University of Virginia Library

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:—