75. CHAPTER LXXV.
EPILOGUE.
If the bride is happy that the sun shines on, Harley and his
brother Sainty had no fault to find with the day fixed on for their
double-wedding.
May had come into the world, with all its wealth of tender grass,
and budding foliage, and singing birds and roses. The old domain
of Blandfield smiled and held out arms of welcome. The airs were
mild and sweet; the path down the hill led to a fairy land of
flowers; the little stream ran laughing under the great weeping
willows, and the distant river, dotted with white sails, broke into
silver spangles in the wind.
Blandfield was a scene of bustle and rejoicing. The grounds were
full of coaches with their glossy four-in-hands and fat old negro
coachmen. To every bough was tied a thoroughbred, champing his
bit. The porch and drawing-room overflowed with youths and
maidens, in lace and embroidery; and portly old planters, and elegant
old dames, had come to honor the occasion with their presence.
All the pleasant people of a pleasant old Virginia neighborhood
had gathered together; and prominent in the throng, behold
the gorgeously-clad Miss Clara Fulkson, who bursts into smiles, is
delighted with herself and all around her, and exclaims, with rapture
and a little scream, to everybody:
“Oh, my dear! isn't this perfectly delightful? Was there ever a
happier occasion than this? Did you ever see a finer-looking bridegroom
than Mr. Justin Harley, who I always predicted would win
our little rosebud? I had positively set my heart upon the match!”
Miss Fulkson is still gushing, screaming, accenting her words forcibly,
and—candor compels us to add—talking everybody nearly to
death, when the gentleman whose good fortune she always predicted
is silently summoned from the room. All eyes are turned
toward the door, a silence follows, and then, listen! There is the
rustle of brocade, like the wind in the corn, as the splendid procession
of gay gallants and little maidens sweeps down the staircase,
and enters the drawing-room, where the parson, in his black gown,
with his prayer-book open, awaits them.
The ceremony ends amid a burst of congratulations, mixed with
kisses. Then the violins, grasped by excited “negro minstrels,”
strike up, and Blandfield becomes a scene of grandest revelry.
Never were lovelier little maidens, brighter eyes, or rosier cheeks.
And the brides were “the admiration of all”—the one, Annie, with
her plump little figure, her sparkling eyes, and raven curls; and the
other, Evelyn, with her tall figure, her brown hair, and her exquisite
grace as she moved, half lost in the white cloud of her bridal veil.
Harley's lofty form rose above the throng, and his grave smile
was full of happiness. As to Mr. Sainty Harley, that youth kissed
all the bridesmaids, shook hands with everybody, and rushed
through cotillons, minuets and reels with the wildest enthusiasm
and abandon.
For they had a “regular old Virginia frolic” after the wedding—
not following the bad fashion of our modern time, when couples
hurry through the ceremony, rush to the railway, and fly off to hide
themselves, as though ashamed of the enormity they have committed.
The violins filled Blandfield with their merry music—the
profuse supper scarce interrupted for a moment the gay revel—and
the birds waking at dawn in the old poplars and oaks, heard the
violins still playing, and mingled their songs with the music and
the laughter.
Have you never, worthy reader, gone to visit some old country
neighborhood, made friends with everybody, returned, and lost
sight of them, and years afterwards met some one who could tell
you all about them?
If your heart is warm—and I would not wound you by doubting
that—you ask a thousand questions. What has become of this one,
and what is that one doing? What has changed?—what remains
the same? The old friends of your bright days keep their places in
your heart; and I like to think that perhaps these figures of my
fancy have also their little corner there.
A few words will tell you all about them.
Harley went with his bride to settle down, a married man, at
Huntsdon, which looked no longer sombre with Evelyn as its mistress.
The London investments left him by Colonel Hartright paid
off all his debts, and having come into possession of the great Glenvale
estate, he abandoned the scheme of draining the Blackwater
Swamp, which remains to this day the haunt of the deer and the
whip-poor-will.
Sainty took possession of Oakhill, and became a great fox-hunter.
At Blandfield no changes whatever occurred, and Miss Clementina
and Miss Clara Fulkson grew gradually old together, becoming
every year fonder and fonder of gossip.
And our little friend Fanny—the reader, I think, will like to
know something of her and Puccoon, and the Lady of the Snow,
whom we left beside her bed at Blandfield. In the spring Fanny
accompanied her father and mother to France, having spent the
winter with Puccoon, now well and hearty again, in spite of his
forebodings; and seven years afterwards, nearly day for day, she
returned to Huntsdon, leaning on the arm of her husband—Mr.
Henry St. Leger.
St. Leger had purchased an estate near Huntsdon, and came to
live and die in Virginia; and the first thing that Fanny did was to
go to Puccoon's hut, where the trapper still lived with her dear old
Otter, throw her arms around his neck, kiss him, and cry upon his
breast, calling him her dear father, and take him away with her,
whether he would or not, to live and die under her own roof,
beside her.
So everybody was happy, you see, kindly reader; and romances
should end thus, if only to reconcile us to human life, I think;—a
little hard sometimes, but not so hard, perhaps, as it is represented
to be.
Let these personages of our drama—these puppets of our fancy—
be happy, therefore, in their Puppet-land!
