 | Reveries of a bachelor, or, A book of the heart |  |
Fourth Reverie.
Morning, Noon, and Evening.
MORNING, NOON, AND EVENING.
IT is a Spring day under the oaks—the loved oaks
of a once cherished home,—now alas, mine no
longer!
I had sold the old farm-house, and the groves,
and the cool springs, where I had bathed my head in
the heats of summer; and with the first warm days
of May, they were to pass from me forever. Seventy
years they had been in the possession of my mother's
family; for seventy years, they had borne the same
name of proprietorship; for seventy years, the Lares
of our country home, often neglected, almost forgotten,—yet
brightened from time to time, by gleams
of heart-worship, had held their place in the sweet
valley of Elmgrove.
And in this changeful, bustling, American life of
ours, seventy years is no child's holiday. The hurry
of action, and progress, may pass over it with quick
step; but the foot-prints are many and deep. You
surely will not wonder that it made me sad and
thoughtful, to break the chain of years, that bound
to my heart, the oaks, the hills, the springs, the
valley—and such a valley!
A wild stream runs through it,—large enough
to make a river for English landscape,—winding between
rich banks, where in summer time, the swallows
build their nests, and brood by myriads.
Tall elms rise here and there along the margin,
and with their uplifted arms, and leafy spray, throw
great patches of shade upon the meadow. Old lion-like
oaks too, where the meadow-soil hardens into
rolling upland, fasten to the ground with their ridgy
roots; and with their gray, scraggy limbs, make delicious
shelter for the panting workers, or for the
herds of August.
Westward of the stream, where I am lying, the
banks roll up swiftly into sloping hills, covered with
groves of oaks, and green pasture lands, dotted with
mossy rocks. And farther on, where some wood has
been swept down, some ten years gone, by the axe,
the new growth, heavy with the luxuriant foliage of
spring, covers wide spots of the slanting land;—while
bare arms to the blast—a solitary mourner, over the
wreck of its forest brothers.
Eastward, the ridgy bank passes into wavy meadows,
upon whose farther edge, you see the roofs of
an old mansion, with tall chimneys and taller elm-trees
shading it. Beyond, the hills rise gently, and
sweep away into wood-crowned heights, that are blue
with distance. At the upper end of the valley, the
stream is lost to the eye, in a wide swamp wood,
which in the autumn time is covered with a scarlet
sheet, blotched here and there by the dark crimson
stains of the ash-tops. Farther on, the hills crowd
close to the brook, and come down with granite
boulders, and scattered birch trees, and beeches,—
under which, upon the smoky mornings of May, I
have time and again loitered, and thrown my line into
the pools, which curl, dark, and still, under their
tangled roots.
Below, and looking southward, through the openings
of the oaks that shade me, I see a broad stretch
of meadow, with glimpses of the silver surface of the
stream, and of the giant solitary elms, and of some
old maple that has yielded to the spring tides, and
now dips its lower boughs in the insidious current;—
and of clumps of alders, and willow tufts,—above
which even now, the black-and-white coated Bob-o'-Lincoln,
quieter mate sits swaying on the topmost twigs.
A quiet road passes within a short distance of me,
and crosses the brook by a rude timber bridge; beside
the bridge, is a broad glassy pool, shaded by old
maples, and hickories, where the cattle drink each
morning, on their way to the hill pastures. A step
or two beyond the stream, a lane branches across the
meadows, to the mansion with the tall chimneys. I
can just remember now, the stout, broad-shouldered
old gentleman, with his white hat, his long white
hair, and his white headed cane, who built the house,
and who farmed the whole valley around me. He is
gone, long since; and lies in a grave-yard looking
upon the sea! The elms that he planted shake their
weird arms over the mouldering roofs; and his fruit-garden
shows only a battered phalanx of mossy limbs,
which will scarce tempt the July marauders.
In the other direction, upon this side the brook,
the road is lost to view, among the trees; but if I
were to follow the windings upon the hill-side, it
would bring me shortly upon the old home of my
grandfather; there is no pleasure in wandering there
now. The woods that sheltered it from the northern
winds, are cut down; the tall cherries that made the
yard one leafy bower, are dead. The cornice is
straggling from the eaves; the porch has fallen; the
it is even worse; the floors sway upon the mouldering
beams; the doors all sag from their hinges; the
rude frescos upon the parlor-wall are peeling off; all
is going to decay.—And my grandfather sleeps in
a little grave-yard, by the garden-wall.
A lane branches from the country road, within a
few yards of me, and leads back, along the edge of
the meadow, to the homely cottage, which has been
my special care. Its gray porch, and chimney are
thrown into rich relief, by a grove of oaks that skirts
the hill behind it; and the doves are flying uneasily
about the open doors of the granary, and barns. The
morning sun shines pleasantly on the gray group of
buildings; and the lowing of the cows, not yet driven
afield, adds to the charming homeliness of the scene.
But alas, for the poor azalias, and laurels, and vines,
that I had put out upon the little knoll before the
cottage door—they are all of them trodden down;
only one poor creeper hangs its loose tresses to the
lattice, all dishevelled, and forlorn!
This bye-lane which opens upon my farm-house,
leaves the road in the middle of a grove of oaks; the
brown gate swings upon an oak tree,—the brown
gate closes upon an oak tree. There is a rustic seat,
built between two veteran trees, that rise from a little
hillock near by. Half a century ago, there was a
veteran trees. I can trace marks of the old blotches
upon the bark, and the scars of the nails, upon the
scathed trunks. Time, and time again, it has been
renewed. This, the last, was built by my own hands,
—a cheerful, and a holy duty.
Sixty years ago, they tell me, my grandfather used
to loiter here with his gun, while his hounds lay
around under the scattered oaks. Now he sleeps, as
I said, in the little grave-yard yonder, where I can
see one or two white tablets glimmering through the
foliage. I never knew him; he died, as the brown
stone table says, aged twenty-six. Yesterday I
climbed the wall that skirts the yard, and plucked a
flower from his tomb. I take out now from my
pocket book, that flower—a frail, first-blooming violet,—and
write upon the slip of paper, into which I
have thrust its delicate stem,—`From my grandfather's
tomb:—1850.'
But other feet have trod upon this knoll—far
more dear to me. The old neighbors have sometimes
told me, how they have seen, forty years ago,
two rosy-faced girls, idling on this spot, under the
shade, and gathering acorns, and making oak-leaved
garlands, for their foreheads.—Alas, alas, the garlands
they wear now, are not earthly garlands!
Upon that spot, and upon that rustic seat, I am
against a tree; my shot-pouch I have hung upon a
broken limb. I have thrown my feet upon the bench,
and lean against one of the gnarled oaks, between
which the seat is built. My hat is off; my book and
paper, are beside me; and my pencil trembles in my
fingers, as I catch sight of those white marble tablets,
gleaming through the trees, from the height above
me, like beckoning angel faces.—If they were
alive!—two more near, and dear friends, in a world
where we count friends, by units!
It is morning,—a bright spring morning under the
oaks—these loved oaks of a once cherished home.
Last night, I slept in yonder mansion, under the
elms. The cattle going to the pasture are drinking
in the pool by the bridge; the boy who drives them,
is making his shrill halloo echo against the hills.
The sun has risen fairly over the eastern heights,
and shines brightly upon the meadow land, and
brightly upon a bend of the brook below me. The
birds,—the blue-birds sweetest and noisiest of all,—
are singing over me in the branches. A wood-pecker
is hammering at a dry limb aloft; and Carlo pricks
up his ears, and listens, and looks at me,—then
stretches out his head upon his paws, in a warm bit
of the sunshine,—and sleeps.
Morning brings back to me the Past; and the past
and memories, but—stranger still,—what might have
been. Every little circumstance which dawns on the
awakened memory, is traced not only to its actual,
but to its possible issues.
What a wide world that makes of the Past!—a
great and gorgeous,—a rich and holy world! Your
fancy fills it up artist-like; the darkness is mellowed
off into soft shades; the bright spots are veiled in
the sweet atmosphere of distance; and fancy and
memory together, make up a rich dream-land of the
past.
And now, as I go on to trace upon paper some of
the visions that float across that dream-land of the
Morning,—I will not—I cannot say, how much comes
fancy-wise, and how much from this vaulting memory.
Of this, the kind reader shall himself be judge.
1. I.
The Morning.
ISABEL and I,—she is my cousin, and is seven
years old, and I am ten,—are sitting together on
the bank of the stream, under an oak tree that leans
half way over to the water. I am much stronger
than she, and taller by a head. I hold in my hands
a little alder rod, with which I am fishing for the
roach and minnows, that play in the pool below us.
She is watching the cork tossing on the water, or
playing with the captured fish that lie upon the bank.
She has auburn ringlets that fall down upon her
shoulders; and her straw hat lies back upon them,
held only by the strip of ribbon, that passes under
her chin. But the sun does not shine upon her head;
for the oak tree above us is full of leaves; and only
the pool, where I am fishing.
Her eye is hazel, and bright; and now and then
she turns it on me with a look of girlish curiosity, as
I lift up my rod,—and again in playful menace, as
she grasps in her little fingers one of the dead fish,
and threatens to throw it back upon the stream.
Her little feet hang over the edge of the bank; and
from time to time, she reaches down to dip her toe in
the water; and laughs a girlish laugh of defiance, as
I scold her for frightening away the fishes.
“Bella,” I say, “what if you should tumble in the
river?”
“But I won't.”
“Yes, but if you should?”
“Why then you would pull me out.”
“But if I wouldn't pull you out?”
“But I know you would; wouldn't you, Paul?”
“What makes you think so, Bella?”
“Because you love Bella.”
“How do you know I love Bella?”
“Because once you told me so; and because you
pick flowers for me that I cannot reach; and because
you let me take your rod, when you have a
fish upon it.”
“But that's no reason, Bella.”
“Then what is, Paul?”
“I'm sure I don't know, Bella.”
A little fish has been nibbling for a long time at
the bait; the cork has been bobbing up and down;—
and now he is fairly hooked, and pulls away toward
the bank, and you cannot see the cork.
—“Here, Bella, quick!”—and she springs eagerly
to clasp her little hands around the rod. But the
fish has dragged it away on the other side of me;
and as she reaches farther, and farther, she slips,
cries—“oh, Paul!”—and falls into the water.
The stream they told us, when we came, was over
a man's head;—it is surely over little Isabel's. I
fling down the rod, and thrusting one hand into the
roots that support the overhanging bank, I grasp at
her hat, as she comes up; but the ribbons give way,
and I see the terribly earnest look upon her face as
she goes down again. Oh, my mother!—thought I,
—if you were only here!
But she rises again; this time, I thrust my hand
into her dress, and struggling hard, keep her at the
top, until I can place my foot down upon a projecting
root; and so bracing myself, I drag her to the
bank, and having climbed up, take hold of her belt
firmly with both hands, and drag her out; and poor
Isabel, choked, chilled, and wet, is lying upon the
grass.
I commence crying aloud. The workmen in the
his arms, and I follow on foot to our uncle's home
upon the hill.
—“Oh my children!”—says my mother; and she
takes Isabel in her arms; and presently with dry
clothes, and blazing wood-fire, little Bella smiles
again. I am at my mother's knee.
“I told you so, Paul,” says Isabel,—“aunty,
doesn't Paul love me?”
“I hope so, Bella,” said my mother.
“I know so,” said I; and kissed her cheek.
And how did I know it? The boy does not ask;
the man does. Oh, the freshness, the honesty, the
vigor of a boy's heart!—how the memory of it refreshes
like the first gush of spring, or the break of
an April shower!
But boyhood has its Pride, as well as its Loves.
My uncle is a tall, hard-faced man: I fear him
when he calls me—“child”; I love him when he
calls me—“Paul.” He is almost always busy with
his books; and when I steal into the library door, as
I sometimes do, with a string of fish, or a heaping
basket of nuts to show to him,—he looks for a moment
curiously at them, sometimes takes them in his
fingers,—gives them back to me, and turns over the
leaves of his book. You are afraid to ask him, if
you have not worked bravely; yet you want to do so.
You sidle out softly, and go to your mother; she
scarce looks at your little stores; but she draws you
to her with her arm, and prints a kiss upon your
forehead. Now your tongue is unloosed; that kiss,
and that action have done it; you will tell what
capital luck you have had; and you hold up your
tempting trophies;—“are they not great, mother?”
But she is looking in your face, and not at your
prize.
“Take them, mother,” and you lay the basket
upon her lap.
“Thank you, Paul, I do not wish them: but you
must give some to Bella.”
And away you go to find laughing, playful, cousin
Isabel. And we sit down together on the grass, and
I pour out my stores between us. “You shall take,
Bella, what you wish in your apron, and then when
study hours are over, we will have such a time down
by the big rock in the meadow!”
“But I do not know if papa will let me,” says
Isabel.
“Bella,” I say, “do you love your papa?”
“Yes,” says Bella, “why not?”
“Because he is so cold; he does not kiss you
Bella, so often as my mother does; and besides,
when he forbids your going away, he does not say, as
mother does,—my little girl will be tired, she had
go. I wonder what makes him talk so?”
“Why Paul, he is a man, and doesn't—at any
rate, I love him; Paul. Besides, my mother is sick,
you know.”
“But Isabel, my mother will be your mother too.
Come Bella, we will go ask her if we may go.”
And there I am, the happiest of boys, pleading
with the kindest of mothers. And the young heart
leans into that mother's heart;—none of the void now
that will overtake it like an opening Koran gulf, in
the years that are to come. It is joyous, full, and
running over!
“You may go,” she says, “if your uncle is
willing.”
“But mamma, I am afraid to ask him; I do not
believe he loves me.”
“Don't say so, Paul,” and she draws you to her
side; as if she would supply by her own love, the
lacking love of a universe.
“Go, with your cousin Isabel, and ask him kindly;
and if he says no,—make no reply.”
And with courage, we go hand in hand, and steal
in at the library door. There he sits—I seem to see
him now,—in the old wainscotted room, covered over
with books and pictures; and he wears his heavy-rimmed
spectacles, and is poring over some big volume,
We step up softly; and Isabel lays her little hand
upon his arm; and he turns, and says—“well, my
little daughter?”
I ask if we may go down to the big rock in the
meadow?
He looks at Isabel, and says he is afraid—“we
cannot go.”
“But why, uncle? It is only a little way, and we
will be very careful.”
“I am afraid, my children; do not say any more:
you can have the pony, and Tray, and play at
home.”
“But, uncle—”
“You need say no more, my child.”
I pinch the hand of little Isabel, and look in her
eye,—my own half filling with tears. I feel that my
forehead is flushed, and I hide it behind Bella's
tresses,—whispering to her at the same time—“let
us go.”
“What sir,” says my uncle, mistaking my meaning—“do
you persuade her to disobey?”
Now I am angry, and say blindly—“no, sir, I
didn't!” And then my rising pride will not let me
say, that I wished only Isabel should go out with me.
Bella cries; and I shrink out; and am not easy
until I have run to bury my head in my mother's
There will be times when it will harrass you strangely;
when it will peril friendships,—will sever old, standing
intimacy; and then—no resource, but to feed on
its own bitterness. Hateful pride!—to be conquered,
as a man would conquer an enemy, or it will make
whirlpools in the current of your affections—nay,
turn the whole tide of the heart into rough, and unaccustomed
channels!
But boyhood has its Grief too, apart from Pride.
You love the old dog Tray; and Bella loves him
as well as you. He is a noble old fellow, with shaggy
hair, and long ears, and big paws, that he will put
up into your hand, if you ask him. And he never
gets angry when you play with him, and tumble him
over in the long grass, and pull his silken ears.
Sometimes, to be sure, he will open his mouth, as if
he would bite, but when he gets your hand fairly in
his jaws, he will scarce leave the print of his teeth
upon it. He will swim, too, bravely, and bring
ashore all the sticks you throw upon the water; and
when you fling a stone to tease him, he swims round
and round, and whines, and looks sorry, that he
cannot find it.
He will carry a heaping basket full of nuts too in
his mouth, and never spill one of them; and when
you come out to your uncle's home in the spring,
you—old Tray does! And he leaps upon you, and
lays his paws on your shoulder, and licks your face;
and is almost as glad to see you, as cousin Bella herself.
And when you put Bella on his back for a
ride, he only pretends to bite her little feet;—but he
wouldn't do it for the world. Aye, Tray is a noble
old dog!
But one summer, the farmers say that some of
their sheep are killed, and that the dogs have worried
them; and one of them comes to talk with my uncle
about it.
But Tray never worried sheep; you know he never
did; and so does nurse; and so does Bella;—for in
the spring, she had a pet lamb, and Tray never worried
little Fidele.
And one or two of the dogs that belong to the
neighbors are shot; though nobody knows who shot
them; and you have great fears about poor Tray;
and try to keep him at home, and fondle him more
than ever. But Tray will sometimes wander off; till
finally, one afternoon, he comes back whining piteously,
and with his shoulder all bloody.
Little Bella cries loud; and you almost cry, as
nurse dresses the wound; and poor old Tray whines
very sadly. You pat his head, and Bella pats him;
and you sit down together by him on the floor of the
and tempt him with a little milk, and Bella brings a
piece of cake for him,—but he will eat nothing.
You sit up till very late, long after Bella has gone to
bed, patting his head, and wishing you could do
something for poor Tray;—but he only licks your
hand, and whines more piteously than ever.
In the morning, you dress early, and hurry down
stairs; but Tray is not lying on the rug; and you
run through the house to find him, and whistle, and
call—Tray!—Tray! At length you see him lying
in his old place, out by the cherry tree, and you run
to him;—but he does not start; and you lean down
to pat him,—but he is cold, and the dew is wet upon
him:—poor Tray is dead!
You take his head upon your knees, and pat again
those glossy ears, and cry; but you cannot bring
him to life. And Bella comes, and cries with you.
You can hardly bear to have him put in the ground;
but uncle says he must be buried. So one of the
workmen digs a grave under the cherry tree, where
he died—a deep grave, and they round it over with
earth, and smooth the sods upon it—even now I can
trace Tray's grave.
You and Bella together, put up a little slab for a
tombstone; and she hangs flowers upon it, and ties
them there with a bit of ribbon. You can scarce
when you are rambling over the fields, or lingering
by the brook, throwing off sticks into the eddies, you
think of old Tray's shaggy coat, and of his big paw,
and of his honest eye; and the memory of your
boyish grief comes upon you; and you say with tears,
—“poor Tray!” And Bella too, in her sad,
sweet tones, says—“poor old Tray,—he is dead!”
School Days.
The morning was cloudy and threatened rain;
besides, it was autumn weather, and the winds were
getting harsh, and rustling among the tree-tops that
shaded the house, most dismally. I did not dare to
listen. If indeed, I were to stay by the bright fires of
home, and gather the nuts as they fell, and pile up the
falling leaves, to make great bonfires, with Ben, and
the rest of the boys, I should have liked to listen, and
would have braved the dismal morning with the
cheerfullest of them all. For it would have been a
capital time to light a fire in the little oven we had
built under the wall; it would have been so pleasant
to warm our fingers at it, and to roast the great russets
on the flat stones that made the top.
But this was not in store for me. I had bid the
all packed; I was to go away—to school. The
little oven would go to ruin—I knew it would. I
was to leave my home. I was to bid my mother
good bye, and Lilly, and Isabel, and all the rest;—
and was to go away from them so far, that I should only
know what they were all doing—in letters. It was
sad. And then to have the clouds come over on that
morning, and the winds sigh so dismally;—oh, it
was too bad, I thought!
It comes back to me as I lie here this bright spring
morning, as if it were only yesterday. I remember
that the pigeons skulked under the eaves of the carriage
house, and did not sit, as they used to do in
summer, upon the ridge; and the chickens huddled
together about the stable doors, as if they were
afraid of the cold autumn. And in the garden, the
white hollyhocks stood shivering, and bowed to the
wind, as if their time had come. The yellow muskmelons
showed plain among the frost bitten vines,
and looked cold, and uncomfortable.
—Then they were all so kind, in-doors! The
cook made such nice things for my breakfast, because
little master was going; Lilly would give me
her seat by the fire, and would put her lump of sugar
in my cup; and my mother looked so smiling, and so
tenderly, that I thought I loved her more than I ever
me to take his jacknife, if I wished it,—though he
knew that I had a bran new one in my trunk. The
old nurse slipped a little purse into my hand, tied up
with a green ribbon—with money in it,—and told
me not to show it to Ben or Lilly.
And cousin Isabel, who was there on a visit, would
come to stand by my chair, when my mother was
talking to me; and put her hand in mine, and look
up into my face; but she did not say a word. I
thought it was very odd; and yet it did not seem odd
to me, that I could say nothing to her. I daresay
we felt alike.
At length Ben came running in, and said the
coach had come; and there, sure enough, out of the
window, we saw it—a bright yellow coach, with four
white horses, and band-boxes all over the top, with a
great pile of trunks behind. Ben said it was a grand
coach, and that he should like a ride in it; and the
old nurse came to the door, and said I should have a
capital time; but somehow, I doubted if the nurse
was talking honestly. I believe she gave me an
honest kiss though,—and such a hug!
But it was nothing to my mother's. Tom told me
to be a man, and study like a Trojan; but I was not
thinking about study then. There was a tall-boy in
the coach, and I was ashamed to have him see me
looked back, and saw little Isabel run out into the
middle of the street, to see the coach go off, and the
curls floating behind her, as the wind freshened, I
felt my heart leaping into my throat, and the water
coming into my eyes,—and how just then, I caught
sight of the tall boy glancing at me,—and how I tried
to turn it off, by looking to see if I could button up
my great coat, a great deal lower down than the button
holes went.
But it was of no use; I put my head out of the
coach window, and looked back, as the little figure of
Isabel faded, and then the house, and the trees; and
the tears did come; and I smuggled my handkerchief
outside without turning; so that I could wipe my
eyes, before the tall boy should see me. They say
that these shadows of morning fade, as the sun
brightens into noon-day; but they are very dark
shadows for all that!
Let the father, or the mother think long, before
they send away their boy—before they break the
home-ties that make a web of infinite fineness and
soft silken meshes around his heart, and toss him
aloof into the boy-world, where he must struggle up
amid bickerings and quarrels, into his age of youth!
There are boys indeed with little fineness in the texture
of their hearts, and with little delicacy of soul,
from home; and with whom, a return revives
all those grosser affections which alone existed before;—just
as there are plants which will bear all
exposure without the wilting of a leaf, and will return
to the hot-house life, as strong, and as hopeful as
ever. But there are others, to whom the severance
from the prattle of sisters, the indulgent fondness of
a mother, and the unseen influences of the home
altar, gives a shock that lasts forever; it is wrenching
with cruel hand, what will bear but little roughness;
and the sobs with which the adieux are said,
are sobs that may come back in the after years,
strong, and steady, and terrible.
God have mercy on the boy who learns to sob
early! Condemn it as sentiment, if you will; talk
as you will of the fearlessness, and strength of the
boy's heart,—yet there belong to many, tenderly
strung chords of affection which give forth low, and
gentle music, that consoles, and ripens the ear for all
the harmonies of life. These chords a little rude,
and unnatural tension will break, and break forever.
Watch your boy then, if so be he will bear the
strain; try his nature, if it be rude or delicate;
and if delicate, in God's name, do not, as you value
your peace and his, breed a harsh youth spirit in him,
the delicacy, and richness of his finer affections!
—I see now, looking into the past, the troops of
boys who were scattered in the great play-ground, as
the coach drove up at night. The school was in a
tall, stately building, with a high cupola on the top,
where I thought I would like to go up. The school-master,
they told me at home, was kind; he said he
hoped I would be a good boy, and patted me on the
head; but he did not pat me as my mother used to
do. Then there was a woman, whom they called the
Matron; who had a great many ribbons in her cap,
and who shook my hand,—but so stiffly, that I didn't
dare to look up in her face.
One boy took me down to see the school room,
which was in the basement, and the walls were all
mouldy, I remember; and when we passed a certain
door, he said,—there was the dungeon;—how I felt!
I hated that boy; but I believe he is dead now.
Then the matron took me up to my room,—a little
corner room, with two beds, and two windows, and a
red table, and closet; and my chum was about my
size, and wore a queer roundabout jacket with big
bell buttons; and he called the schoolmaster—`Old
Crikey'—and kept me awake half the night, telling
me how he whipped the scholars, and how they played
uncommon boy.
For a day or two, the lessons were easy, and it
was sport to play with so many `fellows.' But soon I
began to feel lonely at night after I had gone to bed.
I used to wish I could have my mother come, and
kiss me; after school too, I wished I could step in,
and tell Isabel how bravely I had got my lessons.
When I told my chum this, he laughed at me, and
said that was no place for `homesick, white-livered
chaps.' I wondered if my chum had any mother.
We had spending money once a week, with which
we used to go down to the village store, and club our
funds together, to make great pitchers of lemonade.
Some boys would have money besides; though it was
against the rules; and one, I recollect, showed us a
five dollar bill in his wallet—and we all thought he
must be very rich.
We marched in procession to the village church
on Sundays. There were two long benches in the
galleries, reaching down the side of the meeting-house;
and on these we sat. At the first, I was
among the smallest boys, and took a place close to
the wall, against the pulpit; but afterward, as I grew
bigger, I was promoted to the lower end of the first
bench. This I never liked;—because it was close
by one of the ushers, and because it brought me next
eat fennel, and sung with the choir. But there was
a little black-eyed girl, who sat over behind the choir,
that I thought handsome; I used to look at her very
often; but was careful she should never catch my
eye.
There was another down below, in a corner pew,
who was pretty; and who wore a hat in the winter
trimmed with fur. Half the boys in the school said
they would marry her some day or other. One's
name was Jane, and that of the other, Sophia; which
we thought pretty names, and cut them on the ice,
in skating time. But I didn't think either of them
so pretty as Isabel.
Once a teacher whipped me: I bore it bravely in the
school: but afterward, at night, when my chum was
asleep, I sobbed bitterly, as I thought of Isabel, and
Ben, and my mother, and how much they loved me;
and laying my face in my hands, I sobbed myself to
sleep. In the morning I was calm enough:—it was
another of the heart ties broken, though I did not
know it then. It lessened the old attachment to
home, because that home could neither protect me,
nor soothe me with its sympathies. Memory indeed
freshened and grew strong; but strong in bitterness,
and in regrets. The boy whose love you cannot feed
by daily nourishment, will find pride, self-indulgence,
for the soul that is in him. If he cannot shoot his
branches into the sunshine, he will become acclimated
to the shadow, and indifferent to such stray gleams of
sunshine, as his fortune may vouchsafe.
Hostilities would sometimes threaten between the
school and the village boys; but they usually passed
off, with such loud, and harmless explosions, as
belong to the wars of our small politicians. The
village champions were a hatter's apprentice, and a
thick set fellow who worked in a tannery. We prided
ourselves especially on one stout boy, who wore a
sailor's monkey jacket. I cannot but think how
jaunty that stout boy looked in that jacket; and what
an Ajax cast there was to his countenance! It
certainly did occur to me, to compare him with
William Wallace (Miss Porter's William Wallace)
and I thought how I would have liked to have seen
a tussle between them. Of course, we who were
small boys, limited ourselves to indignant remark, and
thought `we should like to see them do it'; and
prepared clubs from the wood-shed, after a model
suggested by a New York boy, who had seen the
clubs of the Policemen.
There was one scholar,—poor Leslie, who had
friends in some foreign country, and who occasionally
received letters bearing a foreign post-mark:—what
letters;—what extraordinary parents! I wondered
if I should ever receive a letter from `foreign parts?'
I wondered if I should ever write one:—but this was
too much—too absurd! As if I, Paul, wearing a
blue jacket with gilt buttons, and number four boots,
should ever visit those countries spoken of in
the geographies, and by learned travellers! No, no;
this was too extravagant: but I knew what I would
do, if I lived to come of age;—and I vowed that I
would,—I would go to New York!
Number seven was the hospital, and forbidden
ground; we had all of us a sort of horror of number
seven. A boy died there once, and oh, how he
moaned; and what a time there was when the father
came!
A scholar by the name of Tom Belton, who wore
linsey gray, made a dam across a little brook by the
school, and whittled out a saw-mill, that actually
sawed: he had genius. I expected to see him
before now at the head of American mechanics; but
I learn with pain, that he is keeping a grocery store.
At the close of all the terms we had exhibitions,
to which all the towns people came, and among them
the black-eyed Jane, and the pretty Sophia with fur
around her hat. My great triumph was when I had
the part of one of Pizarro's chieftains, the evening
moustache put on with burnt cork, and whiskers very
bushy indeed; and I had the militia coat of an
ensign in the town company, with the skirts pinned
up, and a short sword very dull, and crooked, which
belonged to an old gentleman who was said to have
got it from some privateer, who was said to have taken
it from some great British Admiral, in the old
wars:—and the way I carried that sword upon the
platform, and the way I jerked it out, when it came
to my turn to say,—`battle! battle!—then death to
the armed, and chains for the defenceless!'—was
tremendous!
The morning after, in our dramatic hats—black
felt, with turkey feathers,—we took our place upon
the top of the coach, to leave the school. The head-master,
in green spectacles, came out to shake hands
with us,—a very awful shaking of hands. —Poor
gentleman!—he is in his grave now.
We gave three loud hurrahs `for the old school,'
as the coach started; and upon the top of the hill
that overlooks the village, we gave another round—
and still another for the crabbed old fellow, whose
apples we had so often stolen.—I wonder if old
Bulkeley is living yet?
As we got on under the pine trees, I recalled the
image of the black-eyed Jane, and of the other little
come back after the college days were over,—a man,
with a beaver hat, and a cane, and with a splendid
barouche, and how I would take the best chamber at
the inn, and astonish the old school-master by giving
him a familiar tap on the shoulder; and how I would
be the admiration, and the wonder of the pretty girl,
in the fur-trimmed hat! Alas, how our thoughts
outrun our deeds!
For long—long years, I saw no more of my old
school: and when at length the new view came, great
changes—crashing like tornadoes,—had swept over
my path! I thought no more of startling the
villagers, or astonishing the black-eyed girl. No, no!
I was content to slip quietly through the little town,
with only a tear or two, as I recalled the dead ones,
and mused upon the emptiness of life!
The Sea.
As I look back, boyhood with its griefs and cares
vanishes into the proud stateliness of youth. The
ambition, and the rivalries of the college life,—its
first boastful importance as knowledge begins to dawn
on the wakened mind, and the ripe, and enviable
complacency of its senior dignity,—all scud over my
and like that too, bear upon their wing, a chillness—
as of distant ice-banks.
Ben has grown almost to manhood: Lilly is living
in a distant home; and Isabel is just blooming into
that sweet age, where womanly dignity waits her
beauty;—an age that sorely puzzles one who has
grown up beside her,—making him slow of tongue,
but very quick of heart!
As for the rest—let us pass on.
The sea is around me. The last headlands have
gone down, under the horizon, like the city steeples,
as you lose yourself in the calm of the country, or
like the great thoughts of genius, as you slip from
the pages of poets, into your own quiet reverie.
The waters skirt me right and left: there is nothing
but water before, and only water behind.
Above me are sailing clouds, or the blue vault, which
we call, with childish license—heaven. The sails,
white and full, like helping friends are pushing me
on; and night and day are distent with the winds
which come and go—none know whence, and none
know whither. A land bird flutters aloft, weary
with long flying; and lost in a world where are no
forests but the careening masts, and no foliage but
the drifts of spray. It cleaves awhile to the smooth
spars, till urged by some homeward yearning, it bears
the angry waters, until its strength is gone, and the
blue waves gather the poor flutterer to their cold, and
glassy bosom.
All the morning I see nothing beyond me but the
waters, or a tossing company of dolphins; all the
noon, unless some white sail—like a ghost, stalks the
horizon, there is still nothing but the rolling seas; all
the evening, after the sun has grown big and sunk
under the water line, and the moon risen, white and
cold, to glimmer across the tops of the surging ocean,
—there is nothing but the sea, and the sky, to lead
off thought, or to crush it with their greatness.
Hour after hour, as I sit in the moonlight upon the
taffrail, the great waves gather far back, and break,—
and gather nearer, and break louder,—and gather
again, and roll down swift and terrible under the
creaking ship, and heave it up lightly upon their
swelling surge, and drop it gently to their seething,
and yeasty cradle,—like an infant in the swaying arms
of a mother,—or like a shadowy memory, upon the
billows of manly thought.
Conscience wakes in the silent nights of ocean;
life lies open like a book, and spreads out as level as
the sea. Regrets and broken resolutions chase over
the soul like swift-winged night-birds, and all the unsteady
heights and the wastes of action, lift up distinct,
of memory.
Yet within this floating world I am upon, sympathies
are narrowed down; they cannot range, as
upon the land, over a thousand objects. You are
strangely attracted toward some frail girl, whose pallor
has now given place to the rich bloom of the sea
life. You listen eagerly to the chance snatches of a
song from below, in the long morning watch. You
love to see her small feet tottering on the unsteady
deck; and you love greatly to aid her steps, and feel
her weight upon your arm, as the ship lurches to a
heavy sea.
Hopes and fears knit together pleasantly upon the
ocean. Each day seems to revive them; your morning
salutation, is like a welcome after absence, upon
the shore; and each `good night' has the depth and
fullness of a land `farewell.' And beauty grows
upon the ocean; you cannot certainly say that the
face of the fair girl-voyager is prettier than that of
Isabel;—oh, no!—but you are certain that you cast
innocent, and honest glances upon her, as you steady
her walk upon the deck, far oftener than at the first;
and ocean life, and sympathy, makes her kind; she
does not resent your rudeness, one half so stoutly, as
she might upon the shore.
She will even linger of an evening—pleading first
white hand not very far from yours upon the rail,—
look down where the black ship flings off with each
plunge, whole garlands of emeralds; or she will look
up (thinking perhaps you are looking the same way)
into the skies, in search of some stars—which were
her neighbors at home. And bits of old tales will
come up, as if they rode upon the ocean quietude;
and fragments of half forgotten poems, tremulously
uttered,—either by reason of the rolling of the ship,
or some accidental touch of that white hand.
But ocean has its storms, when fear will make
strange, and holy companionship; and even here, my
memory shifts swiftly and suddenly.
—It is a dreadful night. The passengers are
clustered, trembling, below. Every plank shakes;
and the oak ribs groan, as if they suffered with their
toil. The hands are all aloft; the captain is forward
shouting to the mate in the cross-trees, and I am
clinging to one of the stanchions, by the binnacle.
The ship is pitching madly, and the waves are toppling
up, sometimes as high as the yard-arm, and
then dipping away with a whirl under our keel, that
makes every timber in the vessel quiver. The thunder
is roaring like a thousand cannons; and at the
moment, the sky is cleft with a stream of fire, that
glares over the tops of the waves, and glistens on the
that I can see the men's faces in the main-top, and
catch glimpses of the reefers on the yard-arm, clinging
like death;—then all is horrible darkness.
The spray spits angrily against the canvass; the
waves crash against the weather-bow like mountains;
the wind howls through the rigging, or, as a gasket
gives way, the sail bellying to leeward, splits like the
crack of a musket. I hear the captain in the lulls,
screaming out orders; and the mate in the rigging,
screaming them over, until the lightning comes, and
the thunder, deadening their voices, as if they were
chirping sparrows.
In one of the flashes, I see a hand upon the yard-arm
lose his foothold, as the ship gives a plunge;
but his arms are clenched around the spar. Before
I can see any more, the blackness comes, and the
thunder, with a crash that half deafens me. I think
I hear a low cry, as the mutterings die away in
the distance; and at the next flash of lightning,
which comes in an instant, I see upon the top of one
of the waves alongside, the poor reefer who has
fallen. The lightning glares upon his face.
But he has caught at a loose bit of running rigging,
as he fell; and I see it slipping off the coil
upon the deck. I shout madly—man overboard!—
and catch the rope, when I can see nothing again.
I shout, and shout, and shout, and feel the perspiration
starting in great beads from my forehead, as the
line slips through my fingers.
Presently the captain feels his way aft, and takes
hold with me; and the cook comes, as the coil is
nearly spent, and we pull together upon him. It is
desperate work for the sailor; for the ship is drifting
at a prodigious rate; but he clings like a dying man.
By and by at a flash, we see him on a crest, two
oars length away from the vessel.
“Hold on, my man!” shouts the captain.
“For God's sake, be quick!” says the poor fellow;
and he goes down in a trough of the sea. We pull
the harder, and the captain keeps calling to him to
keep up courage, and hold strong. But in the hush,
we can hear him say—“I can't hold out much
longer;—I'm most gone!”
Presently we have brought the man where we can
lay hold of him, and are only waiting for a good lift
of the sea to bring him up, when the poor fellow
groans out,—“It's no use—I can't—good bye!”
And a wave tosses the end of the rope, clean upon
the bulwarks.
At the next flash, I see him going down under the
water.
I grope my way below, sick and faint at heart;
sleep. But the thunder and the tossing of the ship,
and the face of the drowning man, as he said good bye,—
peering at me from every corner, will not let me sleep.
Afterward, come quiet seas, over which we boom
along, leaving in our track, at night, a broad path of
phosphorescent splendor. The sailors bustle around
the decks, as if they had lost no comrade; and the
voyagers losing the pallor of fear, look out earnestly
for the land.
At length, my eyes rest upon the coveted fields of
Britain; and in a day more, the bright face, looking
out beside me, sparkles at sight of the sweet cottages,
which lie along the green Essex shores. Broad sailed
yachts, looking strangely, yet beautifully, glide upon
the waters of the Thames, like swans; black, square-rigged
colliers from the Tyne, lie grouped in sooty
cohorts; and heavy, three-decked Indiamen,—of
which I had read in story books,—drift slowly down
with the tide. Dingy steamers, with white pipes,
and with red pipes, whiz past us to the sea; and
now, my eye rests on the great palace of Greenwich;
I see the wooden-legged pensioners smoking under
the palace walls; and above them upon the hill—as
Heaven is true—that old, fabulous Greenwich, the
great centre of school-boy Longitude.
Presently, from under a cloud of murky smoke
Column of the Fire, and the white turrets of London
Tower. Our ship glides through the massive dock
gates, and is moored, amid that forest of masts, which
bears golden fruit for Britons.
That night, I sleep far away from `the old school,'
and far away from the valley of Hillfarm; long, and
late, I toss upon my bed, with swift visions in my
mind, of London Bridge, and Temple Bar, and Jane
Shore, and Falstaff, and Prince Hal, and King
Jamie. And when at length I fall asleep, my
dreams are very pleasant, but they carry me across
the ocean, away from the ship,—away from London,
—away even from the fair voyager,—to the old oaks,
and to the brooks, and—to thy side—sweet Isabel!
The Father-Land.
There is a great contrast between the easy
deshabille of the ocean life, and the prim attire,
and conventional spirit of the land. In the first,
there are but few to please, and these few are known,
and they know us; upon the shore, there is a world
to humour, and a world of strangers. In a brilliant
drawing-room looking out upon the site of old Charing-Cross,
and upon the one-armed Nelson, standing
voyager of the sea. Her white negligé has given
place to silks; and the simple careless coiffe of the
ocean, is replaced by the rich dressing of a modiste.
Yet her face has the same bloom upon it; and her
eye sparkles, as it seems to me, with a higher pride;
—and her little hand has I think a tremulous quiver
in it, (I am sure my own has)—as I bid her adieu,
and take up the trail of my wanderings into the heart
of England.
Abuse her, as we will,—pity her starving peasantry,
as we may,—smile at her court pageantry, as
much as we like,—old England, is dear old England
still! Her cottage homes, her green fields, her
castles, her blazing firesides, her church spires are as
old as song; and by song and story, we inherit them
in our hearts. This jeyous boast, was, I remember,
upon my lip, as I first trode upon the rich meadow
of Runnymede; and recalled that Great Charter
wrested from the king, which made the first stepping
stone toward the bounties of our western freedom.
It is a strange feeling that comes over the Western
Saxon, as he strolls first along the green bye-lanes of
England, and scents the hawthorn in its April bloom,
and lingers at some quaint stile, to watch the rooks
wheeling and cawing around some lofty elm tops, and
traces the carved gables of some old country mansion
charming English poesy, that seems made for the
scene! This is not sight-seeing, nor travel; it is
dreaming sweet dreams, that are fed with the old life
of Books.
I wander on, fearing to break the dream, by a
swift step; and winding and rising between the
blooming hedgerows, I come presently to the sight
of some sweet valley below me, where a thatched
hamlet lies sleeping in the April sun, as quietly as the
dead lie in history;—no sound reaches me save the
occasional clinck of the smith's hammer, or the
hedgeman's bill-hook, or the ploughman's `ho-tup!'
from the hills. At evening, listening to the nightingale,
I stroll wearily into some close-nestled village,
that I had seen long ago from a rolling height.
It is far away from the great lines of travel;—and
the children stop their play to have a look at me, and
rosy-faced girls peep from behind half-opened doors.
Standing apart, and with a bench on either side of
the entrance, is the inn of the Eagle and the Falcon,
—which guardian birds, some native Dick Tinto has
pictured upon the swinging sign-board at the corner.
The hostess is half ready to embrace me, and treats
me like a prince in disguise. She shows me through
the tap-room into a little parlor, with white curtains,
and with neatly framed prints of the old patriarchs.
watch the white flame leaping playfully through the
black lumps of coal, and enjoy the best fare of the
Eagle and the Falcon. If too late, or too early for
her garden stock, the hostess bethinks herself of some
small pot of jelly in an out-of-the-way cupboard of the
house, and setting it temptingly in her prettiest dish,
she coyly slips it upon the white cloth, with a modest
regret that it is no better; and a little evident satisfaction—that
it is so good.
I muse for an hour before the glowing fire, as
quiet as the cat that has come in, to bear me company;
and at bed-time, I find sheets, as fresh as the
air of the mountains.
At another time, and many months later, I am
walking under a wood of Scottish firs. It is near
night-fall, and the fir tops are swaying, and sighing
hoarsely, in the cool wind of the Northern Highlands.
There is none of the smiling landscape of England
about me; and the crags of Edinburgh and Castle
Stirling, and sweet Perth, in its silver valley, are far
to the southward. The larchs of Athol and Bruar
Water, and that highland gem—Dunkeld, are passed.
I am tired with a morning's tramp over Culloden
Moor; and from the edge of the wood, there stretches
before me in the cool gray twilight, broad fields of
heather. In the middle, there rise against the
where King Duncan was murdered by Macbeth.
The sight of it lends a spur to my weary step; and
emerging from the wood, I bound over the springy
heather. In an hour, I clamber a broken wall, and
come under the frowning shadows of the castle. The
ivy clambers up here, and there, and shakes its
uncropped branches, and its dried berries over the
heavy portal. I cross the moat, and my step makes
the chains of the draw-bridge rattle. All is kept in
the old state; only in lieu of the warder's horn, I
pull at the warder's bell. The echoes ring, and
die in the stone courts; but there is no one astir, nor
is there a light at any of the castle windows. I ring
again, and the echoes come, and blend with the rising
night wind that sighs around the turrets, as they
sighed that night of murder. I fancy—it must be a
fancy,—that I hear an owl scream; I am sure that I
hear the crickets cry.
I sit down upon the green bank of the moat; a
little dark water lies in the bottom. The walls rise
from it gray, and stern in the deepening shadows.
I hum chance passages of Macbeth, listening for the
echoes—echoes from the wall; and echoes from that
far away time, when I stole the first reading of the
tragic story.
“Dids't thou not hear a noise?
I heard the owl scream, and the crickets cry.
Did not you speak?
When?
Now.
As I descended?
Ay.
—Hark!”—
And the sharp echo comes back—`hark!' And
at dead of night, in the thatched cottage under the
castle walls, where a dark faced, Gaelic woman, in plaid
turban, is my hostess, I wake, startled by the wind,
and my trembling lips say involuntarily—`hark!'
Again, three months later, I am in the sweet
county of Devon. Its valleys are like emerald; its
threads of water stretched over the fields, by their
provident husbandry, glisten in the broad glow of
summer, like skeins of silk. A bland old farmer, of
the true British stamp, is my host. On market days
he rides over to the old town of Totness in a trim,
black farmer's cart; and he wears glossy topped
boots, and a broad-brimmed white hat. I take a vast
deal of pleasure in listening to his honest, straight-forward
talk about the improvements of the day and
the state of the nation. I sometimes get upon one of
his nags, and ride off with him over his fields, or
visit the homes of the laborers, which show their gray
the parish church, I doze against the high pew backs,
as I listen to the see-saw tones of the drawling curate;
and in my half wakeful moments, the withered holly
sprigs (not removed since Easter) grow upon my
vision, into Christmas boughs, and preach sermons to
me—of the days of old.
Sometimes, I wander far over the hills into a
neighboring park; and spend hours on hours, under
the sturdy oaks, watching the sleek fallow deer,
gazing at me with their soft, liquid eyes. The
squirrels, too, play above me, with their daring leaps,
utterly careless of my presence, and the pheasants
whir away from my very feet.
On one of these random strolls—I remember it
very well—when I was idling along, thinking of the
broad reach of water that lay between me, and that
old forest home,—and beating off the daisy heads
with my cane,—I heard the tramp of horses, coming
up one of the forest avenues. The sound was
unusual, for the family, I had been told, was still in
town, and no right of way lay through the park.
There they were, however:—I was sure it must be
the family, from the careless way in which they came
sauntering up.
First, there was a noble hound that came bounding
toward me,—gazed a moment, and turned to watch
elderly gentleman mounted upon a spirited hunter,
attended by a boy of some dozen years, who managed
his pony with a grace, that is a part of the English
boy's education. Then followed two older lads,
and a travelling phæton, in which sat a couple
of elderly ladies. But what most drew my attention
was a girlish figure, that rode beyond the carriage,
upon a sleek-limbed gray. There was something
in the easy grace of her attitude, and the rich
glow that lit up her face—heightened as it was,
by the little black velvet riding cap, relieved with a
single flowing plume,—that kept my eye. It was
strange, but I thought that I had seen such a figure
before, and such a face, and such an eye; and as I
made the ordinary salutation of a stranger, and
caught her smile, I could have sworn that it was she—
my fair companion of the ocean. The truth flashed
upon me in a moment. She was to visit, she had told
me, a friend in the south of England;—and this was
the friend's home;—and one of the ladies of the
carriage was her mother; and one of the lads, the
school-boy brother, who had teased her on the sea.
I recal now perfectly, her frank manner, as she
ungloved her hand to bid me welcome. I strolled
beside them to the steps. Old Devon had suddenly
renewed its beauties for me. I had much to tell her,
had led me to: and she—as much to ask. My stay
with the bland old farmer lengthened; and two days
hospitalities at the Park ran over into three, and four.
There was hard galloping down those avenues; and
new strolls, not at all lonely, under the sturdy oaks.
The long summer twilight of England used to find a
very happy fellow lingering on the garden terrace,—
looking, now at the rookery, where the belated birds
quarreled for a resting place, and now down the long
forest vista, gray with distance, and closed with the
white spire of Modbury church.
English country life gains fast upon one—very
fast; and it is not so easy, as in the drawing-room of
Charing Cross, to say—adieu! But it is said—very
sadly said; for God only knows how long it is to last.
And as I rode slowly down toward the lodge after my
leave-taking, I turned back again, and again, and
again. I thought I saw her standing still upon the
terrace, though it was almost dark; and I thought—
it could hardly have been an illusion—that I saw
something white waving from her hand.
Her name—as if I could forget it—was Caroline;
her mother called her—Carry. I wondered how it
would seem for me to call her—Carry! I tried it;—
it sounded well. I tried it—over and over,—until I
came too near the lodge. There I threw a half
She curtsied low, and said—“God bless you, sir!”
I liked her for it; I would have given a guinea for
it: and that night,—whether it was the old woman's
benediction, or the waving scarf upon the terrace, I
do not know;—but there was a charm upon my
thought, and my hope, as if an angel had been near
me.
It passed away though in my dreams;—for I
dreamed that I saw the sweet face of Bella in an
English park, and that she wore a black velvet riding
cap, with a plume; and I came up to her and
murmured, very sweetly, I thought,—“Carry, dear
Carry!” and she started, looked sadly at me, and
turned away. I ran after her, to kiss her as I did
when she sat upon my mother's lap, on the day when
she came near drowning: I longed to tell her, as I
did then—I do love you. But she turned her tearful
face upon me, I dreamed; and then,—I saw no more.
A Roman Girl.
—I remember the very words—“non parlo Francesce,
Signore,—I do not speak French, Signor”—
said the stout lady,—“but my daughter, perhaps, will
understand you.”
And she called—“Enrica!—Enrica! venite,
subito! c'è un forestiere.”
And the daughter came, her light brown hair falling
carelessly over her shoulders, her rich hazel eye
twinkling and full of life, the colour coming and going
upon her transparent cheek, and her bosom heaving
with her quick step. With one hand she put back
the scattered locks that had fallen over her forehead,
while she laid the other gently, upon the arm
of her mother, and asked in that sweet music of the
south—“cosa volete, mamma?”
It was the prettiest picture I had seen in many a
day; and this, notwithstanding I was in Rome, and had
come that very morning from the Palace of Borghese.
The stout lady was my hostess, and Enrica—so fair,
so young, so unlike in her beauty, to other Italian
beauties, was my landlady's daughter. The house
was one of those tall houses—very, very old, which
stand along the eastern side of the Corso, looking out
upon the Piazzo di Colonna. The staircases were
very tall, and dirty, and they were narrow and dark.
Four flights of stone steps led up to the corridor
where they lived. A little trap was in the door; and
there was a bell-rope, at the least touch of which, I
was almost sure to hear tripping feet run along the
stone floor within, and then to see the trap thrown
slyly back, and those deep hazle eyes looking out
the corridor, under the daughter's guidance, (until I
had learned the way,) I passed to my Roman home.
I was a long time learning the way.
My chamber looked out upon the Corso, and I could
catch from it a glimpse of the top of the tall column
of Antoninus, and of a fragment of the palace of the
Governor. My parlor, which was separated from the
apartments of the family by a narrow corridor, looked
upon a small court, hung around with balconies.
From the upper one, a couple of black-eyed girls are
occasionally looking out, and they can almost read
the title of my book, when I sit by the window. Below
are three or four blooming ragazze, who are
dark-eyed, and have Roman luxuriance of hair. The
youngest is a friend of our Enrica, and is of course
frequently looking up, with all the innocence in the
world, to see if Enrica may be looking out.
Night after night, a bright blaze glows upon my
hearth, of the alder faggots which they bring from the
Albanian hills. Night after night too, the family
come in, to aid my blundering speech, and to enjoy
the rich sparkling of my faggot fire. Little Cesare, a
dark-faced Italian boy, takes up his position with pencil
and slate, and draws by the light of the blaze
genii and castles. The old one-eyed teacher of
Enrica, lays his snuff box upon the table, and his
upon his nose, and his big fingers on the lesson, runs
through the French tenses of the verb amare. The
father a sallow-faced, keen-eyed man, with true
Italian visage, sits with his arms upon the elbows of
his chair, and talks of the Pope, or of the weather.
A spruce count from the Marches of Ancona, wears
a heavy watch seal, and reads Dante with furore.
The mother, with arms akimbo, looks proudly upon
her daughter, and counts her, as well she may, a gem
among the Roman beauties.
The table was round, with the fire blazing on one
side; there was scarce room for but three upon the
other. Signor il maestro was one—then Enrica, and
next—how well I remember it—came myself. For I
could sometimes help Enrica to a word of French;
and far oftener, she could help me to a word of
Italian. Her face was rich, and full of feeling; I
used greatly to love to watch the puzzled expressions
that passed over her forehead, as the sense of some
hard phrase escaped her;—and better still, to see the
happy smile, as she caught at a glance, the thought
of some old scholastic Frenchman, and transferred it
into the liquid melody of her speech.
She had seen just sixteen summers, and only that
very autumn was escaped from the thraldom of a
convent, upon the skirts of Rome. She knew nothing
happiness, lay as yet in her childish hopes. It was
pleasant to look upon her face; and it was still more
pleasant to listen to that sweet Roman voice. What a
rich flow of superlatives, and endearing diminutives,
from those vermillion lips! Who would not have
loved the study, and who would not have loved—
without meaning it—the teacher?
In those days, I did not linger long at the tables
of lame Pietro in the Via Condotti; but would hurry
back to my little Roman parlor—the fire was so
pleasant! And it was so pleasant to greet Enrica
with her mother, even before the one-eyed maestro
had come in; and it was pleasant to unfold the book
between us, and to lay my hand upon the page—a
small page—where hers lay already. And when she
pointed wrong, it was pleasant to correct her—over
and over;—insisting, that her hand should be here,
and not there, and lifting those little fingers from one
page, and putting them down upon the other. And
sometimes, half provoked with my fault-finding, she
would pat my hand smartly with hers;—but when I
looked in her face to know what that could mean, she
would meet my eye with such a kind submission, and
half earnest regret, as made me not only pardon the
offence,—but tempt me to provoke it again.
Through all the days of Carnival, when I rode
wander up, from a long way off, to that tall house
upon the Corso, where I was sure to meet, again and
again, those forgiving eyes, and that soft brown hair,
all gathered under the little brown sombrero, set off
with one pure white plume. And her hand full of
bon-bons, she would shake at me threateningly; and
laugh—a musical laugh—as I bowed my head to the
assault, and recovering from the shower of missiles,
would turn to throw my stoutest bouquet at her balcony.
At night, I would bear home to the Roman
parlor, my best trophy of the day, as a guerdon for
Enrica; and Enrica would be sure to render in
acknowledgment, some carefully hidden flowers, the
prettiest that her beauty had won.
Sometimes upon those Carnival nights, she arrays
herself in the costume of the Albanian water-carriers;
and nothing, one would think could be prettier, than
the laced crimson jacket, and the strange head gear
with its trinkets, and the short skirts leaving to view
as delicate an ankle as could be found in Rome.
Upon another night, she glides into my little parlor,
as we sit by the blaze, in a close velvet boddice, and
with a Swiss hat caught up by a looplet of silver, and
adorned with a full blown rose—nothing you think
could be prettier than this. Again, in one of her
girlish freaks, she robes herself like a nun; and with
veil,—relieved only by the plain white ruffle of her
cap—you wish she were always a nun. But the wish
vanishes, when you see her in a pure white muslin,
with a wreath of orange blossoms about her forehead,
and a single white rose-bud in her bosom.
Upon the little balcony Enrica keeps a pot or two
of flowers, which bloom all winter long: and each
morning, I find upon my table a fresh rose bud; each
night, I bear back for thank-offering, the prettiest
bouquet that can be found in the Via Condotti. The
quiet fire-side evenings come back;—in which my
hand seeks its wonted place upon her book; and my
other, will creep around upon the back of Enrica's
chair, and Enrica will look indignant,—and then all
forgiveness.
One day I received a large pacquet of letters:—
ah, what luxury to lie back in my big arm-chair,
there before the crackling faggots, with the pleasant
rustle of that silken dress beside me, and run
over a second, and a third time, those mute paper
missives, which bore to me over so many miles of
water, the words of greeting, and of love! It would
be worth travelling to the shores of the ægean, to
find one's heart quickened into such life as the ocean
letters will make. Enrica threw down her book,
and wondered what could be in them?—and snatched
intensity over that strange scrawl.—What can it
be?—said she; and she lay her finger upon the little
half line—“Dear Paul.”
I told her it was—“Caro mio.”
Enrica lay it upon her lap, and looked in my face;
“It is from your mother?” said she.
“No,” said I.
“From your sister?”—said she.
“Alas, no!”
“Il vostro fratello, dunque?”
“Nemmeno”—said I—“not from a brother either.”
She handed me the letter, and took up her book;
and presently she laid the book down again; and
looked at the letter, and then at me;—and went out.
She did not come in again that evening; in the
morning, there was no rose-bud on my table. And
when I came at night,with a bouquet from Pietro's
at the corner, she asked me—“who had written my
letter?”
“A very dear friend,” said I.
“A lady?” continued she.
“A lady,” said I.
“Keep this bouquet for her,” said she, and put it
in my hands.
“But, Enrica, she has plenty of flowers: she
gather them by scores to make garlands of.”
Enrica put her fingers within my hand to take
again the bouquet; and for a moment I held both
fingers and flowers.
The flowers slipped out first.
I had a friend at Rome in that time, who afterward
died between Ancona and Corinth: we were sitting
one day upon a block of tufa in the middle of the
Coliseum, looking up at the shadows which the
waving shrubs upon the southern wall, cast upon the
ruined arcades within, and listening to the chirping
sparrows that lived upon the wreck,—when he said to
me suddenly—“Paul, you love the Italian girl.”
“She is very beautiful,” said I.
“I think she is beginning to love you,” said he,
soberly.
“She has a very warm heart, I believe,” said I.
“Aye,” said he.
“But her feelings are those of a girl,” continued I.
“They are not,” said my friend; and he laid his
hand upon my knee, and left off drawing diagrams
with his cane,—“I have seen, Paul, more than you
of this southern nature. The Italian girl of fifteen
is a woman;—an impassioned, sensitive, tender
creature—yet still a woman: you are loving—if you
loves—as a ripe heart should.”
“But I do not think that either is wholly true,”
said I.
“Try it,” said he, setting his cane down firmly,
and looking in my face.
“How?” returned I.
“I have three weeks upon my hands,” continued
he. “Go with me into the Appenines; leave your
home in the Corso, and see if you can forget in the
air of the mountains, your blue-eyed Roman girl!”
I was pondering for an answer, when he went on:—
“It is better so: love as you might, that southern
nature with all its passion, is not the material to
build domestic happiness upon; nor is your northern
habit—whatever you may think at your time of life,
the one to cherish always those passionate sympathies
which are bred by this atmosphere, and their seenes.”
One moment my thought ran to my little parlor,
and to that fairy figure, and to that sweet, angel
face: and then, like lightning it traversed oceans, and
fed upon the old ideal of home, and brought images
to my eye of lost—dead ones, who seemed to be
stirring on heavenly wings, in that soft Roman
atmosphere, with greeting, and with beckoning.
—“I will go with you,” said I.
The father shrugged his shoulders, when I told
guide. His wife said it would be cold upon the hills,
for the winter was not ended. Enrica said it would
be warm in the valleys, for the spring was coming.
The old man drummed with his fingers on the table,
and shrugged his shoulders again, but said nothing.
My landlady said I could not ride. Cesare said it
would be hard walking. Enrica asked papa, if there
would be any danger? And again the old man
shrugged his shoulders. Again I asked him, if he
knew a man who would serve us as guide among the
Appenines; and finding me determined, he shrugged
his shoulders, and said he would find one the next
day.
As I passed out at evening; on my way to the
Piazzo near the Monte Citorio, where stand the
carriages that go out to Tivoli, Enrica glided up to
me, and whispered—“ah, mi dispiace tanto—tanto,
Signor!”
The Appenines.
I shook her hand, and in an hour afterward was
passing with my friend, by the Trajan forum, toward
the deep shadow of San Maggiore, which lay in our
way to the mountains. At sunset, we were wandering
over the ruin of Adrian's villa, which lies upon the
bells of Tivoli were sounding, and their echoes
floating sweetly under the broken arches; before us,
stretching all the way to the horizon, lay the broad
Campagna; while in the middle of its great waves,
turned violet-coloured, by the hues of twilight, rose
the grouped towers of the Eternal City; and lording
it among them all, like a giant, stood the black dome
of St. Peter's.
Day after day we stretched on over the mountains,
leaving the Campagna far behind us. Rocks and
stones, huge and ragged, lie strewed over the surface
right and left, deep yawning valleys lie in the
shadows of mountains, that loom up thousands of
feet, bearing perhaps upon their tops old castellated
towns, perched like birds' nests. But mountain and
valley are blasted and scarred; the forests even, are
not continuous, but struggle for a livelihood; as if
the brimstone fire that consumed Nineveh, had withered
their energies. Sometimes, our eyes rest on a
great white scar of the broken calcareous rock, on
which the moss cannot grow, and the lizards dare not
creep. Then we see a cliff beetling far aloft, with
the shining walls of some monastery of holy men glistening
at its base. The wayside brooks do not seem
to be the gentle offspring of bountiful hills, but the
remnants of something greater, whose greatness has
of yawning chasms. Even the shrubs have a look, as
if the Volscian war-horse had trampled them down to
death; and the primroses and the violets by the
mountain path, alone look modestly beautiful amid
the ruin.
Sometimes, we loiter in a valley, above which the
goats are browsing on the cliffs, and listen to the sweet
pastoral pipes of the Appenines. We see the shepherds
in their rough skin coats, high over our heads.
Their herds are feeding, as it seems, on ledges of a
hand's breadth. The sweet sound floats and lingers
in the soft atmosphere, without a breath of wind to
bear it away, or a noise to disturb its melody. The
shadows slant more and more as we linger; and the
kids begin to group together. And as we wander on,
through the stunted vineyards in the bottom of the
valley, the sweet sound flows after us, like a river of
song,—nor leaves us, till the kids have vanished in
the distance, and the cliffs themselves, become one
dark wall of shadow.
At night, in some little meagre mountain town, we
stroll about in the narrow pass-ways, or wander under
the heavy arches of the mountain churches. Shuffling
old women grope in and out; dim lamps glimmer
faintly at the side altars, shedding horrid light
upon painted images of the dying Christ. Or perhaps,
some bier in the middle, with a figure or two kneeling
at the foot, and ragged boys move stealthily under
the shadows of the columns. Presently comes a
young priest, in black robes, and lights a taper at the
foot, and another at the head—for there is a dead
man on the bier; and the parched, thin features look
awfully under the yellow light of the tapers, in the
gloom of the great building. It is very, very damp
in the church, and the body of the dead man seems
to make the air heavy, so we go out into the starlight
again.
In the morning, the western slopes wear broad
shadows, and the frosts crumple, on the herbage, to
our tread: across the valley, it is like summer; and
the birds—for there are songsters in the Appenines,—
make summer music. Their notes blend softly
with the faint sounds of some far off convent bell,
tolling for morning mass, and strike the frosted
and shaded mountain side, with a sweet echo. As
we toil on, and the shaded hills begin to glow in the
sunshine, we pass a train of mules, loaded with wine.
We have seen them an hour before—little black dots
twining along the white streak of foot-way upon the
mountain above us. We lost them as we began to
ascend, until a wild snatch of an Appenine song
turned our eyes up, and there, straggling through the
brought the mules and wine casks rolling upon us.
We keep still, holding by the brushwood, to let them
pass. An hour more, and we see them toiling slowly,—
mule and muleteer,—big dots, and little dots,—far
down where we have been before. The sun is hot
and smoking on them in the bare valleys; the sun is
hot and smoking on the hill-side, where we are toiling
over the broken stones. I thought of little Enrica,
when she said—the spring was coming!
Time and again, we sit down together—my friend
and I—upon some fragment of rock, under the
broad-armed chestnuts, that fringe the lower skirts of
the mountains, and talk through the hottest of the
noon, of the warriors of Seylla, and of the Sabine
women,—but oftener—of the pretty peasantry, and
of the sweet-faced Roman girl. He too tells me of
his life and loves, and of the hopes that lie misty
and grand before him:—little did we think that in so
few years, his hopes would be gone, and his body
lying low in the Adriatic, or tost with the drift upon
the Dalmatian shores! Little did I think, that here
under the ancestral wood,—still a wishful and blundering
mortal, I should be gathering up the shreds,
that memory can catch of our Appenine wandering,
and be weaving them into my bachelor dreams.
Away again upon the quick wing of thought, I
once more a height that overlooked the Campagna—
and saw the sun setting on its edge, throwing into
relief the dome of St. Peter's, and blazing in a red
stripe upon the waters of the Tiber.
Below us was Palestrina—the Præneste of the poets
and philosophers;—the dwelling place of—I know
not how many—Emperors. We went straggling
through the dirty streets, searching for some tidy-looking
osteria. At length, we found an old lady,
who could give us a bed, but no dinner. My friend
dropped in a chair disheartened. A snub-looking
priest came out to condole with us.
And could Palestrina,—the frigidum Præneste of
Horace, which had entertained over and over, the
noblest of the Colonna, and the most noble Adrian—
could Palestrina not furnish a dinner to a tired
traveller?
“Si, Signore,” said the snub-looking priest.
“Si, Signorino,” said the neat old lady; and
away we went upon a new search. And we found
bright and happy faces;—especially the little girl of
twelve years, who came close by me as I ate, and
afterward strung a garland of marigolds, and put it
on my head. Then there was a bright-eyed boy of
fourteen, who wrote his name, and those of the whole
family, upon a fly leaf of my book: and a pretty,
from behind the kitchen door, but before the evening
was gone, she was in the chair beside me, and had
written her name—Carlotta—upon the first leaf of
my journal.
When I woke, the sun was up. From my bed I
could see over the town, the thin, lazy mists lying
on the old camp-ground of Pyrrhus; beyond it, were
the mountains, which hide Frascati, and Monte Cavi.
There was old Colonna too, that—
Like an eagle's nest, hangs on the crest
Of purple Appenine.
As the mist lifted, and the sun brightened the
plain, I could see the road, along which Sylla came
fuming and maddened after the Mithridaten war. I
could see, as I half dreamed and half slept, the frightened
peasantry whooping to their long-horned cattle,
as they drove them on tumultuously up through the
gateways of the town; and women with babies in
their arms, and children scowling with fear and hate,
—all trooping fast and madly, to escape the hand of
the Avenger;—alas! ineffectually, for Sylla murdered
them, and pulled down the walls of their town
—the proud Palestrina!
I had a queer fancy of seeing the nobles of Rome,
their corslets flashing out of the mists,—their pennants
dashing above it,—coming up fast, and still as
the wind, to make the Mural Præneste, their strong-hold
against the Last of the Tribunes. And strangely
mingling fiction with fact, I saw the brother of Walter
de Montreal, with his noisy and bristling army,
crowd over the Campagna, and put up his white tents,
and hang out his showy banners, on the grassy knolls
that lay nearest my eye.
—But the knolls were all quiet; there was not
so much as a strolling contadino on them, to whistle
a mimic fife-note. A little boy from the inn went
with me upon the hill, to look out upon the town and
the wide sea of land below; and whether it was the
soft, warm April sun, or the gray ruins below me, or
whether the wonderful silence of the scene, or some
wild gush of memory, I do not know, but something
made me sad.
“Perché cosi penseroso?—why so sad?” said the
quick-eyed boy. “The air is beautiful, the scene is
beautiful; Signore is young, why is he sad?”
“And is Giovanni never sad?” said I.
“Quasi mai,” said the boy, “and if I could travel
as Signore, and see other countries, I would be always
gay.”
“May you be always that!” said I.
The good wish touched him; he took me by the
arms, and said—“Go home with me, Signore; you
were happy at the inn last night; go back, and we
will make you gay again!”
—If we could be always boys!
I thanked him in a way that saddened him. We
passed out shortly after from the city gates, and
strode on over the rolling plain. Once or twice we
turned back to look at the rocky heights beneath
which lay the ruined town of Palestrina;—a city that
defied Rome,—that had a king before a ploughshare
had touched the Capitoline, or the Janiculan hill!
The ivy was covering up richly the Etruscan foundations,
and there was a quiet over the whole place.
The smoke was rising straight into the sky from the
chimney tops; a peasant or two, were going along
the road with donkeys; beside this, the city was, to
all appearance, a dead city. And it seemed to me
that an old monk, whom I could see with my glass,
near the little chapel above the town, might be going
to say mass for the soul of the dead city.
And afterward, when we came near to Rome, and
passed under the temple tomb of Metella,—my friend
said,—“And will you go back now to your home?
or will you set off with me to-morrow for Ancona?”
“At least, I must say adieu,” returned I.
“God speed you!” said he, and we parted upon
Peter's, and I for the tall house upon the Corso.
Enrica.
I hear her glancing feet, the moment I have tinkled
the bell;—and there she is, with her brown hair
gathered into braids, and her eyes full of joy, and
greeting. And as I walk with the mother to the
window to look at some pageant that is passing,—she
steals up behind, and passes her arm around me, with
a quick electric motion, and a gentle pressure of
welcome—that tells more than a thousand words.
It is a pageant of death that is passing below. Far
down the street, we see heads thrust out of the windows,
and standing in bold relief against the red
torch-light of the moving train. Below, dim figures
are gathering on the narrow side ways to look at the
solemn spectacle. A hoarse chant rises louder, and
louder; and half dies in the night air, and breaks out
again with new, and deep bitterness.
Now, the first torch-light under us shines plainly
on faces in the windows, and on the kneeling women
in the street. First, come old retainers of the dead
one, bearing long blazing flambeaux. Then comes a
company of priests, two by two, bare-headed, and
chanting.
Next, is a brotherhood of friars in brown cloaks,
with sandalled feet;—and the red-light streams full
upon their grizzled heads. They add their heavy
guttural voices to the chant, and pass slowly on.
Then comes a company of priests, in white muslin
capes, and black robes, and black caps,—bearing
books in their hands, wide open, and lit up plainly
by the torches of churchly servitors, who march beside
them; and from the books, the priests chant
loud and solemnly. Now, the music is loudest; and
the friars take up the dismal notes from the white-capped
priests, and the priests before catch them from
the brown-robed friars, and mournfully the sound rises
up between the tall buildings,—into the blue night-sky,
that lies between Heaven and Rome.
—“Vede—vede!”—says Cesare; and in a blaze of
the red-torch fire, comes the bier, borne on the necks
of stout friars; and on the bier, is the body of a dead
man, habited like a priest. Heavy plumes of black
wave at each corner.
—“Hist!”—says my landlady.
The body is just under us. Enrica crosses herself;
her smile is for the moment gone. Cesare's boy-face
is grown suddenly earnest. We could see the pale,
youthful features of the dead man. The glaring
light over the wan visage of the sleeper. A thousand
eyes were looking on him; but his face careless of
them all, was turned up, straight toward the stars.
Still the chant rises; and companies of priests follow
the bier, like those who had gone before. Friars,
in brown cloaks, and prelates, and Carmelites come
after—all with torches. Two by two—their voices
growing hoarse—they tramp, and chant.
For a while the voices cease, and you can hear the
rustling of their robes, and their foot-falls, as if your
ear was to the earth. Then the chant rises again, as
they glide on in a wavy, shining line, and rolls back
over the death-train, like the howling of a wind in
winter.
As they pass, the faces vanish from the windows.
The kneeling women upon the pavement, rise up,
mindful of the paroxysm of Life once more. The
groups in the door-ways scatter. But their low
voices do not drown the voices of the host of mourners,
and their ghost-like music.
I look long upon the blazing bier, trailing under
the deep shadows of the Roman palaces, and at the
stream of torches, winding like a glittering, scaled
serpent.—It is a priest—say I to my landlady, as
she closes the window.
“No, signor,—a young man never married, and so
“So I”—says the pretty Enrica—“if I should
die, would be robed in white, as you saw me on a
carnival night, and be followed by nuns for sisters.”
“A long way off may it be, Enrica!”
She took my hand in hers, and pressed it. An
Italian girl does not fear to talk of death; and we
were talking of it still, as we walked back to my little
parlor—my hand all the time in hers—and sat down
by the blaze of my fire.
It was holy week—never had Enrica looked more
sweetly than in that black dress,—under that long,
dark veil of the days of Lent. Upon the broad
pavement of St. Peter's,—where the people flocking
by thousands, made only side groups about the altars
of the vast temple—I have watched her kneeling,
beside her mother,—her eyes bent down, her lips
moving earnestly, and her whole figure tremulous with
deep emotion. Wandering around among the halberdiers
of the Pope, and the court coats of Austria,
and the bare-footed pilgrims with sandal, shell and
staff, I would sidle back again, to look upon that
kneeling figure; and leaning against the huge
columns of the church, would dream—even as I
am dreaming now.
At night-fall, I urge my way into the Sistine
the gaunt figures of the Judgment of Angelo. They
are chanting the Miserere. The twelve candle-sticks
by the altar are put out one by one, as the service
continues. The sun has gone down, and only the red
glow of twilight steals through the dusky windows.
There is a pause, and a brief reading from a red-cloaked
cardinal, and all kneel down. She kneels
beside me: and the sweet, mournful flow of the
Miserere begins again,—growing in force, and depth,
till the whole chapel rings, and the balcony of the
choir trembles: then, it subsides again into the low
soft wail of a single voice—so prolonged—so tremulous,
and so real, that the heart aches, and the tears
start—for Christ is dead!
—Lingering yet, the wail dies not wholly, but
just as it seemed expiring, it is caught up by another
and stronger voice that carries it on, plaintive as
ever;—nor does it stop with this—for just as you
looked for silence, three voices more begin the
lament—sweet, touching, mournful voices,—and bear
it up to a full cry, when the whole choir catch its
burden, and make the lament change into the wailings
of a multitude—wild, shrill, hoarse—with swift chants
intervening, as if agony had given force to anguish.
Then, sweetly, slowly, voice by voice, note by note,
the wailings sink into the low, tender, moan of a
the utterance; and swelling out, as if despair sustained
it.
It was dark in the chapel, when we went out;
voices were low. Enrica said nothing—I could
say nothing.
I was to leave Rome after Easter; I did not
love to speak of it—nor to think of it. Rome—that
old city, with all its misery, and its fallen state, and
its broken palaces of the Empire—grows upon one's
heart. The fringing shrubs of the coliseum, flaunting
their blossoms at the tall beggar-men in cloaks, who
grub below,—the sun glimmering over the mossy pile
of the House of Nero,—the sweet sunsets from the
Pincian, that make the broad pine-tops of the Janiculan,
stand sharp and dark against a sky of gold,
cannot easily be left behind. And Enrica with her
silver brown hair, and the silken fillet that bound
it,—and her deep blue eyes,—and her white, delicate
fingers,—and the blue veins chasing over her fair
temples—ah, Easter is too near!
But it comes; and passes with the glory of St.
Peter's—lighted from top to bottom. With Enrica—
I saw it from the Ripetta, as it loomed up in the
distance, like a city on fire.
The next day, I bring home my last bunch of
flowers, and with it a little richly-chased Roman ring.
Warm days have come, and the summer air, even
now, hangs heavy with fever, in the hollows of the
plain.
I heard them stirring early on the morning on
which I was to go away. I do not think I slept very
well myself—nor very late. Never did Enrica look
more beautiful—never. All her Carnival robes, and
the sad drapery of the Friday of Crucifixion could
not so adorn her beauty as that neat morning dress,
and that simple rosebud she wore upon her bosom.
She gave it to me—the last—with a trembling hand.
I did not, for I could not, thank her. She knew it;
and her eyes were full.
The old man kissed my cheek—it was the Roman
custom, but the custom did not extend to the Roman
girls;—at least not often. As I passed down the
Corso, I looked back at the balcony, where she stood
in the time of Carnival, in the brown Sombrero, with
the white plume. I knew she would be there now;
and there she was. My eyes dwelt upon the vision,
very loth to leave it; and after my eyes had lost it,
my heart clung to it,—there, where my memory
clings now.
At noon, the carriage stopped upon the hills, toward
Soracte, that overlooked Rome. There was a
stunted pine tree grew a little way from the road, and
I looked back with strange tumult of feeling, upon
the sleeping city, with the gray, billowy sea of the
Campagna, lying around it.
I seemed to see Enrica—the Roman girl, in that
morning dress, with her brown hair in its silken fillet;
—but the rose-bud that was in her bosom, was now
in mine. Her silvery voice too, seemed to float past
me, bearing snatches of Roman songs;—but the songs
were sad and broken.
—After all, this is sad vanity!—thought I: and
yet if I had espied then some returning carriage
going down toward Rome, I will not say—but that I
should have bailed it, and taken a place,—and gone
back, and to this day, perhaps—have lived at Rome.
But the vetturino called me; the coach was ready;
—I gave one more look toward the dome that guarded
the sleeping city; and then, we galloped down the
mountain, on the road that lay towards Perugia, and
Lake Thrasimene.
—Sweet Enrica! art thou living yet? Or hast
thou passed away to that Silent Land, where the
good sleep, and the beautiful?
The visions of the Past fade. The morning breeze
has died upon the meadow; the Bob-o'-Lincoln sits
swaying on the willow tufts—singing no longer. The
and dense upon the silver stream.
Noon has broken into the middle sky; and Morning
is gone.
2. II.
Noon.
THE Noon is short; the sun never loiters on the
meridian, nor does the shadow on the old dial
by the garden, stay long at XII. The Present, like
the noon, is only a point; and a point so fine, that it
is not measurable by the grossness of action. Thought
alone is delicate enough to tell the breadth of the
Present.
The Past belongs to God: the Present only is
ours. And short as it is, there is more in it, and of
it, than we can well manage. That man who can
grapple it, and measure it, and fill it with his purpose,
is doing a man's work: none can do more: but there
are thousands who do less.
Short as it is, the Present is great and strong;—as
Death than the grave. The noon sun will quicken
vegetable life, that in the morning was dead. It is
hot and scorching: I feel it now upon my head: but
it does not scorch and heat like the bewildering
Present. There are no oak leaves to interrupt the
rays of the burning NOW. Its shadows do not fall
east or west;—like the noon, the shade it makes, falls
straight from sky to earth—straight from Heaven to
Hell!
Memory presides over the Past; Action presides
over the Present. The first lives in a rich temple
hung with glorious trophies, and lined with tombs:
the other has no shrine but Duty, and it walks the
earth like a spirit!
—I called my dog to me, and we shared
together the meal that I had brought away at sunrise
from the mansion under the elms; and now, Carlo is
gnawing at the bone that I have thrown to him, and I
stroll dreamily in the quiet noon atmosphere, upon
that grassy knoll, under the oaks.
Noon in the country is very still: the birds do not
sing: the workmen are not in the field: the sheep lay
their noses to the ground; and the herds stand in
pools, under shady trees, lashing their sides,—but
otherwise, motionless. The mills upon the brook, far
above, have ceased for an hour their labor; and the
sedgy banks. The heat plays upon the meadow in
noiseless waves, and the beech leaves do not stir.
Thought, I said, was the only measure of the
Present: and the stillness of noon breeds thought:
and my thought brings up the old companions, and
stations them in the domain of NOW. Thought
ranges over the world, and brings up hopes, and fears,
and resolves, to measure the burning NOW. Joy, and
grief, and purpose, blending in my thought, give
breadth to the Present.
—Where—thought I—is little Isabel now? Where
is Lilly—where is Ben? Where is Leslie,—where is
my old teacher? Where is my chum, who played
such rare tricks—where is the black-eyed Jane?—
Where is that sweet-faced girl whom I parted with
upon that terrace, looking down upon the old spire of
Modbury church? Where are my hopes—where
my purposes—where my sorrows?
I care not who you are—but if you bring such
thought to measure the Present, the present will
seem broad; and it will be sultry as noon—and make
a fever of Now.
Early Friends.
Where are they?
I cannot sit now, as once, upon the edge of the
brook, hour after hour, flinging off my line and hook
to the nibbling roach, and reckon it great sport.
There is no girl with auburn ringlets to sit beside me,
and to play upon the bank. The hours are shorter
than they were then; and the little joys that furnished
boyhood till the heart was full, can fill it no longer.
Poor Tray is dead, long ago; and he cannot swim
into the pools for the floating sticks; nor can I sport
with him hour after hour, and think it happiness.
The mound that covers his grave is sunken; and the
trees that shaded it, are broken and mossy.
Little Lilly is grown into a woman, and is married;
and she has another little Lilly, with flaxen hair, she
says,—looking as she used to look. I dare say the
child is pretty; but it is not my Lilly. She has a
little boy too, that she calls Paul;—a chubby
rogue—she writes,—and as mischievous as ever I
was. God bless the boy!
Ben,—who would have liked a ride in the coach
that carried me away to school—has had a great
many rides since then—rough rides, and hard ones,
leaves for bonfires, as he did once; he is grown a
man, and is fighting his way somewhere in our
western world, to the short-lived honours of time. He
was married not long ago; his wife I remembered as
one of my playmates at my first school: she was
beautiful, but fragile as a leaf. She died within a
year of their marriage. Ben was but four years my
senior; but this grief has made him ten years older.
He does not say it; but his eye and his figure tell it.
The nurse who put the purse in my hand that dismal
morning, is grown a feeble old woman. She was
over fifty then; she may well be seventy now. She
did not know my voice when I went to see her the
other day, nor did she know my face at all. She
repeated the name when I told it to her—Paul,
Paul,—she did not remember any Paul, except a
little boy, a long while ago.
—“To whom you gave a purse when he went
away, and told him to say nothing to Lilly or to
Ben?”
—“Yes, that Paul”—says the old woman exultingly—“do
you know him?”
And when I told her—“she would not have believed
it!” But she did; and took hold of my hand again,
(for she was blind); and then smoothed down the plaits
of her apron, and jogged her cap strings, to look tidy in
long stories about the old house and how other people
came in afterward; and she called me `sir' sometimes,
and sometimes `Paul.' But I asked her to say only
Paul; she seemed glad for this, and talked easier;
and went on to tell of my old playmates, and how we
used to ride the pony—poor Jacko!—and how we
gathered nuts—such heaping piles; and how we used
to play at fox and geese through the long winter
evenings; and how my poor mother would smile—
but here I asked her to stop. She could not have
gone on much longer, for I believe she loved our house
and people, better than she loved her own.
As for my uncle, the cold, silent man, who lived
with his books in the house upon the hill, and who
used to frighten me sometimes with his look, he grew
very feeble after I had left, and almost crazed. The
country people said that he was mad; and Isabel
with her sweet heart clung to him, and would lead
him out when his step tottered, to the seat in the
garden, and read to him out of the books he loved to
hear. And sometimes, they told me, she would read
to him some letters that I had written to Lilly or to
Ben, and ask him if he remembered Paul, who saved
her from drowning under the tree in the meadow?
But he could only shake his head, and mutter something
about how old, and feeble he had grown.
They wrote me afterward that he died; and was
buried in a far-away place, where his wife once lived,
and where he now sleeps beside her. Isabel was sick
with grief, and came to live for a time with Lilly;
but when they wrote me last, she had gone back to
her old home—where Tray was buried,—where we
had played together so often, through the long days
of summer.
I was glad I should find her there, when I came
back. Lilly and Ben were both living nearer to the
city, when I landed from my long journey over the
seas; but still I went to find Isabel first. Perhaps I
had heard so much oftener from the others, that I felt
less eager to see them; or perhaps I wanted to save
my best visits to the last; or perhaps—(I did think
it) perhaps I loved Isabel, better than them all.
So I went into the country, thinking all the way,
how she must have changed since I left. She must
be now nineteen or twenty; and then her grief must
have saddened her face somewhat; but I thought I
should like her all the better for that. Then perhaps
she would not laugh, and tease me, but would be
quieter, and wear a sweet smile—so calm, and beautiful,
I thought. Her figure too must have grown
more elegant, and she would have more dignity in her
air.
I shuddered a little at this; for I thought,—she
will have seen those whom she likes a great deal better.
Perhaps she will not like me at all; yet I knew
very well that I should like her.
I had gone up almost to the house; I had passed
the stream where we fished on that day, many years
before; and I thought that now since she was grown
to womanhood, I should never sit with her there
again, and surely never drag her as I did out of the
water, and never chafe her little hands, and never
perhaps kiss her, as I did, when she sat upon my
mother's lap—oh, no—no—no!
I saw where we buried Tray, but the old slab was
gone; there was no ribbon there now. I thought
that at least, Isabel would have replaced the slab;—
but it was a wrong thought. I trembled when I went
up to the door—for it flashed upon me, that perhaps,
—Isabel was married. I could not tell why she
should not; but I knew it would make me uncomfortable,
to hear that she had.
There was a tall woman who opened the door; she
did not know me; but I recognized her as one of the
old servants. I asked after the housekeeper first,
thinking I would surprise Isabel. My heart fluttered
somewhat, thinking that she might step in suddenly
herself—or perhaps that she might have seen me
would hardly know me.
Presently the housekeeper came in, looking very
grave; she asked if the gentleman wished to see her?
The gentleman did wish it, and she sat down on
one side of the fire;—for it was autumn, and the
leaves were falling, and the November winds were
very chilly.
—Shall I tell her—thought I—who I am, or ask
at once for Isabel? I tried to ask; but it was hard
for me to call her name; it was very strange, but I
could not pronounce it at all.
“Who, sir?”—said the housekeeper, in a tone so
earnest, that I rose at once, and crossed over, and
took her hand:—“You know me,” said I,—“you
surely remember Paul?”
She started with surprise, but recovered herself,
and resumed the same grave manner. I thought I
had committed some mistake, or been in some way
cause of offence. I called her—Madame, and asked
for—Isabel?
She turned pale, terribly pale—“Bella?” said she.
“Yes, Bella.”
“Sir—Bella is dead!”
I dropped into my chair. I said nothing. The
housekeeper—bless her kind heart!—slipped noiselessly
out. My hands were over my eyes. The
mournfully within.
I did not sob, nor weep, nor utter any cry.
The clock ticked mournfully, and the winds were
sighing; but I did not hear them any longer; there
was a tempest raging within me, that would have
drowned the voice of thunder.
It broke at length in a long, deep sigh,—“oh God!”
—said I. It may have been a prayer;—it was not
an imprecation.
Bella—sweet Bella was dead! It seemed as if
with her, half the world were dead—every bright face
darkened—every sunshine blotted out,—every flower
withered,—every hope extinguished!
I walked out into the air, and stood under the trees
where we had played together with poor Tray—where
Tray lay buried. But it was not Tray I thought of,
as I stood there, with the cold wind playing through
my hair, and my eyes filling with tears. How could
she die? Why was she gone? Was it really true?
Was Isabel indeed dead—in her coffin—buried?
Then why should anybody live? What was there to
live for, now that Bella was gone?
Ah, what a gap in the world, is made by the death
of those we love! It is no longer whole, but a poor
half-world that swings uneasy on its axis, and makes
you dizzy with the clatter of its wreck!
The housekeeper told me all—little by little, as I
found calmness to listen. She had been dead a
month; Lilly was with her through it all; she died
sweetly, without pain, and without fear,—what can
angels fear? She had spoken often of `Cousin Paul;'
she had left a little pacquet for him, but it was not
there; she had given it into Lilly's keeping.
Her grave, the housekeeper told me, was only a
little way off from her home—beside the grave of a brother
who died long years before. I went there that
evening. The mound was high and fresh. The sods
had not closed together, and the dry leaves caught in
the crevices, and gave a ragged and a terrible look to
the grave. The next day, I laid them all smooth—
as we had once laid them on the grave of Tray;—I
clipped the long grass, and set a tuft of blue violets
at the foot, and watered it all with—tears. The
homestead, the trees, the fields, the meadows—in the
windy November, looked dismally. I could not like
them again;—I liked nothing, but the little mound,
that I had dressed over Bella's grave. There she
sleeps now,—the sleep of Death!
School Revisited.
The old school is there still,—with the high cupola
upon it, and the long galleries, with the sleeping
where I slept. But the boys are not there, nor the
old teachers. They have ploughed up the play-ground
to plant corn, and the apple tree with the low limb,
that made our gymnasium, is cut down.
I was there only a little time ago. It was on a
Sunday. One of the old houses of the village had
been fashioned into a tavern, and it was there I
stopped. But I strolled by the old one, and looked
into the bar-room, where I used to gaze with wonder
upon the enormous pictures of wild animals, which
heralded some coming menagerie. There was just
such a picture hanging still, and two or three advertisements
of sheriffs, and a little bill of a `horse stolen,'
and—as I thought—the same brown pitcher on the
edge of the bar. I was sure it was the same great
wood box that stood by the fire place, and the same
whip, and great coat hung in the corner.
I was not in so gay costume, as I once thought I
would be wearing, when a man; I had nothing better
than a rusty shooting jacket; but even with this, I
was determined to have a look about the church, and
see if I could trace any of the faces of the old times.
They had sadly altered the building; they had
cut out its long galleries, and its old fashioned square
pews, and filled it with narrow boxes, as they do in
the city. The pulpit was not so high, or grand; and
I missed too the old preacher, whom we all feared
so much; and in place of him, was a jaunty looking
man, whom I thought I would not be at all afraid to
speak to, or if need be, to slap on the shoulder.
And when I did meet him after church, I looked him
in the eye as boldly as a lion—what a change was
that, from the school days!
Here and there, I could detect about the church,
some old farmer, by the stoop in his shoulders, or by
a particular twist in his nose; and one or two young
fellows, who used to storm into the gallery in my
school days, in very gay jackets, dressed off with ribbons,—which
we thought was astonishing heroism, and
admired accordingly,—were now settled away into
fathers of families; and looked as demure, and peaceable,
at the head of their pews, with a white-headed
boy or two between them, and their wives, as if they
had been married all their days.
There was a stout man too, with a slight limp
in his gait, who used to work on harnesses, and strap
our skates, and who I always thought would have
made a capital Vulcan,—he stalked up the aisle past
me, as if I had my skates strapped at his shop, only
yesterday.
The bald-pated shoemaker, who never kept his
had a son called Theodore,—which we all thought a
very pretty name for a shoemaker's son—I could not
find. I feared he might be dead. I hoped, if he
was, that his broken promises about patching boots,
would not come up against him.
The old factor of tamarinds and sugar crackers,
who used to drive his covered waggon every Saturday
evening into the play-ground, I observed, still holding
his place in the village choir; and singing—though
with a tooth or two gone,—as serenely, and obstreporously
as ever.
I looked around the church, to find the black-eyed
girl who always sat behind the choir,—the one I
loved to look at so much. I knew she must be
grown up; but I could fix upon no face positively;
once, as a stout woman with a pair of boys, and who
wore a big red shawl, turned half around, I thought I
recognized her nose. If it was she, it had grown red
though; and I felt cured of my old fondness. As for
the other, who wore the hat trimmed with fur—she
was nowhere to be seen, among either maids, or matrons;
and when I asked the tavern-keeper, and described
her, and her father, as they were in my
school-days, he told me that she had married too, and
lived some five miles from the village; and said he,—
“I guess she leads her husband a devil of a life!”
I felt cured of her too; but I pitied the husband.
One of my old teachers was in the church; I could
have sworn to his face; he was a precise man; and
now I thought he looked rather roughly at my old
shooting jacket. But I let him look, and scowled at
him a little; for I remembered that he had feruled
me once. I thought it was not probable that he
would ever do it again.
There was a bustling little lawyer in the village,
who lived in a large house, and who was the great
man of that town and country,—he had scarce
changed at all; and he stepped into the church as
briskly, and promptly, as he did ten years ago. But
what struck me most, was the change in a couple of
pretty, little, white-haired girls, that at the time I
left, were of that uncertain age, when the mother
lifts them on a Sunday, and pounces them down one
after the other upon the seat of the pew;—these were
now grown into blooming young ladies. And they
swept by me in the vestibule of the church, with a
flutter of robes, and a grace of motion, that fairly
made my heart twitter in my bosom. I know nothing
that brings home upon a man so quick, the consciousness
of increasing years, as to find the little prattling
girls, that were almost babies in his boyhood—become
dashing ladies;—and to find those whom he used to
look on patronizingly, and compassionately—thinking
that the mere rustle of their silk dress will give him
a twinge; and their eyes, if he looks at them—make
him unaccountably shy.
After service I strolled up by the school buildings;
I traced the names that we had cut upon
the fence; but the fence had grown brown with
age, and was nearly rotted away. Upon the beech
tree in the hollow behind the school, the carvings
were all overgrown. It must have been vacation,
if indeed there was any school at all; for I
could see only one old woman about the premises,
and she was hanging out a dishcloth, to dry in the
sun. I passed on up the hill, beyond the buildings,
where in the boy-days, we built stone forts with
bastions and turrets; but the farmers had put
bastions, and turrets, into their cobble-stone walls.
At the orchard fence, I stopped, and looked—from
force, I believe, of old habit,—to see if any one were
watching;—and then leaped over, and found my way
to the early apple tree; but the fruit had gone by.
It seemed very daring in me, even then, to walk so
boldly in the forbidden ground.
But the old head-master who forbade it, was dead;
and Russel and Burgess, and I know not how many
others, who in other times, were culprits with me,
were dead too. When I passed back by the school,
room, where I had slept the sound, healthful sleep of
boyhood,—and where too I had passed many—many
wakeful hours, thinking of the absent Bella, and of
my home.
—How small, seem now, the great griefs of
boyhood! Light floating clouds will obscure the sun
that is but half risen; but let him be up—mid
heaven, and the cloud that then darkens the land,
must be thick, and heavy indeed.
—The tears started from my eyes:—was not
such a cloud over me now?
College.
School-mates slip out of sight and knowledge,
and are forgotten; or if you meet them, they bear
another character; the boy is not there. It is a new
acquaintance that you make, with nothing of your
fellow upon the benches, but the name. Though the
eye and face cleave to your memory, and you meet
them afterward, and think you have met a friend—
the voice or the action will break the charm, and you
find only—another man.
But with your classmates, in that later school,
where form and character were both nearer ripeness,
first manly sympathies,—it is different. And as you
meet them, or hear of them, the thought of their
advance makes a measure of your own—it makes a
measure of the NOW.
You judge of your happiness, by theirs,—of your
progress, by theirs, and of your prospects, by theirs.
If one is happy, you seek to trace out the way by
which he has wrought his happiness; you consider
how it differs from your own; and you think with
sighs, how you might possibly have wrought the
same; but now it has escaped. If another has won
some honorable distinction, you fall to thinking, how
the man—your old equal, as you thought, upon the
college benches—has outrun you. It pricks to effort,
and teaches the difference between now, and then.
Life with all its duties, and hopes, gathers upon your
Present, like a great weight, or like a storm ready to
burst. It is met anew; it pleads more strongly; and
action that has been neglected, rises before you—a
giant of remorse.
Stop not, loiter not, look not backward, if you
would be among the foremost! The great Now, so
quick, so broad, so fleeting, is yours;—in an hour it
will belong to the Eternity of the Past. The temper
of Life is to be made good by big honest blows; stop
striking, and you will do nothing: strike feebly, and
hour: grapple it, and you may win: but without a
grapple, it will never go with you. Work is the
weapon of honor, and who lacks the weapon, will
never triumph.
There were some seventy of us—all scattered now.
I meet one here and there at wide distances apart;
and we talk together of old days, and of our present
work and life,—and separate. Just so ships at sea,
in murky weather, will shift their course to come
within hailing distance, and compare their longitude,
and—part. One I have met wandering in southern
Italy, dreaming as I was dreaming—over the tomb
of Virgil, by the dark grotto of Persilipo. It seemed
strange to talk of our old readings in Tacitus there
upon classic ground; but we did; and ran on to talk
of our lives; and sitting down upon the promontory
of Baie, looking off upon that blue sea, as clear as the
classics, we told each other our respective stories.
And two nights after, upon the quay, in sight of
Vesuvius, which shed a lurid glow upon the sky, that
was reflected from the white walls of the Hotel de
Russie, and from the broad lava pavements, we parted
—he to wander among the isles of the ægean, and I
to turn northward.
Another time, as I was wandering among those
mysterious figures that crowd the foyer of the French
familiar face: I followed it with my eye, until I became
convinced. He did not know me until I named
his old seat upon the bench of the Division Room,
and the hard-faced Tutor G—. Then we talked
of the old rivalries, and Christmas jollities, and of this
and that one, whom we had come upon in our wayward
tracks; while the black-robed grisettes stared through
their velvet masks;—nor did we tire of comparing
the old memories, with the unearthly gaiety of the
scene about us, until day-light broke.
In a quiet mountain town of New England, I came
not long since upon another: he was hale and hearty,
and pushing his lawyer work with just the same
nervous energy, with which he used to recite a theorem
of Euclid. He was father too of a couple of
stout, curly-pated boys; and his good woman, as he
called her, appeared a sensible, honest, good-natured
lady. I must say that I envied him his wife, much
more than I had envied my companion of the opera—
his Domino.
I happened only a little while ago to drop into the
college chapel of a Sunday. There were the same
hard oak benches below, and the lucky fellows who
enjoyed a corner seat, were leaning back upon the
rail, after the old fashion. The tutors were perched
up in their side boxes, looking as prim, and serious,
the hymn in the same rhythmical way; and he prayed
the same prayer, for (I thought) the same old sort of
sinners. As I shut my eyes to listen, it seemed as if
the intermediate years had all gone out; and that I
was on my own pew bench, and thinking out those
little schemes for excuses, or for effort, which were to
relieve me, or to advance me, in my college world.
There was a pleasure, like the pleasure of dreaming
about forgotten joys—in listening to the Doctor's
sermon: he began in the same half embarrassed, half
awkward way; and fumbled at his Bible leaves, and
the poor pinched cushion, as he did long before. But
as he went on with his rusty and polemic vigour, the
poetry within him would now and then warm his soul
into a burst of fervid eloquence, and his face would
glow, and his hand tremble, and the cushion and the
Bible leaves be all forgot, in the glow of his thought,
until with a half cough, and a pinch at the cushion,
he fell back into his strong, but tread-mill argumentation.
In the corner above, was the stately, white-haired
professor, wearing the old dignity of carriage, and a
smile as bland, as if the years had all been playthings;
and had I seen him in his lecture-room, I daresay I
should have found the same suavity of address, the
composure over the exploding retorts.
Near him was the silver-haired old gentleman,—
with a very astute expression,—who used to have an
odd habit of tightening his cloak about his nether limbs.
I could not see that his eye was any the less bright;
nor did he seem less eager to catch at the handle of
some witticism, or bit of satire,—to the poor student's
cost. I remembered my old awe of him, I must say,
with something of a grudge; but I had got fairly
over it now. There are sharper griefs in life, than a
professor's talk.
Farther on, I saw the long-faced, dark-haired man,
who looked as if he were always near some explosive,
electric battery, or upon an insulated stool. He was,
I believe, a man of fine feelings; but he had a way of
reducing all action to dry, hard, mathematical system,
with very little poetry about it. I know there
was not much poetry in his problems in physics, and
still less in his half-yearly examinations. But I do
not dread them now.
Over opposite, I was glad to see still, the aged
head of the kind, and generous old man, who in my
day presided over the college; and who carried with
him the affections of each succeeding class,—added to
their respect for his learning. This seems a higher
triumph to me now, than it seemed then. A strong
but there is needed a noble one, to win affection.
A new man now filled his place in the president's
seat; but he was one whom I had known, and been
proud to know. His figure was bent, and thin—the
very figure that an old Flemish master would have
chosen, for a scholar. His eye had a kind of piercing
lustre, as if it had long been fixed on books; and his
expression—when unrelieved by his affable smile—
was that of hard midnight toil. With all his polish
of mind, he was a gentleman at heart; and treated us
always with a manly courtesy, that is not forgotten.
But of all the faces that used to be ranged below
—four hundred men and boys—there was not one,
with whom to join hands, and live back again. Their
griefs, joys, and toil, were chaining them to their
labor of life. Each one in his thought, coursing over
a world as wide as my own;—how many thousand
worlds of thought, upon this one world of ours!
I stepped dreamily through the corridors of the old
Atheneum, thinking of that first, fearful step, when
the faces were new, and the stern tutor was strange,
and the prolix Livy so hard. I went up at night, and
skulked around the buildings, when the lights were
blazing from all the windows, and they were busy
with their tasks—plain tasks, and easy tasks,—because
they are certain tasks. Happy fellows—thought I—
done. But the time is coming, and very fast, when
you must not only do, but know what to do. The
time is coming, when in place of your one master, you
will have a thousand masters—masters of duty, of
business, of pleasure, and of grief—giving you harder
lessons each one of them, than any of your Fluxions.
Morning will pass, and the Noon will come—hot,
and scorching.
The Pacquet of Bella.
I HAVE not forgotten that pacquet of Bella; I did
not once forget it. And when I saw Lilly—now the
grown up Lilly, happy in her household, and blithe
as when she was a maiden, she gave it to me. She told
me too of Bella's illness, and of her suffering, and of
her manner, when she put the little pacquet in her
hand `for Cousin Paul.' But this I will not repeat;
—I cannot.
I know not why it was, but I shuddered at the
mention of her name. There are some who will talk,
at table, and in their gossip, of dead friends; I wonder
how they do it? For myself, when the grave has
closed its gates on the faces of those I love—however
busy my mournful thought may be, the tongue is
hear them named. It seems like tearing open half-healed
wounds, and disturbing with harsh worldly
noise, the sweet sleep of death.
I loved Bella. I know not how I loved her,—
whether as a lover, or as a husband loves a wife; I
only know this,—I always loved her. She was so
gentle—so beautiful,—so confiding, that I never once
thought, but that the whole world loved her, as well
as I. There was only one thing I never told to
Bella;—I would tell her of all my grief, and of all
my joys; I would tell her my hopes, my ambitious
dreams, my disappointments, my anger, and my dislikes;—but
I never told her how much I loved her.
I do not know why, unless I knew that it was needless.
But I should as soon have thought of telling
Bella on some winter's day—Bella, it is winter!—or
of whispering to her on some balmy day of August—
Bella, it is summer!—as of telling her, after she had
grown to girlhood.—Bella, I love you!
I had received one letter from her in the old countries;
it was a sweet letter, in which she told me all
that she had been doing, and how she had thought of
me, when she rambled over the woods where we had
rambled together. She had written two or three
other letters, Lilly told me, but they had never
reached me. I had told her too of all that made my
seen on shipboard, and how I met her afterward, and
what a happy time we passed down in Devon. I
even told her of the strange dream I had, in which
Isabel seemed to be in England, and to turn away from
me sadly, because I called her—Carry.
I also told her of all I saw in that great world of
Paris—writing, as I would write to a sister; and I
told her too of the sweet Roman girl, Enrica—of her
brown hair, and of her rich eyes, and of her pretty
Carnival dresses. And when I missed letter after
letter, I told her that she must still write her
letters, or some little journal, and read it to me when
I came back. I thought how pleasant it would be to
sit under the trees by her father's house, and listen
to her tender voice going through that record of her
thoughts, and fears. Alas, how our hopes betray
us!
It began almost like a diary, about the time that
her father fell sick. “It is”—said she to Lilly, when
she gave it to her, “what I would have said to Cousin
Paul, if he had been here.”
It begins“—I have come back now to father's
house; I could not leave him alone, for they told me
he was sick. I found him not well; he was very
glad to see me, and kissed me so tenderly that I am sure,
say—that he was a cold man! I sometimes read to
him, sitting in the deep library window, (you remember
it,) where we used to nestle out of his sight, at
dusk. He cannot read any more.
“I would give anything to see the little Carry you
speak of; but do you know you did not describe her
to me at all; will you not tell me if she has dark
hair, or light, or if her eyes are blue, or dark, like
mine? Is she good; did she not make ugly speeches,
or grow peevish, in those long days upon the ocean?
How I would have liked to have been with you, on
those clear starlit nights, looking off upon the water!
But then I think that you would not have wished me
there; and that you did not once think of me even.
This makes me sad; yet I know not why it should;
for I always liked you best, when you were happy;
and I am sure you must have been happy then. You
say you shall never see her after you have left the
ship:—you must not think so, Cousin Paul; if she is
so beautiful, and fond, as you tell me, your own heart
will lead you in her way, some time again; I feel
almost sure of it.
* * * “Father is getting more and more
feeble, and wandering in his mind; this is very dreadful;
he calls me sometimes by my mother's name; and
and treats me as if I was a stranger. The physician
shakes his head when I ask him of father: oh, Paul,
if he should die—what could I do? I should die too—
I know I should. Who would there be to care for me?
Lilly is married, and Ben is far off, and you Paul, whom
I love better than either, are a long way from me.
But God is good, and he will spare my father.
* * * “So you have seen again your little
Carry! I told you it would be so. You tell me
how accidental it was:—ah, Paul, Paul, you rogue,
honest as you are I half doubt you there! I like
your description of her too:—dark eyes like mine you
say—`almost as pretty;' well, Paul, I will forgive you
that; it is only a white lie. You know they must be
a great deal prettier than mine, or you would never
have stayed a whole fortnight in an old farmer's
house, far down in Devon! I wish I could see her:
I wish she was here with you now; for it is mid-summer,
and the trees and flowers were never prettier.
But I am all alone; father is too ill to go out at all.
I fear now very much, that he will never go out
again. Lilly was here yesterday, but he did not
know her. She read me your last letter: it was not
so long as mine. You are very—very good to me,
Paul.
* * * “For a long time I have written
nothing: my father has been very ill, and the old
housekeeper has been sick too, and father would have
no one but me near him. He cannot live long. I
feel sadly—miserably; you will not know me when
you come home; your “pretty Bella”—as you used
to call me, will have lost all her beauty. But perhaps
you will not care for that, for you tell me you have
found one prettier than ever. I do not know, Cousin
Paul, but it is because I am so sad, and selfish—for
sorrow is selfish—but I do not like your raptures
about the Roman girl. Be careful, Paul: I know
your heart: it is quick and sensitive; and I dare say
she is pretty, and has beautiful eyes; for they tell me
all the Italian girls have soft eyes.
“But Italy is far away, Paul; I can never see
Enrica; she will never come here. No—no, remember
Devon: I feel as if Carry was a sister now: I
cannot feel so of the Roman girl: I do not want to
feel so. You will say this is harsh; and I am afraid
you will not like me so well for it; but I cannot help
saying it. I love you too well, Cousin Paul, not to
say it.
* * * “It is all over! Indeed, Paul, I
am very desolate! `The golden bowl is broken'—
my poor father has gone to his last home. I was
comer—death? He had been for a long time so
feeble, that he could scarce speak at all: he sat for
hours in his chair, looking upon the fire, or looking
out at the window. He would hardly notice me when
I came to change his pillows, or to smooth them for
his head. But before he died, he knew me as well as
ever. `Isabel,' he said, `you have been a good
daughter: God will reward you!' and he kissed me
so tenderly, and looked after me so anxiously, with
such intelligence in his look, that I thought perhaps
he would revive again. In the evening he asked me
for one of his books, that he loved very much.
`Father,' said I, `you cannot read; it is almost
dark.'
“ `Oh, yes,' said he; `Isabel, I can read now.'
And I brought it; he kept my hand a long while;
then he opened the book;—it was a book about
death.
“I brought a candle, for I knew he could not read
without.
“ `Isabel, dear,' said he, `put the candle a little
nearer.' But it was close beside him even then.
“ `A little nearer, Isabel,'—repeated he, and his
voice was very faint; and he grasped my hand hard.
“ `—Nearer, Isabel!—nearer!'
“There was no need to do it, for my poor father was
but I am crazed. It does not seem the same world
it was. And the house, and the trees, oh, they are
very dismal!
“I wish you would come home, Cousin Paul: life
would not be so very—very blank as it is now.
Lilly is kind;—I thank her from my heart. But it
is not her father who is dead!
“I am calmer now; I am staying
with Lilly. The world seems smaller than it did;
but Heaven seems a great deal larger: there is a
place for us all there, Paul,—if we only seek it!
They tell me you are coming home: I am glad.
You will not like perhaps to come away from that
pretty Enrica, you speak of; but do so, Paul. It
seems to me that I see clearer than I did, and I talk
bolder. The girlish Isabel you will not find, for I
am much older, and my air is more grave; and this
suffering has made me feeble—very feeble.
“It is not easy for me to write; but
I must tell you that I have just found out who your
Carry is. Years ago, when you were away from home,
I was at school with her. We were always together.
I wonder I could not have found her out from your
description; but I did not even suspect it She is a
her once since you have met her: we talked of you.
She spoke kindly—very kindly: more than this, I
cannot tell you, for I do not know more. Ah, Paul,
may you be happy: I feel as if I had but a little while
to live.
“It is even so, my dear Cousin
Paul,—I shall write but little more; my hand trembles
now. But I am ready. It is a glorious world
beyond this—I know it is! And there we shall
meet. I did hope to see you once again, and to hear
your voice, speaking to me as you used to speak.
But I shall not. Life is too frail with me. I seem
to live wholly now in the world where I am going:—
there is my mother, and my father, and my little
brother—we shall meet—I know we shall meet!
“The last—Paul. Never again in
this world! I am happy—very happy. You will
come to me. I can write no more. May good angels
guard you, and bring you to Heaven!”
—Shall I go on?
But the toils of life are upon me. Private griefs
do not break the force, and the weight of the great—
Present A life—at best the half of it, is before me.
blessed be God!—there are gleams of sunlight upon
it. That sweet Carry, doubly dear to me now,
that she is joined with my sorrow for the lost Isabel,
—shall be sought for!
And with her sweet image floating before me, the
Noon wanes, and the shadows of Evening lengthen
upon the land.
III.
Evening.
THE Future is a great land:—how the lights,
and the shadows throng over it,—bright and
dark, slow and swift!
Pride and Ambition build up great castles on its
plains,—great monuments on the mountains, that
reach heavenward, and dip their tops in the blue of
Eternity! Then comes an earthquake—the earthquake
of disappointment, of distrust, or of inaction,
and lays them low. Gaping desolation widens its
breaches everywhere; the eye is full of them, and
can see nothing beside. By and by, the sun peeps
forth,—as now from behind yonder cloud—and reanimates
the soul.
Fame beckons, sitting high in the heavens; and
stir your heart; your hand is hot, and feverish for
action; your brain works madly, and you snatch
here, and you snatch there, in the convulsive throes
of your delirium. Perhaps you see some earnest,
careful plodder, once far behind you, now toiling
slowly but surely, over the plain of life, until he seems
near to grasping those brilliant phantoms which dance
along the horizon of the future; and the sight stirs
your soul to frenzy, and you bound on after him with
the madness of a fever in your veins. But it was by
no such action, that the fortunate toiler has won his
progress. His hand is steady, his brain is cool; his
eye is fixed, and sure.
The Future is a great land; a man cannot go round
it in a day; he cannot measure it with a bound; he
cannot bind its harvests into a single sheaf. It is
wider than the vision, and has no end.
Yet always, day by day, hour by hour, second by
second, the hard Present is elbowing us off into that
great land of the Future. Our souls indeed, wander
to it, as to a home-land; they run beyond time and
space, beyond planets and suns, beyond far-off suns
and comets, until like blind flies, they are lost in the
blaze of immensity, and can only grope their way
back to our earth, and our time, by the cunning of
instinct.
Cut out the Future—even that little Future, which
is the Evening of our life, and what a fall into
vacuity! Forbid those earnest forays over the borders
of Now, and on what spoils would the soul live?
For myself, I delight to wander there, and to
weave every day, the passing life, into the coming
life,—so closely, that I may be unconscious of the
joining. And if so be that I am able, I would make
the whole piece bear fair proportions, and just figures,
—like those tapestries, on which nuns work by inches,
and finish with their lives;—or like those grand frescos,
which poet artists have wrought on the vaults of
old cathedrals, gaunt, and colossal,—appearing mere
daubs of carmine and azure, as they lay upon their
backs, working out a hand's breadth at a time,—but
when complete, showing—symmetrical, and glorious!
But not alone does the soul wander to those glittering
heights where fame sits, with plumes waving in
zephyrs of applause; there belong to it, other appetites,
which range wide, and constantly over the
broad Future-land. We are not merely, working, intellectual
machines, but social puzzles, whose solution,
is the work of a life. Much as hope may lean toward
the intoxicating joy of distinction, there is another
leaning in the soul, deeper, and stronger, toward those
pleasures which the heart pants for, and in whose
atmosphere, the affections bloom and ripen.
The first may indeed be uppermost; it may be
noisiest; it may drown with the clamor of mid-day,
the nicer sympathies. But all our day is not mid-day;
and all our life is not noise. Silence is as strong
as the soul; and there is no tempest so wild with
blasts, but has a wilder lull. There lies in the depth
of every man's soul a mine of affection, which from
time to time will burn with the seething heat of a
volcano, and heave up lava-like monuments, through
all the cold strata of his commoner nature.
One may hide his warmer feelings;—he may paint
them dimly;—he may crowd them out of his sailing
chart, where he only sets down the harbors for traffic;
yet in his secret heart, he will map out upon the
great country of the Future, fairy islands of love, and
of joy. There, he will be sure to wander, when his
soul is lost in those quiet and hallowed hopes, which
take hold on Heaven.
Love only, unlocks the door upon that Futurity,
where the isles of the blessed, lie like stars. Affection
is the stepping stone to God. The heart is our
only measure of infinitude. The mind tires with
greatness; the heart—never. Thought is worried
and weakened in its flight through the immensity of
space; but Love soars around the throne of the
Highest, with added blessing and strength.
I know not how it may be with others, but with
those fabrics which strew the great country of the
Future, than the mind. They may not indeed rise
so high, as the dizzy pinnacles that ambition loves to
rear; but they lie like fragrant islands, in a sea,
whose ripple is a continuous melody.
And as I muse now, looking toward the Evening,
which is already begun,—tossed as I am, with the
toils of the Past, and bewildered with the vexations
of the Present, my affections are the architect, that
build up the future refuge. And, in fancy at least, I
will build it boldly;—saddened it may be, by the
chance shadows of evening; but through all, I will
hope for a sunset, when the day ends, glorious with
crimson, and gold.
Carry.
I SAID that harsh, and hot as was the Present,
there were joyous gleams of light playing over the
Future. How else could it be, when that fair being
whom I met first upon the wastes of ocean, and whose
name even, is hallowed by the dying words of Isabel,
is living in the same world with me? Amid all the
perplexities that haunt me, as I wander from the
present to the future, the thought of her image, of
sunlight upon my path.
And yet why? Is it not very idle? Years have
passed since I have seen her: I do not even know
where she may be. What is she to me?
My heart whispers—very much!—but I do not
listen to that in my prouder moods. She is a woman,
a beautiful woman indeed, whom I have known once—
pleasantly known: she is living, but she will die, or
she will marry;—I shall hear of it by and by, and
sigh perhaps—nothing more. Life is earnest around
me; there is no time to delve in the past, for bright
things to shed radiance on the future.
I will forget the sweet girl, who was with me upon
the ocean, and think she is dead. This manly soul is
strong, if we would but think so: it can make a
puppet of griefs, and take down, and set up at will,
the symbols of its hope.
—But no, I cannot: the more I think thus, the
less, I really think thus. A single smile of that frail
girl, when I recal it,—mocks all my proud purposes;
as if, without her, my purposes were nothing.
—Pshaw!—I say—it is idle!—and I bury my
thought in books, and in long hours of toil; but as the
hours lengthen, and my head sinks with fatigue, and
the shadows of evening play around me, there comes
again that sweet vision, saying with tender mockery—
hopefully and joyfully, toward the golden gates which
open on the Future.
But this is only in those silent hours when the man
is alone, and away from his working thoughts. At
mid-day, or in the rush of the world, he puts hard
armor on, that reflects all the light of such joyous
fancies. He is cold and careless, and ready for
suffering, and for fight.
One day I am travelling: I am absorbed in some
present cares—thinking out some plan which is to
make easier, or more successful, the voyage of life.
I glance upon the passing scenery, and upon new
faces, with that careless indifference which grows upon
a man with years, and above all, with travel. There
is no wife to enlist your sympathies—no children to
sport with: my friends are few, and scattered; and
are working out fairly, what is before them to do.
Lilly is living here, and Ben is living there: their
letters are cheerful, contented letters; and they wish
me well. Griefs even have grown light with wearing;
and I am just in that careless humor—as if I said,—
jog on, old world—jog on! And the end will come
along soon; and we shall get—poor devils that we
are—just what we deserve!
But on a sudden, my eyes rest on a figure that I
think I know. Now, the indifference flies like mist;
I watch her, as if there were nothing else to be seen.
The form is hers; the grace is hers; the simple dress
—so neat, so tasteful,—that is hers too. She half
turns her head:—it is the face that I saw under the
velvet cap, in the Park of Devon!
I do not rush forward: I sit as if I were in a
trance. I watch her every action—the kind attentions
to her mother who sits beside her,—her naive
exclamations, as we pass some point of surpassing
beauty. It seems as if a new world were opening
to me; yet I cannot tell why. I keep my place, and
think, and gaze. I tear the paper I hold in my
hand into shreds. I play with my watch chain, and
twist the seal, until it is near breaking. I take out
my watch, look at it, and put it back—yet I cannot
tell the hour.
—It is she—I murmur—I know it is Carry!
But when they rise to leave, my lethargy is broken;
yet it is with a trembling hesitation—a faltering as it
were, between the present life and the future, that I
approach. She knows me on the instant, and greets
me kindly;—as Bella wrote—very kindly. Yet she
shows a slight embarrassment, a sweet embarrassment,
that I treasure in my heart, more closely even than
the greeting. I change my course, and travel with
them;—now we talk of the old scenes, and two hours
life time.
It is five years since I parted with her, never
hoping to meet again. She was then a frail girl; she
is now just rounding into womanhood. Her eyes are
as dark and deep as ever: the lashes that fringe them,
seem to me even longer than they were. Her colour
is as rich, her forehead as fair, her smile as sweet, as
they were before;—only a little tinge of sadness
floats upon her eye, like the haze upon a summer
landscape. I grow bold to look upon her, and timid
with looking. We talk of Bella:—she speaks in a
soft, low voice, and the shade of sadness on her face,
gathers—as when a summer mist obscures the sun.
I talk in monosyllables: I can command no other.
And there is a look of sympathy in her eye, when I
speak thus, that binds my soul to her, as no smiles
could do. What can draw the heart into the fulness
of love, so quick as sympathy?
But this passes;—we must part; she for her home,
and I for that broad home, that has been mine so
long—the world. It seems broader to me than ever,
and colder than ever, and less to be wished for than
ever. A new book of hope is sprung wide open in
my life:—a hope of home!
We are to meet at some time, not far off, in the
city where I am living. I look forward to that time,
d'appui for hope, for thought, and for countless
journeyings into the opening future. Never did I
keep the dates better, never count the days more
carefully, whether for bonds to be paid, or for dividends
to fall due.
I welcome the time, and it passes like a dream.
I am near her, often as I dare; the hours are very
short with her, and very long away. She receives
me kindly—always very kindly; she could not be
otherwise than kind. But is it anything more?
This is a greedy nature of ours; and when sweet
kindness flows upon us, we want more. I know she
is kind; and yet in place of being grateful, I am only
covetous of an excess of kindness.
She does not mistake my feelings, surely:—ah, no,—
trust a woman for that! But what have I, or what
am I, to ask a return? She is pure, and gentle as an
angel; and I—alas—only a poor soldier in our world-fight
against the Devil! Sometimes in moods of
vanity, I call up what I fondly reckon my excellencies
or deserts—a sorry, pitiful array, that makes me
shame-faced when I meet her. And in an instant, I
banish them all. And I think, that if I were called
upon in some high court of justice, to say why I
should claim her indulgence, or her love—I would
say nothing of my sturdy effort to beat down the
a calm front amid the frowns of the world,—nothing
of little triumphs, in the every-day fight of life; but
only, I would enter the simple plea—this heart is
hers!
She leaves; and I have said nothing of what was
seething within me;—how I curse my folly! She is
gone, and never perhaps will return. I recal in despair
her last kind glance. The world seems blank
to me. She does not know; perhaps she does not
care, if I love her.—Well, I will bear it,—I say. But
I cannot bear it. Business is broken; books are
blurred; something remains undone, that fate declares
must be done. Not a place can I find, but
her sweet smile gives to it, either a tinge of gladness,
or a black shade of desolation.
I sit down at my table with pleasant books; the
fire is burning cheerfully; my dog looks up earnestly
when I speak to him; but it will never do! Her
image sweeps away all these comforts in a flood. I
fling down my book; I turn my back upon my dog;
the fire hisses and sparkles in mockery of me.
Suddenly a thought flashes on my brain;—I will
write to her—I say. And a smile floats over my
face,—a smile of hope, ending in doubt. I catch up
my pen—my trusty pen; and the clean sheet lies before
me. The paper could not be better, nor the
to write letters. But now, it is not easy.
I begin, and cross it out. I begin again, and get
on a little farther;—then cross it out. I try again,
but can write nothing. I fling down my pen in despair,
and burn the sheet, and go to my library for
some old sour treatise of Shaftesbury, or Lyttleton;
and say—talking to myself all the while;—let her
go!—She is beautiful, but I am strong; the world is
short; we—I and my dog, and my books, and my
pen, will battle it through bravely, and leave enough
for a tomb-stone.
But even as I say it, the tears start;—it is all false
saying! And I throw Shaftesbury across the room,
and take up my pen again. It glides on and on, as
my hope glows, and I tell her of our first meeting,
and of our hours in the ocean twilight, and of our unsteady
stepping on the heaving deck, and of that
parting in the noise of London, and of my joy at
seeing her in the pleasant country, and of my grief afterward.
And then I mention Bella,—her friend and
mine—and the tears flow; and then I speak of our
last meeting, and of my doubts, and of this very evening,—and
how I could not write, and abandoned it,—
and then felt something within me that made me write,
and tell her—all!—“That my heart was not
be mine,—I would cherish her, and love her always!”
Then, I feel a kind of happiness,—a strange, tumultuous
happiness, into which doubt is creeping from
time to time, bringing with it a cold shudder. I seal
the letter, and carry it—a great weight—for the mail.
It seems as if there could be no other letter that day;
and as if all the coaches and horses, and cars, and
boats were specially detailed to bear that single sheet.
It is a great letter for me; my destiny lies in it.
I do not sleep well that night;—it is a tossing
sleep; one time joy—sweet and holy joy comes to my
dreams, and an angel is by me;—another time, the
angel fades,—the brightness fades, and I wake, struggling
with fear. For many nights it is so, until the
day comes, on which I am looking for a reply.
The postman has little suspicion that the letter
which he gives me—although it contains no promissory
notes, nor moneys, nor deeds, nor articles of
trade—is yet to have a greater influence upon my life
and upon my future, than all the letters he has ever
brought to me before. But I do not show him this;
nor do I let him see the clutch with which I grasp
it. I bear it, as if it were a great and fearful burden,
to my room. I lock the door, and having broken the
seal with a quivering hand,—read:—
The Letter.
“Paul—for I think I may call you so now—I
know not how to answer you. Your letter gave me
great joy; but it gave me pain too. I cannot—will
not doubt what you say: I believe that you love me
better than I deserve to be loved; and I know that I
am not worthy of all your kind praises. But it is not
this that pains me; for I know that you have a generous
heart, and would forgive, as you always have forgiven,
any weakness of mine. I am proud too, very
proud, to have won your love; but it pains me—more
perhaps than you will believe—to think that I cannot
write back to you, as I would wish to write;—alas,
never!”
Here I dash the letter upon the floor, and with my
hand upon my forehead, sit gazing upon the glowing
coals, and breathing quick and loud.—The dream
then is broken!
Presently I read again:
—“You know that my father died, before we
had ever met. He had an old friend, who had come
from England; and who in early life had done him
brother. This old gentleman was my god-father, and
called me daughter. When my father died, he drew
me to his side, and said,—`Carry, I shall leave you,
but my old friend will be your father;' and he put my
hand in his, and said—`I give you my daughter.'
“This old gentleman had a son, older than myself;
but we were much together, and grew up as brother
and sister. I was proud of him; for he was tall and
strong, and every one called him handsome. He was
as kind too, as a brother could be; and his father was
like my own father. Every one said, and believed,
that we would one day be married; and my mother,
and my new father spoke of it openly. So did Laurence—for
that is my friend's name.
“I do not need to tell you any more, Paul; for
when I was still a girl, we had promised, that we
would one day be man and wife. Laurence has been
much in England; and I believe he is there now.
The old gentleman treats me still as a daughter, and
talks of the time, when I shall come and live with
him. The letters of Laurence are very kind; and
though he does not talk so much of our marriage as
he did, it is only I think, because he regards it as so
certain.
“I have wished to tell you all this before; but I
selfish to tell you. And now what can I say? Laurence
seems most to me like a brother;—and you,
Paul — but I must not go on. For if I marry
Laurence, as fate seems to have decided, I will try
and love him, better than all the world.
“But will you not be a brother, and love me, as
you once loved Bella;—you say my eyes are like
hers, and that my forehead is like hers;—will you not
believe that my heart is like hers too?
“Paul, if you shed tears over this letter—I have
shed them as well as you. I can write no more now.
“Adieu.”
I sit long looking upon the blaze; and when I
rouse myself, it is to say wicked things against destiny.
Again, all the future seems very blank. I cannot
love Carry, as I loved Bella; she cannot be a sister
to me; she must be more, or nothing! Again, I
seem to float singly on the tide of life, and see all
around me in cheerful groups. Everywhere the sun
shines, except upon my own cold forehead. There
seems no mercy in Heaven, and no goodness for me
upon Earth.
I write after some days, an answer to the letter.
But it is a bitter answer, in which I forget myself, in
reproaches.
Her reply, which comes speedily, is sweet, and
gentle. She is hurt by my reproaches, deeply hurt.
But with a touching kindness, of which I am not
worthy, she credits all my petulance to my wounded
feeling; she soothes me; but in soothing, only
wounds the more. I try to believe her, when she
speaks of her unworthiness;—but I cannot.
Business, and the pursuits of ambition or of interest,
pass on like dull, grating machinery. Tasks
are met, and performed with strength indeed, but
with no cheer. Courage is high, as I meet the shocks,
and trials of the world; but it is a brute, careless
courage, that glories in opposition. I laugh at any
dangers, or any insidious pitfalls;—what are they to
me? What do I possess, which it will be hard to
lose? My dog keeps by me; my toils are present;
my food is ready; my limbs are strong;—what
need for more?
The months slip, by; and the cloud that floated
over my evening sun, passes.
Laurence wandering abroad, and writing to Caroline,
as to a sister,—writes more than his father could
have wished. He has met new faces, very sweet
faces; and one which shows through the ink of his
later letters, very gorgeously. The old gentleman
writes back rebuke. But Laurence, with the letters
of Caroline before him for data, throws himself upon
his sister's kindness, and charity. It astonishes not
a little the old gentleman, to find his daughter pleading
in such strange way, for the son. “And what
will you do then, my Carry?”—the old man says.
—“Wear weeds, if you wish, sir; and love you
and Laurence more than ever!”
And he takes her to his bosom, and says—“Carry
—Carry, you are too good for that wild fellow Laurence!”
Now, the letters are different! Now they are full
of hope—dawning all over the future sky. Business,
and care, and toil, glide, as if a spirit animated them
all; it is no longer cold machine work, but intelligent,
and hopeful activity. The sky hangs upon you
lovingly, and the birds make music, that startles you
with its fineness. Men wear cheerful faces; the
storms have a kind pity, gleaming through all their
wrath.
The days approach, when you can call her yours.
For she has said it, and her mother has said it; and
the kind old gentleman, who says he will still be her
father, has said it too; and they have all welcomed
you—won by her story—with a cordiality, that has
made your cup full, to running over. Only one
or if real, are you worthy to enjoy? Will you cherish
and love always, as you have promised, that angel
who accepts your word, and rests her happiness on
your faith? Are there not harsh qualities in your
nature, which you fear may sometime make her regret
that she gave herself to your love and charity?
And those friends who watch over her, as the apple
of their eye, can you always meet their tenderness and
approval, for your guardianship of their treasure? Is
it not a treasure that makes you fearful, as well as
joyful?
But you forget this in her smile: her kindness, her
goodness, her modesty, will not let you remember it.
She forbids such thoughts; and you yield such obedience,
as you never yielded even to the commands
of a mother. And if your business, and your labor slip
by, partially neglected—what matters it? What is
interest, or what is reputation, compared with that
fullness of your heart, which is now ripe with joy?
The day for your marriage comes; and you live as
if you were in a dream. You think well, and hope
well for all the world. A flood of charity seems to
radiate from all around you. And as you sit beside
her in the twilight, on the evening before the day,
when you will call her yours, and talk of the coming
hopes, and of the soft shadows of the past; and whisper
of Laurence, a new brother, coming home joyful with
his bride,—and lay your cheek to hers—life seems as
if it were all day, and as if there could be no night!
The marriage passes; and she is yours,—yours
forever.
New Travel.
Again I am upon the sea; but not alone. She
whom I first met upon the wastes of ocean, is there
beside me. Again I steady her tottering step upon
the deck; once it was a drifting, careless pleasure;
now the pleasure is holy.
Once the fear I felt, as the storms gathered, and
night came, and the ship tossed madly, and great
waves gathering swift, and high, came down like slipping
mountains, and spent their force upon the quivering
vessel, was a selfish fear. But it is so no
longer. Indeed I hardly know fear; for how can the
tempests harm her? Is she not too good to suffer
any of the wrath of heaven?
And in nights of calm,—holy nights, we lean over
the ship's side, looking down, as once before, into the
dark depths, and murmur again snatches of ocean
song, and talk of those we love; and we peer among the
homes of friends. And as the great ocean-swells
come rocking under us, and carry us up and down
along the valleys and the hills of water, they seem
like deep pulsations of the great heart of nature,
heaving us forward toward the goal of life, and to the
gates of heaven!
We watch the ships as they come upon the horizon,
and sweep toward us, like false friends, with the
sun glittering on their sails; and then shift their
course, and bear away—with their bright sails, turned
to spots of shadow. We watch the long winged
birds skimming the waves hour after hour,—like
pleasant thoughts—now dashing before our bows, and
then sweeping behind, until they are lost in the hollows
of the water.
Again life lies open, as it did once before; but the
regrets, disappointments, and fruitless resolves do
not come to trouble me now. It is the future,
which has become as level as the sea; and she is beside
me,—the sharer in that future—to look out with
me, upon the joyous sparkle of water, and to count
with me, the dazzling ripples, that lie between us and
the shore. A thousand pleasant plans come up, and
are abandoned, like the waves we leave behind us;
a thousand other joyous plans, dawn upon our fancy,
like the waves that glitter before us. We talk of
talk of her mother, who is even now watching the
winds that waft her child over the ocean; we talk of
the kindly old man, her god-father, who gave her a
father's blessing; we talk low, and in the twilight
hours, of Isabel—who sleeps.
At length, as the sun goes down upon a fair night,
over the western waters which we have passed, we
see before us, the low blue line of the shores of Cornwall
and Devon. In the night, shadowy ships glide
past us with gleaming lanterns; and in the morning,
we see the yellow cliffs of the Isle of Wight; and
standing out from the land, is the dingy sail of our
pilot. London with its fog, roar, and crowds, has
not the same charms that it once had; that roar and
crowd is good to make a man forget his griefs—forget
himself, and stupify him with amazement. We are
in no need of such forgetfulness.
We roll along the banks of the sylvan river that
glides by Hampton Court; and we toil up Richmond
Hill, to look together upon that scene of water, and
meadow,—of leafy copses, and glistening villas, of
brown cottages, and clustered hamlets,—of solitary
oaks, and loitering herds—all spread like a veil of
beauty, upon the bosom of the Thames. But we
cannot linger here, nor even under the glorious old
boles of Windsor Forest; but we hurry on to that
skeins of water.
Again we loiter under the oaks, where we have
loitered before; and the sleek deer gaze on us with
their liquid eyes, as they gazed before. The squirrels
sport among the boughs as fearless as ever; and some
wandering puss pricks her long ears at our steps,
and bounds off along the hedge rows to her burrow.
Again I see Carry in her velvet riding-cap, with the
white plume; and I meet her as I met her before,
under the princely trees that skirt the northern avenue.
I recal the evening when I sauntered out at the
park gates, and gained a blessing from the porter's
wife, and dreamed that strange dream;—now, the
dream seems more real, than my life.—“God bless
you!”—said the woman again.
—“Aye, old lady, God has blessed me!”—and I
fling her a guinea, not as a gift, but as a debt.
The bland farmer lives yet; he scarce knows me,
until I tell him of my bout around his oat-field, at the
tail of his long stilted plough. I find the old pew in
the parish church. Other holly sprigs are hung
now; and I do not doze, for Carry is beside me.
The curate drawls the service; but it is pleasant to
listen; and I make the responses with an emphasis,
that tells more I fear, for my joy, than for my religion.
The old groom at the mansion in the Park,
tells long stories (to which I love to listen) of the old
visit of mistress Carry, when she followed the hounds
with the best of the English lasses.
—“Yer honor may well be proud; for not a prettier
face, or a kinder heart has been in Devon, since
mistress Carry left us!”
But pleasant as are the old woods, full of memories,
and pleasant as are the twilight evenings upon the
terrace—we must pass over to the mountains of
Switzerland. There we are to meet Laurence.
Carry has never seen the magnificence of the Juras;
and as we journey over the hills between Dole, and
the border line, looking upon the rolling heights
shrouded with pine trees, and down thousands of feet,
at the very road side, upon the cottage roofs, and
emerald valleys, where the dun herds are feeding
quietly, she is lost in admiration. At length we
come to that point above the little town of Gex, from
which you see spread out before you, the meadows
that skirt Geneva, the placid surface of Lake Leman
and the rough, shaggy mountains of Savoy;—and far
behind them, breaking the horizon with snowy cap,
and with dark pinnacles—Mont Blanc, and the
Needles of Chamouni.
I point out to her in the valley below, the little
town of Ferney, where stands the deserted chateau of
the old home of de Stael; and across, with its white
walls reflected upon the bosom of the water, the house
where Byron wrote the prisoner of Chillon. Among
the grouping roofs of Geneva, we trace the dark
cathedral, and the tall hotels shining on the edge of
the lake. And I tell of the time, when I tramped
down through yonder valley, with my future all
visionary, and broken, and drank the splendor of the
scene, only as a quick relief to the monotony of my
solitary life.
—“And now, Carry, with your hand locked in
mine, and your heart mine—yonder lake sleeping in
the sun, and the snowy mountains with their rosy hue,
seem like the smile of nature, bidding us be glad!”
Laurence is at Geneva; he welcomes Carry, as he
would welcome a sister. He is a noble fellow, and
tells me much of his sweet Italian wife; and presents
me to the smiling, blushing—Enrica! She has
learned English now; she has found, she says, a
better teacher, than ever I was. Yet she welcomes
me warmly, as a sister might; and we talk of those
old evenings by the blazing fire, and of the one-eyed
Maestro, as children long separated, might talk of
their school tasks, and of their teachers. She cannot
tell me enough of her praises of Laurence, and of his
Laurence is better.”
Carry admires her soft brown hair, and her deep
liquid eye, and wonders how I could ever have left
Rome?
—Do you indeed wonder—Carry?
And together we go down into Savoy, to that
marvellous valley, which lies under the shoulder of
Mont Blanc; and we wandered over the Mer de Glace,
and picked Alpine roses from the edge of the frowning
glacier. We toil at night-fall up to the monastery
of the Great St. Bernard, where the new forming
ice crackles in the narrow foot-way, and the cold
moon glistens over wastes of snow, and upon the
windows of the dark Hospice. Again, we are among
the granite heights, whose ledges are filled with ice,
upon the Grimsel. The pond is dark and cold; the
paths are slippery;—the great glacier of the Aar
sends down icy breezes, and the echoes ring from rock
to rock, as if the ice-God answered. And yet we
neither suffer, nor fear.
In the sweet valley of Meyringen, we part from
Laurence: he goes northward, by Grindelwald, and
Thun,—thence to journey westward, and to make for
the Roman girl, a home beyond the ocean. Enrica
bids me go on to Rome: she knows that Carry will
love its soft warm air, its ruins, its pictures and
And she gives me kind messages for her mother, and
for Cesare; and should we be in Rome at the Easter
season, she bids us remember her, when we listen to
the Miserere, and when we see the great Chiesa on
fire, and when we saunter upon the Pincian hill;—
and remember, that it is her home.
We follow them with our eyes, as they go up the
steep height over which falls the white foam of the
clattering Reichenbach; and they wave their hands
toward us, and disappear upon the little plateau which
stretches toward the crystal Rosenlaui, and the tall,
still, Engel-Horner.
May the mountain angels guard them!
As we journey on toward that wonderful pass of
Splugen, I recal by the way, upon the heights, and in
the valleys, the spots where I lingered years before;—
here, I plucked a flower, there, I drank from that
cold, yellow glacier water; and here, upon some rock
overlooking a stretch of broken mountains, hoary with
their eternal frosts, I sat musing upon that very Future,
which is with me now. But never, even when the
ice-genii were most prodigal of their fancies to the
wanderer, did I look for more joy, or a better angel.
Afterward, when all our trembling upon the Alpine
paths has gone by, we are rolling along under the
chestnuts and lindens that skirt the banks of Como.
out, as well as I may, the loitering place of the bravi,
and the track of poor Don Abbondio. We follow in
the path of the discomfited Renzi, to where the
dainty spire, and pinnacles of the Duomo of Milan,
glisten against the violet sky.
Carry longs to see Venice; its water-streets, and
palaces have long floated in her visions. In the
bustling activity of our own country, and in the quiet
fields of England, that strange, half-deserted capital,
lying in the Adriatic, has taken the strongest hold
upon her fancy.
So we leave Padua, and Verona behind us, and find
ourselves upon a soft spring noon, upon the end of
the iron road which stretches across the lagoon,
toward Venice. With the hissing of steam in the
ear, it is hard to think of the wonderful city, we are
approaching. But as we escape from the carriage,
and set our feet down into one of those strange,
hearse-like, ancient boats, with its sharp iron prow,
and listen to the melodious rolling tongue of the
Venetian gondolier:—as we see rising over the watery
plain before us, all glittering in the sun, tall, square
towers with pyramidal tops, and clustered domes, and
minarets; and sparkling roofs lifting from marble
walls—all so like the old paintings;—and as we glide
nearer and nearer to the floating wonder, under the
as we ride up swiftly under the deep, broad shadows
of palaces, and see plainly the play of the sea-water
in the crevices of the masonry,—and turn into
narrow rivers shaded darkly by overhanging walls,
hearing no sound, but of voices, or the swaying of the
water against the houses,—we feel the presence of the
place. And the mystic fingers of the Past, grappling
our spirits, lead them away—willing and rejoicing
captives, through the long vista of the ages, that are
gone.
Carry is in a trance;—rapt by the witchery of the
scene, into dream. This is her Venice; nor have all
the visions that played upon her fancy, been equal to
the enchanting presence of this hour of approach.
Afterward, it becomes a living thing,—stealing
upon the affections, and upon the imagination by a
thousand coy advances. We wander under the warm
Italian sunlight to the steps from which rolled the
white head of poor Marino Faliero. The gentle
Carry can now thrust her ungloved hand, into the
terrible Lion's mouth. We enter the salon of the
fearful Ten; and peep through the half opened door,
into the cabinet of the more fearful Three. We go
through the deep dungeons of Carmagnola and of
Carrara; and we instruct the willing gondolier to
push his dark boat under the Bridge of Sighs; and
door, and read of—
—that fearful closet at the foot
Lurking for prey, which, when a victim came,
Grew less and less, contracting to a span
An iron door, urged onward by a screw,
Forcing out life!
I sail, listening to nothing but the dip of the gondolier's
oar, or to her gentle words, fast under the
palace door, which closed that fearful morning, on
the guilt and shame of Bianca Capello. Or, with
souls lit up by the scene, into a buoyancy that can
scarce distinguish between what is real, and what is
merely written,—we chase the anxious step of the
forsaken Corinna; or seek among the veteran palaces
the casement of the old Brabantio,—the chamber of
Desdemona,—the house of Jessica, and trace among
the strange Jew money-changers, who yet haunt the
Rialto, the likeness of the bearded Shylock. We
wander into stately churches, brushing over grass, or
tell-tale flowers that grow in the court, and find them
damp and cheerless; the incense rises murkily, and
rests in a thick cloud over the altars, and over the
paintings; the music, if so be that the organ notes
are swelling under the roof, is mournfully plaintive.
Of an afternoon we sail over to the Lido, to gladden
our eyes with a sight of land and green things,
and we pass none upon the way, save silent oarsmen,
with barges piled high with the produce of their gardens,—pushing
their way down toward the floating
city. And upon the narrow island, we find Jewish
graves, half covered by drifted sand; and from
among them, watch the sunset glimmering over a
desolate level of water. As we glide back, lights
lift over the Lagoon, and double along the Guideca,
and the Grand Canal. The little neighbor isles will
have their company of lights dancing in the water;
and from among them, will rise up against the mellow
evening sky of Italy, gaunt, unlighted houses.
After the nightfall, which brings no harmful dew
with it, I stroll, with her hand within my arm,—as
once upon the sea, and in the English Park, and in
the home-land—over that great square which lies before
the palace of St. Marks. The white moon is
riding in the middle heaven, like a globe of silver;
the gondoliers stride over the echoing stones; and
their long black shadows, stretching over the pavement,
or shaking upon the moving water, seem like
great funereal plumes, waving over the bier of Venice.
Carrying thence whole treasures of thought and
fancy, to feed upon in the after years, we wander to
Rome.
I find the old one-eyed maestro, and am met with
cordial welcome by the mother of the pretty Enrica.
The Count has gone to the marches of Ancona.
Lame Pietro still shuffles around the boards at the
Lepré, and the flower sellers at the corner, bind me
a more brilliant bouquet than ever, for a new beauty
at Rome. As we ramble under the broken arches of
the great aqueduct stretching toward Frascati, I tell
Carry, the story of my trip in the Appenines; and
we search for the pretty Carlotta. But she is married,
they tell us, to a Neapolitan guardsman. In
the spring twilight, we wander upon those heights
which lie between Frascati and Albano; and looking
westward, see that glorious view of the Campagna,
which can never be forgotten. But beyond the Campagna,
and beyond the huge hulk of St. Peter's, heaving
into the sky from the middle waste, we see, or
fancy we see, a glimpse of the sea which stretches out
and on to the land we love, better than Rome. And
in fancy, we build up that home, which shall belong
to us, on the return;—a home, that has slumbered
long in the future; and which, now that the future
has come, lies fairly before me.
Home.
Years seem to have passed. They have mellowed
life into ripeness. The start, and change, and hot
ambition of youth, seem to have gone by. A calm,
and joyful quietude has succeeded. That future
which still lies before me, seems like a roseate twilight,
sinking into a peaceful, and silent night.
My home is a cottage, near that where Isabel once
lived. The same valley is around me; the same
brook rustles, and loiters under the gnarled roots of
the overhanging trees. The cottage is no mock cottage,
but a substantial, wide spreading cottage, with
clustering gables, and ample shade;—such a cottage,
as they build upon the slopes of Devon. Vines clamber
over it, and the stones show mossy through the
interlacing climbers. There are low porches, with
cozy arm chairs; and generous oriels, fragrant with
mignionette, and the blue blossoming violets.
The chimney stacks rise high, and show clear
against the heavy pine trees, that ward off the blasts
of winter. The dovecote, is a habited dovecote, and
the purple-necked pigeons swoop around the roofs,
in great companies. The hawthorn is budding into
its June fragrance along all the lines of fence; and
our neglected azalias and rhododendrons chiefest
among them,—stand in picturesque groups upon the
close shaven lawn.
The gateway in the thicket below, is between two
mossy old posts of stone; and there is a tall hemlock
flanked by a sturdy pine, for sentinel. Within
the cottage, the library is wainscotted with native
oak; and my trusty gun hangs upon a branching pair
of antlers. My rod and nets are disposed above the
generous book-shelves; and a stout eagle, once a
tenant of the native woods, sits perched over the central
alcove. An old fashioned mantel is above the
brown stone jams of the country fire-place; and along
it are distributed records of travel;—little bronze
temples from Rome, the pietro duro of Florence, the
porcelain busts of Dresden, the rich iron of Berlin,
and a cup fashioned from a stag's horn, from the
Black Forest by the Rhine.
Massive chairs stand here and there, in tempting
attitude; strewed over an oaken table in the middle,
are the uncut papers, and volumes of the day; and
upon a lion's skin stretched before the hearth, is lying
another Tray.
But this is not all. There are children in the cottage.
There is Jamie—we think him handsome—
for he has the dark hair of his mother, and the same
—little Carry I must call her now—with a face full
of glee, and rosy with health; then there is a little
rogue some two years old, whom we call Paul—a
very bad boy,—as we tell him.
The mother is as beautiful as ever, and far more
dear to me; for gratitude has been adding, year by
year, to love. There have been times when a harsh
word of mine, uttered in the fatigues of business, have
touched her; and I have seen that soft eye fill with
tears; and I have upbraided myself for causing her
one pang. But such things she does not remember;
or remembers, only to cover with her gentle forgiveness.
Laurence and Enrica are living near us. And the
old gentleman, who was Carry's god-father, sits with
me, on sunny days upon the porch, and takes little
Paul upon his knee, and wonders if two such daughters
as Enrica, and Carry are to be found in the
world. At twilight, we ride over to see Laurence;
Jamie mounts with the coachman; little Carry puts
on her wide-rimmed Leghorn for the evening visit;
and the old gentleman's plea for Paul, cannot be denied.
The mother too is with us; and old Tray
comes whisking along, now frolicking before the
horses' heads, and then bounding off after the flight
of some belated bird.
Away from that cottage home, I seem away from
life. Within it, that broad, and shadowy future,
which lay before me in boyhood and in youth, is
garnered,—like a fine mist, gathered into drops of
crystal.
And when away—those long letters, dating from
the cottage home, are what tie me to life. That
cherished wife, far dearer to me now, than when she
wrote that first letter, which seemed a dark veil between
me and the future—writes me now, as tenderly
as then. She narrates, in her delicate way, all the
incidents of the home life; she tells me of their rides,
and of their games, and of the new planted trees;—
of all their sunny days, and of their frolics on the
lawn; she tells me how Jamie is studying, and of
little Carry's beauty, growing every day, and of
rogueish Paul—so like his father! And she sends
me a kiss from each of them; and bids me such adieu,
and such `God's blessing,' that it seems as if an
angel guarded me.
But this is not all; for Jamie has written a postscript:
—“Dear Father,” he says, “mother wishes me
to tell you how I am studying. What would you
think, father, to have me talk in French to you,
when you come back? I wish you would come back
under my window is all full of blossoms. If you
should bring me a present, as you almost always do,—
I would like a fishing rod.
Home.
And little Carry has her fine, rambling characters
running into a second postscript.
“Why don't you come, papa; you stay too long;
I have ridden the pony twice; once he most threw
me off. This is all from
Home.
And Paul has taken the pen too, and in his extraordinary
effort to make a big P, has made a very big
blot. And Jamie writes under it—“This is Paul's
work, Pa; but he says it's a love blot, only he loves
you ten hundred times more.”
And after your return, Jamie will insist that you
should go with him to the brook, and sit down with
him upon a tuft of the brake, to fling off a line into
the eddies, though only the nibbling roach are sporting
below. You have instructed the workmen to
spare the clumps of bank-willows, that the wood-duck
may have a covert in winter, and that the Bob-o-Lincolns
may have a quiet nesting place in the spring.
Sometimes your wife,—too kind to deny such favor
you pick meadow daisies in memory of the old time.
Little Carry weaves them into rude chaplets, to dress
the forehead of Paul, and they dance along the green-sward,
and switch off the daffodils, and blow away the
dandelion seeds, to see if their wishes are to come
true. Jamie holds a butter cup under Carry's chin,
to find if she loves gold; and Paul, the rogue, teases
them, by sticking a thistle into sister's curls.
The pony has hard work to do under Carry's swift
riding—but he is fed by her own hand, with the cold
breakfast rolls. The nuts are gathered in time, and
stored for long winter evenings, when the fire is burning
bright and cheerily—a true, hickory blaze,—
which sends its waving gleams over eager, smiling
faces, and over well-stored book shelves, and portraits
of dear, lost ones. While from time to time, that
wife, who is the soul of the scene, will break upon
the children's prattle, with the silver melody of her
voice, running softly and sweetly through the couplets
of Crabbe's stories, or the witchery of the Flodden
Tale.
Then the boys will guess conundrums, and play at fox
and geese; and Tray, cherished in his age, and old
Milo petted in his dotage, lie side by side, upon the
lion's skin, before the blazing hearth. Little Tomtit
the goldfinch sits sleeping on his perch, or cocks
squint upon our family group.
But there is no future without its straggling clouds.
Even now a shadow is trailing along the landscape.
It is a soft and mild day of summer. The leaves
are at their fullest. A southern breeze has been
blowing up the valley all the morning, and the light,
smoky haze hangs in the distant mountain gaps, like
a veil on beauty. Jamie has been busy with his lessons,
and afterward playing with Milo upon the lawn.
Little Carry has come in from a long ride—her face
blooming, and her eyes all smiles, and joy. The
mother has busied herself with those flowers she loves
so well. Little Paul, they say, has been playing in
the meadow, and old Tray has gone with him.
But at dinner time, Paul has not come back.
“Paul ought not to ramble off so far,” I say.
The mother says nothing; but there is a look of
anxiety upon her face, that disturbs me. Jamie
wonders where Paul can be, and he saves for him,
whatever he knows Paul will like—a heaping platefull.
But the dinner hour passes, and Paul does not
come. Old Tray lies in the sun-shine by the porch.
Now the mother is indeed anxious. And I, though
I conceal this from her, find my fears strangely
active. Something like instinct guides me to the
Paul!—Paul! But there is no answer.
All the afternoon we search, and the neighbors
search; but it is a fruitless toil. There is no joy
that evening: the meal passes in silence; only little
Carry with tears in her eyes, asks,—if Paul will soon
come back? All the night we search and call:—the
mother even braving the night air, and running here
and there, until the morning finds us sad, and despairing.
That day—the next—cleared up the mystery; but
cleared it up with darkness. Poor little Paul!—he
has sunk under the murderous eddies of the brook!
His boyish prattle, his rosy smiles, his artless talk,
are lost to us forever!
I will not tell how nor when we found him: nor
will I tell of our desolate home, and of her grief—the
first crushing grief of her life.
The cottage is still. The servants glide noiseless,
as if they might startle the poor little sleeper. The
house seems cold—very cold. Yet it is summer
weather; and the south breeze plays softly along the
meadow, and softly over the murderous eddies of the
brook.
Then comes the hush of burial. The kind mourners
are there:—it is easy for them to mourn!
Thou, who did'st take upon thyself human woe, and
drank deep of every pang in life, let thy spirit come
and heal this grief, and guide toward that Better
Land, where justice and love shall reign, and hearts
laden with anguish, shall rest forevermore!'
Weeks roll on; and a smile of resignation lights up
the saddened features of the mother. Those dark
mourning robes speak to the heart deeper, and more
tenderly, than ever the bridal costume. She lightens
the weight of your grief by her sweet words of resignation:—“Paul,”
she says, “God has taken our
boy!”
Other weeks roll on. Joys are still left—great and
ripe joys. The cottage smiling in the autumn sumshine
is there: the birds are in the forest boughs:
Jamie and little Carry are there; and she, who is
more than them all, is cheerful, and content.
Heaven has taught us that the brightest future has
its clouds;—that this life is a motley of lights and
shadows. And as we look upon the world around us,
and upon the thousand forms of human misery, there
is a gladness in our deep thanksgiving.
A year goes by; but it leaves no added shadow on
our hearth-stone. The vines clamber, and flourish:
the oaks are winning age and grandeur: little Carry
Jamie with his dark hair, and flashing eyes, is the
pride of his mother.
There is no alloy to pleasure, but the remembrance
of poor little Paul. And even that, chastened as it
is with years, is rather a grateful memorial that our
life is not all here, than a grief that weighs upon our
hearts.
Sometimes, leaving little Carry and Jamie to their
play, we wander at twilight to the willow tree, beneath
which our drowned boy sleeps calmly, for the
Great Awaking. It is a Sunday, in the week-day of
our life, to linger by the little grave,—to hang
flowers upon the head-stone, and to breathe a prayer
that our little Paul may sleep well, in the arms of
Him who loveth children!
And her heart, and my heart, knit together by sorrow,
as they had been knit by joy—a silver thread
mingled with the gold—follow the dead one to the
Land that is before us; until at last we come to
reckon the boy, as living in the new home, which
when this is old, shall be ours also. And my spirit,
speaking to his spirit, in the evening watches, seems
to say joyfully—so joyfully that the tears half choke
the utterance—“Paul, my boy, we will be there!”
And the mother, turning her face to mine, so that
I see the moisture in her eye, and catch its heavenly
have said it,—“Yes, dear, we will be THERE!”
The night had now come, and my day under the
oaks was ended. But a crimson belt yet lingered
over the horizon, though the stars were out.
A line of shaggy mist lay along the surface of the
brook. I took my gun from beside the tree, and my
shot-pouch from its limb, and whistling for Carlo—as
if it had been Tray—I strolled over the bridge, and
down the lane, to the old house under the elms.
I dreamed pleasant dreams that night;—for
I dreamed that my Reverie was real.
| Reveries of a bachelor, or, A book of the heart | |