Chapter 4 No.4

In due time we found our way, through deafening clatter, to Miss Post's door, a little below the Astor House, and in the midst of all that female feet the soonest seek. In Maiden Lane and on Broadway it was easy to find all that a Weston fancy painted in the shape of dry goods; and I did my errands up with conscientious speed before indulging in a fashionable lounge on the Battery.

The first twenty-four hours were full of successive surprises, which ought to have been chronicled on the spot and at the time. They affected me like electric shocks; but in a day or two I forgot to be surprised at the queer Dutch signs over the shops and the swine in the streets. Now I only remember the oddity of Miss Post's poverty in the water-line; and that she had to buy fresh water by the gallon and rain-water by the barrel. Also, the faithlessness of the two brilliant black boys who waited on table and at the door, and who couldn't be depended on to take up a bundle or carry a message to your room, so unmitigatedly wicked were they.

"If I owned 'em," said Miss Post to me, confidentially, "I would have 'em whipped every day of their lives. It's what they need, and can't do without. They're just like bad children!"

That was true enough. However, she didn't own them, and got very little out of them but show; and they looked like princes, with their white aprons and jackets, and their glittering, haughty eyes. They played with their duties, and disdained all directions. I used to follow them with my eyes at the table with amused astonishment. It was very grand, and, as the Marchioness says, "If you made believe a good deal," reminded one of barbaric splendor, and Tippoo Saib. But poor Miss Post couldn't order an elephant to tread their heads off, or she would have extinguished her household twice a day. I looked back with a feeling of relief to Weston, and my good Polly, who would scorn to be an eye-servant or men-pleaser.

At the long table, where sat Mr. and Mrs. Jones, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Mr. and Mrs. Bennett, Babbit, and so on, I looked sharply for Mr. and Mrs. Lewis. But neither was there the first day. All the people were childless and desolate-looking, though much bedecked with braids and curls, which ladies wore at that time without stint. Nobody looked as if she could be Mr. Lewis's wife. However, the ladies all treated me with so much cordiality and politeness that I set New York down at once as a delightful spot.

Happening to speak of Mrs. Lewis, I saw that the corners of Mrs. Jones's mouth went immediately down, and Mrs. Smith's eyebrows immediately up. Of course, no woman is going to stand that; and I inquired minutely enough to satisfy myself either that Mrs. Lewis was very peculiar, or that a boarding-house was not a favorable atmosphere for character. My husband, to whom I told all they said, considered "the abundant leisure from family-cares which these ladies enjoyed as giving them opportunities for investigation which they carried to excess."

"But think of Gus not being Mr. Lewis's child!" said I, after faithfully relating all I had heard.

"He looks like an Italian. I always thought so. But Lewis seems very fond of him."

"Yes, they said so. But that the mother cared nothing for him, nor for her other children, who are off in Genesee County somewhere."

"For health, doubtless," said my "he," dryly.

"And the way they talked of Mr. Remington! calling him George, and more than insinuating that she likes too well to be at the Oaks,-that is his place. They say she has been there all the time Mr. Lewis has been gone!"

"Mr. Remington has been gone too, as you and I can testify," more dryly.

"So he has. I wish I had thought to tell them so."

I hadn't been in a boarding-house for nothing.

"It was like Lewis to take her as he did. Very noble and generous, too, even supposing he loved her. I dare say he does. Is Montalli dead?"

"I don't know. I think so. At all events, they were divorced, and for his cruelty. Only think of a lady, a young lady, not sixteen, and the darling and idol at home, being beaten and pounded! Ugh! what horrid creatures Italians are!"

"And you say Lewis happened to be in Mobile at the time?"

"Yes, and fell in love with her,-she, scarcely eighteen, and to have had this shocking experience! I don't like to tell you how much these ladies have hinted about her, but enough to make me feel as if I were reading the "Mysteries of Udolpho," instead of hearing of a live woman, out of a book, and belonging to our own time."

"Very likely she may have amused herself at the expense of their credulity. I have seen women do that, just for sport, and to see how much people would believe. It is a dangerous game to play."

Mr. Lewis came to dinner, and brought me a little three-cornered note from his wife, written with much grace and elegance, so far as the composition was concerned. It was sealed with a dove flying, and expressed her thanks for my bringing the "sweet remembranser" from her beloved child, and so on, expecting to see me the next day at the Oaks.

The surprising part of the note was, that the writing was scrawled, and the words misspelt in a manner that would have disgraced the youngest member of a town-school in Weston. She had "grate" pleasure, and spoke of my "truble" in a way that made me feel as if I should see a child.

The next day brought Mr. Remington himself, fresh and handsome as ever, saying that a carriage was waiting, and his tulips were at their best, and the ladies expecting to see us,-adding, with an informality which I had not associated with New York, that the day was all planned out for us,-tulips and lunch at the Oaks, Hoboken in the afternoon.

That was a white day, and one long to be remembered. First of all, for Hoboken, which, whatever it may be now, was then a spot full of picturesque beauty and sweet retirement, relieving and contrasting the roar and tumult of the city; second, for the tulips, which were the most glorious things I ever saw, and still remain the pattern of exceeding beauty, though I have since seen wealth of floral splendor, but none that came up to the Royal Adelaide,-nothing so queenly and so noble as the large white cup, fit for Hebe to bear and the gods to drink out of, and holding at least a pint within the snowy radiance of its ample brim. I did not wonder Mr. Remington had a passion for tulips. He flitted about among his brilliant brigade like a happy butterfly, rejoicing in our delight and exulting in our surprise like a pleased child.

"And is each of these different?"

"Not a duplicate among them. Fifteen hundred varieties."

If he had said fifteen thousand, it would not have added to my astonishment. To be sure, no king was ever arrayed like one of these. And fifteen hundred! each gorgeous enough for a king's ransom! It took my breath away to look at the far-reaching parterre of nodding glories, moved by the breath of the south-wind.

"I am satisfied. I see you are sufficiently impressed with my tulips, Mrs. Prince," said Mr. Remington, gleefully, "and I shall send you no end of bulbs for your Weston garden."

Mr. Remington had taken us directly to the garden on our arrival, and now led the way, through large evergreens, and by a winding path, to the house. The land was not half an acre in size, yet I was sure that I had been over a large estate. The same delusion clung to the house, which was in looks like one of Gainsborough's cottages, and ought to have been at least two hundred years old, instead of two. But Downing's advent had already wrought miracles here and there in our land; and a little while before Mr. Remington had been bitten with an architectural mania. So under the transplanted trees, and beneath trailing vines of Virginia creeper and Boursault roses, there peeped the brown gables of a cottage, which arose and stood there as reposeful and weather-stained as if it had been built before the Revolution. Mr. Remington showed us twenty unexpected doors, and juttings-out here and there, to catch a view, or to let in the sun, and rejoiced in our pleasure, as he had in the garden, like a child. In the library, Mrs. Remington received us, looking pale, and being very silent.

I sat down by her without being attracted at all-rather repelled by the faint sickliness of everything connected with her appearance. But neither her pale blue eyes, nor her yellow hair, nor her straw-colored gown and blue ribbons would have repelled me; I could not make her talk at all. I never saw such reticence before or since. As if she were determined "to die and make no sign," she sat, bowing and smiling, and amounting to nothing, one way or another,-giving no opinion, if asked, and asking no question. She was passively polite, but so very near nothing that I was rejoiced when Mr. Remington entered with my husband, and proposed that we should go into the dining-room. He carelessly introduced Mrs. Remington, but further than that seemed not to know she was in existence; and I must confess, I did not wonder. While my husband made, or tried to make, some conversation with her, Mr. Remington showed me an exquisite Clytie in marble, and a landscape by Cole, which hung in a good light, and showed its wonderful wild beauty. And now for the third reason that this was a white day.