University of Virginia Library

3. CHAPTER III.

Pope.

It is unnecessary to repeat the list of characters
that acted the different parts in the train of the
village nuptials. All were there at the close of the
ceremonies, as they had appeared earlier in the
day, and as the last of the legal forms of the marriage
was actually to take place in presence of
the bailiff, preparatory to the more solemn rites

of the church, the throng yielded to its curiosity,
breaking through the line of those who were stationed
to restrain its inroads, and pressing about
the foot of the estrade in the stronger interest
which reality is known to possess over fiction.
During the day, a thousand new inquiries had been
made concerning the bride, whose beauty and
mien were altogether so superior to what might
have been expected in one who could consent to
act the part she did on so public an occasion, and
whose modest bearing was in such singular contradiction
to her present situation. None knew,
however, or, if it were known, no one chose to reveal,
her history; and, as curiosity had been so
keenly whetted by mystery, the rush of the multitude
was merely a proof of the power which
expectation, aided by the thousand surmises of
rumor, can gain over the minds of the idle.

Whatever might have been the character of the
conjectures made at the expense of poor Christine
—and they were wanting in neither variety nor
malice—most were compelled to agree in commending
the diffidence of her air, and the gentle
sweetness of her mild and peculiar beauty. Some,
indeed, affected to see artifice in the former, which
was pronounced to be far too excellent, or too
much overdone, for nature. The usual amount of
common-place remarks were made, too, on the
lucky diversity that was to be found in tastes, and
on the happy necessity there existed of all being
able to find the means to please themselves. But
these were no more than the moral blotches that
usually disfigure human commendation. The sentiment
and the sympathies of the mass were powerfully
and irresistibly enlisted in favor of the unknown
maiden — feelings that were very unequivocally
manifested as she drew nearer the estrade, walking
timidly through a dense lane of bodies, all of which

were pressing eagerly forward to get a better view
of her person.

The bailiff, under ordinary circumstances, would
have taken in dudgeon this violation of the rules
prescribed for the government of the multitude;
for he was perfectly sincere in his opinions, absurd
as so many of them were, and, like many other
honest men who defeat the effects they would produce
by forced constructions of their principles,
he was a little apt to run into excesses of discipline.
But in the present instance, he was rather pleased
than otherwise to see the throng within the reach
of his voice. The occasion was, at best, but semi-official,
and he was so far under the influence of
the warm liquors of the côtes as to burn with the
desire of putting forth still more liberally his flowers
of eloquence and his stores of wisdom. He received
the inroad, therefore, with an air of perfect
good-humor, a manifestation of assent that encouraged
still greater innovations on the limits,
until the space occupied by the principal actors in
this closing scene was reduced to the smallest possible
size that was at all compatible with their movements
and comforts. In this situation of things
the ceremonies proceeded.

The gentle flow of hope and happiness which
was slowly increasing in the mild bosom of the
bride, from the first moment of her appearance in
this unusual scene to that in which it was checked
by the cries of Pippo, had been gradually lessening
under a sense of distrust, and she now entered the
square with a secret and mysterious dread at the
heart, which her inexperience and great ignorance
of life served fearfully to increase. Her imagination
magnified the causes of alarm into some prepared
and designed insult. Christine, fully aware of the
obloquy that pressed upon her race, had only consented
to adopt this unusual mode of changing her

condition, under a sensitive apprehension that any
other would have necessarily led to the exposure
of her origin. This fear, though exaggerated, and
indeed causeless, was the result of too much brooding
of late over her own situation, and of that morbid
sensibility in which the most pure and innocent
are, unhappily, the most likely to indulge. The
concealment, as has already been explained, was
that of her intended husband, who, with the subterfuge
of an interested spirit, had hoped to mislead
the little circle of his own acquaintances and gratify
his cupidity at the cheapest possible rate to himself.
But there is a point of self-abasement beyond which
the perfect consciousness of right rarely permits
even the most timid to proceed. As the bride
moved up the lane of human bodies, her eye grew
less disturbed and her step firmer,—for the pride
of rectitude overcame the ordinary girlish sensibilities
of her sex, and made her the steadiest at the
very instant that the greater portion of females
would have been the most likely to betray their
weakness. She had just attained this forced but
respectable tranquillity, as the bailiff, signing to the
crowd to hush its murmurs and to remain motionless,
arose, with a manner that he intended to be
dignified, and which passed with the multitude for
a very successful experiment in its way, to open
the business in hand by a short address. The
reader is not to be surprised at the volubility of
honest Peterchen, for it was getting to be late in
the day, and his frequent libations throughout the
ceremonies would have wrought him up to even a
much higher flight of eloquence, had the occasion
and the company at all suited such a display of
his powers.

“We have had a joyous day, my friends,” he
said; “one whose excellent ceremonies ought to
recall to every one of us our dependence on Providence,

our frail and sinful dispositions, and particularly
our duties to the councils. By the types
of plenty and abundance, we see the bounty of
nature, which is a gift from Heaven; by the different
little failures that have been, perhaps, unavoidably
made in some of the nicer parts of the exhibition—
and I would here particularly mention the besotted
drunkenness of Antoine Giraud, the man who has
impudently undertaken to play the part of Silenus,
as a fit subject of your attention, for it is full of
profit to all hard-drinking knaves—we may see our
own awful imperfections; while, in the order of
the whole, and the perfect obedience of the subordinates,
do we find a parallel to the beauty of a
vigilant and exact police and a well-regulated community.
Thus you see, that though the ceremony
hath a Heathen exterior, it hath a Christian moral;
God grant that we all forget the former, and remember
the latter, as best becomes our several
characters and our common country. And now,
having done with the divinities and their legends—
with the exception of that varlet Silenus, whose
misconduct, I promise you, is not to be so easily
overlooked—we will give some attention to mortal
affairs. Marriage is honorable before God and
man, and although I have never had leisure to enter
into this holy state myself, owing to a variety of
reasons, but chiefly from my being wedded, as it
were, to the State, to which we all owe quite as
much, or even greater duty, than the most faithful
wife owes to her husband, I would not have you
suppose that I have not a high veneration for
matrimony. So far from this, I have looked on no
part of this day's ceremonies with more satisfaction
than these of the nuptials, which we are now called
upon to complete in a manner suitable to the importance
of the occasion. Let the bridegroom and
the bride stand forth, that all may the better see
the happy pair.”

At the bidding of the bailiff, Jacques Colis led
Christine upon the little stage prepared for their
reception, where both were more completely in
view of the spectators than they had yet been.
The movement, and the agitation consequent on
so public an exposure, deepened the bloom on the
soft cheeks of the bride, and another and a still
less equivocal murmur of applause arose in the
multitude. The spectacle of youth, innocence,
and feminine loveliness, strongly stirred the sympathies
of even the most churlish and rude; and
most present began to feel for her fears, and to
participate in her hopes.

“This is excellent!” continued the well-pleased
Peterchen, who was never half so happy as when
he was officially providing for the happiness of
others; “it promises a happy ménage. A loyal,
frugal, industrious, and active groom, with a fair
and willing bride, can drive discontent up any
man's chimney. That which is to be done next,
being legal and binding, must be done with proper
gravity and respect. Let the notary advance—
not him who hath so aptly played this character,
but the commendable and upright officer who is
rightly charged with these respectable functions—
and we will listen to the contract. I recommend
a decent silence, my friends, for the true laws and
real matrimony are at the bottom—a grave affair
at the best, and one never to be treated with levity;
since a few words pronounced now in haste
may be repented of for a whole life hereafter.”

Every thing was conducted according to the
wishes of the bailiff, and with great decency of
form. A true and authorized notary read aloud
the marriage-contract, the instrument which contained
the civic relations and rights of the parties,

and which only waited for the signatures to be
complete. This document required, of course,
that the real names of the contracting parties, their
ages, births, parentage, and all those facts which
are necessary to establish their identity, and to
secure the rights of succession, should be clearly
set forth in a way to render the instrument valid
at the most remote period, should there ever arrive
a necessity to recur to it in the way of testimony.
The most eager attention pervaded the
crowd as they listened to these little particulars,
and Adelheid trembled in this delicate part of the
proceedings, as the suppressed but still audible
breathing of Sigismund reached her ear, lest something
might occur to give a rude shock to his feelings.
But it would seem the notary had his cue.
The details touching Christine were so artfully arranged,
that while they were perfectly binding in
law, they were so dexterously concealed from the
observation of the unsuspecting, that no attention
was drawn to the point most apprehended by their
exposure. Sigismund breathed freer when the notary
drew near the end of his task, and Adelheid
heard the heavy breath he drew at the close, with
the joy one feels at the certainty of having passed
an imminent danger. Christine herself seemed
relieved, though her inexperience in a great degree
prevented her from foreseeing all that the
greater practice of Sigismund had led him to anticipate.

“This is quite in rule, and naught now remains
but to receive the signatures of the respective parties
and their friends,” resumed the bailiff. “A
happy ménage is like a well-ordered state, a foretaste
of the joys and peace of Heaven; while a
discontented household and a turbulent community
may be likened at once to the penalties and the
pains of hell! Let the friends of the parties step

forth, in readiness to sign when the principals themselves
shall have discharged this duty.”

A few of the relatives and associates of Jacques
Colis moved out of the crowd and placed themselves
at the side of the bridegroom, who immediately
wrote his own name, like a man impatient
to be happy. A pause succeeded, for all were
curious to see who claimed affinity to the trembling
girl on this the most solemn and important
event of her life. An interval of several minutes
elapsed, and no one appeared. The respiration
of Sigismund became more difficult; he seemed
about to choke, and then yielding to a generous
impulse, he arose.

“For the love of God!—for thine own sake!—
for mine! be not too hasty!” whispered the terrified
Adelheid; for she saw the hot glow that
almost blazed on his brow.

“I cannot desert poor Christine to the scorn of
the world, in a moment like this! If I die of shame,
I must go forward and own myself.”

The hand of Mademoiselle de Willading was
laid upon his arm, and he yielded to this silent but
impressive entreaty, for just then he saw that his
sister was about to be relieved from her distressing
solitude. The throng yielded, and a decent pair,
attired in the guise of small but comfortable proprietors,
moved doubtingly towards the bride. The
eyes of Christine filled with tears, for terror and
the apprehension of disgrace yielded suddenly to
joy. Those who advanced to support her in that
moment of intense trial were her father and mother.
The respectable-looking pair moved slowly
to the side of their daughter, and, having placed
themselves one on each side of her, they first ventured
to cast furtive and subdued glances at the
multitude.

“It is doubtless painful to the parents to part
with so fair and so dutiful a child,” resumed the
obtuse Peterchen, who rarely saw in any emotion
more than its most common-place and vulgar character;
“Nature pulls them one way, while the
terms of the contract and the progress of our
ceremonies pull another. I have often weaknesses
of this sort myself, the most sensitive hearts being
the most liable to these attacks. But my children
are the public, and do not admit of too much
of what I may call the detail of sentiment, else,
by the soul of Calvin! were I but an indifferent
bailiff for Berne!—Thou art the father of this fair
and blushing maiden, and thou her mother?”

“We are these,” returned Balthazar mildly.

“Thou art not of Vévey, or its neighborhood,
by thy speech?”

“Of the great canton, mein Herr;” for the answer
was in German, these contracted districts
possessing nearly as many dialects as there are
territorial divisions. “We are strangers in Vaud.”

“Thou hast not done the worse for marrying
thy daughter with a Vévaisan, and, more especially,
under the favor of our renowned and liberal
Abbaye. I warrant me thy child will be none
the poorer for this compliance with the wishes of
those who lead our ceremonies!”

“She will not go portionless to the house of her
husband,” returned the father, coloring with secret
pride; for to one to whom the chances of life left
so few sources of satisfaction, those that were possessed
became doubly dear.

“This is well! A right worthy couple! And I
doubt not, a meet companion will your offspring
prove. Monsieur le Notaire, call off the names of
these good people aloud, that they may sign, at
least, with a decent parade.”

“It is settled otherwise,” hastily answered the

functionary of the quill, who was necessarily in the
secret of Christine's origin, and who had been well
bribed to observe discretion. “It would altogether
derange the order and regularity of the proceedings.”

“As thou wilt; for I would have nothing illegal,
and least of all, nothing disorderly. But o' Heaven's
sake! let us get through with our penmanship,
for I hear there are symptoms that the meats
are likely to be overbaked. Canst thou write,
good man?”

“Indifferently, mein Herr; but in a way to make
what I will binding before the law.”

“Give the quill to the bride, Mr. Notary, and
let us protract the happy event no longer.”

The bailiff here bent his head aside and whispered
to an attendant to hurry towards the kitchens
and to look to the affairs of the banquet.
Christine took the pen with a trembling hand and
pallid cheek, and was about to apply it to the
paper, when a sudden cry from the throng diverted
the attention of all present to a new matter of interest.

“Who dares thus indecently interrupt this grave
scene, and that, too, in so great a presence?”
sternly demanded the bailiff.

Pippo, who with the other prisoners had unavoidably
been inclosed in the space near the estrade
by the pressure of the multitude, staggered more
into view, and removing his cap with a well-managed
respect, presented himself humbly to the
sight of Peterchen.

“It is I, illustrious and excellent governor,”
returned the wily Neapolitan, who retained just
enough of the liquor he had swallowed to render
him audacious, without weakening his means of
observation. “It is I, Pippo; an artist of humble
pretensions, but, I hope, a very honest man,

and, as I know, a great reverencer of the laws and
a true friend to order.”

“Let the good man speak up boldly. A man
of these principles has a right to be heard. We
live in a time of damnable innovations, and of most
atrocious attempts to overturn the altar, the state,
and the public trusts, and the sentiments of such a
man are like dew to the parched grass.”

The reader is not to imagine, from the language
of the bailiff, that Vaud stood on the eve of any
great political commotion, but, as the Government
was in itself an usurpation, and founded on the
false principle of exclusion, it was quite as usual
then, as now, to cry out against the moral throes
of violated right, since the same eagerness to possess,
the same selfishness in grasping, however
unjustly obtained, and the same audacity of assertion
with a view to mystify, pervaded the Christian
world a century since as exist to-day. The
cunning Pippo saw that the bait had taken, and,
assuming a still more respectful and loyal mien, he
continued:—

“Although a stranger, illustrious governor, I
have had great delight in these joyous and excellent
ceremonies. Their fame will be spread far and
near, and men will talk of little less for the coming
year but of Vévey and its festival. But a great
scandal hangs over your honorable heads which it
is in my power to turn aside, and San Gennaro
forbid! that I, a stranger, that hath been well
entertained in your town, should hesitate about
raising his voice on account of any scruples of
modesty. No doubt, great governor, your eccellenza
believes that this worthy Vévaisan is about
to wive a creditable maiden, whose name could be
honorably mentioned with those of the ceremonies
and your town, before the proudest company in
Europe?”

“What of this, fellow? The girl is fair, and
modest enough, at least to the eye, and if thou
knowest aught else, whisper thy secret to her husband
or her friends, but do not come in this rude
manner to disturb our harmony with thy raven
throat, just as we are ready to sing an epithalamium
in honor of the happy pair. Your excessive
particularity is the curse of wedlock, my friends,
and I have a great mind to send this knave, in
spite of all this profession of order, which is like
enough to produce disorder, for a month or two
into our Vévey dungeon for his pains.”

Pippo was staggered, for, just drunk enough to
be audacious, he had not all his faculties at his
perfect command, and his usual acumen was a
little at fault. Still, accustomed to brave public
opinion, and to carry himself through the failures
of his exhibitions by heavier drafts on the patience
and credulity of his audience, he determined to
persevere as the most likely way of extricating
himself from the menaced consequences of his
indiscretion.

“A thousand pardons, great bailiff;” he answered.
“Naught, but a burning desire to do justice
to your high honor, and to the reputation of
the abbaye's festival, could have led me so far,
but—”

“Speak thy mind at once, rogue, and have done
with circumlocution.”

“I have little to say, Signore, except that the
father of this illustrious bride, who is about to
honor Vévey by making her nuptials an occasion
for all in the city to witness and to favor, is the
common headsman of Berne—a wretch who lately
came near to prove the destruction of more Christians
than the law has condemned, and who is sufficiently
out of favor with Heaven to bring the fate
of Gomorrah upon your town!”

Pippo tottered to his station among the prisoners,
with the manner of one who had delivered himself
of an important trust, and was instantly lost to
view. So rapid and unlooked for had been the
interruption, and so vehement the utterance of the
Italian while delivering his facts, that, though
several present saw their tendency when it was
too late, none had sufficient presence of mind to
prevent the exposure. A murmur arose in the
crowd, which stirred like a vast sheet of fluid on
which a passing gust had alighted, and then became
fixed and calm. Of all present, the bailiff
manifested the least surprise or concern, for to
him the last minister of the law was an object, if
not precisely of respect, of politic good-will rather
than of dishonor.

“What of this!” he answered, in the way of
one who had expected a far more important revelation.
“What of this, should it be true! Harkee,
friend,—art thou, in sooth, the noted Balthazar, he
to whose family the canton is indebted for so much
fair justice?”

Balthazar saw that his secret was betrayed, and
that it were wiser simply to admit the facts, than
to have recourse to subterfuge or denial. Nature,
moreover, had made him a man with strong and
pure propensities for the truth, and he was never
without the innate consciousness of the injustice of
which he had been made the victim by the unfeeling
ordinance of society. Raising his head, he
looked around him with firmness, for he too, unhappily,
had been accustomed to act in the face of
multitudes, and he answered the question of the
bailiff, in his usual mild tone of voice, but with
composure.

“Herr Bailiff, I am by inheritance the last avenger
of the law.”

“By my office! I like the title; it is a good one!

The last avenger of the law! If rogues will offend,
or dissatisfied spirits plot, there must be a hand to
put the finishing blow to their evil works, and why
not thou as well as another! Harkee, officers, shut
me up yonder Italian knave for a week on bread
and water, for daring to trifle with the time and
good-nature of the public in this impudent manner.
And this worthy dame is thy wife, honest Balthazar;
and that fair maiden thy child—Hast thou
more of so goodly a race?”

“God has blessed me in my offspring, mein
Herr.”

“Ay; God hath blessed thee!—and a great blessing
it should be, as I know by bitter experience—
that is, being a bachelor, I understand the misery
of being childless—I would say no more. Sign
the contract, honest Balthazar, with thy wife and
daughter, that we may have an end of this.”

The family of the proscribed were about to obey
this mandate, when Jacques Colis abruptly threw
down the emblems of a bridegroom, tore the contract
in fragments, and publicly announced that he
had changed his intention, and that he would not
wive a headsman's child. The public mind is
usually caught by any loud declaration in favor of
the ruling prejudice, and, after the first brief pause
of surprise was past, the determination of the
groom was received with a shout of applause that
was immediately followed by general, coarse, and
deriding laughter. The throng pressed upon the
keepers of the limits in a still denser mass, opposing
an impenetrable wall of human bodies to the
passage of any in either direction, and a dead stillness
succeeded, as if all present breathlessly awaited
the result of the singular scene.

So unexpected and sudden was the purpose of
the groom, that they who were most affected by
it, did not, at first, fully comprehend the extent of

the disgrace that was so publicly heaped upon them.
The innocent and unpractised Christine stood resembling
the cold statue of a vestal, with the pen
raised ready to affix her as yet untarnished name
to the contract, in an attitude of suspense, while
her wondering look followed the agitation of the
multitude, as the startled bird, before it takes wing,
regards a movement among the leaves of the
bush. But there was no escape from the truth.
Conviction of its humiliating nature came too soon,
and, by the time the calm of intense curiosity had
succeeded to the momentary excitement of the
spectators, she was standing an exquisite but painful
picture of wounded feminine feeling and of
maiden shame. Her parents, too, were stupified
by the suddenness of the unexpected shock, and it
was longer before their faculties recovered the
tone proper to meet an insult so unprovoked and
gross.

“This is unusual;” drily remarked the bailiff,
who was the first to break the long and painful silence.

“It is brutal!” warmly interposed the Signor
Grimaldi. “Unless there has been deception practised
on the bridegroom, it is utterly without
excuse.”

“Your experience, Signore, has readily suggested
the true points in a very knotty case, and I shall
proceed without delay to look into its merits.”

Sigismund resumed his seat, his hand releasing
the sword-hilt that it had spontaneously grasped,
when he heard this declaration of the bailiff's intentions.

“For the sake of thy poor sister, forbear!”
whispered the terrified Adelheid. “All will yet
be well—all must be well—it is impossible that
one so sweet and innocent should long remain with
her honor unavenged!”

The young man smiled frightfully, at least so it
seemed to his companion: but he maintained the
appearance of composure. In the mean time
Peterchen, having secretly dispatched another
messenger to the cooks, turned his serious attention
to the difficulty that had just arisen.

“I have long been intrusted by the council with
honorable duties,” he said, “but never, before to-day,
have I been required to decide upon a domestic
misunderstanding, before the parties were
actually wedded. This is a grave interruption of
the ceremonies of the abbaye, as well as a slight
upon the notary and the spectators, and needs be
well looked to. Dost thou really persist in putting
this unusual termination to a marriage-ceremony,
Herr Bridegroom?”

Jacques Colis had lost a little of the violent impulse
which led him to the precipitate and inconsiderate
act of destroying an instrument he had legally
executed; but his outbreaking of feeling was followed
by a sullen and fixed resolution to persevere
in the refusal at every hazard to himself.

“I will not wive the daughter of a man hunted
of society, and avoided by all;” he doggedly answered.

“No doubt the respectability of the parent is
the next thing to a good dowry, in the choice of a
wife,” returned the bailiff, “but one of thy years
has not come hither, without having first inquired
into the parentage of her thou wert about to wed?”

“It was sworn to me that the secret should be
kept. The girl is well endowed, and a promise
was solemnly made that her parentage should
never be known. The family of Colis is esteemed
in Vaud, and I would not have it said that the
blood of the headsman of the canton hath mixed
in a stream as fair as ours.”

“And yet thou wert not unwilling, so long as the

circumstance was unknown? Thy objection is
less to the fact, than to its public exposure.”

“Without the aid of parchments and tongues,
Monsieur le Bailli, we should all be equal in birth.
Ask the noble Baron de Willading, who is seated
there at your side, why he is better than another.
He will tell you that he is come of an ancient and
honorable line; but had he been taken from his
castle in infancy, and concealed under a feigned
name, and kept from men's knowledge as being
that he is, who would think of him for the deeds
of his ancestors? As the Sire de Willading would,
in such a case, have lost in the world's esteem, so
did Christine gain; but as opinion would return to
the baron, when the truth should be published, so
does it desert Balthazar's daughter, when she is
known to be a headsman's child. I would have
married the maiden as she was, but, your pardon,
Monsieur le Bailli, if I say, I will not wive her as
she is.”

A murmur of approbation followed this plausible
and ready apology, for, when antipathies are
active and bitter, men are easily satisfied with a
doubtful morality and a weak argument.

“This honest youth hath some reason in him,”
observed the puzzled bailiff, shaking his head. “I
would he had been less expert in disputation, or
that the secret had been better kept! It is apparent
as the sun in the heavens, friend Melchior,
that hadst thou not been known as thy father's
child, thou wouldst not have succeeded to thy castle
and lands—nay, by St. Luke! not even to the
rights of the bürgerschaft.”

“In Genoa we are used to hear both parties,”
gravely rejoined the Signor Grimaldi, “that we
may first make sure that we touch the true merits
of the case. Were another to claim the Signor
de Willading's honors and name, thou wouldst

scarce grant his suit, without questioning our friend
here, touching his own rights to the same.”

“Better and better! This is justice, while that
which fell from the bridegroom was only argument.
Harkee, Balthazar, and thou good woman,
his wife—and thou too, pretty Christine—what
have ye all to answer to the reasonable plea of
Jacques Colis?”

Balthazar, who, by the nature of his office, and
by his general masculine duties, had been so much
accustomed to meet with harsh instances of the
public hatred, soon recovered his usual calm exterior,
even though he felt a father's pang and a father's
just resentment at witnessing this open injury
to one so gentle and deserving as his child.
But the blow had been far heavier on Marguerite,
the faithful and long-continued sharer of his fortunes.
The wife of Balthazar was past the prime
of her days, but she still retained the presence, and
some of the personal beauty, which had rendered
her, in youth, a woman of extraordinary mien
and carriage. When the words which announced
the slight to her daughter first fell on her ears, she
paled to the hue of the dead. For several minutes
she stood looking more like one that had taken a
final departure from the interests and emotions of
life, than one that, in truth, was a prey to one of
the strongest passions the human breast can ever
entertain, that of wounded maternal affection. Then
the blood stole slowly to her temples, and, by the
time the bailiff put his question, her entire face was
glowing under a tumult of feeling that threatened
to defeat its own wishes, by depriving her of the
power of speech.

“Thou canst answer him, Balthazar,” she said
huskily, motioning for her husband to arouse his
faculties; “thou art used to these multitudes and

to their scorn. Thou art a man, and canst do us
justice.”

“Herr Bailiff,” said the headsman, who seldom
lost the mild deportment that characterized his
manner, “there is much truth in what Jacques
hath urged, but all present may have seen that the
fault did not come of us, but of yonder heartless
vagabond. The wretch sought my life on the
lake, in our late unfortunate passage hither; and,
not content with wishing to rob my children of
their father, he comes now to injure me still more
cruelly. I was born to the office I hold, as you
well know, Herr Hofmeister, or it would never
have been sought by me; but what the law wills,
men insist upon as right. This girl can never be
called upon to strike a head from its shoulders,
and, knowing from childhood up the scorn that
awaits all who come of my race, I sought the
means of releasing her, at least, from some part
of the curse that hath descended on us.”

“I know not if this were legal!” interrupted the
bailiff, quickly. “What is your opinion, Her von
Willading? Can any in Berne escape their heritable
duties, any more than hereditary privileges can
be assumed? This is a grave question; innovation
leads to innovation, and our venerable laws and
our sacred usages must be preserved, if we would
avert the curse of change!”

“Balthazar hath well observed that a female
cannot exercise the executioner's office.”

“True, but a female may bring forth them that
can. This is a cunning question for the doctors-in-law,
and it must be examined; of all damnable
offences, Heaven keep me from that of a wish for
change. If change is ever to follow, why establish?
Change is the unpardonable sin in politics,
Signor Grimaldi; since that which is often changed
becomes valueless in time, even if it be coin.”

“The mother hath something she would utter,”
said the Genoese, whose quick but observant eye
had been watching the workings of the countenances
of the repudiated family, while the bailiff
was digressing in his usual prolix manner on things
in general, and who detected the throes of feeling
which heaved the bosom of the respectable Marguerite,
in a way to announce a speedy birth to
her thoughts.

Hast thou aught to urge, good woman?” demanded
Peterchen, who was well enough disposed to
hear both sides in all cases of controversy, unless
they happened to touch the supremacy of the great
canton. “To speak the truth, the reasons of Jacques
Colis are plausible and witty, and are likely
to weigh heavy against thee.”

The color slowly disappeared from the brow of
the mother, and she turned such a look of fondness
and protection on her child, as spoke a complete
condensation of all her feelings in the engrossing
sentiment of a mother's love.

“Have I aught to urge!” slowly repeated Marguerite,
looking steadily about her at the curious
and unfeeling crowd which, bent on the indulgence
of its appetite for novelty, and excited by its prejudices,
still pressed upon the halberds of the officers—“Has
a mother aught to say in defence of
her injured and insulted child! Why hast thou not
also asked, Herr Hofmeister, if I am human?
We come of proscribed races, I know, Balthazar
and I, but like thee, proud bailiff, and the privileged
at thy side, we come too of God! The
judgment and power of men have crushed us from
the beginning, and we are used to the world's
scorn and to the world's injustice!”

“Say not so, good woman, for no more is required
than the law sanctions. Thou art now talking
against thine own interests, and I interrupt thee,

in pure mercy. 'Twould be scandalous in me to
sit here and listen to one that hath bespattered the
law with an evil tongue.”

“I know naught of the subtleties of thy laws,
but well do I know their cruelty and wrongs, as
respects me and mine! All others come into the
world with hope, but we have been crushed from
the beginning. That surely cannot be just which
destroys hope. Even the sinner need not despair,
through the mercy of the Son of God! but we,
that have come into the world under thy laws, have
little before us in life but shame and the scorn of
men!”

“Nay, thou quite mistakest the matter, dame;
these privileges were first bestowed on thy families
in reward for good services, I make no doubt, and
it was long accounted profitable to be of this
office.”

“I do not say that in a darker age, when oppression
stalked over the land, and the best were barbarous
as the worst to-day, some of those of whom
we are born may not have been fierce and cruel
enough to take upon themselves this office with
good will; but I deny that any short of Him who
holds the universe in his hand, and who controls
an endless future to compensate for the evils of the
present time, has the power to say to the son, that
he shall be the heritor of the father's wrongs!”

“How! dost question the doctrine of descents?
We shall next hear thee dispute the rights of the
bürgerschaft!”

“I know nothing, Herr Bailiff, of the nice distinctions
of your rights in the city, and wish to
utter naught for or against. But an entire life of
contumely and bitterness is apt to become a life of
thoughtfulness and care; and I see sufficient difference
between the preservation of privileges fairly
earned, though even these may and do bring with

them abuses hard to be borne, and the unmerited
oppression of the offspring for the ancestors' faults.
There is little of that justice which savors of
Heaven in this, and the time will come when a
fearful return will be made for wrongs so sore!”

“Concern for thy pretty daughter, good Marguerite,
causes thee to speak strongly.”

“Is not the daughter of a headsman and a
headsman's wife their offspring, as much as the fair
maiden who sits near thee is the child of the noble
at her side? Am I to love her less, that she is despised
by a cruel world? Had I not the same suffering
at the birth, the same joy in the infant smile,
the same hope in the childish promise, and the same
trembling for her fate when I consented to trust
her happiness to another, as she that bore that
more fortunate but not fairer maiden hath had in
her? Hath God created two natures—two yearnings
for the mother—two longings for our children's
weal—those of the rich and honored, and
those of the crushed and despised?”

“Go to, good Marguerite; thou puttest the matter
altogether in a manner that is unusual. Are
our reverenced usages nothing—our solemn edicts
—our city's rule—and our resolution to govern,
and that fairly and with effect?”

“I fear that these are stronger than the right,
and likely to endure when the tears of the oppressed
are exhausted, when they and their fates shall
be forgotten!”

“Thy child is fair and modest,” observed the
Signor Grimaldi, “and will yet find a youth who
will more than atone for this injury. He that has
rejected her was not worthy of her faith.”

Marguerite turned her look, which had been
glowing with awakened feeling, on her pale and
still motionless daughter. The expression of her
eyes softened, and she folded her child to her

bosom, as the dove shelters its young. All her
aroused feelings appeared to dissolve in the sentiment
of love.

“My child is fair, Herr Peter;” she continued,
without adverting to the interruption; “but better
than fair, she is good! Christine is gentle and
dutiful, and not for a world would she bruise the
spirit of another as hers has been this day bruised.
Humbled as we are, and despised of men, bailiff,
we have our thoughts, and our wishes, and our
hopes, and memory, and all the other feelings of
those that are more fortunate; and when I have
racked my brain to reason on the justice of a fate
which has condemned all of my race to have little
other communion with their kind but that of
blood, and when bitterness has swollen at my
heart, ay, near to bursting, and I have been ready
to curse Providence and die, this mild, affectionate
girl hath been near to quench the fire that consumed
me, and to tighten the cords of life, until
her love and innocence have left me willing to live
even under a heavier load than this I bear. Thou
art of an honored race, bailiff, and canst little understand
most of our suffering; but thou art a
man, and shouldst know what it is to be wounded
through another, and that one who is dearer to thee
than thine own flesh.”

“Thy words are strong, good Marguerite,”
again interrupted the bailiff, who felt an uneasiness,
of which he would very gladly be rid. “Himmel!
Who can like any thing better than his own flesh?
Besides, thou shouldst remember that I am a bachelor,
and bachelors are apt, naturally, to feel more
for their own flesh than for that of others. Stand
aside, and let the procession pass, that we may go
to the banquet, which waits. If Jacques Colis will
none of thy girl, I have not the power to make
him. Double the dowry, good woman, and thou

shalt have a choice of husbands, in spite of the axe
and the sword that are in thy escutcheon. Let the
halberdiers make way for those honest people there,
who, at least, are functionaries of the law, and are
to be protected as well as ourselves.”

The crowd obeyed, yielding readily to the ad
vance of the officers, and, in a few minutes, the
useless attendants of the village nuptials, and the
train of Hymen, slunk away, sensible of the ridicule
that, in a double degree, attaches itself to folly,
when it fails of effecting even its own absurdities.