“Only--some minikin mystery?” said Mr. Walsingham. “Yes, ‘_Elle est politique pour des choux et des raves_.’--This charming widow Beaumont is _manoeuvrer_.[1] We can’t well make an English word of it. The species, thank Heaven! is not so numerous yet in England as to require a generic name. The description, however, has been touched by one of our poets: ‘Julia’s a manager: she’s born for rule, And knows her wiser husband is a fool. For her own breakfast she’ll project a scheme, Nor take her tea without a stratagem.’ Even from the time when Mrs. Beaumont was a girl of sixteen I remember her manoeuvring to gain a husband, and then manoeuvring to manage him, which she did with triumphant address.” “What sort of a man was Colonel Beaumont?” “An excellent man; an open-hearted soldier, of the strictest honour and integrity.” “Then is it not much in Mrs. Beaumont’s favour, that she enjoyed the confidence of such a man, and that he left her guardian to his son and daughter?” “If he had lived with her long enough to become acquainted with her real character, what you say, my dear, would be unanswerable. But Colonel Beaumont died a few years after his marriage, and during those few years he was chiefly with his regiment.” “You will, however, allow,” said Miss Walsingham, “that since his death Mrs. Beaumont has justified his confidence.--Has she not been a good guardian, and an affectionate mother?” “Why--as a guardian, I think she has allowed her son too much liberty, and too much money. I have heard that young Beaumont has lost a considerable sum at Newmarket. I grant you that Mrs. Beaumont is an affectionate mother, and I am convinced that she is extremely anxious to advance the worldly interests of her children; still I cannot, my dear, agree with you, that she is a good mother. In the whole course of the education of her son and daughter, she has pursued a system of artifice. Whatever she wanted them to learn, or to do, or to leave undone, some stratagem, sentimental or scenic, was employed; somebody was to hint to some other body to act upon Amelia to make her do so and so. Nothing--that is, nothing like truth, ever came directly from the mother: there were always whisperings and mysteries, and ‘Don’t say that before Amelia!’ and ‘I would not have this told to Edward,’ because it might make him like something that she did not wish that he should like, and that she had _her reasons_ for not letting him know that she did not wish him to like. There was always some truth to be concealed for some mighty good purpose; and things and persons were to be represented in false lights, to produce on some particular occasion some partial effect. All this succeeded admirably in detail, and for the management of helpless, ignorant, credulous childhood. But mark the consequences of this system: children grow up, and cannot always see, hear, and understand, just as their mothers please. They will go into the world;