University of Virginia Library

14. CHAPTER XIV.

Robert Greene.

One summer evening the Doctor, on his way back from a
visit in that direction, stopped, as on such opportunities he
usually did, at Mr. Bacon's wicket, and looked in at the

open casement to see if his friends were within. Mr. Bacon
was sitting there alone, with a book open on the table before
him; and looking round when he heard the horse stop,
“Come in, Doctor,” said he, “if you have a few minutes to
spare. You were never more welcome.”

The Doctor replied, “I hope nothing ails either Deborah
or yourself?”

“No,” said Mr. Bacon, “God be thanked! but something
has occurred which concerns both.”

When the Doctor entered the room, he perceived that the
wonted serenity of his friend's countenance was overcast by
a shade of melancholy thought. “Nothing,” said he, “I
hope, has happened to distress you?”

“Only to disturb us,” was the reply. “Most people would
probably think that we ought to consider it a piece of good
fortune. One who would be thought a good match for her,
has proposed to marry Deborah.”

“Indeed!” said the Doctor; “and who is he?” feeling,
as he asked the question, an unusual warmth in his face.

“Joseph Hebblethwaite, of the Willows. He broke his
mind to me this morning, saying that he thought it best to
speak with me before he made any advances himself to the
young woman: indeed he had had no opportunity of so
doing, for he had seen little of her; but he had heard enough
of her character to believe that she would make him a good
wife; and this, he said, was all he looked for, for he was
well to do in the world.”

“And what answer did you make to this matter-of-fact
way of proceeding?”

“I told him that I commended the very proper course he
had taken, and that I was obliged to him for the good opinion
of my daughter which he was pleased to entertain: that
marriage was an affair in which I should never attempt to
direct her inclinations, being confident that she would never
give me cause to oppose them; and that I would talk with

her upon the proposal, and let him know the result. As
soon as I mentioned it to Deborah, she colored up to her
eyes; and with an angry look, of which I did not think those
eyes had been capable, she desired me to tell him that he
had better lose no time in looking elsewhere, for his thinking
of her was of no use. `Do you know any ill of him?' said
I. `No,' she replied, `but I never heard any good, and
that's ill enough. And I do not like his looks.'”

“Well said, Deborah!” cried the Doctor: clapping his
hands so as to produce a sonorous token of satisfaction.

“`Surely, my child,' said I, `he is not an ill-looking person?'
`Father,' she replied, `you know he looks as if he
had not one idea in his head to keep company with another.'”

“Well said, Deborah!” repeated the Doctor.

“Why, Doctor, do you know any ill of him?

“None. But, as Deborah says, I know no good; and if
there had been any good to be known, it must have come
within my knowledge. I cannot help knowing who the persons
are to whom the peasantry in my rounds look with respect
and good-will, and whom they consider their friends
as well as their betters. And, in like manner, I know who
they are from whom they never expect either courtesy or
kindness.”

“You are right, my friend; and Deborah is right. Her
answer came from a wise heart; and I was not sorry that
her determination was so promptly made, and so resolutely
pronounced. But I wish, if it had pleased God, the offer
had been one which she could have accepted with her own
willing consent, and with my full approbation.”

“Yet,” said the Doctor, “I have often thought how sad
a thing it would be for you ever to part with her.”

“Far more sad will it be for me to leave her unprotected,
as it is but too likely that, in the ordinary course of nature
I one day shall; and as any day in that same ordinary

course, I so possibly may! Our best intentions, even when
they have been most prudentially formed, fail often in their
issue. I meant to train up Deborah in the way she should
go, by fitting her for that state of life in which it had pleased
God to place her; so that she might have made a good wife
for some honest man in the humbler walks of life, and have
been happy with him.”

“And how was it possible,” replied the Doctor, “that you
could have succeeded better? Is she not qualified to be a
good man's wife in any rank? Her manner would not do
discredit to a mansion; her management would make a farm
prosperous, or a cottage comfortable; and for her principles,
and temper and cheerfulness, they would render any home
a happy one.”

“You have not spoken too highly in her praise, Doctor.
But as she has from her childhood been all in all to me,
there is a danger that I may have become too much so to
her; and that, while her habits have properly been made
conformable to our poor means and her poor prospects, she
has been accustomed to a way of thinking, and a kind of
conversation, which have given her a distaste for those
whose talk is only of sheep and of oxen, and whose thoughts
never get beyond the range of their every day employments.
In her present circle, I do not think there is one man with
whom she might otherwise have had a chance of settling in
life, to whom she would not have the same intellectual objections
as to Joseph Hebblethwaite: though I am glad that
the moral objection was that which first instinctively occurred
to her.

“I wish it were otherwise, both for her sake and my
own: for hers, because the present separation would have
more than enough to compensate it, and would in its consequences
mitigate the evil of the final one, whenever that
may be; for my own, because I should then have no cause
whatever to render the prospect of dissolution otherwise

than welcome, but be as willing to die as to sleep. It is
not owing to any distrust in Providence, that I am not thus
willing now, — God forbid! But if I gave heed to my own
feelings, I should think that I am not long for this world;
and surely it were wise to remove, if possible, the only cause
that makes me fear to think so.”

“Are you sensible of any symptons that can lead to such
an apprehension?” said the Doctor.

“Of nothing that can be called a sympton. I am to all
appearance in good health, of sound body and mind; and
you know how unlikely my habits are to occasion any disturbance
in either. But I have indefinable impressions, —
sensations they might almost be called, — which, as I cannot
but feel them, so I cannot but regard them.”

“Can you not describe these sensations?”

“No better than by saying, that they hardly amount to
sensations, and are indescribable.”

“Do not,” said the Doctor, “I entreat you, give way to
any feelings of this kind. They may lead to consequences
which, without shortening or endangering life, would render
it anxious and burdensome, and destroy both your usefulness
and your comfort.”

“I have this feeling, Doctor; and you shall prescribe for
it, if you think it requires either regimen or physic. But at
present you will do me more good by assisting me to procure
for Deborah such a situation as she must necessarily
look for on the event of my death. What I have laid by,
even if it should be most advantageously disposed of, would
afford her only a bare subsistence; it is a resource in case
of sickness, but while in health, it would never be her wish
to eat the bread of idleness. You may have opportunities
of learning whether any lady within the circle of your practice
wants a young person in whom she might confide, either
as an attendant upon herself, or to assist in the management
of her children, or her household. You may be sure this is

not the first time that I have thought upon the subject; but
the circumstance which has this day occurred, and the feeling
of which I have spoken, have pressed it upon my consideration.
And the inquiry may better be made, and the
step taken while it is a matter of foresight, than when it has
become one of necessity.”

“Let me feel your pulse!”

“You will detect no other disorder there,” said Mr. Bacon,
holding out his arm as he spake, “than what has been caused
by this conversation, and the declaration of a purpose, which,
though for some time perpended, I had never till now fully
acknowledged to myself.”

“You have never then mentioned it to Deborah?”

“In no other way than by sometimes incidentally speaking
of the way of life which would be open to her, in case
of her being unmarried at my death.”

“And you have made up your mind to part with
her?”

“Upon a clear conviction that I ought to do so; that it is
best for herself and me.”

“Well, then, you will allow me to converse with her
first upon a different subject. — You will permit me to see
whether I can speak more successfully for myself, than you
have done for Joseph Hebblethwaite. — Have I your consent?”

Mr. Bacon rose in great emotion, and taking his friend's
hand, pressed it fervently and tremulously. Presently they
heard the wicket open, and Deborah came in.

“I dare say, Deborah,” said her father, composing himself,
“you have been telling Betsey Allison of the advantageous
offer that you have this day refused.”

“Yes,” replied Deborah; “and what do you think she
said? That little as she likes him, rather than that I
should be thrown away upon such a man, she could almost
make up her mind to marry him herself.”

“And I,” said the Doctor, “rather than such a man should
have you, would marry you myself.”

“Was not I right in refusing him, Doctor?”

“So right, that you never pleased me so well before; and
never can please me better, — unless you will accept of me
in his stead.”

She gave a little start, and looked at him half incredulously,
and half angrily withal; as if what he had said was
too light in its manner to be serious, and yet too serious in
its import to be spoken in jest. But when he took her by
the hand, and said, “Will you, dear Deborah?” with a pressure,
and in a tone that left no doubt of his earnest meaning,
she cried, “Father, what am I to say? speak for me!” —
“Take her, my friend!” said Mr. Bacon. “My blessing be
upon you both. And, if it be not presumptuous to use the
words, — let me say for myself, `Lord, now lettest thou thy
servant depart in peace!'”