LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2126, 16 December 1880, Page 3

LITERATURE.

THE MYSTERY or LORD BRACKENBURY: A NOVEL. BY AMELIA B. EDWARDS, Author of “Barbara’s History,” ■* Debenbam’a Vow,” &c. ( Continued,) She put ont her hand. He took it ; held it for a moment; then with a hasty ‘God bless yon ! ’ walked quickly to the other end of the gallery, where Mrs Bridget was descanting upon the merits of a half-length portrait of a lady dressed in the fashion of Marie Antoinette, with powdered hair, a large hat, and gloves reaching to the elbow. ‘This, sir,’ Mrs Bridget was saying, ‘is Dame Georgina Langtrey, second daughter of Sir James Stoneleigfa, of Sfconeleigh Castle, Yorkshire. This lady was a celebrated beauty. A portrait of her by Sir Joshua Reynolds was sold at the great Fonthill sale in the year 1819. The next portrait represents her husband, Sir Robert Langtrey, some time Colonel of the West Lancashire Yeomanry He was born Anno Domini 1759, and died Anno Domini 1814. We next come to Squire Edward John Langtrey, only son of the preceding, and father of the late Squire Stephen Langtrey, who was the last male representative of the family. Squire Edward John Langtrey is represented in the uniform of a Deputy-Lieu-tenant for the County. He married in 1816 Miss Hester Penruddook, of Cornwall * * This fair lady I suppose ?’ interrupted Cochrane, examining the next portrait with lively Interest. ‘That is my grandmother,’ said Winifred. ‘Then your grandmother, Mias Savage, was a very beautiful person! There is a look of Sir Thomas Lawrence about this picture. ’ ‘ The original, painted before her marriage, was by Sir Thomas Lawrence, This is a copy.’ ‘ Did you ever see her ? ’ * Oh! no—she died before I was born ; hnt the portrait is supposed to be very like. Bridget remembers her.’ ‘I ought to remember her, Miss Winifred,’said the old woman, ‘I entered her service the first year of her marriage, and I have lived in the family ever since. She was a very beantifnl lady, and the mother of beautiful children. The late Squire was as handsome a gentleman as ever trod shoeleather.’ ‘ls there no likeness of him ? ’ asked Cochrane. ‘Miss Langtrey has miniatures of the Squire, and of herself, and of Miss Mable, sir—Mrs Savage, I should say—which was Miss Winifred’s own mother.’ Mrs Bridget then led the way to what she called the * State Bedrooms,’ one of which, hung with mouldering tapestry and containing an ancient four-post bedstead, with plumes of moth-eaten ostrich feathers at each corner, went by the name of ‘Queen Elizabeth’s Bed-chamber.’ Last of all, hidden away ont of sight in a corner of the courtyard, came the Chapel—a tiny, dilapitated structure, with cobwebbed rafters overhead, and a worm-eaten rood-screen, and one dim, painted window, partly boarded up, and partly mended with panes of common glass. Altar, seats, church-furniture, all were gone—all, save one mouldering scutcheon bearing a faded coat of arms and the motto, ‘LanngtreyLcyanlte.’ ‘And now you have seen all,’said Miss Savage, when they once more found themselves in the courtyard. ‘We inhabit what is habitable of the rest of the house.’ 1 But all this part is perfectly habitable,’ said Coohrance. ‘lt good Queen Bess were to come back to-morrow, you need only light a few fires, put clean sheets upon the beds, and strew the floors with rushes.’ ‘ I am not sure that I should like to dance a ‘coranlo’ with Her Majesty in the Long Gallery, tbongh,’ laughed Lancelot. * And as for the West Wing, yon never ventume into that at all do yon, *Wo have used one of the ground floor rooms occasionally, sir, as an apple-chamber,’ replied Mrs Bridget; ‘but the West Wing isn’t harbor. ’ * I doubt if any paH of The Grange is really ‘harbor,’ said Miss Savage, smiling, ‘ I feel as if it would all topp’e down some day, like a house of cards. But you must now come and soe my annt.’ Chapter XX. OLD MISS LAKOIREY, Old Miss Langtrey received her visitors in one of the rooms with the lantem-llke bay windows that had been ‘Repayred in the Year of Oure Lord MDLIX’—a room like the inside of a box, panelled, ceiled, and floored with old black oak; furnished with grim old furniture as ancient, apparently, as the house itself ; and bare of everything in the way of rugs or carpeting. The logs on the hearth were unlighted, and the room smelt cold and damp, as if it had not been opened for months. The window, with its tiny leaded panes and a great patch of old heraldic stained glass let into the centre casement, admitted very light light, and looked ont upon the court-yard. It was a room cheerful on the whole as a family vault. Ushered into this dreary twilight, Cochrane found himself in the act of being presented to a hostess of whom he at first saw no more than a vague outline in the darkest corner of the room. ‘Sir,’ said a thin hard voice, ‘you are we'come. Be pleased to sit. Lancelot Brackenbury, you are becoming quite a stranger. ’ ‘ I accept that as a compliment, dear Miss Langtrey,’ replied Lancelot, taking a seat near her. ‘ I mean no compliment,’ said Miss Langtrey. Cochrane’s eyes were now getting accustomed to the darkness, and the vague outline had now resolved itself into a little white-haired old lady with brilliant black eyes, sitting bolt upright, with her hands folded primly In her lap, and her _ feet on a stool. She was dressed in some kind of stiff faded brocade, and wore upon her head a simple cap of plain muslin. All this he saw and noted ; but it was her eyes, her keen, vivacious, black eyes, that chiefly arrested his attention. It would be very unpleasant he thought, to meet those eyes blazing with anger ; and that they could blaze, and blaze fiercely, upon occasion, he did not doubt. She turned them next upon himself. ‘My niece tell* me that you are staying at Old Court, Mr Cochrane,’ she said. ‘ How do you like living like an owl among the ruins ? ’ Cochrane replied that he found it quite delightful, and that if all ruins were equally comfortable, he should desire nothing better than to live like an owl for the rest cf his days. ‘You must find it very dull there, ’ said Miss Langtrey. * Indeed, no, I never was bettor amused In my life.’ ‘That is because he amuses himself,’ laughed Lancelot. ‘He is the best of guests, and lam the worst of hosts, I do nothing to entertain him.’ ‘ I object to being ’entertained,’ said Cochrane. ‘ The pleasantest host in the world, to my thinking, is he who lets me have my own way. Now at Old Court Ido just as I like. I shoot, sketch, ramble about, and enjoy my liberty.’ Miss Langtrey eyed him mistrustfully. * Pray, sir ? ’ she asked, * are yon an artist —or an author ? ’ ‘ Neither, Madame—only a poor overworked Government official.’ ‘Whose overwork,’ added Lancelot, ‘ consists of sitting in an armchair, and reading ‘ The Times ’ daily from ten to three! ’ ‘ Ah, you don’t know what tremendous toil it is, reading the ‘ The Times’ daily from ten to threo ! Painting is play to it.’ * Painting is well enough Ip its way,’ said Miss Langtrey; ‘ but I cannot bring myself to look upon it as the occupation of a gentleman,’ ‘My dear Miss Langtrey! ’ exclaimed Lancelot. ‘Ah, well, I am an old-fashioned body, and I can’t help .ny prejudices, In my day, artists made pictures, and gentlemen bought them.’

I‘ Happily fop ns. society has at last discovered that gentlemen may do both,’ said Lancelot. ‘lt is far more pleasure to paint a picture than to buy one.' Miss Langrey sniffed contemptuously. ‘ I detest these levelling innovations,’ she replied. ‘ I hear that young men of good family are taking nowadays to civil engineering and coffee planting, and that it is even considered possible for a gentleman to become a brewer. I don’t understand it.’ Then turning to Cochrane : —"I never was in London but once, and that was forty years ago ; but I remember meeting a Lady Susan Cochrane at a party in Fortman Square. She was a daughter of Lord Skiddaw, and married to a certain Colonel Cochrane of the Dragoons. Was she a relation of yours ? ’ ‘ She was my aunt,’ replied Cochrane. ‘ That is to say, she married my uncle. ’ ‘ Ay—she ran away with him. It was an unequal match, and her family opposed it; but she was Infatuated with him. Is she dead 1 ’ ‘ Years ago; and my uncle afterwards married a rich widow with fifteen thousand a year.’ * All men are polygamist at heart, ’ said Miss Langlrey ; ‘ glad of the chance of marrying a second wife, if they are so lucky as to lose the first. Your uncle was a handsome man, sir ; but a great scamp. They said he owed sixty thousand pounds when he married Lady Susan.’ Cochrane laughed. ‘ I really know nothing about it. Madam,’ he said carelessly. ‘But it sounds so like fact that it’s sure to be a fiction,’ Here Miss Savage changed the subject by bringing out an old engraving of The Grange; and this gave him an opportunity to express his admiration of the house. ‘lt’s a curious old place,’ replied Miss Langtrey ; * indeed, we don’t know how old it is. ’ l lt looks as if it might date from the Heptarchy,’ said Cochrane. ‘lt is not impossible. They were Langtreys here when Domesday Book was compiled. But it is going fast to ruin. ‘ I should like to put it under a glass case,’ said Cochrane, warmly. •It is the rarest old bouse in England, and worth going a thousand miles to see!’ ‘ It la satisfactory to think that you have seen something worth coming for all this way north,’ said Lancelot. • 1 have seen a great deal worth coming for—two sights, at all events, that were entirely new to me ; a coal mine and an ironfoundry.’ Then addressing himself to Winifred, he added:— * I don’t ask you, Miss Savage, if you have been down the Brackenbnry pit—it is not a fit excursion for a lady; but, of course, you have been over the foundry. Isn’t it magnificient when they tap the furnace, and let loose that river of fire 1 I have done nothing but rave about Schiller's ‘Song of the Bell’ ever" since 1 saw it. And then those terrific fellows in iron masks, who mould red-hot snow-balls; and the Nasmyth hammer that pounds the snowballs into solid masses—by Jove, its tremendous I’ {To he continued .)