Stories for Helen Part 5

She kept the family waiting breakfast for her till nine o'clock, and then came down in a white slip or loose gown; her hair still pinned up; her eyes half shut; and her face evidently not washed. Mr. Edington, whose business in the city made it necessary for him to be there at an early hour, had long since breakfasted, and gone up to town in the boat; and after a few days, the rest of the family ceased to wait for her; and the housekeeper was directed to have a fresh breakfast prepared for Miss Sherborough whenever she came down.

The first days of Josephine's visit ought, in Rosalind's opinion, to have been devoted entirely to the amus.e.m.e.nt of their guest, and she was urgent with Mrs. Mortlake, to allow Adelaide and herself a week of holiday. Their governess told them that she would have been willing to grant this indulgence if Josephine was to remain with them a week only: but as she was to stay all summer, it would, of course, be impossible for them, every day, to give up their usual occupations; and therefore it was better to begin as they were to go on. She reminded Rosalind that if they were attentive and industrious, they would get through their lessons the sooner, and have the more time for recreation with their visitor.

After Josephine had breakfasted, Mrs. Mortlake offered to show her the children's library, that she might amuse herself with any of the books she chose, while her cousins were engaged in their morning employments.

Josephine thanked her; but said she could entertain herself very well without books, and that she believed she would take a walk in the garden. She accordingly put on her bonnet, and strolled up and down the walks, gazing listlessly at the flowers. She attempted to gather some strawberries, but found it too fatiguing to stoop down to the beds; and satisfied herself with plucking currants and gooseberries from the bushes. She then sat in the arbour for awhile, and looked all the time straight down the middle walk. When she was tired of the arbour, she established herself on a circular bench which ran round a large walnut tree; and then she counted all the windows at the back part of the house. When this was accomplished, she counted them all over again. And then, finding the sun had become very powerful, she went into the front-parlour, the shutters of which were bowed to exclude the heat, and throwing herself at full length on the sofa, she in a few minutes fell into a profound sleep, from which she did not awaken till her cousins entered the room in search of her, after their lessons were over. They took her up stairs into the apartment they called their play-room, and showed her a variety of things which would have been very amusing to a girl that knew how to be amused. There was a lacquered Chinese cabinet, containing a great number of curiosities brought by their uncle from Canton: and a large box with shelves, on which were various specimens of Indian ingenuity, presented to the children by a gentleman who had travelled all over the country beyond the Mississippi. Their library consisted of a beautiful and entertaining selection of juvenile books; and they had a port-folio filled with fine prints of such subjects as are particularly interesting to young people. They showed her a representation of the grand procession at the coronation of the sovereign of England, printed on a long narrow roll of paper pasted on silk; which paper was unwound like a ribbon-yard from a Tunbridge-ware box, and it could be screwed up again after being sufficiently seen. It was many yards in length, and the figures (which were almost innumerable) were elegantly designed, and beautifully coloured. They had also a little theatre, with a great number of scenes; and a variety of very small dolls, dressed in appropriate habits to personate the actors.

Beside all these things, they had a closet full of amusing toys; and in short the play-room was amply stored with a profusion of whatever was necessary to the enjoyment of their leisure hours.

But all was lost on Josephine. While Adelaide and Rosalind were a.s.siduous in showing and explaining to her every thing, she heard them with listlessness and apathy, and made not the slightest remark. At last, she said "We will reserve some of these sights for to-morrow. I must go and dress myself for dinner. Oh! how I hate to dress. It is an odious task. I must have Mary to a.s.sist me again; for I never _can_ get through the fatigue of dressing myself, and fixing my hair."

In the afternoon, Adelaide and Rosalind took their sewing, and seated themselves with Mrs. Mortlake in the porch. As Josephine appeared to have no work, Mrs. Mortlake gave her a volume of Miss Edgeworth's Moral Tales, and requested her to read one of them aloud. Josephine took the book and began to read "The Prussian Vase," but with so monotonous and inarticulate a tone, or rather drawl, that it was painful to hear her: and her cousins were not sorry when, at the end of three or four pages, she stopped, and complained that she was too much fatigued to read any more.

Mrs. Mortlake then desired Adelaide, who read extremely well, to take the book and continue the story, but in a short time Josephine was discovered to be asleep. When Adelaide ceased reading, Josephine awoke, and saying that she could not live without her afternoon nap, went up stairs to lie down on her bed.

She slept till near tea-time, and when tea was over, her cousins and Mrs. Mortlake prepared for a walk, and invited Josephine to join them.

This she did; but in less than ten minutes she complained so much of fatigue, that Rosalind turned back and accompanied her home, and she reclined on the settee in the porch till the lamps were lighted in the front-parlour. The girls then showed Josephine a portable diorama, containing twelve beautiful coloured views of castles, abbeys, temples, and mountain scenery. Each of these exquisite little landscapes was fixed, in turn, as the back scene of a sort of miniature stage. The skies and lights of these views were all transparent, and there were other skies which turned on rollers, and represented sunrise, moonlight, suns.h.i.+ne, and thunder-clouds. These second skies being placed behind those of the picture, were slowly unrolled by turning a small handle, and produced the most varied and beautiful effects on the scenery, which could thus at pleasure be illuminated gradually with suns.h.i.+ne or moonbeams, or darkened with the clouds of a gathering storm. But Josephine saw this charming exhibition without a single comment; being evidently much inclined to yawn as she looked at it. And getting again very sleepy, she soon retired to her bed.

Next morning, Mrs. Mortlake invited her to bring her sewing into the school-room, and sit there while her cousins were at their lessons. But Josephine replied that she hated sewing, and never did any. However, she took her seat in the school-room, and a kitten soon after came purring round her; so she put it on her lap, and stroked and patted it till the lessons were over, and the girls went up stairs to amuse themselves till dinner-time.

Adelaide tried to induce Josephine to look at some of the beautiful prints in the port-folio; but she found it necessary to explain them all, as if she was showing them to a child of three years old.

Rosalind proposed that they should all go on the roof of the house (it being flat on the top and guarded with a railing) to look at the beauty and wide extent of the prospect; and taking their parasols to screen their heads from the sun, they went up through a very convenient trap-door at the head of an easy little staircase. The view from the roof of Mr. Edington's house was certainly very fine, comprising the bay with its islands and fortresses; its boats and vessels of every description; the distant lighthouse at Sandy Hook, and the blue ocean rolling beyond it: and at the other end of the scene, behind a forest of masts, rose the city of New York with its numerous spires glittering in the sunlight.

Fine as the prospect was, Josephine showed no symptom of admiration; but as they came down through the garret-pa.s.sage, she spied an old rocking-chair standing in a corner among some lumber. (Parlour rocking-chairs were not yet in general use.) She turned her head, and looked at it with longing eyes. "Ah!" said she, "that is the very thing I have been suffering for ever since I left home. Do let me beg to have it in my room." The chair, accordingly, was carried into the apartment of Josephine, who immediately seated herself, and began to rock with great satisfaction; at which most interesting amus.e.m.e.nt she continued till near dinner-time. The rocking-chair was next day taken into the school-room, and with that and the kitten, Josephine appeared to get through the morning rather contentedly.

The afternoon was again devoted to a long nap: and in the evening Josephine reclined on the front-parlour sofa, and entertained herself by running her finger a hundred times over the bra.s.s nails.

Several days pa.s.sed on in a similar manner. One morning when they were all in the play-room, Josephine said to her cousins, "What a very hard life you are obliged to endure. Neither of you have a moment of rest, from the time you leave your beds in the morning, till you return to them at night. First, there is your rising with the sun, and going to work in your little gardens. I am sure you might make your father's gardener do all that business."

_Adelaide_. But we take great pleasure in it; and when we see our flowers growing and blooming, the interest they excite in us is much increased by knowing that we have raised them from the seed, or planted the roots ourselves; and that we have a.s.sisted their growth by watering, weeding, tying them, and clearing them from insects. And is it not pleasant to find that the fruit-stones, we planted a few years since in our little orchard, have produced trees that are now loaded with fruit?

The red cherries, we had last evening after tea, were from one of my trees; and the large black cherries were from Rosalind's. And in August, we shall have our own plums and peaches.

_Josephine_. I am sure it is much less trouble to buy these things, than to cultivate them; and as to the amus.e.m.e.nt, I can see none. Then there are those awful lessons that are always to come on after breakfast. The writing, and cyphering, and grammar, and geography, and history, one day: and the French, and music, and drawing, the next: and-the reading and sewing every afternoon; and the walk every evening. Even your play-time (as you call it) is a time of perpetual fatigue: your plays all seem to require so much skill and ingenuity. And then on Sat.u.r.day morning, to think that you are obliged to go into the housekeeper's room and learn to make cakes, and pastry, and sweetmeats, and all such things. I am sure if I was never to eat cakes till I a.s.sisted in making them, I should go without all my life. It seems to me that your whole existence is a course of uninterrupted toil.

_Rosalind_. There is much truth in what you say, my dear Josephine. But I own it never struck me before.

_Adelaide_. We have always been perfectly happy in our occupations and amus.e.m.e.nts: and the longest day in summer seems too short for us.

_Josephine_. Too short, perhaps, to get through such a quant.i.ty of work; for I consider all this as _real hard work_. I am glad that I have not been brought up in such a laborious manner. My parents love me too much to make me uncomfortable, even for a moment; or to cause me in any way the slightest fatigue. I have spent my whole life in ease and peace; doing nothing but what I pleased, and never learning but when I chose.

I have not been troubled with either a school or a governess; my mother (who was herself educated at a boarding-school) having determined, as I was her only child, to instruct me at home.

Adelaide saw that it was in vain to argue the point any farther. But the foolish reasoning of Josephine made a great impression on Rosalind; so true it is, that "evil communication corrupts good manners," and she was seized with an earnest desire to partic.i.p.ate in the happiness of doing nothing.

Next morning, Rosalind went to her lessons with great reluctance, and consequently did not perform them well. On the following day she was equally deficient; and in the afternoon when Josephine went up stairs to take her nap, Rosalind, looking after her, exclaimed, "Happy girl! How I envy her!"

"Envy her!" said Adelaide, "of all the people I am acquainted with, I think Josephine Sherborough is the least to be envied."

_Rosalind._ She is not troubled with lessons, and sewing, as we are. She can do whatever she pleases the whole day long. No wonder she is fat, when she is so perfectly comfortable. For my part, I expect, in the course of another year, to be worn to a skeleton with such incessant application.

_Adelaide._ But without application how is it possible to learn?

_Rosalind._ I would rather put off my learning till I am older, and have strength to bear such dreadful fatigue.

_Adelaide._ I do not find it fatiguing. I am sure our lessons are not very long, and Mrs. Mortlake is so kind and gentle, that it is a pleasure to be instructed by her; and she explains every thing so sensibly and intelligibly.

_Rosalind._ But where is the use of learning every thing before we grow up?

_Adelaide._ Because, as Mrs. Mortlake says, children (if they are not _too young_) learn faster than grown persons; their memories are better, as they have not yet been overloaded, and they have nothing of importance to divert their attention from their lessons.

_Rosalind._ I would rather grow up as ignorant as our tenant's wife, Dutch Katy, than be made such a slave as I am now. I am sure Katy's life is an easy one compared to mine.

_Adelaide, smiling._ Consider it not so deeply.

_Rosalind._ Yes, I will, for I am out of patience. I wish it was the fas.h.i.+on to be ignorant.

_Adelaide._ Fortunately it is _not_. To say nothing of the disgrace of being ignorant when it is known we have had opportunities of acquiring knowledge, persons whose minds are vacant, have but few enjoyments. For instance, as Josephine knows nothing of music, it gives her no pleasure to hear the finest singing and playing, even such as Mrs. Mortlake's. As she has no idea of drawing, she takes not the least delight in looking at beautiful pictures. Having never been in the habit of reading, she wonders how it is possible to be amused with a book; and as she has no knowledge of history or geography, she often, when she _does_ read, is puzzled with allusions to those subjects; and a French word is as unintelligible to her, as if it were Greek. Plants and animals do not interest her, because she has scarcely an idea of the properties or attributes of any of the productions of Nature. And what is worse than all, she takes no pleasure in listening to the conversation of sensible people, because she is incapable of understanding it: her comprehension being only equal to the most frivolous topics.

_Rosalind._ Notwithstanding all this, her life pa.s.ses calmly and pleasantly; and I am sure she is much happier than we are.

_Adelaide._ Speak for yourself, dear Rosalind. For my part, I do not wish to be more happy than I am.

_Rosalind._ Well, I thought so too, till I knew Josephine. And she is by no means so dull as you suppose.

_Adelaide._ Perhaps she is not naturally stupid; but indulgence and indolence have so benumbed her understanding, that it seems now incapable of the smallest effort.

At this moment Mrs. Mortlake came down with a book in her hand, for the afternoon reading.

"Rosalind," said she, "as my room is over the porch, and the windows are open, I could not avoid hearing all you have just been saying, particularly as you spoke very loudly. As I do not wish to see either of my pupils _unhappy_, I will gratify your desire, and both you and Adelaide (if it is also her wish) may pa.s.s a week entirely without occupation; in short, a week of idleness."

_Adelaide._ O no, dear Mrs. Mortlake: I have no desire to avail myself of your offer. I would much rather continue my usual employments.

_Rosalind._ A week of entire leisure! O, how delightful!

_Mrs. Mortlake._ But, during that time, neither you nor Josephine must come into the school-room.

_Rosalind._ O, indeed! we shall not desire it.

_Mrs. Mortlake._ Neither must you read.

_Rosalind._ Well!--I am sure I have read enough to last my lifetime.

Where is the use of reading story-books that are all invention, describing people that never lived; or of poring over voyages and travels to countries I shall never visit; or of studying the histories of dead kings.

_Mrs. Mortlake._ You must not sew.

_Rosalind._ I never _did_ find it very entertaining to stick a needle and thread into a piece of muslin, and pull it through again.

_Mrs. Mortlake._ You must not draw.

_Rosalind._ I do not see the pleasure of rubbing red, and blue, and green paint on little plates; and dabbling in tumblers of water with camel's-hair pencils, and daubing colours on white paper.