University of Virginia Library

33. CHAPTER XXXIII.

Before Caroline Hay had been three days at
home, she had become painfully sensible that her father's
forebodings as to the effect of a city residence
had not been unfounded. All was changed to her
eye, if not to her heart. Much as she loved the
dear inmates of the plentiful farm-house,—and she
loved them as dearly as ever,—an air of coarseness,
which she had never before observed, met her at
every turn. Her mother's dress and occupations,
the homely phraseology of her sisters, the furniture,
the style of living, though certainly unchanged, or
at least not changed for the worse, struck her unpleasantly,
and chilled her feelings even against the
pleadings of her heart and of her better judgment.
She saw and acknowledged that all was good and
true, generous and contented and happy, that her
father's house was a well-spring of bounty to all
who were in need, and that to him, and to his excellent
partner and help in all ood things, the
whole neighborhood looked with undoubting trust

for sympathy and kindness. She compared the
simplicity and ease of her rustic home with the
feverish excitement of the scene she had left,
and though her reason and her good sense told her
which to approve, she found that habit had become
tyrannical, and likely to maintain a struggle in
her mind which would cost her many bitter tears.

The acquaintance which she had accidentally
formed in the city beyond her aunt's sober circle,
had been rather showy than solid people, who were
however possessed of sufficient refinement to add a
degree of fascination to their gay tastes and habits;
so that the eyes and ears of the inexperienced country
girl were at once dazzled and delighted, and she
learned to look upon elegance as almost synonymous
with dashing, and to find every thing insipid
or vulgar which was characterized by plainness
and sobriety. No wonder she contemplated with
mortified pride the unadorned aspect of things at
home! We are all, it is true enough, marvellously
forgetful of the outward life after we have lived
long enough at the West to become indoctrinated
with the current opinions;—but to return.

Unpleasant feelings were not wanting on the
other side. So prone is youth to extremes, that it
is not surprising that Caroline should have used her
liberty and her father's liberal allowance in providing
herself with dress which was rather gaudy than
elegant. Her aunt had felt her inability to be a
counsellor on a subject where her own views were

averse to even the smallest indulgence of taste or
fancy, and the dress-maker had been but too happy
to display all her art on so elegant a form—those
artists generally considering their employers rather
in the light of sign-posts than of rational beings.
So our poor Caroline was very fine. There were
such loads of curls that the fair head reminded one
of a flourishing bed of Scotch kail, or of the decorations
of some lucky child, who, having the petites
entrées of a carpenter's shop, makes use of the opportunity
to cover her eyes and ears with elegant
pine shavings. Her fingers were heaped with incongruous
rings, and worse than all were the long
ear-pendants, which vibrated with every word, and
seemed determined to repose their weary length on
the snow-white shoulders below.

A costume, which would appear a little ultra even
in the city, wears an air of absolute ridicule in the
country; and while Caroline was feeling the plainness
of her mother and sisters as a mortification
to her pride, they, on their part, were absolutely
ashamed of her finery. They could not think her
ornaments improved her beauty, and, as a further
and incontestable proof of their rustic breeding,
they told her so; which made her cry, and then
they were sorry, and on the whole there was a
degree of constraint in their intercourse which cast
a shadow on the delight of having Caroline at
home once more.

These things being so, we must acknowledge

that it afforded rather a relief when word came that
Mrs. Thurston, overcome by distress and fatigue,
added to some exposure in her night-ride, was quite
ill at Mr. Ellingham's, and much in need of some
friendly aid from Caroline or her mother. Seymour
Bullitt brought the message, and Caroline,
when she saw him by daylight, was more struck
than before with the marvellous improvement in
his appearance, and particularly with the quiet self-possession
of his manner. Indeed she could not
but own to herself that she had known a person,
far his inferior in most respects, pass in the city as
“a splendid fellow”—but then, old recollections,
and such a countrified name!

Mrs. Hay went to Mrs. Thurston, who grew
worse daily; and after a few days' effort, ague accomplished
its usual work by prostrating the nurse;
and Caroline took her mother's place by the bedside
of the sufferer.

This was a new scene for her, and one which
soon proved of an absorbing interest. Mrs. Thurston's
symptoms became more and more alarming,
while she herself won more and more upon the affections
of her young attendant. She was of a saintly
piety, and so lovely in disposition and manner that
it was impossible for a young and ingenuous mind
to know her without loving her. No extremity of
suffering ever overtasked her patience, no disappointment
or omission of duty in others ever ruffled
her serene countenance. Hers was that perfect

self-forgetfulness which binds all around to a warm
and voluntary attention and remembrance, and
Caroline felt that the cares and fatigues of such a
sick chamber were any thing but a task. She was
sole nurse, for though every effort had been made
to procure a regular one, there was no such being
within ken, and the neighbors, though all kindness,
were distant, and could not leave their homes, or
perhaps were detained by the illness of their own
families, for it is one of the disadvantages of the
country that sickness is very apt to prevail in
neighborhoods so as to make it difficult to procure
attendance.

During this time of trial and anxiety Seymour
was by no means an idle spectator. He had become
interested in Mrs. Thurston and her husband
from the circumstances of his first meeting with
them, and they in turn had appreciated his kind
manner, and felt gratified by his friendly attentions.
Now that they were in need of real and substantial
aid, Seymour was at the service of the sick and
afflicted, and many times a day might have been
observed galloping in various directions, on different
errands of mercy, a most useful auxiliary in the
country where population is so scattered, and the
ordinary comforts of the invalid sometimes so far to
seek. It not unfrequently fell to his lot to be the
bearer of messages or more ponderous matters between
Mr. Hay's house and the scene of suffering,

and sometimes to escort to and fro the young nurse,
when she could be spared for a little while.

It would be difficult to say just what were Seymour's
feelings towards his fair enemy at this
period. He thought them those belonging to indifference;
indeed, he sometimes concluded, of dislike.
Her manner, though softened much by the late
rousing of her sensibilities, was still that of one
who had been accustomed to admiration; and
though she had gradually, and almost unconsciously,
laid by all her finery, her appearance retained something
of that dashing air which struck Seymour
unpleasantly, both from his natural taste for grave
simplicity and from its unsuitableness to the objects
by which they were surrounded. And Miss
Hay, if she thought of Seymour at all, had all old
impressions habitually present, although she was
often surprised to notice traits which she could not
reconcile to those impressions. But she was not
much concerned to do justice to one whom she had
known as a clodhopper; so their intercourse,
though civil and frequent, was frigid enough.

They were one evening at sunset returning together
to Mr. Ellingham's, and had turned from
the high road into the wood, when they were overtaken
by a horseman, whose rapid pace continued
till he had passed them, when he reined up suddenly,
and greeted Miss Hay as an old acquaintance.
He was a young man of gentlemanly

appearance, and his face was of that striking and
animated cast which one does not easily forget.
His whole exterior was such as would claim some
praise any where, and of course it was remarkable
enough in a wild Western forest.

Caroline was evidently embarrassed at the
meeting, but recovering herself, introduced the
gentleman as Mr. Avenard, and made inquiries
after some city friends. The stranger's manner,
in spite of manifest effort, betrayed a degree of
agitation, and he eyed Seymour with no gratified
air. The latter felt himself in the way, but he did
not know very well how to get out of it, so the
trio rode together to Mr. Ellingham's.

Here Caroline apologized for not inviting the
stranger to enter, on account of the situation of the
family. His dark eyes flashed at this, and drawing
as near her as possible, he asked, in a low tone,
when he might hope to see her again.

Caroline felt cruelly embarrassed. A thousand
indistinct thoughts flashed across her mind in an
instant. She knew that Avenard, though never a
declared lover, had had abundant reason to suppose
himself not disagreeable to her, and her heart
whispered that if her sudden departure from the
city had not prevented, he would probably have
been not only a declared but an accepted one. But
even the short time which had flown since her
return had been sufficient, under the circumstances,
to throw an air of coldness and hollowness over

most of her city reminiscences, and even over her
partiality for this gay young man. The grief of
Mrs. Thurston, her distressing illness, and the angelic
piety which sustained her under all, had
opened to Caroline a new world of thought and
feeling; and the delightful consciousness of being
useful had given her a sense of the true value and
aim of life. So that Avenard and his claims had
been for the time forgotten, and now that they
were presented anew, she felt unprepared and uncomfortable.

In reply to his question, she said, in a voice as
low as his own, “I cannot receive a visit here,
but if you will come in the morning, I will ride
over with you to my father's.”

He bowed proudly and without speaking, and,
turning his horse's head, rode away evidently dissatisfied;
and Seymour Bullitt, not entering as
usual, went his way too, with his heart beating
inconveniently, and his face almost as red as when
Caroline first knew him—and about what?

He could not make up his own mind on this
point. What was it to him that this dashing young
stranger had evidently expected a favorable reception
from Miss Hay? He called to mind all
the evidences of the young lady's dislike to himself,—and
they were faithfully recorded in his
memory,—and then tried to bring proof equally
satisfactory, of his own indifference to her likes or
dislikes. It required all the time occupied in a

very long détour—a gallop of half a dozen miles
or so—to think over these things, and after all,
when Seymour went to bed, the only fruit of his
reflections was a manful resolution not to call at
Mr. Ellingham's again while the strenger was in
the neighborhood.