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1Author:  Fay Theodore S. (Theodore Sedgwick) 1807-1898Requires cookie*
 Title:  The Countess Ida  
 Published:  1997 
 Subjects:  University of Virginia Library, Modern English collection | UVA-LIB-Text | University of Virginia Library, Early American Fiction, 1789-1875 | UVA-LIB-EarlyAmFict1789-1875 
 Description: It was on a pleasant October evening, in the year 1790, that the public diligence which ran between Hamburg and Berlin drew up in the evening at the post of the former town preparatory to starting. The clock struck nine. The four strong horses clattered with their heavy hoofs against the pavement, as if impatient to be off. The conducteur blew an inspiring blast upon his horn, and a small but observant circle of by-standers were collected to gaze on the company of passengers, and the animated scene in which they formed the principal actors. The travellers for the night, who appeared to take their places, were only five in number. The officer of the post, to whom it was committed to superintend the departure of the vehicle and its occupants, appeared with a light, a pen behind his ear, and a paper in his hand. “Mamma begs me to write you our address. We have taken furnished rooms at No. 70 `sous les arbres.' We are also in some difficulty with a horrid man of whom papa bought some things this morning; and mamma says, if you would call in the course of the day, she should be particularly obliged. “Your affectionate letter is received, and I sit down to answer it, half hesitating, notwithstanding the sincere friendship I entertain for you, whether I ought to comply with your wishes, and relate to you all the adventures of my life, and all the apprehensions which agitate my mind. You will not, even from this confession, doubt the sincerity of my sentiments; for you are, my dear Denham, the only man on earth whom I consider my friend. It is melancholy to reflect how few among all my acquaintance I place complete reliance on. Some who could, perhaps, appreciate the nature of true friendship, have their affections occupied elsewhere; and many, who exhibit a desire to become intimate, are not recommended by qualities which alone can make intimacy agreeable. Of the young men whom I have here associated much with, there is one in particular whom I have learned to esteem. Were we together for some years, I fear you would have a rival. But I am in this metropolis only for so short a time, and he is so much engaged with other avocations, that the interest we feel in each other will probably never grow beyond mutual wishes; for what would be the use of cultivating a connexion, of which the short period could scarcely be more pleasant than the inevitable termination would be painful? I see in this young man, however, much which resembles you. He is naturally noble and superior, born amid all the advantages of prosperity, and spending his life in a sphere of fashion and pleasure, among men beneath him in intellect; and yet, while he equals and surpasses them in the elegant frivolities of fashion, he has the taste and resolution to cultivate his understanding, and the wisdom to reason with impartiality and truth upon subjects generally the least understood in such circles. To see him in the drawing-room, you would suppose him only the gay and light homme du monde; while in his study he is evidently fitting himself for a career of usefulness. This much in reply to your inquiry respecting `new friends.' To your entreaty that I should leave off travelling and seek myself out a good wife, I have also something to say. I have many objections to marriage in my case. They are not those which generally influence men who remain bachelors. I have no prejudices against women, or apprehensions of the married state. On the contrary, I soberly believe no man can fulfil his duty, and enjoy all the happiness intended for him, without a family. The pleasures and affections—even the responsibilities, restraints, and cares which they produce, all tend to develop and balance his character, to enlarge his mind, and to keep his heart in a medium point of enjoyment most favourable to health, content, and honour. An old bachelor is almost sure to have some inaccurate notion or loose principle, which the reflection consequent on a family protects a husband and father from. No, my friend, do not suspect me of such flippant objections to matrimony; but there are others which I cannot easily overcome. You are aware of my general history, but I do not think I ever ventured to tell it to you distinctly, for it has been a subject not very agreeable for me to touch upon. I will sketch it for you, however, and let you judge whether it does not offer me solid arguments against marrying. “The circumstances under which we last parted leave me only the alternative to beg you to name a friend to arrange the terms of a meeting at your earliest convenience. “This afternoon, when I found you soliciting from my daughter promises of attachment incompatible with your relations with the Countess Ida Carolan, I used language which, if you did not deserve, the provocation must sufficiently excuse, without other apology from me. If, in anything which I said, you found an acquiescence in your suggestion as to a meeting, I must beg you to consider that I spoke in a state of mind when a just passion predominated over calm reason. Upon reflection, I find that my sense of duty to my family and to my Creator will not permit me to proceed farther in a course, where I can see no possibility of gaining advantage or honour, either in this world or in the next. I decline giving you the meeting you desire, and, at the same time, I forbid your future visits to my house. If I have offered you any disrespect, it is more than counterbalanced by the insult I have suffered at your hands; and, in permitting the affair to drop where it is, I do so, my lord, not without sacrificing M 2 some of the feelings of a man to the duties of a citizen, a father, a husband, and a Christian. “I am on the eve of leaving Berlin, where I shall probably never return again. It is possible that you may misinterpret the motives with which I send you the enclosed letter. I received it from a person of trust, and can vouch for its truth. Mr. Denham, as you will perceive, offers his name also; but I beg you to withhold it from Lord Elkington, as I am willing, should there be any serious responsibility, to take it upon myself. My sole object is to put you in possession of facts which affect the interests of your family. You are at liberty to state that you received them from me; for, while I have nothing to hope from your decision, I have nothing to fear from Lord Elkington's resentment. If any passing weakness has ever caused me to seem to swerve from the path which I ought to pursue in relation to yourself and everything connected with you, that weakness is at an end. If I have ceased, as with pain I perceive I have, to receive your esteem, I hope I have not ceased to deserve it. “Although Lord Elkington is ignorant of the name and existence of the writer of this note, the latter has the most accurate knowledge of your lordship and his affairs. It is not impossible that your lordship may be at first incredulous on reading it, but a few moments' conversation with your lordship's mother will entirely convince you of its truth. I ain't a rich or a great man like your lordship, but fortune has made me the possessor of a secret which has been for some time a source of profit, and which, I freely tell your lordship, I shall use to my own advantage. Your lordship is aware that your noble father, the Earl of Beverly, was married before he united himself to your mother, the present Lady Beverly. That match was unfortunate, as the world well knows; but—I beg to call your lordship's attention to this fact—there is a circumstance connected with it which neither your lordship nor the world knows, viz., that the issue of that marriage yet survives, in the person of a son, who is, in reality, the heir of your father's estate. This secret exists solely and exclusively in my bosom. The son of the Earl of Beverly, for causes which doubtless can be explained, should it be necessary to investigate the matter in a court of justice, went with his mother to the West Indies. The vessel in which they sailed was wrecked, and all on board perished but two persons. One was the child, who was picked up senseless from a spar (to which the mother had attached him, being herself washed overboard and drowned before she could make herself fast); the other individual saved was myself. We were picked up by the same ship, and I was carried, with the child, into Boston. It had happened that I knew the Earl of Beverly having had a boyish passion for a young female in his household, who, before I left England, had revealed to me certain family secrets of a highly important nature, and, among others, that the mother of this child had fled from her husband in consequence of charges against her honour of the vilest kind. I had seen her in the earl's family (then Mr. Lawson), and I recognised her on board the ship which bore us to the New World, although she was there under an assumed name, and was totally unknown to all but myself. Here, then, I found myself with this boy, whom no one in America knew anything of. Being aware that his father had disowned him, I thought that I might serve both the boy and myself by keeping, for a time, the secret of his birth. For years I kept my eye on him, for a finer fellow never walked. His beauty and character at length attracted the attention of a lady, who, hearing of his desolate situation, took him with her to England, at the age of eight years. Dying, she bequeathed him as a legacy to a lady, who educated him till he left the University. It was then that I informed the Earl of Beverly of his existence. That nobleman arranged with me never to reveal the secret, and has paid me for my silence. “The melancholy duty has devolved upon me of informing you of the sudden, and, I fear, fatal malady which has attacked your father. He was reading this morning in his library; a violent ringing of the bell called the servants to his side, when he was found struggling in his fauteuil in a fit of the most alarming description. Doctor B—and Sir Richard L—have pronounced his case incurable. It is not impossible, they say, that he may recover so far as to retain life for months, and perhaps a year; but that he can never again leave his bed, or recover his senses except as a prelude to immediate dissolution, is quite certain. I need not say that we deeply sympathize with the distress which this event will occasion your amiable mother, and the pain it will inflict upon you particularly, as I have been told some coolness had unhappily arisen between your esteemed parent and yourself. I need only say, my dear Elkington, that, while I sympathize profoundly with your grief, I am the most sincere, as I am the first of your friends to congratulate you upon the magnificent inheritance which is about to descend to you, and which, I am quite certain, could not have fallen into more worthy hands. Command me in any way, should necessity detain you some days longer on the Continent. “You are probably aware of the event which has reduced your distinguished father to a bed of death, from which I am advised by his medical attendant he can never rise, and which precludes all idea of his again assuming the care of his affairs. I beg leave, therefore, my lord, to address myself to you, and shall await your orders. “Sir: I take the liberty of addressing you, to ask you to come to my house and visit a certain Monsieur Rossi, a teacher of languages, who lies at my lodgings in a very distressed state. He has begged me to send for you, as he says, although but slightly acquainted with you, you are the only person in town of whom he dare ask a favour, or who knows anything of him. You can see him at any time.
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