This seasonable assistance enabled him to make the following arrangement for liquidating the sums due on account of his sickening attorney's bills:—
These were his liabilities. Then his assets were:—
As soon as he had made the foregoing statement on a slip of paper early in the morning in his study, (as already intimated,) he averted his eye from it, for a moment, with a sort of cold shudder. Were he to devote every farthing of assets that he had, he still could not come within £1,310 odd of his mere attorney's bills. What was he to do? The result of a long and anxious morning's calculation and scheming was to appropriate £4,000 of his assets thus—(if he could prevail upon his creditors to be for the present content with it:)—
If this arrangement could be effected, then he would be able to reserve in his own hands £1,063, and retain liabilities as under:—
Heavy was his heart at beholding this result of even the most favorable mode of putting his case: but he placed the memoranda in his pocket-book, and repaired to his dressing-room; and having completed his toilet, appeared at breakfast with as cheerful a countenance as he could assume. Each of the three assembled, perceived, however, that the others were striving to look gay and happy. Suffice it to say, that within a week's time, Messrs. Runnington received the necessary security from Lord De la Zouch, who had thereby bound himself in the penal sum of £20,000 that Mr. Aubrey should, on or before the 24th day of January 18—, (that is, in eighteen months' time from the date of the bond,) pay the principal sum of £10,000, with interest at 5 per cent; and this instrument, together with Mr. Aubrey's two promissory-notes for £5,000 each, and also cash to the amount of £2,500 in part payment of their bill, having been delivered to Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap—who, after a great deal of reluctance on the part of Mr. Quirk, finally consented to allow the balance of £1,446, 14s. 6d. to stand over—they gave him, first, a receipt for so much on account of their own bill; and secondly, an instrument by which Tittlebat Titmouse, for the considerations therein expressed, did "remise, release, and forever quit claim," unto Charles Aubrey, his heirs, executors, and administrators, all other demands whatsoever, [i. e. other than the said sum of £20,000.] By this arrangement Mr. Aubrey was absolutely exonerated from the sum of £40,000, in which he stood indubitably indebted to Mr. Titmouse; and so far he had just cause for congratulation. But was not his situation still one calculated to depress and alarm him more and more every time that he contemplated it? Where was he to find the sum requisite to release Lord De la Zouch from any part of his enormous liability? For with such a surety in their power as that great and opulent peer, was it likely that Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap, would be otherwise than peremptory and inflexible when the day of payment arrived? And if so, with what feelings must Mr. Aubrey see his noble and generous friend called upon to pay down nearly £11,000 for him? And was he not liable at any moment upon his own two notes for £5,000 each? And were they not likely to insist speedily on the discharge of their own serious balance of £1,446 odd? What more probable, than that persons such as they and their client were represented to be, would, as soon as they decently could, proceed to extremities with him, in the confidence that the sight and the sound of his agonies would call in powerful and affluent friends to his assistance?
Still pressed, as indeed he was, his spirit had by no means lost its elasticity, supported as he was by a powerful, an unconquerable WILL—and also by a devout reliance upon the protection of Providence. Though law is indeed an exhausting and absorbing study, and it was pursued by Mr. Aubrey with unflagging energy, yet he found time (those who choose may find time enough for everything) to contribute sensibly to the support of himself and his family by literary labors, expended principally upon compositions of an historical and political character, and which were forwarded from time to time to the distinguished Review which has been already mentioned. To produce, as he produced, articles of this description—of considerable length and frequency—requiring ready, extensive, and accurate knowledge, and careful composition; original and vigorous in their conception and their execution, and by their intrinsic merit arresting, immediately on their appearance, the attention of the public; I say, to do such things—and only in those precious intervals which ought to have been given to the relaxation of his strained mental and physical powers—and under the pressure, too, of such overpowering anxieties as were his—argued surely the possession of superior energies—of an indomitable resolution. All this while, moreover, he contrived to preserve an unruffled temper—which, with a man of such sensibilities as his, afforded indeed a signal instance of self-control; and in short, on all these grounds, Mr. Aubrey appears really entitled to our deepest sympathy and respect. I spoke of his anxieties. Suppose, thought he, health should fail him, what was to become of him, and of those absolutely dependent upon him? Suppose illness should invade the dear members of his family, what was in prospect but destitution—or surrendering them up—bitter and heart-breaking contingency!—to the precarious charity of others. What would avail all his exhausting labors in the acquisition of professional knowledge, while his liberty was entirely at the command of Mr. Titmouse, and Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap, who might, at any moment, actuated by mercenary motives, or impelled by caprice, blight all his prospects, and incarcerate him in a prison! Yet, under this burden—to adopt the language of Sir Henry Spelman on an analogous occasion, "non ingentem solum, sed perpetuis humeris sustinendum"—Mr. Aubrey stood firmly. He felt that he was called upon to sustain it; a blessed spirit ever, as it were, beside him, whispering the consolatory assurance, that all this was ordered and designed by the Supreme Disposer of events, as a trial of his constancy, and of his faith, and that the issue was with Him. It is mercifully ordained, that "hope springs eternal in the human breast," and that, too, in every turn and variety of mortal misery. It was so with Aubrey. So long as he felt his health unimpaired, and his mental energies in full vigor, he looked on these blessings as a sort of guarantee from Heaven that he should be able to carry on a successful, though it might be a long and wearisome, struggle with adverse circumstances. Still it cost him a very painful effort to assume and preserve that exterior of tranquillity, which should calm and assure the beloved beings associated with him in this hour of peril and suffering; and oftener than they chose to let him know of it, did the keen eye of a wife's, and sister's love, detect the gloom and oppression which darkened his countenance, and saddened his manner. Theirs was, notwithstanding all I have said, a happy little home. He was generally punctual to his dinner-hour, to a moment; knowing the thousand fears on his account which would otherwise assail the fond beings who were counting the minutes till his arrival. When they had once thus met, they seldom separated till bed-time. Sometimes Miss Aubrey would sit down to her piano, and accompany herself in some song or air, which equally, whether merry or mournful, revived innumerable touching and tender recollections of former days; and she often ceased, tremulously and in tears, in which she was not unfrequently joined by both of those who had been listening to her. Then he would betake himself to his labors for the rest of the evening (not quitting the room), they either assisting him—fair and eager amanuenses! or themselves reading, or engaged at needlework. Oh! it was ecstasy, too, to that poor oppressed father to enter into the wild sports and gambols of his light-hearted little ones, Charles and Agnes, who always made their appearance for about a couple of hours after dinner; to tell them "stories;" to listen to theirs; to show them pictures; to hear Charles read; and to join heartily in their frolics, even rolling about on the floor with them! But when he paused for a moment, and his wife and Kate succeeded him as their playmates, for a short interval; when his eye followed their movements—what sudden and sharp pangs would pass through his heart, as he thought of the future, and what was to become of them!—And when their maid arrived at the appointed hour, causing all sport instantly to cease, and longing looks to be directed to papa and mamma, saying as plainly as could be said, "only a few minutes more," how fondly would he embrace them! and when he felt their tiny arms clasping his neck and caressing him, and their kisses "all over" his face, feelings were excited within him, which were too deep for utterance—which defy description. 'Tis said—I know not with what truth—of Robespierre, as an instance of his fearful refinement in cruelty, that a person of distinction who had become obnoxious to him he formally condemned to death, but allowed to remain in the torturing, the excruciating presence of his lovely family; he and they aware, all the while, that his doom was irrevocable, inevitable; and he momentarily liable to the summons to the guillotine, and which in fact—oh, horror!—came at length, when they were all seated together, one day, at the breakfast-table! Oh, the feelings with which that unfortunate person must have daily regarded the countenances of those around him! How applicable to his condition the heart-breaking strains of Medea—
Φεὓ, φεὓ, τί προσδέρκεσθέ μ' όμμασιν, τέκνα ;
Τί προσγελᾱτε τὸν πανὑστατον γἑλων ;
Αί, αί, τί δρἁσο ; Καρδία γἀρ οἴχεται,
Γυναῒκες, όμμα φαιδρὸν ὡς είδον τέκνων.30
The above passage was one which very frequently, on the occasions I have alluded to, occurred to the mind of Mr. Aubrey; for he felt himself indeed every moment at the mercy of those to whom he owed such a fearful amount of money, and for which he was liable, at any moment selected by malice or rapacity, to be plucked from his little home, and cast into prison!
Oh, happy ye, now reading these pages, unto whom the lines are fallen in pleasant places! yea, who have a goodly heritage; who live, as it were, in a land flowing with milk and honey; with whom life glides away like a tranquil and pleasant dream; who are not sternly bidden to eat your bread with quaking, and drink your water with trembling and with carefulness,31 nor in vain to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows; who have, indeed, no thought for the morrow;—oh, ye who have leisure and ample means to pursue the objects of an honorable ambition, undisturbed by daily fears for daily bread—by terror, lest implacable creditors should at length frustrate all your efforts, drive you from your position in society, and precipitate you and yours into ruin;—I say, oh ye! do I appeal to you in vain? Do you turn from this painful portion of my narrative with indifference, or contempt, or wearisomeness? If the mere description, brief though it may be, of the sufferings of the Aubreys be trying and unpleasing to you, what must have been to them the actual endurance? Poor Aubrey! As he walked along the crowded thoroughfares, morning and evening, between the Temple and Vivian Street, what a disheartening consciousness he felt of his personal insignificance! Which of the passengers, patrician or plebeian, who met or passed him, cared—if personally unknown to him—one straw for him, or would have cared a straw for him, had they even known the load of misery and misfortune under which he staggered past them? Every time that he thus passed between the scene of his absorbing labors at the Temple, and that green spot—his house in Vivian Street—in the world's wide desert, where only his heart was refreshed by the never-failing spring of domestic love and tenderness, he felt, as it were, but a prisoner out upon parole! It is easy to understand that, when a man walks along the streets of London, depressed in spirit, and alarmed by the consciousness of increasing pecuniary embarrassment, his temper is likely to become irritable, his deportment forbidding, his spirit stern and soured, particularly against those who appeal to his charity; which then, indeed, he might be pardoned for feeling, and bitterly—to begin at home. It was not so, however, with Aubrey, whose constant feeling was—Haud ignarus mali, miseris succurrere disco; and though it may appear a small thing to mention, I feel gratification in recording of him, that, desperate as were his circumstances, infinitely enhanced to him as was the value of money, he went seldom unprovided with the means of relieving the humbler applicants for charity whom he passed in the streets—of dropping some small token of his love and pity into the trembling and feeble hand of want—of those whose necessities he felt to be greater even than his own. Never, indeed, did the timid eye of the most tattered, starved, and emaciated object suffered to crawl along the streets, catch that of Mr. Aubrey, without making his heart acknowledge the secret bond of misery which bound them together—that he beheld a brother in bondage, and on whom he cheerfully bestowed the humble pittance which he believed that Providence had yet left at his disposal!—Prosperity and adversity have equally the effect, upon an inferior mind and heart, of generating selfishness. The one encourages, the other forces it. Misery is apt to think its own sufferings greater than those of any one else—and naturally. The eye, as it were, is filled with the object—that is to say, of distress and danger—which is nearest—which is in such fearful contiguity, obscuring from view all remoter objects, at once scaring away presence of mind, and centring its hopes and fears upon self. Not so, however, is it when a noble nature is the sufferer—and more especially when that nature is strengthened and brightened by the support and consolation derived from philosophy—and, above all, religion. To many a strong spirit, destitute of such assistance, alas! how often, under similar circumstances, have come—ghastly visitants!—Despair and Madness, with their hideous attendant Suicide, to do their bidding?
To Mr. Aubrey the Sabbath was indeed not only a day for performing the public services of religion, but also a day of real rest from the labors of life. It was not one, to him, of puritanical gloom or excitement, but of sincere, cheerful, fervent, enlightened devotion. It would have been to the reader, I think, not an uninteresting sight to behold this unfortunate and harassed family at church. They took almost the only pew which was vacant in the gallery—in a church not far distant from Vivian Street—a pew just holding themselves and little Charles; who, since their arrival in town, had begun to accompany them to the morning service. There was something in their appearance—punctual as they were in both the morning and evening—which could hardly fail to have interested any one who observed them. There were two very elegant and lovely women, dressed in simple half-mourning: a man of calm, gentlemanly manners, and an intellectual countenance, but overshadowed with deep seriousness, if not melancholy—as, indeed, was the case with the whole of the little group, except the beautiful child, Charles. If their mere appearance was thus calculated to interest those around, who beheld them so punctual in their attendance, how much would that interest have been increased, had the beholder known their singular and melancholy history? Here were individuals, whose condition was testing the reality of the consolations of religion, exhibiting humility, resignation, faith, a deep delight in attending the house of Him who had permitted such dreadful disasters to befall them, and whose will it yet seemed to be that they should pass through deeper sufferings than they had yet experienced. His temple seemed, indeed, to them, a refuge and shelter from the storm. To Mr. Aubrey every portion of the church service was precious, for its purity, its simplicity, its solemnity, its fervor, its truly scriptural character, its adaptation to every imaginable condition of feeling and of circumstance, indeed, "to all sorts and conditions of men." A little incident fraught with much interest, occurred to them shortly after they commenced their attendance at the church. An occasional sermon was preached one evening by a stranger, from the words "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him," on behalf of a neighboring dispensary. Mr. Aubrey was soon struck by the unusual strength and beauty of the sermon, in point of composition—the fervor and simplicity of the preacher. Its language was at once chaste and forcible; its reasoning clear and cogent; its illustration apt and vivid; its pathos genuine. As he went on, Mr. Aubrey became more and more convinced that he had seen or heard the preacher before; and on inquiring, afterwards, his name, his impressions proved to be correct;—the clergyman had been at Oxford, at the very same college with him, and this was the first time that they had since come within sight of each other. Mr. Aubrey very soon afterwards had an opportunity of introducing himself to the clergyman, and was recognized, and they renewed their early friendship. Mr. Neville—for that was his name—poor soul, had nothing upon earth to support himself with, but an afternoon lectureship in one of the city churches, from which he derived about £75 a-year; and on this sum alone he had contrived, for the last four or five years, to support both himself and his wife—a very amiable and fond woman. Fortunately, they had no children; but they had seen much affliction, each of them being in but precarious health, and a sad proportion of his little income was, consequently, devoted to doctors' bills. He was an admirable scholar; a man of very powerful understanding, and deeply read in metaphysics and divinity. Yet this wretched pittance was all he could procure for his support; and pinching work for them, poor souls, it was indeed, to "make ends meet." They lived in very small but creditable lodgings; and amid all their privations, and with all the gloom of the future before them, they were as cheerful a little couple as the world ever saw. They dearly loved, and would have sacrificed everything for each other; and so long as they could but keep their chins above water, and he realize the stern and noble feeling, "pauper, sed in meo ære," they cared not for their exclusion from most of the comforts and all the elegancies of life. They were, both of them, entirely resigned to the will of Heaven as to their position—nay, in all things. She generally accompanied him whithersoever he went; but on the occasion to which I have been alluding, the good little creature was lying at home in bed, enduring great suffering; and the thought of it made the preacher's heart very heavy, and his voice to falter a little, several times during his sermon. He was perfectly delighted when Mr. Aubrey introduced himself; and when the latter had heard all his friend's little history—who had indeed a child-like simplicity and frankness, and told Mr. Aubrey everything he knew about himself—Mr. Aubrey wrung his hand with great emotion, almost, indeed, too great for expression. It seemed that a bishop, before whom poor Neville had accidentally preached seven years before, had sent for him, and expressed such a very high opinion of his sermon, as led him reasonably to look for some little preferment at his Lordship's hands; but in vain. Poor Neville had no powerful friends, and the bishop was overwhelmed with applicants for everything he had to give away; so it is not much to be wondered at, that, in time, he totally lost sight of Mr. Neville, and of the hopes which had blossomed, but to be blighted. What touched Mr. Aubrey to the soul, was the unaffected cheerfulness with which poor Mr. Neville—now in his fortieth year—reconciled himself to his unpromising circumstances; the calmness with which he witnessed the door of preferment evidently shut upon him forever. Mr. Aubrey obtained from him his address; and resolved that, though, for reasons long ago explained, he had withdrawn from almost every one of his former friends and associates, yet with this poor, this neglected, but happy clergyman, he would endeavor to renew and cement firmly their early-formed but long-suspended friendship. And when, on his return to Vivian Street, (whither Mrs. and Miss Aubrey had proceeded alone, at his request, while he walked on with Mr. Neville,) he told them the little history which I have above indicated to the reader, how the hearts of all of them went forth towards one who was in many respects a fellow-sufferer with themselves, and, practising what he preached, was really a pattern of resignation to the will of God; of humble but hearty faith in His mercy and loving-kindness!
Mr. Aubrey was not long in paying his promised visit to Mr. Neville, accompanied by Mrs. Aubrey. 'Twas a long and not very agreeable walk for them towards St. George's in the East; and on reaching a small row of neat houses, only one story high, and being shown into Mr. Neville's very little sitting-room, they found Mrs. Neville lying on a little rickety sofa near the fire, looking very ill, and Mr. Neville sitting before her, with a number of books on the table, and pen, ink, and paper, with which he was occupied preparing his next Sunday's sermon; but there was also a slip of paper on the table of a different description, and which had occasioned both of them great distress; viz. a rather peremptory note from their medical man, touching the payment of his "trifling account" of £14 odd. Where poor Neville was to obtain such a sum, neither he nor his wife knew: they had already almost deprived themselves of necessary food and clothing to enable them to appease another urgent creditor; and this new and sudden demand of an old claim, had indeed grievously disquieted them. They said nothing about it to Mr. and Mrs. Aubrey, who soon made themselves at home, and by their unaffected simplicity and cordiality of manner, relieved their humble hosts from all anxiety. They partook of tea, in a sufficiently homely and frugal style; and before they rose to go they exacted a promise, that, as soon as Mrs. Neville should have recovered, they would both come and spend a long day in Vivian Street. They soon became very intimate; and, Mrs. Neville's health at length being such as to preclude her from attending at all to her needle, the reader will possibly think none the less of Mrs. Aubrey and Kate, when he hears that they insisted on taking that task upon themselves, (a matter in which they were becoming somewhat expert,) and many and many an hour did these two charming women spend, both in Vivian Street and at Mrs. Neville's, in relieving her from her labors—particularly in preparing her slight stock of winter clothing. And now that I am on this point, I may as well mention another not less amiable trait in Kate; that, hearing of a girl's school about to be founded in connection with the church which they attended, and in support of which several ladies had undertaken to prepare various little matters, such as embroidery, lace, pictures, and articles of fancy and ornament, Kate also set to work with her pencil and brushes. She was a very tasteful draughtswoman, and produced four or five such delicate and beautiful sketches, in water color, of scenes in and about Yatton, as made her a very distinguished contributor to the undertaking; each of her sketches producing upwards of two guineas. She also drew a remarkably spirited crayon sketch of the pretty little head of Charles—who accompanied her to the place where her contributions were deposited, and delivered it in with his own hand.—Thus, in short, were this sweet and amiable family rapidly reconciling themselves to their altered circumstances—taking real pleasure in the new scenes which surrounded them, and the novel duties devolving upon them; and as their feelings became calmer, they felt how true it is that happiness in this world depends not upon mere external circumstances, but upon THE MIND—which, contented and well regulated, can turn everything around it into a source of enjoyment and thankfulness—making indeed the wilderness to bloom and blossom as the rose.
They kept up—especially Kate—a constant correspondence with good old Dr. Tatham; who, judging from the frequency and the length of his letters, which were written with a truly old-fashioned distinctness and uniformity of character, must have found infinite pleasure in his task. So also was it with Kate, who, if she had even been writing to her lover—nay, between ourselves, what would Mr. Delamere have given to have had addressed to himself one of the long letters, crossed down to the very postscript, full of sparkling delicacy, good nature, and good sense, which so often found their way to the "Rev. Dr. Tatham, Vicarage, Yatton, Yorkshire!" They were thus apprised of everything of moment that transpired at Yatton, to which their feelings clung with unalienable affection. Dr. Tatham's letters had indeed almost always a painful degree of interest attached to them. From his frequent mention of Mr. Gammon's name—and almost equally favorable as frequent—it appeared that he possessed a vast ascendency over Mr. Titmouse, and was, whenever he was at Yatton, in a manner, its moving spirit. The doctor represented Titmouse as a truly wretched creature, with no more sense of religion than a monkey; equally silly, selfish, and vulgar—unfeeling and tyrannical wherever he had an opportunity of exhibiting his real character.
It exquisitely pained them, moreover, to find pretty distinct indications of a sterner and stricter rule being apparent at Yatton, than had ever been known there before, so far as the tenants and villagers were concerned. Rents were now required to be paid with the utmost punctuality; many of them were raised, and harsher terms introduced into their leases and agreements. In Mr. Aubrey's time a distress or an action for rent was a thing literally unheard of in any part of the estate; but nearly a dozen had occurred since the accession of Mr. Titmouse. If this had been at the instance of the ruling spirit, Mr. Gammon personally had certainly got none of the odium of the proceeding; every letter announcing a resort to hostile measures expressly purporting to be authorized by Mr. Titmouse himself; Mr. Gammon on most of such occasions, putting in a faint word or two in favor of the tenant, but ineffectually. The legal proceedings were always conducted in the name of "Bloodsuck and Son," whose town agents were, "Quirk, Gammon, and Snap;" but their names never came under the eye of the defendants! No longer could the poor villagers, and poorer tenants, reckon on their former assistance from the Hall in the hour of sickness and distress: cowslip wine, currant wine, elderberry wine, if made, were consumed in the Hall. In short, there was a discontinuance of all those innumerable little endearing courtesies, and charities, and hospitalities, which render a good old country mansion the very heart of the neighborhood. The doctor in one of his letters, intimated, with a sort of agony, that he had heard it mentioned by the people at the Hall as probable, that Mr. Titmouse—the little Goth—would pull down that noble old relic, the turreted gateway; but that Mr. Gammon was vehemently opposed to such a measure; and that, if it were preserved after all, it would be entirely owing to the taste and the influence of that gentleman. Had Dr. Tatham chosen, he could have added a fact which would indeed have saddened his friends—viz. that the old sycamore, which had been preserved at the fond entreaties of Kate, and which was hallowed by so many sad and tender associations, had been long ago removed, as a sort of eyesore: Mr. Gammon had, in fact, directed it to be done; but he repeatedly expressed to Dr. Tatham, confidentially, his regret at such an act on the part of Titmouse. The doctor could also have told them that there had been a dog-fight in the village, at which Mr. Titmouse was present! Persons were beginning to make their appearance too, at Yatton, of a very different description from any who had been seen there in the time of the Aubreys—persons, now and then, of loose, and wild, and reckless characters. Mr. Titmouse would often get up a fight in the village, and reward the victor with five or ten shillings! Then the snug and quiet little "Aubrey Arms" was metamorphosed into the "Titmouse Arms" and another set up in opposition to it, and called "The Toper's Arms;" and it was really painful to see the increasing trade driven by each of them. They were both full every night, and often during the day also; and the vigilant, and affectionate, and grieved eye of the good vicar noticed several seats in the church, which had formerly been occupied every Sunday morning and afternoon, to be—empty! In his letters, he considerately sank the grosser features of Titmouse's conduct, which would have only uselessly grieved and disgusted his beloved correspondents. He informed them, however, from time to time, of the different visitors at the Hall, particularly of the arrival and movements of their magnificent kinsfolk, the Earl of Dreddlington and Lady Cecilia, the Marquis Gants-Jaunes de Millefleurs and Mr. Tuft—the novel state and ceremony which had been suddenly introduced there—at which they all ceased reading for a moment, and laughed, well knowing the character of Lord Dreddlington. At length, some considerable time after Mr. Titmouse's grand visitors had been at the Hall, there came a letter from Dr. Tatham, sent by a private hand, and not reaching Vivian Street till the evening, when they were sitting together, after dinner, as usual, and which contained intelligence that was received in sudden silence, and with looks of astonishment; viz. that Mr. Titmouse had become the acknowledged suitor of the Lady Cecilia!! Mr. Aubrey, after a moment's pause, laughed more heartily than they had heard him laugh for many months—getting up, at the same time, and walking once or twice across the room—Mrs. Aubrey and Miss Aubrey gazed at each other for a few moments, without speaking a word; and you could not have told whether their fair countenances showed more of amusement or of disgust at the intelligence. "Well! it is as I have often told you, Kate," commenced Mr. Aubrey, after a while resuming his seat, and addressing his sister with an air of good-humored raillery; "you've lost your chance—you've held your head so high. Ah, 'tis all over now—and our fair cousin is mistress of Yatton!"