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028 - Fathers and Sons · Wives and Daughters

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Speaker 1: Chapter twenty seven of Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell.
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Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter twenty seven,
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Speaker 1: Fathers and Sons. Things were not going on any better
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Speaker 1: at Hamley Hall. Nothing had occurred to change the state
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Speaker 1: of dissatisfied feeling into which the Squire and his eldest
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Speaker 1: son had respectively fallen, and the long continuance merely of
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Speaker 1: dissatisfaction is sure of itself to deepen the feeling. Roger
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Speaker 1: did all in his power to bring the father and
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Speaker 1: son together, but sometimes wondered if it would not have
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Speaker 1: been better to leave them alone, for they were falling
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Speaker 1: into the habit of each making him their confidante, and
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Speaker 1: so defining emotions and opinions which would have had less
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Speaker 1: distinctness if they had been unexpressed. There was little enough
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Speaker 1: relief in the daily life at the hall to help
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Speaker 1: them all to shake off the gloom, and it even
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Speaker 1: told on the health of both the Squire and Osborne.
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Speaker 1: The squire became thinner, His skin as well as his clothes,
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Speaker 1: began to hang loose about him, and the freshness of
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Speaker 1: his color turned to red streaks, till his cheeks looked
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Speaker 1: like erdistone Pippins instead of resembling a Catherine Pear on
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Speaker 1: the side that's next the sun. Roger thought that his
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Speaker 1: father sat indoors and smoked in his study more than
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Speaker 1: was good for him. But it had become difficult to
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Speaker 1: get him far afield. He was too much afraid of
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Speaker 1: coming across some sign of the discontinued drainage works, or
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Speaker 1: being irritated afresh by the sight of his depreciated timber.
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Speaker 1: Osborne was wrapped up in the idea of arranging his
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Speaker 1: poems for the press, and so working out his wish
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Speaker 1: for independence, what with daily writing to his wife, taking
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Speaker 1: his letters himself to a distant post office and receiving
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Speaker 1: hers there, touching up his sonnets, et cetera with fastidious care,
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Speaker 1: and occasionally giving himself the pleasure of a visit to
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Speaker 1: the Gibsons, and enjoying the society of the two pleasant
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Speaker 1: girls there. He found little time for being with his father. Indeed,
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Speaker 1: Osborne was too self indulgent or sensitive, as he termed it,
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Speaker 1: to bear well with the squire's gloomy fits, or too
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Speaker 1: frequent querulousness. The consciousness of his secret two made Osborne
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Speaker 1: uncomfortable in his father's presence. It was very well for
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Speaker 1: all parties that Roger was not sensitive, for if he
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Speaker 1: had been, there were times when it would have been
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Speaker 1: hard to bear the little spurts of domestic tyranny by
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Speaker 1: which his father strove to assert his power over both
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Speaker 1: his sons. One of these occurred very soon after the
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Speaker 1: night of the Hollingford Charity ball. Roger had induced his
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Speaker 1: father to come out with him, and the Squire had,
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Speaker 1: on his son's suggestion, taken with him his long unused spud.
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Speaker 1: The two had wandered far Afield. Perhaps the elder man
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Speaker 1: had found the unwonted length of exercise too much for him,
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Speaker 1: for as he approached the house on his return, he
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Speaker 1: became what nurses call in children, fractious and ready to
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Speaker 1: turn on his companion for every remark he made. Roger
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Speaker 1: understood the case by instinct, as it were, and bore
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Speaker 1: it all with his usual sweetness of temper. They entered
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Speaker 1: the house by the front door. It lay straight on
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Speaker 1: their line of march. On the old cracked yellow marble slab.
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Speaker 1: There lay a card with Lord Hollingford's name on it,
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Speaker 1: which Robinson, evidently on the watch for them return hastened
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Speaker 1: out of his pantry to deliver to Roger.
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Speaker 2: His lordship was very sorry not to see you, mister Roger,
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Speaker 2: and his lordship left a note for you. Mister Osborne
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Speaker 2: took it, I think when he passed through. I asked
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Speaker 2: his lordship if he would like to see mister Osborne,
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Speaker 2: who was indoors as I thought, But his Lordship said
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Speaker 2: he was pressed for time, and he told me to
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Speaker 2: make his excuses.
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Speaker 1: Did he ask for me, growled the Squire.
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Speaker 2: No, Sir, I can say as his lordship did. He
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Speaker 2: would never have thought of mister Osborne, Sir, if I
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Speaker 2: hadn't named him. It was mister Roger. He seemed so
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Speaker 2: keen after very odd.
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Speaker 1: Said the Squire. Roger said nothing, although he naturally felt
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Speaker 1: some curiosity. He went into the drawing room, not quite
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Speaker 1: aware that his father was following him. Osborne sat at
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Speaker 1: a table near the fire, pen in hand, looking over
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Speaker 1: one of his poems, dotting the eyes, crossing the tees
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Speaker 1: and now and then pausing over the alteration of a word. Oh, Roger,
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Speaker 1: he said, as his brother came in.
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Speaker 3: Here's been Lord Hollingford wanting to see you.
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Speaker 1: I know, replied Roger, and he left.
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Speaker 3: A note for you. Robinson tried to persuade him it
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Speaker 3: was for my father, so he's added a junior Roger
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Speaker 3: Hamley Esquire junior in pencil.
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Speaker 1: The Squire was in the room by this time, and
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Speaker 1: what he had overheard rubbed him up still more the
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Speaker 1: wrong way. Roger took his unopened note and read it.
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Speaker 4: What does he say, asked the Squire.
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Speaker 1: Roger handed him the note. It contained an invitation to
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Speaker 1: dinner to meet Monsieur Geffois and Something, whose views on
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Speaker 1: certain subjects Roger had been advocating in the article Lord
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Speaker 1: Hollingford had spoken about to Molly when he danced with
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Speaker 1: her at the Hollingford Ball. Monsieur Geffoi s Something was
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Speaker 1: in England now and was expected to pay a visit
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Speaker 1: at the Towers in the course of the following week.
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Speaker 1: He had expressed a wish to meet the author of
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Speaker 1: the paper which had already attracted the attention of the
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Speaker 1: French comparative anatomists, and Lord Hollingford added a few words
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Speaker 1: as to his own desire to make the acquaintance of
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Speaker 1: a neighbor whose tastes were so similar to his own,
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Speaker 1: and then followed a civil message from Lord and Lady Cumnor.
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Speaker 1: Lord Hollingford's hand was cramped and rather illegible. The Squire
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Speaker 1: could not read it all at once and was enough
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Speaker 1: put out to decline any assistance in deciphering it. At
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Speaker 1: last he made it out.
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Speaker 5: So, my Lord Lieutenant is taking some notice of the
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Speaker 5: Hamleys at last. The election is coming on, is it?
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Speaker 5: But I can tell him were not to be got
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Speaker 5: so easily. I suppose this trap is set for you, Osborne.
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Speaker 5: What is this You've been writing that the French monsieur
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Speaker 5: is so taken with?
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Speaker 1: It is not me, sir, said Osborne.
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Speaker 3: Both note and caller for Roger.
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Speaker 4: I don't understand it, said the Squire.
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Speaker 5: These wig fellows have never done their duty by me,
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Speaker 5: not that I wanted of them. The Duke of Debenham
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Speaker 5: used to pay the Hamleys a respected due to 'emllest
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Speaker 5: landowners in the county. But since he died and this
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Speaker 5: shabby whig lord has succeeded him, I've never dined that
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Speaker 5: for lord lieutenants. No, not once.
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Speaker 6: But I think, sir, I've heard you say Lord CuMoRe
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Speaker 6: used to invite you, only you did not choose to go,
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Speaker 6: said Roger.
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Speaker 5: Yes, what do you mean by that? Do you suppose
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Speaker 5: I was going to desert the principles of my family
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Speaker 5: and curry favor with the Whigs. No leave that to them.
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Speaker 5: They can ask the Heir of the Hamleys fast enough
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Speaker 5: when a county election is coming on.
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Speaker 1: I tell you, sir, said Osborne, in the irritable tone
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Speaker 1: he sometimes used when his father was particularly unreasonable.
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Speaker 3: It is not me, Lord Hollingford is inviting. It is Roger.
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Speaker 3: Roger is making himself known for what he is, a
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Speaker 3: first rate.
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Speaker 1: Fellow, continued Osborne, a sting of self reproach, mingling with
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Speaker 1: his generous pride in his brother.
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Speaker 3: He is getting himself a name. You've been writing about
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Speaker 3: these new French theories and discoveries, and this foreign savant
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Speaker 3: very naturally wants to make his acquaintance, And so Lord
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Speaker 3: Hollingford asks him to dine. It's as clear as.
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Speaker 1: Can be, lowering his turn and addressing himself to Roger.
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Speaker 3: It has nothing to do with politics. If my father
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Speaker 3: would but see it.
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Speaker 1: Of course, the Squire heard this little aside with the
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Speaker 1: unlucky uncertainty of hearing, which is a characteristic of the
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Speaker 1: beginning of deafness, and its effect on him was perceptible
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Speaker 1: in the increase to acrimony of his next speech.
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Speaker 5: You young men think you know everything. I tell you.
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Speaker 5: It's a palpable wig, a trick. And what business has Roger?
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Speaker 5: If it is Roger the man wants to go currying
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Speaker 5: favor with the French. In my day we were content
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Speaker 5: to hate em and to lick em. But it's just
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Speaker 5: like your can see Osborne setting yourself up to say,
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Speaker 5: it's your younger brother there asking, and not you. I
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Speaker 5: tell you it's you. They think the eldest son was
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Speaker 5: sure to be called after his father, Roger jer Hamley Junior.
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Speaker 5: It's as plain as a pike staff. They know they
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Speaker 5: can't catch me with chaff. But they've gone up this
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Speaker 5: French dodge. What business had you to go writing about
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Speaker 5: the friends? Roger? I should have thought you were too
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Speaker 5: sensible to take any notice of their fancies and theories.
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Speaker 5: But if it is you they've asked, I'll not have
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Speaker 5: you going and meeting these foreigners at a whig house.
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Speaker 5: They ought to have asked Osborne, he's the representative of
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Speaker 5: the Hamleys if I'm not, And they can't get me
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Speaker 5: let him try. Ever so, besides, Osborne has got a
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Speaker 5: bit of the monter about him, which he caught with,
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Speaker 5: being so fond of going off to the continent instead
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Speaker 5: of coming back to his good old English home.
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Speaker 1: He went on repeating much of what he had said
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Speaker 1: before till he left the room. Osborne had kept on
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Speaker 1: replying to his unreasonable grumblings, which had only added to
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Speaker 1: his and as soon as the Squire was fairly gone,
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Speaker 1: Osborne turned to Roger and said, of.
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Speaker 3: Course you'll go, Roger ten to one. He'll be in
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Speaker 3: another mine to morrow.
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Speaker 1: No, said Roger bluntly enough, for he was extremely disappointed.
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Speaker 6: I won't run the chance of vexing him. I shall refuse.
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Speaker 1: Don't be such a fool, exclaimed Osborne.
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Speaker 3: Really, my father is too unreasonable, you heard, are we
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Speaker 3: kept contradicting himself, and such a man as you'd be
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Speaker 3: kept under like a child by.
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Speaker 6: Don't let us talk any more about it, Osborne.
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Speaker 1: Said Roger, writing away fast. When the note was written
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Speaker 1: and sent off, he came and put his hand caressingly
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Speaker 1: on Osborne's shoulder as he sat, pretending to read, but
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Speaker 1: in reality vexed with both his father and his brother
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Speaker 1: though on very different grounds.
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Speaker 6: How go their poems, old fellow, I hope they are
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Speaker 6: nearly ready to bring out?
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Speaker 3: No, they're not, And if it weren't for the money,
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Speaker 3: I shouldn't care if they were never published. What's the
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Speaker 3: use of fame if one may treat the fruits of it?
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Speaker 6: Come now, we'll have no more of that. That's talk
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Speaker 6: about the money. I shall be going up for my
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Speaker 6: fellowship examination next week, and then we'll have a person common,
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Speaker 6: for they'll never think of not giving me a fellowship.
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Speaker 6: Now I'm senior wrangler. I'm sort enough myself at present,
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Speaker 6: and I don't like to bother my father. But when
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Speaker 6: i'm fellow, you shall take me down to Winchester and
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Speaker 6: introduce me to the little wife.
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Speaker 3: It will be a month next Monday since I left.
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Speaker 1: Her, said Osborne, laying down his papers and gazing into
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Speaker 1: the fire, as if by so doing he could call
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Speaker 1: up her image.
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Speaker 3: In her letter this morning she bids me give you
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Speaker 3: such a pretty message to won't bear translating into English.
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Speaker 3: She must read it for.
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Speaker 1: Yourself, continued he, pointing out a line or two in
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Speaker 1: a letter he drew from his pocket. Roger suspected that
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Speaker 1: one or two of the words were wrongly spelt, but
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Speaker 1: their purport was so gentle and loving, and had such
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Speaker 1: a touch of simple, respectful gratitude in them, that he
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Speaker 1: could not help being drawn afresh to the little unseen
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Speaker 1: sister in law whose acquaintance Osborne had made by helping
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Speaker 1: her to look for some missing article of the children's
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Speaker 1: whom she was taking for their daily walk in Hyde Park.
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Speaker 1: For Missus Osborne Hamley had been nothing more than a
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Speaker 1: French bond, very pretty, very graceful, and very much tyrannized
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Speaker 1: over by the rough little boys and girl she had
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Speaker 1: in charge. She was a little orphan girl who had
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Speaker 1: charmed the heads of a traveling English family, as she
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Speaker 1: had brought Madame some articles of lingerie in a hotel,
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Speaker 1: and she had been hastily engaged by them as bond
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Speaker 1: to their children, partly as a pet and plaything herself,
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Speaker 1: partly because it would be so good for the children
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Speaker 1: to learn French from a native of Alsace. By and
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Speaker 1: by her Mistress ceased to take any particular notice of
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Speaker 1: Aimee in the bustle of London and London gaiety. But
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Speaker 1: though feeling more and more forlorn in a strange land.
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Speaker 1: Every day the French girl strove hard to do her duty.
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Speaker 1: One touch of kindness, however, was enough to set the
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Speaker 1: fountain gushing, and she and Osborne naturally fell into an
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Speaker 1: ideal state of love. To be rudely disturbed by the
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Speaker 1: indignation of the mother when accident discovered to her the
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Speaker 1: attachment existing between her children's bond and a young man
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Speaker 1: of an entirely different class. Aimee answered truly to all
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Speaker 1: her mistress's questions, but no worldly wisdom nor any lesson
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Speaker 1: to be learnt from another's experience, could in the least
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Speaker 1: disturb her entire faith in her lover. Perhaps missus Townshend
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Speaker 1: did no more than her duty in immediately sending a
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Speaker 1: may back to Metz, where she had first met with her,
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Speaker 1: and where such relations as remained to the girl might
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Speaker 1: be supposed to be residing. But altogether she knew so
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Speaker 1: little of the kind of people or life to which
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Speaker 1: she was consigning her deposed protegee that Osborne, after listening
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Speaker 1: with impatient indignation to the letter which missus Townshend gave
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Speaker 1: him when he insisted on seeing her in order to
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Speaker 1: learn what had become of his love that the young
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Speaker 1: man set off straight for Mets in hot haste, and
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Speaker 1: did not let the grass grow under his feet till
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Speaker 1: he had made Aimee his wife. All this had occurred
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Speaker 1: the previous autumn, and Roger did not know of the
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Speaker 1: step his brother had taken until it was irrevocable. Then
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Speaker 1: came the mother's death, which, besides the simplicity of its
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Speaker 1: own overwhelming sorrow, brought with it the loss of the kind,
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Speaker 1: tender mediatrics who could always soften and turn his father's heart.
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Speaker 1: It is doubtful, however, if even she could have succeeded
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Speaker 1: in this, For the squire looked high and over high
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Speaker 1: for the wife of his heir. He detested all foreigners,
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Speaker 1: and over Moore held all Roman Catholics in dread and abomination,
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Speaker 1: something akin to our ancestors hatred of witchcraft. All these
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Speaker 1: prejudices were strengthened by his grief. Argument would always have
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Speaker 1: glanced harmless away off his shield of utter unreason. But
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Speaker 1: a loving impulse in a happy moment might have softened
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Speaker 1: his heart to what he most detested in the former days.
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Speaker 1: But the happy moments came not now, and the loving
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Speaker 1: impulses were trodden down by the bitterness of his frequent remorse,
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Speaker 1: not less than by his growing irritability. So Aimee lived
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Speaker 1: solitary in the little cottage near Winchester in which Osborne
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Speaker 1: had installed her when she first came to England as
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Speaker 1: his wife, and in the dainty furnishing of which he
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Speaker 1: had run himself so deeply into debt. For Osborne consulted
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Speaker 1: his own fastidious taste in his purchases rather than her
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Speaker 1: simple childlike wishes and wants, and looked upon the little
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Speaker 1: frenchwoman rather as the future mistress of Hamley Hall, than
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Speaker 1: as the wife of a man who was totally dependent
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Speaker 1: on others. At present. He had chosen a southern county
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Speaker 1: as being far removed from those Midland shires where the
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Speaker 1: name of Hamley of Hamley was well and widely known.
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Speaker 1: For he did not wish his wife to assume, if
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Speaker 1: only for a time, a name which was not justly
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Speaker 1: and legally her own. In all these arrangements, he had
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Speaker 1: willingly striven to do his full duty by her, and
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Speaker 1: she repaid him with passionate devotion and admiring reverence. If
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Speaker 1: his vanity had met with a check or his worthy
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Speaker 1: desires for college honours had been disappointed, he knew where
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Speaker 1: to go for a comforter, one who poured out praise
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Speaker 1: till her words were choked in her throat by the
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Speaker 1: rapidity of her thoughts, and who poured out the small
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Speaker 1: vials of her indignation on everyone who did not acknowledge
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Speaker 1: and bow down to her husband's merits. If she ever
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Speaker 1: wished to go to the chateau that was his home
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Speaker 1: and to be introduced to his family, Aimey never hinted
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Speaker 1: a word of it to him. Only she did yearn
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Speaker 1: and she did plead for a little more of her
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Speaker 1: husband's company. And the good reasons which had convinced her
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Speaker 1: of the necessity of his being so much away when
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Speaker 1: he was present to urge them, failed in their efficacy
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Speaker 1: when she tried to reproduce them to herself in his absence.
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Speaker 1: The afternoon of the day on which Lord Hollingford called
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Speaker 1: Roger was going upstairs three steps at a time, when
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Speaker 1: at a turn in the landing he encountered his father.
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Speaker 1: It was the first time he had seen him since
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Speaker 1: their conversation about the tar's invitation to dinner. The Squire
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Speaker 1: stopped his son by standing right in the middle of
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Speaker 1: the passage.
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Speaker 5: Thou art going to meet the monsieur, my.
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Speaker 1: Lad, said he, half as affirmation, half as question, No.
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Speaker 6: Sir, I sent off James almost immediately with a note
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Speaker 6: declining it, I don't care about it. That's to say,
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Speaker 6: not to signify.
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Speaker 4: Why did you take me up so shop, Roger said
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Speaker 4: his father pettishly.
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Speaker 5: You all take me up so hastily nowadays. I think
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Speaker 5: it's hard when a man mustn't be allowed a bit
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Speaker 5: of crossness when he's tired and heavy at heart.
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Speaker 6: That I do, But father, I should never like to
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Speaker 6: go to a house where they had slighted you.
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Speaker 1: Nay, nay, lad, said the squire, brightening up a little.
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Speaker 5: I think I slighted them. They asked me to dinner
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Speaker 5: after my lord was made lieutenant time after time, but
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Speaker 5: I never would go near him. I call that my
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Speaker 5: slighting them.
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Speaker 1: And no more was said at the time, But the
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Speaker 1: next day the Squire again stopped Roger.
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Speaker 5: I've been making jem try young his livery coat that
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Speaker 5: he hasn't worn this three or four years. He's got
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Speaker 5: too stout for it.
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Speaker 1: Now.
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Speaker 6: Well he needn't wear it. Need he and Morgan's lad
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Speaker 6: will be glad enough of it. He's sadly in want
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Speaker 6: of clothes.
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Speaker 5: Aye. Ay, but use to go with you when you
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Speaker 5: call at the towers. It's but polite to call after
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Speaker 5: the lord what's his name? Has taken the trouble to
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Speaker 5: come here. And I shouldn't like you to go without a.
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Speaker 6: Groom, my dear father, I shouldn't know what to do
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Speaker 6: with a man riding at my back. I can find
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Speaker 6: my way to the stable yard for myself, or there'll
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Speaker 6: be some man about to take my horse. Don't trouble
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Speaker 6: yourself about that.
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Speaker 5: Well, you're not Osborne, to be sure. Perhaps it won't
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Speaker 5: strike em as strange for you, but you must look
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Speaker 5: up and hold your own and remember you're one of
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Speaker 5: the Hamleys who've been on the same land for hundreds
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Speaker 5: of years, while there but trumpery Wick folk who only
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Speaker 5: came into the county in Queen Anne's time.
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Speaker 1: End of Chapter twenty seven