University of Virginia Library

III.
Evening.

THE Future is a great land:—how the lights,
and the shadows throng over it,—bright and
dark, slow and swift!

Pride and Ambition build up great castles on its
plains,—great monuments on the mountains, that
reach heavenward, and dip their tops in the blue of
Eternity! Then comes an earthquake—the earthquake
of disappointment, of distrust, or of inaction,
and lays them low. Gaping desolation widens its
breaches everywhere; the eye is full of them, and
can see nothing beside. By and by, the sun peeps
forth,—as now from behind yonder cloud—and reanimates
the soul.

Fame beckons, sitting high in the heavens; and

joy lends a halo to the vision. A thousand resolves
stir your heart; your hand is hot, and feverish for
action; your brain works madly, and you snatch
here, and you snatch there, in the convulsive throes
of your delirium. Perhaps you see some earnest,
careful plodder, once far behind you, now toiling
slowly but surely, over the plain of life, until he seems
near to grasping those brilliant phantoms which dance
along the horizon of the future; and the sight stirs
your soul to frenzy, and you bound on after him with
the madness of a fever in your veins. But it was by
no such action, that the fortunate toiler has won his
progress. His hand is steady, his brain is cool; his
eye is fixed, and sure.

The Future is a great land; a man cannot go round
it in a day; he cannot measure it with a bound; he
cannot bind its harvests into a single sheaf. It is
wider than the vision, and has no end.

Yet always, day by day, hour by hour, second by
second, the hard Present is elbowing us off into that
great land of the Future. Our souls indeed, wander
to it, as to a home-land; they run beyond time and
space, beyond planets and suns, beyond far-off suns
and comets, until like blind flies, they are lost in the
blaze of immensity, and can only grope their way
back to our earth, and our time, by the cunning of
instinct.

Cut out the Future—even that little Future, which
is the Evening of our life, and what a fall into
vacuity! Forbid those earnest forays over the borders
of Now, and on what spoils would the soul live?

For myself, I delight to wander there, and to
weave every day, the passing life, into the coming
life,—so closely, that I may be unconscious of the
joining. And if so be that I am able, I would make
the whole piece bear fair proportions, and just figures,
—like those tapestries, on which nuns work by inches,
and finish with their lives;—or like those grand frescos,
which poet artists have wrought on the vaults of
old cathedrals, gaunt, and colossal,—appearing mere
daubs of carmine and azure, as they lay upon their
backs, working out a hand's breadth at a time,—but
when complete, showing—symmetrical, and glorious!

But not alone does the soul wander to those glittering
heights where fame sits, with plumes waving in
zephyrs of applause; there belong to it, other appetites,
which range wide, and constantly over the
broad Future-land. We are not merely, working, intellectual
machines, but social puzzles, whose solution,
is the work of a life. Much as hope may lean toward
the intoxicating joy of distinction, there is another
leaning in the soul, deeper, and stronger, toward those
pleasures which the heart pants for, and in whose
atmosphere, the affections bloom and ripen.

The first may indeed be uppermost; it may be
noisiest; it may drown with the clamor of mid-day,
the nicer sympathies. But all our day is not mid-day;
and all our life is not noise. Silence is as strong
as the soul; and there is no tempest so wild with
blasts, but has a wilder lull. There lies in the depth
of every man's soul a mine of affection, which from
time to time will burn with the seething heat of a
volcano, and heave up lava-like monuments, through
all the cold strata of his commoner nature.

One may hide his warmer feelings;—he may paint
them dimly;—he may crowd them out of his sailing
chart, where he only sets down the harbors for traffic;
yet in his secret heart, he will map out upon the
great country of the Future, fairy islands of love, and
of joy. There, he will be sure to wander, when his
soul is lost in those quiet and hallowed hopes, which
take hold on Heaven.

Love only, unlocks the door upon that Futurity,
where the isles of the blessed, lie like stars. Affection
is the stepping stone to God. The heart is our
only measure of infinitude. The mind tires with
greatness; the heart—never. Thought is worried
and weakened in its flight through the immensity of
space; but Love soars around the throne of the
Highest, with added blessing and strength.

I know not how it may be with others, but with

me, the heart is a readier, and quicker builder of
those fabrics which strew the great country of the
Future, than the mind. They may not indeed rise
so high, as the dizzy pinnacles that ambition loves to
rear; but they lie like fragrant islands, in a sea,
whose ripple is a continuous melody.

And as I muse now, looking toward the Evening,
which is already begun,—tossed as I am, with the
toils of the Past, and bewildered with the vexations
of the Present, my affections are the architect, that
build up the future refuge. And, in fancy at least, I
will build it boldly;—saddened it may be, by the
chance shadows of evening; but through all, I will
hope for a sunset, when the day ends, glorious with
crimson, and gold.

Carry.

I SAID that harsh, and hot as was the Present,
there were joyous gleams of light playing over the
Future. How else could it be, when that fair being
whom I met first upon the wastes of ocean, and whose
name even, is hallowed by the dying words of Isabel,
is living in the same world with me? Amid all the
perplexities that haunt me, as I wander from the
present to the future, the thought of her image, of

her smile, of her last kind adieu, throws a dash of
sunlight upon my path.

And yet why? Is it not very idle? Years have
passed since I have seen her: I do not even know
where she may be. What is she to me?

My heart whispers—very much!—but I do not
listen to that in my prouder moods. She is a woman,
a beautiful woman indeed, whom I have known once—
pleasantly known: she is living, but she will die, or
she will marry;—I shall hear of it by and by, and
sigh perhaps—nothing more. Life is earnest around
me; there is no time to delve in the past, for bright
things to shed radiance on the future.

I will forget the sweet girl, who was with me upon
the ocean, and think she is dead. This manly soul is
strong, if we would but think so: it can make a
puppet of griefs, and take down, and set up at will,
the symbols of its hope.

—But no, I cannot: the more I think thus, the
less, I really think thus. A single smile of that frail
girl, when I recal it,—mocks all my proud purposes;
as if, without her, my purposes were nothing.

—Pshaw!—I say—it is idle!—and I bury my
thought in books, and in long hours of toil; but as the
hours lengthen, and my head sinks with fatigue, and
the shadows of evening play around me, there comes
again that sweet vision, saying with tender mockery—

is it idle? And I am helpless, and am led away
hopefully and joyfully, toward the golden gates which
open on the Future.

But this is only in those silent hours when the man
is alone, and away from his working thoughts. At
mid-day, or in the rush of the world, he puts hard
armor on, that reflects all the light of such joyous
fancies. He is cold and careless, and ready for
suffering, and for fight.

One day I am travelling: I am absorbed in some
present cares—thinking out some plan which is to
make easier, or more successful, the voyage of life.
I glance upon the passing scenery, and upon new
faces, with that careless indifference which grows upon
a man with years, and above all, with travel. There
is no wife to enlist your sympathies—no children to
sport with: my friends are few, and scattered; and
are working out fairly, what is before them to do.
Lilly is living here, and Ben is living there: their
letters are cheerful, contented letters; and they wish
me well. Griefs even have grown light with wearing;
and I am just in that careless humor—as if I said,—
jog on, old world—jog on! And the end will come
along soon; and we shall get—poor devils that we
are—just what we deserve!

But on a sudden, my eyes rest on a figure that I
think I know. Now, the indifference flies like mist;

and my heart throbs: and the old visions come up.
I watch her, as if there were nothing else to be seen.
The form is hers; the grace is hers; the simple dress
—so neat, so tasteful,—that is hers too. She half
turns her head:—it is the face that I saw under the
velvet cap, in the Park of Devon!

I do not rush forward: I sit as if I were in a
trance. I watch her every action—the kind attentions
to her mother who sits beside her,—her naive
exclamations, as we pass some point of surpassing
beauty. It seems as if a new world were opening
to me; yet I cannot tell why. I keep my place, and
think, and gaze. I tear the paper I hold in my
hand into shreds. I play with my watch chain, and
twist the seal, until it is near breaking. I take out
my watch, look at it, and put it back—yet I cannot
tell the hour.

—It is she—I murmur—I know it is Carry!

But when they rise to leave, my lethargy is broken;
yet it is with a trembling hesitation—a faltering as it
were, between the present life and the future, that I
approach. She knows me on the instant, and greets
me kindly;—as Bella wrote—very kindly. Yet she
shows a slight embarrassment, a sweet embarrassment,
that I treasure in my heart, more closely even than
the greeting. I change my course, and travel with
them;—now we talk of the old scenes, and two hours

seem to have made with me the difference of half a
life time.

It is five years since I parted with her, never
hoping to meet again. She was then a frail girl; she
is now just rounding into womanhood. Her eyes are
as dark and deep as ever: the lashes that fringe them,
seem to me even longer than they were. Her colour
is as rich, her forehead as fair, her smile as sweet, as
they were before;—only a little tinge of sadness
floats upon her eye, like the haze upon a summer
landscape. I grow bold to look upon her, and timid
with looking. We talk of Bella:—she speaks in a
soft, low voice, and the shade of sadness on her face,
gathers—as when a summer mist obscures the sun.
I talk in monosyllables: I can command no other.
And there is a look of sympathy in her eye, when I
speak thus, that binds my soul to her, as no smiles
could do. What can draw the heart into the fulness
of love, so quick as sympathy?

But this passes;—we must part; she for her home,
and I for that broad home, that has been mine so
long—the world. It seems broader to me than ever,
and colder than ever, and less to be wished for than
ever. A new book of hope is sprung wide open in
my life:—a hope of home!

We are to meet at some time, not far off, in the
city where I am living. I look forward to that time,

as at school I used to look for vacation: it is a point
d'appui for hope, for thought, and for countless
journeyings into the opening future. Never did I
keep the dates better, never count the days more
carefully, whether for bonds to be paid, or for dividends
to fall due.

I welcome the time, and it passes like a dream.
I am near her, often as I dare; the hours are very
short with her, and very long away. She receives
me kindly—always very kindly; she could not be
otherwise than kind. But is it anything more?
This is a greedy nature of ours; and when sweet
kindness flows upon us, we want more. I know she
is kind; and yet in place of being grateful, I am only
covetous of an excess of kindness.

She does not mistake my feelings, surely:—ah, no,—
trust a woman for that! But what have I, or what
am I, to ask a return? She is pure, and gentle as an
angel; and I—alas—only a poor soldier in our world-fight
against the Devil! Sometimes in moods of
vanity, I call up what I fondly reckon my excellencies
or deserts—a sorry, pitiful array, that makes me
shame-faced when I meet her. And in an instant, I
banish them all. And I think, that if I were called
upon in some high court of justice, to say why I
should claim her indulgence, or her love—I would
say nothing of my sturdy effort to beat down the

roughnesses of toil—nothing of such manliness as wears
a calm front amid the frowns of the world,—nothing
of little triumphs, in the every-day fight of life; but
only, I would enter the simple plea—this heart is
hers!

She leaves; and I have said nothing of what was
seething within me;—how I curse my folly! She is
gone, and never perhaps will return. I recal in despair
her last kind glance. The world seems blank
to me. She does not know; perhaps she does not
care, if I love her.—Well, I will bear it,—I say. But
I cannot bear it. Business is broken; books are
blurred; something remains undone, that fate declares
must be done. Not a place can I find, but
her sweet smile gives to it, either a tinge of gladness,
or a black shade of desolation.

I sit down at my table with pleasant books; the
fire is burning cheerfully; my dog looks up earnestly
when I speak to him; but it will never do! Her
image sweeps away all these comforts in a flood. I
fling down my book; I turn my back upon my dog;
the fire hisses and sparkles in mockery of me.

Suddenly a thought flashes on my brain;—I will
write to her—I say. And a smile floats over my
face,—a smile of hope, ending in doubt. I catch up
my pen—my trusty pen; and the clean sheet lies before
me. The paper could not be better, nor the

pen. I have written hundreds of letters; it is easy
to write letters. But now, it is not easy.

I begin, and cross it out. I begin again, and get
on a little farther;—then cross it out. I try again,
but can write nothing. I fling down my pen in despair,
and burn the sheet, and go to my library for
some old sour treatise of Shaftesbury, or Lyttleton;
and say—talking to myself all the while;—let her
go!—She is beautiful, but I am strong; the world is
short; we—I and my dog, and my books, and my
pen, will battle it through bravely, and leave enough
for a tomb-stone.

But even as I say it, the tears start;—it is all false
saying! And I throw Shaftesbury across the room,
and take up my pen again. It glides on and on, as
my hope glows, and I tell her of our first meeting,
and of our hours in the ocean twilight, and of our unsteady
stepping on the heaving deck, and of that
parting in the noise of London, and of my joy at
seeing her in the pleasant country, and of my grief afterward.
And then I mention Bella,—her friend and
mine—and the tears flow; and then I speak of our
last meeting, and of my doubts, and of this very evening,—and
how I could not write, and abandoned it,—
and then felt something within me that made me write,
and tell her—all!—“That my heart was not

my own, but was wholly hers;—and that if she would
be mine,—I would cherish her, and love her always!”

Then, I feel a kind of happiness,—a strange, tumultuous
happiness, into which doubt is creeping from
time to time, bringing with it a cold shudder. I seal
the letter, and carry it—a great weight—for the mail.
It seems as if there could be no other letter that day;
and as if all the coaches and horses, and cars, and
boats were specially detailed to bear that single sheet.
It is a great letter for me; my destiny lies in it.

I do not sleep well that night;—it is a tossing
sleep; one time joy—sweet and holy joy comes to my
dreams, and an angel is by me;—another time, the
angel fades,—the brightness fades, and I wake, struggling
with fear. For many nights it is so, until the
day comes, on which I am looking for a reply.

The postman has little suspicion that the letter
which he gives me—although it contains no promissory
notes, nor moneys, nor deeds, nor articles of
trade—is yet to have a greater influence upon my life
and upon my future, than all the letters he has ever
brought to me before. But I do not show him this;
nor do I let him see the clutch with which I grasp
it. I bear it, as if it were a great and fearful burden,
to my room. I lock the door, and having broken the
seal with a quivering hand,—read:—

The Letter.

“Paul—for I think I may call you so now—I
know not how to answer you. Your letter gave me
great joy; but it gave me pain too. I cannot—will
not doubt what you say: I believe that you love me
better than I deserve to be loved; and I know that I
am not worthy of all your kind praises. But it is not
this that pains me; for I know that you have a generous
heart, and would forgive, as you always have forgiven,
any weakness of mine. I am proud too, very
proud, to have won your love; but it pains me—more
perhaps than you will believe—to think that I cannot
write back to you, as I would wish to write;—alas,
never!”

Here I dash the letter upon the floor, and with my
hand upon my forehead, sit gazing upon the glowing
coals, and breathing quick and loud.—The dream
then is broken!

Presently I read again:

—“You know that my father died, before we
had ever met. He had an old friend, who had come
from England; and who in early life had done him

some great service, which made him seem like a
brother. This old gentleman was my god-father, and
called me daughter. When my father died, he drew
me to his side, and said,—`Carry, I shall leave you,
but my old friend will be your father;' and he put my
hand in his, and said—`I give you my daughter.'

“This old gentleman had a son, older than myself;
but we were much together, and grew up as brother
and sister. I was proud of him; for he was tall and
strong, and every one called him handsome. He was
as kind too, as a brother could be; and his father was
like my own father. Every one said, and believed,
that we would one day be married; and my mother,
and my new father spoke of it openly. So did Laurence—for
that is my friend's name.

“I do not need to tell you any more, Paul; for
when I was still a girl, we had promised, that we
would one day be man and wife. Laurence has been
much in England; and I believe he is there now.
The old gentleman treats me still as a daughter, and
talks of the time, when I shall come and live with
him. The letters of Laurence are very kind; and
though he does not talk so much of our marriage as
he did, it is only I think, because he regards it as so
certain.

“I have wished to tell you all this before; but I

have feared to tell you; I am afraid I have been too
selfish to tell you. And now what can I say? Laurence
seems most to me like a brother;—and you,
Paul — but I must not go on. For if I marry
Laurence, as fate seems to have decided, I will try
and love him, better than all the world.

“But will you not be a brother, and love me, as
you once loved Bella;—you say my eyes are like
hers, and that my forehead is like hers;—will you not
believe that my heart is like hers too?

“Paul, if you shed tears over this letter—I have
shed them as well as you. I can write no more now.

“Adieu.”

I sit long looking upon the blaze; and when I
rouse myself, it is to say wicked things against destiny.
Again, all the future seems very blank. I cannot
love Carry, as I loved Bella; she cannot be a sister
to me; she must be more, or nothing! Again, I
seem to float singly on the tide of life, and see all
around me in cheerful groups. Everywhere the sun
shines, except upon my own cold forehead. There
seems no mercy in Heaven, and no goodness for me
upon Earth.

I write after some days, an answer to the letter.
But it is a bitter answer, in which I forget myself, in

the whirl of my misfortunes—to the utterance of
reproaches.

Her reply, which comes speedily, is sweet, and
gentle. She is hurt by my reproaches, deeply hurt.
But with a touching kindness, of which I am not
worthy, she credits all my petulance to my wounded
feeling; she soothes me; but in soothing, only
wounds the more. I try to believe her, when she
speaks of her unworthiness;—but I cannot.

Business, and the pursuits of ambition or of interest,
pass on like dull, grating machinery. Tasks
are met, and performed with strength indeed, but
with no cheer. Courage is high, as I meet the shocks,
and trials of the world; but it is a brute, careless
courage, that glories in opposition. I laugh at any
dangers, or any insidious pitfalls;—what are they to
me? What do I possess, which it will be hard to
lose? My dog keeps by me; my toils are present;
my food is ready; my limbs are strong;—what
need for more?

The months slip, by; and the cloud that floated
over my evening sun, passes.

Laurence wandering abroad, and writing to Caroline,
as to a sister,—writes more than his father could
have wished. He has met new faces, very sweet
faces; and one which shows through the ink of his
later letters, very gorgeously. The old gentleman

does not like to lose thus his little Carry; and he
writes back rebuke. But Laurence, with the letters
of Caroline before him for data, throws himself upon
his sister's kindness, and charity. It astonishes not
a little the old gentleman, to find his daughter pleading
in such strange way, for the son. “And what
will you do then, my Carry?”—the old man says.

—“Wear weeds, if you wish, sir; and love you
and Laurence more than ever!”

And he takes her to his bosom, and says—“Carry
—Carry, you are too good for that wild fellow Laurence!”

Now, the letters are different! Now they are full
of hope—dawning all over the future sky. Business,
and care, and toil, glide, as if a spirit animated them
all; it is no longer cold machine work, but intelligent,
and hopeful activity. The sky hangs upon you
lovingly, and the birds make music, that startles you
with its fineness. Men wear cheerful faces; the
storms have a kind pity, gleaming through all their
wrath.

The days approach, when you can call her yours.
For she has said it, and her mother has said it; and
the kind old gentleman, who says he will still be her
father, has said it too; and they have all welcomed
you—won by her story—with a cordiality, that has
made your cup full, to running over. Only one

thought comes up to obscure your joy;—is it real?
or if real, are you worthy to enjoy? Will you cherish
and love always, as you have promised, that angel
who accepts your word, and rests her happiness on
your faith? Are there not harsh qualities in your
nature, which you fear may sometime make her regret
that she gave herself to your love and charity?
And those friends who watch over her, as the apple
of their eye, can you always meet their tenderness and
approval, for your guardianship of their treasure? Is
it not a treasure that makes you fearful, as well as
joyful?

But you forget this in her smile: her kindness, her
goodness, her modesty, will not let you remember it.
She forbids such thoughts; and you yield such obedience,
as you never yielded even to the commands
of a mother. And if your business, and your labor slip
by, partially neglected—what matters it? What is
interest, or what is reputation, compared with that
fullness of your heart, which is now ripe with joy?

The day for your marriage comes; and you live as
if you were in a dream. You think well, and hope
well for all the world. A flood of charity seems to
radiate from all around you. And as you sit beside
her in the twilight, on the evening before the day,
when you will call her yours, and talk of the coming
hopes, and of the soft shadows of the past; and whisper

of Bella's love, and of that sweet sister's death, and
of Laurence, a new brother, coming home joyful with
his bride,—and lay your cheek to hers—life seems as
if it were all day, and as if there could be no night!

The marriage passes; and she is yours,—yours
forever.

New Travel.

Again I am upon the sea; but not alone. She
whom I first met upon the wastes of ocean, is there
beside me. Again I steady her tottering step upon
the deck; once it was a drifting, careless pleasure;
now the pleasure is holy.

Once the fear I felt, as the storms gathered, and
night came, and the ship tossed madly, and great
waves gathering swift, and high, came down like slipping
mountains, and spent their force upon the quivering
vessel, was a selfish fear. But it is so no
longer. Indeed I hardly know fear; for how can the
tempests harm her? Is she not too good to suffer
any of the wrath of heaven?

And in nights of calm,—holy nights, we lean over
the ship's side, looking down, as once before, into the
dark depths, and murmur again snatches of ocean
song, and talk of those we love; and we peer among the

stars, which seem neighborly, and as if they were the
homes of friends. And as the great ocean-swells
come rocking under us, and carry us up and down
along the valleys and the hills of water, they seem
like deep pulsations of the great heart of nature,
heaving us forward toward the goal of life, and to the
gates of heaven!

We watch the ships as they come upon the horizon,
and sweep toward us, like false friends, with the
sun glittering on their sails; and then shift their
course, and bear away—with their bright sails, turned
to spots of shadow. We watch the long winged
birds skimming the waves hour after hour,—like
pleasant thoughts—now dashing before our bows, and
then sweeping behind, until they are lost in the hollows
of the water.

Again life lies open, as it did once before; but the
regrets, disappointments, and fruitless resolves do
not come to trouble me now. It is the future,
which has become as level as the sea; and she is beside
me,—the sharer in that future—to look out with
me, upon the joyous sparkle of water, and to count
with me, the dazzling ripples, that lie between us and
the shore. A thousand pleasant plans come up, and
are abandoned, like the waves we leave behind us;
a thousand other joyous plans, dawn upon our fancy,
like the waves that glitter before us. We talk of

Laurence and his bride, whom we are to meet; we
talk of her mother, who is even now watching the
winds that waft her child over the ocean; we talk of
the kindly old man, her god-father, who gave her a
father's blessing; we talk low, and in the twilight
hours, of Isabel—who sleeps.

At length, as the sun goes down upon a fair night,
over the western waters which we have passed, we
see before us, the low blue line of the shores of Cornwall
and Devon. In the night, shadowy ships glide
past us with gleaming lanterns; and in the morning,
we see the yellow cliffs of the Isle of Wight; and
standing out from the land, is the dingy sail of our
pilot. London with its fog, roar, and crowds, has
not the same charms that it once had; that roar and
crowd is good to make a man forget his griefs—forget
himself, and stupify him with amazement. We are
in no need of such forgetfulness.

We roll along the banks of the sylvan river that
glides by Hampton Court; and we toil up Richmond
Hill, to look together upon that scene of water, and
meadow,—of leafy copses, and glistening villas, of
brown cottages, and clustered hamlets,—of solitary
oaks, and loitering herds—all spread like a veil of
beauty, upon the bosom of the Thames. But we
cannot linger here, nor even under the glorious old
boles of Windsor Forest; but we hurry on to that

sweet county of Devon, made green with its white
skeins of water.

Again we loiter under the oaks, where we have
loitered before; and the sleek deer gaze on us with
their liquid eyes, as they gazed before. The squirrels
sport among the boughs as fearless as ever; and some
wandering puss pricks her long ears at our steps,
and bounds off along the hedge rows to her burrow.
Again I see Carry in her velvet riding-cap, with the
white plume; and I meet her as I met her before,
under the princely trees that skirt the northern avenue.
I recal the evening when I sauntered out at the
park gates, and gained a blessing from the porter's
wife, and dreamed that strange dream;—now, the
dream seems more real, than my life.—“God bless
you!”—said the woman again.

—“Aye, old lady, God has blessed me!”—and I
fling her a guinea, not as a gift, but as a debt.

The bland farmer lives yet; he scarce knows me,
until I tell him of my bout around his oat-field, at the
tail of his long stilted plough. I find the old pew in
the parish church. Other holly sprigs are hung
now; and I do not doze, for Carry is beside me.
The curate drawls the service; but it is pleasant to
listen; and I make the responses with an emphasis,
that tells more I fear, for my joy, than for my religion.
The old groom at the mansion in the Park,

has not forgotten the hard-riding of other days; and
tells long stories (to which I love to listen) of the old
visit of mistress Carry, when she followed the hounds
with the best of the English lasses.

—“Yer honor may well be proud; for not a prettier
face, or a kinder heart has been in Devon, since
mistress Carry left us!”

But pleasant as are the old woods, full of memories,
and pleasant as are the twilight evenings upon the
terrace—we must pass over to the mountains of
Switzerland. There we are to meet Laurence.

Carry has never seen the magnificence of the Juras;
and as we journey over the hills between Dole, and
the border line, looking upon the rolling heights
shrouded with pine trees, and down thousands of feet,
at the very road side, upon the cottage roofs, and
emerald valleys, where the dun herds are feeding
quietly, she is lost in admiration. At length we
come to that point above the little town of Gex, from
which you see spread out before you, the meadows
that skirt Geneva, the placid surface of Lake Leman
and the rough, shaggy mountains of Savoy;—and far
behind them, breaking the horizon with snowy cap,
and with dark pinnacles—Mont Blanc, and the
Needles of Chamouni.

I point out to her in the valley below, the little
town of Ferney, where stands the deserted chateau of

Voltaire; and beyond, upon the shores of the lake,
the old home of de Stael; and across, with its white
walls reflected upon the bosom of the water, the house
where Byron wrote the prisoner of Chillon. Among
the grouping roofs of Geneva, we trace the dark
cathedral, and the tall hotels shining on the edge of
the lake. And I tell of the time, when I tramped
down through yonder valley, with my future all
visionary, and broken, and drank the splendor of the
scene, only as a quick relief to the monotony of my
solitary life.

—“And now, Carry, with your hand locked in
mine, and your heart mine—yonder lake sleeping in
the sun, and the snowy mountains with their rosy hue,
seem like the smile of nature, bidding us be glad!”

Laurence is at Geneva; he welcomes Carry, as he
would welcome a sister. He is a noble fellow, and
tells me much of his sweet Italian wife; and presents
me to the smiling, blushing—Enrica! She has
learned English now; she has found, she says, a
better teacher, than ever I was. Yet she welcomes
me warmly, as a sister might; and we talk of those
old evenings by the blazing fire, and of the one-eyed
Maestro, as children long separated, might talk of
their school tasks, and of their teachers. She cannot
tell me enough of her praises of Laurence, and of his

noble heart.—“You were good,”—she says,—“but
Laurence is better.”

Carry admires her soft brown hair, and her deep
liquid eye, and wonders how I could ever have left
Rome?

—Do you indeed wonder—Carry?

And together we go down into Savoy, to that
marvellous valley, which lies under the shoulder of
Mont Blanc; and we wandered over the Mer de Glace,
and picked Alpine roses from the edge of the frowning
glacier. We toil at night-fall up to the monastery
of the Great St. Bernard, where the new forming
ice crackles in the narrow foot-way, and the cold
moon glistens over wastes of snow, and upon the
windows of the dark Hospice. Again, we are among
the granite heights, whose ledges are filled with ice,
upon the Grimsel. The pond is dark and cold; the
paths are slippery;—the great glacier of the Aar
sends down icy breezes, and the echoes ring from rock
to rock, as if the ice-God answered. And yet we
neither suffer, nor fear.

In the sweet valley of Meyringen, we part from
Laurence: he goes northward, by Grindelwald, and
Thun,—thence to journey westward, and to make for
the Roman girl, a home beyond the ocean. Enrica
bids me go on to Rome: she knows that Carry will
love its soft warm air, its ruins, its pictures and

temples, better than these cold valleys of Switzerland.
And she gives me kind messages for her mother, and
for Cesare; and should we be in Rome at the Easter
season, she bids us remember her, when we listen to
the Miserere, and when we see the great Chiesa on
fire, and when we saunter upon the Pincian hill;—
and remember, that it is her home.

We follow them with our eyes, as they go up the
steep height over which falls the white foam of the
clattering Reichenbach; and they wave their hands
toward us, and disappear upon the little plateau which
stretches toward the crystal Rosenlaui, and the tall,
still, Engel-Horner.

May the mountain angels guard them!

As we journey on toward that wonderful pass of
Splugen, I recal by the way, upon the heights, and in
the valleys, the spots where I lingered years before;—
here, I plucked a flower, there, I drank from that
cold, yellow glacier water; and here, upon some rock
overlooking a stretch of broken mountains, hoary with
their eternal frosts, I sat musing upon that very Future,
which is with me now. But never, even when the
ice-genii were most prodigal of their fancies to the
wanderer, did I look for more joy, or a better angel.

Afterward, when all our trembling upon the Alpine
paths has gone by, we are rolling along under the
chestnuts and lindens that skirt the banks of Como.

We recal that sweet story of Manzoni, and I point
out, as well as I may, the loitering place of the bravi,
and the track of poor Don Abbondio. We follow in
the path of the discomfited Renzi, to where the
dainty spire, and pinnacles of the Duomo of Milan,
glisten against the violet sky.

Carry longs to see Venice; its water-streets, and
palaces have long floated in her visions. In the
bustling activity of our own country, and in the quiet
fields of England, that strange, half-deserted capital,
lying in the Adriatic, has taken the strongest hold
upon her fancy.

So we leave Padua, and Verona behind us, and find
ourselves upon a soft spring noon, upon the end of
the iron road which stretches across the lagoon,
toward Venice. With the hissing of steam in the
ear, it is hard to think of the wonderful city, we are
approaching. But as we escape from the carriage,
and set our feet down into one of those strange,
hearse-like, ancient boats, with its sharp iron prow,
and listen to the melodious rolling tongue of the
Venetian gondolier:—as we see rising over the watery
plain before us, all glittering in the sun, tall, square
towers with pyramidal tops, and clustered domes, and
minarets; and sparkling roofs lifting from marble
walls—all so like the old paintings;—and as we glide
nearer and nearer to the floating wonder, under the

silent working oar, of our now silent gondolier;—
as we ride up swiftly under the deep, broad shadows
of palaces, and see plainly the play of the sea-water
in the crevices of the masonry,—and turn into
narrow rivers shaded darkly by overhanging walls,
hearing no sound, but of voices, or the swaying of the
water against the houses,—we feel the presence of the
place. And the mystic fingers of the Past, grappling
our spirits, lead them away—willing and rejoicing
captives, through the long vista of the ages, that are
gone.

Carry is in a trance;—rapt by the witchery of the
scene, into dream. This is her Venice; nor have all
the visions that played upon her fancy, been equal to
the enchanting presence of this hour of approach.

Afterward, it becomes a living thing,—stealing
upon the affections, and upon the imagination by a
thousand coy advances. We wander under the warm
Italian sunlight to the steps from which rolled the
white head of poor Marino Faliero. The gentle
Carry can now thrust her ungloved hand, into the
terrible Lion's mouth. We enter the salon of the
fearful Ten; and peep through the half opened door,
into the cabinet of the more fearful Three. We go
through the deep dungeons of Carmagnola and of
Carrara; and we instruct the willing gondolier to
push his dark boat under the Bridge of Sighs; and

with Rogers' poem in our hand, glide up to the prison
door, and read of—

I sail, listening to nothing but the dip of the gondolier's
oar, or to her gentle words, fast under the
palace door, which closed that fearful morning, on
the guilt and shame of Bianca Capello. Or, with
souls lit up by the scene, into a buoyancy that can
scarce distinguish between what is real, and what is
merely written,—we chase the anxious step of the
forsaken Corinna; or seek among the veteran palaces
the casement of the old Brabantio,—the chamber of
Desdemona,—the house of Jessica, and trace among
the strange Jew money-changers, who yet haunt the
Rialto, the likeness of the bearded Shylock. We
wander into stately churches, brushing over grass, or
tell-tale flowers that grow in the court, and find them
damp and cheerless; the incense rises murkily, and
rests in a thick cloud over the altars, and over the
paintings; the music, if so be that the organ notes
are swelling under the roof, is mournfully plaintive.

Of an afternoon we sail over to the Lido, to gladden
our eyes with a sight of land and green things,
and we pass none upon the way, save silent oarsmen,
with barges piled high with the produce of their gardens,—pushing
their way down toward the floating
city. And upon the narrow island, we find Jewish
graves, half covered by drifted sand; and from
among them, watch the sunset glimmering over a
desolate level of water. As we glide back, lights
lift over the Lagoon, and double along the Guideca,
and the Grand Canal. The little neighbor isles will
have their company of lights dancing in the water;
and from among them, will rise up against the mellow
evening sky of Italy, gaunt, unlighted houses.

After the nightfall, which brings no harmful dew
with it, I stroll, with her hand within my arm,—as
once upon the sea, and in the English Park, and in
the home-land—over that great square which lies before
the palace of St. Marks. The white moon is
riding in the middle heaven, like a globe of silver;
the gondoliers stride over the echoing stones; and
their long black shadows, stretching over the pavement,
or shaking upon the moving water, seem like
great funereal plumes, waving over the bier of Venice.

Carrying thence whole treasures of thought and
fancy, to feed upon in the after years, we wander to
Rome.

I find the old one-eyed maestro, and am met with
cordial welcome by the mother of the pretty Enrica.
The Count has gone to the marches of Ancona.
Lame Pietro still shuffles around the boards at the
Lepré, and the flower sellers at the corner, bind me
a more brilliant bouquet than ever, for a new beauty
at Rome. As we ramble under the broken arches of
the great aqueduct stretching toward Frascati, I tell
Carry, the story of my trip in the Appenines; and
we search for the pretty Carlotta. But she is married,
they tell us, to a Neapolitan guardsman. In
the spring twilight, we wander upon those heights
which lie between Frascati and Albano; and looking
westward, see that glorious view of the Campagna,
which can never be forgotten. But beyond the Campagna,
and beyond the huge hulk of St. Peter's, heaving
into the sky from the middle waste, we see, or
fancy we see, a glimpse of the sea which stretches out
and on to the land we love, better than Rome. And
in fancy, we build up that home, which shall belong
to us, on the return;—a home, that has slumbered
long in the future; and which, now that the future
has come, lies fairly before me.

Home.

Years seem to have passed. They have mellowed
life into ripeness. The start, and change, and hot
ambition of youth, seem to have gone by. A calm,
and joyful quietude has succeeded. That future
which still lies before me, seems like a roseate twilight,
sinking into a peaceful, and silent night.

My home is a cottage, near that where Isabel once
lived. The same valley is around me; the same
brook rustles, and loiters under the gnarled roots of
the overhanging trees. The cottage is no mock cottage,
but a substantial, wide spreading cottage, with
clustering gables, and ample shade;—such a cottage,
as they build upon the slopes of Devon. Vines clamber
over it, and the stones show mossy through the
interlacing climbers. There are low porches, with
cozy arm chairs; and generous oriels, fragrant with
mignionette, and the blue blossoming violets.

The chimney stacks rise high, and show clear
against the heavy pine trees, that ward off the blasts
of winter. The dovecote, is a habited dovecote, and
the purple-necked pigeons swoop around the roofs,
in great companies. The hawthorn is budding into
its June fragrance along all the lines of fence; and

the paths are trim, and clean. The shrubs,—
our neglected azalias and rhododendrons chiefest
among them,—stand in picturesque groups upon the
close shaven lawn.

The gateway in the thicket below, is between two
mossy old posts of stone; and there is a tall hemlock
flanked by a sturdy pine, for sentinel. Within
the cottage, the library is wainscotted with native
oak; and my trusty gun hangs upon a branching pair
of antlers. My rod and nets are disposed above the
generous book-shelves; and a stout eagle, once a
tenant of the native woods, sits perched over the central
alcove. An old fashioned mantel is above the
brown stone jams of the country fire-place; and along
it are distributed records of travel;—little bronze
temples from Rome, the pietro duro of Florence, the
porcelain busts of Dresden, the rich iron of Berlin,
and a cup fashioned from a stag's horn, from the
Black Forest by the Rhine.

Massive chairs stand here and there, in tempting
attitude; strewed over an oaken table in the middle,
are the uncut papers, and volumes of the day; and
upon a lion's skin stretched before the hearth, is lying
another Tray.

But this is not all. There are children in the cottage.
There is Jamie—we think him handsome—
for he has the dark hair of his mother, and the same

black eye, with its long, heavy fringe. There is Carry
—little Carry I must call her now—with a face full
of glee, and rosy with health; then there is a little
rogue some two years old, whom we call Paul—a
very bad boy,—as we tell him.

The mother is as beautiful as ever, and far more
dear to me; for gratitude has been adding, year by
year, to love. There have been times when a harsh
word of mine, uttered in the fatigues of business, have
touched her; and I have seen that soft eye fill with
tears; and I have upbraided myself for causing her
one pang. But such things she does not remember;
or remembers, only to cover with her gentle forgiveness.

Laurence and Enrica are living near us. And the
old gentleman, who was Carry's god-father, sits with
me, on sunny days upon the porch, and takes little
Paul upon his knee, and wonders if two such daughters
as Enrica, and Carry are to be found in the
world. At twilight, we ride over to see Laurence;
Jamie mounts with the coachman; little Carry puts
on her wide-rimmed Leghorn for the evening visit;
and the old gentleman's plea for Paul, cannot be denied.
The mother too is with us; and old Tray
comes whisking along, now frolicking before the
horses' heads, and then bounding off after the flight
of some belated bird.

Away from that cottage home, I seem away from
life. Within it, that broad, and shadowy future,
which lay before me in boyhood and in youth, is
garnered,—like a fine mist, gathered into drops of
crystal.

And when away—those long letters, dating from
the cottage home, are what tie me to life. That
cherished wife, far dearer to me now, than when she
wrote that first letter, which seemed a dark veil between
me and the future—writes me now, as tenderly
as then. She narrates, in her delicate way, all the
incidents of the home life; she tells me of their rides,
and of their games, and of the new planted trees;—
of all their sunny days, and of their frolics on the
lawn; she tells me how Jamie is studying, and of
little Carry's beauty, growing every day, and of
rogueish Paul—so like his father! And she sends
me a kiss from each of them; and bids me such adieu,
and such `God's blessing,' that it seems as if an
angel guarded me.

But this is not all; for Jamie has written a postscript:

—“Dear Father,” he says, “mother wishes me
to tell you how I am studying. What would you
think, father, to have me talk in French to you,
when you come back? I wish you would come back

though; the hawthorns are coming out, and the apricot
under my window is all full of blossoms. If you
should bring me a present, as you almost always do,—
I would like a fishing rod.

Home.

And little Carry has her fine, rambling characters
running into a second postscript.

“Why don't you come, papa; you stay too long;
I have ridden the pony twice; once he most threw
me off. This is all from

Home.

And Paul has taken the pen too, and in his extraordinary
effort to make a big P, has made a very big
blot. And Jamie writes under it—“This is Paul's
work, Pa; but he says it's a love blot, only he loves
you ten hundred times more.”

And after your return, Jamie will insist that you
should go with him to the brook, and sit down with
him upon a tuft of the brake, to fling off a line into
the eddies, though only the nibbling roach are sporting
below. You have instructed the workmen to
spare the clumps of bank-willows, that the wood-duck
may have a covert in winter, and that the Bob-o-Lincolns
may have a quiet nesting place in the spring.

Sometimes your wife,—too kind to deny such favor

—will stroll with you along the meadow banks, and
you pick meadow daisies in memory of the old time.
Little Carry weaves them into rude chaplets, to dress
the forehead of Paul, and they dance along the green-sward,
and switch off the daffodils, and blow away the
dandelion seeds, to see if their wishes are to come
true. Jamie holds a butter cup under Carry's chin,
to find if she loves gold; and Paul, the rogue, teases
them, by sticking a thistle into sister's curls.

The pony has hard work to do under Carry's swift
riding—but he is fed by her own hand, with the cold
breakfast rolls. The nuts are gathered in time, and
stored for long winter evenings, when the fire is burning
bright and cheerily—a true, hickory blaze,—
which sends its waving gleams over eager, smiling
faces, and over well-stored book shelves, and portraits
of dear, lost ones. While from time to time, that
wife, who is the soul of the scene, will break upon
the children's prattle, with the silver melody of her
voice, running softly and sweetly through the couplets
of Crabbe's stories, or the witchery of the Flodden
Tale.

Then the boys will guess conundrums, and play at fox
and geese; and Tray, cherished in his age, and old
Milo petted in his dotage, lie side by side, upon the
lion's skin, before the blazing hearth. Little Tomtit
the goldfinch sits sleeping on his perch, or cocks

his eye at a sudden crackling of the fire, for a familiar
squint upon our family group.

But there is no future without its straggling clouds.
Even now a shadow is trailing along the landscape.

It is a soft and mild day of summer. The leaves
are at their fullest. A southern breeze has been
blowing up the valley all the morning, and the light,
smoky haze hangs in the distant mountain gaps, like
a veil on beauty. Jamie has been busy with his lessons,
and afterward playing with Milo upon the lawn.
Little Carry has come in from a long ride—her face
blooming, and her eyes all smiles, and joy. The
mother has busied herself with those flowers she loves
so well. Little Paul, they say, has been playing in
the meadow, and old Tray has gone with him.

But at dinner time, Paul has not come back.

“Paul ought not to ramble off so far,” I say.

The mother says nothing; but there is a look of
anxiety upon her face, that disturbs me. Jamie
wonders where Paul can be, and he saves for him,
whatever he knows Paul will like—a heaping platefull.
But the dinner hour passes, and Paul does not
come. Old Tray lies in the sun-shine by the porch.

Now the mother is indeed anxious. And I, though
I conceal this from her, find my fears strangely
active. Something like instinct guides me to the

meadow: I wander down the brook-side calling—
Paul!—Paul! But there is no answer.

All the afternoon we search, and the neighbors
search; but it is a fruitless toil. There is no joy
that evening: the meal passes in silence; only little
Carry with tears in her eyes, asks,—if Paul will soon
come back? All the night we search and call:—the
mother even braving the night air, and running here
and there, until the morning finds us sad, and despairing.

That day—the next—cleared up the mystery; but
cleared it up with darkness. Poor little Paul!—he
has sunk under the murderous eddies of the brook!
His boyish prattle, his rosy smiles, his artless talk,
are lost to us forever!

I will not tell how nor when we found him: nor
will I tell of our desolate home, and of her grief—the
first crushing grief of her life.

The cottage is still. The servants glide noiseless,
as if they might startle the poor little sleeper. The
house seems cold—very cold. Yet it is summer
weather; and the south breeze plays softly along the
meadow, and softly over the murderous eddies of the
brook.

Then comes the hush of burial. The kind mourners
are there:—it is easy for them to mourn!

The good clergyman prays by the bier:—`Oh,
Thou, who did'st take upon thyself human woe, and
drank deep of every pang in life, let thy spirit come
and heal this grief, and guide toward that Better
Land, where justice and love shall reign, and hearts
laden with anguish, shall rest forevermore!'

Weeks roll on; and a smile of resignation lights up
the saddened features of the mother. Those dark
mourning robes speak to the heart deeper, and more
tenderly, than ever the bridal costume. She lightens
the weight of your grief by her sweet words of resignation:—“Paul,”
she says, “God has taken our
boy!”

Other weeks roll on. Joys are still left—great and
ripe joys. The cottage smiling in the autumn sumshine
is there: the birds are in the forest boughs:
Jamie and little Carry are there; and she, who is
more than them all, is cheerful, and content.
Heaven has taught us that the brightest future has
its clouds;—that this life is a motley of lights and
shadows. And as we look upon the world around us,
and upon the thousand forms of human misery, there
is a gladness in our deep thanksgiving.

A year goes by; but it leaves no added shadow on
our hearth-stone. The vines clamber, and flourish:
the oaks are winning age and grandeur: little Carry

is blooming into the pretty coyness of girlhood; and
Jamie with his dark hair, and flashing eyes, is the
pride of his mother.

There is no alloy to pleasure, but the remembrance
of poor little Paul. And even that, chastened as it
is with years, is rather a grateful memorial that our
life is not all here, than a grief that weighs upon our
hearts.

Sometimes, leaving little Carry and Jamie to their
play, we wander at twilight to the willow tree, beneath
which our drowned boy sleeps calmly, for the
Great Awaking. It is a Sunday, in the week-day of
our life, to linger by the little grave,—to hang
flowers upon the head-stone, and to breathe a prayer
that our little Paul may sleep well, in the arms of
Him who loveth children!

And her heart, and my heart, knit together by sorrow,
as they had been knit by joy—a silver thread
mingled with the gold—follow the dead one to the
Land that is before us; until at last we come to
reckon the boy, as living in the new home, which
when this is old, shall be ours also. And my spirit,
speaking to his spirit, in the evening watches, seems
to say joyfully—so joyfully that the tears half choke
the utterance—“Paul, my boy, we will be there!”

And the mother, turning her face to mine, so that
I see the moisture in her eye, and catch its heavenly

look, whispers softly—so softly, that an angel might
have said it,—“Yes, dear, we will be THERE!”

The night had now come, and my day under the
oaks was ended. But a crimson belt yet lingered
over the horizon, though the stars were out.

A line of shaggy mist lay along the surface of the
brook. I took my gun from beside the tree, and my
shot-pouch from its limb, and whistling for Carlo—as
if it had been Tray—I strolled over the bridge, and
down the lane, to the old house under the elms.

I dreamed pleasant dreams that night;—for
I dreamed that my Reverie was real.