Mrs General Talboys | Page 4

pass the winter of
1859 at Rome I never clearly understood. To myself she explained her
purposes, soon after her arrival at the Eternal City, by declaring, in her
own enthusiastic manner, that she was inspired by a burning desire to

drink fresh at the still living fountains of classical poetry and sentiment.
But I always thought that there was something more than this in it.
Classical poetry and sentiment were doubtless very dear to her; but so
also, I imagine, were the substantial comforts of Hardover Lodge, the
General's house in Berkshire; and I do not think that she would have
emigrated for the winter had there not been some slight domestic
misunderstanding. Let this, however, be fully made clear,--that such
misunderstanding, if it existed, must have been simply an affair of
temper. No impropriety of conduct has, I am very sure, ever been
imputed to the lady. The General, as all the world knows, is hot; and
Mrs. Talboys, when the sweet rivers of her enthusiasm are unfed by
congenial waters, can, I believe, make herself disagreeable.
But be this as it may, in November, 1859, Mrs. Talboys came among us
English at Rome, and soon succeeded in obtaining for herself a
comfortable footing in our society. We all thought her more remarkable
for her mental attributes than for physical perfection; but, nevertheless,
she was, in her own way, a sightly woman. She had no special
brilliance, either of eye or complexion, such as would produce sudden
flames in susceptible hearts; nor did she seem to demand instant
homage by the form and step of a goddess; but we found her to be a
good-looking woman of some thirty or thirty-three years of age, with
soft, peach-like cheeks,--rather too like those of a cherub, with
sparkling eyes which were hardly large enough, with good teeth, a
white forehead, a dimpled chin and a full bust. Such, outwardly, was
Mrs. General Talboys. The description of the inward woman is the
purport to which these few pages will be devoted.
There are two qualities to which the best of mankind are much subject,
which are nearly related to each other, and as to which the world has
not yet decided whether they are to be classed among the good or evil
attributes of our nature. Men and women are under the influence of
them both, but men oftenest undergo the former, and women the latter.
They are ambition and enthusiasm. Now Mrs. Talboys was an
enthusiastic woman.
As to ambition, generally as the world agrees with Mark Antony in
stigmatising it as a grievous fault, I am myself clear that it is a virtue;
but with ambition at present we have no concern. Enthusiasm also, as I
think, leans to virtue's side; or, at least, if it be a fault, of all faults it is

the prettiest. But then, to partake at all of virtue, or even to be in any
degree pretty, the enthusiasm must be true.
Bad coin is known from good by the ring of it; and so is bad
enthusiasm. Let the coiner be ever so clever at his art, in the coining of
enthusiasm the sound of true gold can never be imparted to the false
metal. And I doubt whether the cleverest she in the world can make
false enthusiasm palatable to the taste of man. To the taste of any
woman the enthusiasm of another woman is never very palatable.
We understood at Home that Mrs. Talboys had a considerable family,--
four or five children, we were told; but she brought with her only one
daughter, a little girl about twelve years of age. She had torn herself
asunder, as she told me, from the younger nurslings of her heart, and
had left them to the care of a devoted female attendant, whose love was
all but maternal. And then she said a word or two about the General, in
terms which made me almost think that this quasi-maternal love
extended itself beyond the children. The idea, however, was a mistaken
one, arising from the strength of her language, to which I was then
unaccustomed. I have since become aware that nothing can be more
decorous than old Mrs. Upton, the excellent head-nurse at Hardover
Lodge; and no gentleman more discreet in his conduct than General
Talboys.
And I may as well here declare, also, that there could be no more
virtuous woman than the General's wife. Her marriage vow was to her
paramount to all other vows and bonds whatever. The General's honour
was quite safe when he sent her off to Rome by herself; and he no
doubt knew that it was so. Illi robur et aes triplex, of which I believe no
weapons of any assailant could get the better. But, nevertheless,