11. XI.
BIRTHS, DEATHS, AND MARRIAGES.
Of “Rivanna” and its owner it is
necessary to say a few words before proceeding
further in this narrative.
The house had been built by Colonel
Seaton, a prominent gentleman of the
colony, who, attracted by the beauty and
fertility of the Piedmont country, had
purchased a great estate here, sent to England
for workmen and materials, and
erected this fine mansion, at the then extremest
limits of civilization.
It is the hard fate of the rich to have
some nail in the shoe. Colonel Seaton's
nail was the want of children. The
great house was dreary without them;
and when one day he was informed that
his brother and his sister had died, leaving
each a little girl without a home, he
went and brought the children to Rivanna,
adopted them as his own, and, on
the death of his wife some years afterward,
gave his whole attention to the
task of rearing them as joint heiresses of
his estate.
The elder of the two cousins was his
favorite in spite of her high-spirited and
somewhat restive character. But the
moment came when this affection sustained
a heavy blow. The young girl
married Mr. Edmund Innis, an amiable
and honorable but thriftless gentleman
of the neighborhood; and Colonel Seaton,
who had opposed the alliance in
every manner possible, made his niece a
low bow, and informed her that thenceforth
they were to be strangers.
The separation soon became more
complete still. Colonel Seaton died.
When his will was opened it was found
that he had left the great estate of Rivanna
to his younger niece, and to the
eldest nothing.
The younger was thus a great heiress,
and suitors promptly appeared. None,
however, pleased the young lady, and,
weary of the wilderness, she went to
spend the winter in Williamsburg.
There her fate met her. Mr. Brand,
of an ancient family and a great estate,
paid his addresses. He was handsome,
he was courtly, he had made the grand
tour, he threw his money about in the
grandest style; and, until his marriage
with the young lady, which in due time
took place, it was not discovered that
the splendid suitor was bankrupt; his
luxury and seeming affluence a hollow
shell, covering — hopeless debt. His
wealthy marriage, however, rescued him
from ruin; his old associates lost sight
of him; he had become a staid and imposing
personage—the worshipful Colonel
Brand, of Rivanna.
Years passed, and two daughters were
born to Colonel Brand; when this history
opens they were approaching womanhood.
Meanwhile, the elder cousin,
Mrs. Innis, grandually saw poverty closing
in upon her. Her husband was a gentleman
of the highest character, but belonged
to that class of persons with
whom every thing fails. Some men
have only to touch lead to turn it to
gold. Mr. Innis had only to touch gold
to turn it into lead. He had possessed a
considerable property—as he advanced
in life it dwindled. In ten years more,
he would have been thrown homeless on
the world, when, fortunately or unfortunately,
he died, leaving his widow
with an only son, and in possession of
but a small remnant of the once ample
estate of the Innises.
What is it that a mother does when
her husband dies, leaving her with one
darling child only? She almost always
spoils the child: and Mrs. Innis did all
in her power to spoil Edmund. She did
not succeed. There was something in
the boy too proud, intelligent, and noble,
to be warped; and, when his mother
died, in his eighteenth year, clasping him
with her last remains of strength to her
poor heart, she left him simple, sweet-tempered,
and unselfish.
The hard hand of loneliness thus
came to press upon the boy, as he
touched the threshold of manhood. Immured
in his little house, resembling
rather a hunting-lodge than a dwelling,
in a gash of the mountain, he saw far
beneath him in the plain, “Rivanna,”
“Carysbrook,”
“Castlehill,” and the
happy homes of happy families, while
one or two old servants, who would not
desert him, were the only human beings
near him, and a few books were his
only other company. Then a new resource
suddenly presented itself.
The cousins—his mother and Lady
Brand, as the wife of the lordly colonel
was colloquially called, in accordance
with a usage not uncommon in colonial
Virginia—had had no intercourse.
This, it must be said, was the fault of
Mrs. Innis, who, proud, sensitive, and
high-spirited, would respond to no overtures,
and resolutely declined intercourse
with those who had spoken ill, she believed,
of her husband. Death had come
now to heal this breach. The sod had
scarce closed over the poor lady, when
Lady Brand came in her coach up the
mountain-road—entered the little house
—went up to Edmund, who was about
to receive her with a bow, and, clasping
her arms around him, kissed him, and
said, with tears in her eyes:
“My poor child, you must not stay
here in your solitary home. You are
my blood, and I love you very much, as
I loved dear Anna. You must love me
a little in return.”
Thereat the boy melted, and sobbed
in the good lady's arms.
An hour afterward they were at “Rivanna,”
and Edmund saw two young
ladies of twelve and fourteen come toward
him, offering their lips—in accordance
with instructions—to their cousin.
Thenceforth the life of Innis changed.
A large part of his time was spent at
Rivanna; and, in course of years, he
found it wellnigh impossible to remain
absent. The girl of twelve became the
maiden of fifteen, then the young lady
of eighteen; and Innis passionately loved
her. Grave, calm, and serene in manner,
the youth possessed strong impulses
and ardent aspirations. Solitude grew
distasteful, books wearied him—Honoria
was ever before his eyes; and, mounting
his thorough-bred, one of the few luxuries
left him, he would go to Rivanna,
spend whole days, and drink deeper and
deeper draughts of that most intoxicating
of beverages—first love!
Nothing hitherto had come to mar
his happiness. Lady Brand, whom he
called “aunt,” received him always with
the tenderest affection; Lou, the elder
of the two girls, was his warm friend,
and even the stiff colonel made him
stately bows, and overwhelmed him with
distinguished consideration—for the colonel
was given to “deportment.”
Of Honoria's feelings, the narrative
will present a fuller view than is here
possible. A few words more will convey
a correct conception of Innis's situation
and plans when our history commences.
He was twenty-three — passionately
in love with his cousin, the daughter of
a gentleman of large wealth—poor, and
doing nothing. At that thought the
very soul of Innis revolted within him.
He thought with bitterness of his probable
future — of visiting Rivanna thus,
year after year, in the character of a
“poor relation” — of one day seeing
Honoria give her hand to some glittering
youth, forgetting him; and of
growing old, uncared for, and forgotten
in his lonely lodge, buried in its lugubrious
pines. That thought had come day
after day to cut Innis like a sharp blade
to the very heart. His once ruddy cheek
grew pale with bitter meditation. With
the prejudice of race, at that time prevalent,
he shrank from trade—he had no
means to enter the professions — what
was left him but to mope and dream,
growing gray and sombre in his sombre
dwelling—bending lower year by year
beneath the inexorable weight which
bows the strongest shoulders toward the
tomb?
These thoughts preyed upon him, as
the worm preys on the bud, and his
cheeks grew so pale that Lady Brand
said one day:
“You are pining, Edmund; what is
the reason?”
“I am twenty-three, and am doing
nothing, aunt.”
“Well, why remain idle?”
“What can I do?”
“Make yourself the first counsellor
in the colony—you have the intellect.”
Innis felt his pulse throb. Then his
head sunk.
“I cannot, aunt. I have no means to
study.”
Lady Brand smiled.
“Listen, Edmund: my connection,
Mr. Wythe, at Williamsburg, wishes a
young gentleman in his office; he is
growing old, and requires assistance in
transcribing his law - papers. He will
receive you into his house as one of the
family gladly, in return for your services,
and instruct you in law besides—”
“Me, aunt?”
“I say you, my child, because he offers
to do so in this letter.”
She looked at him with her kind
eyes and smile, holding toward him the
letter.
“Why should I not scheme to set my
boy up in the world, like other people?”
Innis had his arms around her, ere
she had finished, and kissed her.
“Dear aunt!—you are very good to
me!”
“Don't thank me for only doing my
duty, Edmund. And now, I think it
best that you should go and see Mr.
Wythe.”
“I will set out to-morrow, aunt. Oh,
I assure you, I am not disposed to delay.”
“I will give you an early breakfast,
then, my son; and may God guide you!”
On the very next day Innis was, accordingly,
on his way to Williamsburg,
which he reached in due time. The venerable
Mr. Wythe greeted him cordially.
It was arranged that he should come to
live in his office on the first of the ensuing
January, and Innis returned, as the
reader has seen.
What befell him in Williamsburg has
been recorded; what occurred on his return
will now be related.
