The Case of General Ople and Lady Camper | Page 2

of grass
that would have appeared a meadow if magnified; and there was a wall
round the kitchen-garden and a strip of wood round the flower-garden.
The prying of the outside world was impossible. Comfort, fortification;
and gentlemanliness made the place, as the General said, an ideal
English home.
The compass of the estate was half an acre, and perhaps a perch or two,
just the size for the hugging love General Ople was happiest in giving.
He wisely decided to retain the old couple at the lodge, whose members
were used to restriction, and also not to purchase a cow, that would

have wanted pasture. With the old man, while the old woman attended
to the bell at the handsome front entrance with its gilt-spiked gates, he
undertook to do the gardening; a business he delighted in, so long as he
could perform it in a gentlemanly manner, that is to say, so long as he
was not overlooked. He was perfectly concealed from the road. Only
one house, and curiously indeed, only one window of the house, and
further to show the protection extended to Douro Lodge, that window
an attic, overlooked him. And the house was empty.
The house (for who can hope, and who should desire a commodious
house, with conservatories, aviaries, pond and boat-shed, and other joys
of wealth, to remain unoccupied) was taken two seasons later by a lady,
of whom Fame, rolling like a dust-cloud from the place she had left,
reported that she was eccentric. The word is uninstructive: it does not
frighten. In a lady of a certain age, it is rather a characteristic of
aristocracy in retirement. And at least it implies wealth.
General Ople was very anxious to see her. He had the sentiment of
humble respectfulness toward aristocracy, and there was that in riches
which aroused his admiration. London, for instance, he was not afraid
to say he thought the wonder of the world. He remarked, in addition,
that the sacking of London would suffice to make every common
soldier of the foreign army of occupation an independent gentleman for
the term of his natural days. But this is a nightmare! said he, startling
himself with an abhorrent dream of envy of those enriched invading
officers: for Booty is the one lovely thing which the military mind can
contemplate in the abstract. His habit was to go off in an explosion of
heavy sighs when he had delivered himself so far, like a man at war
with himself.
The lady arrived in time: she received the cards of the neighbourhood,
and signalized her eccentricity by paying no attention to them,
excepting the card of a Mrs. Baerens, who had audience of her at once.
By express arrangement, the card of General Wilson Ople, as her
nearest neighbour, followed the card of the rector, the social head of the
district; and the rector was granted an interview, but Lady Camper was
not at home to General Ople. She is of superior station to me, and may

not wish to associate with me, the General modestly said. Nevertheless
he was wounded: for in spite of himself, and without the slightest wish
to obtrude his own person, as he explained the meaning that he had in
him, his rank in the British army forced him to be the representative of
it, in the absence of any one of a superior rank. So that he was
professionally hurt, and his heart being in his profession, it may be
honestly stated that he was wounded in his feelings, though he said no,
and insisted on the distinction. Once a day his walk for constitutional
exercise compelled him to pass before Lady Camper's windows, which
were not bashfully withdrawn, as he said humorously of Douro Lodge,
in the seclusion of half-pay, but bowed out imperiously, militarily, like
a generalissimo on horseback, and had full command of the road and
levels up to the swelling park-foliage. He went by at a smart stride,
with a delicate depression of his upright bearing, as though hastening to
greet a friend in view, whose hand was getting ready for the shake. This
much would have been observed by a housemaid; and considering his
fine figure and the peculiar shining silveriness of his hair, the
acceleration of his gait was noticeable. When he drove by, the pony's
right ear was flicked, to the extreme indignation of a mettlesome little
animal. It ensued in consequence that the General was borne flying
under the eyes of Lady Camper, and such pace displeasing him, he
reduced it invariably at a step or two beyond the corner of her grounds.
But neither he nor his daughter Elizabeth attached importance to so
trivial a circumstance. The General punctiliously avoided glancing at
the windows during the passage