CHAPTER IV. A little child, a limber elf, A fairy thing with red round cheeks, Must needs express his love's excess COLERIDGE. THE last evening at the Wilderness passed off almost cheerfully, thanks to the unlooked-for advent of Lord Wentworth. Florence danced round the room with delight, when the Earl, to whom she had confided her successful attempt to interest a stranger in the fate of Carlos, promised at once to purchase the pony for his daughter Cecilia. "Carlos shall not fall into the hands of a stranger, however gallant that stranger may be to young ladies. Cecilia shall ride him until his little mistress claims him." Mr. Dudley shook his head. ride again." "Florence will never "Pooh, pooh! Florence retires into the shade for a time, one day, like the phoenix, to arise and shine with unequalled lustre. I prophesy no total eclipse for Florence the fair." "In the meanwhile the poor child must hide her diminished head in a lonely Welsh valley," said Mr. Dudley, with a half smile. Lord Wentworth laughed and dropped the subject. Before the Earl took his departure from the Wilderness he had a long interview with Dr. Leicester, the result of which a future chapter will disclose. The worthy divine welcomed Mr. Dudley at the Rectory with an empressement he would scarcely have displayed had that gentleman been more happily circumstanced. The delicate kindness, the warm hospitality, above all the unaffected sympathy, with which he entertained his guest, would have touched a less sensitive temperament than Mr. Dudley's. Upon him this reception produced the happiest effect. He was soothed and cheered by the kindly nature of his host; his morbid sensibility (the sting of sorrow) was insensibly softened, and gradually gave way to a more healthy tone of feeling. A load was removed from Mr. Dudley's mind when his uncle's affairs were finally wound up. True, when every claim was discharged, every just debt cancelled, he found himself reduced to an income of one hundred pounds a year! But he was "passing rich," he was content that thus it should be, moreover, he was ready to put his shoulder to the wheel, and work for his daughter and himself. Nearly three months elapsed before Mr. Dudley received an intimation from Lord Wentworth's agent, that the cottage was prepared for his reception. Florence, her sorrows forgotten, was wild with delight at the prospect of the journey, and sang and danced about the house, to the infinite amusement of Dr. Leicester, followed in all her gambols by Puck, a beautiful little spaniel, the unwearying companion of her sports. Florence was grieved to part with her dear old friend the Rector, but Mrs. Ward (his widowed niece) had drawn such a charming picture of Welsh scenery, that she was in a fever of anxiety to visit her future home. Snowy mountains, sounding cataracts, rocky glens, ruined castles, were all jumbled together in her brain in most admired confusion. Add to which she had no very clear conception of the distinctive features of the scenery she longed to explore, never having travelled in a mountainous country. Her knowledge was confined to books and prints-knowledge of a very unsatisfactory kind, as all the world knows. Our little heroine may be pardoned the wild fancies which simmered in her brain; after all they were not much more foolish than those of her elders. A maiden of blushing fifteen might have dreamed of serenades amid the ruins of the castle, or of love in a cottagewild chimeras both! Florence merely listened to tales of sieges, banquets, ghosts, and goblins, and strove to identify them with the old castle buried in the Welsh mountains, but she never identified herself with the heroines of those wild tales. One evening the little group assembled in the Rector's pretty drawing-room were unusually silent: the thoughts of the approaching separation weighed on the spirits of all, save Florence, who was carrying on a dialogue or rather soliloquizing sotto voce at the other end of the room, Puck watching every gesture with inimitable patience. The silence was broken by Mrs. Ward, who was longing for an opportunity to cross-question Mr. Dudley, upon the all-important question of Florence's education. This lady was one of those formidable personages best characterized as managers. She managed her uncle's household, her uncle's parish; she would have managed the church wardens or warden, had she not met with manful resistance. She longed to give Mr. Dudley a little advice with respect to the management of his daughter, whom she regarded, with considerable injustice, as a spoilt child. And thus she commenced her attack. "My dear sir, have you considered the disadvantage it will be to Florence to carry her off and immure her in that old castle?" Mr. Dudley, taken by surprise, innocently asked, "As how?" "I fear that Florence, who is remarkably restless and fond of change"-Mr. Dudley looked surprised, having never remarked the symptoms-"will be miserable in an old castle, buried in the Welsh mountains. She must have playfellows. The pleasures of childhood are purely material." This was a favourite aphorism of Mrs. Ward's, and she hastened to bring it to bear upon the present question. My dear Alice, you judge of Florence by other children," said Dr. Leicester impatiently. "The germs of a noble character are hidden under that lively temperament. Already, at eight years of age, she has more sense and feeling than many young people of twice her age." "Then she is much to be pitied!" interposed the incorrigible widow. "A precocious child is as unnatural as forced دو "Fruit," interposed the doctor, "insipid and disagreeable to a degree. But a truce to this sharp encounter of wits. In one breath we will not accuse poor Florence of the waywardness of a child and the vagaries of a genius. Let us hear Mr. Dudley's system of education; doubtless, it is original, probably, delightfully absurd." Mr. Dudley bowed. "I fear that I shall fall considerably in your good opinion when I confess that I have no system at all." Mrs. Ward shrugged her shoulders; the Rector nodded his head approvingly. Mr. Dudley continued, "Anxiety to secure a provision for my child shall not induce me to neglect the allimportant question of education. True, I must forego the services of able instructors, the lessons of fashionable masters, but as far as in me lies, I will supply these deficiencies; I will lay the foundation-a solid English education." "So much for the corner-stone, en avant." "Now for the superstructure. modern languages and belles-lettres ?” What say you to "That they are of infinitely greater value than the inane accomplishments acquired in many fashionable seminaries." "Nay, nay, doctor. Florence must necessarily be deprived of many of the advantages she would have enjoyed under more favourable auspices. She has a sweet voice and a natural taste for music, but this will avail her nothing without proper training." He added, with a smile, "She has a decided penchant for the dance." "Alas, poor Florence," interrupted the Rector, with a dolorous shake of the head, "she may 'run her female exercises o'er' in vain, if she be not trained by the professor of the day." "There is but one professor of dancing," said Mrs. Ward, with admirable naïveté. "My dear Mr. Dudley, let me beg of you not to allow your daughter to take lessons of any second-rate master; wait until she can enjoy the advantage of Monsieur Mercœur's incomparable instruction." "Listen, Dudley, and beware! Last year your old friend, Mrs. Townsend, made the appalling discovery that her daughters, the acknowledged belles of the county, could not dance. True, they had danced at every ball in all the country round for the last ten years." "Five years, my dear uncle," interrupted Mrs. Ward, with a look of horror. "Five years; I stand corrected. To proceed; the young ladies were invited to spend a season in town with their aunt, Lady St. Pol. Great was the rejoicing; mighty the expectations formed by mother and daughters. Now attend to the catastrophe; the chaperone, a woman of fashion, discovered that her protegées could not dance; they must be placed under the hands of Monsieur Mercœur, or they must return to the solemn shades of the Oaks. Colonel Townsend fondly thought that his |