University of Virginia Library

22. CHAPTER XXI.

The Carolans had not been long gone when strange
reports became general of the increasing anarchy in
France. It was said that the utmost prudence was
requisite in every resident of that unhappy country to
avoid fatal collisions with one or the other of the raging
parties. Every day brought fugitives who described
their flight to have been attended with unheardof
perils. It was at length stated that the frontiers of
France were closed against all future departures, and
that the royal family themselves wished to leave their
throne and native land, but were unable to do so.
Day after day the accounts grew more alarming.
Prussia, as indeed all Europe, was becoming more
and more agitated. Poor Claude would have followed
Carolan into France had he possessed the pecuniary
means; but, alas! the interest excited by his private affairs
was merged in that of the general welfare. The
most enthusiastic admirers of English abandoned their
studies for thoughts of a much more serious kind, and
Claude found himself destitute. His friends had disappeared.
Lavalle had gone to France again some
time before. The Prussian army was put in motion.
A tempest, vague and dark, seemed lowering over
mankind. All Europe trembled. The Countess Carolan
received news of her husband which threw her
into a malady—from which she was threatened to be
speedily released by death. Carolan, it was said, had
been seized by the revolutionists—accused of attempting
to aid the king—and thrown into prison, from which
it was feared he would not escape with his life. Of
Ida and St. Marie, no news could be obtained. It was
a dreadful year; and as for Claude, in addition to all
his apprehensions for Ida, he was often at a loss for

means to support life. No one would lend money at
such a period; and, had there been lenders, he had no
right to borrow what he saw no prospect of being able
to repay. All occupation was at a stand. Europe appeared
waiting, as men do beneath a black cloud, from
which they look each moment to see burst the dreadful
bolt, without daring to conjecture where it is to
fall. In the actual course of necessity, to prevent himself
from starving, he had contracted a bill at a baker's.
It was for the simplest aliment which could sustain the
body. It was for common bread. He owed the baker
one thaler. The man demanded his money. Claude
could not pay it. This new creditor was a large, portly,
broad-shouldered person, with no neck, and a high,
square head, the size of which almost amounted to deformity.
His features were all, in a corresponding degree,
large and uncouth. His eyes were round, green,
and protuberant, and shaded by large shaggy brows.
His nose was bloated, purple, and with hairs growing
on the end. His mouth stretched from ear to ear, and
his whole countenance, ploughed with time and debauchery,
and Heaven knows what volcanic passions,
looked like some ragged rock rent apart by a convulsion
of nature. No smile ever softened those deeply-indented
outlines, as no human feelings found their
way into his long-hardened heart. His voice was
hoarse, deep, and guttural; and when he spoke, even
on the most trivial occasions, he grew red in the face
with choler. His head was perfectly white—his
limbs were swollen and gouty—his feet resembled
those of an elephant—his hands were full of knots like
the gnarled branches of some immemorial oak, and he
had a spirit as unbendable. He was worth, men said,
300,000 thalers, accumulated by grasping every cent.
On finding Claude's inability to pay, this curious old
veteran, who perhaps might be regarded as something
of a maniac in his way, sued him and obtained judgment,
and took measures to cast him into prison.

“He shall stay there his year,” said he, “or pay me
my thaler.”

Claude went to him, in company with the sheriff's
officer who had arrested him, and endeavoured to soften
his heart. The old man became furious at the sight
of him. His face, always half purple, grew fiery with
rage, and he swore he would have his thaler or his
body.

“You are a scoundrel,” said he, “to rob me of my
money. You are my slave till you pay me. I hold
to the law. Go! away with him. He is a robber.”

And Claude was thrown into the very prison—the
very room—and with the very people who had formerly
been his companions under the same circumstances,
although with two or three ominous exceptions.

In this position, Claude found himself at the lowest
step of the ladder. He was a beggar—a wretch—a
slave. He saw no other prospect than a year's confinement.
An unutterable anguish came cold and
deadening over his heart as he turned his eyes about
the room, and regarded the gloomy, pitiless walls
which had enclosed him—which were to shut him out
from the world. As for soliciting aid, he knew no one
among all his acquaintances to whom he could apply
but St. Hillaire, Lavalle, and Madame Wharton. All of
these were absent. For an instant the thought of
self-destruction once more rose in his mind. The resources
of his life seemed to be exhausted. He had
struggled against a fate that was too much for him.
Fortune, as if resolved to pursue him with persevering
malice, had stripped him of everything which cheers,
adorns, and blesses human life. No domestic affection
shed an interior sunshine on his heart. No revered
and beloved father—no affectionate and ever-watchful
mother—no sister, with her unchanging fidelity
and attachment—no brother, bound to him with the
sustaining ties of friendship and truth—of old associations
and mutual confidence. The only affection which
had ever risen in his breast was quenched in dark and
hopeless humiliation; and he felt that, in addition to

all these, poverty, captivity, disgrace—the desertion of
his friends—the disgust he had conceived at the conduct
of some from whom he had expected nobler conduct—the
silence and apparent forgetfulness of Madame
Wharton, who had impressed him with a warm esteem
and friendship, altogether seemed to present life worthless,
and death as the greatest happiness which could
befall him. He reflected what an old Roman would do
when honour, hope, and all were lost; and the words of
the lofty and philosophic Cassius rose to his lips with
a sad and solemn meaning:

But, happily, he had learned to govern his impulses,
and to seek his rules of action in a better school than
the erring genius of heathen philosophy. A man who
has borne slander, insult, and a blow from a sense of
right, and who has turned from the woman he loved
without a look rather than lead astray a young heart
disposed to requite his affection, will do nothing rash,
but has in it a principle of the truest courage as a support
in the darkest hour. With an humble prayer to
Him who can cast down and put up, who giveth and
who taketh away, he “filed his mind”—he turned in
upon himself—repressed his despair, and resolved to
await with resignation the will of Heaven.