University of Virginia Library

6. VI.
MAULE'S WELL.

After an early tea, the little country-girl strayed into the
garden. The enclosure had formerly been very extensive,
but was now contracted within small compass, and hemmed
about, partly by high wooden fences, and partly by the out-buildings
of houses that stood on another street. In its
centre was a grass-plat, surrounding a ruinous little structure,
which showed just enough of its original design to
indicate that it had once been a summer-house. A hop-vine,
springing from last year's root, was beginning to clamber
over it, but would be long in covering the roof with its green
mantle. Three of the seven gables either fronted or looked
side-ways, with a dark solemnity of aspect, down into the
garden.

The black, rich soil had fed itself with the decay of a
long period of time; such as fallen leaves, the petals of
flowers, and the stalks and seed-vessels of vagrant and lawless
plants, more useful after their death than ever while
flaunting in the sun. The evil of these departed years
would naturally have sprung up again, in such rank weeds
(symbolic of the transmitted vices of society) as are always
prone to root themselves about human dwellings. Phœbe
saw, however, that their growth must have been checked by
a degree of careful labor, bestowed daily and systematically
on the garden. The white double rose-bush had evidently
been propped up anew against the house, since the commencement
of the season; and a pear-tree and three damson-trees,
which, except a row of currant-bushes, constituted the only

varieties of fruit, bore marks of the recent amputation of
several superfluous or defective limbs. There were also a
few species of antique and hereditary flowers, in no very
flourishing condition, but scrupulously weeded; as if some
person, either out of love or curiosity, had been anxious to
bring them to such perfection as they were capable of attaining.
The remainder of the garden presented a well-selected
assortment of esculent vegetables, in a praiseworthy state of
advancement. Summer squashes, almost in their golden
blossom; cucumbers, now evincing a tendency to spread
away from the main stock, and ramble far and wide; two
or three rows of string-beans, and as many more that were
about to festoon themselves on poles; tomatoes, occupying a
site so sheltered and sunny that the plants were already
gigantic, and promised an early and abundant harvest.

Phœbe wondered whose care and toil it could have been
that had planted these vegetables, and kept the soil so clean
and orderly. Not, surely, her cousin Hepzibah's, who had
no taste nor spirits for the lady-like employment of cultivating
flowers, and — with her recluse habits, and tendency
to shelter herself within the dismal shadow of the house —
would hardly have come forth, under the speck of open
sky, to weed and hoe among the fraternity of beans and
squashes.

It being her first day of complete estrangement from rural
objects, Phœbe found an unexpected charm in this little nook
of grass, and foliage, and aristocratic flowers, and plebeian
vegetables. The eye of Heaven seemed to look down into
it pleasantly, and with a peculiar smile, as if glad to perceive
that nature, elsewhere overwhelmed, and driven out of the
dusty town, had here been able to retain a breathing-place.
The spot acquired a somewhat wilder grace, and yet a very
gentle one, from the fact that a pair of robins had built their
nest in the pear-tree, and were making themselves exceedingly

busy and happy in the dark intricacy of its boughs.
Bees, too, — strange to say, — had thought it worth their
while to come hither, possibly from the range of hives beside
some farm-house, miles away. How many aerial voyages
might they have made, in quest of honey, or honey-laden,
betwixt dawn and sunset! Yet, late as it now was,
there still arose a pleasant hum out of one or two of the
squash-blossoms, in the depths of which these bees were
plying their golden labor. There was one other object in
the garden which nature might fairly claim as her inalienable
property, in spite of whatever man could do to render it
his own. This was a fountain, set round with a rim of old,
mossy stones, and paved, in its bed, with what appeared to
be a sort of Mosaic-work of variously colored pebbles. The
play and slight agitation of the water, in its upward gush,
wrought magically with these variegated pebbles, and made
a continually shifting apparition of quaint figures, vanishing
too suddenly to be definable. Thence, swelling over the rim
of moss-grown stones, the water stole away under the fence,
through what we regret to call a gutter, rather than a
channel.

Nor must we forget to mention a hen-coop of very reverend
antiquity that stood in the further corner of the garden,
not a great way from the fountain. It now contained only
Chanticleer, his two wives, and a solitary chicken. All of
them were pure specimens of a breed which had been transmitted
down as an heir-loom in the Pyncheon family, and
were said, while in their prime, to have attained almost the
size of turkeys, and, on the score of delicate flesh, to be fit
for a prince's table. In proof of the authenticity of this
legendary renown, Hepzibah could have exhibited the shell
of a great egg, which an ostrich need hardly have been
ashamed of. Be that as it might, the hens were now
scarcely larger than pigeons, and had a queer, rusty, withered

aspect, and a gouty kind of movement, and a sleepy and
melancholy tone throughout all the variations of their clucking
and cackling. It was evident that the race had degenerated,
like many a noble race besides, in consequence of
too strict a watchfulness to keep it pure. These feathered
people had existed too long in their distinct variety; a fact
of which the present representatives, judging by their lugubrious
deportment, seemed to be aware. They kept themselves
alive, unquestionably, and laid now and then an egg,
and hatched a chicken; not for any pleasure of their own,
but that the world might not absolutely lose what had once
been so admirable a breed of fowls. The distinguishing
mark of the hens was a crest of lamentably scanty growth,
in these latter days, but so oddly and wickedly analogous to
Hepzibah's turban, that Phœbe — to the poignant distress
of her conscience, but inevitably — was led to fancy a general
resemblance betwixt these forlorn bipeds and her respectable
relative.

The girl ran into the house to get some crumbs of bread,
cold potatoes, and other such scraps as were suitable to the
accommodating appetite of fowls. Returning, she gave a
peculiar call, which they seemed to recognize. The chicken
crept through the pales of the coop, and ran, with some show
of liveliness to her feet; while Chanticleer and the ladies of
his household regarded her with queer, sidelong glances,
and then croaked one to another, as if communicating their
sage opinions of her character. So wise, as well as antique,
was their aspect, as to give color to the idea, not merely
that they were the descendants of a time-honored race, but
that they had existed, in their individual capacity, ever since
the House of the Seven Gables was founded, and were
somehow mixed up with its destiny. They were a species
of tutelary sprite, or Banshee; although winged and feathered
differently from most other guardian angels.

“Here, you odd little chicken!” said Phœbe; “here are
some nice crumbs for you!”

The chicken, hereupon, though almost as venerable in
appearance as its mother, — possessing, indeed, the whole
antiquity of its progenitors, in miniature, — mustered vivacity
enough to flutter upward and alight on Phœbe's
shoulder.

“That little fowl pays you a high compliment!” said a
voice behind Phœbe.

Turning quickly, she was surprised at sight of a young
man, who had found access into the garden by a door opening
out of another gable than that whence she had emerged.
He held a hoe in his hand, and, while Phœbe was gone in
quest of the crumbs, had begun to busy himself with drawing
up fresh earth about the roots of the tomatoes.

“The chicken really treats you like an old acquaintance,”
continued he, in a quiet way, while a smile made his face
pleasanter than Phœbe at first fancied it. “Those venerable
personages in the coop, too, seem very affably disposed.
You are lucky to be in their good graces so soon! They
have known me much longer, but never honor me with any
familiarity, though hardly a day passes without my bringing
them food. Miss Hepzibah, I suppose, will interweave the
fact with her other traditions, and set it down that the fowls
know you to be a Pyncheon!”

“The secret is,” said Phœbe, smiling, “that I have
learned how to talk with hens and chickens.”

“Ah! but these hens,” answered the young man, — “these
hens of aristocratic lineage would scorn to understand the
vulgar language of a barn-yard fowl. I prefer to think, —
and so would Miss Hepzibah, — that they recognize the
family tone. For you are a Pyncheon?”

“My name is Phœbe Pyncheon,” said the girl, with a
manner of some reserve; for she was aware that her new

acquaintance could be no other than the daguerreotypist, of
whose lawless propensities the old maid had given her a
disagreeable idea. “I did not know that my cousin Hepzibah's
garden was under another person's care.”

“Yes,” said Holgrave, “I dig, and hoe, and weed, in this
black old earth, for the sake of refreshing myself with what
little nature and simplicity may be left in it, after men have
so long sown and reaped here. I turn up the earth by way
of pastime. My sober occupation, so far as I have any, is
with a lighter material. In short, I make pictures out of
sunshine; and, not to be too much dazzled with my own
trade, I have prevailed with Miss Hepzibah to let me lodge
in one of these dusky gables. It is like a bandage over
one's eyes, to come into it. But would you like to see a
specimen of my productions?”

“A daguerreotype likeness, do you mean?” asked Phœbe,
with less reserve; for, in spite of prejudice, her own youthfulness
sprang forward to meet his. “I don't much like pictures
of that sort — they are so hard and stern; besides
dodging away from the eye, and trying to escape altogether.
They are conscious of looking very unamiable, I suppose,
and therefore hate to be seen.”

“If you would permit me,” said the artist, looking at
Phœbe, “I should like to try whether the daguerreotype can
bring out disagreeable traits on a perfectly amiable face.
But there certainly is truth in what you have said. Most
of my likenesses do look unamiable; but the very sufficient
reason, I fancy, is, because the originals are so. There is a
wonderful insight in Heaven's broad and simple sunshine.
While we give it credit only for depicting the merest surface,
it actually brings out the secret character with a truth
that no painter would ever venture upon, even could he
detect it. There is, at least, no flattery in my humble line
of art. Now, here is a likeness which I have taken over

and over again, and still with no better result. Yet the
original wears, to common eyes, a very different expression.
It would gratify me to have your judgment on this character.”

He exhibited a daguerreotype miniature, in a morocco
case. Phœbe merely glanced at it, and gave it back.

“I know the face,” she replied; “for its stern eye has
been following me about, all day. It is my Puritan ancestor,
who hangs yonder in the parlor. To be sure, you have
found some way of copying the portrait without its black
velvet cap and gray beard, and have given him a modern
coat and satin cravat, instead of his cloak and band. I
don't think him improved by your alterations.”

“You would have seen other differences, had you looked
a little longer,” said Holgrave, laughing, yet apparently
much struck. “I can assure you that this is a modern face,
and one which you will very probably meet. Now, the remarkable
point is, that the original wears, to the world's eye,
— and, for aught I know, to his most intimate friends, — an
exceedingly pleasant countenance, indicative of benevolence,
openness of heart, sunny good-humor, and other praiseworthy
qualities of that cast. The sun, as you see, tells
quite another story, and will not be coaxed out of it, after
half a dozen patient attempts on my part. Here we have
the man, sly, subtle, hard, imperious, and, withal, cold as
ice. Look at that eye! Would you like to be at its mercy?
At that mouth! Could it ever smile? And yet, if you
could only see the benign smile of the original! It is so
much the more unfortunate, as he is a public character
of some eminence, and the likeness was intended to be
engraved.”

“Well, I don't wish to see it any more,” observed
Phœbe, turning away her eyes. “It is certainly very like
the old portrait. But my cousin Hepzibah has another

picture, — a miniature. If the original is still in the world, I
think he might defy the sun to make him look stern and
hard.”

“You have seen that picture, then!” exclaimed the
artist, with an expression of much interest. “I never did,
but have a great curiosity to do so. And you judge favorably
of the face?”

“There never was a sweeter one,” said Phœbe. “It is
almost too soft and gentle for a man's.”

“Is there nothing wild in the eye?” continued Holgrave,
so earnestly that it embarrassed Phœbe, as did also the
quiet freedom with which he presumed on their so recent
acquaintance. “Is there nothing dark or sinister, anywhere?
Could you not conceive the original to have been
guilty of a great crime?”

“It is nonsense,” said Phœbe, a little impatiently, “for
us to talk about a picture which you have never seen.
You mistake it for some other. A crime, indeed! Since
you are a friend of my cousin Hepzibah's, you should ask
her to show you the picture.”

“It will suit my purpose still better to see the original,”
replied the daguerreotypist, coolly. “As to his character, we
need not discuss its points; they have already been settled
by a competent tribunal, or one which called itself competent.
But, stay! Do not go yet, if you please! I have a
proposition to make you.”

Phœbe was on the point of retreating, but turned back,
with some hesitation; for she did not exactly comprehend
his manner, although, on better observation, its feature seemed
rather to be lack of ceremony than any approach to offensive
rudeness. There was an odd kind of authority, too, in
what he now proceeded to say, rather as if the garden were
his own than a place to which he was admitted merely by
Hepzibah's courtesy.

“If agreeable to you,” he observed, “it would give me
pleasure to turn over these flowers, and those ancient
and respectable fowls, to your care. Coming fresh from
country air and occupations, you will soon feel the need of
some such out-of-door employment. My own sphere does
not so much lie among flowers. You can trim and tend
them, therefore, as you please; and I will ask only the least
trifle of a blossom, now and then, in exchange for all the
good, honest kitchen-vegetables with which I propose to
enrich Miss Hepzibah's table. So we will be fellow-laborers,
somewhat on the community system.”

Silently, and rather surprised at her own compliance,
Phœbe accordingly betook herself to weeding a flower-bed,
but busied herself still more with cogitations respecting this
young man, with whom she so unexpectedly found herself
on terms approaching to familiarity. She did not altogether
like him. His character perplexed the little country-girl,
as it might a more practised observer; for, while the
tone of his conversation had generally been playful, the
impression left on her mind was that of gravity, and, except
as his youth modified it, almost sternness. She rebelled, as
it were, against a certain magnetic element in the artist's
nature, which he exercised towards her, possibly without
being conscious of it.

After a little while, the twilight, deepened by the shadows
of the fruit-trees, and the surrounding buildings, threw an
obscurity over the garden.

“There,” said Holgrave, “it is time to give over work!
That last stroke of the hoe has cut off a bean-stalk. Good-night,
Miss Phœbe Pyncheon! Any bright day, if you will
put one of those rose-buds in your hair, and come to my
rooms in Central-street, I will seize the purest ray of sunshine,
and make a picture of the flower and its wearer.”

He retired towards his own solitary gable, but turned his

head, on reaching the door, and called to Phœbe, with a tone
which certainly had laughter in it, yet which seemed to be
more than half in earnest.

“Be careful not to drink at Maule's well!” said he.
“Neither drink nor bathe your face in it!”

“Maule's well!” answered Phœbe. “Is that it with the
rim of mossy stones? I have no thought of drinking
there — but why not?”

“O,” rejoined the daguerreotypist, “because, like an old
lady's cup of tea, it is water bewitched!”

He vanished; and Phœbe, lingering a moment, saw a
glimmering light, and then the steady beam of a lamp, in a
chamber of the gable. On returning into Hepzibah's department
of the house, she found the low-studded parlor so
dim and dusky that her eyes could not penetrate the interior.
She was indistinctly aware, however, that the gaunt
figure of the old gentlewoman was sitting in one of the
straight-backed chairs, a little withdrawn from the window,
the faint gleam of which showed the blanched paleness of
her cheek, turned sideway towards a corner.

“Shall I light a lamp, Cousin Hepzibah?” she asked.

“Do, if you please, my dear child,” answered Hepzibah.
“But put it on the table in the corner of the passage. My
eyes are weak; and I can seldom bear the lamp-light on
them.”

What an instrument is the human voice! How wonderfully
responsive to every emotion of the human soul! In
Hepzibah's tone, at that moment, there was a certain rich
depth and moisture, as if the words, common-place as they
were, had been steeped in the warmth of her heart. Again,
while lighting the lamp in the kitchen, Phœbe fancied that
her cousin spoke to her.

“In a moment, cousin!” answered the girl. “These
matches just glimmer, and go out.”

But, instead of a response from Hepzibah, she seemed to
hear the murmur of an unknown voice. It was strangely
indistinct, however, and less like articulate words than an
unshaped sound, such as would be the utterance of feeling
and sympathy, rather than of the intellect. So vague was
it, that its impression or echo in Phœbe's mind was that of
unreality. She concluded that she must have mistaken
some other sound for that of the human voice; or else that
it was altogether in her fancy.

She set the lighted lamp in the passage, and again entered
the parlor. Hepzibah's form, though its sable outline
mingled with the dusk, was now less imperfectly visible.
In the remoter parts of the room, however, its walls being
so ill adapted to reflect light, there was nearly the same
obscurity as before.

“Cousin,” said Phœbe, “did you speak to me just
now?”

“No, child!” replied Hepzibah.

Fewer words than before, but with the same mysterious
music in them! Mellow, melancholy, yet not mournful, the
tone seemed to gush up out of the deep well of Hepzibah's
heart, all steeped in its profoundest emotion. There was
a tremor in it, too, that — as all strong feeling is electric —
partly communicated itself to Phœbe. The girl sat silently
for a moment. But soon, her senses being very acute, she
became conscious of an irregular respiration in an obscure
corner of the room. Her physical organization, moreover,
being at once delicate and healthy, gave her a perception,
operating with almost the effect of a spiritual medium, that
somebody was near at hand.

“My dear cousin,” asked she, overcoming an indefinable
reluctance, “is there not some one in the room with us?”

“Phœbe, my dear little girl,” said Hepzibah, after a moment's
pause, “you were up betimes, and have been busy

all day. Pray go to bed; for I am sure you must need rest.
I will sit in the parlor a while, and collect my thoughts. It
has been my custom for more years, child, than you have
lived!”

While thus dismissing her, the maiden lady stept forward,
kissed Phœbe, and pressed her to her heart, which beat
against the girl's bosom with a strong, high, and tumultuous
swell. How came there to be so much love in this desolate
old heart, that it could afford to well over thus abundantly?

“Good-night, cousin,” said Phœbe, strangely affected by
Hepzibah's manner. “If you begin to love me, I am
glad!”

She retired to her chamber, but did not soon fall asleep,
nor then very profoundly. At some uncertain period in the
depths of night, and, as it were, through the thin veil of a
dream, she was conscious of a footstep mounting the stairs,
heavily, but not with force and decision. The voice of
Hepzibah, with a hush through it, was going up along with
the footsteps; and, again, responsive to her cousin's voice,
Phœbe heard that strange, vague murmur, which might be
likened to an indistinct shadow of human utterance.