Aunt Celia went up behind him,and,Van Tyck though she is,she could not restrain her admiration of his work.I was surprised myself:I didn't suppose so good looking a youth could do such good work.I retired to a safe distance,and they chatted together.He offered her the sketch;she refused to take advantage of his kindness.He said he would "dash off"another that evening,and bring it to our hotel,--"so glad to do anything for a fellow-countryman,"etc.I peeped from behind a tree and saw him give her his card.It was an awful moment;I trembled,but she read it with unmistakable approval,and gave him her own with an expression that meant,"Yours is good,but beat that if you can!"
She called to me,and I appeared.Mr.John Quincy Copley,Cambridge,was presented to her niece,Miss Katharine Schuyler,New York.It was over,and a very small thing to take so long about,too.
He is an architect,and of course has a smooth path into aunt Celia's affections.Theological students,ministers,missionaries,heroes,and martyrs she may distrust,but architects never!
"He is an architect,my dear Katharine,and he is a Copley,"she told me afterwards."I never knew a Copley who was not respectable,and many of them have been more."
After the introduction was over,aunt Celia asked him guilelessly if he had visited any other of the English cathedrals.Any others,indeed!This to a youth who had been all but in her lap for a fortnight!It was a blow,but he rallied bravely,and,with an amused look in my direction,replied discreetly that he had visited most of them at one time or another.I refused to let him see that I had ever noticed him before;that is,particularly.
Memoranda:"The very stones and mortar of this historic town seem impregnated with the spirit of restful antiquity."(Extract from one of aunt Celia's letters.)Among the great men who have studied here are the Prince of Wales,Duke of Wellington,Gladstone,Sir Robert Peel,Sir Philip Sidney,William Penn,John Locke,the two Wesleys,Ruskin,Ben Jonson,and Thomas Otway.(Look Otway up.)
HE
OXFORD,June 13
The Angel.
I have done it,and if I hadn't been a fool and a coward I might have done it a week ago,and spared myself a good deal of delicious torment.I have just given two hours to a sketch of Addison's Walk and carried it to aunt Celia at the Mitre.Object,to find out whether they make a long stay in London (our next point),and if so where.It seems they go directly through.I said in the course of conversation,"So Miss Schuyler is willing to forego a London season?Marvelous self-denial!"
"My niece did not come to Europe for a London season,"replied Miss Van Tyck."We go through London this time merely as a cathedral town,simply because it chances to be where it is geographically.
We shall visit St.Paul's and Westminster Abbey,and then go directly on,that our chain of impressions may have absolute continuity and be free from any disturbing elements."
Oh,but she is lovely,is aunt Celia!
LINCOLN,June 20
The Black Boy Inn.
I am stopping at a beastly little hole,which has the one merit of being opposite Miss Schuyler's lodgings.My sketch-book has deteriorated in artistic value during the last two weeks.Many of its pages,while interesting to me as reminiscences,will hardly do for family or studio exhibition.If I should label them,the result would be something like this:-
1.Sketch of a footstool and desk where I first saw Miss Schuyler kneeling.
2.Sketch of a carved-oak chair,Miss Schuyler sitting in it.
3."Angel Choir."Heads of Miss Schuyler introduced into the carving.
4.Altar screen.Full length figure of Miss Schuyler holding lilies.
5.Tomb of a bishop,where I tied Miss Schuyler's shoe.
6.Tomb of another bishop,where I had to tie it again because I
did it so badly the first time.
7.Sketch of the shoe;the shoe-lace worn out with much tying.
8.Sketch of the blessed verger who called her "madam,"when we were walking together.
9.Sketch of her blush when he did it the prettiest thing in the world.
10.Sketch of J.Q.Copley contemplating the ruins of his heart.
"How are the mighty fallen!"
SHE
LINCOLN,June 22
At Miss Brown's,Castle Garden.
Mr.Copley HAS done something in the world;I was sure that he had.
He has a little income of his own,but he is too proud and ambitious to be an idler.He looked so manly when he talked about it,standing up straight and strong in his knickerbockers.I like men in knickerbockers.Aunt Celia doesn't.She says she doesn't see how a well-brought-up Copley can go about with his legs in that condition.I would give worlds to know how aunt Celia ever unbent sufficiently to get engaged.But,as I was saying,Mr.Copley has accomplished something,young as he is.He has built three picturesque suburban churches suitable for weddings,and a state lunatic asylum.
Aunt Celia says we shall have no worthy architecture until every building is made an exquisitely sincere representation of its deepest purpose,--a symbol,as it were,of its indwelling meaning.