On the appointed day the visit was paid. I accompanied them in the carriage, and papa rode on horseback.
The Miss Harmers were away, as, indeed, had been the case since Sophy had left school and taken up her permanent residence there. Sophy was pale, and evidently very nervous; and in her manifest desire to please it was easy to see that she was much affected, and deeply grateful for the kindness which would be the means of removing the disadvantages under which she had laboured, and which had weighed much upon her mind. However, before the visit, which lasted some time, as the library and collection of scientific apparatus had to be inspected, was over, she had recovered her usual placid demeanour.
This visit had the consequences which papa had predicted from it. Society unanimously agreed that although certainly it was a strange, a very strange step for the bishop and his lady to have taken, still as they had done so, there could be no harm in every one else doing the same; in fact that it would only be what was right and proper. The ladies whom papa had rather irreverently spoken of in his letter as the bell-wethers of the flock, held out to the last and declared that they could not reconcile it to their conscience, or to their sense of what was due to their husbands' position. But the flock were no longer obedient to their lead, and indeed whispered amongst themselves, that a bishop's lady, who was moreover the daughter of a peeress, must know a good deal better what was proper and right than a mere canon's wife could do; and the consequence was that from that moment the influence of these ladies over Canterbury society waned much, and the opposition to poor Sophy recoiled upon the heads of those who had made it. In a short time every one in Canterbury and the neighbourhood called at Harmer Place, and the general verdict upon Sophy was decidedly satisfactory. She was pronounced quiet, self-composed, and ladylike; and indeed Sophy evinced none of that nervousness which she had shown upon the occasion of the bishop's visit. To him she felt she owed all; to these people nothing. So, although perfectly polite and courteous, she was yet composed and tranquil; and some of the ladies who had called, quite prepared to be very patronizing and kind, found any such line of conduct completely out of the question. There was a quiet dignity and self possession about her which became her much. She was the well-bred hostess receiving her grandfather's guests, and few girls enacting such a part for the first time could have played it so well.
For three or four months after the bishop's visit had given the signal for society to admit Sophy Needham within its circle, the intercourse was restricted to morning calls of an extremely formal nature, which seemed by no means likely to bring about the result, to obtain which Mr. Harmer had emerged from his solitude; he made up his mind, therefore, to break the ice, which again seemed setting over the surface of the Canterbury society, by giving a series of picnics and open air fêtes. The first of these took place early in June, when I was away at school; but I heard full particulars of it upon my return. The whole of the inhabitants of Canterbury and the neighbourhood whose position rendered them eligible were invited, together with the officers of the garrison, a very necessary addition at Canterbury, where dancing young men are almost unknown. A large marquee was erected and boarded for dancing, a quadrille band brought down from London, and the military band engaged for the afternoon. Archery butts were set up, bowling-greens mowed and rolled, and coloured lamps placed in all the walks, to be illuminated after dusk. People met at between three and four, had a substantial tea at six, and a magnificent supper at eleven. Nothing, in short, which taste and an unlimited purse could do, was neglected, and the result was a splendid success. And yet early in the evening a difference had arisen which would have marred the pleasure of the whole scene had it not been for the firmness of Mr. Harmer. It seemed that soon after nine o'clock when it began to get dusk, some of the ladies of the precincts had objected strongly to the coloured lamps which had just been lighted, and which began to sparkle in the trees and grass by the side of the various walks. Not in themselves, for they allowed the effect to be very pretty; but as offering inducements and pretexts for isolated couples to stroll away, and get entirely beyond maternal supervision. Two of the ladies waited upon Mr. Harmer as a sort of deputation from the others, and it happened that one of them was the chief of the party who had opposed Sophy Needham's introduction into society, but who had at last come to the conclusion that, as others were going, it would be showing a want of Christian feeling to refuse to do as others did. These ladies recited to Mr. Harmer the objections they entertained, and concluded—
"The lighted walks will tempt the young people to stroll away and get quite out of our sight, and as all these thoughtless officers are sure to persuade them to walk there, it will lead to all sorts of silly nonsense and flirtation."
"My dear ladies," Mr. Harmer said, "as to the result I entirely agree with you, and as I, although I am an old fellow now, do like to see young people enjoying themselves, it is precisely for the very reason that you have alleged that I have had the garden lighted up."
There was nothing to reply to this, but one of the ladies said rather angrily—
"Of course, Mr. Harmer, you can do as you like, but we shall forbid our daughters to walk there."
"My dear madam," Mr. Harmer said, gently, "you can equally of course do as you please; but it appears to me, and it will appear to every one else, if you issue such an order, that you can have but a very poor opinion of, and very slight confidence in, the principles of your daughters. You show, in fact, that you cannot trust them to stroll for a few minutes, with gentlemen they have never met before, in well-lighted walks, where there will be dozens of other couples similarly enjoying themselves. Were I in your place, I should hesitate greatly before I laid such a serious imputation upon my children."
The deputation retired greatly crestfallen, and the result was that for that evening the young Canterbury girls were for the first time in their lives nearly emancipated from maternal supervision, and enjoyed the evening proportionately, flirting with a zest all the greater for its being an amusement indulged in for the first time, and making their mothers' hearts swell, and their mothers' hair figuratively stand on end at such unheard of goings on. Another consequence of the lighted walks was that many families of girls who had never hitherto been allowed to dance except in quadrilles, now found themselves allowed to waltz as they pleased. Not that their mothers' views of the extreme impropriety of such dances had undergone any change; but that of two evils they chose the least, and thought it better to have their daughters waltzing under their eyes, than that they should be wandering away altogether beyond their ken.
Why is it that mothers are so much stricter than fathers? It is certain that it is so, and upon this occasion, while the mothers were inwardly bewailing the conduct of their daughters, the fathers, although many of them clergymen, were looking on with beaming faces on the young people enjoying themselves so thoroughly; and more than one would have been delighted, could such a thing have been permitted, to have put his clerical dignity aside, and his clerical white neckcloth into his pocket, and to have joined heartily in the fun.
They did what they could to add to the general enjoyment, and several times some of them gathered into a little knot, with two or three of their wives, and sung some old glees—"Five times by the taper's light," "The winds whistle cold," and "The chough and crow;" and splendidly they sang them too. They had some famous voices among them, and I do not think I have ever heard those fine old glees better sung than I have heard them at Canterbury.
Sophy, of course, attracted much attention throughout the evening, and was constantly the centre of a little group of officers, not a few of whom would have been very willing to have turned their swords into ploughshares for her sake, and to have devoted their lives to the care of her and her possessions.
Sophy, however, by no means appeared to reciprocate