The Argosy — page 59: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Mother of Lord Macaulay. 49 the virtue of silence in women, by no means belongs to a silent sister- hood. Her conversation may be somewhat too epigrammatic, but it is never vapid or empty.: It is discursive, but never visionary or fanciful. It is a trifle prosy, it is true, at times, but then it is prosy from the mere fact of its having more init than most mental digestions can bear at once. When we have thus looked at and listened to the celebrated sister, our eyes easily find their way to her, who, as long as her warm, unselfish heart beat in this world, was never far from Hannah’s side. What hearty, happy, self-forgetful admiration there is in Patty’s glances as they turn towards her more gifted sister! What thorough good temper puts harmony into her irregular features! How does she brim over with sentiment which may at times be silly, but is never anything save kindly! In woman’s history there are few prettier and more touching pictures than that of the united lives of these two sisters. Both, probably, in earlier days had known a stronger but a less peaceful affection. One of Hannah’s lovers was, we know, so deeply attached to her, that though he could never get the happy Yes from her lips, he left her when he died his whole fortune: and we always believe that the feeling with which Hannah herself regarded Garrick had in it a touch of hopeless passion. But long after such fires as these had died out, that calm ray of sisterly love shone on for those two women: shone till it mingled with a better light above. But to return to Selina: she had not been long at the Miss Mores’ schoo! before they found out that there was more in her than in most of their pupils, and both sisters began, like kindly fairies, to weave their spells around the girl, working gently upon her. Hannah opened to her the world of books, and what a wonder world that was for the girl’s clear, impressionable mind. There were all the gracious band of Shakespeare’s women to be made acquaintance with in turn There were the lighter poets to make new music for her inexperienced ear. There was the first calm ecstatic joy of rising heavenward borne on the wings of Milton’s spirit. Patty, for her part, helped to develop—perthaps almost without knowing it herself—the girl’s heart : for who could have watched Patty in the unconscious self-forgetfulness of her daily life without having good quietly instilled into them, as mild showers permeate and make beautiful the earth? No doubt, in after years, when, as wife and mother, storms shook her home, as storms do and will at times shake us all, Selina dwelt upon the memory of this old friend of her child- hood, and was refreshed and strengthened thereby. But the best treasure of all that Selina gained at her school was a living and steadfast religious faith. However insufferably dull and priggish Coelebs may appear to the modern mind (and we must confess ourselves that, had we been in the fair Lucilla’s place, we should have VOL. XXII. E, comicbooks.com