Adeline Mowbray; or, The Mother and Daughter - Amelia Opie

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and this propensity to lose herself in a sort of ideal world, was considerably increased by the nature of her studies.

      Fatal and unproductive studies! While, wrapt in philosophical abstraction, she was trying to understand a metaphysical question on the mechanism of the human mind, or what constituted the true nature of virtue, she suffered day after day to pass in the culpable neglect of positive duties; and while imagining systems for the good of society, and the furtherance of general philanthropy, she allowed individual suffering in her neighbourhood to pass unobserved and unrelieved. While professing her unbounded love for the great family of the world, she suffered her own family to pine under the consciousness of her neglect; and viciously devoted those hours to the vanity of abstruse and solitary study, which might have been better spent in amusing the declining age of her venerable parents, whom affection had led to take up their abode with her.

      Let me observe, before I proceed further, that Mrs. Mowbray scrupulously confined herself to theory, even in her wisest speculations; and being too timid, and too indolent, to illustrate by her conduct the various and opposing doctrines which it was her pride to maintain by turns, her practice was ever in opposition to her opinions.

      Hence, after haranguing with all the violence of a true Whig on the natural rights of man, or the blessings of freedom, she would 'turn to a Tory in her elbow chair', and govern her household with despotic authority; and after embracing at some moments the doubts of the sceptic, she would often lie motionless in her bed, from apprehension of ghosts, a helpless prey to the most abject superstition.

      Such was the mother of Adeline Mowbray! such was the woman who, having married the heir of Rosevalley, merely to oblige her parents, saw herself in the prime of life a rich widow, with an only child, who was left by Mr. Mowbray, a fond husband, but an ill-judging parent, entirely dependent on her!

      At the time of Mr. Mowbray's death, Adeline Mowbray was ten years old, and Mrs. Mowbray thirty; and like an animal in an exhausted receiver, she had during her short existence been tormented by the experimental philosophy of her mother.

      Now it was judged right that she should learn nothing, and now that she should learn every thing. Now, her graceful form and well-turned limbs were to be free from any bandage, and any clothing save what decency required—and now they were to be tortured by stiff stays, and fettered by the stocks and the back-board.

      All Mrs. Mowbray's ambition had settled in one point, one passion, and that was Education. For this purpose she turned over innumerable volumes in search of rules on the subject, on which she might improve, anticipating with great satisfaction the moment when she should be held up as a pattern of imitation to mothers, and be prevailed upon, though with graceful reluctance, to publish her system, without a name, for the benefit of society.

      But, however good her intentions were, the execution of them was continually delayed by her habits of abstraction and reverie. After having over night arranged the tasks of Adeline for the next day—lost in some new speculations for the good of her child, she would lie in bed all the morning, exposing that child to the dangers of idleness.

      At one time Mrs. Mowbray had studied herself into great nicety with regard to the diet of her daughter; but, as she herself was too much used to the indulgences of the palate to be able to set her in reality an example of temperance, she dined in appearance with Adeline at one o'clock on pudding without butter, and potatoes without salt; but while the child was taking her afternoon's walk, her own table was covered with viands fitted for the appetite of opulence.

      Unfortunately, however, the servants conceived that the daughter as well as the mother had a right to regale clandestinely; and the little Adeline used to eat for her supper, with a charge not to tell her mamma, some of the good things set by from Mrs. Mowbray's dinner.

      It happened that, as Mrs. Mowbray was one evening smoothing Adeline's flowing curls, and stroking her ruddy cheek, she exclaimed triumphantly, raising Adeline to the glass, 'See the effect of temperance and low living! If you were accustomed to eat meat, and butter, and drink any thing but water, you would not look so healthy, my love, as you do now. O the excellent effects of a vegetable diet!'

      The artless girl, whose conscience smote her during the whole of this speech, hung her blushing head on her bosom:—it was the confusion of guilt; and Mrs. Mowbray perceiving it earnestly demanded what it meant, when Adeline, half crying, gave a full explanation.

      Nothing could exceed the astonishment and mortification of Mrs. Mowbray; but, though usually tenacious of her opinions, she in this case profited by the lesson of experience. She no longer expected any advantage from clandestine measures:—but Adeline, her appetites regulated by a proper exertion of parental authority, was allowed to sit at the well-furnished table of her mother, and was precluded, by a judicious and open indulgence, from wishing for a secret and improper one; while the judicious praises which Mrs. Mowbray bestowed on Adeline's ingenuous confession endeared to her the practice of truth, and laid the foundation of a habit of ingenuousness which formed through life one of the ornaments of her character—Would that Mrs. Mowbray had always been equally judicious!

      Another great object of anxiety to her was the method of clothing children; whether they should wear flannel, or no flannel; light shoes, to give agility to the motions of the limbs; or heavy shoes, in order to strengthen the muscles by exertion;—when one day, as she was turning over a voluminous author on this subject, the nurserymaid hastily entered the room, and claimed her attention, but in vain; Mrs. Mowbray went on reading aloud:—

      'Some persons are of opinion that thin shoes are most beneficial to health; others, equally worthy of respect, think thick ones of most use: and the reasons for these different opinions we shall class under two heads—'

      'Dear me, ma'am!' cried Bridget, 'and in the meantime Miss Adeline will go without any shoes at all.'

      'Do not interrupt me, Bridget,' cried Mrs. Mowbray, and proceeded to read on. 'In the first place, it is not clear, says a learned writer, whether children require any clothing at all for their feet.'

      At this moment Adeline burst open the parlour door, and, crying bitterly, held up her bleeding toes to her mother.

      'Mamma, mamma!' cried she, 'you forget to send for a pair of new shoes for me; and see, how the stones in the gravel have cut me!'

      This sight, this appeal, decided the question in dispute. The feet of Adeline bleeding on a new Turkey carpet proved that some clothing for the feet was necessary; and even Mrs. Mowbray for a moment began to suspect that a little experience is better than a great deal of theory.

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      Meanwhile, in spite of all Mrs. Mowbray's eccentricities and caprices, Adeline, as she grew up, continued to entertain for her the most perfect respect and affection.

      Her respect was excited by the high idea which she had formed of her abilities—an idea founded on the veneration which all the family seemed to feel for her on that account—and her affection was excited even to an enthusiastic degree by the tenderness with which Mrs. Mowbray had watched over her during an alarming illness.

      For twenty-one days Adeline had been in the utmost danger; nor is it probable that she would have been able to struggle against the force of the disease, but for the unremitting attention of her mother. It was then, perhaps, for the first time that Mrs. Mowbray felt herself a mother:—all her vanities, all her systems, were forgotten in the danger of Adeline—she did not even hazard an opinion on the medical treatment to be observed. For once she was contented to obey instructions in silence; for once she was never caught in a reverie; but, like the most common-place woman of her acquaintance, she lived to the present moment:—and she was rewarded for her cares by the recovery of her daughter, and by that daughter's most devoted attachment.

      Not even the parents of Mrs. Mowbray, who, because she talked on subjects which they could not understand, looked up to her as a superior being, could exceed Adeline in deference to her mother's abilities; and

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