THE BARNABYS IN AMERICA. :

BY MRS. TROLLOPE.

CHAP. VI.

THE mind of a passenger on board a merchant-vessel working her way up the Thames, with very little wind, and that little not above half favourable, must be exceedingly preoccupied if he do not find this part of his expedition very long and very dull. But notwithstanding the great variety of temperament by which the various individuals of the party we are about to accompany were distinguished, there was not one of them who, strictly speaking, could be said to suffer from this evil.

Miss Louisa Perkins, indeed, might, to a superficial observer, have been classed as one of the above-named victims of a slow progress through a disagreeable region. But though her pale, thin visage had no more movement or animation in it, than that of a whiting boiled yesterday-though her very light grey eyes had a plentiful lack of speculation in them, and though she spoke not and moved not, I, who have the happy privilege of knowing every thought of her heart, take upon me to declare that no idea that the river was long or dull ever entered her head. She was there, poor thing, seated on the pea-green bench, formed by the top of the chicken-coop, on purpose to be miserable. Not that her temper was of that sour quality which leads its possessor to find an indulgence in being uncontrolledly cross; on the contrary, the temper of Miss Louisa was essentially gentle and kind; but this gentleness and this kindness had led her on the present occasion to do precisely the very thing that she most abhorred, and in truth she could hardly choose but be miserable. She hated every country and every thing that was not English, and every thing that was American, most of all she loathed the smell of a ship, she detested the sea, and had never been in a boat to cross a ferry without being rather sick. And to add to all this, she greatly doubted the efficacy of their present scheme for remedying the staple misery her of sister's existence; that is to say, she greatly doubted the probability of finding an American gentleman more inclined to marry a young lady of six-and-thirty without money than an English one. So that on the whole, it was hardly possible that she could be otherwise than sad; her only comfort, as she gazed upon the dirty water through which the vessel was crawling, being the reflection that she had saved her sister from jumping into some very like it.

As to the hero of the party, as I have already very fitly designated Major Allen Barnaby, he stood in a manly and commanding attitude, his arms a-kimbo, and his legs "a-straddle," in the style of one of the Sieur David's classic Greeks; sometimes looking ahead, and sometimes looking astern, but always with an air of consciousness that the bark which bore him and his fortunes carried no ordinary freight. The river was neither long nor dull to him-could he forget How he last navigated in the same direction? Could he forget how much he had May.-VOL. LXV. NO. CCLVII.

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added to his little hoard since he passed up it in the other? Could he fail to feel that his glorious intellect and his happy star had enabled him again and again to rise triumphant out of misfortunes which must have overwhelmed a man of lesser genius? And remembering all this, could he do otherwise than look forward with bold hope and unshrinking confidence to the fresh career that was opening before him? To him the tedious river-voyage was but a soothing interval, during which he could indulge, without interruption or restraint, in a series of exciting calculations and a succession of reveries, each bringing flatteringly before his mind's eye the immense superiority of the new world over the old, in all the arts of a highly advanced state of society; and a complacent smile settled on his features as he thought of it.

Mrs. O'Donagough, to do her justice, seldom felt any thing to be tedious; she could always find, or make opportunities for displaying both her mind and body to advantage; and who that does this can ever find any portion of existence tedious? Before the ship reached the Downs, she had made pretty nearly every sailor on board, as well as the captain and the three mates, understand that she knew very nearly as much about a ship as they did-that besides all the personal beauty which remained to her (and she really managed to take off ten years of her fifty-five much better than the generality of those who try their talents at the same operation), besides all that remained, she clearly made them all understand, that she had some few years ago been infinitely handsomer still. To the cook she gave some admirable instructions in ship cookery. On the mind of the steward she strongly impressed the necessity of furnishing the passengers, particularly the ladies, with a liberal allowance of good toddy if he wished to keep them from the horrors of sea-sickness, and she made the little black cabin-boy thoroughly understand, that if ever he hoped to see the colour of her money he must never fail to come to her whenever she called, let who would want him elsewhere. With all this to be done, could she find the river-voyage too long?

As to Don Tornorino and his lady, they had both mutually and separately much to amuse them. The gentleman had very many reasons for feeling himself happy and contented, and truly he was so; but to what an extent no one can guess who is unacquainted with his previous history, and as his fate is now so closely united to that of the amiable race to whose memoirs I am thus sedulously devoting myself, a slight sketch of his early life may be desirable.

As I pique myself upon the unvarnished truth of my narratives, I shall honestly confess to the reader that Don Espartero et catera Tornorino was not by birth an hidalgo; on the contrary, indeed, his mother was a washerwoman and his father a tailor. But in a country where the wholesome exercise of revolution is going on so prosperously as it has been long doing in Spain, it matters little what a man's father may be, provided he himself knows how to profit by the delightful whirlwind of accidents by which he is sure to be surrounded.

The young Tornorino was a very pretty boy, and he was a very sharp boy; and moreover he was a very musical boy; and by the help of all these good gifts together, there were few youngsters in that not very tranquil country who had so pleasant a life. He was very religious, and all the priests that were left in Madrid made much of him. He

both danced and sung to perfection, and Juan Christino delighted in him.

Several semstresses were willing to make him shirts for nothing; and there was not a cook's shop in the city, that had a woman in any part of the establishment, where he might not get the very best of dinners for the asking. Besides all this, his excellent and patriotic father had become a chef-d'escadron to some faction or other, I really forget what, and his mother, lady of the bedchamber to her majesty; so that his position in society appeared as assured as it was brilliant, and a happier young Don never strutted through the highways and byways of Madrid than the young raven-haired Tornorino.

All this lasted till he was twenty-four years old and three months, and then, poor fellow, just as he had got confirmed in every habit of extravagance, luxury, and indulgence, he was literally turned from the court into the gutter. His father was shot as a traitor, having very unluckily been caught in the fact of appropriating some small regimental funds that happened to come in his way. His mother was discarded from her high and very distinguished office, and a young milliner installed in her place; and the poor petted son, for no reason in the world that I know of, save that he had outlived the royal lady's favour, was also informed that his attendance was no longer required. The unfortunate widow of the gallant chef-d'escadron died of starvation within the year, and her accomplished son sold eleven of his twelve guitars, all his gold snuff-boxes, and five of his six sword-knots, in order to convey himself to England, and try his fortune there.

And a dismal fortune it proved, poor fellow! As soon as the few naps he had brought with him had disappeared, he tried a greater variety of expedients to get more than I have time to record. Among other things, he played in the orchestra at Drury Lane, and danced in the ballets at Covent Garden-he gave lessons in most living languages to all who would be so kind as to learn, and offered to teach the guitar for a shilling a lesson.

But somehow or other nothing succeeded with him. He was almost always taking a siesta when he ought to have been rehearsing at the theatre; and he no sooner got a pupil than he began making love to the mother or the sister, and so got kicked into the street. Then every farthing of money he got he was obliged to spend at some Leicestersquare restaurant's, where he could get a plat or two, seasoned with a little garlic, for he felt as if he really must die if he attempted to swallow a chop or a steak prepared for him at his lodgings. But after all, there was really as little harm in him as could reasonably have been expected under the circumstances; and amongst the multitudinous patriots with which London abounds, Patty might easily have done worse.

The variety of pleasant thoughts which now chased each other. through the young man's head as he sat beside his bride, quietly and smilingly receiving and returning her caresses, was perfectly delightful. By far the most distinguishing feature of his mind was a love of ease, and, indeed, of indulgence of all kinds, and this had made the privations endured since reaching England something almost too dreadful to think of. His reverence for the father and mother of his young wife knew no bounds. He saw that their manner of living was exceedingly

far removed (as far at least as he could judge of it) from dry muttonchops, hard beef-steaks, black cold potatoes, and muddy beer. These various articles had formed a large portion of his misery for the last four years; and the idea that he was now to live daintily (comparatively speaking) and do no work, wrapped his senses in a sort of sweet elysium that kept him in a continual smile. Moreover he loathed, hated, and abominated the climate of England to a degree, that made the act of sailing away from it something little short of rapture. He was going to see the sun again! The very name of New Orleans whenever it reached his ears, caused him to display his well-set white teeth to an unmitigated excess; and so perfectly well satisfied was he with his present position, that had Queen Christina stood before him, he would have snapped his fingers at her, and would hardly have consented to change it, had the great general whose name he had assumed offered his own to him instead.

As for Patty-nobody who knows Patty could doubt for a moment her being in a state of perfect felicity; for in spite of Jack and all his false-heartedness she was married, and instead of having one kiss to talk about, she had now more than she could count, and the river seemed to her a very pleasant river; the wind, a very good wind, and the ship, a very nice ship.

But of all this happy, well-contented party, the most supremely happy, and the most rapturously well-contented was beyond all question Miss Matilda Perkins. The annoyances that the Don was leaving behind him were light indeed compared to the various, and forever recurring sources of agony which had lacerated her tender bosom for years.

Never, perhaps, had any woman loved so often and so devotedly! Oh! she felt to the very centre of her soul that she deserved to be loved again, and the having failed of this well-merited reward, and that too through at least twenty years of unremitting though various affection, had left a bitterness of indignation at her heart, which poisoned all her hours, and rendered her life one mournful long-drawn love-lorn sigh. But now, how delightfully was all around her changed! What a rainbow radiance fell upon every thought of the future. Hope sprang aloft upon exulting wings;

the bark that supported her slight figure, as she gracefully 'leaned over the taffrail, seemed wafted by breezes from heaven, and its sails filled by the soft sweet breath of love.

Miss Matilda was, in her way, a great reader; she had dipped into several accounts of America, and she was quite aware how exceedingly the natives were behindhand in all matters of grace and fashion. What

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enormous advantage therefore would this give her over all the native daughters of the land! How certain did she feel that her knowledge of life, her elegant manners, her particularly small waist, and two or three new bonnets and dresses which she had bought at the bazaar two days before she set off, would place her in a position of immeasurable superiority above every body that she was at all likely to be seen with! In short, her swelling heart felt no fears for the result; and the only thing approaching anxiety which crossed her mind was the question whether it would be best for her to accept the first man that offered, or wait a little to take the advantage of choice.