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ON HIS WAY THROUGH THE WORLD 489
Charlotte, you see, is not so exceedingly handsome as to cause
other women to perjure themselves by protesting that she is no
great things after all. At the period with which we are concerned,
she certainly had a lovely complexion, which her black dress set off,
perhaps. And when Philip used to come into the room, she had
always a fine garland of roses ready to offer him, and growing upon
her cheeks, the moment he appeared. Her manners are so entirely
unaffected and simple that they can't be otherwise than good : for
is she not grateful, truthful, unconscious of self, easily pleased and
interested in others ? Is she very witty ? I never said so—though
that she appreciated some men's wit (whose names need not be
mentioned) I cannot doubt. " I say," cries Philip, on that memorable
first night of her arrival, and when she and other ladies had
gone to bed, " by George ! isn't she glorious, I say ! What can I
have done to win such a pure little heart as that ? Non sum
dignus. It is too much happiness—too much, by George !" And
his voice breaks behind his pipe, and he squeezes two fists into eyes
that are brimful of joy and thanks. Where Fortune bestows such
a bounty as this, I think we need not pity a man for what she
withdraws. As Philip walks away at midnight (walks away? is
turned out of doors ; or surely he would have gone on talking till
dawn), with the rain beating in his face, and fifty or a hundred
pounds for all his fortune in his pocket, I think there goes one of
the happiest of men—the happiest and richest. For is he not
possessor of a treasure which he could not buy, or would not sell,
for all the wealth of the world ?
My wife may say what she will, but she assuredly is answerable
for the invitation to Miss Baynes, and for all that ensued in consequence.
At a hint that she would be a welcome guest in our house,
in London, where all her heart and treasure lay, Charlotte Baynes
gave up straightway her dear aunt at Tours, who had been kind to
her ; her dear uncle, her dear mamma, and all her dear brothers—
following that natural law which ordains that a woman, under certain
circumstances, shall resign home, parents, brothers, sisters, for the
sake of that one individual who is henceforth to be dearer to her
than all. Mrs. Baynes, the widow, growled a complaint at her
daughter's ingratitude, but did not refuse her consent. She may
have known that little Hely, Charlotte's volatile admirer, had
fluttered off to another flower by this time, and that a pursuit of
that butterfly was in vain : or she may have heard that he was
going to pass the spring—the butterfly season—in London, and
hoped that he perchance might again light on her girl. Howbeit,
she was glad enough that her daughter should accept an invitation
to our house, and owned that as yet the poor child's share of this