 
 derstood to hold the same position. 
 
 The London ladyships perceiving that the
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 121 
 
 Yorkshire ladyships knew nothing of the 
 Yorkshire lady, looked upon her with leaden 
 eyes. The Yorkshire ladyships perceiving 
 that the London ladyships looked upon her 
 with leaden eyes, would as soon have ad- 
 dressed their conversation to the butler, as 
 to the obscure Yorkshire lady; and as the 
 party separated for their various balls and 
 soirees the moment the gentlemen made 
 their appearance, Caroline returned home 
 with no better impression of the wit and 
 amenity of London life, than arose from 
 having been asked at dinner by the Earl 
 of Carringford, who sat on one side, whe- 
 ther she had been at the last drawing-room, 
 and how she liked the new opera ; and be- 
 ing told by Sir Hugh Marchmont, who occu- 
 pied the other, the name of the favourite 
 for the Derby, and the price he had paid 
 for a yacht. 
 
 How little did she surmise that, by merely 
 mentioning to those seven women in buck- 
 ram that she had been driving all the morn- 
 ing with Lady Mary De Bruce, she should 
 have thawed them into an atmosphere ca- 
 pable of forcing the bloom of an air plant ; 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 122 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 or that, by replying to Lord Carringford, 
 that, though not at the last drawing-room, 
 she was to be presented at the next by the 
 -Duchess of Droitwich, Lord Harringhurst's 
 sister, she should have converted him into 
 a pleasant acquaintance, — Lord C. being a 
 man whose poodle only jumped for lords and 
 ladies. But even could she have guessed 
 that her intimacy at Harringhurst House 
 conferred some semblance of the caste in 
 which she was wanting, Caroline would have 
 scorned to shine with light thus borrowed. 
 
 No one, however, to whom on her return 
 home, to confide her disappointment! When 
 Myrton arrived from the House, she had 
 been many hours asleep. Next morning, his 
 time was taken up with business-appoint- 
 ments, and an expedition to Long Acre in 
 search of a new carriage, (there being no 
 time for building one ;) and the first his 
 wife saw of him was when they met, full- 
 dressed, to proceed to the dinner-j)arty at 
 Lord Harringhurst's. Luckily, the transit 
 from St. James's to Arlington Street was a 
 short one; for Caroline felt that had her 
 husband taken on himself to prepare her
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 123 
 
 by a lesson for the part she was to play in 
 this new world, she should have been unable 
 to restrain her tears. 
 
 Within five minutes of leaving the hotel, 
 she was ushered into a beautiful suite of 
 rooms overlooking the Green Park, affection- 
 ately welcomed by Lady Mary, and respect- 
 fully by Lady Mary's venerable grandfather ; 
 — introduced to " my Aunt Droitwich, and 
 Cousin Bonvilles," and made to feel herself 
 at home in a sociable party. The conversa- 
 tion, interrupted by her arrival, was eagerly 
 resumed ; but in such a tone as to assign 
 their share to the new-comers. 
 
 A variety of great names were successively 
 announced ; but their social importance was 
 at present undreamed of by Caroline, who, 
 even surrounded as she was, could not but 
 notice the attentions paid to her husband by 
 a group of men, whose white or bald heads, 
 and stars and garters, announced them as 
 dignified alike by time and place. 
 
 A person for whom she looked in vain, 
 was the young Duke of Droitwich ; to 
 whom was said to be destined by their 
 united families, the hand of his cousin Lady 
 
 G 2
 
 l'J4 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Mary. But among the two or three young 
 men present, all wearing the same cachet of 
 dress, manner, and appearance, it was not 
 easy to divine the specific numbers I. and 
 II. of her lively young friend ; or decide upon 
 the important III., by whom both were to 
 be superseded. 
 
 '' You have very little idea,'' whispered 
 an extremely fine gentleman, by whom she 
 was ceremoniously taken into dinner, " of 
 how many evil wishes you were yesterday the 
 object !" — 
 
 " Indeed ? " — said Mrs. Myrton, as they 
 seated themselves together at the dinner- 
 table, concluding that he mistook her for 
 some other person. 
 
 " On seeing you driving with Lady Mary 
 in the park, we understood the motive of 
 her giving up her usual ride with Lord 
 Harringhurst ; and hated you, as in duty 
 bound." 
 
 Caroline expressed a hope of reconciling 
 herself to her unknown enemies, by having 
 promised for the future to accompany Lady 
 Mary De Bruce in her rides. 
 
 " Having left my mare in Yorkshire,'' said
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 125 
 
 she, "Lord Harringhurst has kindly promised 
 to find me a horse." 
 
 " Then we have better interest with Pro- 
 vidence than we deserve !" said her companion. 
 ** Our worst wishes against you are fulfilled. 
 Lord Harringhurst's notions of a lady's horse 
 are those of a German riding master, an 
 easy chair on four legs. I desire nothing 
 worse for the most disagreeable woman of 
 my acquaintance, than to ride the wooden 
 horse chosen by Lord Harringhurst !" 
 
 " Is Lady Mary, then, so ill mounted ?" 
 — inquired Mrs. Myrton, almost anxiously. 
 
 " To my shame or honour, I have never 
 observed, — though almost daily her compan- 
 ion !" replied he. "But who, when riding 
 with her^ could have eyes for her horse !" — 
 
 That the man, thus avowedly an admirer, 
 must represent one or other of the three 
 magic numbers, was pretty plain ; and Caro- 
 line accordingly set about improving her 
 acquaintance with the stranger likely to 
 stand towards her in so interesting a light. 
 She had decided him, at her first glance, to 
 be remarkably plain. She now discerned a 
 keen intelligence in his eye, and quiet self-
 
 126 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 possession in his deportment, assimilating 
 well with the eccentricity of his expres- 
 sions. His flippancies were uttered with the 
 stern gravity of a sermon. 
 
 " I trust Mrs. Myrton is not too vain," 
 said he, " of the delight with which Lady 
 Mary hailed her arrival in town ! Do not 
 fancy it either a tribute to your merit, or a 
 proof of her affection. To have with her a 
 person yet more inexperienced than herself 
 in the ways of this wicked world, — a person 
 who has not yet sorted over the illusions of 
 life and thrown out the useless cards, — is a 
 solace to her ignorance." 
 
 " But how can you vouch for my inex- 
 perience ? " — inquired Caroline, blushing, 
 " How do you know me to be so new to 
 the wickedness of London ?" — 
 
 " Because I have you by heart ! " replied 
 the stranger, without affecting to apologize 
 for the blushes he was raising. *' Do not 
 suppose, however, that your picture was 
 dropped into my chamber by a blue bird, 
 like that of some princess, in a fairy tale. 
 My blue bird is a very bumpkin fowl ; — a 
 man, you know little, and probably like
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 1,27 
 
 less, — your Yorkshire neighbour, Sir Fre- 
 derick Brabazon." 
 
 The intimation served only to produce a 
 more vivid flush on the cheek of Caroline : 
 and, satisfied that from the Brabazons her 
 new friend must have imbibed the most 
 unfavourable impressions of her and hers, 
 she could only hope to efface them by addi- 
 tional graciousness. 
 
 " I generally spend a day or two at Holme- 
 dale every year, on my way to Doncaster 
 races," said he. — " A hateful place !" 
 
 " Do not call it hateful, for it is one of the 
 boasts of our neighbourhood," interrupted 
 Caroline, endeavouring to be magnanimous. 
 
 "As regards neighbourhood, I have no- 
 thing to urge against it," he replied. " All 
 that nature has done at Holmedale is good, 
 all the Brabazons have added, detestable; 
 — a Versailles manque^ in the midst of a 
 rude valley in Craven. Every now and 
 then, English people bring back from the 
 Continent the infection of some dreadful 
 taste-fever, against which quarantine and a 
 lazaret ought to be provided at Dover. 
 Most of them insist on grafting on our na-
 
 128 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 tive crabstocks some exotic fruit, that can 
 never ripen in our climate. The Brabazons, 
 for instance, have bedizened their Inigo 
 Jones-ian mansion with all the ornamental 
 glitter of what they call renaissance^ — ara- 
 besques, statuettes, astragals, brackets, ca- 
 meos, gilding, — disfiguring in florid confu- 
 sion the chaste simplicity of the Doric struc- 
 ture!"— 
 
 *^ I have never seen the interior of Holme- 
 dale," replied Mrs. Myrton, " for we do not 
 visit; — or, I should perhaps say. Lady Bra- 
 bazon does not visit me. But I have heard 
 it described as gorgeous." 
 
 " Yes, gorgeous ! — the very word ! That 
 renaissance style originated with the Me- 
 dici ; — money-making people, — ennobled 
 shopkeepers, — whose gold leaf came off on 
 everything they touched. But though just 
 bearable in the breathless climate of Italy 
 and glittering in its vivid sunshine, nothing 
 can be more out of place in our humid 
 country of mildew and tarnish. Let me 
 hope that Stainhurst is pure from gilding 
 and arabesques ?" continued he, with a smile ; 
 " I, who spend half my life in Paris, am
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 129 
 
 often on the point of calling for the cai^te 
 in the dining-rooms of my noble friends 
 in this comitry, which are beginning to emu- 
 late the cafes of the Boulevards." 
 
 " Stainhurst runs no risk of being included 
 in your clause of condemnation, among the 
 houses of your friends,'' replied Mr. Myrton ; 
 " at best, / could aspire only to be classed 
 among your ignoble acquaintance." 
 
 " Hilliard would not be particularly pleased 
 to hear you say so !" replied he, laughing. 
 
 " You know my brother-in-law, then ?" 
 
 " I would say boldly ' yes,' but that 1 
 am half afraid he would disown me. I 
 know him what is called ' a little ;' you 
 need not, therefore, be afraid of my taking 
 the same liberties with Hilliard Park as 
 with Holmedale. I am not privileged to 
 abuse either the place or its master — having 
 never tasted his bread and salt. It is only 
 an intimate friend one feels tempted to 
 decry behind his back." 
 
 Mrs. Myrton smiled, as was expected of 
 her, at this fanfaronnade ; aware that the 
 assumption of a vice, when you have it not, 
 is one of the witticisms of the day. 
 
 g5
 
 180 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 " I am fully entitled," he resumed, " to 
 own I consider Hilliard Park one of the 
 prettiest places, for its size, in the north ; 
 for Sir John and I have disliked each othrer 
 any time these fifteen years." 
 
 " Fifteen years ago, you must have been 
 at school V — 
 
 " Precisely. I became a fag at Eton just 
 as he was leaving it ; and hated him with all 
 the intensity of envy, because I was blacking 
 shoes when he gave his farewell dinner at 
 the Christopher." 
 
 He was interrupted by a message, brought 
 by the groom of the chambers, requesting 
 Mrs. Myrton to take wine wdth Lord Har- 
 ringhurst. 
 
 " Bless the dear old-fashioned soul, worthy 
 to have sat for his portrait to Richardson !" 
 — cried her companion, after the ceremony 
 was completed. — " Lord Harringhurst can- 
 not renounce the habits of his forefathers, 
 any more than the throne and altar of 
 his forefathers. — I expect soon to see him 
 set up a sedan chair for Lady Mary. — 
 No fear of renaissance saloons at Harring- 
 hurst Castle. — Nothing new in the halls of
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. ISl 
 
 De Bruces, — except now and then a cob- 
 web." 
 
 " Or a friend like myself," — added Caro- 
 line, with a smile. 
 
 " Again allow me to say, oh that Hilliard 
 of Hilliard Park could hear you !" — exclaimed 
 her mysterious companion, connecting the 
 epithet new with family origin, rather than, 
 according to Mrs. Myrton's meaning, with 
 her specific self. 
 
 *^ Out, hyperbolical fiend ! — how vexest thou this man ! 
 Talkest thou of nothing but pedigrees ?" — 
 
 exclaimed Caroline, in the phrase of Sir 
 Topaz. " I was alluding to myself as Lady 
 Mary's latest friend, not as the coinage of , 
 the latest edition of Burke's landed gen- 
 try." 
 
 " Would to mercy my lady mother op- 
 posite, were not too busy with her grapes to 
 hear your accusation !'^ cried he ; " she would 
 begin to entertain some hopes of the least 
 worthy of her sons, whom she could never 
 teach to distinguish gules from fess." 
 
 By following the direction of his eyes 
 during this allusion, the previous suspicions 
 of Mrs. Myrton were confirmed, that her
 
 132 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 pleasant companion was no other than the 
 destined husband of Lady Mary. 
 
 " Had I been aware, all this time," said 
 she, with a somewhat heightened complex- 
 ion, " that I had the pleasure of listen- 
 ing to the Duke of Droitwich, I should 
 not have required him to explain that he 
 was no ally of my relations at Hilliard Park." 
 
 " You do me too much and too little ho- 
 nour," replied the stranger. " Do you sup- 
 pose any duke in the land was ever half so 
 amusing, as I flatter myself I have been 
 during dinner? From my conversational 
 powers, you might surely infer me to be 
 that most pains-taking of oppressed human 
 intelligences, a younger brother! — Duke of 
 Droitwich I can never be, unless it please 
 the plague, the cholera, or a steeple chase 
 to remove two elder ones, six feet in longi- 
 tude by two of latitude ; and with propor- 
 tionate strength of constitution to contend 
 against my evil eye. My names are Alan 
 and Bonville, — far more at your service 
 than I fear you will be inclined to find ac- 
 ceptable." 
 
 Caroline was now so angry with herself,
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 133 
 
 for not having at once recognised the strange 
 sailor cousin, — the wild Lord Alan Bonville, 
 — of whom Lady Mary had often talked to 
 her, that it was a relief when, shortly after- 
 wards, the ladies rose to quit the room. 
 
 " How do you like our trusty and well- 
 beloved cousin, Alan-a-dale ?" — inquired her 
 young hostess, so as to be unheard by the 
 Duchess. 
 
 " So well," replied Mrs. Myrton, " that I 
 am all curiosity to learn whether he repre- 
 sent number L, II., or HI. of the catalogue !" 
 
 " I leave it to your penetration to disco- 
 ver !" replied Lady Mary, laughing. "They 
 are all here to-night, or rather they all 
 were ; for, as there is a new ballet, we 
 shall see no one at coffee but grandpapa, 
 Mr. Myrton, and perhaps one or two odd 
 fishes from what I call the frozen Brookes." 
 
 Mrs. Myrton was a little disappointed. 
 She had hoped to have resumed her con- 
 versation with one who appeared peculi- 
 arly qualified to act as showman to the ma- 
 gic lantern of London life. She was how- 
 ever soon reconciled when, the little party, 
 having made its appearance precisely in the
 
 134 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 reduced form predicted by her young friend, 
 the Duchess and her mild, sensible daughter, 
 Lady Helen Bonville being the only ladies 
 remaining, — a political discussion arose, in 
 which the old Marquis appeared to enact 
 the part of judge and jury, and her husband 
 that of an influential and right eloquent ad- 
 vocate. Caroline, as yet but slightly aware 
 of his parliamentary success, was more gra- 
 tified than she had almost ever felt in her 
 life by the respect she saw conceded to 
 the beloved husband of her youth. 
 
 No wonder that, after such a party, her 
 impressions of the inanity of London din- 
 ners as exemplified in the dull, empty pa- 
 rade of her brother-in-law, should have ex- 
 perienced some modification. 
 
 Another comfort was vouchsafed her. 
 The Drawing-room, to which she had looked 
 forward as a source of mortification, so per- 
 suaded was she of the non-necessity for her 
 appearance there at all, was put oiF, in 
 consequence of the indisposition of George 
 IV.; and before the arrival of another 
 season, the ambitions of Myrton might sub- 
 side ; or a change of administration justify
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 135 
 
 the distinction to which he pretended for 
 his wife. 
 
 Meanwhile, the grave and earnest com- 
 pliments paid her on his public success by 
 the good old Marquis, sufficed to place her 
 at ease. Though still seeing, or rather feel- 
 ing, much to regret in the vocation he had 
 adopted, her conjugal pride was gratified by 
 the result. Since the dinner party in Gros- 
 venor Square, moreover, she had experi- 
 enced in her turn, a touch of the same 
 heartburnings against the pride of the Hil- 
 liards, which had laid the foundations of her 
 husband's ambition. It was not in human 
 nature for a woman depreciated and humi- 
 liated by her own sister, not to be a little 
 vain of having the entree to Droitwich House 
 forced upon her, to which Emily, with her 
 beauty, precedence, and twelve thousand a 
 year, had vainly aspired. 
 
 Of the value of the privilege she had soon 
 occasion of judging; for on the Monday, the 
 duchess was '' at home ;" and the favourite 
 friend of the niece she was so desirous of 
 pleasing, was of course among the invited. 
 
 " At least I shall not feel myself lonely
 
 136 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 in the brilliant throng," thought Mrs. Myr- 
 ton, casting a not very discontented look in 
 the glass, when arrayed in a white satin 
 dress, enriched with splendid lace and the 
 diamonds so much more appropriate to the 
 present occasion than to the country party 
 for which they had been injudiciously pur- 
 chased. — " With the assistance of Lady Mary 
 and her singular cousin, and cheered by the 
 affability of that charming Lady Helen Bon- 
 Yille, I cannot fail to enjoy my evening." 
 
 Nevertheless, the effort of entering the 
 room alone, — (a division peremptorily de- 
 taining the members at the House,) — was 
 somewhat alarming ; more particularly as 
 Lord Alan, whom she discerned at a dis- 
 tance, recognised her only by half rising as 
 she passed, from the ottoman on which he 
 was lounging; whispering audibly, in an- 
 swer to an observation from a handsome 
 woman with whom he was conversing, — 
 "yes, beautiful! — a Mrs. Myrton, — the wife 
 of the popular member." — 
 
 The number of times that phrase was re- 
 peated at Droit with House that evening, in 
 answer to exclamation of " what a lovely
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 187 
 
 woman !*' was wholly undreamed-of by Caro- 
 line. Though commanding a succes de societe 
 quite as great in its way as the triumph 
 suddenly enjoyed by her husband as a public 
 man, self was the last object that occupied 
 her mind in that brilliant assembly. To her, 
 things were new, strange, and exquisite, 
 which, to every other person present were 
 familiar as their glove. The brilliant il- 
 lumination constituting their habitual at- 
 mosphere, or rather despised by them as 
 darkness visible compared with the superior 
 lighting of continental fetes, was to the eye 
 of Caroline a blaze; and few people are 
 fully aware of their instinctive pleasure in 
 light, or the cheerfulness and excitement it 
 imparts even to an unsightly spot. 
 
 At Droitwich House, it fell on storied 
 walls, glorious with the highest inspirations 
 of art ; — the spiritual and seraphic faces of 
 Guido, Raphael, Murillo ; — the stately ma- 
 terialism of human beauty pourtrayed by 
 Van Dyck, and Velasquez ; — the sunny land- 
 scapes of Claude and Cuyp ; — the impressive 
 savage nature of Ruysdael and Salvator. 
 It was the first time she had ever seen a fine
 
 138 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 picture gallery thus illuminated. It was the 
 first time she had beheld sculpture etherial- 
 ized by strong eifects of light and shade. 
 And while imbibing with these overpower- 
 ing appeals to her bewildered senses, the 
 perfume of exotics of unimagined fragrance, 
 — the blue nymphea of Egypt and volcameria 
 of Java, Caroline Myrton, transfixed on one 
 of the tissued flower-beds of Sallandrouze, 
 had some cause for conceiving she had en- 
 tered into a new world. 
 
 The kind old Marquis, on seeing her 
 alone, hurried forward with all the polite- 
 ness of the old school, to offer her his arm 
 through the throng ; which, however, throng 
 was none, — the size and system of the house 
 being opposed to those social blunders of 
 modern times. 
 
 " Let me take you to my niece and daugh- 
 ter, who are in the music-room," said he. 
 And they accordingly made their way slowly 
 through the highly-decorated apartments ; 
 Lord Harringhurst pointing out to her as 
 they went, certain matchless objects of art, 
 of European renown ; and enjoying, as if 
 in behalf of a daughter of his own, the
 
 ' THE POPULAR MEMBER. 139 
 
 admiration lavished on her beauty. On 
 reaching the music-room, the impetuous wel- 
 come of Lady Mary exceeded what, from 
 another person might have been consi- 
 dered the limits of good breeding. But, 
 like Cleopatra, the young heiress was accus- 
 tomed to find defect a virtue, and to hear 
 "the holy priests bless her when she was 
 riggish." — 
 
 " Our difficulties are at an end, dear 
 Helen !" cried she to her cousin, seizing Mrs. 
 Myrton, and disengaging her from her fa- 
 ther's arm. " Here is everything you want ! 
 — Malibran has disappointed us," she con- 
 tinued, turning towards Caroline ; " and the 
 beautiful trio from the Gazza Ladra I have 
 heard you sing so divinely, was just about 
 to be erased from the programme. — Pray 
 secure us the delight of hearing it, by af- 
 fording your assistance ? " 
 
 Any other woman in London than Mrs. 
 Myrton would have instantly excused her- 
 self; for any other would have known that 
 the performers awaiting beside Lady Mary, 
 the reply of the new comer, were no other 
 than Tamburini and Lablache. But Caro-
 
 140 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 line as naturally mistook them for amateurs 
 like herself, as Lady Mary conceived that 
 the voice she had admired in Yorkshire as 
 SO sweet and powerful, and the style as 
 so pure and decided, entitled her friend to 
 be heard in concert with the finest singers 
 in the world. 
 
 " It is scarcely fair of you, my dear child, 
 to impose such a tax upon Mrs. Myrton's 
 good-nature, the moment she enters the 
 room ! " remonstrated Lord Harringhurst ; 
 and immediately, to screen Lady Mary from 
 anything so unusual as reproof on the part 
 of her grandfather, Caroline, advancing with 
 a smile towards the piano, expressed in a 
 few simple words her satisfaction at being 
 of use. 
 
 " I thought so ! — a singer! " was the gene- 
 ral whisper of those whose curiosity was 
 previously excited by the appearance of the 
 beautiful stranger so feted by the Bonville 
 family ; and concluding her to be some di- 
 vine signora from Naples or Milan, whose 
 talents were about to convulse with admira- 
 tion our novelty-seeking world of fashion, 
 they prepared themselves to listen with en- 
 thusiasm to the new performer.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 141 
 
 Mrs. Myrton was really a remarkable 
 singer. A fine voice and perfect ear, distinct 
 enunciation and exquisite taste, supplied 
 the want of those mechanical graces to 
 which modern virtuosi have accustomed our 
 ears. But to the artists present, the velvet 
 richness of that young and unstrained voice, 
 possessed as great a charm as, to the rest 
 of the assembly, a certain fervour of ex- 
 pression, doubtless resulting from the unpre- 
 cedented excitement of mind of the per- 
 former. An almost poetical elevation of 
 thought was engendered by the coup d'ceil 
 of those cJief d'ceuwes, — by that fragrant 
 atmosphere,— by the graceful forms around 
 her. — She sang as she had never sang be- 
 fore. She sang so that all present felt they 
 could not be satisfied till they heard her 
 again. Lablache, with a sort of paternal 
 enthusiasm, patted her approvingly on the 
 shoulder, as he might have done the ab- 
 sent Marietta. Tamburini, observed that for 
 one of his country to hear a voice so exqui- 
 sitely melodious, ''faisait die Men a Vdme ;" 
 and the fine ladies thus guaranteed in their 
 approval, placed no bounds to their praise.
 
 142 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 " Come with me into the refreshment room, 
 and take some tea or mac6doine," whispered 
 Lord Alan, quietly drawing her arm under 
 his, as she stood, the centre of a circle of 
 worshippers, and hurrying her away. But 
 the moment they reached the gallery in 
 which the refreshments were served, in- 
 stead of approaching the table, he coolly 
 deposited her on one of the sofas filling the 
 embayed windows overlooking the park. 
 
 " A little pure air will be the best re- 
 freshment,^' said he, leaning from the win- 
 dow to enjoy the fragrance of the gardens 
 beneath. " Pray pardon my having carried 
 you off, like a second Perseus!" continued 
 he, " but I foresaw a thousand mischiefs, 
 my dear Mrs. Myrton, from your remaining 
 in the music-room. You w^ould, certainly, 
 have been tormented into singing again; and 
 I shall never forgive my sister Helen for 
 having allowed you to do so even once." 
 
 Having prepared herself for a repetition 
 of the compliments her performance eli- 
 cited from all present, Caroline was a little 
 surprised. 
 
 " Lady Mary knows no better," said he ;
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 143 
 
 " Lady Mary is a child. — But Helen ought 
 to have been more considerate." 
 
 " You seem to grudge me the pleasure 
 of having been of use," replied Mrs. Myr- 
 ton ; " and, so ably as I was supported, my 
 weakness was overlooked in the strength of 
 others." 
 
 " I dare say, you are as well aware of 
 your strength as my sincerest compliments 
 could render you," was Lord Alan's reprov- 
 ing retort. " You must know that you sing 
 like an angel. But the better the worse, 
 considering you have shown yourself as 
 obliging as you are accomplished. Before 
 you leave this house to-night, you will be 
 having the Dowager Duchess of Bray, Lady 
 Fawsley, and Lady Alicia Wendover, be- 
 seeching your acquaintance ; and probably 
 twenty more of those pitiful creatures, the 
 givers of amateur concerts ; w^ho attract good 
 company to their house by the promise of 
 good music which they are too stingy to pay 
 for." 
 
 Mrs. Myrton smiled at this proof of her 
 companion's perspicacity ; for, already, two 
 out of the three he named, had pressed
 
 144 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 through Lord Harringhurst for an introduc- 
 tion. 
 
 " You are not at present on your guard," 
 he resumed, " against these harpies of Lon- 
 don fashion ; creatures in whose composition, 
 as in that of Corinthian bronze, the basest 
 metals combine with the noblest. I would 
 never pardon my sister, if I found she had 
 caused you to be invited about as ' that hand- 
 some Mrs. Myrton, who sings so divinely, and 
 is such a useful acquaintance !' — -an insolence 
 of which these women are fully capable." 
 
 " You are making me and my music of 
 more consequence than we deserve," said 
 Caroline, insensibly flattered by his anxiety 
 on her account. 
 
 " Of more consequence than you will per- 
 haps become aware of deserving, till it is too 
 late," was his petulant reply. " The beau 
 monde of London, so little and yet so great, 
 — so great, yet so little, — must be either sub- 
 mitted to, or subjected by a cowp de main. 
 The indolent prefer the former alternative, 
 as being the least trouble ; and thereby chain 
 themselves to an oar and hard labour for 
 life ; whereas, those who have courage to
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 145 
 
 make a strong effort in their own defence, 
 may cross their arms in idleness for the rest 
 of their days. 
 
 Fling but a stone, the giant dies. 
 
 and where one has to choose between mas- 
 ter or slave, it is surely pleasanter to ob- 
 tain the upper hand ?" 
 
 "Let us hope my case may not be so 
 extreme : or, at all events, that I may not 
 have sold myself into bondage, — and for a 
 song!" — said Mrs. Myrton, amused to per- 
 ceive that, among the groups passing be- 
 fore them from the refreshment tables, she 
 was honoured with familiar bows by the same 
 haughty guests of Lady Hilliard, who, in 
 Grosvenor Square, had regarded her so coldly. 
 
 " Take my word for it," resumed Lord 
 Alan, "that you have but to throw your lasso 
 dexterously over the neck of the world, to 
 reduce it, as the people of the Pampas do 
 their wild horses, to instant tameness. 
 Should the vice of the animal at some future 
 moment revive, only show it the lasso, and 
 it will tremble in every limb." 
 
 " You will find me anything but an apt 
 scholar in these occult sciences !" said Caro- 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 146 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 line, " for I have no wish to be either freer 
 or more arbitrary than my neighbours. What 
 right have any of us to assume in the world 
 the part of spectators? — We are all per- 
 formers alike, for the general good and en- 
 tertainment; and I am willing to earn my 
 share of pleasure, by a share of toil." 
 
 " I see you are determined to rush head- 
 long into perdition by showing yourself 
 amiable and obliging, when you ought to be 
 selfish as an oyster!" said Lord Alan, rising 
 because Mrs. Myrton, having risen, made a 
 move towards the table where tea was dis- 
 tributing. — " But remember my prophesy, 
 that you will repent your virtues, when it is 
 too late ! — I was in hopes of serving, as the 
 13iece of worthless metal that becomes in- 
 valuable as a conductor to divert the fatal 
 fluid from some beautiful edifice. But alas ! 
 you choose to defy the storm ! And here 
 comes the first flash, in the shape of Lady 
 Alicia Wendover, hoping you will do her 
 the favour to remember a very small party 
 at her house, on the fourth of July. To- 
 morrow morning, you will receive her im- 
 pertinent card, with ' music early ^ on the
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 147 
 
 corner. And *in the sweet pangs of her 
 ladyship's early music, remember me !'" 
 
 A moment afterwards, Caroline found 
 herself with a cup of tea in her hand, and 
 Lady Alicia smiling her into a most familiar 
 acquaintance with one of Cartwright's most 
 artistic sets of teeth. — But Lord Alan would 
 not allow her fully to justify his prognosti- 
 cations. 
 
 " I hope you have come to thank me, Lady 
 Alicia,'* said he, "for endeavouring to per- 
 suade Mrs. Myrton to join your party on the 
 fourth of July. Unfortunately, she has two 
 engagements on that night ; one to my cousin 
 Lady Mary, who has promised us music; the« 
 other, to some country neighbour, who would 
 apply lucifer matches to Mr. Myrton's family 
 seat, were she to be thrown over. — Shall I 
 get your ladyship an ice? — Where is Wen- 
 dover to-night ? — At the house of course ?" 
 said he, besetting ^he intruder with civilities, 
 which, on the part of the Duchess of Droit- 
 wich's son, were not to be rejected. 
 
 And by the time they turned again towards 
 Caroline, she had quitted the room, on the 
 arm of Lady Mary De Bruce. 
 
 H 2
 
 148 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Et chercharjt tous les jours sans jamais rien trouver 
 Fatiguee de penser, je me mis a rever. 
 
 Paul de Musset, 
 
 Either from the same proud reserve which 
 produced the silence of Myrton concerning 
 his parliamentary triumphs, or because she 
 perceived that he was desirous of seeing in 
 these worldly honours a creation wholly his 
 own, Caroline said not a word to her hus- 
 band of the admiration her singing had 
 excited at Droitwich House. Or perhaps 
 she wished him to learn from other lips 
 than her own, that there were those in the 
 world still disposed to find attraction in 
 her whom lie had ceased to consider peer- 
 less. 
 
 It sufficed to tell him that she had been 
 flatteringly received, to content his self-love. 
 The point on which she allowed herself to 
 enlarge, was the adulation paid by old and
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER, 149 
 
 young to the heiress of the Marquis of Har- 
 ringhurst. 
 
 *' You sometimes speak of Lady Mary 
 as spoiled and wilful ! " said she ; " but 
 when you have beheld her thus followed 
 and flattered, — all her reckless words ap- 
 plauded, — all her defiances of decorum ad- 
 mired, — you will cease to condemn. I had 
 expected in the class by which she lives 
 surrounded, more elevation of sentiment • 
 There is some excuse for the money- wor- 
 ship of the poor ; but the meanness of these 
 millionaries disgust me." 
 
 Instead of the indi'gnation she expected, 
 Myrton vouchsafed only a smile to her, 
 enthusiasm. The idle, frivolous, and useless 
 class to which she alluded, the popular mem- 
 ber regarded as undeserving a serious thought 
 — except as consumers : contemplating them, 
 not as Bossuet contemplated the flutterers of 
 Versailles, as souls to be won from perdition, 
 but as implements that might be rendered 
 available to the melioration of the mass. 
 Individual follies were beneath the notice 
 of one still in the first bloom of his Ly- 
 curgushood.
 
 150 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 For a thousand circumstances conspire to 
 stimulate the self-consequence of a new mem- 
 ber of Myrton's condition in life. A deposi- 
 tary of the self-loves of half his colleagues, 
 every man's pet theory or specific question, 
 is vented into his ear. The projects and 
 doctrines which others have long been sick 
 of hearing, are reproduced to liim as a new 
 auditor; till he fancies himself the Anar- 
 charsis Cloots of political life. A victim to 
 the yet undenounced bores of the House, he 
 finds himself beset with invitations wdiich 
 wiser men have ceased to accept. His study 
 is crowded with importunate people who 
 have wearied out older members with bills, 
 petitions and intrusions, frivolous and vexa- 
 tious. And when to the prosy solemnity of 
 the bores and flippancies of the oflScious, is 
 added, as in Myrton's case, the confidence of 
 the wise, the deference of the good, and ac- 
 clamations of the multitude, some excuse 
 may be made for the Popular Member 
 betrayed into the delusions of the fly on the 
 wheel ! 
 
 "The Hilliards want you sadly to ^^ a 
 day for dining with them?" said Caroline,
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 151 
 
 soon after the memorable soiree at Droit- 
 wich House. And it was no small satisfac- 
 tion to Myrton, to be able to answer, " Fix 
 one for yourself, my love, whenever you 
 will. But / have engagements for every 
 ex-parliamentary day till the end of the sea- 
 son." 
 
 Not yet sufficiently versed in member-life to 
 suggest that, on certain days when there was a 
 house, he might contrive to dine in Grosvenor 
 Square, she delivered the message precisely 
 as it was given, greatly to the indignation of 
 her sister. 
 
 Not long afterwards, however, it was her 
 own turn to give offence to Lady Hilliard. 
 Sir Frederick and Lady Brabazon, embar- 
 rassed at meeting Mrs. Myrton of Stainhurst 
 at Droitwich House, the Dowager Duchess of 
 Bray's, Lady Fawsley's, Lady Alicia Wen- 
 dover's, and elsewhere, expressed a desire for 
 the pleasure of an acquaintance with their 
 Yorkshire neighbour; when Emily, accus- 
 tomed of old to dispose as she pleased of 
 her sister, instantly volunteered an intro- 
 duction. — "Caroline would, of course, be 
 charmed to know Lady Brabazon. She
 
 152 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 would take an early opportunity of settling 
 it with Caroline." 
 
 But Caroline, though according to Lord 
 Alan Bonville's interpretation, weak enough 
 to sing when requested by the noble patron 
 of her husband, was, on this occasion, inexor- 
 able. 
 
 " As regards myself," said she, " I have 
 no objection to be acquainted with Sir 
 Frederick and Lady Brabazon. But the 
 mere proposition is an offence to the wife 
 of * the Mirabeau of Stainhurst.' " 
 
 " But I have promised them !'' — cried Lady 
 Hilliard. " Consider how ridiculous I shall 
 look, when they claim the performance of 
 my promise /" — 
 
 " Consider how contemptible I should 
 look if compelled to receive the visits of 
 a family which has insulted my husband in 
 the eyes of his whole neighbourhood !" — re- 
 joined Mrs. Myrton. 
 
 " When you know more of the world, 
 Car.," was Lady Hilliard's haughty rejoinder, 
 " you will admit that people in the position 
 of the Myrtons, must always be exposed to 
 such slights, and cannot smooth over their
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 153 
 
 wounds with too much conciliation. Such 
 scars ought to be carefully concealed, and 
 speedily forgotten !" — 
 
 "Perhaps so. But the hand by which 
 the wounds were inflicted can never be 
 grasped as that of a friend," said Mrs. 
 Myrton with resolute composure. " There 
 was a time when the Brabazons' acquaint- 
 ance would have been an honour to me, 
 and was contemptuously withheld. But even 
 were not Sir Frederick Brabazon the enemy 
 and opponent of my husband, Holmedale is 
 no object to me now" 
 
 " You will come to your senses, when 
 this momentary flush of popularity is over !" 
 cried Lady Hilliard, piqued out of all pati- 
 ence ; " and then, for Emily and Robert's 
 sake, repent not having made hay while 
 your sun shone, by establishing yourself in 
 the society of your county." 
 
 " Not at the cost of my self-esteem," re- 
 plied Mrs. Myrton, firmly. 
 
 " Self-esteem, self-esteem ! — Just one of 
 the school-room words with which you and 
 Myrton salve over your consciousness of 
 being parvenus,'' cried Lady Hilliard, in a 
 
 h5
 
 154 ' THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 rage. " If you think that, because that 
 doting old man Lord Harringhurst has drop- 
 ped your husband into parliament like a bale 
 of goods swung round by the crane of his 
 factory, you are raised at once to the level of 
 the Childertons and Brabazons, you will find 
 yourself strangely mistaken. — Look at Silas 
 Horsemonger, who sits for another of Lord 
 Harringhurst's boroughs I" — 
 
 " I need no example to tell me that Myr- 
 ton derives little distinction from his seat in 
 the House," replied Caroline, rising to take 
 leave of the frantic Lady Hilliard ; " but 
 I believe the assurances of the Duke of 
 Droitwich and your friend Lord Carring- 
 ford, that few names have a better chance 
 than his of conferring lustre on the parlia- 
 mentary annals of the age." 
 
 Of this unpleasant conversation, Caroline 
 repeated to her husband only that the 
 Brabazons expressed a desire to make their 
 acquaintance, which she had very civilly 
 declined. 
 
 " I expected as much !" — was Myrton's 
 observation. " I noticed Sir Frederick's sur- 
 prise, the other day, at the Speaker's dinner.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 155 
 
 at the connexions I have already formed. 
 — He sees me surrounded by the first men 
 of the day ; he knows that a public dinner 
 
 is to be given to me at R , at the 
 
 close of the session ; and finds the moment 
 convenient for making demonstrations of 
 civility. — Quite right to refuse !" 
 
 " Myrton has every excuse for deceiving 
 himself/' mused Caroline, after he had left 
 the room ; and what would it profit him to 
 know the truth ? — that Lady Brabazon's sole 
 object in seeking our acquaintance, is to 
 propitiate Lady Mary De Bruce in favour 
 of her brother, Lord Wynwick, of all the 
 admirers of the heiress, the one she least 
 favours ! Were there no House of Commons' 
 and no borough of Brucetown in the w^orld, 
 the overtures of these people would have 
 been made precisely at the same moment," 
 
 Meanwhile, among the vain and idle by 
 whom Mrs. Myrton was now so surrounded 
 as easily to dispense with the acquaintance 
 of a Lady Brabazon of Holmedale, she 
 was still puzzled as to which of the admirers 
 of Lady Mary w^as the one favoured. Was 
 it the mild, silent, dignified Duke of Droit-
 
 156 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 wich ? — was it his caustic younger brother ? — 
 or was it Colonel De Bruce of the guards, 
 the only person who disapproved of her 
 eccentricities, or took the liberty of blam- 
 ing her proceedings ? — Which of these was 
 the alpha, — which the omega ? 
 
 Fully coinciding in the wishes of the 
 old Marquis and the Droitwich family that 
 Lady Mary might exchange her fortune and 
 distinction for distinction and fortune so 
 nearly of equal magnitude, as to secure 
 her against being sought from motives of 
 interest, Mrs. Myrton was forced to ad- 
 mit that, in the more attractive brother of 
 the Duke, her ladyship had nothing to ob- 
 tain but a husband as full of whims and 
 caprices as herself, and little likely to se- 
 cure her permanent happiness. 
 
 " Lord Alan is an agreeable acquaint- 
 ance," said she, by way of sounding the 
 feelings of her young friend. " But his 
 phrases tallies a facettes^ would become ex- 
 tremely tiresome in a companion for life." 
 
 " Tiresome beyond expression. — Nothing 
 wearies the eye like perpetual glitter !" re- 
 plied Lady Mary. "The first time one
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 157 
 
 sees the fireflies in Italy, nothing can be 
 more enchanting : but who would care to 
 have their atmosphere perpetually bright 
 with fireflies V — 
 
 Misdoubting the sincerity of this prompt 
 acquiescence, Mrs. Myrton veered round to 
 the duke, praising the grave simplicity of 
 his manners and disposition. — 
 
 " Of manners gentle, of affections mild, 
 In wit a man, simplicity a child ! " 
 
 quoted the heiress, laughing immoderately. 
 " But if my poor dear cousin's mild af- 
 fections were only a little more ardent, 
 (instead of his whiskers,) and his air a little 
 more manly (instead of his wit), I should 
 be in far greater danger of becoming a ' 
 duchess, than T feel under the present exist- 
 ing circumstances." 
 
 " In short you have determined never to 
 change your name?" — said Caroline. 
 
 " Not out of any affection for Charles De 
 Bruce !" said Lady Mary, becoming serious. 
 " My three cousins seem sadly loth to let 
 me go out of the family ! They consider 
 me as they do my grandfather's pictures and 
 plate, — heir-loom. But Colonel De Bruce
 
 158 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 is as little likely to win me by his ser- 
 mons, as Alan by his epigrams. My cou- 
 sin Charles is, if I mistake not, a Tartuffe 
 en goguettes. The sort of religiosity in ^Yhich 
 he gets himself up, is to me worse than 
 profaneness ! — Charles would have made an 
 excellent abb6 ; but as a colonel in the 
 guards he is detestable !" — 
 
 Mrs. Myrton gave up the point. Inter- 
 rogation, it was clear, would achieve nothing. 
 But during her two hours' daily ride in the 
 park with the Marquis and his granddaugh- 
 ter, she had ample opportunity for obser- 
 vation. It was there the Sir Jameses and 
 Honourable Williams, in whose behalf she 
 was so overwhelmed with dowagerly atten- 
 tions, took occasion to recommend them- 
 selves to her notice. For, much as may be 
 done in the way of courtship in a London 
 ball-room, between the pauses of a quad- 
 rille or of a glass of lemonade too cold 
 or cup of tea too hot to be hastily swal- 
 lowed, the surveillance of the chaperon is 
 easiest set at defiance in the morning-ride, 
 where that vigilant functionary is superseded 
 by some young married relative engrossed.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 159 
 
 by her own affairs ; or some elderly papa or 
 uncle, engaged in prosing with grey-headed 
 or pigtailed contemporaries, over the de- 
 bates of the preceding night, where 
 
 Thrice they reckon o'er their Noes, 
 And thrice they slay the slain. 
 
 Still, the scrutiny of Mrs. Myrton was 
 distanced. Though even on Wednesdays 
 and Saturdays, — the days when the member- 
 horde is let loose like a band of Don Cos- 
 sacks on Hyde Park, — Myrton seemed to 
 consider it infra dig. to idle away his time 
 among fashionable equestrians, Caroline was 
 closely accompanied ; Lord Alan Bonville 
 escorting her on one side, and on the other 
 some musical ally, chosen from among her 
 confederates of the concert-room ; with Lady 
 Mary, her grandfather, and suitors bringing 
 up the rear. 
 
 "I did my best to serve your happiness 
 this morning," observed Lord Wynwick 
 to Lord Alan, as they were lounging together 
 one night in the round room of the opera, 
 between the acts of the ballet. " I joined 
 Sir John Hilliard, concluding he was going 
 to ride with his fair sister-in-law, and would
 
 160 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 introduce me. But notwithstanding all my 
 hints, he contented himself with kissing 
 hands en passant,^' 
 
 "You did not surely suppose she would 
 allow such an animal as Hilliard to join her, 
 while / was with her ?" coolly replied Lord 
 Alan. " The brother-in-law would be worse 
 than the husband ; whom I contrived to 
 make so uncomfortable the first time he 
 ventured among us, that he has conscien- 
 tiously spared us his company ever since !" 
 
 " Like most women brought up in the 
 country, your angel rides divinely !" observed 
 Lord Wynwick ; " Myrton, of course, like 
 a bagman ! — A lumbering dog of his age 
 ought to be careful against placing himself 
 unnecessarily in contact with — " 
 
 " Young puppies of tailor creation !" 
 said Lord Alan, affecting to glance at his 
 own simple dress and finely formed person, 
 but conveying a reproach only to the well- 
 padded figure of his coxcombical compa- 
 nion. 
 
 " One never sees the fellow anywhere but 
 at the House !" added Lord Wynwick, too 
 thickly encased in vanity to be over-sus-*
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 161 
 
 ceptible. " In the world, the popular mem- 
 ber is wise enough to feel himself out of 
 place. He has probably not made up his 
 mind between the varnished boots and yellow 
 kids of St. James's Street, and a sturdy stand 
 by the leather gaiters of the country gen- 
 tleman.'^ 
 
 " If he were a country gentleman, he 
 would not hesitate," replied Lord Alan ; 
 " but he happens to be only a country 
 manufacturer ; — to borrow a word from the 
 French, — an industriel; — not even a man of 
 yesterday, but dating from this very morning ; 
 and he has still to conquer, inch by inch, 
 ground for the pedestal without which no 
 man appears, in our world, in leather gai- 
 ters. Ten years hence, (if champagne and 
 truffles spare us to be a blessing to our 
 country !) we shall find him riding in the 
 park in all the audacious self-i30ssession of 
 quizziness ; and perhaps feel proud of being 
 honoured by his 'how are you V as we pass !" 
 
 Lord Wyn wick shrugged his shoulders. But 
 that he seldom felt sure whether Alan Bon- 
 ville were in jest or earnest, he would have 
 contested the point with such arguments as
 
 162 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 are usually forthcoming from a head bril- 
 liant only with Mirific Balsam. — For want 
 of an argument, in his haste to return to 
 the omnibus box, he retorted by a sneer. 
 
 " Meantime," said he, "you are generously 
 providing a pedestal for the foot of his hand- 
 some wife." 
 
 It was now Lord Alan's turn to shrug his 
 shoulders ; — not from any doubt on Jiis part 
 as to the earnestness or irony of his com- 
 panion ; but in utter compassion towards the 
 short-sightedness of simple mortality. 
 
 While Caroline was thus surrounded with 
 the feverish triumphs of gratified vanity, 
 though her children and herself were con- 
 stant guests at Lord Harringhurst's at Droit- 
 wich House, — though Lablache, of whom she 
 was now the pupil, vaunted her as the first 
 amateur musician of the day, and though 
 there was not a circle in London, to which 
 she might not have procured the most flat- 
 tering access, — soundness of head and heart 
 secured her from the giddiness usually pro- 
 duced by sudden elevation. She had not 
 forgotten Stainhurst or Elm Hill ; and the 
 ground of London consequently remained 
 firm under her feet.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 163 
 
 Meanwhile Myrton, sure of his vocation, 
 and hourly strengthened in his political 
 connexions, was intent upon the purchase 
 of a house, to be in readiness for the ensuing 
 session. 
 
 " You mean, then,'' argued his wife, " to 
 make your business a secondary considera- 
 tion ? For by spending six months of the 
 year in town, secondary it will of course 
 come !" — 
 
 " I intend to reap in my manhood the 
 harvest sown in my youth," was his firm 
 reply. " In the enjoyment of eight thoij- 
 sand a year, I can afford to give myself so 
 responsible a representative in Yorkshire, as 
 will enable me to discharge in person, my 
 higher duties to the country. 
 
 It was not without trepidation that Caro- 
 line in the interest of her children, ap- 
 peared to question the imperativeness of his 
 mission, or the divine nature of his apos- 
 tolate. But she still hinted at the im- 
 providence of expending a considerable sum 
 of money on a London house." 
 
 " A London freehold is as good an in- 
 vestiture for money as any other," replied 
 Myrton, abruptly.
 
 164 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 " But you told me, when the Holme- 
 hanger estate was in the market, that it 
 was not desirable to tie up more money, out 
 of reach of the fluctuations of your busi- 
 ness?" — 
 
 " My dear Caroline," said Myrton, almost 
 angrily, " believe me, I am not overlook- 
 ing, at the instigations of a selfish vanity, 
 either your interests or those of my children. 
 The prospects of Bob and Emily would be 
 better advanced by the consolidation of the 
 connexions I have lately had it in my power 
 to make, than by a few hundreds more or 
 less, in our future incomes. I see you have 
 been conferring with Hilliard. Hilliard can- 
 not pardon my having attained with eagle 
 stoop, the eminence towards which he has 
 so long been ineffectually crawling ! — He 
 cannot forgive my knowing that he joined 
 the Tories, only because the Whigs refused 
 him a peerage. It is wormwood to Hilliard 
 to be forced to admit that my wife has been 
 placed in a position, by my single exertions, 
 which all the efforts of his immeasurable 
 line of ancestors was unable to achieve !" — 
 
 To such a vaunt, how was it possible to 
 reply? — Would the popular member, (as
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 165 
 
 unlike the reserved Robert Myrton, by 
 whom she had been wooed at Stainton Par- 
 sonage as the beautiful idol of Lord Alan 
 Bonville to the sallow girl so grateful 
 for his preference,) be induced to believe 
 that more than half their good acceptance 
 in London society arose from her power of 
 amusing the guests of their aristocratic 
 hosts, without taxing their pockets ; or 
 that half his public success, like that of 
 Sheridan, originated in the beauty of his 
 wife ? — 
 
 She gave up the point. With a heavy 
 sigh, she closed anew within her heart the 
 feelings and perceptions she was about 
 to confide to him ; — feelings of shame at 
 the false position into which they had suf- 
 fered themselves to be forced ; and percep- 
 tions that, if three fourths of the world ap- 
 plauded, there was much to make the re- 
 maining quarter laugh, — much in their " fan- 
 tastic tricks," to make the " angels weep." 
 
 Notwithstanding the vigour of certain fa- 
 culties in Myrton's mind, notwithstanding 
 his perspicuity in questions of political econo- 
 my and government alscience, there were 
 points on which the intelligence of the woman
 
 166 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 of six-ancl-twenty left that of the man of for- 
 ty in arrear. Myrton might entertain farsight- 
 ed \7iews concerning emigration and coloni- 
 zation, municipal reform, paper currency, or 
 free trade. But he was ungifted with the tact 
 to discover that their peculiar position was 
 the result of accident ; that, had not the noble 
 patron of the popular member possessed the 
 childlike simplicity of character of Lord 
 Harringhurst and the comptroller of his 
 magnificent household the inexperience of 
 Lady Mary, they could never have attained 
 their present eminent, or rather conspicuous 
 position ; — that it was the unworldliness of 
 others which made them people of the world. 
 But the tact which effected this dis- 
 covery on the part of Caroline, resulted 
 from a mouthful of the fatal apple of the 
 tree of knowledge ! A single bite of that 
 forbidden fruit imparts worlds of discri- 
 mination ; and the good and evil made 
 manifest by her intimacy with the serpent 
 Lord Alan Bonville, had taught her more 
 than she might have learnt in the course 
 of centuries, in her sequestered Eden in 
 the north.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 167 
 
 But this of course effected nothing towards 
 the enlightenment of Myrton. His ears 
 were closed as hermetically as those of 
 Ulysses against the Syrens. Convinced that 
 his wife, and his wife's family were among 
 those to whom his self-created distinction 
 was a matter of envy, he was not to be 
 dissuaded out of a belief that, had there 
 been no Marquis of Harringhurst, and no 
 borough of Brucetown extant upon earth, 
 the same united powers of mind and purse 
 which had organized the gold-coining fac- 
 tory of Stainhurst, must, sooner or later, 
 have constituted him a leading public man. 
 When, at the end of six weeks, the pair 
 whom it would perhaps be an abuse of 
 epithets now to call the happy couple, quit- 
 ted London, after a flurry of events and 
 impressions such as the great world of a 
 great city is alone capable of imparting, — 
 the mind of our Adam was still turbid with 
 the agitation of uproarious triumph. As 
 regarded the gratification of his vanity, he 
 had fully succeeded ; as regarded the ful- 
 filment of his purposes, he was confident 
 of success. The victory of Myrton of Stain-
 
 168 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 hurst was already achieved. — The victory of 
 the people of England was sure to follow. 
 
 But, alas ! the heart of his gentle Eve 
 was heavy within her. Having discovered 
 that she was naked, she was ashamed ; but, 
 with a heart still pure, by drawing her chil- 
 dren closer towards her, she attempted to 
 screen herself from view. — Though aware 
 that she could never take the same plea- 
 sure as of old in her obscurity at Stain- 
 hurst, — that she should find the old lady 
 inexpressibly tiresome, — the Wynters colder 
 and duller than ever, — Aunt Minchin in- 
 supportable, and even poor Stain ton Par- 
 sonage an encroachment on her time and 
 thoughts, — she admitted that it was only 
 by girding on more closely than ever the 
 yoke of her home-duties, she was likely* to 
 surmount the evil influence of the Circean 
 draught of pleasure she had found so palat- 
 able. 
 
 As they drew towards R late in the 
 
 evening of a beautiful July day, the distant 
 sight of its murky vapours hanging like a 
 blot in the evening sky, instead of pro- 
 ducing feelings of disgust in the breast of
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 169 
 
 Myrton, created the throbbings of gratified 
 pride : for he fancied he had placed him- 
 self so high, as to compel his birthplace 
 to be proud of him. 
 
 As they advanced still further, winding 
 their way along the happy valley over which 
 Stainhurst predominated as a sort of key- 
 stone, the dewy freshness emanating from 
 the fields, the wholesome fragrance of 
 the copses, the rustling of the leaves, the 
 distant call of the shepherds, the bark of the 
 watch-dogs, the thousand indefinable country 
 sounds that emerge from the woods, the wa- 
 ters, the flowery turf, and which not even the 
 grating of the carriage wheels could wholly 
 overcome, spoke powerfully to the soul of 
 Caroline. — It was as the voice calling in the 
 garden to the fallen one of old ! — Happily, a 
 silent tear, that fell amid the glossy curls of 
 little Emily, who was sleeping on her knees, 
 attested that the appeal came not too late ! 
 
 By degrees, as the more familiar environs 
 of home greeted the eyes of the travellers, 
 eliciting exclamations of delight from the 
 now awakened children, the clouds passed 
 from her soul. On reaching the beautiful 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 170 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 little hamlet so admired by Lord Harring- 
 hurst, the workmen and their families were 
 standing at their garden-gates, to cheer the 
 carriage as it passed. The bells of Stainton 
 Church rang merrily, the moment it came in 
 view. She saw that their coming brought 
 gladness ; that their arrival had been anx- 
 iously expected. — Mothers held up their 
 children, — old men stood bare-headed. — A 
 host of duties were awaiting her on her 
 household hearth. — 
 
 " I remember hearing my poor father say," 
 mused Caroline in the secresy of her heart, 
 (as she caught a glimpse of the open drawing- 
 room windows of Stainhurst, where the Lich- 
 fields, the Wynters, and the little old woman 
 were assembled to await them,) " that the 
 agony of getting sober, was enough to cure 
 any one of the vice of intoxication. — Mtj 
 pains and penalties are beginning ! Why — 
 why did we ever stir from Stainhurst !" —
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. l7l 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Thus we debase 
 The nature of our souls, and make the rabble 
 Call our cares, fears ; which will, in time, break ope 
 The walls o' the senate, and bring in the crows 
 To peck the eagles ! Shakspeare. 
 
 How rarely do the persons whose interest 
 it is to render a fireside pleasant, deny them- 
 selves the satisfaction of making it disagree- 
 able ! — Particularly after a long absence ! — 
 The mischiefs, evils, and grievances, amassed 
 in the interim, are sure to be remorselessly 
 discharged on the head of the returning 
 wretch, hoping to . find flowers and welcome 
 on his threshold; — and, high or low, the 
 home from which we have played truant, is 
 sure to have become encompassed with a 
 hedge of thorns. 
 
 Stainhurst was far from an exception. 
 
 Mrs. Wynter, always jealous of Caroline's 
 
 ascendancy in the family, had embraced the 
 
 opportunity to resume her former influence 
 
 I 2
 
 172 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 over the old lady, and foster the malcon- 
 tents of R , rallying under the com- 
 mand of Aunt Minchin. The aged mother- 
 in-law was taught to believe, that the pride 
 of Mrs. Robert Myrton, falsely calling her- 
 self Mrs. Myrton, had rendered their names 
 unpopular in the neighbourhood ; — that the 
 Parsonage took upon itself unwarrantable 
 interference in the aiFairs of the Hall; — 
 and that, if the new factory secured three- 
 fold the revenue of the old, the out-goings 
 were four times as considerable. Her deaf- 
 ness, usually a safeguard against the gossip 
 
 of R , was no security as regarded the 
 
 deliberately malicious communications of 
 her daughter ; and, so far from deriving 
 comfort from the visit of the Wynters, they 
 had filled her heart with anxiety, peevishness 
 and discontent. 
 
 On the other hand, the Parsonage had a 
 thousand affronts to complain of, and the 
 servants a thousand innovations to resent. — 
 Before Caroline retired to rest, she found 
 that a month would scarcely suffice to redress 
 the injuries arising from the mismanage- 
 ments of the preceding two ! —
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 173 
 
 The following day, the nurse and lady's 
 maid, who had accompanied her to town, 
 and even the children, swelled the chorus 
 of complainants. Their rights had been in- 
 vaded during their absence; tlieir places 
 made untenable on their return; — and when, 
 on flying to the Parsonage for relief from the 
 murmurs of home, the first sound that met 
 her ear was, " It is such a relief to have you 
 back again ! — Had you stayed away another 
 week, Lichfield declared he would rather 
 give up the living, than be insulted every 
 hour by the Wynters !" — she thought of her 
 rides with Lady Mary and the pleasant to- 
 pics of enlightened London, — and shuddered. 
 
 But the disgusts of Caroline were, at all 
 events, of a more remediable nature than the 
 vexations experienced by her husband. Part- 
 ly from incidental circumstances, partly from 
 misapprehension of his orders at the factory, 
 everything had gone wrong. The accounts 
 were at fault, — the machinery was deranged. 
 Offence had been taken by two of his most 
 important correspondents, and insubordina- 
 tion prevailed among the workmen. Several 
 had been necessarily dismissed, and were es-
 
 174 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 tablislied in a rival factory ; one of his great- 
 est favourites had absconded to America ; 
 and the new people introduced by these 
 disagreeable changes, unluckily turned out ill ! 
 
 This concatenation of evils had, of course, 
 been progressively unfolded in the letters of 
 the foreman, and his brother-in-law. But 
 engrossed by London engagements, Myr- 
 ton had contented himself with suggesting 
 palliatives and expedients, without bringing 
 home to himself the results of tidings which 
 possessed the vague unreality of all tidings 
 heard from afar. 
 
 The truth was now, however, only too 
 painfully apparent. The eye of the master 
 had been wanting, — the purse and credit of 
 the master must suffer. But while writh- 
 ing under the discovery of the injuries sus- 
 tained by his property, and the ingratitude 
 of his dependents, he was, unluckily, pro- 
 voked into the use of such very parlia- 
 mentary language towards the foreman 
 who thus inefficiently supplied his place, 
 that the man, considering his faithful ser- 
 vice of twenty years to the firm ill-re- 
 quited by such hasty reproof, requested their
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 175 
 
 accounts might be balanced, and a more 
 zealous servitor provided in his room. 
 Knowing his loss to be irreparable in the 
 factory, he chose to make his ungrateful 
 master as cognizant of it as himself. 
 
 And all this pecuniary loss to fall upon 
 the revenues of a man who, for the last 
 four months, had been trebling his usual 
 expenditure ! And all this additional trou- 
 ble and solicitude to devolve upon his 
 shoulders, when he had been looking for- 
 ward to a respite from care, in order to 
 study in the quietude of country leisure, a 
 variety of important questions submitted to 
 his consideration ! Having become pain- 
 fully aware, during his short but stirring 
 parliamentary experience, of the defective 
 nature of his education for a public man, 
 he had resolved to profit by his first unoc- 
 cupied moments to store his memory with 
 precedents, — to familiarize himself with the 
 constitutional history of the country, — to 
 become acquainted with the origin of the 
 abuses he was intent upon reforming ; for it 
 was essential to ascertain the depth of found- 
 ation of the edifice destined to demolition.
 
 176 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 But all hopes of enlightenment were for 
 the present at an end. Even the parli- 
 amentary reports of the preceding session, 
 must remain a sealed fountain. The worry 
 of business was recommencing around him. 
 The petty legislation of Stainhurst absorbed 
 his whole attention. — Radical reform must 
 begin at home ! 
 
 The first question likely to come before 
 Sir Frederick Brabazon, as chairman of 
 the bench of magistrates, was one arising 
 out of a riot at Stainton ; and on Lord Chil- 
 derton's arrival at his Yorkshire seat, he 
 would have the pleasure of learning, as Lord 
 Lieutenant, the irregularities produced in his 
 neighbourhood by the misgovernment of the 
 workmen of the man, whose arrangements 
 was supposed to have shaken to its basis the 
 administration of which he formed a part. 
 And, worse than all, though Myrton had 
 promised to join with his wife a distinguished 
 party, to assemble at Harringhurst Castle 
 for the opening of the shooting season, he 
 saw at once the impossibility of again leav- 
 ing home. It would be an act of madness 
 to adventure further derangement of his 
 affairs.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 377 
 
 "To settle with Johnson, to whom several 
 years' appointments are owing, just now, will 
 be a great inconvenience to me !" said he to his 
 wife, in a reproachful tone, as though she 
 were the origin of the evil. And when Caro- 
 line was rash enough to hazard an ejaculation 
 of thankfulness that he had not further 
 embarrassed himself by the purchase of a 
 house in town, Myrton took refuge in the 
 expression of a wish that Sir John Hilliard 
 would find it convenient to discharge his 
 pecuniary engagements. 
 
 "The first thousand pounds that Hilliard 
 borrowed of me," said he, " was on a pro- 
 missory note at a year's date, — of which, 
 though four have elapsed, not a shilling of 
 principle or interest have been paid ; and I 
 have since been fool enough to lend him 
 eighteen hundred more, which he seems to 
 have equally forgotten. — But those three 
 thousand pounds are too essential to me, 
 just now, to admit of further indulgence. 
 I shall therefore write to him to-morrow.^' 
 
 Caroline, from whom these transactions had 
 been carefully concealed, was dumb from 
 mortification. So serious an addition to the 
 
 I 5
 
 178 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 obligations conferred on worthier members 
 of her family, was as the riveting of a chain 
 of bondage round her neck. From some- 
 thing which had transpired in Grosvesnor 
 Square, during her stay in town, she felt 
 certain Sir John was in no situation to dis- 
 charge his obligations; and that Myrton 
 was far more likely to receive an application 
 for further assistance, than repayment of the 
 sums advanced. What would be the result? 
 Would her husband's indignation fall upon 
 herself? Should she be subjected to further 
 sneers on the part of Mrs. Wynter ; whose cool 
 impertinence, hitherto inexplicable, she now 
 attributed to knowledge of the humiliating 
 obligations of the Hilliard family towards her 
 brother, — of which, nevertheless, she knew 
 no more than the Duchess of Droitwich. 
 
 A few davs afterwards, as Caroline was 
 about to seal a letter to Lady Mary De 
 Bruce who was on a visit at the villa of the 
 Droitwich family in the Isle of Wight, she 
 inquired of her husband whether he had 
 any message to Lord Harringhurst. 
 
 " Thank you ! — I wrote yesterday," was 
 his cold reply. " It was necessary to ap-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 179 
 
 prize him that it will be out of our power 
 to join his party at the castle, in Septem- 
 ber." 
 
 Instead of sealing her letter, Caroline 
 instantly lighted it at the taper to which 
 she was applying the sealing wax, and 
 threw it blazing into the grate. Her ex- 
 pressions of delight in anticipation of the 
 party thus frustrated, would have now been 
 out of place. 
 
 Attributing the sudden movement to 
 petulance, Myrton surveyed with astonish- 
 ment his usually undemonstrative wife ; who 
 sat absorbed in reverie, not daring to inquire 
 the exact terms in which he had phrased his 
 apology, but dreading that his motive might 
 have been so inexplicitly exj)ressed, as to 
 justify a suspicion that he was displeased at 
 the attentions paid her by Lord Alan Bon- 
 ville, — which she knew had, previous to her 
 departure from town, been made the sub- 
 ject of raillery among his roue companions. 
 She even fancied, and with truth, that the 
 courtesies towards her of the Duchess of 
 Droit wich, were somewhat abating. 
 
 But that this coolness arose from either
 
 180 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 moral or worldly uneasiness concerning the 
 proceedings of her son, was an erroneous 
 conjecture. It was on Lady Mary De 
 Bruce's account the Duchess was inclined 
 to look with a less favourable eye on the 
 beautiful wife of the Popular Member. 
 Since Caroline's arrival in town, the Duchess 
 perceived that her son had declined in fa- 
 vour with his heiress cousin ; and as it hap- 
 pened to fall to Myrton's share in the House 
 of Commons to advocate the claims of a 
 body of dissenters in which Colonel De 
 Bruce affected a peculiar interest, a connec- 
 tion and understanding was imputed to the 
 three, so far from existing, that unavowed 
 sentiments of animosity subsisted between 
 the serious colonel and the habitual cha- 
 peron of his attractive cousin. 
 
 " My aunt Droitwich is only a little 
 jealous of you, dearest Mrs. Myrton," was 
 Lady Mary's frank explanation of the 
 change ; " as a President of the College of 
 Physicians might be, who found the obsolete 
 wisdom of his tete a ferruque superseded by 
 the modern proficiency of some practitioner 
 of the day. The Duchess seldom finds her-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 181 
 
 self called into consultation now, even by 
 grandpapa. But since he is one of those 
 who, thinking no evil, can never be per- 
 suaded to believe any, there is, luckily, little 
 fear of his being put out of conceit with the 
 wife of his favourite disciple." 
 
 This interpretation sufficed to Caroline ; 
 who could understand that the almost filial 
 reliance of Lady Mary upon her counsels, 
 might be vexatious to the more qualified 
 members of her family, had she not been 
 conscious that, in listening to the excessive 
 compliments, the moi^e than compliments 
 of Lord Alan Bonville, she was guilty 
 of a fault. And as neither the Duchess 
 of Droitwich, nor her daughter, could ever 
 have been placed in a situation such as 
 hers, fallen from the skies without con- 
 nexion, into the midst of the conflicting scoff- 
 ing, scornful crowd of London fashionables, 
 her husband engaged elsewhere and her 
 side ever left unguarded, it was impossible 
 for them to conjecture how gratefully, yet 
 in how harmless a sense, she had accepted 
 the arm invariably offered to her by one of 
 the nearest relatives of her friend Lady
 
 182 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Mary. From the precedents around them, 
 they had certainly a right to deduce infer- 
 ences of a different nature ; — and Caroline 
 foresaw, with a sickening heart, that her 
 absence from Harringhurst Castle would 
 be attributed by Lady Mary to the justifiable 
 jealousy of her husband. 
 
 But Myrton had other communications to 
 make, scarcely more acceptable than the 
 announcement of his change of plans for 
 the autumn. 
 
 " I am sorry to find from my sister," said 
 
 he, " that the people at R complain of 
 
 our want of hospitality." 
 
 " What people ?" inquired the pre-occu- 
 pied Caroline, in utter absence of mind. 
 
 " You cannot misunderstand my mean- 
 ing !" replied her husband, with an air of 
 displeasure. "Those people, who, having 
 been for many years on visiting terms at 
 Stainhurst, conceive themselves entitled to 
 find our doors open to them for more than 
 a morning visit." 
 
 " Surely you never expressed a wish that 
 any but the Minchins should be invited to 
 dinner !" —
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 183 
 
 " Because their society seemed distasteful 
 to you. Because, like most people newly 
 married, we studied only our mutual incli- 
 nations, regardless of the sacrifices owing to 
 the world. But as we rise in life, our hori- 
 zon widens in proportion to our elevation. 
 I see things now in a more expanded sense. 
 I perceive that we have no right to hold 
 ourselves above our own class, as exempli- 
 fied in many highly estimable families at 
 
 R . I do not ask you, Caroline, to look 
 
 up to the Minchins as elegant or fashionable 
 people, or the Harmans, or Lees, or Grab- 
 sons, or others whom I could name. But 
 I do ask you to be courteous to them ; and 
 not give them the right to suppose we fool- 
 ishly fancy that a few months in London have 
 rendered us greater than themselves." 
 
 Aware that the piques and jealousies of 
 
 R against Stainhurst were of at least 
 
 half a dozen years' continuance, Mrs. Myr- 
 ton was convinced that no such supposition 
 was likely to arise. But it was useless 
 to expostulate. The public dinner to the 
 honourable member for Brucetown which 
 was getting up among the ex-Brabazonized
 
 184 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 liberals of R , sufficiently accounted for 
 
 the instructions she was receiving. 
 
 Involuntarily, there recurred to her recol- 
 lection a prophecy whispered in her ear by 
 Lord Alan Bonville, that a time would come 
 when the aristocratic whigism of Harring- 
 hurst Castle would pale its ineffectual fires 
 in the eyes of the Mirabeau of Stainhurst ; 
 — that Myrton's natural position was in the 
 enemy's camp ; — that it was his birthright to 
 be a tribune of the people, not the maire 
 du palais of a marquis ;— that popularity, 
 like opium, once tasted, engenders an un- 
 eradicable appetite. 
 
 " Before I see you again," was one of 
 Lord Alan's many predictions, "the name 
 of Myrton may have become a watchword. — 
 At some future time, your husband will be 
 a leading man among the radical members." 
 
 Caroline had forgotten the half-murmured 
 quotation from the French dramatist, which 
 formed her own pertinent rejoinder to the 
 remark : ^'Et qu'est ce que la popularitef la 
 gloire en gros sous /" — nor was she, even now, 
 though beyond the reach of Lord Alan*s 
 irony, (an irony which, like the edge of a
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 185 
 
 Damascus blade, cut only the deeper for 
 being steeped in essence of roses,) wise 
 enough to know that the glory of a public 
 man is safer when invested in millions of 
 half-pence, than thousands in gold ; — that 
 there are more light sovereigns current, than 
 defective copper coin ! — 
 
 " Would you wish me to send out cards, 
 then, for a dinner-party to — " she was going 
 to use his own phrase of " these people ;" but 
 on second thoughts, modified it to " the 
 families we visit in R ?" 
 
 " My mother has already done so, at my 
 request," said he. " All I wished to im- 
 press upon you was my wish that you would 
 leave nothing undone to conciliate those 
 who may choose to accept the invitation." 
 
 It was easy to promise compliance ; it 
 was less so to reconcile herself to the change 
 from being the idol of the most refined 
 circles in the land, into the parasite of in- 
 solent vulgarity. 
 
 When Myrton quitted the room, she 
 could scarcely think of him without disgust ! 
 The contact of all that was noblest and 
 most enlightened in England, seemed only
 
 186 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 to have inspired him with ignoble senti- 
 ments. He had not only become worldly, 
 but worldly in the meanest sense. His 
 Machiavelism was wasted upon objects un- 
 worthy a thought from a mind superior as 
 she had once attributed to her husband. 
 Herder's comparison of the head of Goethe, 
 to " a grand cupola lighted from below," 
 involuntarily glanced into her memory. 
 
 " What an accumulation of disagreeables 
 on every side !" mused the disenchanted 
 wife, as she took her solitary way through 
 the shrubbery towards Stainton Parsonage ; 
 — a path she had so often pursued in former 
 years, arm-in-arm with her husband, when 
 the ambitions of both were bounded within 
 the beautiful park developed through its 
 vistas. And having, as she expected, found 
 her sister Louisa busily occupied in cutting 
 out the new dresses she had brought from 
 town for her little nephews and nieces, 
 Caroline had no scruple in inviting Lichfield 
 to walk with her into the village. — She 
 could not trust herself just then alone with 
 her thoughts. 
 
 The plea of the proposal was of course
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 187 
 
 an errand of benevolence. But after com- 
 forting the sick and relieving the poor, for 
 whom a word from her lips, accompanying 
 alms from her hand, acquired a double value, 
 her brother-in-law naturally proposed to 
 accompany her home ; and as a bright Au- 
 gust sun was shining scorchingly upon the 
 hollyhocks of the shrubbery, they doubled 
 the extent of the walk, by pursuing their 
 more shady way along the overarching 
 avenues of the dismantled farm. Overcome 
 by the heat of the day, Caroline proposed 
 resting a moment on a seat placed among 
 the ivy-covered ruins of the old mansion, — 
 the cradle of the Myrton dynasty ; — a spot 
 commanding a noble view of the happy 
 valley of Stainton, with its delicious combina- 
 tion of woods and waters, — the new mansion 
 embosomed in its groves and gardens, — the 
 new factory, affording impulses of vitality to 
 the estate. 
 
 But without indulging in this comprehen- 
 sive survey, the little patch of landscape 
 around them, was worthy the pencil of 
 Hobbima. The stately grove, arching like 
 some groined minster over-head, and exhibit-
 
 188 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 ing on the boles of its gigantic columns, 
 patches of moss intermingled with gleams 
 of sunshine, — the solemn green of the ivy 
 clothing the foundations of the old house 
 opposed to the tender verdure of the herbage 
 around, — the agile sport of the squirrels, 
 leaping among the beech-trees from bough 
 to bough, — the restlessnes of the rooks, caw- 
 ing and circling as if by right of conquest 
 over the deserted avenue, — imparted a charm 
 to the loneliness, enhanced a thousand fold 
 in the eyes of Caroline by contrast with the 
 troubled vulgarities of the great city she had 
 recently inhabited. 
 
 " How tranquil and how charming !" she 
 exclaimed, as they reached this pleasant 
 resting place, which the fervours of the at- 
 mosphere seemed not to have found out. 
 " In former days, I used to bring my work, 
 or a book here on summer evenings. But 
 for years I have not visited the place ! " 
 
 " Like all easily attainable pleasures, it 
 has fallen into neglect," observed Lichfield. 
 " You ought, however, to favour the spot ; 
 not alone for its intrinsic beauty, but as a per- 
 manent standard of the prosperity of the 
 Myrtons.'*
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 189 
 
 Unwilling to dwell upon the point of view 
 thus presented, Caroline began pointing out 
 with the hand of an artist, the beautiful 
 effects of light and shade, produced by the 
 gleams of sunshine penetrating at intervals 
 the gloomy avenue. 
 
 "What prodigality of beauty one finds 
 on the face of nature !" said she. " What 
 myriads of exquisite and elaborate spectacles 
 are perpetually in progress in the heart of 
 the most sequestered solitudes, with no eye 
 to admire, no voice to commemorate ! 
 While we poor mortals cannot accomplish 
 the smallest feat, without sounding shawms 
 and trumpets, and calling a crowd around 
 us to applaud !" — 
 
 " There spoke the experience of the Lon- 
 don beauty, who I am assured, has been 
 witching the fashionable world with her 
 noble horsewomanship, and exquisite sing- 
 ing ! " — was the arch retort of the parson. 
 
 " I concluded that Mr. Perceval, (whom 
 I met one night at Droitwich House,) would 
 bring down some such foolish reports !" said 
 Caroline, blushing. 
 
 " Let us at least be thankful," resumed
 
 190 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 her brother-in-law, " that such dangerous 
 experience has taught you nothing but wis- 
 dom! The dove we imprudently allowed 
 to escape from our ark, has brought back 
 only an olive-branch. I was half afraid, my 
 dear Car., of finding a sprig of foil or tinsel 
 in its beak !" 
 
 " No great matter what / have brought 
 back," replied Caroline, rallying her spirits ; 
 " since my mate is loaded with laurels.'' 
 
 " Of which, believe me, we are more than 
 sufficiently proud," cried Lichfield, with 
 honest warmth. " I expected great things 
 from him, but he has surpassed my expec- 
 tations. Myrton is a wonderful creature. 
 Myrton possesses a fervour of head and 
 heart, which I little suspected under his 
 former shyness. Since I first knew him, my 
 admiration has been a matter of daily pro- 
 gress. No duty seems above or below his 
 powers ; and I anticipate his attaining a level 
 as far higher than now, as his present dis- 
 tinctions exceed what, ten years ago, one 
 expected at his hands." 
 
 " God grant it ! " was Caroline's earnest 
 rejoinder. " But our career has been hither-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 191 
 
 to SO completely on the sunny side of the 
 hill, that I dread the impartiality of Pro- 
 vidence. A vessel is never in such peril 
 from sunken rocks, as when approaching the 
 shore at the close of a prosperous voyage." 
 
 " Hitherto, I admit, Myrton has had no 
 animosities to contend against," replied Lich- 
 field, gravely. " The moment a man stands 
 upon a pedestal, he must stand firm, for 
 there are thousands of enemies on the watch 
 to accomplish his overthrow." 
 
 " Thousands of enemies, without counting 
 injudicious friends," added Caroline. " The 
 thing I fear most for my husband is his 
 being instigated into attempting too much." 
 
 " I felt sure the great ladies would make 
 an alarmist of you, Car. !" cried the parson, 
 good-humouredly tapping her arm with the 
 stick of the parasol he was carrying. " So 
 much the better! There will need, per- 
 haps, some drawback to the extremities 
 to which the people hereabouts are desirous 
 of inciting their Rienzi. I, who mean to 
 obtain lawn-sleeves under Myrton's auspices 
 somewhere about the year 1850, (when our 
 heads will be shaking, but our principles,
 
 192 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 I trust, as firm as now,) am deeply inte- 
 rested that he should not allow any of his 
 hobbies to fly away with him. In matters 
 so nearly concerning the public weal as 
 politics, a good safe-pacing mule is a better 
 beast to bestride than Pegasus itself. Talk- 
 ing of bishoprics," added Lichfield, " you 
 will be glad to hear that I have an ail-but 
 promise of the next prebend that falls vacant 
 at York. Do not mention it to Lou., how- 
 ever, who would not rest in her bed till the 
 thing was accomplished. With my wife, as 
 with most women, Hope is a disease, — a 
 sort of intermittent fever ; — whereas, in my 
 mind, it exercises only the same influence 
 as the sun on the landscape around us, — 
 altering none of its features, but conferring 
 an additional charm." 
 
 " And a charm how exquisite !" exclaim- 
 ed Mrs. Myrton, with a degree of emotion 
 which she rose and proposed resuming their 
 walk, only to conceal. For she knew that 
 Lichfield must estimate too highly the ad- 
 vantages of her position, and the bounty of 
 Providence by which they were vouchsafed, 
 to have much patience with her craving
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 19 
 
 o 
 
 after a passion created by heavenly mercy 
 for the solace of the unfortunate. — 
 
 But so little did that excellent man sur- 
 mise of the present state of her mind, that 
 he would have laughed at the mere idea 
 of the wife of the Popular INIember being so 
 much as cognizant of the existence of pa- 
 tience, or of hope. 
 
 By the eyes of her family, Mrs. Myrton 
 was still regarded as the happiest woman in 
 the world ! 
 
 VOL. L K
 
 194 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 " All modem energy of soul seems to concentrate itself into 
 love of Liberty, — the Religion of the new era ; — a religion, like 
 that of Jesus, j^reached to the poor and not to the rich, — and 
 having also its gospels, its martyrs, — its Judas ! " 
 
 " Liberty may constitute a new faith," replied his friend, 
 " whose worship is daily extending upon the earth. But just 
 as, in embracing Christianity in the olden time, every nation 
 fashioned its laAVS and observances according to their own 
 wants and character. Liberty must learn to adapt itself to local 
 interests and national customs." — Translated Jrom Heine. 
 
 The sanctuary of Stainhurst once thrown 
 
 open to the agitators of R , no further 
 
 enjoyment of home for Caroline Myrton ! 
 Her faith in the highmindedness of her 
 husband was destroyed, — her pride in him 
 was gone. If heretofore unable to admire 
 him in the light of a polished corner of the 
 temple, she had worshipped the simple dig- 
 nity of the Druidical stone ; and to find 
 him, like the unjust steward, preparing, at 
 conscience-cost, a good berth for himself, 
 when Brucetown should have gone the way
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 195 
 
 of all rotten boroughs, was humiliation 
 indeed ! — 
 
 The banner of Democracy once openly un- 
 furled over the roof of Myrton, the malcon- 
 tents of the county rallied eagerly round the 
 standard. Every private pique arising from 
 municipal oppression, or fiscal exactions, — 
 every personal grievance against Lord Chil- 
 derton, or grudge against Sir Frederick Bra- 
 bazon, — was placed in his hands, as in those 
 of the universal champion. Not a Tory land- 
 owner in the neighbourhood of R could 
 
 prosecute a poacher or a trespasser, but 
 Myrton was expected to be up in arms, in 
 defence of the culprit. He was elected the 
 ringleader of every petty opposition; and 
 required to keep his time at the disposal of 
 the large and influential class which had 
 accused him of insolence, in private life, 
 till he chose to assume the onerous charge of 
 its field-marshalship, in public. 
 
 To reconcile herself to these changes, to 
 school herself into a patient fulfilment of 
 the disagreeable duties which now marred 
 her privacy, Caroline had frequent recourse 
 to the society of Lichfield. The respect 
 
 K 2
 
 196 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 with which Myrton was spoken of by his 
 brother-in-law, seemed to subdue her irrita- 
 tion of spirit, while the calm good sense 
 and warm good feeling governing his views 
 of life, in every particular, were as manna 
 to the cravings of her mind. 
 
 The Stainton parson felt almost as much 
 surprised as gratified, at the frequency of her 
 demands upon his leisure, to be the com- 
 panion of her rides and walks : how little 
 surmising that she was advisedly refreshing 
 herself with the wholesome waters of sweet 
 counsel ! — 
 
 Such efforts are seldom made in vain. 
 After some weeks spent at home, the in- 
 fluence of the sober habits, the beautiful 
 scenery, the quiet studies of Stainhurst, 
 had almost restored her to herself. Her 
 village duties were of a very different nature 
 from the fine-lady beneficence of Lady Hil- 
 liard of Hilliard Park ! The population over 
 which she exercised an influence, exhibited 
 not the servile character of mere tenantry. 
 The Stain tonians were to be wooed, and not 
 dragooned, into accepting instruction for 
 themselves at the parish church, or for their
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 197 
 
 children at the village school. If refractory, 
 the thousand arms of a score of factories at 
 
 R were open to receive them ; nor was 
 
 ejection from Stainton, as from the farms of 
 Holmedale or Childerton Manor, a fiat of 
 ruin and disgrace. After the recent disturb- 
 ances, moreover, it became doubly impor- 
 tant to conciliate and civilize the new 
 comers ; and the Brabazons were not a little 
 amused to learn from Pomposo Perceval, — 
 who, like a bat, hovered between the rival 
 factions, — that those who were desirous of 
 an interview with the beautiful Mrs. Myrton, 
 must look for her in the Lancastrian classes, 
 or almshouses, or spinning-school of her 
 village. 
 
 It was impossible, however, for the re- 
 cluse not occasionally to indulge, in spite 
 of principle or philosophy, in the pathetic 
 ejaculation of Selkirk in his desolate island, 
 
 M.J friends, — do they now and then send 
 A wish or a thought after me % — 
 
 for whatever might be their thoughts and 
 wishes, it was not often they took an epis- 
 tolary shape ! Between Stainhurst and Hil- 
 liard Park there was one of those complete
 
 198 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 breaks so often the result of pecuniary obli- 
 gation; and Lady Mary De Bruce was the 
 sort of enthusiast sure to be engrossed by the 
 engouement of the passing moment, into for- 
 getfulness of friends who were out of sight. 
 Having accompanied her grandfather on a 
 tour of his Irish estates, immediately after 
 the breaking up of the shooting party at 
 the castle, Mrs. Myrton heard of her further 
 movements, and those of her family, only 
 through the medium of the newspapers ; and 
 could scarcely resist a smile when she some- 
 times compared her present Ovidian exile 
 with her recent position, as the centre of 
 the gorgeous circle in which she had been 
 worshipped as a divinity ! 
 
 " The natural and proper result of dispro- 
 portionate friendships !^^ was her sage reflec- 
 tion on the change ; — nor was she blind to 
 the probability, that the decided part her 
 husband was taking in county politics, would 
 create still wider estrangement between 
 Stainton and Harringhurst Castle. The draw- 
 bridge at present uniting them, for mutual 
 service and availibility, could at any moment 
 be drawn up at pleasure, on the side of the 
 castle.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 199 
 
 Just, however, as she was preparing for 
 the happy home-celebration of Christmas, 
 (which it was no small comfort to her to 
 find the old lady had promised to spend 
 with her daughter Mrs. Wynter,) a letter 
 arrived from Lady Mary, enclosed in one 
 from the Marquis to the member for Bruce- 
 town, insisting upon seeing them at, rather 
 than inviting them to, Harringhurst ; where 
 the family had that moment arrived from 
 Ireland. The old Lord adverted to a variety 
 of plans for the approaching session, which 
 he was desirous of confiding to his political 
 neophyte ; his young grand-daughter to im- 
 mediate pleasures, which would lose half 
 their charm without the participation of her 
 friend. 
 
 As Myrton had taken their former ex- 
 cuses upon himself, Caroline resolved to 
 leave those of the present occasion also in 
 his hands: for that any other answer than 
 an apology would be returned, she did not 
 surmise. 
 
 "They want us, I see, on the twenty-se- 
 cond ; but it will be impossible for me to 
 leave home before Christmas eve," was his
 
 200 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 only observation, after perusing the two 
 letters. 
 
 " Surely you do not think of accepting the 
 invitation?" — said his wife, with crimsoned 
 cheeks. " We have never yet been absent 
 at Christmas from Stainhurst.'" 
 
 " Till this year, we were never away at 
 Midsummer. But does that entail an inevit- 
 able obligation?" 
 
 " Christmas and Midsummer are so differ- 
 ent in importance ! At Christmas, it seems 
 a duty to be at home. Our poor people 
 will feel themselves aggi'ieved by our ab- 
 
 sence." 
 
 " Not if their coals, and blankets, and 
 good cheer are forthcoming," replied Myr- 
 ton coldly. 
 
 " But even your mother will be away ! — 
 Mrs. Myrton has promised Sophia to go 
 to High Bennington." 
 
 " That, indeed, removes the only obstacle 
 to our joining the Harringhurst party," 
 rejoined her husband. "I was afraid my 
 mother might be offended at being left alone. 
 As it is, Lichfield will undertake the usual 
 distributions, and Louisa preside at the
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 201 
 
 school children's dinner. It will be a o^reat 
 bore oiF your hands." 
 
 " And a great pleasure lost to Robert 
 and Emily, who are invited to accompany 
 us to the castle, and to whom Christmas 
 at home is the great event of the year !" 
 said Caroline, who felt that they ought not 
 to be tempted into this party of pleasure. 
 
 " As if the children would not be fifty 
 times more amused in a new scene like 
 Harringhurst 1" 
 
 " More amused, perhaps ; — but it was not 
 of their amusement I was thinking; and 
 
 surely the R people, whom you have 
 
 lately seemed so desirous to conciliate, will 
 be affronted if we are absent at the time 
 of their Christmas ball, and annual festivi- 
 ties at the Athenaeum ?" — 
 
 " The members of the corporation of R 
 
 (the only portion of the population you have 
 ever seen me attempt to conciliate) are too 
 wise in their generation not to be better 
 pleased at finding me the centre of one of 
 the first liberal circles of the kingdom, than 
 sharing the twelfthcake buffooneries of their 
 humdrum town. Where am I more likely 
 
 K 5
 
 202 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 to attain the power of forwarding their in- 
 terests than at Harringhurst ? — These are 
 not times when an Horatius Codes saves 
 the country, single-handed ; and they are 
 aware that the more intimately I league 
 myself with an influential party, the more 
 capable I become of benefiting them and 
 theirs. Lord Harringhurst is a demigod 
 in their sight. But for the favour shown 
 me by him, never should I have become 
 a prophet in my own country." 
 
 After a few more faint arguments in fa- 
 vour of their mincepies and holly-bushes, 
 to satisfy the qualms of Caroline's consci- 
 ence, the invitation was accepted. Nor 
 is it to be supposed that her regrets were 
 of a very poignant nature ; for, in the 
 
 same postbag which conveyed to R her 
 
 letter of acceptance, were two for the south- 
 ern post, containing instructions to a Lon- 
 don music-seller and mantua-maker, con- 
 cerning new dresses and new music. A 
 velvet gown and Marschner's last opera had 
 suddenly become indispensable. 
 
 Next to the uneasiness already described 
 of approaching a home from which we have
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 203 
 
 been long absent, may be cited that of re- 
 joining friends from whom we have been 
 secretly striving to disunite ourselves. As 
 we receive anew their protestations of affec- 
 tion, every mental argument we have been 
 exercising against them seems to echo re- 
 proachfully in our ears, like the crowing 
 of the cock in those of Peter. Caroline 
 could not forget how often she had denied 
 to Lichfield and his wife the imputed as- 
 cendancy over her mind of the circle of 
 which she was now once more a part ; — that 
 she had met with malignant defiance certain 
 imputations on the part of Mr. Perceval 
 touching her Bonvillemania ; — that she had, 
 in short, ever since she parted from them 
 in London, been labouring diligently to for- 
 get the words of their lips, the charms of 
 their deportment, the fascination of their 
 praise. 
 
 " If you did but know,** cried Lord Alan, 
 who was one of the first to rush forward 
 and welcome her to the Castle, " how often 
 I have tried to screw my courage to the 
 audacity of writing to inquire after your 
 health ; and afterwards, to coax myself into
 
 204 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 the forbearance of not sending my letter ! 
 For, after all, what right had I to hope you 
 would reassure, by an answer, the anxiety 
 which might be interpreted into an offence ?" 
 
 Fortunately, Mrs. Myrton was too speedily 
 surrounded by persons equally eager to re- 
 new their London acquaintance with her, 
 to be compelled to reply. The party at 
 the castle having been some days assem- 
 bled, had already organised its holiday plea- 
 sures of tableaux, charades, proverbs, plays, 
 concerts, and mazurkas, in all of which a 
 place had been reserved for herself: and 
 thus, the grave matron and active bene- 
 factress of Stainhurst found herself suddenly 
 and irresistibly whirled anew into the vortex 
 of frivolity. 
 
 " Thank goodness, you are come ! Your 
 excellent taste will set us all to rights !'' 
 exclaimed Lady Mary De Bruce ; who, hav- 
 ing no longer a starched aunt Droitwich or 
 gentle cousin Helen at her elbow, was grown 
 more reckless than ever. " We have a 
 charming little theatre and wardrobe pre- 
 pared for us ; and I scarcely know how to 
 begin. I do not choose my cousin Alan-a-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 205 
 
 dale yonder to be manager ; because he 
 presumes to say that, since I returned from 
 Ireland, there is a touch of brogue in my 
 French. But you will keep him in order ! 
 Alan dares not call his soul or heart his 
 own, in dear Mrs. Myrton's presence." 
 
 When once more alone in dear Mrs. Myr- 
 ton's presence. Lord Alan hastened to whis- 
 per apologies for his cousin's indiscretion. 
 " Lady Mary," he said, " had no right to 
 betray his secrets ; especially within hearing 
 of those who might place an illiberal con- 
 struction on her chimeras." 
 
 But the order of the day had now to be 
 proceeded to. All that want of experience, 
 want of taste, want of judgment, want of 
 temper, and want of patience, could do to 
 render the attempt abortive and ridiculous, 
 was effected by her fashionable guests, to mar 
 the projects of Lady Mary. Such as are 
 ambitious of studying egotism and affectation 
 in their higher branches, cannot take a better 
 vantage ground than the theatricals of some 
 mansion of distinction ; for between those 
 who would, and those who would not, or ra- 
 ther between those who would not what the
 
 206 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 others would, and those who would what 
 the others would not, there seemed as 
 little probability of forcing the self-love of 
 the party into bloom by an actual perform- 
 ance, as of creating a Garrick for their go- 
 vernment. 
 
 Weary of their indecision, Mrs. Myrton 
 was suddenly tempted to exercise the power, 
 a boast of which brought Eleanora de Ga- 
 ligni to the scaffold, (the influence of a 
 strong mind over weak ones,) and take upon 
 herself the arduous task of management ; 
 when lo ! the chaos which seemed to come 
 again, was again reduced to order. The parts 
 distributed by so fair a hand, could scarcely 
 be refused : the difficulties smoothed by so 
 mild a voice, could not be re-urged. Two 
 days after her arrival, they were rehearsing, 
 with a remote prospect of success ; and 
 once more in enormous conceit with them- 
 selves and their undertaking. 
 
 " I should like to write a play-bill rai- 
 sonne^ for our performance," whispered Lord 
 Alan to the manageress one day, as he 
 took her in to luncheon after the rest of 
 the party had dispersed into their rooms to
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 207 
 
 study their parts. " I would announce that 
 'Infant Prodigy, Lady Clara Vere, who 
 came out fifteen years ago ;' and who, as 
 she has ever since been growing a year 
 younger per annum, (according to her lady- 
 mother's account,) must now be entitled to 
 a coral and bells ; yet, you saw how bent 
 the poor little infant was on playing Lady 
 Teazle. Next, I would have Lady Alicia 
 Wendover, * for this night only, a victim 
 TO MAUVAiSE HONTE ;' for, pray admire, that 
 on the stage she, whom I have seen stare 
 the ' household brigade out of countenance, 
 never raises her eyes from the toe of her 
 shoe. — Lady Fawsley, whose Stentorian 
 voice has reduced his lordship and Fawsley 
 Hill to Muscovite subordination, and who 
 minces her part with the plain tiveness of 
 a sucking dove, should be announced, as 
 'Zephyrine, from the Theatre des Va- 
 RiETEs/ with Parson Perceval as her Abbe 
 Chaulieu." 
 
 " In short, you would fain throw the 
 apple of discord among those whom I have 
 so patiently drilled into unanimity !" replied 
 Caroline. " Surely, if it be the policy of
 
 208 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 this house to give the children toys to 
 play with, in order that the grown-up peo- 
 ple may enjoy their j^olitics unmolested, 
 you^ as Lord Harringhurst's nephew, need 
 not be the first to hamper the machinery 
 by the introduction of a pebble ?" — 
 
 Instead of an open laugh at the techni- 
 cality of such a figure of speech on the 
 part of the manufacturer's wife, Lord Alan 
 assigned another motive for his merriment. 
 
 " You are really, then, so parliament- 
 bitten," cried he, " as to believe, with the 
 newspapers, that these Christmas parties at 
 Harringhurst, or Howick, or Woburn, or Wal- 
 mer, or Alnwick, are so many numberings 
 of the tribes of Whig and Tory ? — You fancy 
 that because, thirty years ago, my poor dear 
 uncle was viceroy of Ireland, or Lord High 
 Steward, or Lord Low Chamberlain, or the 
 Lord knows what that carries a white wand, 
 he cannot be easy, at threescore years and 
 fifteen, without ' mumbling the game he 
 is no longer able to bite V " — 
 
 " At any other moment," was Caroline's 
 reply, a little piqued at being made the ob- 
 ject of his raillery, "I should be inclined
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 209 
 
 to ascribe more wisdom to Lord Harriiig- 
 hurst's grey hairs ! But considering that 
 the infant, over whose birth he rejoiced 
 in his youth, is grown to maturity — "" 
 
 " Hear, hear, hear, hear, hear !" — inter- 
 rupted Lord Alan. 
 
 " Considering," resumed Mrs. Myrton, re- 
 solved not to be bantered into silence, *' that 
 we are supposed to be on the eve of a great 
 national crisis—" 
 
 *' I see you are determined to drive me 
 mad !'' cried Lord Alan, pretending to stop 
 his ears. " I have heard as much said on 
 twenty occasions, since I emerged from my 
 pinafore ! To say the truth, (and to you 
 whose family tree is rooted at Hilliard 
 Park, I may say it without fear of offence,) 
 this crisis-phobia appears to^ me the greatest 
 mischief connected with the employment of 
 'parvenus in posts of state. Arriving from 
 the outskirts of the crowd, breathless with 
 amazement at all they behold upon the 
 -forum, and big with the apprehension of 
 a prodigy, — they cannot restrain their cla- 
 mour. In families such as ours, such as 
 the Russells, such as the Grenvilles, where
 
 210 'fBE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 protocol-reading — and — writing (as Dogberry 
 would say) comes by nature, the legends and 
 archives of our house supply too many ex- 
 amples of political mole-hills which were 
 esteemed mountains in their day, to admit 
 of our swooning every time the frenzy of a 
 leading article foretels the nature of a tra- 
 gic session ! — The gallery at Droit wich Cas- 
 tle contains portraits of half a dozen pilots 
 who weathered half a hundred storms be- 
 tween the wars of the two Roses, and the 
 Catholic Question. However, it is but na- 
 tural and praiseworthy on your part to 
 fancy that the earth did quake when the 
 honourable member for Brucetown was born; 
 and that his Samsonian hands are to bring 
 down the dry-rot-ten edifice of the unreform- 
 ed House of Commons on the heads of 
 the Philistines !"— 
 
 Caroline was angry with herself for being 
 amused, when she felt that she ought to be 
 offended. 
 
 " It is now m7/ turn to favour you with 
 a cheer !" said she. " But one so bitter at 
 retort, ought surely to be good at reply ; and 
 I begin to wonder it was not a sister's son.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 211 
 
 rather than a brother's, whom Lord Harring- 
 hurst formerly brought in for Brucetown. 
 Why not, at least, serve the party you hold 
 so cheap, by a piquant pamphlet ? — A stroke 
 of your brilliant pen would have more peril 
 in it than twenty of their swords." 
 
 " Thank you ! In these days of universal 
 scribbledom, it is something to have escaped 
 the baptism of ink ! " replied Lord Alan. 
 " Not that I have escaped it by more than 
 a hair's- breadth ! I once penned a certain 
 something, and despatched it for publication 
 to a fashionable bookseller. But it was 
 written, alas, in such plain English, that his 
 dunce of a reader mistook it for Hebrew, 
 and returned it with a polite intimation 
 that they did not deal in foreign literature ! 
 When riding together, you have sometimes 
 seen me uncap to a gentleman in black, who 
 from my air of deference, you probably mis- 
 took for the prime minister, or my dentist, 
 or the head-master of Eton. It was simply 
 the bibliopole whose want of erudition pre- 
 served me from unjustifiable gentlemancide ! 
 I often think of writing memoirs of my 
 escape from the Republic of Letters ; in the
 
 212 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 style of Louis the Eighteenth's first and 
 unique flight, only that the court and parlia- 
 ment of literary beasts might enact a court 
 mourning on learning what a Mirandola 
 they had lost. — Hurrah ! Thank heaven you 
 have finished your partridge ! This is the 
 third time Perceval has thrust his lurcher 
 head into the room, to see what we were 
 about ; et si la seance se prolonge, it is all over 
 with our reputations ! " 
 
 A sudden transition from the sobrieties 
 of Stainhurst to all this movement and pro- 
 digality, was to the mind of Caroline as the 
 spring-tide that sweeps away the foundations 
 of some important lighthouse. How was 
 it possible for her to recur without disgust 
 to her heavy labours of hospitality towards 
 
 the narrow-seeing people of R ; to the 
 
 tedious details of economy by which she had 
 been attempting to remedy the evils of pre- 
 vious extravagance ; — to the cheerlessness 
 of exercising talents there were none to ap- 
 preciate, graces, there were none to applaud ? 
 The leperous distilment of flattery, now 
 poured anew into the porches of her ears,
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 213 
 
 borrowed yet more fatal subtlety from pre- 
 vious privation ; for where is the woman who 
 can listen without danger to praise that 
 affects to be irrepressible, or sighs that pre- 
 tend to be unheard ? — 
 
 It was something, at least, that she was 
 conscious of her danger. If the fair vessel 
 were fated to go to pieces on the rocks, it 
 was not for want of consulting the compass 
 and lead. She knew herself to be in shal- 
 low water. 
 
 The struggle of conscious emotion having 
 imparted to her debut on the stage all the 
 thrilling power which had distinguished her 
 former efforts in the concert-room, she half 
 determined to pretend illness, that she might 
 not be again exposed to the fervour of ad- 
 miration excited by her performance. But 
 after overhearing the spiteful remark of 
 Lady Alicia Wendover to Lord Weymouth, 
 that " nothing could evince greater shallow- 
 ness of feeling than Mrs. Myrton's acting, — 
 that her pathos appealed only to the nerves, 
 not to the heart !" she disdained to recede 
 before a cabal. She would not have it re-
 
 214 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 ported of her at Holmedale, that the imper- 
 tinence of the fine ladies had driven her 
 from the stage. 
 
 Upon all these passages, Myrton looked 
 down with a sense of gratified superiority. 
 Unaware of the secondary consequences they 
 might produce, he did not appreciate the 
 influence of the attitude taken by a public 
 man in private life, over the form and co- 
 louring of his existence. It never once 
 occurred to him that the sneers originating 
 in a green-room at Harringhurst Castle 
 might expand into public depreciation and 
 contempt. So few of us pause to examine 
 the ballot perpetually exercised against us 
 by the world ! For public men, indeed, 
 such a scrutiny is impossible. Instead of 
 the leisurely ascent of a scale del giganti, with 
 commodious landing-places enabling the lite- 
 rary aspirant to a pinnacle of a temple of 
 fame, to consult the svbilline books of the 
 critics for the progressive measure of his 
 merit, a public man is condemned to the 
 clumsy ladder of a Walloon coal-mine, four- 
 teen hundred feet perpendicular, where, to
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 215 
 
 pause midway for a glance into the abyss 
 below, or upwards to the glimmering sky, 
 would render the head dizzy, and the foot- 
 ing insecure. 
 
 Every day after dinner did Myrton re- 
 joice in the signal afforded by the arrival of 
 some new parliamentary man, to draw his 
 chair closer to the venerable Marquis, after 
 the departure of the ladies, for the examina- 
 tion of the shadows cast forward bv the 
 coming session ; the political disputants 
 being divided into the two great families 
 into which Sancho Panza divides mankind, 
 — those who have property, and those who 
 have not. The old Marquis, however, whose 
 mind was transparent as the crystal palace 
 of the fairy tale, might have been mistaken 
 for one of the poorest relations of the un- 
 endowed moiety of Sancho's family of the 
 human race. 
 
 "Is Mr. Myrton coming?" inquired Ca- 
 roline, one evening, of Lord Alan, when he 
 made his appearance behind the scenes of 
 their little theatre, as the curtain was about 
 to draw up for the performance of " Three
 
 216 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Weeks after Marriage," in which she was 
 thought to rival the " Jeune femme colere^'' 
 of Mademoiselle Mars. 
 
 " I was not aware that we had the honour 
 to reckon him among our dramatis "per- 
 soncB /" was the formal reply. 
 
 " I meant to inquire whether he were 
 among the audience," said the lovely Lady 
 Elizabeth of the night. 
 
 " Among the audience collected round 
 Silas Horsemonger, whom I left preaching 
 to four empty claret bottles and six empty 
 heads, upon the new and original text of 
 borough-barter/' replied Lord Alan. " Mr. 
 Myrton has been wasting torrents of elo- 
 quence since you left the room ; in persuad- 
 ing Wynwick that he will be a much more 
 honourable member when his contests for 
 Wynwicksham cost him ten thousand pounds 
 septennially, than by sneaking into parlia- 
 ment gratis, as his family have done any 
 time since Cromwell's ! It would do your 
 heart good to see the devout patience under 
 his sufferings, by which poor Wynwick tries 
 to recommend himself to my uncle, as the 
 direct road to the hand of my uncle's grand-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 217 
 
 daughter. It did mine evil, — and, like 
 Satan, I have long exclaimed, * Evil ! be 
 thou my good!' — to glance from the synod 
 of wishy-washy politicians surrounding my 
 venerable kinsman, to the portraits on the 
 wall of Burke, Fox, North, Sheridan, Wind- 
 ham, Horner, in whose days there were 
 giants on the earth. — I remember one day 
 at Rome, Comte Borghese persuaded me 
 to accompany him to the senate. The 
 Roman senate, — a name to make one's 
 heart thrill ! — And with what do you 
 suppose we found the Conscript fathers oc- 
 cupied? — Their senatus consultus contain- 
 ed neither more nor less than the weekly • 
 tarift' of the price of beef and mutton in 
 the Papal city ! — Even to such base uses 
 are the good old Whigs coming at last !" 
 
 Luckily, the irritation of Lady Elizabeth 
 Freelove found a ready issue on the stage ; 
 and the jeune femme colere accordingly top- 
 ped her part. Between the absence of 
 Myrton and the impertinence of Lord Alan, 
 the passion of Petruchio's Katharine was 
 torn to rags. 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 218 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Amid all this chatter and glitter, the 
 short winter days passed unperceived away ; 
 and Caroline could scarcely persuade her- 
 self that the holidays were at an end, 
 when she heard the words " meeting of 
 parliament," so often and strenuously pro- 
 nounced, as to remind her only too disagree- 
 ably, that her husband was about to pro- 
 ceed to town alone ; and that, till Easter, 
 she was to undergo the peine forte et dure 
 of making a deaf old woman hear and a 
 cross old woman contented ; and to pour oil 
 
 upon the raging billows of R , in order 
 
 to tranquillize the puddle in a storm ! 
 
 And what would she have given to have 
 remained a week or two at the castle after 
 the departure of the Marquis and his guests ! 
 But Lord Harringhurst had promised to 
 deposit his grandchild with the Duchess, 
 on his way to London; and even had not 
 the Yorkshire party been thoroughly broken 
 up, Caroline had noticed, on more than one 
 occasion, a degree of pettishness towards 
 her on the part of Lady Mary De Bruce, 
 which disinclined her for the tete-a-tete.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 219 
 
 " Young as she is, I thought her supe- 
 rior to the childishness of jealousy of a wo- 
 man eight years older than herself, who is 
 somewhat more self-possessed as an actress !" 
 was Caroline's secret reflection upon this 
 first manifestation of personal caprice on 
 the part of the heiress. "But Lady Alicia 
 and Lady Fawsley have probably been poi- 
 soning the pin's prick, by their malicious 
 interference !" 
 
 She bad adieu, therefore, to her young 
 friend with unabated regard and regret ; 
 and received the farewell greeting of the 
 old Marquis, with all her former sense of 
 his kindliness, courtliness, and distinction de 
 grand seignew\ 
 
 " Farewell, dearest Mrs. Myrton !" said 
 Lord Alan Bonville, in his turn, respect- 
 fully kissing her hand at the foot of the 
 grand staircase, in view of the whole circle. 
 " May we meet again at Philippi, and en- 
 joy more rides after Easter in the park, 
 that is, unless the prophecy of your ter- 
 rible Jonah, that after forty days Nineveh 
 shall be destroyed, should be accomplished 
 
 L 5
 
 220 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 in the interim ! — Somehow or other, I am 
 not afraid ! — Mr. Myrton is an excellent 
 man ; but I doubt whether something more 
 than a vir probus be not wanting to shake 
 a great nation in its shoes. — Beg him to be 
 merciful with us ; and, from the bottom 
 of my heart, farewell !"
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 221 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 A handful of Roman dust flung to the winds of heaven by 
 the dying hand of the last of the Gracchi, a victim of the 
 patricians, gave birth to Caius Marius ; less glorious through 
 his victory over the Cimbrii, than for having delivered his 
 native country from the yoke of an oppressive aristocracy. 
 
 MiRABEAU. 
 
 On her return to Stainhurst, Caroline 
 found Mrs. Myrton returned from High 
 Bennington, with anything but favourable 
 dispositions towards her. The more poor 
 Caroline's accomplishments elevated her 
 above the level of the Myrtons, the stronger 
 grew the old lady's attachment for the 
 daughter whose habits of life were more 
 congenial with her own ; — and Mrs. Wynter, 
 who till her brother's marriage had exer- 
 cised unlimited influence over his mind, and 
 never forgiven the wife by whom it was 
 suddenly superseded, neglected no opportu-
 
 222 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 nity of placing the conduct of her sister- 
 in-law in the most unfavourable point of 
 view. 
 
 Eager that her own ill-favoured children 
 should engross the affections and inherit the 
 savings of their grandmother, the rearing 
 and education of the little Myrtons, so 
 different from that bestowed upon their 
 father and aunt, was constantly held up 
 to condemnation. Mrs. Wynter expressed, 
 as often as the speaking trumpet would 
 allow her " hope that it might end well;" — 
 that such wicked extravagance might not 
 bring down the vengeance of heaven on 
 her father's roof. But she had never ex- 
 pected better from a match so imprudent 
 as that of poor Robert. 
 
 Scarcely therefore, had the Mirabeau of 
 Stainhurst proceeded to town for the meet- 
 ing of parliament, (with a sense of self-con- 
 sequence little inferior to that with which 
 his prototype presented himself at the gates 
 of Paris as deputy to the Etats G6n6raux,) 
 when Caroline discovered that she should 
 have to contend incessantly and hopelessly 
 against the old lady, in the exercise of the
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 223 
 
 authority delegated by her husband over his 
 factory and workmen. 
 
 Having accepted the responsibility solely 
 to satisfy the anxiety of Myrton on quitting 
 home, she became harassed, indeed, when 
 she found his mother following and beset- 
 ting her whenever she attempted a visit to 
 the works, or an interview with the foreman ; 
 as if jealous of having it supposed in the 
 village that she was less than paramount 
 throughout the whole establishment of 
 Stainhurst. 
 
 Right glad, therefore, was Caroline that 
 she had obtained Myrton's permission to 
 have her pretty sister on a visit, during 
 his absence. The presence of a third person 
 would be a security against petty bicker- 
 ings ; and Esther was every way qualified 
 to interest those better feelings once more 
 disturbed from the even tenor of their way. 
 An accompanying letter from Mrs. Hilliard, 
 expressed peculiar satisfaction in the visit. — 
 
 " When I remember, dear Car.," wrote her 
 mother, " that your unexceptionable mar- 
 riage arose from a visit to Stainton, I can- 
 not but experience the pleasantest an-
 
 224 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 ticipations in seeing your sister become your 
 inmate." 
 
 And Caroline fell forthwith into a fit of 
 musing upon the chances of human des- 
 tiny ; since, had the visit in question been 
 to Hilliard Park instead of Stainton Par- 
 sonage, she might perhaps have chanced 
 on a companion, of tastes congenial with her 
 own; — one who would not have embraced 
 his vocation as a citizen with such impe- 
 tuosity as to lose sight of his affections as a 
 husband; or fancied it necessary to bright- 
 en the obscurity of his birth, by the co- 
 ruscations of parliamentary glory. She felt 
 that were there another Robert Myrton 
 in the neighbourhood, she should not find 
 courage to recommend him to the accept- 
 ance of Esther. 
 
 Meanwhile, the instalment of Miss Hil- 
 liard at Stainhurst, was every way an ad- 
 vantage. Esther was a simple-hearted, un- 
 affected creature, who, knowing no more 
 of life than was comprised in the house- 
 holds of her mother and younger sisters, 
 regarded Caroline as invested with imperial 
 grandeur. To her, R was a gay me-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 225 
 
 tropolis ! She was delighted to drive in 
 the pony-phaeton with Mrs. Myrton, to 
 perform the round of visits which Caro- 
 line found so irksome ; and her genuine 
 admiration of the fine flowers, fine clothes, 
 and fine children of the Minchinites, ac- 
 complished more in the way of friendly 
 feeling than all the forced endeavours of 
 the Member's wife. It is diflScult to 
 maintain animosities against a beautiful girl, 
 having a sweet voice, prepossessing man- 
 ners, and an open heart ; and those who de- 
 spised the poor-spirited Mrs. Lichfield, and 
 disliked the high-spirited Mrs. Myrton, ex- 
 tended the right hand of fellowship to the 
 younger sister, whose tastes had not been 
 over-refined by the influence of Hilliard 
 Park. While Caroline devoted a portion 
 of every day to imparting instruction to the 
 half-educated beauty, she was unwittingly 
 receiving lessons in her turn from Esther's 
 warm and thankful sense of enjoyment : 
 which exhibited the liveliness and naivete of 
 Lady Mary De Bruce, without her selfish- 
 ness and caprice. 
 
 It was as the dawning of April weather 
 
 L 5
 
 226 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 redolent of field-flowers, after a bitter March, 
 to listen to the effusions of Esther's simple 
 heart, after all the spite and termaganey 
 of a Lady Alicia Wendover, or a Lady Faws- 
 ley. The affectionate girl, so accurately 
 versed in the names and ages of all her 
 little nephews and nieces, and which of them 
 had had the scarlet fever and which the 
 hooping cough, (all excepting those at Hil- 
 liard Park, with whom, even had the plague 
 broke out among them, she would scarcely 
 have ventured to sympathize, so unapproach- 
 ble a personage was the haughty Emily 
 esteemed at Elm Hill !) was just then the 
 very companion for Mrs. Myrton, at once 
 discontented with her lot, and penitent for 
 her discontent. 
 
 " You never ask me to walk with you now, 
 dear Car. ?" — said Lichfield, one day, on the 
 threshold of her village-school. *' So much 
 the better. While you have such a com- 
 panion as Esther, I am reconciled to my 
 loss. Had I found you prefer to hers the 
 company of a fellow scarred over like my- 
 self, with the sinfulness of human nature, I 
 should have given some faith to the scandals
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 227 
 
 Perceval was lago-izing into my ears t'other 
 day at the quarter-sessions. But it acts 
 as an ordeal to spend one's life with a 
 guileless creature like Esther. Nothing 
 but conscious innocence would risk itself 
 in contact with her white-winged purity of 
 nature." 
 
 " I would rather have dispensed with my 
 absolution on penalty of knowing that Mr. 
 Perceval has been defiling my name among 
 the rubbish of country gossip ! " rejoined 
 Caroline, her face crimsoned by vexation. 
 " This accounts for the unnatural amenity 
 
 vouchsafed to me yesterday at R . Those 
 
 people fancied they were practising magna- 
 nimity and forbearance ! — I wonder Mrs. 
 Minchin did not desire me to go and sin 
 no more !" 
 
 Lichfield was amazed at her warmth of 
 resentment. He had not supposed that a 
 mind so superior as Caroline's, could be 
 ruflded by the inventions of a despicable 
 fellow like Perceval. — Her perturbation 
 made him uneasy. — Whence this strange 
 susceptibility ? — What had she to resent ? 
 — What had she to fear ? —
 
 228 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Again, with the honest trust of good faith, 
 he reasoned himself out of his alarms. It 
 was impossible that the woman so content 
 to enjoy a sociable evening by his humble 
 fireside, to listen to the trivial nursery and 
 household confidences of Louisa, to solace 
 the sufferings of the village sick and counsel 
 the backslidings of the village frail, should 
 be the heartless, giddy creature described by 
 the honourable and reverend. So long as 
 Caroline Myrton remained the guardian 
 angel of her factory people and the pains- 
 taking mother of her children, he was re- 
 solved to believe her the faithful wife of 
 her husband. 
 
 A few days after this conversation, Lich- 
 field surprised Mrs. Myrton in the midst of 
 a singing-lesson to Esther, in which the 
 latter did credit both to the preceptorship 
 of her sister and the genius of the family ; 
 when the hostess of Stainhurst, remember- 
 ing, while they sat together at luncheon, 
 his charge against her of seeking him no 
 longer as the companion of her walks, in- 
 vited him to accompany them the round of 
 the village ; and to prolong, as on a former
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 229 
 
 instance, their return home through the 
 avenues of the old farm. 
 
 " Bob and Emily assure me the banks are 
 already covered with violets," said she. 
 " Every spring, those beautiful southern 
 slopes are sheeted as by a bleachery, or 
 a fall of snow ; and when the sun is on 
 them, the scent of field violets is, in my 
 opinion, far more delicate than those of the 
 garden or conservatory." 
 
 " Violets seem to have lost half their 
 charm," observed Esther, "since the tree 
 violet gave them to us all the year round. 
 A violet at midsummer is out of nature ! — 
 One used to love them so dearly, when they 
 seemed to breathe the breath of spring !" — 
 
 " All flowers have been stripped of a por- 
 tion of their attraction by horticultural pre- 
 miums," observed Mrs. Myrton. " There is 
 no longer the charm of spontaneousness in 
 their growth. Even Nature has ceased to 
 be natural. If electricity gild refined gold, 
 the Horticultural Society has taught us to 
 paint the lily. Even the factory people's 
 gardens pretend to hard names and scientific 
 culture."
 
 230 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Before the bright March sun ( which 
 glowed so ardently on the leafless branches 
 of the shrubberies that the tiny buds might 
 be seen expanding and assuming a tinge 
 of green under its influence) abated in bril- 
 liancy, Lichfield escorted them to the spot 
 where the accuracy of little Robert's asser- 
 tions was to be verified ; and true it was 
 that the atmosphere of the old avenue was 
 embalmed with violets ! So mild, too, was 
 the day, that they ventured to rest upon 
 the favourite seat in order to divert them- 
 selves with watching the fussy activity of 
 the rooks, and listening to their hoarse dia- 
 logues from nest to nest. Esther and Lich- 
 field protested they could discover, from the 
 changes of intonation, which were the happy 
 menages ; which of the sable croakers were 
 bad neighbours, — which the Percevals, — 
 which the Mrs. Minchins of the rookery ! 
 
 " I shall not ask Jean Jacques Rousseau, 
 If birds confabulate or no/' 
 
 said Mrs. Myrton, laughing ; " for since 
 the owls of Sultan Mahmoud, none of those 
 conversational birds appear to have said 
 anything much to the purpose. But, as 
 far as — '^
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 231 
 
 " Who is Robert bringing towards us 
 across the paddock?" suddenly interrupted 
 Lichfield. "A stranger? — Probably some 
 person on business, who has mistaken his 
 way to the factory." 
 
 " It does not look like a person on busi- 
 ness : it must be a gentleman !" cried Esther, 
 having directed her eyes towards the path 
 pointed out by her brother-in-law ; and, in 
 order to qualify herself to act as umpire be- 
 tween these conflicting opinions, Caroline, 
 who was rather short-sighted, put up her 
 glass. Lichfield, at the same moment, 
 fixed his eyes on her face, for a solution 
 of the problem ; when, to his utter amaze- 
 ment, he saw the ever brilliant complexion 
 of Mrs. Myrton deepen to the tint of the 
 pomegranate blossom, and her eyes become 
 suffused with tears. 
 
 What was the meaning of this emotion ? 
 — Who was this mysterious stranger? — The 
 suspense of ignorance could not be much 
 further prolonged ; for every moment he 
 drew nearer, with his little conductor bound- 
 ing on before to show him the way, till 
 he stood within a few paces of the ruins, 
 midway in the old violet-scented avenue.
 
 232 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Yet Caroline made no move from her 
 seat, — Caroline uttered not a syllable of 
 salutation. All the announcement of Ro- 
 bert, as he approached the ivy bench, was, 
 " Dear mamma, a gentleman !" the coun- 
 tenance of that dear mamma avouching 
 that the gentleman was anything but a 
 stranger. 
 
 Before a word was exchanged between 
 them, Lichfield was afraid he saw how it 
 was. — Yet, but for the malicious insinua- 
 tion of his scandalous brother of the cloth, 
 the apprehension would not have entered 
 his head which instantly suggested the 
 name of Lord Alan Bonville ! 
 
 " May I hope to be pardoned, dear Mrs. 
 Myrton," said the intruder, as if desirous 
 to anticipate her greeting, " for having pre- 
 sumed to recollect that Stainhurst is with- 
 in visiting distance of Holmedale, where 
 I am spending a day or two ? I always 
 profit by my uncle's absence from Yorkshire 
 to keep up my Tory intimacies." 
 
 " Delighted to see you !" faltered Mrs. 
 Myrton ; " though, I own, I had rather you 
 came from any other spot than the enemy's
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 233 
 
 camp. Let me introduce you to my sister. 
 My brother-in-law, Mr. Lichfield, of Stain- 
 ton, — Lord Alan Bonville ! " 
 
 When hats had been duly taken off and 
 bows exchanged, the visitor observed, that 
 " the former part of the introduction might 
 have been spared ; — that Miss Hilliard's 
 family resemblance spoke for itself." On 
 which hint, the confusion of Esther, by 
 raising her complexion to the same crim- 
 son hue glowing in the cheeks of Caroline, 
 did but increase the likeness. 
 
 Lord Alan, satisfied that the gentleman 
 in black could not fail to be a county ma- 
 gistrate, took early occasion to rhapsodize 
 concerning the excellence of the road be- 
 tween Holmedale and Stainhurst : " a cross- 
 road, yet kept up like a gravel-walk !" The 
 village, too, came in for its share of his lord- 
 ship's civilities. "The church and church- 
 yard were worthy the pencil of Van Hooghe. 
 He owned he had entertained the prejudice 
 
 of ignorance against the environs of R . 
 
 In thinking of it, he must have had Bir- 
 mingham and Manchester in his mind. And, 
 after all, he could call to mind no lovelier
 
 234 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 spot in England than that happy valley ; — 
 woods, waters, acclivities, — pleasant vil- 
 lages, — thriving farms, — a charming sample 
 of English peace and prosperity ! — Such a 
 landscape as the one he was looking upon 
 was a credit to the county, and a comfort 
 to the eye and heart !" 
 
 Poor Lichfield began to have a better 
 opinion of him. Had Lord Alan been the 
 London roue represented, his eyes would 
 surely have fixed themselves on the lovely 
 faces by his side, not on the landscape at 
 his feet. 
 
 Lest he should pay his addresses too as- 
 siduously to the parish and its parson, Caro- 
 line now attempted to give a turn to the 
 conversation by inquiries after Lady Mary 
 De Bruce. 
 
 " One of the chief objects of my visit 
 here," he replied, " was to make the same 
 inquiries of yourself. Since the dispersion 
 of our stage-struck company, I have been 
 repenting at leisure on the other side the 
 Tweed, in a round of visits among my Scotch 
 cousins ; and my sister Helen is so bad 
 a correspondent, or, rather, considers me
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 235 
 
 SO little worth writing to, that she has 
 left me meanwhile in the dark as to the 
 cousin under my mother's roof. I was in 
 hopes you might give me some idea of 
 what they were all doing at Droitwich ?" 
 
 " Like Lady Helen Bonville, I am a 
 bad correspondent," ^ replied Mrs. Myrton. 
 " Aware that a spot (to the homeliness 
 of which you are henceforward qualified 
 to bear witness) affords nothing likely to 
 make my letters amusing to Lady Mary, 
 I have never written to her since my re- 
 turn home." 
 
 " I am certainly able to bear witness to 
 the number of home attractions likely to 
 render you careless of the claims of your 
 friends," replied Lord Alan, apparently ad- 
 dressing the complimentary part of the 
 speech to Esther ; when Caroline, as if 
 suddenly aware of the inhospitality of re- 
 ceiving in the open air the visit of one 
 who had ridden so great a distance, pro- 
 posed returning to the house. It was, per- 
 haps, because the evening sun elicited ad- 
 ditional perfumes, that she fancied, as they 
 all sauntered down the avenue together, the
 
 236 THE POPULAR MEMBER. ' 
 
 fragrance of the violets ten times sweeter 
 than before. 
 
 Lord Alan flattered himself that, by ac- 
 cepting the offer of refreshment, he should 
 break the formality of the visit ; for how 
 was he to infer such a difference of hours 
 between Holmedale and Stainhurst, as to 
 guess that the sisters had already taken 
 luncheon? When they entered the din- 
 ing-room, from whence the servants, unap- 
 prized of a new guest, had not yet cleared 
 away the dirty plates and chicken bones, 
 he had the vexation to perceive, by the 
 heightened colour of Caroline, that he was 
 only creating further embarrassment. 
 
 There was nothing — no, not one single 
 object, in that square, unmeaning eating- 
 room (the lofty proportions of which served 
 only to demonstrate its nakedness), capable 
 of promoting conversation. No family por- 
 traits, — no hunting-piece of Snyders, — not 
 even a modern picture by Ward or Fer- 
 nelly, " portrait of a favourite hunter, or 
 pointer," to adorn those stuccoed walls ; nor 
 bust on bracket or pedestal, of Roman Em- 
 peror or modern statesman. The only ob-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 237 
 
 jects unconnected with the business of the 
 table were a horrible vase and pair of obe- 
 lisks of Derbyshire spar, purchased forty 
 years before by the old people, at Matlock, 
 on their bridal excursion ; and, for the senti- 
 ment's sake, still maintaining a place of ho- 
 nour on the chimney-piece ! — 
 
 " The view from these windows is rather 
 pretty in summer," observed Caroline, 
 hoping to direct Lord Alan's attention from 
 the table where two awkward left-legged 
 country-footmen, radiant with yellow plush 
 and livery buttons, were making renewed 
 preparations ; and compassionating her em- 
 barrassment, he forthwith proceeded to the 
 window, and gazed with considerable interest 
 on the wooded knoll from which he had 
 been gazing at the house ten minutes before. 
 On both occasions, he was probably conjec- 
 turing the direction of Stainton Parsonage, 
 and how soon its proprietor might find it 
 agreeable to go and worship his household 
 gods ! 
 
 Had not Lichfield's mind misgiven him 
 that it was the duty of his cloth, as a sort 
 of honorary chaplain at the Hall, to stay
 
 288 THE POPUPAR MEMBER. 
 
 and do the honour of the sherry and 
 madeira to the noble guest, he had been 
 already gone ; for it was the modest dinner 
 hour of the Parsonage, and he feared Louisa 
 might be waiting. And when, Lord Alan 
 having eaten, drunk, and chatted the while 
 to the general satisfaction, Caroline led 
 the way from the dining-room, the parson 
 seized the opportunity of crossing the hall 
 to make his escape. 
 
 " Here, indeed, I recognize your appro- 
 priate atmosphere !" cried Lord Alan, as 
 they now entered the morning-room, simply 
 furnished, but opening into a beautiful con- 
 servatory. " This I could at once suppose 
 to be a haunt of yours !" And his ecstacies 
 at the sight of several beautiful family 
 miniatures, painted by Mrs. Myrton, would 
 have appeared exaggerated to any one but 
 Caroline's sister, and Caroline's self. He 
 next admired the work-frames — (he could 
 not be far amiss, — they must belong to 
 Esther, or Mrs. Myrton !) and ended by im- 
 ploring his hostess to indulge him with the 
 beautiful ballad of " Forced to doat on 
 thee," melodized by Mrs. Wolff, which had
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 239 
 
 SO often transported him at Harringhurst 
 Castle. 
 
 To plead a cold after having been found 
 seated on a bench under leaftess trees in 
 the month of March, was out of the ques- 
 tion ; and Caroline accordingly sat down 
 and sang to him, with a voice full of tears, 
 and a heart full of shame : — Esther declaring 
 with truth (a little provoked by Lord Alan's 
 silence at the end of the ballad) that never 
 had she heard her sister sing so exquisitely 
 before. 
 
 In order to silence her ill-timed enthu- 
 siasm, Caroline requested her aid in a duet ; 
 and the sweetness with which they executed 
 together a pretty notturno of Amedee de 
 Beauplan enabled their sole auditor to yield 
 the praises due before, but which he had 
 found himself unequal to utter. 
 
 Song now succeeded song, — duet, duet — 
 Two sisters passionately fond of music, and 
 so to seek for an audience, were excusable per- 
 haps for yielding to the eager solicitations 
 of a visitor capable of appreciating their 
 performances. 
 
 "Do you recollect the advice you once
 
 240 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 gave me, never to sing when I was asked ?" 
 said Caroline, in answer to Lord Alan's 
 entreaties for a little Corsican air he had 
 taught her in town, and which she sang to 
 perfection. And while vindicating himself 
 by reminding her that it was only towards 
 con cert- givers he had recommended her to 
 be churlish, and that he had neither house 
 nor instrument he could call his own where- 
 with to torture the good-will of his virtuosi 
 friends, leaning as he spoke, his elbow on 
 the piano as an excuse for looking full in 
 the face of Caroline, the door opened ; and a 
 little old woman in a black mode cloak and 
 bonnet, made her appearance, escorting an 
 individual who had very much the air of a 
 gendarme or tambour-major, disguised as a 
 woman for a carnival ball. 
 
 " My sister Myrton insisted on bringing 
 me home to dinner, with her !" cried Mrs. 
 Minchin, who often accompanied the old 
 
 lady back from her daily airings to R ; 
 
 and the greetings of the two children, who 
 had stationed themselves for an hour past 
 at their friend Lord Alan's knee, to " Aunt 
 Minchin," sufficed to attest the honourable 
 consanguinity of the new comer.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 241 
 
 A general introduction was inevitable ; 
 and as not a ray of sunshine remained 
 upon the landscape without, and dusk was 
 beginning to creep into the room, it oc- 
 curred to Caroline that her mother-in-law, 
 who with respect to invitations scrupu- 
 lously maintained her privilege as mistress 
 of the household, would very likely, at that 
 late hour, invite their guest to stay dinner, 
 — an invitation she was certain Lord Alan 
 would joyfully accept. 
 
 And such would certainly have been the 
 case with any other person similarly in- 
 truding. But the scandal spread by Mr. 
 Perceval in the neighbourhood had been 
 that very day communicated by Aunt Min- 
 chin to her sister, and when, on their arri- 
 val at Stainhurst, the hero of the slander sud- 
 denly presented himself, installed among the 
 lares and penates of the Myrton , family, the 
 stare of amazement exchanged between the 
 two elderly ladies, purported to express their 
 astonishment at the unblushing impudence 
 of the culprit. The mother of the unfor- 
 tunate Robert Myrton would as soon have 
 invited to dinner some wretch out of the 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 242 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Stainton stocks, as the invader of the family 
 peace. If she had not felt a little at fault 
 in the form to be used in addressing the 
 younger son of a duke, instead of an invita- 
 tion, she might have been tempted to give 
 him what people of the Minchin order call 
 " a piece of her mind," — a sorry sample of 
 a wretched article. 
 
 " Well, ladies, ain't you going to give us 
 another tune?" — demanded Aunt Minchin, 
 daunted by no such • scruples. " I 'm sure 
 we heard your voices as we came in, loud 
 enough to have filled York Minster at 
 the festival ; and now you 're as mute as 
 mice ! Can't you persuade my niece, my 
 lord, to favour us with a song ?" — said she, 
 addressing Lord Alan. 
 
 " You are exacting too great a proof 
 of disinterestedness of me, madam," was 
 his grave reply, taking his hat to depart. 
 " I should be debarred of my share of a 
 pleasure, to enjoy which I have already out- 
 stayed the dinner-hour of Holmedale, whi- 
 ther I am returning.'^ 
 
 " No fear !" cried Mrs. Minchin, with a 
 hearty laugh at an announcement which
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 243 
 
 she interpreted into fishing for an invita- 
 tion. " Such fine folks as you seldom go 
 less than ten miles an hour, and Holmedale 
 is little more than twelve. So you ^11 have 
 nigh an hour for dressing, when you arrive, 
 and something to spare for the poor." 
 
 Under cover of her renewed laughter, 
 Lord Alan took leave of Caroline and her 
 sister, rejoicing that the deepening twilight 
 concealed their mutual embarrassment ; then, 
 after a profound bow to the silent mother- 
 in-law and loquacious aunt, he quitted the 
 house. Caroline had scarcely presence of 
 mind to ring for his horse. She felt as con- 
 fused and degraded as if detected in an 
 act of petty larceny. 
 
 " Thank goodness, I 'm that much wiser 
 than I was yesterday !'^ cried Aunt Minchin, 
 squatting herself on a low chair by the 
 fireplace, and holding her worsted shoes 
 to the fire, which the happy party had 
 nearly suffered to become extinguished. 
 " So that 's a fashionable young lord, eh ? 
 Well ! I may now say I Ve seen all the curious 
 animals on the created earth. I saw a pla- 
 typus, and a jeribo, and a ranonceros, and 
 
 M 2
 
 244 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 a jacobin or lion's purvider, in Womb well's 
 show, when I was a bit of a girl ; but this 
 last 's a finer sight than all of 'em put to- 
 gether. Mrs. Robert, my dear, next time 
 this young highflyer drops in to lunch with 
 you, when your husband's in town and his 
 
 mother safe in R for the day, let me 
 
 know in time, and I'll come any distance 
 for another peep at him." 
 
 Poor Caroline had not strength to be 
 indignant at this coarse attack. She knew 
 that Mrs. Minchin would not have dared 
 to utter it, but that all the slanderous 
 tongues in the neighbourhood were on her 
 side.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 245 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 It is not a confident brow or the throng of words that come 
 with such more than impudent sauciness from you that can 
 thrust me from a level consideration. You have, as it appears 
 to me, practised upon the easy yielding spirit of this woman ! 
 
 Henry IV. Part IT. 
 
 Never had the interval till the departure 
 of the post appeared so long to Caroline, 
 as that which now divided her from the* 
 power of saying, in an oflp-hand way, to her 
 husband — " While walking yesterday with 
 John Lichfield and my sister, we had the 
 agreeable surprise of meeting Lord Alan 
 Bonville, who is on a visit at Holmedale. 
 He returned to lunch with us, and appeared 
 delighted with Stainhurst." — And never had 
 the interval of return of post appeared so 
 long to Aunt Minchin, as that which was to 
 bring her nephew Robert's reply to his mo- 
 ther's less flowing version of the matter.
 
 246 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 When several days elapsed without bring- 
 ing a word of answer to either, the spiteful 
 old lady almost flattered herself he was 
 coming in person to play the Bluebeard in 
 his own castle ; and great was the surprise 
 of all parties when, at the end of a week, a 
 letter to his mother containing elaborate 
 instructions concerning the use of a patent 
 
 churn, which was to reach R by that 
 
 day's van, ended with a postscript to his 
 wife of, *' Tell Car. I am delighted to find 
 Lord Alan was pleased with our neighbour- 
 hood. She ought to have persuaded him to 
 give you a day or two on his way to town. 
 It were scandalous indeed if a nephew of 
 the Marquis of Harringhurst's were treated 
 with inhospitality at Stainhurst." 
 
 Though Caroline had no suspicion that 
 the demure old lady had communicated 
 the visit to her son, and though the message 
 was delivered to her in a very modified form, 
 it sufficed to set her mind at ease. Myrton 
 was not displeased at what had so little 
 right to displease him, as the accidental 
 visit of an intimate acquaintance ; and she 
 now saw that her panic had been ridiculous.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 247 
 
 Her husband was evidently as anxious that 
 the Bonville family should imbibe an im- 
 pression that Stainhurst was not a Hotten- 
 tot's kraal, as he had formerly been to ob- 
 tain the favourable award of his venerable 
 patron. 
 
 Crestfallen and disappointed, Aunt Min- 
 chin contented herself with privately observ- 
 ing to her sister that " Bob was a fool, — 
 and deserved his fate ; — and the young lord 
 a coxcomb, and deserved a horsepond ! " — 
 But in Caroline's presence she said not an- 
 other word concerning the visit, which in a 
 few days might have been forgotten, but 
 for poor Esther's frequent recurrence to the 
 fascinations of Lord Alan Bonville. Esther 
 had become duly sensible of the plea- 
 santness of conversing with a man of 
 the world, for whom life rolls on golden 
 castors, compared with the contentions 
 argumentations of those among whom 
 she had abided ; persons, whose existence 
 being a series of common places, they are 
 forced to create a ripple on the water by 
 monstering their nothings. It was but na- 
 tural that the lively and original Lord 
 Alan should appear more amusing to the
 
 248 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 young recluse than her grave brother-in- 
 law. 
 
 Unconsciously, perhaps, the two sisters 
 often made the avenue of the old farm the 
 object of their walk. For the first week, 
 this was natural enough. But when the 
 bright green leaves of the violets made 
 their appearance instead of the blossoms, 
 there was nothing in the pale tassels of 
 primroses by which they were succeeded, 
 and which were to be found in greater abun- 
 dance in all the copses and hedgerows of the 
 neighbourhood, to account for their predi- 
 lection. 
 
 " The rooks will soon know you by sight, 
 Hetty ! " said Lichfield, on meeting them 
 one day descending from the slopes, " if you 
 and Car., spend so much time in spying out 
 the secrets of their little republic." 
 
 " The view is so pretty from the ivy-bench, 
 now the trees are becoming a little green !" 
 replied Esther, unwincing, for she had no 
 ulterior thoughts in the preference ! " Car. 
 has promised that, as soon as they are 
 fully out, she will make me a sketch of 
 Stainhurst and the Parsonage, as seen from 
 the avenue."
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 249 
 
 Lichfield was careful not to inquire whe- 
 ther a portrait of their recent companion 
 was to enliven the landscape. But he was 
 not sorry when the London papers an- 
 nounced among their daily " Changes," the 
 departure of Lord Alan Bonville from 
 Holmedale, for Droitwich Castle. He was 
 well pleased to know that more than a hun- 
 dred miles divided that very agreeable speci- 
 men of the useless and ornamental, from his 
 infatuated sisters-in-law. 
 
 The parson, though not particularly con- 
 versant in the mysteries of the female mind, 
 (inasmuch as his own Louisa was one of 
 those best specimens of womankind fated 
 to realize the fable of the Androgynae by 
 incorporating herself as one with the hus- 
 band to whom her life was devoted, thereby 
 depriving him of all insight into the ca- 
 prices and frailties of the sex,) wisely con- 
 sidered that such a Lord Alan would be 
 ninety-nine times less dangerous to the 
 peace of Caroline, in London, where a hun- 
 dred Lord Alans are to be found, than at 
 Stainhurst, where his elegance was placed 
 in such tremendous relief by the turmoils 
 
 M 5
 
 250 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 of the factory and the busy vulgarity of 
 R . 
 
 On her own part, the retrospections con- 
 nected by Mrs. Myrton with his visit, were 
 far from satisfactory. Instead of antici- 
 pating such impressions as her husband 
 desired, in the mind of the London man, 
 she felt that if Lord Alan had not mistaken 
 her house for a kraal, he had found it beset 
 with Hottentots. But this was not the 
 worst. What must he have thought of her 
 confusion of mind in bidding him wel- 
 come, when startled by his sudden appear- 
 ance ? — 
 
 Her children, usually such a resource to 
 Caroline against every blameable sentiment, 
 were on this occasion unavailable. The visit 
 to Harringhurst had been almost as inju- 
 rious to them as to their mother. Spoiled 
 by the good old Marquis, who was fond 
 of children as Mr. Burchell, and deriving 
 endless entertainment from the menagerie, 
 the aviary, the self-playing organ, the thou- 
 sand costly toys which the castle afforded 
 for the recreation of childkind, the nursery 
 governess complained of the difficulty of
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 251 
 
 fixing their attention on their studies, since 
 their return ; — a complaint highly gratifying 
 to Aunt Minchin, and duly communicated 
 to the vicarage at High Bennington by 
 a letter to the Wynters. 
 
 After Lord Alan's visit, the little crea- 
 tures unwittingly increased their offence by 
 exclaiming, in their impatience of the dul- 
 ness of grandmamma^s tea-table, to which 
 they were admitted as a favour, '* Dear 
 mother, why didn't you make Lord Alan 
 Bonville stay with us? — it would have been 
 so pleasant to talk to him about the castle. 
 Lord Alan could have taught my aunts to 
 play at bouts rimes, and consequences, as we 
 used with Lady Mary. Do write and make 
 him come and spend a great long time at 
 Stainhurst — it is so ve^y dull here !" — 
 
 Luckily, the deafness of grandmamma se- 
 cured her against hearing the whole of this 
 treason on the part of her descendants. 
 But the Lichfields heard and regretted. 
 They saw that even the children were 
 throwing off their sacred allegiance to home. 
 
 But though Caroline never failed to im- 
 pose silence on the sorties of Emily and
 
 252 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Robert concerning Lord Alan, she said little 
 to modify the enthusiasm of her sister. A 
 project had entered her head, such as too 
 often enters the heads of women actuated 
 by undue prepossession, to secure the so- 
 ciety of the object of her regard, by mar- 
 riage with one nearly connected with herself. 
 As the husband of Esther, Lord Alan would 
 become only a somewhat dearer brother-in- 
 law than Lichfield. 
 
 The possibility of such a match once 
 suggested by the enthusiastic admiration of 
 Esther, and a remembrance of the impres- 
 sion her youthful beauty had produced on 
 Lord Alan, Caroline began to discover a 
 thousand feasibilities in a project which 
 most people would have deemed prepos- 
 terous. The antiquity of her father's family 
 left nothing for the Bonvilles to desire ; 
 and, though Esther was portionless, the 
 Duke of Droitwich's younger brother was 
 scarcely entitled to pretend to a woman of 
 fortune. If the young couple chose to con- 
 tent themselves with a moderate provision, 
 there was no reason why their relations 
 should oppose the connexion.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 253 
 
 With these views, she redoubled her care 
 in the formation of her sister's mind and 
 manners ; and, in destroying by her instruc- 
 tion the ingenuousness of Esther's present 
 deportment, of course deprived her of a 
 great portion of her charm. No finishing 
 governess ever worked harder in cramming 
 an awkward girl for her debut, than Caroline, 
 in qualifying her sister for an appearance 
 in London; teaching her at once what to 
 attempt, and what to avoid. 
 
 At present, her apt pupil knew nothing 
 of her sister's hopes of obtaining Myrton's 
 permission to take her with them to town. 
 For, in some incertitude concerning her hus- 
 band's feelings towards her, she had not 
 courage to embody her request in a letter ; 
 but waited to prefer her petition for the 
 leisure of the Easter holidays, when he was 
 to repair to Yorkshire to fetch up his family 
 to town. 
 
 To Caroline's amazement, she was scarce- 
 ly alone with Myrton after his arrival, when 
 he proposed the very arrangement over which 
 she had been secretly brooding ! Though 
 his remarks on Lord Alan Bonville's visit
 
 254 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 had been so cursory and careless, he felt that 
 it might be advisable to invest the beautiful 
 wife who, in London, was left so completely 
 alone, with the responsibilities of chaperon- 
 ship ; and the striking beauty of Esther 
 Hilliard, whom he had not seen before since 
 she attained the charms of womanhood, 
 served to brighten a project adopted, in the 
 first instance, for selfish expedience. 
 
 The delight frankly avowed by the young 
 girl, and by her little nephew and niece, in 
 the prospect of her company, seemed to 
 render unnecessary all he had been about to 
 say to Caroline in apology for the length 
 and dulness of her approaching season. No 
 need to tell her that his time would be 
 wholly taken up at the House ; and that the 
 London world, depressed by the fears aris- 
 ing from the serious indisposition of the 
 king had lost half its charms of the preced- 
 ing season. Enough that he had engaged a 
 capital house in St. James's Place ; and that 
 Lady Alicia Wendover was anxious she 
 should take the alternate weeks of her opera 
 box. 
 
 Having intimated that they must be ready
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 255 
 
 to start at an early hour of the Thursday in 
 Easter week, Myrton devoted himself to the 
 study of certain bundles of documents he 
 had brought from town for leisurely perusal, 
 and the still more laborious task of enter- 
 taining, day after day, the notables of 
 
 R . Surprising the merit he had found 
 
 in them, from the moment of discovering 
 the necessity to every public man, of being 
 backed by a tail ! — Ever since he became 
 aware of the value, in these days of general 
 brag and puffery, of being made the hero 
 of public dinners, votes of thanks, and votes 
 of pieces of plate, he had cultivated the 
 good opinion of that quatrieme Hat of opera- 
 tive life, which, having long supplied the 
 four quarters of the world with cloths and 
 calicos, was perhaps about to supply par- 
 liament with members ! 
 
 On their part, they crowded round him 
 eagerly in the Town Hall ; or accepted 
 thankfully an invitation to his hospitable 
 board. Whatever the be-ancestored Lord 
 Alan might think about the matter, they 
 considered the crisis imminent. Evil por- 
 tents were abroad ; and they were disposed
 
 256 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 to kiss the hem of Myrton's garment on his 
 arrival from the House of Commons, as those 
 of a priest of the oracle. Sir Frederick 
 Brabazon seldom showed the tip of his nose 
 among his constituents ; and invited few of 
 them to show the tips of theirs at Holme- 
 dale, with the exception of a superannuated 
 mayor, knighted through his influence, and 
 one or two of the squarest-toed members of 
 the corporation, who believed not only that 
 whatever was, was right, but was unsus- 
 ceptible of being made better; — men who 
 were as proud of the amount of the national 
 debt, as of the height of St. Paul's, or the 
 battle of Waterloo. 
 
 But the stirring majority courted by Myr- 
 ton were kneaded of another clay, — a clay 
 holding in combination particles of quick- 
 silver and drops of alcohol, — a mercurialized 
 Benthamite of human nature ; and these 
 were as tickled by the notion of having re- 
 presentatives of their own election, as chil- 
 dren by the possession of toys bought with 
 " their own money, " though far less fair 
 and costly than those provided for them 
 by their parents.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 257 
 
 The triumphant expectations with which 
 Myrton managed to inspire them, re-acted 
 upon himself; while his spirits rose in pro- 
 portion to those he created. At a public 
 
 dinner at R , he spoke gloriously — spoke 
 
 as a patriot, — spoke as a prophet. There 
 was inspiration just then in the air : a 
 new era was dawning, and who could say 
 what it might bring forth ! As each of 
 Napoleon's recruits was said to carry to the 
 wars a field-marshal's baton in his knap- 
 sack, it might be about to rain according 
 to Yorick's phrase, mitres from heaven for 
 the cloth, and coronets for the men in purple 
 and fine linen. Promotion was abroad. 
 Every Englishman pretended to have h'poule 
 au pot, whether possessed or not of a hen- 
 roost. Every man would eat of the fruits 
 of his own vine, — unless the grapes were 
 less sour in his neighbour's vineyard. 
 
 After promising all this, and a little more, 
 to the energetic drinkers of sloe-juice and 
 
 vitriolic punch, at the town-hall of R , 
 
 how was Myrton to retire soberly to Stain- 
 hurst, for a practical survey of his factory, or 
 a deliberative interview with his foreman ? —
 
 258 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 Fortunately, as it appeared, the overseer, 
 who now replaced the pragmatical Johnson, 
 was botli qualified and inclined to spare all 
 superfluous trouble to his employers : a hard- 
 headed, calculating man, who carried on 
 the war so actively and quietly, that the 
 workmen had no cause to regret the fre- 
 quency of Mr. Myrton's absence. The po- 
 pular member seemed to have found a trea- 
 sure in Mac Murdoch : a man capable of 
 thinking for himself in an emergency ; and 
 at all other times, thinking and acting in 
 respectful subservience to his superiors. 
 Myrton, who had taxed the former foreman 
 with being a fool for his petulance in quit- 
 ting the factory, could not now sufficiently re- 
 vile his own folly, in having so long retained 
 the services of one, by whose want of energy 
 and intelligence, thousands had been lost to 
 the concern. 
 
 While issuing his parting instructions to 
 Mac Murdoch, and pointing out further im- 
 provements in the machinery which it was 
 his intention to effect in the course of the 
 autumn, and preparations for which were al- 
 ready in progress at Rotherham, Lichfield took
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 259 
 
 an opportunity of seeking a private inter- 
 view with his sister-in-law. 
 
 " Have you seriously reflected, dearest 
 Caroline," said he, " on the responsibility 
 you undertake in introducing yonder simple- 
 hearted child into the high-flying London 
 society into which you have found your 
 way ? — Esther is portionless, — Esther is 
 guileless, — Esther is unfitted by the habits 
 of her early life to contend against the ar- 
 tifices of the great world ; and, unless 
 through your assistance, her best chance of 
 settling in life, is by marriage with a country 
 curate or apothecary ! — Is it wise, therefore, 
 to disgust her with the Ribstone-pippin she 
 still enjoys, by a taste of pine-apple ?" — 
 
 " So beautiful a girl has surely as good 
 a chance of forming a brilliant establish- 
 ment, as Emily or myself!" replied Mrs. 
 Myrton. " Lord Alan Bonville thought 
 her the handsomest creature he had ever 
 seen in his life !" 
 
 " Lord Alan Bonville ! — I guessed as 
 much ! I felt convinced I should find that 
 ill-boding name at the bottom of this unlucky 
 scheme !" cried her spiritual pastor. " Were
 
 260 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 it a child of my own, Car., for whom you 
 proposed it, I would refuse my consent. 
 Without authority in the present instance, 
 I implore you to reflect upon the painful 
 moments you may entail on one whose heart 
 is now at ease ; and who will imbibe an ap- 
 petite for the splendours and frivolities of 
 life, fatal to her humble happiness here- 
 after ! " 
 
 " It shall not be humble," cried Caroline, 
 moved by his earnestness. " I promise you 
 I will bring her back good and charming as 
 ever ; and affianced to some one charming as 
 herself." 
 
 John Lichfield shook his head. " You 
 are undertaking liabilities beyond your 
 means !" said he. " Like Myrton, you are 
 becoming a speculator. But you have no 
 business to speculate with the stock of hap- 
 piness of others. The fate of this child, Car., 
 be on your head ! — If you make her misera- 
 ble for life, hope no absolution from me ! — I 
 foresee that your benefactions to Esther will 
 resemble those of the discoverers of the New 
 World, who stripped the natives of the trea- 
 sures bestowed upon them by nature, and
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 261 
 
 left them, in exchange, the means of murder 
 and misery, gunpowder and disease ! " 
 
 By convicting him of exaggeration, Caro- 
 line fancied she had gained a victory, when, 
 in fact, she had only silenced a friend. But 
 on embracing her sister Louisa, she was 
 deeply touched by the gentleness with which 
 that excellent creature murmured between 
 her sobs at parting. — 
 
 " Take care of her, dear Car. ! — take care 
 of her ! and take care of yourself ^ 
 
 And as she caught a last glimpse of the 
 slated roof of Stainton Parsonage, she could 
 not help feeling that it sheltered a couple 
 worthier and wiser in their generation, than 
 Myrton and herself ; — poor, frugal, laborious, 
 pious, faithful and content ! — 
 
 Other interests, however, diverted her at- 
 tention, at the last moment, from her duty 
 towards her sister. The old lady, who, ever 
 since she had attempted to injure her daugh- 
 ter-in-law with her husband and failed in 
 the attempt, liked Caroline less and less, 
 could scarcely conceal her satisfaction at 
 the departure of the family. The king- 
 dom, temporarily taken from her, was about
 
 262 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 to be restored to her hands ; and she should 
 once more enjoy her sovereignty unmolested, 
 with the Wynters and Mrs. Minchin as her 
 guests. The latter, who made her appear- 
 ance at Stainhurst, on pretence of wishing 
 good-b ye to her nephew, discharged her last 
 shaft at his fine-lady wife, in the shape of a 
 report circulated by Mr. Perceval (who had 
 been staying at Holmedale at the same time 
 with Lord Alan), that the fashionable young 
 lord having made his appearance once or 
 twice with the second course, assigned, as an 
 excuse for his unpunctuality, that he had 
 been detained by Mrs. Myrton at Stainhurst. 
 But this slander, which she had intended 
 should envenom Myrton's ear throughout his 
 journey to town, fell upon it unnoticed ; 
 so utterly was he absorbed by his duties to 
 come, and the peculiar interest they excited 
 in his own neighbourhood. Already, the 
 cry of the people was great in the land. 
 Like all popular watchwords, the demand 
 for parliamentary reform was repeated by 
 hundreds and thousands, who assigned no 
 definite meaning to the concession. As the 
 word "Repale '' designates, in certain districts
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 263 
 
 of Ireland, a good crop of potatoes, in the 
 
 neighbourhood of R , " reform'' stood for 
 
 high wages and cheap bread ; and, as its 
 avowed champion, Robert Myrton became 
 indeed, the man of the people ! He was 
 apprized by Mac Murdoch, that his men had 
 applied for a holiday, for the purpose of 
 
 drawing him though the town of R . 
 
 No wonder, therefore, that he felt himself 
 something of a hero ; and believed that 
 
 His fame was fated to fold in 
 This orb o' the earth. 
 
 " Let them wait awhile, my dear sir," 
 was Myrton's moderate reply. " No one 
 would wear the civic crown with greater 
 pride than myself, if fairly obtained. But 
 the victory of the people is still to be fought 
 for. It were imprudent to forestal our 
 harvest of laurels." 
 
 Nevertheless the men were not to be pre- 
 vented (Mac Murdoch protested, at least 
 that it would breed ill-feeling in the fac- 
 tory to prevent them,) from assembling in a 
 body to the number of many hundreds, to 
 huzza the carriage as it issued from the lodge
 
 264 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 gates, — and the sound went nearer to the 
 heart of Myrton than the loudest cheers of 
 the House. It was as the voice of his fa- 
 ther's people bidding him go forth and con- 
 quer in their behalf. His children clapped 
 their hands for joy at the spectacle of the 
 animated and applauding crowd ; and Caro- 
 line and Esther, already full of cheerful anti- 
 cipations, felt that the London campaign 
 was opening under favourable omens. 
 
 It was a bright sunshiny spring day. 
 Stainhurst was in its holiday attire of green 
 and gold, grass and kingcups. The or- 
 chards were as white with blossom as when 
 compared by the old Marquis to a bridal 
 bower. The hawthorn hedges, and broom 
 and heather, made a garden of the road ; 
 and as the fine sweeping landscapes of 
 Yorkshire disappeared from view, the travel- 
 lers became reconciled to lose the beauties 
 of nature, only because about to enter into 
 the most brilliant of the realms of art. 
 
 Impossible to say with what buoyant 
 excitement of feeling they drove through 
 London to the door of their new house, on 
 the evening of the second day, Myrton, an-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 265 
 
 ticipating a career of triumph, — Esther of 
 pleasure, — Caroline of — . But let us not 
 pretend to interpret the feelings of Caroline! 
 At present, she scarcely understood them 
 herself. 
 
 " You will find London in a perfect fer- 
 ment, my dear !" said Lady Alicia Wendover, 
 (who, prompted by her interests, was their 
 earliest visitor next day,) " as you have pro- 
 bably left the country. You have no notion, 
 dear Mrs. Myrton, how high politics have 
 been running ever since the commencement 
 of the King's illness. Everybody calls it 
 le commencement de la fin. For my part, I 
 care nothing about the matter ; as Mr. Wen- 
 dover has no borough interest, and no genius 
 for parliament. But it is certainly a bore 
 to have one's parties broken up. By the way, 
 my dear, you must settle about this opera- 
 box business, before to-morrow night. For 
 Malibran sings in the Semiramide ; and if 
 you do not take it for the alternate weeks, 
 Andrews will get me eight or ten guineas 
 for it." 
 
 And, as a matter of course, her announce- 
 ment that, private balls being inadmissible 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 266 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 during the fatal illness of his Majesty, the 
 Opera would be thrice as well attended, 
 settled the determination of the country 
 lady. 
 
 As Myrton had anticipated, the introduc- 
 tion of Esther proved rather an advantage 
 than otherwise to his wife. Though Lich- 
 field prognosticated that it would be less 
 easy to obtain access for two, than one, 
 into the closely-packed black hole of fashion- 
 able despotism, experience proved him to 
 be mistaken. The " Miss Hilliard," ac- 
 companying Mrs. Myrton, served to point 
 out the gentle blood of the latter to many 
 who had fancied her connexion with Hil- 
 liard Park to arise solely from the marriage 
 of Sir John with a pretty parvenue; and 
 more than one of those who would be sorry 
 to admit Minerva herself into their coteries, 
 unless her aegis bore the royal arms of 
 king Jupiter, — or Venus, unless she could 
 prove herself of Chapteral descent, — thence- 
 forward submitted to the acquaintance of the 
 wife of the popular member. The two or 
 three state prisons of aristocratic life, which 
 gay people confess themselves and make
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 267 
 
 their wills, previous to entering, lest they 
 should become extinguished by the weight 
 of the atmosphere, heard their lordly gates 
 grate on their hinges, to admit two addi- 
 tional victims to the great dulness to the 
 great world ! — 
 
 Lady Mary De Bruce was still with her 
 aunt in the country. 
 
 " The Duchess will not be in town this 
 fortnight,'' was the information afforded by 
 Lord Wynwick, who made his bow in Mrs. 
 Myrton's box at the Opera, full of curiosity 
 touching the new beauty by whom she was 
 accompanied. 
 
 " Nor any of the family V — inquired Caro- 
 line, fixing her glass on the glittering tiara 
 of Assur. 
 
 " Nor any of the family, /suppose ! — They 
 all seem so dreadfully afraid of losing sight 
 a moment of Lady Mary ! — It is scarcely 
 giving her a fair chance to be-cousin her 
 as they do with De Bruces and Bonvilles." 
 
 " Scarcely giving others a fair chance, 
 you mean!" replied Mrs. Myrton with a 
 smile. — " But, surely, between the gravity 
 of the Duke, the gaiety of Lord Alan, and 
 
 N 2
 
 268 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 the sanctimoniousness of the colonel, she 
 has ample scope of choice ?" 
 
 " Say rather, between the hypocrisy of 
 De Bruce, the bitterness of Bonville, and 
 the sweetness of Droitwich !" — retorted Lord 
 Wynwick. " However, / have long given up 
 the contest. Having no artful duchess 
 mother, or partial Mrs. Myrton, to sing my 
 praises in Lady Mary's ears, I retired long 
 ago from the poll.^' 
 
 And as Malibran was just then beginning 
 to sing charmingly in theirs, his lordship 
 retired also from the box. 
 
 Though at first disappointed at the absence 
 from town of her friends, Caroline soon 
 reconciled herself by the determination that 
 on their arrival, they should find Esther and 
 herself thoroughly established. And it was 
 so ! The first thing Lady Mary De Bruce 
 heard of Mrs. Myrton was, that she had 
 been the beauty of a ministerial party the 
 preceding night ; lovelier than ever, and 
 ofiftciating as chaperon to a sister equally 
 lovely. 
 
 " Were you aware that Mrs. Myrton had 
 an unmarried sister?" she inquired of her
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 269 
 
 cousin Alan. " I only remember that af- 
 fected Lady Hilliard, and a dowdy, good 
 kind of parson's wife." 
 
 " Surely, I mentioned to you having seen 
 her in Yorkshire ? — a beautiful girl, with 
 eyes the size and colour of the bay of 
 Naples ! — called Rebecca, or Rachael, or 
 Esther, or something Jewish and scriptural." 
 
 " You told me nothing of the kind ! " 
 cried Lady Mary ; " and, till now, I was 
 always puzzled what could take you to 
 Stainhurst. — But you and the Duke are 
 certainly the two closest persons of my ac- 
 quaintance !" — 
 
 " Droitwich has a right to be close, for 
 there is something in his mind worth con- 
 cealing," observed the accused. " Reserve 
 on my part, would resemble the conduct 
 of swindlers, who lock up stones in a port- 
 manteau to impose it on the world for bag- 
 gage. No one trusts me, even with secrets ; 
 and I have none of my own. As regards 
 Miss Hilliard's beauty, I am convinced I 
 showed you at least twenty sonnets to her 
 eyebrow ! — Nay, I even inscribed one of 
 them in your album."
 
 270 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 " I concluded it to be addressed to her 
 sister, and so did Helen ; for you are as 
 close with your sister as with myself, though 
 you have nothing to gain by it." 
 
 " I scarcely know what I am likely to gain 
 by it with your little ladyship, unless a 
 jobation, — such as you are giving now, and 
 which I should get gratis. However, since 
 you hold to being apprized of my ten thou- 
 sand passions per annum, know all men, 
 women, and children by these presents, that 
 I, Alan Bonville, (commonly called Lord 
 Alan Bonville, because I have the misfor- 
 tune to be younger son of a duke,) am, for 
 the time being, desperately in love with 
 one Miss Something-or-other Hilliard, now 
 living in St. James's Place, in the city of 
 Westminster ; — a girl my excellent mother 
 would figuratively describe as not having 
 a halfpenny in the world, — the only use her 
 Grace ever condescends to make of a coin 
 
 so Ignominious 
 
 1". 
 
 "Alan ! — do be serious, if you can, for once 
 in your life !" cried Lady Mary pettishly. 
 
 " My dear coz. I was serious for a whole 
 week at Harringhurst !" — was his imperti-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 271 
 
 nent rejoinder. " Your attempt at acting 
 in comedy all but converted me into a He- 
 raclitus." 
 
 In consequence of this wild communi- 
 cation, Lady Mary De Bruce hurried to 
 St. James's Place, with feelings totally al- 
 tered towards Caroline. 
 
 "I am dying with curiosity to see this 
 beautiful sister of yours," cried she, after 
 embracing Mrs. Myrton : " my cousin Alan 
 is desperately in love with her." 
 
 And the blush raised by this strange as- 
 sertion on the cheek of Esther, who was 
 quietly working in the adjoining drawing- 
 room, so enhanced her beauty at the mo- 
 ment, that the heiress more than acquiesced 
 in the flattering verdict pronounced by the 
 world. 
 
 Lord Alan Bonville desperately in love 
 with Esther ! — Mrs. Myrton had certainly 
 some excuse for fancying herself almost as 
 great a politician as her husband ! Her plans 
 were already brought to bear, and every 
 one seemed engaged in furthering her pro- 
 jects. To her extreme surprise, even the 
 Duchess of Droitwich, though in all pro-
 
 272 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 bability apprized by her niece of Lord Alan's 
 sudden passion, instead of testifying resent- 
 ment, invited the whole party to dinner 
 at Droitwich House, and was full of atten- 
 tions for Esther ! —
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 273 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 When factions are carried too high and too violently, it is a 
 sign of weakness in princes. 
 
 Bacon. 
 
 Cry, Trojans, cry ! Practise your eyes with tears, 
 Troy must not be, nor goodly Illion stand ! 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 The match-makers and rumour-mongers 
 of London were beginning to feel surprised 
 that Lady Mary De Bruce was still un- 
 married ; and, as is ever the case where 
 those remain single whom the world pre- 
 destines to matrimony, all sorts of strange 
 causes and motives were assigned for her 
 spinsterhood. 
 
 Some said that the Marquis, having 
 pledged himself to miite her and her for- 
 tune with the only son of his only brother, 
 Lady Mary was waiting her majority to 
 communicate to her grandfather that Co- 
 
 N 5
 
 274 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 lonel De Bruce had already contracted an 
 imprudent marriage, which she was gene- 
 rously determined to palliate by giving up 
 to him half her property. Some declared 
 that it was Lady Mary herself who had 
 formed a clandestine alliance, with the cu- 
 rate of Harringhurst, or the tutor of her 
 cousins ; some, that she was attached to 
 the Duke of Droitwich, who was afraid of 
 her volatile disposition ; some, that she was 
 attached to Lord Alan, and jealous of Mrs. 
 Myrton of Stainhurst. Of all this, the only 
 incontestable fact was, that the heiress to 
 an ancient barony and forty thousand a-year 
 was, at nearly nineteen, still attainable. 
 She had refused dukes, earls, marquises, 
 — wits, poets, and orators, — old lords with 
 married grandsons, and boys fresh from 
 Eton ; — but — she was still unmarried. 
 
 One or more great heiresses should always 
 remain undisposed of in the market, as a 
 touchstone for the temper of men's minds. 
 No better test of their quality than whether 
 they have bowed the knee to the molten 
 calf who, divested of her millions and 
 diamonds, they would avoid like the plague ;
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 275 
 
 and it was certainly no small enhancement 
 of Lord Alan Bonville's merits in the eyes 
 of St. James's Place that, though poorer 
 than Job after passing through the In- 
 solvent Court of Uz, and with every faci- 
 lity for recommending himself to his wealthy 
 cousin, he was the only person who treated 
 her with studied disregard. Though he said 
 and did nothing to justify Lady Mary's an- 
 nouncement of his passion for Esther, he 
 certainly paid her more attention than he 
 condescended to throw away on the idol 
 of half the rising youth of Britain. 
 
 More than once did the venerable Mar- 
 quis express to MrSi Myrton, with tears in 
 his eyes, a wish that dear Mary would make 
 her election ; that he might see the child 
 of his beloved son happily settled in life 
 before he laid his head in the grave. 
 
 " You, my dear madam, who are so happy 
 in your marriage," said the mild old lord, 
 "ought to persuade your young friend to 
 make her choice. But where shall we find 
 for her a second Myrton, — a man equally 
 endowed in head and heart, — a man willing 
 to be governed by his wife at home, while
 
 276 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 capable of influencing abroad the destinies 
 of the nation !" — 
 
 Unluckily, when this compliment was ut- 
 tered, there were others at hand beside 
 Miss Hilliard; others, who fancied that, 
 in the estimation of Myrton's wife, not 
 only his equal, but his superior might be 
 found, without any very laborious search ; 
 and Lord Alan Bonville was accordingly 
 required to join in the laugh occasioned 
 by his uncle's credulity. 
 
 " Conceive," said Lady Alicia Wendover, 
 " the dear old Marquis calling upon the 
 mercy of Providence to find him out, among 
 all the birds of the air and fishes of the 
 sea, a husband like Mr. Myrton for his 
 granddaughter ! — I was very near calling 
 in an apothecary and stomach-pump ; your 
 handsome friend looked so terribly, as if 
 struggling against a dose of poison.'' 
 
 " I wish she had given it to her husband in- 
 stead !" was his cool rejoinder ; '' not be- 
 cause (as your ladyship seems to infer) I 
 am pledged to marry the widow and set 
 up as a Yorkshire clothier * doni la veuve in- 
 consolable continue son commerce, et cetera !'
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 277 
 
 but to put an end to the fiendish attempts 
 of this Champion of Reform to effect the 
 ruin of all younger brothers of condition ! 
 What was the House of Commons insti- 
 tuted for, I should like to know, if not as a 
 sanctuary for the descendants of the Barons 
 who wrested Magna Charta from King John, 
 when they come to have no other house 
 over their heads ? — Rotten boroughs are the 
 endowed almshouses of the aristocracy ; 
 founded by our ancestors on their return from 
 fighting in the Holy Land, to secure their 
 remote posterity from destitution. I have 
 been only waiting till I obtained twenty or 
 thirty thousand pounds' worth of credit, to 
 take refugee in Brucetown, or some other of 
 our family boroughs ; and they tell me that 
 my patrimony is about to be wrested from 
 me, and given to the Modes and Persians. 
 If the Tories knew what they were about, 
 (which they never do till informed by the op- 
 position papers,) they would scramble together 
 all the ruined Honourables from Crockford's, 
 and pay their way into parliament with 
 Charles-street cheques, to fight like a forlorn 
 hope, in defence of our sole security against
 
 278 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 the rigour of the law ! We might still 
 grind such a fellow as Myrton into impal- 
 pable powder !" 
 
 By this rhodomontade, Lord Alan accom- 
 plished his purpose of diverting the atten- 
 tion of the prying Lady Alicia ; more es- 
 ' pecially when he added something about the 
 " tribunitial insolence '^ of Myrton, quoted 
 from Johnson's annotations ; wherein that 
 learned lexicographer allows himself, (like 
 magistrates carrying prohibited arms,) the 
 use of words unstamped as legal English 
 by his authority, — a privilege denied by his 
 admirers to scribblers of inferior condition. 
 
 Against the impertinence of such per- 
 sons as these aristocratic babblers, who sat 
 by the fire and " presumed to know what 
 was done in the capitol," Myrton had no 
 longer leisure for resentment. It was a 
 momentous time. Those who studied its 
 symptoms, predicted that the carton-pierre 
 temple of fashion was about to sink with 
 its royal idol ; and who could say what new 
 divinity or paged w^ould be substituted in 
 its room, or what priesthood seize upon the 
 sacerdotal authority? — To consult the omens
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 279 
 
 with redoubled care, was incumbent on all 
 who were bent upon consecration. 
 
 Among the persons most convinced that, 
 as the reign of terror expired with Robes- 
 pierre, the reign of superficiality would ex- 
 pire with George the Fourth, was Myrton ; 
 and it became an immediate question for 
 his decision, whether to enter the new par- 
 liament about to be created by the new 
 reign under the renewed auspices of Lord 
 Harringhurst ; or whether his sprouting 
 pinions were of sufficient strength to at- 
 tempt an independent flight. Due consider- 
 ation apprized him that to detach himself 
 at so critical a moment from the fraction 
 of the liberal party by which he had been 
 introduced into public life, would savour of 
 the pretension of erecting a standard of his 
 own, such as might create an everlasting 
 breach between him and the high-bred cir- 
 cles he found so inviting. Moreover, every 
 open seat was beset with postulants, whose 
 greater liberality, or 'greater luck, might dis- 
 tance his competition ; and he consequently 
 determined to accept with gratitude the 
 offer of his patron to bring him in again
 
 280 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 for Brucetown ; on his undertaking (as 
 though the pledge were needful !) to bite 
 off the ear of his mother at the foot of the 
 gallows, by advocating the great question of 
 Reform ! — 
 
 While Caroline, therefore, was emulating 
 the loud regrets of the idlers of the day 
 that the festivities of the season were pre- 
 maturely ended, Myrton was enjoying the 
 conviction that his apotheosis was about to 
 begin. The great bell of St. Paul's tolling 
 for the death of the King was a signal of 
 release, as welcome to his ambitious soul 
 as the first tolling of the mass-bell in Ire- 
 land to that of the daughter King Lir, 
 condemned to retain the form of one of the 
 feathered creation, till the dawning of a 
 new faith assigned her a nobler existence. 
 
 To betray his exultation in presence of 
 Lord Harringhurst, was out of the question ; 
 for, in addition to the ever-active charities 
 of his nature, the old Marquis entertained 
 a personal affection for the sovereign he had 
 
 lost. It was with the notables of R , 
 
 many of whom hurried up to town on 
 business connected with the renewed forms
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 281 
 
 of a new reign, that he rejoiced openly in 
 the change ; triumphing alike in the liberal- 
 ized principles which were about to establish 
 more firmly than ever the stability of the 
 English throne, and the arbitrary ones likely 
 to precipitate the downfal of that of France. 
 , His humble adherent, Mac Murdoch, ven- 
 tured to append a congratulatory postcript 
 on the aspect of political affairs in London, 
 to a letter in which he offered congratula- 
 tions on the prospect of commercial affairs at 
 home ; and the Lees, Harmans, and Grab- 
 sons of R saluted him, on their arrival 
 
 in town, hat in hand, as one having already 
 his foot in the stirrup of the state. In the 
 entertainment of their zeal and allegiance, 
 however, consisted the chief perplexity of 
 Myrton. To avoid offering them the hospi- 
 talities of his London house, as he had done 
 that of Stainhurst, would be an irreparable 
 offence ; and, to enable them to spy into, 
 NOT the nakedness, but the prodigality of 
 the land, was equally dangerous. Ralph 
 Grabson, the active and hard-headed leader 
 of the radicals of R , was a near con- 
 nexion of the Minchins ; and, though proud
 
 282 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 of the substantiality of Myrton, as a manu- 
 facturer and landowner, was the very man 
 to be disgusted with his participation in the 
 gilded fopperies of London life. 
 
 As yet, the simplicity of manners and 
 appearance sedulously retained by Myr- 
 ton, secured him, among his partisans in 
 
 R , from the jealousies heaped upon his 
 
 wife. But, as yet, these people had no 
 claims upon him. As yet, his political exis- 
 tence, was the creation of Lord Harring- 
 hurst, as thei7' political subjection was the 
 birthright of Sir Frederick Brabazon; and 
 the favours of Myrton being gratuitous, it 
 was their business to be thankful and un- 
 critical. 
 
 Impossible, however, for the honourable 
 member for Bructown not to foresee that 
 
 the honourable member for R must 
 
 embrace a more arduous calling, and become 
 a more responsible citizen, as well as more 
 influential politician. Five years before, 
 when emerging from his life of business, 
 with his mind stimulated by the harassments 
 of the factory and his heart edified by the 
 tendernesses of domestic life, he would have
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 283 
 
 embraced such a duty as the representation 
 of a large and turbulent population, as the 
 strong swimmer combats exultingly with the 
 waves. But the soldier of Reform, having 
 tasted of the luxuries of Capreae, had lost all 
 appetite for munition bread ! 
 
 He knew that Ralph Grabson, and his 
 brother radicals, if hospitably entertained to- 
 day, would multiply themselves into hundreds 
 on the morrow about to dawn on the Dead 
 Sea of political life ; and of what avail the 
 splendours and refinements of his establish- 
 ment, if converted into a rotunda meeting ? 
 His chief incentive to the calling of a public 
 man, was to attain the level of the Hilliards, 
 Brabazons, and Childertons, which he had 
 unexpectedly overtopped; and it would be 
 nothing to dazzle them by his public distinc- 
 tions, if, in private, besmeared once more by 
 the contaminating contact of Hottentots. 
 — As well have adhered to the kraal ! 
 
 He might have spared his cogitations ! 
 The Grabson, Lees, and Harman class of the 
 community, far more earnest than himself 
 in the cause whose triumph was commencing, 
 took no thought of his toyshop. They had
 
 284 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 real grievances to be redressed ; tliey had 
 real burthens to be relieved from. For them, 
 the patronage of a Lord Harringhurst afforded 
 no alternative ; and they were too much 
 engrossed by the aspect of the political world, 
 both on the Continent and throughout Great 
 Britain, to give a moment's thought to the 
 sumptuousness of Myrton's liveries, or the 
 embossing of his plate. 
 
 All the stronger thoughts and feelings 
 of the country were, in fact, intent upon 
 the birth of the new parliament, destined, 
 like Hercules, to strangle in its cradle the 
 besetting monsters of the times. By the 
 dissolution of the old, the signal had been 
 given for the dispersion of the London 
 world; and, startled in the midst of her 
 visions of pleasure, — her projects unaccom- 
 plished, her hopes unrealized, — Caroline 
 found herself suddenly on the eve of return- 
 ing to the country, with less pleasure than 
 ever in the prospect. 
 
 For there was no Harringhurst Castle to 
 look forward to, as a resource against the 
 crossness of her mother-in-law, and the pro- 
 vocations of Aunt Minchin. Lady Mary,
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 285 
 
 enchanted by the warmth of her reception in 
 Ireland the preceding year, had persuaded 
 her grandfather into spending the whole 
 autumn at Bruce Court ; and Stainhurst 
 had nothing in prospect but a perpetual 
 congress of Lees, Harmans, and Grabsons ; 
 reproaches from the Parsonage, virulent 
 animosity on the part of Holmedale, and 
 utter estrangement on that of Hilliard Park. 
 
 Mrs. Myrton was spared, however, the 
 tauntings she apprehended from her brother- 
 in-law touching the non-fruition of her 
 schemes in favour of Esther, by an unex- 
 pected family misfortune. Scarcely was 
 she arrived at home, when her children 
 were attacked by the scarlet fever ; and, 
 in the anxieties of a mother, all minor cares 
 were forgotten. Excited by their journey 
 and previous sojourn in the sultry metro- 
 polis, both Emily and Robert suffered se- 
 verely ; and the life of the former was, for 
 some days, in peril. 
 
 " I don't know whether they have con- 
 trived to make a fine lady of you in 
 London, Hetty ! " said Lichfield, kissing poor 
 Esther affectionately on the forehead, when,
 
 286 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 at the close of a third night's watching with 
 Caroline, (the child being pronounced out 
 of danger,) she was about to retire to rest 
 " but I 'm heartily glad to see they have not 
 spoiled an excellent girl and capital nurse." 
 
 And, if the heart of the brother-in-law 
 were thus touched, how much more that of 
 the fond mother, by the vigils and tears 
 thus shared with her sister! — The sweet- 
 tempered, confiding Esther was becoming 
 to Mrs. Myrton almost as a child of her 
 own. 
 
 When the weakness of the children, dur- 
 ing their slow, convalescence, suggested a 
 sojourn at the sea-side for their perfect 
 restoration, to part with " dear aunt Hetty " 
 was found impossible, and Mrs. Hilliard, 
 though a little disappointed that two months 
 in London had not already rendered her mo- 
 ther to another ladyship, consented that she 
 should accompany the family to Scarborough 
 for the autumn. 
 
 By this arrangement, Myrton felt himself 
 placed at liberty. Having secured an affec- 
 tionate companion for Caroline, he was en- 
 titled, after settling his family on the coast.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 287 
 
 to return to Stainhurst; ostensibly for the 
 regulation of his business, in reality, for 
 the regulation of his plans. His wife, 
 though relieved from all immediate anx- 
 iety about her children, was still too much 
 engrossed by the danger they had under- 
 gone, to experience the apprehension that 
 might have arisen, some months before, 
 from knowing that her husband was about 
 to be surrounded by her enemies ; — for into 
 decided enemies had his rapid elevation and 
 her imputed hauteur converted the family 
 of her husband. She now took no thought 
 of the cold sneers of the Wynters, the jeal- 
 ous pettishness of the old lady, or the full- 
 blown coarseness of Aunt Minchin. It was 
 enough for her happiness that a tinge of 
 colour was beginning to tinge the cheeks of 
 her little girl ; and that Robert was able to 
 enjoy half an hour's exercise without fatigue. 
 And now came in the sweet o' the year 
 for Myrton ! He was monarch of all he 
 surveyed at Stainhurst. He w^as able to 
 " clap hands with the greasy citizens " with- 
 out fear of incurring the silent contempt 
 of his wife. He could accept the gross
 
 288 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 adulation of Mac Murdoch, secure from the 
 scorn of a higher mind. He was flattered 
 into believing himself an apostle in the eyes 
 of the factory, and a demigod in those of 
 
 R , without being plucked by the sleeve 
 
 and reminded, like the triumphant of old, 
 that he was mortal. He began to breathe 
 more freely. His mother and her sister had 
 no grievances against him ; and were eager 
 to render his life easy and pleasant during 
 the absence of one with whose company 
 they would fain have enabled him to dis- 
 pense. 
 
 In his lack of an auditor, he, who ten 
 years before, confided his simple thoughts 
 to the reverential ear of a mere girl, was 
 glad to find a less acquiescent listener in 
 Ralph Grabson. Scarcely a day passed but 
 
 the Danton of R returned home with 
 
 him to dinner ; by way of an iron anvil 
 on which to hammer out his opinions. 
 
 The election of Sir Frederick Brabazon 
 having been attended with circumstances 
 of peculiar offence, no sooner did Holme- 
 dale perceive the popular member engaged 
 in a league, apparently offensive and defen-
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 289 
 
 sive, with those by whom the representative 
 
 of R had been insolently, and even 
 
 unfairly attacked, than it became justified 
 in its resentments against Myrton, though^ 
 at the moment of the election, absent at 
 Brucetown. The Yorkshire baronet, whose 
 acquaintance had been rejected by the in- 
 solence of his parvenu neighbours, seemed 
 to mistake Holmedale for a Court of Ver- 
 sailles bearded by the presumptuous Mira- 
 beau of Stainhurst ; nor was his rage against 
 the new power concentrating itself at his 
 gates, and carrying off his kingdom by a 
 coup de main, the less virulent, from being 
 restrained by the hypocrisies of civilized 
 life. 
 
 " If this Reform bill be carried," said he, 
 one morning to Lord Childerton, in the 
 old library at Childerton Court, '' I vow 
 to God I will shut up Holmedale, and quit 
 the country! — I only ask you, my dear 
 lord, will this neighbourhood be habitable, 
 when such a fellow as yonder scum of the 
 factory dam at Stainhurst, attains the as- 
 cendancy ? Will it be possible to set foot 
 again in a place like R , on which the 
 
 VOL. I. O
 
 290 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 means and substance of my family have been 
 lavished for centuries; and which, now in 
 its pert prosperity, having outgrown all oc- 
 casion for our support, flings its ungrate- 
 ful insults in the face of those at whose 
 footstool it has been kneeling ? " — 
 
 " Compose yourself, my dear sir," was 
 the reply of the colder and more determined 
 Lord Childerton. " The Bill will not pass ! 
 Holmedale has nothing to fear. — Even in 
 your own house, I doubt its success. It 
 must eat through stone walls, if it over- 
 come the opposition of ours !" 
 
 Even this reassurance did not satisfy the 
 misgivings of Brabazon. Since the July re- 
 volution had precipitated the tyrant of the 
 Tuileries from his throne, and that of Sep- 
 tember banished the House of Orange from 
 that of Belgium, he never traversed the 
 
 streets of R without feeling his own in 
 
 jeopardy. The begrimed faces that scowled 
 upon him, provoked other emotions in his 
 mind than those of disgust. The brawny 
 arms of the workmen, discoloured with dye or 
 reeking with toil, seemed to have suddenly 
 acquired a terrible strength. Half a hundred
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 291 
 
 of these Helots, collected together at a dis- 
 tance, sufficed to render his morning ride 
 uncomfortable. — Lady Brabazon's carriage 
 had been pelted with mud in his revolted 
 capital, yet he dared not denounce the 
 offenders ! 
 
 " This comes of the evil," muttered he 
 between his clenched teeth, " of living in 
 the midst of a manufacturing population !"— 
 
 But even between his clenched teeth, he 
 gave not vent to a still bitterer consci- 
 ousness rankling in his heart, of being a 
 mark for the malignancy of a man of the 
 people, such as his neighbour, the Popular 
 Member ! — 
 
 When November arrived, and the dis- 
 contents of the country having gradually 
 collected the elements of a storm over the 
 metropolis — the fearful thunders of public 
 opinion made themselves heard till the 
 Tories retreated in dismay, it was rather a 
 comfort than otherwise to a man like Bra- 
 bazon, to know his party relieved from the 
 odium of power. The Whigs in office, 
 their auxiliaries became less alarming. Hav- 
 ing probably learned his lesson from the wisest
 
 292 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 of Chancellors, that " many a man's strength 
 is in opposition ; and that when that faileth, 
 he groweth out of use," he was satisfied 
 to see his enemies at the helm, in the 
 midst of the tempest. 
 
 But if the Brabazons and Childertons 
 were resigned to their fate, how triumphant 
 were the allied malcontents of R — -— ! 
 The first blow was struck of the grand contest, 
 — the first blood spilt, — and victory remained 
 on their side ! Like Henry VIII. rejoi- 
 cing in the birth of the daughter of Anne 
 Boleyn, as " promising boys hereafter," they 
 regarded the formation of a Whig minis- 
 try as security for the future advancement 
 of the Radicals. 
 
 Sir John Hilliard, indeed, and a few more of 
 the earlier acquaintances of Myrton equally 
 unskilled to take the measure of his am- 
 bition, concluded him to be deeply morti- 
 fied at receiving no post in the new admi- 
 nistration. But they were mistaken. Myr- 
 ton knew that the time for his advance- 
 ment was not fully ripe. As yet, his per- 
 sonal consequence was only half developed. 
 Fame, like the palm-tree, bears ,its noblest
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 293 
 
 fruit on the summit. He had no desire for 
 honours too slightly earned. He mistrusted 
 the stability of a hollow pedestal. On the 
 triumph of the Reform question, he should 
 be prepared to dictate terms to the grati- 
 tude of go Vermont. 
 
 The ferment of ambition was not, how- 
 ever, the less potent in his bosom that its 
 hopes were deferred ; and however undue 
 the value assigned by his weakness to aristo- 
 cratic sunshine, his strength lay, like a mine 
 of iron, at the bottom of his soul, — a strength 
 whose rich veins expanded from the cause of 
 the people. The member for Brucetown, or 
 minion of Harringhurst Castle, might have 
 modified his opinions; had not Myrton of 
 Stainhurst, Myrton the manufacturer, ruled 
 paramount over both. The echoes of the 
 Marseillaise, heard from afar, had roused the 
 old man in him — and on reaching his house- 
 hold hearth, after being cheered through the 
 
 streets of R , he was tempted to answer 
 
 the remark of his brother-in-law, " that it 
 was strange the Marquis had not recom- 
 mended him for some honorary employ- 
 ment in the new administration," in the 
 
 3
 
 294 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 energetic words of Kean, when interrogated 
 by his wife touching Lord Essex's opinion 
 of his performance, — " Damn Lord Essex, — 
 ^e pit rose at me ! " — 
 
 Was it likely, that a man whose heart and 
 soul were thrilling with this fever of excite- 
 ment, and who firmly believed the political 
 world to be on the eve of one of those pro- 
 digies, which, like the deluge, extinguish a 
 race of monsters, but leave a regenerated 
 race of mortals and a fairer face of nature 
 behind, should be prepared to lend his ear 
 to the petty scandals of a vulgar old aunt ? 
 Vain at such a moment was the significant 
 tone in which Mrs. Minchin informed him 
 that " Mrs. Eleazar Harman's family was 
 just returned from Scarborough ; from whose 
 account it appeared that he had no likeli- 
 hood of getting Mrs. Robert back to Stain- 
 hurst till Christmas ; — that though the 
 other county families had left Scarborough, 
 she had friends about her such as made 
 weather a matter of no consequence ! " 
 Not a question was he moved to ask ! 
 Even when she informed him, in plain 
 English, that " a young lord, Lord Alan
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 296 
 
 Bonville, had been staying at Donner's 
 Hotel, and daily visiting his family," he lis- 
 tened with as unmoved a countenance as 
 though the delinquency thus imputed re- 
 garded the Mayoress of R ! The honour 
 
 of Caesar's wife was as nothing, compared with 
 the meeting of the new parliament ! — As 
 Mrs. Minchin observed, (in describing the 
 scene to one of her Grabson nieces,) — " I 
 protest I might just as well have talked to 
 one of Robert's bales of cloth ! — Not the 
 spirit of a fly left in Robert Myrton ! " — 
 
 All he answered in reply to her obliging 
 communication, was, that " it was by his 
 desire his wife remained at the sea-side, 
 while he repaired to town for the discharge 
 of his duties/' He even expressed some 
 vague satisfaction that there should be any 
 one left at Scarborough in the way of 
 society. " Lord Alan is an amusing fellow 
 of his class," added he, " and was paying a 
 good deal of attention, in town, to Esther 
 Hilliard." 
 
 His letters to Caroline, meanwhile, which 
 were not only few and far between^ but 
 brief when they did make their appearance,
 
 296 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 contained no allusion to Lord Alan. He 
 was either utterly disregardful, or too proud 
 to avow the smallest anxiety. Even when 
 they met again at Christmas, no mention 
 was made of the subject. Myrton was full of 
 the recent political changes, and approach- 
 ing political agitation : Caroline of the in* 
 terest of arriving at home, which she had 
 scarcely seen since the month of May. It 
 was a great joy to her when her husband 
 sanctioned her refusal of an invitation to 
 spend the holidays at the seat of Mr. Wen- 
 dover in Hertfordshire : — Myrton despising 
 the Wendovers as people without the pale 
 of political life, — Caroline disliking them, 
 as people who valued her society only as a 
 means of affording entertainment to guests 
 of higher account. 
 
 " If Lord Alan were here," said she, to 
 her sister, when preparing to write her refu- 
 sal, *' he would bid me express my regrets 
 that I could not wait upon the pianoforte of 
 dear Lady Alicia Wendover; or join the 
 charming trios and quartettes, assembled 
 under her hospitable roof." 
 
 Very often, too often perhaps, did Mrs.
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 29? 
 
 Myrton thus allow herself to cite to Esther 
 the sayings, or applaud the doings, of Lord 
 Alan Bonville. When the sisters were 
 alone together, their conversation naturally 
 reverted to their London pleasures and the 
 friends by whom they had been shared. 
 For though all had been forgotten during 
 the anxieties of the earlier autumn, the 
 visit recently made to Scarborough by Lord 
 Alan (which though so enlarged upon by 
 the malignancy of aunt Minchin) was only of 
 a few days duration, sufficed to revive for- 
 mer impressions, and lay the foundations of 
 a friendship still more intimate, still more 
 dangerous. 
 
 Nothing, indeed, so tends to forward 
 familiarity, as the desultory habits of a resi- 
 dence by the sea-side; where people meet, 
 walk, drive, ride, eat and drink, as sunshine 
 and line weather prompt them ; as though 
 in a hurry to snatch all the health and en- 
 joyment possible out of the great waters 
 before them. Though belonging by ma- 
 ternal descent to the county. Lord Alan 
 had never before visited the Brighton of 
 Yorkshire ; and Mrs. Myrton, as one of the
 
 298 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 indigenous, felt herself bound to do the 
 honours of Hackness, Firley, and Robin 
 Hood's Bay ! 
 
 Never had he appeared half so agreeable 
 to either of the sisters, as while participating 
 in these simple pleasures. Mrs. Myrton, 
 long aware that his aiFectation was only skin 
 deep, and that his apparent frivolity con- 
 cealed considerable attainments, was sur- 
 prised neither by his good-humoured tole- 
 ration of the children, nor by the varied 
 powers with which he contrived to render 
 their tea-table more amusing than the gor- 
 geous coteries of Droitwich House ; the con- 
 stituents of which, his clever mimicry often 
 caused to pass before them, as on the glasses 
 of a magic lantern. 
 
 " Suppose we write a letter tripartite, and 
 inform my cousin Mary how agreeably we 
 are spending our time during her absence?" 
 said he, one evening, after Caroline and 
 Esther had been delighting him with the 
 music of the " Pirata," then in its freshness 
 of bloom. 
 
 " Lady Mary has never addressed a line 
 to me from Ireland," observed Mrs. Myrton ;
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 299 
 
 " and I am scarcely inclined to recommence 
 a correspondence she has, perhaps, volun- 
 tarily neglected." 
 
 " As if that giddy creature had ever plan 
 or project in either her commissions, or 
 omissions ! " cried Lord Alan, laughing. 
 " Her arm felt tired, and if no one was at 
 the trouble of picking up the shuttlecock 
 for her, I dare say she threw the battledore 
 after it, and renounced the game. — But let 
 us start afresh. — We will indite her a letter 
 in three chapters. — We will rouse her by 
 a Cerberus bark ! — How shall it be ? — In 
 the character of the three Destinies, or the 
 three Graces, — or — " 
 
 " In the character of three faithful and 
 admiring friends," said Mrs. Myrton, gravely. 
 " Write your own letter, telling her as you 
 propose, of the quiet life we are living here, 
 which you have kindly assisted to enliven ; 
 and Esther and myself will add a post- 
 script." 
 
 "And now," said Lord Alan, '^ parions ! 
 To which of us will her capricious ladyship 
 address the answer ? — She knows I am not 
 so fortunate as to be bound to the same
 
 300 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 haven with yourselves. Will she write to 
 the dear home in the happy valley, so often 
 the subject of my dreams ? — or to the bastille 
 of my forefathers at Droitwich, which I 
 would I were also compelled to see again 
 only in the spirit ! "■ — 
 
 " To both, I should imagine," replied 
 Caroline ; while Esther, in the simplicity of 
 her heart, began lamenting that he was not 
 bound to the same haven, and wondering 
 whether he were ever likely again to visit 
 Holmedale, and take Stainhurst in his way ? 
 
 His reply was such as to render the cold 
 silence of Caroline on the subject almost 
 uncourteous. A smiling remark that no one 
 could venture a second visit uninvited, be- 
 sought in vain for an invitation. 
 
 For though Mrs. Myrton felt convinced 
 that very little was wanting to strengthen 
 his attachment for her sister into the courage 
 of making her his wife, she dared not expose 
 his visits to further misrepresentation on the 
 part of her husband's vulgar relations. Till 
 the moment of his quitting Scarborough, 
 indeed, she flattered herself that his marked 
 attentions, his involuntary sighs, and stolen ^i^
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 301 
 
 glances at one of the loveliest of human 
 faces, would end with a proposal. But Lord 
 Alan's sense of the imprudence of such a 
 match, was probably still paramount. 
 
 On the eve of his departure arrived 
 news of the change of ministry, and the 
 probable accession to office of his family 
 and friends ; when his first irrepressible 
 burst of exultation seemed to betray the 
 motive of his previous reserve. 
 
 " If they only remain in long enough to 
 afford me such an opportunity of distin- 
 guishing myself, as may satisfy my uncle 
 that I am not the jackanapes he thinks 
 me," cried he, " let the country go to the 
 devil in all its impenitence of unrege- 
 neration ! — I, you see, wear the egotism 
 on my sleeve which others hide in their 
 heart of hearts ! — Not one in a thousand of 
 these noisy patriots cares really for reform. 
 Some want to make themselves heard of, — 
 some to pull down their enemies, — some 
 to elevate their friends, — some, a seat — 
 some, a place — some (like myself), a wife — " 
 
 Then, as if feeling that he had been be- 
 trayed into saying too much, he turned 
 
 VOL. I. p
 
 302 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 towards Mrs. Myrton with a ten millionth 
 repetition of Tom Sheridan's joke, — " the 
 only thing that puzzles me is whose wife 
 I am to take !" 
 
 Had aunt Minchin been present, her wig 
 would have been justified in standing on 
 end at such barefaced profligacy. 
 
 But that their own return to Stainhurst 
 followed quickly upon Lord Alan's depart- 
 ure for Droitwich Castle, both sisters would 
 have found the aspect of the spots they had 
 visited together, singularly changed by the 
 loss of the momentary sunbeam shed by his 
 presence. Even at home, the recollection 
 of his lively sallies, and a perception of the 
 disagreeable discrepancy between his high- 
 bred manners, and the cold abstraction of 
 Myrton and dull formality of Lichfield, 
 recurred oftener to both than was good 
 for the happiness of either: and when, 
 after the expiration of many weeks, the 
 post brought no tidings of Lord Alan or 
 Lord Alan's cousin, Caroline w^atched, with 
 some uneasiness the anxious restlessness of 
 her sister, and half repented that she had 
 done so much to anchor the hopes of Esther
 
 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 303 
 
 on what might prove, in the end, a shifting 
 bed of sand. 
 
 It was some comfort that her husband 
 was at that moment enjoying too complete 
 an elation of spirit not to dispense a portion 
 of his joy to all around. Instead of raising 
 objections to her proposal that Esther should 
 again accompany them to town, he seemed 
 in a humour to comply with every wish of 
 every heart. 
 
 It is true, she had cheerfully met his own 
 proposition that his wife and children should 
 repair with him at once to the metropolis. 
 The long and arduous session on which he 
 was about to enter, seemed to render such 
 an arrangement essential to his domestic 
 comfort ; and, so well did he conceal his 
 fears that, left alone with Stainhurst, the 
 edifice he had been so laboriously construct- 
 ing at R as a temple of popularity 
 
 would crumble away under her counteract- 
 ing influence, that Caroline bitterly re- 
 proached herself with her inadequate parti- 
 cipation in the warm sentiments of affec- 
 tion, suggesting his desire for her company 
 in London.
 
 S04 THE POPULAR MEMBER. 
 
 But was it likely that so frank and high- 
 minded a woman should be exempt from 
 the confidence reposed by thousands of ad- 
 herents, and the nation at large, in the 
 high-principled sincerity of the Popular 
 Member ? 
 
 END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 London : 
 
 Printed by S. & J. Bentley, Wilson, and Flby, 
 
 Bangor House, Shoe Lane.
 
 ■'ty; ■-" - ' ■• =,';|S' 
 
 UNIYER9ITY OF ILUNOIS-URBANA 
 
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