University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.

The presence of Mary Pynchon's lover at Agawam was
no less the subject of common gossip than common knowledge.
He had not been within the plantation a day when
Mr. and Mrs. Pynchon had received business or friendly
calls from nearly all who dared to call upon them, some of
whom achieved their object, and won a sight of, and perhaps
a word with, the interesting gentleman, while others
only had the pleasure of bemoaning the “prospect of our
losing Mary,” or of expressing the wish that “things might
turn out so that there might be an addition to the settlement.”

Agawam had never had such a visitant before, and the
effect of his presence upon the girls and young women
particularly, was very noticeable. Before he came, they
usually had enough of labor to occupy their time, but from
their morning walks and afternoon rambles, which invariably
led by Mr. Pynchon's house, one would have supposed that
they had all become suddenly impressed with the necessity
of seeking health at a common fountain, to which there was
but a single safe and direct route. There was a general
experience of attraction to the building that contained the
new man, among the gentler sex of every age,—a kind of
indefinite out-reaching of sympathy, some of which found
its highest satisfaction in simply going towards its object,
without the hope of coming near it, just as a score of the
fresh tendrils of a grape vine will reach their delicate fingers
towards a new, though distant object, each with an incipient
curl of sympathy at its trembling terminus, while only one

is near enough to clasp the object in a coil that knows no
release but in death, or by a rupture more cruel than death.

Doubtless his relations to Mr. Pynchon and his daughter
had their influence in this matter, but there was something
above and beyond these,—something above and beyond
anything apparent to the eye, or comprehended in the reason.
He was a man who impressed every one, and received impressions
from every one,—taking something from every
individual with whom he might be brought into personal
relation, and filling the void with himself, so that many found
themselves talking as he talked, with an unwonted elegance
and facility, or walking as he walked, with an unusual grace
of motion.

Holyoke was no less charming to the simple-hearted Mrs.
Pynchon than to her beautiful step-daughter, and became
as early the confidant of the grave and reserved father as
of the young and noble-hearted son. He was authority in
matters of fashion, and intelligent in questions of theology,
—equally at home in politics and polemics. His sojourn at
Agawam was a precious episode in the life of the Pynchon
family, and friendship nearly monopolized the time that love
could poorly spare.

To Mrs. Pynchon he was a fountain of intelligence concerning
places and persons associated with the past. To
Mr. Pynchon he was a fresh, free spirit, full of vitality and
strength, able by the subtle powers of intuition to solve
questions that his own reason had grappled with in vain.
To John he became an idol—a man—by the side of whom
all the men he had seen were pigmies—mere shows of men.

On the morning following Holyoke's arrival at Agawam,
he walked out with Mr. Pynchon, while John and some of
the neighbors joined his companions from the Bay in a fishing
execursion. Mr. Pynchon communicated to him his plans
concerning the plantation, gave the character and position
of each settler as he passed his cabin, and soon introduced

his visitor into all the interests of the place, and his own
policy in their management and development. Holyoke
was unreserved in his comment upon each subject as it was
presented, found a practical solution of every difficulty that
might be involved in it, and offered his free and natural
suggestions in a manner that entirely confirmed him in the
good opinion of his host. This outside survey of the plantation,
and this introduction of Holyoke to its acquaintance,
did not satisfy Mr. Pynchon. With the exception of Mary,
he had long felt that there was no one in the plantation who
was a proper receptacle of his confidence, in matters touching
his religious opinions and experience; and from her he
had hidden much, as has before been intimated, through
the fear of disturbing her faith in Christian doctrine as generally
accepted by the Puritan churches, or of loosening
her confidence in himself.

Approaching the house on their return home, the old
gentleman and his guest sought a convenient location in the
pleasant morning sun, and sat down.

“It seems to me that you must be happy here, Mr. Pynchon,”
said Holyoke, breaking a silence that had lasted for
some minutes.

“Why?” inquired Mr. Pynchon, looking upon the young
man with a smile.

“First, because you are in a pleasant spot; second, because
every one reveres you; and, third, because you may
do very much as you please here,” replied Holyoke.

“Are those all the reasons you can give?” inquired Mr.
Pynchon.

“They are all I thought necessary to give, because the
absolute essentials of happiness are things which a man generally
carries with him,—which are, to a very great extent,
independent of circumstances. Religion and family affection,
for instance, are, or should be, unaffected by location
and associations.”

“So far as religion is concerned, the case, with me, is the
opposite of this,” rejoined Mr. Pynchon; and looking at
Holyoke with a smile of peculiar meaning, he added, “and
one of my best friends is engaged in breaking up my home.”

“I understand the latter clause of your statement,” returned
Holyoke, with an answering smile, “and do not
have it in my heart to blame your friend for undertaking
the enterprise, but the first part I do not understand.”

“I will explain,” replied Mr. Pynchon, “if you have the
desire or the patience to hear. You say that religion is, or
should be, unaffected by location and associations, but I
have no possession so seriously affected by those accidents
as my religion. My relations with God have been less disturbed
by them than my relations with men, since I have
been here in the colony; and oftentimes I have even felt
that the influences around me aided me in spiritual enjoyment
and development; but I have a lack of sympathy with
some of the prevalent views of religious doctrine, that does
much to destroy my peace, and that sometimes fills me with
emotions that would be akin to remorse, if they proceeded
from anything akin to guilt.”

“Where lies the trouble?” inquired Holyoke. “Has any
difficulty sprung from your difference with the views of
which you speak?”

“No: I have never differed openly, and there lies my
trouble. I listen, on Sabbath and on lecture days, to doctrines
that in my heart I believe to be full of error. Some
of them disgust me by their absurdity, and others distress
me by their detraction from the dignity of the divine character;
and yet I feel bound to make a show of believing
them, or perhaps feel it a duty to refrain from dissent and
controversy. I have pursued this course because I was
afraid of weakening the influence of the minister among his
flock, of arousing doubts in the minds of some, of throwing
others off their balance, and, in short, of injuring the cause

of Christ which, if I have true knowledge of my own heart,
I am most anxious to serve.”

“You should be satisfied with your motives, at least,”
responded Holyoke thoughtfully.

“That I am not,” returned Mr. Pynchon. “While I
have no doubt of my sincerity in the wish to advance the
cause of religion, I am led to feel that perhaps a wish to
preserve my influence and position in the colony has not
been altogether without power in determining my course
thus far. It is this distrust of my motives, to some extent,
that gives me uneasiness, but the greater part of it arises
from a distrust of my own judgment in regard to duty. Is
it manly, is it christianly, tacitly to approve doctrines which
my judgment rejects and my conscience condemns? Am
I not endangering truth by these compromises with error
for its sake? Am I not doing for truth the work of an
enemy, in the name of a friend? These are questions that
trouble me constantly, and you can thus very readily see
why location and associations have very much to do with my
religion.”

“Do you regard these errors of which you speak as fatal
errors, Mr. Pynchon?” inquired Holyoke.

“I think a man may be saved, and still believe them, if
that is a reply to your question,” said Mr. Pynchon.

“And you are perfectly settled in, and satisfied with, your
own views of doctrine?” continued Holyoke interrogatively.

“As well settled, perhaps, as imperfect man may be. My
trials involve a question of practical duty rather than of
doctrinal belief.”

“What if I were to quote to you from Romans the
words, `Hast thou faith? Have it to thyself, before God,”'
suggested Holyoke.

“You would not help me at all,” replied Mr. Pynchon,
“for I should quote from the context, `for, whatsoever is
not of faith, is sin!”'

“Well,” said Holyoke, “your position is a hard one, and
the question of duty is one which you only can decide. I
cannot place myself in your position, but were I living on
this plantation, as I do live in a settlement where, doubtless,
the same errors are taught, I should not have the slightest
trouble in regard to them, although my opinions might not
differ from yours. Unimportant errors wear out, and drop
away from truth of themselves, if they are let alone. If
they are controverted, they often grow so as to hide the
truth, and frequently live on the pledges of controversial
pride, until they have rendered the truth with which they
may have been associated a loathing and a byword. If I
were certain that the ministers of the colony were against
me, in a point of doctrine which I believed involved no fatal
error, I should certainly save my strength and my influence
for advancing essential truth, rather than expend both in a
vain attempt to destroy any unimportant errors with which
it might for the moment be associated. Martyrdom is
never pleasant, and can hardly be called respectable when
suffered at a stake which the martyr is obliged to hold up
to keep it from falling.”

“Just as I expected!” exclaimed a musical voice behind
the gentlemen, as Holyoke uttered his last words. “I have
been looking at you from the window for the last half hour,
and I had no doubt that you had both shut your eyes to all
these beautiful things around you, and the staple duties of
life, and were discussing some dry chip of a doctrine.”

Both turned, and looked into the healthful, smiling face
of Mary Pynchon. Her father saw that she was dressed
for a morning ramble, and guessed in what direction, without
his late companion, she wished him to move; but he
could not give up the conversation so readily, and addressing
her, he said, “Mary, you mistake in regard to the nature of
our conversation, but why do you speak so contemptuously
of doctrine? It seems to me that some of the dryest chips

are the staple duties of life which you so readily associate
with beautiful things.”

“Because that doctrine is good for nothing save as a
definition of our relations, and relations are good for
nothing unless they are practical,” replied Mary, at once
becoming serious and animated.

“The Oracle of Agawam!” exclaimed Holyoke, half
sportively.

“Giving her responses in enigmas,” added Mr. Pynchon.

“And consulted by idolatrous and deluded men,” rejoined
Mary, her flexible features in harmony with the pleasantry.

“But seriously,” said Holyoke, “did you mean anything
in particular by that little speech of yours?”

“Seriously, I did,” replied Mary. “I meant that God is
the ordainer of doctrine, and that men are the performers
of duty; and that any further than doctrine involves to us
a question of practical duty we have no use for it, and no
business with it. I am very tired, if it is proper for me to
say so (and Mary's cheeks kindled, and her eyes flashed
with strong feeling), of these everlasting discussions of, and
quarrels over, doctrine, and their accompanying lamentations
over neglect of duty. Men will talk of nothing but
doctrine from morning till night, and have nothing to
bemoan in their prayers but their neglect of duty; while,
if they had but done their duty they would have found out
the doctrine, as well as won honor to religion, and saved
remorse to themselves.”

“That may all be true, and I am inclined to think that a
part of it is,” said Holyoke, “but I do not exactly see how
a man can find out one doctrine by performing the duties
issuing from relations defined by another.”

“Just over the bank, there, flows the Connecticut,” said
Mary, raising her hand, and blushing at her own earnestness,
“and its waters come from hills and valleys very far
North. Now if you were wishing to find the sources of

the stream, you would not wander indefinitely over the
whole northern region after them. You would begin here,
and trace the river upwards, and thus find them infallibly.
Now in God are the sources of duty, and they flow out
from Him through streamlets of relationship, until they
combine in one large river which, if we follow it, will not
only bring us to Him, but will show us the location, size,
and character of each tributary as we advance upwards.
At this end it is duty, and God is at the other, and as we
can only find our way to God through duty, so we cannot
fail to discover all necessary doctrine, for it must lie directly
on the way. The remark of the Saviour that `if a man
will do His will he shall know of the doctrine,' is doubtless
a gracious promise, but it is no less the statement of a
philosophical truth.”

When Mary had finished her simple and beautiful lesson,
there were tears in Holyoke's eyes, called there by various
agencies. In the first place, it was eloquent, and touched his
sensibilities, and in the second, the beautiful speaker was
his own dear betrothed; and the love that had swelled in
his bosom for her brimmed with new fulness as he comprehended
with new appreciation the intelligence that informed
her Christian character, and the preciousness of the prize he
held in the possession of her love.

Mr. Pynchon, as he turned to bid the lovers a good morning
and a pleasant ramble, was a gratified witness of the
emotion apparent in Holyoke, and yet his gratification was
not untouched with sadness, for he could not but feel that
what was the young man's gain, was to a certain extent
his own loss. But as he walked slowly homewards, and
turned to observe his children as they passed down the
street in loving converse, and felt how precious they were
to each other, and how precious a thing was love, his selfishness
vanished, and a prayer for their constancy and happiness
found utterance at his trembling lips.

While he was meditating, the lovers had left the street,
and, striking into the Bay Path, had passed beyond his
vision. They sought, by a common impulse, the spot where
they had met on the previous day, and there found the fresh
mound that marked the resting-place of the unfortunate pet.
Mary proceeded to a neighboring shrub, and broke off a
twig, white with shad blossoms, and laid it upon the mound,
with such a degree of tenderness and respect that Holyoke,
half amused, stepped to her side, and looking in her demure
face with a merrily twinkling eye, exclaimed, “In memory
of the deer—departed!”

Mary could not entirely maintain her gravity, although
she endeavored to do so, and half sportively, half sadly she
replied, in his own vein, “Flowers are a proper offering, for
here lies a hart that loved me.”

“Good! I am relieved!” exclaimed Holyoke. “I never
knew a woman with a broken heart who kept her wit.”

“And I never knew a man with very much wit who kept
a heart to break,” rejoined Mary, with an insinuating tone
and a roguish smile.

“Have you any acquaintances that happen to be heartless?”
inquired Holyoke with a jocular look of concern.

“Oh! no!” replied Mary, merrily laughing; “there are
none among them who possess the conditions.”

“A truce! a truce!” exclaimed Holyoke. “Let us have
a suspension of hostilities, while I repair damages.”

Holyoke's efforts to repair damages were of the usual
character under such circumstances. No music had so
charmed him, in his whole life, as the words of repartee that
had closed his mouth. He would have been willing to be
the victim of Mary's sharp words to any extent, for somehow
(and there lay the mystery) her utterances seemed
to be his property, for other reasons than that they were at
his expense. To be beaten in an argument by Mary would
have been a boon almost worth praying for, while to be

fairly down in an encounter of wits was a bliss that he felt sure
of re-achieving at every convenient opportunity. In short,
the sweetest pride he had ever tasted was that which came
to his lips on the same breath that asserted in language the
most appropriate the equality of the pure mind with which
he was matched.

Seeking still higher ground, the lovers paused and looked
off upon the valley.

“When shall you be ready to leave your Arcadia?” inquired
Holyoke tenderly.

“When love and duty agree in permitting me to leave
it,” replied the girl.

“I believe you profess to find your duty in your relations,”
said Holyoke, with an allusion to a portion of the
religious conversation of the morning.

“And what then?” inquired Mary.

“Does it not follow that your highest duty will flow from
your tenderest relations?”

“Let us speak plainly,” said Mary. “Do you wish me
to leave this place? Do you wish me to leave my father,
my sister, my brother?”

The question was asked with evident emotion and anxious
earnestness, and Holyoke could only reply by inquiring
what kind of an answer she wished for or expected.

“I have thought,” said Mary, “or more properly, perhaps,
dreamed, that when your eyes should comprehend the
beauty of that river and the valley through which it passes,
and these pleasant hills, and should learn how large the
harvests are, and how full the woods are of game and the
streams of fish, it would seem to you a place where you would
love to live,—where you would love to expend the force
of your enterprise and the influence of your life. I have
become strangely attached to the people here, and to the
enterprise in which they are engaged. My father is happier
here than he would be elsewhere in the colony, and

here is my young brother, who, I am sure, could hardly
get along without me. I know you cannot attribute the
feeling to anything that makes me unworthy of you or
your love, but I confess that the thought of leaving the
settlement fills me with sadness.”

Mary uttered these words with anxious misgivings, and
Holyoke heard them with his eyes upon the ground.

“I know,” continued Mary, taking one of his hands in
her own, “that your associations are all at the Bay, that
your mother is there and all your mates, but there are
others there to take care of and comfort those who are
dear to you. I know you would lose much by coming here,
but would you not gain much? It seems hard to me to
relinquish the privilege of helping to mould the character
of this settlement, and give life to influences which
shall be active when all the valley, up to and beyond
those mountains, shall be full of people, rejoicing in happy
homes and overflowing harvests. If I feel thus, who
am a woman, a man with talent and power and superior
position would, it seems to me, look upon such a privilege
as more precious than comfort, and more valuable
than riches.”

She paused for a reply, and paused with anxiety, for she
felt a chilling influence in the half offended look that Holyoke
still cast upon the ground, but dared not lift to her
honest face.

There is nothing in the world so unreasonable as a man's
love, because it is so largely mingled with personal pride.
A woman is simply grieved if she have not the whole of
her lover's or her husband's heart. A man is offended if
he even mistrust that his will, his claims, and his love are not
supreme in the mind and heart of his mistress or his wife.
And so, while Holyoke was listening to the beautiful words
of one who had honored him by her love, and by associating
him with schemes of noble social and Christian enterprise,

a jealous feeling touched his heart,—a feeling springing
from the idea that she had planned without reference to
his will, and acknowledged claims paramount to his. He
knew that the feeling was a mean one, and yet, while fully
ashamed of it, he would not shake it off, but stood there,
like a man as he was, with a kind of dogged determination
to give pain to the woman whom he loved, and whom he
would not have seen misused by another without a thorough
vindication of his claim to be her protector.

“Then you do not love me well enough to go with me
wherever it is for my interest to go, or where my interests
already are?” said Holyoke, with a half averted gaze and
reddening face.

“And can you say that to me?” exclaimed Mary, half
deprecatingly, half reproachfully.

Holyoke looked at her, and had the selfish satisfaction of
seeing all he wished to see, and was then ready for forgiveness.
He saw a pair of eyes brimming with tears. He saw
upon beautiful features an expression of wounded love and
injured sensibilities. He saw what he had unworthily craved
—a demonstration of his own power and her devotion.
He stooped to kiss a tear that was falling from her cheek
—an act which she received half unconsciously, with eyes
still fixed upon him. At last, as he tried, half laughing, to rally
her upon her sadness, the sense of shame came over him,
and his poor pride gave way before an honest indignation
against himself, which found vent in strong language.

“Mary,” said Holyoke, taking her hands in his own, “it
is my deliberate opinion that I am a heartless, contemptible
man. I have been as mean and unmanly as Judas. I yield
myself to your reproaches, and will submit to any penalty
you may inflict. I'm a fool—an utter fool!”

“You cannot expect me to marry such a man as you
describe yourself to be,” said Mary, with a smile that rose
to her face unbidden.

“If you really knew how I have abused you, and how
heartlessly I have led you into this trap, I am not sure that
you would not reconsider your pledge of truth to me.”

“Well, confession will go further towards securing
mercy for you than anything else, so you had better make
a clean breast of it, and tell the worst.”

“This morning, Mary,” said Holyoke, leading her to a
seat, “your good father walked with me all over the settlement,
and pointed out the beautiful lands on both sides of
the river, informing me of allotments still to be made, and
lots that were for sale, and I knew the secret wish that
actuated him in this survey; but I said nothing, and let
him talk, accepting no hint, and blind to every anxious
suggestion. And then you came, and here, after pouring
frankly into my ears your noble words and wishes, that
might have come from an angel, and did come from motives
as pure as words were ever born in, I trampled on your
feelings and your suggestions, and selfishly, and with
perverse intention, injured you by doubting a love that I
knew to be true. And now, with these facts before you,
what should you judge I came to Agawam for?”

“You could not have come to do this.”

“Very well—I did not, but what do you suppose I came
here for?”

“I have had the impression,” said Mary, slightly puzzled
by his manner, “that you came to see me.”

“I did, my love, and I came also to find a place to live in
—to plant here my home, my fortunes, and my name.”

“May God bless you!” exclaimed Mary, and hid her
face upon his breast.

“Your prayer is answered,” responded Holyoke tenderly,
“even while you are speaking.”

When, at length, she lifted her head, Holyoke said in a
low voice, “Are my crimes forgiven?”

“No,” replied Mary, “they are forgotten.”

The lovers sat for some minutes in silence, which was at
last broken by Holyoke. “Mary,” said he, “I have just
conceived an idea that seems strange to me as well as
rational.”

“What is it?”

“That I have become a new being in a new world.”

“Explain,” said Mary.

“Do you ever think of your childhood without having a
vision of your childhood's home? Can you think of yourself
as a little child, without seeing all that surrounded you
when a child?”

“Granted that I cannot,” replied Mary: “What then?”

“Would it not seem to you that the scene was thus a
part of the soul—that the soul, by receiving impressions
from it and passing into it in the realization of life, had
become fitted to it, and bore the stamp of all its features?”

“I think I understand you,” said Mary, “and now for
your new idea.”

“I felt as I was sitting here, that my soul had flowed out
upon, and fitted itself to a new scene,—as if all that I saw
around me had become a part of me; and certainly no
thought of love for you can ever visit me, without bringing
this picture with it.”

“Yours should be a great love to be worthy of a casting
in such a mould,” said Mary, smiling at the fancy, “and I
take it as a pledge that your soul can never fit itself to any
other.”

“Mary, you are inclined to joke me—I see it in your eye,
but the truth is, I feel just now intensely poetical.”

“By the way,” continued Mary, with a look of well disguised
concern, “you are not going to set up a claim to the
proprietorship of these lands, based on the fact that they
have become a part of you, are you?”

“When you become a part of me, I calculate I shall set up
a claim of proprietorship,” responded Holyoke, reluctantly

drawn away from his pet conceit, “and why should woodland
differ from wife?”

“There is one difference, at least: the wife takes your
name and the woodland does not.”

“Honestly, Mary,” said Holyoke, “it would be a very
great happiness to give my name to a scene like this, to be
linked with it for ever, to have it spoken from a mountain
top or sung by a waterfall.”

“If you wish it,” said Mary, entering into his enthusiasm,
“let it be so. Do you see that blue mountain top at the
North, just lifting itself above the intervening forests?”

“Yes.”

“Let that be Mt. Holyoke for ever!” said Mary, stretching
out her hand.

“Amen!” responded Holyoke, “and I shall see that your
authority in bestowing the name is fully honored. But
what shall be done with the lonely mountain westward of
mine? It would be unkind to leave that nameless.”

“Let it be named in honor of the poor pet that lies
yonder,” said Mary, pointing to the grave of Tom.

“Let it be Mt. Tom for ever!” said Holyoke, in sportive
imitation of Mary, and the lovers simultaneously rose, and
bent their steps homewards.