Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. IV, No. 19, Dec 1851

"Don't laugh," replied Maria, gravely; "papa is quite ill with vexation; imagine, in a small town like this, two doctors! it's all the fault of that advertisement. Some scheming young man has seen it, and finding no hope of practice elsewhere, has come here. I suppose he is as poor as a rat."

At this instant the sound of horses' footsteps was heard, and then three vans full of furniture appeared in sight. They were coming our way. We looked anxiously to see before which house they stopped. I must confess that what Maria said interested me in the young doctor, and I really hoped all this was for him. Maria said nothing, but, with a frown on her brow, she waited the progress of events. As I expected, the vans stopped before the young doctor's house, and in a few minutes the men began to unload. My friend turned pale as she saw that the vehicles were full of elegant furniture.

"The wretch has got a young wife, too," she exclaimed, as a piano and harp came to view, and then she added, rising, "this will never do; they must be put down at once; they are strangers in the neighborhood, we are well known. Sit down at that desk, my dear girl, and help me to make out a list of all the persons we can invite to a ball and evening party. I look upon them as impertinent interlopers, and they must be crushed."

I laughingly acquiesced, and aided by her, soon wrote out a list of invitations to be given.

"But now," said Miss Walker, after a few moments of deep reflection, "one name more must be added, they must be invited."

"Who?" exclaimed I, in a tone of genuine surprise.

"Mr. and Mrs. Edward Radstock," replied Maria, triumphantly, while I could scarcely speak from astonishment.

The rest of my narrative I collected from the lips of my friend, a little more than a year later.

The ball took place to the admiration of all C – . It was a splendid affair: a select band came down from London, in which two foreigners, with dreadfully un-euphonic names, played upon two unknown instruments, that deafened nearly every sensitive person in the room, and would have driven every body away, had not they been removed into the drawing-room balcony; then there was a noble Italian, reduced to a tenor-singer, who astonished the company, equally by the extraordinary number of strange songs that he sang, and the number of ices and jellies which he ate; then there were one or two literary men, who wrote anonymously, but might have been celebrated, only they scorned to put their names forward among the common herd, the οἱ πολλοί already known to the public; there was a young poet too, who thought Alfred Tennyson infinitely superior to Shakspeare, and by the air with which he read a poem, seemed to insinuate that he himself was greater than either; and then there was a funny gentleman, who could imitate Henry Russell, John Parry, Buckstone, or any body, only he had a cold and could not get beyond a negro recitation, which might have been Chinese poetry for all the company understood of it. In fact it was the greatest affair of the kind which C – had seen for many a long day. Mr. and Miss Radstock came, and were received with cold politeness by both father and daughter. The young man was good-looking, with an intelligent eye, a pleasing address, and none of that pertness of manner which usually belongs to those who have just thrown off the medical student to become the doctor. Miss Radstock, his sister, who kept house for him, until he found a wife, was a charming girl of about twenty. She smiled at the manner of both Mr. and Miss Walker, but said nothing. Young Radstock's only revenge for the lady of the house's coldness and stateliness of tone, was asking her to dance at the first opportunity, which certainly was vexatious, for his tone was so pleasing, his manner so courteous, that my friend Maria could not but feel pleased – when she wanted to be irate, distant, and haughty.

They danced together several times, and to the astonishment of many friends of the young lady, of myself in particular, they went down to supper the best friends in the world, laughing and joking like old acquaintances.

Next day, however, she resumed her original coldness of manner when the brother and sister called to pay their respects. She was simply polite, and no more, and after two or three words they retired, Emily Radstock becoming as stiff and formal as her new acquaintance. From that day Maria became very miserable. She was not avaricious, and did not fear her father losing his practice from any pecuniary motives, but it was pride that influenced her. Her father had for some years monopolized the parish, as his predecessor had for forty years before him; and now to behold a young unfledged physician setting up exactly opposite, and threatening to divide in time the business of the town, was dreadful. The physician of the town, sounded better, too, than one of the doctors, and altogether it was a most unpleasant affair.

Maria's place was now always the bow-window. She had no amusement but to watch the opposite house, to see if patients came, or if Edward Radstock made any attempt to call about and introduce himself. But for some time she had the satisfaction of remarking, that not a soul called at the house, save the butcher, the baker, and other contributors to the interior comforts of man, and Maria began to feel the hope that Edward Radstock would totally fail in his endeavors to introduce himself. She remarked, however, that the young man took it very quietly; he sat by his sister's side while she played the piano, or with a book and a cigar at the open window, or took Emily a drive in his gig; always, when he remarked Maria at the open window, bowing with provoking courtesy, nothing daunted by her coldness of manner, or her pretense of not noticing his politeness.

One day Mr. Walker was out, he had been called to a distance to see a patient, who was very seriously ill, when Maria sat at the bow-window looking up the street. Suddenly she saw a boy come running down on their side of the way; she knew him by his bright buttons, light jacket, and gold lace. It was the page of the Perkinses, a family with a host of little children, who, from constant colds, indigestions, and fits of illness, caused by too great a liking for the pleasures of the table, which a fond mother had not the heart to restrain, were continually on Mr. Walker's books.

The boy rang violently at the bell, and Maria opened the parlor-door and listened.

"Is Mr. Walker at home?" said the boy, scarcely able to speak from want of breath.

"No," replied the maid who had opened the door.

"He will be home directly," said Maria, advancing.

"Oh! but missus can't wait, there's little Peter been and swallowed a marble, and the baby's took with fits," and away rushed the boy across the road to the hated rival's house.

Maria retreated into her room and sank down upon a sofa. The enemy had gained an entrance into the camp, it was quite clear. In a moment more she rose, just in time to see Mr. Edward Radstock hurrying down the street beside the little page, without waiting to order his gig. This was a severe blow to the doctor's daughter. The Perkinses were a leading family in the town, and one to whom her father was called almost every day in the year. They had a large circle of acquaintances, and if young Radstock became their medical adviser, others would surely follow. In about an hour, the young man returned and joined his sister in the drawing-room, as if nothing had happened. This was more provoking than his success. If he had assumed an air of importance and bustle, and had hurried up to inform his sister with an air of joy and triumph of what had happened, she might have been tempted to pity him, but he did every thing in such a quiet, gentlemanly way, that she felt considerable alarm for the future.

Maria was in the habit of spending most of her evenings from home, her father being generally out, and that large house in consequence lonely. The town of C – was famous for its tea and whist-parties, and though Maria was not of an age to play cards, except to please others, she, however, sometimes condescended to do so. One evening she was invited to the house of a Mrs. Brunton, who announced her intention of receiving company every Thursday. She went, and found the circle very pleasant and agreeable, but, horror of horrors – there was Mr. Edward Radstock and his sister Emily; and worse than that, when a lady present volunteered to play a quadrille, and the ladies accepted eagerly, up he came, of all others, to invite her to dance! Mrs. Brunton the instant before had asked her to play at whist, to oblige three regular players, who could not find a fourth.

"I am afraid," she said, quietly, but in rather distant tones, "I am engaged" – the young man looked surprised, even hurt, for no gentleman had spoken to her since she had entered the room – "to make a fourth at the whist-table, but – "

"Oh, go and dance, Miss Walker," exclaimed Mrs. Brunton, "I did not know dancing was going to begin, when I asked you to make up a rubber."

Maria offered her hand to the young man, and walked away to the dancing-room. Despite herself, that evening she was very much pleased with him. He was well informed, had traveled, was full of taste and feeling, and conversed with animation and originality; he sought every opportunity of addressing himself to her, and found these opportunities without much difficulty. For several Thursdays the same thing occurred. The young man began to find a little practice. He was popular wherever he went, and whenever he was called in was quite sure of keeping up the connection. He was asked out to all the principal parties in the town; and had Mr. Walker been not very much liked, would have proved a very serious rival.

One morning the father and daughter were at breakfast. Maria, who began to like her bow-window better than ever, sat near it to scent the fragrance of her flowers. When the young doctor came out, she always now returned his bow, and a young lady opposite declared in confidence to her dressmaker that she had even kissed her hand to him once. However this may be, Maria sat at the bow-window, pouring out tea for her father in a very abstracted mood. Mr. Walker had been called out at an early hour, and returned late. He was not in the best of humors, having waited four hours beyond his time for his tea.

"I shall die in the workhouse," said he, as he buttered his toast with an irritability of manner quite alarming. "This Radstock is getting all the practice. I heard of two new patients yesterday."

"Oh, papa," replied Maria, gently. "I don't think he has got a dozen altogether."

"A dozen – but that's a dozen lost to me, miss. It's a proof that people think me old – worn out – useless."

"Nonsense, papa; C – is increasing in population every day, and for every one he gets, you get two."

"My dear," replied Mr. Walker, with considerable animation, "I think you are beginning to side with my rival."

A loud knocking came this instant to the door, and the man-servant immediately after announced "Dr. Radstock."

Mr. Walker had no time to make any remark, ere the young man entered the room, bowing most politely to the old gentleman and his daughter; both looked confused, and the father much surprised. He was in elegant morning costume, and looked both handsome and happy – the old doctor thought, triumphant.

"Pardon me, sir," said he, "for disturbing you at this early hour; but your numerous calls take you so much out, that one must take you when one can find you. My errand will doubtless surprise you, but I am very frank and open; my object in visiting you is to ask permission to pay my addresses to your daughter."

"To do what, sir?" thundered the old doctor in a towering passion. "Are you not satisfied with trying to take from me my practice, but you must ask me for my child? I tell you, sir, nothing on earth would make me consent to your marriage with my daughter."

"But, sir," said Edward Radstock, turning to Maria, "I have your daughter's permission to make this request. I told her of my intentions last night, and she authorized me to say that she approved of them."

"Maria," exclaimed the father, almost choking with rage, "is this true?"

"My dear papa, I am in no hurry to get married, but if I did, I must say, that I should never think of marrying any one but Edward Radstock. I will not get married against your will, but I will never marry any one else; nothing will make me."

"Ungrateful girl," muttered Mr. Thomas Walker, and next minute he sank back in his chair in a fit of apoplexy.

"Open the window, raise the blinds," said the young man, preparing with promptitude and earnestness to take the necessary remedies, "be not alarmed. It is not a dangerous attack."

Maria quietly obeyed her lover, quite aware of the necessity of self-possession and presence of mind in a case like the present. In half an hour Mr. Walker was lying in a large, airy bedroom, and the young man had left, at the request of Maria, to attend a patient of her father's. It was late at night before Edward was able to take a moment's rest. What with his own patients, and those of his rival, he was overwhelmed with business; but at eleven o'clock he approached the bedside of the father of Maria, who, with her dear Emily now by her side, sat watching.

"He sleeps soundly," said Maria in a low tone, as Edward entered.

"Yes, and is doing well," replied Radstock. "I answer for his being up and stirring to-morrow, if he desires it."

"But it will be better for him to rest some days," said Maria.

"But, my dear Miss Walker," continued the young doctor, "what will his patients do?"

"You can attend to them as you have done to-day," replied Maria.

"My dear Miss Walker, you, who know me, could trust me with your father's patients; you know, that when he was able to go about, I would hand them all back to him without hesitation. But you must be aware, that for your father to discover me attending to his patients, would retard his recovery. If I do as you ask me, I must retire from C – immediately on his convalescence."

"No, sir," said Dr. Walker, in a faint voice, "I shall not be about for a month; after making me take to my bed, the least you can do is to attend to my patients."

"If you wish it, sir – ?"

"I insist upon it; and to prevent any opposition, you can say we are going into partnership."

"But – " said Edward.

"If you want my daughter," continued Dr. Walker, gruffly, "you must do as I tell you. If you wish to be my son-in-law, you must be my partner, work like a horse, slave day and night, while I smoke my pipe and drink my grog."

"My dear sir," exclaimed the young man, "you overwhelm me."

"Dear papa!" said Maria.

"Yes, dear papa!" muttered old Walker; "pretty girl you are; give a party to crush the interloper; faint when he gets his first patient; watch him from your bow-window like a cat watches a mouse, and then – marry him."

"But, my dear papa, is not this the surest way to destroy the opposition?" said happy Maria.

"Yes! because we can not crush him, we take him as a partner," grumbled old Walker; "never heard of such a thing; nice thing it is to have children who take part with your enemies."

Nobody made any reply, and after a little more faint attempts at fault-finding, the old doctor fell asleep.

About six months later, after a journey to Scotland, which made me lose sight of Maria, I drove up the streets of C – , after my return to my native Greenwich, which, with its beautiful park, its Blackheath, its splendid and glorious monument of English greatness, its historic associations, I dearly love, and eager to see the dear girl, never stopped until I was in her arms.

"How you have grown," said she, with a sweet and happy smile.

"Grown! indeed; do you take me for a child?" cried I, laughing. "And you! how well and pleased you look; always at the bow-window, too; I saw you as I came up."

"I am very seldom there now," said she, with a strange smile.

"Why?"

"Because I live over the way," replied she, still smiling.

"Over the way?" said I.

"Yes, my dear girl; alas! for the mutability of human things – Maria Walker is now Mrs. Radstock."

I could not help it; I laughed heartily. I was very glad. I had been interested in the young man, and the dénoûement was delightful.

The firm of Walker and Radstock prospered remarkably without rivalry, despite a great increase in the neighborhood; but the experience of the old man, and the perseverance of the young, frightened away all opposition. They proved satisfactorily that union is indeed strength. Young Radstock was a very good husband. He told me privately that he had fallen in love with Maria the very first day he saw her; and every time I hear from them I am told of a fresh accession to the number of faces that stare across for grandpapa, who generally, when about to pay them a visit, shows himself first at the Bow-window.

THE FRENCH FLOWER GIRL

I was lingering listlessly over a cup of coffee on the Boulevard des Italiens, in June. At that moment I had neither profound nor useful resources of thought. I sate simply conscious of the cool air, the blue sky, the white houses, the lights, and the lions, which combine to render that universally pleasant period known as "after dinner," so peculiarly agreeable in Paris.

In this mood my eyes fell upon a pair of orbs fixed intently upon me. Whether the process was effected by the eyes, or by some pretty little fingers, simply, I can not say; but, at the same moment, a rose was insinuated into my button-hole, a gentle voice addressed me, and I beheld, in connection with the eyes, the fingers, and the voice, a girl. She carried on her arm a basket of flowers, and was, literally, nothing more nor less than one of the Bouquetières who fly along the Boulevards like butterflies, with the difference that they turn their favorite flowers to a more practical account.

Following the example of some other distracted décorés, who I found were sharing my honors, I placed a piece of money – I believe, in my case, it was silver – in the hand of the girl; and, receiving about five hundred times its value, in the shape of a smile and a "Merci bien, monsieur!" was again left alone – ("desolate," a Frenchman would have said) – in the crowded and carousing Boulevard.

To meet a perambulating and persuasive Bouquetière, who places a flower in your coat and waits for a pecuniary acknowledgment, is scarcely a rare adventure in Paris; but I was interested – unaccountably so – in this young girl: her whole manner and bearing was so different and distinct from all others of her calling. Without any of that appearance which, in England, we are accustomed to call "theatrical," she was such a being as we can scarcely believe in out of a ballet. Not, however, that her attire departed – except, perhaps, in a certain coquetish simplicity – from the conventional mode: its only decorations seemed to be ribbons, which also gave a character to the little cap that perched itself with such apparent insecurity upon her head. Living a life that seemed one long summer's day – one floral fête– with a means of existence that seemed so frail and immaterial – she conveyed an impression of unreality. She might be likened to a Nymph, or a Naiad, but for the certain something that brought you back to the theatre, intoxicating the senses, at once, with the strange, indescribable fascinations of hot chandeliers – close and perfumed air – foot-lights, and fiddlers.

Evening after evening I saw the same girl – generally at the same place – and, it may be readily imagined, became one of the most constant of her clientelle. I learned, too, as many facts relating to her as could be learned where most was mystery. Her peculiar and persuasive mode of disposing of her flowers (a mode which has since become worse than vulgarized by bad imitators) was originally her own graceful instinct – or whim, if you will. It was something new and natural, and amused many, while it displeased none. The sternest of stockbrokers, even, could not choose but be decorated. Accordingly, this new Nydia of Thessaly went out with her basket one day, awoke next morning, and found herself famous.

Meantime there was much discussion, and more mystification, as to who this Queen of Flowers could be – where she lived – and so forth. Nothing was known of her except her name – Hermance. More than one adventurous student – you may guess I am stating the number within bounds – traced her steps for hour after hour, till night set in – in vain. Her flowers disposed of, she was generally joined by an old man, respectably clad, whose arm she took with a certain confidence, that sufficiently marked him as a parent or protector; and the two always contrived sooner or later, in some mysterious manner, to disappear.

After all stratagems have failed, it generally occurs to people to ask a direct question. But this in the present case was impossible. Hermance was never seen except in very public places – often in crowds – and to exchange twenty consecutive words with her, was considered a most fortunate feat. Notwithstanding, too, her strange, wild way of gaining her livelihood, there was a certain dignity in her manner which sufficed to cool the too curious.

As for the directors of the theatres, they exhibited a most appropriate amount of madness on her account; and I believe that at several of the theatres, Hermance might have commanded her own terms. But only one of these miserable men succeeded in making a tangible proposal, and he was treated with most glorious contempt. There was, indeed, something doubly dramatic in the Bouquetière's disdain of the drama. She who lived a romance could never descend to act one. She would rather be Rosalind than Rachel. She refused the part of Cerito, and chose to be an Alma on her own account.

It may be supposed that where there was so much mystery, imagination would not be idle. To have believed all the conflicting stories about Hermance, would be to come to the conclusion that she was the stolen child of noble parents, brought up by an ouvrier: but that somehow her father was a tailor of dissolute habits, who lived a contented life of continual drunkenness, on the profits of his daughter's industry; – that her mother was a deceased duchess – but, on the other hand, was alive, and carried on the flourishing business of a blanchisseuse. As for the private life of the young lady herself, it was reflected in such a magic mirror of such contradictory impossibilities, in the delicate discussions held upon the subject, that one had no choice but to disbelieve every thing.

One day a new impulse was given to this gossip by the appearance of the Bouquetière in a startling hat of some expensive straw, and of a make bordering on the ostentatious. It could not be doubted that the profits of her light labors were sufficient to enable her to multiply such finery to almost any extent, had she chosen; but in Paris the adoption of a bonnet or a hat, in contradistinction to the little cap of the grisette, is considered an assumption of a superior grade, and unless warranted by the "position" of the wearer, is resented as an impertinence. In Paris, indeed, there are only two classes of women – those with bonnets, and those without; and these stand in the same relation to one another, as the two great classes into which the world may be divided – the powers that be, and the powers that want to be. Under these circumstances, it may be supposed that the surmises were many and marvelous. The little Bouquetière was becoming proud – becoming a lady; – but how? why? and above all – where? Curiosity was never more rampant, and scandal never more inventive.

For my part, I saw nothing in any of these appearances worthy, in themselves, of a second thought; nothing could have destroyed the strong and strange interest which I had taken in the girl; and it would have required something more potent than a straw hat – however coquettish in crown, and audacious in brim – to have shaken my belief in her truth and goodness. Her presence, for the accustomed few minutes, in the afternoon or evening, became to me – I will not say a necessity, but certainly a habit; – and a habit is sufficiently despotic when