 | CHAPTER XIII. The forsaken |  |
13. CHAPTER XIII.
Threatens eternal slaughter to the soul.
—Ford.
The first rays of morning, as they stole through the
grated window, discovered the miserable pair as mute
as statues beside each other. No chiselled marble was
paler, and they were as motionless, settled despair having
already succeeded the deep agony of grief. Not
a word had passed their lips during that tedious night
of mental suffering, and the dead silence had scarcely
been broken even by a convulsive sob. The shaft was
poisoned with despair, and it no sooner reached the
heart than the death of hope followed without a struggle.
When they first awoke to a sense of their condition,
after being left alone, the light of the lamp was
insupportable to them, for it served to betray the one
to the other, and they could not withstand each other's
gaze. Jurian arose and extinguished it, and fervently
did they pray, but no words passed their lips, that the
sun might never rise again, and that time henceforth
might become one eternal and starless night. With
anguish did they behold the first rays of the sun gradually
stealing along the wall, as it dispersed the sense
of loneliness with which the gloom of night had enveloped
them, and they no longer desired to look upon
a joyous world in which they could not mingle. Miriam
was the first to break the deep silence that had
ejaculation from the heart, and scarcely audible—
“It is already day!” she sighed. “Where shall I
hide myself from the eyes of the world; where from
the sight of heaven!”
“Miriam, speak to me. Let me hear the sound of
your voice again. This fearful conflict of thought must
be interrupted, or it will terminate in madness. Speak
to me, in pity speak to me.”
She turned to him, struggled to speak, and burst
into tears.
“Weep on, Miriam,” he continued. “Thank God
that you can weep, for tears may assuage the anguish
of your heart. O! that I could weep with you.”
“Have you not wept? Your eyes are red as fire.”
“And burn like fire; but I cannot weep. I have
not shed one tear. Thought has become as subtle and
scorching as flame, and it seems as if the very fountain
of tears were dried within me. My heart is swoln too
large for my bosom, my eyeballs ache to bursting, and
yet the natural channels that might relieve my anguish
are closed. I have often thought if I could weep I
should feel relieved.”
“I now no longer wonder at the alteration in your
appearance that I remarked last night.”
“Incessant thought has wasted my frame away, for
what chance has the body when the mind is struggling
to cast off its earthly fetters! I knew not, until lately,
the mighty attributes of that mercurial essence. They
say that the human form is its dwelling place, and yet
the bounds of the universe are too narrow to confine
it. The elements cannot obstruct its progress, for it
will traverse the world of waters to their uttermost limits
in an instant, and cleave the highest heaven with
greater rapidity than light itself can travel. No place
is so sacred that it may not enter. It can delve through
the earth to the centre, and hear the groans of the condemned;
and it can stray unfettered through the happy
the Most High appears to be approachable. At least
so it seemed to me; for there methought I have stood,
Miriam, for days together, awaiting my sentence, loth
to depart until judgment should be pronounced upon
me. And so strongly was I impressed with the belief
that it was no hallucination of mind, but that I had actually
visited the world of spirits, and learnt that I
should there be adjudged with greater clemency than
on earth, that at times my soul has cast off the mountain
that weighs upon it, and resumed the serenity of
former days.”
“How can that be!”
“And wherefore should it not be? It is the intention
that constitutes the crime, and not the act, for
crimes of the deepest die have been perpetrated, and
passed under the name of virtues. Human sacrifices
have been made to appease the gods of the heathen,
and the judge of Israel offered up his own daughter,
and believed the unnatural sacrifice acceptable to a
merciful Judge. And was he criminal, or was the appalling
act purged and purified by the deep devotion
that dictated it? If the intent can divest such a deed
of its horror and criminality, and instead of punishment
it is to meet with reward, then surely, Miriam, there
can be no crime in any act, if crime were not intended.”
“Why reason thus? We are steeped to the lips in
sin, and no sophistry can shake that dreadful conviction!”
“And what is sin, my sister?”
“O! call me not by that name! Until I am dead,
never breathe that word again.”
“It shall be buried in my heart, Miriam. But what
do you understand by sin? Are the principles of right
and wrong immutable? Came they into the world when
creation was new, or have they grown out of human
institutions, so that that which was sanctioned and enjoined
upon man in one age, may become an offence
from the opinions that now prevail, we are indeed
criminal, but if that race of people, who we are taught
to believe possessed the most immediate knowledge of
the divine law, sinned not with their eyes open, then
Miriam, there is still room for us to hope, for that which
was free from moral guilt at one period, no subsequent
rule that man may prescribe for his conduct can render
otherwise. True, the infringement of those rules may
call forth human punishment, and to keep them inviolate,
man in his arrogance may threaten us with divine
vengeance, and impiously lay down a rule of action for
the Creator, but it does not follow that those rules shall
be recognised beyond this world.”
“Whither would you lead me?”
“If human laws are to test the degree of moral turpitude,
there can be nothing more undefined and uncertain
in its nature than crime, for that which one
nation sanctions another may condemn, and deeds
which at one period were calculated to paralyze every
hope in heaven, at another may be considered justifiable.”
“Can our crime ever be palliated?”
“Call it not crime—we are unhappy, but not criminal.
We are taught to believe, Miriam, that there was
a period when the natural ties that subsist between us,
would have been so many links to bind us more closely
together. Who was it that solaced Cain in his wanderings?
Who was it that Abel took to his bosom?
There are many instances wherein it was pronounced
right that the germ of natural affection should be permitted
to expand, and that the ties which heaven had
entwined should be strengthened by those which earth
had created. But that is no longer right; and I am
aware that he who credits it has a fearful weight of
human condemnation on him; heavier than mortal can
contend with, but has he also the condemnation of
heaven to oncounter?”
“O! do not reason thus! You are mad, Jurian!
It is blasphemy to doubt it.”
“I fear it is; but like a drowning man, Miriam, I
grasp in my desperation even at the bubbles on the surface.
I have endeavoured to divest myself of the prejudices
of education, to turn the mind into a frightful
path that heretofore it trembled to enter, and I have
laboured to extinguish the very light of reason, that I
might not see the inky waters that lay before me, but
I struggle in vain, and like a weary swimmer soon
must sink. O, Miriam, is it not a fearful thing to be
plunged thus in utter despair—to meet with execration
here, and condemnation hereafter, for crimes of which
we were unconscious! In trying one accused, by human
laws, they judge him by the intent, and if the absence
of evil design be manifest, no matter how atrocious
the wrong inflicted, but slight stain is left upon
him. Then is it just that we should be utterly condemned
who knew not—It cannot be possible! We
will not sink yet! Hope, Miriam, hope!”
“For nothing in this world.”
“True, there is nothing left us here. Our race is
run—but in the next! Look there, with confidence
look there.”
“I dare not raise my eyes—my thoughts ascend,
but the weight is so heavy they sink to earth again.”
“Despair not yet. Let me not see you sink. Struggle
to bear up. You must not sink.”
“What have we to hope for?”
“Every thing to hope, and nothing to lose. Let
not thine eye rest upon earth, or thou canst not fail
being wretched. Look abroad, and thou wilt perceive
that it has been so ordered that even the most abject
may behold more of heaven than earth in his pilgrimage.
It matters not whether he stand upon the mountain
top or in the depth of the valley, still heaven appears
to him boundless, while the orb he treads upon
is circumscribed.”
“But in all that boundless space is there one spark
of mercy for me?”
“Doubt not, Miriam. Bear up, or you are lost.
Suffer not despair to take such full possession of your
soul, that not a spark of hope remains to solace.”
“It is in vain to struggle, Jurian. Support me; I
would lie down.”
“How pale you are, and faint! Gracious God! you
are dying!”
“Not dying—not yet; but sick to the soul.”
“Mercy, mercy heaven!”
“O! that I dare pray!”
He supported her to the bed, and she lay down and
covered her face with her hands. He kneeled beside
her, and a few minutes after Foster opened the door of
the cell and ushered in M`Crea. Jurian rose as he
entered, and on recognising the surgeon, he exclaimed
in a deep and hurried tone—
“It is well, sir, that you have come, that you may
behold how one sin begets another, and witness, before
you die, the last bitter fruits of your own crime. You
have been a prolific source of misery to many, but here
lay your last victims, and earth supports not two so
utterly wretched.”
“I must answer for my own sins, Jurian,” replied
M`Crea; “but why am I to be reproached with
your's?”
“Because they are but fruits of the same tree. Had
you not been criminal, I should have been innocent,
and that polluted one have passed from this world as
spotless as she entered it. To you alone, sir, is to be
attributed our eternal shame and misery.”
“Add not to the bitterness of the present moment,
by reproaching the gray head of your father with the
errors of his youth,” replied M`Crea, with evident agitation.
“Is it now a time to claim the name of father,” replied
Jurian, “when it can be of little moment to you,
far, as strangers, and have but a few more steps to travel,
then where is the use of making a parade at parting?”
“Unfeeling boy! can you disown a penitent parent,
and treat him as a stranger!”
“Did not that penitent parent disown his son? You
cast me off, from infancy, and yet expect to find a heart
overflowing with filial love, without bearing in mind
that your neglect was calculated to chill every germ of
affection that nature may have implanted in my bosom.
Your kindness never put a pulse in action. The channels
of natural love, if such there be, were soon chilled;
the warm blood never passed through them, and
it is now too late to find the way. That fault rests on
your head, not mine. It is in vain, sir, to trust to natural
ties when we refuse to create factitious ones, and
too frequently are the latter mistaken for the former, as
I am perfectly satisfied that they do not exist in this bosom.
I can readily conceive that there can be no bond
so strong, no friendship so sincere, as that which may
exist between father and son, but then it rests with the
father to create it. Implanted in infancy and growing
with years, it may at times be mistaken for the mysterious
link by which nature is supposed to connect those
of the same blood, but my heart can recognise no such
tie.”
“Is it in man's nature to become so depraved, as to
lose all feeling for the author of his being?”
“True, I owe you life, but look into the extent of
the obligation. I was stigmatized with shame when
first I breathed, and you were the cause. In my progress
through life that shame has adhered to me as a
consuming leprosy, and there is no cure. It was your
will that I should enter upon the world a proscribed
being; with a ban against me that even the grave cannot
remove. You foresaw this, and yet cared not. You
curst me at my birth, avoided me through life, and now
of father can work no miracle in a heart that has never
experienced a father's love.”
“O! spare me, my son,” exclaimed M`Crea.
“Spare me the most humiliating consequence of
crime. A father to be rebuked by his offspring—to
have the errors of his youth called up in judgment
against him, until he trembles with shame and remorse;
to have the death-wound torn open and made bleed
anew, by the hands of a son, is unnatural. Spare me
that; and if you knew what I have already endured,
your bitter reproaches would be changed for tears of
compassion.”
“It may not be expected,” replied Jurian, in the
same cold tone, “that he who cannot shed a tear for
his own griefs, will weep for those of another. But
why still dwell upon the tie that should exist between
father and son? Let us remove the veil that blinds
your better judgment. Am I indebted for my existence
to the gratification of your own selfish passions,
or to a holy wish to possess a son in whom your affections
might concentrate? Assuredly to the former, and
you would have rejoiced if death had removed me from
your sight when I first breathed. I was looked upon
as a foe to your peace. Nature formed no covenant
between us, at least you did not acknowledge it, and
from that hour, through life, we have been as strangers
to each other. Then wherefore should you expect to
find a heart overflowing with natural love for you? As
well might the husbandman who scatters no seed look
for a golden harvest, and complain at finding nothing
but weeds and nettles.
“Jurian, I feel in all its force the truth of your rebuke.
I have lost a son by my own injustice towards
him, and such a one as would have realized my most
sanguine hopes. But it is not yet too late to redeem
what has past.”
“It is now too late. As well might you expect
to revive hope in this bosom. Behold the change that
a few days have effected, and you may conclude that
the cause is deep rooted, and not upon the surface.
And look there,” he continued, pointing at Miriam,
who sighed deeply, and sobbed aloud, “the storm has
also passed over that delicate flower: think you, will
it ever hold up its head again? No, never in this
world; she has been too cruelly crushed, and there is
no relief but in the grave. Look there, I say; and
can you recall in that forlorn being the once lovely
creature whose joyous voice filled every heart with
gladness? Behold, and reflect that to your errors
may be traced this utter desolation.”
“To my errors! I am lost in amazement. In what
manner have I wronged her?”
“Had you been candid to me; had I known to
whom I owed my being, she would still have been innocent,
and escaped the accumulation of horror that
now weighs her to the earth. But, no, the secret was
preserved until our ruin was consummated, and then
divulged to show the extent of our guilt, and the hopelessness
of our fate. Why was it not permitted to die
in the bosom that had sheltered it so long! Why was
it at this time brought to light, and with it the damning
truth that I had laid the crime of incest on my sister's
soul. It would have been mercy to have let us died in
ignorance of this.”
“Jurian, hear me.”
“And wherefore? Is it in the power of words to
extenuate your conduct, or mitigate my crime? If not,
it is but idle waste of breath to speak. Go, and leave
us.”
“Hear me, I say. Your offence does not assume
the frightful aspect you imagine, for she is not your
sister.”
“Merciful heaven! say on.”
“I repeat it; she is not the child of Alice Grey, who
is at hand to attest the truth of what I now assert.”
“Can this be true! Miriam, hearest thou the words
he has spoken? Thou art not my sister. Arise from
the bed of eternal death, to new life, my Miriam, for
thou art not my sister.”
The poor girl sobbed as if her heart were breaking,
while Jurian continued—
“Be comforted, for if this prove true, we shall be
relieved of more than half our wretchedness.”
“I know not what to think,” she replied. “My
brain is bewildered, and like a troubled sleeper, I but
pass from one horrid dream to another.”
“But thou hearest, thou art not my sister—that
frightful dream is over. Awaken thy mind to a full
sense of that truth, and it will inspire you with new
life, and give you courage to bear what remains.”
“Yes, thank God, that dream is over—a dream that
I feared would disturb even the repose of the grave.
But how is it over! Are we awake, and find it but a
dream? Perchance, Jurian, we but sleep deeper, and
the horrible phantom will again return.”
“Here is one will put it to flight forever,” said
M`Crea, as Alice entered.
“My mother!”
“Not your mother, Miriam, not your mother,” replied
Alice, receiving her in her arms.
Alice now stated that Miriam was her sister's child;
that the child she had by Corwin had died shortly after
she deserted her husband, and that her sister dying,
leaving Miriam an orphan, she had adopted her and
brought her up as her own. She further stated, that
the deranged condition of her mind had prevented her
from informing Jurian of the nature of his relationship
with the unhappy girl, nor had she, until a short time
previous, reverted to what might be their sufferings
while labouring under the belief that they were so nearly
allied in blood. This thought came upon her as
nearly drove her frantic, as she now saw no means of
communicating the secret to him. She believed that
he would fly the country, and remain undeceived until
death, while a single word from her lips would have
spared him a life of misery. While occupied with these
reflections, M`Crea entered the cabin in which she was
confined, and she made known her feelings to him. He
left her to consult with captain Swain, who immediately
acquainted the commander-in-chief with all the circumstances
of the case—the fact of her having placed the
life of her own son in jeopardy—his subsequent escape
—the deception that had been practised upon the guard,
and the nature of the offence for which Jurian had been
arrested; the result was an immediate order for the
liberation of Alice, and a promise to suffer the young
man's conduct to pass without undergoing a public investigation,
as there was no evidence against him, except
that which was now locked up in the bosom of his mother,
and as the charge appeared to have been dictated
by the spirit of revenge. Their minds were relieved
by this information, although the weight of misery that
still remained, under different circumstances would
have been sufficient to crush them, yet we are happy
or wretched by comparison, and the magnitude of their
offence had so greatly diminished, that they felt comparatively
happy. Jurian was permitted to go at large,
as Foster had no warrant for his detention, and was unacquainted
with the transactions at Valley Forge.
The day of trial arrived. The principal witnesses that
appeared against Gordon, were Ephraim Horn and the
woman who had betrayed him; others came forward
to testify as to their having been robbed on the public
road, and identified the prisoner as the person who had
waylaid them. There were no witnesses on behalf of
Paul, except 'squire Morton and Nicholas the innkeeper,
both of whom bore testimony as to the general
good conduct of the party accused; but this had little
of doubt as to the guilt of the prisoner. Gordon,
during the trial, behaved with calmness and self-possession.
He cross-examined Ephraim with considerable
adroitness, and notwithstanding the solemnity of
the investigation, more than once elicited a laugh from
the jurors and the thoughtless by-standers. When
Madge came to the book to be sworn, his countenance
fell, and his demeanour became serious. He turned
his face from her, and said a few words to Nicholas,
who was standing hard by; wishing to conceal under
the veil of indifference, the emotion occasioned by the
presence of his betrayer. The testimony of Madge
was conclusive, but the treacherous part she had performed
excited abhorrence in the minds of all who listened
to her. Her testimony was no sooner received
than she withdrew among the crowd of spectators to
conceal herself from observation, and as she passed
the prisoners' box she covered her face, and did not
venture to encounter the gaze of the man her voice had
condemned to the gallows. Paul scarcely turned his
eyes towards her as she passed. He was found guilty
by the jury without leaving the box, and the awful sentence
of the law was pronounced by the judges.
The trial of Miriam came on. The interest excited
by her appearance was intense. She was as pale as
death, and so feeble that her limbs could scarcely support
her, when the clerk of the court called upon her
to stand forth and hold up her right hand, while he read
the indictment. At a few paces distant on the right of
the prisoners stood M`Crea and his son, awaiting in
dreadful suspense the event of the trial, while the agitated
Alice was leaning on the railing immediately behind
the prisoners. Silence was strictly observed
throughout the court-house, as every one appeared to be
too much engrossed with his own feelings to be communicative.
The witnesses examined were corporal Drone,
the countrymen who were present at the time of discovering
Quaker. The corporal stated the circumstances of the
case as they appeared, but as he could not relieve his
mind from prejudice in favour of the prisoner, he was
unwilling to permit a cause of such importance to rest
solely with the ingenuity of the counsel employed; he
accordingly gave his own colouring to the case, and
was prepared to enter largely into its merits, but was
interrupted in his harangue, and desired to confine himself
solely to an unvarnished statement of the facts, which
somewhat disconcerted the corporal, and materially
abridged the thread of his story. He was mortified at
losing so fine an opportunity of displaying his eloquence,
and after repeating the facts three or four times over,
with several fruitless attempts to branch out, he was
dismissed, and he resumed his station among the crowd.
The countrymen corroborated the statement of
Drone, but Madge when called upon, was governed by
her jealously, and gave quite a different colouring to
the charge against the unfortunate Miriam. She commenced
with the time she first knocked at the door,
previous to the arrival of Paul, and supplied her narrative
with fictitious circumstances, alleged to have transpired
during the night, which, if credited, went fully to
establish the guilt of the prisoner, and that the deed was
in agitation before the unhappy victim was ushered into
the world. Her testimony was heard with patience to
the close, when Paul rose, and in a deep voice, exclaimed—
“It is a fabrication from the beginning to the end.
If you will hear me, I will state the facts fairly and impartially.
I am a doomed man; this world is nothing
to me now, you may therefore depend upon what I say,
for I have now no reason to deviate from the truth.”
One of the attornies suggested, that as Paul was a convict,
his testimony was inadmissible, and he was accordingly
rejected. “I am then thrown beyond the
pale of society,” exclaimed Paul, his large gray eyes
word of a sinner has sufficient weight with you to take
away the life of a saint. Beware, lest you condemn to
death a lovely being who has been guilty of but one
fatal error, upon the bare assertion of a wretch, covered
with crime, and so blotched, that all the fires below
will not purify her. Her offence towards me is sufficient
to blast her character, and impugn her testimony.
Doubtless I merited punishment, but not at her hands.
She should have been the first to protect; but was the
first to betray. What act have I been guilty of, that is
not spotless, compared to her treachery? And yet the
law protects and cherishes her, and sends me to the
gallows.” He was interrupted by the judge, and ordered
to sit down; Paul obeyed reluctantly, and the testimony
of Ephraim Horn was taken, as to what transpired during
the brief residence of Miriam at his house.
Having heard all the testimony, the lawyers addressed
the jury, and were listened to with breathless
silence by the friends of the unfortunate girl. During
the speech of her advocate, a slight ray of hope stole
across their countenances; which gave place to the
gloom of despair, as the counsel for the prosecution
proceeded in his harangue. He was the abler man;
nature had lavished on him the persuasive power of
eloquence, by which the light of reason becomes obscure,
and the spotless robe of innocence is made to
appear as the garb of hypocrisy—by which the most
virtuous action is converted into guilt, and a cherub's
smile into the grin of a demon. Hope fled from the
bosoms of Miriam and her friends, as the opposing advocate
concluded. Alice, in her despair, cried out, “Do
not listen to him—there is poison in his words—he has
prostituted God's gifts to the service of Satan—he has
doomed to death the innocent—he has robbed the widowed
mother of her child!” She was silenced; the
jury retired, and shortly after returned a verdict that
the prisoner was guilty of concealing the death of her
fainted in the prisoners' box, and was supported by Gordon,
while Jurian bent over the railing to assist her,
and Paul placed her in his arms, accompanied with a
look which bespoke the deep contrition of his soul.
Alice stood horrorstruck, and M`Crea could not conceal
from the by-standers how deeply he was interested
in the scene. Miriam revived, sentence was
pronounced, and the court adjourned. As the judge
was speaking, the poor girl repeatedly exclaimed, “I
am innocent; as God is my witness I am innocent;”
but the acquittal by the conscience of the accused has
but little weight in this world, if the voices of his fellow
mortals pronounce him guilty.
The prisoners were taken back to the jail. Gordon
walked firmly but dejectedly by the side of Foster.
Jurian and his wretched mother supported Miriam, dissolved
in tears, to the prison door, where he left them,
and went in search of M`Crea, who had been led out
of the court-house, overpowered by his feelings, as soon
as the unhappy result of the trial was made known.
Alice entered the prison with Miriam, and Foster obtained
permission for her to remain with her daughter
until the day of execution should arrive.
| CHAPTER XIII. The forsaken | |