Missouri Botanical Garden PETER H. RAVEN LIBRARY Pagination Note: Since many of the items lack a specific page number, the page number displayed online refers to the sequentially created number each item was given upon cataloging the materials. 0 1 cm 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 copyright reserved Missouri Botan i cal Garden .sUc 0*0- ixstce, e &/’ &Zu A <3 C2 f\y'^ArS (/Zy . M*-tl, ’ ^ /4/C^t / 7 c-£r~ <^/ *^r~ < / / //§.t%-c *?- — '*?-<: ' ^~‘ '**^~ ^4 J yc~^f-7 Cl? c^r/- c4~ y^^-r-C \ 7/Ct/ ?z . j ^ ^ ^ t/p, C°- <3a?r//^ a — z Zo~7 7^ C ^ v '''P>_ j /k. - z z o a z o w z H >-* 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Missouri Botanical cm copyright reserved garden 6o 'xi 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Missouri Botanical cm copyright reserved garden f ; - Missouri Botanical Gi jGeorge ENGfeLMANN ?/ f f f f * 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Missouri Botanical cm copyright reserved garden 5S0URI Botanical Garden :orge Eng^mann Papers A / 1 a r,~~ZT~ «■'“> * i'n,^ *? * * *-^? 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She asked Anne whether she was going to Lady Uppingham’s that night, and told her that she understood it was to be the first of a series of parties, and wasn’t it delightful? Everything was so charmingly managed at dear Lady Uppingham’s. She had such taste. Now, the Hartleys had never been in the way of such supreme delight as Lady Uppingham’s parties, and poor little Cin- derella- Anne did not know what answer to make. Fortunately for her, a little sense of fun came in to help her while she was undergoing these interrogations — invaluable auxiliary for which those who possess it cannot be too thankful. The humor of the situation saved her. But Mrs. Hartley was much impressed by the aspect of her new daughter-in-law. “They are evidently in the very first society, Anne,” she said, “ as, of course, was to be expected in their position. What a thing for Francis to be among people who will appreciate him. There is only one thing that troubles me.” “ What is that, aunt ? ” “Her health, my dear,” said Mrs. Hart- ley, solemnly shaking her head. “ Oh, her health ! ” said Anne, with some- thing of the contempt of youth and strength. “What danger could there be about any one’s health at twenty ? ” And she paid no attention to her aunt’s maunderings (as I am afraid she thought them) about the character of Miss Parker’s complexion, its variableness, and delicacy of tint. Indeed, poor Anne had enough to think of without that. She had to conceal her own feelings and master her own heart. And she had to endure the affectionateness of Francis, who was more “kind” than he had ever been before, and would indeed be tender to her when he saw her alone, until, between despite and bitterness, and proud sense of injury, and a still prouder determi- nation not to show her sufferings, Anne felt often as if her heart would break. Fortu- nately, he was not often at home in the evenings, and at other times she could keep herself out of his way. And then came the marriage, an event of which Anne was almost glad, as it ended this painful interval, and carried Francis away to another house, where he could no longer gall her by his kindness, or touch her heart by old tones and looks, such as she had loved unawares all her life. Poor Anne — she played her part so well, that no one suspected her; or rather, better still, the sisters who had suspected her decided that they had been mistaken. Mrs. Hartley had never taken any notice at all; and if any one in the house had a lingering conscious- ness that Anne was not quite as she was before, it was John, the second son, a very quiet fellow, who communicated his ideas to no one, and never gave to Anne herself the least reason to believe that he had found her out. After the wedding, however, when all the excitement was over, Anne fell ill. No, she was not ill, but she was pale and languid, and listless, and easily tired, and so frightened Mrs. Hartley, that she sent for the doctor, who looked wise, , and ordered quinine, and hinted something about cod- liver oil. As Mrs. Hartley, however, was able to assure him, which she did with much vivacity and some pride, that disease of the lungs had never been known in her family, Anne was delivered from that terrible rem- edy. No, she was not ill, whatever the doctor might say. She was, as all highly strung and delicate organizations are, whom sheer “ pluck ” and spirit have carried through a mental or bodily fatigue which is quite beyond their powers. The moment that the heart fails, the strength goes ; and when the great necessity for strain and exertion was over, Anne’s heart did fail her. Life seemed to stop short somehow. It grew fade, monotonous, a seemingly endless stretch of blank routine, with no further motive for exertion in it. All was flat and blank, which a little while before had been so bright. She made no outcry against Providence, nor did she envy Miss Parker, now Mrs. Francis Hartley, or bemoan her own different fate. Anne was too sensible and too genuine for any of these theatrical expedients. She cursed nobody ; she blamed nobody ; but her heart failed her: it was all that could be said. Her occupations and amusements had been of the simplest kind ; nothing in them at all, indeed, but the spirit and force of joy- ous,' youthful life, with which she threw her- self into everything ; and now that spirit was Missouri Botanical Garden: 56 $MF%MMy 1 OF ANNE MATURIN. gone, how tedious and unmeaning they all seemed. At this dreary time, however, Anne had one distraction which often answers very well in the circumstances, and, indeed, has been known to turn evil into good in a man- ner wonderful to behold. She had a lover. This lover was the Rector of the parish, a good man, who was one of Mrs. Hartley’s most frequent visitors, and a very eligible person indeed. Everybody felt that had it been- a luckless curate without a penny, it would have been much more in Anne’s way, who had not a penny herself. And prob- bably had it been so, Letty and Susan said, with justifiable vexation, Anne would have fancied him out of pure perversity. For the first moment, indeed, she seemed disposed to “ fancy” the Rector. Here would be the change she longed for. She would escape at least from what was intolerable around her. But after a while there seized upon Anne a visionary disgust for the life within her reach, which was almost stronger than the weariness she had felt with her actual existence. And she dismissed, almost with impatience, the good man who might have made her happy. Perhaps, however, Mr. Herbert was not altogether discouraged ; he begged to be considered a friend still ; he came to the house as before. He was of use to Anne, though she would not have acknowledged it ; and perhaps in thfc natural course of affairs, had nothing supervened, a pleasant termination might have come to the little romance, and all would have been well. “ The Francis Hartleys ” came back after a while and settled in their new house amid all the splendors of bridal finery. They “ went out ” a great deal, and happily had not much time to devote to “old Mrs. Hartley,” who liked that title as little as most people do. Mrs. Francis was a very fine and a very pretty bride. She was a spoiled child, accustomed to all manner of indulgences, and trained in that supreme self-regard which is of all dispositions of the mind the most inhuman, the least pardon- able by others. It was not her fault, Anne would sometimes say with perhaps some- thing of the toleration of contempt. She had been brought up to it; from her earliest years she had been the monarch of all she surveyed ; her comfort, the highest necessity on earth ; her pleasure, the law of everybody about her. Sometimes even this worst of all possible trainings does a generous spirit no harm ; but poor little Mrs. Francis had neither a generous spirit nor those qualities of imagination and humor which keep peo- ple often from making themselves odious or ridiculous. She had frankly adopted the pleasant doctrine of her own importance, and saw nothing that was not reasonable and natural in it. Further, the fact crept out by degrees that Mrs. Francis had a tem- per : undisciplined in everything, she was also undisciplined in this, and even in pres- ence of his family would burst into little ex- plosions of wrath against her husband, which filled the well-bred Hartleys with incredu- lous dismay. At these moments her pink color would flush into scarlet, her bosom would pant, her breath come short, and circles of excitement would form round her eyes. The pretty white of her forehead and neck became stained with patches of furious red, and the pretty little creature herself blazed into a small fury out of the smooth conventional being she generally appeared. That Francis soon became afraid of these ebullitions, and that Mrs. Francis was often ill after them, was very soon evident to his family. He came more to his mother as time went on, and though he did not speak of domestic discomfort, there was a tone in his voice, an under-current of bitterness in what he said, that did not escape even less keen observers than Anne. She, poor girl, had managed with infinite trouble to with- draw herself from the dangerous intimacy which her cousin had tried to thrust upon her. It was better, she felt, to allow him to draw conclusions favorable to his vanity than to permit him to hol'd her hand, to show her a tenderness which was fatal to her, and unbecoming in him. She gained her point, though not without difficulty, and it would be impossible to describe the mixture of softening compassion, sympathy, pain and contempt, with which Anne came to regard the man whom she had loved unawares all her life. Yes, even contempt — though per- haps it was not his fault, poor fellow, that he was under that , contemptible sway of weakness, which even the strong have to bow to, when an ungovemed temper is con- joined with a delicate frame and precarious health. But it was his fault that he had married a woman for whom he had no real love, no feeling strong enough to give him influence with her, or power over her; and it was his fault that he came back and made bitter speeches at his mother’s fire-side in- stead of making some effort worthy of a man to get his* own life in tune. These were the reflections of an inexperienced girl, one of