Hopes and Fears

takes a vast deal of persuasion to bend me to swallow so much pardon

in milk and water. I wonder if there's time to change the spooney

simplicity, and come out in something spicy, with a dash of the

Bloomer. But, maybe, there's some news of him in the other sheet,

now she has delivered her conscience of her rigmarole. Oh! here it

is-')

'Phoebe will go home with us, as she is, according to the family

system, not summoned to her sister's wedding. Robert leaves London

on Saturday morning, to fetch his books, &c., from Oxford, Mr.

Parsons having consented to give him a title for Holy Orders, and to

let him assist in the parish until the next Ember week. I think,

dear girl, that it should not be concealed from you that this step

was taken as soon as he heard that you had actually sailed for

Ireland, and that he does not intend to return until we are in the

country.'

('Does he not? Another act of coercion! I suppose you put him up to

this, madam, as a pleasing course of discipline. You think you have

the whip-hand of me, do you? Pooh! See if he'll stay at Oxford!')

'I feel for the grief I'm inflicting-'

('Oh, so you complacently think, 'now I have made her sorry!'')

'-but I believe uncertainty, waiting, and heart sickness would cost

you far more. Trust me, as one who has felt it, that it is far

better to feel oneself unworthy than to learn to doubt or distrust

the worthiness or constancy of another.'

('My father to wit! A pretty thing to say to his daughter! What

right has she to be pining and complaining after him? He, the

unworthy one? I'll never forgive that conceited inference! Just

because he could not stand sentiment! Master Robert gone! Won't I

soon have him repenting of his outbreak?')

'I have no doubt that his feelings are unchanged, and that he is

solely influenced by principle. He is evidently exceedingly unhappy

under all his reserve-'

('He shall be more so, till he behaves himself, and comes back

humble! I've no notion of his flying out in this way.')

'-and though I have not exchanged a word with him on the subject, I

am certain that his good opinion will be retrieved, with infinite joy

to himself, as soon as you make it possible for his judgment to be

satisfied with your conduct and sentiments. Grieved as I am, it is

with a hopeful sorrow, for I am sure that nothing is wanting on your

part but that consistency and sobriety of behaviour of which you have

newly learnt the necessity on other grounds. The Parsonses have gone

to their own house, so you will not find any one here but two who

will feel for you in silence, and we shall soon be in the quiet of

the Holt, where you shall have all that can give you peace or comfort

from your ever-loving old H. C.'

'Feel for me! Never! Don't you wish you may get it? Teach the catechism and feed caterpillars till such time as it pleases Mrs. Honor to write up and say 'the specimen is tame'? How nice! No, no. I'll not be frightened into their lording it over me! I know a better way! Let Mr. Robert find out how little I care, and get himself heartily sick of St. Wulstan's, till it is 'turn again Whittington indeed!' Poor fellow, I hate it, but he must be cured of his airs, and have a good fright. Why don't they ask me to go to Paris with them? Where can I go, if they don't. To Mary Cranford's? Stupid place, but I will show that I'm not so hard up as to have no place but the Holt to go to! If it were only possible to stay with Mr. Prendergast, it would be best of all! Can't I tell him to catch a chaperon for me? Then he would think Honor a regular dragon, which would be a shame, for it was nobody's fault but his! I shall tell him I'm like the Christian religion, for which people are always making apologies that it doesn't want! Two years! Patience! It will be very good for Robin, and four-and-twenty is quite soon enough to bite off one's wings, and found an ant-hill. As to being bullied into being kissed, pitied, pardoned, and trained by Honor, I'll never sink so low! No, at no price.'

Poor Mr. Prendergast! Did ever a more innocent mischief-maker exist?

Poor Honora! Little did she guess that the letter written in such love, such sympathy, such longing hope, would only excite fierce rebellion.

Yet it was at the words of Moses that the king's heart was hardened; and what was the end? He was taken at his word. 'Thou shalt see my face no more.'

To be asked to join the party on their tour had become Lucilla's prime desire, if only that she might not feel neglected, or driven back to Hiltonbury by absolute necessity; and when the husband and wife came down, the wish was uppermost in her mind.

Eloisa remarked on her quiet style of dress, and observed that it would be quite the thing in Paris, where people were so much less outre than here.

'I have nothing to do with Paris.'

'Oh! surely you go with us!' said Eloisa; 'I like to take you out, because you are in so different a style of beauty, and you talk and save one trouble! Will not she go, Charles?'

'You see, Lolly wants you for effect!' he said, sneeringly. 'But you are always welcome, Cilly; we are woefully slow when you ain't there to keep us going, and I should like to show you a thing or two. I only did not ask you, because I thought you had not hit it off with Rashe, or have you made it up?'

'Oh! Rashe and I understand each other,' said Cilly, secure that though she would never treat Rashe with her former confidence, yet as long as they travelled en grand seigneur, there was no fear of collisions of temper.

'Rashe is a good creature,' said Lolly, 'but she is so fast and so eccentric that I like to have you, Cilly; you look so much younger, and more ladylike.'

'One thing more,' said Charles, in his character of head of the family; 'shouldn't you look up Miss Charlecote, Cilly? There's Owen straining the leash pretty hard, and you must look about you, that she does not take up with these new pets of hers and cheat you.'

'The Fulmorts? Stuff! They have more already than they know what to do with.'

'The very reason she will leave them the more. I declare, Cilly,' he added, half in jest, half in earnest, 'the only security for you and Owen is in a double marriage. Perhaps she projects it. You fire up as if she had!'

'If she had, do you think that I should go back?' said Cilly, trying to answer lightly, though her cheeks were in a flame. 'No, no, I am not going to let slip a chance of Paris.'

She stopped short, dismayed at having committed herself, and Horatia coming down, was told by acclamation that Cilly was going.

'Of course she is,' said forgiving and forgetting Rashe. 'Little Cilly left behind, to serve for food to the Rouge Dragon? No, no! I should have no fun in life without her.'

Rashe forgot the past far more easily that Cilla could ever do. There was a certain guilty delight in writing-

'MY DEAR HONOR,-Many thanks for your letter, and intended

kindnesses. The scene must, however, be deferred, as my cousins mean

to winter at Paris, and I can't resist the chance of hooking a

Marshal, or a Prince or two. Rashe's strain was a great sell but we

had capital fun, and shall hope for more success another season. I

would send you my diary if it were written out fair. We go so soon

that I can't run up to London, so I hope no one will be disturbed on

my account.