HERMAN, 
 
 BY E. FOXTON, 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 LEE AND SHEPARD. 
 
 1866,
 
 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865, by 
 
 LEE AND SHEPARD, 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts
 
 TO THE MOTHERS 
 
 PUTNAM, SHAW, AKD THE LOWELLS, 
 
 THESE VOLUMES AEE DEDICATED. 
 
 IN REVERENT SYMPATHY. 
 
 2063521
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THIS story was written in the years eighteen hundred 
 and fifty-seven and fifty-eight. 
 
 It is now presented with little alteration to the reader, 
 less as a picture of the state of things to-day existing among 
 us, than of a state of things from which the war of to-day is 
 delivering us, of a state of things into which we may be 
 thrust back to-morrow, if we listen to those who would 
 fain prattle to us of the " constitutional rights" to tyranny 
 of armed, or vanquished, traitors. 
 
 BOSTON, 1865. E. F.
 
 Contents of Volume I, 
 
 CHAPTER L 
 
 MM 
 YOUNG AMERICA, 9 
 
 CHAPTER IL 
 THE KNIGHTS LADY, 25 
 
 CHAPTER ILL 
 THE KNIGHTS TRYST, 43 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY, 61 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 THE KNIGHTS VOW, 77 
 
 CHAPTER VL 
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH, 96 
 
 CHAPTER "VTL 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN, 127 
 
 CHAPTER VHL 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET, 161 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS, 201 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE LADY'S PRIVILEGE, 219 
 
 5
 
 VI CONTENTS OF VOLUME I. 
 
 CHAPTER XL PAG*. 
 THE ARMORY, 227 
 
 CHAPTER XH. 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP, 256 
 
 CHAPTER TTTT. 
 THE 8ISTEE8 OF CHARITY, 295 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 THE LADY'S SHRLFT t 338 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT, (Concluded,) 361
 
 HEKMAN: 
 
 OR, 
 
 YOUNG KNIGHTHOOD. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 YOUNG AMERICA. 
 
 " Odiprofanum vulgus et arceo." 
 
 .HORACE. 
 
 " Of all things under heaven that make me merry, 
 It makes me merriest to see a boy 
 
 That wants to be a man." 
 
 PHILIP YAN ARTEVELDE. 
 
 MRS. MYDASS gave a ball. Many of her newer 
 acquaintance who were bidden went to it ; and some 
 of her older acquaintance, who were not, improved the 
 opportunity which their enforced seclusion afforded, to 
 meditate and comment upon the wholesome text, 
 " Pride goeth before a fall," evincing thereby in them- 
 selves an edifying amount of humility and charity. 
 
 Mrs. Mydass, in the mean while, stood under a 
 splendid chandelier, in a very pretty little blue-and- 
 silver boudoir, a handsome, haughty she-millionaire ', 
 and she looked it, in a smuggled crimson velvet, trim 
 med with point lace, fresh from Madame 1'Hoste's at 
 Paris, and in an attitude which would have been as 
 fine as her dress, if her nose had not been unfortunately 
 1* 9
 
 10 HERMAN. 
 
 posed just an eighth of an inch above its proper alti- 
 tude, which gave the expression of an unsuccessful 
 effort to smell of the roses in what Mr. Dickens says 
 " a lady calls her back hair," an effort to be con- 
 demned, not merely as unsuccessful, but as altogether 
 fatuitous ; for the roses were not like those which her 
 first-love used to put into it in the little back garden, 
 but of muslin, and probably smelt accordingly. 
 
 A cordial pleasure tempered the terrors of her 
 majesty as she welcomed her friends, i. e., those whom 
 she wished to have for her friends, leaders of the ton, 
 reigning belles and beaux, prominent politicians of the 
 dominant party, a distinguished author or artist or 
 two, and last not least, (for she had been by nature a 
 warm-hearted creature, though now a good deal spoiled 
 and spoiling,) two or three of her early play-fellows, 
 who were " respectable " enough to keep still within 
 her sphere, whom she did love, and who did love her. 
 Most of these favored ones rewarded her by calling her 
 " charming " and " fascinating," (which she certainly 
 was when she chose to be,) or, if their tongues were 
 tainted with snobbishness, " high-bred," (which she 
 certainly was not, unless it be high-bred to be bred up 
 by one's grandmamma in the little parlor-kitchen behind 
 what used to be her milliner's shop in Newburyport, 
 before she and her only son, between them, made the 
 money which made Mrs. My d ass.) Towards all the 
 rest of her visiters, however, summoned to visit her, as 
 they had been, by notes partly at least in her own 
 handwriting, notes which, if she had had anything of 
 that spirit of generosity and honor for which only, if at 
 all, is aristocracy to be held in high esteem, should 
 have served as their guaranty against the slightest an- 
 noyance from which she could protect them while 
 under her roof, towards all these, I am sorry to tuy
 
 YOUNG AMERICA. 11 
 
 that she conducted herself as if she had convened 
 them to envy rather than to share her prosperi- 
 ty, and as if she could find no better way to 
 promote the cheerfulness of the occasion than ad- 
 ministering a moral cold shower-bath to them on her 
 very threshold. Equally sorry I am to say, that they 
 revenged themselves after it by getting together in 
 corners, and repeating, with gloomy joy, a certain dark 
 tradition, said to be confirmed still by the memories of 
 many juniors of " the oldest inhabitant," to the effect 
 that her maternal grandfather had often been seen 
 riding through the streets of the city in his cart, laden 
 with the disjecta membra of the leafy lords of the for- 
 est, felled by his red right hand. This was true ; and 
 a very sturdy, jolly old fellow he was ; and if his grand- 
 daughter's respected husband, with all his " respecta- 
 bility," was half as honest, I certainly don't mean to 
 deny that he was, because I know nothing to the con- 
 trary, except a story that he failed while he was in busi- 
 ness in ISTew Orleans, and has never paid his creditors, 
 ' why, then, I have only to say that he was one of the 
 noblest works of God, whether he looked like it or not ; 
 one cannot always judge by appearances. Moreover, if 
 the conjugal Mydass had been half as good-humored as 
 the grand-paternal Frost, he would have been also one 
 of most good-humored works of God ; but alas ! 
 he was not, and Mrs. Mydass herself could have 
 borne witness to the fact, if it had not been con- 
 trary to all laws of courts or of courtesy, that a wife 
 should be required to testify against her husband. 
 
 Calling imagination to the aid of history, after a cus- 
 tom established, if not authorized, by the example of 
 most chroniclers of men and things, past and pres- 
 ent, some of these outraged, not to say outrageous, 
 J<jPsV<noi even went so far as to assert that one
 
 12 HERMAN. 
 
 of their hostess's grandmothers had been a nursery- 
 maid. This was false ; she was only a house- 
 keeper; but, false or true, what should all of these 
 blood-curdling myths concerning the origin of Mrs. 
 Mydass's family go to prove, except its present nobility ? 
 Tiiey were not, they could not be, one whit more atro- 
 cious than the legends connected with the rise of many 
 of the most illustrious houses in ancient Greece and 
 mediaeval Europe. Nobility, in short, would seem to 
 have a natural tendency to grow out of ^-nobility, as 
 flowers do from the refuse of the sty or shambles. Yet, 
 what young American would not be a nobleman ? We 
 are commanded to repent of our own sins, but not of 
 those of our forefathers, luckily, for we are often 
 rather proud of them than otherwise, though they are 
 visited upon us in more ways than one ; and, in the 
 present case, Mrs. Mydass looked unconscious and not 
 at all repentant. 
 
 Revolving around her and each other in their steel 
 hoops, like double and triple stars of many colors, the 
 little be-flounced, be-flowered, and be-ribboned de- 
 butantes, in pink, sky-blue, white, and yellow, went 
 tilting and swaying through the crowded door-ways, to 
 the dazzling drawing-rooms, with their gilded walls 
 half covered with large pictures, all supposed, by the 
 uninitiated, to be originals by foreign masters defunct, 
 two or three deserving to be such, and one really such. 
 In these drawing-rooms, winter and summer seemed 
 met to receive the pretty, shivering, human butterflies, 
 on floors as white as snow-drifts and as cold to their 
 tiny, white-satin feet, and among masses and mounds 
 of flowers from many a green-house far and near. 
 The handsome and stylish,* so-called, were instantly 
 
 * Style. Analysis: (Bandoline + Crinoline + Chatter 
 -i- Laughter) 2 46
 
 YOUNG AMERICA. 13 
 
 pounced upon by their respective, and it is to be 
 hoped, respectful, admirers, and whirled and twirled 
 themselves up into the seventh heaven like Eastern 
 dervishes. They enjoyed themselves very much. The 
 plain or shy fled from the feet of the polka like chaff 
 from the hands of the winnower, and were speedily, we 
 would not be un courtly enough to say kicked, but 
 danced into corners where, as the air gradually heated, 
 they bloomed like blossoms bedewed with hot tears 
 from the candles above them, or were driven by sud- 
 den sorties and sallies of the dancers upon the orchestra ; 
 and, while it blew Labitzky into their ears or fiddled 
 him into their tresses and ~berthes, fanned themselves 
 industriously, and smiled hard. They enjoyed them- 
 selves as much as they could. 
 
 The handful of elderly gentlemen got chairs for the 
 handful of elderly ladies when it was possible, but were 
 duly admonished by the younger beaux that they must 
 not presume to meddle with those destined for the sup- 
 port of the younger belles in the panting pauses of the 
 waltz. They gazed benignly around, remarked how 
 delightful it was " to see the young people so happy," 
 and, if their benevolence was tempered with prudence, 
 took good care to keep their venerable toes out of the 
 way of the happy young people. If it was not, and 
 they did not, they had them soundly trampled on ; 
 their benignity proved as fleeting as their youth, and 
 their age was wrapped in deeper gloom. 
 
 As the night wore on, the matrons politely clapped 
 their fans upon their gaping mouths, like covers on 
 boxes. They patiently took mental notes of the dresses 
 present, that they might be able to tell their absent 
 friends " about the party," or treasure up a few useful 
 hints for their own future costumes. The old married
 
 14 HERMAN. 
 
 men now and then attempted a little wit ; but the 
 younger ladies would and the elder could hardly smile 
 upon them. So, after sundry furtive peeps at their 
 watches, " the feeling" among them persuaded some of 
 the hapless old wives and widows to go to the card-tables 
 with them, to make the time seem shorter, and then 
 took them to their coaches unless they had dancing 
 daughters present, when they left them to their fate, 
 and to the dawn of the coming day. " The unfeeling " 
 forsook them speedily, and forgot their own woes to- 
 gether in talking politics ; invaluable topic ! omni- 
 present like the weather, and so much more exciting. 
 
 At midnight, in the armistice which precedes the 
 German in the dancing-rooms, while the mass of the 
 company were contending in the supper-room below, 
 or endeavoring still to force an entrance, the pure 
 moonlight sweetness of Schubert's Serenade was play- 
 ing through the half-emptied apartments ; and several 
 nmsic-loving couples, as if wafted by it, like flowers 
 waved by a soft south wind, were gently passing to and 
 fro there, to enjoy it. Two young men of the world, 
 however, (or, as truth compels me to own, boys of the 
 world, for the oldest of the pair could not have been 
 out of his teens,) were disturbing the listeners very 
 much by their chattering, as, with their eyes full of 
 eye-glasses, they lounged near one of the folding-doors, 
 languidly reviewing the slow procession, which passed 
 and repassed before them. 
 
 " Who comes here ?" said Mr. Robert Jones, as a 
 rather pinch-featured but well-dressed lady approached 
 them, with an expression of shrivelled ecstasy run to 
 seed. 
 
 " A granny, dear !" rejoined Mr. John Robinson. 
 " What did you look at her for ? Some horrid old 
 maid !"
 
 YOUNG AMEETCA. 15 
 
 " No, it wasn't. 'Twas Mrs. Jonathan Howard. 
 I ogled her as hard as I could, on purpose to make her 
 think I'm a nice young man, who can appreciate moral 
 and intellectual excellence even after beauty may be, 
 just a little, on the wane. Too much mind ; but 
 her husband has a lovely place down on Clam Beach, 
 lots of company all the time in summer, and I want 
 to make her invite me next July or August." 
 
 " Has a husband and place at the sea-shore, has she ? 
 That's some apology for her ! I don't see what busi- 
 ness women of her age have to go out, though, only 
 meandering about, and getting in the way of the peo- 
 ple the party was made for, and trying to simper you 
 into finding their carriages for them, just as your part- 
 ner gets desperate and goes off with somebody else. 
 They ought to be ' stayers at home,' as the good book 
 says." 
 
 " Here's an old maid for you now, if you want 
 one." 
 
 " I don't, thank you ; but I know her, and she 
 knows me too, I'm afraid ; for she would stand winking 
 and blinking, with her eye-glass Up, at Mrs. Eben Clif- 
 ford's, the other night when I was manager, right in 
 the way of everybody in the all-round, till at last, in the 
 conscientious discharge of the duties of my office, I really 
 had to dance right into her. You wa'n't there. Too 
 exclusive, were you ? Lots of fun you lost by it, let me 
 tell you. Half a dozen of us nobs went together, and 
 had it all our own way. The house of Clifford were so 
 glad to get us on any terms, that old Ebby couldn't 
 say a word. He only walked round the whole evening 
 rubbing his hands, and asking us to take wine, and 
 thanking us for coming. Well, I had that horrid Miss 
 Andrews, you know, two yards in the girth, and
 
 weighs twenty stone! 'Twas no fault of mine. 
 I never asked her ; but she would keep taking me 
 out, and tiring me to death ; and so I thought I'd break 
 her of it, you know, and kill two birds with twenty 
 stone. So first I spun her round till she didn't know 
 where she was ; by Jove, my arm's been as stiff as 
 buckram ever since ! 'twas like giving a screw 
 to Bunker Hill Monument ! Then I put on the steam, 
 and made her show her paces, got her going at a two- 
 forty in a retraite, and bounced her right into Miss 
 Simmins, and Miss Simmins into a cocked hat ! m 
 
 1 Oh, what a fall was there, my countrymen ! 
 There you and I and all of us fell down, 
 And the next couple stumbled over us I'" 
 
 " What ! Went down, did they ?" 
 
 " Miss Andrews on top of Miss Simmins, and I on 
 top of all ! I meant to brace myself back when it came 
 to the point, as I have done hundreds of times in such 
 emergencies, and bring up all standing ; but the floor 
 was waxed, and my boot slipped, and, as I told you, 
 my arm was good for nothing; and then conceive of 
 the momentum of that mass in motion ! Simmy's 
 breath was squashed out of her, under the pile of us, in 
 one little squawk, just like what a toy-dog makes when 
 you tread on it ; but, after we pried Miss Andrews off 
 her, she didn't seem so much the worse. 
 
 'Tender maids are tough.' 
 
 Perhaps 'twas quite as well for me, that neither of 
 them did recover her speech till I'd had presence of 
 mind enough to be faint, which I did, luckily, before 
 either of them thought of it. Sam Holmes and Seth 
 Somerville had had their eyes on me all the time, and 
 understood, and were perfectly enchanted with, my
 
 YOUNG AMKRICA. 17 
 
 conduct from first to last ; so they rushed to the rescue, 
 and tumbled me out into the dressing-room, and pearl- 
 powdered my face to an affecting pallor ; and Minny 
 Blaise and Fanny Flirt came out and fanned and 
 cologned me. That little Fanny Flirt's a real duck, 
 only sixteen ! 'twas a nursery-party, you know, and 
 so much manner and savovr favre ! Self-possession's 
 perfect !" 
 
 " Apologized yet ?" 
 
 " Not I. I've no business to speak to Miss Andrews, 
 because I don't know her ; and as to the venerable 
 Simmins, if I approached her with any such purpose, 
 the natural candor of iny disposition would break 
 through all the figments of conventionalism in some 
 such speech as, ' Aged maiden, it is you who owe an 
 apology to me, and not to me only, but to the society 
 of which you are no ornament ! You have received but 
 the deserts and the portion of intrusive old maiden- 
 hood ; and, if you do not like them, consider what 
 business you have to be an old maid, or to have any 
 portion at all beneath the sun. You are thirty, 
 madam, thirty years old, if you are a day. You 
 know it; and no doubt the parish register shows it. 
 Long ago you should have ensconced yourself in the 
 wed ding- veil, or in the shroud ; and if our laws were 
 not conceived in a spirit of most weak and self-defeat- 
 ing mercy as short-sighted as yourself, they would set 
 apart a convenient little space in the Back Bay, near 
 Braman's Baths, to be used as a Bosphorus in which to 
 drop you over, and with you all other offenders 
 like you, who presume to keep their patronymics 
 after their twenty-fifth birth days, at the very latest. 
 The Humane Society ought to furnish sacks ; and, 
 if it won't, you can set some of your sewing-circles
 
 18 HERMAN. 
 
 to make them, instead of aprons for the Broad-street 
 babies !' " 
 
 " You'd make the girls more attentive to us than 
 they are now." 
 
 " No matter. It's a good fault." 
 
 . " Well, I've no objection to the plan, provided 
 you'll save me out Clara Arden, as our little Nell al- 
 ways makes the cook keep the prettiest kitten for her, 
 when she puts the rest of the litter in soak, as the 
 washerwomen say. If my dog didn't shake half a dozen 
 or so of her cats from time to time, we should be eaten 
 up by them ; but when he does, I'm sorry to relate, 
 she shakes the house simultaneously with her voice, 
 and will not be comforted, like Rachel weeping for her 
 children." 
 
 " What do you want Clara Arden kept any longer 
 for ? By the way, here she is ! ' Talk of the 
 devil ' ! " 
 
 A lady and gentleman of singularly fine and dis- 
 tinguished presence were drawing near, towering above 
 the couples before and behind them, in fair, calm, and 
 generous beauty as well as in stature. 
 
 "Who's that with her?" 
 
 " Why, her brother, the Doctor. Don't you see, 
 you blind bat ?" 
 
 " Why does he walk with her, then ? What a 
 spoon !" 
 
 Edward Arden walked with his sister for three rea- 
 sons : first, he liked to please her ; secondly, he was 
 fastidious, and thought her decidedly, and, with one 
 exception, incomparably, the handsomest and most 
 graceful woman present, and accordingly the most 
 suitable companion for himself; and, lastly, consider- 
 ing himself on the whole the best male speculation in
 
 YOUNG AMERICA. 19 
 
 the matrimonial market, he always labored under the 
 unfounded apprehension, that somebody would take it 
 into her head to marry him, and that he should not be 
 able to help it without taking more trouble than he 
 usually found it agreeable to take about anything ; and 
 he was therefore glad to place himself under his sister's 
 protection. 
 
 " I don't believe she's a day over twenty-three," re- 
 sumed one of the interlocutors. 
 
 " What'll you bet ?" 
 
 " Not much. The last boat-race shelled me out 
 like a pea-pod ; and the governor got wind of it, and 
 was perfectly savage. I've been as poor as a beggar 
 ever since, and shall be till next quarter-day ; after, too, 
 unless he comes round." 
 
 " I don't see that she's anything to make a fuss 
 about, though. She's a good-looker, to be sure ; but 
 she hasn't half the style of Miss Moad." 
 
 " I thought she was an angel, once. I tell you I 
 did. "What are you smirking at ? I tell you, she was 
 as good as an angel to me, once, when I was a little 
 chap, and had the measles. We were at Saratoga, at 
 the United States Hotel. There was a great hop and 
 just as my sister-in-law was going to lead off in the 
 Redowa, Dr. Arden, who knew she couldn't be every- 
 where at once, ran up to see after me, and found me 
 half mad with dreams, fright, and fever, all alone, up 
 in the third story, where they'd put me to keep my in- 
 fection to myself. Nobody could hear when I called ; 
 and my hussy of a nurse had gone off, flirting with 
 somebody. Well, my sister was sorry, of course, and 
 did what she could; but she was engaged twenty 
 deep ; so she asked the doctor if he wouldn't just send 
 a waiter to find the nurse. But the man couldn't find
 
 20 HERMAN. 
 
 her, or didn't try, or something ; and meanwhile I got 
 to sleep again, and dreamed the devil had caught me, 
 and was cramming my month with cinders and ashes. 
 I howled right out, and woke sputtering, with my 
 tongue feeling exactly as if I'd had a particularly good 
 time at dinner the day before, which wasn't the case." 
 
 " As if you had a whole duck in your mouth, with 
 all the feathers on, bitter as burdocks ?" 
 
 " Precisely ! But before I knew where I was, Clara 
 Arden had hold of me, and was lifting my head up, 
 and patting my pillows ; and I did think she was an 
 angel, and asked her to make the devil keep off me ; 
 and she smiled, and said she would. I believe she 
 could, if anybody ; and when I came to my senses, 
 and she found how thirsty I was, she rang the bell, and 
 spoke to the servant in that gentle, queenly way of 
 hers, that he knew he'd got to mind, and made him 
 bring her fresh water, and powdered sugar, and a great 
 dish of currants, in a trice. And there she stood, you 
 know how, as she always does, so 'light and yet so 
 stately, like a magnificent white pigeon just come 
 down, in her white tarlatane, that seemed to light up 
 the black chamber, and brewed me the nicest drink I 
 ever tasted. Then she sat down by me, and talked, and 
 laughed, and cooed out pretty little cheerful stories, till 
 midnight. Pretty well frightened the nurse was, too, 
 when she came back, to find her there ; while all the 
 time we could hear the teetle-tum, turn, teeile-twn of 
 the music going on down below ; and she was the best 
 dancer there that summer, though unfortunately too 
 tall. She's a real trump ! There isn't anything I 
 wouldn't do for her. I declare, if I was anything of a 
 marrying man, I'd marry Clara Arden to-morrow 
 rather than any other girl in Boston."
 
 YOUNG AM.ERICA. 21 
 
 " Thank you, Bobby ; but I should want a little 
 longer notice," said a soft, arch voice at his elbow, as 
 Clara, repassing, curved her white throat, and nodded 
 good-hum oredly, but rather mischievously, back at him, 
 over her long, sweeping, snow-drift of a shoulder. 
 
 " Good gracious," ejaculated the discomfited Bobby, 
 coloring up to the tips of his fingers, not to say the rip 
 of his glove. 
 
 " Served her right for eaves-dropping ?" rejoined 
 Mr. Jack Robinson, who was, like a mosquito, very 
 venomous for one of his size. 
 
 In the mean time, the supper-room was pouring up 
 its tide into the drawing-rooms again, like a reflex 
 wave from the Spouting Horn ; and a few skirmishing 
 waltzes were preluding the last grand engagement. 
 
 " By Jove, what a stunner !" 
 
 "A screamer ! Who is it ?" 
 
 Neither a pugilist nor a town-crier, as these epi- 
 thets, (evidently, from the tone in which they were 
 uttered, intended to be complimentary, though other- 
 wise certainly a little alarming if employed to charac- 
 terize feminine attributes,) would have seemed to imply, 
 was entering the room, but a superb girl of eighteen or 
 nineteen, as tall and fleet-looking, and almost as slen- 
 der, as Diana's spear, and just now, at least, looking 
 almost as sharp and fatal. Her outline was as oriental 
 as Rebecca's ; and she seemed to breathe from every 
 feature an expression of indignant pride, which would 
 not have misbecome that heroine when she threatened 
 to dash herself down from the battlements. At her 
 side moved a slender but very shapely youth, whose 
 height, and age too, apparently, scarcely exceeded hers. 
 He would have been, like her, uncommonly handsome, 
 but for the unnatural paleness which discolored his
 
 22 HERMAN. 
 
 fine, earnest, oval, olive face, a paleness made the more 
 conspicuous by the bright blackness of his moustache 
 and thick, round curls, and the almost blackness of his 
 burning brown eyes. They passed, speaking little, and 
 in tones too low -to be heard above the general outcry 
 of conversation about them. He looked much at her ; 
 she, straight on with a gaze which seemed to pierce the 
 very walls and the future before her. When her lips 
 unclosed, he grew, if possible, whiter. 
 
 " I know who it must be ! Miss Constance Aspen- 
 wall, of South Carolina. She was to be here. They 
 say she's worth four hundred thousand dollars, niggers 
 and all!" 
 
 " Put it up to a million, white you're about it, Bob. 
 But, by George, what a temper she must have !" 
 
 " Don't like such a little partner, I suppose," said 
 Mr. Bob Jones, unrolling, and drawing up his lank five 
 feet eleven of skin and bone, as if he had been a tape- 
 measure, from the divan on which he had been lounging. 
 
 "'I had a little husband 
 
 No bigger than my thumb. 
 I put him in a pint-pot, 
 And there I bid him drum;' 
 
 and then I took a most ecstatic twirl or two with Rob- 
 ert Jones, Junior, Esquire. Guess I shall have to try 
 my luck. If she's cross, I'll : 
 
 "Hallo! Why, that's Herman Arden with her! 
 It's a perfect tableau of Judith and Holofernes ! He's 
 chalky enough already ; and she looks as if she'd have 
 her fingers in his hair in another minute. Do you 
 know what he did the other night ?" 
 "Got tight?" 
 
 " I should think so. He went and made a nasty 
 sneaking Abolition speech at a caucus."
 
 YOUNG AMERICA. 23 
 
 " What got into him ?" 
 
 " The deuce, I suppose. I wonder he dares show 
 himself anywhere among genteel people. He might 
 have known Mrs. Mydass didn't want him here, and 
 only asked him because she couldn't get along without 
 her 'most particular friends,' his brother and sister. 
 He must have some brass to speak to a Southerner af- 
 ter it a lady especially." 
 
 " Hallo, Miss Blaise ! I'm not ready for you yet. 
 You know Miss Aspenwall, don't you ? Present me 
 to her first, will you ?" 
 
 " Miss Aspenwall, Mr. Jones. Mr. Jones, Miss 
 Aspenwall." 
 
 " May I have the pleasure ?" said Mr. Jones, ex- 
 tending his arm. 
 
 " I thank you. I never waltz." 
 
 " Oh, then, you don't know how much you are 
 losing! One turn with me will whirl every scruple 
 to the winds ; and " 
 
 " You will have the goodness to excuse me. Good 
 evening." She swept off to a window, but there she 
 found herself followed still, by Herman. " What does 
 this mean, Mr. Arden ?" 
 
 " Good heavens, Constance, what does it mean ? Do 
 you know what you are doing ? You know, you must 
 know, how what you are, and what you are to me ! 
 and that I offer you a heart not worthy of such a 
 prize as yours, indeed, whose could be ? but, if there 
 is no tenderness in yours to plead for it, I must say for 
 myself, a true, fresh, loyal heart at least, ready and 
 eager to serve you to the death second only to the God 
 who made you ; and to love you only I dare not say, 
 less than Him, but only too well ; and you trample it 
 in the dust beneath your feet, turn upon me, and cast
 
 24 HERMAN. 
 
 me down at one stroke from the threshold of heaven to 
 hell, and reject me, not, (as you have a full and un- 
 questioned right to do,) with womanly gentleness, and 
 consideration due both to your character and mine, but 
 with scorn and insult with no explanation ! Is this 
 worthy of you?" The color that the smothered vehe- 
 mence of his low and hurried words had brought back 
 into his face, and the sort of indignant tenderness that 
 glowed in it, made him perfectly beautiful. 
 
 Constance's bosom heaved for an instant; for she 
 was a girl, and not a heartless girl, but it was only 
 for an instant ; for she was a haughty and determined 
 woman. " Perhaps it is not." 
 
 " Of your rejection,! do not claim a right to ask an 
 explanation." (Poor fellow ! If he had not been the 
 most delicate and generous of lovers, he might have 
 claimed all the right to ask it, that could be given him 
 by as much tacit acceptance of his tacit wooing, as a 
 most maidenly and dignified girl could grant.) " Of the 
 manner of it I do." 
 
 " You shall have it." 
 
 " When ? I have pressed you far enough already, 
 for such a place and time as this." 
 
 " You have, indeed !" 
 
 " Oh, Miss Aspen wall 1" 
 
 " To-morrow morning, if you please, at half-past 
 eleven." 
 
 " Will you allow me to inquire for your coach ?" 
 
 " No, I thank you. Mr. Yan Eooselandt is here."
 
 THE KfllGHT'8 LADY. 25 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE KNIGHT'S LADY. 
 
 "A daughter of the gods, divinely tall, 
 And most divinely fair." TENNYSON . 
 
 " Eire la destines voiUe ffun grand komme, agir par sa main, 
 grandir dans son sort, driller sous son nom, c'ttait la seule ambition 
 que lui fdt permise, ambition tendre et devouie qui scduit lafemme, 
 comme elle suffit au gtnie de sint&resst." 
 
 LAMAETINE. 
 
 CONSTANCE ASPENWALL was a very intelligent, very 
 high-flown, and, as she would have said with pride, a 
 very high-spirited girl ; or, as she ought to have felt, 
 with shame, a very high-tempered girl. She was an 
 orphan. Her only brother had thought himself sum- 
 moned by the love of glory and of his country, to 
 leave her, in the year 1847, and go and try to shoot 
 some Mexicans, for endeavouring to defend their fami- 
 lies and certain lands belonging to them, which these 
 United States would have been much better without, 
 and did not want, but which a few slaveholding indi- 
 viduals thought that they did, for the better holding of 
 their slaves and supremacy. His enterprise terminated 
 in the Mexicans, very naturally, shooting him. The 
 poor young man, though ignorant and infatuated, was 
 generous and well-meaning and deserved a better fate, 
 like many other light-hearted and thoughtless youths, 
 who were butchered like beasts, or broken down for 
 life, in that miserable and wicked war. To make other 
 little sisters orphans and desolate, he left his own, cry- 
 ing bitterly, to the rearing of strangers, and his negroes, 
 2
 
 26 HERMAN. 
 
 crying more bitlxerly and with more reason, to the ten- 
 der mercies of un-overseen overseers. 
 
 How the negroes fared, never fully transpired. 
 Colonel Rochemaurice, Constance's cousin, and guar- 
 dian of her. property, conscientiously visited her plan- 
 tation once in every twelvemonth, and usually found it 
 expedient to place the management of it in new hands ; 
 but that was all that he found time to do in regard to 
 it, except to see that a proper amount of produce was 
 regularly forthcoming and sold, and that the proceeds 
 were profitably invested. 
 
 Constance herself, in the meanwhile, did neither 
 so well nor so ill as she might have done. The influ- 
 ences of a gentle and genial home, invaluable to a rich 
 but wayward nature like hers, were lost to her. She 
 was kept, for the most part, during the remainder of 
 her minority, at one and another boarding-school at 
 New York, where she imbibed the necessary amount 
 of spelling, arithmetic, and foreign languages, and 
 learned to draw and paint a little, and to play and sing 
 magnificently. She was not generally beloved by her 
 schoolmates, because she did not generally love them ; 
 but she always had one or two retainers, who admired 
 her beauty, applauded her spirit, shared her lavish 
 allowance of pocket-money, and, until she fell out with 
 them in their turn, were very fond of her; as they could 
 hardly help being; for, when she allowed herself to be 
 gentle and fond, all the concentrated warmth of her 
 natural disposition burst forth, and warmed the few on 
 whom it fell, as the June sun is hottest when it breaks 
 through a hole in the clouds on an overcast day. She 
 wished to be a queen among her companions. She was 
 crushing in her scorn to rebels . but her obedient sub- 
 jects found in her a powerful and bounteous pro- 
 tectress.
 
 THE KNIGHT'S LADY. 27 
 
 Alas, poor Youth! How Nemesis stalks at your 
 heels, picking up your every fault, and sowing it, to 
 raise a harvest of sorrow for your reaping in after days ! 
 How each of your peccadilloes grows up into a habit ! 
 And how are you suffered, rashly, confidently, and un- 
 fearing, to entangle and knot the thread of which the 
 web of all your earthly life, the only life for which most 
 of us care much now, is woven ! Such as Constance 
 had been in her school, such she came out of her 
 school, and, thinking to bend a playful, caressing kitten 
 to her will v laid the full weight of her girlish hand on 
 what rose under it a kingly young lion ! 
 
 Even when kind to her companions, she " felt," that 
 is to say, fancied, herself immeasurably superior to 
 them all. Thev were frivolous, girlish, and childish. 
 
 */ / o 7 
 
 Their thoughts ran on dress and admirers ; and it had 
 never occurred to her to ask herself whether the indiffer- 
 ence for which she gave herself credit, on these points, 
 was not, so far as it was real, the mere apathy of 
 satiety, a satiety which offered itself to her at nursery 
 parties and summer watering-places, long before her 
 regular debut. They had no such aspirations as hers. 
 She had a soul all on fire with what stood in her mind 
 for the love of country ; and the South stood in her 
 mind for the country, and three hundred thousand 
 slaveholders for the South. The denunciations of 
 the South, which she met with in some quarters, 
 and the equally indiscreet and violent denunciations of 
 those denunciations, which she met with in others, alike 
 inflamed her pseudo-patriotism, and, as a Southern girl, 
 she considered it incumbent upon her to hate the 
 North. If her -country would but point out to her 
 some sacrifice which she could make, some service 
 which she could render to it ! If there were only Clo-
 
 28 KEEMAJST. 
 
 rindas now, how she would rush to Mexico, and avengo 
 the loss which, in her gallant brother's death, had been 
 sustained both by herself and her native land ! If she 
 had been a man, she would have conquered for it this 
 whole continent, from the pole to the isthmus ; nay, 
 perhaps to Cape Horn ; (bigness standing in her mind 
 for greatness a rare mistake! but pardonable in a 
 school-girl ;) and then, mighty in counsel as in arms, 
 she would have consolidated it all into one vast repub- 
 lic. A crown should, indeed, have been offered her by 
 her grateful and adoring countrymen, but she would 
 have majestically waved it aside, preferring to find her 
 own glory in the grandeur and liberty of her exalted 
 nation. The South, meaning again the Council of 
 Three Hundred Thousand, should govern it, c'est- 
 a-dire, hold its government offices, and fight for it. 
 The supple and pusillanimous, but ingenious and indus- 
 trious North, should be kept out of mischief, and 
 suitably employed in fetching, carrying, spinning, and 
 weaving, for it ; and all within its borders should have 
 been beautiful order, dominion, and glory, had she 
 been a man. Being not a man, however, she shrank 
 instinctively, as most persons of fine feminine natures 
 will, from wishing herself one, as a kind of sin against 
 her nature. She turned from the dazzling vision, 
 came down from the throne of her castle in the air, 
 and set another Lord upon it in her place, thus : 
 
 When she was emancipated from her school, and left 
 behind her the prosaic and grovelling companions and 
 teachers, w r ho could not so much as understand her, far 
 less sympathize with her, she should emerge, of course, 
 like other heroines, into an appreciating and admiring 
 world, all whose unmarried men would at once throw 
 themselves at the feet of a creature endowed with such
 
 THE KN-IGHTS LADY. 9 
 
 wealth, rank, intellect, spirit, and beauty. Most >f her 
 suitors would be too far beneath her for anythii.g but 
 her very scorn to stoop to ; but among them there would 
 still be one glorious kindred spirit, waiting only for the 
 inspiration of her ardor, loveliness, devotion, and sym- 
 pathy, to prove himself the mightiest champion and 
 most stainless patriot of his age and time. Him she 
 would cherish with her whole soul, and honor and 
 obey ; yes, indeed, it would be her own will to obey 
 him, her mightier, grander, more magnificent self, 
 and the beautiful untameable, won at last, w r ould exult 
 in the silken bonds and golden chains with which her 
 love should fondly deck her and bind her to his side. 
 
 Ah, Constance ! Our wishes often come within our 
 reach in this dim life, but oftenest, perhaps, in a mas- 
 querading dress ; and so we turn away from them, and 
 are wiser and sadder when it is too late. We strike 
 them down, it may be, with our own hands, and then 
 the mask drops off ; and we know them as they lie 
 in the dust before us ; but, though we weep and wring 
 our hands over them^they cannot rise again. They 
 are dead, and can return no more, or only as pale 
 Memories, which are the ghosts of Hopes, to haunt us 
 in our lonely hours, with "those saddest of words, 'It 
 might have been ! ' How should the apostate cru- 
 sader know that the helmeted page is his Rosalie? 
 Why should he not clench "his gauntleted hand" 
 against him ? How can Penelope tell, that the wan- 
 dering supplicant on her hearth is her own longed-for 
 and prayed-for Ulysses? Why may she not set the 
 dogs upon him, or let the other suitors slay him? 
 How can we see whether or not we are spurning our 
 happiness or clasping our woe ? 
 
 How, indeed, if we are living like apostates or pa-
 
 60 HERMAN. 
 
 gans ? But there is. a certain very old-fashioned, not to say 
 obsolete, Book, which says, " If any man lack wisdom, 
 let him ask of God, who giveth to all liberally, and 
 upbraideth not; and it shall be given him." And 
 though this promise probably refers more directly to 
 wisdom in the management of one's heavenly than 
 one's earthly affairs, yet the two are closely connected ; 
 and heavenly wisdom would certainly save us from the 
 most lamentable of our earthly errors, and from those 
 bitterest of regrets which come when we discover that 
 we have suffered ourselves to be cheated into sacrificing 
 some bliss, offered us by the God who serves us, to 
 some demon whom we at the time were serving. 
 
 Constance, however, was not aware that she was in 
 any want of wisdom, nor yet did she consider herself 
 to be living in the least like an apostate nor a pagan ; 
 for she went to church at least once every Sunday, 
 when the weather was fine, and scolded herself very 
 hard, not to say very justly, out of -a prayer-book. Out 
 of church, to be sure, she thought humility a virtue fit 
 only for servants, small traders, ^ind clergymen. Hell, 
 in her creed, was a very suitable place for dirty, igno- 
 rant, and wicked people, who used bad language, robbed, 
 and murdered. It was very meet and right, that they 
 should be kept somewhere out of the way of their bet- 
 ters, or else be burnt up at once. ]S"ow and then, 
 likewise, there might be an exceptional condemnation 
 thereto, in the case of some unusually ill-behaved lady 
 or gentleman, who died suddenly, or perversely and 
 unaccountably refused on his death-bed to say he was 
 sorry, repeat his prayers, and send for a clergyman. 
 As for the possibility of anything like punishment for 
 anything she did, ever coming near her in this world 
 or the next, she never imagined any such thing. Her
 
 THE KNIGHT'S LADY. 31 
 
 religion was negative, not positive. It forbade her to 
 commit any State's Prison offences ; and if she refrained 
 from such tempting indulgences during her mortal life, 
 which she anticipated little difficulty in doing, it 
 promised to confer upon her heaven at her death, not 
 at all as a favor, but as her due and well earned wages. 
 The doctrine of human neighbourhood and Christian 
 brotherhood she ignored altogether ; and, in short, she 
 was just as much of a Christian as she might have been 
 if she had been a respectable Pharisee's well-reputed 
 daughter, nineteen hundred years ago. Her God was 
 the god o battles ; and she thought the most victorious., 
 of warriors, conquering for his country in any cause, 
 right or wrong, the greatest of heroes. I do wrong, 
 however, to say that she thought; for, like most 
 women, (and men, too,)* she had yet to learn to think. 
 She took for her opinions the first ideas that came in 
 
 * Let Mm or her who doubts that daring assertion, take a seat in 
 any omnibus or car that runs four or five miles oat from Boston, and 
 in again; and let him or her listen to the common run of the wearers 
 of waistcoats therein, as they earnestly, but hesitatingly, stiltily, in 
 very newspaperlsli English, and with an air as of men somewhat 
 painfully overtasking their "memories, endeavour to discuss politics; 
 then let the listener, alighting from the car or omnibus, enter the 
 nearest reading-room and, for the argument of the Democrat, see yes- 
 terday's Post, or Courier, and for that of the Whig, the leader in the 
 Boston Dally Advertiser or perhaps, if said Whig be a very general 
 reader, some old speech of Daniel Webster's; and then let the listener 
 say whether that daring assertion is not founded on fact. 
 
 Now i am far .from implj'ing that the arguments wliich these way- 
 side orators attempt to pit against each other may not be, in them- 
 selves, sound and forcible ; for editors of newspapers occasionally say 
 very good things, and Mr. Webster did so frequently; that is not the 
 point. The point is that the arguments in question, good or bad, 
 never grew out of the brains adjacent to the tongues that now utter, 
 or try to utter them; as may be inferred 'lot only from our finding, 
 at the reading-room, where they did come from, but from the 
 speakers using them against each other with about as much facility 
 and appropriateness as- a pair of emulous and painstaking parrots 
 strenuously enunciating against each other from their opposite perch- 
 es, one a clause taken at random and taught him from one of Fox's 
 orations, and his interlocutor, a sentence chosen for him in like 
 manner from a speech of Pitt's.
 
 32 HEEMAN. 
 
 her way, and for her worship the first idols, provided 
 only that they had pretty names engraven on their 
 pedestals. 
 
 Constance, in dne time, quite grew up, (to the 
 height of five feet, eight inches,) and came out; but 
 she found the world without the walls of her boarding- 
 school almost as dull and unresponsive as that portion 
 of the world which she had left behind within them, 
 after the first excitement of the really unusual sensa- 
 tion she made by her beauty, grace, and reputed wealth, 
 in a limited number of drawing-rooms in a limited 
 number of cities, was over. At first, indeed, young 
 men were presented to her by (half) dozens, wherever 
 she went. But of these, the Tvighrbom, as she was 
 pleased, for want of better, after the fashion of romantic 
 young ladies and a certain school of writers of instructive 
 popular tales, to denominate the sons or grandsons of 
 successful merchants and manufacturers and professional 
 and political men, and grandsons or great-grandsons of 
 farmers and small tradesmen, proved too often to be 
 of the calibre of Messrs. Bob Jones and Jack Robinson, 
 cared more for dancing than for talking in general, and 
 talking on her favorite topics in particular, and stig- 
 matized her as "slow" "Hue" and "strong-minded." 
 While the low-torn, namely, the sons of farmers and 
 mechanics, (mud-sills, in the classic Carolinian tongue,) 
 who, having come up from the plough and work-bench 
 to the University, were slowly and surely working 
 their way up, to be themselves successful professional 
 and political men, youths whose minds had been as 
 much more thoroughly trained than hers as her man- 
 ners had been than theirs, who could, some of them 
 at least, have fully appreciated her wit and fancy and 
 amply repaid her with their own humor and sagacity,
 
 THE KNIGHT'S LADY. 33 
 
 after their first shyness had been charmed away by a 
 little feminine tact and kindness on her part; all 
 these low-born youths were, for mere want of the habit 
 of society, set down by her at once as boors utterly un- 
 worthy of her society, and repelled and frozen with 
 icy looks and monosyllables. 
 
 Having no near relations living at the South, except 
 an aunt whose home was in Baltimore, but whose hus- 
 band's business carried him frequently to Paris, she had 
 never returned to her native State since she left it, and 
 fell in with few young planters. Of these, fewer still 
 appeared to her to be very liberally educated ; and 
 some were even addicted to " commencing to lairf h," 
 " sailing on boats," instead of in them, and committing 
 other offences too numerous to mention against the 
 idioms of what she had been taught to consider her 
 vernacular, beside further embellishing the communi- 
 cation of their ideas by speaking English with what 
 may be termed the Guinea accent, and introducing from 
 time to time certain startling guttural intonations, evi- 
 dently learned while the organs of speech were still 
 pliant, in conference with sable masters and mistresses 
 not of the cultivated class of negroes. 
 
 Then, again, even among the small number of per- 
 sons whom she was disposed to like, she found, to her 
 surprise, that not quite all were ready to like her. 
 Some of them, adding to their good minds and man- 
 ners good hearts, were much displeased with what they 
 heard, if they did not chance to see, of her unamiable 
 and unwarrantable contempt for others, whose feelings 
 and worth they respected. In a word, she soon found her- 
 self as little popular out of school as she had been in 
 it, and demonstrated an important proposition, which 
 I here lay down for the benefit of all romance-reading
 
 34: HERMAN. 
 
 young friends of mine, may they be many, when, if 
 ever, my romance is printed, namely : those who live 
 in a world of their own, can hardly ever get on at all 
 well in the world of other people. 
 
 Her circle of possible sympathizers narrowed and nar- 
 rowed wherever she went, until in Boston, in this present 
 winter of 18 , the Arden family stood almost alone in 
 her liking and in liking her ; but they suited her so well 
 that, in their company, she seemed and felt thoroughly 
 amiable, charmed, and charming. There were only 
 two brothers among them, however ; and Edward, the 
 oldest, was too indolent and epicurean ; and Herman, 
 the other, too little imposing, too little stern and mys- 
 terious, and, though two years her senior in age, too 
 young in all his ways for her almost despaired-of hero ; 
 and where to look for him, she still could not tell ; when, 
 in the meanwhile, not only had Herman Arden fallen 
 in love with her, which was to have been expected, 
 and not at all extraordinary, but, without in the least 
 dreaming of such a thing, such things will happen 
 sometimes, she had fallen in love with Herman 
 Arden ! 
 
 How such things do happen, perhaps the people to 
 whom they happen, even, can seldom tell exactly ; but 
 these two people really had some points in common, 
 and seemed at least to have many. Both were very 
 romantic, to begin with ; and he perfectly agreed with 
 her in taking her superb physical beauty for the stamp 
 of equally rare spiritual beauty. Both had earnest and 
 aspiring natures, earnestly yearning after what pre- 
 sented itself to their minds as the noblest and the best. 
 Though neither of them had hitherto discovered it, 
 however, they were unlike in this, that while he stood 
 ready to tear his way in all directions, save one, through
 
 THE KNIGHT'S LADY. 35 
 
 Iiis most cherished illusions, the moment he ha d cause 
 to suspect that they were illusions, until he could come 
 at the realities which they veiled, she hugged her illu- 
 sions, and stood ready to tear, metaphorically of course, 
 every reality, person or thing, which came too near 
 them. She loved the names of patriotism and glory 
 instead of the things ; he, the names for the sake of the 
 things. She felt, and did not think ; he felt, but 
 thought, too. She esteemed herself a genius ; he was 
 pretty near being one, without knowing it. He was 
 mindful of what he considered his duty to his God; 
 and this, and the modest hope that he was so, gave him 
 an inward purity and dignity of life. She was mindful 
 of what she considered her duty to herself; and this, 
 and the proud consciousness of it, gave her an outward 
 purity and dignity of life. Much as, in her secret 
 heart, she loved admiration, and that was much more 
 than she was aware of, she could never stoop to flirt 
 nor to be flirted with. Unlike him, she could be re- 
 vengeful but, like him, never intentionally unjust. 
 She could be arrogant and cruel in speech, as lie never 
 was ; but her pouting lips knew no better than his 
 own how to frame a lie. 
 
 Then, Herman and she liked many of the same 
 pleasures ; and people who enjoy themselves together 
 are apt to like each other ; a truism worth the pon- 
 dering of match-makers. He was an excellent rider, and 
 always eagerly ready to escort her and his sister on his 
 beautiful bay. He sang well in a duet, and read aloud 
 much better. He read her favorite poems to them as 
 they worked or drew, and taught Constance to love 
 some of his, when interpreted by his singularly musical, 
 true, and spontaneous intonation, which often seemed, 
 as she once told him, " as if the soul of the dead poet
 
 36 HERMAN. 
 
 had got into his voice." He threw aside his Greek 
 authors, to study Italian with her. and Clara ; and, 
 though much more ignorant of the language than they at 
 the outset, soon surprised them with the light which his 
 bright eyes could throw, at one glance, into dark places 
 in the " Di/oi/na Commedia" which had puzzled them 
 for hours. There was no commission too difficult or 
 too troublesome for him to execute zealously for Con- 
 stance, at the slightest intimation from her that she 
 would consent to accept his services ; and they were 
 always offered and rendered with a sort of chivalrous 
 courtesy, which seemed to imply, that in doing her will 
 he did his own, and that to honor her was the highest 
 honor he could pay to himself. 
 
 Still, she could only fancy him her page and not 
 her knight, until once, after he had been off on a scien- 
 tific expedition for a week or two with Mr. Agassiz, 
 she perceived that the page could not be dispensed 
 with, if the knight was not forthcoming ; that Her- 
 man loved her with all his heart, and that she could 
 not veny well help loving him in like manner. Since 
 it could not be helped, therefore, the best thing to be 
 done seemed to be to get the page knighted. In 
 plainer English, though she had now been two years 
 out of school," and the original castle had been a good 
 deal shattered in spite of her, by contact with the hard 
 battering-ram of fashionable life, she wished that the 
 ruins should be manned for her by a helpmeet, who 
 should at least be a statesman high in office ; and as 
 Herman was so fond of her, and so very Clever and 
 obliging, she believed that she might make him the 
 profitable servant of her ambition, supporting the com- 
 parative weakness of his character by the strength 
 of her own. She understood that his family, in all
 
 THE KNIGHT'S LADY. 37 
 
 its branches, had always belonged to that wing of the 
 "Whig party which belonged to Slavery. She would 
 with him return to South Carolina, where her family- 
 interest was powerful, and -invest all the ready money 
 she could raise, if necessary, in negroes. Their votes 
 should in part elect him to Congress,* and her beauty 
 and popularity, for, to promote such an object, she 
 would stoop for once to court popularity, should do 
 the rest. Once in the House of Representatives, with 
 his natural abilities and the stimulus which her com- 
 manding energies should give him, what should stop 
 him ? She saw, through no very long vista of proba- 
 bilities, herself presiding like a queen at the "White 
 House, and him Commander-in-Chief of the American 
 Army. 
 
 Herman, also, had his secret day-dreams, in which 
 love, patriotism, and glory figured largely ; though it 
 remains to be seen how far they could be made to coin- 
 cide with hers. God is the only common end towards 
 which all men and women can press forward, side by 
 side, and ever nearer to one another, in harmonious, 
 converging lines; most other objects do but lead 
 them asunder, or make them cross one another's 
 paths continually. 
 
 * Constance here, like some others, labors under a slight misap- 
 prehension. Individual masters do not vote for (i. e., against) their 
 individual slaves. The wrong done by black representation is whole- 
 sale, not retail. ' ' Representatives, " * * * says the Constitution, ' ' shall 
 be apportioned among the several States, which may be included 
 within this Union, according to their respective numbers, which shall 
 be determined by adding to the whole number of tree persons, inclu- 
 ding those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians 
 not taxed, three-lifths of all other persons." Thus the few white 
 voters in a Slave State, in which the majority, being slaves, should not 
 vote at all, might have as many Representatives at Washington as the 
 many white vocers in a Free State; and such nominal Representa- 
 tives of slaves, being usually slaveholders, uphold slavery year after 
 year, and speak and vote down the liberties alike of blacks and of 
 non-slaveholdiug whites.
 
 38 HERMAN. 
 
 On the night before that of the ball, Herman sig- 
 nalized his coming of age,by making, in an informal 
 public meeting professedly open to men of all parties, 
 his maiden speech. All sorts of opinions were ex- 
 pressed about it, of course, according to the notions 
 previously fixed in the minds of the hearers. The rad- 
 icals present stigmatized it as time-serving; the soi- 
 disans conservatives as seditious ; but all the judges 
 of oratory, who did not happen tc be too angry to ex- 
 ercise their judgment, were agreed that, though 
 rather too good for the occasion, in eloquence, schol- 
 arly finish, and statesmanlike information, it would not 
 have been unworthy of William Pitt at the age of the 
 speaker. Furthermore, Dr. Lovel, a certain dear old 
 divine, who chanced to be among the hearers, and whose 
 very heart was sore with the denunciations of one 
 party and the sordid cotton talk of the other, stayed a 
 day the longer away from his rural parsonage, to drop 
 in on Clara, (with whom he always ate his Sunday beef 
 when he preached in town,) and enchant her with the 
 assurance that, if Herman could -but indoctrinate the 
 rest of the youths of the country with his spirit of en- 
 lightened and self-sacrificing patriotism, he would do 
 as great a work as Washington's, free the slaves and 
 masters at the same time, and cement the Union more 
 indissolubly than ever with universal peace and good 
 will. Clara sent out to Whitney's immediately for 
 worsteds and canvas to work two pair of beautiful slip- 
 pers, one for the praised and one for the praiser. 
 
 And Constance ! Was not she enchanted, too ? 
 She was furious, I beg her pardon, indignant ; and 
 the little scene at the ball was the result. But then, 
 to do her justice, the news first reached her through 
 one of the partisan newspapers, those licensed false
 
 THE KNIGHT'S LADY. 39 
 
 witnesses against their neighbours ! and it rang the 
 knell of the Union and tile nation with a bell with 
 Herman's tongue in it. 
 
 All through the next day, most unlucky of Fri- 
 days, ne had not once been near her, for a very good 
 reason. He was correcting and re-writing his speech, 
 from the copious notes which a very rapid reporter had 
 taken of it, that it might as soon as possible be laid 
 fairly and in fair type before the public, in the place 
 of the incoherent or garbled and spiteful extracts and 
 abstracts, which the public was now straining its specta- 
 cles and venting its wrath over. The very first printed 
 copy he destined to be laid before his lady, as the first 
 of many laurels with which he hoped to crown her. 
 She might disagree with his discourse at first upon some 
 minor points ; he knew and admired her independent 
 spirii ; but she was candid and generous, and could not 
 fail to be pleased at finding in a Northern man so cor- 
 dial t.n interest in the prosperity of the South, and at 
 finding, in any countryman, so hearty a zeal for the 
 promotion of the highest welfare of the whole country ; 
 and then, if his performance was as eloquent and bril- 
 liant as some of his other acquaintances told him, how 
 very proud and happy she would be ! How very elo- 
 quent and brilliant it was, he for the first time per- 
 ceived, as he read ; for, as he spoke, the mighty spirit 
 of oratory had leaped upon him, casting up the riches of 
 his whole being from its depths, and carrying away his 
 self-consciousness as with a whirlwind. 
 
 And this man, so full of promise, noble in beauty, 
 loyalty, enterprise, courage, and heroism in the best 
 sense of the word, who loved her as no other ever had, 
 or would or could love, Constance was in the mean- 
 time preparing to do her best, or worst, to dishearten,
 
 40 HERMAN. 
 
 agonize, and alienate, for what I should be tempted to 
 call a girlish whim, were it not that I might thereby 
 seem so disrespectful as to cast an intentional slur on 
 some of the, so esteemed, most sagacious men among 
 her contemporaries ! Her hot temper prevailing more 
 and more, hour by hour, over the warm heart which 
 might have pleaded for him, she condemned him in his 
 absence and for his absence, which seemed to her to 
 add contempt and contumacy to ingratitude and trea- 
 son ; and her hastily-formed purpose, to discard him 
 at once and forever, grew and grew, like the mam- 
 moth snow-balls which she saw the little schoolboys 
 making in the gray storm before the dismal windows 
 of the Revere House, by much revolving. 
 
 At twilight, Herman's task released him. He 
 tossed the last scrawled sheet to the printer's familiar, 
 dressed with particular care, tied in his most faultless 
 knot his prettiest cravat of Clara's selection, swallowed 
 a cup of tea, and strode up and down from one end of 
 the drawing-rooms to the other, until at last his sister 
 appeared, in her blue evening cloak and rigolette, with 
 the flowers in her hair peeping out between its strings 
 of tiny pearl-like balls, as if through snow-flakes ; and 
 the tardy coachman pulled the door-bell with a hard 
 jerk, to make believe it was not the first time he had 
 rung it, and whirled them off to Mrs. Mydass's. 
 
 There Herman had placed himself near the hostess, 
 watching the door of entrance, and come forward to 
 meet Constance, as she appeared in it, with such an 
 expression of joy, affection, and hope just dashed with 
 modest doubt, as should have made her thank her God, 
 and humble herself before Him in the presence of her 
 great happiness ; when she for the first time treated 
 him as if he had been a poor and awkward student,
 
 THE KNIGHTS LADY. 41 
 
 i. e., like a dog. Then following that strange blind 
 instinct of our nature, which makes us, when evil 
 threatens, greedy of the worst, which makes the 
 young wife look up into the face of the messenger who 
 has come to tell her that she is a widow, and cry, 
 " Don't tell me he is sick ! say he's dead !" though she 
 dies of the news, Herman, like Samson, bowed him- 
 self, and pulled his fate down instantly upon his own 
 grand head, unshorn, if crushed. He had offered her 
 his hand, and for the first time, in words, all the wealth 
 of his manhood and his love. The offering was re- 
 jected, as, under the circumstances, only an added 
 affront; and just there, and then, we found and left 
 them.
 
 42 HEEMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE KNIGHT'S TRYST. 
 
 " I have not slept; for that I am to blame." 
 
 PHILIP VAN ABTEVELDE. 
 
 ^ " Oh, friend, are we indeed the sport of Fate? 
 
 Was there no clay wherewith to touch mine eyes, 
 That they might see thee in thy true estate, 
 Good with the good, wisest where all were wise ?" 
 
 GAIL HAMILTON. 
 
 CONSTANCE went home to her hotel, and sat up all 
 the rest of the night in her dressing-gown and shawl, 
 " preparing herself" for the morrow. A very poor 
 way, my dear little girls, of preparing yourselves for 
 anything, unless by and by, perhaps, in some crisis of 
 life such as sometimes comes even to creatures as gen- 
 tle as you, and not many years older, in some great 
 perplexity, or sorrow, or joy, which drives your sleep 
 away, you pass the hours of darkness in thanksgiving, 
 or- prayer for guidance and comfort, and in duteous 
 consultation of God's word, after the manner as I sup- 
 pose of holy men and women of old time. Now a 
 vigil may be a very good or a very bad thing, according 
 as God or Satan is one's fellow-watcher. If you wish 
 to judge of the nature of Constance's, you shall have 
 the benefit of some of her meditations. They were 
 plausible ; but so, sometimes, is Satan. 
 
 At last, her early longings were fulfilled. Her 
 country did call upon her for a sacrifice. The sacrifice 
 should be rendered, even to the last drop of her heart's
 
 THE KNIGHT'S TRYST. 43 
 
 blood, if indeed her heart could ever bleed for a 
 recreant and traitor. If it could, it would deserve to 
 bleed, and to be torn out and trampled upon by her 
 AVII hands and feet. (A rather difficult operation for 
 a person unskilled in anatomy, and an awkward one 
 for anybody to perform upon himself.) She would 
 never disgrace her gallant forefathers ! (She did not 
 know much about them ; but I have been credibly in- 
 formed, by one who did, that she did them injustice ; 
 that they were very sensible, though somewhat prosy 
 and commonplace old planters, who would probably, 
 if they had not labored under the double disadvantage 
 of being dead and being unaware of the state of the 
 case, have desired her to say her prayers and go to bed 
 like a good girl, and try to get up wiser.) She was 
 glad that Herman had asked for an explanation ! It 
 should be such a one as should show him of what a 
 prize he had proved himself unworthy. But, might 
 not she suffer afterwards? Hardly; and if she did, 
 what was suffering in a good cause ? Her self-respect 
 and proper pride would come effectually to her aid. 
 She had made a mistake, that was all, in fancying a 
 possible future resemblance between her ideal man and 
 Herman, and had only to rejoice that she had discov- 
 ered it before it was too* late, and to return to her old 
 allegiance. She would make up her mind before he 
 came, what to say and how to say it in a few conclu- 
 sive words, which should open no door to discussion. 
 ]STo wily northern tongue should cozen her out of her 
 principles. She would have the matter over, and for- 
 get it. She thought of Jephtha's daughter, and was 
 sure that she herself must be very much like her, 
 though she could not, for, in spite of anger and the 
 real regret and misgiving which she was beginning to
 
 HERMAN. 
 
 feel, though not to acknowledge, she was growing ex- 
 ceedingly sleepy, at the time remember precisely what 
 it was that Jephtha's daughter did. 
 
 In the meanwhile, she was becoming very chilly. 
 The wintry dawn was so long in coming, that she be- 
 gan to suspect a repetition of the Dark Day, or an 
 eclipse of the sun; and, when it came, she looked so 
 pale and plain by its murky gray light, and her eyes 
 were so blood-shot and swollen, that she was afraid 
 Herfnan would think she had been crying, and she had 
 not ! at least not much, and it was only because she 
 was tired and out of spirits, and had no mother nor 
 anybody to care for her, and felt sorry to lose the 
 friendship of Clara Arden, who would of course be sure 
 to take Herman's side, right or wrong ; sisters always 
 did so, and she wished, for her part, she had one, too, 
 poor girl ! So she threw herself on her bed, under an 
 eider-down quilt, and, when her maid came, bade her 
 call her again at ten ; slept two hours, rose, feeling 
 if possible more weary, irritable, and wretched than 
 before, drank a cup of strong coffee, which, as she 
 could eat nothing with it, merely added a sort of uni- 
 versal tremor of body and mind to her previous dis- 
 comfort ; had her thick, long, fine black hair exqui- 
 sitely dressed to the further torment of her aching 
 head, and in her elegant morning-dress walked down 
 stairs, supporting herself by the banisters, to a private 
 parlor, which she shared with her present chaperone, 
 Mrs. Courtenay Yan Rooselandt of New York, and 
 which, as that lady was dressing to make calls, she now 
 had to herself. She sat down and waited a quarter of 
 an hour. Her head throbbed more and more. The 
 door-bell rang. 
 
 " Mr. Arden" 
 
 " Show him in."
 
 THE KNIGHT'S TKYST. 45 
 
 He was in the room. She looked up and rose. 
 Each saw how very pale the other was ; and one was 
 sorry. She had intended to shorten the interview by 
 not inviting him to sit down ; but finding herself unable 
 to. stand, (lo! the consequences to one's nerves of pre- 
 paring one's-self !) she was forced to sink again into her 
 chair, and to point to another. He moved towards it 
 mechanically, but only leaned upon the back of it, and 
 stood looking into her face. He would not begin. 
 Then she must. She must collect her ideas ; but how 
 could she, with her brain all one swollen pulsation, and 
 with anybody looking at her in that way? But what splen- 
 did eyes he had ! and how strangely manly he looked, for 
 once in his life ! No matter. As these thoughts passed, 
 or rather jerked, through her head, she put her hand to 
 it involuntarily. He started, and half reached a bottle 
 of Cologne water. She rejected it with a gesture, and 
 recollected her part : " You understand, I trust, that 
 you are here to receive, not a retractation, but an expla- 
 nation merely, of what seemed to strike you as so un- 
 accountable last night." 
 
 He flushed, but bowed, still without speaking. 
 
 " I was surprised, I own, in my turn, to find that it 
 could be thought to require an explanation ; but no one 
 shall ever have an excuse for saying that I have forgot- 
 ten, in my conduct towards him, what is due to myself 
 and to a woman of honor. My explanation, since you 
 require it, is, that I have heard of your speech." 
 
 u From the newspapers ?" 
 
 " From the newspapers." 
 
 He brightened instantly and sat down, drawing, as 
 he did so, his chair an inch or two nearer to her. She 
 receded in proportion, and slightly gathered towards 
 her the wide folds of her drapery.
 
 4:6 HERMAN. 
 
 "I cannot wonder, then, at your displeasure. I 
 must explain" 
 
 " It was you only, I think, Mr. Arden, who desired 
 an explanation ; and pardon me if I say that you have 
 had it, and that I am now about to be otherwise 
 engaged." 
 
 " And you are determined not even to hear what I 
 have to say for myself? Oh, Constance ! Miss Aspen- 
 wall, have I been so utterly mistaken ? Have I only 
 my own presumption to thank for my hope that at 
 some future time, not by the mad precipitancy of last 
 night, for that I can never forgive myself, but by 
 the patient devotion of months and years, I might win 
 your affection ?" 
 
 " A common woman would answer, that you had 
 only your own presumption to thank for it, and would 
 hide, by a shameless falsehood, her shame at having 
 allowed her preference to be won by a person incapa- 
 ble of rewarding and retaining it. I am not a common 
 woman ; and I shall stoop to no such meanness. It is 
 no shame to me, to have been led on to almost love 
 the man you seemed." 
 
 He started up : " You almost loved ! Then, no- 
 blest, dearest, sweetest, love me! Love me, Con- 
 stance! O, Constance, Constance, I don't know how 
 to seem !" 
 
 "Excuse me. You seemed, though a Northern 
 man, a perfectly liberal and unprejudiced man; and 
 you are an Abolitionist." 
 
 Constance's love of repartee was breaking up the 
 ice between them, almost as fast as Herman's love of 
 her. Pride and affection were tilting in the scales ; 
 and the expression of delighted hope, at the instant in 
 his face and voice, tossed pride up almost to the beam ;
 
 THE KNIGHT'S TRYST. 47 
 
 out Satan, having been invited in to the fonference, 
 stayed without urging, and stood by all the time, ready 
 at need to put in his foot, heavy as the Indian fur- 
 dealer found the white man's hand. 
 
 " So some of the newspapers say, I know," answered 
 Herman ; " and so are you an Orthodox Christian, and 
 I too, I hope ; though both of us go to King's Chapel, 
 and neither of us to Park-street Church or the Old 
 South, with the so-called Orthodox par excellence. 
 What's in a name ? I have no intention, I assure you, of 
 binding myself to do the bidding of any political party ; 
 but this name of Abolitionist is a very vague one and 
 may be applied to a very great variety of people. May 
 I ask what you know 1 of them 3" 
 
 " Quite as much as I wish. I know that they are a 
 set of wild and lawless people, who are ready to drown 
 their native country in blood, in order to take away 
 the rights and property of their neighbours and to undo 
 all that their fathers bled and died to do, of judges 
 that neither fear God nor regard man ; preachers who 
 preach sedition, schism, and skepticism ; and conceited 
 vixenish women, going out of their sphere to meddle 
 with what they know nothing about, and dictate to men 
 in politics." 
 
 Constance was getting upon the stump, which is 
 often, if not usually in one of her sex, equivalent to 
 putting herself in a false position. Herman's good- 
 breeding could always keep the corners of his mouth in 
 order; but anything comical which came in his way, 
 even in his sadder moments, was invariably as flint to 
 steel, to his eyes ; they would sparkle at it without his 
 knowledge. Besides, Constance's evident thawing had 
 raised his spirits ; their disagreement was assuming the 
 air of a very harmless, sociable lovers' quarrel ; and they
 
 4:8 HERMAN. 
 
 were chatting together as if soon to be again on their 
 former terms or more. Constance saw in an instant the 
 weak point in her oration ; and in another mood she would 
 have laughed outright ; but Satan applied that innocent 
 involuntary little sparkle (why should a spark not 
 sparkle ?) to her pride ; and it exploded, and blew him 
 up at once. Did Herman mean that her adjectives 
 "conceited" and "vixenish" applied to herself? (He 
 never dreamed of such a thing ; but it had occurred to 
 him, as she spoke, for the first time, that she might not 
 at her age be so accomplished in statesmanship as she 
 was in music and belles-lettres, or as she might be by 
 and by, and yet that she had shown some little dispo- 
 sition to regulate his public course.) Such abominable 
 impertinence! How could she ever have imagined 
 that she liked him ? With a sudden change of voice 
 and aspect that terrified him, she exclaimed, "It is 
 time to put an end to all this !" 
 
 " Good heavens ! What have I done ?" 
 " Must I say it again ?" cried she, adroitly shifting 
 her ground, and in a manner moving the previous 
 question : " You have lifted your voice against our 
 country, against the noblest part of it, and the part to 
 which I belong, and against warning besides ; for I 
 had been more frank than you, and been at no pains 
 to disguise my utter hatred and scorn of Abolitionism!" 
 " I certainly knew that you disliked some of the 
 extreme doctrines of some of those who wish for the 
 abolition of Slavery ; and you knew that I did. I did 
 not know that there was one word in my speech, from 
 beginning to end, that could give offence to a mag- 
 nanimous, patriotic, Christian woman ; and I must 
 entreat, Miss Aspenwall, that you will read it before 
 you condemn it."
 
 THE KNIGHT'S TEYST. 49 
 
 JSntreat sounded a little like demand ; for he was 
 again beginning to feel that she was using him very 
 ill ; but how authority became him ! He was really put- 
 ting on the look of her ideal man ! 
 
 " And if I should read, and afterwards con- 
 demn it ?" 
 
 There was a pause. He rose, walked towards the 
 window, and again towards her, and then said, in deep 
 though smothered tones, " Remembering the weakness 
 of human nature, I should thank God, that it was 
 spoken before I knew how much it was to cost me." 
 He stopped, but presently went on again, in a voice 
 which grew, though not loud, firmer and clearer: 
 "Having been as candid as yourself, from the begin- 
 ning" (this was said with some emphasis, but not 
 rudely,) " I will be so to the end. I did not knowVor 
 believe, that I should offend you by exercising in this 
 matter the conscientious independence of thought and 
 action, which I should always be the first to respect in 
 you, or, if you gave me the right, to claim for you ; but 
 I could not and did not conceal from myself the possi- 
 bility that it might be so, that in these unhappy days 
 of strife, prejudice, and slander, your judgment might 
 be perverted, though your heart never, and through 
 your judgment my heart. Therefore I determined to 
 leap in the dark, and put my loyalty to my God, my 
 country, and my kind, at once beyond the reach of any 
 tampering with my self-interest ; and thus, what may 
 have looked to you like indifference to your disappro- 
 bation, was in reality an excessive, you may think a 
 very cowardly and contemptible, dread of it. I 
 should be a suitor utterly unworthy of you, and 
 despised by you in the end, if I were capable of giving 
 np my independence and manhood to any human 
 3
 
 50 HERMAN. 
 
 being. If I gave them up to any, man or woman, it 
 should be to you. It shall be to no one. I will hold 
 them fast, so help me God ! as sacred trusts, sacred 
 to humanity and religion." 
 
 " Eeligion says, ' Fear God ; honor the king.' ' : 
 
 " Miss Aspenwall, here is no king ! . O how much 
 those will have to answer for, who bewilder noble, art- 
 less, unsuspecting minds like yours, with such wretched 
 sophistries and perversions ! What did our forefathers 
 say to the Tory application of that doctrine, when it 
 ran counter to their liberties ?" 
 
 " ' Our country, right or wrong,' I suppose, as every 
 patriot must." 
 
 He looked at her as if he could scarcely believe that 
 he heard her aright ; and she colored, as the girl in the 
 fairy story might have when her lips had dropped a 
 toad, not merely for shame at its ugliness but for anger 
 with the person who pointed it out to her. 
 
 " And you think," said he, " that we can serve our 
 country by helping her to call down the judgments of 
 God upon herself? by fostering and promoting her 
 iniquities ?" 
 
 " I am no metaphysician, Mr. Arden, to split such 
 hairs with you. Let the subtle North argue ; but the 
 South can act, and repudiate, as I do, a Union which 
 can only humble and degrade her." 
 
 " Mr. Otis, ma'am." 
 
 " Show him in." 
 
 "Is this final?" 
 
 " Good morning, Mr. Arden. How do you do, Mr. 
 Otis?"
 
 THE FAMILY POKTEAIT-GALLEEY. 51 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT GALLERY. 
 
 "Look here, upon this picture, and on this/' 
 
 SHAKSPEARE. 
 
 ' ' Le present a pour ratine le passt. " 
 
 EMILE SOUTESTRE. 
 
 LATE on Sunday afternoon, Edward and Clara 
 Arden sat in their dining-room, at the opposite 
 ends of the table, with the finest engravings from 
 Landseer and his compeers over their heads, and 
 between them, in two embossed silver dishes, a 
 heap of Brown - Beurr6es, and another of clustering 
 Alexandria - Muscats and Black - Hamburgs brood- 
 ing on their own green leaves, and basked in the 
 light of each other's countenances, and of their cheer- 
 ful soft-coal fire. Leaning her smooth cheek on three 
 or four fingers, which, like marble piers, parted a flood 
 of golden, glossy, flossy curls, she was looking into 
 dream-land ; and gazing at her, robed in the rich 
 purple silk, which he had- chosen for her because it 
 became her Monde beauty so well, with the gossamer 
 lace that fell over it about her white rounded arms and 
 chroat, fine and frosty as if the fairies had caught her in 
 tome such trance, and woven it around her out of 
 :ime, gazing at her so, through the soft blue etherial 
 smoke- wreaths of his cigar, he could have fancied that 
 ne was looking into dream-land too, and beholding as 
 fair, sweet, and stately a presence as the luckiest of 
 poets could find there, besides. It was Clara's wont
 
 52 HiKMAN. 
 
 to be fair, and sweet, and stately ; but on a Sunday 
 evening, he often thought that there was a peculiar 
 indefinable charm about her, even beyond that which 
 she always had for him, a tinge of more supernal 
 sentiment, a certain odor of the incense of the sanc- 
 tuary still lingering about her as it were, which made 
 her from an angelic woman a womanly angel. 
 
 Perhaps it was somewhat egotistical in him to ad- 
 mire her so much ; for they were as much alike as a 
 brother and sister, eminent respectively for manly 
 and maidenly beauty, can well be, as Apollo and 
 Diana ; Herman said, " no offence to Edward, as 
 body and soul ;" it had been one of the innumerable 
 whims of his childhood to call her, after he had got a 
 smattering of Greek, " Edward's Psyche ;" and the 
 pretty pet name of Psyche had clung to her to this 
 time. Both of them had the same generous and regal 
 beauty of form and harmonious and regular cast of 
 face, just not quite Grecian enough to make Ameri- 
 can Nature seem a plagiarist, and the same remarka- 
 bly graceful and agreeable play of features, especially 
 of the lips, which, in speaking or smiling, gave glimpses 
 of teeth that might have moved a dentist to rapture 
 or despair. They were not quite Sabastian and Yiola, 
 however ; for he was three years the oldest, and seven 
 inches the tallest and six the stoutest, and his eyes were 
 of a less deep dark violet than hers. Her cheeks were 
 usually white, moreover, and his ruddy, often a little 
 tanned, and, further, a good deal obscured by a mag- 
 nificent moustache and beard of rich auburn ; while the 
 floating golden sunset-cloud of Clara's tresses served 
 alternately as a veil and a setting for her lovely counte- 
 nance. They make so calm and pleasing a picture as 
 they sit there in my mind's eye together, that I cannot 
 bear to disturb them vet. Let us therefore seize this
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY. 53 
 
 opportunity to inquire a litttle into their antecedents. 
 Yet of their and of my knight's forefathers, I shall say 
 nothing. Reasoning from analogy, I suppose that he 
 must have had some. But, (though such are, when as- 
 certained or even merely suspected, whether good, bad, 
 or indifferent, though often far from estimable or 
 agreeable in their time and, individually, of no manner 
 of use to anybody now, a matter of most excessive and 
 mysterious gratification to their descendants,) they are 
 apt to be the greatest of bores to the neighbours of the 
 latter. Moreover, they are wont to be attended with 
 the further disadvantage of inducing the latter to in- 
 flict upon their helpless offspring, while too young and 
 inexperienced to resist, most frightful catalogues of 
 Gothic and Vandalic appellations, thereby visiting 
 upon them the euphonic sins of their fathers to the 
 thirteenth and fourteenth generation. Besides, the 
 Ardens, father and oldest son at least, were too fully 
 satisfied with the present standing of their family to 
 trouble themselves with many investigations into its 
 past. The former might perhaps, by hard labor and 
 antiquarian research, have convinced himself that his 
 ancestral tree first sprang in the ancient forest of Ar- 
 den, and that he could, with an unquestionable right to 
 do so, make a melancholy Jaques of one of his sons, 
 and enjoy the peculiar privilege of calling his daughter, 
 Celia Rosalind Audrey Phebe. But such was his re- 
 publican arrogance that, if he had had any mind to call 
 her so, then he would have called her so as fast as he 
 could say over the words to the. christening clergyman, 
 and the clergyman could learn to say them after him, 
 and would never once have thought to enquire whether 
 he had any right to call her so or not. One cannot 
 eee that she or he lost much by his omitting to do so, 
 either with or without a right. At any rate he left the
 
 54: HKRMAN. 
 
 veracious historian, i. e. myself, without the slightest 
 foundation whereon to construct a pedigree. 
 
 I regret it the less, not only on account of the dis- 
 advantages already enumerated attendant upon the 
 possession of it, but' on account of a disadvantage still 
 greater, namely : the possession of a pedigree often 
 tends to foster the soul -degrading sin of pride ; and the 
 quality of pride would appear to be so altogether con- 
 trary to the prejudices of the angels, to the public 
 opinion of that good society into which we hope to be 
 introduced, most of us, some time in the course of the 
 current century, that indulgence therein threatens to 
 lower our permanent and eternal rank very seriously. 
 Perhaps if some of us could see the present status to 
 which the arrogance and selfishness of some of those 
 vaunted ancestors, whose example makes arrogance and 
 selfishness appear to us weaknesses so amiable, have re- 
 duced them, we should make less account than we now 
 do of our relationship to them, and rather prefer to 
 hush it up. No ! Let us search our family records 
 chiefly to find, if we can, some "one saintly man or wo- 
 man, no matter how hard-worked, no matter how 
 poor, and little known on earth, whose deeds here five, 
 fifty, or a hundred years ago were his or her title-deeds 
 to bear the title of lord or lady high-seraph now at the 
 court of the King of kings. If we can find one such, 
 let us thank God that the blood of that saint, however 
 ignoble here in the estimation of his inferiors, flows in 
 our veins ; let us yield to its motions, attune our hearts 
 to its workings, and with a hallowed ambition strive so 
 to walk like him in his Master's steps in humility and 
 self devotion, that he may gladly condescend hereafter 
 to come forward and claim kindred with us from among 
 the shining rows and ranks of Heaven's nobility.
 
 THE FAMILY 1'OBTKAIT-GALLEEY. 65 
 
 The married life of the deceased Arden pel 6 was al- 
 most as episodical as that of Blue-Beard. His first 
 wife, Kitty, died in a couple of years after their mar- 
 riage, leaving behind her his oldest daughter, Catherine, 
 who was brought up in the country by her maternal 
 aunts, and with whom we are likely to have little to 
 do. She had, at the time when .our story begins, 
 been for some years the respected partner of Jona- 
 than A. Flint, a broker, a thrifty, busy, earthy, 
 ant-like kind of a man, with warts on his chin 
 and spectacles on his nose. Like a poor wild vine 
 rooted at the foot of a dwarf-oak, she climbed towards 
 heaven as far as she could without leaving him behind, 
 and a little further, and stretched lip her groping, un- 
 supported hands towards it, for them both, and tried to 
 be good as well as she knew how, and succeeded pretty 
 well, too, in a certain weakly way. 
 
 The second wife, Alice, whom Mr. Arden espoused 
 at the end of the next two years, was a daughter of a 
 Governor of one of the Western States. The discon- 
 solate widower fell in with her at Washington, whither 
 he went to recruit his spirits and represent the com- 
 mercial interests of "our beloved Massachusetts" in 
 Congress. She was a rare creature, who, 'after absorb- 
 ing the sweet influences of woodland, hill, and river, 
 and developing the perfect physical organization,which 
 she afterwards bequeathed as an invaluable legacy to 
 Edward and Clara, in long rambles over her father's 
 large farm, had accompanied his ex-Excellency, when 
 he was sent to the National Senate ; and, among the 
 strange medley of people of all kinds and countries, 
 who throng that human menagerie and epitome of the 
 world, the White House, she had rubbed off any re- 
 mains of rusticity or provincialism that might still have
 
 56 HERMAN. 
 
 clung to her, without losing any of the gracious, frank 
 kindliness or gentle dignity, which had grown up with 
 her while she assisted her mother to superintend her 
 rural home, or to do the honors of the "Gubernatorial 
 Mansion " hi the city. She might have helped to con- 
 fer upon her little boy and girl other gifts and graces 
 besides her good health, with its natural accompani- 
 ments of good spirits, looks, and temper ; but, as she 
 was hurrying back from her father's death-bed, to find 
 consolation for her first sorrow in their rosy kisses and 
 chubby embraces, she was killed, or murdered, call it 
 which you will, cut off by a violent and agonizing 
 death in her benign and glorious prime, by one of 
 those accidents in our public conveyances which slay so 
 many of our countrymen. She was dragged out 
 breathing, a ruin from the ruins, and lived long 
 enough to see herself a mangled cripple, and to try to 
 press her husband's hand, but, happily, lived no 
 longer. 
 
 The young stranger had already, in her brief resi- 
 dence among his acquaintances, so endeared herself 
 to them, that all State Street, Beacon Street, Park, 
 Chestnut, and Mount Yernon Streets, seemed to ring 
 with one outcry of horror, grief, and indignation. Mr. 
 Arden's nerves were shaken by the shock to such a de- 
 gree, that he was incapable for months of thought or 
 action ; but some of his friends prosecuted the company 
 of the fatal railroad, in his name. The grossest care- 
 lessness was proved on the part of an ignorant and 
 stupid underling, who had been employed, apparently, 
 not because he was known to be capable, but because 
 he was supposed to be cheap. The company were made 
 to pay a certain price (which they were rich enough to 
 afford to do pretty easily, out of their past and future
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY. 57 
 
 economies in the wits and wages of their servants) for 
 this wife and mother, quite as if she had been a negress. 
 It was the price of her blood, and her husband loathed 
 it. He took it, notwithstanding, in order to make, 
 so far as he could, a wholesome example of her de- 
 stroyers ; and, thinking of his own little bereaved ones, 
 he endowed with it an asylum for orphans. 
 
 Mrs. Arden, the third, was a pretty, sensitive, tear- 
 ful little devotee, who went almost directly from her 
 sick-room in her father's house to her sick-room in her 
 husband's. Morbidly and narrowly conscientious, in 
 her fears lest she had done or should do wrong, she 
 seemed to forget that she could be wrong simply in not 
 doing. Especially, she forgot that most important 
 general order to the church militant on this anxious 
 earth, " Rejoice alway ; and again I say unto you, re- 
 joice !" Thus her heavenward march, wanting the 
 heavenly music ot gladness and hope to inspirit it and 
 to allure others to join it, lagged sadly, became a 
 crawl, and would have been an utterly solitary one 
 had not her little Herman, her only and her husband's 
 youngest child, come to put his tiny, puny hand in 
 hers and move beside her through the latter years 
 of her short and sorrowful pilgrimage. He was her 
 constant companion in her hushed and darkened cham- 
 ber, and, sitting on -his little stool, as it were in the 
 shadow of death, never making " a noise to disturb 
 poor mamma," and feeding on broths and jellies, 
 looked as pale, as unearthly, and almost as thin, as her- 
 self, so as to justify, in the opinion of the few visitors 
 whom she at long intervals admitted, her own belief 
 that he was doomed very soon to precede or follow her 
 to the other world. 
 
 On the other hand, however, Sally Dalley, (a poor 
 3*
 
 58 HERMAN. 
 
 neighbour of the second Mrs. Arden, at the West, who, 
 having been befriended by that lady in her youth, had 
 thought herself incredibly favored in being permitted, 
 when her rich husband came to carry her off to ISTew 
 England, to follow her fortunes as a sort of female ver- 
 satile fac-totum, and was at that, time doing duty as 
 nursery-maid to her orphans) ejected over the fast- dis- 
 appearing hedge of her teeth the opinion, "OV massy ! 
 there wa'n't nothin' under the sun ailed the child, 
 nothin' on earth but mewin' up an' coddlin'. Land ! 
 how'd Ed'ard an' Clary look in one week's time, 
 d'ye s'pose, if they was kept shut up in the dark, an' 
 couldn't git no bread an' milk an' baked apples, nor 
 beef-steak, an' mutton-chops, an' roast puttaturs, nor 
 nothin' but blue - monge, an' slops, an' so on ? nor 
 couldn't git out to the Mall, to roll their hoops, an' run, 
 an' romp, an' holler ? I declarej I tell 'em sometimes 
 it seems a'most as if they'd take my very ears off. 
 I heared a learn'd man say once, we'd all got drums in 
 our ears. I don't know as we have, nor I don't know 
 as we haint ; but I know this, if I don't know nothin' 
 else, if my ears is drums, them 'ere childern's tongues 
 is the drum-sticks. But, la ! I always put 'em to bed 
 the second the nursery-clock strikes seven ; an' I keep 
 it a little fast, 'cause it's best to be punctooal ; an' then 
 there's peace till six in the mornin' ; an' I tell 'em, if 
 they'll only be good childern an' love each another, 
 an' 'let dogs delight to bark and bite' like 'birds in 
 their little nests,' I can stand a sight o' good-natur'd 
 noise." 
 
 " Sick !" Sally was once heard to say, (and it would 
 have cost her her place but for Mr. Ardeu's tender 
 memory of her faithfulness to his dead Alice and her 
 little ones,) to another guardian of youth, in answer to
 
 THE FAMILY t'ORTKAIT-GALLERY. Oi) 
 
 some kind inquiries about the present incumbent, or re- 
 cumbent, "I should think she might be! sick o' doin' 
 nothin' ! I reckon if she'd jump out of her bed and 
 make it up for herself, as Miss Arden, my Miss Ar- 
 den, I would say, would, when we was short o' help, 
 'twould do more good to her dyspepsy than layin' in it 
 all day. I wish I could have the shakin' up of her 
 feathers once, with her in 'em !" 
 
 But Sally's opinions on this point were not entitled 
 to so much consideration as, from her general sagacity 
 and good penetration, they would have been if they had 
 been less tinged with jealousy of her mistress, I beg 
 Sally's pardon, her mistress's successor. Yet, though 
 she indulged herself in the luxury of this amiable feeling, 
 as I regret to state that she did also in that of snuff, it is 
 due to her to add, that she secreted both with equally 
 conscientious care from her charges. Hurtful indul- 
 gences are commonly thought fit for those only who 
 have arrived at years of discretion. "We may allow 
 them to ourselves ; but we must keep them from the 
 young. "Well, perhaps there is some philosophy in it, 
 after all. Keep the spring of life clear, and its after- 
 current may be so. Taint the one, and the other 
 scarcely can be purified save by a miracle of renewing 
 grace. 
 
 Sally's excuse was, not for the snuff, which was 
 wholly without palliation, but for the harshness of her 
 judgment of the poor inoffensive invalid, that she 
 took very little notice of her (Sally's) children. Ed- 
 ward and Clara were admitted to their new mamma's 
 chamber, to get a kiss and a bunch of grapes or an 
 orange, usually once a day ; but that was all that she 
 had to do with them. Their father, for his part, was 
 too busy in making money for them, to learn how to
 
 60 HERMAN. 
 
 play or talk with them, or even to find out that he 
 owed them any further parental duties except to keep 
 them at the best schools, which he took pains to do. 
 Beyond this and a remarkable absence of natural de- 
 pravity in their dispositions, there appeared to be no- 
 thing earthly to guard them against the ordinary perils 
 of childhood and youth, as they outgrew the constant 
 companionship and the authority of " Nursey." Mrs. 
 Arden, whether her illness had been originally a maid- 
 die imaginaire, and since aggravated by self-indulgence, 
 or not, became really too ill to do all that her prede- 
 cessor would have done for them, and was too timid, 
 procrastinating, and unenterprising, to undertake even 
 as much as was in her power. A step-mother as she 
 was, she said, how could she hope for the charitable 
 construction of her neighbours or even be sure of her 
 own motives, if she attempted to assume the responsi- 
 bility of managing the children of another? Perhaps 
 she should be stronger next year ; but at present she 
 felt that her very life depended upon rest and quiet, 
 and her first duty was to her own son ; so that she did 
 not see that she could do anything for the dear little 
 things, better than to intrust them a little longer to the 
 care of the faithful though very peculiar servant whom 
 their own mother had chosen for them. Sally would 
 be very likely to leave them at once, if her manage- 
 ment of them was interfered with ; and it really seemed 
 to agree with their rugged constitutions, though it 
 would certainly have been death to Herman. 
 
 To the suggestions of more persuasive tongues than 
 Sally's, which reached herfrom time to time with regard to 
 him, she opposed a mild but unconquerable vis inertia}. 
 
 She wished that she was able to take him out more. 
 
 i. 
 
 She never left him behind when she was well enough
 
 THE FAMILY POKTKAIT-GALLERY. 61 
 
 to drive ; and she hoped to let him go out to play as 
 soon as he was a little stronger ; but he was so fragile 
 and sensitive, and the other boys were so apt to be 
 rough ; or he was a very delicate child, and as he 
 had been confined to the house a good deal by colds in 
 the winter, she did not think she could with prudence 
 send him out regularly, until the spring was far ad- 
 vanced and the danger of east winds coming up was 
 over ; or now in June, the mornings and evenings 
 were so chilly and the sun so powerful at noon, that 
 there seemed to be no time fit for him to exercise in 
 out-of-doors ; or he had been so completely prostrated 
 by the heat even when kept within-doprs with every 
 precaution, that he could scarcely be in a state to walk 
 out before the autumn ; or, if the climate of this insa- 
 lubrious planet was for once, by some rare chance, well 
 adapted to the needs of its inhabitants, she missed 
 him so dreadfully while he was out, and was so afraid 
 that he might be run over by the horses or fall into 
 the water, or that he might get into bad company ; and 
 he was so pure and innocent now, that she could not 
 bear to think of it ! 
 
 Clara and Edward, to be sure, who, envying his 
 sick-room privileges and privations alike, that is, not 
 at all, regarded him with the greatest admiration, 
 interest, and pity, as an unnatural curiosity of wonder- 
 ful beauty, intellect, and fragility, were always trying 
 to get him into their possession for an hour or an after- 
 noon, to ride on a sled, slide, play ball, or walk with 
 them ; and they, in the meanwhile, thanks to a good 
 Providence, partly, perhaps, to their good, dead mo- 
 ther, who can tell? (no thanks, certainly, to their 
 living one,) were growing up to be a very well-behaved 
 and well-informed lad and lass, and by rare good for-
 
 62 HERMAN. 
 
 tune or good taste, affected no associates who were not 
 of the same stamp. They wonld have held over their 
 little half-brother the kindest and most watchful pro- 
 tection. But Mrs. Arden's nerves, or want of nerve, 
 got the better of her more and more. She could not 
 let Herman go ; or, if she did, she cried till he came 
 back. After the little fellow found that out, he could 
 scarcely be induced to leave her side again. Clara 
 might creep behind the chamber door, and peep 
 through the crack, and beckon as much as she pleased. 
 He was sorry, but steadfast. 
 
 " Oh, Psyche, what a beautiful dress ! Come into 
 the dressing-room, and let me see you in the light. 
 How bright you are ! see ; I have to put up my hand 
 over my eyes. You are all like a rainbow ; and your 
 shining head is the sun ! No, beauty, I can't go. 
 Mamma isn't so well ; and if she wakes up, and finds 
 I'm not here, she'll tremble all over so, you don't 
 know. But when you get back, just come up to the 
 door, and whisper ' Herman' very softly, and then I'll 
 ask leave, and slip down stairs with you, and sit on 
 your knee; and you can tell me all about what you 
 saw, and the Common, and the Frog Pond, and the dear 
 little ships, and set me some more sums, on soft paper, 
 couldn't you? that won't crackle, because mamma 
 hears the pencil on my slate." 
 
 Clara was not very fond of her books, but she was 
 of her teacher, and of some of her schoolmates, who were 
 studious girls ; and her attachment to them carried her 
 on with them ; so that she was able to give the little 
 prisoner all the aid he wanted in his English studies ; 
 and before he had outgrown her knee and her lessons 
 he was readily promoted to Edward's. Study and 
 reading were an unspeakable relief to the monotony of
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY. 63 
 
 his strange and solitary little life ; and it was a pretty 
 and a singular sight to see his tiny figure lying at 
 length on the carpet within the window curtains, 
 enclosed in a sort of trench of books with a ray of 
 light, through the shutters carefully parted just above 
 his lifted head, sliding down over his curls to fall on 
 the Greek or Latin page before him. He loved to 
 read Shakspeare, Milton, and Scott, aloud to his mo- 
 ther, when she was well enough to hear him. Whether 
 she was well or ill, she heard him read some selected 
 passage from the Bible daily ; and, as the bones of some 
 birds are dyed by madder mingled with their food, so 
 his very inmost frame of mind seemed to take a 
 heavenly hue from its heavenly nourishment. The 
 seed was not merely scattered, but planted. He not 
 only read the Gospel, but believed, and took it all quite 
 in earnest. Was it childish in him ? He was but a 
 child ; and " of such are the kingdom of heaven." He 
 was not fond of exhibiting himself to strangers as a 
 prodigy of piety, or, indeed, of any kind ; but when he 
 was quite alone with his mother or Clara, long before 
 the Greek days and when he was still almost a baby, 
 he would both hear, and ask questions which were not 
 always easy to answer, on every-day principles. 
 
 " But, mamma, why don't we and papa go about 
 and do good, too ? We could go in" the coach." 
 
 " Poor mamma is too weak and sick, darling ; and 
 papa is busy ; and Herman is only a little child ; but 
 by and by, if he lives to grow up, he must try to be as 
 much like the Saviour as a mere man can be ; and now 
 he shall have a dollar-biJQ. to give papa to put in the 
 contribution-box, next Sunday, for the poor people." 
 
 " No, thank you, dear mamma, you shall give that 
 yourself; but 1 think I had better let papa put in my
 
 64 HEEMA2T. 
 
 dear little gold one for me, that Neddy gave me to buy 
 a rose-bush ; because it would be more like the poor 
 widow, wouldn't it? and so the Saviour might like 
 it better than my giving him your money. He's rich 
 enough already, you know, because he is God's son ; 
 and his Father has got all the silver in the stars, and 
 gold in the moon, and all the diamonds and rubies 
 down in the black mines underground in my story- 
 book, and all the pearls and treasures down in the bot- 
 tom of the greatjhigh gurgling sea. But he only wants 
 to see whether we care more about him than we do 
 about keeping anything else we've got ; and if we do, 
 he'll like us just as he did the poor widow," &G. And 
 then mamma would smile and go off into a doze ; and 
 the little pale creature would sit, and think, and watch 
 her between his dark ringlets, with a countenance as 
 pure and bright and solemn, as that with which his 
 angel might, at the same moment, have been beholding 
 the face of his Father in heaven. 
 
 As we have seen, one feeling which lay at the root 
 of Mrs. Arden's mode of education, and which cov- 
 ered up, in the eye of her conscience, the love of self- 
 indulgence which was her immediate motive, was her 
 solicitude for Herman's spiritual welfare. They were 
 in all probability to enjoy little more of one another's 
 society on earth. She must insure to herself his society 
 in heaven. In short, she was afraid to trust him in 
 the world in which his Maker had appointed his pro- 
 bation. Her mistake was probably a much rarer, per- 
 haps a safer one than that of virtually granting the 
 freedom of a city, without precaution, reservation, or 
 oversight, to the incautious, susceptible, chameleon soul 
 of a child. Still there were great dangers attending it ; 
 and an obvious one was, that her son, when he became
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY. 65 
 
 his own master, as sooner or later, if he lived, he 
 must, would, seeing his conspicuous inferiority in 
 some things to other boys or young men, for very shame 
 become shameless, and imitate them even in the wild- 
 ness and wickedness which, being too often the brand, 
 are too often mistaken for the stamp of hardihood. 
 Even if he escaped this peril, how was her hot-house 
 sensitive plant ever to endure hardness as becometh a 
 soldier of Christ ? She might reasonably have antici- 
 pated, to be sure, that one or two years more of her 
 management would have so enervated his physical 
 frame, as forever to cut him off from the dangers and 
 duties of active life ; but 
 
 " L'homme propose, 
 Et Dieu dispose." 
 
 When Herman was twelve years old, after three 
 days and nights of watching and terrible anxiety, which 
 he endured with an agonized self-control which, in him, 
 surprised all who witnessed it, during which he was 
 never once undressed, and slept only by snatches be- 
 side her on her death-bed, he saw his mother breathe 
 her last, and was carried in Edward's arms from her 
 chamber, in fits. It was midnight. He went from one 
 swoon to another till morning, but was well enough on 
 the day after the funeral to be brought down stairs 
 between his brother and sister, and laid on the sofa ill 
 the drawing-room. He was very gentle and submis- 
 sive towards them; but his grief, though borne pa- 
 tiently and silently, seemed too heavy for his little 
 strength to rally under ; and, in the course of the fol- 
 lowing week, Clara, while 're-arranging the chamber 
 which his mother had occupied, thought she heard 
 something from Sally in the dressing-room, about " the
 
 66 HERMAX. 
 
 child," and "not long for this world." Sally was sum- 
 moned with unusual haste and emphasis. 
 
 " Nurse ! what was that you were saying about lit- 
 tle Herman ?" 
 
 "La, Miss Clara, I didn't speak, not to you, I 
 would say. I was only a talkin' to Bridget about 
 somethin' or 'nother. I ask pardon for disturbin' of 
 you, I'm sure. I didn't know as you was there." 
 
 " Nurse, did you say he was going to die ?' 
 ' "Well, Miss Clara, I'd rather not undertake to re- 
 member exactly, if it's all the same to you, the very 
 words as I was a sayin' on jest that minute. My 
 memory's gittin dreadful poor ; and 'taint best never to 
 undertake to tell nobody nothin' 'thout you knows it. 
 It's app'inted to all on us sometime or 'nother to die, 
 as the minister says ; not till bumbye I hope, 'cause 
 the best on us aint hardly good enough yet." 
 
 "Nurse," returned Miss Clara, evading ghostly 
 counsel and drawing her girlish figure up to its full 
 height, (five feet eight precisely in her little high-heeled 
 boots,) " little Herman is not going to die. I shall see 
 about it." Words of power, as Nurse knew. Clara very 
 seldom, in those days, undertook to "see about" anything; 
 but when she did, it was usually seen about, and well. 
 
 " La, well, Miss Clara, dear, I s'pose then he won't. 
 There ! Don't you cry ! Don't you cry ! Red eyes 
 is very pretty for the rabbits ; but blue ones is the 
 nicest for you." 
 
 Just after the street-lamps were lighted that after- 
 noon, and one minute after the chaise of the family 
 physician, Dr. Brodie, deposited him at his door, which 
 was opposite to Mr. Arden's, the doctor's bell rang 
 sharply; a light, quick, fluttering sound ran up his 
 stairs ; and a tall weird figure, black from head to in-
 
 THF FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLEKY. 67 
 
 dia-rubbers, appeared in his study. The ruin-spangled 
 shawl, which was wrapped hastily about the top of it, 
 fell back ; and out came the golden curls and fair flushed 
 face of his young favorite, Clara. 
 
 " Why, niy dear ! Is it you ? What is the matter ? 
 Is Herman sick?" 
 
 "Yes, Doctor, no, I mean he's no worse to- 
 night ; but he does not get better very fast ; and I 
 want to know what I shall do to make him well." 
 
 The Doctor was very sorry for her, and a good deal 
 at a loss. He was a busy man, and intent upon his 
 business. In the sick-room, he usually saw the sick 
 person he came to see, and nothing and nobody else. 
 Herman's positive ailments up to this time had been 
 few ; for nature seemed, in the beginning, to have in- 
 tended him to inherit from his father a constitution 
 whiph, though slight and susceptible, was elastic and 
 enduring. Dr. Brodie had never happened to inquire 
 particularly into his habits, or to suspect the almost 
 total want of air, exercise, and proper food taken with 
 proper appetite, which had gradually paved the way to 
 his present condition. He thought it a mysterious and 
 desperate one, and could not bear to say so to the hope- 
 ful, loving young creature, who came to him with BO 
 much confidence. He soothed her by entering very 
 sympathizingly into a long conversation upon the sub- 
 ject, in the course of which he discovered causes, in- 
 deed, more than sufficient to account for the state in 
 which her little brother was ; but if they explained it, 
 they scarcely made it less alarming. He doubted 
 whether Herman could survive the immediate effects 
 of the mismanagement from which he was suffering, 
 and whether, even if he did, his life could ever be a 
 blessing to himself or to any one else ; but he finally
 
 68 HERMAN. 
 
 told Clara that he thought, " if Herman was taken at 
 oiiee to the sea-shore, kept in the open air as much as 
 possible, and away from his books, amused, induced to 
 play with other children, and judiciously fed, it might 
 save him," adding, with a mental reservation, " if any- 
 thing could." 
 
 No sooner said than done. Clara engaged him to 
 call that very evening after tea, " to tell papa ;" con- 
 ferred with Sally D alley ; was called the next morn- 
 ing at five o'clock, for the first time in her life ; still 
 more strange to tell, rose when she was called ; break- 
 fasted on an egg, as being at once compendious and 
 nourishing ; ran out and bought two travelling-trunks ; 
 with Nurse's assistance packed them, and a basket of 
 provisions ; kissed her father ; hugged Ned, who came 
 hurrying and gaping down stairs just before it was too 
 late to bid her good-bye ; made him promise to write 
 to her every week and, without much difficulty , to 
 spend his whole vacation with her ; ordered round the 
 coach, put Sally, two pillows, and Herman, into it; 
 jumped in herself, and drove away with his head in 
 her lap, in the soft June morning, to lodge for five or 
 six months with the family who cultivated a large, old- 
 fashioned farm belonging to her father, on the sea- 
 shore not many miles from Boston. 
 
 Here Miss Clara passed her time profitably, in 
 " astonishing the natives " not only by her beauty, but 
 by her doings. For the first five or six days, to be 
 sure, she was scarcely seen; for Herman, overcome 
 with fatigue, soothed by the rich, heavy salt air, and 
 lulled by the slumberous, ceaseless murmur of the sea, 
 slept from morning till night, and from night till morn- 
 ing, while Sally took care of him through the dark 
 hours, and his sister through the bright ones, dividing
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY. 69 
 
 her attention between him within, and the beautiful ori- 
 oles without the window, flashing like lightning from one 
 full-blossoming apple-tree to another, viciously tweak- 
 ing the blossoms, and interspersing these performances 
 with their startling, reedy, rollicking whistle. But at 
 the end of this period, she with him made her appear- 
 ance out-of-doors, in a gray gingham and flat. She 
 sat with him in the woods, and hung him about like an 
 idol, (as he was to her,) with oak-leaf wreaths and pine- 
 leaf chains. She milked the pet Alderney into his 
 mouth, and gathered wild strawberries, raspberries, 
 blue-berries, and thimble-berries, into that ever recep- 
 tive and commodious cavity. She called the farmer's 
 children about her, and, with him clinging fast to her 
 hand, took the lead in most uproarious games of puss- 
 in-the-corner and the old-man's-castle. She wrote to 
 the Doctor for leave to let him bathe in the sea, and 
 set Sally to make them up some bathing-dresses, and 
 Edward to teach them to swim. She soon proceeded to 
 climb with him into the hay-carts, and, reclining in the 
 scented hay and clover, made luxurious progresses 
 through bright meadows twinkling with butter-cups, and 
 shady grassy lanes among the wild green hills, balmy with 
 the breath of evergreens, and strown, as if by the 
 giants, with huge mossy rocks, while rough ridgy pole- 
 fencesj sticking out of their sides here and there like 
 the back-bones of mastodons, completed their antedilu- 
 vian expression. She rowed him in a boat ; she went 
 jogging about, with him before her, on the back of a 
 plodding old cart-horse; and, in a word, she played 
 with him such pranks as were never heard of in, or 
 imagined possible to, that discreet and decorous young 
 woman before or after. 
 
 This was Herman's first actual face to face, and
 
 70 HERMAN. 
 
 hand to hand, introduction to his mother earth ; and 
 he passed his time in a sort of wondering rapture too 
 deep for expression, except that once, in a confiding 
 mood, he told his sister he had dreamed that the farm 
 was the Garden of Eden, and she was Eve without any 
 snake, and with leave to eat apples if she wanted to, 
 though she liked the peaches better ; and he was her 
 son Abel; but Cain had been sent to a boarding- 
 school, (which was Herman's great horror, and equiva- 
 lent for a banishment to Siberia.) Clara still had to 
 allow him to read his chapter in the Bible every day, 
 though other books were strictly withheld. He could 
 not go to sleep without it ; for he had " promised poor 
 mamma." Towards thanksgiving time, she brought 
 him back to town, with the last chestnuts in a bag as a 
 present for the Doctor, alighted at that gentleman's 
 door, and in triumph exhibited her patient to him with 
 cheeks redder than her own ; and hers bloomed to such 
 a degree, that she looked like Gambadella's portrait of 
 her mother come out of the frame : that for one young 
 admirer whom she had left behind her, she now had 
 two, which is saying a good deal ; and that she was 
 pretty unanimously pronounced to be the handsomest 
 girl in Boston that winter. She had " seen about it. 
 Little Herman" did not die. 
 
 There was now nothing morbid left visible about 
 him, except his more than girlish shyness and sensi- 
 tiveness ; and these might cling to him through life, un- 
 less done away with by the companionship of other 
 boys. He was therefore placed at once at the Latin- 
 School. There his lessons gave him no trouble ; and 
 though Edward, who, with all his indolence in other 
 matters, was quite English in his devotion to boyish 
 and manly exercises, was fain for very shame to give
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY. 71 
 
 him private lessons in their own yard in sliding, and 
 on a solitary spot on the Back Bay in skating, before 
 he could suffer him to exhibit his attempts in either to 
 his school-mates, he got on, on the whole, very well 
 with them. He had both an ardor about whatever he 
 undertook, and a natural dexterity, which enabled him 
 quickly to overtake or outstrip most of them in any- 
 thing which required skill rather than strength ; and 
 his strength was in the meantime increasing rapidly. 
 Besides, there was a certain magical charm about Her- 
 man's nature, which tended to make every one who 
 had a good side turn it to him instinctively. With 
 him, the rough were gentle and the brazen modest ; 
 and, though this led him in his after life to form too 
 favorable judgments of his neighbours at first, and thus 
 sometimes to be disappointed in the end, it certainly 
 was in his early days a merciful tempering of the 
 wind to the shorn lamb. He went on rapidly and 
 prosperously through school, college, and the Law 
 School ; while his great facility saved him time enough 
 for dabbling in drawing, modelling, and verse-making, 
 in each of which his efforts were crowned with a mod- 
 erate degree of success while they continued, which 
 was usually until some other hobby happened to be 
 trotted out before him, and not after. 
 
 The only marked incident in his history, between 
 his recovery and majority, was the death of his father. 
 Mr. Arden was struck with apoplexy at his desk, and 
 went, in three days, from the counting-house to the 
 narrow 'house. His children were dutifully as sorry 
 for him as they could be ; but that was not so sorry 
 as they might have been. He had been too busy in 
 trying to make them rich, to spare any time for making 
 them happy. Happy they had been; but it was in
 
 72 HERMAN. 
 
 one another, and not in him; and about as happy, 
 therefore, they continued without him. He had never 
 been intimate with his children. There were no mutual 
 consolations, rejoicings, confidences, or counsels to re- 
 member and to miss when he was gone. All Clara's 
 few little perplexities and troubles had been shared 
 between "Ned and Nurse;" all Herman's, little and 
 great, between " mamma and Clara ;" and as for Ed- 
 waid, he never appeared to have any, little or great. 
 They had hardly seen their father through their child- 
 hood, except at their meals ; and then he was usually 
 tired, and seldom spoke except to enforce upon them 
 the old-fashioned monastic rule of silence at the table. 
 When they grew older, and he would willingly have 
 heard and joined in their conversation, the habit of 
 silence and constraint before him had become too fixed 
 to be easily broken. He did not know how to draw 
 his daughter out ; and his oldest son was pursuing his 
 studies at college, and afterwards at Paris. He felt his 
 loneliness on his own hearth sometimes, but ascribed it 
 chiefly to his widowhood. If he suffered, he betrayed 
 it only by increasing gravity and sternness ; if his 
 spirits rose, by going more to his Club. Thus, though 
 a most upright and well-intentioned man, or perhaps, 
 to speak more correctly, most free from ill intention, 
 and in money matters a very indulgent parent, he lived 
 little beloved, and died little lamented by his children, 
 and left with them a memory which, instead of being 
 a cherished source of tender, elevating, and grateful 
 feeling, was a briar in their consciences that it was a 
 relief to cast from them ; because, though they had no 
 unfilial words nor deeds to reproach themselves with 
 on his account, they could not but acknowledge to 
 themselves that they had said or done very little to 
 give him pleasure.
 
 THE FAMILY PORTRAIT-GALLERY. 73 
 
 Edward and Clara moved on towards middle life, 
 side by side, gracefully, graciously, and harmoniously, 
 with a merry mutual understanding, that if they could 
 ever find fellow-pilgrims whom they liked better than 
 one another, they should part at once ; but that had 
 not happened. The pet quality of each appeared to 
 be a certain quiet elegance in living, being, and doing, 
 and that each of them beheld possessed in an almost 
 unrivalled degree by the other. As to their moral and 
 religious code, it was much like that of Constance, with 
 two additional clauses inserted, while it was forming, 
 by the early cares of Sally, which decreed that they 
 should read the Bible on Sundays, and go to church 
 twice on that day, if the weather was as good as that 
 which did not prevent their walking and riding through 
 the other days of the week ; and these clauses had a 
 supplement, that probably grew out of the observance 
 of them, to the effect that one ought to do any good 
 office to others which came in one's way, which could 
 be done without putting one's self much out of one's 
 way. In what is called the religious sentiment, Clara 
 abounded, and Edward was not deficient ; but it was 
 only another item in their long list of luxuries. Their 
 practice, it must be owned, was much better than Con- 
 stance's, both because their tempers were, and because 
 they had had a home to grow up in, and some kindly 
 domestic influences to grow up under and to serve as 
 conductors outwards for their general human sym- 
 pathies , but the example of Mrs. Arden the third 
 had certainly not tended to attract them magnetically 
 to the devout life. 
 
 Edward was by this time a physician. He had as 
 much employment as he wanted among the rich, which 
 was a little, and as much as he wanted among the poor,
 
 74 HERMAN. 
 
 which was usually none at all. He did not care to be 
 roused from his downy slumbers by night, to soothe the 
 exaggerated alarms of indisposed " exiles of Erin" in 
 Broad Street, nor, by day, to have conquered combat- 
 ants, with broken heads, borne in by their exclamatory 
 friends (" an' surely !") in hob-nailed shoes over Clara's 
 hall-carpet, into his very-well-appointed library. -He 
 baited no trap, therefore, for such miscreants, by put- 
 ting a sign in either of his windows. His father's door- 
 plate only, left undisturbed, or his servant if he was 
 out, told his friends of his Avhereabouts ; and when 
 they were not very well, nor very ill, they sent for 
 him. His parts were naturally fine ; and no expense 
 had been spared in his education. He was as skilful 
 as want of experience would let him be ; and the 
 beauty of his person, voice, and movements, made his 
 presence seem as appropriate as that of fruit and flow- 
 ers in a luxurious sick-room. 
 
 Clara kept house for him with a goodly corps of 
 servants under her, ordered the dishes, and played the 
 pieces, which her brothers liked best. She read a 
 little, embroidered much, went shopping with a full 
 purse, and seemed to herself and others to possess a lot 
 most enviably full of indulgences and void of duties. 
 She went to balls and parties, made calls, had dinner- 
 parties when she could get enough good talkers to- 
 gether, and often sat between times in a mysteriously 
 beautiful trance; as she was still doing late on this 
 particular Sunday afternoon, when Edward, having 
 obligingly left us time for a great deal of gossipping 
 about him and his, at last exerted himself so far as to 
 take his cigar from his dainty lips, between the tips 
 of two ivory-rimmed fingers, and said, " Clara." 
 
 She raisei her eye-lashes and answered, " Miofra- 
 tello."
 
 THE FAMILY PORTKAIT-GALLEEY. 75 
 
 " Don't you think you'd better go and sec about 
 Herman ?" 
 
 She looked all astray. A relation of hers once said 
 of her, that, tender-hearted as she was, and efficient, 
 too, when roused to action, another might be fading at 
 her side, or she herself 
 
 "Wearing awa', 
 Like the snow-wreath i' the thaw," 
 
 without her finding it out. She was too full of happi- 
 ness to suspect the approach of sorrow. Her spirit was 
 so clad in brightness, that shadows passed by and 
 never fell upon her. 
 
 Edward continued, " He was walking the floor 
 over my head half the night. You must have ob- 
 served that he ate no dinner to-day. That sort of 
 thing won't do for his mother's son. He must have 
 some weight on his mind. I dare say it has some- 
 
 o / 
 
 thing to do with that unlucky speech. He would 
 never have made it, if he had only had the discretion 
 to consult me first. It's capital in itself, to be sure, 
 and true enough, I dare say ; and he's a noble fellow ; 
 but whom can he get to act with him ? Nobody but a 
 mob of unpractical and impracticable fanatics. All 
 the respectable \usus loquendi : i. e., respected ?] men 
 of the North have got their minds made up quite as 
 stubbornly as those of the South, not to do anything 
 against Slavery, however they may talk now and then 
 just before an election ; and if one of them steps an 
 inch in advance of the rest, they all fall away from him 
 to the right and the left, arid he ceases to be respecta- 
 ble ; and as for our mechanics, tradesmen, and farmers, 
 I suspect they are under the influence, if not in the power, 
 of the nobs and the demagogues here," said Edward, 
 exaggerating as rhetoricians are sometimes tempted to
 
 76 HERMAN. . 
 
 do for the sake ot point and parallel, " almost as much 
 as the sand-hillers and mean white men, that Herman 
 talks about, are there. They have knowledge enough 
 to make money, but not enough to make statesmen. This 
 brother of ours will only get himself into Coventry for 
 nothing; and I cannot see the good sense of giving up 
 all the peace and comfort of life for the sake of these 
 abstract questions." 
 
 Clara neither knew nor cared much about the politi 
 cal questions under discussion ; but the idea of Herman 
 ill or in trouble had frightened her out of her usual 
 careful courtesy, and nearly up two flights of stairs, 
 before Edward got half through his oration, which he 
 finished notwithstanding, to himself, probably be- 
 cause, having once begun, he thought it too much 
 trouble to leave off.
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. 77 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE KNIGHT'S VOW. 
 
 " Omai convien che tu cost H spoiUre I 
 Disse?l maestro." DANTE. 
 
 IT seems to be received as an axiom, just now, 
 among a large class of critics both literary and oral, 
 that perfection of moral beauty must needs be in itself 
 a blemish, and render its possessor uninteresting and 
 unnatural. We do not hold these truths, if truths 
 they be, self-evident. On the contrary, there appears 
 to us in our blindness, to be a close analogy between 
 
 cDi/ 
 
 moral beauty and most other kinds of beauty, physical 
 beauty included ; and who but a peculiarly barbarous 
 barbarian could think the Apollo Belvidere rendered 
 more interesting or more natural by a hump-back, 
 bandy-legs, or a skull modelled after that of a Mat- 
 head Indian ? In fact, the very statement of the above 
 doctrine involves a contradiction in terms. We have 
 seen a great many good people, indeed, who appeared to 
 us too priggish, but never one who appeared to us too 
 perfect. 
 
 As that ingenious and liberal moral philosopher 
 and casuist, Increase Cotton, LL. D., teaches however, 
 while it is highly proper to have a judgment of one's 
 own, it would be rash and self-conceited to act accord- 
 ing to it, where it runs counter to that of the public at 
 any given time ; because charity forbids us to doubt 
 that the public are always conscientious in forming 
 their judgments ; and. because a hundred and still
 
 78 HERMAN. 
 
 more a million, of heads are better than one, the case 
 of the Hydra, and a very few others somewhat simi- 
 lar, being mythical and altogether exceptional. It 
 gives me pleasure, therefore, to be able, gracefully 
 bowing in this matter to the opinion of the critics 
 aforesaid, to bespeak their interest and sympathy in 
 and with my hero, by declaring that, at this period of 
 his life, and perhaps to the end of it, he was not per- 
 fect at all. Oh, that I were able to conform myself 
 to that further fictitious, not to say factitious, standard 
 of taste, according to which, just as, though a hemor- 
 rhage from the nose, howsoever ill-timed, distressing, 
 or even dangerous to the patient, is comic, one from 
 the lungs is poetical and tragic ; and an extravasation of 
 blood about the heart is not inappropriate to the demise 
 of the most romantic civil hero, (who would seem, in- 
 deed, capable of escaping an earthly immortality only 
 by means of pulmonary disease or some accident, un- 
 less pounced upon by some convenient and imposing 
 epidemic,) while a similar affection of the brain of an 
 imaginary personage can be rendered affecting or ex- 
 cusable only by a weight of years and virtues in the 
 patient ; so certain moral diseases, alias sins, in actual 
 life making the sinner by no means peculiarly en- 
 gaging, have in fiction acquired a prescriptive right to 
 our regard ! I know how much more picturesque, be- 
 coming, and appropriate to the fair ideal of early man- 
 hood, are the vices of the bandit than the foibles of 
 the boy ; but, alas ! there is such a thing as truth as 
 well as conformity in the world, even the world of 
 novelists ; and truth to my vision of Herman, as he 
 now rises before me out of my inkstand day by day, 
 like the genie rising out of the casket or the fair Lady 
 of Avenel out of her weL, compels me to own, on
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. Y9 
 
 pain of having my sharp metallic pen forevermore 
 rankling like a thorn in my conscience, that he was 
 scarcely more like a bandit than was the fair lady her- 
 self, and though beautiful and in his way grand in 
 himself, whether I can show him to be so by my 
 tame sketch or not, beautiful? and grand rather after 
 the fashion of St. Michael, than that of Satan writhing 
 under his feet. 
 
 He had been, up to this time, one of those stainless 
 but somewhat whimsical spiritual knights, who, for 
 want of the inward foes which their fine and lofty na- 
 tures refuse to afford them, and not having heard as 
 yet the trumpet which calls them to fight an outward 
 battle with evil for their neighbours, are driven to fight 
 a few spiritual windmills now and then. He had in- 
 herited a little of his mother's morbid, negative, and 
 spurious conscientiousness. His fastidiousness he car- 
 ried almost as far as Constance did hers, that is, 
 almost to a sin ; but if he did lock up the inner trea- 
 sures of his nature, and give a pass-key to only three or 
 four friends at a time, he did not frown on the rest of 
 the world or push them roughly away from the key- 
 hole, but hid it with a smile, and treated them all the 
 while to so much of his general good-will and urbanity, 
 that they never imagined how much he was all the 
 while withholding from them. He had a strong and 
 burning desire, by success in some art to glorify less 
 his God than himself. Instinctively and invariably 
 kind as he was to all creatures weaker than himself, 
 women, children, and inferior animals, his tempera- 
 ment, from extreme sensitiveness, was irritable enough 
 to give him much more trouble than it was ever suffered 
 to give his neighbours ; and if anything mean or cruel 
 would force itself upon his notice, he was capable of
 
 80 HERMAN. 
 
 being extremely angry, though hitherto he had sinned 
 not, and seldom let the sun go down upon his wrath. 
 He had, in cold blood, a great and overweening dislike 
 to giving offence to others even in a good cause ; and 
 when he was grieved, as he still was too easily, his 
 mother's tears had not yet quite forgotten their way up 
 into his bright, dark eyes, though few human eyes were 
 suffered to see them there. Mortifying faults ! But 
 he was ashamed of most of them, and struggled with 
 them all as fast as he found them out, as valiantly as 
 he would have done with the more interesting brigand 
 peculiarities to which we have been alluding, if he had 
 had them to struggle with ; and if we any of us succeed 
 in taking the kingdom of heaven, as we are bidden to 
 strive to do, by force, it must be by resisting the 
 temptations we have, rather than those we have not. 
 If he had other faults, his friends could not find them 
 out ; and it is a curious psychological fact, which in 
 some points of view rather favors the practice of hu- 
 mility and self-examination, that those .who honestly 
 and secretly find the most fault with themselves, are 
 commonly the very persons with whom others find the 
 least. 
 
 Such as he was, then, Clara knocked at his door. 
 He came to it smiling, though not speaking and look- 
 ing somewhat pale and dishevelled, and stood holding 
 it hospitably open. She shone in, like a moonbeam ; 
 and he rolled his study-chair for her up to one side of 
 the fire-place. She sank down in it in her dreamy 
 way, and singing, " The Lord is my shepherd," in a 
 low, full, sweet tone, like that of a subdued organ- 
 pipe, to his favorite air of Adeste Fideles, she looked 
 round the room. 
 
 It was large and long, though low, and fitted up in
 
 THE KXIGHT'S vow. 81 
 
 a rich, strange, fantastic style. Part of the furniture 
 was antique, of carved black walnut ; and the rest, 
 though modern, carefully made to match. The cur- 
 tains and carpet were dark. Busts, globes, relics, and 
 oddities, stood on queer little tables against the walls, 
 looking very weirdly in the flickering firelight ; and 
 the walls were hung above with old engravings, small 
 paintings, and so-forth. Everything in the room seemed 
 instinct with some kind of significance, and to have 
 been carefully selected to suit the peculiar taste of the 
 occupant. Edward once told him that his " very and- 
 irons were emblematic." Over the mantel-piece was a 
 skull from the catacombs of Rome, which the boy had 
 crowned with amaranth and set up there, in self- 
 mockery, as the likeness of his idol, Fame. On one 
 side, against the wall, the fitful light played on a large 
 marble bas-relief, which had been sent him from Borne 
 by a prosperous sculptor, who, on his way thither 
 years before, when poor, ill, and alone, had been be- 
 friended by the Arden family, and, much struck by 
 Herman's singular turn of mind and precocious fancy, 
 had taken the design from one of his ludicrously ill- 
 executed drawings. It represented the Angels of Life 
 and Death, floating about each other, the one robed, 
 garlanded, and buoyant, sweeping upward and onward 
 in chase of a butterfly, which hovered before it, just 
 beyond its reach ; the other, dull and naked, sinking 
 blindly and heavily downward, with closed eyes like a 
 sleeping albatross, a fading morning-glory clutched in 
 one unconscious hand, and the other closing instinct- 
 ively on one furling wing of its heedless companion, 
 the Angel of Life ; with the motto below, in black 
 
 letter : 
 
 " I am the stanchest hunter, playmate, see! 
 Thou chasest butterflies, while I catch thee."
 
 82 HERMAN. 
 
 In au alcove, which appeared to be used as an ora- 
 tory, at the further end opposite to the fire, gleamed 
 the tarnished gilding of two tablets containing the 
 Creed and ten Commandments, which Herman had 
 rescued from destruction or desecration, when a small 
 Virginian ante-Revolutionary chapel was pulled down, 
 and set up here, where they seemed to hallow all the 
 room. On one side of the alcove hung an engraving 
 of Scheffer's " Dead Christ," and on the other, one 
 of his Christus Remunerator. 
 
 In the midst of this abundance there was no dis- 
 order. Everything kept its most tasteful and appro- 
 priate place ; except, indeed, that the sofa, where 
 Herman had thrown himself again, was strewn with 
 books ; for it was one of his peculiarities, and of old 
 Sally's few complaints against him after he came in a 
 measure under her care, that " Master Herman couldn't 
 never read no fewer than a dozen books at a time." 
 The most of these things Clara saw with her memory, 
 quite as much as with her eyes ; for, though Herman 
 had evidently been reading and writing, he had turned 
 down his gas, as she suspected when he heard her 
 coming, that she might not see his face too distinctly. 
 On the writing-table she espied, when a jet of flame 
 blazed up from the coals, a freshly written paper, glis- 
 tening and blotted, apparently, with something be- 
 sides ink. 
 
 " You look rather literary," said Clara, completing 
 her survey, and pausing in her hymn, " What have you 
 to read ?" 
 
 "Nothing very new: the Bible, the " Imitatio 
 Christi" St. Francis de Sales's "Introduction d la 
 Vie Devote" Jeremy Taylor, Henry Ware, and so- 
 forth. Clara, what do you suppose those worthies
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. 83 
 
 would have said, to stand in my window, as I did this 
 cold morning, and see the beggars go by?" Herman 
 had never quite thrown aside his old habit of half- 
 inquiring, half-meditative soliloquy, when alone with 
 her. 
 
 ; ' That they were sorry for them ; as you were your- 
 self, no doubt." He shook his head. " Why, what 
 should they have said ?" 
 
 " ' He who hath this world's goods, and seeth his 
 brother have need, and shutteth up his compassion 
 from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him ?' per- 
 haps ; as the prayer-book did to-day." 
 
 " Do you think that means, that you should ' teach 
 them wants they never knew ? ' ' 
 
 " Wants of engravings, and cushioned chairs, and 
 carved book-cases ? ~No. I should have an easier con- 
 science, though, to-night, if I had spared a little time 
 and money to supply some of the wants which, I fear, 
 their fortunes have taught them already, want of 
 work, fuel, food, and innocence." 
 
 " Cheer up, then, and do it now if you think you 
 ought. You have not lost much time. You have your 
 life before yon." 
 
 " Yes ;" and he sighed heavily. 
 
 " Herman, don't you want to tell me what the mat- 
 ter is ?" 
 
 " Matter ! Why ? What makes you think any- 
 thing is the matter 2" 
 
 " Because I know. Tell me now, and you will feel 
 a great deal better ; you always did ; I will make you. 
 My fortitude is so great, equal to any emergency ! it 
 is a pity not to prove it. I see already that you must 
 have done something dreadful, paid six cents instead 
 of four- pence half penny, or said you were glad to
 
 84 HERMAN. 
 
 Bee somebody you wished in Vienna, or something else 
 as terrible. Certainty would be better than suspense. 
 Come, let me know the worst at once. Herman, if 
 you won't, I shall be obliged to come and kiss you." 
 
 " Kiss me, and I will." 
 
 She floated towards him instantly, and bent over 
 the arm of his sofa, and, as her golden shower of ring- 
 lets fell upon his face, he clasped his arms around her 
 neck, cried " Mother !" and burst into tears. She was 
 deeply touched. It carried them both back to the 
 time when such outbreaks of feeling had been more 
 common with him than now, and when her tender 
 ministrations had healed the desolate little orphan of 
 his sickness of mind and body ; and the sorrow of his 
 young manhood soon flowed out to her almost as freely 
 as his boyish confidences had been wont to do, except 
 that he could not own to her, for he would not to him- 
 self, what a spirit his idol had shown, well nigh her 
 own iconoclast. After the first ebullition of his emo- 
 tion, however, it was kept down and in w T ith that un- 
 flinching, agonizing self-repression which, in the pres- 
 ence of another almost always, taken in connection 
 with its intensity, made suffering in Herman so im- 
 posing, so affecting, and so unlike that of any one else, 
 and which in his childhood had proved almost too 
 much for his strength or life to support. 
 
 He confessed his love, its delight, suspense, strong 
 and increasing hope, and then his loss of her who was 
 to have been, who only could have been, his inspira- 
 tion, his muse, his guiding star, the divinity at whose 
 shrine his hitherto too selfish ambition should have 
 been hallowed, the magnet by which he should have 
 learned to steer his hitherto fickle course steadfastly, 
 et cetera, et cetera. Poor Herman ! He said it all as
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. 85 
 
 simply as he knew how, and just as he thought it ; but 
 he was yet a mere youth, in love, and in first love, 
 and of course he could hardly be expected to 
 
 "Ope 
 His mouth, but out there flew a trope." 
 
 Clara smoothed his jetty curls with her light jew- 
 elled fingers, and pitied him so truly, that, even while 
 she said in her heart, " A lucky escape for him and all 
 of us, if she has such a wilful disposition ! if he could 
 only see it, poor fellow !" she could not help saying 
 soothingly to him, " It could be only a girlish freak, 
 Herman. She must love you; nobody whom you 
 loved so could help it. Depend upon it, she is as sorry 
 as you are already." 
 
 " ~No ; she was only misled, and might have been 
 undeceived, perhaps, at first ; but she has a high spirit, 
 and I am afraid that my hastiness and harshness es- 
 tranged her." 
 
 " Oh, my dearest Herman ! your harshness never 
 estranged a kitten ! If she deserves you and would 
 make you happy, you must be the judge of that, go 
 to her directly, and she will be only too glad to see 
 you, and to ask your pardon." 
 
 " I did go yesterday. She was gone." 
 
 "Gone! Where?" 
 
 " Away. To her aunt in Baltimore, probably. In 
 the afternoon, I strolled down again towards the Re- 
 vere House, I don't know why, from habit partly, I 
 dare say ; I had not made up my mind to go in ; and 
 I saw her trunks go by on a railway coach." 
 
 " Don't you think you might be mistaken ? Some 
 one else might have the same initials-." 
 
 " The Van Rooselandts' baggage was with hers. I 
 saw their name in full. ISTo ; she was determined to
 
 86 HERMAN. 
 
 place herself beyond my reach once for all. And so 
 that story's done, my Psyche ! Ko more ' to be con- 
 tinued ! We've come to ugly old Finis !' as I used to 
 say, when we read fairy tales together." 
 
 The poor youth tried to smile without signal suc- 
 cess, sprang up, and began with an averted face to 
 gather together his books and replace them on their 
 shelves, perhaps to give himself time to recover his 
 voice, for there was another story now to be begun. 
 
 Returning presently to her with a step which 
 seemed almost martial in his strong self-mastery, he 
 placed her beside him on the sofa. She told me some 
 years afterwards, that she had never been able to re- 
 peat the conversation which followed, deep as was the 
 impression which it made and left upon her, and pow- 
 erfully as it had affected the course of her life ever 
 since. She said : " It was as if I had been sitting on a 
 stone some day, looking up into the sky, expecting and 
 thinking of nothing of the sort ; and all at once heaven 
 had opened over my head, and let down a shower of 
 sounds and slibwn a swarm of sights, such as I had 
 never heard nor seen before, and so could find no 
 words for." 
 
 In words firm, but low and brief, for egotism was 
 always a pain to him, he admitted her to glimpses of 
 his inmost soul, which, stirred to its depths as a sea by 
 an earthquake, was laying bare and casting up all its 
 hoarded treasures before the Lord. His brief enjoy- 
 ment of his love, he showed her, had made an intensity 
 of love indispensable to him. He hungered for it, 
 thirsted for it, fainted for it. When Constance's was 
 taken from him, he could think of nothing earthly that 
 could take its place ; nothing could ever take its place, 
 except the love of God. He had spent the day chiefly
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. 87 
 
 in carefully examining the New Testament anew, in 
 order to find out precisely on what terms this love was 
 to be obtained ; and "here," said he, rising and bring- 
 ing the blotted sheet from the table, " is the determina- 
 tion to which I have come, tried to come." 
 
 He turned up the gas, that she might be able to 
 read, but still hesitated, and. lingered over it. She took 
 it from his half-reluctant but yielding hand, and read 
 to herself, as follows : 
 
 " ACT OF ENLISTMENT. 
 " MY HEAVENLY FATHER : 
 
 " For the sake of Thy love, and the love of Christ, 
 and the gift of the Holy Spirit offered me by Thy word, 
 I enlist myself to serve Thee henceforth, not after the 
 fashion of these slothful and degenerate days, which I 
 have hitherto most shamefully and disloyally followed, 
 saying I go and going not, but after the manner, so 
 far as in me lies or may lie in the future by Thy 
 grace, of those early Christians, worthy of the name, to 
 whom Thy glad tidings of great joy were first spoken ; 
 in body and in soul ; in heart and in life ; in deed, 
 word, thought, and feeling ; bound to no sect or party 
 so much as to that of the Twelve and their Leader ; in 
 joy, if it ever comes to me again, and in sorrow; 
 through good report, and, if it must be, through evil 
 report ; without reserve ; keeping nothing back from 
 Thy treasury, but holding in instant readiness to throw 
 into it, as Thou mayest draw upon me, property, lei- 
 sure, life, and every power of the body and the soul ; 
 resisting the world, the flesh, and the devil, whenever, 
 wherever, and however they may oppose themselves 
 to me in Thy paths, after the pattern held up to 
 me by the one great Master, loving Thee with all
 
 88 IIERMAN. 
 
 ray heart, mind, soul, and strength, and my neighbour 
 as myself; passing each day as if summoned already to 
 give an account of all my earthly deeds at the judg- 
 ment-seat of Christ on the morrow; and doing all 
 which Thou dost bless me with power to do to bring 
 about the coming of his kingdom of light, love, and 
 harmony, in this poor, blind, deaf, wrangling, and igno- 
 rant world, until Thou shalt call me hence to a higher 
 and holier one ; all of which is my reasonable service. 
 "BOSTON, 18. [Signed.]" 
 
 " "Was Herman mad, or was almost everybody else 
 B0 2 But there was little in the paper, thus far, but 
 what we always read in good books, and heard in good 
 sermons, that we ought to do. But was it really neces- 
 sary to do it, in literal, sober earnest ? Did anybody, 
 even among the best of people, could anybody more 
 than try to do such things, now and then ? O, how 
 awful it was ! What had got into Herman ?" "Won- 
 dering thus within herself with astonishment deepen- 
 ing into terror, Clara ran glancing down over the first 
 page ; but, turning to the other side of the sheet, she 
 read, with a sense of great relief, 
 
 " No, my God ; I dare not sign ! How can I dare, 
 fickle and weak as all my former life has proved me, 
 to run the risk of adding the sin of covenant-breaking 
 with Thee, to all my other shortcomings and desertions? 
 I have not the might to give Thee that which is not 
 mine to give nor to withhold. . Sign Thou my heart 
 with Thy name, and hallow me to Thyself; and stoop 
 to take that which is Thine by right already, but which 
 is too low and weak to lift itself to Thee. Thou with 
 whom all things are possible, work one more hard 
 miracle, and admit one more rich man into the king- 
 dom of heaven !"
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. 89 
 
 Clara had thought that no life could be more blame- 
 less than Herman's hitherto ; but, judged by the 
 standard which he was now setting up for himself, or, 
 if he was right, which Christ himself had set up for his 
 disciples, even his conduct had been imperfect; and 
 as, while she pondered in silence, he took down his New 
 Testament again, read aloud from it, and commented 
 upon it, her suspicion that he might be right grew, and 
 grew stronger, and the solemn conviction came upon 
 her, that he was so. As he said, " it was as impossible 
 as undesirable to set limits to the mercy of God ;" but, 
 to her surprise, they did not find, in the sacred title- 
 deeds of heaven, that it was secured, or offered, to them 
 on much easier terms than those which Herman was 
 endeavouring to accept. 
 
 " Herman," said she at length, reverently lifting 
 her gentle eyes from the paper to his face, " how long 
 have you seen that it was our duty actually to do 
 all this?" 
 
 " Not many hours, distinctly, as a man," he replied, 
 " though I think I did as a child. I have known ob- 
 
 o , 
 
 scurely ever since, that it was my duty to inquire and 
 find out precisely what my duty was ; but I could not 
 or dared not ; I was too hurried or too happy." He 
 blushed like a school-girl detected in some meanness, 
 and muttered to himself, " Selfish coward ! I deserved 
 to lose the happiness which made me so unfaithful and 
 ungrateful !" 
 
 " Don't, don't blame yourself so, Herman ! You 
 have always been better than almost anybody else. 
 Don't think God is displeased with you, because trou- 
 ble has come to you through no fault of yours. Don't 
 you remember we are told, that 'whom the Lord 
 loveth he chasteneth' ? And in that sermon that you
 
 90 HERMAN. 
 
 liked so much, on that very text, Dr. Lovel said that 
 ' sorrows had often proved to be among the very best 
 earthly blessings which God sent to His saintliest 
 children, and that He gave a double portion of them 
 to His best and dearest Son.' " 
 
 Herman's smile shone out, but clouded in again, as 
 he answered, " Thank you, dearest ; but they are sent 
 to sinners too ; though even then I believe it is in 
 mercy. But I have saddened you long enough with 
 my difficulties and regrets. I have always been too 
 much in the habit of thinking of myself; and now that 
 this blow has fallen upon me, I must rouse myself, and 
 learn to think of others." 
 
 " Will you hear a little good advice, for the sake of 
 one other ?" 
 
 " Hear it, at least," said he, good-humoredly. 
 
 " Then go to bed now; for you look quite worn out, 
 and Edward says you did not sleep well last night ;" 
 
 " I'm sorry if I disturbed him." 
 
 " Oh, he did not care, except on your account ; he 
 made up, for it this morning; and then let me come 
 back and read you to sleep, as I used to do ; and to- 
 morrow, pack your valise, and set off on a little 
 journey." 
 
 "I was thinking of that ; though it will have to be 
 two valises, instead of one, for the journey, is not to be 
 a little one. I am going to the Rocky Mountains." 
 
 " To the Rocky Mountains ?" 
 
 " And further, too, perhaps. Bear's-meat is good 
 for the vapors. You remember the queer, quaint old 
 fellow I brought in to dinner a fortnight ago, Mr. 
 Grubb, the Indian antiquary ?" 
 
 " Quite well." 
 
 " Part of his object in coming back to civilization,
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. 91 
 
 besides his natural desire to taste what he calls his 
 ' native Indian-pudding and pandowdy' once more be- 
 fore he died, was to get some lawyer to go out there 
 with him, to look up the claims of some of his favorite 
 Gray-Buffalo Indians to some hunting-grounds of theirs, 
 which he says a cheating land-company are trying to 
 cozen them out of at Washington. As neither he nor 
 his copper-colored friends have much pay to offer, this 
 part of his undertaking has not prospered. The busi- 
 ness requires a little technical legal knowledge ; and 
 part of it can be done only by a person who has been 
 on the spot. Old Mr. Andrews, who has known him, 
 and all about him, from a boy, says he is a thoroughly 
 upright and trustworthy man, and deserves credit and 
 assistance. Therefore, I think I shall volunteer." 
 " When should you go ?" 
 
 " This week, the sooner, the better ! I do not 
 know what day. I must send him a note this evening, 
 and find out." 
 
 She was going. He held out his hand hastily for 
 the paper. 
 
 " May not I have it a few minutes more ?" she 
 pleaded, " and copy it, for Edward and me ? You 
 know how sacredly and secretly we would both of us 
 keep it. Dear Herman, it concerns both of us as 
 much as it does you. You would not wish to leave us 
 behind you on your way to heaven." . 
 
 He yielded ; but she did not guess what a sacrifice 
 he was making. It was the first-fruits of his new self- 
 abnegation. She went to Edward, told him as much 
 ^as she could, showed him the paper, and, looking up 
 doubtfully and timidly through her long lashes, to see 
 how he regarded her communication, saw his calm eyes 
 full of unwonted and tender emotion, and his face
 
 92 HERMAN. 
 
 illuminated as if a holy lamp shone upon it. The 
 elder brother was very different from the younger; 
 but his spirit often bowed down in secret to do him 
 homage. 
 
 Herman's bell rang ; and Patrick, the man-servant, 
 was dispatched with a note to the lodgings of Mr. 
 Grubb, and presently brought back word that he 
 would be glad to start at half-past eight the next 
 morning. 
 
 Herman fell asleep that night like a tired martyr 
 sung to sleep by a duet of angels ; for Clara, sitting 
 where he could see her pure, and just now earnest and 
 inspired countenance, between his closing eyelids, 
 
 " Lent to the rhyme of the poet 
 The beauty of her voice," 
 
 and read to him the poems of the sweet and holy Her- 
 bert, that strange, unearthly writer baptized in the 
 mingled waters of Siloam and of Castaly, the very 
 imperfection of whose language heightens perhaps the 
 peculiar effect of his heavenly thoughts, by making 
 them seem the foreign broken utterance of some way- 
 faring seraph, who has scarcely had enough to do with 
 this world to learn our tongue. 
 
 At first, his dreams took a soft and glowing hue 
 from the sweet voice and lines. He thought that, after 
 a dim, groping struggle, and a battle, painful but 
 strangely short, with half-seen foes, who, though seem- 
 ingly terrific of aspect and sometimes giving him sharp 
 stabs, for the most part turned to thin air and van- 
 ished as he successively grappled with them, he had 
 broken through them all, and into heaven, which had 
 all the time been nearer to him than he knew. He 
 was lying to take breath and rest for a few moments
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. . 93 
 
 tinder a palm-tree ; while rapturous bursts of recogni- 
 tion and congratulations of new-comers, by their fami- 
 lies and friends, were going on from moment to mo- 
 ment all about him * and Herbert himself, a noble old 
 harper with a beard of silver, sang a grand song of 
 welcome and triumph in the mighty chorus of which 
 all the angels who flew by and across him joined, just 
 as they happened to pass, as if it was .most familiar to 
 
 them : 
 
 " With sin and the sinning 
 
 His warfare is o'er 1 
 The earth drops beneath him, 
 And heaven stands before I ' 
 
 lie could not yet look up to see them freely ; for, 
 having just come out of darkness to great light, he 
 was dazzled ; but to and fro their pinions fanned him 
 with a pleasant thrill, and their shadows continually 
 hurried over him, and over the asphodel turf about 
 him, as those of clouds do over the hills on a sunny, 
 breezy summer morning; and by the flitting and 
 glancing of these shadows of theirs, he could perceive 
 that they were darting about, and up and down, on 
 their various errands, with the eager spontaneo-usness 
 and rejoicing buoyancy of sportive birds. All possible 
 failure or suffering lay beneath him now. Everlasting 
 love and joy were won. To-morrow was a word of fear 
 no more, but of certain transport ; and every instant 
 he was listening' for the coming of the Saviour, who was 
 to raise him up and strengthen him to bear the new 
 weight of his overwhelming happiness. 
 
 He woke. All was still; and the light was extin- 
 guished. Clara was gone ; and he remembered that he 
 was about to leave even the roof that sheltered her, and 
 that his Constance had abandoned him and set her
 
 94 HERMAN. 
 
 face against him. The room seemed like a tomb. In 
 this life, there must be some such wakings. Alas for 
 the darker and more fearful awakening to be feared for 
 souls who, too cowardly to bear such as these with 
 courage, hurry from them with suicidal and illicit 
 flight into the untimely and unsanctioned sleep of 
 death ! 
 
 He struggled, nerved himself, and slept anew ; but 
 now all was dark within him. He seemed to be nailed, 
 a penitent malefactor, to the cross, hanging between 
 heaven and earth. Darkness was above him, and Gol- 
 gotha below ; but beyond the shadow of the overhang- 
 ing cloud, which intercepted every ray of light from 
 him and the fellow-sufferers whom he heard, though he 
 could not see, groaning at his side, he looked out into 
 a weary and interminable day. Life went on, near 
 him, though apart. Children played in the streets. 
 They grew. They were youths and maidens. They 
 were men and women. They married. They toiled. 
 They reared children in their turn. They grew gray. 
 They sickened. They gave up the ghost. He saw 
 their funerals go by, and their children's children bear 
 their palls ; and still the interminable day went on, and 
 could not end ; for still the pitiless sun shone on, and 
 would not go down ; and still he could not die. Then 
 at last, through the thick gloom at his side, he heard 
 the expiring voice of Christ shriek out, " My God, my 
 God, why hast Thou forsaken me !" "With the bound 
 !ie gaye in his agony, he overset his cross. It fell upon 
 iim ; and as he came to himself, with cold horror 
 oozing from him at every pore, and found himself in 
 his own chamber and lying in his bed, it was at first 
 with a nightmare sense of material pressure on his 
 body, head, and limbs, the trace left behind, by the 
 conflicts of the preceding days, on his every nerve.
 
 THE KNIGHT'S vow. 95 
 
 Poor y on th ! Invigorated as he had been already, 
 in muscle and mind, by the healthful activity of his 
 stripling years, the sensitiveness and excitability, en- 
 tailed upon him by earlier mismanagement, were in- 
 deed a heavy cross for him to bear through life ; but 
 at least he rose under it, and carried it off manfully. 
 His alarm-clock struck six. He sprang from his bed, 
 lighted his gas, took a stinging cold bath, dressed with 
 his usual neatness but much more than his usual speed, 
 and bustled briskly through the completion of his 
 packing.
 
 IIEKMAX. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEAKTH. 
 
 "A perfect woman, nobly planned 
 To warn, to comfort, and command." 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 "Obedient Yamen 
 Answered, Amen; 
 And did 
 As he was bid." 
 
 REJECTED ADDRESSES. 
 
 HEEMA.N ran down to the dining-room for the roll 
 and cup of solitary tea, with which he had requested 
 Miss Dalley, whose versatility was at present officiating 
 as sub-housekeeper and head-cook, to supply him. 
 Quite an astonishing whiff of warmth and glare of fire- 
 light came in his face, as he opened the door ; and, at 
 the table, a still further and more agreeable surprise, 
 sat Clara ! He had taken leave of her and Edward 
 both, the night before, and had had no expectation of 
 seeing either of them again for months ; for nine o'clock 
 was usually, at this season, their very earliest time of 
 appearing in the morning ; but there she was, in her 
 home-like dark-blue merino, presiding over a larger 
 quantity and variety of muffins, eggs, ham, cutlets, 
 fresh butter, corn-bread, toast, tea, coffee, jam and 
 honey, than the frugal Sally usually found it necessary 
 to administer to her somewhat abstemious consumers in 
 the breakfasts of a whole week. The aspect of the 
 comfortable and hospitable apartment offered a most 
 inspiriting contrast to that of the chill, dusky, lonely
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 97 
 
 chamber which he had just left, disordered with the 
 stir of flitting, and still haunted by the spectres of the 
 night. 
 
 Clara was eager to see him do justice to her good 
 cheer. Beginning to do so to please her, his healthy 
 appetite, returning, presently showed what arrears it 
 had to make up ; and he went on to please himself, 
 and soon looked and felt a different creature from the 
 hypochondriac dreamer of two hours before, and was 
 conscious of the pleasant stirring within him of a little 
 if the young-manly spirit of adventure. 
 
 It was going to be his turn now, however, to ad- 
 minister a small portion of consolation. Clara had 
 poured out a cup of milk for herself, and allowed him 
 to put one or two things on her plate ; and, if she took 
 very little off, she explained it by saying that, in order 
 to be quite impartial, she ought to eat half her break- 
 fast with one of her brothers and the other half with 
 the other. Meanwhile, she blithely pressed him with, 
 " Another egg ? Yours was tiny enough for a pigeon's. 
 Another cup of tea? Not half a cup? That little 
 brown corner of corn bread ? A spoonful of jam ? Let 
 me give you a little more honey, to finish your toast 
 with," till she could prevail no further and saw him, 
 in a traveller's bustling fashion, beginning to push back 
 his chair and compare his repeater with the Time- 
 piece, as they called the bronze clock among them- 
 selves, from its having a figure of the old destroyer 
 upon it. Then she rose and moved towards him, 
 checked herself and turned to the fire, but, squeezing 
 and almost wringing her hands as she pretended to 
 warm them, she said quite unintentionally, " Don't, 
 you think, Herman, you should find it more convenient 
 to wait and go to-morrow ?"
 
 98 HERMAN. 
 
 " Have you never noticed, dear Psyche" said he, 
 looking up at her as he pulled on his boots with a sort 
 of pensive, wistful humor in his face, which peculiarly 
 belonged to it, "it is odd, isn't it? that, when to- 
 morrow is always so much the most convenient day for 
 doing everything disagreeable, nothing ever actually 
 gets done but what we do to-day ?" 
 
 She returned his smile as gaily as she knew how ; 
 but it so happened that, while she was using all her 
 efforts with her red lips to make them spread that 
 signal of gladness, her bright eyes altogether forgot 
 themselves and were so heedless as to drop two great 
 diamonds in plain sight. It occurred to selfish Herman, 
 for the first time, that he was not to be the only suf- 
 ferer from his own departure. 
 
 "Why, Clara!" exclaimed he, " O, fie! What 
 are you watering your blue forget-me-nots for?" 
 
 He stood holding one of her little hands in each of 
 his. She smiled again, though dimly. Her smile al- 
 ways set a bewitching round dimple in her left cheek, 
 a perfect kiss-trap. He put his lips to it an instant. 
 She thought they trembled ; and that trifling symptom 
 of momentary faltering in his resolution strengthened 
 hers. What a shame, when he had just succeeded in 
 rallying his spirits a little, for her to grieve him again ! 
 Could she not wait ten minutes more, send him 
 off in good heart, and then cry as much as she 
 pleased ? 
 
 " Morning dew-drops make forget-me-nots look all 
 the prettier ; have you never noticed that ?" said she, 
 archly, finding her voice instantly, and looking bravely 
 and brightly up into his face. 
 
 " God bless you ! keep the sunshine in yours." 
 
 " And when shall we see you come back, with your
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 99 
 
 tanned travelling face, and the horrid shaggy beard 
 you'll catch among the buffaloes ?" 
 
 " As soon as I can, you may be sure. In time for 
 Sea Farm, I hope ; and, while I am gone, I shall 
 write, and you will, too, every week, won't you ? I'll 
 send you word where to direct." 
 
 " Indeed I will ; and so shall Ned." 
 
 " Don't make rash promises, Miss ; keep that one, 
 though, now that it is made. Where in the world is 
 that Gummage ?" 
 
 Patrick, commonly called behind his back " Gum- 
 mage," (having earned his alias by his fancied resem- 
 blance to that pensive " Angel in the House " of Mr. 
 Peggotty,) had gone to call a coach, which he forgot to 
 do at the proper time. As the bell rang again, and 
 harder, he made his grotesque appearance afc-the door 
 in enforced silence, with one of Herman's valises in 
 each hand and an umbrella in his mouth. 
 
 "The coach there, Patrick? All right. Put 
 them in." 
 
 A hurried embrace in the drawing-room, and Clara 
 had let him go, and stood by herself, wondering how 
 she had ever made up her mind to do it. He was 
 shaking hands with Sally in the hall. The horses' bells 
 jingled. She peeped through the window-curtains. 
 He was gone. She proceeded to cry as much as she 
 pleased, according to her programme, for a few min- 
 utes ; but then she heard Edward call for his shaving- 
 water ; and it occurred to her that, as it might take her 
 some time to leave oft', she had better begin to do so at 
 once. She ran up to her dressing-room, bathed her 
 eyes, fed her canary, hummed the prettiest air she 
 knew, watered her fuchsias and myrtles, and had her 
 sorrows put out of sight if not out of mind, before
 
 100 HERMAN. 
 
 that young Sybarite required her to pour out his 
 coffee. 
 
 Everybody knows how long a day is, which is be- 
 gun in this manner. When Patrick had carried off 
 his tea-cups and saucers, and Edward had sauntered 
 away to see if there was anything new and gratifying 
 to be found at the hospital, the room looked strangely 
 empty, dull, and formal. She unlocked her own par- 
 ticular private drawer in the French-desk, took out her 
 copy of Herman's paper, sat down in her high-backed 
 low chair with it, read it once more, as her only pres- 
 ent means of hearing from him, began to consider how 
 she might best act upon it in her own case, and looked 
 from it thoughtfully into the fire. The fire gave her a 
 hint : Certainly. What a comfort it was to have a lit- 
 tle light and warmth to turn to on such a snowy, 
 dreary, home-sick sort of day ! She rose, returned to 
 the desk, took from her pocket-book a bank-bill, en- 
 closed it to one of the city-missionaries with the simple 
 direction, " For fuel for the poor," gave it to Patrick 
 to deliver, and took up her embroidery, feeling better. 
 
 The clock ticked ; the ashes sifted whispering from 
 the grate ; while still she, in a needle-woman's desul- 
 tory fashion, pondered, as she wrought, on the con- 
 tents of the paper. Accustomed as she had been from 
 earlier times than she could remember, to do as a mat- 
 ter of course whatever she saw that it was proper for 
 her to do, she was well-practised in the alphabet and 
 Orb-dbs by which she was now to read the first lessons 
 of a higher obedience. She was not perplexed by the 
 question, which so often convulses less docile minds 
 when duties present themselves, To do or not to do ? 
 but only by that much less perturbing question, to 
 which an answer may almost always be found by a sin-
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 101 
 
 cere inquirer, What to do ? She was generous and 
 devoted, and lived almost wholly in her affections, 
 her religious affections among the rest, though hitherto 
 they had been much more sentimental than practical. 
 
 Herman had read to her the evening before, with 
 that awe-struck earnestness of his, which gave such 
 thrilling reality and power to the dead letter, that 
 most solemn and tender declaration, which was hence- 
 forth to be the key-note of his life, "Inasmuch as ye 
 have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, 
 ye have done it unto me." Now, if she had reason to 
 believe that her Saviour himself was in Boston at that 
 time, in sickness, poverty, or any distress which she 
 could relieve, she felt that it would have been impos- 
 sible for her to content herself to sit down so indo- 
 lently day after day in that warm, luxurious room, 
 without a single effort in his behalf; but that she 
 must have hurried out with eager inquiries to find him, 
 lavish upon him her superabundance, and do her very 
 utmost to soothe and comfort him. Yet she had been, 
 contented to amuse herself thus there day after day, 
 while there was only too much reason to fear that 
 some, whom he would hereafter affectionately welcome 
 as brothers and sisters, must be continually suffering 
 near her, from all those evils and furthermore from the 
 thoughtless, neglect of self-indulgent triflers like her. 
 What should she do about them now ? go out alone 
 and unguided to seek for them ? She did not think 
 that that was exactly the thing. She might be im- 
 posed upon, and do more harm than good ; and, be- 
 sides, she was pretty sure that Edward woul'd not like 
 it. Perhaps Dr. Brodie would know of some among 
 his poorer patients, who would be the better for some 
 little delicacies, books, or a happy face looking in upon
 
 102 HERMAN." 
 
 them now and then ; and if they needed money, so 
 much the better ; for she had a good deal more than 
 she knew what to do with. She would send in for him 
 and his wife to drink tea with her that very evening, 
 and ask him. 
 
 Then, model young ladies in edifying English nov- 
 els taught gratuitously in schools continually. That, 
 again, did not seem precisely the thing for her ; e very- 
 tiling here was so different. She laughed quietly to 
 herself at the idea of the probable consternation of the 
 teachers of any one of the Boston Public Schools, at the 
 tall apparition of the stylish and fashionable Miss Ar- 
 den, coming in, long after prayers and in the midst of 
 all the " mental arithmetic " and so-forth, to offer to 
 hear the children say their texts or to instruct them in 
 the catechism. Another good suggestion ! . The Knee- 
 land-street Sewing-school. She had heard her friend 
 Kate Lee wishing that she had some one to take her 
 class there, while she went for a few weeks to Phila- 
 delphia. She would offer her services ; why did she 
 not think of that before ? and perhaps she should dis- 
 cover some of the deserving paupers she was in search 
 of among the parents of her pupils. She wrote her two 
 notes to Mrs. Brodie and Miss Lee, and returned to her 
 seat and her musings. 
 
 She had given a little money, which she did not 
 want. She was going to give a little time. That was 
 all very well ; but was it enough ? She recollected 
 something, which she had once heard her old friend 
 Dr. Lovel say, in a sermon on the high-hearted excla- 
 mation of David when the equally generous Araunah 
 offered him as a gift all that he required for a sacri 
 fice, " Nay, but I will surely buy it of thee at a price. 
 Neither will I offer burnt-offerings unto the Lord my
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 103 
 
 God of that which doth cost me nothing." The rev- 
 erend old gentleman had said that, though in his opin- 
 ion we were scarcely called upon to sadden our service 
 of God and man by any self-imposed austerities for 
 Austerity's sake, yet that no Christian, in the most 
 prosperous lot, could thoroughly fulfil all the duties to 
 which Providence called him without much self-de- 
 nial. It had puzzled her a little at the time and did 
 so now much more, as she recurred to it with deeper 
 earnestness. She knew he was much more likely to 
 be right than she ; for he had had much experience in 
 his long life, and was a man of much sagacity as well 
 as of saintly excellence. But she could hardly remem- 
 ber anything in particular that she had considered her 
 duty, which she would not rather do than not. 
 
 Suddenly the thought struck her, that she had 
 never been quite so attentive as a good sister ought to 
 be to her sister, Mrs. Flint, and that she had now 
 neither seen nor heard of her for two or three weeks. 
 A struggling sunbeam fell upon the carpet beside her. 
 She heard the snow-shovels without, scraping the 
 brick side-walks. It was clearing up, though the 
 wind still sounded bleak and bitter. She would put 
 her work away immediately and take a good, brisk, 
 freshening walk to Blackstone Square, which would be 
 a benefit to two worthy females at once and most sat- 
 isfactorily disagreeable to one of them. She was soon 
 safely secreted in her muffling rars and shaggy little 
 snow-boots, and on her way. 
 
 Her half-sister, Catherine, had been brought up 
 many miles away in the country, by two rustic mater- 
 nal aunts, who were displeased by Mr. Arden's speedy 
 second marriage, kept her to themselves, and never pro- 
 moted much intercourse between her and his other
 
 104 HERMAN. 
 
 children. Her mother had been a rather pleasing ex- 
 ception in a rather unpleasing, though otherwise un- 
 objectionable family circle. She was a little rustic 
 belle, with whom he accidentally tumbled in love when 
 a boy rusticated from college, to whom he engaged 
 himself, to the intense disgust of the elder nobles of his 
 house, (the house of Arden, Duke & Company, mer- 
 chant-princes,) and whom he married seven years later, 
 from a sense of honor quite as much as of affection ; 
 though he carefully retained a moderate degree of 
 that. The second Mrs. Arden, one of those tho- 
 roughly dear women, whose pleasure it is to begin at 
 the beginning, and do every one of their duties as gra- 
 ciously and gladly as they do everything else, felt her 
 heart warm towards her husband's little orphan when, 
 two or three weeks after their marriage, she first heard 
 of her ; would fain have taken her for her own, and, 
 failing in that, sent many little gifts and most sweet 
 little notes to her " dear little daughter," never for- 
 getting to insert in them courteous messages to her 
 protectresses, which by degrees mollified them so much, 
 that the child was to have been dispatched to pay her 
 a visit on the very Thanksgiving to which she was re- 
 turning, when she was killed. After that, there was 
 little more intercourse between Catherine and her 
 father's household, than a formal interchange of letters 
 from him to her, and her to him, once a quarter. She 
 seldom came to town ; and when she did so, usually, 
 according to a custom established during the lifetime 
 of the third Mrs. Arden, stayed with an old widow, 
 a cousin of her mother's, at the North End. She felt 
 bashful, awkward, and out of place, in the elegant es- 
 tablishment of her. silent and abstracted father, and it 
 never came into her head, she was not original, and
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 105 
 
 nobody had put it into her head, that it would be 
 well for her to endeavour to show an older sister's soli- 
 citude and tenderness, and thus repay some part of 
 the debt of gratitude which she owed their mother, 
 to the fair, self-possessed, magnificent boy and girl, 
 who seemed so sufficient to themselves and to one an- 
 other, and who, when summoned to the parlor to enter- 
 tain her, did the honors with a mingled ease and 
 reserve which would not have misbecome a prince and 
 princess. Soon after her father's death, as soon, al- 
 most, as it was ascertained that he had left her fifty 
 thousand dollars, she was married. Mr. Flint's vul- 
 garity " not to put too fine a point upon it" of man- 
 ner, made him very distasteful to her sister and bro- 
 thers, and his vulgarity of mind, more particularly so to 
 Herman ; while her own rusticity and the mild, insipid 
 eau-sucree of her appearance and character, offered few 
 counterbalancing attractions to their pampered disrel- 
 ish of commonplace. 
 
 Near relations, however, like coupled hounds, can, 
 from the very stringency of the tie which binds them 
 to each other, scarcely avoid being not quite indiffer- 
 ent to each other ; they can take their choice only be- 
 tween being friends or foes. The feeling, which was 
 negative on the part of the calm Ardens,-was by this 
 time, after a hardly-conscious succession of slights from 
 them, some real, and some naturally imagined in 
 consequence, in a fair way to become very positive on 
 the part of Mr. Flint, whom Nature (or, as lie would 
 have poetically said, ' Natur 1 ?) had made a good hater. 
 Catherine's heart was incapable of rancor towards any 
 creature ; but its general lukewarmness was certainly 
 growing colder on the side towards her father's family, 
 under the influence of her husband upon her mind,
 
 1 06 HERMAN. 
 
 which was of that colorless, chameleon sort, that gen- 
 erally takes its hue of opinion from any other mind at 
 the moment nearest. Matters were thus quite in train 
 for that pretty and creditable thing, a family feud. 
 Clara bestirred herself none too soon ; though she 
 never knew or even suspected how much petty annoy- 
 ance, or worse, was saved to her and hers by her tardy 
 promptness. "Who, that w T alks unpricked and unstung 
 in the straight path, ever can discern or calculate the 
 number of briars or scorpions that were lying in wait 
 for his erring foot, on the right-hand or on the left ? 
 
 Mrs. Flint's door was opened to Clara by a wild- 
 looking Irish girl, with smut on her face, suds on her 
 arms, and a rent in her duster-colored apron. She un- 
 derstood the English language but imperfectly, well 
 enough only to tell fibs in it. (When St. Patrick ex- 
 terminated the reptiles among the shamrocks, did he 
 drop and leave behind the serpent's tongue there ? 
 and if so, why ?) The Irish dialect was not among the 
 number of Clara's fashionable acquirements. Therefore 
 was the information possessed by the handmaiden eli- 
 cited but slowly, after the merciful fashion generally in 
 vogue in refined circles when anybody is doomed to 
 hear a piece of bad news, which consists in the linger- 
 ing process of piling deliberately up upon one another 
 a sort of ascending scale of dolorous lies, each one a 
 little nearer the heart of the hearer than the last, until 
 at length the truth is brought up to give the final stab ; 
 a method similar to that pursued by the ingeniously 
 compassionate, imported man-servant of a fellow-citi- 
 zen of ours, who, when ordered to cut off the tail of 
 his dog, considerately deprived him of it only an inch 
 at a time : " Miss Flint wa'n't to home. She was en- 
 gaged most partic'lar. She was sick to her bed, and
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEAKTH. 107 
 
 couldn't see nobody, indade, not if 'twas the Pris- 
 ident." 
 
 As it was not the President, Clara thought that ad- 
 mittance might perhaps be obtained. She was anxious, 
 and grieved besides. It was a proof and reproof at 
 once of her past remissness, that her own father's 
 daughter should be lying sick so near her, and she, 
 know it only by chance, and then be forced to stand 
 thus parleying, a stranger with a stranger, at her 
 door. 
 
 " Won't you say it is Miss Ardeh ?" 
 
 " Miss Harding ?" 
 
 " Oh, no ; Miss Arden. Can't you say it ?" 
 
 " Yes, sure, Miss." 
 
 " Try again, then, and let me hear you." 
 
 " Miss Andiron." 
 
 " No ; say Mrs. Flint's sister. How unlucky that 
 I did not bring my cards ! Be so good as to get me a 
 piece of paper and a pen." 
 
 " Is it a pin, Miss ?" 
 
 " What did you say was the matter with Mrs. 
 Flint?" 
 
 " Well, indade, and I think they said it was just the 
 pla-gue, Miss," returned the Orphic Biddy, with a rich 
 specimen of what pedants and pedagogues call " the 
 rising inflection." 
 
 Clara could not help laughing ; and, partly to hide 
 her mirth, partly to get out of the cold, and partly to 
 help herself to writing materials, swept by her into a 
 dismal little parlor, more dismal than ever now, from 
 its look of desertion, which ordinarily served as a 
 complication of dining-room, drawing-room, and day- 
 nursery. Biddy stood for an instant spell-boundj then 
 crowded in with her, and with much presence of mind
 
 108 HERMAN. 
 
 locked up the tea-spoons ; after which, with an air of 
 expectation, she planted herself in a " come one, come 
 all !" attitude, with her back against the door of the 
 china-closet. Clara in the meantime tore off a piece 
 of the margin of a newspaper, and wrote upon it as 
 well as she could with a tiny gold pencil, which usu- 
 ally enjoyed quite a sinecure place on her chatelaine : 
 
 " My dear Catherine : I have but just heard that 
 you are not well, and I am so sorry. I hope you will 
 let me come up-stairs and see if there is not anything 
 I can do for you or the children. I am afraid you 
 must have been very forlorn, shut up in this cold, long 
 storm. I came out on purpose to see you. I can't 
 bear to go home again without knowing exactly 
 how you are, and doing something to make you feel 
 better. Your affectionate sister, c. L. A." 
 
 The cordial, simple words were balm to poor Cathe- 
 rine's heart ; for she had been /eeling very helpless and 
 lonely. Besides, it was always exceedingly difficult for 
 her to say no to anybody or anything. 
 
 " Betty," said she, to a prim, homely, anxious-look- 
 ing child, who was sitting upon the foot of her bed, 
 "it is your dear Aunty Clary. Run down, and ask 
 her to please come right up-stairs." 
 
 " Tan't we tidy you up first, ma ?" 
 
 "No, little dear. "We mustn't keep dear aunty 
 waiting. Ask her to please excuse the looks of things, 
 for poor dear ma is all in a muss." 
 
 Setty obediently went, but with a housewifely look 
 of regret round the dark, disordered room, and a 
 straightening pull at the rumpled counterpane. It was 
 very good of her to venture ; for she was shy ; and, 
 having very seldom seen her Aunt Clara, she was much 
 Afraid of facing alone such a vision of mysterious 
 
 en dor.
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEAETH. 109 
 
 Clara was standing, rapt in contemplation of the 
 many little clothes flapping and freezing on the lines 
 in the yard, with the elder Flint's capering among 
 them like a dancing-master in the midst of his pupils, 
 and thinking with compassionate wonder of the many 
 stitches which it must require to make and keep them 
 in order, when she heard a mouse-like squeak at the 
 door. Turning round, she saw the tiny, changeling 
 figure of a child of five years old, upright and stiff, 
 dressed in an ugly, but neat mousseline-de-laine, of 
 primitive cut. Her face was sallow, intelligent, and 
 as mature and joyless as that of a care-burdened woman 
 of thirty ; her forehead was unbecomingly large and 
 prominent, as were also her dim, bluish-gray eyes ; her 
 mouth, just large enough to admit a cherry without 
 crowding, was ruefully drawn down at the corners, 
 like a caret, to signify that her nose was an after- 
 thought, and must not be over-looked ; a most unneces- 
 sary hint ; for it was altogether too big for her, and 
 looked like a grown-up nose snatched in haste, and 
 clapped on her by mistake, from a wardrobe of noses ; 
 her cropped black hair was perfectly smooth ; and her 
 neck, hands, and arms, clean, but red and chapped 
 with the cold. 
 
 " How do you do, dear ?" said Clara. " Come and 
 give me a kiss. What have you got to say to Aunt 
 Clara?" 
 
 The fairy, coloring with bashful fright? involuntarily 
 retreated a pace, with a musquito-like whisk as if 
 blown away by the advancing flounces, repeated like a 
 parrot, " ma tays, won't you please walk up-tairs, and 
 please not look at her, 'tause she's all in a muss ?" and, 
 having discharged its conscience of its burden, fled be- 
 fore her face.
 
 110 HERMAN. 
 
 Clara glided after, and up the uncarpeted stairway. 
 The house was a large and fine one, which Mr. Flint 
 had taken by the foreclosure of a mortgage from an 
 insolvent premature speculator. Intending to sell it, 
 as soon as the situation should have become fashionable 
 enough to enable him to do so to advantage, he had 
 thought it worth his while to furnish only an absolutely 
 necessary number of rooms in it ; and it had an unin- 
 habited, chill, cheerless look and feeling. 
 
 The invalid made an effort to stretch out her hand, 
 as her visiter appeared in her chamber, but at the same 
 instant turned away her face, with the instinctive 
 shrinking from observation of an habitually neat person 
 caught in an enforced deshabille, and said, with a tone 
 of very genuine gratitude sweetening her usual rustic 
 whine, " Dear Clary, how kind it was of you to come 
 and see me!" 
 
 " And how kind it was of you to let me ! What is 
 the matter ? How long have you been so unwell ? 
 Why did you not send us word ?" 
 
 " O, I didn't think of troubling you, dear. It ain't 
 anything, I expect, but a cold. But it's kind o' stiff- 
 ened up my shoulders, so as I can't put my hand to my 
 head ; else dear ma's hair wouldn't look so all in a 
 frizzle, would it, dear little Betty?" The tip of the 
 little brown mouse's nose was peeping out from her 
 nook behind the blue-and-white check bed-curtains ; 
 but it was instantly drawn in again out of sight, like ( 
 the head of a tortoise. " I ain't fit to be seen, I'm 
 sure. I'm real ashamed to let you see me ; you always 
 look so nice ; but I seemed to kind o' hanker so, you 
 know, after some of my folks to come and set with me. 
 The city's such a dreadful lonesome place to be sick in, 
 so different from what it is to home, up to South Brad
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. Ill 
 
 lee, I mean. It always makes me real home-sick when 
 anything ails me. Up .there, you know, everybody 
 knows everybody else ; and if anything's the matter, 
 there's always lots of folks to run in and take right 
 hold ; and aunt was such a good nurse. I do miss her 
 so. If it hadn't been so awful cold and snowy, I'd 
 have sent for her to come down ; but I expect the roads 
 are all blocked up. Why, I hain't even so much as 
 had my face washed to-day !" 
 
 " Do, pray, let me do it for you." 
 
 " Why, deary, I couldn't begin to think of no such 
 a thing, in your elegant gown and all !" 
 
 " I'll take off the skirt, if that will make you feel 
 easier about it, and turn up my sleeves, and tie an 
 apron round my neck ; I will brush your hair, and 
 plait it up snugly for you, too, if you feel able to 
 bear it." 
 
 " Well, I declare, you're so good ! I'm sure I don't 
 know what to say !" 
 
 " I will tell you," said Clara, as, perceiving that 
 her offer was a tempting one, she quickly and quietly 
 took off her bonnet and prepared her dress ; " say 
 where I shall find your sponge, and towels, and 
 brushes." 
 
 " Oh, dear little Betty will hop and get 'em in half 
 a second for dear Aunty Clary, if you will be so kind. 
 It's imposing on good-nature, I'm sure! It's real de- 
 lightful to feel your soft, dear little hands. My Abi- 
 gail was a-coming to clean me up, after Bubby went to 
 sleep ; but I had him vascinated last week, and he's 
 got a dreadful sore arm ; and it makes him so arbi- 
 trary, she can't hardly lay him down a second without 
 his screeching out so grieved, it sets me all in a pres- 
 piration. And when she's in a drive to get to him,
 
 112 HERMAN". 
 
 she's so quick and kind of, thorough, I hate to have her 
 come near me when I'm all so sort of tender." 
 
 The little sprite, Betty, had already flitted off on 
 her toes in her will-o'-the-wisp-like way, and returning 
 marvellously soon, with all the articles ordered col- 
 lected in a small wash-basin, set them down on the 
 floor just within Clara's reach, and jerked herself back 
 again, as if feeding a rattle-snake and expecting its 
 spring. In a few minutes more, without being bidden, she 
 had obtained fromher crony, Biddy, a small jug of warm 
 water, which she brought very carefully, with all her 
 tiny red fingers and thumbs spread out like lobster- 
 claws on the brown sides of it. She stooped forward 
 to set it down, and rebounded as before ; after which, 
 she presently, by a subdued, mouse-like rustle, scratch- 
 ing on the partition, and sly peeping, made known her 
 return to her watch-tower, a high-chair between the 
 wall and the further side of the bed, at the opening of 
 the curtains, which she held on each side with each 
 hand, just far enough apart to protrude her nose be- 
 twixt them when unobserved, and shut it up like a 
 clam when detected. 
 
 " How long have you had this cold ?" asked Clara, 
 as she brushed and stroked the scanty, but fine and 
 silky light-brown hair, her father's hair, so like his 
 own, as she had smoothed it across his dead forehead, 
 that it seemed impossible that her fingers could be 
 making their first acquaintance now with this, and that 
 it appeared to reproach her for having left his child, as 
 near and perhaps as dear to him as she, so long un- 
 tended in her patient sufferings and solitude. 
 
 " Well, it seems a good while; but, come to think 
 of it, I don't believe it's much more than a week since 
 I've been abed, a week last Sabbath. Why, that was
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEAHTH. 113 
 
 yesterday, wasn't it? this is washing-day ! so it was 1 
 Not but a week. I've had a cold, though, most all 
 winter. The spaces in this house are so dreadful long 
 and draughty ! I never could stand cold very well ; 
 so to home they used to cosset me, and I always had 
 the sleepm'-room, that opened right into the keepin'- 
 room ; and when it was cold, or anyways chilly, I 
 could always put my double-dress on, and step right in 
 there and do my hair in the morning, early, before the 
 folks began to call. 'Tain't healthy to sleep with a fire 
 in your chamber, folks say ; and husband don't like to 
 have the furnace lit, only now and then to keep the 
 pipes from rusting, 'cause he says 'twill make us ten- 
 der ; and I most seem to get frozen stiff, nights and 
 mornings, dressing and undressing myself, and running 
 up to the nursery, and down to the kitchen, and all." 
 
 " Have you had any advice ?" 
 
 "Well, no I haven't. I hope I shall get along 
 without. Abigail wanted me to s?e the doctor, when 
 he come to vascinate my babe ; but she was out, attend- 
 ing Bible-class ; and I was asleep; and Bridget carried 
 Bub down ; and nobody thought of it. Mr. Flint ob- 
 served there was a doctor down-town that owed him 
 some money, and worked great cures, an electorizer ; 
 and, if I don't get better before long, he talks some 
 of having him come up to electorize me ; but I don't 
 know as it's just what I want." 
 
 Clara privately resolved that Dr. Arden should pay 
 her a visit the next day, and ascertain her wants. 
 
 " Husband says, if the ladies only had to work foi 
 their living, and other folks's living, too, as hard as he does, 
 he guesses they wouldn't be down sick quite so often ! 
 the gentlemen are so funny !" added the poor little 
 woman, trying to force a feeble he-he with tears of
 
 1 14 HERMAN. 
 
 weakness welling up into her eyes, as the unwonted and 
 tender attentions which she was receiving impercepti- 
 bly drew out her confidence ; " but I tell him, ' if 
 doing all the cutting-out, and fitting, and house-keep- 
 ing, and half the mending, and making, and cooking, 
 and nursery-work, for five people, ain't working hard 
 enough for one's living, I don't know what is.' r 
 
 " Where is your little Tommy ?" said Clara, fearing 
 that they were getting upon dangerous ground ; 
 " sha'n't I see him to-day ?" She had made Mrs. Flint 
 very comfortable and neat, and was now hovering 
 lightly about the chamber, turning confusion to order 
 everywhere with a noiseless touch ; while her sister's 
 charmed gaze followed her, as if thirsting to drink in 
 the fulness of calm life and animated peace, which al- 
 ways made her very aspect at once so strengthening 
 and so healing, so soothing and refreshing, to any one 
 in any kind of suffering. 
 
 " He's up in the nursery. He froze one of his feet 
 a little, Saturday afternoon, playing snow-ball in the 
 yard. Mr. Flint don't allow him to wear woollen 
 socks, because he wants to harden him ; and Abigail 
 was going to fix it up for him with some sweet-oil and 
 cotton-wool ; and she set her foot down, that he 
 shouldn't set foot down here again till he had his foot 
 done. But I'm afraid he won't. He's always as impi- 
 dent as a tiger to her, she says. I guess she don't know 
 exactly how to manage him ; it takes father for that." 
 Then came a little, involuntary sigh. 
 
 " How do you think it would do for me to run up 
 to the nursery, and see about him ? Perhaps he will 
 be good with me." 
 
 " Why, dear, I couldn't only be too thankful to 
 have you, I'm sure, if you'd really like to ; but I can't
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 115 
 
 seem to bear to think of all the trouble I'm a-giving 
 of yon. Abigail is just as faithful as faithful can be; 
 but she has her hands over-full when I'm taken off ; and 
 the poor little things miss ma. You go right straight 
 up-stairs, and it's the right-hand first door." 
 
 Clara could easily have found the nursery, with no 
 other direction than that afforded by the menagerie- 
 like symphony of jumpings, whimperings, and scold- 
 ings, which issued from the door, half-opened to let the 
 smoke out and barricaded with a chair to keep the 
 children in. 
 
 " Let 'em alone !" blustered frost-nipped Tommy ; 
 " you sha'n't touch 'em, I say ! They're my toes, and 
 not yours !" 
 
 "Well, sir," rejoined Abigail, "I'm sure nobody 
 don't want to deprive you of 'em." 
 
 Clara tapped softly. There was a temporary ces- 
 sation of hostilities ; and a sharp-looking, black-eyed 
 Nova-Scotia woman appeared at the barrier. She was 
 of cylindrical form and, being clad in bottle-green, 
 strongly resembled a walking vinegar-vial of pickled 
 virtues. Clara's benign and lady-like aspect was as a 
 spoonful of soda to the vinegar. It effervesced in sim- 
 pers, bows, and curtseys, became insipid, and sub- 
 sided. 
 
 " I came up to see', if I could help to take care of 
 the children. Mrs. Flint told me, that she was afraid 
 you had too much to do while she was ill. Oh, there 
 is the little man, that I want to have a little chat with ! 
 Come, Tommy, darling ; come sit on my knee !" 
 
 Tommy w T as only too happy to do so. He remem- 
 bered her very well, and, though only six years old, 
 had sat staring at her with his bright blue eyes wide 
 open, from the first instant of her appearance, with a
 
 116 HERMAN. 
 
 3lever boy's genuine admiration of beauty and grace. 
 One source of his previous disquiet had been, that, hav- 
 ing declared before he heard of her arrival, in full 
 nursery-conclave, that, he wouldn't be a good boy, 
 and let all the cross old Abbies in creation be fumbling 
 with his foot, and tickling him half to death, it had 
 become a point of honor and consistency with him not 
 to yield, as it was with her not to let him go below 
 until he had done so ; and he had been very much 
 afraid, that he should thus lose his chance of seeing his 
 Aunt Clara. Bubby, alias Dandy, alias Daniel Web- 
 ster, who, if he resembled his namesake in nothing 
 else, certainly did so in being, as his discerning parent 
 had said, " arbitrary," at the same moment awaking 
 and being " grieved," by finding himself deposited on 
 his back on the bed, instead of in the weary arms of 
 his attached foster-mother, opportunely burst into a 
 full-blown war-whoop; so that Miss Arden had the field 
 to herself. 
 
 Slightly glancing at the little white, dangling, blis- 
 tered foot, she cheerfully said, " Oh, is that all ? How 
 glad I am it is no worse ! Tommy, did you ever hear 
 the story of a poor little boy, who had to have his foot 
 cut off, because he froze it very badly indeed, and had 
 nobody to take care of it, and bind it up for him ? and 
 he was so brave that he did not scream once, and only 
 groaned three or four times. It is in a very pretty 
 book, that I had when I was a little girl ; and if you 
 are a brave boy, too, I think I must give it to you." 
 She told the story very minutely, in a whisper. Tom- 
 my's eyes twinkled. 
 
 " Now," added she, " I will tell you what we will 
 play. I will be the surgeon, and tie up your foot, and 
 you shall be the courageous little boy ; but it will be
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEAKTH. 117 
 
 scarcely anything but play ; because I don't think I 
 need hurt you in the least. You can tell me if I do." 
 
 The experiment succeeded perfectly, Tommy enjoy- 
 ing it more than she did ; but just as she set him down 
 with a kiss, and rose, there was a terrible shock and 
 shout in the room "below. 
 
 Little Betty's good conduct was of an intermittent 
 type. Her quietness and obedience, at the time of 
 Clara's arrival, had been chiefly owing to her pressing 
 secret anxiety lest her sick mother was now about to 
 die, and go to heaven and leave her, an event with 
 which Abigail v/as always threatening her, contingent 
 upon her being naughty, and making " a noise to wake 
 up her dear little brother." That theological pre- 
 ceptress further informed her, that if she was always a 
 good little girl, she also would be able to go to heaven ; 
 as she would in that case turn into an angel, and have 
 wings given her to fly up into the sky with. Betty's 
 self-knowledge taught her, however, to regard this 
 prospect as not only a distant but an extremely uncer- 
 tain one, and to think it most prudent to have recourse 
 at once to some other expedients of her own. She 
 therefore, on this eventful morning, persuaded Bridget 
 to assist her in pinning one edge of two clean dish- 
 cloths down each side of the waist of her dress, a pro- 
 cess attended with repeated perforations of her surface, 
 which she endured, though with sundry wriggles, yet 
 with all the fortitude of enterprising genius intent on 
 its ideal. Then, taking the upper corners of the towels 
 opposite to the ones pinned at her shoulders, in each 
 hand, she ran up from the kitchen to view herself in 
 a looking-glass, flapping her artificial pinions like an 
 unfledged chicken. 
 
 The invention certainly looked promising. She 
 hoped that it would answer her purpose. She
 
 118 HERMAN. 
 
 wished to try it by flying from the window-sill 
 of an unused second-story apartment, adjoining her 
 mother's, into the street ; but the window was fastened ; 
 and she could not reach the bolt. Comforting herself 
 with the reflection that, as the adjustment of the con- 
 trivance might not yet be perfect, it would perhaps be 
 better to attempt a shorter flight at first, she next set 
 up two high stools about a yard apart, and endeavoured 
 to spring with arms extended, like a flying-squirrel, 
 from the top of one to that of the other ; when, lo ! she 
 verified the proverb, and came down on her poor little 
 chin, on the edge of the furthest, which upset and fell 
 upon her in its turn. She was hurt, as well as griev- 
 ously frightened, disappointed, and mortified ; and her 
 loud fall, and shrieks of mental and physical anguish, 
 brought down and up to the scene, in one promiscuous 
 rush, Clara, Abigail, Daniel Webster, Tommy, and 
 Bridget. 
 
 Poor Catherine behaved as well as she could ; but 
 she was shivering with terror when they laid the sob- 
 bing child beside her ; and Clara pitied her afresh, not 
 for being ill merely, but for being ill in such a Babel ; 
 could this be by any means a fair specimen of her 
 life ? She V,gged her sister's permission to take Tom- 
 my and Betty home, to finish the day in Mount -Vernon 
 Street, and leave her to rest and sleep. Tommy caught 
 at the idea, and would not be denied; but poor little 
 Betty only burrowed with her great head under the 
 pillow ; and no entreaty nor inducement, that Clara had 
 to offer, could obtain from her anything more than a 
 closer nestle to her mother, and the antithetical reply 
 in a half-sob, " 'Es ; 'tay here." 
 
 A coach was sent for ; as Tommy could not walk. 
 He watched for it, and was in it the moment it stopped
 
 THE AJSTGEL OF THE HEARTH. 119 
 
 at the door. Clara came to the bed-side with her bon- 
 net on ; but poor Catherine clung to her with a linger- 
 ing hand, as if she could not bear to let so much health 
 and happiness go from her. " When shall I see you 
 again ?" said she, plaintively. 
 
 " Oh, of course, I mean to come to you every day, if 
 possible, at least, till I see you in your parlor again." 
 
 Catherine smiled, and let her go. She was leaving 
 happiness enough behind her now. 
 
 It was two o'clock. The air seemed redolent of 
 one omnipresent beef-steak. As she passed the first 
 corner, she saw Mr. Flint hurrying round it with a car- 
 nivorous expression ; and so did Tommy, as she sus- 
 pected by his shrinking back out of sight from his win- 
 dow, and holding his tongue for as much as thirty 
 seconds. 
 
 She stopped before the shop of the family grocer, 
 who came bowing and smiling out to receive her com- 
 mands, and ordered some fruit and flowers to be sent 
 in her name to Mrs. Flint. Kext she drove to a toy- 
 shop, bought a handsome rocking-horse, and ordered it 
 home, to be ridden there by Tommy, who clamored 
 in vain for a drum, and a flaxen-haired and blooming 
 wax-doll, with eyes which would shut and open, to 
 serve as a bribe and companion for Betty, the next time 
 she should request the pleasure of her company. 
 
 She reached home, feeling like a restored exile, in 
 time to superintend an early dinner for her little guest, 
 and to amuse herself with him for an hour, before Ed- 
 ward came in and she went down to dine. Luckily, 
 Tommy's horse had then just been brought ; and she 
 left him delighted with it in the " nursery," still so- 
 called, a sunny, cheerful room, adjoining her own, 
 where her maid sat at work in the day-time. The girl
 
 120 HEEMAN. 
 
 was an American, conscientious, intelligent, and, for- 
 tunately, particularly fond of children ; so that she 
 promised herself much cooperation from her, if it 
 should prove, as she foresaw, expedient to have such 
 visits often repeated. 
 
 " Edward," said she, as they luxuriated together 
 as usual, over their dessert, " I want you to do two 
 things for me." 
 
 " Dis done." 
 
 " Go to see Catherine Flint," 
 
 " Et pourquoi?" 
 
 " She is confined to her bed, poor thing, with a 
 rheumatic cold." 
 
 " Certainly. She has called in no one else, I 
 take it." 
 
 " !No, not yet. Her husband has proposed to call 
 in an electrical practitioner, who owes him some 
 money." 
 
 " What Mrs. Malaprop might justly call a quackti.- 
 tioner, perhaps." 
 
 "Perhaps. At any rate, she does not much like 
 the plan ; and if you go in good season to-morrow, be- 
 fore there are any professional etiquettes in your way, 
 and pay her a brotherly visit, no one can object." 
 
 " It shall be done ; and you may rely upon my 
 curing her as quickly as possible. What can be the 
 reason that agreeable people so seldom are sick ? Clara, 
 you never are." 
 
 " Perhaps I shall be, if you will grant my second 
 request." 
 
 " What is that ? Do you want me to buy you some 
 candy ?" 
 
 " I want you to invite Mr. Flint here to dine to- 
 morrow."
 
 THE AJSTGEL, OF THE HEABTH. 121 
 
 You! what?" 
 
 " Want you to invite Mr. Flint here to dine to- 
 morrow." 
 
 " Angels and ministers ! Clara, shall I order a 
 hair-shirt and scourge?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Neither shall I invite Mr. Flint here to dine to- 
 morrow." 
 
 " Only once." 
 
 " Only twice ! Why, you could not possibly have 
 seen what he did the last time." 
 
 " What do you mean ?" 
 
 " What I saw." 
 
 " I know it could not possibly have been anything 
 worse than I saw. Let us compare. Describe your 
 vision." 
 
 " Language fails me." 
 
 " I will help you." 
 
 I saw" 
 
 Well, so did I" 
 
 " Him put his knife," 
 
 " I know. He had just been mashing beans, and 
 eating them with it." 
 
 " When Patrick handed him the squash," 
 
 " That's it ! Into the spoon," 
 
 " And scoop out the squash, that clave unto it, upon 
 his plate !" 
 
 Exactly !" 
 
 O o oh !" 
 
 "A a ah!" 
 
 " And after that, you propose to me to bring him 
 here again !" 
 
 " I tliink we ought once, while his wife is ill." 
 
 " Can't he rush into Parker's just as well, distend 
 6
 
 122 HERMAN. 
 
 himself, and be back again in his counting-room in 
 fifteen minutes?" 
 
 " A pretty suggestion for a medical man ! Who, do 
 you think, will employ you, sir ?" 
 
 " You, madam, as you suggested, if your reasonable 
 and tasteful request is granted, provided I am in a 
 condition to attend to you." 
 
 " We will not have any squash." 
 
 " We will have nothing. We will keep a solemn 
 fast. It will be of service to his dyspepsia." 
 
 " I may ask him, then ?" 
 
 " At your peril !" 
 
 " Thank you. You shall see how nicely I will 
 manage. We will have no dish on his side of the ta- 
 ble : and I will tell Patrick that, for that day, I will 
 try not having the vegetables passed round, but letting 
 him take the plates to the dishes, and himself help to 
 whatever is wanted, which stands opposite to Mr. 
 Flint ; and you and I, of course, shall dispense the pro- 
 visions at our ends of the table." 
 
 " It will be too late for me. I shall not live to see 
 the second course. He will suck me down in one of 
 his long-drawn sonorous gasps over his soup." 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! ha ! How absurd. He will not sit op- 
 posite to you." 
 
 " He will draw all the smoke down the chimney, 
 then." 
 
 " He can sit with his back to the fire. We won't 
 have any soup." 
 
 " Then you will have fish ; and he'll chop it up with 
 his steel knife, and eat apple-sauce with it." 
 
 " Suppose he does, now. We shall know better 
 this time than to look at him. Do let him spoil his 
 dinner, if he likes. What does it signify to us ?"
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 123 
 
 " Philanthropy, my dear girl ! Philanthropy!" 
 " He would spoil it just as much anywhere else." 
 " He would not have so good a dinner to spoil," 
 said the sophist, slyly shifting his ground. " Execu- 
 tions must take place; but one would not therefoie 
 wish to hang an excellent person, nor to witness his 
 parting pangs." 
 
 " What a tease you are ! It is of no use for me to 
 talk to you ; it only makes you worse." 
 " Not usually. Try a different subject." 
 " I will, only this I must say first, dear Edward, 
 that I am very sorry to plague you, but in sober ear- 
 nest I think, that we ought to be kind to the Flints ; 
 for you know we never exerted ourselves too much to 
 make poor papa happy ; and now the only thing that 
 we can do for him is, to befriend the other members of 
 his. family." 
 
 After a supplementary frolic with Tommy, Clara 
 sent him safely home, rejoicing over the story-book 
 which she had given him, though begging hard to take 
 his horse, too. She had been glad to have him come, 
 and was now glad again to have him go ; and it was 
 with quite a new sense of enjoyment of her usual 
 leisure and freedom, that she welcomed her grown-up 
 friends, Dr. and Mrs. Brodie, and had a merry, socia- 
 ble evening's chat with them. They were a very well- 
 matched, united, and clever elderly couple, who, after 
 struggling together through a youth of hard work, 
 small means, and six children, had made their way to 
 an easy competence while they were still fresh and 
 vigorous enough to enjoy it heartily, and all the more 
 from its contrast with past privation and anxiety, 
 and from the economical habits, which made it a for- 
 tune to them. 
 
 The Doctor was as witty as wise ; and his stories
 
 124: HERMAN. 
 
 of sayings and doings, which he had seen ai.d heard in 
 the course of his practice, kept them much of the time 
 in fits of laughter ; but between them Clara found a 
 chance to make her intended inquiries ; and he readily 
 and eagerly engaged to keep her supplied with objects 
 of chanty. 
 
 He mentioned to her at once a poor man, for- 
 merly an industrious and thriving mechanic, who, 
 'after losing his wife and three daughters by a singular 
 series of fatalities, had been seized with incurable 
 paralysis on the burial-day of the last. His savings 
 from his past earnings supplied him with what are com- 
 monly called the necessaries of life ; but driving gave 
 great relief to the pain which he suffered, as well as to 
 the vacant monotony of his creeping years; and this 
 he could not afford himself. Clara determined imme- 
 diately to give an order to the keeper of a livery-stable, 
 to sena for him four times a week, at her expense, a 
 suitable vehicle, an open one, as the Doctor advised, 
 when the weather was fair and mild enough, with a 
 safe and, if possible, a companionable driver to take 
 him out. It was not very much for her to give. It 
 was so much for him to receive, that three years after, 
 on his death-bed, he spoke of it, almost with his last 
 breath, with tears of gratitude. 
 
 " Edward," said she, that evening, as he returned 
 after accompanying her visitors to the door, " how 
 much money have I to spend ?" i 
 
 " 1 usually draw three hundred dollars, don't you 
 know ? for you, every quarter. Why ? Isn't it 
 enough ? Of course, there's plenty more, if you want 
 it. I am going to the bank to-morrow. How much 
 will you have?" 
 
 " Thank you. I believe I have enough now, for 
 the present ; but I meant to ask what my whole in- 
 come \va?."
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE HEARTH. 125 
 
 " Have you waited all this time to find that out ? 
 How exactly, like you -! Clara ! Clara ! Thank Hea- 
 ven, that it did not make you an unprotected female." 
 
 " Indeed I do. I hope it never will. But my in- 
 come ?" 
 
 " O ! .the same as mine. Twelve thousand a year it 
 was when it was left you, out of which you contribute 
 three thousand live hundred dollars, as I do, annually, 
 for our household expenses. If you mean to turn 
 financier, and want to know exactly how much it is 
 now, you must let me send up Mr. Crockett and his 
 books,' and exhibit your business talents and practical 
 turn of mind in a conference with him. He's trustee, 
 and trusty. Your principal must have increased some- 
 what by accumulation ; for you have never spent more 
 than half your interest." 
 
 " I'm BO glad !" 
 
 "Little miser! Why? To make some fortune- 
 hunter come after you, and cheat you into believing 
 that he likes you better than I, and that you like him 
 better than me ?" 
 
 A very pretty blush and smile, and a slight shake 
 of the curls, were the only answer he got ; but the an- 
 swer in Clara's heart was, " Only think how much, 
 good it can do !" 
 
 She was partly right, and, in her humility, partly 
 wrong. Money is, in itself, almost as likely to do harm 
 as good ; while, like all the gifts of Providence, it is pretty 
 sure to do one or the other. Money, however, man- 
 aged by good sense and good feeling, such as she had ' 
 been showing within the last few hours, is, if only 
 one means, a very great one, of doing much good to 
 one's neighbour, and more to one's self; and yet, 
 after all, her good sense and good feeling alone 
 had done little less good than her money that day.
 
 126 HERMAN. 
 
 Edward lighted their night-lamps with a weary 
 yawn, and said that they had had a tolerable evening, 
 but he was not sorry to have the night come, for the 
 day had been detestable. 
 
 " Have you found it so? I am sorry. I believe I 
 have rather enjoyed it." 
 
 " Are you so hard-hearted ? Haven't you been 
 haunted by the ghost in that chair ?" said he, point- 
 ing to a large and curious old-fashioned high-backed 
 chair, worked in pale dim colors and odd and fading 
 figures, which had been Herman's mother's, and 
 in which his graceful stripling figure was usually to 
 be seen comfortably lounging, at that time of night. 
 (He had earned for it the name by which it usually 
 went with his brother and sister, the " Ghost's 
 Chair," in his childhood, by melodramatically an- 
 nouncing to a nervous guest, " It is some of my 
 great-grandmother's work ; and she is a ghost.") 
 
 " To tell the truth, no ; or, at least, not unplea- 
 santly. I believe that I have thought so continually 
 about Herman's presence, as to have hardly yet be- 
 come conscious of his absence. There has been a 
 sort of departing sunset-light left shining back from 
 him, that has shown me my way all day long." 
 
 Perhaps Clara had read and transmuted with 
 her joyous spirit that sweet, sad verse of Tennyson's : 
 
 " His memory long will live alone 
 
 In all our hearts, as mournful light 
 That broods above the fallen sun, 
 And dwells in heaven hall' the night." 
 
 So it was when he left them again for a longer jour- 
 ney ; and there was one who walked in that soft and 
 solemn twilight to her life's end.
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 127 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 
 
 "A youth, light-hearted and content, 
 
 I wander through the world; 
 Here Arab-like is pitched my tent, 
 
 And straight again is furled. 
 Yet oft I dream that once " 
 
 PFIZEE, translated by LONGFELLOW. 
 
 THE first day of Herman's journey, after the bustle 
 and excitement of the first hour of starting, passed but 
 heavily. His weariness returned upon him ; and 
 the severed heart-strings ached. The sides of the rail- 
 road were heaped up with drifts ; and the air was filled 
 with flakes, which the charging winds made such com- 
 motion among, that it seemed to him that it was snow- 
 ing up as fast as down, and that there was almost an 
 equal chance, that the storm would end in the flying 
 white feathers' hitching again in the low brooding 
 clouds, and leaving the earth as bare as it was before 
 they fell. The windows were all shut, and dim with 
 the breath of his grimly-contented, suffocation-loving 
 fellow-passengers; he made no attempt to open his; 
 for he thought that if, in circumstances so depressing, 
 they could derive any comfort from the inhalation of 
 their customary carbonic acid, it would be a pity to de- 
 prive them of it ; and even when he wiped a pane, and 
 tried to divert his thoughts by looking at the shifting 
 views of the ghastly landscape, the provoking steam, 
 which the engine blew from its ever-smoking pipe, kept
 
 128 HERMAN. 
 
 clapping its hand over each picture, just as his eye 
 fixed upon it. Last, not least, as he had feared, his 
 otherwise worthy companion proved a prig. 
 
 Happily, the latter had laid in a seemingly inex- 
 haustible supply of mental provisions for his journey, 
 in the shape of tracts ; pamphlets on teaching children 
 to read right by the ingenious process of spelling wrong, 
 and on other important and practicable kindred re- 
 forms ; specimens of the " phonetic " alphabet, and of 
 the productions of its patrons ; and second-rate trea- 
 tises, by self-taught, not to say untaught, geniuses, on 
 intemperance, war, slavery, &c., a gloomy and de- 
 pressing kind of literature, chiefly remarkable, per- 
 haps, for its power of bringing the might of pressing 
 social evils into the strongest contrast with that of the 
 means by which it proposes to remove them. He 
 kindly offered some of these to Herman. He accepted 
 one, as an excuse for his unsociable silence. It put 
 him to sleep, and was thus of some service to him ; but 
 he dreamed of Constance Aspenwall; and when he 
 awoke, he dreamed of her still. 
 
 Day and night he hurried on ; but it was still as one 
 in a dream, a dream of her. He could not help it 
 yet. He glided over Delaware Bay, and with an idle 
 eye watched its flocks of wild ducks, floating on the wa- 
 ter like the brown sea- weed of Sea Farm, till the steam- 
 boat came too near, and then flying up and away with 
 the silver linings of their wings twinkling in the sun 
 against the evergreen trees on the shore, and wondered 
 whether she had lately watched them so. Delaware 
 and Maryland lay behind, Maryland where she might 
 even now be, so near him, yet so far from him, so little 
 guessing he was there, caring so little where he was. 
 The beautiful hills of Virginia closed in around him,
 
 THE KNIGHT A .XL) THE BACKWOODSMAN. 129 
 
 with houses nestling, and sometimes even carefully 
 fitted, into their sides. The mountain -laurels 
 gleamed like emeralds through their coating of thin 
 ice. The hills grew higher and higher ; and, where 
 the road cut through them, a rich green matting of 
 thick tufted moss drooped lovingly over, to heal their 
 wounds and hide the scars. Log-cabins began to ap- 
 pear and run by, with galleries, thatched roofs, and 
 alas! now and then great black holes broken through 
 them ; but who would be tasteless enough for a mo- 
 ment, to speak of thrift and comfort in comparison with 
 the picturesque, and with the (very) " peculiar institu- 
 tion," which is so very promotive of it ? Large snaky 
 creepers ran writhing up the trunks of the still leafless 
 trees. The setting sun shone on gilded, filmy, dis- 
 tant mountains and clouds, which one could hardly tell 
 apart ; but he passed the highest Alleghanies to his re- 
 gret in a dark night, without seeing so much as a bear, 
 in a jolting stage-coach with rough-looking men about 
 him ; as he found when the morning broke and he be- 
 held them for the first time, nodding waggishly at each 
 other in their uneasy sleep. 
 
 They stopped for breakfast, for a few moments, at 
 an inn. Herman determined to avail himself of the 
 opportunity to wash his face. For this purpose he was 
 shown into a spacious apartment containing the conve- 
 nience of a handsome rose-wood bedstead, and nothing 
 else. The very door had neither latch, lock, bolt, nor 
 'button^ to keep it shut. By earnest and repeated ex- 
 postulation, lie obtained a quart-bowl of water and a 
 napkin, just before the coach started again. On they 
 went once more through the wide dreary tracts of 
 brown and white mountain and wood-land, coming now 
 and then to a clearing, where the snow was unbroken 
 6*
 
 130 HERMAJST. 
 
 except by the ebon stumps of felled trees, which 
 looked like the graveyard of the departed lords of the 
 forest. 
 
 At Wheeling, Mr. Grubbe pointed out to Herman 
 a fresh novelty. It was a " wharf-boat," a sort of 
 scow with a store-house in it, containing for sale, the 
 old man told him, such things as passing steamboats 
 were likely to want, and moored at the shore, or rowed 
 out towards the middle of the river, according to the 
 depth of the water at the time. 
 
 They were again embarked, and sliding smoothly 
 down between the brown sepia landscapes on the banks 
 of the Ohio, with the small black mouths of their- sub- 
 soil coal mines opening everywhere, like those of the 
 soul-destroying pit. Cairo was passed ; and they were 
 stirring with the prow of their steamboat the dingy 
 boiling gruel of the Mississippi. 
 
 Here his worthy old friend, having by this time 
 read most of his pamphlets, and distributed many, was 
 much thrown upon Herman's society for entertain- 
 ment. Herman made the best of it, by drawing from 
 him a little account of his mode of life, and of the sav- 
 ages among whom he passed it. He hinted a little 
 surprise that, at Mr. Grubbe's age, he should not choose 
 to retire from the scenes of his labors, and end his days 
 in ease and comfort. He was only to have a lesson to 
 teach him that tastes are almost as various as men. 
 A well-known dentist declares on the authority of his 
 own experience, that there is such a thing as a taste for 
 dentistry, on the part of the practitioner,' though even 
 he probably would not venture to assert that he ever 
 ascertained its existence on the part of the patient. 
 
 " Well, sir," said Mr. Grubbe, attempting in vain, 
 as he usually did at the commencement of a discourse,
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 131 
 
 to clear his bronchitic voice, an organ without stops, 
 which in its tones resembled an asthmatic watchman's 
 rattle, " May-be it's with bear's meat and buffalo as 
 they say 'tis with human flesh ; I never tasted none o' 
 that ; if you eat it once, you'll have to again. After 
 you've got inured to the West, the East's too close and 
 shut-up and crowded for you, and you want elbow- 
 room : 
 
 " 'Why, this is freedom; these pyore skies 
 Was never soiled with city sut!' 
 
 as our great national poet, Whittier, observes, sir ; 
 though as to that, the Indian's lodges are a great deal 
 tuttier than any chimney, to those under 'em, at 
 any rate. When the wind blows a-puffing down the* 
 hole a-top, it seems as if 'twould smoke your "rery eyes 
 out. But mark my words, my dear young friend, no- 
 body ever got nothing wuth having yet, without suffer- 
 ing some for't ; and I have got the vocabularies com- 
 plete of twenty Indian dialects! think of that, sir; 
 think of that !" 
 
 " Have you, indeed ?" said wicked Herman, with an 
 inward chuckle in the midst of his woe. " How hap- 
 py it must make you ! How long has it taken you?" 
 
 " Let me see. Stop, sir, eighteen hunderd twen- 
 ty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three, well, about thirty 
 years, sir." 
 
 " After all," thought Herman, " his whim is a 
 rarer one, but why is it at all more absurd than that 
 of the moneyed man, who has spent the same time in 
 adding to his ample fortune, by less harmless means, 
 perhaps, some hundreds of thousands of dollars, which 
 neither he nor his neighbours will ever use, but which 
 he must soon leave behind him, to buy very likely the 
 destruction of his idle purse-proud children '{ Mr.
 
 HEltiiAN. 
 
 Grubbe's Indian dialects will do nobody any harm, at ' 
 any rate, even if they do nobody any good." 
 
 Mr. Grnbbe lifted up his voice the while, continu- 
 ously : " I hope they have not been unprofitable years, 
 sir, to the Injun, any more than to me. (It was his 
 habit to speak always as if there was only one Indian, 
 as it is that of certain other philanthropists to speak 
 as if there was only one slave in the world, pleasing, 
 illusive idea ! Also, he was subject to grammatical 
 inconsistencies and entanglements in his speech, as are 
 most of those who labor under the aforesaid idiosyn- 
 crasy.) If he has taught me much, I hope that he has 
 learned something from me in return. According to 
 im T poor ability, I have labored, I trust conscientiously, 
 to impact unto him the glad tidings of great joy, sir. 
 It goes to my heart, as I tell 'em, to see so many fine, 
 brave, copper-colored fellers a-going with their horses 
 and feathers and fringes a-rampaging over the pur- 
 rayra, and to think that it ain't nothing, as you may 
 say, but a great green sieve to let 'em through down into 
 hell-fire, just for want of their knowing what nobody'll 
 take the trouble to come and teach him, and what no- 
 body can find out for themselves ; and the wicked 
 trappers going and telling him that our God will love 
 him, sir, if he'll only give them his squaws and horses, 
 and let 'em have his furs reasonable, sir !" 
 
 " It does seem hard and discreditable enough," an- 
 swered Herman, forgetting that he was thinking aloud, 
 " that we should live on near them so lazily, on the 
 very lands which we have taken from them or from 
 their kindred, and do nothing, or worse tlian nothing, 
 for these poor half-witted children of our Heavenly 
 Father!" 
 
 "Half-witted, did you observe, sir? FJ, they are
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 133 
 
 not, sir. I beg your pardon. They're outwitted some- 
 times, more shame to us, but, if they had as much 
 privileges, they'd be every bit as smart as you or 
 me, sir." 
 
 " You have great advantages over most other peo- 
 ple in judging of that. I wish I had your familiarity 
 with their languages." 
 
 " Well, sir, it is an advantage, especially to the 
 missionary. The interpreter is often good-for-nothing. 
 Why, once, when I fust come out here, a lot of 'em 
 come to me, a-seekin' the way of salvation; and I 
 thought I'd do my best, for want of a better, to make 
 known to 'em some of the plainest doctrines. So I 
 commoonicated with 'em through my interpreter, and 
 told him to tell 'em they must have a new heart. 
 What should he go and do, as I afterwards found out, * 
 in his partial acquaintance with their dialect, but 
 tell 'em they must git a new gizzard ! It's enough 
 to make one weep. Such good souls as they are, too, 
 some on 'em. They had ought to have good in- 
 struction." 
 
 " You like them, then," said Herman, absently ; 
 " I am glad of that." 
 
 " Well, sir, I ask your pardon ; but that's just as 
 sensible as if you'd said, ' Do you like white folks ?' 
 Some on 'em I do ; and some on 'em I don't. I like 
 the good ones, of course ; and there's some o' that sort 
 and some o' the other, I expect, to be found every- 
 where ; though the traveller ain't apt to discover it. 
 Why, when \ was to Boston, there was a gentleman in 
 company with me one day, that had just been to Eng' 
 land ; and, says he, ' The Englishman never laughs.' 
 Well, that very same day, a couple of hours afterwards, 
 in a book-store, I took up a book of travels, or letters.
 
 HERMAN. 
 
 or something, by ail Englishman who'd been a-visiting 
 our country ; and, says he, ' The American does not 
 laugh.' Well, I take it, the one statement was just 
 about as reliable as the tother. One on 'em had hap- 
 pened to have -fell in with sober Englishmen, and 
 the tother with sober Americans ; that was 
 all. The traveller judges according to what he 
 sees, and thinks there ain't nothing but what he 
 doos see. Suppose, now, an Injun sets off to travel 
 to Washington about a treaty ; and he goes through 
 Arkansaw, and somebody gives him a bottle of fire- 
 water ; and he goes to Kentucky, and somebody points 
 a double revolver at him, and tells him to be off. 
 When he gets back, he'll commoonicate to his tribe, 
 like as not, that the folks in Arkansaw is all kind and 
 friendly, and the Kentuckians miser'ble wretches. If 
 he's a aggravating Injun, he'll get bad treatment every- 
 where ; and then he'll come back and say all the white 
 folks are bad. Xow, I'm fearful the white man, when 
 he gits out w r here we're a-going, is very often very ag- 
 gravating to the Injun. You can't ascertain mark 
 my words, sir ! whether religion and civilization's in- 
 side of a man, or only outside, till you git him away 
 from his folks. If he's only held up by the pressure of 
 proper ways and people around about him, and the 
 eyes of his neighbours fastened on him, he'll fall flat 
 the minute they're taken off, just as he will hereafter, 
 there's too much reason to anticipate, before the judg- 
 ment-seat. Why, how many Xew Eno-landers out of 
 
 j s - O 
 
 godly Sabbath-keeping families, do you suppose, sir, 
 carries the Sabbath with 'em when they git, for in- 
 stance, among the French, who, it's stated, haven't got 
 none of their own? Why, judging from a conversa- 
 tion of a party of 'em, that appeared quite respectable
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 135 
 
 and consequential people, who'd just come over in the 
 steamship when I was a-stopping to the Bromfield 
 House, I should think none too many, sir. Why, even 
 the young ladies, and very fine youngladies they seemed 
 to be, too, and conducted with much propriety, had 
 been, I understood from remarks I heared the young gen- 
 tlemen make, a-looking on and laughing to places of 
 entertainment to Paris, that no decent pretty-behaved 
 young female had ought to know so much as the name 
 on, sir ! ISTow, if the salt is a-going to lose its savour, 
 every time it comes in contact with anything that isn't 
 salt, where's the use of having it at all, I say ; and 
 how is the whole earth ever going to get salted, if even 
 them that is Christiana at home is a-going to be 
 Turks in Turkey? They may conduct becomingly 
 enough to Boston, and New York City, and Cincinna- 
 ter, under the observation of their folks ; but, as like as 
 not, the moment they git out alone on the purrayra, 
 with only the great blue eye of God, if I may say so 
 without irreverence, over them, they'll lie to the Injun, 
 and cheat him, or steal his corn or squashes if they 
 have a good chance, or kill his pig or his cow, and 
 leave their consciences to home with their best vests 
 and pants, and take 'em out again, all as good as new, 
 when they git back there. Then, when the Injun 
 finds out what they've been up to, he's indignant natu- 
 rally, sir ; and not being able to get redress any other 
 way, the next time he sees a white man come prowling 
 about, perhaps he'll shoot him ; and then we call him 
 a sanguinary tribe, and exterminate him. Yery likely. 
 AVaVtwe a sanguinary tribe in seventeen seventy-five, 
 and shouldn't we be again, with the like provocation, 
 sir ? Why, I knew a young gentleman, who come out
 
 130 HERMAN. 
 
 from the States, a while ago, with the express, avcwed 
 purpose, to kill a Injun, sir."* 
 
 " Infamous !" cried Herman ; " but he could not have 
 been in earnest ! It must have been mere bravado !" 
 
 " Xo, it was not, sir. I beg your pardon. He pur- 
 posed it ; and he did it too. Xow, I am far from taking 
 it upon me to say, that it mayn't be necessary to shoot 
 the Injun once in a while, in self-defence or after 
 judicial inquiry into one of their outrages ; but if the 
 latter, it hadn't never ought to be done only after a 
 very dispassionate examination. Justice has got two 
 hands, as I say, and had ought to keep one for the 
 white man, he wants it enough, and not lay 'em 
 both on the red man ; and then she wouldn't have so 
 much trouble to keep him in order. They're like 
 childrin not 'half-witted childrin' as you observed, 
 sir, but smart childrin, that air easy put out, and 
 knows when they're imposed upon, and don't look on 
 things just as we do, and has to be checked once in a 
 while when they gits too obstreperous, but had ought 
 to be yery patiently taught and kindly and forbear- 
 ingly treated, generally, and protected in all their 
 rights, and always will be by well-principled compas- 
 sionate individuals." 
 
 The steamboat was just then coasting along one of 
 the two unfathomable, gloomy, trackless, forests that 
 walled the river on each side, with their straight stalks 
 almost branchless to the tops for want of elbow-room, 
 and hung about with gray moss, drooping and trailing 
 
 * " A young Kentuckian, of the true Kentucky blood, generous, 
 impetuous and a gentleman withal, had come out to the mountains 
 with Russel's party of Caliibrnia emigrants. One of his chief objects, 
 as he gave out, was to kill an Indian; an exploit which he afterwards 
 succeeded in achieving, much to the jeopardy of ourselves, and ot;;ers 
 who had to pass through the country of the dead Pawnee's enraged 
 relatives." The California and Oregon Trail," pp. 333-4.
 
 THE KXIGHT AXD THE BACKWOODSMAN. 137 
 
 like the dusty ancient cobwebs of the lethargic spi- 
 ders, slumbering out their century in the undisturbed 
 woods around the palace of the Sleeping Beauty. Five 
 minutes before, a tall and shaggy person had dropped 
 on board from an overhanging cotton-tree. He wore 
 a coat of buffalo-skin, with pistols peeping from the 
 breast, and a knife in the belt ; and with the affection- 
 ate gripe of a grizzly bear, he hugged a rifle. His 
 head was thatched with a great abundance of straw- 
 colored hair ; and a very little yellowish-brown flesh 
 padded the large raw bones of his gaunt face. Pie had, 
 with the easy affability of one who knows that he can 
 command a welcome, joined our travellers at once, 
 for the benefit of listening to their conversation. He 
 had since occupied his time profitably in a leisurely 
 rumination upon their words and his own quids, and in 
 freeing his utterance from the stores of tobacco which 
 obstructed it. This last he accomplished satisfactorily 
 by- ejecting a portion, and packing away the rest in his 
 pouches like a monkey. The deck of his speech being 
 thus cleared for action, he began : " Gosh, stranngers, 
 yer don't mean ter say yer spoony about shootin them 
 thar dog-goned wild Injuns, be yer? Just wait till 
 yer've seen some o' their cussed ways, an yer'll think 
 no more o' that nor o' shootin any other kind o' var- 
 mint, 'xcept they ain't so nice to eat." 
 
 " I beg your pardon, sir," said Mr. Grubbe, with 
 awful solemnity, "I am acquainted by personal ob- 
 servation with more of their ways than I should expect 
 to learn from you -or anybody else, sir ; and I should 
 hope and pray, sir, to be very spoony, indeed, as you 
 were pleased to denominate it, sir, about taking away 
 the life or the rights of any of Go'd's creaturs, sir !" 
 
 "Parson, strannger?"
 
 138 HEKMAN. 
 
 " No, I am not, sir ; but that is no reason why I 
 should not feel as a Christian man, sir !" 
 
 " Xo harm in that, strannger, sartin ; an, if that's all, 
 I don't see as there's anything to hinder mj br-ingin 
 yer round to take a common-sense view o' the subject. 
 'Life an rights o' God's critters,' says you. Ain't buf- 
 falo and coon God's critters, too; and can't you kill 
 them, when they've got what you're in need on to eat 
 an to wear?" 
 
 " Injuns are God's immortal creaturs, sir." 
 
 " Be they ? How d'yer know ?" 
 
 " Is it possible you are so benighted, sir ? They 
 have souls, sir." 
 
 " Yes, I'm benighted, I reckon. How d'yer know 
 that?" 
 
 " They have reason and affection, sir." 
 
 " Ugh ! Precious little on it ! For that matter, so 
 has dogs, and twice as much on it, too ; and they don't 
 live forever. I swow, I wish they did. I'd try to get 
 a change o' heart for the sake o' seein a little pinter o' 
 mine again the tother side o' Jordan. I'll be durned 
 if that little critter didn't have more sense nor any 
 Christian, an wa'n't fonder o' me rtor nobody else since 
 I lost my mam ; an that's longer ago nor I can remem- 
 ber of. When he took sick, I lost a week's prime 
 huntin a-nussin on him ; an when he licked my hand 
 and stretched out stiff, I don't mind ownin up to 
 it, I blarted right out jest like a bossy-calf. The 
 bush turned lonesome, an empty, an ha'nted. I kep 
 seemin to h'ar his racin feet a-comin patterin arter 
 me; and then 'twould seem as if rfiy very throat 
 would ha' busted right up like a steamer-biler, to think 
 o' all his pootty fun, an capers, an frisks, an fawuins 
 round me's bein turned fust into pain, an fright, an
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THfi BzYCK WOODSMAN. 139 
 
 miser}', an then into a nasty, stinkin, little lump o' 
 M-orms an carrion, under the leaves that he'd ha' been 
 H) glad to be playin with, when he hadn't done a 
 tiling under the sun to be punished for. He was jest 
 as good as good could be, an minded every word I said 
 to him; an I couldn't see why he shouldn't be took 
 up an rewarded jest as much as anybody else ; sothe 
 very fust camp-meetin I could h'ar on, I jest took a 
 tramp o' forty mile, to ask a parson what chance 
 there was for him ; an he said, none, an I'd better for- 
 git trifles, an think o' my soul, an make my peace 
 with God; but I told him, if them was God's Ways 
 with innocent critters, I reckoned thar wa'n't no great 
 chance with Him no-how for a sinner like me; an if I 
 did make the peace, I'd be likely to break it, an cuss 
 and swear like the devil, whenever I thought o' poor 
 Tip; so 'twa'n't hardly wuth a while." 
 
 "I beg your pardon, sir," interrupted Mr. Grubbe, 
 addressing himself to Herman, " I regret to be obleeged 
 to leave you ; but I don't remain no longer in the seat 
 of the scorner. I had hoped, from the turn of your 
 conversation previously, sir, that it wouldn't have been 
 necessary to warn you against evil commoonicatlons ; 
 but you're a-beginning to prove what I was a-observing 
 of j ust ^ now, of the extraordinary effect on weak 
 brethren of a change of sitooation." He rose and left 
 the guards* 
 
 The backwoodsman pondered an instant, unable to 
 comprehend that any offence could have been given by 
 his frank statement of his own spiritual case ; but, as 
 the meaning of Mr. Grubbe's elegant language, and its 
 application to himself, dawned upon him, lie sprang to 
 his feet, threw his hand to his belt, and pulled up five 
 or six inches of his seemingly interminable knife. The
 
 140 HERMAN. 
 
 white hairs of the retreating old man seemed to re- 
 prove him, however; for he paused, and muttered, 
 " Too darned old ! Fight, strannger ?" continued he, 
 speaking to Herman, who had hitherto sat silent 
 though attentive, " I reckon yer responsible for him V 
 
 " Thank you," said Herman, going on nonchalantly 
 with a willow- whistle, which he was making for the 
 child of the steward : " We'll have a fencing-match by- 
 and-by, if you like, if we can find any foils ; but it's 
 rather warm at present for anything of that sort, and I 
 would rather sit and talk a little longer first. I was 
 interested in what you were saying about your poor 
 little dog. If I had been present, I should have been 
 disposed, when your parson said there was no chance 
 for it, to ask him, ' How do you know that?' as you 
 did Mr. Grubbe just now." 
 
 " I bet I did," said the son of the wilderness, first 
 puzzled, then appeased ; and the knife sank again into 
 its place. 
 
 " What answer did he make you ?" 
 
 " D d bosh ! I disremember half on it now. But 
 he said that all that critters was fit for was eatin, an 
 drinkin, an sleepin, an fightin; an that's all that 
 Injuns is ; an in heaven thar wouldn't be none o' that 
 a goin on, but singing psa'ms an praisin the Lord ; an 
 critters wa'n't up to that ; an they received thar good 
 things in this world, and thar smTerins wa'n't much, an 
 was the 'xception, too, and not the rule, so they didn't 
 want no compensation." 
 
 " I know. I have heard a good deal of that sort of 
 
 1 
 
 special pleading myself; and I do not relish it much 
 more than you do, especially from clergymen. I arn 
 afraid that they are, some of them, much too apt to 
 take it for granted in the first place that a thing is so,
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 141 
 
 and then to undertake to prove that it ought to be so,' 
 when they know neither the fact nor the reasons. 
 People tell us a good many things, I think, in the 
 name of God, that God never told them." 
 
 " Is they a heaven for clever brutes, then, do you 
 reckon ?" 
 
 " It seems to me there are stronger reasons for'be- 
 lieving that, than for believing the contrary." 
 
 " When ye're a parson, I'll jine yer church." 
 
 " Very well ; when I am, I shall be glad to get a 
 hearer ; and one thing you may be very sure of, that I 
 shall not undertake to serve the God of truth by telling 
 lies nor making false excuses for Him, nor by pretending 
 to know more of His counsels than I do. This matter of 
 the future state of the dead, He has left almost wholly 
 wrapped in mystery. Almost the only thing which he 
 has told us clearly about it is, that good men and wo- 
 men shall be very well off after they leave this world ; 
 and bad ones, very badly. Therefore, if you ask me 
 whether the lower animals will live again, I tell you 
 honestl^, in the first place, that I do not know ; but, 
 in the second, that, as I said, I see a good many rea- 
 sons to encourage us to hope they will ; and I dare say, 
 that there are a great many besides, that I have never 
 thought of. It is of no use for anybody to try to con- 
 vince you and me, that the domestic animals at least, 
 the only ones of which I have seen much, do not suf- 
 fer and very often grievously, in their life on earth. 
 They enjoy more than they suffer usually, it is very 
 likely, as I sjaspect that human beings do, but they 
 suffer, notwithstanding, not only in their bodies, but in 
 what you and I should call their souls, their thoughts 
 and feelings, perhaps as keenly in proportion to their 
 power of enjoyment as we do ; and past pleasure is no
 
 HERMAN. 
 
 more a compensation for present pain to them than it 
 would be to us." 
 
 " I'm blasted if 'tis ! Poor Tippy wouldn't lia' 
 yowled so like murder, an wriggled round on his bed, 
 an tried to stand up on his legs an foller, when he seed 
 me a-goin off to leave him a spell an shoot somethin 
 for us to eat, if he hadn't ha' known by 'xperience 
 what jolly fun 'twas for him to go along an help." 
 
 "A female animal, whose young are taken from her, 
 plainly endures the same kind of pain, I don't say the 
 same degree, of course, that a woman does at the loss 
 of her child. It is not bodily pain ; if it is not spirit- 
 ual, what is it ? Then, the merely bodily agonies of 
 beasts are often such as you and I are not ashamed to 
 confess, that it almost unmans us, not only to witness, 
 but to think of. Some comparative anatomists, men 
 of science, I mean, doctors, are in the habit of in- 
 flicting tortures even on poor, harmless, helpless, hope- 
 less dogs, the most nearly human of all our inferior 
 animals, which it would be very hard for a brave 
 Christian man, with heaven in full view, to undergo 
 for the sake of his honor, his country, or his religion." 
 
 "Wot! Think if they'd ha' cotched my Tip ! 
 Wouldn't I ha' gin 'em ! D'ye ever see one o' the 
 scoundrels at it ?" 
 
 " Once." 
 
 " D'yer gouge him ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Why the - - didn't yer ?" 
 
 " ISTot because I shouldn't have beecumost happy to 
 put a stop to his proceedings, in some way or other, 
 you may depend upon it ; but, as I was saying, ani- 
 mals do suffer in this world, as well as we, for no fault 
 of theirs. God created them as well as us, and gave
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 143 
 
 them a great love of enjoyment. So far, we are treated 
 alike. He is eager to make more than amends to us in 
 the other world for onr undeserved troubles here ; and 
 therefore it seems likely that He is going to do some- 
 thing of the same sort for them, not to make them 
 happy with our degree of happiness, any more than He 
 does here, but very happy after their own fashion, 
 which consists, in great part, like ours, in the enjoy- 
 ment of the society of those to whom they are attached. 
 God's own Son said that God fed the birds, and watched 
 over even each particular sparrow. It seems improba- 
 ble that, after taking care of any creature for several 
 years, He would turn against it on a sudden, and in- 
 flict pain or death, or suffer them to be inflicted upon 
 it, (when, as you say, it has done nothing to be pun- 
 ished for,) without intending to comfort and revive it. 
 The- longer we take care of anything, the more we love 
 it. One of those good men, in old times, who knew 
 God best, said that He was love itself; another of them 
 declared that in Him was no variableness nor shadow 
 of turning, and that every good gift came down from 
 Him. Now, the pity which we feel for any innocent lov- 
 ing creature that suffers and dies, is a good feeling, a 
 good gift, and must therefore have come down to us 
 from God. Does it seem at all likely that He would 
 have given it all away to us, and kept none for 
 Himself?" 
 
 " Can't say as it doos." 
 
 " Further, the Bible says that He does not willingly 
 afflict nor grieve the children of men ; therefore it 
 should seem that He would willingly bless and comfort 
 us. When His Son, our Saviour, who was of course 
 much more like His Father than any other person, 
 was on earth, he seems to have been what, if he had
 
 14:4: HERMAN. 
 
 been only a man, we might call a sympathizing, kind, 
 obliging man. He used his wonderful power not only 
 to show that he was really God's messenger, which he 
 might have done by severe and terrible miracles, such 
 as calling down fire from heaven on those who dis- 
 pleased him, but to comfort the unhappy, cure the sick, 
 and raise the dead whom the living were crying for." 
 
 " I swow, I wish he was back again. I'd see him, 
 or I'd know why ; an wouldn't I ax him to comfort 
 me, an raise up that dog ! You see, strannger, I'm 
 kinder soft along o' him, I know ; but I'm thirty year 
 old, as near as I can guess ; an I've been livin alone in 
 the bush or the purrayra all my life pootty much ; an 
 he war all the dad, or mam, nor brother, nor child, as 
 ever I had to car' a cuss for me ; an, now he's gone, I 
 haint had no heart to git another. I had a friend an 
 a Injun sweetheart once; and they run off together. 
 When I cotched up with ? em, I put a ball or two 
 through him, nat'rally, and she hove herself into the 
 river; so thar was a end o' that. I was a youngster 
 then, an 'twas a hull year afore I could git up my 
 sperits ; an for that long, I skulked mostly, an kep out 
 o' everybody else's way. Tip was nothin but a pup, 
 an jest a little spell afore that thar catasterphy, I'd 
 spied him, with his black eyes a-startin out of his head, 
 a-strildn out an fightin like mad with the rapids, whar 
 a pack o' little cusses had soused him in, to look at him 
 drownd. I was so tickled to see his pluck, that I 
 stripped, an dowsed in arter him, an fished him out, an 
 \vallopped 'em all round; an he nevei' forgot it; so 
 when I jest went out o' sight and nowhere, like a "Will- 
 o'-wisp, he follered arter, an nosed me out. I war beat 
 out, a-layin under a palmetter an dreamin skeery 
 dreams ; I couldn't git shet on 'em them times, so I
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACK. WOODSMAN. 145 
 
 didn't snooze no more nor I could help ; an up he 
 come, and roused me out, a-tmnblin over me an scourin 
 my face an eyes with his tongue, an squealin for joy. 
 He was right smart of a hunter a-ready, an could allers 
 cotch enough to eat when he wanted ; but he was jest 
 as lean as a rail then. The little jackass didn't want 
 nothin else till he'd got me. I had a hard scratch on 
 it ; an he was the only livin soul as come a-nigh to me 
 to say, Cheer up. He was sorry for me when nobody 
 else war ; an now I can't help bein sorry for him. If 
 them old times was only back, or if I could see the 
 Lord now-a-days, may-be he'd consider the sarcum- 
 stances, and do sothin for us." 
 
 " You can see him a little while hence, at any rate." 
 
 " Wh'a' say?" 
 
 " Before he went up, he left this word behind for 
 anybody who wanted him : ' If any man serve me, let 
 him follow me, and where I am, there shall also my 
 servant be.' If you will serve him, therefore, in this 
 world, you can see him after you leave it." 
 
 " S'pose he'd do anythin for sich a miser'ble black- 
 guard ?" 
 
 " Certainly. He came into the world on purpose 
 to look after and rescue miserable blackguards. But 
 if you want to overtake him, I should advise you to 
 follow him without any more loss of time, and to take 
 care not to step out of his track ; for if you once lose it, 
 you may never find it again." 
 
 " Blast yer ! (This was said, not for anger, but for 
 emphasis;) ax pardon, but d'yer s'pose I've spent 
 half my days in the bush, not to know as much as that 
 thar? Yer'll find I'm a pootty plaguey d d good 
 heft to h'ist, I'm afeard ; but jest yer put me on his 
 track, if yer can, an cotch me a-losin on it!"
 
 14:6 HERMAN. 
 
 " Leave off swearing then, in the first place," said 
 Herman, for the first time laying down his work, and 
 raising his gaze to the man's face not so sternly, per 
 haps, but as firmly and fearlessly as a keeper does, 
 who quells a lion, " and drinking and brawling." 
 
 There is great power sometimes in a clear soul, 
 looking suddenly through a clear eye. The poor ruf- 
 fian felt it, and his sank abashed beneath it. " Who's 
 been a-peachin on me, strannger?" said he, confused 
 and hesitating, in a lower tone. 
 
 " Your own tongue, your own breath, excuse me, 
 and your own knife. Come," continued Herman, 
 kindly, " you must not mind my knowing it. We are 
 fellow-strugglers with sorrow and sin. I have had my 
 troubles, and thought them pretty heavy ones ; but I 
 see now that they were scarcely to be compared with 
 yours ; and God only knows how much more severe 
 than mine your temptations may have been. Besides, we 
 are strangers, and may never come in each other's way 
 again unless we meet up there ;" and he pointed up 
 into the deep blue sky above them, looking as if he be- 
 longed to it. " I hope we shall, one of these days, and 
 that you will be able to tell me, then, that I did some- 
 thing to help you up. You called yourself a miserable 
 blackguard just now, and I thought you did it as if 
 you meant it, like an honest, open-hearted fellow, who 
 wouldn't bely himself, at any rate, for the better or the 
 worse. What then ? If you were a blackguard yester- 
 day or this morning, is that any reason you should 
 be one this afternoon or to-morrow ? Here, I will 
 give you this, to show you your way." He took out 
 his pocket New Testament, and with his pencil wrote 
 most of the Ten Commandments in printing letters on 
 the fly-leaf. " You can read ?"
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 147 
 
 " I reckon." 
 
 " All that we need is, to follow the directions in 
 this little book. The greatest saint, that the angels 
 ever rejoiced over and welcomed in heaven, could do 
 no more than learn and obey them." 
 
 " That all ? A man might do that much without 
 hurting hisself, I reckon." 
 
 " No doubt ; if he's a manly, resolute man, and 
 knows how to keep his purpose in sight, and run it 
 down, and how to face the difficulties within and with- 
 out him, and put them down by main force. Are you 
 that sort of character ?" 
 
 " I be. I won't say no good o' myself that ain't 
 true; an that ain't much ; nor I won't say no bad o' 
 myself that ain't true, an that's a'most every kind o' 
 bad ; but when I has a object, I sticks to it ; an when 
 I says I'll do a thing, I doos it." 
 
 " Good ! You'll do, then. Will you read this 
 book every day, and ask God, in Christ's name, to help 
 you to understand and obey it ?" 
 
 " If I don't, I'll be ! I mean I will ! Jest read 
 some on it out to a feller fust, will yer? an 'twill spell 
 out the easier for't, may-be, arterwards. My readin's 
 got a bit rusty, I'm afeared. I lamed it to the workus, 
 whar I was raised ; but I run away jest as soon as I 
 war big enough ; an sometimes I been a year or two 
 without seein' a page o' print." 
 
 " With pleasure ; and you had better look over me, 
 if that will help you. I will mark the plainest and 
 most important parts, too, for you, so that you can 
 turn to them easily at any time." 
 
 Pointing to the words with his pencil as he slowly 
 pronounced them, Herman began: '"Thou shalt love 
 the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy
 
 148 HERMAN. 
 
 soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind ; 
 and thy neighbour as thyself/ " 
 
 " That's a almighty hard un, ain't it, to start 
 with?" 
 
 " Yes, but it makes all the others easy ; and it is 
 not at all disagreeable, either, after you have got into 
 the way of it." 
 
 " Ye've got the hang on't, I reckon ; haint yer ?" 
 
 " I am trying to do so ; but I find it will take a 
 good deal of time and patience, and a grent many 
 prayers, to bring it about. The nearer I get to it, the 
 pleasanter I find it. Love is the most delightful feel- 
 ing in the world. Didn't it make you happy to love 
 your poor dog ?" 
 
 " I reckon. Yer think thar's a chance for me to 
 have him again, then, if I doos it all ?" 
 
 " How many strange ways God has," thought Her- 
 man, " to lead His lost sheep home to him !" " Indeed 
 I do," he replied ; " but whether you will or not is for 
 God to say, and not me. Your only chance, your 
 business in the first place, is to serve and follow 
 Christ." 
 
 But was it not wrong in Herman to try to cheat the 
 backwoodsman into being a Christian ? It would have 
 been, very, if he had done so ; but he did not. If he 
 cheated anybody, it was himself. He honestly be- 
 lieved every word that he said upon the subject. He 
 habitually believed every word, which he said upon any 
 subject whatsoever, and refrained from saying anything 
 which he did not believe. It was probably this evident 
 heartiness and good faith on his part, and the remark- 
 able power of adaptation and mental and moral sym- 
 pathy, which he was already developing, that gave to 
 so many others, wherever he went, so much faith in his-
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 149 
 
 words, and especially in himself, and that gave him 
 from this time forward, more and more, an ascendency 
 over the minds of the doubting, groping, seeking, and 
 sorrowing, which, to men of a different stamp from 
 himself, seemed altogether marvellous and unaccounta- 
 ble. He was very heterodox, perhaps, on this occasion ; 
 but if so, he was so in the excellent company of Bishop 
 Butler.* 
 
 " Injuns ain't neighbours, be they ?" exclaimed the 
 proselyte, striking on a spiritual snag. 
 
 " Certainly ; all human beings are. You will want 
 to know, now, how I know that Indians are human ; 
 and I could tell you. But it might take a good deal 
 of time: and we shall need all that we have for this 
 book, shall we not ?" 
 
 " Be I bound not to fight 'em no more, then ?" 
 
 " I do not say that you are not to defend yourself, 
 if they attack you ; but you must by all means do your 
 very best to keep on good terms with them. See here," 
 said Herman ; and turning over the leaves, he found 
 and read aloud, " ' If it be possible, as much as lieth 
 in you, live peaceably with all men.' " 
 
 " "Wall, but, strannger, I h'ard a speedier once 
 a-speechifyin ; an he said 'twas 'manifest destiny,' 
 don't that mean it's all right ? for us to drive 'em out, 
 an squat on thar huntin-grounds ; and he seemed a 
 larn'd man." 
 
 " It is the manifest destiny of the children of the 
 devil to outrage, rob, and murder the ignorant and de- 
 fenceless ; not of the children of God." 
 
 " Wall, now, strannger, doctors differ. I was on a 
 boat a spell ago ; an thar was the cutest, most interestin 
 
 * See "Analogy of Religion," Chap. I.
 
 150 HERMAN. 
 
 little chap of a seven-year-old, ever I see, a-coming on 
 from Arkansaw to Mizzoura. He'd got a little cow- 
 hide, an he'd crack it around his ears all day long, 
 a-playin overseer. He'd go an hide by the door o' the 
 cook-shop ; an every time he cotched the darky cooky 
 a-comin in or out, he'd hit him such a crack on his 
 stumps, as would make him skip like a nanny-gout ; 
 an then he'd haw-haw so, you'd hear him all over the 
 steamer, an know what he was about in a second. 
 Then he'd ax everybody to loan him a chaw o' tobacca. 
 lie was on'y jest a-larnin ; an it made him jest as sick 
 an yeller as death ; but gosh, he didn't mind it no 
 more'n nothin, he was so plucky ; an he'd choke, an 
 chaw, an chaw, an choke, with his in'ards all up in his 
 swoller, jest like any mail. I never saw nothin like it. 
 I thought I'd ha' gin anythin to ha' had him, an brung 
 him up to the bush ; an the fust city we stopped to, 
 I stepped into the store, and bought him the poottiest 
 little bowie I could find. 
 
 " He had a pootty little book; an says I, ' Jest spout 
 out a bit on't, an let's h'ar yer.' 'Twas all about Gin- 
 eral Cortes, an Bonyparte, an Walker, an them cele- 
 brated heroes ; an it said that civilized folks like we 
 are oughter conquer folks as wa'n't so smart an en- 
 lightened, an instruct 'em. '"Wall,' says I, 'what 
 d'yer think o' that thar doctrine ?' ' Fus-rate,' says 
 he. ' How be yer a-goin to apply it ?' says I. Says 
 he, ' When I gits to home, the fust thing, I'll take an 
 conquer away Bobby's garden ; 'cause he's on'y a four- 
 year-old, an so stupid he can't raise nothin; an plant 
 it all with mint for juleps. My, ain't they prime!' 
 ' Wall, but,' says I, ' that's on'y a-conquerin on him. 
 Yer know, arter that, yer've got to 1'arn him.' ' I'll 
 1'arn him,' says he, a-cockin his eye at me. ' Yer will,
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAX. 151 
 
 will yer?' says I. ' What'll yer 1'arn him ? To make 
 juleps too ?' ' Cotch me !' says he, as bluff as a buf- 
 falo ; I'll Tarn him to keep off.' ' That won't do, 
 though,' says I, ' 'cause he's yer brother ; an ye're the 
 biggest, and strongest, an smartest ; so yer'd ought ter 
 be good to him an take car on him ;' but I thought the 
 book was right enough in gineral." 
 
 " Never mind that book. It was only some man's. 
 This is God's. It is full of directions to us to deal very 
 justly and forbearingly with -all. men ; as we shall 
 naturally, if we love them ; and, of course, He who 
 made all men, knows best, and has the best right to 
 say, how they ought to be treated 7 Suppose now a 
 father had six sons, and gave them each some land ; 
 and five of them were fine, strong fellows, and always 
 knew what they were about ; but the sixth was an 
 idiot ?" 
 
 " What's that ? a nat'ral ?" 
 
 " Yes. What should you think they would do with 
 him?" 
 
 " Wall, I dunno. Wouldn't think thar was much 
 they could do with him, on'y keepin him out o' harm's 
 way, see that he could git enough to eat an drink, an 
 that nobody didn't impose on him, I s'pose." 
 
 " But suppose he was wasteful, and quick-tempered, 
 and troublesome?" 
 
 " What o' that ? He wouldn't know no better." 
 
 " What if they robbed him of what his father gave ' 
 him, or cheated him out of it, and beat and killed him, 
 or drove him away to starve ?" 
 
 ' What then? Why, then I would on'y like to see 
 'em at it when I was by, the thunderin mean bullies ! 
 I'd think thar scalps was a heap too nice night-caps 
 foi 'em ; an I'd have 'em off, too, if they wa'n't stuck on
 
 152 HERMAN. 
 
 an everlastin sight tighter nor most folks's be ! That's 
 all the what !" 
 
 " Good ! Your heart is in the right place, I see ; 
 though you must not be cruel even to the cruel. Scalp- 
 ing and gouging are too savage punishments for a 
 Christian man to inflict on the most unchristian of 
 men ; and you must not be too ready to take the law 
 into your own hands. But, now, the next silly, pro- 
 voking Indian you meet, going along bedizened out in 
 his finery, or lazy, stupid negro, either, say to your- 
 self, ' There goes my heavenly Father's poor under- 
 witted son; and I must see how gently and generously 
 I can bear with his ignorance and folly. If I can, I 
 will do him some good. At any rate, no one shall do 
 him any harm that I can help.' ' : 
 
 " What ! niggers neighbours, too ?" 
 " All men, black, white, and red." 
 " JSTiggers an Injuns be kinder wantin, then, arter 
 all, ain't they ?" 
 
 "The average of them are, at present, I should . 
 think, very much below the average of white Ameri- 
 cans, in intellect. The difference between them and 
 natural idiots, however, is considerable, I suspect, in 
 this ; that idiots are ignorant and shiftless, chiefly be- 
 cause they can't be taught much, and Indians and 
 negroes, because they haven't been." 
 
 " Ax pardon for interruptin on yer. Fiddle 
 away." 
 
 Herman read on several pages. 
 " Seems to me," said his disciple, " God don't say 
 so much about a change o' heart as the parsons doos. 
 Hain't I got to go through that ? I'd be glad to git 
 shet on't, if I could. I'm bound to stan' it anyhow 
 without hollerin, as the gals an some o' the fellers doos.
 
 THE KNIGHT A>'D THE BACKWOODSMAN. 153 
 
 if it did hurt like murder; but they says some folks 
 loses thar wits under the torment, an doesn't never git 
 'em again." 
 
 " I don't recollect, that God anywhere says, that He 
 should wish to alter a heart, which was already full of 
 love to Him, to Christ, and to His other children, and 
 of an earnest wish to serve Him and them. So far as 
 our hearts are not in this state, they need to be changed, 
 no doubt ; but we shall be very glad to have them, if 
 we know what is good for us. Has not yours changed 
 a little, this afternoon ? Don't you already feel more 
 hope of God's taking pity on yon, and more disposition 
 to do good to others, than you did ?" 
 
 " I reckon." 
 
 " Very well. Does that change make you wish to 
 shout, and scream, and go into fits ?" 
 
 " Wall, no ; it's kinder soothin to h'ar o' the Lord's 
 bein my Father, an folks bein my brothers, 'cause I 
 never had none afore ; an I allers tho't 'twould be kind 
 o' social if I could. Hain't I got to have no conviction 
 o' sin ?" 
 
 " Can we help having it, when we compare our 
 lives with that of Christ ?" 
 
 "Wall, I dunno. I wouldn't s'pose yer'd never 
 done nothin so very vicious." 
 
 Poor Herman ! He colored after his boyish fashion. 
 He, to whom it was almost like literal self-dissection to 
 show so much as a glimpse of his inner man to his deli- 
 cate, tender, sympathizing Clara, to be called upon to 
 shrive himself to this shaggy Faun ! The latter mis- 
 understood his reserve, and looked surprised and dis- 
 appointed. 
 
 " Wall," said he after a pause, administering en- 
 couragement in his turn, " the best on us miss it some- 
 
 O '
 
 HEKMAN. 
 
 times ; an least said is soonest mended. I wouldn't 
 ha' tho't it on yer, but may-be yer was too young to 
 know 110 better ; an anyhow tain't for me to say no- 
 thin ; an thar's time enough afore yer to make up 
 for't." 
 
 It served Herman right, and did him good. 
 
 " You mistake me ! you mistake me !" cried ' he, 
 raising his fine head, with a face as clear as his con- 
 science, and with all the free glad grace of his happi- 
 est moments. " No one can accuse me of any crime, 
 from my infancy to this day. Judged by man's moral 
 laws, I am innocent ; but God's do not you see it ? 
 are broader. Man says, ' Do nothing that I call evil.' 
 God says, ' Do no evil,' too ; but also, and just as pos- 
 itively, ' Do good.' This I have not done hitherto. 
 That is my sin. I have had friends, knowledge, hap- 
 piness, and time. I have known that many of my poor 
 brothers in the world were ignorant, friendless, and 
 unhappy ; but yet I have been contented to sit at home 
 at my ease, and keep all my good things to myself, and 
 might have been so all my life, if He had not sent 
 me trouble to take such unworthy contentment away. 
 Was not that selfish, stingy, mean? What can our 
 Father think of me ?" 
 
 " Ye ain't to home now, anyhow. Whar be yer 
 goin to; an what's yer business ?" 
 
 " To the West, to help some Indians to keep their 
 hunting-grounds." 
 
 " He'll forgive yer, I reckon. I would, in His 
 place." 
 
 " If I truly repent, He will forgive me that, with 
 my great advantages, I have done so little good. If 
 you truly repent, he will forgive you that, with your 
 great disadvantages, you have done so much evil. But
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 155 
 
 we have both of us broken His laws. We both need 
 repentance." 
 
 " Jest you tell a feller what that thar is, in a com- 
 mon-sense way." 
 
 " Repentance ? There are different kinds . of it. 
 The best kind is what we should wish for, of course ; 
 and that is, as I understand it, such a hatred and dread 
 of our past sins as would keep us from ever indulging 
 in them any more, if temptations to them thrust them- 
 selves in our way never so invitingly, such as would 
 make it as impossible for us to wish to indulge in them, 
 as it would be for us to wish to taste the most delicious 
 food in the world, if we knew that it had ratsbane in 
 it. It is a hearty sorrow for having displeased our 
 Father and ill-used our brothers, and gives us such a 
 longing to serve Him and them, that we cannot be 
 easy without doing it. Now, do you think that a 
 raving maniac can serve them to much advantage?" 
 
 " I'd full as lieves he wouldn't undertake to sarve 
 me, for one." 
 
 " To be sure. A wise man, who wishes to serve 
 them will be scarcely more ready to craze himself with 
 fanaticism than with drink." 
 
 The s.upper-bell rang. Herman would gladly have 
 disregarded it, in order to prolong the conversation ; 
 but his new friend sprang to his feet with a presence 
 of mind, which showed that he hungered and thirsted 
 for something else besides righteousness. As he did 
 so, however, he stretched out his huge brown paw for 
 the book, and, touching it gingerly, accommodated it 
 with a nook among the pistols in his furry breast ; and 
 this Herman inwardly hailed as a good sign. 
 
 At the head of the table sat Mr. Grubbe, indulging 
 in a sulk sanctimonious. The backwoodsman seemed
 
 156 HERMAN. 
 
 to have forgotten the grudge he owed him, or else to be 
 disposed to offer it up as a first-fruit, on the altar of 
 his reformation. He handed the old man, in succes- 
 sion, all the viands within the reach of his long arm. Mr. 
 Grubbe made it a point of honor to refuse all refresh- 
 ment at hands so unholy, and thus soon found himself, 
 to Herman's extreme, though carnal, diversion, re- 
 duced to a somewhat ascetic banquet of tea and pickles. 
 The novice fed, notwithstanding, freely and phlegmat- 
 ically ; and then, the sun having meantime gone 
 below, immediately followed its example. Herman 
 availed himself of the opportunity thus afforded to 
 soothe Mr. Grubbe, who, he saw, had something still 
 undigested besides the pickles, which last he thought, by 
 themselves, likely to be quite enough for him at one 
 time. Towards Herman, however, he was rather in 
 sorrow than in anger : 
 
 "I could never have believed it of you! to waste 
 just one and three-quarters of the blessed hours that 
 we've all got to render an account on, by my watch 
 that hasn't lost ten minutes these twenty years, and 
 spend it with a drinker and a swearer !" 
 
 " But, my dear sir, I was not drinking nor swear- 
 ing with him ! Did you suppose that I was ?" 
 
 " Evil commoonications, sir, evil commoonications ! 
 How's this earth ever a-goin to be salted, as I say ?" 
 
 " How, indeed, if the salt, supposing you do me 
 the honor to believe me to have a grain of it, is never 
 to be suffered to come in contact, for any purpose, with 
 anything which is not salt ? That is not so very ill- 
 intentioned a fellow, after all. He has been reasoning 
 of righteousness, and temperance, and judgment to 
 come, half the afternoon, and gone off to bed with my 
 New Testament in his pocket."
 
 THE KNIGHT' AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 157 
 
 " You don't say so ! I want to know ! My dear 
 young friend ! I've been a-judging of you; and I ask 
 your pardon. Why, it's little short of a miracle ! Do 
 you think it's genoowine ? Why, he swore so that he 
 made my very hair stand on end !" 
 
 (Mr. Grubbe's "very hair" was a wig. It was 
 apt to stand on end. Perhaps he chose it on that 
 account, when his own locks, untimely loosened and 
 uprooted, it may be, by being too frequently called 
 upon to render that token of sympathy with his emo- 
 tions in view of the depravity of his fellow-men, fell 
 off and forsook him, thinking it most in keeping with 
 his most habitual frame of mind.) 
 
 " He is trying to leave that off, with remarkable 
 success, I think, for so new a convert. He seems 
 very much in earnest altogether, just now, and a very 
 simple-hearted, open, childlike soul. Nobody can tell 
 how long it may last ; and I am afraid there must be 
 a great many things against him, poor fellow! But 
 any one who has the gospels in his hand and head has 
 a spar to cling to that will bring him into port, if he 
 will but stick to it, and go where it draws him." 
 
 " I shall be most happy to ren'der you all the assist- 
 ance in my power in your work of grace. Shall I con- 
 verse with him as one under awakening or con- 
 viction ?" 
 
 " Why, thank you, I hardly think I need trouble 
 you. I am afraid two spiritual guides at once might 
 be one too many for him, and confuse him." 
 
 " On the contrary, in the multitude of counsellors 
 there is safety. What method have you pursued with 
 him 2" 
 
 " Why, a very unmethodical method, I believe it 
 must have been, if any. What one do you find an- 
 swers best with the Indians ?"
 
 158 HERMAN. 
 
 " Oh, I tell 'em in the first place, of course, you 
 know, that they must git a new heart, and that there's 
 only One above that can give it to 'em ?" 
 
 "And do they get it?" 
 
 " Well, some doos, and some doosn't." 
 
 "And when they have got it, what do they do 
 next ?" 
 
 "Why they leave off drinking, and tobacco, and 
 dancing, and stay in their lodges on Sabbaths." 
 
 " Leave off dancing ? Why ?" 
 
 " Because they are God's people, sir. Herodias 
 danced." 
 
 " But did not Miriam ?" 
 
 " That was under the old dispensation." 
 
 " But i-s it possible that you can see any harm in it, 
 in all kinds of dancing, I mean ? Some sorts do not 
 seem, even to me, altogether good, I admit," added 
 Herman, remembering with a thrill of melancholy 
 pleasure, how Constance had appeared 'to enshrine her- 
 self in his mind by her unvarying refusal to join in any, 
 which seemed too rude and too familiar to her coy, re- 
 tiring, sacred maidenhood. 
 
 " Do you call yourself a professor, sir, and ask such 
 a question ?" said Mr. Grubbe, indignantly. ]STever 
 travelling on Sunday, he thought, and rightly, that at 
 one town, where they went to different churches, Her- 
 man had stayed to the Communion. 
 
 " A professor !" cried Herman, thoroughly puzzled, 
 " no, indeed ! Of what ? Dancing ? I thought you 
 knew that I was a young lawyer, but just admitted to 
 the bar." 
 
 " Of religion, sir. Many younger than you have 
 been admitted to the fold ; and I thought you had 
 been. Excuse me. I cannot jest on such a subject. 
 air."
 
 THE KNIGHT AND THE BACKWOODSMAN. 159 
 
 " Neither can I, believe me," said Herman. 
 "I misunderstood yon, and now you misunderstand 
 me. Among us at home a professor is only a teacher, 
 properly an academical teacher, of some branch of 
 learning. I never heard the title given before to a 
 communicant, as such." 
 
 " I ask your pardon, sir. I was born and bred in 
 Xew England, as well as yourself; and I have heared 
 it from the cradle up ; you must have heared it ; but 
 you may have obliviscited." 
 
 Herman was waked, as it seemed to him in the 
 middle of the following night, by a noise in his state- 
 room. On opening his eyes, however, he perceived 
 that it was light, and saw the face that the noise be- 
 longed to. 
 
 "Hope I hain't disturbed yer, strannger; but I 
 reckoned yer might be over-sleepin." 
 
 " What's the matter ?" cried Herman, simultane- 
 ously, starting up in his berth ; " boat on a sawyer ?" 
 
 " No, but I be. Here's a gol-durned word, ax par- 
 don, didn't go fur tur say that thar, that's got twice 
 as many letters to it as any two words has any busi- 
 ness to have ; an it won't spell for'ards nor back'ards, 
 nor up nor down ; nor I can't make no head nor tail 
 on't." Hereupon the book was thrust into Herman's 
 good-humored countenance. He pronounced the word, 
 and sank, back again on his pillow with a sleepy sigh. 
 " Tired o' sleepin, strannger ? Sun's been np most a 
 hour. 'Mind tur come out, an have another spell o' 
 readin ?" 
 
 " Yes, I'll be with you as soon as I can dress," said 
 Herman ; and presently again the moments, the boat, 
 and the river, rushed on together towards their end,
 
 160 HERMAN. 
 
 while, scarcely marked along the banks, the little reg- 
 ular rows of cotton-trees of two years' growth looked 
 over the heads of the cotton-trees of one, and the cot- 
 toii-trees of three years' growth over those of two, as, 
 in a republican aristocracy, families of two generations' 
 " respectability," in some rare instances, look down on 
 families of one, and families of three generations' on 
 families of two ; and, scarcely marked, the tiny young 
 leaves began to come out, and thicken through the 
 gray, grim woods with a mist of green; and here and 
 there the lovely red-bud spread its thin,rosy veil of mimic 
 peach-blossoms over the mysterious labyrinthine depths 
 of the trackless, boundless forests ; while still the rough 
 huntsman of the West and the graceful scholar of the 
 East hung together, fellow-students and learners both, 
 over those few wondrous pages, which have power to 
 make the unlearned wise, and the wisest feel himself 
 ignorant; and, hour by hour, they gained upon the 
 spring.
 
 THE LAJSfD OF SUNSET. 161 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 
 
 " I venerate the pilgrim's cause, 
 Yet for the Indian dare to plead. * * * 
 His heraldry is but a broken bow, 
 His history, but a tale of wrong and woe ; 
 His very name must be a blank." 
 
 SPKAGUE. 
 
 THE flanking hills were passed. Herman stood at 
 the foot of those mysterious towering walls of rock, 
 which the mythical Great Wolf and Gray Bear pawed 
 up from the plain in their horrid fight, in ages gone 
 before Man came to see and to record ; whose story, if 
 Tradition tries to tell, she can but tell a lie ; whose 
 chronicles Geology can but stammeringly half-spell and 
 half -conjecture from the half - effaced stone hiero- 
 glyphics rudely graven there and then by the con- 
 vulsed uncertain hand of Nature in her throes ; and 
 whose full history we can read only in the other world 
 and from the memories of angels. Before him, at last, 
 stood the Rocky Mountains, say, rather, the mount- 
 ains of rock ! Heaped, piled, jumbled, and tumbled 
 together and upon each other, the huddled petrified 
 Titans, their craggy loins girt about with fringy firs 
 and their heads capped with eternal snow, sat, stood, 
 and climbed on one another's shoulders tumultu- 
 ously, lifting their white, splintered, bristly chins, to 
 beard the calm, clear sky above them, which seemed to 
 answer in the silence, as with the voice of God, " Ye, 
 even ye, shall perish and crumble into dust ; yet I shall 
 endure !"
 
 162 HERMAN. 
 
 | 
 
 The caravan began to climb. Herman could not 
 yet. Hastily dismounting and ordering Bernard, his 
 French guide, to wait for him with his horse, he en- 
 tered one of those dim, weird, and wild ravines, which 
 burrow through the ridges here and there. The sad 
 wind sang and played through it, as if on an ^Eolian 
 harp, the dirges of departed days and hopes, the woo- 
 ing hymns of yearnings and aspirations too sweet and 
 high to be foregone, too vague, perhaps too heavenly, 
 to be ever satisfied on earth. Around him the shady pine- 
 boughs shivered with the startled rustling of the nest- 
 ling owls that haunted them. At his feet lay, out : 
 stretched and still, a black pool, the remains of what 
 had been a height-born torrent. It had danced in 
 light. It had done its work. It had died in darkness. 
 Who had missed or mourned for it? Not one. Far 
 up, and up, and up, through the narrow jagged rent 
 above him, perhaps beyond his power to climb, almost 
 beyond his sight, the lonely misty face of the overhang- 
 ing mountain looked blankly down upon him, like the 
 pale ghost of human godliness, a little above our com- 
 mon walks and infinitely below heaven. 
 
 The solitude, the silence, the chill, the vastness, the 
 everlastingness, benumbed him. He courted it only 
 the more, that perhaps it might benumb his sorrow. 
 He sought to freeze and kill and bury in it the cease- 
 less pain of his own consciousness. He measured his 
 puny human stature, in thought, with the precipices, 
 the stunted firs, even, about him, and strove to 
 teach his chating mind to say within him, " What mat- 
 ter if this pigmy, this insect, suffers in its little day? 
 The pang is scarcely come before it is past. The sigh 
 gives place to the death-rattle, and the breast is breath- 
 less. The corpse is dust; the name forgotten. The
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 163 
 
 mountain stands. The earth rolls round. The uni- 
 verse still marshals on its darting suns and systems. 
 God rejoices. All is well." 
 
 All, Herman, in vain ! What man ever yet, 
 self-conscious man ! drew peace and comfort out of 
 thoughts like these ? One little human soul is wider, 
 longer, to itself, than space or time. His sorrow came 
 back and looked him in the face, as if with the face of 
 his love, and said, " True, thou art little, and the earth 
 is great ; and yet, behold I show thee a mystery, the 
 heart of any man is large enough to hold as much as 
 .the whole full earth can, of joy or woe for him !" 
 
 He heard in the breathless " hush of the air " the 
 hiss of Satan, whispering despair to him ; as is his wont 
 when he finds melancholy men alone in desert places. 
 He fell on his knees and prayed : and unseen angels 
 came and ministered unto his fasting spirit ; and his 
 faith came back and looked him in the face, as with 
 the face of the Christ yet uncrowned, and said, "Could 
 ye not watch with me one hour ? What I do, thou 
 knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter. Fol- 
 low me ; and. where I am, there shall also my servant 
 be. He that cometh to me shall never hunger." 
 He came forth again, with a countenance shining as 
 
 " Moussa's cheek, when down the mount he trod,- 
 All glowing from the presence of his God." 
 
 .Bernard saw the change in him, was surprised, and 
 asked him what he had found. " Peace," he could 
 have answered ; but he evaded the inquiry, and, 
 snatching from him the rein of his own shaggy Indian 
 pony, was in the high-peaked saddle in an instant, and 
 preparing to give himself up, heart and soul, to the 
 wild delight of a headlong ride on a worthy steed.
 
 1 64 HERMAN. 
 
 Little Manitou, so-called, was a scion of a wild herd 
 born of the further prairie; and her home-sickness 
 seemed to have got into her head. She ran up the 
 precipices like a squirrel or a fly, leaped the black cen- 
 tre-cleaving chasms like a goat, or braced her little 
 fetlock-fringed hoofs and slid down the steeps like a 
 lama, with a shower of gravel and pebbles of flint, 
 agate, and jasper, at her heels. Her spirits soon in- 
 fected him ; for a generous horse and rider have much 
 sympathy between them. He cheered her on with 
 hand and voice, and, with eyes dancing and his short 
 round curls pulled straight into a jetty halo round his 
 face by the shrewish fingers of the mountain breezes 
 whose haunts he was invading, looked laughingly back 
 over his shoulder at his cowardly Canadian, as, explo- 
 ding w r ith patois and indignation, he toiled after him. 
 
 Yet there was not a shade of brutal recklessness in 
 his daring. His high-mettled little steed was sure- 
 footed and sagacious, and knew her ground better than 
 he ; and his instinct taught him that he promoted his 
 own safety, as well as his and her pleasure, best, by 
 letting her take her own way and pace, neither fretted 
 nor disconcerted by any interference on his part. She 
 appeared, indeed, to think it a question not worth 
 considering for a moment, whether she kept him on her 
 back or not ; but he could trust to himself for that ; and, 
 with all her pranks, he observed that she took care to take 
 the very best care of herself. If he did not fear death, 
 neither did he fear life now ; and when the wary pony, 
 laying back her ears disapprovingly, halted to consider 
 her ways, and then, with her four feet walking in 
 Indian-file one before the other, went mincing and 
 picking her way round the narrow rini of a precipice 
 one or two hundred feet deep, at the base of another
 
 THE LAND OF 8CJNSET. 165 
 
 one or two hundred feet high, and gave him time to 
 breathe and think, it was with a flush of hot shame 
 that he remembered a hasty half hope, that had stirred 
 within him in the black night on the Alleghanies, once 
 when the coach had jolted in the rough road more than, 
 usual, that it might overturn with him, and dash his 
 troubles out in the valley beneath. How readily do 
 such wishes arise in the thwarted breast of eager, fiery, 
 passionate Youth ! How mercifully are they often de- 
 nied! He was glad already, that his had not been 
 granted. A craven's mood, he felt, was no mood to 
 die in. 
 
 "Childish!" he said to himself; "what if the 
 boarding-school is somewhat dreary, uncongenial, and 
 uncomfortable, and its discipline severe and painful ? 
 What pupil in his senses would, at his entrance, ask 
 leave to hurry from it, an untutored, unformed, grace- 
 less clown, to court ? No man ever yet went up to the 
 other world too well-prepared to figure in it by the 
 lessons of a single day. Besides, I have never yet 
 passed a single day, however dreary, that I can recol- 
 lect, which did not bring its special blessing, if I looked 
 for it. Let me press forward with trust and good hope, 
 then, through the long line of comforts and joys, which 
 the days that yet stand between me and the grave must 
 have in store for me. What if they be many ? So, 
 then, will their blessings be." 
 
 An alternation of light and darkness seems to be 
 appointed to the soul on earth, as well as to the body. 
 Man can hardly escape it, except by perversely shut- 
 ting out the light when it rises upon him, and immu- 
 ring himself in perpetual gloom. This was not Her- 
 man's way. He endured the darkness, but always 
 sought the light, and now heartily welcomed the re
 
 166 HERMAN. 
 
 turning cheerfulness, that enabled him to enter with 
 genuine interest into the living epic opening before 
 him. 
 
 He drew rein at a point in the pass, which over- 
 looked the plain on the further side. Two huge crags 
 rose just before him on each hand, their peaks spanned 
 by a bridge of leaden clouds with rims of silver, making 
 a frame through which he saw the intense blue of the 
 sky, and the rifts below and beyond him pouring out 
 their Indians into the swarming valley. He studied the 
 wild procession and cavalcade, as it defiled before him, 
 and thought how unreal it all seemed ! how like to 
 some phantasmagoria! panorama conjured up by the 
 demons of the mountains, to mock the traveller and 
 work his woe, by forcing him to tell his mates on his 
 return incredible and apparently mendacious or maniac 
 tales ! or how like the fantastic pageantry of those 
 very demons themselves ! Who would have believed 
 any accidental wayfarer, who alone, and the first of all 
 his dim-faced"brethren, should have lost himself on the 
 unbounded prairie, strayed away to westward, and 
 come back to cities and the haunts of common men, 
 with a report of sights like these ? 
 
 The old brown warriors, looking as if sprung from 
 the old brown desert, paced together, as if " in solemn 
 conference on peace and war, and the affairs of state." 
 The younger, with their robes of skin merely belted 
 about their waists and their magnificent busts and 
 limbs exposed more than those of circus-riders, lashing 
 their fine horses, went dashing and careering to and 
 fro with wanton and superfluous energy. The pretty 
 young squaws on pretty ponies, all tinsel, fringe, and 
 feathers, paced daintily along, quite unencumbered 
 except with finery. The old and ugly ran, half-clad.
 
 THE LAND OF 8UXSKT. 167 
 
 on foot, with the luggage, screaming discordantly, 
 hunting the laden dogs about, and scolding so loud 
 that their voices sometimes reached him, or sometimes 
 made an insignificant part of a load trailed in a travail * 
 at the heels of some other unhappy beast of burden. 
 Herman saw one equipage, composed of, first, a mule, 
 
 1 then a travail, a squaw in that, a child on her shoul- 
 ders, and in the child's arms a puppy. 
 
 They halted, dismounted, and unloaded. The 
 leathery lodges sprang up, like a circle of mushrooms. 
 Herman moved on, and went down towards them. 
 The men seated themselves luxuriously, each under his 
 own roof-tree, that is to say, lodge-poles, with an 
 air of expectation. Some of the engaging females 
 pounced, like Fates, upon some of the fawning dogs, 
 dragged them away from their sports or fights, as the 
 case might be, pounded, their skulls and brains together 
 with stone mallets, skinned them, and cut them up. 
 Others made fires, and toasted them over the coals for 
 a tough Homeric banquet. 
 
 Bernard proceeded to pitch Herman's tent ; and 
 Mr. Grubbe, who was experienced and, with all his 
 love of " the Indian," had his decided prejudices in 
 favor of Meneaska housekeeping, took up his quarters, 
 and found much comfort, therein. Herman, on the 
 other hand, had a great fancy to experience a little of 
 
 ., the hospitality of his red neighbours, whom he, and 
 the caravan with whom he had hitherto traversed the 
 prairies, had joined only the day before. Mr. Grubbe 
 
 * "The long poles used in erecting the lodges are carried by the 
 horses, being fastened by the heavier end, two or three on each side, 
 to a rude sort of pack-sacldle, while the other end drags on the 
 ground. About a foot behind tue horse, a kind of large basket or 
 pannier is suspended between the poles, and firmly lashed in Us 
 place." PARKMAN'S "Oregon Trail." This basket is, I believe, called a 
 travail.
 
 108 HERMAN. 
 
 told him, that he needed only to pass under the buf- 
 falo's-hide curtain of one of the lodges, and say that he 
 had come to stay in it, and he might be sure of a lodg- 
 ing, and food and welcome ; but that, his cockney pre- 
 judices prevented his doing. He walked, however, in 
 the twilight, among the lodges, dark without and bright 
 within ; he saw the lurid light of the fires reflected 
 from the leather hangings and leathery faces ; he heard 
 the uncouth, unintelligible speech, and the bursts of 
 scarcely less articulate laughter which followed it ; and 
 just as, to his regret, he was forced by a traveller's ap- 
 petite to turn towards his own dwelling, he was invited 
 in by the signs of Weahwashtay, (the Good Woman,) to 
 partake, with her husband and children, of a supper of 
 boiled mongrel, which he did very gratefully. Then, 
 going to his tent, he wrapped himself in his buffalo- 
 robes and, with the good rifle Kill-wolf for a bedfellow, 
 fell sound asleep, lulled by the rhythmical if not melo- 
 dious breathing of the worthy Grubbe, who was much 
 addicted to sleeping aloud. He was disturbed only 
 pleasantly by the howls of the canine watchmen of 
 the camp, who, by proclaiming in chorus the hours of 
 twelve and three, gave him an opportunity to remem- 
 ber and recognize the singularity of his situation, as 
 his eyes, half unclosing, looked to the unsteady flicker- 
 ing light of the pine-knot, stuck in the ground in the 
 middle of the tent and burnt so low at his second 
 arousing, as scarcely to show the dark figure of Bernard 
 asleep across the door. The caravan had, after a very 
 brief halt for supper, pushed on towards the Pacific. 
 He was, but for his two tent-mates, now at last alone 
 among the Indians. 
 
 It was broad day before he was broad awake, in the 
 midst of a great stir, bustle, and noise within and with-
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 169 
 
 out the tent. Springing through the door he beheld, 
 in the clear, sunny morning air, the whole camp in 
 commotion. Horsemen and dogs, in full cry, were 
 hunting each other between and even through the 
 lodges, yelling, kicking, biting, and fighting one 
 another promiscuously ; and women, running, scolding, 
 and hiding their favorite children and puppies, and 
 every dangerous weapon which they could lay hands 
 upon ; while on one side, a little aloof from the fray, 
 Mr. Grubbe, with the hangings of the tent decorously 
 held together close about his neck, and his popped-out 
 head embellished with a tasselled night-cap of conical 
 form, was proclaiming " peace principles" in a most 
 stentorian and indignant voice ; and on the other, nine 
 old women stood in a row before a blasted fir, and 
 sang, to allay the rage of the combatants, a medicine- 
 song, which to Herman's uniustructed ear seemed rather 
 more adapted to excite it. Perhaps, however, the pro- 
 ceeding was founded on the homoeopathic theory, 
 that which would have a tendency to excite a disorder 
 in a sound subject being expected to allay it in any 
 already affected by it. If so, homosopathy, on this one 
 occasion at least, came off victorious. The white-faced 
 halcyon grew black-faced in vain, and ceased from his 
 exhortation in dudgeon; the red-faced ones carried 
 the day. 
 
 As soon as Herman was dressed, he went out again 
 to inquire into the cause of the tumult. He discovered, 
 that the War-Eagle had informed the Rattle-Snake, 
 that he could kill more buffaloes in one sunshine than 
 the latter could in a moon. Thereupon the crested 
 Rattle-Snake, as in honor bound, had snapped his fin- 
 gers in the plumy "War-Eagle's face Whereupon the 
 War-Eagle, with his finger and thumb, opprobriousiy 
 8
 
 170 HERMAN. 
 
 tweaked the Rattle-Snake's nose. And upon that, all 
 the valiant retainers of both had rushed to blows, in a 
 manner greatly to the credit of all parties, and would in- 
 evitably have left of one another nothing but the scalps 
 and the squaws, had not the mighty and terrible medi- 
 cine-woman, Ahkayeepixen, (the striker of many,) in 
 her official robe of white mountain goat-skin, wrought 
 with wolves' and owls' claws, and her tunic of buffalo 
 calf's hide, begun a dreadful chant, which, if they had 
 waited for her to finish it before they stopped fighting, 
 would inevitably have brought down upon them the 
 great invisible bird of Thunder, to stun them with the 
 flap of his wings, and burn them all up with the flash 
 of his eye. 
 
 As Herman was extremely impatient to hear a little 
 of the Indian eloquence, about which he had heard so 
 much, he had no sooner finished his own breakfast, 
 than he invited the warriors to a bountiful lunch of 
 reconciliation, at which he gratified them with molasses 
 and water, biscuits, and a sheet of sweetened chocolate ; 
 after which they gratified him pretty nearly as follows, 
 (Mr. Grubbe having gone to walk, and Bernard there- 
 fore serving as interpreter :) 
 
 . Swarthy Chieftain, seated on his heels. "Snort, 
 splutter, sputter ; gibberish, gibberish !" 
 
 Bernard. "He say he make you his what you 
 call? gratitudes, for coming so far from de graves of 
 your grandpapas' osses, to bring him good cake and 
 sweet drink." 
 
 Herman. " He's very welcome. I only wish there 
 was more." 
 
 Bernard. " Ah she to he shee ; um cumps." 
 
 Swarthy Chieftain. " Hoogh ! En achemish. Hipsh 
 toiB. Ta rachatoo cachatoo."
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 171 
 
 Bernard. "He say he cram so much already, he 
 ready to burst ; and so as full is his belly of grub, so is 
 his mous of sanks, and his heart \vis affection." 
 
 Herman. " Tell him his talk delights me, as much 
 as my grub does him." 
 
 Bernard. " Emim itoo tumtine." 
 
 Chieftain. " En amacus. Emim sextua ; en sextua." 
 
 Bernard. " You his friend ; he yours." 
 
 Herman. " Much obliged to him, so I am. Set 
 some of the others to talking. Tell that one with the 
 queue of long feathers in his hair to speak up, and let 
 me hear what he has to say for himself. Ask him 
 where the rain comes from." 
 
 Bernard. " Sacre ! I tell you as much as dat Die- 
 self, by gar! Clouds is just like your sponge dere. 
 Dey gits full of water fust ; and den dey swells up all 
 big, till dey fills up all de sky, so dat dey squeezes each 
 anoder. Den out comes de water, of course, till -it's 
 all gone ; and den zey is small again, so dat you no see 
 'em." 
 
 Herman. " Thank you. Your theory pleases me ; 
 but I wish to have his to compare with it. You will 
 ask him." 
 
 Bernard. "Em, hemakis meohot, etu ke inese 
 wykit?" 
 
 Chieftain, confidently. " Hemakis Tota aha hohum 
 hatta, &c." 
 
 Bernard. "He say dat de sky is de floor of ze 
 Great Totem's lodge. By and by, de stars pricks it all 
 full of trous, what you call holes. Den he cry. Tears 
 drop down t'rough de holes. Dat's de rain. Uigno- 
 rant ! Les Gray -Buffalo sont toujours si l>eies /" 
 
 Thus the conference continued, while the pipe ol 
 tobacco and shong-sasha, (the bark of the red-willow).
 
 172 HERMAN. 
 
 went the rounds, whiff by whiff, through the party, for 
 one or two hours. In the course of that time, Herman 
 
 was frequently 
 
 "Too inly moved for utterance," 
 
 though not usually to tears. But if he laughed, it was 
 only in the, luckily, capacious sleeves of his hunting- 
 coat. He succeeded in concealing his emotions with a 
 Spartan dignity so equal to that of his guests that, 
 when the convivium broke up, he was the most popular 
 man in the encampment, and found it expedient hence- 
 forth to be out of the way when there was any eating and 
 drinking going on within the lodges, or else to keep his 
 appetite in readiness by taking no meals within his 
 own tent ; so many were the invitations, which it 
 would have been as uncivil to decline among them as 
 an invitation to take wine among us, poured in upon 
 him at all hours, to partake of pnppy, bitter roots, 
 dried-currants stirred into warm bear's-grease, pemmi- 
 can, old dried fish, and gritty messes of choke-cherries 
 pounded up whole, stones and all. He was glad to 
 throw off the acceptance of this branch of hospitality 
 as much as possible upon Mr. Grubbe, to whose sea- 
 soned stomach and really excellent heart nothing came 
 much amiss from his savage pets. 
 
 It is saying a great deal to say, that even Herman's 
 beads, tobacco, and chocolate, made him more popular 
 among them than this good old man ; for the mutual 
 attachment between the latter, amidst the general hos- 
 tility between their races, was really something beauti- 
 ful to see. They appeared to regard him with some- 
 what of superstitious veneration, and somewhat of 
 compassion, as a being wise as to the other world, and 
 foolish as to this ; respected and protected him, 
 brought him botanical specimens collected at random,
 
 THE LAND OP SUNSET. 17o 
 
 ducked him when in his near-sightedness he stumbled 
 upon wild bees' nests, found his spectacles when he 
 had laid them down upon the mountains and forgotten 
 to take them up again, listened with courtesy, if not 
 complete conviction, to his attempts to impart to them 
 religious instruction, and cherished him generally. 
 On his side, mal d-propos as he often was with the rest 
 of the world, towards them affection taught him tact, 
 and he was not only forbearing and forgiving, but con- 
 siderate, usually, and strictly observant of their rules of 
 punctilio and etiquette. 
 
 Good feeling may often practically more than fill 
 the place of good sense. Can any amount of abstract 
 good sense fill the place of good feeling? Herman 
 thought that he had never fully perceived, how truly 
 the sentiments which others entertain for us are apt to 
 be, in the long run, the echo of those which we enter- 
 tain for them, until he witnessed the intercourse be- 
 tween these often ferocious and so-called unmanageable 
 savages, and their fond but in some respects very fool- 
 ish old friend. If, as a recent traveller has asserted, 
 " no man is a philanthropist on the prairie," it is very 
 sad to think how terrible an accumulation of ill-will 
 and alienation must have been, in all probability, 
 wrought by the hosts of ungoverned white men perpet- 
 ually trooping, for years past, over their desert domain, 
 in these tribes of undisciplined and passionate red 
 brethren of ours, whose code of honor seems to exact 
 the return of wrong for wrong as rigidly as that of any 
 Christian duellist.* 
 
 "They [the Indians] have been heretofore left comparatively un- 
 protected from, violence and wrong, inflicted by unprincipled white 
 men. * By such men, unworthy of the name, they are often 
 
 cruelly beaten when unprotected, and not untrequently shot down in 
 mere wantonness. The bloody revenge that almost certainly follows,
 
 171 HERMAN. 
 
 Mr. Grubbe was born with a love of adventure, 
 which was much developed and colored by the perusal 
 at odd minutes of an odd volume of the curious and 
 kindly narrative of Lewis and Clark's peaceful early 
 exploring expedition among the Indians of the West. 
 It was given him, the other volume being lost, by 
 the wife of a shoemaker to whom he was appren- 
 ticed, as a reward for his kindness in drawing about a 
 sick child of hers, in a little wagon, out of working 
 hours. He dreamed of it by night, and longed by day, 
 as he patiently drudged over his last and lap-board, for 
 the time when he should be free, and able to go out 
 with his knapsack on his shoulder, and verify all the 
 wild story for himself. That time was long in coming. 
 His father died ; his brother was a sot ; his sisters were 
 many ; his mother was poor. It came at last, how- 
 ever. He earned and saved enough to portion and 
 provide for them all, and set forth with an easy con- 
 science and thankful heart, to refresh himself with the 
 contemplation in others of the free, fresh life, the spir- 
 its and spontaneousness, which monotonous, hard, and 
 sedentary toil, hope deferred, and advancing age, had 
 forever driven out of him. Of this refreshment 
 he was never weary, nor of those who afforded it 
 to him. 
 
 becomes tbe general theme, unaccompanied by the circumstances of 
 cruel provocation which gave it birth. A border warfare springs up 
 between the pioneer settlers, ,who are really trespassers on their 
 lands, and the tribes; and the strong arm of the Government being 
 invoked ibr their protection, wars take place, which are carried on 
 at much expense, and at the cost of many valuable lives, retarding 
 the progress of our people, by rendering the condition of the settler 
 insecure, and closing, perhaps, with the annihilation of almost entire 
 tribes. This process of the destruction of a people of whom Provi- 
 dence has given us the guardianship, originating in such causes, is 
 unworthy of the civilization of the age in which we live, and revolt- 
 Ing to every sentiment of humanity." 
 
 [Report of the Secretary of the Interior for the year 1856.
 
 THE LAND OF 8UNSET. 175 
 
 Herman, too, felt as if he could never have too 
 much of it. It was an anodyne, if not an antidote, to 
 the pain still lurking at his heart ; and young yet, un- 
 crushed, and ^i1^crushable^ he threw himself into it 
 heart and soul, sitting by night among the chiefs while 
 the pipe, and the story which he soon began to learn 
 rapidly to understand, went round the tire, and, by 
 day, sketching their picturesque, symmetrical, faultless 
 forms, decked in their best for the purpose in all their 
 barbaric pomp of skins, fringes, beads, and plumes, or 
 as they sat proudly, half-stripped for the course, upon 
 their pawing horses, or climbing by himself to catch 
 the likenesses of the wild mountains in every variety 
 of their frowning, sullen, or smiling expression, or, 
 above all, after they recrossed the mountains, as they 
 did in a day or two, rushing on his own foaming little 
 steed, like a spirit of the storm, through the break-neck 
 buffalo-hunts, with a dim whisking of tails and up-and- 
 down tilting of shaggy haunches before him, and clouds 
 of dust and a thunder of hoofs all around. 
 
 It was not the most prudent pastime in the world ; 
 for the plains were riddled everywhere with the bur- 
 rows of the prairie-dogs and their tenants, the rattle- 
 snakes. Let Little Manitou once put her little hoof 
 into one of these pit-falls, and down she must go with 
 a broken leg, and Mr. Herman Arden with a broken 
 neck, or if. with any slighter injury, to receive his 
 quietus at the hands (i. e., hoofs and horns) of some at- 
 tentive and considerate old buffalo. But boys will be 
 boys ; (oh, that they would never be anything worse !) 
 .and there are two merciful provisions of fate with re- 
 gard to them : one, that their mothers and sisters can't 
 see all they do ; and another, that a man laboring un- 
 der the intoxication of youth is like a man intoxicated
 
 176 HERMAN. 
 
 with liquor, it often takes an uncommon deal to kill 
 him. As for Little Manitou herself, she liked the fun 
 so well, so much better than life, judging from the 
 indiscreet and altogether headstrong and headlong 
 manner in which she conducted herself, that Herman 
 had no scruples about the humanity of it on her ac- 
 count. His own danger, boy-like, he hardly happened 
 to recognize. He was sorry for the buifaloes ; but it 
 was a consolation to him, and let us hope to them, to 
 reflect that he never shot any of them, except when his 
 larder was positively in want of beef, and that, as they 
 were doomed to be hunted at any rate, it could make 
 very little difference to them whether twenty-nine 
 horsemen only were at their heels, or thirty. 
 
 Next best to hunting them, he loved to creep on his 
 hands and knees among them, when they fed or lay 
 upon the grass with their huge, grim strength mild and 
 at rest, to lie and muse, and try to forget, in a fantastic 
 sympathy with them, that he had ever known, any 
 more than they, a regret for the past or an anxiety for 
 the future ; till, all at once, some unwieldy monster of 
 them would roll over, toss his hoofs in the air, rub and 
 scrape his leathery back on the sharp stones, in a rap- 
 ture of uncouth comfort, and then, scrambling up upon 
 his fore-legs and squatting on his haunches like a dog, 
 with his mane full of dust over his browsy forehead, 
 would fix on his visitor a look of grave, grotesque, com- 
 placent inquiry, like an old fop powdering himself, 
 turning round, and saying, " What do you think of me 
 now ?" 
 
 In fact, revelling, as Herman did, like a genuine 
 lover of nature, in the contemplation of the harmless, 
 amusing animal life, so in keeping with the whole 
 scene, about him, the wanton destruction of it was a
 
 THE LANJD OF SUNSET. 177 
 
 grievance to him. It was not merely that the Indian 
 patriarchs killed rather more beasts and birds than 
 they wanted for food, dress, and shelter ; nor that their 
 naughty little boys were, morning, noon, and night, 
 straying with their miniature bows and spears over the 
 plains, and piercing, pricking, cutting, and crushing 
 every hapless little creature they could find harmless 
 enough to be tortured with impunity, while their pa- 
 rents admired their exploits as a cat does those of her 
 kitten, mumbling, scratching, growling, and nosing over 
 its first mouse. Even the in all other respects 
 best-behaved of the white men, with whom from time 
 to time he fell in on ' the prairies, seemed inspired, in 
 the view of the sublimity and beauty around them, 
 only with the enthusiasm of the veteran butcher, who 
 is reported to have held the following colloquy with a" 
 certain appreciative matron : 
 
 " Miss So-and-so, what a splendid night 'twas, 
 night afore last ! D'y e mind ?" 
 
 " I remember, General Brisket, it was a remarkably 
 beautiful night." 
 
 " Oh, 'twas real heavenly. I see the moon shine 
 into the winder o' one side an out o' the looking-glass 
 o' tother; an I laid an laid, and tumbled an tossed; an 
 at last says I, ' Miss Brisket,' says I, ' I can't stand 
 this here no longer !' says I, ' I shall have to git right 
 up, an go to slarterin.' ' : 
 
 But the chief offender in this slaughter of the inno- 
 cents was Herman's self-constituted particular friend 
 and squire, Whattaraskle, the Good- Woman's very bad 
 boy. He was an incorrigible or, at any rate, uncor- 
 rected little varlet of fifteen, handsome, slender, light, 
 and fleet as the celebrated Mercury, blown up by a 
 Zephyr. He was to the full as light-fingered and mis-
 
 178 .HERMAN 
 
 ehievous as any Mercury whatsoever could be, and like- 
 wise was blown-up, so to speak, by everybody except- 
 ino- his mamma, whose credit alone saved him from 
 
 O 
 
 well-merited chastisement at every turn. 
 
 Weahwashtay regarded him as "great medicine," 
 which he certainly was, if being a dose could make 
 him so, and would neither punish him herself nor let 
 any one else ; for, on one occasion, when he, an imp 
 of five or six years old, was alone with her on the 
 prairie, they were pursued by the Demon of Fire, who 
 probably wanted to claim his own. Whattaraskle, at 
 the same time, was pursuing a butterfly, to the right 
 and left, and forward and backward. Every time his 
 anxious parent caught him to carry him off, he kicked 
 and thumped her, and steadily retarded her progress 
 by this ingenious means till she set him down again, 
 which she was at last compelled to do once for all, not 
 merely by physical anguish, but by the hot approach 
 and breath of the rushing flames, and the recollection 
 of the poor little yearling papoose, who must already 
 be wriggling and crying for her in its furry cradle at 
 home. With the tenderness of a lioness, and the pres- 
 ence of mind of a princess, she therefore knocked her 
 offspring down, set her well-knit knee on his shoulders, 
 tied his feet with one of her flying locks, which she 
 twitched out by the roots for the purpose, threw on the 
 ground her mantle of buffalo-skin, rolled him over and 
 over in it, with the brown outside outwards, till he 
 looked like a ckarledvnier, (I spell it by ear,) darted 
 off unencumbered, with the foot of an antelope yet 
 none too fleetly, for her life, and left him to take his 
 chance. When the fire had burned itself to death, the 
 young chief was found, sound asleep and quite un- 
 harmed, in the singed hide on the only green spot in
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 179 
 
 the black prairie. His escape was looked upon as 
 miraculous. 
 
 He took a great fancy, not altogether reciprocated, 
 to Herman, from the time he first tasted his chocolate 
 and biscuits, lay across the openirig of his tent, watched 
 all his movements, jumped up and ran after him when 
 he went out, like a dog, broke his pencils, fingered 
 his drawings, tore his papers, and made his own counte- 
 nance frightful with his paints like a monkey, secreted 
 his little valuables like a magpie, howled at his ear 
 when he wanted to go to sleep like a wolf, and, in 
 short, in spite of coaxing and cuff's from Herman 
 and Bernard, persisted in conducting himself like a 
 whole menagerie. But the head and front of his 
 offending was, that he could never see any living thing 
 stir, bird, beast, or reptile, without frightening, 
 hurting, or killing it. Herman might spend hours in 
 stealing unawares upon a herd of shy wild animals, 
 sheep, goats, or antelopes, and just as one or two of 
 them had been obliging enough to group themselves 
 prettily, and his portfolio had been softly and stealthily 
 opened, that neither sight nor sound might give the 
 slightest intimation to the shy, coy darlings, that they 
 were sitting for their pictures, out would leap the dark 
 imp into the midst of them, shouting and clapping his 
 hands ; or, worse still, out would leap an arrow 
 from his unseen bow, to lay the fairest sobbing and 
 bleeding upon the grass, and sweep her sisters away, 
 as if on the wings of the wind. This was intol- 
 erable ; and so Herman told Mr. Grubbe ; and so Mr. 
 Grubbe told Weahwashtay ; and so Weahwashtay told 
 Whattaraskle ; but not to much purpose. While she 
 scolded him at one end of the lodge, he was out at the 
 other; and before he had done, he very nearly got
 
 180 HEKMAN. 
 
 himself into a very serious predicament, and Her- 
 man too. 
 
 The latter, determined to make a very serious im- 
 pression upon Whattaraskle's mind, and, if possible, to 
 enjoy one afternoon's ramble and sketching in peace, 
 had, with the mournful concurrence of Weahwashtay 
 and amidst a chorus of approving laughter from the 
 other nobles, forcibly ejected that offending youth from 
 his tent, while he held a high coffee-feast there one 
 evening. On the following day, he promised the boy 
 a whole string of large carrot-colored beads, of inex- 
 pressible beauty and inestimable value, if he would 
 bring him the flower of a certain plant, which Herman 
 had his reasons for supposing to be out of blossom. 
 Failing to find it earlier, he was to continue his solitary 
 search till sunset, when, if he did so, the beads were to 
 be his at all events. If, on the other hand, he let Her- 
 man hear or see anything of him, before that time, with- 
 out his flower, he was to forfeit his reward. These 
 conditions agreed upon, Herman waited only to see 
 the stripling set off with zeal and speed up the mount- 
 ains, and to deposit the beads in the hands of Mr. 
 Grubbe, to be given, if earned, in his absence, before 
 he set off himself in another direction, with speed 
 scarcely less and zeal even greater. Climbing diag- 
 onally and then going horizontally, he found a satis- 
 factory spot half-way up his mountain, with a dizzy 
 precipice below, and a snow-roofed summit above re- 
 minding him pathetically of wedding-cake, and just 
 above that, one glassy icy peak, looking loftily down 
 over it through an up-and-down floored gorge, tapes- 
 tried, where it opened near him, with green quiverino- 
 pine-boughs. The day, the lights, the shadows, the 
 clouds overhead, the mists underneath, the silence, the
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 181 
 
 solitude, the scene, was, in short, perfect. He placed 
 his portfolio on a raised tablet of black rock, that 
 looked like the unintelligible tombstone of dead ages, 
 and himself on another, and sketched, and gazed, and 
 dreamed, he knew not how long. 
 
 All at once, there was a rushing and crashing in the 
 gorge. A slight dark form was darting towards him 
 with every sinew strained. It was that of the ubiqui- 
 tous Whattaraskle ; and behind it for an instant ap- 
 peared a rampant, shaggy, fur-clad figure surmounted 
 by, as it seemed to Herman's remarkably keen sight, a 
 positively demoniac face. It stooped out of view, ap- 
 peared again much nearer, stood up once more on its 
 hind-legs full seven or eight feet high, as if to take an 
 observation, and again came scrambling and tumbling 
 on, on all-fours. It was the gigantic "Caleb," as some 
 of his familiar acquaintance call the grizzly bear. The 
 little fugitive, no doubt, must needs have been beard- 
 ing him in his headquarters. The precipice was below. 
 He could not run much further without running from 
 the jaws of one death into those of another. His 
 strength was almost spent. His speed was slackening ; 
 his adversary's increasing. He was in a fair way to get im- 
 mediately just what he deserved ; but still it was not 
 pleasant to see his poor mouth foaming, and his tongue 
 and eyes starting from his sharpened face, after that 
 fashion ; and thus it happened that, the next time the 
 justly incensed Caleb tilted himself back on his hind- 
 egs, with his bristly muzzle all snarls and white teeth, 
 and eyes full of mischief, he saw close before him not a 
 young Indian's back, but the front of a young white 
 man, with his feet firmly planted in a portfolio, two 
 teeth as white as Caleb's own compressing his bristly 
 under-lip, eyes that sparkled as if the bad example of
 
 182 HERMAN. 
 
 / 
 
 Caleb's had been too much for them and they meant 
 mischief, too, and, aimed precisely at Caleb's red, 
 steaming, open month, a rifle that instantly went ofi' 
 with a crack, a whiz, and a bullet, which must have 
 affected Caleb's brain very seriously, had he not just at 
 the right moment shaken his head disapprovingly at it, 
 as if he had thoroughly studied the whole subject of 
 duelling, and really could not consent to give it his 
 countenance. Pawing the smoke out of his red eyes, 
 he came on again ; and the rifle was unloaded, the 
 knife too short, the solitude around, the precipice be- 
 low, and death, in the shape of Caleb, staring Herman 
 in the face ; when, " on the very verge of fate," his 
 good genius reminding him of his ruffianly accomplish- 
 ments, he threw himself into a scientific attitude, 
 clutched his rifle with both hands, and encompassed 
 himself with a whirring whirl of passes, in hopes of 
 scaring the monster away. Caleb did not appear at all 
 dismayed, but, on the contrary, rather gratified, and 
 approached to embrace him, when, to his chagrin and 
 astonishment, he received a broken paw. He stopped 
 to mouth, fondle, and condole with it, just long enough 
 for Herman to dart twenty paces backwards, and up 
 into a stunted half-naked fir-tree rooted in the thin, 
 slanting soil, six feet or thereabouts above the brink of 
 the precipice. "Whattaraskle was already perched in 
 it, and unconscious of anything but terror, tried to 
 push Herman off. But a smart rap on the knuckles, 
 from the rifle which the latter still held fast, warned 
 him that he might trespass too far upon his forbear- 
 ance. Driving him higher into the tree on the safe 
 side,- and taking up his own position on the lower 
 branch, which ran off horizontally at the height of 
 about eighteen feet, Herman began in all haste to re-
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 183 
 
 load ; but before he could accomplish this, the bear was 
 climbing the trunk as fast as his three legs could carry 
 him. Herman laid his body loosely along the limb of 
 the tree, twining three of his own limbs around it, out 
 of harm's way, drew his hunting-knife, and, as soon as 
 Caleb came within his reach at arm's length, darted 
 head-downwards at him, struck him in one eye, and, 
 quick as a snake, drew himself up again. The bear 
 stopped climbing, but clung. With his weight, the 
 roots cracked; the tree shuddered. He must fall, or 
 all go down, down, down, together. Repeating the 
 manoeuvre, as instantaneously as before, Herman 
 stabbed him in the other eye. He dropped, rolling, 
 roaring, and struggling, on the pebbly gravel at the 
 root of the tree, and they after, while with the three- 
 fold jerk the fir reeled, swung, toppled slowly over, and 
 hung roots uppermost and branches out of sight. 
 
 Herman reloaded six times, and shot no less than 
 six bullets through poor Caleb's brain and lungs before 
 his troubles were over ; and then, that which is a mat- 
 ter of conjecture to most of us, namely, how death 
 would seem to us if we knew that we were, in all 
 probability, just about to die, could never be again a 
 matter of conjecture to Herman. He knew. 
 
 How had it seemed ? Like " only an incident in 
 life." But did he not kneel down and thank his 
 Maker for his preservation ? Undoubtedly ; not, 
 though, that he had any particular preference for living 
 in this world in those days, but because he saw that it 
 was God's will that he should live, and was therefore 
 content and glad to do it ; and because, when he had 
 time to think, he did not love to think how, if his ad- 
 venture had had a different ending, Clara would have 
 cried in his far-away home, while the mountain eagles
 
 184: HERMAN. 
 
 were picking his bones in these their fastnesses. But 
 first of all, must I tell the whole story ? He was a 
 whimsical fellow, and, as I have said, not perfect. 
 Before he did anything else, he rolled on his back, 
 screaming with fun at the idea of having come off vic- 
 torious at double-stick with a bear. He cut out and 
 pocketed for trophies his victim's twenty claws, which 
 were all of them between four and five inches in 
 length. Then, with Whattaraskle's assistance, he 
 rolled and shoved him over the broken edge of the 
 plumb descent, thinking that a little pounding might 
 make him tenderer, and that at any rate it would be 
 convenient to let him travel homewards of his own 
 motion as far as he could ; for he must have weighed 
 between two and three hundred pounds. To the foot 
 of the precipice, Herman, on his return to the camp, 
 sent up a detachment of his most trust-worthy friends, 
 under Whattaraskle's guidance, to get the dear re- 
 mains. He was, though quite unhurt, for once in his 
 life completely tired out, and sore and strained in 
 every muscle from his fight, and made no attempt to 
 accompany them. They satisfied themselves with de- 
 vouring raw, on the spot, only a portion of the more 
 tempting entrails and marrow, and faithfully brought 
 him home flesh enough to enable him to entertain them 
 meetly at solemn festivals on several succeeding days. 
 Whattaraskle, having regained his wits, was not 
 ungrateful. He did not cease to be mischievous ; for 
 then he must have ceased to be ; all the mischief sub- 
 tracted, he must have become a mere cipher. But the 
 next day, when his deliverer, on a ramble to see again the 
 scene of his adventure, unwittingly sprang into the baked 
 clay bed of one of the innocent-looking, dry-on-the-top, 
 bottomless-fluid-underneath quicksands, or rather quick-
 
 THE LASD uF SUNSET. 185 
 
 puddles, of the Rocky Mountains, and was sucked down 
 helplessly up to his knees, and up to his hips, and up 
 to his chin, and up to his nose, Whattaraskle, behold- 
 ing, not only with infinite presence of mind emitted 
 yells such as only an Indian can utter, but whisked up 
 an oak fast by, scrambled along an overhanging 
 branch, hung from it at full length by his hands, and 
 gave Herman both his feet to hold on by till help 
 came, and did not once flinch nor complain, though it 
 was a full quarter of an hour in coming, and, in the 
 course of that time, his arms were pulled nearly out of 
 their sockets ; had it not been for which merciful inter- 
 vention, my pleasing tale would have wanted a hero ; 
 all the interesting incidents wherewith I am about to 
 delight my readers in my ensuing chapters would 
 never have happened to him ; and he would probably 
 have been at this time still sinking and sinking through 
 the earth, and destined eventually, (if gravity does not 
 forbid the idea,) to reappear in the shape of a very re- 
 markable fossil at the antipodes. 
 
 Nor was the Good Woman inferior in gratitude to 
 her bad son. She could not, indeed, refrain from 
 coaxing away all of the bear's claws but two to orna- 
 ment a necklace for her husband, from Herman, who 
 she saw was, from a defective education, incapable of 
 appreciating in any just degree their beauty and worth ; 
 but, not satisfied with preparing the bear's skin with 
 the auburn hair on, so nicely for him, that he slept un- 
 der it every cold night for years after, she, wishing to 
 provide for him a pleasant surprise, managed to ab- 
 stract from his tent his only extant pair of civilized 
 boots, steeped them in the animal's grease to soften the 
 leather, and wrought them thickly with dyed porcu- 
 pine's quills, after which they were, though unctuous,
 
 186 HERMAN. 
 
 impervious to the wet. She also, to his great joy, ( b- 
 lained for the kind " Meneaska," from her husband, 
 an invitation to take up his quarters at his lodge. 
 
 Herman did so immediately, and by bringing, as 
 Mr. Grubbe advised, his own clean rugs and wrappings 
 with him, made himself comfortable enough, and would 
 have been more so, if his host's totem had not pre- 
 viously solemnly enjoined it upon him in a dream, if 
 ever he passed a night \vith a white man to hop twice 
 or thrice like a frog to and fro across his pillow at mid- 
 night. Herman was first made aware of this rite 
 rather roughly, by being awakened at the proper time 
 by a smart fillip from the Chieftain's toe, in his nose, 
 which felt at the moment as if it must be nearly torn 
 off; but the agile Taiquinsuwatish improved by prac- 
 tice, and no serious accident of the kind occurred again, 
 though his guest was sorry that he should be put to so 
 much trouble on his account. 
 
 Not many nights after, when Herman and What- 
 taraskle, having taken an unusually long ramble and 
 scramble, had gone to bed early, leaving Taiquinsuwa- 
 tish still out at a gambling entertainment, and ~Weah- 
 washtay, his wife, rocking herself to and fro on a buffalo- 
 skin before the fire, and soothing to sleep her youngest 
 papoose, who was ill, Herman was awakened by hear- 
 ing a deep, hollow voice at the door say : 
 ~ " Weahwashtay ?" 
 
 " Eshe ke ? (Who is it ?") 
 
 " Umpqua." 
 
 "With a wild cry of joy she started up, rolling the 
 baby off her knees upon the shaggy hide, and clasped 
 her arms around the neck of a tall, tottering, advancing 
 figure of a man, clad in a single squalid mantle of worn- 
 out fur, through whose rents his meagre ribs could be
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 187 
 
 seen. He wavered and faltered, as if blinded by the 
 dazzling fire-light ; but throwing back her head to look 
 at him, she dragged him forwards to it. 
 
 " Oh, Umpcjua, where are your beautiful robes ?" 
 
 " Gone." 
 
 " Your warriors ?" 
 
 " Gone." 
 
 " Papooses ? squaws ?" 
 
 " Gone. All gone." 
 
 She beat her breast, and cried with a long wail, 
 " Gone, Umpqua, gone ! all ? Gone how ? Gone 
 where ?" 
 
 " The bad Bostons !" * groaned out the poor man, 
 with an accent of indignant, appealing agony, impossi- ' 
 ble to describe. " The bad Bostons !" he repeated, as 
 if no other words could express the full depth and ex- 
 tent of his wrongs and wretchedness. 
 
 " Umpqua sit ! Umpqua eat ! Umpqua lie !" 
 cried she, bursting into a perfect storm and whirlwind 
 of tears and cries of wrath and pity, and seizing, all in 
 the same instant, on him and on food and clothing for 
 him. 
 
 "Eat? No. Drink? No. Live? No !" replied 
 he, in a calmer tone. " I seek not, a beggar, my kin- 
 dred, to live, but to die. Who sleeps there with no 
 welcome for me ? Taiquinsuwatish ?" 
 
 " Meneaska." 
 
 His voice changed from despair to fury. 
 
 " What, he sleeps warm iij your lodge, while, 
 driven out, I wander by night, in, dark, cold, rags, and 
 famine !" 
 
 He caught up a spear and sprang madly forward, 
 
 * The name given, it is said, by the Indians of Oregon, to those 
 who volunteered to destroy them.
 
 1 88 HERMAN. 
 
 trailing along the ground Weahwashtay, who clung to 
 his waist, shrieking for help and crying, " Oh, strike 
 him not, Umpqua ! He good ! He armed ! Mene- 
 aska, have pity ! He mad ! He my brother !" For 
 Herman, starting up on one knee arid cocking and 
 presenting his loaded rifle, had brought the stranger to 
 bay. 
 
 They looked one another in the face thus for a mo- 
 ment ; and then Umpqua, apparently impatient of de- 
 lay, and surprised that Herman did not pull the trigger 
 on which his finger rested, dropped his spear, bared his 
 breast and, proudly throwing back his head, exclaimed, 
 " Fire ! Finish ! Why not ? Fear not ! I fear 
 not !" 
 
 "Why should I wish to kill you, or you to kill 
 me ?" said Herman. " I am a friend to the Indians, 
 and a friend to no white man who treats them ill. 
 I took up the rifle only because you took up the spear. 
 You have laid down the spear ; I lay down the rifle." 
 
 He suited the action to the word, and offered his 
 hand with a smile. " What ! not shake hands ? Why 
 should you hate me ?" 
 
 " I take no white man's hand !" said Umpqua, 
 speaking in English, and rapidly and distinctly, though 
 with a marked Indian accent. "I hate the white man ! 
 Why? I had wide plains and rivers of beasts and 
 birds, fishes and roots. I said not to the white man, 
 Come ; but when he came, I did not say, Go. When 
 he was hungry and cold, I gave him skins and food. 
 When he was strong, he took them away from me. 
 When he was weak, I let him hunt on my prairies. 
 When he was strong, he said, ' Go away ; you shall 
 not come here !' 
 
 " I hate the white man ! Why ? I had many
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 189 
 
 wives, but one I loved best. I found a white squaw 
 lost in the woods. She sat not down, like the red 
 squaw, cheerful to die, but held out her hands to Ump- 
 qua, and wept. I despised her ; but I mercicd her, 
 too, and gave her sweet berries to eat, and led her to 
 my lodge, and said to my best wife, ' Get up from my 
 best skin, for the white squaw is a guest, and is weary.' 
 We fed her many days. When her people came ask- 
 ing her, I gave her up safe. While I hunted, the white 
 man stole my best wife. She cried to my son as he 
 passed. The boy ran to his mother. The white man 
 shot him dead. 
 
 " I hate the white man ! Why ? Two more sons 
 I had. The diggers (miners) come and say, ' They 
 have killed a white man ; we will have them to kill.' 
 I say, ' No, they have not killed.' Your blue-coat 
 chief at the strong house, he say, ' No, you shall not 
 have them to kill.' They say to him, ' Then we kill 
 you !' Then he say, ' Kill away, if you can kill ; me 
 first, and them after !' At last, all the white men, 
 they say together, ' Let us have them, to try whether 
 they have killed ; and, if they have not, let them come 
 back all safe.' So I say, 'All right,' for I know they 
 have not killed ; so the boys go with soldiers. They 
 are tried ; they have not killed. ' Take them back 
 safe,' say the law chief. As they come, they are killed. 
 Then I say, ' I hate the white man ! I will live beside 
 him no more. I will go to the wild bears and eagles. 
 They are kinder and truer.' Then the white man 
 say, ' It is war ! Umpqua is bad. He will kill us. 
 Hunt him out.' 
 
 " I hate the white man ! Why ? I build my lodge 
 and kindle my fire alone, far up on the high, cold 
 mountain. I say to my sick and my old, my women,
 
 190 HERMAN. 
 
 my babies, ' Here yon shall rest, safe and warm ; for 
 who wants the bare bleak mountain, but bears and 
 eagles and Umpqua ? This we will have to ourselves, 
 better than plains with bad neighbours.' By night, 
 the bad Bostons awake us, with pistols and rifles. 
 I fight them. They run, and come back with a thun- 
 der-gun and lightning-balls from the strong-house. 
 They hunt my sick and old, my squaws and my ba- 
 bies, in the cold and dark, from steep slippery mount- 
 ain to mountain. They shiver, they stumble, they 
 sicken, they starve, they die, too fast. So I say, ' Let 
 us now have peace !' But the Bostons say, ' You .are 
 bad. You love us not. You have killed us too many ; 
 we must chastise you. We will frighten you first.' 
 They cannot make Umpqua afraid ! But I send to the 
 blue-coat chief and say, ' Only let them not hurt the 
 women and babies ; we hurt not your women and ba- 
 bies.' The bad Bostons catch on a high rock one of 
 my sick squaws, with two papooses. Some say, ' Hurt 
 them not.' Some shoot. She fall. My babies' brains 
 are spilt on the stones. 
 
 " I hate the white man ! "Why ? I have left yet 
 one daughter. When I am great, she is beautiful in 
 her skins, and beads, and feathers ; and every young 
 chief come from far, and say, ' Give her to me.' But 
 I say, ' No ; I love her too well ; she may not leave 
 my country.' And every young chief come from near, 
 and say, ' Give her to me ;' but I say, ' ISTo ; I love 
 her too well; she may not leave my lodge.' Her 
 beautiful robes gone ; her beautiful face going. She 
 is tired, and cannot rest ; she is hungry and faint, and 
 I have often nothing to give her. Then I say, ' Go ; 
 sleep safe in the white squaw's house, and eat her 
 bread. Old Umpqua can wander ; but for girls it is
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 191 
 
 bad.' I am sad, but she is safe. The white squaw 
 sick. She moan, ' I want water.' The girl say, * I go 
 to the spring.' She say, ' Go not ; the Bostons will 
 catch you.' My girl say, ' !No, I can run too fast.' 
 They see her. They call her. She stop not. They 
 shoot. She drop dead !" 
 
 " Can all this that he says be. true ?" cried Herman, 
 turning to Mr. Grubbe, who had entered with the 
 crowd which at the outcries of Weahwashtay had in- 
 stantly filled the lodge. 
 
 " I'd like to know what can't be true that's too bad, 
 in voo of the depravity of our fallen natur, sir," replied 
 the old man, wiping his nose a great deal between pity 
 and indignation. 
 
 A cry from Weahwashtay recalled their attention to 
 the poor outcast. His tall . frame reeled. His eyes 
 were glazed. His hands were groping in the air, as if 
 seeking some friendly ones to grasp them again, at last, 
 to lead him on his last, long journey. With wail upon 
 wail, Weahwashtay clasped them in her own ; and 
 then, as if seized with his death-pangs, but determined, 
 a chief to the last gasp, to yield to them only at his 
 own time and pleasure, he, swaying to and fro, went 
 down and down, kneeling first on one knee, and then 
 on both, then sitting, and then slowly falling back- 
 wards, like a man literally sinking by inches into his 
 grave. After a few moments, he recovered himself 
 
 ^ D f 
 
 enough to speak again, though in an altered tone : 
 " All gone. Breath gone. Heart gone. Umpqua 
 gone. Weahwashtay, I am not fit to die." 
 
 This appeal was answered by Weahwashtay's in- 
 stantly, in the midst of her tears and sobs, heaping to- 
 gether the finest clothes in the lodge, and even snatch- 
 ing from her own dress, and that of her unresisting
 
 102 HERMAN. 
 
 husband, their most precious ornaments, to clothe and 
 deck the lean, scarred, half-naked form before her. 
 Umpqua received her cares with evident satisfaction, 
 and even assisted her in them feebly, from time to 
 time, so far as his weakness and the stupor which was 
 stealing upon him would permit. 
 
 His appeal was answered also by Mr. Grubbe, who, 
 kneeling beside him, eagerly put to him the ordinary 
 technical theological questions of his school. At first, 
 between the deafness and dulness of approaching 
 death, and the indistinctness of the good grieving man's 
 articulation, Umpqua did not seem to hear or under- 
 stand. When he did, he neither received satisfaction 
 nor gave it. Mr. Grubbe, greatly shocked and dis- 
 tressed, assured him in his most earnest and compas- 
 sionate manner, that if he died in his present state of 
 feeling, an eternity of hell-fire must be his portion. 
 Urnpqua, reclosing his weary eyes, merely replied, 
 phlegmatically, " Then me get a little sleep now, 
 first." Mr. Grubbe persisted, and roused him to 
 anger. Drawing in his short breath, to hiss out his 
 whispers more" distinctly, he turned his head with an 
 effort, and opening his eyes, rolled them round upon 
 his ghostly adviser, saying as an after-thought, " I hate 
 the white man ! Why ? He say, ' Spell my books, 
 and pray my God. He make us good. He make you 
 wise, happy.' I spell your white books. I pray your 
 white God. He make me not happy. He make you 
 not good. He make you too strong, and crafty, and 
 bad, and lying, for Umpqua. You make me die, 
 with my young dead before, in the lodge, in the skins 
 of another ! Go. I will die ; but you shall not see. 
 Too many white face I saw in my life. I will see none 
 while I die. Go !"
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 193 
 
 He was seized with another spasm ; and Herman 
 saw that it was too late to hope to change a state of 
 mind, in his circumstances so natural if not pardona- 
 ble, that their presence, and the associations and emo- 
 tions which it awakened, could only increase his suffer- 
 ings and hasten his end, and that Mr. Grubbe was in 
 danger of stirring up, in the already too much offended 
 friends of the sufferer, a very serious exasperation, not 
 only against himself, but his religion, if he persisted 
 long in preaching it with a pertinacity so untimely. 
 He therefore left the lodge at once, and took the old 
 man with him, " with gentle yet determined force." 
 Mr. Grubbe found it hard to forgive him ; for when 
 they arose in the morning, TJmpqua was dead. He 
 had smiled away his poor, worn, harassed, hunted life 
 very peacefully at last, in full-dress, with his sister's 
 hand clasped close in one of Ins, and her husband's best 
 spear in the other. 
 
 " That precious soul, sir ! I trust its everlasting de- 
 struction lies more on your conscience than mine ; but I 
 shall never forgive myself." 
 
 " My dear old friend ! How can you suppose, that 
 our merciful Father in heaven has anything but the 
 tenderest pity in store for that poor ignorant child of 
 Nature, who had been, if we can trust his own account 
 at all, so much more sinned against than sinning ?" 
 
 " He denied his Lord, sir !" 
 
 ""What did he know about his Lord ? Nothing, 
 most likely, except a few bald, confused, contradictory 
 statements, which he could not understand, from a 
 class of men whom he had found for the most part, in 
 matters which he could understand, to be utterly un- 
 trustworthy. He spoke disrespectfully of our white 
 god, just as he might have done of the totem of any 
 1 9
 
 1 94 HERMAN. 
 
 Indian of whom he had reason to think very ill. He 
 spoke very disrespectfully to you, too, not knowing 
 you. Cannot you forgive him ?" 
 
 " Do you take me for a Turk, sir ?" 
 
 "No, for a most forgiving and compassionate 
 Christian, but yet for a far less forgiving, considerate, 
 and compassionate person than Christ. The guilt of 
 this poor savage's abjuration seems to lie, chiefly or 
 solely, with those who drove him to it, by disgracing 
 and practically denying their faith ; and very heavy 
 guilt theirs is ; and we might have come in for a share 
 of it, if, when he thought he had at length fairly get- 
 away from all of us to die in peace among his kindred, 
 we had remained to beset him on his death-bed, while 
 the very sight and sound of us, if half he said was true, 
 might well have been enough to unsettle his reason. 
 Do you think we could have made him love our God, 
 and all in a minute, too, by making him angry 
 with us ?" 
 
 " I believe in instantaneous conversion, sir." 
 
 " I scarcely believe in any great chance of it in that 
 case. Besides, it might have taken but very little more, 
 after what his friends had just heard, of what they 
 must have considered persecution of him, to induce 
 them to murder you ; and then what, do you think, 
 would have become of their souls ?" 
 
 " We had ought to do our dooty, and take the con- 
 sequences, sir." 
 
 " No doubt ; but ought we to do it in an injudi- 
 cious way, and thereby bring bad consequences unne- 
 cessarily upon others?" 
 
 " I am content to be a fool for the gospel, sir." 
 
 " So was St. Paul ; but he was also contented to be 
 all things to all men, and to give none unnecessary
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 195 
 
 offence. Besides, I do not think we were beginning 
 with Umpqua, in a Christian I mean a Christ-like 
 way. He was worn-out and broken-hearted. Christ 
 said, ' Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy- 
 laden, and I will give you rest,' not ' Come unto me, 
 all ye that are weary and heavy-laden, or I will give 
 you hell-fire.' Indeed, you must forgive me. I do not 
 mean to forget for a moment that I am a much younger 
 and less experienced man than you ; but I should be 
 exceedingly sorry, for the Indian's sake, to have them 
 further irritated now. "We must remember what an 
 unfortunate impression Umpqua's story must have 
 made upon such impetuous, undisciplined creatures." 
 
 Herman sent a resplendent brooch of ruby-glass and 
 gilding to Weahwashtay, as an additional decoration 
 for the corpse, which sat in state in a lodge near her 
 own. He also requested permission to come to the 
 funeral, and sat among the silent mourners patiently 
 through that day and the following night, as sincere a 
 mourner as any there ; while, within him, his heart 
 preached to him " an awful sermon, upon the text, 
 " Woe unto the world, because of offences ! For it 
 must needs be that offences come ; but woe to that man 
 by whom the offence cometh." He mourned not only 
 as a man, for the poor fellow-man so wantonly done to 
 death, but as a Christian, for his Master crucified 
 afresh even in these days, and put to an open shame, 
 by the barbarities practised by those baptized in his 
 name upon their weaker brethren ; and, as a patriot, 
 for the disgrace of his country, so harsh a step-mother 
 to some of her feebler swarthier sons. 
 
 His unaffected sympathy and sorrow were not lost 
 upon his hosts. They, by the time they went out about 
 their usual business again, invited him to join them at
 
 196 HERMAN. 
 
 hunt and feast as freely as before. He hoped the storm 
 had blown over, and, no longer fearing for Mr. Grubbe, 
 went out as usual, leaving him to take care of himself. 
 The opportunity was not lost upon that worthy man. 
 On returning from a solitary ride one day, Herman 
 met several very sinister looks from an equal number 
 of pairs of dark eyes, and found Weahwashtay, with 
 her baby in her arms, sitting at the door of her lodge, 
 a most gory and unpleasing spectacle, having cut 
 herself into the very image of ugliness with a knife. 
 On his kindly asking her the cause, she, altogether con- 
 trary to her custom, turned away her head moodily, 
 and made no reply. 
 
 Herman easily coaxed the whole story out of What- 
 taraskle. Mr. Grubbe had been easing his conscience 
 by assuring the tribe, according to the boy, that they 
 were all going to be burnt up, as soon as they died, by 
 his white god, because a white man ate a papaw once, 
 a long time ago, if they didn't get something, a hard 
 word, Whattaraskle couldn't say it, and didn't know 
 what it meant, but he guessed it was some kind of new 
 totem ; and that his white god was burning Umpqua 
 very bad now, and never would stop, because he spoke 
 ill of the white god, and did not love the Bostons. 
 (It was very unreasonable in the Indians not to be 
 grateful to their instructor, no doubt ; but might not 
 we be a little ungrateful to the Romish priest, who, 
 after we had had a relation, or friend, worried out of 
 his life by the inquisition, should, with the best inten- 
 tions, endeavour perseveringly to convince us, for the 
 good of our souls, that our dear departed was partaking 
 of unmingled brimstone in consequence of his having 
 indulged, in his ignorance, in uncomplimentary ex- 
 pressions respecting the triple tiara, and died out of
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 197 
 
 fervent cliarit}^ witli the inquisitors. Perhaps, in such 
 circumstances, even civilized we might be somewhat 
 unreasonable. Let us hope not ; but who can tell ?) 
 AVhattaraskle further deposed that Weahwashtay did 
 not want the Meneaskas there, bringing their white god 
 around the lodges ; because the papoose was sick, and 
 she was afraid, if it died, he would get it to burn, too. 
 Moreover Whattaraskle thought that the white god 
 must be silly as well as cross ; because the old Meneaska 
 said that if they minded him, and did not drink fire- 
 water nor smoke tobacco, he would pay them by 
 making them rest always, a great long life, so much 
 longer than this, it never would leave off, and do no- 
 thing but sit still and sing in the clouds, and never 
 jump down and run. But Whattaraskle did not want 
 to run and ride a little while, and then rest a great 
 long while. He ran and rode a great while and rested 
 a little while, and jumped up again. 
 
 This view of the case, Herman could very well un- 
 derstand and sympathize with, with his } r oung blood 
 still dancing in his veins, like that of the Indian boy, 
 from the hunts of the preceding days. He felt how 
 much more even this rugged life, with its trials and 
 triumphs, was to him in his moments of highest and 
 purest emotion, than a stagnant eternity of mere 
 clouds and psalm-singing could be. He did not be- 
 lieve that God, the fountain-head of life, genius, and 
 action, the ever-working, ever-creative Mind of minds, 
 could have so wondrously and variously endowed the 
 human soul, with no other purpose than that of smiting 
 all its powers but two or three, almost as soon as it be- 
 gan to put them forth, with an everlasting catalepsy. 
 He did not in the least believe that the Bible, rightly 
 understood, confirmed any such ideas. He was sorry
 
 198 HERMAN. 
 
 to interfere between Mr. Grubbe and his neophytes ; 
 but, for their sake and his, the case appeared to be one 
 which left him 110 choice. 
 
 Herman at once sought out Taiquimuwatish, who 
 was a kind-hearted and, for an utterly uneducated, a 
 remarkably intelligent man, took him to his tent, pro- 
 pitiated him with simple dainties, and then told him in 
 confidence, that he was sorry to hear that some of his 
 young men, who could scarcely be expected to be so 
 sensible as himself, had been displeased by some things 
 which had been said by Mr. Grubbe. Mr. Grubbe 
 loved them, and meant to tell them nothing but the 
 truth. It was a pity to be angry with him, for he 
 was a good man ; but, as Taiquinsuwatish might have 
 observed, he was a very simple man ; and there were 
 some things in the Great Spirit's message very puzzling 
 to white men themselves, quite too puzzling for Mr. 
 Grubbe to understand, he was sure. If Taiquinsu- 
 watish would give him leave, Herman would tell him 
 and his young men what he knew about it. Mattered 
 and curious, Taiquinsuwatish readily gave his con- 
 sent. 
 
 Herman led them to a little distance from the camp, 
 that Weahwashtay might not again be frightened. 
 Then, while a burning mountain before him, now veil- 
 ing its face with smoke and now glaring with flame, 
 reminded him solemnly of Moses, and Sinai, he ex- 
 plained to them, I leave my readers, from their past 
 and future knowledge of Herman, to imagine how, 
 the simple theology and ethics of the gospels. 
 
 At every pause in his discourse, there was from the 
 attentive listeners a punctual response of " Hoogh !" 
 At the close, Taiquinsuwatish came up to Herman and 
 took him by the hand, sayiitg in his broken English,
 
 THE LAND OF SUNSET. 199 
 
 which he was proud of speaking, " I been like little 
 child, uneasy, feeling round in the dark for something, 
 I know not what. Now I hope learn something 
 true, for help me to learn my people do right. Give 
 me truth. I love not silly lies." 
 
 Herman determined that this appeal should not be 
 disregarded, and that, as soon as possible after his re- 
 turn home, he would endeavour to send out a missionary, 
 better instructed than himself, to this interesting and 
 inquiring people. In the meantime he taught them 
 what he knew, and was always listened to with good 
 will, even by Weahwashtay lifter her child had re- 
 covered. Mr. Grubbe, by means of his powerful 
 mediation, was again taken into favor, but not as a 
 theologian. " Man good, talk kapse-is bad," was 
 the most merciful verdict pronounced upon him by the 
 copper-faced public. Taiquinsuwatish declared that he 
 must either " shut up his tongue, or leave ; for if he 
 made mad the young men, they would do him some- 
 thing, and he [Taiquinsuwatish] could not help ; and 
 then the Bostons would come." Mr. Grubbe thought 
 Herman extremely latitudinarian, and altogether repre- 
 hensible ; but Herman was very glad, notwithstand- 
 ing, that he was alive to tell him so, and contented 
 himself with saying to himself, " Great God ! how is 
 this poor evil world ever to be hallowed, if wickedness 
 is so wide and goodness is so narrow ?" 
 
 Far away there we must now leave him yet a little 
 longer, seeing fox-dances, buffalo-dances, and all sorts 
 of wild -beast dances, war -parties, hunting-parties, 
 gambling-parties, and all sorts of savage parties, seeing 
 mourners give away their best horses or clothes, for 
 grief at the loss of their friends or loves, just as he had 
 given away himself for grief at the loe? of his Con-
 
 200 HERMAN. 
 
 stance, thinking how like an elvish parody upon oui 
 life all their life was, with its worthless finery so 
 highly prized, its silly, fantastic, imperative point of 
 honor, its wars and single combats, about nothing and 
 bringing about nothing, and its endless toil to no end 
 but the grave, wondering whether, in the sight of God 
 and the holy angels, our civilized pomp, and worldly 
 strifes and achievements, were worth any more than their 
 uncivilized, or would seem so in ours, a few years after, 
 when we should look back upon them with the eyes of 
 departing spirits, and sometimes wishing, with the 
 waywardness of youth and sorrow, that there hence- 
 forth he might spend all his days, seeing the crowded 
 haunts of white-skinned men no more, till in old age 
 it should seem to him a half-forgotten dream that they 
 had ever been his own and, clad in skins, eating 
 strange food, and speaking a strange language, could 
 wear his life away, retired in these wild solitudes, with 
 their uncouth but not ungrateful children, sporting 
 with them, teaching them, and protecting them, re- 
 vered by them in his life, and seeing their dark weep- 
 ing faces around him in his death.
 
 THE KXIGHT FA8T8. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 
 
 " I think a wise aad constant man ought never to grieve while he 
 doth play, as a man may say, his own part truly, though others be 
 out." Sra PHILIP STDSET. 
 
 il Let any one set his heart, in these days, to do what is right, and 
 nothing else, and it will not be long ere his brow is stamped with all 
 that goes to malre up the heroical expression with noble indigna- 
 tion, noble self-restraint, great hopes, great sorrows; perhaps, even, 
 with the print of the martyr's crown 01" thorns." 
 
 KEfGSLBT. 
 
 " AND David went to Samuel, to ^aioth of Kamah, 
 and dwelt there ;" these words, by some perhaps whimsi- 
 cal association, kept running in my head this morning, 
 while I sat with Clara Arden. David had been high in 
 favor and in hope. He had fallen through no fault of 
 his. He had been forced to leave all, home, kindred, 
 friends, and even his beloved, and she was a princess, 
 and had taken refuge on the mountain, with the 
 grim old prophet. The gentle shepherd was in process 
 of change into the kingly warrior. Cursed by Love and 
 Song, he had become the pupil of hero-fashioning Ad- 
 versity. He had thrown the harp from his fine touch, 
 and was learning to say, " Lord, teach my hands to 
 war, and my fingers to fight." He was anointed, in- 
 deed, but uncrowned ; and his peaceful, harmonious, 
 kindly life, was doomed to be thenceforward a long 
 battle. With some change of costume and scenery, 
 David seemed to stand before me in a picture, 
 9*
 
 202 HERMAN. 
 
 which Clara took me into her sitting-room, to see, and 
 wept while she looked at. 
 
 It was a large and admirably painted picture, of a 
 youth in the morning of manhood. He stood alone in 
 a wild mountain landscape, with lightning darting 
 from a heavy, leaden, and lurid cloud above him, and all 
 the air around him darkened with a look of thunder; 
 out of which his face seemed almost to shine in the 
 glare of the flash. A coat of shaggy skin was girt 
 about his slight waist with a soldier's eash. He held 
 and lightly leaned upon a rifle in his right hand ; and 
 I scarcely needed to be told as I was, that the grasp of 
 that slender hand had been, at need, like the gripe of 
 Death, which only Death could unloose ; nor that the 
 moccasined foot, planted so lightly and firmly among 
 the crags where he stood, was as sure and almost as 
 swift as that of the huge-horned Rocky Mountain 
 sheep, which, perched just above him, looked down 
 upon him confidingly, while beneath him, on the other 
 side, a wolf skulked away. His features were of the 
 finest and rarest Roman type, at once regular, sym- 
 metrical, delicate, and noble. His coloring was dark, 
 mellow, warm, and clear. Such outlines with such 
 tints would alone suffice to make a very handsome 
 man. There was an expression about this man which 
 made him far more than that. Slender as he was, he 
 looked so mysteriously, infinitely, full of power and 
 life, not the ugly, gross, soulless, material life of the 
 prize-fighter or the anaconda, but the irresistible nerve 
 and energy of some superhuman man or manly angel ! 
 It was easy to see that it was a high and strong 
 heart, which sent up the generous red blood to bear 
 witness of it in those smooth olive cheeks. That 
 mouth was not more sweet than strong. Those deep,
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 203 
 
 dark, musing eyes, seemed overcast and darkened with 
 the shadow of approaching doom, to feel, but not to 
 fear it. One would not like to meet a foe in such a 
 man. With such a man at one's side, one -would 
 scarcely fear to cope with any other foe. Resolute, 
 concentrated, imperial, impassioned more than pas- 
 sionate, he seemed as if born to subdue first himself 
 and then the world. If he was such in the dawn of 
 his manhood, what was he in its prime? What and 
 where are such men in their prime ? Go, ask the sera- 
 phim ! In what age has the world not rejected some 
 of those of whom it was not worthy ? They overcome 
 it ; but the Cross by which, like their Master, they 
 conquer, lifts them from it ; they shake its dust from 
 their climbing feet, and leave it beneath them ; and a 
 cloud receives them out of their sight. 
 
 But was it so with Herman ? Let us hope not. 
 Let us go on, and we shall see. He had unboyed 
 himself wonderfully in the few months of his absence. 
 Perhaps we are, many of us, made old by months, and 
 days even, rather than by years. There was an alter- 
 ation in him which, though she would hardly own it 
 even to herself, surprised and disappointed Clara. She 
 felt it from the first, even in the bright week that she 
 and her brothers spent, immediately after his arrival, 
 at Sea Farm, that they might not fail of their annual pil- 
 grimage. She had a more assiduous, considerate, and 
 devoted brother, than she had ever had before ; but he 
 no longer needed that she should devote herself to him. 
 She had got back a man instead of a stripling ; and he 
 seemed to her a sort of changeling. She admired, re- 
 spected, and loved the man ; but then, she missed the 
 boy. It was all very well to have some one to pet her ; 
 but she had always had Ned to serve her in that capa-
 
 204: HERMAN. 
 
 city. If it had not been for Tommy and Bessy, she 
 did not know what she should have done now for 
 something to pet. She tried to convince herself that 
 it was the bronze of travel that made half the differ- 
 ence in him, and her fancy the rest ; but when the 
 former wore off, the latter remained the same, if it 
 was a fancy ; but she had, howsoever slowly and un- 
 willingly, to make up her mind that it was not. His 
 face was very handsome still, far handsomer than 
 ever before, Edward said, but it was not the dear old 
 young face, which had leaned on her shoulder so often, 
 and which she had been promising herself, every day 
 for weeks past, that she should soon see again.. That 
 was gone, nobody knew where, and she should 
 never see it again. She could have cried to think so. 
 The look that Constance wondered at, and admired in 
 spite of herself, in her last interview with him, had be- 
 come, when at rest, the most habitual expression of 
 his countenance. It was often, at such times, almost 
 stern in its determination. There was that in it which 
 showed, that the soul within had thrown its silken 
 robes of dalliance off, and put its armor on. At such 
 times, Clara often sat and watched him unobserved, 
 until her interest grew to pain, as if the change had 
 put some barrier, inexplicable but impassable, between 
 him and her ; and then she would rise involuntarily, 
 go to him, and put her hand in his or force some play- 
 ful speech, when out would still come his own old smile, 
 all the more sweet and bright by contrast, and show her 
 that, however it might be towards others, towards her 
 he could not change, except to become less her charge 
 and play-fellow and more her protector, or, if she 
 would have it so, her counsellor. 
 
 There might have been more reasons than she knew
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 205 
 
 for his gravity. In the first place, well as he acknow- 
 ledged that her affection deserved his confidence, and 
 hard as he had tried to accord it, he had probably not 
 succeeded in telling her half how well he loved Con- 
 stance Aspenwall. (What man, who knows how to 
 love, ever cares to expatiate much on a disappointed 
 love ?) It was strange perhaps that he should love her 
 so ; but so he did. He had never been able to see any 
 fault in her, from the beginning of their acquaintance 
 to its close, but one ; and even that his dazzled eyes 
 saw as something apart from her, not her fault, but 
 the fault of her training, or want of training. Her 
 soul on one occasion, and on one alone, had appeared 
 before him in an ugly dress ; but that he considered as 
 merely the* fault of the dress-maker. His passionate 
 tenderness immediately substituted for it the garb of a 
 goddess ; and in this her image stood evermore clothed 
 in his thoughts. She was that rare thing, so much 
 oftener heard of than seen, a perfect beauty, and 
 moreover brilliant, ardent, and, where she loved, rav- 
 ishingly lovely ; yet she was certainly not, at this time 
 at least, all that he thought her. 
 
 I cannot undertake to defend his delusion ; but in 
 extenuation I must state, that it is a common, not to 
 say a universal, one. Enamored lads and lasses, you 
 see in each other not what you have really found, but 
 what you have ideally found, what Mr. Dickens 
 says you all see in your looking-glasses, " the pleasing 
 reflection of your own fancy." Sly Puck, believe me, 
 did not use up all of the juice of the " little western 
 flower" upon Titania's eyes, nor on those of the 
 Athenian lovers. I can see the traces of it upon the 
 drooping lids of almost all of you. Cupid weaves and 
 baits the snares for you ; but he leaves it to Chance to
 
 206 HEKMAN. 
 
 set them in the way of the unwary. Tityrus, if, at the 
 time when you first saw Amaryllis in Italy, the Fates 
 had thrown you in England in the neighbourhood of a 
 trap with Phillis in it, Phillis would have caught you ; 
 and you would have preferred her " herbs and other 
 savory* messes," to the juice of all Amaryllis's figs and 
 oranges. Cory don and Amaryllis, ditto, ditto. Col- 
 lectively you would have worshipped your golden- 
 haired and raven-tressed divinities as extravagantly, 
 I mean appreciatingly, as you now do ; severally you 
 would have changed idols. " Propinquity, my dears," 
 as Mrs. Broadstone said, " Propinquity !" 
 "Leaves have their time to fall;" 
 
 and when it comes, fall they do headlong, iji the dust, 
 on the flower-bed, or among the nettles, as the case 
 may be ; and so have hearts their time, chiefly between 
 the ages of sixteen and thirty, to fall, in love; and they 
 do it likewise in a rather precipitate and indiscriminate 
 way, as the wind may happen to blow ; but Herman's 
 fell upon a queen-lily, and clung to it henceforth. He was 
 not mistaken in thinking Constance a rare woman, if he 
 was, in thinking her more than a woman. He thought 
 her more than a woman, and suffered accordingly. 
 
 In the second place, there was a change in* his posi- 
 tion in society, in consequence of his speech, speeches, 
 rather, for he soon found occasion to follow up the 
 former with others equally eloquent, and much more 
 effective because, with growing tact, better adapted to 
 his audiences. That change in his position can per- 
 haps be thoroughly understood only by those who, 
 members themselves of unfashionable political parties, 
 have moved in fashionable society when parties ran 
 
 * Let us as an emendation propose savorter.
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 207 
 
 high, lie had hitherto enjoyed his share of the social 
 consideration which two or three generations of wealth, 
 tastefully used, had entailed upon his family. With- 
 out the least self-conceit, he had hitherto, from pure 
 inexperience, want of knowledge of the world, and 
 confidence in the good faith of others, unthinkingly as 
 young persons are apt to do in similar circumstances, 
 taken it for granted that the cordial welcome and 
 charming courtesy which he met with wherever he 
 went, were the expression of a sincere liking and re- 
 spect for his person and character, and that they could 
 hardly be forfeited among the generality of his neigh- 
 bours, unless by misconduct on his part. To his surprise, 
 the welcome, the charm, and the courtesy were, not to be 
 sure universally,but somewhat generally, altered. The 
 well-bred now often treated him with cool good-breed- 
 ing ; the ill-bred, with cool ill-breeding. Some hon- 
 estly thought his political course wrong ; some, with- 
 out caring particularly whether it was wrong or right, 
 thought it most inconvenient and exasperating ; and 
 others, again, without thinking at all, took their cue 
 from the rest. 
 
 It is no doubt a very trifling thing to have a single 
 little drop of cold water thrown upon one's head ; but 
 a very long succession of such little drops, dropped 
 upon the same worn and intenerated spot, may in time 
 have an unpleasant effect even upon one's reason ; and 
 it certainly must strike the sufferer oddly at first, when 
 he finds old neighbours, whom he has always regarded 
 as friends as far as anything, volunteering as amateur 
 executioners, whenever he comes in their way, to ad- 
 minister each his globule of the homoaopathic, hydro- 
 pathic, cumulative, torment. When it falls upon a heart 
 that already knows its own secret separate bitterness,
 
 208 HERMAN. 
 
 the case is harder yet. Cold water, however, is a bad 
 or a good thing, according to the nature of the stuff it 
 has to act upon. It softens plaster ; steel, it tempers. 
 Let Tyranny, social or individual, plunge in it the 
 sword of Liberty glowing from the forge. The sword 
 will hardly drown, or come out again the more pliant 
 for the treatment. 
 
 Herman would not mention to his sister the petty 
 daily annoyances to which he was subjected. He 
 thought that women, being excluded from the agreea- 
 ble excitements of political life, ought also to be privi- 
 leged against the disagreeable. He did not wish 
 to separate her from her old friends. He knew her 
 w r ell enough to fear that, however the opaque polish of 
 her manners might cover her indignation, her feelings, 
 if she once saw how matters stood, might be seriously 
 and permanently altered towards any of them who 
 proved fickle towards him. To Edward he did drop a 
 hint or two. Edward administered consolation some- 
 what after the fashion of Eliphaz the Temanite, Bil- 
 dad the Shuhite, and Zophar the JSTaamathite, rolled 
 into one. In the first place, he extenuated, if he did 
 not defend, Coventry ; in the second, he denied its 
 existence : 
 
 " You have always held yourself aloof from other peo- 
 ple, my dear man. "Why should you expect them to stand 
 by you ? You have been a perfect Peter the Hermit ; and 
 now you come out before them with a ragamuffin party, 
 and preach a crusade against all their souls hold dear, 
 or mean to hold dear, if they can, factory denims, and 
 negro stuffs, for instance. Not being very well ac- 
 quainted with you previously, whose fault is that ? 
 they were unwearied in requesting the honor and the 
 pleasure of your company, they naturally think you
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 209 
 
 crazy. Learn a lesson for the future ; arid if you ex- 
 pect to influence men, and have them stick to you in 
 times like these, show yourself among them, and 
 make yourself agreeable and necessary to them at all 
 times." 
 
 " I always felt kindly towards our acquaintances. 
 I supposed that they knew it." 
 
 " How ?" 
 
 " By taking it for granted, I suppose ; as I did, that 
 they felt kindly towards me." 
 
 " You were a guileless youth, if you took anything 
 of the sort for granted. The generous public, not be- 
 ing guileless, usually requires stronger proof. Besides, 
 you labor under the further disadvantage of belonging 
 to a conspicuous and rather wealthy family. Don't 
 you know that wealth and family are positive sins 
 against the peace of Demos, to be atoned for, at the 
 jealous old fellow's tribunal, only by general sociability 
 and scrupulous observance on the part of him who is 
 guilty of them ? An unfashionable and obscure man 
 may keep his own company to himself without offence, 
 perhaps. In a man like you, reserve is proof positive 
 of pride, arrogance, and incivisme. He may at any 
 time be ostracized or guillotined for it, at a moment's 
 warning, on the slightest provocation, and without the 
 slightest interference in his behalf from the uncon- 
 cerned bystanders. ' Hurra, you ain't, got no friends !' 
 as the mob remarked, though happily without founda- 
 tion, in the case of Mr. Pickwick in the pound. If 
 Mr. Pickwick, like some wise persons I could name, 
 bad kept himself closeted with the cold remains of Ho 
 mer, Sophocles, Demosthenes, or some other dead an- 
 cient, and relied on no other means of attaching to 
 himself live moderns than privately wishing them well,
 
 210 HERMAN. 
 
 and letting them alone, he would have had no friends ; 
 and then the shower of eggs and turnips might have 
 lasted till this time, or until the hen-coops and green- 
 grocers' shops were exhausted, for aught that Messrs. 
 Wardle, Winkle, and Company, would have cared. 
 Anybody who liked, a good many always do like on 
 these occasions, would have pelted him. "Who would 
 have protected him ?" 
 
 " I see. It is half my own fault, or folly. Edward, 
 how came you to be so wise ?" 
 
 " By doing nothing, my dear boy, an invaluable 
 practice ; it gives one so much time for thinking !" 
 
 " You have been studying human nature, one side 
 of it at least, while I have been poring over my books. 
 Your knowledge is more practical than most of mine, 
 and fresher ; but are all its lessons so gloomy as this 
 which you have been giving to me ?" 
 
 " The gloom, if there is any, is in your own dark 
 eyes. Mine are lighter. I regard life as a book of 
 satire, illustrated with very amusing caricatures ; or at 
 the worst, it is only a black background, against which 
 a parti-colored and not altogether sooty character-, 
 like mine, I flatter myself, appears to advantage, ra- 
 diant by contrast. I should look gloomy myself, I fear, 
 in the light in which you walk, star-trampling reformer. 
 The world is dark, you may say ; it eclipses the sun 
 almost half of the time. What if it does ? I avail 
 myself of a lucifer, touch up my gas, dress for a ball or 
 the theatre, go out, and enjoy the night. The night is 
 a very good thing, after all. It serves me to laugh, 
 and you to learn, in. If I had to choose between the 
 two, all of one or all of the other, I should prefer the 
 earth to the sun, I believe. I do not want too much 
 light."
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 211 
 
 " You are in the clouds now. Come down where I 
 can understand you." 
 
 " Understand, then, with regard to yourself, that I 
 suspect you are merely beginning to see the world as 
 it is, instead of as it ought to be ; whence arises at first 
 an unpleasant surprise in your youthful mind, at not 
 finding it heaven. Men get their bodily eyes open 
 earlier than kittens do ; but it takes the cleverest of us 
 more than your twenty-one years to do the same by 
 our mental optics, and to learn to see things for our- 
 selves with them exactly as they are. Furthermore, I 
 tli ink you made a great mistake in going off to the 
 West just when you did. Run before geese, and, of 
 course, they will pursue you with hisses ; because they 
 are geese." 
 
 " But I did not run away for fear of the geese. 
 I never dreamed of such a thing." 
 
 " I know that, of course ; but how are geese to 
 know it ? But let by-gones be by-gones. You have 
 come back again, at any rate. Go out now, whenever 
 and wherever you're invited ; and let people see that 
 you're neither afraid of them nor ashamed of yourself. 
 Let them cry for" about the space of two hours, months, 
 or years, Great are Mammon, Daniel, and his ' Tay- 
 riff,' gods of the Bostonians ! They'll get hoarse after a 
 while, and then stop. You're only a nine days' won- 
 der. They'll soon want the pillory for somebody else. 
 Remember however, that I am arguing upon your sup- 
 position, and not by any means on my own perception, 
 of your personal unpopularity. I suspect it exists 
 chiefly, if not wholly, in your own poetical fancy." 
 
 This was the last as well as the first conversation, 
 which the young men held together upon this subject ; 
 for, Edward's conscience pricking him a little at the
 
 212 HERMAN. 
 
 close, he presently with some heat and abruptness an. 
 nounced an intention on his part, to " kick, no matter 
 where, in Beacon Street or on 'Change, or anywhere 
 else, anybody, no matter who," whom he caught " giv- 
 ing himself any such airs ;" and, as Herman thought 
 that his little French boots might be much better em- 
 ployed, he said nothing further. 
 
 Edward was, indeed, triply perturbed. He saw, so 
 far as he would open his eyes to see, that there was 
 much reason for his brother's endeavouring to rouse the 
 country to take the stand he aimed at against, not the 
 South, but a few of the Southerners. He was, with all 
 his frivolity, no wilful perverter of youth in general ; 
 and as to Herman in particular, in his secret heart he 
 admired and revered him to such a degree, that not 
 only was he confident that it would be in vain to try 
 to bring him down from his elevation, but he would 
 have felt himself as sacrilegious in doing so, if he could, 
 as the horror-struck sportsman, who, when the wider 
 winged, round-eyed owl tumbled out of the tree before 
 him in the twilight, shrieked in agonies of ineffectual 
 remorse that he had " shot a cherubim." Yet he was 
 too epicurean to place himself at his young brother's 
 side in the battle. No wonder, therefore, if he felt 
 somewhat cross ; he certainly had enough to make 
 him. 
 
 What advice he had given was good ; and Herman 
 resolutely followed it, so far at least as to go out and 
 show himself wherever he was invited. His manner 
 became more formed, manly, and imposing ; and thus, 
 though not undignified before, gained in dignity more 
 than it had lost in cordiality and vivacity. His hon- 
 est innate, but hitherto latent, pride, (if we must call an 
 unchristened and not altogether unvirtuous trait by the
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 213 
 
 name of a vice,) defensive, not offensive, being called 
 forth to repress the insolence of others, ennobled his 
 noble countenance more and more, and heightened the 
 " Coriolanns look " which Edward admired so highly, 
 so highly, that he insisted on having the picture, a 
 description of which serves as a sort of frontispiece to 
 this chapter, taken for him by a certain justly-cele- 
 brated artist, in Herman's twenty -third year. 
 
 Dr. Arden was not alone in his admiration. The young 
 belles, too, appreciated the young orator's personal ad- 
 vantages and graces, and, caring much more about 
 partners than politics, would have elected him one of 
 the reigning beaux of the time, if he had pleased. 
 Their charms, however, served only to remind him of 
 others to him far more charming, and to make his con- 
 stant heart grieve the more for his Constance. In 
 spite of Clara's remonstrances, therefore, he was too 
 often to be seen standing alone before statues, pictures, 
 or flowers, or in corners, looking very handsome, pic- 
 turesque, abstracted, and, as she declared, " Byronic," 
 and remembering his social duties only now and 
 then, when he beheld some plain damsel or noteless 
 dame in distress, and, constituting himself a volunteei 
 member of the Humane Society, pressed forward to her 
 relief, walked a quadrille with her, fed her, or found 
 her coach for her, according to her need. 
 
 How ; ' weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable," did the 
 scenes of gayety, so-called, appear to his saddened eyes 
 bedimmed with cataracts of tears unshed. He stood 
 among them alone in spirit, often wondering sadly by 
 himself what others found there to make them all so 
 merry. Often and often while people at his side were 
 telling one another, in apparent ecstasy, " How de- 
 lightful !" it all was, he could have found it in his
 
 214 HERMAN. 
 
 heart to groan, " Lover and Mend thou hast taken 
 from me !" 
 
 At these times, it was hardest for him to forget how, 
 one short year before, indifferent as he was in gei> 
 eral to what is generally termed society, an invitation 
 to any entertainment where Constance might be, had 
 been to him as a ticket of admission to Paradise ; how 
 he had thought 4 of it by day and dreamed of it by 
 night, with more and more rapture, hour by hour, as 
 the appointed time for it drew nearer ; how he had 
 hurried to it and arrived at it, in spite of all his reso- 
 lutions, the earliest of all the guests ; how the whole 
 house had seemed lighted up with her coming pres- 
 ence far more than with gas or chandelier ; and, then, 
 how she had slowly, grandly, entered and smiled on 
 him, and glorified the place. 
 
 In his vacuity and ennui, he for the first time 
 found out, by contrast, how very happy he had been 
 while he had fancied himself merely looking forward 
 to happiness, in his fulness of hope. Fulness of frui- 
 tion, the infinite soul of man is scarcely intended to 
 find upon this finite earth. Half the happiness in 
 which sanguine Youth is so rich, is raised by a mort- 
 gage which Hope takes on the expected and usually 
 much over-rated happiness of Manhood. Manhood, 
 hence, often finds himself a bankrupt therein. Hope 
 but lately had been promising Herman successful love, 
 fame, and that he should soon greatly and acceptably 
 serve his country. His love, no matter ! His patriot- 
 ism had called down upon him the reproach of treason 
 to his country. .His eloquence was already becoming 
 famous ; but its effects were accounted his infamy ; 
 and he read each of its successive triumphs chiefly in 
 the averted eyes and deeper darkening round him of
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 215 
 
 the " old familiar faces." If his brother and sister 
 could have guessed half of the almost girlish suifering 
 on these occasions of the still too soft and sensitive 
 heart, which the disappointed, wronged, and slandered 
 young lover and patriot hid so bravely under his com- 
 posed and commanding exterior, they would have 
 spared him, and entreated him to spare himself. It 
 was quite as well for him, therefore, that they could 
 not. 
 
 Let no one ask for greatness, who is not ready to 
 endure, great agonies. Groans, self-stifled, are the na- 
 tive air of Manhood and Heroism, harsh, but whole- 
 some, like the biting, bracing northwest wind. When 
 the wind sets in that quarter, oh man, if you be a man, 
 and if the errand which calls you out to face it be a 
 good one, set your teeth, breast it, and breathe it. If 
 you were puny, cold-blooded, and sluggish, it might 
 chill you, and kill you ; but, being strong and active, 
 it will make you only the stronger. By and by it will 
 cease, and you will glow after it, as with a generous 
 fire in your veins. Let this smooth, round world be- 
 times show you the hollow inside of it. You will be 
 the less likely to attribute too much weight to it here- 
 after. It is an ugly sight ; and you may feel for years 
 afterwards as if the ground was mined beneath your 
 feet. "What of that, if it leads you to make the greater 
 haste to plant them firmly on the Rock of Ages ? 
 For years afterwards, you may feel as if there was no 
 earthly stay that might not in a moment, without a 
 moment's warning, give way and crumble from you. 
 Your insecurity will be your safety, if it drives you to 
 cling to the Cross. 
 
 Further : average undisciplined human nature is a 
 looking-glass for average undisciplined human nature.
 
 216 HERMAN. 
 
 Just as your neighbours are treating you, you in their 
 place, mortifying as it is to acknowledge it, would pro- 
 bably have treated them in yours. Unless you are 
 very disinterested or very shamefully selfish, you 
 would rather of the two, that they should show you 
 how such conduct looks in them, than that they should 
 see how it looked in you. They are treating you as 
 you in their place would probably have treated them, 
 without this lesson, but as, after this lesson, you can 
 never henceforward treat any honest man. After 
 this lesson, you can never assist in thus laying under the 
 ban any person who may, for aught you know, be 
 acting faithfully and uprightly upon perfectly consci- 
 entious convictions, however they may differ from 
 your own convictions conscientiously and cautiously 
 arrived at, or your opinions hastily and ignorantly 
 taken up. 
 
 Furthermore, my reader, if you are old, .you may 
 know the truth of what I am about to say even better 
 than I do ; but if you are young, and your youth is 
 innocently joyous, rejoice in your youth, and thank 
 God that you can ; and, if it is troubled and its trou- 
 bles are of your own foolish making, the best counsel 
 that can be given you is, to unmake them again as fast 
 as you may. But if it is not so, if, honestly desiring 
 to be happy, you cannot find the way, if you are al- 
 ready discovering, like Herman, that your youth, which 
 your childhood falsely fancied to be a pleasure-ground, 
 is in reality doomed to be a school, and a harder one 
 than your childhood ever entered, if you feel it as 
 bitter irony when those, who are old enough to know 
 better, congratulate you in poetry or prose upon your 
 youth as such, and inform you that, by reason of it,
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. 217 
 
 you must needs be mysteriously and incomparably 
 happy, and see everything about you flushed with the 
 magic, rosy hues of joy and hope, if, while your con- 
 temporaries seem to prove such sapient sayings true, 
 by rejoicings which you can hardly understand, and 
 know not how to share, you feel yourself lonely and 
 left out, if the world cannot satisfy you while you 
 do not yet find in yourself the strength to reach hea- 
 ven, then take heed to yourself. Much is given to 
 you, much discipline, much opportunity of winning 
 through that discipline much good to yourself, per- 
 haps to your fellow-beings ; much is probably to bo 
 required of you. 
 
 Take courage. Be you sure of this : God has some 
 good gift in His hand for every one of His faith- 
 ful servants. If your turn to receive yours has not 
 yet come, by no means go away from Him, nor mur- 
 mur, but wait patiently and trustfully till it does. 
 Many a garden that, under a cold sky, has no straw- 
 berries in June, will have peaches in August, or grapes 
 in October. Watch and pray. Have fortitude and 
 faith. Earthen-ware and glass are handled gingerly. 
 Gold and diamonds are rubbed hard and sharply cut, 
 to make them shine. Neither the glass nor the dia- 
 mond knows why. He who has you in hand knows 
 best how you ought to be treated, in order to make the 
 most of you. A youth of struggles is the not uncom- 
 mon prelude to a manhood of power. Wrestle with 
 the adversary in what form soever he comes, in the 
 name of the Lord. Conquer a peace. Wrestling 
 will make you strong. From your fasts and vigils 
 and seemingly-unheard prayers, you may yet be led 
 forth at length, a mighty and thrice-blessed champion 
 
 10
 
 218 HERMAN. 
 
 before God and man, with a voice as of an angel say- 
 ing in your ears, " When first thy prayer went forth, 
 I was sent towards tliee ;" or if it be not before God 
 and man that you are led forth, but before God and His 
 angels only, to some service that, like the kingdom 
 of God, " cometh not with observation," does the 
 soldier who fights victoriously before the King and 
 His ,lords, afflict himself because there are no peasants 
 to look on ?
 
 THE LADYS PRIVILEGE. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE LADY'S PRIVILEGE. 
 
 ' She spoke with passion, after pause, ' And were it wisely done, 
 If we, who cannot gaze above, should walk the earth alone ? 
 If we, whose virtue is so weak, should have a will so strong, 
 And stand blind on the rocks, to choose the right path from the 
 
 wrong ? 
 
 Ay sooth, we feel too strong in weal to need thee on that road, 
 But woe being come, the soul is dumb that crieth not on God." 
 THE LAY OF THE BKOWN KOSARY. 
 
 CONSTANCE, in the meanwhile, had been beginning 
 to find out, to her utter dismay, how fearfully she had 
 trifled with her happiness. 
 
 Fancy and Chance combine to cheat many and 
 many a girl who sits in a drawing-room, as a fortune- 
 teller cheats a girl who stands in a kitchen. The for- 
 tune-teller says in the kitchen, " On such a day, in 
 such a street, you shall meet a nobleman, who does noi 
 yet know his parentage. He will offer himself to you. 
 You shall marry him, after which all will be revealed. 
 You may know him by his wearing two roses, one 
 white one and one red one, at his button-hbie." 
 
 In due time, she sends forth a neighbouring grocer, 
 enamoured of the maiden, with the decoration specified ; 
 and the girl, beholding, says to herself, " There are the 
 roses ! Here is the nobleman." 
 
 Fancy, in like manner, foretells in the drawing-room, 
 to the maiden who sits there, " You shall soon -meet a 
 man, handsome and rich, [usually, but with variations
 
 220 HERMAN. 
 
 to suit the taste of various maidens,] kind and excel- 
 lent. Him you shall marry ; and he shall prove to be 
 all that your heart can desire." 
 
 Chance puts in the damsel's way a rich and hand- 
 some suitor ; and, seeing the wealth and the beauty, 
 the damsel confidently says to herself, " There are the 
 wealth and the beauty ; here are the kindness and the 
 excellence !" 
 
 As we have seen, the red roses by which Constance 
 had been expecting to recognise her mate were genius 
 and heroism. He had them, sure enough ; but they 
 were out of her sight, snugly buttoned up in his bo- 
 som ; and thus it happened, that when her heart knew 
 him, and, like a spiritual table, softly rapped and 
 tapped, " This is certainly he !" her brain, not always 
 the truest part of a mortal, doubted, and she was 
 wholly unprepared for the unaccountable pain which 
 she felt in turning from him. She thought that it 
 would and must soon cease ; but, as sometimes when a 
 nerve has been wounded, the pain only grew and 
 grew. 
 
 Under the influence of one of those almost irresisti- 
 ble, and perhaps inexplicable unless demoniac, impulses, 
 such as make a child in a passion tear up its garden 
 or dash in pieces its favorite playthings, in spite of a 
 lurking suspicion that it is pretty sure to be very sorry 
 afterwards, she had hurried through the complete 
 breaking oif of their intercourse. Mr. and Mrs. Van 
 Rooselandt, who had already stayed at the Revere a 
 week longer than they intended, for her pleasure, wil- 
 lingly left Boston with her as soon as their trunks 
 could be packed, and, within a week after their return 
 to New York, provided her with a safe escort to Bal- 
 timore.
 
 THE LADY'S PRIVILEGE. 221 
 
 A slight feverish attack followed close upon the 
 fatigue and excitement of the time, and served further 
 to confuse her recollections of her parting interview 
 with her lover. Even if she had been willing to return 
 to it, dwell upon it, and consider in cool blood her own 
 part in it, she would from the very first have had much 
 difficulty in recalling it with any distinctness ; and 
 weeks and months passed, further effacing the record, 
 before she was willing. She could not, when at last 
 she tried to do so, recollect how decided and harsh her 
 rejection of Herman had been, nor how impossible she 
 had made it for him to renew his suit. Accustomed 
 as she had been to unbounded servility on the part of 
 her declared admirers, his silence at times appeared to 
 her irritated and self-torturing pride a proof that the 
 renunciation had been as much his as hers ; and it was 
 gall and worm wood to her to be forced by suffering 
 to acknowledge to herself, that she could suffer for the 
 sake of one not only, as she thought, unworthy of her, 
 but indifferent to her. 
 
 " Why," she would say to herself, " did Nature 
 make me no stronger or no weaker ? strong enough to 
 renounce him, too weak to forget ? strong enough to 
 transfix my own heart, too weak to draw the weapon 
 out again?" 
 
 For some time after her recovery, in other respects, 
 from her illness, her loss of color, appetite, and spirits, 
 continued so apparent, that her aunt, Mrs. Ronaldson 
 of Baltimore, at whose house she was, became quite 
 distressed and alarmed about her. She conferred with 
 the physician, who had attended her niece. He only 
 laughed, shook his head, and declared that he " could 
 discover no vestige of a sick-room obstacle to her being 
 as fat and rosy as any dairy-maid ; but that belles
 
 222 HERMAN. 
 
 would sometimes have their ball-room difficulties ; and 
 those an old pill-porter like himself could hardly be 
 expected to understand or alleviate." 
 
 Mrs. Ronaldson was a most tender and warm- 
 hearted woman, and would gladly have done for Con- 
 stance anything that sympathy and kindness could do, 
 if she could only have found out what to do, or what 
 the matter was. She dared not question the repellant 
 sufferer ; but she ventured to write a pleasant note to 
 Mrs. Yan Kooselandt, begging she would tell her 
 whether Constance had made any conquests while 
 under her care; as she [Mrs. Ronaldson] naturally 
 felt great interest in her successes ; and as that young 
 lady was always too modest to give any account of 
 them herself. 
 
 Mrs. Van Rooselandt deposed, by return of post, 
 that Miss Aspenwall was rather quiet and domestic 
 while in Boston, and apparently little interested in 
 general society. She became well acquainted there 
 with a very agreeable family of unmarried orphans, 
 named Arden, and passed much of her time with them 
 enfamille. But the eldest of the two brothers, though 
 the finest young man in the world, was a confirmed 
 bachelor, whom no one would think any more likely 
 to marry than the man in the moon, and a little too 
 un romantic and given to raillery and satire, too, she 
 thought, to be likely to suit Miss Aspenwall's taste ; 
 and the younger, Mr. Herman Arden, was not only 
 still quite a boy, but had behaved very sadly and dis- 
 graced himself at some place of public entertainment, 
 she regretted to hear, just before they left Boston. 
 She could not tell precisely how it was, for she was 
 very much occupied in looking at some exquisite point- 
 , at Mudge's, when she heard some ladies speak-
 
 THE KNIGHT FASTS. ' , 223 
 
 ing of it ; but she was really very sorry that anything 
 of the sort should have happened ; for he was a gen- 
 teel, pretty little youth, and very attentive to herself, 
 and had always, in her presence, conducted himself in 
 a perfectly gentlemanly manner. She thought Miss 
 Arden must have been the chief attraction to her 
 charge. In fact, if she was called upon to tell the 
 whole truth, she feared that Miss Aspenwall was her- 
 self too little impressible to give any man the least en- 
 couragement to fall in love with her, though no doubt 
 she could not fail to be universally admired wherever 
 she went. The few young men, who were worth hav- 
 ing, were all so spoiled in these flirting days ! They 
 expected the young ladies to meet them at least a 
 qirarter of the way ! It was a pity ; but she did not 
 know what could be done for so very dignified a per- 
 son as their young friend, unless they could induce Sir 
 Charles Grandison or Thaddeus of Warsaw to come to 
 life for her benefit. 
 
 (Whisper from behind the scenes : Mrs. Van Roose- 
 landt had developed a fine natural talent for match- 
 making in the way of her duty, in successively and 
 successfully disposing of six daughters of her own to 
 six sons, simpletons, ignoramuses, horse-jockeys, and 
 others, of men of fortune.* Like the celebrated 
 British surgeon, who, after he retired from business, 
 used to ride down to town now and then, and cut off a 
 leg or an arm or two by way of amusement, this tri- 
 
 * It may be as well explicitly to state here, in order to avoid nil 
 possible risk of misconstruction, that men of fortune sometimes have 
 sons of genuine merit. Some of the sons-in-law of Mrs. Van Roose- 
 landt, for instance, had brothers who were tine fellows. But these 
 tine fellows were not for the Misses Van Rooselandt. Their devoted 
 parent did the best she could for them. Who could do more ? One 
 must not mind triiles in. so important a matter as matrimony.
 
 224 HERMAN. 
 
 umphant lady, instead of resting lazily beneath her 
 laurels, now took a disinterested pride and pleasure in 
 acting as show -woman to any beauty, heiress, or 
 stylish girl " of family," so-called, whom she could 
 catch, and in speedily making her over to somebody 
 who had a fine gilded cage to put her into. For the 
 first time in her life, she had now had a peerless beauty 
 and respectable heiress, in one individual, in her hands 
 for the greater part of three months, utterly in vain. 
 With this most remarkable bait on her experienced 
 hook, and with as fine fish in the sea as ever were 
 caught, she had not only caught nothing except a Tar- 
 tar, but had not even to her knowledge had so much as 
 a nibble. She may .therefore be excused if, though as 
 usual in the most gracious state of mind towards the 
 fashionable world in general, Mrs. Ronaldson included, 
 she was doubly tniffy where Mrs. Ronaldson's niece 
 was concerned ; first, because Constance had given her- 
 self airs towards her ; secondly, because Constance had 
 given herself airs towards other people. She might 
 have found it hard enough to pardon Constance's dig- 
 nity. Anybody in her situation might have found it 
 hard enough to pardon Constance's haughtiness, which, 
 if the latter had been ten years younger, would have 
 been called by its proper name, naughtiness.) 
 
 Thus, then, Mrs. Ronaldson's compassion was left in 
 the dark. Acting on the scanty hint of the doctor, how 
 ever, in the spirit of the undoubted originator of homoe- 
 opathy, the wise man, in the fine old English ballad, 
 who, having "jumped into a bramble -bush and 
 scratched out both his eyes," on perceiving his loss, at 
 once, with a presence of mind and resource never to be 
 too much commended nor faithfully imitated, and 
 " with all his might and main, jumped into another
 
 THE LADY'S PRIVILEGE. 225 
 
 bush and scratched them in again," she argued that 
 what a ball might cause, a ball might cure, and gave 
 her niece one immediately, at a venture, as a farrier 
 might a bolus to an indisposed cow. Greatly to her 
 satisfaction, her patient seemed not ill-disposed to her 
 remedy ; and from that time the good, simple-hearted 
 matron, a Roman Catholic, and at heart a devotee, 
 was indefatigable in going out and inviting in, making 
 parties for the theatre and the opera, and accom- 
 panying Constance to see every sight and hear every 
 sound, which she thought could possibly give her 
 pleasure. 
 
 Constance seemed eager for every novelty or ex- 
 citement offered her ; and if, after trying each, she 
 always parried every chance inquiry as to whether 
 she had enjoyed herself, she was prepared, and an- 
 swered so adroitly, that her evasions passed unnoticed. 
 Her aunt's anxieties, therefore, were soon at rest. If 
 the young beauty had ever really had anything resting 
 upon her mind, it must, she thought, have been some 
 mere girlish trifle, and havr, blown away before she 
 could take such interest m ^r.ieties ; and the late hours 
 which Constance now kept v/ere quite sufficient to ex- 
 plain her continuing somewhat pale, and sometimes 
 appearing at her light breakfast with swollen eyes. 
 Thus she had her own way, and her grief to herself, to 
 the full. 
 
 Her nature had its very good side ; though hitherto 
 we have been seeing only the bad ; partly because she 
 was showing it particularly at the time when our story 
 begins, and partly because, in spite of our own (Mr. 
 Foxton's and his readers') unusual sweetness of dispo- 
 sition, we could not help, all of us, North, South, 
 East, and West, being a good deal out of patience 
 10*
 
 226 HEBMAN. 
 
 with her for her suicidal folly, and her ill-treatment of 
 our hero. A soul, higher and deeper than she knew, 
 had lain' slumbering and wasting within her ; and now, 
 at the voice of her first womanly sorrow, it woke up, 
 lifted its hollow eyes, and cried day and night within 
 her, with a dreary cry, which her compressed imperial 
 lips would not yet suffer to pass through them, " I am 
 hungry ! I am hungry !" And when she would have fed it 
 with the best shehad, luxury, admiration, dissipation, 
 and it rejected them all, she looked into her world, and it 
 was empty ; while the cry arose again yet louder and 
 more drearily, until it seemed to her that she should go 
 mad, " I am hungry ! I am hungry, hungry, hungry ! 
 Feed me, or I shall die ! I am hungry, oh, my God !" 
 And He who giveth food to the beasts and the young 
 ravens which cry, we may believe, did not disregard the 
 doleful and desperate voice, even though uplifted in re- 
 pining misery rather than in supplication, for the poor 
 wasted soul was fed with such nourishment as it would 
 receive, if not at first with a rich and plenteous meal. 
 Wise human beings do not treat the starving so ^ and 
 the prodigal son must often stoop to eat his husks, be- 
 fore he makes his way home to the full feast of wel- 
 come and the fatted calf.
 
 THE ARMORY. 227 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE ARMORY. 
 
 "You think justly, feel rightly, yes, but your work. Produce it. 
 Men of wealth, men of talent, men of leisure, what are you doing in 
 God's world for God ?" F. W. ROBERTSON. 
 
 "And long it was not after, when I was confirmed in this opinion: 
 that he who would not be frustrate of his hope to write well hereafter 
 in laudable things, ought himself to be a true poem; that is, a com- 
 position and pattern of the best and honorablest things, not presu- 
 ming to sing high praises of heroic men, * * * unless he have in 
 himself the experience and practice of all that which is praiseworthy." 
 
 MILTON. 
 
 To LIVE is a verb which implies to do, as well as to 
 be and to suffer. What was Herman doing all this 
 time ? Nothing but making speeches, when nobody, 
 in polite parlance, wanted to hear him, and going to 
 parties where nobody wanted to see him ? A little. 
 Perhaps we may get an inkling of the nature of his 
 other occupations, by placing ourselves in imagination 
 at the key -hole of the door of Clara's dining-room, 
 if we can, in doing so, escape the detection of the unim- 
 aginative Patrick, the sentinel spirit who haunts the 
 passage, and by overhearing one or two conversations 
 therein. 
 
 Not long after Herman's return to Boston, Clara, 
 having been caught out in a shower in a cold Novem- 
 ber afternoon, sat drying her little boots at a cozy little 
 fire in the grate of the cheerful apartment above-men- 
 tioned. Through the open door, she had a vision of 
 Herman driving before him, from the library to his
 
 228 HERMAN. 
 
 chamber, a Gummage, loaded to the chin with books, 
 which Herman was guarding from a fall, with his 
 wary arms stretched out on each side of that patient 
 beast of burden. Thereupon Miss Clara, being in want 
 of a little society and chat, called out, " What ! More 
 books ? Do you think there is any more room left in 
 your head ?" 
 
 " Yes. I'll come down again in a moment," said 
 he, and vanished, but presently returned, and, ranging 
 a second pair of very unexceptionable boots beside 
 hers on the fender, added, " I am going to study medi- 
 cine." 
 
 " Another profession, besides more arts and sciences 
 than I can count on my fingers ? Why, you have got 
 one more than you know what to do with, have not 
 you? already. I shall have to call you Mr. Richard 
 Carstone." 
 
 " You would have to call me Mrs. Pardiggle, I fear, 
 if I did not. I want a pied-d-terre among the poor, 
 an interest in common with them, that I may have 
 the right to enter into their houses, and the power to 
 enter into their feelings. It is their interest to be well, 
 and when it is mine to make them so, we shall have a 
 bond of sympathy at once." 
 
 " But if you want another profession in order to do 
 good, why not be a clergyman ?" 
 
 " Frankly, in the first place, because I should not 
 like it ; in the second, because, not liking it, I see at a 
 glance dozens of good reasons why I should not do it. 
 A warrior, before he enters the field, should take care, 
 if a choice is left him, to choose armor that fits him. 
 Jt should not encumber him, nor, on the other hand, 
 cramp him unnecessarily. The gown is too large for 
 me. It needs a man mighty } both morally and intel-
 
 THE ARMORY. 229 
 
 lectually, if riot physically, too, in these days, to fill it 
 worthily. I should be lost in it." 
 
 " Indeed, I do not see why you should," said Clara, 
 who would have likod to see him in it, more than she 
 ever said ; " I think you do yourself great injustice." 
 
 " "Well, but then it would pinch me here and 
 there intolerably. I want to be a man amongst men. 
 A clergyman is expected to be almost as much tied'up 
 in conventionalisms as -a woman ; and other men treat 
 him as they treat a woman. They are on their guard. 
 They are ashamed to show before women and clergy- 
 men how they are not ashamed to talk and act before 
 the Maker of women and clergymen. They exhibit 
 their souls to their pastor, as they do their bodies, 
 chiefly in their Sunday clothes. They seem to him 
 excellent and moral persons. He cannot but believe 
 that the evil reports, which they are now and then can- 
 did enough to bring him about one another, are misun- 
 derstandings unintentionally exaggerated. Then he 
 must not say his say about popular and public sins, 
 unless his congregation please ; or, if he does, he 
 must often be accused, and he may often fear justly 
 accused, of alienating them from Religion by aliena- 
 ting them from himself, because they consider him the 
 speaking-tube of Religion. His pocket, too, is in the 
 power of his principles ; and this may lead to the sus- 
 picion, at least, that his principles are in the power of 
 his pocket." 
 
 " But you are independent." 
 
 " In fortune, yes ; I have that advantage over 
 most of the clergy ; in mind, I doubt. We are all of 
 us, except the very strongest, obliging enough to take 
 the characters that the opinion of others assigns us. 
 For instance, tell a man that he has lost his temper,
 
 230 HERMAN. 
 
 and he generally does lose his temper. Tell a girl 
 that she blushes, and she blushes. These are experi- 
 ments, of course, that you and I should not try; but 
 we have both of us probably enjoyed the privilege of 
 seeing or feeling them, sooner or later. Now, society 
 is to an unfortunately large extent agreed that parsons 
 are of necessity prigs. Unless they are men of much 
 independence of mind, that is enough to make them 
 prigs. It would make me a prig. If they escape the 
 danger of priggish-ness, they are likely to run into that 
 of boorishness or foppishness. They are called upon 
 ' to define their position ' oftener than the member 
 from Bunkum. In short, it must be very hard for 
 them to be manly, dignified, genial, simple, and self- 
 forgetful. Besides, many and many a man has gone 
 into the pulpit against his inclination, from a mistaken 
 sense of duty to that Providence, which manifestly 
 moulded him to fill a different niche, who might have 
 done much more good, or at all events less harm, at a 
 carpenter's bench." 
 
 " Do you really think so ?" 
 
 " I really do. Many a one, who might have been a 
 very worthy Christian, healthful, cheerful, and useful, 
 in the place for which his taste and nature fitted him, 
 making his neighbours like his motives the better 
 because they liked him so well, has been a dull and 
 tedious preacher, making religion seem a mere weari- 
 ness ; or, still worse, a superstitious preacher, helping 
 to make the Word of God of none effect through his 
 traditions ; or an unsound, rash, speculating preacher, 
 infecting parish after parish with his own crude vaga- 
 ries. "We are told that the kingdom of heaven is like 
 yeast in flour, which steals through it all, particle by 
 particle, until it is throughout, in every part, raised
 
 THE ARMORY. 231 
 
 and lightened. Christianity, so at least it appears to 
 me, was surely intended to elevate, quicken, and 
 hallow the action of the human mind, in all lawful 
 departments of its action, art, science, literature, 
 trade, manufactures, &c., not to drive conscien- 
 tious men en masse out of all other departments into 
 one. Among these I must think that a strong prefer- 
 ence in us for any one, is often an indication of some 
 peculiar power to succeed in that one, and therefore, 
 other things being equal, of the will of Providence 
 that we should pursue that one." 
 
 A third pair of boots, which had been heard gradu- 
 ally approaching through the passage and room, 
 was now added to the row on the fender, supply- 
 ing the positive degree of comparison, small, to the 
 smaller, and smallest, already perched basking there, 
 like four black-birds on a fence in the sun ; as Ed ward, 
 lazily throwing himself back in his father's old arm- 
 chair, ejaculated, " What reason the community has 
 to be thankful, that a merciful Providence wasn't 
 pleased to endow me with a strong preference for pick- 
 ing pockets ! I should hold myself bound in conscience 
 to devote myself to it immediately, that it might hence- 
 forward be conducted on the highest principles." 
 
 " Try it, and welcome," said Clara, laughing ; "'I'll 
 pay for all you steal. * You're very clever, sir,' as 
 poor Miss Tuangh said, when we were little and she 
 came to try to give us lessons on the guitar ; ' but you 
 want entoosms? r 
 
 Edward yawned, poked the fire, leaned back again 
 in his chair, &nd-^-twiddled Clara's golden-beaded pur- 
 ple silk purse between the finger and thumb of one 
 hand, and threw up and caught Herman's black pocket- 
 book with the other, concluding the performance by
 
 232 HEKMAN. 
 
 depositing them in his opposition waistcoat-pockets, 
 and saying in a languid tone, "My dear Herman, 
 you can write a draft on Miss Arden, to send to your 
 tailor." 
 
 " You have got the laugh against her, to be sure," 
 said Herman ; " but against me you have not. Inno- 
 cent occupations were what I was speaking of." 
 
 " I have always been impressed with the belief, in 
 the society of the good," rejoined Edward, " that no 
 occupations were innocent, theoretically considered, 
 for which I had a vocation. I thought you said use- 
 ful. Usefulness is, in the judgment of a practical 
 man, a far higher virtue than innocence ; and this pur- 
 suit of pocket-picking is in the highest degree a profita- 
 ble occupation, to the pickpocket. Let us see." He 
 pulled out again the purse and the pocket-book. He 
 slipped together the gold rings of the former, and ex- 
 plored its recesses with one long, white middle -finger. 
 " In Clara's, an eagle at this end ; and in this, four sil- 
 ver quarters of a dollar, and four three-cent pieces, 
 tokens of her guileless disposition, which she took in 
 change, I would wager my head, in full faith that they 
 were four gold dollars. Herman's ;" he unclasped it, 
 " better still ; a lead-pencil, inspired, no doubt, a 
 toothpick, adapted to be used as a harmless provocative 
 in the intervals of inspiration, and oh, great Apollo ! 
 look at the poetry ! What a bargain I shall drive with 
 Putnam ! And now that I've got the pencil, I can 
 write nobody knows how much more with it, and 
 sell it when I've done as a literary relic, secondary 
 only in importance to Dr. Goldsmith's wig. But, in 
 the first place, let me see whether these effusions can 
 be read; and, in the second place, let me see whether 
 they can be understood. May I ?"
 
 THE ARMOKY. 233 
 
 " ' Try it,' as Clara said ; I'll make you welcome to 
 nil you will make out. ' You're very clever, sir,' &c." 
 " It does look a little Pindaric, to be sure. How- 
 ever, 
 
 " ' As home to the homesick, 
 
 As rest to the weary, 
 As land to the shipwrecked, 
 As death to despair !' 
 
 Rhythm unexceptionable; but what got the rhyme? 
 It must have fallen out with itself when I tossed up 
 the pocket-book. Patrick will pick it up before 
 breakfast to-morrow morning, perhaps, when he sweeps 
 
 the carpet. 
 
 " 'Aurora, Musis arnica.' 
 
 I have noticed that he is often tuneful at such sea- 
 sons, inspired, I suppose, by the soft cadence of the 
 straws in his broom, just as our other household min- 
 strel is, by the measured, murmurous rustle of the 
 reeds around Castalia's fountain. The poetical pocket- 
 book proceeds : 
 
 " ' The turf grows smooth and green once more, 
 
 From whence the tree was torn; 
 But doth the summer shade therefore, 
 And song of birds, return ?' 
 
 A little want of logical sequence observable, perhaps ; 
 but, to make amends for it, we find here an interesting 
 token of the progress of the art of poesy, in the super- 
 inducement of rhyme, imperfect, indeed, and rude as 
 yet, but full of promise for the future. The awakening 
 of a spirit of scientific inquiry is also to be remarked, 
 in the last two lines. Lest the poet himself should 
 not possess sylvan information sufficient to set at rest 
 the anxious doubt, which he excites in the minds of his
 
 234 HERMAN. 
 
 readers, I will state in a little annotation on the mar- 
 gin, that if the tree whose untimely deracination he 
 deploreth was an oak, a pine will probably spring up 
 in its room, or, if it was a pine, an oak. Thus its 
 place will be refilled, if not by one thing, by another ; 
 and the soil meanwhile gets 'the benefit of a rotation of 
 crops." 
 
 " Thank you for a happy idea," said Herman. 
 
 " You are extremely welcome. To continue : 
 
 " ' The twittering nests 'mid whispering leaves, 
 
 The boughs, return no more; 
 And time may heal the heart that grieves, 
 But scarce its bliss restore.' " 
 
 Herman's cheeks glowed under this infliction, like 
 those of an Indian at the stake ; but he bore it like 
 one. Clara pitied him, and came to the rescue. 
 
 " Come, Ned," said she, " I want the pocket- 
 book." 
 
 " What will you give me for it ? Remember, I 
 have scarcely as yet begun my examination of it. We 
 are, as it were, selling and buying an unexplored tract 
 in California. You must pay me a handsome pre- 
 mium on its possibilities." 
 
 " A three-cent piece ? A quarter of a dollar ? The 
 eagle ?" 
 
 " No ; I am above mercenary considerations ; and 
 besides, I've got them already." 
 
 " Extortioner ! What will you have, then ? a tune 
 on the piano ?" 
 
 "Yes; but I can always get that gratis. Who 
 thinks of paying for the air he breathes? I retort 
 your reproach. Who but an extortioner would think 
 of making me pay for the air I hear ? Will you tell 
 me what you two had been discussing before I 
 came in ?"
 
 THE ARMORY. 235 
 
 u If you will let Herman have the pocket-book." 
 
 " And go on with the discussion, just as if I were 
 not here ?" 
 
 " If you will not interrupt and make fun of us, if 
 you will let me have the purse." 
 
 " There then. Now then." 
 
 " Herman was abusing the clerical profession." 
 
 " Yery good. Let us hear. All fair in war. They 
 abuse us to their hearts' content, every Sunday. Why 
 shouldn't we take our revenge on a week-day ?" 
 
 " I was abusing, not the members of the profession, 
 but the inconveniences and restrictions of it. Clara 
 was asking rne why I did not enter it." 
 
 " Clara, I shall be obliged to lock you up. It would 
 never do, in the world, for a fellow of his temper- 
 ament !" 
 
 " And I was telling her that I did not incline to do 
 so, and why, not inclining, I did not see that I ought. 
 I don't know whereabout we were, exactly, when we 
 left off; but I'll begin again here, at any rate. A good 
 example, or I am much mistaken, often loses half its 
 effect by being set by a person whose setting it is taken 
 as quite a matter of course, and all in the way of his 
 business. There seems to have been a convenient divi- 
 sion of labor between many congregations and their 
 pastors, like that between many wives and their hus- 
 bands. ' Be good for us,' virtually but not virtuously, 
 says the congregation, 'and we'll be rich for you.' 
 Thus the good example and precepts of their clergy- 
 men are too apt to look like parts of financial transac- 
 tions, to the very men whose minds most need to be 
 turned, by his precepts and example, from their too ex- 
 clusive devotion to financial transactions. They think 
 he is good for s< > much a year, just as they are busy for so
 
 236 HERMAN. 
 
 much a year. You will ask me, I dare say, now, what 
 reason I have t:> take it for granted, that I am going to 
 set a good example at all, in orders or out."- 
 
 " No, I shan't," said Edward. " All precedent 
 confirms the depressing idea. But I must ask you 
 how you can answer it to your conscience, that you 
 persist in setting the example to a person of so persist- 
 ent unimprovableness as myself. Have you no fear of 
 increasing my culpabilities by my opportunities ?" 
 
 " Not I. That's your affair. I can trust you to 
 take care of yourself. I suspect your worst sin is, pre- 
 tending to be sinful. A less tasteful kind of hypocrisy, 
 by the way, Mr. Ned, than the common kind. That 
 is said, you know, to be ' the homage which Vice pays 
 to Virtue :' but yours is the homage which Virtue pays 
 to Vice. However, I have no fear of hurting anybody 
 in that way, at least. I don't take it for granted, at 
 all, that I am going to set a good example ; but if I am 
 not, I have no right to go into the pulpit ; and if I am, 
 I believe that I need not go into the pulpit. I believe 
 that I, observe, I don't say everybody, but 7", can do 
 more good out of it than in it. The stampede of con- 
 scientious men, as a matter of course, into it, must be 
 attended, I think, with this great disadvantage, among 
 others ; if all conscientious men are to be expected to 
 go into the pulpit, the converse of the proposition will 
 be practically taken for granted : namely, men who 
 don't go into the pulpit are not to be expected to be con- 
 scientious. God makes the priest, as much as He makes 
 the poet. If the priesthood, no, I doubt whether that 
 word belongs to the new covenant ; it is obsolete, if 
 the ministry is a man's vocation, let him take it and 
 thank God, for it is the highest ; but, if I know my- 
 self, it is not mine. The church wants such God-
 
 THE ARMORY. 237 
 
 anointed leaders, G<. d knows, to till her highest places, 
 in these half-deistical, half-superstitious days ; but we 
 cannot all fill the highest places; and she wants 
 Christian laymen, too, ready to carry out fearlessly and 
 freely into practice, what her Christian preachers 
 preach, and to show, as her preachers cannot, how per- 
 ' feet soever their practice may be, that no such apology 
 as a black coat is needed for saying Christian, I don't 
 mean canting, words, and doing Christian deeds." 
 
 There was a pause ; and Clara filled it by saying, 
 " Herman was telling me, that he thought of studying 
 medicine." 
 
 "Was he?" said Edward. "I noticed in passing 
 something of a gap in my shelves. I supposed he had 
 run away with the contents, merely with the inten- 
 tion of filling up a corresponding space in his cours de 
 litterature universelle. Do you really mean to prac- 
 tise ?" 
 
 " If I can get a chance. Dr. Brodie tells me that 
 he can make me useful immediately, as a sort of half- 
 assistant among his poor patients." 
 
 " Shall you practise only among the poor ?" 
 
 " That's as it may prove hereafter. I shall go 
 where I'm wanted ; if the rich send for me, to the 
 rich ; if the poor, to the poor. If both, perhaps I shall 
 find it convenient to be a sort of medical Robin Hood, 
 and take from the one what I give to the other." 
 
 " How long have you thought of it ?" 
 
 " Ever since I saw the inflamed eyes of the poor 
 Indians, I believe. Ever since we came on a poor, 
 forsaken Sioux girl, on the prairies, I am sure. Didn't 
 I write ? No, I had no chance at that time to send a 
 letter. It was a very hard case. A pretty creature 
 she was, of sixteen or eighteen, and seemed, from her
 
 238 HEKMAN. 
 
 dress, to be a person of condition. She had on leggings 
 of fine scarlet cloth, richly ornamented, and was wrap- 
 ped in two superb buffalo robes, which were beautifully 
 embroidered with porcupines' quills, as were a pair of 
 new moccasins which she had on, besides. She was 
 lying beside a perfect encampment of the dead, of 
 dead-lodges, so-called. Mne Sioux were decomposing 
 in theirs, at a little distance, to her extreme ^'scom- 
 posure, one would have thought, lying in state in 
 their buffalo-skins, with their saddles, spears, camp- 
 kettles, and accoutrements, piled around them. They 
 had all died of the chole'ra ; and her savage friends, 
 afraid to wait for her to follow their example, had paid 
 her the agreeable attention of laying her out before- 
 hand, with all these pretty things, I suppose, to recon- 
 cile her to the arrangement,- in the spirit of the 
 Frenchman, who promised to design for an elderly and 
 decrepit gentleman a monument so exquisite that it 
 would be enough to give one ' envie de mourir? Then 
 they had all run away and left her. She opened her 
 eyes and looked at us ; and I hope, that it was" some 
 comfort to her to see living faces around her as she 
 died. But I thought, then, how gladly I'd have given 
 all my knowledge, such as it was, for a little of 
 yours." 
 
 " You have never thought of practising law?" 
 
 " No, I don't believe I ever did much in earnest. 
 I liked the study, and had a vague notion of its being 
 a stepping-stone for me into public life," 
 
 " Which your Free-SoiUsm has knocked in the 
 head, hey 2 " 
 
 " I don't want an employment to show me only the 
 worst side of men ; I am getting cynical enough, in 
 spite of myself, without it, in all conscience. A man
 
 THE ABMOKY. 239 
 
 has no business to stand aside with his hands in his 
 pockets, abusing the world for being so bad, before he 
 has done anything in the world to make it better. 
 I want active, social, regular, benevolent, in a manner 
 compulsory, occupation. I feel myself strongly at- 
 tracted to your profession. What do you think of my 
 going into it, Ned ?" 
 
 Herman asked this question with some anxiety; 
 for Edward was thought, by those who knew him best, 
 to have a large stock of sound common-sense and saga- 
 city, which he generously put into a charity-fund, and 
 reserved it exclusively for the use of his neighbours. 
 Edward raised himself in his chair, sat judicially up- 
 right, and considered. 
 
 " Well, I believe it may be a very good plan, if you 
 follow it up in moderation. You're in magnificent 
 health now ;. but you must remember that you've pro- 
 bably inherited from your ahem ! parents, a nervous 
 system that mustn't be trifled with." 
 
 " Let my nervous system alone, you sir ; and don't 
 talk shop. I rather think, all that must have altered 
 since I was a child. At Cassei's they call me the 
 strongest man of my height and weight in Boston." 
 
 " No ! do they ? So far, so good. Then you have 
 only got to mind that you keep yourself so. It won't 
 do, for instance, for you to study from starlight to star- 
 light six days in the week, and sit up with sick emi- 
 grants six nights." 
 
 " I'll take care." 
 
 " If you will, I cannot see why you shouldn't do 
 very well. You're just the inexplicable sort of person 
 to like practising medicine ; and Clara and I are just 
 the inexplicable sort of. persons to like having you, 
 aren't we, my Psyche ? if we should ever be foolish
 
 240 HERMAN. 
 
 enough to get sick, which we don't mean to do on this 
 side of ninety. Your chemistry, Latin, and Greek, are 
 no bad stock in trade to begin with, nor your modern 
 languages, either, among foreigners. Pity the Erse 
 isn't among them ; but you might take a few lessons 
 of the golden-mouthed Gummage ! And it's no bad 
 thing for a poor, but practical, philanthropist, to have 
 some advice that people are ready to take, to give 
 away, beside all his money, which he needs for him- 
 self." 
 
 In Herman's opinion, he by no means needed all 
 his money for himself. By his father's will, he had 
 his lodging given him until he should marry ; and, by 
 his brother's and sister's will, all his other household 
 expenses. His yearly income was about three thou- 
 sand dollars. He had determined to make one-third 
 of this suffice him for clothes and pocket-money ; to in- 
 vest one-third to meet possible unexpected demands 
 upon him in the future ; and to bestow the rest in 
 charity. Of the latter, two hundred dollars were to go 
 annually to one of two missionaries, whom he had en- 
 gaged to go out to his Indian friends. 
 
 He had not forgotten them, but had made it his first 
 business on his return to find some vigorous, sensible, and 
 kindly young man,who had enough of the apostolic spirit 
 'to give his time and teaching to them zealously, in return 
 for a living. It fell out beyond his hopes that, by a very 
 happy chance or providence, his friend Dr. Lovel was 
 able to point out to him not one, but two, just such as 
 he wanted, young theological graduates and friends, 
 whose large frames, developed at the plough and 
 anvil, had proved unable to bear the change to the 
 sedentary life of the clergyman of a parish, and who 
 were on the point, to their great regret, of abandoning
 
 THE ARMORY 24:1 
 
 their profession for some more active and airy occupa- 
 tion. They were able and eager to teach their rude 
 
 / o 
 
 converts enough of farming and house-building to keep 
 them out of mischief through the week, and on a Sunday 
 to talk to them, simply, plainly, and devoutly, of God, 
 His Son, and His will, to administer reverently all holy 
 rites, and to do their best by precept and example to 
 build up in the hearts of our red neighbours a new lit- 
 tle chapel in the wide church of Christ. They were 
 already making their preparations to depart together 
 for the wilderness, with the alacrity of a pair of 
 Xaviers or John Eliots, Herman agreeing to provide 
 in part for the support of one of them, and Clara for 
 that of the other, for the present, until they should 
 have had time to settle, and provide for, themselves. 
 
 " You ought to be laying up something," continued 
 the young old bachelor ; " you'll want to be married 
 and settled by and by." 
 
 Herman said nothing to this, which Edward thought 
 a bad sign. Clara said, " Oh !" for Patrick had 
 lighted the gas, and revealed Mr. Flint, who must have 
 been sitting there in the dark behind them, and listen- 
 ing to their conversation, nobody knew how long. 
 Being discovered, he emitted a chuckle, half-propitia- 
 tory, half-congratulatory, and came forward rubbing 
 his hands with satisfaction at the success of his graceful 
 and agreeable trick. 
 
 "Found your front-door on the jar," said he, " and 
 slid in jest for to show ye how easy a burglar might: 
 Glad to hear a little profitable conversation. Doctor, 
 there was some sense in what you was a-sayin of. It's 
 time Herman, here was a-doin somethin. It don't 
 never pay for young fellers to be idle." 
 
 Edward, who did not gratefully appreciate either 
 11
 
 242 HERMAN. 
 
 his brother-in-law's pleasantry or his approbation, 
 bowed rather stiffly, presently said something of " a lit- 
 tle business to attend to above-stairs," and walked oft' 
 to the last number of "The Newcornes " and a cigar. 
 (He had once brought one into the parlour, when Mr. 
 Flint stayed too long, but only once. That was a joke, 
 which Mr. Flint in his turn did not appreciate ; for 
 tobacco made him sick ; and it drove him off; nor did 
 Clara. It was of no use for Edward to endeavour to 
 explain to her, as humbly as learnedly, that he perpe- 
 trated it only in conformity to the custom of the pol- 
 ished ancients, who always burned perfume before their 
 guests, when it was time for them to depart. She was 
 within an inch of being angry with him, nearer than 
 she had been since the days when they were contend- 
 ing rivals in the nursery for the attentions of "Nursey," 
 and she followed up the rebuke of her countenance, 
 
 " Severe in youthful beauty," 
 
 by a little speech to the effect, that it was the only nn- 
 gentlemanlike thing she had ever known him to do in 
 his life. Dr. Arden was speedily brought to repent- 
 ance, and never relapsed.) 
 
 " Charity's a good thing in its time an place, Her- 
 man," continued the voice of the charmer ; " but you're 
 young yet ; an I can tell ye it had ought to begin to 
 home, an be kep there, too, a consider'ble spell, afore 
 it's let out. You come down to my store jest as so m 
 as ye like, and fetch whatever you choose in your pus, 
 an I'll put ye in the way to double an thrible it. That's :i 
 fair offer, ain't it, Clary ? I've got a stool an de?k all 
 ready for ye ; an I an Steel want a young gent like yon, 
 that can read an write French an Spanish, an them lin- 
 goes, pretty bad jest now. You look out f< >r number one
 
 THE ARMORY. 243 
 
 in the fust place, get rich, an live all respectable an 
 comf table. Hold on to your money while ye want it, 
 and as long as ye can. When you're done with it, 't'll 
 do jest as much good as ever to other people. Jest you 
 make a will, an leave a lot on it, you know, to the 
 missionaries, or some divinity-school or benevolent in- 
 stitootion, to pay the insurance on your soul, you know. 
 That's the way I do business. That's my notion of 
 charity." 
 
 " But suppose, Mr. Flint, you should fail " . 
 
 " Good gracious, sir !" exclaimed Mr. Flint, starting 
 to his feet, " what do you mean ?" 
 
 " Why, not succeed in your business, not become 
 rich." 
 
 " Good gracious, sir ! I'll trouble you to be more 
 guarded in your expressions. I'm not generally nerv- 
 ous, but really ! The credit of a business man, an 
 honest man ! I hope your help isn't in the pantry. I 
 hope nobody heared." 
 
 " No, no. There's nobody there." 
 
 " If it isn't disagreeable, I'll shut the door." 
 
 " I'll shut it myself. I beg your pardon for using 
 so unlucky an expression." 
 
 " It was a very equivocal expression, Herman, I beg 
 leave to observe. Anything that suggests the idea of 
 insolvency! might bring a run upon me directly! 
 You'll be more prudent, though, in my office?" 
 
 " If I possibly can," said Herman, a little mali- 
 ciously, " if I decide on accepting your kind offer. But 
 suppose you should not succeed in your plans, not 
 become rich at all, or earn a good deal of money and 
 lose it before you died, without becoming bankrupt ?" 
 " Well, sir, I guess 'twouldn't be long afore I died, 
 anyhow. I'll trouble you to discontinoo the subject." 
 
 u Yes; but, Mr. Flint, suppose I fail,"
 
 HEKMAN. 
 
 " Nothing more likely, I should think, sir," inter- 
 rupted Mr. Flint, grinning rather wickedly. 
 
 " In the charitable plans, I mean, which you were 
 so good as to attribute to me. That would be other 
 people's loss, not mine, wouldn't it? Did you ever 
 know a man die of grief for the losses of his neighbours ? 
 Don't you think I should stand it ?" 
 
 Mr. Flint smiled again rather more amicably, and 
 agreed that there might be " some sense in that 'ere 
 voo ;" and Herman, whose well-bred conscience pricked 
 him a little for his pertinacity, thanked him so heartily 
 for his generous offers, that he completely mollified 
 him. Mr. Flint went on: 
 
 " Well, go on your own hook, and welcome ; but 
 whatever ye do, don't be poor. Keep clear o' that, 
 anyhow. It's about the wust thing in the world ; an 
 nobody knows how awful 'tis that hain't tried it. 
 There was my granmother. Poor old lady ! she died 
 to the poor-house. She took care o' me, and kep on 
 her limbs as long as she could ; but she got too old to 
 do any thin to support herself; and so they put her in 
 there, an bound me prentice to a dairy-farmer. Well, 
 I took on terribly about it, by myself, up in the barn- 
 chamber ; but I dursn't go near her for a month, for fear 
 o' the other boys pokin fun at me about havin a relative 
 in such a place ; but she took sick with lonesomeness 
 and what-not ; an when I heared o' that, I jest cut an 
 run there. But her intellect was a good deal affected ; 
 an when she see me, an knoo 'twas somebody that was 
 kind to her, she jest put out her claw of a hand and 
 said, 'Eoathted apple.' Her teeth was poor; an I 
 s'pose she couldn't eat what they give her. Well, I 
 told 'em what she wanted, and begged 'em to give her 
 one; but 'twas early in the fall; an I s'pose apples
 
 1 IE ARMORY. 245 
 
 wa'n't very reasonable yet ; an they said they hadn't 
 got none. I was a tender-hearted little fellow then, 
 jest like my son Thomas." 
 
 [" No, you were not, then nor ever !" indignantly, 
 but internally, remarked Miss Arden.] 
 
 " I cried an run right off to a man that had a orchard 
 nigh there, an told him if he'd let me have a dozen of 
 his great red Baldwins for granny, I'd bring his cow to 
 and from pasture with our'n every day and night for a 
 month. My mouth had watered for 'em many a time, 
 an I might ha' stole 'em easy enough ; but that never 
 warn't my way. Honesty's the best policy. We struck 
 the bargain ; but don't you think the stingy old codger 
 wouldn't trust me with one aforehand ! 'Drive the 
 cow safe a week fust, an then come for your fust three 
 apples, an so on,' says he. ' Granny'll be dead !' says 
 I. ' Granny's granson won't,' says he ; ' better speak 
 out, an tell truth, and say you want 'em to eat your- 
 self,' says he. ' We all know Squire Scrouge keeps you 
 pretty short;' an then he an his men set up a haw-haw, 
 an I run off boo-hooin harder than ever ; an I went 
 stompin my feet many a time to an from pasture, 
 to think how she might be a-dyin, an I couldn't go 
 near her for want of a apple !" 
 
 " "What a shame !" cried Clara. 
 
 "What a disgraceful shame!" cried Herman. 
 
 "Yes, wa'n't it? And to think how I might be 
 a-drivin his plaguey old cow for nothin, too, all the 
 time ! I wa'nt, though. That wa'n't never my luck. 
 Wednesday come round again ; an I went and got my 
 apples, an picked up sticks out in the woods, an lighted 
 'em with a match I'd been treasurin up, that I'd found 
 in the road, an roasted my apples, an carried 'em to 
 her all bobbin hot on a twine. I never see anythiu
 
 246 HERMAN. 
 
 eat like her; an the other old grannies come round an 
 looked on, an mumped with their chins as ef they wished 
 they'd had somethin to mump for. She lived to eat 'em all 
 but three. When I brought them, she wast jest a-dyin, an 
 couldn't take no notice. I couldn't touch 'em. They'd 
 ha' stuck in my throat. I went an sold 'em for six 
 cents ; an them six cents was the nest-egg of all I'm 
 wuth now. I walked into the city the fast chance I 
 could get, an bought half a dozen slate-pencils with 'em 
 an traded 'em off with the boys around for nine-pence; 
 and so on from that time, I've always gone to bed 
 Saturday night richer than I got up Monday morning; 
 for I vowed, when I stood by poor old granny's shabby 
 old shell of a second-hand coffin, that ./wouldn't die 
 poor, or I'd know why." 
 
 He wiped his eyes ; and Clara pitied him so much, 
 that she asked him to stay to tea. It was a case of 
 virtue rewarded, for he " guessed he'd got to go home, 
 an look over his accounts." Herman attended him to 
 the door, precisely like a very good brother-in-law, and 
 came back in a state of contrition. 
 
 " How much better we might think of almost all 
 persons we dislike, if we knew them better !" said 
 Clara. 
 
 " The very thing I had in my mind. We see men's 
 faults, but not the excuses for them. If mankind had 
 dealt more generously by little Jonathan, Mr. Flint 
 might deal more generously by mankind. As it is, 
 how honest he is !" 
 
 " In spite of the Coolies ?" said Clara, archly. 
 
 "Well, as honest as a man can be, who lets his 
 neighbours keep his conscience for him. I shall let 
 him have all my savings to take care of, taking due 
 care myself that they are not invested in Coolies; and
 
 THK ARMORY. . 247 
 
 I shall not turn up the nose of the disrespectful at his 
 offers of patronage and fortune. He wished to give 
 me the best he knew. Knowing what he told us, who 
 can wonder at his having a morbid horror of poverty ? 
 Besides, a man who has a family, ought to endeavour 
 to make a proper provision for a family." 
 
 Clara did not say, " You may have a family ;" for, 
 when Edward suggested it, she had noticed Herman's 
 silence, and divined with gentle-womanly tact that his 
 wounds were still too fresh to be touched. At any 
 rate, the profession upon which he wished to enter 
 would be of itself a provisio* for thfe possible wants of 
 the future. He continued : " To go from particulars 
 to generals, I think there is some injustice in the gen- 
 eral sneer against the dollar-hunting of New England 
 and the Middle States, as there is in most undiserimi- 
 nating sneers. People despise others for struggling 
 for things which they do not struggle for, merely be- 
 cause they already have them. There is as much 
 jealousy on one side as there is envy on the other. 
 Take from a British nobleman his title and entailed 
 estates, and from a Southern planter his negroes and 
 plantation, and if they do not presently set themselves 
 to work, as hard as we, to help themselves, by hook or 
 by crook, to the comforts, elegances, and luxuries of 
 life, and to a position in society, it will probably be not 
 because they are more unworldly than we, but because 
 they are more unenterprising and lazy. But, on the 
 other hand, ther.e is a frightfully common tendency 
 among us to seek things, in themselves good or harm- 
 less, in a bad or dangerous way. I do not see that the 
 New Testament forbids us to make Mammon serve us ; 
 but it does tell us that we cannot serve God and 
 Mammon ; and we do serve Mammon. Where so
 
 248 ; HEKMAN. 
 
 many bow down, perhaps the counterpoise of the com- 
 munity may best be restored by some few leaning back- 
 ward. It is the privilege of young men situated like 
 me, for instance, with health, competence, and leisure, 
 to be -able to do this ; among a community, almost all 
 of whom do, and most of whom must, work hard for 
 money, to work as hard, but not for money, for some- 
 tiling better than money, to carry out literally the 
 apostle's direction, ' Let no man seek his own, but an- 
 other's wealth,' as we have it in our rather intensified 
 version. The more literally we can carry out such pre- 
 cepts, the better for us, 4t seems to me, each and all. 
 Perhaps this, in its fulness, is one of those precepts 
 which not all men can receive, but those to whom it is 
 given ; but I have a very deeply strong impression, 
 that it is given at least to me. In all my tastes, cir- 
 cumstances, and condition, within and without, I see 
 as it were the workings of the gloved hand of Provi- 
 dence, pointing and beckoning me to this line of life." 
 
 " Are you tired of my questions ?" 
 
 " Never." 
 
 " When Edward came in, I was just going to ask 
 you whether you did not think your love of art 
 and literature showed that you might find pleasure and 
 a pursuit in one of those directions ?" 
 
 "Pleasure, no doubt. A pursuit such as I need 
 just now ? /doubt. Take care of the duties, and the 
 pleasures will take care of themselves, I believe will be 
 the best maxim for me, while my habits for mature life 
 are forming, particularly since I have spent all my 
 past life for myself." 
 
 " But not lost it, surely, Herman, for yourself or for 
 others. You have been fitting yourself for usefulness, 
 feeding and developing your mind. sharpening your 
 tools."
 
 THE ARMORY. 249 
 
 " Sharpening and pointing the weapon of self-in- 
 dulgence, I fear, against myself, among the rest. 
 However, ' Let the dead past bury its dead,' and let me 
 ' act ; act in the living present.' All men can act well. 
 Few can write, carve, or paint well. On our -death- 
 beds, the question which we shall ask with most anxiety, 
 of those who would cheer and encourage us, will be, 
 not whether men praise us, but whether Christ will. 
 At the judgment-seat, the question which we shall ask 
 ourselves, and expect, and prepare to answer, with most 
 solicitude, will be, not what we have written, carved, 
 or painted, but what we have done. A fellow-soul 
 rescued from Satan, is a poem for an angel's reading." 
 
 " Oh, Herman, indeed, some paintings and poems 
 are deeds, in the best and noblest sense of the word ! 
 Are they not ? You would call it a great and good 
 deed, I am sure, to preach some sermons ; but did you 
 ever hear a sermon which did more to rescue your sou^ 
 from thoughtlessness and worldliness than Retszch's 
 
 O 
 
 ' Chess-Player,' or the ' Christus Remunerator ?' or that 
 helped to fill you with more religious courage and he- 
 roism than Mr. Longfellow's 'Psalm of Life,' or more 
 Christian trust than his ' Resignation,' or than some 
 of Mrs. Browning's ' Lines on Cowper's Grave ?' " 
 
 " True, love ; I have shifted my ground, I see ; and 
 you have taken up your position on that which I 
 started from. I surrender. If I could, day by day, 
 paint such pictures, or write such poems, I should 
 think that I was doing my part, and my appropriate 
 part, for mankind ; and that I had earned a right, 
 perhaps, in ordinary circumstances, to give the 
 mere remnants of my leisure to so-called charities 
 The preacher by profession may be too often left to 
 dance alone to his own piping, while even the inime- 
 11*
 
 250 HERMAN. 
 
 diate bystanders content themselves with listening or 
 looking on ; but the great Christian author or artist is 
 a trumpeter whose notes are heard over the civilized 
 world. It can hardly be, one would think, but that, 
 among so many listeners, many will be found to march 
 to such music. But I am neither Mr. Longfellow, Mrs. 
 Browning, nor Scheffer. For painting and sculpture I 
 have some talent, I believe, I don't mean to under- 
 value myself, but not a spark of genius. Now talent 
 is very good for good common every-day work in the 
 world, but good for nothing in the studio." 
 
 " But I enjoy some of your verses, perhaps I had 
 better not say how much. You do not like flattery; 
 I do not like vanity." 
 
 " Because I wrote them, Psyche ?" 
 " Yes ; because you wrote them so." 
 " My verses. I have hoped myself, sometimes, when 
 I have heard you read them, that there might be some- 
 thing in them. But it is not every day, nor every 
 week, nor month even, that I can write anything that 
 even you or I should think worth reading ; and I find 
 little breadth or richness in my poetical vein just now. 
 One should live, and think, and feel much, and suffer 
 much, too, perhaps, if God has appointed suffering for 
 him, before one should write much. If I made it my 
 way of life now to go into my room every morning to 
 write, it would soon change into my going there every 
 morning to muse, and finally to read and doze, a mere 
 literary dilettante. I should empty into two or three 
 compositions the crude accumulations of my boyhood 
 and youth, have nothing left, and write nothing, or, still 
 worse, nonsense or namby-pamby ; for men who write 
 at all times because they will, instead of sometimes be- 
 cause they must, must often write falsely and feebly.
 
 THE ARMORY. 251 
 
 Then, feeling that I had staked my all upon a a cast, 
 would of itself be enough to make my hand shake. In 
 my anxiety lest I should fail, I should lose the calm- 
 ness and self-possession essential to high success. My 
 life wants at least two strings to its bow. I believe that 
 one may write the better for having worked, and work 
 the better for having written. At any rate, to make 
 one single poem live, the life-blood of lively living 
 years should be drained into it." 
 
 " Poems are vampires, then, and that is the reason 
 why you are sometimes so pale when you have been 
 writing. Write no more, then. You may give up 
 poetry." 
 
 " Never, till poetry gives up me, and that I trust 
 will be only when life does, nor even then, or I should 
 be unsatisfied with heaven. But I think that the best 
 poetry is oftenest that which follows up a man in the 
 midst of affairs and forces him to write it, not that 
 which he follows up apart from affairs, and forces him- 
 self to write ; it is the foam which rises from a working 
 life ; the one is to the other as the rainbowed wreaths 
 of spray of Niagara to a bowl of soap-suds, which a 
 child puffs up into bubbles with his own breath 
 through a tobacco-pipe. Few men are strong enough 
 to write to purpose, who are not also strong enough to 
 work and wait." 
 
 " And you think that your work is not, cannot be, 
 in the ministry ?" said Clara, recurring fondly to her 
 first idea. " Oh, Herman, how I should love to hear 
 you preach 1" 
 
 " So you shall, whenever you please," said he, 
 smiling ; " and so shall other people, whenever they 
 please and I please. I will be a minister, God willing ; 
 I like the good, humble, old-fashioned word. I wish
 
 252 HERMAN. 
 
 to try to carry the word of God into the houses of 
 those who will not, or who cannot, go into the house 
 of God to seek it. I have heard, and I suspect it is 
 true, that many or most of those who hold pews in our 
 churches are so well instructed in their religion already, 
 if that were all, that they could at need preach edify- 
 ingly enough to their preachers ; so that, if they do not 
 do their duty, the difficulty is not that they do not 
 know it, but that they do not choose it. That is a dif- 
 ficulty which I must leave to the grace of God to con- 
 quer. I wish to seek, and if I can, save some of those 
 who are lost, who do not know the way, who are be- 
 wildered, to whom, as I have also heard, God is 
 known as a being less horrible than Satan, chiefly in 
 this : that the One can sometimes be permanently pro- 
 pitiated, and the other not. I wish to go to them, so 
 far as an uninspired man may, as the apostles did, com- 
 forting and healing, as well as teaching. If I can do 
 their bodies good, they may, for gratitude's sake, let 
 me do what I can for their souls; and then I will try 
 to make them the better citizens, better men, better 
 Christians, for my having lived beside them. Those 
 who seek the preacher least are probably those who 
 need him most ; but the clergy cannot do everything, 
 and should not have everything left to them to do. I be- 
 lieve, as I have hinted before, that it is much easier for 
 a layman than for a clergyman, to get at a very large 
 class of his fellow-men. A clergyman stands a little 
 apart from them, and speaks to them from above. 
 A physician stands at their side, knows where their 
 hearts are, and can speak to them if he will. More- 
 over, my Psyche, to end where we began, selfish men, 
 and most men are selfish, are most likely to do their 
 duty when it falls, in with their inclination ; my inclina-
 
 THE AKMORY. 253 
 
 tion draws me very strongly to the profession ofrnedi- 
 c'ine ; and therefore," 
 
 Herman went to work, and to work that on the 
 whole suited him. He grew more cheerful, though not 
 gay. He soon found that the good solid wheat, " the 
 marrow of men," was not taken out of his bread of life, 
 if the spice and sweetness were. He was now in the 
 < ondition of some nice little boy, who, having seen a 
 plum-cake borne by him on its way to the oven, and 
 i'ully expected to banquefthereon, finds himself abrupt- 
 ly set down to bread and milk instead, with an order to 
 eat it up, and then go to sleep. Bread and milk is nu- 
 tritious. It is not altogether unpalatable. Yet one 
 would hardly require him to smack his lips over it. If 
 he makes no 'wry faces, he does pretty well. Herman 
 did not smack his lips ; but, on the other hand, he took 
 what was given him patiently, and made no wry faces. 
 
 If his life was no longer set to music, at least he 
 marched on without it, without flagging ; and some of 
 the poetry, that he did not write, he acted. But this 
 one poem must have been written not very far from 
 that time. I found it, a few weeks ago, in his hymn- 
 book and his hand-writing, in the family pew of the 
 Ardens at King's Chapel. It appeared to have been 
 written at a heat. For once Herman could not have 
 been very attentive to the sermon. 
 
 Perhaps few Christians could in that place, on the 
 black spring-day of which the verses bore the date ; 
 when, not many rods oif from the old stronghold of 
 Freedom, a Boston court-house was degraded into a 
 slave-pen, and when our once high-hearted old town, 
 half reennobled, even in her avaricious and outwitted 
 dotage, by her too late-roused indignation, sat shaking 
 in the dust in chains of her elder sons' forging, while
 
 254: UEKilAN. 
 
 her younger ones, marching in arms round about her, 
 pointed their weapons at her heart to keep down her 
 impotent rising. 
 
 FANEUIL HALL*. 
 
 " Ei yap TO&' eortu, 
 OVK oZ8' A^yas Ta<r&' eAevSepas en. 
 *AAA' 016' iyia TO riavSe Aij/u.a ical ijtviriv' 
 vri<TKi.v fleArjcrovo-'. -i) yap aitrxun) rrdpos 
 ToO i\v Trap' e<rO\ol? avSpd<ri.v po/ii^crai-" 
 
 EURIPIDES. 
 
 Ho, here ! my sturdy brothers, frm the college and the forge, 
 Come up as came your forefathers to blunt the tools of George ! 
 Swifter, easier, than their cart-horses, from Berkshire's summits far 
 And the shores of sandy Plymouth, flies for you the panting car. 
 Leave your hall-bought stock uncheapened, and unsold your slaugh- 
 tered flock; 
 
 And quench the match just lighted in the gray, old granite rock. 
 Leave the hungry cod unbaited in the waters blue and still, 
 And hither steer your dories by the shaft of Bunker Hill. 
 Where Lexington's moist clover twinkles in the morning light, 
 And Dorchester's gay butter-cups dance on her storied height, 
 Let your ploughs stick in the furrows, smoke your hay-cocks in the 
 
 sun; 
 
 Here are fetters to unrivet ! Freedom's work is to be done ! 
 With eager and with gallant hearts obey the welcome call; 
 For a suppliant cowers trembling 'neath the eaves of Faneuil Hall. 
 
 Rejoice, thou trembling fugitive. Were hell-hounds on thy track, 
 Not from these sacred precincts had they power to drag thee back. 
 Our three-hilled city owns no rule save that of equal laws. 
 Approach her grand tribunal, and securely plead thy cause. 
 What ! Why? Condemn the guiltless ? Away with all your fears 1 
 He asks but justice. Try him, by a jury of his peers. 
 There is no room for them. The court with Slavery's slaves is filled. 
 Are you mad? Speak low. Look round you. Be your reckless 
 
 brawlings stilled; 
 
 For the shadows, and the footsteps, of hireling soldiers fall 
 On shackled Justice's threshold, in the shade of Faneuil Hall. 
 
 * The reader who would not be more nice than wise, may save 
 himself some trouble with these lines, if he will drop the new-fangled 
 dactylic pronunciation of Fan-you-will, supposing him so unfortu- 
 nate as to have ever adopted it, and content himself, as Peter of 
 the name was probably obliged to, with simple " Fan'il."
 
 THE AitMuKY. 255 
 
 Rejoice thee yet, tbou fugitive ! Behold these free-born bands. 
 The swords of patriot ancestors are glittering in their hands; 
 And heroes' blood, that throbbed of yore for Freedom and the right, 
 Swells in their veins; and tyrants must lly blasted at the sight, 
 And leave thee free as heaven's own air around you hallowed wall 
 In Freedom's oracles of yore breathed forth from Faueuil Hall ! 
 
 Hope not in them, poor fellow-slave; their aid is not for thee. 
 The steel they bear is chains they wear, the chains of Tyranny. 
 Fall back, ye hapless recreants ! into your grandsires' graves; 
 Their clapboard ribs, if empty now, ne'er helu the hearts of slaves; 
 Go, with your snoriiigs wake them from their rest well-earned and 
 
 deep; 
 
 For Liberty's old Cradle has rocked all their young to sleep ! 
 Oh, monument of Glory dead, to shapeless ruin fall, 
 Nor mock us with thy memories, polluted Faneuil Hall ! 
 
 Farewell, our country's cuckoo-brood, the brood of Sloth and 
 
 Gold! 
 
 Our country's true-born, to the front ! Her cobwebbed flags unfold. 
 Oh God of love, unserved too long, with changing mien art Thou, 
 The awful God of battles, our only helper now 2 
 Leap forth then clad with lightnings, from Thy black and bellowing 
 
 cloud. 
 
 With Thy forgotten thunders appal the craven crowd. 
 Our lives, our youth, our manhood, we immolate to Thee. 
 Take all, dread God; but save our sons our birthright, liberty. 
 As the seed of better ages our martyred forms shall fall. 
 Our names shall be the household words for aye of Faneuil HalL 
 
 In Thine unerring balance our wavering counsels weigh 
 For strife or peace, oh God of grace, this dark and evil day. 
 Be Thou our Ligut, our Leader I Prompt Thou our unlearned parts. 
 We are men, and blind and erring, but with brave and loyal hearts. 
 Choose Thou the way. We follow on the green or crimson path, 
 Through the lanes of Peace and Plenty or the fire-sown road of 
 
 Wrath. 
 
 As Freedom's champions let us live, her stainless champions i'ie, 
 And in our blest and honored graves in happy slumbers lie, 
 Where, through the stillness e'en of deathj twill reach our half-roused 
 
 ear, 
 When Freedom's voice is raised once more, and shouting freemen 
 
 hear, 
 
 As he, who to her portal fled a fearful chattel thrall, 
 Hangs up his shattered fetters o'er the gates of Faneuil HalL
 
 256 HERMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XI L 
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CA.MP. 
 
 "Earth feels new scythes upon her. 
 We reap our brothers for the wains, 
 
 And call the harvest honor. 
 Draw face to face, front line to line, 
 
 One image all inherit, 
 Then kill, curse on, by that same sign, 
 Clay, clay, and spirit, spirit." 
 
 E. B. BROWNING. 
 
 "Madam, no. 
 
 I have done nothing; if a wrong there be, 
 It lies with others; I have but obeyed 
 Whom I am bound to serve." 
 
 "Alas! thy guilt 
 
 Is but more abject, being ministrant 
 Unto another's, and thyself no less 
 Accountable to heaven." 
 
 TAYLOE. 
 
 HERMAN in due time took bis degree of Doctor of 
 Medicine ; and then, being by that time in some need 
 of rest and recreation, he took a journey with a three- 
 fold motive thereto : he wanted to see Kansas, a place 
 of which we all hear so much and know so little ; he 
 had an old schoolmate ill in the army there ; and a kind 
 new friend of his, his schoolmate's mother, was very 
 unhappy about her son, and anxious to have him re- 
 sign and come home, on more accounts than one. 
 Herman left his emigrant fellow-travellers at the little 
 cluster of wooden, mud, and thatched houses, which 
 has since made so much noise in the world under the
 
 THE KXIGHT IJS THE CAMP. 257 
 
 name of Lawrence. But, as he rode on over the pur- 
 ple and golden flowers of the quiet prairie, his ears still, 
 It >r an hour or two after, seemed to ring with the words 
 which he had left behind, ringing through the streets 
 of that busy little town : 
 
 " Anticipate I'll have much difficulty in locating a 
 site, sir?" 
 
 " "Wall, I don't, mum." 
 
 " Want to sell your claim, strannger ?" 
 
 " Wall, I don't know. How much do ye want to 
 give ?" 
 
 " Reeder," 
 
 " Whitfield," 
 
 " Stringfellow," 
 
 " How'd the voting go, up to Hobanob Precinct ? 
 You was present, sir, I presume." 
 
 " Well, pretty much as it did down to Bugaboo, 
 sir ; judges disagreed. Biggs and Sharp, Pro-Slavery, 
 they thought best to let the Ruffians vote without 
 swearin. Blunt, Free-State, he dissented. The Ruf- 
 fians got some leavers, an pried up the cabin an let it 
 down again some two or three times ; an Blunt, he at- 
 tempted to abstract the ballot-box an quit the premises ; 
 but old man Firetur, of Mizzoura, accompanied with his 
 two sons, encountered him to the back entrance, an put 
 a pistol to his vest ; an says he, ' You better return an 
 deposit that there box, or one or the other on us will 
 hind in hell,' says he, ' or eternity,' I forgit which. 
 Never mind. It's all the same." 
 
 " Well, yes, sir ; I guess it was in that case about 
 synonymous. Purceed." 
 
 " ' Drop it,' says Raymond Firetur, a-perducin a 
 revolver, . ' or I'll put sixteen through ye.' So Blunt. 
 he jest dropped it an resigned, like a desperate mean-
 
 258 HERMAN. 
 
 spirited feller as he is ; and they elected old man 
 Firetur judge, in lieu of him' ; an he an the other Pro- 
 Slaveries, the} 7 let all the Ruffians vote themselves, an 
 put down lots of other individooals that wa'n't there 
 besides, Israel. Putnam, an Ben Franklin, an George 
 Washington, Colonel Freemont, Sam Slick, Mr. Garri- 
 son, an cetra. They got the returns to mount up to 
 four hunderd an up'ards ; an report says there ain't 
 niore'n one-twenty legal voters in that whole precinct." 
 
 Then these echoes died out, chased away into the 
 distance by the sweet voices of the birds, and the muf- 
 fled patting of Herman's horse's hoofs upon the turf, 
 lie enjoyed the charms of solitude thoroughly, after 
 days spent in cars, steamboats, and inns, but had had 
 enough of it before he came in sight of the sentinel 
 pacing to and fro before the temporary barracks, jn 
 which Lieutenant Charles Marshall was at present in- 
 dulging in dreams of glory and realities of fever and 
 ague. 
 
 Perhaps Lieutenant Charles had had enough of it 
 likewise; for his "What? who? Arden ! where did 
 you drop from ? oh, by George, now, if this isn't 
 jolly !" when our hero was introduced, was extremely 
 emphatic and hearty. He was miserably ill, thought 
 himself dangerously so, and was very glad to get Her- 
 man's opinion to the contrary, as well as his attentions as 
 nnrse. In this capacity, Herman devoted himself to 
 him for a fortnight, and so successfully, that at the end 
 of that time he thought him well enough to discuss his 
 resignation, and proposed it to him accordingly. 
 
 " Why," said the lieutenant, putting his hand to 
 his pulse, " you don't think I'm going to relapse, do 
 you ?" 
 
 "No, no. Let that alone, Charley. You'll only
 
 THE KNIGHT I]S T THE CAMP. 259 
 
 put it out of order, like a watch, by fingering it. But, 
 ' excuse my preaching a bit,' as I heard a Methodist 
 minister say, in the steamboat which brought me down 
 the river; we are all of us going before long to relapse 
 into second childhood or death." 
 
 " Well, what then ? One is more in the way of 
 second childhood out of the army than in it ; and since 
 death must come, let it only be the death of honor and 
 fame, 'and find us doing our duty." 
 
 " ' Let it only find us doing our duty ;' yes," said 
 Herman, rather sadly, " and come when it will. But 
 one of the first of our duties, and the hardest, too, 
 sometimes, is to find out what our duty is. Tell your- 
 self, Charley, I won't ask you to tell me, how much 
 honor and duty there is in selling one's sword to alow- 
 principled Government, as you won't deny that ours is 
 just now, for the sake of fifteen hundred dollars a year, 
 of figuring now and then in a paragraph in a newspa- 
 per, which is what I suppose you mean by fame, and 
 of being a favorite with a certain class of ladies 
 wherever you go, on account of your blue coat. I did 
 not mean to frighten you. I think you are recovering 
 fast. But if you stay in the army here and now, you 
 may certainly be shot alter shooting, in obedience to 
 such orders as you may any day receive, some honest 
 settlers, who ask only to be let alone, and would rather 
 not do you any harm, if they had their choice ; and 
 then, in the grand court-martial over the clouds, if your 
 Captain asks you why you killed his servants, your 
 fellow-soldiers in the church-militant, shall you dare to 
 speak of this sort of honor and duty to him ?" 
 
 " Why, Arden, this seems to me the most extraordi 
 nary way of looking at the subject. I see it so entirely 
 on the other side, that,"
 
 2 CO HERMAN. 
 
 " On the upper side ? or on the lower side ? As we 
 hope both of us, I suspect, to spend our eternity in 
 heaven above rather than in hell beneath, it appears to 
 me a wise plan to ascend in thought as often as we 
 may to the footstool of the throne of God, and take 
 thence our views of earth and earthly things, that they 
 may look to us now in our mortal three-score and ten, 
 as they will hereafter from our death-beds, and through 
 the countless ages of our immortality." 
 
 " Well, then ; if you insist upon putting it on that 
 ground, I don't see how I am to know that the stranger 
 I shoot in a crowd is a Christian." 
 
 " How are you to know that he is not ? A Ma- 
 hometan, it is said, will not destroy a stray piece of pa- 
 per without examination, because the name of Allah 
 may be written on it. Would you like to shoot into a 
 crowd where you knew that Christ might be ? Did he 
 not say, ' Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least 
 of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me ?' ' : 
 
 " But do you think that all his words are to be taken 
 BO literally ?" 
 
 " No, not all ; nor yet do I think that any of them 
 are to be explained away so as practically to mean no- 
 thing, which is the more common error. I think that, 
 whenever he spoke, he meant something. What do 
 you suppose he meant when he said that ?" 
 
 "Why, I don't know; in the way of one's 
 duty," 
 
 " It is your duty, if you are bidden, to kill or crush 
 these Free- State settlers, very much as it was the duty 
 of Alva and his men to kill and crush the Nether- 
 landers, of Judge Jeffreys to butcher his countrymen 
 on the Bloody Assizes, or of the Eoman soldiers to 
 crucify our Saviour. Would you like, for the sake cf
 
 THE KNIGHT I2f THE CAMP. 261 
 
 present glory and honor, to have your name stand be- 
 fore posterity beside theirs ? Would you like to cast in 
 your lot with theirs in the other world ?" 
 
 " Why, of course not ; but, as to the Saviour and 
 those words of his, you must excuse my saying again, 
 that I think you are very literal and very extrava- 
 gant." 
 
 " Well, let it pass then for the present ; and make 
 up your mind at your leisure as to what he did mean." 
 
 " Joshua and David fought." 
 
 " But we must remember that they firmly and fully 
 believed that God was on their side, and they on His. 
 In the light which Christianity has thrown on the 
 character of the Father, I find it difficult to assure my- 
 self that He ever takes a pleased part in the domestic 
 brawls of His sons ; but if He does, He, the giver of 
 free will, I know and am sure that it is on the side 
 of freedom, rather than of slavery." 
 
 " There again, now, there again, you see, there is 
 a very important difference between us in the very 
 grounds we stand upon. I do not know that slavery 
 is wrong. How do you ?" 
 
 " Pooh, pooh, Charley ! For shame, Boston boy ! 
 You must have been keeping bad company, and they 
 have stolen your wits. How do you know that twice 
 two is four ? Is there any such anomaly or miscalcu- 
 lation in the creation, as that the Creator should send 
 some human souls into the world with several hundred 
 human bodies belonging to each, and some thousands 
 of other human souls into the world with no bodies be- 
 longing to them at all ? When one -soul can wear a 
 hundred bodies at a time, let it claim them as its own, 
 and not till then. If you seriously want an argument, 
 though, you shall have it. I do not think I exaggerate
 
 262 HEKMAN. 
 
 when I assert that a very large inajorit} of persons in 
 civilized countries say that slr.very is wrong. The 
 minority, who say that it is right, are for the most part 
 persons whose interests, real or fancied, bid them say 
 it is right. Now, the presumption is very strong that 
 a thing, which almost all uninterested persons denounce, 
 and few except interested persons uphold, is an offence 
 which deserves no Defence. Then, to go back to 
 Joshua and David, we must further remember that 
 they were not Christians, and had not Christians to 
 fight against. I think we may get a little side-light 
 upon the Gospel doctrine of social duty from St. Paul's 
 consternation at finding that some of his brethren were 
 going to law against one another before the unbelievers. 
 How little he probably dreamed that the name of 
 ' fellow-Christian,' before unbelievers and believers, too, 
 both nominal and real, would soon or ever get to be 
 less a title to the good-will and good offices of one's 
 sharers in it, than Odd-Fellow is now. ' Why do ye 
 not rather take wrong ?' he says. ' Why do ye not 
 rather be defrauded ?' " 
 
 " Would you be a non-resistant, then ?" 
 " I cannot say, yes. I will not say, no, until I have 
 lived and thought longer, and sifted the matter through 
 and through. Thus far I have gone, and no further as 
 yet: The whole spirit of the Gospel, so far as I under- 
 stand it, is the spirit of filial and brotherly love. Can 
 a man, full of this spirit, kill his brother, his Father's 
 son ? Perhaps, yes ; perhaps, no. But can he kill him 
 for the sake of flattery, or pay, or promotion, or even 
 to enrich any of his favorite brothers, (i. e., his coun- 
 trymen or his party,) by the portion of that one ? No ; 
 a thousand times, no ! But may he not kill him be- 
 cause he sees- him lifting his hand against his other
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 263 
 
 brothers, his mother, or his sisters, or their helpless 
 little ones ? Yes, perhaps, if there be no other way ; but 
 if he can find any other way, he will thank God, and 
 take it." 
 
 " Ah, well. Now you are beginning to look at the 
 other side of the question ; and your own good sense and 
 candor show you at once that there's a great deal in it. 
 Any soldier, who deserves the name, is glad and proud 
 when he sees the pretty girls smiling around him," said 
 the lieutenant sentimentally, "to think how quickly his 
 sword would leap out of the handsome scabbard, which 
 they admire so much, to defend them. We think of 
 that, I can assure you, on many a hard march." 
 
 "Marches to defend them against home-keeping 
 Mexicans, against squaws and papooses ? Ah, Lieu- 
 tenant, there's a good deal of romance, I fear, no, call 
 things by their true names, a good deal of falsehood 
 in our notions of war. If it were always or usually in de- 
 fence of mothers, sisters, and wives, or even of our altars 
 and hearths, I could find it in me to covet that sword of 
 yours, and to wish, too, perhaps, heaven forgive 
 me! that I might soon have a chance to draw it. But 
 for one woman who is really protected by war, are not 
 hundreds made orphans, and widows, and worse ? Let 
 us be frank with ourselves now, as our Judge will be 
 with us hereafter. Thus much is to me as clear as 
 daylight : defensive war only, if any war, is permitted 
 to a Christian." 
 
 " Very well. Let it be granted ; and see what aomes 
 of it. The soldier is the hand. The head is at "Wash- 
 ington. The head opens its mouth, and says, 'War 
 exists by the act of Mexico, or of Nicaragua, Kansas, 
 or Cuba,' or, 'Our frontiers need protection against the 
 Indians.' Don't you take? Shall the hand mutiny
 
 264 HERMAN. 
 
 against the head ? The head says : ' The war is a de- 
 fensive war. Carry it on.' It is the duty of the head 
 to judge. It is my duty to obey." 
 
 "Excuse^ me. In my judgment, the head of 
 Christian men is overhead. If you are a Christian 
 man, you are under orders which take precedence of 
 any from Washington." 
 
 " "Would you have me mutiny whenever orders come 
 which I don't approve ?" 
 
 "Not at all. When orders come, too bad for you 
 to obey, I would have you resign." 
 
 " Suppose the orders came at such a moment, that 
 my resignation would leave my innocent troops at the 
 mercy of an enemy. What should you say then ?" 
 
 "Nothing, my poor dear fellow. Your situation 
 would be cruel enough in itself. I should not have 
 the heart to embitter it further by a single word of 
 mine." 
 
 "Well, what should you think, then? You are 
 checkmated now, I believe." 
 
 " Do you ? My predominant idea would probably 
 be, that if you had had any reason to foresee the possi- 
 bility of a dilemma so horrible, compelling you to be 
 accessory to the destruction of one of two innocent 
 parties, it was utterly incomprehensible that you should 
 have waited to be caught in it." 
 
 " But you tell me I may fight in defence of my 
 country ; and I tell you, that I am not the judge of the 
 character of her wars. It is to be taken for granted that 
 Congress knows what it is about." 
 
 " ' Half the mistakes in life,' according to a most 
 sensible maxim, ' arise from taking things for granted.' 
 You are an educated man, an intelligent man, and, if 
 you are also a conscientious man, you have certain
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 265 
 
 qualifications as a judge, of your own conduct at least, 
 which it would be taking a good deal for granted to 
 attribute to the common run of ' available candidates' 
 turned into in embers of Congress." 
 
 " You are complimentary ; and in return I can do 
 no less than tell you, that I never in my life saw such 
 an impracticable, theoretical, wrong-headed, good- 
 hearted fellow. Ride your hobby as far as you can, in 
 the name of absurdity; and let us see where it will 
 throw you. You'll allow at least, I hope, that we must 
 have armies in readiness to protect our native coun- 
 tries, in the present state of this naughty world?" 
 
 " I am not prepared to deny it." 
 
 "Hurra! Hup, hup! We've kept step together 
 at last, like good pieties, for one whole second. Now, 
 if I and my fellow- warriors are all of us going to resign 
 whenever we are, or fear we are perhaps going to be, 
 ordered to do anything that isn't quite proper, what 
 will become of all the armies ?" 
 
 "What, indeed! Don't you think you shall, some 
 of you, wait till next week ? You won't quite all throw 
 up your commissions to-night ; shall you ?" 
 
 " You think we ought, don't you ?" 
 
 "I think tlwu oughtest ', what will my opinion sig- 
 nify to anybody else ? My business is with thee, thine 
 with thyself. Do you not remember what our Master 
 said to St. Peter, when, after receiving a command 
 and having his destiny pointed out to him, he turned to 
 look after his fellow-disciple, and asked, 'Lord, and 
 what shall this man do?' 'What is that to thee? Fol- 
 low thou me.' If we wait to do our own duty until we 
 can decide, what is, in every conceivable circum- 
 stance, the duty of everybody else, we are as reasona- 
 ble, my patient, as we should be if we refused to do au
 
 266 HERMAN. 
 
 errand at the nearest town until we had drawn ont the 
 chart of the universe. A nephew of William Pitt, I 
 have heard, resigned his commission in the British 
 army, rather than serve against us in our Revolutionary 
 war. Still England fought us, to her cost. An officer 
 in our army, so his own cousin told me, left it when 
 called upon to help the Georgians to the homes of the 
 hospitable and friendly Cherokees. Still the Chero- 
 kees were driven out. Do you honestly think that, if 
 you follow the example of those two gentlemen, there'll 
 be any difficulty in refilling your place at once '? Until 
 a great revolution, a great regeneration, to use the 
 clerical word, has taken pla-ne in the moral sense of 
 the world on the subject of war, the army will not bo 
 dismembered by Christianity, ror will there be by any 
 means much difficulty in finding officers and soldiers 
 enough to march out readily for aggressive warfare. 
 When that great regeneration has taken place, it will 
 pervade the community and cabinet as much as tho 
 camp; and Christian officers and soldiers will never 
 more be ordered out for aggressive warfare ; no great 
 change for the worse, surely ; and every man, who haa 
 done anything, in cabinet, camp, or community, towards 
 bringing it about, will have struck a noble blow in the 
 good fight for the establishment of Christ's kingdom on 
 earth. We, nominal Christians, are as heathen still in 
 council and camp as Homer's heroes. A corrupt knot 
 of office-holders want an unjust war for their own inter- 
 est. There is an outcry against it, at first, among good 
 Christians at home. Good Christians in the army sigh 
 over it ; because their true hearts tell them that it is 
 unnatural work for them to despoil and destroy their 
 brothers; but, because their sophistical heads assure 
 them that it is their duty, they inarch off and do it.
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 267 
 
 notwithstanding, as obediently as if they were bad 
 Christians or good Pagans. In compliance with the 
 wishes of their fellow-Christians at Washington, or 
 London, or Paris, or Vienna, they take, we won't 
 say steal, the required number of towns from their 
 fellow-Christians over the border, and kill, we won't 
 say murder, the necessary number of their fellow- 
 Christians, the owners, for defending them as it is their 
 duty to do. (What is the fountain-head of duty to all 
 Christians, but the will of Christ? Can Christ give 
 conflicting orders to his servants? Can he smile to see 
 them kill one another? he, who is 'with them alway, 
 even unto the end of the world ?' If their faith had 
 eyes strong enough to see him stand by and look on, 
 could they slay on ?) However, their notable victories 
 over their brothers abroad soon reconcile their brothers 
 at home to the war. It becomes popular. The office- 
 holders gain their objects ; and the success of tht.ir expe- 
 dient is noted as a good hint for future use. The army 
 are said to have covered themselves with glory. Is 
 that, their glory so-called, the reward of loyal boldiers, 
 deserters, or fratricides? Is it their King's cause, or 
 that of the arch-Rebel, in w r hich they have fought ? Is 
 it Christ's crown, or one of Satan's weaving, which sits 
 upon the baptismal spot on their foreheads? If our 
 fellow-Christians are not onr brothers, as St. Paul calls 
 them, in some strong and binding sense, it is as false as 
 Satan in us to call them so, over our Bibles, or at 
 church, or anywhere else. If they are our brothers, it 
 is as cruel as Cain in us to kill them, far any grudge 
 against them of our own or another's. What shall we 
 say, then, of sacrificing our Master in the person of 
 his followers for self-interest? Is not that a iittle tv>o 
 much like Judas?"
 
 208 HEKMAl*. 
 
 " Pshaw, Arden, pshaw ! You talk like a woman. 
 You've nursed me like one, too, though ; so I'll forgive 
 you." 
 
 " Like w.hat sort of a woman, Marshall ? a good, or 
 a bad ? If the former, I have a good right to be lis- 
 tened to, when I speak to a question of right and 
 wrong. Like what woman ?" 
 
 " Like a very good and dear, but a very trying one 
 to me sometimes, I must say;" answered Marshall 
 rising and walking up and down the room. " I dare 
 say she Sent you here to look after me. God bless you 
 both ! You came when you were a good deal wanted. 
 She's a dear, tender, affectionate soul, and always 
 means well and kindly by me, I believe; but I suffer not 
 the woman to teach nor to usurp dominion over the 
 man ; do you ?" 
 
 " ' To teach ?' Yes, if she is modest and 
 quiet about it; as St. Paul's own friend, Priscilla, 
 seems to have been suffered. ' To usurp dominion ?' 
 No. I suffer no usurpation anywhere, that it lies with 
 me to forbid. It seldom works well for either party con- 
 cerned in it. If a woman, or a child even, pointed 
 out to me a wrong that I was doing, or a duty left un- 
 done, I should consider her words a message from God 
 to me, perhaps in answer to my prayers for guidance, 
 an answer that I must take or go without any, and 
 her a messenger, provided she spoke in a proper 
 spirit." 
 
 " My mother is extravagant the moment she gets 
 beyond her province, extravagant to a degree! 
 I should not say so to anybody else, you. know ; but to 
 you I may, because you know how much good sound 
 sense and feeling she has in matters she does under- 
 stand. What do you think she said to me the very
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 269 
 
 night before I left home to come here? That she 
 would rather I should be killed by, than kill, any of 
 these haranguing Yankee clod-hoppers! And she a 
 widow, and I her only son, and the tears streaming 
 down her poor old face at the time at such a rate that 
 I couldn't bear to see it ! What do you think of that 
 yourself?" 
 
 " There spoke the Christian Spartan, the Spartan 
 matron, for she preferred your honor to your life, the 
 Christian, for she preferred your loyalty to Christ to 
 either ! She would rather have your body spotted 
 with your own blood, (though I believe it would kill 
 her, Charley ; for 1 must tell you that her anxiety about 
 you is preying upon her constitution seriously,) than 
 your soul with the blood of your neighbour. The one 
 stain would last a little longer than the other. She is 
 less near-sighted than most people, and can see beyond 
 the grave ; that is all." 
 
 " Well, one of you is as bad as the other. But 
 after all, Arden, there's more than one flaw in your 
 reasoning, that I should have picked before, if I could 
 have got a chance. Religion has nothing to do with 
 these worldly matters, as I have often told her." 
 
 " What has it to do with us, then, while we are in 
 the world ?" 
 
 " You know as well as I. It teaches i s that we must 
 pray," 
 
 " One way, and live another ?" 
 
 " And read our Bibles," 
 
 " And not obey them ?" 
 
 " Our Bibles say, ' Render unto Caesai the things 
 that are Caesar's,' " 
 
 " 'And unto God the things that are God's ' ; but no- 
 where, Render yourself unto Caesar, if I recollect right
 
 270 HERMAN. 
 
 Our master is Christ. He bids us, upon our allegiance, 
 do good and no wrong to our neighbour. If we think 
 we can, while in his service, enter into some more 
 lucrative or honored service besides, we may do so 
 unblamed ; but we do so at our peril, for, the moment 
 the second service conflicts with the first, we must 
 abandon the second or be traitors. ' Loyalty first, lucre 
 afterwards. Merit first, applause afterwards. Christ 
 , first, Csesar afterwards.' You understand, I trust, all 
 this time, that I am not maintaining that Christianity 
 calls upon us for an armed resistance to unrighteous- 
 ness. For a passive resistance, it does call upon us 
 continually. If there is a genuine hero on earth, in 
 my judgment it is an independent man, who, when 
 driven to the wall by some unholy custom or law, 
 breaks it by his action, and mends it by his suffering. 
 He is a Daniel in the palace of Nebuchadnezzar. He 
 serves God peaceably, in spite of the king, and takes 
 the consequences. Unflinchingly he goes into the 
 lions' den, and brings out of it liberty of conscience 
 henceforward, not merely for himself, but for his more 
 timid brethren. The doctrine of individual responsi- 
 bility and allegiance to God, is the very corner-stone of 
 religion. As long as allegiance and responsibility to 
 man are allowed to take its place, it will be difficult to 
 find anything too bad for good men to do. Christianity 
 is the leaven which creeps through the meal, not all at 
 once, but particle by particle, until the whole is leav- 
 ened. Its work upon society, under God, must be 
 done, if at all, like that of its Founder, by individual 
 action and individual suffering. It is scarcely possible 
 for any individual in the midst of a alien race to stand 
 upright towards God, without doing something by the 
 very act to raise those above him, and taking some
 
 THE KNIGHT EN THE CAMP. 271 
 
 weight off those below him. We are all of us, by our 
 own low standard of loyalty, helping to keep each 
 other down." 
 
 " These fine-spun considerations may be all very 
 well for ministers, martyrs, and professed followers of 
 Christ ; but flaw the second is, that you continually 
 talk of my loyalty and allegiance to him, when I have 
 never promised him any, and never will, till I am pre- 
 pared, consistently, honorably, and in all respects, to 
 fulfil my engagements, whatever they may bind me to. 
 I am not a member of the church, my dear Arden. 
 Did you think that I was ?" 
 
 " In a certain way. I supposed that you had been 
 baptized into it." 
 
 " Of course, when I was a baby ; but that was no 
 affair of mine." 
 
 " You were entered in the church, then, before you 
 entered the army. So far, the church would seem to 
 have the prior claim to you, not to speak of your being 
 God's by creation. I will say nothing of your being 
 Christ's by redemption ; because I do not know whether 
 you will or will not choose to accept the terms on 
 which that is offered you. But if the claims of the 
 church and those of the army upon you conflict, which 
 do you mean to abide by ? As you say, I don't think 
 your being baptized, by the will of others, binds you 
 in honor, though it may somewhat in gratitude." 
 
 " There's no use in talking. I cannot, at present, 
 give up my profession." 
 
 " If you are not ready at any moment, at any cost, 
 to give up anything in order to follow Christ, go into 
 the church, Marshall, to whose altar your mother car- 
 ried you in her arms. Go when its members are all 
 assembled to welcome some other child into its fold.
 
 272 HERMAN. 
 
 Go not in bravado, but in sober sadness. Dip your 
 hand into the font before them all, and say, With 
 this hand I wash from my brow that sign which you 
 laid upon it, but which it has proved unworthy to 
 wear. A follower of Christ I cannot be. My sandals 
 are not stout enough to follow his bare and bleeding 
 feet through low and thorny ways ; and he who is not 
 with him is against him. A hypocrite I M r ill not be. 
 If I range myself on Satan's side, at least it shall be 
 under no false colors. You could not do it, Marshall. 
 An unchristian man you think you can make up your 
 mind to be j but an unchristened one you would not. 
 Yet Christ said not, He who merely does not deny me 
 before men, ' I will confess before my Father Who is 
 in heaven ;' but ' he who confesses me before men.' 
 We dispute Christ's claims upon us ; we would not 
 consent to cast from us a tithe of our claims upon him ; 
 yet what is baptism but an empty form, a desecrated 
 form, if the spirit be not washed, but only the body ? 
 It is so with us almost all. We cling to the Christ with 
 one hand ; and we push away the Cross with the other. 
 We would have his wages, not his work. We take 
 our stand on this world with both feet, and lay hold 
 on the threshold of heaven's gate with just so many 
 unwilling fingers only, as we think may enable us, to 
 vault in, when we feel that at last the slippery earth is 
 rolling from underneath us, and that we must go some- 
 where else, a desperate and disgraceful game to play! 
 You cannot make up your mind to be altogether Sa- 
 tan's. Be altogether God's> then, for integrity's, and 
 loyalty's, and honor's sake ! St. Paul bids us, ' Be 
 not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by 
 the renewing of your minds;' a task hard enough for 
 most of us to achieve in the time given us to do it in,
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 273 
 
 yet not, it would seem, hard enough to satisfy our am- 
 bition ; for we most of us choose a harder, saying to 
 ourselves, ^Be conformed to this world, but be ye 
 transformed by the renewing of your minds' ; and in 
 the self-contradictory endeavour to accomplish this, we 
 spend our strength and life in vain, succeeding only in 
 the first half of it. No ; this world is not yet con- 
 formed to Christianity, nor can we yet be transformed 
 by Christianity, while conforming oureelves to the 
 world. It is a less unchristian world than it was, 
 thanks to the saints of eighteen centuries, who have 
 lived and died to make it so ; but its every unwilling 
 step towards righteousness has been planted on the 
 heart of some faithful servant of Christ, whom it tram- 
 pled under its feet for dragging it forward, but who, if 
 he died himself, left his impetus alive in it. It w r ill 
 not be a Christian world, nor a world in which one can 
 be a Christian, yet conformed to it, until it has been 
 dragged on and up for centuries again by men animated 
 with the spirit of the apostolic age. Thanks to the 
 faithful men of that age, it has lowered its tone a little 
 since their day ; but everywhere, in every path in 
 life, in the camp, the courts, the church, the shop, the 
 hall of legislature, it meets us, still the same perverse 
 old world that tried to face them down, but tried in 
 vain, thanks to their faith that we have not, and their 
 manhood that we have not, and their Master that we 
 have, and deny, through our thoughtlessness and 
 cowardice and paltriness, at every turn. Afraid or 
 ashamed any longer to say to us, ' Be conformed to me 
 on pain of the nails, the lions, the rack, or the stake,' 
 it still says, ' Be conformed to me on pain of loss, dis- 
 credit, insult, plainer clothes, a smaller house, or harder 
 fare ;' while still, as in those old days in Judea, the 
 12*
 
 274: HERMAN. 
 
 voice of the Saviour answers low and solemnly, ' What 
 Bhall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, 
 and lose his own soul ?' "Whose voice of the two we 
 are following, Marshall, you and I, we must judge for 
 ourselves, until Christ judges for us; but the soldier, 
 who puts up his sword into the sheath in obedience to 
 orders brought him by the telegraph of conscience from 
 his Commander-in-chief at the right hand of God, ra- 
 ther than carry out the bloody designs of some mutinous 
 Satan-serving human subaltern, the judge who, in sub- 
 mission to the decrees of the Judge of the Supremest 
 Court, puts his ermine off rather than dabble it in the 
 gory mud, following a lackey at the heels of Tyranny, 
 the young preacher who comes down from the pul- 
 pit where he hoped to wear his hoary hairs one day, 
 rather than keep back God's truth, or utter a lie 
 therein, the merchant, who lets his profits go, that he 
 may hold fast his principles, the statesman, who sits 
 down in patient obscurity, rather than serve a faction 
 against God and his country, nay, even the poor un- 
 derling, who, with a needy family, refuses, in the name 
 of Christ, to help serve a false warrant, and takes the 
 consequences with him, instead of food and clothing, to 
 his home, all these, glory be to them ! They are doing 
 what it is their duty to do, though no more. It may 
 not be much, not much compared with the doings 
 and sufferings of the first martyrs and confessors ; but 
 it will be something to keep them from hanging their 
 heads in utter shame, when the glorious company of 
 those first martyrs shall open its shining ranks to re- 
 ceive them to its bosom." 
 
 " How could the affairs of the world ever -be car- 
 ried on, if your principles prevailed ?" 
 
 " As we pray every day that they may be car-
 
 TilK KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 275 
 
 ried on, Thy will, oh God, being done, on earth as it 
 is in heaven !" 
 
 " But what a condition a man would be in, if his 
 religion was liable any day to drag him away from his 
 business !" 
 
 "In no worse a condition than those first Christians, 
 who were liable any day, for the sake of their religion, 
 to be dragged from their business to torture and death. 
 Christ said, ' If any man hate not his father, and mo- 
 ther, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, 
 yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.' " 
 
 " That was in the first age of the church." 
 
 " He said it in some sense, I think, for all time. 
 The world's exactions have been a little lessened since. 
 That was God's demand, like Himself, unchangeable. 
 There was no partiality there. The outward condition 
 of later Christians has been softened, as I said, through 
 the hardships conquered by those earlier ones ; but 
 there are still strongholds of evil to be brought down, 
 still martyrdoms to be suffered, and still palms unwon. 
 Heaven and heavenly glory are still offered to us on 
 the same inward conditions that they were to them, 
 110 easier, no harder." 
 
 " Can you fulfil those conditions, as you understand 
 them, yourself, Arden?" 
 
 " I have been trying for three or four years past to 
 train myself to fulfil them," answered Herman, sim- 
 ply ; " but I have been surprised to find what up-hill 
 work it is. If I can say forty or fifty years hence, on 
 my death-bed, that I have succeeded at last, I shall 
 think that I have done a pretty good, life's work." 
 
 " Do you mean, then, to denounce, and expect me 
 to denounce, all professional soldiers, who merely obey 
 orders through thick and thin, as no Christians ?"
 
 276 HERMAN. 
 
 " By no means. To their own muster let them 
 stand or fall. The Gospel has always appeared to me 
 a code of laws marvellously adapted for a man's using 
 in his judgments of .himself, marvellously adapted for 
 his not using to pass judgment upon his neighbours." 
 
 " Then, Arden, why do you, why will you, use 
 it to pass judgment upon me ?" 
 
 " Have I been arrogant ?" said Herman, stopping 
 short, and putting the question to himself as much as 
 to his friend. 
 
 " Not you. No, no. Forgive me." 
 
 " It is a bad tone, that one gets insensibly in politi- 
 cal wrangling ; but, indeed, I did not mean to use it 
 towards you. I fancied myself all this time not your 
 judge, but your advocate, pleading your cause against 
 the adversary of all souls. If I was bitter, it was 
 against him, not you, my dear old fellow." 
 
 " There is no bitterness, I believe, Arden, that your 
 look and voice could not sweeten, to any one who in 
 my circumstances, sick, and alone, and forlorn, had 
 
 learned to Pshaw ! pshaw ! I'm too well now to 
 
 have an excuse for sentimentalizing, or for being 
 peevish, either. Go on. But suppose I can't under- 
 stand what the Gospel requires of me ?" 
 
 " Can't you ? or won't you ? Shall I go on ? In 
 either case, you will not be a very valuable servant, 
 and must not expect high wages. No ; I will not put 
 it on so low grounds ; you will hear no word, ' Well 
 done !' Did not you hear what your Georgian major, 
 what's his name ? Anathema?" 
 
 " No, Annameth," 
 
 " Oh, yes, said to his black, Pete, the other morning, 
 when he'd done something more ingeniously blundering 
 than usual, and made some such excuse for it? "With
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. '211 
 
 more oaths than I shall repeat, (partly because they were 
 more than I can remember, and partly because I won't 
 teach my tongue the trick of them,) he inquired, patly 
 enough, as I thought, ' You - - scoundrel, 
 
 you, why the didn't yon understand ?' " 
 
 " He does swear, doesn't he ?" 
 
 " Yes ; I should think he would want to, sometimes. 
 Slaveholding is certainly one of those sins, which bring 
 their own punishment with them. Your mental un- 
 derstanding is good enough. The defect, if there is 
 any, must be in your morale. The great Physician 
 had healing for the blind, but not for those who wil- 
 fully shut their eyes. If you can see, but will not, you 
 must set your highest hopes on being suffered in hea- 
 ven as a penitent sinner, not welcomed as a victorious 
 saint. The triumph of the saints who follow you will 
 be, not the having completed, but having undone, the 
 work you did on earth. Where will be your point of 
 sympathy with them, or theirs with you, or yours with 
 Christ ?" 
 
 " Arden, I should not have been petulant ; but the 
 fact is, that you give me more pain than you think. 
 I am not altogether so thoughtless and heartless a fel- 
 low as you may consider me. In sickness and solitude, 
 a man often gets morbid ; and you bring up, only a 
 great deal more vividly, ideas that haunted and tor- 
 mented me miserably in the first of my illness, before 
 you came to cheer me up and set me on my legs 
 again." 
 
 " Perhaps, too, you think that I owe you an apol- 
 ogy, my dear Marshall, as a citizen, for .undertaking to 
 express an opinion upon your position in the army 
 here ; and so, perhaps, I do, if I have not taken my 
 opinion from you ; but I thought that I had, from
 
 278 HEKMAN. 
 
 things you have been letting fal. incidentally ever since 
 I came. If you heartily believe upon good grounds, 
 that you are likely to be called on here only to protect 
 good citizens, not to persecute them, my strictures upon 
 offensive warriors don't apply to you. Christianity 
 has to do with general principles ; individual Christians, 
 with the particular application of them, I admit. Judge 
 of your own duty, then, on your own responsibility ; but 
 judge impartially, for the sake of your mother and 
 your old friend, for your responsibility is an awful one ; 
 and you do still think it wrong for you, in these circum- 
 stances, to remain in the army. I knew you formerly, 
 and know you now, well enough to be sure that I am 
 not mistaken. Am I?" 
 
 " Well, it's pretty hard for me to get out of it." 
 "Pretty inconvenient to do what one thinks right, 
 pretty often. Yes, I know that very well." 
 
 " I tell you, Arden, you don't consider ! You don't 
 seem in the least to see how it is. I should say you 
 hadn't the least feeling for me, if I could say it, looking 
 back over the last two weeks, without being a more 
 ungrateful and paltry fellow even than you think me. 
 It isn't with me as it is with you. You're rich enough 
 to afford to ' keep a conscience,' and yet live as you 
 please. You were born a gentleman ; and I'm only 
 one by virtue of my commission. All the prospects 
 in life of my family depend on my working my way 
 up in the army. If I leave it, I must go down to 
 drudge at a clerk's desk, and set my poor little sisters to 
 wear themselves out in keeping school ; if I stay in the 
 army, I can, with economy, dress them well, introduce 
 them well, and marry them well. My first duty is to 
 them and my mother. I'm a faithful son to her, if I 
 do serve her against her will. Don't you think
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 279 
 
 yourself, that our circumstances point out to us our duties 
 in life ?" 
 
 " No doubt, to a certain extent ; but some of them 
 bid us to be led by them, and some to struggle, that by 
 wrestling we may wring from them the blessing which 
 they were sent to bestow upon us. As to position in 
 fashionable society, Marshall, I can't help you much ; 
 for, with all the gentility which you give me credit for, 
 I'm in Coventry at present myself" 
 
 "You, Arden!" 
 
 " I, Marshall, though on no account which need 
 make me blush for myself, or my friends for me ; but 
 my sister is not ; and I can answer for her, that she'll be 
 very happy to make the acquaintance of yours, and in- 
 troduce them. I am in circumstances, thank heaven ! 
 to help a friend to keep a conscience, if a pretty well- 
 filled purse can do it ; and you must share mine with 
 your old school-fellow, if only to prove to him that he 
 has not lost your friendship by his pertinacious ha- 
 rangues. With your abilities and education, you'll 
 soon make your way as a civil engineer; and then 
 your mother will no longer sigh over your remittances 
 as I have heard her lately, regarding them as the price 
 of blood, yours or your countrymen's." 
 
 " God bless you ! "With all your cranks, you're the 
 best-hearted fellow that ever lived ; but there's tattoo ! 
 It's time for me to turn in. "We'll talk about this, per- 
 haps, some other time." 
 
 They had little more time for talking, for several 
 days ; as the young officer was now well enough to re- 
 sume his duty, and took an extra share of it,^>n the 
 plea that he must repay his comrades for their extra 
 trouble during his illness. Perhaps he was not very 
 sorry ; for though Herman, in the foregoing con versa-
 
 280 HERMAN. 
 
 tion, had softened his "fortiter in re" with a "suavi- 
 ter in modo " an expression in tone and manner of 
 cordial interest in his friend, and pain in giving pain, 
 which is quite lost in ray report of his words they had 
 struck home more than once. Marshall was kind- 
 hearted, affectionate, and intelligent ; but he was one 
 of that more numerous than enviable class of men, who 
 have just conscience enough to keep them wavering 
 in the wrong, too little to keep them unwavering in 
 the right. 
 
 A few days after, after an absence of a few hours, 
 he returned to his room, where he had left Herman to 
 " keep house for " him. He bade him good afternoon, 
 with an elaborate imitation of his usual manner, came 
 up to the table at which Herman was reading, brought 
 down his fist upon it with all his force, swore, dashed 
 himself into a chair beside it, leaned his arms and face 
 upon it, and burst into tears. 
 
 " My dear Marshall," cried Herman, " my dearest 
 fellow ! What's the matter ? What has happened to 
 you ?" 
 
 " The matter is," said Marshall, bringing it out as 
 fast as he could between oaths, and sobs, and curses, 
 " that, as the devil would have it, I've killed little 
 Sophy's husband, little Sophy, Arden, my own 
 little cousin, the best little thing that ever was ! She 
 married a school-master, and came out here. So de- 
 lighted she was, too, when she found I was stationed 
 here, to think, as she said, he would have a friend in 
 the army; if worse came t" worst. All through my 
 sickness, she was making little nice things for me, and 
 making him bring 'em." 
 
 " Well, but, Marshall, how did this happen ?" 
 
 " A 'n't I telling you as fast as I can ? They sent me,
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 281 
 
 d 'em, too late to do any good! down to AJganock 
 Precinct, to see to the voting. The Border Ruffians 
 came, of course ; and, before I could get there, they 
 and some of the Free-State men had got into a row. 
 They wouldn't disperse ; so I had to charge into 'em ; 
 and when they did scatter, there was his tallow face 
 looking up at me out of the dust, under my horse's 
 hoofs! I hacked off of him, and picked him up, 
 coughing blood, and groaning blood, and breathing 
 blood, he couldn't speak. A pretty sight for her to 
 see brought home ! and she going to be confined, no- 
 body knows how soon !" 
 
 " How came he there ?" 
 
 " Don't I tell you ? He was one of the judges ; 
 and when the other two caved in, and he saw that all 
 the Ruffians would be let vote, he took the ballot-box 
 and ran, the only thing he could do to put a stop to 
 it. They ran after, the Ruffians and Pro-Slaveries, 
 and tried to get the box. He stood to it like a 
 pluckier fellow than 1 thought him, he always 
 seemed one of your peaceable, scrupulous slow coaches ; 
 1 and some of the other Free-States came to help 
 him ; and 'twas a free fight all round. Oh, d it ! 
 What's the use in talking ? Such things must hap- 
 pen, if the Abolitionists will kick up a row. 'Twas no 
 fault of mine." 
 
 " Indeed, I hardly see that it was. It was a horri- 
 ble accident ; and you must feel it terribly ; but you 
 were interfering to prevent mischief, not to make it. 
 Thank -God for that, Marshall! Thank -God for 
 that !" , 
 
 " Thank the devil I I don't thank God, and I 
 won't, for anything about it ! Can't you wait to hear 
 the whole story before you begin with your congratu-
 
 282 HERMAN. 
 
 lations, if I've got to tell it all out, word for word, be- 
 fore you can see through it ?" 
 
 " I thought you had finished. Let me hear." 
 
 " The first fight was before I came up. The Ruf- 
 fians on the ground, then, were two or three to the 
 Free -States one. They knocked Robbins down, 
 wrenched the ballot-box out of his hand, got back to 
 the polls, crowded them, chose- judges of their own, 
 and voted as fast as they could. He, thinking himself 
 responsible for the integrity of the vote, rallied his 
 party in considerable fbrce, and besieged the polls. 
 He was foremost, nearest the house. J didn't see him. 
 The Free-State men wouldn't give inf unless I'd prom- 
 ise 'em that nobody should vote, who wasn't according 
 to their notions qualified. I couldn't. I had no au- 
 thority. My orders were only to see that the election 
 went on peaceably, not to say who should vote, and 
 who shouldn't. I couldn't go beyond my orders, 
 could I?" 
 
 "I think not. Goon." 
 
 " I'm going on as fast as I can. So the Free-States 
 laid on to the Ruffians ; and we laid on to the Free- 
 States ; and that's all. It's the fortune of war. I only 
 did my duty. He did his. There's nobody to blame. 
 Poor little Sophy ! I wonder if he's dead yet. I 
 wonder if she knows. "- 
 
 "What! Did he not die?" 
 
 " How should I know ? They carried him all wrig- 
 gling into a shed. I couldn't stay to look on, of course, 
 with them all glowering round at me, and taunting 
 me, itoo." 
 
 " Had they a surgeon ? " 
 
 " No ; I galloped as fast as I could to Bayou's quar- 
 ters, and begged him to go as I never begged a brother
 
 THK KMGIIT JN T1IK CAMP. 283 
 
 officer to do me a favor before. He wouldn't budge 
 an inch. He said he knew, by what "l told him, 'twas 
 no use." 
 
 " "Where is the man ?" cried Herman, starting up. 
 
 "What! are you going? God in heaven bless 
 you ! I never thought of you. Do you think you 
 could save him ? Here, put on my uniform great-coat 
 for a passport. The country is swarming still with 
 those bandits. 
 
 " I cannot ; it is stained." 
 
 "No, it isn't. Where?" 
 
 " No matter. Lend me your pistols." 
 
 "There. Why won't you take the coat?" 
 
 "Thank you. I like mine better just now. I'm 
 going among Free-State men, remember." 
 
 "Bless you! They wouldn't lay a finger on it. 
 Don't you know, they're very careful how they meddle 
 with lawful authorities?" 
 
 " If so, a good reason," thought Herman, " why 
 lawful authorities should be very careful how they 
 meddle with them." He hastily received Marshall's 
 hurried directions, and set off, promising to bring or 
 send him good news, if he could, as soon as he could. 
 
 There was no more good news to be brought or 
 sent from poor Robbins in this world, except that his 
 sufferings were over. He lay on some straw in the 
 shed into which he had been carried. His -friends, 
 having taken off their coats to cover him, in a vain 
 effort to keep out the chill of death, stood in their shirt- 
 sleeves around him, looking helplessly and hopelessly on. 
 At his feet, and staring immovably with her bright, 
 glassy eyes, as if fascinated, at the grisly contortions of 
 limb and feature which he could not suppress, crouched 
 a little black-haired, white-skinned creature, in whom
 
 284 HERMAN. 
 
 Herman had no difficulty in recognising " Sophy." As 
 tearless as unsmiling, she, like a medical student in a 
 hospital, gravely, composedly, intently, observed and 
 studied the agonies of her husband, seeming not to let 
 a motion nor a look escape her, but catching each one 
 with a curious kind of greediness. She did not stir, 
 except now and then slightly, with a sort of uncon- 
 scious mimicry, to copy some writhing or grimace of 
 his. He gazed at her with much more apparent terror 
 than she, at him. 
 
 $My God ! " groaned he, in a deep, dull voice, like 
 a dead man speaking out of a tomb, " Poor Sophy ! 
 how she looks ! take her away." The blood frothed 
 at his lips as he spoke. She blew bubbles from hers 
 like a baby, put her fingers to them, looked at her 
 fingers, seemed surprised that they were not red, and 
 looked back at him. 
 
 " Come, Miss Robbins," said an elderly man, sooth- 
 ingly, " You come home along o' me. Marthy and 
 Huldy have got something mighty pretty to show 
 ye, some little baby-socks, red and yeller, they've 
 been a knittin. Come, your husband don't like to 
 see you here, all among the men-folks. We'll take the 
 best o' care of him ; an I guess he'll feel some better 
 by and by. Come, and we'll go down to your place, 
 and get a bed in the team, and come back and fetch 
 him." 
 
 She did not stir, nor seem to hear, but kept ^fcitch, 
 still with the same passionless intensity, while Herman 
 busied himself with her husband. "I am a physician," 
 said he, stepping within the ring ; " let me see if I can- 
 not do something to relieve you." 
 
 The man looked up wistfully and gratefully into his 
 face ; but " no use," he said ; and it was of no use. His
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 285 
 
 spine and ribs were so injured, that examination could 
 be only added torment ; and the last cold drops were 
 already on his brow. "Only take care of her," 
 gasped he, "it's enough to kill her. Take her away, 
 for pity's sake ! Oh ! kiss me, Sophy, and go." She 
 rose, sank again, crawled to him on her hands and 
 knees, put her lips towards his, and then, stopped mid- 
 way, as it seemed, by his. deathly look, and forgetting the 
 kiss, resumed her trance-like watch. Herman took 
 her hand, and spoke to her ; but when he would have 
 led her away, she resisted him with all her pftsive 
 strength, though without a word, or turning ^her eyes 
 for an instant from her husband. 
 
 "Here, Atkins," said the man who had first ad- 
 dressed her, beckoning to another, like him somewhat 
 advanced in life, but hale, hearty, and respectable- 
 looking, "she don't know what she's about. This is 
 awful for him, and enough to craze, her for life. I'll 
 git behind her, an take her easy by the shoulders ; and 
 you lift her feet; and we'll see if we can't git her off 
 quietly, and down to my house. We'll git the girls 
 to put her to bed ; and may-be she'll sleep it off. We're 
 such old friends, I guess she won't mind us." 
 
 They tried it, and tried it in the most compassionate 
 and considerate way ; but, as soon as the little fragile 
 creature understood what was intended, her apathy 
 gave place to the most frenzied rage. She flew at 
 thefr faces with her nails, and scratched and bit like 
 a wild cat at bay. 
 
 "Hold on!" moaned the groaning voice through 
 her screams. " Don't vex her. There, there, Sophy 
 You shall stay." 
 
 They set her down. She threw herself upon him 
 and clasped her arms so tightly round his mangled
 
 280 HERMAN. 
 
 form, that he cried out in his turn. She loosed her 
 hold, and raised her head to look at him once more. 
 She saw a corpse, and with another wild cry fell into 
 strong convulsions. 
 
 " So, most miserable wife of a most miserable hus- 
 band," thought Herman, "I would rather be even in 
 your place than Marshall's ! "What shall I say to him ? 
 It would be happier, ten thousand times happier, I 
 suppose, for you to die ; but for his sake, pray God I 
 may save you !" 
 
 He could not save her ; nor could the best physician 
 of the neighbouring towns, who was brought in, in the 
 course of the evening, by one of her husband's friends, 
 after they had got her home in an ox-cart. With 
 Herman, he did what could be done for her through 
 the night. In the morning, all hope was gone ; and he 
 was obliged to go to his other patients, and leave her 
 to Herman. He stayed by her till noon, when he gave 
 her up to the undertaker. He wandered through her 
 ^little cabin. Rude as it was without, it looked neat 
 and tasteful within, and cheerful, all excepting the 
 chamber where the two young corpses lay, side by side. 
 Between them on their bed lay another, looking like a 
 stranger to the day-light, the little waxen baby, that 
 was never to see the light of the sun, that neither of 
 its parents had ever seen, dressed in a tiny white 
 robe, which the women had found beside its mother's 
 work-basket, with the needle still sticking in the 4ast 
 stitch, where she had probably left it, as she started up 
 to hear of the father's murder. The flowers, fresh still, 
 which she had gathered the day before, were taken by the 
 sobbing girls from the vase in which she had put them, 
 in her simple parlour, to strew her shroud. 
 
 "Better so," said Herman, as, these arrangements
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. . 287 
 
 completed, he came back, and stood leaning against 
 the door-post to take his parting look; " poor harmless 
 people! Since man must needs have the life of one of 
 you, I see the mercy of God in this, that He took you 
 all together ! " 
 
 It was already near sunset, when he set out on his 
 return to the barracks. He walked slowly; for he 
 dreaded his meeting with Marshall, and wished, by 
 diverting his thoughts for a time from the tidings which 
 he had to bring, to overcome or at least lessen his own 
 sense of their horrors, that he might the more gently 
 impart them to his friend. He passed by the place 
 where the skirmish had been. The trampled grass and 
 flowers were beginning to lift up their heads again. 
 The clear waters of the creek that ran by, were swell- 
 ing up into, arid washing away, the hoof-prints in the 
 banks of the ford. The by-ds perched and sang, where 
 the men must have struggled and shouted curses only 
 yesterday. The earth had sucked in the few, small, 
 dark pools of blood ; and the sinking sun shone still < 
 upon the spots, as if to dry them out of sight. If they 
 cried out of the ground to God, God only heard. All 
 was peaceful and still. Nature seemed striving for- 
 givingly to heal and efface all the prints and scars 
 which Man's outrages had left upon her fair counte- 
 nance, that they might bear no witness against him to 
 her Maker. Herman leaned against the trunk of a tall 
 hickory, and stood endeavouring to breathe her patient 
 oalinness in. 
 
 " Ah," said he to himself, " is Man forever to be the 
 one blemish on the face of this beautiful creation ? Is 
 humanity forever destined to make the single discord 
 in the diapason of the universe? My countrymen, are 
 we to gorge this fresh virgin continent with blood
 
 288 . u 
 
 and crime, as our fathers and brothers did and do the 
 old? Is it not a strange and sad proof of the differ- 
 ence between Christendom and Christianity, that 
 eighteen hundred years after the author of the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews wrote, 'Let brotherly love continue,' 
 it should be found necessary to proclaim among soi- 
 disans civilized nations, Let brotherly love begin, and 
 that the doctrine should be accounted new, fanatical, 
 unpractical, and wild? What a different state of 
 things the world would by this time have presented, 
 if that pure love had continued from the first to spread 
 over it, the spirit everywhere, in only that one respect, 
 keeping pace with the name, of the Saviour ! The 
 strong, instead of trampling upon the weak, \vould be 
 seen lifting them up ; the lofty, heard saying to the 
 lowly, ' Come up higher,' instead of, ' Crouch beneath 
 my footstool ;' the learned, instead of seeking to fix 
 their increasing knowledge as a great gulf between 
 themselves and their fellow-men, would be ofteuer 
 eagerly employed in making, by means of it, smooth- 
 er roads for the ignorant to ascend upon. The 
 unlucky debtor, instead of running away or blowing 
 his brains out, would go with confidence to his wealthi- 
 est neighbour, and find no difficulty in obtaining aid, 
 beyond an honest unwillingness to seek it. As often 
 as a charitable deed was done, the pleasure would have 
 been on the doer's side; the pain, if there was any, 
 on that of the asker. The person, who had saved the 
 most men, would be held a greater hero than he who 
 who had killed the most. He would be considered the 
 greatest statesman, who showed the most skill in har- 
 monizing the interests of other countries with those of 
 his own. The poor savage would be guarded, borne 
 with, and taught, by his civilized neighbours, as kindly 
 and patiently as an idiot by his generous, manly
 
 THE KAIGHT IN THE CAMP. 289 
 
 brothers. The beauty, instead of estimating the power 
 of her charms, like that of a piece of ordnance, by the 
 amount of mischief they could do, would deal with the 
 happiness of her young admirers as cautiously as she 
 would have her beautiful no longer rival, friend 
 deal with that of her favorite brother. The brilliant 
 and accomplished gentleman, instead of amusing him- 
 self by playing off the follies and drawing out the 
 weaknesses of the artless and inexperienced, would, by 
 the dignified respect he paid them, teach them to re- 
 spect and dignify themselves. The ship-owner would 
 say to the homesick emigrant, Will you sail ? as readily 
 as the Jehu says to the well-dressed native American, 
 ' Will you ride ?' Theft and murder would of course 
 be unknown ; drunkenness, idleness, and poverty, 
 scarcely less so. The offender would be eager to ac- 
 knowledge and repair his misdeeds ; the offended, 
 to forgive and have them forgotten. Envy and jeal- 
 ousy would have died a natural death. The joy of 
 one would be the joy of every one. The poorer would 
 work for themselves, readily and thoughtfully provided 
 with employment, if necessary, by others ; the richer, 
 for their neighbours. The master would loose the 
 slave ; the slave, cling to the master. We should all 
 be every day as eager and happy to befriend each 
 other as we now are when some great calamity, 
 a fire, shipwreck, or tornado, wakes up the angelic 
 instincts in us, which so soon grow torpid again in our 
 heavy worldly air, and for an hour or a week changes 
 earth-worms into men, and men into heroes. Wherever 
 we went, north, south, east, or west, we .should find 
 at need, in every stranger whom we met, the Good 
 Samaritan, walking in some new disguise. 
 
 " ' There were no need of arsenals or forts.' 
 13
 
 29'0 HEKMAST. 
 
 The strength of nations, no longer suicidally wasting 
 itself in their mutual destruction, would be com- 
 bined for gigantic labors in breaking in for the service 
 of man every practicable portion of our globe, and in 
 bringing to light all its attainable hidden resources, for 
 the prosperity of each and all. A new bliss, above the 
 bliss of Eden, would quicken and warm all hearts, 
 the joy not only of receiving, but of doing good. The 
 custom of seeking the welfare of others might have be- 
 come, through gratitude, social sympathy, and a sort 
 of generous competition, as ardent a passion as that of 
 seeking one's own is now. Our old bad fashion of 
 treating one another, and our God, as foes, has been 
 tried long enough, not on the whole to the satisfaction 
 of anybody, except that of Satan, who set it. It was 
 already old when the Gospel was new, long-tried, and 
 always found wanting ; yet we have stupidly persisted, 
 one after another, generation after generation, in con- 
 tinuing to try it ever since. When will the new 
 fashion come in? When shall we find all within and 
 without us zealously following the example of Christ in 
 brotherly and filial love ?" 
 
 Ah, not yet, young dreamer, not just yet ! One 
 generation of young dreamers, and actors, too, like 
 you, might do something towards bringing it about ; but 
 you have fallen, like your Lord and Master before you, 
 upon a generation, not of vipers, altogether, by any 
 means, but of men, only men, men as they used to 
 be, men as they are, neither angels nor devils, but 
 mongrels, crosses between the two, not Christians 
 yet, with some apparently rare exceptions, if to be 
 Christian is to be Christ-like, but only no longer 
 Jews nor Pagans ! 
 
 As Herman's meditations reached the point above
 
 THE KNIGHT IN THE CAMP. 291 
 
 recorded, he became aware that they were insensibly 
 forming themselves into a tune, the time of which was 
 marked by a steady sound, steadily approaching, 
 " thump ! rub-a-dub ! thump ! rub-a-dub !" It was the 
 beat of a drum. It had not, he thought, the precision 
 of the performance of the regimental drummer. He 
 had- seen no reason to think that the Free-State men 
 were likely to be out. They had told him, that the 
 Border Ruffians had probably recrossed the border the 
 night before. What could this mean \ There was 
 certainly the scraping of a fiddle, too ; and now a noise 
 of coarse singing! lie resumed his walk towards 
 barracks. The music followed him ; and, turning his 
 head from time to time, he soon saw following the 
 sound into sight, a grotesque irregular procession of 
 dogs, horses, and two or three hay-carts, in the midst 
 of a mob of red-shirted, butteruut-colored-trowsered, 
 beardy men. They whipped and kicked the horses, 
 and came hooting and hurrying on, some riding, and 
 some running and holding by the hay -carts. Over the 
 foremost a deep crimson flag, with a white star in the 
 centre, flapped and swung from the staff, which was 
 lashed to the right-hand corner-post of the frame. 
 Here was a troop of ruffians, most evidently, of Bor- 
 der Ruffians, most probably ! Herman could not get 
 out of their way without running, nor with it : per- 
 haps. He jogged on accordingly in their way. Their 
 drum appeared to be persevering in a march ; their 
 fiddle iu a jig. They themselves were in the mean- 
 time vocally performing, in a tipsy chorus, a simulta- 
 neous variety of " negro melodies," among which "Ole 
 Dan Tucker" was for the time predominant. 
 
 " High !" yelled one of them, preluding his recita- 
 tive with a faithful imitation of an Indian war-whoop. 
 " Dog-goned if h'ar ain't Dan now !
 
 292 HEKMAN. 
 
 " ' Git out de way, ole Dan Tucker ! 
 
 You's too late to come to supper," &c. 
 
 "Darn yer, 'tain't uuther!" responded one of his 
 tuneful brethren. " Swow, if 'tain't Yankee Doodle. 
 Gorry ! View my splendiiFerous breeches !" contin- 
 ued he, looking down from his height, as the cart in 
 which he stood came along by Herman, and plucking 
 sympathetically at his own nether garments, which 
 happened to be of buckskin. " Reckon woollens was 
 cheap whar you was raised, strannger. 
 
 " ' Oh, Yankee Doodle's corned to town, 
 
 All dressed in striped trouse's ! 
 Says he, The city's built so thick 
 I cannot see no houses !' 
 CHORUS. " 'Icamiot see no houses.' 
 
 Hooh! yah! he! ho! ha!" 
 
 " What was the price o' wooden nutmegs when you 
 left Bosting, Y. Doodle, Esk ?" 
 
 " What'll yer take for Bunker's Hill Monument to 
 make a dam for the Mizzoura ? Give yer a almighty 
 dollar, fifty cents more'n it's wuth, too, come !" 
 
 " How's yer pilgrim father ?" 
 
 " Durn yer fool," cried another, extracting the nose 
 of a bottle from his mouth, and in the act, as it were, 
 uncorking his voice, " he ain't no Yankee ! His cheeks 
 is just like a tomattur's." 
 
 " Dog-goned if he ain't ! See his rig. Trig as a 
 tailor." 
 
 " You be dog-goned, then ! He ain't got no gab. 
 What'll yer bet ?'" 
 
 " Treat all around, fust store we come to." 
 
 " Done ! Blast yer, Ketchum ! Runnin over the 
 moon, be yer ? Hold on thar !" 
 
 The foremost cart, which had already gone jolting
 
 THE KXICrHT IN THK CAMP. 293,. 
 
 by, halted ; and so did the rabble rout, by this time 
 encompassing Herman before, behind, and on one side. 
 On the other side of the cart-track there, ran the river. 
 Herman still made his way on as well as he could 
 through the crowd, entrenching himself in silence." 
 
 " Ho, mister !" cried one of the disputants, calling 
 after him from his cart, pricking the wheel-horse with 
 a bowie-knife to make it start forward, and then pull- 
 ing it up on its haunches beside otir hero, " what d'yer 
 call the travelin milk-pump with four trotters under- 
 neath, two pokers in front, one handle hangin down 
 behind for you to grab at when you wants to catch her, 
 an a leather jacket on ?" 
 
 " Why, I suppose," said Herman, facing about and, 
 in spite of his impatience to be rid of them, bursting 
 into a hearty laugh at this most un-Agassiz-like de- 
 scription, " you must mean a cow." 
 
 " Thar, he said 'caow' !" exclaimed one of the betters, 
 triumphantly. "Auld, he treats ! Auld, he treats !" 
 
 " Durn yer, I won't !" rejoined Auld. " He didn't 
 commence to. He said ' cow ' as neat as any on us." 
 
 " Cause him to repeat it over again," said an elderly 
 man better dressed than the others, who appeared to 
 be in authority. 
 
 Herman had pushed on a few paces. The humane 
 feats of the charioteer were re-performed ; and the 
 war-chariot was again at his side, with what looked 
 like the muzzle of a small brass field-piece showing it- 
 self furtively at the side, through the straw in the 
 bottom. 
 
 " Let's h'ar yer say it again, mister." 
 
 " Certainly," said Herman, good-humoredly, " on 
 condition that you'll let me hear you say something 
 afterwards ; and that is, Good evening. It is time we 
 were all getting into night quarters ; and your horses
 
 294 HERMAN. 
 
 and so-forth there block up tiie road." He repeated in 
 a. loud tone, so that all could hear him, the word 
 " cow," and marched on as before. 
 
 " Vote by show of hands, gentlemen," said a voice 
 behind him, which he todk to be that of the elderly 
 man who had previously interposed ; " Does Auld 
 treat, or Harrass ? Those who deem the stranger to 
 have said ' caow ' will evidence the same by holding up 
 their right hands in token of assent. Harrass treats. 
 It is a vote." 
 
 " Durn it all !" expostulated Mr. Harrass, doggedly, 
 " I don't car' a dog-goned durn for that. He's lamed 
 ter say it since he come h'ar. You git him to hooray 
 for Buck an Breck, an I'll give in." 
 
 " Ho, mister ! let's h'ar yer hooray for Buck an 
 Breck !" 
 
 The road here turned aside from the river into the 
 prairies, and Herman determined to make his escape. 
 
 " There's a good old saying," he replied, " that 
 ' one must not hurra till after election.' This is my 
 way. Good night." 
 
 He turned aside over the grass, which, though 
 breast-high along the creek, w r as not more than ankle- 
 deep on the rising ground opposite. ~No effort was 
 made to stop him ; though he thought he distinguished 
 stage-whispers and muttering asides of " He is a Yan- 
 kee !" ' ; a Abolitionist !" " Free-State spy !" But, as 
 he reached the top of a line of sunset-gilded knolls, 
 which in another minute would have hidden his form 
 from the beholders, he heard a sharp crack and whistle, 
 and felt a hard blow on his back, and warm o-ush over 
 
 / O 
 
 bis hip. Before he had time to think what it could 
 mean, he also felt the world roll over with him into 
 the night, and ceased to think at all.* 
 
 * See Note A. at the end of the volume.
 
 THE 1STKK8 OF CHARITY. 295 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHARITY. 
 
 "Young women pretty and incapable; old women listless and 
 useless; and both young and old, if women of sense, perishing of 
 ennui, and longing for som? kind of a career." 
 
 THE POTIPHAE PAPERS. 
 
 WHEN Herman came to himself, it was still very 
 dark ; and through the darkness he felt that he was 
 carried along steadily without any effort of his own. 
 His first vague idea was, that he was in the other 
 world, and that the unseen ministers of eternal justice 
 were bearing him on to receive his final doom. This 
 notion was speedily put to flight, as his senses returned 
 to their duty, by the sound of the footsteps of his bear- 
 ers, and their quick, hard breathing. A sensation of 
 sickness and pain from their motion presently added 
 its testimony, feelingly to persuade him that he was 
 still in the body. But was he in the hands of friends 
 or foes ? a not uninteresting question for a man, who, 
 within no very long time probably, had become weaker 
 than a child. He fixed his swimming eyes, as well as 
 he could, on the darkness before him, an\l made out, 
 as well as he could, the darker outline of a figure in it; 
 and then his fain tn ess returned, and he could only shut 
 them again, and lose all other care in the one longing 
 to have his possessors, whoever they were, only lay 
 him down, anywhere, and let him alone. 
 
 In a few minutes more, lifting his heavy eyelids a 
 second time, he saw himself going feet foremost into a
 
 290 HERMAN. 
 
 lighted place, which looked like the kitchen of a farm- 
 house. His bearers laid him down wearily on an old- 
 fashioned wooden settle. As they stepped back from 
 him. and raised their heads, the flickering fire-light 
 showed them to be women, tall, and dressed in coarse 
 black gowns, with huge white cape-bonnets, and black 
 rosaries and crosses hanging at their waists. The first 
 one was elderly, pale, and wrinkled, but had a quick 
 eye, and a cheerful, though firm-set mouth. The other 
 was CONSTANCE ASPENWALL ! It was ! It was ! - 
 She did not recognize him, for his face lay in shadow ; 
 but he saw her. She was turning away, but one 
 glimpse was enough. As the other Sister of Charity 
 began to feel his pulse, and say, " Ah ! he's coming 
 to ! Don't be alarmed, sir, you're among friends," he 
 could hear, through the open door, Tier own voice, so 
 clear and liquid still, but so subdued, saying earnestly, 
 in the next room, " Have you any hartshorn, madam? 
 brandy? spirit of any kind? Rum? Oh yes, 
 that will do, thank you ! And is there any surgeon 
 you could send for ? We have brought a poor man 
 here, whom we found lying insensible down by Ash 
 Creek, where they were fighting yesterday." 
 
 The good woman of the house was heard hurrying 
 and rummaging about in the next apartment for an 
 instant, in 'an outburst of interjections of horror and 
 hospitality,. tongue, foot, and hand, apparently keeping 
 time. 
 
 The old Sister stooped to dip a mug-full of water for 
 Herman, out of a pail, which stood on the hearth. 
 
 Constance recrossed the threshold ; and the pale and 
 
 gory ghost of her lost love rose from his rude couch, 
 
 and staggered before her. She tossed her arms wildly 
 
 above her head, with all the shriek she did not utter 
 
 13*
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHARITY. 297 
 
 frozen in her face. He would have fallen at her feet 
 in the track which his freshly-flowing blood had made, 
 had not Sister Mary Peter, with the quick instinct of 
 her profession, whirled round like a windmill, caught 
 him, and replaced him on the settle. Constance fol- 
 lowed mechanically ; and through the sickness and 
 faintness which returned upon him, he could hear her 
 mutter, as if beside herself, " Oh, my God ! I have 
 killed him, and his wounds bleed afresh at the presence 
 of his murderess !" 
 
 He struggled to rise again ; but Sister Mary forbade 
 it, with both word and deed. " Constance !" " Oh, 
 Herman !" She came before him, and took his droop- 
 ing hand. He put hers to his lips. 
 
 Sister Mary guessed something, sympathized, and 
 covered the little scene from her hostess (whose atten- 
 tion was luckily divided for the moment by the opera- 
 tion of scraping with a knife, from her hands, the dough 
 which covered them,) by the dexterous interposition of 
 her person ; but she could not possibly let this sort of 
 proceeding go on. It was quite contrary to rule. 
 " "Go out, and see whether the boy has gone for the 
 doctor, Sister Agnes Alexis," said she authoritatively, 
 taking Constance by the arm ; " and don't come back 
 here till you're quite composed. The patient must be 
 kept perfectly quiet. I'm going to undress him ;" and 
 she put Constance out. " It takes these young things 
 some time to get used to the sight of blood ; and he 
 was a pretty heavy weight for her to carry. Mrs. 
 Dobbs, if you had a chamber where we could put him 
 to bed before the doctor conies," 
 
 " Certingly, Miss Peter, certingly. Right this way, 
 ma'am. The best bed's all ready prepared. I'll git 
 you my i*uning-sheet to lift him on ; an I guess I'd
 
 29S HERMAN. 
 
 better help you a spell, ef Miss Alexis is flustered. 
 'Twas something of a heft for you to fetch so fur. 
 Pootty young man, ain't he ? Hope he'll git over it ; 
 but he does look dreadful bad, don't he ? I never ! 
 his eyes is open now. Hope he didn't hear what I 
 said ! La ! he'll git over it fast enough, I'll bet." 
 
 Sister Mary locked the door, pocketed the key, and, 
 aided and abetted by her chattering hostess, very gently 
 and quickly exchanged Herman's clothes, moistened 
 and stiffened with dew and blood, for a coarse, but 
 clean, home-spun shirt. She then, no other surgeon 
 being forthcoming, examined his wound, stanched it, 
 and bound it up as well as she could, which was not 
 very badly ; for she had formerly been employed for 
 several months as dresser in a military hospital in 
 Europe. The ball she found in Herman's stocking. 
 It had extracted itself ; and, though it had previously 
 danced a good deal in his system, as a ball sometimes 
 will, she thought that it had spared his bones and vitals 
 altogether, and that the loss of blood would, if he was 
 strong enough to bear it, be of service in preventing 
 inflammation, provided he kept perfectly quiet in 
 body and mind / and he might be sure that Sister 
 Agnes Alexis, and she, would take the best care they 
 could of him, and do their part, if he would do his. 
 
 Having delivered herself thus scientifically and 
 diplomatically, she took the key from her pocket, re- 
 quested Mrs. Dobbs, nothing loth, to take charge of 
 her patient for ten minutes or so, and to lock the door 
 after her, as she did not wish him to be disturbed, 
 and informed him that if he stirred before she came 
 back, it would be at the peril of his life. She then 
 slipped quickly out, reclosed the door, and left him to 
 such comfort as he could find between hig soft band-
 
 Tin: SISTERS OF CHAKITY. 299 
 
 ages without and his hard struggles within, while he 
 lay, longing to collect all his remaining life into one 
 efibrt, to leap up, burst the door, and throw himself at 
 Constance's feet, if it was only to die there, and yet 
 fearing to compromise, he knew not how grievously, 
 " Sister Agnes Alexis." 
 
 As Sister Mary Peter expected, she no sooner came 
 into the passage, with her little lamp in her hand, 
 than she came upon her young colleague. Constance 
 was kneeing in the dark on the boards, with her 
 hands clasped, almost knotted, over her heart. She 
 sprang up, and caught Sister Mary's arm. 
 
 " He is doing very well, my dear, at present, at 
 least," said the latter, replying to her speechless ges- 
 ture ; " and now come out with me . I must ask 
 you," 
 
 " And I must tell you ! Sister, I don't forget my 
 vow ; and if the blessed Virgin and you will help me, 
 I won't break it ; but I must see him and be with him 
 now ; and if you try to part us before he is out of dan- 
 ger, I can;w> answer for the consequences. You must 
 know, no, I shall not go away ! he might die ; we 
 will whisper, your ear. Mr. Arden, this gentle- 
 man, was my lover ; but we quarrelled and parted." 
 
 " Whose fault was that ?" 
 
 " Mine. He was as upright and warm and true a 
 lover as woman ever had, only too good .for me. 
 I wished to govern him in matters I knew nothing 
 about ; and he had too much spirit to submit to it ; 
 and so we parted. I thought that I had made him 
 cease to love me ; but I see now that I have not ; and 
 I know, that it could have been only despair which 
 drove him, as it did me, to this fatal, fatal place. 
 Now, do I not owe him some amends ? his life, if iny
 
 300 HERMAN. 
 
 care can restore him? a happy death, if, oh, heaven, 
 have pity on us ! he must die ? Stay in this house, 
 Sister Mary ! Stay, and go in, and let me go in with 
 you and tend him till he is out of danger, or out of 
 this weary world ; and then I will allow you to take 
 me away with you, wherever you will, to any one who 
 needs us more. He is too honorable to tempt me to 
 break a solemn oath, whatever you may think of me. 
 Stay and be mer/ciful, as you would have St. Peter 
 show you mercy in your need ! I shall control myself 
 perfectly before the people of the house, and him, and 
 everybody else ; and so will he, when you tell him how 
 much depends upon it." 
 
 Constance hurried through these sentences, almost 
 in the time of a:iy single one, that Sister Mary had 
 ever heard from her before. Her tears of grief, terror, 
 and entreaty, flowing as fast as her words, had mean- 
 while become a perfect rain, and were rapidly thawing 
 the not very hard or cold heart of the experienced 
 elder, who liked a bit of romance when she could hon- 
 estly come by it, and who, besides, began to consider 
 that, while getting her out of Herman's way by finesse 
 was in the circumstances impossible, any attempt 
 to do so by the exercise of authority would probably 
 fail, and also bring about the very exposure of the 
 novice's feelings, which it was desirable to avoid. 
 Constance's hitherto resolutely unflinching, implicit 
 obedience, moreover, had led the sagacious old lady to 
 apprehend that her mutiny, if she were ever driven to 
 it, might be extremely formidable ; but it also encour- 
 aged her to believe, that Constance could still com- 
 mand herself in this, or any, emergency, provided she 
 saw it to be worth her while. 
 
 Just as Sister Mary Peter showed signs of waver-
 
 SISTEKS OF CHAKITY. 301 
 
 ing, and Sister Agnes Alexis redoubled accordingly her 
 half-menacing entreaties, it happened in her favor that 
 the key clicked in the lock, and the door opened. 
 Herman, with the cunning of utter helplessness, had 
 shut his eyes and feigned sleep. Mrs. Dobbs, tired of 
 silence, and suddenly recollecting that certain rolls 
 must be turning to bricks in the oven, peered out to 
 seek a substitute. Constance, seizing her advantage, 
 flashed in like lightning, with Sister Mary at her heels, 
 flew to Herman, looked in his eyes, and put w r ater to 
 his lips, but laid her finger on her own, while her col- 
 league took the word : 
 
 " Mr. Arden, [so Constance had told her who he 
 was,] as Sister Agnes Alexis has told me of your old 
 acquaintance," said Sister Mary, looking at him sig- 
 nificantly ; (so Constance had told her how they 
 stood with one another ! Just like her, artless, 
 noble-hearted creature ! How much better it looked 
 than concealment ! How much more to the credit of 
 all parties !) " \ve both think it may be a comfort to 
 you to have her assist me in taking care of you ;" 
 
 " God bless you !" 
 
 " Talking, at present, will not be good for you, 
 sir; and I have consented, understanding from her 
 that you are an honorable man, who will make- no 
 effort to turn her mind from her duty, when her vows 
 call her away to the service of others who need her 
 more. That will hardly be, of course, till you are bet- 
 ter, provided you are patient and docile, so that it is in 
 our power to do you good." 
 
 Herman bowed his pillowed head, looking very grate- 
 ful. They understood one another pretty well. She felt 
 for the young sufferer, and would gladly do for him all 
 that she could, consistently with fidelity to the obliga-
 
 302 HERMAN. " 
 
 tions which bound her; and more he must not, and 
 would not, ask. She would suffer them to pass what 
 might be his last earthly hours together, under the 
 sanction of her presence ; but it must be upon her own 
 terms ; and that was all that she could do for him. She 
 had them in her power ; and he must and ought to 
 submit. A young Sister in her charge might tend a 
 sick man blamelessly ; but she must not listen to a 
 lover. 
 
 So the slow hours crept on. The Dobbses mascu- 
 line came audibly home in their tramping cowhide 
 shoes, tramped up stairs, and anon breathed stertorously. 
 Mrs. Dobbs knocked for the last time at the door, 
 brought in a plate of cold baked pork-and-beans and 
 pumpkin-pie for supper, stared at Herman, requested 
 " Miss Peter" to " jest please mind the lamp didn't drop 
 no sparks," and withdrew to her dormitory. Then the 
 long, unbroken night ranged with clicking footsteps 
 round and round the face of the old eight-day clock, 
 while the unfortunate young people, so long parted, 
 BO soon to part again, perhaps forever ! sat and lay in 
 each other's presence, under the Argus eyes of their 
 keeper, with parted hands, and sealed lips, and burst- 
 ing hearts, bursting with a struggling chaos of love, 
 wonder, hope, and dread. How much had each to ask 
 and to tell ! Must they part again, and leave it all 
 unsaid ? How soon ? When should they meet again ? 
 As these questions, with a chorus of similar ones, 
 rushed through Herman's brain, his pulse throbbed 
 higher and higher. 
 
 To one of them, he felt at last as if he must have an 
 answer, or die. Beckoning Sister Mary to him at mid- 
 night, he whispered, " Is she bound for life ?" 
 
 " Oh, no, my son !"
 
 T11K SISTEKS OF CHARITY. 303 
 
 " For how long 2" 
 
 " A year." 
 
 He cast towards Constance an inexpressible glance 
 of relief and delight, closed his eyes, fell asleep, and 
 awoke the next morning with a sonse of such unwonted 
 and childlike lightness of heart, that his first idea on 
 seeing the bare rafters over his head was, that he was 
 a happy little schoolboy again, spending a vacation at 
 Sea Farm; and when he would have raised himself to 
 look about him, the weakness and stiff soreness, which 
 checked him, did but remind him that he was a happier 
 man ; and, as he sank back upon his pillow, it was with 
 an ineffable sense of thankfulness and joy, which re- 
 called to him the words, " Verily I say unto you, there 
 is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, 
 or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for 
 my sake and the gospel's, but he shall receive an hun- 
 dred-fold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and 
 sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with per- 
 secutions, and in the world to come eternal life." 
 
 His sound sleep, which he stood in great need of, 
 having had none for forty hours before, recruited his 
 strength, reduced his fever, and cleared his head. He 
 was now able, in some degree, to take his case under 
 his own consideration ; and his opinion, as well as Sis- 
 ter Mary's, was very encouraging to himself and to 
 Constance. It was further confirmed by that of Dr. 
 Coffin, the physician who had been with him the night 
 before in poor Robbins's cabin, and who looked in upon 
 him in the course of the morning, in great amazement 
 and some wrath at seeing his late able, active, and 
 blooming assistant, so quickly turned into a pallid, 
 meek-faced, helpless patient. He was much struck by 
 the spectacle of Herman's resignation, which certainly
 
 HERMAN. 
 
 was most edifying, and was exceedingly kind, and 
 ready to do all that be could ; but be was very busy 
 and burried, and bis fingers were much bigger than 
 Sister Mary's, and bis touch harder and heavier; so 
 that Herman was glad, on more accounts than one, to 
 bear him compliment her merrily upon her skill, and 
 declare that she bad done and was doing all that was 
 necessary, and that unless the symptoms changed, or 
 she desired a consultation, he believed he need not 
 meddle much further in the business, though he would 
 look in as often as he could get round that way. All 
 that Herman required, all agreed, was good nursing 
 and quiet just now, and good feeding presently. His 
 good health and condition would do all the rest for 
 him ; and, for himself, he was afraid now only of get- 
 ting well too fast. 
 
 He wanted no change. He would have liked only 
 to stop the clock, and make the earth stand still. What 
 health was, or could be, like illness watched by Con- 
 stance ? She said little ; she could do nothing, but now 
 and then bring him cool draughts or keep the flies 
 away, for sister Mary left her nothing else to do ; but 
 that was enough. She sat for the most part with her 
 eyes cast down ; but that gave him only the better 
 chance to keep his own fixed undetected on her face. 
 He gazed silently until, in weariness and weakness, he 
 could gaze no longer, and the beautiful vision swam 
 away into dreams of her. He could not bear to think 
 of losing one moment, in her presence, of 
 " The sober certainty of waking bliss;" 
 
 but when he awoke with a start, and looked to see that 
 she had not fled with his dreams, amends was made him 
 for his unwilling slumbers ; for, before she had time t/i 
 look away, he found that she in her turn \vi,s gazing
 
 THE SISTKKS OF CHARITY. ' 3U5 
 
 upon him ; and thus, sometimes, for an instant their 
 glances would meet. So the bare " best-chamber," 
 with its unpapered walls and floor painted yellow, its 
 narrow strip of blue carpet before the hearth, and green 
 Carpet before the door, and chalky plaster vases on the 
 mantel-piece, full of hectic apples and jaundiced 
 oranges, was, to one of its tenants at least, an Elysium ; 
 and so the first day passed, and the second. 
 
 But, on the third, the unhappy Herman could not 
 but perceive that he was better. What a vexation it 
 is sometimes to have a fine constitution ! His trials 
 had begun with a particularly good and long night's 
 rest. In the morning, he could not keep himself from 
 having an excellent appetite for all the toast and tea, 
 that Sister Mary would give him for breakfast ; she 
 would give him only a quantity altogether too moder- 
 ate to afford him the smallest chance of getting up a 
 little more fever ; and his pulse had run down, in the 
 course of the night, most unreasonably. He hoped 
 once in the forenoon that it was quickening again ; but 
 that was only because Constance brought him some 
 flowers ; and, as soon as she turned away, it was pro- 
 voking enough to beat only a sort of Dead March. He 
 was recovering about twice as fast as he had expected, 
 or as almost anybody else would have done in his 
 place ; and when Sister Mary, on dressing his wound, 
 reported accordingly, she seemed to expect him to bo 
 ij;lad of it. It was all very hard, and could not be 
 helped; but the hardest and least to be helped of all 
 was, that Marshall, who had heard some rumor of 
 what had happened and been trying in vain to dis- 
 cover his whereabouts, did discover them, and came 
 to see him in the afternoon, and told him that he should 
 repeat his visit in the course of three or four days, as
 
 HERMAN. 
 
 soon as he could be relieved from his duty, stay with 
 him until he was well enough to travel, and then ac- 
 company him at least as far as was necessary, on his 
 return to Boston. He even went so far as to mention 
 this plan before Sister Mary. She approved of it highly, 
 declaring that the business of her mission required her 
 elsewhere, and that, if Herman continued to improve 
 as fast as he had begun, he would need nothing, after 
 the end of the week, but what his friend could easily 
 do for him under the occasional direction of a phy- 
 sician. 
 
 Poor Herman had nothing to say. It was certainly 
 the best arrangement that could be made. Ned could 
 not come for him. He was gone to the Adirondacks, 
 where 110 summons would reach him. Clara would 
 and must soon hear of his situation, and could hardly 
 fail to be much alarmed and distressed until she saw 
 him. Constance could not be expected to remain with 
 him, after the first exigency was passed. He said no- 
 thing accordingly ; but he, thought a good many 
 things, and among others made the very improper re- 
 flection, that the very most odious feature in some 
 arrangements is, that they are so manifestly the best, 
 that nothing can be said against them. 
 
 Marshall was again looking very ill himself. quite 
 as fit for a patient as for a nurse. He was to travel 
 for some weeks for his health. Dr. Bayou had given 
 him a "sick certificate." Herman did not have to tell 
 him the end of poor " little Sophy's " story. He made 
 no inquiries ; he had heard it already, and had had the 
 additional pain of great anxiety about his friend ; for a 
 pencilled note, which Herman sent to him as soon as he 
 was able to write it, miscarried ; and he had only vague- 
 ly heard that he had been wounded, whether mortally
 
 THK SISTEttS OF CHAKITY. 307 
 
 or uut was not known. There was an expression of 
 despairing, moody suffering about him, very painful to 
 witness or to think of. Time might mitigate it, or 
 aggravate. Remorse is a disease of most uncertain 
 prognosis. There is but one specific for it ; and that, 
 the sufferer is very often unwilling to try. 
 
 Herman could not sleep that night until late. He 
 was glad to while away some tedious, restless hours, 
 and drive away some unquiet and disquieting thoughts, 
 by making Sister Mary chat with him. He rather 
 liked her. She had a quaint queer mind, with an odd 
 mixture in it of shrewdness, subtlety, and simplicity, 
 and had seen much of life, both in her present vocation 
 and in her earlier days, as a member of rather a fash- 
 ionable family in Baltimore. If she had not been so 
 formidable and insurmountable an obstacle to an im- 
 mediate explanation between himself and Constance, 
 he thought he might even have grown fond of her. 
 Her only fault as a nurse was, that she was too faithful. 
 She scarcely left him by night or day, except for a few 
 moments, when the hospitable Mrs. Dobbs paid him 
 one of her three or four daily visits ; and when she 
 did go, Constance always went with her. Sleep 
 seemed to be with her rather an occasional indul- 
 gence than a necessity of nature ;, and now having, as 
 she did regularly after the first night of danger and 
 uncertainty, sent " Sister Agnes Alexis " off to bed at 
 an early hour, she was, as usual, sitting bolt upright at 
 his side, in a plain old-fashioned high-backed chair, in 
 which she dozed a little now and then, with the spot- 
 less cape-bonnet canted waggishly awry, and one eye- 
 brow set up, as if in token of readiness in the eye 
 belonging to it to open at the slightest notice. He 
 coughed slightly ; the eye opened instantly, and so did
 
 308 HKKMAX. 
 
 its fellow, and her mouth, with the prompt inquiry 
 whether he did not lie comfortably, or would like to 
 have her move him. He asked her whether she was 
 sleepy; she of course promptly denied the charge; 
 when he suggested that he was not either, could not 
 make himself so, and should be glad to have her talk 
 to him. She was all obliging -readiness, and disposed 
 to begin with converting him, but could not proceed 
 far in that direction, before he treated her in return 
 for her motherly care, ungrateful fellow ! to a little 
 filial sauciness. 
 
 She informed him with much fervor, that the very 
 night before she found him, the Virgin Mary had ap- 
 peared to her in a dream, with the North Star in her 
 hand, and foretold to her, that the very next day she 
 should fall in with a young heretic, born under that 
 star, who should be saved by her nursing from imme- 
 diate, and by her teaching from eternal, death. 
 
 The device was so temptingly transparent, that on 
 the spur of the moment he could not help rejoining, that 
 on that very night, though he owned he could not now 
 remember it, he was sure that St. Peter must have ap- 
 peared to him, and told him that the Pope had stolen 
 his. keys, and that before he could get them back again, 
 Herman must make an excellent Protestant of an ex- 
 cellent Sister of Charity. " An old one, not a young 
 one !" he ejaculated with a frightened after-thought, 
 heaping insult on insult to poor Sister Mary, in his 
 anxiety lest she should imagine that he entertained any 
 present designs against the faith of his lady-love. 
 Then, perceiving the unintentional rudeness into which 
 he had been betrayed, he colored piteously, and was 
 mute, and quite confounded. 
 
 Sister Mary told her whole rosary before she looked at
 
 THE 6I8TEK8 OF CHARITY. 309 
 
 him again, which probably, if she was angry, answered 
 the same purpose as " counting a hundred " before she 
 spoke ; for though, when she had done, she shook her 
 head at him, it was very good-humoredly. He begged 
 her pardon for his levity, but added in sober earnest, 
 that he thought it hardly fair that he should hear his 
 creed attacked, unless she would promise him in return 
 a candid hearing of all his arguments in its defence, 
 which she could not do, because they were u tempta- 
 tions of the old boy, my son !" Their theological con- 
 ference, therefore, ended where it it began; but there 
 were collateral matters about \vhich he was eager to 
 ask and she to tell, though she might have chosen to 
 taboo them in the presence of the younger and less- 
 confirmed devotee. She was the first regular religieuse 
 with whom he had ever talked; and he was much 
 struck with the specimen of active, ardent, joyous 
 beneficence, and animated, vigorous, occupied old 
 age, which she presented. He begged to know, what 
 was the most common motive with those who embraced 
 her profession. (He was too delicate to ask what her 
 own had been ; though he longed to do so, for she bore 
 in her intelligent face the remains of much beauty, her 
 temperament was evidently a peculiarly cheerful one, 
 and he believed that without some property she could 
 not have secured admission to her order.) 
 
 " Well, my son," she replied, crossing herself de- 
 voutly, " of course there may be subordinate motives 
 in many cases, of many sorts and kinds. Some Sisters 
 may have been crossed in love, I dare say ; we don't 
 talk about those things much : but I hope the chief 
 motive, in all cases, is the wish to serve the Lord. It 
 ought to be." She paused ; " you want to say some- 
 thing."
 
 310 HEJRMAX. 
 
 " I did wish to ask something ; but I am afraid you 
 would think it was of a piece with my impertinence 
 just now." 
 
 " Xo ; I shouldn't think any more about that. Ask 
 away." 
 
 " Cannot women ' serve the Lord ' without for- 
 saking their domestic duties ?" He expected the stereo- 
 typed and, as he thought, generally perverted reply, 
 '' Whoso loveth father or mother more than me, is not 
 worthy of me;" but he did not get it. Right or 
 wrong, Sister Mary had, upon that subject, some no- 
 tions of her own. 
 
 Her smile was a little bitter, but with a kind of 
 tonic bitterness, like wormwood sweetened, as she re- 
 plied, "What the Protestants are always saying behind 
 our backs, no doubt! Many thanks to one of you for 
 saying it to my face, and giving me a chance to answer 
 it ! A girl may go and get married, no matter how 
 many duties she leaves behind her, nor how much she's 
 wanted in her father's house, and go to the world's 
 end with her husband; and, if he's rich, her. friends 
 haven't a word to say ; and if she really can be spared 
 from home, and loves him, I haven't, either ; for mar- 
 riage is an honorable and holy sacrament appointed of 
 God; and if, when her lover'd got her heart, she held 
 back her hand from him to turn it to the service of the 
 church, Satan might tempt her with dreadful regrets 
 and lookings back, which won't do at all, for our rule 
 requires zeal and a single heart. If she don't like her 
 husband though, I must think, whether I say it or not, 
 that she'd have done better, instead of marrying him, and 
 setting up another private misery-factory of her own 
 where there were plenty of 'em already, to devote her- 
 self to God, and go about helping some of the number
 
 THE SISTERS OF OHAUITY. 311 
 
 less troubles that have sprung out of just such mar- 
 riages. But if she wants to do that, all her friends find 
 their tongues at once, and set up a terrible outcry about 
 her domestic duties. 
 
 "When I was out in the world and read vain 
 books, there was a story in one of them about a sort of 
 a fairy, PeriBanou, seems to me, was her name, our 
 Lady forgive me for remembering such stuff so long ! 
 but she had a tent that would stretch out to fit a thou- 
 sand people, or shrink up to fit one, just according to 
 the number it had to fill it. Now, when I hear that 
 sort of talk about domestic duties, I'm apt to think 
 they're jnst like that tent. One woman, if she has a 
 good head and pair of hands of her own, and a few 
 servants, can keep house for ten men ; but if there's 
 only one man in a family, and ten women, 'twill take 
 'em all just exactly the same to keep house for him ; 
 and not one woman of 'em all can be spared, except 
 it's to be married, or do something else that's the fash- 
 ion, from the stretchy domestic duties." 
 
 " But do not the different women in a family owe 
 some duties to one another f 
 
 " Of course they do, while they stay in the family ; 
 and of course, if they can't be spared, they ought to 
 stay in it, and not leave it to be married, nor anything 
 else; but what I have to say about it is only just this: 
 If one of 'em can be spared from it at all, and is going 
 to be, isn't it fair she should be allowed to take hei 
 choice between leaving it for the service of God's pool 
 or, of the world 2" 
 
 " It would seem so, indeed. I never thought of 
 that before." 
 
 " Yes," pursued the old lady, warmly and volubly. 
 ' but she mustn't do that, whatever she does. It would
 
 312 HERMAN. 
 
 be so undutiful, so unnatural, sounsisterly, and so-forth 1 
 But, if she's rich, she may stay where she is and do 
 nothing, and welcome ; and when she's got so tired of 
 that, she can't stand it any longer, she may marry a 
 man she doesn't love, and learns to hate ; and if she 
 passes the rest of her days dismally, in rearing discon- 
 tented, wayward, wicked children, who would never 
 have been born to sin and suffering but for her, for a 
 tyrannical father, in a home of strife and manages, 
 with all her efforts, to undo a tenth part of the mis- 
 chief she's done, by and by, when she dies, somebody'll 
 write a beautiful obituary about her, and put in, ' She 
 hath done what she could !' I've read enough of such 
 in my time. I've seen enough of such marriages." 
 
 She stopped ; but it was evidently for breath, not 
 words. Herman's attentive eyes asked for more. It is 
 usually an agreeable thing, to an intelligent observer of 
 life, to be allowed to take an observation of it from the 
 different point of view of another intelligent observer. 
 She went on : " You are a young man, Mr. Arden ; 
 and, as you said, I am an old woman ;" 
 
 " Comparatively," said the wretch. " Older than 
 the other Sister, I thought. She is very young." 
 
 " Old enough to box your ears, sir, if you give me 
 any more of your nonsense ! older than her age and 
 yours put together. Yes, I shall be sixty-nine years 
 old, if it please the Lord to prolong my evil and sinful 
 days six weeks longer." 
 
 " I should not have imagined it," said Herman, with 
 perfect sincerity. 
 
 "And not ashamed to own it, if I'd only spent my 
 time better. As it is, I've seen a good deal of married 
 life, and thought about it a little, too ; or I might have 
 entered into it, well, half a dozen times over, at least."
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHARITY. 313 
 
 " Among the Mormons ?" 
 
 " No. I'd have choked any lover I ever had, if I'd 
 married him, I'm sure, in the honeymoon." 
 
 " Oh ! the ' Female Bluebeard ' !" 
 
 " Just so," said she, absently. " Three kinds of 
 marriages there are, my son ;" she counted them on 
 her fingers ; " the first, that's rare ; that's made in 
 heaven ; they say that all are, but that's because they 
 don't know ; the second, that's common enough, I 
 hope, made on earth ; the third, that's common 
 enough, and too common, I happen to know, made in 
 the other place, and a trap-door to jerk folks down into 
 it ! You understand ?" 
 
 " Partly ; but I wish you would be so very good as 
 to let me have your commentary." 
 
 "Well, the last and worst speaks for itself; and it 
 isn't necessary, nor charitable, to say much about it. 
 It's when people, who are naturally aggravating to 
 each other, marry from interested motives, or from a 
 mistake that they find out when it's too late, and don't 
 try, as they ought and as some do, to make the best of 
 it ; and the tie between 'em is like a bunch of thistle- 
 burs between the manes of two colts, that pricks, and 
 goads, and tears, and crazes, as long as it sticks 'em 
 together. The middle one, I said, was made 011 earth ; 
 that's when all that the Jenny-bird wants is a nest, and 
 a mate to feed her in it ; and she don't see much differ- 
 ence between the first that happens to twitter to her 
 and the others, provided he knows how to feather his 
 nest and bring in plenty of nice things for her and her 
 young ones ; and their tempers chance to suit each 
 other on "trial; and he minds his business, and she 
 minds hers ; and they get used to each other, and bill 
 and coo when they meet, and are happy enough apart 
 14
 
 314 HERMAN. 
 
 to be sure, but rather happier, after all, when they are 
 together. 
 
 "And the first kind?" 
 
 " Ah ! that I know less of. You'll find out about 
 that for yourself one of these days, I hope, that is, if 
 you marry at all, Mr. Arden." 
 
 "Thank you," said Herman, pressing her hand 
 cordially ; " but may I not hear a little about it before- 
 hand?" 
 
 " True boy ! an't you ? You must suck your orange 
 a little, at least, all the morning, if you can't cut it till 
 the clock strikes luncheon-time! Wait and leave a 
 drop or two of juice in it, I advise you. The last, I 
 can only guess at ; for the best kinds of happiness 
 don't show much on the outside. But, if I must say 
 something about it, I suppose it is when two people, 
 upright and blameless towards the rest of the world, 
 are, God, who made them so, only knows why, pe- 
 culiarly pleasant and delightful to one another, really 
 are so, and don't merely fancy they are till they can't 
 help themselves, and then change their minds ; when 
 they'd rather sit side by side in a barn than apait in a 
 palace, but yet are too kind to each other to marry till 
 they can afford something better than a barn to sit in, 
 for, when the wind comes in the cold cracks, comfort 
 and peace are apt to fly out together ; when the very 
 foot of the one, ' as he comes up the stair,' as the old 
 song says, I used to sing it, ' has music in't,' to the 
 other, more than the tongues of all the flatterers in the 
 world ; when each always brings out what is happiest 
 and best in the other, and each character gives to the 
 other just what the other wants; and the n>an gjows 
 tenderer and all the nobler for that, and the woman 
 nobler and all the tenderer for that; and so tl otv.o
 
 THE SISTEiiS OF CHAKITY. 315 
 
 human souls mix in each ; and they strengthen, and 
 sweeten, and hallow each other, into two blessed bles- 
 sing guardian angels. 
 
 " Now, Mr. Arden, young folks will be curious ; and 
 I dare say you wanted to know, and were too polite to 
 ask, how 1 came to be what I am. Humanly speaking, 
 to tell you the truth, I believe it was because /was dis- 
 appointed in love, such love as that. I see you're 
 pricking up your ears, my son ; but you're doomed to 
 be disappointed yourself, if you expect to hear any ro- 
 mance from such a matter-of-fact old woman, just as 
 the girls are when they tease me to tell them my story. 
 God has all kinds of ways and means to drive and 
 draw perverse souls to his ends. It wasn't in any lover 
 in particular that I was disappointed, but in an oppor- 
 tunity to enter into that last sort of wedlock ; and 
 luckily I had sense enough to feel, that neither of the 
 other two sorts would do for me. I had offers enough, 
 1 may say without vanity, now that the time for 'em 
 has been gone by for some more years than you'Ye 
 lived ; and more shame for me, for I was a sad flirt, 
 and drew men on when I oughtn't ; and I liked this 
 one for this, and that one for that, but no one for every- 
 thing, and many for companions, but no one for a 
 master. I was a wild unruly thing enough, in those 
 days &>t what you'd call a bad-hearted girl, I hope, 
 but thoughtless and lawless, and bent on nothing but 
 amusing myself, and having my own way. I hardly 
 went near my director more than twice a year. I'd run 
 down a 'whole square if I saw him coming, to get out 
 of his way ; and if he sent for me, and I had to go, I'd 
 have so little to confess to him, that he'd say, ' Do you 
 mean to tell me that this is all, my daughter ?' and then 
 I'd answer, ' Why goodness gracious, father, no ! How
 
 316 HERMAN. 
 
 can you possibly expect me to remember half?' When 
 he set me my penance, I used to forget it before I 
 reached home or, at all events, before I'd done it ; so he 
 had to write it down for me on a piece of paper ; and 
 then I lost that, and was afraid to tell ; and I ate meat 
 fast-days half the time, and did and left undone every- 
 thing I oughtn't, just in that heedless way ; and all 
 the while I was dressing, and dancing, and riding, and 
 singing, and laughing, and talking, from morning till 
 night, with a pack of other young folks of my own age, 
 just as frivolous and flighty as I. 
 
 " Well, that was very pleasant for some years ; but 
 pretty soon they began to pair off and go, the boys into 
 their offices and counting-rooms, and the girls into 
 their nurseries; and I had to find myself younger com- 
 panions, or go without, which was not quite so agreea- 
 ble. However, I made the best of it. I was called 
 handsome then ; and my spirits were high ; and the 
 brother I lived with (I was an orphan) was pretty 
 wealthy, and pretty extravagant too, I'm afraid, and 
 kept open house ; so that I was surrounded with silly 
 fellows enough of all ages, and enjoyed myself tolera- 
 bly well some years longer ; but that couldn't last 
 always, and I began to have my trials at home. My 
 brother's own family was large, and growing ^larger ; 
 and so were his expenses. His wife was rather quick- 
 tempered ; and so was I. The children took after us 
 both in that ; and, though he was naturally rather fond 
 of me than otherwise, he began to think we were 
 rather too many for one house to hold. So he would 
 encourage the visits of two or three old beaux of mine, 
 that I'd led on and then refused, and who of course, it 
 didn't give me any particular pleasure to see, in hopes 
 I'd change my mind. And when he saw I'd have
 
 THE SleJTEltS OK CHARITY. ".17 
 
 nothing to say to 'em, it would sometimes make him 
 cross. 
 
 " That made my home his home I mean, uncom- 
 fortable ; and when I went out to change the scene a 
 little, it still weighed on my mind, and spoiled my 
 spirits ; and then I wouldn't always receive as much 
 attention as I liked, or was used to. The night I was 
 twenty, i had a regular cry, I remember; and the 
 next ball I went to, there were some gay little Creoles 
 there from New Orleans ; and all the good partners 
 were running after them. I had only two invitations 
 to dance that whole evening ; and at supper-time I was 
 quite forgotten and left by myself; till~one of the 
 slighted gentlemen I told you of spied me, and seized 
 his opportunity to say, ' I think you'll have to make 
 the most of me, this time, Miss Caro.' I had to take 
 his arm, and go in with him ; because I didn't know 
 what else to do. I didn't choose to have it appear that 
 I was overlooked. But I was so angry, that every 
 mouthful he gave me seemed to stick in my throat. 
 When I got home that night, I sat down on my bed 
 opposite my glass, and let down my curls all around 
 me, and said to myself, ' So, my dear, they want to put 
 you on the shelf; that's plain ! I'm sorry for it ; for I 
 don't see that you look superannuated at all, and I'm 
 sure you don't feel so; but I don't see what we are 
 going to do about it.' 
 
 " After that, I wouldn't go to any more parties ; but 
 I didn't find that my home grew much pleasanter. 
 How I did long to be independent ! But marrying 
 seemed to me to be an odd contrary way to bring that 
 about. I had about live hundred dollars a year of my 
 own, to be sure, and might have taken cheap lodgings 
 for myself, somewhere; but I thought 'twould be so
 
 318 HERMAN'. 
 
 dull and lonesome for me ! I had always been used to 
 see everything pretty and cheerful about me, and a good 
 deal going on ; and if my relations weren't always very 
 good-natured to me, nor I to them if the truth must 
 be told, their voices and footsteps round me were a 
 good deal better than nobody's. 
 
 " How I did envy, those days, the little country- 
 woman who brought us in our eggs, and butter, and 
 fruit, in her little waggon, twice a week. I rode out 
 to see her place once. She was a farmer's widow, and 
 had an orchard, and pasture, beautiful cows, and a 
 pretty garden, and took care of them all herself, with a 
 younger brother, who lived with her, and one or two 
 servants. She bustled about, and churned, and gar- 
 dened, and picked her fruit, and milked her cows, and 
 drove her pony to and from town in the fresh early 
 mornings. She had plenty of work and plenty 
 of amusement, neighbours coming and going ah 
 the time, and a pleasant word for everybody, and 
 a pleasant word from everybody, and was laying 
 up money all the time, to spend as she liked. But, 
 bless you, my son, you know that, even if I hadn't 
 been brought up not to know how to do much, it's 
 contrary to nature that a lady should do. any thing for 
 her living. It's as much as she can do, and more too, 
 sometimes, to get leave to w r ork for other people ; and 
 I had no great inclination at that time to exert myself 
 for anybody else. My heart was all bent on self arid the 
 world. I'd have worked with a good will and all my 
 might, to make myself well off in this life ; but I hardly 
 ever thought anything about, the other. 
 
 '" When I was a school-girl, there was a poor old 
 maiden lady I used to call Aunt Ruthy, and go to see 
 very often, and carry her flowers whenever I had a
 
 THE SISTKRS OK CHARITY. 319 
 
 bouquet ; because I pitied her so. It's almost the only 
 good thing about me then, that I can remember. She 
 was so grateful, poor soul ! she lo%'ed me dearly, and 
 would tell me all her troubles. Girls like to hear 
 other people's, before they have any of their own. She 
 had just about enough money to pay her board and 
 buy her caps, but nobody that belonged to her, and 
 nothing to do. She was a timid, moping thing natu- 
 rally, and couldn't do much to help and cheer herself ; 
 and she couldn't endure solitude. It killed her at 
 last. She went crazy, and died in an asylum ; where I 
 thought, when I went there to see her, she seemed hap- 
 pier than she ever did before she went in. When her 
 acquaintances could make it convenient, they'd ask her 
 to come and stay with them, out of charity ; and then 
 I would see her creeping round, so pale and meek, in 
 other people's houses, always taking the worst of every- 
 thing when she helped herself, and only the second 
 best when other people helped her; and though she 
 had been brought up as delicately as any of them, I've 
 known that woman actually go down into their kitch- 
 ens, among their strange servants, and do up muslins, 
 or make cake, or anything else, just so that they might 
 find her useful, and not want to get rid of her so soon ; 
 and she would stay so long, that at last they'd think 
 they must give her a hint; a very little one would do, 
 and mortify her half to death besides, for she had very 
 lady-like feelings ; and then she'd go back to her dis- 
 mal little room, and take to her bed, and cry for a 
 week ; till I found out she was there, and ran in to 
 make her laugh and cheer her up. Now, I had always 
 said that, whatever I did, I wouldn't be like Aunt 
 Kuthy. 
 
 " But one day, when I came home from spending
 
 320 HERMAN. 
 
 a week with a married school-mate in the country, and 
 was just going to run up stairs with my shawl and 
 parasol, my sister-in-law put herself in my way in the 
 drawing-room door, and whispered in a hurry, coloring 
 up a little, ' Mr. Carroll has got your chamber, Caro. 
 My sister and her children had the west-rooms, and 
 we didn't expect you back quite so soon ; so I told 
 Phillis to put your things into the third-story lumber- 
 room, and clean it up nice for you ; and we'll have the 
 porter up in the afternoon to move out the trunks and 
 boxes. There's a beautiful view there over the roofs ; 
 and husband says we must have another spare 
 chamber.' 
 
 " I didn't say one word. It seemed to take my 
 breath away. My chamber was my nursery, where 
 mamma used to come in, in her beautiful ball-dresses, 
 to kiss me and tuck me up evenings before she went 
 out, and my brothers used to bounce through the door 
 when school was let out, and throw down their satchels 
 and toss me up in the air. I'd slept in it all my life, 
 and felt as if 'twas almost as much mine to live in as 
 my own body. 
 
 " I walked up the three flights of stairs. The room 
 had been swept and dusted ; and Phillis had laid all 
 the old pieces of carpet and matting smooth over -the 
 bare floor, and stacked up the boxes and trunks in one 
 corner as well as she knew how ; for I always gave her 
 my cast-off finery, and she was fond of me. But, dear 
 me ! how I did feel ! like a steamer with her safety- 
 valve screwed down. I wonder I didn't 'blow up, with 
 my pent-up feelings. There wasn't a soul I would say 
 a word to ; and I couldn't even cry, for fear they'd see 
 my red eyes. 'Well,' thought I to myself; 'wait a 
 bir, I'll 'soon catch up with you. Here's the first step, 
 Aunt Kuthy.'
 
 THE SISTERS OF CIIAKITV. .llM 
 
 " That afternoon, I ordered my horse, and rode out 
 alone, -wondering how long I'd be allowed to keep him, 
 and thinking; enough, you maybe sure. When I came 
 near home, we. lived just at the edge of the city, not 
 being in a great hurry to get back to the lumber-room, 
 I reined him in on the brow of a steep little hillock, 
 and sat still, looking at the sunset. One of my little 
 nephews, who was always playing some prank or other, 
 shot him with a blunt arrow, out from behind a bush. 
 He started ; and, as I caught up the reins tighter, he 
 was very spirited, and used to hunting, he leaped with 
 me down twelve feet sheer, and stood still, trembling a 
 little. I did not fall ; but I felt my head terribly hurt 
 by the jar. My brain seemed crushed to a quaking, 
 aching jelly. I grew dizzy and blind, and laid my 
 face down on his mane, and clasped my arms round 
 his neck, in hopes he'd carry me of his own accord to 
 his stable, where they'd know me and take care of me. 
 Little Bobby came out, crying terribly. He was my 
 pet, and didn't mean any harm. He only did it out of 
 fun. He led me home, begging me, all the way, not 
 to tell. I never did. 
 
 " When they saw me, they were only too glad to 
 carry me back into my own chamber; but I had some- 
 thing else to think about. I'd rather by half have been 
 safe apd sound in the garret. The doctor came ; and, 
 by the measures he took, I knew he thought the case 
 was pretty serious ; but they wouldn't let me see a 
 priest, for fear 'twould agitate me; and how could I 
 have confessed, if he had come ? My memory was 
 oddly affected. I could recollect things as well as 
 ever, but often not words ; and when I could, I used 
 them half the time at cross purposes. 
 
 " I went to sleep, and dreamed I had died. My 
 14*
 
 322 HERMAN. 
 
 soul flew up, light, like a balloon, away from the 
 earth, while I tried to hold on, first by the grass, and 
 stones, and bushes, and then by the trees, and chim- 
 neys, and mountains, and then the clouds, and rain- 
 bows, and sun, and moon, and stars ; but each and all 
 they slid away, one after the other, from my slippery 
 fingers ; and up, and up, and up, I went, and presently 
 I was on high among the four-and-twenty elders, and 
 the sea of glass, and all that you read about in the Apo- 
 calypse. Then the Lamb that was in the midst of the 
 throne opened its mouth, and began to speak to me, 
 and order me to give an account of my deeds done in 
 the body. I thought and thought, and tried and tried, 
 with all my might, to remember one good thing to tell ; 
 but I couldn't, to save my soul ; and then I thought 
 I'd hold my tongue, and not say anything at all, and 
 that would be next best ; but the truth seemed all at once 
 to begin to move and stir underneath it just like a worm ; 
 and I found it would speak of itself, do what I would ; 
 and then I heard it say, ' I haven't done anything at 
 all, but be an idle, godless flirt, and a cumberer of the 
 ground !' ' There,' thought I, ' young woman ! Now 
 you've done it !' I looked round for the Virgin to say 
 a good word for me ; but she hid her face in her hands, 
 and burst into tears. Then I seemed to begin to go 
 down again, down, and down, and down, head fore- 
 most, in the dark; for I'd been struck blind by the 
 light of Heaven, because I hadn't been in the habit of 
 looking up to it to get used to it ; and I heard a great 
 wide hiss coming up under me, nearer and nearer, and 
 felt a horrid heat on my forehead, growing hotter and 
 hotter. But then I woke up in my own bed, fright- 
 ened out of my wits, and all the more because I 
 couldn't speak intelligibly, to tell anybody what the
 
 TlIK SISTERS OF CHARITY. 323 
 
 matter was, to find that the noise was only the buz- 
 zing in my ears, and the heat the flushing of my face ; 
 but, as to the rest, I couldn't explain it away quite so 
 easily. 
 
 " A few days after the doctor said to me, in a new 
 way, as if he meant it, they'd been trying to make 
 me believe it, all along, but I knew better, ' You're 
 doing well ! quite 'out of danger.' ' Not quite,' thought 
 I, 'yet! I've got a reprieve; and I'm glad enough of 
 that ; but we're all under sentence of death ; and, when 
 least we think of it, in comes the warrant. I mean, for 
 one, to be better prepared for it the next time !' 
 
 " He had got a little Sister of Charity, to come in 
 and take care of me through the worst of it, and for a 
 week or two after ; because he thought I needed more 
 skilful nursing than I was likely to get otherwise; 
 though my sister-in-law, I'll do her the justice to say, 
 was terribly shocked, and as kind as could be. I dare 
 say she always would have been, if she could only have 
 had her own house to herself. It may sound like an 
 Irish bull, Mr. Arden, but all my experience and obser- 
 vation has gone to show that family union isn't pro- 
 moted by too many branches of a family crowding 
 together under one roof. I don't say it mayn't be ne- 
 cessary for 'em sometimes to do it; and, if the Lord 
 ordains it for 'em, He can make a way for 'em to bear 
 it. But it's a temptation ; and, where they're at lib- 
 erty to choose, I'm sure it's better for 'em to meet now 
 and then with pleasure and good-will, than to live 
 together with discontent and mutual annoyance. 
 
 " My nurse was one of the best women I ever saw, 
 and just like a mother to me. When she left me, I 
 missed her so, I didn't know what to do ; and as soon 
 as I could walk out, I called to see her. She was put-
 
 324: HEKMAN. 
 
 ting up work for some bright-looking poor girls, with 
 another Sister to help her, as brisk and pleasant-looking 
 as she was, in a cheerful, snug, sunny little parlour, with 
 geraniums and tea-roses growing in the window ; and 
 I could hear little children's voices saying hymns in 
 the next room. ' Dear me, Sister,' I sighed out, ' how 
 happy you do seem !' 
 
 " ' So I am, my dear,' says she, ' thanks to a good 
 God, who brought me here; but ,you mustn't imagine 
 I didn't have my trials out in the world, as well as 
 other folks. When my poor dear husband died, the 
 whole earth seemed to me like a great lighted tomb, 
 with me sitting alone in it, and all the other people 
 racing to and fro round me and chasing after shadows; 
 and I thought the din, and glare, and emptiness, and 
 vanity, and solitude, would drive me crazy. But I 
 found the poor and sick were good company for me, 
 after all. I could forget my own troubles in thinking 
 about theirs ; and it's strange how much easier to bear 
 other people's troubles always seem, than one's own. 
 Besides, I learned to take theirs on my shoulders ; and 
 so, when I could relieve them, I got relief myself. Reli- 
 gion's a great comfort.' 
 
 " ' Religion !' said I, ' my goodness ! You don't call 
 that a comfort, do you ? Why 'twas that, and nothing 
 else, that made me cry and tremble so that night, when 
 I woke up, and couldn't tell you what the matter was ! 
 Why, I think it's the most awful thing in the whole 
 universe!' 
 
 " ' That can only be when we don't live according 
 to it, my dear,' said she. 
 
 " ' I'm going to live according to it, henceforth, at 
 any rate,' said I ; ' but I don't expect I'll ever lind it 
 very entertaining.'
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHARITY. .325 
 
 " She took me out with her, though, as soon as I 
 was strong enough ; and we went round together 
 among her poor; and I was pleased to see how they 
 looked up to her, and loved her. She gave advice to 
 one, clothes to another, and dressed a cut or a scald for 
 another ; and I emptied my little purse, and bought 
 flannel, and cotton, and lint, and a couple of oranges 
 for a poor man that we found gasping with consump- 
 tion up in a hot attic under a stove-pipe. I shall never 
 forget the feverish, famished, thankful look, that he 
 snatched them with. I never bought anything scarcely 
 that gave me so much pleasure. I always did pity the 
 poor when they came in my way. 
 
 "I liked the Sister's busy, stirring way of serving 
 God. The contemplative life wouldn't have suited 
 me. I told her I believed I would be good, if I could 
 only live with her. She said, ' I hope you'll be good, 
 my dear, live where you will.' But I couldn't. Some 
 saints have led holy lives, to be sure, in the midst of 
 distractions. There's nothing grace can't do, if you 
 only have it. But then there are all sorts of gifts ; and 
 some are fittest for one thing and some for another. 
 When people are just beginning their lives, if they 
 only begin straight it must make it a great deal easier 
 for 'em to go on so; but I was no chicken, and had a 
 whole host of bad habits, that everything about me 
 helped to keep up. I wasn't particularly ill-disposed, 
 that I know of; but 'twas my nature always to be up 
 to something; and if it didn't happen to be a good 
 thing, then it had to be a bad. It had got to be 
 second nature with me, whenever I was in company, 
 to be either vain and coquettish, or jealous and envi- 
 ous ; and, at brother's, I was all the time in company, 
 or else wasting my time and money, dizening myself
 
 326 HERMAN. 
 
 out for it. Besides, you know, it wasn't convenient for 
 him to keep me much longer. 
 
 " When I could see my director, I had a long full 
 talk with him, about my concerns and difficulties, 
 how I needed a new home, and wanted to lead a new 
 life, and get ready for death ; and finally, when he 
 didn't seem to know what to propose, I hid my face 
 between my hands, and whispered through my fingers 
 that I wished I could be a Sister of Charity ; but I 
 wasn't good enough. 
 
 " How he did jump ! ' You must be good, whether 
 you are one or not,' said he. 
 
 " ' To be sure,' said I ; l If I can't be good enough 
 for a Sister, I will never be good enough for an 
 angel.' 
 
 " When he found I was in earnest and eager about 
 it, he put me on probation, and spoke to my brother. 
 He was willing, and rather glad, I fancy, after the 
 first surprise was over. But they all agreed I must 
 stay where I was a few months more, till I'd entirely 
 got back my strength; and my director told me, I 
 must make the most of the time to repair past errors 
 in my family, and leave all in peace. So I did. We 
 parted at last as good friends as brothers and sisters 
 should be; and I've been thankful for it ever since. I 
 tried to do my very best in my noviciate. They made 
 it a long one ; because I'd been such a skittish thing ; 
 but at last they decided that my vocation was genuine. 
 So I took the vows ; and I've never repented it; and it 
 seems to me now, that I've become a different creature. 
 Doing seemed to help me in praying ; for I knew the 
 Lord loved the poor; and when I'd been trying to 
 serve them, I felt as if He'd been working with me ; 
 and for the first time in my life, I could turn to Him as
 
 THE SISTEKS OF CHARITY. 327 
 
 t>. a Helper and Leader and Guardian, instead of an 
 angry Judge. Ah, sir, if you'd be converted, and be- 
 come a priest, you'd know." 
 
 Herman at that very instant dropped asleep, instead 
 of answering; but he had never been less inclined, than 
 then, to enter into the Romish priesthood ; and, when 
 he awoke the next morning, he was, if possible, still 
 less so. Sister Mary Peter's recital had so far tinged 
 his dreams, that they had been filled with scenes of 
 beneficence ; but everywhere, in well-known garret, 
 hospital, jail, and cellar, the semblance of Constance 
 had been leaning on his arm or busied at his side, 
 aiding him to comfort the sorrowing, tend the sick, 
 lead back the erring, and lift up the fallen ; and, just as 
 the unfeeling Shanghae cock crowed under the " best- 
 chamber" window and waked him up, he and she, 
 having done a good day's work together, were going 
 chattily and merrily up the steps of a small, newly- 
 painted house with "Dr. Herman Arden" on the door, 
 at the corner of two busy thoroughfares, to a snug little 
 parlour where a cozy late dinner for two, of her ordering, 
 must, they knew, be awaiting them. 
 
 In spite of this mishap, he expected to see her again, 
 as usual, as soon as his morning toilette had been with 
 Sister Mary's assistance completed ; but she did not 
 come near him till noon, not till he had become seri- 
 ously alarmed lest Sister Mary, or some Jesuitical ally, 
 had surreptitiously spirited her away ; and when Sis- 
 ter Mary, finding it impossible to pacify him otherwise, 
 w r ent after her and brought her in, she sat shyly by the 
 window, bending over some knitting, said nothing even 
 to Sister Mary, except when she was spoken to, and, in 
 the course of an hour, made her escape again. He 
 could hear her, through the thin, loose partition behind
 
 328 HERMAN. 
 
 him, faintly singing, in her chamber, low chants and 
 Misereres. 
 
 This conduct of hers did not greatly astonish him. 
 He reminded himself that a convalescent could not ex- 
 pect to be treated with all the indulgence accorded to 
 a probably dying man ; and he knew the exceedingly 
 sensitive delicacy of Constance's character well enough 
 to fear that, now that the danger was over, she suffered 
 from the recollection of the emotion which she had 
 been surprised into showing, at the unexpected sight 
 of him and his danger. 
 
 But her conduct, and the latter explanation of it, 
 made him only the more eager for an opportunity to 
 relieve her mind at the same time with his own, by a 
 full declaration of such ardor of unchanged attachment, 
 on his part, as should throw hers completely into the 
 shade. They might now be separated almost any day ; 
 and the dread of her leaving him, and leaving him in 
 ignorance of her plans, and in utter uncertainty as to 
 when and where he could meet her again, was becoming 
 from hour to hour more intolerable. Added to this 
 was the idea of the influences which might in the 
 meanwhile be brought to bear upon her imaginative 
 and excitable mind, and of the possibility that, under 
 a superstitious and mistaken sense of duty, she might 
 already have determined against so much as listening 
 to a suit which her poor defrauded heart seconded, if, 
 indeed, it did second it ; for even this was more than he 
 knew, and, to all this, his helpless inability to take 
 the case into his own hands. Even if he had been well 
 and strong enough to rise, dress, and go to her, which 
 he was far enough from being, he was on parole, most 
 clearly implied if not expressed, with Sister Mary ; and 
 after all that she had already done for him, he felt that
 
 Tin; ai>ii;u^ o CHARITY. 329 
 
 it would be doubly disgraceful to get her into a 
 scrape. 
 
 Though a strict guardian, she had not been in any 
 respect a harsh one. She had kept him very still till 
 his fever went down ; but, during the last day or two, 
 she had allowed a great deal of pleasant general con- 
 versation. It was conducted in a parliamentary man- 
 ner, she being Mrs. Speaker, putting the questions, 
 and having the answers ostensibly addressed to her, 
 yet so managed as probably in a great degree to meet 
 the wishes of all parties concerned. Herman had 
 talked, and Constance evidently listened. When he 
 could not see her eyes, he could see her color come and 
 go. Sister Mary had considerately and dexterously 
 drawn from him just what the silent novice was most 
 likely to wish to hear, some account of his late occu- 
 pations and way of life, and the present situation of his 
 family, finding an excuse, perhaps, for the gratifica- 
 tion of her own curiosity in gratifying that of \\er pro- 
 tegee. He. also had learned from her something of their 
 movements, and how they came, just at the right mo- 
 ment for him, to be in Kansas. 
 
 They had been sent on a mission, to see if there was 
 need of, and a good opportunity for, the foundation of 
 a charity-school there, and had been boarding for a few 
 days with Mrs. Dobbs. They had heard of the skirmish 
 i:i which Robbins was killed, gone to the nearest 
 village to see whether their services were required by 
 ;inv of the wounded, lost their way and been belated 
 in returning, and come upon. Herman when there was 
 just twilight enough left for them to see his form by. 
 They had previously been very near being sent to 
 New Orleans to nurse the yellow fever. Herman's 
 hair almost stood on end, as Sister Mary mentioned it;
 
 330 HERMAN. 
 
 but Constance raised her eyes, and they shone. She 
 had liked it, evidently. So young, so out of love with 
 life ! Would she like it now? He longed to ask her. 
 Sister Mary spoke of it very calmly. She was growing 
 old, she said. She must soon leave the world, at any 
 rate. She would rather, if she had her choice, be 
 active, and go about, and wait on others to the last, 
 than live on to a time when she must be idle, sit still 
 in her chair, and have others wait on her. She should 
 be glad to think that, when she could no longer serve 
 the Lord by her life, she should serve Him by her death. 
 But she felt as if she might still have eight or ten years' 
 work in her ; and so she was not sorry, on the whole, 
 that it had been put off for the present. 
 
 " Where were they to go next ?" Herman had asked, 
 with unwary abruptness. Sister Mary had been loqua- 
 cious as to the past. As to the future, she was virtually 
 dumb : " It was impossible to say. Where they were 
 sent. Wherever the Lord had need of them." 
 
 On the evening of this " day of misfortunes," Her- 
 man, being further goaded, and at the same time in a 
 manner set free from restraint by Constance's absence, 
 made an impassioned appeal to the compassionate 
 Duenna. 
 
 Sister Mary, sorry as she was for him, declared that 
 she had done already all that she could for him, and 
 more than she could answer for to her conscience, or, 
 she feared, to her confessor. They should not have 
 stayed at all, if she had known that Herman was going 
 to get well. 
 
 He begged her pardon for having done so, but 
 adroitly, though sincerely, suggested, that his getting 
 well was probably in great part owing to her staying. 
 
 This was manifestly her own opinion, though veiled
 
 THK SISTERS OF CHAKITY. 331 
 
 ivith elaborate humility. .But she made his convales- 
 cence an argument with him for his being too thank- 
 ful, now that iiis life was restored to him, to care about 
 anything henceforth but spending it well. 
 
 This being a view of the state of affairs which he 
 could not fully embrace, he ungratefully adjured her 
 to tell him, at least, how long it would be before " Sis- 
 ter Agnes Alexis's " year of service expired. 
 
 " Well, less than a year, my son." 
 
 " But, how many months ?" 
 
 " Why, not a great many, my son ; but, if you wish 
 to live to see the time, you must avoid excitement. You 
 had a bad night last night, in consequence of too much 
 conversation yesterday ; and, if you'll excuse my 
 noticing it, I think that may be the cause of your be- 
 ing a little fractious to-day. Shall I close the shutter? 
 for you to take a little rest now ?" 
 
 " No, thank you. Will it be many weeks ?" 
 
 Sister Mary was seized with a fit of deafness, which 
 was the more remarkable, that her hearing was usually 
 peculiarly quick : " Tea very weak ? I will go and get 
 you some stronger." 
 
 " If you do, the instant you are out of the room, I 
 shall spring out of bed, and halloo to Mr. Dobbs to 
 bring me my clothes." 
 
 " Mr. Arden ! Are you beside yourself?" 
 
 " To be sure I am ! My dear, good, kind Sister 
 Mary, I wouldn't be, if 1 could possibly help it ; but 
 do only consider ! Miss Aspen Sister Agnes Alexis, 
 and I have been so perfectly frank with you from 
 the first moment of our meeting, that you must 
 know even better than we do ourselves, how we stand 
 towards each other. Because she fe an honorable 
 woman, and because I am an honorable man, we have
 
 332 HERMAN. 
 
 now been the greater part of a week under the 
 same roof with one another, in these very trying and 
 peculiar circumstances, -without exchanging a sentence 
 of what can be called explanation. It shows what 
 good faith we have kept with you, that, on the fourth 
 and perhaps last day of our stay together, I should still 
 have these primary questions to put, and put them to 
 you. How can you possibly, with all your knowledge 
 of human nature, think that it can be in my human 
 nature to let you carry her off, without knowing where, 
 to be exposed, for anything I know to the contrary, to 
 plague, pestilence, and famine, without knowing even 
 where, nor how soon, I can take measures to see her 
 again ? I don't mean to go near her until she is free, 
 provided I can only make sure of finding her then ; 
 but, by hook or by crook, I must keep hold of some 
 clue to her, if it is only by following her about the 
 country, and not losing sight of her, wherever she goes ; 
 otherwise, at the moment she is released from her vow, 
 she may be hundreds of miles away from me, and re- 
 new it days or weeks before I can get at her ; and so 
 again the next time, and the next, till I have spent all 
 my days in a wild-goose chase after her !" Herman 
 groaned, as Sister Mary had never heard him groan 
 before. 
 
 Much moved, she put a useful suggestion in the 
 form of a rebuke, exclaiming indignantly, " Well, 
 then, sir. I'm very much surprised that you do not ap- 
 ply to some of her relations. They are the proper per- 
 sons to go to for information, of course." 
 
 " To whom, ma'am ?" 
 
 " Why, her Aunt and Uncle Ronaldson, I said, at 
 Baltimore." 
 
 " Oh, yes, I remember."
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHAKITY. 333 
 
 " And yon will be good and patient, my son ? 
 I would be sorry to think we had lost all our labor; 
 and if you attempt to rise at present, or travel too soon, 
 you must know yourself that your wound will inflame, 
 and you will be worse than ever." 
 
 " If I can," said Herman, with something of the 
 querulousness of an invalid ; " but I must make sure of 
 being on the spot, in time to speak to the Sister ; and 
 if you will not tell me when that should be," 
 
 " I'd tell you anything I could, my son, with all my 
 heart ; but you must see yourself, that it isn't the thing 
 for me to be making appointments of this sort." Her- 
 man did see it, and owned it ; but he sighed, and 
 stirred restlessly; and she went on, "You needn't 
 hurry, at all events. Mrs. Ronaldson is travelling just 
 now, I know, and not to be at home till the end of 
 next month. And I give you my word, that that will 
 be soon enough for you, and too soon. If you were in 
 Baltimore now, you couldn't do anything about your 
 business till some time after that." 
 
 Herman thanked her for this and all her kindness, as 
 warmly as he had expostulated with her a few minutes be- 
 fore, gave her fifty dollars for her charities, begged her to 
 call upon him if it should ever be in his power to render 
 her any service, and told her that he should always be- 
 lieve that, under Providence, he owed his recovery 
 from the only two illnesses of his life to " his two sis- 
 ters." Sister Mary had heard enough about Clara be- 
 fore, to feel rewarded. 
 
 The next morning brought Marshall, his baggage, 
 and Dr. Bayou, who was now to take the chief super- 
 vision of Herman. At noon, Sister Mary brought in 
 Constance, to say good-bye. She did not say it. She 
 did not speak. He held out his hand. She did not
 
 334: HERMAN. 
 
 Beem to see it, turned, and went out. Sister Mary, for 
 the last time, bent her tall old form over him, arranged 
 his pillows, and strove to make him comfortable in her 
 kindest and most motherly way. But the pain, which 
 he was now enduring, was beyond her power to relieve. 
 She saw his pale young face full of strong anguish 
 strongly borne; and he saw actual tears in her cheerful 
 eyes. Coming back again, and smoothing the counter- 
 pane, she whispered, " Take heart ! take heart, my 
 dear ! 'Twill soon be over. Trust her to me. I will 
 watch over her as if she was my daughter, or you were 
 my son." He wrung her shrivelled hand, and kissed 
 it. The door was shut. He was alone. 
 
 He heard a horse's hoof stamp impatiently on the 
 loose gravel underneath the window. Perhaps she was 
 there. Perhaps he might have one more glimpse of 
 her yet. Could he stand ? He could try. Clasping 
 the bed-post with both hands, he cautiously lowered his 
 feet to the floor, got hold of the back of the high- 
 backed chair to support him, and pushing it along 
 softly before him, reached the window in spite of the 
 swimming of his head. He peeped between the closed 
 shutters cautiously, that he might not be seen. A white- 
 covered butcher's-wagon was standing beneath. The 
 restless horse had turned, so that the opening at the 
 back of the wagon diagonally fronted the window. 
 Just as Herman looked out of the window, Constance 
 looked out of the wagon. She could not see him ; and 
 lie saw her the longer. There was a " divine despair" 
 in her eyes. Then she raised her handkerchief in her 
 hand, and bowed her head to it. She loved him ! He 
 would have given his heart's blood to be permitted to 
 dry, with his own hand, those tears that she was shed- 
 ding. And yet, strange inconsistency of love ! those
 
 THE SISTERS OF CHARITY. 335 
 
 tears of hers, which he could have wept to see her 
 shedding, were a greater comfort to him then than 
 anything else could give ; and on the memory of them 
 he was to live henceforth for many a day. 
 
 Sister Mary came out, and climbed into the modest 
 chariot. Mrs. Dobbs followed to the wheel with vo- 
 ciferous farewells. Silas Dobbs scrambled up in front, 
 and whipped up Dobbin ; and the wagon vanished 
 behind the barn before Herman grew too blind to see. 
 If he fainted now, it was no matter. Getting from his 
 bed was all that he had to concern himself about. 
 How he was to be got back, was other people's affair. 
 Not preferring to be caught at the window, however, 
 he made, as often as he regained strength and con- 
 sciousness sufficient, sundry efforts at locomotion and, 
 at the same time, with the legs of the chair upon the 
 wooden floor, sundry unearthly noises which speedily 
 brought Marshall, who was eating his dinner below, to 
 the rescue. 
 
 He was rather astonished at finding his usually 
 rational charge in the middle of the floor, astride on a 
 chair, and clinging to the back of it with both hands, 
 with a very pale face over the top ; and his first idea 
 was that Herman, in a fit of delirium, had been in- 
 dulging himself with a 
 
 "Ride a cock-horse 
 
 To Banbury Cross, t 
 
 To see an old woman jump on to her horse;" 
 
 in which we, who are in the secret, perceive that he 
 was not altogether wide of the mark ; except that the 
 woman was young, and in a wagon. Getting very lit- 
 tle explanation from Herman, he took him in his arms, 
 put him to bed and, as soon as he appeared capable of 
 comprehension, suggested to him that, if he had a fancj
 
 330 HERMAN. 
 
 to sit up, he had better at first try being pillowed up 
 for a little while where he was, or at any rate wait till 
 somebody came to assist him, to which Herman meekly 
 assented. He showed no more signs of any such fancy 
 for several days after. 
 
 The clock had struck twelve. Cinderella was gone, 
 without even leaving him so much as her shoe ! Oh, 
 yes, though ! There were the flowers she had gathered 
 for him. He must press and preserve them ; and do- 
 ing this and gumming them in arabesques and wreaths 
 upon paper, as he had seen her treat some in former 
 times, afforded him occupation enough for two or three 
 days after he really became well enough to sit up in 
 bed. But the strange, sweet, bitter-sweet episode was 
 over. The palace of Dainty-Delights was disenchanted. 
 He perceived that the apples were hectic, and the 
 oranges jaundiced, that the green carpet did not har- 
 monize well with the blue, nor with the yellow floor, 
 and that the lath-and-plaster walls had no paper for 
 him to while away his restless hours in studying. He 
 next proceeded to discover the truth of the theory, that 
 women make better nurses than men, but yet that Mrs. 
 Dobbs must be one of the exceptions that proved the 
 rule; for she could no more make Sister Mary's place 
 good than Marshall ; that serious illness was a state 
 often less trying than convalescence ; and that it was 
 singular what a difference physical weakness could cause 
 in one's power of attention ; for though the Messrs. 
 Dobbs were all of them intelligent yeomen, and 
 had much to tell him about the state of affairs in 
 
 * 
 
 Kansas, which was authentic, and no doubt important, 
 he knew no more about it, after they had been hospita- 
 bly trying to entertain him with it for an houi* tfcan 
 when they began.
 
 THE SISTEltS OF CHAJKITY. 337 
 
 The Kansas doctor, on his next friendly visit, wai 
 less impressed with Herman's resignation than with 
 his affording a remarkable illustration of the fact', that 
 few men, no matter how skilful they may be in gen- 
 eral, can understand their own cases. " I never, 
 Capting Dobbs," declared he, " see or conversed with a 
 youngster that had more information, or what you'd 
 call a better general idee of physic and surgery, than 
 that there, up stairs ; but here he's been remarking to 
 me, that he expects to be able to travel next week. 
 Leevetenant Marshall, if you let him try it, I guesa 
 you'll repent of it, and him, too. He's a dead man if 
 he doos, as sure as he lives." 
 
 The opinion of Dr. Bayou coincided in substance 
 with that of Dr. Coffin, though not in language, being 
 expressed in the purest Mississippian, of which I regret 
 that no specimen has been preserved for me to lay also 
 before my readers, for a comparison of dialects. Her- 
 man submitted himself, with the best grace he could, to 
 the decision of his medical brethren ; but his good con- 
 stitution and habit of health now came to the aid of 
 his wishes, and extricated him safely from their hands 
 before long, and much sooner than they expected, in 
 spite of the drawbacks of homesickness, restlessness, and 
 irrepressible anxiety ; and he quitted Kansas, after all, 
 with a much lighter heart than that with which he had 
 entered it. 
 
 15
 
 338 HEJBMAN. 
 
 CHAP TEH XIV. 
 
 THE LADY'S SHKIFT. 
 
 "My queen was crouching at my side, 
 
 By love unsceplred and brought low, 
 Her awful garb of maiden pride 
 All melted into tears like snow. 
 
 The mistress of my reverent thought," 
 
 THE ANGEL IN THE HOUSB. 
 
 AFTER Herman's return to Boston, he was much 
 of the time in spirits so mysteriously high, that Edward 
 declared it must be a cure for despondency to be shot 
 through the body, and that if he were entrusted with 
 the care of an asylum for the insane, he should cer- 
 tainly make taVgets of all his melancholy patients. 
 This remark of his deserves recording for this reason, 
 though for this reason only: it was the nearest to a 
 sportive, not to say a good-humored one, that he made 
 at this time and on this occasion. Quite contrary to 
 his wont, he was in a state of gloomy and taciturn in- 
 dignation ; and, from his unusual reserve, it was diffi- 
 cult to discover whether he was most angry with the 
 Border Ruffians for having shot Herman, or with Her- 
 man for having been shot. 
 
 Even this, Herman bore with remarkable cheerful- 
 ness. Perhaps Constance's tears had watered his 
 hopes, and they grew so fast as to over-top all minor 
 annoyances. He was, however, restless and incapable 
 of settling himself to anything long. As soon as he 
 was well enough, he resumed the care of his patients 
 and some charity pupils whom he had ; but his own
 
 THE LADY'S SIIKIFT. 339 
 
 studies seemed almost at a stand -still, while he 
 obligingly read aloud to Clara more novels and poetry 
 than, on her own account, she had ever perused in her 
 life. To the great improvement of her bloom, he rode 
 with her so fast that she often wanted breath to pro- 
 test against his speed ; and he had scarcely apologized 
 for his offence before it was repeated. He romped 
 with Tom and Bessy, until they pronounced that he 
 had grown " the funniest man in the world, a great 
 deal funnier even than Uncle Edward." 
 
 At the same time, as if for a counterpoise to all this, 
 he brought home to Clara one sombre book after an- 
 other upon monachism, mediaeval art, Romish saints, 
 &c. ; till one day she asked him whether he meant to 
 decoy her into a convent, and rewarded him by singing 
 in her very archest and prettiest way, a snatch of the 
 old song, " Oh, is it not a pity?" with its burden, "No, 
 I won't be a nun 1" 
 
 tlpon this he informed her, with unaccountable 
 and rather depressing solemnity, that he seriously 
 believed there was a great deal more of unearthly 
 excellence and saintliness among the charitable or- 
 ders of the Church of Rome than the Protestant 
 world had ever given it credit for; after which, he 
 went off without loss of time into the very brownest 
 of brown studies. 
 
 " Will you go out to walk with me ?" asked she at 
 length, finding him dull. 
 
 " Yes," said he, looking up blankly into her face, 
 " I shall go to Baltimore, myself." 
 
 " Shall you ?" returned she, laughing, " but I shall 
 not. It's rather far for a stroll ; and, besides, I shan't 
 trust myself there with you at present. There are too 
 many convents there. I might find myself in one
 
 340 HERMAN. 
 
 before I knew it. I beg jour pardon, though ; I for- 
 got that that seemed to be a tender point with you, 
 when I touched it just now. I dare say many of the 
 nuns are most excellent and interesting." 
 
 " ' Convents !' ' nuns !' " cried he, rousing himself; 
 " I did not say anything about them, did I ? Why 
 should you imagine, that they had anything to do with 
 my going to Baltimore ?" 
 
 " Why, I did not ! Have they ? Are you really 
 interested in them ?" 
 
 " Oh," said he," relieved, and endeavouring to 
 recollect himself, " there are a great many objects of 
 interest in Baltimore. There is an Athenaeum, a mon- 
 ument to Washington, and, I believe, a bank, 
 and," 
 
 " Toy-shops and confectioners'-shops, I dare say," 
 suggested she, demurely. " Never mind. Don't task 
 your memory. I can look for my old Worcester's 
 Geography, the next time I go to the garret, and find 
 out all about it, no doubt. When do you visit this 
 interesting city ?" 
 
 " Oh, next week. Have you any commands ?" 
 
 " Only to come back safe and soon. Herman, I 
 don't want to ask you any questions that are not neces- 
 sary, but this one I must, because I have been so fright- 
 ened about you so lately : It is no dangerous errand 
 that takes you to Baltimore ?" 
 
 " No, indeed, my dearest, no ! You will know all 
 about it some time, perhaps ; perhaps, very soon." 
 
 " That is all I wish to know, until you wish to tell 
 me." Clara said this in perfect good faith, with 
 respect at least to any mere selfish inquisitiveness on 
 her part. The vulgar general charge of idle feminine 
 curiosity is sometimes brought by their inferiors against
 
 TIIK LADY 8 SHRIFT. 341 
 
 women, who rather deserve praise and admiration for 
 tlieir eager and anxious sympathy, and solicitude for 
 the welfare of those very persons who ridicule them 
 for it. Any serious attempt at concealment between 
 Herman and Clara was, however, a thing so unprece- 
 dented, that she presently caught herself instinctively 
 trying to unriddle it : 
 
 " Transparent young cheat !" thought she ; " how 
 he stammered and blushed ! It must have been about 
 something more than my thoughtless banter about his 
 monastic hobbies, unless he is really getting Roman- 
 ized. Herman could not ! I might have been afraid 
 of it a few years ago ; but now, with all his fancy 
 and fervor, he has too much knowledge and clear, 
 sound, strong good sense, unless the Roman Catholics 
 are right, after all ; but Dr. Lovel declares, and knows 
 how to prove, that they are not ; and so does Herman, 
 too, I dare say. Imagine him starving and whipping 
 himself, and going down on his knees to confess all the 
 crimes that he never committed, to a great, ignorant, 
 puzzle-headed, l exile of Erin ' of a priest ! I don't 
 think there can be much danger of that. He had 
 hardly time enough to fall in love while he was gone ; 
 and besides he went nowhere near Baltimore. And 
 then I don't think he is ready yet to fall in love with 
 anybody except that absurd Constance. He seldom 
 cares to speak to any lady here, except me. Can she 
 have changed her mind, and he found it out ? She had 
 relations there ! And can he think of placing himself 
 at her mercy again 2 I hope, if so, at any rate, that 
 by this time she has learned better how to prize him. ' 
 
 " Ah, Herman ! Herman 1 Why cannot we go on, 
 just as we are, without any change in our peaceful, 
 pleasant home ? Why is it, that for even you, who
 
 342 HERMAN. 
 
 know eo well how to win and return a sister's affection, 
 a sister's affection cannot be enough ? Yours and Ed- 
 ward's makes my life so sweet and blessed ! "Why is it 
 that, when almost all men who have sisters can command 
 a sister's affection, a sister's affection seems enough for 
 
 ' o . 
 
 the happiness of scarcely any of them? And, yet 
 more, why is it that so many of them seem to disre- 
 gard, if not to spurn it utterly ? They do not treat 
 their sisters as equals, still less as companions, still 
 less as they do their friends. They make them useful 
 when they themselves are in sickness, want, or afflic- 
 tion ; but when they are well, wealthy, and happy, 
 they leave them to themselves, and to their vacuity 
 and loneliness ; and so the poor, un cherished, forsaken, 
 shaded things, (unless fate sends suitors to see, fancy, 
 and carry them off to brighter and warmer homes than 
 their own, or unless they have a rare faculty of finding 
 sunshine for themselves,) are too often blighted, mil- 
 dewed, and frost-nipped, and become scare-crows in 
 appearance, and nothing very cheerful in reality. 
 I have seen enough of it, since dear compassionate Her- 
 man taught me to open my eyes to the condition of 
 those less fortunate than myself. God send him hap- 
 piness, and Constance, too, made worthy of him, 
 if she is essential to his happiness ! I don't know how 
 I could ever forgive her for having made him so 
 wretched ; but, at all events, I could try for his sake. 
 Perhaps he had reason to think she would relent, but 
 would not say so, for fear of having afterwards to com- 
 plain to me a second time of disappointment. [A pretty 
 good guess, that last one, Miss Clara !] But what am 
 I about, to sit here, prying into his thoughts after this 
 meddlesome fashion ? As soon as he ought, he will tell 
 me all that he ought; and untilthen, as I told him. I
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 343 
 
 do not wish to know." Clara found that she had 
 worked a whole crimson tulip wrong in her tidy, and 
 addressed all her powers resolutely to the wholesome 
 penance of picking it out. 
 
 Herman went to Baltimore ; but whether or not he 
 remembered to visit the interesting bank, monument, 
 and confectioners' shops, never transpired. It is, how- 
 ever, I regret to say, certain that he did not lie in 
 ambush under the house of St. Tabitha, drug the 
 watchmen, scale the walls by night, and bring Con- 
 stance down a rope-ladder out of a three-story window ; 
 nor did he break into a secret conclave of Tartarean 
 ecclesiastics, and demand his Eurydice back with a 
 moving mixture of threats and pathetic entreaties, at 
 the risk of being let through the floor into the cellar, 
 like one of the Ravels, by means of a trap-door con- 
 veniently disposed under the carpets for the purpose ; 
 nor did he hide in one of the pews of the church of St. 
 Nostrum, bounce out, and drag his lady-love from the 
 altar, on the occasion of her being dragged to it by 
 opposition captors to renew her vows. It would have 
 been much more appropriate to a romance, and accord- 
 ingly much more convenient to me, if he had done 
 some one or all of these things ; but by that strict ad- 
 herence to truth and nature, for which I am distin- 
 guished, (or mean to be, one of these days, if I can,) 
 I am forced to own, that how romantic soever in his 
 feelings, he was apt to be sadly commonplace in his 
 doings. 
 
 He procured an excellent letter of introduction to 
 Mr. Ronaldson, made acquaintance with his wife, and 
 when he had found out what a thoroughly good, warm, 
 open heart she had, and also had reason to think that 
 she had granted him a little corner of it, he opened his
 
 344: HKEMAU. 
 
 own to her. The devotee in her struggled a little at 
 first, faintly, with the woman, but had to yield before 
 long, and yielded entirely to her natural sympathy 
 with youth and love. She gave Herman her best 
 wishes and advice, and made up her mind that she had 
 never quite thought her dear niece had found her voca- 
 tion. About his seeing her ? Oh, he should see her in 
 her [Mrs. Ronaldson's] own house, of course. Constance 
 was coming to pass two or three days with her as soon 
 as she returned from Georgetown ; and that would 
 probably be next week. Her year had just expired. 
 She was waiting only for Sister Mary's company. 
 Constance was to write and let her know w 7 hat day to 
 send the coach to the cars. She would send Herman 
 word ; and he had better be at her house, and make 
 sure of an interview at once. Any opposition to his 
 seeing Constance, on the part of her superiors ? Oh, 
 no, she thought not. She would be very sorry to 
 think so. But, then, dear Constance herself was 
 ardent, and sometimes a little wilful, (though that was 
 chiefly before her conversion, and ought not to be 
 remembered now.) She had been very strongly bent 
 on going into the Sisterhood ; nothing could stop her ; 
 and now she might have scruples of conscience of 
 her own, about letting herself be turned from that line 
 of life. Mrs. Ronaldson would send for him ; and he 
 had better be on the spot. Herman was not un- 
 willing. 
 
 The coach rumbled to the door, and stopped. The 
 tall, Diana-like figure all in black, the same that had 
 haunted the farm-Louse in Kansas, reappeared, and 
 darted into the hall, into the arms of Mrs. Ronaldson. 
 They kissed each other, billing and twittering together 
 like two Canary-birds for full five minutes. Herman,
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 34:5 
 
 in ambush, peeped through the crack of the parlour- 
 door. He could not have waited go long, but for the 
 necessity of avoiding a denouement before the coach- 
 man and Sambo. 
 
 " Oh, dear Aunt Cora, how dear you are ! How 
 sweet it is to see one of my own family again ! How 
 good you are, to let me come back to you once more !" 
 
 " How naughty you were,* you wilful darling, ever 
 to go away and leave me ! How could you do so ?" 
 
 "Indeed, I don't know. I've wondered a great 
 many times. Give me another kiss, two, and hold 
 me tight ! Oh, I never knew what a darling foster- 
 mother I had, nor how ungrateful and shameful it was 
 for me to say I was all alone in the world, till I had 
 run away from you !" 
 
 " Come, come into the parlour, and let me take off 
 your bonnet. It's all damp with the rain." 
 
 Constance hung back. " Do you think there can 
 be any of my own dresses up-stairs, Aunt Cora ?" 
 
 " I am afraid not, dear ; you gave them all away, 
 did you not ? There, that will do, children ! Run up 
 to the nursery. Go down and tell the cook to make 
 some muffins, Sambo." 
 
 " I'm afraid I did. I shall feel so odd and con- 
 spicuous in these before people ; and, besides, I hate to 
 see them myself." 
 
 "What! Why?" 
 
 ' " They remind me of my wilfulness and folly. 
 Aunt Cora, it is of no use to try ! I can no more be a 
 Sister than I can, a seraph !" 
 
 " Why, Constance ! Why ?" 
 
 " Oh, because, it does not suit me. I'm not good' 
 enough. I mean to do good part of the time ; but I 
 want to do something else besides, and draw, and play, 
 15*
 
 346 
 
 and read my own books, and think my own thoughts, 
 without always meditating. I'll be the children's gov- 
 erness, or anything you please, if you'll only let me 
 stay with you. Is Uncle Henry in the parlour ?" 
 
 " No, dear. Come in." 
 
 Herman met her on the threshold. He thought she 
 would have fallen. " Why are you here ?" exclaimed 
 she, not knowing what she said, with her white lips 
 scarcely stirring. 
 
 The low, spontaneous answer broke from him with 
 equal abruptness, " Because I love you !" 
 
 " Children, children," cried Mrs. Ronaldson, " come 
 away from Cousin Constance this moment, all of you ; she 
 is tired. ]STo, no, Jenny; off the sofa, up to the nursery. 
 Mammy Philly has the nice warm water all ready ; and 
 we will have such a frolic ! Constance, my dear 5 
 you'll be so kind as to excuse me for half an hour, I'm 
 sure ; my children's bath. Skip, Bobby, mamma will 
 catch him !" Gathering her brood together, like a hen 
 who sees a hawk, Mrs. Ronaldson swept, with them be- 
 fore her, through the door and shut it, leaving the coast 
 clear. 
 
 Herman and Constance, meantime, saw nothing 
 and heard nothing but one another. They stood face 
 to face alone again, for the first time since that misera- 
 ble morning in Boston, more than three years ago. 
 ' Then Constance dropped like a broken idol on one 
 knee before him, covered her face with her hands, a"nd 
 burst into a tropical deluge of tears : " No, no ! Let 
 me stay here ! It is the proper place for me ! Ah, 
 Herman, noble Herman ! why were you so true and I 
 so unworthy ! No, don't ask me to rise ! My wicked 
 pride deserves a penance, and shall have it ! I have 
 knelt to other men since I spurned you, the guide
 
 THE LADY'S SHBIFT. 347 
 
 and counsellor that Heaven ordained me, and asked 
 for their forgiveness for lighter sins ; and now," 
 
 " Miss Aspen wall ! Constance ! oh, dear Con- 
 stance ! Don't let me see you so ! I have taken you by 
 surprise ! Forgive me ! Oh, you shock, you grieve me !" 
 
 " I will never do that again, at any rate," said she ; 
 and trying to check the sobs, which shook her whole 
 frame, she allowed him to raise her and lead her to a 
 sofa. " But if I confess myself to any one, I am sure 
 it is fit that I should do so to you, oh, my patriot, my 
 hero, my true-love ! far truer to me than myself! 
 whom I wronged, and agonized, and repaid with my 
 childish scorn and anger for being only too lofty and 
 heroic for a spoiled and senseless thing like me to un- 
 derstand ! If you want revenge, you shall have it." 
 
 " ' Revenge !' on you ? my dearest ! my own heart 1 
 I don't. I want nothing but your affection, if you can 
 only give me that. You are over-tired, and," 
 
 " Yes, I am over-tired, and deserve to be, of follow- 
 ing out my own wild will ; and / want revenge, if you 
 do not, on my mad pride and passion, which have made 
 us both so wretched !" 
 
 " Both ! Were you ' so wretched,' too ? Oh, Con- 
 stance, Constance !" 
 
 " Was I not ? Did you think me so heartless as 
 well as senseless ! Well you might, indeed ! But to 
 have to go away and leave you, in that wilderness, 
 among strangers, perhaps to relapse and die ! Oh, 
 what could you think of me ?" 
 
 " Would you like to know what I did think of you ? 
 that you were an incarnate blessing, sent to me by 
 Heaven in the time of my utmost need ; that your 
 infinite compassion could be bounded only by your loy- 
 alty to duty ; and that the very memory of your pres-
 
 348 HERMAN. 
 
 ence, when you were gone, was as an amulet to preserve 
 me to devote myself to you ! I kept myself up as well 
 as I could with that, and with the hope, the fixed de- 
 termination, to see you soon again, and make you mine 
 if it was in the power of mortal man to-do it ; but in 
 spite of all, when you were gone, Constance, you can- 
 not imagine how I felt ! as if my very being would 
 be crushed inwards with its own emptiness !" 
 
 " Can I not ? You shall hear. I loved you, Her- 
 man ; I did not know it, but I did love you at the 
 time, in Boston," 
 
 " Oh, Constance ! You did love me ? And now ?" 
 
 " No less," faltered she, pausing ; and then she 
 broke forth again, " I liked you always, and Clara, 
 and Edward. I was always happier and better with 
 you, than with anybody else I ever saw ; my mind and 
 heart and whole soul felt at home with you, I could 
 not tell why ; but, indeed, I never knew how I loved 
 you, Herman, till after that day when you stood before 
 me so pale, and brave, and strong, showing me how 
 much, how over-much, you loved me, and yet how 
 you could do without my love. I was ill soon after ; 
 and even when I tried, and it was long before I did, 
 to remember all that passed between us, I could not, 
 with any clearness ; but that look of yours, that fond, 
 firm agony, I could not forget ; and I could not help 
 admiring you for it, even when I thought you in the 
 wrong ; but when I found that I had been a fool and, 
 for the climax of my disgrace, the fool of tyrants !" 
 
 " My Constance ! Do you mean to' say that you 
 can not only feel for me, but feel with me, now ? My 
 God, 1 thank -thee 1" 
 
 " Herman, indeed I can ! You may well wonder 
 at it. It needed very much to break down my igno-
 
 THE LADY 8 SHRIFT. 349 
 
 ranee and- arrogance: but the ruffian, who struck 
 Sumner down Weeding on the Senate floor, struck with 
 the same stroke the scales from my eyes, as I believe 
 he must have done from those of hundreds ! Then I 
 knew my pet institution by its fruits. A system, which 
 had for its arguments the blows of a bravo and for its 
 tongue, a bludgeon, could be little akin to 'my cher- 
 ished Patriotism and Liberty. Chivalry and the 
 South, indeed ! As I read the news on a stray scrap 
 of newspaper, in which a child had brought some fruit 
 to one of the Sisters, I thought of you. ' So Herman 
 was right!' I said. I blushed, and turned literally 
 sick with shame, as if I had seen instead a published 
 account of my treatment of you ; so that the Sister 
 Superior saw, took the scrap from me, looked it over, 
 and asked me whether either of the parties was a rela- 
 tion or friend of mine." 
 
 " Oh, Constance, you could think of me, and yet 
 become a Sister of Charity ?" 
 
 " I was one already to all intents and purposes. 
 I had entered upon my noviciate, and taken a private 
 vow ; and I was glad then that I had dropped out of 
 life, and left my name and all behind. ' What can he 
 think of me now ?' I said to myself. ' Nothing, but 
 that very likely I am one of the ladies, who are at 
 this very moment getting up subscriptions, to buy new 
 clubs for that representative of the South ! to break 
 on the grandest heads of my countrymen ! Herman's 
 own among them, perhaps. I am disgraced,' I said, 
 ' and my South is disgraced ; and the sooner I am out 
 of this weary wicked world, the happier for me ;' and 
 I asked leave to go with Sister Mary ; because we heard 
 that the cholera was in Kansas, and I thought that I 
 should like to die in the service of the sick Free-State
 
 350 HERMAN. 
 
 people there. It seemed to be the only reparation 
 to jour cause, that I had it in my power to make ; 
 and, I did not in the least suppose that you 
 would ever care to hear of me again ; but I 
 thought, that if you should, I should like to have you 
 hear that." 
 
 | " My own love ! How could I have borne to hear 
 j it ? How could you suppose, that I could ever for a 
 moment forget you ? How could you ever consent, for 
 a year or a month, to put so fearful a barrier between 
 yourself and me ? Could you not have served God 
 among your friends and kindred, in some happier 
 way?" 
 
 " I am afraid I did not care so much as I ought 
 about serving God," murmured Constance, her pink 
 cheeks blushing between her delicate fingers, like roses 
 through snowy icicles. " You must not think me as 
 good as you are, Herman; or you will despise me for a 
 cheat when you find me out. You shall hear the 
 whole story, as you have a right to do, as fast as I can 
 summon up resolution to confess how poor a part I 
 have played. But, first, you must hear how hopeless 
 and dreary I was ; for that is my only excuse. As for 
 happiness, I might have found it here, perhaps, I 
 might have done so, certainly, if I had been less 
 spoiled, wayward, and exacting, if I had not loved, 
 and known what it was to be loved again. As it was, 
 I was spoiled, wayward, exacting, and, yes, I will 
 own it ! it is due to you, broken-hearted !" 
 
 " My own precious Constance ! You broken- 
 hearted, too ! and I not here to comfort you. If I 
 could but have guessed ! "When one word would have 
 brought me so enraptured to your side !" 
 
 " But that word," stammered she, " was one that I
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 351 
 
 could not say. It was mine to chide you from me ; 
 not mine to bid you back again. JSTo matter ; perhaps 
 I would not have done it, if I could. No; I am 
 pretty sure I should not. I was possessed by the evil 
 one ; (for people may be, even in our times, Herman. 
 I believe in that doctrine firmly, shudderingly. God 
 grant he may be cast out now !" She crossed herself 
 and shivered ;) " and even if you had thrown yourself 
 at my feet in those days, I believe I might have 
 spurned you again, who knows ? though, in order to 
 do it, I trampled on my own soul. I said to myself, 
 ' He has been tried in the balance and found wanting ; 
 let him go ! I am happy enough without him ; or, at 
 any rate, I am going to be. I must occupy my mind, 
 and forget the whole matter.' Then the question 
 arose, How occupy my mind ? 
 
 " There appeared to be nothing for me to do, but to 
 go out a good deal ; and accordingly I did that. I re- 
 ceived a great deal of what is called attention ; and 
 ladies told me, that gentlemen had said that I was very 
 handsome. What comfort was there in that ? So 
 were many very unhappy or even very despicable per- 
 sons ; so was Eleanor, I must learn not to mention 
 names when I am going to be spiteful," said she, inter- 
 rupting herself with a sobbing laugh, " who had not, 
 I believed, an idea in her head, except that she was 
 the greatest beauty on this continent, or a feeling in 
 her heart except a longing to have the fact frankly and 
 explicitly stated to her on every occasion. Yery soon 
 I began to grow tired, and to say to myself, ' I have 
 had enough of this. What next ?' I could not see any 
 next, or at least any that I found any comfort in con- 
 templating. Oh, Herman, it is a dreary thing to 
 stand, a girl of nineteen, on the very threshold of life,
 
 352 HERMAN. 
 
 and see before yon nothing but death to look for- 
 ward to ! 
 
 " Even what I had in possession, I could not keep. 
 The young men were proud of walking and dancing 
 with me, just as they were of driving a fine horse, and 
 discussed me, I suspected, much as if I had been one. 
 4 She is a glorious creature !' I was told that they said 
 and swore ; but I knew that in five years' time they 
 would probably say it with less emphasis, and in ten 
 change it into ' She was a glorious creature,' or forget 
 it altogether. One always wants a prospect of some- 
 thing, some gain, some growth, some permanence, at 
 least ; and I saw no prospect of any in that direction, 
 even if it had been worth having, which I doubted. 
 
 " In hopes of a hint, I looked about me to see what 
 other old maids were doing. Some of them were dressy 
 and chatty, and seemed to be contented and satisfied ; 
 but it was with much the same things that the young 
 maids were doing ; and of those things I was weary 
 already, and expected to be still more so before ten 
 years more were gone. Then there were others, old 
 maids par excellence, whose chief function in life ap- 
 peared to be, to be dowdy, useful in certain dry ways, 
 and ' content with their sphere ;' but their sphere, so 
 far as I could see, was nothing but an exceedingly flat 
 round of duties, that nobody else chose to do ;" and 
 again Constance laughed with that sobbing laugh, half- 
 tearful, half-mirthful, like a lost child, that has been 
 sought and found by a kind older brother, and is telling 
 him about its wanderings. 
 
 " Altogether I did not like the looks of the future 
 at all, and tried to throw myself into the present Again, 
 as fast as I could. But I was worn out with mere ball- 
 room prate, and sometimes wished to talk of things
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 353 
 
 more interesting' than my neighbours' flirtations, 
 clothes, and suppers. Some people stared and an- 
 swered at cross-purposes; and others assured each 
 other solemnly that I was very intellectual. ' What 
 of that?' I said to myself, 'What good does an intel- 
 lect do you, unless you know what to do with it? 
 What comfort was Samson's long hair to him, when 
 he ground in the mill ?' ' Why don't you write a 
 book ?' they said ; but I never like to write often or 
 long ; and, by that time, through idleness and dissipa- 
 tion, I had lost the control of my own mind, if I ever 
 had any, and did not know how to set myself to work 
 or to keep to anything steadily ; and then, I will 
 humble myself to tell you this, Herman, to give you 
 some satisfaction for the pain which I inflicted on you, 
 too, by my arrogance ! in my inaction and vacuity 
 my inward griefs had completely, and in spite of me, 
 got the upper hand. My heart was growing so full of 
 the tears which I was too proud to shed, that I feared 
 that if I did write, they would burst through my pen, 
 and trickle over all my pages, and every one would 
 know the sorrowful secret, which I was so anxious to 
 keep from every one. 
 
 "I took a disgust to society and tried music next, 
 to make the time pass and keep me from thinking ; 
 but it did not keep me from feeling. I often played 
 seven or eight hours a day, and left off only because 
 my heavy fingers flagged on the keys ; but then I often 
 cried. Herman, I do not see how music can ever do 
 much for worldly and selfishly unhappy people; because 
 it awakens spiritual longings, which only heavenly and 
 holy affections can fill. 
 
 " At last, I believe that I must have become really 
 morbid ; for I spent half my time sitting with my
 
 354 HERMAN. 
 
 hands folded at the window, gazing into the street, and 
 speculating on the faces of the women passing by. 
 I did not care particularly to study those of the girls ; 
 for I knew that animal spirits, hope, and thoughtless- 
 ness, were enough for most of them; but I pored 
 eagerly and as long as I could, through the blinds, over 
 the countenances of the middle-aged and the old, to 
 read their fortunes in them. When I saw one go by 
 with a proud, glad look, I said, confidently, ' She has a 
 kind husband, or a fond, tmie lover. She steps quickly. 
 She knows that the time seems long to him, while she 
 is out of his sight. Perhaps he is sitting in some win- 
 dow, and looking out for her, a-s, not as, I am now. 
 Perhaps he is waiting for her at the nearest corner. 
 Life is short. Why should they waste a moment of it, 
 needlessly apart?' 'When one followed with a con- 
 tented, cheerful, domestic look, I said, ' She has a 
 cheery, kindly home to go to, with plenty of sociable 
 brothers and sisters in it, if she has no more.' When 
 another came, somewhat pale and worn, but with a 
 sweet, calm, and earnest expression, ' She may have 
 had her trials ; but, if so, she must have had somebody 
 to support and strengthen her under them, good old 
 parents, very likely, who, having passed through the 
 sorrows of life before her, know how to feel for her, 
 soothe, encourage, and guide her, while she in return 
 takes heart and keeps her spirits up, that she may the 
 better cheer and cherish their old age.' But when I 
 saw a woman pass, with a haggard, withered, drawn, 
 defiant face, I said, ' She is -alone in the world ; an 
 orphan, with no brother or sister ; and her lover is 
 worse than dead. She has no hopes, and bitter mem- 
 ories from which she knows no refuge. She hates life, 
 and herself, and all the world. She is embittered,
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIJT. 355 
 
 soured, cankered, as I am going to be, as I am now.' 
 At length, one day, I saw two Sisters of Charity, one 
 of them majestic, and, though old, still beautiful, both 
 looking happy. That was a reproach to me; for I sup- 
 posed that they had no domestic ties, nor anything but 
 the unselfish service of God and man to make them 
 more contented than myself; and I arose, and left my 
 window." 
 
 " But, my own dearest, were you so utterly alone ? 
 I cannot bear to think of it. Had you no friend ? 
 You were here, were you not? Surely, surely, Mrs. 
 Ronaldson must have been kind to you ?" 
 
 "'Kind!' Indeed she was! much more than 
 that ! Incredibly kind, it seemed to me, when I looked 
 back, after toil, hardship, and real homelessness, had 
 begun to bring me to my senses. She was as affection- 
 ate and tender towards me as I would let her be ; but 
 at the time I fear that I really took it only as a matter 
 of course," said Constance, blushing like a fair cloud at 
 sunset. " It seems to me that I did use to take it as a 
 matter of course, that all around me should be devoted 
 to my worship and service. When they were so, I fear 
 that I merely did not notice it. When they were not, 
 I felt it as an outrage. I knew nothing of life then. All 
 my notions of it were drawn from fiction and my own 
 selfish fancy. I was the prima donna of my opera, 
 and did not see that other people were made for any 
 other purpose than to play accompaniments or sing 
 seconds to me. I bewailed my loneliness ; but I be- 
 lieve it was more than half my own fault ; for I did 
 like to keep everybody at bay with my haughtiness. 
 A brother, sister, father, or mother, might be made a 
 picturesque accessory to the grand central figure of a 
 heroine. A kind, indulgent, attentive aunt, was quite
 
 356 HERMAN. 
 
 too tame and homely a character to be held under con- 
 sideration for a moment ; and," Constance's long 
 curled eye-lashes drooped till they over-hung her 
 blushes, " I know that I did not esteem or appreciate 
 Aunt Cora at all as I ought. I despised her ; because 
 she had less taste and time for idle accomplishments 
 and day-dreams than I ; and I thought her common- 
 place ; because she was so absorbed in her little house- 
 hold and social cares, in trifles, I thought then, in 
 her duty, and promoting the welfare and happiness of 
 others, I see now. Oh, it seems all so long ago, as 
 if I was talking of what I was in some preexistent 
 state, or of some other person ; and indeed I must 
 have changed very much, or I could never have hum- 
 bled myself to acknowledge such ingratitude and folly ! 
 Don't you think so ?" asked she, with the eager, plead- 
 ing look of a contrite, docile infant, who, after a repented 
 fit of naughtiness, begs to know, " Am I good now ?" 
 
 " I do," he returned, with a fond and not very 
 credulous smile, " if you ever were such a person as 
 you describe. I think, further, that you have learned 
 to turn the satire, with which you used to make me 
 laugh at others, against yourself. I could rather weep 
 at it now. Spare her whom I love best." 
 
 " Truth is the truest satire for some persons," said 
 Constance, vengefully, but looking well pleased, not- 
 withstanding ; " she deserves mercy through your 
 intercession, who had so much on you. You shall 
 hear the worst of her before you give yourself to her," 
 
 " Excuse me," cried he, playfully. " The informa- 
 tion comes too late. She has me already beyond recall. 
 In pity, don't make me discontented ! The best that I 
 can do is to make the best of my bad bargain." 
 
 " We have talked enough of so unfortunate a sub- 
 ject, at any rate, for once," said Constance; "and
 
 THE LADY'S BHKIFT. 357 
 
 there is Uncle Henry's step on the stairs ! They will 
 make us go to tea presently ; and oh, Herman, I have 
 not seen you yet, nor heard anything about you ! Let 
 me have one look now, to see if you have really got 
 your well face back again, before I run up stairs to 
 bathe my eyes. No, now I cannot. You must not 
 look at me. Look at that sweet St. Agnes over my 
 head. Yes, you do not look as you did in Kansas. 
 I am sure you are well ; but you do. not look as you 
 did usually in Boston. You are older, graver, 
 stronger, grander. Strength is born of suffering ; Her- 
 man, you have suffered, too ?" 
 
 His brows knit themselves slightly together at the 
 memories raised by the question ; but they relaxed, 
 and he smiled, such a smile ! with the very strong 
 essence and elixir of mastered pain in it, as he said, 
 " Too much to recall ! enough to give zest to an hour 
 like this !" 
 
 " What have you suffered, Herman ?" Constance 
 would have been more or less than woman, had she 
 not felt that her confession demanded one in return. 
 
 "Need I say? Unhappy love," The tears 
 welled up again in her deep, pitying eyes, and he 
 hurried on : " Slander, insult, numberless hindrances 
 in striving to save the liberties and honor of our 
 country," 
 
 " And you allowed yourself, for a moment, to regard 
 things like those ?" cried she. " But that could have 
 been only because you were lonely, because I forsook 
 you ! Herman, it is so glorious, so noble, to suffer in 
 a great cause ! Go on ! You cannot, you shall not 
 be overcome ! The blood of the martyrs was the seed 
 of the church ! The heart's blood of patriots is the 
 seed of the common weal ! If the whole country, nuin 
 by man, were to turn against you now for a time, jou
 
 358 HEKMAN. 
 
 would no more heed it now, [the 'now' meant, ' with 
 me by your side,'] except for the country's sake !" It 
 was a true girl's speech, more enthusiastic than logical ; 
 but, as it rippled through her beautiful lips, she looked 
 at him, as a queen might upon her champion ; and 
 conviction flashed on him through the exquisite dark 
 eyes, which, with a kind of kindling tenderness, 
 beamed inspiration on him through their modest 
 lashes. He cast down his own, abashed in his turn 
 before that blaze of tender and regal beauty, and an- 
 swered, with docility like her own, " I believe that I 
 could not." 
 
 Sympathizing Mrs.Ronaldson,whohad scarcely waited 
 to superintend the first stage of her infants' immersion, 
 before she returned to keep watch in the hall and 
 guard against any untimely intrusion, was now forced 
 to tap at the door. Her husband wanted to see Con- 
 stance, and wanted his tea. She found her niece 
 smiling, composed, and radiant with gentle happiness. 
 All was plainly as it should be. Herman seized her hand 
 with a grasp, which said, in a " natural language " un- 
 derstood all the world over, "Congratulate me." Con- 
 stance slipped her arm within hers, and whispered, as 
 they crossed the hall together, " Dear, dear, sly Aunt 
 Cora. You thought it would refresh me to walk into 
 the parlour, did you ? So you are a match-maker, no 
 better than the other matrons, after all." 
 
 Herman spent half the following night in writing 
 to Clara ; Constance, in reviewing the events of the 
 day. Herman had done wisely in checking the first 
 out-pourings of her long-pent feelings. He did so, 
 partly because he could never bear to see any woman 
 cry, that one particularly, but also because he 
 understood her well enough to suspect that, how-
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 359 
 
 ever many tears of repentant tenderness she might 
 shed, in the first overwhelming transports of their 
 reunion, she would shed more of mortification .and 
 remorse afterwards by herself, if she thought that she 
 had shed one too many before him, or been by a hair's 
 breadth too unreserved and demonstrative. Besides, 
 balm as each word of her passionate contrition was to 
 the wounds which her pride and anger had inflicted 
 upon him, he thought it unfair to take advantage of 
 the emotion into which he had surprised her, to win 
 one from her. He did not consider, that if in a calmer 
 moment she had remembered that he had drawn her 
 on to say too much, her enthusiasm might have re- 
 acted, and become aversion. This was true, notwith- 
 standing. - He had his reward for his forbearance. In 
 her vigils it came. up in review. 
 
 " What could he have thought of me ?" thought she, 
 " kneeling, and sobbing, and almost throwing myself 
 at his feet, as if to take or cast off at his pleasure! 
 "What a tragedy-queen I behaved like! Clara never 
 does so. When can I learn to be calm and rational, and 
 like other people ? I hope he will recollect how com- 
 pletely I was taken off my guard. But he does ; he did at 
 the time. He said, in those mellow, soothing tones of 
 his, so full of protection and manly tenderness, which are 
 the sweetest in his voice, of all the tones of all the 
 voices that I ever heard, just so, ' I have taken you 
 by surprise ! you are tired !' No, not so ! I cannot 
 say it as he did ; nobody else could. And he tried to 
 stop me again and again, as well as he could without 
 appearing to see that I was making a fool of myself. 
 He could not enjoy his triumph ; because it was my 
 humiliation. How generous! how mortifying ! Well, 
 it was bad enough, to be sure; but it might have been
 
 360 HERMAN. 
 
 worse. I kept some things to myself, I thank the 
 saints ! I did not say that I could not work, for want 
 of him to hold my worsteds for me to wind, nor sing, 
 because the notes of his voice, seemed to be always 
 hovering around mine, and mine was so hollow and 
 meagre without his, nor read, for wondering what he 
 would say of each new book. At least, when I told 
 him about my sitting at that window, I did not men- 
 tion how I used sometimes to watch by the hour, to see 
 if, by some hopeless chance, I might not see him pass 
 by ; and oh, above all, I did not say how I used to 
 watch for my chance to snatch at the newspapers un- 
 observed, nor how they would always flutter in my 
 hand while I looked for his name, first among the mar- 
 riages, and then among the deaths. ' In Boston, th 
 instant, Herman Arden, aged 21 22 23. Papers at 
 a distance will please to copy.' Nor how I would then 
 give a long sigh, and take breath again for the next 
 twelve hours, but say to myself, ' Very likely he is at 
 the altar or in the hearse at this moment; but it \vill 
 take another day for the news to come.' 
 
 " Horrid, horrid days ! horrid dream ! It is over 
 now ; so much I have to be glad of, and must be ; and 
 now, if he is ill, no one can take me away from him. 
 I shall at least be in the same town, and able to hear 
 how he is ; and, if I am not worthy of him, he 
 shall teach me to be ; so honorable ! so trustworthy ! 
 so loyal ! so "- very sleepy was Miss Aspenwall, 
 that at this juncture a very heavy slumber prevented 
 her from completing the list of her true-love's attri- 
 butes ; and she never succeeded in doing so to her 
 satisfaction.
 
 THE LADY'S SHKIFT. 361 
 
 CHAP TEE XV. 
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT 
 
 (CONCLUDED.) 
 
 "That there should be no other carriere [than in marriage] possi- 
 ble for the great majority of women, except in the humbler departments 
 of life, is one of those social injustices which call loudest for remedy." 
 
 JOHN STUART MILL. 
 
 " These views are every day driving distinguished, and gifted, and 
 enthusiastic women, into the pale of that church, which stretches out 
 its arms, and says, ' Come unto me ye who are troubled, ye who are 
 idle, and I will give you rest and work ; and, with these, sympathy 
 and reverence, the religious sanction, direction, and control.' Can 
 we find nothing of all this for our women ? Why should they thus go 
 out from among us ?" MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 CONSTANCE was awakened the next morning by that 
 delicious sensation, which probably comes to most of 
 us twice or thrice in a life-time, of a heart-full of hap- 
 piness, waiting only for the drowsy memory to rouse 
 itself, walk in, review its treasures, and take possession. 
 The furniture of the luxurious chamber around her told 
 her at once of her escape from hardship and banish- 
 ment ; and then instantly rushed in, the thought of 
 Herman. Clasping her hands with an exclamation 
 of thankfulness, she sprang from her bed, impatient to 
 begin the day. 
 
 She looked for her clothes. On a chair beside her, 
 .hung the dreary black robe and the cross and rosary. 
 She turned from them with a shudder. Then, with 
 averted eyes, she put out her hand for the cross, 
 pressed it to her lips with reverent and remorseful ten- 
 16
 
 362 HERMAN. 
 
 derness, and hung it about her neck. " From this, at 
 least, the anchor of my hope," murmured she, "I will 
 never be parted. It shall lie on my heart till I lie in 
 my coffin. God grant, that that may not be for many, 
 many years ! It is so beautiful to live ! And if I wear 
 it henceforth, not without, but within, I must also 
 endeavour to bear it on my soul as well as on my body. 
 But that robe, that black uniform of celibacy and or- 
 phanage, the pall of all his happiness and mine when 
 last we met, and met only to part, how can I ever 
 put it on again ! It seems ill-omened ! Ah ! I could 
 not have been worthy to wear it ; or it would not look 
 so grim to me !" 
 
 Her soliloquy was interrupted by a tap at the door. 
 Annette, Mrs. Ronaldson's pretty, jaunty quadroon 
 maid, came in, smiling and sparkling with delight cha- 
 racteristic of her race, half at Constance's return, and 
 half at the finery with which her handsome arms were 
 filled to overflowing, embroidered white petticoats, 
 the freshest and finest sleeves and neckerchiefs of 
 wrought muslin, little dainty caps and coifs, and three 
 of the most youthful and tasteful morning-gowns, from 
 Mrs. .Ronaldson's wardrobe. " Mistis, she send me 
 when Mistis go to mass. Mistis she say, 'Annette, 
 you go now, in good season ; 'cause, if don't fit, you got 
 to alter 'fore breakfast ready, mind !' " 
 
 One of the dresses did fit. Mrs. Ronaldson was tall 
 and well-formed ; and it had been made when, having 
 just recovered from an illness, she was slenderer than 
 usual. It happened to be of the very prettiest shade 
 of lavender, the very hue to set off to the best advan 
 tage Constance's clear cool tints, her black curls, 
 pink cheeks, and white, polished neck and forehead. 
 " Ky ! look more better on young mistis, dan does on
 
 TIIE LADY'S SHRIFT. 363 
 
 Mistis she-sef, now," declared Annette; and so it did. 
 Constance always became her dress, as much as her 
 dress did her. Pretty things looked prettier on her, 
 and plain things pretty ; and if she wore a pair of 
 gloves a single evening, and threw them by, one might 
 know them afterwards by the trick of gracefulness 
 which her dainty hands had left in them. 
 
 Annette would have dressed her hair ; but she had 
 not, just now, much to dress. A border of jetty curls, 
 scarcely longer than Herman's own, as a setting to her 
 fine brow and blue-veined temples, were all that was to 
 be had ; and she saw Annette in the glass, over her 
 shoulder, comparing with them her own frizzly tresses 
 with an expression of sly triumph. She sent Annette 
 away. " How provoking!" said she to herself. "What 
 will Herman think ? It looks so masculine, and strong- 
 minded, and horrid ! I could find it in my heart to 
 pull it, to make it grow quicker ! And, otherwise, I 
 don't look so badly, for an ex-nun at the venerable age 
 of two-and-twenty," said Constance, as she gave her- 
 self a gradual twirl before the Psyche. "How per- 
 fectly lovely I look ! my dress, I mean ! How sweet 
 and considerate of Aunt Cora! How I did despise 
 such trappings once, when I had them ; but being dis- 
 contented with them, and contented without, I find are 
 two different things. I should not care for them now, 
 however, if it were not for Herman. Oh, this head ! 
 how shall I hide it ? I could almost run it into the 
 sand, like an ostrich. I've a great mind to put on my 
 cornichon again. No, it would look too absurd with 
 all these embroideries, and make me and everybody 
 remember what I want to forget, and have forgotten. 
 This little muslin Mary Queen-of-Scots, now. with the 
 rose-colored ribbons? The very thing !"
 
 364 HEKMAN. 
 
 So Herman thought, when he saw her an hour after. 
 She had been captivating enough for him in the sombre 
 costume, which heightened by contrast the charms of 
 her youth and beauty ; but it seemed to him, as well as 
 to her, like a ghostly barrier between them, and he was 
 delightfully surprised to have it banished, and told her 
 so, as they seated themselves again in the little parlour, 
 to chat away the morning at their leisure. 
 
 "Borrowed plumes," answered she. " This dress is 
 Aunt Cora's ; but she has gone out to shop for me 
 now. She makes everything easy and pleasant to me. 
 When I entered upon my noviciate, I gave her my 
 jewels ; and she now insists upon giving back to me, 
 not. them ; fpr I do not want them ; and it would not 
 suit my present circumstances, nor feelings either, 
 exactly, to wear them, but a large equivalent in ready 
 money. I gave everything else to the church, Herman. 
 I have nothing left for you but myself." 
 
 " Nothing but an infinite treasure ? That will satis- 
 fy me tolerably for the present. I have between two 
 and three thousand dollars a year, very much at your 
 service ; and if you need more, I flatter myself that I 
 ahall be able to earn it. It does not cost me much to 
 keep myself." 
 
 " I have learned, too, not a little to my surprise, 
 how little I can live upon. A good lesson, is it not ? 
 aot the only one, I hope, which I have learned in my 
 aew grave school ; but I have not explained to you 
 yet how I came to enter into it. I told you that I saw 
 the two sisters go by ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " I did not know them then. Afterwards I did. 
 One was Sister Mary Peter, your nurse ; you under- 
 stand her pretty thoroughly, I fancy, a good, useful
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 365 
 
 woman, though quaint and odd. The other was the 
 very beau ideal of a saint, Sister Corona Bartholomew 
 of Consolation. Wonderful as the beauty of her form 
 and i'ace were at her age, they were nothing to that of 
 her character and life. She always reminded me of 
 those lines of Scott, which you read to Clara and me 
 once, don't you remember? we were sitting in the 
 
 library : 
 
 'Where, darling of each heart and eye, 
 From all the youth of Sicily, 
 St. Rosalie retired to God.' 
 
 She was young, rich, beautiful, and beloved; and 
 her first sorrow, she told me, was parting from her 
 family ; but, from the earliest times that she could 
 recollect, she used to steal away from her companions 
 to kneel and pray, and loved God best, and wished to 
 give herself wholly to Him. Her parents almost wor- 
 shipped her; but they were devout persons, too," and 
 required of her only, that she should wait until she was 
 strong enough for her duties, and old enough to know 
 her own mind. She entered upon her noviciate at 
 twenty-one ; and they gave her up with blessings and 
 thanksgivings, that she had been able to make so safe 
 and happy a choice, in the midst of all their grief at 
 the separation. 
 
 " The evening of the day that I saw them, Bishop 
 Devereux called. Oh, you must know him, Herman ! 
 I had seen him repeatedly before ; but I was hardly 
 acquainted with him till then. Little Jenny happened 
 to prattle something about the beauty of one of her 
 schoolmates. She wished she was as handsome. The 
 Bishop is always kind to children. He took her up, 
 gave her a ride on his knee, asked her why she wished 
 so, and told her that, if she wished for a beautiful 
 spirit, that was very well worth having ; because she
 
 366 HEKMAN. 
 
 could keep it forever, and ten thousand years hence it 
 would still be beautiful ; but, if she wanted only a 
 beautiful face, he thought she might do as well with- 
 out it ; for it seldom lasted long, and was often gone 
 almost before one knew one had it, and it might 
 leave her unhappy at the loss of it. lie did not look 
 towards me, or make the slightest application of what 
 he said to me. He was too well-bred for that ; though . 
 he is one of the most sincere and penetrating persons I 
 ever saw, and can tell you home-truths enough, if you 
 ask him for them. But his words seemed to wake an 
 echo in me ; and, before I knew it, out came some 
 simple little speech in confirmation of them. 'Yes, 
 indeed !' I believe, was all I said. He smiled good- 
 humoredly, as if he was half-pleased, half-surprised, at 
 my earnestness, and mused a few minutes. 
 
 "Mammy came and took Jenny, to put her to bed ; 
 and then he drew his chair up beside mine, and devoted 
 himself to my entertainment for an hour, showing him- 
 self not like a priest then, but like a high-minded gen- 
 tleman, scholar, philosopher, and man of the world in 
 the best sense of the term, that of a man who knows 
 the world, not by being led blindfold by it, but by 
 seeing through it. He is a man of both worlds, in 
 short. Though he never forgot the gentleness and 
 courtesy due from man to woman, he gave out his 
 mind as freely in talking with me, as if he had been 
 conversing with an equal in intellect and information ; 
 and that, Herman, is, I think, the rarest compliment 
 which your sex ever pays to mine. [A compliment 
 too, Miss Constance, which, as the bishop was shrewd 
 enough to know, an intellectual girl seldom fails to 
 appreciate.] But he did not tire me out, as some men 
 who consider themselves ' gifted in conversation ' would,
 
 THE LADY'S SHEIFT. 307 
 
 by hurling huge theories at my head one after another, as 
 ' fast as I could parry them, or haranguing solemnly and 
 endlessly on one subject in a drawing-room, as if he 
 was in a lecture-room ; nor did he keep the floor to him- 
 self. On the contrary, he took care, I could see, to 
 make me bear my full part. He listened respectfully 
 and apparently with interest to me, and then would 
 either clinch iny ideas with one pithy, pointed sentence 
 of his own, or attack them playfully, and make me 
 defend them before he would yield. In this manner 
 we ran, sometimes a-tilt, sometimes abreast, through a 
 long course of literature, sculpture, painting, and music ; 
 while I did not know which to admire most, his wit, 
 eloquence, information, breeding, or benevolence. At 
 last we came upon architecture, where he had to have 
 the field to himself; for I knew nothing of it; but he 
 begged leave to bring some fine photographs, which he 
 had, of foreign cathedrals, for me to look over, and 
 gave me a description of St. Peter's, and the Miserere 
 in the Sistine Chapel, which was a perfect poem. I 
 dreamed of them all night ! 
 
 " That evening had been an oasis in the dry des- 
 ert of my life. When it was over, I was surprised 
 to find how cheered and interested I had been, carried 
 out of myself, or rather into something like my old self. 
 I remember, when I awoke the next morning, dull 
 again, and hopeless as usual, I said to myself, Now I 
 know exactly how those old saints at Jerusalem, who 
 1 came out of their graves and appeared unto many,' 
 must have felt, if they were put back into them. The 
 bishop repeated his visit, however, the very next week, 
 and brought his magnificent photographs ; and Aunt 
 Cora and I drew him on, by our interest and attention, 
 to give us quite a charming, lecture upon them, full of
 
 36-8 HERMAN. 
 
 antiquarian lure, and of that enthusiastic kind of rever- 
 ence of which he is so full. 
 
 " After that he was here a good deal. He had been 
 Aunt Cora's director ever since she was twelve years 
 old, and was therefore quite intimate in her household. 
 Either she, or his own penetration, must have given 
 him a hint that all was not quite at peace within me ; 
 and he was as kind and attentive to me as a father to 
 a suffering daughter. 
 
 " At last, she gave Jenny a children's party, and 
 invited three or four of the grown-up sisters of the 
 smallest children, to accompany and take care of them. 
 Jenny wanted a fortune-teller ; and Aunt Cora gave 
 Annette five dollars, to get herself up a costume like 
 that of the Sybil in the drawing-room. You have no 
 idea how well she did it, nor how picturesque she 
 looked. We gave her a little, mother-of-pearl and gilt 
 casket, with two compartments in it, one containing 
 little scrolls of colored paper with fortunes written on 
 the inside for the boys, and the other, similar ones for 
 the girls. As she could not read, we told her to pre- 
 tend that she could not speak, and merely to give out 
 the papers in silence, as the children marched, two and 
 two, before her for them ; and she did it, very deftly 
 and prettily. Aunt Cora hid her in the recess of a 
 M T indow, with the purple curtains let down straight 
 before her to the floor ; and through them, I suppose, 
 she availed herself of the privilege of peeping, till the 
 clock struck eight ; when she parted them, and stood 
 revealed, gorgeous and mysterious, creating an immense 
 sensation. 
 
 " Aunt Cora hoped that I would write the fortunes ; 
 a couplet of amusing doggerel for each would have been 
 enough ; but I put it off for two or three days, forgot
 
 THE LADY'S SHKIFT. 369 
 
 it, and did nut think of it again till Annette came with 
 her empty casket, at five o'clock on the fated afternoon ; 
 when I had a headache and was just going to dress. I 
 Bat down for an hour, and scribbled off twenty or thirty 
 as fast as I could ; but then I had to go to my toilette, 
 and left poor aunty in the lurch, to find the rest where 
 she might. She was disappointed ; for she expected, at 
 the least, forty little guests ; and what half of them had, 
 the other half would be sure to want ; but she took it 
 kindly, thanked me, and said that perhaps, as a last 
 resort, Uncle Henry would write some. So I left the 
 business on her hands, and thought no more about it. 
 When the time came, however, the supply of little 
 orange, purple, scarlet, and green papers, seemed in- 
 exhaustible; and some of them, I found when the 
 children brought them to me to read, had verses in 
 them prettier than mine, or, I thought, than any Uncle 
 Henry could write, and in a hand I did not know. 
 
 " When all the children knew their doom, Annette 
 salaamed to Aunt Cora, and withdrew, after giving her 
 the casket. It was not even yet empty. In the bottom 
 there were several envelopes of gold and silver paper ; 
 and she gave them to us, older girls. Mine had within 
 it these lines, written in that unknown hand : [Con- 
 stance's memory was a perfect library. She could 
 usually repeat any passage that struck her particularly, 
 either in poetry or prose, after reading it twice or 
 
 thrice.] 
 
 'Maiden fair and proud, 
 Thou, amidst the crowd, 
 Movest like a thin^ apart, 
 With a pure, but cold, cold, heart I 
 Like you clear cold river, 
 By whose side the aspens shiver, 
 And the elms their drooping green 
 Hold aloft, its front to screen 
 16*
 
 370 HERMAN. 
 
 Prom the hot intrusive sun; 
 And wild roses, one by one, 
 Peep with timid, blushing, grace, 
 In its cool impassive face, 
 While it goes unlingering by, 
 Lonely in its majesty, 
 Thankless, sell-involved, sedate, 
 In its flat and shallow state. 
 
 'Maiden, wouldst thou know 
 Where that river's fiow 
 Grows most high and deep ? 
 Where it, from the steep 
 Of its rocky pride, doth stoop 
 To wet the h'ps of flowers that droop 
 In the lowly vale beneath ! 
 There opal clouds its beauty wreathe 
 The heavens, that see it, straight fling down 
 Their striped rainbows, for its crown ; 
 And its abasement speaks in thunder, 
 With such a voice, that all men wonder 
 And the rooted earth doth shake, 
 And an answering murmur make. 
 
 ' Wouldst thou be so high ? 
 Bow in charity 
 To the humblest near thee, 
 Those who need, yet fear thee ! 
 Then shall clouds, if they surround, 
 But adorn, with rainbows crowned, 
 Thy heaven-watched, plenteous, bounteous liie; 
 The world, amid its selfish strife, 
 Around thy path shall feel a thrill 
 Of wonder, murmur, and be still; 
 While with a grand unearthly voice 
 Thy long-mute being bids rejoice 
 The heavenly Shepherd's panting flocks, 
 That bleat along the thirsty rocks, 
 And, even in thy saddest hours, 
 Thy tears revive God's drooping flowers.' 
 
 " I had time only to glance at the first words then ; 
 for I was wanted to play Magical-Music on the piano 
 for the children. When they were gone, I stood under
 
 THK LADY'S SHRIFT. 371 
 
 a chandelier, and read the whole, once, twice, thrice. 
 It surprised and puzzled me, and gave me a glimpse of 
 myself, such as I had never had before. I had no 
 objection to being told, that I was proud. (I think we 
 are many of us more vain of our faults than of our vir- 
 tues, Herman ! Just as the courtiers overlooked Prince 
 Nosey 's pretty other features, and said to him, ' It is a 
 most princely and becoming thing to have so huge a 
 nose !' Satan says to us, ' It is a most becoming thing, 
 and a proof of a peculiarly noble nature, to have so 
 fastidious a sensitiveness, reserve so invincible, haugh- 
 tiness so unapproachable, and so sovereign a contempt 
 for all those less favored by birth, fortune, and educa- 
 tion, than ourselves ! In short, arrogance, hastiness 
 of temper, and exclusiveness, are the indisputable 
 patent of inherent nobility !' and, as with his royal 
 highness, so it is with us; until we acknowledge our 
 blemishes to be blemishes, we cannot be freed from them ; 
 and that is the reason, I suppose, why so many of us carry 
 them with us into the other world, and, when it is too 
 late, when our fleshly disguises are stripped off, 
 behold ourselves, and are beheld by others, ugly fiends.) 
 However, there was a rather different view from mine 
 taken here of my pet peccadillo. ' Cold ! self-involved ! 
 thankless !' If those little adjectives were intended for 
 me, I thought them specimens of pretty plain speaking ; 
 and it was not every one, from whom I was disposed to 
 take them in good part. Then, careless and hurried as 
 the versification was, there was a suggestion in the last 
 stanza, which startled me like a hidden door suddenly 
 opened before me, through the blank stone wall of my 
 future, showing me a long solemn vista lighted from 
 above ; and at its end lay paradise. 
 
 " While I read, and wondered, and pondered, the
 
 372 HEKMAN. 
 
 bishop, who had been present in his most genial mood 
 all the evening, merry-making and making merry, like 
 a playful shepherd among the little lambs of his flock, 
 spoke at my elbow : ' The answer of the oracle ? Can- 
 not you make it out?' 
 
 " ' Its words, but not its meaning, nor its author. 
 Can you help me, sir ?' said I. 
 
 " He took it from me, and slowly read it to himself. 
 ' So this came to you !' he said at length. ' A coinci- 
 dence ! as you enlightened Protestants would say. What 
 a superstitious old Catholic like me, would rather call 
 a providence !' 
 
 " ' You have seen it before ?' 
 
 " ' Certainly ; I wrote it,' he replied, with the utmost 
 frankness. ' I came in at twilight, to make arrange- 
 ments for the magic lantern as I promised Mrs. Roiiald- 
 son, and found her in perplexity about the fortunes,' 
 " ' Which I promised to furnish, and forgot ;' 
 
 " He bowed, and went on, ' That fact she did not 
 think it necessary to mention. I accept your candid 
 confession as your penance, and absolve you. I wrote 
 the required number, and this among them.' 
 
 " ' And thought of me ?' 
 
 a t 
 
 I have often thought of you lately, and with 
 much solicitude and sympathy. You do not complain ; 
 but it is the duty of the physician of the soul, as well 
 as the physician of the body, to learn to interpret the 
 dumb signs of speechless suffering. My skill has seldom 
 been so baffled as in the study of your case. It cannot 
 be a common one ; for you are not a common woman. 
 Without some aid from you, I shall never, I begin to 
 fear, understand it. Of thus much I am certain : 
 girl as you are, you are passing, alone and in silence, 
 through grief and despair which might drive a strong
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 373 
 
 man mad ; and I am also sure that, if you would allow 
 me, I could relieve and save you ; because the holy 
 church has balm for every wound. However, if I had 
 known that these verses were to fall to your share, I 
 might certainly have toned them down to advantage. 
 Flat and shallow ! your stateliness is anything but 
 that ; I must have been thinking of the river, rather 
 than of you, when I wrote it. I had no right to say 
 anything of the sort to you. I was hurried, and had just 
 come from the confessional, and forgotten to lay aside the 
 trick of plain speaking ; and, in short, you will forget 
 the unlucky scrawl, will you not, and forgive an old 
 friend for an unintentional, acknowledged, and de- 
 plored offence ?' said he, with touching humility, twist- 
 ing the paper to a match in his hand, and holding it up 
 towards a candle. 
 
 " ' No,' cried I, springing forward to intercept it, ' I 
 cannot find it in my heart, to waste things so precious 
 as forgiveness and forgetfulness. I will neither pardon 
 an imaginary offence, nor forget a prophecy so far 
 above my hopes or deserts. Right? you have a right 
 to say anything to me that I need to hear ; or, if you 
 have not, I will give you one ! Speak plainly to me ; 
 I can bear it. Faulty I may be, must be, but not 
 weak, or, at least, not altogether weak; for, as you 
 have seen or I would not have told you, I know how 
 to suffer, and to suffer in silence. Flatterers are many ; 
 friends are few. Probe my heart, if you will, but 
 gently, for its wounds have rankled long ; and satisfy 
 yourself that they are incurable. I will endeavour to 
 welcome the pain, for the sake of the charity which 
 prompts you to inflict it.' 
 
 " He paused and considered. Then he said, 
 ' When can I see you ? It is too late to begin any- 
 thing to-night.'
 
 374 HERMAN. 
 
 " ' Name your own time. All times are alike to 
 me now.' 
 
 " ' Poor child ! No, I will not. To know when I 
 was coming, would only make you nervous. Let me 
 call when I can. I shall be particularly busy all this 
 week ; but perhaps in the course of the next, or the 
 week after, I may find you disengaged. If you are 
 not, you can send me away again. You are not at all 
 subject to sudden illness ?' 
 
 " * Not at all.' 
 
 " ' If you should be ill, or meet with any dan- 
 gerous accident, you would not fail to send for me 
 instantly ?' 
 
 " ' There is no one on whose sympathy and support 
 I should more confidently rely.' 
 
 " ' Nor any one to whose rescue I should hasten so 
 anxiously. Send after me, wherever I am. I shall 
 leave word at my house, whenever I leave it, where I 
 am going, until I have seen you again.' 
 
 " He was so very kind and solicitous about me, that 
 he found time after all, to call the very next morning. 
 Not expecting him, I was sitting here alone, in doleful 
 consultation with a dictionary and a grammar, trying 
 listlessly to puzzle out a page or two of ' 'Cicero de 
 /Senectute.' I learned a little Latin at school; and 
 I had taken it up again, since my conversations with 
 him had stimulated my mind, with a vague idea that 
 it was a good thing to do, and a dignified way of get- 
 ting rid of my time. At first our interview was rather 
 awkward. He waited for me; and I, for him. He 
 looked at my book. ' Latin ?' said he ; ' Do you like it ?' 
 
 " ' Frankly, no. Less than any other language 
 that I ever studied. There is so rigid, petrified, and 
 crystallized a regularity in the forms and terminations,
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 375 
 
 and such utter seeming confusion in the arrangement 
 of the words ! It is so dreadfully unlike English, that 
 it makes me feel both home-sick and spell-bound. It 
 often reminds me of a frightful dream, by which I was 
 once tormented when a school-girl. They tried to 
 teach me geometry ; and I believe I fairly fell sick of 
 it. At all events, fall sick 1 did, from whatever cause ; 
 and, as often as I could lose myself in a feverish slum- 
 ber, \found myself in a wilderness of mere huge, hard, 
 gray granite prisms, cubes, and-so-forth, every block, 
 that I looked at successively, having more and 
 blunter angles, arid huger and blanker sides than its 
 neighbours piled up to the sky, around to the horizon, 
 and down to the centre. At last, when I had fully 
 possessed myself of their grim individuality, and they 
 themselves of mine, for they all seemed to watch 
 and crouch for me like so many blind but sentient 
 Sphinxes,- -they began to stir -and tumble grittily down 
 over one another, and finally over me; when the 
 hard, blank, horror reached its climax, and I awoke 
 screaming.' 
 
 " He smiJed. ' The study can hardly be any great 
 pleasure to you, then,' said he. ' Why do you pur- 
 sue it?' 
 
 " ' I hardly know. "Why do others ?' 
 
 " ' A few men and women from love of it. Many 
 men from ambition.' 
 
 " ' And no women from ambition ?' 
 
 " ' A woman of creative genius, here and there, may 
 perhaps, to strengthen and expand her brains ; as an 
 athlete fights with a shadow, to strengthen and expand 
 his muscles ; as a means, not as an end.'. 
 
 " ' But why should not other women, too, as well as 
 the many men. who, as you say, become learned from
 
 376 HERMAN. 
 
 ambition ? I do not think I quite understand. Surely 
 not all of them who do so, are creative geniuses.' 
 
 "'By no means, my daughter. [How patiently 
 and pityingly the word came out! I had been an 
 orphan so long!] But they can be physicians, law- 
 yers, and dignitaries in Church and State ; and, in all 
 their several walks of life, they find full employment 
 and demand for highly-cultivated minds. Diplomas 
 are showered upon them, professorships conferred upon 
 them, and flatteries interchanged with them by other 
 scholars all the world over. Are you ambitious ?' 
 
 " ' I hardly know. Not very, I believe, naturally, 
 or, at least, not for myself. If I sometimes strive to 
 become so now, ambition itself is to me a means rather 
 than an end. If I am ambitious, it is to obtain the 
 power of exorcism.' 
 
 " ' In your turn, you puzzle me.' 
 
 " ' I am haunted, father !' 
 
 " ' My child, by what ?' 
 
 " ' By a thought !' I said ; and I closed my eyes 
 involuntarily, to shut it out. Oh, Herman ! I never 
 could repeat all this to you, if I did not grudge it to 
 any man, the holiest and the best, that he should know 
 anything of me that was kept back from you, my 
 betrothed !" 
 
 " My own sweet Constance ! Why should you 
 shrink from making me believe, if you can, that you 
 cared for me one thousandth part as much as I did for 
 you?' 
 
 Constance smiled faintly, glanced timidly into his 
 face, looked down again, and went on : " Then the 
 Bishop said, very gently and compassionately, ' Cannot 
 you explain yourself a little further, my daughter ? 
 Take courage, and endeavour to think aloud. Forget
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 377 
 
 that any ear is present to hear you, except His whose 
 mouth-piece I am. Remember, that a painful malady 
 is always less terrible to the physician than to the 
 patient. You know, that I may almost be said to 
 have a hereditary right to your confidence. Perhaps 
 you will allow me to offer a conjecture as to the nature 
 of your suffering ?' 
 
 " I bowed. He opened the ' Golden Legend,' which 
 lay before us on the table, and turned, and pointed, to 
 
 the lines, 
 
 ' Love, that in every woman's heart 
 Will have the whole, and not a part ; 
 And is to her, in Nature's plan, 
 More than ambition is to man,' 
 
 " I started. He looked at me. The trap had 
 sprung. There was no escape. Covering my face 
 with my hands, I cried, ' My lover proved unworthy ; 
 [I really thought so then, Herman ; there is nothing 
 that we cannot believe, if we do but assert it often 
 enough ;] and I discarded him, at once and forever. 
 One can be very strong for an hour. He returns no 
 more. His memory does, and is driven away only to 
 return, in solitude, in society, in hours that should be 
 gay, and in hours that should be holy. "Who can be 
 strong at all times, and forever ? I struggle. My life 
 shall give way before my resolution does ; but I some- 
 times think that both may, before my grief. Press me 
 no further, kind father; but, if you have the skill, 
 teach me the way to cast this demon out. Could not 
 ambition do it, think you ?' 
 
 " He hesitated. ' Tell me what you really think,' 
 I urged ; ' surely my openness deserves frankness in 
 return.' 
 
 "His answer was to the point, as usual. (It is one
 
 378 HERMAN. 
 
 great charm of his conversation, that he always takes 
 up a subject jnst where you leave it ; instead of merely 
 waiting for you to pause, and then, as so many people 
 do, going on to make a speech of his own, perfectly 
 disconnected with what you have said, as if he was 
 playing crambo.} i You shall have it, my daughter,' 
 said he, ' since you ask for it. As a man of honor, I 
 cannot deny that successful ambition may often stupify 
 misery like yours ; though, like other opiates and ano- 
 dynes, it is apt in the end to leave behind a worse 
 disorder in the place of that which it alleviates. But 
 the world has three prizes only, that I recollect, to offer 
 to the ambition of women ; and the triumph of learning 
 is not one of them. Study as hard as you can, for the 
 sake of that, and you will succeed only in becoming a 
 woman among scholars, and a scholar amongst women. 
 You will find no companionship in your own sex, nor ad- 
 miration in the other. Crowd your fine and subtle, but 
 small and sensitive, brain as full as it will bear, with 
 Greek and Hebrew roots and crabbed Latin authors. 
 Hundreds of thick-skulled Germans, Englishmen, and 
 even New-Englanders, will bear away the palm from 
 you. Your head will no more hold as much as theirs, 
 than your stomach would. You might as well chal- 
 lenge a prize-fighter to eat forty pounds of beef with 
 you upon a wager. You are like a swan running a 
 race with an ostrich. The creature is out of its ele- 
 ment. Men will ridicule and despise your vain attempt 
 to outdo them on their own ground, and join with 
 women in setting down to the account of your unfemi- 
 nine accomplishments all the shortcomings in feminine 
 duties in which they can detect you, or of which they 
 can suspect you.' r 
 
 " The Bishop was severe," said Herman.
 
 THE LADY'S BHKIFT. 379 
 
 " But right, was he not ?" 
 
 " Half. Eight enough, I dare say, in thinking that 
 Nature had been unkind enough to incapacitate most 
 women from outstripping, in their greedy race, mere 
 gluttonous ostriches of envious and selfish pedantry. 
 But I interrupted you." 
 
 " The Bishop went on : ' Let Cicero alone, then ; or 
 read him in English, if you don't like Latin. No. The 
 real prizes which the world offers to the ambition of a 
 woman and a lady are three : first, what it calls a great 
 match ; secondly, eminence as a writer ; and, thirdly, 
 success in sculpture, painting, or the composition of 
 music, which arts we will throw into one department, 
 and consider them together under one head ; as, among 
 them all, they may furnish one ever-green laurel wreath, 
 for one woman, in one century. Can you think of any 
 others?' 
 
 " ' I have sometimes thought that, if I were a poor 
 girl, and if actors and actresses were a more refined 
 set of people than they are said to be, I could find a 
 career, excitement, and oblivion, among them.' 
 
 " He looked at me with astonishment, and some- 
 thing more like sternness than I had ever seen in his 
 face before, and rejoined, ' But now ? they being what 
 they are said to be, and you, a lady ?' 
 
 " ' I cannot go upon the stage.' 
 
 " His brows unbent ; and he replied, ' Right ! If I 
 were indeed your spiritual father, and we were consid- 
 ering your eternal instead of your temporal welfare, I 
 should be obliged to tell you that you could take no 
 more probable way than that, to purchase a little tem- 
 porary ease or delirium at the expense of everlasting 
 torments and horrors ! But, one thing at a time. I 
 am to talk to you, just now, as a man of the world to a
 
 380 HERMAN. 
 
 woman of the world. My three alternatives remain. 
 Let us consider your chances as a candidate for each. 
 Marriage : women like you, supposing that there are 
 enough women like you to constitute a class, do not, 
 unless my penetration is at fault, love twice, nor marry 
 without love ?' He waited for an answer. 
 
 " ' Your penetration is not at fault. O father, in 
 pity let us speak no more of that !' 
 
 " ' Forgive me ! no ; I will not touch your poor 
 heart again, until you give me leave to heal it ; and if 
 I have done so hitherto, it was not from heedlessness, 
 but from necessity. My child, it was needful that the 
 wound should be thoroughly searched, before it could 
 be dressed ; but that has now been done. For the 
 present, let it alone. There, remain then, open to 
 you, literature and art, if you are a woman of genius; 
 if not, of course, failure w r ill be your only attainment 
 in either. Now, what is vulgarly called talent^ know 
 that you have to a high degree; but genius is so rare, 
 that the presumption is always strongly against its 
 being possessed by any one, either man or woman, 
 until its possession has been proved. Perhaps you 
 have it, notwithstanding. Let us see. Let me ask 
 you a question or two. For which do you feel within 
 yourself the greatest aptitude, literature or art ?' 
 
 " ' Of the two, I think, for literature. I can copy 
 with my pencil anything that I see ; but I cannot de- 
 sign. I can read any music, and even ^\^j fantasie 
 when I am in the mood ; but I fear that they owe all 
 the merit, which they have, to their being executed 
 with the expression of the momentary feeling which 
 prompts them. I cannot write them down ; because I 
 know nothing of the rules of music ; and I am sure, 
 that what little inspiration I have, would die under the 
 Irudgery of learning ; nd conforming to them. On
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 381 
 
 the other hand, I write prose and verse with ease, and 
 sometimes with pleasure.' 
 
 " ' In literature you will probably succeed, then, if 
 in either. Your destiny, perhaps, often faces you when 
 you awake in the morning, or arouses you in the night, 
 or confronts you in the bustle of the day, with a dim 
 plan in her hand, a sketch of a romance, a poem, or 
 a play. She will give you only fitful glimpses of it, 
 probably. She half unrolls it; then she folds it up. 
 She lets you see sometimes the beginning only, some- 
 times the middle, sometimes the two ends. She is very 
 seldom indulgent enough to reveal to you the whole, at 
 once. If she ever does so, it is, most likely, for an 
 instant only, and with a malignant purpose to overload 
 and overwhelm you with more details than your 
 memory can hold. She says, however, This plan, which 
 I hold in my hand, half hid even from your eyes, you 
 are doomed to carry out before the eyes of mankind. 
 The memory of its unearthly beauty shall haunt and 
 fever you ;* its grandeur shall oppress you ; its very 
 difficulty shall defy and taunt you, until your work is 
 done. From what I have already shown you, guess the 
 rest. The rest is there, somewhere, and traceable 
 in full harmonious proportions from the portion you 
 have seen. Dispatch ! For you there is to be no 
 cheerful, calm companionship, no refreshing sleep, no 
 relished food, until the task lies behind you, that now 
 lies before. You may fly ; but I shall follow. You 
 may pine ; I shall not pity. You may fall sick ; but I 
 shall lie in wait for your recovery, and put your pen, 
 before your needle, into your trembling hand. 
 
 " ' She speaks ; and you obey, impatient to have the 
 
 * " The memory of a beautiful denied you shall strain your powers.' 
 
 E. B. BROWNING.
 
 382 HERMAN. 
 
 doom behind you instead of before. You go apart 
 fearfully, shut your door, and give yourself up to the 
 mysterious prompting, like a Pythia forced to the 
 tripod. You are no longer a woman, but a writing- 
 medium^ a soothsayer, a seer. Ideal creatures swarm 
 in the air about you. You throw yourself into them ; 
 they, themselves into you. You speak their words, do 
 their deeds, feel their feelings, shriek their pangs. The 
 thoughts thicken. They dazzle, they blind you. Your 
 brain reels with them. Bewildered, you turn this way 
 and that until you are dizzy, to catch them before they 
 escape you ; as a child does to catch all the snow-flakes 
 in a hurrying storm. Your heart beats hard ; your 
 breath pants fast. Still you hurry on ; because you 
 cannot stop, because the preternatural dictation does 
 not. Time hurries on with you. Your clock strikes 
 the hours as fast as it usually ticks the minutes, 
 hours which- do on you the work of years, such hours 
 as stamp wrinkles on the brow, and on the brain. 
 
 " ' At length a sudden stop surprises you. Coming 
 to yourself, you look about you, and perceive that your 
 task is finished. That is, at least, a relief. You lan- 
 guidly take it up, turn it over, and read it, at first with 
 curiosity, then with admiration, and then with amaze- 
 ment. It is something new under the sun. It does 
 not seem to you to be yours. It is not, properly speak- 
 ing, though it makes you famous. It is the work of 
 the demon whose servant you are. It is strong ; but 
 you are weak, weaker even than ever before- He 
 has taken much of your life to put into it. A few more 
 such achievements, and all will be spent ; and you will 
 go to him for the arrears of your wages. 
 
 " ' Have you ever felt anything like this ?' said thp 
 Bishop. I never had." . 
 
 " Thank God !" cried Herman.
 
 THE LADY'S SHKIFT. 383 
 
 " Are you glad 2 Then I am, too, now ; though I 
 was rather sorry at that time, to tell the truth." 
 
 " Indeed I am ! 'Self-forgetfulness is one thing, 
 and one of the noblest things, too, under the sun ; 
 self-abandonment, quite another. Nobody can love a 
 generous ardor and enthusiasm more than I do ; but I 
 distrust and detest unnatural excitement of all kinds. 
 Why should it be more right or reputable, wilfully to 
 inflame and finally to destroy one's God-given brain 
 with undue solitude, fasting, or labor, than with opium, 
 in order to write, carve, or paint, better than one's 
 neighbours .? for that, I take it, is what the cant about 
 sacrificing one's self to art commonly means, in plain 
 English." 
 
 " The bishop was glad, too," said Constance. '"But 
 that,' said he, 'is female genius. It is the forbidden 
 fruit, which is now and then offered to Eve's daugh- 
 ters by the Serpent, as it was to her. Like her, they 
 do not thrive upon it. It first intoxicates, then kills 
 them.' 
 
 " ' But surely,' I exclaimed, ' not all women of 
 genius answer this description !' 
 
 " ' To be sure,' said he, ' now I think of it, *here are 
 exceptions, some of whom you may have met with, but 
 whom I did not consider it necessary to mention, be- 
 cause I could not believe that your place -jould be 
 found among them, female geniuses, if you will, but 
 females not of feminine but of masculine genins. I 
 have myself chanced here and there to encounter some 
 nondescript, calling herself a woman, who, w'thout any 
 goading inward gad-fly or exhausting fire in her veins, 
 besieged eminence scientifically, month after month 
 and year after year, and conquered it at last, by regu- 
 lar approaches, like a man. She has no hea'-t to unset-
 
 384: HERMAN. 
 
 f 
 
 tie her aim by its perturbations ; and her iron nerves 
 and India-rubber spirits are incapable of weariness and 
 discouragement. She eats, drinks, sleeps, laughs, and 
 talks, but deliberately succeeds notwithstanding. She 
 regularly and readily takes her seat on the tripod every 
 day, for a certain number of hours ; she suffers only 
 when she is kept away; and even then she endures it 
 stoically. If Apollo will not come; down, she cheerfully 
 makes him a curtsey at the end of the time, and goes 
 away, watching all the time, however, with the stanch, 
 calm, cold-blooded, persistent instinct of a cat that sits 
 beside a mouse-hole, while she seems intent only upon 
 her needle-work or housekeeping, to pull him down 
 upon her head, if he lets drop within her reach so much 
 as the hem of his garment, or one golden hair. The 
 next day, she is at her post again, and the next ; 
 until she fairly tires him down, and he does her bidding 
 to be rid of her. 
 
 " ' She is an open-eyed, clear-sighted looker-on in 
 life ; and what others secretly feel, she openly expresses. 
 Men have hitherto had the pen to themselves almost as 
 exclusively as the sword. The thoughts and feelings 
 of distinctive manhood have become commonplace by 
 long repetition. Women, with a few exceptions, have 
 but lately begun to write with energy, simplicity, and 
 the artistic skill which comes of liberal culture; and, 
 even now, there is not more than one woman in ten 
 thousand capable of writing, with force and fire, what 
 distinctive womanhood has been thinking and feeling 
 from the beginning of time. Hence, such a person as 
 I have in my mind finds fresh themes in plenty ready 
 to her firm, bold, and masterly hand. She handles 
 them accordingly, and has her reward ; but her very 
 reward would be intolerable to you. 
 17
 
 THE LADY 8 SHRIFT. 
 
 " ' Men will not believe, that a woman's ink can 
 glow so with anything but her own heart's blood. They 
 analyze it, in order to find out what sort of stuff her 
 heart is made of, and confidently pronounce it the gall 
 of bitterness. They cannot attribute to her the pos- 
 session of a head for any practical purpose. The utter- 
 ance of her divination, laying bare the souls of others, 
 will always be taken for a revelation of her own. Her 
 cold heart is sure to get the credit of all the fire of her 
 pages. People insist on pitying her for sorrows, which 
 she is incapable of feeling. She takes their sympathy 
 coolly, silently, and graciously, as a tribute to her 
 power, which is all that this mere mind clad with 
 womanhood cares about. She smiles in her sleeve, and 
 keeps her own counsels. Could you do so? Could 
 you bear to have it supposed, how falsely soever, by 
 every chance reader in the booksellers' shops, that you 
 had laid your autobiography, with the leaves cut, in- 
 vitingly in his way ? Could you bear to have it asserted, 
 that you had sold the sacred privacy of your shrinking, 
 shuddering soul for fame ?' 3: 
 
 " Is it permitted to me to say a word or two to the 
 bishop, in behalf of this poor representative woman 
 of his," asked Herman, a if I will do so very respect- 
 fully?" 
 
 " Certainly ; I should like to hear what you would 
 say ; and so would he, if he were here ; but oh, Her- 
 man, Herman, you are not going to answer respectfully ! 
 There is the very sauciest possible twinkle in your eyes 
 at this moment ; and there is no use in your trying to 
 draw your lips in to hide under your moustache!' 1 '' And 
 both of them, looking in each other's faces, went back 
 to boyhood and girlhood and laughed heartily together 
 for sheer happiness and affection. " Your very ringing 
 17
 
 386 HERMAN. 
 
 old laugh !" continued Constance. " How like the 
 dear old days it sounds ! How unfortunately unro- 
 mantic I used to think it ! How glad it makes me 
 now, to hear it so full of health and happiness ! You 
 must have kept it put away for me all these years. If 
 you had brought it out oftener, it would have changed 
 and grown older and less mirthful with yourself." 
 
 " Yes ; there must be eome ' secret sympathy' be- 
 tween us. I could not often laugh while you were 
 sighing." 
 
 " But you must not laugh now, either, at the first 
 friend, who was able to give me any comfort, after I 
 drove you away ; or I shall sigh again." 
 
 " Don't ; or I shall never even smile again ; but 
 neither shall I laugh or sneer at that poor, patient 
 female genius of his. The picture is drawn from life, 
 evidently ; but not, I think, quite to the life. Some 
 of the outlines, however, are so true, that from them 
 we can, I hope, correct the others. I should like to 
 know that woman, Constance ; though perhaps, as the 
 A.nonymi in the newspapers say, when they mean to 
 be especially withering, 'I should not want such a 
 woman as that for my wife,' even supposing, as they 
 always forget to add, I could have her if I did ; and 
 though I can even conceive it to be possible that, being 
 wedded to Apollo, she might not care to marry me. 
 Helpmeets don't grow on every bush, nor even on 
 every estimable and admirable bush. I never in my 
 life saw but one woman whom I did wish to marry j 
 [Constance's blush was as soft and bright as sunshine 
 strained through a crimson cu v tain upon polished 
 ivory ; her long curled eye-lashes lay basking upon it 
 and she looked most demurely nun-like, most supreme 
 ly happy ;] but I have seen many whoit- I liked
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 387 
 
 esteemed, and wished well, very heartily ; and I fancy 
 that this lady of masculine genius might be of the 
 number. It seems to me, that it is somewhat arrogant 
 in us mighty men to claim as masculine, not feminine, 
 everything that is vigorous, true, artistic, and, in 
 short, worth claiming. If she has a lyre, she probably 
 got it where we got ours, those of us who are lucky 
 enough to have any, from the gods, such as they 
 chose to give her. She has as much right to 
 charge ours with being effeminate when they sound 
 sweet, as we hers with being masculine when it sounds 
 strong. If she thunders, we need not accuse her of 
 having stolen our thunder. I, for one, will dispute 
 her possession neither of a head nor a heart, even if 
 she chooses to keep the latter to herself and Apollo ; 
 nay, I think that she must have one, and a great one, 
 though calm, and 
 
 ' At leisure from iteelf, 
 
 To soothe and sympathize;' 
 
 else how should she be let into the secret of those 
 shrinking sorrows and struggles of her own sex, which 
 she rises above in her individual life, yet makes her 
 own in order to bespeak for others the sympathy and 
 compassion which for herself she does not need, 
 strifes and sorrows which she describes so vividly and 
 so eloquently, that they seem, to those too selfish to 
 understand her self-forgetfulness, to be her own, while 
 the real sufferers remain sheltered and unexposed. She 
 shows her real retenue and freedom from egotism by 
 never caring to come forward in proprid persona to 
 explain herself. She minds her own business ; and if 
 other people will not mind theirs,,! would rather that 
 she should laugh than cry. 
 
 " Because, though a woman, she is human, and am-
 
 388 HKRMAN. 
 
 bition belongs to, not manly merely, but essential 
 human nature, she is ambitious. Her sisters, not daring 
 to be ' strong-minded ' enough to look higher, are am- 
 bitious of tine houses, clothes, and equipages ; she of 
 fine poems, plays, or romances. Their triumphs are 
 over the rest of her sex ; hers, for the rest of her sex. 
 A few more women like her, in the study and the 
 studio, and the world will find out and acknowledge, 
 that there is a kind of power and heavenly fire that is 
 feminine or confined to neither sex, and that women, 
 without being in the slightest degree unwomanly, may 
 and do have noble brains, and put them to noble uses. 
 I like her better far than her predecessor in review, the 
 ' writing medium,' because, in being an author, she does 
 not forget to be a woman. If her only hope was set 
 on literary success, she could hardly bear so cheerfully 
 to be so often balked in her efforts. If she can lay her 
 ineffectual pen and paper aside, so good-humoredly, 
 when her vacant time expires, it must be, I am pretty 
 sure, to go away and perform the good offices -of a good 
 daughter, sister, friend, or neighbour. Thus she can 
 say, If this hope is lost, all is not lost. She must have 
 a brave and great heart to bear such disappointments 
 so courageously, and" never sicken with hope deferred. 
 In order to do so, it would seem as if it should be a 
 good heart, too, and lean on God ; though being in 
 partnership with a strong head, early and duly stocked 
 with ecclesiastical history, perhaps it is a sealed, and 
 appears a heretical, heart to the bishop and his church. 
 I ask your pardon. Am I getting on forbidden 
 ground ?" 
 
 " Oh, no, I an^not bigoted ; and I fear he may be a 
 little so. Go on. "I like to hear about her. If there 
 is such a woman, I wish I could know her."
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 389 
 
 " I wish you could ; for, without friendship, she 
 might be lonely in the midst of her struggles and her 
 triumphs. She is most probably unmarried ; for if she 
 had a husband and children, they would interfere with 
 those regular tete-d-tetes with Apollo. A woman must 
 usually choose between art and wedlock. Either is 
 enough to engross her, to the exclusion of the other. 
 She has chosen art, and is more than content when it 
 smiles upon her, and uncomplaining when it frowns. 
 
 " I find no coldness, but rather a fine ardor, in her 
 calm, grand perseverance. I don't quite believe in 
 that absence of inward prompting in her case. If the 
 divine gadfly of inspiration stings her, she probably 
 will not think it worth mentioning, but will say, with 
 Mr. Toots, ' Oh, it's of no consequence, thank you !' She 
 is strong enough to bear it by herself, with the help of 
 the wholesome food, sleep, and recreation, which she 
 has sense enough to take. She wants her readers to 
 think about, not her, but the heroes and heroines whom 
 she talks to them about. She does not mean to have 
 them prying into that heart of hers, at which she looks 
 herself just often enough to set it right towards God 
 and her neighbour, and no oftener. She is not intro- 
 spective. She sees many things without her in the 
 world, in heaven, and in hell, which she thinks much 
 better worth her attention and ours, than anything 
 within her. I like her better than her predecessor; 
 because, while self-forgetful, she is still self-governed. 
 I think I should even like her books better than those 
 of that possessed victim of glory. They might, they 
 would, be less demoniac, less maddened and madden- 
 ing, but they would be truer, juster, sunnier; one 
 would be not unlikely to find in them here and there, 
 amidst all their imperfections, reflected glimpses of the
 
 390 HERMAN. 
 
 greatest of all minds, the mind of God. If any of 
 those books fell in my way, I would take them thank- 
 fully, and use them just as she desired, as spy-glasses 
 to look through at life, and help me to see it more 
 clearly ; I would not invert them, and use them to peer 
 back impertinently at her with, through the wrong end. 
 If I could, I would write reviews of them, such as 
 should do good to that good heart of hers, as free from 
 paltry flattery as she from vanity, and letting her indi- 
 viduality as utterly alone as she does, bestowing upon 
 them honest praise and no less honest criticism, such as 
 should show her how for the future to polish away all 
 of the blemishes, of which she would gladly be told, for 
 the sake of getting rid of them." 
 
 " Oh, Herman," cried Constance, " let me thank 
 you for her ! Herman Hermano you deserve your 
 name ! A brother to all man and womankind ! How 
 much better than a brother to me !" 
 
 " Yes ; you thank me, and from your heart. You 
 have been taught to disbelieve your own possession of 
 genius ; and yet you receive a tribute to its possession 
 and worthy exercise by any of your sisters, as a tribute 
 to you. Thus generous, noble, women think and feel ! 
 Nor do they think and feel so of genius only, but of 
 learning also. It is true, as the bishop said, that 
 scholarship in women is not rewarded so abundantly as 
 in men, by academical distinctions and Mutual-Admi- 
 ration Societies. I am afraid it may be also true, that 
 there is a very wide and very narrow prejudice against 
 it ; because good sense and good feeling are apt to be 
 in the minority, on any question newly presented to this 
 prejudiced old world. But all those persons, whose 
 opinion is really worth regarding, like a woman none 
 the less for being liberally educated, provided she is
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 391 
 
 none the less conscientious, useful, gentle, and 
 genial ; and such of your own sex, particularly, as you 
 would choose for companions and friends, sweet friend, 
 have quite a remarkable habit of glorying and delight- 
 ing in the acquirements and achievements of other 
 worthy specimens of womankind, as if they were their 
 own. It is as much as a man's life is worth, among the 
 former, to detract from the latter." 
 
 " I may study or write, then, sometimes, if I will 
 choose you for my director ?" 
 
 " On one or two conditions." 
 
 " What are they ?" 
 
 " You are not to become a writing-medium, nor to 
 drown your bloom and spirits in printer's ink; and 
 your learned labors are to be pursued at my elbow, so 
 that I may have the honor of lending my aid to smooth 
 away any possible difficulties, before they have time to 
 chronicle themselves in wrinkles." 
 
 " No, I will never be an author or a scholar. The 
 conditions are too hard ; and so is the work." 
 
 " What ! Not ambitious, after all ?" 
 
 "What! Do not you propose to allow me a share 
 henceforth in all your triumphs ?" 
 
 " Certainly ; all that I have." 
 
 " Then I shall want no others, at least of that sort," 
 murmured she. " But now I must tell you the rest 
 of ' Ye Nunne's Tale.' The bishop asked me, further, 
 whether I had ever published anything. I had, at 
 Uncle Henry's entreaty, a few times, allowed him to 
 have a few of my verses printed in a magazine." 
 
 " ' How were they received ?' inquired Bishop 
 Devereux. 
 
 " ' They were praised by some of our acquaintances ; 
 because Uncle Henry told who wrote them.'
 
 392 HERMAX. 
 
 " ' But were they noticed by strangers ? ana- 
 lyzed ? criticised ?' 
 
 '"Not at all.' 
 
 " ' That which does not excite criticism, is usually 
 below criticism. I fear that literary fame is not for 
 you ; and literary flattery will not fill or satisfy your 
 mind. You are inordinately proud, Miss Aspenwall, 
 since you have given me leave to say so ; but you are 
 not vain. Spontaneous inspiration, you have not ; a 
 masculine nature, you have not ; and you cannot whip 
 yourself up daily to long toil by the hope of the even 
 well-earned praise of those, who do not love you, and 
 whom you do not love. To you the world has nothing 
 to offer.' 
 
 "'Nothing!' I repeated, and stopped. The word 
 seemed to me to come out of my heart, sounding like 
 an echo out of an empty tomb. 
 
 " ' Oh, yes,' said he, ' I forgot. There is one thing. 
 You can wear the finest dresses, and drive the finest 
 horses in Baltimore.' 
 
 " I burst into tears. ' Daughter, daughter !' cried he, 
 ' Do not weep so. The world has, indeed, nothing to 
 offer; but I have something, or I could never have 
 steeled myself to inflict upon you all this cruel, this 
 necessary, pain. I can, and will, help and rescue you 
 out of this deluge of tears. You shall be saved, -poor 
 dove! warmed and sheltered, and taken into the ark. 
 The world is cruel to you and such as you. Come out 
 of it. Come into the only true church ; and you shall 
 find full scope for your fine,full nature, rest for your soul 
 here, and hereafter, bliss unspeakable. Set your am- 
 bition on a heavenly diadem, and you shall wear it in 
 the train of Mary ; for heaven has a Queen ; and her 
 hands are full of honors for her faithful servants,
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 393 
 
 among whom is neither male nor female, bond nor 
 free. Her canonized maidens, like herself, are called 
 blessed by all after generations ; and, unless I deceive 
 myself very greatly, there is still an empty place among 
 them reserved for yo*u. Hear what dignities she has 
 conferred upon her faithful handmaidens, even on 
 earth and before the eyes of. men, to confound their 
 overweening arrogance !' and then he broke forth into 
 one of his wonderful improvisations, Herman ; until the 
 very walls around us seemed to vanish from my eyes, 
 while in an eternal temple not made with hands, and 
 in a pageant of awful grandeur and beauty, the holy 
 saints, Theresa, Agnes, Catherine, and the rest, seemed 
 to pass before us in procession, wearing crowns upon 
 their heads, and beckoning to me. I wished to follow 
 them. I could not bear to have the vision fade. 
 
 " When he ceased, I told him how it had seemed to 
 me. He ans\vered, that I had seen more than he was 
 conscious of describing, but that it was a glimpse of 
 the true reality ; and that among such visions I might 
 pass my earthly life, into such realities I should be 
 born when my earthly life was over, if I would but 
 walk in the footsteps of those saints here below, and 
 come out of a world which had nothing but emptiness 
 and vanity to offer me. 
 
 " ' Out of the world !' thought I. Oh, 
 
 Anywhere, anywhere out of the world !' 
 
 Many and many a time, I had repeated that line to 
 myself in those days ; and his words appeared to me 
 strangely like an answer to it. But I said nothing. 
 He arose to go. ' Stay,' I said. 
 
 " ' My daughter,' he answered, tenderly, ' it pains 
 me too much to look on, a useless spectator merely of 
 . 7*
 
 394 HERMAN. 
 
 pain which I am not permitted to relieve, the pain of 
 one whose suffering is sharper to me than my own. 
 The wounded has endured the probe, but now repels 
 the balm. What can the surgeon do, but depart to 
 the succor of others, who have already felt and learned 
 to welcome the touch of his healing hand ? I must not 
 urge you. Wait if you will, and take time to make up 
 your mind ; but do riot wait too long. Life is short. 
 The judge stands at the door. At any moment, if my 
 time is prolonged to that blessed moment when you are 
 ready to receive peace, I will hasten to you, ease your 
 aching heart with absolution, and welcome you into 
 the sheltering arms of the only true church. In the 
 meantime, if I send you some books, will you read 
 them on your knees, at night and alone ?' 
 
 " I did so. I liked his books. I liked his conversa- 
 tion. But neither his books nor his conversation made 
 me a Catholic. I did not believe, that I should ever 
 be a candidate for canonization. I did not see why I 
 could not be quite as good as a Protestant, as I could, 
 as a Catholic. Besides, being good was not precisely 
 what I cared about so much at first. I wanted to do 
 something great. I know it was very wrong," said 
 Constance, blushing beautifully. 
 
 " Do you, dearest ? Not caring to be good would 
 be indefensible, to be "sure ; but how can you know, 
 that it was wrong in you to wish to do something 
 great ?" 
 
 "Why because, I supposed it must be; be- 
 cause the bishop told me so afterwards, when I con- 
 fessed to him that I was not contented with doing 
 some dull work, which the Sisters had given me. You 
 must ask him why it was so, if you do not see." 
 
 " I do not, I must own. It seems to me a doctrine
 
 THE LADY'S BHKIFT. 395 
 
 whose tendency is, forever to tie down great powers to 
 small performances. Do not you remember the parable 
 of the talents? From those to whom much is given, 
 much will be required. This desire to do something 
 great, like all other desires implanted in us by our 
 Maker, requires to be hallowed, and kept within its 
 due bounds. It must not be suffered to degenerate 
 into a desire to do something greater than our neigh- 
 bours ; for then it would lead us to grudge and envy 
 them their successes, and to wish that their works might 
 be the less, that ours might be greater. But as long 
 as we can restrain our desire of greatness to a desire 
 to do our utmost to outdo our past selves, and to glo- 
 rify our Heavenly Father by the glorious deeds of His 
 children, and, above all, so long as we keep it, with all 
 our other tastes and wishes, down under a paramount 
 desire to do His will, whether in great things or little, 
 it seems to me that it may tend to His service, and to 
 the coming of His kingdom on earth." 
 
 " Well, I cannot tell. You must talk with the 
 bishop. I shall be very glad if you do not find it 
 wrong ; for I long to see you great, to have all the 
 rest of the world see you as great as I do, I mean. 
 However ; what I wanted was happiness, or at least 
 forgetfulness, the absorption of all the powers of my 
 vacant mind, that were preying upon me, in some 
 grand career. Don't you remember Michael Scott's 
 demon ? I had one like his. I knew that it would 
 tear me unless I could find work for it ; but, if I could, 
 I thought that it might do great things. I believed that it 
 was strong ; for else how could it have rent and con- 
 vulsed me so ? I did not wish to confess, nor care about 
 absolution. Remorse was not my trouble; nor was 
 fear. I did not imagine, that eternity had in store for
 
 396 HERMAN. 
 
 me any torment worse than the restlessness, aimlessness, 
 and hopelessness, that gnawed away my spirit day by 
 day. A Sister Infirmarian told me once of a state of 
 trance, in which the sufferer may lie incapable of speech 
 or motion for hours or days, and even permit himself to be 
 put into the coffin and the tomb, in breathless life and con- 
 scious death. Such a state, it seemed to me, was mine, 
 combined with a mental cramp which made movement 
 a necessity, and immobility an added torture. My 
 destiny had taken the form ofi a nightmare, and sat 
 upon my breast, whispering, ' Hush !' when I would 
 have cried out, and ' Be still !' when I would have 
 struggled. Do you think many women lead such lives, 
 Herman ? Do you think any one could lead a long life 
 so? Oh, how merciful my God has been to me ! 
 
 " I said something like that to the bishop, one day ; 
 for, slow as I was in putting myself under his direc- 
 tion, he was very patient with me, and came often to 
 see me, watching over me with a solicitude and sympa- 
 thy which he could not conceal, though he never forced 
 them upon me. He had often desired me to visit some 
 of the convents ; and now he asked Aunt Cora to take 
 me to see the Orphan Asylum of St. Barbara. She was 
 delighted with the suggestion ; for she had already 
 taken me to see all the secular sights in the city, and 
 was almost in despair of finding anything new in which 
 she could hope to interest me. 
 
 "Beautiful, majestic Sister Corona came to meet 
 us, with a lovely rosy child of eighteen months asleep 
 upon her shoulder, with its dimpled hands clasped 
 round her neck, such a living picture of Innocence 
 reared by Holiness! She always seemed to me the 
 likeness of some mediaeval saint, come by miracle out 
 of the canvas. She welcomed us with a smile that was
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 397 
 
 like a benediction, and took us to see the other little 
 children at their play. ' Isn't it enough to do your 
 heart good, my dear ?' said she, seeing me smile at one 
 of them. 
 
 " ' Heart !' cried I, turning almost sharply upon 
 her ; ' I have no heart ; or it is ossified.' 
 
 " ' Oh, no, dear daughter,' said she, with a sort of 
 cheerful, hopeful tenderness which she always had in 
 her voice ; ' Don't think so ! It may have been be- 
 numbed by some rude shock ; but it will be sure to 
 soften and grow warm again, if you do but press a 
 little child to it often enough. If you have none at 
 home, come to me when it aches ; and I will lend you 
 my best and sweetest.' 
 
 " ' I was ashamed to look at Aunt Cora ; for I had 
 seldom taken much notice of my good-humored, noisy 
 little cousins, except as an interruption. When we 
 went home, I called them all about me on this sofa 
 and upon my knee, told them stories, and felt better. 
 I had received the first of many good lessons; and 
 week by week, and soon day by day, I went to the 
 Sisters for more, and seldom failed to find what I 
 sought ; while my heart, and mind, and imagination, 
 were all fired by what I saw and heard among them. 
 Here at last, I thought, I had found a mode of life, 
 offered to a young and lonely woman, neither listless, 
 aimless, useless, solitary, nor unguided. Among the 
 sisterhood, I found ardor and enthusiasm ; nor yet en- 
 thusiasm only, but organization, power, obedience, 
 action, and beneficent daring. Their order connected 
 them with far countries and past times. Their indi- 
 vidual histories were sometimes full of romantic interest 
 and adventure. They never knew, when they rose in 
 the morning, where they were to sleep at night, nor,
 
 398 HERMAN. 
 
 when they lay clown at night, where the sun was next 
 to rise upon them. They went where they were sent, 
 at a moment's notice, without a word, sigh, or tear, 
 rejoicing if they were found worthy to suffer in their 
 Master's cause, even into plague-stricken cities, where 
 to go was death, and there most joyfully, because 
 through them lay the shortest roads into his presence. 
 They rushed upon the field of battle, into the thunder 
 and lightning of cannon, and hail-storm of shot, with 
 hearts as strong and more fearless than those of their 
 brethren, who went there to wound and to slay ; for to 
 them, to die was but gain. Here at last was a career 
 open to me which not only men, but angels, might well 
 watch and call glorious ! I longed to share it." 
 " And well you might, my storm-queen !" 
 " But in order to do so, Herman, you perceive that 
 it was necessary for ine to become a Catholic, if I 
 could. One might say, indeed, that I could have 
 learned to lead as useful, religious, and active a life, as 
 a Protestant ; and theoretically, I suppose I might ; 
 but practically, I don't think I should. I had yet to 
 learn the very alphabet of self-sacrifice, obedience, and 
 humility. I had no habits of regular industry. I was 
 indolent and inexperienced, and absolutely needed, 
 before I attempted to work by myself, to serve an ap- 
 prenticeship to some person or persons, who had a 
 right to set me to work every day, show me how to 
 work, and see that I did my work. Left to myself, I 
 should but have exerted myself for the poor or sick, in 
 a very ignorant and inefficient manner, for a day or an 
 hour now and then, and then idled a week or a month. 
 I should not have wished to enlist myself in the imme- 
 diate service of any clergyman ; and clergyivomen I did 
 not know where to find, out of the church of Rome.
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 399 
 
 It is all very well for Miss Dix, to go about the world 
 alone doing good, at her age ; but, at mine, I could not ; 
 and, long before I was as old as she, I knew that my 
 bodily and mental powers would have rusted out in 
 idleness and repining. I don't by any means say that 
 they ought, you understand, but that they would. I 
 know it is the theory, that if a nice young lady sits 
 down through all her youth in a nice parlour, nicely 
 dressed, and attends to her domestic duties, (' whether 
 she has any, or enough to occupy her, or not'; as Sister 
 Mary used to say, ' that does not make the slightest 
 difference ;') by and by some other duties will come to 
 her; but, Herman, don't you think there is a little cant 
 about that? Do you think, that young women are 
 quite the exceptions in human nature, that they are 
 taught to consider themselves ? Do you not think that 
 they, like other persons, need to make some prepara- 
 tion in their youth for what they are to do, and to do 
 well, in their middle age ajid old age ? Am I alto- 
 gether strong-minded and wrong in thinking so?" 
 pleaded she, timidly, looking into his face. 
 
 " If you are, I am altogether wrong with you. If 
 all single women bethought themselves betimes of 
 doing this, I believe that we might see fewer she- 
 maniacs in the Insane Asylums, and fewer she-topers, 
 discontented wives, coquettes, and gossips, out of them. 
 But the choice of such resources, sanctioned at present 
 by custom and fashion, is dismally small, I grant the 
 bishop, for that epitome of variety, womankind. I 
 scarcely know how a woman of character and ability 
 can do her sex a greater service, than by striking out 
 quietly and modestly some new line of business suited 
 to them, and taking the lead in it. Florence Nightin- 
 gale has done this ; and only see what a, furor she has
 
 4:00 HERMAN. 
 
 excited. Because her experiment succeeded, it is 
 lauded to the skies. But I suppose there are many 
 able women as little able to be nurses, as to be artists 
 or idlers. Other such experiments will have to be 
 tried, before the proper field of Womanhood can be 
 explored and defined. Some such experiments must 
 fail ; but, provided they are tried conscientiously and 
 j judiciously, their triers will deserve pity and sympa- 
 thy, rather than the ridicule and condemnation which 
 they will receive." 
 
 " Herman, I wish I knew what advice you, a pro- 
 testant, could have found to give me, if you had come 
 to my aid instead of the bishop ?" 
 
 " Can't you guess ? It would not have been re- 
 markably disinterested." 
 
 " Oh, fie ! Seriously, now ; what advice would you 
 have given to any other spoiled, idle, discontented 
 ennuyee in my place?" 
 
 " Do not ask. You would think my prescription a 
 very harsh one, I fear. Remember, my craft teaches 
 me to be unsparing in recommending and urging un- 
 pleasant remedies." 
 
 " I am not afraid. I think you could be firm ; I 
 know you could not be unfeeling. Tell me." 
 
 " At least, I should not have been so unfeeling as to 
 insult your sense or your suffering by telling _you, that 
 your case was not a hard one. I should not have done 
 so, in the first place, because it would have been a 
 falsehood ; in the second place, because it would have 
 been a folly. You needed to see, that your situation 
 was, in some respects a peculiarly disadvantageous, 
 unfortunate, and dangerous one, that you might also 
 see that it was necessary for you to make peculiar 
 efforts, in order to extricate yourself from it. It was a
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 401 
 
 misfortune to you, that in your own sect there were no 
 ' clergy women ' to guide and encourage you. The 
 time will come, I hope, when there will be, I do not 
 say female preachers, though I think, that not St. 
 Paul himself could have found it in his heart to shake 
 his head at Sarah Martin ; but I do hope the time 
 will come when all the branches of Christ's church will 
 include, like that of Cenchrea in old times, accredited 
 female ministers of mercy and holiness, capable of 
 training up younger women to follow in their steps. 
 However, you had to do, not with what might have 
 been, but with what was. 
 
 " I take then the Bishop's premises : given, a 
 woman, young, intellectual but without any par- 
 ticular scientiiic or artistic bent, ardent, enthusiastic, 
 melancholy by nature or circumstances, desirous of 
 playing a fine role in the world, and surfeited with 
 leisure. I begin with saying, Satiety can best be cured 
 by abstinence ; the first step is to get rid of your 
 leisure, your worst enemy, as you yourself acknow- 
 ledge. ' Precisely,' she would say, ' but how ?' I 
 answer, By hard labor. (There is no royal road to 
 greatness, believe me, dear Constance, even for women. 
 I am the last person in the world to undervalue them, 
 I am sure, with such a lady-love and such a sister as 
 fall to the lot of few men ; but the nobler the nature 
 of any creature is, the more does it deserve a noble 
 culture, and to be nobly trained to noble uses. And, 
 of all the tricks that my sex plays yours, there are few 
 paltrier than that of wheedling and flattering persons 
 capable of higher and better things, into contented 
 insignificance. We hold up glory to young men as 
 their highest earthly aim ; obscurity to young women ; 
 and then, "finding women in attainments, energy, and 
 ability, generally inferior to men, we coolly attribute
 
 4:02 HERMAN. 
 
 the inferiority of the former in these respects solely to 
 an original difference in nature.) If you would do 
 anything great, you must work your way up to it, and 
 be content to pave your way to great ends with 
 small beginnings. ' But,' she would say, ' at what 
 shall I work ? Am I to sit down with my head upon 
 my hand, and wait for my work to come to me ?' By 
 no means, I reply ; Stand up, the quicker the better ! 
 prepare yourself for it, and look for it. But all true 
 greatness must have the Greatest of Beings for its 
 starting-point and goal. In a figurative sense, it should, 
 like the Son of God, come from God and go to God. 
 Look to God first, then ; ask of Him guidance and 
 steadfastness, for you will have need of it ; and then 
 see whether He has not already given you something 
 to do, laid it close to your hand, I suppose myself 
 to be speaking to a stranger, you remember, which 
 you have not seen, merely because you have not looked 
 for it. We cannot expect God's blessing upon any 
 work which we prefer to His ; the greatest glory of his 
 children is in glorifying Him ; and we cannot glorify 
 Him in disobeying Him. Whatever task he has set 
 you, do that, whatever you leave undone.* A woman, 
 for instance, who has no very near relations, may still 
 have some relations who need her good offices. At 
 any rate, you owe service to Christ through his poor. 
 If you yet want an introduction to them, ask any sensi- 
 ble and benevolent clergyman or physician of your 
 acquaintance, to give you a list of proper objects of 
 your charity, with some suggestions as to their needs. 
 A person who has time, but little money, may very 
 properly turn some of her time into money, as the 
 apostle suggested, ' working with her hands the thing 
 
 The Reverend Ephraim Peabody.
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 403 
 
 that is good, that she may have to give to him that 
 needeth.' If yon can hear of any discreet and conscien- 
 tious elderly woman who is engaged, heart and hand, 
 in any laborious work of mercy, you may strengthen 
 her hands, and train your own, by working under and 
 with her; and whether you are cutting out a poor 
 child's frock, or writing a report for a Female Humane 
 Society, or whatever you do, throw yourself into it, 
 and do it in the best and busiest manner. The thing 
 may be a trifle ; the habit of mind, in a case like yours, 
 will be everything. Settle with yourself how many 
 and what hours, daily and weekly, you ought to give 
 to these things. Having done so, you may, if need 
 require, exceed your limit ; but do not, unless need 
 require, fall below it. As soon as you are known 
 as a charitable worker, charitable work will pour in 
 upon you. 
 
 " Then, you may think it a paradox, but I think 
 that the undeniable disadvantage under which young 
 women lie, in not being able to enter upon the 
 labors of mature life from the threshold of mature 
 life, is partly counterbalanced by another of their 
 disadvantages, namely, that they commonly reach 
 that threshold unprepared to enter upon the labors 
 of mature life. They may have the foundation of 
 a good education and its garniture, a little elementa- 
 ry knowledge and a few so-called accomplishments / 
 but a generous, liberal education, such as brings out the 
 full, harmonious, vigorous developement of the facul- 
 ties, they have usually not received, and may well 
 spend a few years more in bestowing upon themselves. 
 I say, therefore, next, set apart some hours of every 
 morning for strengthening and tempering your mind 
 by study."
 
 404 HERMAN. 
 
 " By what studies, Herman ?" 
 
 " Now, I am going to be cruel ; you know 1 told 
 you I should. By just the same studies, which have 
 strengthened and trained other strong and able minds; 
 chiefly Latin, or Greek, (which is far more interesting, 
 and no harder, though the little topsy-turvy letters 
 make it look so,) mathematics, and history. Get your 
 friends, I should say to our imaginary young friend, 
 to find some suitable and able teacher to give you a 
 start at first ; find two or three other agreeable girls, 
 if you can, sufficiently industrious and intelligent not 
 to keep you back to wait for them, for fellow-students ; 
 (for you must faithfully follow both of old Burton's 
 invaluable prescriptions for the cure of your melan- 
 choly, ' Be not solitary,' as well as ' Be not idle;') and 
 go to work like a school-boy. Do not do too much ; 
 for you must remember, that you have only that deli- 
 cate tool, a woman's mind, to work with, and that it is 
 easily warped or broken ; but do not do too little. Fix 
 upon your hours, both for recitation and preparation ; 
 and let nothing but some positive duty interfere with 
 your punctuality to them. Let your daily question be, 
 not whether the mood for either study has come ; but 
 whether the time for it has come. The clock must be 
 your master for some months at least, until you have 
 learned self-mastery and regularity ; after that, you 
 may safely and advantageously exchange your rigid 
 obedience to times and seasons, for a more pliant fidelity 
 to a general plan of life." 
 
 " But, and but, and but ! Rigorous Mentor, you 
 have hardly left me breath enough to protest against 
 your rigor! But would it not be horribly hard 
 work?" 
 
 " Horribly ! so hard, that while you gave your whole
 
 THE LADY'S SHEIFT. 405 
 
 mind to it, as you ought arift must, you would have 
 not one single spare thought to inform you whether 
 you were unhappy or not, whether you were lonely or 
 not, or whether you were yourself or somebody else." 
 
 " But would it not be horribly dry ?" 
 
 " Horribly I'- so dry, that you would no longer find 
 your leisure, when it came, a bore, but a luxury ; but 
 it must not come yet. After your lessons, you must 
 have some good, earnest, hearty exercise, according to 
 your strength ; riding, skating, bowling, or rowing, for 
 instance, if you could obtain suitable companions, 
 would be much more likely to improve your spirits 
 and health than mere constitutionals. - After that, I 
 must let you rest. I think I see you reclining very 
 prettily in the easy-chair, which you have earned a 
 right to, with a fine bloom, and two bright eyes 
 (unless they share in your general weariness ; if they do, 
 you must only play on the piano or listen to some one 
 else, knit, or chat,) fixed upon a piece of needle-work, 
 or an interesting biography of some Christian hero or 
 heroine, who served God mightily, in spite of mighty 
 difficulties, or some work of elevating and inspiriting 
 fiction; : I will not deny you even that. You will 
 enjoy it; but you will not enjoy it long. You are 
 conscious of feeling a little drowsy ; and then some- 
 body says, ' Constance, my love,' or ' Katy,' or ' Miss,' 
 ' sha'n't you burn your .hair ?' "With surprise, you find 
 that your eyes are shut. You unclose them just long 
 enough to say your prayers and make your prepara- 
 tions for the night, and drop asleep again the moment 
 your cheek touches your pillow. Healthily refreshed 
 after healthy fatigue, you rise early the next morning, 
 to find your learned labors probably less dry ; and after 
 a while, it may be, you will cease to find them dry at
 
 406 
 
 HERMAN. 
 
 all. Thej will become transfigured before you. In 
 your classical studies you will see yourself going to the 
 same school, as it were, and sitting on the same 
 benches, with the greatest philosophers and statesmen 
 of ancient and modern times; and the mathematics 
 will unroll for your inspection the architectural plans 
 of the Creator, the laws which are the skeleton of the 
 universe. At any rate, you have got rid of your 
 leisure. You have plenty of work, wholesome if 
 not attractive, in social duty, study, and exercise, each 
 kind capable of indefinite extension, according to your 
 need. Under the first head, leave yourself time enough 
 for the generous consideration and promotion of the 
 happiness of those immediately about you, that self- 
 discipline may not degenerate into mere self-reference, 
 and that your heart may not share in the hardening 
 process which is going on in your intellect ; for the 
 sympathies, even of those naturally the most fastidious 
 and exclusive, are capable of indefinite expansion; and 
 on the other hand I have felt, noticed, I mean, that 
 the tendency of a wounded soul is sometimes to close 
 over again with a rough and callous scar. Having 
 laid out your plan, to the best of your judgment, giving 
 its due place to each of these things, try it for three 
 months at least, without once asking yourself whether 
 it is doing you good or not, and, if possible, without 
 making a single alteration in it." 
 
 " But, my dear Herman, would it not be very diffi- 
 cult to persevere in so severe a system of self-culture, 
 without any stimulus or object?" 
 
 " Very difficult, my dearest love ; under the present 
 regime, a woman needs to have twice the energy and 
 capacity of an ordinary man, in order to attain as 
 generous an education even as many an ordinary man ;
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 407 
 
 but no one can lead a great life without great efforts. 
 The impetus, which it is the privilege of us young men 
 to receive at the outset of our career, from our elders, 
 valuable as it is, is apt to spend itself soon and die 
 out, unless we can keep it up, in great measure by 
 ourselves. Besides, though you may have no human 
 stimulus, you ought to encourage and enliven yourself 
 continually with the hope of your heavenly Father's 
 approbation, and the hope also, that if you are faithful 
 over a few things, He will make you ruler over many 
 things. Do not parents always take pleasure in seeing 
 their children do well ? Do not dutiful children love 
 to give them that pleasure ? Moreover, we suppose my 
 arduous experiment to be tried by a girl capable of 
 greatness, a girl of a great soul. We will suppose, 
 then, that she has tried it, and tried it with little 
 change of outward circumstance even for nine or ten 
 years. She has spent nine or ten years, then, in the 
 diligent and judicious exercise of all her powers, in 
 the faithful and loving discharge of all her duties to 
 God and her neighbour. The ardent, but inexpe- 
 rienced, undeveloped, and unoccupied girl of twenty, 
 is now a woman of thirty. She has the habit of study, 
 the habit of attention, the habit of reflection, the habit 
 of action. Her mind is well furnished, scholarly, 
 clear, and quick; and her health, probably good. 
 Throw such a person anywhere, and she will come 
 down on her feet. 
 
 " Having been forced, under God, to lay out her 
 path in life for herself, and having done so thought- 
 fully and considerately, her every step has been an 
 exercise of judgment. A good and experienced judg- 
 ment is now, therefore, added to her original ardor 
 and enthusiasm j and good judgment, ardor, and enthu-
 
 4:08 HERMAN. 
 
 si asm, make up almost the perfection of a working 
 character. She is the person of whom all who know 
 her say the first, when any good work is to be done, 
 ' She would be the very person to do it, if she has not 
 too much upon her hands already.' She will be, she 
 is, she has been, great, in self-mastery, capacity, 
 industry, and fidelity to God. Whether men and 
 women do or will call her so, she has ceased to care, if 
 she ever cared. Having toiled so long, with the object 
 of making herself not an admired scholar or mathema- 
 tician, but an accomplished and able handmaid of the 
 Lord, she has learned to love less the praise of men 
 than the praise of God. She has ceased to estimate 
 greatness by any human standard ; and perhaps she 
 finds the works, which have already accumulated upon 
 her, extensive enough, even for her enlarged and 
 practised powers ; but, if she believes that she conkl 
 secure greater usefulness in a wider sphere, her en- 
 gaging kindness and proved prudence have probably 
 earned for her the confidence and cooperation of many 
 friends ; and her riper age itself has now become a sort 
 of chaperone for her. She will then, perhaps, become 
 a mother to some orphan children, like Miss Bremer's 
 Evelina, or devote herself to the wounded, like Miss 
 Nightingale, to the sick, like Miss ****** ? M. D. to 
 the insane, like Miss Dix, or to the wicked, like Mrs. 
 Fry, or strike out, like them, some new path for her- 
 self, suited to her individual self. Perhaps she will 
 become such a mistress, as she herself could not find on 
 her entrance into life, to other unoccupied and unsatis- 
 fied girls. What she will do, I cannot tell; nor will 
 she ask me. By this time she knows herself; and, in 
 whatever course she takes, she probably has at least 
 thirty years of vigorous activity before her, all the
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 409 
 
 more efficient for the ten waiting and working years 
 of preparation which have preceded. 
 
 " Looking back over a past crowded with honorable 
 achievement and deeds of love and wisdom, three hun- 
 dred and sixty-five in a year at the very lowest com- 
 putation, she is hardly very wretched. I do not say 
 that she is leading so happy a life as I wish her, or so 
 happy a life as I hope such women will be able to lead 
 a century or two hence, when there are more of them to 
 keep each other in countenance, and society has become 
 accustomed to them, and found out how many things 
 they are good for ; but is it not a beautiful and blessed 
 life, compared with that which she was leading and 
 likely to lead ?" 
 
 " Yes, indeed !" 
 
 " Whether following out my suggestions would lead 
 to such a life, I can only conjecture. They are the 
 suggestions of only a young and inexperienced man. 
 But I should like to have the experiment tried." 
 
 "Byrne, Herman?" 
 
 " Yes, my dearest love, if you find yourself ' idle, 
 discontented, and ennuyee? Seriously, no. Physi- 
 cians don't try experiments on the members of their 
 own families, unless they are tired of them." 
 
 " You have not tried it upon Clara, then ?" 
 
 Herman laughed heartily. " I wish you would 
 ask Edward that question, when I ""am by to see. He 
 always regarded her as his peculiar property, don't 
 you recollect ? Besides, I do not think Clara, in any 
 respect, a fit subject. She was never ennuyee in her 
 life. It never in her life, I imagine, occurred to her 
 that she could do anything great ; she is contented 
 with being beautiful and good. Perhaps she could do 
 more good if she were more enterprisingj^but no, I 
 18
 
 410 HERMAN. 
 
 will not say, or even think, anything so ungracious and 
 ungrateful. I doubt, whether she has in her the mate- 
 rial for a Miss Dix or Mrs. Fry. She is never idle 
 now ; and I do not believe, that hard labor of any kind 
 was what God planned for her ; she has none of the 
 restless eagerness, which commonly accompanies a 
 igreat capacity for it. Domestic life is her paradise ; 
 and she is an angel in it. She does her good and 
 appropriate service in this feverish, dark, unquiet 
 world, while she shines through and over it with her 
 aspect of sweet, calm, heavenly peace. Different people 
 are made, and wanted here, for different uses. Provi- 
 dence assorts us all. I like you each best as you are. 
 There is room for, and need of, both the Clara and 
 the Constance. More's the pity, that there is only one 
 of each." 
 
 " Well ; as I was going to tell you, the Sisters' lives 
 made a convert of my heart; and then I said to the 
 bishop, ' Make me like them, and I can ask no better.' 
 He taught me, he tried to teach me, to be gentle to- 
 wards others, severe towards myself, to look upon my 
 character not as that of some mere irresponsible heroine 
 of fiction, but as God should look upon it at the last 
 day, to repent of my pride instead of priding myself 
 upon it, to seek out, acknowledge, and cure my faults, 
 instead of excusing them, to struggle with my indo- 
 lence, and to mortffy my selfishness. I took a private 
 vow ; by the regulations of the order, years must pass 
 before one can formally and fully be admitted to it. 
 I joined the Sisters, and, by special favor, was allowed 
 to assume their habit. I did as they did, and as they 
 bade me ; and among them I have toiled a year." 
 
 " A happy year, my dearest ?" 
 
 " Herman, do not ask ! But I will tell ! A year
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 411 
 
 of sackcloth and ashes it has been to me ; because I 
 was not worthy. I went to them, hoping to get out 
 of the world of which I was so weary ; but, because I 
 was so worldly, the world followed and went in with 
 me, even there. My life was far more monotonous, 
 and less exciting, than I had expected ; partly because 
 I had, I suppose, expected too much, and partly be- 
 cause I took too little interest in duty for its own sake. 
 All the pampered tastes, which had lost their appetite 
 in me from over-feeding, regained it from fasting, and 
 hungered and thirsted for poetry, songs, drawing, con- 
 versation, and all that gives beauty and grace to polite 
 life. Toil, hardship, and contact with real life, sobered 
 my mind and moderated my demands ; and I often 
 wondered, how I could ever have been in such a hurry 
 to leave Aunt Cora's. While the Sisters said, that I 
 was learning efficiency, energy, and skill in tending 
 the sick, (they employed me chiefly in that ; because 
 they said their sicker patients liked my noiseless move- 
 ments and quiet ways, but that I was too silent and 
 grave to be with children. Do you find me silent and 
 grave, Herman ?) all that time, I was painfully and 
 sadly learning deeper and sadder lessons, which they 
 knew not of, lessons that humbled me to the dust. 
 In contrast with their single-hearted, eager self- 
 devotion, my own worldliness, my own selfishness 
 stared me in the face day by day: I could bear the 
 days, however, better ; for then we were busy, and I 
 had less time to think ; but when night came, and we 
 sat down to rest, with nothing more interesting to 
 me than the prescribed life of some poor saint to 
 read, and they read and heard it, and were contented 
 and thankful, then most of all I saw and felt that I 
 was utterly unlike them, that I was a hypocrite 
 among them, and had no right to be there, that I had
 
 4:12 HEKMAN. 
 
 snatched the crown, of which I was not worthy, before 
 it was held out to me, and only-because it shone. It 
 scorched me, therefore, and I could not bear it, I did 
 not know how I could bear it long and live, nor yet 
 how I could ever bear to acknowledge my error, self- 
 conceit, and presumption." 
 
 " You have learned humility, Constance ! I will 
 not try to flatter you out of it. I fear, we are all more 
 given to think of our own glory than the glory of God. 
 But did it not occur to you, that a part of your uneasi- 
 ness might come from the fact, that He had ordained 
 you to serve Him in part as an intellectual woman ; 
 and that you were unnecessarily starving your intel- 
 lect?" 
 
 " To tell the whole truth, though I put it on no 
 grounds higher than those of my longing, and suffer- 
 ing, for a little literary food more tempting to me, I did 
 complain of that to the confessor,! had where I then 
 was, in hopes he would grant me a dispensation. I 
 got only a penance from him, and an assurance that it 
 was a ' timptation of the inemy, me daughtther,' " said 
 Constance, casting down her eyes demurely, as she 
 lapsed in spite of her into a little sly mimicry ; " but 
 he was a foreigner, from from Ireland, and not a 
 highly educated person himself. I dare say the bishop 
 would have been more lenient."- 
 
 " And you thought it your duty, Constance," said 
 Herman, with a strong inward emphasis upon the 
 " you," " to obey such a person as that ?" 
 
 " Certainly. I was bound to do it. Don't you 
 know what is said in the ' Combat Spirituel '? oh, I 
 forgot ; you have not read it yet, ' It is better to obey 
 the lowest \le dernier] of men for the love of God, than 
 to command kings and princes.' ' 
 
 Herman shuddered within himself, as he thorght 01
 
 THE LADY'S SHKIFT. 413 
 
 the uses that might be, and as he feared had been, 
 made of such maxims ; but he said only, " You did 
 not want poetry to read, while you were tending 
 the sick. If I were sick, you could be contented 
 without reading?" 
 
 " Yes, quite as contented as I could with it. I 
 wish you may be partly right, and that I may not 
 have been so wholly wrong ; but" Constance went on, 
 "in short, I was continually haunted and harassed 
 more and more, in the midst of all my fatigues, hard- 
 ships, and privations, by the fear that I had mistaken 
 my vocation, and seized on one too holy for me, 
 through a vain love of excitement and eclat, and a 
 wilful longing for death ; though how wrong that was 
 I did not fully see, until I saw it with your eyes. Do 
 not you remember that day in the farm-house in 
 Kansas, when Sister Mary was talking with you and 
 I sat by, and she mentioned that the Sisters of St. 
 Luke wished to have a convent in a very unhealthy 
 place in Florida, and were forbidden, because Bishop 
 Devereux said, that it would be wantonly throwing 
 away their lives ? You had lately been hanging, as 
 we thought, on the brink of the grave, and so calmly ; 
 but you said then that No one could be prepared to 
 die, who was not prepared to live willingly, so long as 
 it was the will of God. Up to that time, death had 
 been more and more my hope, and my only hope ; for 
 pride and shame threatened forever to l>;ir my escape 
 from what seemed to me an ever more and more 
 insupportable captivity. l>at then a great revulsion 
 of feeling came over me. The truth and courage, 
 which breathed ont from you. gave me strength to be 
 brave and true to myself; and I determined to humble 
 myself, own my lolly, face ridicule, and bow my spirit 
 to go back to the home from which I had broken
 
 414 HEKMAN. 
 
 away, open still to me, as I knew, with a hearty wel- 
 come, make myself as useful as I could to Aunt Cora, 
 and eke out my support, if she would allow me, with 
 my needle or by copying or translating, for a time, to 
 devote my spare hours to the poor and sick in Balti- 
 more, no longer as I hoped inefficiently after the skil- 
 ful training I had had, to read, rest, and think, and 
 endeavour, by time, penance, and prayer, to wean 
 myself gradually from the world, and fit myself for the 
 calling I had so rashly taken upon myself to follow, 
 and then or never to return to it. For, Herman, you 
 must not think, indeed you must not !" exclaimed 
 Constance, with a gush of proud blood into her cheeks, 
 u that I had the least idea of putting myself in your 
 way, or throwing myself upon your compassion. 
 Sister Mary had told me, that she understood you were 
 soon to be married ; else I might not have had moral 
 courage enough to face some misconstructions, to which 
 my return would have exposed me." 
 
 " What did the woman mean ? How dared she!" 
 cried our excitable young friend, starting to his feet 
 and looking puritanically ready to annihilate the Scar- 
 let Woman, with all her dependants but one. 
 
 " ' What did she mean ?' " repeated Constance, laugh- 
 ing, as she laid her hand upon his arm and 
 
 "Smoothed the raven down of broadcloth, till he smiled;" 
 
 " To make me as cold and stiff and unkind to you as 
 possible, and keep me from giving you a single chance 
 to speak to me or correspond with me ; as if we had 
 not been honorable people, and upon honor ; but to 
 set it all right with me afterwards, as she did yester- 
 day, at the last moment, just before she set me down 
 safely here ; though then it came very near being all 
 wrong for you; for, until she repeated to me some
 
 THE LADY'S SHRIFT. 415 
 
 piteous, despairing, nonsense that you once talked to 
 her, sir, I had a great mind to run off again x and hide, 
 no matter where ; and, after all, I did not know 
 whether to believe her or not. ' How did she dare ?' 
 She did not know how your eyes could flash, I sup- 
 pose; nor did I till this moment. She does equivo- 
 cate a little now and then ; it is her only fault, but 
 always she says, 'with a good intention ;' and she 
 keeps a little paper book, in which she sets every 
 instance down, so as to be sure not to forget one at 
 confession. I fear she would not find that the ' sooth- 
 ing sacrament' that she calls it, if you were her 
 director; and you are right. Of all things, I detest 
 and despise falsehood !" 
 
 "And of all things, I love truth," said Herman, 
 pressing her hand, "truth and Constan-ce, one and 
 inseparable !" And so they were. Herman ought 
 not to have made puns, especially bad ones ; but this 
 one was founded on fact, and on a good fact. 
 
 But what had become of his supernal and unap- 
 proachable heroine, his sovereign queen, his seventh 
 heavenly saint ? She was gone ; and he did not miss 
 her. His tragic muse had put her buskins off, because 
 the place whereon she stood was holy ground; but 
 she stood for that only the nearer to his heart. It is 
 not every child, who chooses his book for the sake of 
 its pretty covers, that is so well pleased when he 
 comes to read it, or with so good reason. Herman 
 had found in his, the fair pages of his Constance's 
 heart, not quite what he had expected, it was true, 
 but in nursery parlance a " pleasant surprise," a sur- 
 prise so pleasant, that it never occurred to him to go 
 back to ask what his expectation had been, or to com- 
 pare it with the reality. He had been but a boy 
 when he fell in love, and a somewhat unformed, dreamy
 
 4:16 UEKMAN. 
 
 boy, who sought to find without him the stimulus, 
 guidance, and steadfastness, which he had not yet proved 
 within. He was a man now, and a strong and reso- 
 lute man, though tender-hearted still, and found it as 
 sweet to lead his lady-love, as she did to be led by 
 him. He had changed so much, that if she had not 
 been much changed, too, she might not, she could 
 not, have suited him so well. If not altogether a 
 guide for him, she was eager to be guided, and would, 
 he foresaw, soon permit him to be her guide in all 
 respects where she needed one. He hoped so, at least ; 
 and if he was not quite sure, his doubt was as a little 
 grain of pepper, which gave piquancy to his hope. 
 If capable of being deceived, it was through thought- 
 lessness and artlessness, not dulness ; and she herself 
 was incapable of deceit. If not faultless, she was 
 most candid and open in owning her faults, most nobly 
 eager to repair them, and most winning in seeking 
 forgiveness. Happy is the man or woman, who can 
 pour out all his or her failings and feelings before the 
 soul that loves him or her the best, and be only the 
 dearer for the revelation ! 
 
 It is not to be imagined, however, that Herman 
 analyzed and anatomized Constance after this cool 
 fashion himself, for our satisfaction ; far from it. It 
 is only I, who do it for the satisfaction of my less 
 enthusiastic readers. Without deigning to pry into 
 the premises, he jumped at once to the conclusion, that 
 she was precisely what he wanted to make him the 
 happiest of men ; and as this was precisely the same 
 conclusion to which he had jumped about four years 
 before, any little alteration in the premises over which 
 he jumped was quite disregarded.
 
 NOTE TO VOLUME I. 
 
 NOTE A. It is scarcely necessary, I trust, to remind ray readers 
 here or elsewhere, that what I undertake to lay before them is not a 
 history, but a story. 
 
 If, however, they will judge for themselves whetner or not the 
 episode of Kansas, se non c vero, e ben trovato, I am happy to refer 
 them to the " Reports of the Majority and Minority of the Congres- 
 sional Committee of Investigation on the subject of Kansas," in 
 which they may find testimony both for and against me. 
 
 18*
 
 A 000 038 593 o