University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.
LOVE AFTER A FOREIGN FASHION.

It is part of youth's business to sport and play, dance and sing,
just as certainly as to work and grow. The work and growth
depend quite as much upon the play as the food and nurture.
And we must not look too severely upon exuberances which belong
to the instincts. We must let youth rollick at due seasons,
just as we suffer young colts to kick up their heels upon a common;
and we must not see too austerely that this kicking up of
the heels, whether of the human animal or the young horse, is
calculated to exhibit them in uncouth or ridiculous attitudes.
Do n't vex yourself, or others, about their attitudes. It is the
kicking up which is the essential performance; the grace will
grow afterward, as a due consequence of the familiar exercise.
To us who are no longer in the gristle, whose limbs are solidly
set, and grow daily more and more uncompromising, there is, no
doubt, something quite as impertinent as awkward in this rollicking
of young creatures. But, dear brother, now growing grisly,
if not ungraceful, be sure, while you rebuke the absurd antics of
boyhood, that you are not governed quite as much by a secret
envy, which deceives yourself, as by a fastidious feeling of the
proprieties. Be sure, before you sermonize, that you would really
refuse these antics, even if you could practise them; that it would
be no satisfaction to you to leap backward forty years or more,
and rejoice in the hop-skip-and-jump, the somersault, or even the

bruising-match and buffet of yonder urchins, whom you now regard
with such solemn gravity, as emulous only of the doings of
apes and monkeys. Boys have to go through a certain portion
of ape-and-monkey practice and experience before they can be
men; and we have only to take care that they are duly exercised
in man-practice also, so that they do not finally grow into the
exclusive fashion of the beast!

And girls are boys, with a certain difference, and women men!
And they too must pass through a certain amount of rollicking;
and our only solicitude in their case is that they should not show
quite so much of their heels as the tougher gender. Just see that
their figleaves are a fraction longer; and if you make some difference
in the cut and fashion of skirt and small-clothes, you will
probably put as much curb on the young creatures as they need
in the rollicking season through which they have to pass.

And if the silly monkeys insist, for their part, on flinging up
their heels to the sound of music, do n't fancy, for the life of you,
that the disparagement is to the heels, however much it may be
to the music. If the fiddle can time the paces of these wild colts;
if heels can be made to work together harmoniously; be sure that
there is much less chance of their being cast up in each other's
faces. And, one thing let me tell you — the more you encourage
the shaking of the legs, the more you discourage that incessant
wagging of the tongue, which is apt to become a scandal to the
sex, in teaching all the arts of scandal. In brief, innocent sports
are absolutely necessary to the preservation of innocence; and
the heart depends quite as much, for its continued purity, upon an
occasional flinging out of legs and arms, as upon your stale saws
and owl-like maxims. All that we have need to do, to guard
against danger, is that the sports shall be simply those of young
limbs needing exercise, stripped of all conventional adjuncts, by
which we teach something more profound than exercise, and more
mischievous than the contredanse and pugilism. To the pure all
things are pure, even the heels of colts and the claws of kittens;
and we have only to see and keep them to the mere rollicking,
without suffering this to become tributary to the sensualism at
once of thought and blood. And so you shall see that dancing
does not mean simply hugging and squeezing; and that you are
not reconciled, by a foreign fashionable name, into those practices,

which, in the plain vernacular, mean anything but dancing! Of
course, this is doctrine meant only for animals of English breed —
that stern, intense, savage Anglo-Norman nature, which goes to
its very sports with a sense of morals, and justifies its pursuit of
happiness by a reference to duty. It is otherwise with light flexible
natures like the Italian and the French. To these, sport is
its own justification, and sufficiently satisfies of itself. But when
we, of rough British origin, undertake their habitual exercise, we
are apt to get drunk upon them. The fire rages in the blood, and
rushes to the brain, in our intensity of temperament, and the game
which we have begun in play is but too apt to end in passion.

We have said all this, dear reader, in order that you should be
properly prepared to look upon a little child's play — a colt rollicking
— without feeling your sense of dignity too much outraged.
Remember, too, we are in a wild land, where European law
scarcely touches us with a feeling of reserve or caution. Our
dramatis personœ, also, though of all European stocks, are of
rather irregular practice, and will, no doubt, show you many rules
not to be found in Gunter. Do n't let these things cause any misgivings.
It is your policy to see something of all the world's varieties
— to see how Humanity demeans itself in different situations;
and you are wise in just that degree in which you recognise all
human practices, irrespective of the laws laid down by your little
parish conventionalities. Thus warned, if you blunder, sagely or
savagely, in your meditations, the fault is none of ours.

Our Zulieme has no sooner heard that she is in a place of
safety, where she can rollick upon dry land without dreading the
loss of skin and scalp, than she begins to fling out her heels. She
lilts, she sings, she screams, claps her little hands, and dances, and
forgets that she has a master.

“Sylvia! Sylvia!” she half shouts, half warbles, as she darts
down into the cabin.

“Phipps! Phipps!” — and Sylvia appears, a thick-lipped negress,
mulatto rather, with a turbid current running through veins
and skin, great eyes, a flat nose, and glossy black hair of that wiry
and frizzled character which, to some eyes, may possess a peculiar
beauty. In the hands of some modern novelists, who are ambitious
equally of taste and eccentricity, she might become a heroine,
calculated to provoke the raptures of a Prince Djalma. To

others, of more philanthropy than taste, she would appear the
ideal of a much-wronged race of hybrids, who would be more esteemed
for their charms could an eccentric philosophy succeed in
disturbing the natural instincts of a superior civilization. But
poor Sylvia lives at a period when taste was more proper and
natural, and philanthropy more sane, and so we describe her as
she appears to all about her — an Abigail of very vulgar attractions,
with all the cunning of her class, sly, deceitful, somewhat
clever, and ugly enough for trust, as the waiting-maid of “milady.”

Phipps is a brisk cabin-boy, of British bulk and character, sixteen
years old, sprightly enough in his province as a knife-cleaner
and actor of all work in a cruiser's cabin, without any very salient
features, moral or physical, his nasal prominence excepted. This
is a nose, an unquestionable proboscis; an ample rudder to a
round, fair Saxon face of good fleshy rotundity.

They both show themselves at the summons of the lady. They
are both pleased to obey a call which promises pleasure. There
is to be a supper and a dance on shore. Phipps plays the fiddle:
Sylvia feeds with appetite; has as great a passion for dancing as
her mistress, though scarcely so graceful of movement; and both
are particularly delighted with the idea of a rollicking on shore.

And they go to work with an impulse which makes preparation
easy. Fruits, and sweetmeats, and solids; plates, knives and
forks; flasks of ruddy wines of Canary and Madeira, are transferred
in a twink from hold and cabin to the shelter of green trees.
Blankets, nay cloaks, and rich couvrelits, are spread upon the
turf, and hung from the branches; and soon you behold the fair
Zulieme seated in state under a natural canopy of oaks and cedars.
And anon you behold the sailors, in clean toggery, beginning
to group themselves about the area, though at a respectful
distance from the queen of the fête. They are never indifferent
to sports which relieve duty; and they are not superior to the
vanity which for ever feels conscious that other eyes are looking
on. So you note that their duck trowsers are of the whitest; and
some of them sport red sashes about the waist, in which their pistols
and knives shine with recent furbishing. And they wear
jaunty jackets of blue, and green, and crimson; and their hats of
straw are wound about with shawls or handkerchiefs of quite as

many colors; and these are of silken stuffs, such as would have
been held rare and rich enough in the days of old Queen Bess.
And you need but look into the eyes of these several parties, to
see, as Phipps tunes his fiddle in a recess of the wood, and the
notes come faintly to their senses, that they meditate shaking legs
themselves, presuming, no doubt, on indulgences which have not
been denied before.

And at the feet of the beautiful Zulieme you see the Spanish
guitar, thickly inlaid with pearl, and ebony, and silver, in vines
and flowers, while a broad scarf of crimson floats around it in the
breeze, which said scarf will anon encircle the neck and shoulders
— white and bare enough in her present costume — of the
beauty of the feast. She has made her toilet for the occasion.
She has an eye, with all her childish simplicity, to what belongs
to such an occasion. She knows that all these rough sailors admire;
that they too have eyes; and failing to figure, as she designed,
in the festas of the Cuban, she is not unwilling to receive
the homage of a ruder class of worshippers.

And so she glows in green and crimson, and her hair wantons
free, only sprinkled with pearls, which contrast exquisitely with
her raven tresses; while, wrapping her neck in frequent folds,
and dropping down upon her bosom in a gorgeous amulet, with
pendant diamond cross, they serve to show how much whiter is
the delicate skin which they do not so much adorn as illustrate.
Her dress, open enough for the display of a very admirable bust,
is loose enough in skirt for the perfect freedom of an exquisite
figure. A cincture of green and gold, with diamond clasp, encircles
her waist, and her jewelled poniard secures the clasp, the little
sheath forming the rivet which brings the opposing eyes of the
clasp together.

Zulieme has not forgotten the first of her lessons, — the one
tanght most easily — the one always taught by a fond, foolish,
adoring mother, — that she is, in truth, very beautiful; and that
the sole object of dress is not, as vulgar people think, to conceal,
but to adorn and properly develop the person; and, as she now
sits before us, we are again reminded of Cleopatra —

swelling with all the consciousness, not only of a most voluptuous
beauty, but of the masculine eyes looking on, that drink in provocation
at every glance, and grow momently more and more bewildered
with the intoxications of passion.

To the class of beauties which Zulieme represents, the possession
of the fascination is nothing compared with its exercise upon
the victim. It loses half of its charm in their own eyes, unless
they feel that others grow blind beneath its spells. And when
vanity and voluptuousness grow together, who shall measure the
extent of insanity to which their proprietor will speed? It was
fabled of Circe, that she transformed her worshippers into brutes.
But the fable properly implies that they were brutified by the
fascination, which, in its own growth of passion, had lost all power
to discriminate in the choice of its worshippers, and had ceased to
consider the difference in the quality of the homage, or whether it
was accorded by brutes or men. Circe was willing enough to
exhibit herself to beast as well as man; and, like her, our Zulieme
was perhaps quite as well pleased with the admiration of Jack Tar
as that of her own liege lord, his superior and hers — the stern,
half outlaw, but noble Captain Calvert.

“But where is my lord, the while?”

We could answer. We have seen where and how. But of his
griefs, or of any griefs, our lady asks no questions. The feast is
spread. The viands are about to be served, and Lieutenant Molyneaux
sits at the feet of the lady, hands up the cates, and serves
her with hands and eyes. He too, always studious of his personal
appearance, is habited with care and taste for the occasion.
His figure, tbough not massive, is a good one. He prides himself
equally on the having, and the making, of a leg. Charles Molyneaux
is something of a courtier. He has dressed himself, making as near
an approach to the court costume of that day as possible. For
example, his neat figure is clad in silk stockings and small-clothes.
He wears a diamond buckle at knee and instep. He has on a
richly-flowered vest of silk; and the frills of his shirt protrude
six inches from his bosom. His silken cravat is of dimensions
which suit rather a levée at St. James, or St. Cloud, than warm
weather and the woods of Kiawah. His coat is of brocade, such
as Bolingbroke wore at the court of France. It is of Paris cut
and so, a sufficient model, of course, for all the courts of Europe.
Mr. Molyneaux is a person of conventional tastes. He does not

suffer himself sufficient freedom, to consult that better propriety,
which makes good taste superior to all convention. In one respect,
however, he left Nature to her own decencies. He wore
no pomatum or powder in his hair; but this forbearance was not
his merit. These commodities were neither among the ship's
stores nor his own. He possessed a naturally fine shock, which,
let go free, had grown into very copious love-locks, which did not
misbeseem the days of Rochester and the effeminate style of his
own face. His complacency is such as not to suffer him to suppose
that any costume would misbeseem his person!

And, sitting at the feet of the gay lady, he played the courtier
in speech, and look, and action, no less than in costume. He
taught his eyes to languish, looking deathly things into hers. His
tones were subdued sweetly to those murmuring accents which
lovers suppose to be fitly adapted to honeyed sentiments; and the
compliments whispered to her now, and at other periods, were of
that equivocal sort — half serious and sentimental, and half playful
— which the young coquette hears with a thrill, and responds
to with a sigh; and which the fashionable world considers a very
natural, proper, and wholly unobjectionable method of conversation:
Passion feeling his way; gradually insinuating; not offending
all at once, but so preparing his advance that the mind is
gradually corrupted, and not apt, when final offence is given, to
show itself offended at all. It is, indeed, wonderful how rapid is
this progress of safe insinuation in such cases: she who drinks,
tasting none of the poison, so infinitesimal is the dose, and so
sweet the draught; but, drinking so frequently that all the veins
are filled in brief season, and the poison finally makes perfect
lodgment in the heart. Of course, where there are many lovers,
there is a corresponding growth of obtuseness; passion itself no
longer finding stimulus, from too great a familiarity with this sort
of provocation, and flirtation serving then to gratify the vanity of
that passion which has no other appetite. It is curious, indeed,
how cold and sterile vanity contrives to render all other passions.

Poor Zulieme! she was a flirt from mere vanity and vacuity of
thought. It was easy for her to smile and play; very pleasant to
be played with; very grateful to be taught that she had her own
fascinations, and that wisdom, in her case, might very well be
dispensed with. She had been made beautiful — made to appear

beautiful — and so, to appear beautiful was her great duty in life;
and to receive the continued assurance that she was the beauty
that she had been taught to think herself, and was doing the
proper business for which she was made, was, of course, calculated
to put her mind at rest on all disquieting subjects. That her husband
did not seem to care whether she was beautiful or not, was
not so much a cause of solicitude as of vexation. It only showed
him a wrong-headed, inappreciative person, who really did not
know what the uses of a husband are!

But Lieutenant Molyneaux gave no such offence. He was
shrewd, quick, selfish; had those arts in perfection which teach
how to take advantage of another's weakness. He soon sounded
the shallows of poor Zulieme's little heart and head: thought so,
at least; but was mistaken partly. She was a pretty idiot, vain
and capricious; a spoiled child, insolent as lovely; charming without
an art, but charming only as a plaything. But, as Molyneaux
was wont to say —

“It's a plaything, after all, that a man most wants. Let a man
take a wife who will; a plaything for me! and why not another
man's wife?”

There was no good reason, as the world goes, why not! His
comrade, Lieutenant Eckles, whom you see also in attendance, not
far from the beautiful Zulieme, but not at her feet; a young man
of inferior intellectual calibre to Molyneaux, but more certainly
moral; a good-looking fellow, too, but by no means beau or courtier;
he had some misgivings in regard to the policy, if not the
propriety, of his comrade's practice. More than once, on the
present voyage, he had shaken his head gravely at the presumption
of Molyneaux in respect to the captain's wife: not, however,
committing the absurdity of reproaching his morals, but only
warning him against the dangers of his course.

“Look you, Molyneaux,” he was wont to say, “for all that
Captain Calvert seems so indifferent about these liberties you take
with his wife, I'm sure he do n't like it.”

Likely not, Eckles — but she does.”

“I think that likely, too; but do n't you see that you're in
shoal water all the time, and can't say when you 'll be among the
breakers.”

“Pooh, Eckles! shall one drink his can the less because of

that? Shall I refuse fruit lest I be sick to-morrow? I am not
such an ascetic; no, nor such a fool. I am for taking the pleasure
when and where I find it, without asking myself whether
there be a thorn lurking for the fingers.”

“You will feel it prick when you least expect it; and the wound
will, some day, make you feel that the pleasure was a little too dearly
paid for. The captain's a terrible fellow when he rouses up!”

“What do I care, so long as I do my duty? The world's a
sort of feast, where men gather to get food which they relish. I
find mine here and there, and do not ask who is the gardener.
Enough if, when I pluck and eat, my appetite smacks its lips.
As for the captain's rages, none know them better than myself;
but I fear no man that ever stepped a quarter-deck, and he knows
it! But you are mistaken: I take no liberties with his wife that
are not the custom of the Spaniard. We dance together, and
before his eyes.

“Ay, but he's an Englishman; and what the Spaniard sees no
harm in, the Englishman winces at. And dancing's one thing,
but regular hugging another. There's that fandango, for instance,
which you and she are so fond of. Would you like to see your
wife carrying on such a game with another man?”

“When I marry, my wife may carry it on if she pleases. But,
so long as I have my senses, and know what other men's wives
are, you will not catch me putting my neck into the halter. I am
quite satisfied with another man's wife at a fandango.”

“Very well, perhaps, so long as he's satisfied; but if it's the
captain, be sure to keep your heels in running order, if he happens
to break loose. He's not suspicious, not jealous; he's got
too much pride for that, I'm thinking; but if ever he thinks you
grow saucy, and go too far, he'll make no more bones of breaking
your bones than he would of cleaving a Spaniard to the chine. I
can tell you there's not a man in the ship but sees and says you
go too far, and will be brought up some day by a taut rope and a
short turn. It's one thing to dance with the lady; but to do it as
you do, with so much unction — to bring her up to your bosom,
and squeeze her so closely, and keep at it so long — it neither
agrees with the captain's bile nor with the music. You do n't
keep proper time, Molyneaux; and devils seize me, if any husband
will keep proper temper long, if the thing goes on. For my

part, if 't was my wife, I'd soon have you ashore, broadsword to
broadsword.”

“And get your skull split in the performance.”

“That might be. But, in a case of that kind, you 'd find even me
an ugly customer; and as for the captain, let me tell you, clever
as you are at fence, you would n't stand three minutes before him.
He'd beat down all your guards before you could say `Jack Robinson,'
and slice off head or arm, making clean work of it, not
leaving you chance for a single prayer. Now, do you look to it.
The captain begins to grow a little restiff; the wife's a silly creature,
who can't see; and your very impudence will help to shut
your eyes and open his, where a wiser fellow would never be
suspected, by keeping wide awake himself.”

“My dear Eckles, do you never suspect yourself of being tedious.
Other men would only think you envious; but the envy
is forgivable; the dullness never.”

“You are the most conceited ass, Molyneaux; and your ears
will bring you to the pillory. I envious! and of you, I suppose?
Oh, that a man's calf should turn his brains so completely!”

The young men were both dressing for the festa when this dialogue
took place: Molyneaux was drawing on his silken stocking,
and stroking the limb with evident complacency. Hence the reference
of his companion to the particular member. The sarcasm
of the junior member fell innocuous on the ears of his senior; in
fact, provoked his laughter only. He was too well fortified by
self-esteem. It was an additional tribute to the merits of his legs.
But this must suffice for clues in this progress. Meanwhile,
return we to the festa.

Molyneaux served the cates and viands. Zulieme shared with
him, helping him in turn. Eckles, more respectfully apart, was
rather a spectator than participator in the scene. He ate and
drank, it is true. He had a genuine English appetite. The sailors
were dispersed in the woods, making merry after their fashion,
little groups of them forming under so many trees, and drinking,
eating, and gambolling, like young donkeys in a pleasant
pasturage. Very soon, finding her mistress absorbed in his gallantries
with Molyneaux, Sylvia took herself off to a social circle
of more freedom, among her favorites of the crew. Phipps was
not so modest as to suppose that he could draw off with safety;

and Lieutenant Eckles, though feeling himself de trop, was yet,
for this very reason, unwilling to withdraw. He sat; looked
on uneasily; rose and stood about; was sometimes spoken to, and
sometimes spoke; but formed no essential member of the tableau.

And the rich wines of Sicily and Madeira were soon put in
circulation; and the joyous Zulieme seemed to yield herself
wholly to the intoxication of the scene. Her bright eyes sparkled
back to those of her cavalier. Her lively tones answered to his
subdued and sentimental ones.

But it was somewhat disquieting to him that she should talk
merrily, in answer to his saddest murmur; that there should be
nothing sad either in her looks or words. She was a little too
much the child, at play, for him. He could better prefer a little
more of that Anglo-Norman intensity which conducts so readily
from play to passion.

But where should Zulieme learn that sentiment which is the
due medium for such transition? It was neither in heart nor
head; and the hopes of any progress on the part of our roué
could be predicated only of her exuberance; the loose, familiar
habits of her race; her ignorance of all concentrative passion; her
butterfly caprice and infantile restlessness. Such a character
naturally baffled the usual arts of the courtly gallant. He relies
upon the use of a conventional sentiment of which she had never
learned the A B C. That sort of eloquence — a compound, in
which fancy relieves, yet reconciles us to passion; which is enforced
by sadly-searching glances; soft, low tones, melting into
murmurs — all these, the more common agencies in such a game,
were wanting in their wonted potency, dealing with so light a creature.
She was willing enough to sport on the edge of the precipice,
but only because she was so totally ignorant of any precipice
in existence. Sin is usually a thing of great intensities, by which
one is hurried onward in repeated provocation; the merely loitering
nature is as frequently diverted from sin — that is, the sin of
passion — as it is from positive virtues, by its mere caprices; and
Zulieme Calvert, née Montano, was one whom the sound of a fiddle
could divert from a death-bed — whom the grateful occupation of
costuming herself for a festa, where she was to be seen of many
lovers, would suffice to win from the embraces of the most ardent
whom she herself preferred over all the rest.

How shall Lieutenant Molyneaux beguile such a nature to a
moment of serious thought of love? for he can only prevail by
inspiring her with some such mood.

Well, he spoke of love, of hearts naturally twinned by Heaven,
denied by man; afflicted with mutual yearnings, but with great
barriers of convention between: not insurmountable, however,
thank Heaven! Love will find out a way — why not? Is love,
decreed of Heaven, to be denied of man? Shall these mutual
hearts be defrauded of their mutual rights? And what are these
barriers that rise up to conflict with the purposes of Heaven?
Are they not pretexts and impediments of merely human artifice?
And shall those who have Heaven's sanction upon their affections
— shall they submit to these human artifices?

Such was the sort of stuff, of an ancient fashion, which the roué
finds stereotyped to his hands in the old romances, with which
our amorous lieutenant regaled the ears of Zulieme Calvert, in
the effort to arouse her fancies. The case was, of course, put
abstractly.

And he looked so languid and sad, so wretchedly interesting,
while he said it, that poor Zulieme sighed too, and looked very
wretched herself for a moment, and said:

“'T was, indeed, very sad and very cruel, Mr. Molyneaux; and
I wonder why people do submit to such denial. I 'm sure I
would n't. If I loved a gentleman I 'd have him, and he should
have me, and I 'd no more mind what mamma said than I 'd mind
Sylvia. But I do n't think such things happen often, lieutenant.
I do n't think love makes one so wretched. If it did, 't would
be no better than grief or melancholy. Now, when I was in love,
I was always the gayest creature in the world. I told everybody.
I had a hundred friends, and we talked of it all the time;
and we made songs about it, and dances —”

“Dances!”

“Yes! we made dances about it; and one played the gentleman,
and the other the lady. And oh! you should have seen us:
how we bowed to each other, and sidled by each other, and smiled
and looked up, and sighed and looked down; and then, on a sudden,
the gentleman seized the lady in his arms, and drew her up
to him, and gave her such a kiss. Oh! I vow, when I was in
love, or only playing love, it was the most joyous time of my life.

and I was never so gay — so happy. Love never made me
wretched.”

“But was this when you married the captain? He did not
court you in that way, did he?”

“Oh! no! — poor fellow, he could n't do much courting, any
way. When I first saw him, he was half dead. Father brought
him home. He was wrecked, you know, and cast away; and he
and Belcher travelled over the isthmus, till he was taken sick,
and brought to our hacienda. And he was so sick! He hardly
knew anybody; was out of his head; could see nothing; and
talked all sorts of things about England, and fighting, and a lady
whom he called Olive. It was always Olive — Olive, Olive!
And he spoke so softly and sweetly, and I could see that he was
a handsome man, and a brave, though he was so feeble. And so,
when he called me `Olive,' I answered him; and I nursed him;
and he was so pleased, and I was so pleased to nurse him. He
was like a doll, and I washed his face and bathed his head, and I
combed his hair, and all that did him good; and when he was
raving, he kissed my hands, and called me his dear Olive, and I
let him call me so, and answered him, and never told him that I
was not Olive, but Zulieme. And I sang and played to him on
the guitar, and when he got better we played together. Oh! he
was a great doll for me, and it was in playing together that we
made love and carried on our courtship. It was very funny.
Such plays as we had — such rompings! And I taught him how
to dance our Spanish dances; and he sang with me — he 's got a
beautiful voice for singing; and I chased him through the orange-groves,
and found him out where he used to hide himself; for he
loved too much to hide himself among the thick groves; and he
looked so sad when I found him; but I cheered him up, and he
would smile, and sing and dance with me, all so good; till, one
day, he started up in a sort of passion, and looked very grand, and
said I should be his little wife; and I said, `Yes, why not? it will
be so funny to become a wife.' And so the priest married us. But
he 's changed since then — he is not funny now. He 's so serious,
and so cross! — all you English are so cross and quarrelsome.”

“But I am not.”

“Oh! yes, you are, though you do try to please me and make
me happy.”

“Ah, Zulieme, what you call love is very different from what I
mean. I could teach you a better sort of love — more sweet,
more precious — which would fill your soul rather than your
eyes; for which you would be willing to die; for which, alone,
one who knows what it is would be willing to live!”

“Do teach me, then. I 'd like to know every sort of love. I
suppose it 's different in all countries; but I do n't think you
English know much about it; at least, I do n't like your rough,
hard, quarrelsome sort of love. It seems to me as if you are
always angry when you love. There 's Harry, now — why, when
he made love to me, it was like a tiger. I did n't know but he
wanted to eat me. And when he spoke of love, even before we
were married, it was as if he spoke of some great sorrow and
trouble; for he groaned, and clasped his head in his hands, and
then he would start, and dash out into the groves, and almost run,
till he got into the thickest part, where the sun never shines.”

“I would teach you another sort of love from his,” responded
the courtier in low tones, looking sadly sweet, with that intense
stare of the eyes, which, with a slight dash of melancholy in the
gaze, makes the usual ideal of devoted and inveterate passion,
among professed artists.

“Oh! do n't look so wretched!” cried the lady, flinging a handful
of Brazil nutshells into his face. “It 's enough to scare love
out of the country to look so while you talk about it. Do n't
you — you hurt me.”

He had seized her hand, and would have carried it to his lip,
when a guttural sound, rather a grunt than groan, aroused him to
the consciousness that there were other parties on the ground.
With a fierce glance he looked around, and met the ominous visage
of his brother lieutenant, who, fearing lest the scene should
too greatly shock his own, or the modesty of some other party,
sent forth the doleful ejaculation, which had arrested the gallantries
of our cavalier. Molyneaux could have taken him by the
throat.

“Oh! you had reason to groan, Mr. Eckles,” said the laughing
lady; “for such a doleful picture as Mr. Molyneaux made of
himself was absolutely distressing. Now hear me tell of love:
when you love, you must look sweet, and bright, and happy;
you must sing, and you must dance; and go together into the

groves, and get oranges, and bananas, and figs, and nuts; and
then have a chase, and pelt one another as you run, till you 're
ready to drop with laughter, and only shake it off to dance. For
you must n't laugh out when you 're dancing — only smile; you
need all your breath, you know, if you want to dance beautifully.
But, hark! Phipps has gone off with his fiddle, and the sailors
are at it. Hear what a shouting and shuffling: and that Sylvia,
she 's gone, I vow, and I suppose she 's footing it with the best of
them. How funny! Come, let 's go and see.”

And she sprang up, gathered up her skirts with one hand,
grasped the arm of Molyneaux with the other, and crying to
Eckles, “Come, Mr. Eckles, won't you?” she lilted away in a
capering motion, which required that Molyneaux should adopt a
new step, somewhat difficult to his execution, in order to keep
time with hers. Eckles slowly following, with uplifted hands and
eyes, the three soon buried themselves in the deeper woods, where
a more inspiriting and less pathetic action was in progress.