i I i B -NRLF 3 3E7 ma Rumor. BY THE AUTHOR OF COUNTERPARTS," AND "CMARLES AUChEST£K. 1^ ^-^ ^^^vs .IBRARY OF THi: University of California. CIRCUl / I Estnrn in ^aif week^^ or a week \it\ibxz the end of the ^^Jtac Ik dt Bumo r. BY THE AUTHOR OF « CHARLES AUCHESTER," "COUNTERPARTS," Em /■ i£/^.a^/A ^3\ Q^Lj^h^d 7 ' Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil, Nor in the glistering foil Set off to the world, nor in broad Rumor lies; But lives and spreads aloft b_v those pure eyes, And perfect witness of all-judging Jove; As He pronounces lastly, on each deed. Of so much fame in Heaven, expect thy meed." LYCinAs. BOSTON": ESTES A.lsrD LA.XJIIIA.T, 143 WASHINGTON STREET. 1874. 3s~^y^ RUMOR. QUIA n CHAPTER I. It was a mid-August evening, warm and cloudless, and very dusty on a certain bigh road in England, along whose foot-path were pressing two travellers, a woman and a youth. The way was monotonously bounded on one side by a long wall, enclosing shrubbe- ries pertaining to a retired manufacturer, who had found it very easy to plant trees, but im])o.ssil)le to force from them prema- turely the solemn s])lendors of profound an- cestral shades. Lamps at regular distances showed the road onwards straight and un- winding within the sight, and the view across the road, by daylight a breadth of pasture, deep grceu or clover-flush, now seemed a purple Hat, over which the soft wind wan- dered, each breath heaving with stolen fra- grances, or laden still more heavily with the distant thunder of the train, and the dimin- ished, wailful shriek of its guardian monster. The wayfarers must have been weary, for before they reached the angle of the wall, they both stopped, and the woman sat down to rest on the bank, which, spotted with scanty grass, half choked with dust, sloped to the (lustier road. She said some words to her companion, and he nodded for reply, and then stood on beside her, with his large hat, of a somewhat outlandish form, slouched over his brows, and his right foot beating constantly on the ground. Presently a water-cart — strange spectacle after sunset upon so lone a road — creaked slowly by, scattering its broad stream over the hissing dust. It w^as scarcely out of sight when a carriage followed it, seen by the light of its own lamps, and whose driver, steeds, and occupants alike received the benefit of the cooled and moistened track. It was going at full speed, and in another instant would have passed the travellers, when its course was arrested by the youth himself, Avho stepped into the road, and walked full pace towards the horses ; there- by causing the conscientious coachman to piiU them up, much more on account of their fresh and timid blood, than for fear of running over a human being in a slouched hat, who had the further audacity to advance to the window as the carriage stopped, and to tap upon the glass, which was up then, but dashed down in another moment. " Who are you, and what do you want ? " inquired a lady, whose spirited tones betrayed not the least alarm, though her only com- panion was another lady. The youth bowed, or rather nodded, then raised his head which had been sunk upon his breast, and cast a peering glance on both those fair faces. The hat was dragged off after that scrutiny, and a very lowly though awkward recogni- tion followed in a bow. He fumbled with one hand a little, and at length produced a letter. " I wish to know where these people live," said he in broken EngHsh. " To whom then is it addressed ? " asked the elder lady, and she took the letter in her hand, and read the superscription by the light of a lamp hanging from the carriage top. For these ladies whenever so travel- ling together, did not waste their time ; when not speaking they studied or read to- gether, and were in all respects like devotedly attached sisters, except that they were mother and daughter. "What a singular — extraordinary coin- cidence — why Elizabeth, this letter is for us ; and the writing too is the old scrawl, Schenk's hieroglyphic — who is to make it out ? " " Let me look, mamma." And the two heads touched one another, bending over the letter. They spelled, smiled, laughed together as though no one else were by. " The letter is for you ther, lady, as you open it," said the youth, who Avas still stand- ing close to the window, and looking in full upon them ; thus placed, however, not seem- ing rude, if his behavior were so. Now ne spoke German. The lady who had addressed him first looked up, and answered in that language. " It. was very impertinent to open it with- (3) RUMOR. out telling you first it was for us ; but my old friend's writing made me forget for a moment every thing else. But it would have saved you some trouble if you had inquired at the station where we lived ; they know." " Ah, but I could not pronounce the name, and I would not show the letter, because it would pei-haps have been stolen, and it is all I have in the world, except something which is not of value yet. Now," changing his moody tone for one of sharp vivacity, " which way am I to go to find your house ? at least not your house, of course I know my place, though you will let me see you there, an/' will do more than that, for Schenk promised me so. But my mother is with me, and is sick with the journey ; she is sitting out there on the bank, and I must take her to an inn." " Strange to bring her ! Schenk does not say so," whisjjered the mother to the daughter, noiselessly close at her ear ; but the whisper was heard. " She goes with me every where," he said, in a sharp and scornful voice. " Your daughter does not leave yoti." The ladies glanced at each other, and in their mute eye-language, expressive to each other, they inquired, " What shall we do Avith both ? " at least, the mother's eye in- quired so ; but the daughter answered alone in English. " We must take them back, mam- ma, it is three miles to Northeden now, and I am sure no one who has come from the station can walk so far, particularly if tired." The mother looked amazed, and somewhat anxious. " Go back ? but if so we shall not get to Walden until eleven, nay twelve o'clock, and Charles will be so terribly alarmed about you, and will think you are taken suddenly ill." " Oh no, he always has true presenti- ments, never false ones. A little anxiety will season him, he will have plenty of it in time to come. We cannot leave that pale creature sitting in the dust. Turn the horses' heads, draw up at the side of the road, and then when we have taken up those two persons, return to Northeden, and stop at the Homestead Inn." This last part of the sentence, delivered as an order, was directly obeyed ; evidently the servants were accustomed to witness acts of eccentric kind- ness on the part of their employers. The door was opened, the youth handed his mother into the cai-riage, and followed him- self, quite as a matter of course. She was so exhausted that she was soon asleep, and he would have shut himself up, as it were, with closed lids and lips, as though asleep, had not the elder lady asked him " How did you know me ? How did you trust the let- ter to me ? Might I not also have stolen it ? " " I know a thief when I see one," was the reply. " First I thought that ladies, or any body in so fine a carriage, could tell me the way to take. And when I saw you I knew you from the picture you gave Schenk." " Has he kept that scratch all these years P the lady asked. There was a nod, but no further reply or remark, the hat Avas dragged down again over the brows, and the face sunk again upon the breast. " It has not taken long you see, mamma," said Elizabeth, as they stopped at the door of a picturesque country inn, with lights gleaming through crimson blinds below, and behind white curtains above, at the windows ; and to the master of which, when he came out, his round countenance elongated like a face in a spoon, by surprise, the elder lady explained something which only drew it down the longer, though at the same time it was warped across by a smile, made grim with reverence. The woman woke up ; the youth handed her out as composedly as he had handed her in, and Avhile she stared round her, courtesied, and poured forth an inarticulate babble of gratitude, he looked on with an air almost impatient, and although he said " I thank you, lady," it Avas rather in the tone of a superior Avho acknoAvledges his due, than of an inferior (or even an equal), benefited by an act of unusual, and most opportune courtesy. " NoAv fresh horses, mamma," said Eliza- beth, " and Ave shall in no time be there." CHAPTER II. The mother and daughter entered the ball-room at the auspicious moment AA'hec, supper was served; auspicious for them, be- cause its formality all broken up, the croAvd pressing outAvards, armed Avith one desire — a very natural one after the fatigue of a festival at the sultry autumn fall, that of refreshing itself — left them an almost de- serted room behind it. The gentlemen of the croAvd Avere many of them gay in military costume, Avhose possible gairishness was corrected and sof- tened by the universal ladies' costume-— Avhite ; for the heat and splendor of the Aveather demanded the lightest and the cool- est covering. As all passed to the pavilion on the laAvn Avhich Avould contain all the guests, there Avere many Avafted " I wonders," and floating questions respecting India, whether the weather was as Avarm tliere, or could possibly be Avarmer — Avhether such and such exotics in the tent or on the tables, Avere children of the Indian sun; Avhich Indian fruits Avere most refreshing ; Avhich station AA-as the healthiest, the gayest, and the least infested by rattle-snakes. And these murmurs, insignificant in themselves, were accompanied by glances Avhich rendered them significant, and smiles more sad .than gay, and many a sigh half stifled ; over all spreading the melancholy of which not the RUMOR. manliest is ashamed, the melancholy promise of the Unknown, to the daring and the devoted. For a common cause or condition binds the many hearts together in a stricter fraternity than' that of blood ; and the few great hearts and heroic minds raise the many of less intelligence and feeling to their own high standard, at least for the time they are to act and endure together. This regiment was very soon to , leave for India, and for active service, and though a large proportion of its members were full of hasty blood, foolish with the frailty of youth; though there were vain men, frivolous men, idle men, and selfish men, among them, still they all seemed alike endowed with a mysterious individual interest that each perceived in each — bound to one place, on the same business, liable to the same dangers, pos- sibly the same destiny or death. So men feel in the time of a common plague or sick- ness, or when great judgments walk abroad, and fall on men together ; — limine, or panic ; as terrible as war and death, if less sublime than they. There was one among those present having already seen active service, who had won glory already as his just guerdon during his first campaign in India, a man marvellously ma- tured for his years, and of principles as pure as his stainless soldier's honor. It was he who advanced to meet Elizabeth, and who took her from her mother's side with the air of one who had moi-e part in her possession already, than had her mother. Till her coming, his glance had been sad with sus- pense, but only with such gentle torment ; neither shade of jealousy nor scowl of suspi- cion had darkened his fair and dauntless aspect. Yet she had kept him waiting three hours after the appointed time for their meeting that night ; and there remained but three weeks more in all, that he might hope to pass, before their separation, in the sun- shine of her darling presence. Instead of following the crowd, these two rettirned a while to the dancing-room, where they had all the red seats to themselves, and where, it may be supposed, Elizabeth ex- plained to him the cause of her delay. Her mother did not return to them, though she had greeted her daughter's companion with more than the interest of a friend ; — she went on with the rest, and was unquestionably, al- though so late risen, the star of the evening. She was one of those rare natures whose fruit- age is more precious than their flower ; and the spells of her mature mind were more power- ful than had been her charms in youth. Her imperial form, her bright complexion and brighter glance, her lips cast in the very mould of a smile, scarcely formed her fasci- nation, or more than veiled with their im- pression the stronger one of her dazzling talents ; and it is unquestionable, that but for her noble nature, generous heart, and delicate reserve, this Lady Delucy would have been a very dangerous person — and perhaps herself in danger. But Heaven had formed her in a holy, as Nature in a happy hour, and she beneficently difiiised her influ- ence, as a summer day its light. Even beauty has a beneficent influence when it dwells with a woman framed as she. For such a woman, losing her husband early, and retaining her whole grace if not her fresh- ness, and gaining the full experience both social and intellectual, from a studious and refined existence, than which, to the inex- perienced, there is no greater attraction : — such a woman has it in her power to afliect the youthful of the opposite sex, more de- terminately than do the majority of their age, in her own. Such a one, through thoughtlessness, or vanity, or ungoverned impulse, — called by the cowardly charitable, excitability, — may injure the first impres- sions of women formed by men still ignorant, and rash with the virgin susceptil)ility of youth, — and even if her own reputation be not injured, its mortal raiment may be smirched, till the inward brightness fails, , through its destined medium, to flash on ^ mortal eyes. But one so virtuous, possessed, entirely of herself, and gay with conscious goodness, is an ideal of maternity ; all the young are as her children, and if they call her not by the name of mother, her heart responds as such to theirs. Lady Delucy could not help feeling inter- ested m every young man present who was a brother ofticer of Colonel Lyonhart, to whom her daughter was affianced. And they were one and all bewitched by her ; a swarm of them behind her chair, and one on each hand, and several across the table : to all these she listened with delight, though it is possible their conversational powers were very limited, and inferior to her own. But in their ruling subject of discourse her heart and hopes were bound up. They all sin- cerely admired, the_ most sincerely liked, Charles Lyonhart, and for some who had served with him or under him already, he was an actual hero. Tales of his successful daring, and natural power over those sin- gular Eastern aborigines of which Europe talks so much and knows so little ; — of his simple virtue and austere self-reverence ; — assurances of his iron strength and iron will, ahke physically and morally defying for him the stimulant climate ; even the probable minutia; of the voyage and journey were grateful to her ear. Such preoccupation accounted for the fact, that she neither spoke to, nor specially noticed, any other of the guests at the other tables or her own. When all were ready to dance again, and she was returning to the ball-room, rather anxious for fear Elizabeth and her friend should be rudely disturbed, she happened to brush the elbow of a gentleman just inside the door. With her usual amiability she paused and would have apologized; but in- RUMOR. stead, slie started back, — murmured, " Di- amid," in a tone of mingled interest and surprise ; then recovering her full self-pos- session, she held out her hand and said with great cordiality, " I did not know you had returned ; — why did you not send me word ? " " Here is the reason," he answered in a ->proud voice, and with an air of mingled de- fiance and delight ; and he drew forward a young, very young girl, who had fallen be- i hind him wltile Lady Delucy spoke, " Lady i Geraldine Albany ; my wife." Again the elder lady lost her self-command, she started and flushed, and gazed with earnest wonder ; there soon stood tears in her eyes. On account of the girl herself, such tears M"ould not have been signs of too exagger- ated interest, drawn from a maternal heart. For she could be scarcely more than a child in yeai-s, yet her vivid and pictorial loveli- ness, of a lofty stamp and suggestion, gave promise of great power and gi-eater pride : power to suffer, pride to endure ; and through all, passion, which was existence, and a lov- ing nature which would set no limits to its necessity and demand for love. A being so far above the gentle average of her sex, that to invest her too early with the estate which is either the crown of blessings or of bur- dens, had been an error, if not a deed to merit a gi-aver name, on the parts of her parents and her husband, a man of mature age, and into whose youth had been crowded experience and adventure such as seldom spread over an entii-e human life prolonged to flirthest age. Few persons besides Lady Delucy would Rc have reasoned. Others would have found in the child's extraordinary beauty a charm- ing excuse for her premature social exposi- tion. And though her uncohscious pride and innocence touched Lady Delucy, she was far more troubled to observe her unse- creted devotion to the man who def\"ing its infimcy, had chained her soul in its cradle. Yet this man was one to seem, to a chance scrutiny, as interesting a person as his bride. Delicacy of structure gave distinction to a figure otherwise insignificantly small, and the whole countenance bore the impress of sensibility, sagacity — it might be genius, yet miglit only be — success. The first thought for the beautiful child, so painful, passed into another and a peace- fuller reflection in Lady Delucy's heart. •' I thank God," she thought, " that I had the courage to prevent my child from leav- ing me too early." Elizabeth was eighteen, yet her mother, in sanctioning her betrothal to Colonel Lyonhart, had refused to part with her for three years ; ostensibly on ac- count of the ardent and exhausting climate whither service sent Charles Lyonhart. A deeper prudence also might have justified such a refusal, at least so it seemed to her St this moment. " This is Lady Delucy," said Mi Alban) to his wife, after introducing her. " Oh, I am afraid of her ! " said the child half shrinking, yet smiling too. Then, rais- ing her glorious eyes, " Diamid, I mean Mr. Albany, was always telling me abroad how clever and severe you are, and how hopeless it was for me to think you would ever like me." " Lady Delucy took both her little hands. " You are a sweet young lady, but how is it I have never seen you before? I do not even know your old name, if you can have any thing old about you." " I was Geraldine Hope, Lord Chevening is my father, and the great "William Witt was my great uncle. Diamid is going to take me to see his tomb in Westminster Abbey ; I have never seen it yet." " There is political interest for you, at least," exclaimed Diamid Albany, with an air of fondness. " As for your not seeing her, that is not strange, for no one has seen her here ; she is no English heath-flower, ■with its honey bells all ready for the wild bee. And I married her from the nursery, which she falsely fancied was a school-room, where she was spelling out words and mean- ings in her o\y\\ fashion, so ignorantly, that I was touched with compassion, and took the lesson of life into my own hands." Geraldine yawned like a baby. " Oh Di- amid," she whispered, " I am dreadfully sleepv ; why should we not go home, as you do not dance ? " " And do you not dance ? " inquired Lady Delucy ; " yours at least is the dancing age." " Oh no,' no ! I don't care for dancing, and detested it when I learned : I never was at a ball before." " I am very glad Mr. Albany dislikes dancing ; it is quite beneath a man of gen- ius. And besides," added the little crea- ture, Avith a c}Tiicism rather plaintive than amusing, " there is not a single man in the room I should choose to dance with ; they all look like fools. No loise man would dance, I think it such a waste of time." " Why a greater waste of time to dance than to" look on dancing?" asked Lady Delucy. " He was obliged to come," she whis- pered ; " he hates them all, and so do L But Mr. Pm-ves is to be his brother mem- ber, at least he hopes so, and he wishes to conciliate him. Diamid has been talking to him all the evening, and I, all the time in a dream, talked nonsense in my sleep to Mrs. Purves." " Why, you are a better politician than I, Diamid : you must know I always call him Diamid; "he is as a son to me; Diamid coming in for the county ? I am much sur- prised." "It is papa who has done it, and his friends ; papa quite worships Diamid." " Geraldine," he broke in, " you ai-e very RUMOR. dred, you say ; you have done more than I isked you. Let us go home." " Will you let me come and see you very ioon ? " asked Geraldine of Lady Delucy. " May I come to-morrow ? " " To-morrow ! " said her husband. " What an audacious little goddess thou art. Lady Delucy never has a minute for her friends, tier cases for bounty are so numerous." " But I am a case for her bounty, what else ? And I am not afraid of her, though you said I should be. May I come to-mor- row ? For Diamid is going out ; for the first time he will leave me, and I shall not be able to bear " " Let her come then," said her husband, ohiefly to stop the sentence short. " Yes, do come, Lady Geraldine. I shall Oe alone in the morning, and though my daughter will be engaged, yet I think an old lady can entertain you, who remembers your husband as a little boy, and a very pretty little boy too." " But before your taste was formed, when you were only a pretty little girl," added Diamid Albany. At these 'Words, few and foolish enough. Lady Delucy smiled, but with a sort of scorn that made fuller her lip and glanced in lightning from her sunny eyes. Then Diamid, as though afraid that scorn should strike wonder from his young wife's mind, did she perceive it, drew her hand hastily to his arm. " Good night," said Geraldine, her face suffused, and beam- ing with the happiness she had not yet learned to hide from men. CHAPTER in. " You will come with us to-night ? " said Lady I^elucy to Charles Lyonhart. " She ft^asts me to-day that I may starve )n scraps to-morrow," he answered gayly, at east in a manner that would be gay, what- iver it» master coidd not feel. On the way lome it Avas perhaps as well that Lady De- ucy was in a reverie of her own, or she night too rudely have disturbed theirs — by .•emarking it. For they did not speak, hav- ng long since passed that stage of affiance- ihip, when persons are studying each other's 3haracters through the medium of conversa- tion, and at no time had the young soldier been a man great in words. His sentences, few and epigrammatic, and thundered in trenchant tones from lips to whose expres- sion his eagle glance lent double energy, had Dnce, nay twice already, conquered without a sword ; but his pulses, once touched by love at the quivering heart-spring, lapsed into a strong, calm current, unconscious of control. The condition of war lashed his mettle as the bray of the trumpet that of the war-steed ; the condition of peace made him gentle to love, even with a gentlenesa that passed the love of women. He was one of the few who may safely be prejudged as constant ; who, having chosen a calling, never know in it caprice or change ; or, hav- ing found a heart to rest on, never weary of repose. When the three reached home. Lady De- lucy, late as it was, or rather early in ilie morning, could not find it in her heart to forbid Elizabeth and her lover their farewell beneath the stars, for the moon had set, and the first phantom of Oriental glory glowed at the gates of day. And those divine eyes, whether they watch from unpeopled worlds in light alone, or with the light of spirits, never looked down, since the world was in its cradle, on two souls who sinned less against love in loving. Never one word of complaint passed his lips, nor found breath in his sighs, when in her presence ; he seemed resolved to sweeten the bitter of separation for her, by leaving with her none but bHssful memories. Elizabeth slept with her mother as she had ever done since the night she was born. When at last they lay down side by side, to rest an hour or two, the mother and daugh- ter found it alike each, impossible to sleep. " It is the t\vitter of the birds just waking up I think, mamma," said Elizabeth, " and the feelinc/ that it is getting lighter and lighter every instant, though one can't see it for the shutters. It is very hard to sleep in the light, except when one is sick." " If you really won't try, then, I will tell you a piece of intelligence which will sur- prise you, and I hope please you too." " Pray tell me mamma, I thought you looked as if you had heard something strange, or something strange had hap- pened." The mother's face was turned away, a warm flush colored it, which she would have feared might be seen, even with closed shut- ters, and by the light of a shaded lamp. " Diamid is married, that is all, but it is something new, is it not ? " As warm a glory covered the daughter's face, but she did not turn it away ; she half sat up in bed. " Married, Diamid married ? how ridiculous I have been ! how cruelly I am disappointed. Are you quite sure ? you know they always will tell stories about Di- amid ; 1 do not believe it, and you cannot." " Is it possible that you did not see him to-night ? " " See him, no. Was he there ? did he tell you himself ? " "She was there with him, I saw her." " What and who is she ? " " Lord Chevening's daughter, a child who can scarcely have seen sixteen." " What can Lord Chevening have been about ? How unlike him, with his rational ideas, and worldly prudence ! I thought 8 RUMOR. ..here was something odd too about their shild, that she was not to be seen abroad, or something." " That I do not know, but I know the Chevening party must have been trying to win over Diamid ; he is to be returned for the county too. At all events he does not treat her as though any interest save that of feehng had been at work within him, and that I am very glad to see. He is very fond and khid." " That is imjjossible, mamma, whatever he has done, for six months ago — " '* — Six months ago, Charles came home, Elizabeth." " Mother, you are cruel to me ; had it not been for Charlie, who has taught me all I know on the great subject, I should not have been so certain. But 1 did think he — I mean Diamid — went away only on ]n-obation ; I thought he would come back, and that then — or perhaps when I was gone — But, cer- tainly, that would be so long to wait." Only these words Avere bitter, not their tone. How long was it to be ? Three years, her mother had decreed ; but forebod- ing eclipsed faith, and in the dreary shadow the years M-ere magnified, seemed to s])read to the impossible's blank verge. Her mother dared not comfort her, because the only con- solation she could have bestowed was one she dared not offer. This dailing passion of her motherhood, her single permitted love, she had destroyed as an idol, when she gav.e promises that she should leave her side — when she felt that she held her in trust for another, who would carry her away whither her own sphere of social and private duties could not in conscience be removed. The separation would be complete when it came, except in that spiritual sense so much more painful to spirits in prison of the flesh, than to those whom death has divided the one from the other. People called this mother selfish, prim, eccentric, even unnatural. Per- haps her own child was constrained in her demeanoi' and her affection by the course which they ridiculed. But it made no dif- ference to her, she believed that she was doing right, and it is not too much to say, that she suftered much more than her child in carrying out her own decision. Eliza- beth's frame was as fragile as her mind was strong, and like all the intellectual who are Aveak in body, she had a spirit whose power deceived herself. She thought she could bear any thing — fever, miasma, fatigue, watching — she was sure that the dead mid- Indian heats would be delightful, because, in England, she loved the summer best. But EHzabeth believed herself capable of bear- ing any thing, just because she had never had any thing to bear ; luxury, repose; ease, blended in her experience ; and her delicate nealth, her nervous sensibility, acted on only Dy the most delicate impressions, and by every association that could soothe and charm, had actually been the medium of en« joyment only, or of excitement more glorioui than joy. Her mother knew this, and knew also, what a long dream of misery is life from which health's bloom has been brushed — ■ that irreparable bloom ; and how far more terrible is the doom of those in whom the nerve life has been untoned. A spring which can never again respond to the full necessity of the hour, and which ever fails when the demand is greatest on it — if once over-strained — if indeed it he not broken. Still the mother could not be certain, that her child's full womanhood would be stronger than her early youth — she could only hope so, and strive after such a result as much as a mother and a mortal may. But being a perfect woman she was not, therefore, a perfect person ; nor did she think herself one, nor fancy, because her talents were so fine and varied, that the winged genius had made his nest in her soul. The balance between her cherished inde])endence of thought and feeling and the indwelling principle of duty which ruled her actions, made her remarkable, for such a balance is rare. It had been to her mind's expansion a great advantage that she was not born in the rank she occupied now, and which she was most unexpectedly called to take. Still she was of descent which is called res])cctable, in society, being the only child of a mer- chant whose family had for ages trafficked with the merchants of the East, whether for fruits, drugs, or perfumes, it little signifies. He Avas often called to the Levant, and there he married the daughter of a Levantine merchant, his ally ; it was said that her dow- ry was accepted in consideration of payment for a debt. It is certain, that he was the last person that should have so married, for he was eminently English, in habit, thought and belief; hard-headed, and not much soft- er-hearted ; rigidly, if narrowly, educated ; sharp-seeing in his own business ; intellect- ually blind ; and as prejudiced as he was practical, his practice being routine in ordi- nary rounds, not perseverance in any new- detected principle. Yet being the last persoi who should have done it, he was on that very account the first to do it ; and in sc doing he gratified his innate obstinacy at the expense of the approbation of his English friends, and his wife, very beautiful in the first instance, gratified his carnal impulse at the expense of her after-happiness, or pos- sible improvement — for such impulses are ever without moral fruition. There is nothing so painful, because noth- ing so unnatural and inconsistent, as the position of an Oriental, it matters not of what race, or degree of capacity, under a northern sun ; in the country of the north most civilized, the more especially. It is more cruel to bring such liither to live, oi KUMOR. rather to exist in a condition whose vitality is far below that of vegetation, than to kill them in their own country ; but of course no one who has not so suffered, will agree to this. However, this lady suffered intense- ly, although her instincts had not been refined Sy education into aspirations, nor her mind sufficiently opened to desire such cultivation, of the only kind she could have here re- ceived. The languor which seemed to swathe her faculties, might have been penetrated by influences of knowledge in her own natural home, but here they lay unconscious, not as in a chance swoon, but a perpetual hiberna- tion. It was not marvellous that this mo- notonous existence should shock the realist and doer," should seem a moral monstrosity, under the pale broad daylight that shines on mechanical perfection, in a land whose ground throbs, and whose echoes pant with the pulses of the giant progress. She made no friends, and as a friend lost her husband, who did not misuse her bodily, because he valued his class reputation, and had the conscience, stingingly sensitive, of the sectarian. So she sank into profounder depths of indolent repose, the abuse of that which was in moderation as necessary to her as the siesta to the southern, the melting bath to the Turk, and the dream-drugged atmosphere of the divan, to the whole Oriental world. But this lady did not smoke, because her husband had told her when he brought her to England, that it is not here becoming, and to her was nat- ural that slavish obedience, which is even touching because it is so implicit. Very early she became Christianized for the same reason, it was so natural to her to yield be- lief, she received the faith of the greatest of ensamples with the unquestioning readiness peculiar to the child and the slave. She was even anxious that her only child should be early imbued with what she had been told to believe, and therefore believed, as she did not do what her husband forbade her, be- cause he was her husband ; and for the same reason, because he ordered it, she called her child by the two commonest of the many common Christian names which are natural- ized in England, though her own flowery, figurative tongue presented many a musical, symbolic, poetic name to tempt her. So Elizabeth Mary were the names she gave her infant. Her first English winter saw this infant's birth, and the hard cold was little likely to restore her nervous tone or physical strength ; she never recovered either ; neither sedatives, nor stimulants prescribed by English physicians, affected her in the least, because she was cut off from the only ones that could affect such a constitution — climate and tobacco. Between such a father and such a mother he child early learned what few children even imagine, that there are vast differences between persons, characters, and conditions. Her father, without meaning exactly to ac- complish such a result, held up her mother to her as contemptible, because ignorant of what persons round her knew. He taught Elizabeth to return thanks in her prayers that she had been born in England, with a father who was neither Jew, Turk, infidel, nor heretic, whatever her mother might be. To be grateful for the existent social code which raises a child to its father's position, what- ever its mother's may have been. He gave her governesses and masters, with certifi- cates from college and employer. They taught her all they knew ; her mind was very quick to receive, but she could not retain all, only the best part, that is, the ex- ercise of the memory aroused the thinking faculties. But her greatest pleasure, a sort of de- lightful dream that she dreamed every day at a certain hour, was to go and see her mother ; her father set apart one regular time for this filial and maternal interchange of intercourse, because it was proper, and religious, that a child should honor both her parents. So she paid her visits to the large room, filled with overpowering, melting heat from two large ornamented stoves, filled with dim light from low-hanging lamps, even at noonday, because to exclude the draughts thick crimson curtains fell always over the shuttered windows. No chairs nor table furnished the room, only piles of cushions, in the midst of a heap of which her mother reclined by day and on which she slept at night. Always sumptuously attired in glit- tering stuffs and gorgeous shawls, her dark skin lighted up by blinding jewels ; and featured delicately, with her moony eyes and soft, slow motions, she captivated her child's fancy, naturally a brilliant one, and it was only in her child's presence that she was ever known to talk. When they were alone together, and Elizabeth coaxed her and ca- ressed, she Avould now and then tell her about the land whence she had been brought; the mosques, the palaces, the palms ; the bazaar and the harem ; the fountains, flow- ers, and skies. Perhaps, had her father heard these confidences, made in broken Englisli, helped out with racy idiom and translated proverb, he would have forbidden his wife to talk upon the subject to his daughter, but he was scarcely ever present, and when so her voice was silent, she hardly even whispered to him greeting and fare- well. Elizabeth kept them to herself, mere- ly because she did not think they would interest her father, and yet they were always in her thoughts, and the gladdest day of all her youngest life was that on which she found a copy of the Arabian Nights in the library. Her father, who seldom had either time or inclination to take her out with him, was so delighted with a long letter, half in French, and half in Italian, with a Latin postscript, 10 "RUMOR. written to him by her the Christmas she was fourteen, that he took her to see a panto- mime. From that hour she had an aim in life ; she was always dreaming, yet perform- ing in her dreams ; the creative faculty was routed, and by its instantaneous reciproca- tion the artistic mhid was revealed to itself. Her father, discovering her enthusastic de- light when on different occasions he took her to the theatre with him afterwards, imme- diately curtailed her enjoyments in that line, began to have grave doubts whether it was proper a taste so decided should be encour- aged, at last drew a line, as he expressed it, and only allowed her to hear a play of Shakspeare's twice a year, and those always historical ones. But even few and far be- tween, those were angel visits to her. Her progressive mind affected not her innocence of heart. She even clung more and more to her helpless mother, and once entreated her father to try a change of cli- mate to her own coinitry, for her mother's health. But her father answered, " She does not wish it, she has never asked me, and it would make her suffer more to be disturbed." Nor had she ever confessed it to her child ; her pride was the pride of the Eastern, the most stubborn in the world. When Elizabeth was twenty-one, there occurred a crisis in commerce, one of those climaxes which are sudden prosperity to a few, to the many the crush of ruin, and which seem periodical, like war and epi- demy — perhaps necessary for the expurga- tion of men's minds from the lust of luxury and over-confidence. Her father, who, though not speculative, kept all his capital afloat, lost all in the losses of others richer than himself. There only remained a small sum, about five hundred pounds, which he had reserved as a present for his daughter on her coming of age — and this she had just received ; she placed more than half in her father's hands, he knew not what she meant to do Avith the rest, but she only be- sought him not to move from his house, for a few months, because her mother was ac- customed to it. --^^Bhe had made up her mind in a moment ; and was sanguine of success, as the pure in purpose, full of conscious poM-er, have a right to be. A chief theatrical manager of that day, was as remarkable for discernment and benevolence, as for talent and popular- ity, and it was to him she went, confided her scheme, and was received by him as his own pupil, a rare honor, but well deserved. She studied with ardor, persistency, and indus- try, which those who sneer at the dramatic calling ;.s an amu::ement (I'ke novel-v. liting) might have found it impossible to exert in their own worldly business. She worked so hard that her master, unflinching as he was in ordinary cases, gave her the credentials for public initiation at the end of three months, together with a parting boon of encouraging words, such as had never been the verdict of his lips before. In fact she owed much to her previous mental cultivation, and so he told her ; but she owed the most to a singularly serene disposition, which quelled insurgent excitability, and lent her self-con- trol in action, which it is the work of years artificially to attain. When every thing was settled between the manager and master, now her employer and friend, she told her father of her sclieme, secreted until perfect, for their subsistence as a family, through hei newly developed art. Only an English father would have outraged a child's tender- ness and devotion as he did, in return for her confidence. Instead of giving her strength by his approving smile, sti-ength very needful to one whose excessive mod- esty was the only possible enemy to her success, he raved, and stormed vith rage, only impotent because it could find no real basis, and when the heat of the mood had subsided to a calm more cruel, he tried to argue without actual premises, and darkened his counsel by words without knowledge, till his fury turned against himself, and doubly aggravated his insane anger towards his child. He commanded her to relinquish her design on the pain of excommunication from his thoughts and love ; and this final utter- ance in its cool measured tones, dried up the tears Avhich his harsher heat had drawn from the stricken rock, for firm as a rock remained her rooted intention, though she suffered to the full as bitterly as he had meant she should. But it was a false sense of duty, the name, against the true sense of duty, the necessity, and that sufficed ; conscience against prejudice prevailed. She knew that else they must starve, that her mother must perish if forced into less luxurious routine, that her father's head was white with his early winter, creeping on his barren autumn. She" knew that none other of her talents, nor all his business habits could gain employ- ment which should even supply them Avith bread, much less sustain her mother in her needful ease. So she went to work Avithout his blessing, which she was innocent enough to covet, and in the face of the disapprobation and con- tempt of all her relations and acquaintances besides. These last, with the usual incon- sistency of such persons, all went to witness her fu-st public performance, applauded her in the theatre, and went home and slandered her to their heart's content. But her f\uher never went to see her and hear her, never mentioned her objectionable calling, nor confessed himself indebted to her in the least degree. Yet he ate of h".'r bread, and drank of her cup, and was to her as a father still, though he treated her no longer as a child. So, without a father's sanction, the most sacred save that of conscience, ot a mother's presence and protection, she wa< RUMOR, exposed to the roughest of all the tides of opxiiion, and breasted its breakers by her own strength alone. For three years it pre- vailed, her reputation remained as pure as her fame was fresh, and but for lier reticence of demeanor, her triumphs might have drawn envy from her inferiors. At the end of that time too she would have been rich, but for her double burden of filial love and duty. A young man of what is called high birth, but ill-bred, worse-principled, and vicious most of all, happened to turn towards her his roving eyes, and unhappily she fixed them. Her stately sweetness, and excelling character, excited hira to attempt an adven- ture, which none but he would have dared to dream of, mueii less to undertake. And he failed at the very outset, nor could he suc- ceed in obtaining a single interview ; and all his letters were returned unopened, except the first one, which had been opened without sus})icion of its contents. Through a false heart he could afford to act falsely without compunction, and the false unfaltering tongue assisted his revenge. First in one ear alone he Ijreathed the lie, reversing every circum- stance ; hers the dawning interest, the de- voted attention, the insinuating correspond- ence ; the crowning fact, — the crooning falsehood, — her ardent and uncontrollable attachment, declared and gratified, but grati- fied only with the calm facility and freedom of a man of fashion. This tale, told to one person under a half-promise of secrecy, made and received by two persons alike dishonor- able, very soon spread, first in whispered hints of abhorrent deeds, soon a bruit of de- graded purity, at last a belief in it that could not. because it would not, be shaken. Unfortunately it was while she was absent from her usual home, spending a few weeks to rest and recruit in country air during a needful suspension of her engagements, that her father heard the report, and believed it, so true is it if men M'iii, they are allowed to harden their own hearts. He impotently resolved never to see her again, and wrote to tell her so, darkening still more blackly the fair page so sullied, by curses as impotent as the resolution. 15ut she was weak enough to be made ill by that letter ; ratlier innocent enough, filial enough, and new enough to life, with its tests the most austere and awful always for the purest. She was so ill, she could not answer it, could not rebut the charge ; by which worldly women would only have been made strong with indignation, but which prostrated her physically, stunned her mentally; effects which served to convince people more and more that the charge was a true one. A week after this letter had been sent, her father, who had not left her house yet, despite his intention never to see her again, was sitting in his room with a countenance grim and pale, but past repentance as he was, serving only to suggest remorse. A 11 gentleman was announx^L and entered ; b white-haired man, plaiii-^Jteed, .dignified; who pulled out a card, threw it on The tabtej^' and, still standing though requested to take a seat, said calmly, " I have come formally to obtain a formal consent to my intended proposals for your daughter's hand. As a matter of form I say, merely, for it is other- wise of no value. I am of age to be her father, as well as in a position to protect her _ as a husband from her own parent — and," more unhappy parent than you have dared to assume yourself! from my own son." The father to Avhom he spoke turned so deadly pale with the reaction of nature shamefully repressed, that the visitor w is obliged to ring the bell for water, though he showed no compassion when a more death- like SWOOP ensued. He might have felt compassion, for he was easily moved towards it, had he not detected the glance of unholy triumph, and lustful pride, when his own name -was read by the other on the card he had thrown down. For, truly virtuous, though exclusive and proud enough in his own fashion, the Earl Delucy valued his own character above his rank, and as for his family history, he would only have been thankful to have the last page erased and to throw the book into the fu-e ; so terrible to his heart and his faith Avas its necessary record, the useless, vicious, and abominable character and career of his only son. It had been some time before the report of Elizabeth's degradation had reached him, still longer before he learned that his own son had first given utterance to it, and pre- tended she was his own victim. Lord Delucy had only seen her once or twice ; he was no play-goer, but the profoundest Shaksperian student could not have possessed more dis- crimination of character ; and when he heard she was ill he went to see her himself, and in the presence of two physicians whom he forced to accompany him, and a nurse who had been hastily provided, he assured her of his unshaken faith in her goodness and her innocence. That assurance was to her re- vival, and saved her from the grave, Mhere very likely her reputation would have been lost forever for those still living, who, ])er- haps to spite etiquette, which prescribes that of those departed only good must be spoken, are remarkably fond of thinking evil of the same. Elizabeth really married Lord Delucy out of gratitude ; no other sentiment could find room within, and as for passion, she shrank from the very name with a terror only par- donable in one who had suffered so desper- ately from its simulation. Her gratitude, sincere, boundless, and devoted, dwelt alone in her heart, filled up the measure of her thankfulness to Heaven, whom first she thanked. But no colder shrine than her spirit ever guarded from the wanton wind th« vestal flame. She felt that happiness la 12 RUMOR. its primitive purity could never affect her | now, and that Love was a severer ^rieud than | she had deemed him. In her duty she never [ failed any more than in her gratitude, and in I her duty she must have been perfect, for her husband never missed any thing in her, neither passion, nor love, nor even happiness. Her light ste]), her sunny smile, her faithful breast, at least brought him the fulness of that delight of which he had clasped, in his first alliance, the iieshless skeleton. She, j too, was rewarded, for her father restored to her bis blessing, which, how little soever its ' intiinsic value, was very dear to her. Her mother returned to her own land, and lived many years there, rejoicing in the sun. Her husband's child, sick, dreary, lost in terrors and the blackest unbelief, came to die near her, helped by her gentleness thi'ough the darkest hour ; and if not at peace with him- self, perhaps so with God, because penitent, went to rest. As she watched by her husband's dying I pillow, made easy by her sweet tenderness, her soft solicitude, and sacred influence, she ' made the inward resolution, which she re- newed on a more religious vow upon his closed grave, that whatever might her temp- tations be, she would never marry again ; to his memory she devoted herself, and to his child, their only daughter ; his conservative tastes she cherished as her own ; his castle wore its raiment of decay proudly, his fallen trees found their last beds in the soil from which they sprang — she was, in short, the guardian of his child and heiress. But she had not controlled that child in her affection, and blessed God that it was not ])art of her duty to do so ; but that it was a part of her duty in her own to control herself she be- lieved, and acted in that faith. Time had brought a victim to the sacrificial altar of her heart; she had slain it, her own love in her own happiness. One great delight, besides her daughter, was still her own. Generous, to a fault, if slie had not been most just ; large-hearted, oi)en-hauded, and full r>f sympathy with art, she dedicated to artists if needy, perseverant, and genuine, the large fortune settled on her by her husband, Mhich it did not trouble her to receive, as it scarcely diminished sensibly the vast one reverting to her chUd, and was entirely separate from it — the fruits of her husband's services as an eminent ruler, in his youth, in India. CHAPTER IV. ) It was early day. Northeden lay in a valley ; its castle and its hamlet, and the val- ley was bright with culture as a teeming garden, with a core of the richest timber growth in its centre, from wr-ose shade, in the distance a deep green cloud, sprung the pale turrets to which the new-risen sun, piercing the mild mist of the lowland, now lent a roseate burnish. The castle was old enough to have been a ruin, and restored ; not with the restitution Avhich has fallen like a curse on many a shrine antique ; the plaster-glare of freshened arches, the ghost-colors of modern windows. Here old materials fallen from use or into misuse were replaced and recombined. Tap- estries of hues as dim as dying flowers, still rendered faithfully from the walls their pale pictorial legends ; flowers carved in wood, — an art in its perfection lost like the art of glass distaining, — were eaten with the canker of decay, yet held their graceful sway on cornice, frame, and moulding, mixed with leaf garlands, worm-peforated until they seemed browidy glimmering like skeletons of forest leaves in autumn.- Old furniture, old carpets, old damasks, filled the state-rooms without one gairish incon- sistency. To velvet curtains, whitened in long lines M-here the sun had burned upon their folds, to leathern hangings, whose gold figures Time's finger had rasped to pallid yellow, to blackened stone, chipped marble, phantom portrait, stole a lesser than day's own light even at fullesli noon, from small unfrequent windows, gloomed deeper by the intense tints, with which old art had gemmed the upper panes. The breeze, whether creep- ing in through crack, or dancing thi'ough open door, seemed to lend itself to mysteri- ous echoes the moment it entered the halls, and the tem])est-tone of the wind sounded like a roll of thunder heard in a vault or f cavern. On winter nights of storm, too, the trees in the park roared hke a sea against that thunder, and there scarcely passed a day, during the latter equinox, but some huge hoar elm, or oak of fabulous descent, crashed to the trembling ground. These corpse trunks, never removed when fallen, lay here and there under the leaf-domes and arch-avenues, across your path you met them, or crushing flat* the long fern of the glades ; — some half-bleached, dry as ivory, with hollows that the wild bees made their cells in ; others enamelled with mosses of emerald and gold, or crusted with lichen delicately fair as the sea-flowers which wreathe a sunken Mreck. A high wall, wrapped so thick with ivies that not a brick-tint started through the glossy gloom, compassed the park all round, a solitude undesecrated by the step of prog- ress, and than which none serener or sweeter could be found in the summer noons when the insect hum, the myriad chirp, and the breeze that chafed the leafy deeps, melted altogether into a dream of sound most like that di-eara of shade. There was a garden next to the park, but that too rather grand than gay, with walks as wide RUMOR. 13 as roads, and deserts of grass spangled with flower oases, for lawns ; with pillars whose crowning vases were too vast to fill ■with any flowers save hollyhocks and dah- lias ; with black evergreen masses cut into monstrous shapes ; with fountains of quaint device, some trickling, others dry; and mossed dials, and summer houses large en>>ugh to live in. The garden wall con- tinued that of the path, as richly ivied, and passed down to the gates, bordering on each side the entrance avenue of elms planted six deep, a quarter of a mile long. There was another approach to the castle, quite close to the tower called the summer tower, because only in summer inhabited. In the wall on that side of the garden the ivy from a certain spot had been cut away, and the bricks taken out, leaving an aper- ture large enough for a single person to pass through, filled with the gate of the lightest iron fretwork. To stand on the castle-side and look through that gate, was like turning from the mellow darkening twilight to the dazzle of fullest noon. In a smaller garden, flowers were blossoming in that perfection which it is the necessary homage of the flower-worshipper's most jealous passion to create. Round the soft lawn, unspeckled by one peasant daisy, the wall was hidden by a light Gothic framework, delicately gilt, filled with foreign plants whose blooms bathed in the sunlight, calm as jewels displayed behind a shrine of crystal. As brilliant were the flower-beds on the lawn, but there the jewel calm was agitated by each quiver of the breeze, to that stir of infinitely blended fra- grance which is its paradise to the sense of smell, and that silent harmony with which the flutter of color feasts the eye. Urns overflowed with sparkling creepers, baskets of wrought alabaster held rose clusters as snowy-pure, tier above tier aspired pyramids that seemed blossoming flame. In sea-water basins gleamed the flowers of the ocean, and in one bright water lay lilies of the wave, white, golden, azure, fanned by mysterious maiden hair and bordered with blue forget- me-not. There was a house in this garden too, its low white walls crossed with trellis from veranda to chimney, the trellis so thickly interlaced with delicate plants, in fullest flower, that it looked rather a bower than a domestic dwelling. All the rooms, all on the ground floor, showed through the crystal sashes of their windows a soft gleam of colors like shadows of the flowers without. All the walls were hung with flower-colored silks ; one, a sjjring chamber, with hues of hyacinths, junk, lilac, purple, tender-blue ; a summer drawing-room with rose hues, pale and white and damask ; an autumn one with tints of geranium, and green relieved with gold. The dining-room was filled with gems of pictures, and fruit beautifully painted seemed dropping from the ceiling. One bed-room was lined with white ; soft and pure as the cradle of a child seemed the bed with its satin quilt, and lace curtain falling from a single pillar of curved ivorj', tufted with one snowy plume : while marble cherubs in recesses here and there held lam])s that when lighted, cast on their dimpled coun- tenances a flush like the roses of the davvn. But now, at morning, the artificial flush has sickened before the living lights that mock all art and artifice. The sun look s in at one window without any greeting frnni hues that mimic his own rainbows, the win- dow of the only simple room in that delicate and sumptuous dwelling. Strict need of the severe student had ordered its furniture only, a table with its oil-cloth cover some- what rubbed, old turkey carpet faded, one large chair, one desk, one Avicker basket filled with torn letters : the walls lined with books, none gayly bound, the monotony of the many uniforms suggesting standard authors, works of reference, official registers. In that room, writing at the table, sat Dia- mid Albany. Pale the night before, he was ghastly now, and shadows blue as those cast in hollows of the snowdrift, rimmed his great dark eyes. The droop of those eyes, ' in society so vividly expanded, the frown between them, melancholy rather than stern, the relaxed under lip, the nervous clutch of the pen between the fingers as though their own strength were not suflicient to retain it unseconded by the power of the will, the stoop and rounded shoulder, all told a tale of weariness irresistible by the body ; but mentally, never gaining the upper hand. Weariness of what? Certainly not of that apparation, which entering at the door, melts every Hue of the face into momentary soft- ness, brims the eye with kindness warmer than afiection, and swells the breast with a sigh of ineffable relief. It was Geraldine in her unfashionable morning dress, a loose white robe of lawn, her lovely hair flowing to her waist in child- like curls. Child as she was in years, and old for his years as he was, there seemed no incongruence between them, even in point of age. Only genius, with its daring inno- cence, its untaught power to solve all mys- teries of feeling, could have rendered her a companion as well as a consoling charmer, for one of his sagacity and experience. She understood his character without caring that she did so ; she drew upon his enormous mental resources with confidence but without apology ; never did she descant upon that which he valued far too secretly to bear its mention — his idol of renown. Too little yet, to say of one too liberally gifted with sym])athy, with intelligence; with passion; too early gifted with consummate joy. " I am going to Lady Delucy's," said she, clinging to his embracing arm, and covering his hand with kisses fit to fall on an infant's j cheek, so soft and noiseless were they, " and 14 RUMOR. it is a very good thing I am, for do you know if I Avere alone without you, even for a morning noiv, my heart would beat so with suspense that I should die." " No, no, you would wait for me." " To M-ait would be death," she answered ; "is not night the emblem of death? does it not wait for the morning ? But you will only be six hours, four at the committee, and one hour to ride there, and the other back." "I shall not ride, it takes too long ; I take the train." But Geraldine threw her arms round him ; she wept; she implored, and the roses burned feverish on her cheeks. " Not the train, Diamid, not the train without me. I hnow something would happen ; I should die of fear. I know you are safe on horseback ; all creatures love you." " Saving only men." " But promise, promise !" So he promised, well knoAving the result of hard riding to the strained nervous sys- tem which had been the solitary demon bat- tling with his ambition all his life ; always conquered, though its thrusts were felt so keenly. Geraldine stood beside the horse while he mounted, stroked its black, silk mane, ran for a rose to put beside its ear, took one of its delicately shod feet in her hand and flap- ped a little dust ofi' it with her handker- chief, talked of riding behind her husband in man's disguise, " a jockey-groom, Mr. Albany's last," made him change watches with her, in short, detained him by every possible expedient, till he had barely half an hour for a ride of eleven miles. Just before he left her, he gave her the key of the iron gate between their garden and park. " Shall I give your love to her ? " asked Geraldine. !' I have given it all to you, there is none left for any other." And so he rode away, and she returned into the garden, sat down amidst the flowers and wept bitterly, blind- ingly, as some weep over the grave of love. Oh haughty passion, untrained in thy blos- som hours, flinging wild tendrils round a heart too fully satisfied ; what shall be thy fruition ? or shall those tendrils, grown more strong and clinging still, strangle the j delicate spu-it Contentment, more easily than I Sorrow could wither it away P Certain it was, however, that she could not bear her- j self alone for long ; she rose hastily, filled j her garden-hat with fresh-blown flowers as ^ she passed them, and went through the gati into the park. CHAPTER V. Lady Delucy saw Geraldine cross the lawn from the ground floor windows of a room she had always been used to share Avith her daughter, till she had found a com- panion dearer still than her mother ; Geral- dine stepped in at the window, M'hich was open. " I have come, you see," she said. Lady Delucy took both her hands, would have liked to kiss her, but did not dare, so proud was the brilliant face in every line, with the pride of a child who will not be coaxed to smile when it is sad, or when it does not choose. Neither did she, any more than a child would have done, try to conceal her surprise at the style of the room, so sombre and dull to her, with its dim wainscoting, high chairs, and heavy tables, heajis of books wherever there was room to deposit them, odd volumes from the library, Italian and French novelties in their flimsy wrap- pers, new plays, new poems, German and Spanish dictionaries, all the newspapers, all the periodicals, all serials illustrated by art. There were certainly a piano and a harp, but the first was closed and the second cov- ered. There were but two easy seats in the room, reading chairs, in one of which the lady sat, and Geraldine chose a cushion at its foot. " Diamid would not send his love to you," she began, " though I asked him whether I should bring it." " Because he had given it all to you — was not that the reason ? " " How could you know he said so ? for he did." " I knew Diamid when he was as young as you are now, he was in my father's house at that time, to be initiated into the myste- ries of Eastern trade, for though his father was a bookworm, his earlier ancestors Avere all connected with the East, you know." " Yes, but papa Avon't hear of that ; it makes him very angry. I suppose Diamid used to talk to you, and that you petted him ; he says so." " I learned his ways, and understood his fancies ; he Avas as wonderful a boy as he is now a wonderful man." " And Avhen youAvere married he says you were very generous to his father, who was so poor because no one Avould risk the pub- lication of his books." " Generous, never ; my husband, who always sought the society of the wise, be- came acquainted Avith Diamid"s father, and Avished him to live near him, because he A'alued his society so highly." " And so he Avent to the house where we live noAV ; but Diamid said it Avas your house, that your husband gave to you, and that he had no peace till he had earned enough money by his books to buy the house ; he could" not bear to be indebted, even to you." ♦' Diamid Avas always too proud ; it is per- haps his only fault." " But it Avas not so pretty then as he haa made it now." RUMOR 15 " No, indeed ; when I came from London this time, and found all the workmen about it, I suspected something was going to hap- pen." " Did not Diamid write and tell you about me ? he said he tells you every thing." " No, he did not tell me that, but I fancy he was too agreeably engaged to find time to write." " Were you not surprised to see little me, iast night ? You could not be more sur- prised than I was when he asked me to be his wife. He too — I should as soon have dreamed that one of the sons of God would see that I was fair, and come from heaven to seek me, because it was hell without my love." Lady Delucy sighed, but she did not check her ; she knew too well the necessary conditions of a nature preraatured, all that it will do and have ; its erring yet touching exigencies. " I should like to hear all about you, Ger- aldine — you must let me call you so — how you first saw Diamid, and how he ventured to think you would suit him. All about you, because concerning him will please me." *' I'll try, but there seems so much, though there is really so little, so few events in my life I mean. My mother was a Geraldi, and I had her name, to make my father's name endurable, and now it serves to beautify my beautiful new name, which no one can take from me. I was liorn in Italy, and came to England for a little while with papa and mamma. But when I was six, and mamma had still no son, my grandmamma Geraldi, who had married her cousin of the same name — he was dead then, though — sent for me ; she wished to bring me up and leave me her fortune, which is very large. She hated me first for being a girl. Papa could not refuse, for he wanted me to have all the money. I did not care for it then, but now I do, for it will be Diamid's to make use of, and papa's too shall all be his when it is mine. So they sent me back to Italy, and an English governess with me, that I might be brought up like an English girl. I can truly say however, that I have forgotten all she taught me, except the language itself. She was a Protestant, and read me English prayers on a Sunday, and made me hold books of sermons in my hands all day. Then I had a master for French, and one for Latin, and for mathematics and astronomy. I loved none of those things, but hated astronomy most of all. There was an ob- servatory at the top of the palazzo, and there I was stuck to look through a tube, till I could dream of nothing but the shapes of the constellations as they are traced on the globe, crawling all over the sky ; and then I had an illness in which I raved about them, so they left ofi" teaching me astronomy, and I had more time to myself. Soon I began to read the books in the library for pleasure — for after all, I understood Italian best, and I found out all the poetry, and soon wrote my- self, it is so easy to write poetry in Italian, and in Italy. I improvisated to the statues in the garden ; I was Beatrice, I was Laura, I was Leonora D'Este. Always a woman, and the poets my heroes, yet I burned to be a genius greater than the greatest of all those. But I took care to keep to myself only, my worship of the divinities of song. " There was only one person in our house who interested me, because of my own age, for I was allowed to be intimate with no young ladies of Catholic families, and there were none round about who were not so. A dear cousin of mine lived with grandmamma; his name was Geraldi Feriani. He was an officer's son, one of the younger branch of his own family — and mamma's first cousin, not so rich as she in expectations, married him to avoid being put into a convent. Ge- raldi is just a year older than I — eighteen. He loves me a great deal better than I de- serve ; even as a child he spoiled me. Every body was rather strict besides, grandmamma pretty strict with me, but terribly strict with him. She treated him as she treats her ser- vants ; she never addressed him in conversa- tion, and she would not let him have masters, though I wished him to loarn with me. She forbade me also to play with him, and I dis- obeyed her, though I never promised in words that I would obey. The only times we could be alone together was when grand- mamma was in the oratory, or w^ith the priest in the chapel. How handsome Geraldi would have been if he had not been so sav- agely, doggedly sad ! he never smiled to show his splendid teeth, and his eyes were half shut up with melancholy. He stamped on the ground when he walked, as if he were crushing down something terrible and strong into it, and often went into pale pas- sions, \vhen he did not speak, but set his teeth tight and ground them, and shuddered from head to foot ; till I was afraid he was going mad. That was when he was growing tall, and grandmamma used to hint that it would not do to keep him idle any longer, yet she never said what he was to be when he grew up, nor he either ; he would never speak of himself to her. " One day he had been walking about with that crunching, grinding step, and be- ing in the garden, and knowing grand- mamma was at her prayers, I called him to come and sit beside me, and when he would not come I pulled him, and then he came quietly enough. We sat down, I recollect, on the base of a statue of a nymph with a thorn in her foot ; she was holding her foot in her hand, and stood in a thicket of roses, from which the thorn came, I suppose. But the other foot was chipped, and a great piece too was broken oft' the plinth, as we were sitting, on Geraldi's side. Then I said, ' I wish I knew what makes you so dreadfully unhappy; is it because grandmamma is 16 RUMOR. cold? She cannot love warmlj-, Geraldi; she cannot love as I love. Do not mind about her; I will love you double; I will love you warmly as the sun, and kiss you as softly as the moon, when she lays her beam upon your forehead. I will love you more than twenty sisters, and Avhen I am married, we will live together.' Of course, Lady Delucy, I only meant that I should be mar- ried some day, to some one or other. But Geraldi turned round on me ; black fire seemed to dart out of his eyes ; he caught hold of me, and pressed me so hard in his arms that I felt his heart beat, and heard it too. ' Geraldine, Geraldine, do you mean that ? ' 'Of course,' said I, quite startled, as soon as I could get my breath. " ' But do you not see that they will never allow it? We must go away in the dark — far — far.' " ' Oh, Geraldi, I did not mean that I would marry yoii, but that you should live with me and my husband.' " Down fell (3eraldi, dropped like a stone on the ground, and cut his temple against the sharp, broken edge of the plinth. I was horrified, I thought he was killed ; but the blood started out of the wound, and I screamed. Then, remembering how far we were from the house, I tied it up with my handkerchief, meaning to run home for some one directly I had done so, for I thought he would bleed to death. But instead, the bleeding revived hira ; he opened his eyes, and held my frock so tightly, that I could not stir. " ' Promise me,' he said, between his lips, which were purple, and his clinched teeth, ' that you will never, never tell any one that you refused me ; I could not bear that, and if you did, I should kill you and myself too with my father's sword, the same which — ' " — And there he stopped short, nor could I make him complete the meaning of the sentence." " My dear child," said Lady Delucy, " pardon n)e, but should you not keep your cousin's story a secret? Was it not con- fided to you alone ? " " Oh, no, he did not say so ; I have told Diamid. I should not tell miy body, of course, but Diamid says he feels for you al- most as a mother." Any but a child in inexperience, at least cf women, would have been struck by the expression of the lady's face — very sudden, like the shadow on it of a mental spasm, very short, passing into a light of pale, yet patient melancholy. But Geraldine's proud eyes saw only signs of interest, and sym- pathy with herself. " ^ly love," said the lady, very tenderly, " would you have liked, if Diamid had not loved you, that any person — that he — should have known you loved liim') " " Yes, yes," cried Geraldine, in glad tones of triumph, "I should have gloried in it, and have wished to die for love of him, and that all the world should know I died so, he the most of all." " Oh," thought Lady Delucy, " child most of all there, younger in that belief than thy years ! Strange fate ! desire uncreated, be- fore fulfilment came : Spring born instead of summer, of the spring. A destiny un- earthly of doomed delight. Can such last, even for this short life ? If not, who would break and scatter one link of the frail and fiower-woven chain ? Not I." So she smiled and sighed together, while Geraldine went on. " When Geraldi was well again, I said to him, ' AVhy did you say that they would not let us marry ? I do not say we ought, for I don't believe we should suit each other ; and besides, I must marry to please papa, be- cause he is ambitious, and I am liis only child, and he has been so kind in letting me live in darling Italy; but tchy would they positively prevent it, if we liked ? ' " ' I am poor, I am disgraced, I had better be dead, and if I were worthy of my father I soon should be.' But no more would he tell me, so I was curious, and talked to the sei-vants, with whom I had never been thrown before, but I was determined I would know. I made out that grandmamma took Geraldi out of charity ; certainly the English proverb that charity is cold, re- ceived its interpretation through her. Well, Geraldi's father was never a favorite of his mother's family ; he became by conviction a republican, and tried to turn his sword against the king, who had treated some of his associates with dreadful injustice and cruelty. I don't know the particulars, but GerakU's father was discovered in his at- tempt, and imprisoned. To evade his prob- able fate he fell upon his sword, and died in torment. For the double offence of treason and suicide, his child suffered the loss of all his property, except the sword, which some daring colleague, in prison too, managed to steal, and gave Geraldi. Geraldi has buried it in the ground, in its case. I only know the spot, for he made me promise not to tell even Diamid. The Geraldis had always treated his father as a hair-brained under- ling, one who had infringed on the honor of the family ; so conservative, even of bad things, are they. I loved Geraldi better than ever, after I knew all about his troubled life, yet I loved less to be near him, and I strove my utmost to conquer that aversion, . because I thought it cruel and ungenerous when he had no one else to love him. I was excessively hurt and angry with grand- mamma, yet dared not say so, for fear she should send him quite away, and at last I almost worked myself up into a beUef that I ought to marry" him, and that when I was old enough I would try; perhaps I might like him better then, I thought. " Papa and mamma always came to spend EUMOR. 17 the autumn with us, and returned to Eng- land in time for the opening of Parliament. Last autumn papa wrote word that he should bring a friend with him, and that I was to he introduced at taljle — I had never appeared yet, when there were any strangers. The day came ; the courier came to say that they were just at hand. Then grandmamma took me into her own hands and dressed me for the first time in her life. To my surprise and horror she put on me a lace frock — a dreadful thing from Paris, low in the throat, with short sleeves — and what was worse, she trimmed me all over with jewels, till I looked like an idol of the Virgin. I did not dare to complain, however, and indeed I felt it did not really signify, for I was not at all excited ahout the stranger they said was coming. All day that day too, Geraldi was nowhere to be seen. At last the time came, grandmamma went down, dressed grandly, but not frightfully as I was, and she led me in her hand. Of course I wanted to run and kiss papa and mamma, but she pinched my hand so tight I could not get it free. And when I got into the room — an immense room — I could not at first see what the stranger was like. I looked all round, while papa and mamma embraced me, and at last saw some person in a corner — next moment papa took me to him. But what was strange, he only said my name by way of introduction, not Ids. It was Diamid, however, looking so beautiful, but oh, so weary ! And when he said ' I am very happy to see you. Lady Geraldine,' so kind- ly, just as if I were a child (and indeed I suppose I was, for I wanted to put my arms round him and kiss him) I thought for the first time that English was, after all, not so harsh a tongue as I had always believed. But the next moment Diamid glanced at my dress — I saw he thought it ridiculous, for there was a little baby-smile just at the cor- ners of his mouth ; and I burned with shame and indignation. J never reflected in those days, but acted on impulse as naturally as I breathed, and I ran with all my speed out of the room ; I did not even hear them call after me ; I suppose they were too much amazed, for no one had seen Diamid's glance except myself I rushed into grandmamma's room and tore ofl' the lace rubbish and dia- monds, flinging them into her press, and then I let down all my hair in curls just as I had worn it before grandmamma rolled it up and dressed it, and as I Avear it now ; and I put on one of my old dresses, made like this which I have on. Nobody sent after me, and I staid there a while, and at last went down into the library, got something to eat from one of the servants, and then settled myself to read, but I could neither read nor settle, so I went out on the terrace, and walked up and down very fast — I was so excited I did not know what to do, so afraid and yet glad — all the world seemed 3 I new ; and yet I felt it was only because that I stranger was in the house, only because 1 longed for him to see me again, in my own ! natural habit, that he might think me pretty, as I knew he would then. Presently they all came out to walk ; I had expected them, because the evening was so warm ; I walked slower ; soon papa came up to me. He was very angry, I could see that, and yet I did not care, for Diamid was close behind him. Papa began to scold in a very low voice, and in Italian. " ' I am much displeased with you, — how dared you go away when I ordered you were to be present at dinner? and how dared you change your dress, which I had ordered too — I am astonished, I am amazed — ' But Diamid interrupted him. " ' Stay,' he said, ' she should be enshrined and worshipped as that rare thing, a womar Avho understands herself, and who, unstainec* by the vanity which clothes all beauty with corruption, has courage to repudiate artifice ; as sincere as she is fair.' Papa looked as- tounded ; he had no idea Diamid understood Italian. And so ashamed for him to have heard what he said to me." " Why ashamed ? " asked Lady Delucy, assuming ignorance, for she could not be- lieve so young a girl would know. " I did not know then, — Diamid told me afterwards, he tells me all I ask him. Papa wished Diamid to marry me, and to seem so anxious that I should appear in full dress was a British blunder, which no one could detect more easily, nor mock more delicately, than Diamid. Papa had chosen to admire Diamid because he is what papa calls a self- made man, meaning he can do all he chooses, and cares to do the utmost, because so am- bitious. Papa is ambitious, but has a small mind which can only move in a circle. I had heard all my life of Diamid Albany, but never for a moment then, imagined this stranger was the same. So Diamid walked with me on the terrace ; he talked to me so beautifully, so kindly, yet so admiringly ; I was proud, I grew prouder every moment, and felt as if I grew, — I do believe I was a M'Oman grown that night. Tlie next day we talked again ; how easy I was with him, — yet he was the first person to Avhom I had ever looked up. He drew out every secret feeling, only by looking me in the fiice, as the air draws out the perfumes of the flow- ers, and the sun draws up the dew. I told him all about Geraldi, and actually asked him whether I should not do right to marry him. Diamid said earnestly, ' You must not think of it, my child. Small natures in making sacrifices become sublime ; great minds by the diminution of natural happi- ness, turn into slaves instead of the rulers they should be.' Proud as I was when he called me woman, I was happier now that he called me ' child.' " Next day papa brought me a number cf 18 RUMOR. books, and told me that I was to read them, that it was time I should — that every body must be able to say they had read them, and talk, about them. I wondered why, but not long. I never was averse to reading, except books on science. Every thing but science seemed treated of in these. There were dramas, prose romances, satires, essays, theoriei sketched and typified, and I felt sure that only one produced them all. There was no name on the title pages ; you know Diamid never put his name till it was famous ; this was the first edition of his works, papa had procured it on purpose, that I might not know. For some days I did not see iJiamid, nor papa; they M'ent out on excursions, and I was left at home. I had read all the books through by the time they returned, and was reading them again. I remember so well that day, as well as those in heaven must remember the day they died. I was reading 'The Lotus Valley.' You remember that one, of course ? " " I do remember it, but perhaps I do not know it so well as you do ; it was the earliest of the works he published." — " Yes, his Primavera, this first bloom of the spring of genius, what a blossom too ! I was reading the passage where Renaro locks up the child Inesilla Avhom he has received as ransom for her father, in the court of the Hareem. I know that passage by heart." " * You cannot escape,' said Renaro; 'you are entirely in my power ; with a word of mine I can release you, by an act detain you here forever.' ' I do not care,' replied the child, ' nothing is of any consequence to me now. But do kill that pretty, poor but- terfly which I caught this morning and was playing with when you carried me away. I hid it in the hollow of my hand, but you pressed my hand so tightly that it was hurt, — poor me! I crushed the butterfly, and when you let my hanl go and I opened it, it fell upon the floor. It jannot fly, it has lost its beautiful soft dust, and its rose and purple spots are quivering with pain. Oh, crush it M'ith your font, which is heavier than mine ! I have no slippers, and my tread is too light to kill it. I should make it suff'er more.' Renaro strode three steps along the marble floor, and crushed the butterfly ; its ruined wings lay like bruised petals of a storm-scattered iris. He turned to the child ; he had put on not an angry frown. ' So you have lost your Psyche,' he said, ' and you are mine.' ' But you cannot crush me,' she answered. " ' Then Renaro heaved a great sigh, which shook the pomegranate blossoms. He went out hastily, and left Inesilla there. When he returned she was asleep by the fountain in the midst ; the sound of the Avater, as a song of eternal kisses, had lulled her sorrow till it dreamed of joy. Renaro approached her with stillness ; his feet unshod, he held in his hand the gem-eii.crusted slippers, lest their sound on the marble should awaken her. Her long hair had fallen into the water, and floated wide there like golden weeds ; Renaro lifted it from the water, wrung it from its dangerous moisture, and dried it on the folds of his robe, so gently, all so tenderiy, that she smiled in her sleep, in a dream that her mother was toying Avith her hair, as in days when they dressed each other with flowers, and made a play of love. Renaro laid that yet damp hair back from her brow, lest its chill should cross her sweet visions with the cold di-eam of death ; then gathering pomegranate flowers and the jas- mines which had come from her own land, he laid them in her lap, and glided from the court again, again sighing, this time not loud enough to shake the blossoms, for fear of rudely stirring a sweeter blossom still' " While I read, Diamid came behind 'me, and looked over my shoulder. I felt his breath on my neck ; I would not move, lest he should go away. When I arrived at the end of the last passage, I was going to turn a page. ' Are not those two passages con- tradictory to each other? Critics say so, and doomed the book to oblivion long ago ; but it is not buried, nevertheless, I suppose because there are so many fools left in the world,' he said. " ' No, no ! ' I said, very eagerly, ' they are not contradictory passages, they explain each other. He did exactly Avhat she asked him, and did it to prove his allegiance, which is further proved by the interest of a man so stern and inflexibly drawn, in the affair of a child and a butterfly. It is a delicate and subtle touch, quite in keeping Avith the gen- tleness of his demeanor afterwards. I agree Avith all this author Avrites, and understand all too, Avhich is more than I can say for any other English Avriter. But he is not an English //(mA-e?- — he only subdues the lan- guage to his uses, a stubborn instrument, but so entirely his slave. Ah ! I understand him, and Avish I could see him, for I know him without seeing him. I am not like oavIs Avhich see best in the dark, or bctts Avhich love to fly at tAvilight ; I can only look at the light, and soar toAvards the sun.' I don't knoAv Avhat rhapsody I Avas going to utter, for his presence gave me the gift of language, as the music-god of the north, Spromkari, — to all those children Avho see him in his blue depths, playing on the eternal harp, — giA'es the gift of music. But Diamid touched my forehead Avith one of his hands ; I turned to him straight, I looked at him. He said, in tones that seemed to pierce my brain, ' Thou understandest all, in understanding me!' And before I could breathe again, before I could even Avonder Avhat he meant " Here the Lady and Geraldine started both, and both exclaimed, " What sound Avas that P " It did not cease, but SAvelled Avitli a volume and a voice neither of the Avin.d nor thunder. RUMOR. 19 It was music certainly, imperious and insur- gent, brimming far over, and flooding its own source. " The organ ! " cried Lady Delucy, " the old organ in the hall ; but who can be play- ing, and, above all, to make it sound so ?- I must go and see." And she left Ger- aldine, and went. CHAPTER VI. Though Geraldine had been nurtured in one of the kingdoms of the glory of song, she had heard little music, and understood less. For a moment or two, her idolizing taste for her husband's deeds and words, had been wounded by her companion's putting them by so easily for a fresh and a strange interest. But still the sound grew, surging stronger and richer, till the diapason woke sympathetic vibrations in tlie strings of the closed piano, and made the chords of ihe covered harp shudder, as if brushed by a hand too rude. Then Geraldine's heart filled with the passion of happiness ; it pene- trated, and seemed to create a new desire, which was not for love to convict of some imperious need unfelt before. Soon she was in the hall too. The organ in the hall was very old, and not of master-build. Not a gleam of gild- ing remained on the pipes, from whose points cobwebs hung and fluttered, and the cover for the keys had been lost so many years, that deposit after deposit of dust had fallen between their cracks, half choking the sound of some, and dumbing altogether not a few. Still before the organ hung its cur- tain, once red, now rust-hued velvet, and the rings which held it to the rods were rusty too. In fact for years the instrument had been considered useless, and only the con- servative pride of the house had suflered it to remain standing. Yet this wreck, this ruin, this body from which one would have said the soul had fled, seemed in this hour to have its mechanical power renovated as if by its long rest, and a soul more great than its own possessed it newly. When Lady Delucy went into the hall, the fii'st thing she saw was a group of her own servants, one of whom was dispensing gos- sip, that salt of servants' lives, to the rest. Being the senior of the party, he grimaced with fear when he beheld his mistress. She only inquired, however, who was placing ? " A wild-looking, wandering sort of a per- son," was the reply, " and he knocked at the front entrance door, just a single knock, as sharp and sudden as a shot, and when I opened it, this person walks in, and asks for you, my lady, not like a gentleman's servant, but as an impostor who wishes to pass for a | gentleman. He must be a impostor of course or would have knocked a double knock, acting as a gentleman. I says, not of course thinking it mattered whether he was kept or not, ' you can stand inside while I inquire whether my lady will have any thing to say to you,' knowing there was no plate in the hall except the fire-irons. ' But,' says I, * give me your card Mith your name, or 1 cannot think of troubling my lady.' He gives me this scrap of paper, and who could read that f — it's not writing at all ! While I am gone to see whether your ladyship is at home to any one of that class, he spies out (I suppose) the horgan, and I know no more than that I and the rest within hear- shot, run in to remove him ; but you see, my lady, believing him to be a lunatic rather than a impostor, why naturally we couldn't agree among us to disturb him, knowing no one but a lunatic could play so on the hor- gan — //m^ horgan in particular." Lad)' Delucy took the paper, and read, ic a grotesque German hand, the name of a person who had stopped the carriage the night before. Now Lady Delucy had not forgotten him ; she told him to call on her that day, when she left him with his mother to be cared for at the vdiage inn, the nighi before. But she had appointed four o'clock, as she had fixed employment for the morn- ing — engagements, however, which Geral- dhie had been permitted to break through after all. But Lady Delucy was not one to be severe upon artists for infringement of social rules, or M-ant of punctuality ; upon real artists rather, for she gave no quarter to mimic ones. The voice of her servant worried her, as it jarred against the noble music ; she sent him and all the rest away, and then stood still to listen. As for the servants, they vanished precipitately, not without noise, which such persons usually manage to make, most of all when they are trying to be quiet. Once in their own place, the seasoning of their dis- course grew still more stinging. " My lady's ways and whimseys is not strange, being met with as she was by my lord. I hope and pray this strange man won't harm her — but to leave her all alone with him ! Supposing he Mas to go into one of his lunacies while here ? " " / only hope he is no more than a luna- tic," observed a younger member of the reti- nue, one M'ho had shared the quite modern benefits of a course of popular education. All the others looked up to him, as coming from London, and having attended lectures on all subjects, occult and familiar. " What could be worse ? " they asked ; " what did he uiean ? " " I don't mean any thing, for I don't know, and without knowing there's no meaning ; but I do remember heai-ing of the fiddler who had only one string to his fiddle, which the devil screwed on for him, which was 20 RUMOR. show n in this, that if any other fiddler hap- pened to play .oil it (but he was always much against their doing it), why, they only made it squeak and set your teeth on edge ; and yet he, the fiddler it belonged to, could play music and keep your mouths open as well as youi- ears, on that very one string, soft and loud equally." " What was his name ? " asked one of the housemaids. "I can't exactly remember, but it was • jmething like Pagan, and a Pagan he was, or worse, which I believe myself. 1 believe in the devil ; I think it a part of religion ; nor am I a Dissenter — I renounced the devil at the font." " But how could he be the devil, if the devil fastened on the string ? " " Is not that what I Avas wishing to bring you to ? Do not fiddlers fasten on their own strings? AVell, that proves him to have been the devil, and the devil, we are expres- sively told, walks about seeking whom he may devour, and what more likely but that being a spirit, and able to change his shape, he should have taken fust to the fiddle, and take to the horgan noio ? " " But still people have played on that hor- gan," observed a sceptical scullery maid, wlio, in the excitement of the time, had been allowed to approach her superiors as she was not wont, "or else what was it made for, and put up in the hall ? " " Certainly people has played on it, but clothes wear out, and so do horgans. Han- del, who wrote those long pieces called oritorias, one of which I heard in London, a Cliristmas piece called Messiah. He played on that horgan once, more than one hundred years ago. And to show its age, the long parts of the keys wjjich are made black in cur proper church norgans, are made white in that one, and the white parts of the keys black." " Ah," said the old porter, who had spoken to his mistress, " I recollect once, when my little lady was a tiny roaming thing of six or so, she come roaming into the hall one night when I was putting logs on the hall fire. My little lady says, ' Prout,' she says, as pn tty as she always speaks, ' will you just mas^e a little wind come into the organ ? I want to try and put down one of those keys. Mamma says they are too heavy, and that I cannot ; but if I could, it would surprise mamma very much, would it not, Prout?' ': Of course I did it, with pleasure, and I declare I think it pretty near as hard to play the bellors as to play the horgan, at all events I did play the bellors, and my little lady could not play the horgan. Not with all the strength of her little fists piled one on the other,~Could she get down one note. I remember then my little lady says, ' It's no use, Prout, but I thank you,' she always «aid / thank you, so grand and yet so pretty. Then I come round iu front, and she is playing with the keys, if she can't upor them. She calls the long white keys ladies coffins, and the black parts marble pave- ments, and says, ' no wonder they are dead, being made to listen to music, and the music being dead.' And she finishes by rubbing her pretty little fingers all along the dust and smearing it all over her face. And her nurse comes, snatches her up, and scolds me rarely." "I give you a last proof," here broke ir the devil-ridden. " The devil and no mis- take ! There is no one blowing the bellows, and Prout is well aware as I am, that no one besides the devil could make wind for himself" " Then my lady might be whisked out of window in a flame of sulphureous fire, like Lady Hatton in the play." " That was because Lady Hatton sold herself to him to get a sweetheart ; — my lady living all by herself is safe enough for that." " She may live all alone by herself, but she sees people sometimes — and just before he went abroad, Mr. Albany was in and out in her own room, through the door in the wall — not coming round the right way of the front entrance." To this theory the majority only gave con- sent by silence. And was the lady astonished that the organ, Avithout wind to feed it, should give out a greater than its own voice ? She did not think about it at all, nor find time to wonder ; she remembered no more the actual decay ; thus repaired, the dim pipes filled fresh with golden tongues. So masterly was the hand that thus created, that she almost feared the masterhood of the creating pres- ence. She would have doubted the possi- bility of the player's being so young as the person who had given her the letter, but for the fact that the name on the scrap of paper in her hand was the name mentioned in the letter from one she had benefited in his neediest days, who now commended to her notice another needy aspirant. All at once, while she was lost in the improvisation, jast as one progresses spiritually in a dream, not knowing the end, enrapt in expectation, the dream broke off' short : just as in a rude awakening from sleep. " Are you tired ? " asked a voice, which sounded after the music strangely harsh and rude. Then the lady heard a rustling, and steps ; she was sure tuat some second ])erson moved behind the organ, coming forward to the front ; still the curtains were undrawn ; it was not her the voice addressed. No longer fearing to dissipate the dream, she walked up to the curtains, and very gently drew them aside. Behind them, as she expected, sat the youth ; beside him now stood his mother, who on seeing Lady De- lucy fell into a nervous fluster, which entu-eiy deprived her of utterance, though it made RUMOR. iil her cough spasmodically for many moments. As for the player, he had dropped his eyes gloomily, like a moping owl in the sunshine, and his hair, which was in color and texture not unlike tlie down of the owl's breast, fell forward (as if recently shaken) over the brows ; so completely covering that crown of the countenance, the forehead, that the lady could not the least guess at its struc- ture, nor even trace its size. By the fresh and aU-revealing daylight she perceived that the face she scanned was in fact, as the world Avould have decided, irremediably plain ; to her it was interesting for other reasons, but most of all because of that same harmonious ugliness, for each feature being plain by itself, the effect was far more agree- able to an artistic vision than might be a face with one lovely feature, distorted by the ugliness of the rest to the discord unavoida- ble in such a case. The skin of this face was colorless, but neither white nor fair ; of a dry sallow tint, w^hich attested a condition of bodily ill- health. Years upon years of experience be- yond the natural portion of so young a life, had folded too straitly the thin line of the lips ; there was still a charm for which the lady had an eye in the expression absolutely unsen- sual, which the severity of the line imparted ; while yet the face retained the whole burden of the passion of youth, unshared. Unmiti- gated — virgin yet. The lady interpreted all these meanings, for she was a student of such whenever they pi-esented themselves, but they would have been veiled from other eyes by a prevailing aspect of despair, in- creased by the expression of the figure, more sharply lined than even the face, more droop- ing still, the torture of restrained restlessness in its rigid attitude. The lady's eyes filled with the light, if not the tears of pity — but she took care he should not see them. She stood behind him, and soon her kindly smile reassured the mother ; it struck her that she could not speak EngHsh easily, and she addressed her in her own tongue. "Your son has a wonderful talent for music," she observed. The son did not stir, nor move his eyes. " Oh," began the woman fluently enough, after the fashion of her class, when once their tongues are loosed. " Oh, I do not know what to say, how to apologize, for my great misconduct in coming in. You had ordered him to come alone, my lady, and he would not wait till the hour "you had ap- pointed ; 1 followed him close, as I always do when he walks about, for fear he should fall into a ditch, or walk straight against a wall. But when he arrived I waited outside, as it was right for me to do. In a minute he opened the door, and pulled me in ; his arm was so strong, and his eyes shone so, that I was afraid of his having *a fever of the Drain, for the doctoi-s warned me never to cross him, not when he^^»a^oinvjears old and broke all the wine g^!te^t,(^r'ge and small, by putting water into thf^^^^id play- ing cathedral chimes. And not liking the sounds he made so well as those chimes — the finest in all Hanover — he took the little stick and smashed them one by one." While she so ran on, the son looked up and xhe lady did not see how he glanced at his mother, because she stood on the other side, but the glance checked her tongue. Then he turned to the lady, who smiled ; but it was evident to her, that, at once he had de- tected the pity that softened her eyes, for a livid haughtiness fell upon his face, like the shadow of a sultry cloud ; it was Avith it as with a clear complexion when it blusbr^s, divided between pride and shame. The eager voice, deepened from its usual harsh medium, seemed to convey that haughtiness to another sense than sight. " The lady could not blame me for handling her organ — / could not have handled it too long." " Herman, Herman ! " cried the mother again, in affright. " Lady, I pray you, forgive him, he is so wild upon music that he has no respect of persons ; he has made an idol of it, and it prevents his giving honor where honor is due both to God and man." The lady noticed a twang in these last few words very unusual among associations of her country, how common soever in this. •She saw too, how they grated on the son's ear, but still he turned not to speak ; his mother could perceive this ; bitterly the thin lips curled, but no bitter answer came. " Your son is quite right to say he could not play too long ; I am only astonished that he can play at all upon an instrument so unworthy of him, and so completely worn out." " Do you know ? " he exclaimed, speaking harshly, eagerly again, " do you know what it shows, what it proves, that I can play on it? Do you know that it is not only bad because it is old, 1)ut that the day it was set up it ought to have been pulled down again, and broken into bits and sticks, and made into a bonfire ? And the maker should have been roasted in the midst, if indeed any fire could have been hot enough to burn through so thick a skull — except the hottest " " Herman ! Herman ! " broke in the moth- er, and he left the dooming sentence unfin- ished still persisted, " Lady, do you know what it is to make music from a lump like this ? " " It is genius," said the lady, for want of * better word. " It is creation. It is what made the world; it is what He who made aU things only gives the lords of men." " Herman ! Herman ! " " You have said so, mother. Why did you give me the name lord -man ? " " Hush — thou knowest, all know who do 22 RUMOK. not shut their ears, that all are alike tefore God." " But not before man," he muttered. The lady came again to his rehef. " Is the organ your fiivorite, your own in- strument ? " she asked. He looked full at her, and his small gray eyes filled as it were from behind tlie iris with pale, gleaming fire — the true magnetic light. A sudden power seized him to express in words. " Your question could only have been thought of, and asked with a view to a reply, by a woman. Oh lady, women are very use- ful to musicians in all but the highest, — in dramatic parts. They are divine, in divine dramatic parts, equally the World-divine, — the Oljmpian, — parts of majestic passion, or sublimated crime ; — and the Spiritual divine, — parts angelic, of tender chastity, or all-sacrificing love. Women are priceless, or rather slaves to be purchased at any cost, by musicians for the use of music. But as for women being musicians themselves, — why, the pianoforte was made for women — that is quite enough." "Made for women?" interrupted Lady Delucy, amused rather than surprised. " Yes, made for them, an invention patented by benevolent persons on their account. How many women, answer me, play otlter instru- ments, instruments for the orchestra, as well as most women play the pianoforte P " " They are the exceptions, certainly," said the lady. "Exceptions! and exceptions among wo- vien, who all imitate each other! — few enough are such exceptions. The pianoforte is a toy, and for the most part women treat their pianofortes just as they treated their toys when they were children, petted them and knocked them about, often spoiled them altogether, now and then swaddled them in wool, and did not play Avith them ftt all." " That is true, certainly ! " " And as true, that when women are not satisfied with their own rights in art, it hap- pens as it does when dissatisfied with their own rights in life as women ; they try to scale ihe heights, they bruise and break their frail fi'ames against the rocks ; and if a woman, j>o trying physically to attain what she need not covet — for spiritually she is able to em- brace it — if such a woman does not perish, self-hurled to destruction, she remains an exception, as you say, a monster ; soon she hates herself." The lady was surprised, but she gloried in any thing that resembled an encounter of two minds agreed to differ. " How then ? " she asked, " Cecilia was herself a Saintess." " Madam, Cecilia was unmarried — that is sufHcient to ])rove her beyond all women ; an angel. Cecilia was a type. We call all Art feminine, because it aspires." " Woman reaches out her arms to man, the truer to nature and to beauty, the more fully she opens her arms, still always to the One, that shall fill and satisfy, not to the many, who pass through them to elude her. So does Art — above all, Art-Musical, stretch in all her strength to God. And as God is infinite, phantoms of perfection all briglit with the brightness of His presence, pass one by one through the dreams of Art, they elude her embrace only to give room to fresh and pure celestial visions ; we call that Cre- ation, it is the progress of a Soul. Finite while human, the faithful man, with his single impression, fills the arms of the f.iitlif'ul woman. That woman is slave, not child of Art. I give you a proof. Possessing what you call Genius, she will throw it by, cast it to the winds — nay, lay it at the feet of the man she loves, and bid him tread it into the dust of things forgotten, if only his opinions or pursuits agree not with the habits of Genius. I grant that a woman may have genius, — most unhappy mind, and thirsty soul! though I would have her calmly wise, fit to worship as she is meet to love. A woman may be a poetess of the holy passion, she may discuss in books what men's natures dare never expose to themselves, much less to others. She may clothe heroism and grace with the material immortality of sculp- ture. She may paint — that is to say, she may commune with the color-art as nuns in convents keep up their communication with their celestial bridegroom ; by yearnings, by fastings, by self-imposition and perpetually- recurring disappointment. But music ! — Song, indeed, is a wreath of woman ; it crowns with unearthly loveliness her fairest charms, it gives her beauty if she has none else ; it gives her wings if she is pure, and she soars before death into the nearest heaven, and drops on us influences, holier than the star-influences, dreams of passion incorruptible. But song is not the whole of music, it is a ray only of the rainbow, or rather, the most artless form of musical ex- pression, giving just such tender beauty to Art M'hen it assists it, as infancy gives human nature." The lady ceased to be surprised ; she was absorbed in growing interest. The shrill tones had mounted to a lofty pitch, so that their metallic clarity struck throug} the face changed as visibly as an autumn nndscape when the sun pierces the fog that mantled it — the gray eyes fixed, and delicate lights played over them like the steady electric smiles of a fervent summer night. When he ceased speaking, of course the lightnings faded, the eyes grew dim, yet the face re- tained its brightness somewhat, and the hands qjiiver^d silently over the keys, though they formed no clustering chord. The lady grew actually impatient if he 'did not play ; she must hear him go on speaking. " Then you did not tell me which instru- ment you love best to play — though you told me (and taught me) a good deal besides, RUMOR. 9 A which, peihaps, it is good to know, that we may not think too highly of ourselves." " I did not tell you to take you down. I have no instrument, as the cant is, and the ignorant boast ; God be thanked for that ! Unless the musician can play with all instru- ments for his own purposes, he is but the in- strument of music himself. Only so far as he commands them all, is he himself music — least finite image of the Eternal." " You do not then satisfy yourself in play- ing ? " " That time has long been past with me, or I should not be hdre. I dream now — like the Spirit of God moving upon the fiice of the waters, so stir my shadows, dim shapes of sound, across the chaos of my fathomless intention." "I knew not," murmured the lady half unconsciously, when he paused again, — "that musicians could so speak — could so discourse of what alone they understand ; it is strange and new." The mother, who had been nearly asleep during a rhapsody which was hke a sermon in a foreign language to her ear, now woke up and yawned. A sort of shiver shook his frame, as the cross influence smote him, and he sank into the old attitude, with more than the old restraint. CHAPTER VII. While Lady Delucy was talking to her new and singular acquaintance, she had for- gotten, in her artistic enthusiasm, her other friend, scarcely of less recent introduction. Geraldinehad listened to the music first with wonder and delight ; then with mingling wonder whether Diamid, who admired scarcely any playing, would admire this. But when it ceased, she grew weary, and finding Lady Delucy did not return to look for her, she persuaded herself it was quite time for her to go home, that she might be ready to greet her husband on his return. She left a little note on the table in the room where she had been talking to Lady Delucy, explaining this, and bidding her farewell. The lady was glad to see her daughter and Colonel Lyonhart come into the hall, for the ])ause in the player's behavior made her nervous ; she scarcely knew what to say or do next. She left him and hastened to meet Elizabeth. " Have you heard any thing while you were in the garden ? " she asked her. " Young Rodomant has been playing. No praise can exaggerate his merits. Schenk has spoken well." " We were too far from the house, mamma ; we went to the village, for we thought he and his mother would want a lodging ; there are two rooms to let in the white cottage." low yet, I have not seen him sl^hld like him to stay Jiere.^ »^*^hecked her. For Eliz- " I do not alone yet. Ehzabeth's sr abeth could recall several melancholy, though diverting instances of her mother's excessive benevolence. One that of a gen- tleman who spoke broken English, and announced himself as a German artist, car- rying with him a portfolio of magnificent foreign sketches, and a letter of introduc- tion from one of the princes of German artists, but who could not sketch, because he had broken his arm (still in a sling) in the overturn of a diligence. He was lodged and boarded sumptuously for a fortnight, at the end of which time there appeared in the Times an advertisement of that same port- folio, the actual property of the artist, who was said to have written the letter. An ex- ceedingly large reward was ofl'ered for the sketches, if restored ; and Lady Delucy hast°ned to the rooms she had appropriated to her visitor, but found him already gone ; he had received the information before she did, having taken his copy of the paper himself, out of the letter box, the instant it was deposited therein by the postman, and being aware that Lady Delucy seldom looked at hers till after breakfast. Not only had he gone, but though she wrote to the artist directly, she had to send to town for his ad- dress, and her friend reached him Jirst, and made his story appear so plausible that he received the reward. He was at last caught, with the forged letter still upon his person, but he had then spent the money. Another time Lady Delucy had done a great deal for a man who played upon the harp, very well too, but in the streets, and who prevailed upon her innocence, to believe that his fa- ther, a man of social position, had turned him out of doors, because he persisted in the study of art. She procured him a good many pupils besides her own daughter, and one morning M-hen he was left alone in the dining room for about five minutes, he pocketed and vanished with six golden spoons and a silver pap-boat, enriched with emeralds, out of the side-board closet. Lady Delucy knew she had often been deceived, but her benevolence had in those cases misled her judgment, being fii-st ex- cited. In this instance, her judgment had been formed first. She had not been pre- possessed, nor did she know the youth was absolutely poor ; she thought he only wanted patronage. Her daughter's smile, however, made her very anxious that Eliz- abeth should herself judge of the power and the skill which so enchanted her. It was evident that Elizabeth only went to please her mother ; but she did go with her to the organ — having given Colonel Lyon- hart a look, which asked him to go too. " jSIy daughter," said Lady Delucy,. " wishes to renew her acquaintance witih you — she scarcely saw you last night." 24 RIIMOR. Elizabeth's sweet smile and expressive eyes were sweetest and most eloquent for the musician, just because she did not ad- mire him at all ; she pitied his pallid and rugged countenance, his writhing restless- ness awakened newly, his despairing ex- pression, that almost implied self-disgust. Now, to Lady Delucy's extreme annoyance, the gloom which had filmed his eyes melt- ed not the least, it overspread his whole countenance, and an unutterable awkward- ness possessed his frame ; he stooped, he shrugged, he shook himself like some wikl animal disturbed in its lair by man, and ended by burying his face in his hands, and placing his elbows on the key-board. So he staid a while ; but only while his mother was again courtesying and apologiz- ing. She began to cry at last ; and then he looked up, and said in his harshest tones, yet not without respect in his manner to Lady Delucy, — " Am I to play any more ? because if not, I must go." How respectful soever he was to her, he turned his back completely on Elizabeth and her lover. " I wish my daughter to hear you play, if you are not tired." For she hoped his playing would dissipate the disagreeable eflect he had personally produced. " I am very willing," he answered, " but she," pointing to his mother, "has not strength to blow any longer ; and without wind I can but make these keys rattle like old bones. However, to the ears of asses, and some men, it would be as agreeable and profitable if I rattled them as if I played." And he rattled them with his knuckles. Lady Delucy was very glad that Colonel Lyonhart, who understood almost every Ori- ental dialeot, was profoundly ignorant of all European languages but EngKsh. She sent in all haste for one of the servants, who came ; but would not have dared to come had his ladies been alone ; for Colonel Lyon- hart was looked upon by the household at large in the same sort of light as a police- man — an infallible protector against natural or diabolical dangers. Sorely did the lady repent her ignorance of a phenomenon of character she had not happened to meet with before. Rodomant put out the whole power of the organ, and laying his hands on as many keys as they would cover, commenced a series of awful noises, hideous and ridiculous ; yet various as the streams of nightbirds, the squalls of grimalkins, the howls of beasts, the groans of those in the extremity of sea-sickness, whole masses of fiats, sharps, and naturals — those next-door neighbors, and bitter ene- mies, held on together, till the ear was set as it were on edge, like the teeth by a virulent acid. At last the bolt of musical revenge fell, in a crash of dissonances, a chaotic strum too loud to be endured ; and every one fled ihe field, except Lady Delucy, who indeed could not move for laughing, and whose firfct anger had subsided into the sympathy of one who had been the most delicate of comic actresses, and drawn smiles to a thousand lips by the least dimpling relaxation of hei serene soft face. Rodomant's mother ran away first ; then EHzabeth, who staid as ' long as she could bear it, because in her sim- plicity she really thought he was playing hia best ; and who, when she did move, glided so gently away that no one heard her in the midst of the other noise. Charles Lyonhart, following close beside her, slammed the hall door with his whole strength, in a sort of heroic rage, because Elizabeth's ears had been so tortured, and her sweet grace insulted by one — upon whom he conferred various epithets in Hindostanee, which it would be difficult even at Billingsgate to parallel in the English language. With the banging of the door the noise of the organ ceased. Rodomant looked up in the lady's face with a droll, satisfied smile ; not arch, for the lips were not curved enough to assume such an expression, but confiding and mild withal ; — while he touched here and there a note, or gathered and let go again a chord, softly and fitfully as a butterfly now brushes a rose, now lights upon a pansy. " I have sent him away ! " he said trium- phantly. " You were very cruel," said the lady, " for he has never heard music such as yours, and it would have done him good. I also partic- ularly desired that my daughter should be enchanted, as she might have been if you had done yourself the smallest possible justice," " I was not thinking about her being en- chanted — I only could not have him near me ; and as to playing, that was good enough for him. He is a person who considers music a craft for vagabonds, half wits, and men who faint at the sight of blood. He does not even know M'hat art means, but what he un- derstands by it he despises. He thinks us all dissipated, extravagant, and vain as women. We are voluptuous, spendthrifts, weeds of the devil's growing in God's great field — the world. You cannot contradict me, it is all true that I have said." It was so true that she could not contradict him. Charles Lyonhart, like most men first ) in their own worldly order and clinging to a worldly profession with a tenacity renown has riveted, was ignorant of the claims of those whose profession, if it can be so called, is eminently unworldly, how dependent so- ever its votaries be on the world for suste- nance. As little worldly-wise, less worldly- prudent, and of no use in the world at all, he esteemed all artists of every class. Lady Delucy had spent many hours in vainly con- trasting this prejudice in his mind, and had given it up at last through the conviction that it must arise from a want of passion in his nature But that was before her daugh" ter's betrothal, which convinced her shortlj KUMOR. that whatever might be his prejudices, he was persistent and passionate enough. Yet he did not care even for Elizabeth's playing, and he tried not to yawn, and tried hard to listen, when she sang great foreign scenas. He liked her simplest ballads best, still preferred the kind accents of her silver speech to her most golden singing. "Will you stay here and play, while I speak to your mother — and will you let me speak afterwards to yoic ? " " Do not listen, lady, to anything she says about me — she tells untruths ; that are truths to her, however, for she believes them. About herself she can talk — there is little in her history ; and still less, alas ! in mine." Then Lady Delucy took the woman to the room where she had talked to Geraldine. Directly they were shut in, the woman began, as the lady expected, to cry and complain. " It was so sad, so trying," she said, " to have a child who was not like other children — who cannot work regularly to gain an honest living — cannot settle into regular habits, and marry happily in his own coun- try. If he had been quite an idiot, he would always have been a baby to her, and she should not have suffered half so much as now she did. He was always making ene- mies, and quarrelling with his friends ; and now, after throwing away such fine chances in Germany, to come to England and dis- grace himself the first thing, by placing him- self on an equality with a high lady, — a great lady, — and she, his poor mother, obliged to seem to encourage him, because she dare not cross him, lest, as the doctor said, those convulsions might come back, which he had when he was a child." " You are quite right," said the lady, di- rectly she could get in a Avord — " to take care of him, and it would be very wrong to cross him. I will tell you why : your son is not my equal in music, he is my superior. And once I was not the lady of this house — I was an actress on the English stage, until my noble husband married me." She meant to mend matters, but she had made them worse : the woman shi'ank from her with awe and terror in her face ; she was evidently one of those — fewer abroad than at home, but too many any where, who have been bred in superstitious horror of actors and actresses, a superstition perhaps the last remaining in full strength, of the fine antique stock, of whom witches are the maternal an- cestors. But the lady's sweet smile and countenance which glowed with goodness carried a countercharm to the artificial dread. " Well ! so kind and great a lady had been in so humble a position, that it was wonder- ful she had no pride — could excuse her son's behavior." " But your son is a good son to you, is he not ? " the lady asked. " He certainly never told lies, and he ate very little and drank no beer, and was not gay ; he hated all anmsements. But so wild, so irregular, so rude to every body, particu- larly Ills betters." " Was his father a musician ? " asked Lady Delucy. " Oh no, a shoemaker, but a very good one, with a fine business. Herman would never learn it, nor any thing. I am now sorry we sent him to school, for then he could not have taken up the whims he did about learning. Thou, another vexation hap- pened. He was so clever that he went be- yond all the scholars. His father would have sent him to college, and he might have been a Professor, but he said, ' No, I know as much as I want of those things. I will read for myself.' He spent his mornings in a great library, and Ave thought perhaps he Avas writing a book, that might be a good thing, to have his books at Leipsic fair. But one day I found his papers , they Avere not book papers, but music, pages on pages of it. And as he Avas out, I burned them, because I thought it Avould force him to take up Avith some serious pursuit. For all this time he Avas living on our hands. When he came home " " Oh," said the lady, " was he very much vexed indeed ? " " No, and that Avas odd, he took it so easily that I thought he Avould never Avrite any more. He did not scold, he only sighed once, and tapped his forehead and said, ' Thou canst not burn Avhat is not written.' However, soon he began, not only to Avrite again, but to play. He played noAv on a fiddle, Avhich he tried for a week ; all night long he played ; at the end of the Aveek he got a horn, then a flute ; all sorts of instruments. Tliere might have been hope if he Avould have kept to one, but he never settled to any. And he Avas so idle, that he Avould only practise." The lady smiled. "But hoAV did he contrive to play the organ, for that is Avonderful in him, and even you must be proud of him there." " No, lady, I do not understand music, nor can I hear much in it. I used to love our solemn, holy hymns at Rosenthal." " What, then, is your religion ? " asked the lady. " I am a Moravian, and the Countess Von Welt brought me Avith her, Avhen she married, as her maid, because I Avorked so Avell. I embroidered all her Avedding dresses ; and oh ! to see my husband's shroud and Avind- ing-sheet — they Avere most beautiful, so fine, every body came to see them." A sudden thought struck the lady. " What was your name before your mar- riage ? " she inquired. " Rachael von David ; my father lived at Rosenthal, and was a tailor. My mother was a Moravian, she too worked well." " A Moravian," murmured Lady Delucy, " The old heritage, the old brand of merit, 26 RUMOR. only naif hidden under the parti-colored rags of naturalization." " What did you say, madam ? " " Nothing, nothing ; but your son, how did he get to the organ ? " " He asked his father for six lessons, only six. He learned of the organist at the Church. After one lesson he came home with a black bruise on his head ; when his master began to play to him, he had actually pushed him off the stool ; then naturally enough his master was in a passion, and hit his head with the corner of the big choral book. Herman would learn of him no more ; nothing suited him but that he would learn of Herr Schenk at the Cathedral. That was so dear his father refused him first. But it was not dear in the end, for Herr Schenk took a fancy to him and gave him twenty- four lessons for nothing. Then came the worst part of his ingratitude to God and man. For though I should have preferred him to be any thing else, yet it would have been very respectable if he had got a place as organist — in a Church, I mean, of course. Herr Schenk promised to give him a letter, a certificate, and one besides to tell that he could teach. At first he got on so well that he had eight pupils, and he played duets sometimes with Herr Schenk, which made crowds come to the Cathedral to hear. At last, oh Lady, my old mistress, the Countess von Welt, sent for him, for my son to teach her daughter, the young Countess. How glad I was ! I teas proud then. Oh how I talked to him and besought him to be- have well, and I made him most beautiful shirts, and brushed his clothes ; he looked like a gentleman. For a month or two he went on well, except that he always crumpled his wristbands by tucking them half way up his arms, — the shirts were never fit to put on twice. But then he did a most .dreadful and grievous thing, which spoiled all his for- tune, and then troubles came together as close as swallows in a fiight." " What was the dreadful thing though ? " asked the lady frowning, really impatient. " He actually had the audacity to make love, at least not exactly to make love, but to show he felt it, to the Countess Clara, my old mistress's own child, his own pupil. The Countess sent him away, and would never see me, nor him, any more. All the people, who let him teach their children, took them from under his instruction too : he lost all, — and when the Countess von Welt sent him his money, he sent it all back to her. Then, all at once, his father died ; he had been poorly, and I had not told him of Her- man's misbehavior, because I thought it would make him worse. I was glad I had not told him ; he was spared that unhappi- ness. Then, after his death there was much less money in the business than I thought ; he had always looked for his son to help him. And Herman made me sell the stock : it fetched little, for the people were all run- ning to a new shop opposite the market, where a French-woman sold shoes and boots from Paris. — Well, Herman said to me, ' this money will keep you for a year, anc' then you will see what I shall do. I am going away all day, every day, but I shall come back at night and sleep.' In case of robbers or fire, just to think, to leave me so ! And he Avould not say where he was going : certainly he came home every night, but he never said a word, and I of course thought he was working hard at some trade, to sur- prise me with. At the end of the year he told me — that is, he took me with him to Herr Schenk's, and, lady, that whole year he had been doing nothing but studying music. ' Why,' I said, speaking as mildly as I could, ' how much more time do you mean to waste so?' " ' All my life,' said he. Then despair seemed to fill my heart, and I could say no more, I could only pray for resignation to bear my lot." " And what next ? " " Herr Schenk said, very politely I must say, — he is a fine old gentleman, — * Your son is going to England and there he will make his fortune.' ' Oh, what a long way,' I said ; ' if we must go any where why not nearer home ? ' ' Because, said Herr Schenk, ' England is the richest country in all the world, and I shall write him a letter which he is to take to a kind and great lady, who will introduce him to her friends as she in- troduced me. She is richer now than she was then. All the great persons in England like their children to take lessons of for- eigners, especially Germans, in music. And he can teach children — yes, and grown-up children now." Lady Delucy thought of the simple old German who only loved his pipe besides his organ, and who led so frugal a life that ht could subsist entirely, when in London, upon the handsome remuneration she, his then only pupil, made him for his instructions, when, before her marriage, she had wished to make herself mistress of the science of music. And she wondered how the being she had in the hall would contrive to instruct children, especially the childi'en of the no- bility of Britain. She would ask no more questions about him. " You tell me you work," she observed. "Now you need be under no apprehensions about your son and yourself, for I can get you and give you a great deal of work. Fine work is alniost as difficult to procure as fine music. My daughter will be married some day, and as she wiU go to India with her husband she will want a great many more clothes than do most young ladies when they marry. You shall make them all — at least as many of them as you like — for I know how beautiful is the needlework of HUMOR. •n the Moravians, and that my daughter and I shill like yours very much better than w'h;xt is (lone in England." Then the lady finished in her thoughts : — " It will take her mind off her son. His pa- tience with her is actual virtue, but it would be heresy to call it so." Soon she was alone with the son. He uas not so agreeable as she had ex- pected — for, once out of the musical body, he was as queer and restless as ever, seem- ing scarcely in a condition of sanity. In- deed, had she been a fool, she might really have thought him mad ; but she was of too lucid a mind not to receive clearly the im- pression of every other. She fixed her se- rene eyes on him, and gradually he calmed beneath their influence. However he writhed and fidgeted, his eyes became fixed upon her, and he now examined her with all the eager- ness of a youth, yet all the simplicity of a child. " She has told .you about the little Count- ess, lady ? " " I did not believe what she believes, hoAV- ever ; do not fear." " No, I should think not. It was the Countess who made love to me. It was I Avho would go no more to teach her, after she had jn-essed my hand and asked me for a lock of my hair. But she was so angry with me for scolding her and sneering at her, that she told her mother it was I who had been the fool. I never knew love — the love of the human lover. My bride is found, however — nay, I have married her. And she shall not be poor. She shall reign a queen, and I her king, will reign over her, yet worship her and be her servant." " Now, I wish to ask what are your de- sif/ns ? Without knowing them I cannot help you, and I wish to help you, rightly. You know that, for you read character." " " You ought to wish ; it would be for your own advantage, too," he muttered. Truly, no respect of ])ersons dwelt with him, saving only one person — himself. "I know, and fully recognize, the claims of genius. But there is an intellectual as well as a moral conscience. The greater the powers the more conscientiously they must be employed ; the more they in'omise the more they must produce." " Who, of nineteen years, ever knew what I know ? I am aged Avith knowledge ; wis- dom turned my heart to stone in the cradle." " Is this vanity or the pride of jjower ? " the lady asked herself. " But what do you wish to do — how to begin ? " she added, aloud. " Lady," — and here his voice was no longer rude, it trembled — "I did not come here to make money, though I came because it is so rich a place ; and though it is strange enough that, practical nation as you are, with your golden tests for every thing, even merit, you still are the people who give the most to fame, and the most fame to the famous. I want to make my first great fame in England, not as others have done, make it abroad and then bring it over, already hackneyed, to be hunted round and round in a circle, and then turned out altogether." " But here — in this country-place ? " " Oh, Schenk gave me the letter addressed here, because he said it was the time of year when fine ladies are in the comitry. As for my mother, you may think it impertinent I brought her" too. But I will never leave her, and I can earn enough to support her by spending an hour a day in wriung trum- pery for the music-sellers. I ought to sup- port her, for I would learn no trade. You see what she is, that she believes in art as in the devil — in fact, not believing it at all, but frightened at it as the superstitious fear ghosts, not believing in them either. But she brought me up, instead of strangling me or starving me ; ugly as a viper when I Avas liorn, she nourished me, she let me live. And for that she shall be remembered Avhen I am a Power upon the earth." " Your Avish then is fame, fame earthly and perishable, after all." " Fame ! — but many things have fame, earthly things, fame earthly ; things spiritual, a fame as pure." " May it be yours, and may you deserve it ; above all, may you not depend upon it for your soul's sustenance, for if so, you shall thirst again." " Ah, you once had fixme, a Avoman's fame. And you could give it up ! What surer proof that fame is no more sufficient for a Avoman's Avhole delight than love is enough for man's." The lady smiled. When she had given up her dear pursuit it Avas for nothing she loved as Avell, nor had the love she received filled up the chasm in her being between her artist and her private life ; it did but cover the abyss Avith frail bright roses, though an angel hovered over it — her child. Still, nothing in her face, or manner, or most transient mood, betrayed that to her life the vital principle of life's perfection Avas Avant- ing. There Avas but a sh>;ide of graA'ity at Avhich one Avondered, because she was so generous, and her means to relieve Avere so large — for to have the j)oicer to be gener- ous equal to the Avill, is the most certain brightener, after love, of a true-hearted Avoman's fate. CHAPTER Vin. Ox a bright May morning the chief critic of one of the periodicals that sustain the glory of the English press, Avas sitting at his desk Avith nothing particular to do, becausa 28 EUMOR. nothing particular had been done. Innumer- ,able letters lay on the table directed to Tims Scrannel, Esq. He had answered all he meant to answer, and left the others out to produce an effect, even though his servant only should witness the effect, and have cause to marvel at the magnitude of his correspondence. Tims Scrannel was no ordinary person. Sluggish and cold as crawled the current of his blood, surcharging his temperament with lymph, yet his veins held brighter, quicker dro])s, that seemed as though with that they could not blend, any more than wine with oil when poured upon it. His parents' mar- riage of mislike had developed itself in the sure result, an offspring endowed with a crabbed contrariety of attriljutes. He was, as it were, possessed of twin spirits, frater- nizing not in their mutual prison, — as if to realize the old heathen suspicion that two de- mons dwell with the individual man, prompt- ing him either to good or evil. A demon and an angel ruled this nature, and if not equally, it was not strange, for the demon was fos- tered upon its own food, the flesh, and the senses were its ministering slaves. But as for the angel, that slept in the trances of the soul, only waking at strange moments, a stranger almost to itself. All circumstances had conspired to make this life a convulsion, rather than a struggle, for this twin-possessed. He was unloved by a loveless mother — one of those of whom one can but believe they are here, on earth, in a state not only probational but progress- ive : — a feminine monster, head-woman — that is, a brain teeming with frivolous inventions ; heart-reptile, whose still, chill blood seemed the unbound snow-wreath of maiden modesty to the simple nature it de- luded — until round his Marm heart the cold coils had closed — too late, for after mar- riage. Thenceforth his life became a galvan- ized existence ; his soul swooned into a torpor which nothing but the shock of death could scatter. Tims Scrannel was their only child, begotten in disap])ointment, and born, as far as character involves jjersonality, of a mother, yet without one. He Avas ugly, and his mother hated him, cast him from her cold oreast ; he was weakly, and his father cared /or him tenderly, until his budding character disclosed the blight of the maternal blood. He had been christened — by his mother's determination, which always carried the day by woman's majority of one against him who, if not her master, is sure to be her slave — and named a name which no person coidd wish to bear to the grave, and have inscribed upon his coffin. But he Avas so insignifi- cantly named that he might possibly inherit a property belonging to a relation of his mother's, whose house bore that name since Barebones sat. And he changed his sur- name besides, that he might actually inherit the fortune of another. The first specula- tion failed entirely, and as for the second, it was, on reversion to him, so diminished by extravagance that it was scarcely worth the trouble of a claim. At twenty-five Tims Scrannel was a disappointed man. He had never been a youth, in the young, ignorant, and dreamful sense, reeling as with wine be- neath the bliss of being. Like Narcissus, he gazed on himself, and unlike Narcissus fell to hating the image he beheld within. He detested liis looks, his name and style, his means — just sufficient to make the very poor envy him as rich, the rich to look down on him as very poor. His ambition was petty, therefore perilous, for if he longed to be something it was something he knew not of, and no winged impulse drove him to any goal. From head to foot cased in the icy mail of scepticism, there yet boiled a spring at his heart — the fire of jealousy ever fed that central heat. Yet was the brain sound, the mind without a flaw, and there were mines of intellectual resource ever in re- serve, and golden veins enriched by working to the uttermost. And as for the soul, there in its own home the angel slept, and now and then woke gently — gently as Byron's slept, under the muse's magnetic sway. The Avak- ing of the angel gave a thrill of higher life — nay, the highest — to the imprisoned na- ture ; it distilled through all the senses. To his ear, ever that of the musical voluptuary, it brought the music of the spheres ; to his eye it showed the green repose of death's illimitable fields, the true Elysian. In those angelical moods, his taste Avas turned as fever- sick from the luscious fruits of pleasure, and the taste spiritual that it typified yearned in the thirst of its extremity for such Avater as Avas promised to the Avoman frail and faithful at the earthly Avell. Then the very arms Avearied of all that man can materially em- brace, the sense of touch AA'as sublimated into that spiritual body Ave call magnetic, Avhen soul embraces soul ; then the very scent fainted from perception of artificial essences, the green-room boviquet and the ball-room Avreath ; but a rose freshly opened, or a Avall-flower Avashed in spring rains, suf- fused the soul Avith soft, sad memories, a trouble of delight. But the tAvin-angel, far from making the possessed one suffer less, added poignancy to the contrasting torment ; the demon-twin raged and tore him, in revenge for the tran- sient heli)lessness in which it had been bound. And its fiendish strength, in alli- ance Avith the cold common sense of the mind in Mammon's poAver, excellently fitted him for his profession, a jackal of that lion, the press. He, Avithout unmanly flinching, could pluck the literary Aveakling from the breast that nourished it, and mercifully strangle its earhest cries ; he could cut the gangrene of vanity from the self-love he wounded, Avith a hand that quivered not the while it tortui'ed. He could also have bound RUMOR 29 ap the wounds which sensitive merit had received from a misappreciating majority; he could have directed conscious yet trem- bling power, and have taught the new- fledged muse the flight of the Olympian heaven. He helped none of these. He could a])prove, but it was always the prize eff'ort of mediocrity; he could encourage, but ever the mind mimetic, he could urge to fresh essays — but it Avas then as though he urged tlu3 swan to the shore, and the dove to the water-waste where her foot should find no rest. He could condemn the night- ingale to silence, and tempt the hedge-spar- row to sing. But he was a treasure to his employers, those who call sweet bitter, and bitter sweet — and taste them wrong too, after long vitiation of the mental palate. It has been said that it is easier to unmake than to make, and this certainly holds good of criti- cism. A book may be demolished (as to its popular and peculiar character) in half an hour's light M-riting, yet itself may have been labored at for many months. Just as a picture may be despoiled of fame by being hung in a wrong light, so may a book be displaced from the niche its own pretensions might htive gained for it, by a false design ascribed, not proved. But who looks for proof in such a case, in days when time is money ? But Tims had funded his mental resources so wisely that he lived well, in the social sense, by means of a style of writing no more difficult nor exhausting to a shi-ewd person of superior education and large liter- ary experience, than it is difficult for a dis- pensing chemist to compound drugs. He lived also by himself; he was not married, though no longer young in years ; he was too great an ejncure to admire easily, and too suspicious to select, even among women, who pleased him. Then he was so plain a man, and only a beautiful woman of a high physical stamp and social caste would have repaid him for the trouble of marrying. Still, often as the demon rent him with its teeth, and lashed his sullen blood to blackest fever, his angel, the Art-loving, saved him from the vortex of dissipation, seeming to hold above it her still impending presence, as the moon's white finger points out the sudden chasm at the traveller's feet. Tims rose from the writing-table in his ornate room, so chastely furnished, with its small pyrmaid of minute marble busts — the celebrities of the modern Olympus, re- duced by the skill of the first metropolitan modeller from master casts. Four pictures only adorned the walls, a Murillo, a Correg- gio, a Titian, and a Turner. About a thou- sand books, all bound in green — all presents from their authors, and each with its fly- leaf an autograph — filled two cases of carved mahogany, and the one large window faced a small fretted balustiade, sparkling with scarlet geraniums. Tims walked up stairs into his dressing- room, a chamber so shaded and so scented that in it Adonis might have lain in state. He snarled in the ruthlessly-reflecting mir- ror at his own face, his brickdust-hued hair, and eyes pla'ced like those of a Mongol, — at the entirely bare fact of ugliness attested by every line and wrinkle, the angel-gleam totally eclipsed now by the interposing demon. But upon his hands Tims did not scowl ; he grimly grinned ; they were his jiet point, the jewels of his personality — white, delicate, well-shaped — worthy as models of his artis- tic worship, and the constant contemplation of them Avith which he was wont to relieve his mind in public, when surrounded by handsome men, fair women, and beautiful- faced artists, whom he envied most of all. Tims was dressed carefully, yet carelessly, in a sere-leaf colored coat and a brown round-topped hat, like a wandering artist. He was going to see and be seen at th<^ private view of the Academy in Trafalgar- square. It was full when he got in — the chie*^ room especially crowded, and as usual tht great crowd was before one picture. Tims, of course, had seen all the most im portant pictures at the artists' own houses for they all tried, naturally enough, to con- ciliate him. Strange, however, to say, the crowd was in this instance neither before Moonraker's " Morning after the Last Day," nor in front of Leveler's " Dream of the Christ child," nor wondering, divided be- tween delight and distaste, at Romana's " Expiation, Post Mortem." It consisted certainly, for the most part, of men, and they were all worshi])ping together at a shrine which would never lack votaries, though all fanes should fall and temples perish, — woman's beauty. It was a full- length life-sized portrait, and when Tims caught a glimpse of the lovely girl-face he looked to his catalogue and read the name to that number. Lady Geraldine Albany. Tims hated all beautiful women the mo- ment they Avere married, but he liked to look at them, and at their pictures if well painted, could he not see themselves. There was every thing in this portrait to entice his scrutniy, but he only growled at it afar off and turned away. He had been rusticating for six months, and had not heard all the fresh fashionable news, for like many who are enforced to Avrite for the public, he was too sick of such writing to read more than he was obliged. Thus, though he immediately recognized the countenance of Geraldine, he did not imme- diately connect her name, Albany, with the name of the Albany whose renown was one of the phenomena of the times and a popular proverb. When Tims had been in Italy about ten years before, he had been courteously re- ceived by the Geraldis, to whom he carried 30 RUMOR. a letter of introducton from a generous | literary colleague, his superior in rank. He had access to the picture gallery, the deco- rated chapel, and the palace-gardens. AVhile wandering amidst the paths which were strewed with the fallen myrtle-flowers, he met the loveliest child he had ever seen, none the less lovely because it was a girl. Upon this child he ;;ast a glance of admii-a- tion, met by one of scorn, that piqued him more, so that he dared to address her; whereupon she uttered a wild musical scream and fled into the house. Finding she be- longed to it, he thither followed her, and she •was forced by her grandmother's stately presence to acknowledging his — that is, she courtesied to him with her eyes turned from him. He seized her hand and would have kissed it, but she could bear no more, and tearing it from him she plunged it into a case of water, then rubbed it violently u])oii the damask table-cover, shrieking, at the top of her voice, " Wicked, ugly, horrible man to touch my hand ; the mark will never come out ; it will never come clean again ! " — and so was borne ofi" by her nurses, pour- ing execrations upon him until too far oft' to be heard. He never forgot her dislike of him, nor her beauty either ; and here it shone upon him from the canvas, only ex- panded and perfected as the full moon- drooping with its glory, from the thin, pearly crescent. And, as he turned away from the art-reflex, there beamed upon him the orig- inal, the face he recollected, just so perfect now. And it whitened with the old child- scom as Geraldine recognized him, and the child's dislike, none the slighter for the woman's added to it, quivered in an azure lightning from her proud blue eyes. And to brim up the torment in full measure, the daughter of the Geraldi leaned on the arm of the Diamid Albany as only a wife could lean on one to whom her faith was wholly given and her love dedicated. Yet another than Tims might have been too much touched by her looks this morning to lecall any old anger except as a dream. The portrait "had not been painted six months, yet Geraldine had altered since, strangely, pathetically, most spiritually changed, though she could not but have been known again. The soft brilliant coloring of her Anglo- Italian race, carnation on the lips, blush- bloom on the exquisitely fair cheeks, the blood that tinged the clear lilac of the veins with rose, were in the pictm-e, but Geral- dine's mortal face wore them no longer. She was pale to the edge of ghastliness, only too young to look so, as the dawn-flush softens the strong dazzle of the snow. Her forehead was ampler; a mournful shade from the excessive dilation of the pupils darkened the blue ii-is of her eyes. After her first glance at Tims, which was one of startled memory merely, she looked at him — knew aim no more j she only clung the closer to her husband's side. Ke was talkin? ; she drank down his words eagerly, as the thirst* stricken in the desert the drops of the rain- shower ; and now and then, when he ut- tered some choice remark, the phantom of a smile stood on her lips, the ghost of a blush on her chtjek, and she seemed to tremble as the rose might tremble with the vibration of the nightingale's song. When Albany caught sight of Tims, who could not easily be mistaken for another any more than he himself could, they greeted. Diamid was cool in his salute, because he was entirely occupied with his wife whose society he had little enjoyed since they had come to town ; Tims was obsequious, because infuriate. To see the child who had hated him married to the man he hated ! Tims i had always hated Diamid Albany. Albany, ) notwithstanding, did not take the bread out of his mouth, he rather put bread into it, by giving him so much to write about. But he ever scorned to cater to the critics, though glad, as all sensitive writers must be, to be praised when he deserved it. And all Scran- nel's criticisms, those with Avhich too he took the greatest pains, Avhich he impregnated with his sagacity the most generously, were « against Albany, who had no reviewer who did him so much harm, because none other of BO pregnant a mind and eloquent a style. Others ridiculed what they understood not, darkened their counsel by words without knowledge, or servilely flattered the author's personality, because incapable to discrimi- nate between his own merit and that of his books. But Scrannel had a brain all eyes, which could penetrate to every motive, and he knew the weakness of Albany to consist in his moral pride, as his strength lay in his intellectual generosity. When reprints ap- peared of his novels — those works so bril- liant and profound, each illustrating some one select idea, and which had all been pro- duced in a space wherein an author less creative and prodigal would but have com- pleted one, — Scrannel reviewed them at large, having merely noticed them when first they astonished the\yorld. He accused the writer of idleness with capacity, upbraided him with what he had done, and" pronounced the mental powers exhausted, because they had been concentrated. His poems and dramas, which had been flung off carelessly as the peacock casts its plumage, were no longer produced, because the spring had dried up. And as for his political character — for it was the triplicity of his talents as author, orator, and genius of affairs, that chiefly excited men's' envy, as it compelled their appreciation — because he had changed his opinions, rather cast off from them the ripened husks, retaining the new kernel — because his judgment, through experience attaining a loftier attitude-, viewed therefrom a wider sweep of probabilities — he was I damned as shifting and slippery, with those EUMOR. 31 who hunt for place. Unfortunately for him bis friends were less potent, far fewer also than his enemies, as it will ever be in the case of real merit, ■vvhether modest or self- asserting, in this day of party and of prog- ress. And his enemies hated his success — not him, for him they knew not. He had a fault as v/ell as a weakness however — lust for power, not as the vain man yearns, but as the proud spirit would bow the heavens to attain ; and he cared not for his actual success, because, not continuous, he deemed it not complete. In fact, the very beauty of his character, and that wherein he differed from the fully successful, was that in these the heart must be o/"the Avorld, and he was only in it. Wherein he despised himself, therein was his glory ; what he would have grasped in the present, even at the expense of his own future immortality, was precisely that the deprivation of which made him greater than the great Thing he would have liked to be. But, after a youth of unex- ampled renown, it was natural for a heart still true to nature, amidst the artificialities of the necessary mental condition, to fancy its maturity a failure, because it contrasted with its youth as decidedly as the brooding midsummer, when the birds have left off singing, the trees wear their intricate calm shade, and the fruits drop dead-silontly on the lush grass, differs from the spring with its million love-notes, its leafage green- ing hour by hour, its infinite progressive bloom. As for Geraldine, she cared for none of these things ; she lived in a world of her OAvn, certainly, and one dangerously different from the world material under her feet and round her ; — for he was its sun, its atmos- phere, alas ! its only heaven. And on this day Geraldine and Diamid were alone together so far as their conscious- ness was concerned; still* another person was with them — rather, just behind her, watching him with suspicious, brilliant eyes, that flamed with jealousy. Her cousin, the poor and haughty boy, Avho had dragged out his dependent existence at her grandmother's house, had been the better off', if not the happier, for her marriage. She had sent for him to stay with her directly the second moon of marriage streaked the sky. Geral- dine Avas still a child in her indiscriminate generosity, as when in her baby-days she heaped her own dinner into a beggar's bas- ket, and forced her ear-rings on a wandering lazar, and gave her first watch to one of the menial nuns at the neighboring convent, to help her to be punctual alike in her bead- tellings and her tioor-scrubbings. It would have been better for Geraldi not to have seen her again, but she sent for him because she thought it would make him happier, whether she knew it was good for him or not. So, between his hatred for her husband and his love for her, the fierce Itahan faith quickened in his brain to a delirium only differing from that of illness because it was under his temporary control. " They are rather diflerent now," he mut- tered, as the three passed the picture. " Of whom do you speak ? " asked Albany, who heard the remark. " Geraldine and the portrait. She is ten years older, twenty years sadder, and thii'ty years uglier." " Thank you ! " said Geraldine, smiling forcedly, " and not one year wiser, Geraldi? " " He knows not," said. Diamid, in his lowest tone. " Only I know yet." " They wiU all know soon," whisperer/ Geraldine. Geraldi heard the whisper, and added, " That indeed they will," with still more dis- dainful irritation in his voice, darker anger in his eye. As he followed her down stairs — for very soon she told her husband she did not admire any of the pictures, though she did not confess to her real fatigue — they passed another group. Lady Delucy and her daugh- ter, with a strange-looking man, from whom at first they all shrank — then all turned to examine him. He faced this scrutiny with so vivid and mocking an eye, foldhig his arms, and standing still, that they all three felt ashamed, they knew not why ; even Diamid felt baffled in his instinct of reading character at a glance. " We are going up stairs, and you, I sup- pose, have been," said Lady Delucy, as they met ; but it was evident she was glad to get her companion away, for she said to him in a tone of kind authority and interest, " We must go on directly, for we have not much light to lose." " 'Tis a German, then," said Diamid, as they moved on. '' Who can he be ? She has never told me of him — do you know Geraldine ? " " No," said Geraldine, " I never saw him before ; he does not look a proper person to be with her, so odd, so wild, and rude. I think it must be some madman who followed her in, and she does not know how to get rid of- him, and is afraid of making him angry." " It is one who follows her as I follow you,-'' said Geraldi, " therefore perhaps I am mad." It was true that Geraldine had never seen him, though she had heard him behind the curtain in the hall. And, to Lady Delucy's surprise, though Geraldine had become ex- cessively intimate with her, running in and out of the castle every day through the gar- den, yet lately, that is, the last three months of their country sojourn, she had not seen her at all. Nor had she seen her yet in town, for they had all only just come up. But in this moment of their meeting she had observed the change in Geraldine's face. She was just going to observe it to 32 RUMOR. Elizabeth, when Rodomant began to talk, and as usunl, when he did so, she forgot what she had been going to say herself. "After all," he said, jamming his hat down still more over his eyes, '* it is not so very unusual in this country for persons to seek what I seek, and which you tell me I pursue too earnestly. Those persons, who stopped to stare at me, I suppose saw in me what I saw in them; but the difference between us is, that one of us has gained it, and wearies of it ; another will never gain it ; and the third — well, the third will gain it, and never weary." " Yourself the third. You are right about Jiim, the older man; he is very famous, but I think you're mistaken about the other ; he looks as if he had some loAver purpose or excitement than even the desire to excel." "The desire to excel! that is not it; the desire that the whole world shall confess to the excellence ! But I did not mean the boy, I meant the girl." "I don't think she has any ambition ; she is entirely devoted to her husband, perhaps jealously so." " She is half devoted to him, that is heart-devoted, but the mind is devoted to Bomething else, drawn up like a mist to the sun — it will descend to earth again in tears." " Do let us move on again, or it will be quite too dark to see Romana's picture." CHAPTER IX. "Is this your picture-gallery? " he ex- claimed loudly, as they entered the chief room. " Why, our print-shops are as big them- selves ; and as for the pictui-es, I see no paintings of any thing except tall men and women." " There are too many portraits ; and this is rather a poor harvest. Romaua has only one, Leveler only one, and Moonraker only one. The last tMo artists are abroad — the fii-st has just returned to England." " Let us see what is the difference. What is that picture with the map of the moon in it?" " That is not a moon ; it is the skeleton of the earth — Moonraker's Morning after the Last Day." Ic was a singular picture : a black-blue sky, where pale comets sti-eamed athwart cresset star-wreaths, sick lightnings blent with wild Aurora — chaos had returned to the material heavens. And the material earth, — whether in the poet's fancy bleached by fire-purification, or withered with the age of its last millenium — the material world looked like its own ghost, terrible in its stark white loneliness — as the lady had called it, an orbed skeleton. "That is a bad, wicked picture," said Rodomant, not heeding Avho heard him. " Wandering away to eternal oblivion — Avhat does he mean by that ? Confusion re- turned again, worse than the first, because without hope. No Time coming, with pri- mal love and bloom of passion. No balance of bliss, the restitution, the new earth and heaven; if he could not paint those, n was ii-religious to paint this. " " Tliis, at least, is not irreligious ; the Dream of the Christ-child." " A child like any other child, and not a pretty one either ; on the contrary, a child with an old face, like mine. His head on a lamb, and a wreath of holly round his head — did holly grow in Palestine ? or snow- drops near Jerusalem? for he is crushing snow-drops in his hand. A Hebrew child, of princely race, with the features of a swaddled German. Nor is the dream depicted as a foreshadow, it is a literal portrait, a study of an agony, an effigy of Nature in extremity, the doom distinct as the scarlet thorn-wounds. And the lesson it teaches — what is that to you, whose Protestant law forbids you to worship likenesses and images ? The Catholic worships the symbol of what is reality to his faith. But how often soever men have piinted similitudes of Man-Gtid, this man cannot paint God as man. The artist is an artificer, the design beyond the workman's hand." " See, now, Romana's ' Expiation.' You know what it means ? A criminal after execution given up to the medical authorities to be cut into pieces for the benefit of mortal successors. A horrible subject ; 1 wonder he chose it, with his refinement. It is a refinement of horror, certainly, but it is well painted, and there is in the idea of a crimi- nal's further degradation after a degraded death, being expiatory, some kind of rude pathos." " There is much more," cried Rodomant, halting before this picture, which literally blazed with finish; "there is profound tragedy in the conception, and the painting is superb. In all our galleries there is nothing half so grandly drawn and colored. The marble of the table is marble, the gas above is gas, and what it lights is dead flesh and living flesh — the two humanities.— Which is the sadder and the most of earth ? Not even the half-sheeted, livid body, hidp- less now to conceive or commit evil, with the calm that death refuses not to one, even the most evil, creeping back over the dead face, and stealing from it the last convulsion that is life's, not death's. The damp still hang- ing to the hair, you could catch it on youi finger ; those tears of terror, do they not seem repentant? The purple ropemark, is it not a brand? Does not the branded go free afterwards ? Yes, less sad, less earthly is the dead flesh than the living men. See I their triumph. How they gloat over theii RUMOR. 33 treasure ! How they long like cannibals for the division of the same spoil ! To them the dead is no more sacred than the carcass of a dog, but as much more valuable as the drug we call gold is more precious than the mud we scrape from our shoes. This paintt." is a satirist and also a master. He is a master because he is imitated. See all over the walls, blots and patches in frames, where men have tried to paint like him and failed. Like all founders of faiths, himself sincere and wise, his followers are fanatics. He should have founded no new faith, he should have followed the old one to which Nature gives laws, as God gives laws to Nature. Then should he by this time have reached heaven, the artist's heaven — Ideal." " This artist professes to paint what is as it is, not as it is seen, for he says no two men's eyes are alike nor see the same." "The high artist should aspire to paint what is not seen as it is, too. He chooses subjects so human and so sad, because sad- ness and humanity are every where. Do we not know them, see them, feel them ? He excludes himself from the heaven of art ; he is an infidel — he does not really believe in what he cannot see. Dwells beauty on the face of the beloved ? How often not ; yet always the lover by faith perceives it. He, this stern art-realist, paints dead tlesh and liv- iaig flesh; marble, and wood, and metal; hard earthly things, and cruel, curious men. He dares not paint a sea-maid, for he has not seen the sapphire ooze from which crystal- lized her blue diamond scales. He dares not paint an angel, for angels are not clothed in threads of cambric, nor have they their plumes furnished with down from the cygnet's breast. See, too, lady, how he chooses to paint red hair on all heads alike. We call red hair a defect. Well, some defects are beauties, like the opal rainbow, or the blemish pearl. See how he glories in red hair ! Let him call the halt, blind, and lame to a feast of Art." It happened that Romana — called actually Rufus Romana by the art-opposition — was just behind liodomant while now he spoke. This being, Romana, fine-featured and sen- tient, was excessively proud, so proud, in- leed, that the slight taint of vanity in his veins was imperceptible in the excess and rush of the first impei'ial quality. And his pride had kept him in the other rooms while kind friends and kinder enemies were re- porting to him, with all sorts of exaggera- tions, that a foreign artist was expatiating on his picture in German. But when some one told him that the German said he could not paint an angel if he would, his vanity goaded him into the immediate vicinity of the crowd round Rodomant, which crowd, curious for a fresh excitement, gave way before him, and so forced him to go as near as possible to the speaker, lest the listeners should think him a coward, or incapable of self-defence. " Are you a painter ? " began Romana, boldly. " I never said so," the other answered, turning round. " But all arts serve Art. As kings crown before men, like brother monarchs artists should uncrown in presence of each other. Yoti painted that pictuie." " How do you know that I did ? " " By the fire that feeds your eye as you look at it — a parent's pride; and by the sorrow whose swelling tears the fire ,>erpet- ually quenches — a parent's sorrow, that recognizes in the child its own transmitted imperfection." "I never paint, that is, I never exhibit, a work which is not perfect," said Romana, haughtily. " But the perfect is an abstraction, except as it is developed in kind, even in degree. A pebble is perfect ; so is a worm, a moth, a flower, a rainbow, a star, the sun. This is a very low, perhaps the lowest possible revelation in development, of the perfect. When we are hungry you give us a stone for bread. And did you give us bread, we should yearn for manna. Others can give us bread — any can give us stones on which to break our teeth. But you ! Were you born to aspire as well as to create, what nec- tar and ambrosia could you feed our souls withal ? " " Perhaps I am aspirant rather than crea- tive. It is unfair to judge me by one work, and that painted — well, in this place it would not be well-bred to say for what rea son. Will you come to my house and see my pictures there ; there are many, and l have more studies. And," lowering his voice, " I think I can show you an angel that I have painted even." Romana took out his card. Rodomant took it, showed it to Lady Delucy, as though a child should consult its mother, and asked, " Shall I go ? Is it worth M'hile ? " Now Romana would not have borne that I'ude speech bravely, but for the fact that he was very glad to see the lady was connected with his random critic. For Lady Delucy had never been able to endure his pictures ; and as he was getting on admirably in the world, and selling them before they were painted, she had never asked him to her house ; he needed not that patronage — ■ which for want of a word more worthy we are driven to call the sympathy of art-lovers with those who serve art for bread. He would have liked to know this lady, who was the fashion, as now and then unwoi Idly persons are. She did not look at him, how- ever, but only said to her companion, — "You know best, and must do as you please ; I never advise you." Had she advised him, most probably he would not have gone ; as she did not, he went. He lived in lodgings in town, just as ho had done in the country, and found it eaiy 34 RUMOR. enough to live, according to the frugal hab- its of liis fii-st retirepafint. Exquisite bal- lads, illustrations.-»i!-' social ephemera, that would have done honor to a laureate, and compositions for the pianoforte, in which the million failed to detect his actual contempt for that instrument, though any master must have been amazed at their audacious caricature of the mania for bra- vura — these he poured forth in profusion, and with equal facility disposed of l.Lem, but always with the stipulation that they should be published in another name than his — nor indeed was his name known yet as one to be known, nor breathed in any corner. It was his custom, however, to treat his patroness with grateful attention still, shown, however, in his own manner. Did she send for him he never went ; was always engaged, and sent word so without writing ; yet it was by no means disagreeable to him to see her, for he continued to do so every other lay at least, — knocking at the door now singly, now with fantastic imitation of the longest and loudest coachman's thunder ; and always directly it was opened running straight up stairs into the lady's boudoh, which was only indeed a little shrine musical, filled with tempting relics of the saint, and the shapes harmonious that suggest and sup- ply her forms of worship. If the lady was not there, he would touch the keys and throw forth an invocation of ethereal sounds, or sing — for he would sing, though he had no singer's voice — in wild and shrieking accents, whose eloquence was of passion only. She seldom resisted that appeal, but if she did, from pre-occupation or necessity, he generally revenged himself by going away, but putting the piano out of tune first. And as no person could put it in tune again except him only, after he had put it out, she was obliged to wait till he chose to come and do so. If, however, she was in the room, he all the same opened the door (knocking first, but never waiting for her to say " Come in '') and marched to the piano, only nodding to her as he passed before he began to play. And whether he despised that instrument or not, he certainly pro- duced from it his ideas for her especial benefit. The night after he had gone with Romana, he came as usual, but not as usual — went and stood in the middle of the room, instead of sitting down to play. " I like him," he began, " but not his pictures — they are all alike." " Romana's ? I have not seen them ; but I should think they were. I mean, 1 have not seen those he has at home." They are all sold — he sells them ten deep. There is the golden calf — a real golden calf ; there is the fiery serpent — a real fieiy serpent — fiery-eyed, and venom- spitting ; there is Portia, and the leaden box is a leaden box — the portrait in it is a real portrait — of course she has red hair there is a real Cinderella — she is ugly as a real cinder-grub — she has red hair, too there is a lady called Geraldine in a wood — the bark of the trees real bark — the leaves have veins and edges as if cut with scissors ; the lady has naked feet — real naked feet, on real grass, of which you count the blades and the beads of dew. j Her jewels are real jewels — they are cut, ; and they sparkle. Her hair, of course, red, \ but there is i-ather more than the usual i quantity of blue mould which he puts fo: ' mist, because it is moonlight. The only thing in that picture that is not real, is the j moonlight. Well, I stood and looked — I ! did not say any thing. Presently, he uncov- ' ered a portrait. ' There is the angel of the sun,' he said. It was simply a picture of a very fair woman, with brighter red hair than the rest. " ' Why,' I said, ' that is a woman. If your angels are women, no wonder you are so long in getting to the sun — you must have been born in a mine.' Then the door opened, and the little sun-angel appeared. She is a great deal prettier than the picture, and was very polite. He is very fond of money. He said, ' You may make but one success if you are poor ; but'when you grow rich, you may be famous as often as you please, and as unworthily.' I said I heard it was in this country so. ' In every coun- try,' he said. ' Till Cagliostro was rich he I was called a charlatan, afterwards he was a true magician ; before Turner grew rich he was cold-shouldered, people squinted behind them at his pictures — afterwards he might paint what he pleased, as badly as possilile or as well, it was all the same to the world.' " Then he tried to find out who I was — I believe he thought I was rich, because my coat was gone shabby." " You did not tell him ? " " Xo, nor how nor where I live. Not be- cause I agree with him about money ; but that the purple raiment I am weaving for myself to wear forever, may never be con- temptuously contrasted with the rags I spin from the refuse of my brain, to cover myself with now. Besides, we don't tell when we sell our old clothes to the Jews. Some fin? ladies sell their dresses and trhikets — d: you ever, lady ? " "No," she said, laughing; "who told you that slander ? " " My mother, who likes fine clothes her- self, and therefore mortifies her flesh by wearing sad colors. The woman of the house told her. I lock my door that they may not pester me about baked meats and porter. They sit in the kitchen, listen to the mice scratching — ' gnawing coffin nails,' they call it — and eat toasted cheese." " But you did not tell me how you parted from your new acquaintance — do you mean to see him again .'* " RUMOR. 35 "No, not if I can help it, in this world, and I don't think we ■ shall be near each other in heaven. If I do ever see him again, it will be in the days of my kingship, and he will bend to me, and I shall hold out the sceptre, and he will touch it. And what he asks I shall bestow." "You riddle," cried the lady, laughing, " and as it is not often you take the trouble to talk to me, and to-morrow I dare say will be si)eechless again, pray explain what you mean to-night." " Well, I told him, ' Some day you will become a scene-painter, which is exactly what you are fit for.' He was in such a passion, that he got up and ran about, would, I believe, have rung the bell, and ordered my carriage, as I am told the fine people do liere, even if you go to their houses in a wheelbarrow. But I saved him the trouble, for I got up and went directly." " Quarrelling again ! you quarrel with every one — and if you do, what will become of you in this place ? " " You will see. Do I ever quarrel with you, lady ? " " What did you mean," asked Geraldine of her cousm that evening, when they were alone, " by saying that they would all know soon ? What will they know ? " " That you are miseral:)le," said Geraldi — " miserable with him, and through him. You are pale with the death of hope — de- spair. An icicle wastes not in the sun more rapidly than you do. You are strangling your wretchedness, but it is stronger than you, and its cold embrace Avill stop your heart at Inst." " Geraldi ! " she answered, as soon as she could speak for the -wild trembling Avhich seized her while he spoke, "you are cruel — cruel, and untrue. If I am pale, it is be- cause I am sick with happiness. Brides are always pale, even in Italy, my Geraldi — pale as the myrtle-blossoms, even when their lips are red — red as the coral myrtle-buds. Are my lips not red, Geraldi ? " Those lips, with their burning bloom — had hectic really dropped on them the first spark of its fire inextinguishable, which goes not out till the time, oe it long or short, that it has consumed the last ashes of the sacrifice to life eternal, of the mortal life ? " Red ? yes, red as the fatal anemone — red as the unripe grape when the sun shines through the clusters." Geraldi leaped for- ward, held her in his arms, pressed his lips to hers, scarcely cooler than they, strained her to his heart, tiU the blood, driven suttb- catingly upwards, filled her brows with throbbing anguish. Yet she felt nothing in his embrace but its affection ; the passion 80 much less pure, the love so much weaker than hers for Diamid, became indistinguish able from them as flame in flame. And her pity filled her with aflection too. " Oh, Geraldiwe, why are you so sad ? You never laugi^^ you scarcely evel smile." ^^^ " Fie, Geraldi — in Italy it is not polite to laugh ; we never did." " They laugh enough in England — this cold hell whose devils are white, not black — to the whitest of which you have sold yourself." " Geraldi ! " She drew herself from him, but only that she might cover her face with her hands, and weep into them. " You do not know hira ? I can forgive you. But he is so dear to me, that I cannot bear hard words about him — above all from you, Geraldi ; you must not speak so. You must be wicked if you think it ; but you do not — no one could. He is pure as Heaven, and I adore him." " Oh, Geraldine ! and you would not adore the Mother of Heaven — you said it was taking too much from God, A love so blasphemous can be for nothing pure." She wept still ; silver tears rolled down on her dress, between her fingers, now so pale and thin ; either the founts of grief or gratitude were broken up, for not once she sobbed, she cried too tenderly. " You must be miserable, oh, my cousin \\ for you weep while he is away : when he comes, you never weep. It must be pride that dries your eyes when he is near. It must be pride that makes you hide your grief from poor Geraldi, because you knew how I loved you, and that had I not been poor Geraldi, I would have married you." " Never ! never ! never ! though I know not why. And how do you know I never cry before him ? I never cry before you when he is near — it is rather so!" " Oh, cruel ! cruel ! And false — just as it is false to say I should not have mai'ried you — for I wotdd." " Oh, Geraldi ! how little you know of love, if you have never wept for gladness." " But why do you sit alone so much, and hours and hours togetlier lock your door ? I have come there, and I know it. I have tried to turn the handle, for I thought you were in a swoon, and you never heard me. You don't go out with him every time Avhen you might, to hear him, to be seen with him. And when he is out, and cannot want you, you stay away from poor Geraldi, though you know I live on seeing you, and even endure his presence, for the sake of staying Avith you." "Geraldi — he is very kind to you, very generous and gentle. He speaks of you as my brother, and a treasure of mine. He would show you how to get rich, if you would only learn. You are unkind to him and to me not to try to love him." Suddenly she dried her eyes — looked up, a purple light streamed from under their golden lashes ; the shape of her lips dis- solved into the softer cue of a smile. She 36 EUMOR. opened those smiling lips ; low, half-pro- nounced words quivered between them, but ooukl not at first escape ; again she closed them, again they parted. Geraldi's eager ghmce seemed to scare her purpose, for she left his side, and wandered to the window, ■with an uncertain step, like that of the night- wrdker in his sleep. And as persons in her bodil}' condition always do the most impru- dent things, she opened the window, though it was raining, and the rain swept full in that way, driven by a wild spring gale. As the drops touched her forehead, and si)rin- kled her closed eyelids, her strength re- turned. But she remained with her back to Geraldi. " I will tell you why I have sat alone, and still shall sit alone for some time. Diamid said I had better tell no stranger, nor even a friend. But you are no stranger, and you are more than a friend — besides you know no one here. I have been writing a book, Geraldi. It is not finished. But Diamid Bays — no, I cannot tell you what he says, you must guess, it is too favorable for me. He is so proud, I am so proud of his pride, and so weary of the delight it has given me, and of waiting to see what the Morld will say. He says my fame would crown his life, would fulfil his whole desire. I won- dered he so wished it, until he told me what tlie people say about his marrying me, be- cause of papa's connection, and" the two for- tunes I am to have. Say, Geraldi, are not you glad too ? " " I never saw or thought there was much good in writing books, Geraldine. Of course it is a novel — all women in England write novels." " These are the best and the worst works written in that class, Diamid says. Perhaps mine might be " " The best : I dare say it would. I know how splendidly you used to talk in our games, and that I could never find Avords to answer you. But at the big library now, I'rom which you have your books, why they sell about three months after they come out for about a tenth part of the first price. The man left a paper here, to say so, and there was a printed list, and among the names were many of the most celebrated, vliich I have even seen at our grandmother's. Then look at the library there, who ever opens all those books, or remembers the men who wrote them? Had you married me, your name would have been greater than the names of those Avho write books, for the deeds of the old Geraldi, and the new Feri- ani, are remembered through all Italy." " But the past are not myself. Oh ! to be known, were it only for one splendid hour, to make the world wonder at me, the crowds turn pale Avhen they read my words, to make those who cannot understand me tremble, and those who can, shiver too with excess of sympathy ! To have it said that young as I am, I have genius and its sorrows for mj doom. I could even bear to die." " And it is poison too, slow or quick, ac- cording to your strength or weakness. Then besides, it is not wholly to ])lease him." " It was at first. When I used to talk to him, dream aloud to him about all things seen and unseen," he said, — " ' Geraldine, that is all too good for me alone, the world should hear it. But you are an idle southern child, and have no de- sign nor persistence ; you could not write if you would, and are far too proud and mod- est to talk to the vulgar English as you talk to me.' " That is true, I cannot talk before the peo])le in society, they make me ashamed, not because they are above, but because they are so infinitely below me. And I know all the fashionable people think me stupid. I have seen them stare at my silence and my refusals to dance. They think me afraid of them — me ! Why, it is well they know not for them my contempt and scorn. But when Diamid said I could not write, I fired, my blood danced, and my brain grew giddy with the rushing past of a thousand pictures. Next time I was alone I took a pen ; I Avrote ; then it was all calm, not the unbroken calm of the noonday, but like the nightfall, still blue, still calm, but filled with stars, my ideas as countless and as bright." "At least, Geraldine, show me what is written." " But you cannot read English easily." " I should in any language be able to read and understand Avhat you wrote." CHAPTER X. " Have ijon an invitation for to-night ? " asked Tims Scrannel, visiting Romana in his studio one July morning, a disturbance the latter took care eagerly to receive as an honor, for fear of making the former angry,' and drawing down on his own head the stored thunderbolt of critical revenge. " I have an invitation to the afl'air at Bays- water, but as I passed the back of the house early this morning, I heard the workman's^ hammers going as hard as ever — surely it^ will not be ready." " Well, as far as that goes, such a trum- pery structure would not take long to run up. They were probably working at the decorations. However, I dare say, whatever we see, we shall hear little enough, for what does she know of acoustics ? " " He must know by intuition every doc- trine and decree of the science of sound, for such an attempt to be made feasible at all. She would never be made ridiculous, nor let another." KUMOR. 37 " But what experience has she? None of the foreign stage, and what does she know of music — nothing, except how to sing what is put hefore her. It is a tolerably big bubble for a woman to have blown, and will make all the more noise in breaking, because a woman blew it." " I don't see how it can be her bubble, it is merely his. He is rich, and she only gives him her su])port and patronage." " And you believe that ? I believe noth- ing of the kind. The speculation and the risk are hers — the other report is only a blind. No man rich enough to put a work on the stage in Germany, and in his senses, would bring it to England first." " Well, I suppose we shall know soon — but I was surprised to find you did not know already — that you were at none of the re- hearsals." " I have been away, busy at Paris about Halevy's last, and had I been here, I should have refused if she had sent for me." "I understand that the artists of the band, and the actors, are all agog about it, and Morrison, the manager of the Regent, is very angry at their excitement. Says she has no right to make them ofl'ers which entice them from their proper engagements with him ; which is absurd, for at the very end of the season, when he has filled his pockets as full as he will fill them, it is unreasonable to expect they should not be eager to make as much as tliey can, honestly." " Well, I only hope we shall not be suffo- cated, for half the world is invited, and there is little enough guarantee for security in a canvas and pasteboard booth, as it will be. However, no one but myself will give her an article, and if we are crushed I die at my post. Die you at yours — take my advice and stick to your easel you will be better off' at home." " Oh. I shall go, I am curious. I like one who will dare every thing for a great chance, if it is but to fail." Lady Delucy, generous woman as she was, had never so generously risked herself, her own reputation for sense and judgment, and her means, before. She felt the whole re- sponsibility of the position she had taken, gj.A was willing to abide by the conse- quences as only a generous person, entirely hrdt pendent of popular opinion, ever is. Still, so strong were her fears, that her hopes must have been stronger yet, for they pre- dominated in her breast. Never in her girl- ish or married davs, so strong an excitement filled her ; for the first time she felt the ut- most of which she was capable. From the moment she had brought her proi^gc to town, he had worked, she knew not how hard, nor at what, until he chose to reveal. She had even fretted herself for fear he might be wasting his energies on the slight, unenduring compositions which he produced for self-subsistence — she was afraid, after all, that in his great words had evaporated the shadow of his grand designs. Because he talked so well, and played with ease that gave an air of trifling with art to his usual manner, she feared he might per- haps do little else — deceive himself uncon- sciously, and her through himself. Still, these doubts and suspicions only hung round her impression of him when she saw him not ; the instant he appeared, his con ite- nance, with its severe lines, its aspect of power, and the eyes keen enough to scruti- nize even himself, as they seemed ; these unerring signs restored her confidence, and the admiration which he exacted almost, scarcely could be said to excite. May, creative, teeming May, had done scarcely less amidst the fields and gardens, than tliis young aspirant in the Paradise of Art. It seems in the invention and execu- tion of some great works, as though one day M-ere as a thousand years ; moments are mul- tiplied, hours lengthened, days stretth into the night — there is rather no night then. Only its first triumph can young genius so secure, only the wooing of the yet unwedded fame so speeds — devotion without weari- ness, excitement without exhaustion, passion wrthout pain. After that, through no night does the moon shine with the sun's ripening strength, the light of no day is as the light of seven : the unwedded has become the bride — the wife ; experience has annihilated anticipation, care mingles Avith solicitude, the sublime suspense of the greatest hope of life, is lost in that hope's fulfilment. It was true that this strange being, who was as poor in worldly means as any who ever dared self-advancement, had in point of fact borrowed from the lady who had be- friended him, to such an extent that only extreme sagacity, or its meeting extreme of madness, could have empowered him to hope he could ever disburden himself of his obli- gation. But it was the confidence with which he had accepted her magnificent favors, that gave confidence to her discriminating mind. She could not believe that so proud, so lit- tle vain a person, would overrate his own merits, so great as she even felt and ac- knowledged them, nor utter false prophecies as to his own reception by the world. Still she knew the difference between worldly success, the proofs of which are the most substantial that exist, and the success among the feiv, which is at best but a phantom of rumor, sneered at by the mob as phantoms are in which they nevertheless believe, and as intangible and melancholy a companion as another phantom, to the person haunted by it. Had the majority of Lady Delucy's ac- quaintance been privy to the conversation in which she engaged to go greater lengths than ever patronage before extended, they would have given her crowning credit for the eccentricity, which was the favorite 38 RUMOR. charge against her — they could not in fact have made another, if they would. Certainly, she did things rarely done in her rank, yet so simply one could not say ehe did them in. defiance of it; as when she went alone, regularly, and as a matter of course, not of duty, into dark places of the earth, where a clergyman would not have allowed his wife to go — nor taken her. Tlien she sat up with her own servants if they wer€v sick and in danger ; she neither left them to the servants of servants, nor sent them to the hospital. There was none most deeply disgraced of her own sex she did not humbly endeavor to reclaim ; nor any she despised among the children of humanity, saving only those who proudly execrate the lawless and openly offending, quite unmindful of secret faults within themselves, too deeply, perhaps too darkly, hidden for man to perceive or suspect. However, her friends and acquaintances consoled themselves for their consciousness that she was superior to all the selfish con- siderations which swayed them, by the fact of her being not actually one of themselves. It was proper for her to perform duties which were not theirs ; what she had once been ex- cluded her from the circle unexceptionable, which forms its cordon round the patrician's centre, whatever in these days that may be. Just as the pedigree of the Arab race-horse is injured irreparably if he so much as stands upright in a tilled field, so her former profes- sion distained her present rank, and was neither to be forgiven nor forgotten. One day Rodomant had run up to her room as usual, but not, as usual, empty-handed. He held in his arms a great bundle of music, closely written. "It is done ! " he exclaimed ardently, " done, but all is dark. There wants the command, ' Let there be light ! ' and now I find I am man, and no god, for I cannot pro- nounce the words." "Can I?" asked Lady Delucy, who, aware of his passion for orchestral composition, had engaged to produce, at her own expense, in her own house, any M-ork of reasonable length for instruments alone, whether symphony or ci amber overture. " It is too great ; you will be afraid. Bee all this ! " — turning page after page of score instrumental first, then recitative- voice. " Why," said Lady Delucy, astonished even more than afraid, for the supernal energy of this young mind had produced all this in one short month, " why, it is an opera ! " " Did you think I would condescend to any thing else at Jirst ? Would I be known as able only to do a part when the whole is in my power ? If you were not a woman I would play it to you, while you followed it, but women cannot read score though they pretend they can. You would not make out translate — fast enough. Take then the libretto and read that. Slowly, for there are ideas there besides mine ; shadows rather, to which I have given souls, wandering souls, which I have made to live and die." She took the little black book from his hand and started. " Count Alarcos ! "N^Tiy, what made you choose that ? Did you read the tale abroad ? " " No, no. In whose hand does the divin- ing-rod bend and point, except in the hand of him who is born with the gold-atfinity? My divining rod led me. I found the book here — an English one. I thought half an hour after reading it, and then it all came. Since then I only had to write what was made ready." " It is a sublime and awful subject, and the most perfect tragedy I know. Tliis dra- matic rendering is besides superb, for I see how literally the English text is followed in the translation. Wise, too, to have it Italian, not German." " It was too slow, yet simple, for my many-colored tongue. It ought to have been in Spanish, only nobody would listen. And Italian is best for a rendering from Spanish." " A finer subject for musical illustration could not be found. I always wondered that it did not wake up the world when published as a drama." " Because it should be an opera ; as I said, it moves too slowly without music ; it cannot be developed without action, because it is so simple. It seemed waiting for the music, I thought, as I read it." " 1 am only afraid lest the subject, or rather the moral, will be, that is, would be " "Would be what? — a woman to want words ! " " Untraceable by these English ; they love to be convinced even in a play. The retri- bution is in perfect harmony with the laws of justice, yet earthly justice is not heavenly, and I fear its transcendentalism might dis- please." " No fear of that, because it is a tragedy, and the retribution is not only sad but hor- rible. Any murder interests ; dramatically invested, it excites, because then people fee, it is not shocking of them to feel an in' -.resl;. But murder, and the vengeance, not of mar., but God, you cannot call transcendent al ; it is only spiritual. That was why it required embodying to be appreciated. Yet how, after all ? Before there icas light how could light shine ? Can silence speak ? " and he sighed deeply — groaned almost — then ex- claimed, " Was there not a rich man, one Lord of Chandos, who gave our Handel a thousand pounds for his passionate pastoral of ' Acis and Galatea ' ? " "I believe so," said the lady. "But Han< del was Handel." RUMOR. 39 " And Rodoraant is Rodomant. Still, he was my equal. That was a man to whom I would have taken off my hat. I know none now, and only one woman, besides my mother." Here he made a gesture towards the lady, as though he uncovered his head. The hard arrogance of his last words, uttered in the sanest and most tranquil tones, redoubled that earnest wonder in her breast respecting his real character. Could he be what he conceived himself, or was it a Active claim ne purposely preferred, which, if disproved, must ruin him and make her actually ridicu- lous ? " Women believe nothing, ' except what they should doubt. That is why men make them wretched, break their hearts, and so on ; they believe whom they should doubt, and doubt what they should believe. My mother, who is always preaching, says no one can get into heaven witiiout faith. The Mohammedans were right, then, to keep women out of Paradise. Your Chandos lord b(?lieved in Handel ; that was the rea- son he grew to be greater than a Chandos even in this England, though you do say people only care for money here. I do not believe that, but I suspect that they will have the worth of their money here, when they have paid it. Quite right, too ; they should have it if they paid me. Did Handel ask Chandos for a thousand pounds ? " All this time the lady had been think- ing deeply and anxiously. How thankful would she have been for some one wiser than herself to direct her. She at last said so. " There is one here wiser," was his reply. "It would cost much more than a thou- sand pounds to produce an opera like that. There is not a manager in London who would dare it, even if they were not all full for the season, the lists made out, and en- gagements signed." " I would not let them have it; they would spoil it. I must have it all my own way ; and then, once heard, once known, they would fight for it, and spare no ' thousand pounds' on it. It would make them rich. And if you introduced it, lady, you would Btand in higtory a fiimous woman." Still she meditated, hesitated ; she cov- ered her eyes with the little black book con- taining the words of the libretto. " You know," said he impetuously, half indignantly, turning to the piano, " how I despise this toy of wood, wire, and ivory. Yet hsten only to its lispings of the great strain of the overture." Those lispings were distinct enough ; they praised their parent. And the calm, strong, fiery temperament, rushing into the touch, interpreted that praise. At the end he turned, a light covered his countenance, not of triumph, but the stiller radiance of self-respect. She saw it not ; she had sunk into a seat, half swooning with the sudden pleasure, a passion which can only be felt by the musical ; sweeter, how sweeter far than that of love, how far more deeply satisfied ! The book with which she had hidden her eyes was wet with tears. "Is it not beaut: ful, exquisitely beaati- ful?" he cried, in tiunsport. But she only murmured, " Go on.' " No," cried he, " you have heard enough. To believe is to will, they say. If you believe not now you never will believe, and never will. How can I go on ? Have I four voices, a chorus, a hundred hands ? The greatest of sopranos, the greatest of con- traltos, a master bass, and a master tenor, a chorus without a will of its own, a band, every individual of which, having a will of his own, will bend to mine." " And space, for there is none sufficient yd in my house here. And scenery and dresses — and such scenery, such dresses! And above all, how shall we find time ? " " I can create time. They say time is money ; I would mine wei'e." " If you can create time then, the means are yours." But though Lady Delucy brought herself to this decision she suffered sorely — not from the consciousness that in case of a fail- ure she should have to exercise the strictest personal economy for years, for she neither drew upon her purse devoted to general alms, regularly emptied and refilled each year, nor upon the fortune she had amassed on the stage, which she devoted to her needy brothers and sisters in art. It was upon the capital whose niterest supplied her own annual income that she drew, and so largely that she did not choose to tell her daughter how much of personal luxury she risked. For, she thought, when Elizabeth goes to India she will never know on how little ] live in England, or abroad where no one wil) know me. But, little as she revealed to Elizabeth, that young lady was frightened quite as much at the chance of her mother's being held in permanent contempt by the world by a "mistake," which the world never forgives, as at the chance of losing some thousand pounds, which seemed as great a one. However, Elizabeth consoled herself at last by reflecting, " Mamma can go with me to India, then no one will guess any thing here ; or if she does not choose she shall live at Northeden, and we will send our children over to her to be educated." Lady Delucy not only deceived her daugh- ter as to the extent of her speculation, but she made it appear to the world as though she shared it equally with the artist, and most persons, to whom it mattered little, believed her. Not so Tims Scrannel, who, like some bad, shrewd natures, understood good unworldly natures better than such understood each other. He suspected hei 40 BUMOK. of the entire risk, and hence his remark to Homana. Now Lady Delucy would have thought it quite worth her while, and would have done her utmost to conciliate Tims Scrannel, whom she duly appreciated as the only art-critic in England. She desired to buy him over, dearly bought as he ever was ; not, however, by bribe of gold, but by ap- pealing to that enthusiasm which none who read his matchless criticisms could fail to recognize and respect, how embittered soever was their sympathy by the cold and cruel cynicism which gave his brightest words so sharp an edge. But Lady l)elucy was not permitted to '• buy him over " by the heaven- sweet beguilements, sweeter than earth's sii-ens, which her own soul confessed in the music of the new and strong aspirant. For she wished to invite him to the rehearsals, to make the single exception to their privacy in his favor. But Rodomant said " No, for in that case he would write his remarks ages before the proper time, the revelation ; be cool enough to study his expressions, put lies among them, and the world would be- lieve the review to be written in the heat of enthusiasm ; under my influence when com- plete. Till it is complete, neither he nor any, save you to whom it belongs of right, shall be able to chatter about it or bear wit- ness to it — false witness as it then would be." The time was ripe — the night fell. Lady Delucy had arranged for three special per- formances, to which she had invited her audience free. If they foiled there could be none other, for who would pay to hear if he would not come to hear without paying ? Her invitation list included every critic of any note, every artist and publisher of any mark, all the managers, all the amateurs, and a great many fashionable persons. Also 8ome of that class with which the pit and galleries are filled. It was at the last moment she trembled, lest her audience should fail her, lest some great and sudden S])ite should take hold of her mob — one of those epi- .deniic antipathies which sometimes infect a crowd. Nothing of the kind ; they were all too cool, too sober ; they expected too little. They expected so little : " It was just like Lady Delucy," was all they said ; and as for theii perceptions of art, the drums of their ears had been so seasoned for two months {>ast by Verdi's own at the opera, that they lad lost all sensitiveness, except to an en- tirely new excitement, of the brain through the ear — not the outward ear only. Then, besides, as clergymen have no religious objection to going out to dinner (the etiqueite of their profession not requiring them to return such entertainments), so there are few persons who will not conde- Bcend to be amused — cheated out of a por- tion of that time which is said to be so short, but which they find so long — for nothing. The night came, the hour ; and hot as va6 the night, cloudless and breathless, the theatre was crowded before the hour. A rich, deep clock-chime struck eight times. Upon the eighth note's last vibration swelled the first chord of the overture — the clock had struck in the same key. It is said that the marble model which has stood for ages as the test of 'deal feminine proportion, aff"ects the beholder with a first impression of insignificant and characterless calm ; — that the Pyramids seem to dwimlle as they dawn upon the traveller's yearning gaze ; — that Niagara's waters shrink, and its thunders soften, from the gigantic dreamed conception of them, when no longer dreamed of, but seen and heard. It is so often with the sublimest creations of the mind and will ; rash and deficient efi'ects in art aston- ish more suddenly than the transcendental ones conceived in enthusiasm, but born of knowledge, and nurtured by design. So calm in the fulness of development should be a great work, that it startles not but sat- isfies, so at the brimming cup the lip is athirst no more, and the delighting spirit is at rest. Such was the character and tendency of the overture — it was listened to rather than judged ; that it was original was pardoned, because it was, though eminently original, more beautiful than strange. And it was mournful ; never was lost a moment the re- minding key-note of the tragedy to come. Beauty, specially in art, seems more divine when mated with melancholy than blent with joy, as a great art exponent acknowledged, in saying that the passions by tragedy are purified. The curtain rose on Burgos, the superb pictorial city, its fulgent skies empurpling the " solemn towers," and " groves of golden pinnacles." Then human interest began to stir, human sympathy to breathe ; from that moment they grew, mightily sustained. As a drama where poetry was wholly passion should, it opened humanly and quietly, with- out startling incident, saving only when the two courtiers meeting in the stately street, breathe to each other in hurried dia- logue the story of the mysterious Siwooning of the Infanta that morning in Court, when there passed her the returned Alarcos, lately a proud alien, restored thrice as proud a cit- izen and noble. With this dialogue, sud- denly blending the news of Alarcos's mar- riage during his exile, announced by the page entering, closed the first act. Then, in a rich room of his palace, Alar- cos paces, touching a guitar slung from his shoulder, in accompaniment to a sweet French ballad sung by Florimonde, his wife. She sings proudly, joyously, at first — ends mournfully, for an unnatural abstraction wraps Alarcos as in the first mists of the doom that shall hereafter darken into black - ness ; feebly, fitfully he strikes the strings, at last drops the guitar, then in a duet be- tween the wife and husband their chai-acteri RUMOR. 4\ first reveal themselves. Her tenderness and devotion, her unworldliness, half feminine, half angelical ; his ambition, which shall crush all tenderness, all devotion, with iron heel, his worldliness half manly, half Satanic. And the results yet veiled are rendered still more dimly prophetic by the delicate diver- sion from a too intense contemplation either of the awful chief, or gentle martyr of the plot, occasioned by the entrance of the g-aests Sidonia and Leon. Alarcos talks Ughtly Avith Sidonia, of indifferent things, aside. Florimonde, in a thwarting duet with Leon, asks of the morning adventure at the palace of the King, of the swoon of the Infanta, and its cause — that unrevealed. The next scene sweeps to the central in- terest of the tale. Alarcos is alone in his chamber, the orchestra is wholly brought \nto play, yet so subdued are all its various voices, that it seems to bind the music and the plot in suspense ; ghosts of sound shiver past the strained ears of the audience, as phantoms melt before the eye they momen- tarily startle. The tones in such mystery are prophetic ; there enters a veiled lady, who seems as ghostly, gliding in at those elusive sounds. But Alarcos lifts the veil, the suspense is rent, and the first grand in- terview between these awful lovers is pre- ceded and accompanied by a tumult of angry and voluptuous harmonies, contrasting their sweetness and their strength like the two conflicting voices. The Solisa of the night is the first contralto, as the Alarcos is the piofoundest bass voice in Europe. ' In each the will to sustain is equal to the power to produce ; an imperious necessity where the scenes are so long, and the passion of the parts rests never, but rises higher and higher, as gradually too as a sea to flood tide, that shall break at last against unyiekling rocks. The length of the two scenes where the Infanta fiist pours forth her passion to Alarcos, then of the King her father demanding the mar- ried Alarcos for her husband, is relieved by the length of the symphonies which seem themselves to speak, a cloud of spiritual and wordless witnesses to defiant love, and am- bition more defiant still. No blank silence follows the first act, no space is left for reality to enter and dissolve the dream not yet dreamed out. A delicate and enchanting interlude fills up this space, in which numberless guitars fling their low tinkle over the surface of a profounder theme, as foam into which the deep waves sparkle and melt at their edges. It grows more soft and distant, prevailing yet as the curtain rises once more upon the street ; the meeting of Sidonia, the late love-smitten of Flori- monde, with the taunting Leon ; farther and farther melts the distant music, and is lost as they begin their commune, so soon disturbed by the entrance of Oran the Moor, rushing in, confessing the crime of murder for which be is pui-sued, and entreating the protection which Leon yields to him. As the three re- treat again, the guitar tone chafes the air ■ — this time a solitary one — and as the scene shifts, there swells above it, yet with it, an impassioned serenade. You hear, but see no minstrel, for the broad golden moon- light streams into a room through the un- closed and fluttering curtains of an open window, and magically mingles with the bright lamplight, amidst which Alarcos stands, as though listening, with an intense pallor on his frowning brow. His- sweet Avife enters, her arms full of dewy pomegranate and jasmine blooms she has been gathering in her moonlit garden. He bids her listen, harslrly, commandingly. She stands beside him, and at the end of the next verse wearily admires. He tells her that her beauty in- spired the songful importunity : her tortured virtue sobs its resisting plea — in return, the husband pleads the lover's cause — and leaves her. Then Solisa, alone in her room too, save for the presence of a page, one of those royal toys called Menino, upon whose shoul- der a Spanish princess may lean (though a finger-touch of grown man laid on her i-ai- ment's hem will be his death-warrant). So- lisa is soon quit of his presence too, for she sends him to the banquet-hall that he may watch the King's conduct to Alarcos, seated near him. Unrolls before the e)'e the banrquet- hall, the gold and blue roof bedropt with scarlet stalactites, the silver fountains seen through purpling vistas, the table gleaming and tiashing with gold-fringed damask, •jewelled goblet, crystal flask ; the band ol courtiers round with their gem-sparred dresses, and gem-incrusted sword-hilts. There sits Alarcos by the King, his face radiant, covered with unholy smiles — then, when all the guests are dismissed save him alone, it flames with triumph from the dark fire of his eyes. The King in their com- mune, sustained by each with equal arro- gance, now first hints at the possibility of a marriage between Alarcos and Solisa — at the possibility of Florimonde's death. On this horror the curtain falls. Another interlude — this time no fantastic strain of faery. All the genius of the com- poser rises to assert itself, all is a Avhile his own. A noble organ fills the air with a vast Catholic voluntary, solemn but not severe, imagination pouring forth in ])raise her whole resources, pure as the unsullied rain- bow every color of tone is there ; and then, when every heart is filled with music, and the thoughts born of it, holy but still impassioned, voices both high and deep in holy chorus swell to meet it, it subsides to be their support, and more plaintive than ever with prayer, that passion born of heaven, the mass begins. The curtain rises before the last entreaty, " Give us Peace." There stands the dim Cathedi-al, dim for greatness — for not all 42 RUMOR. the altar's illumination, nor all the shining tracery of the lighted chapels, can pierce and scatter those roof hung mists, that vaulting shade. It is filled to its furthest corner with kneeling figures ; at the altar the prior and his train await the last Amen. Across this still picture a strange thwart vision steals : Alarcos, from the front of the stage, staggers into the holy place, advances towards, yet approaches not completely, the place most holy. The last melting chord, the last yearning echo of the voices, are still. With the stillness the altar darkens, yet the chapels gleam afar like arches shaped of flame and amethyst. The prior's deep voice vibrates through the darkness, strong yet tremulous, in\dting all who sin and sorrow to approach him. Alarcos reels to the con- fessional ; the confession all shall hear. He confesses ! — oh, hellish perversion of truth by pride and passion — a crime he has not committed. In the anticipation the commis- sion is confirmed — enforced. For though the priest thrusts him not aAvay from the door of hope, no, not when he confesses murder, and the doubly-damning motive of Love and Power, still he turns not to clasp the chance, which he knows maybe certainty, for he is yet unstained in hand, though the soul be smirched forever. Unshriven he goes forth, with dry eyes, stainless hand, and the lust of blood raging in his veins with hotter madness. Then begins the anarchy of passions, in which all love changes to lust, whether for power or for possession of that once loved. The Infanta, alone with her father, again demands, this time without reserve or patience, that Alarcos shall be hers. Her father, scared from self-confidence, refers her to Alarcos only, and, referred to Alar- cos, she sacrifices every attribute of a woman except her sex ; she urges their union before the suit which shall release him from his present marriage can be settled by the church. From this moment the scent of murder seems to taint the entire plot. Leon, who hates Alarcos for his supremacy at court which still prevails, would kill him, but not with his own hand. In return for his pro- tection of Oran the Moor, he demands of him that he shall kill Alarcos. Oran seems to promise such allegiance, but will not act alone : four hired murderers do his bidding — rush upon Alarcos as he passes — boast- ing beforehand of success in a savage quar- tette, helped by brazen discords ; they are scattered in an instant by the lightning of Alarcos' steel. Oran remains to fight with liim — falls wounded by the same charmed arm, but not to die — rises burdened with a deadly oath that for the life now spared him, he will take a life for him who spares. The voice of the vow is terrible, the music rages, the dim dream of horror begins to dawn as real. The horror is again suspended, again the audience breathes. The strains relenting, grow thin, gay, drop oft' one by one, and be- tween the third and fourth act you hear a solitary mandolin. It is a monotonous, yet merry dance-measure. Soon it illustrates, as it were, a vignette of refined jictorial comedy ; a gypsy-girl dances to the measure of the mandolin in an inn room, her lithe dark form bathed in fire-light flushes : they gleam, too, on a group seated round a table ; dark faces, dark forms, drinking i-eck- lessly, drowning now and then the music with their jokes and proverbs. The door ojDenS; a masked stranger enters, shakes a purse in the fire-light, asks for Oran — the tragic tone is instantly restored — nor lost again. Sidonia tells Florimonde where she may see her husband with Solisa. Her tenderness is too deeply probed where so deeply wounded. She Avould find him faithful whom she yet believes so. She consents. She enters the palace-garden like an angel clothed in white ; the moon di'ops on her a veil of silvery beams, and on the fretted marbles, plashing fountains, bloom-starred myrtles, whose per- fume fills the theatre, seeming to float upon the wings of the almost whispering melodies that are as though the leaves should shiver, and the winds and waters murmur them- selves in music. There is no Alarcos in- this solitude, and no Solisa ; but Sidonia rushes in to carry her away. Fast and thick multiply the tragic phases rushing to con- summation. Oran bursts upon the scene, beats off' Sidonia. Florimonde swoons upon the earth. There is a sudden gleam of torches — a procession in the midst — the Infanta, who returns to her home from mass. She sees the lovely lady, knows not Flori- monde, bids them bear her to her own cham- ber. Alarcos enters; his Avife and he meet eye to eye. Now and then, from that mo- ment, the sweet voice in its pure tones rises in entreaty, in wonder, over the vast and awful deceit between the Infanta and Alarcos. The voices beat down, as it were, the orches- tra, one against the other. They break and rage. Solisa, at the crowning moment, in a blind agony snatches the dagger of Alarcos — she rushes to the couch of Florimonde. But with k rending imprecation he arrests her hand : for the crime must be complete, to merit the retribution stored in heaven. Once more, for the last time, the palace cf Alarcos rears its turrets ; light from the noonday falls dazzling on its terraces. Once more, for the last time, on those terraces walks Florimonde — for the last time sings a swan's song, a dream of death, which to her pure soul is only heaven, and which echoes from angel harps and voices seem to answer. Oran enters, his brow gloomy with a pallid cloud ; the magnetic vision of his unmixed race detects the doom with which the air ia charged ; with quivering finger points he out, with deep trembling voice announces, the RUMOR. little cloud, like a man's hand, swelled just feintly as a gray moon-cvescent on the burn- ing blue of heaven. The scene shifts ; the blue dazzle, the delicate di'ead portent are swept away. Once more the palace halls break stately on the eye, their light puts out the light of day, tenfold radiance streams from the golden roof, tcnfuld tlames the jewel-blaze. The hall of Belshazzar glared not with more aw- ful si)lendor. .There is a feast of nielody, a surfeit of delighting sound — but ever and anon the music surges underneath. Is its fui-y a portent ? Does the storm tread heaven more near the earth ? The music rages as Solisa and Alarcos meet. They come to the front of the stage — the dancers move behind them — none approach. That night she will possess Alarcos, her impellent passion rushes through her lips — his answer shudders from his own. A moment more, and he is gone. The golden lights are quenched, darkness wraps the stage — seems to wrap the orches- tra. Not long ; from a labyrinth of low, groping tones, breaks in music thunder — thunder with mountain echoes — still har- mony, but too profound to trace, as all colors are absorbed in black. Blue, white, and livid lightnings thwart the blackness of the stage, and in one broad cleaving gleam you see a charger, black as hell ; you see Alarcos on him, his face lit up white by the lightnings, which light the foam of the charger up like snow — and you see that the lightnings not stream and shiver only round, but cling to him ; pale fire, a mail of electric lustre, horrid as a mist of hell, grows and gathers to liis garments as he rides through the storm to murder Florimonde. He is at home, the storm is spent, the thunder-pulses throb less heavily, the light- ning seems to smile. Oran enters. Alarcos demands of him the fulfilment of his mur- derous vow. At the last moment of life this stained soul puts on the robe of purity which shall clothe him fit for heaven. Oran will not take the life of Florimonde. Alarcos persists. Cold with pride, even then, he would spare his own hand from stain. Oran, to share his own heart, with his own s;tained hand, stabs himself. Florimonde, paler now than all, save death and the dying, rushes in — her hand touches the wound — he dies in Paradise of that touch. The husband and wife are alohe upon the stage ; no longer she pleads — no more he quails beneath her holy eyes : there is no more thunder, nor passion, nor love. He j ^nds her to embrace her children before the long, long journey he is going to send her ; can a soul so black know how short is the journey for a soul all light to heaven ? One cry breaks from her heart — no more — her heart is broken. No more the music rages ; but while the stage is emptj, void of all save dead Oran's body, an ineffable movement fills the orchestra, of soft woe, of solemn triumph, that from many an eye draws tears. Alarcos returns — alone ; the violins break from the ranks of harmony with shuddering discord — they upbraid with spirit-like shriek and groan the miracle of crime accom- plished. A clanging chaos, both of sweet and awful sounds, succeeds — a trumpet blast suspends it — another, and the chaos responds in calm — a tliird, and silence an- swers. In the silence, as the sinner stands alone, the messenger enters. In recitative, which the wind instruments support in sim- ple unison, lending an intense distinctness to the appalling words, the tale is told. The storm was spent, because its work was done ; the avenging angel had returned to heaven in its track. The bolt had fallen, — " Winged from the startling blue of heaven, And struck — the Infanta." Alarcos falls — self-sent to hell. Or has the retribution, equal — and only equal — to the crime, already been sufl[icient ? Has not there been a sacrifice besides ? No pictorial art, nor stage-phantasm, ex- hibiting to the eye the similitude of that ret- ribution, would have affected the audience at the croAvnring crisis of suspense, like that se- vere and simple recitation, with the unisons of tone. It was like truth, not drama — a fact, not a representation. There was a moral, and all perceived it. At the last dark word of Alarcos, ere he fell, the twilight stage grew darker ; as he fell there was darkness — with the dark there was silence, and the cur- tain fell. He who was most difficult to satisfy through the ear, and whose verdict decided the press, was the first to raise his voice — others had waited for him, and applauded that — more and more swelled the tribute, till it burst from every lip. The " hundred- tongued " had said Amen to the artist's fii-st prayer to art. Be it not, oh, listening devotee, self-ador- ing, adoring thine own creation — be not this first prayer to art thy last aspiration towards a Uivinif / higher than that as the heavens are higl iv than the earth ! This was Lady Delucy's first hope for him, breathed to her own heart only, when she knew his first hope fulfilled. He went home. For him, that sultry and clouded August night, the sun rose upon the landscape of his life. Sitting in a slip of room, whose small dull window showed no peeping star, where no lamp burned, where no board was spread, no flask filled, he was intoxicated, but not with wine. No fumes curled round his brain, confusing fact and fancy in thew genial heat ; but a foretaste filled his being of life to be longed for, loathed no more — a generous existence budding, that should blossom in blissful hours, and drop ripe fruits in the footsteps of the future. And even as the deep luscious 44 RUMOR. draugjits of nectar quaffed at feasts Olym- pian, stimulated the thirst of hero-deities to greater exploits, more surpassing pleasures ; Bo now the soul of the musician swelled in him, inimitably to expand the brightness of Lis art — shall we not sigh to say besides, his own glory ? A delirium of rapture, whose clouds were golden as they pressed upon his bi-ow, and burned in his sharpened pulses, revealed that fever which was but joy exces- sive, excessive unto pain. How long he sat, like one that mused in the midst of madness, lost in thoughts that seemed vaster than his own soul, he knew not ; in such wild medita- tion time is annihilated, and yet more in love. For all through that golden atmosphere, itself so bright, there flashed an image which was its sun, and it was a tangible vision which ruled the being no longer consecrated to art alone, and the self-love she almost makes divine. CHAPTER XI. No marvel that the old world inwrapt itself in mysterious creeds of destiny, of doom, of solar and astral influences, when the laws which govern organization were un- known, and a man determined not by any j physiological deductions, the difference be- j tween himself and other men. In this life of [ sadness and ])robation, where to the philoso- pher, the idealist, and the saint, even rapture is but a milder melancholy than woe, we j are never astonished to see troubled faces, to j read strange and tragic stories in men's eyes ; we do not wonder at the care-wasted, the passion-worn, the calm-despairing ; but we are surprised at success, and more than all, when the successful can appreciate and de- light in it. Perhaps the sympathy and inter- est excited in the minds of a few, by a writer or artist if special character and feeling, however much attesting originality and ex- clusive talent, yet show, that to the power of such a mind a limit is set, by some encroach- ing mortal weakness, or too intense spirit- ualism. A really vast genius in art will affect all classes, and touch even the uniniti- ated with trembling and delight, and pene- trate even the ignorant with strong if tran- sient spell, as the galvanic energy binds each and all who embrace in the chain-circle of grasping hands in the shock of perfect sym- pathy. As for this opera of Alarcps, not only were the three performances of its free inaugura- tion attended by every invited person, but the first performance the week afterwards, for which tickets were issued, as from any other theatre, was thronged to the doors, and many were turned away. Then, after a day or tw , ^ame the reviews — those anatomical pieparations of words which fresh authors think as much too important at first, as tl ey grow to think too little important afterwards. The reviews in this case were all favorable^ however ignorantly they dealt with their sub- ject — except in one instance, where wisdom and approbation went hand in hand. Lady Delucy sent all the reviews to the composer, for no one knew where he was, and through her only could he be communicated with. She gave him time to read them, for she deemed the joys of triumph as sacred as the torture of disa])pointment ; and then, as he came not to her, she went to him. It was the first time she had Ibeen to his lodgings ; and she took his motlier with her up stairs, leaving her outside the dooi-. She knocked — there was no answer — nor any when she knocked again. Was it not absurd to treat him like a man after all? Was he not young enough to have been her child? So she turned the handle gently, and went in. He was sitting at the table, in an attic bare of any furniture save a bed, a chair, and table, a piano, and a stool. He Avas Avriting ; sheets lay all about him ready for the press ; all the reviews lay in a heap on the floor — at least, there lay the papers that contained them. As the lady entered, he looked up and frowned, at the same time a flush, ever rare upon his face, reddened it, but it did not look like the crimson of anger or irritation. His words explained it partly. " I did not know it was you, lady, or I had not been so rude. I tell my mother she is to knock if she wants me, which she has no oc- casion to do at all : however, she is to knock — and if I don't answer her. to knock again ; if I don't speak then, she is to go away — not to knock a third time. But you, lady, should not have knocked — you should have come in straight. How could I have ex- pected, even if I had guessed, it might be you ? You have been away so long, forget- ting me entirely. There is one comfort though, you have forgotten me for something, which is also of me, but greater than myself." All this time he went on writing — it was evident that his abstraction was not of the higher faculties. " Why do you write so hard ? " asked Lady Delucy, sitting down on the music stool. " I want to pay you. Suppose I die first — such a debt would darken my purest re- nown. But no one knows it, only I. Is not my purest renown your approbation ? " " You have read those ? " she asked, kindly and smilingly, pointing to the papers in the corner. " How can persons criticise music unless they are musicians — equal, besides, to the music they criticise? It is different with books — every body writes now, and critics better than authors. But music ! Those are all stuff, except one, and that makes up for all the rest. That is good and true, and a master must have written it — a master, at least, of words, and of the secret of compo- RUMOR. 45 gition, whether he can create or not. I should like to see him. As for the other notices, they will light the fire, just as these rags and scraps, which are paper money now to me, will one day light future fires." " I do M'onder how you can write so," she exclaimed, turning over waltzes, and ballads, and fantasias, all brilliant and of marked efl'ect, yet all endowed with that extreme fa- cility for voice and finger, which none but the Domposer who has surmounted the last diffi- culty, can impart with ease. "They make me bitter on myself — they are degrading, but only for a time. They sell — oh, how they sell'! And yet there is one thing more ; for soon all the women, whose fools of parents, and greater fools of teachers, have told that they have soprano voices, will scream the holy songs of Florimonde ; and the rest, who cannot even scream, yet will sing — will scrape their throats with the deep passion of Solisa. Soon, soon," and he sighed — " that is the worst part. I do not know whether in the midst, it was after all the consciousness that by my power alone, that crowd was kept so still to listen. I do not know that the delight was there — some- thing stronger still, not of myself, nor them, sustained me." " Ah ! yes." " You -who love art, and lie not as hun- dreds do who say they love it, you know that art is sola-ce and strength alone. Yet, when it was over, how was it that the memory was not stronger ? it should have been, and suf- ficient too. Why the memory was worth less than the anticipation. It is this ; there were faults, there was weakness, none else perceived them. I alone can criticise and reform myself Next time it must be stronger — it must annihilate the fame of this — the sun must put out the little hght of this morning star. Stop, lady, do not go ; the man is coming directlv for these ; will you wait, for I wish to ask you another favor. Not a big one, a very Httle one, the least you can grant, much less than many I shall ask you." He glanced at her with sudden sparkling eyes, but she saw them not, she was patiently untying the strings of her bonnet, for truly she humored him too much ; she waited. For half an hour he went on writing, then made the papers into a packet, fastened the string and seal with deft fingers, and taking it outside the door, threw it to the bottom of the stairs, and came ir again. " There will be no more of Alarcos till the spring," he said ; " and as every body who fe fine is going into the country I suppose you are going too, lady." This, with a sneer. " I shall go ; my daughter's health re- quu-es it, and I hope you are coming with me ; it will do you much more good to write there. I shall not go for a week, however." " Well, I am not coming to your country house, at least 1 do not know yet. But never mitid that ; I want you, lady, to take me with you to one of those parties you told nij of, where you wished to take me before, and I would not go, because I would not be insignificant among the insignificant. Above all. among those who rule. I want to see your celebrated persons, your literary ones, — those of whom men talk, and for whom women feel the most. You know what you told me about fame and fashion. I wish to see both, for I am now famous, and you know it — you cannot be ashamed." " Ashamed ! I should be proud ; but I am wondering where to take you, for so many people are gone. There are dinners, cer- t?ahily." " Oh ! I could not sit still for those, nor eat their food. I only eat pulse and drink water, like the Hebrew children who grew so strong." " It is also very difficult to gather the cel- ebrated persons together. The most famous poetess is in Italy ; the poet laureate has not been in London all the summer. Our great- est painter is just dead." " I thought Romana was your greatest painter ; he thinks himself so I know." " I do not think he does — hoM-ever, he is not. He will never be buried, as our king painter lies, in St. Paul's Cathedral." " I would rather be buried there," pointing to the towers of the abbey, which were the only fair sight from the garret window. " Yet — buried ; no, it is not time to die ; " then he shivered. " But after letting the whole world know, I would return and give my ashes to the dust beneath the feet of those who first confessed me. I will not yet die — love me not too well ye gods ! I could not die young, for there is weakness, if the body fails before the brain, and I am strong." Yes, thought the lady, as she looked at his frame, delicate but compact, like fine wrought iron, no gossamer frostwork ; at his youth-keen eyes, that almost pained her vision with their piercing centre-spark ; at his brow of grainlike granite, and almost of granite hardness ; not the poHsh which on certain ivory-like temples attests the most fragile of all God's structures to enclose the spirit. Strong, she recurred again to the word, yes, too strong to die, but strong enough to suff'er till death is yearned for, yet will not come. Strange too, she thought, that man, strong man, pities the early dead; those who fall as flowers under the sickle with the dew yet upon their leaves ; and he deems long life, with the failure of " deske," at last, a sublimer fate ! " Shall I disgrace you, if you take me with you ? " he asked suddenly, seeing her fair countenance so grave, regarding him. " Shall you be ashamed of me ? " she an« swered, smiling again as only she could smile. •' I was not thinking about it at all. But fear not; your artistic preeminence will 46 RUMOR. give you fame, and your eccentricity, because it is natural to you, will give you fashion." " One thing, lady, more. If you ask me to play, or to play for you if you sing, I will do it ; but if any one else asks me, I will go out of the house, and leave you to tell them ■why." " You will be fashionable," she said, laugh- ing, you need not even change your coat." Lady Delucy at last selected an evening to take him into public. She did not choose to make market out of him by introducing him at her own house, not because — though studiously conscientious in the fulfilment of her social claims, though no one could be more profitable and hearty in the part of hostess, — she did not love society ; only submitted to it with a patience and self- denial very peculiar, as peculiar as her dis- taste for it, which scarcely any of her sex share, and none save those flitting excep- tions would beHeve. But she would not ex- hibit Rodomant at her house, because in that case she must perforce be preoccupied, and unable to watch him. She took a strange and passionate interest in this j-oung heart, which had for its companion in the flesh, so strong a spirit and precociously mature a genius. She knew him yet so pure in life, by the instinct which is left only to the pure in heart ; and she trembled for the tests that must await him, for, perhaps, than the artist, none meet with temptations more manifold, or more difficult to resist. Not till the rigorously fashionable had left town, could she find an evening on which to fulfil even the least part of his request. She went to fetch him alone, for Elizabeth, who affiected society even less than her mother, though from a more obvious cause, would not go out that night ; she was writing a letter, which Avas a volume, for the Indian Mail. Rodomant kept his patroness waiting a long time, and when he at last appeared and took his seat opposite her own, he decbred that he did not want to go at all, and only went to please her. " I was M-riting," said he, " a special song for you, and when we come back to-night, I will sing it to you." " It will be too late then," she said, " and, besides, may I not sing it myself?" "I said a song for you, not a song for you to sing. It cannot be too late ; it is a song to sing at night, and I shall sing it at twelve, or two, or three." Then he threw himself back in the carriage, and deranged his hair with his hands, though an accomplished hairdresser had arranged and cut it, and carried away a harvest of the soft brown sweepings for ladies' fronts. And he was carefully, even fashionably attired, to the lady's surprise, for he had only worn one coat since his arrival in England, and that was so fretted and threadbare that it was a wonder it did not fall to pieces ; though in spite of this carelessness in respect of those incumbrances (the costlier the greater) called clothes, he had that mania for the bath, which is the most certain certificate of refined blood, however distant from their source its filtered drops may flow. When they arrived he was in such a dream, that the lady had tc address him three times before he' stirred though he smiled each time she spoke, a sleepers smile in slumber at some swef instinct of a dream. At last he crept o\.. noiselessly, after her, and into a hall of oi of those large new houses, whose fror. flaunt at Hyde Park, and cast their mockii. shadow over the small old-style abodes Mhic. pertain to families of style" antique, which they have too strong taste to modernize. These large new houses meet the exigency of the times ; rich tradespeople, doctors who are fashionable and would be rich, and cer- tain clergymen who can afford to be fashion- able, rent them generally ; but they often change their tenants. To Rodomant, bred in an old German town, where, instead of convenience, ruled the picturesque, a town out of the route of tourists, and only visited by art-students and bookworms, this house was a fairy-palace. He saw no new furni- ture, nor brilliant appointments at Lady Delucy's house ; she gave away a great 1 deal too much to be able to aflbrd them ; for to be really generous, even the rich must deny themselves — to be generous according to their means — we speak not of just charities which men perform (as they go to church) for fear of not going to heaven when their change shall come. And Rodomant's delight in illusion was like that of the German child, and up to that time had been as cheaply satisfied as the German child is satisfied with its formal tree at Christmas, its gingerbread monstrosities, frightful toys, and flickering tapers, such as a French child Mould flout, and of which an English child would without fail inquire, how much (or rather how little) such a paltry show had cost ? " Whose house is this ? " inquired Rodo- mant, lingering on the first landing, and staring at every thing as a matchless spec- tacle. " Whose think you ? " returned the lady, humoring him, though she took care to .speak in German while the servants were at hand. " An ambassador's, the Russian ambassa- dor's, no doubt." " It is the house of a publisher ; do you remember the dark shop I showed you in the city the other day ? " " Where the man sold books written by other persons ? Yes." " This is his house, his home." Further, he had just thought fit to marry, which might excuse, as well as account for the fact that in the house was every thing ' completely new, new as a servant-maid's bon- ' net on Easter Sunday ; therefore, and only therefore, the least vulgar. There, in th« drawing-room, were the inevitable gold jpi- HUMOR. 47 ored curtain? = Ac] the sage l.jusewife knows light i ; so V: ell ; there the chande- liers of Oslei, the carpets of Crossley, the musical instruments of Erard ; there the dull books clothed, like many a dull person, in costly dresses ; there the portfolios of those standard eiio;ravings which every body buys, and therefore nobody looks at ; there were the copies of copies, the mimics of models, the patented elegancies which have inundated societj- since the opening of the Crystal Palace ; there were the countless photographs of known and unknown, wise and foolish portraits which have palled upon the sense of sight since science (vainly) sought a rivalry with art. Earnestly, in- deed, must these money-spinners grub all the morning, to burst into such splendid butter- flies at night. Lady Delucy found it hard work to get up to the master of the house, and to pull her companion with her, and at last, having succeeded in introducing him, he shrank away into a corner, and not shyly, but cynically, surveyed the people present, who by no means seemed to charm his fancy like the room itself. " Are all these people famous ? " he de- manded, dryly, " for there are so many of them, that in that case it would be more original to be a fool." " I have not recognized one yet ; T will look out." She cast her eyes round and through the crowd, wherever it divided. " Do you see," she said at last, " that gen- tleman who leans against the wall ? " " To whom every body speaks, as they pass, while he bows without moving his lips ? " " What think you of him ? " " He would not be so ugly, if he did not look so awful ; grave as the grave, he is gray, not only his hair, but his face ; he is cold and grim as a winter's night ; he is like old Death. He must be miserable, and born to make others so." " He is the most famous person present, and deserves his fame. He is a very great writer, perhaps the greatest, some say so. He is a popular idol now, and a word from his lips is much more cared for than the queen's sweetest speech." " Then he is very ungrateful to look so. Is it not ingratitude, lady ? " " I think not ; the follies of others have worn him low ; this vain world afflicts him, for he is good. He sees through all mate- rial things, and the motives of selfish men, as a surgeon would see you an unclothed skeleton, and watch the coursing of your blood." " But surgeons do not suffer as he looks to suffer on account of the sufferings of others ; they are not leaden-pale, they do not Avince." " Did you see him wince ? " thought the lady. Then aloud : " It may be good for you to know what the famous have to bear, despite their fame. That man is in constant torture, nameless, unknown — torture that at last must kill ; torture that wrestles with time yet cannot strangle it. He must, and he will, endure to the end, — but how long ? Who shall tell the length of moments, made millenniums by pain ? yet blessed, thrice blessed, if so intensely purified." Tears stood in her maternal eyes, tears soon gath- ering ever in them, yet seldom or never fall- ing. The young adept in art who knew of nothing else, looked at her with wonder ; he had fought with the goblin nprve-shadoMs, and deemed them agony's own substance; what more then was that real agony, which, as she spoke, he felt he did 7iot know ? " " Do you mean, lady, that he is made to suffer because he is famous ? I do not see the necessity, if he is good." " Just because he is good. I grant there have been — may have been, rather, for my creed disclaims the dogma — famous men who have never suffered in just proportion to their triumph. These men were doubtless 7iot good. Yet who shall say that the unut- terable iniquities of the greatest tyrants have not been recompensed by fears as un- utterable. Alarcos might have taught you that." " That is a poem ; these are real men. Well, lady, surely some few are born under a morning star. There is Romana come in, with his beautiful, golden wife. What will you tell me of him ? he, at least, looks happy." " Yes, now. There shines upon him that rainbow which, seen at morning, they do say warns us of storm before the night. Happy, I grant you, in his home ; and he would be entirely so if he could only look to home for happiness, but he cannot ; his vivid talents counterfeit genius to his own partial eye. Because he cannot create, he esteems combi- nation above creation. Yet, as in all cases where the intellectual conscience is not self- satisfied, he is intensely conscious that his is but a class-reputation — nor is that class the Jirst class." '"' And any thing else is — yes, you are right, lady, it is despicable ; I would not pick it up." " Then see the glaring melancholy of his eye. He knows that as his fame is secta- rian, so his artistic revelations are narrow of conception, just as they are of completion overwrought. He feels defects he cannot remedy ; he can see where he cannot soar ; yet, in comparison with many, known and gifted, he is happy — for his nature is all reverence, his principles are incorrupt. Know yo-i. my young friend, that it is not so with aii who stand in the light of all men's eyes for judgment." " Who," asked Rodomant, after a musing moment, in which he seemed to drink down her meaning as a child at its mother's knee when she speaks of God — "who is that man like a wild beast — a tamo beast, rather, who is talking with his mouth wide open 48 •RUMOR. like a frog, to a very beautiful young lady, and who looks as though he wished to eat ber, and was measuring in his eye exactly where he should begin. Surely, he is king of the cannibals, and she is not safe." " Your tame beast is your critic, the man whose master-words about a master-work you prized so dearly ; the young lady you tall so beautiful is indeed beautiful, though Rot young ; she has been called for twenty years the rose of all the seasons. She is (old, and hard, and heartless ; her fame was her beauty, and she was not tender-minded enough to give her beauty (all she had to give) to any other heart." *' I don't call beauty fame ; have women no other ? and if they have, surely they are purer than men." •' Men and women are equal sinners, I be- lieve. But when I remember what women ought to be, what is their protection from the temptations which harass men the most, I must confess to honoring men the most ; this is doubtless a woman's faith, but so it possesses me. I will give you two instances, that you may not think too well of women, for even that is dangerous." " I should never think well of women, for I should never think at all except of one woman." " Listen," said the lady, who, though she did not clearly comprehend, did not like this speech. " You see the lady yonder with men all round her, she who bends to them as though she were a queen. Many crowns she wore as her right, for the many rights of genius were hers ; but the last crown she took to herself she usurps ill wearing ; it is another's, only the real queen is dead, and there is no one brave enough to pluck the crown from the brow of her who wears it falsely." " I don't understand one word," said Rod- omant, confused, and no wonder at the lady's sudden indignation, which filled her clear forehead as with the light of fii-e, and trem- bled on her lips. " I will tell you. The greatest genius among women in this country died a year ago. Till that woman died no one knew who she was ; she lived alone like a white ' snowdrop springing from a snow-bound sod in a wild wintry field. Pure as snow she lived, died sudden as a snowdrop under the earliest warmth of spring. That woman had written a book the whole world read, in every tongue the tale was told, it rung in every ear. At the end of the book there was the touching history of a man whose eyes were put out in his head, blinded by tiie fill of a rafter from a burning house. This may sound a simple incident enough to you who have not read the book, but let me tell you that the beauty and perfection of the book depend upon it. The woman he has loved, and \vho, to save her soul's peace and his, left him long before, found him when he was blind, comforted and loved him, then staid with him forever. Now 1 tell you that the queen on the sofa out there, writing a poem, and not knowing how to fin- ish it, adopted that incident just as it was written in the book of the dead authoress, and wrote it in her own. A man struck blind by the fall of a burning brand, and a woman restored to his love just afterwards. And yet not a single critic noticed this lit- erary imitation." " As far as I understand, that is an evil story, but you must show me the book, lady, and the poem, then I shall understand it all. It seems better to be sorrowful than wicked ; of this, I am determined — that I will be neither. Are there pny more women who have done such things ? " " You shall hear of one more, because she is here. See her there ; she is pale, and very fair, yet you shall acknowledge that she looks, of all here, least at ease. When she was very young she was to be married to a man worthy of all love, as perfect a person as can be found on earth ; she loved him too, with all her mind and strength — I do not say her heart and soul, because if a heart is really touched, it must be constant, if a soul is filled, it cannot fail in fiith. Her lover was drowned, just before the day appointed for their marriage. "Well, she was, and is, a poetess ; she wrote an entire book about him, the most exquisite memorial that ever • immortalized a man on earth ; it made his remembrance fragrant as an imperishable violet, worn in every breast. No book ever drew such sympathy of tears from human eyes. The very first poem in the book vyas an assumption of perpetual virginity. She wore that virgin widowhood for fifteen years, and then " " She died, of course." " She married." " And what did the world say ? " "It said no more than about that pla- giarist who appropriated an incident from a dead writer, and that writer a sister-woman. The world smiled at the marriage contract, and went to the wedding." " I will come to no more parties with you, lady ; I Avish I had not come at all, to hear these ugly stories. But one thing you shall see, that there shall be one famous who never wearies of fame, nor of trying tJ deserve it. One happy, who yet shall de- serve his happiness." He spoke low and very fast, and a sudden mortification fell upon him, as he remarked that the lady did not seem to attend. Sud- denly she had dropped as it were the thread of the association. She was looking at the door through which three persons were entering — Geraldine, Geraldi, and Diamid Albany. RUMOR. 49 CHAPTER XIL Had not Lady Delucy been akogether astonished at Geraldine's looks, she would have certainly been as much surprised at the appearance at all in public, of the boy her cousin. As it was, she did not turn her eyes on Geraldi, which, after a cordial if not glad greeting of Albany himself, she fas- tened on Geraldine with inquiring distress. " My dear child," she said, in the lowest whisjjer, while the hand of Geraldine touched hers, " how very ill you look! surely you should not be here." But Geraldine withdrew her fingers, and for answer gave a flashing defiance from her troubled eye, such a glance as might shoot from the eye of the dove when it saw the hawk descending on its brood. She was so thin that, but for her symmetry, she could not have appeared in the dress evening so- ciety demands. " And why was she there ? " thought the lady — why, above all things, had Diamid brought her to a party at a publisher's, not even his own publisher's either, whom to conciliate on his own account, it had ceased to he needful years and years before ? " Meantime, while she wondered, while Geral- dine dealt her scorning gaze, and Diamid looked intentionally unmeaning at them both, Geraldi, Avhom nobody observed, slipped secretly a small sealed note into the hand of Rodomant, whispering curtly that he was not to read it until he found himself alone. If Lady Delucy had not so preoccupied herself with that same neophyte of hers, she would have heard that every one in the room that night was speaking of a new book, which some had, some had not read, but of which all who had, were speaking in terms of wonder and curiosity, which decided those who had not — even those who never read any thing, and those who, reading every thing, have time for nothing, to " get it," as they would have said, directly. The pub- lisher was the only person, who for reasons of his own, held his tongue on the subject. The manuscript had been dropped into the letter-box of his house of business, after business hours ; the delicate backward writ- ing was not to be identified, and it was made a free gift to him, on condition of its immediate production by the press. The man (who read his own books — no book- taster for him) — knew when he had read a doz^n i)ages, that to publish it would incur for himself no risk. Good or bad, the work of creative genius or morbid imagination, it was enough for one so shrewd that such a book had never before been written ; the subject, the matter, and the manner, all were new. Yet, after all, what was this fame virgin- al? As far as what the people said — and an evening part}- in a di-awing-room is a fair 7 sample of the great, gay. talking w ffld — their excitement .md its expression much resembled those invoked by a new mem- ber's maiden speech in Parliament, on the night it is uttered — and forgotten. Cheers in surges, volleys of hisses, popguns ot applause. Every one who knew Albany M'ell enough to dare to sjjeak to him, asked him whether he had read this book ; with- out equivocation he contrived to avoid an answer by demanding to have it described. As soon as each speaker left his side he stohs a glance at Geraldine, but a glance whicli was carefully bereft of all inquietude or interest. Ill as Lady Delucy had thought her, it had not been because she was pale, for a narcotic, which was to her young con- stitution a vivid stimulus, had filled her veins with fiery life and her cheeks with fiery color — her brain with fiery phantoms too. This brilliance burned itself slowly out ; she was pale as snow in twilight, her eye softened languidly, her frame drooped with greater lassitude. The man of wisdom and experience by her side, he who had lived so long, could not understand this mood. But, in truth, the glory which Geraldine had created for herself, the halo which in clear, contem])lative solitude she saw around her own fair head, faded alto- gether in that artificial light. Each trivial verdict from lips of the frivolous and fash- ionable, took out of her some portion of her ])ride. She knew not how it was ; she only knew that she had, as it were, fallen from heaven, or wakened from some deep Italian summer, come back to her in a ha])py dream of sleep, to a November morning of cold, stifling fog, laden with snow instead of thunder. She herself had besought Diamid to take her where there would be the best chance for her to hear her book spotten of. He had calculated the time, and just a week after it was out, before the reviews began, he did take her, certainly to the most likely place. Nor had her desires been disa]i- pointed. She had not only heard it spokevi of, but discussed ; if much dispraised, also violently approved. Therefore, he under- stood not, for the first time, Geraldine. When he had heard his first work spoken of he had been excited, enchanted, satisfied. He did not know that it was not only the difference of sex, distinctly defined, as it is not always, between himself and her, but the difference between Geraldine and others of her own sex, particularly the class author- esque of Avomen. For, say what men will of them, and women can say for themselves, there are very few feminine writers who are intensely, and to the heart of hearts, physi- cally and morally, perfect feminine natures. In their lives, their loves, their marrages as wives and mothers, how many of them are ideals of womanhood, whom an ideal nature among men would long to clasp as his own.f* At the same time, it is true, thai 50 RUMOR. there are many women so intensely femi- nine, that they would not write, to publish, if they could, too proud, because too wise, to expose their feelings to a world made up of persons with whom they neither hold communion nor have sympathy. But such a case as a woman thus intensely feminine, thus proud and modest, betraying herself to the world in her writings, is an exception, and one in the whole world the most rare. For such must be her innocence of the world even if in it, such her ideal condition a.".ik(; of thought and feeling, that she thinks not of it as it is, nor feels 'for individuals as they are, necessarily and happily, all unlike herself. Let none envy the exceptional, those whose fate it is to weave rainbows into the awful web of being, whose fathom- less heart-springs brim the fountains of imagination with eternal freshness, while the dream-flowers nurtured by that fresh- ness only bloom to die. It is no characteris- tic, no destiny to be coveted by the selfish for themselves, or by parents loving and unselfish, for their children. If these ex- ceptional beings are weak or false to their own estimates — if on the least scrutiny a flaw is found, then they do evil in this evil world. If they are strong, and pure, and shrink not to declare that they know — oay, all the more if their mind's history is a page clean as drifted snow — then must they endure to the end, perhaps find that end th.e martyr's fate without his fame. Geraldine was born a poetess. None, save the trees, whose still stateliness shaded her, the silent statues, and flowers lovely enough to inspire for each blossom a new- made song, had been audience to her wild improvisations. Doubtless, finer images, more delicate phrases, sweeter heart-confessions, more melodious eloquence, dropped from her young lips in those hours of the play- time of her genius, than distilled from the pages of her first essa)- at English composi- tion. As for her pleasure in writing, it was just what every one experiences in doing what they do most naturally. As for hei- ambition, it was but the reflex of her hus- band's — the ambition, not to do a thing for its own sake, or for love's sake — sweeter still ; but that, others, and as many others as possible, may approve, applaud, perhaps envy. But just as she adopted all his politi- cal views without understanding them, all his opinions of men she had ever seen, all his verdicts of books she had never opened — so *it was enough for him to say he desired her to be a famous woman, to make her de- sire aid determine to be one — yea, with a disea^ed and raging desire, like the fever after ii oculation. Befoie we know ourselves, God knows us ; and when that shock of self-knowledge comes, and but for Him we should be alone, we have His sympathy. Blessings never suf- ficiently appreciated, that of the isolation of each soul, at certain times, which the more il divides us from each other, the more it draws us to the love of Him, from whom we can hide nothing. As Geraldine felt that night she was for the first time divided from her husband, he understood not the disap- pointment which had fallen on her hopes a blight ; her idol, for the first time, was in- sufficient, as all idols are at last. Then for the first time, too, her soul realized its Maker. Neither as sadness nor joj*, trouble nor triumph, came that real conception — it was quiet as the echo of a still, small voice. Oh ! divine dawn of faith, which is neither the hour of baptism, nor the first-lisped affirmative of the creed Christian, nor the day when the parental conscience is released by the Church from the responsibility of the child's salvation ; but the instant, a space that cannot be reckoned in time — when the soul feels its need of God, and finds that need destroyed forever by His presence — before he called He answered it. If Lady Uelucy had possessed any worldly pride, it would have received many a sharp side-thrust, and many a rankling sting from the style in which she had been treated ever since her husband's death. Nobody ever forgot she had been an actress — people took care to show that the respect they paid was to her rank, not to her — while to her character they condescended. A woman whose mother had fallen, is not judged so severely by half. Yet it is not exactly the fault of each person who so conducts him- self that so he acts ; it is the absolute im- possibility for those who cai'e supremely about wealth, and secondarily, about social ' position, to assimilate Avith the personality of artists. When Lady Delucy, therefore, was asked, as a private individual, to sing, it was rather- as though she were commanded (having been prepaid) to do so. ^She cared for none of this treatment — it afflicted her not, and she always did her best in every company, loving art so dearly, that it was a pleasure of which she never wearied to lend it even the least and most partial interpreta- tion. So being asked to sing by the wife of the host, a young woman who was accus- tomed to sit with her feet on the fendt-.r, and give her opinion upon the manuscripts of master-writers, and who thought herself a genius because she did so. Lady Delucy ascended calmly, and asked Rodomant to accompany her. Most exquisite was the accompaniment which bore the exquisite voice on its melodious ripple, and mild as sunshine with a southern breeze seemed the player's mood. People stared, of course, to see that the lady did not accompany herself, as she had ever done before, and little imps of suspicion glanced at each other from eye to eye, more especially as this strange person had never left, the whole evening, the side of the lady who had the reputation for doing I the strangest things. As for Geraldine, the RUMOR. 51 only person present who did not connect the lady with the player for an instant, she ex- perienced a mortification, bitter even after all the bitterness of the hour, in seeing that l^iamid drank down the music, seemed to hang- upon the voice, and was evidently soothed by both, as it was seldom he was quieted by any thing. How, thought she, in her passionate impatience forgetting that for him, by any and all means, she coveted above all things, rest — how could he listen, attend to any thing, think of any thing, but me to-night? He was thinking, she could not, as a woman, dream how deeply, wildly, with what wondering and wistful tenderness he was thinking only of her, and that deli- cate renown of hers Mhich, to his worship- ping appreciation, it seemed must be sullied by being questioned or even admitted. He was lost in a transport of melancholy love, which would have drowned him in tears in the hard-fticed presence of that fashionable company, if it had not been for the sweet sustaining presence of the woman who had been, all life, his kindest and most faithful friend ; therefore his eyes rested on her eyes, not on those which were his only heaven, and therefore he inclined his ear to the lull- ing measure of her voice. Every one listened now — so refined, yet genial, was the strain — not too exalted for the hour, nor pandering in a single note to the vicious taste of the vulgar, as musicians named honorable have often abased them- selves to do. The hostess, who was charmed to see that no one looked dull, though there had been no dancing, waited impatiently till the third song was ended, and Rodomant refused to play any more accompaniments lest the songstress should be fatigued, and then went up to him, and very imprudently asked him to play by himself. To her hor- ror, and every one's surprise, except Lady Delucy's, he scowled, turned his back upon her, and ran, rather than walked out of the room. Lady Delucy, as soon as she could speak without laughing, made her most graceful apology for his behavior, and took all blame to herself, because she had in- formed no one of his assurance to her be- forehand, that he would do as he had done, if requested by any person except herself, to play. The apology, received ungrace- fully enough, at least had the effect of mak- ing all persons talk, so that no dulness returned upon the room, not to mention the renewed sparkle of suspicion in many bril- liant eyes. The most briUiant eyes of all, however, sparkled with their own light only; those eyes belonged to the rose of all the seasons. She had no time nor patience for suspicion on such a hackneyed subject as the eccentricity of Lady Delucy, but the only passion she possessed even in counterfeit, was a more than Athenian mania for whatever happened to be new — except, and a some- what wide exception, too, in Art — her ab- solute ignorance of which was in twin pro portion to her absolute indifference to it. Tims Scrannel, who always talked to her when he met her — not going after her, for she always alighted, butterlly-like, at his elbow — took care to avoid the slightest, col- lision with artistic subjects in his discourses ; his tact made such avoidance easy, and his great talents provided him with topics for every taste. That he admired this Helen Jordan very much, was evident — that she liked him to admire her, more so ; and silly as she was, there was between them a kind of pact, that she would help him in discov- eries that he was unusually dull, and she un- usually capable in making. Just as half-wits, persons of incomplete mental development, and uneducated servants, make the most sentient somnambules, so this foolish beauty had a sort of instinct Avhich led her to divine secrets, and ineloquent as were her means of speech, she could worm from the innocent truths which they had sworn to bury with their bodies in tlie grave, unguessed. This same evening she had fiuttered to Tims Scrannel, which whipper-in looked crosser and more crabbed than ever, and arching her brows at his face, had said, — " I will bet you any thing," — the all-sea- soned rose talked slang wherever it could be brought in. " I will bet you any thing that I know what you are thinking of." " You would be too modest to confess," and he snarled a smile. " You have never spoken to me to-night," he added. " I have had no time ; my ears ache with the dinning repetition of ' Who wrote Vir- gilia ? ' and my tongue aches with protest- ing I do not know. Yoii, too, have been wondering, I know, but you would not ask lest any one should say, 'He does not know.' " " I confess, alone to you, I cannot find out, and I want you to help me. My con- science will not suffer me to review a book, especially one so low in standard as a novel, without knowing, at least, who its aut lor is ; whether an immature, or an experienced person, man or woman — all should be con- sidered first." " Suppose I cannot find out, this time ? "' " It will be your first failure, and vty faith will not allow that you can fail." " Nor mine ; but I must have time — how long will you give me ? " " Six weeks, or two months at the far- thest ; we shall then see how the other papers take it up." " Secure that, you can cast it down in face of them all, except the Times." " The Times will not dare to speak till I have spoken." Lady Delucy had not yet read, this book ; she read few novels, having too refined a taste and too fixed habits of study. But while Geraldi was talking to Geraldine in Italian, having drawn her aside, just after 52 RUMOR. Rodomant had left the room, Albany came to his friend, and asked her, as a favor to him, to read it; She promised in the fewest words, and then seriously addressed him on tlie subject of Geraldiue's changed appear- ance. She knew much of illness, if little of disease, and she was very im])ressive Mith him in urging him to obtain advice for Ger- aidine. But Diamid, who, the least of all her charms cared for her mere youthful bloom, and who had been pale himself and thill his whole life long, could not interpret those signs, but as the natural and necessary coiisequence of perfected intellectual devel- opment, and intensified spiritual existence — these truly were so clearly marked in Geral- dine, that it was scarcely surprising they dis- guised from him her actual suffering. He remarked, also, that she slept mcU ; he was a watcher himself, and had known none but iier\ous nights ever since he remembered any thing ; he knew not that she procured sleep with the most stealthy and dangerous of narcotics, which indeed her physical con- dition, untampered with by doctors, and uncharged with drugs, enabled her to absorb with equal facility as an excitant or a seda- tive. Her various Italian reading, wholly unsuited to a child, had taught 'her many things which she had better not have known, tlie occult " little " knowledge which is so dangerous; and to execute her least desire in secret, she had a slave, Geraldi, who would have procured her poison if she had required it, on the sole condition that he might swallow it with her. 'i'iie longer and more earnestly, mater- nally, Lady Helucy talked, the more deter- mined seemed her listener to treat the sub- ject of their discourse as a supposititious evil. In fact, as she soon saw with sorrow, he adored so blindly, wilHngly, that he could not, because he would not, see the truth, and this excessive passion alarmed her as well as saddened. So unselfish was she, that she dwelt not on the fact to which a delicate woman must be most sensitive, that this blind worship, this fixed idolatry, was as far beyond what he had professed or shown to her, as the unfailing star-shine is above the fading flower-gleam. She only trembled for the victims, both, of a love which so absorbed each for the other that there blent not in their married hearts one yearning after a higher union, that eternal embrace which, for the pure, a parting must precede. Still her memory of her OAvn devotion, single love, and self-appointed loneliness, may have mingled its own melancholy with the melancholy of her present thoughts. When she was going home alone, she mused still on the past till the present was a dream, and the future seemed annihilated, not to come — a frame in which we seem at a stand-still ; who has not experienced it ? Arrived at hrime, she found her house in darkness ; she asKed for her daughter. Elizabeth had gone to bed, so said the man who inquired of hei maid ; it was true that Elizabeth had sent the maid away, but only that she might have time to write an " appendix " to her volume of foreign post. Lady Helucy was still down stairs, when one of the servants, ad- vancing humbly, but pale with some myste- rious fright, said under his voice, and peeping all around as he spoke, — " the German gentleman is here, and he said he was r.ot to go till he had seen your ladyship — he has been here these two hours." In fact, Rodomant had gone straight to her house instead of to his own lodgings — where then was his pride ? Alas, there is only one power stronger in the mind of man, and that she knew. This fact surprised and perplexed her, but did not make her afraid, as it did her household, who now more than ever convicted, clung to the fact of his in- sanity, and held as for aloof as possible. She went up stairs, quietly, wearily, little fit for any kind of spiritual or mental conflict, yet ready to meet whatever encountered her courage or her will. He rose on seeing her, and bowed. She hoped for a moment he had but waited to say good-night, and held out her hand, with farewell on her lips, which melted unbreatbed betM'een them, howev- er ; for he advanced quickly, looking full into her eyes with an expression — sweet, entreating, but imperious — an expression which made her fear. Far rather would she have met the furtive glow of madness, smouldering to quick eruption, than that fine, living fire which burned without con- suming. An ordinary mind impassioned excites an interest which none of its medium moods could rouse ; but, in the passion of genius there is something awful ; we are aff"ected bv it even in its errant and earthly frames ; we weep over its sins as over the woes of ordinary men. Here, the soul as yet was pure, the temper of the being keen, untar- nished. The lady, vvhose single, pure, and yet passing preference for one man, had given her discrimination which otherwise her great personal reserve would have denied her, un- derstood every phase of passion, from the new or invisible, and the crescent, ever ex- panding, to the full-orbed and irrepressible, raining down its glory on every thing and being, base or beautiful — but all transfigured in the loveHness of the one. But she had yet to learn that, for some rare natures, the dawn of passion is as the Oriental sunrise — • there is no perceptible twihght ; the sun flames up suddenly, his fire pure, his heaven undefiled by mist — so sudden, vivid, was the rising of this passion on her perception. No marvel that from its power her gentle nature shrank. " I shall not go yet," he said, with perfect respect in his manner, yet in a voice which just betrayed the light sharj) tone of audacity which a powerful mind adopts when passion RUMOR. 53 IS excited. "Where a small mind would cringe and fawn, that perhaps as exaggeratedly ex- pands. " I shall not go yet, and you are very ungrateful, lady, to wish to send me away — for you do ; I read that in your eyes — and I have to sing your song ; you could forget that. You have heard nothing to- night so sweet, so loving, so exquisitely beautiful. But I can sing it best at night, or farly, early morning. It will soon be day, and the birds will wake, and, perhaps, I then shall be afraid. But now the world sleeps, and while it lets you alone, your heart left to itself, will listen for wnat 1 shall make it hear." " Sing then," said the lady. " Sing your song once, and then I must leave you, for I am tired, and so should you be, and_ j,re, though, at your age, fatigue di?guises itself in excitement, which is more tempting than sleep. Sing now, and I will listen, but not to one word afterwards." " Perhaps you will not send me away when you have heard. Here is your song, and when I am dead, it will still wear the crown of songs, and go hand in hand with your name forever." "Poor Kodomant," she thought; "names on title-pages are waste words on waste- paper Avith the mob. How simple ! " Slowly and reluctantly he left her side, still turning his head towards her. He sat down languidly. He scarcely brushed the keys with the chords of the symphony. But the voice rose, as if to break all barriers down, to quell all reason, to quench despair — strong, shrill, yet painfully sweet from the strict correctness of the ear. It made the hearer " thi-ill with wofulness." In gardens where the languid roses keep Perpetual sweetness for the hearts that smile, Perpetual sadness for the hearts that weep, Lonely, unseen I wander, to beguile The day that only shines to show thee bright, The night whose stars burn wan beside thy light. Adelaida ! Adelaida ! all the birds are singing Low, as thou passest, where in leaves they lie ; With timid ohirp unto their soft mates clinging, They greet that presence without which they die — Die, even with Nature's universal heart, When thoi, her queen, dost in thy pride depart. Adelaida ! Depart ! and dim her beauty evermore — Go, from the shivering leaves and lily flowers, That, white as saints on the eternal shore, Stand wavering, beckoning, in the moony bowers ; Beckon me on where their mnist feet are laid In the dark mould, fast by the alder shade. Adelaida ! Adelaida ! 'tis the Grave or Love Must fight for this great first, last mastery. I feed in faith on spicy gales above. Where all along that blue, unchanging sky Thy name is traced — its sweetness never fails To sound in streams of peace, in spicy gales. Adelaida ! Adelaida ! woe is me, woe, woe ! Not only in the sky, in starry gold, I see thy name — where peaceful rivers flow, Not only hear its sweetness manifold; On every white and purple flower 'tis written — Its echo every aspen-quake hath smitten. Adelaida'. Go farther ! let me leave thee ! I depart, — Who whispered I would linger by thy side } Who said it beat so warm, my feeble heart ? Who told, I dared to claim thee as my bride ? Who cried, I roamed without thee all the day And clasped thee in my dreams ? — away, aw^.v ! Adelaida. I die, but thou shalt live ; in the loud noon Thy feet shall crush the long grass o'er my head, Not' rudely, rudely — gently gently, soon Shall tread me heavier down in that dark bed, And thou shalt know not on whose head they pass, Those silent hands, whose frozen heart ! — Alas, Adelaida ! He rose and approached her. Surely his own despair must have been carried out of him in the despair of the last verse, or that triumphant brightness could not have been kindled on his countenance. Appalled, but with unerring impulse, the lady held out both her hands. That gesture of queenly calm, and -the intense gaze of her serene eyes, Avhich showed neither emotion nor en- couragement, kept him back, but abashed him not — he was yet too pure to be abashed. Only a dread desolation, one cold and rigid* covered his features, so lately relaxed and brilliant, with hope that was too childishly like certainty. " It is a beautiful song," said the lady, in very distinct tones, " but not written for any one in particular ; it is a poet's song, and adaptive. 1 have known the words all ray life, or rather its form in German, but I never heard them really interpreted till now. Again, I say, it is a poet's song." " Adaptive ! not written for any one in particular ! " he exclaimed, in tones of scorn that annihilated weakness. " You will kill me, then ! " But, could death have ])ower upon the strength that vitalized those ac- cents ? He trembled, but it seemed rather with indignation than with sorrow. " I am to die, then, before my time." " To live long, honored and famous, and ])erhaps loved. But not now that, not yet. You have not suffered enough, and perhaps your pride will never allow you to sutler enough, to deserve that blessing." " From yon such words ! So much for women : they are all alike, except in fice and form. You profess to care nothing for the world, yet you are worldly, for you will not give up the many for the one. You pretend to think meanly of those who cannot feel — yet the one who feels the most you despise. t alone could make you happy — for I alone should love you as you deserve. You are not happy, — I have watched you, you are on the contrary miserable, miserable in yom complete and wilful loneliness." 54 RUMOR. That it was his ^-sl, forced and premature bloom of passion, she knew well. Nothing else is so rash, inconsequent, so involuntary a seizure of the faculties — therein blends the sublime and the absurd, M'ill and whim are then confused. In ordinary cases, this is the time of schoolboy and schoolgirl senti- ment, born of fanCy and fed on folly — the time of valentines and moonshine vows, the stretching of spell-imprisoned childhood to- »vards youth — for common natures their only ideal time — for the ideal their only vulgar experience. Had this ca.^e been an ordinary one, Lady Delucy would have had little mercy for the subject of it — she had but lectured him soundly, and forbidden him her presence. But so gentle, so gener- ous, was her sympathy with genius, that she longed to turn its first disappointment to its permanent advantage. She was far too gen- erous for displeasure, too gentle for annoy- ance — perhaps too proud — but not with earthly pride, for she did not dwell a single instant on the difference between their social ranks. Had his pride, whether earthly or spiritual, sufficed to bear him in a whirlwind from her presence, she had not needed to explain her deprecation of his assumptive mood. But his pride, far from being too little, was too great to suffer him to go, to ,allow himself vanquished ; he yet remained, and daringly, vividly regarded her. " I Avill tell you something," she said, averting her eyes from those that searched her face. " I will tell you something of my- self, because I perceive that it would be ut- terly useless to dwell on the fact, in which I believe, and you do not, that you are but anticipating your future hopes and happiness in an uneasy, troubled dream. The more I spoke of 1/ou, the less you would respect me — you might think me a hypocrite and worldly, too, but ni)thing could convince you I am speaking the truth from my heart, and that I long to leave this world entirely — long as I only long besides, for heaven. Listen, then, to what I say. Should not a woman be faithful to her love, as to her duty ? I have loved once, and do love still, and the person I love is out of my reach forever." " I do not believe that the lord your hus- band, of whom you speak with such stern reverence, ever made you love him." " I do not speak of him now ; but from gratitude, not from 'stern reverence' — for it was very sweet though sad — from grati- tude to him I would not marry another. This was a vow, made before Heaven ; I kept it, and will keep it. I kept it in the hour of temptation." " What was your temptation ? " for her voice died away. " What was 'it ? " — more than impatiently — " when the only one I ever loved offered me his affection and a home with him, I re- fused them both. How can I acceptor dream of yours ? If I loved none other, my vow would bind me ; loving another, I am doublj bound. Now, having said this of myselfj what I never breathed before, even in mj prayers to God, you will listen to a word about yourself It would not be for your good, present or future, nor for your happi- ness even noic, though you are too young to know that — nor would y(>ur genius ever find its wings, so burdened — burdened with one who could only give you friendship." " Who is the man you love ? " he broke in, i inattentive the instant she returned to his ' position, and in a voice so loud and clear, that she trembled lest the servants should be at hand — she knew that some of them, at least, were u]3. He paced the room, swifter and swifter grew his strides, at last he came to her again, and stood still rigidly, his eyes flashing at shorter and shorter intervals, like the lightnings of a storm that gathers. " I implore you, do not ask me," she pleaded, in a voice that might have touched any heart, so passionate and plaintive was it. It had upon the soul in its storm, no more power than music on the thunder of the clouds. On the contrary, her tender trouble excited and determined him more wildly still. " I will not go till you have told me ; I will know his name. If you tell me not, I shall knoiv that you are false, that you invented the tale to be rid of me because you think me poor, beneath you ; — because you would be ashamed." " Hush ! hush ! " she cried, for she really heard steps — her daughter's — outside the door ; for Elizabeth, who had not been to bed herself, had been first amazed by the dis- tant sound of singing at that hour in the morning, and then more decidedly ])uzzled by her mother's non-appearance after that sound had ceased. The lady joined her hands, half wrung them. " My daughter is outside ; she will come in — what could she think ? Consider for yourself, if not for me, and go ; there is another door." But Rodomant went to the door outside which steps were heard, and bolted it — re- turned to her. Her courage gave way be- neath his will and her own fear. She lost her pride for one dread moment, or lost its consciousness — it swooned. What could it matter, if he knew? — besides, lawless as he professed himself, she had entire faith in his natural honor and nobility. Again and again he urged her, for he marked well her relent- ing weakness. " Some one you saw to-night — last night," she murmured. " That will not do," he stamped — impe- riously he added, " there was not one my equal there." " I never said he was your equal — I do not care for you," she answered, the swoon spent and the pride awakening half-delirious. " It is Diamid Albany, and will that make you wiser ? I think not, for how should such as you know liim ? " She opened the RUMOR. 55 door — the oilier dnor, of which she had epokeii. threw it wide : then, just then, there was a low knock which she knew to be Eliz- abeth's, at the door which he had bolted. To thi« door she ilew, unbolted it without a sound, and opened it — Elizabeth entered — he was fairly driven forth, for he disliked her, a fact her mother knew. He did not even bow, but turned and fled. Yet his ear, piercingly and painfully sensitive, caught their mutual greeting. " I am glad you came," said the lady, " for he has been singing his own songs, and it is always difficult to dismiss him then." " Mamma, you spoil him," said Elizabeth. He lieard no more, that was enough, he did not see the glance the daughter cast ujjon the mother, half-amazed and half-distrusting, nor the expression that overcast the mother's face, half sad, half shamed. We pity the woman Avho marries very early, without a strong preference of her own for him she marries. For, in such case, she may have too much of girlhood to hide from a daugh- ter of her own. And that strange nature, did it wince be- neath the first stroke of the rod of discipline ? Rodomant hardened his heart for a while, by icing over its fountains with cold disdain, be- neatJi whose crust slept self-contempt, its surges spell-bound noM-, but sure to swell up in bitter waters as soon as the first warm influence or kindly breath should melt the ice. Such a nature expects all it thinks it deserves, when new to life. Probably it de- serves as much as it desires ; but do the great, the good, ever receive their full deserts in this short life? Do any? saving only those, unenvied by all who love and who aspire, who have their portion in and of this life only. From the gates of the grave falls the shadow of Sin's retribution upon this earth ; often before the unworthy and erring reach actual death, they walk in that deeper gloom. But the retribution of the pure who suffer, no mortal eye shall see ; those black portals shut in the light ineff'able ; not till they are oi)ened can the glory embrace, which shall thenceforth sustain their souls. CHAPTER Xin. In ordinary — even in extraordinary in- stances — a first disappointment of sincere, if presumptuous hopes, results in a tempo- rary abandonment of the soul to what, in its best moods, it would despise. Lady Delucy was too sagacious to fear such a reaction in this case, which interested her. Just as the inferior minds sink below their own level, condescend to indulgence which degrades them, a great mind and noble nature will rise above the cii-cumstances they could not control ; they may ^^^-^xciternent, must seek occupation to chaSh^iine*'l)iit it is-, higher excitement they need," and they find it in a loftier employ. As Rodomasit's disdain melted, his pride revived ; self-contempt surged a while, but pride, so much the stronger, calmed that, too, and left him (be- side himself) nothing but the honest, if haughty purpose to repay his benefactress the uttermost farthing he was actually in- debted to her, and then go free. She, who as a woman, failed to comprehend his mas- culine nature, however she sympathized with him as an artist, was extremely afraid of see- ing him again, that he would come rushing in next day, audacious as usual, and then evermore defiant. When the next day passed without his eccentric apparition, she rejoiced with trembling — that day brought no Rodo- mant — the next, woman-like, she was half- curious, and half-relenting; not towards his designs and desires, but towards himself. On the fourth day she sent for his mother, M'hom she wished to take into the country with her, that she might superintend, under her own eye, the large trousseau for her daughter — not a quarter yet completed. Her messenger was baffled, both the mother and son had left their lodging, and its keeper knew not whither they had gone. So Lady Delucy went to her sweet country home, and, in a few days, received a large parcel of fin- ished work, together with a dutiful note from her Moravian, containing an address, to which fresh materials were to be sent — an address to a shop, none other ; nor was any mention made of her son, who had frightened her into secrecy on his account. Lady Delucy looked anxiously for Geral- dine, the moment she arrived at Northeden. But though she sent her the kindest of easy invitations, on finding her actually at hei bower of a house with her husband, no Geraldine appeared, though he made a very short visit without her, and mentioned the fatigue after her journey from town in ex- cuse for her non-appearance. Lady Delucy felt puzzled and pained — she felt certain Geraldine was ill, and she would fain have aided her with her tenderest maternal cares. As for Diamid, passing a mother's tenderness was his ; still he was also puzzled, if not also pained. For her depression seemed to deepen, and a singular reserve veiled from him a while her heart. His temper remained un- roused, where scarcely any man's would have preserved its calm, and he philosophically attributed her manner to a proud desire to conceal the utmost irritability of suspense. For a book produced at the end of a season in town, however likely to be read for that very reason out of town, still stands a chance of remaining long uncriticised ; then reviewers are rusticating, and editors act by proxy. It •■ seemed so in this case, for none had appeared a month after the book was out. Now Geraldine had never desired to se* 56 RUMOR. her family since her marriage. Certainly, she had only been married a year, but she had during that time received and refused many invitations to her father's house. Now that all public business was suspended a while, Lord Chevening, her father, wanted to see ])iamid, his pet political colleague, to enjoy communion and sympathy with him on the prophecies and jjrobabilities of the next session. He had written to him, and Geral- dine's mother had Svritten to her — bidding tliem to Hope Park. Diamid resolved not to mention his own invitation, till Geraldine should speak or give some hint of hers ; to his surprise she told him of it immediately, and expressed her wish to go. In fact, though she did not know it, she began, having •too soon been satisfied with joy, to feel the longing for excitement, which is the most dangerous moral symptom that can affect human nature. To Hope Park they went. It was a curious and sufficiently exciting change of scene for a girl who had seen nothing of r'nglish character, for, say what one will, there is no life — no social development of life, which reveals character so clearly as a mixed company, gathered at a country house or palace. There fashionable persons un- bend and behave as though they had dropped a set of manacles and shackles, and could not be merry enough in revenge. There wise persons do foolish things, men and women are boys and girls ; above all, parents who condemn themselves in town to what the best of them must feel is an unnatural state of separation from their children, do see their babes all day, play with them, perhaps even condescend to devote themselves to their de- light and improvement ; above all, there one sees the worst ^and best of every character, for we defy any, even the most ruthless misanthropist, to enact the hypocrite in the bosom of a home whose hospitalities extend a home to many — whatever its defects — sacred, and felt to be so by all but the utterly perverted. The hostess of Hope Park was especially charming, for the Italian blood of Geraldine's tnother gave its own rare and courtly sweet- liess to her manners, still, easier, if some- what graver, than those of her adopted country. Though not passionately attached to her daughter, as she was to her husband, she still loved her with a romantic feeling very peculiar to some mothers both of Italy and southern France. Indeed, no one in this climate Avould give them credit for half the feeling they possess, because it is so usual for them to part with their daughters j purse." Then she would pull his out of his pocket and fill it, or if she found no purse there, fill her own and put that into his pocket, and add another to her lieap of portemonnaies that very day. Geraldi felt as though it were no degradation to receive money from her, quite ignorant of the Eng- glish laws on the subject of a wife's prop- erty ; he felt it was hers, and so proper for him, her blood, to accept, though he would have perished before he touched a farthing from Albany's hand. But he did ni,t spend this money ; from the moment he had de- termined "to enfranchise himself socially, he had set it aside religiously, with a growing interest, worthy of a miser or a niilhon- naire. Before Geraldine had left town, she had offered him more than she had ever done before, and he had refused it, exhibiting his privily-hoarded store with a kind of grim glee, for he considered such a store all-suffi- cient for every emergency, even of an art career. So positively refusing, Geraldine could not make hira take any more money, for his will Avas as much stronger than hers as his intellect was weaker, and she left him, inly wondering herself how he had contrived to save it, when she had spent twice as much in the same time — not on her dress, for that was ever simple, but in buying the costliest and most charming presents for Diamid, such as could be of no possible use to such a man, or, indeed, a man at all, and in throwing away coin on every crowd of beggars, or single beggar, that beset her carriage, and whom her servants dared not drive away for fear of receiving their dis- charge — for by all servants who had ever RUMOR. 65 lived with him, Albany was literally idolized ; a rather singular tribute to the goodness of heart of one whose development, whose breeding, and intellectual perfectness, were utterly above their comprehension. Before she left Geraldi, however, Geraldine charged him to let her know when he wanted money, adding, " I shall not tell Diamid, because you are foolish, and fancy he does not like you, but you don't mind asking me for any thing ; I would take any thing from you.'" This was balm to Geraldi ; he felt as though he and she had a secret between them which her husband could not share. In his note to Rodomant, Geraldi had touched his taste by employing the fewest words : " I am miserable, unfortunate and proud. I am Italian, and I wish to go upon the stage. I wish to learn of the composer of Alarcos, who alone can teach such as I. I should like to act Alarcos ; may I come to see you ? " Still perhaps, had Rodomant received the note by post, or from another hand than the writer's, he would have tossed it behind the fire, and waited till a second appeal, attest- ing persistency and earnestness, should be made. But the strong admire the strong, the proud have ready sympathy for the proud, and, dare we write it? man is readier, more instant to help men, than to help women ; except in cases which only prove the rule. Many a good man, with average intelligence, will watch like a Avoman by the sick bed of a male friend, ply him Avith as- siduous, if awkward, attentions, and beguile with never-ending chat his convalescence ; — when, woe to that man's wife, if she lies half an hour on the sofa, or lifts her hand to her throbbing head in his presence : Avoe to her, for he oppresses — " he shall rule over her." When Rodomant read the note, he de- cided on replying to it directly, and sent his answer by his mother's hand, for Geraldi had given no address, merely his name. " Come," said the answer, " to this direction, but tell no one where I am, or I will do nothing for you, and burn this bit of paper." Geraldi, next day, went. He was astonished to find the composer of Alarcos in so mean a room, but the surprise was quenched in s}nn])aihy when Rodomant said, " Young man, you stare at my poor room, learn to look at the inhabitant of it, as God beholds the soul through the body which it dwells in. I am in debt to the generosity of the noblest nature in this or any country, and I cannot rest, nor cease to hoard and scrape — nor die, till the debt is discharged. Therefore you perceive, my allowing you to take up ever so small portion of my time, is charity." Geraldi understood this speech, and was not made angry by the beginning and the end of it, solely because he had, unconsciously, one point in common with the speaker. Artless as was the boy, and perfect in art the man in years so feAv the older, they each longed supremely for one thing — ■ ot the same — and both were determined tc obtain it at any price. Geraldi nursed dark thoughts in his breast, Rodomant only bright ones ; but each had made a compact with his own soul to feed those thoughts on hope anu ftiith till the consummation of desire should crown existence. In spite of Geraldi's ignorance of German, which he would neither bear to hear, nor would endure to learn, he and Rodomant, af'er Avonderfully brief practice, understood each other well. The latter had the faciHty, peculiar to the finest musical organizations, as well as to those of the genius linguist, of acquiring by acute ear and unfailing memory, a rapid conversational, if non-grammatical, knowledge of any new language, the sweeter, and more melodious the easier, of course. Besides, his necessary intimacy with the Ital- ian text of operas served him well, and Ge- raldi's beautiful Tuscan accent helped hira further. Though he said, before trying Geraldi's voice, " You are to sing to me to gain, if you deserve it, a certificate ; I am no actor, and by an actor you must be trained ; " yet Avhen he had heard it, he added, " No one else would take the trouble to cultivate your voice, of which there is very little, though it is very good ; nor is yet ripe. School-cul- ture Avould ruin it and its prospects ; I shall tone and mature it — that is your only chance. You have a person for an actor, therefore it matters the less about your voice, so long as the most is made of what there is. But I shall not teach you unless you do exactly as I order you ; no one must know you come, or I should have them all coming ; nor must you make a fool of your- self, and boast you know me, or I will never see you again. You must take me when I can trouble myself about you ; if I am busy you must wait ; if I am out, stop till I re- turn, for your time is of no value, and mine is more precious than gold." Geraldi approved of this treatment, and as for the gypsy style in which the refined be- ing dwelt, nothing suited his vagrant tastes so well ; so after a day or two he almost al- ways lived in the artist's attic, from ten at morning till ten at night, eating his bread and olives, or a mess of maccaroni, paid for and cooked by himself, while Rodomant ' swallowed his. handful of oat-meal biscuit, ► and the coffee, which Avas his only luxury*, for each cup of Avhich he counted a certain number of beans, and which tasted like coffee served up to an Arab chief. Geraldine had not time to miss Geraldi during these exped^ticns, for he did not take one until the day she left London, and he said nothing of them in his letters. He certainly found that his master gave him enough to do, and this Avas a happ)' circum stance in more respects than one for him, that constant occupation, and his strong, if 66 RUMOR. unconscionable, love for his cousin, pre- serving for him his boyhood green amidst temptations which are the most tremendous peril to the purity and promise of his age. He had to work all day, for Kodomant steing him well in health, and wholly unim- paired in nervous energy, had no compunc- tion in so filling up his time: his actual lessons always short, but ever infinitely suggestive, were also few ; for the master, if he worked the pupil, worked himself thrice as hard, as onl}- a proud person braced by gratitude can Avork. Gei'aldi had been living this life, intense for the brain, and wholesomely dietetic for the heart, just three weeks, which had passed like months, when he received Geraldine's wildest, saddest, and most complaining let- ter, her answer to his received the morning of her self-betrayal. She had taken two days to write it, days of weakness and mental self-exaltation, the slight inward delirium of a secret fever. She had poured out the whole melancholy of her determined desolation, the heart's blood of her lacerated pride. More and more unpardonal^le — unless she had actually lost the reins of her mind, which was not the case, seeing that she could write with complete coherence — she told Geraldi her husband's mild remonstrance, so gently uttered, but of which she contrived to convey a harsh impression, even cold. And Geraldi, wliile he wept hot tears over the sheet, triumphed, for he thought she had at last confided to him the secret of her un- happiness in her marriage ; that possibility he had jealously persisted in till it became a fact in his futh. He was in a mood in which exultation literally brimmed over the measure of his existence for the hour ; he felt as though, if he could not confide in some one, liis heart must burst — a rash and ruth- less mood, which can no more spend itself without an explosion than can a thunder- cloud. He read and re-read the letter from morn- ing post-time until noon, then folding it up and laying it on his heart, he rushed to his new acquaintance, breathless and panting, and made as much noise on entering the attic as an Italian can ever make. Rodo- mant was writing in the hot August calm — not a sigh crept through the open window to flutter his paper — not an earthly reminis- cence trembled through his creative trance. He was evolving the most intellectual and imaginative form of music for a single in- strument — the sonata — and for the instru- ment he had aff'ected to despise as belonging of right to women. Perhaps it was for that very reason he had lately taken it to his heart ; but however this might be, it was only a few weeks since he had essayed the publication of such a composition with sud- den and complete success — even though town was empty, for his publisher transmit- ted it to every sea-side city and country place. For as the most beautiful poetry sometimes sells in a fit, so does the most beautiful music for single interpretation, only it must be the 7nost beautiful. There- fore the artist was once moi-e free, his high- est faculties refreshed by long rest, and his intellect impregnated with that most ethereal of inspirations — a pure, ideal passion, Avhich even though it shall disperse like a rose-hued mist of morning, shall have ful- filled its mission in the loveliness with which it purified the sense. It had always irritated to extremity Rodo- mant's temper to prepare easy tune-fooleries for fashicmable fingers ; while doing so, if he was disturbed or spoken to, it had been as though a chained lion were stirred up with a whip. But writing as he pleased and approved, soothed him as oil glides over wa- ter ; his humor grew compassionate and con- descending ; with a kind of hero-superiority he smiled on men as children. How, then, upon a youth in expectancy and unreason- ableness still a child ? He beneficently nod- ded at Geraldi, but motioned to him to wait awhile, and so Geraldi meant to do, but his condition of selfish excitement made it im- possible for him to attend even to the easy exercises in the rudiments of harmony, which Rodomant set him to do in his spare moments. Nor could Geraldi sit still ; his heart boomed rather than beat in his ears; he went to the window longing for some strong wind to blow, then walked away from it and continued pacing up and down the room. Rodomant was conscious of his un- easy motions all through his own moonlight fancies, for a serene ecstatic serenade was rippling silently beneath his pen. He even spoke ; his own voice never interrupted nor disturbed his own thoughts. " What is the matter with you that you are idling the best hours of the day?" he asked, still writing, and yet listening to the still music in his brain. Geraldi groaned. " I can't work, I can't sit down ; I am miserable to madness, and so is she ! " Rodomant heard these words, and under- stood them in the true sense of tlie poet- musician ; he thought Geraldi deep in some boy's dream, a sort of fragment of the same rainbow that framed his owm concep- tions. " David charmed Saul when he was mad. I will play to you," said Rodomant, and went to the piano. Wildly paced Geraldi up and down the room, while the first movement of the sonata sounded ; one of stormy but sus- tained yearning, well answering to Geraldi's mood. But when the slow serenade, ineft'a- bly sweet, began, divinely played, for the composer was in love with its loveliness, then all at once Geraldi's heart sank, melted in the m'dst of him ; he went up close to the instrument and laid upon it his head; he uttered a low soft cry, then burst into tears. RUMOR. 67 The tribute enchanted Rodomant ; and that he might be assured the emotion he saw was the effect of his playing, he asked Geraldi what was the matter? in a voice he had ne^er used to him before. Geraldi, won like the magnetic patient by the gently-waving hand, burst forth in frantic high-toned language, which passion made poetical. Rodomant listened, playing on his melodious passion, the delicious under-flowing current of his consciouMiess, that he whom he deemed a child was ennobled by passion too. Alas ! for passion, when love in its loveliest form, the self-sacrificial, is not there. Of course Rodomant heard the story — the whole story, concentrated as passion only can condense, in Geraldi's own way. Geraldine, his cousin, he adored — she was unhappy in her mar- riage ; and if he expressed not, he implied, M'hat he was determined to believe, that she too loved him. Further, Geraldi implied not, but fully expressed, that she had written him a letter to tell him she was unhappy. And he tore the letter from his bosom, only did not read it, for Rodomant shook his head. Still from under his relenting fingers flowed the melodious invocation ; he listened in a dream. And does not the dreamer speak in sleep sometimes ? May one not question him and receive an answer ? But, alas ! Geraldi knew not of the slumber of the soul entranced by the enchantments of art, which he only sensuously perceived, and which did but excite him to selfish introspection. " Why did she marry him, if she loved you ? " asked the dreamer, speaking in that sleep in which tlie bodily eyes are open. " He made her — he was powerful, and she was ambitious, though I did not know it then, but she has shown, it since. Yes, he made her marry him, she was so delicate and innocent ; but she would have shown me her love had there been time. She shows it me now, too late. And he is too old for her. Every body at his age has been in love ; of course he has loved a woman who would not accept him, because she did not love him." " It was not because she did not love him," murmured the dreamer in a low but strangely eager voice, still playing, but now more dreamily than ever, for the last few words of Geraldi had half restored consciousness of Fact, though consciousness of Time and Place still slept: — the finger drooped, soon there would be silence. At that instant, a full-grown sagacity, terrible in its strength and pain, was born within Geraldi. He had always suspected there was a mystery — this man knew it, and should tell him, but how ? Would there be time ? for this same new in- stinct told him that the speaker knew not what he uttered. " Yes," said Geraldi, " of course she loved bim ; something prevented her ; she was obliged to refuse. She told you too, then ? " he added, with wild invention, hazarding any thing to get at the truth. " Yes, she told me tJiat nigJif — I made her tell me. But," cried Rodomant, waking full and suddenly as a sleeper when the opened shutter lets in the sunny blaze, " it was strange tliat she should tell a boy like you. My lady, I thought I had your secret all to myself, as well as your goodness and gener- osity to remember always. I am sorry, angry, that she told ijou." "Her goodness — lier generosity," thought Geraldi, who suddenly remembered that Ro- domant always spoke of Lady Delucy as his benefactress — nay, Rodomant ha/l confided to the boy the whole story of the opera. Ge- raldi threw his last die. " Lady Delucy did not tell me — I guessed it. Every body must have guessed it who saw them ; but you were not in England." Geraldi, as we well know, had come to England precisely when Rodomant did, buflie was certain Rodomant did not knoAV it. The last moon-ray melted from the mood of the awakened sleeper ; he exclaimed, " My lady no longer if she cannot keep a secret — only a woman like other women." " It is Lady Delucy," thought Geraldi. It is said that no secret is safe with one intoxicated. Had Lady Delucy known this ? CHAPTER XVL There is perhaps no kind of suffering so intense, because none so palpable and real, as a reaction of illness purely physical, after excessive mental excitement. Geraldine found this. After her attack, whose danger she apprehended as little as she fully appre- ciated its discomfort, she ceased to find it interesting to be ill, for before it she had esteemed herself ill, and self-interest had been even a romantic alleviation of her dis- tress. However, her long reply to Geraldi's last letter was the last of her intellectual ex- ertions ; after that was written and despatch- ed, she sank down utterly as she would have done before, but for the exigent deman(' upon her sympathy of his woful and wild appeal. She came" down stairs no moie; and though she did not confess lioio she had suffered, she denied no longer her suffering to her husband, or rather she confessed to confusion of mind, and to nerves which would not respond to what social routine imposed upon them. He, too happy to see her calm again, for the calm of exhaustion chased the hectic from her cheek and the fire from her •eye, rested ever by her side ; for a little while again she nestled to his heart, and if not ecstasy, certainly a transient peace pos- sessed him. It may well be wondered at why he sought for her no medical advice. But there was for him this large excuse — one founded too upon the experience of a 68 RUMOR. life more than twice as long, and to the full as vital as her OAvn — that he had consulted on his own account almost every European doctor with never-failinf^ unsuccess. And, except for exact symptoms of actual disease, he had lost whatever confidence his youth might have confessed to in any European doctor whatsoever. Could he have carried Geraldine on that famed square of carpet bought by Prince Houssain, to the lap of the Arabian Desert, or th»> heart of the city of Damascus, he would have called to her side the fathers of ti-aditional pharmacy who preserve it pure as at its source, or the physician whose sage glance is knowledge, whose magnetic touch is life. But this England ! It must be told that Albany, though he bore transplantation as well as any other exotic which is carefully conserved with all due appliances of artificial heat and screening from the air, yet was no more the Albany he woidd have been had his forefathers never left their native Orient, than that rose of the London Pantheon, over whose poverty of scent the Persian Prince wept a few short summers since, was the same rose which in his divine native air throws up a perfume which might i)ierce the region of the sun which wooed it forth, and one of whose tears distilled and sealed in crystal will sweeten a drawer for a quarter of a century. And this England, Albany despised and hated — yes, hated, though he hated neither living man nor woman, nor in- sect, nor reptile in it. No doctor, nor school- man, no ])hysiologist has ever dwelt suffi- ciently upon the consequence of climate. Yet a change from a climate to which one ha*; been, not horn perhaps, but assimilated by hundreds of ancestral births ; a change from such climate to one its contrary — from the South Australian to the Hyperborean — from the Syrian to the Saxon, must Avork ruthless evil; the heart will chill till its natural charities are frosted over, the brain will pai-tially collapse, its action ever in ex- tremes. Therefore did the change from a natural to an artificial climate and condition render Albany unjust, more especially as his intellect, transcending all others round him, lifu'il him out of the mists of conventional- ism, and showed him man rather as he is, than as he icoulcl be : for many and many an erring soul and feeble mind aspires and longs to be that it is not, yet icUl be, shall be, as suitly as there is truth in God, and as the heavens are higher than the earth. But this is little to the purpose, except as it conceims Geraldine. She was now — A\liile her husband believed her in a fair way to recover at rest, all the beauty of perfect health — very nearly at the point to die. She knew it not herself, had she known she W(yuld probably have cared little ; for it is a liiQt that the happiest-lived, if pure, di'ead d'=-:Tth no more than sleep, and to them it seems to come as naturally and unexpectedly. \ However, the disease wnich had entered a\ an avenue so minute, that only she herself had perceived it, not knowing it as a disease, gained ground rapidly as it only does in ex- ceptional cases ; it kept secret its prepara- tions as a volcano, and as silently and mildly smouldered. That which was to be death to Geraldine's baby-happiness, her baby-fame, was to let her free to find the discii)Hne Avhich should alone develop her womanhood. But for what happened, she would have died " an infant," in years as well as knowledge. It was the second day Geraldine had re- mained up stairs, not always lying down, for that oppressed her more, though she made so light of the oppression that she did not mention it to Diamid. But she rested on his arm, she kissed him", was quiet to be kissed herself, played with flowers and ar- ranged them, felt, oh, how glad ! that she had no book to write. She determined to forget Helen Jordan, the scene on the ter- race, Diamid's words, even her repetition of all to Geraldi ; in short, she was in that most exquisite but most dangerous mood of her temperament — life was ebbing sofjjy, like little melting waves of a receding tide. She ate as little as usual, for she, with her Italian frugality, entirely sympathized with Diamid's Oriental temperance, and the latter prevent- ed him from perceiving that in reality she needed more and more nourishing food than she had ever required in her life. The siesta of sickness ! when after the long weary morning the afternoon drops heavy on the lids, needful sleep, from which the sick one wakes again to weariness : for through the mist that wrapped the half- closed brain, uneasy visions rise like ghosts, and the torpid heart cannot stir enough to scatter them ! How unlike the siesta of the southern beauty, from whose sweet rest oi sweeter dreams she s])rings with dewy warmth upon her brow; or the noon-slumber of the tender growing babe, from which it stretches to its home of milken promise. So weary was Geraldine when she fell asleep, wearier in her dreams, though they were not awful — she was yet herself, and her memories were vet too young. Her husband watching by iier, steadied his thoughts by a strong effort of volition, fearing magnetically to excite her ; indeed, tried not to think of her at all,^ but mused on the political conditions which were to her an unknown world, in which he, half his time, was forced to exist. So, as it often happens in illness, when one is not actually in the grasping poAver of pain, Geraldine dreamed of her childhood, her youngest girlhood, and of Geraldi. "Wearily she wandered in old places, where he had always been, — strangely enough, she could not find them there. And noAV, in her sleep, half-consciously she wanted him — sick per- sons of her temperament always desire the presence not so much of the person they love the best, as that of the person they love the RUMOR. 69 best of tlieir own blood. Most long after their mothers — Geraldine was to her mother half a stranger — but she had grown ujj with Geraldi, and knew him better than all the world. Not that she could have endured the loss of her husband's society and strong sup- p(>rting solicitude, but she required Geraldi's as well. Now Diamid, though he possessed the t>ower of being jealous, which all the most oving natures own, was too sagacious ever to suspect cause for it where none existed, and too generous to be angry with those who were jealous of him. So when Geral- dine awoke and said, " I have been dream- ing about Geraldi, I thought I was at home, I mean in Italy, and that I could not find him there. I am afraid he is ill, for I have not heard from him to-day," Albany only thought of saving her distress and sus- pense. " Nothing is easier," he said, " than to hear to-night before bedtime, and then you will sleep more tranquilly. Geraldi is sure to be at home, for he knows no one in Londou, or near it. I will carry a message to the nearest telegraph office, and wait for the reply myself; as I shall send it in Ital- ian, it will be the most secure plan."^ " You are too good, too kind," said Ger- aldine ; " and will you say that I have been rather ill, but am much better now ? " Diamid carried the words in his mind, as those c^' a nervous person whose nerves are weakened by excitement, nothing more. The telegraph office was four miles off. Al- bany drove there in his brougham. It was close to the station, and after delivering the message, he walked to the platform till it was possible for the reply to return. The afternoon express was due, the bell rang, the throbs and thunder of the train ap- proached, it stopped. One person got out of a second-class carriage — Geraldi. He did not look ill, not paler nor more sullen than usual, but more resolute. Albany, de lighted for the first time to behold him, rai up to him, holding out his hand — " Why, Geraldi ! I had just sent a message to town after you; my wife. was fretting because she had not heard this' morning from her brother — she is a little tired, but you will do her more good than any thing or any body, let us go directly. Give Lawrence your carpet-bag." " No, I thank you, Mr. Albany," answered Geraldi, in the tone of a second in a duel, for the "my wife," and the "brother," added insult to injury in his esteem. " No, I thank you. I shall be at Hope Park but a quarter of an hour after you, and you can ])repare Geraldine, lest my sudden coming should alarm her. I was certain, from the tone of her last letter, that she was ill." So Geraldi stepped into a railway fly, to which was har- nessed one (^f those half anatomies of horses, which make one wonder whether all the re- spectable horses were sent to clover in the Elysian Fields, upon the abolition of mail- coaches. Albany said no more, but stepped into his brougham and drove ofl'; for tiie first time his sweet temper, " sore " a? it was " with tenderness," was ruffled by the boy's behavior — what right had he to speak of the "tone" of her letter, and above all, what complaints had she made ? How could she seek for sympathy any w^ere but in his heart, which ached" with its excess, ana wiih the excess of love, if of happiness no longer ? Yet so unselfish was he, that when on telling her of his meeting with Geraldi, Geraldine smiled, he was really glad and thankful the boy had come. " I shall leave you with him," said he, finally, " while I go down to dinner, for I know Geraldi never will dine late, and per- haps he will persuade you to eat more than I could yesterday." Just as the dressing-bell rang, Geraldine's maid knocked-, and being called in, an- nounced that a young gentleman wished to see her. She directed that he should be shown up, saying in an aside to Diamid, "It is my cousin " — lest the maid should not show him proper resj^ect. And Diamid retreated into his dressing- room and closed the door, not sorry to escape the sight of their first embrace — not be- cause he was jealous, but it would have made him sad. Geraldi entered — not rushing in — the consciousness of his errand made him feel manlier than even before, if not with an hon- orable manhood: though, to do him justice, he really was too selfishly absorbed not to think himself the most unselfish and honor- able of men. Geraldine threw her arms innocently round him, but he felt how feeble was their pressure ; in an instant he felt sure she was ill. He saw the difference in her sin^ce their short separation ; he recollected on a sudden that when they were leaving Italy, just after her marriage, her grand- mother had said, with a half-ominous shake of her head, " If England does not suit her health, which is all I fear, you must send her back to me." And Diamid had exultantly nodded, so radiant at that moment had been Geraldine's bloom. " Oh, to get her back to Italy," thought the boy; "then if I told her, she would never come back to him again. But there would be none to bear me witness, as there is here; perhaps, she would not believe it — not because she really cares for him, but be- cause she is so proud. She shall hear it — I must tell her; oh! will she believe it?'' He stooped to her ear, and whispered, while Geraldine still softly clasped him. " Where is Mr. Albany, angela mia ? " " He is gone down to dinner." "AVhat! he left you alone'? how cold, how cruel ! " •' Hush, Geraldi, he went down on purpose i that you and I might be alone together — he 70 RUMOR. said you would do me good, and so you will ; now tell me every thing that has happened to you since yesterday. And I will tell you " "No, let me speak first," said Geraldi, in a voice singularly clear and calm for him. " What can you have to tell me ? " Ger- alil'ne thought of her poor book, the embers of her author's pride flashed out a gleam, its fii e was not yet spent. He had heard some- tliiTig triumphant — he ha'd come on purpose, there could be no other reason. " "What have I to say? Oh, Geraldine, listen, listen! At las you will know me, know all I have endured for you, and will thank me for the truth, for you ai-e a Geraldi, brave as well as proud." He flung himself on his knees : a false heroism, a false enthusiasm, filled and fired him — there was excuse for him, as there is for most who err, and for soihe who fall, but woe for the consequences of selfishness ; woe for him who shall offend one of those little ones, whose inexperience and want of disci- pline have too long kept them children. Geraldi was no child, but a most precocious youth ; he knew more than she did, though he was not more wise. A sickening suspi- cion of some evil unknown, more terrible than any comprehended, seized Geraldine. Had Geraldi known the precise character of her illness, it is but justice to say that, while he would have moved heaven and earth to get her back to Italy, he would have left unsaid every syllable of the words which were burning up from hi-, heart. But Geral- dine could not speak, except in a low, quiet whisper, to entreat him to tell her all he meant, at once ; she felt that long sus])ense would bring on just what had bef illen her when Helen Jordan shocked her. The soft flutter of her heart began again, its small pulse beat countlessly fast, but Geraldi knew it not ; he thought her calmer and stronger for his presence. He put one arm round her, as she sa: nearly upright against the high-piled sofa-cushioi s : but he turned his head away with an instirct he ought to have ■ittend'^d to — he did not wish to see the expression of her face while he spoke. He told all, feeling as though his own secret were worthless, having discovered the value of an.other''s ; he i,.ated his struggles long past, his resolve to depend no longer even upon her, and his decision to go upon the stage. Every minute incident of visits to the attic of the artist, their habits when to- gether, their conversations, in which some- times mingled Lady Delucy's name. The only departure, if not from truth, from fiict, Avas tliat when Geraldi came to the point, his confession of his own misery, and Geraldine's supposed wrongs, he swerved from the actual recollection. Instead of saying that Rodo- mant was playing when he spoke, and that after all he hud but remai-ked di-eamilv, " It was not because slie did not kve him,* naming no one ; instead of recalling his own inventions, which elicited the inwardly addressed complaint of Rodomant, Geraldi made an ungenuine statement — that the artist had assured him, in so many words, that Diamid loved Lady Delucy, and had made to her a proposal of marriage, which she refused. Had Geraldi possessed one spark of Ger- aldine's poetic fire, it would have warmed his words, but like his determined mind — not his glowing heart — they Mere steady, and stern, and cold. So they fell on Geral- dine's heart like ice-bolts, shattering, crush- ing down into her inmost being, her last remains of the vital innocence of youth. Had his words been buruingly eloquent as they were boldly strong, they might have melted on her ear, fusing themselves into the radiant imagery that ever inwrapt her thoughts. Then might the powers of her intellect, challenged to prove the truth, have sprung vigorous from their sick inertia, have wrestled successfully with the falsehood, wrung from it its sting, and left it van- quished, because unarmed, harmless as a non-existent enemy, a proven lie. But Geraldi, by the instinct of selfish passion, which imparts the power to discriminate lietween the best means and inferior ones, knew perfectly well that no raving would convict her — he had raved too often and unsuccessfully ; and he avoided the grounds of his own interest and love with equal tact. If it be a fact that the condition of bodily illness is a torturing one, because unnatural — a departure from jmre and perfect physi- cal laws — it is also true, that in illness we cs .mot reason, though reflection is even more spontaneous than in health. The memory weakens, while receptivity of fresh impressions is morbidly intense. Geraldine, therefore, questioned not, but contemplated this projected fact with vivid fearfulness ; the valley of death's shadow held no horror more monstrous yet impending, for the soul- sick pilgrim. Nor had she strength left to fly from the temptation of terror, as terrible as that of sin. And so all the love and ten- derness ineffable of her husband's invariable behavior, her destiny crowned with a devo- tion for which she owed at least as much gratitude to heaven as to man, were as it were lost upon her ; of them her ren em- brance darkened, deadened, as the slarrj heaven beneath which drops and spreads a universal cloud. But though she sinned this time through suffering, there was suffer- ing as hers, and more sharply to be felt, for him who erred the most. As' Geraldi ended the story which his miserable jealousy had perverted, he expected a burst of that old indignation for which Geraldine, even as a child, had been remarkable ; no inward and still disdain, but an exaggerated and elo- quent defiance. Geraldi had most admu-ed- RUMOR. n her in these moods ; they had brought her the nearest to himself. No sigh troubled the air, no breathing quickened into passionate or plaintive whispers ; sighs could not break, it was as a lake frozen over to the brim, and beneath that ice the breath lapsed faintingly, but lapsed into an internal pulsation too dangerously quick, a pulsation which indeed pressed the spirit to the edge of earth's ex- istence ; that thin, how thin a line of dark- ness which divides from light, a line one cannot pass in sleep, or swoon, or trance, nor in dreams, but in death alone. Was it death, then, Geraldi saw, and deserved to see, when he turned his eyes to examine coldly and deliberately the effect of his commimi- cation ? He thought so, nay, believed, and for the time as bare and remorseful an agony seized upon him as though he had murdered Geraldine, not her happiness only. For white lay the shadow of death upon her face, ghostly gray upon her relaxed and stirless li'ps, deep violet round her eyes, those eyes that would not wholly close, but showed a gleam of filmy pearl and azure within the golden lashes, a dreary sight. And when Geraldi moved his arm, which had encircled her, scared from his cruel embrace by a fear as cruel, her head fell, not softly, as when pressed by the poppy-wreath of slumber, but heavily, and where it di-opped, re- mained. Geraldi could bear no more ; he had nev- er really had any thing to bear except Avhat even in its suffering is passio-. through ecstasy, and rapture in its mo^t restless moods. Now flung from his hope of love, vitalizing life with treble energy against the conviction of death, if not true, a reality to him ; he had no piace to flee unto ; a wan- dering star is net more lonely in the deserts and the depths of space. Self-reliance spent in an instant at that surpassing shock, no help near, none in himself, and no hope from her, he fled from her, not knowing whither he meant to go, but by instinct going to the right place and person. As in uneasy dreams the night-walker arises and wanders safely through unknown places, so he who had never been in a room of Hope Park before, went straight to the dining chamber, and di- rect, opening the door mechanically, yet ad- vancing with steps that staggered not. The whole distinguished company were met, all nad eaten enough to be able to talk, and drunk enough wine to make conversation agreeable. All, except Diamid Albany, w hose mind was so perfectly in training, that he could bring it to bear at any moment on the most difficult question or interminable argument, yet who preserved so strict a du- ality of being, that his heart was free and revelling with his precious charge up stairs. As the door opened, the decorous retainer put to guard it might as well have tried to prevent a lightning from shining in at an open window, as Geraldi from going whither he would; the rest of the servants lemained immutable as statues each behind his chair, exact patterns of what their models should have been, for their masters and mistresses were all disturbed, and exclaimed in toups as affrighted and trembling as if a ghost had entered. Quietly as a ghost indeed, Geraldi glided, creeping to Albany's chair, and whispered, for he meant none else to hear, though all heard the hoarse and ho].bw utter- ance — " Geraldine is dead ! " Never had a person who deserved so little, endured so much of misery, distress, and that indescribable care we call worry, as Albany. It really seemed as though he, to whom it mattered most whether Geraldine were dead or lived, were the last who had an interest in her, and hold upon her. Every matron in the company rushed after her mother; and her mother, who had never tended her in her life, made as though she had never quitted her an instant, nor weaned her from her side. She stood at the head of the sofa on which Geraldine had evvooned, and Geraldi at the foot ; on each side pressed a crowd of fair and curious faceji; for her husband there was no room. And Albany, whose deepest passion, whether of grief or joy, never interfered with his philosophy, saw that the best thing he could do was to summon medical aid, so long de.spised by him, but now desperately desired. But while writing a message in the library, one came for him from Geraldine, who had revived with the quick response of youth to remedies untried before ; Geraldi brought the message. As it is said that great sinners, after great judgments passed away, become more reck- less, so was the boy more sullen and more saucy, for on delivering the message, he con- trived to convey the sense of his own value in Geraldine's eyes, and reurned before Al- bany could reach the bed-room, to the side of her pillow. But whatever were Geral- dine's wishes, her Avill was against his that time ; she ordered him to go, as she had ordered every other person to go out of the room ; and this time, he knew not why, he dared not disobey, nor try to thwart her. No embrace, however weak, no words of love, however low, for her husband. She only said, and rather more imperiously than she had addressed Geraldi, " I want' Lady Delucy. I must see her directly — send for her. I cannot sleep nor die, which ever it is to be, till I have seen her." " I will send for her instantly," answered Diamid ; " she shall be here to-night" — for he knew she was only in the next county. He rejoiced too much that Geraldine's frewt set towards her, to wonder at it for an in- stant — we seldom wonder when ^\hat we wish for happens. For he kncHv by experi- ence the invaluable influence of Lady Delucy in illness or sudden woe, her soothing sweet- ness and secret strength, her character per- fect in its maternity. Such a nurse for mind 72 RUMOR. and body could not be bought or hired — long had he coveted for Geraldme a frendship for which she did not care, and which the elder lady was too delicate to press upon the way- ward girl. Now he only thought, " she finds at last, that she wants indeed a friend — as I find that at last a husband is neither friend, ni)r mother, nor nurse — alas!" So a third time that day was the electric telegraph put to Geraldine's use, and Lady Delucy arrived almost simultaneously with physicians sent for from London. Now, though Lady Delucy had prophetic- ally feared lest the united happiness of U la- mid and Geraldine might be a destiny too brilliant for endui-ance, she had also fervent- ly longed for the dispersion of the dread possessing her, had prayed ardently for their steadfast peace. Few women, none save the bestand the noblest, regretdisappointment be- falling others who have acted towards them with injustice, even if the only seeming in- justice has been the difference between the balance of happiness in the different desti- nies, or what, for want of a better name, we call good fortune. This, Albany's first friend, M'ould have gladly given — not only her life for his, that were too easy a gratification — but, her life for Geraldine's, her health for hers, her peace, if not of heart, of conscience — that possession most precious which the pure who sufi'er alone know how to prize, pjager and earnest were her questions asked of Diamid, the first person she saw on her arrival; slow and despondent his replies, for what could he say? Even she saw as well as felt, that he had deeper cause for care tiian Geraldine's bodily indisposition — a cause she could not divine, and dared not inquire of him. She could not divine, for a woman whose devotion to a man is disinterested, never suspects that another woman could fail in her allegiance to the same. And directly she found that she could confer no consolation on him, she hastened to succor where she might be most needed after all. Physicians had examined Geraldine by that time, and had taken care not to betray to their patient their suspicion of her immi- nent danger ; nor could they succeed in con- vincing her parents of it ; they could not, or would not, believe such a possibility. Her mother had often fainted in her girlhood, and her father, from whom she inherited the con- sumptive temperament, had outlived the sus- picious weakness of his youth. On entering Geraldine's room. Lady De- lucy started, as well she might, to see Geral- di there ; she had never given him credit for being really of so much consequence to his cousiu as Geraldine had chosen to make out in Ikt childhood's history. And, had Geraldine not happened to have seen Lady Delucy, he would probably have taken her for a nurse ; but he had seen her — he knew her, and also instantly knew why she had been sent for. He had never di-eamed of Geraldine so acting, for the jealousy of a man diff"ers essentially in its monitions from that of a woman, save in those cases where morally the sexes seem in unnatural encroach- ment upon each other. A man's jealousy is resolute and rash; a woman's, spiritual, but oh ! how subtle ; his would visit the victim with sudden and murderous revenge, hers would drain from existence its green and healthful joy, and blight the blossom at its heart of the sweet flower called hope, leav- ing the sapless stem, the withered petals, '.o their death in life. And so now Geraldi trembled : an earth- quake's throes rend not more suddenly the earth's material calm, than the shock of his suspense heaved his spirit ; for now he re- called the false, in what he had stated, rather than the true, and the probability of his real surmise vanished ; for himself he foresaw disgrace, and, worse than disgrace, the death of Geraldine's love. No need now to send him from her side, he was only too thankful to go ; and she, whose suspense was at least as terrible as his, cared not to detain him near her ; if she should after all need a witness, he was not the one, nor should he be compromised ; there was another, the person who had told him. Lady Delucy sat down by Geraldine, w'hom they had not dared to move from the sofa on which she lay. Nothing but illness at a crisis could have made a girl naturally gen- erous and amiable, so morbidly inconsiderate and unjust. Every one knows that there are many ways of saying the same thing ; a ret- icent and delicate hint, a question implied rather than expressed, when that which has to be mentioned must hurt the person ad- dressed, at all events, and may wound the heart incurably. But Geraldine would not greet Lady Delucy, and thrust back her soft hand ; weak as she was, she reared her head from the pillow, and surveyed her companion with haughty and irreverent gaze ; the volition of jealousy more violent than that of love, galvanized her into momentary strength, and she exclaimed in a voice authoritative as that of an elder catechizing a rebellious child, — " Did Mr. Albany ever ask you to marry him ? I will know from your own hps ; and if so, why did you refuse him ? " There "never was a softer heart than the lady's ; had there been the least admixture of love's humility in the manner of the question, or even the bewildered incoherence of passion overwrought, she could have ])ar- doned it more readily, and replied more easilv ; but she, too, "had pride, and pride that had been half-starved, not pampered, like Geraldine's, with every luxury of lovp's indulgence. By great calmness and dignity unruffled, she hoped to arrest what she could not believe was more than suspicion — how roused, she knew not. " Your illness only, my dear child," nhe RUMOR. 73 answered, " could have put such a fancy into your head, you have been dreaming awake, as we do at times in iUness ; try to rest, and above all do not think, we will think for you in!ead ; and be assured that nothing has ever happened to me which can signify the least to you." With a dread, quivering clutch, Geraldine seized Lady Delucy's hand — a clutch of the weak and wasted fingers only, for the hand had no power to hold — a mere momentary grasp, as it were a spasm of touch, wild as the spasm of suspense, that gave her spirit an instant strength — short-during as a babe's convulsion, powerful as a grown man's madness. No condition of bodily sanity could be a match for this — the insanity of sickness. " Yes or no," screamed Geraldine, M'ith a cry like the cry of a child convulsed, a short, sharp shriek, intermingling v/ith the gasps of vague distress. " Yes or no, or I shall die — I will die — I can die if I choose, this moment." And what was strange, or perhaps natural. Lady Delucy was appalled into belief that the actual danger which she contemplated would indeed be the death she feared. Now she had a theory (which she had never had the' opportunity of testing) that common sense is the best antidote to excessive exal- tation of the faculties. \\\ an instant she made up her mind to tell no lie, nor confess the genuine truth, but to generalize. She therefore answered lightly with — oh ! how heavy a heart and depressed a feeling, re- specting her own worth or mission in the world, we cannot write, — "You are very much younger than Diamid, my dearest Geraldine. All men who marry late have had ideas, if not intentions, of marrying early ; it may not have been for love, very often for gain, sometimes " Here Geraldine broke in with weakened tones, that wailed into a sob almost before they spent themselves. "It is true then, true, and he is true, not Diamid, not Diamid, but he." Then Geraldine's eyes closed, and she lay still again, still as in the swoon which had whelmed her fiiculties after Ge- raldi spoke the truth he cruelly perverted. But Geraldine this ^ time Avas in no swoon actual; she suffered too strongly; it was but the swoon mimetic of hysteria, that last mystery left for modern medicine, and modern courage to explain. The lady un- derstood, though she could not have explained it ; she was in misery for the misery she had caused, and for which she directly blamed iicrself, as persons of uncharged conscience are ready to do. Oh, that she could give consolation ! let those who wish the same never try to offer it through tvords ; the very fragrance of a flower sickens the sick at heart, and words, however tender, rasp the sensitive ear of the tortured brain. In feet, consolation is as awkward an intruder 10 upon sorrow, as any companion save the lover, upon love ; so much of love is sor- row, and so precious is sorrow, in the place of love, clothed in the raiment of that familiar dead delight. " It is not true," said the lady, who had never embraced sorrow in the ])lace of love, for love had never nestled near her. " It is not true that he loved me as he loves you — per- haps not true that he loved me at all." Now, as the lady herself had believed her- self beloved, she felt as though she made in this remark the last concession of charity ; she thought she had done the utmost to veil the truth without actual falsehood. But she implied the fact which Geraldine had dreaded to have confu-med ; — that was enough to seal for that young heart the doom of its despair. Truly, we should never seek to know what we fear. The mystery of Hope is a celestial phantom placed between the heart in its frail humanity, and the reality of Awe ; nor should its veiling brightness be rent with our own sacrilegious hand ; if we are to prove the worst, if for us the mystery of Terror is to be fulfilled, let Heaven's own hghtnings rend the radiant mist, and Heaven's own mercy temper the justice of the revela- tion. With all her self-created assurance, Ger- aldine had not really believed Geraldi — she now knew by the torturing extremity of her conviction that she had not ; but she believed now, and remorselessly the truth entered as iron into her soul. Almost as calm as death is enforced resignation, hard as the nether millstone is the pride of patience. So calm and rigid Geraldine remained some time, that the lady hoped she was asleep, and even thought so ; — for the flutter of a few strayed golden hairs on the gii-l's cheek showed that still she breathed and lived ; and her companion trusted — she dared not but trust — that in sleep the distressful hal- lucination would spend itself, into it passing as one of its own dreams, and so remain at the awaking, or perhaps be as a cU'eam for- gotten. For the lady never imagined Geral- dine had been told ; she for a moment forgot she had told any one herself, and she could understand and pardon that with which she could not sympathize — a suspicious imagi- nation informing a passionate nature. She also pitied the young wife ; for, knowing that Albany was of necessity, much occupied with what could not interest Geraldine, she thought it possible her heart had during those pauses of conjugal intercommunion lapsed into loneliness severely felt, because so strongly contrasting with the sympathy at all other hours her own. Little knew the lady of the preparations intellectual pride had been making in Geraldine's mind so long, for the final ruin of its peace — or how easily the heai't's happiness succumbs when mental peace is destroyed. Less knew she 74 RUMOR. of the force, and depth, and fierceness of Geraldine's spiritual pride, surpassing in its suddenly-aroused activitj-, the strength of her love, as the heart's master-pulse, the wrist's small throbbing thread. Much has been said, preached, and written, about the evil of pride ; but in good truth such words fall to the ground, where they deserve to lie ; no one declares the real reason why pride is wrong, and an insult to the Majesty of Heaven; for few indeed know, and those few are too proud to confess. There is an absurd idea -which, by the way, no ])roud person ever entertains, that pride in all its kinds and every degree is wrong; and it therefore may sound paradoxical to assert, what all proud persons know nevertheless to be true, that pride is as necessary for the maintenance of the human condition in its human perfection, as charity is necessary for the maintenance of the spiritual condition, whose perfection is universal love. Is there a virtue which, by abuse, that is, through excess, may not sink to weakness, the atmos- phere surrounding vice ? what virtue has rot, at times, by individuals or parties, been abused, degraded through excess ? Yet, what without pride is amlntion — not emula- tion, the desire to excel others, but the desire to excel? What without it is honor, — not the principle of duelling, but the principle which bids a man make his Mill, and never contract a debt ? What is chivalry Avithout it, — not particular devotion to every wo- man, but general reverence for all ? AVhat without pride is poverty ? — not the pov- erty which begs and crawls by day, and wan- tons and feasts at night ; but the poverty which the rich dare not to insult by helping, and which tliose neither rich nor poor sus- pect not. Above all, what without pride is passion — the anguish of disappointed love ? wreathing with its purple blossoms the grave of hope till men tread on it as on a bloom- ing garden — stifling the sigh that might reveal — drying the tear that would betray the tenderness of the wounded heart ; keep- ing secrets for a thousand, nay a thousand thousand, from all but God. Certainly, for this life, pride is at least as precious a pos- session as great beauty, high race, or suffi- cient wealth ; all blessings, liable enough to be abused, still blessings as much as the wine whicl can intoxicate, the food which may surfeit,* the pain-chai-ming opiate which is also poison. But pride, in its excess, is more dangerous than all other passions, in proportion to its strength, which surpasses theirs. So is it alone, and for that reason alone to be con- trolled by love — the true spmt of self-sac- rilice, even as pride is the true spirit of self- respect. And pride is fatal when it will not be controlled by love, but rises insurgent over it. Celestial hosts, swerving from their homage to the heavenly principle, were lost — they are said to have fallen, a word how eloquent to express the degradation of the proud, none but the proud can tell. So in this hour of trial, when pure, anself ish, unmixed love alone, could ha.e tri- umphed over evil, a Moman who was no angel — fell. Just as Satan can bestow the king- doms of this world and their glory, so can pride give strength to its own, for any, the last emergency. Geraldine stirred, and opened her eyes ; as Lady Delucy the iglit, looked innocently and sweetly around. Soft and quiet were her tones, too ; pride gave her power to modulate them. " I want to see Diamid," she murmured ; " Avill you call him ? " Lady Delucy thought, " Why should she not see him ? was he not the proper com- panion for her ? " And she inwardly rejoiced, going instantly to call him. Close enough he was at hand, only outside the door, and listening to the silence as only the loving can listen, for a breath or a voice of Geraldine's. He crept to her side — he saw, too, the softer expres- sion which masked her countenance at her own will, and his instant emotion rendered him unguarded — suspicious he never had been. He scarcely felt it strange -when Geraldine said to him, though without hold- ing out her hand — still she smiled the shadow-smile of illness, — " My dearest Diamid, I want to ask you a question, — I am sure you will answer it — indeed, I guess the answer. Did not you once ask Lady Delucy to marry you ? " Diamid was quite deceived ; had he loved Lady Delucy passionately he would have been thunderstricken ; he might have equiv- ocated in reply ; but he had felt it so little, that he was not afraid to confess, nor ashamed how little he had felt. " Long and long, and very long ago, before Geraldine was born — before she came to make all the world a paradise. That is what happens when tender creepers fondle round old stones," — and he bent to kiss her, so innocent of the root of that delicate and clinging parasite, for he himself was born without suspicion, or the power to envy or bear maUce. But Geraldine with one hand covered her lips, with the other pressed him from her. " Did you hate her ? " she inquired vehe- mently. " I must know that ; I " Now Albany was as just as generous ; he knew he had never hated the woman whom he had never passionately loved — her good- ness faced him suddenly — and, to excuse his abrupt reply, it must be said that Geral- dine's sudden question, its sudden vehe- mence for an instant displaced the idea of her danger ; he could not believe that one near death would exhibit a mood so earthly. " Xo," said he, in solemn tones, " I did not hate her, — and no one could." Albany had better not have uttered the ti"uth this time, and soon he knew it ; but he ■RUMOR. 75 was irritated — he had married a child of genius, and one in all but genius still a child. When she acted childishly, she annihilated the ideal of the wife, which his imagination, mature as his manhood, cherished. Soon, indeed, was he punished for his sin- cerity. For Geraldine called loud upon Geraldi, and though he was not near this time, her cries for him redoubled, until Al- bany, terrified at the excitement possessing her," called the boy himself. Geraldi slowly and reluctantly returned, expectant of im- mediate disgrace, and was crowned with im- mediate triumph. '' You loved me always, Geraldi, and were always true ; Geraldi, you spoke the truth ! " And she drew him to her arms ; he, stunned with the sudden conquest, was almost shamed into gentleness unlike himself, thus doubly decen-ing Albany, who amidst his deep dis- tress, was even consoled by the reflection that she had any one near her whom she would allow to minister to her comfort. If comfort, it was not calm for long. With the night a low delirium seized Geral- dine ; she knew nothing, seemed to see no one, raved in murmurs, wailed in whispers, the most fearsome freak of malady to be- hold, if not to bear. Still, perhaps, the re- action of fever upon the brain, for the hour making there its stronghold, saved her lungs, at least it saved her life. But the moral mania left her not ; all night she shrank away when Albany approached her, shrank -oser to G6raldi, who never left his position, nor unclasped her arras from his embrace. CHAPTER XVII. The time when Albany had asked Lady Delucy for her hand, had been the passion- spring of existence, which steeps all moods in an empurpling light. None but sweet words had dropped from his lips, for only sweet thoughts nestled in his brain, and his poet's imagination teemed with tender fancies. Tlien he felt just enough, not too much, to be able to make love eloquently. It is not the most deep.y-loving who can plead most fluently, nor does he, inwrapt in another's being, seek for conceits or compliments to adorn his petition. Then it is true that Di- amid had admired Lady Delucy — any man of fastidious taste must have done so. She was also agreeable to him, her soft heart and deliciois temper eased his irritable genius and so )thed his nerves. But she was, as an object, sujn-emely desirable, for she had high position, large fortune, and boundless gen- erosity wherever she loved or approved. Born and self-trained a physiologist, he knew perfectly well that he w'as dear to her, and he concluded that his protection of her and the devotion from which he could trust him- self never outwardly to swerve, would be equivalents for what he wished her to be stow. He knew that she alone could ad- vance him immediately to the high ground he wished to take ; years of solitary aspu-a- tion and industry must bring him to that same point, self-elevated step by step, but that he would not bear ; he had a singular theory, certainly having ambition for its germ, that genius, unless developed sud- denly, and very early, was worthless. In fact, as far as intellect was concerned, he did not believe in late development at all. Now when his father, and bibliopole, but no genius, had discovered his son's literary fancy, as he called it, and discovered it through Diamid's throwing up the employ- ment and profession selected for him, and for which, unlike most who throw up prac- tical commonplace, he was totally unfit, that parent threw him up also to all intents and purposes, left him to himself; and it was the daughter of his former employer, who alone understanding him, had given him frankly the assistance he then most needed — means of literary publicity. He knew w-ell that all belonging to her would become entirely at his disposal, did he marry her, not for what he considered selfish ends, they were so disguised beneath the promises of his genius. Lady Delucy, having given him up, at first had expected he Avould marry, marry as most men do, some from one motive, some from another, few for love alone. When he did not marry, it cannot be denied that whatever quality took the ])lace of vanity in her was flattered, and that her love became more than ever dear to her — it seemed a reality like the child unborn, or the child dead, in either case more ])recious than bar- ren single-hearted love. Abroad he did not marry either, and on his first wandering fif- teen years were spent; all that time she nursed her secret treasure, and it lived for her. Then he returned, and for some few years threw his whole genius into aflairs, as he bar" his first years thrown it into litera- ture, and with as startling and ])ositive a success. When Elizabeth had remarked to her mother, the night after they met him newly married, that she had fancied sonU' thing six months before, she was not wide of the mark, for Diamid had done a thing as foolish as he could do, rendering himself ridiculous, and the la4y who loved him more unhappy than was necessary. It was then he constructed the door in the wall between his garden and hers ; for she had the tantalizing felicity of knowing he lived close to her dur- ing his retreats into the country, as she had herself persuaded her husband to leave the pretty tenement in its grounds, which was attached to the castle — not to Diamid, but to Diamid's father, who had naturally left it to l)iamid, on discovery that, after all, his 76 RUMOR. eon had distinguished himself a^ove all other men of his age ; nor been unfilial either. So Diamid had cohstructed this entrance, and daily, some days hourly, the lady found him in her room. Servants remarked to each other, and Elizabeth also, to herself, on this arrangement ; the daughter, who inher- ited her mother's gentle temperament, was delighted to think she would at last be happy ; for even in her childhood Elizabeth had suspected the truth, as she once said to her nurse, that Mr. Albany did not really care for her, she was certain, for he only kissed her and nursed her before her mamma, never deigning to notice her when he found her alone in the room. Now Lady Delucy, who of course ought to have been stronger of will than when younger, was weaker ; she could not trust herself to refuse him again, if again he asked her hand, which he was on the edge of doing, for still his comparative poverty debarred him from complete popular success, though his party-success Avas perfect. So she never gave him the opportunity, for she never staid with him alone, and Elizabeth marvelled why her mother pertinaciously called her to her, and whispered to her to remain, whenever Diamid spent the morning there, making the party that illustration of duluess, a triad. And Elizabeth was very glad, indeed, that Albany at last went away just before Charles Lyonhart returned from India. In deep self-disgust at his incapacity to outwit a woman, and sated of all but am- bition — love he had then never tasted, Dia- mid left Northeden very suddenly, inflicting a deeper wound than he conceived he had it in his power to inflict, for now it mattered not to him to conceal his indifl'ereace, and it breathed over his gentle manner like frost, on dew ; the stidden chill of the first winter- warning strikes not death to the flower of the field as that light-dropping coldness pierced hope to its heart in the lady's faith- ful breast. Still, she was not prepared, even by his indifference to her, for his new pref- erence, so rapidly conceived and consum- mated. Nor was Diamid prepai-ed for this either, any more than she, and in the sudden shock jf passion, the seeds of retribution for him were sown. Lord Chevening's political party required a head, all the rest of the members were complete, and worked without it, as a steam-engine without a driver, perpetually crushing down their own designs, nor able to avoid what was actually unnecessary col- lision with the plans of others. And Lord Chevening determined to win Diamid wholly, as he had his sympathy, to have his strength. This nobleman was blood-descended from 'hat first William Witt, who thrilled the senate with eloquence it had never before echoed, whose last words of harmonious de- fiance, and last awful apparition, excel in dramatic sublimity every thing except Shake- speare ; and from that second William Witt, who, born of such a father, seemed to have been purposely endowed with every quality the parental genius had lacked, or disdained to use, and to have had the genius purposely denied, in order that he might be- come a martyr through the weakness which could not save the state the evils he could foresee and foretell. But as to Lord Chev- ening, whatever he inherited of the ambi- tion and arrogance, certainly the genius and the sagacity remained quiet in their tombs for him. And he had need of Diamid Albany, knowing no better nor newer means to re- sort to to purchase him over, than to project and complete an alliance between him and his only child — he had no son. Now Dia- mid, if he had not cared to marry for love in his youth, cared even less now, — indeed, never thought about love at all, — though his fine taste would have revolted from an ugly or an unaccomplished wife. So was he punished ; for, seeing the child Geraldine, i he loved her, loved her as only sages love little children, or young men their first ideal ; loved with all the pain of passion, yet the adaj)tive innocence of sympathy, all the an- guish of adoration, and all the tenderness of protecting strength. And if he ever had a fear of any thing after their union was ac- com])lished, it had been the fear of losing her love — not his own, which he knew and felt to be eternal. And now he believes that he has lost it, and finds for the first time, that without love life is -mere exist- ence, and wisdom only foolishness. - Meantime, as quietly as she could, under the circumstances, I^ady Delucy mused in solitude on the singular interview she had had with Geraldine, and there gradually grew u])on her — slowly, because she was so unwilling to entertain it — the remembrance- that she had certainly confided to one ear her secret. She was equally certain of having told no one except the wild musician ; but with all his peculiarity she had felt sure of his honor ; how, besides, could he have con- fided, who had made or accepted no friends ? For she had not an idea or dream of Geral- di's being mixed up in the matter — how should she have had ? for she knew nothing about him, except that he was Gerakline's cousin, poor and proud. She had never been so angry with any one as she now felt with herself; her secret "a caged bird flown," and she herself had opened the door. She chafed as a calm lake might chafe, whose shore the earthquake shook. Worst of all, though she instantly resolved to question Rodomant, she did not know where to find him, for all communication she had with him was such as she might have maintained with her banker ; from time to time — short times too, say once a fortnight or in three weeks — he sent her small sums of money, or single notes, duly registered. Still, these were al- ways acknowledged, as requested, or rathe* RUMOR. 77 demanded by him, to a certain place — a| music-warehouse — and to that place she j wrote, telling him that she must see him in- stantly, at her house in town where he had so often been ; that he must meet her there, if it were only for ten minutes, and reply to a question she coukl not write, and he alone could answer. And she followed the letter — which she wrote in the night — to town the next day, after writing to her daughter, to say she should be at home the next. But her torments were increased before she could get away. She had to see Diamid, who, when he heard that she was going, went to her room and let himself in ; Avho for the first time in his life entirely convinced of her worth, overrated it in his imagination, rich as his heart was generous, and appreci- ated her for the first time in exact proportion as he misappreciated his dethroned idol, whom he had never loved so sadly, but Avhom no more he worshipped. She had to hear him say that he had never done her justice, never so vividly perceived her secret and spiritual charms : and confess that he had been a happier and a wiser man if she had married him. This was the central sting of her sorrowful irritation ; for this she knew. She knew by the prematurity of her first ex- perience in life, by the perfect flower of her j youth's amaranth love, that though not so blissfully intense, so ecstatically exalted as ] his joy in his lot with Geraldine, she could and would have bestowed upon him a safer, for a more endurant happiness, a more avail- able wisdom for earthly purposes, than that hild of brilliant promise, whose fall from the pure unselfishness of perfect love, had made him miserable in her own wayward misery. He left Lady Delucy at last, after a long and to her most distressful interview — left her in a storm of inward excitement, which nothing could better have suited than the rushing mighty impulse of the express train. Scarcely serener when she reached town, her mood was much that of the weather when the storm is spent, yet still electric tints suifuse the clouds, and gild their edges, and the clouds seem angrier and more gloomj' be- cause of the deep blue gulfs between them. All the elements of her character were in agitation, and her natural calm of tempera- ment, in trying to restore itself, alternated with her indignation in a struggle new to her experience. In such a frame she awaited the coming of the offender. Now, there are persons who never ought to be found foult with, rare and noble natures, of difficult and eccentric temper. They should not be blamed, simply because if they are blamed, they harden, their consciences as it were become negative ; they will neither allow themselves to have done wrong, nor <;xpress, nor feel contrition. But such na- tures, if convicted uncondemned, will always confess, will overrate their misdemeanor, exaggerate it in their own esteem, repent heartily, and never offend again. Now Rod omant was a being of this order, and fur ther, he was just now ^ho mind or mood to be found fault with ; iMsjie was, to tis^^ phrase, only as much to thejJta^^oiidl^ i homely, getting on in the world, which of course in England means, and only means, making money. And though he sneered in secret at those Avho helped him to make it, it never occurred to him that he ought rather to have sneered at himself, for producing what the many could appreciate, rather than what the few would have delighted in. And it really seemed as though his destiny were to be that which, while most dangerous, is also that most powerful to erect Self king of mobs, a rich man — positively, not relatively, rich, one of those men to whom it seems only necessary that they shall extend the palm, that fortune may rain into it golden drop- pings; the one talent of him who increased not, given to him that had made ten, not even to him that had made Jive. For Rodomant began to make money as fast as he pleased, and to be known not only in the uncciled chambers of the organ builders, but in that very fane where seldom the oi'gan sounds, so that those M'ho hear listen. Not only at grand morning performances, under distin- guished patronage, where persons paid a guinea each to the art-trader, who just then hired Rodomant and paid him. but, even at the Abbey-service, this being of strong voli- tion continued often to supplant the organist at his own good pleasure, and played statelily or eccentrically ; it was all the same, he filled the space with music any how, for his fingers could not touch a note without generating tone — it was as the perfume of the blossom, the light spreading from the sun. And the aisles would not empty, the reader would not leave the lectern, the choir-singers paused in their niches, like white birds wresting on their nests, till the magician who had chosen to detain them there scattered his spell and let them go. Still, though it was known well enough, by that time, that this master of what cant calls the ecclesiastical school of music, was also a composer of an opera on no holy subject ; not a soul guessed that he also supplied the pianoforte and the harp- market with the ephemeral trash, whose fash- ion, like other fashions, lasted a butterfly's life, and died. For though yet sound at his character's core, his heart yet a spring shut up, a fountain sealed, Rodomant despised all men, yet was all things to all men, not that he might win some to the most refining of all faiths but love, but to win all things for himself. So his mightiest and purest gift, the creative genius, did not languish in him, but slumbered, and grew in sleep, gained strength in its unsullied calm, for that would not prostitute itself to the end of gain, ever, though partially a just ambition. It hap- pened, that as Rodomant mixed more in the world, he became not sensualized, for which 78 RUMOR. he had to thank a spiritual imagination, and still more a cool cynical judgment ; but de- graded in his aims, heart-frozen, if not hard- ened forever. He became more worldly than M'ise, for now he longed to be rich after he had paid his debts, forgetting that her to whom he was indebted, he never could ade- quately, however literally he could, repay. He desired to be considered and called a rich man, while he yet aspired to be a musi- cian, rich in hoards of genius ; and by this frail golden thread were his M-ings bound a while, fast as by his lost locks was chained the antique model of physical power. He therefore was in a mood less modest than ever in his life, for the lust of wealth is ever ministrant to undue personal estimation. So when the note arrived at his address, and he received it in his hand, — opened it, — he hesitated not an instant about obeying it to the letter ; not as a grateful person of inferior sex hastening to do homage to the lady who had most befriended and honored him, but as a man condescending to a woman's whim ; the weaker she, in his opinion, for besides not knowing her own mind. For, will it be believed, this M-ild unchastened heart imag- ined that the heart of his benefactress relent- ed towards him, — sure proof that his pas- sion had declined from its perfection, and that love had never breathed within his breast. Sooner, then, than she had expected him, he was announced to Lady Delucy. He otime in with defiant tread, and a sort of smiling disdain in his countenance. She was surprised : all his old constraint he had also banished, yet she had admired him more in his most aAvkward moments. She did not sit down, she felt too disturbed even so far to take rest, nor did she offer him a chair, something in his manner forbade her ; whereupon he took one in her very face, though the action was so evidently one of bravado, that it was rather grotesque than rude, and at any other time she would have laughed ; even now she felt inclined to lec- ture him like a child. " I am amazed at you ! " she began, in the dignified tone which Elizabeth, when a child herself, had been used to call " Mamma playing at queen." " But really, when you come before me and behave so strangely, I cease to be astonished at what you hare done besides. I believe I told you I had a question to put to you, — let it be answered directly, that our inter- view may be as short as possible." This treatment did not tend to subdue him ; on the contrary, his glance gathered satire, his eyebrows lifted up, his lip drawn down, subdued her in part ; she remembered how she had always humored, perhaps spoiled him. So she' thought to treat him kindly; and sat down too. Upon which motion of hers, he whimsically rose to his feet, folded his arms, bowed his head, and waited. " What on earth makes you behave so P " she exclaimed, in a tone of obvious annovance. Said he, with mock respect, that imparted irreverence to his manner, " We are no longer equals in art, we must not do the same thing. When my lady stood, it would have been unpolite for me to stand ; when she sits, for me to sit would be a scandal." Fortunately he touched her comic vein ; she was provoked to smile, and he even quickened her curiosity. " Why, then, are we no longer equals in art ? though that has nothing to do with my question." " Because we never were equals in any thing else. You treated me as an equal then, and I bore it, because we were equals in art. Now you treat me like a servant ; formerly you would have said, ' take a seat, I am sure you must be tired ! ' in such a soft voice, as if it breathed through silk. Noio we are therefore no longer equals in your esteem. Besides, I owe to you still — but not for long — and then — then I am free of you and all your sex." " I fear, if I free you," said the lady an- grily, " that it will be but for you to be bound again ; for you are, alas ! not to be trusted." He stamped and frowned. " I do not un derstand ; is your gold sent from my hand, changed to brass by your touch? Are such charges to be addressed to me ? " " You best know what you deserve ; if you can deceive, you can of course also deny."' " What ! from your lips, which should be the last " " Why the last ? if you deserve — and you must — you do." " Because," he said between his sharp- shut teeth, " a man *cannot give a woman the lie, any more than a man can fight a wo- man, if she injures or insults him." " Oh, I wonder," said she more severely than ever, " I wonder you pretend to respect any one of the laws of chivalry, you who have broken the chief and crowning one." " What nonsense ! " exclaimed Rodoniant, recovering himself, for he actually could not comprehend her meaning. " And how much more of the woman's idle nonsense am I to hear ? Ask the question quickly, and let me go-" "You have betrayed my confidence ! " she exclaimed as soon as she could command her voice, for what she believed to be his impudence appalled her, made her tremble. " And the least you can do is to tell me to whom you did so. Rememl^er, as indeed you must, the night you exjiressed to nie your feelings, and when I generously — I must say so — generously confessed to you mine, believing you as pure in heart as you were sound in head. That night you asked me the name of the person to wnom I had I given what you audaciously asked me to RUMOR. 79 give you, and which I refused you. You, more audaciously, asked me the name — I, more generously, told it to you. You asked me, when I was half Avild with terror, lest any one should overhear us, and weak with the fatigue of a long, long night. I did wrong — quite wrong ; and now I know it ; I judged you too kindly, I believed in you too confidingly, and I have met with my re- ward ; for you have revealed my secret, to whom, I know not, nor when ; but ijou know, for it has become known, and has created wretchedness, which for some souls may be eternal." " I reveal a secret ! I repeat yotirs ! " he cried, in a voice, whose sudden anger made her quail, for it was like the noble anger of one unjustly accused — it was also solemn. For he lifted his right hand, — " I swear by all the stars, by the throne of Heaven, and Him who sits " But the lady flew as it were forward to- wards him, and flung her hand across his lips : " Spare, spare me that, and your OAvn soul." But he plucked her hand away, and threw it from him ; his aspect struck her, for though yet he shuddered with anger, he gazed Avildly, dreamily around, . " I will swear, I do swear, by all you believe, and I would fain believe. It is you who are false, lady ; a lie never blackened my lips. And as for ingratitude, it is you who are ungrateful ; for I was the faithfullest servant you had, and I would have served you to your own glory. / tell ? I repeat your lover's name ? From that night I never recalled the name ; it sank down in my memory like a stone in the deep water. It was only, I grant, when I was mad, that I wished to know it, and I was honorable enough to forget." " I may, perha])s, gain seme explanation another way," said the lady, sighing, " for we both seem under a hallucination now. That man's young wife has found out that he loved me twenty years ago — who told her ? None knew it but he, and I, and you. He did not tell her; I asked him." " And he denied it, and you believe Mm, and not me?" " Certainly, I believe him, for it was not — it could not be his interest to tell her, and besides " " Besides, you choose to believe him — a ■woman's reason ! And how was it more my interest than his ? What have I to do with him, or her, or you ? " " Misery of miseries, there is no end of its complication ! Oh, that I could put faith in any one ! But hear to the end, for you know not all. She was ill before, and noio she is believed to be dying — it may have killed her — / may have killed her ! As a last hope for her life, she is going back to Italy, that is, if her strength lasts long enough. And she is going, if she goes, without her husband. She will not even see him. Sup- pose she dies, what shall I feel ? what will yoii feel, if you have deceived me now .•' " He was looking down now, with folded arms, trying, though she gave him not credit for the efl"ort, to rack memory to a confession of what it contained not — had he confessed, indeed, that he was guilty, he would have seemed to himself to lie. " I am tired out of this farce," she ex- claimed, and truly she seemed so, impatient also, for she thought he was allowing his thoughts to wander from the sulyect. " Ex- cuse me, but really I am driven to extremity, and refinements are out of time. Do you ever — have you ever, drunk wine lately ? you never did ? " " If I say yes, perhaps you Avill believe that I do riot,"" he answered bitterly. " And, if Rodomant did drink wine it would never make of him a fool and a villain, for wine makes not fools and villains, but draws out of men who are such their folly and their villany. He does not drink Avine, because wine must be bought — and he would rather buy power. Nor does he need wine to in- spire him, for he has genius — and, lady, genius is always truth." To her troubled mind this self-defence sounded pure rodomontade, an invention to beguile her from her purpose. She was sorely puzzled and deeply hurt ; never had she been so disappointed as in him, and she despised herself with quite as unexampled a contempt. Did he deceive her, then, or himself? Strange paradox as it m^^y ap- pear, he was actually innocent. Ye( Jiad he been as thorougly intoxicated as .he worst and meanest of men, he could not more en- tirely have forgotten the circumstances un- der which he conveyed the meaning of the truth ; if not the truth, in words. He did not hioic he had told, for he had not meant to tell, Geraldi. The greatest penalty of ideal genius is its tendency to act on im- pulse ; motive it has none — sJwiild have none, if it is pure and true to nature ; but in proportion to its singleness and sincerity is the danger that it may involve others, and the necessity that it shall be constantly mis- understood. In fact. Lady Dclucy shouhl have died rather than have revealed, under any circumstances, such a fact as that Mhich, in the passion of the hour, had seemed too trifling to have any result whatever. We ever err when our endurance fails even for a moment. And possibly, she should never have registered within her a rash vow ; f )r history, both sacred and secular, teems with precedented proofs that Providence dooms such to punishment — rewards it never. " Who then repeated — who ? " she reit- erated in lower tones, yet impregnated with distrust rather than regret. " She who repeated it to one may have repeated to many a secret — what differ- ence ? " was his reply, (irreverent even for him, and he was never remarkable for ven ■ 80 RUMOR. eration.) To her sensitive ear it sounded insult ; it was her duty to ' bear no more. She left the room, and he did not look up after her — only waited till she had gone, to go. And she heard and saw no more of Rodomant himself; only received, a week afterwards, a song whose title-page was em- blazoned with the vulgarest designs in raw- scarlet, blue, and gold, (aye, vulgar as any valentine,) and dedicated to herself — not only printed either, but published, too : — Criiel as kind, and false as true ! Who but a madman could dpsire Moonlight with lightning, hail with dew. Sunshine with storm, and frost with fire ? Nightshade and violet's purple meet In the spirit-wreath of thy radiant hair ; Gall is distilled with honey sweet, When thy looks are fond and thy speech is fair. Lo ! in thy glance gleams April light, Smiles melting through a mist of tears, And flashing on the eager sight Till Bliss too beautiful appears ! Lo ! from thy glance breaks wild disdain To strike the gentle gazer blind. And shafts, deep dipped in icy pain, Winged wilful from thy wayward mind. Lo ! on fhy lips in summer sleep, The noon-delighting rose is fed ; Thy speech with sympathy makes weep The saddest heart whoee hope is dead. Lo ! calm-beguiled beneath thy sight, Won by thy mild voice to repose, He writhes with sudden stinging sleight From scorpions curled beneath thy rose. Slight as the reed for slenderness, — Hard as the uncut diamond gem — Soft as the babe for tenderness, Harsh as the judge whose lips condemn. Rending the rainbow in thy wrath, Crushing the leaf till its spring is dead, — Trampling on hearts in thy daily path, That thy hand had raised and thy smiles had fed Long as the proud neck bears the weight Of thy fairy foot, thou art melting meek ! Let the proud heart but rise elate. And thou spurnest — starrest by a freak. A stone let the humble ask of Thee, And Thou givest fine bread of thine own; Let him ask for bread, confiding free, And lo ! Thou givest him a stone. Whether Rodomant scrawled the not too laureate-like lines himself, or employed a verse-monger, she never knew, but they proauced the impression upon her acquaint- ance which she would least have desired they should receive ; that she had carried on with the young musician one of those solemn farces called flirtation, a word she abhorred only less than the word of which it was the sign. It was, besides, 'a pretty pendant to the Adelaida, which he had de- signed to immortalize her name and his ; this absurd effusion. And further, the sin- gular popularity of the former extended also to the latter, which as nearly attained the burlesque of sentiment as its predeces- sor had approached the sublime of tragic passion. And it also tended to produce a confused idea of the author's real merits, for it elicited from the waspish renown of Tims Scrannel's Avisdom an unnecessarily elaborate criticism, in which he perorated on the near affinity of genius with insanity, perhaps because himse'lf so undeniably sane. CHAPTER XVIII. On a windless winter night a small, dark figure stood alone upon the chief bridge of the bright river that sparkles round the quays of Parisinia. Parisinia, the capital of Iris, a city fair as Athens, in the vernal freshness of her viojetl ■ wreath, and awful in the truth and tradition of its history as the annals of imperial Rome ; fantastic, faery, as the changing cloudland of the poets, whose granite gates and marmorean palaces frown pale upon the ground which calls to Heaven for vengeance, a Heaven as yet silent in answer to its silent cries. City, whose grown-up children of- to-day dance over the indistinguishable graves of her children murdered yesterday; whose intermural groves seem with their summer sighs and creaking autumn groans to breathe eternal lamentation over the mar- tyrdom of myriads — a martyrdom unregis- tered, unwept. Each day has its saint, each saint his feast, in Parisima. To-night it is a feast of lights. No marvel that figure leans alone upon a bridge, for bridges and quays, palaces, bazaars, and hovels, have poured forth their people into tlfe streets. And he who stands alone is one to whom the popular excite- ment, the confused glare, the noise of the one-ideaed multitude, are poetry afar off. Above the stars keep watch still, as if frozen into the sky, the intense white moon sjjreads her silvery-blue wing's wide as God's love, upon the city. Below, there heaves a sea of mingled mist and rainbow, phantoms of fire melting into ghosts of smoke, flame fountains, and earth suns, mock lightnings and mimic moons, shoot, rush, and spray into the air, whose divine clarity they no more disturb than the surgent and sinking joy-cries of the grown-up children interrupt the calm chorus of the everlasting star-song. The figure in the cloak, with hat muffling the brows, and white face leaning down- wards, to greet the moon's white face in the frost-spelled water, was the figure of Rodo- mant. What doest thou there, Art's proph- et, in that region of dangerous delight? Once in it, even if not of it, can he escape the condition of moral mediocrity, which its intense civilization, its exaggerated exist- ence, its perfect worldliness, engender'' On this vast altar of ten thousand inuo- RmiOR. 81 cents, is his soul also to be sacrificed to the flesh? Vain sacrifice, not j^ure as theirs. Not to the flesh, it seems. He is thinner and paler than ever, spiritualized to the utmost by intellectual ambition, unhuman- ized as much as possible by spiritual pride. The principle which religionists call the devil, that defiant and unrelenting power, that loveless Sathanas, has certainly permis- sion to bestow the kingdoms of this world and their glory, who can doubt it ? For its mast8rj)ieces of desire and pinnacles of honor — yea, and the strongholds of success, are as surely his own as the world God made ami breathed this beauty upon, the world over which the Divinity of nature spreads its dtedal wings is 7iot his own, but God's. Truly, those who really long after the glory of the world God did 7iot make, may have it, though if gained that dreadful guerdon by His own, He wrests it from their enjoyment by all-levelling sorrow, or the disappointment that cheats satiety. This demon in his kobes of light, his ma- terial promises dyed in the deep lustre of the supplicant's golden imagination, had appeared to Rodomant, as it appears to all at one time or another, though to none but the most choicely gifted in an attitude so alluring, and with temptations so spiritual and so strong. In an evil hour — for in it he lost his faith in the only person he loved and honored, Rodomant received the first proof of foreign recognition, so important to one who has gained a local one, for he had learned to look upon the country which first nurtured his -genius as his home, and despised it accordingly, as such natures are apt to do. On his way to h.'s lodgings, after his last interview with La,ly Delucy, he had called — he scarcely knew why, to see whether any other letter had arrived at his address ; and found one, thus having received two that day, a cir- cumstmce which, absurd as it may appear, increased his consequence in his own eyes, he having received none for months, except acknowledgments from his first patroness. This second letter, when opened, proved to be a communication from the most popular comj)oser of modern operas, living in Pari- sinia, to whose musical and dramatic recrea- tion he was entirely devoted. It was an address masonically majestic and fraternal, treating Rodomant as his equal, by courtesy, for actually he considered none equal with himself; but it was all the same to Rodo- mant, who was as much his inferior in cun- ning as his superior in art. And after a cloud of complimentary words, there was evolved a meaning which as a tribute to his genius Rodomant implicitly accepted, little suspecting that he was being dealt with for purposes of gain, that is gold, not glory. He was invited to come over and criticise the performance of his Alarcos, before con- du ting \t himself in the most perfectly U constructed theatre of Europe, with an orchestra, orgbjiized with the same precision as Parisinia's militaryj, force. It may seem paradoxical that ali5-.:-eomposer, in this age of rivalries, should seek to advance the interests of another ; but this was also a manager on an immense scale, and had suf- ficient capital both of money and repute to speculate where there was but a ghost of a risk, and to spend where an outlay would probably reduplicate its own return. Alarcos had already been produced in Parisinia, but at inferior houses, and though Rodomant had given careless permission on being paid, after his usual fashion of casting off' things behind, and rushing onwards, his replies would have been diff'erent if he had had the least idea how his work was distorted and defiled on those occasions. Slill the lower Parisinians, whose taste for terror seems imbibed with their mothers', or rather foster-mothers' milk, for there are in Pari- sinia no mothers ; — the ranks of the peojile were literally ])itten with the new tragedy, which, curtailed as it might be in the ideal portions of the plot, received from the act- ing company and scene-painter its full complement of horrors. Rodomant had unintentionally, in choosing such a subject, created what hundreds spend dreary years in trying to invent, and fail, — an interest. Had he felt, or been, one whit like the Par- isinians, he would have shrunk in moral agony from the interest he roused in them, as his physical nerve would have shuddered from the contemplation of the machine for murder which a citizen of Parisinia patented. But his was so fine an imagination that it had power to infuse horror with hues of beauty ; thus it happened, that the match- less charm of the music decided the success in England, of a work whose bare tragedy would have made it fail. But in Parisinia it was the tragedy, not the music, upon which the town was mad, just as in the books of its sovereign novelist, it is the Ac- tive crime, not the retributive moral, which tells so powerfully upon the populace. When the military bands, which had been stationed at different points of the city — not near enough each to each, to mix their diapasons — ceased, Rodomant knew that it was the signal for Alarcos. In seven thea- tres at once, its first note struck at the same hour ; no art-furor had ever been so univer- sal, or endured longer, except a rage of blood. A necessary condition to enjoy a passing triumph, is a calm, what it is almost im])ossible to procure in England, where there is neither a social arrangement, an art- exposition, nor a design for architecture, without a flaw. Rodomant pressed through the illuminated streets unnoticed, which was just what he approved, — for he detested contact with common persons, — and was met at the door of the theatre by a deputa- tion of famous men, all treating him lU 82 RUMOR. though he alone were famous, whifh he ap- proved as much. Nor did they pester hira with too prolonged or multitudinous a pres- ence, for they only accompanied him to the door of the box of the first celebrity among them, a prince of literarians ; then vanish- ing, left him with the owner himself, who, fifter standing till Rodomant was seated, bowed, and removed also to the other corner, larthest from his guest. This box had been selected for Rodomant, because he wished to be himself unseen, and the literarian, among other luxuries, had ordained screens of fine wire to extend along the front of the box, impervious to lights without, though •emi-diaphanous from within. There is not in the world a dramatic audi- ence so refined and so audacious as that of Parisinia ; no critic arbitrates for the crowd — it is a crowd of critics. Disappoint it — balk its passion for the novel, and it bris- tles like a monstrous snake, whose hiss is the sure and instant indicator of its poison- ing sentence. Fascinate it by a shock of novelty, some fresh color added to its Iris, and it will fawn at your feet, wreathe round you a calm enchanted circle, the glare of its glance melt to a softer light than smiles, its fangs drop honey. The fascination of the hour — his own — yet reflected back to him after he dispensed It, crept on Rodomant, and conquered. It was the hour in which he first both tasted luxury and drank its fulness — luxury, ideal and sensuous — the perfume with the flower. He had never been idle to enjoy before, and labor may be love, but to a delicate frame it is never pleasure. Then he sank into cush- ions which supported, while they yielded the softest rest — rest v/ithout sleep, the rarest ; BO trifle this, for it is impossible for a sensi- tive nature to enjoy any thing under circum- stances of physical discomfort. And when he looked out in front, he saw that great eight, a mighty multitude possessed with the spirit of the hour, totally unlike an English crowd, with its restless, ignorant, and divided Interest. Here a phalanx of faces glittered, with an expression one-like, absolute, pale with eagerness, sti-ained with ex])ectation ; a galaxy of glances fixed and ardent, which seemed to devour what they gazed on. Rod- omant shivered like an aspen when that great vision spread before him ; he believed them spelled by the sacred theurgy of art ; he dreamed that from the heaven of his imagination he had rained upon them that manna of the spirit — sweet as the food of angels — a universal sympathy. Little guessed he that but for the scenic sorcery unrolled Ijefore them, they would not have listened, or that, Hke fi:-e to the salamander, was to them their natural atmosphere of fear. What tended to deceive him most was the music itself, an immense orchestra not inter- preted, but produced it as it originally stood. In England it is impossible to make a great orchestra of one min^ ; in Germany orches- tras ai"e small, though generally perfect. Parisinia's taste, the quality which she alone possesses, is infused into art as into fashion, so entirely to charm the senses, that the soul through them has no appeal to make. Rodomant worshipped himself that night, and believed himself adored. There was no fatigue in store for him, his was too inex- haustible a nature, his own music refreshed and strengthened him till he was equal to any eff'ort. Had it not been so, he might have shrunk from the advances of the gentle- man in the box with him, who, immediately the curtain fell, came to him and requested his company that night — he said not to a party — there are no cant terms in Parisinia; but he conveyed to him the impression that he did him the highest honor it was in his power to confer on one so high. This man spoke Rodomanl's own language, and as they met one another in passing out, acted as his interpreter. Nothing can convey the compliments the rest paid Rodomant, too delicate to be crystallized into any other tongue, and it was their manner, through which he imbibed the essence of their cour- tesy, sweet, if cold as the ice-confection for which their banquets are renowned. Still, it was only to these few, who were the un- known to the many, that Rodomant was in- troduced on his way to his entertainer's house. He was to remain incognito, as far as the public was concerned, until he per- formed a self-inauguration by conducting Alarcos ; this arrangement also pleased him well. In the rooms he entered with his conduc- tor, he met again all those to whom he had been introduced, many others — not too many — and many women. He was a neojjhyte quite prepared to reverence a social system which lent such reverence to art ; for to do the Parisinians justice, there is much uncon- scious and childlike generosity in their rec- ognition of genius; but then, perhaps, their passion of novelty is as childish too. Rodo- mant had never actually seen society, except at a bookseller's house in London, — nay, the house of a puritanically disposed publisher, — no free-handed, generous minded one, such as exist, thank Providence, and are tht Providence of genius. x\nd those 'whom there he met, he met in the presence, nay, by the side of a woman not too knowing to be wise, nor too experienced to be innocent. If he thought that gaud-besprent gingerbread drawing-room an ambassador's, he might well be pardoned for esteeming that in which he found himself, a saloon of the chief and central palace of the regnant of Parisinia. It seemed, to his artistic and unsophisticated appreciation, not a room at all, but a temple, dedicated to nymphs and oreads, delicate footed fauns, and bearded satyrs. There was space — for the Parisinians, if they sleep at all, winch seems mythic, sl^ep in carpet- RUMOR. 83 less cloaets, on pallets a prisoner would de- spise, dedicating all the room to effect, and full dress hiding dress, the perfection of taste, as the perfection of art hides art. And as it is space, which more than anj' thing lends illusion to the cathedral and the theatre, so here, in a private assembly, the same effect obtained. And for ornament ; scarcely an- other was employed than flowers ; floAvers wreathed the walls, and hung in long ten- drils from alabaster vases, and rested on fiiir bosoms, while they blushed in dark locks. If few of them were real, what signified it? they all seemed so, and for one, Rodomant did not know it. But innocence is incompatible with wis- dom, though purity from wisdom never sepa- rates ; to know no evil is to know nothing that can make us of service to others in this evil world. And there is no shock so great, yet so tempered by its sadness, as the en- trance of the knowledge of evil to the pure. Against temptations, the strongest to ordi- nary men, Rodomant wore a double armor; his spiritual imagination and strong sense of the absurd. It has been said that tragedy purifies the passions ; it is certain that com- edy holds the most in check. And as for the blind baby-instinct, which is in ordinary cases the last relic of infancy in youth, — so soon stripped from it, like the latest blossom of the spring, — Rodomant had it not; he had never been like a child, — even in the cradle stamped with prematurity, — indeed, being one of those peculiar and exceptional natures who seem not to grow older, but younger, as thev advance in years. An al- most cynical indifference to woman was the angel of Rodomant's life, a stern and uncom- promising genius, albeit good, engendering in him an exaggerated idea of what woman ought to be. That man should err in the act of gaining experience, seemed to him natural and necessary, if not right ; but he also held the opinion, that woman must be perfect, or her spell were broken ; higher than the angels a little, as man was a little lower. A purism peculiar in one so ardent- ly imaginative, and which in puritanic Scot- land might have made him a proselyte (for ■ne phase of his being) to the most detest- able of spctar'an creeds: but which in profli- gate Parisinia clothed his soul M-ith safety, as asbestos sheathes the frame from fire. Still, for escape there might have been a struggle ; the flame might have scorched, though it had no power to consume, but for tlie suddenness — equal to the completeness of the revelation. An introduction step by step ; an initiation, hint by hint, and he might for a moment have bent the knee to Baal, have worshii)ped one hour the corrup- tion Sense had deified. Directly he entered, he had diverted him- self by looking at all the women. This was natural, and also natural that at the first glance he should admu'e them inexpressibly — they were so gay yet so gentle ; all talked so easily, yet in such light, low tones. For it is an error, of general acceptation nevertheless, that the Avomen of Parisinia are rattles, that they have no repose of manner, and possess uncommon vivacity instead of co'^mon intelligence. Now, it is a fact, that the women of the lower orders, if illiterate, are all gossips in all the countries of Eurojse ; and it is to be hoped that the educated avo- men of every other country, leave to England the loud talk, louder laughter, and very slight self-possession which are modern fosb- ions among the English fair. But the refined women of Parisinia are not only ideals of taste, but models of tact also ; for they en- chant without beauty, and almost always without grace ; they smile by Art, make love by Art — their whole lives testify to Art's abuse, when violently separated from Nature, whose monitions govern conscience, for the pure in heart Rodomant's companion, still standing by his side, introduced him to several of these women — singers and actresses ; one or two writers of epicene repute among general readers, but known as women by famous men. Now Rodomant, though self-cultured, was no slave to art; he served it in a free spirit, and had ranged the superficies of modern univer- sal literature as those of his social station are able to do in no country as in Germany. He had read, therefore, the finest translations into its all-ennobling tongue ; but for French novels he had no taste — with one exception ; a tale with its scene laid in Germany, dedi- cated to the two holiest subjects in his young esteem ; the developement of musical art, and the philosophy of lawful love — a perfect book, perhaps the most perfect romance that ever issued from the press in any country. Rodomant had thought it written by a man, for a man's name was on its title sheet ; but he learned this night that it was a woman's, and that its authoress was present. Soon she passed him — a woman of a noble counte- nance, almost a divine expression ; eyes the thoughtfuUest, and brightest, almost an in- fantine-innocence beaming from her splendid brow. Almost, and where not quite, what was the thing wanting? He knew not, yet felt as he gazed ; but it was something vot wanting in her books, for therein Art sup- plied the loss of Nature. Still, Rodomant's interest was seriously excited ; he took pains to question his com- panion ; he expressed ignorance, and a desire to be enlightened, little dreaming what he should hear. For he learned, in about half an hour, that as for that Avoman, not only the man she lived Avith, on Avhose arm she leaned, Avas not her husband, but that she had a husband also. That, of the other women, not one present was the wife of him to AA-hom she seemed one. It was no exceptional infraction of a law as natural as it is moral — no isolated instance of 84 lUMOR. mai-riage tlu'ough hatred dissolved, by the law of nature greater than that of custom ; but it was in Parisinia, literarj', dramatic Pai-isinia, Society's exemplar — the rule of life. Now, after his communications, made with smiling lips, in calm tones, as though he spoke of what must be, and therefore should be, the literarian expected a bow or assent of sympathy, at least, if not an outburst of free and frantic sentiment. But even he, accustomed to every shift of the mask of mannerism, started at the dark disapproba- tion which gathered to the brow of his young listener, the flash of his eye, like lightning through a cloud, the unmistakable recoil, thouirh there Avas no movement of the head or limb. Was Rodomant a pupil of Ven- tura, and yet the composer of an opera tlie most secular, if not profane P Nor could the older and more unhappily experienced set down the strong antipathy of the younger to his green and pliant youth ; his frame was too sturdy, if not robust, his facial lines too strong, his eye too keen and angry. Rodomant from that moment hated his position, and longed to change it ; so did the other, and a chance soon favored both. There had been neither music nor dancing until that moment, at the absence of which Rodomant had been too absorbed to won- der. But now, under a delicate but sweep- ing touch, a pianoforte began to sound — somewhere in the arch-separated saloons — though the ])layer could not be perceived. It was one of those modern pianofortes which a bravurist knocks to pieces in the course of one concert. No bravurist pre- sided here, but of what school of art the performer was a student or master, Rodo- mant could not guess ; he had never met with such a one before. The performance was a measure in triple time, neither ma- zurka nor waltz, resembling both in its sub- ject, but too fleetly hurried into a maelstrom of chromatic harmonies, the embryos of a hundred ideas born prematurely and dying formless — or rather subsiding each into eacli, effectless — as water blends with water. r brushed past Rodomant's strong and h9althy brain like a chaos of the faintest echoes, a whirl of the phantoms of perished sounds ; but to the morbidly rarefied per- ceptions of the rest present, it was a seizure of violent excitement, a sudden mania for universal motion. Every couple present slid as it were into each other's arms — waltzed, but it can hardly be called waltzing — they seem blown in circles by gusts of mi pulse, while wider and wider spread the meshes of tne melody, and closer and closer grew the threadings of the accompaniment, a web of w'tchery no easier for the en- chanted to l)reak than Maimouna's silken line. Rodomant was not enchanted; he gazed with contempt, too lofty for the occasion, ou the gyrations of the possessed. Suddenly, and, as it were, between the spokes of tlia M-heeling vision, he i)erceived an apparition contrasting by its calm with the active frenzy of the croAvd. A man, standing perfectly still, his figure darkly defined against the rose-colored silk curtain which was dropped between the farthest arch and the recess where the instrument was placed ; for Pari- sinia's last new art-toy, her pet pianist, was fi:ir too fastidious and nerve-tortured to endure the gaze of the multitude. Now Rodomant was attracted to this man, as he believed, solely because he was standing still, and the only person present who ap- peared able to keep still besides himself; and as Rodomant al-ways acted on impulse, though he was unaff"ected by the impulse to waltz, he walked straight out from the wall to join him whom he admired, only because that being was behaving like himself. Ro- domant took no pains to avoid the dancers ; on the contrary, he maliciously hoped that he might trip one or two of them up — no such thing — the tact of Parisinians perme- ates them from head to foot ; they never trip, either in address or step, and all they did was with seeming unconsciousness to shrink into closer circles as he approached, and leave him a clear path through them. Thus, without the gratification of rendering any one ridiculous, he reached his destina tion ; still dark against the roseate back- ground stood the calm, unyielding figure, for the man to Avhom he was attracted did not lean nor lounge ; he stood upright, firm, as if his feet were rooted to the ground ; and further, his aspect made Rodomant de- spise himself, for having glanced at all at the frivolities which frittered the hour ; for his countenance was casted with indifference, not contempt, and his eyes seemed shut, so lieavily the lids were dropped, nor did the balls quiver. Was ho asleep ? thought Ro- domant. Could he sleep standing, like a horse ? That question was soon settled, for the moment Rodomant took his stand by his side, as though he meant to stay, the other opened his eyes, and turned them, without moving a muscle, to look at him. It was an instantaneous glance — no stare, and the look not lustrous, the eye's light languid as that of the sun when ray-shoi'u and half-blinded by a summer heat-mist. " Oh, that he Avould look at me again,' thought Rodomant ; " does he admire or despise me ? and why should I care which ? " Why, indeed ? he is no musician, nor poet, nor art-enthusiast ; men call him visionary, hut are visions parents to their own fulfil- ment ? are they built up, dream by dream, into solid towers of pride, whose top shall touch the heavens? Rodomant cared, because it was a neces- sity of his soul to care, a necessity suddenly aroused, if not created. As diamond cuts diamond, so does genius recognize genius, RUMOR. 85 and it only, with utter appreciation. A man of genius may be flattered by the admiration of the crowd — that is not recognition ; it is that the real gem resembles the counterfeit as the counterfeit mocks the real ; the crowd will acknowledge either, and mistake very easily the one for the other. But with the admiration of the crowd true genius is never ■ satisfied ; by its peers alone will it be judged, only accept their sentence. For genius ' knows that with its brother genius dwells no envy — only a great and loving jealousy, which urges the brother to loftier flights of imagination, and profounder utterances from the oracle of wisdom : a jealousy pure as that of the prophet, " jealous " for the honor of the Most High. Never had any man — and only one wo- \ man — attracted Rodomant before. Never had he before been mastered, for none could master him but his superior in ambi- tion — not music. He did not know this, any more than he knew that he was sub- dued ; had he known it, he would have burst away. And his ignorance of the spell set upon him proved its strength. There was a likeness between him and this man — a singular resemblance, and yet a difl'eri'nce more remarkable. Rodomant jjerceived the likeness, and was delighted to observe that he was no plainer than the stranger — on the contrary, the stranger was plainer than he. They were both the same height to an inch, both small and spare, both of the strongest make ; but the stranger looked as if his muscles were wrapped close together, and riveted with iron ; in Rodomant the articulation was con- stantly perceptible from his constant rest- lessness. The stranger's hand was small as Rodomant's, but stiff and still, yet looking, even in repose, as if its grasp could stran- gle; Rodomant's had the free fling of tbe ])ractised musician ; it hung light and loose from the wrist. On both their faces lines of nervous sufl'en'ng were drawn ; but Rod- omant's assisted in the caprices of expres- sion, for they melted and reappeared ac- cording to his moods of pleasure or disgust; the stranger's were carven like hieroglyphs on granite, and as mysterious ; calm and endurant, but not to be translated by men. His brow was swart, yet sallovv — darkly ])ale, darker by multitudinous shades than the keen heights of Rodomant's noble fore- head, yet square like that forehead at the base, and sloping instead of rising — like his — into hair without curl, but waving, short and wirily, all over ; while Rodomant's tossed here and there, finely fluttering in every breath. And certainly in detail the features of both diff'ered decidedly enough ; for Rodomant's nose, though powerful and fastidious, was short and not large ; that of the other was far too large for beauty, with a wide nostril, breathing subtlety, yet, itrange to say, fastidious too. As for Rod- omant's mouth, its thin lines were clear tc the eye ; but that of the stranger remained, even to Rodomant, a mystery, for not a trace of it was perceptible under the im- mense, thick-trimmed moustache ; though the chin and jaw — the stronijhold of voli- tion — were shaven as smooth as Rodo- mant's. And therein reigned the likeness supremely, both wei^ so strong, so solid, with an expression at once austere and eager. But the eye — that sun and centre of ex- pression — diff'ered more from Rodomant's than the whole firmament of eyes in the room that night ; strange eyes, of no color that eyes should be — of no color save the color of the sea, yet neither its deep blue calm, nor its sparkling, sunny emerald ; but the hue of the heavy waves rolling sullen beneath a sea of cloud ; the green not clear, but turbid, and the foam not white, but gray. And gloomy as the sea-hung cloud, there haloed the eyes a rim of deep brown shadow, imparting to each iris an intense softness, in which the pupils seemed not to rest but float. Further, this man Avas dressed, like Rodomant, in black ; like Rodomant, he wore neither ribbon-end nor order-bauble, and in his air, whether real or assumed, was of as utter simplicity as Rodo- mant's. But again there interposed a con- trast between their modes of address ; be- tween Rodomant's reckless ingenuousness where he took a fancy, and the other's im- pregnable reserve. This final dissimilitude piqued Rodomant to his most audacious ' behavior, which was in fact his best, be- j cause most natural. " Well," said he abruptly, in bad Parisin- I ian — grammatically bad, as he had only ! picked a few sentences out of a pronouncing dictionary — " this is the true black or unlaw- ful Art, and what do ive here, assisting at its impious rites ? What has bitten them all ? " " A spider, I believe they call it," answered the other, slowly and between a slow half yawn. Now Rodomant had never heard of the tarantula. " Quite a mistake," he said, " it is a member of a society of apes, with an Englishwoman for his mother. Some mis- sionaries — Moravians no doubt " — this with a private domestic sneer — " made a settlement in the monkey-islands, carrjing with them a pianoforte, and an old maid apiece for each pug, as bribes. And having baptized and trained one of the off"spriug, packed it off to Europe for exposition, on purpose to foil 7ne." " Surely you are no artist ? " questioned the stranger, in a dubious tone. " What else should such as I be ? " growled the other. " I asked for information • but you look like a man of sense — you suggest wit also, and a knowledge of the world — but above all you look sensible." " And why 7iot an artist and also a man 86 RUMOR. of sense, wit, knowledge of the -world — how an artist without ? " Here Rodomant blundered into German. To his surprise the stranger went on in German too, easily, if lazily pronounced. " it is simply impossible ; I do not speak of mediocrity, or the perfection ef mechanic skill, but of a king-artist." " Right term," nodded Rodomant. " Dear me, are you also one ? " " Quite another, the fiirthest from it ; but I comprehend the principle of all dominant aspirations — to be first, or die. I was going to observe that one man can only suc- ceed well in one thing — can only be perfect through concentration — that is, can be hut one." " Well," said Rodomant, " and what is God ? " reverently, yet innocently, using the world's name for the Supreme, as the German-child uses the Christ's name, child to child. The stranger, who of all races least favored German, looked dubiously, as before he had spoken ; he lacked the fluency of Rodomant. " I will answer you," said the latter, who could not bear to wait — " God is Love. And yet in that word who dares to say that all attributes of good and genius are not comprehended ? Power to create and de- stroy ; to try the pure, and judge the base ; retribution and reward in His right hand and in His left." " Stay, " said the stranger, " I cannot fol- low you ; you are out of your depth, or / am drowned in the shallowest. I merely meant to convey — for actually it is but an acces- sory, at the best, of which we are treating — that one man can only do one thing well." " And you suppose, sir, that Art, as you call it, is but one thing ? Creation is pro- gressive, though Nature is permanent. The seasons are born fresh every year ; we change our bodies once in seven, yet all remains, for the chain of facts as of ideas is ever conse- quential, yet incomplete, as Time is incom- plete without Eternity, and Eternity has no end. Artists are nearer Heaven than most men, for they best carry out the notion of i continuity." " I give it up," said the other, " for if I WHS nearly drowned before in the depth, I have nC'W nearly lost my breath in the rarefied height of your metaphysics. But I value Art's amenities, and if 1 were at the head, s-ould encourage them — they should be the mxuries of the poor as they are necessaries to the hixurious of the rich." " Condescending," said Rodomant, " but as you are not at tlie head, as you call it, nor likely to be in a position to command me, it matters just nothing. But what do you call amenities ? what we have just heard ? " " I have not heard a note ; I did not listen." j " I would malce you listen to me." I " I have heard you alreadj-." " You mean Alarcos ? " asked Rodomant, pettishly. " Well, if you don't like that, and can't enter into it, and don't allow that 1 am at the head there, why it is of no con- sequence what you think, and I have ren- dered myself ridiculous fur the f^-st time in my life in talking to you, and it is what I deserve for coming into company, which I detest as I hate the devil, and where alone it .^ems to me one meets him." " But I like it, I enter into it, I allow you at the head there. I feigned at first, for 1 wished to see whether any one so suddenly- exalted could be sincere and sensible : for I do hold to my first opinion, that without sense a man never consolidated a design, nor met save with furtive successes. But more than this; listen — I, who never thanked a man before, I am gratetul to you, for you have helped me — you have sliorlened my tvay, perhaps by many steps." There was such intense meaning in these few words, that they tortured Rodomant's taste for the mysterious. " Tell me — tell me ! " he called out, and stamped upon the floor, though the stamp was smotliered in the thick-piled mat on which he stood, and gave no sound. And he glared his gray eyes upon the stranger. But the stranger made no sign ; the cast, as it were, slipped back over his countenance ; down fell the lids, expressionless as sleep ; and Rodomant felt that he might as well address, expecting an answer from, a stone. CHAPTER XIX. At that very moment, the lady of the house, — for there was a lady of the house, though no master, came up to Rodomant, requesting him to play. And it struck Rodomant, intuitively, that it had been her approach on the cessation of the playing and the dance, which had restored the stranger to his indifference. Of course Rodomant was gratified at this suggestion of his own sagacity, for the other had meant then to confide in turn, though yet he knew not what ! But he thought only to surprise the stranger into emotion, how to draw from his brain one tear, even though it should dry before it fell ; he longed to melt for one instant his unrelenting mood. So he obeyed the lady's request ; otherwise, he would have bluntly refused it. So he stepped within the rosy silken flutes, not looking back, for he would have disdained to show his desire, but desiring, and expecting the stranger would follow him, which was not the case. Behind the curtain was a sort of impromptu green-room ; many of the initiated into whatever mystery had RUMOR. 87 last, been advertised and explained in Pari- siniu were already there, clustered like drones round the author of the last hour's " sensa- tion." Rodomant glowered upon them all but the latter, and would have chiefly scowled in nis direction, but for his aspect. He, the player of the spider-dance, lay on a couc^h in a half-dislocated heap, exhausted, nerve-wrung. One lately dragged from the rack could scarcely more wildly writhe ; not a gloam of spirit redeemed the morbidity of the countenance ; it was like a skeleton clothed on with shadow — that frame worn down with the constant and grateless effort to maintain the charlatanic efficacy, the white magic of those wasted fingers. Rodo- mant had not been far wrong when he likened him to an ape highly cultured — still an ape in extremity might excite even tears of pity ; but not in Rodomant, whose great fault was that he could not compromise, even Avhen a concession was due on charitable grounds. He found, as he had expected, that the instrument was not tone-worthy, as he would have expressed it. But what was that to one whose tone-generating touch had calli'd up the phantoms of sound in their sweet- ness, as they had breathed of old, from the hollows of organ-pipes in Mhich the winds ! had died ? Here was a task more difficult, then, — easier for him to accompli'-h, — who cared to accomplish none that were not difficult, and for others than himself impos- sible. And he pdayed only for one person ; therefore his judgment, true to intuition, en- forced him to play in the simplest adaptive style. He chose a pastoral movement, for the inartistic ear is attracted by art sugges- tive rather than creative ; and beneath his breathing fingers the leaves danced lightly, soft gusts swept the i-ustling grass, in the midst of a multitudinous warble the passion- saddened nightingale dropped tears of mel- ody, the low pathetic bleat of distant flocks, the small sharp cricket chirp, the milkmaid's troll, all chafed the ear at once, and now and then the huntsman's horn, the hounds' wild, wailful cry, shivered through the voiceful aim, then died as into the distance, and «eemed to leave nature to its joy. And soothing as nature to the world-wearied poet was this, its successful imitation, to the player ; he had meant to affect one other only, but he had played himself into a mood of rare content, and cai-ed not the least for those polite countenances, the contempt of whose owners he perceived as distinctly as one sees through transpai'ent glass ; nor would he have cared if he had heard with his earthly ear their dismissing verdict in respect of his playing — not his distinct dra- matic genius — the verdict being rococo, older that was than the memory of any present, a memory not permitted in eti- quette to extend beyond yesterday — a lit- eral yesterday in Parisinia. Rodomant returned to his corner. The man he had designed to melt was gone. Not into the crowd, one glance showed that among ten thousand, he could not have con- cealed himself. Had Rodomant then struck the rock ? and breaking up the fountains of his heart, driven him for sacred shame, " to his chamber to weep there P " Or had he vanished directly Rodomant left him, an alternative flattering to the man as degrad- ing to the artist, since it proved the interest to have been excited by the person ; and in- deed this possibility reconciled Rodomant to the fact of his being a stock more soulless than the stones that danced for Orpheus. Stung by curiosity to an irritation which made it impossible to remain in that languid atmosphere, he felt that he must question someone, and unconsciously hastened to the likeliest person, the gentleman who had in- troduced him there. This gentleman was enraptured in a quiet way, to see Rodomant return to his side, not only because it had been inconvenient to him to come — for the Parisinians are perfect in politeness, if they know not heaven-born courtesy — but be- cause he had in progress four romances, six editorial leaders, and three ])lays, for more copy of all which about a dozen printers' imps were to call at noon on the morrow. They passed silently down broad stairs into the street ; the broad, beauteous street, now covered with its pitying veil of moon- light, for the illuminations, waxing sick when Rodomant left the theatre, had died out since, leaving no trace of their glory but a scent of rancid oil-smoke. Still Rodo- mant rejected the cigar offered by his com- panion, who seemed as though the end of his existence were answered, not in covering as many sheets of paper, but in consuming as many cigars as possible in the shortest possible time. Not that Rodomant could not have smoked, but he was a true epicure, and preferred the bouquet of choice tobacco to its flavor ; besides, he was noM- preoccu- pied, and dreaded lest there should not be time for a full gratification of his curiosity. " What is the name of the man who did not make a fool of himself?" he inquired, when his companion had puffed a few times. " Sir," replied the other, removing his cigar as though he cared not for it, and in that inimitably polite tone with which a Par. isinian offers or responds to an insult : " sir, there are in Parisinia no fools." Then Rodomant sneered at the moon, for looking down on that Babel of bright con- ceits. " Oh," he said, " I mean the man who did not dance, the man about my make, in the corner against the red flap." " The little man who could not dance — oh yes, I can tell you." There was a deli- cate slight of Rodomant's own personality in this description, for Rodomant had spoken of the man as his own make, and Rodomant had not danced ; actually, though not be- cause he could not, it was a fact that he had 88 HUMOR. nevar tried. And thin-skinned as are_ tlie sensitive youth of genius, he felt the slight. Before he could recover himself or reply, the literarian went on. " In effect it makes one laugh a little. He whom you denoted as the only wise man, Mas the only fool present. Just now they hand him about for being a fool who has" done a clever thing. Nothing can equal the stupidity of that small personage except his insignificance — shown in this : that though he got out of prison only a week ago, imprisonment too for a state offence, really such as a child might perpetrate in kicking the crown on its cushion in the closet, the king has pardoned him the escapade, and engaged to let him go free, on condition that he stays out of Parisinia." " But he is in Parisinia noio," said Rodo- mant. "The king does not know that, and it is one among many things he does not know." " How then ? you are honorable although you are his enemy ; you keep his secret for him ? " " Do you suppose," said the stranger in a sibilant whisper, after staring all round him for several minutes — " do you suppose that because I am his enemy, I am the king's friend ? I hate him, I detest them both, both the galvanized skeleton and the skeleton that cannot obtain enough fluid* to set him going. I hate all skeletons of royalty. It is delicious to hate — to love palls after it ! " Rodomant shuddered ; he felt rather as though he were side by side with a locomo- tive anatomy ; a chill as deadly as if it wan- dered from an empty vault to supply its wandering tenant with proper nutriment, seemed to glaze the warm fast current of the artist's noble heart. He did not understand the morbid mystery, and shrank from trying to solve it ; it was something veiy different that he desired to know. " But what then is this man's name ? " " He goes by all kinds of titles for con- venience, but only acknowledges to one. He calls himself ' Porphyro, — in sublime eimplicity repudiates a baptismal name. He says he is a captain, — it must be of some mytliical militia, — for he belongs to no reg- iment of Iris ; yet has always lived in Par- isinia. He confesses neither to father, mother, nor relations, and I fancy has suc- ceeded in convincing himself that he is the offspring of Theogony. He is dull as an English day, dry as a German dictionary, a mummy resuscitated, possessed neither of mercury nor blood. His talk is all epigram, trite as Time ; and effete as are his opinions, he absolutely has not prudence enough to conceal them. He exhibits to every person who is idiot enough to notice him, his wind- eggs on which he has brooded till they are addled, and in every one's eyes will blow his big bubbles, that burst the moment they have air. In fact, he is star-sirucJc, a higher degree of madness than the mania of simple moonshine, but quite as harmless." " What was his ofience ? " asked Rodo- mant, quietly, M'ho had borne the one-sided tirade thus far with patience, for fear its point should, after all, elude him. " Sir," said the other, striking his cigar as j if it were a color, yet holding it out at arm's- J length as though it were the badge of all the j tribe of authors. " Sir, his offence is a 1 duplicature, or rather two-sided, after the J moral of the gold and silver shield — you recollect the fable ? " " Well." " Again, our good brother, the author of the ' Shadowless,' speaks with just contempt of those who treat serious matters as trifles, and trifles as serious matters. Now, the king " " In his name ! " exclaimed a deep grum- bling voice, and from a pitch-black archway sprang an armed man, and laid his sounding hand upon the literarian's shoulder ! Yet how low had been his voice, how hushed his chatter — could any but Rodomant have overheard that last word single-dropping to a whisper ? — it would seem so, and moiy than one ear, too, for two other figures grew out of the darkness suddenly, and pinioned the arms of him whom the first arrested^ The four marched quickly, clattering along the pavement, leaving Rodomant behind them, alone in the moonlight. Exceeding dissatisfaction kept him calm for several moments — now should he never know what the strange man's fault had been, for he felt he could never ask him, even if he should meet him again. Then- he wondered why they had taken the other and left him ; somewhat pride-stung, for he would rather have gone to prison than not be noticed. But this mood was born and dead in a mo- ment only ; he was too sagacious not to re- turn to the conviction that freedom is better than bondage. " What a fool he must be," was the final sum of his musings, " to have walked so quietly along with them ; I would have knocked them all down and run away Still, Rodomant was sagacious enough no. to repeat the king's name, even to his thoughts. The event influenced him some- what, besides, for on returning to the hotel where he had in the morning engaged rooms, he discovered that what he had seen and heard had given him a disgust for luxury and ease, or rather had rubbed away the bloom from his idea of them. So he dis- dained to sleep in his elegant bed with the gilded columiis, and kicking ofl' his shoes, lay on the door-mat till the morning ; when he confounded his mother (who was his in- variable companion and care) by looking out, in the tallest house of the narrowest street, for the barest attic, fullest of draughts and draught-blown dust. Thereunto he re- moved ere night, appointing to his mother a RUMOR. 89 room at hand, somewhat more commodious than his own, though quite as devoid as that of the grace which invests outward Pari- sinia, and shuns all he;' internal arrange- ments, except the saloons, which are r ever complete unless filled. In his attic Rodomant also found the jare memory rise like an unbidden phantom to his thought, that he was in truth not yet free ; the excitement of the night before pass- ing like fumes of a less spiritual intoxication from his brain ; he stood face to face with the hard fact of the debt not yet paid. '1 o pay it became his fixed idea ; his pride nour- ished and kept it living. Now it was of no use, as he directly discovered, to prorUice his matchless minstrelsies of the soul to tin. i^ory key, for no one would just then buy them ; no, nor his imitations of imitation — that market was monopolized by the pianist, who had last bitten the Parisinians, and Rodo- mant's plain sense told him it would be as impossible for him to excel the other in tliat craft, as to supplant the reigning ballet queen in her own slippers. Not long, how- ever, had he to %oait that he might work, knowing what woi'k was to the purpose — in Parisinia they live so fast that the hour is the moment, and with the moment came the . man. He had not to wait, for that morning, that moment of the hour was he in request. And if a fiJctory-child were to be paid a month's wages for a single day's work, it would not be more simply astonished than was Rodomant, when the receipts poured in upon him ; positively to be paid for what, instead of hard work, was one whelming su- perfluity of intense delight, for he had but to conduct, night after night, his virgin opera, making whatever strictures he liked upon the singers' voices, exalting the orchestral perfectibility to an empyrean in which the critic could not breathe, so long as he con- sented to be paid for himself conducting it ; and so, eccentrician as he was, attract full houses as an additional novelty amidst the surfeit of yet unexhausted horror. So, by day, it happened that Rodomant rested and meditated, as one might do in the express train at full speed, for such seemed his sud- denly eventful and teeming life to be. And now he suddenly became, not only a mind, but a person, constantly in request, a condi- tion as fiattering to the proud who yet know not the world, as to the vain who know the world. To do Parisinia justice, her leaders would quite as soon visit her heroes and idols in garrets or cellars, as in golden sa- loons, only the inhabitant must be either heroic or adorable, the Jirst of the class he represents, whether artist in sugar, or ideal- ist of crime. Every morning brought cards and notes to Rodomant, and would have brought visitors, but these were as incessantly refused admittance ; this again put down to the charge of intentional originalisra, whereas they were not admitted simply because the 12 inhabitant was n(»w too actually ii depend- ent to bear to sacrifice his independence, for he had no notion of making himself a diffi- cult and therefore more desirable acquaint- ance. The little man who could not dance, the man with the imperial-sounding name, and doom of insignificance, had not been incorrect even had he said as well as thought, tl^at a man musician could be a man in no popular and conventional sense. For Rodo- mant up there, knew nothing of that which the raggedest street-sweeper, the starveling of an operative with less time than he for self-emancipation from the bondage of igno- rance, knew perfectly, while their steady eyes watched faithfully, if very wearily, hoping for respite at the end, or rather at the begin- ning of the new. Nothing knew Rodomant — the luxurious art-child, cradled on her bosom softer for her own than Nature's even, if not so broad as hers, and soothed by her divine lullabies — of the changes, rapid as though a prism flashed on her instead of the blue constant Heaven, which were passing over Iris and its diamond of cities. Nothing knew he, seated in his cave high upon Olym- pus, above the cloud and storm, below the sun and starbeam only, of that awful periodic passion, which more dread than epidemy, more wild than war, more secret than earth- quake, though as sure, was returning from its last rest, to burst upon devoted Parisinia, seven times already purified by sharper pangs than of fire, or of pain, or of the sword, or nature-spasm, but not yet pure. But if any thing can be said to be peculiar to Parisinia, where every thing is unlike all else in other cities, it is — not the moral vol- cano over which her genius broods — but the indifterence with which her children regard the monumental evidences of past eruptions, and prophesy others to succeed. Dehcately as fairies in their fairydom, indestructible because immaterial, they dance upon the thin lava crust, green with last spring's grass, purple with last spring's violets. Nay, on that grave of graves they plant their vine- yards and their corn, they rear their marts of crystal, besprent with their toy-miracles, their love-tokens of young invention, and the Iris-orbed bubbles of the gentle queen Ca- price. Now Rodomant, though he refused to make acquaintance among Parisinians in his single room, disdained not to acquaint himself with Parisinia on her own broad ground, he being besides in too healthy a physical state to endure existence without exercise and air. It may seem strange that he, an artist, should not have found his way into the matchless picture-house, mausoleum of dead, and princely rfception-rooms of liv- ing painters, which really seems the only en- during crown of Parisinian pride ; but Rod- omant feared — his passion for painting was nearest to his love for music, as is often the case, and he dared not gratify the former at the expense of the latter. He confined 90 RUMOR. his scrutiny to the shops, *nd there enjoj'ed the counterfeit images of many an art-gem, whose original would have enslaved his soul. For say, oh youngest and freshest of enthu- siasts! perusing the counterfeit of the Palace of Art in its shrine " all windows," — is the Court Alhambra, Alhambra to thy soul ? is Pompeii excavated for thee there ? does Rome breathe ? dost thou swoon joy-stricken, amidst the marble divinities which now real, we ripened from the ghosts of fable that haunted thy classic boyhood ? and even amidst the brilliant development of plant and flower in its garden, that Paradise re- gained, dost thou shudder beneath the stu- pendous substances which assume to be shad- ows of Geology's gigantic world, that Past behind the Past ? Therefore is Rodomant safe, and for the same reason, is safe from the women of Par- isinia, as a poet, even a modern poet, if a true poet, is safe from the whole revelation of the real Vanity Fair, last named so among men, because first deemed so among angels. It is easy to bring knowledge to men's doors, but they must seek for wisdom, and go out of their houses to find it. Rodomant sneered most impatiently at such shops as he would have termed " bazaars for women," that is, the very toy-miracles and love-tokens of invention, and bright- blown bubbles of caprice ; but he ever rested before the print-shops. There are no such print-shops in the whole world. There was one, his favorite, because as he beheved the cause, replenished every day, but really, on account of the delicious taste which spread it ; for taste is as inefl'able a luxury to the mind, as comfort to the body. The com- partments of this window were modelled like the arches of the great cathedral of Parisinia ; in each niche stood the model of its enshrined saint, and one or two of the finest proof-engravings published in every city of the earth, lay beneath the shadow of that fairy calendar, changed every day. Rodomant had been bred in superstitious horror of the Catholic religion, and since his mature manhood had learned to look upon its results too lightly ; the reaction of all superstitions in their excess. Those mind- wanderings of macerated monks, light-headed from fasting to starvation's edge ; those soft ravings of cloister-caged virgins, dream- bound for lack cf dear reality: the yearnings so natural, on the one hand, for wifehood forbidden and maternity repressed, on the other for the material bride and material heaven of home ; whose ideal ever is to be crushed down into aching sense like the living burled alive ; all these unwritten tragedies were unread by Rodomant ; how far less comprehended or even guessed at in their divine perfection, — which only Jeho- vah knows how to reward, — the exalta- tions, the humiliations, above all the char- ities of these living dead, who shall soonest among the living obtain the life flirough ■ death. 1 In this shop-window, all were Catholic por- traits, whether architectural or personal. One morning as Rodomant approached, he noted in a glance, that the whole frontage of view was occupied by a single picture, a portrait too, an immense white margin framing the fi^ce and figure of a charitable sister in her weeds of sacred office. This was sufficient for Rodomant, who would have turned to go without looking. As easily might the poet belated at the evening, — his own sweet time, determine that he would not look upon the evening-star, full risen in the dusk above him. He may look round, sweep with his adoring eye the whole twilight, whitened with the brightening stars like dew, as soft and tremulous ; or the darkling earth where his feet crush the real dew bedropt unseen ; but for that one steadfast star, the star that shone before all others, and still shines brightest, if far softer than they all, he must turn to it, if only to see that still it shines there, safe in Heaven. So gazed Rodomant upon the passionate yet saint-like visage of the unknown portrait. For that it was a likeness he never doubted ; no artist could create the ideal of such a countenance, only the Creator who created all. It was a new face, no marvel it was displayed to Pari.siuian eyes; but whether beautiful or' not, Rodo- mant, as a single observer, did not know, he was so new in the sense of its impression, to all beauty. But it held him breathless,"^ike a mighty musical idea ; a mystery which he yet should reveal unto himself, a silent proph- ecy. And strange to say, after the first long thirsting gaze was satisfied, he felt excited to composition, went home, seeing nothing round him, and wrote in his best style, the unsalable. Next day, very early, he naturally and impulsively went to the same place ; there were still the small shrined figures, the crosses garlanded with passion- flowers, the bloomless if undying grave- wreaths, but no nun — in her place some novel delineation of antique martyrdom. Rod- omant turned away with disgust too deep for anger. Wandering from wiiidow still to window, he started again, then rested at another print-shop. Here were crowned heads and mitred foreheads; all the peat, the fair, the famous, or the vicious — in the midst the nun. A nun no longer, which fact for an instant staggered Rodomant, as though an instance of human inconstancy. For he called her a nun, comprehending not the distinction between the costume of such a one, and a sister of another order. Soon he forgot to censure, to Monder, even to think ; the measure of sensation filled up to the brim by that same first impression, rather than contemplation — he had received the day before. This was a tinted picture, and now she was dressed as a beautiful refined woman da-esses before the world, with delicate RUMOR. 91 lace, and i)ale golden water-lilies in her shaded golden hair. Still, for that skin so pale yet brilliant, for those star-eyes filled with light that blinded their own hue, for those lips that seemed ready to quiver into a smile, jet refrained as from too full human pity of all the millions who must weep on earth ; for all these color suffice not, nor art ; it was impossible not to believe that the original as far surpassed the portraiture, as the sun hi? niost Earning painted image. But about this, or the points on which a woman-fancier dvells, or a poet moons, Rodomant knew nothing, and knew not that he felt. As far as external impression went, he only remarked, so as to admire jealously, that this Avoman's forehead was finer as well as fairer than his own ; for the internal im- pression, so mastering yet so calm, it again filled him with the imagery of music, evolved tones in his brain to which he listened — as he looked at her, and swept by an irresist- ible yearning to create, as the day before, he wandered home, that is going not at all straight, but indirectly thither. And would have written, but being out of paper, was driven forth again to buy some, and found that he was haunted. She was every where ; here again in one window in her sad-colored raiment, the cloistral calm seeming to float above a calm far purer in her face, bent as it seemed on an eternal mission ; ihere she M'as on horseback, where Rodomant hated to see women, but where at least this woman looked the most a woman, in the divine con- trast of her countenance with her position ; and last, full fronting him, she carried a diadem on her brow. From this last picture Rodomant plucked himself away, very angry to find that she was, as he would have ex- pressed it, a queen. After that last look, he would not go near the shops ; he was seized with a sudden shame at having looked at all, and at the same moment affected with a curious shyness of his kind, as though his admiration of an object exposed in public were contraband. Nor did he dream of possessing himself of one of these many copies, he felt too keenly their art-deficiency, while his natural pride and reticence forbade him to ask any one for the simplest informa- tion al )out the original. So by a strong eff'ort, which, in one of his unimpaired volition, was sure to be successful, he wiped the picture from his memory, and went to work igain. This time having a genuine purpose, if one of little worth in his own private opinion ; for he was called upon in frantic yet all courteous terms, to prepare music and dramatic illustration for an opera, to fill the gap in case Alarcos should suddenly or tran- siently cease to excite. Rodomant ran his eye through the piece, still the tragedy of terror, the passion murder ; and as all tragedy was precious to Rodomant, and any passion acceptable, both suggestive, he con- sented. In a week copies of the score were ready, for he flung from his hand the blotted scraps, sure that by a thousand imps at Art's bidding, all would be made clear without his troubling himself, as certainly he had not found in London. Soon — a natural result in the case of a mind and character equally exalted above the average, his steady enthusiasm faltered, and his mood subservient to a lower stan- dard of taste and feeling, became one of ex- citement merely. MeanXime his ideal purism retreated from his own perception, still there in its place, the innermost soul of being, just as the stars shine on above a lighted theatre, but those within behold them not ; and it seemed as though his destiny — no divine one, if so it doomed him — were to fix him in Parisinia so that he could not move. For there came a white day — a diamond among the jewels of circumstance, as he momentarily and yet innocently con- sidered it ; he was ordered to conduct Alar- cos in the private theatre of the king within palatial premises. Loyalty would seem to be a passion innate in all fine natures ; per- chance a faint reflex of that divine faculty of worship which explains while it assists to keep the first commandment ; and though Rodomant was in half-descent from the race ruled specially by Heaven's King, he yet re- tained the simple susceptibility of the Ger- mans to external impresidons ; to him a king was not a man like otljer men, he was the anointed of the Most High ; and to his shame be it spoken, for this very reason he was most independent in his deportment on this occasion ; he concealed his gratification, and obeyed the command as a favor which he could have refused had he chosen. The au- dience consisted of the sovereign, his wife and children, and the court, and looked like a group ready for an historic painter. Noth- ing so perfect was ever so unsatisfactory ; nothing so elaborate ever so monotonous ; nothing so brilliant ever so dull. Still Rod- omant enjoyed the event as a child enjoys its birthday regalities and revels, and it was to be his last enjoyment in Parisinia. On his way home, for he refused to be escr „ed in a royal carriage, and it went em,jcy to his house that still the honor might descend upon him, he stepped into a golden retreat for a cup of cofiee, delicious as the nectar of the gods. Here, to his surprise, he met the literarian, Avhom he had never seen since the night of his first intro- duction, for Rodomant, ajsorbed in his conductorship, never looked to see who was present at the public performances of his works. " I will walk home with you," remarked the literarian, " I have something to say." And Rodomant by this time knew enough of Parisinia not to wonder why he did not explain himself then and there. They went forth. " We shall not be watched now," said Rodomant's companion, 92 RUMOR. •' they know too well that you have no opinions." " No opinions ! " growled Rodomant. " No political opinions, and they are the only ones that are alive in Parisinia, alive to be starved, or drowned, or gagged." " But I have political opinions," said Rod- omant, heedless of the ineffable experience that sneered upon him at hand, "I have political opinions, I am very loyal, I always stick to the king, wherever I find myself. I am quite aware that it is dangerous in Pai'i- ^siioia, not to honor the king." " Fool," hissed the literarian, or rather hissed the first letter of that name in Pari- sinian which in Hebrew, a prince of the house of David forbade brother to use to brother. But most likely Rodomant and this man were not brothers, after all. " Well," said the latter, coolly as frozen courtesy drops ever on the hidden warmth of sim])le charity. " Do you wish to hear my message for you ? " " That depends on who sent it," observed Rodomant, adding with the self-composure of genius, for which the tact of the man of ten talents is no match, " I don't see how you can have a message from any one to me ; i thought you were taken to prison." " My dear, a new-laid egg is not more creamed with innocence than you, nor con- ceals its innocence within its shell unfrac- tured, as do you. True, I Avent to prison — j all fashionable persons so graduate here. Yes, I went to prison, slept very comforta- bly, and was let out next morning, having been by a slight mistake taken for somebody else." " Taken for whom ? " " They saw me walking with you, and in the dark took me for a man you had been seen talking to in the evening." " A man ! have they put him in prison too ? " said Rodomant, rather eagerly. " Xo, they could not find him." " Xo more can I," said Rodomant, in an anxious manner, which let him down to the lowest step of the ladder of the other's vari- ous standards. " I have looked for him con- stantly, sometimes have thought that he might have come to see me, or asked per- mission. But perhaps, being no artist, he did not dare." " He cares now, it seems, enough to send for you, if not p'^-vgh to come after you himself. 1 saw hmi only this morning." " Is he here ? and how do you know, if no one else knows ? Why should he tell you ? " " Why should he not i " " Because you might repeat, as you cer- tainly seemed to detest him." " Xot so ; being sworn adversaries in opinion, we are for each other the safest friends." Rodomant did not understand this, and scorned to inquire, for he cared not in truth to know. " I was happening," remarked the othei " to speak of your last work, and Porphyro asked whether it was like the first ? I re- plied that it resembled such fragments as you might have disdainfully discarded after pruning the first ; warmed up." " A lie," said Rodomant. " The greatest compliment," said the other; " I thought you had cooked it so on pur- pose. Parisinia, like the old clothesmen m the wilderness, has long loathed light food ; she has a present appetite for fiesh-meat, cooked not after the Jewish law ; by and by she will loathe cooked meat, and tear raw quails to pieces with her teeth. You have merely studied the taste of the times." " Disgusting nonsense, worthy of a mad- man with a nightmare ! I am thankful, at least, to be no loriter ; there are no eternal laws for language, as for music." Rodomant restrained himself at this point — not really reverencing his tormentor, a^d fearing to lose the information it seemed he alone could give him. " So he sent me a message — give it me." " I happened, as I said, to mention you, and he clapped his hands once, saying with his eternal triteness, ' The slave of the Ring.' " Xow. nothing would have made it endura- ble to Rodomant to be called even sport- ively, a slave, saving only the implication that he was the genius of boundless means. And Rodomant had read Aladdin over and over, since childhood, and more shame for an artist, had often wished himself in Alad- din's place. " What does he mean I am to do for him ? " "Scarcely likely he would tell me. He wants to see you ; asks you to go to him." " Where is he — his address ? " " Which' I cannot speak nor write as his address. Go simply to the little glove-house, where they take casts of your hand. Go to the first man on the left side, and extend your hand ; ask notliing, except three dozen pairs ; what color you choose, you will have them 2;iven you as a present." " What glove-house ? " asked Rodomant, who, as we know, only knew by heart the picture-shops. His companion in indirect language indicated which So Rodomant went there, instantly ; he could bear suspense (on small occasions) lit- tle better than a child. The glove-house was full of people, who were passing back- wards and forwards from a glass-door be- yond, communicating with the chamber of the modellist. The person to whom Rodo- mant, speechlessly, extended his delicate member, bowed low, and preceded him as though tlu-ough the glass-door like the others ; — a small square corridor led inside by four doors, four ways at once, dark except for the semi-gleam through the silk-shaded glass-door. Rodomant's conductor opened RUMOR. 93 the door next that in the corridor, through which tlie others entered ; and having let him in by holding it just wide enough for him to pass, dejKirted without sign or word of introduction. He found himself in a room of tolerable size, furnished like a hundred small saloons in Parisinia, with large win- dows looking full to the widest street ; and the king's central city palace, glaring paie upon it from not afar, but the nearest ap- proachable point permitted to inferior abodes. There was a man sitting in one of these windows smoking, and destroying time by the perusal of pictorial newspapers. Not Porphyro, Rodomant felt without looking. In fact, it wtly from pity for, if not disdain of, his wild ignorance. His eyes A'ere fastened on the ground, and his frown «as at the darkest of its wrinkling shadow — hnlf -petrified with the consciousness of what he might have lost, he could not stir. Fortunately for him, the Prince was tired of this dumb audience, and how anxious soever to test the powers of charming found so effi- cacious by Saul, had other amusements to busy his august brain then. So he said, half-yawViing, still gravely, as all princes and all men address in Belvi- dere, " You are fatigued, will like to retire ; we shall meet again, if not to-night, to-mor- row." then waving his glove, he also turned to go, tb' ough an arch behind the throne, whose f^7 iperies two pages held back on each hand for the train to pass — the prin. cess and her train having passed through an- other door — and Rodomant just caught a dazzle of countless lamps in a lighted space beyond, before the draperies fall dark again. The hall was vyet filled with servants in ranks unbroken, saving only two, who left the line, and bowing low to Rodomant, pointed gravely to another door, and moved towards it in preceding him. They led the way through what to Rodomant seemed miles of gal- lery and corridor, bewildering for stately splendor to a gaze fed lately on Parisinian taste, with its everlasting mirrors and iue\'i- table gilding. Here all decorations were ages old, unworn as the architecture, and like that, had never felt the touch of damp — that most unconquerable of conserva- tism's foes. Pictures, each worth a royal ran- som, — statues, each equal to the value of the fairest slave, ])ainted ceilings that seemed dropping grapes to make one thirst, lilies one longed to gather, roses one yearned to smell, — bronzed jialm-trees s])rung from a mosaic floor, with cressets flaming from each branch for lamps, — walls hidden deep in damasks, old when the tapestry of the North was wrought, and fresh now tliat tapestry was threadbare, — great sheen of glistering shields, star-shapes of unsheathed swords, and rows of rapiers -with gem-incrusted hil^^s that shone like the jewel-case of a barbaric queen ; — all spoils of the age when fighting was an art, but unused in battle for centuries that ran close to the end of a millennium now. Something of the old passion, which when royalty bought loyalty by love, was young, seemed to haunt this palace-stillness, and hang like a perfume in its paths ; so loi.g will heroic memories of one hero only, last, — how much longer if of a race of heroes buried and turned to dust, or embalmed in raai-ble, not permitted, for all their state, that gentlest boon of death — to change. And Rodomant, excited to vivid enthusiasm, bui-n- ing with romance, would have liked to linger tlvn-c all night, and people the solitude with m.,.- ■ -I I'les fairer than any that had ever lived Liicicj but he could not pause, for his canductors passed on quickly — as it was, they were far in advance of him when they threw open a door at last, held it so till he came up to them, then bowed as he went in instinctively, and closed it after him. It was a door of a chamber with doors beyond — and yet beyond, — a palace in the palace, so I it seemed to Rodomant. He knew not that the suite of rooms was that always occupied by the domestic musician of the Prince, any iriore than he knew how and where his pred- ecessor was cursing him for having sup- planted him — in poverty and neglect all the more deeply felt because he had been thrust back into both after sudden if undue exalta- tion, just such as had now befallen Pvodo- mant. In all respects these chambers were the same — save one. There was a littla RUMOR. 101 anteroom unMrnished, mosaic-floored, and damask-huAg, and roofed with what seemed layers of concave shells dropping tears of coral that never fell ; there was a small sa- loon with pictures, soft carpets, and softer seats ; a study, with books and instruments ; a sleeping-room, whose bed was nung with golden net — to keep out the stinging insects that haunted even ^Aai eternal summer — a little divan in which was a bath ; a miniature oratory, and beyond all, a pearl of conserva- tories," shaped as a crystal lotus, but with in- verted lips ; this the new feature of which we spoke. Strange freak too — a conservatory in a climate where every flower conserved for colder climates by a coke-engendered summer stived in glass, blossoms to the moon in open beds. But this was a conser- A'atoi-y of coolness, not of heat, the temper- ature lowered to that of Rodomant's own native air. This he knew not, he only re- alized, stepping into a dim green twilight of leaves lit by one soft lamp alone, that there flourished old flowers which as a child he had gathered in the woods and fields, and carried home to ihe old German town to die ; forget-me-nots, anemones, blood-red veined lilac, and frosted while ; pale pink wild roses, and countless blooms whose names he had forgotten, for they had been of his own ci'eation when a child. In the midst, beneath the lamp, a tiny fountain sprang from a basin that looked hollowed from a crystal, and was sunk in vivid moss, with fern leaves waving round it, just stirred on their delicate stems by the delicate vibration of the tin- kling water-drops — like kisses broken into song. Beside the fountain, crowning charm of that cool fairy-spell, there stood, there grew — a little living linden, in whose frail green leafage and golden blossom was a nest of nightingales, singing to that cool summer or eternal spring. Rodomant stepped spell- bound, breathless, to the fountain's edge, and saw the sparkle of the water fretted by darker dimples, as the leaf-shades lay upon the rip- ple and were pierced l)y the lamp-lights be- tween them. The linden full in blossom as in leaf, seemed to ring out all its golden flow- ers hke fairy-bells to greet him. The bloom- bells hung and rung so, the nightingales nes- tled and sang so, in the linden over his old father's grave in the old German city. Great proof, if simple, that love's essence is immortal, however transmutable, that there is never a time when the heart is sad or glad with tender reminiscence, that the thought of one's parents — bad or good ; of one's broth- er — Cain or Abel; of one's sister — deep- hearted or frivolous, does not melt that soft mood into tears. The excess of Rodo- mants's emotion welled up, like a spring over-brimmed with sudden rains, as calm at its surface as at its source ; and in that sweet human frame he thought, not only of his old father, innocent as a gray-haired child, but of his living mother, who had often provoked ! him to laughter, but never to tears before. I Yet that How of sudden feeling perhaps made him in part ungrateful — he never consid- ei-ed it possible, though it was obviously more than probable, that this refreshing pleasure had been prepared on purpose for him ; he only enjoyec "^e present happiness as we are too apt to dv ivithout referring it to human care or sympathy. He wailed, how long he knew not, till recalled. A sil- ver-toned bell rang loud — he obeyed the direction towards the ante-room of the sound ; there, at the open door, stood a beautiful pale boy, with the darkest eyes, dark velvet dress with a small silver cross on the breast, a little sword by his side, and a plumed cap in his hand. He held to Rodomant a small sealed note — opened, it showed, writ- ten in German, these words : — " If you are not too tired, may I have the pleasure of seeing you for a short time this evening in the garden ; my page will show you the way. If you are weary say so, or you will grieve me much. My page speaks none but his own language. " Adelaida, Princess." Rodomant shuddered, then stood rigid ; deei)er, stranger than ever, wrought the spell — it was enough to arrest the flow of common life in human veins. A sort of rapturous recklessness succeeded the sur- prise ; he felt desjierate, as in a delicious, but too hastening dream, in which we fear so to wake before the dream's perfection. He gave the page a slight thrust with his hand — the child ran on — but this time, tc his comfort and relief, not through the almost endless spaces he before traversed ; it was a shorter and a less illuminated way, where darkling shapes of sentinels seemed stationed every where, as they were outside every where, walking silent up and down. Passing out through an immense door, Rod- omant found himself behind the palace, whose back, like its front, was one corusca- tion of illuminated windows ; such illumina- tions, however, as were lighted every night. Intense curiosity, and the daring one feels in dreams, drove Rodomant round in front — the page following this time instead of leading — for sounds of music seemed borne from that direction in unknown quaint strains. Arrived at the angle of the im- mense building, he saw the vast lawn, like a white and waveless sea, and groups upon it whose shades fell dark, but whose dresses looked like robes of spirits, all white or black. The women, whose singular som- breness of costume had struck him in the hall, all wore white now — still half-veiled from the head to the knee, but not the face, were veiled in white, their fans were white, and all those jewelled wore only diamonds, while very many wore, instead of jewels, the large bright fireflies of the country, caught 102 RUMOli. and cagi'd in silvei- net, and fastened in their hair and bosoms. The men, dres'sed all in black, gave their dark contrasting harmony to the spiritual white, such as is so rarely seen in costume, because colors thwart and scatter, rather than combine with black and w hite. They were dancing — all — and Rod- omant in that short survey found that the dance-art was less a pastime than a deep and intricate delight ; scarcely a smile broke the sweet yet grave monotony of motion, and for conversation, the air was winged with delicious whispers only. Kodomant, after one of his sweeping, piercing glances, saw that in that company was no princess — among a thousand faces he would have known hers ; and now, as her idea came back, like a star which a cloud has passed over, he felt a profound awe, almost a tender terror, of her possible return — and that entirely because he had learned her name. And this magnetism of a name was simply one of those coincidences which chance every day presents, such as when we talk of a long-absent friend a.' morning, and he pays us a visit at noon, or we dream of a letter at night, and receive it by the post on the mor- row. Still it is possible, that as the late dis- covered laws of science which may l)e termed iileal, are so simple, that their simplicity caused them to be overlooked for ages by the pedant and the philosopher, and to be grasped by the humble and the perse verant after all ; so the laws of spiritual connection may be too pure to be greatly complicated. Enough — Kodomant felt as though his song-poem, Adelaida, had been prophetic sacrilege, and were punishable with the igno- miny of detection and disdain by her — its prophetic heroine, one whose foot should, rightly, be upon his neck. And while so musing, deep again in self-disgrace, a shadow- dropped on the clear pathway at his feet. " You are here — that is kind," said the princess, " I saw you come out, 1 was in the gardens behind you, so I followed you — 1, and you too, must be unseen to-night." At the sound of her voice, so changed from its cold key ; so cordial, gentle now, ll'>domant raised his eyes from lier shadow, and fixed them on her face. The first glance told that she had not changed her dress, still wearing the sombre robe that softened her dazzling beauty, the dai'k veil half-dropped from her golden hair, and her heavenly countenance turned shadeless to the moon. Witli modesty far higher than any pride, she sliowed no recognition of llodomant's ecstatic and insatiate gaze ; her cheek glowed not, her features quivered not, and when she led th3 way, with her slow and soundless steps, she turned towards him still. It was a face that made a crisis in the history of human beauty, so human was it where the most divine, its majestic outline disguised by the pathos of its expression, its princeliness lost iu a loftier nobiity. The forehead so vast and clear, with the *emples an alabaster tint, the soft sharpness of whose edges told of fretted thought and wisdom drawn from sadness — the hair that seemed to fling out radiance from the delicate head — the still, transparent eyes, gray as the first creeping beam of morning, but by this moonlight dark as violets — the lips whose passionate yet unsmiling sweetness caused the impres- sion of genius, stamped upon the aspect, to sink into that of love ; all these, Kodomant now felt, that having seen represenieA, he had never seen before, and he also detected a mystery besides, blended with her demeanor so kindly, as with her clear regard — a mys- tery whose cause was indetectible, or which he dared not in his imagination to try to solve. " Oh," he gasped at last, " you are not like your pictures, yet I thought no one could live and be so beautiful." She smiled,'^ smile which revealed with all its sweetness a vivid wit, albeit too tem- pered and too subtle for the sarcasm that can vent itself in words. Kodomant marked that voiceless irony, and it pierced him, as the wit of tlie beautiful alone can pierce the heart of man ; he revenged himself by being actiu^Uy rude : — " Oh, princess," he exclaimed, " are you then vain, as other women ? — it is no harm in them ; they are consistent so ; but you — how can you bear your portraits to hang every where, for brutal men and vain women to make remarks upon ? " " What remarks did they make ? " asked the princess, quietly, withal an interested accent that astonished Kodomant, quite as much as the calm gathered from her blood which prevented lier easiest manner, her most earnest tone, from seeming or sounding the least fomiliar — nay, the least intimate — tj the most audacious, such as he. " You do not tell me," she urged again. Now Kodo- mant had never heard a single remark ; he had but made observations of his own, and well knew what they were. To escape con- fession, he went on abruptly: — " But why, princess, do you have so many pictures painted ? there cannot be enougii artists who are loorthi/." "You wish to know? — you shall," she said. " It is that men may know, and women too, if there is faith to be placed in looks, that mine at least are human." Bitter was the stress she laid on the last word : Kodomant felt that it, too, partook of the mystery that ruled her aspect. " I thought you were, — that your picture was of a saint," said he, " not a saint wlio had ever lived, though." " I am no saint," replied the princess, sighing, " nor am I sure I wish to be one ; there are too many martyrs upon earth not to render saintship upon earth a mockery and a mimic heaven is nothing for hereafter. " But there are saints," said Rodomant. RUMOR. 103 " Xot on earth ; " but she added, " I am glad VDU thought me one." Had she known the core of the character with which she deaU, she would last of all have uttered this. Rodomant's chest rose, his ])ulses dangerously quickened. '.' Do you know," she went on, " I ought to have told you where we are going, and have requested your permission, in case you felt unequal to any exertion — if so, speak. I em, I believe, unreasonable, for I want you to play to me to-night. I thirst — and I know (from one who knows) that the foun- tains lie under your hand. And perhaps for some days hence you will not be disengaged ; you will have too much to do to indulge me so." Rodomant, transported, could have kissed her garment's hem. " Any thing, at all times, princess, and above all, now." " See," said the princess, " we have already walked some little way, for I would not summon attendants, and my page, who is behind us, will do all we want ! I am taking you by a j)rivate path to the chapel, it is my way ^^ hen I go there, and I beg you always to use it when you wish to play alone." " The chapel ; we are to go to a chapel then ? " " There is no room elsewhere for the organ, which, I believe, is the largest in the world ; but no player ever put its whole power forth ; scarcely, it seems to me, could mortal hands. There is a story of an old musician who did so, and Avho, in so doing, smashed the altar window." " Stuff," exclaimed Rodomant, under his voice. " I fancy so too," she said ; " still there is a law that it must not be done, and it never is done. If ever such a calamity happened, it must have been some centuries ago, and the window must have been restored by human hands, for there it is, and I believe is the fin- est in Europe ; it is certainly the largest, like the organ." As the princess spoke, she turned out of the full moonlight into a winding and narrow way. It was bordered with sensitive plants, and above them light-leaved aspens, shivering to the breezeless air, as though departed spirits, unquiet yet, had rushed to take shelter in their shade ; and its turf was entirely composed of those short, subtle- /?cented herbs which aromatize the intense purity of the atmosphere in the Arabian desert. And in and out of the leaves, like shapes the restless souls had passed into, was scattered the quivering, dim, gold- emerald lustre of countless fireflies. This path, with its strange, spiritual secrecy, was in marvellous contrast with the scene beyond At ; at once the wildest and the loveliest of the palace outskirts, and the highest ground. Here gushed and overpowered the milder flower fragrance, the intense perfume of fi'uit; vines, laden with great grapes like those of Eshcol, crawled on the ground amidst the pines and melons, all basking in the mellow moonlight ; pomegranates, figs, and peaches were fallen in wasted showers round dwarf groves of geranium aiid jasmine thickets, while every where, entwined with every thing, and cheek to cheek in counllesg myriads, were roses — roses whose bloom the moonlight could only veil, not quench, and whose leaves strewed the turf so thick that it was as though a storm of rosy snow- fiakes had dropped on that eternal summer. Rodomant, after the first glimpse of all this lovehness, lit by the moon's soft blaze '.o beauty seeming supernatural — yet Nature's only — stood still, for an instant forgot the princess, who stood still too, and watched him with a distant yet gentle interest. He stood still, for he could not move ; he was chained with adoration ; his heart swelled in a single sigh that could not s])end itself, at the scene both near and distant, over which the heaven seemed to bend in one vast smile. Along the line of the horizon, where the heaven kissed the earth, undulated high, fair hills, whose summits of dazzling yet sil- very brightness outshone the lustre of the moon. Those hills, whose sides were dressed in an eternal summer, had for their crowns the eternal purity of snow. And nearer, in the moon's undaunted glory, were vineyards and groves of olive, sweeps of corn, with intervening glens where foliage blackly glit- tered, through which white villas gleamed. There was over the whole landscape a sleepy stillness, but it was defined as by day. " It is beautiful, exquisitely beautiful," ex- claimed Rodomant, suddenly, and using his favorite phrase when charmed ; as suddenly he was reminded of the princess, and turned upon her all the rapture of his regard. " I am very sure," he added, sighing, " that it must be the promised land." " No, no," exclaimed the princess quickly, brokenly, as though some strong emotion checked her even as she spoke, or as if in her enthusiasm she felt the want of ner own tongue, for she still used Rodomar.''s. "It is not even 6n its borders," she continued in that startled, troubled voice. " Beautiful as is my country, all countries are nearer that. The eternal ices, the stunted forests of the north are nearer, the red-hot deserts without a fountain or a tree, the damp sodden citiea that rise out of the islands of fog." Again the mystery confron.ted Rodomant as a visage veiled ; this time he gazed aston- ished at the princess, whose accent dropped from its agitation at sight of his surprise to a soft reserve, still touched with sadness, as she changed her theme. "I fear it is getting late — I fear that I am selfish. See, the chapel is just at hand, through the little cedar grove." And walk- ing on, she turned her face aside, though the velvet-like density of the cedar shadow was uncleft by a single moon ray, and the path they trod was as grayly dim as the 104 RUMOR. twilight of a moonless night. As they left the grove, she said, quite calmly now, " There are no lamps lit in the chapel to- night, but I know you can play in the dark — such mitigated darkness too as it will be with that moon of ours, and the gleam from the altar, too." " Ah, the altar and the candles," said Kodomant, M-hom the cedar-dusk had re- stored as well to his composure. ♦' You are a Catholic princess, of course ? " " Perhaps so — in one sense I believe I am ; in one sense they say not. I never con- fess." " Because you never sin," he almost whis- pered. " What say you ? " cried the princess, her voice sharp-toned with mingled shame and reverence, no longer broken, but passion- ately distinct. " Never let me hear — nor say you such words again, nor think them ! " The form of the chapel rose full and vast on Rodoman't's vision now — where its dark edge crossed the brightness round their feet, she paused again, and Hfting her eyes to the rich blue heavens, she murmured, — " See, they are not pure in His sight." CHAPTER XXI. Entering the chapel, Rodomant mar- velled at its name ; it was such only in de- sign and form, but in size a cathedral, the largest he had seen. The rare proportion of the wide, light-fretted arches, hanging in the gnlden darkness like a spell-work, to dissolve with the coming of the day, — the roof un- pillared vaulting out of sight, the sea of shadow that bathed the long vista at its base, the far yet vivid gleam of the altar candles, each looking like a spotless column crowned with flame, and that white Vision reared above all, watching through the still- ness over all ; — these things fell on the brain of Rodomant, and clung there like some reality intangible and awful* as a dream. " You worship here, princess ? " he asked, as after granting him the time for bne long look below, she hovered before him up a spiral staircase with balustrade of marble. " Sometimes, when I am in the mood, but that is seldom." " How so, in such a place, with such im- ages around you, to stir thoughts of the Holy One ? " "My Holy One dwells not in temples made with hands." " Where, then, is His temple — all Nature, I suppose ? " " But few find Him there ! " " Where, then, do you find Him, oh prin- eess, for He must be ever near you ? " " In your heart I believe, in mine T hope. " Now princess," said Rodomant, turnin;^ upon her as she touched the last stair, and i rested to regain her breath, " that does not satisfy my reason, that arrangement of yours. In a book all Catholics hold good, and all good Christians read, there are some such words as these : I dwell in the humble ai d con- trite heart — God speaks there too. Now you are not contrite, for you never confess, you say, and I am not humble, because — because I am proud, and one can't of course be both." " Humble before human clay — never, that were to sink as low. But humble before God — are you not so ? " " I do not know," said Rodomant. " I have never" — here his voice shook slightly, and he felt his lips turn cold — " never real- ized God in my life — princess, I believe I am a heathen." " ])o not use a word so meaningless — or wh?ch means the ignorant ; you are not such. But it may be you are not "to blame for this single-minded pride of yours; you have not been forced to the contrition for tiie sins of others who regret not, but glory in them — in which humiliation consists." Rodomant was confounded, not as with an argument ; but he could not dash the lucid truth aside ; there was nothing to he sard, except exactly what he thought. "Prin- cess, you are very religious." "Ibelieve not — no, that is the last thing I am ! " They had reached the great space of the organ, whose height Rodomant could not I guess in that vaster height, the roof; but its i immense width and depth, its pipes like thickly-clustered columns of some basaltic ! cavern, and its rows above rows of sharply- I glimmering keys, from which the page ' deftly swept the covers, made Rodomant's I blood dance, and his fingers tingle. Another I moment and the giant-music slumbering was ' awakened in its gentle strength. But strange i to say, just as he was about to seat himself, j he looked at the princess, her pm-e pale j face, her heavenly eyes, drew him back I from that elder spell, his craft refused its cunning. " Oh," he exclaimed, and his audacity was softened to supplication by his tone, "oh, princess, I will play any time — if I only may talk to you now — if you behead me afterwards." He moved as he spoke, not close to her side, but distant many feet, within the gilded fretwork that surrounded the place for the organist instead of curtains. She gave no sign, save that she forbade him not, and smiled a moment as he urged again. " Princess, what do you mean by saying you are not religious ? " " Because the first element of religion, in which there are two elements — and two only, it seems to me — is love to God, aa RUMOR. 105 tlie second is charity, or love to man. Now, who loves God ? do you ? " She looked at him as she spoke, her voice was even severe, and her glance scrutinized. Rodomant felt his brain spin, as with the revolution of a dazzling wheel, which plunged his thoughts into bright confusion, then stood still, and they rose strong and steady. " I believe," he said at length, in the wary tone which attested his singular sincerity, " I do believe that I worship the Supreme, and that is all." " Ah ! " returned the princess, her words again divided by low deep sighs, " that is just the worst ; I, too, worship the Supreme, it is so easy, for to worship is to a pure heart as necessary as breath to life — and He is every where. His beauty is eternal upon the earth ; faith in His being is easy enough, but love for Him, how is that ? But," she added, turning to him a sterner gaze and the severity strengthening in her accent, " you have no such excuse as /, for you have not seen what I have seen, you know not the secret with which I groan. You have lived with Art, and for it ; the greatest gift of God, except that love which I cannot feel, is yours. You have genius, nor have you, hitherto, misused it or misled your life. You sJwuld be grateful, you should love with such a love as I would die a thousand times, each time with a thousand tortures, but to feel!" Mystery within mystery, thought Rodo- mant, nor pleasurable ones, it seems — what realization, not dim but vivid, of what naked terror, had tinctured this august pure nature with a despair as unnatural as her self-con- demnation ? The hour and the circumstances conspired to make the fact of her di'cad suffering too precious in his sight. She a princess and he her servant, nay her slave at pleasure ! The loftiness of the theme, which, afe it seemed instinctively, the royal maid had chosen, and her unworldly anguish which, dwelling on it, drove all earthly con- siderations from them both — as t^vain souls, strangers in the flesh, should stand on a wrecking vessel side by side, whom each wave might unite in death, united therefore for the l)rief breath left them. Therefore, in simple and tender sympathy, Rodomant sought to soothe hei thoughts. " But," said he, " I cannot tell why it should afflict you, that you are not actually a saint — you do not ^\ish to be one — you said so." " Not for myself! nor is example any thing, alas ! But it seems to me strange that yours is not a softer nature, a nature tender enough for the flowers of heaven to inhabit it. I often think, that had I lived where humanity is human, where men are ruled by a man and not a demi-demon crowned with folly — had I dwelt where the life of eveiy day is made sweet by simple virtue — not 14 heroism, but goodness ana its joy ; I should not, either, have been ungrateful — I should have loved Him as my soul, nor have ever loved another so that He could be jealous of my heart." For the last few words only, in which she spoke of human love as a pos.sibility, a strange tenderness had stolen on her speech, and as she uttered them, she looked out into the chapel ; but her eyes seemed,resting on nothing there. Rodomant leaning forward to catch a glimpse of their expression — certain at that instant that he was not noticed — saw a mist upon them that almost ckew dimness to his own ; the source of tears was brimmed, but she would not let it overflow one drop — nor he. Certainly the ten-or had melted from those late dilated orbs ; and if it was still passion that clouded their deep lustre, the trouble was one of joy. Rodomant had looked to see — had seen — but the strong instinct of his sturdy pride was true to it ; he felt that as she had eluded the sub- ject of their conversation, as she had mo- mentarily forgotten him, so was his place by her no more for that time. His curiosity, his reverence, his sympathy, his worship — all sank together in the depths of that un- fathomed pride ; and without a whisper or a rustle, he was gliding — literally, for the musical are ever delicately footed as deftly fingered — behind her down the stair, when he saw through the last fret of the gilded j cage about the organ, a sudden glancing light, that crossed the steadfast altar-candles far beneath tlieir flaming tongues, and that glimmered, then was quenched in the abyss of shade from which the arches seemed to spring. Far be it from us to say that this light so little, and so swiftly darkened, would have deterred Rodomant from his retreat ; j on the contrary he was hastening downwards, when the voice of the princess — all the more divinely sweet when she was unseen, as per- fumes rise from flowers more delicious in ■the darkness — stayed him, as it must have j done had he been told that to pause an in- ' stant was instant death. " I fear I have kept you to-night too long, yet wait a moment longer ; I have one friend here to whom I wish to present you, and see he has just come in ; he is crossing the chapel to go to bis own rooms, which are out> side, near at hand." " The man who held the lantern is a priest, princess, I §ee," said Rodomant, glancing through the fretwork, and distinguishing so much by the altar-hght. " My priest." " To whom you never confess." " He knows the reason." Then she called upbn a name, adding a few words besides in her own tongue, new to Rodomant, so rich, so sonorous and majestic, that to his swift conception it seemed a language fit for royal lips alone. The figure of the man, which had reached the sluoui beneath the arclies, staid 106 RUMOR. there ; and soon steps sounded on the pave- ment, and mounted the marble stair. " I wonder," observed Rodomant, half to himself, " what he wanted a lantern for ; it is so light abroad, and in here, too." The princess heard him. "You need not inquire, it is not your work," she said ; " and you may thank God for that, even if you do not love him." liodomant had no time to speculate on this remark just then, for the princess's priest, her friend, as she had called him, stood before them. With his body he made the deepest reverence, but never raised his head, which, as he approached, was dropped low on his bosom, while his countenance ex- pressed humiliation the most passionless and profound, a willing self-abasement which would have touched Rodomant's contempt, had it appeared on a face one shade less noble or admirable for that expression. As it was, the attitude and aspect shamed Rod- omant for his own audacity and freedom ; and again shame passed into surprise, as he glanced sideways at the princess. She had returned to her reserve as when in her fa- ther's presence she had gi-eeted Rodomant so coldly, only she was colder now ; and if there ever were a moment when she could be named haughty, it was that in which she in- troduced them — Rodomant to the priest, by name Father Rosuelo. Rosuelo bowed to Rodomant with the least possible inclination that the eye could detect, still never raised his eyes. Then the princess spoke again in her own tongue, and rather more at length, with rather more than ever of authoritative distance ; but at the end of her august ad- dress she smiled for Rodomant. " Good night," she said ; " I have asked Father Rosuelo to go to your rooms with you to-night for a little time, or, if you like it, to remain, as you may be lonely in a place so new ; he is a delightful companion, I can assure you that." But she held forth no hand this time, and Rodomant, recalling his profane familiarity, felt the pulses prick in his lips for shame ; never, never then should he breathe over that virgin lily of her hand again ; and yet, before they parted, another short scene was acted through, as strange as any in his sight. An instant, and every trace of haughtiness had left the face of the piincess, and lowly she bowed her head, wliile the priest that instant reared himself his utmost height, and raised 'his eyes so suddenly that it seemed as if he would avoid sullying by a single glance the edge of her white forehead; then he held his hands above her golden hair, and dropped from his lips a blessing, as sweet and rich as scattered incense, whose great old Latin words Rocfo- mant could interpret from the masses of Italy and mediaeval Germany. And as the deep Amen melted from his solemn utterance, the Erincess lifted her head, once more not hum- le in the presence of a man. Without look- 1 ing towards either of her companions again,- she called her page frotr. behind the organ, and passed down stairs, while, through the fretwork, Rodomant beheld that she left the chapel by the door at Avhich the priest — not she before with himself — had entered it This would havo driven his Avonder to his lips directly, but for the change in Rosuelo, which he marked, as his eyes left the vacancy her going had made else every where. No longer humble, with bowed head — no longer either rapt to heaven with vision strained from earth, but erect, with a dignity which would have been superb in a courtier the nearest to the sceptred hand ; and with an expression of face as little angelical as Rod- omant's, perfect as was its beauty. It is very likely that his first full sight of Rodomant convinced him that the least assumption of celestial authority over that mortal, would only affect comically his unvenerative nature ; at all events, when he spoke, the tones were as little as possible pious, though i)olite with the same perfection as his facial beauty. " You will not consider, I hope, that her highness's recommendation of me renders it necessary you should accept my poor com- panionship ; how proud too, even, I should be to offer it — how far prouder of your own." " I am thankful, on the contrary, since it pleases you. I fancy, however, you will hardly stomach the task, for a task it will be — a long one I sliould think. I am literally perishing of curiosity, and if I do not this night obtain some satisfactory clew to this maze of inconsistencies that have put my thoughts into a tangle too, I shall commit suicide on the spot — not this holy one. — For I suppose death gives us all the knoM'l- edge denied by life ; — it ought, in consider- ation of what it takes away." Not a shade of disapproval crossed the other's counte- nance. " But you all speak German here — it is strange, difficult as it is." " I believe the ])rince8s and I are the only two, if I dare mention her highness with my- self. The prince knows but a phrase or two. Still, you should learn our language, finer than Italian for music, as it is more poetical for prose — I should be very glad to teach you at my leisure." " Thanks ; I shall teach myself, I always do. But if I am to hear any thing before the morn- ing, it seems to me we should stir. And really, sir, though those grand apartments are called mine, I feel too little at home in them to take you there — it is you who must conduct me." " You are so courteous," said the priest, " that I fear not to vex you by the confession, that if I am to reply to any questions of yours regarding this place, or what you aptly terra the inconsistencies around us, it must not be in your own rooms. Were I seen to enter with you, and known to remain longer than necessary for the purposes of my caUing, it RUMOR. 107 misrV't be reported to the prince our master, and if lie should become aware, some suspi- cion might rest with you of being initiated into that knowledge, which to attain and di- gest here is to eat a bitterer fruit than that which changed to despair the innocence of our earliest parents ; not to speak of the pos- sibility of your being dismissed before you have taken your stand almost, — a high stand that will be, if we may beheve one who never errs in precept or in statement, whatever his practical future remains to be." " Ah ! " said Rodomant, " a spark seems to glimmer in my bewildered brain ; how good ! if in this glow-worm suspicion of mine my first mystery should be cleared from its entan;.;k'ment. Do you mean a man in Par- isinia called Porphyro ? " A little start betrayed some slight tempo- ral excitement in the man of the church, though it was further betrayed — to the empty moonlit chapel only — by the volcanic flash 'that leaped from his bright eyes, aside. " What other name than Porphyro should he bear ? Man-miracle, who, if he lives but to fultil his own promises, is the prophet of the age, the only one whose predictions shall not lie. Yes, I mean Porphyro, and he is one of the consistent mysteries, so far as he has yet ])roceeded, because remahiing, as a mystery should, to preserve its mysticism, uiirevfciiled." Then changing his tone, he said, " Warm as it is, we must not stay all night, for were we found here none would give us credit for confessions at such a length. I was going to ask you to come to my rooms, very inferior to yours in all re- spects ; but it strikes me you are likely to be temperate and careless of luxury as you are independent; we shall at least be safe there from paid eyes of sentinels." " 1 will go any where, to ask you what I want to hear, and get your answers." " Come, then, follow me," answered Ros- uelo, " I do not Avonder ; were I in your place, I should feel the same, and in mine the knowledge of what is, while it ceases to be matter of curiosity, remains a mystery still." ^ The two men went down stairs towards the door through which the princess had passed Kosuelo taking his dark lantern from a stall where he had placed it. Rodomant, intent on getting out as soon as possible, looked neither to the one hand nor the other, hut in spite of himself, he was attracted to the end, so much and so directly that he passed the door where Rosuelo staid, and went straight on. No marvel ; it was not the stupendous window that would have filled the space of the widest arch, nor the In'iceless pictures on which genius had t!x- lausted art to imagine the unseen, but the amazing spectacle seen only at such a shrine, prodigy of human ignorance that by the ma- terial would propitiate the divine. Rodo- mant, beneath the altar, stood statue-still, and gazed, and gazed uuwinkingly, at the cold, yet fiery splendor. As if the hand of some giant had unlock&cj^.in that creative soil the secret mines of gathef§d-4ges, ty all the kings of the whole earth had come, as those of the East alone in the old times before us sought the straw-spread cradle of Humanity's best Friend, to pour their ti-easuries out empty at the feet of one they knew not, yet adored. Great v.. Jsses, each gem a diamond glory ; topaz and amethyst in clusters like the grapes without the walls ; sapphires large as the evening planet strikes on northern eyes, heaps of rainbow-veiHng opal, pearls — as though the sea had cast up all its pearls, — rubies and carbuncles, like roses blossomed out of flame ; chains thick as golden man- acles, and gyves of silver ; filagree, to which gold wasted had given a worth beyond gold ; lace carved from ivory, rings each an amulet ; and again, ingots upon ingots of the royal and virgin metals ; and last, above all this abased and useless wealth, rose the stainless effigy of human passion, made divine through purity — the idea to outshadow which in type has taxed human invention to the a erge of madness, and tested human worship at the expense of man's love to God, exhibited in love towards his kind. Rodomant took no long survey ; he turned quickly from the shrine on which that storm of riches had foUen, resting quietly, his eyes smarting with the tears the blinding blaze had drawn to them. " Good Heavens ! " he exclaimed in his simplest manner, " how rich the prince must be ! " " The prince ? " said Rosuelo, gravelj — " the Church. And this but a niche of the church as small, in comparison with its whole temporal wealth, as the least of the visible stars in comparison with the system of the universe." " Ah ! " observed Rodomant, quaintly, " it is a great thing to belong to a church so rich, as it is a credit to be one — even ft poor relation — of a very wealthy family ; I under- stand." Rosuelo made no answer, but paced rapidly to the door, still open, but which he closed behin'', himself and Rodomant. " Now let us } asten," said he, and strode on fast again. Again reminded by the brightness of the moon, Rodomant recurred to the lantern, now extinguished. " May I, inquire why it was lighted in the first instance ? " he said. " Oh, certainly — I had been in the dun- geons, darker places than, I hope, you evei saw. Now please me by puttiiig no more questions till we are safe — till I speak to you myself." Rodomant was quieted more easily, as he wanted leisure to inspect the road they took — a new one altogether, leadhig farther from the chapel and the palace (perhaps half a mUe) into what seemed to him wild country, but which was still enclosed, until they reached what Rodomant had noticed in tha 108 RUMOR. distance as .. mansion of sparkling marble, but which was a wall extraordinarily lofty, of pale gray granite, marbled as it were by the moonlight's blaze. No trees were tall enough to overtop this wall, save here and there a palm, which drooped like funeral plumes — a dark and mournful crown. " What place is behind, in there ? a prison, I suppose, where the dungeons are ? " again asked Rodomant. Rut Rosuelo shook his head, next minute stopping at what looked like a buttress sprung from the wall's huge angle, but which proved to be a human habitation, how difficult soever to name, whether as vault above the ground, or as jirophet's chamber ill, not on the wall. Opening the door with a key fastened to his girdle by a cord, he c '.tered, followed close by Rodomant, who, while the other struck a light, first knocked liis head against the low lintel, and then tumbled over the step by which was the descent to the floor within. Once there, he stared all round — not a large circle — with fresh amazement. Arched exactly like a vault, the furniture thereof was just such as that of the prophet's chamber ; and Rod- (uuant had the fixed idea that priests wor- shipped images and gazed on pictures, till the quiver of their own strained eyeballs or twitch of lips too weary of repetition, was ascribed to the stone features or tints intan- gible of the canvas. Also he had heard of scourges self-apj)lied, and exposed, not hidden ; and cold crosses on which Faith's victim stretched himself, long, night-long vigils. Nothing such here, for use or orna- ment, not a crucifix above the pallet, narrow as a grave ; not a black-looking volume upon the rending eagle, of unplaned wood. " I>et us sit down and sup," said Rosuelo, as he placed a candle in a metal stand on the table, shapeless and uncarven, and drew the two rude stools which were the only seats and the only number there was room for, forwards. Rodomant, easy as in his Lon- don attic, easier than in saloons he ever felt, sat down and watched the other with curiosity, which became pleasure — for whatever made men independent of each other and the world he steadfastly admired. The supper was barley-bread, served on wooden platters, abundance of grapes in a rough straw- basket, and 1 handful of cold roasted eggs laid on fresh leaves — that was all, and all came out of a little vaulted hole in one cor- ner, — could there be corner where a room was round ? — which served for cupboard and for library, La«t of all, before seating him- self, Rosuelo filled a pitcher of reddish earth with water from a huge stone basin, which, as the corner hole was library and cupboard, served for wine-cellar and toliet-mirror as well. Tlie candle-flame, more liberal in its revela- tions than moonlight, showed completely and fully Rosuelo's face. Rodomant again re- fliai-ked its beauty, in which the searching vision could detect no flaw. Superb features of strong patriciai:. type ; skin bloodless pale, unwrinkled as a rose-leaf freshly plucked ; grave, deep-gray eyes, looking as black as they were lustrous from the darkness of the fringe ; hair where it was left, like threads of sable silk — these traits had once stamped him the handsomest man in Belvidere, and it was his exhausting life which had given him bemtty on chasing mere good looks away, as it was his intense inward and constant struggle with passion as strong as he, which imparted to him the melancholy calm that yet was least like the angelical. " You eat nothing yourself," said Rodo- mant, pulling grape after grape from the stem. " I have supped," answered Rosuelo, " on something sweeter than is in my power tc offer you." " You are a strange one for a priest — no crosses, nor virgins, nor heads, nor pic- tures, nor rods ; then you say you have eaten, that does not look like fasting." " My instruments of torture are kept in a secret place, yet none the less inactive — what I worship is also there. As for fasting, my food this evening was not food of men, but angels — or sweeter; that which one eats not nor drinks, yet receives ; which nourishes not the body, yet sustains the life to suffer on." " That is, you are a Catholic of the prin- cess's sort ; she don't confess ; it is all s;^tV- ifual, I supi)ose, as my mother says, though she is no Catholic either. You adhere to the principle and eschew the practice — only in private life, of course ? " "" I am surprised at nothing you say ; and being something of a physiognomist, the very alphabet of the science teaches me that you are sincere, and that it is not needful to explain to you that secrets are secrets — you understand them so. Otherwise I had not brought you hither — I had literally obeyed the princess's commands." ""Good," said Rodomant, " you are safe, for I have no one to whom to repeat a secret ; I knew a lady once, I might have told, but she is as good as dead to me, for I have killed her out of my thoughts, and a cold grave she has of it in my memory. But, I must ask, do you prescribe this spir- itual fulfilment of the delegated orders of papa in Rome, for all your sons and daughters, that you follow yourself — and prescribe, I suppose, for the highest of your congregation, unless she adopts it of her own accord ? " " I ordain obedience implicit, absolute, unquestioning, to every ordinance great or simple, public or secret ; from every one except myself, with whom I am concerned, saving only in the case you mentioned last. Obedience to me, as if to the sovereign of the church ; yet to whom, as to all here, I seem as though I too obeyed, more rigidly RUMOR. 109 than all. Yet remember, none know me, none follow nie hither, and you the first I have admitted, will not take advantage of my confidence." "" Never, when it is made mine. But are you enforced — actually self-enforced to lead a life all lies — do you enjoy deceiv- ing others ? It cannot be for gain's sake, as I sec you here." " I deceive no one ; what is prescribed is right — for those it suits, those whom it relieves, those whom it holds in check from the clutches of despair. Some constitutions, drugged too deeply, cease to respond to medicines ; there have been those who fed on poisons, yet could not find death through them. So I, I have survived forms — rites touch me like a dead man's finger. But in ihis land all who are not born villains, are kept in childhood all their lives — childhood as to ignorance, not in the innocence of joy. The former — those Avho will not believe, be- cause they dare not, either in forms or the Deity which forms assume to reach, I make tremble ; they can only be fiiscinated from crime by fear, fear of the wrath to come. But the "rest, the children, swathed in bands of ojipression, iron-fettered, under pretence of helping them to run alone, blind-folded, for fear the light should let them see too nuich : these, if they found or fancied Di- vinity in a pebble hammered from a rock, I would instruct to kiss the stone and keep it for a chiu-m within their breasts. Men want consolation every where, so all my brethren tell me — of every church; that they languish without it in this age more than any other ; how then must it be here, a corner of the earth wliich God made most beautiful, like old Jerusalem, only to forsake it." "Hush — for old Jerusalem, you know little about that. Why her own words are these, old as her hills, and written on the hearts of all her children. ' The tabernacle of God is now with every nation. Worship no more towards Jerusalem, for in the heart of evei'y man is henceforth the Holy of Holies.' You will wonder how I — not being a Jew of course myself, remember such words. A lady told them to me — a lady whom I have forgotten ; but I did not forget those words, they not being her own. And I was reminded of them by something the ])rincess said, only to her I dared not repeat them." " T know but one heart in which is the Holiest of Holies," said Rosuelo, " and that is hers. In our hearts here is no Deity — neither the King of Heaven, nor the idea 1 ">yal which, if pure, in some sort symbolizes Him on earth, and so incites men to moral- ity and greatness, as the King Divine invites to love and worship. Our hearts are all empty, but it is not so easy to rid men of busy brains ; and out of busy brains, with no hearts to govern and guide them — nothing but empty husks — what may not come ? " "I do not know nor understand ; but in most countries, whatever commou peo])lo suffer, great people are exempt. Here the contrary is the case." " Not at all — at the end, we wait for that." " I never heard nor read any thing particu- lar about this country. When I told people I was coming, all they said was, • What a fine climate — how rich a princedom, the most ancient dynasty of Europe. For a man to go there gives him style — for an artist.' (being below a man, I know not in what degree,) ' for an artist to get to Court, is to obtain credit with all the world, so that he may remain idle ever afterwards,' Nor have I ever found its place in history — but then I never read any in our library at Gottsend, ex- cept ' Jover knew who ren- dered a mean pursuit sublime.' " " He said that, did he ? I wish I had known it." " You would not have come, I sup])ose ; your ])ride would have detained you there." " Ah ! but I am afraid I should, yet I know scarcely why I came ; it was not to see the original of all those i)ictures, for I did not know they were of the princess j nor was it because ofAdelaida — I did not know it was her name ; nor because I wanted money, for I find I can make that any where. " I believe," said Rosuelo, calmly, " that you came just because Porphyro advised you to come. I never knew any one resist the slightest suggestion of his ; I was going to say except myself, but I have never had the ojiportunity. I am to him but as one of the tapers on the altar, or one bead of tlii'^ rosary of mine — a small item of Church property contributing towards its furniture a mite." " A very large, and a very magnificent mite," cried Rodomant, laughing ; then plunging his hands into his hair, and entan- gling it hopelessly, "my thoughts are not only knotted and twisted, but whirling round ; yet, hitherto, all the things I wanted to know have turned out as little supernat- ural as Porphyro, and not one is, despite his commonplace platitude, so great a mys- tery ; ghosts, changelings, and the new men with tails just discovered in Africa, are open revelations, and real, compared with him. Therefore, in case I go mad before the end of my questions, ])ray tell me in a word who is Porphyro. I tried to find that out. A man was just telling me when he was taken to prison out of the street. And as for Por- ])hyro himself, you might as well try to bleed a block of marble." " Every thing else, save what is under seal of my conscience for others ; — all else I will tell you gladly, but not that ; Porphyro'a pretensions / will not explain, it would not be just. If you are honored with another private interview with the princess, ask her — she may condescend to tell you ; — she alone knows, or asserts that her opinion is correct and lucid." " Ah ! you hate him ! I hear it in your voice. Well, if I must wait I must, but it is a curious subject for her contemplation — so ugly a being, she might as well thhdv of me ! " with a sort of grim glee. " But you sjioke of parties all hating the throne in Parisinia. I cannot see the con- nection between them and Belvidere, or the secrets under which you and the princess groan, for they seem to affect i/on as dee])ly." " The only connection between them lies in the universal European anarchy whicii is likely to result from a special outbreak in Parisinia — for in all cases of revolution, in modern times. Iris has stiuck the key-nnte. Any civil panic annihilating monarchy there would communicate itself to all those Italian and German provinces whose wrongs are smouldering, like covered fu-e, which, for want of air, seems only harmless smoke. Once kindled, the great flame-contagion would roll on steadily, and take us in its course ; for wrongs so mighty, yet condensed into so small a space, would ignite more easily than all. Those are our secrets, yet known to thousands, and we dare not avow RUMOR. in them for their sakes, we, the minority, who could do nothing- for them by ourselves, save to heap up higher their earthly hells of tor- ment — did ice complain, who have no power to save. These are our secrets ; and though your ears shall not deteet in the stillness round us, when we hold our speech, one zephyr's flutter, one nightingale's low note in all the air ; though sound seems quenched with weariness in the moonlight whose white Avings cover us ; yet I tell you I hear, not fancy, but hear groans indistin- guishable, which have sunk into my brain, — s!u-ieks wrung clear from agony that have cloven my heart and entered, — sobs that crushed hiwards by endurance of thousands, seemed crushed into my bosom too, — and above all, the surging of a sea made of mil- lion times a million tears — not drops, but waters, seems beating endlessly beneath my feet. I tell you, stranger as you are to mir- acles in wrong and woe, that all these sounds 1 hear, distinct as if trumpets were blown, or thunders rattled across the midnight. And, victims as we are, we who suffer and who love, we yet have this proof, that God afflicts through man ; — for one higher than an an- gel, yet lowlier than all the upstart women of the earth besides, weeps for us, would die for us — but that she saves herself for us instead ! " Rosuelo stood up, as though he would pace his cell, then sank down again, for in twelve feet of room across its circle where was there room to turn ? He wiped with an end of his serge frock, great pearls of sweat from his face, that from its whiteness had furmed there indetectibly ; the only tears he ever deigned, or dared, for fear of losing his control, to shed, llodomant surveyed him with a pity none the less deep because it was still thwarted by a curiosity roused almost to desperation by his words, thrilling and full of meaning, yet obscure as wander- ing ^olian harmonies, in which the Art- trained musician delighted not. But the pity overcame, and as the curiosity sank sec- ondary, a self-convicted knowledge dawned — often the case, when men of high intelli- gence are cast upon that alone, " You mean, I suppose," said he, after musing a minute, and creating and destroy- ing in that minute as many theories of pop- ular adversity as Malthusians would have invented in a millennium. " I suppose you just mean, that this Prince Belvidere is a tyrant, a person like those of ancient his- tory, who became the foundations for the giants and ogres who ate little children — you called the most part of the peo])le chil- dren, I remember. Poor sweet princess, I little thought thee rudely housed and hardly loved, my Adelai'da. No disloyalty there, for the princess of the song is mine ; I always wondered at her loveliness — no wonder noM-, prophets only hint at truth in proph- ec). Rosuelo stared at Kodoniant, who, since he recalled the memory ol Ms "irgin song, the sweetest ever invented or sung by man, had dropped his voice, as though he addressed a fairy up his coat sleeve. The priest heard only the allusion to the prince, and afterwards a vague mutterance ; expect- ing some result, he waited, but none came. " A tyrant ! " said Rosuelo, suddenly, steadying his voice as it were to pronounce the hated word more perfectly. " To call him tyrant, is to name a tiger a turtle-dove, or a wolf a lamb dro])ped white upon the grass. Tyrants are ever strong, but the best of them have been brave, the worst of them have dared to threaten by word of mouth ; not bullied through mouthpieces for fear of the bow drawn at a venture piercing through the smallest loop-hole. The emperor-cle- mon of old Rome broke flies upon his finger nails for pastime, but the prince of this Par- adise on earth breaks men upon the wheel in earnest, out of his own sight, and the tales of their torments are his romances and his poems — not that he confines himself to one phase of torture, there is no monotony in his revenge on innocence — and surely Freedom must have the wings of an angel, not a bird, for he cannot crush it, though he is crushing it forever — it is like seed scat- tered by the wind on plumes of down, tram- pled into the ground it dies — to rise again, nor are the harvests few nor far between, only as yet, they are crushed as easily as the germ that gave them birth." Rodomant, perceiving that even his com- panion's earnestness made him drift from the point, observed with his peculiar quaint- ness, " Why don't they kill him ? such things have been and are justifiable. Jael killed Sisera, and was praised for it in the Bible ; a Frenchwoman stabbed one of the bad leaders in the Revolution," — but here he paused ; unluckily for his allusions, they were both feminine, and recalled the princess — could he fancy her a murderess — of her father, who, whatever he was, had given her to the world ? It was a depth he could not fathom, and cared not to look down. " Why do the people let him live ? " at last he added, endeavoring mentally to lose sight of the ideal parricide that had crossed his thoughts. " Have not swords leaped from many a scabbard, and balls whistled in scores along the wind, all directed at his breast ? none touching the vital inch, which, invaded, would rid the world ? — is it that the Thing has no heart — is actually not mortal, but devil-born 2 Sometimes, in my wildest mo- ments, I fear so. But seriously, the people brood eternally over the means of his de- struction, and therein lurks their own. But see, it is just that fixed idea and hope of theirs which ruins the innocent with the guilty; those who only conform to, with those who project, the intention. Spies, planted every where, thick — yet unnoticeable ua il2 RUMOR. summer insects, carry each word, each ges- luie or grimace of disafl'ection, to those who guard the throne ; the sun sets not be- fore they wlio wliispered, or looked, or shrugged, strew the bottoms of the dun- geons. Not only so, however. Among men who aspire to domestic ties in life, it is a proverb that love's raptures are too sacred to be expressed — as a priest, to whom love is forbidden, my sacred theme is agony. . . . Why do they not kill him ? How, except on few and rare occasions, a state- procession, a solemn airing, a farce of M-or- shipping in public, can they see him, or be near enough even to breathe '.death' in his farthest courtier's ear ? And fewer and rarer those occasions the longer he endures. His palace is a prison, his courtiers armed for him (are they not also armed to protect themselves, their wealth, their lusts, their vices?) — white as pure innocence beside the palest of his crimes. His servants are soldiers, bound by bribe instead of honor ; see how they creep, rank after rank, up to his house ; they besiege, in order to protect it. Mailed all over but at the mouth, his guards keep his golden gates, and stretch ihence in one long iron, yet jjulsating chain, up to his chamber-door. His bed bristles with weapons ; his pillow covers im])leme..ts of destruction. For the sole remaining dan- ger (poison) every cup he fills is half- emptied before he tastes it, and each plate lie fills is shared." " How can it be ? " asked Rodomant, half to himself, " for even bad kings are not often cowards. How grows, or whence comes, a character so unnatural, so unsuited to such a dignity ? that is stranger than that being born to his place, he should resolve to keep it." " Not strange to those who read the clear- est and most obvious, most inviting of na- ture's secrets, yet which, alas, none concerned in them ever will read, or if they are forced to perceive, will confess. As intermarriages of weak and faulty families, repeated from generation to generation, to gain or to con- serve wealth, power, or to seal ambition ; as such unions stamp accidental defect or wick- edness as special by reproduction, so, in progiJess of time, they cease their speciality, and becoming hereditary, are the fact, a double evil — disease tr madness ; scrofula of the blood or of the brain, coexistent, with scarcely an exception ; but scarcely co- active, that is, if the brain is actively af- fected, the health is seldom externally so ; if the body is preyed upon, the brain is gen- erally passive. The former is the case of the Prince." " Good heavens, what a web of words, but for the last, I should have had no hint, for your allusion to families and marriages plunged me into double mysticism. Never call German mystical again. But do I un- derstand you to say the brain of the Prince is affected, not his health ; if he is insan^j, then where are his crimes ? how can he be responsible ? " " It is a doctrine as mischievous as ab- surd," said Rosuelo, coolly, " and all the more fallacious because it is popular, to ex- cuse crimes committed by a madman, on the plea, that non-responsible, he is therefore innocent. None but a bad man, gone mad, ever conceives or commits crimes ; it is the test of a man's character, what he does, says, feels, when control is lifted from him — in sleep, delirium, drunkenness, dementia. Thousands of the good and innocent, lambs bearing the sins of their forefathers, are sac- rifices to that form, the most terrible of Heaven's retribution, wrought in man on earth ; forever in our thoughts should such be set aside, and between them and the bad in whom God suspends volition (the true cause of madness) let there be a line drawn, defined as between blackness and the noon- day. Harmless they, sacred in their delu- sions, their fancies, their reveries ; holy, as the sage among savages used to denote them, wiiether wild or calm ; susceptible of elevation and improvement, or doomed to perpetual dwarf-hood of the faculties, by an atony of the mind's material." " Heaven help me ! " said Rodomant, " but not being, nor inclined to become, a physi- cian or pathologist, is that the term ? — I rather prefer facts to explanations. If the Prince is mad, and your dogma holds, that intermarriages perpetuate accidental fates, how came he so ? Cannot kings find mates in the many royal dynasties besides their own ? " " Not where such wealth, such false yet fast tenures of state and superstition, such arrogance and power, such giant strength and monstrous weakness, have held each other together so long ; bound by blood, the strongest of all amalgams, which losing its virtue, changes affection into selfishness — decomposes it, like a body beneath the earth, just holding together for want of air, but which once exhumed, mixes in a moment with the common dust. Such is the doom of all dynasties which endure through selfish- ness and pride only — the air kept out, or truth kept from contact with them, they en- Joy a living death, and blight all things, all persons within their spell, with breathless but not harmless terror. The rent once made, whether by the daring many, or the dauntless one ; truth once forced inwards at the breach, and no need for bloodshed : tlie skeleton clothed in strength has crumbled, the spell is scattered to annihilation." " It strikes me," said Rodomant, Avho was not struck so much as amused by this tirade — as, indeed, the inexperienced in physiol- ogy — key to history's cypher — ever are at the fragments of wild theories which are all its votaries have time to gather in a single lifetime. " It strikes me as strange after all HUMOR. 113 these horrors, tonglomerate and actual, that such a person as the princess should exist — of royal blood. If what j'ou assert be true, she must be false to nature." " Not the least ; her existence is a truth of nature's in itself, as pure and perfect as a flower, withal as simple. The princess's mother was not of royal blood — and that one fact in her father's career, his marriage, seems in its result to favor the celestial su- perstition that there are human beings ap- pointed now and then to embody angels — spirits albeit chained to clay, that di'op bless- ings where they move and breathe ; that rob curses of their evil charm ; that where they cannot save, console not with charity but love ; whose sympathy lends sweetness to the cup of death, and shares its bitterness. Such is the princess; — but Avhat besides? Scarcely should I tell you, if I could, for who daies to think, to dream of her, as of a woman ? " " Except that you have been dwelling on her womanly character only : the brow wear- ing the crown cannot stoop or the crown will fall. If her mother was not of royal blood, Fo\v came it to pass that her father married her ? — why was he allowed ? " " He was not allowed nor disallowed. Al- ready the dynasty is so near decay that those who, supporting it, are supported by it, dare not rouse themselves, nor stir one finger to resist a whim of the head. The subtlest movement or division among them miglit hasten tlie crisis they abhor to contemplate. The marriage of the Prince was a whim ; yet if Heaven could spare one hope for him, its result might seem such ; at least, an atone- ment to the people — and in her person a gift, a sign from Heaven. Those whom the Prince tortures, condemns unheard, dooms to ignorance and fear alone for life, all call her their child, not his — the people's child ; all stretch to her their hands, at her feet would cast their hearts ; she might tread upon their necks." Rodomant, in his wise simplicity, felt not so sure of this, even on his brief acquaint- ance with the princess and her future sub- jects. " Stilts again," was his remark. " Pray go on with the story ; bring it down to the level of my intelligence. His marriage was a whim — what then ? " " I should have told you that the princess is the child — the only one of his second marriage. His first, with a cousin of the nearest affinity, was fruitless of a son, and all the daughters died as infants. There can he little doul)t he frightened his wife, feeble in body and in mind, to death — for it is amazing how long luxury and ease will re- tain the faintest life in existence — th.re is nothing to fret the thread. And the first princess died young. Our princess's mother was, though not royal, of noble hlood, mixed with that of a fair race much fairer than this Id which peoples Belvldere, though of frater- nity with that too, in the Iieginning — farther back than pedigrees are traced. Under the snow-crowns and lucid skies of Caucasus, the beauty was first-born from light and cradled, which gave to the mother of our royal angel her sun-touched hair and heaven-colored eyes. She was almost as fair as her child, almost as holy, in all save the weakness, and that rather of head than heart, which allowed her to marry him. He married her to possess her, and possessing, cast her from him like a weed. A weed may flourish on a dunghill, but not a flower, whose seed first fell from heaven. So, flower-like, she dropped a seed and died. When first insulted by the Prince, she fled to the only dwelling not closed to her by him, the only gates not guarded, opened wide to welcome her ; she found an asylum where safety was purchased by purity, and assured l)y weakness ; the nearest house kept sacred by the Church to women. " Oh, a nunnery — is there one near ? The Prince is superstitious then ? " " What you call so — and what perhaps I think so, but may not say. The Convent of the Weeping Sisters lies within the wall of which that wall " — pointing with his finger — " is part. You asked me what it was this evening, at a moment when it was imjjrudent to speak, therefore I did not reply. Yes, in that house the mother died — in that house the princess was born, and there every night she sleeps. Passes in at the gate a royal maiden, lies down a sister on a bed scarcely softer than my own, and rising in the morning still a sister, she wears the robes of the order till after noon — then drops them, and is until the evening again, a king's daughter." " That is all very romantic, and like a girl," observed Rodomant, " but it seems to me that there is a waste of time — and a sentiniental air — in that. I should prefer the princess, that is, respect her more, if she were always, at all times, just herself — I recollect particularly, the picture of her as a sister — certainly the dress made her look most beautiful of all." " Silence ! " said Rosuelo, " how dare you tamper with her motives ? you who are "not worthy to understand them. Yet listen — for the meanest shall not calumniate her, while I have breath. The princess wears that dress, assumed that order, that she might visit all who suffer in all their nooks of hell — she would enter hell itself to rob it of its prey. As a daughter of royal blood, so rigid is the etiquette of falsehood, she might not stir one inch without her father's leave, nor could she gain it for that end. Clothed in the virginal vesture of the church's daughters, she is free to enter every where, to speak — to console — to tovcli, just as another woman of the sacred sisterhoods." 114 RUMOR. " Tljen," cried Rodomant, in a voice of amaze, toned audibly by fear as well — distress — no, something wilder — passion. "Then, can it be — is it true that she will never — that she cannot, marry?" "Not at all," answered Rosuelo, coldly, very carelessly, " her vows extend not to that degree." "Thank God — for somebody — I mean whoever marries her — who will that be, I wonder ? How shall I meet the Prince to- morrow — to-day, — is it not this morning now ? ■' " Long past midnight, I should say, but I have no time-piece ; to me it is not needful. I feel the hours, and my pulses tell me the minutes. I fear from your remark that you are fatigued ; if you ever slept on a bed so hard, take mine, and I will call jou so early still, that the guards shall only think you ai-e a very rigid Catholic, that you miss no hours of prayer. As for me, I always sit up three nights in the week, it suits me and my business also." " If so," said Rodomant, suppressing his first yawn, so long suspended by what to nim was a trance of breathless interest, " I really will, for it is my fate to be sleepy at wrong times. And if I fell asleep before the prince, I might blurt out your confidence, lose my own head, and be the cause of your crucifixion." And he threw himself straight along the pallet, which pillowless reminded him of a stall in the cathedral of his native town, into which he had sometimes slyly crept without his mother's knowledge — and yet where, shame to him, he always dropjjed asleep under the childish impression that nothing is so pleasant as to do any thing in the wrong place. Rosuelo passed the time in adoration — not of God, God-Christ, nor the Virgin, and he told no beads. CHAPTER XXH. Rodomant was called after a few hours' Bleep, and Rosuelo made him rise, though he had just reached that condition of mid- sleep when sleep seems necessary to exist- ence. Dead, dragging weariness chained every limb ; Rosuelo made him bathe his face, made him drink some water, and then follow him directly, that is, he strode out at the door, and so fiist that Rodomant's feet, ] which felt like feet in a nightmare, could not I keep up Avith him. Just as they caught sight ! of the palace, and soldier-sentinels, the priest j turned short and said — " Though we are | safe now, to have it remarked merely that l after your journey you hastened to return thanks, and afterwards spent some time with ! jour confessor, this mterview of ours, asj it is the first, must be the last ; -we must meet as friends no more. Last of all, let me beg of you, for the princess's sake, to take offence at nothing said or done to you, or to any one in your presence, while you are with her father. Please him also — humor him — it can do no harm, and may do some little good, if he is diverted, even for a time." " Ah ! before w^e part, tell me the reason the princess was so cold to me before her father — so kind afterwards." " She is cold to all men before her father — to all men out of his presence also, as far as we have the right to know. Excuse me, but you and I are her servants ; she would be kinder to a servant than to an equal.'' Rosuelo here gave Rodomant greeting, and went his way. Rodomant entered the palace, and reached his own place cheerily ; a memory, despite the intervening terrors, was like a morning song-bird in his brain. Whatever Rosuelo had said to damp him, his natural sincerity told him what was in fact true ; — the august girl had never communicated to any person the feehngs, in the tones she had used to him. Yet his sincerity also saved him from taking undue credit to himself, and he also had cause to call upon his philosophy ; for the motive of her strange and sad sweet confidence had surely been Porphyro's rec- ommendation ! Yet Rodomant rightly felt that it was extremely improbable she had confided those feelings so sacred, yet so simple, to a being like Porphyro — that human magnet, attracting all natures strong and keen — steel-like, as Rodomant himself, but yet who stood apart like a male modern sphinx, whose enigma, if written, remained to be read and translated, and who was the last child of creation it was likely a woman like the princess would — but there Rodo- mant stumbled over a harder recoUeclion — the ring. With that memory came burning thoughts, and rushing pulses, which drove him to the cool conservatory ; and while refreshed there bodily, he mentally resolved that he would think no more of Porphyro until the prin- cess told him — all. Then he reverted to Rosuelo, whose extraordinary personal charm removed, gave way to the impression, always a detestable one to Rodomant, of his insin- cerity, selfward as well as to the souls of others, of his craft out of, not in his priestly' profession. " I am truly." considered Rodo- mant, " a fitter person for her to confide in, or confess to either, than he — for, a Catho- lic, he reveres not his church; a fanatic, he seems entirely faithless, and I suspect him of a hankering and hungry taste, for all his monkishness and melancholy." This satiric suspicion, albeit spiced with spite, was indeed true ; and it was true besides that it was the last act Roseulo should have perpetrated as an honest man to become a priest at all. The poorest honest member of the religion RUMOR. 115 he professed bends before rude images reared in nooks by dusty waysides, or golden and gemmed doll-deities on marble shrines, with the same homage, the same simplicity, { perhaps the same faith. They are idols — \ vet ihcv represent what not only may be j worsliipped. but what men are commanded to adore. Rosuelo's idol, with all its divine \ idea, was human ; God he neither adored nor loved, for he cared for Him, he felt Him, he longed for Him not. Rosuelo was a de- scendant, one of the latest and very poor- est, of a noble family, once royal, too, and whose dignity, despite its poverty, could only he extinguished by the Church. Chosen in the bud of his boyhood a page for the princess, then in her infancy, he perused iier beauty from its dawn — that his oidy study, until her character unfolded too. But with so much beauty, and so grand a youthful grace as he himself possessed, it was not likely that he should be overlooked in a search through the court and kingdom for recruits to fill the ranks of that ideal sol- diery — a royal guard. Appointed so to protect the person of the ruler, and his im- mediate protectors on foot, Rosuelo looked on horseback a picture of a warrior ; dis- mounted, a knight in a masquerade. Along with the rest of his honoralile contempora- ries, sharing that chivalric ordinance, he was hated by the people, as they hated all who reminded them of their Prince — except his child. His beauty made no way with them, it had shone fairer scan-ed with noble wounds. Still Rosuelo prized his beauty ; it might be all he had to decide his fortune with — his first throw and his last. Seeing the princess from infancy to childhood, from childhood to the prime of womanhood, he had fixed on her as his deity, his faith — his fate. On her hirs soul was set, and it was with him as it might be with any, who, having a glimpse into heaven once, withdrawn, should deter- mine on entering it without denying self, or conquering sorrow, or loving God and man. He permitted himself, from the first moment he beheld her, to prophesy what she would become, as though she were created and designed for him ; and such, as a stripling's dream, might have been pardoned ; but it entered into his manhood as well, became its chief strength, and its entire passion. The princess in no way was to blame for this sentiment run mad ; as she passed into womanhood she lost nothing of her purity through her intense perception of her power over others — that is men. Numbers she did not affect as vien, she was infinitely too exalted, and yet too simple a woman ; and while all praised her beauty, it was to many as inexpressive and unexciting as a statue placed in shadeless light. The reserve which veiled her passion none should pierce except the chosen, and if he came not, none. Tiien, with all her regal courtesy, she loved not to meet the gaze of men — not that she avoided it, but her eyes bad a glance which looked through them and beyond them, as though they were shapes of mist that passed over the' heaven of her contemplation. But to return to Rosuelo's brief ^nd bitter career as a secular personage. He was one of the few who would have died to obtain her, but the only one who ever for an instant thought it possible he might. He not only loved her as a woman, surpassing the bounds of lawful fealty which his conscience dared to sanction, but he let her know it ; first enforcing her attention by his open and measureless regard, then addressing her, much as Rizzio addressed a princess more regal, yet less over herself a queen. Ade- lai'da, greatly displeased rather with herself than him, expressed no displeasure, and disguised the instinct of womanly aversion which his presence as much as his audacity had touched, lest she should at that moment drive one distracted to despair. But she expressed such cold decision ; she dis- charged his suit so directly and so readily, that if he despaired not, he hoped no more. She interpreted the change in his mood, and therefore gave him generous counsel ; and if imprudent, it was not the less kindly nor natural from a heart so young. She forbade him her presence, unless he entered it as married ; and she advised him in few words, to travel, and to marry — she would find means to reconcile her father to his temporary absence, and his secret should be sealed from all. Rosuelo did neither; but quite secure, as the most desperate and de- testable might have been, of that secrecy, he obtained permission of the prince to enter a college, in aspiration after and prep- aration for priesthood. No other motive would have induced the prince to spare him ; it was a merit to sacrifice to the church so handsome a soldier and loyal a subject as his own person ; not to speak of the fact that the instant any member of the princely household expressed or implied a desire "to quit it, he was thrust out, lest he should poison or betray the prince. Rosu- elo worked hard, and his studies and ecclesi- astical consistency refined his beauty, while they gave it the fascination of intelligence cultured to excess ; and returning on the prince's hands as his own spiritual advise^- — talismanic rather than practical — he easily found access to the convent the prin- cess claimed as her favorite resort, from which he knew well she would not retreat on his accoi nt, because of the many who depended for what was dearer than life, on her connection with its order. So Rosuelo met her almost daily, though scarcely ever in the evening, hence his allusion to the angelic repast he had partaken of, in his conversation with Rodomant. In the first instance, after his return, the princess had troubled herself little, for her ideas were so pure that, as she would have considered 116 RUMOR. a married man necessarily freed from the lijjhtest personal influence, so a thousand times more surely a priest must be self- protected from the same. Thereupon slie received him kindly, treated him ingenu- ously, till sharply and suddenly, not gradu- ally, she detected her error, and severely , blamed — this time him, not herself. It was t well for her, that from the beginning of her' independent life she had contemned confes- sion, and refused to confess. This decision saved her from what would have been insuf- ferable communication with Rosuelo; though she would not have allowed him to become aware that he inspired her with repugnance or alarm ; it was therefore fortunate that she could assure him she had it not in her power to obey that dictate of the Church, because she dared not confide to man what she did not even breathe to Heaven — that she loved not her fother, nay, that as far as hatred could encroach on a heart filled and clothed with charity — she hated him, or evil in his image. When Rosuelo found that he was denied those spiritual yet delicious confi- dences which had filled his dreams since his departure, he fell into the despondence where dwells no deity, the real and only depths of hell. Through all, his body was easily mastered, or rather his behavior, his desperation was so strong that it clutched and defied from self-discovery all attributes, all faculties, all but its own blank fict. Therefore, he could not only endure, but was permitted to see her ; in the dimgeon- dark, by the lantern gleam, at the pallets to which the tortured were dragged to regain strength for torture ; they met, the priest and the princess, with no rank — nothing but her disregard — between them. So the broken in heart and limb, the scourged of frame and sick of soul, the tormented who would not have acce])ted deliverance, but hid sought the snare, those saved for the wheel or the whip, for the scaflbld, or the state-shot to end them, all Hstened to Rosu- elo's exhortations without an echo in their sympathies : they confessed without relief, wei-e absoi.'ed by him without finding con- solan m ; and his prayers, trembling elo- quent as uttered music, touch their ears as the cold air struck the iron of the dungeon- walls. For, when he addressed the unseen Father, he saw with his bodily eyes a form he would have enduied their whole miseries at once but to embrace ; and if he sought the intercession of the holiest of human mothers, it was with another woman for him — not her own for them. Meantime Rodomant had forgotten Rosu- elo, for on returning to the sleeping cham- ber in which he had not slept, he found a suit of rich clothes laid ready on a jasper table. Whether placed there by fairy hands or human, he presumed they were meant for him, and particularly as Porphyro had bid- den iiim to depart without special equipment from Parisinia. This costume was remark^ able, gay, in contrast with those he had re- marked aliout the throne ; it was indeed only at balls that even the women of the Court wore white or colors, so perfect was the taste in fashion of the most depraved of men. However, Rodomant hesitated not an instant, but dressed himself, plumed hat and all, then resolutely and half-humoro-isly surveyed himself in a mirror ; for he was bent on flattering every mere foible of the prince ; in a positive agony of fear least by that person he should be sent away. It was fortunate he did not know, as Porphyro had kej)! to himself, with the fact of the treat- ment of court-musician in court-fool, that it was a mummery of motley with which the office was invested, to distinguish it from all those offices more serious or sublime, helJ by the persons about the Court. So Rodo- mant took time easily as.for a spoi't, and being dressed, until he should be sent for, lay down and slept out what remained wanting to him of his rest the night before, or rather the morning. At noonday the summons came. Nothing in the palace resembled the pen- etralia of the prince. The chamber to which Rodomant was conducted lay in its very centre, at the heart of branching corri- dors, safe, so it seemed, as a cellar or a vault, for the ceiling was so lofty that only a bird could pass over it, and it was lighted from that roof alone. Luxury behind luxury, splendor shading splendor, seemed the order of its appointment; the superb pictures were veiled with velvet, the mosaic floors weie hidden by carpets stiff" with gold, and these again softened by depth u])on depth of sil- very fur, the skins of costliest animals. The tapestries were wasted on the walls, for an intricate gold net-work crossed them in every ])art, up which clomb living jasmines — or what seemed to breathe but lived alone in malachite and ivory. The canopies to every chair were silver orange trees, with fruit of gold ; the chairs of perfumed wood were gilded smooth as glass ; the tables in- laid with gems, and each a gem, svere lost to vision beneath a surfeiting strew of priceless toys. The hue of the cushions and couches wavered between a pallid azure and the fairest flush of rose ; and the seat the prince occupied had fringe of fiiry brilliants and tassels of pearl in seed. He was not alone. At Belvidere was a harem, differing from those of the Ivistern world in so far as that it was not veiled from other men, nor masked to all besides its owner. In a recess lined with blue enamel, pow- dered thick with stars of silver, was a cham- ber-organ in a case of goldsmith's work, chased and ornamented precisely like a huge Parisinian clock ; this, Rodomant's compar- ison in his own mind ; also a harp whose frame was studded Mith emeralds and rubies, and a pianoforte, which, from its exterior, RUMOR. 117 gave the impression of a masterpiece in Chinese ivory-carving — these the musical furniture of the apartment. Rodomant who, quite self-possessed, could not bring himself to apj^roach the prince, went to their recess as to his proper place, and the prince, struck favorably with his modest deport- ment, graciously commanded him to play. Now, Rodomant would have perished before he defiled his own special revelation, his own infant imaginings, his virgin and art- betrothed thoughts, by giving them an instant's utterance there. He knew his au- ditor, however, and his performance, given with the entire strength of his masterly exe- cution, lent spirit and voluptuous sweetness to a theme at once solid and sum]5tuous — adaptive, yet not inconsistent with the reve- ries of a dramatic artist. Then the prince approved, and further conferred with him, through an interpreter, taking a skimming flight over the fields of art in every age since that in which music was a cipher and a single string — for man. For the prince had that sharp, brilliant cunning, which gleams from the eyes of the lofty among the lower ani- mals — dregs of an intellect once lofty among the loftiest men ; also his instincts had in them a ])ower to select — dregs of a nature once fa>tidious as noble and imjjas- sionate ; he, too, could play, for his muscles had an elasticity that, though it failed too quickly far for strength in warfare, still lasted him a Avhile on those soft ivory keys, than which his hands were fairer — dregs of a race superb, and once as untiring as the mountain eagles. At length Rodomant was dismissed, the point and conclusion of the audience being the prince's command for the production of Alarcos in the theatre of the palace that day week. At the moment the composer never even touched in his own mind on the diffi- culty of carrying out such a command ; for he was sick and weary of his great com- panion, yearning to be alone, or rather for that which he expected to spring from his next solitary hour, a summons to the prin- cess. None such came, and he heard no more of her that M-hole day, than if she ex- isted not. It was quite as well for his artistic fate that the prince, bent on the instant grati- fication of the most refined sense he pos- sessed, showed the same tyrannous decision =^mployed to arrest and punish his conscious slaves, towards this whom he would have esteemed a slave as well, albeit an uncon- scious cue, Rodomant he had no idea of lea'-'.ng idle, and after the necessary noonday meal, and after rest, which was the only rule the prince could not defy nor tamper with, it being a law of climate enforced by nature, he sent for Rodomant to revicAV the orches- tra, which was further stated both by band- master and jjlayers, to have been in training for the retjuired opera for months. This feignided litJe to Rodomant, who, wherever he was put, contiived to direct and to over- throw every system but his own, on the best of grounds, that this alone was right. All this took much time, particularly as the prince was not only present, but seemed ubiquitous, dancing up to Rodomant ; sug- gesting, whispering praise, and blaming loudly, with the strict etiquette of the critic- aster, but producing no more effect upon his new conductor than though he had been not only deaf, but also dumb, and subsiding at last, more like myrmidon than master, at trf silent touch of the art-sceptre — calling up all the spirits from the orchestral deeps — for the great vibration swept the prince to his place as easily as a reed is taken by a rushing tide. Till very late that nig't Rodomant worked, long left to himself by the prince, who was too well acquiijnted already with the letter of Alarcos to bear the innumerable and analytic readings for long ; the prince read score as excellently as some idiots are said to draw cats. As for those he taught, Rodomant had to go back to the very beginning — they were ignorant of his new song as childi-en who mispro- nounce an unknown language ; and in the process of correction, which was infinitesimal and strictly administered, of course his tem- per, never calm, surged out in passion that sounded terrible to those who comprehended not his words — for at present he could not communicate his will to them save through those pseudo-Italian phrases which may be termed the slang of musical art. Only a week to prepare Alarcos was in such-like phrase — to cram — there was no other pros- pect until he freely spoke their language. Dismissing them when the last gasp of atten- tion turned into a yawn, a universal one it looked like, they vanished quietly ; never had he in his own land beheld a brood of performers so pale, so orderly, so sombre — spiritless, or spirit-chained and dumbrd. So he returned to his rooms in a desperate mood, with the finest space for music, the quickest if not the most intelligent of musi- cal readers, and perfect instruments, with sovereign voices ; if he succeeded not in this his first effort, could he not take this tide at the ffood, he should lose — not for- tune, that were too light a loss to mention in comparison — but a golden fate to which the mightiest fame was as a handful of shrunken dross. Little he imagined that for the first time now his powers of endurance had to be tested thoroughly. Next morning, again bidden to the prince's presence, again made to play, enforced to hear, not only his jjlay- ing, but the ravings of mystic sensualism peculiar to the prince in his most princely moods, and which baffled the moralist as an obscure disease eludes the physician ; again the afternoon of arduous if world-derided labor — flimished, longing, unhelped by siga of hope. So the next day to the next, with 118 RUMOR. nights between, sleepless, not dreamless — at last came the hour for Alarcos, and at least he must know whether indeed the prin- cess lived — for that week, as for the blank it left between his soul and her, might have heen the dread, quick week between death and death's death-burial. Fortunately for his mood, on the edge of despair, an angel plucked him from it. The princess was in her own seat, and though forced to turn from her face after his first intense inspection — so swift and vivid that it seemed to others but a glance — ■ yet that apparition was enough not only to console but deceive him through its beauty. Though it was a fact that never had Alarcos gone so ill, so unlike the opera under a parent's inter- pretation, yet he had never been so content with* it before. It was well that the prince was chiefly occupied with the dramatic pro- cession of the plot, — strange that those born to die by violence ever hanker after histories of violence or blood, — and also well that his standard of perfection and Hodomant's were not identical. So for the fust time in his life Kod(miant heard no blunders, detected no expressional error. He who in his brain's full energy — his heart's whole holiday — had discerned a tlaw as minute as a single string the tenth part of an inch too highly screwed, or a deficiency as delicate as one flute-note dro]iped ; and who, over a slur too harshly rounded, or a forte thundered issiino, had fractured his self-re- spect by anger any number of times ; this certainly the first excejjtion. For his fealty to her image and impression, he was this time rewarded ; false as he was to that bride he had once boasted as a choice, his Art ; and to the very woman who, refus- ing to accept his primal fancy for the love it was not, had indebted him to her so deeply, and won in return his ungrateful non-remem- brance. However, before he left his desk, the princess sent for him ; and first follow- ing close the page, her messenger, he soon .eft lhe boy behind, and had to wait for him after all. In the portion of the palace at once the most primitive and secluded, the princess dwelt when by day in her father's house. Rodomant found her in a chamber Mhose first furniture was intact, eVen to the ])aint- ings. worn by time; and the antique cressets, instrad of lamps, which shed a solemn and semi -light. A taste, not severe, only natu- rally simple made melancholy by contempla- tion, ruled in every corner; books of every variety, in almost every language, but not one richly bound ; tables covered with let- ters and papers (chiefly petitions) never unread, oftenest answered in person ; a plain pianoforte and harp, of finest mechanism ; these last in a recess, as though not com- panions of every hour, but for recreation only. Not an unnecessary ornament besprent the room, just as none marred the heavenly and unconsidered, if not unconscious, beauty — of its haunting angel. Rodomant, so overpowered, that he lost not, to the sight, one particle of strength (there is i such self-possession as that sprung from strong emotion) stood meekly in her sight, and in himself desiring rather to die with her eves so bent upon him, than to lose her yet again. And she, early schooled in the experience that calm grows out of suff"ering, and endur- ance from mental pain, thought him too dis- tressed to allude to, or make apology for, the comjjarative non-success of his first experi- ment in her father's theatre. For she whose intellect was one of a more consistent integ- rity than his own — the impulsive one of the passion Genius, had perceived and realized the failure, with her great heart regretted it for him (the least of the strangers she entei tained there, unawares) and with her sweet, woman's instinct, longed to lighten its re- membrance by her sympathy. " You must not think," she began, " that my father will be displeased." " With what ? " asked Rodomant, in a tone correspondent to his attitude — one of meek defiance. " That your beautiful work was so poorly expressed and so fatally mishiterpreted," — she used again what must be called artist- slang, and which ought, with all slang, to be pronounced by truth as well as taste, illicit. " Not at all," said Rodomant, collectedly ; he had gathered his stray wits to himself while she spoke — not of herself — and therefore he could rally his reasoning forces easily. " Not the least. Though I made the music, Alarcos is a giant child — the eldest should be. First-born of r ly fame, mj brain's darling ; it is a character not easily comprehended by the many, especially when they have first mislearned it. Yet for its defection — for its yielding your highness only slight and partial pleasure, pardon, oh great princess ! " He raised his eyes here, ard literally blazed upon her — her own shivered mo- mently, as if a sudden lightning crt. -ssed them — still she thought, and onlj thought, " what splendid eyes ! a train lit up by in- ward fires where the golden ideas (ire melted into form." But yet, how was it, she met not again that lightning ? but her i weet eyes fell, and the lashes, golden-dark like cedar branches tipped with sunshine, dropped their dehcate shadow on her cheek. " I think," she said, " that all the blame lies with us — we atBelvidere I mean. The failure in perfection Avhich I noticed, was en- tirely owing to the fact that you and your pupils did not understand each other — liter- ally I mean. As for us, or rather them, edu- cation is not the order of the day in Belvi- dere, they learn nothing which nature teaches them not, and that she teaches in ])erverted in them. And though our tongue is exquis- itely musical, and of a rarely choice constrac- niJMOR. 119 aon, it is least commonly made a study, of all the languages of Europe — perhaps be- cause itself so nearly Eastern. Yet is easy to understand, and easy, I hear, to learn. Then let me ask you, will you learn my lan- guage, and let me teach you ? You would learn not only easily, but soon, as I under- stand your command of memory is so great, that you play the works of all ages without book or note. Once more, will you learn, and shall I teach you ? " It was well for Rodomant, that his natural breeding never failed in any circumstance — his passionate amazement vented itself here in the grace of gratitude alone. " Your highness is far too generous, too great in condescension. I could not learn so ! " Quite sincere in that. Then replied she, with her tact as subtle as the air, " You shall have my master Ros- uelo ; I mean, when I say my master, he who taught me your tongue when, having read one of its fairy tales translated, as a child, I felt a longing to repeat it inwardly as written in the beginning. I think my friend, whose birth and faculties are noble, would be an instructor to whom you could not ob- ject." " No, no," said Rodomant wildly, yet lowly — she noticed not his passionate confusion — "I will learn any thing of any one, to do the bidding of your highness." Little knew she that in her easy renunci- ation of an intention on her part whose ful- filment would have been for him as dear as dangerous, she plucked away for that hour, his passion from its firm hold on sense. In an instant he comprehended that if he was to stay before her, he must control not only his words and manner, but his insurgent tlioughts ; she must be for him a princess — neither angel nor other woman. "Do you dislike the heat?" asked she again, with an interest that was somewhat singular in a stranger's mere personality. " I took care you should have a cool corner in which to breathe." The conservatory — yes, Rodomant knew what she meant. Yet something checked the expression of his gratitude — an instinct he could not conquer, though then unmixed with suspicion. Her generosity simply abased him lowlier in the heavenly humiliation of worship. He could not speak — and did not tiT — she thought him embarrassed ; yet evi- de'ntly wished for his society, or why not have dismissed him ? This question suggested itself, but to his honor he would not answer it internally. " I heard that you had a mother," she went on ; " why did you not bring her with you ? that you might at least have had some one to speak with of your home." " My mother? Your highness is too good • — she went to Germany before I came." " You must miss her very much," said the princess, in her benignest accents That re- mark restored Rodomant more than oould any influence besides have done ; his humor- ous vein roused instantly. " The idea of our wanting or missing each other ! " he exclaimed, and his eyes lit up with laughter, though no echo of it left his lips. " She first left Germany with me when I went to England, that her apron-tic might restrain me from the haunts of the devil. And when I got on in Parisinia, and she found that I still lived in a small room, drank no wine, nor gambled, then she wanted to go and pay a visit to the people who knew hd when she was dressed like any owl. I had given her some ornaments too, and she want- ed to show them — she was too honest to buy any for herself, for she considered my money was earned unfairly, because it was made by music." The princess smiled. " It is a great gift of Heaven to have honorable parents, whether learned or simple. I should like some day, when there is time, to hear your history." " It is nothing," said he abruptly, " I am people-sprung, and if I have no defects of ancestry, it is because I know no ancestor." " You need no pedigree," the princess thought, as she cast a glance on him from head to foot — the frame with its symmetric sternness, the eye whose strong brilliance attested taintless blood — a sign infallible, but by few interpreted. " We are all people- sprung," she added, " if truth be spoken, which is seldom — princes, kings, nobles, all were of the people once ; the people raised them specially from among themselves, and bore the control because of superiority — an accident — on the part of those they raised. If the superiority exists not, if it ceased long since, are the people to bear control of those who represent it in a hollow superstition ? " Then she changed her tone, indignation strik- ing through it, and over her spreading a mo- mentary air of abstraction, such as always possessed her when that theme was touched, and obliviousness of all besides. " I can- not comprehend why it is lawful and right- eous for the army of one country to fight that of another, for the thing called Ruler in its own ; yet against the laws of heaven and of honor to fight on its own ground, for its own rights, against the oppressor be- cause he is their own oppressor, and not the oppressor of others." " Civil war ! " asked Rodomant, somewhat startled, quite as much because the subject seemed unfitted to her ideal impression, as because she was a royal woman. " Your highness, then, defends it?" " Certainly, if any ought, it would be I." " But they might kill you," he exclaimed, with horror in his voice. " AVhat a sacrifice ! " she murmured ; " a drop for an ocean. But if tlie restitution were only in such degree, I would gladly die — at least, I ougJit to die gladly, and I would willingly." 120 RUMOR. would like to live, and therefore could only be willing, not glud t6 die. Alas, for whom then would she live ? — they shall not destroy her. They s'lall not kill you, princess," he added aloud, the echo to his thought ; " there are many, too many, wlio love you ; it would not be permitted." Rosuelo's words returned upon him, words which, sprung from love, had seemed the birth of loyalty ; and then came sweeping back to memory the fact that to the princess hernelf had the priest referred him for the elucidation of Porphyro's mystery. Quick followed the conviction, insignificant enough, how great to him, that Porphyro alone could have acquainted the princess with any cir- cumstance of his life — his mother, his mem- ory, or, for instance, his German fondness for linden trees. Had not Rosuelo asserted that Porphyro wrote to the princess ? And now was Rodomant driven direct io the point which, quite unconsciously, he had been trying to avoid ever since he saw the ring on Porphyro's finger — that ring so attractive and yet obnoxious, so magic-like yet real — jtal as the man who dared to wear it, and whom it was impossible to invest either pre- sent or absent with an ideal attribute, yet who needed not the faintest pencilling of imagination to render him a mystery. Un- conscious as Rodomant had been of his own shrinking from that point so dark yet defi- nite, it was the unconsciousness of one in- stinct only — like a blind man's sightlessness, while yet his sense of touch is doubly if grop- ingly acute. So felt Rodomant, if blindly, that something in some person, whether Por- phyro, which suspicion he tried to strangle, or another, exercised over the princess an influence which was scarcely negative, though it might be unconfessed. Whether he would ever have gone to the point in words cannot be pronounced, for the princess, going to the dimmest corner and taking a book in her hand, remarked very carelessly, " I forget whether you ever saw Captain Porphyro, my father's friend, in Parisinia ; yet I think it must have been so, as he spoke of you with familiar interest very unusual from him. He was there, I know, the whole time of your visit, but I understand he lives in great and necessary seclusion." Now Rodomant studied to be as careful as she had been the reverse — in exact and ironic proportion. " He lived in great seclusion, and I heard it was necessary, though I never could find out why. At first he was in prison, so I was told by others — • so he told me himself : still I could never find out why — there seemed a fate that I should not hear. I saw him myself, for the first time, however, not in seclusion — it was at the house of a great actress. I wondered who he was ; and when I heard, and also discovered that he corre- •po-ided with the house of Eelvidere, I recol- lected him with astonishment still greater, as a person so insignificant in apjiearance, and so limited in capacity." These words, both spiteful and untruthful, succeeded, if they were meant to wound. The princess turned round quickly, and threw on him a sad yet searching glance. His mien must have dis- pleased her even, for she assumed that in- stant the loftiest manner she ever employed to any connected with the jK'opIe, and which was lowly compared with the loftiness un- measurable she used to every creature of the cotiti. " Every thing must be begun, remember ; you had to begin yourself, and thougli gen- ius often triumphs young in art, it is not so with genius not inspired of art or poetry, yet God-inspired — yes, more than they." " I presume it is Porphyro's genius to which your highness alludes." Rodomant's crest rose as his courage was required. Her mood, most regal, daunted him not the least. " Will your highness condescend to tell me what are its bent and character ? I am as ignorant of either as of the crimes he ap- pears to have committed, yet of which I could make no one directly accuse him. I see what he is ; what is it he would there- fore do'?" " His genius is the genius to command — men as the greatest man, no ruthless name of ruler, no tyrant christened into king, no mockery of paternal oversight, but sympathy as strong as brother felt for brotlier ; no shadow of a material sceptre to intercept from each heart the light of freedom ; yet a rule, the firmest where the gentlest, which those ruled shall rather embrace than endure." Bhnd instinct again burned strong in Rod- omant. He could not have given a reason for it, but he felt as though he stood there to resist a delusion, no harmless one in itself, but which affected, in this instance, an angel to its hurt. She had ceased trem- bling, and if he had not heard the tender shiver, he detected a softness to which the tones of her voice had fallen — she dared not speak aloud. " Princess," he said, with more reverence in his manner than she or any other had ever heard in it, " I think that his ideas, if of command, are not so fabulously faultless. I was with him once alone, and tired of the mys- teries he makes, or which others make about him, I inquired ' Who and what was he ? ' ' I am what you see me,' he replied, ' and as to who I am, you know my name, all that I am and mean— lies there.' So I said," went on Rodomant, his recollections rejoining link by link, " ' Porphyro, that means purple,' I know enough Latin for that, princess." " Yes, yes," she answered hastily, forget- ting to turn to the shade, full facing him with eager interest, " bold words of yours ; what did he answer then ? " " He said just this, 'What more meaning therein than in red, or blue, or wliite ? ' But KUMOR. 121 he said it so that a child could have under- stood his meaning — more, so much more, that it could not be expressed in words. I should say," added Rodomant, with that in- genious instancy which possesses imaginative persons to let out freely their fancies as they rise — often strangely and accurately repre- senting facts thereby, "I should say — it strikes me, that Porphyro has turned a pun on his own name into a spurious prophecy. He would like to be Caesar Augustus, if not to Rome, to some place or race — perhaps the whole world; one maj as well dream great things as little — and design them too — who realizes and who fulfils ? " The princess, far too interested to be an- gry, far too earnest to conceal her serious- ness, stood as if on her defence of the absent. " I never knew a person of such great mind so simple — he is ever liberal. What he said he meant, what he says he always means — his words are ever few. He has not a dream or design of royalty — much less the idea imperial, which is destroyed even in imagination, at this age of the world." Rodomant pressed his lips into a rigid line that he might not smile here ; the man i knew the man's nature better than did the aiigel-womau. He would not smile, lest he should interrupt her ; he dreaded to hasten his own dismissal by check of her singular and ■ still enthusiasm. The princess — most woman- j like, least angel there — thought he shared her interest or that she had awakened his. " As for his character," she went on, " the ■world holds not his equal. There is besides this to be said — he might rightfully have dreamed of ruling with crowned brows, for he is of a family whose source is traceable to that of the first emperor of Iris — Carlmag- nus the mighty and the good." " Ah ! that explains much — and he re- pudiates it ? " questioned Rodomant in a slow distinct murmur. " He repudiates it tacitly ; he relies not on it for the fulfilment of his great intention, and indeed he is too greatlj' occupied to trouble himself with or to discourse about trifies. It is enough that, if he chose, he could revive the right ; he asserts only his own fate — his star." " Ah, I remember, what was it that man said — princess?" said Rodomant, training his tone back to deference. "There was a man I asked about him, a man who puts kings and queens for characters into his books, and who makes them do as strange, common things as are done by men and wo- men too. Tliat man told me Porphyro was star-struck. I thought the idea of people having stars was as old as that old idea of pur- ple which vexed your highness just now." " I do wonder I am foolish enough to talk to you ! " exclaimed she, half-sweetlv, half impatiently, "but as we began we will finish. Porphyro believes in a star, as we must have a symbol for the idea of destiny; it also 16 represents the soul of man. A. star is but another name for that individual intelligence which the hour of birth presents to Time for time, to Eternity for eternity. Even the saints' histories so represent men's beings. One star differs from another, but they are innumerable : infinitely they people the fai depths of space — space immeasurable, em- blem of the immortality which contiins the life of each created soul. Some are distinct as suns — fixed guides for men on track .ess path or wave. Many are bright, but of lesser use and glory; thousands hang to- gether in nebulous gleam — each contributes its light, yet as a light is not distinguishable. There are stars invisible to men, even as a broken ray of light's fair essence. But aU are stars alike." Rodomant's humorous perception pierced to the very germ of this wild notion, it was such as a woman of the princess's wit could only entertain under a spell, an influence which, albeit cast from the brain of another commanded her heart alone, not her under- standing. But he resolved to make no comment on such a theory ; only to obtain information, and impart it. " I do not see," he said, " how so inno- cent a person contrived to get into prison — the days are over when they put men into prison for being astronomers. Yet that he was in prison I know, and more than that, he very nearly went there again for brtak- ing his word." " For what ? " asked the princess, hur- riedly, swept downwards, though most un- willingly from her starry trance. She evi- dently despised no man's opinion, if it con- cerned Porphyro's career or character. " For breaking his word," persisted Rodo- mant. "The same man who told me he was star-struck, told me he was just let out of prison — Porphyro I mean — for an of- fence he was just going to explain to me, when he — the man who was with me — was himself caught hold of by soldiers in the streets, and taken to prison. Why was he taken ? Actually because they mistook him for Porphyro. 'Porphyro had been seen with me that night, hence arose the mistake. How flattered I felt to have been remarked by officers of the state! Now, though I don't know why they had put Porphyro in prison the first time, yet I do know that the king let him out on condition — on his word, princess, that he did not reappear in Pari- sinia. Yes, he was there ; an odd thing for a man who always speaks the truth. He was there, not only then, but afterwards. 1 went to see him — he sent for me." The princess here gave the troubled look peculiar to those who, in perplexity, will not try to unravel it, because they will not to themselves acknowledge its actual impres- sion. To a nature of stainless truth, such perplexity is intensely painful ; if unac- . knowledged, perhaps most deeply fell. 122 RUMOR " I have not heard from him of his private , concerns or conduct for a long time, though we correspond. He told me his intentions once, and it is enough — I believed him ; I understood them. I believe him and under- stand them now. There is no one person great and good as •well, whose enemies out- number not his friends, and l)oth occasion- ally act for the worst instead of the best — his enemies misrepresent, and his friends exaggerate. And so it must be till the time comes — till he can prove himself of himself alone." " Oh ! " exclaimed Rodomant, wickedly ; he actually longed to make and to see her angry. "It was but a very little offence," my friend said. And he, my friend princess, hates the king, though he does not love Porphyro. He said it was just such a tiny crime, and insignificant, as if a child were to kick the crown on its cushion in the closet." It succeeded not here — she even looked relieved. " I know nothing of it, nor of the iiundred disagreeable circumstances which sow thorns in the right path for such a man. It will be as well for us to avoid that phase of any subject — the political side — for we can know nothing of it accurately, either I as a woman or you as an artist." " But as a princess, would your highness avoid it ? How so, and do your royal duty ? " " Perhaps, if such a thing ever came to pass ; even then, were I called to reign, I might after all not govern." She spoke proudly, even triumphantly, with lifted head. "What can she mean?" thought Rodo- mant. " Would she resign and retire into her convent? Yet why then look so royally? " Alas for him, his own heart answered the question — " There is one to whom she would resign the rule, while wearing its signet only." " I have to tell you," she added, " though you do not deserve to hear, that you are better appreciated by Porphyro than he by you. He has for you a regard and admira- tion I never heard him express for any one who was a ncn-politician before. You' shall read a part of a letter in which he writes of you." Just as if his opinion were inestima- ble and final. Now Rodomant was entirely regardless of it, Avhatever he was when face to face with the person of whom they spoke. "Not now, princess; your most humble servant cares for no appreciation — for no approbation ; I should say, saving only yours, and that, I have not earned to-night." . " His is worth much more than mine," she said, with her hand upon a casket she had been about to open, and she looked disap- J)ointed that the excuse for taking out the etter had failed. " It is worth much more, because music is my solitary charm, my dear- est passion, and to him it is the merest pas- time ; to subdue him, its eff'ects must rise indeed to the sublime. And you have that credit; he was positively affected by yovir compositions — they made him eVen elo quent." " Condescending — charming ! " cried Rodomant, and bowing low, mockingly, then fixed on her his eyes with a sh}- glitter. " My brain is lighted up to-night ; I recol- lect every thing. Some words of his seem, to whistle past my ears, as they did that night — so sharp, distinct, and strong. But perhaps I may not have permission to repeat them, it is already late." " You may," she said, with regal attitude, but downcast eyes : why did she not dismiss him? " I was standing by this man with tho imperial-sounding name, and, after a few remarks, in which we quarrelled, and he showed himself as ignorant of art as I am of his offence against the king, he added, ' If I were at the head, I would encourage art,' just as if genius could be planted, watered, and made to grow. Then, princess, he turned aside to me, and he dropped these words into my brain — they ring there yet when I remember them — ' I, who never thanked man before, I thank you, for you have helped me, you have shortened my way, perhaps by many steps!' Princess, since you have stamped him with your approval, and have condescended to enlighten me as to his star, a meaning shines through those words, which I no more perceived in them then than we can see the stars at noonday. I did not go out in Parisinia more than I was obliged, and yet the wind sings through every one's key- hole ; it said very distinctly how discontented the people were ; and I for my part never saw any thing so terrible and savage as their love for bloody stories, whether of love, or war, or suicide. For that they liked Alar- cos — for that I sickened of it the moment it was made clear to me. W^hen Porphyro paid me that compliment, which then I did not know how to digest, he had only heard Alarcos, he had only seen their enthusiasm — or rather mania — for it. Then what meaning could he have had, princess ?" She stood with steadfast lids that would not lift themselves, a haughtier grace seemed to crown her brow, but round her lips crept, blending with their disdain, a helpless ex- pression, which would have deterred any other man from straining on the subject fur- ther. Not so Rodomant, it but strengthened his inexorable longing to torment — born of a blacker jmng of his own most secret heart. "It could be but one meaning, / think — that my music, exciting the people so madly, might drive them all the faster to a revolu- tion ; little signs precede great events some- times, and strengthen them to fuMment. He said by many steps I might shorten his ■way — no, had shortened it. Was not that fighting against Heaven's set decrees ? And worse, — for those only can do who can dare every thing, — did it not show a want of perfect confidence in himself alone ? " RUMOR. 123 For a moment tlie princess looked at him ; surprise at his perseverance, his audacity, supplanted every other sensation ; and for that moment her glance seemed gathering quiet wrath — her breeding would have con- descended to no other. Yet it was not in nature — woman's nature — to be angry with Kodomant ; his quaint, bright glance, wholly unworldly, yet half-heroic aspect, above all the unconscious fascination which lurked e\ en under his impeitinences, all held her fast ; too generous to resist the spell, she smiled, and quite drew back her hand, which had wandered from the casket to a chased boll lying near it ; had she meant to summon her servants, and abash him by dismissal in their presence ? It mattered little, for the fair hand drojiped to her side, and was lost in tl>e dark folds of her dress ; the other hand grasped her rosary, but in reality was pressed upon her heart, to keep down in- wardly the soft and shattering pulse, un- known to man, and to all women but very fey,'. Had Rodomant known this, he would have died rather than add to that still ex- tremity of repressed emotion ; but he saw nothing except the smile which bathed her as])ect in a fresh and vivid beauty, more be- wildering, if less sweet, than her proud and tender gravity. He would do, say, risk any thing, to remain as long as possible in her presence, to procure even a few instants' further respite from the despair which waited to arrest him the moment he should be left alone. There was but one means left him, and he sold it, little suspecting what he should acquire in exchange. Even were it his last resource, should he not crush her pride with the knowledge of that — her secret ? " Princess, I must say one thing, whatever are Porphyro's faults, he is not ungrateful, and I should have recalled that before. He wears tlie ring faithfully ; I saw it on his fin- ger. How beautiful it is ! " He uttered each word slowly, to lengthen her suspense. She started back a pace, bewildered and un- blushing, he could not doubt her innocence. " What ring ? " she asked unfalteringly, " I never saw him wear one, nor any orna- ment. Yet doubtless he has many, his mother k'ft jewels, I know." " A ring," said Rodomant roughly, his reverence momently impaired by the baf- fling of his design to torment. "A ring with the portrait of your highness, the finest I ever saw ; fine for minuteness, fine for finish. I had a fancy, now a fallacy, as I perceive, that only your highness's own hand could have guided so fine a brush to such rainbow-ravellings of color. And then, what more common than for a princess to bestow even a gift so costly u])on one who serves her, or who pleases her equally, a soldier too, not a court-musician, that soldier's tool, though for what ornament he meant me in his ai-mory, or to what use in the future he means to bend me, break me, or melt me down, I cannot tell any more ihan I can teL from what genius he forced that ring, seeing it was not given him." This last dying gasp of spite hurt no one but himself. The princess heeded him no longer, he saw that, and he also realized that he had filled her with delight — for another. Her cheek glowed, the glory in her eyes grew tremulous as starhght seen in quivering water ; her brow brightened like sunshine falling on a lily. Sweet smiles lit the roses of her lips, not .swift as wont, but lingering ; yet even when she again addressed him, he felt the smiles were not for him, but for some delicious hope to which he had lent naif- assurance. " I never painted a ring, I do not paint," she said, .so graciously that he would have preferred her severest wrath. " Nor did I ever give a ring to any man ; but Porphyro paints, I know, and so minutely that I have seen a picture of his on a watch-paper fitted to a watch no larger than a thumb-nail. Have you seen any other of his paintings ? " this indifferently, of course, that she might hear more. *' Dear, yes," said Rodomant, his vexed passion sinking into suUenness ; " I saw a great picture finished up small, of Parisinia, as he means to make it — he told me so. A city as unlike Parisinia now, as the great golden globe, called moon in Belvidere, is unlike our shrunken silver phantom called a moon in Northland. Can any but a king re-make a city, or another but an emperor give to an empire resurrection?" But he repented re- turning to that well-chafed string, after the other and sweeter he had touched. For the princess, resolutely stretching her hand this time, shook loudly the silver bell, and turn- ing towards the door till it was opened by a page, saluted Rodomant in silence, and with- drew. Silent as she was, however, he had to see her last with the blissful blush he had himself called up, brightening on her face to a calm more tender. For truly, whether she felt or no, whether lightly or deeply, for Por- phyro , never before had he contributed the least to her woman's peace or happiness — he had but stirred her heart to restle«i-sine^8 on its first awakening. CHAPTER XXm. "Whatever she did that night, whether she wept her fill of those delicious tears whose fountains, like those of the one agony prepared for every soul, break up but once, or whether she slept and dreamed, and smiled upon her dreams, Rodomant never knew, for in after days the bliss and agony, alike extinct, had uo ghosts to give Ap from 124 RUMOR. the grave. But as for him, -whether for his misconJucl or his presumption, lie sutiered enough thai night — not enduringly but openly. The control of her presence taken from him, and the freedom of solitude Hung over him instead, he passed the hours in that deep heart-raving which, when the brain is lucid, cannct waste itself in words. But for the passion for renown which yet held fast his mind, leaving his heart to -its wildest dreams, his after-works had never been, for he would have destroyed liimself. As it was, he walked with crushing footstep, up and down, and round and round, backwards and for- wards, from one chamber to another, like a forest-animal caught fresh, and possessed of several cages instead of one. The night seemed but an hour, and a short one too, for, say what physiologists will of physical pain drawing out time immeasurably, the spirit's anguish quickens it ; were it not so, it could not be endured at all, for the power to suffer would be exhausted by the demand upon it ; the pain, as of the body in a swoon, would cease. Then comes the blank arousing — so it came to Rodomaut in the bright morning, when light sickened, and the rare perfumes toucheil the sense like the common odors — with disgust ; when the nerve-strength too quickly drawn upon, had not a sand left in the glass, and before vi- tality returned again, there must be that blank in being, and the blank alone. Truh", if pride be love's antidote, pride is no anti- dote for passion at its height. Mad, undig- nified, even disloyal as Rodomant's conscience convicted the state of his heart to be, as soon as the short sharp anguish had dis- persed itself and left room for slower tor- tures ; yet he could conscientiously excuse him by very means of a torture sharper than all. lilack as was his jealousy, it was not cold like envy ; it burned and was consumed not, and by its very tiame he saw the fact, cleared further also by an instinct that seldom erred, and never on his own account, that one not above him, not his equal in some respects, was preferred before him. Every instance of her gracious kindness, before so infinitely dear, turned its thorn-like pang into his heart ; for the sake of the regard she bore another had that regai'd been shown, her very appreciation was not genuine, but adopted on the recommendation of that other ; she had taken even his own genius on trust. He despoiled her sweetest wreath of charity in the cool of that blank morning, teaiing up the pale fiowei"s of the conserva- tory, rending the fair ferns, and breaking branches off the linden, so that the nightin- gales shivered in their unveiled nest. He even gnashed his teeth in honor of Lady Delucy, and cursed her wordlessly for having excited him to write a song-memorial of no memory he had ever known, and to blast its prophecy with ruthless sadness. Still, the very blank excluded not the prudence which does not belong to passion, but is inevitabla in love. " If I betray myself I am lost," thought Rodomant, " if all be lost not now. But no. she only went that I might not disturb her thoughts of him, ungrateful as all women are." But, ungrateful as she was, she had not forgotten him, nor her generou** intention towards him in the very least fulfilment. At eight o'clock a message came from Rosuelo to know whether Rodomant would take his first lesson in his own room or the priest":;. Rodomant chose the latter alternative, anx- ious to get away from the scene of his night- terror, and further having a partiality for the vicinity of the prison-palace in which tlie ])rincess slept. Rosuelo, who had forbidden Rodomant to visit him again privily, had of course set his negative aside on receiving, almost with the dawn, the commands of the princess. Still it was evident he intended to make the visit one of necessity and strict employment only, for the table was covered with books, and he only just noticed Rodomant's entrance by bowing, without looking up. But Rodo- mant took no notice of the books, begin- ning instantly, " I heard all about Porphyro last night, that is as much as she knows or thinks she knows — you must tell me the rest." Rosuelo, amazed at this abrupt remark, looked up — saw the shadow of the terror so dark below, and the blank above it, lying pallid on Rodomant's face. An expression at once all blank and all darkness — how could it be interpreted ? what was there to read ? Yet Rosuelo saw, felt — as deep as his human nature went was pierced with sympathy. " Another victim," he mur- mured, in his low rich tones, " and the slayer innocent." But as Rodomant seemed too absorbed, or too exhausted, to have heard the words, he added, " and what think you now of Porphyro — I told you of whom to inquire." " I hate him," said Rodomant, between his teeth. " Hard wqrds and dangerous," said Ros- uelo with a guarded glance, " nor is he hate- ful." " Who loves him then ? " cried Rodomant, with eyes he took no pains to veil, flashing defiance of the assertion. " The princess would tell you, thousands — and that tens of thousands will. I won- der she did not say so." " Because I was placing facts before her, and she was rejecting them as tj-uths — • there was no time. I tell you I come to you to hear the rest — and will. Is the man bad ? that is of some consequence, it seems to me, to be ascertained by those who if they hate him, do not hate her." " Porphyro bad — I think, on the con- ti'ai-y, that his heart is kind, an 1 dispositioa RUMOR. 125 inclined to benevolence. I even think that | in his self-estimate he is not willinj^ly de- ceived, for I do not call his an intellect of i lofty cast, and he has gazed so long on a j point in the distance where lies the Possible, j th-it his mental vision is weakened and dis- torted. Then again his honor is of a home- I spun quality, and he would be glad to shift | it for one of superior material, on the plea that every man must better himself in order to better others." " Blue and crimson he would change it foi — just what I thought, and suggested to the princess — she was exceedingly angry, though she made no noise — I saw that." " I wonder you provoked her, it was surely not worth while, even had you been one of her own country, and a subject born ; for she is far too royal in her nature's essence, whatever be the freaks of her benevolence, to punish her estate — never would she ac- tually stoop." " I don't clearly see," said Rodomant, who did not. " Of course she would never stoop, because the loAvlier she descended in rank, the loftier she would be raised above it in herself; it was quite worth while to tell her what I kncM- about Porphyro, for she thought too well of him. It might make her miserable without cause if she dis- covered her mistake too late. Therefore, I do not understand why you say it was not worth while." " Because she would not, with all her de- voted s|)irit, her ])assionate singleness, her proud innocence, mary-y any but a crowned head. Love she might, though far too femi- nine, and of virtue too refined to retain such love even in its least degree, after the claims of one legitimate had been assumed by her." Just like other men, Rosuelo settled that the princess would not marry any man in rank below her own — because she had dis- couraged himself!. Rodomant made his eyes look owlish. " Of course I never thought she would marry any but a crowned head ; that was exactly the reason I thought she might marry Porphyro." Rosuelo turned on him one of those glances that combine pity for ignorance, with contempt for assumed knowledge. " Your misconception is quite natural. Of course you heard his own version of his late failure ? " " I did not knoAV that he had ever tried in any thing to succeed. We never spoke of what is called his political offence, though I heard others speak of it, but could not even gain the initial of it." " He simply desired an audience in pri- vate of the king ; and the king after causing him to be searched and found unarmed, al- lowed him one, in which he requested (and seemed to expect) his majesty to resign." " To him -!- of course ? " '• Not the crown, so he pretended, only what maJces the crown — the prerogative under its natural restraint from without, and its seal and sign, the approbation of tht, people — even that he denied, wishing t" take to himself, or to transfer to any one." " The princess said she had never heard of that — was that a lie ? a lie on lips like hers ? " " No more than if she told you she did not believe in purgatory, which I am sure she will never experience. This pre- tender took care to sow her mind so thick with germs of thoughts and dreams most dear to her, all promising for harvest the exaltation and happiness of humanity, that he left no room for prejudices to be struck by others. I also believe that he confided to her his plans without their name, for there are two ways of lying, one called foul, the other fair ; the first is to substitute false- hood for fact ; the second to imjjly a little more, or confess a little less than the whole and perfect truth. He adopted the latter mode, and she who is of honor like snow under its first crust for purity, believed him of course. She does believe what she sees and hears, that is why joy has never blos- somed in her youth." " I can scarcely think, however, that he meant to deceive her — he may simply with- hold his final intention until fulfilment, to add to her surjjrise, perhaps to Avhat he fan- cies would be her gratitude. For I fancy I can trace, under that iron calm of his, an arrogance which even passion would not soften, and that would make him love to raise her, not for love's sake, but his own. What then — tell me — what is his destiny to the letter, in his own esteem ? " " Of course it is obvious — he harps on the idea that he is descended from Carlmag- nus, which is just possible, though I believe it not ; — but to adduce such a fact, even were it a fact, in support of claims that held to it in the beginning, is, to say the least, a fault in Avorse taste than the crime of trea- son simple. Wliy, there are a dozen families in any civilized country who might put forth as clear a right to royalty, being at the foun- tain head, not traditionally but historically, of royal blood. And to hint at such facts as claims, even in the heat of delirious ambi- tion, is to commit an error against the laws of nature, to go back in the world's being instead of forwards — moral sorcery, if in- deed it could be done." " That was, I suppose, the two-sided of- fence — to believe in one's descent from a dynasty extinct, and to desire the annihi- lation of the present, pretending unsel fish motives. What part he means to pla^ in process, even if in the end his aims suc- ceed, 1 cannot think, nor how the people are to be governed." " The trick might possibly be tried, of the elected few, as was once played and swept into anarchy's quick chaos. It might so hap« 126 RUMOR. {>5n, but, without his intervention in the necessary progress of events, and if Por- phyro thinks he could gain control even over that few, I fancy him mistaken ; there are a dozen men in Parisinia, whose brains, if capacity were in the ascendant, might rule the world — they have also not only heads, but voices, it is little likely they would need or call for a mouthpiece such as Ills. A person so deficient in intellectual habit, and so limited in expression, I never saw. If ever the reii\s were put between his fingers, it would be as though you or I, or any other not trained a cavalier, were bidden to break a horse of the first breed freshly caught." " That is in the blood — the Arabs are not taught except by nature — I also believe I coidd hold a horse fast myself, and make it own me. However, you are a priest, and I have as good as lived in a cloister — we both differ, and either of us may be right or wrong. / believe, that if that man asked tlie king to resign, he ivill resign, without his asking, perhaps ; if he means to be at the head of the few, then they will wake up and find him there ; if he has determined he will govern all, he will do it, but not as the this offender's twin brother watched for the prince's carriage next time he went to mass in public — he had to wait a month, though that was an extraordinary instance, to return thanks for the repression of the rebellion that had hardly breathed. This brother aimed a ]5istol-shot at the prince, and Por- phyro, who was on horseback, rushed before the window-glass when he saw the man's arm raised. The glass being shut, tliere was in reality little fear, except for the glass itself, and further, the carriage was moving rapidly. However, it happened, fortunately for Pcirphyro that the shot brushed the mar- gin of his hat, so that there was at least a shoio of danger averted from the prince, who exaggerated it, as all cowards do, and who never forgot the intervention. For he knew full well, whatever he knows not, that few indeed would interpose their bodies between him and death, except those paid, and Por- phyro at that moment had not been. Once here, I mean at court, he ingratiated himself as subtly as an infection — to my perception as little agreeably, but as sure ; gave ad- vices which were approved but never fol- lowed, flattered habits he did not personally adopt; was most provedly a hypocrite, un- princess thinks. For he is famished, dying less lie was a solitary exception, and detested of thirst, mad in the core of perfect sanity, | not the head here. Worst of all, least com- for Fame ; what he considers its crowning \ prehensible, he bewitched her. Well, saint- heaven as well as its ultimate earth-point ; ! esses as well as saints were tempted, and and that is not what you would consider it, | angels fell." nor I. If it were the imperial idea he wished j " If so," said Rodomant, " it proves at to realize, the clouds would descend from i least that the fascination of ugliness is as the sky to weave purple for his living pall, , strong as the power of beauty." He could and the stars would shape a crown for him, j aflord to say this, not being beautiful him- did man refuse." ' self in his own eyes. Rosuelo shook his head slowly, but was I " I believe," said Rosuelo, " that a crea- evidently careless to dispute the matter, and ' ture such as she — if there ever existed Rodomant detected his weariness of that ! such another face in angelic archetype, does topic — changed it to a nearer interest. " I j not perceive ugliness, nor is subject to the cannot understand one thing, and that is, antipathies which invade the senses of cpar. how Porphyro became at home in such a ser beings. That man attacked her in court as this ; a person without parentage, as they represent him." " That is not strictly true — his father held an insular position, and his mother was no- ble — on her side he might take the title of count. But such medium rank he repudi- ates, he never would adopt it, proof most rational of all thrit he requires the utmost, and half expects it. Still, repudiating the title, he did not renounce the privileges understood by it, and has tried the i)ulse of every living monarch so to speak — few even touch thrones from such a distance, and there seems a fite that no regnant should resist his influence ; well, it is true that cer- tain fishes require a peculiar bait. He was here, somewhat on sufferance for a time, still on a visit to a chief nobleman of ours ; and during that space chanced one of the innumerable emotions of the people that have yet reached a crisis. Among a hun- dred arrests or so, one soldier had been shot for mutinous grumbling over his rations, and princii)le — an abstraction he assured her might be realized. As man she understands him, perceives him not, she sees ah idea which her virgin and unbetrothed will as- serts to be his image — that is all. Could vou see her, as she is often, and perhaps at this very instant, you would not be aston- ished that ugliness, as you call it — that is, the impression which negatives beauty — has over her little or no power. Her senses seem charmed to unconsciousness in the heart which embraces all humanity ; charity annihilates her tastes — otherwise, frail of body as she is, I see not how she could have ever lived so long." " 'Where is she at this moment, then ? " The thought of seeing her again quickened into yearning. " In one of the prisons, there she spends all her mornings, a day for each in turn, most frequently underground, as there He the criminals whose crimes rise highest in their intention, and who are the hardliest RUMOR. 127 revenp;ed upon the divine, or diabolical right of royalty. " Well," said Rodomant, courageously, " you have been very good so far, and have told me some charming little episodes of real romance, pray crown your kindness, take me with you and let me see her, how she looks, I will not speak to her. As for doing any thing else, I could as easily write a sonata on the sky, as read a grammar les- son, yet I promise you I will learn double to-morrow, treble the next day, and so on. My memoiy is certainly prodigious — Por- phyro told one truth there for all his lies. And as for those eternal sentinels, I shall pack up the books and carry them on my shoulders, and just you tell me what ' good day ' is in your tongue, and I shall silence their wonderment with it. ' He has been learning of the priest,' they will say. For of course the priest is the finest scholar in all the country." Whether, out of routine, even a man of the church prefers a vision of his material paradise, as even to the wisest among the race of the wise, " stolen waters " were the most refreshing, it cannot be said ; but it is certain tliat after proper resistance to the unruly appeal, Rosuelo gave in, and con- sented that Rodomant should accompany liim in what for him was an exceptional visit in the forenoon. Passing the long wall of the convent, a quarter of a mile through corn-fields bordered with shrubs, full of fruit and blossom at once, brought them to the city, the capital of the princedom of Belvi- dere. At a distance it lay against the sky's deep sapphire, like a cluster of domed pearls and ruby-pointed pinnacles ; even near at hand the ruddy brick and stainless stone burned rosily and dazzling in the sun-pierced clarity of the atmosphere, close-blazing upon noon. Inside the gates, true, still the domes swelled palpably, and the spires pointed calm as needles cast in marble, but alike too much above the eye gazing onwards in suspense, til attract them from what showed at hand aruund. Close streets, like lanes of London ; unj.'aved, dingy roads, paths traceless, dry.- seas of drifted dust all baked beneath the burning air, struck Rodomant like a hard material dream, and in that slow furnace he nearly sM'ooned, before the point of desire was reached. He and Rosuelo seemed the only things alive, except the insects, whose croM-ding clouds made the only shade between men moving and the sun — water-carriers were flung in the full blaze beside their ves- sels, and fruit-sellers watched their blooming perfumed baskets like tinted statues. But in the hot, quiet town at length Rosuelo paused. There was a low thick portal, leading to an Immense court-yard ; they entered this, and here men moved in plenty — the eternal sen- tries, as Rodomant called them ; even they seemed to march wound up. On the flags of the court-yard the sun struck cruelly; Rodomant cast his eyes wildly around for shade — there was none all over the numer- ous studding windows, and their innumerable thwarting bars — and gladly, at Rosuelo'8 bidding, he rushed into what was the twi- light glimmer of a broad stone vault — the last above ground, and which left them as they touched the top step of the flight that, when the door was closed behind them, felt like winding blackness ; so that dizziness, together with the dark, would have unstead- ied the fii-mest footsteps. As to Rodomant, the steep and tortuous twists were hideous as a nightmare in the chasm which, to a sen- sitive brain, darkness unmitigated makes ii being. " Why did you not bring your lan- tern ? " he inquired, feeling at the same time for Rosuelo's frock, at which he plucked for safety, to convince himself he still could feel. " There are lights below already — this is not my usual time. Here we are," he added, and truly at that moment Rodomant touched straight ground. " I must ask you not to speak nor whisper, and do not go too near. I will bid them open the door a httle way, so that you can see. But it must be a moment only ; when I touch your arm we must return." Then the piiest uttered a pass-word in his lowest tone, and what seemed invisible hands moved rusilingly ; with great, though almost noiseless labor, a door, which was but a breach in a wall seven feet in thickness, closed rudely by a mass of stone, was heaved back about a foot. Through the crack gushed a yellow glimmer, and showed to Rodomant the unfailing sentinels, looking like mailed ghosts, as they glided back to their dense niches outside the door, and there stood motionless. With that same yellow glimmer there floated outwards an unctuous, tepid odor, indescribable for its disgust, but loathsome to the full as that scent of corrup- tion after death which we shut, on its first hint, into the coffin. Rodomant was so intensely seasitive to it that his first impulse was to take advantage of the yellow ray and rush up stairs — it actually jjreoccupietl liira to the exclusion of the princess's memory. " Do you see her ? " asked Rosuelo, who was behind the door, in the faintest whisper, and the question recalled to him — what P that she, of her own choice was there, and in the midst of That whose very verge of dis- comfort he found it so hard to approach, to which his strongest effort of volition only could bind him, even for a few fleet moments Still sick — brain-sick with the reeking hu. man odor, heart-sick with the labor of tlie pulse in che airless pressure, he strained his eyes — dim also with the double faintness — to pierce the unscattered breath-mist which forbade pure light to live there — did it enter. Yet torches by hundreds were hanging from the sides, their reflexes blotched widely on the universal glaze of damp which lined the walls, and the rills of moisture that crawled 128 RUMOE. slowly doM-n-nards like the toad's cold trail. There seemed humh-eds of pallets, or rather beds, for thouffh all flung upon the ground, not one was without its pillow. By each pallet, too, there seemed a woman, each rohed like each in sad and solem vesture ; all seemed like phantoms, gleaming stead- fastly within a dream on the edge of awaken- ing — a conscious dream. But there ivas but one — one life, one heart, one soul, for him who gazed ; whose dim glance as it fixed on her grew clear, whose instinct would have isolated her amidst the whole seven heavens of perfect spirits. Xot his alone perhaps — he saw, without envy in that hour, that every eye fed on her, devoured her ges- tures, drank consolation from her beauty — the true use of beauty given to woman. Eyes sunk so deeply that they seemed but eyeless sockets — eyes glaring with the black fii-e of fever wrung from strength — eyes gleaming like pallid meteors from hollow, half-skeleton faces, and eyes whose owners, hapjjier than the rest, retained the softest instinct of humanity, with vision shivered through their tears ; all these surveyed her openly, with hunger and thirst for her pres- ence — she shrunk not from that dread, intense regard — hel])less yet safe with those stripped of all law but that of gratitude ; nor from their contact either. For as many as had strength to crawl had kept long be- fore from their beds, lay all about her feet, and clutched her garment's hem, while she bathed a wound of foulest stench, and bound it, smilingly, caressingly, as a tender mother the thorn-scratch of an angry rose on her nfant's fi-agrant skin. Fresh fruits lay in .heir baskets on the ground, not a berry spoiled ; white loaves stood there uncut, and l)ottles through which the wine, untasted, blushed. Rest, from her own forgotten and conquered Meanness, dropped sweeter on their souls than sleep, and every wild, unruly nature found its home in her world-embra- cing heart. " Oh, that I were one of them," said Rodomant to himself, " then were I not too insignificant to be loved." " The time is up," murmured Rosuelo, and touched him on the arm. And they left h(;aven below them under the ground, to miss '.t in the light of day, that great celestial uiystery the firmament, and the solitude where She was not. CHAPTER XXIV. It is strange, yet common, to hear this age pi-onounced the least romantic that has been born of time. To call it the most reasonable were not to lie, for ideas the greatest, and aspirations of the strongest tiight, must be explained and realized to be understood, or shared by men with Man. If adventure and invention be initials of Ro- mance, then this is an era of its triumph, and as for heroism, its grand component, heroes are numbered in a nameless crowd, their names preserved in heaven, too many for record on earth. As for tragedy, the second element of romance, its inBuence whispers in a universal wail, calm under- current of great humanization's encroaching tide. Xor does it appear that the revela- tions of science, light stronger than the sun, nor its dreams, fulfilled in iron, have lessened the delight of mortality in art, in meta- physics, in imaginations. If more men write verses, fewer men make poetry; it never can grow wild as weeds, nor be trampled under foot so, like those vain scattered stutterings of the former, idiots self-invested with the paper-crown. If many more breathe sympa- thies with themes befitting brotherhood into the ears of the great family, as many hide their selfish feelings, how sweet soever, from the world. The very genius of the period, late crowned with success more perfect than ever was doomed to man — the genius steam, ' is as beautiful in its might and regularity as the type it engenders — self-command. Its 1 very special and dominant peculiarity of ] forcing men into involuntary personal con- nection with each other has foiled to wring from a single bosom its secret, either of bit- I terness or bliss. Some such thoughts as • these, and many fancies more, too fine and ■ fleetly spent for words, occupied Lady Deiu- '■ cy. sitting at home in her country castle, as ! isolated, even literally, from all external cir- j cumstiince, as though no railway spirit shot I hourly across the land its level of dark lines i cut through the rose-hung hedges, and pa-^t I the surges of the yellowing wheat. Then its 1 deep tremendous voice, so terribly distinct 1 in frost, so mysteriously distinct all seasons ; from that of thunder or of the sea, mixed on 1 this mellow morning with the strong warm rush of the west wind, now bringing up fast- flying racks of clouds to bathe the bright earth in shadow, now sweeping heaven as clear as the circle of a stainless shield. The lady who sat in her favorite room' saw noth- ing of these changes upon the dayligh'. heard nothing of the voices of the wind and steam ; yet was she not idle in her preoccu- pation, her mind was indeed busy in revmge for the freedom of her hands and eyes. Nor had she dropped one good, nor taken up one useless habit for any change in her opinions or disappointment in any one she had ever trusted ; and she possessed the virtue so rare and excellent, of positively, not neutrally, forgiving those who had brought her pain, so that honestly as well as generously she could rejoice with them or weep. That there was more than enough romance in this real world she knew — if she had not experienced ; bitterly she bemoaned the fate of those in whom no commonplace te**-s of discipline or RUMOR. 129 disappointment could destroy or blunt the sharp and fatal sensihility which af^gravates trouble to torture, while it heightens to ecsta- sy content. Singularly enough, what had made her heart more tender, and her sympa- thy more true for such, had done for her character Avhat no previous experience had accomplished, no lesson of life enforced. While the person who had made her earth heaven, in all but the fulfilment, was at peace in the heart's prosperity, she had never felt her own deep fondness falter, her un- claimed allegiance, or her secret faith. But, once beholding him alone amidst the ruins of his happine^js, the crest of his great pride in the dust, the flower of his love torn from its bleeding stem, she found in her pity, for her passion a jjerfect antidote, an enduring cure. Perhaps it was strangest of all, that with that soft passion vanished its softer shadow — melancholy ; life no longer a bur- den, borne for love's sake alone, became at length true life for others ; her sympathy was warm, not a s]iark struck by benevolent im- pulse from colder charity ; her heart opened with her hand. As for the wild words, whose error the hour excused, which Diamid Alba- ny dropi)ed in her ear, when freshly stung by misery, they had melted from her memory as though unspoken, the very ti-ne she met Wm next, when he came to her for the help which a strong man will only take from a woman, in the need he will confess to her alone. To 'ook to spiritual causes, which form regularly as ihe least occult, it was, of course, the veiy fac t of her former passion's regeneration into unmixed love, that brought the heart too strong to break and be at rest, near hers. It was now but the bloom of July, and not a year since Geraldine had left her husband, and Rodomant the protection of his first friend. Of both these, and another, whose interests were dearer and nearer home, she sat and mused. More precious were his interests than theirs, for reasons which ap- peared to her as just as they were extraordi- nary, in the course of events. When Geral- dine left England, it had been in publicity's full light ; it was said to all and believed by all, save those who had seen the secret, that shp had only gone to Italy for a season on account of lier sudden illness. Every body except the immediate circle she left, and the relation to whom she returned, also believed that her husband accompanied her, it being then fuL recess ; particularly as Albany re- api)eared after Christmas again in London, and went to work as usual in the tread-mill of the political slave and aspirant. But when time crept on, or flew, and it was clearly evi- dent that he never left England nor town for a dav — not even at Easter this year — it began to be surmised — was whispered — then noised about, that there had been an actual though utterly unaccountable separa- tion — unaccountable because Diamid's de- fotion to his young wife had given rise to many an ignorant comment and sickly sneer. On the top of this foundation-stone for ca- lumny, the infraction of so faultless a do- mestic system as that of England, a superb pyramid in honor of the living was rapidly erected ; the most insignificant facts, the vul- garest little anecdotes, supplied by servants and time-servers, were heaped together, and held by an amalgam of aspersions, too care- fully or carelessly framed for libel. The crown or apex of this fine moral structure was a large book, which appeared so season- ably that it seemed actually probable it had been prepared on purpose — a life written without authority of the living, a memoir as difTused and labored as ever perpetuated the true or fiilse ftime of the dead — an anony- mous book, a bad book — so bad that, like an arch-hypocrite, it deceived its own author; and when it had been greedily perused by the just and the unjust, and not suppressed, he drugged his conscience with the flattering falsehood that he had done not only his duty, but a service to the state as well as the pub- Mc. But this last stone, Avith its hieroglyphs well graven on the memories to whicli they had been transferred, was but just placed on its height — the pyramid, when lo ! in nine hours, the pyramid was as though it existed not. it remained to be regarded no more than a dust-heap ; the doom of all pyramids that have tried to touch Heaven these modern times. Still, lies once imbibed by the cruel or the dull as truths — those who love them, or love not the Truth itself, soon leaven the life they entered ; the poison, mixed through the whole humanity, alters its essence, even renders it, like that poison-king of old, capa- ble of absorbing falsehood to any extent without distrust or pain. So the million — that vague term for the tares among the human wheat — began to invent theories as to Albany's career, and criticisms on his character, of their own ; and not only such as live by the abominations they love, did ^o, but men of re])uted honor, and honesty pro- fessed. Nothing was too mean, of too creep- ing an insinuation, to be grafted on the real subtlety which distinguished his intelligence; no fraud too monstrous to be attributed to his yet undeveloped intention. Did he, with the oracular simplicity peculiar to great minds of large experience, utter an opinion — finite and liable to error as are all those who prophecy by precederit, which, in God's system, is not always a concomitant of man's — and did that opinion fail to fructify in fact, he was then a traitor to his profession, his utterance had been a designed and Avilful heresy, he had but spoken to hear his own voice, to silence others less voluble, per- chance less arrogant, that he miglit amuse himself by scattering the poor needles of nis sarcasm like a sane, not a mad man, fiinging fire. The most respected and venerable chronicles of the popular press originated, or issued, these tirades, pointless but lac«r- 130 RUMOR. ating like blunted weapons. Yet not one of thosn originators or issuers failed to gorge with curiosity unsated the daily supplies of the reporters who warmed up Albany's im- pertinences of the night almost before they were cold ; and there was not a reader of all the myriads which pay for their literary ban- quets at the rate of a penny a day, who did not snatch the sheet (dewy from" the morn- ing press) and rend it ruthlessly open to p junce on Albany's speeches — or on his name, when it stood, as it did so often, to varnish the leader — each repetition better thai a guinea to the golden editorial pocket. Nor did a noonday breakfast, on porcelain sind silver, digest in any instance among those little people called "the great, without the assistance of that bitter tonic, Albany's undeserved yet inevitable notoriety, admin- istered in the morning paper. Xot these strict prints alone were indebted to him for displeasing without cause, there was one organ semi-literary, and half of ]xseudo-art, which had been es"tablished to ridicule rather than satirize each thing and person happen- ing to relieve the monotony or scare the pro- priety of the social system. This pictorial hornbook for the grown-up children, from which they learned to magnify the little- nesses of others, and scorn the "greatnesses, would have lieen almost as forlornly circum- stanced as the shadowless man, biit for Al- bany's existence. Innumerable, infinitesimal, kaleidoscopic, were the representations and misrepresentations of his person, his phvsi- ognomy, his habit, turn, or trick. Their frequency — nay constancy of recurrence, never involved a failure of interest ; un- swerving, fascinated, universal, that at least proved one species of consistency in its vic- tim or hero, for he was both. The truth was, that the day, nay, the very hour in which Geraldine left her husband with her parents, her doctors, and her cousin Geraldi, — her husband, stricken far too des- Eerately to resist any who cared enough for is sufferings to control him, went quietly away with the only person who did so care. Lady Delucy asked no permission of his, she took him — he might have been an idiot in- fant, for his passivity at that moment — to her own house. And there she kept him perfectly secure in the devoted secrecy, — miracle even rarer than the honor of one's friends, — of her servants, as well, of course, as that of her only child. In fact it is no truism — truth's counterfeit and foil. — to say that virtue is its own reward; not dumb and sheeplike harmlessness, misdoing never, doing good to none ; but sincere and active virtue, naked truth clothed on with kind- ness. The servants in this lady's employ were some of them venerable and oracular gossips, the rest inexperienced and greedy ones, but all gossips. Each and every one of them knew of Diamid's former visit, the 4d informed the young who had not wit- nessed, or rather known of them in the first instance ; for the chief of them had been secretive visits, and as, of course, such per- sons will, they concluded them romantic and prelusive. But remembering them clearly, as such j)ersons remember only such facts, — clearly as Elizabeth herself recalled ; her own child held her not more sacred or more inno- cent, than in her care for Albany, they held their mistress now. But it was a my>int which should either explain or pall'ate the blame of that hour ; when sh" tried to per- ceive whether it was mutual or single, she became as it were blind. Yet one sad cer- tainty seemed clear, that Elizabeth's calm and reticence of conduct, through all the months since she parted with her lover, had been not assumed — no veil to cloak hei passion or her suspense in separation ; they had been simple, real indications of honest — no, dishonest — but real indifference. And at thought of the hypocrisy which her child must have played out in presence of her lover, the mother grew sick ; the stain upon the woman's living name smhched the scutcheon of the buried father. Last of all, ignorant and uninquiring, as all are of that subject, at once the simplest and the most inscrutable, the mother neither recognized nor suspected the true cause of her child's unchild-like, or her own unmaternal con- duct — the cause M'hich alienates the child from the parent, renders the parent unjust to the child — a marriage not made ia heaven. While Lady Delucy still stood under the trees her old servant came again ; again brought word fresh-gathered from the peo- ple at the station, that Elizabeth had not only gone without a gentleman, but without luggage, even a single packet. This seemed to seal the fact that some one she must have met, for the mother knew the child's luxurious necessities and habits ; long and long must the infiuence have been at work to persuade her, not only to leave her home, her mother, her lover's soul in ab- sence, but to leave them positively to run in debt to another, not only for luxury, but for necessity — for the commonplace pro- tection which the false husband never ex- tends — or with exceptions an age apart ; the protection of home, property, every per- sonal attribute ou his part, extending over the simple, unembarrassed self of the woman given up to him. In vain now for the old servant to linger, with liberty unprece- dented, taking leave to point out the mer- cies of the dispensation — how, as the young lady had gone alone, without gentleman or luggage, it could be nothing to hurt the feelings of the colonel. How she must have gone to my lady's town-house, — perliaps the colonel had arrived there, and had sent her a letter by the telegraph. This last hint did really seem worth acting on. Instantly a message was despatched to the town- house — despatched by Lady Delucy her very self, and she waited in her carriage fol the reply. It came thi-ough the house. RUMOR. 137 Keeper, formal in the midst of its surprise — aead respectful ; oh, the ice-daggers of con- ventionalism, when they strike through the fire of that slowest of the purifiers — sus- pense. Eli^aheth had neither been seen nor heard of in her only London home. This last chance spent, Lady Delucy had actually, not Actively, to sit still. If she went any where she might miss the letter, if she became overwrought to illness she night become useless if required to move afterwards ; there was nothing to be done, as in the case of sudden death, an accident, or a chaise and four to Gretna. She sat up all night, a feat her even health and unstrained nerves permitted ; by verj- bright lights thrice in the night she wrote to Lyonhart, and thrice burned them, for the simple rea- son that, beyond the fact of her wild anxiety she had nothing to assed. At morning, whose first blue glimmer had seemed to her watchful eyes a sign of hope, no hope came, no letter, therefore, from London, none that day. Then, and only then, the fact returned on her, that Elizabeth had said she would vrite that day, so that a letter, if written, could not reach her till the morrow, and might not then. So she had still to rest and wait in the suspense of unknown calam- ity ; since the old days of her youth, when revilers had persecuted her own innocence, she had known no such bitterness — that had been tu' as a foretaste, in one drop, of the full draught forced upon her now. Meantime Elizabeth, quite at ease in con- science, was too ardently and minutely occu- pied to retiect a single moment backicards, as it were ; her one fear yet lingered, that it was possible her mother might guess whither she had gone and her design — and, naturad result of her solicitude — desire to accom- pany her daughter. The fear even touched on terror of detention, of recall, or of paren- tal command such as never had issued from lips whose authority, even in this instance, Elizabeth preferred to ignore rather than re- sist. That fear, this shade of terror, she endeavored to annihilate in her ener?etic preoccupation, fully requii-ed indeed, if she were to set forth that fortnight. And deli- cate nerves, never yet strained upon, will seem to carry youth and love through exploit ar.i adventure — fatigue, even such as strong nerves shattered can only shrink from in desp-iir — even at their contemplation. First, knowing that no business transactions take place after the dinner hour of official gentle- men, she drove to a hotel — the only one she knew, where she had occasionally passed an hour or two in visiting friends of her mother who just lighted on London for a day or two, and had taken wing again. None knew her — the human Nile was too full, too strong, and too incessantly renewed, not to cover perfectly her name and character. That evening, through the agency of the Undiadv, stirred up at once by curiosity IS I and a boon as hard as it wa.s sweet — a gift in money of course, Elizabeth was too ignorant to invent a less suspicious bribe — that very night she possessed a maid, or rather a waiting-woman, of middle age, for it had suddenly struck the maiden, the moment she I realized the bare fact that she must face men in her arrangements, that it would be more agreeable and more due to her mother's chUd, to have a companion somewhat older than herself. As for her own rank, she es- chewed her title — that of her mother also — as particularly dangerous, and called her- self, a style quakeresque which never struck her on its assumption — Elizabeth Home. But this ntyle sen'ed her somewhat less than a lady's ordinary one in mid-society, tht unfailing Miss, to secure her ordinary- at- tentions on the part of her new retainer. Extraordinary ones it certainly bestowed on her — that person, whether accustomed to ; the sphere of the toilette, the study-nursery, or the humble-companionship to the arro- gant-in-little, undertook and commenced to carry forth the operations of all three, and 1 demanded — clear-seeing that she might j obtain — wages embracing the triple salary i of such. Li the morning she dressed Eliia- beth, but at the same time asserted there was no time for dressing hair, so cleverly , conceaUng her ignorance of any patent pro- cess ; she also instructed — that part of her extemporaneous duty was so acceptable to her employer that its impropriety escaped detection — she instructed, or rather ordered, Elizabeth where to go for her outfit, (her own also,) and how to prociore the swiftest passage — overland of course. Besides hand- I ling and dictation, she held fast on her mis- I tress — the companion either rose to the employer, or the employer sank to the level of the companion. Side by side, seat by seat, not arm in arm — because some instinct upheld Elizabeth in the determination to keep her mud-colored robe out of the mud — they went about all day. In cabs and out of cabs, over city-stones, which for her pre- vious experience might have remained mjthic golden ones, in the depths of those west end marts of universally adapted clothing, which make one realize the census better than all its fianires, Elizabeth was accompanied by the leech-like liege, her sovereign servanL By night, her departure was arranged ; she had j intended it should have been actively begun, but was consoled by the fact placed before I her that day, that had she been in town j only twelve hours later, she could not have departed for fourteen days. Remembering her word to her mother, she wrote a line, or rather two lines this time, still saying she I was safe, well, and would write on the mor- { row, concluding with love this time. Of j course, the note, despatched by the night- 1 post, and reaching Xortheden duly, gave much more pain than pleasure, and the con- ; elusion seemed a mockery on the child's paxt; 138 RUMOR. that day the mother wept, which she had not allowed herself to do before. While she was weeping, alone of course, Elizabeth rather worse off, now all was settled, than if alone, was on the Southampton line : that afternoon she was on board a vessel for Alexandria ; she aspired that evening to be gone ; but no, it was Sunday, and the steamer sailed not till one o'clock next day. Fearfully, while waiting, did the sense of ho]ie decline to that of weariness — a Sab- bath so weary seemed to extinguish even the hope of rest, or wish for it ; a longing for excitement, continuous, buoyant, even of danger to be faced, rather "than the sick thought of rest — possessed her. The two places taken had been the last, therefore, though overpaid for, were quite the worst ; and this daughter of luxury, as well as rest, had no idea how much of her discomfort and dispirit arose from facts, l)are, modern, and nauseous-smelling facts, around her. How- ever, one advantage sprang from this drear annoyance ; she hul time to write fully to her mother, and she did so, for the first time un- veiling her whole mind, as well as outpouring her heart, a blessing for her mother, without which she might, perhaps, never have rallied to her nature's complete healthfulness. The long Sunday night spent, the dawn fully brightened ; the vessel filled like an im- mense beehive ; every cell had its inmate, and as it seemed, there was a crowd on deck to whom no cells were portioned. At twelve o'clock the last farewells were breathed from lip to lip, the last letters carried on shore -^ Elizabeth's with the rest — safe in its direc- tion now. And to that address, spied by her hireling, she perhaps owed that she was not maltreated or despoiled beyond all remedy, before she reached the desert. Never fell a shock more sharp and sudden on a mother's nature than this letter — sud- den because utterly a surpiise as to its con- tents, sharp in the excessive revulsion of the blow, which at once annihilating any fault or imprudence of the child in the eyes of the mother, flung the whole weight of blame back on herself. Once certain that her daugh- ter was faithful in her life's affiance, no other charge signified, nor could exist, least of all that of ingratitude to her mother ; this mood's reaction well exhibiting the enthusi- asm which had lingered beyond youth — a youth to the life's end. Of course this en- thusiasm also lent impulse to conviction ; there was but one course — to follow in- stantly — if not to reach her at the first or second stages, which might be possible — yet to be constantly so near behind her, that they should meet almost instantly in India's capital. After all, the worst part of the lourney was after that point, and by her inti- mate acquaintance with various persons of position in Calcutta — through her husband — she hoped at least to lodge a message for her daughter in that place, which should detain her there in waiting for ner mother. Happily for Lady Delucy, she was a favor- ite through her young unmarried character, as well as her marrier) ^ank, with an old no- bleman of dilletantesque niarme taste — per- ha])s the most unusual — as the fresihwatel mania is one of the most common. He waa possessed of a steam-craft of exquisite beauty, the size of the largest yacht ; this sea-bird flew on canvas-wings besides steam. In it the owner had voyaged, across the great mild ocean, to South Australia ; it was, there- fore, well tested as well-tempered. Fortu- nately for Lady Delucy, it was lying now at Saijbath in a fairy bay of Wight ; thither she went instantly, or rather to the owner's dwelling, overlooking the blue sea and the brooding " Halcyon." In such a cause she hesitated not to request its loan ; engaging and determined to fit it for instant voyage herself. The request was granted — not easily though — for the owner expressed conscientious scruples about such a vessel in such a voyage, as short and difficult as the antipodal one had been long and safe. But the mother conquered ; in a few hours the yacht was manned, provisioned, commanded, and poised for flight — her speed justified the term. The owner led the lady on board, and bade her God-speed ; would fain have accompanied her, but that his escort was de- terminately rejected. Just as they stood to- gether to say farewell, the captain leaped on board; late, to the lady's impatient "fancy, and, in fact, retarded by a sudden rumor brushihg past his ear on shore — a rumor which those who staid at home soon learned as real. A revolution burst out in Parisinia — the king of Iris, for life's sake eschewing etiquette — (of course escaping Britain-wards) had reached the Enghsh shore. CHAPTER XXVL Of the fatal grief she had caused, how far was Geraldine actually guilty? Stranger than all the schemes proven by the schocil- man and visioned by the poet, is the jjhiloso- phy of Sin ; its laws and jjhases as truly and fixedly set as its ends, in the appointed retri- bution ; yet, just as no man could righteously apportion this, so no human mind can decide upon the kind or degree of man's : H'ence against the great rule harmonizing axi life, all things, utterly — perfect love to God and man. Well, indeed, for one and all, for the strongest and the weakest, the murderer and the liar, with the impatient and the vain — that man is not the judge, and th;it only One, seeing not as man sees, can detect the cause, minute or mighty, whose effects man only grasps at. Well mdeed for al\ that if RUMOR. 139 ran condemns — from, his little experimental knowledge settles and prescribes finite pun- ishment "to his brethren who offend against him (even to the violent and premature ex- tinction of mortal life) — the great Father receives the Si)irit ; and in His hand, which infolds the universe, is Mercy infinite and Judgment only, fixeA. One or two'of those among men, who may each justly be named an individual charac- ter, have fastened on and brought to light great discoveries, after intense and patient toil ; discoveries of which the greatest as the least, are temporarily beneficial only. Na- ture, violated by disease, has its tortures tranquillized by old wanderiirg mysteries restored to science newly; madness these times is charmed, not scorpion-whipped ; idiocy is mechanically elevated, made nearly ornamental, if scarcely useful, in the domes- tic pictm-e ; fresh or forgotten medicines bring antidotes for new or revived symp- toms: physical malformation, distortion, deterioration by accident, find in ceaseless inventions anc' palliatives every refinement of substitution or relief. Even the suffer- ings of Children — that host deepening rank by rank backwards, age by age into the old Time before us, which first crowned Inno- cence with martyrdom — are beginning, only beginning — (men are too grown-up to com- prehend them quickly) — to be looked into ; the account may some day be clearly made out, and settled. It is said that the progress of moral improvement and spiritual direction upwards, is equally on the advance. This is impossible ; man as a race is too selfish, his health of body and mind shut out the future of death, shut in the spiritual life ; time and tlie necessary alternations of Work and Pas- sion are too preoccupying. Then of all the thousands given up, as they conscientiously imagine, to the instruction and elevation of their kind, only one or two in every thou- sand, possess great hearts and teeming minds in bodies at once strong and sympathetic sufficiently, to influence as a reaUiij, the soul. Certainly, the vigilance of the many who, from jirotected birth, restrained habit, lack of temptation, have a character intact before the world, is a valuable agent to protect lim- ited society from general revolution ; yet, crime jn-evented in its efiect annihilates not the germ of disposition which would have ripened, but for repression, into crime; just as not every open sin committed is presump- tive of a nature recklessly turned from God. In many hearts clothed in white before the world, His spirit reads black hatred, burning jealousy, more ruthless than the flames, and cruelty " as crimson," redder than spilled blood. In many a soul whose body has for- feited innocence. His eye detects the spark that, after Expiation, shall blend with his light some future, for an eternal day. It is fashion, and has longer held than most, to assert that want of training for the character, and want of care over the feelings as they flower from instinct, is the cause of that common first, sometimes final, failure in life — a disappointed and disappointing youth. But the majority of facts is not on this ground of assertion, though the reverse one is so seldom considered, that fads are not accepted from its point of view at all. Yet it is a truth, that the instances of suc- cess and failure are equal on either side. A child j)laced and bidden to keep in the right paths by wrong persons — that is, bj per- sons whose secret lives are not governed by right — goes almost inevitably wrong; so it happens that children of ftilse religionists are ever faithless, errant, desultory, or dissi- pated. Those again, untaught, uncared for, unchecked, who feel and act exactly as in- stinct directs in infancy, and passion in youth, take just the same wide, thorny, track- less paths across the desert of the world, fall as often into snares by the way, and insnare as many others. There are in each case exceptions ; God has dropped living testi- mony of his existence in rare natures too pure for Avrong, as he has also of his love in loving hearts, too full of charity's fresh sweetness to hold or feel the sting of hatred • and of his beauty in countenances, which reflect it on earth as his angels do in heaven. But with these few, if story tampers, then is it denied the remotest resemblance to Truth. Geraldine had been trained Avith constant care, watched w'ith unrelenting vigilance ; her mind adorned by culture, and her frame by the grace with which culture crowns de- velopment. Propriety and orthodoxy wei'e the guardian dragons of her youth's para- dise. Obedience enjoined was also enforced, as long and as far as human agency could influence or threaten. Yet. as a child, she read forbidden bsoks, disobeyed orders that were wise, because in their very list were included many more that were foolish. Gen- erous through all her waywardness, there was not a particle of what is meant by virtue in her goodness ; virtue is goodness protest- ing, fi',hting actively, against evil, unsubdued by f .itagonism of person or of principle. Swe .it-tempered, because never thwarted — for her self-indulgences were secret and un- suspected — she was at the same time noble, because nobility became her blood, her cir- cumstances, and her pride ; unworldly, he- cause unworldly — no merit in natural breed- ing conserving her from vulgar taint. And at the first thrust in life's warfare against her positive contentment, her pure spiritual selfishness, she not only failed — she fell at once. And he who, subtly as the arch-temper, armed and urged the thrusting chance against her, might at first sight seem as much to blame as she was to be pitied. Yet it was not so. He. wild as the desert animal or bird no man has ever tracked or netted, who 140 RUMOR. had been unrecognized as he grew by any being older than himself or wiser, as a broth- er; he, whose gratitude for the only kind- ness he had realized, had merged through passion into ingratitude the worst and cruel- est. Even this boy was as Httle proper to be cursed as Geraldine. Both how deeply, fatally to blame, yet who should blame them ? AVlio knew how, if indeed worthy, to find fault? Only the single person who might have been justified in casting at them a Btcne, stood still aloof, and plucked'Tione up, Mysterious, and yet certain are the pro- cesses of the soul's deterioration, facts ■wrought deep in darkness, as those of the eoul's jjurification are wrought open to the light of God; yet each as needful to the other, and the end consistent, if unseen be- yond this life ; and precious to Heaven must be those souls reclaimed who are left not to the doom of their own devices, the calm of a false life, the luxury of those who receive in tliis world their portion. Luck, good or bad ; the success wliich crowns desire for some, or the disappoint- ment wi-enching hope from others, is a term derived from man's tendency as a mortal, to dwell on a point — one particle of the per- fect and rounded destiny, of which the incidents of luck, whether prosperous or misfortunate, are merely successive points. Thus, if a man has a successful paj^sion, a wish fulfilled, nay, but a whim gratified, he will call himself fortunate, looking neither back at the weary lougmg, nor forward to dead inditference. Just so he will wring his hands as in the doom of despau-, should the single passion be balked, the wish unan- swered, the whim ungranied, never contem- plating the whole at once, life stretching from first breath to eternity's edge ; which aspect of the being is impossible, save for the sage in the lucid mirror of his full ex- perience, and the departing spmt which views all the restless past in peace, from the calm brink of death. In neither of these frames, from no point of contemplation, did Geraldi behold his tri- umph. Yet it covered him with glory in his own esteem, like a purple robe over a coat of lustrous armor. For just as the tempo- rary downfall of one he chose to consider, be- cause he detested him, an enemy, was for himself an actual, if not an obvious, triumph, so his false and unallowable zeal on behalf of his cousin, in his own eyes, seemed hon- orable chivalry. Self-possessed all through his dreamed design, cool in his daring, herein consisted the danger for her — his control over all except his passion, and that only secretly indulged, no longer as an aspiration, but as an intention, and only now a hope, so far as hope impHes fulfilment. Confidence was the set frame to which the long course of selfish energy had hardened ; and in the midst of that unboyish mood — befitting rather the strong man with formed and busy ! head, and bafHed heart — Geraldi sa^- hi« j passion, intention, and hope, all at once and j the same, a triumph. So sure, he could I atford, in the slow development of evtnts, to ' wait — patiently, too, as a woman, or rather as a fox or other subtle animal of prey, for whom only patience will procure a feast. For the same reason it was easy enough for him to continue the manner and mode fraternal towards the hapless Geraldine. Also he was aided here by necessity — neither he nor another mortal could set aside or suiiersede the reign of sickness, sacred above lU othei sovereign claims. For long, by a bare pulse- thi-ead, in all opinion but his generated au- dacity, Geraldine's being in this world hung ; and, but for the chance w'hich is a concomi- tant of existence as long as one sure grain quivers in the life-glass unfallen ; but for the consciousness that if he never possessed her living, the one who had done so could never possess her dead ; it would seem as though no hope unhallowed, no charm unlawful, could be fulfilled for or given to Geraldi. But it happened not so, nor endured he the least of all the agonies of terror, not one pang of the travail of suspense. Xow and then such phenomena among characters are born, as there are minds created too eccen- tric to merit the name of genius : and from the moment he had succeeded in blasting, by a final shock — artificial, albeit, as a powder train well-laid — the constancy he had un- dermined for months, his inward chaos of black despau- had lighted up with flames of jealousy, no longer hidden perforce from his own perception, and burned into defiance — disdain ; he defied his cousin's Maker as he disdained her master upon earth. Mood which made old races take their stand on facts of Satanic mfiuence direct from the Lord-demon ; of possession by inferior dev- ils, superior in dread strength to man, of witch-bewitchment, and wizard-craft. For the true deliverance of man to the powers of evil is that he be deUvered up to himself — that he go away out of God's sight wilfully, if not willingly, not that God forsakes him. For there is not a question that when man rehes utterly and wholly upon himself alone, his volition is stronger, because more intense and wholly concentrated then — his pride en- tirely concerned and glorified ; he will have what he icill to happen : if so, right often it does happen, and God interferes not — it is out of sight of his pure eyes. Geraldi determined that Geraldine should live; and she Uved — he not only resolved, ! but believed it — so it happened. Faith im- I plicit removes mountains ; evil is possible to ! it, if unusual of occurrence, as good ; arch- ] magicians of Egypt taught this truth to Moses. Always, saving in the matter of life I and death, this may be said truly. And it is ' also certain that, as it happened, Geraldine j would have Kved without liis resolution inter- I posed. We but set down the fact that ha RUMOR. 141 willed, believed — and his desire and assur- ance came to pass. Looking to natural causes after super- natural, instead of the usual succession, it was not only natural but a necessity, she should so far recover. For the possible death-result of her illness, short as danger- ous, had been annihilated with the danger suddenly removed ; just as but for certain c'lnditioas fulfilled, it would have killed her instead. These conditions were such as, if she had ha])])ened to be the child of parents unal)le to fulfil the physician's decrees (ful- filled to the letter for her) or obliged to delay her depaiture from this climate impregnated with lung-poison ; but neither case was hers. Almost common as is the prescription of climate equable and mild for consumptive tendency or disease, these vary in so many forms and have such unexpected phases, that it is no marvel the exceptions among such exiles are those who return, or remain abroad, there cured. In Geraldine's kind of attack, to rally was recovery, unless relapse ensued, which probably would have chanced in this land — mist-cradle of the sea-born fog. And she rallied even before leaving England, though her husband was not near enough to perceive the improvement; though, half-restored already as she was, she cared not to bid him farewell. This, at once the crown and core of her deep offence, she might have been forgiven dm-ing the light-headed hallucination consequent upon hemorrhage of the lungs ; so long as that endured, a neg- ative excuse, if not actual, might be due to her. But, the crisis overpast ; then tended by nurses whose very paid footsteps lulled, whose handling seemed to drop sleep's pop- pies on the eyelids ; by physicians who loomed over the couch by which they were no longer needed, like knowledge and pro- tection in effigy, breathed on by and nested in luxury like a fairy in the heart of a rose- cup — the potions disguised by perfumes, the pills gilded tasteless — the wines for strength- ening, delicate as nectar, the fruits for re- freshment like dainties dropped from para- dise, with ices hard as snow on mountain summits, and sweet with all the souls of fruit. Not only such enticements to ease, but the sameness of painless convalescence, lightened and varied for Geraldhie by g, perpetual mild sunshine of homage, an eternal incense of uns])oken flattery. And all through the phases of passive en- durance, which make steady restoration like one long indolent holiday, she never faltered from her rash and sudden estimate, her con- ■.science whispered not, it was drugged too deep with selfishness ; her judgment could not question, it was blind and dumb. Had she even been left to herself, it seems little likely she would have come to her right mind, much more to her healthful heart, soon and easily — of the spirit's sickness the cure is never sure if sudden, and almost always^, slow. But the influence of Geraldi — he strong as she was weak, her selfishness single, but his doubly inthralled by self, his character set against all laws of heaven and honor consciously and willingly, as hers was ignnrantly bent — that influence indeed seemed to exist only to seal her doom, and distance to the remotest hour of hfe, if not forever, her return to the possession of her right mind and heart. Geraldi could afford to behave with pro- priety at present, for the perfecting of the fraud he practised on those he had first de- ceived. Not one of those he had made mis- erable or guilty — neither of the twain - - had the least suspicion of his design, or that he had any. Albany's imagination Avas tco grand to have made it possible for him tc conceive a plan at once so monstrous, and so mean ; Geraldine was at this time too self- preoccupied with the romance of her posi- tion to contemplate any fixed point or proba- bility in the future at all. Nor stood Geraldi on the list for pardon, of those M'ho do not err wilfully but weakly, who insensibly fall into temptation, driven thither in a whirl of impulse. Calm if not skilful as a surgeon, he was cool as an executioner, not one gleam of com])unction crossed his countenance, se- renely warped with smiles, none was emitted in secret from his heart ; if Geraldine's con- science was drugged, his was scotched — it coukl not stir nor sting. There might pos- sibly come an hour in which it should rear its crest in revenge, and pour forth all the ven- om of its tohnent to help another torment ; but it was yet in the beginning — not seem- ing near the end. When Geraldine reached her grandmother's house — her old home — it would have been indeed strange had she experienced no dim and moving reminis- cences — not compunction for her fault, but natural trouble at the change passed over her with which she charged another — and blamed him bitterly, wildly, in the quick pang that seized her then, and was so quickly spent. First felt then, too, because not till she was established there were her spirits strong enough to wing her memory ; her con- valescence was only then complete. The first breath of the embalmed air, the first stately shadow of the marble terrace seen freshly in the sun, the first rustle of the old myrtle thickets, were the i>emedy, and she responded to it — with it her brain cleared fully, and in the first lucid frame she suffered, still rather in her pride than through her love. Afterwards in her regenerated exist- ence she often inquired of herself where that love of hers lived while her separation from it lasted — during the suspension of it, when the heart's loss was by the heart unregretted. Love cannot die — it must then have been for the time al)sorbed into the great principle of love, which governs all things, and there have rested, ere it rose again, and purified. Now, it was well for Geraldi's satisfaction 142 RUMOR. that he had rmde up his mind it would be a long and measured race towards the goal of his desires. For, after her wild ap])eal and approach to him in her first natural agonj-, she turned from him as decidedly. Ptomance and pride ruled her girl's brain between them now ; her career, fine and poetic in its com- mencement, was of course at this its climax, sublime. What woman, she considered, ever acted with energy so direct and spirit so exalted ? She was accustomed to lie and muse — or as her mind grew stronger, inly comment, on the various modes with which other girls of her age and station had or would have endured the indignity, the dis- grace, (if endured,) of a second place in a husband's heart ; on their spiritless inven- tions to keep the fact even out of their own sight, because of what they would have to sacrifice, in sacrificing wifehood and worldly consideration. All which I sacrificed, thought Geraldine, never reflecting on the fact that she had never cared the least in the world for any worldly advantages, consideration, or any outward claims of wifehood as a woman in society, &c. She certainly shed tears sometimes, just after waking in the morning, when the truth came fresh as light to her, or at night, when weariness softened all her sensations ; but they were hitter dews, she pressed them back from the beginning, and at last learned to feel them ■without permitting them to fall ; for they expressed her natural longing, which pride kept down and would not brook. One only excuse existed for this unnatural repression of nature, the system pursued by Geraldi had been subtle enough to have etfect from the beginning, her innocence helped this effect, but most her blood-affection. At the very beginning of her new life in old scenes, she received her first letter from her husband. No need of Geraldi's subtle strong revenge, or the grandmother's small family spite, to make her consider — in her frame, then feel it — cold and cruel, even careless. As she received it, it actually in- sulted her in her own esteem, for in that moral anarchy of exaggerated sentiments and untempered thoughts, a letter such as Albany's, Avhose quiet diction and reserved pain betokened perfect sanity of mind and body, was as useless as it seemed revolting. And yet, this letter had a positive eff'ect, be- sides that which may be named the negative one, of preventing its own reply, for of ( ourse Geraldine was too proud to answer it, or to write to England at all. Its posi- tive efi'ect however was, that it prompted her to avenge herself rather more dangerously, if she succeeded in her design, than had she merely written violent and haughty letters to her husband which no one else should read. Through moral anarchy, great ideas are «pt to generate in imaginative minds. They even rise, strong at first through passion, land seeming winged to heaven — but flag- ! ging, downflung, as all man's mechanism on j that aspiring road. For ideas to rise, to endure, and drop their fruit, they must be j produced in moral harmony, if not in men- tal calm. So Geraldine aspired, and fell. No one will believe that a person of jio- etic temperament, with the gift of language, will live without expression in some one form or another. Art is the true expression, though therein so many forms include them- selves. Music certainly the highest, albeit words (not poetry) the lowest and the easi- est. Young as she was, Geraldine was not so ignorant that she had not informed her- self of every literary whim and fashion, as well as orthodox achievement. She knew, and when at home with her husl)and had often, to his fond amusement, ridiculed the performances of that singular authoress who, separated from her husband, could not tear herself from the contemplation of marriage, which she made absurd in attempts at sublimating it out of her own personal ex- periences, Geraldine had mocked, not causelessly, the pages innumerable which she darkened with demon likenesses of him who had sometime been her master in tlie flesh — the man whom she hated and assert- ed to have injured her. As in the old-fash- ioned toy of change ible ladies, she emjjloyed his head-])iece for an initial to all her char- acters, whose extravagances and wicked- nesses, as depicted by herself, she persisted in pinning on him, however unlike hinj those heroes veritably might be. Scarcely a month after her arrival, Geraldine had arrangetl a work, in reahty suggested by the infituated lady she had repudiated in her ridicule — out of her young ignorance it sprang vast, gloi'ious, and complete in antic- ipation. No such book had yet been devised ; such should be read and received by all, in true not false testimony of man's ingratitude and falsehood. The doom of her first book withheld Geraldine in this new mood, no more than the first shot miss- inij the wild herd daunts the desert-huntei-. lie — her husband — had alone been to blame for its non-success, or rather for its success not satisfying her. This new work should electrify those stocks and stones the first had not stirred, and he should be crushed under its weigh't of retributive genius. And as the nerve-spirit was not spent in this clay skeleton fur Geraldine, only her physical functions aff'ected, she might have succeeded at least m finishviy what she ardently begin, but for a circumstance, small amid the niyi iad proofs of the giant Circumstance's ex istence, but immense enough to her near perception to crush her experunent into an- nihilation. Her grandmother, whose table was of course supplied with choice literary items a» well as common ones ; just as it was duly f spread with inventions to culture and cor- RUMOR •3-^; rupt tlie palate ; never herself did more than dip into book or periodical, poem or pamphlet ; as with her simple Tuscan tastes she only ia.sfed Fi'ench dishes ; mementoes of exluiusted appetites reexcited and sus- tained. Nor was Geraldine a great or steady reader — therein proving that she was not destined for a great or steady luminary of literature. She also dipped into dishes of both kinds — perhaps more vividly perceived their separate flavors. Among them, while her great idea was dawning into morning twilight, from which she prophesied its perfect day — she hap- pened to take up a sewn publication, the review of all reviews. She took it up quite carelessly — as vehemently, passionately, al- most desperately, dropped it. Then clutched it f/eshly, gathered it in her hands, as though it contained a new gospel of prom- ises for a new condition of pain and yearn- ing ; or, rather she held it as a maiden her first real love-letter, or one condemned his written reprieve. It was the name that riveted her first — of her own old book, that lost yet exintlng fable of her own young fame ; loved still, though with aff'ection most carefully con- cealed from pride. But now Geraldine read and re-read the superscription ; it could not be, yet was. And he M'ho had taken it in hand — spent time upon it — was the one alone to whose notice she had not aspired, deeming it too powerful and high. Even Diamid's literary experience had most led him to the false belief that, if a book were not noticed by Tims Scrannel, its literary success was incomplete. The pang, which was already stifled from repetition, once more struck through and through her, yet scarcely touched her heart, it pierced her pride. Alas ! that it should have come too late for Jam — for me to behold him when yet he would have cared for the surprise. Still, pride pierced, was all the more thrill- ingly sensitive to the fact that all the world yet should read and wonder. She should be held up to honor in absence — her genius made heroic by its author's sad, romantic fate. Such were the first suggestions of her nature as it then M'as influenced — next came the curiosity to life, held in check till then by these suggestions. Her eyes fas- tened on the page — she read. The first few sentences rang rich as festal yet solemn music ; all Scrannel's criticisms opened so. Then came the sketch by the strong, masterly, accustomed hand — no caricature, not a line altered — certainly no injustice to the book's design. Then lucid, logical, thoughtful, but ever calm — the gradual and crushing argument. For he had actually taken pains with it ; his intel- lect had not spared itself in the task. The faults not hinted at, but shown ; the beau- ties shorn of their ideal mist, down to bare, and sometimes skeleton sentiment. The eloquence st^^e^ to its fact — precocious wealth and \^J^e„^5'^words not understood. Xo one could qries'tlon the truth or justice of what was proved ; there stood the per- formance which now to the performer's men- tal vision showed, as to the sensuous eye shows the design of the unskilful draughts- man, its crooked and tremulous lines crossed by the artists correcting pencil. All this, however, could Geraldine bear patiently, even proudly, for her mind gave not the lie •to it in any particular. Not to the verdiot annihilating her claim to genius ; herein ])roving, perhaps, that her claim was no false one, for if passion be even — ovcti ex- aggeratedly prone to pride, certainly true genius is of and in itself inevitably modest. Still, a sort of quiet settled down on her, which an older person, better disciphned, because longer, would have shrunk from in terror — as sign of near despair. She scarcely cared to finish what she read ; well for her comfort had she failed to turn the leaf — the last leaf, too, remaining. But as, in all moods approaching (but not yet) de- spair, there was a biting necessity for more excitement — even more painful excitement. So she looked on hurriedly. Not twenty lines m.ore belonged to her ; they were soon surely read and understood. How then was it that she still held the paper, tighter and tighter, till the clasp seemed clinched — while it rustled as in palsied fingers ? Why stole that shadow, which seemed rather of stupefiction than of sorrow, over her clear forehead ? And wherefore did her eyes wander wildly and dilated, up and down the page, as though to learn some meaning — whether enchantiiig or detesta- ble — by heart ? She had dreamed the verdict of false genius final — there was yet another crueller and falser than the false imputation. Cer- tainly the very final objections, which were less against her book than her own charac- ter, had been hinted at before by little writ- ers in insignificant reviews, forgotten with the hour. But hinted too vaguely for her to understand their drift. Here there was no hint, but set assertion — by a man of tb.e world, who certainly should have studitci women — that this woman was a reprobate. Immoral — unvirtuous — tampering wiih veiled truths. Poor Geraldine ! her inno- cence, rash knowledge — her instinct, vice. Now, in fact, Tims Scrannel, when that blossom of premature genius dropped before the crude fruit formed, in the very path of his perception, took no heed of it, save as an epicure in letters to remark siletitly on the annihilation of such a ])romise — a fruit which when ripe might have given a new flavor to his fastidious taste. Beautiful however, it was, as valueless — that flower which might have turned to fruit — he would as soon have thought of noticing its descent critically as of seriously treating in text a 144 RUMOR. windf:ill in a iieic^hbor's orchard. Yet, like all vain, sensitive men, he was by no means independent of the many — nay not of the ignorant whom he ])rofessed to despise. So when many others — quite enough private persons to constitute the term the public — contemplated this bloom dropped too soon from promise, inhaled its odor fresh with youth, and sweet with youngest passion, they deeftied it a rare thing, just as some wild flowers are precious in climates where they do not grow, and when even Rumor em- ployed on*- whisper of all its myriad tongues, to marvel at and inquire the author's name ; then it even called for notice by one whose chief notability was that he was able as well as willing to decide all Rumor's questions. But how to notice it ? he to whose vivid intel- lectual instinct his slow heart ever gave the lie, how should he praise ? why blame ? when either sentence might be a blunder written to be read of all men. It is amazing how many men of natural ability and erudite experience, are at impor- tant moments driven or drawn into the power of women one shade less than fair, one ray less than beautiful, and but one whit wiser than foolish. The beautiful and wise, the queens of physical fairydom, are foiled if they cast forth their gentle and un- conscious spells in company with the brazen- fronted, clad with guile. Tims Scrannel, who would have routed a whole phalanx of lovely and witty women by his sneers alone, and scattered their bright faculties with his angel-demon ogle, •was willing to take counsel of Helen Jordan, a person whose brains might have been safely contained in an empty egg-shell, and whose iu'^ocence had evaporated in her chris- tening-dews. Now Helen Jordan actually at first believed that " Virgilia " — book of classic name and nature romantic out of all rule and reason — had been written by Al- bany. She had read and loved his books for the fashion contained and ridiculed in them, just as clowns go to penny Shakespeare- theatres for the fun. As being a person little able to distinguish between things that wnoiiy liiiiered, she was very likely to con- found those together that bore to each other % certain resemblance. So her deception was helped out by phrases and manner in- sensibly imitated from Albany's, in the book. She had a sort of vulgar admiration for his person, as he possessed eyes and hair of the stereotyped heroic tint and darkness. But she cordially — cordially as a being so cold and hollow could — detested Geraldine with her unworldly and impulsive nature — such unworldliness innocently condemned a nar- row mundane mind, such impulsion mocked and shamed a passionless and calculating nature. Helen Jordan took some pains to excite Tims Scrannel about Geraldine's authorship. He, looking at himself from his point of view — too near not to be out of all perspective — deemed himself too lofty and sublime, to busy himself, es])ecially with the antic of premature intelligence. Helen became the more resolved that Geraldine, the married girl, should be plagued and pun- ished for the sake of her own grown wo- man's hatred. Scrannel, however, bided the time — not even a M'oman, too headless and heartless to excite his jealousy, nould incite him to expression ; he would act, con- victed by himself, and the impulses of de- testation are as direct as those of love. He hated Albany as the all-seasoned rose hated Geraldine ; he had hated her, too, but the hatred had been forced uiuler by the force more irresistible of admiration. And per- haps he hated him for the reason Helen hated her — the reason also which had drawn the high-experienced and culture-chastened genius to the untempered, inexperienced girl — the purity of both. To wound Al- bany through his dearest weakness, his vul- nerable humanity, was at once a gracious and an honorable course. For, whom sjiared Albany in his satire ? Whom distinguished he as M'orthy to share his heart save his wife alone ? All the world had seen the homage he paid, the love he gave her ; he never thrust his tenderness back into his nature, because rude eyes might detect it ; it was for her, not them, and if they questioned it, it might at least teach them, Love, not " un- derstanding," is the most precious treasure of the wise. So, in due course, Albany was deeply pained by a judgment of his wife, which, had she been in her right ])lace by his side, he would only have laughed at with her ; now the heart M'ound stanched, but not healed, opened fresh to the insidious chill, and throbbed anew. Who knows not the torture of an open wound in winter ? Desolate had he been, and dry as winter until then — nor had the cold lacked either — still, as time breathed on the pain, in time, with all wounds, it healed, and then that pain which lay not lowest, but at the surface, was forgotten, as a generous mau forgets the wrongs he only felt as -woes. But it was not so with Geraldine ; still pure, if not faultless — unfallen, if changed for evil. All the graceful sneers, the satire sheathed in brilliant eloquence, the strong experience which crushed — as the former had scattered — her delicate-winged ideas, had failed to wound her vitality, though they pinched her as if skin-deep — for never was she a moment vain. But the unfalter- ing and awful accusation of immorality — of rash tampering with sacred truths ! from the moment she read it — clearly compre- hending its full force — she doomed herself. AVas it possible she was then unknown to herself till then — such as a thousand others — shameless, forlorn in the shadoivlessness of vanished virtue ? The magnitude of the charge prevented her from testing it ; as well could a rock-clung limpet resist and RUMOR. 145 fling- from itself a rock hurled down upon it to crush it. She could but drearily and pit- iably accept the sentence she had no power or knowledge how to reverse, and retire not only from fame but from a dearer reputation — rest buried under the charge till death. Yet, unhappy child, she knew not — the shock had been too great to let her realize — how much her singular conduct and rash defection towards her husband, had contrib- uted to remove from a conscience, never over-honorable, the last honorable compunc- tion. Of course had she borne silently, wha*, was actually a real sorrow to a nature like hers, uncompromising — silently — then how proudly — no critic could have con- nected her history with her mind's invention, or dared to touch upon her conduct. l^ut the more important result of her new and dread condition was retarded — the time had not then come. For the present, the reading of the poisoned sentence had but envenomed her own opinion of herself, and struck her mute. Never cared she to write again — to ex])ose herself to charges she could neither resist nor repudiate. Nay, from that hour her genius, frail at the best as a summer butterfly, drooped like one bruised and crushed, its wings could not open — its impulse was spent forever. In truth, the most delicate genius is so easily crushed, that (praise be to Heaven), it is rarer to find existent than the mighty and the strong. For the time then — in one sense forever — Geraldine was stricken idle. She had never cared for nor followed any feminine pursuit, save poetry and love ; these failing her, her hands dropped nerve- less in her lap, a mist rose up in her brain and wrapped her faculties from her percep- tion ; she went softly in the utter bitterness of her soul. The pre-adamite warfare between the devil and Jehovah, is a type repeated in every age down to tiiat ebbing at our feet. The prin- ciple of evil, at once actual and subtle, tries hard to separate the sons of God from God for Eternity, and sometimes succeeds en- tirely for time. To effect such separation, the demon in every imagined and unimag- ined form enters the mind of man — for some the trial is fiercer, shorter, and the triumph earlier complete — man's return to the faUier of his spirit. But while it pos- sesses, it rages in the soul, sears it, rends from perception of love's soft touch, yells to drown love's delicate eternal music. In such cases all causes seem to favor the enemy of Love, while the struggle lasts events happen which minister to the sovereign evil ; so it was with Geraldine. Temptations closed upon her, before she had time or recovered sense to fling one back without acknowl- edgment. Geraldi did his best, which was his worst, and his blood-influence lent his intentions an irresistible, because so subtle a sti-ongth. 19 But how could Geraldi, the proud boy- pauper, contrive to gain influence permanent and indestructil)le ; did a poor man ever so succeed ? For the matter of that, Geraldine, in her listless life, retrieved from conva- lescence, had one cause for wonder left her one curious point, a fixed one, even in her aimless reverie. How had Geraldi changed ? — for he had altered; what gave him the swing of confidential ease in presence of others, which formerly her freedom of inter- course had alone permitted him ? In hei long lazy days Geraldine marvelled much. In old times of childish peace she had de- pended on him for sympathy if not for amusement ; his contrasting company wa' needful to make her vitality effervesce. She had never done without him, and knew not how to do. But, surely she had him still ; who else cared for his presence ? Yet he was often, and very often, absent. Geraldi was at the age of manhood, when Geraldine, yet lingering a girl, was married ; he was now a fresh-formed man. So she realized as a woman since her married sepa- ration ; till then she had been conscious of a relation brotherly as fond. He meant their relation to alter, in kind or in degree ; but while the strong chain slipped over her, she recognized not that a captor's hand had dropped it. For yet another excuse M'as hers — she had neither mother nor grandmother in any but a legal sense. The mother, who should be to the child all sympathy, as the mother's mother. Wisdom in experience, had never touched her soul, nor claimed to instruct her heart ; her mother existed for society — the present; her gi-andmother for family — the past. Between two such shadoM-y supporters, the child and grandchild slipped. True, she should never have forsaken that estate which for a woman supersedes all influences of parentage and ancestry ; but she scarcely forsook them as a woman grown, albeit as a wife. So deprived, or having deprived her- self of her natural support, she fell back on her old one, which had never failed her. But her fancy was troubled with the fact, that whether his support remained to her or not, it was for the most part invisible. Ge- raldi, from the time of his return with hei, was for some time Avhole days absent, always part of each day. Whither he went she could not dream, nor what pursuits he had adopted in London, which could be carried forward in Italy. Whether he even went beyond the gardens she could not tell, as she could not search them herself and did not choose to take any person into her con- fidence. And without his society she lan- guished ; of course in a nature like hers such desire could not perpetually languish, but must declare itself There was no sacrifice of pride to declare such need to him ; was he not her own cousin — her own blood ? To him had she not been ever kind ? So, very 14G RUMOR. Roon she stretched out her -weak hands to him when, after brief and distantly-con- ducted visits, he turned to leave the room, and called aloud on him out of her solitude, to remain with her and console her. Hfii-e was the first-fruit of the triumph — her fingers plucked it for him, and cast it at his feet. To make himself, and to be, needful to her — she who had disdained his need ! From that moment she was in his power, for life — he knew that ; but who shall say what is life ? how long the power in which we hold those breathing, by our breath, shall last ? Geraldi, like Agag of old to him who should slay him, came delicately to Geral- dine's command. He had refrained just as delicately on the journey ; but then she had been too weak to want him absolutely. Now, the heart she had rudely weaned from its natural sustenance, craved the like food — love. Not for the world would Geraldi have startled her away by relapses into his old fierceness — he had actually outgrown them. So, though he was less demonstra- tive, he gave much more support ; and as his form set to its final mould, his mind set also, and was one of those unimaginative, self-reliant, definite ones, wholly without genius or modesty. His opinions, correct or false, all sounded' right, because they never faltered. For instance, though he never spoke of Albany of his own accord, it was he who, when she gave him her husband's first letter to read, denounced it with one ■withering frown, one blighting word — and decided her without advising — not to an- swer it. Then the melancholy fear that time assumed, touched her far more than the old black tempest; yet that ch/ud but for him disguised the black and seething hell of his own thoughts, the rage of his desires beneath them ; the suspense necessary half maddened him ; but who knows not the craft, the calm of the unproved madman ? Such were his. Then when Geraldine reflected, between her romances — such became his visits — she also wondered exceedingly how he had con- trived to achieve the air and even the grace of one habituated to worldly society ; and how he managed no longer to be poor. Had he found a gold-mine at which he dug in those long absences ? Geraldi actually had money ; indeed, from the way he displayed it, in handfuls negligently, or dispensed it in domestic largess, she fancied he must be very rich. Truly, what he had. he ^lusoanded well, and the god of evii made it prosper, though it was neither found nor inherited — only earned, and earned for service. Geraldi had, in fact, become a subaltern — he had not talents for a chief, in a theatrical com- pany scarcely superior to a strolling one. And this same office tliat paid him his due deserts, also gave him the social air, the grace of costume, the self-possession Geral- dine w ondered at ; though he owed it to his inborn nobility that his stage-breeding wai never detected at its source. Dabblers in one art or calling often piclj up the rudiments of another, or others, by the way. So Geraldi found. He had con- trived, "fe-vv and brief as had been his inter- views with Rodomant, the true master, to learn from him sufficient to prevent his con- founding the true with the fulse — in art. So he never confided in mock or mimic ar- tists, to his own detriment or despite. Xot one of the actors in the trou])e he had joined knew his real name or rank ; he even passed for one sprung absolutely from the people, and raised to the part he played. The operas were insignificant ones. The theatre almost entirely patronized by the people and the peasantry — for it was not in the town next his grandmother's house, but in an inferior village, scai'cely ever passed through by strangers. Among the audience, he was welcomed most cor- dially, as an aristocrat in undress will ever be with those he calls and deems his natural detesters — no persons actually so love and appreciate refined politeness. Geraldi could aftbrd to be polite to them — amidst them he was actually superior, therefore acted as an equal — this equality led to a peculiar, yet natural, result. One evening he stole into Geraldine's room — in old times he never went to her room, but met her in the gardens. Now he went to her room unasked — yet seemed not intrusive, because he went so seldom. This evening it was little likely she should think him so — she had longed so for his coming, which was never now a certainty till he had come. He looked grand to her vision as he advanced, dilated in the twilight with a golden shadow on his pale dark vis- age, and the evening fires burning in his ! brown trans])arent eyes. Round his statu- esque curls, like black carved marble, a tri- I umph seemed to gather, merely from the ] position of his head, thrown back more proud than merely haughty. Geraldine felt jealous — that triumph had invested him as he entered, she feared it had not brightened with her smiles. Not that he thought of another woman, no suspicious cloud had drifted by his desperate impulse across her imagination, yet so pure. But she feared wildly to lose his love, she gazed upon him with the timid imploring sadness of one who has a frieird — to whom that one is the ojily friend. " What is it, Geraldine ? " he asked, after letting her spend many moments in the vain and thirsting glance. And he laid his cool hand on her forehead gently, where of old his kisses rained like fiery dews — night, morning, noonday — every time. "Nothing," she faltered, maiden-like. "But you surprise me. I thought you looked as if you were going to say 8ome« thing." EUMOR. 147 " 1 ffas. Have you taken enough care aliout me, to wonder where I went so often since we came ? " " Oh, often, often — always ! " " Have you ever wished I was not out — Oh, Geraldine ! " And the pahn which pressed her forehead still, glowed suddenly as though it clasped a fiery coal. " Ah, yes," she answered, sincere in very fervor, and simple yet. " But I thought you perhaps were husy." " I was, and so shall be ; but it was all *.hat I might become more fit to guide and comfort you. One cannot learn too much, and I kiiew less than little. I have been studying." "What? I thought you had done some- thing, for jou have made money, Geraldi." A smile, too cunning to part the Ii])s, flitted over his. " Yes," he said quietly, " some, and I mean to have more — my dues with those of many thousand men. Geral- dine, what would you say to tilts'^ I am a soldier now." "A soldier? Oh, how delighted I am! But not surprised. An officer, of course, Geraldi ? " " Oh, of course, an officer." " In which regiment, Geraldi ? Did the duke see you ? did you go to him ? did he send for you ? " The duke was the mild ig- norant — futile while absolute — regnant of that ])rovince. " No — the duke did not see me — mine is a higher master, his claims broad as free- dom — his kingdom wider than this land. He is crowned with human happiness — his sceptre is plenty, his rule the only secure peace. His name is Liberty." Geraldine started and stared — she posi- tively did not understand him — his magnil- oquence charmed, however, as much as it excited her, and that was all he required. He had simply joined the republican cause (whose army was in truth as vast as it was undisciplined), a nvatural result of a contempt for all authorities of earth and heaven — a burning and restless youth — a lawless pas- sion — and a will for which the impossible existed not. CHAPTER XXVII. The sickly and chilly spring of Rodo- mant's life had dissolved with its mists of doubt and hope rainbows, into a summer- time of teeming fervor, and all-creative strength — as such springs sometimes do. An early summer — whose character seemed to have taken from that rare climate its im- pression — with its brilliant dreamy days, and lucid studious nights. That inaugura- tion of his to the several offices, never at- tained or held before by a single person at a time, had taken place immediately before hii first patroness had read of and commented on it. Yet — it was just as well he knew not, with his simple sensitiveness, thrs^fact — the cluster of incidents, out of which an editor of a continental newspaper of one day's date, one week in this millennium, had made a constellation of interest for the lim- ited circle of its readers — the facts, related with so profound an interest for such, found no notice whatever in any English paper ; there was no room for them, or their claims were not sufficiently consequential. That inauguration had been a superb small festival — Rodomant considered it a sublime one. No wonder, perhaps, in that court where conservatism — kept calm with almost purple state, the soft magnificence, the drain of prodigality, whose results were like flying dreams of art — both impregnated the hour and the occasion with an excitement that seemed higher than the human. But the fine rite, arranged so artfully after antique precedent, would on the contrary have struck his fine taste as a gilt and velvet pageant ; the sword of the order, that should never be unsheathed in battle, as an ignoble toy ; the other decorations as tinsel and silken tape ; but for the sway of his deep secret, that ideal- ized all, and lit each formal or hollow item with a glory stolen from paradise. This event had fallen on him with the sur- prise peculiar to one of ideal brain and heart unspoiled, when an honor undeserved ac- crues to him. He felt it undeserved, and it was actually unexpected, for though he had received compliments enough from the prince, he had never lent them any real meaning ; and was further ignorant that his marked in- dependence of demeanor had as much to do with the satisfaction he elicited, as had his productive energy, which never failed, flag- ged, nor refused to follow and fulfil impulse. Never had the prince been so ceaselessly di- verted from the exhaustion of his old pleas- ures, now yielding worse weariness than pain, nor from the hideous thoughts which haunted that black place, his conscience, as spectres are beheld in darkness. The per- ception of the beautiful was left in him — as in how many of the basest and the hard- est — strange argument to crush the sophism some hold, that evil natures are annihilated as beings altogether. For the sense of beauty exists and can exist in the immortal only. And this lovely instinct survived in one for whom all others had sunk beneath the human average — the prince, if gratitude had not decayed in him, would have actually felt gratitude towards Rodomant, when he dis- covered it was not only blood and rapine whose tragic moods he could depict, but that no poet-musician had ever drawn upon the same resources for the development of the philosophy of passion in its phases the high- est and least terrible — those of love. Cold and loveless indeed was this appreciation — [48 RUMOR. thai of th( virtuoso with taste refined and rigorous, rendered inexorable by indulgence. He admired Rodomant's works for their con- summate art, as he would have applauded a skilful sculpture of one fresh torn from the rack — each strained muscle starting — in repose ; the marble agony anatomically cor- rect, the torture of the countenance reflected, not imagined. Those weeks when Rodomant labored hard for the prince's edification, might have been set down to his account as first lessons in the mockery of devotion — the slavehood of the noble will chained by the wishes or the whims of the svil and unjust. Or they might seem so. B'jt there is only one case in which a ]iroud and self-reliant nature will yield im- plicit obedience to the rules of one unloved — unserved in heart. Rodomant, in serving the tjrant and the time, misserved not Art ; no force, nor fraud, nor promise of all he longed for, would have dragged him to that ground of degradation. Had his own un- worldly strain of composition been objection- able, or not acceptable there, he would have gone, even if he had plucked out his heart and bunied it at the gray convent gates ; or the spirit, which gives life to being bound in clay, had given up the ghost, and flown to heaven, on the borders of that land of promise. But, without doing violence to his artistic honor, he could remain — nay, make himself necessary rather than of consequence ; there- fore he staid — and for what guerdon ? un- guessed by ruler or courtier, even by the person who unconsciously bestowed it. To go back some moments in his history; the unselfishness of love and the selfishness of passion — what word-artist or philosopher shall ever exhaust that theme ? The antago- nists that in every opposition learn to blend, who close in combat, endanger each other's existence, yet whose final thrust melts into an embrace, and they are one ; the perfect whole, whose elements defied each other to unite, yet whose warfare was more great and strong than that between love and hate, or hate and passion. From love, Rodomant the untamable, who could not be taught behivior, imbibed propriety without learning it. The unmannered, reticent, abrupt, grew graceful, sympathetic, assimilative. No fitful frame nor mood grotesque — not a look or phrase to startle her. And strong, indeed, with the man'.'; untarnished moral armor, must have been the love, for the fight be- t-ween it and its brother-enemy — the passion, went on in her presence unseen as the rush- ing of the life-blood ; it was maintained in a deep and secret place — the lover's heart — a separate place from her as well as to her unknown ; for was not she given, if not prom- ised, to another ? This fact, indisputable because he never disputed it, thundered Toicelessly in his conscience, which, clear • ad void of evil, echoed it without pity — self-pity, passion's arch-deceiver. But yet, for the silence with which they grapj^ltd in her presence, these foes who might become closest friends, their victim, who was yev their master, revenged himself on himself and them when he was alone. Great strug- gles, physical as convulsion, racked his frame, the restraint reacted in groans ut- tered, as well as tho.se too deep for utter- ance. He grovelled on the ground because such place alone befitted him ; face to face with clay he felt as though he drew nearer death — that only heaven of desj)air. Sweats, heavy as if drawn by scourges self-inflicted, soaked his sleepless pillow, and wrung from his brain in water what might, in its primal flame, have burned to madness. With such long strifes, the body wasted, but no disease made way for itself through the impaired and fretted medium, only the spirit seemed more freely to penetrate it, as moonlight that only mocks the surface of stone with glory, filters lustrous through chisel-thinned ala- baster. The princess marked a change, but under- stood it not, and was anxious till she proved that, M-hatever the affection was, it obstructed not energy, nor touched actual health. But her anxiety informed more deeply than be- fore, her interest, always strong, as it had been of sudden growth. His perfect sin- cerity and truth untainted, not his genius, had drawn from her much of her life's pure confidence ; and the revelations of his genius, as a woman mastered her afterwards, before she was aware. But she was aware, and not unwilling to own, that as a friend he had crept into her heart. And while for him she felt friendly only, she was safe with as from him, not a ray of fascination — from the lightsome and varied treasury he owned in common with those rare beings, men of great hearts and sovereign minds — he .suf- fered to escape through his manner, impene- trable even when sincere. From the day he saw her in the dungeon proved it was no dream that so she spent her time, felt her singular and pathetic char- acter through the aspect of her helpless charity ; he had decided on his course. In the first place, that he loved her, and might adore her still, that he had the right, so long as he jx ssessed himself of the power to conceal from her the least sign of the fact, its shadow's shadow. That next, he had not the right to betray to her — nay, on the housetops to proclaim his preference — merely because she preferred not supremely, him. Thirdly, he thought — he would have said he svas certain — he knew whom she preferred, and so believing, he considered it not only his right but his duty, to convey to her by all and every means his own impres- sion of the person so marvellously favored. This he had done invariably whenever he had the opportunity, and with as little effect as he would have persuaded her of the RUMOR. 149 scentlessnesR of the rose. But now he bethouofht himself to employ other means than such as he had vainly exhausted — means certainly fair and legitimate, though unprecedented, because they were placed in the pnwer of no one else, and besides would have failed to affect ordinary — oi most extraordinary women. The very day he had seen her in her morning audience, breathinia: comfort where she C3uld not save, she sent for him after her return. He reached the rooms after the mid-day sleep, which had been neither sleep nor rest to her ; it seldom was, in fact those hours alone she dreamed, those only hours she allotted to what she would have named selfish — that is, maiden reflection on the future, the hoped-for, the untried — the secret-chosen she believes has of her made secret choice. She was of the temperament so difficult to save from the minute mom^entary shocks of which such myriads go to make up one day's suffering. Brigh^ — never brilliant — but bright at evening, in aspect and of intel- lect, she seemed to brighten with the star- time, with M'hose glory her glances wore affinity, as well as her lofty, yet dewy-tender thoughts. But in the morning-light her lustre waned, or was veiled under a spotless cloud ; her pallor was ever then remarkable, though instinct with her beauty still. Fa- tigue and the sadness gathered from her chief pursuit, touched her paleness with mortal reminiscence, which at night dropped from her expression of spiritual radiance and more than mortal purity. That tintless pallor, when Rodomant be- held, sent a trembling terror through him ; so did the soft-azure shadow round eyes whose color and very meaning seemed to retreat more from the sight by day. So did the natural exhaustion of the frame at once so delicate and highly strung — this seemed unnatural languor. Love's unhallowed idea quivered like wings heard in darkness, through his brain ; a phantom paler than she rose and stood still before him. The name love will not whisper, was echoed without a word by the swell of his low sighs to his throbbing ear — the idea, the phantom, the name of Death. " She will die — she will die ! " seemed reit- erated ruthlessly, as a lost and wandering strain of music no player shall ever give life to. A white and rentless veil, rigid as iron and cold as ice, fell between his pas- sionate presentiment and her. Sense could never clasp, nor mortal love inthrall her — to Death no virgin ever broke her promise. Then love rose mighty — mightier than passion, as the tide is surer than the tem- pest — strangled the suspicion and dashed it backwards — dead. Rent the veil of ice and iron with one glance of tenderness, and saw the living countenance — pallid, but redeemed from death. One warm sigh swept the phantom, like a trail of mist, to space ; one gush of Jove's great song, that harmonizes Heaven and Creation, devoured the weak echo without a name. And love uttered to silence, passion listening, — " she shall live — not for me — but through me." In that mood the musician sat down to his machine — no marvel at the result. Yet she wondered — that was well; it was first on his list of designs to conquer the monotony of her being — that dead sea on which her happiness eluded her, was floated wide — seemed lost. He played so as to strike great shocks on deepest-ringing iron, clashing brass, sweet-thrilling silver ; all metals seemed to lend their power to tone — not merely every instrument of art was mocked, but every voice of nature mim- icked ; seas surged, great thunders seemed to blast the rocks, fresh-shivering breezes after rain seemed rustling in the myriad leaves, birds crowded, chirped, and clam- ored. First then, the princess rose from the seat she had taken, and came quickly where she could see his hands. They and the keys flashed against each other like showers of dancing snow flakes, or conflicting millions of elfish meteors — difficulty was derided, impossibility achieved, execution outdone by craft. Then all spelled and quieted, a lull- ing lay woke warily — as not to waken some sleeper or the sleeping woe. A dew of music, such as might drop in dreams on the musician's brain ; she stole back to her seat, and slept with her forehead on her hand. " I can do as T will," he thought. Yet it was natural after fatigue, if soothed, to rest — music had but medicined nature. This was the first and least of his caprices. Of course, the fancy he had framed about Porphyro grew certainty — or, rather, from being a double fancy, became a double fact. How she first received, or he fii-st dared to impart, the impression, Rodomant could not tell ; but if it proved the selfishness of pas- sion, that for Porphyro's doing exactly what he would have done himself in his place, he condemned and hated Porphyro ; so it proved the unselfishness of love that he neither condemned nor despised her for pre- ferring Porphyro — rather pitied her the more sincerely, and adored her with loftier devotion. Still, he never spoke of Por- phyro again, until she alluded to him her- self — small credit to him on that point, as no man could have approached the subject without the indication of her will. But when, as he foresaw would happen, his music became to her a solace exquisite and inseparable, he never faile o make use of hands moi-e persuasive ^ . descriptive than any tongue. Nor tr"- cd he to chance im- provisation, every d,, some fresh memorial reached her, of 'lamatic genius to which there was no tbe'ue of love sealed up — noi phase of passion a dead note. Love's quar- 150 RUMOR. rels, the broken heart, the waiting hope, absence and meeting, suspense, misunder- standing, and union ; such were the initials of his art-narratives. " What is that ? " asked the princess one day, when dispirited and weary she sat down to listen — and some vague, cold meaning touched her through tangled harmonies. " This," said Rodomant, censoriously, and loudly — without leaving off, " is a scene, or rather a case, of a woman's self-deception. Bittir, wild fruits she plucks on a dusty ■waj.k, find presses them to her lips, till she pt-'rsuades herself they are sweet and all- refreshing, because the perfume of her kisses touched them. Thorns she snatches, and believes them roses, for she tears her hands with them, and the blood is bright as roses — her heart's blood, though dropped from her wounded hands. Delusions she covets — and nature helps her to create — she sees clear waters lying far out across the golden sands ; she flies to them, they fleet from her — at a glance of the sun they are gone, and she sinking to the hot and yield- ing ground, has her parched mouth filled and choked with dust. Torment and an- guish spring like giant shadows from her solitude. She will not bear them company — she renders up her solitude to Another, — no shadow — she will not be alone. Alone ? Before, she was alone with soli- tude, God's freedom ; now she is alone with a corpse — Death's solitude. Then, by the side of the love she sought living, and found dead, her love lies down, and dies. But pas- sion, that cannot die vnshared, goes mad with her, and in the hideous duality — love- less, frenzied — she whirls about creation long after her life's end. She will not rid herself of the phantom — for it is a phan- tom, heavy as a nightmare — for confession alone will lay it ; and she will not confess — no woman ever will — that she was deceived, not in love, but in what she loved ! " So raved Rodomant, in the pauses of his magic ; his unillumined and fantastic theme, groped out in crude and darklhig transitions. Certainly such wild, boyish words should but have excited to mirth; perhaps roused to satire, a woman as wise as the princess. Why then the proud silence, that yet from \\". aspect's changeful anger seemed as if it must rend itself with indignant negative ? Why the dropped eyes not with contempt, but a pained and curious shame ? why the (juick hectic, kindled sudden clear as fire, on the cheek's pure pallor ? And why the re- treat, not the f>ugust and quiet step that of habit seemed b. 'rn to tread — not on necks, but flowers it '^"hi d to crush ; but rapid and impetuous, as \ "iven ? No salute, no turning of the heai. nd, after that day, no summons to the mins. ' for many days. That Porphyro was .. - of the great, few i 1 all the ages. One o. • he chosen — by God, or the god of the godless - Occasion — which means not the same as Circumstanoe, the secular name for Providence. He waa one who could and should oidy be judged by the children of the future, who Mill wall- lightly over our resting dust. For they, whether their natural gifts, their advantages of culture, their purity of judgment, are to transcend ours or not, will certainly survey the past through no heat-mist of excitement nor glow of heart-enthusiasm ; nothing pre- pares prejudice like the passion of personal experience, before its object is laid in earth, from which springs only the rigid truth, cold as the marble of the monument. Porphyro was a strange person. The Creator must have loved him, and it maybe, as Humanity's best Friend loved the man.Avho sorrowed because he could not bear to leave all things for that love. Alas ! for Porphyro — for the great and dominant, whose hearts beat too low and even to be listened to, md heard, in the busy working-day, through the crashing incessant turn of Labor's wneel, and the grinding footsteps of Oblivion's Progress. In the cool of the day, that pulse might be heard to beat, a lulling and tender promise ; as the first Time-servers heard the voice of divine love in the pulses of the leaves of Paradise ; in the evening too when Labor paused, and Progress treading down the moments ever, trod in silence. But these Sabbaths were too short for Porphyro to learn in them even the alphabet of that great philosophy — the heavenly philosophy of love — as available for earth and every prin- ciple of utility ; which, in gratifying its own impulse for satisfaction, only compasses that to fulfil the happiness of another — or of many others, — or of all the world. Porphyro had a heart whose every pulsa- tion, measured by himself or not, was benef- icent ; but he was without impulse entirely. He had an ingrained generosity in lieu of, and greater than, all nobility ; he had never trodden on a worm, nor spurned the most degrading weakness of any one who had trusted him. His head contained a brain of that order, which precisely, because perfectly in order, was able to issue rules irrefragable, in cases where men of vast talents or the rarest genius owned no sway at all ; or, if they essayed such, were foiled disgracefully. A brain was his, close as com])act and fu'l -- and busy as a beehive with ])etty ])lane fc r the amelioration of all humanity ; little iOgic for the solution of gigantic myster'es, all, to do him justice, animated and r.'ndered possible to his unimaginative faith by his bounteous if not boundless heart. Yet the man had one fine trait — too fine and rare not to escape his judges, and which they never detected — ht was strictly honest. He believed sincerely that the place and influ- ence he coveted — nay prophesied and in- tended for himself — were the highest to be attained by man. There is not a quistion, that no enforced hero, no chosen nJer oi RUMOR. 151 time-appointed chief, ever was bo sincere in desiring the temporal benefit of those sub- mitted to h.'s destiny. Had Porphyro, ^vith his character, owned a faith firm as his self- confidence, he might have regenerated his kingdom— had he possessed a heart great as his genius, he might have regenerated the world. But yet, to account for the attachment with which he actually inspired the many, and the intense impression he produced on a few, it must be owned that his was no ordi- nary fascination. From the hour in which Fate had drawn him into her experience, Adelai'da knew Porphyro admired, as he could, loved her. Eminently conscious him- self of whatever his fascination might con- sist in — and it was natural, or it had not affiected her — he cast his spells to net her virgin faculties, rather than her heart — at first ; or perhaps because of possessing that also, he felt perfectly assured. Caught — as is the phrase — first himself — not entangled by coquettish charms, but captured by that star-like essence which, glancing from her eyes, betrayed the direction of her being, and which he could not bind any more than the Pleiad's SM-eet influences themselves. So affected, at once his resolve was taken. Without impulse, however, the resolve re- mained one ; no casting of himself freely at her feet, no burning and blissfully-confused confession, letting out young passion from its bondnge link by fiery link : that was not Porphyro's way. And, in natural course, his unconscious, because natural, duplicity de- ceived himself Though he had never ful- filled towards her the man's first duty of allegiance — self-offering — he behaved as though that were achieved, and the sacrifice accepted, sealed by her also. He wore the ring which she had not given him, but he had bestowed upon himself, in token of the desire of his to be crowned, and therefore as good and positive as possession. The jirincess, simple in the greatness of her intelligence, of boundless, and all-embra- cing heart, had sorely suffered, though none, till Rodomant, ever guessed it or suspected. Perhaps this was the reason that she, the proudest of women in her virtue, was not angered really — only outwardly — by the strong indignant sympathy of the only being who ever dared — as a subject, or cared as a man — to fathom her mysterious pain, and probe it to its depth. Sorely had she suf- fered ; for she whose profound and most essential passion had never been touched or breathed on, far less called into sympathetic life, had felt PorphjTo's fascination too strongly for her peace — her pride. Bewil- dered by it, she could not deny it to herself. She had listened to his dissertations on the benefaction of humanity, when the dry bones of effete arguments, scraped from the four winds, were vitalized by his generous feeling with a transient breath, that seemed to her immortal longing. And her mind — wise as ever dwelt in woman, though not knowing more than woman's should be — rose ex- panded to the theme. Then, at the time she first saw him, he was poor and powerless, and only not an outcast because he owned to no country which could cast him forth. She was rich, had a fixed position, and, if she lived, would one day have power of her own. But in all the pride of her own genuine modesty, she seemed tc perceive his reflected ; he should suffer on account of neither. She had given him opportunities to declare his devotion — opportunities so guileless, chaste vet subtle, that women would have smiled "at, and men have mocked them as such. Yet these all stood against her, unacknowl- edged, unresponded to. Brief language, a few expressive simple words — how many souls for lack of these have been drunk up in despair's black gulf! how many hearts have drifted from their anchorage on life's calm summer sea, and been lost in wild mid-ocean ! Though the princess had sufl^ered a vague melancholy in her hours of occupation — a deep, true trouble in her hours of trance, both had sprung from a poetic sorrow almost too tender to wish away; till Rodomant's strange conduct, and ingenuous swerve from precedent, had appalled her hopes. In pro- portion, however, as she prized his franknesS; always the rarest quality revealed to one in her position ; she desired to disembarrass him also of Ms idea, which she fondly determined to believe he entertained through ignorance. The night, rather the evening, before Rod- omant's inauguration, there came a knock at his door, not the door of the ante-cham- ber, but his own inmost and secluded apart- ment. Unprecedented circumstance ! Ser- vants were wont to appear in doorways, whose draperies they lifted, statue-calm and silent, whether they came to lay tables, or to bring written orders. Pages had their privilege of all ages, to dance in and out. But neither knocked, it was not fashion in Belvidere, save for supreme personages, when they chose to visit those of lower de- gree. Rodomant hastened to the door, the princess entered. It was well he was habitu • ated to surprises such as small events be- come to the supernaturally sensitive ; for otherwise he might have committed the fatal, for in this case disloyal, blunder of evincing his surprise. Quiet, reverent, but not prodigal of word-homage, he received this honor for the first time She had never entered his own room before. A great change had passed on her, swift as an Alpine spring, sweeping winter to the molten snows — since but a few hours ago, M-hen he saw her last. No longer pale, her face siione on him, its lilies bathed in bloom to which the rose is dead ; her lips quivered with tha shadow of an inward smile, whose meaning was not for men to read and interpret out- 152 RUMOR. wardlj'. Her %vhole aspect betrayed that joy lends a charm te" beauty more divine than that of sorrow — whatever poets may say. "I am happy to say," and her voice con- tradicted not her coiniteaance — "that our friend — no h)nger to be called Captain — Porphyro will be here to-morrow on purpose to hear your new work, and to see you in- vested." " On purpose ! " Yes, the words were accented, as if she well knew what excuse he made, and thanked for it herself, the cause of the excuse. " That is not all," said Rodomant to him- eelf, his cynical observation not affecting his courtesy — yes, courtesy, the ease which gentle passion, strong a's gentle, lends the rude and proud. " That is not all — she conceals something ; a woman alwavs does. Thank God for that token ; she is fallible after all. She wants me to ask her too." This was true, and equally true that she knew not she desired him to question her. Few men, indeed, stand pure, that test of being needed bj- the woman of their pas- sion's choice — it is commonly sufficient for a woman to show that she requires physical support or spiritual help, for a man to turn against her physically, and despise her in his heart. Not so Rodomant, his uncompro- mising nature only rebelled against power ; therefore, in her momentary weakness, he succored her by an impulse, as he would have risen seraph-strong to aid her in ex- tremest mortal exigency. " Your highness will excuse me," — in an interested tone — "because my curiosity about an extraordinary person was author- ized by your opinion. I cannot forget that he spoke kind words to me, and procured for me advantages I can neither name nor num- ber. I am not vain enough, though perhaps I am too proud, to take any part of the honor of his visit to myself. It belongs not to me, lait by virtue of the representations or misrepresentations of your highness's gen- erosity, that the comer for the first time to — " " Not the first time," said the princess hurriedly, with a flying flush — though he knew that l)efore as well as she, therefore needed not to hint at it. " Oh, of course not — I recollect. He rr.ust have been here before, or could not be kn»)wn so well and so honorably respected. But he came — as I came — a servant; and now I fancy from what I have lately heard whispered, he will come as — a master." " Yes, yes," cried she, with an enthusiasm she had never let free before. She took a letter from the folds of her deep girdle — half-opened it --then closed it, with fingers no longer snowy — they blushed like her visage. " I dare say you know all then. You are a politician, and study the wonder- ful library whicli is issued daily in a thousand thousand numbers — whose leaves Sibylline are Si^ttered by millions to the night, as | prophecies, or records of promises unfulfilled, Vou read newspapers ? " " No," said Rodomant, " I don't look at papers, princess, I have no time ; I have even left off' reading Avhat they say about myself. But all old ladies like reading them — be- cause they are Sibylline, I suppose — and though I have no wife, I have a mother, which, for such purposes, is as good. So she writes to me, and as she is my mother, and takes the trouble, I always read her letters ; that is the reason I have no time to read let- ters of lying editors to the gas])ing frog of a jiublic that swallows whole whatever is dropped into its jaws — vermin for fresh flies, and marsh-mud for virgin honey. My mother, in the last of her long letters, tells me that the old king of Iris — the king I saw looking young and handsome as a king in waxwork — is no longer a king ; that he has turned his back on his people and run away. Except that, though I guess something, I know nothing. Oifi! yes, I remember my mother went on to say that it had been a mistake about Babylon the great being Rome, for it was Parisinia, and that the abomination of desolation was not to happen in the East, but in Iris. There was also something about a great and a little eagle which I could not understand. Is Porphyro king yet — does he direct now, princess?" " Not king — never, never — I told you so! But he is certainly director. You have heard nothing ? " she asked, with a show of surprise which tried to hide the delight of being the one to explain and expatiate on the subject. "Nothing — I knew not what was going on — I had no right — I was busy with my petty opera, as he with the life-drama he di- rects." " See these papers — read them all," she exclaimed, bringing out from a fold in her dress a heap her narrow hand could scarcely grasp. " You will then learn every thing which I could not so well express. I have marked the paragraphs referring to the sub- ject, and to him. You will glance thi-ough them quickly, your eye is so rapid." Never had Rodomant revealed — unre- vealed to her blind love — his own love as in this instance. If any other woman — power upon earth or not — had given him a bundle of printed news, and required him to read them, he would have thrown them, if not in her face, most certainly on the floor, and re- fused to pick them up. These he took calmly, and examined them in order carefully, it was true they were arranged and pencil-empha- sized, easy to decipher their meaning if one only knew the name of Porphyro — and Rodomant knew more. Quietly he read and turned the sheets — in some instances re- read a paragraph. At last laid them <^n the table, and folded his arms in front of the princess, who now stood calm as he, though her cheeks yet burned as with the impresi RUMOR. 153 of a crimson rose-leaf, concentrated blossom of all the blushes that had spent themselves. " I see," he began in a tone whose temper alone concealed its ironic edge, " that the Parisinians, acting for all the towns and country-places throughout Iris, had deter- mined to govern themselves. Straightway, as must be the case when each child in a nursery or play-room wants the same toy (and there is but one), there comes to pass a childish quarrel. The children fight -^ first pretending they do so for fun — bruise each other, blind each other with black e^'es, scratch till the blood shows, and pile up their lesson books in corners for self-defence. When the dispute is loudest, and there ap- peareth no end, the wisest of the children — not many to be sure of them — gather to- gether out of special attraction for each other — such attraction as the witch's pot had for the witch's pan in the old story. They col- lect in a corner, leave off quarrelliug, and proceed to chatter. Being a few faculties wiser than the rest, they agree shortly that fighting disables them and others from ob- taining or preserving the precious and unique toy. They clasp hands, and compliment each other, then finish by agreeing as fol- lows : ' we will keep together, and when the others see us nodding and whispering, they will feel and acknowledge how clever we children are.' But this did not happen, tlie others made too much noise. Then said the biggest of the clever children, ' let us join hands round the rest, and enclose them in a ring, and let our wrists be broken before they can get out.' This succeeded better — the other children were taken by surprise, tired too with blows and bruises. ' Now,' said the biggest child, and the others in the ring after him, ' let us put the toy on the table, with a glass case over it, or pack it up in a drawer, then it will be safe, cannot be spoiled or broken, and will belong to all, not to one in particular.' The children, clever and stupid, all agreed to this, for, thought each (none said so), if once the toy is on the table, I can smash the glass, when the others are asleep or stupid, or break the lock of the drawer ; then will the toy be mine.' But on a sudden it was remarked, that one child had neither joined in the ring of the clever ones, nor mixed among the quarrellers. Then the biggest child turned to that child — he was noticeable not because of his size, but be- cause of his smallness — he was indeed the smallest of them all. The biggest chi d said, ' pray don't stand there in the corner, join our ring, for youi- wrists are very strong.' The small child had always been noticed for his skill in knocking down ninepins, and his strength in batting at cricket, besides his cunningness in tricks with cards. ' Oh, I will come,' said he carelessly, and stood among them. It was besides remarked that he took pains — the only time he showed any interest — to assure them he did not 20 care about the toy, and would refuse it, were it offeretl to him. He also added coolly, that he would not stand in the shoes of the big- gest child, for any reward or punishment." " Good Heavens ! " exclaimed the prin- cess painfully, impatiently — " spare me such poor, such utter folly — it is not worthy of you — drop that strain." Rodomant bowed — turned his eyes from her, and towards the ground. " I will speak plainly instead. This Por- phjTO, having generously and meekly conde- scended to bear a hand in liglitening the burden of Direction, is pretty soon discov- ered by the rest of them to be the only child of all, who has power even passingly to di- rect either the select few managers, or the mob of children with which those professed to deal. They furtively find out their own incompetency, suddenly bring all ti.oir weak- ness to bear upon him, and offer him the shoes of the biggest child, into which he, the least one, slips. Now those shoes have the fairy gift in common with the seven-league boots, to contract as well as expand. They contract on Porphyro — surely it seems so, princess ? Once in the place he coveted, he speaks not, moves not, he seems cramped from locomotion and free will. He must kick off the shoes that pinch him, or never will he really direct. He wants no shoeing, his heel is iron, as his brain is adamant, en- graved by fate with ciphers ; he translates them — predestination, resolution, and as- sumption." By this time the princess had rallied her reasoning powers, as far as they were hers, — as a woman, she turned the pa])ers over again, and snatched up one. " You cannot have read that — you ought to read those words," said she, " you have read all the rest, of little consequence as regards his char- acter ; here stands the cipher of his honor, if you like the term. See, he has sworn, yes, sworn never to infringe the privileges of those who have conferred on him the privi- lege he prizes only — of being trusted by them, their confidence his, as he is one among them, while yet the chief; no crown — no sovereignty. He swears." Rodomant had noted that fact most of all ; it had been the point on which he f;istened his misbelief, his masked contempt. He raised his head, and poured from his eyes — now void of passion, the whole lustre c' his intelligence upon the princess. Never 'le- fore had she met it bare, or unveiled by heart-emotion. " Sworn, and sworn falsely," he uttered "' For it were against his nature to fulfil the vow. If he keeps the oath, he is false to himself; if he breaks it, false to them. I am glad to see, princess, that he saves him- self by the skin of his conscience, any how ; however, time seals the result. I perceive that Porphyro himself did not pronoun :» the oath. Its words were given out by an- 154 HUMOR. ether, and ho. was to assent in form. Sup- pose in thundering, ' I swear,' from his throat through the echoing space, he had whispered to his own ear only — ' not ;' as ladies, I have heard, are fond of doing at the altar, when they wish to slip the vow obe- dience. For the matter of that, what man fulfils his marriage letter — what woman ? What human being dares swear, a finite being, under the vault of heaven? What creature of smiles and tears, of passion, of superstition, and of awe, can engage to keep his word ? True honor needs no oath, its guarantee is faith, more certain than any vow, though in the heart its music is often mute, and it never writes promise on the forehead." This remark closed the conference — whether in wrath or woe, indiiferent or dis- turbed, the princess left him without ac- knowledgment, as indeed, in one sense he deserved. But his words haunted her all night like oracles, so strongly closed on memory and thrust all other meanings out, that though she took care to hide their sense next day — and many days — in her deepest heart ; it was certain to return again — de- sired or unwelcome. CHAPTER XXVIII. A SLEEPLESS night brought Rodomant to the important morning birth-hour of his in- ferior, yet for him, loftier Direction ; he, too, had his pride, but he freely confessed it. At noon he entered the theatre, white dome of dazzling daylight, for rehearsal of his new opera, before the prince and members of the household guests — and Adelaida. The theatre was empty, vague lines of white and gilding arched in void tiers towards the roof — and the royal box pro- jecting on its own special pillars from its own appropriate and spreading arch, was veiled from view by a fretted screen, laced through and through with myrtle branches. But Rodomant, bristling with suspicions, glanced behind him from instant to instant — during the precursory hubbub of an or- chestra which sounded like a million hives, full of bees, steadfastly swarming — and beheld the box door opened, and saw the princess ushered into it by Porphyro, who held the door open with the air of the hum- blest servant, and followed after her with the air of the proudest master. The prin- cess in her father's box ! That in itself was a fact phenomenal. Then fell the evening, stars gleamed above the noon of glory, those suns too far in space for recognition blazed upon a tran- sient poor repute of one recognized among the multitudes of earth. This hour no empty dome, but one built up of living faces, lighted by living glances, to the ceil- ing's edge, and revealed by lamps of dia- mond-like serenity M'hich made that plas- ' tered whiteness vivid as the eye of day. Again, the princess in her father's box, though protected from him as divided by another presence ; screened no longer, but divinely, earthly beautiful for all beholders. Her dress too — the mourning virgin ami sad-colored sister of humanity — a lace robe like woven light, on satin like woven moon- beams — texture, fashion, form, all those ol Parisinia. Large water lilies, fresh gath- ered from their cool recesses, weighed down her golden hair, and veiled her bosom ; yet she wore no jewels, only the pearls from a water deeper and cooler than the lilies' home — great pearls clisped her wrists, and melted into the pearl-hue of her neck. No diamonds, though, on festal occasions, they only were ordained the sign of state for such as she. Did she desire to abase, and give public evidence that she abased, in his sight and presence, the very glory of the regalia ? Opera and anthem over — investiture of ribbon, medal, star, and sword, succeeding, over too ; nothing less than that at an end the after-banquet, noiseless and superb, limited enough for him, in whose honor those invited ate and drank, to see clearly the princess next her other friend — not Rodomant, who sat beside the prince. The banquet over, those met had leave and right — unfrequent loosing of the rigid cus- tom — : to do, gather together, or depart, as each inclined. Rodomant, his sfenses by this time at once strained and made more keen by the demand on them, would have gladly retired, but for a look from tlie princess, which, imploring far more than it com- manded, took him far more swiftly than would command have done, to her imme- diate presence. Not only hers — nor had Rodomant touched a few i'eet of the ground from him beside her — Porphyro — before he felt the old attraction rivet him ; the strange face, without beauty or comeliness, arrests him with interest, unenforced but felt ; the half-closed eyes, with their glaze of ocean-green, wog' like glance of the male siren, needing no charm of song to bid the seer listen. Involuntarily, Rodomant bowed, and as involuntarily, when Porphyro stretched forth his hand with a friendliness utterly un- ])resumptive, Rodomant took it; — ring and all? No, he took care amidst his fascina- tion, to look most eagerly, and lo ! no rii g clasped any finger of either pale-bronzed hand. A thrill of warmest gratitude shot through his breast, precious as a sunbeam to the frost-starved earth ; none but a lover could have felt, or would understand its meaning — his exultation. She, then, had not given him the ring. But, next instant, as rapid an icy spasm checked his joy. KUMOR. 155 WTiat would she now think of his preten- sions to veracitj .-' Absohitely, for a mo- ment, the ircn influence of the other griped his memoi'v, and held it in a numbed sus- pense ; he could not resolutely believe that he had actually seen the riue:. But when somewhat recovered, he looked up, he saw she was far too happy, if excite- ment imphes bliss, to notice or regret such a deficiency. Never had she shown so witty, so profound a mind, Avrought to vivid repar- tee ; it resembled a deep lake, diamond- stirred by a sudden breeze ; and yet for the glancing revelation at the surface of those treasures never fathomed, her loveliness avenged itself, and earthly joy only lent her more and more unearthly beauty. Porphyro spoke in his own pecuhar short, but meaning sentences ; she replied at length, Rodomant constantly silent, save when especially ad- dressed, stood by Porphyro, and gazed steadfastly forwards at the room, lest the aspect of her loveliness should lure his love a moment from its vigilance, its determina- tion to obtain the truth in this rare opportu- nity vouchsafed. So, fervent and yearning as a mother, with the discernment and calm of a brother, while, suspicious as a lover, he watched Porphyro. In the aspect, the man- ner, the expression of that person, there was nothing to blame or question ; adoration, blent witfh deep devotion ; rapture, chastened by res])ect. were the impression one could not, evei so fastidious, deny. The voice which, in us elevation, had a blasting, if not brazen tone, now dropped to the softness of velvet-muffled metal, stricken. As for her face, while she listened, it was veiled from Rodomant by his own design; but her voice, of temper rather golden than " silver," as cited by poets to the being who seems their universal and common mistress — her voice expressed full animated sympathy, rather than divine delight. Suddenly, across viva- cious satire, which an Englishwoman would have " rung in" with a sounding laughter- peal, ])ut which she left to its own fate un- adorned, there floated a fragrance in its very homeliness mystical, and almost painfully exciting, a scent of Saxon violets, or what Rodomant M'ould have called German ones, ••he very moss-mixed perfume which glad- dens the wide fir forests in his own bleak, glorious ('ountry. There were in the cool conser-satory, and there only, as he deemed, violet plants ; had the princess been there, veiled from vision by her own projected phantom in the spirit, and gathered them ? For certainly Rodomant, who had passed the night preceding beside the fountain, and the morning when he was not elsewhere, in the rooms so near it, had never seen her, flesh or phantom, enter. By magnetism, whether approximate the most to animal or spiritual, two minds of equa. strength are wont in each other's vicin- ity to detect a change or shock of thought in either. PorphjTO suddenly lifted his voice ; it sounded metallic still, but no longer mufliled. " Do you remember," said he to Rodo- mant, " our meeting in Parisinia ? I was in close quarters then ! By this time, I am somewhat better off — my house at least gives me room to look freely out of the win- dows, and I have a garden." " A garden," replied Rodomant, quite easily ; " I should scarcely think you had time for one, either to enjoy or to cultivate." " It takes no time to inhale enjoyment as one breathes, and my garden requires no cultivation. It is a sort of exclusive para- dise for me, and yet consists only of one single plant." " A plant for which nature has taken out no patent, I suppose ; a unique, a monstros- ity of vegetation." " I thought it might be, myself — but was agreeably mistaken ; for though I might not have minded a ' unique,' I should have de- cidedly objected to a ' monstrosity ' in en- couragement of my mood and aspirations then. I was walking on a dull and dusty road, a mile out of Parisinia, when a gar- dener's cart passed me, filled with green plants, balm and other herbs ; primrose-roots and such common charming things. Pres- ently, after it was out of sight, I came to a dry brown stalk with stems and leaves equally shrivelled, like paper burnt to ash; this was left by the wayside, and I felt sure it had been thrown away because it was thought to be dead. I picked it up — no theft there, I believe ? " The princess was listening, like a child to its first fairy-story ; yet for her this was a twice-told tale. ♦' I took no care of it, except to put it into a pot of earth ; as one would ])ut a frozen lamb to the fire. The pot stood in the window ; I never expected the plant to flour- ish, nor could guess what family it belonged to ; in fact I believed it dead, yet would give it at least a chance. J was myself at that time very anxious ; I was dead-hearted, and my s' irit had as it were frozen. I had cares, I w? i in darkness with them ; thick darkness of the mind." '♦ The darkest — before the dawn," mur- mured the ])rincess, whom it seemed Por- phyro's presence had touched with simplicity I resembling matter-of-fact — his cwn — dur- ing this relation. He interrupted /■ .mself not. I " Somehow, that dark time, I learned to ! associate my destiny with the fate of the dead-seeming weed. I used to say, ' I am flung by men out of their experience, and judges no longer accept me as worthy of the lowest test ; were I a vile nonentity, neither human nor animal, I could not be more ob- viously disdained, more mutely cursed.' Let me watch whether this brown rag of vegeta- 1 tion has any life left, any soul, any fate — 1 there should be fate in flowers." 156 HUMOR. " Certainly, as likely as in stars," mut- tered Rodomant, captiously ; and Porphyro gave him a glance, as unlike that which he sideways turned to the princess, as light on granite differs from the sheen of emerald. A hard and defiant inexpression. Men's eyes ever dropped under it, as they always fol- lowed — fixed by — the glassy-emerald stare; even Rodomant was repelled and cowed. The man had both ends of the magnet in his dual nature. " I determined I would leave it to its fate," resumed Porphyro, "as I had flung myself into the tide, or counter-tide, of mine. I never watered it ; I never turned it to the sun, nor gave it air, nor stirred the earth about its root — if one it had. Its leaves, without air, sun, or water, raised and uncurled themselves, grew green, were shaped into the form and type commonest amidst mere leaves ; yet whose shadow pro- tects a blossom the sweetest of the field, and of the garden, which, were it as difficult to cultivate, would be prized as highly as the rose. But would this blossom so' yield the secret of its value ? I knew not, for I had made up my mind not to help it, though, certainly, little black knots crept here and there under the green. One morning, cares at their thorniest were blunted and dis- persed, thick darkness turned suddenly to day — I found my Destiny in my own hands. Weary, bui at rest, in confidence, I returned to my home ; as 1 entered, I perceived a de- lectable fragrance ; as I advanced, I saw one of Nature's triumphs, which, from repetition, never weary. In my window the plant had flowered ; it was a nosegay of finest violets, their purple worthy of their perfume. Sud- den as Aaron's rod they had blossomed into being — so had my Fate in my own hand." And with these words Porphyro fell a few paces backwards, as if to exhibit the prin- cess. Repugnantly, therefore, yet out of necessity, far more imperious than will on his part, Rodomant looked past him and re- garded her. The direction of her drooping eyes told him where to look — they were fixed upon the lily in her bosom. In its in- tensely pure white cup, lay, rather shown than concealed by the petals bending from the centre, a little leafless violet bunch — a fairy world of sweetness, and purple as im- perial night ; purple, deemed Rodomant, as the director's unfulfilled imperial dream. Or was it 0^7 the result, this fancy, of his fanatical habi: and pleasure to trace and hunt analogies ^ Perhaps so. And Rodomant, for that moment fasci- nated beyond caution, though doubly vigi- lant, watched the princess, who at that instant noticed not him nor any. He saw that her eyes, still downcast, suddenly fixed them- selves on the cross terminating the rosary of huge pearls round her throat — a cross composed of pearls so large that seven of them formed the sigil Catholic, six inches long. And the last pearl of the base — add- ing of course the weight of the rest there- unto, touched, as she bent her neck, the heads of the lily-cradled violets. He saw then that with a singular, tender care, she unclasped the cross from the string, lest it should crush the flowers, and handed it to the ladies nearest. Then Rodomant, vigilant in the very crisis and intensity of his own passion, chafed to torment — looked away from the princess to Porphyro — for he wished to ascertain whether he too had detected the token of virgin in- terest. And Rodomant's own face glowed with a sudden and virgin-like shame. Not at her gesture, so sweet, .so chaste, so in- voluntary, and yet tender ; but at Porphyro's expression, as he view^ed it too, the furtive flame-like glow that crossed rather than filled his eyes — a basilisk-like glance blend- ing gold and green — not sly, but clouded and filmed over, as it were, by the mist ex- haled from ])assion, which the spirit had not love and light enough to pierce and scatter with " healing wings," those beams of heav- enly morning. Yet neither was it this look that angered Rodomant, but the change in Porphyro's countenance, when the princes.s met it next ; then the sultry lustre went out, or rather in — the old gloomy impression rolled back and smothered it — and Rodo- mant felt sure the passion, as well as the manner, was too much under command to be as generous as it was genuine. Perhaps Porphyro detected Rodomant's dissalisiac- tion by his infallible gauge for motives — certainly he had not seemed to see it. But Rodomant was astonished to find himself again so soon addressed. " I was very happy," said the director, " that his highness's invitation reached me at a time when I had just enough leisure to dare to ftccept it. I had heard so much of you — I was not wrong, after all, in desiring you to leave us. You too have reaped your wishes, a harvest of honors, not one single ear shorn from the sheaf, nor wanting," and he sighed. Porphyro sighed, no love sigh, not subtle and soft enough — rather the short and eager gasp of the race-horse, as it nears the goal, and feels as if flying /ro?H it by lapid and violent reaction of sensation — the goal it may yet fly short of. The incurable Rod- omant instant coupled with that sigh the idea, " one want then is shorn from yours, or unfulfilled." So, in one of his quaint asides, he mut- tered, " If the reaper leaves the richest ears on the field for the gleaner, what then ? it is the reaper's fault that from his bundle the most golden rays are shorn." But the ac- cent was too meaning, as well as the articu- lation too prolonged, to escape the urincess's attention. The remark, besides, concerned Porphyro ; she arched her bending throat suddenly; loftily as a swan disturbed, ami RUMOR. 157 flung at Rodomant one of her imperial glances, which, however, failed to touch him like the yearning mother-grief she had lav- ished on her prison-martyrs. And the sharp reHection which his discernment pressed on him, pressed back his pride besides, and made his heart sv.ell full and great with pity, still passionate pity ; for all his sense Avas pas- sion, as all his soul was love. That grief over- flowing the heart moistened the eyes with sudden dew ; he regarded her with those eyes an instant, as though they two alone stood to- gether at the edge of time with earth behind them. Porphyro therefore marked, un- marked, the change in both the faces. But, after that review, looked straight up into the color-cells of the splendid ceiling ; superb in his owr granite calm. For PorphjTo had a thought, and in what terms soever he ex- pressed his feelings, his thoughts he never revealed as they rose in him, and scarcely ever, except through his actions, in the end. Even Rodomant suspected not he had been watched, believed that Porphyro, tired of the hour which ministered not to his secret, had dropped into his favorite pastime, a purple study. And he believed so still, even through the interest implied for himself in the next remarks. " I admire your new opera more than any I ever heard. It is also the first to which I could bind myself to attend with equal pleasure and profit to those which are af- forded by a spoken drama. It is the first tizne singing ever charmed me as much as acting proper. The character of the faithful wife is indeed a thought, of conception too ideal for genuine life, but with art it justly assimilates, exactly where it differs from na- ture — But does your highness honestly think yourself that Fiel would have refused, not the solicitations, — those of course she would have rejected — but all sympathy with the regrets of her old lover ; and that when her husband, her second lover, whom in- deed she had been obliged to teach herself to love, was safe in prison, quite out of the way, and disabled from knowledge of what his wife was doing — would she have refused to feel pain for herself, in denying him that last request, a last embrace ? " But the princess was covered with confu- si jn — nay with blushes the deepest that had ever dyed her face ; and her eyes fell lower, lower, while her neck arched more and more, She could not answer ; — for the character of Fiel, the heroine, was taken from herself, and she knew it, though Rodo- mant had never hinted so, nor any other person guessed — not Porphyro, or he would have never tampered Avith the theme. It was a spiritual resemblance in a mental por- trait, such as a keen soul alone could have achieved, and the original knew it without acknowledging it — because she felt it — it faced her, soul to imaged soul. " I think vou should ask 7ne," observed Rodomant, with a dignity none would have dreamed of his possessing, — he learned himself but for the occasion — Braced by it and consciously exalted, he looked a head taller than Porphyro, yet was but exactly i the same height as he — "I supplied the in- ■ cidents, even the details of the story. I i have also a turn that way. It is a fiction, no historic tragcdv, nor home-bred comedy. The faithful wife, the type of Faith — all types should be portrayed as feminine — would cease to be faithful, if for a second her heart swerved. If her heart were faith- ful it had not mattered (save for the good taste of a woman) whether her lips touched alien clay, or not. Some women would have tried that trick to save their husbanda — as a chance, I mean ; for recollect her husband was in the power (and in one of the prisons) of the prince, her old peasant- lover. But she is Faith, this wife, therefore she kee]3s her vows to Heaven as though still in the sight of man, and in the sight of man as before Heaven ; for the same reason, she reiterates her vow of constancy to her hus- band when he is torn from her." " But," urged Porphyro, " Heaven seeing the heart, how could slie keep, as narrated, the heart's vows to her husband pure ? when the old love, the prince who had disguised himself as a peasant in those old days, that he might prove her disinterested and free ; ■when he asked for one, and that to be the Inst embrace ? For she must, in nature — whatever for conveniency the plot contains — she vinst have loved her old love still ; he was her first passion, and her maiden choice ; the husband was the master of her aff'ecfion, and her love's counsellor — love which (even if not a counterfeit) was but the cold shadow of the primal passion." " Not so," answered Rodomant, with flashing eyes. " The peasant, prince, or — never mind his name — only call him not lover in whom selfish passion has smothered the innocency of love's intent ; he thought himself still' beloved because the stifling fog, M'hich wrapped his own heart, excluded him from the contemplation — from the per- cejition — of the intense and heavenly altar- flame lit up within her heart by love, or of the angel ever hovering there to feed it — Faith. Faith is as incomprehensible, nay, as false an abstraction to the libertine, as chastity ; both are words which represent to him no idea. To him, faith is a dead letter, as chastity is cold. In feet, that is because he, never having been faithful, neither de- serves nor will attract faith ; just as to him chaste passion has a clasp of ice. For chas- tity is the allegiance of passion ; exclusive, concentrated — contains all the celestial warmth human yearning can woo from heaven ; fire which shall consume not with clay, but return with the spirit to heaven. In a sentence. Faith is devotion of the spirit., as Chastity is devotion of the passions. 158 RUMOR. Human love and heavenly are not so far apart ; for the love of man and woman (too be pure) must be as single as love to God — for each other." " Your purism will lose you your fame, so dearly and lately bought, unless age and ex- perience sliall divert you from the fixed idea impenetrable, which so many minds have split at, gone, as it were, asunder in the darkness. In this great age, when every movement must be onwards if the mover wishes to keep his advantage ; when individ- uals march, as armies used, against error and corruption : and, mixing in the mass, they who rejnne too much, or pause for insane speculations of no avail to man, will be swept out of the path of recognition ; nay, crushed into oblivion's dust." " Stay, I am astonished," said the princess, smiling maiden-sweet at Porphyro. " I am surprised to hear you make occasion for a squabble with one you admire ; indeed I am shocked. You must make your peace with Herr Rodomant, who is so great a friend of mine, that I cannot forget he was first pre- sented to my appreciation as a friend of yours." " No squabble," said Porph\TO with dex- terous deference, " but a tail of an argument ; we let the argument slip us, and only re- tained the end. I really have one more critical remark, if I may venture so to call it, to insinuate." To Rodomant, — " Did you really mean to imply, Avhat is not expressed but ob- scurely hinted, that the faith of the wife to her husband secretly remained intact, as well as her conduct? — that she absolutely retained no emotion in favor of her former suitor ? I thought a wife's triumph was to resist temptation, which is not temptation, unless /(.'^^ to tempt." " Why do we pray /rora temptation to be led, and believe, as we are told, prayer offered up in faith is answered ? Things and persons tempting, formed to tempt — are abundant in the world ; they cease not out of it any more than the poor. Then it must be that they who are futhful in pray- ing, as they are heart-whole in love to God, are powerless to be affected by temptation — rendered so by love and faith. So with the wife towards him who is next, for her to God. It was indeed no trial to Fiel to re- fuse the request of her old lover — she no longer loved nor beHeved in him — she dis- honored him indeed. It was certainly a tri- umph, yet rather a triumph of honor than of love — love is its own crown, or rather needs none; she, faithful to her womanhood, as in her wifehood, could no more honor than love a man who had deceived her. Fiel quite as much repudiated the prince, because on their first acquaintance he had recourse to deception — in order to prove whether her liking and regard were for nimsolf alone, or for the rank which in- vested him besides — as because she had discovered the hoUowness of his character, its artifice, and the narrow coldness of his heart." " Assertion is not argument," observed Porphyro tritely. " I am not prepared to assert, even when I am certain ; I preler to prove. But you and I have both forgotten in whose presence we have discussed so openly. Her highness must be more than tired of the subject, and of us. Shall we therefore both retire ? " The princess, less calm than he, was vis- ibly amazed at having attention drawn to her ; also she was evidently at that instant in the frame very frequent with women pos- sessed as she ; she looked here and there, at last fixed her eyes on Rodomant, with a distressful kind of gaze, as of one longing to avoid all scrutiny — but that of the faith- ful friend. That glance always tested Rodo- mant's devotion, for it always called it forth, instead of the excitability, named enthusi- asm falsely, which weak-charactered men claim in extenuation of their irrepressible interest — interest they have no right to show. Through the rose-shadow of her still warm blushes, he, with his eye so vigi- lant, could detect her insufferable weariness ; and detect its cause without complaint or murmur to his own heart — weariness of liini, and longing to be left alone with Por- phyro. Rodomant ever detested demon- stration in presence of a third person ; he sometime eschewed his lesson, newly learned of etiquette — so on this occasion. He watched his opportunity — soon given — for the princess — as women, obviously inter- ested in a lover who has acted but not yet spoken, ever will — was fighting out her self- resistance to the last ; and after her openly evinced confusion, interest, her burning blushes, not yet faded, betook herself to a rallying and mild disdainful mood, touching every matter which was rife among the wise and foolish at that hour — saving only the theme just touched and left by her twa rival knights. Rodomant, without rustle or spoken Avord, retired behind them both — no slight worry for one who detested general company as he ; for he had to pass through a calm and noiseless crowd, each individual of which seemed gifted with eyes behind, before, all over ; albeit, it made a show as serene and splendid as an Oriental flower-garden by moonlight. There was not one person with whom he could have exchanged salute, though treated in positive familiar by the master of them all — for Rosuelo only en- tered the palace on rare occasions, these never secular ones. Midway in the immense room had stood the princess with Porphyro, withdrawn from the doors and from her father's place at equal distance. Rodomant, without peril, except to his sensitive pride, attained tne HUMOR. 159 near neighborhood of the doors, and there, on one hand, beheld a group of persons too preoccupied with themselves, or with each other, to observe him. As he passed close by them, he heard them, to his amaze, chattering peacefully in Parisinian, a tongue more rarely used in Belvidere than in any modern court, and which those used evi- dently too much at their ease to have adopt- ed — it was their own. What could such sign portend ? A few feet farther — those feet embracing the only void space in the room, and quite close to the gold-wrought velvet draperies of the doors, thrown wide behind them ; he caught sight of a counte- nance he was certain to have seen before. Impossible, for he Icnew it not, yet must have dreamed of it, for it dawned clearly on his memory, as forgotten dreams are wont, in certain moods, most vividly to do. It was a regular and brilliant face ; its im])res- sion that of contemplative enthusiasm, which, obviously withdrawn in spirit from those about it, yet contained not the mys- terious indrawn expression of the poet, musician, or mystic proper. Rather it seemed bent fixed upon a vision suspended before its eyes, between them and other countenances, which vision it serenely stud- ied. Perhaps at the moment Rodomant passed him he had ended his contemplation ; perhaps Rodomant's form intercepted the vision more decidedly than the rest of those moving or moveless around ; at all events, as Rodomant passed the other started back, and in a moment the instinct, Avhich, Hke a fine and viewless chain, is only felt when along it quivers the delicate electric force, the artist instinct woke, in each, for each. Even then Rodomant knew not his brother's name ; only knew he met an artist, and also that he had met him in the flesh before. And the remembered stranger-brother brought his bright eyes to bear on Rodo- mant; while a smile as bright, gave the assurance so genial to the sensitive, that his face was also recollected. No vanity min- gled with the pleasure, though perhaps some pride, when the unknown bowed profoundly, gracefully, and said in a charming voice — " This is one of the most delightful mo- ments of my life ; I thank you. In your present cire sketches right, and the more wrong sketches are painted nid, the falser they will apjiear, and be. Still, who has a good eye, or a good sight? scarce any one." So Romana mildly raved as usual. Rodomant, appearing to attend, heard nothmg, except M'hen he became quiet, then inquired, " Is Porphyro present at the sit- tings ? " — though Romana had already said so. •' Yes, and she looks at him — she could not help it, though that is actually the rea- son I caiuiot get on. After I had placed her properly, he placed himself exactly o|)i)osit.e — her, I mean, and as her eyes are directed straight, she cannot help looking at him of course. As he did so, he exclaimed wittily, ' I am an obtuse target for the beam-arrows of the hunter Eros.' I never thought to laugh at Porphyro, but turned poetic, he is as irresistible as a comic elf-face, painted for the calyx of an orange-flower." Next day Romana had another sitting, the day after that, a third. Further than that, the princess having admired specially a beau- tiful piece of scenery in one act of Rodo- mant's new opera, whose scenery Rodomant had determinately superintended himself, she happened to express her regret to Por- phyro that such a scene should be destroyed — or rather exist only in illusion so coai'selv grounded, and with an atmos])here of gas. Forthwith, at Porphyro's instigation, the scene was put upon the stage, without music, motion, actors, or gas-light — in broad day; and at Porphyro's expense, Romana was employed to paint it after his own fashion for the princess, while the portrait was to stand over, for finish, the day of Porphyro's departure now very near. Romana made a beautiful picture ; in fact it was as proper a subject for him, as engravings are fit for ]5hotography. And the first time Rodnmant was called to see it, he just carried his eyes over the great canvas piled as it were with golden, rufous-tinted, ultramarine, and ruby layers, then turned to Romana and remarked, " I said you would come to scene-painting, if you remember." So, from that hour, he lost himself Romana as a friend, and very rarely received him as a guest ; thus hn heard not through him how the princess passed her mornings, nor whether Porphy- ro's phantom-suit was laid by the reality. It was the last night now of that Jong- short-week, and, for the fii-st time in tne RUMOR. 16 evening, Adelalda was with Porphyro alone. It was not on terraces or in gaidens, for he had said something straightforward, sound- ing incoherent to her impassioned fancy, about its not oeing solitude where lights could be seen, music heard, or chance foot- steps might cross their path. They had first been together in the royal saloons, and it was close upon the hour of royal rethement, when he so easily persuaded her that near the jtalace they could not be alone. The princess, desperate in her delicate pride — not in her love, she was too gentle there — would have risked almost any thing this night, to have her long doubts removed — her hopes confirmed — or both crushed to- gether. In this desperate desire there was neither shame nor self-contempt ; it was roused nature in its unclad modesty, that shivers without the pure raiment love only promises to wrap it in — which love with- holds not at the fulness of time — only nig- gard prudence, or some passion less gener- ous than that of love. They went down to the sea ; Porphyro as ever, leading. Not near the polished stair at M'hose sweep Rodomant had landed, but below that, and at a point more isolated ; a silvery strand, with the tide lapping close to their feet, strewn thick with shells, by day like flakes of rainbow, now like long ridges of thrown-up pearls — and ocean weeds as wild and lovely as mermaids' hair. Gray wreaths of fresh-foamed froth gave out their ineff"aDle odor to the breathing but noiseless night ; the moon was ruby-golden, low, and crescent ; its crescent and reflected shadow made it a whole but mysterious-looking sphere, which lit a broad path lustrous-rosy on the oil-calm water, broken off" by a cleft of darkness before it touched the shore. The heaven overhead, dark-blue as the bosom of the purple iris, seemed vault on •vault higher than the stars, they floated deep in 't, yet seeming nearer earth than heaven. One, vivid, glittering, yet serene, looked half-ready to roll from those purple deeps, a drop of dew from light's fountain, yet trembled onwards steadfastly — a ser- aph's tear or smile ! The princess asked herself this question — strangely her heart always warmed — her spirit seemed winged to those far stars she felt so near. She had seen that " bright particular " one arrest Porphvro's eye first, and of course hers fol- lowed its direction. Soon she looked down from that glory to 'ds starlit, night-shaded face — that owed so much of charm to the dusk and the gh'Uer of the tempered dark- ness. The ambition on the rigid-strong features — passion-torn for hei- — the god- dess, too — sometimes seemed quenched in aspiration now, the lines deep-worn with sleepless contemplation of that dim dream of iJestiny, giving the countenance an impress of s fter and more human care. Some pas- sion swept his lace in gusts, now faint-pale, now gloomy-frowning — and at last, the sweet gleam of an inward smile — bu< summer-lightning, that smiles all ovei heaven, lasts longer in its flash than did the smile. " Do you know," he said, \i\ a tone whose sweet expression had outlived the smile, " that I have lately been drawn curiously to- wards that star ? Have you ever heard how the moon draics men when they hapjjen to sleep full under its light — particularly when at sea, and near the tropics ? It jjroduces strange convulsions, contortions of the coun- tenance, which last for many days. Men must then have an affinity with the moon. The many may — do you not think so ? for they are able to endure its influence, though it smites them with superterrestrial force. The sun's magnetism is too fierce, too in- tense, too celestial to affiect men of itself; also too kindly, for, open-eyed and direct, it would consume him to ashes. So it per. vades all matter, — impervious to man, af- fects him through matter. And also reflects its magnetism, its shadow of light and heat, in the Star of the Million, the moon. But, that star, it draws me as the moon draws the million. Other men feel nothing from the stars ; I always shuddered at them as at death, yet longed to embrace them as — something as awful — and sweet as death may be." He spoke with long-drawn breathings and pauses, that seemed to make gaps in her be- ing. Only one thing strong as Death, and and " sweet as Death may be." Her heart echoed — then its pulses froze, waiting for the event — the crisis, which now had surely come. " Do you know that star ?" he inquired, in tones of interest that quelled her passion, as a north wind sharply thwarts a summer noon, and bids the summer momentarily die in winter. Tears had rushed warm to her eyes before, and brimmed them, now they eiung icily as hail-drops to her lashes. Cold as that sunrise speaking statue of the desert, she stood and answered, no longer looking towards him, but at the star — which she saw not, for the ice-drops blinded it, their cold pain made her close her eyes — or was it fear ? Fortunately, however, she had marked the star, and knew its name ; all princesses are taught astronomy, and she had learned it, to prove her own dislike. " It is the planet Mercury. I am a little surprised at your late adoption of one al- ready adopted, at least by name. Then in astrology, it gives names to a physiological temperament, a whole host in one. I fancied j your star was new-discovered, as your des- tiny is newly found. Nor knew "l that it had a name except your own." " Nor did I realize my right to call it mine till lately. In the dead" ol nndnight the ap- propriation blazed upon me. It was a simple coincidence that guided my choice. You 168 RUMOR. know the meaning and the use of Mercury in heraldry, in royal blazon ? " Alas ! she knew it tinted the blazon of her father's ancestral Kne. Mercury, the purple. Black word, base meaning. He could not mean it so. How strange — so strange, that it seems unlawful, is the intuition of the strong. Enthusiasm is compared to it, igno- rance, or frequent blunder. Porphyro de- tected his mistake, perceived his precipita- tion, without a word or sign of hers, for she could not be paler than she had been before. " You are unhappy ? " he questioned, ten- derly, the tenderness quite real, and longing to melt wholly from repression. " Ade- laida!" Xever had he so named her; and in that tone, delicious to her virgin heart as the nightingale's note, breathing in music the rose's name, before it drops upon her breast. " I have been unhappy," she faltered, while the ice-tears dissolved, and dried di- rectly, like summer rain drops. " I am not unhappy now," her heart added, but not her tongue. " And why are you unhappy ? Tell me. The good should be always happy — the heavenly-hearted supremely so." " I believe you know all my reasons — all in one chief cause that is " — rallying at the commonplace retort, too womanly ever to betray herself " We have often talked about it, perhaps too much ; discussion only makes one discontented, where one cannot mend. But it does me good to hear of your amendments, your true and deserved suc- cess. You, at least, must be as happy as you merit." "Is the old cause «ZZ? " he asked. For she had never concealed from him her mis- ery as a daughter, any more than her help- lessness as sovereign heu'ess. No morbid filial sensitiveness — dead virtue, had sealed her tongue from repudiation of such a char- acter as her father's, any more than earth- bounded fanaticism led her to use " vain re[)etitions " for the reclamation of his life. " Yes, all ; what need of more ? " she re- plied, disappointment dropping its dead weight on her heart again, and somethin like disdain shooting a wild pang through ill he had to ask? her passion. " Was that al " All ; ah ! it shall be some day forgotten, and as nothing." Again the relenting tremble, and the weight was lifted, the pas- sion-pang forgotten. " I had something to say to you, or I had not asked you to see me so late, in sueh a lonely place. I have to blame myself for being the medium of placing near you a person, a man, not strictly to be trusted, or rather one to be feared, most of all by me, because /or you." She bound her breath, she counted the inward pulses of her heart, slow, slower, suflbcating with susjiense. He waited for her to speak. He might as well ha^e waited for the star " Mercury " to fall. " I mean — forgive me for alluding to such a subject, on behalf of such a person. If your father persists in retaining that Rod- j omant in his service, may I ask you, entreat you, to banish him from yours ? tacitly, of conrse, to suspend your commands for his attendance upon you." "I do not understand — I cannot im- agine.'^ " Of course you cannot ! " said Porphyro, in an accent of arrogance singular in a people's director — one oi themselves. "Of course you cannot understand nor imagine. It is not your place to stoop — to breathe so low." " Explain yourself," said Adelaida, w'ith the imperial air, natural and subhme when she adopted it, the very queen of truth and dutjr. " I never like — I do not choose to entertain mysterious hints of, or against, my friends, or my servants." '' " Is he your friend ? " " Assuredly ; I thought him yours ; he deserves to be so, even more than mine. If he has disappointed you, and if you are justly disappointed, it will give me pain. But I cannot affect sympathy, unless I feel it. It is yours to enlighten me as to his error." " I would not vex you, but for justice. ! No wonder you were in the dark, or in the light, out of his reach. God forbid ; the scandal ; the shame ; it must be stopped ; it must be crushed ; it shall be annihilated, and he, too, if needful. Forgive my open- ness ; you wLU forgive me ; you ever forgave me ; you ever will. That man, the un- bought slave, the scoundrel overpaid for trickery, he dares to look at you, to think of you, to love you, I was about to say — but that is an absurdity." She reeled a few steps from him, her head whirled giddy, her heart spun rapid with a sudden sickness, both of body and soul ; her modesty, her pride, were agonized. Not at the assertion — she could have smiled at that — but at the declaration of one man's love by another man. Yet the sickness sprang from a deeper, wider wound, which opened and bled, not for the first time, but more than ever. " Oh, that he would de- clare his own, none other's ; confess his lone- liness, and let me heal the heart which aches in solitude ; fill ip with my own poor faith the soul in who-se void he finds no God." But this cry rose to heaven in si- lence ; her generosity conquered her sor- row ; she stood erect, braced beauteous in its golden mail. " It grieves me that you should say so, because, for the first time, I cannot agree with you ; and further, I am certain you are mistaken in attributing any but the loftiest motives to that person, the purest of life, and most noble-hearted I have ever known.* RUMOR. 169 This was no pique ; her heart whispered unheard, " We women do not love men al- ways the most noble-hearted, nor even the purest in their lives." " If it were even true, which I cannot see is any business of yours or mine," she went on bravely, " I do not understand its affect- ing you to anger, particularly now you are in power. It is not like you to oppress the weak or the strong, made perfect in endur- ance." " Ah ! you ackncKvledge, then, it concerns not yourself'} I rest easy on that assurance ; I trust you, and, if you command it, him also." " Trust me ? Then he calls me to him- self, esteems me his. Who gave him the right yet ? " And the thought and question jarred against each other. " How long should this unnatural suspension last ? Should not the hour end it ? " " I am sure, servant as he is of yours, and, in so feeling and daring, lower than the lowest of your servants — self-degraded — that you will maintain the distance between yourself and him, unshortened by an inch — a thought — a smile." " Needless to promise, if you say you tniH me." Not proud the voice, if the words so sounded, and, as she spoke, she longed more haughtily to control her tone, without suc- cess. " I am sorry you thought it right to interfere — sorry for him — for myself — for you, of whom — all three of us — such a suspicion is unworthy. One friend of mine shall never suffer in my esteem at the insti- gation of another, unless I find either false." Porphyro did not reply — whether he was offended, hurt, sorry, or satisfied, she could not tell. It is most probable he was quiet because he knew not what to say ; having presumed upon his own power, had too rap- idly exhausted his means. It certainly \^ould not have be in easy for the gracefullest gal- lant to have slid into a love-scene directly after this nondescript and unconcluded one. And Porphyro, if neither graceful nor gallant, was of tact intact. " I am most imprudent, and have been ex- tremely, unpardonably selfish, to keep you here so long, at such an hour — you must be cold." Porphyro's having lately left a latitude where an hour after midnight is always chill, might excuse the inconsequence of that conclusion. " I am particularly warm ; but as I am also tired, and it is past my usual hour, I will retire, with your permission." She waved her hand to him, but turned away her eyes, and walked slowly, carelessly up the glimmering steep. As they reached the palace gates (for he had followed her, of course) she bowed again to him, and, call- ing her page, went on to her own nightly home. Bowing to him that last time, she could not resist looking at him, to see how he looked — and then so sad was the fascina- tion of his face, half-jealous, half-reproach 22 ful — entirely distressed; that though she dared not stay to speak to him lest it should seem she desired him to speak ; yet when she threw herself on the couch in her con- vent-chamber, she upbraided herself wildly, bitterly, for perhaps having left him too soon — perhaps having dashed her destiny from her own embrace ; called on herself as harsh, ungrateful, cruel, tiU her anguish was deadened to remorse. There is a sorrow of sorrows, suffered by so few, that for the many its existence is a fable. The master-poet who told that '• re- membering happier things " is sorrow's " crown," surely guessed not ; happy for him if he learned not since, that the soul and essence, if not the outward thorn-crown, of great woe, is to behold, without being able to console or lessen, the suffering of the best beloved. If the one and only beloved on earth, then deeper, firmer, are the thorn points planted in the spirit. Love's roses, the delicious thoughts, the lovely fancies that spring from the consciousness that the beloved is alive on earth ; those paradise- blooms may veil fi-om vision the piercing ecstasies of grief, but more sharp-toned than any pleasure, that pain distils in the dark- ness on the being. Exquisite is the pain, exquisite as the joys of divinely-inspired love, of this as divinely-inspired sorrow, and it has more sympathy with heaven ; for One who of old gave pattern to all both for love > and sorrow, wore the thorns in his heart loilg before they pressed his brow ; and for his thorns no roses blossomed in the wilderness. It may be justly wondered how a trouble so prodigious and possessing was to fall on Rodomant. For surely after Porphyro's warning, lover-like charge, delivered with almost spousal authority, Rodomant had no chance of discovering whether the princess was sad or gay, betrothed, or from her hopes divided more than ever. Of course, the master of her heart was obeyed with the im- plicit sweetness of a pliant wife. Of course she went beyond the spirit, to the extremest letter of his demand, and rigidly excluded Rodomant from her presence, even denying him a farew-ell glimpse ! Not at all ; prov- ing at once how illogical is the rule of love, and how irrational must passion be, where most moderate expectations and requests are not inevitably accomplished. Truly the man who could cope with humanity on the largest scale of generalization, who had suc- cessfully mastered, and illustrated in his own person the theory of popular governance, was unable to crush t!ie heart-justice of a single-woman, as fragile as a fioweret by a glacier, and shaken like a reed herself in the tempest of her own emotion. Had Ade- laida been in his arms, and a fly drowning in her sight, she would have left his embrace to stretch forth a finger ; the instinct of benevolence was stronger in her than love, how strong then ! — as it should be ui the 170 RUMOR. woman boin not only to be a wife, but to become a mother. Had Porphyro left the subject of Rodo- mant alone, which, in his set sphere of knowledge, he was too ignorant to know, he might have done quite safely — at least for the time he dreaded ; the chances were that she herself would have restricted, if not avoided, interviews with him, as it is natural for a woman whose love sorrow suddenly impregnates, to shrink from mental contact with men and women — rather more from men ; and certainly most of all from a man who had taken occasion — too far out of precedent to be termed a liberty — to read her heart in silence, and comment upon its impressions aloud. Truly she shrank from men, from women, from the light ; from God's eye, to which so pure a soul looked naturally upwards all hours of the day, and sleepless hours of the night. When Porphyro had actually gone, bound to her no more than when he came, she was stunned for hours, therefore — happy for her in surrounding circumstances too quiet to reveal her torture to the most pitilessly curious eyes. But when came the reaction of the disaster, which befell so true and spotless a nature, with a sense of shame like crime — far blacker, bitterer than pride ; she felt a strange and solitary yearning for Rodomant's society — such a sick desire as some persons experience in critical illness for some fruit or cate unprocurable at the place or season — perhaps it may be only for a draught of water from some spring, leagues away. It may be said that nothing could be easier than for the princess to gratify this whim of a wounded spirit — but yet it was simply impossible, because she chose not to send for him — she absolutely could not. And actually she never would have had courage to send for him again, had she not met him through the instrumentality of another — or by his own design. For many days Rodomant assiduously at- tended the prince, dwarfing his powers for the accomplishment of caprices, and min- istering to the only sense left unimpaired in that person of royalty. He never expected to see, nor saw, the princess with her father after Porphyro's departure, any more than before his visit. Least of all persons, could Adelaida have faced her father at that time. Had he guessed and seen her suffering, she must straightway have destroyed herself — no exaggerated assertion this. The shame — albeit ideal shame, which would have filled her veins then, and bewildered very consciousness, would have driven her to th;it end — oblivion of shame, if not of sorrow — which draws to its dead crisis so many women, soul-darkened with actual shame. So unused was her father to her company, so careless of her welfare, so determinately he thrust from him (into that dark place of his which held many galleries of anatomic terror) the idea of her as his natural suc- cessor ; that she was safe in hrr certainty that he would never miss nor ask for her He saw her so seldom except in public, when her beauty served in part for his own blazon — that to have her near him was an exceptional case ; yet it was against the law of her Hfe to subscribe openly to approbation or reprobation of his lawless life : a medium course which is the only one left to a pure- minded and duteous daughter, whom either of her parents insults as a woman, by cn- sample. For the rest, the prince meant her to marry Prophyro, as much as Porphyro meant to marry her ; but that had in "the prince's esteem no meaning that verged on love. Indeed, he thought Adelaida as pas- sionlessly cold, as he considered her beauty monotonous and marmorean. Even he mis- took Porphyro's present design of pressnig his love so lightly ; for Porphyro held fast the passive claim, because so certain of it — more certain than man of woman has ever the right to be, while unaffianced. The vanity of the fairest woman is a trifle to the vanity of such a man. However, the prince thought Porphyro both proud and modest — that he refrained from certain motives which he had not failed to unfold to the prince — how carefully soever he had con- cealed them from his daughter. One day Romana surprised Rodomant with a call, for Romana lodged out of i]v palace precinct, after his patron's departure. He had quite forgotten his anger, whose subsidence was just that of wrath in all men of his temperament, as forgiving as they are sensitive. Friendship, however, had with- ered in the seed, not because of the anger, but between him and Rodomant it could not have grown up. Cordial acquaintance, in most cases more agreeable than enforced familiarity, remained to them, and as Rodo- mant had not seen Romana since the flying angry hour, he was curious at the same time that he was gratified. " I am come to you in despair," said Ro- mana, dashing himself into a seat, pink- faced, and semi-furious. " In despair, I shall never finish her, I cannot begin her (I have destroyed her twice), and if I can't be- gin, how end ? There was no color to go from at first, and now there is nc expres- sion. Out of a coffin no one ever looked so lifeless. Except for the genius of death, she is no subject at all, and done in marbli;, she would look, not only death-like but dead, else I would try my hand at a model, and paint from that. 1 am harassed ; I have no sleep ; and all my glorious color-dreams are gone to the darkness, the devil's own place. It is not that I want to be paid ; in fact she has so plagued me, that if I ever do get through it, I will not take from Por- phyro a stiver. But my fame, my name, my reputation akeady tampered with ; what RUMOR. 171 would be said if I failed? for, insignificant as she is as woman, being a princess, per- force the popular tongue would rattle. There is but one hope for me, and I place it in you. If any thing can conquer her mo- notony, it is your craft ; you must come and amuse her with playing, while she sits." "Did she order me?" asked Rodomant, eagerly, at which Romana laughed. " Rigid propriety, what armor for you. It sits on you as uncanny as the skeleton outside the man in ' Quarle's emblems,' an old religious book. No, she did not order, but I asked her if she would allow it, and she instantly, of course, graciously, assented. Is not her assent command ? O man, in the ' body ' of this death, how worldly art thou ! " " Certainly, assent is command," said Rodomant drily, for he grudged unnecessary allusion to the subject. So Rodomant, with pulses filled with fire, calm-bound as if with ice, by his will, to whose force iron were a non-resistant, went straightway to Romana's studio. This was and enforced demand upon vitality of any violent agitation fosters and quickens ;;o its crisis. Nor knew he the counterfeit if all diseases, which renders even physical suffer- ing the more intense and dread, because the vitality unimjiaired gives equal strength for extra suffering. So Rodomant again thought — this time felt certain — she wan going to die. This time, too, the energy of denial and repudiation SM'elled not in him to choke the fear. It was fixed in a desperate de- spair. It must be — then let the sacrifice hasten to completion ; let the pure fires close around the virgin life at once, and wing the spirit for Heaven, to its reward. Only let it be noip, before he, the destroyer, had per- jured his soul by tasting the delights of possession vnmeriied. It Avas like the old Hebrew story of the mother who willed her own child to live, and gave it up to false motherhood of another, to spare its life, re- versed. He would have this treasure stolen by death before it was ravished by life. Vir- ginius-like, he could himself that hour have slain her from his sight, to destroy the a deserted pavilion in the gardens, which i power of earthly love upon her. Porphyro had suggested to the princess I This fine frame of passion's least tempo- would serve as such ; and it was for Por- ral (though necessarily temporary) halluci- phyro but to suggest — in a few hours its i nation, might have fleeted faster than it did, ])reparation was completed. The soft fres- j had he known that during all the previous coes of the interior, wholly unstained by that climate, were left to adorn the walls ; the glass dome was cleansed, and from it, us from a semi-sphere of crystal, poured down the artist's light. Around, a few choice statues, fragments, models, and beauteous pictures, all from the princess's own store, were placed, and her own property was the superb easel of sandal-wood, framed in gold, and inlaid thick with minute pictures on enamelled round medallions — the en- amel green. At the proper distance, too, were the legitimate raised chair, cloth- stained dais, and inevitable screen, which last, in this case, stretched all across the studio, dividing it into uaiequal halves. She was abeudy seated, this side of the screen to Rodomant, as he entered by one of equi- distant doors, with grass-green blinds before them. He did not look at her the least, but cast one glance all round the half of the apartment he could scrutinize What your highness ? for I see no instrument," he inquired in a comic tone, he could not have resisted then employing. " My ])iano is behind the screen," she answered loftily ; and as he passed her side- ways to attain the edge of the screen near him, he saw, as one sees a white flower smite the vision that sought it not, amidst the color-blossoms of the garden, her pale face altered fearfully. He had not learned the truth — a truth few know, that no one dies of love, who carries not in him or her the germ of some disease, in itself winged direct for death, and which the unnatural (and fruitless) sittings, after Porphyro's de- parture, Adelaida had invariably ordered two of her ladies, a matron and a maid, the one to read aloud, the other to embroider, in a corner of the studio ; and that tliis day slie had released thfim, in consideration of Rodom ant's presence. Such a token of con- fidence in his person would not only have melted the death-apotheosis, but have "further roused hopes unjustifiable, indomitable — but lately held down and numbed. Not knowing she so honored him, his mood led him to torture himself ruthlessly, and also to excite her to a sense of herself, as heroine of the divine tragedy he had arranged in his own anticipation. It was very seldom he sang, even to himself, and he had never in his' life done so to a wo- man except Lady Delucy. His extraor- dinary voice, which, instead of compass, possessed an almost blasting power, and tead of sweetness, a shrill clarity which I to play on, may it please* made words of passion awfully articulate, ' as it lent to those of love a strenuous anguish of application. This voice the princess had never heard, and guessed it no more than she saw or imagined his gifts of personal fascination, which he dex- terously and honorably concealed, and which were as far more irresistible than Porphyro's as spiritual than merely animal magnetism. "Princess," he exclaimed, tardily from behind the screen, "I wrote last night a song, which I humbly hope will gratify your highness j and which, with your permission, I will give you." "Its name, pray?" she" asked with inter* 172 RUMOK. est, curiously contiasting with the languor of her looK and colorlessness. " A swan's song — it is dying ; you know the legend." " Pity it is not true ; think you not so, Mr. Romana ? A fine subject for your brush ! " " A fine subject, indeed, for his stick," grumbled Rodomant to himself, " fancy the material he would lump it with. The chis- elling of the feathers in chalk lustre, the sedges like a milkmaid's green hat ribbon, the shnbs on that side of the brook as star- ingly down upon one as the shrubs on this side. Don't I know ? " " Your highness compliments me too highly." broke in Romana, and scattered his pre-criticism. " The subject is scarce suited for a picture. If one drew the swan, how should one re])resent the ])roper and natural development of the muscles of the throat ? Quite different in the case of a bird, pro- vided by nature only with a cry for purposes of necessity, and a song-bird in the act of singing, wherein the muscles must be brought into visible and actual play. In short, as the swan's song is a fable, he can- not be seen to sing, therefore must not be so painted, for he must not be imagined " " Oh," sighed Adclaida, to her own heart; "does Porphyro hold those art-tenets? hor- rible ! " and the unpleasant impression was deepened by the suggestive comic tone be- hind the screen. " Mine is a she-swan. May she therefore bemoan herself? For I declare truly, that though she cannot be ' seen to sing,' she can be heard." Romana was shocked at this direct breach of court-breeding, and of course busily oc- cupied himself, that he might be seen to keep aloof himself from such a charge — did not go on painting, because he had not begun — besides the princes'^ had fidgeted out of her attitude : but shifted his canvas, poked about with his brushes, mixed his colors till his palette was a chaos of the rainbow, and achieved such like tricks of the not perfectly self-possessed. " Let us hear her, by all means," said Adelaida, and settled in her attitude again ; Romana fumbled for a brush, and took a long preliminary gaze — then painted. And Rodomant sang these words, weeds of his own fancy, which, gathered for his particular charm, he prized as sacred " herb of grace," beyond any flowers of anoth- er's imagination, and which he had even originally /a?ic?!e(^ such as they were, not in German, but in the tongue of Belvidere — richest and rarest tone stricken from the .iEolian harp of language by the windlike and wordless voice, Necessity — which voice seems, in the case of that tongue, to have limited necessity to passion. As for the aiusic which bore the words along to their jfoal of meaning, it was simple of melody, I with accom])anIme!it of lorg aid surge-like chords, the weltering calmness of the brim- ming, but not stagnant, stream, drawing slowly, surely onwards, to-W(.rds the sea. Take me, oh take me, while my life is g^Iory, Ere I be weary, take me to thy rest,— Kre love be feeble, or my locks be hoary, E'ea in my beauty take me to be blest Let me be with Thee, while my young heart pineth For all love, nil Heaven ; with' its first pure fire, Through this dim mortal mine immortal shiuetli. Yearns for all wisdom, with a dread desire. Do I not seek Thee ? Yea, my youth is wasting In aspiration, struggling Thine to be, Seems it in longing all my heart is hasting To Heaven before me, — now is one with Thee! Yea, at the midnight, when the dark earth sleepeth. Watch I with Thy starlight, till I seem a star 'Lone amidst thousands — then my mortal weepeth, Far from Thy starlight — from Thyself how far ! Young is my spirit — crowned with dewy roses — Fresh is my life as lilies freshly blown. Love for its sweetness and its hope reposes On Thee, Eternal — on Thy smile alone. Soothes not Thy love my first, last music? woven Wildly on the waters, shivering in tlieir reeds? Like searching fire the skies its voice hath cloven, Burning to touch the altar4ight it feeds. Dying, now dying, it touches, and I hear Thee Wooing in darkness, whence the glory came, Calling, Beloved, in hitter breeze to cheer me. Blown from the deep which death I fondly name. At the end of the first verse the princess, astonished, held her breath to listen ; sat like a study of calm. At the end of the second she shuddered, rigidly repressed herself, and hung on the remaining words ; but though stirless till the end as a marble phantom of herself, she changed in counte- nance ; a void inexpression crept over it, white as the veil unperceived Death drops on the fairest foces ! At last, from inex- pression, the expression altered, and settled finally into a cold unmeaning terror, a scared look in the sweet blue eyes — the jnind seemed banished from the countenance. Romana was naturally in despair, lost his court self-command for a moment, — " For pity," he cried, not said, " play something joyous, something sprightlier, at least — you are freezing her highness. And even I cannot get on ; my brush is as if it had been dipped in ice — my wrist is cramped." " Play something, dear, yes ! " said Rodo- mant, quite secure of his effect upon her. And reckless indeed were the succeeding aberrations ; they can be named nothing correcter, of his daring hands, his far more daring intellect. Strong and wild as a hur- ricane out at sea ; or as a mind projjhesying its own madness in the last sane and insane- verging passion. To the princess, however, whose idea he had succeeded in fettering, it was all yet of the swan's song, (as unlike song of swan, as poetry or song could be.) To her, that great confusion of whelming harmony was the deep to which the swaa had di-ifted; the river-banks with theil RUMOR. freshly earth-sprung rushes, their gushes of Avild-flower scent, their reminiscences of humanity in ?choes from the shore — all past, all lost; the very mid-sea drenching surf shutting out its feeble death-M-ail from its yearning ears ; and not the dead-white surf alone, but the shrieks of the di owning, the groans of the crushed between embracing icebergs, from pole to pole ; the last dry gasps of those who die for water on the salt and burning waters at the thirsty Line. Then, as the strains swept again to the simple but torturing theme, she fell back upon herself and thought of herself delib- erately and horribly, as of another person dead ; over whose death, and death's cause, she lamented too profoundly to melt in tears ; too proudly to define lament in lan- guage. Suddenly, there was silence, and it stunned her like a sudden and altered shock of sound — behind the screen. Then Romana. flushed with wrathful distress, and sadly worried between his subject and her slave, exclaimed, — " Your highness is so wonderfully good and patient, that I hesitate not to request that for the future the sittings should be continued as they were held before." And his brush, which he had grasped too tena- ciously in revenge for his courtly restraint, rolled out of his fingers. How she wished that Rodomant would say something to help her, — no such thing." " As you please ; but unless you are tired, you shall not be disappointed of a sitting to-day. I will do better this time ; music is too exciting, after all, or excites me too much." She rang a hand-bell, and a page entered ; him she sent to summon her ladies as before. " We will have no more music, indeed," she said, in a tone she meant to carry impression of her OAvn vexed anger to Rodomant, or perhaps to ascertain whether he was still there. x\s he did not reply, nor make the sHghtest sound, she supposed him to have retreated through the door at the side of his screen, whose silken openings •would betray no person's exit. Meantime he sat on quietly, heard the ladies come in, and the reading of a book commence, which, though a tearing fiction of the foremost class and fashion, was as interesting to him (and as he believed to her) as a work on cosmogony or a treatise on cookery. The silting was now over, Romana well pleased, for she had made one of those supernatural efforts in which proud women infallibly succeed ; she dismissed him to his afteruDon repose, — the ladies also. Ro- mana thought Rodomant had gone ; the ladies knew not he had been there ; the princess, of course, was certain of his de- parture, or she would never have said to Romana, whose healed vanity flushed joy thereat, " I wish to look at your pictures ; the Director told me of them. May I ex- amine that portfolio ? " " Too deejiiy honored, your highness ;' they are onmspiiit^ and corner pieces; canvasser are., mifortunately too huge-' tffl strew so fairy-li^vi. building as is this one." And he lifted a sufficiently huge case on to the easel-ridge, did not dtiiaHaW imloose the strings, and noiselessly shot out of the par- tition. All was stillness in the studio then ; the sun burned hotly on the roof, and the door- draperies hung calm as folds in malachite. She listened, and felt uneasy at the lack of sound, in the midst of which a ghost would have seemed as natural an apparition as in the noon of darkness. Even a sigh of her own startled her, however, when it Avas emit- ted, then forcibly repressed. Strange that in solitude, she should ])e afraid to sigh. At length she touched the ribbons of the portfolio ; nervously and uncertainly placed by Romana on the supporting ridge, it lost balance instantly, and crashed on the mosaic floor — a great crash, for it was Romana's " specimen," not " incident " book. And straightway Avith the crash, then appeared from the side of the screen, the calm, sturdy form and unimpressioned face of Rodomant. Quiet as a servant, and with the exact pro|)er polish of non-interest, he advanced, and like a menial automaton, gathered up the stray certificates of fame, for they were scattered f;\r and near, replaced them in the portfolio, and this upon the easel, firmly as menial fingers should. But, as it seemed, on second thoughts, he removed the port- folio again, and put it on the firm table Romana had used for his box, then wheeled the table on its velvet-easy castors, to the princess's side, and standing behind the table, was evidently aliout to remain there, like a servant, in case she should further need him. In the sea of her emotions tossed so high, she caught at his presence like a spar of drift-wood, evidently feared his departure. " Do not go," she said, desperately ; " I have not seen you so long ; have you been ill ? " " Oh, no, I am never ill, your highness ; but I was not sent for, and without such sign of favor, I had no right to appear, having already appeared too often." " I believe I have been ill myself," she said, still desperately, " if you were not ; the heats are great this year. I am, how- ever, perfectly well now, and therefore I do not understand — Oh, that you would not tax my patience as you do ! What was the meaning of your singing that song to me ? very inferior to any other of your songs ; but what was the meaniny^ " " So obvious and simple, that on my life I know not how to explain it." " No swan's song, certainly," she said, in a lowered, helpless voice. Then implor- ingly, still helplessly, " What makes you think I am going to die ? that / ought to think so ? You would not say so, or imply 174 KUMOR It, if j^ou did not knoAV it. Alas, for me ! " and she cast her eyes round at the walls, as though they prisoned her, and she was thence to be led forth for execution. " Alas ! for with your genius and your integrity, you must then have the second sight, the gift of prophecy which is given to so few, in those few unerring. Yet, how cruel of you to tell me so ! I might at least have not felt it till it came, then had my hopes lasted until my hour. And now you tear them from me, ungrateful as you are ! Did I ever rend your peace of mind out of your bosom? did I ever kill you in anticipation? " Ilodomant's hallucination dropped from him, less like a mist than as a husk, which left him spirit-bare and shivering in the face of his insane selfishness, his blind and ruth- less cruelty. He fell low on trembling knees, as rapidly arose, for near enough, and looking upwards as he knelt, he could detect the drops on her brow, delicate as beads of dew in the lily's bosom, and the shadow of death, which the pure soul ever meets and conquers before the substance, over her whole resigned fiice and drooping figure. " Great heaven ! God is my witness, my meaning was not that, at least not so. I allowed my own evil imagination to outrage my feelings, in revenge of them, I suppose. It was wicked, audacious, any thing but what you think it ! I was resolved to exor- cise the hideous travesty of an idea, held by Romana, that your highness was like a Ma- donna. I thought, if I can but give that commonplace a tragic burst, all will be well, so far as that the fat Catholic mother (Eve second), of all living, will be flung out of the possible scale. Pardon, pardon, O good and great princess ! " " It is a disgraceful weakness in me," she answered, still trembling, but no longer with the quake of terror — the Strong so near her hud quieted that. " I ought to be glad, were I to die. And God knows I should be thankful — if no one knew it ; if I could die a nameless and unheeded alien in this land, without the trouble of leaving it, for I am past that — I think. If I might drop into the gi'ave secure that only earth should cover me — unrecognized and uninscribed. But 110 — still not yet — not now, nor for some time either." She made a long pause, but her tone still raised at the last words, denoted that she meant — even meant to say — more. So far as that, her pride was spared — if not her meaning. " Because." said Rodomant, very calmly, and the calmness stilled her trembling, " you would not choose to have said, what might and probably would be said, if you died now. You would not bear it said, because it would not be true — and a lie would keep even your divine soul from rest." " What would not be true ? Indeed^ is half-sincerity the truth on your part? If I desire you to tell me, you can "ureh have no fear." "I have no fear for myself; it is tor you, princess — it is because, if you command" me and I confess the very truth, you will disdain yourself for having commanded me. And I so often, naj' constantly, disdain myself, that I know it is a detestably unpleasant feeling, and would not that through my hetdlessness you incurred it." "I understand you, I believe — you are right. I wish I could prove you wrong ia any instance ; but yet I never have foinid you mistaken ; I yet hope I may. I sujjpose you mean, that if a woman of my age, unmnrrieu, dies without obvious disease, she will be ac- cused of dying — for love." Her chaste-cold dignity, recovered noM', made the words a mere abstraction in their sound. " Certainly, I meant so. I speak quite plainly, more honest than so tliinking to my- self alone. As a servant who sees urgent danger to his service's sovereign — for in- stance, if flames wrap round her sleeping- chamber, he rushes through the barrier, un- bidden, and tears her from the pillow — his own arms carry her to safety. Or a snake creeps near her under the flowers she is gathering — he plucks the monster from her contact, even though in so doing his hand shall touch her own. So near, so daring, such a home-thrust is my warning. Die not, O great princess ! die never, so long as it is in your power to live. To die for love is glory; a maiden's palm, a widow's crown of wifehood — if he who loved them went be- fore them and called them after him, through the irresistible necessity for those who love, and sej)arate — to meet again. But let no woman die for any whom she loves with a love beyond his love. Or eternally must the spirit ]iine, unmated." " That is nonsense, what you last assert ; no just spirit will ])ine eternally. Perliaps than 'mating' there are joys more excellent, as more celestial. Pity, you obscure your own best notions with what I think a false philosophy." No heavenly mood affected her at this moment ; but Rodomant had not re- joiced for a long time as at the reaction of her behavior. Still pale, but haughty from head to foot, with tossed head, and upper lip that curled from the under like the petals of the over-blown carnation, and golden eye- brows arched, she leaned back in her chair, and fell again on the portfolio — not trifling witii it either, but taking out each board and examining it deliberately, passing each one to Rodomant over her shoulder, as he stood behind her seat. Mute as a servant, and as untiring, he continued to hold in both his hands the momently increasing bundle ; but at length she came to the last of all the draw- ings — the portfolio was empty ; she held the drawing still — selt'-contempt — unbear- able to such a nature — dropped its " deadly henbane '* on her consciousness. But at the HUMOR. 175 first instillment of the poison, her whole being rejected it. Truth itself as she was, she could not endure a false view of herself even for a moment; her nobility, innate and per- fect, cleared every barrier of pride. " I believe you unjustified in what you say ; but that you may be aware I claim arid hokl my right as a woman, I will tell you that I have put far from me every thought of Pori)hyro ; nor do I choose, even in your mind, to be coupled with him — understand this. No dishonor — not the shade of blame attaches to him ; the dishonor is my dream, and the blame — no shade — is mine ; for I yielded to homage paid me naturally as a woman, as though it were the worship con- secrated to the M'oman chosen only." " Lady ! " said Rodomant, still behind her chair ; she started, never had she been ad- dressed so nearly as a woman, — "I am not Morldly-wise, but out of the world I know much. I wish to s])eak — nay, more, I will speak, and then beseech you to banish me forever ; to fulfil, in fact, his wishes, not be- cause they are his, but mine. Porphyro loves you, princess, as well, as honestly, as ardently as he can love. Porphyro delays his own desire, and suffers — delights to suf- fer ; the obstinate, who defy love as the infi- del defies God, absolutely delight to suffer at their own will ; but, mark me, he would ijot choose to suffer, nor endure delay, were he not certain that, at the instant he shall de- termine, he is to ask and to receive. Vehe- ment as is his passion, another passion chains it ; and cold are these eternal chains — no fire can unrivet, no rose-enwoven fetters /nV/e them from the heart of the woman he is j doomed to marry with or without love. That cold strong passion is his master- will ; he wills not to cross it — incapable of self-denial in the worldly, as he is in the least worldly sentiment. x\nd if he might — oh ! princess, were he still permitted, he would not own you as he is — in his own esteem — a wo- man's own inferior." " Oh, this ceaseless tampering with the truth! — the one truth faithful to me, of which, as it clings to me, I am certain." " Hear me yet, and bear with me — as the truth denying yours. He will not take you — he would not endure your devotion, till the world should own him — shall, as he knows it will, own him chief; till he himself will raise you among nations, not you him. He would not take your help so far ; he would not bear the gratitude he then must feel." " You will not tempt me," she said, in that tone of firm tenderness, with which a perfect wonan denies the truth from lips 'bat imply the falsehood of the One to wh )m she is a.ways true, till he prove himself from his oivn lips, false. " You will not tempt me against my faith. How can I help it, if I believe him ? — help- lessly." Strange, so to thrust her helpless- ness upon another man ! Now Rodomant, still religiously behind her, took nomeasure.<> from her womanly, half lost, and entirely- appealing look ; if he had seen it, he would have withdrawn without speaking. But, Avith whole intention to M-ithdraw entirely — he believed, oh, presumptuous ! not eternally — from her presence, he was determined to tell her his whole mind, untinctured with a warm ray from his heart ; he could resolve upon the first intention, the latter eluded him, as for so many of us, happily, it eludes the made-up minds of philosophic men. "Is it, O princess — loyally beloved and honored, — is it not as unloyal, as dishonor- able, for a man to keep back his suit in words, — declaring his love by sighs, his pre- possession by presumptuous glances, — as it would he for a man who loved in vain, and knew it ; knew that he loved in vain for earth, — to declare it openly to his own soul ? Souls are not bodies, princess ; and I think some shall meet in heaven, face to face, em- bracing without fear, Avho on earth were in- tercepted by their bodies, or their bodies' miserable glory — Rank, — from meeting soul to soul, in the poor flesh soul glorifies." A noble, yet strangely peaceful expression, covered his large brows ; his passionate eyes were strangely peaceful too. Yet he gazed only on the braids back dropping of her golden hair ; and she, she saw him not. She dared not face him, yet could not have de- fined, and if questioned, would have denied that proud and timorous love defiance. But w ith an unprecedented gesture of kindliness and grace, she turned back her hand, half threw it over her shoulder. Rodomant M-')uld have died before he embraced it, but he^smiled upon it, as the father of the first- born smiles on the vague, sweet new born face. Swiftly, almost-angrily, she withdrew her hand. " I wished," she said, in an accent of fiery but by no means strong resentment — " to TAKE farewell of you. We will not meet again. I thank you, and shall not forget you, but we will not meet. On earth I mean, of course ; all friends will meet in heaven. Now leave me, I forgive you." Oh, glorious exile for Rodomant ! proud error crowning love's emergency. She would not condemn Porphyro from any other lips than his own. She still loved him — why then fear another ? he too a servant ! and Poi • phyro her master, self-chosen, long desired. CHAPTER XXX. The princess kept her word, or Rodo- mant sought not to countermand it; they lid not meet. Had ne persisted in presenting himself before her, it is little likely she 176 RUMOR. would have persisted in her determination not again to see him until they met, as friends shall meet, in heaven. But he rigidly restricted himself to the necessary offices of his position, in which she could not be said to be concerned, except ostensi- bly ; for though, as her servant, his blazon remained untarnished in title, it was vir- tually extinguished in her father's claims upon him — these actual and inevitably entailed. It has been said, we know not what we can bear until the full measure of our ap- pointed burden is dropped upon us. Many accept the meed of suffering in patience — blessed power derived from temperament the slackly strung. Few, but those perfectly, achieve the victory over suffering in courage, gitY of iron predominating in the blood. And one or two in every thousand, beat back and defy suffering with pride, so long as an atom of pride's essence remains to them uneva])orated. For pride is a non- during agent. Then at the last gasp foiled, seemingly crushed down into a m.iss obtuser and more inert than clay, such spirits break all bonds amuider, and by might of j^assion, the Spirit's incorporeal strength, they spring to life again, the vitality of suffering; a life, if less lasting than eternity, yet sustaining to the farthest verge of time. There is yet another class, both despised and prized, perhaps both inordinately, for its exceptionalism. Of its individuals, there are not one or two in every thousand, but in every hundred thousand, perhaps, a single instance, rare as the aloe among blossoms, the phoenix among winged fables. This is the organization of the ideal, as strictly opposed to the skilful and creative genius. Delicately irritable, it is at the same time victoriously strong; vehemently impassion- ate, it is sensitive even to itself. Its im- pressions, vivid to pain, fade not like the vivid impressions of other temperaments, but are permanent in full intensity. Their very memories are not embalmed, but living. Far more securely than men of ordinary prudence, such a being reserves its impulses, until certain of their direction, whether to- wards fruition or disappointment. And it is less pride that influences him in the con- cealment of great desires unauthorized, than the ardent spiritual aspiration after sacrifice, that dream of the ideal oftener realized than any dream of any other di-eamer. Meantime the mortal error and the human fault, the peculiar flaw of this organization, which pre- vent its being either desirable, or perfectly admirable, while they render its conduct an enigma to the world, and convey to the puritanic a warning fear ; are the moods inexpedient for time and for society — inutile on behalf of the multitude, a per- plexing charm even to the sympathizing and appreciative few — by which such tempera- ments are distinguished. As for theii' own sufferings, they are agonies no skill or pre- caution are able to blunt, but ever calmlj borne to outward eyes, not patiently ?r/77u'n, however ; and entailing weakness, manifold, mysterious, inexplicable, which mars symme- try, and rasps the fulness from the edge of beauty, should such a one be born with either; which saps slowly, slowly, never unto death by itself, however, the sound health of blood, and body, and brain: while the nerves chafed down, made naked to the quick, respond too sharply, suddenly, to every demand upon them, great and small ; and M'hen subjected to extraordinary shock, or long inevitable pressiu'e, give awful signs, interpreted by fools, semi-physiologists, and some sane men, as tokens near upon that end of suffering — madness. Neither such extraordinary shock, nor so long an inevitable pressure can be classed or described with precision that might enable any to guard against or baffle either. Both may spring from any cause sufficient to affect sensation through emotion. And beings liable to them are, of all the creatures of humanity, the least selfish, or selfishly ])rov- ident, or prospective. Such was Rodo- mant, the very king and type of such a tem- perament and organism. He had proposed to himself the most perfect and unbetrayed endurance of his own set task ; he had laid securely, in his own esteem, his plan for permanent self-sacrifice. And it was easy and safe so long as excitement — no more a continuous concomitant of strong feeling, than fever of disease — lasted. Swiftly ex- tinguished, as flame whose feeding fuel is spent, was such excitement — it scarcely endured until two suns had risen and set after his exile from presence of her he was born and only lived to serve. Then the reality of existence became less like a weight or burden, than a blank of hope, of expecta- tion — it even seemed as though despair were too definite a torment to haunt the empty being. As the firmament without the sun, could one still imagine light abroad, or as the universe without its Maker — could one disbelieve actually his existence ; was now Rodomant's state of consciousness. He looked back now through his experience, in which the queen and angel of his destiny was concerned, with amazement at himself for having suffered at all, when he wa< per- mitted to see her, and not deprived of hop'j when the permission v,as timely suspended. Spiritual enough to be able fully and rap- turously to inhale as it were her spiritual fragrance, through the medium of personal, if ever so reserved, communioji, he was far too passionate to be able to perceive that spiritual emanation, cut off from her pres- ence altogether ; it may in fact be doubted whether those passionately attached can ever attain perfect communion ■of spirit in absence, for as they meet in the love-glorified body, so the flesh yearns for the flesh in RUMOR. 177 separation, as truly as the spirit for the spirit, and as nobly. And while flesh and spirit are bound together, as on earth, each is necessary to the other, and neither perfect of itself. _ _ I Not only his own selfish part in this forced absence pained him — he could now be of j no more service than a bread-fruit tree in | the Pacific isles — to her. Were she ill, he would not have the chance to detect the ea'-lie^t and medicable sym])toms — were she to die, as it now seemed possible she might, in punishment for his blasphemous fancy — he would only hear her death announced, as in a thousand ears of those who loved her not it would be announced — and with her death forgotten. Great awfid woes, no more than simple small ones, come singly, as has been said. Soon another terror fell upon him, and iliis one paralyzed his pride that volition had no power to rouse it. The moment he tried — it had never before caused effort — to com- pose again, he was balked, as light balks the blind, as the sweet warm sunshine balks the dying, too cold to feel it. It was not that material failed him — on the contrary, themes, operas, masses, great orchestral skeletons, swarmed, mocking, in his brain. But when he would have seized one and dismissed the rest, the whole eluded him together, a phan- tom crowd. Again, endeavoring to poise his mental perception, that reeled like a drunkard's vision, back rushed the ideas in their undisciplined and whirling multitude, producing of the brain a super-vital action, like the result on a pulse in fever, of stimu- lants too rashly imbibed. With a desperate but resolved self-denial, he threw all the im- plements aside, and would haA-e simply EXISTED, till the faculties fell into rank, and the violent reaction reacted again in order, would have simply existed — but for the great truth, — superseding fact and imagina- tion, — which directly the intellect resolved on non-employment, sprang like lightning across the storm of consciousness, and died not like lightning, but endured to dazzle and beguile from rest : — the Truth, alike pertaining to heavenly and earthly devotion, that love cannot " slumber nor sleep." JJay and night, therefore, the sleepless certainty possessed him. Nor was this vigi- lance, albeit the devotion of self, entirely seliish in devotion, Rodomant, — not the first man whose habits love's rule has in- fringed on — even altered, — began to take an interest in politics and to devour their chronicles dated from a given region, written in a given dialect. If there was one spe- ciality of modern civilization he loathed, it was the universal prevalence — plague he had been used to term it — of newspapers. Now he courted them, and they became his guides, his instructors in the familiar science of Predominance. He discovered, by the way, in these readings that predominant 2a persons are alone thus ephemerally em- balmed, also that as many insignificant as remarkable persons predominate in the an- nals of diumally celebrated hero-worship. This was a discovery by the way, for often he bemoaned himself on the length and depth of rubbish he had to examine and sift, in order to discover those grains of rarity more precious and less common than gold — items of infoitnation about the person or subject that happens to interest one. Now Rodomant forced himself to the laborious achievement entirely to discover what Poi-- phyro was said to have done, or to me«n — he drew his own conclusions from the cloud of witnesses encompassing this most tan- gible mystery that ever baffled humanity. Certainly, many assertions made one day were contradicted the next, even by the press which held Porphyro next its heart, that of Parisinia ; — also reports were spread which to Rodomant's honor he discredited : — to his honor, for he had anticipated, and wished to believe them — but repudiated them for her sake, whose destiny their fulfil- ment would darken. They wei"e reports, now uncertain and sibylline, now oracular, and attested of the possible exaltation of Porphyro to the highest rank man has dared to invent and invest himself with, under the Ruler of heaven and earth. As far as Rodomant's safety in his position was concerned, it was happy for him that he had composed with such unmitigated indus- try before the crisis of his love. He "had endless creations, both sketched out and clearly arranged — filled in, he would have said. But the prince's curiosity was insa- tiable, and he had the mental avidity of the intellect diseased, an appetite unnatural, that would only gorge what was new. So Rodo- mant wondered, with a sort of fatal calmness, what would happen when he had produced the last sheet from his finite stoi-e. He remembered Porphyro's words about his fame — or genius — exhausted on its "trial cruise," — spoken all those long month's ago ; now he felt as though that genius were becalmed upon a tideless and a shoreless sea. As for his fame — alas ! yet bewailing it bit- terly as Israel's mothers wept their slaugh- tered first-born, he foresaw not the celesti^ remission of certain sorrows that very be- reavement should purchase him. For his fame was dead, or so he deemed it ; was it not rather that it had never lived ? Yet the poor soul, crowned with those delicate palm- shadows, which shelter the brows so proudly in youth's first burning summer-day, can only suffer in silence when they fall and dis- solve, not even waiting to wither with the autumn, like forest-leaves of earth. They can only suffer in silence, the moon-heata beating on the head, for pride never fails the intellect, though love may usurp in the heart. It is a mistake that genius inevitably lacks common sense ; on the contrary, that homely 178 RUMOR. Dut precious instinct is ever wanting m pro- portion to mental deficiency. Rcdomant | once assured that he could be of no further ' use, where he was, to the only being he cared | to serve or please — and not only so, but the j only being, who, he now discovered, had made him prize his present position, arranged with himself to go, to return to his own rank, and exalt — if his faculties regained their rule — no longer himself as an artist, but his art. Long prostration and severer penalties might await him still, but his chances would be greater of recovering himself — that self- possession which the wise man clings to, and that self-respect which saves so many minds from madness. Free of the degradation of a tyrant's bounty, he could even endure pov- erty ; that phantom he had feared in his first fame might intercept its fulness, but which now, without further experience, save from within, he had learned to appreciate as a better friend, and a nobler foe than wealth. Now it might seem very easy for Rodo- mant to withdraw — indeed, how should he be liable to detention more than any other servant who works for wages, and desires to change his place? He could not tell himself why he dreaded to ask permission, for he knew he must do that, or thought so then ; but yet he had a presentiment which he dis- liked, but could not disdain — for his presen- timents were always prophetic — that it would be as difficult to loose his chains of service, as though they had been fetters of the same temper as those with which the prince loaded certain of his servants, Avho had the misfortune to be born his subjects too. Determined to get free, however, and desirous to attain liberty without scandal, which might possibly im])licate another, Rodomant finally settled with himself to re- quest leave of his patron to pay a visit to his mother — a request so natural, it seemed impossible should be either refused or sus- pected. But the prince suspected all men — even court-musicians. Rodomant knew not, rither, that one of his predecessors had been imprisoned on suspicion of a tendency to communism, betrayed in a letter to a friend, which, written in cipher, had its characters detected as secret, through the thin post paper enclosing it. Nor knew Rodomant that, although this person escaped, he had in the very act of escaj^e rendered such sus- picion more likely to fall upon other persons of the same profession. Rodomant's wit, daring, and non-dependence on others, 8eemed to invest him further with suspicion — just such a one as he, multiplied by thou- sands, created those social nuisances called secret societies ; and these all had for their foundation an improper desire for lib- erty, both of action and of opinion — they all detested autocracy, which they named tyranny. Such common-place objections as these sufficed tc rendei Rodomant's request improper, and in its assumed reason an im- posture. He had prepared a respectful but ncn obsequious speech, in which to make known his desire ; he was amazed at the aspect of the prince on its reception; the latter turned pale, and gazed weakly around him — there was unsteadiness and, at the same time, animal-like eagerness in his voice as he replied, — " What on earth, or under earth, do yon want to go for ? " "To see my mother, as I Lad the honor to tell your highness." "So you said — that is impossible; son* are not in these days so filial ; then, you have only been here a year and eight months. Besides — how do I know you have a mother ? No, no ! " changing his tone on a sudden, vvith the sugar-like lymph of a tem- perament whose amiable moods were more dangerous than its anger. " I cannot spare you ; that is more than a sufficient answer. No one has filled your place, nor would, so welL You are therefore fixed in it — a marked point, too — an envied one, as you ought to be grateful enough to acknoM'ledge. But you possess the hairy hide of genius, alas ! we must expect no amenities." " I know the value of my position," said Rodomant, too earnestly for good policy. The prince brought his hand down on the table with force that shook it, and also pained his own velvet palm. Rubbing it, he ex- claimed, viciously, " 1 do not choose you to go — that is enough, let us hear no more about it. Now, what have you done the last week — it is, I believe, so long since I last sent for you." But, alas ! as we have said, Rodomant had done literally nothing ; he endeavored to annihilate the void impression, however, by all sorts of sudden inventions, clever enough to have deceived an art-academy, but which the prince detected — too clever himself not to do so, and which he detested,, too passion- less to endure passion's vagaries, out of the restrictions of art. He instantly fancied Rodomant had so disported himself on pur- pose to disgust him, or rather in a moment it struck him that the restlessness and the idleness sprang from the same source — a mercenary inclination. He was prodigal, if not liberal, with the finances wrung like their life'-s blood from his poorer subjects by taxation, fine, and forfeiture. " What is your salary?" he inquired, knowing quite well, of course, but very glad to shift the cause of suspicion : his tone was gay. Rodomant stared — he was alarmed, he knew not why. " Your salary ! " exclaimed the other, im- patient now. Rodomant had £400 a year, reckoning in Saxon, with perquisites that added another hundred to the sum. He mentioned it in the current terms of Belvi- dere. . " We will for the future appoint it £700; but there must be no remission of duties, RUMOR. 179 as of late. There will be a special chance for you to distinguish yourself soon — you are of course aware, and will be prepared." Rodomant bowed with awful stateliness, an awful sensation affected him, which he could not have defined, as he suddenly re- flected on that chance for self-distinction, of which it was true he had heard, but which he heeded no more than one heeds the reversion of day and night at one's own antipodes — it se;med to have as little to do with Jiim. It was the prospective jubilee of the prince, or rather his fiftieth birthday, to be so cele- brated ; his worshippers who were in fact the men who, nearest to him, feared him most, had devised the pageant, and caused it to be noised abroad. Rodomant, however, cared little to dispute with him at this moment — and assumed irreproachable propriety. " Your highness would honor me unspeak- ably by a liint, at least, of your commands for me on that auspicious occasion ; they could not be too deeply or too long consid- ered." " A grand mass," said the prince, hastily, giving a curious glance over his shoulder, then drawing in his breath. Rodomant knew tbe sign ; a semi-sibyl or half-caste gypsy, who had in part tended the infancy of the prince, had uttered when dying a mysti- cal enunciation with reference to his end, that, should he survive the fiftieth anniver- sary of his birth, he would behold his chil- dren's children. The possibility of his perishing on that day was, however, not further stated ; and, in consequence, the prince who had been born at noon was anx- ious to get over that Iwnr, and till its end meant to remain in seclusion, while the few drops in his veins, that were dregs of a race once supreme, forced him to resolve upon a celebration of that era, it having lieen sug- gested to him by those who were, as well as himself, privy to the oracle. He would re- pudiate this by a special solemnity, and an act of sublime courage. " A grand mass," he repeated, " in token of gratitude to Heaven, and reverence for the Clnirch. For performance in the cathe- dral — not the chapel — remember. I ex- pect you will astonish us on the occasion." Dismissed sooner than usual, and followed to the door by scrutinizing eyes, Rodomant left the ])rince in a frame bordering on obsti- nacy. He was not only I'esolved on flight, but that his flight should be immediate. It may be said, was it so surpassingly difficult to escape ? Surely, it required no extraor- dinary ingenuity to leave the palace, — it was only to walk out of it, and return no more ; of course, he only chose eccentric means because, in common with most minds of genius, he preferred exceptional to straight- forward conduct. Not at all ; he knew, not that it was difficult, but impossible, to escape at pleasure. His presentimental terrors, ac- complished, held him by an iron spell be- sides. But the actual impossibiJity consisted in the literal fact that the palace was a masked prison — it would have been as easy to quit unnoticed a real and open-faced one. As we said before, soldie s in domestic disguise guarded stairs, corridors, corners ; porters, mailed under velvet, kept every entrance; outside, the sentries double deep, at dreary day and wakeful night, moved on. And as for the windows of Rodomant's own rooms, they were so near the roof, that to glance from them to the marble flat of the bight st terrace turned dizzy even his strong head. It was a fact that he had often passed out of the palace unnoticed ; but how long would even that possibility endure? for once in- fected with the prince's desire to detain him, the careless or mocking myrmidoms of tyran- ny — careless and mocking for Rodomant as a mere toy-appendage of the court, cheaper purchased than themselves — would swiftly change to careful and grave individuals, ready to pounce upon him with arrest. For such service they were sold, and would have kiUed him before they let him go. Rodomant walked wildly up and down, drew deep but inward sighs, felt half stifled with the fancy that those superb strong pre- cincts were strong petrifactions of his own despair. He had taken off his shoes, actu- ally afraid, at that distance from the royal centre, to be heard to pace in meditation, or semi-madness. If an indirect course must be adopted, why did he not apply to Ade- lai'da? if not in person, w^hy not by letter? Surely she, without collusion or hypocritic demeanor who lived a life in contradiction of her father's existence, op])osed tacitly, yet openly, to his character and conduct, his hab- its, his very state — could have managed to procure for Rodomant a safe and speedy exit. Truly and painfully as she would have felt his loss, were he actually about to depart, she would with all her heart and skill have endeavored to gratify him, and suc- ceeded. But Rodomant wovdd have passed his whole life in that palace-prison, or in u narrower one, rather than have addressed to her a line, a word, or conveyed to her a hint of his need through any other person. This last arrangement might liave been read- ily effected ; for Romana, still in the ne^r vicinity, was yet admitted to her presence", and also now and then continued to flit across Rodomant's duL'' or frenzied evenings, like a brilliant moth. Rodomant knew he could send a message by Romana to the princess ; on Romana no suspicion had fallen, and he could behave amiably — even gayly, while at the same time he was sincere ; in his transient stays he only beheld the gold and gemmed surface of the hollow false regality. No, Rodomant would never again communicate with her, hia pride exulted absurdly in this decision. She had banished him, and — shame to him for that —he had a savage gratification in obey- 180 RUMOR. ing hev fflll to the letter — nay. beyond it, I he flattered himself — he would not( he stated inwardly) have gone to her, had she sent tor him. I P) ovidence — or a lowlier fate — sent Ro- mana tu his rooms that evening. The painter was amazed at liis agreeability — he was j charming, loquacious, but extremely calm. After a variety of topics had been touched, [ he asked carelessly, " Have you finished the I princess? I suppose so — it is almost an insult to your industry to put the question." •' It is ended — yes, at last." " How soon to go then ? I mean it, not j you ? "' Rodomant was dismayed momently; lie feared it already gone. . " Oh, I cannot tell — she tries me sorely ■with her caprices about the frame ; she will not let it stand in that provided by Porphyro, • regardless of expense.' I will say that for the director, Avhom many accuse of ' stinge.' I am on her father now, he takes much less space, I mean time ; he is an effigy, and will not be expected to have expression." " How soon shall you have finished both ? " " In ten days, and be off by that time, too ; I cannot do — or rather, have not done what I expected here, after all. But, as doctors tell one, the benefit of sea air is not expe- rienced till one returns inland, I trust it will be the case that the beauty and color of this matchless climate will impregnate my future to fruition — my present sorely lacks it." '• Does the prince like his own picture ? " asked Ptodomant, in agony at his errant allusions. " He likes hers better, which is a good thing for me, because he will of course praise it to Porphyro. He is, I believe, proud of her picture, because I have con- trived to infuse into it a certain resemblance to himself', without marring hers. As she is considered a handsome woman, his vanity is gratified ; I imagine the parental instinct to be hiexcitable." " Oh, you end in admiring her then ? " Rodomant was too preoccupied with his sterner purpose to be ruffled at the idea, which would have infuriated him a short month back." " Her character, certainly ; she is one of the shining lights, futile as all female mis- sionaries, and she-ameliorators on a large scale, must be, but sterling good herself. Her beauty is nought — insufficient even for a study." " How much will you have for it ? " Rodo- mant. inwardly reckless, held himself out- wardly in check — his design formed, he could aflbrd it time to ripen for security. " I mean, how much will Porphyro give you ? " '* Not settled." " How much shall you ask ? " " I should have asked two hundred, if re- ijuired to settle beforehand. If I had pleased myself, and painted quickly, I would have taken one hundred and fifty ; but as it hat spoiled much time, and I hate the result, I shall ask, and receive of course in this case, two hundred and fifty." "Xot too much — not enough, indeed — you are certain that is all you intend to take ? " " Surely. What a singular question — singularly put too — by you." Quite natural, Rodomant thought, in the event of his eccentric resolve achie"'?d. This was neither more nor less than tc de- stroy the princess's picture. Of course (so reasoned he) for such a crime he should be banished ; for it was a crime he could suf- ficiently defend in its confession, from possi- bility of affiliation on treason as its ])arent. He could but be banished ; exile was the only punishment to which in such a case a sovereign could condescend. Far other would have been the result, he considered, had he determined to destroy the prince's own portrait ; that might, and indeed must, have attached to him the suspicion of dis loyalty towards, if not design upon, the per- son of the original. The prince did not care enough for his child to associate her with the the royal idea, any more than the reality. Then, what triumph to annihilate the work founded falsely on the artist's prej-_ udice ; what glory to denude Porphyro of its possession, already reckoned on by him so audaciously. It was indeed this last con- sideration of all, that thrust Rodomant to the commission of a deed which his innate nobility would have repudiated, in its natu- ral and healthful condition. The mood in which he wrought his morbid vengeance selfishly, was neither healthful nor indeed natural ; and the moments, in which he pro- jected it so swiftly, were haunted by phan- toms of disease, if not disease ; prompted by a disordered, if not disorganized, intelli- gence. " So she did not like the frame ; why not ? " " Too many insignia of ' rule,' both hers and his. Crowns and laurel garlands ; stars and flowers, chiefly the iris and violet — certainly nothing prettier than the latter. Nor are crosses wanting ; her ' order ' is not overlooked. The unfortunate portrait is at present frameless. I have sent for the other frame to Genoa." The news of the repudiation of the frame, also the description of it, gave Rodomant a gleam of grim pleasure ; a sunbeam on a Golgotha, for his mood, with all its antici- pation, was ghastly too. " So, where is the picture in the mean- time ? " " In the studio still ; there is no damp there ; I almost wonder, for the sake of its future possessor, she did not retain it in her own rooms." " I am warm," said Rodomant, after some minutes' taciturnity, which made Roraana RUMOR. 181 nse to his feet-- prepare to go. "I -will walk out with you to see this poi'trait ; it is not late." CHAPTER XXXI. It was early — for warm as it was, the shortest days of Belvidere were close at hand ; a balmy sweetness, like our softest spring, was all it knew of winter. Rodo- mant, in going forth companioned by Ro- mana, did the wisest thing he could to elude suspicion, even if in that short time it was possible that suspicion could have spread. " You may thank me," said Romana, at the bottom of the pavilion stair, for letting you see my work. I would not let a fool, nor what is called a brother-artist — Cain is symbol for such a one and the whole frater- nity, — I say I would not let such see a work of mine by candle-light ; they would not allow the truth, that my colors stand that fade-all test." Rodomant would have esteemed the moon's light sufficient for his contemplation, but he dared not say so. Romana vaulted up the steps ; the pavilion was raised by them several feet from the ground, besides being placed on an eminence, and clad from its marble margin to the level ground with myrtle spires. Rodomant suddenly beheld a green glare through all the eight narrow arches blinded with grass-tinted silk, that contained the windows. " Come up," he heard Romana say, the latter having, by means of a match from his cigar-case, lighted the chandelier suspended from the central ceiling-point, whose alabaster branches were furnished with taper-!, wax-white as themselves. Rod- omant, giddy with prescience, ran up hastily, as Romana was drawing from the portrait its covering. Rodomant gave a glance, gasped inwardly, and closed his eyes. Thenceforth, in his esteem, there was not only pardon for his intention, but virtue in i's fiilfilnient ; for this he yearned but to be alone. From this moment Romana's pres- en^e only strengthened his desire for ven- geance ; before the artist had touched his generosity, pained him, though he dreamed not a moment of reluiting in his purpose. " I shall not go at present, it is so cool ; you can, I suppose, leave me here ? " " Gladly, that is to give you any comfort, loser as I shall be of your company. I can- not stop ; I am sick of the picture, and if I remained too long might perhaps destroy it." Strange unconscious utterance of its doom ! Rodomant was very glad to think that the picture would not be regretted by him. Porphyro could not suffer for its loss too much to please him ; on the contrary. Romana went out nodding, with a fresh cigar between his lips. Rodomant crept in front of the picture, and glared at it as like a wild beast as he could look under any cir- cumstances. So far he might be pardoned ; for an honest and faithful, not to say ideal, lover, the portrait was sufficient to sadden, to anger, to disgust. Yet clay never re- ceived more homage, devotion so exclusive. It was a perfect and a successful study of human flesh — finer than Raphael, "and ripened beyond Rubens. It was a iieshly exaggeration, however, of Adelaida's facial image, whose indwelling and out-shining spirit it was that made it fairest of the fair. The flesh in the portrait had conquered the spirit ; not a ray was reflected from the eyes, whose living sweetness was at once so heav- enly and so human ; here color in them anni- hilated light. The frail fairness was buried under layers of elaborate tint ; the faint rose- shadows were represented purpureal. The slender form of the countenance, too sudden in point for oval, was fitted out — mellowed into stoutness. The lips, so fine and curl- ing, were painted the color of the robin's breast — a coral orange — and pouted pertly. The very cheeks looked fruit-like, as they showed against the sick sere-background. Last of all — oh! crowning desecration,! in the hair had Romana immortalized his fancy name, as if on oath. " TIae golden net to entrap the hearts of men," fair Por- tia boasted even in her " counterfeit," not so Adelaida. Hers was conserved in care- fully imitated red — perfect red ; no golden glow nor shadow. Those golden hairs ! which Rodomant adored and cherished, which were precious each to him as, to the Father of all-seeing love, are the hairs He numbers alike on the brightest and the dull- est head. Rodomant stood about ten minutes, fas- cinated at once by the hatred with which the work inspired him, and the delicious terror of his own anticipations. Suddenly, he drew the sword which he carried at his side, which though never it might wave in battle, should do him dearer service. It flashed like the maiden meteor of a warrior's fame, as he plunged it into the canvas, not once, but again, again, and yet again, till it was slashed into countless ribbons that strewed the floor all round him. The very shock of accomplishment seemed to disturb his spirit, like a stone flung sud- denly into water. In wide dull rings his senses seemed scattered astray — closing nearer, their return dazzled him, and he felt as though he should swoon. When calm returned, his perception woke fuUv to the fact. What fact ? What phantom"? Was he, in revenge for liis vengeance, haunted ? Haunted — after all. Or was that vision the glimmering of all we love restored to us, beyond Death's twilight stream ? — No ghost — it was herself by his side. Pale, — 182 RUMOR. it did not seem with the colorless tension of terror, but sorrow and great surprise, and a mingling shadow of a new, an unknown passion ; all trembled on her changing face, while a mysterious discomposure pervaded her air, she shrank from him as he turned on her his vivid eyes, whose glances ques- tioned as they glittered. And as he saw her shrink, his wrath, his fresh excitement at her sudden presence, quailed to anguish. Was it in anger, or dislike, she placed those few feet of air between them? Alas, he recollected in a flash what reason had the beloved of Porphyro, ivho also loved him, to entertain both rage and detestation. But both were so unlike her ; why then that dis- tance of hers, which appalled him like the chill of an eternal solitude ? As he gazed on her even, he sank on his knees, then bowed his head, and shut out her aspect and the light, with both his hands • fast pressed upon his burning eyes. " Pardon, oh, pardon, have mercy, my princess. I was not master of myself; I think indeed that, if I was not mad, I had an excuse as mighty." " Pardon, why should I pardon ? you have not offended me." Her voice was hushed and inward ; his pulses leaped, then paused as though to follow her meaning into her being's recesses. But he did not interpret the tone, his honor was strung too high, nor, with all his absorbing passion, was he even a moment selfish. " I know that I have ofi'ended, though I know not how far I am pardonable. More than all, it angers me against myself that I have brought you here." " Ah, I was indeed frightened ; I thought the place was on fire, the windows shone out so suddenly, I saw them from my win- dow in the convent. And, hoping to save the picture, I came directly." Still the low small voice, the manner hesitant and unfamiliar. " To save the picture — ah, then your highness regrets it «< a work. No, no — that cannot be," vivaciously, as he rose, and spurned the canvas fragments with his feet. " Porphyro is balked of his precious posses- sion, knowing not its value. He is there- fore the only one to comjilain." " I do not understand your mood — nor why you came — nor why you discuss what it is impossible for you to defend." Here she assumed a haughtiness too obviously assumed to take the slightest eflect on her hearer. "I always thought you just, princess — as well as merciful — most women have not sufl[icient sense to form judgments, and few are merciful. Being both, I wonder you condemn unheard." " Ho-w can there be any thing to explain — you siin j)ly destroyed the work of a brother artist, because it displeases your own taste, which may, like mine also, be incorrect." " But it displea.ses him too — 1 took care to find out that — and also what it is worth, I am going to pay him. I am quite certain, princess, that you are glad it is destroyed ; but you are afraid to tell me so. If llomana had been more proud than vain — ]3roud as a musician, — / should not have had to destroy it." She smiled, and turned aside with her head to hide something l)esides a smile, a blush, very slight, but which her gesture rendered detectible to Rodomant, as the sun in heaven. His heart quickened, the warm blood rushed over his frame, his brain with the reaction brightened. " You are not angry with the action, I can see. You are only displeased with me for being selfish. I have had some cause — the wild bird loves not to be forced into its cage forever, without license to fly, even for half an hour at a time. I was, however, treated so." "Who forced you into a cage — did you not come here of your own free will ? If not, I strangely mistook the person who in- troduced you." " Yes, of my free desire — but now it has become my desire — my resolution and ne- cessity to depart. And how can I? your father has ordered me to remain." " To depart," she whispered, unconscious- ly, and a blank distress crossed her face, fleetly as a cloud over the sea, but too dark, too sudden, above all too natural, not to convey its full impression — no blank one that. Rodomant felt a longing to die that moment, while its celestial sweetness im- pregnated his heart. There might have been two reasons — or rather, either of two might have been the motive which had bidden her to banish him. " My father ordered you to remain ? " she said, recovering herself, as if she had heard his last words long after they were spoken — who knows not that simple and common consequence of a mood preoccupied ? " Why did you ask him ? excuse me. Just now he is particularly nervous about any change in his household — he likes not new i\ices even, nor that old ones should leave him. Jest it- should be through disaffection that they depart. And as his birthday approaches — this birthday — he is anxious. Could you not bear to stay over that time ? on his account, of course." Strange plea — for her father ! was it tlu'ough pity — through ])rescience of an un- known doom — or rather, was it not that she desired not to lose this audacious, singular, but one true-souled friend of her lonely life ? Rodomant, keen to distinguish every shade of difference between her former and her present self, thought he could distinguish the regret she sought to veil. He might have been certain of it — but he would not allow himself time to realize. He believed this behavior of his sprang from honorable RUMOR. 183 pride; it did but rise from the insatiable purity of his passion, which would not have accepted the woman he adored, unless an overwhelming preference for him affected her — a love as like his own as woman's love could be. " I could not stay over the jubilee ; it is that I wish to avoid ; I loould, if possible, depart instantly. That was my intention in d'istioying the ]ncture." " Your intention in destroying the picture ? J cannot understand — Avhat connection has the ])icture with your departure ? how could it assist you ? " " I thought it would make the prince so very angry, that he would send me away — that he would deem it below his state to punish me ; indeed, how could he for a 'deed without a name'?" The princess could not help smiling at this notion ; child-like in its futility, as are such notions of very unworldly men ; above all, men of genius ; but she soon fell grave. " I am indeed sorry, for I fear it will not help you at all. He would not care suffi- ciently, or, if he cared in the least, would attribute your nameless deed to the eccen- tricity that has so often served you. Why did you not apply to me ? I could have written to Porphyro, and he would have con- trived it ; he could have recalled you to his person." " I do not want to be recalled to his per- son ; I should then be doubly bound. I want freedom, and I must have it, both for my heart and brain, or I shall die — or else go mad. Shall I act that I have gone mad, like David of old, princess ? " " Hush ! hush ! " she exclaimed, " pray, do not jest on the most hideous reality that may befall us — you or me, or any one. Such mockery sounds like a challenge to that fearful chance," She shuddered, then fixed her eyes with penetrating majesty on Rodo- mant. She searched his face ; her scrutiny contained no sentiment, but it seemed uneasy. " Oh ! I am not mad," said Rodomant ; "and it is nonsense, princess, to say that any person might become so ; it is much more likely that the whole world is mad already, as some philosophers assert." " Why did you not apply to me ? " again she repeated. " Because your highness ordered me away." Quite sane was the sarcastic tone. She blushed again, and cast her eyes towards the pavilion door. He stood out far from it, as though to leave the pathway clear for her departure, if she chose to go ; yet she staid. And now, there was no mys- tery in her expression, for the benevolence of her heart brimmed up, and filled her eyes ■with dewy kindness. His welfare, if he left that place, what of it? — and how, if he fared ill ? " What do you mean to do — pardon me, I do not inquire curiously — in case you go hence ? Where would you go ? Not that I would detain you ; the aberrations of genius like yours are needful to it ; it is ever rest- less ; but I should not like to think you needed any thing to fill up the measure of your daily comfort." Had not Rodomant's mood been fiery, he must have melted into tears ; as it was, he mocked himself, and answered drily, " Thank God, I am no sensualist, nor was I bred in luxury, which I detest. I have a - ready had too much, and besides, this cli- mate enervates my ideas." Pure nonsense this, of course ; she thought it bitter truth. " I am quite sure I shall be able to find a way ; take no forced steps," she said ; " and if I may advise you, it will be to remain until the jubilee." " That I am quite determined not to do ; why would you have me, princess ? " " I would not have you ; it is for your advantage." It was ; she knew how lavishly all who ministered to it would be paid. " But, though I resolve to go, I will be downright honorable, and leave a mass for the solemnity, or rather, send it here after I am gone ; I should enjoy that. A grand mass ; a solemn mass ; it shall drop its ' peace ' from heaven, and rend heaven with its ' hosanna.' Princess ! " he exclaimed, after an instant's pause — the creative mo- ment of the artist — during which she wavered between him and the door. At the fresh address, she stood still, however ; what more might he have to say? Far, indeed, was it from her to expect he would allude to the picture again ; she knew his moods too well ; and in that one he had absolutely forgotten it. " I have the greatest inclination to cast my ' peace ' and my ' hosanna ' to-night ; I can only do it at the organ — that is, as I feel now. And I suppose it is too late." " Not the least ; you have often played later." " That is true." " If you wish it, I will give orders." She passed him swiftly, thankful to escape for reflection ; on her, indeed, she was resolved the responsibility of the deed he had done — "without a name" — should rest. And her whole heart was bent on keeping it a secret from her father, whom she feared for Rodomant, though she had avoided infect- ing him with her dread. He stood some moments in a waking dream, gazing into the void she had filled and left ; then he saun- tered slowly down the steps, and through the gardens towards the chapel, the semi- darkness, with its heart of balm, enfolding his dream in its own dream more deeply still. All was ready in the chapel ; Adelai'da longed to divert him alike from the past and the future. With all her anxiety, and all her expectation, this meeting him had 184 KUMOR. touched her with inexplicable delight. A deep romance, deeper than that the still and passionate night' ever breathed on her virgin spirit, thrilled her through aijd through with pleasure she could not name, and cared not to define. Never, in her life, had she positively indulged herself till this hour. But, before Ilodomant reached the organ, whose lobby had a separate door and stair- case on either side, she established herself in the darkest corner of the chapel, and there remained. This corner was immedi- ately beneath the organ-niche, and farthest from the altar glare, and she fully intended to go out and return to the convent, before he had finished playing. Souls wrapped in sense have few vagaries, or rather, little inclination to indulge in them : Puck and Ariel alike pass them by on dancing step or delicate wing. They are never freak-ridden, though their gross whims gorge themselves in sensual secrecy. But a spiritual nature has for its highest and hardest temptation a disposition to out- rage precedent — sometimes propriety. It is sure of itself — very likely — but it may endanger the machinery, moral or tangible, which it employs for agent. Again, who has not dreamed of a dream ? who has not remembered dimly what yet experience con- tradicts ? who does not confound fact and imagination, to the damage of his reputa- tion for truth ? Rodomant was in a lawless frame, a frame he had fixed on himself by his outrage on precedent ; his subsequent excitement had enchanted him more wildly, and any number of imps and elves were ready to rush at his silent word, from the caverns of his haunted brain. Again, he felt he must spend his energy ; his long idleness re-acted on a sudden in prodigious strength of intel- lect, it stirred like a giant refreshed. Long time ago he had dreamed — he had entirely forgotten it vfas a fact that he had been told — that, if the whole force of that organ were put out, the result would be tremendous. He had also dreamed (that is been assured) that there was a law made to the purpose that the whole force of the organ was never to be employed. The law had never been broken, except once — but there his memo- ries waxed dim and indistinct ; he was at the mercy of his own volition, which resolved on recalling nothing that could dissuade him from his rash and forbidden longing. Un- known to himself, perhaps, the failure of his design to escape, of which the princess had assured him, drove him to the crisis of a more desperate endeavor. But, whether it was so or not, he was unconscious of it — 60 far innocent. He sat down, believing himself alone. Had he been aware of her presence, that would have beguiled him to safety, brought his wandering spirit to her heart. Had she retained courage to stand beside him, where her breath might mingle with his own, instead of placing her- self out of sight — of hearing — out of feeling through the secret sense — his fatal sorrow had never fallen on him, for he had never indulged his fatal ecstasy. " Softly, softly," mocked his whisper — to himself — and he touched alone the whisper- ing reeds. Adelaida held her breath, and chid the beating of her heart, which seemed louder than the mellow pulse that throbbed in tune above. The symphony that followed fell like a mighty universal hush, through which the clarionet stop chanted, unuttered but articulate — " Give to us peace." Then the hush dissolved into a sea of sighs ; " peace, peace ! " They yearned, and the mild, deep diapason muttered "peace." She, the one listener, felt as it were her brain fill soft with tears, her eyes rained them, and her heart, whose pulses had dropped as calm as dew, echoed the peaceful longing of the whole heart of humanity. A longing as peaceful in its expression, as the peace it longed for ; the creation's travail seemed spent to the edge of joy. Suddenly, as light swept chaos, this peace- ful fancy was disrupted ; her heart ravislied from its rest, its calm torn from it. Down went the pedal which forced the whole first organ out at once, and, as if shouted by hosts of men, and by myriad angels echoed, pealed the great Hosanna. The mighty rapture of the princess won her instantly from regret ; no peace could be so glorious as that praise ; and vast as was the volume of sound, the hands that invoked it had it so completely under control — voluntary control as yet — • that it did not swamp her sense ; her spirit floated on the wide stream with harmonious waves towards the measureless immensity of music at its source. To reach that centre without a circle — that perfection, which im- perfection shadows not — that unborn, undy- ing principle, which art tries humbly, falter- ingly, to illustrate — was never given to man on earth ; and tries he to attain it, some fate, of which the chained Prometheus is at once the symbol and the warning, fastens to hi' soul for life. The princess had bowed her head, and the soft and plenteous waters of her eyes had dried up like dew under the Midsummer sun ; yet still she closed her eyes, for her brain felt fixed and alight with a nameless awe, such as passion lends presentiment. Suddenly, in the words of Albericus, theie burst overhead a noise like the roaring of " enormous artificial golden lions," that was the drum ; less, in this instance, like smitten parchment, than the crackling roll of clouds that embrace in thunder. The noise amazed himself — yet Rodomant exulted in it, his audacity expanded with it, broke down the last barrier of reason. He added stop after stop — at the last and sixtieth stop he unfet- tered the whole volume of the wind. That instant was a blast not to speak ii-reverently, RUMOR. which sounded like the crack of doom. To her standing stricken underneath, it seemed to explode somewhere in the roof with a shock beyond all artillery — to tear up the ground under her feet, like the spasm of an earthquake — to rend the walls, like light- nings' electric finger ; and to shriek in her ringing brain the Advent of some implacable and dreadful judgment, but not the doom of all men — only one, which doom, alas' she felt might be also hers in his. Ail men and women, within a mile, had heard the shock — or rather, felt it, and in- terpreted it in various ways. Only the prince himself, who Avas standing on the terrace, and had distinctly perceived the rich vibra- tion of the strong, but calm, Hosanna, inter- preted it rightly and directly ; more than that, his animal sagacity told him it was Rodomant, who, having amused himself, was now indulging the same individual. The capricious never pardon caprice easily, the capricious-cruel, never. The prince said no word to any person, but set off by himself, and walked fast in the direction of the chapel. Several of his trained followers went after him, by force of habit ; they had been taught to protect themselves in taking care of him. To Adelaida there was something more terrible in the succeeding silence, than in the shock of sound ; it had ceased directly, died ■ with the noise, the confusion, the sudden stoppage in the procession, for the carriage, a few feet past them, had ceased to move. He even thought that one of the horses had fallen, and Geraldine, though raised above him, could see no more distinctly. Suddenly, and soon, the collapse of the multitude reacted ; it divided in wide masses, and straggled towards the cathe- dral, as though that shadow, or the wall which cast it, were a shelter from suspicion. Some persons had snatched torches from their bearers, and were flaming ihem in every face, dark with masks that hid suspected features. There thundered an order to un- mask from the crowd just round the carriage. In a moment there glared a mass of white faces and terror-straining eyes on the moon- light, and in the shadow. Geraldi, in fear for Geraldine's fatigue, though he anticipated nothing worse for him nor her, was too full of it to heed — in fact, he only half-under- stood — the order to unmask. And he un- masked not — his and hers the only faces now darkened in the multitude. The un- masked soon detected this : bred in terror and superstition from the cradle, and^ tyrant ridden into petty tyrants all — soon marked and fastened on both the masked faces, the one figure close against the wall, the other the torch-carriers — some waving them above their heads ; others thrusting them forwards into the masked faces ; one or two, more cat-like and less ardent, held the flame steadily, as near the ground as possible. One of these saw the pistol lying almost at Geraldi's feet. In a half-breath, it seemed as though a hundred hands grasped his limbs together — • as if a hundred strangling fingers were eager at his throat. They were trying to unmask him, and the many failed. He was obliijed to remove the hand which held on Geraldine, or he must have choked. He tore ofi" his disguise ; and Geraldine, brave as all women of passion in emergency, took hers off quietly, and leaping from her elevation, flung herself to him ; and though his arms were bound already, and hers seized in- stantly, she pressed on close beside him. But her beauty sealed her innocence. Un- happily, his aspect struck conviction to the crowd, as well as to the officer who held him, of gt'.ilt. For Geraldi's heart, never melted in his life, this hour, this moment, broke — his pride gave way beneath it ; and the agony that could not wash itself away in that agony — that storm of tears — the agony of having brouglat her into this danger, which might destroy her, she was so frail — passed with the cold, mad multitude for fear. . . . Rosuelo, intrepid in assurance, lucid in in- toxication, with all his wine-steeped faculties met in vivid focus ; his frame wound up to a pitch higher than the fever-crisis in its strength ; his arm steadied by a brazen nerve, directed by a will like that of mad- ness, had shot the prince with intention pre- conceived — with motive his delirious brain deemed pure ; and, like such fanatics usually — self-righteously impelled — he had suc- ceeded. He had also prearranged, together with the crime, his own detection and arrest. How had these failed, when the crime suc- ceeded ? By force of nature, the nearest thing to God. With the crime, the convic- tion of it naked struck home, struck thi'ough joints and marrow to conscience, and wounded it to death. The false dress — the sacred investiture of imagination — dropi^ed from the Fact of murder — not as regicide, but blood, for which . blood must flow. m^A. in an instant, like Cain from the face of God, Rosuelo turned and hid from man. In the confusion — rolling rather towards the point of murder than towards the agent of it — • and helped by the shadow which had covered his entrance, he escaped under cover of the same, by the low door he knew so well — that he had opened so often after his minis- terings to those in extremity, and Avhom, his OAvn faith wanting, he had failed to help. But Rosuelo could not bear the noises brought through the crevices and cracks into the great empty space, and wandering there, like bodiless voices of sovds without rest, crouchmg in the niche above. On came j imprisoned. Blood for blood! they shrieked RUMOR. 193 BO -whispered his soul, too. He must be alone to listen to that whisper. He knew every secret path, above and under ground, which threaded the city ; one of them led direct from tlie cathedral to the royal chapel, along which, on superb saints' days, the im- mense cathedral service for the holiest sacra- ment, was carried to the chajjel ; fear of the plate being ravished had caused the prince CO establish this secret process of trans- mission. He reached the chapel, all in shadow ex- i;cpt M-here one broad moon ray pierced a red gem of the altar window, and lay on the white step like blood just spilled, Rosuelo shuddered, and passed it hastily with closed eyes — groped for the door with his hands — the door which led to his own cell in the convent-sliadow, and went out cf it towards his only earthly home. In the first morning gleam he sat in his stone chamber ; the morning freshness rolled the fire-cloud from his brain. And strangely enough, instead of experiencing the remorse which is said to strike naked to the soul, especially by daylight after darkness : the remorse uhich, in the night had possessed him all tlirough the self-righteous assurance that his deed was just, now vanished like a spectre — took wings to itself like a day- scared noisome bird of night. Instead, a sense of triumph, Avinged with white glory like an angel, seemed to hover over his aching brain — the brain that seemed to ache with the very oppression of the glory. One, without faith in what all his life he had professed to believe, might well deceive himself in his life's crowning act. AVas it indeed so ? . . The moment for which he had only lived, which alone had kept him alive for years — the second of time for which he might be said to have labored, so long had been the travail of his thought, with the design he had accom- plished in a breath — this was done, the breath breathed, the soul returned by man to God, unrecalled by him. . . From the time Kosuelo had first worshipped a woman in the place of her Creator — not with that love which blends, even in its earthly form, with heavenly love, but a love blind to God and heaven — a desire made sublime by pas- sion, but not instinct with any soul ; from that hour — now long past, yet ever present to him — he had bent his whole purpose, and trained his reason to the accomplish- ment of a deed which should exalt her to the character he knew she longed for most — deliverer of her degraded race from the rule which crushed it. From such pure fruition, should not crime spring pure? Then why all those long months — after long years of contemplation — did he find it needful to mithridate his mind through the only avenue of sense he left open to himself — to the end that crime's poison should, when at last 'asted, taste to it like wholesome food? 25 But with the calm white day, not only did triumph spread dazzling wings over his head, to his strained and morbidly acute percep- tion, but a dread shook the triumphant ecstasy, like a cold wind sweeping under the bright morning-clouds — ofien sweeping them away. This was, a fear lest the prince should not prove actually dead. For he did not know this ; he had not staid long enough to discover. He wondered, in the cold mood the fear had brought and left, why no person had come to tell him ; he had officiated from time to time, in turn, for the prince's private services. He would not have wondered, had he known the state of the city, since the blow was struck; .xw the spasm of surprise had passed into a saturnalia of awful joy, how the weight re- moved from the spirits of the populace, that for years had chained their hearts, had given place to the hideous license which is the reaction of too long a check, removed from inferior minds in the mass, without culture and without hope. Noiselessly as though he feared to wake the dead, or call the living, Rosuelo left his cell. Cautious and soundless as he was, he was perfectly assured, not paler than usual, nor had he a drier tongue. Dead stillness, living freshness, every where. He walked under the convent wall, slowly ; even with stately step. He meant thus to gain the chapel again, then to be found, as usual, at matin-time, and then to question what per- son soever he might first meet. Suspense was saved him, so far, and none could prize it more than he ; even at that calm moment. Walking calmly along, and coming in due course to the convent-gates, he saw them open ; open to the convent garden. This was unusual. He would have entered, and gone across the garden to the inner doors, but found it needless ; he could inquire at hand, for a group of sisters was gathered just inside the open gate. He was afraid to question directh- about the prince, so merely asked, M'hy they all waited there so early^ and what event they were expecting ? " It is the poor woman, my father," said the eldest of the sisters, without looking in his face ; indeed, they were none of them surprised to meet him, his apparition ever haunted their experience. *' The ])rincess sent word she was to be brnus;ht here, directly she heard she was so ill. She will come to see her, herself, before any one is abroad," added the same sister, peering anxiously through the open gateway. " I did not know there was a woman con- cerned," returned Rosuelo ; not caring to assume ignorance, as he might be well sup- posed to have received intelligence of the night's event, if the nuns in their seclusion had heard of it. " The wife, or sister, none knows which, of the assassin. There was believed to have been a conspu-acy, at first, from her being se 194 RUMOR. close to him, but to him only could the blow be traced ; and she was so young, and looked so innocent." *' Besides, she fell down in a fit in the guard-room," broke in another. " Ah ! " said Rosuelo ; " and he — he has not escaped, of course ? " •' He was beheaded at two o'clock ; the prince ordered it, instantly, without form. He spoke so loud," said the sister, sinking ter voice, " that every one about him thought he would revive. They were his last words ; the command was distinct, and no one dared to plead, because all thought he might re- cover." " If the princess had only been in time ! " exc!!aimed a third ; '• but she did not arrive till he was speechless. She sent word on her own responsibility for the execution to be delayed. It was too late. They say the princess fainted ; I don't believe that, she never faints." " Where was the princess last night, then ? " inquired Rosuelo, with choking calmness ; it was well for him that the awful fact bred awe, if loyal sorrow were impos- sible. " That was the worst — yet it might have been as bad, had she been at the palace. She was in bed — here ; she did not go out last night — some say she was not well. / think she had one of her dreams the night before." As a child, the princess had been accus- tomed to relate her dreams to the sisters in the convent, who were her favorite friends. Even in infoncy, those winged ideas had ever a celestial direction, and a lucid distinct- ness that resembled forecast ; as she grew older, she retained the faculty (rather spirit- ual than intellectual) of dreaming at her own will. But she never, after she attained full youthhood, confessed her dreams. In this instance, that previous night, she had not dreamed at all in the usual sense, for she had not slept. Nor had she, in the common meaning, praj-ed. But she had passed the long hours in wrestling with the unseen — in mastering the mystery of the unknown ; all humanity seemed borne upon her bosom, in her heart's deep bitterness ; all hope for the world seemed to consist in the great love her own heart felt, the shadow and evidence of the Divine. However, Rosuelo knew nothing of such dreams as hers, and, when he dreamed, it was of her, not of her spirit. He thought not at this instant of her at all, he was bit- ten by a rabid curiosity. " And who," asked he, "does the wretch appear to be? — has his name been mentioned ? " " No one knows his name — he would not give it. He was an Italian, however — one of the new insurrectionists, they say. There were papers found on him, when he was searched, — in cipher, and the oihcer who translated certainly found some words he | could decipher, and they were about a plot. That was good to happen, for it proves that, even if his punishment was premature, it was just." It was a fact that Geraldi, in his last par- oxysm of audacity to force Geraldine from her safety, had retained about his person some letters ewid minutes, both relating to a design on the government of his own lawful sovereign, whose name was not mentioned in either. Thus the snare had entangled his o%vn feet. But, neither assassination, nor personal injury, was intended in the first in- stance. Rosuelo, still burning with the desire for knowledge, which he knew not in what terms to confess, nor how to gratify further at that moment, stood among the women, as if pre- paring with them to assist their sacred charge. The women whispered together — not about him, though. Soon a carriage was seen in the distance ; it passed in and out of the tree- shadows slowly, but when it came near enough for the sun to reveal its panels, it was discovered to be the princess's own. Rosuelo was obliged now to await its en- trance, for his departure would have been too remarkable to attempt. The wheels rolled through the gateway, the princess was in the carriage — Rosuelo saw no other occupant as yet. He felt that her eyes fell upon him, and yet more self-consciouslyye?<, rather than saw, that she alighted then and there. Her glance quitted him an instant, during which Geraldine was lifted from the front seat tenderly, the princess assisting ; next moment she looked at him again, and turned her eyes from him, slowly, gradually doM-nward, till they rested painfully — it seemed reproachfully — on Geraldine's fiice. "Whom reproached she ? — not strange that she felt pain, and showed it ; but why re- proach ? " She is dead," said one sister solemnly. '• Close her eyes," exclaimed another, and trembling, put out a gentle hand to touch the lids of the blue eyes, glazed upwards, unshrinking from the sun that poured upon them. Rosuelo turned sick, and felt as though he turned pale from head to foot, faint anguish thrilled in every vein. Had he remained an instant, he must have fallen, and he knew this. In the black mist that swept before his eyes he saw nothing, even lost sight of her he loved, and that dead face he feared. He groped for the cold stones of the piled up gateAvay, passed out, and crept along by fingering the cold stones of the wall. By the time he reached his cell, he again saw "distinctly — realized with vivid sense be- yond distinctness. He had once entertained a design for poisoning the prince, when called to exhibit the host in his presence, on one of the rare occasions which happened about a year apart from each other. But, infidel as he was, he had always trembled to EUMOR. 195 pollute the wafer, because the priace believed m its efficacy. It was easy to him to poison either element on his own behalf, for he be- lieved in neither. He took a little phial from a recess, and went out quietly, locked his cell, and entered the chapel, or rather first the sacristy. Re- issuing from this sacred and secret chamber — o])en to men of his profession, he stood at the altar foot with something in his hand. A golden vase, deep-crusted and edged with gems, that flashed like rainbow lightnings in the sunshine, poured insufferably, blindingly glorious, through the altar window, unrup- tured by the shock of music, which the echoes had long since forgotten. Never could Rosuelo explain to his dying hour, long delayed, why he did not drain the goblet in the secret chamber of the sacristy. Probably it was a simple reason — nature's daily, hourly miracles are ever simple — the instinct of self-preservation roused by immi- nent, though self-presented, danger. A natural instinct — whereas that of self-de- struction is an unnatural one, requiring stimulants or stultifying opiates, in order to consummate its cravings. j As Rosuelo stood on the altar base, still dallying with the death he had invoked, an ineflable sense of worship of the adorable, if nameless — struck him. It was a new sense, belonging not to the" order of senses, and lied him with delicious fear. It could not De the contemplation of those heaped trea- sures of the world, cast recklessly on the shrine of that unknown God, the church. He had seen them a thousand times, and long since wearied of the spectacle. But as though, through the myriad jewel-blaze, he detected the source of light, he leaned to- . wards it, strained his eyes towards it, but did not kneel. He aspired too yearningly to abase his body. His brain quivered with a pulsation that resembled the throbbing of white flame in fire, nearest the cent]-al heat. As so he stood, all eye; a voice clove the dazzling calm. The forgotten senses leaped to order in response ; the hand, holding the fiacred vase, filled from flagon by the church held sacred, shook, but still grasped it. When ghouk' it be emptied — if not now P Cui' ous were Adelaida's first words, curi- ously at variance, too, M'ithlier white cheeks, swollen eyes, and womanhood trembling in each fibre. " Give me that wine to taste." No longer " father," he noticed that, even in his extremity. No longer " my daughter," then. " It is not for such as thou," he said. But Ids voice was steady, the question on her part had steadied him. " Give it me, this moment," she repeated. " The sacred vessel ! " he exclaimed. " Was it ever sacred to you ? " She stretched her hand towards it — already she touched the stem. With an iron force and a gesture that contradic**'d his calm tone, he tore it from her touch — up- turned it. In a moment, the wine lay likf dashed rubies on the marble step. Then for once he flung himself on his knees — not before God, but her. " I thought you would not let me taste it," she said. " You do not wish to kill me. Now rise, there is my hand." Very sternly the last few words were uttered. But he would not touch it, he staggered to his feet, and leaned with his whole weight of weak- ness now on the railing of the altar. She looked clear at him, Jier pale face darkt neiJ M-ith shame, with sorrow, with passioi.tsa regret. " I saw your face, when I was in the :ar- riage. That told me. I followed you. Understand — you told me yourself — I should never have dreamed, nor guessed it . . . So you Mould have died, and allowed them to write murder on a stainless grave ! " His chest heaved with the great pulse of his heart — swollen as though all his li^ had rushed into it — between its beatings he could only mutter, " Blood for blood, the old law — nature's; men demand it too." "There has been blood for blood," she answered, awfully, " and better blood than yours ; it was innocent, and for a sacrifice to the guilty shall suffice. You forget, that it is / now only, who have the right to let you die — or to command you to live." This was true — he knew it. Oh ! that she would " let him die." "You cannot — you ought not — to for- give," he groaned, falling on his knees again. " Oh, give me death ! " " I bid you live, because you wish to die. I charge you, before God, to Kve. I com- mand you, unless you would destroy me ; I can bear no more of death." She wept an instant. Her sorrow tri- umphed ; his manhood melted into pity at her tears, and in her weakness his strength dissolved. Her presence was no longer temp- tation, either to passion or to death. " Swear to me," she faltered, " swear that you will depart and live. Make not my burden .heavier. I have already, much to bear." " No oath," he said, " for I cannot take it, nor you accept it from me." " Your promise." " I will not promise. But I go. And be- cause you command it, I will try to live, I will try not to long for death." " I believe you — you will not disappoint me. For you dare not die ; you have hated too strongly : you must learn to love. To live for others — you have hijured many. Give yourself, instead of substance. Live that, after death, in its own time, we may meet as friends forever." She moved slowly towards the door — she had done her utmost; her entire strength was spent. She feared — more than she hoped ; she had little faith in the efficacy of 196 EUMOE. her endeavor. Yet it was successful. Shun- ning the death he yearned for, as he had been taught by murder lo shun her love ; he went forth, and lived. His life was " the body of death " — one long exhaustion of the founts of loveless charity, drained ever, never empty. He fjund no comfort — no peace — no self- approval. In thick dangers that were death t;i thousands, he stood safe, and lived ; dis- e ses in passing mocked his health, that, unfed by care or wholesome influences, never failed him. Ingratitude met him for devo- tion, crime-laden conscience delivered over t!j him its burden, the cup of cold water he gave was dashed in his face, his sympathy repudiated with contempt. In lowly paths, by ways none traced, he learned histories unwritten, he taught lessons that were never learned. And last of all, without reward, without hope — having forgotten love in lov- ing others — he died, expecting rest, only rest, and only desiring rest. And woke up to receive — a martyr's crown ; a fame celes- tial that rung through Heaven. She had left him to the judgment of God Adelaida returned to Geraldine, still lying, . where she had first been placed — in the princess's own bed. Doctors, called in, had quarrelled over the name of the attack, and all but fought over the proper remedies. Trance, catalepsy, hj^steria, idiocy from fright, incipient insanity, jangled in the cat- alogue ; cordials, cardiacs, stimulants, opi- ates, were exhausted in their appellatives professional. One or two were tried, suc- cessively ; but Adelaida would permit no more to be administered ; she perceived a vague distress creep over the death-calm face, an expression which only one woman could interpret in another, when speechless. It betrayed that power to suffer lasted — therefore, there was life : also power to dis- criminate — therefore reason. So she sent all the doctors away, nor would allow another nurse to enter — fearful to thwart or trouble the magnetic current which encompasses vi- tality. Not a moment's sleep did she suffer her- self to take, lest her patient should, suddenly restored, require nutriment, and actually sink for want of it instantly conveyed. She yet found means to su])erintei"id every necessary duty, by communicating with messengers at the door. She would permit no person but herself to be a])plied to for public necessities, nor special exigencies of Death's occasion. Her fi'ther lay in state; all prisoners were released {for the moment her own pension- ers] ; and the sick carried to hospitals for rhe time appointed, tended by her own sister- hood, while she was tending Geraldine. The assertion has been ventured, that hap- piness will restore the dying. If love makes happiness, Adelaida might have raised the iead, so loving was she. It is possible that me e care and pity would not have brought bacij Geraldine from the etlge of the grave she was so near ; but as her nurse watched her, she loved her, and willed hei restora- tion, with the single heart of love. Deeply as a woman Svi pure and passionate could, she felt for the helpless creature lying in her own bed. She had taken pains to ascertain, that all through the reclcless injustice of a secret tribunal, an. the barbaric cruelty of a secret execution, the very soldiers who took part in the latter, assisted' by the guards con- cerned in the first, had combined, without orders, to tear Geraldine from the scene, long before its completion. Therefore, knowing that she was actually unaware of the end, Adelaida conceived it could only have been wedded-love, or promised wife-hood that had caused in its agony of parting a lapse of con- sciousness — a pause in being, that resembled an enchanted death. It was a hard task for a woman like Ade- laida to sit by her, and await her re-living response ; the awakening of reason which would be the signal for the real death of be- reavement to enter the soul. Not only to have to witness the unavailing sorrow, but to break up its fountains by the shock of rev- elation — which it was hers alone to make. She had been sorely nerve-shaken herself, and heart- wrung by pride — by neglect. For Porphyro, actually busy as she had never beheld, and could not fancy him — Porphyro. whose M'hole intelligence was bent on grasp- ing his own sanity tight in the crisis of suc- cess, such as never dizzied man before — • had only sent an official message of politic sympathy with the new regnant and the kingdom in one. Not a word to her — for her alone ! And to recall her loss to her, was to mock her with an orphanage that had lasted from her birth — no new loneliness, except what he had himself created for her. Late in the afternoon of the fifth day of her unconsciousness, Geraldine suddenly and softly woke — like an infant, to whom the shock of waking is so gentle, while to the adult it always seems a violent recall. Ade- laida was sitting at the window — that win- dow always open, though now a screen was drawn from the ceiling to the floor, between it and the bed. Geraldine, turning her head on her pillow, saw, as she supposed, a char- itable nurse. " How long have I been asleep ? " she asked. Adelulda's heart an- swered long before her lips ; she forgot all her own sorrow in the joy of that awakening, which she had watched for with the tender- ness which so tenderly endears its object. " Many hours," she answered, going quietly to the bedside. Adelaida spoke in Italian — all accomplishments were hers. Geraldine for an instant fancied herself back in Italy, and forgot (she had remembered in her trance) for a moment what had hap- pened. She gazed in the sweet face bending over her, as though to recall it as belonging to one of her ancient friends ; but her eyea wavered in their weakness, and closing them, RUMOR. 197 she remembered all — on the darkness of her brain, the picture of the late past seemed drawn distinctly, only far less vividly than when she slept. " Is he buried ? " were her first words. And natural as they were to herself, knowing what she knew, they made her companion shiver. She had not shared, and could not sympathize with, the terrors of that trance. She could not even guess them. Amaze- ment checked and dried the springing tears. How ! could the sleeper have dwelt with the unseen ? — whither had gone forth her soul, and how had it stealthily returned ? But Adelalda knew too much about illness to express surprise. " He is not buried," she answered steadily and softly. " I thought you would like to see him, and I had him embalmed." " I thank you," said Geraldine as quietly. Something of the somnambulistic suspension clung to her senses still, though her soul had released her frame — the cold and passion- less serenity, in which all impressions, great and small, sink lightly, Uke bodies in a vacuum. " There is a comfort," she continued, look- ing out now as into space, with a vague, yet solemn, vision. " He did not sutler ; I who saw it suffered. Sensation ceases before life. The sword was sharp, too ; the man sharp- ened it on purpose. His back was turned to Geraldi ; but I saw a tear drop on the steel, and dull it. He knew Geraldi was innocent, I saw his thoughts, and I wondered that he struck ; but, though I was there, I could not speak." Adelaida again shuddered. Whence came this awful familiarity with what ilesh had not experienced — which eye had not seen, nor ear heard ? For it was impossible Geraldine could have been sensibly conscious. She had been wrenched from him, before the sentence was pronounced; had fidlen straight- way into that state which had suspended, at least obviously, her volition. Still more fixed became her gaze — not dreamy, but as if searching the light for some mystery it enfolded, as unseen as in the darkness. " He is now at rest, and some time soon, he will be happy. I wish I could noio see his thoughts, as 1 AiA then ! But he — will — be — happy — when — I — am — back — again — with " — Here her voice dropped a name in silence ; the princess's eager ear lost the sound, though her eye saw the motion of the lips. Strange phenomenon ! Geraldine felt, even in that awakened sense, that she had no right to reveal Geraldi's secret, shel- tered by the grave. " How gently he went ! How glorious he looked ! I saw in his soul that he was glad to die He wanted to write word to Diamid — " Again she paused. "They would not give him pen and ink. I think they thought he wanted to defend himself, and they knew it was of no use. . . . He scratched his wrist, and showed it them — made signs he only wanted a pen, by writing on the air." It was all true. And truly had she read his thoughts, — his soul. He had longed to write to Albany an assurance, signed by a hand with its latest motion, of Geraldine's perfect innocence — his own intended guilt, from which, let it be in justice to him said, he had actually quailed, when it became pos- sible of accomplishment. His agony had. not been the fear of dying, for every drop of blood in his veins was vahant ; but that he had not been able to write such an assur- ance ; he feared, no man would believe a woman's simple word — he knew not th* husband from whom he had separated Geral- dine, yet to whom, in his last hour, he yearned but to restore her, pure. Adelalda, who had intended to make Ger- aldine take some nourishment the moment she showed consciousness, had literally been spelled from her duty ; she could but stand there, and hear to the end, the mysterious story. It was over — all told, and, with the will for action, the power ceased. Now Ger- aldine really fainted from want of food — the strange hunger without appetite, which all who have passed through great sorrows — which are also great terrors — know so well. From this, it was easy to arouse her — it was merely a physical symptom, and restora- tives, which had failed utterly in the first instance, availed directly now. And when restored, the nurse's chief care was to pre- vent the patient from eating too fast and ea- gerly. " Make me strong, oh, let me be — strong ! " was now her only cry. And though farthest from strong, yet after an hour's nat- ural sleep, she woke, and demanded mate- rials for writing. The princess, still sitting in the window, wondered who upon earth she could have to write to — she wrote so much. The sheets covered the bed all round her ; hours afterwards, she wrote still, and there were sheets on the floor; hours after- wards, she wanted more paper, she had filled a quire. This, Geraldine's last compositicm — for she never again had desire to write, nor need to write to him — was a letter to her husband. CHAPTER XXXIII. Singularly as the princess's reign began, it would have excited more general astonish- , ment if it had not been over a kingdom so limited in tract and a people so inert, she was suddenly called to rule. As it had been ushered in with no more state than that — • always solemn, in this, case awful — the right of royal sepulture demanded, so no universal acclaim, no addresses of adulation, nor waste 198 RUMOR. of finances, M'ere permitted by her to succeed it. For the present, as at first, she wore her wonted robes of sorrow, which required no weed additional to make them mourning ; and remained in strict retirement. Except for the orders which none could countermand, nor, so early in a reign, the most disaffected dishonor — the orders for the personal free- dom and temporary amelioration of the most suffering and degraded of her subjects, — she contradicted the precedent, and altered not a phase of government as yet. As for the antique charmed circle of ministers and cour- tiers, they marvelled at this license of repose even more than did the people. And the latter, morally unprepared for the change wrought for them by feminine benevolence, received it rather as a shock, than accepted it as a boon. Then, there was nothing to feed wonder for the wealthy and ambitious, nor curiosity for the needy and ignorant ; the surface of events lay calm without a tide — a calm which, if it were suffered to re- main unstirred, unbroken, for very long, might reasonably be anticipated to quicken into those forms of monstrous evil, inevitably bred by idleness — whether among courtiers, or amidst criminals. Adelaida knew this well ; she had reasons great and deep, and as philosophical as ever swayed a woman, for permitting such a state of things to last awhile. She desired her subjects to experience the need of gover- nance, to ascertain their absolute inaptness to rule themselves ; she willed to excite in them a universal yeai-ning for a safe, strong guid- ance to a place among nations, higher than their country had held before. Exhausted by tyranny, she would have them rest with- out action, and without hope or fear, in order that they might recover some portion of that mettle, which is, to a multitude, what the «' tone " of the physician is to the human institution. Had she chosen, she could easily have won for herself a fictitious loy- ilty, a passion for homage, such as one so fail- may ever expect from the majority, and which, if she be also so wise, she may even keep warm for herself, in a thousand hearts, for years. But it was not for years, she longed that her country should benefit through her influence, it was for ages — to the end of time. And being so wise, she trusted neither to her woman's beauty, nor her own unworldly wisdom. During Geraldine's sick trance, she had attended solely to her ; on her recovery, rapid as her lapse from strength, her nurse left her often, providing her with every book and means of recreation appertaining to her- self. Then the princess shut herself up in her rooms m the palace, and wrote many letters, all with the same superscription — all ou the same subject, for the simple reason ihat she received no answer to the first, nor second, nor any, else she had only written one. They were sent by special couriers, who, at least, had sworn to di iver them, anif swore, on their return, that they had been delivered into the proper reciiiient's own hands. So, no answer came ; at last, after despatch- ing seven letters, all couched in the same tei'ms, almost the identical words, the prin- cess gave in, or her patience gave way. Still she staid sedulously in her seclusion, and therein assumed an air, which was certainly pure from all passion save that of pride, but which breathed from brow, from gesture, an-l from eye, — for the first time, a pride excel- ling love ; for it was pride outraged, triumph- ing in humanity over love destroyed ; and Heaven, in that human crisis, cannot help its children. Adelaida, in her pride, be- moaned herself over its very absolute and necessary indulgence ; for she had reflected, had meditated, had speculated, all in vain, to understand why Porphyro had thus in- sulted, through her royalty, her womanhood. It was Porpliyro whom, in all those letters, she had addressed; and Porphyro, as man, as gentleman, as soldier, as director — albeit she no longer loved hira — was, indeed, difli- cult to realize in insult towards woman, fre- quent as had been his lapses — unknown to her — from the severity of virtue, and he had actually never failed in kindness to any hu- man being. There is limit to all anguish, unless meant to kill, and simple wound to neither love nor pride does that. The limit crossed her ex- istence suddenly, and quickly, as a line across the daylight drawn, and made an electric pathway. In fact, by electricity she was told, through silent rushing Avhisper it made her ware, that Porphyro, on a certain day — breathed, too, in silent mention its near date — would visit her. And that was all ; no fate a woman cherishes, to be left in igno- rance of a man's will towards her, even in so slight a matter as a visit ; for Adelaida was woman enough to be sensitive on that point ; she would, lovelessly expecting him, right royally receive him, in revenge --not of him, "but of herself — that she could not with fairer and tenderer honor greet him, and because all yearning for his coming ceased. The limit of the hundred years sleep made scarcely livelier noise through the enchanted palace. She sent for the grand chamberlain, she called the ministers ; the decorator of apartments was alone with her for hcfurs in her room. Her commands, which instituted arrangements the most profuse, the most superb, and peremptorily royal, were issued with haughtiness, with resolution, with cour- age ; aftecting her servants unresistingly. Beyond Cleopatra's super-feminine fascina- tion, or Catherine's brazen sex-defiance, or the iron tact of Austria's typicial empress, seemed the power of this ])ale girl's will, for the first time breathed in words. None questioned the undeniable mystery of her I mood ; all hastened to achieve its large de- RUMOK. 199 iigns — vhcse result, like their " final cause," must be postponed a page or two. Time brought the morning- of Porphyro's visit. The precise hour of that event had been left out of mention, and Adelaida — whether it should prove to be early or late ■ — did not choose to appear, as she felt, im- patient. She therefore lingered long in her sleeping chamber, now left clear to her, for Geraldine had been, in the safest hands of all the world for her, removed aAvay. Ade- laida wore her conventual dress — would she retain that ton ? However that was to be, she now leaned listlessly to the sight, on the sill of the open window. Thoughts bright and dark, like wings of birds crossing, now in sunshine, now in shadow, the face of day, swept softly the empyrean of her spirit. That empyrean seemed an immensity of solitude. For the thoughts were not antici- pations — they rushed from the chasm of the past, hence their shifting light and dark- ness — hence their incapability to companion or console the present, or whisper promise for the future. In fact, her mind had aspired to that rarest frame, in which flesh must ])erish prematurely, unless drawn for- cibly eartliwards by the warm breath of human sympathy, or the magnetism of long- suflering love ; too rare an atmosphere to breathe in — too high above mankind, and yet too for — how far below the lowest heaven ! The dead love's ghost, invisible, haunted that solitude with its own empty, unseen, voiceless presence, making itself felt by creating, within solitude a solitude. And the new and living love seemed as far as Heaven, as unknown as angels' faces, as impossible to realize, through sense, as God Himself. These rare moods beguiled her. Certain that all her preparations wi-e complete, she heeded not the momenus, as they melted into minutes, nor the minutes, as they slowly lengthened into hours. In reality, she passed four hours as it were thus suspended between earth and heaven. In the glowing, burning afternoon, the still hot hour when the sun drove all crea- tures to the shade, and the shadow brought them sleep — the time when the very flowers seemed to dream, and the fruit looked charmed like the golden bunches of Hespe- rian groves, when the lucid sky lay face to face in light with the lustre-dissolved depths of the lovely bay ; then a great sound of a lilver clarion gushed through space, making Itself a way irresistible as a lightning or a wind. Adelaida alone, and vividly awake, heard it fearfully : — it seemed to transfix her brain, its echoes thrilled and rang there like the pulses of a sudden wound. And before the old gray convent walls had trem- jled out their last vibration, a second salute pealed silvery — this time as breathing soft as the shell of Orpheus heard in the depths of the darkest forest. Not withering into silence this — but proK.Aged, and passing into a superb and ardent strain, the peculiar double-cadence, at once mellow and ear piercing, of metallic instruments in concert, unqualified by wood or string. A bass of drums, rolling on into the city's silence, seemed to rock the martial measure on its heavy monotone, but not the maitial measure only, another sound, deeper and, though as regular, intermitted, which the melody was not ; this other sound seemed to echo from under ground th.* dull throb of tha stricken parchment on the air. And it seemed to the imagination of Adelaida. fired suddenly, like the tread of a great arvny trampling forwards to destruction. For ar instant the listener quailed; she was «"umai after all, and the blood seemed to i;- a'-e it. coursing, and stand in her veins i'.e-stil' The next it rushed back to her heart with the courage of a thousand virgiii'j, in the!/ purity secure. She waited not ?. moment after that — the time was come for energy, if not action : sne. nastened into the coui t- vard, where her carriage had the whole mo'-n- ing waited, and in ten minutes more was safe within the palace. Now its prepara- tions seemed doulily necessary, as guarded by hundreds of soldiers and men, they would suffice for welcome — for defiance — or for defence. But the purest-minded imaginative woman may mistake a man, especially a man she has once loved too carefully, and now too carefully dislikes. The silvery blasting chal- lenge had been a peaceful one, if triumphant as pacific ; and even Adelaida rallied, and half-disdained herself, when she heaid the music and the march draw nearer ; knowing then that both had entered at her gates, and been received there by her owii e.5pecial ser- vants, appointed by herself tr, .vatch all day for Porphyro, whose arrival al', had expected, without being aware of the special features which should invest it. She placed herself at tbe central window of the seven which spread ivide their crystal sheets in front of the lai^est rece])tion room. She had not changed her dress, and its sombre quietude contrasted most singularly with the dazzling array and royal superfluity around her, but not so remarkably as with the picture which, a few seconds after she had taken there her station, dropped as it were by magic before her eyes. Across the lawn, whose emerald enamel sloped half a mile towards the bay, there swept suddenly a glittering crowd of guards, not hers, and drew up statue-still : — a band, the most superbly mounted, and walking their horses to the tune — now chastened audibly, while the drums were silent, fol- lowed, and arranged themselves at an angle with the guards. The uplifted instruments, the arms and harness, gave under the sun a glory like molten metal ; no eye could rest on it for long. Lastly, across the double 200 RUMOR. sneen, outshining it for whiteness and silvery blaze, was slowly drawn an equipage, which with its eight steeds, whose heads M-ere held by sixteen men, closed the angle, and was nearest the frontage of the palace. The moment she caught a glimpse of this, and even before it rested, the princess left the window, crossed the room, and passed down the broad stair to the broader terrace. She knew her place as a woman, and there- fore advanced not further. Indeed there would not have been time. The door of the carriage was opened. Porphyro stepped out immediately, and hastily crossed the space still stretched between them. And in that brief interval she had recovered her full consciousness and control. An almost touching impression affected her just then, of the indifference to circumstance of Por- phyro's personality. Looking' at once slighter and stronger, plainer and more interesting than ever, dressed simply in black, without badge or ornament to vulgarize, he seemed more than ever distinct both from men and their inventions ; and as to the pomp sui-- rounding him, he was actually as indepen- dent of it, even in his air unchanged — as a woman perfectly beautiful is of her elegant drawing room, or her graceful toilet. He y\'as himself — why had he sought assimila- tion with the many through a medium they despised ? So questioned Adelai'da her own taste ; not yet her heart responded, for she had not seen all, and she yet guessed noth- ing. Porphyro trod the step of the terrace be- neath her, and without rising to the exact level, sank on the marble at her feet. As of old accustomed, she had simply extended her hand. For the first time, instead of touching it with his, he kissed it. Strange shadeless indignation, and scarcely masl^ed contempt ? Used to vain pomp from her cradle, how sur])rised or mystified her this ? How stung it her suspicion ? Alas for him this time ; she saw, she comprehended, and she sickened at the mystery fulfilled. Yet, it had been distinctly forecast for her, had she but then regarded it — how long agc>! Truthful had been the prophet, who w & no longer there, to behold the strict accom- plishment of his prevision. Accomplished not in those superb rags of purple, nor those sublime drugs of metal, nor in the plumes snow-tufted of the milk- white steeds ; nor in the dazzling panel, on whose surface gleamed the iris, with golden central ci])her of a single letter ; nor in the silk-soft lining of the chariot, iris and star- besprent ; nor in the star and iris, reiterated on every breast, save that of him who^e double sign they were. These were con- ceits, — and if they sprang from human vanity, how much nobler he who shall re- veal, than he who hides, his special weak- ness. But, stay ; the frame of the carriage, raised like a canopy of silver frostwork, supported an imperial crown. " Grant me a short interview alone ; I will lead the way,"' was her first remark. Its assurance, rather of tone than of phrase, momentarily shook the world-tested and emjjire founding audacity of Porphyro. To pluck the lily was not then so easy — albeit it had so slight a stem, and frail a ])lossom. He had to follow her, for she walked on '•apidly. And though in his first youth he had dreamed, his dreams were numbered — ■ the last approached its dissolution. He was wide awake enough to perceive precisely the path they took ; a void and silent path through a delicate and quivering shade. Muorv of another kiss — the only pressure I Incomprehensible was her treatment ; yet of human lip she ever felt — returned to her : not painful as this new salute, which in old day (so short a while ago) she had longed for with all the jealous innocence of passion. Now she drew her hand back quickly, she could not endure the pressure, if prolonged — as it seemed it might be. And , Porphyro lifted his head in amaze- ment — quite sincere. Their eyes met; for the first time his spirit shrank from its full confidence ; — never had her eyes faced him so serenely or so long, or with so little trouble in their gentle glory. And — stranger still — she addressed him at once in accents intimate and haughty — too haughty for a woman in the sweet suspense of hope, too intimate for a woman who loves pro- foundly, with as much modesty as pas- sion. " 1 rejoice to see you, for your presence assures me of your consent to my arrange- ment. Now excuse me but for an instant ; — my curiosity is strongly excited. I ex- pected you as uminl. — And I see he could not com]3lain, for where she took him, thither she also went. It was to the convent, and she gave him no rest nor satis- faction until the door of her own chamber was closed, and they within it. Never had Porphyro's nerves received a shock at once so subtle and so violent ; the change from the dazzling show which lately framed him as its idea, to the colorless and alinost grim seclusion round him 7ioiv, was not so stun ning as the difference between his late cer- tainty of success in love, and his present depression of that conviction — to what was actually, though he refused himself so to recognize it — despaiif, " Sit down, pray," said Adelaida, kindly but very calmly ; " " you must be fatigued'. Indeed, it is a pity you took the trouble to come; a written reply would have suf- ficed." " How can you — I had almost said, how dare you — meet me thus ? I come to be- stow what you have so long deserved — what so long I yearned to give you. 1 What saw she that filled her glance with 1 have filled the world with my name ; I am RUMOR. 201 at last, not worthy, but as worthy as one so unworthy ever cotdd be — of your love." She recoiled step by step, for step by step he pressed towards her. Anger had rekin- dled his smothered love ; its splendors lit the faded sea-hue of his eyes, and pride frowned dai'kly pallid from his forehead. Two such passions never struggled in em- brace so close, so strong ; one must destroy the other, or both die. At last she touched the wall of the narrow room. Still he advanced, and with a ges- ture at once supplicating and imperious, stretched out his hands. They fell upon her robe and glided down its folds, for her handfi were close gathered to her bosom. At his touch u])on her raiment she shook it, removing her hands for the purpose — then crossed them as before. At that sign of what he thought to be a super-refined co- quetry of action, he fell back to the opposite corner. " Strange conduct, strange reply," she said, " whether meant as assent or negative to my request." " Nor do I understand," he answered ; and sudden dejection struck through his voice. The painful accent called upon her vast benevolence ; she had not ftieant to hurt a mitn, only to keep a lover from her presence. " Forgive me ; I was perhaps ungrateful, for it was good of you to come. I grant you have many rights to be displeased, but you, who are so generous, remember mine." "Yours — your rights? Ah, brightest, who remembers them as I ? Am I not here to j)rotect them in protecting you ? " " Peace, peace ! " Her spirit rose again. "Must I remind you, that I — whom, as a woman, you have neither understood nor treated with consideration — that I did not address you in a strain to deserve this re- sponse. That I asked you a question con- cerning a state secret between us — a state secret between two sovereigns, not between a woman and a man." Porphyro changed from pallor to a wan- ness in which witherfed the last tint of life. His eyes were dropped, but not with the old crafty fascination. Adelaida had to call all her courage from her virgin conscience in order to carry on the interview, so deeply did it pain her to see that look, which, if not shame, Mas pride in closest contact with it — " high places made low." " Listen," she said, in a gentle voice, that was yet cold as icicles that drop on the im- penetrable marble. " I do believe you are a great man ; you are, in comparison with most old rulers, and all the rulers of this age, a good man. But there was a time when I thought you best of all in every age — 1 thought you perfect. Ah, well have I been punished ! You knew it : you also knew that you made me unhappy, else your face would not change, your eyes would not 26 lower, in my sight, weak creature that I am, and full of faults. You knew I was un- happy, and you let me suffer." " I suffered myself," said Porphyro, sim- ply, brought down to strict fact by her plain- s]:)eaking, how impossible, if she still loved him, how unlike her when she did! " I knew it. Stay ! I throw myself on your generosity ; for no woman, perhaps, ever spoke so freely to a man before. That is scarcely my fault, however; for I was afraid once to whisper in your presence, lest 1 should displease you. Yes, I thought you perfect then." " Is any perfect upon earth ?" asked Pt-- phyro, pointedly ; but the point was blunt — the weapon uselessly recoiled. " There is one individual, whose circum- stances, if not himself, have attained, in his own eyes, perfection. I am sure, at least, that half an hour ago he thought so ; that he thought, before God and man, he had realized a perfect destiny. And a man's circumstances are always set down to his chai-actp- by me:. ; just as chance is God to most of them. After saying so much, may I speak further ? " " Speak always, even if to torture me." And, to do him justice, he looked as if his pride, if not his love, was racked. " I wrote to you ingenuously, trustingly, not as a woman. That, however, I have said before. I addressed your honor and your intellect. I wished to give you some- thing which would enable you to benefit mankind. Little knew I how enormously you had benefited by men. I desired you to accept my kingdom, which, small as it is, I am unfit to govern ; to wear my crown, which, Hght and little as it is, is too heavy with responsibility for me to wear. And how do you reply ? How do you venture to come, unbidden .^ " " AdelaMa ! " "Yes, unbidden. Do you think I am a woman to beckon a man to my hand ; or to wish a man near my heart, when he has di- vided himself from that suffering which all life has been my life ? Should I have in- vited you? Did I not rather command'? And did my heart sound in my invitation? Are you too modest inwardly, despite yoox outletting pride, to take my meaning : that my conscience, not my heart, had written your name on its fair face, as fan' as it ? 1 knew how you could govern ; and I would have had you, as I would have you still, include my poor section of misguided and tormented humanity under your great direc- tion and strong control. I knew not then what you had further taken for yourself — wasted at your subjects' expense." Porphyro was alarmed ; he had only read women in their common cipher ; this char- acter, his passion, in adoring its fleshy tab- ernacle, had overlooked, j " Surely," he remonstrated, " you do not 202 RUMOR. treat me thus, becaust I have earned — what I might say, if any might, that I de- Bere — a crown." " Did I not entreat you to attend, to bear with nie ? I have gone from my meaning, but, indeed, I am bewildered and unhappy. In losing you, I lost much, Porphyro." "But I come to claim you — to give my- self " " Silence ! " she answered, thrillingly. " Will you never understand ? Do you think I am a person to waste words vagufly ? to torture myself besides for wil- fulness ? " " At once — only once, hear me plainly," he broke in, actually at onoe too literal and too impassioned to believe she was sincere in her retreat, and too ignorant to appre- hend rightly what she hinted. " At once, I offer you my crown, my hand, my love ; will you take them ? Answer me, and quickly ; for, hard as you think me, I tremble." He really trembled ; never before had she given him credit for that sign of weakness strong men disdain themselves for, but all women honor in them. " I am truly sorry that you asked me ; you might have spared — I wished you to spare us both. I cannot marry you." Porphyro had been shot at in the streets three times, and never started ; had ])hilos- ophized twice in prison, when sent therefor life ; had speculated forty years on the pos- sible reversion to him of an old, old doom, by all but himself deemed dead, and at last realized it. He had, in fact, received so many shocks with so much calmness, that he met this lilow worthily — that is, as becomes a worldly man, whose dignity is a jewel even dearer to him than his honor. " I am sorry," he replied, and ceased trembling in her sight by a mighty effort, wbich drove his passion inwards and for- ever. " You would have been the ornament of the throne — the best crown of the em- pire; I say nothing of myself; my com- plaint is not for your ears, as my affliction cannot touch your heart." " You shall not assume misconception. I loved you when I saw you — you made me love you ; I had none else to love, and Nature had for me no soul, for then none of her children loved me. You asked more woo- ingly than in words, for my love. I gave it freely. Then you received it without re- sponse ; it was so you treated a virtuous woman, as if she had thrust herself on your notice publicly. You drew out my whole heart, as the sun opens a flower to himself, and then your icebolt withered it." Porphyro was aghast. It is not too much to say, that through her vivid representation of what a less chaste woman would have con- cealed, he fii-st caught a glimpse of his own error. Irreparable now ! For the pain and ehauie she had perceived at fii-st came not from a cause she suspected, but from one less noble and les^ manly, if more admirable in the world's wide shallow gaze. He had felt pained, because she bent not to him as of old ; she no longer adored him, and he loved adoration ; he could no longer mastei her, she controlled herself. But he had felt ashamed, because he had deceived her in his desik'ns from the beginning, and had wrcught the deception to make way for himself to escape from her contempt, in case he failed. If she knew not he had aspired to a crown, she would neither pity nor despise him fur not attaining it. But now, what had been his error, or vi\\dt felt he his error now ? He had not loved enough ; his love had not been strong enough, nor all-sufficient to direct his passion rightly ; he relied too much upon her faith, a thing so frail and fleeting in a woman who is loved with less than a man's whole power ; though in her, beloved to the utmost and honorably worshipped, the faith is a thing eternal and of eternal freshness. Still, it Mas not in Porphyro to convict himself oi this error, even felt, unconvicted by her ; nor was it in him to give up directly ; he too ardently desired success in this his scheme, for it was a scheme in which other hopes wet-e conceinied than those alone of love. " You will, at least, explain to me the reason. Is it simply because I have attained supremacy, whose sign you do not recognize as one of which I forewarned you ? Or is it because I delayed my hopes, you punish me ? — because 1 esteemed myself, in my mere person and character, unworthy of yours ? If I mistook, have not great men mistaken ? Were not women the first to pardon — the last to punish such ? " " To pardon — to punish ! — how dare you so address me? To punish — above all, to punish one who has injured me, is not my way. And one who has not injured me, how shall I even pardon"? If you will be told, you shall hear. Heaven is my witness, I would have avoided both. I wrote to you on purpose. I might have said it was because you deceived me ; there was a time when it would have been the truth ; and though hard it would have been to myself to refuse you then I would have done it. I might also have averred it was because you kept me in suspense ; for long and long was the loneli- ness you had created for me in making my heart need you. But not these reasons together now suffice ; they are but a part of the truth, and not its essence. I, too, have erred, and I confess it. I have swerved from faith in you. But I wish not to add hypoc- risy to natural failing. I wish to be honest, and tell you that I dare not marry you, be- cause I no longer love you. This is the real, and should be the only reason." There was silence — she hoped he would not break it ; she hoped he would depart. She tui-n«d from him to the window sill, and RUMOR. 203 the light fell on every line of her face — no shade was there. He came a little forward to examine it, to find if there were but a shade of pily, or ray of fond regret. And he saw how soft, yet grave, was the expression — the glance heaven-directed, filled with what seemed quenchless, if it were tearless, nielanclioly. So, like a person at once pas- sionate and perverse, he would not give up hope because she bade him, while yet she showed herself unhappy in the least degree, if far, far happier than himself. Rather, in such a nature, hope, stricken from its near summit of certainty, prevailed too lowly, too prayerfully in self-revenge ; and pride could prevail no longer against the selfishness, which, in that hour, revenged itself on her because she could not gratify it. " It is cruel — cruel — and crudest, be- cause so utterly unlike you — you have torn your own image, like that of an angel, from its shrine, — never again shall I so behold you, unhappy that I am ! Unlike you, as I knew you, and adored you, to dash the cup from thirsty lips ! And to judge hardly, harshly, bitterly, is more unlike you. You did not so judge the dead, whom in life you could not honor. You did not so judge the murderer, whose escape you sealed with your free permission — nor the innocent, who died too soon for you to save, and ] whose sanctified memory you have written saintlier than any canonization." All the world by this time knew the story of the innocent who had sufl'ered, and the guilty who had gone free, nameless the latter, the former blazoned every where, as on a pure white stone. " You have broken my heart — you have crushed my pride — you have stoned to death my hap])iness — and under it my usefulness Mill be buried ; how can I labor the dry length of life, uncomforted — [ alone ? " He continued bitterly ; — " You will be answerable for my errors, for you alone could convict me of them, could de- stroy them, could charm my being from the groMth of fresh ones. Waste, wild, and overrun -with weeds, will be my pathway , now. ... It would have bloomed a garden, whose increase would have blessed humanity to farthest time ; its flowers would j have sprung beneath your smiles, its fruits your presence would have ripened in me. For your smile is all the encouragement after which I languish ; your frown alone is condemnation to me. ... A tear shed on my bosom would have melted my heart to all mine enemies, and a kiss have sealed my peace with the whole world. Now my sceptre shall be a rod of iron, my crown shall not be colder or more sunless than the sur- face of my soul presented to the universe. And for this you have lived — you, a weak and tender woman ; shelterless, unprotected ; \nd alone. Yes, alone — as I." No need for the failing voice, the smoth- ered sigh, the retreat still hastier, yet farther, towards the door. His words had done the work ; they Avere forged like acts in the brain, to do. At first threatening almost, and then wholly subdued ; in both cases, their power came from the soft, soft voice, whose pathos was Mon from will — not from nature over- brimmed with inward tears and fointing in supplication. Poor girl, poor woman, late- loving, but now beloved ! here struck Por- phyro a bolder stroke, disguising its double edge and chilling mettle, with the tendernes? that breathed on both a mist too soft fo; tears, yet containing the soul of tears, as white mist of the morning holds the dew Had she been selfish ? had she studied her own pi-ide, petted her own heart, too much ? spiritualized her aspirations too highly? And he suffered. He had deceived her, had tor- tured her faith with needless trial, but still he loved her. Faithful, when she had follen from faith What mattered it, if she married him ? none would guess her secret history, and he who had contemplated her defection towards him, was now — in the moment of sharpest test — right ready to forgive it, and receive her, in face of the whole world, his wife. ... Of what use to that world, alone and crownless, could she be? And now, if through ker he went astray ? Now this mood was no contemptible de- cline in resolve from weakness moral, nor sentimental excitation of the sex ; she was incapable of either. But he had done the best for himself, in representing himself as dependent on her in the least and lowest degree. Never was woman in so lone a plight — without parents, or fraternal friends or sisters. The last of a race extinct, if she died childless, and unnoticed in history, if she died unmarried ; these two facts might have driven another Avoman straight into the shelter and recognized honor of matrimony. But they would have deterred her. Still to be alone — to have no bosom friend nor life- enwoven intimate. Above all, to be of use — to aid another — another who yearned for her as companion more than mistress ; to be represented — to be believed. Never had her happiness, her safety, nor her real value as an individual, been in such danger. She turned suddenly, deeply-touched and truth- fully, by all the conflicting impressions of her soul, her conscience, 'ind her mind : not her heart, that beat still and changeless under all. She beheld a countenance which had once attracted, and now as physically re- pelled her ; it was stamped with stern depres- sion, fast cooling down, like iron lately hot, to a determinate and endurant hardness ; — should that iron enter his soul at her pleas- ure, and for her pleasure only? Porphyro, Avithout looking, saw his ad- vantage, and took advantage of it ; — what lover, whose whole aim is earthly, would 204 RUMOR. not ? He advanced towards her ; he lingered in advancing, she trembled, but no longer shrunk away. Her eyes filled with a sudden dew, which she had not thought would swell — she only felt the swelling at her inmost heart — the yearning for another too far away, whom nature, true to herself, would yearn for in the place of one too near. And the tears saved her, for she would not have this one behold them, nor ofier to wipe them from her eyes. She raised her hand, which in another instant she might have out- stretched towards him, eternally beyond recall. She raised it to her eyes, and covered them, and longed out of the sud- den darkness for some other Light than light. While doing so there came an answer, a soft and nearly noiseless rustle, lower than the south wind's summer breath, stiller than the shiver of the air through the tops of the long grass, withal as palpable as each, and more living than both together. In a mo- ment more, the sound passed into a touch — a touch ineffable, without pressure or detention, least like human fingers, and im- parting no hint of human presence. She snatched her hand away — she looked ; and through the dim rainbow-twinkle of the sup- pressed tear-drops, she beheld her carrier dove. The darling of her regrets, the idol of her longings, had returned — and not too late K^cept for itself! — The constant, aspir- ing creature, who shall name it soulless? Except for itself — too late for it — it had touched her hand, in token of faith fulfilled unto the end, and faith's farewell, then fallen on her bosom. It would have fallen lower — its impulse was extinct — but that she caught it, and pressed its beak to her living lips, and tried to breathe into it, and held its feet in her warm palm in vain ; relaxed and chill, they took no hold. Too long had been its way across the airy wilderness, and weariness had spent itself to death. Its eyes, Avhose brilliant circles had expressed a love that shamed all human tenderness, whose glance fixed on one far point unseen, had surpassed all human constancy, had dropped under a dull film. It had won its rest, and eai-ned it. Ah, that our rest might be won from our desert, and earned so well, fiweet dove ! Over no human grave had Adelaida ever wept, no death she had ever mourned. But now she felt as though, in naming herself friendless and forlorn, she had overlooked a treasure, a friend, a sister, or a soul who loved her best. Her tears burst forth with- out control. Porphyro's presence was nei- ther preventive nor restraint. Over the Boft dead thing she wept such tears, as while he saw them, he jealously coveted. At that instant he felt as if he would die, so to be wept for by her ; so lamented even for one short hour. But his mood changed, when she untied a paper — only a slip of paper — beneath its wing. He had not ex])ected that ; he did not even identify the feathered angel as a carrier-pigeon ; in these days seldom sent except on errands of speechless or separated lovers. "Few and short" were the words of the message for which she had (uncon- sciously) waited ; yet they saved her — the/ came before the sacrifice she was about to make was otlered. Offered — even if not accepted — had the sacrifice been, that mes- sage would have come too late. It Avas but a slip — a scrap — and it car- ried only these expressions. " I have been mad once, and I afn going mad again, if they leave me here. I am not mad now, when I call on you to deliver me — to come to me ; your presence alone can save me. And I ask no more." It was dated from the House of Health, at a certain town in north- ern Prussia ; sufficient to guide her thither, though she knew not the direction nor the road. Porphyro was not disinterested. He Avas even selfish, as we have shown. But on see- ing her face — or its unspeakable change from misery to joy, as she oj^ened and read the little note, his purpose changed, or rather turned to the temper he should have shown at first. Of course, he thought of a lover — that was to Ije expected ; of course, he was jealous, therefore his pride rallied ; of course, he blamed the unknown for hav- ing ravished her love from him. And he would have blamed her if he could, but, to do him justice, he loved her too much not to desire her happiness ; and once con- vinced that it depended on another, he was ready — almost willing — to give up his cause. " A message from a friend ? " he observed haughtily — he had meant to tone it humbly. " From a friend in trouble," answered she, with real humility — which through .ove sounded proud. Next day, at the hour of noon, Belvidere learned the reason for which the extraordi- nary preparations had been made — the consummation of state accomplished in the council-chamber of the kingdom, before rep- resentatives gathered from every class ; Adelaida — not renounced her rights — but made them over to another. Porpliyro, standing at her side, accepted her gift in a short speech — the most heartily eloquent he ever made. He pledged himself to do his best for her people, and nobly redeemed his pledge. But those, who listening to the strong words of the Emperor of Iris, had known him as the untitled and cosmopolitan Porphyro, remarked a pale languor in his countenance, a subtle air of self-reproach, and, above all, a steadfast melancholy, which had not belonged to him in those old iroQ RUMOR. 205 days when Fate was barren for him, and the Heavens over his petition " as brass." Was it the golden doom that thus affected him with man's least earthly passion — gratitude — or a deeper mystery still, which none in- terpreted — chai-ged with no golden happi- ness, nor treasure more precious than gold ? CHAPTER XXXIV. Had Rodomant been really mad ? Did ever any, who had really been mad, confess it on his return to sanity ? They say so — but like many questions of the school of medicine (dumb and deaf oracle to the mil- lion) it may be answered with more chance of touching near the truth, by the technically ignorant, than by the professionally taught. May not frenzy counterfeit be more terrible to its victim than real frenzy ? seeing that, in the former case, the reason unwarped grasps the agony of the nerves with appre- ciation. And is it strange that common men misname them — honestly, through mistake of the awful nature duplicate, which seems identical ? But it may be almost cer- tainly asserted that of real madness, as of actual death, none give us evidence in ex- planation. It seems m madness counterfeit — the insane condition of the nerves de- pressed or overwrought — and which in- duces a perfect raving after sympathy and a tongue unchained in self-confessions, as it seems in trance — tfiat counterfeit death which physicians tremble to announce, and cannot mastpr, and from whose dread phase of suspension the wakened sleeper tells such strange sweet stories of what it has seen, and heard, and felt ; the ecstasies, the music, the meeting of old friends in new bright homes. But they who were restored from death --real deaths by miracle, of their experience gave no sign. Nor do the mad, restored. The sternest apostle of the t\v«;\lve orders parents not to ])rovoke their children. A master of modern writers, who has a voice, thrillingly reminded jjarents — who expect aJl duty from their children — to fulfil at least first their own duty towards those they bare. But yet, with the misery which fills the earth through their injudiciousness, their injustice, their ignorance — parents are neither charged nor connected. In fact, in common cases of ordinary characters, the sufferings entailed on children after their fii-st infancy are, as it were, a part of educa- tional discipline — wholesome of course, perhaps necessary, and it may be even kindly, as it tends to prepare them for the earthly discipline of experience, and the heavenly discipline of sorrow. Such char- acters in routiue ordinarily survive the mis- understandings and nistreatments of their childhood, without injury to their mora, constitutions, or check to their mental growth. But not so the exceptional, who in every estate and rank, the farther they be indrawn from general sympathy, and the less they resemble their routine companions, the less meet special sympathy — the more are distanced by the little competition of the equal crowd. Above all, in their homes, where they naturally expect tenderness and forbearance — those elements of sympathy — as their due, they cannot exact either, for, in the majority, they do not exist. The super-Spartan hardness and heart-defian:e of parents towards their children results less from secretly indulged selfishness than from callous vanity — the old idea (fit to be ex- ploded with bloody nursery horrors and blackest fables of the supreme evil) that the young think their elders fools, but the elder knmo the young to be so. This conscienceless indifference to the life within, this heartless supervision of the life without, often and often seal premature de- velopment — always so delicate and so ar- dent — for quick disease — disease that kills. Happy, thrice happy, those who die — die to be numbered and glorified with the martyr- dom of innocence. But most unhappy those, who, physically resistant, or strong-spirited sufficiently, survive — survive, to endure the blight of the intellect, that should have opened in perfection ; the atony of the natu- ral affections — the long life-sickness of the exhausted heart. Rodomant had been one of those unlucky for their own comfort, if world-esteemed fortunate beings, a child of genius, with its peculiar faults and mysterious virtues, soar- ing strength and saddening weakness. From his childhood misunderstood, he had suffered less from mistreatment than from the loneli- ness engendered by it, and so far its result. But still, at times, his preoccupation with art, ever a healer, better than Nature, of human nature lacking human sympathy, had conquered suffering and dispelled loneli- ness. During the full health of the faculties pertaining-* to the imaginative mould, the delicious freshness of young creation, sweeter than the freshness of youth or spring, he perceived not his own want of a parent's heart to sustain, rather than a parent's wis- dom to instruct. But in alternative seasons, when the idjjjal lay hueftss and spiritless round him, as a sky under universal cloud, he suffered negatively and dully, his pi'ide would not give the suffering a name, and the sense of duty, which generally coexists with innocence, prevailed too powerfully to allow him to trace the torment to its cause. Further than this, so long as his genius was new, and his senses were responsive to all impressions, his mother's narrow views and dry existence affected him not, any more than the valley mists obscura £06 BUMOR. the vision and load the breath of the traveller springing nearest the mountain Bummit. It was the most unfortunate thing that had ever hapi)ened to him, to be returned, as it vere, on her hands — driven to dependence on her for feminine tenderness and care, just at the time when he had lost his most delicate and powerful sense — that whose closing was to such an organization like blindness — total blindness of the soul. For light is indeed the only fitting analogy for sound, and they who are of music's children love it better than common eyes love light. More unfortunate was it yet, because by this time she had come to consider him of consequence, as he made money, and had lived in royal houses. She had boasted of him to her curious friends and ignorant acquaint- ance — not more ignorant than she, with more excuse She had counted on freedom from earthly cares her whole life for the future, through his bounty, which she named her due, and esteemed as poor part- payment for parental kindness and innate merit. And Rodomant, much like all generous natures, had wrought himself into a frame of fihal hope — a weary, if unuttered, long- ing after rest — rest in which quietly to be let alone to sufl'er, and wliich he fancied must be fulfilled on that cold shrine — a loveless home. Her heart would surely open tu him now, after long absence, returned in woe, which must be sacred to a mother, and her secret— hidden frum all others upon earth. The woe was not only irreparable, but wrong darkened and sharpened it — his own wrong against himself. His conscience was tor- mented with the indiscretion which had drawn down that doom upon his head ; he was not born so fated, at least such was his persuasion, and through it he suffered doubly. Had his mother received him — not to say with open arms, but with decent fondness — he would have cleared his conscience, and opened his whole heart out to her — inju- diciously, of course, but impulsively, and even gratefully — grateful for a friend be- tween whom and himself (intercepted by lieshly ties) pride need not thi-ust its bar- riers. But she was amazed, she was vexed, she was, most of ajl, cold and hard. She showed more stupid than he had deemed her ; he had been of late with a woman the wisest of her sex. She showed stupid, for he could not hear her voice ; and her face — which grim disappointment darkened — her face was as the face of a stranger. Prom that moment, he repudiated explana- tion ; above all, he resolved to conceal from her his infii-mity. There was, then, but one alternative, to seem dumb ; for as he could not hear, how without self-betrayal should he iiswer ? The verj' night of nis arrival — aggravated to her specially, because he had come in a private royal carriage, which had gone away without him, thus assuring her he had come, not to visit, but to live or stay; — that same night Rodomant, driven on by the last hope that merges in despair, -svent to a phy«ician hard by, who had known him, and pro- nounced in childhood upon his " irritable genius." To him, under seal, or rather ab- solute oath of secrecy, he confided his cause of torment, and submitted for examination without a murmur. Baffled completely — for he could detect no flaw nor organic de- fection — this physician called on another, specially and solely devoted to the sense of hearing, and somewhat arrogant in his pre- tentions to inevitable cure. He, too, was baffled ; but he left behind his stricter and more intricate search greater mischief than he found. The nerves, neutrally deadened before, were touched now into living torture, whose vibrations, of stronger agony than pain, seemed to sting and gnaw the very centre of sensation. R.odomant raved at them both, then flung their fees in their faces, and rushed out of the house, and straightway sank into a mood of gloom and heaviness which might be felt — a silent and mortal-daunting mood; he never raised his eyes, he never spoke, scarce ever moved, and hardly ever ate ; worst of all for himself, he never slept ; condemned all hours of the day and darkness at once to hear no hint of the lost music, to catch no echo from the breathing woiid, and to listen to a roaring inwards as of a sea that whelmed his brain. Superstitious to the last and in the lowest degree, and afraid — as all the superstitious are — of insanity in every form, also like the illiterate and unfeeling together, apt to con- nect every unknown and unusual symptom of sickness or behavior with insanity, the mother took her course according to hei creed of ignorance and mock ideas of duty. Directly he had come home, tliat very night while he was in bed, she possessed herself of all the money he had brought, and hid it for her future use. But a few days afterwards, she communi- j cated in person with the charitable commit- tee of a free asylum hi the next town — not her native one, in v. hich she lived, — and obtained leave for him to be examined, in process towards admission, in case he proved insane. All honor to the jury of sane-said minds who sat in judgment upon his. Certainly Rodomant scowled i*pon them as they ap- jjroached, the very image of a dumb mad- man, and when they attempted to handle him resisted and beat them back, in likeness of a strong madman too. His pulse tear- ingiy rapid, thriliingly high ; his head burn- ing,' as if covered with a red-hot ii'on plata on the "region of the brain," — above all. RUMOR. 207 dumb, determinately dumb — though not born so. Proof this last of mania rather than strict madness, as the blood-excitation was one proof of that. It so happened, therefore, that he was removed by force — proof additional and conclusive. Would a sane man struggle against captivity of the will by his brother man ? Of course not, — he Avould go sanely, and sanely argue out his sanity. But fero- cious as he was on the road, despair met him at the threshold of the asylum — that house of health — and chained him strong as iron on every joint, and calmed him like tlie snow-sleep freezing fast the limbs to death. Again examined within the walls, he was quift enough, spirit-spent enough, to be pronounced harmless, to him a worse curse than had he been named dangerous or desperate, for it entailed on him the neces- sity of contact with those actually mad, botli those who were reckoned harmless like himself, and those who had not always been so, but were now reclaimed from the sharper discipline \\ hich had fined down the charac- ter of their frenzy. And if any thing could hive maddened him, that contact would. It certainly drove him desperate in his own consciousness, and made him dangerous to himself. His flesh crept, his soul revolted from those strange faces with all their warped expressions — the sidelong glances, the furtive leers, the grins without mirth, the sighs without sorrow, here and there the spectacle of the rabid instinct, gagged and starved, or the saddest of all wanderir.g dooms — the melancholy mad. The hideous yearning at last came over him to imitate them, to mock their grimaces, their gestures — to cower like them under the master- keeper's eye. And all night they played before his sleepless eyes on the dark wall of his cell, — lay a sick and dreary incubus upon his dreamless brain. At last, controlled by others, when he should have controlled himself alone, his control grew languid and sank, — gave way; he cared no longer to maintain it. The nerve-life, strained to its extremest tension, snapped and failed. What seemed a col- lapse of the faculties in the annihilation of the will, and which was, in fact, the sem- blance of madness, followed. Then followed treatment, instead of simple control and vigilance. What was deemed and doctored as his monomania still remained in form of silence ; that is, he would not speak. But while he tore his hair and rent his dress, he uttered cries like the screams of the dumb, which rent the ears of those who heard them, for he heard them not. Now, the discipline of the asylum shared the age's enlightenment and reform — it owned no torture-chamber, nor chain, nor whip ; but it Avas a charitable and a free asy- lum, aud contained a thousand inmates. How should the idiosyncrasies of all be studied, any more than those of sane children in a charity or free school? They were, like these latter, humanely considered in themas.s, but individiials were unknown among tliem. The 'God-smitten, numbered in heaven, M'ere victims unnumbered u])on earth. They kept Rodomant in the darkness dur- ing that paroxysm, to rest his brain, and in solitude, that he might not excite others. Want of hearing had felt like darkness be- fore, but real darkness was superadded now. At last, light fare, and frequent fasting from that, brought him physically low, and the mental torment passing into the weakness of the flesh, decayed. He was therefore released from darkness, but still not permitted to mingle in the crowd of wandering reasons — well for him. This being a humane institu- tion, innocent recreations wtre permitted, even innocent whims indulged. Rodomant, for instance, had not l)een deprived of his bird ; indeed, he would have fought for it to the death, and none could have laid a finger on it Avithout actual danger ; but it had been used to darkness, as all trained members of its order are, and suffered nothing from it. Sane enough, in his nervous extremity, to be afraid of doing it harm, he never touched it all that time ; it sat on the perch of its large cage in a corner, and as it is called in bird- fimciers' jargon, moped ; in reality, that which it had in place of a soul, ])ined after the soul that had cherished it. After his re- lease from darkness, Rodomant treated it as of old — kept it in his bosom, and fed it from his hand. No idea of m d^ing use of it struck him then, for loss of personal free- dom at first aff"ected him as with the sense of death — living burial, withal — total and necessary separation from the liv- ing free. The bii-d drooped ; but Rodomant had never seen it in its joyous aud vivid mood — that spiritedness which birds certainly pos- sess, if without souls — therefore, he feared not for it; and he chose not to notice it more than was necessary, because of its con- nection with her. But once reaccustomed to the light, and thankful, if not glad, to be alone, he craved to test his powers of com- position, or to discover whether they were lost. He must, for that end, communicate with some one. It was not then to be thought of, for he was resolved as ever not to speak. There was even a charm to him in withholding his voice, because it seemed now all he could call his own, and master in secret possession. Idleness, however, was unendurable, and at last he brought himself to write — he had thought of it at first, and repudiated it — on the princess's tablet. She had put it into his hands at parting. His request (simple enough) for pens, ink, and paper was instantly granted, though he waa watched a while, and several of his first effu- sions were carried away to be examined. !08 RUMOR. Bit, proviid to be notliing but scribblings in musica. notation, they were pronounced luumless as their author, upon whose disease they tended to throw no light. So spoke tho Ammiltee ; but had one of them chanced to be a profound musician, he might have traced the disease through all its phases metaphysical therein, even to its souixe ; 80 inexorable was the science, and so ex- ])ressive the passion, of that his artistic ))astime. liut Rodomant had written at first too ve- hemently, and the ])hysical energy was spent too soon for his peace — for his patience. Now, for the first time, idealess, heart-sick, ho])eless, he turned passively to Heaven, and saw, alas ! a face between himself and Heav- en, which made Heaven shrink to distance immeasurable and incredible — beyond his soul, his aim, his attainment. For he could not reach her — how Heaven, then, which must contain her? He had no longer the right to love ; at least, if he had been really mad, a fad he knew not that he doubtfd. Then, of coiu'se he did not love ; he denied to himself the possibility ; he icould not, again he leaned upon his- crushed and uselessly-suspended M'iil. And again it yielded, and he charged the weakness, his love's relenting, upon an- other — that other no human soul. On a bright morning, the bird, pined to thinness, wiiich its soft down and delicate full i^lu- mage concealed, dashed suddenly — wildly — agiiust the window, at that moment closed : — then flew round and round the room, uttering low calls — Rodomant heard not, though he watched its motions with amaze. Next, exhausted, its heart panting through its whole frame, it perched upon his hand, surveying him with expressive, piteous ghn- ces — eyes that bemoaned its fate in looks more sad than tears. Then flew round the room again — and again beat its wings ag liust the window. Lastly, came back to his hand, and flxed its eves once more on his. Rodomant correctly interpreted the bird's desire — but allowed not to himself that it l)ore the slightest resemblance to his own. He would not keep it captive — he had suf- fered too strongly in captivity. Long had been the bird's captivity — long even as his own. It should fly — it should go free. But for it to go free was to go home, happier than he and wiser than its heaven-given instinct; — it had wings, and knew how to direct them in a path along a track- ess way. But, sending the bird without message, woidd it be recognized and received? Were there not in the winged Avorld more thou- sands like it? Was it not long, long since she had seen its eyes ? What if she closed lo it her window — refused to let the com- missioned stranger 'inter? This was some of the nonsense of lovers' logic. Then there was more he uttered to his own heart , - if he wrote he must write the truth, he aared not tell her lies ; further, had she not com- manded him to write in trouble — only in trouble, — and dared he disobey? Besides, there could be no harm in writing, and no danger, if he confined himself to strict com- ])laint. She was most likely, besides, by this time married to Porphyro, and as a woman safe from him or any man ; — this last false ■ argument clinched design. For Rodomant no more believed that she had married Por- phyro, than that she would turn the bird away from her window. This noncredence resulted not from any knowledge of Por- phyro's imi)erial realizations, for he had Jieither read nor inquired for information, on his account (since leaving her). So, written with a trembling hand, and tied with trem- bling fingers to the wing of its aerial Mercury, the complaint was sent. Wished back of course, directly it was too late for recall ; and contemplated with sullen pride, as the sealed sign-manual of self- degradation. Now, when Adelaida I'eceived that com- plaint, — the short, sharp, silent call out of torment unnatural, unspeakable, at length unbearable — it is not too much to say that she suff'ered agonies of conscience, as well as heart. She had never heard him describe or fliscuss his mother ; but he had ever named her with a simpler show of honor than he accorded to any in his speech, always saving herself alone. But like all noble children who have never known a mother, she thought a mother must be the sweetest and the safest friend — the surest comforter — the most judicious adviser, too. Even now she did not know, nor guess, how far his mother was to blame ; but she must be to blame, if she had permitted others to claim the charge of him. Perhaps, however, she considered the mother had died suddenly ; for her char- ity was boundlessly suggestive. Then, the whole blame belonged to her herself. She had let him go — alone, friendless, without security for his future. In fact, at the mo- ment of his departure, she had erred, and that the first time in her life, through pride — a womait's divine, yet selfish, instinct to conceal her love in that last struggle : she had studied her own interest as a woman not his as a human being. She had not dared to question the fact of his departure; she had not dared to hint at his detention, even for a while. And now she was dou1)ly punished : his suff"erings, past and irretriev- able, fiiced her full, — dread spectres of sub- stantial agonies endured b}' him in the jjower of others, and those others — what might they not be ? What dark secrets of the darkest prison-house of life might not scare his memory now, forever, and cloud his gen- ius for all' time ? She shrunk in thought from that view of the sidiject. But, liesides, the brief message expressed only the wild RUMOR. 209 and cTiftined desire to be free ; only demanded her to fulfil her promise — a promise given by herself, not extorted, nor ^even asked, by him. Not a sign of any passion but despair imbued it — not a word concealed the slight- est hint of love. Her task was now set - - to screen her love behind her human interest, and under patronage's frozen veil to hide her passion. Rodomant's mother, having done her duty by him, sate at peace in her own house. She would even have said, could she have put her meaning into words, that a person pos- sessing that dangerous, troublesome, and useless gift, called genius, was better in con- finement, if humanely treated, even if not mad. She was an ignorant woman, weak in sex and spirits ; he was watched and cared for by wise, religious men, well paid to do their work, and therefore sure to do it. It was all for the best — better than if he had remained at home in idleness — better than if he had remained in full exposure to the temptations of the world. She was, however, rather disconcerted when one day a travelling carriage stopped at her door, and a lady of commanding ges- tures and ineffable beauty made inquiries concerning her son. She read more than disapjn-obation — disgust, disdain, in those queenly looks ; and the loving eyes flashed forth a lightnii^g at her, Avhich pierced tnrough joints and marrow, and the hard wall of her heart, to conscience. But she was not rebuked, except in silence, and the terrors of the expressive eyes. The exact distance and direction gained, the lady went her way at full speed ; but delight and dread surpassed it. The mother had been, through all her fears, imjjressed with the gravity of the bright lady's dress ; and it had alarmed her further, for she recognized the set religious costume, though it prevented her from form- ing impertinently-romantic or insultingly- rash conclusions. The costume she wore gained Adelalda entrance ; without it she might have failed, for she carried no certifi- cate from the committee, nor sign of any social rank. She was, according to her re- quest, admitted as a visitor, and expressed i desire to see all over the asylum. An officer and a nurse accompanied her. Much they marvelled at her slight and rapid survey, after the strong interest she expressed — at her soft, hurrifd steps — her breathless, low inquiries. Greater was their wonder, when they reached a certain door. " It is a dumb madman in there," explained the nurse paus- ing ; " and he has been dangerous. He went mad on music, the doctors think, for he is always writing it, and tearing it to pieces again. Besides, the phrenologists felt his head, and the bump for that is largest — except self-esteem. Should you go in there ? it would be better not ; he is apt to take offence, above all at strangers, 27 and has an awful way of looking, even when he does nothing worse. He had a bird — a pretty pigeon — when he came here, and then he would not let any one touch it. But we think he has strangled and hidden it — perhaps eaten it ; they have such tricks and fancies. We cannot find it, however — and yet, perhaps, it flew away." But the visitor not only insisted on enter- ing — she would go alone. A double golden handful won her the permission, which eiee had not been granted. And directly she entered, she bolted the door inside. She started when she saw him first. For an instant — shorter than a breath — she knew him not. For his back was towards her, and one sign of mortal winter had fallen on his mortal spring. He was now indeed, — " A youth ; with hoary hair." But though he heard her not, he felt her even before she came. Her steps dropped on the silence of his being — listening alone, as it lived alone, for her — like echoes of unheard music, or kisses sweeter than all music, which the spirit in embracing long before the meeting in the flesh — gave back the Spirit for its hope. And he turned to- wards her a face shining clear with the shadoiv of the glory which gives light to the heaven of heavens. And stretched out help- less arms : token sufficient of humanity in the beloved, for the loving woman upon earth. Love's secrets, like those of death — are sacred ; be they so untold. Diamid Albany, — not as he had desired nor expected, — received his reward. Few husbands would again have taken a wife, as he took Gerakline — to his bosom, to his heart, to his life, for all life. Without ques- tion, without reproach, without decline from devotion, without even change in the method of his tenderness. What indeed would it have been to him of assurance, to be told, to have confessed to him what he already deemed he knew P — that as her love had faltered and her faith a season failed, he could never recover her heart. For this he believed, this bitterness steeped the sweet fountains of his life's first joy, and changed its flavor. She never knew it ; for no bitter- ness had turned his LOVE, and that was given her fi-eely — more freely than when she first gave hers. Then, why should he reproach her ? Could she help it, if his love had failed to satisfy her of his truth ? Too compassionately — too simply, out» of uncon- scious pride — he sxirveyed her nature, for reproach to be reasonable in his eyes. How, either, could he change his manner, even to enhance his dignity ? for he had once de- ceived her, no she thought, he would never apparently again deceive her. So his love — strong, pure, and deep as ever — fulfilled its every impulse, and was free. But none knew the secret of his impaii-ed and melan- 210 RUMOR. eholy happiness. He scarcely knew himself how much he suffered from the beHef, to him fact, that Geraldine's love was not his •wholly, albeit she had in faith returned. Possibly, had he revealed to her this his misbelief, she could never have succeeded in convincing him it was fiilse. As it was — for, in comparison with her love, her tender- ness, her yearning over him yioio ; her first young passion in its bud had been but pre- scient and imperfect. In this, her first full bloom of womanhood, she fancied herself to feel, as indeed she showed, more reserve towards her husband than in her first mar- riage. For Geraldine — poetess still in mind and heart, though never again in deed, — always named to herself her union in the first instance which Diamid and their subse- quent reunion, — as though the former had been the marriage made on earth, the last the marriage fulfilled and finished — if not made — in Heaven. And the space between the two was as it were to her soul the gulf ^of death overpast, and forgotten in the peace of the paradise beyond attained: — as we may fondly and faithfully believe our own dark passage to the light shall be — for- gotten, M'hen we attain that light. But that reserve of hers, which she attri- Duted to her own unspeakable gratitude, and the things "by the ear unheard," as by the eye " unseen," pertaining to perfect mar- riage ; mysteries, even so accomplished, but secrets, unless accomplished ; that reserve resulted in fact and only from the woful episode Avhichwas to her as the grave passed through and no more remembered, but which to Diamid was an open and an empty grave, ever yawning dimly beneath his feet. She had left him once, might not she again leave him ? For that first time she left him, he believed — how help it ? that her heart had swerved. Alas, what right had he to expect that she should stay? He had (so he considered in himself) selfishly sought her love, and forced upon her his, too early, at an age when almost any child of ideal mind will respond to the prophecy of woman- hood. And now — he believed, she remained with him because it was her duty, and even forced herself to take his love with smiles, to accept it without tears. Perhaps no person except a woman would have believed or could have understood that Geraldine had never, as a woman, loved Geraldi ; and that she was as guileless of passion for him as she was instinct with pure affection. However, as Diamid never, even in their first meeting, alluded to Geraldi, Geraldine dared not. He refrained from fear of breathing on the scarce closed wound ; she, from fear of feigning re- gret she did not feel. For never death of one so near in the dear affinity of blood, brought such full repose to the survivor. Perhaps, also to the dead. Thus it happened that on that subject there never was any explanation given nor asked, — both avoided it. But the difference between them in this instance was, that Ger- aldine, after a short spell of her new bliss, forgot the intervening anguish altogether, even to its remotest cause ; while Diamid remembered it continually and ever, to the end of life. Tlien was the mystery made clear, with all the mysteries besides of love, of sorrow, and of death. What, then, was his reward in l{fe7 That he, a soul, whose one temptation Avas the most earthly and the least sensual of all ihe passions, the only passion, it may indeed be said, which in no spiritualized form what- ever, shall survive the grave, — re- isted that temptation once for always, until the end. He repudiated his life's pursuit, and crushed to dust his idol for his love. He renounced his hold on fame, and consigned to oblivion what he had safely and fairly won. Physicians ordained, and her obvious con- dition confirmed their ordinance, that Geral- dine could not live, or that to tempt life there, would be to experience relapse, which must be fatal in a northern, any northern climate. She was, therefore, to remain in Italy. Italy — to a man, like Albany ! Yet there he remained with her. Italy, theme inexhaustive of poets exhausted, and pet paradise of idle lovers ! For him a flower whose honey had been drained, a spring dried up, a changeless picture of one eternal dream. Yet there he remained for life, and so sealed her health, her comfort, and his own marriage vow, as well as her happiness, for truly she adored her home. When he had left England on the receipt of her letter, that letter whose very length and full expi'essiveness deceived him, he had been on the point to realize the desire, long delayed, of his intellectual being, and of what he dearly esteemed besides his moral worth and public fitness. A vacancy had occurred, which, on his filling it, had raised him nearest the head of government ; and iii another month or two, that head-command, long coveted, would have been his own. • His departure from England, so sudden and inexplicable — his non-return ; entailed on him the inevitable suspicion of incom]ie- tence, with which the incompetent and vain love to charge the competent and proud. Even his best friends disliked, contemned, and spurned him in his retreat, and their partial verdict crowned the decision of the crowd. He h:K([ failed at the crisis of politi- cal probation, and all his earthly labors went for nothing. More fruitful blessings than fame bestows were given him in his solitude, and made life's garden blossom like the rose. But the ambitious — the best-hearted of such — are ever ambitious for their children ; thus his ^ melancholy became tinctured with that of " hope," as well as that of " resignation." He was, as far as man can be, a faultless father, Geraldine as faultless, as a mother. RUMUtt. 21] Their children certainly reaped joy and early instilled knowledge from the past sorrows of both their jmrents, and the faults of one. Never were children so gay and fair, so win- ning, and so wise. Their father devoted his life to their education, and with them their mother learned. Neither was that great gift of offspring the exceeding great reward. If his name faded in his own lifetime, and in sight of his own yearning eyes, from fame's wan scroll, whose brightest record oblivion gathers to its dust of six thousand years at last, — it was written on a page unturned by man, a fair white stone which bears eternal testi- mony to all Sacrifice, the least and greatest if sincere. . . . Lady Delucy reached Calcutta before her child, by what was almost a mir- acle of speed and self-denial, for she had not paused an instant on the voyage ; and when Elizal^eth arrived herself, mind-weary, worn in frame, and almost exhausted with antici- pation — only not sick at heart, nor failing in love's own courage — she found herself in her mother's arms. The surprise was for- gotten in the surpassing joy, the comfort in- effable, the speechless sense of rest. Eliza- beth had much to learn after that, and her voyage had been a kindly induction to the rapid changes, and often rougher phases of her life. For a time, her mother, remaining with her and her husband, hoped to take them back with her to England ; but in short while Lyonhart, from being a commander of armies, became also a governor of peace — an heroic fixture in that land, whose unde- ciphered characters he first attempted to explain to others — to themselves — and was certainly the fast to learn himself. And Elizabeth, happy as she was, glorified in his supreme devotion, — yet, womanlike, pre- ferred infinitely to share personally the rigors of his position abroad than to enjoy his society and his love, entrenched in the calm of her useless rank, at home ; nor did she ever try, in the moment most dangerous or critical, to entice him from his duty. Her mother returned to England with her child's first child, then two years old, and there awaited the fresh arrival of other chil- di-en year by year. As she never parted from them — as she doted on them — and as though born under the tropics, they were children, one and all, of blood heroic and boundless spirit, she experienced one loss in gaining them. Hundreds of hapjjy days — years of happiness as she enjoyed through them, and they through her, she never had a quiet hour in her after-life. And the greatest of all the excitements which ever befell her after her return to Eng- land, was a journey she took to visit a cer- tain deaf musician and his sweet wife in Germany. The wife framed and sent the invitation, he would never have invited any one, last of all his first fair patron. But Adelaida, who had insisted on receiving all details of his life before she knew him, and had traced his artistic experience through every line and shade, had learned, without commenting to him upon it, the inestimable kindness with which one of her own sex had blessed her husband in his sore need. Di- rectly she ascertained that benefactress to be in England, she longed at once to express her own gratitude in person, and to see the woman, who — without loving him — had fostered his genius in its strong and strug gling infancy — without whose care, it or its possessor with it, might have prematurely perished. Probably she also desii-ed that the lady should meet her husband in his full and bright renown — a renown he cared for absolutely nothing ever since it had been com])assed and retained. Now she could not have wished to re-introduce him on account of any improvement in his grace or gallantry, for he had made no way in either, — he had rather declined in both. Surly to strangers — incomprehensible to friends — for admirers impracticable — grotesque as in his unformed youth, and five hundred times more difficult to influence : he received Lady Delucy like a fresh foe rather than a friend of old ; but it was not because he lacked feeling, it was because he felt too much. His wife however made amends for his behavior, for his proud, speechless grat- itude, and his iron indifi'erence towards all women but herself; with her fadeless beauty, her exquisite wit, her exhaustless tact. But it was also true, that, except to him, her heart and her love were sealed. Lady Delucy never knew how — nor whethei really, after all, Rodomant had betrayed her secret. Such small secrets, which go to make up the sum of great ones, are seldom — except in books — explained on eai-th. He had not to work for bread. His wife had taken care of that. Too tenderly she tortured herself with the infirmity that harassed his flesh, and which he never con- quered — even in spirit — the triumph of the wife lay in that fact ; for, never amiab'ie in his existence, his restless temper had turned to moody now. He adored her, but frequently tormented her — she loved him all the more. To her only he complained — raved — condemned the decree of fate, which he deemed not ever that of Heaven. And the more she suff"ei-ed on his accoui.tf, the more she loved him still. But would not have done so, but for her knowledge — the knowledge a woman never misses — of his unchanging love. Lady Delucy won- dered somewhat at their marriage, over which she yet rejoiced. But she never saw them when alone together. He was not enforced to work for bread, because Adelaida, in renouncing with her earthly rank, her worldly influence, and all her cares ; had retained a small but rich 212 RUMOR. estate, out of ths scale of royal possessions, ] more men than any-living monarch, be that which had belonged to her own mother by i little or gi-eat to say. In public repute he right. Its products sufficed for both of them, shares the contrary honors of deity and for they were equally temperate, equally un- demon. Devotion and detestation are twin worldly, and both luxurious alike only in guardians of his throne. For the rest, still charity, in music, and in love. * * * his name and fame are new among the na Porphyro has benefited, if not mankind, | tions, and still his reign is — Purple. ESTES & LAURIAT, PuhlisJiers, Booksellers, and Importers, No. 143 Washington Street, . . . Boston. C. E. LAURIAT. DANA ESTES. Knighfs Popular History of England. 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RETURN TO-^- MOFFin LIBRARY LOAN PERIOD ALL BOOKS ARb bUBJbCI TO RECAI I " ,^,ENEW BOOKS BY CALLING 642?2452 DUE AS STAMPED BELOW isnA FORM NO. DD 19 UNIVtRSITY OF UALIhORNIA, BERKELEY" BERKELEY CA 94720 6000 ■ " ■■' '■: ■m.1^ svi 10 OTO sqi' wojaq ^9941. b io 1 ;j399iii "imm nt aiujo^ / i6 •BIUJOJTl-BQ JO A;iSJ9Alun MUX JO AHVHan ^V J