Fairfax, whatever you do will be pleasing to me. The family of the Clerks have been very kind, have called often, and asked me more than once to their house, but I know not why all society was unpleasant to me but that of this dear friend," and she turned her kindly eyes to Miss Harding. Fairfax took that lady's hand in his, and thanked her with peculiar grace for all that she had done for Margaret. "I trust I am not ungrateful," he said, "towards those who show kindness to myself, but their services to me, my dear Miss Harding, would seem of little value in my eyes when compared with acts of friendship to this dear girl. I trust that I shall have ample opportunity of showing my gratitude, and in other ways than in words, and in proving to you that the most disagreeable man in the world' is not altogether the most insensible one." He smiled gaily as he repeated Miss Harding's expression regarding himself, and then, mounting his horse, rode back to Sir Wild Clerk's. During dinner every one remarked that although Sir Allan Fairfax often fell into fits of thought, yet that when he did converse he was infinitely more cheerful and gay than on the preceding day. One of the daughters of his host, a light-hearted, familiar, merry girl rallied him on his happy looks, declared that she was sure he had met with some delightful adventure in his morning's ride, and insisted upon knowing what it was. "Let us have a truce till after dinner," said Fairfax, in reply, "and then I'll tell you, upon my honour, when we have not so many eyes and ears upon us." "Oh, then, it is a love adventure," said the young lady. "What, is there nothing but love that requires discretion?" said Fairfax, "but mind, you must be very secret whatever it is ;" and after dinner he told her as a matter of strict confidence that he was going to be married to his first and only love, and who the person was. This may seem a strange proceeding, but Fairfax calculated justly, and before the party broke up the secret was known to every body in the room without his taking any more trouble about it. Day after day he now spent with Margaret Graham, and when the period which he had promised to remain with Lady Clerk was over, he removed to his own quarters at the White Lion, where he could be more at liberty. Margaret was very happy, and Fairfax was all in all to her. He was a good deal changed, it was true, since the time when she had first known him; he was graver, almost sadder. It seemed as if present happiness effaced with difficulty the traces which past sorrow had left upon his heart. She remarked, too, and so did others, that he never mentioned the word Kenmore, and Miss Harding noticed, almost amused, that her friend's lover never referred in any manner to the period or the circumstances of Margaret's marriage to the old surgeon. "What jealous creatures these men are," she thought; "it is evident he cannot bear to think of her having been even nominally the wife of another." It cost Fairfax some trouble, it is true, to avoid pronouncing the name he seemed to hate, but he did it pertinaciously. His bride was always named as "Margaret," to herself and to Miss Harding, of course; but when he had to speak of her to others it often caused a good deal of circumlocution. He called her "the lady formerly Miss Graham," "Mr. Graham's daughter, of Allerdale," and to her servants it was always "your mistress." It pained Margaret a little, for she could not help remarking it, and her own feelings towards poor Doctor Kenmore were those of gratitude and esteem. She did not suffer it, however, to interrupt her happiness much, for she thought when once they were married the cause of such conduct would be removed, and she named as early a day as possible for her union with him she loved, for Margaret had no affectations. All the neighbours became amazingly kind when they found that Mistress Kenmore was about to be married to Sir Allan Fairfax, and she suffered herself, though with a feeling of timidity from long seclusion, to be persuaded to mingle with society. She took more pleasure in it, too, for every one was loud in praise of her promised husband, and only on one occasion did she meet with, or remark, one of those little touches of malevolence which are often brought forth in the breasts of the discontented by the sight of happiness in others. "How strange it is, my dear Mrs. Kenmore," said Lady Clerk, "that Sir Allan never mentions you by your present name, and never speaks a word of your first husband-it is quite remarkable." Margaret felt all the rudeness and the unkindness of the speech, but she answered mildly, "His mind reverts more pleasantly to former and more happy days, my dear madam. Indeed it is much more agreeable to us both to think as little as possible of a period of adversity, sorrow, and suffering, and to let memory rest on those brighter hours when I was Margaret Graham, and he was simply Allan Fairfax." But Margaret did not go back to Lady Clerk's any more. In the meantime all arrangements were made, the marriage-day approached rapidly, and the agitation which Margaret felt-the bright, happy, thrilling agitation, made her feel all the difference between love and friendship. A brother officer of Sir Allan's came down from London to be present at the ceremony; Margaret chose only one bridesmaid, the same who had accompanied her to the altar before; and when Fairfax was about to take leave of her on the day preceding that which was to unite them for ever, he turned to Miss Harding, and taking up a packet which had lain on the table since the morning, he said, "Dear Miss Harding, you must show Margaret and myself that you are not proud with two dear friends, and accept this little testimony of our united regard and affection." "I must know what it is, Sir Allan," said Miss Harding; "proud you shall not find me; but still there are things, there are feelings which I am sure you would not wish me to give up even for your sakes.' "I should wish you to accept that packet," said Fairfax, with a smile, "it is Margaret's wish, too, and I am sure you will not refuse her on the eve of her wedding-day." "But what is it?" said Miss Harding, a little agitated, though she was usually very much composed. Open it and see, Eliza," said Margaret; "all I can say is that Fairfax and I have done our best during the last month to make it what we could wish for you, and if you refuse it you will inflict great pain upon us." With a hand which trembled a good deal, Miss Harding opened the thick envelope, but found nothing within but some old and new parchments, and a slip of paper apparently a catalogue of the rest. At the head was written, "Conveyance of the Mount Cottage Estate, Adam Brown, Esquire, to Elizabeth Harding, Spinster." Then followed, "Fine and recovery," ," &c. &c. &c., not one word of which did Miss Harding comprehend. "I do not understand it at all," she said, gazing bewildered in the faces of her two friends. "They are the title-deeds, dear Eliza," said Margaret, "of the cottage you have always so much admired just coming out of Brownswick, and the grounds about it. They are from me and him I love, in our day of prosperity and happiness, to her who was a friend to me in the time of adversity and sorrow. You must not refuse the gift." "I will not, Margaret," said Miss Harding, throwing her arm round her friend's neck and kissing her. "I can bear gratitude, for that is very different from dependence." But when at an after period Miss Harding came to inquire of what the gift consisted, she found that the beautiful little cottage was accompanied by furniture as beautiful, and that the grounds Margaret spoke of were not the gardens alone but the fields around, which rendered her, moderate as she was, independent of the world altogether. The marriage-day dawned brightly; the church was fuller of people than either Margaret or her bridegroom wished, and the ceremony was performed, making Margaret and Fairfax man and wife. With a heart thrilling with joy and gratitude to heaven-none the less because some solemn memories mingled with present happiness-Margaret was led from the vestry to the carriage which was in waiting, and left her native county for a time with him she had loved long and well. At the end of the honeymoon, as it is called, they were to return and spend a short time at her house near Brownswick till the old mansion of her husband's family could be made completely ready, for it had been somewhat neglected of late; and we must pass over all that followed the marriage ceremony till they came back. Suffice it that when they did return, and when Miss Harding met them in the hall, she looked in Margaret's eyes to read there the tale of her friend's heart, and found pure, unmingled joy in every look. Would that we could stop here where such histories generally come to an end; but Margaret's sorrows were not yet altogether over, and we must trace her course yet a little further. FACES THAT BUT ONCE WE MEET. BY MRS. PONSONBY. FACES that but once we meet, There the wayward memory Casting from the heart away, : A GRAYBEARD'S GOSSIP ABOUT HIS LITERARY ACQUAINTANCE. No. III. Forsan et hæc olim meminisse juvabit. Notice of Richard Cumberland continued - The London Review Names of the principal Contributors-Its Want of Success-Anecdotes of Cumberland, and Summary of his Character-Thomas Hill, the Literary Drysalter-My first Interview with George Colman the Younger-Hill's Proneness to Exaggeration, and the Dilemmas in which it involved him. NOTWITHSTANDING the total failure of Cumberland's project for securing a more equal distribution of profits between publishers and authors, he was not discouraged from attempting the reform of another literary abuse, which, though it might not be equally beneficial to the former, was scarcely less detrimental to the latter class. Enlightened and impartial criticism, rare enough in our own days, could hardly be said to have existed at the period of which I am writing. Under the insanifying influence produced by the horrors of the French Revolution, and the angry excitement of the war then raging, every Review was perverted into an instrument of political animosity and religious, or rather of irreligious, hatred. Not writings but writers were criticised, the verdict being solely guided by the party or sect to which they were known, or suspected to belong. Partiality of the critical judges on one side generated reaction on the other; both were equally culpable; both seemed to exult in that which formed their joint condemnation, their success in dashing the scales out of the hands of justice. From this abuse we have been gradually emancipating ourselves, but there existed another, perhaps equally injurious, and, certainly more insidious, which, even now, has only received a partial remedy. All the Reviews were the property of booksellers, some of whom had notoriously established them for the express purpose of puffing their own publications, and vilipending those of their competitors. Thus was criticism doubly corrupted at its very source, subjected to every evil influence that could pervert, degrade, and taint it. That Cumberland wished to cleanse this Augean stable, for the general purification of literature, there is no reason to doubt; but we may fairly presume that he was not altogether uninfluenced by personal considerations. Too thin-skinned not to wince under the critical lash, however leniently applied, he made no secret of his hostility to their system, when the Edinburgh Reviewers, combining unprecedented vigour and talent with more copious and artistical critiques than had hitherto appeared, acted up to the severe spirit of their motto-" The judge is condemned when the offender escapes. "The unfavourable notice of his memoirs, in their number for April, 1806, in which they charged him with an exorbitant appetite for praise, and jealousy of censure, was little calculated to reconcile him, either to the Aristarchi of Edinburgh, or to the general condition of criticism as it was then conducted. Whatever might have been his motives, he resolved to attempt a remedy for a manifest evil by establishing a Review totally independent of bibliopolitan influences, and guarded against all abuse of the judicial functions on the part of the contributors, by the stipulation that their names should be prefixed. On these conditions he succeeded in engaging associates, few of whom, however, could be deemed men of sufficient literary eminence to promise success to the enterprize; and in May, 1809, appeared the first number of" The London Review, conducted by Richard Cumberland, Esq." The introductory address explains, in the figurative and overwrought style to which I have alluded, his reasons for the undertaking. "It is by no means my disposition to censure indiscriminately a whole body of gentlemen concerned in the like labours with my own, merely because they carry on their operations under casemates, or by ambuscade, while I work in the open field; yet I am free to own that I should like to see their faces that I might have a better chance of understanding their manœuvres. When the enemy veiled himself in a cloud, honest Ajax only prayed for light. * Every one must confess that there is a dangerous temptation, an unmanly security, an unfair advantage in concealment; why then should any man who seeks not to injure but to benefit his contemporaries resort to it? A piece of crape may be a convenient mask for a highwayman: but a man that goes upon an honest errand does not want it, and will disdain to wear it. * If critics aim to raise themselves by sinking others, there is a marvellous great bathos in their ambition. But what is it they wish to do? Is it to make men brighter that they persuade them they are blockheads; or do they aspire to erect a throne for themselves upon the ruins of genius, and be approached like black barbarians through an avenue of skulls erected upon poles, as the trophies of their cruelty? Let me then wonder at the bad policy of those who waste their pains in watering a dead plant, from which they can expect no produce, and neglect a living one which bursting into bloom if duly fostered, may delight them with its beauty, and regale them with its odour." Diametrically opposed to this doctrine, is the present opinion of one of the contributors to the Review, who, rendered wiser by a long experience, thus sings his palinode: "If concealment affords a strong and often an irresistible temptation to the gratification of malice, and the splenetic effusions of envy, an avowal of the critic's name must inevitably blunt or misdirect the sword of justice; thus seducing him into an opposite extreme, and affording a fresh proof that the reverse of wrong is not always right. Absolute impartiality is hardly attainable; for almost every man, without being conscious of the fact, has his little prejudices and prepossessions; but the fearlessness and independence possessed by an anonymous writer are calculated to make a much nearer approach to fair criticism, than the fettering responsibility imposed by the reviewer's signature. The man who is hampered and disarmed by publicity, will only exercise a portion of the critic's functions; avoiding all notice of those whom he is afraid to attack, however manifest may be their demerits; overlauding the objects of his favour; and attempting to neutralise the conscious excess of these encomiums by an undue severity towards the humbler aspirants whom he thinks he may victimise with impunity.": Few, except raw recruits, had been enlisted by the editor for an enter * Memoirs, &c., of James Smith, vol. i., p. 22. |