MRS. LEYBURN'S STORY, AS TOLD ME BY MY WIFE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 5, Issue 273, 19 December 1861, Page 4

MRS. LEYBURN'S STORY, AS TOLD ME BY MY WIFE

(FOR CHRONICLR. ]

CHAPTER I.

We live in the quietest possible way, my.wife and I. We have nothing, to disturb us, having, no children, and a. comfortable income securely invested; banks may collapse 'like* crushed bandboxes, argosies, may sink at sea—we have’ no calamity to dread short; of the paying of the national debt. I don’t say that we could hot make annoyances to ourselves. We have a young mail, for instance, hired to superintend a horse and phaeton .and help in the garden, he might be a source of perpetual anxiety, ; or our > female acrvants--rbut knowing them to be human, we shut our eyes to their foiblesonly last season, w*hen‘the strawberries disappeared •mysteriously between niglit 'and morning, my wife took an opportunity of remarking on the circumstance, to the .household corps, and was unanimously- ref erred, to the birds for an account of the missing fruit. / “ That’s all 'very well,” she quietly said, “ but you know birds don’t wear shoes.” On am average we must have gone round the garden at least once every day all the season with one or more visitors, arid on each occasion my wife repeated this little anecdote with a humorous appearance of Unoonoiousness,' I,; listened with a smile of appreciation, and our visitors were' amused, as they had a right to be. / . ’ . Although the main stream of time runs, quickly enough with us, .I must acknowledgethe feeders are apt to lag; the years flow quickly past, but the hours and miuutea dally a'little sometimes. . On Tuesday mornings we rouse ourselves with considerable alacrity, that being ! the day I always walk to a neighbouring village to settle Our weekly account for butcher meat (we have a butcher in our village, but good reasons, which X need not detail, here,,prevent our dealing with him) ; if it is a good day, my wife accompanies me, and we get back to dinner with an appetite, and a' feeling that we have earned' . it; on Saturdays X always wind up two clocks and three timepieces, and my wife squares her household book.

We give a small dinner party some half dozen times a year, and otherwise are on good terms with the greater part of the village and neighbourhood. Our . village .is most strictly .exclusive and genteel;; it is five miles from a railway station, and as pretty a place as you could see. The houses are old-fashioned, but good and commodious,, with-well-stocked aqd well-grown gardens, while the :rents are miraculously low,; the consequence of which is, that the .tenants are ultra genteel, mostly retired medical, military, 1 and naval men, with' sons scattered in every' land and sea, and with daughters collected at. home,- pf!fell ages, with very aristocratic bear-, ings and high distinguished noses. There is bne house at the end of the village yrhich has even had the privilege of dccupied by one ‘indi-_ gent nobleman after another ; repeatedly X have given his lordship a seat in my ; phaeton, andVe all enjoy the'title, and work it'diligently. . When dinner-r-the event of, the> day—is over, my wife takes an easy chair on ont side of the fire, and ! take ah easy chair on the other' she furnishes herself with a volume of some kind, I produce my note-book and pencil—the latter is pretty long and thick, my wife calls it my composing stick—to note down any thought that; may occur; her book slips from her hand into her lap ; my composing stick falls quietly on the carpet; the world ' recedes—probably the 1 fire takes the opportunity and recedes top; and the next thing we are aware of is, the jingle of. the tea-tray as it is brought in. We don’t always fall asleep, however. One afternoon, lately, my wife got interested and excited, oyer her book, and finally shut it with a ban,", causing a sudden dispersion of my ideas;] “ What is it, my dear ?” I asked ; ‘ ‘ you have put to flight a train of thought which was just shaping itself into words in my mind.” “l am sorry for it. If I had fifty children not one of them should have a governess ! ” “Indeed!” I rejoined, “that’s an energetic resolution ; what’s 1 at the bottom of it ?” ' • “ Bottom of it! ” she exclaimed ; “fancy a young, impulsive, and; at the same time demurelooking girl, given to keeping a diaiy or journal or something, and writing for the press, coming into this house] ! Why, she; would have you down, with yoiir- composing stick, and me with my goloshes and my constitutional walks round the garden on a wet day ; the very servants would be stuck in in some Way, and our village, sleepy and picturesque as it is—she might make a good thing of it; then, if 1 she chancedto' die; her biographer would weave us all into; an artistic web, in which we would flutter through the length and breadth of the land, like so many helpless flies, preserve us from being so pilloried ! ”

“. Well, it would riot be the most agreeable thing, possible,” returned I, musingly—(l did not say it was good that we had no need for a governess). 44 Do you know- it is said-the Cmoriel’s daughter,' Miss McTavish;—the' one with the very hooked nose—writes for periodicals ?”

“ You don’t say so ? That is the reason, then, that she is always so anxious to get chapter and verse for everything. Only the other day I took her round to; see the poultry ; one of the dorkings-had dropsy, and she asked ine: to, * sketch the .origin, progress* and issue of. the. disease as exhibited, in.. the- domestic fowl,’ as if I stood at the creature’s ear all day and took notes. So she writes, does she ? ’ I’m sorry for it?” '

“ Sorry ! why should you be sorry? Don’t you see you have a chance for immortality even without the governess ?.” - . : “Do youknow, Edward, I was surprised the other day by being told that Mrs. Leyburn, of Scotston, was a governess before she married. ” M Indeed !” said I, a good deal interested, for I rank among . Mrs. Leyburn’s. warmest, admirers, * * one would hardly, guess that; she has nothing of the speak-and-act-by-rule-ish-hess that often betrays the members of that profession.” • V. .. . - “■ Well, if you like, I mll tell jrbxv her history, as Mrs. Ingersoll told it to nie. I hope it may not reach Miss McTavish’s ears, .or she will be spicing it up for the public ; one would need to be pretty guarded with her in future.”, - “ Is there anything remarkable about .Mrs. Leybiirn’s history ?” I asked:; “ Wait a little, and you’ll hear. Her grandfather ” r

“ Spare me the grandfather, Clara,- if you please. I have no doubt he was a most respectable worthy man, but just he good enough to come to herself at once.”

,r l’m not going to say much about him, but I must give the story as I got it.. I am neither good at paring nor adding—--—her grandfather was an English .clergyman; not a bishop, as you may suppose, but a curate- ” “ With a delicate wife and only daughter.” ‘.' ; Yes,’’. replied my. wife, " I see you know it; well, what do you think of the story ?” . “ No, I do not know it; go on, I don’t know more of it.” ' .4 . ... . “ Qh, you were guessing; I might know that trick of yours. Yes,' an only daughter and an only, son. The daughter Syas very pretty, and it chanced that a detachment of soldiers were .quartered in their neighbourhood.” “Ah, I see now. • She'married the Lieuten-; ant against the father’s will, the regiment was ordered to Sierra Leone, he died of climate and 'she of grief, leaving another only daughter—- “ Now, yoh’re;' nghi this time, Edward, except that the marriage was not against the old, gentleman’s-will/thaty the regiment was not ordered, to/Sierra Leone, that he did not die-of , climate, nor she , of grief. While the .only ‘ daughter was still ah infant; her _ father Lieutenant Jerpoint, was killed' in- a duel, ; fought with one of his ; brother officers, .in consequence, it was said, of some insult offered-to-his wife. ; Mrs:;' Jerpoint' lived fill ‘ within; .these 1 three * years ; don’t;you remember the Leyburhs being in doepmourning ahopt that*time?'’ - "

. ?‘.No,-Pcah’t:say<Ldo,”;- ■ ‘.'.TTr: tW - " Well, then;<you remembicr seeing athiribldgenileinari in : chu»? with', them ? He wore a black'velvet : 'cap : always close to the head.”. : t-r,; .r..— .“ I.do not remember him,,ejiher,” - .... “ He'was Mrs,,Leyburn’s uneje—a-curate, as his father was y Mrs. Jerpomt live'di witli him up to the time of her death' The Lieutenant :did not leave a fortune; so his widow educated her {daughter to., be a [governess; and by the way, if Miss •, McTavish does hear this story, and sets herself to (lo it up, she may probably get it returned ’on her. liarids; T as governess heroines must be pretty stale by this i time.” _... “ That would depend entirely on how she got it up ; in good bauds, a world of interest might be squeezed out' of the governess yet, although one might think that she had been pretty well used,up.” ; “:Then, to-go on. Through t some, channel, Miss Jerpoint got a situation secured for her in the family of Sir Benjamin Isinglas, of Isinglas Hall. Down came the young* lady to Scotland, not certainly one of the'tordiriarykind of book governesses, moping and melancholy, and "faneying slights where none are intended, tut genial and free, and at. an age when the volume qf life lay wide open before heir .at the" bright page of hope. It was true, she was sorry to leave her mother and uncle, and they would miss her. much,- but they were still comparatively yoilrig; arid had their .time, filled up by duties which were a pleasure to them, while round them waa a circle of chosen rind intimate friends ; then her weekly letters woulefgo far to make up for her absence ; and,.so .they did—they; were tho genuine overflow of the gladness of a young, animated creature, happy in herself and in her circumstances, and upori whom caTe had not laid the weight of his.little'finger. ” 1 44 Wifie,” said I, “ I will lend you my composing stick, and without doubt you will rival Miss McTavish in her own line. ” \ . “Don't speak nonsense ; I am just telling you the;story as it was told me.” 44 Well, go, on; what next ? Mr. Leybura would be a tenant of Sir Benjamin’s, .and catch glimpses of Miss Jerpqint when he called to pay his.rent.” “ Mr; Leyburn never was a tenant of Sir Benjamin’s. Miss Jerpoint was an exceedingly suitable companion, as well as teacher, for Miss Isinglas, and both Sir Benjamin and Lady lainglas soon saw this, arid valued her accordingly. Although she never can have been good-looking, as a girl Mrs. Leyburn must have been- very charming.” • f- - . “ Not good-looking! I beg to differ with you there ; and she is .very charming now, mellowed and brought to perfection by some kind of discipline, as I think ; a woman is hardly a woman without that.”. “ Indeed.!; then I can hardly be a woman, having, had .no discipline?” . ; 44 No disciplihe ! have hot I been hard at work for I’ll not; say how; many years disciplining you, and is not each 'moment ,as it passes a chisel chipping off there,- and bringing out line by line here, till the work is perfect Clara, ■that your husband is still yourlovertells of the very nobility of womanhood:”. - 1 Here my .wife gave me one of those looks, that some score of, years since nearly made me lose my senses, and with which even now she settles all differences and carries all points. - ■: “ But,” said I, 44 1-am .eager-to hear about Miss Jerpoint and Mr. Leyburn; how could they misunderstand each 1 other ? They have, too much sense to have made themselves miserable about nothing.” •' •1 •■* “ Just' have patience ; although I don’t write, I have sense enough ; not to blurt out the rind of my story, before the. right £im&, Where was I ? —yes, Miss ' Jerpoint, young,-happy, arid beloved,' and treated almost; a 3 a daughter of the liouse; nofreezing,politeness chilled her warm, blqod,..no coming in, with the dessert,* and then disappearing... to the solitude of ..her own room, to sit,and'listed to the sounds of gaiety above and below, feeling that for neither circle., was she an eligible guest. 'No riiorbid musings, nor crushed aspirations,; nor bitter and desponding entries in diaries—indeed, Mis 3 Jerpoint was not guilty of keeping a journal; she did not sit iri : a dark corner watching the sunshine iri which she might not bask, arid jealously noting all the dust and motes that floated 1 in its beams ; no, she breathed in; a generous -atmosphere, and soul' and body, were, in sound . and. perfect health.” '• “ What did happen ?” I interrupted. Did Mr. Leyb—” - .-v; ’ ;!v,* “ ,Oh, the impatience ,of mankind ! Mr. Leyburn, indeed !—do you suppose that Miss Jerpoint had but one lover.?” • Oh, I r see—” *' * • ■, 4 ■ The clergyman .of the parish—” : : , 44 Ah, the minister was it? Wellj. Satan could-have gone to paradise as an angel of light as easily as a . reptile, or as a presbyteriau minister as easily as either; 1 ' “ The minister of the parish,’’* continued my wife, 44 was a venerable old man— H . “Whew—”/ . •- t ■> . —and highly respected; he was unmarried, and had a niece who kept house for him; occasionally a brother of hers resided with them—” “ That will do now, surely.” - “ his wife. On the death of the old man they all left together, arid the-manse stood untenanted ; a little Eden it was; and so Miss Jerpoint often thought, as she and. her pupil passed it in their daily walks and drives.”