Mansfield Park
flat business, she was sure. In comparison with his brother, Edmund
would have nothing to say. The soup would be sent round in a most
spiritless manner, wine drank without any smiles or agreeable trifling,
and the venison cut up without supplying one pleasant anecdote of any
former haunch, or a single entertaining story, about “my friend such a
one.” She must try to find amusement in what was passing at the upper
end of the table, and in observing Mr. Rushworth, who was now making
his appearance at Mansfield for the first time since the Crawfords’
arrival. He had been visiting a friend in the neighbouring county, and
that friend having recently had his grounds laid out by an improver,
Mr. Rushworth was returned with his head full of the subject, and very
eager to be improving his own place in the same way; and though not
saying much to the purpose, could talk of nothing else. The subject had
been already handled in the drawing-room; it was revived in the
dining-parlour. Miss Bertram’s attention and opinion was evidently his
chief aim; and though her deportment showed rather conscious
superiority than any solicitude to oblige him, the mention of Sotherton
Court, and the ideas attached to it, gave her a feeling of complacency,
which prevented her from being very ungracious.
“I wish you could see Compton,” said he; “it is the most complete
thing! I never saw a place so altered in my life. I told Smith I did
not know where I was. The approach _now_, is one of the finest things
in the country: you see the house in the most surprising manner. I
declare, when I got back to Sotherton yesterday, it looked like a
prison—quite a dismal old prison.”
“Oh, for shame!” cried Mrs. Norris. “A prison indeed? Sotherton Court
is the noblest old place in the world.”
“It wants improvement, ma’am, beyond anything. I never saw a place that
wanted so much improvement in my life; and it is so forlorn that I do
not know what can be done with it.”
“No wonder that Mr. Rushworth should think so at present,” said Mrs.
Grant to Mrs. Norris, with a smile; “but depend upon it, Sotherton will
have _every_ improvement in time which his heart can desire.”
“I must try to do something with it,” said Mr. Rushworth, “but I do not
know what. I hope I shall have some good friend to help me.”
“Your best friend upon such an occasion,” said Miss Bertram calmly,
“would be Mr. Repton, I imagine.”
“That is what I was thinking of. As he has done so well by Smith, I
think I had better have him at once. His terms are five guineas a day.”
“Well, and if they were _ten_,” cried Mrs. Norris, “I am sure _you_
need not regard it. The expense need not be any impediment. If I were
you, I should not think of the expense. I would have everything done in
the best style, and made as nice as possible. Such a place as Sotherton
Court deserves everything that taste and money can do. You have space
to work upon there, and grounds that will well reward you. For my own
part, if I had anything within the fiftieth part of the size of
Sotherton, I should be always planting and improving, for naturally I
am excessively fond of it. It would be too ridiculous for me to attempt
anything where I am now, with my little half acre. It would be quite a
burlesque. But if I had more room, I should take a prodigious delight
in improving and planting. We did a vast deal in that way at the
Parsonage: we made it quite a different place from what it was when we
first had it. You young ones do not remember much about it, perhaps;
but if dear Sir Thomas were here, he could tell you what improvements
we made: and a great deal more would have been done, but for poor Mr.
Norris’s sad state of health. He could hardly ever get out, poor man,
to enjoy anything, and _that_ disheartened me from doing several things
that Sir Thomas and I used to talk of. If it had not been for _that_,
we should have carried on the garden wall, and made the plantation to
shut out the churchyard, just as Dr. Grant has done. We were always
doing something as it was. It was only the spring twelvemonth before
Mr. Norris’s death that we put in the apricot against the stable wall,
which is now grown such a noble tree, and getting to such perfection,
sir,” addressing herself then to Dr. Grant.
“The tree thrives well, beyond a doubt, madam,” replied Dr. Grant. “The
soil is good; and I never pass it without regretting that the fruit
should be so little worth the trouble of gathering.”
“Sir, it is a Moor Park, we bought it as a Moor Park, and it cost
us—that is, it was a present from Sir Thomas, but I saw the bill—and I
know it cost seven shillings, and was charged as a Moor Park.”
“You were imposed on, ma’am,” replied Dr. Grant: “these potatoes have
as much the flavour of a Moor Park apricot as the fruit from that tree.
It is an insipid fruit at the best; but a good apricot is eatable,
which none from my garden are.”
“The truth is, ma’am,” said Mrs. Grant, pretending to whisper across
the table to Mrs. Norris, “that Dr. Grant hardly knows what the natural
taste of our apricot is: he is scarcely ever indulged with one, for it
is so valuable a fruit; with a little assistance, and ours is such a
remarkably large, fair sort, that what with early tarts and preserves,
my cook contrives to get them all.”
Mrs. Norris, who had begun to redden, was appeased; and, for a little
while, other subjects took place of the improvements of Sotherton. Dr.
Grant and Mrs. Norris were seldom good friends; their acquaintance had
begun in dilapidations, and their habits were totally dissimilar.
After a short interruption Mr. Rushworth began again. “Smith’s place is
the admiration of all the country; and it was a mere nothing before
Repton took it in hand. I think I shall have Repton.”
“Mr. Rushworth,” said Lady Bertram, “if I were you, I would have a very
pretty shrubbery. One likes to get out into a shrubbery in fine
weather.”
Mr. Rushworth was eager to assure her ladyship of his acquiescence, and
tried to make out something complimentary; but, between his submission
to _her_ taste, and his having always intended the same himself, with
the superadded objects of professing attention to the comfort of ladies
in general, and of insinuating that there was one only whom he was
anxious to please, he grew puzzled, and Edmund was glad to put an end
to his speech by a proposal of wine. Mr. Rushworth, however, though not
usually a great talker, had still more to say on the subject next his
heart. “Smith has not much above a hundred acres altogether in his
grounds, which is little enough, and makes it more surprising that the
place can have been so improved. Now, at Sotherton we have a good seven
hundred, without reckoning the water meadows; so that I think, if so
much could be done at Compton, we need not despair. There have been two
or three fine old trees cut down, that grew too near the house, and it
opens the prospect amazingly, which makes me think that Repton, or
anybody of that sort, would certainly have the avenue at Sotherton
down: the avenue that leads from the west front to the top of the hill,
you know,” turning to Miss Bertram particularly as he spoke. But Miss
Bertram thought it most becoming to reply—
“The avenue! Oh! I do not recollect it. I really know very little of
Sotherton.”
Fanny, who was sitting on the other side of Edmund, exactly opposite
Miss Crawford, and who had been attentively listening, now looked at
him, and said in a low voice—
“Cut down an avenue! What a pity! Does it not make you think of Cowper?
‘Ye fallen avenues, once more I mourn your fate unmerited.’”
He smiled as he answered, “I am afraid the avenue stands a bad chance,
Fanny.”
“I should like to see Sotherton before it is cut down, to see the place
as it is now, in its old state; but I do not suppose I shall.”
“Have you never been there? No, you never can; and, unluckily, it is
out of distance for a ride. I wish we could contrive it.”
“Oh! it does not signify. Whenever I do see it, you will tell me how it
has been altered.”
“I collect,” said Miss Crawford, “that Sotherton is an old place, and a
place of some grandeur. In any particular style of building?”
“The house was built in Elizabeth’s time, and is a large, regular,
brick building; heavy, but respectable looking, and has many good
rooms. It is ill placed. It stands in one of the lowest spots of the
park; in that respect, unfavourable for improvement. But the woods are
fine, and there is a stream, which, I dare say, might be made a good
deal of. Mr. Rushworth is quite right, I think, in meaning to give it a
modern dress, and I have no doubt that it will be all done extremely
well.”
Miss Crawford listened with submission, and said to herself, “He is a
well-bred man; he makes the best of it.”
“I do not wish to influence Mr. Rushworth,” he continued; “but, had I a
place to new fashion, I should not put myself into the hands of an
improver. I would rather have an inferior degree of beauty, of my own
choice, and acquired progressively. I would rather abide by my own
blunders than by his.”
“_You_ would know what you were about, of course; but that would not
suit _me_. I have no eye or ingenuity for such matters, but as they are
before me; and had I a place of my own in the country, I should be most
thankful to any Mr. Repton who would undertake it, and give me as much
beauty as he could for my money; and I should never look at it till it
was complete.”
“It would be delightful to _me_ to see the progress of it all,” said
Fanny.
“Ay, you have been brought up to it. It was no part of my education;
and the only dose I ever had, being administered by not the first
favourite in the world, has made me consider improvements _in_ _hand_
as the greatest of nuisances. Three years ago the Admiral, my honoured
uncle, bought a cottage at Twickenham for us all to spend our summers
in; and my aunt and I went down to it quite in raptures; but it being
excessively pretty, it was soon found necessary to be improved, and for
three months we were all dirt and confusion, without a gravel walk to
step on, or a bench fit for use. I would have everything as complete as
possible in the country, shrubberies and flower-gardens, and rustic
seats innumerable: but it must all be done without my care. Henry is
different; he loves to be doing.”
Edmund was sorry to hear Miss Crawford, whom he was much disposed to
admire, speak so freely of her uncle. It did not suit his sense of
propriety, and he was silenced, till induced by further smiles and
liveliness to put the matter by for the present.
“Mr. Bertram,” said she, “I have tidings of my harp at last. I am
assured that it is safe at Northampton; and there it has probably been
these ten days, in spite of the solemn assurances we have so often
received to the contrary.” Edmund expressed his pleasure and surprise.
“The truth is, that our inquiries were too direct; we sent a servant,
we went ourselves: this will not do seventy miles from London; but this
morning we heard of it in the right way. It was seen by some farmer,
and he told the miller, and the miller told the butcher, and the
butcher’s son-in-law left word at the shop.”
“I am very glad that you have heard of it, by whatever means, and hope
there will be no further delay.”
“I am to have it to-morrow; but how do you think it is to be conveyed?
Not by a wagon or cart: oh no! nothing of that kind could be hired in
the village. I might as well have asked for porters and a handbarrow.”
“You would find it difficult, I dare say, just now, in the middle of a
very late hay harvest, to hire a horse and cart?”
“I was astonished to find what a piece of work was made of it! To want
a horse and cart in the country seemed impossible, so I told my maid to