thought of bitterness. Indeed, he himself seemed
to have imbibed Nurse Gooch’s original opinion,
that his genuine love for sacred things was a sort
of impertinence and pretension in such as he—a
kind of hypocrisy even when they were the realities
and helps to which he clung with all his heart.
Still, this depression was only shown by reserve,
and troubled no one save myself, who knew him best
guessed what was lost by his silence, and burned
in spirit at seeing him merely endured as one unworthy.
In one of our varieties of Waverley discussions the
crystal hardness and inexperienced intolerance of
youth made Miss Fordyce declare that had she been
Edith Plantagenet, she would never, never have forgiven
Sir Kenneth. ’How could she, when he had
forsaken the king’s banner? Unpardonable!’
Then came a sudden, awful silence, as she recollected
her audience, and blushed crimson with the misery
of perceiving where her random shaft had struck,
nor did either of us know what to say; but to our
surprise it was Clarence who first spoke to relieve
the desperate embarrassment. ’Is forgiven
quite the right word, when the offence was not personal?
I know that such things can neither be repaired
nor overlooked, and I think that is what Miss Fordyce
meant.’
‘Oh, Mr. Winslow,’ she exclaimed, ’I
am very sorry—I don’t think I quite
meant’—and then, as her eyes for one
moment fell on his subdued face, she added, ’No,
I said what I ought not. If there is sorrow’—her
voice trembled—’and pardon above,
no one below has any right to say unpardonable.’
Clarence bowed his head, and his lips framed, but
he did not utter, ‘Thank you.’
Emily nervously began reading aloud the page before
her, full of the jingling recurring rhymes about
Sir Thomas of Kent; but I saw Ellen surreptitiously
wipe away a tear, and from that time she was more
kind and friendly with Clarence.
’None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserve the fair.’
Song.
Christmas trees were not yet heard of beyond the Fatherland,
and both the mothers held that Christmas parties
were not good for little children, since Mrs. Winslow’s
strong common sense had arrived at the same conclusion
as Mrs. Fordyce had derived from Hannah More and
Richard Lovell Edgeworth. Besides, rick-burning
and mobs were far too recent for our neighbours to
venture out at night.
But as we were all resolved that little Anne should
have a memorable Christmas at Chantry House, we begged
an innocent, though iced cake, from the cook, painted
a set of characters ourselves, including all the
dolls, and bespoke the presence of Frank Fordyce at
a feast in the outer mullion room—Griff’s
apartment, of course. The locality was chosen
as allowing more opportunity for high jinks than the
bookroom, and also because the swords and pistols
