CHAPTER II.

_Armine Described_.

AFTER his marriage Sir Ratcliffe determined to reside at Armine. In one

of the largest parks in England there yet remained a fragment of a vast

Elizabethan pile, that in old days bore the name of Armine Place. When

Sir Ferdinand had commenced building Armine Castle, he had pulled down

the old mansion, partly for the sake of its site and partly for the sake

of its materials. Long lines of turreted and many-windowed walls, tall

towers, and lofty arches, now rose in picturesque confusion on the

green ascent where heretofore old Sir Walsingham had raised the fair

and convenient dwelling, which he justly deemed might have served the

purpose of a long posterity. The hall and chief staircase of the castle

and a gallery alone were finished, and many a day had Sir Ferdinand

passed in arranging the pictures, the armour, and choice rarities of

these magnificent apartments. The rest of the building was a mere shell;

nor was it in all parts even roofed in. Heaps of bricks and stone and

piles of timber appeared in every direction; and traces of the sudden

stoppage of a great work might be observed in the temporary saw-pits

still remaining, the sheds for the workmen, and the kilns and furnaces,

which never had been removed. Time, however, that had stained the

neglected towers with an antique tint, and had permitted many a

generation of summer birds to build their sunny nests on all the coignes

of vantage of the unfinished walls, had exercised a mellowing influence

even on these rude accessories, and in the course of years they had been

so drenched by the rain, and so buffeted by the wind, and had become so

covered with moss and ivy, that they rather added to then detracted from

the picturesque character of the whole mass.

A few hundred yards from the castle, but situate on the same verdant

rising ground, and commanding, although well sheltered, an extensive

view over the wide park, was the fragment of the old Place that we have

noticed. The rough and undulating rent which marked the severance of

the building was now thickly covered with ivy, which in its gamesome

luxuriance had contrived also to climb up a remaining stack of tall

chimneys, and to spread over the covering of the large oriel window.

This fragment contained a set of pleasant chambers, which, having been

occupied by the late baronet, were of course furnished with great taste

and comfort; and there was, moreover, accommodation sufficient for a

small establishment. Armine Place, before Sir Ferdinand, unfortunately

for his descendants, determined in the eighteenth century on building

a feudal castle, had been situate in famous pleasure-grounds, which

extended at the back of the mansion over a space of some hundred acres.

The grounds in the immediate vicinity of the buildings had of course

suffered severely, but the far greater portion had only been neglected;

and there were some indeed who deemed, as they wandered through the

arbour-walks of this enchanting wilderness, that its beauty had been

enhanced even by this very neglect. It seemed like a forest in a

beautiful romance; a green and bowery wilderness where Boccaccio would

have loved to woo, and Watteau to paint. So artfully had the walks been

planned, that they seemed interminable, nor was there a single point in

the whole pleasaunce where the keenest eye could have detected a limit.

Sometimes you wandered in those arched and winding walks dear to

pensive spirits; sometimes you emerged on a plot of turf blazing in

the sunshine, a small and bright savannah, and gazed with wonder on the

group of black and mighty cedars that rose from its centre, with

their sharp and spreading foliage. The beautiful and the vast blended

together; and the moment after you had beheld with delight a bed of

geraniums or of myrtles, you found yourself in an amphitheatre of

Italian pines. A strange exotic perfume filled the air: you trod on the

flowers of other lands; and shrubs and plants, that usually are only

trusted from their conservatories, like sultanas from their jalousies,

to sniff the air and recall their bloom, here learning from hardship

the philosophy of endurance, had struggled successfully even against

northern winters, and wantoned now in native and unpruned luxuriance.

Sir Ferdinand, when he resided at Armine, was accustomed to fill these

pleasure-grounds with macaws and other birds of gorgeous plumage; but

these had fled away with their master, all but some swans which still

floated on the surface of a lake, which marked the centre of this

paradise. In the remains of the ancient seat of his fathers, Sir

Ratcliffe Armine and his bride now sought a home.

The principal chamber of Armine Place was a large irregular room, with

a low but richly-carved oaken roof, studded with achievements. This

apartment was lighted by the oriel window we have mentioned, the upper

panes of which contained some ancient specimens of painted glass,

and having been fitted up by Sir Ferdinand as a library, contained a

collection of valuable books. From the library you entered through an

arched door of glass into a small room, of which, it being much out of

repair when the family arrived, Lady Armine had seized the opportunity

of gratifying her taste in the adornment. She had hung it with some

old-fashioned pea-green damask, that exhibited to a vantage several

copies of Spanish paintings by herself, for she was a skilful artist.

The third and remaining chamber was the dining-room, a somewhat gloomy

chamber, being shadowed by a neighbouring chestnut. A portrait of Sir

Ferdinand, when a youth, in a Venetian dress, was suspended over the

old-fashioned fireplace; and opposite hung a fine hunting piece by

Schneiders. Lady Armine was an amiable and accomplished woman. She had

enjoyed the advantage of a foreign education under the inspection of a

cautious parent: and a residence on the Continent, while it had afforded

her many graces, had not, as unfortunately sometimes is the case,

divested her of those more substantial though less showy qualities of

which a husband knows the value. She was pious and dutiful: her manners

were graceful, for she had visited courts and mixed in polished circles,

but she had fortunately not learnt to affect insensibility as a system,

or to believe that the essence of good breeding consists in showing your

fellow-creatures that you despise them. Her cheerful temper solaced the

constitutional gloom of Sir Ratcliffe, and indeed had originally won his

heart, even more than her remarkable beauty: and while at the same

time she loved a country life, she possessed in a lettered taste, in a

beautiful and highly cultivated voice, and in a scientific knowledge of

music and of painting, all those resources which prevent retirement from

degenerating into loneliness. Her foibles, if we must confess that she

was not faultless, endeared her to her husband, for her temper reflected

his own pride, and she possessed the taste for splendour which was also

his native mood, although circumstances had compelled him to stifle its

gratification.

Love, pure and profound, had alone prompted the union between Ratcliffe

Armine and Constance Grandison Doubtless, like all of her race, she

might have chosen amid the wealthiest of the Catholic nobles and gentry

one who would have been proud to have mingled his life with hers; but,

with a soul not insensible to the splendid accidents of existence, she

yielded her heart to one who could repay the rich sacrifice only with

devotion. His poverty, his pride, his dangerous and hereditary gift of

beauty, his mournful life, his illustrious lineage, his reserved and

romantic mind, had at once attracted her fancy and captivated her heart.

She shared all his aspirations and sympathised with all his hopes; and

the old glory of the house of Armine, and its revival and restoration,

were the object of her daily thoughts, and often of her nightly dreams.

With these feelings Lady Armine settled herself at her new home,

scarcely with a pang that the whole of the park in which she lived was

let out as grazing ground, and only trusting, as she beheld the groups

of ruminating cattle, that the day might yet come for the antlered

tenants of the bowers to resume their shady dwellings. The good man and

his wife who hitherto had inhabited the old Place, and shown the castle

and the pleasaunce to passing travellers, were, under the new order of

affairs, promoted to the respective offices of serving-man and cook,

or butler and housekeeper, as they styled themselves in the village.

A maiden brought from Grandison to wait on Lady Armine completed the

establishment, with her young brother, who, among numerous duties,

performed the office of groom, and attended to a pair of beautiful white

ponies which Sir Ratcliffe drove in a phaeton. This equipage, which was

remarkable for its elegance, was the especial delight of Lady Armine,

and certainly the only piece of splendour in which Sir Ratcliffe

indulged. As for neighbourhood, Sir Ratcliffe, on his arrival, of course

received a visit from the rector of his parish, and, by the courteous

medium of this gentleman, he soon occasioned it to be generally

understood that he was not anxious that the example of his rector should

be followed. The intimation, in spite of much curiosity, was of course

respected. Nobody called upon the Armines. This happy couple, however,

were too much engrossed with their own society to require amusement from

any other sources than themselves. The honeymoon was passed in wandering

in the pleasure-grounds, and in wondering at their own marvellous

happiness. Then Lady Armine would sit on a green bank and sing her

choicest songs, and Sir Ratcliffe repaid her for her kindness with

speeches softer even than serenades. The arrangement of their dwelling

occupied the second month; each day witnessed some felicitous yet

economical alteration of her creative taste. The third month Lady Armine

determined to make a garden.

‘I wish,’ said her affectionate husband, as he toiled with delight in

her service, ‘I wish, my dear Constance, that Glastonbury was here; he

was such a capital gardener.’

‘Let us ask him, dear Ratcliffe; and, perhaps, for such a friend we have

already allowed too great a space of time to elapse without sending an

invitation.’

‘Why, we are so happy,’ said Sir Ratcliffe, smiling; ‘and yet

Glastonbury is the best creature in the world. I hope you will like him,

dear Constance.’

‘I am sure I shall, dear Ratcliffe. Give me that geranium, love. Write

to him, to-day; write to Glastonbury to-day.’