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New York :
LEA VITT, PUBLISHER,
好​EO.
Nos. 49 Mercer and 455 Broome Street.





THE
MO 88 ROS.
Take this sweet flower, and let its leavo
Beside thy heart be cherished near-
While that confiding heart receives
The thought it whiupers to thine oar.
NEW YORK:
GEO. A. LEAVITT, PUBLISHER.


K08138
HARWARD COLLEGE LIBRARY
SHELDON FUND
JULY 10, 1940


Contents.
282
9
.
.
THE BARONS TOW. By Miss POWER
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO. BY THE AUTHOR OF FRANKENSTEIN.
FLORENCE IIOWARD; OR, TWO DAYS IN A LIFE. BY MRS.
19
WALKER.
.
40
TIIE TRIAL OF IIUSBANDS.
58
86
PARTED FOR EVER. BY THE AUTHOR or IIYDE NOGENT.
THE FIRST-BORN. BY J. FORBES Dalton, Esq.
THE WIDOW'S SONG. BY T. K. HERVEY, Esq.
94
98
THE HERMIT AND THE PITCHER. BY MRS. Sr. Siyox.
101
.
THE RETIRED MERCHANT.
. 103
MORNING. By Miss PHEDE CAREY.
107
THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE. A REMARKABLE PASSAGE IN
THE ROMANCE OF HISTORY.
· 109
ADDRESS TO NIGHT. BY L C. LEVIN.
12C
AN EVENING AT HOME. BY KATE SUTHERLAND.
121
THE WIDOW'S MITE.
129
THE FIRST ORATION.
130
WHY DONT HE COME!
133


s
OONTENTS.
BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS. From Miss BREMER
PAO1
· 134
141
REMEMBEREST THOU ME BY WM. H. CARPENTER
VISIT TO FATHER MATHEW. BY COL. WM. SHERBURNE.
- 142
REMEMBRANCE.
145
POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
0
- 140
157
• 158
THE THREE ORPHANS. By Miss ExxA HEMPLE.
FAREWELL.
- JOHN BICKER, THE DRY DOMINIE OF KILWOODY.
THE WIDOW TO THE BRIDE BY MARY N. MEIGS.
159
· 186
THE IIUNGARIAN WIFE BY MRS. M. E HEWITT.
188
THE BURIAL AT SEA. By Rev. Theo. LEDYARD CUYLER.
• 189
NEVER GIVE UP.
197
195
THE WILD-WOOD FLOWER. BY MRS. MARY ARTHUR.
MY OWN FIRESIDE.
199
.
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY. BY KATE SUTHERLAND
• 200
THE STRAWBERRY GIRL; OR, THE OLD POCKET PISTOL.
By Bro. PRINCE.
213
THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT. BY B. B. BLANK, GENTLEMAN DE JURE 235


THE BARON'S VOW.
BY MISS POWER.
In one of the finest and most ancient castles on the banks
of the Rhine, dwelt the Baron von Leyden. The chateau,
together with a considerable portion of the surrounding
country, had descended to him from a long line of ances-
tors, whose services with the sword had rendered their
names celebrated in the annals of many ages; but the
descent in the instance of the present baron had not been
direct from father to son. He was the younger of two
brothers, by about ten years ; and when, during the life of
their father, Alberic, the senior, had, at the age of five and
twenty, gone off to foreign wars, his brother, then just fif-
teen, had so urgently prayed to be allowed to accompany
him, that at last the baron reluctantly yielded his consent,
and the brothers departed together.
In due course of time, the good old Baron von Leyden
finished his mortal career; and his son, Alberic, who was
1*
B


10
THE BARON'S vow.
still in foreign lands, was declared heir to all his estates.
News had arrived at the castle, some months before this
event, that the young Alberic had taken to himself a wife,
of the dark-eyed maids of Italy; but since then no intelli-
gence had been received of either of the brothers, and it
was not even known whither the fortunes of war had taken
them. At length came accounts, stating that Alberic had
fallen by an unknown hand, and that his young wife, on
receíving the news of his death, had perished in giving
birth to a child, who had only survived the mother a few
hours. Rupert, the younger brother, who had now attained
the age of four-and-twenty, was therefore the undisputed
possessor of the Castle von Leyden, and his return to his
paternal domain was daily expected. But years passd by,
and the Baron von Leyden came not to claim his property :
foreign lands seemed to have given him a distaste to his
own ; and his tenants and retainers murmured at being
thus neglected, and obliged to continue in listless idleness,
while the lord who ought to have led them, protected them,
and administered even-handed justice and rule over them,
spent in far countries the substance their labor procured
for him.
But he came at last, and great were the rejoicings that
hailed his arrival. Twenty years had passed since he had
last crossed the threshold of his father's hall, and none
could have recognized in the dark, swarthy, military-look-
ing man, the joyous, light-hearted, fair-haired stripling,
whose merry laugh and bounding step had shed mirth
through the gloomy castle, and brought smiles to the stern
lip of many an ancient warrior ; for Rupert's frank and
generous temper, warm heart, and high spirit, made him


THE BARON'S vow.
11
the darling of every inmate of the castle ; while Alberic,
whose disposition was haughty and somewhat passionato
and overbearing, was more feared and less loved than his
younger brother,
But years had wrought even more than their accustomed
changes in the Baron von Leyden ; all the gayety of
former days had fled, and was replaced by a sort of hardy
recklessness of manner, only varied by occasional fits of
gloom : but his actions were most commendable ; his char-
ities unbounded. Possessed of great wealth, much of
which he had acquired abroad, he had the means as well
as the power to do good; and two days of every week was
the great hall of the castle thrown open for the reception
of the poor, the aged, the pilgrim, and the traveller:
here they rested, and were provided with a substantial
meal; while the baron himself, declaring that he had taken
an oath to that effect, always placed the first dish on the
table, and invited his poor guests to sit down to the repast.
Winter had set in ; out of doors, cold reigned supreme :
biting blasts-glittering icicles—snow, rendered crisp and
dry by intense frost-congealed rivers—“motionless cata-
racts," proclaimed hoary winter's sovereignty ; while within
castle hall and peasant's cot, the blazing hearth or tile stove
seemed to bid defiance to his power. A large party of
wanderers from many quarters were collected within the
hall of the Castle von Leyden ; near the fire were seated
some of those who had arrived the latest, and who had not
yet entirely recovered from the effects of the intense cold :
among these were two persons who had entered the castle
together, and who were evidently fellow-travellers. The
one was an old hoary-headed man, on whose wrinkled brow


12
THE BARON'S vow.
time and grief had traced many a furrow; the other, a
young woman, who, though fatigue and sorrow had done
much to efface the lines of beauty, still evidently possessed
charms, that in happier circumstances might excite no
common degree of admiration. In her arms was an infant,
of some ten or twelve months' old ; and on this child, the eye
of the young mother rested with an expression of anxious
love and care that no weariness nor suffering could destroy ;
and, when comforted by the genial heat, and soothed by the
soft voice of its youthful parent, it gradually sunk into a
peaceful slumber, she smiled through her grief, and, ad-
'dressing the old man, whom she called father, in Italian,
directed his attention to the sleeping babe.
Soon there was a stir in the hall, and many a hungry
glance was directed to the door, as the Baron von Leyden,
bearing a vast dish containing a formidable piéce de resis-
tance entered, followed by three or four servitors similarly
laden. Placing his burden at the head of the table, the
baron invited the hungry travellers to sit down to their
repast, a request which it was by no means necessary to
repeat; but as the old man led her he called daughter to
the table, the baron, starting suddenly, and gazing for a
moment with looks of astonishment and anxiety, hastily
turned and left the hall.
Meantime the guests did ample justice to the substan-
tial fare placed before them ; the health of the baron was
drank with many a joyous repetition, and cold, hunger, and
fatigue, were for the moment forgotten by the greater
number of the party.
The repast was nearly concluded, when a message ar-
rived, requesting the attendance of the old man and his
.


THE BARON'S Vow.
13
a
daughter in the baron's closet. They instantly proceeded to
obey the summons, the page leading the way: arrived in
the room, the baron hastily rose from his seat, and, addressing
the old man, said that he wished to speak to him for a short
time alone, and begged that his daughter (he pronounced
the word inquiringly) would leave them for a few moments;
she was accordingly shown into an adjoining apartment,
and they were left together.
There was a pause for some instants : at length the
baron, advancing to where the old man stood, threw off his
hat, and turning full to the light, addressed him in a voice
of suppressed agitation, “Do you know me now, Pietro ?”
he said.
Santa Maria !” exclaimed the venerable man, start-
ing back in amazement, “it is it must be—Signor Ru-
pert! At last have I found you! Now no more will my
Agatha be a houseless wanderer! no more will pain and
hunger and fatigue gnaw away her young life! Now I
may die--die happy and contented, that she has found a
home!” and old Pietro fell on his knees, and wept like a
child. The baron gently raised him, and desiring him to
be seated, proceeded to ask him a train of questions, which
led to an explanation.
But ere he begins, we must also explain, in a few
words, some of the preceding events. The wife of Pietro
had been the favorite attendant of the Lady Teresa, the
bride of Alberic von Leyden : she had reared her from child-
hood, and when her lady married, had, with Pietro, her
husband, continued in the service of the young couple, and
had followed their fortunes to the last.
For a year all went on smoothly and happily. Alberic


14
THE BARON'S vow.
and his bride were devotedly attached to each other, and
young Rupert seemed to love his brother's wife as warmly
and sincerely as he would have done his own sister ; while
she regarded him in every respect as a brother.
The three were in the frequent habit of wandering
about in the neighborhood of the place where they lived,
either on foot or on horseback ; but latterly Teresa had
been compelled to give up these excursions, as she expected
shortly to become a mother; and the brothers used to go
out, sometimes together, but most frequently one at a time,
while the other stayed to enliven the solitude of Teresa.
On one occasion, however, they both went to attend a
grand chasse that took place at the castle of a neighbor-
ing knight; they were to return at a certain hour, and
Teresa, feeling unusually well, resolved to walk a short dis-
tance to meet them. She set out alone, refusing the com-
pany of either of her attendants, and took her course to-
wards the forest, through which she knew their road lay.
An hour passed away without bringing home the
party ; a second glided by, and when the third was some
way advanced, Pietro and his wife started forth in quest of
the wanderers. Following the path their mistress had
taken, they proceeded for some distance without finding
any traces of her, till at length-Oh, horror !—they sud-
denly came upon what appeared to be the lifeless corse of
their beloved lady! Marianna, her faithful attendant, threw
herself on her knees by the body, raised the fair, drooping
head—chafed the cold hands, and at length succeeded in
restoring life to the senseless form she supported ; mean-
while Pietro had gone to pocure a litter, and she was car-
ried home and placed, almost lifeless, on the bed. From


THE BARON'S vow.
15
that bed she never rose again : during the night she gave
birth to a daughter, which she only survived a few hours ;
but before she breathed her last, she confided to Marianna
the following tale :-She had gone, she said, to meet her
husband and his brother, and had just come in sight of
them; but, before they saw or recognized her, a body of four
or five men rushed from the wood, struck down her husband
and carried off his brother, in spite of all resistance : at this
sight she had fallen senseless, and remained until she was
discovered. She charged Marianna that, if her child sur-
vived, she should adopt it as her own, and that if ever any
inquiries were made of it, she should declare that it had
died immediately after its birth. She would give no reason
for this desire, but she pressed it so urgently on her faith-
ful attendant, that she could not refuse to comply with
the last wishes of her dying mistress. Soon after the
hapless young mother breathed her last, and she and
her husband, whose body was found in the wood, with
the mark of a grievous blow on the temple, were buried
in the same grave ; Pietro and Marianna (to whom she
had given all the little personal property that had belonged
to herself and and her dead lord) took charge of her infant,
whom they christened Agatha, and reared her up with their
own boy, Antonio, who was some four or five years her
senior. Years rolled by, and when the maiden had at-
tained her seventeenth year, she married the playmate of
her childhood, and thus doubly cemented the bond that
united her to those who had been to her as her own kin.
But alas ! a fearful and ravaging sickness broke forth ;
hundreds fell sacrifices to the destroying disease, and Ma-
rianna and Antonio were among the victims. Agatha, who
&


16
THE BARON's vow.
was now a mother, in one night saw herself a widow, and
her hapless babe an orphan. She and Pietro fled the scene
of past happiness and present anguish—the scene where
naught but death and poverty and disease reigned around.
The old man considered that, with his wife, had expired
the vow made to preserve secrecy as to the existence of
Agatha ; and he resolved to take her to her father's land,
and to seek a home for her among some of that father's
kin. With this intention they set forth, and wandered on
till accident led them to the Castle von Leyden.
Such was the substance of the tale Pietro related : the
1
baron listened with profound attention to the close, and
then, with visible effort, proceeded to give his explanation.
“Listen, Pietro,” he said impressively, “ for I am now
about to tell thee, that which no human being but myself
even suspects. That fatal day, when returning from the
hunt with my brother, (Heaven grant rest to his soul!) a
deer sprang from the thicket; we both fired; the deer fell
-the shot was an unusually long one--and each claimed
the praise of having killed him. We were equally posi-
tive; neither would yield; and a hot dispute arose. You
remember my poor brother's violent temper: in a moment
of fury he struck me, I returned the blow; he staggered
-I
;
and fell. In an agony of terror and remorse, I flung my-
self on my knees beside him. I raised him up-I called
on him, in terms of passionate grief and affection, to speak
to me-to forgive me! All was vain, he was dead—and
I was his murderer! I now recollect that at the moment
he fell, I heard a scream, but in the agony of the instant
the circumstance was scarcely observed ; alas ! it must have
been the scream of Teresa—she then had witnessed the
a
>
1


THE BARON'S vow.
17
death of her husband by the hand of one whom she had
ever loved as her own brother! When I discovered that life
had indeed departed, I fled from the spot like one dis-
traught ; but I did not leave the neighborhood entirely
till I could hear the fate of Teresa. With much difficulty
I learned the birth of her child, and the death of both it
and the mother. I was then trebly a murderer! Life had
lost all that could render it endurable ; and I rushed into
every danger, with the frantic hope that I should never
come forth alive; but I escaped all the storm—the fight-
in each peril I seemed to bear a charmed life, and passed
through all unscathed. Then I thought that kind Provi-
dence had preserved me for a better end—I resolved to re-
turn to the vast possessions now become mine, and there to
spend the rest of my life in acts of charity, as some atone-
ment for my past guilt. Among other penances, I im.
posed upon myself that of ever placing before my humble
guests the first dish at each repast, and never allowing
any excuse to interfere with this duty; and to this, worthy
Pietro, do I owe the recognition of thee, and of my bro-
ther's child, whose singular likeness to her mother first led
me to believe that the grave had not swallowed up all that
were of my own blood.—Now shall she be to me as a
daughter, and in the light of her love shall my last days be
bright.”
Thus spoke the baron ; and the tears that sparkled on
the sleeve of his dark doublet, told what varied emotions
had been excited in his breast during the recital.
It were little needed to give the sequel of the tale : the
gentle Agatha, who never knew her uncle's involuntary
crime, loved and tended him as a daughter ; and in her


18
THE BARON'S vow.
fond attentions, and in the caresses of her child, he once
more found the peace so long denied him.
Old Pietro became also an inmate of the Castle von
Leyden, and passed his last days near his daughter-in-law
and grandchild. Now was explained to him the reason
why the Lady Teresa had so urgently insisted upon the ex-
istence of her child being denied ; she had seen her hus-
band fall by the hand of his brother, but, knowing that the
blow had been provoked, and the consequence uninten-
tional, she did not wish to bring the offender to punish-
ment: still, though willing to screen him, she could not
bear the idea that, some day, her child should fall into the
hands of him by whom its father met his death, and be de-
pendent upon him for protection.


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
is
FHS SISTERS OF ALBANO.
RY THE AUTHOR OF FRANKENSTEIN,
It was to see this beautiful lake that I made my last
excursion before quitting Rome. The spring had nearly
grown into summer, the trees were all in full but fresh
green foliage, the vine-dresser was singing, perched among
them, training his vines; the cicala had not yet begun her
song, the heats therefore had not commenced ; but at
evening the fireflies gleamed among the hills, and the coo-
ing azilo assured us of what in that country needs no assur-
ance, fine weather for the morrow. We set out early in
the morning to avoid the heats, breakfasted at Albano, and
till ten o'clock passed our time in visiting the Mosaic, the
villa of Cicero, and other curiosities of the place. We
reposed during the middle of the day in a tent elevated
for us at the hilltop, whence we looked on the hill-embo-
somed lake, and the distant eminence crowned by a town
with its church. Other villages and cottages were scattered
among the foldings of mountains, and beyond we saw the
deep blue sea of the southern poets, which received the
swift and immortal Tiber, rocking it to repose among its


żu
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
>
devouring waves.
The Coliscum falls and the Pantheon
decays—the very hills of Rome are perishing, but the
Tiber lives for ever, flows for ever, and for ever feeds the
land-encircling Mediterranean with fresh waters.
Our summer and pleasure-seeking party consisted of
many: to me the most interesting person was the Countess
Atanasia D-- who was as beautiful as an imagination
of Raphael, and good as the ideal of a poet. Two of her
children accompanied her, with animated looks and gen-
tle manners, quiet, yet enjoying. I sat near her, watching
the changing shadows of the landscape before us. As the
sun descended, it poured a tide of light into the valley of
the lake, deluging the deep bank formed by the mountain
with liquid gold. The domes and turrets of the far town
flasheừ and gleamed, the trees were dyed in splendor ;
two or three slight clouds, which had drunk the radiance
till it became their essence, floated golden islets in the
lustrous empyrean. The waters, reflecting the brilliancy
of the sky and the fire-tinted banks, beamed a second
heaven, a second irradiated earth, at our feet. The Medi-
terranean gazing on the sun-as the eyes of a mortal bride
fail and are dimmed when reflecting her lover's glance-was
lost, mixed in his light, till it had become one with him.
Long (our souls, like the sea, the hills and lake, drinking in
the supreme loveliness) we gazed, till the too-full cup over-
flowed, and we turned away with a sigh.
At our feet there was a knoll of ground, that formed
the foreground of our picture ; two trees lay basking against
the sky, glittering with the golden light, which like dew
seemed to hang amid their branches-a rock closed the
prospect on the other side, twined round by creepers, and


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
21
redolent with blooming myrtle—a brook crossed by hugo
stones gushed through the turf, and on the fragments of
rock that lay about, sat two or three persons, peasants, who
attracted our attention. One was a hunter, as his gun, ly-
ing on a bank not far off, demonstrated ; yet he was a
tiller of the soil ; his rough straw hat, and his picturesque
but coarse dress belonged to that class. The other was
some contadina, in the costume of her country, returning,
her basket on her arm, from the village to her cottage
home. They were regarding the stores of a peddler, who
with doffed hat stood near: some of these consisted of pic-
tures and prints—views of the country, and portraits of the
Madonna. Our peasants regarded these with pleased at-
tention.
“One might easily make out a story for the pair,” I
said : “his gum is a help to the imagination, and we may
fancy him a bandit with his contadina love, the terror of
all the neighborhood, except of her, the most defenceless
being in it.”
“You speak lightly of such a combination,” said the
lovely Countess at my side, “as if it must not in its nature
be the cause of dreadful tragedies. The mingling of love
with crime is a dread conjunction, and lawless pursuits are
never followed without bringing on the criminal, and all
allied to him, ineffable misery. I speak with emotion, for
your observation reminds me of an unfortunate girl, now
one of the Sisters of Charity in the convent of Santa Chiara
at Rome, whose unhappy passion for a man, such as you
mention, spread destruction and sorrow widely around her."
I entreated my lovely friend to relate the history of the
For a long time she resisted my entreaties, as not
Run,


22
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
a
self ;
willing to depress the spirit of a party of pleasure by a tale
of sorrow. But I urged her, and she yielded. Her sweet
Italian phraseology now rings in my ears, and her beauti-
ful countenance is before me. As she spoke the sun set,
and the moon bent her silver horn in the ebbing tide of
glory he had left. The lake changed from purple to silver,
and the trees, before so splendid, now in dark masses, just
reflected from their tops the mild moonlight. The fireflies
flashed among the rocks; the bats circled round us ; mean-
while thus commenced the Countess Atanasia :
The nun of whom I speak had a sister older than her-
I can remember them when as children they brought
eggs and fruit to my father's villa. Maria and Anina were
constantly together. With their large straw hats to shield
them from the scorching sun, they were at work in their
father's podere all day, and in the evening when Maria,
who was the elder by four years, went to the fountain for
water, Anina ran at her side. Their cot—the folding of
the hill conceals it—is at the lake side opposite ; and about
a quarter of a mile up the hill is the rustic fountain of
which I speak. Maria was serious, gentle, and consider-
ate ; Anina was a laughing, merry little creature, with the
face of a cherub. When Maria was fifteen, their mother
fell ill, and was nursed at the convent of Santa Chiara at
Rome. Maria attended her, never leaving her bedside day
or night. The nuns thought her an angel, she deemed
them saints ; her mother died, and they persuaded her to
make one of them ; her father could not but acquiesce in
her holy intention, and she became one of the Sisters of
Charity, the nun-nurses of Santa Chiara. Once or twice
& year, she visited her home, gave sage and kind advice to


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
23
Anina, and sometimes wept to part from her; but her piety
;
and her active employments for the sick reconciled her to
her fate.
Anina was more sorry to lose her sister's society.
The other girls of the village did not please her; she was
a good child, and worked hard for her father, and her
sweetest recompense was the report he made of her to
Maria, and the fond praises and caresses the latter bestowed
on her when they met.
It was not until she was fifteen that Anina showed
any diminution of affection for her sister. Yet I cannot
call it diminution, for she loved her perhaps more than
ever, though her holy calling and sage lectures prevented her
from reposing confidence, and made her tremble lest the
nun, devoted to heaven and good works, should read in her
eyes, and disapprove of the earthly passion that occupied
her. Perhaps a part of her reluctance arose from the re-
ports that were current against her lover's character, and
certainly from the disapprobation and even hatred of him
that her father frequently expressed. Ill-fated Anina! I
know not if in the north your peasants love as ours; but
the passion of Anina was entwined with the roots of her
being, it was herself: she could die, but not cease to love.
The dislike of her father for Domenico made their inter-
course clandestine. He was always at the fountain to fill
her pitcher, and lift it on her head. He attended the
same mass; and when her father went to Albano, Velletri,
or Rome, he seemed to learn by instinct the exact moment
of his departure, and joined her in the podere, laboring
with her and for her, till the old man was seen descending
the mountain-path on his return. He said he worked for a
contadino near Nemi. Anina sometimes wondered that


24
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
vere
he could spare so much time for her; but his excuses were
plausible, and the result too delightful not to blind the in-
nocent girl to its obvious cause.
Poor Domenico ! the reports spread against him
too well founded : his sole excuse was that his father had
been a robber before him, and he had spent his early years
among these lawless men. He had better things in his
nature, and yearned for the peace of the guiltless. Yet he
could hardly be called guilty, for no dread crime stained
him ; nevertheless, he was an outlaw and a bandit, and now
that he loved Anina these names were the stings of an ad-
der to pierce his soul. He would have fled fom his com-
rades to a far country, but Anina dwelt amid their very
haunts. At this period also, the police established by the
French government, which then possessed Rome, made
these bands more alive to the conduct of their members,
and rumors of active measures to be taken against those
who occupied the hills near Albano, Nemi, and Velletri,
caused them to draw together in tighter bonds. Domenico
would not, if he could, desert his friends in the hour of dan-
ger.
On a festa at this time—it was towards the end of Oc-
tober-Anina strolled with her father among the villagers,
who all over Italy make holiday by congregating and walk-
ing in one place. Their talk was entirely of the laddri
and the French, and many terrible stories were related of
the extirpation of banditti in the kingdom of Naples, and
the mode by which the French succeeded in their under-
taking was minutely described. The troops scoured the
country, visiting one haunt of the robbers after the other,
and dislodging them tracked them, as in those countries


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
25
they hunt the wild beasts of the forest, till drawing the
circle narrower, they enclosed them in one spot. They
then drew a cordon round the place, which they guarded
with the utmost vigilance, forbidding any to enter it with
provisions on pain of instant death. And as this menace
was rigorously executed, in a short time the besieged ban-
dits were starved into a surrender. The French troops
were now daily expected, for they had been seen at Velle-
tri and Nemi; at the same time it was affirmed that
several outlaws had taken up their abode at Rocca Giovane,
a deserted village on the summit of one of these hills, and
it was supposed that they would make that place the scene
of their final retreat.
The next day, as Anina worked in the podere, a party
of French horse passed by along the road that separated
her garden from the lake. Curiosity made her look at
them; and her beauty was too great not to attract ; their
observations and addresses soon drove her away--for a wo-
man in love consecrates herself to her lover, and deems the
admiration of others to be profanation. She spoke to her
father of the impertinence of these men, and he answered
by rejoicing at their arrival, and the destruction of the
lawless bands that would ensue. When, in the evening,
Anina went to the fountain, she looked timidly around, and
hoped that Domenico would be at his accustomed post, for
'the arrival of the French destroyed her feeling of security.
She went rather later than usual, and a cloudy evening
made it seem already dark; the wind roared among the
trees, bending hither and thither even the stately cypresses ;
the waters of the lake were agitated into high waves, and
dark masses of thunder-cloud lowered over the hill-tops,
>
2


26
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
C
giving a lurid tinge to the landscape. Anina passed quickly
up the mountain path ; when she came in sight of the
fountain, which was rudely hewn in the living rock, she
saw Domenico leaning against a projection of the hill, his
hat drawn over his eyes, his tabaro fallen from his shoulders,
his arms folded in an attitude of dejection. He started
when he saw her; his voice and phrases were broken and
unconnected ; yet he never gazed on her with such ardent
love, nor solicited her to delay her departure with such im-
passionate tenderness.
“How glad I am to find you here !” she said ; “I
was fearful of meeting one of the French soldiers : I dread
them even more than the banditti.”
Domenico cast a look of eager inquiry on her, and then
turned away saying, “Sorry am I that I shall not be here
to protect you. I am obliged to go to Rome for a week
or two. You will be faithful, Anina mia; you will love
me though I never see you more ?"
The interview under these circumstances, was longer
than usual ; he led her down the path till they nearly came
in sight of the cottage ; still they lingered ; a low whistle
was heard among the myrtle underwood at the lake side ;
he started; it was repeated, and he answered it by a
similar note; Anina, terrified, was about to ask what
this meant, when, for the first time, he pressed her to
his heart, kissed her roseate lips, and with a muttered
“ Carissima addio,” left her, springing down the bank; and
as she gazed in wonder, she thought she saw a boat cross
a line of light made by the opening of a cloud. She stood
long absorbed in reverie, wondering and remembering with
thrilling pleasure the quick embrace and impassioned


TAE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
27
farewell of her lover. She delayed so long that her father
came to seek her.
Each evening after this, Anina visited the fountain at
the Ave Maria ; he was not there ; each day seemed an
age; and incomprehensible fear 3 occupied her heart.
About a fortnight after, letters ar ived from Maria. They
came to say that she had been ill of the malaria fever, that
she was now convalescent, but that change of air was ne-
ccessary for her recovery, and that she had obtained leave
to spend a month at home at Albano. She asked her
father to come the next day to fetch her. These were
pleasant tidings for Anina ; she resolved to disclose every
thing to her sister, and during her long visit she doubted
not but that she would contrive her happiness. Old
Andrea departed the following morning, and the whole day
was spent by the sweet girl in dreams of future bliss. In
the evening Maria arrived, weak and wan, with all the
marks of that dread illness about her; yet, as she assured
her sister, feeling quite well.
As they sat at their frugal supper, several villagers
came in to inquire for Maria ; but all their talk was of the
French soldiers and the robbers, of whom a band of at least
twenty was collected in Rocca Giovane, strictly watched by
the military
“We may be grateful to the French,” said Andrea,
' for this good deed : the country will be rid of these
ruffians."
“True, friend,” said another; “but it is horrible to
think what these men suffer; they have, it appears, ex-
hausted all the food they brought with them to the village,
and are literally starving. They have not an ounce of


28
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
a
66
maccaroni among them; and a poor fellow, who was taken
and executed yesterday, was a mere anatomy; you could
tell every bone in his skin.”
There was a sad story the other day,” said another,
“ of an old man from Nemi, whose son, they say, is
among them at Rocca Giovane; he was found within the
lines with some baccala under his pastrano, and shot on
66
the spot.”
>
“There is not a more desperate gang,” observed the
first speaker, “in the states and the regno put together.
They have sworn never to yield but on good terms: to se-
cure these, their plan is to waylay passengers and make
prisoners, whom they keep as hostages for mild treatment
from the government. But the French are merciless : they
are better pleased that the bandits wreak their vengeance
on these poor creatures than spare one of their lives.”
“ They have captured two persons already,” said ano-
ther ; "and there is old Betta Tossi half frantic, for she is
sure her son is taken : he has not been at home these ten
days."
"I should rather guess,” said an old man," that he went
,
w
there with good will : the young scapegrace kept company
with Domenico Baldi of Neini."
“No worse company could he have kept in the whole
country,” said Andrea; “Domenico is the bad son of a bad
race. Is he in the village with the rest ?”
“My own eyes assured me of that,” replied the other.
"When I was up the hill with eggs and fowls to the pi-
quette there, I saw the branches of an ilex move; the poor
fellow was weak perhaps, and could not keep his hold;
presently he dropped to the ground ; every musket was
)
a


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
29
a
>
levelled at him, but he started up and was away like a hare
among the rocks. Once he turned, and then I saw Dome-
nico as plainly, though thinner, poor lad, by, much than he
was, as plainly, as I now see-Santa Virgine ! what is the
matter with Nina ?”
She had fainted ; the company broke up, and she was
left to her sister's care. When the poor child came to
herself she was fully aware of her situation, and said no-
thing, except expressing a wish to retire to rest. Maria
was in high spirits at the prospect of her long holiday at
home, but the illness of her sister made her refrain from
talking that night, and blessing her, as she said good night,
she soon slept. Domenico starving !-Domenico trying to
escape and dying through hunger, was the vision of horror
that wholly possessed poor Anina. At another time, the
discovery that her lover was a robber might have inflicted
pangs as keen as those which she now felt; but this, at pres-
ent, made a faint impression, obscured by worse wretched-
Maria was in a deep and tranquil sleep. Anina
rose, dressed herself silently, and crept down stairs.
She stored her market-basket with what food there was in
the house, and unlatching the cottage-door issued forth, re-
solved to reach Rocca Giovane, and to administer to her
lover's dreadful wants. The night was dark, but this was
favorable, for she knew every path and turn of the hills ;
every bush and knoll of ground between her home and the
deserted village which occupies the summit of that hill :
you may see the dark outline of some of its houses about
two hours' walk from her cottage. The night was dark, but
still; the libeccio brought the clouds below the mountairi-
tops, and veiled the horizon in mist ; not a leaf stirred ;
ness.


30
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
her footsteps sounded loud in her ears, but resolution over-
came fear. She had entered yon ilex grove ; her spirits
rose with her success, when suddenly she was challenged
by a sentinel ; no time for escape ; fear chilled her blood;
her basket dropped from her arm ; its contents rolled out
on the ground ; the soldier fired his gun and brought
several others round him ; she was made prisoner.
In the morning, when Maria awoke, she missed her sis-
ter from her side. I have overslept myself, she thought,
and Nina would not disturb me. But when she came
down stairs and met her father, and Anina did not appear,
they began to wonder. She was not in the podere; two
hours passed, and then Andrea went to seek her. Enter-
ing the near village, he saw the contadini crowding toge-
ther, and a stifled exclamation of "Ecco il padre !” told
him that some evil had betided. His first impression was
that his daughter was drowned ; but the truth, that she
had been taken by the French carrying provisions within
the forbidden line, was still more terrible. He returned in
frantic desperation to his cottage, first to acquaint Maria
with what had happened, and then to ascend the hill to
save his child from her impending fate. Maria heard his
tale with horror ; but an hospital is a school in which to
learn self-possession and presence of mind. Do
main, my father,” she said ; “I will go. My holy charac-
ter will awe these men, my tears move them ; trust me, I
swear that I will save my sister.” Andrea yielded to her
superior courage and energy. .
The nuns of Santa Chiara when out of their convent
do not usually wear their monastic habit, but dress simply
in a black gown. Maria had; however, brought her nun's
.
66
you re-


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
31
66
habiliments with her, and thinking thus to impress the sol-
diers with respect, she now put it on.
She received her
father's benediction, and asking that of the Virgin and the
zaints, she departed on her expedition. Ascending the hill,
she was soon stopped by the sentinels. She asked to see
their commanding officer, and being conducted to him, she
announced herself as the sister of the unfortunate girl who
had been captured the night before. The officer, who had
received her with carelessness, now changed countenance ;
his serious look frightened Maria, who clasped her hands
exclaiming, “You have not injured the child ! she is safe?”
She is safe--now,” he replied with hesitation ; "but
there is no hope of pardon.”
“Holy Virgin have mercy on her! what will be done
to her ? »
“I have received strict orders ; in two hours she dies."
“No! no !” exclaimed Maria impetuously, “that can-
not be ! you cannot be so wicked as to murder a child like
her.”
“She is old enough, madame," said the officer, “ to know
that she ought not to disobey orders ; mine are so strict
that were she but nine years old she dies.”
These terrible words stung Maria to fresh resolution :
she entreated for mercy; she knelt; she vowed that she
would not depart without her sister; she appealed to hea-
ven and the saints. The officer, though cold-hearted, was
good-natured and courteous, and he assured her with the
utmost gentleness that her supplications were of no avail ;
that were the criminal his own daughter he must enforce
his orders. As a sole concession, he permitted her to see
her sister. Despair inspired the nun with energy; she al-


32
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
most ran up the hill, out-speeding her guide; they crossed
the folding of the hills to a little sheep-cot, where sentinels
paraded before the door. There was no glass to the win-
dows, so the slutters were shut, and when Maria first
went in from the bright daylight she hardly saw the slight
figure of her sister leaning against the wall, her dark hair
fallen below her waist, her head sunk on her bosom, over
which her arms were folded. She started wildly as the
door opened, saw her sister, and sprung with a piercing
shriek into her arms.
They were left alone together : Anina uttered a thou-
sand frantic exclamations, beseeching her sister to save her,
and shuddering at the near approach of her fate. Maria
had felt herself, since their mother's death, the natural pro-
tectress and support of her sister, and she never deemed
herself so called on to fulfil this character as now that the
trembling girl clasped her neck; her tears falling on her
cheeks, and her choked voice entreating her to save her.
The thought-0 could I suffer instead of you was in
her heart, and she was about to express it, when it sug-
gested another idea, on which she was resolved to act.
First she soothed Anina by her promises, then glanced
round the cot; they were quite alone : she went to the
window, and through a crevice saw the soldiers conversing
at some distance. “Yes, dearest sister," she cried, “I will
-I can save you-quick-we must change dresses—there
is no time to be lost !—you must'escape in my habit.
“And you remain to die?"
They dare not murder the innocent, a nun! Fear not
for me,I am safe.”
Anina easily yielded to her sister, but her fingers
66


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
33
trembled ; every string she touched she entangled. Maria
was perfectly self-possessed, pale, but calm. She tied up
her sister's long hair, and adjusted her veil over it so as to
conceal it ; she unlaced her bodice, and arranged the folds
of her own habit on her with the greatest care—then more
hastily she assumed the dress of her sister, putting on, after
a lapse of many years, her native contadina costume.
Anina stood by, weeping and helpless, hardly hearing her
sister's injunctions to return speedily to their father, and
under his guidance to seek sanctuary. The guard now
opened the door. Anina clung to her sister in terror, while
she, in soothing tones, entreated her to calm herself.
The soldier said they must delay no longer, for the
priest had arrived to confess the prisoner.
To Anina the idea of confession associated with death
was terrible ; to Maria it brought hope. She whispered, in
a smothered voice, “The priest will protect me—fear not
-hasten to our father !"
Anina almost mechanically obeyed; weeping, with her
handkerchief placed unaffectedly before her face, she passed
the soldiers ; they closed the door on the prisoner, who
hastened to the window, and saw her sister descend the hill
with tottering steps, till she was lost behind some rising
ground. The nun fell on her knees, cold dew bathed her
brow, instinctively she feared: the French had shown sinall
respect for the monastic character ; they destroyed the
convents and desecrated the churches. Would they be
merciful to her, and spare the innocent! Alas! was not
Anina innocent also ? Her sole crime had been disobey-
ing an arbitrary command, and she had done the same.
“Courage !” cried Maria; “perhaps I am fitter to die
2*
>


34
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
than my sister is. Gesu, pardon me my sins, but I do not
believe that I shall outlive this day !"
In the mean time Anina descended the hill slowly and
tremblingly. She feared discovery—she feared for her sis-
ter--and above all at the present moment, she feared the
reproaches and anger of her father. By dwelling on this
last idea, it became exaggerated into excessive terror, and
she determined, instead of returning to her home, to make
a circuit among the hills, to find her way by herself to Al-
bano, where she trusted to find protection from her pastor
and confessor. She avoided the open paths, and following
rather the direction she wished to pursue than any beaten
road, she passed along nearer to Rocca Giovane than she
anticipated. She looked up at its ruined houses and bell-
less steeple, straining her eyes to catch a glimpse of him,
the author of all her ills. A low but distinct whistle
reached her ear, not far off ; she started—she remembered
that on the night when she last saw Domenico a note
like that had called him from her side ; the sound was
echoed and re-echoed from other quarters ; she stood
aghast, her bosom heaving, her hands clasped. First she
saw a dark and ragged head of hair, shadowing two fiercely
gleaming eyes, rise from beneath a bush. She screamed,
but before she could repeat her scream three men leapt
from behind a rock, secured her arms, threw a cloth over
her face, and hurried her up the acclivity. Their talk, as
she went along, informed her of the horror and danger of
her situation.
Pity, they said, that the holy father and some of his red
stockings did not command the troops : with a nun in their
hands, they might obtain any terms. Coarse jests passed


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
35
arms.
as they dragged their victim towards their ruined village.
The paving of the street told her when they arrived at
Rocca Giovane, and the change of atmosphere that they
entered a house. They unbandaged her eyes : the scene
a
was squalid and miserable, the walls ragged and black with
smoke, the floor strewn with offals and dirt ; a rude table
and broken bench was all the furniture ; and the leaves of
Indian corn, heaped high in one corner, served, it seemed,
for a bed, for a man lay on it, his head buried in his folded
Anina looked round on her savage hosts : their
countenances expressed every variety of brutal ferocity, now
rendered more dreadful from gaunt famine and suffering.
O there is none who will save me !" she cried. The
voice startled the man who was lying on the floor ; he
leapt up-it was Domenico : Domenico, so changed, with
şunk cheeks and eyes, matted hair, and looks whose wild-
ness and desperation differed little from the dark counte-
nances around him.
Could this be her lover ? His recog-
nition and surprise at her dress led to an explanation.
When the robbers first heard that their prey was no prize,
they were mortified and angry ; but when she related the
danger she had incurred by endeavoring to bring them
food, they swore with horrid oaths that no harm should be-
fall her, but that if she liked she might make one of them
in all honor and equality. The innocent girl shuddered. .
“Let me go,” she cried ; " let me only escape and hide
myself in a convent for ever."
Domenico looked at ber in agony. “Yes, poor child,”
he said ; "go, save yourself : God grant no evil befall you ;
the ruin is too wide already.” Then turning eagerly to his
comrades, he continued—“You hear her story. She was


36
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
"
to have been shot for bringing food to us : her sister has
substituted herself in her place. We know the French ;
one victim is to them as good as another : Maria dies in
their hands. Let us save her. Our time is up; we must
fall like men, or starve like dogs : we have still ammunition,
still some strength left. To arms ! let us rush on the pol-
troons, free their prisoner, and escape or die ! ”
,
They needed but an impulse like this to urge the out-
laws to desperate resolves. They prepared their arms with
looks of ferocious determination. Domenico, meanwhile,
led Anina out of the house, to the verge of the hill, inquir-
ing whither she intended to go. On her saying to Albano,
he observed, “That were hardly safe ; be guided by me,
I entreat you : take these piastres, hire the first convey-
ance you find, hasten to Rome, to the convent of Santa
Chiara; for pity's sake, do not linger in this neighbor-
hood."
“I will obey your injunctions, Domenico," she replied,
“but I cannot take your money, it has cost you too dear :
fear not, I shall arrive safely at Rome without that ill-fated
silver.”
Domenico's comrades now called loudly to him; he
had no time to urge his request ; he threw the despised
dollars at her feet.
Nina, adieu for ever,” he said ; may you love again
more happily!”
“Never !” she replied. God has saved me in this
dress ; it were sacrilege to change it ; I shall never quit
Santa Chiara.”
Domenico had led her a part of the way down the
rock; his comrades appeared at the top, calling to him,
66
>
66


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO..
37
“Gesu save you!” cried he ; reach the convent. Maria
"
shall join you there before night. Farewell !” he hastily
kissed her hand, and sprang up the acclivity to rejoin his
impatient friends.
The unfortunate Andrea had waited long for the return
of his children. The leafless trees and bright clear atmos-
phere permitted every object to be visible, but he saw nc
trace of them on the hillside; the shadows of the dial
showed noon to be past, when, with uncontrollable impa-
tience, he began to climb the hill, towards the spot where
Anina had been taken. The path he pursued was in
part the same that this unhappy girl had taken on her
way to Rome. The father and daughter met ; the old
man saw the nun's dress, and saw her unaccompanied ;
she covered her face with her hands in a transport of fear
and shame ; but when, mistaking her for Maria, he asked
;
in a tone of anguish for his youngest darling, her arms fell ;
she dared not raise her eyes, which streamed with tears.
Unhappy girl !” exclaimed Andrea, “where is your
sister ?”
She pointed to the cottage prison, now discernible
near the summit of a steep acclivity. “She is safe," she
replied ; " she saved me, but they dare not murder her.”
“Heaven bless her for this good deed !” exclaimed
the old man fervently ; “but you hasten on your way, and
I will go in search of her."
Each proceeded on an opposite path. The old man wound
up the hill, now in view, and now losing sight of the hut
where his child was captive : he was aged, and the way was
steep. Once, when the closing of the hill hid the point
towards which he for ever strained his eyes, a single shot
66


38
THE SISTERS OF ALBANO,
was fired in that direction; his staff fell from his hands,
his knees trembled and failed him ; several minutes of
dead silence elapsed before he recovered himself sufficient.
ly to proceed. Full of fears he went on, and at the next
turn saw the cot again. A party of soldiers were on the
open space before it, drawn up in a line as if expecting an
attack. In a few moments from above them shots were
fired, which they returned, and the whole was enveloped
and veiled in smoke. Still Andrea climbed the hill, eager
to discover what had become of his child : the firing con-
tinued quick and hot. Now and then, in the pauses of
musketry and the answering echoes of the mountains, he
heard a funeral chant ; presently, before he was aware, at
the turning of the hill, he met a company of priests and
contadini, carrying a large cross and a bier. The miser-
able father rushed forward with frantic impatience; the
awe-struck peasants set down their load—the face was un-
covered, and the wretched man fell lifeless on the corpse of
his murdered child.
The Countess Atanasia paused, overcome by the emotions
inspired by the history she related. A long pause ensued :
at length one of the party observed, “ Maria, then, was the
Eacrifice to her goodness.”
“The French," said the Countess, "did not venerate
her holy vocation ; one peasant girl to them was the same
as another. The immolation of any victim suited their
purpose of awe-striking the peasantry. Scarcely, however,
had the shot entered her heart, and her blameless spirit
been received by the saints in Paradise, when Domenico
and his followers rushed down the hill to avenge her and
themselves. The contest was furious and bloody ; twenty


THE SISTERS OF ALBANO.
39
"
French soldiers fell, and not one of the banditti escaped ;
Domenico, the foremost of the assailants, being the first to
fall."
I asked, “ And where are now Anina and her father?”
You may see them, if you will,” said the Countess,
on your return to Rome. She is a nun of Santa Chiara.
Constant acts of benevolence and piety have inspired her
with calm and resignation. Her prayers are daily put
up for Domenico's soul, and she hopes, through the inter-
cession of the Virgin, to rejoin him in the other world.
“ Andrea is very old ; he has outlived the memory of
his sufferings ; but he derives comfort from the filial at-
tentions of his surviving daughter. But when I look at
his cottage on this lake, and remember the happy laughing
face of Anina among the vines, I shudder at the recollec-
tion of the passion that has made her cheeks ſale, her
thoughts for ever conversant with death, her only wish to
find repose in the grave.”


(
FLORENCE HOWARD;
OR, TWO DAYS IN A LIFE.
BY MRS. WALKER.
“Look on this picture, and on this."
SIIAKSPEARE
Toe experience of most persons will attest that it is not
the events of months, or even weeks, which govern the cha-
racter of their lives; but rather, that they take their hue
of good or evil from the action of days, often of hours.
Who, when memory rushes over the records of the past,
does not seize on some brief yet special points in time,
which seemed like the landmarks of destiny to conduct him
to the goal of weal or woe !
The story which I am about to narrate is one of the in-
stances where life might be said to be divided into two
days, concentrating in the one the essence of earthly hap-
piness, in the other that of misery.
Florence Howard was the only daughter and heiress of
one of the richest and noblest of the aristocracy in ——shire.
That beauty which in this country so pre-eminently, I had
almost said exclusively, belongs to high birth, had, in a
very remarkable manner, been bestowed upon her. A


春
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Painted by Stephanoit.
Engraved by O. Pelton
1


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FLORENCE HOWARD.
41
small, exquisitely-shaped head, fair, ample brow, and large,
deep blue eye; a complexion with the smoothness and faint
blush of early infancy; an unusual quantity, for an Eng-
lishwoman, of the brightest of chestnut hair ; and a form
which Canova might have taken for the model of his Venus,
so luxuriously yet delicately was it moulded; were the
claims which she advanced to that supremacy in loveli-
ness which the men eargely demanded for her, and which
even her own sex conceded, without attempt at disputa-
tion.
Nor was she only in external semblance perfect. Of as
rare a quality were her heart and mind. So essentially
gentle, almost humble; was she, so unelated by the extrin-
sic advantages surrounding her, so warm and generous in
every impulse, so noble in conception, so utterly unsullied
by any, the slightest, admixture of meanness or deception,
that they who had the best opportunity of observing her,
could but regret that a nature so finely wrought should
be given to one of earth's denizens, doomed, as all are, to
perpetual collision in their sojourn here with the grovelling
and the base.
Her intellect only required exercise for its development,
to have won admiration for its grasp and power. It need
not be said that, with all these attractions, the hand of
Florence was the object of anxious rivalry among many
competitors. Too much beloved by her mother, her only
surviving parent, to sway her in her inclinations, she was
left to the full indulgence of her own taste in the selection
jf the object on whom to bestow her affections, and she
was precisely the most improper person to be trusted with
50 hazardous a responsibility. Undoubting of evil, over-


42
FLORENCE HOWARD.
flowing with all that ardor, one of youth's most beautiful
characteristics, which confides with fond and earnest trust-
fulness in the excellence of mankind, she was ever ready
to be the dupe, as it were, of her own perfections, by invest-
ing others with those attributes of virtue which she herself
possessed. She had read of grief and crime with sceptical
incredulity. Living in an atmosphere of unclouded joy,
which had never been dimmed by the presence of pain or
sorrow, the tales which occasionally reached her of the ex-
istence and consequence of sin in the world without, ap-
peared but as the exaggeration of fable or the distortions
of malice. Such was Florence Howard when I was first
introduced to her. A few weeks afterwards, the busy
tongue of rumor informed me that she had at length
smiled on the homage of one of her worshippers, and was
the affianced bride of Sir Loftus Fitzgerald. The court-
ship ard preliminaries having been arranged at Vienna,
little was known in the neighborhood of the merits or de-
fects of her betrothed husband, beyond the fact that he
was the scion of a noble Irish family, and not overburdened
with the gifts of fortune. They, however, who had seen
him, represented him as being equal in personal endow-
ments to Florence herself, combined with manners the
most dazzling to a creature of her temperament—reserved
and cold to others; to her soft and conciliating in the
highest degree. It was determined that her nuptials
should be solemnized on the day that she attained her ma-
jority, now but a short period distant.
Those persons who have lived in a country village,
must be quite cognizant of the “note of preparation
heard on every side, when any of the principal inhabitants


FLORENCE HOWARD.
43
a
are about to perform that most serious act in life's drama
--marriage. It will, therefore, be readily conceived what
activity, what excitement, what joyous yet restless anxiety,
reigned in every house and cottage, when it was formally
announced that the star of the county, the idol of her ten-
antry, and the richest heiress within a hundred miles, had
fixed the day for plighting her faith, and stamping with
the changeless fiat of bliss or sorrow the remainder of her
life. I recur to the time, and it seems as if I could now
see the eager, important-looking faces of the villagers, hur-
rying to and from Howard Park to their.dwellings, all ac-
cessory in some way or other to the approaching festivities,
and each deriving individual though temporary consequence
from their connection with it. Cattle were to be fattened
for slaughter, trees to be felled for bonfires, all the gardens
for miles round to be laid under contribution to furnish
garlands for the occasion. These and a thousand other
employments gave to the quiet village of Woodfield all the
stir and merriment of a country town on the eve of an
election, without its defacing adjuncts of brawling and in-
toxication.
The eventful day at last dawned, and the heavens could
not have worn a lovelier aspect, or earth shown a fairer
surface. The season, June, was rich in the full flush of
summer luxuriance; the air had that clear, transparent
buoyancy which, not often breathed in our climate, is felt
by us, when it is bestowed, as so very a blessing, that the
spirits of all are involuntarily elevated. Every breeze in-
haled came loaded with such excess of fragrance from the ten
thousand blossoms waving around, that it had been op-
pressive, but for the singular freshness mingled with it
>


44
FLORENCE HOWARD.
The sun lighted up every nook of the wide-spreading forest
which skirted Howard Park; and never did its glory shine
en so matchless a specimen of Nature's workmanship as
the heroine of the day, the heiress and the bride. That
woman must be plain, indeed, if, arrayed by the hands of
a “Devy," with the delicate auxiliaries of Brussels lace
and white satin, added to the adventitious charm associated
with her position, who does not dress into a pretty bride
at twenty-one. How, then, did Florence appear ? I
actually started as if I had seen some fairy creature as I
beheld her. With the simplicity and piety of her charac-
ter, she refused to be married by special license in her own
drawing-room, preferring to come to that altar where, in
infancy and youth, she had performed the rites of religion,
and there, in the sight of God and man, record her vows of
allegiance to the husband of her choice. The peasants,
who had probably never gazed upon so costly a toilette, sur-
veyed her with astonishment; and, when she lifted the
bridal veil, and gave her young cherub face to view, forget-
,
ting the solemnity of the place, they burst into loud, un-
disguised admiration. She uttered the responses clearly
and firmly; and I almost fancy I can still hear that low,
sweet voice, which, even in its gayest tones, had a touch of
sadness in it. She looked radiant with happiness; yet,
when Sir Loftus placed the ring on her finger, his hand
was wet with the fast-falling tears which gushed from her
eyes, and which even yet filled them, when we retired to
the vestry; and this gave rise to a remark from him,
which, though spoken playfully, grated on my ears with
peculiar harshness.
"I hate to see women cry-even you, Florence ; I can
a
6


FLORENCE HOWARD.
45
scarcely stand it !” were the first words breathed by the
bridegroom to his bride. I confess it cost me a struggle
with temper to avoid some comment on so abrupt a speech.
She, true to her meek and loving nature, hastily wiped
away her tears without reply. But with woman's unerring
tact, having observed the effect which the little circum-
stance had made on me, she whispered, “Why do you
not scold me for crying ? it seems ungrateful to Provi-
dence, when I am so very, very happy!
We returned from the church to her home over a path
literally strewn with flowers. The peasants, in their best
attire, lined each side of the road, and poured forth warm
and hearty blessings on her as she passed. And well did
she merit their prayers and benisons, for there was not a
cottage on her estate that she had not personally visited ;
nor from any had the cry of pain or sorrow ever appealed in
vain. A fête champêtre, in a style of magnificence commen-
surate with the occasion, was given at the park; and, so
universally beloved was she, that I do not think the hate-
ful taunt of envy mingled with one of the congratulations
offered by her assembled guests.
It is rarely given to man or woman to live a day of
such unalloyed felicity. The wife of the inan she fondly
. loved, the mistress of enormous wealth, the idolized child
of a doting mother, life lay before her, in imagination, one
line of unbroken sunshine. Her pure, warm heart, full of
gladness, communicated a portion of its intense happiness
to all who approached. The old became younger as she
drew near—the sad, gay. Even while I write, I fancy I
can again hear her clear, musical laugh, as she flung back
he shower of roses which her juvenile companions, in play-
>


46
FLORENCE HOWARD.
ful frolic, crowned her with. Their blushing leaves looked
pale by her cheek, which the excitement of the day had
tinted with the deepest glow, and which the long auburn
ringlets, sweeping over and descending nearly to her waist,
could not quite conceal.
Never did I see human happiness so beautifully and
vividly depicted as in the face of Florence Howard on that
her wedding-day. The radiant yet sportive expression, the
entire abandonment of the soul to the bliss of the moment,
the concentrated look of full and perfect content, all spoke
the felicitous harmony which reigned within.
But I must not linger over this period. The breakfast
was finished, the travelling carriage at the door; and,
amid the tears of many—the blessings of all—she set out
for Milan.
It was early in the morning of a dark winter's day ;
the ground was covered with snow, which fell thick and
fast; and the streets of Paris were almost utterly deserted.
Uncongenial as the weather was, a lady, whose delicacy of
appearance seemed ill able to combat with the elements,
was yet seen hurrying along. She held in her arms a little
girl about two years of age, while a fine boy a year older
a
clung to her hand. She bent her steps to the Poste res-
tante, and inquired in an eager voice for letters. The mail
from England was not yet ready for delivery, and she re-
traced her path to the Rue des Lombards, and entered a
house where she occupied a small apartment. The room
was meanly furnished, destitute of every accessory of lux-
ury, deficient almost in those of comfort and necessity
One article only, quite out of keeping with the rest of the .


FLORENCE HOWARD.
47
appointments, struck the eye. it was the picture of a gen.
tleman, admirably painted, in an elaborately embossed gold
frame, suspended over the fireplace; on it the gaze of the
lady instantly fixed itself.
“No letter yet! and I must bear another intolerable
hour of suspense and agony! God give me strength to
endure this wretchedness, and keep my mind from frenzy !
Oh, Loftus.! Loftus ! in mercy write to me!” And in an
attitude of wild supplication, she flung herself before the
picture, while the hoarse, choking sob of anguish convulsed
her frame. The children gazed on her with that affecting
look of earnest wonder and scrutiny with which infancy
ever beholds any violent exhibition of suffering. The little
girl, flinging her tiny arms around her mother's neck, lisped
in broken accents, “Oh, dear mamma, do not cry so-papa
will be sure to come. He has promised little Florence a
doll from England, and papa must not tell a story, must
hc, my own mamma ?
No, sweet child, he ought not-he will not. Loftus,
dear boy, what hour did the church clock chime last ?
My head is so giddy I cannot count the time."
“ It was nine, mamma.”
" Then the letters must now be ready." And slıe again
hurried with her children to the post-office. This time her
application was successful. She received a large packet of
letters, tore them open with frantic impatience, read them,
staggered a few paces forward, and, with one loud, piercing
shriek, fell senseless to the ground.
I was sitting in the apartments which I occupied in the
Hotel Meurice, in Paris, when the garçon came bustling


48
FLORENCE HOWARD.
into the room, to tell me that an English lady, as her dress
and contour indicated, had fallen in a fit in the street.
I waited not to ask particulars, but hastened forth.
When I reached the spot, I found that she had been con-
veyed to a neighboring surgeon's, still in a state of stupor.
I followed. Those about her were using stimulants to re-
store her to consciousness. Oh that return of consciousness !
to the wretched how awful is it! For a while we refused
to believe in this new calamity ; we would fain force back
the dial of time, and make it point where it did only one
little hour ago : then we strive to wrestle with the weight
that has fallen like an avalanche on the mind ; we seek to
hurl it from us—to walk again in peace and freedom : vain
effort! The fiat has gone forth for us to suffer, and,
though every heartstring may quiver with agony in the
conflict, we cannot flee from the encounter.
Branded in ineffaceable characters on my own brain is
the image of that poor young creature, as I entered tho
shop ; she was slowly recovering, seated on a low stool, her
body rocking backward and forward with dull, monotonous
movements. She opened her eyes and looked about with
à quick, restless glance, which had all the glare of de-
lirium without its vacant apathy. She shed no tears; but
a gasp, between a sob and a groan, occasionally heaved her
bosom, and disturbed the muscles around her small exqui-
sitely-chiselled mouth. One hand was pressed tightly
against her forehead ; in the other, the letters she had re-
ceived were firmly clenched, and the surgeon informed me
that she had grasped them with unrelaxing tenacity, dur-
ing the whole time of her swoon. We were thus left in
ignorance of the origin of that earthquake of passion, be.


FLORENCE HOWARD.
4S
neath whose throes she had sunk. That the shock had
been mental there could be little doubt; and this, if pos-
sible, riveted more strongly the chain of interest which in-
sensibly linked me to her. For what is the acutest bodily
pain but a grain in the balance compared with the intoler-
able anguish of grief's colossal machinery, playing against
the heart and brain ? There is something to my feelings
inexpressibly solemn in viewing any one stricken by a spe-
cial visitation of Providence. I carry out my sympathy
even to inanimate nature : I never look upon a tree scorched
and shrivelled by the thunderbolt from on. high, but my
attention is imperatively arrested, my reflections become
sad and serious. Its companions, perchance, are flourish-
ing around, still revelling in the sunshine, still tossing their
green heads to catch a kiss from every passing breeze, while
it stands a blasted monument of the wrath of Heaven.
But, when the victim selected for punishment is taken from
my own order of intelligence, when I see a being before me
like myself, far better, it may be, chosen out and smitten
to the earth by the chastisement of Deity while I stand
unscathed, my sensibilities are aroused—how keenly and
my soul filled alike with mysterious wonder and humility.
The fair creature before me, what had she done to be thus
afflicted ? Still in the early summer of existence, gladness
should have filled her breast, bloom freshened on her cheek.
Yet she lay before me, crushed and wan, with the succor
of strangers only to support her from without, and a mine
of exhaustless wretchedness within Why was this?
We cannot fathom the inscrutable purposes of the Omni-
potent; be it ours to acquiesce in them, meekly and unre-
3


50
FLORENCE HOWARD.
piniugly, unquestioning their wisdom, confident in their
mercy.
To still the passionate cries of the children on behold-
ing the state of their mother, they had been taken up
stairs, where the wife of the surgeon, with that ready hu-
manity which French women possess in an eminent de-
gree, was caressing them into silence. But their mother
was now restored to perception, and with it came the evi-
dence of their absence. With strength which, in contrast
with her preceding feebleness, seemed supernatural, she
sprang from her seat, pushed aside the persons who were
bending over her, exclaiming, in a voice whose tone thrilled
every one present, “My children ! my children ! where
are they?” They were quickly placed in her arms, and
an hysteric laugh of frightful gaiety greeted their appear-
She was now sufficiently recovered to be placed in a
fiacre, and driven to her lodgings. The surgeon, whose
interest in her was only less intense than my own, insisted
on accompanying her; and I promised at his suggestion
to visit her again in two hours.
I lounged in the interim to the Louvre, but in vain did
the treasures of art present themselves to my eye; my
every thought was preoccupied by remembrance of the scene
I had witnessed. The form of the lovely, fragile sufferer
was ever before me. It seemed, too, that her features were
familiar. They haunted me like a dream of the past; but
identity came not with the vision. One moment I fancied
I had seen her in the Ionian isies, where my health had
obliged me to pass the last four years, and from which I
was returning, taking Paris en route. Then again she re-
called the beautiful Lady Fitzgerald. But she it could
ance.


FLORENCE HOWARD.
51
a
scarcely be, for though no accounts of her had reached me
during my sojourn in Greece, still she was too fixed in posi-
tion to associate, even in possibility, with the poor faded
being I had lately seen. Yet it was strangely like her,
and I almost regretted that I had obeyed the surgeon's
order to retire into the inner shop during her resuscitation,
as he was fearful lest the presence of so many strangers
might exasperate her nervous excitement ; otherwise there
would have been opportunity for mutual recognition. But
it was chimerical to suppose this. It was doubtless one of
those casual resemblances which sometimes come across us
to perplex and baffle memory.
I returned to the surgeon's ; he had just arrived from
Mrs. Gordon, for so he told me she was called. He gave
fearful report. She was externally calm and collected, but
his experienced eye could detect, through the artificial
trammels she had placed on her manner, the vehement
struggle of the inner mind. He considered her tottering
on the very verge of insanity. He urged me instantly to
visit her, and offer the plea of my sex and country to in-
duce her to confidence. I proceeded to her residence, and
was admitted. At sight of the picture of Sir Loftus Fitz-
gerald, which hung over the chimney-piece, I literally
stood aghast, for it all but determined my fears that it was
indeed his wife whom I had recently seen.
I was not long in doubt. She entered from an adjoin-
ing room, looked at me with surprise and earnestness, called
me by my name, and burst into tears. I did not attempt to
stem the gush of feeling from which I hoped for relief to
her overwrought brain. During its indulgence, I had fuil
leisure to observe the almost miraculous havoc which four


52
FLORENCE HOWARD.
years had wrought on her person. She was thin to atten.
uation; her hair was banded back, and showed her once
fair, round cheek hollow and sunken ; her large, lustrous
eyes, by their size and brilliancy, seemed to make yet more
conspicuous the ravages of suffering in the rest of her face.
Her brow once smoother than the polished marble,
ploughed by the furrows of care, was now defaced by wrin-
kles. Her figure, though its graceful symmetry nothing
could destroy, retained but the outline of its former per-
fection. Even her hands, once so remarkable for their
beauty, had lost their fair texture and delicate plumpness,
and looked thin, feeble, and sickly. Her mouth only was
that of other days—a model of expression and beauty.
The torrent of her sorrow at length found pause ; and,
well divining the ansiety which devoured me to learn what
vicissitudes had brought thus lowly in station and broken
in spirit, one whom I had last seen surrounded by grandeur,
beaming with felicity, she murmured in a low, indistinct
voice, “ You must indeed wonder to see me thus. It is a
long, wild story: will you listen to it? It is well that some
one should be the depository of my wrongs; and I thank
Heaven for the contingency that has brought you near me
this day. The hour may not be far distant when my be-
loved children may want a protector.” And she shuddered
“
as she spoke. It is unnecessary to say with what eagerness
and sincerity I offered my services, or with what variety of
emotion I listened to the following narrative.
“I will endeavor to be brief and coherent : but my
head is strangely confused. You know that immediately
after my marriage, we proceeded to Milan. A few—a very
few months elapsed before the conduct of Sir Loftus began


FLORENCE HOWARD.
53
to change. All his love and devotion were gone, and suc-
ceeded by coldness and indifference. You know my tem-
per is not violent--you will believe, therefore, that I bore the
alteration uncomplainingly, though I was sick-how sick !
--at heart. My station in society compelling me to be
much in public, we were necessarily but little alone, and
that little he abridged by every device in his power. .
" This continued for a year. I became the mother of
that boy. His unkindness amounting to inhumanity, during
my illness, even my attendants commented on.
Still I re-
proached him not: it is not invective that will restore
affection. We left Milan, and took a palazzo at Naples ;
and here ”—and her whole frame was convulsed, and for a
while she was unable to proceed), “here it was the abyss
of that misery opened on me which has so utterly and fa-
tally ingulfed me! There was a lady at Naples—Miss
Lascelles ; I thought her my friend ; she was an old play-
mate, and I rejoiced to see her. She was with us con-
stantly, and I was glad at the attention my husband paid
her, for, poor fool that I was ! I believed it indirect kind-
ness to myself. But soon it became of such a nature, that
it had been degrading to myself to witness it. Hours-
days elapsed, and they were out alone together. Oh ! how
I shudder when I think what burning, maddening mo-
ments of torture I counted over ! Passions, more fierce
,
and devastating than the volcano near me, raged in my bo-
som.
I knew the man I worshipped—may God forgive
me! I fear with sinful idolatry—while I was pacing my
lonely chamber, deserted and wretched, was caressing ano-
ther. Sometimes I imposed on myself the sight of this.
It was less intolerable than the thick-thronging fancies


54
FLORENCE HOWARD.
6
which swept over my brain during their absence. But I
could not long bear it. The intimacy between them be-
came matter of such public animadversion that I forbade
her my house. From that hour he was almost a stranger
too. Even the birth of his little girl sufficed not to draw
her from his side.
“At this time a new and singular evil threatened me,
the realization of which has precipitated me from affluence
to poverty. A claimant to the estates which I possessed
made his appearance. It was the son of my father by a
woman in the West Indies. I knew not of his existence ;
but, as if fate had determined to task me to the uttermost
limits, he came at this epoch. I cannot explain—my head
is too bewildered—all the causes which had kept him so
long away. Enough ; he produced a certificate of his
mother's marriage. Sir Loftus, who depended so much on
the gratification of the senses for enjoyment, regarded the
menace of loss of wealth with peculiar apprehension. He
met the claim at first with derision, then with the fixed
determination to resist it to the utmost. On me he heaped
every species of abuse and violence, accusing me of having
duped him.
The man withdrew not his pretensions. Leaving me
here, Sir Loftus proceeded to England. Legal authorities
were consulted, and a trial followed, in which the jury
awarded a verdict to our opponent. We were thus in a
moment given over to poverty. All the long arrears of rent
were demanded. The property which had accrued to me
from my dear mother's death-how often have I blessed
Heaven that she lived not to see her child's sufferings !-
Availed not to meet this : my jewels were sacrificed, and I,
>
66


FLORENCE HOWARD.
55
the heiress of tens of thousands, forced to employ my
musical attainments to procure subsistence for myself and
my children.
“I have not told you that I found Sir Loftus, after my
marriage, to be deeply involved in debt ; and he had long
since squandered at the gaming-table the patrimony which
he possessed. He returned with Miss Lascelles living
openly as his mistress. I saw him but rarely-his time
was divided between her and Frascati. Yet, even yet, I
hoped to reclaim him. I would have forgiven him, and he
had been dearer to me in poverty than wealth : but it was
not to be. With what delight would I have labored for him
day and night, if his smile had brightened my scanty meal !
Riches I did and could surrender unrepiningly; but, oh !
the idol whom I could have prayed or defied Heaven for, I
could not renounce—him, the one love of my youth, of my
life!
With all his frailties, still was he dear to my fond
heart—still was he my husband, whom I had knelt with
at the altar, and swore to obey till death. I fear I sinned,
for my excess of love has brought on me my doom of woe.
“One morning, about four weeks since, he received
- letters from England, which strangely discomposed him :
he said his presence was instantly necessary in London,
and, without bidding me farewell, without one kiss, he set
off in the diligence.” Here she became so fearfully agi-
tated that I urged her to cease.
“No, no,” she vehemently answered ; "it is coming to
an end-it is all coming to an end. I heard nothing till
this day. I had letters—one from my solicitor: he tells
(and she grasped my hand tightly, while her wild
haggard looks filled me with alarm) “ that--that Sir Lof-
me'


56
FLORENCE HOWARD.
1
tus is a married man-has had.a wife and family for years ;
and I, wretched creature, have been but his paramour !
My children, my poor children, they, too, will have the
brand of infamy stamped on their brows—they are illegiti-
mate!” And her ashen cheek became streaked with a
crimson light.
“But that is not al;' and her large eyes had a look
of fierce despair, and she shrieked, rather than spoke, the
other words : “I had another letter ; it was from him, my
husband—oh, no ; I have no husband ! I was but his
mistress. He wrote from Liverpool. He tells me that he
supposes I shall commence proceedings against him ; but
he cares not, for he is sailing for America-and not alone.
she—the woman-my friend, goes with him, and he in-
tends to marry her as soon as he lands. And he says he
never loved me-he only married me for my fortune ; and
I have bartered my all of happiness here, perilled, it may
be, my soul hereafter, for one who never loved me. How
shall I live? The finger of scorn will point at me, the
laugh of derision greet my approach. Where shall I hide ?
I have no money, no character, no name!” and she groaned
aloud.
For some time I had watched her with foreboding ap-
prehensions. As she uttered the last words, she started
up, and rushed to the window, and, had I not caught her
by the robe, would have dashed herself into the street. I
seized her hand, and her screams were heart-piercing.
“Off, let me go ; I will—will die !” The violence of her
cries brought up the inmates of the apartments below. It
was but too evident that her senses were gone, and that
strong coercion was necessary.
I sent for the surgeon.
2


FLORENCE HOWARD.
57
He pronounced her immediate removal to a lunatic asylum
compulsory ; and, when the night of that eventful day
closed over her unhappy head, she was an inmate of La
Salpêtrière, a raving maniac. There she remains to this
hour,


58
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
H3 TRIAL OS PUSSANOS.
2
In the year 1789, a year memorable for the first tremblings
of the French monarchy, all Milan was in a tumult of ano-
ther kind—six months of joyous expectancy, followed by
six months of gay gossip. So runs the world.
So runs the world. While one
half of it is looking for comets and convulsions, battles and
bulletins, the other half is thinking of balls and suppers.
Every royal and noble head in France was pondering how
long it was to be on its own shoulders, at the moment
when every head male and female in the Grand Duchy of
Milan was pondering whether velvet or silk was the more
captivating ? whether the Austrian hat with gold lace, or
the Sforza bonnet with heron plumes, was the more exqui-
site ? the gentlemen curling their raven moustaches into
the most heart-touching curls; and fifty thousand female
bosoms of the handsomest dimensions panting with the am-
bition of fifty thousand Alexanders for the conquest of all
mankind.
But, what was the spell fixed upon all the sons and
daughters of the Grand Duchy at this moment ? Those
vb, had the fortune to promenade near the Governor's


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
59
palace, on the evening of the 1st of June, might have formed
some remote conception of the cause. There was an un-
usual crowd in front of the superb and well-known portal.
The multitude were making merry with all the merriment
of an Italian populace. A Tyrolese mountebank, attracted
by the same instinct with which flies are attracted to
honey, was performing his wonders in the great square ; a
group of Calabrese dancers were figuring under the strada
of the colonnade; a party of pilgrims returning from the
Apennines had made their halt to see a little of the world
before they climbed the mountains of the Tarentaise ;
and
a huge monk, the most stupendous of his species, was ha-
ranguing from a little portable pulpit on the vices of the
age. Gluttony was his theme, and he roared out ruin
against all full-feeders with all the remaining energy of a
voice stifled with good living, and gesticulated with all the
animation left to him by a stomach worthy of an elephant.
The crowd around him was especially gay. They aban-
doned the other exhibitors to thin audiences, and with in-
finite peals of laughter pronounced the preacher the most
capital farceur of them all.
But, as the twilight of that luxurious clime began to
clothe the battlements and cupolas in violet, the signs of
high festivity became more conspicuous in the Viceroy's
mansion. The windows began to blaze with illumination ;
rich transparencies, emblematic of the combined glories of
Austria and Italy, now covered the walls ; banners spread
their embroidered folds upon the languid and dewy wind.
The concourse of equipages soon poured into the courts;
and the harmony of the fine orchestra of the palace was
heard performing “God save the Emperor,” a sign that the


60
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
Viceroy had entered the salon, and that the ball was on
the point of beginning.
Still it was obvious that there was something wanting
The national anthem was concluded ; à pause followed,
the anthem was renewed. Some one was clearly waited
for, who suspended all the pleasures of the fête. At last,
a distant shout told that a personage of peculiar impor-
tance was at hand. A carriage rushed along, with four
Barbary horses as swift as stags, and with one of the royal
couriers in front, to announce the coming ; and the glimpse
which the last gleam of day allowed of its inmate, showed
that that inmate was well worth waiting for. It was the
equipage of the Spanish Ambassador; and bore, like a
triumphal car, his lovely daughter, the Senora Carolina,
Countess of Medina Sidonia, to victory-victory over rival
beauties and haughty nobles, over knights and generals,
over statesmen grown old in the harness of diplomacy, and,
as universal envy declared, over the grim heart of the Aus-
trian Viceroy, the Archduke himself. A flourish of trun-
pets, as the young beauty ascended the magnificent stair-
case, followed the shout which the populace had given, as
they saw this far-famed paragon descending from her car-
riage. A buzz of admiration received her on her entrance
into the salon de danse ; and the smile that softened the
rigid outlines of the Viceroy's iron couutenance was noted
down in the deepest recesses of many a highborn and angry
heart for retribution.
Shall we describe her beauty ? It is impossible Who
could ever describe beauty ? The color of a lip or a
cheek may be described. Even the glancings of a fine
eye may be told. But what shall tell the union of mind
.


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
61
and feature, the electric flash of the soul lighting up the
countenance, the language that wants no words to express
the deepest of all thoughts ? No; that is impossible.
Who can
scribe what none can define ! A look pen-
etrates the soul ; a feature fixes its portrait on the mem-
ory for ever; the glance of a moment is treasured in the
heart for years on years. How are those lovely, powerful,
and most dangerous of all things to be transferred to the
cold and slow characters of the human hand ! At some
future time man may have the faculty of transcribing
them; but it must be when all his faculties are ethereal-
ized, when he can speak the language of spirits, when his
hand can stamp the image of his thoughts with the vivid-
ness of creation, when his pen flows, penetrates, and flames
with the brilliancy, the swiftness, and the power of the
lightnings.
La Carolina was young; but she was beyond the feeble
girlhood which has not yet combined the intellect with the
countenance. On this day she was one-and-twenty. Her
intellect lived in her fine features. If she had been silent,
moveless, spellbound, she would have made one of the love-
liest pictures of the rich beauty of the South. But, when
was she ever seen thus ? When she spoke, moved, or
looked, there was but one imperfect word to express her
animated loveliness ; and that word was fascination.
The ball was, of course, superb. The Archduke's at-'
tentions were unremitting, and La Carolina received them
with the
grace and ease natural to her rank, and the con-
sciousness that it was the natural homage to her beauty.
Yet there were times, even during this brilliant fête, when
the sparkling of her eyes lost its lustre, her cheek had a


62
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
paler tint, and she seemed to forget even that she was
dancing with the brother of an Emperor. But every thing
comes to a close in this world ; the dawn breaking in
through the high casements of the ball-room, and betray-
ing the artificial colors of many a noble cheek, warned the
majority that a speedy retreat was indispensable. Illus-
trious mothers and daughters wrapped themselves up in
their shawls, rushed out in a torrent of high blood and
brilliants, flung themselves into their equipages, and scat-
tered away to all points of the horizon like ghosts at sun-
rise. The magnificent halls were soon as empty as a ca-
thedral ; last came the Countess de Medina Sidonia, led
down the staircase by the Viceroy himself, surrounded by
an emulous cortège of nobles and militaires, received with
a shout by the populace, who had lingered through the night
to see her departure, and then whirled away by her four
dashing barbs with the speed of a vision. It was the next
evening, when her noble father, the Duke de Medina, en-
tered her apartment, and, with an animation which put
his ambassadorial solemnity in considerable danger, ex- ·
hibited to her the fruits of the night's triumph. Four let-
ters were laid by him on the table. The Duke was haughty
by habit, pompous by office, but affectionate by nature.
He never could resist a smile from his daughter and who
could resist the witchery of that smile ? The letters bore
the crests of four of the noblest names in Italy—one being
the Archduke's.
“My dear father,” asked La Carolina,“ what am I to
do with those formidable papers ? I thought the de-
spatches were meant for you."
“In this instance, my dear girl," said the Ambassador,


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
63
>
they come from a higher court than ambassadors have any
thing to do with, and are authorized by a more imperious
commission. They are direct despatches from Cupid, and
sealed with the hearts of the Viceroy of the Milanese, and
the three Counts Calderone, Castelli, and Barante.”
La Carolina took up the Archduke's letter ; it contained
a proposal of marriage. She handed it to her father, with
the words : “His Highness does me infinite honor, but he
dances too ill for me ever to marry him.”
“Preposterous !” said the grave Ambassador.
" The truth is,” said La Carolina, “that the Arch-
“
duke, having had two wives already, is too experienced in
the ways of women for me ever to have the control, which
I think essential to the happiness of a wife. Another
point is, that he is something older than my dear father,
and, as I never loved
age
in
any
instance but
one,
never expect to love the Archduke ; and the third is, that
I am determined not to have him.”
The Duke remonstrated. But La Carolina had one
arrow still in store.
“My dear father, my Spanish blood will not suffer the
degradation. If the Archduke were as young as he is old,
as gay as he is grim, and as witty as he is solemn, I should
not have one of the house of Hapsburg. They are scarcely
five hundred years known. Am I to degrade the pedigree
that dates from the Romans, the line of Pelayo, and the
true heirs to the crown of Spain, by an alliance with a fa-
mily of whom the world knows nothing, but that they have
thick lips, speak Teutonic, and are Emperors of Germany ?”
The arrow hit the mark, and that mark was in the very
centre of the proud Spaniard's soul. The Archduke's lette!
I can


64
THE TRIAL CF HUSBANDS,
was flung into the fountain, that threw up its sparkling
waters along with the perfume of a hundred exotics round
the young beauty, like incense on the shrine of an idol.
The next three letters were then discussed. The Count
Calderone first came under inspection ; he was a Spanish
grandee, of immense fortune. Castelli was a Neapolitan,
dated his descent from the Norman invaders of Sicily.
Barante was a Roman, with a pedigree sufficient to over-
whelm the whole Herald's College, and crowded with car-
dinals and Cæsars. La Carolina made but a single remark
on them all.
“Those proposals,” said she, “would be quite charm-
ing, if I were to marry pedigrees, and be in love with gen-
tlemen's grandfathers.”
The Ambassador, however was not to be so easily
tamed on the present occasion.
“You act unjustly both to your suitors and to me; a
proposal refused without a reason is an insult. You have
seen those young noblemen where noblemen ought to be
seen ; you have danced with them, talked with them, and,
for any thing I can tell,' added he with a smile, "have
even given some of them reason to think that you thought
them very captivating fellows.”
“ That I deny,” said La Carolina coloring. “I never
stooped so to honor any human being. The admiration was
lost on me ; but where is the necessity for my marrying at
all. I am infinitely happy at the present moment: what can
be more cruel than to take the bird from the wing, and
put it in a cage ? I have every enjoyment that life can
give, and I cannot discover how they would be increased in
the slightest degree hy my having to consult the frowns of


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
65
a
any grandee, count, or baron, in this world of folly. And
why may not I, my dearest father,” said she, fixing her
dark eyes swimming with sudden tears, on his softening
countenance, “live as I have done already, be like the bee,
or the butterfly, extracting sweets from every weed of life,
or fragrance from all its roses ? Let me but remain as I
am, and I shall not have a wish unfulfilled.”
The daughter and heiress of the Duke of Medina
Sidonia must marry," replied the grandee. The most
illustrious rank of Spanish nobility must not be left in the
hands of strangers. I must see my daughter the head of
noble house ; my son-in-law shall be the man on whom
you
will fix; he shall take the name of my family, and
the line of a hundred generations shall not perish through
the romance of a young lady, who thinks herself too hand-
some and too happy to do her duty to her ancestry and to
Spain.”
The dialogue continued for some time, the young beau-
ty arguing, and the statesman being still more determined.
“ But, my dear father," at last said Carolina, “sup-
pose that the whole three should be unworthy of your
name, that they should be guilty of the follies and vices
which would tarnish your honor, and that the only result
of this hasty alliance, should be regret that it was ever
made.”
“Well, then,” said the Ambassador, “the whole
three are not likely to be equally involved. Make me this
stipulation, that, if there be one of them in whom you can
detect neither vice nor folly, him you will allow me to
present as your husband.”
“But suppose, my lord duke,” said she, “that, with
>


66
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
7
all his virtues, he should be a dull bookworni, or a bigot,
will you not allow me to reject him ? "
”
“Granted,” said the father.
The tête-à-tête broke up. La Carolina adjourned to
ner toilette, to receive the most celebrated modiste of Milan,
with the most tasteful dress ever worn at court. The
Ambassador went to his closet to write a despatch, settling
the next election to the Popedom.
The three suitors were informed, that on that day threc
months the Duke of Medina Sidonia would have the honor
of returning a definite answer to their proposals. They
were alike astonished, indignant, and submissive. The will
of La Carolina was as little to be contested as her beauty.
The dialogue between the fair object of the general admi-
ration and the Duke, secret as it was, had transpired, ac-
cording to the custom of courts, within the next four-and-
twenty hours.
Before the week was over, it was the talk
of all Italy, and the trial of husbands” entered so much
into the gay, witty, and censorious gossip of that most
gos-
siping of all countries, that the three suitors must have
been men of stone or steel to bear it; publicity was flung
upon them like a shower of vinegar; they went with all
the speed of post-horses far beyond the gates of Milan.
The Count Calderone was a lover of pleasure. But he
had the singular faculty of his nation of concealing all his
vices under an air of gravity. On returning to Andalusia,
he sent for his confessor, determining to make a vow for
the next three months against every favorite offence of his
nature. The confessor came, and the expedient proposed
was that, by the assiduity of his attendance on the Count,
.
66
a
)


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
67
he should be enabled to give credentials of conduct capable
of satisfying all the scruples of all the dukes and countesses
of Christendom.
The Count was an habitual gamester; the first act of
his confessor was to make a formal demand of all the
cards and dice in the castle; they were sealed up, and the
virtue of their master was secure. But not even priests
can guard against accidents. Before the week was out,
the confessor was thrown from his mule, and received a
contusion which confined him to his bed. The melancholy
news was brought by a young monk, whom the reverend
father had deputed in his place to take the confession.
The young monk was a melancholy object of conventual
austerity ; his countenance was the very color of the clay
which the fraternity dug every morning in token of their
graves ; his frame seemed exhausted with watching, his
eyes half closed, and his voice hardly above a whisper. If
maceration of the flesh were virtue, the young monk was a
saint already. Calderone looked upon him with compas-
sion. When the confession was over, and the certificate
was written, he pressed him to take some refreshment.
The monk lifted up his eyes and hands in solemn protes-
tation. Water was his sole refreshment, bread his luxury.
He tasted slightly of both and withdrew. The Count fol-
lowed him with his eyes, as he moved slowly down the
wooded steep which led from the castle into the lovely and
garden-looking plain ; then, turning to a sumptuous board,
up, like a true epicurean, to the pleasures of
the table. The monk renewed his visit and the Count his
confession weekly for a month.
" I am weary of this,” said the Count one day: "re-
gave himself
a
i


68
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
verend father, this seclusion is horrible, I have nothing to
confess ; now, if I were in Milan, the matter would be dif-
;
ferent--I should probably have a great deal.”
“Myson,” said the monk,—"? for, young as I am, I am
entitled by the grace of our church to call you so,-I agree
with you that solitude is not your place. Your rank is made
for the public eye, your talents are made for public life,
and your virtues are now so far confirmed, that you might
defy all the temptations of the earth without danger.”
The Count hesitated. He gazed in the sallow visage.
Reverend father,” said he, “I have known a good deal of
the world in my time, and for one man ruined by timidity
I have known a hundred undone by presumption. Besides,
I have but two months more to wait. No! I shall not go
to Milan."
“Wisely thought of,” said the monk ; " and yet, my
lord, vigorous minds, like yours, are entitled to despise the
common fears of mankind. The man who in a solitary
castle achieves virtue, is only like the prisoner who in his
dungeon does not abuse liberty. The reason is, beause he
cannot help it. Monk as I am, I say that such is the chief
I
virtue of our monks; but a Spanish noble ånd soldier
conquering temptation, in the most tempting city in the
world, has gained a laurel which he may lay at the feet of
the proudest beauty of the earth, and proclaim himself a
conqueror.”
Next morning the monk received a message from Cal-
derone, stating that he had received letters, which made it
of the highest importance that he should immediately re-
turn to Milan, and of course, dispensing with the services
of the reverend father for the time.


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
69
The Count Castelli had spent the interval in a different
way. Indolent by nature, he was incapable of the rigid
determination of his rival ; he sent for no confessor, but,
hiring a villa near Portici, collected round him a bevy of
actors and opera-sirgers, with whom he gave little dra-
matic fetes, enjoyed pleasure parties on the water, and em-
ployed all his abilities to kill the tedious time. From one
vice, however, he was exempt ; the love of wine is not a
Neapolitan propensity, and, in the midst of all the gayeties
of life, he .was untouched by the temptations of Bacchus.
But his delight in the drama was excessive ; the interludes
;
performed by the Neapolitan peasants are sometimes re-
markable for their humor; and one evening, as he was re-
turning to his villa, he found the avenue blocked up by a
crowd of the populace, laughing, talking, and gesticulating,
in the highest possible state of enjoyment. A fellow, per-
sonating a Dalmatian mountebank, was performing his
pantomime on a temporary stage erected in front of the
mansion. His figure was extraordinary; he seemed bent
to the ground with age, yet his springs and dances recalled
those of a monkey in his native forest, and he wreathed
his deformed frame with the flexibility of a serpent. His
humor was equally singular. Speaking the patois to per-
fection, he carried on a running fire of dialogue with the
populace, by which he made so many hits at the national
absurdities, the characters of the leaders of fashion, and
even the sacred persons of the monks themselves, that the
multitude were kept in a continual roar. Castelli stopped
his chariot and listened, until night fell, and like a curtain
covered the performer, the audience, and the stage. The
Count had a supper party that night; the pantomimist


70
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
a
was taken into his carriage, and brought home with him as
a choice novelty of the evening. But, if he had amused
the populace, he still more amused the party; he spoke
half a dozen patois of half a dozen languages; touched
half a dozen instruments, if not with perfection, at least
with skill; told piquant anecdotes of half a dozen caurts ;
and, but for the hideous ugliness of his countenance, would
have made half a dozen conquests among the beauties of the
supper table, probably to be rewarded by as many swords in
his midriff, from the hands of their acknowledged lovers.
The evening was too delightful not to be repeated.
The presence of the pantomimist became as necessary as
lamps to a theatre; politics to superannuated bachelors ;
a circle of listeners to a professed wit; a handsome con-
fessor to ladies who have once been handsome themselves ;
cards and cardinals to royal mistresses turned devotees ;
scandal and champagne to the flatness of high life ; showers
;
of billets-doux to refresh the fading sympathies of exhausted
belles ; ribbons, orders, and the opera, to counts and kings
-or, last and first, his mirror to the gay and showy Count
Castelli, whose daily investigation satisfied him that wrin-
kles might be kept at a much greater distance by due skill,
than many of his less polished contemporaries supposed.
A succession of frolics, such as only Neapolitans can in-
vent or perhaps enjoy, drove ennui to an immeasurable dis-
tance. Yet one evening the pantomimist was actually
caught in the fact of committing a tremendous yawn !
The whole circle stared. He had never been in higher
oddity. He denied the charge with his usual address.
But eyes and ears, however unbecoming it may be to use
such things at court, are much confided in and consider-


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
71
2
a
ably used in private society. The charge was proved.
And the gayest.of all grimaciers was so much overpowered
by the proof, that he was almost dull for the evening.
This was not to be borne. Castelli summoned him to
a private audience, and at length wormed the secret out of
his soul.
“ All is delightful here, Monsieur le Comie,” said he,
with strong symptoms of the fatal yawn again. But va-
riety is charming; I have been here a week already."
“But I have been here two months," said the Count,
“and, what is worse, have to remain here a month more.”
“And what power on earth,” said Monsieur Allegranti,
pleasantest of men and mimes, “could have compelled you
to such a horrid necessity ?"
“ The power that compels, alike, the beggar and the
king; a woman,” was the answer. “I must remain here
on my good behavior for three mortal months; or beyond
getting into some of those abominable scrapes into which
youth, fortune, and good looks are continually leading a
man in courts and cities.”
The Count spoke the speech in front of a huge Vene-
tian mirror, which gave him smile for smile. The Mime
laughed in his face, and, with a keen sparkle of his singu-
larly sparkling eyes, said, “Well, Monsieur, as I am not
under a vow to play the hermit, I shall make my way to
the first city I can find. As for the woman in question-
trust me, I know the sex tolerably—and, if she is a daugh-
ter of Eve, she will think ten times as often of you, if she
hears that you have been so unable to abide the agonies of
absence, that you are in the next street to her, playềng all
kinds of frolics—the maddest of wþich she will invariably
>


72
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
set down to passion for herself—than if you lived like a
sheep upon one of your hills, or wore a head the length of
St. Dominic's. To-morrow I march for Milan, where I
have an engagement to play at the opening of the opera
house. La Scala for ever!”
To-morrow saw the Count's establishment scattered,
like so many doves from the dovecot; and a large group of
its fairest joining with him in the conviction that to live
out of the sounds of the violins and pirouettes of that mag-
nificent salle d'opera, was one of the impossibilities of this
world.
The Count Barante was a diplomatist. And he had
taken his measures with professional sagacity. By bribing
the favorite domestic of La Carolina, he had obtained a
knowledge of all her movements; and, as the movements
of a woman and a beauty, are not quite so regular as those
of the Copernican system, he had contrived to puzzle himself
to the most hopeless degree. He was informed that she
received letters, visits, and persons. On each and all the
diplomatist hung conclusions. He must return from Rome.
But the young and lovely Countess seemed made to
perplex calculation, as much as she charmed hearts, and he
soon found that to catch a serpent by the tail, or to extract
sunbeams from the rose, was an easy task compared with
the daily problems supplied by the loveliest creature in the
world. But to investigate these bewitching difficulties was
impossible at that distance. And the dexterous Count
had found the means of a public mission to the Court of
Milan. But a month remained.
The story of his rivals was perfectly known to him ; for
a


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
73
what must not be known to a person of so much sagacity,
and with so much secret service money at his disposal ?
He knew that Calderone had returned incognito from Spain,
and was employing his leisure hours at one of the most
private gaming-houses in the city. He had, in person, too,
been present at a private masquerade, where Castelli, be-
tween love and wine, had performed some antics worthy of
the galleys.
Time is tardy to every man who expects any thing, ex-
cept to the man who expects to be hanged. But even to
the fortune-hunter, tardiest of all, he still gets over the
course. The three months came to an end. A week before
their close, Barante waited on the Duke. Ambassador
with ambassador, the formalities of diplomacy were prac-
tised with the usual gravity. But when the first parade
was over, and they began to talk common sense, the Baron
stated in decisive words that the fair Carolina naturally
fell to his lot, if she was to wed neither a gamester nor a
Bacchanal—“both my supposed rivals,” said the Count,
with a glance of triumph,“ sustaining those characters in
the most approved style.”
Very extraordinary !” said the Duke, "for if there
were any two noblemen in Italy untouched by those vices,
I should have pronounced the Counts Calderone and Cas-
telli to have been the men."
“ You shall have proof,” was the answer.
" Do me the
honor to come to a fête at the palace of the Roman legation
on this day week, and your Excellency's eyes shall have
full conviction. Should the Lady Carolina do me the ho-
nor to grace our party, my pleasure and her proof, too, will
be complete.”
>
6


74
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
The evening came; the fête was showy.
"All the
rank, beauty, and fashion of Milan,” in the court phrase,
6 were assembled.” The time of the probation had expired,
and the Counts Calderone and Castelli were the observed
of all observers, for their dress, address, and jewels. . The
Count Barante had the higher excitement in his counte-
nance and figure, of hope assured. The Duke of Medina
Sidonia figured in all his brilliants of every order of Spain
and Italy—a walking effigy of diamonds and ribbons. But
he had by his side a brilliant, than which no man had ever
worn a brighter on his bosom ; his daughter, La Carolina,
magnificently attired, looking lovelier than ever ; and, to
the surprise of all who knew the history of the rivals, her
fate, and the evening, looking the very picture of unem-
barrassed beauty. This produced a prodigious variety of
conjectures.
Women of the first fashion are not always the first to
be embarrassed at any thing; and there were belles pre-
sent, and very handsome ones, too, who might have pro-
tested against being charged with a blush of surprise or
sensibility since their cradle. But, a night on which their
fate was notoriously to be decided !-a night on which de-
pended a residence for life, and whether that residence was
to be in Andalusia, Naples, or Rome !-a night on which
depended whether one's “Cavalieri serventi” were to be
solemn Spaniards, brisk sons of the Campagna Felice, or
cardinals, to the end of the chapter of accidents; all the
considerations that make matrimony a business of thought
might be expected to have given the dazzling physiognomy
cf La Carolina at least the air of thinking. And this was
the more likely, from her having been occasionally seen at


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
75
:
other times to look the picture of irresolution; her splendid
eye suffused with sudden dimness, her cheek like an autum-
nal rose, her words like those of a mind straying far away
from the showy circle round her, and touching on deep and
involuntary remembrances of remote lands, and years past
and gone.
But on this night all was the extreme of the contrast.
Not a shade passed over the brightness of her brow; she
danced, smiled, and spoke with equal animation : the
Archduke hovered round her once more, and the three
rivals silently agreed that in the possession of this capti-
vating being he should be master of a prize worthy to ex-
cite the rivalry of Archdukes. At length the grand busi-
ness of the night commenced, which, in every land, is the
supper. The Archduke led La Carolina to the seat of ho-
nor, a distinction which inflamed the bosom of every fair
lady present against the lady, and added to the old unpop
ularity of Austrian dominion amongst the gentlemen
The supper was superb; all the virtuosi of Milan filled the
orchestra, and Banti, then the most exquisite singer in the
world, poured her mellifluous strains like another nightin-
gale through the pauses of the harmony. But even the
fairest of the fair will grow weary of wit and iced cham-
pagne; the strains of Banti ceased, the chariots were or-
dered to the door, the Ambassador and La Carolina were
already bowing their way out of a circle of retiring nymphs
and statesmen, when Barante came up and whispered in
his Excellency's ear, “Now for the proof !”
He touched a spring in the wall, and the Duke and his
daughter found themselves in a small apartment, with two
or three dresses thrown upon the chairs. “Will your
>
a


776
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
2
66
Excellency and the Countess," said Barante, "condescend
to put on these disguises for a moment, and follow me ? "
He then led the way through a suite of chambers to a low
recess, hidden by a curtain.
Here, your Excellency, you will see one of the suitors
for the hand of this fair lady. You dislike the character
of a gamester, I presume? Here see the Count Calderone,
who professed such abhorrence of this vice, engaged with a
set of the most desperate gamesters in Milan. I marked
him returning from the supper table, with some characters
like himself; the palace of the embassy, your Excellency
knows, has communication with several of the surrounding
casinos, and you will find that the Cavalier Calderone,
unable to restrain his most dangerous propensity, even
with so high a prize before him, is now deep in play. . You
will have only to use your own eyes."
La Carolina drew back. But the Duke, observing to
her that their dominos perfectly concealed the persons of
both, led her forward. Two or three groups were seen en-
gaged in play. At last, in an obscure corner of the dim
apartment, they observed Calderone, his face corivulsed
with agitation, and his hands grasping the dice-box in the
nervous agony of a man who was on the point of throwing
his last stake. He threw, glanced at the dice, and ex-
claimed that he was undone. At that moment the Duke
advanced. Calderone looked up in astonishment and hor-
ror as the Duke drew the mask from his face, and stood
transfixed at the consciousness of the discovery. His anta-
gonist in the game had fled.
‘You see now !.” said Barante. And before the Span-
iard could recover from the surprise, the group had passed
>


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
77
into another apartment. The scene here was of a different
order. It was one of carousal. At the head of a small
table, surrounded by faces flushed with intoxication, sat
Castelli, preparing, goblet in hand, to answer the challenge
given to him by one of the company, to drink a bottle of
champagne at a draught, in honor of the "fair Countess of
Medina Sidonia." The handsome features of the bon-
vivant were evidently fevered by the excesses of the night.
La Carolina shuddered as she saw him take the goblet in
his hand, and fill it to the brim. Startled at seeing so
hideous a spectacle of voluntary idiocy, she would have
almost implored him to lay it down ; but in the next mo-
ment the Count, lisping out her name in accents of con-
firmed intoxication, put the goblet to his lips, swallowed
it, and after an imperfect attempt either to speak or stand,
fell back senseless in the chair.
This is my abstemious rival,” said Barante.
sume, my lord duke, the trial is complete ? Let us leave
this scene of abomination. My gondola is on the canal."
They embarked, landed, and passed into an apartment
whose coolness and elegance formed a striking contrast to
the scenes which they had left behind. La Carolina,
pained and exhausted, threw herself into a seat by the case-
ment, which let in the delicious air of the garden. There
was now but one stranger in the room; a figure dressed in
the costume of the Roman embassy. “I demand,” said
the Count, “the performance of your Excellency's promise,
the hand of the Countess Carolina." His Excellency
looked at the stranger sitting at the table. “He will be
no hindrance to our communication," said Barante; "he
is only my secretary, and is indeed come here by my own
66
“I pre-


78
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
request to settle all the preliminaries of the important
transaction between us."
The secretary suddenly raised his head from some oc-
cupation which he was busily pursuing, and on being in-
troduced to his Excellency, apologized for not having per-
ceived him before, owing to the nature of his occupation.
“I have been copying,” said he, “ some verses, which per-
haps his Excellency would wish to see, as they are in ho-
nor of the illustrious lady his daughter.”
“Ah ! then you write verses ? ” said the Duke.
“I have not that honor," said he ; "the subject is toc
high for me—they are the Count Barante's.”
“What ! the Count an author?” said the Duke.
“Yes,” said the secretary ; "he has devoted himself,
within the last month, to the art of poetry, and produced
several exquisite sonnets on the charms of the Countess of
Medina Sidonia."
During this dialogue, Barante had approached the
lady, and poured out his compliments, delicately giving
way for his panegyric at the table; where the Duke was
poring earnestly over a succession of lines ; and, if the
physiognomy of an ambassador was ever made to tell any
thing, surprise, contempt, and anger, successively passed
,
over his features. At length she heard the murmured
words,—“Detestable stuff !—Who could ever have thought
that the man was such a fool !—Meagre conception ! -
Deplorable nonsense ! The sonnets were successively
thrown upon the table.
“Those performances may not suit your Excellency's
taste," said the secretary, in a low tone. " But to so emi-
nent an authority in diplomatic literature, I have the honor


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
79
of submitting in this paper a criticism by the Count on
an anonymous volume, entitled “The Alliance of Spain and
the Popedom;' which has so lately appeared, that it may
possibly have escaped your Excellency's notice.”
The Duke's bosom, rigid as it was by the formalities
of sixty years, yet throbbed with sudden sensitiveness ; for
what girl at her first ball, boy on his first school day, or aide-
de-camp on his first mounting the staff coat and feather,
ever equalled the mingling of rapture and fear that thrill
through the most veteran maker of books at the sound of
one of his own productions ?
The Duke's feelings were not long kept in suspense.
The criticism was a labored, acute, and contemptuous
attack on all the statements, arguments, and principles of
his volume. The publication, as being without the Duke's
name, had been handled as the work of some hired scrib-
bler, whom Barante recklessly described as equally destitute
of truth, sense, and information. The blood of the Span-
iard might be hot, the pride of the grandee might flame,
but the wrath of the author was a burst of lava. When
was it otherwise ?
Walking over to the astonished Roman, criticism in
hand, he charged him with a deliberate intention to insult
his honor as a member of the diplomatic body, and his feel-
ings as a man. The outbreak was tremendous. The sec-
retary was sought for by the vengeful eye of Barante.
But he had been wise in time, and disappeared.
The Count was not a man to swallow the whole tor-
rant of scorn. Swords were drawn, and the screams of the
Countess, the rush of the servants to the door, and the ge-
neral tunult, aroused the whole population of the palace


80
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
Amongst the rest came in Calderone and Castelli. The
warlike part of the affair, of course, could not now be pro-
ceeded in: but recrimination, wonder, and inquiry supplied
its place with clamor enough. The Counts finally and
severally came to the conclusion, that they had been ca-
lumniated in the grossest possible manner, besides being
betrayed on that particular night into situations and cir-
cumstances of which it was perfectly impossible to account,
except by intolerable perfidy, or palpable magic.
Ambassadors, profound as they are, may be puzzled ;
and the Duke of Medina Sidonia himself seemed to be ex-
tremely in this predicament, when the door opened and a
monk walked into the midst of the declaimers. The effect
on Calderone was electric. “Will the Count Calderone,"
said the ecclesiastic, in a solemn tone, "venture to deny
that his favorite vice is gaming, his favorite game hazard,
and that no farther back than this evening he staked his
last ducat on the die ?
“ Villain ! you tempted me, first and last,” was the only
exclamation of the astounded Spaniard.
“ There,” said the monk, unfolding a paper, "give up
your pretensions to this lady, and I give up the bond for
the surrender of your estates.” Calderone nervously grasped
at the paper, and rushed out of the room.
The monk next fixed his full, dark eye on Castelli.
The Count was now sobered, and his stern look repaid the
gaze with fierce defiance. “Monk,” said he, “I know your
tribe. You may play tricks with fools and cowards, like
the blockhead whom you have just frightened out of the
room, but beware of knavery with me. I solemnly declare
before this company that I have never seen the fellow's
mortified visage before."
6
>


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
81
a
a
A smile passed over the monk's features as he drew the
cowl from his head, and threw a glance in the Count's eyes.
" The Punchinello, corpo di Baccho !” exclaimed the Count,
suddenly bursting into a roar of rage. “Scoundrel of
scoundrels, what brought you here ? Allegranti himself,
or Il Diavolo ?”
The monk made no other reply than twisting his fea-
tures into another grimace, which actually convulsed the
Count with laughter. “Stop," he cried, "for the sake of
St. Januarius, stop, or I shall die. Diavolone, if you make
such another face again, I shall have you assassinated
for finishing the days of a nobleman."
The whole room joined in the laugh, as the monk,
slowly turning round the group, gave them all an evidence
of his extraordinary talent.
"Your Excellency,” at length said Castelli, in a voice
exhausted with convulsive merriment, "I have nothing to
say in the way of excuse. You see what this rascal is.
He would tempt St. Anthony to run away with St. Brid-
get, or make St. Francis drink like a fish. Ha, ha, ha :
Let me say but another word. He tempted me from my
beverage of oranges and iced water to champagne and
chambertin. In his pleasantries I forgot this lady, myself,
* and the world. I am fit only to be a bon-vivant, and if the
villain will only come and dine with me once a week I shall
make him my heir, provided he does not kill me with laugh-
ing before I have time to make my will. Duke of Medina
Sidonia, Countess Carolina, fairest of all countesses, and
you, noble ambassador of his holiness, I have the honor to
bid you all good night. I must laugh and drink, or die."
Castelli sprang to the door, and vanished in a moment.
4*


82
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
.
“And by what title am I to address you, sir ? :
haughtily said Barante, at length recovering from his sur-
prise. “You have detected two fools, who had not strength
of mind enough to hide their absurdities for an hour toge.
ther. I presume you pride yourself on so prodigious an ex-
ploit ; but I am not to be trifled with. By what right
have you entered this palace ? "
By the request of the Count Barante himself,” said
the monk, as he threw the gown from his shoulders, and,
altering his countenance, stood before the group in the
secretary's costume.
“What, Andreas !” exclaimed the Count, starting
back. What son of Beelzebub have I been entertain-
ing ? I suppose, Spadocino, you have made fine work of
your portfolio ? The secrets of the embassy were in caz-
tal hands."
“I never betrayed any of your Excellency's secrets,”
said the secretary in a dry tone, “but your sonnets, which
your Excellency was, I presume, proud to acknowledge, and
your criticism, which could have belonged to no genius in-
ferior to your own.”
“ Mille diavoli !” exclaimed the Count, clapping his
hand on the hilt of his rapier. “Who are you ?”
The demand was echoed by the Duke. Ia Carolina's
eyes sparkled with tenfold brilliancy. A smile was on her
red lips that would have awoke all but the dead ; and the
little jewelled foot hung in air, as if she were about to step
forward ; though whether to throw herself into the young
secretary's arms, or to fly from him, must be left to the
fancies of young beauties with their lovers standing at bay
before them
>


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS,
83
66
My Lord Duke, I owe that answer only to you,” said
the handsome youth, with a flush which gave additional ex-
pression to a noble countenance. “I am the Count Orazio
de Gusman, your relative, and descended from the high an-
cestry of the Sidonias. I loved your daughter, but, doubt-
ing whether she would do me the honor to acknowledge my
love, I determined to follow her to Milan. I there found
that her hand was solicited by three individuals of superior
opulence. Bụt, I knew two of them to be profligates by
nature, and hypocrites by habit. I made my way into
their society. As a monk, for assuming which disguise I
have purchased absolution this morning, I found out the
gaming propensities of Calderone. As a Mime, I brought
the Bacchanalianism of Castelli into full display, for which
I shall buy absolution to-morrow. To complete my work,
I brought them back to Milan, where temptation and de-
tection were equally inevitable.”
“ Bravo ! " exclaimed the Duke.
“Bravo !” echoed the attendants, with Italian free-
dom.
“ Bravissimo !” said not the charming tongue, but said
with tenfold eloquence the flashing eyes of the young
Countess.
Orazio turned to Barante. “This noble person,” said
he, “will, I trust, excuse my development of his poet'ua!
and critical powers. As his secretary, I was acquainte l not
with his vices, but with his virtues; not with his infidelity
to the Countess Carolina, but with his fidelity to the
Muses ; not with his love of the die, but his love of the
laurel; not with his passion for the bowl, but-4"
“ Mille diavoli!” screamed Burante, cutting sh 'rt the
>
.


84
THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
speech, “I wish you were in the belly of Vesuvius. What
a measureless blockhead I was, to have any thing to do with
you ; Duke of Medina Sidonia, it was this traitor that
tempted me first to write sonnets; it was his atrocious
sycophancy that persuaded me to think myself a second
Petrarch ; the unlucky volume itself that ruined me was
put into my hands by this Scapin. May he be in the bot-
tom of the Liparis ! To-morrow I shall throw up my en-
bassy, and never return to Milan for the next thousand
years."
The Count sprang from the spacious casement down
the marble steps of the parterre, and vanished among the
shrubs of the garden. The lovers gazed after him from the
saloon. The Duke had gone to the table where the papers
still lay, and was profoundly busy in gathering every scrap
that touched on his authorship, and tearing them into a
million fragments. Never was criticism more thoroughly
extinguished.
In the mean time, what was the occupation of the two
lovers? It is impossible for us to tell. The night was
lovely, the garden lovely, and the moon, as she sailed.over
the
pure azure above, was lovely. All might fạirly be ob-
jects of contemplation. Yet we cannot tell whether they
saw any one of the three. There are times in this world
when people see without using their eyes, and hear with-
out a word being spoken. Whether the low sighs which
both uttered fom time to time were telling of the happy
arts with which Orazio beguiled his rivals, or the anxious
interest with which La Carolina heard of his progress ; or
whether they told of things beyond the moon, or whether
they were sir,ply the relief of hearts overloaded with de.


THE TRIAL OF HUSBANDS.
85
light, are totally beyond our knowledge. But, the intense
gaze which the lover fixed on the blushing beauty, her eye
fixed on the ground, her faint effort to withdraw her ex-
quisite form from the arm that clung round it, and the ono
long and fond kiss, that seemed as if it communicated the
soul of one to the other, looked like happy passion. And,
what has Earth nobler, lovelier, or more happy ?


*86
ZARTED FOR EVER
1
PARTED SOR SVER.
BY THE AUTHOR OF HYDE NUGENT.
>
On é certain part of the coast of France there is an isl-
and of peculiar loveliness, which, par distinction, I may
call the Isle of Roses. Always bright, blooming, and ver-
dant, its climate iş perpetual summer; while its landscape,
though in miniature, presents to the eye a scene of min-
gled wood and rock, shady dell, and grassy glade, in such
profusion of wildness, that it seems as if Nature had re-
solved to show there was still a paradise upon earth. Its
shore is broken into sequestered bays between jutting cliffs
of no great height, some of which are tufted with overhang-
ing wood, with here and there a spring gushing through, and
finding its way to the sea. Surrounded nearly by reefs of
rocks in the distance, it has ever been a sort of Scylla to
man, and is only accessible on one side, by which ap-
proach the few wants of its happy, though small colony of
inhabitants, are supplied from the main land.
The goodly report I had received of its solitude, and
almost nullity of visitors, induced me to seek the shades of


PARTED FOR EVER.
87
the Isle of Roses. Here, thought I, if on earth, the wea-
ry may indeed be at rest; or the lover of nature may follow
her in all her luxuriant glee, and fanciful wanderings, with-
out fear of inquiry from the curious, or molestation from
the officious.
The only habitable house, however, for an Englishman,
was that which I occupied ; having been before tenanted
by an English family, who, from particular reasons, had
lately left, after making it one of the most comfortable
Anglo-French residences I ever met with. Accident had
once thrown me into their society on the Continent. · Tra-
velling in the southern parts of Europe in search of health,
lost more to mind than body, though its cause is of little
moment here to tell, it was my study to avoid the society
of strangers, and especially that of my own compatriots.
At one place, however, I was so kindly treated by the in-
mates of a house in which I was for some time staying,
that one evening I could not resist their solicitations to
accompany them to the réunion of a few friends. “I shall
at least meet no English there," I thought; but I was mis-
taken ; and it happened that those whom I did encounter,
excited in me a greater degree of interest than at the time
I was willing to allow, even to myself. These were Sir
George M
and his daughter, I believe an only child.
I was not introduced to them, I did not wish it ; but the
wandering air of abstraction which hung about the unhap-
py-looking girl, beautiful as she was, made me inquire of
my friend, Madame de T- what might be the cause.
A French woman delights in a love-tale, and next to
being herself the heroine, she loves to be the raconteuse.
A French woman likewise tells a great deal, I will not say
>


88
PARTED FOR EVER.
>
in few words, but in a short time. Without, however, at.
tempting to repeat her story, I will merely give the sub-
stance, which was as follows:
Like myself, an invalid wandering in search of the lost
treasure, the Baronet was accompanied by his daughter;
and, vieux militaire, as he was, by an officer of rank who
had for some time been on his staff, a young man not only
of great mental accomplishments and personal graces, but
also of high moral reputation. The Baronet was fond of
a quiet life, so was his daughter, and so was Colonel
G-
and agreeing so perfectly, no wonder that they
were charmed at discovering in the Isle of Roses a retreat
so exactly suited to their tastes.
The General, who as well as a baronet, was a branch
of one of the most ancient and noble families in England,
was possessed of a highly aristocratic mode of thinking and
acting. He was, however, exceedingly absent and careless
of what was done, provided that views of family interest
or connection were not interfered with. He was withal a
little tormented with that most distinguished of diseases,
the gout. When a boy, Col. G-
had been taken
by him on his staff, at the request of parliamentary friends;
and as he rose in life and succeeded to fortune, the Gen-
eral had become much attached to him ; but the latter
never forgot, that on the score of family, his aide-de-camp
dared not look back one generation. Imprudent man,
then, to allow a friendship to commence between two
young people, which would never with his consent be
sealed by an indissoluble union. The consequences of
their residence in such a beautiful retirement, thrown to-
gether as they were, without any other society whatever,


PARTED FOR EVER,
89
His anger may
and aided by a foreknowledge of each other, might have
been easily foreseen. They became devotedly attached,
and the stronger their love, the greater the fear that its
discovery should be a death blow to their hopes. Each
day increased this feeling. Colonel G- knew from
Sir George's ideas and connection, that there was not the
shadow of a chance of any proposal being for a moment
listened to. His altered and melancholy air, and the fre-
quent sighs that escaped the unhappy Eleanor, at length
excited a suspicion on the Baronet's mind that all was not
right; and on suddenly asking his daughter if any thing
preyed upon her mind, he surprised her into a full confes-
sion.
be conceived. It had never struck him
as possible, that Eleanor M- -, with so much noble,
and even a few drops of royal blood in her veins, could
ever think of a man whose family was not even of yester-
day; which term only conveys the mind as far back as the
seventeenth century. Colonel G was of no family, in
fact. All the blood of the Conqueror's contemporary
rushed at a fearful rate through the vessels of his descend-
ant on the discovery of the truth. But why should I
describe the anger, the inflexibility, the harshness of one
party, the tears, the prayers, the sorrows of the second, or
the offended dignity, the regrets, the explanations, the de-
parture of the third ? These followed in quick succes-
sion; but after the parting of the lovers, or rather the sep-
aration, had taken place, for they were not allowed to see
each other, and the despondency of the beautiful Eleanor,
from which no exertions on her father's part could rouse
her, was complete, was he satisfied—was he made hap-


90
PARTED FOR EVER.
pier? Never could he be ; nor was it any consolation to
him to know that his own imprudence had caused his
daughter's misery.
This historiette sufficiently accounted for the wild and
distracted air of La Belle Anglaise; who, the picture of
despair, yet obliged by the General to go into society, was,
to her infinite unhappiness, still the point of attraction for
all the gallant men in the room. And here I might en-
ter into a description of her beauty, but what would it
avail ? For one only might those deep blue eyes again be
kindled into animation, those lips be induced to wear a
smile. A time might come, but the sternness of her fa-
ther's look at present seemed to deny all hope. Yet was
there occasionally a momentary gleam of affectionate so-
licitude in his glance, though, on a sudden, some recollection
seemed to cross his mind, and the knitting of his brows
gave a hardness to the countenance, which, to a keen ob-
server, told of inflexible decision.
Unhappy man! thy
want of foresight has broken the hearts of two who were
dear to you, and blasted the happiness of thine own.
I was much interested by Madame de T—'s story;
moreover, the deep seclusion which her description of the
Isle of Roses led me to believe it possessed, prompted my
traget thither. I found it all I wished. Here I was com-
pletely shut out from the world, and might, but for the
restlessness of a diseased mind, have there ended my days.
A slight circumstance, however, again induced me to
wander forth.
There was one apartment in my house to which I had
taken a particular fancy, and used it as a breakfast room,
It was not what we should style a parlor, being something


PARTED FOR EVER.
91
between the French salon and the English rooins sc
designated ; a degree of perfection to which my prede-
cessor had brought it. Jasmines and roses peeped in at
the windows, which communicated with what may scarcely
be térmed a garden ; for that is too regular a sounding
title for the wild and beautiful flower-grounds they opened
upon. Its cheerfulness and sunny aspect was by degrees
drawing me out of the morbid melancholy which had for
months beset me. There was a style of elegance in the
Italian marble chimney-pieces and other furniture still
left, which bespoke the taste of the late occupant. There
were also some fine pictures still hanging to the walls.
There was a harp-key, probably mislaid when packing up,
and heaps of music; some pencil drawings in a bold mas-
terly hand, and several books, with other things, which
were to have been sent afterwards, but my housekeeper
declared she had as yet had no opportunity. I cannot
say that all these gave me much comfort. I was begin-
ning to grow nervous from constant thinking of the unin-
terrupted happiness of those who had so lately enjoyed
every comfort and luxury in the beloved society of each
other. At length I almost transferred the case of Colonel
G- to myself; and though this sympathy in some
measure made me forget my own grief, it worried me be-
yond endurance, and soon came to a climax.
Ranging up and down the room one morning, I espied
I
on a shelf, which had before escaped me, a heap of papers.
These turned out to be old gazettes, full of orders in coun-
cil and military promotions; but between their leaves had
crept something of much more interest ; namely, two or
three songs.* written in a hand of which the beauty and


92
PARTED FOR EVER.
delicacy of the characters easily betrayed by what fingers
the pen that traced them had been guided. They were
Italian, save one, which, though now seldom heard, has
acquired the deathless fame a production of the author of
Marmion" must ever hold. There was a portion of this
which increased my melancholy sympathy in the fate of
the lovers to an extraordinary degree, and it was the first
line that caught my attention,
<<
From his true maiden's breast, parted for ever."
I suddenly threw down the song, under the most painful
feelings, and wandered forth into the grounds, for I almost
fancied myself—such an effect has loneliness upon the
mind—in the company of the trio by whom that room
had been occupied. But wherever I went, still was their
story before me; the "early violet” dying, reminded me
of the death of their hopes, and the sound of the “far
billow" through the deep groves caused a sigh for happiness
and peace that could be known but in the grave.
Reader, I know not the fair Eleanor ; I had seen her
but once, yet I will confess to you, that when I took my
way through the beautiful sunny solitudes and fairy glades,
which her foot had lately pressed, I could not help feel-
ing as much interest in her fate as though I had been in-
timate with her all my life. Here was her own secluded
bath, covered in and shaded from view, in a clear sandy
bay of the sea-shore ; there was her garden, there her
green and gravel-walks, and the flowers which herself had
planted ; but the hand that checked their luxuriance, and
tended their growth, was with them no more. From the
.
shore, led up a winding path, whose turns might scarcely
>


PARTED FOR EVER.
99
be perceived from the thick-flowing shrubs and evergreeng
that hung or protruded from its banks. Vegetation was
growing rank, and nature seemed droopingly. to inquire for
the fair and taper fingers, that, till lately, had controlled
her too forward family. In short, every place told of her:
and fancy, or a diseased imagination, worked upon by all
these trifling circumstances, hurried my departure from
the Isle of Roses; for in every ramble I was perpetually
haunted by the recollection that it had also been a favorite
resort of those who were now
" Parted for ever.”


94
THE FIRST-BORN,
.
93 FIRST-SORN.
BY J. FORBES DALTON, ESQ.
HOPE and Fear, philosophers say,
Checker our lives like night and day;
And so, perhaps, they usually may. .
But pleasanter far are feelings between,
Like the summer sunset and twilight scene,
When the brilliant heavens are all serene,
And the earth is clad in her darkest green,
And we quietly gaze in deep delight,
With our hopes and our fears all out of sight,
Not wishing for day nor dreading the night.
Now, in such a mood, for about a year,
It might have been less, but 'twas very near,
Had our good yeoman lived. For why ?
He'd won the maiden of his choice,
His hopes and fears had all gone by,
He'd nothing left but to rejoice.
a


TIIE FIRST-BORN.
95
And that he did in such a style,
It would have cheered your heart to see ;
He seemed to live on Mary's smile,
And laughed with such a boyish glee.
How rapidly Time sped his flight !
He loved as when love first began,
She was his whole and sole delight,
And Mary loved her “own good man."
A happier home, a happier lot,
They both declared the world had not.
But Hope and Fear, long driven away,
Both came back on the self-same day.
Mary was ill and kept her bed,
John felt a very odd pain in his head,
Which his sister said was merely a whim,
And nobody else seemed to care for him.
For there came an old lady who bustled about,
And contrived very soon all his household to rout.
For, although not a lady of high degree,
That she deemed herself mistress 'twas easy to see,
Yet, though ever in motion, still quiet was she,
As she glided along and appeared to be
Engaged in some awful mystery.
How Mary was, John wished to know ;
The nurse declared he must not talk;
fle paced his parlor to and fro,
there,” she said, he “must not walk,"
But "


96
THE FIRST-BORN.
He sat him down and laid his head
Upon his palm—all—all alone ;
His manly. heart o'ercharged with dread,
Yet dared he scarcely sigh or groan.
Yet might he breathe a silent prayer
To Him who can in silence hear;
He did—and lighter grew his care,
And Hope resumed the place of Fear.
He listened, gazing on the floor,
Strange fancies o'er him "coming thick,"
While the old clock behind the door
Had never seemed so slow to tick.
And thus his anxious watch he kept,.
Oft murmuring his loved one's name,
Lonely as though the household slept,
Till from her room a low sound came.
'Twas scarcely sound—but like the fall
Of fairy footsteps gathering round;
Then whispering soft-then silence all,
As though 'twere hallowed ground.
Then broke the spell—not with a word,
But an infant's cry. How it made him start I
He listened, and he thought he heard
An echo in his heart.


THE FIRST-BORN.
97
'Twas Nature's voice. That feeble cry
Awoke paternal love and pride;
Feelings with death alone to die,
Yet still he trembled for his bride ;
Till his sister tripped in with a whisper of joy,
Saying, “ Mary is well, John, and so is your boy."
)
It now only remains of our FIRST-BORN to state
What is told so exceedingly well in our plate.
His aunt and the nurse in his long-clothes arrayed him,
And then in the arms of the latter they laid him ;
And so, in due form, to his father conveyed him,
And with high approbation and smiles surveyed him,
(As the painter's talent hath deftly portrayed him)
While they both ostentatiously displayed him,
As highly delighted as though they had made bim.


98
THE WIDOW'S SONG.
THE WIDOW'S SONG.
BY T. K. HERVEY, ESQ.
Oh ! this world is a wide one-for sorrow or joy--
And where in this world is my own sailor-boy!
With his loud ringing laugh, and his long sunny hair,
Do they play on the breeze yet, and float through the
air ?
Is there any bright land, mid the lands of the earth,
That holds the lost child of my heart and my hearth ?
I have sat by the fire, when the old men have said
There be eyes of the living that look on the dead;
Oh! tell me, ye seers, in your search of the tomb,
Do you find my fair son in its valleys of gloom ?
Is there any pale boy, with a look of the sea,
Mid that people of shades, who is watching for me?
Oh! that morn when he left us ! —mine eyes are grown
dim,
And see little that's bright, since they looked upon him ;


THE WIDOW'S SONG,
99
And my heart, in its dulness, hath learnt to forget,
But the light of that morning shines clear to it yet ;
No record is lost of the far sunny day
When passed my fair boy, like a spirit, away.
We waited-how long !—but we waited in vain,
And we looked over land, and we looked over main ;
And ships-oh! how many came home from the sea,
That brought comfort to others, but sorrow to me;
In all those gay ships, oh ! there answer was none
To the mother who asks if she yet have a son!
And we fed upon hope, until hope was denied,
Till our health of the spirit it sickened and died ;
And his father sat down in his old broken chair,
And I watched the white sorrow steal over his hair,
And I saw his clear eye waxing feeble and wild,
And the frame of the childless grew weak as a child ;
And the angel of grief, that o'ershadowed his brain,
Now wrote on his forehead, in letters of pain ;
And I read the handwriting, and knew that the breast
Of the weary with waiting was going to rest ;
So he left a fond word for the lost one-and I,..
I linger behind him, to tell it my boy!
Shall he come to his home-perhaps sickly and poor,
And meet with no smile at his own cottage-door!
Shall he seek his far land, from the ends of the earth,
And find the fire quenched on his once happy hearth!
None to love him in sorrow who loved him in joy-
Ob ! I cannot depart till I speak with my boy!


100
THE WIDOW'S SONG.
I have promised to wait—I have promised to say
What grief was his father's at going away.
Will he come ?—will he come ?-oh! my heart is grown
old,
And the blood in my veins it runs languid and cold;
And my spirit is faint, and my vision is dim,
But there's that in mine eye will be light yet for him!
They tell me of countries beyond the broad sea,
Where stars look on others that look not on me,
Where the flowers are more sweet and the waters more
bright,
And they hint he may dwell in those valleys of light,
That he rests in some home, with a far foreign bride :
Oh ! this world is a wide one-why is it so wide ?
a
But they surely forget, which my sailor does not,
That I'm sitting whole years in my lone little cot;
He knows-oh! he knows, if I may, I shall wait,
-
Till I hear his clear shout at the low garden-gate ;
Oh ! weary of life, but unwilling to die
Till the latch has been raised by my lost sailor-boy!
I believe that he lives
were he low in the mould,
There's a pulse in my heart should be silent and cold,
That awoke at his birth, and, through good and through
ill,
Hath played in its depths, and is playing there still ;
When its star shall have set, then that tide shall be dry,
And the widow be sure where to look for her boy!


THE WIDOW'S SONG.
101
Oh ! will he come never !-lost son of the sea !
I hear a low voice that is calling for me :
It comes from that spot, the dark yew-trees among,
Where the grave of thy sire has been lonely too long,
A voice like a spirit's—I come—oh ! I come !
Hath he met my lost child in the land of the tomb !
I shall know !—but, if not, if he comes to the door,
When the voice of his mother can bless him no more,
Some finger shall point to the pathway of tombs,
Where my boy may come up to our mansion of glooms,
And I think I shall hear his light tread o'er the stones,
Like the sound of the trump in the valley of bones !
THE HERMIL AND RHB PIRBHIBR.
BY
MRS.
ST.
SIMON.
He who bids adieu to the world, and retires into the wil.
derness, does not for that reason become a saint; for so long
as the inclination to evil dwells in the heart, temptation
from without is easily found and sin is committed.
Experience taught this to the man of whom an old story
gives account. This man was by nature prone to sudden
bursts of passion, but instead of seeking the cause of this
fault in himself, he cast the blame upon the man who excited
him to anger, and he thought-


102
THE HERMIT AND THE PITCHER.
.
a
“ If this is so, the world is an injury to me, and it is
better that I should leave it, rather than lose my soul.”
He withdrew, therefore, into the wilderness, and built
himself a hut in the midst of a wood, close by a spring; and
the bread that he ate was brought daily to him by a boy,
who had been directed to place it upon a rock, at a distance
from the hut.
And thus all went well for several days, and he thought
that he had become the most mild and even-tempered man in
the world.
One day, he went, as usual, with his pitcher to the spring,
and placed it so that the water might run into it. But as
the ground was stony and uneven, the pitcher fell over. He
placed it upright again, and more carefully than before; but
the water, which spouted forth irregularly, overturned it a
second time. Then he angrily seized the vessel and dashed
it violently upon the ground, so that it broke in pieces.
He now remarked that his old anger had broken forth
again, and he thought-
“ If that is the case, the wilderness can in no way profit
me; and it is better that I try to save my soul in the world,
by avoiding that which is evil, and practising that which is
good.” And he returned again into the world.
Observe—there are evil inclinations which
may
quered by avoiding the occasions which call them forth, and
there are others which must be vanquished by resistance.
But to perform either, we need not fly from the world, but
from ourselves only.
be con-


THE RETIRED MERCHANT.
103
THR RBRIRED MERCHANR.
A London merchant engaged in Mediterranean commerce,
had successfully prosecuted his business and amassed, what
all merchants desire, an ample fortune. His, indeed, was
a princely one. He had purchased a large and beautiful
estate in the country, and had built and furnished a splendid
mansion in town, on the Surrey-side of the river, and now
that he was verging towards sixty, he concluded to retiro
and enjoy the remnant of his life in peaceful leisure.
He negotiated for the sale of his abundance-making busi-
ness, and sold it for another fortune. He then retired. He
was a bachelor. He had his halls, his parlors, dining rooms
and drawing rooms, his library and cabinets of curiosities.
The floors were covered with the most mosaic specimens of
Brussels or of Turkey carpetings—the furniture was of the
most complete and exquisite selections—the walls with splen-
dent mirrors and with classic paintings were adorned—and
fine linen decorated all.
Carriages, horses, grooms and servants, were at his com-
mand. Books, pictures and engravings were at hand to
interest him. The daily and the weekly papers, and the
periodicals, brought to his table all the news of the great
world, and his friends and his acquaintanco paid him hom-
age. How happy must the man be, who has all this !
He was not happy. He had no aim, no motive. The


104
THE RETIRED MERCHANT.
zest with which he read the papers when he was a merchant,
he had lost, now he had ceased to be engaged in commerce.
A storm, a fleet, a pestilence along the Mediterranean
shores, was full of interest to him before, because he had in-
vestments there. Now, they were of no consequence to him.
The views and aims of government, were watched by him
before, with searching scrutiny, because his destiny was
bound up with theirs. The parliamentary debates were of
the greatest consequence before, as indicating British policy;
but that to him now ceased to be an object of importance.-
His fortune was achieved—his course was run-his destiny
fulfilled.
Soon, every thing and place appeared to him, one uniform
and universal blank. His beautiful apartments were unused
-his carriage and horses unemployed—his books unread
his papers were unopened-his meals untasted—and his
clothes unworn. He had lost all enjoyment of his life, ana
contemplated suicide.
Saturday night arrived, and he resolved on Sunday morn-
ing early, before the busy populace were stirring, he would
make his way to Waterloo bridge, and jump, or tumble off,
into the river.
At three o'clock, he set out on his final expedition, and
had slowly reached the bridge, the shadows of the night
protecting him from observation, when a figure stood before
him. Amazed at being seen by any one, he turned out of
his path, when the figure crouching low before him, revealed
a tattered, miserable man, bearing his head in abjectness.
“What are you doing here,” inquired the retired
"
merchant.


THE RETIRED MERCHANT.
105
a
C
>
“I have a wife and family, whom I can't help from starv.
ing, and I am afraid to go and see them. Last night I knew
they would be turned into the streets,” replied the man.
Take that,” replied the merchant, giving him his purse,
with gold and silver in it—thinking to himself, “how much
more useful this will be to him, than in my pockets in the
water."
“God bless you, sir-God bless you, sir,” exclaimed the
man, several times—kneeling before the astonished merchant.
“Stop,” said the merchant, “ do not overwhelm me so
with your thanksgivings—but tell me where you live.”
66 ' In Lambeth, sir.”
“ Then why are you here this morning,” said the mer-
chant.
“I do not like to tell you,” said the man. “I am ashamed
to tell a gentleman like you.”
“Why so ?”' replied the merchant.
“Well, sir," replied the man, “ as I had not a single pen-
ny, and did not know how to get one, I came here to drown
myself, although I knew 'twas wicked !!!
The merchant was astonished and appalled, and after a
long silence, said, “ My man, I am overwhelmed with wealth,
and yet I am so miserable, that I came here this morn-
ing for the same purpose as yourself. There's something
more in this than I can understand at present. Let me go
with you, and see your family.”
The man made every excuse to hinder the merchant_but
he would go.
“Have you lost your character ?” said the merchant.
"
“No sir,' replied the man, " but I am so miserably poor


106
THE RETIRED MERCHANT.
the man,
and wretched—and for anything I know, my wife and chil.
dren may be turned into the street."
• Why are you out of work and pay ?" resumed the mer.
chant.
“I used to groom the horses of the stage coaches,” said
"but since the railroads are come up, the coaches
are put down, and many men, like me, have no employment.”
They plodded on their way, two miles of brick and mortar
piled on either side. At last they came to a third-rate
house, when a rough, common-looking woman was opening the
door and shutter. As soon as she saw the man, she let loose
her tongue upon him for all the villany in the world, but
something which passed from his hand to hers, hushed her
in an instant; and observing the merchant, she courtesied
to him civilly.
The man ran up stairs, leaving the merchant and woman
together, which gave the former an opportunity to make in-
quiries. Having satisfied himself that want was the crime of
the family, he told the woman who he was, promised to see
her paid, and induced her to set on and cook a breakfast for
the family, and supply them with any thing which they
needed.
The man returned, and the merchant went up stairs, to
see, for the first time, a wretched family in rags, dirt, and.
misery. He cornforted them with hope of better days, and
bidding the man take a hasty meal below, took him with him,
and helped with his own hands to load a cart with bed, bed-
ding, clothes, furniture and food, for the family.
The man was gone, and the merchant for the first moment,
reflected on all that had passed. He was relieved of his


MORNING.
107
.
misery, by doing something for another, and out of mere
selfishness, he resolved on doing good to others, to prevent
the necessity for drowning himself.
He employed the man in his stable, removed the family
near, and placed them in a cottage, sending the children to
school. Soon he sought out misery to relieve, and was led to
consider the cause of all misery-sin. He turned to God and
found Him-and sought to turn his fellow sinners.
He aided every good word and work, and was the humble
teller of his own humbling story. He had been a merchant-
man seeking goodly pearls—and having found the pearl of
groat price, he went and sold all that he had, and bought
it-and the retired earthly merchant became an active hea-
venly merchant.
MORNING
BY
MISS.PHEBE
CARE Y..
SADLY, when the day was done,
To his setting waned the sun;
Heavily the shadows fell,
And the wind, with fitful swell,
Echoed through the forest dim,
Like a friar's ghostly hymn.
a


108
MORNING.
Mournful on the wall afar,
Walked the evening sentry stár;
Burning clear, and cold, and lone,
Midnight's constellations shone;
While the hours, with solemn tread
Passed like watchers by the dead.
Now at last the morning wakes,
And the spell of darkness breaks,
On the mountains, dewy sweet,
Standing with her rosy feet,
While her golden fingers fair
Part the soft flow of her hair.
With the dew from flower and leat
Flies the heavy dew of grief ;
From the darkness of my thought,
Night her solemn aspect caught;
And the morning's joys begin,
As a morning breaks within.
2
God's free sunsnine on the hills,
Soft mists hanging o'er the rills,
Blushing flowers of loveliness
Trembling with the light wind's kisgucom
Oh! the soul forgets its care,
Looking on a world so fair !
a
Morning woos me with her charms,
Like a lover's pleading arms;
Soft above me bend her skies,
As a lover's tender eyes;
And my heavy heart of pain,
Trembling, thrills with hope again.


.


1
i



D. Roberta, es
T. W51mone, sculp!





THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
109
RHB DESOLATION OF YRCHIRIE.
A Remarkable Passage in the Romance of History.
“The memorial tree,” from which the arrow of Sir
Walter Tyrrel glanced, and beside which the king lay
extended on the ground, is now exceeding old, and scarcely
a trace remains of its former greatness. It stood in this wild
spot, (the New Forest) when the stern decree went forth,
which enjoined that throughout the whole extent of the south-
western part of Hampshire, measuring thirty miles from
Salisbury to the sea, and in circumference at least ninety
miles, all trace of human habitation should be swept away.-
William the Conqueror might have indulged his passion for
the chase in the many parks and forests which Anglo-Saxon
monarchs had reserved for the purpose, but he preferred
rather to have a vast hunting-ground for his “superfluous
and insatiate pleasure" in the immediate neighborhood of
Winchester, his favorite place of residence. The wide ex.
panse that was thus doomed to inevitable desolation was
called Ytene or Ytchtene; it comprised numerous villages
and homesteads, churches, and cestral halls, where Saxon
families of rank resided, and where an industrious population
followed the daily routine of pasturage and husbandry. A
large proportion had been consequently brought into cultiva-
tion ; yet sufficient still remained to afford a harbor for


110
THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
numerous wild animals. This part comprised many sylvan
spots of great beauty, with tracts of common land, covered
with the golden blossomed gorse, and tufts of ferns, or else
with short herbage, intermingled with wild thyme. Noble
groups of forest-trees were seen at intervals, with clear run-
ning streams, and masses of huge stones which projected
from among the grass. The sun rose on the morning of the
fatal day in cloudless beauty, and fresh breezes tempered the
heat, which, at harvest-time is often great; the people were
already in the fields, and the creaking of heavy-laden wagons
was heard at intervals, with the sweeping sound of the rapid
sickle. In a moment the scene was changed. Bands of
Norman soldiers rushed in and drove all before them. They
trod down the standing corn, and commanded the terrified
inhabitants of hall and hut, to depart in haste. More than
one hundred manors, villages, and hamlets were depopulated,
even the churches were thrown down—those venerated
places, where the voice of prayer and thanksgiving had been
heard for generations. He who passed the next day over the
wide waste, saw only ruins black with smoke, trampled fields,
and dismantled churches. Here and there broken imple-
ments of husbandry met the view, and beside them, not un-
frequently, the corpse of him who had dared to resist the
harsh mandate of the Conqueror. Females, too, had fallen
to the earth in their terror and distress, and young children
were in their death-sleep, among the tufts of flowers where
they had sported the day before. Many stately buildings
were pulled down at once; others, having their roofs thrown
open, were left to be destroyed by the weather, and hence it
got seldom happened that a stranger, in passing through a


THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
111
meadow into one of those shady coverts, which still varied
the aspect of the country, forgetting, 'in the freshness and
the loveliness of all around him, the terrible undoings of pre-
vious days, might see through the undulating branches of the
trees, the walls or roofs of houses, which looked as if they
had escaped the general ruin. They stood, apparently, in
the midst of cultivated fields, occasionally by the road side,
and their pointed roofs were covered with the vine or honey-
suckle. On a nearer approach the illusion vanished, not a
sound disturbed the silence of the place; the houses which
looked so inviting when seen at a short distance, showed that
the hand of ruin had done its work. The doors were broken
open, the windows dashed in, the roofs were open to the winds
of heaven, and the little gardens overrun with weeds. The
ruins of an antique abbey were often close at hand, with its
richly painted windows, broken through and through; or,
perhaps, the shattered walls of some hospitable dwelling, in
which a Saxon thane had resided.
a
Where the labor of man has ceased, vegetation soon asserts
her empire, and fields, when left to themselves, become,
according to their soil, either wild or stony, or else covered
with a dense growth of underwood and tall trees. Such was
che case over the wide expanse which had been rendered
desolate ; the spaces of common ground, with golden blos-
somed gorse and wild thyme, continued such as they had
been, but trees grew thick and fast, the beautiful groves
became woods in the course of a short time, and the once
cultivated country was rapidly absorbed in the wilderness
portions of Ytchtene.
The memorial tree,” which now stands lone and
a


112
THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
a
a
seamed, was then a sapling, for such we may conjecture to
have been the case, according to the well-known longevity of
forest-trees. Three events of great interest are associated
with it—the making desolate a wide extent of country ; the
death of the proud Norman, by whose command the work of
ruin was achieved ; and the untimely end of his successor.
Had the history of William I. been written with reference
to his private actions, it might be noticed that a tissue of
domestic sorrows succeeded to the laying desolate of Ytchtene.
His wife Matilda died a few years after, and his fair daugh-
ter Gundreda, the cherished one in her father's house, was
cut off in the flower of her youth. He saw with grief the
jealousy that subsisted between his sons William and Henry;
and during the time that Duke Robert, his first-born, con-
tinued an exile and a fugitive, Richard, his second son, was
gored to death by a stag, as he was hunting over the wide
expanse which his father had depopulated. Men spoke of
the sad event as a just punishment on him who had respected
neither the lives nor feelings of those who once had dwelt
there. Some said, this is but one; we shall see others of his
family to whom the forest will prove fatal,' and they spoke
true.
War was declared with France, and the king shortly after-
wards departed for the continent. The object of the expedi-
tion was expressly to take possession of the city of Mantes,
with a rich territory situated between the Epte and the Oise.
The corn was nearly' ready for the sickle, and the grapes
hung in ripening clusters on the vines, when the fierce king
ordere1 his men to advance on the devoted territory; when
in the bitterness of his spirit he marched his cavalry through


THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
113
a
the corn-fields, and caused his soldiers to tear up the vines
and cut down the pleasant trees. Mantes could offer but a
weak resistance, and the town was set on fire. Riding be-
side the ruined town, to view the misery which he had
wrought, the horse of the Norman conqueror trod on some hot
cinders; the frightened creature plunged violently, and the
king being unable to retain his seat, fell to the ground. The
injury which he sustained caused him to be carried in a litter
to a religious house, in the neighborhood of Rouen, where his
array was encamped, for he could not bear, he said, the noise
of the great city. It was told by those who were present at
the time, that although he at first preserved much apparent
dignity, and conversed calmly on the events of his past life,
and concerning the vanity of human greatness ; when death
drow near, the case was otherwise. He then spoke and felt
as a dying man, who was shortly to appear before the tri-
bucal of his Maker, there to render an account of all the
deeds which he had done, of all the gifts committed to his
carc, of his riches and his power. His hard heart softened
then, and he bitterly bewailed the cruelties which he had
committed.
One morning early, the chief prelates and barons received
a summons to assemble with all haste in the chamber of the
king, who finding his end approach, desired to finish the set-
tlement of his affairs. They came accordingly, though the
day had not yet dawned, and found him with his two sons,
Henry and William, who waited impatiently for the declara-
tion of his will. “I bequeath the duchy of Normandy,"
said he, "to my eldest son Robert. As to the crown of En-
gland, I bequeath it to no one, for I did not receive it, like


114
THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
66
the duchy of Normandy, from my father, but acquired it by
conquest and the shedding of blood, with mine own sword.
The succession of that kingdom, I therefore, leave to the de-
cision of the Almighty. My own most fervent wish is, that
my son William, who has ever been dutiful to me in all things,
may obtain and prosper in it.” “And what do you give me,
O my father ?” impatiently cried Prince Henry, who had
not been mentioned. “Five thousand pounds weight of
silver out of my treasury," was his answer. But what can
I do with five thousand pounds of silver, if I have neither
lands nor a home?" Be patient,” rejoined the king,
"and have trust in the Lord; suffer thy elder brothers to
precede thee—thy time will come after theirs.” On hearing
this, Prince Henry hurried off to secure the silver, which he
weighed with great care, and then provided himself with a
strong coffer, having locks and iron bindings to keep his
treasure safe. William, also, staid no longer by the bed-side
of his dying parent; he called for his attendants, and
hastened to the coast, that he might pass over without delay
to take possession of his crown. He, whose sword had made
many childless, was thus deserted in his hour of greatest
need by his unnatural sons.
His last sigh was a signal for a general flight and scram-
ble. The knights buckled on their spurs, and the priests
and doctors, who had passed the night by his bed-side, made
no delay in leaving their wearisome occupation. “To horse !
to horse !” resounded through the monastery, and each one
galloped off to his own home, in order to secure his interests
or his property. A few of the king's servants, and some
vassals of minor rank staid behind, but not to do honor to


THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
115
a
the poor remains of him who had been their king. They
spoke loudly and trod heavily, where but a short time be-
fore men would scarcely have dared to whisper ; where the
noiseless step and hushed sound, told the rank and sufferings
of him, whom now the voice of seven thunders would not
wake. They proceeded without remorse to rifle the apart-
inent both of arms and silver vessels; they even took away
the linen and royal vestments, and having hastily packed
them in bundles, each man threw the one, which he secured,
upon his steed, and galloped away like the rest. From six
till nine the corpse of the mighty conqueror lay on the bare
boards, with scarcely a sheet to cover him. At length the
monks and clergy recollected the condition of the deceased
monarch, and forming a procession, they went with a crucifix
and lighted tapers to pray over the dishonored body. The
Archbishop of Rouen wished that the interment should take
place at Caen, in preference to his own city, it being thought
most proper that the church of St. Stephen, which the king
had built, and royally endowed, should be honored with his
sepulchre. Arrangements were made accordingly, and the
corpse being carried by water to Caen, was received by the
abbots and monks of St. Stephen. Mass was performed, the
Bishop of Evreux pronounced a panegyric on him who had
borne the name of Conqueror while living, and who had done
great deeds among his fellow-men, and the bier on which lay
the body of the king, attired in royal robes, and being in no
respect concealed from the view, was about to be lowered into
thc
grave, when a stern voice forbade the interment.
shop," it said, “the man whom you have praised was a rob.
ber. The very ground on which we are standing is mine;
66 Bi-


116
THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
1
and this is the site of my father's house. He took it from
me by violence to build this church upon its ruins. I reclaim
it as my right, and in the name of the Most High I forbid
you to bury him there, or to cover him with my glebe.” The
man who spoke thus boldly, was Asseline Fitz-Arthur. He
had vainly sought for justice from the king while living, and
he loudly proclaimed the fact of his injustice and oppression,
before his face, when dead. Many who were present well
remembered the pulling down of Fitz-Arthur's house, and
the distress which it occasioned, and the bishop, being assured
of the fact, gave his son sixty shillings for the grave alone,
and engaged to procure the full value of his land. One mo-
ment more, and the corpse remained among living men;
another, and it disappeared in the darkness of the tomb, and
the remainder of the ceremony being hurried over, the as-
sembly broke up in haste.
Barons and men-at-arms were assembled in Malwood-
Keep, at the invitation of William Rufus, who proposed to
hold a chase, and to follow the red-deer over the wide hunt-
ing-grounds, where once stood the pleasant homes, which his
father had rendered - desolate. William was preparing for
the chase, when an artizan brought him six new arrows. He
praised their workmanship, and putting aside four for him-
self, he gave the other two to Sir Walter Tyrrel, or, as he
was often called, Sir Walter de Poix, from his estates in
France, saying, as he presented them, “Good weapons are
due to him, who knows how to make a right use of them.”
Many of the younger barons were already mounted, and their
horses were curvetting on the grass, as though they partook


THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
117
of the impatience of their riders, while every now and they
the blast of the hunter's horn, in the hand of some young
squire, gave notice to those within that the sun was already
high. All was gaiety and animation, and boisterous mirth
within and around Malwood-Keep, when a stranger was seen
approaching through the forest, grave, and yet in haste. Ho
spoke as one who had business of moment to communicate,
and which admitted of no delay, but his look and voice suf-
ficed to check the eagerness of those who sought to know
whence and why he came. He told the king, when ad-
mitted to his presence, that he had travelled both far and
fast; that the Norman abbot of St. Peter's at Gloucester
had sent to inform his majesty how greatly he was troubled
on his account, for that one of his monks had dreamed a
dream which foreboded a sudden and awful death to him.
“ To horse !" hastily exclaimed the king, “ Walter de Poix,
do you think that I am one of those fools who give up their
pleasure or their business for such matters ? the man is a
true monk, he dreameth for the sake of money; give him an
hundred pence, and bid him dream of better fortune to our
person.”
Forth went the hunting train, and while some rode one
way, some another, according to the manner adopted in the
chase, Sir Walter de Tyrrel, the king's especial favorite,
remained with him, and their dogs hunted together. They
had good sport, and none thought of returning, although tho
sun was sinking in the west and the shadows of the forest-
trees began to lengthen on the grass, at which time an hart
came bounding by, between the king and his companion, who
ytood concealeil in a thicket. The king drew his bow, but


118
THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
the string broke, and the arrow took no effect; the hart
being startled at the sound, paused in his speed, and looked
on all sides, as if doubtful which way to turn. The king,
meanwhile gazing steadfastly at the creature, raised his bri
dle-hand above his eyes, that he might shade them from the
glare of the sun, which now shone almost horizontally
through the forest, and being unprovided with a second bow,
he called out “Shoot, Walter, shoot away!" Tyrrel drew
his bow, but the arrow went not forth in a straight line, it
glanced against a tree and struck the king in its side-course
against his breast, which was left exposed by the raised arm.
The fork-head pierced his heart, and in an instant he ex-
pired. Sir Walter flew to his side, but he saw that his mas-
ter was beyond all human aid, and mounting his horse he
hastened to the sea-coast, from whence he embarked for Nor-
mandy. He was heard of soon after, as having fled into the
,
dominions of the French king, and the next account of him
was, that he had gone to the Holy Land.
Rufus had left the bed-side of his dying parent while life
still lingered, intent only on obtaining the English crown;
he even left the care of his interment to the hands of
strangers, for it does not seem that he at all concerned him-
self about the matter. Now then was he also left alone, in
the depth of the still forest. His companions in the chase
were eagerly following their amusement, and chanced not to
pass where he was lying. At length the royal corpse was
discovered by a poor charcoal-burner, who put it, still bleed
ing, into his cart, and drove off to Winchester. The intelli-
gence soon spread, and Henry hastened to seize the treasures
that belonged to the crown, while the knights, who had


THE DESOLATION OF YTCHTENE.
119
re-assembled at Malwood-Keep, thought only how the acci-
dent might affect themselves; no one caring to show respect
to the remains of the unhappy monarch, with whom they had
banquetted the evening before. It was afterwards observed
by many, that as the corpse of the Conqueror lay extended
on a board, with scarcely a vestment to cover him, so, by a
reasonable coincidence, the body of his unnatural son, un-
washed, without even a mantle, and hideous to look upon, re-
,
mained in the cart of the charcoal-burner till the next day,
when it was conveyed in the same condition to the cathedral
church of Winchester. There, however, some faint show of
,
respect was paid to what had been a king : it was interred
in the centre of the choir, where, as wrote the chronicler of
this sad history, many persons looked on, but few grieved.
It was even said by some, that the fall of a high tower which
covered his tomb with ruins, showed the just displeasure of
Heaven against one, who having deserted his dying parent,
sought not to repair the evils which he had done, who, neither
acting justly nor living righteously, was undeserving of
Christian burial.
:
a


120
ADDRESS TO NIGHT.
ADDRESS TO VIGHT.
BY L.
C.
L E VIN.
HAIL, goddess of the gloomy hour!
I love thy faint and lonely ray;
Thy deepest shadows please me more
Than all the gorgeous light of day.
I love thee when the vault of heaven
With lightning fires is sheeted o’er,
And field and forest, thunder riven,
Quake with the elemental roar.
I love thee, too, when not a breath
Breaks thy expressive stillness; wbcta
It seems as if triumphant death
Reigned over all that once were men.
Oh! let intrusive memory lose
All thoughts of objects felt or seen,
And fancy paint in quaintest hues,
What ne'er will be nor e’er has been.
I'll think my soul, in ages past,
Was tenant of some brighter sphere;
And for some dark transgression, cast
To work its absolution here.
But, day appears—my fellow men
Rise up, like monsters from their lair;
I see myself like them, and then,
Think my lot hopeless, and—despair.


AN EVENING AT HOME.
121
AY EVENING AT HOME.
BY KATE SUTHERLAND.
a
"Not going to the ball ?" said Mrs. Lindley, with a look
and tone of surprise. " What has come over the girl ?”
I don't know, but she says she's not going."
" Doesn't her ball dress fit ?"
“ Yes, beautifully.”
“ What is the matter, then ?"
“Indeed, ma, I cannot tell. You had better go up and
see her. It is the strangest notion in the world. Why, you
couldn't hire me to stay at home.”
Mrs. Lindley went up stairs, and entering her daughter's
room, found her sitting on the side of the bed, with a beauti-
ful ball dress in her hand.
“ It isn't possible, Helen, that you are not going to this
ball ?" she said.
Helen looked up with a half serious, half smiling expres
sion on her face.
“ I've been trying, for the last half hour,” she replied,
“to decide whether I ought to go, or stay at home. I think,
perhaps, I ought to remain at home.”
I
“But what earthly reason can you have for doing so?
Don't
you
like
your
dress ? »
“O yes ! very much. I think it beautiful.”
6


122
AN EVENING AT HOME.
“ Doesn't it fit you ?”
“ As well as any dress I ever had.”
Are
you
not well?”
“ Very well.”
“Then why not go to the ball? It will be the largest and
most fashionable of the season. You know that
You know that your father
and myself are both going. We shall want to see you there,
of course.
Your father will require some very good reason
for your absence."
.
Helen looked perplexed at her mother's last remark.
“ Do you think father will be displeased if I remain at
home?” she asked.
“ I think he will, unless you can satisfy him that your
reason for doing so is a very good one. Nor shall I feel that
you are doing right. I wish all my children to act under
the government of a sound judgment. Impulse, or reasons
not to be spoken of freely to their parents, should in no case
influence their actions."
Helen sat thoughtful for more than a minute, and then
said, her eyes growing dim as she spoke,
“I wish to stay at home for Edward's sake.”
“ And why for his, my dear ?”
“He doesn't go to the ball, you know.”
“ Because he is too young, and too backward. You
couldn't hire him to go there. But, that is no reason why
you should remain at home. You would never partake of
any social amusement, were this always to influence you.
Let him spend the evening in reading. He must not expect
his sisters to deny themselves all recreation in which he
cannot or will not participate.”


AN EVENING AT HOME.
123
a
a
“ He does not. I know he would not hear to such a thing
as my staying at home on his account.”
“ Then why stay ?”
Because I feel that I ought to do so.
This is the way I
have felt all day, whenever I have thought of going. If I
were to go, I know that I would not have a moment's enjoy-
ment. He need not know why I remain at home. To tell
Ι
him that I did not wish to go will satisfy his mind.”
“I shall not urge the matter, Helen,” Mrs. Lindley said,
after a silence of some moments. “ You are old enough to
judge in a matter of this kind for yourself. But, I must
say, I think you rather foolish. You will not find Edward
disposed to sacrifice so much for you.”
“Of that I do not think, mother. Of that I ought not to
think."
“Perhaps not. Well, you may do as you like. But, I
don't know what your father will say."
Mrs. Lindley then left the room.
Edward Lindley was at the critical age of eighteen ; that
period when many young men, especially those who have
been blessed with sisters, would have highly enjoyed a ball.
But Edward was shy, timid and bashful in company, and
could hardly ever be induced to go out to parties with his
sisters. Still, he was intelligent for his years, and compa-
,
nionable. His many good qualities endeared him to his
family, and drew forth from his sisters towards him a very
tender regard.
Among his male friends were several about his own age,
members of families with whom his own was on friendly
terms. With these he associated frequently, and, with two


124
AN EVENING AT HOME.
or three others, quite intimately. For a month or two,
Helen noticed that one and another of these young friends
called every now and then for Edward, in the evening, and
that he went out with them and staid until bed-time. But
unless his sisters were from home, he never went of his own
accord. The fact of his being out with these young men,
had, from the first, troubled Helen ; though, the reason of
her feeling troubled she could not tell. Edward had good
principles, and she could not bring herself to entertain fears
of any clearly-defined evil. Still a sensation of uneasiness
was always produced when he was from home in the evening.
Her knowing that Edward would go out, after they had all
left, was the reason why Helen did not wish to attend the
ball. The first thought of this had produced an unpleasant
sensation in her mind, which increased the longer she debated
the question of going away, or remaining at home. Finally,
she decided that she would not go. This decision took place
after the interview with her mother, which was only half an
hour from the time of starting.
Edward knew nothing of the intention of his sister. He
was in his own room, dressing to go out, and supposed, when
he heard the carriage drive from the door, that Helen had
gone with the other members of the family. On descending
to the parlor, he was surprised to find her sitting by the
centre table, with a book in her hand.
“ Helen! Is this you! I thought you had gone to the
ball. Are you not well ?” he said quickly and with sur-
prise, coming up to her side
“I am very well, brother,” she replied, looking into his
face with a smile of sisterly regard. “But I have concluded
a


AN EVENING AT HOME.
124
to stay at home this evening. I'm going to keep your com
pany."
“ Are you, indeed! right glad am I of it! though I am
sorry you have deprived yourself of the pleasure of this ball,
which, I believe, is to be a very brilliant one. I was just
going out, because it is so dull at home when you are all
away.”
So
“I am not particularly desirous of going to the ball.
little so, that the thoughts of you being left here all alone
had sufficient influence over me to keep me away.”
Indeed! Well, I must say you are kind.” Edward
returned, with feeling. The self-sacrificing act of his sister
had touched him sensibly.
Both Helen and her brother played well. She upon the
harp and piano, and he upon the flute and violin. Both
were fond of music, and practised and played frequently
together. Part of the evening was spent in this way, much
to the satisfaction of each. Then an hour passed in reading
and conversation, after which, music was again resorted to.
Thus passed the time pleasantly until the hour for retiring
came, when they separated, both with an internal feeling of
pleasure more delightful than they had experienced for a
long time. It was nearly three o'clock before Mr. and Mrs.
Lindley, and the daughter who had accompanied them to the
ball, came home. Hours before, the senses of both Edward
and Helen had been locked in forgetfulness.
Time passed on. Edward Lindley grew up and became a
man of sound principles—a blessing to his family and so.
ciety. He saw his sisters well married ; and himself
finally, led tf the altar a lovely maiden. She made him &


126
AN EVENING AT HOME.
)
truly happy husband. On the night of his wedding, as he
sat beside Helen, he paused for some time, in the midst of a
pleasant conversation, thoughtfully. At last, he said,
,
“Do you remember, sister, the night you staid home
from the ball to keep me company ?”
“That was many years ago. Yes, I remember it very
well, now you have recalled it to my mind.”:
“I have often since thought, Helen,” he said, with a
serious air, “that by the simple act of thus remaining at
home for my sake, you were the means of saving me from
destruction."
“ How so?” asked the sister.
))
“I was just then beginning to form an intimate associa
tion with young men of my own age, nearly all of whom have
since turned out badly. I did not care a great deal about
their company; still, I liked society and used to be with
them frequently-especially when you and Mary went out in
—
• the evening. On the night of the ball to which you were
going, these young men had a supper, and I was to have been
with them. I did not wish particularly to join them, but
preferred doing so to remaining at home alone. To find you,
as I did, so unexpectedly, in the parlor, was an agreeable
surprise indeed. I staid at home with a new pleasure, which
was heightened by the thought, that it was your love for me
that had made you deny yourself for my gratification. We
read together on that evening, we played together, we talked
of many things. In your mind I had never before seen as
much to inspire my own with high and pure thoughts. I
remembered the conversation of the young men with whom ]
nad been associating, and in which I had taken pleasure,


AN EVENING AT HOME.
127
with something like disgust. It was low, sensual and too
much of it vile and demoralizing. Never, from that hour,
did I join them. Their way, even in the early stage of life's
journey, I saw to be downward, and downward it has ever
since been tending. How often since have I thought of that
point in time, so full-fraught with good and evil influences.
Those few hours spent with you seemed to take scales from
my eyes. I saw with a new vision. I thought and felt dif-
ferently. Had you gone to the ball, and I to meet those
young men, no one can tell what might not have been the
consequence. Sensual indulgences, carried to excess, amid
songs and sentiments calculated to awaken evil instead of good
feelings, might have stamped upon my young and delicate
mind a bias to low affections that never would have been
eradicated. That was the great starting point in life-the
period when I was coming into a state of rationality and
freedom. The good prevailed over the evil, and by the
agency of my sister, as an angel sent by the Author of all
benefits to save me.
Like Helen Lindley, let every elder sister be thoughtful
of her brothers at that critical period in life, when the boy is
about passing up to the stage of manhood, and she may save
them from many a snare set for their unwary feet by the evil
one. In closing this little sketch, we can say nothing better
than has already been said by an accomplished American
authoress, Mrs. Farrar.
“So many temptations,” she says,
“ beset young men,
of which young women know nothing, that it is of the utmost
importance that young brothers' evenings should be happily
passed at home, that their friends should be your friends,


128
AN EVENING AT HOME.
that their.engagements should be the same as yours, and that
various innocent amusements should be provided for them in
the family circle. Music is an accomplishment, chiefly va-
luable as a home enjoyment, as rallying round the piano the
various members of a family, and harmonizing their hearts
as well as voices, particularly in devotional strains. I know
no more agreeable and interesting spectacle, than that of
brothers and sisters playing and singing together those ele-
vated compositions in music and poetry which gratify the
taste and purify the heart, while their fond parents sit de-
lighted by. I have seen and heard an elder sister thus lead-
ing the family choir, who was the soul of harmony to the
whole household, and whose life was a perfect example of
those virtues which I am here endeavoring to inculcate. Let
no one say, in reading this chapter, that too much is here
required of sisters, that no one can be expected to lead such
a self-sacrificing life ; for the sainted one to whom I refer,
was all I would ask any sister to be, and a happier person
never lived. To do good and to make others happy was her
rule of life, and in this she found the art of making herself so.
“Sisters should always be willing to walk, ride, visit with
their brothers; and esteem it a privilege to be their compa-
nions. It is worth while to learn innocent games for the
sake of furnishing brothers with amusements, and making
home the most agreeable place to them. ....
“I have been told by some, who have passed unharmed
through the temptations of youth, that they owed their
escape from many dangers to the intimate companionship of
affectionate and pure-minded sisters. They have been saved
from a hazardous meeting with idle company by some home






H. Warren
Epide








1:11E WIDOW'S MITE.
129
engagement, of which their sisters were the charm; they
have refrained from mixing with the impure, because they
would not bring home thoughts and feelings which they could
not share with those trusting, loving friends; they have put
aside the wine-cup and abstained from stronger potations,
because they would not profane with their fumes the holy
kiss, with which they were accustomed to bid their sisters
good-night.
THE WIDOW'S VITR.
It is the fruit of waking hours
When others are asleep,
When moaning round the low thatched roui
The winds of winter creep.
It is the fruit of summer days
Passed in a gloomy room,
When others are abroad to taste
The pleasant morning bloom.
'Tis given from a scanty store
And missed while it is given :
'Tis given—for the claims of earth
Are less than those of heaven.


130
THE FIRST ORATION.
THE FIRST ORATION.
No pub-
a
A TEMPERANCE society was to be formed in Lyonville, and
of course there must be an address from some one.
lic lecturer happening to be in the place, those engaged in
getting up the meeting pitched upon a young man named
Agnew for the purpose, and, despite of all objections and re-
monstrance, extorted from him the promise to act as orator
for the evoning. Agnew had talents, was a good talker and
a warm advocate of the temperance cause. But he had never
spoken in public beyond an occasional argument in a debat-
ing club, and very naturally had many serious doubts as to
his success. He had only three or four days for the work of
preparation. At first he tried to write an address; but he
failed in this altogether. He had not the faculty of thinking
with his pen in hand. Then he turned his subject over and
over again in his mind, lying awake upon it half the
night, and going out into the fields early in the morning to
exercise himself in reading aloud or speaking, to an imagin-
ary audience, the oration he had composed.
These performances were, upon the whole, quite satisfac-
tory to the young orator; and by the time the meeting was
to be held, he felt fully prepared to do both himself and his
subject àmple justice.


THE FIRST ORATION.
131
On the evening in question, the little village-church was
filled to overflowing. For the three hours previous to the
time when he was to open his address, Agnew had been
repeating it over and over again, in order to have every word
perfect in his memory. But as the period drew near, he felt
more and more nervous. There was a weight on his breast,
and a dry, choking sensation in his throat. On entering the
church, and finding it so crowded with spectators, Agnew's
knees began to tremble; and when he searched about in his
mind for the opening portion of his address, it was no where
to be found.
Seating himself on the platform temporarily erected for the
purposes of the evening, he awaited, in a state of nervous
anxiety, the conclusion of the preliminary ceremonies, still
searching, but in vain, for the clue to his oration. Not a
single portion of his intended speech could he remember, try
as he would to recall it.
At last the time came. There was deep hush of expec-
tation through the assembly. All eyes were upon him. Ris-
ing, in the trembling hope that, at the last moment, his
speech would come, he said, with as steady a voice as he
could assume,
“Mr. President"
Just at that moment, the door of the church opened, and a
man who sold liquor and had done more to corrupt and de-
moralize the young men of the village .than any one in it,
entered, and, with a look of defiance, walked boldly down the
aisle, and took his seat just in front of the young speaker.
As he did so, he perceived Agnew's embarrassment, and
gave a chuckle of enjoyment.


132
THE FIRST ORATION.
Mr. President,” said the speaker, as the liquor-seller thug
noted his confusion. His voice was steadier than before.
“It is related, that, in old times, when the sons of the Lord
came up to worship, Satan came also.”
He paused, looking steadily at the tavern-keeper; and the
eyes of the whole congregation followed his gaze.
“ It is also said,” he continued, “ that there is joy in hea-
ven over one sinner that repenteth. Happily, Satan cannot
now appear among us in bodily form. Many who have
served Satan, however, are here, but I sincerely trust as the
repentant sinners over whom heaven rejoices."
Thus opening, extemporaneously, he continued, turning
his reference to the liquor-seller to such good account as to
disarm his resentment, while he deeply interested both him
and the whole audience. His address was most admirable,
yet not a line of what he had prepared was uttered.
When he sat down and the pledge was presented, the old
liquor-seller was the first to sign. So much for Agnew's first
-
oration. He has made many since ; but none that will be
e
remembered in Lyonville as long as bis maiden speech.
S. A.
PP
5
..


WHY DON'T HE COME.
133
WHY DON'T HB GOMB.
Why don't he come ?—the morning light,
In amber rays, break from the east;
He said he would come back last night,
Nor tarry at the midnight feast.
Ah, that the revel and the song
Should lure him from my smiles away,
The vigil why did he prolong
In politician's idle fray ?
When the last evening's hymn was sung,
My babes a wondering silence kept,
And with his name upon its tougue,
Each little innocent has slept.
Until the waning moon was high,
A silent watch I here did keep;
But slow, the long, long hours went by,
And I retired, alone to weep.
I see him not-he little knows
The pain this faithful heart must feel :
Oh, that his own may find repose,
Nor be consumed by party zeal.
The sun is up—yet he comes not,
To light with joy our peaceful home;
These revels are with ruin fraught-
I wonder why he does not come!
MWOSA


134
BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS.
BRAUTIRUI THOUGHTS.
FROM
MISS
BR E MER.
>
CHRISTMAS IN SWEDEN.—How cold, how gloomy it is !
The window-panes are covered with ice; the morning twi-
light extends its hand to the evening twilight, and the dark
night entombs the day. In Norland, however, the mid-day
has a few bright moments ; the sun sheds still a few feeble
beams, then he quickly disappears and it becomes dark.
Farther up in the country people know nothing more of
day-the night endures for months.
They say in the North, that “ Nature sleeps,” but this
sleep resembles death ; like death, it is cold and ghastly,
and would obscure the heart of man, did not another light
descend at the same time--if it did not open to the heart a
warmer bosom and animate it with its life. In Sweden they
know this very well, and while every thing sleeps and dies
in nature, all is set in motion in all hearts and homes for the
celebration of a festival. Ye know it well, ye industrious
.
,
daughters of home, ye who strain your hands and eyes by
lamplight quite late into the night to prepare presents. You
know it well, you sons of the house, you who bite your nails
in order to puzzle out "what in all the world” you shall
choose for Christmas presents. Thou knowest it well, thou
fair child, who hast no other anxiety than lest the Christ.


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS.
135
!
man should loose his way and pass by thy door. You know
it well, you fathers and mothers, with empty purses and full
hearts ; ye aunts and cousins of the great and immortal race
of needlewomen and workers in wool-ye welcome and un-
welcome uncles and male cousins, ye know it well, this time
of mysterious countenances and treacherous laughter! In
the houses of the rich, fat roasts are prepared and dried
fish ; sausages pour forth their fat, and tarts puff themselves
up; nor is there any hut so poor as not to have at this time
a sucking-pig squeaking in it, which must endeavor, for the
greater part, to grow fat with its own good humor.
It is quite otherwise with the elements at this season.
The cold reigns despotically; it holds all lifo fettered in na-
ture; restrains the heaving of the sea'a besom ; destroys
every sprouting grass blade ; forbids the birds to sing and
the gnats to sport; and only its minister, the powerful north
wind, rolls freely forth into gray space, and takes heed that
every thing keeps itself immoveable and silent. The spar-
rows only—those optimists of the air--remain merry, and
appear by their twittering to announce better times.
At length comes the darkest moments of the year,
the
midnight hour of nature ; and suddenly light streams forth
from all habitations and emulates the stars of heaven. The
church opens its bosom full of brightness and thanksgiving,
and the children shout, full of gladness, “ It is Christmas! it
is Christmas !" Earth sends her hallelujah on high!
"
And wherefore this light, this joy, this thanksgiving ?
"A Child is born!” A child! In the hour of fight, in
"
a lowly manger, he has been born ; and angels have also
sung, “Peace on earth !" This is the festival which shall be


136
BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS.
celebrated-and well may ye, you dear children, sound forth
your cries of joy! Welcome, even though unconsciously,
the hour in which this Friend, this Brother; was born to
you; who shall guide you through life, who shall lighten the
hour of death to you, and who one day shall verify the
dreams of your childhood; who shall stand beside you in
necessity and care, and shall help to answer the great ques-
tions of life. Rejoice, ye happy children, whom He blesses !
Rejoice, and follow after Him! He is come to lead you
and
all of us to God!
There are inexhaustible, love-inspiring, wonderful, en-
trancing thoughts, in which man is never weary of plunging.
The sick soul bathes in them as in a Bethesda, and is made
whole--and in them the healthy find an elevating life's re-
freshment. Of this kind are the thoughts on that Child
His poverty, His lowliness, His glory.!
FATHERS OF FAMILIES.—Thou who sittest at thy table
like a thunder-cloud charged with lightning, and scoldest the
wife and the cook about the dinner, so that the morsel sticks
in the throat of the mother and children-thou who makest
unhappy wife and child and servants—thou who preparest
for every dish a bitter sauce out of thy gall-shame and in-
digestion to thee!
But—Honor and long life to a good stomach, and espe-
cially all good to thee who sittest at thy table like bright
sunshine ; thou who lookest round thee to bless the enjoy-
ment of thy family—by thy friendly glance, thy kind speech,
callest forth sportiveness and appetite, and thereby lendest
to the gifts of God a better strength, a finer flavor than the
profoundest art of the cook is able to confer upon them--
a


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS.
137
honor to thee, and joys in abundance. May good-will ever
spread the table for thee; may friendly faces ever sit round
thy dishes. Honor and joy to thee!
NATURE.—The wind on the sea, the air on the mountain,
the sea-like sound in the wood, the fresh, fresh breath of na-
ture, which expels care and refreshes life—I praise you !
Who has not felt himself elevated when he has returned
from the house of mourning, from the impure atmosphere of
society, and from the exhaustion of business ? Wonderful,
powerful, care-free life in the air, in the water, and in the
earth! Mighty Nature, how I love thee, and how gladly
would I lead all hearts to thee! In hostility to thee, le is
a burthen ; in peace with thee, we have a presentiment of the
repose of Paradise. Thy storms sound through the immor-
tal harps of Ossian and Byron ; in the songs of the sea-
l
heroes in the romances of the north, breathes thy life. The
feeling heart owes to thee its best and freshest sentiments.
To her also who pens these lines hast thou given new life.
Her soul was sick to death, and she cast herself on thy bo-
Thou didst raise her up again ; she received power
to
lift herself up to God.
SELFISHNESS AND EGOTISM.-It is indeed a terrible
sight, that of a man who has so completely smothered every
thing divine in his nature, that nothing remains but a horri-
ole egotism. To such a one nothing is sacred ; to accom-
plish his will and to satisfy his humor, he hesitates at none,
no, not the most criminal means, and finds a pleasure in
making himself a tormentor.
THE FAR NORTH.—So poor, so waste, so gloomily does
nature here present herself—monotonous, but great! Great,
som.


138
BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS.
a
since she is eternal, without change, without disquiet. Proud
and immovable in her poverty, she casts from her the indus-
try of men, the affluence of agriculture, and renounces every
joy, but at the same time every
fetter. She turns away her
countenance from life, draws the winding-sheet around her,
and seems to rejoice herself in everlasting repose.
LIFE's MOONLIGHT.—There is also a moonlight in human.
life-a moonlight in the hearts of men. It ascends cheer-
fully after a disquieting, stormy day. It has the reconciling
of fight and shade; a bright twilight; a still melancholy; a
soft slumbering of feeling; a wo—but it also is a benefit :
then are shed quiet tears, gentle and refreshing as the dew
upon the scorched-up valleys. Often, however, is it a long
time before this repose, this heavenly light, descends into the
heart; often is it tempested so long.
THE BRIDAL Hour.—We array ourselves for marriages in
flowers ; and wear dark mourning-dresses for the last sor-
rowful festivity which attends a fellow being to his repose.
And this often might be exactly reversed. But the custom
is beautiful—for the sight of a young bride invites the heart
involuntarily to joy. The festal attire, thọ myrtle wreath
upon the virgin brows; all the affectionate looks, and the an.
ticipations of the future, which beautifully accompany her-
all enrapture us. One sees in them a new home of love
raised on earth ; a peaceful Noah's ark on the wild flool of
life, in which the white dove of peace will dwell and build hier
nest; loving children, affectionate words, looks, and love.
warm hearts, will dwell in the new home; friends will enjoy
themselves under its hospitable roof; and much beautiful
activity, and many a beautiful gift will thence go forth, anul


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS.
139
full of blessing diffuse itself over life. There stands the
young bride, creator of all this—hopes and joys go forth
from her. No one thinks of sufferings at a marriage festival.
And if the eyes of the bride stand full of tears; if her
cheeks are pale, and her whole being—when the bridegroom
approaches her, fearful and ill at ease-even then people will
not think of misfortune. Cousins and aunts wink at onc
another and whisper, “I was just so on my wedding-day-
but that passes over with time!" Does a more deeply and
more heavily tried heart feel perhaps a sigh arise within,
when it contemplates the pale, troubled bride, it comforts
itself, in order not to disturb the marriage joy, with, “O
that is the way of the world !”
MISFORTUNES.-When a heart breaks under the burden
of its sorrows—when sickness strikes its root in wounds
opened by pain, and life consumes away slowly to death, then
none of us should say that that heavily-laden heart should
not have broken ; that it might have exerted its strength to
bear its suffering. No; we would express no word of censure
on that prostrated spirit because it could not raise itself-
before its resurrection from the grave.
But beautiful, strengthening, and glorious is the view of a
man who presents a courageous and patient breast to the
poisoned arrows of life; who without defiance and without
weakness, goes upon his way untroubled; who suffers with-
!
out complaint; whose fairest hopes have been borne down to
the grave by fate, and who yet diffuses joy around him, and
labors for the happiness of others. Ah, how beautiful is the
view of such a one, to whom the crown of thorns becomes
the glory of a saint !


140
BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS.
a
;ا
I have seen more than one such royal sufferer, and have
always felt at the sight, “Oh, could I be like this one-it
is better than to be worldly fortunate!”
But I must here remark a difference. There is a misfor-
tune in which we see a higher hand, an inevitable fate; it is
like a thunder-stroke out of the clouds. But there are suf.
ferings of another kind, of which the torture resembles a
perpetual needle-pricking. These proceed from the hand of
man; these arise in families, where married people, parents,
children, only live one with another to make home a hell :
there are the plagued and the plaguers ; it were difficult to
say which are most worthy of pity—the unhappy ones !
The first kind of misfortune is most easy to endure. It is
much, much easier to suffer under the hand of God, than
under that of man. Lightning from above gives death, or
light and exhilaration ; the prick from the hand of man
wastes away
like a slow cancer; it embitters the heart-bit-
terness is the simoom of life ; where it blows, there exists a
desert. But even here, is there a means of deliverance.
There is an angel-patience which blunts the wounding point,
which sanctifies the sufferer under his pang, and at length
improves others by this means. There is a Socratic cou-
rage which converts all Xantippean shower-baths into re-
freshing rain; there is a hero-mood that breaks the chains
which it finds too heavy to be borne. Many a tormented
one proves himself, but he proves himself before a higher
eye; he may, if he will, prevent his heart becoming embit-
;
tered, for that is the worst that can happen to him.
a


REMEMREREST THOU ME.
141
RENEM BERBST THOU JE,
BY WM.
H.
.
CARPENTER.
I LOVED thee when thou wert a fairy thing
Of less than sixteen summers; and thy form
Was as a flower of beauty's fashioning,
Bright in the sunshine, drooping in the storm.
Thy laughing eyes were of that deep clear blue,
In which the soul was seated like a star,
Throned in its kindred heaven.--I would strew
Gladness around thee, fair one! though afar
Our streams have parted, ne'er to mingle more.
Thou hast encircling thee in thy bright home
The fond ones of thy girlhood,--and thy door
Still looks on scenes where once we loved to roam ;
(I bless thee, dearest !) and thy golden tress
Lies even now before me, and is wet
With tears that come from memory's fount and press
Its spirit depths full sadly.—Where we met,
Is pictured to the sense; the bower, the beechen tree,
On which our names were graved ; the little stream,
That gliding onward mingled with the sea;
The sun just setting, while his crimson beam,
Falls slantingly upon the tiny sail
That gems the still blue waters. Thon art there,
And I'am by thee, and thy lashes veil
The tears that glisten through them; while a prayer
Comes whispered from thy lips—bless thee! bless thee i
That prayer was breathed for me and—this is but
A dream of what hath been.


142
VISIT TO FATHER MATHEW.
VISIT RO BARIER YARHEW.
BY COL. WM. SHER BURNE.
.
On leaving the beautiful and chaste City of Dublin, which
may be ranked second only to the City of Edinburgh for its
magnificent mansions, I was presented with letters to the
Very Reverend Theobald Mathew at Cork'; to the Earl
Montagle, late Chancellor of the British Exchequer and
Member of the House of Lords, residing near Cork; to the
Lord High Sheriff of the County of Cork; and numerous
others of equal rank and standing in Ireland, all of which
placed me in a position, while on my rambles over an
island so enchanting in prospect, clime and soil, to the tra-
veller, made me forget the famishing thousands, or my
danger as a foreigner travelling amid subjects armed at
every point and ripe for rebellion, incendiarism, and blood-
shed. Yet, after a pleasant jaunt, by railway and coach, I
arrived in safety at the City of Cork, and took my quarters
at Cotton's Imperial Hotel. The following morning I called
to deliver my letters of introduction and pay my respects to
Father Mathew, (so termed in Ireland,) whose humble
abode I found a few squares from the hotel over the Lee in a
narrow, obscure street. In front of the house was a large
number of the poor, waiting to have an opportunity to see
the great Apostle of Temperance and obtain the usual morn-
a


VISIT TO FATHER MATHEW.
143
ing blessing, with something also to keep them from star
vation. Making my way through the motley crowd, amid a
hundred cries of "a penny, your honor, in the name of
God !” I gave the usual summons, and was invited into the
office of the good Father's private secretary, on the right of
a narrow passage, the floor of which was covered with straw,
thrown carelessly down, for the purpose, as I was afterwards
informed, of letting the poor mendicants wipe their feet of
the mud brought in from the street before entering the office.
The secretary, on learning my object, my letters and coun-
try, expressed much regret that Father Mathew was absent
from town on a mission of mercy; but said that he would
return that evening, and hoped I would leave my letter and
card, as he would feel rejoiced to see and take by the hand a
citizen from a country that had saved millions from starva-
tion by its most generous sympathy in the great time of
need.
Soon after breakfast the next morning, while reading the
morning paper near the front window in the parlor, a cab
drove rapidly up the street and reined up at the Imperial;
and while gazing out to see a large number of the poor Irish
in front and around the cab, I was aroused at the entrance
and announcement of mine host of the name of Father
Mathew, who, with all the courtly grace of a finished gentle-
man, bade me welcome to Ireland, and regretting that his
absence on the day previous had deprived him of the plea.
sure of welcoming me at his own domicil. The deep-felt
gratitude, towards the American citizens, he expatiated upon
until tears filled his eyes ; and when describing the horrors of
the famine and what he had seen and passed through during


144
VISIT TO FATHER MATHEW.
a
my aston-
that awful visitation of Providence, it seemed completely to
unman the good Father, who rose, and with measured steps
walked the room for a while in silence, apparently to recover
his agitated feelings and change the too-painful subject. On
the taking leave, he said, with his usual bland smile, while
holding my hand, that he should expect me to dine with him
on the next day with a few select friends, to whom he should
be pleased to introduce me. On waiting on the good Father
to his cab we found, still collected, a large number of the
poor, who, on his approach, knelt on the pavement to ask a
blessing as he passed out to enter his carriage. Many fol-
lowed the carriage some distance up the street.
'I had the impression, like thousands of others, that Father
Mathew was a small man,
of advanced
age,
and
ishment was great on seeing a gentleman in the prime of life,
of true Chesterfieldian grace in every movement, and with
handsome form and features. Father Mathew may be
termed one of nature's true noblemen. His dress was a suit
of black with small-clothes and boots of high polish up to
the knee, when in the street or making short visits; in
private, at home, he wears a well-made neat shoe, after the
style of the old English gentleman.
At the humble residence of the Apostle of temperance, on
the next day, I was introduced to the Lord Mayor, severai
of the corporation and two or three priests. We dined in
the same room in which we all met, and when dinner was
announced, Father Mathew did me the honor of placing me
at his right hand with the Lord Mayor on his left. We had
an excellent dinner, with pure water; tea and coffee followed
while the dessert was on the table, a part of which had been


REMEMBRANCE.
145
sent from the United States by a lady as a present to Father
Mathew. All the time we were at the table, a constant
crowd of the poor destitute Irish were in front of the house,
looking up to the windows, most anxiously wishing for some
of the crumbs that fell from the good Father's table. While
sipping our coffee, Father Mathew rose and whispered me to
excuse him for a few minutes. His object was, to order his
servant-man to divide all that was left of the dinner among
those who crowded the door in front, as far as it would go,
and then to request them to return to their homes and he
would see them another time; all of which was fulfilled, and
all left on their way rejoicing, blessing the name of Father
Mathew.
REMEMBRANCE.
..
'Tis something, if in absence we can trace
The footsteps of the past: it sooths the heart
To breathe the air scented in other years
By lips beloved, to wander through the groves
Where once we were not lonely; where the rose
Reminds us of the hair we used to wreathe
With its fresh buds—where every hill and vale,
And wood and fountain, speak of time gone by,
And Hope springs up in joy from Memory's ashes
7


146
POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
POBTRY OF MR. HAYNBS BAYLI.
a
The songs of Mr. Haynes Bayly have been the most po-
pular of our times next to those of Moore. They are things
generally slight in substance, yet invariably elegant and
pleasing. Some are airy and cheerful beyond even Mr.
Moore's best ditties of the same kind; others express, in a
manner which the public felt to be original, the pathos aris-
ing from some of the less happy relations which rest beneath
the smiling exterior of refined society. From a memoir pre-
fixed to an edition of Mr. Haynes Bayly's lyrical works,
published by his widow, we learn that he was connected by
birth with the aristocracy of England, and the sole heir of a
gentleman of property near Bath, who had pursued the
business of solicitor in that city. By a fate rare with poets,
he was nurtured in the lap of luxury; but it will be found
that misfortune claimed her own at last, and that his latter
years were spent under the pressure of difficulties which seem
next to inseparable from literary avocations. He was an in-
attentive school-boy, preferring, even at seven years of age,
the business of dramatizing stories from his picture-books to
that of mastering his tasks. He composed verses under the
age at which Pope and Spenser attempted them. Educated at
Winchester school, he was devoted by his father to the legal
profession ; but it was found impossible to confine him to


POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
147
such duties, and after a severe struggle with the paternal
wishes, he was allowed to study for the church. This was a
voluntary-assumed pursuit, but it did not prove the less
uncongenial when tried; and, finally, it seems to have been
found by all parties that it was vain to prevent the subject
of our mémoir from giving himself entirely to that for which
his faculties seemed primarily fitted-elegant literature.
While he was studying at Oxford, he formed a 'fond
attachment to a fellow-student who fell into consumption and
died. At an early age of the youth's illness, his sister, who
resided at Bath, ventured on the somewhat extraordinary
step of corresponding with Mr. Bayly, to ascertain her
brother's real state ; for the accounts which had hitherto
2
reached the family were only calculated to excite alarm
without giving satisfactory information. This increased the
interest which our poet felt in his friend's condition, and he
soon gave himself entirely up to the duty of watching beside
his sick-bed. He used to read to him for hours during the
intervals of the slow fever which was consuming his life. He
soothed him in the hour of pain and suffering, and at the last
closed his eyes in peace. His whole conduct, and a monody
in which he expressed his feelings on this occasion, make
manifest the extreme kindness of nature which distinguished
Mr. Bayly. Afterwards, his acquaintance with the young
lady was renewed at Bath, whither he returned immediately
after the decease of her brother. He was overwhelmed with
thanks for his attentions to the lost one by the bereft family,
and invited constantly by the afflicted parents to fill the
vacant seat at their table; in short, he soon became as one
of themselves. The sorrowing sister poured forth her grief:


148
POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
the poet sympathized, and “pity is akin to love.” It was
certainly not surprising that an attachment begun under
such circumstances should have strengthened daily; and
when the lover declared his sentiments, it of course became
necessary to inquire into the probability of his being able to
raise a sufficient income to allow of their marrying with
prudence. Mr. Haynes Bayly was entirely dependent on
his father, who was not then disposed to come forward for
such a purpose. The young lady had nothing of her own,
and her father, Colonel would not make any settle-
ment on her. How were matters to be arranged? They
were both too wise to think of living upon love, and, after
mutual tears and sighs, they parted-never to meet again.
The lady, though grieved, was not broken-hearted, and soon
became the wife of another. Mr. Bayly fell into deep
melancholy, to alleviate which he was induced to make a
journey to Scotland. It was at this time, and with reference
to his own feelings, that he wrote his well-known song, “ Oh,
no! we never mention her;" also one less known, but per.
haps more remarkable for the generosity of its sentiments :-
I never wish to meet thee more, though I am still thy friend ;
I never wish to meet thee more, since dearer ties must end;
With worldly smiles and worldly words, I could not pass thee by,
Nor turn from thee unfeelingly with cold averted eye.
I could not bear to see thee 'midst the thoughtless and the gay;
I could not bear to view thee, decked in fashion's bright array ;
And less could I endure to meet thee pensive and alone,
When through the trees the evening breeze breathes forth its chnerless
mnan.


POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
149
For I have met thee 'midst the gay, and thought of none but thee;
And I have seen the bright array, when it was worn for me;
And often near the sunny waves I've wandered by thy side,
With joy that passed away as fast as sunshi rom the tide.
But cheerless is the summer! there is nothing happy now;
The daisy withers on the lawn, the blossom on the bough:
The boundless sea looks chillingly, like winter's waste of snow,
And it hath lost the soothing sound with which it used to flow.
I never wish to meet thee more, yet think not I've been taught,
By smiling foes, to injure thee by one unworthy thought.
No—blest with some beloved one, from care and sorrow free,
May thy lot in life be happy, undisturbed by thoughts of me.
A year spent in Scotland, and a subsequent gayer resi-
dence in Dublin, re-established the poet's spirits, and he
now began to publish his songs. Returning, in 1824, to his
father's house of Mount Beacon, near Bath — being now
twenty-seven years of age—he formed a new attachment,
equally peculiar in its circumstances, but more fortunate in
the event. He was introduced by a friend at an evening
party given by Mrs. Hayes, whose soirees at Bath were fre-
quented by the talented, the young, and the gay. Mrs.
Hayes had an only daughter, who, having heard with delight
the ballad of “ Isabel,” expressed the greatest anxiety to
see its author; the friend just alluded to being one of Miss
Hayes's suitors, was requested by her mother to convey an
invitation for her next.party to the beau ideal of her daugh-
ter's fancy. The appointed evening arrived—the poet saw,
and was fascinated with Miss Hayes; and, on conversing
with Mrs. Hayes, discovered that she and his own mother
had been friends and schnol-fellows in their young days,


150
POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
This circumstance laid the foundation of an intimacy which
ceased only with his life. His friend was then little aware
that he was introducing to her, whose hand he himself was
seeking, her future husband; for so it proved.
He came, he saw, but did not conquer at once ; for the
young lady, though she could not but acknowledge that Mr.
Haynes Bayly was very charming and agreeable, was nover-
theless disappointed at not finding him exactly what her
youthful imagination had portrayed. Seeing, therefore, that
he was “ épris," without her having any intention of capti-
vating him, she persuaded her mother to shorten their stay
at Bath, and take her to Paris. Mrs. Hayes reluctantly
complied, as she much wished her daughter to encourage -
Mr. Haynes Bayly's suit; but when she found her daughter's
mind was set on going abroad she wisely allowed her to do
80; for Miss Hayes, when absent from the poet, missed his
witty and delightful conversation and his attentions, which
were entirely devoted to her, so much, that her mother's
wish was more forwarded by absence than it would have been
had she remained at Bath. Mr. Haynes Bayly was, how-
ever, not discouraged by her intended departure—as appears
from the poem addressed to her, of which the following is a
specimen :
3
Oh! think not, Helena, of leaving us yet ;
Though many fair damsels inhabit our isle,
Alas! there are none who can makc us forget
The grace of thy form, and the charm of thy smile.
The toys of the French, if they hither are sent,
Are endeared by the payment of custom-house duties.
)


POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
151
Ah! why do not duty and custom prevent
The rash exportation of pure British beauties?
Say, is there not one ('midst the many who sighed
To solicit your favor)—one favorite beau ?
And have you to all, who popped questions, replied,
With that chilling, unkind monosyllable—NO?
Your mansion with exquisite swains has been thronged,
With smiles they approach you, in tears they depart;
Indeed, it is said that a man who belonged
To the Tenth, sighed in vain for a tithe of your heart.
And are you still happy? Could no one be found
Whose vows full of feeling could teach you to feel ?
A girl so expert at inflicting a wound,
Should surely be now and then willing to heal.
Then leave us not; shall a foreigner own
The form we have worshipped as if 'twere divine ?
No, no, thou art worthy a Briton alone,
And where is the Briton who would not be thine ?
The pair were made happy by wedlock at Cheltenham, in
1826. The heir of a wealthy gentleman, and united to an
elegant woman who had also considerable expectations, there
seemed every reason to augur for Haynes Bayly a long
course of happiness. They spent part of the honeymoon at
Lord Ashtown's villa at Chessel, on the Southampton river;
and here occurred a little incident which gave rise to the
most popular of the poet's songs : a large party was stay


152
POETRY OF MR. AYNES BAYLY.
ing at Lord Ashtown's, and the day before it broke up, the
,
ladies, on leaving the dining-table, mentioned their intention
of taking a stroll through his beautiful grounds, and the
gentlemen promised to follow them in ten minutes. Lured
by Bacchus, they forgot their promise to the Graces, and
Mr. Haynes Bayly was the only one who thought fit to
move; and he in. about half an hour wandered forth in
search of the ladies. They beheld him at a distance, but
pretending annoyance at his not joining them sooner, they
fled away in an opposite direction. The poet, wishing to
carry on the joke, did not seek to overtake them; they ob-
served this, and lingered, hoping to attract his attention.
He saw this manquvre and determined to turn the tables
upon them; he waved his hand carelessly and pursued
his ramble alone ; then falling into a revery, he entered a a
beautiful summer-house, known now by the name of But-
terfly Bower, overlooking the water, and there seated himself.
Here, inspired by a butterfly which had just flitted before
him, he wrote the ballad, “I'd be a butterfly.” He then
returned to the house, and found the ladies assembled round
the tea-table, when they smilingly told him they had enjoyed
their walk in the shrubberies excessively, and that they
needed no escort. He was now determined to go beyond
them in praise of his solitary evening walk, and said that he
had never enjoyed himself so much in his life ; that he had
met a butterfly, with whom he had wandered in the regions
of fancy, which afforded him much more pleasure than he
would have found in chasing them; and that he had put
his
thoughts in verse. The ladies immediately gave up all fur-
ther contention with the wit, upon his promising to shon


POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
153
them the lines he had just written. He then produced his
tablets, and read the well-known ballad,
I'd be a butterfly, born in a bower,
to the great delight of his fair auditors.
It should perhaps be here remarked, that the poet foretold
his own doom in this ballad; for it will be seen by his early
;
death, that his nerves were too finely strung to bear the un-
foreseen storms of severe disappointment which gathered
round him in after years. On the same evening he com-
posed the air, to which Mrs. Haynes Bayly put the accom-
paniments and symphonies, and it was sung the following
evening to a very large party assembled at Lord Ashtown's,
who encored it again and again.
For several years Mr. Bayly lived in the enjoyment of the
utmost domestic happiness. Possessed of fortune, brilliant
talents, and manners universally pleasing, no lot could appar-
ently have been better cast. Although not called to literary
exertion by necessity, he wrote and published many beautiful
lyrics, which generally attained great popularity : he com-
posed a novel, The Aylmers, which met with success--and
began to write for the ståge. At length, in 1831, came the
blight of misfortune. A bad speculation of his father's and
his own in coal mines, and the faithlessness of the agent
upon his wife's property in Ireland, reduced him to compa-
rative poverty. The fine nervous system of the amiable
poet was ill calculated to bear up against such calamities :
for a time, his spirits were so sunk, that he was totally una-
ble to command his mind to literary composition. A short
residence abroad served to restore him in some degree, and
>


154
POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
he resumed the pen with feelings which he has embodied in
an Address to the Spirit of Song
I welcome thee back as the dove to the ark :
The world was a desert, the future all dark;
But I know that the worst of the storm must be past,
Thou art come with the green leaf of comfort at last.
Around me thy radiant imaginings throng,
I welcome thee back again, Spirit of Song'
I welcome thee back, and again I look forth
With my wonted delight on the blessings of earth;
Again I can smile with the gay and the young ;
The lamp is relighted, the harp is restrung.
Despair haunts the silent endurance of wrong;
I welcome thee back again, Spirit of Song !
Some deeper feelings which still abode with him are ex. .
pressed in a birth-day ode, which he soon after, in pursuance
of a custom, addressed to his wife :-
Oh! hadst thou never shared my fate,
More dark that fate would prove;
My heart were truly desolate,
Without thy soothing love.
But thou hast suffered for my sake,
Whilst this relief I found,
Like fearless lips that strive to take
The poison from a wound !
My fond affection thou hast seen,
Then judge of my regret,
To think more happy thou hadst been,
If we had never met.


POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
155
And has that thought been shared by thee?
Ah no, that smiling cheek
Proves more unchanging love for me
Than labored words could speak.
But there are true hearts which the sight
Of sorrow summons forth ;
Though known in days of past delight
We know not half their worth.
How unlike some, who have professed
So much in friendship's name ;
Yet calmly pause to think how best
They may evade her claim.
But ah! from them to thee I turn;
They'd make me loathe mankind;
Far better lessons I may learn
From thy more holy mind.
The love that gives a charm to home,
I feel they cannot take;
We'll
pray
for happier years to come,
For one another's sake.
From this time Mr. Bayly's life was in a great measure
that of a man writing for subsistence. In this new character
he exhibited marvellous industry, insomuch that, in a few
years, his contributions of pieces to the stage had amounted
to no less than thirty-six, while his songs ultimately came to
be numbered in hundreds. But severe literary labor, united
to corroding anxieties, proved too much for his delicate
frame, and he sunk, in 1839, under confirmed jaundice. He
lies buried at Cheltenham, under a stone which his friend
Theodore Hook has thus inscribed :-" He was a kind


156
POETRY OF MR. HAYNES BAYLY.
parent, an affectionate husband, a popular author, and an
accomplished gentleman.” Most sad it is to reflect how he
thus came to realize his own playfully-expressed wish :-
What, though you tell me each gay little rover
Shrinks from the breath of the first autumn day!
Surely 'tis better when summer is over,
To die when all fair things are fading away.
Some in life's winter may fail to discover
Mears of procuring a weary delay-
I'd be a butterfly; living, a rover,
Dying when fair things are fading away!
The poems and songs of Mr. Haynes Bayly will not be
entitled to a high place in the literature of our age'; a certain
air of insubstantiality attaches to them all; the pathos
rarely goes down to the springs of the human feelings, and
the humor scarcely exceeds the playfulness which marks
elegant society in its daily appearances. Yet, considering,
him as what he really was, the poet of modern fashionable
life, he must be allowed the merit of having reflected this
successfully, both its gravities and its levities. He must be
allowed, moreover, to have possessed in an eminent degree
the comparatively rare power of producing verses which
readily danced along in connection with music. Withal, an
amiable and virtuous nature shines throughout all his varied
compositions.


THE THREE ORPHANS.
157
here
IZ E233 OB 2.H A 2 S.
BY MISS EMMA HEMPLE.
DREAMING of the shadowy past
And the future, dim and vast,
In the sun-set hour so fair,
Mused the orphan sister there.
On her brother's laughing brow
Lingered not a shadow now;
And the baby, clasped from harın,
Fondly, on her weary arm,
Only saw a world of light,
Wrapped in beauty soft and bright.
They were happy_dreaming not
Of their thorny checkered lot ;
All forgetful of the days
When a mother watched their playı,
And their father smiled to hear
Happy voices greet his ear ;
When the tempter had not come
Darkening their peaceful home,
And the ruin was unwrought
Which the poison cup had brought
Then in memory floated by
That dear mother's sunken eye;
Household comforts, one by one,
Parted with, till all was gone,
And their mother drooped and died,
And their world grew drear and wido,


158
FAREWELL.
And no loving, sheltering arms,
Folded them from outward harms;
And there came no warm caress,
The peor orphaned ones to blesg.
In the dreaming orphan's heart
All these shadows bore a part;
Yet a hope was blent with all--
God, who “ sees the Sparrow's fall,'
Will not let those children know
All the bitterness of wo.
And her heart, so warm and true,
Will be mother, sister, too;
Hoping on and hoping still,
Through all sorrow, care and ill.
EARS WIL,
It hath a sad, sweet sound_" Farewell."
When loved lips murmur it;
For 'tis the breaking of a spell
We fain would bind us yet.
Then fades Love's rapturous mystery,
And slowly move the loitering Hours;
For bleak and bare Reality
Usurps the realm of flowers.



---


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JOHN BICKER.
159
OH BIGKER,
SHE DRY DOMINIE OF KILWOODY.
“DE'Il break your leg if ye get out over this door, the
night, to any of your drunken companions. Do ye think I
am to be getting out of my warm bed, to be letting you in at
a’ the hours of the night, I wish the first drop of whiskey ye
tak, wad gang like boiling lead down your throat.”
'
Such were the mild remonstrance and exclamation of scold-
ing Tibby to her husband, John Bicker, the dry schoolmaster
of Kilwoody. John answered with great mildness :
“Ah, Tibby, the whiskey's nae so strong now-a-days,
woman; its mair like water than onything else. Ye ken this
l;
morning, Davy and I drank a whole mutchkin afore breakfast
and were ne'er a bit the waur of it."
“The mair's the pity,” retorted Tibby," the de'il's ay good
to his ain, but out of this house ye shall not stir till morning!”
'Ony ower the way to Saunders Glasses," returned John;
“I gave Davy and Rob my hand, that I would come, and I'll
nae stay very long : indeed I maun gang, Tibby.”
“Ye'll gang ower my back, then,” exclaimed Tibby,
placing herself between John and the door, “and ye'll get the
mark of my ten nails as deep as I can houk in yer face. I'm
ower easy and good natured with ye, ye vagabond, and that's
the way ye leave me to gang after your drunken sand beds,
that would soak in as muckle whiskey as would fill our goose
66


160 :
JOHN BIOKER.
dub; ne'er-do-weels, that have their stomachs paved wi' whin
stanes.?"
John stood and wriggled his shoulder, and scratched his
head, at this announcement of a determined blockade. He
tried to appease the enemy, but in vain. He knew his own
strength, but was unwilling to exert it. A vigorous attack
would have in a moment procured him his liberty; but this,
John was afraid would be attended with too much clamor ;
and perhaps be productive of consequences he might after.
wards be sorry for. He, therefore, determined to call off the
attention of his infuriated spouse by a seeming acquiescence,
and so take advantage of some lucky opportunity of effecting
nis escape. But this system of tactics had been tried ton
often before, and Tibby seemed determined it should not suc-
ceed this time, as she cautiously barred the door of their
little cottage, and placed herself so as to have full view and
command of that weak part of the garrison. John was turn.
ing, disconsolate, to the fire-place when his feelings were
roused to the full pitch of resolution by the voice of a friend on
the outside.
" John, we're biding for you; what keeps you, mon ? "
It was the voice of David Gourlay, and the sound was
irresistible. John flew to the door, which he unbolted in a
twinkling, burst from the enraged grasp of his wife, who fell
upon the threshold in the momentary struggle, and, ere she
could recover the use of her tongue or her limbs, the school-
master of Kilwoody, nimble as the mountain-deer, bounded
over the hills with the all-inspiring emotions of newly-
recovered liberty, and anticipations of social delight. Tibby,
seeing all her plans frustrated and her determinations
a


JOHN BICKER.
161 :
thwarted, con.d only give vent to her feelings in iinprecations
against her husband, and the direst wishes as to his fate.
“I wish he may never enter this door again alive,” she ex
claimed. “May I have the satisfaction of stretching him on
his dead-dale. I hope this nicht he'll taste his last drop of
whiskey in this warld. It wad gi' me the greatest pleasure
that on sabbath next he was laid in the kirk-yard of
Kilwoody, the graceless wretch !” here she sobbed with pas-
sion. “O that I saw him in his dead claes, and the black
bits of boord on ilka side o' him."
The day had been moist and warm, but, towards evening
the clouds began to discharge their contents in torrents and
one of those sudden transitions, from mildness to the most
piercing cold took place, which are so often wofully felt by
the valetudinarian about the close of autumn. John, how-
ever, (the hero of our tale,) was snug and comfortable in the
warm corner of Saunders Glasse's clean sanded parlor, where
every fresh potation of whiskey toddy seemed to inspire him
and his companions with warmer and more affectionate regard
for each other. The solitary song gave way to the universal
chorus. The storm that raged without, was lost in the joyous
uproar which expressed all the rapture of social feeling with-
in. Long before midnight, John and his four jovial com-
panions had vowed to stand by each other, “come weal, come
WO."
Scolding wives, squalling children, to-morrow's labor, to-
morrow's care, were all forgotten and the hour of parting,
like the hour of death, if it crossed the imagination for a
moment, was chased away by the loud sounding laugh, the
cordial shake of the hand, and the fresh flowing bumpers.


162
JOHN BICKER.
Scolding Tibby, as the only gratification of revenge which
was in her power, bolted carefully the door, moved all the
pieces of furniture which were portable, to strengthen the
fortification and went to bed at an early hour, vowing that her
drunken husband should find no shelter within his house from
the howling storm which now threatened, every moment, to
overthrow their little dwelling. Wakeful to enjoy the success
of her manoeuvres, Tibby did not sleep; she listened, with the
utmost anxiety, betwixt every pause of the hurricane, and
watched for her husband's return, that, if possible, she might
add insult and reproaches to her merciless refusal of admit-
tance.
The hour of one had tolled its solitary note from the parish
kirk of Kilwoody, when the attentive ear of Tibby distin-
guished the sound of some one fumbling about the door in
search of the latch. It was the next moment gently lifted,
but the door still remained immoveable; a knock was then
heard, but still Tibby kept silent. Aperite portum! open
the door,” cried the Dominie, in a tone, which, evidently,
showed the state of inebriety in which he had returned.
The vengeful denial stood trembling on Tibby's lip, but she
repressed it, rightly judging the silence with which she treated
his request would add to her petitioner's embarrassipenit.
With the exultation of successful revenge, she heard his
knocking, his threats, and his entreaties, and so callous was
she to his sufferings, that in a short time wearied with the
tumultuous passion to which her mind was a constant prey,
she fell fast asleep.
About six in the morning she was awakened by the sound
of several voices at her door, and, ere she could half dress


JOHN BICKER.
163
(6
66
herself to appear with decency, she distinguished, amid a con-
fusion of tongues, the alarming expressions of:
“Ay, ay, he's gone at last. Wae's me, John, it’s an
awfu' thing! at yer ain door too, stiff and cauld: it's an awfu’
thing !"
Tibby removed the barricading and opened the door. She
pierced among the small crowd, which was now fast increasing,
and beheld her husband lying without sense or motion on the
ground.
“ John! John!” she exclaimed, with terror, “dinna lay
there, mon; come to yer ain warm bed, I didna mean to hurt
ye.”
“Nae bed will ever warm him,” exclaimed one of the by-
standers; "a dreadful life ye led him, in this warld; and I'm
sure he canna be waur used in the neist.”
Tibby stood motionless, whilst two or three of the stoutest
young fellows in the crowd carried the body within doors and
laid it on the bed.
There never waur sic a nicht under heaven,” exclaimed
one, “as last nicht; none but the heart of a monster wad
have refused shelter to a dog in sic a storm.'
6 Oh !” cried another," she'll find a judgment come ower
her afore she dies; it's to be hoped honest John's now in
glory; but as for you, ye limmer, an awfu' end will be seen
of you."
Tibby was not of a disposition to allow herself to be
baited, thus, with. impunity; and put to her shifts, she stoutly
defended herself.
“ It was a' owing to his drunken, graceless ways,” she re-
torted, “I told him how it wad be, and I did a' that I could
a
.


164
JOHN BICKER.
to keep him froin that den at Saunders Glasse's; but it was
ordained to be the death of him."
" That's a mair sensible word,” said Willy Clew, the
weaver, who was also an elder of the kirk, “that's a mair
sensible word, than I wad have expected o'ye; for if Provi-
dence, for its ain ends, ordained that John Bicker was to die,
no a' the warm firesides between this and Loch Leven wad
hae saved him, had he been put just in the middle o' them.”
Every body assented to the truth of this sage observation,
and Tibby, by the lucky hint, obtained a respite from farther
animadversion on her conduct. The visiters, one by one,
dropped off, eager to enjoy the momentary attention they
· might command by being the first to communicate the dread-
ful event, to the quidnuncs of the parish of Kilwoody. All
the old women, as they sipped a little glass of comfortable
aqua-vitæ raised their eyes to heaven and inveighed most bit-
terly against the sin of drunkenness. The wives, in many an
energetic lecture, set forcibly before their husbands' eyes the
dreadful fate of the dry Dominie, and the men retorted that
it “could not be all the whiskey in Saunders Glasse's change
house that could have affected the well-seasoned stomach of
Johnny Bicker; but that he owed his death, poor man, to that
termagant cat-o'-thunder, his wife, who had left him exposed,
all night, to sic dreadfu' weather.”
There are some consciences, which have so much antipathy
to the stings of self-reproach, that, let their actions partake
of ever so much turpitude, the most innocent, and even the
most praiseworthy motive is assigned to them. Tibby was
one of this class; and, to hear her expressions, as she un-
dressed the inanimate body of her husband, one could not


JOHN BICKER.
165
have supposed that her obstinacy had had the smallest share
in his destruction.
“ Wae's me, John, you wad na hae come to this untimely
endif ye had ta’en the advice o’your ain Tibby. Ye wad
hae stopt, comfortably, by your ain cosie fireside, and no
tempted Providence at a' the hours o' the nicht; weel did I
ken that nae good could come of it, and muckle wark I had,
to try to keep ye at hame. But no; ower my back ye wad
gang!"
Tibby was here interrupted in her cogitations by auld
Alice, who had been summoned thither by the rumor which,
by this time, had obtained a pretty extensive circulation.
This withered sybil had been so long accustomed to all the
paraphernalia of mortality, that deaths and funerals were the
chief sources of her enjoyments.
Alice kept an exact register, in her own mind, of all that
had died, or were likely to die, in the parish of Kilwoody;
could name all the otherwise unrecorded tenantry of the
churchyard, and, as if she expected to survive all the present
generation, was at no loss in assigning, even to every living
inhabitant, his or her future cold and narrow mansion.
Indeed, the region of death seemed to be the element in which
she lived. With a ready tact, and handiness of manner,
which showed that her heart went with her work, she closed
the dying eyes of one, stretched out another, decently, on the
board which, in Scotland, is called the “dead dale," and
which is placed under the corpse previous to its coffining: and
dreased a third in the fancifully cut and ornamented garb of
the grave, the work of her own taste and ingenuity, which
alas! was only to be exhibited for a moment and withdrawn


166
JOHN BICKER.
from mortal sight forever. An expected death produced a
feeling of calm satisfaction in the mind of Alice; but a sud-
den event, of the kind we have just related, seemed to be a
supernumerary favor conferred by fortune, in her kindest
moments. Alice, therefore, no sooner heard of the circum-
stance, than she flew to offer her services. While she kindly
enquired into the particulars of the affair, her interrogatories
were mingled with the sagest reflections on what she termed
the workings of Providence, and many a wistful look she cast
to the bed, eager for the signal to begin her operations.
“A we drap of water, Tibby; and just tak’ the chill aff
it. A bonny, weel formed corpse as e'er I saw, sin’ the day
Tam Mickleson drapped aff. Haud ye up the jaw bone, till I
fasten this firmly about the lugs. That's richt. Na, na,
you mauna tie it there; pit the bonny locks just aneath the
nicht-cap. I wish we had the dead dale here, for we canna
straught him weel without; a' the joints get sae stiff. If
they be supple the morn's morn, l’se tell you what, it's a sure
sign they'll be mair wanging the gate he's gane afore the year
be out."
Alice had thus far proceeded, when they were joined by a
much less disinterested visiter, Tam Mowat, the wright, by
whom all the coffins in the parish of Kilwoody had been made,
to measure, for the last twenty years, for he kept none of
those ready-made articles which are to be seen in many of
our cities requiring only to be lined and finished off at an
hour's notice. The bracing air of Kilwoody, in spite of two
Edinburgh medical professors who had lately set up, to amend
the constitution of its inhabitants, seemed so obstinately favor-
able, at loost to the corporeal sanity that Tam Mowat, with


JOHN BICKER.
· 167
.
the assistance of an apprentice or two, could execute any
order as soon as wanted.
The personage we have mentioned spoke very kindly to the
widow and still kindlier to auld Alice, whom he considered as
a kind of jackall to his profession. He had called, he said,
only to see his honest, worthy neighbor, after the woful and
melancholy accident.
6. There was nae a man in the parish,” he said, “ he was
mair fond o’than Mr. John Bicker; and he believed there
was nae another man of sic learning left in a' Kilwoody; but
this,” he added, “is betwixt oursels, and ye need tak’ na no-
tice o' it."
Tibby assented to the truth of all these encomiums, yet
still the man of wood had the mortification of not being
nearer his purpose. After as many hints and manoeuvres, as
might have been beheld with admiration by a city dealer, Tam
ventured to hope,
That his auld friend wad be decently interred, becoming
the respectable manner he had aye lived in.”
.
"
'God forbid he shud na,” rejoined auld Alice, “and I'll see
the grave houked, myself, in the nor'east corner within a fit o'
Babby Wishart's head stane. They never liked yin anither
when living, but they'll sleep quietly thegither for a' that.”
The wright, without any further orders, took out his rule
und began to measure the length of his old acquaintance.
“A sax feet coffin will be just the thing,” said he,
and-
“Five feet and a half," interrupted Tibby, “ John was
only five feet and a half.”
“ I'm no one,” answered the wright, “ that likes to stint
>
(6
а


168
JOHN BICKER.
a
a
Let me see,
things; I aye mak' it a point to give a corpse plenty of room.
It's a hard thing that a man's to be strautened in his coffin,
whate'er he was in the warld.
what
age
will I
call him?"
“Twa-and-thirty, next September,” answered Tibby,
"
“and be sure you mak’ it strang and firm."
“Leave it a' to me," returned Thomas, who was impatient
to take his leave, having accomplished the end of his visit.
The two ladies, however, insisted upon his taking a glass
previous to his departure. In a few minutes after, the dead
dale arrived, and Alice, with alacrity, pursued her willing
task. She stretched the feet nearly parallel te each other,
laid the hands by the side and spread the fingers open ; then,
laying a sheet over the whole body, she placed a plateful of
salt on the stomach to keep of the influence of any evil spirit.
Refreshing herself with a dram, she took her leave, assuring
Tibby that she would return in the evening, to watch the
whole night by the side of the corpse, an attention which the
country people in Scotland never omit paying to their deceased
friends.
In our large cities there are two ways of being carried to
cur long, last home. In a hearse with nodding plumes, at-
tended by our friends, in mourning coaches, or borne upon the
shoulders of undertaker's porters, followed in regular files by
all those whom duty and affection summon to the melancholy
office.
In Scotland there is a third, the only one practised
among the poorer class; the coffin is laid upon two or three
poles, which are supported on each side by the friends of the
deceased, who, alternately, relieve each other, until they arrivo
at the grave.


JOHN BICKER.
169
a
When a Scotchman dies, his relations think they cannot
show a greater mark of iespect to his memory, than by
securing a numerous attendance at his funeral. For this pur-
pose, they immediately order circular letters to be printed.
T).ey bear the signature of the nearest relative or friend and
ar drawn up in formal terms, announcing the fatal event, the
;
tine and place of interment, with an invitation to attend the
funeral. These letters are sent to every person with whom
the deceased is supposed to have had the most distant ac-
quaintance, so that it not unfrequently happens that, amongst
the crowd which accompanies a man to his grave, there are
found some who had scarcely any knowledge of his person.
On the day of interment, as the persons invited are too nu-
merous to be admitted within doors, they wait in the street.
Each is dressed in a complete suit of black, so that it is, in
general, necessary, for the pettiest tradesman or mechanic,
supposing him to be a man in a settled line of business, to be
provided with this article, (colored clothes being considered
inadmissible and indecorous,) as it may chance for him to be
invited to twenty of these occasions in the course of a year,
many of which he may find it imprudent to decline. The
funeral is seldom delayed beyond the third day. After the
crowd have waited for some time, the coffin containing the
body, is brought out and placed with the feet forward. The
nearcst relations gather round the head, and the rest follow,
promiscuously, without any order or solemnity, some talking
over the news of the day, or, between every pinch of snuff,
relating anecdotes of the deceased. In this manner they
advance to the place of interment. No clergyman is seen in
official attendance, no burial ceremony is performed ; the body
8


170
"OHN BICKER.
is let down into the grave; the company uncover for a mo-
ment, the aperture is closed up, and all but the immediate
friends of the deceased disperse to their respective homes,
none, but the latter description of persons returning to the
desolate mansion. It may be proper, also, to remark; that in
no case are women allowed to accompany even the nearest
and best beloved of their friends.
To return to the thread of our story. Alice was punctual
to her appointment, and Tibby, feeling little inclination to
sleep, became the partner of her vigils. The large eight-day
clock, which had clicked for many a year in the farthest cor-
ner of the parlor, had been, as is customary on such occa-
sions, condemned to temporary silence, and the tabby cat, who
had hitherto roamed unrestrained was, by Alice's direction,
imprisoned in a solitary out house. Tibby and her friend sat
themselves down on each side of a comfortable fire, and,
placing the large family Bible on the table between them, they .
read, or endeavored to read, chapters, alternately, wisely
passing over the hard names which now and then occurred,
neither of them being great adepts at dissecting polysyllables.
This, together with a little village scandal, a ghost story or
two and now and then a small drop of comforting liquor,
enabled the ladies to pass the night without much uneasiness.
The next day, at noon, Tibby was rather surprised at the
entrance of two clean, neat, and rather fashionably dressed
young men, who, uncovering as they approached, with a great
deal of politeness informed her, that they were Messrs.
Cronic and McGruel, surgeons and apothecaries from Edin.
burgh, who had lately commenced practice in the parish of
Kilwoody, and that they had called to solicit her permissiop


JOHN BICKER..
171
to view the body of her husband. Tibby, unable to divine
the cause of what she considered their singular curiosity,
would fain have denied their request; but she was not a little
abashed by their manner, which, though gentlemanly, was
familiar and confident. She, almost involuntarily, muttered
some term of acquiescence. The two Esculapian philosophers
approached the bed, and touched the body in several places;
their observations and remarks were made, according to
Tibby's report, in Latin : at least, what, to her, seemed just
as intelligible. By their manner, however, she guessed that
they differed in opinion; but after a few minutes of words
contention, they fixed upon a method of elucidating the sub-
ject; a method, which, as there is no such thing as a
coroner's inquest in Scotland, they knew could only be put
into practice by the consent of Tibby. This was, to examine
the interior of the deceased, to search for the cause of his
sudden departure; the body exhibiting appearances by no
means common in apoplexies. Tibby no sooner heard this
request, than she lost all the respect with which she had
hitherto treated them. She flew into a violent rage, and,
being joined by auld Alice, who that moment entered with
part of the grave paraphernalia, and who soon understood
from the ejaculations of her friend the cause of the dispute,
such a clamor ensued, that the two Galens of Kilwoody
thought it best to make a timely retreat.
“What !” cried Alice, “gie honest John Bicker to the
doctors, like a hangit man, for a’ the Edinburgh collegeners
to glowr into the inside ohim !"
“God keep us a?,” added Tibby, “what the de’il do they
want to see? Our John was shaped like ony other decent


172
JOHN BICKER.
mon.
I'se warrant there were nae follies about him, mair
than about ony other.”
“Never mind, Davy Gourlay and Saunders Webster,"
answered Alice, “will sit up the nicht to see that nae harm
happens to the gude mon, and we'll have a gude deep grave
houked for him, the morn's mornin. I never thought those
doctor chiels ower canny. There's Saundy Gordon, he's been
cloghering and spitting his insides out for thae twa or three
years, and they've been aye gieing him this bottle and that
bottle. Ouch dear, I think it's fleeing in the face of Provi-
dence; and the doctors will have it a' to answer for, some
;
day."
On the morrow, which was the day appointed for the inter-
ment, the sable crowd, as is usual on such occasions,
assembled. About half an hour previous Tam Mowat had
arrived with the coffin. The body had been dressed with
great neatness by the dextrous hands of auld Alice; a glass
of wine was handed to each of the few persons who had
entered the dwelling, and Tibby was desired by the wright to
take the last look at her inanimate husband. It was then
that the emotions, which she had hitherto succeeded in sup-
pressing, became irresistibly manifest. She was for a few
minutes convulsed with sobbing; this was luckily succeeded
by a plentiful shower of tears, and—but we did not set out
with the intention of writing a pathetic story: suffice it to
ay, that the dry Dominie was soon enclosed in that narrow
boundary, which, but for a short time, prevents us from
mingling with our kindred earth. The sad reliques of mor-
tality were borne to the door; the velvet mort-cloth, as it is
called in Scotland, was thrown over it, and the procession,


JOHN BICKER.
173
moving on, .soon arrived at the church yard of Kilwoody,
Alice watched it from the window and was not a little sur.
prised at observing the two surgeons, Messrs. Chronic and
McGruel among the crowd of mourners. She was morally
certain that these gentlemen were not in the number of the
invited; but she deferred her comments on this singular cir-
cumstance to a more convenient opportunity. The reader,
perhaps, may have already guessed the motives of the above
named gentlemen, in endeavoring to ascertain the exact spot
of interment. The difference of opinion which had arisen
between them at the house of John Bicker, had continued on
their way home, and, like all other disputes, had ended in
confirming each party in his own particular opinion. As they
had been disappointed in their application to make a regular
dissection, they were determined that the dry Dominic of Kil-
woody should again visit the upper air. In the larger cities
of Europe or in some of our own, as New York, &c. &.
workmen might have been easily found to effect this premature
resurrection ; but, in Scotland, we believe the offer of future
independence could not have bribed the poorest peasant to the
sacrilegious operation. The two men of science, therefore,
'were resolved, in the “witching time of night,” to take the
labor upon themselves; and, accordingly, being provided with
a pick-axe, shovel and some other implements, they, about an
hour after midnight, set out with caution and noiseless foot-
steps, through the village, to violate the spot where so many
generations of the natives of Kilwoody had, hitherto, rested
in peace.
The church-yard of Kilwoody was situated on a rising
ground which seemed to have been fashioned by art for the


174
JOIN BICKER.
purpose for which it was then employed. It was surrounded
.
by a wall on the outside, nearly ten feet high, but little more
than half that height in the interior. In some places, where
this wail had been broken down, it was repaired, like many
of the fences in Scotland, with rough, unshapen stones, the
argular points of which, rudely fitting together, served to give
it some degree of solidity without the use of mortar. We
may here remark that the barren appearance of these fences,
frequently impress the English traveller in this country, as
well as in Scotland, accustomed as he is, to the verdant
enclosures of his own country, with an idea of sterility, which
is, by no means, justly imputable to the soil. The night was
serene and mild; but the multitude of stars which spangled
!
the deep blue sky, made it lighter than the two surgeons
wished for. Shrouded in thick great coats and fur travelling
caps, and bearing the implements for disintering the Dominie,
they soon arrived at the church-yard, where the rough pro-
tuberances of the uneven walls enabled them easily to reach
the top. Having attended the funeral for the sole purpose of
noting the situation of the grave, they had no difficulty in
immediately commencing their labor. This was comparatively
easy, as the earth still lay loose and-light; yet, ere they had
arrived at the coffin, the tender skin of their hands, unac-
customed to such friction, began to convey no very pleasant
sensation. They persevered, however; and, at last, had the
satisfaction of hearing, by the hollow sound, that they had
reached the surface of John Bicker's narrow dwelling. In a
little time, they cleared the whole extent, and with their tools,
wrenching open the lid of the coffin, soon effected the resur
rection of the Dominie.


JOHN BICKER.
175
“Where is the bag ?” said one, to the other ; and it was
soon discovered that each had carelessly depended on the
nther for the provision of this necessary article. This was
vexatious; for the risk of detection in the conveyance was
thereby considerably increased. However, they were forced
to trust to that good fortune, which had hitherto favored their
enterprise, and, placing the body carefully on the grass, at
some little distance, by the side of a distinguishable tomb-
stone, they began, with alacrity, to re-fill the grave with earth
,
and again make up the hillock, neatly covered with turf,
which, to the eyes of a whole contemporary generation, marks
the peaceful resting place of even the lowliest and humblest
of the Scottish peasantry.
While they were employed in this operation, and had
nearly completed their labor, they were alarmed by the sound
of a deep, hollow groan. It broke, for a moment only, the
surrounding stillness; and, indeed, passed away almost as-
quick as the instant of its perception. The two surgeons, how-
ever, started up, stared aghast at each other, and, without utter-
,
ing a word, listened most attentively. Their whole souls for
some moments seemed to be in their ears; but all was silent.
'Did not that seem like a groan ?” muttered McGruel.
"Hush!” replied the other, catching hold of his friend's
hand.
They again bent themselves in the attitude of listening;
but all was still—the air was even calmly still, and they again
began to adjust the turf.
“It must,” said Chronic, in a low tone, “have been the
sighing of the wind among the tombstones; and yet, in my
ear, nothing could sound so like a groan."


176
JOHN BICKER.
“Let us make what haste we can,” returned his friend,
“there may be other living creatures beside ourselves, even ir.
the precincts of this church-yard.”'
The moment their work at the grave was completed, they
carried the body to the wall. There, placing a rope under
the arm-pits, they slid it gently down the deep exterior; and,
leaving it there, leaped back into the church-yard to secrete
their tools in the corner of a dilapidated tomb, which, at a
very remote period, had contained the bones of some favorite
retainer of the ancient barons of Kilwoody. Every thing
being prepared for their departure, McGruel first mounted
the low wall, at the spot where he had deposited the corpse
of
the Dominie. Previous to his meditated descent on the
outside, he darted his eye through the gloom below, as if
measuring the extent of the leap, when suddenly uttering an ex-
clamation of terror or surprise, he rushed back to his friend.
“Gracious God!” exclaimed the amazed surgeon," he is
moving from the wall !"
His companion, inspired more by curiosity than alarm,
looked immediately over, and to his utter astonishment, beheld
John Bicker, the dominie, seated, as well as he could distin-
guish, at some little distance on the ground.
“I must be certain,” said Chronic, “that this is no delu-
sion. Follow me."
So saying, he leaped from the wall and was immediately
imitated by his companion. They ran to the spot, and, with-
out giving themselves time for reflection, grasped the dominie
in their arms.
“ Are you really a living man ?" said McGruel, with great
earnestness.


JOHN BICKER.
177
"
“ Where am I ?" returned the Dominie in a low, languid
and feeble voice, which marked the extreme degree of debility
to which he was reduced.
" Thank God!” answered Chronic, “We have come to
deliver you from a death, at which the imagination shudders.
Had we been but a few inoments later you might have suffered
the short but horrid consciousness of being in the grave."
The Dominie by his actions seemed unable to comprehend
the meaning of their words, and appeared nearly fainting,
when the two surgeons placed to his mouth a bottle of wine
which they had brought as a cordial for themselves. The few
drops he swallowed revived him, and McGruel disrobing him-
self of his great coat, wrapped it carefully round him.
Whilst they were about this charitable act, John Bicker, by
the feeble light, perceived the habiliments of mortality with
which he was clothed, and, with a shuddering of horror,
demanded an explanation.
“ There is time enough for that,” replied the surgeons,
• when you are more recovered. Try if you are able to walk,
with our support; we shall conduct you to our home, where
you shall obtain the quiet repose and invigorating medicines
you seem so much to need.
The Dominie felt sufficient strength to move along, leaning
on the arms of the two surgcons. On their way they gave
him a full explanation of the causes of his late condition; a
narrative to which he listened with the deepest interest, inter-
mingled with those shuddering emotions, which we feel on
looking back at any dangerous situation in which we have been
placed, our deliverance from which has been effected neither
by our own wisdom nor courage, but by a fortunate circum.


178
JOHN BICKER.
stance upon
which we could never again depend. It was at
this moment that his new friends took an opportunity of
setting forth to him, the necessity, the importance, and the
Llessings of temperance. It is needless to detail, to the
reader, what was said on the subject, but every word sank
deep into the heart of the Dominie. With a mind capable
of higher pursuits and an elevation of ideas, inspired by the
partly classical education he had received, he now felt a loath-
ing at the vulgar and sensual debauchery, into which the
ardent sociality of his temper had seduced him. This frame
of mind was, no doubt, strengthened by the recollections,
which momentarily pressed upon his imagination, of the
horrid fate which seemed to have been averted from him by
a special interposition of Providence.
“ I'll make nae solemn promises,” said he, as he raised his
eyes to the multitude of stars which bespangled the deep,
dark azure sky; I'll make nae solemn promises to heaven, for
that, perhaps, would be a presumptuous confiding in my own
strength; but let thae bonny, twinkling lights bear witness, at
least, how I wish to become an altered man."
“This, to you,” replied McGruel, " is a new starting post
of existence; let every step of your future course be in the
path of prudence and virtue."
The Dominie seemed absorbed, for a few moments, in deep
abstraction. He had, evidently, made up his mind to some
resolution which he did not then disclose; he only ended his
reverie by the exclamation,
“ All believe me dead; and but to one I shall be dead !”
On their way to the dwelling of the surgeons, they necessa-
rily passed the public house of Saunders Glasse, where the


JOHN BICKER.
175
schoolmaster had so often rioted away his substance and so
lately endangered his existence. It is hard to describe the
shuddering of horror with which he approached the place
This was not a little increased by the sounds of jovial merri-'
ment, that arose from the drunken crew.within. Begging his
new friends to stop, for a moment, he applied his eye to a
broken part of the window shutter and beheld his former
companions, with joined hands, in a circle, round a large bowl
of punch, reeling and shouting, with all the vociferation of
delirious inebriety. The effect of this scene was heightened
by the sable garb of mourning, still worn by the party, all of
them having been, the preceding day, at the funeral. The
Dominie, at this moment, could not resist the opportunity
afforded him, of endeavoring, however ludicrously, to effect
the reformation of his former associates. Raising his well
known voice as much as his slowly-recovered strength would
permit him; the surgeons having, previously, thundered on
the window shutters, with their fists, to command attention,
he thus addressed them :
6 Besotted drunkards! is the little reason that God has
given you, so puir a gift, that you find your greatest pleasure
in its destruction ? Winna my awfu' fate warn you? Maun
I come frae the grave to preach, to you, repentance ?"
The momentary silence which followed this address was
soon interrupted by drunken Davey Gourlay, who, striking his
fists with great vehemence on the table, exclaimed,
“May I taste never anither drap, if that binna · Johnny
Bicker's voice and, dead or alive, de’il may caie, we'll drink
thegither;" so saying, he snatched up one of the bumpers
staggered towards the door, and the party on the outside
66


180
JOHN BICKET.
>
say!
9
might have soon been detected to have been of this carth's
gross substance, had they not, immediately, withdrawn.
Drunken Davey, disappointed in finding the object of his
search, staggered back again. “It was Johnny Bicker's
voice I'll swear,” he exclaimed, “but what the de'il did ho
!”
The whole company with the exception of Saunders Web-
ster, expressed their total want of recollection; the latter,
hiccoughing as he spoke, asserted that he remembered it per-
fectly well.
“We were a' desired,” said he,“ to take a warning that
66
people of reason had the gift of getting drunk in the grave.”
“The very words !” vociferated all the party, “for mind
ye,” added drunken Davey, “the ither warld is the land
of spirits, and as this is Britain, why it maun be British
spirits, the very words Saunders Glasse has painted aboun
his door."
The accuracy of Davey's logic, was, without farther exam-
ination, taken for granted, the party again filled their bumpers
and, as far as their growing insensibility would allow, the
former scene of thoughtless uproar was resumed.
The two surgeons, without farther interruption, conducted
the revived Dominie to their genteel, clean, and comfortable
dwelling. Having supplied him cautiously with nourishment,
they caused a bed to be prepared for that
repose,
which was
chiefly wanting for the recovery of his strength. In a few
moments he fell into a deep sleep and his attentive hosts, who
visited him from time to time, beheld, with satisfaction, that
his slumber was of a kindly nature which promised speedy
renovation to his languid frame. He continued in this state


JOHN BICKER.
181
He arose,
ز
the whole of the day and it was not till evening that he
awoke, wonderfully refreshed in body and mind, when he
bethought himself of putting in practice the project he had
conceived in the early part of the morning.
dressed himself in clothes which had been left for that pur-
pose in his bed-room. Fearful lest his new friends would
oppose what they might consider his premature departure,
he stole, softly, to the door; and, hoping to escape unper-
ceived in the increasing darkness, cautiously crept along,
taking the nearest way to his own home.
Tibby had, that evening, twenty times oftener than was
necessary, stirred the large coal fire, till it blazed in the chim-
ney, and trimmed the lamp, which hung over the mantle piece.
She had busied herself all day to get rid of the uneasy
thoughts which oppressed her; and during day-light, assisted
by the kind condolence of her neighbors, she had pretty well
succeeded; but towards evening, as these visitors departed,
!
the dreary sense of her hopeless, lonely situation, almost
overcame her. Among the peasantry of Scotland, the widow
is supposed to possess a sacred claim on the good will and
attention of all that surround her. Heaven is supposed,
peculiarly, to interest itself in her cause, consecrating her
blessings and avenging her injuries; yet with all this, Tibby,
when necessarily left alone, felt as if the world did not now
contain one being in whose interests she could participate.
She looked around her, till every object that met her eye
seemed to lay its heavy load upon her heart. She gazed at
the glowing embers of the fire and hardly felt the scalding
tears which trickled down her cheeks. She now turned to
the bed, which, but yesterday, had exhibited the most mourn.


182
JOHN BICKER.
ful spectacle she had ever beheld. A nearer object now moro
deeply interested her, the vacant chair at the fireside, where
her husband had held his seat, by prescriptive right; a magis-
terial throne, which Tibby, amid all her rebellions, had never
dared to usurp. It was now empty and, as if to get rid of
its forever hopeless vacancy, with despairing sobs, she
threw herself into it. The consciousness that she had been,
to say the least, unkind and unrelenting, tore her heart with
agony.
“Oh! that he had died in peace with me,” cried she. “If
I could hae seen him but for a moment. He was ower kind
to me and I did nae deserve it—but nae matter,” she added,
bursting into a flood of tears, “it winna be lang afore we lie
in ae cauld grave thegither."
At this moment the sound of some person at the door
assailed her ear; but, how was she astonished, when she
heard the well-known voice of her husband, saying:
“ Dinna be frightened, Tibby! dinna be frightened, my
woman!"
She started from her seat and, looking round, beheld him
within the threshold. Tibby trembled with agitation, without
the power of uttering the faintest cry of terror.
“Dinna be frightened,” reiterated the Dominie, "dinna be
frightened, my lassie; not for the warld's wealth wad I harm
ye.”
Saying these words, he made a motion to approach nearer,
when, with 2 confused idea of supernatural danger, Tibby
snatched up the large family Bible which lay upon the table.
The sacred volume is, in Scotland, supposed to be the most
effective shield with which a guiltless heart can be guarded in


JOHN BICKER.
183
the dangerous intercourse with disembodied spirits, and Tibby
grasped it firmly in her arms. She fixed her eyes, intently,
on her husband's countenance and saw it not only beaming
with affectionate regard, but that there was nothing the least
unearthly in its appearance. She soon found herself so far
rocovered, as, with faltering voice, to mutter something which
seemed an inquiry as to the object of his awful visit.
“Ye ken, Tibby my dear,” said the Dominie, “ye ken
that your father, a wee while afore he died, sold a' his kye,
and gev you the siller, now ye never wad tell me where
ye
had
hid it: this is my first business wi' ye, my woman.”
“ There, there," said Tibby, pointing with eagerness to
a corner under the farthest bed-post; “fifty-four pounds, sax-
teen shillings.”
John easily found the money, and, securing it in his pocket:
“Now, Tibby,” said he, “gie me your hand; will ye gang
alang wi' me?"
“No! no !” replied Tibby, while an icy coldness ran
through her veins, “no! not till God's time come.”
“But I'm alive, woman," returned the Dominie, “ alive
and as well as ever I was in my life. I was only in a fit; the
doctors got me out of the grave;-convince yourself that I
>
2
am alive.”
Ere Tibby was aware, she felt one of her hands grasped in
both those of her husband.
“Do you not feel,” he added, “ that I am flesh and
blood ?”
Tibby's terror yielded to the conviction of her senses, as
she suffered her husband to impress the warm kiss of affection
on her lips.


184
JOHN BICKER.
>
2
“I am a reformed man, Tibby,” said he. “I see the
folly, the madness of my former conduct"
“And I see the cruelty of mine," interrupted his wife, as
she hung upon his shoulder.
“Let us leave this place, for ever," returned the Dominie;
my former worthless associates believe me dead, and we
canna hae a better opportunity of parting wi' them; with this
little money we'll gang to Edinburgh and begin some line of
business, where, if industry, frugality and temperance, ever
meet their reward, we maun thrive. Greet nae mair, Tibby,
dry your e'en; will ye come wi' me ?"
“Oh! to the warld's end," was the ready answer, and they
both immediately set about making preparations for their
departure.
The silver teaspoons, marked with husband and wife's
initials joined in an involving cypher, the guidman's watch,
articles which are hardly ever wanting in the dwellings of the
Scottish peasantry, were casily stowed about their persons,
and the more ponderous part of their property Tibby, by her
husband's direction, transferred in writing to the care of the
two surgeons. Thus prepared, they set out, the darkness of
the night favoring their concealment and were soon arm ir.
arm, with the most vivid hopes and ardent resolutions, on the
great road to Edinburgh. Early next day, the whole village
of Kilwoody was not a little alarmed by the news of the dis-
appearance of the dry Dominie's widow. It was sagely con-
jectured, that the apparition of her husband had in revenge
for her usage of him carried her away, bodily, to the other
world. The whiskey topers at Saunders Glasse's had some
confused remembrance of having seen or heard the phantom


JOHN BICKER.
1.85
a
a
on the way to its unhallowed purpose, while not a few of the
old women, on being made acquainted with the circumstance,
perfectly récollected perceiving an extraordinary blue flame,
the preceding evening, hovering around the Dominie's dwell-
ing. Some had even heard what they called an “awfu' and
indescribable noise,” which must have taken place at the
moment when the vengeful spirit flew through the air with his
prey. Auld Alice blessed herself that. John Bicker could
have no quarrel with her, as she had made his grave clothes
of the neatest pattern, and Tam Mowat, the wright, pro-
tested that wherever the soul of the dry Dominie might then
be, he was sure his body was safe betwixt “sax good pieces
of wood as ever were planed.”
John Bicker and his wife, on their arrival at Edinburgh,
rented a small store in the grass market, and laid out their
little sum of money in dry goods and hosiery. . They wrote
an account of their proceedings, to their friends, the two
doctors, who feeling a wish to promote their interests, fur-
nished them with recommendations to several respectable
persons. This increased their business and credit and every
day saw them making gradual advances to a comfortable
independence. John soon transferred his stock to larger
premises in the Lawn Market. The rest of his history may
be related in a few words. He at last settled near the Tron
Kirk, at the time when the line of houses in High street
joined that edifice, the South bridge not being then projected.
Having been fortunate in his spéculations as a wholesale
merchant, he was chosen one of the baillies of the city,
[This office is nearly the same as that of alderman in New
York.] In this honorable situation, he acquitted himself


186
THE WIDOW TO THE BRIDE.
with impartiality and considerable talent, and those who
beheld him in the municipal chair, dressed, officially, in
black, with the golden chain of dignity and the medallion
of justice depending from his neck, could never have re-
cognised in the grave magistrate, the drunken, dry Dominie
of Kilwoody.
To WIDOW TO SEE
O FEE BBIDS.
BY MARY N. MEIGS.
I saw thee wedded, lady,
At the altar's holy side,
As with roses ’mid thy shining hair
Thou stood'st a happy bride.
The soft light o’er that joyous band,
A tender radiance shed,
While priestly word and marriage ring
Proclaimed thee duly wed.
I saw the wedded, lady,
With the love-light on thy brow,
And I caught thy low-breathed hispaa
Of the holy marriage vow,
And by the quick pulsation
In my bosom's inmost coré,
I knew thy heart was throbbing,
As it ne'er had throbbed before.


THE WIDOW TO THE BRIDE.
137
I saw thee wedded, lady,
And my thoughts went roving back
To a bridal day, which long ago,
Illumed life's sunny track;
When, like thyself, I vowed to love
Through weal and wo for lifo,
And with the golden circlet, claimed
That sweetest name, of wife.
.
Oh! marvel not, if, ʼmid the smiles
That graced thy nuptial hour,
Mine eyes were wet with burning tears
Which fell like summer shower :
It was not envy of thy lot,
Nor sorrow at thy bliss; •
I would not that thy cup of joy
One shining drop should miss.
But oh! 'twas memory, memory's power,
Which thus my spirit bowed,
I knelt again as once I knelt,
And vowed as once I vowed.
Methought I stood as thou didst stand,
The loved one at my side-
Then looked upon my darkened robes,
The widowed, not the bride!
Yet, lady, though my heart was sad.
As sad it oft must be,.
Heaven's best and holiest benison,
'Twould still call down on thee:
Joy to the bride! Love's brightest vreatb
For thee may true love twine,
And be thy wedded life as vlest,
And oh ! less brief, than mine.


188
THE HUNGARIAN WIFE.
ESIT NG ABIA WIE
:
BY MRS. M. E. HEWITT.
Wake! hearts beloved ! the midnight stars
Move, hushed, through yonder sky;
Love's hand hath loosed thy dungeon bars,
Love bids thee wake and fly!
A swift ship goes across the main,
Free shores our coming wait;
Our land still wears her galling chain,
Our homes are desolate.
Yet still our hearts give out the cry,
As from the battle's van,
Hungaria! Hungaria!
Death to the Austrian !"
66
Ah! what avails the burning word
That stirs the soul of life?
Our wounded country bears her sword
All broken from the strife.
The Austrian and the Muscovite
Have woven wide her pall,
And the Moslem's bond-word holds, to-night,
Her glorious sons in thrall.
Haste ! haste, beloved ! and still our cry,
In yon blest land shall be
Hungaria! Hungaria !
Our home, and Liberty ?”
06


THE BURIAL AT SEA.
189
THE BURIAL ASSA,
BY
REV.
T II E O
1, E DY ARD
CU Y L E R
,
>
A GREAT many Temperance Stories have already been
written ; some humorous, and some pathetic; some fictitious,
and some, like the following, “ founded on fact.” Many of
the ablest pens in our land have been employed in portraying
the miseries and the fate of those who “tarry long at the
wine; who go to seek mixed wine." It may seem, therefore,
highly presumptuous in me to ask the reader to give me his
attention while I tell him, in a very few words, My Temper-
ance Story.
One evening, as I was coming out of the harbor of Liver-
pool, on board the noble packet ship — I stood, leaning
over the railing of the quarter-deck, watching the steerage
passengers, as they were cooking their suppers in the mid-
ships below. It was a picturesque sight. As the small peat
fire in the brazier threw its flickering light on the wild, ragged
group, I was strongly reminded of the gipsey gaugs that still
infest some of the rural districts of England. Most of them
were Irish; but I could detect occasionally the burly face of
1
the English peasantry; and there was an old German, in
close scull-cap and long, blue gown, who sat stirring his por-
ringer, like some alchemist over his magic bowl.
Just bụneath where I stood, I noticed, particularly, a pale,
delicate woman, bending over the fire, preparing her humble


190
THE BURIAL AT SEA.
meal. Sometimes she would turn around, and listen to a
rough, red-faced man, who addressed her in no very gentle
tones; and sometimes she would stop to play with two rosy
;
children, who sat by her on a chest. Her form was slender,
and she had once been handsome; and there was an unmis-
takable air of refinement in her gentle manner, and the
attempted neatness of her coarse dress, that made her,
among the squalid objects around her, like Wordsworth's
peasant girl, “a sunshine in the shade.”
a sunshine in the shade.” When their scanty
meal was ready, she took the youngest child by the hand, and
beckoned to the surly fellow behind her, who followed her
down the gangway, swearing fiercely as he went.
A flattering prospect, thought I, for this delicate creature,
who is doomed to leave home and kindred in the tender keep-
ing of such a brute. A porcelain vase would as well be
trusted in the hands of a savage! For a young wife and
mother to go far from her native land into the wilds of an
American forest, is hardship enough, even with the best of
protectors; but a drunken husband “who can bear ?"
For some days after, I noticed, by his unsteady gait and
rude treatment of every one who approached him, that he
was continually under the excitement of drink, of which he
had smuggled a considerable quantity on board. This was
once very common, especially among the Irish emigrants,
whose generous liberality to the seamen sometimes endan-
gered the safety of the ship. But, thanks to a merciful God,
who has sent to suffering Ireland the GREAT APOSTLE of
Temperance, this evil is well-nigh done away, sad the
emigrants from that country are now remarkable for their
quietness and sobriety.


THE BURIAL AT SEA.
191
a
This man, I observed, from the effect of continued intoxi-
cation, soon became quarrelsome; and, one day, in the heat
of a scuffle on the forecastle, he was pitched upon the main
deck, and his head struck upon the iron cable coiled over the
windlass. He was taken up insensible; and a physician,
who happened to be among the cabin passengers, was called
'down, and pronounced his recovery hopeless. In the evening,
I went down to visit him. A steerage is at best but a
noisome place—to a sick man, it must be a very “black hole
of Calcutta.” The squalid beings who herded together in
the same cabin, were gathered in silent groups at the farther
extremity, and many had retreated to the main deck. He
was in the last stages of a violent fever, accompanied with a
most frightful delirium. Over his poor pallet, bent ono
woman—the same delicate form I had noticed on the first
evening; and in the intervals of his paroxysm, her deep-
drawn sighs could be distinctly heard. It was nothing to her
.
now that he had so lately abused her, and reviled her, and
even cursed her, while performing for him offices of kindness.
He was in his dying agonies; and she was his wife, and that
was enough.
I could be of no service there, and the scene was too much
for me to bear. When I returned to the saloon of the vessel,
handsomely garnished and brilliantly lighted, and found my
fellow-passengers lounging on the sofas, with a novel in their
hands, or gathered around the whist-table, laughing and jest-
ing, I was forcibly reminded by the contrast of the strange
world in which we live, where joy and sorrow are brought into
startling proximity; and where, as in a great city, there is
often but a thin wall separating the travails of birth from the


192
THE BURIAL AT SEA.
gayety of the bridal party and the still chamber of death.
The next morning, when I came on deck, I observed an
unusual soberness on every face. A group were collected
around the mainmast, gazing silently at some object on the
deck below. I came up behind them, and looking over the
railing, I"felt that it was a corpse!” After the summary
fashion on board ship, it was inclosed in blankets, bound
around with coils of rope, and stretched upon a plank. To
the feet, a large weight was soon attached, and the whole was
then swung over the ship's side and made fast with ropes.
As soon as breakfast was conoluded, the boatswain piped
all hands to the burial. The steerage passengers were seated
on the long-boat and the water-barrels, and the cabin
passengers were gathered on the quarter-deck. When the
poor widow had come forward, and taken her seat on a little
cabin-stool set for the purpose, with her two children by her
side, the captain commenced reading the burial service.
That nobly eloquent service never sounded to me more
solemn. When the captain had concluded the words, “We
therefore commit his body to the deep,” the signal was given.
A heavy plash was heard, and the unsightly mass sunk "like
lead in the mighty waters.” There was a general rush to the
ship's side, as soon as the plunge was heard: but a few bub-
bles merely were seen rising to the surface—the only
memorials that shall ever rise to mark his resting-place.
During the day, the wind died away, and by night we were
perfectly becalmed. I passed the evening, as I did many
while at sea, in walking the deck, and enjoying the calm
quiet of an ocean solitude. Not a breath of air was stirring.
The sails were idly flapping against the mast, as the ship
.


THE BURIAL AT SEA.
193
.
swung slowly to and fro on the long glassy swells. The
moon had just risen from the bosom of the sea, and poured
its broad stream of light, which played and flashed on the
slow undulations of the waters. While I stood watching this
.
peculiarly beautiful appearance of the rays upon the ocean,
which every one who has been to sea must have observed, I
saw a female come up from the gangway, and, creeping up
upon the pile of spars where the body had laid, sat down and
· gazed intently down into the water. It was the poor widow.
She had no grave to go to; she could only look upon the
treacherous sea, which had so suddenly swallowed up all that
was left of him she had so long loved. When I looked at the
heart-stricken woman, solitary and forlorn, bereft even of
her“ broken reed,” and left with her helpless children, alone,
in the middle of the wide ocean, my heart ached for her.
To my mind, the miserable object which had been so
unceremoniously cast away, seemed scarce worth a tear.
Not 60 to her. He was her husband, th: father of her
children, who had not yet sinned away all her early love, and
whose degradation and wretched end drew forth all her com-
passion, and united it to the inextinguishable affection of the
wife.
Her case excited great interest among the passengers, who,
as a substantial proof of their sympathy, raised a handsome
sum to defray her immediate expenses on arriving in a
strange land. When I took her this tribute of their
sympathy, I asked her some questions relative to her circum-
stances and her history. This she willingly gave me.
It
was the old familiar tale—beginning with the golden days of
her girlish love; the vows plighted before the altar of the
9


194
TIE BURIAL AT SEA.
village church ; and the little ivied cottage, with its woodbine
trailing over the door, and contentment seated by its humble
fireside. There, she was as happy as the day was long.
Then came the temptation—the fatal first glass, offered by
an old comrade, was soon followed by the second, and this
sooner still by the third ; and, before he was aware, he had
become a confirmed drinker. She saw it, and warned; but
it was too late. And then came upon her the long agony.
which no one who has not felt it knows; the days which
brought no light, and the nights which brought no rest; the
hours of weary watchfulness; the hopeless labor from morn-
ing till night, watered by many an unbidden tear; the slow
ooze of the heart's blood, drop by drop, wrung forth by the
iron hand of despair! All his cruel treatment, and all his
negleot, she bore with a woman's fortitude; and, woman-like,
she returned caresses for every blow. At the end of five
years, everything was gone. The landlord, who had borne
with him very patiently, at last informed him that, as there
were so many sober men out of employment, he could not
afford to employ a drunkard. There was no resource but the
workhouse and the beadle ; and I do not wonder that these
have terrors, even for the most miserable. Her brother had
left England when he was a boy, and was now in a comfort-
able “ situation" in the city of New York. Thither their
landlord offered to send them, if they were willing to go. This
kind offer they gladly accepted; and the snug cottage, and its
;
woodbines, and its once happy fireside, were, with many lin-
gering looks, left behind them for ever. The painful sequel
of her story I have already given.
The rest of my homeward passage was, as such a passage


THE BURIAL AT SEA.
195
a
should be, delightful. The first sight of the Neversink hills,
rising above the monotonous waste of waters, threw me into
raptures. All day long I sat on deck watching the familiar
objects, as they gradually came in sight; and never did home
scem half so dear to me. The bay of New York never was
half so beautiful ; and the white cottages on the banks looked
like miniature pasteboard creations, after being so familiar
with the heavy stone structures of old England. The last
gasp of a wind which had been dying all day, had just borne
us within the Narrows, when a steamboat hove in sight to take
us to the city. We had been telegraphed, and all expected
friends. The poor widow, who had been invited, as a mark
of respect, to take her place, when she chose, on the quarter-
deck, came to me, and asked if I did not think her brother
might be on board? I told her that perhaps he did not know
when she was coming; but when the boat drew alongside, and
she looked hurriedly over the mass of strange faces, she ap-
peared much disappointed. I suggested to her that she might
not know him after an absence of so many years.
yes !” said she, in surprise. “He was a brave lad, and as
handsome as ye ever saw. Poor fellow ! the day before he
went away, he took out of his earnings, and bought me this
ring. Isn't it very pretty ?". I could not deny the beauty of
a brother's gift, plain as it was, though it doubtless shone as
brightly in her eyes as if it were set with diamonds. As the
news-boats came round us when we entered the harbor, the
simple-hearted woman was on the look-out for her “brave
lad” in each of them, little thinking that by this time he was
grown
into a care-worn man.
It was night-fall when the ship rounded to the wharf; and
66 Oh,


196
THE BURIAL AT SEA.
the officers of customs forbade us to remove our luggage until
the next morning. Before I left the vessel, I looked about,
among the hurry and confusion, for the friendless woman and
her children ; and it was some time before I found her, sitting
in one corner of the dark steerage, with one of her childrer
sleeping in her lap, and the elder weeping in sympathy with
her mother's grief by her side. She had hitherto borne her
trials with wonderful composure ; but the sense of her utter
forlornness in a strange land, with no one to care for her or
her fatherless children, was too much for her broken spirit,
and she sobbed aloud. I could do nothing for her ; I could
only get a promise from the captain to see that some temporary
provision should be made for her, if no friends appeared ; and
I stepped ashore more thankful, I trust, than before, for the
home to which I was coming.
Some will read this simple narrative, perhaps, and feel an
increased sympathy for the suffering condition of the English
poor, which, even under such circumstances, makes them seek
an asylum three thousand miles across the sea. Some will see
in it only a beautiful exhibition of female constancy and for-
titude. But there is a deeper moral still. It only unfolds
another page in that great record of sin, and sorrow, and
shame, caused by the damning vice of intemperance. It is
but a story of every-day life. The contrast between the
happy peasant girl in her ivied cottage and the desolate
widow, homeless and forsaken, weeping at night over her
fatherless children in a strange land, is a contrast that is pre-
Bented on almost every page of that accursed volume. Many
& sad record, indeed, has been washed out by the tears of
timely repentance; but the volume is not yet full! While the


NEVER GIVE UP.
197
thirst for gain shall prompt man to pander to his brother's
appetites, and while an absurd custom maintains its cruel
tyranny, there are many dark pages yet to be written.
It was a great relief to me, next morning, on going down te
the ship, to hear that a well-clad, honest-looking fellow had
presented himself at the gangway as her brother, and had
taken her to his own home. What has become of her since, I
have no means of knowing ; but if this book should ever fall
into her hands, she may find it hard to restrain a tear when
she reads my Temperance Story.
HEVER GIVE UP,
NEVER give up! There are chances and changes,
Helping the hopeful a hundred to one;
And, through the chaos, high wisdom arranges
Ever success, if you'll only hope on.
Never give up! for the wisest is boldest,
Knowing that Providence mingles the cup;
And of all maxims, the best as the oldest,
Is the true watch-word, Never give up.


198
THE WILD-WOOD FLOWER.
THE WILD-WOOD EIW32,
EL
BY MRS. MARY ARTHUR.
Far down and away in a shadowy place,
Where the sunshine crept in faintly,
And the vines swept low with a drooping grace,
And the leaves were still and saintly ;
Where the wind forgot its rushing tones,
And whispered softly past,
Though out on the hill-side its voice was wild,
And the skies were overcast:
There-passing a happy life away,
Drinking the morning dew,
And making fragrance all the day,
A sweet wild-wood flower grew.
Through all its life no human eye
Had ever bent above it.
But it caught sweet glimpses of the sky,
And learned from these to love it.
And when leaves were parted o'er its head,
The sun-touch brought it bliss,
And it quivered down to its glowing heart,
At its brightest, faintest kiss ;
For the little flower had never heard
Of the wide world's light and stir,
And she dreamt in her happy simple joy,
That the sun was bright for her.
But their came one day to the forest dim
A woodman stout and bustling,
And the pleasant quiet soemed naught to him,
Or the wind's uncertain rustling :


MY OWN FIRE SIDE.
199
He peered about among the vines
With a searching prying eye,
And he crushed the moss with a heedless tread,
And dashed the trailers by ;
'Till he found at last what he came to seek,
A sapling straight and tall,
And the trunk he broke, with a heavy stroke,
And laughed to see it fall.
Down-down with a sobbing, thrilling crash,
With its treasures clinging o'er it,
And light few in with a blinding flash,
And scared the shades before it.
A wide quick gleam, around-above-
The little flower fell,
And she saw that the sun, her own dear love,
Kissed every flower as well :
And the leaves pressed close on her burning heart,
And she bowed her pallid head,
And before the day had passed away,
The wild-wood flower was dead
BLY OWN FIBISID,
A GENTLE form is near me now;
A small white hand is clasped in mine;
I gaze upon her placid brow,
And ask what joys can equal thine :
A babe, whose beauty's half divine,
In sleep his mother's eyes doth hide;
Where may love seek a fitter shrine
Than here-my own fireside ?


200
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
THE GERISTMAS PAR22
BY KATE SUTHERLAND.
CHRISTMAS had come round again_merry old Christmas,
with his smiling face and wealth of good cheer; and every
preparation had been made by the Arlingtons for their annual
Christmas party, which was always a gay time for the young
friends of the family.
Some hundreds of miles away, in a quiet New England
village, lived Mr. Archer, an uncle of Mr. Arlington. He
was a good man; but being a minister of the old school, and
well advanced in years, he was strongly prejudiced against all
“fashionable follies," as he called nearly every form of social
"
recreation. Life was, in his eyes, too solemn a thing to be
wasted in any kind of trifling. In preaching and praying, in
pious meditation, and in going about to do good, much of his
time was passed; and another portion of it was spent in
reflecting upon, and mourning over, the thoughtless follies of
the world. He had no time for pleasure-taking; no heart to
smile at the passing foibles or merry humors of his fellow-
men.
Such was the Rev. Mr. Jason Archer-a good man, but
with his mind sadly warped through early prejudices, long
confirmed. For years he had talked of a journey to the city
where his niece, to whom he was much attached, resided.
This purpose was finally carried out. It was the day before


THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
201
Christmas, when Mrs. Arlington received a letter from the
old gentleman, announcing the fact that she might expect to
see him in a few hours, as he was about starting to pay her
nd her family the long intended visit.
“Uncle Archer will be here to-morrow," said Mrs. Arling-
ton to her husband, as soon as she met him after receiving her
letter.
“Indeed! And so the good old gentleman has made a move
at last?"
“ Yes; he's going to eat his Christmas-dinner with
us,
he
says."
"
66 Yes;
“So much the better. The pleasure of meeting him will
increase the joy of the occasion.”
“I am not so sure of that,” replied Mrs. Arlington, look-
ing a little serious. “It would have been more pleasant to
have received this visit at almost any other time in the year.'
“Why so ?”
“You know his strong prejudices?"
“Oh, against dancing, and all that ?"
he thinks it a sin to dance."
“ Though I do not.”
“No; but it will take away half my pleasure to see him
grieved at anything that takes place in my house."
“ He'll not be so weak as that."
“He thinks it sin, and will be sadly pained at its occur-
Is it not possible to omit dancing for once ?"
“At the party to-morrow night ?"
66 Yes."
Mr. Arlington shook his head, as he replied
“Don't think of such a thing. We will receive him with
rence.


202
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY
true kindness, because we feel it towards the good old man.
But we must not cease to do what we know to be right, thus
disappointing and marring the pleasure of many, out of
deference to a mere prejudice of education in a single person.
When we go to see him, we do not expect that any change
will be made out of deference to our prejudices or peculiar
opinions; and when he comes to see us, he must be willing to
tolerate what takes place in our family, even if it does not
mert his full approval. No, no; let us not think for a
moment of any change in affairs on this account. Uncle
Archer hasn't been present at a gay party nor seen dancing
for almost half a century. It may do him good to witness it
now. At any rate I feel curious to see the experiment tried.”
Mrs. Arlington still argued for a little yielding in favor of
the good parson's prejudices, but her husband would not
listen to such a thing for a moment. Everything, he said,
must go on as usual.
“A guest who comes into a family," he remarked, “should
always conform himself to the family order; then there is no
reaction upon him, and all are comfortable and happy. He is
not felt as a thing foreign and incongruous, but as homogene-
To break up the usual order, and to bend all to meet
his personal prejudices and peculiarities, is only to so disturb
the family sphere as to make it actually repellent. He is
then felt as an unassimilated foreign body, and all secretly
desire his removal."
“But something is due to old age !" urged Mrs. Arlington.
“Yes; much. But, if age have not softened a man's
prejudices against a thing good in itself, I doubt very much if
& deference to his prejudice, such as you propose, will in the
ous.


THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
203
She was
least benefit him. Better let him come in contact with a
happy circle, exhilarated by music and dancing; and the
chances are, that his heart will melt in the scene rather than
grow colder and harder. The fact is, as I think of it more
and more, the better pleased am I that uncle Archer is
coming just at this time."
But Mrs. Arlington felt troubled about the matter. Early
on Christmas morning the old gentleman arrived, and was
welcomed with sincere affection by every member of the
family. Mr. and Mrs. Arlington had a daughter, named
Grace, who was just entering her eighteenth year.
gentle and affectionate in disposition, and drew to the side of
uncle Archer in a way that touched the old man's feelings.
He had not seen her before this, since she was a little girl;
and now, he could not keep his eyes off of her as she sat by
him, or moved about the room in his presence.
“What a dear girl that is !” was his remark to her mother
many times during the day.
“She's a good girl," would simply reply Mrs. Arlington,
speaking almost without thought. Grace was a good girl ;
her mother felt this, and from her heart her lips found
utterance.
It seemed, all through the day, that Grace could not do
enough for the old man's comfort. Once she drew him into
her room, as he was passing her door, to show him some
pictures that she had painted. As he sat looking at them, ho
noticed a small, handsomely bound Bible on her table.
Taking it up, he said
“Do you read this, Grace?"
“yes," she replied; “ every day.” And there was such
Q
>
6


204
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
a light of goodness in her eyes, as she looked up into his face,
that Mr. Archer felt, for a moment or two, as if the
countenance of an angel was before him.
“Why do you read it ?” he continued, after a pause.
“ It teaches us the way to heaven," said Grace.
“And you are trying to live for heaven ?"
“I try to shun all evil as sin. Can I do more ?"
All the minister's creeds and doctrines, and confessions of
faith, which he had ever considered the foundations upon
which Christian life was to be builded, seemed, for a moment
or two, useless lumber before the simple creed of this loving,
pure-hearted maiden. To seek to disturb this state of inno-
cence and obedience by moody polemics, he felt, instinctively,
to be wrong.
>
“Perhaps not,” was his half abstracted reply; perhaps
not. Yes, yes; shun what is evil, and the Lord will adjoin
the good.”
“Yes, yes; she is a good girl, as her mother says," was
frequently repeated by uncle Archer during the day, when he
would think of Grace.
Evening caine, and young and old began to gather in the
parlors. The minister was introduced to one and another, as
they arrived, and was much gratified with the respect and
attention shown to him by all. Grace soon drew around him
three or four of her young friends, who listened to what he
had to say with an interest that gratified his feelings.
Nothing had been said to Grace of her uncle's prejudice
against dancing; she was, therefore, no little surpriscd to see
the sudden change in his manner, when she said to a young
lady in the group around him--


THE CHRISTLAS PARTY.
205
Come! you must play some cotillons for us. We're
going to have a dance."
After going with the young lady to the piano, and opening
it for her, Grace went back to her uncle, whose face she
found deeply clouded.
“Aint you well, uncle ?" she asked, affectionately,
“O yes, child, I am well enough in body,” was replied.
5 But something troubles you, uncle—what is it ???
By this time a number of couples were on the floor, and at
the moment a young man came up to Grace, and said
“Shall I have the pleasure of dancing with you this
evening ?"
“Not in the first set,” replied Grace; “but I will consider
myself engaged for the second, unless you can find a more
agreeable partner.”
“Do you dance, then ?" asked uncle Archer, gravely, after
the young man had turned away.
“Dance ?" Grace was in doubt whether she had clearly
understood him.
“Yes, dear.”
“Certainly I do, uncle. You don't think there is harm
in dancing ?"
“I do, my child. And, I am sure that, after what you
said about reading your Bible and trying to live for heaven,
your
admission greatly surprises me. Religion and dancing !
How can they have an affinity ?"
" Good and evil can have no affinity,” said Grace, in reply
to this remark. “Evil, I have always understood to be in a
purpose to do wrong. Now, I can dance with a good
purpose ; and, surely, then, dancing cannot be evil to me.”


206
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
“Dance with a goor purpose! How can you do that, my
dear ?"
“ I have often danced with the sole end of contributing my
share to the general enjoyment of a company."
“Strange enjoyment !" sighed the old parson.
The timing of steps, and the orderly movement of the
body in concert with musical harmonies, often affects the
mind with exquisite delight, uncle. I have enjoyed this over
and over again, and have felt better and happier afterwards."
“ Child! child !” replied the old man; “how it grieves me
to hear you say this."
“If there is sin in dancing, uncle,” said Grace, seriously,
“ tell me wherein it lies. Look at the countenances of those
now on the floor; do they express evil or good affection ?-
here, as I have been taught, lies the sin.”
It is a foolish waste of time,” returned the old man; ba
foolish waste of time; and it is an evil thing to waste the
precious time that God has given to us.”
We cannot always work or read. Both mind and body
become wearied.'
“ Then we have time for meditation."
“But even thought will grow burdensome at times, and the
mind- sink into listlessness and inactivity. Then we need
recreation, in order that we may afterwards both work and
think better. Music and dancing, in which mind and
body find an innocent delight, effect such a recreation.
I know it is so in my case; and I know it is so in the
case of others. You do not say that dancing is a thing evil
m itself ?!
“No.” This was admitted rather reluctantly.
66


THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
207
" Then if it be made to serve a good end, it is a good
66
thing."
“But it is often made to serve evil,” said the minister.
“ Then it is an evil thing,” promptly answered. Grace;
and so every good gift of heaven may be made an evil thing
to those who use it for an evil purpose. You know it is said
that a spider extracts poison from the same flower where the
bee gets honey. The deadly nightshade draws life from the
same rain and sunshine that nourishes and matures the
wheat, from which our bread is made. It is the evil purpose,
uncle, that makes a thing evil.”
“Could you pray on going to bed, after an evening spent in
dancing ?” asked the old man, confident that he had put a
question that would clearly show his niece her error. To his
surprise, Grace answered, with a beautiful smile on her face
“O yes; and I have so prayed, many and many a time;
0
;
not failing to return thanks for the pleasure I had been
permitted to enjoy."
“ Thanks for mere carnal pleasure !”
“All things are good that are filled with good affections,"
said Grace. “We are in a natural world, where all pleasuro
,
and pain affect us in the natural degree most sensibly. We
must come down, that we may go up. We must let our
natural joy and gladness have free course, innocently, that
they may be changed into a joy that is higher and spiritual.
Is it not so, uncle ???
Now, the old man had not expected to find such a nice head
on so young a body; nor did he expect to be called upon to
answer a question, which came in a form that he was not
prepared either to negative or affirm. He had put all natura)
>


208
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
>
pleasures under the ban, as flowing from the carnal mind;
and, therefore, evil. As to filling natural pleasures with
spiritual life, that was a new position in theology. He had
preached against natural pleasures as evil, and, therefore, to
be abandoned by all who would lead a heavenly life. Before
he could collect his thoughts for an answer satisfactory to
himself, two or three ladies gathered around them, and he
discreetly forebore to make any further remarks on the sub-
ject. But he felt, as may be supposed, very uncomfortable.
After the first set was danced, one of the young ladies who
had been on the floor, and who had previously been introduced
to the old gentleman by Grace, came, with color heightened
from excitement, and her beautiful face in a glow of pleasure,
and sat down by his side. Mr. Archer would have received
her with becoming gravity, had it been in his power to do so;
but the smile on her face was so innocent, and she bent
towards him so kindly and affectionately, that he could not
find it in his heart to meet her with even a silent reproof.
This young lady was really charming his ear, when a gentle-
man came up to her, and said,
“Anna, I want you to dance with me.
“With pleasure,” replied the girl. “You will excuse me
for awhile, Mr. Archer,” said she, and she was about rising
as she spoke, but the old man placed his hand upon her arm,
and gently detained her.
“ You're not going to leave me?"
“No, not if my company will give you any pleasure,”
replied the young girl, with a gentle smile.
" Please excuse me.
This she addressed to the person
who had asked her to dance. He bowed, and turned away.
>


THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
209
“I am glad to keep you by my side,” said Mr. Archer,
with some seriousness in his manner.
“ And I am glad to stay here,” was promptly answered,
“if my company will give you any pleasure. It does me
good to contribute to others' happiness."
The old man was touched by this reply, for he felt that i
was from the heart. It sounded strangely to his ears from
the lips of one who had just been whirling in the mazy dance.
“There is no real pleasure in anything selfish," he
remarked. “Yes, you say truly, it does us good to con-
tribute to the happiness of others.”
“For this reason,” said Anna, “I like dancing as a social
recreation. It is a mutual pleasure. We give and receive
enjoyment."
The old minister's face grew serious.
“I have been to three or four parties,” continued the
young girl," where dancing was excluded, under some strange
idea that it was wrong; and I must say, that so much evil-
speaking and censoriousness it has never been my lot to
encounter in any company.
The time, instead of being
improved as a season of mental and bodily recreation, was
worse than wasted. I know that I was worse instead of
better on returning from each of these companies, for I
insensibly fell into the prevailing spirit.”
That was very bad, certainly,” remarked Mr. Archer,
before whose mind arose some pictures of social gatherings, in
which had prevailed the very spirit condemned by his young
companion. “But I don't see how you are going to make
dancing a sovereign remedy for the evil.”
“It is not a sovereign remedy," was answered, “but it is a


210
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
>
>
ooncert of feeling and action, in which the mind is ex.
hilarated, and in which a mutual good-will is produced. You
cannot dance without being pleased, to a greater or less
extent, with your partners on the floor. Often and often
have I had a prejudice against persons wear off as we moved
together in the dances, and I have afterwards discovered in
them good qualities to which I was before blinded.”
“Uncle," said Grace to the old man, just at this moment,
bending to his ear as she spoke, and taking his hand in hers,
--“Come! I want to show you something."
Grace drew him into the adjoining parlor, where another
set was on the floor. Two children, her younger brother and
sister, were in it.
“Now, just look at Ada and Willy," whispered Grace in
his ear, as she brought him in view of the young dancers.
Ada was a lovely child, and the old uncle's heart had already
taken her in. She was a graceful little dancer, and moved in
the figures with the lightness of a fairy. It was a beautiful
sight, and in the face of all the prejudices, which half a
century had worn into him, he felt that it was beautiful. As
he looked upon it, he could keep the dimness from his eyes
only by a strong effort.
“Is there evil in that, uncle ?" asked Grace, drawing her
arm within that of the old man's.
“Is it good ?” he replies.
it is good,” said Grace, emphatically, as she lifted
her eyes to his.
Mr. Archer did not gainsay her words. He, at least, felt
that it was not evil, though he could not admit that it was
good.
66
Yes;


THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
211
Spite of the dancing, which soon ceased to offend the good
old man, he paesed a pleasant evening. Perhaps, he enjoyed
the Christmas party as much as any one there.
Nothing was said, on the next day, by any one, on the sub-
ject of dancing; though Mr. Archer, especially, thought a
great deal about the matter. Some ideas had come into his
mind that were new there, and he was pondering them
attentively. On the third day of his arrival, he had a severe
attack of rheumatism, from which he suffered great pain,
besides a confinement to his room for a couple of weeks.
During that time, the untiring devotion and tender solicitude
of Grace, touched the old man's heart deeply. When the
pain had sufficiently abated to let his mind attain composure,
she sought to interest him in various ways. Sometimes she
would read to him by the hour; sometimes she would enter-
tain him with cheerful conversation; and sometimes she would
bring in one or two of her young friends, whom he had met at
the Christmas party. With these, he had more than one
disrussion, in his sick room, on the subject of dancing, and
the old minister found these gay young girls rather more than
a match for him. During a discussion of this kind, Grace
left the room. In her absence one of her companions said to
him
“Grace is a good girl.”
A quick light went over the old man's countenance; and he
replied, with evident feeling-
“Good? Yes; I look at her, sometimes, and think her
· almost an angel.”
She dances.'
The old man sighed.


212
THE CHRISTMAS PARTY.
" She is a Christian.'
“I wish there were more such in the world,” said he
unhesitatingly.
“And yet she dances."
“My dear child,” said Mr. Archer, turning with an
affectionate smile towards his young interlocutor," don't take
such an advantage of me in the argument.”
“ Then it is settled,” was continued, in triumph," that if
dancing is not a Christian grace, a maiden may dance and yet
be a Christian ?"
“God bless you, and keep you from all the evil of the
world,” said the old man, fervently, as he took the young
girl's hand and pressed it between his own. “It may be all
"
right! it may be all right!”
"
Grace came back at the moment, and he ceased speaking.
From that time the venerable minister said no more on the
subject, and it is but fair to believe, that when he returned
home he had very serious doubts in regard to the sin of
dancing, which had once been as fairly held as if it had been
an article in the Confession of Faith.
>


THE
213
STRAWBERRY GIRL.
#HB STRAWBERRY GIRL
OR, THE OLD POCKET PISTOL
BY
BRO.
PRINCE.
* You go on your visit to-day, brother Frank, I under-
stand, and I want the keepsake you promised me;" said
Ann Linden, a bright-eyed, rosy-cheeked girl of sixteen,
to her brother, who was fixing a pocket pistol, while around
him lay a pair of ball-moulds, a shot-pouch, and a powder-
flask. “But O, mercy! what are you doing? You are
not going to take that old pistol with you surely, dear, dear
brother?"
“Yes, but I am, sis.," replied he. “This old pistol, as
you call it, I expect will be the means of making my for..
I
tune."
>
“Be the means of your death, more likely, I am afraid,"
retorted she, sorrowfully. “O, don't take it with you,
brother---some accident may happen ; it may burst, or go
off and kill you."
Frank Linden stopped a moment and looked up at his
sister, who stood by his side, and he saw tears standing in
her eyes.
“Why, Ann!” said he, “what dangers you imagine
You need not fear,--the old pistol will never do any hurt to


214
GIRL.
THE
STRAWBF RR Y
me.
>
I have not yet loaded it or fired it; but thought I
might, when I got to my uncle's in the country. But here,
you may take a lock of my hair for the keepsake, if you are
afraid you will never see me again ;” and he laughingly
held his head towards her.
Heaven forbid that I should never see you again,” re-
plied Ann; “but, brother, that would be a choice keep-
sake," and she took her scissors, which hung by a steel
chain from her belt, and clipped off a lock of Frank's hair,
the longest she could find. “There," said she, "I will
"
keep that until you get married and make your fortune, and
then give it to your wife, if that old pistol does not make a
cripple of you and prevent such an event. I do wish you
would throw the useless, dangerous instrument away.”
“Ann, I tell you this old pocket pistol will be the means
of affording me a great deal of pleasure, and the instru-
ment, perhaps, of making my fortune. Remember, sis.,
what I tell you;” and he continued his work of cleaning
and fixing it.
His sister turned and left him, saying she could not con-
ceive what pleasure could be derived from an old pocket
pistol ; nor any prospect of its being the means of making
his fortune, or any other person's.
Frank and Ann Linden were the son and daughter of a
respectable upholsterer in New York, who, though not rich,
yet was well off and doing a comfortable business. Frank
was about twenty years of age—had graduated from col.
lege, and, ere he commenced the study of law, a profession
be intended to pursue, was going to spend a few weeks in
1


THE STRAWBERRY
215
GIRL.
the country, at his uncle's, living in the interior, near the
Pennsylvania line. Fishing, hunting and rambling through
woods and fields, he was not much accustomed to; yet he
anticipated fine sport, and left home in goods spirits for an
absence of four weeks.
The old uncle whom he visited had no children, and had
been a widower for some ten or twelve years, having with
him, as housekeeper, a widowed sister of his deceased wife,
a Mrs. Jones, who had one daughter about the same age of
Frank, named Elsie Jones.
The old gentleman, Frank's uncle, received him with all
the hearty welcome of a man fond of his relations, and
more particularly so, as Frank was a favorite, being named
after him. He had not seen him for some years, and was
surprised at viewing a handsome, stout-built young man,
large enough, as he said, to lift a barrel of cider into the
tail of a cart, or to mow all day; and he chuckled and
laughed, as he turned him round, exclaiming, “ Frank, my
boy, you are stout enough for a farmer !”
No doubt I am, uncle,” replied Frank, “ and you will
find I can do justice to farmer's fare, likewise ;." as just at
that minute Mrs. Jones announced that dinner was ready,
and he followed his uncle to the table, where a large dish of
beef and pork, with sundry kinds of vegetables, such as
turnips, potatoes, and cabbage, were smoking by its side
The uncle had no fault to find with his nephew for not
doing ample justice to his table, as a day and a night's rido
over a rough road, and several hours' fasting, had, though
he was somewhat fatigued, given him a fine appetite.
a


216
GIRL.
THE
STRA W BERRY
After dinner, the old gentleman retired and took a nap,
and Frank sauntered off into the fields, and from thence
strayed to a piece of woodland, through which murmured a
purling brook, where, on the margin, he seated himself,
watching the little ripples of the stream, and noticed occa-
sionally the darting glimpse of a speckled trout, which
seemed to catch his shadow, and then vanish from his sight.
For some time he amused himself in looking at the
stream, and in witnessing also the gambols of a gray squir
rel, that alternately leaped from the trunk of a fallen tree
that was near, and then ascended the body of one that was
standing, and after an absence of a moment, would be seen
again on the fallen tree. He thought of his pocket pistol,
and wished he had brought it with him, imagining he might
shoot the nimble animal. At length he arose, and, crossing
the brook, wandered through the woods until he came to a
large tract of cleared land, at the extremity of his uncle's
domains.
As he leaped from a fence into an open field, he heard a
sudden scream, when, looking forward, he saw a young
girl, with her hair streaming from her head and her bonnet
hanging from her neck, running as if for life, uttering loud,
piercing cries; in one hand she held a basket, and in the
other a stout stick,-behind her, from the distance he was
off, he could see nothing. Her screams, however, aroused
him, and he sprang forward to meet her. As they neared
each other, he discovered an enormous black snake, of the
racer breed, with his head erect; he had a white ring
around his neck, and was close upon her. The snake
a


THE
217
STRAWBERRY GIRL.
seemed to move with velocity, about one-third of its length
erect above the ground. Its eyes shone like two sparks of
fire, and with mouth open and forked tongue protruded, it
seemed intent on its victim.
Frank had never seen a snake of this species before ; but
he knew their bite was harmless, yet their powerful coil
dangerous. The young girl, who, he thought, might be
about fifteen or sixteen years of age, appeared frightened
almost to distraction. She was pale and colorless, and
scemed ready to drop to the earth, as he came up and
sprang between her and the snake, seizing the stick from
her hand as he passed. A few feet only separated the girl
from the swift serpent as he jumped between them; and ere
he was aware of it, the reptile was coiling around one of
his legs, and winding its way up his body.
Frank Linden was unused to fear, and in imaginatior.
always thought he could face anything; yet a cold kind of
feeling ran over him for an instant, at the discovery that the
snake was coiling around him; but he recovered himself in
a moment, and boldly seized the serpent below the head
with one hand, with a view of destroying it in his nervous
grasp. On seizing it, the snake instantly uncoiled itself
.
from his leg, and in spite of his exertions gradually worked
itself through his firm grasp, by immediately coiling its
lower part around his arm, winding its folds so tight as to
pain him. Throwing down his stick, in vain he strove to
tear the reptile from his arm with his other hand ; for its
tenacious grasp baffled all his strength in the effort.
As Frank sprang past the girl, she had stopped and
10
a


218
THE STRAWBERRY GIRL.
iurned round, and stood panting from the exertion of run-
ning: gazing, with horror depicted on her countenance, at the
sight of the snake writhing and struggling in his iron grasp.
Finding he could not tear it from his arr, Frank felt for
his pocket-knife; but with one hand he could not open the
blade, and he held it towards her, requesting that she would
open it.
Trembling, she approached, and putting her basket on
the ground, took the knife from his hand and opened
the blade. In the mean time, Frank grasped with both
lands the snake, that was gradually slipping through his
clutch.
The young girl's terror in a measure seemed to abato
now; and as he held the reptile with both hands, he di-
rected her to cut it from his arm, when in an instant she
inserted the blade of the knife between one or two of the
coils, at once severing the snake into three parts, which
relaxed its tenacity, and fell to the ground, when Frank
threw the part remaining in his hands also to the earth,
and soon dispatched all remains of life in the dissevered
pieces.
He had now time to look at the girl, to whose rescue from
a horrid death, perhaps, he had so fortunately arrived. She
was neatly dressed in a home-made striped frock, fitted to
her light, graceful form, leaving her neck bare, except what
was covered by the cape of her sun-bonnet, which was made
of the same material with her frock. Her dark, expressive
eyes now glistened with pleasure, as he stepped towards her
and took up her basket, which he discovered was nearly


THE STRAWBERRY GIRL.
219
a
full of delicious-looking strawberries, which she had been
gathering
Without alluding to the recent scene, he emilingly com-
plimented her on her success in gathering so many luxurious
berries, and taking three or four out, he ate them, praising
their flavor. Still holding her basket, he then civilly re-
.
quested that he might carry it, and see her safe to where
she was going
The crimson that mantled her face and neck vied with
the color of the fruit she had been picking, as she curt.
sied and thanked him, modestly yet timidly replying that
she was so frightened that company home would be a favor;
and Frank took the artless girl's arm, put it within his,
and they crossed the field together towards the road that
bounded the farm of his uncle.
“Where did you gather these delicious berries, Miss ?"
asked hat; “pardon me, I do not know your name, or I
should address you by it.”
Julia Sefton is my name," she quickly replied.
live a short distance down the road,—the strawberries ]
gathered in the field adjoining the one you saw me in,
which I was crossing, intending to carry them to Elsie
Jones, for the nephew of Mr. Linden, who, she told me, he
expected this evening from New York, to pay him a visit.
They are quite a treat to people from the city.”
“Indeed! Then, Miss Julia, these strawberries were
!
intended for me ; for my name is Frank Linden, and I am
the nephew of Mr. Linden, to whose house you were going.”
Julia blished and looked down, casting a side glance at
66 We
a


220
GIRL.
THE STRAWBERRY
him, rather pleased, though a little confused at what she
had said ; and she tried to mend the matter, by saying that
Elsie Jones was going with her,—but when she called in
the morning she cou¥d not go, and begged of her to bring
some, if she gathered any.
Frank laughed, and told her she could go with them yet
to his uncle's-saying he should certainiy now claim a part
of her berries.
“And cannot you eat them at my mother's just as well ?
We have some maple-sugar and sweet cream; and mother,
;
I know, will not be offended at my bringing you there, see-
ing you have been so kind to me.
You will go, won't you,
Mr. Linden ?" asked she, looking earnestly and innocently
up into his face.
- Call me Frank Linden, Julia! I am not old enough
to be a Mr. yet. Yes, I will go to your mother's with you ;
but you need not tell her about the snake, because I am
afraid she will not let you go after berries again," said he,
smiling at her earnest,tender of hospitality to him.
“O never fear that, Mr. Frank !” quickly returned
she, .“ mother will let me go ;” and her eyes sparkled with
pleasure.
“ There! there is Mr. again! Do call me plain Frank,
and leave the Mr. off!” exclaimed he, looking coaxingly at
her.
"Well, then, Frank! Frank Linden! which shall I call
you ?-tell me?” asked she; and for the first time her
shrill laugh rang loud over the fields. “It is so odd to call
A man only just by his plain, first name !"
a
1


THE STRAWBERRY
221
GIRL.
“But Julia,” said he, “I am no man yet, and plain
Frank suits me best. My sister Ann always calls me so ;
and now I am away from home, I want some one to remind
me of her. I think your red cheeks and your eyes resemble
hers very much."
“Do they?" answered she, “then I will call you Frank;"
and she blushed, she knew not why, as they passed along.
Julia was pretty, and the excitement of the scene sho
had passed through, and the exercise of running, together
with the warm weather, had given an additional color to
her fine-formed countenance, which, when she was smiling,
showed two rows of regular, beautiful white teeth, peeping
from between a pair of cherry lips, while a slight dimple
danced on one of her fresh blooming cheeks.
Frank, as he gazed at her, was completely struck with
surprise at seeing so much real beauty in the country. He
thought his sister handsome; but Julia was more pretty,
just then, in his eyes. As they walked on, they talked of
wild-flowers and birds, honey-bees and grey squirrels, until
they came to the fence by the road, where they could see
the little white house, the residence of Mrs. Sefton, Julia's
mother. It was partly hid by several large trees, but one
white end was peeping out through the foliage. Here
Frank was going to set the basket down and help Julia over
the fence; but she withdrew her arm from his, and step-
ping on a piece of board that rested on one of the lower
rails, lightly sprang over into the road, and laughingly
reached out her hand, telling him she would help him over.
He declined her gallantry, however, but handed her the


222
GIRL.
THE
STRA "BERRY
a
basket of strawberries, and clambered over, evidently evin-
cing that he was a novice at the leaping of fences in the
country.
A moment or two now brought them to Mrs. Sefton's
house; and Julia, pushing open the front door, took Frank
into the best room, and handing him a chair, hastily untied
her sun-bonnet and threw it on the table, requesting him to
raise one of the windows, while she would call her mother.
Frank did as he was requested, and, seating himself,
took a survey of the humble apartment. In one corner
stood an old-fashioned clock, which was ticking away, the
hour hand pointing to nearly five. Eight or ten common
wooden chairs, painted black and flowered with yellow, were
set round the room; between the two front windows hung &
mahogany-framed looking-glass, with a landscape-painting
at the top, and over the whole of which was a piece of green
gauze. In the fireplace on one side of the room was a large
bunch of green ivy-bushes, interspersed with wild-flowers,
and on the bushes were fastened about a dozen blown egg-
shells, that had been dipped in melted bees’-wax, looking
yellow, and presenting the appearance of lemons hanging
among the green leaves. On the mantle-piece were two
brass candle-sticks, which shone like burnished gold; and
standing by the jambs of the fireplace stood a pair of brass-
headed shovel and tongs, and within the jambs were a pair
of andirons with urn-shaped brass tops. A home-made,
striped rag-carpet was on the floor ; and under the looking
glass stood a cherry table, with a polish of bees'-wax,
shining equal to any modern high-finish ; while in one cor-
a


THE STRAWBERRY
223
GIRL.
ner of the room stood a bureau or desk, it answering the
double purpose, and on the top of which was a book-case
about half filled with books. These articles, and an old-
fashioned, round-top stand, with a large family biblo
covered with green baize, constituted all the furniture of
the best room. A coarse painting of a man in the olden
costume of small clothes, shoes with large buckles, ruffled
wristbands to his shirt, and a long-waisted coat with enor-
mous large buttons, was hung on the whitewashed wall on
one side of the room, while over the mantel-piece were two
or three dingy gilt frames, hanging against the chimney,
containing profiles cut from paper, and placed on black silk,
showing the side of the form of faces.
Frank had scarcely cast his cursory survey over the room,
when Julia again made her appearance, accompanied by her
mother. The old lady was dressed in a dark-colored calico
frock, over which was a check apron, tied around her waist.
She wore a common, middle-aged-woman's cap, and
though her countenance looked care-worn and somewhat old,
yet there were traces of beauty still remaining on her face.
As she entered the room, Frank arose, and was introduced
to Mrs. Sefton by Julia ; the old lady curtsying and
smoothing down her starched apron, as she took a seat
opposite him.
Mrs. Sefton, like many other ladies, was talkative; she
remembered his father and mother—when they were mar-
ried—what a pretty little boy he was when a baby-how
handsome his father used to be, and thought he resembled
bim uncommonly. All of which Frank listened to, and


224
GIRL.
TIE STRAWBERRY
laughed, and humored the old woman, praising her nico
little house, and complimenting her daughter Julia.
In the mean time Julia had changed her home-made
frock for a neat calico one, and was seen flying round in the
adjoining room; and in a few moments came in and moved
out the cherry table, spreading over it a table-cloth that
vied in whiteness with the pure snow, and as if by magic,
soon had it covered with tea-things, with the accompani-
ments of a blue bowl of rich cream and a large dish of
strawberries; and Frank observed that her hair, which had
hung in dishevelled tresses when they arrived, was now
neatly combed and hanging in ringlets over her neck and
shoulders, with a fresh-blown rose pinned among a cluster
of curls on one of her temples.
Julia, I see, has set the table,” said the old lady, ad-
Ι
dressing Frank; “her strawberries will be a treat to you,
I suppose;" and leading the way, they sat down, Julia
pouring the tea, and helping him to strawberries and cream.
To say that Frank Linden did not enjoy himself, would .
be belieing his looks and feelings—he was perfectly en-
raptured ; and after spending a pleasant hour, he rose to
depart.
Julia accompanied him to the door, and he made her
promise that on the morrow she would be ready to go with
him and gather strawberries, provided her mother had no
objections.
On Frank's return to his uncle's, the old gentleman was
inquisitive to know where he had been; but Frank evasive-
ly answered, telling, however, all the places he had wan.
a


THE
225
STR A W BERRY
GIRL.
a
dered over, at the same time studiously avoiding all mention
of his adventure with Julia Sefton.
It leaked out notwithstanding, the next day, by the way
of Elsie who early called on Julia to go after berries, and
he artlessly told her about the snake scene, and of Frank's
accompanying her home.
Every pleasant day for a week or two Frank, Julia and
Elsie were off gathering strawberries. Each had a basket,
and Elsie competed with Julia in gathering the greatest
quantity, always getting her basket full first, not so much
from her being more expert, as from other little circum-
stances, such
as,
that if Julia camo across a spot where
they were thick, she called Frank, (who not being very
expert, filled his basket slow,) and directed him to the
thickest clusters; and then half joking, and half from some
other cause, he would occasionally take a handfull from her
own basket and put them into his; and again she fre-
quently had to stop and listen to some little story of his ;
and sometimes, when picking side by side, she was obliged
to playfully push Frank away, as his fingers were sure to
come in contact with hers and take hold of them, pretend-
ing he thought them berries, while she would stop and
box his ears for taking her hand for the vines.
Every rainy and unpleasant day Frank was sure to go a
fishing in the brook which ran along near Mrs. Sefton's
house, and to be gone all day; yet he never catched a chub
or trout, but might have been seen, instead of being on the
margin of the brook angling for fish, to be sitting alongside
of Julia in the loom where she was weaving, helping her tie


226
THE STRAWBERRY GIRL.
the threads, fix the quills in the shuttle, and occasionally
· wanting to whisper something in her ear, because he pre-
tended the loom made such a noise he thought she could
not lear,-always making a mistake in getting his mouth to
her ear, by placing it to her lips; and when he went away,
would always brag to Mrs. Sefton how much Julia and
himself had wove. But the old lady averred, that with all
his help, Julia did not weave scarcely any when he was
there; and occasionally scolded her when she went into the
room and saw how little she had accomplished.
• At length the four weeks of Frank's visit to his uncle
expired, and he was to go the next morning. He never
knew so short a month, and Julia, who dreamed and
thought of nothing but Frank, wondered why he should stay
60 short a time.
6 Then I shall never see you again, cousin Frank,” said
Julia, when he told her he was going; for they had added
the endearing name of cousin to each other, for that kind
of relationship that existed between them, or as a substitute
for a more tender title. “And you will forget your cousin
Julia when you get to the city. I wish you had never come
to visit your uncle !” and she lcaned her head against his
breast, with both arms around his neck.
“I shall never forget you, cousin Julia," replied Frank,
pressing her to his bosom. Have
you no relations in the
city that you may one day visit ? because then I might see
a
you."
>
“ Alas! I know not,” sobbed the poor girl ; “but then
if I had, it would not be like seeing you here,-and then I


т.н Е
227
STRAWBERRY
GIRL.
am a poor girl, and you will move among the rich. It is
right I suppose for us now to part; but, Frank, you will
sometimes think of me, won't you ?" and she looked up into
his face, with tears streaming down her cheeks.
“ Yes, I will think of you, and love you too,” answered
he, kissing the tears from her face. At length he bade
her farewell, telling her always to remember him, and that
he should never forget her.
The next day, by the roots of one of the large trees in
front of their house, on the spot where she had parted with
Frank, Julia found a pocket pistol. She knew it belonged
to him, for it had the initials of his name “F. L.” rudely
marked on a little silver plate on the stock. She took it
and put it in her trunk, resolving to keep it until she again
saw him. It would be a kind of remembrance, though she
felt she needed nothing just then to keep him in her recol-
lection. A little wad of paper was stuffed in the muzzle
of the pistol, which Julia discovered when she put it into
- her trunk, and as it was probably put there by Frank, she
did not remove it; as every thing now that related to him
in her possession was a treasure to her.
Julia's parents were English, who had come to this
country early, and located on the spot where her mother
now resided. They were poor, and she was their only
child. Mrs. Sefton had been a widow about a year, her
husband having for some years before his death been cut
of health, so that when he died there was little left for his
wife and daughter. They, however, managed to live in the
same house, and by industry and economy, with the help


228
GIRL.
THE
STRAWBERRY
>
of a cow and about a couple of acres of land, got along
quite comfortably. This was their situation when Frank
Linden became acquainted with Julia.
About one year rolled on after Frank Linden made his
visit to his uncle. He had commenced the study of law,
and amid his studies, amusements, and pleasures in the
city, thought but little of Julia Sefton. It is true, occa-
sionally some little circumstance would remind him of the
artless, pretty strawberry girl who had so enraptured him,
and for the first time enlisted the feelings of love in his
breast; and though at such times some misgivings of con-
science would come over him, for awakening in her gentle
bosom hopes of his lasting attachment, yet he exeused him-
self, and would as much as possible banish the recollection
of her from his mind. When he first returned from his
visit, he spoke in rapture of Julia to his sister Ann, and
described her as one on whom his memory would linger with
delight. She joked him frequently of his country love,
and often reminded him of the extravagánt encomiums he
bestowed on her; and then all the dear recollections of his
visit and Julia Sefton would rise up before him, and he
would laughingly tell Ann that Julia would one day, per-
haps, become her sister.
In the mean time Julia, by the way of Elsie Jones, who
still resided at Frank's uncle's, learnt that he was studying
law; and though she never expected to see him again, she
continued to cherish his image in her recollection.
One day she was unusually depressed in spirits,--her
mother had gone to assist a neighbor, in whose bounty they


THE
229
STRAWBERRY
GIRL.
were continually sharing; and she was left alone at home.
She went to her trunk for something which she wanted, and
in removing some articles to find it, lifted out, accidentally,
Frank's pocket pistol, which lay among them. It fell on
the floor and suddenly exploded, startling her so much, that
it was some moments ere she recovered herself sufficiently
to pick it up. She never dreamed when she put it there
that it was loaded; and the thoughts that something serious
might have occurred made her feel thankful that she had
escaped injury. Picking up the pistol from the floor, she
stood looking at it, as she had frequently done when visit-
ing her trunk; and she thought of Frank, until the tears
filled her eyes. All at once the smoke of burning paper
arrested her attention, and she discovered that the wadding
that had been discharged from the loaded instrument was
smoking in one corner of her room. She instantly ran and
put it out, and looking on the floor, near the now extin-
guished wad, saw the little roll of paper that was in the
muzzle of the pistol. Looking at it a moment, she carc-
lessly picked it up, and discovering that there was print-
ing on it, unrolled the kind of stopple and stood by the
window, listlessly glancing her eyes over what was on it.
It seemed to be a piece of an old newspaper, torn from
among the advertisements that had been printed a year or
two previous. As her eyes thoughtlessly ran over some of
the old notices, they rested on the following:
“ INFORMATION WANTED !-Information is wanted respecting the
whereabouts or place of residence of one Leander Sefton, and his wife
and child, who emigrated to this country from England some years


230
GIRL.
THE STRAWBERRY
since, the place of their location not being known by their friends
Any one knowing the family will confer a favor on them by sending
information to this office, or the family themselves will learn something
of great importance to them by calling at No. – Broadway, New
York.”
This, in addition, was duly signed and dated as a public
advertisement. What could it mean? The information
required most certainly alluded to their family. Julia was
not born when they came to this country, but she had fre-
quently heard her father and mother talk of their friends in
the old world, regretting that all communication was sus-
pended, and they and their connexions were buried to each
other. She read the notice over and over again, and
longed for her mother to come home. As it drew towards
night, she stood in the door and watched for her coming,
and so impatient was she, that minutes seemed as hours to
her.
At length, Julia discovered ner mother far up the road,
slowly wending her way home, and she could not wait until
she arrived, but ran off to meet her. The old lady saw
Julia running towards her, and could not for her life
imagine what was the matter. Julia soon, however, came
up, and in hurried accents communicated the contents of
the advertisement she had discovered.
Mrs. Sefton was surprised beyond measure. There
could be no doubt but that they were the persons sought
for. Her husband, she knew, was a connexion of a
wealthy family of the same name in England, and in his
sarly days it was supposed that he would inherit an estate


THE
231
STRAWBERRY
GIRL.
of some thousands on the death of an uncle ; but that uncle
they heard had died, and it was said that he left the pro-
perty to another.
After a day or two advising, it was decided that Julia
should proceed to New York, and make application at the
place designated in the advertisement; and accordingly
preparations were made for her to go on the important
expedition.
Unused to travelling and inexperienced, Julia knew
nothing of the ways of the world. There were four pas-
sengers in the coach in which she took her passage to New
York, all males, two of them rather aged, and the other
two were young men. Her youthful appearance and pretty
looks attracted attention from the young mon; and unpro-
tected as she was, her situation made her feel unpleasant
After an hour or two, however, one of the elderly gentle-
men, a Quaker, who lived in the city, seeing how she was
situated, felt interested for her, and kindly took her under
his charge, benevolently paying every attention to her she
needed during the numerous changes and stoppings; and
they reached the city the next day in the morning, stopping
at the stage-house in the Bowery.
Here her Quaker friend, after getting a room for her
accommodation, and having her trunk carried to it, left
her; and Julia retired, that she might, after taking some
refreshment, be ready to go out, and transact the business
of her journey.
She soon finished her toilet operation, and partook of a
comfortable breakfast. The room she occupied looked into
>


232
GIRL.
THE
STRAWBERRY
the street, and was over the stage-office; and just as she
had got ready to go out, she heard voices below, one of them
saying, “Here, take my card up to her—I know it must be
,
,
a lady I have seen!” and in a moment more she was sur-
prised by a servant at her door, who entered and handed
her a card, with the name of " Frank Linden” written
on it.
“O, where is he?" she involuntarily exclaimed, as she
saw the name; and confused and overjoyed, she looked at
the servant entreatingly.
“He is below, Miss," answered the servant.
6 Shall I
send him up ?”
“O, do!” she hastily and innocently replied, and the
servant stared at her and left the room.
“How fortunate this is ! ” joyfully murmured she to
herself; and in an instant more the door was thrown open
again, and she was in the arms of Frank Linden.
Frank had been walking that morning, and accidentally
stopping at the hotel after the stage arrived, saw the name
of Julia Sefton on the book, as taken from the way-bill,
and had immediately inquired for her.
It took but a few moments for Julia to tell Frank what
brought her to the city,—the circumstance of her discover-
ing the notice on the piece of old newspaper, and the pro-
bability that it was for them, the name of her father, and
the other members of the family in number, all correspond-
ing.
After the excitement of their meeting had a little sub.
sided, Frank accompanied Julia to the place mentioned in


THE STKA W BERRY GIRL.
233
the advertisement; and hearing the particulars, his surprise
and joy were scarce less than hers on finding that the fact
was, a large legacy in funds had been left to her father in
England,
-in case of his death it was to go to his heirs, of
which Julia was the only one.
After putting her business in a proper train, Frank took
Julia home to his mother and sister, introducing her, rela-
ting the object of her visit to the city, her success, and the
prospect of her becoming an heiress to a splendid fortune.
The Linden family received Julia as the acquaintance of
Frank, tendering her the hospitalities of their house, and
paid her every attention in their power; and as she had
necessarily to stay in the city a few days, she made their
house her home.
Frank's law studies, somehow, for a few days failed to
draw him to the office; he found it more pleasant to be
sitting with his sister Ann and Julia than to be poring over
Blackstone,-he was attending a suit at home, and he
gained his cause; for, ere Julia left, they had exchanged
Vows.
The morning after Frank had won his suit, as he was
making a confidant of his sister, alone by themselves, Julia
accidentally came into the room, just as Ann was saying to
her brother, “ And where is that old pistol, that has blown
to light the fortune of your beloved ?"
“Ay, where is my pistol, Julia ?" asked Frank, looking
towards her, “ I told Ann that it would be the instrument
of making a fortune.”
Julia blushed at the tell-tale looks of Frank, as she ro


234
GIRL.
THE
STRAWBERRY
plied, “It has indeed been a fortunate instrument,” and
she went to get the pistol out of her trunk.
Julia did not return home unaccompanied ; and on
Frank's third visit to see his uncle, some few months
after, she returned to the city with him as his bride.
Ann, who had now indeed got a sister in Frank's pretty
Strawberry Girl, as she embraced her as his wife, delivered
over the lock of hair, saying, “Here, Julia, is your hus-
band's keepsake to me. I was to hand it over when he got
married.”
Julia took the lock of hair, kissed and returned it again
to Ann, saying that as she had Frank himself, she could
well spare that much of him, requesting her to keep it in
remembrance of her brother and for her sake; and
laughingly clipping off one of her own golden curls,
which she presented, told her she could now have a part of
each, hoping she would never love them less for the keep-
sake.
Frank Linden finished his law studies, and became quite
eminent at the bar. In after years, when a group of
young
black-eyed, cherry-cheeked Lindens were fondling around
him, and Julia, one of them, said, “ Come, pa, tell us a
pretty story," he related the preceding; and when they had
listened, and asked the name of the story, he laughed and
sent them to ask their blushing ma, telling them he believed
it was called “ The Strawberry Girl, or the Old Pocket
Pistol."


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
235
RECORDS OF LITERARY LIFE.
NO. I.
THE AUTHOR'S BEYBEIT.
BY B.
B.
BLANK,
GENTLEMAN
DE
JURE.
66
66
а
“Why don't you try the stage, Blank ?" said a fortunate
son of commerce to an unfortunate son of commas, with
whom the good and great man had once most graciously
condescended to pass the evening and partake of a bottle
of wine.
I have tried it,” was the laconic response of the man
of letters.
You got the piece brought on the stage, didn't you ?”
os I did."
“ Then, of course, you had a benefit ?"
“I had, and such a benefit, too, as I shall not be likely
to forget.”
“What do you mean, Blank? the piece wasn't damned,
surely, on the author's benefit night?"
“Worser than that,' as the Fat Boy said."
66 Worse than that! It couldn't be worse than that.
Damnation is the climax of all misfortunes either in this
world or the next. But drop your mysticisms, and let us
hear all about it, at once.'
“I cannot promise you all ; but you shall hear a part.
>
ور


236
THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
But before beginning, and while there is yet time to recall
your rash request, I give you notice that a whole composed
of many such parts, would, as the Yankee says, be “pretty
considerable.' So, if after this warning, you persist in your
rash request, your anger and your énnui be upon your own
head."
“Be it so, only proceed—I am becoming interested.”
“He that will to Cupar, maun to Cupar,' saith the
proverb; so here goes :
“I believe I never told you that, in the course of my
literary career, I had once been a journalist. No matter.
I couldn't make it go, and that would be an end of it, only
that I believe that you could not well understand how I
fell into the one walk, without knowing something of how
I'fell out of the other. In my mind my connection with
the press and my connection with the stage are so indissolu-
bly connected that I could not conveniently think or speak
of the one without thinking or speaking of the other. You
cannot understand why this should be the case at present,
but you will fully appreciate it by and by.
“You no doubt recollect the case of Mr. Weller's friend,
the cobbler, who had been ruined by having had money be-
queathed to him. I always thought his case a strange one,
but I consider my own quite as strange. I lost public con-
fidence by convincing the public that I was honest. We
hear a great deal almost every day about honest and inde-
pendent journals. Believe me, my dear sir, there is no
such thing in existence. The possession of such a phe-
nomenon would make a nonentity of a nabob in a single


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
237
6
year.' My own party admitted that I was a clever enough
writer, but decidedly too candid for a politician, while our
opponents denounced me day after day, as a daring and
dangerous incendiary; at once an enemy to society and a
traitor to the commonwealth. It could not be that they
attached to myself personally, or to the press under my con-
.
trol, sufficient importance to justify such incessant and
systematic persecution; but their object must have been to
stab the party, to which I had dedicated my services,
through the side of its too fearless champion. Our folks,
however, were too wide awake' to give them the chance,
for they prudently and quietly washed their hands of a con-
cern that they soon perceived was calculated to do them
more harm than good.—Thus rendering the prayer of the
philosopher,' to be saved from his friends,' entirely super-
fluous so far as they were concerned ; they having effected
that consummation for themselves, without any necessity for
providential interference.
“ There is, I believe, no species of infatuation short of
absolute madness to compare with the unyielding perversity
that prompts the proprietor of a falling newspaper to per-
sist in its publication. Neither the desertion of his last
friend, nor the absorption of his last farthing, can admonish
him to pause in his suicidal career; but led on by a sort of
mocking monomania (for it cannot properly be called hope,)
similar to that which clings to the culprit at the gallows
foot, he persists from day to day, till either the mill-agent
refuses another ream of paper, or the sheriff lays hands
upon the press. And, indeed, even then, it is ten to orie,
6
.


238
THE AUTHOR'S DEEPI1.
that his diseased imagination will present the vision of
some great capitalist or influential politician, coming and
asking what is the matter, and, upon learning the state of
the case, laughing at the very idea of permitting such a
print as the to go down for the want of a few
thousands.
“It was during the exhaustion that is almost certain to
succeed one of those terrible and mysterious paroxysms,
that I first thought of writing for the stage. The severe
regimen prescribed, not by an eminent physician, but by an
empty purse, had completely reduced my malady and
restored my reason. Actuated by the instinct of self-
preservation, I had rented an apartment at three dollars per
month, which, though it might have been amply carpeted by
and ordinarily-sized shawl, was to suffice, in its own proper
person,' for sitting-room, sleeping-room, library, office, and
study; not to mention (for, in truth, they were scarcely
worth mentioning, its additional duties in its capacity of
pantry, kitchen, and cellar. It was therefore in the most
picturesque and secluded nook of this most picturesque and
secluded mansion, that, polishing and combining the fresh
and vigorous conceptions of genius by the most mature
judgment and severe artistic skill, I produced the immortal
work that was destined to "accrue to my benefit, in fame
and fortune, in the manner following:
“The fate of my journal, though it had not much shaken
my own faith in my own abilities, in the abstract, had
nevertheless inspired me with doubts as to the capacity of
the public to appreciate my talents. With becoming
6


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
239
-
6
*
modesty I concluded that the latter were of too high an
order to be properly estimated by any save the most en-
lightened portion of the most enlightened community; and
it was therefore with considerable misgivings as to its fate,
first with the manager, and subsequently with the managed,
that I began and finished what I believed in my own heart
to be a perfect gem of dramatic art.
“How I lived, or rather how I existed, during the period
of its creation, would, if faithfully and forcibly communi-
cated to the public, confer a benefit upon medical science
and domestic economy, compared with which the Author's
Benefit would be almost as nothing.* My books, wearing-
apparel, &c., remained at the residence of the only relative
who had latterly taken any interest in my affairs, and with
whom I had been occasionally stopping during the last days
of my unfortunate newspaper. My uncle (for in that rela-
tion did the kinsman in question stand to me), though a
good enough sort of man in his way, and not wholly indif-
ferent to the claims of ordinary poverty, had but little
sympathy for absolute destitution. Therefore to wait upon
him, in person, haggard and empty-handed as I then was,
would, I was well enough aware, be much more likely to
excite his indignation than to inspire his pity: and I had
sufficient experience of the prying and not over delicate
temperament of the testy old gentleman, to convince me
* I migkt, at some time, have been tempted to reveal the secrets of my prison.
house, but for two causes, one of which was, that I did not believe society had
merited such a service at my hand ; and the other was not merely an apprehension,
;
but a positive conviction, that the speculators in breadstuffs would have the reccrd
curned by the hand of the common hangman.


240
THE AUTHOR's 'BENEFIT.
that before surrendering my property to any third person
whom I might depute to receive it, he would demand an
amount of satisfaction which I was not just then in a con-
dition to afford. So that even the miserable resources
which I might otherwise have derived from these last rem-
nants of my property were thus effectually cut off; and I
was left to the operations of providence on the better feel.
ings of the better few of my former non-paying subscribers:
for it is but justice to the upper or more patronising class
of my friends and supporters to state, that they had, with
a delicacy of feeling that does them eternal honor, latterly
avoided me altogether. With the tact peculiar to refined
and cultivated minds, they must either have concluded that,
in my altered circumstances, their presence would be morti-
fying to my pride, or else that their countenance, at such a
juncture, might inspire hopes that it would be equally disa-
greeable to combat and imprudent to realize. But to pro-
ceed with my story. Like the criminal whose trial
approaches, my excitement became intense, as my drama
began to approach its close: but when, through the agency
of a friend, it was eventually placed in the hands of a
manager, and when some days had elapsed without my
hearing anything on the subject, my hopes and my agitation
began to subside together.
“In the meantime my every resource had become exhaust-
ed. Another instalment of rent was, for some days, due,
and my landlord, though still modest, was evidently becom-
ing melancholy. Winter had fairly set in; and I had
warmed myself by the last fagot that my last farthing


THE AUTHOR's
241
BENEFIT.
>
>
had purchased;' and was cold again. 'Every person and
every occurrence seemed to conspire against me. Ever
a dog, probably discovering through the a-Cute-ness of his
noble instinct,' that I was a person to be 'Put down,' had
contributed his mite to that consummation, by tearing the
skirt off my only coat.
“ While my affairs were thus evidently approaching a
crisis, I had one morning quite unexpectedly found a six-
pence in the pocket of an old vest, and as there had been
a heavy fall of snow the night before, I was just calculating
(now that I had the power of making a choice) whether it
would be better to buy arsenic, and stay within doors, or
borrow a shovel, and start out and try my fortune as a
cleaner of sidewalks. The instinct of gentility which had
once been the most potent ingredient in my composition, and
which even yet was not wholly eradicated from my systern,
at once suggested the preference of dying like a gentleman
to living like a sweep. It (the instinct aforesaid) moreover
insisted, that when men and angels had abandoned me,
there was one who had not; but with the consideration of a
brother, had furnished me with the means of reaching him-
self, where there could be little doubt I would meet a
hearty and warm reception : and that to appropriate the
remittance to any other use, than that contemplated by the
,
generous donor, would be, at once, an act of black ingrati-
tude and of base dishonor.
“ Considering the late scarcity of specie on the premises,
and the care with which every receptacle of that description
of property had been cleaned out, the turning up of the
6
11


242
THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
sixpence could scarcely be attributed to anything short of
supernatural agency. And taking it for granted that some
power had miraculously interfered, the sum remitted was
so much worse calculated to procure a meal than to pur-
chase a medicine, as to indicate clearly enough that my
unknown benefactor had made the advance for the purpose
of enabling me to terminate rather than protract my miser-
able existence. If the amount had been fifty, or even
twenty-five cents, there might have been some room to
doubt the exact intentions of the giver, but as it was, there
was nothing to leave the mind in any sort of suspense as
to the meaning. At least so it appeared to me, and in
vindication of the faith that was in me, I had already
reached the street, when what would undoubtedly have been
the last stage of my mortal pilgrimage, was suddenly inter-
rupted by a boy's stopping me to inquire for the residence
of a Mr. Blank. I told him that I was the person whom he
sought, and hastily requested to know his business. He as
hastily produced a letter which he said was from Mr.
the manager to whom had been submitted my play, and
handing it to me took his leave.
“What mysterious and inconsistent creatures we are !
an hour before I could have put a loaded pistol to my head,
or a poisoned cup to my lip, with an unshrinking purpose
and a steady hand, and now my agitation was such that I
was scarcely able to break the seal of a letter! I did,
however, break it at last, and learned from its contents that
my play had been accepted, and that my presence was
required at the theatre, the next morning, for the purpose
>


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
243
of hearing certain suggestions in regard to some slight alter-
ations that the manuscript required before being placed in
the hands of the actors. On the whole the communication
was as gratifying as I could have desired, unless it had
actually covered a remittance. The temperature of my
room rose at least thirty degrees in as many seconds, and
before the hour was out, I had about as much idea, either
of becoming a suicide or a sweep, as I had of inflicting per-
sonal chastisement on the man of the moon.
“The sudden change in my prospects affected not only a
very perceptible revolution in my own bearing, but also in
that of my friends. They were all so glad : though it was
nothing but what must have been expected. They had
known all along that a man like me could not be long kept
down. By the way, it was probably this conviction that
prevented them all from offering me the slightest assistance
to rise. But now that I was upon my legs, there was no
lack of hands to brush the dust off my garments, and there-
by obliterate all indication of my recent fall. Didn't I
want money, was the demand of one. Didn't I need a
regʻlar new fit-out o'clothes,' was the question of another.
Like the erudite and excellent Jedediah Cleishbotham, I
partook, in a 'moderate degree,' of the good things offered
by both ; and before even the week, whose beginning had
1
witnessed my all but confirmed resolve of quitting the world
entirely, had fully reached its close, I had taken, as it were,
,
a new lease of existenco; and, vanity apart, was already
about ás favorable a specimen of the ex-journalist as you
would be at all likely to encounter. So that, on the whole,
>


244
BENEFIT.
Τ Η Ε
AUTHOR's
it is but justice to the unknown benefactor, already referred
to, to admit, that whatever might be his 'intentions,'
whether, as Mr. Free would say, "vartuous' or otherwise,
his trifling donation had, for so far, been fortunate to me,
or at least coincidentally the precursor of a very uncommon
run of good luck.
“ The incessant vigilance of the energetic and experienced
manager was not long in bringing my fate, as a dramatist,
to the test of a fair trial; and as it is rather the effects of
the speculation upon the fortunes of the author, than a par-
ticular history of the production itself, that I propose to
communicate, I will let it suffice to state, that the charge of
the press, and the verdict of the play-going public (the
judge and jury in such cases), were as favorable as I could
have either reasonably hoped or desired. The piece had a
good run, as it is called, for several successive nights; and
at length the managerial conscience came to the conviction
that it was now time that the originator should derive some
advantage from a speculation, for so far, sufficiently suc-
cessful.
“In accordance with this praiseworthy conviction, the
Author's Benefit' was announced in due form; and apart
from the habitual and well-known good nature of the gen-
eral public on such occasions, I had reason to believe that
there were certain circumstances. involved, calculated to
render such benefit what, I believe, is technically denom.
inated a 'bumper.'
“ I have already intimated my high admiration of the re-
fined and unobtrusive delicacy that had, almost uniformly.


THE AUTHOR'S BENEF
245
T.
6
marked the course of my friends towards* me, subsequent
to the fall of my unfortunate journal, and also of the ready
and generous outburst of satisfaction with which I was
welcomed back to their circle the moment that there was
even a prospect of my being able to enter it on terms that
would not be humiliating to myself. But, strange to tell,
there were others who, either from their natural distrustful-
ness, could not, or from their instinctive hatred of what-
ever is lofty and refined, would not, see the matter in the
same light in which I viewed it; and some of these even
carried their scepticism or their malice so far as to publish
a series of very ungenerous and offensive strictures upon
the relative position of 'Shakspeare and his Friends,' in
one of the most meddling and, I am sorry to say, not the
least influential, of the daily papers.
Now, whatever may have been the amount of my indig-
nation at this daring invasion of the sanctity of private
friendship, I could not but foresee that, so far as my coming
benefit was concerned, it must be, on the whole, beneficial.
In the first place, it was salculated to give the affair an
unusual degree of notoriety; and, secondly, if there were
any of my friends who felt that their conduct had, in any
degree, justified the malice or misconception to which it had
been exposed, the ' benefit' was sure to be seized by them as
an easy and graceful opportunity of quietly giving the lie to
the insinuations of their traducers; as it afterwards ens
abled them to say, or, what was still better, enabled others
. The word 'towards," as it occurs in the text, is, of course, not to be "taken in
its literal sense )


246
THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
6
to say for them, “ If the friends of Mr. Blank, knowing
that they had a gentleman to deal with, did not imper-
tinently invade the sanctity of his humble retreat during
his temporary obscurity, had they not, when a legitimate
and appropriate opportunity of bettering his circumstances,
without wounding his feelings, presented itself, come to the
restue, as friends ought ?' And that I had not over-
estimated the circumstances, public and private, that bore
favorably on the coming event,' I had the satisfaction of
seeing amply demonstrated, by the presence, at an early
hour, of, perhaps, one of the largest and most respectable
audiences ever convened on the mere occasion of a common
theatrical performance.
“ I need not say that, during an existence much more
frequently and deeply marked by disappointment and humil-
iation than by honor and triumph, this was the proudest
moment. But a moment, and a moment only, it was des-
tined to be; for after two or three manifestations of im-
patience by the audience for the rise of the curtain, the
manager presented himself, and after expressing his own
extreme sorrow and mortification at the circumstance,
stated that the person who had hitherto so successfully re-
presented the principal character in the new piece had reck-
lessly, and, he might add, criminally rendered himself en.
tirely unfit for appearing before them on the present occa-
sion; and as a proper substitute could not now be obtained,
he proposed, with their permission, to offer for their present
amusement something else ; and that the consummation of
the highly meritorious purpose which, to their great honor


THE AUTHOR's BENEFIT.
247
6
6.
had brought them together in such multitudinous numbers,
would be postponed till some more fortunate occasion, when
he hoped to be able to obviate the very possibility of further
disappointment.
“A murmur, evidently of dissatisfaction, was the only
response : and thus ended the first act,' if not of the new
play, at least of the kindred drama of "The Author's
Benefit.
“ If the evil genius' that had, almost from my childhood,
dogged my footsteps, baffled my energies, and thwarted all
my better purposes, was still, as it would seem, resolved to
exercise its sinister influence in my affairs, it was evident
that the energy of my new colleague, the manager, would
give it something to do. True to his late promise, the bills
soon again announced the Author's Benefit in imposing
form, with the additional, and highly important announce-
ment, that the principal character was to be sustained by
-, a new theatrical star whose effulgence had
lately burst upon and dazzled an astonished and admiring ·
world.
“From all this you will perhaps conclude that if the evil
genius aforesaid, had had any agency in making the man,
who should have appeared on the former occasion, 'unca-
pable,' its geniusship had proved itself as shortsighted in its
malignity as if it had been an ordinary mortal ; as the cir-
cumstance had only the effect of removing an ordinary
performer, to have his place supplied by one who brought to
the task all the talent and eclat of a distinguished master.
Be this, however, as it may, such were the promising, nay
Mr. -
6


248
THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
even highly imposing auspices under which my second bene-
fit, or rather the second section of my benefit, was ushered
in.
“ With the view of having a quiet and uninterrupted
opportunity of observing the general effect of my own handi-
work, and especially of discovering now near the perform-
ers would come to the realization of my own conceptions of
the respective characters, I made my way, with some diffi-
culty, to a box opposite the stage, and took my seat close
beside a genteel and intellectual-looking man, when the
commencement of the play at once attracted all my atten-
tion.
“The early part of the performance, which, of course,
was merely preliminary, passed off pleasantly and popularly
enough, but on the first appearance of the strange actor,
I was astonished to find that the applause which greeted
his advent was mingled, or rather accompanied, with unmis-
takable manifestations of a very different character.
“ What is the meaning of this? I mutterd to myself,
but loud enough, it would seem, to be heard by my quiet
neighbor, who replied by asking me if I had not been pre-
pared for something of this sort.
“I answered in the negative.
6. Then you have not read this morning's?'
“I had merely glanced over a portion of its columns,
but had not had leisure to read it with any attention.
"You are not then aware,' continued my new acquaint-
ance, that this strange actor is accuscd of having, on a
tertain occasion, offered a wanton and public insult to our


THE
249
AUTHOR'S
BENEFIT.
as this."
country;* ard that consequently his sojourn amongst us is
not likely to be either a pleasant or a profitable one. For
my own part, I must confess myself one of that unpopular
class, known as lovers of law and order, and would, at pre-
sent, much rather be allowed to enjoy the play, in which I
feel already interested, than witness any insult to the
National Honor avenged on such an occasion, and in such
1 manner,
66 There was no time for further comment. Every portion
of the densely crowded house was now in one tremendous
uproar : one party going for the play and the player, and the
Other (the more formidable and reckless, if not the more
numerous one) equally intent to cut short the career of
both.
“As I have neither leisure, inclination, nor ability to
give even a faint description of the scene that ensued, I
shall substitute for the attempt, one, or rather both, of the
somewhat trite, but still serviceable phrases, which the
1
* As, in this age of literary scepticism, there might be found some even of so
"little faith” as to doubt the authenticity of “The Author's Benefit,” and to regara
it rather as a clumsily-concocted romance, than as a simple and genuine sample of
auto-biography, narrated, as itself declares, for the temporary amusement of a
friend, and afterwards committed to writing, at his request : and as such "unbe.
licvers,” in attempting to sustain their imputations by "internal evidence,” would
be likely to point to the circumstances detailed in this part of the narrative as
bearing too striking a resemblance to those connected with the tragedy of Astor
Place, for mere coincidence; I therefore most solemnly declare, that, so far from
such resemblance, which I readily admit, being entitled to any weight as an evi.
donce against the genuineness of the whole, the work, if I may so dignify it, was in
manuscript, with those incidents which are now resemblances included, at least
nighteen months before the unfortunate event that made them such occurred.
The Futhor


250
.
THE
AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
6
6
6
>
(6
wisdom of our ancestors' has left for such case made and
provided'-namely, that the scene in 'question is much
more easily imagined than described ;' and to be duly
appreciated must have been really seen.'
“You will now perceive what, as an old dramatist, I did
not choose to put you in possession of, by an undramatic
anticipation—namely, that in standin' trait,' and in the
transfer or substitution thereby effected, my 'familiar
spirit, as I may well call it, had in no degree invalidated
its claim to be considered a 'cute genius' as well as an
evil' one.
Its (for a time) "hidden purpose’ in that trans-
action is now, I think, sufficiently apparent.
“As might have been expected of a person so well
accustomed to failure and disappointment, I was now pretty
thoroughly convinced, that whatever notoriety, or, if you
please, immortality, I might have derived from my Benefit,
it was likely to be a misnomer in the general and most
important acceptation of the term.
I had, moreover,
learned with astonishment, but from a source whose purity
I had no reason to doubt, that the foundation upon which I
had lately erected my hopes of pecuniary salvation was,
unless on the very surface, a mere "bed of sand :' in other
words that my friend and patron, the manager, though
popular and plausible in his manners, had hitherto so
managed matters' that all the advantages of every specu-
lation in which he engaged, had uniformly accrued to him-
self; and all the disadvantages as uniformly to his less
fortunate colleagues.
“ The pressure of necessity, almost the only motive power
2


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
251
that could ever give me either energy or alacrity, and aided,
es it now was, by the torture of suspense, impelled me to
seek an immediate interview with his Managerial Highness,
and to come to a fair, or even an unfair understanding
with him at once. And having obtained the desired oppor.
tunity, I began by declaring my entire conviction that the
difficulties that had hitherto surrounded our connection were
entirely owing to the visible ill-luck that had, with scarcely
an interval, haunted myself and my affairs from my child-
hood till the present hour; and that such being my convic-
tion (a conviction sustained alike by former experience and
recent occurrences), I could not, in honor or justice, persist
in involving a more fortunate patron, who had endeavored to
serve me, in consequences which, I was aware, had their
root in my own sinister and mysterious destiny.-That the
early success of the piece was, at least, presumptive evi-
dence that, so soon as my immediate or pecuniary interest
should ccase to be involved, the ordinary tide of fortune,
which had been temporarily affected by such interest, would
return to its accustomed channels, and to the ordinary per-
formance of its natural ebbs and flows.-That I was, there.
fore, come to ' renounce forever' all further interest (pecu-
niary, of course) in the affair ; and that for such renun-
ciation I was willing to accept the nett proceeds of the
house, on either of the evenings which had been set apart
for my benefit.
“Of this not apparently unreasonable proposal, however,
the manager did not at all approve, though there was nothing
in such disapproval that appeared either unreasonable in
6


252
BENEFIT.
THE
S
AUTHOR
6
6
itself or uncomplimentary, so far as I was concerned. The
Author's Benefit;' he was resolved, should have, at least,
another chance. Its abandonment at such a point, and
under such circumstances, would, he argued, be as undig-
nified as injudicious, and altogether such a concession to the
threats of a 'cloudy morning' as he was neither accus-
tomed nor disposed to make. Moreover, the adoption of
such a course would, he insisted, be especially unjust to me,
so far as my literary reputation was concerned. My friends
had never yet had an opportunity of judging of my produc-
tion, and as nothing but the fact of the pecuniary interest
of their friend being involved could ever bring them out in
such numbers as they had before congregated in, they would
never have such an opportunity as would be afforded by
another benefit. Furthermore, the slander or misconcep-
tion which had been the cause of the late disturbance had
been fully and satisfactorily explained, and those very per-
sons who took a lead in that disgraceful affair were now
most anxious for an opportunity of obliterating the recol-
lection of the part they had acted, by rushing into the op-
posite extreme. So that the piece would still have the
advantage of the distinguished talents of which it was so
likely to be deprived.
“ The 'manifest destiny' apprehension upon which I had
mainly rested for a justification of my intended course, he
absolutely laughed to scorn; declaring his perfect willing-
ness to incur his share of the consequences, though my
ministering angel' should do its worst. In short, he wag
resolved that my adjourned benefit should be immediately


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
253
announced; and as I had no plausible ground for further
objection, announced it was.
“I recollect having once met a very worthy clergyman, at
the house of a widow whose first husband had been shot
dead by robbers at her side, in the bridal chamber, during
the honeymoon, whose second, scarcely two years after-
wards, had broken his neck by a fall down stairs; and the
question having arisen as to the probable fate of the third
(for she was still young, handsome, and comparatively rich,
and therefore not likely to be a widow long), the clerical
opinion was, that, as the third time was the charm, the
natural, or rather supernatural, conclusion would consign
him to the gallows.'
“I should be sorry to do the motives of any, but more espe-
cially those of my own friends, the slightest injustice; but
in view of the fact that the latter had already acquitted, nay,
more than acquitted, themselves honorably as to any claim
that I could have had upon them, I cannot even yet wholly
banish the suspicion that it must have been some such pre-
sentiment as the foregoing, in regard to the final result of
this my third attempt to wrest fame and fortune from the
grasp of Fate, that could again bring them out, as they did
come, in even more overwhelming numbers than on either
of the former occasions. And as to the general public, all
the anticipations of my far-seeing colleague secmed even
more than realized. The house, as I have just intimated,
was not only crowded to an uncomfortable and even danger-
ous excess, but hundreds, as I was told, had to go away
without being able to gain admittance on any terms. The


254
THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
6
reception of the formerly obnoxious actor proved that the
reaction upon which the manager had calculated was not
only extensive but complete; and as, little to the credit of
human nature, men are generally more ready to respond to
the new-born admiration of converted opponents than to re-
ward the tried fidelity of older friends, the personage in ques-
tion seemed to outdo himself, or at least to soar far above
even the most extravagant anticipations that had already
been formed of his talents as an almost unrivalled artist.
“ The piece had reached the crisis of development, and
the excitement, of course, was at its highest pitch, when,
preceded by a slight but perceptible disorder on the stage,
the appalling word ' Fire ! fell upon our ears, with all its
terrible significance. The scene that followed I leave to
your own imagination; and if it can vividly depict the state
of things that might be naturally supposed to occur, if, by
some powerful intercession or special act of Divine grace
and mercy, all the inhabitants of the lower regions were
allowed one minute, and no more, to escape from their
hitherto hopeless captivity, by two or three narrow and
difficult points of egress, you may come near realizing a
scene in a theatre,' such as the most incessant and enthu-
siastic play-goer had, perhaps, never witnessed before.
“ With the most horrifying sights and sounds stunning
my already half-stupified senses, I was borne in the direc-
tion of one of the doors, where, for a time, I believe, I
struggled as desperately as the best; but an overwhelming
wave of the maddened multitude pressing on from the rear,
I experienced a crushing sensation, such as might have been
6
a


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
255
produced by some powerful machinery, and then, no doubt
much to my immediate ease and comfort, lost consciousness
altogether.
“When I recovered my senses, I found that I was again
within the classical retreat that had witnessed, in my re-
gard, the early coyness and subsequent condescensions of
the dramatic muse. I had, perhaps fortunately, still re-
tained possession of it, though for some weeks past a sojour-
ner at one of the fashionable hotels, the proprietor of which
had, as Pecksniff would say, very naturally failed to re-
cognize me when presented in the forlorn condition in which
I had been picked up in the street. And hence, to borrow
the language of commerce, I was still to be found at the
old stand.'
“I had, it appeared, been recognized by some friends of
the stiff,* who, in the confusion, had providentially stum-
bled upon me as I lay in the gutter, nearly naked, entirely
insensible, and apparently dead. Yes, my dear sir, such is
the instability of human greatness! In such deserted and
inglorious condition was I found in the immediate vicinity of
my recent triumphs; nay, upon a spot to which I must cer-
tainly have been borne upon the shoulders of a shouting
multitude !
“In perfect accordance with, and confirmation of, my
theory, that I was another Tineman, upon a small scale,
and that the blows that had, of late, so mysteriously fallen
upon those by whom I was surrounded had been covertly
'
.
* The phrase applied by the elder Free, in his official communications, tc denota
the nearest of kin or connexion to the deceased.


256
BENEFIT.
THE
A UTHOR's
aimed at myself, I learned that, of the sufferers by the late
catastrophe, I had the honor of being the chief. By a dis-
pensation which, under the circumstances, was as miracu-
lous as it was merciful, no one, save myself, had sustained
serious injury. I did, it is true, hear of one old lady who
pertinaciously clung to the idea that she had been trampled
to death; but as her case presented none of the usual
symptoms of such a fate, and as the medical authority
was moreover decidedly against her, she secured but few
adherents to her opinion, and was compelled to retire, in
disgust, to her former home, where she was said to have
made a desperate but ineffectual attempt to terminate an
existence, thus unnaturally forced upon her, by swallowing a
strong dose of warm brandy and oysters.
“ To say that the fire at the theatre had ended, as it
began, in smoke, would be claiming for it no exemption
from the ordinary fate of fires, as most, if not all, others do
the same ; but it had differed from the generality of its
class in the somewhat important particular of having at
no time emitted any fiercer or more destructive property.
So that the manager, with his usual good fortune, had
escaped comparatively scathless; a circumstance at which
I heartily rejoiced, not more for his sake than my own; as
he had, therefore, no pretext, if he should chance to desire
one, for withholding at least a portion oi the proceeds of the
strange, strangely-protracted, and strangely-terminating
Beneſit, which, with all its strangeness, had, undoubtedly,
produced sufficient to benefit somebody. Who that fortu.
Date somebody was eventually to be, was now the question


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
257
and a question which the temper exhibited by certain gen.
tlemen, who had lately honored me with a succession
of calls, was likely to bring to a somewhat innmediate
issue.
“ As I think your interest in the whole affair must, by
this time, be pretty well' used up,' I will not trouble you
· with a particular account of the number and variety of my
attempts to impress upon my late colleague the unequivocal
justness of my claims, and what was still more important,
to inspire him with a disposition to settle them. Let it
suffice to say, that they were all entirely fruitless. Indeed
it would appear that, as his special mission was to manage
others, he had, to prevent mistakes, been endowed with the
prerogative of being entirely unmanageable himself.
“He did not, however, go so far as to absolutely deny
that I had claims; but that he also had claims must not be
forgotten. He had had losses too, for which he must be
indemnified, in the first place, and as the extent of those
losses could not yet be ascertained, I must rest contented,
at least, for the present.
With the truthfulness of his intimation that the extent
of his losses in the transaction was somewhat hard to
ascertain, I was perfectly satisfied. But the resting con-
tented was not quite so easily realized,' with my house,
which should have been my castle, at least two-thirds of
the day in the undisputed occupation of my creditors.
“Howsever,' as an old friend of mine used to say, at
the end of some five or six weeks after the fire, and like a
patient and discreet, but withal dignified plenipotentiary
>


258
.
THE
AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
who has vainly exhausted every legitimate means to obtain
a peaceful recognition of his country's claims, I brought the
fruitless negotiation to a close, by formally demanding-
not my passports, but what in my case was perfectly identi-
cal-my Manuscript.
“ The bearer of this, my last diplomatic note, returned
with an intimation that the great man would himself call
upon me in the course of an hour; and to this one promise
he was faithful.
" At about the termination of the stipulated period, a
rap which told of offended dignity as plainly as a rapa
could, raised me from a sort of half-slumber, half-reveriv, to
which I was then subject; and on my uttering the words,
Come in,' the manager, more richly dressed, and alto-
gether more dignified and imposing in his appearance than
I had ever before seen him, entered the room.
offer of a seat he paid not the slightest attention; but broke
in by remarking that he had had the honor of receiving a
note from me.
“Yes, I had taken the liberty of writing for the purpose
of recovering my manuscript.
66. There it is, then !'. he rejoined, flinging, as he spoke,
a package, which I had not till then observed, directly in
my face, and after regarding myself and my humble resi-
dence with a momentary but deliberate look of the most
withering contempt, turned towards the door, which, from
the very limited dimensions of the apartment, was, of
course, not far distant.
But near as it was, he was not destined to reach it in
To my


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
259
safety and in triumph. Stung to absolute madness, by the
first gross insult that I had ever received, and that, too,
offered by one who had already so deeply wronged me, I
seized a heavy walking-stick which I had used since my
accident, and which therefore lay on the table before me,
and with one blow brought the strong and proud man pros-
trate and bleeding to the floor. But no wonder that that
blow told: it was the expression—the embodiment of the
indignation and revenge of a spirit long irritated, and now
wantonly outraged.
“I am confident that, even in my frenzy, I did not repeat
the blow, and when my excitement had sufficiently passed
away to allow me to contemplate the effects of my unwonted
fury, I saw that my enemy was still prostrate and motion-
less. At first I did not feel any great apprehensions as
to the consequences, knowing, as I did, that he was an
extremely strong, robust, and healthy man, in the prime of
life, and had received but one blow of an ordinary-sized
stick, wielded by an arm that had never been a strong one.
But when eventually becoming alarmed at the length and
unbroken stillness of his swoon, I stooped down to examine
his condition more closely, I found that, though there was
still something like warmth in the vicinity of the heart, the
extremities were cold and pulseless, nay already stiffening-
that-Father of Mercy-he was dead ! -
Distracted as I was, I had presence of mind sufficient to
induce me to take my hat, and to put the few shillings I
possessed in my pocket; and I had also the courage to tell
the nearest apothecary, with what degree of composure I


260
AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
THE
know not, that an accident had occurred at No.
st.
where his services might be required.
"My wisest course would now have been to deliver
myself up at once to the proper authorities, and declare the
truth, which both the appearance of the room and of the
deceased, as well as what was known of both our characters,
would have strongly corroborated : and as there had been
but one blow struck, and that in the heat of passion, and
under strong provocation, my punishment might have been
a comparatively light one. But though the propriety of
such a course may possibly have presented itself to my dis-
tracted and terrified imagination, it could have no effect; as
Flight-Flight and Distance from that fatal room and its
silent inhabitant, were the absorbing ideas of my mind and
the sole impulses of my actions. And so powerfully and
rapidly did they impel me, that, without other agency than
that of my own weak limbs, unnerved, as they were, by
recent illness, and still more recent and exhausting excite-
ment, before that fatal day had terminated in midnight, I
was at least forty miles both from my victim and the scene
of his sacrifice. And it was now, in the deep solitude of the
dark forest, and in the unbroken stillness of midnight, that
I had first leisure and power to compute the full advanta-
ges which I had actually derived from my Benefit ; and the
results of my calculation were-Bankruptcy, Fugitation
and Murder, in possession; and in reversion, or prospect,
the Gallows and a Dishonored Grave!
“Having thus, as I trust, convinced you, that my con-
nection with the stage was somewhat more interesting than


THE AUTHOR's
261
BENEFIT.
6
advantageous, and that I have no great reason to anticipate
any very brilliant results from a renewal of it, I would now
dismiss the subject with, as the orators say, 'returning you
my most sincere thanks for the patience with which you
have heard mo throughout.' But as you may, perhaps, be
still somewhat curious to know how it is that I am again in
the same city where I was the agent in so terrible and
tragical an occurrence, and free, and even apparently will-
ing to avow the act, I will, with your permission, endeavor
I
to account for the circumstance, in as few additional words
as possible.
“ Know then, that, after a pilgrimage of some weeks,
eleven successive nights of which I had passed under the
blue vault of heaven,' which, both for my own sake and that
of Poetry, I am sorry to say, did not always look so blue as
I sometimes did myself, under its influence, * I came to a
place in what was then the western wilderness, where some
hundreds of men were engaged in digging a canal. By a
singular coincidence certainly, the contractor to whom I
applied for employment chanced to be an old friend and
even a distant relative of my own. And despite the dis-
guiso that I had intentionally assumed, powerfully aided as
6
* In addition to some two or three ordinary thunder-storms, I had, during this
more interesting than altogether agreeable portion of my experience, not merely
the privilege of beholding, but the honor of encountering one of those magnificent
outbursts of natural temper' called Tornadoes, which, in my own presence, and in
a moment, reversed the position of the largest trecs, and, as I was told, in the
neighboring valleys brought navigation to such a pitch of perfection and con
venience, in a few hours, as enabled the denizens of the favored region to embark
from their sleeping-room windows, and, in some i istances, from their very lied
vides !


262
AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
THE
it was by the effects of the trials through which I had
recently passed, he knew me at once. And when, in very
natural and unſeigned surprise, he asked me what, in the
name of Misfortune, could have brought me there, and in
such a plight, as I was never a good hand at a lie, and as ]
had moreover full faith in his friendship and honor, I, with-
out hesitation, confessed to him the whole truth.
"I will not, of course, in what was to be but a sort of
verbal postscript, inflict upon you a treatise on the pleasures
of canal-digging in the wilderness, but will let it suffice to
say, that both my employer and co-laborers (for which may
God bless them !) did all within their power to render it to
me, forlorn fugitive that I was, as endurable as possible.
“I had, I should suppose, been some three weeks labor-
ing in my new vocation, when I was one night, at a late
hour, aroused from a troubled sleep to learn that the gen-
eral wished to see me immediately, in his own tent.
“That my retreat had been discovered was the only
natural conclusion, and if escape were still possible, my
present city of refuge,' humble and unenviable as it cer-
tainly was, must be exchanged for a state of much greater
precariousness and still more utter desolation.
time, however, that I had reached my immediate destina-
tion, I had regained my wonted composure, and was pretty
well prepared to encounter the very worst. At all events,
I was not in hands to trifle with my suspense, and soon
learned the cause of the unwonted summons. A son of my
friend and employer had just arrived from the seaboard,
and had brought him a number of newspapers, in one of
6
By the


THE AUTHOR'S BENEFIT.
263
,nar-
which he had accidentally discovered a paragraph which he
believed of sufficient interest to me to justify an invasion of
my repose. He pointed it out, and it read nearly as follows:
6. UNPARALLELED BASENESS.-Our readers need not be informen
that, some six weeks ago, that emperor of dramatic purveyors,
rowly escaped falling a sacrifice to the fury of one of his bards; but they
may not be aware that when it was discovered that the vital spark was
not wholly extinguished, he was, for the sake of greater convenience,
removed to the hospitable residence of his friend Mr. where his
wants and wishes were not only anticipated by the numerous and well-
qualified officials of that magnificent establishment, but where his
recovery was facilitated by the active and unwearied superintendence
of certain members of the family : and of a surety, it will be news to
most of them (and news that they will scarcely be willing to credit)
when they learn that the author of such munificent hospitality has
been rewarded by the recipient with the seduction of his beautiful,
highly accomplished, and hitherto amiable and virtuous wife. Such,
however, is undoubtedly the fact. The guilty couple departed for
Europe in the Havre packet of Saturday, and the most unfortunate and
deeply-injured husband is to embark for London at noon to-day.
“ As our paper is just going to press, we have neither room nor
leisure for comment, but will return to the subject to-morrow.'
The state of my feelings, after perusing the foregoing,
would furnish an important proof, if proof were wanting, of
how completely circumstances can alter cases. Almost
from my very childhood I had regarded gross breaches of
confidence and hospitality as the most unmitigated indignity
that could be offered either to God or to Society; and now
an absolute devil, nay the very fiend whose special mission
it was to suggest anıl mature the whole transaction, could
not have gloated over that paragraph (the formal record of
his own success with such unmingled ecstasy as I did
66


264
BENEFIT.
.
THE AUTHOR'S
And is there any one so stupidly insensible as to wonder
that such should be the case? Whatever might be the
extent of my future misfortunes, and certainly my pros-
pects wero none of the brightest, the brand of Cain was
at least removed, and I might again turn my footsteps
towards the haunts of civilization, and look, without terror,
upon the face of my fellow-man.”
“ That is a good story, Blank : at least too good to be
lost. What will you take for putting it into manuscript ?”
" The honor conferred by the request is more than suffi-
cient recompense.
It shall be done."
“Nonsense, man! Do as I tell you, and you shall be
paid in something more convertible than honor. By all
accounts, you have had enough of that sort of payment
already."
Whether the request was merely a delicate method of
offering assistance, or was made with the purpose of intro-
ducing me to the notice of some of his literary friends, I
know not, and am not likely to know. Before the mission,
trifling as it was, was executed, he who had given it was
not in the way either to explain his purposes or to fulfil
them. He was no more—at least in America; and as he
had either neglected or forgotten to mention my case to
those who were competent to act for him, the manuscript of
“ The Author's Benefit” might have shared the obscurity
of many others of its humble and unknown kindred, but
for what, I much fear, will be found to be the too favorable
opinion of the distinguished gentlemar under whose aus.
pices it is now given to the public.





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