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To none but Clarissa was he ever seen to relax his serious manner; perhaps hers were the only eyes who saw the tenderness behind the stern, reserved exterior. He really liked his cousin; but although Kitty was not, like most people, afraid of him, it must be confessed that he wearied her, and she much preferred to have her gossip with Clarissa, when Gulian was safely out of the house.
As late as 1818, in an address before the Historical Society, Mr. Gulian C. Verplanck, Irving's friend, showed the deep irritation the book had caused, by severe strictures on it as a "coarse caricature." But the author's winning ways soon dissipated the social cloud, and even the Dutch critics were erelong disarmed by the absence of all malice in the gigantic humor of the composition.
Its eloquence, its patriotism, its crowded illustrations, drawn from vast resources of knowledge, its epigrammatic axioms, its occasional pleasantries, are all characteristic of the writer. Mr. Gulian C. Verplanck, the venerable senior member of the society, proposed the vote of thanks to Mr. Motley with words of warm commendation. Mr. William Cullen Bryant rose and said:
"How old are you, Betty?" came the next remark. "I am turned sixteen," replied Betty, somewhat surprised at the question. "So I thought." Gulian paused again to give weight and dignity to the disclosure. "You are now of a marriageable age. I have this morning received a proposal for your hand."
In a second Gulian and Kitty were outside the door, and beheld at the foot of the winding stairs poor Pompey, picking himself up, with many groans and much rubbing of his shins, while Peter, rolling himself nearly double with laughter, stood midway of the flight, with a queer object in his hand which Gulian seized hastily. "It's only a gourd," gasped Peter between paroxysms.
"Kitty, Kitty," said Clarissa, holding out a welcoming hand to her visitor, who seated herself on a cricket beside her, "why have you not been in this four days? I am truly glad to see you, for ever since Gulian and I dispatched our letters to my father I have been so cross and impatient that I fear my good husband is beginning to tire of his bargain, and lament a peevish wife."
"I accept the escort gladly," said Verplanck. "Farewell, then, and my hearty thanks." Betty and Mrs. Seymour had been ushered into a small bedchamber, where they were making some slight changes of dress when Gulian Verplanck knocked at the door and informed them that the coach would shortly be ready for the continuation of their journey.
She came here with Clarissa when she was a bride; oh, we have a few negro servants in dear New England, Peter, but not so many as here. Gulian told me that there are some three thousand slaves owned in the city and its environs. But our negroes go to church and pray; they do not dance, and I know Chloe would be shocked with Miranda's flippant ways. She was ever opposed to dancing."
"But they will not; I heard Gulian say only last night that the cleverness with which the placards are prepared and placed was wonderful. Who tells you these things, Peter? Do have a care, for we are under Gulian's roof, and he would be very angry if he knew that your and my sympathies are all on the side of the Whigs." "Oh, I hear things," murmured Peter evasively.
"Oh, no; the sister next to me in age died in infancy. Then comes Oliver, and then Pamela, who is seventeen now, and next my Betty. How I wonder if the girls have changed; five years makes a long gap, you know, and even my imagination can scarce fill it. Do you fancy we will hear soon, Gulian?"
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