Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 683

Too much squareness about the brow, too decided a mouth and chin, and eyes – well, if they ever looked soft, as well as large and dark, I had not seen it. Then the complexion, it might do for some people, but Philip's wife ought to have more colouring and softness, more general loveliness than this. Philip's wife! She ought to be a child of light, 'beautiful with all the soul's expansion' – the expression of her face ever varying with the dainty colouring of her graceful poetic thoughts.

I was still picturing to myself the kind of woman Philip's wife ought to be, frowning the while at a dark discontented face, frowning discontentedly back at me, when the door was softly opened, and turning hastily round, my eyes fell upon a young girl standing upon the threshold.

'I beg your pardon; I do not think you heard me knock, and I could not wait. I am Lilian.'

How shall I describe Lilian Farrar? I have described her! A child of light, 'beautiful with all the soul's expansion' – the expression of her face ever varying with the dainty colouring of her graceful poetic thoughts. I need only add that she had deep-blue eyes, shaded by long lashes, straight, delicately chiselled little nose, sweet sensitive mouth, pale-brown hair, and the figure of a graceful child just merging into womanhood.

'May I come in, please?'

Might love and loveliness and youth and all that is true, and sweet, and good, come in? But I only bowed, and held out my hand with a smile.

'I am so sorry I did not know when to expect you, Miss Haddon.'

'I came earlier than I ought to have done.'

'O no; pray do not think that; only I should like to have been at the station to make friends at the beginning.'

'Let us call this the beginning.'

She drew nearer to me, and in a caressing child-like way, lifted up her mouth to be kissed, as she said: 'Welcome to Fairview.'

I am not considered to be demonstrative; but I know I kissed her as heartily as she kissed me, quite understanding that this was not like an ordinary first meeting. Then she gently impelled me towards a low chair, and knelt down beside me.

'If you could only know how very anxious I have been, and how relieved I am.'

'Relieved?' I asked, bending down to get a better view of the sweet face.

'Yes; indeed I am.'

'Then you can in a measure understand my sensations,' I replied, smiling down into her eyes.

'O yes; but you could go if you did not like us, you know.'

'And you could dismiss me if you did not like me.'

'I did not think of that; I was only afraid – companion means so much, does it not? – how hard it would be for me if I cared for you, and you only cared to be here because' —

'Of the salary I received?'

'Oh, pray do not think that I meant that. – May I say exactly what I was thinking of, Miss Haddon?'

'Pray do.'

'Then I meant that it would be bad for me if you looked down upon the Farrars, if you were ever so nice, or even if you looked down upon the Tippers. I have just seen papa, and he says you belong to great people. That rather frightened me, until I saw dear old auntie, and found that she only knew you were nice; when I began to hope.'

'I shall soon set your mind at ease about all that,' I cheerfully replied. 'Meantime, believe this much – I have begun to look up to Mrs Tipper.'

'What a nice kind thing to say, Miss Haddon.'

'What a pleasant thing to feel, Miss Farrar.'

She made a little moue at the 'Miss Farrar,' and I went on: 'You are very young, are you not? – younger than I expected to find you.' I was going to add for an engaged young lady, but thought it better to let the allusion to her engagement come first from her.

'Only just turned seventeen,' she replied with a little sigh.

'Is that so very depressing?'

'Dear Miss Haddon, if I may tell you about myself, we shall feel more at home with each other?'

'Tell me anything you please, my dear; and try to believe this much – you may trust me.'

'I believed that, the very first moment I looked at you. Yours is a face to trust.'

'Is it – is it?' I murmured, smoothing the hair back from her white brow. 'That is indeed something to be thankful for. And now I can ask with a clear conscience, why it is a trouble to be only seventeen?'

'Because – dear Miss Haddon, I am engaged; and Arthur – that is his name, you know – does not like waiting until I am older, to be married. Papa says he must wait at least a year, and Arthur does not like it. Of course I should prefer waiting. I am sure we could not possibly be happier than we are now, and I should not like leaving papa – I will not, until he is quite well again – but I do not like Arthur to be disappointed either.'

'Mr Farrar told me of the engagement.'

'But I do not think that papa told you of one thing which is the very best of all. Arthur first met me at a garden-party, given by one of our neighbours, just after I came home for good; and he had not the least idea that papa was rich when he began to care for me. He liked me for myself – only for myself!' with a grave little nod at me. 'He was quite surprised when he found that I am an heiress. Do you know, he often says that he should prefer having to work for me; only, of course, that need not be.'

I read her thought, and my heart went out to Lilian Farrar, as I smilingly replied: 'He gives one that impression.'

'Do you know him?' she inquired, looking a great deal surprised.

'Enough for that, I think. Mr Wentworth, is he not?'

'Mr Wentworth!' she ejaculated. 'What made you think that? No; but Arthur is an intimate friend of Mr Wentworth's.'

I saw that I had made a mistake. But I was so much impressed in Mr Wentworth's favour, that the fact of his being an intimate friend of her lover's seemed a sufficient guarantee of the latter's claims to respect.

'They were at Eton and Oxford together, and Arthur likes him very much,' she continued, as though she, on her side, considered that was saying a great deal in Mr Wentworth's favour.

'A barrister, is he not?'

'Yes; but he has not been very successful as yet, though he works very hard – writes for newspapers and magazines; and I am sure it is very good of him, for Arthur says he was brought up in the greatest luxury by a rich uncle, and always led to believe that he would be the old man's heir. But just as he was leaving Oxford, his uncle married a young girl, and when he had children of his own, he quite discarded his nephew. But he is like Arthur, and does not care about the money; he is a great deal more troubled about having lost the old man's good-will. Arthur says that he lives in an old tumble-down house – which is all he possesses of his own – with one servant, in the poorest way, and very rarely visits anywhere but here. Even here he does not come half often enough to please us, we all like him so much. Strange that both Arthur and he should commence life with large expectations, and both find themselves penniless; is it not? Mr Trafford was unfortunate in some speculations, I believe; and the estates had to be sold after his death.'

I said something to the effect that it was fortunate that they were equal to the position. Later, I found that her lover's father had squandered his property in the worst kind of extravagance.

A gong was being sounded, and she rose, putting her hand under my arm. 'You must be wanting luncheon, Miss Haddon. Auntie said that she could not prevail upon you to take any refreshment.'

I was beginning to feel hungry, and acknowledged that I was. As she went down, she explained that her father had of late taken to invalid habits, and did not join them at table. We found only Mrs Tipper in the dining-room; a large, lofty room, furnished with the same heavy grandeur of style which had struck me in the other parts of the house. But a change had come over Mrs Tipper since I had left her. Her genial good-nature was veiled by the same stiffness and constraint which had jarred upon me at first, as she politely trusted I should find something I could eat, regretted not having known that I should arrive early, so that she might have given orders accordingly; and so forth.

'The Haddons of Haddon!' I thought. She had seen her brother, and been awed by them. But I really could not allow them to come between this dear old lady and me, and therefore replied, I had been accustomed to live so plainly that this was quite a banquet to me; as indeed it was. I saw that I lost ground a little with the man-servant in attendance by my candour; but I could afford to wait for his better appreciation. Mrs Tipper hesitated a moment, when she reached the head of the table, and signified by a gesture her wish for me to take my seat there; in fact, I know now, as I guessed then, that she was only too glad to slip out of taking any prominent position in the household. But I very decidedly shook my head, and passed down, replying to her little protest, that it was not to be thought of – it would not be right. I saw that she understood me to mean that it would not be etiquette, and sat down contented. Could the dear little lady have known it, my ignorance of the ways of the fashionable world was greater than her own. To my amusement, Mrs Tipper's superiors in such knowledge have succumbed to the magic words, 'It would not be right,' with which, knowing no other code, I have occasionally ventured to settle a question. With certain people, 'It is not right,' solely means 'It is not etiquette,' than to sin against which there is no greater wrong; and they have yielded, because they have supposed me better acquainted with the newest mode, rather than imagine that I could have the audacity to attempt innovations of my own.

I soon succeeded in making matters pleasant with Mrs Tipper again. In five minutes the Haddons of Haddon were forgotten, and we were getting through luncheon in friendly agreeable fashion. There was a slight obtuseness on Richard's side when I required anything; but he found that his forgetfulness did not in the slightest degree disturb me, nor prevent my obtaining what I wanted. I quietly waited; and as he could not let me repeat a request more than once without drawing the attention of the others to his negligence, he came at length to understand that it was just as well to do a thing at once as to be quietly forced to do it. The attention of both Lilian and her aunt was too much concentrated upon me for them to notice the man's remissness, and I did my best to prevent them seeing it. I knew that Lilian's eyes were turned upon me more than once when I was supposed to be unobservant, and thought of her words, 'Companion means so much,' with all the more respect for her judgment, whatever it might prove to be.

That we two should be friends, I knew. I should love her, and I believed that she might come to love me. But would ours be as the companionship of two of the same age? Should I ever be able to lay bare my inmost self, living so intensely and so differently to the Mary Haddon most people knew, to this young girl? She had spoken of her love to me; should I be able to speak of mine to her – the love which was deeper and stronger than a girl's love? It was with something akin to pain that I told myself no. Because it was not the love of a girl; because it was in its heights higher and in its depths deeper; because it was in its strength and weakness so much more human at eight-and-twenty than at seventeen, I could not talk about it to Lilian Farrar. The shadowy poetic sentiment which clings about a young girl's dream, the love which is more in love with love than with the lover, was not mine. I am an old woman now, writing a story for men and women, and therefore I will add that I have still quite as much romance and enthusiasm in my composition as I had at seventeen, which is an admission to make in these days; but at eight-and-twenty I persuaded myself that they were or ought to be dead. In truth, my eight-and-twenty years were pressing upon me rather too heavily for mental health. I could not take kindly to the idea that youth was gone, or recognise that the best of me was not necessarily gone with it. But there is no need for me to analyse and dwell upon my weaknesses here; they will be apparent enough as I go on, and will doubtless preach their own moral without my assistance.

After luncheon, we returned to the pretty morning-room where I had first seen Mrs Tipper, and devoted the afternoon to making better acquaintance with each other. I began by telling my own little story (so far as it could be told, with Philip left out) about my dear mother's long illness, the struggles I had had to obtain a living when alone, and so forth, because I wished to appear in my true colours to these two, and above all, wished to get rid of the Haddons-of-Haddon tone in our future intercourse. Then dear old Mrs Tipper came out grandly with her little story respecting past ups and downs; not even omitting the fact that her deceased husband had been messenger (between ourselves, porter, my dear) in the firm where her brother rose to be chief, and how he had been pensioned by 'dear Jacob,' and ended his days in peace and comfort in a cottage of his own at Holloway, all the grandest visions of his youth realised.

Afterwards, Lilian told how her father had risen in life entirely by his own efforts; whilst her colour deepened with an equally right pride as she added that her mother had been a gentlewoman, to whose foresight her child owed the education that was something better than any her father's money alone could have purchased. As Mrs Tipper had informed me, it had been Mrs Farrar's dying wish that the first fifteen years of her child's life should be spent with an old friend and distant connection of her own. She had not erred in her judgment. Notwithstanding her naturally good disposition, Lilian would have suffered from the disadvantages consequent upon being brought up in luxury, the petted heiress of a wealthy man, instead of spending her early years at a country vicarage in wholesome study and exercise. I could understand now how it happened that Mr Farrar's daughter was so refined and different from what might have been expected. I knew now why it gratified her so much to believe that her lover had not sought her for her money's sake. Any one but herself would have thought it natural enough that she should be sought for her own sake. How true, and good, and sweet she was, and how soon one knew it; there being no mysterious complications in her nature which it would take time to discover.

'To think of our having so dreaded the lady-companion, auntie; and to think of my having pleaded so much with papa against engaging one!' ejaculated Lilian, when, after a very pleasant afternoon, we rose to go to our rooms and dress for dinner.

'We did dread her, did we not, dear?' smilingly returned the old lady, putting her hand upon mine; 'though I had the most cause for dread.'

'Indeed you had not – your cause is mine,' very decidedly said Lilian.

That they could say so much before me was sufficient, had I not already arrived at the agreeable conclusion that I had found a home until Philip's return.

AUSTRIAN ARCTIC DISCOVERY

At a time when the attention of this country is again being specially directed to the question of Arctic exploration, it becomes interesting to take note of what other nations have recently achieved in the region of Polar discovery. It is not too much to say that it is with justice that England considers herself in the van as yet of Arctic enterprise; but we have little hesitation in affirming that the expedition the story of which is told in the two volumes under notice,1 is worthy of ranking side by side with the most memorable of our own voyages of discovery; and when it is considered that the attention of Austria has but very recently been turned to the subject of Arctic exploration, the amount of success achieved by that nation is all the more creditable.

It deserves to be stated that the expedition of the Tegetthoff was partly due to the munificence of a private individual, the Count Wilczek, who contributed the sum of forty thousand florins towards its equipment, besides encouraging the enterprise by every means in his power. The Tegetthoff was a screw-steamer of two hundred and twenty tons burden, built expressly for this expedition, with engines of one hundred horse-power, and fitted out for a voyage of two-and-a-half years' duration. Her commander was Captain Weyprecht, and with him was associated, as colleague and as director of the land operations, the writer of these volumes, Lieutenant Payer. The crew, officers and men included, numbered only twenty-four. The ideal object of the voyage was the north-east passage; its direct and expressed aim, the exploration of the seas and lands lying to the north-east of Novaya Zemlya. Where the ship was to winter was not definitely fixed; and a return home by way of Behring's Strait was, though improbable, a possibility.

The Tegetthoff left Bremerhaven on June 13, 1872, and Tromsoe a month later. Immediately previous to the voyage of the Tegetthoff, a preliminary voyage of reconnaissance had been made in a small coasting-ship by Count Wilczek, who had found the sea between Spitzbergen and Novaya Zemlya almost entirely open and free from ice. It was hoped, therefore, that the water would be in the same condition when the Tegetthoff crossed it, and that where a small sailing-vessel had gone so far, a fully equipped steam-ship might penetrate almost indefinitely. But to the latter vessel the Spitzbergen seas presented a wholly dissimilar aspect. The ice was first encountered in seventy-four degrees – much farther south than was expected; and from that time it never entirely left the vessel.

Off Cape Nassau the expedition was overtaken by Count Wilczek, who had followed in the Isbjörn, the small sailing-ship in which the preliminary pioneering voyage had been made, with the object of placing a depot for the Tegetthoff on the north coast of Novaya Zemlya. Very shortly after the two vessels separated, the Tegetthoff was fairly beset and hemmed in by the ice in latitude 76° 22′ N., longitude 63° 3′ E. The good ship had made her first and her last voyage, for from that icy grip she was destined never to get free.

Long and desperate were the efforts made by officers and men to release the ship. Sawing the ice and blasting with powder, both above and below the surface, alike proved fruitless. Fissures that had been made with great toil, froze again as soon as made; and when the vessel tried to steam against the ice, it was unable so much as to set the floe in motion. The Tegetthoff was now entirely at the mercy of the terrible foe by which she was beset on all sides.

It might be supposed by such as are only imperfectly acquainted with the Arctic regions, that the ship thus firmly locked in the ice would be safe at least from immediate danger. But this was very far from being the case. For some time indeed, the ice by which she was encircled remained motionless, but this condition of things was not to last. The 13th of October – a Sunday – was a day ominous for the fate of the expedition. In the morning, the ice-floe burst across immediately beneath the ship. Officers and crew rushed on deck to behold the ice heaving around them on all sides. The aft-part of the vessel was already nipped and pressed; and the rudder, which was the first to meet the shock, trembled and groaned. The crew were unable to unship it by reason of its weight, and had to be satisfied with lashing it securely. All then leaped out upon the ice, and as quickly as possible got on board whatever articles had been left lying outside the ship. Next, the fissures in the floe were hastily bound together with ice-anchors and ropes, and filled up with snow, in the hope that they might freeze over, though it was felt that at any moment a sudden heave might undo the whole work.

During all this time meanwhile, the ice was tossing and trembling from its bases, while the air reverberated with the most awful sounds, as of shrieks and howls. Mountains lifted themselves suddenly above the level surface, and the low groan that rose from the depths grew into a deep rumble, and finally increased to a roar of fury with the volume of myriad voices. Uproar and confusion ruled supreme, and destruction seemed every moment drawing nearer the ship as the ice crashed against her. Now huge blocks reared fathoms high above the vessel, forcing themselves against her hull; now masses fell down beneath her, until they began to raise her above the level of the sea, the explorers being in readiness at any moment to abandon the ship, in the event of her being crushed. The pressure approached its height at about noon, at which time the vessel was straining and groaning in every plank and spar; but the crisis had now been reached, the pressure abated, the Tegetthoff righted herself, and all immediate danger at least, was past.

But the above terrible experience indicated to the explorers what they might at any time expect. Henceforward every noise in the ice was heard by them with apprehension and fear. It was worse than living within the continual influence of earthquakes. At night, officers and men always slept with their clothes on, ready to rush on deck whenever the ice was heard beginning to groan and heave; and this state of things continued for one hundred and thirty days, the whole of that period being one of almost constant darkness.

The first winter passed by the expedition in their icy prison was at best but a time of gloom, though all on board combined to render each other's lot as little wearisome as possible. The conduct of the crew throughout the enterprise was exemplary and praiseworthy; and it is pleasant to read of the kindly feeling and sympathy that prevailed between officers and men. Only by the maintenance of complete harmony and mutual consideration could an existence passed under the circumstances described in these volumes be rendered tolerable. The devices resorted to, to employ and pass the time, were various. Constant occupation on the part both of officers and men was found not only to be beneficial, but absolutely necessary to ward off ennui and depression. The duties connected with the daily routine of work were not sufficient; occupation had to be invented. The chief officers had their scientific observations to employ and interest them; but the resources of the men were fewer. At first the building of snow-houses was resorted to as a means of filling up the time. Then a school was begun, in which were passed many hours daily; besides which, there was seal-catching and bear-hunting. On an average, two bears were killed weekly, and roasted bear-flesh was relished by all; and the flesh of the seal, which was at first but little appreciated, was by-and-by found to be at least palatable.

It is well known that the getting-up and performance of theatricals have been found a source of great beneficial occupation and amusement during winters passed in the Arctic regions, where it is a matter of prime importance that the spirits of the men should be kept as even and jolly as possible. But there were several reasons why the crew of the Tegetthoff were compelled to forego such recreations. Their numerical strength was too small; the languages spoken on board were too diverse; for the crew was a very mixed one, including Germans, Italians, Hungarians, and Slavs, all orders, however, being issued in Italian; and the performance must have been given in four separate languages. There was no other place available for a theatre than the barricaded deck, where the spectators would have had to sit enduring a temperature of from twenty to thirty degrees of cold; and lastly, there was a general feeling that the situation of the party was a far too serious and critical one for such diversions to be so welcome as other Arctic expeditions have found them.

During the first winter the Tegetthoff drifted through the wandering ice for the most part in a north-easterly direction. When a little north of seventy-four degrees, she took a turn towards the west in February 1873. Her course was now a generally westward one, but with variations. In the spring and summer of 1873 every effort was of course again put forth to free her from the ice. All endeavour in this direction, however, still proved ineffectual, and the little party again prepared, though with very anxious and depressed hearts, to face a second winter. But through the long gloom of that second winter they were to be buoyed up by hope and expectation. In August the ship took a turn northward, when suddenly, 'as if by magic,' the mists lifted, and behold! a vast shape, high, bold, and rocky, loomed out of the fog on the vessel's bows. It was land beyond a doubt, new land; and fresh hope and life filled every breast at the sight. The whole aspect of things suddenly changed for the explorers. They had now something to look forward to through the long winter – namely, the exploration of that new land which they had discovered, or as it may be said, which had discovered them.