My dear boy, I am very much touched by your wish to
increase your mother’s jointure,—a
very proper wish, independently of filial feeling,
for she brought to the estate a very pretty fortune,
which, the trustees consented to my investing in land;
and though the land completed our ring-fence, it does
not bring in two per cent, and the conditions of the
entail limited the right of jointure to an amount
below that which a widowed Lady Chillingly may fairly
expect.
I care more about the provision on these points than
I do for the interests of old Chillingly Gordon’s
son. I had meant to behave very handsomely to
the father; and when the return for behaving handsomely
is being put into Chancery—A Worm Will Turn.
Nevertheless, I agree with you that a son should
not be punished for his father’s faults; and,
if the sacrifice of L20,000 makes you and myself feel
that we are better Christians and truer gentlemen,
we shall buy that feeling very cheaply.
Sir Peter then proceeded, half jestingly, half seriously,
to combat Kenelm’s declaration that he was not
in love with Cecilia Travers; and, urging the advantages
of marriage with one whom Kenelm allowed would be
a perfect wife, astutely remarked that unless Kenelm
had a son of his own it did not seem to him quite
just to the next of kin to will the property from
him, upon no better plea than the want of love for
his native country. “He would love his
country fast enough if he had 10,000 acres in it.”
Kenelm shook his head when he came to this sentence.
“Is even then love for one’s country but
cupboard-love after all?” said he; and he postponed
finishing the perusal of his father’s letter.
KENELM CHILLINGLY did not exaggerate the social position
he had acquired when he classed himself amongst the
lions of the fashionable world. I dare not count
the number of three-cornered notes showered upon him
by the fine ladies who grow romantic upon any kind
of celebrity; or the carefully sealed envelopes, containing
letters from fair Anonymas, who asked if he had a
heart, and would be in such a place in the Park at
such an hour. What there was in Kenelm Chillingly
that should make him thus favoured, especially by the
fair sex, it would be difficult to say, unless it
was the two-fold reputation of being unlike other
people, and of being unaffectedly indifferent to the
gain of any reputation at all. He might, had
he so pleased, have easily established a proof that
the prevalent though vague belief in his talents was
not altogether unjustified. For the articles
he had sent from abroad to “The Londoner”
and by which his travelling expenses were defrayed,
had been stamped by that sort of originality in tone
and treatment which rarely fails to excite curiosity
as to the author, and meets with more general praise
than perhaps it deserves.
But Mivers was true to his contract to preserve inviolable
the incognito of the author, and Kenelm regarded with
profound contempt the articles themselves and the
readers who praised them.
