 | THE CONFESSIONS. Idomen, or, The vale of Yumuri |  |
4. THE CONFESSIONS.
Madam Burleigh told me, that for a year,
she had not read. To think of the scenes
that had past, was now, sufficient amusement
for her hours of leisure and reflection.
The recent events of reality were still passing
in her memory, and affected more intensely her
thoughts than even those works of feeling and
fancy which had once so strongly attracted
her.
“I am,” she said, “surprised at my own
contentment. Before I saw you, I had no certain
good in view, yet despite of all that has
befallen me, I have felt, since established in
this cottage, as if sustained by some pleasing
hope.”
Happy climate, I exclaimed, what a power
dost thou possess of throwing a bright misty
you have accepted my friendship;—you
do not doubt my integrity. Tell me, then, all
that has passed to you. Confide in me, even
as in thy God when thou addressest thyself to
him in prayer!
This speech brought tears to her eyes.—
Sweet, sweet tears of gratitude and guileless
confidence! who else had ever dropped them
for me?
Souls have existence upon earth, fully capable
of friendship! but scattered are they, far
apart, by time, circumstance, and that pride
which shudders at rejection. How many pass
to the grave, without knowing even one fellow
being! How pines, in secret, the solitary
philanthropist, who wastes his benevolence upon
ingrates; and lavishes upon those who heed
it not, that love of which the mere knowledge
would have been heaven to a bosom of reciprocity!
The breakfast table was occupied and removed.
We retired to a little boudoir separated
by a white curtain from the principal apartment.
Here stood a sofa, and near it a small
work-table, adorned with a vase of tuberoses,
pomegranate and lime blossoms.
Idomen sat down and busied her hands as
when I first had known her. I placed myself
by her side on the sofa, and entreated her to
describe to me the days of her absence.
“Life,” she said, “was new when I first saw
but misery, save that of many griefs in childhood,
I never yet had tasted.
“After my cousin and Ethalwald had departed
and you, my friend were gone, perhaps never
to return, I began to reflect on my condition.
Our affairs grew worse and worse. Vessel
after vessel had been taken at sea, and Burleigh
my husband, sought relief from his fears, in
such amusements as suspended recollection.
A stranger to need and to economy, his expenses
increased with his misfortunes.
“I lingered sadly at home, took care of my
darling boy, and endeavored to make what
little retrenchment I could, to avert, if possible,
the ruin which I knew was in pending.
“The neighbors who surrounded us became
less warm in their attentions. `I foresaw
from the first, what every thing would come
to,' said a lady who came to visit me. `Mrs.
Burleigh,' said another, `your piano, I am
afraid, must soon be closed. I foresee that you
must soon be obliged to make a change in your
way of living.' I, too, foresaw enough. I
knew that some change must be at hand, but
a vague hope sustained me.
“Our table had been hospitable, our doors
open to many; but to part with our well garnished
dwelling, had now become inevitable. We
retired with one servant, to a remote house of
meaner dimensions; and were sought no longer
by those who had come in our wealth.
“I looked earnestly around me; the present
was cheerless, the future, dark and fearful.—
My parents were dead, my few relatives in
distant countries, where they thought, perhaps,
little of my happiness.
“Burleigh I never had loved, other than as a
father and protector; but he had been the benefactor
of my fallen family, and to him I owed
comfort, education, and every shadow of pleasure,
that had ever glanced before me, in this
world. But the sun of his energies was setting,
and the faults which had balanced his
virtues, increased as his fortune declined.—
He might live through many years of misery;
and to be devoted to him was my duty while
a spark of his life endured. I strove to nerve
my heart for the worst. Still there were moments
when fortitude became faint with endurance;
and visions of happiness that might
have been mine, came smiling to my fevered
imagination. I wept and prayed in agony.
“Still heaven was kind to me, for I felt not
the suffering of want. The disgusting lamp,
with its oil of sea animals, took the place of
my neat waxen tapers; but my rooms were
decent and comfortable, and my wood fire well
supplied.
“Burleigh passed many of his evenings, I
knew not where. Perhaps it was a fault that I
never had complained of his absence, and that
I forbore reproach, and shrank when rough
answers were made to me.
“My little Arvon said his prayers and went
early to bed, and many a long hour I sat alone
arranging his garments and my own. My
hands were employed, but thought could not
be confined.
“During evenings like these, fancy wandered
sometimes in pleasant fields, and many verses
came flowing to be arranged, and were written
on slips of paper in my work basket.
“Wakeful, sometimes, in the night, I listened
to the moaning of the winds of winter, and to
the breathing of my sleeping husband; beguiling
my fears of what might come, by thinking
of plans for its endurance.
“In these reveries, I said in my heart, `when
a little child I could make verses, I will strive
to excel in Poetry. The poets are distinguished;
fame attracts friends, and if I can have
friends, sincere and elegant friends, poverty
and seclusion will be nothing. Alas! how was
I mistaken!”'
In uttering this exclamation, Idomen became
disconcerted. She dropped, awhile, the cambric
she was sewing, and half concealed her
face with a cluster of flowers that I had brought
for her. Their odour was powerful, resembling
that of the little plant mignionette; I had
plucked them from a tender tree that I had
brought, for its fragrance, from Guamacaro;
and I now blest them for their influence.
Idomen subdued her emotion. My eyes
were fixed on her, and she seemed to divine
will tell you all,' she said, `and yet, in those
dark moments I have described, I thought of
the stranger Ethalwald, only as a picture I had
seen, or as the beautiful delineation of some
poet.
`Could I even have seen him, in those days, I
would not for worlds that he should have looked
upon my unhappiness. In my former pleasant
drawing room, I had sighed for the image
(when it came smiling to my soul,) that I
now endeavored to banish from a dwelling-place
that seemed to me so dreary.
`In this secluded dwelling-place my first
crime was committed—do not start or shrink
at the word!—crime, indeed it was, but a crime
that passed only in intellect,—this material
form that your early praises conspired, oh!
my friend, to make me value, has been guarded,
in kindness, by heaven!'
“I felt assured, but said only: This, indeed,
is thy promise, continue. She paused a moment
and resumed: `The man of the world
might laugh;—the prude, male or female,
might condemn. In my own bosom I felt
sometimes half guilty, and sometimes grateful
to providence for the amusement and solace
afforded me. Crime, even though it were, it
healed my sickening spirit, and saved me, perhaps,
from the gloomy prostration of despair.
`There lived at P—d an uncommon man,
descended from some of the Scottish settlers
of New England. His name was Birkmoor
Grant. He had passed with reputation, through
one of the best Universities of the New
World.
`In a country where wealth is divided, and
few individuals have much, the merit and
learning of Grant obtained for him sufficient
distinction. He had risen by his qualities and
efforts, above the restraints of poverty, and
moved in the most refined circles of merchants
whose earnings had escaped the wreck of
wars and of winds, and of men who had studied
at school and were successful in the learned
professions. In the cities of the North
American Republic, such are the only nobility.
Birkmoor Grant, when a little child, had suffered
the sorrows of an orphan; and seemed
to have feeling and taste.
`In a note, written amidst a thousand hopes
and fears, I sent to him requesting an interview,
and received him with trembling, when
he came, yet succeeded, at last, in expressing
the desire I had formed of publishing some of
my verses.
`Oh! my ever valued friend, whom heaven
allows me to meet again, in the solitude of
this island, after so many eventful years! the
praises first received from you in the snowy
region of my birth, were then still resounding
design.
`I spoke with emotion and earnestness;
Grant heard me with attention, and promised to
lend me his assistance.
`I now became happier than before; charmed
and amused, I went cheerfully through the labors
of my little household; copied, translated
and composed.
`Secluded from the world, and pained by the
cold regards of some whom I had known in
better fortune, the visits of Birkmoor Grant afforded
me the utmost relief. He looked over
my verses and my prose; scrutinized and praised.
`Save a few, my dear friend, shown to you,
these verses, which then became so great a solace
to me, had never been read by any mortal.
Burleigh, my husband, so far from cultivating
letters, very seldom even read or wrote;
even his letters on business were written by
others at his dictation. Still, nature had implanted
in him, the highest and most perfect
veneration for learning and the elegant arts;
and no student or tyro, ever asked him in vain
for a subscription.
`Persons like this overrate the ability of others;
Burleigh declared himself no judge of what
I wrote, but favored the visits of Grant, and saw
how my hours were employed with satisfaction
and encouragement.
`Caution and coldness characterize, it is
said, men of the Northern republic. Of the first,
Birkmoor Grant had his share; yet his actions
to me, were most friendly; and the fervor of a
gratitude, expressed from the depths of my
soul, threw him sometimes off his guard, and
drew from him words of passion.
`Your visits, I said, with a little music and
poetry, are, now all the pleasure of my existence!
At the future I dare not look:—the
prospect is too doubtful—too dismal. May I
even hope, always, for your friendship. “Always,
so help me God!” was the answer.—
He was pale, he trembled, and drops of perspiration
appeared and stood upon his forehead—
How many oaths are uttered that never reach
even so deep as the memory of him who speaks
them!
`This scene transpired of a morning, when
he whom heaven had sent as the friend of my
dark hours, alone, was sitting, by my side, over
a MSS. which he had read, marked, and corrected.
It was but a momentary meeting of
souls destined soon to be severed, or wrapt in
that impenetrable envelop which shrouds the
best thoughts of mortal beings. If we ever
meet again, in time or eternity, gratitude will
still expand the sentiments of mine, and his
cannot suffer with remorse, for injury either
done or caused to me.
`Birkmoor Grant, when my friend, had reached
morals and good conduct. His company was
sought by the gayest circles around him; and
many a father and mother were pleased when
he visited their daughters. His person, besides,
was excellent, in height, figure, and
features; and his crisped hair, blacker than
the raven of Canada, the snake of the Mississippi,
or the vulture that stalked this morning
by the limpid and flowery Yumuri.
`Besides these endowments of nature, which
had been trained to produce more effect than
is common with men of his country and profession,
the manners of Grant were cultivated;
and he piqued himself on being able to shut up
his books, and to look when he pleased, like a
man of the world.
`I often wrote pages merely for the pleasure
of hearing him read a few words. His visits
were frequent; sometimes in the presence of
Burleigh and my son; sometimes in my hours
of solitude.
`Often when drest for some neighboring ball
or festival, he would come ere the evening had
advanced, and spend half an hour at our fireside.
At one of these intervals, I said to him,
in sincerity: `How kind of you to remain here
so long in quiet conversation with a recluse,
while a circle of gay young girls have, perhaps,
attired themselves to please you, and are now,
perhaps, waiting in expectation.' `Because,'
happiness.'
`A shade of self-complacency marked the
rest of his visit, as well as an evident satisfaction
that his presence was fully appreciated; and
that his voluntary absence from a more happy
company was considered in the light of a sacrifice.
`Soon after this, I had reason for less of gratitude.
A year had passed in a pleasant and
harmless friendship; but the motives of Grant
were now changed and apparent. He uttered
sentiments that I could not answer; and gave
me to perceive, that beneath the veil of my retired
misfortunes, he was capable of a deed that
must afterwards be concealed by falsehood.
`Here, then, was my crime. I had not courage
to part with his visits immediately. Do
not start, my friend, or blame me too deeply.
`These visits were dangerous, but no more.
`Could he basely avail himself of a weight of
circumstances that I struggled continually to
bear? Could he sacrifice a sincere friend to
himself, and conceal the deed by duplicity? A
thought like that, alone was sufficient for my
preservation. Yet, I suffered him to hope, for
a while, and to think himself completely beloved.
That sufferance alone seemed a crime to
me, and the sense of a mental debasement, added
at intervals to my torments. Still, his
company continued to be a solace and amusement;
him a copy of these verses, which were a close
to our readings together in Italian:
Such feelings must thy soul refine
As are not oft of mortal birth:
'Tis love without a stain of earth,
Fratello del mio cor.
Looks are its food, its nectar sighs,
Its couch the lips, its throne the eyes,
The soul its breath, and so possest
Heaven's raptures reign in mortal breast,
Fratello del mio cor.
Though friendship be its earthly name,
Purely from highest heaven it came;
'Tis seldom felt for more than one,
And scorns to dwell with Venus' son,
Fratello del mio cor.
Him let it view not, or it dies
Like tender hues of morning skies,
Or morn's sweet flower of purple glow,
When sunny beams too ardent grow,
Fratello del mio cor.
A charm o'er every object plays,
All looks so lovely, while it stays,
So softly forth in rosier tides,
The vital flood ecstatic glides,
Fratello del mio cor,
A very life drop leaves the heart;
Such drop, I need not tell thee, fell,
While bidding it for thee, farewell.
Fratello del mio cor.
`The habitual prudence of Grant preserved
him, I doubt not, from pain—he loved the less
as he esteemed the more; and not very long
after this, sought a girl of fortune in marriage.
`I had no time to think of him more, for soon
my whole soul became absorbed, and every
moment devoted. Poor Burleigh had caught
a fever by a series of imprudent exposures,
against which, all remonstrance had been vain.
By his bed I continually watched, reflecting
upon benefits received at his hands, and on the
large amount of good dispensed in the sphere
around him. Wayward and petulant, immoveable
in will, and with character unformed, save
by circumstance, his faults had increased
with misfortune,; but his soul remained full of
generosity. He died, and my boy was an orphan.
`Pale with grief and watching, I saw him deposited
in the earth; and of those who had
sought and received from him, a few appeared
as my comforters.'
Dalcour arose, paced with me a few moments
the leafy piazza, shook the fragrance
from a jessamine of Florida that hung like a
curtain between the rustic pillars, and asked
story he had begun. Pleased with the melody
of his voice, I had shared the melancholy pleasure
that he evidently took in its recital. I
plucked a rich carnation from a vase of limestone
that stood raised from the earth, and sat
down again upon the sofa of bajuca, inhaling
the perfume of the flower that so lately had
luxuriated near me.
Dalcour called to a negro who assisted in
keeping the night watch; a mocking bird of
Virginia was soon hung in his cage, upon the
lattice of grenadilla that overshadowed the
fountain, and the notes of the bird, softened
by a little distance, were heard at intervals,
as the friend of Idomen continued again his
recital:
“Madam Burleigh had paused, and I saw that
she was agitated. Fearing to exhaust her too
much, I arose to depart, recommended an
early meal and siesta; and obtained from her
a promise to ride with me, for health, at the
decline of the sun.
“Protected from the heat by an umbrella of
peculiar construction, I rode slowly into the
town; procured neat trappings for a lady's
pony, ard returned to wait the time of the
passeo at my own growing plantation.
“At five o'clock I returned again to the
dwelling of Idomen, while Benito, my excellent
negro, followed in my track, with a pony
reared and broken in the neighborhood.
“For the use of ladies, few horses are more
delightful than those of Cuba, and this was one
of the most gentle. I had purchased him for
his beauty, easy step, and obedience to the
rein, and my heart now exulted in seeing him
adorned for a friend, endeared to me by so
many circumstances.
“The saddle cloth I had procured in the morning
was blue bordered with yellow, and in the
Spanish taste. Though favorable to the dress
of the rider, I half regretted its concealment
of the fine mottled sides of the gentle gray
creature, who curved his neck as Idomen
mounted to her seat.
“Benito, my negro, loved the animal, and had
taken of him unusual care. On this occasion
he had fastened round his neck[1]
a garland of
my newly blown roses, and named the pretty
creature as he stood still to receive this first
ornament “Ojo-dulce.” The dress of Idomen
was light gray, bordered with black; thrown
open because of the warmth of the air, and
showing frills of neat lawn at the neck, hands,
and bosom. She wore on her head a fine
palm-leaf hat of the country, surrounded by a
wreath, woven, as she waited my arrival, of
blossoms from an orange tree in her enclosure.
“The sun was approaching his decline with
more than usual resplendency; and the expressive
face of my companion, seemed beaming
with health and pleasure. Her light exercise;—the
odor of her flowers;—the colors of
twilight;—the melting, as it were, of the whole
sky;—a sense, perhaps, also of confidence in
my protection;—the whole charming present
combined, had steeped for the moment her
heart, as if in a flood of balm; and scenes and
beings at a distance, were banished awhile,
even from that memory which so closely and
constantly retained them.
“A blood-warm bath, perfumed with orange
flowers, and softened with an infusion of malva,
is not more grateful to the form weary of
exertion, than hours like that to souls that
have suffered from sorrow.
“We rode through Matanzas;—it was the
hour of the passeo. Numerous volantes adorned
with silken fringe and silver plating passed
each other in the streets, filled with ladies
entirely unveiled and dressed for the evening.
It was pleasant to hear the music of their greetings,
and to see the quick, peculiar movement
of their small hands, waved in salutation; yet
we soon passed through the town towards the
Rio San Juan, and sought the cool borders of
the bay.
“Refreshed by the breeze of the waters, we
rode slowly on till attracted by a group of trees
a moment from our horses, to examine the
bowery retreat.
“A wild fig tree had formed itself on an old
wall[2]
perhaps of some early Spanish settler, for
no vestige of the edifice remained, save only
that portion which distinctly appeared through
the meshes of the curious plant, which rising
above it in the air were united in a stately trunk.
Large masses of luxuriant foliage, extended
themselves on high, in a circular form; and
relieved with their dark deep green, eight tall
silver shafted palmettos standing round it at
a pleasing distance.
“The whole seemed a temple of nature. Visit
it, when you ride with Ambrosio. Perhaps
he will sketch it with his pencil. The spot to
me had a charm, and indeed, so had every thing
beheld on that day and lovelier evening. While
we still lingered, looking alternately at the
scene and the colors of the sea and sky, a gentleman
passed us followed by two servants
with laden horses, as if returning to the country.
He looked at us both with scrutiny, and
saluted Idomen in Spanish by her christian
name; she waved her hand with some emotion
Dios.'
“The sun was near sinking; yet the rider
proceeded slowly, looking back till we remounted
our horses. His name, said Idomen, is
Belton; I knew him at Guamacaro, as the very
intimate friend of my deceased uncle Lewellyn.
“We passed back through the town at a
quickened pace for, at this time, but few volantes
were found lingering in the duskiness.
I left Madam Burleigh at her door, promising
to return the next morning after breakfast.—
Assisted by Benito, I threaded my way through
the dark wood, bending closely to the neck of
my pony, to avoid the boughs and vines that
swept over us, till we gained the commodious
avenue of my newly planted bamboos.
“My contented negroes came severally to
welcome my return. They had washed their
arms and faces at their own tank, and brought
with them little children to witness the safety
of their master.
“Supper was already spread, and as soon as
I could I retired. But when bathed and composed
upon my pillow, the looks of the stranger
who had spoken to Idomen by the wild
fig-tree, seemed present again ere I slept.
“As soon as the labors of another day were
directed, I took with me again my faithful negro,
and repaired to the dwelling of my friend.
“Benito brought on his horse a vase of tuberoses
in water, together with the blossoms of
that little tree, more fragrant than the mignonnette
of France; covered from the sun with
fresh plantain leaves. Madam Burleigh received
them unwilted. I had become more
anxious than ever to hear the rest of her adventures.
She waited but to taste with me the
milk of a cocoa-nut, placed the flowers I had
brought on a little table of her cool curtained
boudoir, and thus continued her narrative:
`When poor Burleigh was laid in the earth,
my health, for some weeks, continued wretched,
but I struggled for fortitude and composure,
and assistance was not long withheld.—
Lewellyn Lloyd, my uncle, soon heard of my
bereavement, and sent for me to come to this
Island.
`To see another country and climate was
pleasing to my imagination; but it grieved me
to part with little Arvon. A friend, once dependent
on my husband, remained still attached
and unchanged. He urged the necessity
of my absence, and promised to take care of
my boy till I could send or come to reclaim
him. I saw that he loved the child, and trusted,
with tears, my dear little orphan to his assurances.
`My autumnal voyage to this island was long
and interrupted by storms. Sick and tossed
upon the waves I scarcely rose from my pil
was but pain and hurried reflection, cheered at
intervals with hopes of the future.
`The winds became hushed as we approached,
and beneath the clear waters of the Bahamas,
the sea-flowers were seen upon the sands.
The odour of plants and ripened coffee came
greeting our senses while still upon the bosom
of the ocean. To see the distant land was renovation,
and cold, storms, and sickness were
forgotten.
`It was noon when we entered the fine harbor
of Havana, and the first day of the week.
The scene that arose before us, seemed too
wildly picturesque for reality. Beings of all
tints and complexions, between the light Spanish
olive, and the jetty black of Africa, seemed
crowded to gaze on our arrival; arrayed in
clean white garments, they looked as if prepared
for a festival.[3]
`The day was warm but not oppressive. The
castles Moro and Punto, rose gilded with the
sun, on each side; and about the dark ledges
of the wave worn cliffs that support them, stood
groups of men and boys, angling, as if for pastime,
in the waters of the bay beneath them;
their unsoiled linen dresses were relieved by
the color of the rocks; and the whole seemed
like a sketch from the vivid fancy of some painter.
`But why should I pause to describe emotions
known to so many? The feelings of those
who come from a land of snows and leafless
forests to those beautiful islands of the sun,
are well known, my friend, to you.' “And
yet,” I returned, “to hear the description from
thy lips, surpasses to my heart, the reality as
it looked to my eyes. Now that I have become
thy father and protector, I hope to see
all in thy presence. The beauties of the country
are known to me well; proceed, then, to
tell me of thyself. Disclose to me every incident,
as it comes to thine own soul in
truth.
“Idomen looked at me and continued:
`Unaccustomed to the sight of a relative, my
uncle Lewellyn Lloyd received me with unhoped
for affection.
`A few days were passed in Havana. That
haven of adventurers from many countries has
seldom been presented to the world, either in
verse or romantic story; yet scenes are daily
passing in its courts, which outvie the inventions
of fiction.
`We rode on the beautiful paseo; listened to
the music of the opera; and visited the tomb
of Columbus. How rude is his bust of marble;
and yet as I stood by it, in the cool cathedral,
the soul of the hero seemed present.
`Llewellyn soon became impatient to see me
at his home in Guamacaro. Two days we
rode slowly in a volante, curtained with green
`On the grounds of the “Conde de Loreto,”
the fruits that were lying in heaps, seemed
enough to fill a city with luxury.
`But one night was passed at Matanzas, and
riding slowly through the sun we reached ere
the fourth evening of our journey the “Cafétal
San Pablo,” the same that you saw at Guamacaro.
A French mayoral had ornamented the
place as well as he could for my reception.—
The hall within looked gloomy, but flowers
were twined round the simple pillars without,
edged every walk, and bloomed and breathed
in every alley. The calmness of the scene
gave me pleasure. Here I might ride, write
verses, and look at the sky and verdure.
`The twilight was nearly past, when I stood
with Llewellyn, in the piazza, glancing far
down the darkening avenue of palms, orange,
and mango trees. Two hundred expectant
negroes came soon in a line, two by two,
conducted by white overseers, to welcome the
relation of their master; they all bent the knee
an instant, and uttered the Spanish commendation.
Soon after drawn up in a ring they
repeated an evening prayer; then retired to
the lawn before their cottages, to sup and pass
the evening at the sport they most delighted
in.
`It soothed me to be welcomed with festivity.
never been made necessary to mortals!
`At half-past nine the sweet toned bell of the
estate resounded through the fresh dewy air;
I retired soon to my bed-room, entered a blood-warm
bath, and lay me down, protected from
the insects by clean white lawn of France.
`It was long before I sank into sleep. The
varied objects of the day were floating in succession
through my mind; and mosquitos that
sang without my barrier of lawn seemed darting
and striving to reach me, while fresh from
the North and sanguineous.
`When dreams at last began to mingle with
reality, the pleasant morning bell soon banished
them; and a noise like the waves of the sea
seemed rushing towards the roof where I slept.
It was but the numerous doves, who had come
from their cote at the well known sound of
the bell, and lighted on the dwelling of their
master, to wait for a repast of maize, daily
strown for them, thus early, before the steps
of the piazza. Vultures may stalk by these
rivers, but Cuba is a region for the dove.(15)
`When I rose all was verdure and brilliancy.
The sun had risen in his beauty, but the dew
was still heavy upon the flowers. Palmettos,
papayas, trees of the Otaheite almond, and
dark plumy clusters of bamboo, rose high
against the clear blue firmament.
`The large flocks of doves had dispersed, but
green chattering parrots were tearing with
their ivory beaks the rind of the most acid
oranges. Lizards of various colors—green,
blue, flame-like vermillion, and velvet black,
glided out to bask in the sun, and to lap with
their soft tiny tongues the large drops hanging
near the branches.(16)
`To pace the cool piazza, to inhale the respiration
of flowers, to banquet the eye with
soft tints and shades; to feel upon the cheeks
and forehead, caresses from the fresh morning
breezes, for a while was sufficient amusement.
`The limbs of the negroes that passed to and
fro among the trees were round and glossy
with health, their labors were light and cheerful,
and their far native land forgotten. Singing,
in low hum, rude songs of their own composing,
they lived all day among the flowers
of an eternal spring; plucking the red berries
of the coffee fields, or trimming broad hedges
of lime trees, continually in fruit and blossom.
`The noonday beam that endangers the brain
of the white man, to them was but pleasure
and rejoicing. Their jetty black skins became
smoother (17) and more supple in its heat, and
they welcomed its hottest reflection like the
serpent that glides from his retreat in the vernal
season of the north. Ripe fruits were their
nightly repast, their sports music and dancing.
`The few wants they knew, in a state so near
to that of nature, were promptly and easily
supplied, and they lived careless of to-morrow
as the birds that feasted on their orange
trees.
`The purple-shelled crab, that leaves his
traces in the red soil of their gardens, must remember
his path to the sea; the ant that devours
their coffee plants, must plan and choose
a retreat ere he delves his subterranean abode;
but the negro leaves all to his master. In the
power of men wise and humane, how happy
are even ignorance and slavery!
`For six months I lived in tranquillity. The
neighboring planters with their families, were
early and frequent in their visits; and Llewellyn,
my uncle, was kind, and satisfied with
my endeavors to please him;—but my boy,
my darling boy, was absent and fatherless.
`At length that curiosity felt, ever, at the
arrival of a stranger, began to be fast subsiding.
My relation and protector spent much
of his time at Matanzas. Alone, amid the
shades of “San Pablo,” I had power to choose
and arrange my own rural amusements. In
all my life, before, I never had lived in the
country; and no where could nature have appeared
in a softer aspect.
`In the morning I directed the household,
and then read or wrote a few hours. At the
decline of the sun a pony was brought to the piazza,
by some neighbor or domestic.—
This mode of life was new, and inspired a contentment
that I seldom before had tasted. No
external amusement was sighed for, every hour
was occupied, and every flower and insect a
subject for admiration and wonder.
`But this calm was of short duration. A
friendly merchant died, and embarrassments
were perceived in the affairs of him who protected
me; while some other secret affliction
seemed preying on his mind and spirits. My
sense of contentment fled; and the future again
became threatening; though, so lately, it had
scarcely claimed a care, save that of thoughts
and plans for the welfare of my absent boy.
`Two owners of estates in Guamacaro had
intimated a wish for my hand; but uncharmed
with their manners and wholly unacquainted
with their sentiments, my soul could not otherwise
than revolt at a contract so immediate.
It was said to Llewellyn—“your niece, it is
very true, can depend on herself for amusement,
and make herself contented as she is;
yet still, as she has no fortune to depend on,
it will be better, both for herself and for you, to
get her off your hands by a prudent marriage.”
Thus was the offer made, and thus was it urged
to me. Both to sell myself, I knew not
what to answer; and said, only, that having
been a wife even from childhood to the beginning
at liberty, so far as with gratitude I might, at
least for a little while longer. My uncle said
no more, but grew every day cooler and cooler.
`A year was finished at San Pablo: the planter
who had caused my uneasiness, took little
pains to win my esteem, yet often spoke secretly
to Llewellyn. Pressed, pained and distrustful,
I knew not how to proceed, when a
letter arrived from Canada: Pharamond Lloyde,
my cousin, had lost by sudden death, his young
and beautiful wife, and entreated of me a visit
of consolation. Llewellyn saw the letter and
made no effort to detain me.
`With a thousand dark misgivings I prepared
to leave, again, this sweet island of flowers
and forgetfulness.
`The planter, who had been to me more
reasonable and respectful than the rest, came
to San Pablo on the eve of my departure, and
a tear was on his sun-burned cheek. Why
did he not sooner evince some real affection.
`Every thing was ready. I had prayed earnestly
to heaven for direction in my resolves,
and went, half promising to return;—yet as I
stepped into the volante which was to bear me
to Matanzas, there came to my heart a sensation
resembling the touch of death.
`A vessel in which ladies were passengers,
left, before three days had passed, its mooring
in the beautiful bay. Llewellyn and the friend
with me together in a boat when the time of
her sailing approached. It was the month of
March, the coffee trees were in full blossom,
and the sea winds for many miles before us,
were rich with the perfumes of the island.—
The eyes of both my conductors were beaming
with regret and tenderness as we parted.
Alas! I never saw them more! The little
boat that bore them was soon out of sight;
and both, ere another year had passed, were
embarked on the sea of eternity.'
“The scenes and events that follow, were
passed,” continued Dalcour, “in a country far
distant from me, yet I learned them from the
lips of Idomen, and have written them since,
in my language. I keep them preserved in my
cabinet with the verses and designs of her
whom I cherished but to lose again: go with
me to my inner apartment, and I will show
them to you.”
I followed Dalcour across the hall towards
a passage that I had not remarked; but now
that he had ceased to speak, I perceived that
he was pale and exhausted, and begged him
to retire till the morning.
The apartment of Ambrosio was still, as I
passed by it to my own; and I threw myself
at once upon my pillow and found the refreshment
of sleep needful in every clime, but most
needful in the tropics.
Like Idomen at San Pablo, I was awakened
in the morning by the sounding wings of tame
doves. The sweet tones of the bell soon followed.
I lay listening to the various noises
of the plantation till I heard the voice of Dalcour,
then arose to bear him company among
the fair scenes of his creation.
At nine, a breakfast was served which might
tempt the most delicate gastronome. Jellies,
oysters containing pearls, small birds, a flavorous
paste made with the tender grains of
unripe maize, fried slices of ripe bananas, melting
avocado pears, and honey of the country,
carefully taken from the comb, and seented
with the blossoms of the orange tree; these
viands were served with light bread, rice and
wine, and followed by coffee and chocolate.
While, for palates less easily excited, garlie,
anchovies and the bright scarlet pimiento, could
be brought at a moment's warning, yet would
ill have accorded, in their odor, with two large
vases of flowers which Benito had placed upon
the table.
Ambrosio, as soon as he arose from the meal,
gave pencils and tablets to his negro, and repaired
to the avenue of bamboo, to sketch its
green arches in perspective. Before another
hour had passed away, the biographer of Idomen
sent for me to come to his most secret
retirement.
A narrow passage between partitions of basket
conducted to a small apartment, secluded in
one of the wings, and lighted by two small
windows entirely concealed with flowers and
foliage. Different from all the rest, this one
little room, or closet, was neatly finished with
fine plaster, and hung, wherever there was
space enough, with choice paintings or engravings.
Two cases for books were each of
them surmounted by a bust of fine marble, one
a copy of the Belvidere Apollo, the other a
little resembling Canova's Venus from the
bath.
A round French table, in the centre, was
faced with marble wrought in mosaic, and the
floor that we trod upon, was also a pavement
of marble. In a niche, or indentation in one
of the sides of the room, stood a small stove of
porcelain, to be heated during those few winter
weeks when cold reaches even to Cuba,
and changes the colour of the cheeks and lips,
though it cannot harm the tenderest leaf. (18)
A pretty French cabinet, also of porcelain,
and delicately painted, stood open, and seemed
reserved for papers and choice relics, which
elsewhere might be injured by the insects. (19)
“This,” said Dalcour, “is my oratory.—
Here but one domestic ever enters, and seldom
any stranger; here I sometimes come, in
the hours of midnight and reflection; and here
I pass those very few days, when the sun is
flowers all the while, the creole wraps his
cloak closely round him.”
My attention was immediately arrested by
an oval painting, apparently of some ancient
master, on each side of which, on a small projection
or table of marble, stood two waxen tapers
in candlesticks of carved alabaster, and
covered with glasses. The picture presented
half the figure of a woman of light complexion
and mild expression of countenance, who held
on a scarf, in her lap, fresh flowers of a temperate
region, exquisitely tinted and delineated.
Dalcour seemed pleased with my attention,
and said that he had purchased the picture in
France, because of its resemblance to Idomen.
The English verses of her whose memory
was so dear to him, were rolled with his own
MSS. which he seemed to wish me to copy:—
I preferred to hear the story from his lips, as
before, and promised to wait till the moonlight
might be shining again in his piazza. The
glowing beams of the sun seem never in accordance
with those deep feelings of the heart
which shrink from the common observation,
and seldom can well be expressed even to the
best earthly friend; but the tongue will sometimes
gain courage when evening conceals the
countenance.
I wished to read and write, at least, so many
of the verses as related to the story half
my country as a fragment of the distant new
world.
I saw that a cushion of silk was lying upon
the too cold marble before the picture of Idomen;
and conceived of the fond superstition
which caused a knee sometimes to bend there.
The light task even that I proposed, seemed, in
such a retreat, profanation; and yet, to take to
any other place, those papers, once warm in the
hand of the very friend so cherished in memory,
might be still more repugnant to one who
so worshipped an ideal; but Dalcour soon relieved
my embarrassment, by requesting me
to wait where I was, in possession of the papers,
till he joined me. One snaill silken ottoman
supplied the place of other seats, and that
I was to sit on with my tablets.
At three I rejoined del Monte. A meal, a
siesta, and a ride about the grounds, filled well
the other hours till moonlight. Ambrosio, before
the time of the passeo, had gone through
the wood to Matanzas, but promised to return
the next morning, and finish his sketch of the
fine arched perspective of the avenue of bamboo
by which we entered.
As soon as the twilight had faded, I dressed
myself afresh in cool linen, and sat down upon
the sofa of bajuca to wait for the coming of
my sensitive and bland entertainer. He had
not joined in our afternoon exercise, but came
of orange flower water. Refreshed from a
long repose, he felt not the last night's wakefulness;
and, handing me a cluster of flowers,
proceeded soon with his story, as it came from
the lips of Idomen, to be written forever on his
memory. The tones of Idomen herself could
scarcely have been more plaintive than those
of the fervent old man, who seemed to inherit
the soul of one of the troubadours of his country.
He paused awhile, to recollect her words,
and then continued thus her narration. `We
had left the land of sunshine and sweets. The
month of April had begun, yet snow storms
greeted the return of our vessel to the country
of my birth place.
`P—d seemed no longer my home; yet
there many duties detained me. When a few
months had passed, I took with me my darling
boy, and went, over mountains and through
woods, to Canada,—to the country of Ethelwald—to
a land of deeper snows and wilder
forests than even the one where my soul had
first waked to consciousness. yet music,
beauty, and love, had power to make even, on
the ice of the St. Lawrence, a paradise unknown
to me before.
`Little Arvon, then eight years of age, was
my only attendant and companion. It was
autumn. The wild scenery of northern America
was tinted with the most beautiful colors,
The bold barren cliffs of the mountains;—the
cold mountain streams, strown with fallen
leaves,—the desolate branches, despoiled of
their foliage by piercing winds, or still bearing
that foliage painted, by early frost, with the
richest gold and crimson, might be likened to
the gorgeous vestments of a queen who stands,
with all her train, amid the shrinkings and
suffering of poverty.
`How strong was the contrast of those bare
dark rocks and forests, already half dismantled,
to the flowers and everlasting verdure
that fleeces those shores and tangled deserts,
and return to the smiles of the sun, every day
that he rises in Cuba!
`Rude cultivators of the ruder soil, and traders
who carried their contraband merchandize
to Canada, from the flourishing republic,
were all our travelling society. Both farmer
and trader were kind to little Arvon and to his
mother. Bearing good will to all mankind,
we were helpless ourselves, because alone; but
be it to the honor of those regions, continual
good offices were received on our way, and no
evil done or designed to us.
`We stopped at Montreal for refreshment;
and a passage for us was taken in the steamboat,
which then, but for a few years, had roared
through the waves of the St. Lawrence.
`In all the varied climates and vast extent
with this? The wild aborigines of the country,
first called it the “great river;” and that name
in their own soft language, composes the word
Ladaüanna, which sounds like the music of its
waves. An aged chief[4] of the Hurons, who
learned to write of white men, traced afterwards,
that name at Lorette, on a leaf of my
pocket book, with a hand that had scalped his
enemies.
`Beautiful Ladaüanna! how clear and sparkling
art thou to the eye! to the lip how sweet
and salutary. A cataract, the wonder of the
world, is formed by the waters that rush to
the sea through thy channel. And, near the
soft ripple of thy brink, was born the most
lovely of mortals!
`A night and nearly a day had been passed
upon the waves, which, near to the shores,
were beginning to be “candied with ice.” A
passing storm had caused our course to be retarded.
`It was colder than usual in October, but
the brilliant tints of the northern New World
had not yet faded into russet. The leaves of
the walnut were still like burnished gold, and
those of the maple of a glowing scarlet; while
tall flourishing pines, with their various evergreen
companions, seemed defying the approach
of winter. A light fall of snow had
powdered the foliage, and faintly sparkled in
the pale rays of the sun, just escaped from his
clouds to set clearly; like some mortal who
vanquishes misfortune to die when his path becomes
pleasant.
`Oh Nature! in whatever climate thou art
seen, how many charms adorn thee! Where
the last dwelling of the white man (20) is seen
towards the northern polar ocean, I have beheld
thee, crowned with rocks, and admired
thy rude magnificence. In these regions of
burning Cancer, thy temples are ever bound
with flowers.'
“After this brief rhapsody was finished, I
left Idomen a moment; and finding Benito in
the small, shady court within, I received from
him a ripe guayava, and cut it in parts to present
it, on a leaf, to her who was speaking for
my pleasure. Its pulp of bright rose color,
enclosed by a rind of pale gold, could not tempt
her to soil her lips at that moment; but I laid
it on the table before her, to emit a rich fragrance,
as she continued:
`When the steamboat was near approaching
the Canadian town, Trois Rivieres, I felt
cold, and retired to the cabin of ladies, leaving
Arvon in safety on the deck.
`A thousand emotions were crowding to my
heart, as I sat a moment in solitude, while all
was noise and bustle above. The boat stopped
opposite to a place that awakened in me
no other than pleasing recollections; yet my
heart, I knew not why, beat violently. A hope
was obtruding itself, vague and indefinite in
its nature, but strong and exciting in its effects;
and I called on my utmost resolution
to suppress and subdue it. My sense of the
past became dim, and the present was scarcely
realized, when little Arvon came running
with pleasure in his eyes, and entreated me to
go up to the deck with him.
`I followed him to the door of the cabin.—
“Mother,” said the expectant boy, “they say
Mr. Ethelwald is coming; is not that the beautiful
gentleman that held me on his hand, when
I was very little, in your drawing room at
P—d?” A small boat had advanced from
the shore, with one person besides the rowers.
It was indeed, Ethelwald. Half overpowered,
I concealed myself within the door-way, where
I was standing.
`He did not remember Arvon, but with eyes
beaming beneficence, and a smile that seemed
the epitome of every thing delightful either on
child, extending his arm a moment, like the
well-known Peruvian chief in a tragedy of the
German Kotzebue.
`Every eye was immediately arrested by
this playful exhibition of strength, so picturesque
and so uncommon.
`As soon as I had regained self-possession
enough to appear, I called Arvon to me, and
bade him ask the stranger to come a moment
to the door where I stood.
`Short as had been our stopping before
Trois Rivieres, the steamboat was again ready
to proceed. Ethelwald came at my summons,
he took my trembling hand, discolored by the
frosty atmosphere, but his own hand, beautiful
in its strength, was white as the petals of
the magnolia of Florida, and warm and soft as
down beneath the wing of the ptarmigan of
Canada.
`The beams of the coldly setting sun seemed
clinging to his fair curly hair; his cheeks
were glowing with exercise; but his beautiful
nostrils were white and symmetric as if sculptured
by the hand of a Phydias.
`He looked, I cannot describe his looks!—
A seraph descending on Mount Hermon, or a
god revealing himself in the manner conceived
by Homer, seemed realized in this mortal
of the northern New World, whose birth place
was still within the glance of the tawny savage
of the forest.
`My tongue, at last, served me to say:—
“Has the change of five years been complete?
or can you still perceive in me a friend?”—
“I can, I can!” he exclaimed; but ere he
could add another syllable, his Canadian rower
came running, to hasten his departure.—
The bell of the boat rang violently, for night
was fast descending on the river. “Let me
hope that we shall meet again,” were his
words; he pressed, and shook gently my hand,
and in one moment more had sprung into his
boat and was gliding away through the duskiness.
`It was dark, but I saw him gain the shore.
I held little Arvon by the hand and drew him
gently from the deck, but the boy was not inclined
for sleep. The scene just passed, had
struck forcibly on his memory, and he seemed
to take pleasure in recalling the events of his
infantine life.'
“Here Idomen looked at me; and I said, I
also at P—d have held on my knee in
friendship, your little flaxen haired Arvon.”
`That orphan boy, is now, she replied, with
strangers; will you help me to protect him,
if I send for him to this land of flowers?'—
“Can you still ask, I returned? To whom but
to him and to you is the rest of my life to be
devoted?
“How strong were the feelings of maternity
which caused her to revert to her child, so
her mind, to a seraph.
“To prevent all expressions of gratitude, I
said:
“But, Idomen, of what did you dream on
the night following this interview with the
handsome Ethelwald?” `Call him not handsome!'
said she, suddenly; `from a term so
common as that, his looks can never be conceived,—you
ask me, my friend, of what I
dreamed, but that night I closed not my eyes.
The dull, trembling noise of the machine, that
was forcing our prow through the river, hitherto
had but caused me to sleep. When I
thought of my expected arrival and meeting
with Pharamond, my anticipation had, I scarcely
knew why, been gloomy
`But now, the scene lately passed had followed
me to my pillow, and my narrow but
comfortable bed was pressed, not in sleep, but
in reverie. Fear vaguely whispered of something
to be suffered, but pleasure was predominant
in my soul. Alas! who could ever bear
misfortune, were it not for the aid of some
sweet vision or some passing incident?
`Early the next morning, we stopped at
Quebec. The powerful vapor that had impelled
us was escaping with its loud roaring
noise, and all was bustle and tumult on the
deck above. But few greetings of friends had
taken place, ere I heard the voice of Pharamond,
of all that had befallen me struck suddenly to
my heart, and I could not forbear trembling as
I presented to him my Arvon, now an orphan.
`It was soon after my early marriage that,
for the first time in my life, I saw my cousin
Pharamond. He then made journeys to visit
me, and was never weary of expressing to me
his affection. Now he remarked my unusual
paleness, and I thought his kiss of welcome
was the coldest I ever had received from him.
`The streets were still nearly bare of snow,
and a caleche took us to his dwelling. Few
cities in the world are more varied and picturesque
than the gray fortress of Quebec. I had
seen it once before, on a summer excursion. I
had stood upon the green sods around its hanging
citadel, and overlooked the broad bason
of the “Ladaüanna.” The mouth of the
stream Montmorency, could be seen from the
harbor where we lay, and the murmur of its
distant cataract, narrow, but higher than Niagara,
had been sweet to my ears even in this
dull morning. But the day was cloudy, and
though Pharamond tried to be cheerful as we
passed through the cold narrow streets, a constraint
appeared in his manners, which I never
had observed before. Of this he himself
was sensible, and desired me to attribute it to
the loss of a well-beloved wife.
`The house we entered was high above the
fortress called H—. Every room was fitted
up with a comfort that was perfectly English.
Nothing seemed intended for display. A low
dining room, warmed by a stove of molten iron
covered with devices, was the first apartment
we entered; and the three servants of the establishment
were all which, at the moment,
greeted our arrival. “Mother,” said little Arvon,
as soon as we were left alone, “do you
think you shall love to live here?”
`I thought of the sofas and carpets of my
own pleasant drawing rooms, where the boy
had first sported in his infancy;—where you,
my friend, so kindly sent, by heaven, to me
now, had first played with his curls, while you
praised my music and poetry I thought next
of the flowery walks and fields of this island.
I thought of many other things; but when I
thought, also, of the late meeting with Ethelwald,
I felt that I could endure the gloom of
the approaching winter.
`It pained me more than any thing else, to
see little Arvon look sad; but while I caressed
and strove to amuse him, Pharamond returned
with a young relation and took him to walk
on the ramparts, and to see the troops of the
garrison at their accustomed daily parade.—
English soldiers in their neat showy dresses,
and Scots in their highland attire, can no where
present a finer spectacle than among the rocks
a picture by West, and the strong hold of
British America.
`While alone and dressing for dinner, there
came to my mind a reason for that shade of
coldness which appeared in the manners of my
cousin. Llewellyn Lloyde, our uncle, was reputed
as a man of wealth; Pharamond had
thought me his favorite; and when he requested
my visit, thought it probable that a rich
planter, his relation, would leave his sunny
fields to attend me during the summer.
`On the contrary, I had come, alone with
my orphan boy; and with looks expressive of
sadness, rather than the joy he expected.
`At dinner I endeavored to speak on subjects,
that I knew had once been charming to
my cousin, and I saw him beguiled at intervals,
into something like his former cheerfulness.
`Day passed after day, and the scenery around
was renovating to my health and spirits.
After breakfast in the morning, I walked
on the ramparts with little Arvon; stood with
him near the hanging citadel, and sat with him
sometimes on the cannon that frown upon the
brink of the precipice that overlooks the bason
of the river. The plains of Abraham skirted
with trees, the distant hills, taking from
the northern atmosphere a thousand beautiful
tints, the gray walls and towers of the fortress,
all appeared to me as seen through a mist of
was almost forgotten. I felt an enthusiasm,
deeper than I had ever known before, even, my
friend, amid the eternal verdure of these scenes
of forgetfulness.
`Two weeks passed away in this manner,
and I entertained the friends of my cousin,
who passed at home those hours not devoted
to his affairs.
`Constantly, but not impatiently, I expected
intelligence from Ethelwald; when one day
a letter arrived, bearing the arms of an ancient
family; it was conceived in terms of
friendship, heightened even to tenderness;
and signed by the names in full, Walter Rodolph
Arno Ethelwald. Regret was expressed
that a letter only was obliged to supply the
place of an immediate visit.
`How inspiring is such an incident! keep
the heart filled with a pleasing sentiment, and
all worldly misfortunes are easy to bear.
`A vague apprehension of some impending
danger and misfortune still intruded itself on
my mind, but I had, now, many moments of a
hope, that in itself was almost happiness.
`Yet another change was soon to take place.
Letters on urgent and unexpected business
summoned my cousin immediately to England.
No time could be lost, for the river would very
soon be frozen. His home must soon be
abandoned. I saw that he was pained and
how to relieve him. A young relation was
going to his seminary at N—t, there I
could place little Arvon, and remain near my
boy during the absence of Pharamond.
`The plan was approved and executed.—
Pharamond resolved to embark from a port in
the United States, and accompanied me himself,
to the seminary, but eleven miles from
Trois Rivieres.
`Ethelwald came, while we stopped in preparing
to he rowed across the river, already
very cold and crusted with ice near its borders.
His looks were warmth and summer. He gave
many charges to the boatmen of his native
stream. They rowed with care and swiftness,
and sang all the way to their oars, which seemed,
in their accustomed hands, as if only used
to beat the time of their melodies.
`Pharamond placed my boy in the seminary,
and had found for me, the best accommodations
in the little village near him. The affairs
of my cousin were pressing; he waited
but to see us established, and bade an affectionate
adieu.
`The principal fathers of the seminary were
excessive in their kindness to Arvon, and paid
to me early visits; speaking in general terms,
and saying nothing on the difference of religion.
`The chapel and other buildings where they
the high banks of the river Nicolet. Gardens
were seen where a hill declined on one side,
but on the other side, which was its summit,
arose a thick grove of tall pines, where the
students were permitted to take exercise.—
the roofs and spires of the whole were covered
with plates of tin, and such was the purity
of the climate that these plates retained always
their brightness. They looked in the distance
like polished silver, glittering in the sun, and
relieved by the dark green of the pine trees.
`Every thing was novel and picturesque.—
The inhabitants of the village were simple in
their manners; gay, kind and hospitable. I
soon found myself, alone, in a family descended
from one of the old nobles of France, but
living, now, in the usual manner of the country.
`Ethelwald had promised to visit me, on the
third day after my arrival; and I busied myself
as soon as I could, in arranging the little parlor
assigned to my use, by the family.
`Never till now, had I been so fully sensible
of a great change in my condition. I had no
piano forte; the room was warmed by a dim
stove, and the furniture rude and inelegant;
yet still a sofa and carpet, although of no costly
texture, threw over it an air of luxury, when
compared with most of the dwellings of this
little home in the forest.
`At the neighboring seminary Ethalwald
had been placed in his childhood; the scene,
therefore, would not be strange to him; he was
familiar alike with the opulent nobles of Europe,
and the savage sons of the desert who
still hunt the beaver in those wild but fertile
recesses.
`The house where I lived was warm; and on
the morning of the expected visit I dressed myself
in white, and placed a carnation, which
bloomed all the winter, on a small table near
the window, where I had spread books and music.
`This window looked towards the seminary;
the clock of the chapel had just sounded eleven;
and I perceived a large fine figure aproaching
the declivity that led to my dwelling. A
knock was soon heard; my heart beat quickly
as I ran to receive the expected; and a greeting
ensued, like those between friends of
many years.
`The organ of my greatest pleasure, has
been to me, from childhood, the eye. Not a
gleam of beauty was ever lost on Idomen,
though born amid puritans, in a retired village
of the new world.
`The charms, of every thing I had seen,
seemed concentrated and enhanced in him
who then stood before me. Even you, my
friend, educated, as you have been, amid the
paintings and statues of Europe, you who
and seen the chefs d'œuvre of Florence,—
even you, my friend, expressed wonder, when
you looked upon him first at P—d.
`Five years had passed away since that interview;
the figure of Ethelwald had gained
in fulness, but colour and proportion were
still unencroached upon. He wore a military
undress of blue, lighter than usual, and the
linen disclosed at his neck, hands, and bosom,
was white as the snows of his birth place.
`We stood near the window whence I had
watched his approach; and my soul, as he
spoke, drank a nectar of music and of beauty,
too potent for one so weak.
`His hair, though a shade darker than when
I first beheld him, still clustered in golden
ringlets; his teeth had lost none of their stainless
and pearly perfection; his hand, though
nerved with the strength of a Theseus or of a
Hercules, was white as the fairest infant princess
ever bleached by the moist air of Britain.
`His age was now within two years of thirty;
but the fabled Venus, as she stepped from
her shell, could not have been imagined more
exempt from blemish or discolor.
`He had lived much in the freezing air of
his native woods and rivers; he had buffetted
the same winds that tinge, with deep brown,
the wrinkled cheek of the Canadian peasant,
as he sings and smiles at his toil; but it seemed
passed by him untouched.
`Ethelwald, for a moment, observed my attention.
“When you saw me, he said, at
P—d, you likened me to Apollo; but now
you see me a mortal—almost an old man.”—
My quick answer was, what then am I?—
“When your hair is gray,” he returned, “mine
will be white; and in that thought there is
comfort.” Such a speech from such a creature!—how
could I do otherwise than feel it
even as I did?
`Three hours, which seemed but as a moment,
he remained, with me, in conversation,
and then departed to meet an engagement.
The lands appertaining to Nicolet had
been purchased by a British officer from a former
French Seigneur, and their proprietor now
lived with his family at a commodious cottage
called “the manor house.” Thither Ethelwald
repaired to dress and dine, but returned to me
early in the evening.
`He had brought with him from Trois Rivieres
the miniature picture of a brother, who
died in the British army in India. A little history
of their family ensued after looking at
this. Of “a beauteous band of brethren,”
Walter Rodolph Arno was the last. All but
him, had been snatched in early youth from a
world they were formed to adorn;—from a
world whose other inhabitants their persons
around, remembered them with regret and enthusiasm;
and looked upon the last who remained,
as something too fair to stay long.
`The picture lay before us on the table, and
during the intervals of conversation, Ethelwald
read from a little book he had brought with it,
many extracts and specimens of verses once
breathed by voices he could hear no more, and
copied by hands of his kindred, whose beautiful
whiteness had become but the gray dust of
the earth.
`Softened by such reflections, the charm of
his presence was enhanced. The flight of
hours was unheeded, the interview was uninterrupted;
except that from time to time some
one of the family walked in through a half open
door, that led to their own apartment, spoke a
few words in French, and retired again.
`The clock of the seminary, to our utter
surprise, struck eleven; the hours of our host
were early, and Ethelwald arose to return to
the “manor house.” As he threw on his
warm, furry cloak, my eyes glanced an instant
round the little apartment, the humble
scene of a visit so delightful; and was suddenly
and forcibly struck with the contrast between
that scene and the brilliant figure before
me. Here then, I said to myself, has lingered
so many hours, one to whom Catharine
of Russia would have opened with her own
Have you not, I said, passed a dull evening?—
“Would to heaven,” he returned, “that my
evenings might all be like this!”
`I said no more, for his answer had deprived
me of utterance. Ethelwald bade good night
in the English manner, pressing my hand that
trembled with a pleasure so extreme, that I
felt not the parting till he was gone.
`I retired immediately to my room, washed
in the sweet water of the neighboring river,
and threw myself quickly into bed. Sleep I
could not. Even coherent thought was impossible.
I counted till after four, the striking
of the seminary clock; and at seven I counted
it again, with the impression of vague but
sweet dreams.
`I thought that Ethelwald would cross the
river early for his home at Trois Rivieres;
but at ten he came again, to pass another half-hour.
`It seemed still a dream as I followed to the
door this being so unlike the rest of mortals.
“Stand not here,” he said, “you may take cold
and die too,—and then—all will be past.” A
thought of the early death of his six brothers
and sisters, was, it seemed, passing through
his mind.
`I returned to my little drawing room, stood
till I could see him no more at my window
that looked towards the seminary, and then
from. The smiling picture of his brother
was suspended to the chain about my neck. I
placed it before my eyes, sat leaning upon the
table, and for an hour moved not my position.
I know not what I thought, but during that
hour, I had no wishes. I sat in a stupor of
delight; and to move again, I felt neither
strength nor inclination. Could mortals long
endure a state of happiness?
`A sentiment of pain recalled me to myself.
Little Arvon ran into the room. He had felt
himself ill, and his benevolent instructors had
yielded to his wishes, and let him come suddenly
to visit me.
`It was but a sense of confinement that affected
him; but the slightest uneasiness of this
sensitive orphan boy, went always through my
heart, like an arrow tipped with poison.
`The worthy family around me gave him
jelly of currants and raspberries, that grow in
abundance where the forests have been newly
cut down. I soon consoled him and went out
with him to walk on the banks of the still unfrozen
river, that hastened with its tributary
waves to the beautiful Ladaüanna.
`The day was warmer than usual, and tracks
of the hare and ptarmigan were seen in the
sparkling snow. A party of Indians had
come to the village to sell, for the approaching
winter, moccasins wrought with the quills of
colors; and snow shoes curiously woven
of the soft pliant skin of the deer. We saw
them in a group at a distance, as we followed
the bending of the stream.
`The squirrel glided lightly through the sun,
still apparently employed in collecting his last
winter stores from the scattered walnut and
beech trees. The river was crusted with ice
at its borders, but took, at its still flowing
channel, the bright blue of the sky, against
which, the spire of the chapel of the seminary
was glittering like polished silver. (21)
`My boy was happy in these scenes. The
excitement of travelling and the liberty he had
lately enjoyed, made confinement of any kind,
irksome, but the priests were kind and gentle;
they thought of his state as an orphan and a
stranger that knew not their language. They
allowed him to visit me daily, and promised
to vary his aliments in any way his health might
require.
`My solicitude for this child was extreme.
I thought of his friendless state, and felt that
my own happiness must be secondary to the
duty I owed him. He passed with me the day,
and at night returned to the seminary.
`The next day brought me letters and papers
from Ethelwald, and my table seemed
covered with his name.
`It was said, in Europe, at this period, that
were disbanded. Ethelwald was now an officer
on half-pay, but holding a civil employment
which occupied his time and attention.
For three days he came not, but every morning
brought a note; and a pleasing perturbation
that I had not power to overcome, took
entire possession of my faculties.
`A small protestant or English chapel had
been built near the “manor house;” there I
was invited to dine at the conclusion of the
evening service. Ethelwald, who crossed the
St. Lawrence late on Saturday evening, came
at the proper hour, to attend me.
`The chapel, surrounded by trees of the forest,
was new, simple, and unadorned. There
was no music save the voices of those who attended.
Ladies were near me, but my most
admired sat opposite; and when he sang—his
expression, or what I felt, would be lost in a
faint description. To look at beauty and listen
to its music, are given to our conceptions
as types or specimens of the ecstacies of heaven.
`Has any one lived a life without tasting a
single day of happiness?—happiness in accordance
with the pantings of the heart which
feels it?—happiness, for the time, so large as
to leave no room for wishes?
`One day, at least, of such happiness, has
been mine. One day! A single point between
sufferable by a few pleasures,—often uncheered
with hope, and sometimes blackened by
despair.
`On the scenes of that day, let me dwell,
oh, my friend, a moment longer! The voice
of Ethelwald gave the tone in which I sang to
the Most High. His arm supported me as I
descended the steps of the sanctuary; and I
thought, as I felt its warm gentle pressure,—
Heaven has materialized a being of my fancy
and exceeded her wildest idea.
`The English of Canada are very exact in
their etiquette. We all had walked to church,
and on reaching the hall of the `manor house,'
every one immediately retired to be rid of furs
and moccasins, and to dress, for the approaching
meal, in an evening garb, however plain.
`At table Ethelwald was beside me. The
first wine of the repast, was poured by his
hand, raised to my lips at his request, and tasted
at the same time with his. He saw my
light soup almost undiminished, and helped
me himself, from a choice partridge or Canadian
pheasant, snared in the neighboring woods
by some semi-civilized Indian; but pleasure
had risen too high, even for the refreshment
of food, and the little I could swallow, seemed,
at that moment, a difficult interruption.
`From time to time, I caught a glance, as
his white hand raised to his lips, the white
shone in the light of the tapers; the warmth
of the well furnished room had brought to the
transparent skin of his forehead, such lucid
particles of dew as you, my friend, once beheld,
with me, at P—d. I looked at him
again, and thought, does he, indeed, nourish
himself with food, and has he blood like mortals?
`Pardon, oh, my excellent friend, the unreasonable
emotions I describe! Some fiend,
perhaps, tempted to destroy, but he whom I
loved, at least, was not unworthy.
`The clergyman, to whom we had lately
listened, our polite host and hostess, and a
young girl, the daughter of their friend, with
a lover to whom she was betrothed, formed,
with two other guests, the evening party.
`No amusement was introduced, because it
was the first day of the week, and the family
were of the church of England. We merely
conversed or sang a little to the piano. Ethelwald
lost no opportunity of placing himself at
my side; and whenever sitting at a distance,
his eye never failed to meet mine, with an expression
that comforted my soul.
`The hour for retirement too soon arrived;
the use of a cariole had been declined. I was
guarded from the cold by thick garments of
the north, and Ethelwald led me to my dwelling.
`The first moon of winter was shining, and
cast, as we walked, our united shadows on the
sparkling white path that slightly crisped beneath
our footsteps. Alas! if my love was but
a shadow, it was not delineated on snow!..
The tablets on which it was engraved will be
carried with me to eternity.
`I fain would have spoken, but words were
denied me; neither did Ethelwald speak much;
of much there was no need, the tone of his
voice was enough to tell all that my heart demanded.
From time to time he drew my arm
closer beneath his, or lifted me from the earth
wherever the frozen path had been roughened.
`The house where I lived had a little hall in
front. The door was partly of glass, and a
light shone through it from within; my beautiful
friend, before it opened, would fain have
pressed his lips to mine, but withdrew them
at my faint repulse,—asked pardon,—lifted me
over the threshold, it was too late at night for
him to cross, and withdrew with a pressure of
the hand.
`The Canadian servant slept, but my bedroom
was always kept warm; I ran to it in
haste, and as I threw off my outer garments,
and remembered who had helped to wrap them
around me, I felt astonished at having twice
denied him what I gave every day to my son.
“`Man is not made for rapture;” could Idomen—a
woman, therefore in the second grade
that second grade should be—could Idomen
long have endured a happiness like that of the
day which had just passed away forever?
`Sleep, that loves to hover over grief, keeps
kindly at a distance from pleasure. On that
night, sleep was long in banishment from my
pillow.
`When I closed my eyes, a moment, I
dreamed of being clasped in the arms of my
friend, and awoke with the vivid imagination,
alarmed, and reflecting on my state—something
whispered that my thoughts were dangerous—but
no!—there was no guilt in him
who caused them.
`I was wakeful, and the night was still. I
could not hear a sound save the breathing of
some of the family, through the thin walls of
my chamber. Fearful, and reflecting on my
dreams, other scenes began to rush upon my
mind. I thought upon my darkest years; and
then the last day I had passed would come to
me, entire and like a smiling picture. What
a contrast of pleasure and of pain!—Which
was my future to resemble? The doubts that
ensued were almost insufferable; and I strove,
as I had often done before, to beguile my perturbed
feelings by endeavoring to condense
them into verses.'
“Here Idomen rose a moment, and gave me
from her port folio, a few leaves of paper num
braided knots of that odorous grass, found by
Indians in the woods of Canada; these dry relics
of a distant country were sweet, even near
the flowers that surrounded us.
“Having rested till I read the verses, Idomen
again, thus continued: `In the morning
I arose weak and languid but happy,—
though doubts would intrude themselves. A
day had passed almost without nourishment,
and a night almost without sleep. My soul
had been full and satisfied, but my countenance
shewed traces even of this slight irregularity.
The eye and the blood are made of earth; celestial
food makes them brighter for a while,
but that which comes from the ground can
alone preserve them from perishing.
`I washed me for renovation, in the soft
sweet water of the neighboring tributary
stream, braided my hair as well as I could, and
swallowed an egg like drink from its shell, as
I had been taught at sea, to supply the deficiency
of appetite.[5]
`Ethelwald could not stay long, but came
before he went to cross the river; he seemed
anxious for my health, and gave me many cautions.
As we stood near the window whence
my weak hand that trembled in his, and pressed
me a moment to his heart. Even then I
had power to draw back—resistance to the
highest delight, had become to me involuntary
as breath. Yet why and what did I resist?
No ill was intended—no dishonor could possibly
have been perpetrated. Was it some
spirit who abridged me of a pleasure like its
own in heaven?—where souls meet the souls
that were made for them, and love is pure
though ineffable.
`Ethelwald again asked pardon; renewed
his cautions, and parted with a promise of return.
I watched his fine figure till it disappeared
by the dark pines of the seminary. It
was the hour for a visit from little Arvon, and
I stirred not till I saw him approach.
`The next morning brought me no letter;
but the day following, a packet arrived. He
must think of me, I said, while absent, or he
would not take pains to write so much.
`The letters of this friend, born in a snowy
region, still half a desert, and serving as hunting
grounds to the red sons of the forest—
those letters, which I still retain, were delicate,
easy, flowing—perhaps models in their
kind. With the education of him who wrote
them, no particular pains had been taken, but
an exquisite natural taste for all that is beautiful,
had given to him what never can be
sewed them in satin of rose color, and keep
them ever near me.
`On that day, when the dearest of them
came, of many delightful pages, this passage
enchained my attention: “I fear you were almost
angry with me when last I stood at your window;
but oh! with how little reason? I feel for
you the warmest regard, may I not also say affection.”
`These words I read over many times, and
thought till I had scarcely power to move.—
When I walked they sounded in my ears, but
doubt and presentiment came over my heart
like a damp. I feared to believe myself happy,
but now, I dared not think of the alternative.
`The next day all thought was impossible,
for Ethelwald, ere noon, was in my drawing-room.
The weather had become very cold; he
brought me warm gloves, and books, and moccasins
of the country, for Arvon.
`No allusion was made, by my friend, to
that passage of his letter, which had sunk so
deeply in my heart; but my looks must have
well convinced him, that he felt no affection
unreturned. “My fortune,” said he who enchanted
me, “is small. If I go to India promotion
will follow.” I would have gone with
him to the ends of the earth! This I felt but
told him not; some adverse power restrained
thought of little Arvon, and uttered not a definite
word. The picture of Ethelwald's brother
was fastened to a chain about my neck;
he saw it and said, “I cannot give you that,
but I will give you mine.” His picture! besides
the inimitable original, no gift could
have been so delightful. Have you got it?—
I asked with emotion; but something invisible
restrained me, and I claimed not his promise
in words. Was not this the crisis of my
destiny?.. and did not my evil fate prevail?
`It was no longer a time to say more; two
Canadian visitors entered, and claimed the
civility of us both. One arm of Ethelwald
was mine, the young visitors by turns, shared
the other. We walked by the pine grove of
the seminary, and along the path leading to
the “manor house.” The banks of the river
N..... t were covered with snow; and
snow clouds were gathering in the heavens.—
We returned to an early repast, but the sun
was near setting ere it ended. Ethelwald lingered
till twilight. The winter day was too
short; the cold was fast increasing; the broad
Ladaüanna would soon close; and while closing
might be impassable for many days.
`Ethelwald seemed to look with regret at
the shades gathering without my window;—
the snow began to fall in large flakes; by forest
go; yet he still seemed inclined to linger.—
the company who had followed us from the
dining table, left the room a moment to look
at some painted doe skin dresses, lately purchased
from the Indians; his exquisite mouth
was near mine in speaking low, and I gave
him what had thrice been denied. “Is this
first kiss,” said a voice from the deepest recesses
of my soul, “the seal of thy death or of
thy happiness?” I shuddered. To die with
him I loved, at that moment, had been more
than I can fancy of heaven; but to see him no
more on earth, was what I dared not think upon.
`It had already become dark; and the family
gathered round the door, as Ethelwald made
his adieus, smiling at the storm he was to
brave.
`I mingled, as accustomed, in the amusements
of the evening; and even sang songs to
please others; but to me, all was insipid; every
thing seemed hollow and unmeaning, for
the joy of my soul was withdrawn.
`From time to time, expressions were dropped
in praise of him, who, so lately, had made
paradise of the little dim room; and then,
while I heard his name, I was happy.
`Most of the company had known his family,
and described with enthusiasm, the beauty
of his mother, and then the last sister he had
Rodolph tore his bright hair; and it was feared
he would that day follow this last of his
beautiful brethren.”
`He seemed to be regarded by the artless
speakers around me, as a being unlike the rest
of men; and they paid to me a species of homage,
because I was the subject of his attention.
`At nine o'clock refreshments of the country
were served; thin cakes, dipped in syrup
of the same maple, which, in autumn, decorates
their forests with foliage scarlet as the tulip,
—walnuts, butternuts, jelly of red currants,
sweetmeats of wild plums, and conserve of
raspberries that grow so profusely where the
thick woods have been felled.
`A boat song or chanson sur l'eau, was sung
at my request. The rhymes seemed as if composed
extemporally; but the simply pleasing
air was one of those which accord most sweetly
with the murmuring rivers and caseades, so
abundant in the rocky wilds of Canada. The
chorus or “refrain,” ran thus:
Jamais je ne t'oublierai.”
In its course, the words also struck my ear:
Jamais ne je la retronverai,
Pour un bouquet de rose
Que je lui ai refusé
Je voudrois que la rose
Fut, encore au rosier.”
`The songs at length, were over, the dim
stove replenished with boughs from the neighboring
woods; and before the clock of the
seminary struck eleven, every head beneath
our roof was on its pillow.
“`Beware,” says Plato, “of the kiss.”—
Many, perhaps, have found by experience that
Plato had reason for that caution
`While still at Quebec, even after the banquet
of a letter bearing the four beautiful
names of my friend, my slumbers were but little
interrupted. My heart had received an
impression, but the stamp had not, then, drawn
blood. Now, it had sunk below the surface
to a depth that was soon to be discovered.
`Memory was too faithful. I feared not for
Ethelwald; for a Canadian boatman, who
loved him, was his conductor. The winds,
besides, were not violent; and the river of his
birth was well known where he crossed. But
the first hurried pressure of my lips, given as
he was going forth to meet a storm, braved on
my account, had been returned with an eagerness
that was now felt again and again.—
When I sank to a momentary sleep, it seemed
as if his arms supported me;—but fears mingled
with my dreams, and I woke, startled and
unrefreshed.
`In the morning, the cold had increased;
and two days passed without a word from Trois
Rivieres. On the third day some boatmen
Indian canoe of bark, sometimes trusting to
the waves, and sometimes dragging over ice,
their light manageable vessel. By these means
a letter reached me, which related in a playful
manner the return of him who left me, for
his home, on the last stormy night.
`The winds had not been violent, but the
waves were about to congeal, and the darkness
was so bewildering that the rower had
missed his way. These words were in the letter
of Ethelwald: “The poor fellow was in
such a fright, that he left the boat entirely to me;
but fortunately, a dear little nun, soon hung out
a light from the highest window of her convent”
(at Trois Rivieres,) “we soon saw it, and were
conducted in safety to our landing.”
`The letter telling this was affectionate, but
I thought I could perceive in it a slight difference
from the others. It promised a visit
soon, but left the dear when untold.
`While expecting one beloved or admired,
there is always a certain preparation which
occupies both mind and person. The sweet
Ladaüanna, was frozen, and could now, I knew,
be crossed. Three days I braided my hair,
and placed music and a flower of winter on
the table near my favorite window. But still,
I looked in vain, towards the slope of the hill
of the seminary, for that figure, which could
not be mistaken. I did all I could to be cheerful,
`On the fourth morning came—not my
friend but a letter dated late on the night
preceding.
`Ethelwald to write to me, had retired from
a convivial circle; in “the moment of mirth,”
he had thought of his solitary expectant; his
lines, though entirely unguarded, were such
as might well be dear to me. They were
meet for no eye but that of a friend, and I
prized them the more that they were not.
`Yet the fifth, sixth, and seventh day passed;—still
Ethelwald was absent. He came no
more, like a god of Grecian mythology, to diffuse
light and summer through my lone and
wintry habitation.
`My nights became almost sleepless—my
days passed in fruitless excitement. The
beautiful being who had charmed me, kept continually
embodied to my mind;—and I often
sank upon my couch, exhausted by that strong
mental effort which was constant, and wore
on my system, though entirely unconscious
and involuntary. My earthly frame was too
weak for the continual demands of “ideality.”
`Every day I grew thinner and thinner, till
I realized the words of the psalmist beloved
by protestants and puritans: “My beauty
wasteth away, even as a moth fretteth a garment.”
The thought was bitterness!—even
now, how far was I inferior to the object of a
to be endured or to endure? Was all this
change in a week?—how then could I live, if
deprived.... I dared not think of it!...
`The family around, perceived in me a difference,
but ascribed it to “mal de pays.”
`The pastor of the English chapel near the
“manor house,” visited me as one of his flock.
This was a man, destitute of worldly prudence,
but his heart was kind and good. He perceived
that my health was declining, and reverted
to the visits I had received, till I thought he
suspected the state of my feelings. He did
not enquire what had passed, but told me that
the friends of Ethelwald were, now, overwhelming
him with fêtes and invitations. So much
of the time of their favorite, they were determined
should not be passed among the pine
trees of N—t. Alas! what had I done,
that strangers should conspire against my happiness?
`In the picturesque towns of Canada, there
lived families who had beautiful daughters;
and he, who was an ornament to every room
that he entered, and to every street where he
walked, had lived single to the age of twenty-eight.
Must this paragon of the country be
monopolized—and perhaps, even carried off
by a stranger whom nobody knew?—(A Yankee?)
`At the castle of St. Louis, at Quebec, the
wont to be often assembled. Ethelwald,
(though born in Canadian America, and apparently
unconscious of the merits he possessed,)
was a man whose fortune would have been
made had he lived in the time, and been seen
by a Catharine of Russia. Ethelwald must
adorn the handsome groups at the castle. So
thought Lady D—e, while directing the arrangement
of her drawing room, or looking
from her window, far over the magnificent basin
[6] of the spreading Ladauanna.
`This lady lived, in effect, as the vice-queen
of her province. The handsome officer from
England, the amiable descendant of France,
the half-civilized Indian of the forest [7]
—all,
with the females whom they loved, delighted
in paying to her, their varied homage. The
wishes of this lady were seconded by the power
of her husband, and her regards had been
directed to Ethelwald.
`Had these things transpired but one month
before, I should have lost a few brief days of
pleasure, yet escaped such degrees of pain as
hope had been indulged; the arrow had entered;
and to tear it forth again was a torment
more dreadful than death.
`Three other days and nights passed away,
and still I saw not the friend whose presence
had become to me, as needful as the sun to a
garden of the north.
`Hitherto, I had almost disdained the gifts
of the world and of fortune; the mere want of
them might now, be my perdition. I felt myself
as a withering blossom, which God alone,
could resuseitate; and yet, I was too weak
even to ask of heaven, the only dew which
could restore me. The reptile of suspicion
was creeping towards my heart, and the winds
that blew over me, seemed chill from the deserts
of despair.
`I dared not write to Ethelwald, nor to ask
of him the cause of his absence; to find him
cold or unfaithful was more to be dreaded,
even than the pain of the burning suspense I
endured.
`While still in this miserable state, Henry
Arlington, the commercial partner of my absent
cousin, Pharamond, came to visit me in
my retirement. He seemed shocked at the
change in my manners and countenance, yet
spoke of the gay manner in which Mr. Ethelwald
had lived, particularly for the last two
weeks.
`The devotion of this breathing image of a
deity, to a retired woman, had, it appeared,
been discussed in every circle; and every effort
had been made to amuse and detain Ethelwald.
“Lord D—e, our Governor,” said Arlington,
“exerts himself to obtain promotion
for his new favorite. A succession of parties
are contrived for him; his head will be turned
with vanity; and I am told, even now, he intends
getting published some of your verses,
in praise of his own beauty.”
`I felt a sickness at my heart; but so strong
was the self-command, acquired while I lived
with poor Burleigh, that I now succeeded in
suppressing all violent emotion. During the
whole conversation, I had been walking the
room with Arlington, but perceiving that my
steps began to falter, I sat down as we approached
the sofa.
`During all my life, I had never fainted save
from loss of blood; but strength at this moment
had entirely forsaken me.
`Arlington saw that I was ill, but that he
had noticed when he first entered. He now
changed the subject of his speaking; and
strongly advised me to leave awhile little Arvon,
my son, and visit his wife at Quebec. I
promised that if not better I would come; and
he soon after left me, promising to return the
next day before proceeding on his way to
Montreal.
`It was difficult to sit through the daily repast
when he was gone;—soup, bird, and
sweetmeats, were as slips of paper on my
tongue, for all external sense of taste was benumbed
by the feelings that absorbed me. I
retired to my chamber and lay down awhile
on my couch, unconscious of the passing of
hours, but awake to a conflict indescribable.
`When the hour for tea had arrived, the
Canadian servant came to call me to that little
drawing-room where I had passed days and
hours resembling heaven; but my head ached;
I desired to be left to repose, but slept not,
for I could not weep.
`The night passed in thoughts that devoured
me. Had Ethelwald felt no regard?—had
he visited me only for amusement? Could
he wound me to the quick, to gratify a trifling
vanity?—Could he, who had seemed so tender
and noble, unreflectingly doom me to perish?—to
think so unworthily of one so dear,
was worse than to leave him forever.
`Have I then, I thought, become an inconvenience?—He
whom the world caresses shall
soon, if so, be set at ease.
`My thoughts became insufferable; I threw
myself from side to side upon my bed, and
made and rejected a hundred plans of procedure.
Fixing at length upon one—one stern
resolve, I found, as I reflected on it, as it were,
a cruel alleviation of my torment.
`In the morning I arose weak and languid,
but firmly intent upon my purpose.
`I first gathered together music, papers,
gloves, and every little proof of kindness which
the beautiful Ethelwald had brought to me.—
Then with excessive pain I penned a note, the
contents of which have now fled from my memory,
and brought a large sheet of paper to enclose
the packet I had made.
`While folding the ample envelope, the first
thing I saw was music, presented by this friend
of times past, when I first knew him at P—d,
—so young—so beautiful—so apparently unconscious
and sincere!
`For five years I had looked at this music,
and never till now, with other emotions than
those of pleasure. A shriek almost escaped
me as it disappeared beneath the paper I was
folding. I felt as if acting against some strong
resistance, and every nerve seemed strained,
as I doubled the last corner of the paper that
enclosed it.
`When it was entirely out of sight, I could
proceed better, and lighted my taper at the
stove.
`The packet was soon fastened with a riband,
and seal of black bearing my usual impression.
`I looked at it, when alone, and shrank back
—was it not the seal of my destiny? and did
not some unseen being direct the movements
of that morning?
`Scarcely had I finished when Arlington
came, as he had promised, to ask if I had any
commands for him. Here, I said, is a parcel
and a letter. Will you present them to Mr.
Ethelwald as you pass through Trois Rivieres?
He looked for an instant at the packet and at
me, and then said, “Mrs. Burleigh, you are
certainly ill, and I fear lest I said too much
during yesterday's conversation. It is not
for me to ask what are the contents of this
letter and parcel; but let me advise you not
to send them till you have had time for reflection.”
I have reflected, was my answer, and
when once resolved it is better to execute.
`Arlington was intent upon business; and
being in haste to accomplish it, he took the
parcel and letter and departed, repeating his
wishes to see me, ere long, at Quebec.
`When again left alone, I endeavored to
find consolation, and to resign myself to the
will of Heaven, to that spirit who, felt but unseen,
marks out the destiny of mortals.
`I strove to applaud myself for what I had
done, as an act of generosity and duty;—but
ere the next day had passed, came a letter
from Ethelwald.
`With a feeling, haply, like that of the savage
warrior of the woods, whose death song
is composed, I broke the seal of this paper,
traced by the hand of one far dearer and more
charming to me, than life to the hunter of the
forest.
`Had the words of this letter been either
light or indifferent, pride would have been
awakened, and the passions that follow in her
train might have assisted me in recovering
from the shock. But every expression of my
beloved was that of gentleness and sorrow.
`After telling me that his absence had been
entirely the result of unavoidable circumstances,
“How could you, for a moment,” he
continued, “believe a report which would
prove me, if true, a false friend, base in feeling
and in character? ought you not first to
have considered?—Every thing once mine you
have returned; have I deserved this at your
hands? You say “let us not meet again.”—
I will not visit you if you desire it not, but if
we meet by accident, I cannot be so inconsistent,
as not to continue to evince for you the
regard I have felt and expressed.”
`Thus wrote Ethelwald, a seraph in mind
as in form, under circumstances, where any
other man would have shown both pique and
resentment. Every line of the paper in my
hand was breathing with tenderness, combined
with a sense of injury, which renewed with
double force every feeling of my love and admiration.
`All excuse and self-complacency forsook
me; degraded in my own eyes, I felt as if unworthy
either of heaven or of earth.
`My frame was already weak with what I
also forsaking my mind, save one only of
self-torture. Still I sank not entirely; accustomed
from childhood, to reflect much, and
often thrown upon my own resources, I made
constant effort to look calmly at the worst and
to seek for hope and amusement in vague and
distant objects.
`The hymn, which you will find among my
papers, of that winter which I shudder to think
of, was the fruit of one of many sleepless nights.
It depicts but faintly, the suffering that became
less intense whenever I could express the
slightest pang of it in verse.
Dost thou reject my midnight prayer?
Dost thon withhold me e'vn from thee?
Thus writhing, struggling 'gainst despair?
Thou know'st the source offeeling's gush,
Thou know'st the end for which it flows—
Then—if thou bid'st the tempest rush,
Ah! heed the fragile bark it throws!
Fain would my heaving heart be still—
But pain and tumult mock at rest:
Fain would I meekly meet thy will,
And kiss the barb that tears my heart.
Weak I am formed, I can no more,
Weary I strive, but find not aid,—
Prone on thy threshold I deplore,
But ah! thy succour is delayed!
Amid its circling host upborne,
Smiles, as life quickens in its ray—
What would it, were thy hand withdrawn?—
Scorch—devastate the teeming whole
Now glowing with its warmth divine!
Spirit whose powers, of peace, control
Great nature's heart, oh! pity mine!
`That winter which I tremble to recall at this
moment of vivid recollection;—that winter
allowed one day of happiness, which memory
will always retain, and fly to the picture she
has made of it, when the present is dull or languid—all
the pain of that winter, which to
think of, oh! my friend, makes me shudder
even in thy presence, and while breathing the
perfume of these flowers—the pain of that
winter and of my life, was, perhaps, too small
a price for the happiness of such a day!'
“Thus,” exclaimed Dalcour, “doth nature
evince her kindness! The mind, where she
reigns, casts aside the remembrance of pain,
and treasures every moment of pleasure, to
look upon with joy, through the varying path
of futurity. Idomen could forget months, and
even years of suffering, to dwell upon the memory
of one day; and the color that now mantled
on her cheek, almost pale before she spoke,
arose from the excitement of that long past
day of satisfaction.
“I wished to prolong the sentiment so pleasing,
tho' indefinite, and was fain not to suffer
my friend to revert immediately to scenes that
I knew must follow. I presented to the now
smiling Idomen, an orange, brought by Benito
on a piece of fresh plantain leaf. The faithful
boy had peeled it with his ebony fingers,
(kept always pliant and unsoiled for the light
labors he loved,) and opened it, without spilling
a drop of nectarious juice, at its own delicate
divisions.
“Idomen swallowed it in complacency, but
said:—`My friend, do not fear to exhaust me;
the scenes I soon shall describe were indeed,
terrible, while passing, but to speak of them
now, amid flowers and fruits presented to me
by the hand of friendship, I feel to be almost
a pleasure. So the mariner, while seated on
the deck of a new skiff, on a calm sea, rosy
with twilight, reverts to the horrors of a wreck,
escaped only one voyage before.
`I know not, yet, the will of heaven; but
whatever fate may be marked out for me, the
past, at least, is certain, and mine.
`I would not give the scenes past with Ethelwald,
with all their pain of more than many
deaths, for a whole long life of calm happiness.'
“This, again,” said Dalcour, “is nature!
and yet, I knew it well to be but a passing hyperbole,
the overflow of excessive excitement
her who had suffered. Had the choice been
offered, Idomen would have been found obedient
to duty and to reason.
“When a few brief moments were passed,
I again desired Madame Burleigh to proceed,
in sincerity, with her story; but her lips were
still moist with the fragrant gift I had presented.
She retired to the court, a moment, and
rinced, habitually, the delicious sweetness of
the orange from the well kept ivory of her
mouth. No care was ever spared by Idomen
to preserve from a decay, so common among
the fragile beauties of the new world, such
gifts as should always be guarded, because
they are received from heaven. But when
this moment had been given to the angel of
health, she sat down again by my side, remained
a little while silent, and thus continued her
story:
`In beings formed to taste it keenly, the desire
of happiness is strong. Happiness, in its
utmost excess, had been but lately in my view.
Had my own hand broken the cup, which heaven
itself had presented? I asked myself this,
and conceived, for the first time in my life, of
the torments ascribed to those wretched souls
in perdition, who have been shown, for a moment,
the delights of paradise, to be told that
their own sins have shut them, forever, from
the scene. Alas! with such a consciousness,
of external arteries?
`In the midst of such reflections as these,
came a card from the “manor house.” A
large ball was to be given, and Ethelwald, I
knew, would be invited.
`But one month before, with what pleasure
could I have adorned myself to meet him at
such a festivity!—but now?—the thought was
a stab to my heart; annihilation, even, would
at that moment, have been preferable.
`Ethelwald, I thought, would be there; and
gay, thoughtless persons might come, also, on
purpose to look, in curiosity, on one, to whom
the present favorite of the world around him,
had devoted whole days, and even weeks. To
meet such persons, would require my utmost
health and firmness; how, then, pained and altered
as I was, could I sustain the glances of
scrutiny?
`I feared to meet the gaze of the multitude;
yet one look of kindness from him I had offended,
would have been to me like the dew-cup
of the deserts of Florida, to the slave dying of
thirst, yet fugitive, and fearing to return to the
well or fountain of his master.[8]
`The night of the ball arrived, and the cold
the heat of stoves, pained every vein and artery
on the surface of my sensitive skin. The
pain of my heart was still keener; but a faint
gleam of hope was like the sun of approaching
spring.
`A young relative of my host, had come to
N—t for the ball; and learned, with unfeigned
regret, that I was too ill to go. Her
name was Elmire; she, I knew, would speak
of me to Ethelwald, and the next day, oh!
heaven!—might bless me with an interview.
`A dress of pale blue was chosen by this
gentle girl. Azure, celestial azure, was the
favorite colour of him who reigned in my
thoughts. With an impulse, accompanying
my natural love of beauty, I assisted at her
toilet, and helped to arrange her fair locks so
as best to comport with the style and colour
of her face, neck, and garments.
`When all was finished, her hair, countenance
and vestments were so complete in the
harmony of tints, as to waken in me, when I
looked at her, despite of the pain at my heart,
a feeling almost delightful.
`I felt, as it were, a spirit too sad to enter
paradise, who comes weeping to fold the robes
of some messenger to that smiling region.
`The reputation for loveliness is generally
obtained by some circumstance. Often, after
hearing the praises of a belle of some town or
her companions, is heard to ask, “which is the
beauty?”
`With the gentle Elmire it was otherwise.
She had never been vaunted. Few travellers
go searching for violets or lilies of the valley,
when roses and magnolias are flaunting, in
their fragrance, around them; yet violets and
lilies, were they near at hand, would often
be chosen in preference.
`When Elmire was complimented, she blushed,
turned aside, and spoke of the beauty of
her mother.
`That mother soon came to N—t, to
take back Elmire to her home. In her youth
she had lived at a remote “township,” in the
midst of Canadian forests; and her mortal form,
though entirely neglected, remained still, as
little impaired as nature, unassisted by mortal
skill, could, in any climate, have preserved it.
The happy peasants of her neighborhood had
named her in their simplicity, “l'ange des bois.”
Her beauty, except that of Ethelwald, was the
most perfect I ever had seen. Both have lived,
and will probably cease to live, in some
one of the groves or cities of a country, without
other poets than the savage archers of the
forest.
`When such forms of beauty come on earth,
perhaps, ere they fade or change, some model
is made of them for heaven. Or perhaps, they
what, in heaven, is eternal, when forms shall
take the cast of divinity, and every lovely particle,
that seemed lost and scattered upon
earth, shall be called and united to its own, to
smile and to bloom forever.
`When Elmire was gone, I felt weak, and
retired to my couch,—there, though I slept
not, the night was less painful than those
which had lately preceded it; for a glimmer
of hope was in view, as I looked forward to
the morning.
`Ethelwald was to be at the ball; could he
leave N—t without seeing that friend, to
visit whom he had so lately crossed the Ladaüanna
in storms?
`At four o'clock, the young visitor returned.
I heard some of the family arise to admit
her, but feared to call and ask her questions.
`When the soul has suffered much, it clings
to the faintest hope, even as the infant, whose
mouth is sore, clasps with his little transparent
hand the smooth coral and silver bells, and
shrinks from the food presented.
`It seems better to embrace an illusion than
to hazard, by certainty, the renewal of ineffable
pain. With the first, a little rest was possible—the
last would have banished repose entirely
from my pillow.
`In the morning, ere breakfast was ready,
that Ethelwald had danced little, and spoken
with her, often, through the evening; that he
expressed sorrow at not seeing me as he expected;
the more, as a party of friends had
engaged him to cross the river as soon as
the company should separate, to proceed with
them at that early hour, upon the frozen St.
Lawrence to Quebec.
`Besides this intelligence, a note soon arrived
from my beloved, which evidently had
been penned during the late festivity. Of
tenderness it was full, like the letters I still
preserved, but the hurry of the scene, and the
influence of mirthful companions, were, also,
both perceived in its contents.
`Hope now fled, and the light, again, was
misery. Elmire wished me to return with
her and with her mother, to their residence at
Trois Rivieres.
`At any other time I should have shrunk
from the cold; but change of place is often desirable
to the wretched.
`I sawmy little Arvon, and prepared, on the
second day after the ball, to accompany the
mild Elmire, with her father and her mother,
to their abode.
`Eight English miles we had proceeded over
the country, when our cariole descended to
the ice of the Ladaüanna, which seemed like
a pavement of crystal.
`The whole snowy landscape was magnificent,
but to look at it long, could be done, only
at the peril of death or mutilation.[9]
`The quicksilver of the thermometer stood
at a point which it reaches but in few parts of
Europe. The same degrees of latitude in the
New World, are well known to be far colder
than in those eastern regions long inhabited
by civilized man.
`In the frozen Ladaüanna, there are always
open chasms. Through these, as is said by
the peasants, “the great river breathes.”—
How superb was its breath on that day!
`Our cariole, drawn by a little thick-haired
Canadian horse, seemed but as a speck in the
snowy immensity around us.
`One English mile we had rode upon its frozen
waves, and another mile was yet to be past.
`I held over my mouth my closely furred
hood, and only made bare my eyes to look at
the scene before me,—at the breath of the vast
river.
`Through those deep chasms or mouths,
through which breathed the Ladaüanna, arose
clouds of vapor, mounting to the sky,—assuming
the form of phantoms;—mingling light and
shade,—and sparkling in the cold beams of the
distant sun of winter.
`I thought of the depths whence arose those
brilliant vapors,—and an idea darted through
my soul. Could I throw myself into the midst
of these shining particles, the warm wave beneath
would receive me, and how soon could
I be safe from all the disappointments of the
world!
`Attended as I was, I could not stir from the
cariole. Had escape at that moment been
possible, the thought would have been obeyed,
perhaps, as suddenly as conceived. It
could not be—yet my mind from that moment
became possessed with a design, which heaven
alone has frustrated.
`After two or three hours, we ascended the
bank of the river, and soon reached the dwelling
of Madame C—l, in a street of Trois Rivieres.
The rest of the family appeared and welcomed,
with embraces, Elmire and their parents.—
“L'ange des bois” was living in one of those
low-roofed abodes of her country, which display
all the charms of hospitality.
`The table was already spread. Canada,
with its still few inhabitants, is a country of
ease and of plenty. Soup was followed by
venison and birds of the forest, kept frozen in
snow, since the autumn.
`Wild nuts, wild fruits preserved in the sugar
of the maple, and the beautiful apples of
Montreal, kept always bright and unfrozen,[10]
composed the dessert, while pieces of ancient
plate told the families of Europe from which
my kind hostess and her children had descended.
Their present was happy; their past was
tender regret; and pleasing hopes adorned
their future.
`Madame C—l spoke freely, herself, of her
uncommon personal perfections, but took no
pains either to display or to embellish them.
`Untinctured either with vanity or ambition,
she confided in the love of her husband; and
thought only of him, her children and her
household.
`Yet her face was still of fair colors, while
nothing could exceed its outline; her hair was
still shining; her light brown eyes softly
bright; her lips full and red; and her hands,
though much used, white and taper.
`The dwelling where Ethelwald was born
could be seen from her window. She had
known his mother and brethren, and spoke of
them all in terms of love and admiration.
`I have said that the friend whose absence
made me miserable, was the last who survived
of his family. Madame C—l spoke of the
favor he had lately obtained in the sight of
the governor of the province, and said it was
remained so long, contented in the place of
his nativity.
`The verses, oh! my early and constant
friend, which drew from you so much concern
for my happiness, when I showed them to
you at P—d, were given anonymously to a
journal of the day, and when printed, with the
permission of my husband, were sent, still
anonymously, to Ethelwald. His soft eyes
had read them;—his musical voice had pronounced
them;—his kind heart had suspected
whence they came;--and his white hands, after
five years had passed, unfolded and showed
them to me again, one delicious evening at
N—t. Five years he had remained contented
near the roof of his childhood, and
sometimes read in secret, a few verses, the
only proof of regard from a woman, whom he
had then known but a week. Why did he
preserve them?--What scenes have since transpired?—Why
had our late meetings been permitted
by heaven?
This I unconsciously asked of my soul,
now so deeply troubled. I heard and rejoiced
at his honors;—but when I thought of myself,
my whole being, as it were, seemed shivering
within me, and the design I had formed
while crossing the ice of the Ladaüanna, absorbed
every inward thought with renewed
intensity.
`Yet, dark as was all within me, I responded
beloved. I listened to their artless songs of
the country, and sang them others, in return,
though with a voice that, in my own ear, was
hollow, and with a feeling entirely indescribable.
By many an early struggle I had learned
the art of seeming cheerful to those around
me, while my heart, in secret, was desolate or
suffering. Thus, sometimes, on a sod of Florida,
are seen pale flowers and verdure, while
the hollow darkness beneath it, is tenanted by
a serpent and her progeny.
`Early the next day, the father of Elmire
conducted me back to N—t. The cold
had a little diminished; but the breath of the
Ladaüanna still mounted in columns to the
skies, and its waters, covered with snow, resembled
rocks of crystal, heaped with feathers
of the ptarmigan. I thought of my design
of yesterday, and wished that its current was
flowing.
`N—t, which had lately seemed beautiful,—N—t,
with its dark gray seminary
and glittering spires, with its grove of pines
and river, broad, my friend, as the Seine of thy
country, though but small as a tributary of the
St. Lawrence. N—t, with its happy little
dwelling, where I had passed the sweetest
moments of my life, seemed now the dearest
place for my tomb, and I longed to lay me down
in the bosom of a land that seemed to me as a
foster mother.
I deemed that the world could, to me, be no
longer as before; yet even for years ere this
period, vague hopes for the future were sometimes
all that made it endurable.
`My desire, now, was for death; but what
would become of my boy, of my fair little Arvon,
already too much an orphan?—would not
suicide also, be guilt?—to me it had never
seemed a crime;—still there was a doubt!
`I pondered long in secret, and went through
long trains of reasoning. Arguments, whispered,
perhaps, by some evil spirit, arose in
favor of my purpose.
`Men of ancient times,—men who thought
much, men who lived nearer than we to the
time of the creation, believed, that at least,
two genii attended the steps of every mortal.
The adorable bearer of the cross said nothing
to disprove this belief;—he, even, was tempted,
and prayed to be delivered from temptation.'
“Idomen was weak and overwhelmed; the
power that preserved her was not mortal. `Oh!
father of spirits, desert me not again! for I
know I live only by thy protection.'
“I trembled,” said Dalcour, “as I looked
intently on the blooming fair-haired woman by
my side. Her face was covered with her
hands. Of those which are called the stormy
passions, her heart was entirely destitute.—
Anger, hatred, and revenge, endanger the
peace of others; but far more dangerous to
which are good only when governed by reason
or by heaven.
“Idomen soon recovered her composure,
and said:—`I have promised, oh! my friend,
to tell thee all; I conceal not a thought or a
sentiment; thy regard would possess no charm
for me, if obtained by falsehood or deceit.
`See me, then, as I am!—Behold that Idomen
whom heaven has preserved, and esteem
her still, if thou wilt. Without fault, there is
said to be no human being; happy then, is
she who is still esteemed, when all her faults
are made apparent!'
“Proceed,” I said, “in thy story, as thou
hast begun. My esteem, Idomen is already
thine. Truth for me, is enough. I do not ask
perfection. While the tongue is unsoiled with
falsehood, there is little corruption at the heart.
`Yet dreadful, said Idomen, were the hours
that I would depict to thee! I soon resolved
fully on death. My imagination heavily employed
itself in devising means to execute a
deed that might free me, at once, from the
world and all its evils. Yet great as was at
this time, my suffering, its endurance even
seemed preferable to the shock that might be
felt by my boy.
`Yet my Arvon had, now, become acquainted
with those around him; he spoke French a
little, and was contented. Seeing my drooping
that I loved, to go to Quebec, stay till I was
better, and then return to him again.
`His innocent wishes determined me. I
wrote to Henry Arlington that my health required
a change of scene, and a young relation
was immediately sent to escort me.
`I parted with my child, as I thought for
the last time on earth. My sleepless nights
had continued. After once more crossing
the frozen Ladaüanna, and while stopping at
Trois Rivieres, I desired my young attendant
to procure for me a phial of Laudanum, to be
used at discretion. The black potion was
obtained, and carefully secured in my portmanteau.
`Refreshments were served at an inn; eat I
could not, but feeling a deep thirstiness, I swallowed
from time to time, an egg, in some wine
of France, mixed with water of the Ladaüanna.
`Our hardy Canadian driver took care of his
long-haired pony; and we soon proceeded on
our course upon the frozen waves of the river.
`My young conductor perceived not the
state of my feelings. He was one whom I had
known and regarded; and whenever he conversed
I listened with a sort of indescribable
suspense. But during long intervals of silence
as we proceeded slowly on the ice, I sat occupied
entirely with such thoughts as but
served to strengthen my purpose. I am weak,
if this deep mental suffering
should continue, even reason may ere long,
forsake me; it is better to be dead than a
maniac.
`All day we glided on, as lonely as a little
boat at sea; and at night ascended the bank
of the river, and stopped for rest at a village.
`On the third day we reached the snow
crowned fortress of Quebec. Arlington was
lately married. His companion, though gay,
was deeply imbued with an admiration of belles
lettres, and seemed pleased to receive me for
her guest.
`The cause of my illness was easily divined
by Marian; she loved to watch the progress
of the passion which had so consumed me,
and watched it with a feeling like those of poets
when they read a tragedy.
`Marian was piquante, lively, shrewd, and
teeming with wit and sarcasm; yet her manners,
to me, were softened to a degree of respect
and almost of tenderness. Perhaps some
guardian spirit, acted on her heart at that
time, and secretly commissioned her to preserve
me.
`Arlington's house was in one of the broader
streets within the gray walls of the lofty
tower-flanked fortress, and to my surprise, I
was told that a hotel nearly opposite was the
temporary abode of him I loved.
`To be so near was a deep satisfaction, but
the hand of despair had grasped my heart, and
was cold there.
`Ethelwald, when apprised of my arrival,
called upon Mrs. Arlington, and desired to see
me. How lately could I have flown to him!
But now trembling, exhausted, my lips, cheeks
and hands, rough with the fever of my blood,
and the cold winds of the river, I went to
the drawing-room to see him, once more, from
whom I thought soon to part forever.
`He took my weak hand in the manner of
friends in his country. His own hand, (mid
winter though it was,) was warm, moist with
a light perspiration, and whiter than the milk
of the cocoa-nut, or petals of the fragrant magnolia.
`The touch of that hand, it seemed to me,
was enough to make the dead awaken, and my
heart, half petrified as it was, felt almost a
thrill, in return for it.
`At first my eyes were cast down; I contrasted
the fullness of the happiness of him before
me, with the feelings that devoured my
peace.
`A sentiment of pride came over my heart.
Friends and fortune, I thought, may desert
me,—but at least, I have courage to die. Vain
boast of a desolate soul! power even to seek
the grave, is not given to every wretch who
sighs for it.
`The tone of the voice of Ethelwald, despite
of every endeavor, very soon caused my lids
to rise. I wished not to trust myself to look
at him; but my eyes, as soon as raised, were
riveted.
`The most perfect health adorned his beauty;
he seemed encircled by a vapour of softness
and of brilliancy; and his countenance
was so full of benevolence, that I fain would
have knelt and wept before him.
`But Marian Arlington was present, and her
voice turned the current of my emotions.—
I saw her shrewd dark eye glancing first
upon me, and then on her other visitor.—
I wished her to leave the room a moment, but
could not ask her, and a strong sentiment of
pride restrained me while beneath her observation;—pride
in one who sought the grave!
Alas! what an enigma is every thinking mind
to itself! During such intervals as that, do
not unseen beings shed their influences?
`The moment was past. Marian ran to the
window, and said that a carriage was driving
to the door of the opposite hotel. It contained
a party that Ethelwald was to join. He
took leave; but I could not, as I once had done,
find strength to follow him to the door.
“After all,” said Marian, when he was gone,
“of what value is beauty in a man?—your favorite,
I am sure, is vain, and you will make
him more so. No! for him I am determined
you shall not distress yourself.”
`I was not in a state to answer. I retired
to my room near the saloon where we sat,
bathed my aching head in the waters of the Ladaüanna,
and endeavored to gain strength for
the day.
`With great effort, I succeeded in dressing
for dinner at five. Some friends of my hostess
came in, and the theatre was proposed.
My faint refusal was not taken; neither had
I energy enough to resist with firmness.
`At N—t, Ethelwald had once spoken
to me of his walks through the Louvre while
at Paris. “With what pleasure,” he said,
“could he lead me to the statues and pictures
which had most engaged his attention.
I may, at least hope,” he continued, “that you
will walk with me, some day, round the fortress
of Quebec, and look with me at the prospect
from its ramparts.” From these ramparts
may be seen the last dwelling of civilized man,
intervening in all the vast wilds between the
castle of St. Louis and the brink of the arctic
ocean. (22)
`We were, now, both in the same fortress;
yet the walks of Ethelwald were taken with
others, and Idomen was in the care of strangers!
`The friends of Arlington were ready in
their attention; but after the arm which had
lately supported me, to lean upon another was
like death.
`In the course of the theatric entertainment,
I looked a moment towards the box of Lord
D—e, and saw him who had appeared to
me like a deity, on earth, surrounded by gay,
trifling ladies, who kept him in continual conversation.
`I dared not take another glance; when returned
I was too ill to sup, and retired to my
pillow, reflecting on the next day's purpose.
`Alone in the darkness of the night, and disturbed
only by the sound of carriages, returning
at intervals from scenes of festivity, I lay
endeavoring to be calm, and to silence those
doubts which conscience continually presented.
`Words like these came to my mind:—
what tie have I to the earth, save that only of
my child?—him I cannot benefit, even though
I strive to remain. At best, I am weak; if I
droop continually, at last, what shall I become?
a burthen, a burthen? alas!—even now, what
am I else? If I live in misery like this, reason
must ultimately forsake me. How terrible
for poor little Arvon, who has looked on me
only as a being loving and beloved! How very
far more terrible to look upon a maniac;—upon
one, perhaps, even loathsome, than to see
me only in memory;—(as he knew me, oh, my
friend, when you first took him on your knee!)
children are soon taught to bend their minds
to new objects. Arvon, even now, can bear my
him; and if there be kindness on earth, he will
find friends better than I! No! no! he shall
never see his mother an object for other feelings
than those of love!
`Towards morning I slept from exhaustion;
at nine, I arose to breakfast with Marian, and
afterwards retired to write.
`My purpose had now become fixed, and despite
of the night I had passed, my appearance,
though pale, was calm to those around me; but
if the soul which now warms me be eternal,
the remembrance of that day, so calm to those
around, will continue to the latest eternity.
`I first wrote separate letters to Arlington
and to Marian, beseeching, for the sake of
compassion, and as they valued their own futurity,
to conceal from my son the manner of
my death. I then wrote to Pharamond, told
him that I was ill, and that I felt I should never
see him more. I then recommended little
Arvon to his care, and besought him to petition
our uncle, Llewellyn Lloyde, in favor of
my orphan boy, as soon as he should return to
the beautiful river, and find me no longer on
earth.
`To write these letters seemed a duty, but
it was a terrible one, I know not what death
I may die, but no greater pain, I am sure, upon
earth, can be suffered. To swallow the
poison, when compared with it, was as a trifle.
`I next looked over a small trunk of papers.
From time to time they had been saved, when
my imagination was under the influence of a
strong but vague hope that I should, one day
or other, be loved and renowned; and live longer
than my natural life, in the history of the
country of my forefathers, and that where I
first beheld the light. No mortal, I said, shall
smile at the fancies of lonely Idomen!—and
the few long preserved papers were burned at
the same taper, where I had just sealed, with
black, my letters of death.'
“Here Madame Burleigh shuddered, and
again exclaimed:—`You have bid me, my
friend, speak truth to you, even as to God!—
I know not why, but what I felt in burning
these papers, in resigning this vague hope—
this indescribable illusion, caused me a pain
even greater and more sickening than the
certainty of leaving life, and my child. Yet
love for Ethelwald was stronger even than this
hope or illusion, for it forced me to resign a
flattering possibility which, from childhood,
had mingled with my reveries.
`At five o'clock, instead of appearing at
dinner, I lay exhausted on my bed. Marian
was kindness itself; she knew not what I had
been doing, but imagined that I suffered because
Ethelwald had not come in the morning.
With her own hands she brought me nourishment—soup,
light wafers, and jelly of the beautiful
remained at home, with some intimate friends
of her selection, and came frequently to my
room. Perceiving that I slept not, she brought
her companions to my bed-side, determined
that my own regrets should be lost in the
charms of conversation.
`Despite of my heaviness of heart I perceived
her delicate attentions, and felt for her, esteem
and gratitude.
`In the morning I breakfasted in bed. Appetite
I had none, but I swallowed, to give me
strength, an uncooked egg and some jelly, and
promised at five, to be present in the drawing
room. My earthly affairs seemed concluded,
and I strove to give to friendship the last day
of my existence, in a world where it is often
sought in vain.
`When the day was nearly spent, I arose,
called forth all the strength that remained to
me, bathed carefully, dressed myself in white,
and succeeded in braiding with my trembling
hands, the hair, which your praises, oh, friend
of my retreat, first taught me to value at P—d;
and when Marion saw me, she placed in it a
few dark leaves of a laurel, cultivated in a lower
apartment of her home. I had once looked
for laurels more lasting.'
“Idomen,” I returned, “let thy hopes continue!
If heaven has planted laurels in thy
reach, thou hast now, a friend, whose humble
She looked at me an instant, and proceeded:
`The saloon of Marion overlooked the street;
there the family party had assembled before
descending to the dining room. On entering,
I found them at the windows, and went to look
with the rest. Ethelwald was walking down
the snow-covered pavement, together with a
young man of exquisite beauty, though of a
style entirely different from his own. The
last was like an animated statue of brown marble;
the first like a celestial visitant.
`The stranger was a Thespian of uncommon
personal endowments; within the walls of
Quebec, good scenic representations were seldom
enjoyed, and every lover of the elegant
arts caressed and entertained the present visitor.
`Ethelwald looked up toward our windows
with a smile, which, to see, was worth a whole
year of common happiness! with a smile that
should have healed and consoled, but my heart
was closely grasped by the strong hard hand
of despair.
`At table, remarks were made on the two
that had walked together; on the favorite Thespian,
and on him who lately had been favored
by the governor or viceroy of the province.—
Another guest came in at the dessert, and added
that a certain lady of wealth and beauty
was evidently making endeavors to gain the
beside, it was a wonder that he had lived so
long in quiet, on the banks of his native river.
`I spoke not a word on the subject; but I
heard enough to determine me, even if I had
not before been resolved.
`The whole party were again going to the
theatre, and Marian would not leave me at
home. I know not why it was, but I felt no
reluctance in going, although shrinking as before,
from every arm that supported me.
`How potent, yet how complicated and indefinite,
are the varying motives of the soul!
to ourselves how unaccountable! to the world
how utterly inexplicable!
`The taking of means not to see another
morning, had all day, absorbed every energy.
Yet I spent at the theatre, the eve of my meditated
death, and even the scene represented
is still impressed upon my memory.
`H—n, the Thespian visitor, had chosen
for his appearance, the part of Kotzebue's
Rolla, and the light dress of a Peruvian chief
displayed to full advantage the grace and symmetry
of his figure. His hair was wild and
thick, his eye dark and piercing. A white
tunic fell to the knee, and was confined lightly
round the waist with a cincture of gold and
serpent skin. A small golden sun shone at
his breast, and another on each shoulder.—
His fine neck was bare; and his finished limbs,
silken covering, which seemed, in closeness
and colour, like the skin of a warrior of Potosi.
`Ethelwald, I knew, was present, and admiring
also the fine form of the mimic Peruvian;
but I dared not look towards the place where
he sat, for fear of a prying glance from the lady
who would fain abridge his liberty.
`We retired, when the tragedy was over,
and at ten, I sat at the supper table, with Arlington
and Marian, who said she thought me
recovering, and that she hoped soon to see me
restored to spirits. To spirits, I replied, I indeed,
hope soon to be restored! Something
whispered to my heart, at that moment, `take
heed lest those spirits be evil.'
`At eleven I retired to my room, with the
intent to do my last earthly deed.
`When carefully bathed in the waters of the
river I loved, when my hair was combed and
parted, when I had put upon my feet, which I
thought would never wander more, white slippers
and hose of Cuba, I folded about me a
white morning robe, just washed, by a laundress
of Canada, in the waters of the Ladaüanna.
May my weary soul, I said, be washed
and made free from stain, even as I now
endeavor to throw from this material form,
every particle of soil or pollution!
`To finish this last toilette, now made for
my mother earth, I went and looked sadly in
of my own eyes was too dreadful to be contemplated;
I turned away and shuddered.
`Papers and a pencil were always kept near
in my hours of solitude; I wrote and sealed a
brief letter to him whose visits once seemed
to me like those of a messenger from heaven
`it was now past midnight; the letters I had
written were placed beneath the pillow of my
bed; and I held in my hand the same large
phial filled with black juice of the poppy
which had been procured at Trois Rivieres.
`All was ready. I heard a carriage stop at
the opposite hotel, and found myself involuntarily
at the window.
`A few dim lights were still burning, and as
the door opened, I saw a figure, which I knew
to be Ethelwald; and it appeared to me that
he turned and looked a moment towards my
room.
`Three days have passed, I exclaimed, and
he has not come, though so near! Yet, even
if he still regards me, how can I wish to be a
cloud to his brilliant days?
`No! I will die, while there is still a hope
that he loves me!—at this a thousand thoughts
were poured like a flood into my soul. I remembered
the scenes at N—t. I contrasted
the sweetness of his breath—of the
kiss which seemed so warm and true, with the
black fœtid draught, which, even as I held it in
The soft mystic warmth which had seemed
to encircle his beauty, came to my mind in
contrast with the coldness of my own bed of
death. I returned from the window, knelt
down by the pillow I had smoothed, and earnestly
repeated this prayer to heaven.
`Creator of suns and of systems, thou who beholdest
thousands of worlds at a glance, yet regardest
the sparrow and her brood, father who
carest for the pains of an insect, look down upon
her who implores thee!
`If the death I seek be permitted, oh, take me
to some other state of being. Purify me, as thou
wilt, with suffering, but make me, at last, not
unworthy.
`If the deed I would do be a crime, deign to
interpose thine omnipotence!
`Author of daily miracles, which seem, to the
eyes of mortals, but the mere workings of nature,
regard me at this crisis! Thou who canst only
punish to perfect, save me from too deeply offending.
If to swallow this poison be a deed
beyond forgiveness, act secretly but surely upon
the conduits of my blood, and withold its effect
from the heart I now lay bare to thee.
`Creator, thou who knowest me better than I
have wisdom to know myself, if punishment be
needful, give me strength to endure it. If I die
in sin, requite not that sin upon the innocent!
`Giver of life, protect thou my child upon this
the bourne of mortality.
`When these words were pronounced to the
supreme director of men and more perfect angels,
I swallowed the contents of the phial;
rinced carefully my mouth and hands, passed
a handkerchief of white lawn over my head
and beneath my chin, (as if done to the newly
expired,) and tied it closely near the temple.
I then lay gently down, held to my nostrils
a handkerchief wet with water of the orange
flower, and expected my last earthly
sleep.
`To my utter astonishment, no heaviness or
stupor came over me. I lay perfectly at ease,
wooing, as it were, the slumbers of death.—
But instead of the expected sleep, I felt a light
pleasing sensation; my bed seemed as if rocked
with a gentle motion; and thoughts circled
through my brain in a manner va ue and
confused, but pleasant in their nature and impression.
`I know not how long this delirium continued,
or whether I slept at all; but when day-light
appeared through the windows, I felt myself
still alive and sick, as at my first voyage
on the ocean.
`The wants and necessities of these forms
of matter are more imperious while on earth,
than even the cravings of the soul. Till the
hour for breakfast, I lay violently ill, and
bed and dress unsoiled from the black profuse
ejection.
`At nine o'clock Marian came in. My dress,
my looks, and the odor of the draft I had swallowed,
told her, at once, what had been done.
I asked her, as a friend, to conceal the discovery
she had made. Marian consented, but
first, exacted from me, an assurance that I
had no more poison in my chamber.
`From the first, she had loved to watch the
course of my feelings, subjected entirely, as
they were, to the power of a passion, by every
one spoken of with pleasure; by every
modern person deemed romantic; to every
heart known a little; but felt, in its excess, by
few.
`The curiosity of her whose care saved my
life, was now, more excited than before; and
with feelings, like those awakened by a tragedy
of Schiller, she left me sleepy from exhaustion
and flew to prepare restoratives.
`In the course of that very morning came
Ethelwald;—had I died he would have been
called to look upon me!—he was told that I
lay slightly indisposed; and another evening
had come, ere Marian let me know of his visit.
Exhausted as I was, a lively regret took possession
of my soul; for, had I known he was
beneath the roof, I would have seen him, even
as I lay, and told to him the cause of my suffering.
`But destiny had differently ordained; and
Marian, perhaps, while her kindness saved
me from death—(for even the effect of the
poison must have killed without her care and
gentleness;)—Marian, perhaps, was commissioned
to separate my days from those of him
I loved, even as darkness at the beginning of
the world, was separated from light and animation.
`Carefully nursed and nourished, in three
days I was able to rise; but the vivid regret I
had felt, at not seeing once more, when he
came, the bright being, whose estrangement
made life insupportable, was succeeded by a
despair more dull and heavy than before.'
“It is little,” said Dalcour, “to read or tell
the story of a stranger; yet even that sometimes
agitates and disturbs; and we cannot
speak minutely, of sufferings endured by ourselves,
without strong and fatiguing emotion.
Idomen wished to continue, but I saw that her
strength was overtasked. At the hour of the
passeo, I knew that two friends were expected
from Matanzas, and I left her to spare her spirits,
and to emerge from the past to the present.
“The sun was high and powerful, but the
way to my woods was not long. I mounted
my creolian pony, languid with the hottest
hours of day, and, resting on his saddle the
staff of my green silken umbrella, I proceeded,
the shady groves of my dwelling.
“Benito followed, bearing my change of
dress on a little horse, brought to light near
the palm-covered cottage of his mother. A
palm leaf hat of his own weaving, covered his
wooly locks. Large drops of oozing moisture
ran down his black, glossy forehead,
made cool by the profuse evaporation. The
careless, happy negro was humming extemporal
airs, and never thought once of the sun.
“The edges of the heart-leaved convolvulus
(or morning glory) were beginning to roll inwards,
even in my shady pathway. It was
the hour for refreshment and repose. I retired
to my vine woven chamber, and as soon
as its shade had cooled me, I bathed me with
sponges of the river, and put on fresh linen
for my lonely repast and siesta.
“A soup, enriched with nutritious roots
from my garden, was boiled at my fire every
day, and sent, when I had tasted, to the women
with young children in my hospital, to be
shared with any who were sick. This, with a
speckled guinea fowl, and a heart of fresh curds
laid on rose leaves, were my simple but luxurious
banquet.
“Fig-bananas and fragrant guayavas were
presented on fresh, green leaves, and set before
me, at the dessert, with a vase of such
flowers as I loved. I sat long, alone at table,
musing on Idomen and her story.
“The powers she possessed of feeling both
pleasure and pain, were, as it seemed to me,
but proofs of the depth of her genius; for who
can describe or conceive of that which he never
has felt? Amid so many griefs and transitions,
it seemed to me a subject for wonder,
that her reason, ever active and reflecting, had
not been even more disordered than the truth
of her narrative had proved it.
“Her present healthful appearance, though
absent, and still loving Ethelwald, gave assurance
of her mind's elasticity. Her fancy was
evidently feasting on some vague hope of seeing
him again. Her passion I deemed an illusion;
happy as she had described him, and
surrounded by gay, friendly circles; it was
not probable that one so admired, at his home,
would appreciate the character of Idomen, at
a distance, or prove for her the love of a storied
knight-errant or troubadour.
“Yet his reign over her warm imagination
was still undiminished and entire; and for that
I felt a secret satisfaction, as it guarded her
heart from new attachments.
“I knew the full strength of gratitude in a
soul like hers whom I admired, and resolved
to become her protector, in any way comporting
with her wishes.
“I would favor her cultivation of the muses,
and take her to polished Europe, when at last
she might wish to study there. Ethelwald, I
of some fair daughter of Britain;—while
reason, friendship, gratitude, the welfare of
her child, and, what is so strong in an artist, the
hope of success in her art,—every inducement
would conspire to obtain for me, even the hand
of Idomen, if necessary to her safety or to her
honor.
“Benito slung my colored hammock of Otaheite,
and I took my siesta in the woods. No
nauseous worm or reptile is found either in
the fruits or among the thick leaves of Cuba.
The pretty lizard, so entirely fearless of
man,[11]
I loved always to contemplate, and welcomed
his delicate eyes, whenever he approached
my solitude.
“At sunset, I went with Benito, to where
the branches of the night flowering cereus had
clasped themselves like serpents, around fallen
trunks of palmetto. A curious fruit is
sometimes found on these plants, shaped like
a tapering pear, and covered with prickles
like the leafless stem that it grows upon.—
Chance smiled upon our search, for we found
two of these rare luscious apples, or pulpy coverings
of seed. As I saw them closely swelling,
I could but think of the fruit presented by the
invader of paradise.
“But one, far unlike a destroyer, now sought
them, for her, whom he wished to adorn his
paradise. Benito, as he stood, wove a basket
of leaves, and I placed the rare fruit that had
crowned my search, in my cabinet of porcelain,
till morning.
“At ten, the next day, I found Madame Burleigh
in expectancy. I gave flowers for her
boudoir; but reserved the fruit of the night
blooming cereus to change the current of
her thoughts when perturbed by the scenes
she depicted.
`A few brief incidents,' said Idomen, `will
finish, oh! my friend, the gloom of my many
adventures, and reveal the whole past life of
her whose heart is laid bare to thee!
`Again I had strength to go through the
routine of the day; but half that day was
spent in lassitude on the sofa.
`Light soups and jellies, presented by the
hand of Marian, with the charm of her conversation,
preserved the little life I still retained.
The presence of this friendly companion,
had in it, I knew not what of animation
and influence; yet the faint joy it imparted
was only as the light of a passing taper,
flashing at intervals through the iron grated
aperture of the dungeon, in which my soul sat
became deeper and deeper; and I doubted
the care of heaven, though so lately preserved
from death,
`No! I secretly exclaimed, if heaven had
preserved, heaven would comfort!
`Even Marian, I know well, (while her lips
amuse me with gentle words, and her hands
present me with sustenance,) is reading the
tablets of my mind, like some story, half real
and half imaginary. As I become weaker she
will be weary;—but no! I will retire in time.
I was now able to walk out. An elderly
lady who had come from N—t, brought me
a letter penned with the infantine hand of my
dear absent little Arvon. Every thought of
horror returned; and I feared that I might
live to give him pain.
`The bearer of Arvon's letter was going out
to buy ribands and artificial flowers for the toilet
of her village daughters, and desired me
to bear her company, and taste the fresh air to
my own benefit. I went with her to choose
these little adornments of festivity; passed
from door to door, and stopped at the rooms
of an apothecary.
Candies prepared with healing herbs for
the colds of winter, were purchased for Arvon
and her children. I spoke of the noise made
by vermin in the night, and said I would give
her arsenic to destroy the disturbers of her
sleep. A youth, when asked, produced some;
arsenic was used in a family.
`How much, I said, would destroy a human
being?—`two grains' returned the young man,
`would occasion the death of the strongest
soldier in this garrison.' I bought what might
fill a large shell of a walnut of England; kept
half myself and gave the other half to my companion
who, I knew, would leave Quebec very
soon, and could not return again to the parlor
of Arlington. She left me at my door, and
went farther.
`I returned to my room to dress for dinner,
and laid aside the deadly purchase. Little
was now to be done, the letters of death I had
written were still by me, and sealed. A few
more words on their envelop was sufficient.—
The same vestments of white which had wrapped
me for a dreadful purpose had again been
freshly washed in the waves of the Ladaüanna.
`Beautiful name of a beautiful river, my lips
even at that dismal hour, took almost a pleasure
in speaking thee; and my chilled heart,
even then, could frame good wishes for the
forest chief[12]
who first had pronounced its
voweled syllables.
`St. Lawrence, if indeed thy spirit can watch
near the noble stream, baptized with thy name
children of the woods, who still cross its waves
in their canoes of bark, who still border their
moccasins with the hair of the elk, and transfix
with their arrows, the wild speckled pheasant,
and the ptarmigan, white as thy snows.
`Again I was taken with the family party to
the theatre; but Ethelwald was not there.—
Once, since my baffled attempt, I had seen him,
but the spirits which were wont to rush forth
in joy at his presence, had forsaken me; neither
did Marian forbear her watching for one
moment. The wish still remained of confessing
to him all I had felt; but the power for
such a confession was denied me.
`Again I saw the mimic Peruvian, but the
picturesque scene was now lost on me. Again
I sat at the supper table, but could not smile
with the rest.
`Requesting some sweetmeats for a soreness
of the throat, I retired to my room as
soon as was consistent with courtesy.
`Letters of death were again placed under
my pillow; I bathed myself once more in the
waters of the river I loved, and wet a white
kerchief of Cuba, in perfume of orange flowers,
which had blossomed there. Again I breathed
to Heaven, the same prayer, my friend,
which I have repeated to thee; but it was
breathed with less of fervor and more of heaviness
than before.
`At last, after pausing a moment, I chose
from the sweetmeats sent to my room by Marian,
a wild plumb of Canada, and mixed with
it as much arsenic as the quantity of its own
stone and pulp. The whole was swallowed.
I rinced, carefully, my throat, teeth and lips;
tied a white handkerchief beneath my chin, and
lay down once more, to my doom, unless heaven
should avert it.
`A heavy sleep came over me, together
with a dull impression that I was now, tempting
and offending a Deity who had lately interposed.
`How entirely dependent are mortals! Men
have boasted of, at least, the power to die;..
but even that power they possess not. Some
higher hand must concur, before even death
can be obtained, by any wretch, who would
rush to an unknown state, to escape from the
torments of this world. The sufferer may
complain of destiny, and strike his own heart
in impatience; but heaven alone can vouchsafe
to him, the eternal stillness of the tomb!
`In the morning I again awoke, not in world
of spirits, but on earth, and deathly sick. My
offended vitals spurned and flung the heavy
mineral, with an effort more painful and violent
than was caused by the juice of the poppy.
`Marian, at the hour of breakfast, came to
my room, and sent for a young physician, her
relative, who staid by me till the poison was
endeavored to act upon my fears, but spoke
less of a future existence than of ingratitude,
dishonor, and defacement of my form while
on earth. Concealment of what I had done
was only obtained by promising that I would
make no farther attempt to leave this world.
For the term of three months I gave a promise;
and fearing to distress me, they did not
exact one forever.
`Three days I lay ill, in bed, thinking that
the poison might still destroy, though in a
manner less easy than I had hoped for. Marian
was constant in her attentions; she brought
me such nourishment as could be taken without
effort, she sang, conversed, read, and employed
every pleasing art to amuse and beguile
me of suffering.
`Her cares, her conversation, the charms of
her mind, were a balm, perhaps, sent by heaven,
to heal and restore me to the path intended
for my treading.
`In four days I could rise again; but a light
eruption, the effect, perhaps, of the mineral I
had swallowed, was spreading itself over the
whole surface of my form. Of this my physician
in kind wisdom availed himself. “Your
system,” he said, “is peculiar, no poison that
you can procure will give you death;—you
have twice tried the experiment; but disease
may be easily induced; and even now, you
are fortunate in escaping defacement.”
`How inexplicable are the changes of our
hearts; and how necessary to mortals is the
sympathy of earthly cotemporaries! The
confidence of two persons who kept my secret,
produced upon my soul a stronger effect than
the utmost of her own reasoning powers.
`Thus, often, some slight external succor,
restores action to the palsied energies which
have baffled every inward exertion.
`I had promised to live, and my pain, however
keen, must be endured. The mere circumstance
of having a promise to keep, acted as a
support, and urged and impelled to effort.
`Rumors continued to float around, that a
fair lady, with a fair fortune, was still ardent
in her attempts on the heart of him who seemed
to me like Phxœbus.
`I knew that if I lingered in Quebec, I must
sometimes meet in public, both the idol and
the nymph that would enchant him. The fatal
packet sent from N—t had in every
worldly sense, exonerated Ethelwald from farther
regard for her who folded it.
`I looked upon myself, changed, emaciated,
escaped, as by a miracle from death, and contrasted
the joyous presence of him I loved,
with my own sadness and dejection.
`I could not bear the thought that mere pity
should ever take the place of that tender
and impassioned attachment which, however
evanescent, had existed.
`The time still was short since Ethelwald
had crossed, to see me, the Ladaüanna in
storms; but, to me, it had seemed an age of
suffering. I would not, now, that he should
look upon me; I even would avoid a meeting
with him of whom the mere sight was heaven.
`In the midst of these revolving emotions,
a letter arrived from the pine grove of N—t,
and I resolved to return to my child.
`The same young relation who had brought
me to Quebec, took me back to the wild lonely
village where my happiest moments had been
passed.
`Wrapped closely from the air, I endured
the first hours of our journey; breathing many
a secret prayer to heaven, and during long
intervals of silence, binding up, as it were, my
disordered thoughts into verses.
`The month of March was begun; the excess
of cold had diminished; but the beautiful
river was still frozen and hard as a rock of
crystal.
`By degrees I was attracted by the scene.
I threw back my close furry hood, and perceived
that I once more could look around and
breathe the free air without danger.
`Waves, rocks, trees and mountains, buried
and fleeced with snow, assumed forms the
most fantastic.
`A path on the river before us, was marked
out by dark boughs of evergreen, set up by
traveller. (23) Our little rough-haired horse
of the country was driven by a faithful singing
Canadian, and our cariole skimmed like some
bird of winter, over a vast expanse of whiteness,
or as it were, through a wilderness of
brilliancy.
`We rode low upon the river, but as we
passed its banks, huge snow-drifts, at intervals,
seemed rising even to the heavens. Every
thing sparkled in the sun; the winds were
hushed; the sky was blue above us; and looked
as serene as the countenance of him I fled
from beholding. Spring, though distant, was
preparing to approach; I respired the pure
breath of the desert, and my soul caught returning
animation.
`I felt the movement of a pleasure whose
organs had long been inactive; it rushed
through my soul like something new, and the
palsied sense was resuscitated. Beautiful nature,
how darkly involved is the heart when
its pains counteract thine influence!
`These feelings continued but a moment;
yet they left a refreshment behind them, and
the poignancy of reflection was softened as
we rode one day longer upon the frozen Ladaüanna.
`To persons who deserved my gratitude, I
had promised to live three months; and no
promise once given to any mortal by Idomen,
had ever, in her life, been broken.
`In three months more the waves would
again be unlocked; and a hope now began to
dawn that my heart again might be healed.
`Ere the term of my promise could expire,
the vast rocks of ice would be riven, and I
should view the magnificent spectacle of the
river regain ng his liberty. In three months
more his waters would flow on in peace and
beauty, and then—if heaven willed me not on
earth, and my wretchedness still should continue,
I could find me a hiding place from the
world in the depth of his pure sweet bosom;
and be hidden alike and forever from the eyes
both of pity and of cruelty. Thus whispered
my still sickly fancy, but a cure was begun
in my soul.
`In the morning we crossed the great river,
and rode over the slightly yielding snow, till
the tall pines of the seminary seemed beckoning
our approach to N—t.
`As the clock of the seminary struck twelve,
the kind inmates of my former dwelling came
rushing to the door to receive me. Each in
turn expressed a sorrow that my health was
not yet recovered, but said that my eyes looked
better than when I had left them for Quebec.
O hope! how the first faint gleam of thy twilight
has power to change the countenance
of a mortal, so fallen in the night of despair!
`Notice was sent to the seminary, and little
the cold that made me sick, but now, spring
was coming, I would be well again.
`My young conductor remained but a day,
and departed, followed by my blessings.—
Would to heaven I could essentially befriend
him, and every other being, who has done to
me the slightest deed of kindness.
`I feared a recurrence of pain, and avoided
the temptations of solitude. I walked daily with
Arvon on the snow, or sat in the midst of the
family and neighbors, preparing his linen for
the summer. Employment is sweet when butsy
for those whom we love.
`The gentle Elmire came again from Trois
Rivieres. She spoke often of Ethelwald, and
repeated what he had said, at the ball, whither
I had seen her depart, with braided hair and
dressed in azure. A vague possibility that,
at length, he might come to seek, once more,
the friend he had loved to visit, soon entered
my heart with her accents, and assisted in restoring
me to health. Every thing around
me had been hallowed by his touch or presence;
a glimmer of hope was blended with
pleasing remembrance, and conspired to make
the long day supportable.
`But lately I had shrunk from my mirror,
and said in the language of the passionate bard
—`my beauty consumeth away;—my heart is
smitten and withered;' but now the color
cheeks, and roundness was returning to the
arms which had nothing to embrace but little
Arvon.
`It is bitter to look forward to life, when
despoiled of an illusion of felicity, yet now, I
could resolve to bear the prospect and endeavor,
at least, to be worthy of the idol to whom
I should have fallen in sacrifice, save only for
the hand of heaven.
`Meantime, the rivers burst, roaring from
their imprisonment, and vast masses of ice
were heaped like mountains on their shores.—
The murmuring boughs of the forest, had
cast off their cold incrustations; the skies
were clear and blue; the early birds of spring
were returning; and the snow fast dissolving,
near the earth, paid a thousand, thousand tributes,
to the thousand rivers and rivulets now
hastening to their giant sovereign, the magnificent
Ladaüanna.
`The sweetness of breezes through forests;
the rushing of over-swollen waves; the rapturous
cries of birds; the dropping of waters
from boughs and housetops; all mingled their
melodies with the songs of the ever tuneful
peasants of this country of streams and cascades.
`My heart still smarted with its recent
wounds; but a flood of gratitude seemed poured
warmly over it; and thanks burst forth to
`The large suffocating stove was now moved
from the hall of our dwelling; fragrant branches
from the forest took their place upon the
large cheerful hearth; and while they crackled
into flame, the neighboring children would
often assemble and sing there, the boat-songs
of their fathers.
`No walks could be taken save on snow-shoes
like an oval sieve, made by the savages
of doe-skin cut into threads, and woven or
knotted like net-work. Binding closely to the
souls of our feet, these light far-spreading sandals,
I walked daily with Arvon, on the banks
of the river of the village.
`Letters from Pharamond had arrived, at a
warmer port, distant from Quebec; and reached
us by coming far over the still snow-covered
country.
`My cousin arrived at Quebec as soon as
the ice had departed. The three months of
my promise had nearly expired. It was now,
the month of June, and relief had come to my
soul, like cool balm to the temples of the sick
of a fever.
`I could but regard this relief as a sign from
heaven to encourage me to remain on earth.
Yet in all concerning powers invisible, the mind
is sometimes shaken with doubts; and it constantly
asks itself the question: Does heaven, indeed,
a fond dream of fancy?
`I could not trust myself entirely. I dared
not return to Quebec, for I shuddered at the
thoughts of a renewal of the terrible temptations
which had passed.
`Power unseen, yet protecting, which I
fain would obey in gratitude, was not the new
energy which sustained and gave wisdom to
walk with caution, a breath from the infuser
of souls?
`When Pharamond, at length, found time
to spend one day at N—t, letters had arrived
from Cuba, relating the sudden death of
Lewellyn, my uncle, and so lately my friend.
`Tears streamed from my eyes, which but
three months before were tearless; he who
had parted with me half in anger, was now, no
longer upon earth. My mourning dress for
poor Burleigh had not yet been entirely laid
aside. My friend next in affinity was now, no
more, and fresh weeds of black declared the
renewal of sorrow.
`Worldly concerns, for a while, were banished
by grief for the deceased; but when
Pharamond had left me again, they returned
and pressed upon my thoughts.
`My supplies would soon be exhausted, unless
the once kind Llewellyn had thought of
me before he left this world. I felt that my
duty as a mother, must be set above all selfish
regretted that I had not given myself
in sacrifice to the wishes of my uncle, now no
more; a union of interest would have secured
independence to myself and to my orphan,
with the power of benefiting others; but the
deep reluctance I had felt, had been seconded
by fears and scruples, lest truth and honor
might be violated.
`To Pharamond I shrank from obligation;
once, indeed, he had expressed for me the warmest
regard. He saw me, when almost a child,
married, and obedient to the slightest wish of
my protector. `Idomen,' he then said to me,
`could I find another like yourself,—but you
are estranged by marriage; and even if you
were not, the relationship between us would
be an invincible barrier. What choice have I,
then, but to devote myself to fortune and to
celibacy?” My cousin, since that period, had
seen a woman that pleased him, wedded and
lost her, and now, was again entirely devoted
to commerce and to worldly acquisition.
`I resolved to return to Cuba; my only relation
there, was dead; but all species of fear
for myself had fled with the brilliant excess of
the happiness which late had bewildered me.
My little fair-eyed Arvon, who would protect
his minority, educate him, and prepare him
for the world? I thought of the planter who
had wept when I left him at Cuba, and warmly
child his support and affection. That mortals
are changeable, I had reason to know too well;
but I thought of my escape from death, and
trusted in the power that protected me.
`The timid doe that finds her shelter in the
forest, afar from the low white dwellings that
overlook the Ladaüanna, will brave danger in
defence of her young; the delicate dove of Cuba
will struggle and flutter in defence of the
inmates of her nest; but even the lioness of
Africa is weak when beset with perils.
`Meantime, the short glowing summer of
Canada, was accomplishing the term of its intensity.
The snows of eight returning moons
had enriched the earth with their deposites, and
she, now, in her gratitude, became prodigal
of fruits and flowers. Flowers of a darker
dye, or fruits of more luscious flavor, regale
not our senses, oh, my friend, even in the leafy
retreats of this island beloved of the sun!
`The violets of the gardens of the priests,
were tinged with purple like the mountains,
when seen in autumn from the gray stony
ramparts of Quebec. The roses of Persia,
with theirs would be rivalled in sweetness.—
The robes of the ancient kings of Tyre, or the
shells upon the beaches around us, could not,
if compared, outvie the velvet purple of their
heart's-ease.
`Their full clusters of grapes were ripening
hung in clusters of alternate topaz and
ruby. Melting raspberries of black, red and
white, lined the walls of their enclosure; and
a small, curious melon lay roughly on the dark
prolific soil, yet scarcely yielded, in taste or
fragrance, to the anana with its golden embossment,
enclosed in its green folded covering,
from the sun, whose near beams have made
it mellow.
`So sweet was the brief produce of these
gardens, long buried in snow, which bloom
beneath the care of a seminary of priests on a
tributary stream of the St. Lawrence.
`Agitated as had been my own bosom, I
could not look without emotion on the tranquil
and innocent lives of the men who adorned
these retroats. Here, sheltered from the
world, and, as it were, even from themselves,
they followed not the beckonings of hope, and
were strangers to fear and inquietude.
`The depths of their hearts I could not see,
or what springs of passion were concealed
there, but their lips breathed humanity and
kindness.
`To priests I entrusted my son, and the mother
and the orphan were respected. With
priests, I walked in these fair gardens, which
but lately had formed the base of snow-drifts;
and beheld glowing fruits upon the branches
that, when I first looked upon the silvery spire
icy incrustations. The feelings of ages had
passed since that time, through my bosom,
and still were retained by memory.
`The superior of the seminary of the pine
grove had taken up earth every summer, while
endured the few moments of his recreation;
and every summer, with hands washed for sacred
offices, had formed one step of a circular
mound, and covered it with sods of sweet
grass. When, on the seventh year, the green,
fragrant base of seven steps was completed,
there was placed on it a column woven into
shape with wicker; and other years still must
elapse ere the newly planted vines could entwine
it.
“Such,” said the peaceful architect “is the
fragile nature of men's labors. The ancient
pyramids of the Nile, though their projectors
have been for ages forgotten, are less permanent
to the eyes of the Eternal than this column
to the youth of N—t.”
`The nothingness of this life, for a moment,
was fully presented to my intellect; and I conceived
of the sentiments of those, who in different
ages of the world, have retired to commune
with the future, and calmly wait a passage
to eternity.(24)
`In this harmless community of men, without
earthly hope, I could have placed my orphan
boy, to pass his days unruffled by those
I could even myself have entered the
convent at Trois Rivieres, and listened as long
as I lived, to the waves of the Ladaüanna.—
But the thought crossed my mind as a shadow,
not as a reality to be followed.
`Many have said that `the will of mortals is
their destiny;' and in many a crisis of mortal
life, the saying may seem to be truth; but
whence comes the energy which urges our
will to fruition, or the circumstance that makes
it inevitable?
`The summer so brief and beautiful was
more than half passed away; and before the
return of the snows of autumn, again I must
be upon the ocean.
`Before I could again embark for this island
of flowers and forgetfulness, six hundred English
miles must be traversed by land, by lake,
and by river. Pharamond had made arrangements
for my journey, and dear little Arvon
was appeased by my promise to send for him,
wherever I might stay.
`The sweet August of Canada was almost
passed when my cousin appeared, once more,
at the village of the moments of my happiness.
The parting with Arvon and my kind inmates
was over; and we glided, once more, in a batteau.
The beautiful Ladaüanna was warm and
smooth as a mirror; the songs of the boatmen
were low; and at intervals they dipped their
drops that fell from them.
`My heart was full of perturbation; and
when at intervals, I spoke, it was to recommend
earnestly to Pharamond, the boy I was
leaving behind—yet whom, like the fabled
pelican, I would fain have nourished with my
blood. Still, when we approached the opposite
shore of the river, and saw, at a distance,
the Convent of Trois Rivieres, a thousand other
sentiments and sensations came rushing and
mingling with those which, so lately, were true
to maternity.
`Duty had triumphed over love; but the
broad stream we so sweetly were gliding over,
had been crossed when rough with storms, by
Ethelwald, to see me. On the banks we were
approaching he was born; and a strong desire
took possession of my senses to behold him,
once more, ere I departed.
`To the momentary wishes of my agitated
thoughts, heaven and circumstance were propitious.
While resting in a dwelling that
overlooked the river, we learned that the ornament
of the simple town of his birth had
been greeted early in the morning. He had
left, for a few days, the fortress of Quebec,
and the streets of Trois Rivieres were enlivened
by his presence.
`The day was unusually warm, I had once
more bathed in water from the river I loved,
my mourning attire. I looked earnestly in the
small mirror of my bed-room-for-one-night,
and saw with a deep satisfaction that some
roundness of contour had returned again to
my person. I dropped a moment, on my knee,
and thanked the Almighty for his benefits.
`A dessert of fragrant melons and raspberries
from newly-felled forests, was served with
dried fruits brought from distant climates by
the commerce of Britain, and sometimes tasted
in this spot, even by the savage hunter of
the desert.
`While we still sat lingering at the board,
the coming of a stranger was announced. He
bent as he entered the door; it was but the
self same figure which before had been present
to my soul; but to look upon the heavenly
reality was a delight so supreme, that the
past and the future were as nothing.
`The bliss of the deity is but love. Those
who have known what is love in perfection,
though on earth, and but for a moment, need
not ask what reward awaits the just.
`The sun was declining in its beauty; we
sat over the dessert, and the brim of one glass
of the tears of the grape was pressed to my
lips as those of Ethelwald touched another.—
We drank to those who were away; but our
souls at that moment were rushing towards
each other, and could see no object but the
present.
`Scarcely a drop was swallowed save by
Pharamond, who soon threw himself upon the
sofa, so oppressed with heat, that sleep was
with difficulty resisted.
`I stood near a window, with Ethelwald,
whom I never had seen before in summer.—
The intense sun of that season, so brief in
his country, had slightly tinged his forehead,
which seemed amid the snows of winter too
spotless for an earthly material. But the
charm of his expression seemed enhanced;
and as his light golden hair was faintly moved
by the zephyrs of his own native river, I
thought I could feel by sympathy, every thrill
of those delicate arteries that made him a being
of sensation.
`The twilight became paler and paler: sleep
had possessed itself of Pharamond, and we both
looked from the window, upon the waves darkening
with shadows, yet still tinted with rose
color. Here was, now, at least, an opportunity
for some explanation of the past. But the
past and the future were as nothing; to see
and to feel was so much, that every other organ
was inactive. An innate sense told me
I should speak, but my tongue could find only
broken sentences.
`Do you remember, I said,.. `I am not,'
replied he, whom I looked upon, `I never can
be ungrateful!'... I felt the soft warm pressure
of the hand into which mine had fallen,
from my intellect, as a thing which could
not be possible.(25)
`A word or a promise must have united our
destinies, but neither word nor promise was
spoken. Something both wished to impart,
seemed struggling to burst forth from our lips,
but neither had the power of utterance....
What mysterious influence reigned absolute
till the dear opportunity was no more?—That
question can only be answered by the being
who marks out, on the map of eternity, the
path in which mortals are to wander.
`Our tongues were like tongues of the entranced;
the countenance of Ethelwald, though
now shaded by evening, appeared to me anxious
and wishful. I long to hear or say something
definite;—but alas! it was impossible to
break the ineffable silence of expectancy.
`I knew not how much time had passed, but
the moon had risen and was shining; and a
servant, at length, came in, to ask of Pharamond
directions for our morning departure.—
A bustling noise, and the moving of travelling
trunks ensued; it was time for the inn doors
to close.
`Ethelwald seemed reluctant to go; and I
began to shudder and tremble, and could not
even say remain with me. Pharamond arose,
gave directions to the servants, and appeared
as I thought, impatient. The constant companion
and departed.
`I saw him from the window, in the moonlight,
his noble form, slowly receding on the
shores of the river of his birth. His eyes, to
the last, seemed turning frequently back towards
my window.... oh, heaven of heavens,
shall I never behold him again?—to
what purpose then, has he been known to me?'
“Here,” said Dalcour, “I arose a moment,
and asked of Benito, those fruits of the night-flowering
cereus which had been gathered
the evening before, and were now kept by this
favorite negro in a small vase of marble from
France. They were the first of their kind that
Idomen had ever seen, and the current of her
thoughts was insensibly changed as she admired
them.
“I cut into halves, with a knife of silver,
one of the sweet juicy apples or formations,
divested it of its outward prickles, and by tasting
one portion myself, compelled Madame
Burleigh to swallow the other. This, with
the usual process of rinsing the sweetness of
fruits from her lips, and the ivory within them,
diverted her mind from what it dwelt on, and
calmed the over-rising emotion. She looked
at me, thanked me for my care, smiled gently,
and resumed:
`The hurry of travelling admits of no consideration;
and perhaps its principal charm is
boat would go at a certain hour in the morning,
and those who would depart must be ready.
`Till twelve at night, I was occupied in
making those arrangements most necessary to
cleanliness and to order; and at six in the morning,
I arose. The bell of departure was ringing,
as we stepped from the shore to the vessel.
`I had nerved myself, as well as I could, to
walk in the path traced by heaven; yet my
eyes, from time to time, wandered round in
the hope of encountering a form transcendent
above all others. But a letter was all that
came; it was placed in the hand of Pharamond,
who did not present it to me, till far on our
way to Montreal.
`I lay down on my berth to break the seal;
it was tender but not conclusive—“give me,”
said Ethelwald, “your address, and you shall
receive from me a full explanation.”
`The hurry of the changing scene, a thousand
doubts, a thousand wishes, a thousand
fears and regrets—all combined to overpower
the cooler energies of reason, that might have
been enough for my happiness.
`I remembered all that I had suffered, and
thought Ethelwald cold and ungrateful in allowing
me, thus to leave his country—and yet
my pains had never been known to him, and
own hand had committed when I sent to him
the packet sealed with black.
`But the last brief, delightful interview, was
still so vivid on my memory, that my mind
dazzled by the present, looked not calmly upon
past events. Of my answer to the last
note of him, who had seemed to me a seraph,
I can only remember this sentence:—“I go,
perhaps never to return—I ask no explanation
—may every happiness attend you.”
`Having slept but little in the night, I sent
to excuse myself to Pharamond from sitting at
his side while at table; drew closely the curtain
of my berth, and clung for refreshment
to my pillow. Thought would not be bidden
to rest, but sported as it were, with the stings
of inquietude; and the lines tied round with a
riband of carnation, came flowing to be arranged
on that day.
`Demoustier thus describes the young hunter
of Cyprus, when he inspired that sentiment
which proved the cause of his death:—
“He was not immortal, but of that enchanting
age when life resembles immortality.”—
The same might have been said of Ethelwald,
when first seen at P—d.
`Since sending the fatal black-sealed packet,
I had scarcely thought of making verses,
but the sight of my idol had been like the influence
of the god of Delphos. The stanzas,
heart to retouch them.
Lived where ægean waves are swelling,
Ere yet calm reason came to earth,
Warm Fancy's lovelier reign dispelling,
The Sire of Heaven, she had believed,
To stamp thy form had ta'en another,[13]
And all who saw had been deceived,
And given the Delphic God a brother.
And many a classic page had told
Of nymphs and goddesses admiring;
Altars, libations, harps of gold,
And milk-white hecatombs expiring.
And oh! perchance there had remained
Some Phidian wonder—still, still breathing
Love—life—and charms—past—but retained;—
And warmth and bliss had still seemed wreathing,
Softly around the Heaven-touched stone,
As now a light seems, from thee, beaming—
While thought—sense—lost in looks alone,
Grow dubious if awake or dreaming.
And must thou pass?—nor picture show,
Nor sculpture, what my lyre is telling?—
Too feeble lyre!—as morn's bright glow
Fades o'er the river near thy dwelling?—
Spirit of Titian! hear and come,
If come thou mays't, a moment hither,
Oh! let but one acanthus wither,
Round her loved ruins, while thou stay'st,—
Come to these solitudes, and view them;
Must genius ne'er their beauties taste?—
Nor tear of rapture ever dew them?
View the dark rock—the melting blue
Of mount and sky so soft embracing—
The bright broad stream,---but beauty, hue,
Life, form, are here,—all else effacing.
Nature, to mock the forms of bliss
Which fervid mortals have created,
From their own soul's excess, made this,---
And gazed at her own powers elated.
Fragrant o'er all the western groves
The tall magnolia towers unshaded,
But, soon, no more the gale he loves
Faints on his ivory flowers; they're faded.
The full-blown rose, mid'st dewy sweets,
Most perfect dies; but, soon returning,
The next born year another greets,
When summer fires again are burning.
Another rose may bloom as sweet,
Other magnolias ope in whiteness,—
But who again, fair scenes, shall meet,
The like of him who lends you brightness?---
Come, then, my lyre, ere yet again
Fade these fresh fields I shall forsake them---
But some fond ear may hear thy strain
When all is cold which thus can wake them.
`Though disappointed in the regard and
constancy of Pharamond, he still held and will
ever hold a large space in my affections.
`At the hour of the principal repast, with
strict injunction that I should swallow them,
he sent me bread, soup, and fruit from the
plentiful table of the boat, that bore us, against
the current of the river, with a noise like the
roaring of Niagara.
`At length the dull murmur of waves and
machinery assisted me in gaining repose; but
ere the twilight had faded, I went out to walk
upon the deck; for soon I must part, perhaps
forever, with a kinsman now doubly endeared
to me, by a thousand regrets and recollections.
`Pharamond gave me his arm; spoke kindly,
and bade me be supported; and his was the
only arm upon which, since my walks at N—t,
I could lean upon without a shudder.
`The long northern twilight was beautiful.
The track of the engine that propelled us was
seen like a glittering serpent on the far perspective
of the river, whose limpid course it
had disputed. Yet, despite of the rumbling
noise and foaming agitation of our course, the
light batteaux of the peasants were seen near
the fertile shores, or crossed the far off trail
with strong arms trained to the oar. The
scene around was so lovely and peaceful that
it minded me, as we steamed along, of paradise
when Eve was driven forth.
`The scenes I was so rapidly leaving were
those most entwined with my affections. The
waters of the pure, sweet river, sparkled and
reflected the deepening color of the sky. I
thought of him born upon its banks, and of
the doubtful future that awaited me. Tears
gushed from my eyes, and it seemed to me at
that moment, a far happier lot to be sunken in
the Ladaüanna, than to part, with those who
drank of it, forever.
`I talked much with Pharamond, and his
voice had softened to a tone as tender and encouraging,
as when he first beheld me just
expanding to the figure of womanhood.
`At ten o'clock my cousin mildly compelled
me to retire to sleep for refreshment—but
my head and heart were too full for sleep, and
the verses tied with riband of purple and rose
color, were half of them pencilled ere I rested.
The first time I beheld thee, beauteous stream,
How pure—how smooth—how broad thy bosom heaved!
What feelings rushed upon my heart!—a gleam
As of another life, my kindling soul received.
Fair was the day, and, o'er the crowded deck,
Joy shone in many a smile;—light clouds, in hue,
As silvery as the new-fledged cygnet's neck,
Cast, as they moved, faint shadows on the blue
Soft, deep, and distant, of the mountain chain[14]
Wreathing and blending, tint with tint, and traced
Time—scene—has changed; 'twill never be effaced.
Now o'er thy tranquil breast, the moon-beams quiver—
How calm the air—how still the hour—how bright!
Would thou wert doomed to be my grave, sweet river,—
How blends my soul with thy pure breath to night.
The dearest hours that soul has ever known,
Have been upon thy brink; would it could wait—
And, parted, watch thee still;—to stay and moan
With thee, were better than my promised fate.
Ladauanna! monarch of the north!
Father of streams unsung, be sung by me!—
Receive a lay that flows resistless forth!
Oh! quench the fervor that consumes, in thee!
I've seen more beauty on thy banks—more bliss—
Than I had deemed were ever seen below;—
Dew falls not on a happier land than this:—
Fruits spring from desert wilds, and love sits throned on [snow.
Snows that drive warmth to shelter in the heart;—
Snows that conceal, beneath their moonlight heaps,
Plenty's rich embryo;—fruits of flowers that start
To meet their full-grown Spring, as strong to earth he [leaps.
How many grades of life thou viewest; thy wave
Bears the dark daughter of the woods, as light
She springs to her canoe; and wildly grave, (26)
Views the “great spirit” mid the fires of night.
Frame their wild songs and sing them to the oar;
And think to chase the forest-fiends away,
Where yet, no mass-bell tinkles from the shore.
The pensive nun throws back the veil that hides
Her calm, chaste eyes; straining them, long, to mark,
When the mist thickens, if perchance their bides
The peril—wildering on—some little bark.
And trims her lamp and hangs it in her tower;
Not as the priestess did of old; (she's driven
To do that deed by no fierce passion's power,)
But kindly—calmly—for the love of heaven.
Who had been lost; what heart from breaking saved;
She knows not—thinks not;—guided by her star,
Some being leaps to shore;—'twas all she craved,—
She makes the holy sign, and blesses him from far.
The plaided soldier, in his mountain pride,
Exulting, as he treads with statelier pace,—
Views his white limbs reflected in thy tide,
While wave the sable plumes that shade his manly face.
The song of Ossian mingles with thy gale,—
The harp of Carolan's remembered here,
The bright-haired son of Erin, tells his tale,
Dreams of his misty isle, and drops, for her, a tear.
Thou'st seen the trophies of that deathless day,
Whose name bright glance from every Briton brings,
When half the world was marshalled in array,
And fell the great, self nurtured “king of kings.”
Youthful Columbia, ply thy useful arts,
Rear the strong nurseling thy fair mother bore,
Enough for thee; tempt these brown rocks no more.
Or leave them to that few, who blind to gold,
And scorning pleasure, brave with higher zest
A doubtful path; mid pain, want, censure, bold—
To pant one fevered hour, on Genius' breast.
Nature's best loved, thine own, thy virtuous West,
Chose for his pencil a Canadian sky;
Bade Death recede, who the fallen victor prest,
And made perpetuate, his latest sigh.[15]
Sully, of tender tints transparent, fain
I would thy skill awhile; for memory's showing,
To prove thy hand the purest of thy train,
A native beauty from thy pencil glowing.
Or he who sketched the Cretan; gone her Greek;
She, all unconscious that he's false or flying,
Sleeps, while the light blood revels in her cheek
So rosy warm, we listen for her sighing. [16]
Could he paint beauty, warmth, light, happiness?
Diffused around like fragrance from a flower;—
And melody—all that or sense can bless,
Or soul, concentrate in one form his power,
I'd ask. But Nature, Nature, when thou wilt,
Thou canst enough to make all art despair;—
Guard well the wondrous model thou hast built,
Which these, thy nectared waves, reflect and love to bear.
That seldom break. Tho' the heart beat so cold,
That Love and Fancy's fairest garland dies—
Tho' false, tho' light as air, thy bonds may hold.
The mother loves her child;—the brother yet
Thinks of his sister, tho' for years, unseen;—
And seldom doth the bridegroom quite forget
Her who hath blest him, once, tho' seas may roll be [tween.
But can a friendship, pure and rapture-wrought,
Endure without such bonds?—I'll deem it may,
And bless the hope it nurtures;—beauteous thought,—
Howe'er fantastic—dear illusion,—stay!
O! stream O! country of my heart! farewell!
Say, shall I e'er return? shall I once more—
Ere close these eyes that looked to love—Ah tell!
Say, shall I tread again thy fertile shore?—
Else, how endure my weary lot—the strife,
To gain content when far—the burning sighs—
The asking wish—the aching void—oh, life!
Thou art and hast been, one long sacrifice!
`At eight in the morning, we were landed,
and sat, in a breakfast room, at Montreal.—
Pharamond could go with me no farther; the
season for the merchant of Canada was quickly
passing away, and vessels were waiting at
Quebec to be freighted under his direction.
`I was left with a friend of my cousin, who
had grown old amid the toils of commerce;
but his soul was the seat of rectitude. The
over the wide provinces which Britain retains
in America, and was familiar alike to the merchants
of the neighboring republic.
`This just man had a wife and children, to
whom he was tenderly attached; he expressed
surprise at my loneliness, and my courage
to attempt so long a journey and voyage, without
any protection, save of strangers. Yet,
after reflecting a moment, he said, in a tone
of emotion; “Emma, my wife, might be forced
to do the same, if storms should destroy my
shipping, and I should be called to leave this
world. May God ensure towards her the
same good will that I feel!” A faithful girl
was procured to attend me, and an elderly
friend of my kind host, who was now, on a
visit of pleasure, offered to go with me to New
York. At that city, increasing in commerce,
another merchant, known alike to Horace
Gear, and to my cousin, had directions by
letter, to receive me, and to provide a safe
passage to this island.
`Gear was opulent and respected, and his
table was profuse and hospitable; his fair wife
was not well, but a female relation presided.
He wished to present me to his friends, and
said: “I should like better to know your
heart bestowed, on some one here, than to see
you trust yourself, so fearlessly, to the dangers
of the sea and to fevers.”
`Courtesy required of me exertion; but
when forced to take the arm of a stranger, in
passing from room to room, my heart shrank
within me; for I thought of scenes at N—t,
and of the arm which had there, been mine.
`The day was fixed for my departure; and
the traveller appointed to escort me, seemed
pleased the better, as I promised to leave every
thing to his direction. Bourn was the name
of this companion, entirely unknown; of years
he had numbered seventy; in his youth he had
emigrated from Britain; and he told me that
all he possessed, had been gained by the trees
of the desert, which he caused to be felled
around him, and then sent them, in rafts,
through many rivers, to freight vessels for his
native land. Few, in these northern domains,
could excel him in fortune; the sports of the
hunter gave him health; and the strength of
his manhood was prolonged. I listened to the
story of his life; of his dangers when lost in
the forest—of his many adventures with the
Indians; and the beautiful daughters of the
woods, which, during his course, he had seen.
His memory was clear and vigorous; and his
intellect, untired with study, made eager records
of the present.
`I had little to do, save to listen; and to
see awakened, as he spoke, the unspent ardor
of a soul, which must soon leave its earthly
material.
`How pleasant to my ear, are the accents
which flow from minds long retained in this
world. To meet a warm generous intelligence,
unbattered by the sieges of years, awakens in
my heart a sigh for the elixir of life.
`I knew not the country we were passing
through, and Bourn shook his scarcely gray
locks, and smiled at my utter surprise, when
told we were approaching Niagara. He had
longed to behold, again, that greatest of curiosities,—and
now that time and circumstance favoured,
he knew I would pardon a deceit practised
only to betray me into pleasure.
`Sorrow, for a few days' protraction of my
journey, was lost in the sudden expectation of
seeing the wonder of half a world, formed as it
is, by the peerless Ladaüanna, which traverses
forests and lakes to make the most stupendous
spectacle known either in the old or new
continent.
`Would that the wheels of the machinist,
might never be rolled within the light of its
rainbows, or mingle their clatter with the deep
solemnity of its murmur!
`America has rivers and torrents enough
for the wants and the wealth of her people.—
The soul need not be bartered for bread, nor the
scene which most exalts her aspirations be defaced
for the grinding of grain, or the weaving of
earthly habiliments.
`Northern half of the new world, and ye fair
of Niagara, protect them with the spell of your
power, and consecrate the spectacle to “God the
infuser of souls!!”
`The earth trembled beneath our feet as we
reached an inn near the beautiful abyss. For
the first day the roar was deafening, and when
first led to the brink I could not stand unsupported;
but sank upon my knees to endure the
confused and overwhelming sensation.
`Seven days we remained in the neighborhood,
and when more familiar with the noise,
self possession, at last was restored to me.
`The first view had been as nothing; for
the varieties of the scene were infinite. Every
point presented views entirely new, and
each, as we gazed, seemed astonishing above
all the rest.
`On the side of the precipice which belongs
to the republic, one branch of the vast torrent
rolls over a trembling cliff higher, and a little
detached from the immense rock of the centre;
and midway down the steep, projects a
threatening crag accessible to the footsteps of
the daring.
At this point[17]
the amazing height of the fall
strikes the deepest impression on the senses.
A rude stair-case winds down, and gives access
to a ledge of the precipice whence travellers
may obtain a view.
`On this crag is sometimes seen a solitary
human figure in dark, fearful relief, against
the sparkling foam of the headlong stream,
which he can touch with his hand, while distant
alike from the summit, and the terrible
gulf beneath. Be it savage, cradled in danger,
or civilized man nerved by thought, the
head aches to behold a mortal thus poised between
beauty and death.
`At different hours of the day appear the most
vivid rainbows, which change their soft beds of
foam, resembling down, with the rise and decline
of the sun; while the tints of the whole
mass of waters, are more tenderly exquisite
even than the colors of the sky.
`The same waves that cause all this splendour
would pass by the happy dwelling where
he whom I loved, first saw light. They form
the most beautiful of cataracts, and ere they
could reach the sea, would bathe and give drink
to the most beautiful of mortals!
`On the brink of the precipice appertaining
to Britain, and near where the river falls in
the figure of a vast crescent, a high overhanging
rock has been shaped by nature like a table,
and on the level of its top, a slight building
is placed for refreshment to the weary.—
On the last evening of our stay, my conductor
sat within its shelter, holding in his hands a
book in which travellers record their sensations.
`The feelings of a lady,' said Bourn,
of forest trees; go out awhile, alone, upon the
rock, and think of something to write in this
volume, that I may never hold again I will
trace your name in my own rude hand, which
dipped in blood, like that of savages, has taken
with them, skins from the doe, ermine and
castor.'
`I went out, but trembled all the while; and
when the aged hunter came to seek me, I gave
him the verses tied with riband of pea-green
and lilac—colours most predominant in the
dolphin while dying, in agony to himself, but
in beauty and pleasure to those around him—
the colors of the Dolphin and of the Falls of Niagara.
Spirit of Homer! thou whose song has rung
From thine own Greece to this supreme abode
Of Nature—this great fane of Nature's God—
Breathe on my brain!—oh! touch the fervid tongue
Of a fond votaress kneeling on the sod.
Sublime and beautiful, your chapel's here?—
Here, 'neath the azure dome of heaven, ye're wed—
Here, on this rock, which trembles as I tread!
Your blended sorcery claims both pulse and tear,
Controls life's source and reigns o'er heart and head.
Terrific—but, oh!—beautiful abyss!—
If I should trust my fascinated eye,
Sense—form—would spring to meet thy white foam's [kiss—
Be lapped in thy soft rainbows, once, and die.
Colour, depth, height, extension—all unite
To chain the spirit by a look intense!—
The dolphin in his clearest seas—or thence
Ta'en, for some queen, to deck of ivory white,
Dies not, in changeful tints, more delicately bright.
Look!—look!—there comes, o'er yon pale green ex [panse,
Beyond the curtain of this altar vast,
A glad young swan;—the smiling beams that cast
Light from her plumes, have lured her soft advance—
She nears the fatal brink—her graceful life has past.[18]
Look up!—nor her fond foolish fate disdain;—
An eagle rests upon the wind's sweet breath—
Feels he the charm?—woos he the scene beneath?
He eyes the sun—nerves his dark wing again—
Remembers clouds and storms—yet flies the lovely [death.
“Niagara! wonder of this western world,
And all the world beside! hail, beauteous queen
Of cataracts!” an angel, who had been
O'er heaven and earth, spoke thus—his bright wings [furled—
And knelt to Nature first, on this wild cliff unseen.
`Niagara may almost complete my story.—
Brought safely to New York, by the aged hunter,
my conductor, a vessel was found ready
to sail.
`I wished to see nothing in this city of commerce,
save only one gallery of pictures; and
even he who had grown old amid deserts,
could perceive beauty in some of these.—
The fine arts are learned by inspiration, and a
true love of them comes from nature, and nature
alone.
`Placed safely on board a good vessel with
the maid I had brought from Montreal; recommended
to those who bore me on my way in
such terms as I knew would be regarded; I
bade farewell, forever, to the courteous stranger
of the forest, who had been to me so excellent
a guide. We parted with warmth and
regret, in the hope of meeting only in heaven.
`These verses were composed as I lay,
doubtful of the future, and musing continually
on the past.
The distant bower not yet is sear;—
Why do I shrink, as wave and blast
Blead in low murmurs to my ear?
But late this weary form could brave
Autumnal blast or wintry storm;—
I stood upon thy frozen wave,
Ladauanna, and was warm.
That wave upon my glowing lip,
Melted to nectar; and the air,
But froze my breath, to let it drip
Like summer dew-drops, from my hair.
As to heaven's shrine, I need not tell,—
But ask no more than half I felt,
For every yellow leaf that fell.
Oh, how I loved!—the coldest glen,
The pine tree bending 'neath its ice,
The snows that form the black bear's den,
To me, bore flowers of paradise.
Hours of enchantment, life and light,
Can ye be fled to come no more?—
No!—heart, if thou had'st known a blight,
Less pain were at thy wounded core.
Sweet spirit of the desert wild,
Who lent thy plaintive harp to me,
And loved me, when a pensive child,
Oh, guard my lone maturity!
For, like the ocean bird, I roam,
From wave to wave, nor look for rest;—
The sea my path, the world my home,
My guide a flame that burns my breast!
`Tossed three weeks upon the waves of
autumn, I reached this warm Island, but to
learn that the friend I most relied on—he who
saw me depart with tears, was no longer on
earth to give me welcome. He had died on
his way to the North, where haply he had
wished to meet me.
`The blow, for a time, was terrible; but the
God who bereaved gave also. The friendly Lorington,
he who found me this dwelling, came
he left the world, had provided enough for my
necessities. Leonora, the Spanish lady of
this last friend, came also to invite me to her
home; and with her I remained, until this retreat
could be made ready for my shelter.'
“Thus finished the narrative of Idomen.—
The hour of her repast was approaching; I
saw her arrange the fruits and flowers I had
brought, while a place was prepared for me
at table.
In 1829, this singular group of trees was still standding
on a road bending near the bay of Matanzas, and
leading into the country. The wild fig tree, or as the
French call it, “figuier maudit,” may be seen in Cuba,
in every state of its curious and surprising formation.
This chief in 1826, (and who for aught I know, still
is there,) resided with his family at Lorette, the catholic
village, about nine miles from Quebec, where Indians
live in peace and happiness, in a state of semi-civilization.
His name was “Zauanaui,” to which had been
prefixed the names “Nicolas Vincent.” Thinking the
House of Assembly were not sufficiently mindful of
his nation, he went himself to England, and had several
personal interviews with George IV. He spoke and
wrote English.
This manner of taking sustenance while exhausted
with any powerful emotion, is noted here for its excellent
effect.
Nothing could exceed the magnificence of the prospect
from the window of the Castle of St. Louis, which
has since been destroyed by fire.
Nicolas Vincent Zauanaui, the same grand chief of
the Hurons who had an audience of George IV. in England,
went sometimes with his wife, who also spoke
English, to the Castle.
This flower, in the form of a cup, and containing a
draft of pure dew, was said, by early writers, to be found
in the stagnant marshes of Florida. A note to the same
effect has already been given in this work.
During the intense cold of Canada, it is not uncommon
for careless travellers, to freeze dangerously their
ears and faces.
No apples in the world are more beautiful than those
of Montreal. The sunny side of the mountain near that
city, is favorable for gardens; the inhabitants have a sort
of passion for its culture; and fruits are abundant around
it.
The tameness of the small lizard is a surprising circumstance;
it seems to put entire confidence in human
beings, and never moves when they approach, unless
driven by violence. Its eyes are very beautiful, and
seem to express wisdom or thoughtfulness.
| THE CONFESSIONS. Idomen, or, The vale of Yumuri | |