University of Virginia Library

The next day Senor Don Guzman de Cardona arrived,
and the whole house was in a commotion of excitement.
There was to be no school, and everything was
bustle and confusion. I passed my time in my own room
in reflecting severely upon myself for the imprudent words
by which I had thrown one more difficulty in the way of
this poor harassed child.

Dolores this day seemed perfectly passive in the hands of
her mother and sisters, who appeared disposed to show her
great attention. She allowed them to array her in her most
becoming dress, and made no objection to anything except
removing the bracelet from her arm. “Nobody's gifts
should take the place of her mother's,” she said, and they
were obliged to be content with her wearing of the diamond
bracelet on the other arm.

Don Guzman was a large, plethoric man, with coarse
features and heavy gait. Besides the scar I have spoken
of, his face was adorned here and there with pimples, which
were not set down in the miniature.

In the course of the first hour's study, I saw him to be a
man of much the same stamp as Dolores's father — sensual,
tyrannical, passionate. He seemed in his own way to be
much struck with the beauty of his intended wife, and was
not wanting in efforts to please her. All that I could see
in her was the settled, passive paleness of despair. She

played, sang, exhibited her embroidery and painting, at the
command of Madame Mendoza, with the air of an automaton;
and Don Guzman remarked to her father on the passive
obedience as a proper and hopeful trait. Once only,
when he, in presenting her a flower, took the liberty of kissing
her cheek, did I observe the flashing of her eye and
a movement of disgust and impatience, that she seemed
scarcely able to restrain.

The marriage was announced to take place the next week,
and a holiday was declared through the house. Nothing was
talked of or discussed but the corbeille de mariage which the
bridegroom had brought — the dresses, laces, sets of jewels,
and cashmere shawls. Dolores never had been treated
with such attention by the family in her life. She rose immeasurably
in the eyes of all as the future possessor of such
wealth and such an establishment as awaited her. Madame
Mendoza had visions of future visits in Cuba rising before
her mind, and overwhelmed her daughter-in-law with flatteries
and caresses, which she received in the same passive
silence as she did everything else.

For my own part, I tried to keep entirely by myself. I
remained in my room reading, and took my daily rides, accompanied
by my servant — seeing Dolores only at mealtimes,
when I scarcely ventured to look at her. One night,
however, as I was walking through a lonely part of the
garden, Dolores suddenly stepped out from the shrubbery
and stood before me. It was bright moonlight, by which her
face and person were distinctly shown. How well I remember
her as she looked then! She was dressed in white
muslin, as she was fond of being, but it had been torn and
disordered by the haste with which she had come through
the shrubbery. Her face was fearfully pale, and her great

dark eyes had an unnatural brightness. She laid hold on
my arm.

“Look here,” she said, “I saw you and came down to
speak with you.”

She panted and trembled, so that for some moments she
could not speak another word. “I want to ask you,” she
gasped, after a pause, “whether I heard you right? Did
you say” —

“Yes, Dolores, you did. I did say what I had no right
to say, like a dishonorable man.”

“But is it true? Are you sure it is true?” she said,
scarcely seeming to hear my words.

“God knows it is,” said I despairingly.

“Then why don't you save me? Why do you let them
sell me to this dreadful man? He don't love me — he
never will. Can't you take me away?”

“Dolores, I am a poor man. I cannot give you any of
these splendors your father desires for you.”

“Do you think I care for them? I love you more than
all the world together. And if you do really love me, why
should we not be happy with each other?”

“Dolores,” I said, with a last effort to keep calm, “I am
much older than you, and know the world, and ought not to
take advantage of your simplicity. You have been so accustomed
to abundant wealth and all it can give, that you
cannot form an idea of what the hardships and discomforts
of marrying a poor man would be. You are unused to having
the least care, or making the least exertion for yourself.
All the world would say that I acted a very dishonorable
part to take you from a position which offers you wealth,
splendor, and ease, to one of comparative hardship. Perhaps
some day you would think so yourself.”

While I was speaking, Dolores turned me toward the
moonlight, and fixed her great dark eyes piercingly upon
me, as if she wanted to read my soul. “Is that all?” she
said; “is that the only reason?”

“I do not understand you,” said I.

She gave me such a desolate look, and answered in a tone
of utter dejection, “Oh, I did n't know, but perhaps you
might not want me. All the rest are so glad to sell me to
anybody that will take me. But you really do love me,
don't you?” she added, laying her hand on mine.

What answer I made I cannot say. I only know that
every vestige of what is called reason and common sense
left me at that moment, and that there followed an hour of
delirium in which I — we both were very happy — we forgot
everything but each other, and we arranged all our
plans for flight. There was fortunately a ship lying in the
harbor of St. Augustine, the captain of which was known
to me. In course of a day or two passage was taken, and
my effects transported on board. Nobody seemed to suspect
us. Everything went on quietly up to the day before that
appointed for sailing. I took my usual rides, and did
everything as much as possible in my ordinary way, to disarm
suspicion, and none seemed to exist. The needed preparations
went gayly forward. On the day I mentioned, when I
had ridden some distance from the house, a messenger came
post-haste after me. It was a boy who belonged specially to
Dolores. He gave me a little hurried note. I copy it: —

Dolores.”

There was the end of it all. I escaped on the ship. I
read the marriage in the paper. Incidentally I afterwards
heard of her as living in Cuba, but I never saw her again
till I saw her in her coffin. Sorrow and death had changed
her so much that at first the sight of her awakened only a
vague, painful remembrance. The sight of the hair bracelet
which I had seen on her arm brought all back, and I felt
sure that my poor Dolores had strangely come to sleep her
last sleep near me.

Immediately after I became satisfied who you were, I felt
a painful degree of responsibility for the knowledge. I
wrote at once to a friend of mine in the neighborhood of St.
Augustine, to find out any particulars of the Mendoza family.
I learned that its history had been like that of many others
in that region. Don Jose had died in a bilious fever,
brought on by excessive dissipation, and at his death the
estate was found to be so incumbered that the whole was
sold at auction. The slaves were scattered hither and
thither to different owners, and Madame Mendoza, with
her children and remains of fortune, had gone to live in
New Orleans.

Of Dolores he had heard but once since her marriage. A
friend had visited Don Guzman's estates in Cuba. He was
living in great splendor, but bore the character of a hard,
cruel, tyrannical master, and an overbearing man. His
wife was spoken of as being in very delicate health, — avoiding
society and devoting herself to religion.

I would here take occasion to say that it was understood
when I went into the family of Don Jose, that I should not
in any way interfere with the religious faith of the children,
the family being understood to belong to the Roman Catholic
Church. There was so little like religion of any kind
in the family, that the idea of their belonging to any faith
savored something of the ludicrous. In the case of poor
Dolores, however, it was different. The earnestness of her
nature would always have made any religious form a reality
to her. In her case I was glad to remember that the Romish
Church, amid many corruptions, preserves all the essential
beliefs necessary for our salvation, and that many
holy souls have gone to heaven through its doors. I therefore
was only careful to direct her principal attention to the
more spiritual parts of her own faith, and to dwell on the
great themes which all Christian people hold in common.

Many of my persuasion would not have felt free to do
this, but my liberty of conscience in this respect was perfect.
I have seen that if you break the cup out of which a soul
has been used to take the wine of the gospel, you often
spill the very wine itself. And after all, these forms are
but shadows of which the substance is Christ.

I am free to say, therefore, that the thought that your
poor mother was devoting herself earnestly to religion, although
after the forms of a church with which I differ, was
to me a source of great consolation, because I knew that in
that way alone could a soul like hers find peace.

I have never rested from my efforts to obtain more information.
A short time before the incident which cast you
upon our shore, I conversed with a sea-captain who had
returned from Cuba. He stated that there had been an
attempt at insurrection among the slaves of Don Guzman,

in which a large part of the buildings and out-houses of the
estate had been consumed by fire.

On subsequent inquiry I learned that Don Guzman had
sold his estates and embarked for Boston with his wife and
family, and that nothing had subsequently been heard of
him.

Thus, my young friend, I have told you all that I know
of those singular circumstances which have cast your lot on
our shores. I do not expect that at your time of life you
will take the same view of this event that I do. You may
possibly — very probably will — consider it a loss not to
have been brought up as you might have been in the splendid
establishment of Don Guzman, and found yourself heir
to wealth and pleasure without labor or exertion. Yet I am
quite sure in that case that your value as a human being
would have been immeasurably less. I think I have seen
in you the elements of passions, which luxury and idleness
and the too early possession of irresponsible power, might
have developed with fatal results. You have simply to
reflect whether you would rather be an energetic, intelligent,
self-controlled man, capable of guiding the affairs of life and
of acquiring its prizes, — or to be the reverse of all this,
with its prizes bought for you by the wealth of parents.

I hope mature reflection will teach you to regard with
gratitude that disposition of the All-Wise, which cast your
lot as it has been cast.

Let me ask one thing in closing. I have written for you
here many things most painful for me to remember, because
I wanted you to love and honor the memory of your mother.
I wanted that her memory should have something such a
charm for you as it has for me. With me, her image has
always stood between me and all other women; but I have

never even intimated to a living being that such a passage
in my history ever occurred, — no, not even to my sister,
who is nearer to me than any other earthly creature.

In some respects I am a singular person in my habits,
and having once written this, you will pardon me if I observe
that it will never be agreeable to me to have the
subject named between us. Look upon me always as a
friend, who would regard nothing as a hardship by which
he might serve the son of one so dear.

I have hesitated whether I ought to add one circumstance
more. I think I will do so, trusting to your good sense not
to give it any undue weight.

I have never ceased making inquiries in Cuba, as I found
opportunity, in regard to your father's property, and late
investigations have led me to the conclusion that he left a
considerable sum of money in the hands of a notary, whose
address I have, which, if your identity could be proved,
would come in course of law to you. I have written an
account of all the circumstances which, in my view, identify
you as the son of Don Guzman de Cardona, and had them
properly attested in legal form.

This, together with your mother's picture and the bracelet,
I recommend you to take on your next voyage, and to see
what may result from the attempt. How considerable the
sum may be which will result from this, I cannot say, but as
Don Guzman's fortune was very large, I am in hopes it may
prove something worth attention.

At any time you may wish to call, I will have all these
things ready for you.