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 THE LIBRARY 
 
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 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
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 HISTORIETTES.
 
 IN THE PRESS 
 
 THE AYLMERS; 
 
 A NOVEL. 
 
 Three Volumes, Post Svo.
 
 HISTORIETTES, 
 
 OR 
 
 TALES 
 
 OF 
 
 CONTINENTAL LIFE. 
 
 «Y THE AUTHOR OF 
 
 'THE ENGLISH IN ITALY." 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. 
 1827.
 
 Printed by J. F. Dove, St. John's Square.
 
 W7t 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 " What is a man to do, who has travelled 
 over the whole of Europe en posteV demanded 
 a disconsolate voyager, who, somewhere this 
 side of Kamschatka, wept, like another Alex- 
 ander, that the earth contained no new realms 
 to be conquered by his chariot-wheels. " Go 
 over the same ground on foot. Each country, 
 I promise you, will be new enough." Such 
 was the reply ; and full it was both of sense 
 and justice. The pleasure felt in enjoying 
 travel by wholesale, if I may so say, and tra- 
 versing empires with a courier's speed, is, 
 whatever the world may say, a very high plea- 
 sure, even independent of vanity : it is an ex- 
 
 GUSH
 
 yi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 citement, of four-horse-power, to say the least 
 of it, so great, as to sink almost below consi- 
 deration the minor and common pleasures of 
 travelling. Impelled by it, the varied leagues 
 of Italy, and the dreary wersts of Russia, pass 
 our chariot to the right and left with almost 
 equal delight to us, and the spirit of adventure 
 that fills the breast of the wanderer over Tar- 
 tarean snows in his sledge, compensates for 
 his privations, and renders the sum of his en- 
 joyment fully equal to that of him, who drives 
 listlessly from city to city, and from inn to 
 inn, in devotion by the luxuries and the clime 
 of the genial South. 
 
 But as in love, war, wine, ambition, and all 
 possible phases of excitement, so in travel, men 
 soon lose that young and happy faculty of be- 
 ing easily and simply pleased. Locomotion, 
 mere locomotion, loses its charms, and plea- 
 sures of a more stationary kind, even in moving, 
 must be sought. Britons, well supplied as 
 they take care to set forth with all the com-
 
 INTRODUCTION. VII 
 
 forts of hard-ware, soft-ware, and nicknackery, 
 are here sadly at a loss. They are famous 
 marchers, or rather wheelers by the way-side, 
 but know not how to pitch their tents for ever 
 so short a season, or to be happy therein. 
 Their exploring voyages for the most part re- 
 semble that of the dove from the ark — they 
 find no dry ground for a resting-place, till 
 they return to the little floating-ark of an isle, 
 whence they set forth. 
 
 Once forced, however, to become a citizen of 
 the world, none becomes more fully so than a 
 Briton; and as none are more eager and 
 greedy after the gross pleasure of galloping 
 across a continent, than they are at first, so 
 none, after some years of foreign life, become 
 better adapted for enjoying travel in detail. 
 The man of what nation will, so readily as 
 an Englishman, fling himself alone among 
 strangers, or isolate himself in solitary scenery-? 
 Who ever saw a single Frenchman, with all 
 the love of that nation for the picturesque,
 
 Vlll INTRODUCTION. 
 
 wending his way alone through the defiles of 
 the Alps ? The Germans, with all their enthu- 
 siasm, travel in hordes. This maybe account- 
 ed for by the fact that in that frank and sim- 
 ple country, feeling, be it ever so marked, ever 
 so wrought up, has no need of either secrecy 
 or modesty. But in England, where the en- 
 thusiastic feeling of the German is united with 
 that prevalence of ridicule and morbid dread 
 of it, generally considered characteristic of 
 French society, sentiment must necessarily be 
 cherished, and enjoyed in solitude. This is 
 the true reason, that in travel so many indi- 
 viduals of our nation contradict the national 
 character, by throwing themselves amongst 
 strangers', losing themselves in foreign life, and 
 spending their days, staff in hand, along the 
 mountain-paths, and in the cottages and cha- 
 lets of Switzerland. It is a paradox, I have 
 often heard foreigners wonder at, and wonder 
 at moreover not only as a paradox, in being 
 opposed to national character, but being con-
 
 INTRODUCTION. IX 
 
 trary to received opinion, that an Englishman 
 is always an Englishman, his tongue, his feel- 
 ings, and even his least habits indefeasible. 
 
 There is truth, however, in both observations 
 — in the vulgar one, and in its contradiction. 
 At our first setting forth, we are all the in- 
 sular, prejudiced, proud, shy, selfish- seeming 
 beings, that the ridicule of continental envy 
 can depict us. Nay, if we return immediately, 
 we return little better. But let us tarry abroad. 
 Let the novelty of mere travel wear off ; let us 
 be unconnected with home by family or pro- 
 fession, deprived of the hopes of any such 
 connexion, even as I, who write, by having 
 attained a certain age without having made 
 such provisions, and scorning to turn back for 
 them. To such a man, the wide world is the 
 only home, for there he enjoys all the advan- 
 tages of his freedom, and is not reminded, as 
 every object in his native home, did he dwell 
 there, would not fail to bring to his recollec- 
 tion, that his is a life manque, wanting in fact —
 
 X INTRODUCTION. 
 
 or that he has let pass the streams of love, of 
 ambition, of all the ways of worldly happiness, 
 beyond recal, and that while his contempora- 
 ries are winning or have won the noblest prizes 
 in the lottery of life, he sate down content 
 with an anticipated blank. To such a man, 
 his native land is a huge, staring, unanswer- 
 able, and never-dying reproach, far beyond my 
 enduring at least ; and here, therefore, in this 
 foreign land, I have become most at home. 
 Every thing, that should be strange, is fami- 
 liar, and all that should be familiar, strange. 
 If I hear but an English voice, it has to me the 
 wildest, most outlandish sound, and jars upon 
 my ear. 
 
 I am not a singular being, and therefore my 
 egotism may be allowed, yon egoistic vowel 
 being a numeral that stands for a whole spe- 
 cies — we are simply the wandering and the 
 disappointed. We are exiles, not romantic or 
 pretentious ones, not favoured or exalted by 
 any peculiar or dreadful visitation of Provi-
 
 INTRODUCTION. xi 
 
 dence. Crossed in love, we may have been, 
 in friendship must have been often, wronged 
 no doubt somewhat, but not enough to make 
 verse withal, with every propensity to com- 
 plain bitterly of the world, at least when in the 
 spleen, but in truth with little reason, for the 
 neglect has been on our side ; would-be misan- 
 thropes, but in fact nothing more than hip- 
 pish, indifferently gay, and seasonably un- 
 happy — he, that would know more of one indi- 
 vidual of the species, may accompany me upon 
 my rambles. Though an Englishman, I have 
 divested myself of all that pertaineth to one so 
 born, except the core : my foregoing intro- 
 duction I intended as an argumentative proof 
 that such might be the case, but, like myself, 
 it has proved garrulous and errant. In the 
 mean time, take these pretensions as granted, 
 and allow me to be your guide. My object is 
 to amuse you with narrative, as oft as fit and 
 worthy objects for such cross our path, and
 
 Xll INTRODUCTION. 
 
 in the default and during the intervals of 
 such, to utter most unpremeditatedly the 
 crotchets of a warm and somewhat whimsical 
 fancy.
 
 THE 
 
 REGICIDE'S FAMILY.
 
 THE 
 
 REGICIDE'S FAMILY 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A visit to Motiers Travers and the Lake of 
 Bienne, with a concomitant perusal of some of 
 the later and egoistical productions of Rous- 
 seau, excited in me a more than usual desire 
 for solitude and pedestrianism. Both were fa- 
 vourites of my fancy, until that period, indeed, 
 more often meditated than put in practice; for 
 the Continent had not then been very many 
 months open to the incursions of Englishmen, 
 and my own dear country, with its boors, its 
 high roads, its landlords so very acute in 
 their perceptions of rank and wealth, I had 
 
 B
 
 
 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 ever found most agreeable to traverse with the 
 greatest number of wheels and horses procur- 
 able. From Yverdun I set forth in obedience 
 to the irresistible whim of the moment, visited 
 the field of Grandson, the valley of the Orbe, 
 and all the places around, famed either for 
 association or the picturesque. The reader 
 shall not be troubled with a description of these 
 well-known scenes, in which neither interest- 
 ing personage nor adventure crossed my path, 
 or occurred to enhance the enjoyment of them. 
 Indeed, it is to be doubted, if these chefs 
 d'xuvre of Nature's arrangement or caprice are 
 most productive of pleasurable sensations : 
 their effect is too overpowering, too absorbing, 
 too exclusive of that accompanying train of 
 thought, which oft heightens the charm of less 
 romantic spots far above that of places more 
 famed and sought. " You cannot both eat 
 your cake, and have it," saith the proverb ; 
 and so can you not enjoy aught in anticipa- 
 tion without diminishing the sum of final plea-
 
 FAMILY. 6 
 
 sure, and converting a portion of it into dis- 
 appointment. This perhaps is the secret of 
 the frequent failure of Nature's choicest 
 scenes in producing their effect. Or perhaps 
 it is, that chance, that queen of adventure, is 
 jealous of shedding needless interest upon a 
 spot so well supplied from sources foreign to 
 her, and selects in preference for her freaks 
 and incidents an insignificant by-road, or not 
 o'er romantic vale, where she may introduce a 
 way-farer like myself to some mysterious per- 
 sonage, or indulge his curiosity with the clue 
 to some interesting story. 
 
 I have ever found that one of the best 
 guides to scenic and sequestered beauty is a 
 river. Having followed for some days the 
 current of the Orbe, repaid for no small diffi- 
 culties and fatigue by the splendid and ever 
 varying points of view which it offered, I re- 
 solved to trace in a similar manner towards 
 the north the course of the Doubs, especially 
 as it would conduct me by a more novel path 
 
 b 2
 
 THE REGICIDE S 
 
 than the high road, towards Bienne and So- 
 leure, whither rny steps were bent. Beautiful 
 as was the deep valley of the Jura, through 
 which the current ran, it certainly rivalled not 
 the banks and sources of the Orbe ; and my 
 thoughts, as I journeyed on, were freer per- 
 haps, and more buoyant on that very account. 
 The mind gave its spirit to, not took its im- 
 pressions from, the scene ; my imagination 
 when excited, seemed to lord it o'er the pros- 
 pect, instead of being awed in mere and sub- 
 missive admiration ; whilst reverie might steal 
 ray perceptions from it, without meeting re- 
 proaches for being forgetful of surrounding 
 beauty. 
 
 Such were the feelings with which I traced 
 the course of the Doubs for several days, now 
 traversing with it a dreary and elevated table- 
 land, now descending the steep ravine, down 
 which it roared, and compelled by the imprac- 
 ticability of accompanying its immediate cur- 
 rent, to seek a distant way, aloft, from whence
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 I beheld the silvery line of spray that marked 
 its descent, breaking through the dark-green 
 foliage of the pines that overhung and at 
 length concealed it. Farther on I succeeded 
 in regaining its banks, of which, although that 
 opposite was the craggy base of some young 
 Alp of the Jura, the one which I traversed 
 was a deep and luxuriant meadow shaded by 
 young plantations, and tenanted by the tin- 
 gling herd of a vacherie. White houses scat- 
 tered at intervals, some pitched upon the 
 ledge of a declivity, others upon the brink of 
 the stream, with] the patches of cultivation 
 that surrounded each, imparted that resem- 
 blance to Welsh scenery, which Simond has 
 remarked. 
 
 Absorbed in contemplating and hoarding 
 up the impressions here preserved, I wandered 
 on, abstracting myself at moments from the 
 objects round to pursue some butterfly of the 
 brain, and recurring to the prospect as oft as 
 a sufficient distance past presented it under a
 
 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 new appearance. Twice or thrice in these 
 glances did the figure of an old man meet my 
 view, before it attracted my full attention. 
 His being well clad was a circumstance not so 
 unusual in these manufacturing and wealthy 
 vales, as to promise superior rank or informa- 
 tion. His occupation, however, which became 
 evident upon nearer approach — he was herba- 
 lizing: on the mountain-side — was such as to 
 command instantly not only the respect, but 
 the interest of a rtveur, of one just risen from 
 the perusal of Jean Jaques. I drew near to 
 him, whilst he, regardless of my approach, al- 
 lowed me full leisure for scrutiny. He seemed 
 of most diminutive form and stature, his in- 
 significant person nevertheless surmounted by 
 a large head and countenance, the eyes in- 
 deed lustreless, but the face itself beaming with 
 placidity and benevolence — such a one as Mari- 
 vaux has described as having an viirplus ancien 
 que vieux. His hair, which he chose not to 
 cover, his hat being whimsically appended to
 
 FAMILY. 7 
 
 the button of his coat, was of silver gray, and 
 parted o'er a brow and cheeks, notwithstand- 
 ing his age, of juvenile contour. This gave 
 him to me a Miltonic appearance, that not a 
 little increased my interest. 
 
 I accosted him. He replied, as one to 
 whom converse with a stranger was welcome : 
 and I in a little time abandoned the Doubs 
 for the more social company of the gray- 
 haired unknown. He was at first somewhat 
 too much of a botanist for me, and expa- 
 tiated upon the gender, number, and person 
 of a specimen of Cerastium Aquaticum which 
 he had gathered, in that mortifying tone of 
 communication, which supposes and takes 
 quietly for granted, one's knowledge of a sci- 
 ence, utterly unknown to one. I was at 
 length obliged to confess the little interest I 
 took in the culling of simples, professing my- 
 self at the same time a worshipper of Nature 
 in the mass, rather than in her minute spe- 
 cimens.
 
 8 
 
 THE REGICIDE S 
 
 "Your admiration, then," replied he, "is 
 that merely of an amateur for an art, the pro- 
 duce and enjoyment of a leisure hour. Na- 
 ture is my only companion, my sole study, 
 and were I to confine my attention to its 
 general appearance and effects, I should lack 
 occupation often both for mind and body." 
 
 " That seems strange to me," quoth I ; 
 "can yon prospect be less interesting than 
 this tiny flower?" 
 
 " To you, young man, far more so, who have 
 a well of feeling springing in your breast, 
 which you can pour forth upon its fair extent. 
 But I, who am old and narrowed in my sym- 
 pathies, as well as a frequent soj ourner amongst 
 these scenes, cannot afford, unless at rare- 
 occurring intervals, such an outlay of senti- 
 ment, as scenic enjoyment demands. The 
 mere sunshine is enough to cheer my listless 
 dreams, and a greater object of interest than 
 a flower would mar the even tenor of my 
 pulse and thoughts."
 
 FAMILY. 9 
 
 Being a younger man then than now, I 
 scarcely understood what a few years' progress 
 in apathy has since rendered perfectly intelli- 
 gible to me. I left the argument there. 
 
 "You are proceeding to Locle?" said my 
 companion. 
 
 I answered in the affirmative. 
 
 "We may be companions so far," added he 
 stretching forth his staff towards the village, 
 the red roofs and tin-capped steeple of which 
 were seen in the extremity of the valley, tinged 
 with the ray of the declining sun. 
 
 We walked along for some time in silence, 
 which in any other situation might to such new 
 acquaintances have been embarrassing. But 
 the lovely scene was excuse sufficient for ab- 
 straction; and both of us looked and listened 
 to the brawling Doubs, and towards the pic- 
 turesque banks which overhung it on the 
 opposite side, if not with similar thoughts, 
 at least with countenances similarly expres- 
 sive. 
 
 b 3
 
 10 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 " Those banks are France," observed I, in- 
 quiringly, " and these meads are Switzerland?" 
 
 " Even so," replied my companion. 
 
 " What a scene for an exile, to wander near 
 and behold the limits of his country, yon soil 
 that he must not tread, yon barrier that he dare 
 not pass?" 
 
 "Are you an exile, Sir?" demanded the old 
 man. 
 
 '•' At best but a voluntary one." 
 
 " It is pity that your isle is not blessed with 
 revolutions, political convulsions, and all the 
 sublime consequences of parties struggling for 
 life as well as power ; for exile seems to appear 
 to Englishmen the very sublime of their sad 
 and romantic pleasures. All that ye, insular 
 pilgrims, seem to want of happiness, is a fair 
 excuse for being unhappy." 
 
 I could not but smile at this unexpected 
 sally. 
 
 " Now I am an exile, and from that land you 
 contemplate," continued the old Frenchman ;
 
 FAMILY. 11 
 
 " and yet neither bank nor stream inspire the 
 sentiments which you would lend me as an 
 imaginative being." 
 
 "At first, however, you must have expe- 
 rienced such, though habit since has worn 
 away the feeling." 
 
 "There you are wrong. 'Tis one of those 
 that habit and indulgence would increase. But 
 I am a cosmopolite, and know no country ; and 
 what I lose thereby in romance and in your 
 respect, I gain in quiet." 
 
 "And has banishment filled you with no 
 regrets ?" 
 
 "A few — my evening's sorbet, and my jour- 
 nal — my sunny walk in the Jardin des Plantes, 
 and my solitary chamber au quatrieme over- 
 looking the bustle of the Faubourg St. Antoine 
 — an old friend's conversation too — my chil- 
 dren, they may suffer, they have — but the young 
 may bear their own sorrows." 
 
 The conversation seemed to press upon his 
 confidence, so that I discontinued it, and in a
 
 12 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 few moments we entered the little street of 
 Locle. 
 
 " Know you, ifthereisaninnin this village?" 
 asked I of my companion. 
 
 " A wretched auberge, if there be one." 
 
 " I must then find out the mansion of the 
 cure. 
 
 " That will not be difficult, for thither in fact 
 am I at this moment bound." 
 
 I accordingly followed his steps through the 
 village, in which our appearance seemed to ex- 
 cite little attention. The genius of mechanical 
 industry, more pressing, less curious and idle, 
 than that of agriculture, presided there, and 
 neither loom nor hammer rested to allow of 
 scanning the traveller more closely. Man, the 
 machine, laboured on as regularly and inces- 
 santly as the wheels which the stream of the 
 Doubs was turning, and with no trifling roar. 
 
 We clambered up the declivous street. The 
 church surmounted an eminence above the vil- 
 lage, and beyond this, contiguous to his place
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 13 
 
 of worship, stood the comfortable and spacious 
 mansion of the cure. He himself stood in his 
 vine-crowned porch, and immediately greeted 
 his brother elder with a cordial salutation. I 
 too went not without my welcome ; and we 
 three sat down in the porch, overlooking Locle, 
 the Doubs, and its beautiful valley, thus 
 spending the first moments in contemplating 
 the scene, while the evening's repast was 
 brought forth and spread before us. 
 
 " Welcome to our valley, Monsieur La Ver- 
 siere," said the cure, " but you would have been 
 more welcome, had you brought Mademoiselle 
 Cornelie with you." 
 
 "I had no thoughts of wandering so far 
 when I set forth this morning," replied La 
 Versiere, " but my favourite chasse aux fieurs, 
 my botanising mind, led me on even to the 
 brink of my Rubicon yonder, where, by the by, 
 I met Monsieur," turning to me, " and gained 
 from him a lecture upon my want of senti- 
 ment."
 
 14 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 " 'Tis a commodity that the youths of his 
 country abound in, almost as much as in the 
 superfluous wealth, that might dispense with it." 
 
 "That rather is its cause and food," ob- 
 served La Versiere. 
 
 " You may easily exaggerate our stock both 
 of wealth and sentiment," observed I ; " they 
 overflow in a Swiss valley perhaps, while 
 the sources are often dry enough with us at 
 home." 
 
 "But you promised often to bring Made- 
 moiselle Cornelie to see me. The ride would 
 do her good. Our valley at least rivals yours. 
 And the conversation, though but of an old 
 curt, would enliven her." 
 
 " 'Tis true, my reverend friend ; and, what 
 your delicacy forbears to urge, we should take 
 advantage of the only house, the only society, 
 to which we have admission." 
 
 "Nay, nay," said the old cure, "you are 
 strangers in these parts." 
 
 " Strangers still more to our age and gene-
 
 FAMILY. 15 
 
 ration," rejoined La Versiere; "so fortune has 
 willed it." 
 
 " What else can we expect, if we commence 
 by being strangers to the truth ?" 
 
 La Versiere smiled. And I, somewhat in- 
 terested, though uncalled to join in a con- 
 versation not a little enigmatical to me, devoted 
 my attention to the pastoral fare before me, 
 viz. kid for viand, herbs of every kind, and 
 white wine not of the sweetest. Grapes and 
 gruyere terminated the repast. 
 
 " Ossian, however, is often with you," said 
 M. La Versiere. 
 
 " Yes, that son of thine would recompense 
 for the churlishness of a whole family. And 
 yet, I fear, even he is selfish in his visits. The 
 rogue loves my library far better than he loves 
 me. Except his stock of volumes be exhausted, 
 I never see him." 
 
 " Perhaps you have been endeavouring to 
 convert him," said La Versiere with a smile, 
 " if so, Ossian is proud."
 
 16 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 " A sound reason that for his retaining his 
 own opinion." 
 
 " An efficacious and not a dishonourable one, 
 when that opinion is scouted and persecuted." 
 
 The curt passed his hand over his fine fore- 
 head, and smoothed with hard and trembling 
 fingers his thin white locks. He seemed to 
 have the subject, on which he was about to 
 speak, at heart. He was, perhaps, too full of its 
 importance, too agitated, to succeed, if aught 
 it was that he wished to impress upon his 
 tranquil companion : for feeling, though it 
 be the strength of man, appears but weakness 
 to the merely reasoning and the cold. 
 
 " I do not wish, that is, I do not seek, to win 
 you to the truth, La Versiere ; you are over- 
 old, overwise, and too much versed in the ways 
 and wisdom of men, to listen even with pa- 
 tience to the arguments of a rustic and unworthy 
 minister of a creed that you disown. But 
 come, I will make a pact with you, — descend, 
 thou from thy apathy and sneers, I will waive,
 
 FAMILY, 
 
 17 
 
 1 
 
 f possible, my faith and confidence in revelation 
 — we will put ourselves altogether aside — and 
 take into consideration the young and the ris- 
 ing generation, your children, La Versiere."— 
 
 " I understand you." 
 
 "Will you send them forth into the world 
 without a stay, without guide, without conso- 
 lation," continued the pastor, straight losing 
 sight of his stipulation. 
 
 " Nay, now I understand you not," said La 
 Versiere. 
 
 " I mean, that even calling in question the 
 truth of the Great Truth, would it not be wise 
 to arm young minds with a knowledge and 
 conviction of its principles, ere they be sent 
 forth to combat with the world and all its 
 temptations to vice and to wrong?" 
 
 " What arm them with a lie ?" 
 
 " Be decorous, or our pact vanishes. The 
 greatest of your sophists never succeeded or 
 even attempted to degrade Christianity lower 
 than the rank of a probability."
 
 18 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 " Shall I teach it to my children then as a 
 probability ?" 
 
 " I fear, that were vain." 
 
 " I will not stoop to deceive them, were the 
 remote good even proved to me, which it has 
 not been." 
 
 "What then shall be their guide through 
 life?" 
 
 " La Morale." 
 
 "Whose system?" 
 
 " I scarcely can determine." 
 
 The cure smiled, and La Versiere smiling 
 too, added, " In the face of an argumentative 
 antagonist to name a master were not wise." 
 
 " No truly. But I hope, that the system of 
 morals, whose founder you hold so wisely s e_ 
 cret, and which is to be your children's creed 
 and guide, is at least more than a probability, 
 since with such you have professed yourself 
 discontented." 
 
 "The system, if it can be called one, is 
 merely composed of simple truths, and chal-
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 19 
 
 lenges no authority but what reason allows. 
 It makes no promises, and can therefore not 
 deceive." 
 
 " How are its precepts to be enforced, de- 
 prived thus of the agency of hope or fear?" 
 
 " May not a generous mind act without re- 
 ference to either — worship good as good and 
 beautiful — shun evil as disgraceful — " 
 
 " There !" interrupted the cure. 
 
 " Not as disgraceful then," continued La 
 Versiere; " since you will say, that hope and 
 fear would mingle in the motive, and that the 
 opinion of our fellow men would in that case 
 be our arbitrary guides — say, evil is to be 
 shunned as ugly, as offending upright con- 
 sciousness, as marring the ideal of virtue in 
 the mind." 
 
 " Specious and sad," exclaimed the pastor, 
 — " what a frail prop to support one through 
 the world." 
 
 " Ye recluses," said La Versiere smiling, 
 " seem alway to look upon the world as a kind
 
 20 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 of lion's den, or mortal melee, where nothing 
 less than to be armed cap-a pie, the vizor drawn 
 down over the eyes even to blindness, can pre- 
 serve one from destruction." 
 
 " And you, La Versiere," said the cure so- 
 lemnly, and regarding fixedly the person whom 
 he addressed, " can you, a Frenchman, who 
 have been both witness and actor in your 
 country's revolution — you, a Conventionalist, 
 who have been proscribed and proscribing, who 
 have seen the blood of the best flowing like 
 water, in those times when philosophy reigned 
 and Christianity was a crime in your land — can 
 you demur to this life's being called a lion's 
 den ? Can you, who have seen foes and friends 
 hurried to the scaffold, and have seen them too 
 in the more awful act of despatching other 
 victims thither, can you call life aught but a 
 mortal melee? You have seen the fruit of 
 the very principles you now profess. Sown 
 long since, they seemed harmless, nay salutary 
 in their growth, and your parent might not
 
 FAMILY. 21 
 
 have feared them for you. But you have seen 
 them in full effect, in flower and in harvest, 
 and can now choose to sow in your children's 
 minds either the germ of fresh horrors, similar 
 to what you have seen, or in its place a surer 
 seed—" 
 
 Here the nerves of the old man failed his 
 zeal ; and moved by his own excitement as 
 well as by the revolutionary horrors which his 
 fancy brought to his view, his voice faltered, 
 and the tears of emotion trickled down the 
 furrows of his cheek. 
 
 "This vvas not in our pact," said La Versiere, 
 sharing his friend's emotion. 
 
 A silence of some moments ensued, during 
 which the ruffled feelings of, indeed, us three, 
 settled into a far deeper and sweeter calm, than 
 that which preceded our momentary excite- 
 ment. When it was resumed, it vvas with 
 calmer and more harmonious views of the sub- 
 ject. The disputants had learned to respect 
 one another, and minor points touching the
 
 22 the regicide's 
 
 great subject of dispute were brought forward 
 and discussed, not without interest, but still 
 with forbearance and amenity. 
 
 I shall not follow all the windings of their 
 desultory argument, rendered so delightful 
 to me by the character of La Versiere. He 
 was a personage, whom I had become ac- 
 quainted with in history, had esteemed dead 
 (for the revolution, although but thirty years 
 are upon computation found to have elapsed 
 since it raged, is far more than half a century 
 old in the chronology of those, beyond whose 
 actual recollection it dates) — and now to find 
 him before me, re-arguing the old philosophy, 
 and freshly too — it was interesting as a scene 
 of future remembrance. His very impiety, so 
 disgusting at second-hand from the mouths of 
 my compatriots and cotemporaries, seemed to 
 come well from the ancient. It struck me, but 
 as any other idle superstition, in which races 
 of mankind have been educated ; and greedy 
 as I was of information and novelty, his so-
 
 FAMILY. 23 
 
 phisms were as delightful to me, as would have 
 been the traditions of the Hindoo — far more 
 delightful truly, as both more rational, and 
 more demanding the exercise of reason to ap- 
 preciate and detect them. 
 
 At length they came to speak of the latter 
 ends of the irreligious, of Montesquieu, of 
 Hume. The cure reluctantly allowed that the 
 deaths of these men were as calm, as happy, as 
 those of the most resigned and saintly ; and 
 that in the last scene, as well as in the conduct 
 of life, none could have done more honour to 
 humanity. 
 
 I here observed that, " Although certainly 
 the most striking proof of religion was the com- 
 plete and satisfactory manner in which it solved 
 the great enigma of humanity; the universal 
 fitness of it to all men, and to all conditions of 
 men, so that human nature and it seemed, 
 when brought in contact, mutually to corres- 
 pond : yet that to this law, as to all others, 
 there were exceptions, for instance, passionless
 
 24 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 characters, cold and prudent, and therefore re- 
 moved from most of the uneasinesses and anx- 
 ieties of life ; of that even flow of blood and 
 temper, as to be easily ruled and guided by the 
 voice of reason, without vice, without sorrow, 
 without temptation, exempt from the chief 
 pains and pleasures of their fellows, without the 
 pale of humanity, and therefore scarcely ame- 
 nable to its laws. If to all this be added an 
 acute and reasoning mind, made contented by 
 competence and fame, we shall have the great 
 exceptions we have spoken of, may perceive at 
 the same time how much and truly they are 
 exceptions, and how from individuals such as 
 these no conclusion can be drawn against the 
 laws and aids requisite for the rest of mankind. 
 With a view to this world only, it may be said 
 of such a man, of many a person, — he may do 
 without religion, he will prove an honest, moral, 
 worthy member of society without its precepts, 
 — but can this be said of men in general, can 
 it be said of nations ?"
 
 FAMILY. 2 
 
 r 
 
 " Even /fear not/' said La Versiere candidly. 
 
 " Can it be said even of all the members of a 
 family?" urged I; "is it in the nature of chance 
 that they should be all passionless, reason- 
 able, and exempt from that common proneness 
 to ill, which nought but religion can coun- 
 teract ?" 
 
 " That is home," said the curt; " I should 
 have preached for years without coming to 
 the point." 
 
 La Versiere pondered, but still shook his 
 head. 
 
 " To push this gentleman's argument far- 
 ther," continued the curt," with examples that 
 he cannot supply, there is Ossian La Versiere, 
 your eldest son, mild, studious, reasonable, 
 and contemplative, who, young as he is, has 
 worked out for himself a moral system, on 
 which he stands, cold and proud; who metes his 
 smallest actions by a reasoning rule, and who 
 is honourable from self-taught principle, not 
 from the prejudices of men — why him I should 
 
 c
 
 26 the regicide's 
 
 have no fear of, in the most trying scenes of 
 life (it is our pact to put futurity out of the 
 question). But Oscar, your younger boy, the 
 wild, impetuous, weak, passionate Oscar, what 
 system devoid of hope or fear, or without hold 
 upon a thoughtless mind, will uphold him 
 through the life on which he already enters. 
 And Cornelie too, your lovely daughter, sage 
 as she is, if she want not a guide, yet she may 
 want consolation, for is she secure from the 
 ills of life, from ingratitude, injustice, disap- 
 pointment — " 
 
 " This part of your argument I can answer," 
 said La Versiere ; " consolation she will find in 
 her own breast against the bitterest stroke of 
 adversity." 
 
 " I doubt it," said the cure. 
 
 " To be frank in my turn," said I, " I scarcely 
 do. The pride of philosophy consoles the strong 
 mind, almost as much as religion. And it is 
 as moral truth, more than as consolation, that 
 I value the latter."
 
 
 FAMILY. 27 
 
 " You are over-yielding for a believer," said 
 the cure to me. 
 
 " Nay," replied I, " I have too much faith 
 in the strength and truth of religion, to think 
 it needs all the accessaries that men bolster it 
 up withal." 
 
 " Let us not afford sport and speculation 
 to this common foe of ours here. Rather 
 let us unite our powers to persuade him to 
 give up his family, ere it be too late, to my 
 tuition, that I may give them to drink living 
 water." 
 
 " It is too late, my good friend," said La Ver- 
 siere. " You know, I have never forbidden or 
 debarred you what you now ask. My family 
 are within your reach." 
 
 " But without your aid, your open approba- 
 tion, I should not be listened to." 
 
 " That I cannot remedy. I have taught 
 them their father's creed ; if they would 
 change, they are welcome." 
 
 c2
 
 28 the regicide's family. 
 
 The good curt cast up his eyes in hopeless- 
 ness, he shook my hand cordially, as we retired 
 separately to rest; and the parting salutation 
 of La Versiere was scarce less friendly.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Deeper thoughts occupied me upon my couch, 
 than those which generally haunt the idle wan- 
 derer. Solitude has been praised, as favouring 
 serious reflection, I never found it so : having 
 seldom been thoughtful to less purpose, than 
 when abandoned altogether to myself. No- 
 things become then absorbing. The body, 
 wearied, gives the mind excuse for repose; and 
 the greatest intellectual feat of many a solitary 
 journey, undertaken for the wisest and gravest 
 of contemplation, turns out to be some high- 
 piled castle in the air. 
 
 The sun rose not long before me on the fol- 
 lowing morning. The venerable curt was in
 
 30 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 his garden, wearing the same anxious, bene- 
 volent look that I had observed the evening 
 before. It seemed as if sleep had neither 
 lulled nor interrupted the train of his ideas. 
 It had not done so. 
 
 " I am rejoiced at your coming," said he, 
 after the first salutations, " and at your meet- 
 ing with my neighbour. Especially if, as I 
 take you to be, you are both generous and 
 idle." 
 
 " One of the two at least," was my reply. 
 
 " Your society cannot but be of good effect 
 to La Versiere and his interesting family — far 
 more than mine, for I am old, and crabbed, 
 and crazy — moreover they have a prejudice 
 against my garb — the word pretie sounds to 
 them, as it doth to every French ear, like exe- 
 cration." 
 
 *' But me — how know you that my ad- 
 vances " 
 
 " Nay, if you have but the charity, it is suf- 
 ficient. They are shunned here by every re-
 
 FAMILY. 31 
 
 sident, nay, the very peasant dreads to meet or 
 hold converse with La Versiere or any of his 
 family. And were it not that my ministry 
 sanctions my acquaintance, even I should 
 suffer from the contact in the opinions of my 
 virtuous but simple flock. Now you are a 
 stranger, and above prejudice — " 
 
 " Good God! but why all this? what has 
 been their crime ?" 
 
 " You have heard me allude to it," said the 
 pastor. " La Versiere was of the Convention, 
 one of its fiercest Jacobins." 
 
 " Impossible ! — those gray hairs, that mild 
 benevolent countenance, that voice of benig- 
 nant sound — " 
 
 " Alas! in troublous times, chance more 
 than man's nature makes him what he is." 
 
 " True, and this man was a Jacobin, say you, 
 the friend of Robespierre mayhap — " 
 
 " No, not exactly — he even aided in that 
 monster's fall." 
 
 " I breathe, but what then, honourable men
 
 32 the regicide's 
 
 sate in the Convention, nay, might have sate 
 with upright motives amongst the very Jaco- 
 bins. Is this all his crime?" 
 
 " He was one of the regicides," said the 
 cure, in an under voice, " and as such is 
 shunned by all, even by many, whom I have 
 heard to uphold the crime itself as just." 
 
 " Free as you suppose me from prejudice, he 
 is not the man I should select for a friend," 
 
 " Nay, but he is a curiosity to a wandering 
 moralizer. And how fate moreover assigned 
 to him such a part, is beyond conjecture, for 
 he is, even as he looks, mild, benignant, harm- 
 less, the weak instrument of the fierce popu- 
 lar cry perhaps, or of some crafty associate, 
 swept along with a torrent, in which his prin- 
 ciples and creed proved but a sorry stay. I 
 earnestly desire better for his children." 
 
 " If you destine me to be their instructor," 
 replied I, " you will be disappointed. I hold 
 teaching in horror— and independent of that, 
 could not endure the thought of cultivating
 
 / FAMILY. 33 
 
 any one's friendship with a design. No, on my 
 faith, I am no Quixote, spiritual or chivalric — 
 and if the world wants mending, another in- 
 dividual must be found to undertake the 
 task." 
 
 " Nay, I made no such proposal," said the 
 cure, " at least no farther than your pleasure may 
 accord with my design. Oscar La Versiere is 
 spirited, Ossian well-informed, romantic, and 
 inquisitive, the father himself a living volume 
 of history and memoir — his daughter Cornelie 
 lovely—" 
 
 " Say not another word, my reverend 
 friend." 
 
 " Your free, natural, unmeditated conversa- 
 tion is all I reckoned upon to further my de- 
 sign." 
 
 *' You over-value its influence." 
 
 " Not at least the pleasure you will find in 
 exercising it, should the name of regicide not 
 deter you." 
 
 " I own, I like not the sound. But the 
 
 c3
 
 34 the regicide's 
 
 family have not shared in the crime, and are to 
 be commiserated in suffering for it." 
 
 Our conversation was here interrupted by 
 the appearance of the subject of it, who had 
 just risen, and now joined us. 
 
 During the repast, of which we immediately 
 partook, the cure took an opportunity to ques- 
 tion me respecting my route and intentions. 
 Receiving for answer that they were even then 
 uncertain, to see picturesque beauty and follow 
 up adventure being my only plan, La Versiere 
 observed, that perhaps I would have no ob- 
 jection to accompany him home. The invita- 
 tion was coolly given, and arranged ; of this, 
 however, understanding the cause, I did not 
 allow it to stand betwixt me and my curiosity, 
 if I should call the interest I felt by so imper- 
 tinent a name. His offer was therefore frankly 
 and instantly accepted. And soon bidding 
 adieu to the venerable cure, we two bent our 
 steps together eastward, leaving behind us 
 Locle and the Doubs.
 
 FAMILY. 35 
 
 How beautiful was our path, here winding 
 through a cultivated valley, rich in herds and 
 pastures, and tenanted by the immense wooden 
 establishment of a vacherie ; and farther on 
 climbing and surmounting some bleak summit, 
 of which however the barenness and aridity was 
 recompensed by the view that it of a sudden 
 opened into an hundred vales. This is not 
 the region of the loftier Alps, where the view 
 is always barred, either by some peak loftier 
 still than that which one has climbed, or, if a 
 day's labour enable the traveller to gain the 
 higher eminences, by the indistinguishable 
 distance to which the plains are then sunk 
 below. Here, as we stood upon a height, 
 mountain and valley undulated before us, like 
 the waves of a tempestuous sea, sinking on- 
 ward to an extended plain as it approached 
 the horizon, the far surface specked with 
 shining lakes, — whilst nearer and to our 
 right, that of Neufchatel interrupted the suc- 
 cession of ridges and ravines, and lay, its
 
 36 the eegicide's 
 
 farther shore almost the boundary of our 
 prospect. 
 
 La Versiere pointed out to me each place 
 remarkable for either its beauty or recollec- 
 tions, and this not with the vanitv of a man 
 vaunting his native haunts, which is the beset- 
 ting sin of all ciceroms, whether peasants or 
 proprietors, but with imagination pleasingly 
 unoccupied with the all-importance of the 
 scene. It was not merely look here, and look 
 there ; but each name suggested to his tongue 
 some character, or anecdote, or opinion, whim- 
 sical or sound, in hearing and discussing which, 
 the intervals betwixt my raptures and admira- 
 tion of the scene were delightfully passed. 
 He, it is true, did not join in these raptures, 
 but culled his specimen of wild flower or of 
 heath in the mean while. Not that he was 
 dead to rural beauty, but that a little patch of 
 meadow pleased him more than the most far- 
 stretched view. 
 
 " This prospect now, if I allowed it," said
 
 FAMILY. 37 
 
 he, 'f would bring me back to past times, would 
 place me again on the eminences of youth and 
 hope, from whence I looked down upon the 
 world, and began my career through it with 
 ardour. I like not this, it embitters my 
 spirit, and makes me misanthropic, which I 
 would not be. The retrospect over such a 
 vain, cruel, blind, and ungrateful world hardens 
 me. I am like Lot's wife," continued the old 
 man smiling, and quoting a volume that he 
 was not unfamiliar with, "if I look back, I be- 
 come indurated." 
 
 In the nook of a far distant vale, La Ver- 
 siere pointed out to me the place of his re- 
 treat, surrounded by dark pine groves, and se- 
 parated by them from a village or hamlet of a 
 few shepherds' huts. The ridge of the hill 
 above was crowned with fir, of which its 
 rugged, serrated, but highly picturesque out- 
 line here and there displayed a gap, through 
 which some impetuous gust had forced itself a 
 passage. The same wood but partially covered
 
 38 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 the side of the hill, and where the axe had made 
 inroads, bright pastures and chalets appeared, 
 pleasingly contrasted with the dark groves 
 above and around. It was a beautiful situa- 
 tion, but over-retired, and even in summer led 
 one to think upon its dreariness, when snows 
 and winter winds prevailed. 
 
 Little more than an hour's farther walk 
 brought us to the gate of the little mansion — 
 in England it would have been called a cot- 
 tage, in France a chateau. And whatever 
 seemed dreary in its distant appearance, va- 
 nished altogether upon nearer approach. The 
 hand of taste and care appeared in all its alen- 
 tours: vineyard and orchard, fruits and flowers 
 appeared, tended by more active hands than 
 that of my old companion. Climbing shrubs 
 seemed almost to weigh down the rustic porch; 
 and the wide windows widely open (one charm 
 of the south) displayed all the apartments of 
 the house. 
 
 There was more fragrance than furniture
 
 FAMILY. 39 
 
 within — but what of that? — Comelie bounded 
 forth to welcome her father, and me as a 
 stranger afterward, with some surprise but with 
 no embarrassment, not even using the art, as 
 she approached me, of divesting her coun- 
 tenance of the glad smile, which the sight of 
 her father had called up. Her look and presence 
 shed a feeling of happiness instantly around 
 me. Alas ! that smile, and the flush which 
 accompanied it, soon vanished, and I saw, 
 that such was not her habitual mien, that joy 
 dwelt not with her, nor even visited her breast, 
 except upon such brief occasions as that I first 
 witnessed. 
 
 The countenance of Cornelie La Versiere, 
 one from a hurried glance would describe as 
 that of a Minerva. It was that however of 
 a French Minerva, differing little in outline 
 from the Grecian, except perhaps that the 
 nose was longer, and somewhat compressed. 
 Her large dark eye was also far too expres- 
 sive for that of a mere abstraction or fabulous
 
 40 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 personage; and there was a melancholy in it, 
 that would have ill befitted Olympus. It was 
 the gravity of her gait and demeanour, proba- 
 bly, that afterwards suggested to me the re- 
 semblance, heightened by an antique mode of 
 coiffure, that she had adopted more in obedi- 
 ence to her father's taste than to her own. 
 He had been guided by classical and repub- 
 lican associations in the selection of her name; 
 the same feelings, to which his exile and mis- 
 fortunes still more attached him, for La Ver- 
 siere considered himself as a martyr to the 
 cause of liberty, made him delight to look upon 
 his daughter as a Roman or a Grecian maiden. 
 He regretted indeed, that he had not named her 
 Portia — but that would have been arrogance. 
 Thus much of Cornelie's character had been 
 acquired and put upon her. Much however 
 had been natural. And now all was nature 
 and unaffected in her. If aught of the grave 
 or the antique had been superinduced upon 
 her simple character, it had been grafted so
 
 FAMILY. 41 
 
 young, that the grown plant betrayed no sign 
 of bearing other than its own fruit. 
 
 Her brother Ossian — it strikes the reader 
 no doubt, as it did me, how absurd and in 
 how little keeping it was to have two members 
 of a family, the one named from Livy, the 
 other from Macpherson. But in the early 
 days of the French revolution, the mania for 
 Celtic antiquity rivalled, in poetic taste at 
 least, even that for classic. Buonaparte him- 
 self was a declared admirer and patron of the 
 son of Fingal, and previous to that general's ce- 
 lebrity, Ossian was no less a favourite with the 
 Directory and the leaders of the Convention. 
 Obedient to the whim of the day, and com- 
 pelled indeed to some such choice, since Chris- 
 tian saints and names were out of fashion, La 
 Versiere called his two sons Ossian and Oscar, 
 as their elder sister had been doomed by the 
 antecedent taste, to bear the name of the mo- 
 ther of the Gracchi. 
 
 Her brother Ossian soon made his appear-
 
 42 the regicide's 
 
 ance, armed with a volume of Bernardin St. 
 Pierre, and Oscar, soon after, clad in a cha- 
 mois hunter's garb, having just returned from 
 an expedition of the kind amongst the Alps. 
 The elder brother was slight of form, mild of 
 countenance, and dark, in features somewhat 
 resembling Cornelie ; Oscar was fair-haired, 
 ruddy, huge of limb, and of a monstrous 
 hand, in appearance well befitting his name, 
 notwithstanding his southern birth. 
 
 It is a delightful scene to see parents and 
 children meet, when they are all in all to each 
 other. Let me add, this is much more and 
 oftener the case in France than it is with us. 
 There may be the same affection perhaps, but 
 it is more sombre and tacit; such ties with 
 us want the tenderness and devotedness, 
 which they possess on the continent. We are 
 more animal in this department of our domes- 
 tic affections ; we rear with love, with atten- 
 tion, but no sooner find our offspring indepen- 
 dent of us in reason and strength, than we
 
 FAMILY. 43 
 
 turn them forth to form other affections, and 
 a domestic circle for themselves. The child 
 of a French parent may be said to be never 
 weaned. 
 
 They lose no doubt by this much of our 
 boldness, originality, and independence of 
 character : but to a moral contemplatist, like 
 myself, they gain far more in the interest 
 which they excite. 
 
 His children gathered around old La Ver- 
 siere, questioned him of his stay, its cause, of 
 M. Thouin, the venerable pastor, of me, of a 
 thousand trifles moreover, and all, including 
 the rough Oscar himself, with a tenderness, 
 that was touching. It affected me. It was 
 new. 
 
 La Versiere perceived what I felt, and said, 
 "You see, the affections of the lonely, undis- 
 sipated abroad, are concentrated at home. 
 They overflow with us; indeed, we have some 
 little that we could spare," continued he, shak- 
 ing off both Ossian and his sister.
 
 44 the regicide's 
 
 " And I am sure," said Ossian, "we do be- 
 stow affection and attention elsewhere. I 
 have your old friend St. Pierre here, Oscar 
 has his gun. And Cornelie" — here the youth 
 checked himself, as if he was approaching a 
 forbidden or delicate subject. 
 
 And his father, interrupting him, said, 
 " Come, I beg you to employ some of your 
 surplus friendship in welcoming this English 
 gentleman. His coming deserves it as an era, 
 for except Monsieur Thouin, he is truly the 
 first, friend or stranger, that has ever crossed 
 our threshold, since we came." 
 
 " What friends or visitors could we possi- 
 bly have in this lone region, and in a land 
 which does not produce gentry ?" said Oscar 
 proudly, seeking to indicate his rank in so- 
 ciety before a stranger. 
 
 "An Englishman!" ejaculated Ossian at 
 the same time that his brother spoke. Cor- 
 nelie, without the ejaculation, directed her eyes 
 towards me with the same expression of cu-
 
 FAMILY. 45 
 
 riosity. Oscar too caught the information of 
 what country I was of from the mouth of 
 Ossian, and looked too, but without any of 
 that friendly feeling in his countenance, which 
 his father had invoked in my favour. 
 
 " Your look, Oscar, seems to say, that an 
 Englishman was the last person you expected 
 to behold here." 
 
 " It was my thought," replied the young man. 
 " Have Frenchmen, then, been so good, so 
 grateful to us," asked the father. 
 
 " I have no wish," said Oscar bitterly, " but 
 to see both countries expire in the gripe of 
 each other." 
 
 " Fie, brother," said Ossian. 
 "That, I think, is a specimen of our super- 
 fluous affections," added the old man, nowise 
 moved by his son's bitterness. 
 
 " Monsieur has been most kind to accom- 
 pany you, father," said Cornelie, " especially 
 to this dull and retired corner, the amusements 
 of which you surely did not exaggerate."
 
 46 the regicide's 
 
 " Not I in truth," said La Versiere ; " I did 
 not make mention of even any one of you, 
 holding out as an inducement merely an old 
 hermit's converse." 
 
 I said something complimentary, as may 
 be supposed. 
 
 " Monsieur shall not lack amusements," 
 said Ossian, who evidently warmed to the 
 stranger more than either his brother or sister, 
 " I have walks, and books, and curiosity to 
 employ him, father has recollections, and 
 Oscar's gun or Cornelie's harp will surely 
 come in at intervals to ward off ennui." 
 
 " If Monsieur is fond of sport," cried Oscar, 
 kindling up, and becoming friendly at the 
 thought. 
 
 " I shall be delighted to accompany you to 
 the mountains," said I. 
 
 " Will you," cried Oscar, coming forward, 
 and grasping my hand. 
 
 Cordiality was infectious, and as its smile 
 was lit up in every countenance, Cornelie
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 47 
 
 swept the chords of her harp, and sung to a 
 little air of Gretry's a song, of which the fol- 
 lowing is a translation : 
 
 When cold from me the world hath turned, 
 
 And fortune fled away, 
 When dim the lamp of friendship burned, 
 
 And love withheld its ray : 
 Oh then, the wild rose on the thorn, 
 
 The bird upon the tree, 
 The sweet and lonely breath of morn, 
 
 Were friends enough for me. 
 
 When solitude my soul oppressed, 
 
 When recollection broke 
 At times on mine oblivious rest, 
 
 And all the past awoke : 
 Oh then, the brawling of the stream, 
 
 The music of the bee, 
 The motes that people the sunbeam, 
 
 Were soothing friends to me. 
 
 When even the face of nature shed 
 
 A gloom upon my heart, 
 And when that fiend, despair, I bade 
 
 In vain, and oft, depart: 
 Oh then, the noisy crowd beneath, 
 
 The dance, or, it may be, 
 The wayfarer upon the heath, 
 
 Were welcome friends to me.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Hours and days glided on so happily for me, 
 that whether their sum would have formed 
 weeks or months, my memory neither could 
 then nor can now determine. Out of doors, 
 Ossian was my constant companion : wood and 
 fell, lake, ravine, and torrent, we explored to- 
 gether, never weary of the scene, never weary 
 of each other. A mixture of curiosity and re- 
 verence first attached him to me as an Eng- 
 lishman ; and as the former became gratified 
 and allayed upon acquaintance, the latter set- 
 tled into that firm and tender friendship, 
 which a youth may inspire, and entertain for 
 a man some ten or twelve years his senior.
 
 THE REGICIDE'S FAMILY. 49 
 
 Like all young Frenchmen, Ossian La Ver- 
 siere had had no education whatsoever, none, at 
 least, of what we should call education. He 
 had acquired a smattering of Latin, and what 
 he knew of the classic writers of that language 
 was gathered more from hearsay than perusal. 
 At the university, he had listened to a course 
 or two of philosophical lectures, in which in- 
 efficient mode of teaching no sort of philoso- 
 phy had been taught. There had been no text- 
 book or standard work set down for either 
 teaching or learning, each professor being left 
 to his whim, his pedantry, or his ignorance to 
 preach what, and from what master he pleased. 
 As his school was not confined to the students 
 of the university alone, but was also fashiona- 
 bly attended, he consulted his own vanity in 
 his declamations, rather than the advantage of 
 his pupils ; and the eloquent mysticism and 
 paradoxes which he ambitiously uttered ex ca- 
 thedra, were merely calculated to raise the lec- 
 turer's own character with the world as a man 
 
 D
 
 50 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 of talent, instead of producing either advan- 
 tage or instruction to the young. In the col- 
 lege, where Ossian had followed his studies, 
 one professor regularly lectured upon revolu- 
 tions and government and the history of his 
 country, thus plunging the young mind into 
 the labyrinth of politics, ere it had been pro- 
 vided with the clue of moral principle. An- 
 other taught philosophy forsooth, that is, ut- 
 tered critical commentaries on Condillac and 
 Kant, replete with that epigrammatic truth, 
 that is at once so very piquant and so little 
 instructive, that would convey pleasure per- 
 haps to the idle readers of a periodical work, 
 but which to young students was worse than 
 mummery. Think merely of making a class of 
 youths, of boys, go through a course of Ger- 
 man philosophy, the German philosophy of 
 yesterday, philosophy that even Dugald 
 Stewart declares is either nonsense or caviare 
 to him. This one absurdity is sufficient to 
 give an idea of the state of public education in
 
 FAMILY. 51 
 
 France, where, appended to this enlightened, 
 novel, and unprejudiced mode of teaching phi- 
 losophy, in contradistinction to our Gothic 
 modes at Cambridge and Oxford, is such a 
 scholastic winding up of study, as that of 
 doing one's Rhetoric. 
 
 Ossian listened attentively to the political 
 lecturer of his college, to the philosophical 
 lecturer of the same, both of which instructors 
 supplied him with zeal at least, if not with 
 ideas ; and finally he did his Rhetoric, as the 
 cant of the Pays Latin has it ; in other words, 
 wrote a theme or two, with credit to his in- 
 dustry and talents. 
 
 When, however, young Ossian hoped to fol- 
 low up his career by studying for the French 
 bar, or, as they say, attempted to j aire son 
 droit, he found, poor youth, that he had "fallen 
 on evil days, and evil times." There was a 
 secret, but not the less virulent reaction on the 
 part of the restored government, not against its 
 old enemies, for they were extinct or in obli- 
 
 d2
 
 52 the regicide's 
 
 vion tantamount, but against the innocent off- 
 spring of those revolutionary characters. Os- 
 sian La Versiere was denied the permission of 
 inscribing his name to become an advocate. 
 He demanded a reason for his exclusion : 
 meanness was added to malice in the dictation 
 of the answer, which was, that they could ad- 
 mit or recognize no student with the Heathen 
 Christian name of Os si an. 
 
 Oscar, who had been at the Ecole Poly- 
 technique previous to the restoration, and who, 
 then but a youth, had been wounded in eigh- 
 teen hundred and fourteen, on the heights of 
 Mont Martre, defending with his school-fel- 
 lows the capital of their country against the 
 Russians — Oscar too found himself debarred 
 of a profession upon the restoration of the 
 Bourbons. He quitted the school, but could 
 never make his way into the ranks of the 
 army. 
 
 Long had old La Versiere consoled himself 
 upon the failure of his own schemes of ambi-
 
 FAMILY. 53 
 
 tion, upon his ill success in life, and conse- 
 quent narrowness of fortune, by the thought 
 that his children would commence the world 
 with better prospects, and in better times ; 
 when a government at once settled and free 
 would preclude for his offspring the possibili- 
 ties of the crimes and misfortunes into which 
 he had himself fallen ; and would at the same 
 time open to them legitimate paths of ambi- 
 tion, in which their own talent, joined to their 
 father's experience, might enable them to ad- 
 vance. Whatever acts he had joined in, what- 
 ever virulence he had seemingly partaken of, 
 he hoped that his age and a quarter of a cen- 
 tury's lapse would sink such recollections in 
 oblivion, especially under the reign of the de- 
 scendants of the generous Henry the Fourth. 
 At worst, thought he, what are exile or tor- 
 ture to these old limbs, surely they cannot 
 visit the father's principles upon his chil- 
 dren? 
 
 They did so, nevertheless. Not that the
 
 54 the regicide's 
 
 restored Louis was either vengeful or despotic ; 
 but that in France so closely woven was and 
 still remains its population in the spider web 
 of tyranny and servility, that were the Prince 
 himself a Trajan, we should find his govern- 
 ment carried on, in his despite, by a body of 
 Sejani. 
 
 Exiled himselfbyname, LaVersi&re retired to 
 Switzerland. Shut out from every profession, 
 from every means of earning their bread, his 
 sons had no inducement to rsmain behind. 
 And Cornelie, but more of her hereafter. 
 
 Seeking to banish disaffection from the 
 minds of its subjects, the French government 
 largely created it. Oscar, bred to war, yet de- 
 nied enrolment in the armies of his country, 
 became one of those discontented, martial 
 spirits, ready to join the standard of revolt 
 wherever it was raised. Ossian, instead of be- 
 ing allowed to merge his enthusiasm in the 
 Pandects and the Code, was turned adrift to 
 read Rousseau, Condillac, Condorcet ; and as
 
 FAMILY. 55 
 
 letters seemed the only career open to him — 
 that one of which misfortune so often points 
 out the path to genius, — he was turned forth 
 to become, as far as his talent would enable 
 him, a publiciste and an apostle of liberty, in- 
 stead of directing hispeaceable course towards 
 the bar, and treading in the illustrious steps 
 of Isambert or Dupin. 
 
 To what moral guide the brothers were 
 abandoned, I have before hinted at. The last 
 stroke of fortune had deprived their parent's 
 mind of energy, as well as of hope. Thought- 
 less of, even if not denying, the very existence 
 of a Providence, he ceased to deliver the pre- 
 cepts of morality, which he had been wont to 
 impress upon his children, and, save now and 
 then an advice or a word respecting their per- 
 sonal safety or worldly prudence, La Versiere 
 abandoned them altogether to their disposi- 
 tions and their fate. He still loved them, but 
 it was with a mute, sad love, conscious of its 
 want of power to impart or bequeath aught to
 
 56 the regicide's 
 
 the objects of it, not even a hope in immor- 
 tality or a belief in virtue. He was a most 
 unhappy father, whenever he thought, when- 
 ever his spirits were low, or his mood contem- 
 plative. 
 
 " Good God !" thought I to myself, " place 
 a Christian in this state of exile, surrounded 
 by such a family, and what a picture of hap- 
 piness would it present? Every deprivation 
 would be converted into a source of happiness, 
 and every misfortune, like the bee with its 
 sting drawn, would yield nothing but sweet." 
 
 I repeated this to La Versiere, he smiled — 
 to Ossian, and the youth stared without com- 
 prehending me. 
 
 Ossian was my chief and constant com- 
 panion. Indeed it was through friendship to 
 him, and the continued acceding to his en- 
 treaties, that I remained so long with the 
 family. The old Conventionalist himself was 
 friendly and entertaining ; but it was at few 
 periods of the day, and then but for a short
 
 FAMILY. 57 
 
 time, that he could support society or con- 
 versation — the lethargy of age was creeping 
 fast upon him. Oscar was abroad amongst 
 the hills ; and even more domestic hours, 
 which he could not have employed in the 
 pursuit of game, I perceived that he spent 
 elsewhere than at home. The lovely Cornelie 
 was sad and cold to me, absorbed, it seemed, 
 in grief, of which I was restrained by delicacy 
 from inquiring the cause. Her eyes, indeed, 
 never betrayed tears, even though past; but 
 her pale cheek, abstracted thoughts, or atten- 
 tion, when she deigned such, constrained, 
 alienated, as well as interested me. She was 
 often about to be amiable, when recollection 
 checked the propensity of her nature — the 
 smile subsided, the look of confidence died 
 away : — and I was compelled to shun a so- 
 ciety, which put me to pain and made me ill 
 at ease. Yet I overheard her solitude at 
 times, when her harp spoke, and her voice 
 with it, in tones so pathetic and feeling, that 
 
 d3
 
 58 THE regicide's 
 
 I was sure some latent cause must exist, that 
 marred the harmony of her temper, and made 
 it jangle, "like sweet bells out of tune," so as 
 to fret and sadden all around, whom she was 
 born to charm. 
 
 Ossian, however, was never-failing as a 
 companion, in the ready mood, either to listen 
 or talk, to trifle or be serious, with amiable 
 deference and sufficient pride. He was, in- 
 deed, somewhat too indefatigable in his pur- 
 suit of argument or opinion : and I have 
 started to find him at my bed-side ere sun-rise, 
 ready to commence the moment I opened my 
 eyes, with, " What you said is very true, but 
 then I cannot but think — " 
 
 " Pray, when did I say any such thing ?" 
 " Last night before we separated." 
 The hours of sleep had brought to-his young 
 mind no anxious thought to interrupt or chase 
 away the thread of his speculations. This 
 was at times troublesome, but in sum de- 
 lightful to me. It made me feel an interest
 
 FAMILY. 59 
 
 in many subjects, well worthy interest the 
 most profound, which in the world or alone 
 I had lightly considered or cursorily glanced 
 at. Our elders, or our contemporaries and 
 equals in talents and acquirements, may in 
 general prove the best society for improve- 
 ment. And yet to listen to superiors, or come 
 into collision with rivals, will often have less 
 effect in strengthening the intellect, in making 
 it fathom and comprehend itself, than simply 
 bringing it in contact with that of a junior or 
 a child. 
 
 For whole days would he question me re- 
 specting England, whose institutions and cha- 
 racter he had learned to venerate ; though it 
 was late ere he could do so — ere he could 
 shake off the atrocious idea which he had 
 been first taught to entertain of our island 
 — ere he could see the falsehood as well 
 as the malignity of the cuckoo-song of Le 
 Brun, 
 
 " Avare et perfide Angleterre," &c.
 
 60 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 Like most of his generous and enthusiastic 
 young countrymen, Ossian now flew from one 
 extreme to the other; and from believing Eng- 
 land to be the mother of treachery and avarice 
 in the political world, as well as that of bar- 
 barism in taste and civilization, he was ready 
 to fall down and worship her supremacy in all 
 things. This, no doubt, was the great link 
 betwixt us. 
 
 Literary arguments we had in abundance ; 
 and my opinions on this score shocked him as 
 much, and appeared as great heresies to him, 
 as did the opinions in more serious matters, 
 which he had been taught and of course pro- 
 fessed, appear to me. When I considered Vol- 
 taire's Tales to be inferior imitations of the 
 style of Swift,* he was aghast ; and when I 
 called his beloved Bernardin St. Pierre's 
 description of the physical effects of puberty 
 upon ' Virginie,' to be worse than indecorous, 
 to be beastly, Ossian did not speak to me for 
 * * Micromegas' and the ' Quinze-Vingts' perhaps excepted.
 
 FAMILY. 61 
 
 four-and-twenty hours, so indignant and hurt 
 was he at the remark. 
 
 A conversation of this kind took place one 
 afternoon The argument turned upon pas- 
 sionate novels, and was, if I remember right, 
 suggested by a volume of" Delphine" happen- 
 ing to lie upon the table, a work that Ossian 
 had lately borrowed and perused. After some 
 critical discussions, that would be here out of 
 place, Ossian said, that "it had cost him a 
 world of tears." 
 
 "What work has not, my dear Ossian?" 
 said Cornelie: " Your tears are so near to your 
 eyes, that the sorriest ballad causes them. to 
 overflow." 
 
 " They are the dew of the spirit," observed 
 the poetic Ossian, " sweet and refreshing 
 after the long, garish, overpowering day-light 
 ofworldliness." 
 
 " It is unmanly," said Cornelie. 
 
 " I know not what their appearance may be. 
 But I should esteem them more likely to nerve
 
 62 the regicide's 
 
 the arm, than to make it falter, in the hour 
 when courage is required." 
 
 "But the characteristics, the outward ap- 
 pearance of courage is useful, as often super- 
 seding the necessity of putting it to the proof," 
 said the old man. 
 
 " That may be true," replied Ossian, " but of 
 what value is the mere mask of manhood, com- 
 pared with the precious gift of sensibility, 
 which, as my friend here describes religion to 
 do, in causing us to sympathize with the sor- 
 rows of our brethren, extracts the bitterness 
 from our own." 
 
 " I do believe, Ossian, thou wert born to be 
 a devotee." 
 
 Ossian blushed at a taunt, which accused 
 him of deserting the philosophic creed of his 
 father, and of being unable to support the dig- 
 nity of free thought. 
 
 " And have I never seen you to weep, Cor- 
 nelie," said her brother. 
 
 " Not over ideal woes."
 
 FAMILY. 63 
 
 " Not even when they happened to resemble 
 your own — when they were the counterpart of 
 what troubled your own heart ?" 
 
 "My heart, me !" said Cornelie, blushing 
 in her turn. 
 
 " Nay, sister, we all have feelings, as well 
 as sorrows. Your taunt called the blood to 
 my cheeks ; and I have had my revenge, — more 
 than my revenge," added he, as he perceived 
 the abjured tears roll down Cornelie's cheek. 
 
 He stepped forward to take her by the hand, 
 when she abruptly quitted the room. 
 
 " How absurd and contradictory," said Os- 
 sian, turning to me, for his father was by this 
 time dosing asleep, " are all our little vani- 
 ties. Here I, whom the enmity of fortune has 
 merely chased from a crowded city and trou- 
 blesome hopes to sweet retirement and study, 
 and who am truly happy in all moods, pride 
 myself upon my capabilities of gratuitous suf- 
 fering and sorrow ; whilst Cornelie, whose 
 heart has been wrung by ingratitude, prides
 
 64 the regicide's family. 
 
 herself on being hardened, and proof against 
 grief." 
 
 " Not absurd, but natural," observed I, 
 " that we should welcome that degree of sen- 
 sibility which affords us pleasure, and turn 
 against and defy the feeling when it swells 
 to bitterness and anguish. But Cornelie — 
 her melancholy has long inspired me with in- 
 terest and curiosity, dare I inquire of you the 
 cause?" 
 
 " I had purposed to tell you," said Ossian, 
 " and will at once relate it. But the pine- 
 grove will be the fittest scene for the story. 
 We will step forth."
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Cornelie's story may be briefly told. An 
 officer of gallantry and merit under Napoleon 
 had become attached to her ; and she, an ad- 
 mirer of heroism, soon returned his affection 
 two-fold. Unfortunately for both, his career had 
 begun late, and fell upon those disastrous times 
 when the military glory of France was in the 
 wane. The expedition to Russia had called 
 him off from their meditated nuptials; and, 
 although he returned from the North with ho- 
 nour and rank increased, still the invasion now 
 imminent on France, and the perils that me- 
 naced his Sovereign, allowed Colonel Girouette 
 no leisure for private happiness. Cornclie
 
 66 the regicide's 
 
 herself was as much interested in public events 
 as her lover, and would have scorned, even 
 more than he, to proceed with her own private 
 plans of felicity, during the great struggle 
 between contending principles and nations. 
 Little attached previously to Napoleon, whom 
 she looked upon as the Gallic Caesar, the con- 
 queror of his country's foes, but still the de- 
 stroyer of its liberty, hers, with many another 
 heart, that beat with patriotism and a love of 
 freedom, rallied in the despot's favour, when 
 they beheld, what they deemed, a more perni- 
 cious cause about to triumph over him. She 
 forgot his tyranny, his crimes, his ambition ; 
 and considering him but as the glorious repre- 
 sentative of that revolution, in which her parent 
 had acted so proud a part, and of which she 
 might call herself a child, she felt every wish 
 and vow of her breast rise in his behalf. In this 
 indeed, however unjust as a lover of liberty — 
 for Louis must evidently reign constitutionally, 
 and Napoleon as evidently could not — she was
 
 FAMILY. 67 
 
 not unreasonable, as the triumph of royalty- 
 over revolution in the persons of their os- 
 tensible chiefs, would infallibly degrade her 
 parent and his family from the consideration 
 in which hitherto they had been held, nay, 
 might drive the old Conventionalist into exile, 
 or place his very head in peril. 
 
 Great as was the abyss of misfortune into 
 which the family seemed about to plunge, 
 Cornelie did not fathom it altogether : the 
 worst came unexpectedly upon her. The 
 allies entered Paris : there ensued for her half 
 a year of humiliation and despair, for Girou- 
 ette did not blush to retain his epaulettes 
 under the new regime. Napoleon came from 
 Elba; Cornelie breathed again, and to her 
 joy, her lover re-drew his sword for his old 
 master, and marched to the field of Waterloo. 
 The sword of the Colonel was drawn in vain, 
 and was left upon the field of battle. Being, 
 however, not one of the most conspicuous 
 traitors, and having the requisite audacity
 
 68 the regicide's 
 
 and suppleness to shew himself once more at 
 the Thuilleries on the king's return, the 
 Colonel obtained another sword, made the bee 
 on his accoutrements give place once more to 
 the lily, the imperial crown to the regal, and 
 the N to the two interlaced LL's of his new 
 master Louis. 
 
 The high-minded Cornelie was greatly 
 shocked at this fickleness, this apparent 
 want of all firmness and principle on the 
 part of her lover. It answered ill to her lofty 
 ideal of heroism and patriotism ; and for se- 
 veral weeks her consequent contempt of Gi- 
 rouette was supreme. But the Colonel, in 
 despite of all this fickleness, was gallant and 
 good-hearted ; and, moreover, pleaded his 
 cause with a frankness, a good-humour, and 
 with such vivacity, that his frequent change 
 of parties would have seemed, at least to the 
 eyes of any other lady than Cornelie La 
 Versiere, to become this esprit volage, as much 
 as fickleness in affairs of the heart was con-
 
 FAMILY. 69 
 
 sidered to become the gay gallant of the last 
 ao-e. Then Girouette's was not a singular 
 case : if he had sinned, some hundred thousand 
 of his comrades had sinned with him ; and 
 such numbers, we know, can be brought be- 
 fore no tribunal — 'tis madness to accuse them 
 — " c'est quereller avec le genre humain" as 
 De Stael says, and seems to think an ab- 
 surdity. 
 
 La Versiere too, — and if one feeling pre- 
 dominated over another in the breast of Cor- 
 nelie, it was that of love and devotion towards 
 her parent — came with his worldly views and 
 reasonings to the aid of Girouette. Much he 
 argued upon human nature, and the way of 
 the world, much on the trying circumstances 
 of the times, which those, he said, who were 
 above in fortune, might be above in conduct. 
 
 The Duke of T , retired upon his property, 
 
 acquired during a long and glorious career, 
 and as secure to him as his fame in history, 
 may keep aloof from either party, and care
 
 70 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 not much which wins, but Girouette, who has 
 nought but his commission — 
 
 " Nay but, dear father," would Cornelie in- 
 terrupt, ft consider ourselves in ancient Rome, 
 or put such excuses for a hero into the mouth 
 of Plutarch, and how should we exclaim?" 
 
 " Were we in Rome, dear Cornelie, we 
 should do as Romans. But here we are in 
 Paris." 
 
 "Why then was I given a Roman name?" 
 "We were fools enough in those days to 
 believe that a name bestowed heroism, as well 
 as virtue and freedom. We have found since, 
 that names are but names." 
 
 " I would at least act up to mine." 
 " Cornelia," said La Versiere, " was known 
 but as the mother of the Gracchi. She herself 
 lived in the times this aristocracy triumphed, 
 and was contented to live in, nay wed in such 
 adverse times, that she might rear up children 
 to be the assertors of her country's liberty. 
 If you wed not this honourable suitor, who in
 
 FAMILY. 71 
 
 this new reign will not fear to woo, or even 
 approach, the daughter of a regicide ?" 
 
 Cornelie felt the force of her father's argu- 
 ments, nay, she felt even more than he urged 
 in behalf of Colonel Girouette : and this was, 
 that, tainted as she must allow his patriotism 
 and public honour to be in some degree, his 
 private honour remained whole and untouched. 
 Were he not actuated by such, and by a lively 
 attachment moreover, would he continue his 
 addresses to the daughter of a regicide, and 
 still be eager to conclude a connexion, which 
 must so hurt his prospects, and stand as a 
 mighty obstacle betwixt him and the patron- 
 age of the now reigning family. This argued 
 disinterestedness. This demanded gratitude. 
 And in consequence of such reflections, still 
 sighing and regretting, nevertheless, that her 
 love had fallen from her ideal of heroic per- 
 fection, Cornelie rendered to Girouette the 
 heart that she had half withdrawn. 
 
 The soldier was again happy. Cornelie had
 
 72 the regicide's 
 
 not been deceived, when she reckoned in him 
 a heart devoted to her. But both she and her 
 father had considerably over-rated his dis- 
 cernment. A son of the revolution himself, 
 altogether unacquainted with the principles 
 and prejudices of the once ancient and now 
 restored government, he formed no idea of 
 the depth in which it still held its old hatreds 
 rooted, of the vengeance and re-action which 
 it meditated. He entertained no fear, that an 
 aged ex-conventionalist, so insignificant and 
 forgotten as La Versiere was now, could ex- 
 cite the attention or resentment of the go- 
 vernment. And in the connexion he was 
 about to form, the soldier at first saw no 
 obstacle, no bar whatever in the way of his 
 advancement. 
 
 Others, however, had the discernment which 
 he wanted. And the whisper that buzzed 
 around the court, some conversations with his 
 comrades in the Salle des Marechaux, soon in- 
 formed him, that it would be prudent to delay
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 73 
 
 a little at least the completion of his marriage 
 with the daughter of La Versiere. 
 
 Corn61ie saw this delay, and arrived at the 
 comprehension of its cause with indignation 
 ill-stifled. Her parent, however, wary and pru- 
 dential, rather prized his future son-in-law the 
 more for his caution. The ambition, too, of 
 the old man had of late become awakened by 
 the free government, which Louis thought 
 either proper or prudent to octroy to his people. 
 There was about to be an election of represen- 
 tatives for the lower legislative chamber, and 
 La Versiere, after more than twenty years' re- 
 tirement from public cares or business, ea- 
 gerly plunged once more into the vortex of 
 intrigue. His object was one of nicety and 
 difficulty; and at length he promised himself 
 success, through the medium of a princely and 
 sacerdotal personage to whose party, in case 
 of his election, he promised to attach himself. 
 One would think, that the preliminary sacri- 
 
 E
 
 74 THE REGICIDE S 
 
 fice of independence might have disgusted the 
 veteran statesman: — but no, he was resolved 
 to fish in troubled waters at any price. 
 
 His ambition hastened his ruin and dis- 
 grace. He was elected, and no sooner re- 
 turned to the chamber, than he was expelled, 
 and voted ineligible. But for the notoriety 
 which this (for his expulsion had not passed 
 without a fierce debate) drew around him, the 
 old Conventionalist might perhaps have been 
 permitted to linger out his days in his beloved 
 Paris. But now he was obliged to fly; and 
 thus by a last, weak, listening to ambition, 
 the old man not only expatriated himself, but 
 ruined the hopes of his family. 
 
 Cornelie alone seemed to rise superior to 
 misfortune, and rejoice in the political mar- 
 tyrdom, which she considered her parent to 
 suffer. It shed also around his decline a 
 blaze of notoriety, which her filial love mis- 
 took for fame. And she was not sorry, that
 
 FAMILY. 75 
 
 there was now an opportunity of putting to 
 the proof the depth of her lover's attachment, 
 and the true temper of his mind. 
 
 If she wished for this, fortune had been 
 ungraciously kind in granting her desire. For 
 it did indeed put Col. Girouette's attachment 
 to the proof. Not that it abated his love ; 
 for his, though a soul of alloy, was not alto- 
 gether of baser metal. But it certainly put 
 other and weighty considerations into the op- 
 posite scale, which balanced and kept most in- 
 decisive his resolutions respecting his mistress. 
 When the La Versieres, however, departed 
 for Switzerland, he took leave of her with 
 every symptom of true and desperate attach- 
 ment. Cornelie's grief still partook of con- 
 tempt. Ossian looked on and believed the 
 Colonel's sincerity ; whilst Oscar, boy as 
 he was, was with difficulty restrained from 
 defying him to mortal combat, or run- 
 ning him through without waiting for such 
 preliminary. 
 
 e2
 
 76 the regicide's 
 
 Two or three years had since elapsed. Sen- 
 timents on all sides seemed to have remained 
 much the same, save that the secretly-con- 
 veyed threats of Oscar, had tended more than 
 even Girouette's worldliness totally to break 
 off the affair. 
 
 Corn61ie too, though she had loved, might 
 be said to have ceased to love. * Visions of 
 hope no longer made part of her dreams, or 
 came to cheer the sorrows of her waking soli- 
 tude. Thoughts of ingratitude and disap- 
 pointment seemed alone to possess her. A 
 hatred and distrust of the world was the senti- 
 ment evident throughout her conversation, 
 unless at times, when her woman's heart re- 
 luctantly betrayed itself. Her affections were 
 thrown back upon her, and were only pre- 
 vented from rankling into utter misanthropy 
 by the love which she bore her parent. To 
 that they turned. For all impulses of affec- 
 tion spring from the same source, and from 
 the same want : if disappointed in one ob-
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 77 
 
 ject, or shut from one exit, they make their 
 escape and rush towards another. 
 
 Yet it is in vain that one seeks to concen- 
 trate or contain the many and mighty im- 
 pulses of a great passion within the scope of a 
 smaller one. Cornelie loved, and when she 
 found that she had bestowed her affections 
 upon an unworthy object, it was not with com- 
 plete success that her stoicism endeavoured 
 to transfer her feelings and emotions from love 
 to filial affection. A surplus remained within 
 her breast, and turned to gall. In vain she 
 attempted and affected to contemn the world 
 and her lover : her misanthropy was too bit- 
 ter for her apathy to be complete ; and the 
 outward semblance of tranquillity and cold- 
 ness, which she wore, covered restlessness 
 and anguish. The struggle undermined her 
 health, even more than an abandonment to 
 despair could have done; for here her spirits 
 would have fathomed the depths of sorrow, 
 and rebounded. Whereas she struggled for
 
 78 the regicide's family. 
 
 life near the surface, sunk slowly, and to rise 
 no more. 
 
 Ossian wept, as he recounted to me the 
 causes of his sister's sorrow. " It draws, how- 
 ever, now to a crisis," said he ; " Colonel Gi- 
 rouette has been ordered to Strasbourg, from 
 whence the distance hither is not great. And 
 we shall soon know what his real intentions 
 
 are and have been. If he fail " The young 
 
 man's look bespoke his intentions, and both 
 seemed not less resolute for the natural mild- 
 ness of his character.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 A little matter occurred some time after, 
 which it is of no consequence to set down here, 
 and of as little to allude to, save that as I was 
 of some use, and proved myself friendly to the 
 La Versieres, more indeed from the betrayal 
 of my sentiments, than from any actual benefit 
 that was in my power, our intimacy came to 
 be more closely established. The old man 
 spoke to me as a senior, Oscar no longer shrunk 
 from including me in the reproaches which he 
 frequently cast on Ossian for being a senti- 
 mentalist and a moper over volumes, whilst 
 Cornelie began to feel herself as free and alone
 
 80 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 in my company, as if I was either nobody or 
 one of the family. 
 
 This many may consider as no kind of com- 
 pliment. To me, however, it was the greatest ; 
 being inexorably love-proof, and that for the 
 best of reasons, having fallen in and out of that 
 said predicament one dozen times at least ere 1 
 was twenty, and almost as often since, amongst 
 which the first at thirteen years, and the last 
 at three-and-twenty, I may note down as the 
 most remarkable and serious. Thus the world 
 is to me, nay, the very world of romance is, 
 what the stage was to a thorough-bred critic of 
 the last century, when critics actually went to 
 play-houses, viz. a subject for dissection, not 
 emotion. Hence Cornelie's indifference to my 
 presence was the most welcome, as well as the 
 most flattering of compliments. 
 
 She soon understood, moreover, that Ossian 
 had disclosed to me the story of at once her 
 misanthropy and sorrow. She was neither 
 pleased nor wroth on perceiving this ; — her
 
 FAMILY. 81 
 
 feelings were alike above vain disclosure, or 
 the dread of it : 
 
 *' For there are griefs, my friend, that sufferers hide, 
 And there are grief3, that men display with pride ; 
 But there are other griefs, that, so we feel, 
 We care not to display them nor conceal." 
 
 One morning Monsieur Thouin, the curt al- 
 ready introduced to the reader, made his ap- 
 pearance at our dejeun6. He was welcomed 
 cordially by old La Versiere and his daughter, 
 with delight by Ossian, but with scowls and 
 sullenness by Oscar. I thought at first that 
 this conduct on the part of the youth was mere 
 ill-humour and ill-breeding; but I soon per- 
 ceived from the sternness of the cure's looks, 
 that there did exist some cause, some recent 
 cause yet undiscussed, of displeasure on the 
 cure's part against Oscar, and a consequent 
 fear and sullenness in the latter. The clergy- 
 man's visit was probably occasioned by this 
 very circumstance, whatever it might be ; as 
 he was evidently unexpected, and bespoke in 
 
 e 3
 
 82 the regicide's 
 
 his countenance more serious thoughts than 
 became a visit of friendship. 
 
 The cure, however, kept those thoughts in 
 reserve, he brightened up in a little time, 
 joined in the conversation, assented to the pro- 
 posal of his spending the day, and to all eyes, 
 save those of Oscar and myself, society and 
 friendship appeared the sole motive of his 
 coming. 
 
 " You here yet, Sir," said he, addressing me, 
 " did I not prophesy your amusement?" 
 
 '• It is but a small compliment to such a fa- 
 mily, to say they have interested and detained 
 with them the idlest of all wanderers." 
 
 "Not altogether idle and fruitlessly em- 
 ployed since he has beenhere/'rejoinedThouin, 
 significantly. 
 
 " Altogether," said I. " You remember my 
 declaration." 
 
 " Nay, that cannot be. For the very exist- 
 ence of a rationally religious man amongst in- 
 fidels goes far, without a single argument, to
 
 FAMILY. 83 
 
 shake their blindness and obstinacy, which 
 consists more in contempt for what they call 
 superstition, than in any solid-laid disbelief. 
 A zealot, like myself, who cannot keep himself 
 from preaching, offers infallibly the ridiculous 
 side, and thus hardens them. But a sober, 
 cool believer, who neither meditates their con- 
 version, nor deigns to argue, but simply pro- 
 fesses belief, and shews the rational man of 
 sense on all other points, verily, he is the sort 
 of apostle that shakes these philosophers in 
 their negative principles, and ignorant self- 
 satisfaction." 
 
 I shook my head, but the cure gave a coun- 
 ter-shake, which meaned to say, " I know 
 better." 
 
 Numerous good-humoured and light topics 
 occupied the morning. It was not, until he 
 found the family collected after their early 
 dinner, that Thouin asked La Versiere, " whe- 
 ther he had since thought on the request he 
 had made of him, when last at Lode?"
 
 84 THE regicide's 
 
 " Truly I have not," said the father of the fa- 
 mily. " I spoke then a ready and a conclusive 
 answer, unless you have since lit upon some ar- 
 gument yet unurged and of sovereign weight." 
 
 " That perhaps I have." 
 
 " I thought so, my dear friend, by the all- 
 importance of your countenance. Well — here 
 are the persons concerned — My children, M. 
 Thouin would make Christians of you all." 
 
 Oscar smiled contemptuously. 
 
 " Nay, sir," said Thouin to the youth, " until 
 you prove yourself an upright, moral man, ac- 
 cording to the principles you profess, I will 
 allow of no sneers against what you do not 
 understand." 
 
 Oscar's blood rose. 
 
 " I hope, he will never be found other," said 
 the father. 
 
 " You are a minister of peace, not dissen- 
 sion," said Cornelie imploringly. The cure un- 
 derstood her, and remained silent, while Oscar 
 departed.
 
 FAMILY. 85 
 
 " Indeed, Sir," continued Cornelie, " your 
 zeal is thrown away. We will abide by the 
 opinions of our father." 
 
 " What ! you too, my daughter," said the 
 pastor, " whom I thought to have long since 
 convinced — who listened, and allowed the fair- 
 ness and cogency of my reasoning." 
 
 "Tis true, Sir. But I cannot recall that 
 chain of argument at need, and even if I 
 could, it would not supply that philosophic 
 pride, that makes me contemn the ills of 
 life." 
 
 " That is, because you have not advanced 
 far enough in religion to have a feeling of it. 
 You heard but its rational proofs. The 
 feeling comes later, is of far more sweetness, 
 tenacity, and force. Persevere, and you will 
 find it." 
 
 " Do, my child," said old La Versiere; " the 
 pleasures and consolations of enthusiasm are 
 more powerful than those of reason. And you 
 will need the most powerful."
 
 86 the regicide's 
 
 " Truly, though insidiously spoken," said 
 Thouin ; "but see that the basis of enthusiasm 
 be truth, then you may taste its pleasures, and 
 receive its consolations with safety." 
 
 " And who will lay that basis ?" 
 
 " Neither the idle, nor the ignorant, nor the 
 self-satisfied," replied the pastor. 
 
 Ossian here interposed to interrupt rising 
 warmth, by breaking his lance with the cure. 
 " On me too, M. Thouin, your arguments 
 have had some influence, and my conversation 
 with the friend here, whom you procured us, 
 has made them sink deeper. What have 
 been nations without religion, urge you, but 
 still degenerating races of men ? And you are 
 right. The mob must have their creed, which 
 may be symbolically true for them, as that of 
 the Jews was for the superstitious rabble of 
 their nation. But allow me to think, that 
 reason and philosophy may furnish higher 
 intellects with a faith purer and more befitting 
 them."
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 87 
 
 "And where is to be found a society of 
 those higher intellects ?" 
 
 " In history — in Pliny's letters, which I 
 have been just perusing, and which have done 
 more, I promise you, than Voltaire to turn me 
 from your counsels. When I contemplate in 
 those pages the higher order of Romans of 
 that day, their nice honour, their generosity, 
 courage, and contempt of death, their Platonic 
 loftiness of sentiment — when I contemplate 
 all this, I own, I cannot see the necessity of 
 revelation to mankind." 
 
 The eyes of Cornelie brightened with de- 
 light at what she considered the eloquence 
 of Ossian. 
 
 " It is but an outwork of religion that you 
 attack," said Thouin, "an insignificant out- 
 work, but still as it is one, through which the 
 thoughtless unbeliever, when he recurs to re- 
 ligion, generally directs his retreat, I will de- 
 fend it — and that simply by asserting that 
 Pliny was a romancer, his heroes, including
 
 88 
 
 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 himself, slaves and adulators as public men, 
 as well as debauched and sunk below all the 
 laws of morality as private men — they might 
 preach eloquent Platonism from the midst of 
 their boys and baths, and with as much 
 justice as they extolled fortitude and public 
 virtue in their adulations of the despot who 
 ruled them. But why recur so far back to 
 times of scant or uncertain records for the 
 reign of philosophy. We have seen it in our 
 own days. We have seen its effects both on 
 things and on men." 
 
 "We have," said old La Versiere, proudly. 
 
 " Not to pursue exactly that path of argu- 
 ment," interrupted Cornelie, "doth not phi- 
 losophy ally better with the heroic virtues 
 than religion, which is so exclusive and con- 
 temptuous in principle, as to consider every 
 thing as light and supererogatory that doth 
 not make part of itself. Patriotism, I remem- 
 ber, is not once mentioned in its code — " 
 
 The curate smiled —
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 89 
 
 "—Nay, all the heroism recorded in Plutarch 
 would be but vanity in its eyes." 
 
 " And all the heroism of France, from Ro- 
 land to Bayard, from Henri Quatre to Turenne, 
 not to mention the civilian virtues of De Thou, 
 of D'Aguesseur, De l'Hopital, names that 
 might — will rank with Plutarch's best — on 
 what was it founded, but religion?" 
 
 " The French character," said Ossian 
 proudly, " made the greater part of their 
 heroism." 
 
 "And then what made that character, my 
 young, patriotic friend, — but it is useless to 
 argue these points. I care not whether truth 
 or untruth allies best with heroism. There is 
 a phenomenon in the world, called religion, to 
 the existence of which we can no more shut 
 our eyes than against the light; its truth 
 stands based on simple, rational proofs, and 
 it should be first seen, whether these proofs 
 can possibly be set aside or slighted, ere we 
 proceed to argue the needlessness of what
 
 90 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 forces itself upon us, or the seeming absurdity 
 of its rites and objects. For me to go over 
 those proofs to you were vain, for it is the 
 characteristic of all moral demonstration to 
 lose its force, the instant it loses its novelty. 
 Hence we are obliged to enforce the truth on 
 some by their fears, on others by their 
 hopes — " 
 
 La Versiere smiled. 
 
 " — To you, cold reas oners, I can only urge 
 it by arguments of expediency." 
 
 "And how will those apply at present? Are 
 we not passing happy, contented at least, suf- 
 fering no ills, not at least that religion can 
 cure, unless you mean that an hypocritical 
 affectation of it would recommend us to the 
 mercy of our enemies." 
 
 " Suspect me of no such thought. Mine 
 are far wide of such, considering merely that 
 your children are entering on the world, that 
 they touch the age of the passions, at which 
 hour the seeds of life's happiness or unhappi-
 
 FAMILY. 91 
 
 ness are sown, and that they are without a 
 moral guide to conduct them safely through." 
 
 "They have their judgments, and if that 
 fail, their hearts and consciences." 
 
 " False as a guide perhaps, and most cer- 
 tainly frail as a support." 
 
 "Indeed, M. Thouin, you alarm yourself 
 causelessly in our behalf." 
 
 " Would you keep your sons from blood," 
 said Thouin. 
 
 La Versiere made no reply. 
 
 "If you would," continued the pastor, "I 
 warn you, that that morality which can teach 
 no forgiveness of injuries, will not do so, 
 placed as they are, at least, in estrangement 
 and enmity with their brethren." 
 
 "Whither doth all this tend." 
 
 " I have given one great argument for the 
 expediency of instilling religion into your 
 offspring, La Versiere ; and I rejoice to see, it 
 has made its impression. Another I would 
 shew you by asking in what manner you in-
 
 92 the regicide's 
 
 tend your children to gratify their natural pas- 
 sions, and be happy?" 
 
 " They are too poor to marry," said the 
 Conventionalist, " and, I hope, too proud to 
 raise up a progeny of beggars." 
 
 " Your prudence therefore exposes them to 
 a life of temptation, though with what charm 
 you have armed them against falling into the 
 ways of vice, I cannot conjecture." 
 
 " Come, come, we must leave those things 
 to chance." 
 
 "Why not say to nature?" 
 
 " Well, I will say, to nature." 
 
 "The hallowed link of marriage is super- 
 stition in your eyes ; you have made your en- 
 thusiastic son, Ossian, here, contemn that 
 rite, for example, or esteem it necessary but in 
 obedience to the world's prejudice." 
 
 "You are not much in the wrong," said the 
 Conventionalist. 
 
 "Then you have embittered for him even 
 the sweetest dream of a poet's life."
 
 FAMILY. 93 
 
 " May not a pure mind hallow its own con- 
 ceptions and visions?" asked Ossian. 
 
 " Suppose, La Versiere, this son of yours 
 had corrupted one of our mountain maidens." 
 
 " An unlikely supposition, for the popula- 
 tion shun us, even the soft-hearted Ossian in- 
 cluded, as vipers." 
 
 " Revenge and despite for such injustice 
 might drive him to meditate such an act, as 
 the wolf would snatch a lamb from the jea- 
 lously guarded sheepfold." 
 
 "You injure Ossian by such impossible 
 suppositions." 
 
 Ossian turned somewhat pale. It was, 
 however, for Oscar. 
 
 The cure took M. La Versiere aside, and 
 they walked together for the space of nearly 
 an hour. But the subject of their conversa- 
 tion the reader will hereafter be enabled to 
 conjecture.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Although imagining the cause that had 
 brought the cure from Locle, and had given 
 rise to some trouble, reproof, and exhortation, 
 in the family, it was some days ere I exactly 
 learned it. During that interval indeed I 
 formed the resolution of resuming my peregri- 
 nations, but in addition to the usual solicita- 
 tions of Ossian and his father, Oscar re- 
 proached me with having never yet kept my 
 promise of accompanying him upon an expe- 
 dition amongst the higher Alps in chase of 
 the chamois. 
 
 I was desirous of enjoying the novelty of 
 this famed sport, as also of exploring the re-
 
 THE REGICIDE'S FAMILY. 95 
 
 gion of eternal snows in fuller and more agree- 
 able company than that of a guide, and with 
 some more inspiriting motive and excitement 
 than that of beholding the sublime and pictu- 
 resque. The beauties of Nature are never so 
 gratifying as when they seem to present them- 
 selves by chance. — To go absolutely and with 
 pleasure prepense in search of a prospect, 
 makes the feeling which it excites cold and 
 artificial, — it limits the enjoyment to the eye 
 merely, and shuts out that noble accompani- 
 ment of thought, which, had one stumbled by 
 chance upon such a scene, could not have 
 been wanting. 
 
 Ossian agreed to accompany us. The ex- 
 pedition and the absence of his sons pleased 
 old La Versiere, who had reason to expect a 
 visit from Girouette, and who did not wish 
 the fiery spirit of Oscar, nor the sensitive 
 Ossian, to meet the fickle soldier, whom they 
 both looked on with so much suspicion. 
 
 We set out, the three of us, for the sons
 
 96 the regicide's 
 
 of the regicide had found it impossible to 
 attach to them even a peasant follower — 
 armed with guns, poles, cords, and cord- 
 ladder, hatchets, provision too, all which 
 formed a burden for each back, that by 
 no means agreed with the breadth or habits 
 of mine. 
 
 It was more than a day's journey to the 
 scene of our intended sport, and the brothers 
 spoke frequently, and with some mystery at 
 first, of a chalet where we were to stop and 
 equip ourselves more lightly for the actual 
 fatigue of the chase. As I was bound for the 
 same chalet with them, it became necessary, 
 sooner or later, to let me into the secret of 
 this mystery. 
 
 " I dare say, you have conjectured what 
 brought old Thouin amongst us the other 
 day," said Oscar to me, " or perhaps he told 
 you." 
 
 " Not a word did he mention to me : nor 
 did I allow myself to form conjectures with
 
 FAMILY. 97 
 
 respect to what you all seemed to think best 
 concealed." 
 
 " Nothing in it to hide — merely a pretty 
 parishioner of M. Thouin's, whom I thought 
 proper to carry away, and he to come to com- 
 plain of." 
 
 " Then he had some reason, methinks." 
 " Bah ! priests have always reason." 
 " And the mystery of the chalet consists in 
 its containing this young lady." 
 
 "Precisely," replied Oscar; "and therefore 
 at this moment dare I not visit it alone. The 
 brolher is vigilant and suspects. He hates 
 me, as I do him, and though he durst not 
 cross my path, for if he durst," and Oscar 
 ground his teeth, " but did he know the place 
 of my treasures, he would come by night or 
 in my absence, and steal her from me." 
 
 ". But how will our company aid you to de- 
 ceive his vigilance?" 
 
 " He will not suspect me of bringing a 
 stranger thither. And three of us, with a 
 
 F
 
 98 the regicide's 
 
 good look out can surely discover if we be 
 watched. If I can espy him lurking, my game 
 is found without a chamois." 
 
 " Oscar," said Ossian, "I will leave you 
 here, if you talk so. I know it is but talk. 
 But yet, how bring yourself to say that you 
 would fire upon a fellow man." 
 
 "Rather our natural enemy, Ossian. Are 
 we not shunned like beasts of prey — denied 
 friendship, denied approach to the fair ones of 
 our race, whose minds are poisoned against us, 
 whilst these chains subdue and pain us — shall 
 we be marked out like Parrias from our kind, 
 as your favourite book describes* — and shall 
 not we have our revenge?" 
 
 " Better to live like that Parria, Oscar." 
 
 "Ah! you may, Ossian. But I have blood 
 in my veins, feelings, passions." 
 
 " And nothing to restrain them, Oscar, un- 
 happily." 
 
 * Oscar alluded no doubt to St. Pierre's ' Chaumiere In- 
 dienne.'
 
 FAMILY. 99 
 
 '* Nothing — what should there be to restrain 
 them?" 
 
 " Reason, justice, Oscar." 
 
 " And have I not spoken both ? Are we not 
 put out of the pale of human kind, and for no 
 crime ? Are we not at war with it?" 
 
 " Nay, but ours is a peculiar, unnatural 
 situation — we should forgive, and be re- 
 signed. " 
 
 " And I am to let Paul seize Marie, and 
 bear her from me ?" 
 
 " Nay, I would defend her without vindic- 
 tiveness against him, who rightfully seeks to 
 free her." 
 
 "Rightfully — is she not mine — doth she 
 not love me — " 
 
 But I must acquaint the reader with the 
 story of Marie more briefly, than the dialogue 
 of the brothers would allow. 
 
 She was the daughter of a wealthy landed 
 proprietor, such as in any other country 
 would have assumed the bearing and title of 
 
 f2
 
 100 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 a gentleman. In that land, however, none 
 soared above the rank of a peasant, except 
 perhaps the ambitious burgesses of the prin- 
 cipal towns. The father of Marie had his 
 flocks and herds, which he tended, his moun- 
 tain-side, domain sufficient for the noble of a 
 more flat and fertile country, his house, de- 
 corated externally with paintings, inside with 
 white-wash, his vacherie, a score of chalets 
 and of shepherds — a son too, and several 
 daughters, amongst whom he had ample 
 wealth to divide. 
 
 Paul, the son, had upon the first coming of 
 the La Versieres to the country been the com- 
 panion of Oscar, whom he led through the 
 Alpine paths around, and initiated in the dar- 
 ing sports of those lofty regions. In these 
 exercises the Swiss youth was soon surpassed 
 by his scholar, and this did not tend to 
 strengthen their mutual amity. Oscar during 
 this time had penetrated to the domestic cir- 
 cle of the Swiss farmer, had seen his daughters
 
 FAMILY. 101 
 
 — they were rude, mountain beauties — but 
 love, headstrong as it is after choice, is before 
 it possessed of a very flexible spirit of confor- 
 mity, and Oscar, to whom the sight or society 
 of Parisian grace was henceforth denied, 
 yielded his heart to the simple fascinations of 
 a Swiss girl. Marie was the object of his 
 choice, nor could she resist the first glance, 
 that bespoke preference and homage, from a 
 youth of Oscar's person and carriage, from 
 one too who wore the manners, and boasted 
 being a native, of the metropolis of France. 
 
 What were Oscar's views I know not, nor 
 perhaps did he himself — when a monk from 
 no very distant convent entered one day the 
 house of poor Marie's father. He craved a 
 meal, and repayed the hospitality he received 
 by a full or rather over-full history of the new- 
 comers, or La Versieres, who had settled in 
 this part of their country. Revolution, re- 
 publicanism, regicide, are themes that few 
 talkers at any time can resist expatiating upon ;
 
 102 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 and they certainly in the present case supplied 
 the monk with materials for the homily of an 
 hour. Other reports at fair and market re- 
 specting the Conventionalist and his family, 
 corroborated the hints and warnings of the 
 mendicant. Oscar in consequence found the 
 gates of the farm shut against him, and was 
 forbidden attempting any future intrusion by 
 the proprietor himself, who, not without some 
 horror at the mere presence of the youth, ex- 
 orcised him, as it were, from his domicile. 
 When he expostulated, the names of Judas, of 
 assassin, impious brood, and cursed seed, 
 struck first upon his ear, as applied to him, 
 and but that the indignation that swelled 
 within him was merged and mingled in a 
 greater degree of astonishment, he would have 
 been prompted at the instant to some extrava- 
 gant or fatal act. 
 
 Vengeance, however, kept awake in his 
 breast, as did love in that of Marie. So bit- 
 ter, so absorbing were Oscar's thoughts of re-
 
 FAMILY. 103 
 
 sentraent, that his affections were over- 
 whelmed by the more powerful passion. True, 
 he still loved Marie, but that was no longer 
 the predominating idea — the thoughts of her 
 beauty, her tenderness, her sufferings, occur- 
 red — but not so often as did his own humilia- 
 tion, her father's insults, her brother's nesr- 
 lect. Had not the pursuit of his love agreed 
 so well with that of vengeance, there is no 
 doubt which he would have sacrificed. As it 
 was, scorning or deeming impracticable the 
 seeking of honourable satisfaction from any of 
 a family, whom he now looked down upon as 
 peasants, how muchsoever in imagination he 
 had been before inclined to consider them 
 above that rank, he resolved to gratify his 
 passion for Marie, and to procure that gratifi- 
 cation in a baser way than he at first medi- 
 tated, in order to take vengeance upon her 
 family. 
 
 He succeeded but too well in his selfish 
 project, and at length was compelled to bear
 
 104 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 away Marie from her father's roof, lest her si- 
 tuation might reveal their connexion, and ex- 
 pose her to all the fury of her parent. Selfish 
 as his motives were, they were not unmingled, 
 especially of late, with purer feelings, as was 
 evident from his consulting her safety in pre- 
 ference to the vengeance which he had intended 
 to inflict by her shame upon her family. Had 
 he held such a resolution as this, he would 
 have been a demon indeed. — But he was a 
 youth of strong passions, abandoned to them 
 and to himself, the sport of circumstances and 
 of his own mind, incapable of mastering or 
 guiding either — thus, like the higher order of 
 beasts of prey, of mingled tenderness and fe- 
 rocity, generosity and cruelty, not without 
 seeds of nobleness in a disposition, which 
 seemed formed for its own destruction, as well 
 as for that of all around it, whether friends or 
 foes. 
 
 Of Paul, Marie's brother, when Oscar de- 
 signated him as a sneak, or by some word of
 
 FAMILY. 105 
 
 equal value, and when even the equitable 
 Ossian assented to the character, I could not 
 entertain a high opinion, mere especially con- 
 sidering, that although suspecting Oscar La 
 Versiere, he had yet sought or demanded no 
 open vengeance. But what vengeance could 
 a peasant seek, especially of one unrivalled in 
 agility and strength? M. Thouin had heard 
 the circumstance, and immediately placing his 
 suspicions right, had come to relate the affair 
 to old La Versiere, and to expostulate with his 
 son. But all he obtained by his coming was 
 another version of the story, with assurance 
 from the old man, that vengeance could not 
 have been his son's motive, and that when the 
 anger of the family was allayed, Marie should 
 be forthcoming:. 
 
 "As one of your family," urged Thouin. 
 " You must speak to Oscar on that subject," 
 wasthe only answer of La Versiere. 
 
 As the greater part of these circumstances 
 were either revealed to me, or penetrated, dur- 
 
 f3
 
 106 THE REGICIDE'S FAMILY. 
 
 ing our journey to the chase, my veneration 
 for the exile's family, and for Oscar especially, 
 began to abate. " But such," said I, " is the 
 world, shaded characters and mingled motives 
 compose it — to look too close at any corner 
 of life, is to convert the over-curious pryer into 
 a misanthrope. All this may not be so bad as 
 I think it. At any rate, Ossian is pure-minded 
 and noble — and Cornelie, these circumstances 
 will put to the proof what she is."
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 We proceeded on our mountain path in the 
 mean time, abandoning the pine-crowned sum- 
 mit and ridges of the lesser Alps, and direct- 
 ing our course to where the many tops of their 
 mightier brethren reared themselves above the 
 clouds. It was in the neighbourhood of these, 
 and in a retired valley, or rather, high up on 
 one of the mountains which inclosed the val- 
 ley, that we found the chalet. It was com- 
 pletely concealed by a projecting rock from 
 the view, and was only reached and discovered 
 on the wide waste of the Alp-side, by a speck 
 of pale-green pasture above it. A wild and
 
 108 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 rapid torrent rolled in full sight beneath, 
 shrunk however considerably from its winter 
 course, which we could perceive, as by the 
 help of poles and stones we crossed it, from the 
 wreck of fir-trunks and crumbling rocks, which 
 marked the line of its high-water. Above the 
 chalet far, arose a bald granite brow, seldom 
 bare to the sky as now, and beyond this 
 were descried the ever-during snows of a still 
 loftier Alp. 
 
 I had thought the day's toil concluded, when 
 we had reached the mountain-base, and saw 
 the spot which marked the chalet within what 
 seemed an insignificant distance above us. But 
 more than an hour elapsed, and the sun was 
 sinking behind the distant Jura, ere we reached 
 our resting-place. 
 
 Marie proved to be a more interesting girl 
 than I had augured. She had a beautiful, 
 simple, mountain face, not the less lovely in 
 my eyes from bearing the marks of care and 
 pining, and approaching motherhood. She
 
 FAMILY. 109 
 
 sprung to welcome Oscar, as woman's love 
 alone can welcome; and cried and laughed 
 and sighed upon his bosom with momentary 
 and frantic happiness. Even after a time Os- 
 car vainly chid her forgetfulness of his brother 
 and his friend — she acknowledged no one's 
 presence but his, — would not be calmed, nor 
 could be brought to prepare repast, to think 
 or speak of aught, except his being with her. 
 
 The tears started to Ossian's eyes. I turned 
 to look with dry ones down the vale already 
 darkling below with the first gray of night. 
 
 The tender fondness of poor Marie, connected 
 with what I knew of Oscar, touched me. Some 
 minutes did I moralize on woman's love and 
 man's unworthiness ; yet was not sorry, on 
 awaking from my reflections, to find that an 
 old woman, not so oblivious or absorbed as 
 poor Marie, was spreading cheese and milk and 
 bread upon the rude table of the hut. A por- 
 tion of kid too appeared soon after invitingly. 
 And in despite of sentiment, we were all,
 
 110 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 Marie included, much better and happier after 
 supper than before it. 
 
 "What can be Oscar's intentions respecting 
 this poor girl?" asked I of Ossian, as we 
 walked forth a moment, previous to our re- 
 tiring for repose. 
 
 " He knows not himself," said Ossian ; " my 
 father says, he has acted wrong, and says no 
 more. Cornelie wants to bring her home, 
 and make her one of the family instantly, and 
 it was with difficulty that my father could 
 prevent her setting forth to come here the 
 other day." 
 
 "And why have prevented her?" said I. 
 
 "Why, indeed! But we still hold to a 
 world that shakes us ofT." 
 
 The next morn we rose to prosecute our 
 sport, and quitted the chalet before sun-rise, 
 directing our course over the summit of the 
 mountain. Surmounting it and descending 
 into a bleak valley, if valley a hollow too 
 high even for vegetation can be called, we
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 Ill 
 
 reached a glaicer at the foot of the Alp which 
 we intended to climb. The summer's sun had 
 attacked it on every side, and was now beam- 
 ing on its solid mass, which seemed, like 
 glass, to reflect without being subdued by the 
 powerful ray. Its circumference, however, 
 irregular and elevated from the ground, was 
 dripping on all sides; whilst a full stream 
 emerged from under it, and rolled towards a 
 neighbouring cleft. 
 
 A mist, considered most fortunate by Oscar, 
 was shading the lofty peaks and snowy re- 
 gions above us. It would enable us, he said, 
 to come amidst the game unperceived. Ac- 
 cordingly we still ascended by a weary and 
 awful path, penetrating the chill cloud, which 
 excluded all view of the precipices that might 
 overhang, or undermine us. The experienced 
 eye of Oscar alone prevented us at times from 
 stumbling into huge ci'evasses or clefts in the 
 snow, which at half a foot depth became ice, 
 and which extended down, perfect abysses,
 
 112 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 awfully deep and blue. Even when disco- 
 vered, and when the danger was obviated of 
 thus falling into them unawares, it was no 
 easy task to imitate Oscar's mode of clearing 
 them by a leap upon his pole. Though some- 
 times they were of breadth so considerable, 
 that we were compelled to follow their brink, 
 until we reached either their termination or a 
 snow-bridge, which might enable us to cross 
 them. One of these we encountered, which 
 proved a very ravine of ice ; and we descended 
 into its depths and ascended in the same 
 manner by steps, which the hatchet of Oscar 
 instantaneously formed. It was a novel and 
 no agreeable situation, to find oneself in its 
 depth, chill, blue barriers rising up on each 
 side, and the murky cloud shutting out sky 
 and sun, a fit vaulting for such dungeon. 
 
 As we regained the snowy surface of the 
 mountain's side, we emerged from the cloud, 
 which rolled in white voluminous folds be- 
 neath us, illuminated by the bright rays of the
 
 FAMILY. 113 
 
 morning sun. The valleys below were hidden 
 from our view, whilst the heights of the snowy 
 Alps above lifted themselves up in awful soli- 
 tude. We could now descry, and we felt awe 
 in doing so, the particular appearance of these 
 unseen and unapproachable summits, the 
 bleached granite peaks, against which the 
 scarcely whiter snow-drifts lay couched — the 
 wide, irregular summit, which to the eye be- 
 low had seemed a peak, and which now ap- 
 peared a broad round scalp, with a roll of 
 snow around its ridge, like a fillet or a crown. 
 The sky was no longer of that light, trans- 
 parent blue, which cheers the upturned looks 
 of men — it was of a deep, blackening, awful 
 hue, and seemed repulsive of the audacious 
 glance, that dared to scan its depths so near. 
 The utter solitude was the most awful of the 
 sensations awakened by the scene, for our 
 steps upon the " crumping snows," were but 
 those of insects intruding upon such vastness 
 — the elements above were rulers here — the
 
 114 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 slightest breath of wind, that shook from their 
 places of rest the light balls of snow and ice, 
 precipitating them down the mountain's side, 
 caused an uproar in our ears, — but still it was 
 slight in such a scene, nor more than was pro- 
 portioned to the majestic and unechoing still- 
 ness of the Alpine realm. 
 
 "Nature," said I, "that has filled each 
 cranny of the globe with life, seems not to 
 have (this momentary intrusion on our part 
 excepted) a solitary representative here." 
 
 " Hush," said Oscar, " you forget on what 
 errand we came. Look yonder — " 
 
 I was answered, on directing my view to a 
 distant, though not one of the most lofty 
 peaks, by descrying an animal upon its very 
 point. 
 
 "There," exclaimed Ossian, "your reflec- 
 tion is twice belied." A majestic eagle shot 
 down the mountains, not checking his straight, 
 headlong career, till he had passed not many 
 yards above our heads, and then whirling
 
 FAMILY. 115 
 
 around us, he screamed and lay hidden behind 
 some projecting point. 
 
 "I never was more strongly tempted to 
 forfeit a day's sport for a bird of prey," said 
 Oscar, bringing down his gun, that he had 
 pointed at the eagle. 
 
 "Nor I, i'faith," said Ossian ; "I never 
 thought they ventured so near the hunter." 
 
 " It is a child-devourer, the most savage of 
 the tribe. It is considered ominous, when 
 they do approach so near." 
 
 " Hunters and fishermen are always super- 
 stitious," said Ossian ; " the danger attendant 
 on their pursuit, as well as chance being the 
 chief regulator of their success, furnishes them 
 with omens, vows, and a legion of saints pe- 
 culiar to them." 
 
 Oscar, I thought, looked more angry at the 
 cool remark of his brother than became one 
 professing the philosophic creed of the La 
 Versieres. — " Brother," said he, " books and 
 libraries have their laws and influences — the
 
 116 THE HEGICIDE'S 
 
 hills and wild places of the earth have theirs 
 also." 
 
 As Ossian smiled, Oscar grew still more 
 angry. 
 
 " Come," said I, " Ossian, one of your name 
 and poetic temper might afford more quarter 
 to superstition, especially when she is a moun- 
 tain deity. I for my part admire and am a 
 follower of her myself, whilst she is a denizen 
 of the hills, inspiring the wild and untaught 
 poor with caution at times, and at times with 
 consolation. There she is a beneficent, a poetic 
 spirit. It is only when haunting the plains of 
 the civilized, the crowded towns of the artizan, 
 and working upon the mean fears of every 
 day life, that she becomes, by a union with 
 ignorance and power, metamorphosed into 
 demon." 
 
 " And I tell thee, Ossian, to mock not what 
 you have not experienced. That eagle's cry 
 bodes harm ; this evening I will give you leave 
 to mock me."
 
 FAMILY. 11 
 
 " I hope, that it does bode harm, at least 
 to a couple of chamois," said Ossian. 
 
 As we marched in pursuit of the game, 
 a sudden gust from below rushed upwards, 
 and penetrating the cloud that still rolled be- 
 neath us, made a rent in it, as it were, and 
 opened for us a vista to the valley, This is 
 one of the most lovely phenomena of Alpine 
 scenery. Deep through the vapoury cloud, 
 which rolled and closed gradually round the 
 breach made in its mass, we descried the gay 
 fields and groves, and with some difficulty the 
 torrent below, the sun shining on the depth 
 of the valley, as upon us, whilst the pent of 
 the mountain side that we descried beneath 
 lay under the shadow of the cloud, except 
 where the slanting rays penetrated through 
 the breach. 
 
 " Well," said Ossian, " if ever nature pre- 
 sented a phenomenon that might be construed 
 into an omen, and into a fair omen, that is 
 one."
 
 118 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 "Take it as such then, and be thankful, 
 without entering into a disquisition upon it," 
 said Oscar. 
 
 " I have nothing either to hope or fear, and 
 therefore look for no omens. — But, Oscar, 
 thou art very splenetic and churlish this 
 morning." 
 
 " And thou, Ossian, wouldst argue under an 
 avalanche, even at the risk of making its mass 
 move down to confute you. And I promise 
 you, our voices, insignificant as they are, 
 Heaven knows, might aid this south wind in 
 bringing down one of these excrescences of 
 snow that overhang us." 
 
 He had scarcely spoken, when a quantity of 
 snow detached itself from on high, luckily 
 somewhat in advance of us. It appeared tri- 
 fling at first, but as it gathered and shook 
 down other masses in its descent, it fell some 
 yards before us, in an impetuous shower, 
 which, although there were no large fragments, 
 none that could dignify the fall with the name
 
 FAMILY. 119 
 
 of avalanche, would have sufficed, I have no 
 doubt, to sweep us from our path and from 
 this life together. I would have retreated, but 
 Oscar pointed forward, and we accordingly 
 wended on in a hurried and stealthy pace, 
 silent ourselves as the grave, and breathless 
 as our speed permitted, whilst the fragments 
 of the young avalanche rolled with pattering 
 and awful sound beneath us. 
 
 For folks, who are neither soldiers nor ad- 
 venturers, and therefore unused to these things 
 it is a disagreeable feeling to know one's life 
 in jeopardy. And this is not in the least 
 abated by its having been the sober, serious 
 reflection of the half hour previous, that there 
 is really nothing in life worth living for. I 
 would recommend as the best antidote to mis- 
 anthropy, ten minutes' hurried walk beneath 
 the white brows of an impending avalanche. 
 I for my part never felt more philanthropic 
 than after su^h a trial, more reconciled to hu- 
 man nature, to life, and to all its ills.
 
 120 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 We had not long passed, and were sheltered 
 beneath an aiguille or lesser peak, when down 
 the monster came. The enormous mass slid a 
 space, perhaps a furlong, sending down before 
 it a shower of loose snow — then like a huge 
 wave, that strikes the shore and leaps into a 
 surge, the avalanche turned over, split, dashed 
 and rolled its mighty volume down. I could 
 not describe it, no more than I could my own 
 sensations, as I saw it strike the path we just 
 had trodden. It swept the very cloud before 
 it into a shower ; and the only impediment it 
 encountered was the pine-grove, already shat- 
 tered by many a fall. The stout firs fell like 
 grass before a mower — the foremost uprooted 
 borne below, and the rest flung prostrate one 
 upon the other, and buried instantly beneath 
 the ruin. The time of its descent allowed me 
 to form an idea of the distance, for it was many, 
 many minutes, ere the fall subsided in the 
 vale, scattering fragments far in its farthest 
 shock — we could perceive the white masses
 
 FAMILY. 121 
 
 on the green meads, among the rocks, and on 
 the torrent's brink, the course of which was 
 completely stopped. From above, subsidiary 
 falls took place from time to time, keeping up 
 the mountain thunder so long, that I began to 
 fear that the Alp itself would crumble. It was 
 nearly an hour before we could recover pre- 
 sence of mind to pursue our journey. 
 
 We did at length, Ossian saying no more of 
 omens, myself pondering on the past mixture of 
 the awful and sublime, and Oscar, bent on the 
 capture of a chamois, as if naughthad happened. 
 
 The reader is perhaps aware,.,that he, with 
 us, is not engaged in the chase of this ro- 
 mantic little animal, after the orthodox, 
 Alpine fashion, which requires dogs, a num- 
 ber of chasseurs, and other requisites. But the 
 brothers could command no gathering or 
 suite, and therefore went alone, as we de- 
 scribed it, to the chase, a mode both difficult 
 and perilous. 
 
 Oscar, however, had seen the game, a prin- 
 
 G
 
 122 the regicide's 
 
 cipal part of success ; and we now approached 
 the place, which was certainly as inaccessible 
 and cunning a spot as a chamois could en- 
 trench himself in, and as hazardous to the ap- 
 proaches of his enemy. The peak on which 
 the deer had been at first descried hung over 
 an angle, which was the point of junction be- 
 tween two lines of mountains, both most pre- 
 cipitous where they met. Here the animal, 
 with his wonted cunning, placing himself on 
 the summit of the precipice, and fearing no 
 enemy on that side, directs his watch in the 
 other directions from whence he may be ap- 
 proached. A number of hunters would sur- 
 round and force the deer in its flight to allow 
 at the least some of their party a shot, but the 
 solitary chasseur must draw near on the most in- 
 accessible side. Although Oscar was not al- 
 together solitary, he considered himself so, as 
 Ossian was not the most expert of marksmen, 
 and he reckoned me, not judging falsely, as 
 about Ossian's equal.
 
 FAMILY- 123 
 
 Consequently ordering Ossian round to the 
 far side, and leaving me at this, Oscar took 
 upon himself to ascend the very face of the 
 precipice, where, with some miles of depth be- 
 neath him. — I shudder at this moment to 
 think upon it. 
 
 Allowing sufficient time for Ossian to have 
 accomplished his circuitous path, Oscar com- 
 menced his perilous clambering, in which a 
 false step would have precipitated him to cer- 
 tain death, and in which even a loosened and 
 falling fragment would have scared the game. 
 Trembling myself far more than he did, I 
 watched his progress, gathering confidence 
 from the caution, activity, and presence of 
 mind which he evinced, more intent indeed 
 upon him than upon the deer, which I was 
 set to watch. I turned my eyes at times, how- 
 ever, to my duty, and could perceive the cha- 
 mois browzing, most probably on the mountain 
 moss that could alone grow in that wintry re- 
 gion, its side discovered towards the precipice, 
 
 g2
 
 124 THE regicide's 
 
 whilst its sharp eye was bent in the opposite 
 direction. 
 
 At length I saw the youth pause on a pro- 
 jecting piece of rock, not more than broad 
 enough for his feet, whilst not a shrub was 
 there to allow his hand to stay his footing. I 
 thought of the precipice beneath him, and 
 again shuddered. How can he resist in that 
 position the repercussion of the gun? He le- 
 velled it, however, and fired. The chamois 
 fell. Another shot was heard — no doubt 'twas 
 Ossian's. And still another followed. Our 
 pieces were single-barrelled. The shots were 
 all too loud for an echo. I looked at my own ; 
 'twas yet undischarged — I turned towards 
 Oscar. He slid from his position, and from 
 my sight at the same time; and whether 'twas 
 a voluntary movement on his part, or that a 
 dizziness or stun occasioned by the shot had 
 shaken him from his frail footing, I could not 
 tell. 
 
 His shout, however, was heard at the instant,
 
 FAMILY. 125 
 
 not a shriek, or sound of fright ; and I felt re- 
 assured, as I rushed towards the precipice. 
 On looking down, Oscar was upright, bound- 
 ing from rock to rock, and ledge to ledge, with 
 the force and impetuosity of a supernatural 
 being. Another figure fled from him. This 
 no doubt was the person who had fired the 
 third shot, and perhaps as an intruder, he 
 had excited the vengeance of Oscar. — But 
 Heavens, what a path for flight ! — What, for 
 pursuit ! — Each step taken with safety was a 
 miracle for each. 
 
 Oscar gained upon his prey, for such the 
 fugitive seemed, they both approached the 
 last ledge or shelf of rock, the summit of a 
 kind of natural abutment, past which a step 
 was inevitable destruction, for thence down- 
 ward the rock sunk precipitating, and left not 
 a resting-place for a straw. The fugitive 
 reached it, and paused an instant, — I could not 
 help clasping the cliff, on which I leaned, with 
 intense anxiety : I felt as if I had been my-
 
 126 the regicide's 
 
 self in the same perilous situation with 
 them. 
 
 Oscar seemed to have no such thought for 
 himself, no such commiseration for him who 
 fled. As the latter turned in suspense, Oscar 
 reached the same ledge, and, either by the im- 
 pulse of his coming, or by deliberate violence 
 (the will at any rate did not appear to be want- 
 ing), the hapless fugitive was precipitated from 
 the fatal ledge. A commenced shiiek, for the 
 break seemed wanting to complete it, came at 
 the first plunge from the body — for it was no 
 more. It fell shattered and mangled, stain- 
 ing the snow in its descent, down, down — 
 Oh ! that a lake had closed upon it, and spared 
 my imagination the horrid sight that often 
 haunts it, of that hapless form rolling, strik- 
 ing, and finally separating, till the fragments 
 were lost in the fearful depth and distance. 
 
 I felt Ossian at my side, and started from a 
 momentary stupor. 
 
 " You have seen it," cried I.
 
 FAMILY. 127 
 
 " All, all," whispered he, " the fearful sight. 
 But we must save my brother." 
 
 "Who is it? what is it?" demanded I. 
 
 " It must have been Paul," replied he. 
 
 " Paul — what ! Marie's brother? 
 
 " The same. No other would have fired at 
 Oscar." 
 
 " Ha ! and his was the third shot, and at 
 Oscar." 
 
 " I saw him level — he waited for Oscar to 
 discharge his piece, that he might 'scape, and 
 then fired." 
 
 "Is Oscar wounded?" 
 
 " Tis what we must see. He must be, he 
 must be so. Look, he lies motionless upon 
 the ledge — my brother, he is dead." 
 
 Ossian cast aside his gun, as he spoke, and 
 rushed down the precipice with the same su- 
 pernatural fearlessness, though from a very 
 different cause, as that which had impelled 
 Oscar. I dared not follow, able to do naught 
 save gaze after him. In the same security,
 
 128 the regicide's 
 
 though not with equal speed, Ossian at length 
 gained the ledge where Paul had been preci- 
 pitated. He raised up Oscar, who was 
 wounded, and bled profusely. The youth 
 then called to me, to throw down ropes, and 
 otherwise assist in raising up the wounded 
 Oscar to the summit of the precipice. It was 
 a task of difficulty and fear. The youth was 
 almost unable to help himself; we dragged 
 him, I may say, unaided, and at times he was 
 suspended over the same precipice, down 
 which the unfortunate Paul had fallen to de- 
 struction, supported only by a frayed rope, 
 and the doubtful strength of Ossian and my- 
 self. 
 
 At length we had safely drawn him upon 
 the snowy surface above, and upon examina- 
 tion we found that he had been shot in the 
 right shoulder, not dangerously. The sight 
 of the wound rejoiced me — he, who had pe- 
 rished, did make an attempt on the life of 
 Oscar, and paid the forfeit of his base attempt.
 
 FAMILY. 129 
 
 We asked Oscar, who it had been. He con- 
 firmed Ossian's conjecture, and answered, 
 " That villain, Paul." 
 
 " Oscar, he is no more." 
 
 " By a coward's and an assassin's fate." 
 
 " Ah ! brother, may we never have such 
 cause for vengeance." 
 
 Oscar looked with an angry frown, but 
 could no longer reply. 
 
 We bore him, before evening-fall, to the cha- 
 let of Marie. 
 
 g 3
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 T know not what account of the adventure 
 they gave to Marie — it was not, however, the 
 truth. She, poor girl, was agitated and dis- 
 tracted much by even what she beheld, by 
 the blood of Oscar, his weakness, and our 
 anxious looks. To this we delayed to add the 
 overwhelming tidings of her brother's fate. 
 
 My first words in private to Ossian were of 
 the necessity of procuring some medical aid. 
 But he pleaded the utter impossibility of pro- 
 curing any, as well as the needlessness, he 
 hoped, of having recourse to it. There were 
 other points of consideration of greater mo-
 
 THE REGICIDE'S FAMILY. 131 
 
 ment, but all thoughts we deferred for the 
 night. 
 
 Betaking ourselves to a few hours' repose, 
 Ossian and myself started at the early dawn 
 to return home. Oscar slept, and betrayed no 
 dangerous symptoms ; and we descended the 
 mountains, leaving him to the care of Marie 
 and her attendant. 
 
 We spoke little during our rapid journey ; 
 and scarcely alluded either of us to the catas- 
 trophe of the preceding day. Remarks upon 
 our path, upon the rapidity with which we 
 had traversed what part of it was past, and 
 in what time we might accomplish the re- 
 mainder, formed our only, interrupted conver- 
 sation. It was not more than three at noon, 
 when Ossian approached his home. None 
 came to welcome him; our return was not so 
 soon expected. And when Cornelie espied 
 us, her mind instantly augured a misfortune. 
 
 La Versiere came too. Ossian unburdened 
 himself of the circumstances of the story.
 
 132 the regicide's 
 
 The old man seemed more moved than his 
 daughter. She was not hardened to the 
 melancholy fate of Paul, nor blind to the 
 wrong that had given rise to his vengeance, 
 but she deemed the catastrophe not unmerited 
 by the base means which he adopted of 
 wreaking that vengeance. She contemplated 
 the deed and the misfortune. But her father 
 eyed at once the consequences, was less 
 moved perhaps than any of us, but far more 
 alarmed. 
 
 He shut himself up for some time, and left 
 us to our melancholy debate, or as melancholy 
 silence. At length he came forth, having de- 
 cided that it was best to hush up the circum- 
 stance, say nought of it to any, and bury even 
 the remembrance of it, if that were possible. 
 
 This determination, on the part of their fa- 
 ther, astonished and displeased both Cornelie 
 and Ossian — to me it was still more unwel- 
 come. Paul would be missing, on whom 
 would the suspicion fall, save upon his only
 
 FAMILY. 133 
 
 known enemy? But the old man upheld, that 
 shame for his sister's enlevement and disgrace 
 was cause sufficient for his disappearance ; 
 and that for a Ions; time he must be considered 
 absent principally in search of her. The re- 
 mains might be found, 'twas urged. This he 
 declared unlikely in that wild region, where 
 moreover many hunters, strangers even to the 
 country, yearly perished, and to identify the 
 remains of one precipitated such a depth, 
 would prove as impossible, as to light on them 
 was improbable. 
 
 But what were the advantages of conceal- 
 ment? — That, were it disclosed, none would 
 credit the whole truth — that it would be infal- 
 libly believed, that with or without a struggle 
 Oscar had overcome the youth who rightfully 
 sought vengeance, and that he had sacrificed 
 him to his evil passions. Marked out for de- 
 struction by the rulers of a neighbouring 
 country, whose known hatred could not fail to 
 influence the local government, within whose
 
 134 the regicide's 
 
 jurisdiction the region lay, it was impossible 
 that either in the court of justice, or in that of 
 public opinion, one of the Regicide's family 
 would be judged fairly or impartially. 
 
 " Let us, as well as Oscar, trust to an up- 
 right conscience," said Cornelie proudly, 
 " speak all, and fear nothing." 
 
 Ossian seconded her proposal. But the old 
 Conventionalist had been too much accustomed 
 to the wily ways of the revolution, and de- 
 pended so totally on that address and cun- 
 ning, which the men of that epoch always did, 
 and do still continue to pride themselves in, 
 that he closed our mouths, and forbade all utter- 
 ance of the fatal subject. Thus the fact, which, 
 if told openly, had lost much of the suspicious 
 and the horrible, gathered for all of us in the 
 foul closeness of secrecy the taint and odour 
 of crime. 
 
 I myself did not fail to expostulate; but to 
 take uponme the consequences of open confes- 
 sion I could not, fatal as they might prove to
 
 FAMILY. 135 
 
 this hospitable family. To abandon them and 
 the country also occurred to me — but I found 
 myself unable to make what they must consider 
 as so selfish and ungenerous a proposal at such 
 a moment. Poor Cornelie! her noble and ge- 
 nerous spirit shone forth in that hour of trial 
 — her reasonings dissuaded us from any rash 
 resolution— her countenance inspired all, even 
 her father, with firmness — her anxiety was pre- 
 served for her hours of solitude. I thought 
 how displaced she was on this low and de- 
 graded state of existence. Her breast should 
 have supported the head of some drooping 
 hero or despairing statesman. Man would 
 have gathered fortitude in gazing upon her, 
 and lessons of virtue were written on her brow. 
 Had she been in the place of a Roland, or De 
 Stael, cast upon those times, when an over- 
 throw of prejudice and a fresh spring of en- 
 thusiasm had levelled all rank, save that of ta- 
 lent, in society, and allowed even women to 
 appear on the stage of history, then would her
 
 136 the regicide's 
 
 mind have been felt in matters worthy of its 
 influence and agency, and her fate, whether of 
 pride or of misfortune, had then been such as 
 became her nature. As it was, cursed with an 
 unworthy lover, a parent whom she adored, 
 but all whose disappointments had naturally 
 risen from petty, selfish, and mistaken ambi- 
 tions, with brothers for whom no prospects 
 opened, except such troubles as their idleness 
 and passions promised, her high enthusiasm 
 served to weigh upon her, instead of bearing her 
 up, — her large-mindedness obstructed her hap- 
 piness and content in the narrow space allowed 
 for its developement, and every nobler instinct 
 of her nature proved a source of sorrow and 
 disappointment. 
 
 Ossian and his father had returned almost 
 immediately to the chalet, with such medi- 
 cines and necessaries, as were deemed requi- 
 site. It was with much difficulty that CornSlie 
 was restrained from accompanying them ; — as 
 for me, I was too weary to again encounter the
 
 FAMILY. 137 
 
 fatigue. And thus the daughter of the man- 
 sion, and myself its guest, were left to each 
 other's company, an awkward circumstance 
 even in that region where etiquette had little 
 penetrated. In the distraction and hurry of 
 the moment, however, this circumstance was 
 contemplated by no one, not even by Cornelie 
 and myself, I believe, until we met with mourn- 
 ful faces in the solitary salon. 
 
 With my English ideas of propriety clinging 
 to me, I felt somewhat embarrassed at my si- 
 tuation, and was even meditating a visit to the 
 curt, when Cornelie, too full of serious thought 
 to dwell for a moment on such trifles, at once 
 burst forth on the subject that absorbed her. 
 
 " Poor Marie !" exclaimed she, " I wish I 
 had gone — a female, even though a stranger, 
 would have comforted her — and yet 'tis of no 
 use, till Oscar can bear removal, then will I 
 go and bring her here, to ours, to Oscar's 
 home. I will overcome my father's prejudices 
 — they are unworthy of him."
 
 138 the regicide's 
 
 " It is prudential motives, not prejudice, 
 Cornelie, that weighs with your father," said I. 
 
 "And why? Is not the union between Oscar 
 and Marie as sacred, as if the little watch- 
 maker, the mayor of the neighbouring town, 
 had given it his sanction." 
 
 " Quite so to me, who am no admirer of 
 marriage as a civil contract." 
 
 " Why be dissatisfied with it as such?" 
 
 " For such reasons as our present conversa- 
 tion suggests, that it does not sufficiently mark 
 the difference betwixt the connexions of vir- 
 tuous love, and those of vice, of vanity, and 
 momentary passion." 
 
 " Methinks, however, that it does so. Sins 
 against society are thus marked by social re- 
 probation. I see no need of enforcing such 
 laws by the denunciations and menaces of reli- 
 gion?" 
 
 " Are not these more powerful ?" 
 
 " More severe, I grant you; and, like all severe 
 codes, necessarilv inefficient. Look at all coun-
 
 FAMILY. 139 
 
 tries where the threats and promises of religion 
 are construed and believed according to the 
 letter, they are the most dissolute in Europe. 
 In those others, as in your own, where, if I am 
 rightly informed, although religion is mildly 
 professed, honour is allowed to be the univer- 
 sal motive of action, and guide in principle, 
 virtue pervades private life. No, Sir, the ce- 
 remony is nothing, it needs neither pomp nor 
 superstition. The social respect with which 
 it is regarded, hallows it sufficiently." 
 
 " I regret," said I, " that you always look at 
 religion on the unamiable side. Setting its 
 proofs apart, I cannot conceive, how a woman 
 should fail to prefer it to all systems of ethics ; 
 its distinguishing characteristic being to suit 
 the wants and weaknesses of the heart, to ally 
 with the feelings, to be capable of being iden- 
 tified with them, so as to elevate, to purify, to 
 follow them. A cold and finely-reasoned sys- 
 tem of morality may conduct a man through 
 many trying scenes of life, may direct his 
 steps and bear him upright through moments
 
 140 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 when self and honesty were at variance — but 
 for a woman, and a woman's heart, for passion, 
 for affection, for love, there is but one creed, 
 one thought that can hallow and console. — " 
 
 Cornelie looked impatient. 
 
 '.' Think only of the state of woman," urged 
 I, " in classic and heathen times ?" 
 
 " Nay," said she, " tempt not Cornelie to 
 that topic of discussion. I should be wild 
 and warm, and should allow too much advan- 
 tage to a sophist like yourself." 
 
 " A sophist?" 
 
 "I know of one charm at least, independent 
 of that recommended and preached by you, 
 which consoles the heart, and hallows at least 
 its misplaced or unfortunate affections. — And 
 that is self-denial, self-oblivion." Cornelie 
 leaned her head upon her hand, evidently want- 
 ing this very self-oblivion, the effects of which 
 she boasted. 
 
 " It is a melancholy consolation," said I, 
 " to forget." 
 
 " And a common-place one — but you mis-
 
 FAMILY. 141 
 
 take, by self-oblivion I meant not forgetful- 
 ness. That I do not wish for. With a bleak 
 future, what should one do without a past to 
 dwell on, let that have been ever so sad." 
 " We can make the future what we will." 
 " We cannot make it sun shine, if the past 
 o'ershadow it." 
 
 " But we have wandered from our argu- 
 ment." 
 
 " So let us. The pleasure of society is to 
 converse, not argue." 
 
 There was here a pause in our dialogue, 
 from which we were further and finally diverted 
 by the unusual sound of horse's steps upon the 
 little avenue. We had not heard the gates un- 
 closed, and the noise had scarcely reached our 
 ears, when horse and horseman crossed the 
 window in our view. 
 
 Cornelie grew very red, and straight after as 
 pale. 
 
 The Cavalier's was a handsome, martial 
 figure. He entered, Cornelie hesitated. A
 
 142 the regicide's 
 
 struggle of many thoughts and feelings passed 
 within her mind, and paralyzed all motion. 
 But the frank soldier seized his welcome, 
 kissed both the pale cheeks of Cornelie, sate 
 down beside her, masked his own emotion, if 
 he felt any, and dissipated hers with ques- 
 tions, tidings, gay remarks, ejaculations. In 
 a few moments he had set all present at ease, 
 except himself, as I knew by the glance which 
 he cast at me, as soon as our recovery from as- 
 tonishment and dumbness gave respite to his 
 volubility. 
 
 This was Colonel Girouette. 
 It is extremely unpleasant to be the bodkin 
 or third person between a pair of lovers, but it 
 is doubly absurd and disagreeable for a care- 
 less, heart-whole, decided bachelor to find him- 
 self, in addition to the above awkwardness, 
 the innocent object of jealousy and suspicion 
 to the hot-brained suitor. To be suspected at 
 all of such a sentiment is an insult to the dig- 
 niBed apathy of the character, and to be sus-
 
 FAMILY. 143 
 
 pected in order merely to be maltreated, and 
 to obtain the subsequent character of a silly 
 pretender discarded, is the very acme of tor- 
 ment and vexation. What is a man to do ? If 
 he looks grave, there seems to be reason in the 
 thing, and the affair becomes tragic. If he 
 smiles — it is the natural ruse, and exasperation 
 is pre-excited. If he expostulates, he is dis- 
 believed — if he good-humouredly and ironi- 
 cally assents, he is believed. — In short, jea- 
 lousy excited must have an object to vent 
 itself upon, and even when convinced of its 
 own vanity, must still rage for the sake of 
 consistency, and to preserve its own character 
 as a rational passion. I knew not what to do. 
 The spark of suspicion had fallen, the flame 
 was awakened. Each word and gesture, how- 
 ever warily spoken or artfully chosen, would 
 be as likely to fan as to extinguish it. I wished 
 myself, at the chalet — at the cures. I was at 
 sea, and longed for a spot of dry land, — " long- 
 heath, brown furze, any thing."
 
 144 the regicide's 
 
 " And your father, Cornelie," said Girouette, 
 ''Ossian and Oscar, where are they?" 
 
 " Oscar lies hurt in the mountains, owing 
 to an accident which he met with in hunting. 
 My father and Ossian have gone to see 
 him." 
 
 " And—" 
 
 " Monsieur, allow me to introduce, &c — a 
 friend of M. Thouin's — he was with Oscar 
 when the accident happened." 
 
 " Pray, Sir, what was it?" 
 
 "A shot," said I. 
 
 " And a fall," said Cornelie. 
 
 There was a pause. 
 
 " Two concise causes," said the Colonel, 
 " but quite sufficient to lay up one man. Mon- 
 sieur is a stranger in these parts ?" 
 
 " Altogether so, until a visit of many weeks 
 with my friends here has rendered me as 
 much acquainted with its beautiful scenery, 
 as I can well be." 
 
 "Delightful country, highly delightful, I
 
 FAMILY. 146 
 
 do not wonder that its attractions have de- 
 tained you so long." 
 
 " I need not say, that the family of this 
 mansion have been to me its chief attraction." 
 
 "Indeed. I begin to regret my abrupt ar- 
 rival." 
 
 " How should that be ? I, for my part, was 
 longing for the coming of a third person: 
 Oscar's accident, and my fatigue in assisting 
 him, having, awkwardly enough, left me the 
 task of keeping up the spirits of Mademoiselle 
 Cornelie." 
 
 "The task." 
 
 " And a troublesome one — she is most sadly 
 given." 
 
 "And my English friend," said Cornelie, 
 rallying, " in order to inspire me with mirth, 
 was treating me with a most serious disqui- 
 sition on " 
 
 " On what, pray," said Girouette, keenly. 
 
 " Ma foi," replied Cornelie, smiling and 
 
 u
 
 146 the regicide's 
 
 blushing, " I do believe it was upon mar- 
 
 riage." 
 
 I was somewhat shaken from my own pre- 
 sence of mind by the young lady's awkward 
 frankness, and looked, no doubt, most fool- 
 ishly guilty, as the Colonel observed, " That 
 there could not be a more interesting topic 
 for a tete-a-tete, and certainly not one better 
 calculated to have effect upon the drooping 
 spirits of a lady." 
 
 " There has been too much of this," said 
 Cornelie, rising, and quitting the apartment. 
 
 I never met a more frank, gay, fascinating 
 fellow than was Girouette. Half an hour spent 
 in his company solved for me satisfactorily 
 the enigma, which previously I was quite un- 
 able to comprehend, of such a woman as Cor- 
 nelie remaining attached to a man, that had 
 shewn so many signs of fickleness and self. 
 But mere man as he was, in the most worldly 
 of senses, he pleaded guilty to it in a tone so
 
 FAMILY. 147 
 
 good-humoured, and confessed his very worth- 
 lessness in a style so generous and noble, that 
 if the hearer believed him guilty of such petti- 
 ness, he could not help believing at the same 
 time all men, even the best, capable of the 
 same. He enhanced himself, not by elevating 
 himself above his fellows, but by degrading 
 them to a level with himself. I had observed 
 such heroic characters in fiction, framed upon 
 the same principle — but then they had always 
 a touch of the tragic, and told even of their 
 failings" in Cambyses' vein" — whilst Girouette 
 wore all his imperfections in the comic sock, 
 not the buskin — and even when he sported 
 with the feelings which he possessed, and 
 that intensely, it was by no means in ironic 
 derision of them — there was none of the affec- 
 tation or exaggeration of romance about him. 
 When Cornelie left us together, he neither 
 cut nor insulted me — the least that I might 
 have expected from a dragoon of rank — but 
 merely spoke forth his suspicions in as few 
 
 h2
 
 148 the regicide's 
 
 and as plain words as possible, which I an- 
 swered with more circumlocution, but all as 
 simply. We were very great friends — at least 
 so I thought — in ten minutes. 
 
 After an absence of little more than that 
 time, Cornelie returned, armed with a colder 
 air than she had been able to assume in the 
 flurry occasioned by her lover's arrival. 
 
 " I am so sorry, Colonel Girouette, to be the 
 only one of the family at home to welcome 
 you. But this accident — It is the more awk- 
 ward, as you gave my father reason to expect 
 you." 
 
 "Your father — did not I give the fair Cor- 
 nelie reason also?" 
 
 " Reasons, Colonel," said Cornelie tartly, 
 " are a supply, which you abound in, and are 
 lavish of. But in truth I had long ceased to 
 expect you." 
 
 "A soldier's time and motions, fair mis- 
 tress, are not his own. They are his k — his 
 country's."
 
 FAMILY. 149 
 
 " Be not ashamed to mention the name of 
 your royal master, even to a republican's 
 daughter. Under a constitutional King, I too 
 would be a royalist, if he would permit me. 
 And yet, just as is his cause, and equitable as 
 may be his reign, it took me some time, ere 
 I could regard his rule with a subject's 
 fealty." 
 
 " You do then at last — you delight me." 
 
 " Ay, at last, which only differs from at first 
 by a certain degree of sincerity." 
 
 :< Still ferocious" (Jarouche, the word is un- 
 translatable) " on our ancient subject of dis- 
 pute. It is time that question were at rest. 
 I can assure you, all the world, save yourself, 
 has forgotten it." 
 
 " And the great cause also." 
 
 " What — Napoleon — ay, truly, he is in the 
 purgatory of heroism, oblivion." 
 
 " And, I believe," said I, anticipating any 
 remarks of the kind, which, as an English- 
 man, I always love better to speak than listen
 
 150 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 to, " his gaoler makes it a true purgatory for 
 him." 
 
 " I pray you, Sir, not to name that comp- 
 troller of foul linen," said Girouette, " , 
 
 those Saint Helena paragraphs have almost 
 re-made me a Bonapartist." 
 
 " The persecution of the mighty captive 
 must have refreshed his party." 
 
 "Given life to one already extinct. All 
 that his fame wanted was martyrdom. I hope 
 sincerely, those English gentlemen will poi- 
 son him." 
 
 " Poison, Colonel Girouette," said I, *' I 
 fervently hope not." 
 
 " , they shall though. 
 
 " Shall, how V 
 
 " Simply, that we are determined to give 
 them credit for it, whether or not they be kind 
 enough to attempt it." 
 
 " Suppose you could even bribe them to it, 
 where's the point gained ?" 
 
 " Why, that we should have a military
 
 FAMILY. 151 
 
 saint, and a potent rallying- word — an acorn, 
 Sir, that might spring up to overshadow the 
 empire. France has grown sadly civilian of a 
 sudden, moustaches are out of fashion— the 
 aproned negotiant begins to think that he can 
 do without us, so doth the embroidered mar- 
 quis, that jostles us at court: — the representa- 
 tive supersedes the officer, the tribune the 
 field of battle— and, in short, without the re- 
 action of a party, at least the mock-organiza- 
 tion of one, we militaires shall soon be no- 
 thing." 
 
 The Colonel seemed to pride himself upon 
 the acuteness of his party views, and evidently 
 the character he was most ambitious of was 
 that of an intriguant. I thought it pity, that 
 he did not reserve his subtle opinions in po- 
 litical matters for the ex-conventionalist. On 
 me, amusing as they were, they were thrown 
 away. In Cornelie they evidently exxited 
 deep disgust. Still Girouette rattled on,
 
 152 the regicide's 
 
 treating the subject as lightly as if it were 
 mere scandal or a disquisition upon taste, nor 
 once pausing, as a British gallant would and 
 must have done, to consider lest his conversa- 
 tion should grow too profound for the ears of 
 our fair companion. These are questions, 
 however, that need never interrupt discourse 
 in foreign life, where neither years nor small- 
 clothes are deemed, as with us, requisite for 
 the attainment of political, and other know- 
 ledge equally grave. 
 
 Girouette had another motive for his pre- 
 sent loquacity. This was the sullen humour 
 with which Cornelie received him, and which 
 seemed to tinge every reply and observation 
 of hers with bitterness. Conversation, he 
 knew, carried on in this spirit would infallibly 
 tend to augment the difference, and could but 
 increase exacerbation. He therefore kept it 
 altogether in his own hands, left neither Cor- 
 nelie nor myself room for more than a mono*
 
 FAMILY. 153 
 
 syllable, and thus by a kind of gay and varied 
 monologue, he contrived to make the evening 
 pass in good-humour and harmony, although 
 of his two companions one was very dull, and 
 the other in the least amiable of tempers. 
 
 h3
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 When I arose the next morning, at a much 
 later hour than usual, owing to the fatigue of 
 the preceding days, I found that Girouette and 
 Cornelie had had a long and stormy tete-a-tete. 
 The prudent father's presence, which had in 
 late interviews calmed the indignant pride 
 and moderated the high and hot feelings of 
 his daughter, was now unluckily wanting. 
 And Girouette, accustomed to glide with suc- 
 cess through a gay, thoughtless, conforming 
 world, was irritated by reproaches cast upon 
 him for want of that heroism and consistency, 
 which he deemed absurd. His political feel- 
 ings or conduct were not those certainly which
 
 THE REGICIDE'S FAMILY. 155 
 
 most excited the lady's indignation and con- 
 tempt — but it was to those only that she con- 
 fined her reproaches — she disdained to accuse 
 that fickleness and time-serving spirit in his 
 private feelings, of which her happiness had 
 been the sacrifice. 
 
 He had not encountered from her such per- 
 tinacity and coldness before — and the chill 
 struck more powerfully upon him for being 
 unexpected. In fact, his coming had been 
 the termination of a long debate and struggle 
 within him, between honour and love pretty 
 equally mingled on the one hand, and am- 
 bition on the other. Love had carried the 
 day victoriously, but not without a struggle, 
 and one of the great supports and pleasures 
 attending his final resolution was the con- 
 sciousness of acting, in despite of certain sa- 
 crifices, what was right and honourable. Now, 
 it cut all at once his self-complacency to the 
 quick, to find that he was penetrated, fa- 
 thomed, the mean workings of his selfish soul
 
 156 the regicide's 
 
 read, himself humbled and contemned. Cor- 
 nelie La Versiere was not the being, that in 
 absence he had flattered himself by imagining. 
 In the arrogance of solitary meditation or 
 plans, we are most apt to under-rate our fel- 
 low actors in the scene we contemplate. Gi- 
 rouette had looked on Cornelie as a fond, sim- 
 ple creature, whom his address could mystify, 
 to use his own expression,— whom he could 
 make happy by deceit, and with less than a 
 whole heart. 
 
 He came in the pride of his cunning, in the 
 strength of his worldly intercourse and know- 
 ledge of mankind. And certainly his voluble 
 gaiety was irresistible at first— it silenced 
 Cornelie — it even won somewhat upon her 
 dislike — and perhaps the continued presence 
 of a third person would have afforded his fas- 
 cinations time and scope to have had effect. 
 But when they met alone — when no witness 
 checked the feelings of Cornelie, in the full 
 utterance of them — then, as ever, address was
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 157 
 
 baffled by simplicity, — the shallow sincerity, 
 which the worst and weakest put on at times 
 under the influence of an excited resolution, 
 was penetrated and exposed by that which 
 knows no change— the little mind of the in- 
 triguer lay unmasked and awed before hers, 
 great in its unity of purpose and thought. 
 Defeated, discovered in all his wiles, Gi- 
 ro uette retreated to frankness, to confession, 
 covering meanness with mirth, and self with 
 the false heroism of worldliness. But neither 
 did this avail ; the trenchant reproof of want 
 of honesty, both in word and thought, went 
 through all such vain guards. The man was 
 humbled. This was all he gained by the 
 interview, the event of which he had looked 
 upon as too certain, to anticipate or think of it 
 as a triumph. 
 
 It was one of those lessons, which, if any 
 thing can reclaim a corrupt heart, they will. 
 De Stael says somewhere, "He, whom we 
 love, is the avenger on earth of all the crimes
 
 158 the regicide's 
 
 we commit. The Divinity lends him his 
 power" — and that, she might have added, not 
 only for castigation and vengeance, but also 
 for correction. 
 
 In addition to thus punishing and cutting 
 down the meanly-founded pride of her lover, 
 and at the same time gratifying her own more 
 honest portion of the feeling, Cornelie, had 
 she been the most artful of coquettes, could 
 not have chosen a more effectual mode of re- 
 gaining as well as reclaiming a fickle, though 
 not altogether a false heart. In his first bitter 
 humiliation he retired to solitude with the de- 
 termination of at once departing and no more 
 reverting thought or step towards the threshold 
 of La Versiere, and in the bitter, though not 
 less buoyant gaiety, which disappointment, in 
 common with other excitements, gives birth 
 to, Girouette congratulated himself upon an 
 escape so little hoped for, and an extrication 
 at once from trammels that tortured his heart 
 and crossed his ambition. But as his spirits
 
 FAMILY. 159 
 
 subsided, and that sadness followed, which is 
 so favourable to recollection, and when in 
 consequence the images and associations con- 
 nected with this, his early and first attachment, 
 came over his memory — mortified too, and 
 sick as he had been rendered of the selfishness 
 and cunning, of which he had just seen a 
 proof of the inefficacy, his old impressions 
 recurred in full and irresistible force. He re- 
 called Cornelie, the simple, enthusiastic girl, 
 that had first won his heart — in womanhood 
 her early virtues, as well as her charms, were 
 now perfected — whilst his gleams of high 
 spirit, and ardent patriotism had been ob- 
 scured and lost, scarcely betraying a glimmer, 
 except in such a moment uf roused thought as 
 then, to mark their having ever existed. How 
 should he now recover that pride of spirit, 
 which he once promised himself to hold ? How 
 relume that heroism within him, which min- 
 gling with the world had quenched, and which 
 burned alone, to his discernment, in the breast
 
 160 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 of the old Conventionalist's daughter ? It could 
 only be regained by cherishing his affection for 
 that noble female. 
 
 Such were the reflections of his morning's 
 walk, such his last conclusion. And he was 
 right in more senses than he thought of — his 
 maxim was just, even in the abstract. — Our 
 first affections, if wisely and worthily bestowed, 
 are the true Palladium of virtue. With them 
 we are impregnable. Ungarrisoned by them, 
 we are open to all baseness. For when love 
 (by which I mean the early, first, and pure) 
 abandons the young heart, self is sure to enter 
 and take possession. 
 
 I encountered the Colonel in his walk, 
 flushed by these thoughts. We conversed. I 
 could scarcely believe it was the same man, 
 so changed, so earnest were both his tone and 
 subject. 
 
 " Almighty Love," thought I, " thou canst 
 transform," &c. 
 
 " You are a happy, serious, thinking people,"
 
 FAMILY. 161 
 
 said he to me, " I wish I were an English- 
 
 man." 
 
 I could not avoid smiling at the ludicrous 
 fickleness and abruptness of the sentiment. 
 Which I may account for by remarking, that 
 in common with other voung Frenchmen, Gi- 
 rouette had two modes of knowing England 
 and its national character, both of which, 
 though as contradictory as opposites can well 
 be, he nevertheless had studied, and he be- 
 lieved both, there too, in common with his 
 countrymen, inclining to one or the other ac- 
 cording as it was his whim to bless or curse, 
 to envy or to hate us. 
 
 One draft of our character, one section of 
 us, as an architect would say, he had seen in 
 the diatribes of the Moniteur under the Impe- 
 rial regime: — in this we were perfidious, ma- 
 chiavelian, avaricious, starving, slaves, narrow, 
 barbarous, &c. And as an exaggerated pic- 
 ture is always supplied in justice with one of 
 another extreme as a contrast, this he had
 
 162 the regicide's 
 
 contemplated in the Lord Bomston of Rous- 
 seau's " Heloise," where, as the reader knows, 
 we are represented very Grandisons, and phi- 
 lanthropes par excellence. Now, Girouette was 
 at present very much dissatisfied with himself, 
 and with his country, and being in a romantic 
 turn of mind, the " Heloise," and its super- 
 excellent Lord with the barbarous name natu- 
 rally occurred to him, and produced the unpa- 
 triotic remark, which I have set down. 
 
 " I am sorry to hear you say so," replied I, 
 " a man must have some time quarrelled with 
 himself, ere his discontent swells into a dislike 
 for his country. There is but one degree far- 
 ther, to which bitterness may reach." 
 
 " What may that be, pray ?" 
 
 " Misanthropy." 
 
 " Now you mention it," said he, relapsing 
 into his usual tone of half-serious, half-trifling, 
 " I think I do feel considerably misanthropic. 
 Even your appearance just now was disagree- 
 able to me, and had not my habitual good
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 163 
 
 manners come to my aid, I should have been 
 almost tempted to quarrel with you." 
 
 " You're bilious, my good Colonel ; consult 
 a physician." 
 
 "Thou shalt be he — what say you to my 
 pulse?" asked he, stretching forth his arm. 
 
 " Nay — the physiognomy alone is sufficient 
 to supply the moral physician with symp- 
 toms." 
 
 " And what saith my countenance. 'Tis a 
 frank one, I have heard, but of few words, 
 for in truth it saith little." 
 
 " Much, Sir, on the contrary, much. It 
 telleth at this moment more than I could well 
 collect — love, pride, vexation. The eyes tell 
 one, the brow another, and many a quivering 
 muscle tells the third." 
 
 " What more, Sir — you deserve a conjuror's 
 fee?" 
 
 " That flush bespeaks a new train of thought 
 — that lip, unnaturally compressed, a resolu- 
 tion not habitual to a fickle humour."
 
 164 the regicide's 
 
 " 'Sdeath ! Sir, what necromancer are you V 
 " One of Lavater's followers, even of that 
 Swiss philosopher, whom ye slew at Zu- 
 rich." 
 
 " He perished no doubt like another Archi- 
 medes, while studying the physiognomy of 
 Massena. But where's your remedy for this 
 sad complication of ills?" 
 
 ' I have been summoned late with my ad- 
 vice. Another and more powerful physician 
 has ministered the proper drug." 
 
 " And what may that have been ?" 
 
 " Let the physician speak for herself, if 
 you durst question her." 
 
 As I spoke, Cornelie appeared. 
 
 " What a lovely being, such a queen-like 
 gait — there must be a sublime air amongst 
 these hills, that communicates itself to beauty 
 — she is wonderfully changed and improved, 
 Cornelie La Versiere, — is she not? But you 
 have not known her long." 
 
 " Yet you must have seen her, Colonel, in
 
 FAMILY. [65 
 
 the rich saloon, in the queen of cities, Paris, 
 rivalling its proudest fair." 
 
 " No more to the Cornelie of this Swiss 
 solitude, than Montmartre is to yon Alp." 
 
 "True — the lonely bird hath ever the sweet- 
 est note, and the solitary star of evening hath 
 a hundred vows and eyes directed towards it, 
 for every one that coldly admires the galaxy of 
 a crowded heaven." 
 
 " You put me in mind of Os^iun, who pesters 
 one with similes — it is not that — 'tis that the 
 mind really expands in solitude, especially of 
 such noble scenes, and acquires, as hers hath 
 done, a wilder and more independent spirit." 
 
 The lady now joined us: and the glance of 
 the soldier quailed to that of the maiden. 
 
 " We were even speaking of you," said 
 Girouette. 
 
 " Indeed — what^words had ye to expend?" 
 
 " We were comparing the Cornelie of so- 
 ciety, of the metropolis, to her who is the exile's 
 daughter."
 
 166 the regicide's 
 
 " I thought, Colonel, that you had some time 
 since discovered the difference." 
 
 " Never till this moment, Cornelie." 
 
 " I cannot believe your discernment so 
 tardy. Have you never perceived corruption 
 in the exile's blood, or a certain atmosphere 
 around the dwelling of the old revolutionist, 
 most pernicious and blighting to modern am- 
 bition. Are we not altogether past, and out 
 of the mode, this coiffure, as well as the dear- 
 est feelings of this heart? Changed, say you — 
 you are right indeed." 
 
 " He were a cold and selfish wretch, whose 
 thoughts were these." 
 
 " Are they not yours ?" 
 
 " No, by mine honour." 
 
 " Answer as frankly, have they never 
 been?" 
 
 The soldier hesitated. Her searching eye 
 was upon him. " If they have ever intruded 
 for an instant, more worthy thoughts have soon 
 chased them away."
 
 FAMILY. 167 
 
 " Ah ! that instant, and that soon," — I turned 
 from them, down the garden walk. 
 
 " Pardon, then, dear Cornelie," said the 
 soldier, sinking on one knee, " I have confessed 
 the worst, more even than the truth, in hopes 
 of mitigating your anger. I am repentant and 
 swear eternal truth." 
 
 " Think you then, good Sir, that you have 
 but to swear in order to be believed, or that 
 bringing one knee to earth is punishment suf- 
 ficient to my vengeance. Or that even if I did 
 believe that for the moment you were sincere, 
 1 should promise more than to forgive and to 
 — forget. 
 
 " Oh — this is too much — you are cruel, un- 
 reasonable — " 
 
 I heard no more, until returning, as my steps 
 again brought me near to them. 
 
 " My sentiments changed," said Cornelie, 
 repeating no doubt a question of his ; " they 
 are — that is, they are not changed, but oblite- 
 rated. I care for none beyond my family —
 
 1G8 the regicide's 
 
 and if my affections are ever to extend be- 
 yond that circle, they are yet to be awakened." 
 
 " Tis well, Mademoiselle." 
 
 " Or re-awakened/' said the lady. " But, as 
 I said, more urgent business presses than these 
 arguments." 
 
 " Business, of what urgent kind can these 
 solitudes afford? The vintage— but that may 
 be left to ruder hands." 
 
 "'Tis neither agricultural nor household 
 business, Colonel — but some that requires my 
 absence upon a distant ride. My father and 
 Ossian will be home before evening, and I my- 
 self ere that. — You cannot lack amusement." 
 
 "Surely I can accompany you." 
 
 " Impossible — that cannot be." 
 
 " You will require some attendant in those 
 wild, mountain paths." 
 
 " Monsieur," replied Cornelie, turning to me, 
 who had by that time approached, " will be 
 kind enough to accompany me." 
 
 " At your command."
 
 FAMILY. 169 
 
 " Am I to consider this as vengeance, Cor- 
 nelie ?" 
 
 "As whim, if you so wish it." 
 
 " Then I may turn my horse's head towards 
 Strasbourg — ." 
 
 " You had better tarry to see my father, 
 and repose yourself and steed at least one 
 day." 
 
 " Repose, indeed," cried the Colonel in no 
 calm tone, "when woman's hand pours the 
 opiate."
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 I obeyed the young lady, silent and obse- 
 quious as a mute, and all as ignorant whither 
 her command tended. The jealousy of Girou- 
 ette was of course re-awakened, and his anger, 
 right well pleased, as such passion always is, 
 to find itself converted into vengeance by hav- 
 ing an object offered to it, already vented it- 
 self upon me in frowns and scintillating glances. 
 He gave us to understand in parting that he 
 remained for my sake, as much as for the 
 lady's ; and, uninfluenced as I was, by any of 
 the pugnacious passions of love, jealousy, or 
 resentment, I felt the conveyed hint to be no 
 compliment.
 
 THE REGICIDE'S FAMILY. 171 
 
 Our horses had some time quitted the pine- 
 encircled mansion of the exile, as well as the 
 subjacent village, ere I recovered from my 
 astonishment, and requested of Cornelie some 
 explanation of her conduct, of this journey, 
 and of the necessity of its being unshared by 
 Colonel Girouette. 
 
 " You have not guessed then what my pur- 
 pose is ?" 
 
 " To visit Oscar." 
 
 " No — I go to speak with the father of 
 Marie." . 
 
 "And of Paul." 
 
 " Even so. But of Paul's fate he cannot 
 yet be certain. And if I can in the mean time 
 reconcile him to Marie, and assure him that 
 she shall make one of our family, the heavy ills, 
 with which misfortune has visited him, will be 
 alleviated." 
 
 " Are you certain that Oscar, that your fa- 
 the rwill " 
 
 "They must, they shall. In this cause of 
 
 i2
 
 172 the regicide's 
 
 right, and of rendering the consolation that 
 we trebly owe to this unhappy father, I will 
 prevail." 
 
 I thought that little good consequences could 
 ensue from this journey, and interview with an 
 exasperated man . ' ' The first preliminary must 
 be to confess your brother guilty of the one 
 crime at least," said I, " and who can tell how 
 the old man will bear the tidings, the confir- 
 mation of what he suspected, coming too from 
 your mouth. His passion may vent itself in 
 some way even hazardous to you. Insult at 
 least you must expect, and for what object is 
 all this hazarded?" 
 
 " Nay," said Cornelie, " it is we who have 
 first wronged, and must first risk. I will 
 throw myself upon the old man, will talk to 
 him, will beseech him, to forgive his daughter, 
 and her lover." 
 
 " But you know not how deep may be his 
 prejudices." 
 
 " The greater shall be my patience, the more
 
 FAMILY. 173 
 
 perseverant my entreaties. I am but a wo- 
 man, and an unhappy one — he cannot see in 
 me a fiend." 
 
 " He may have learned the fate of Paul, and 
 by the hand of whom ?" 
 
 "Then 'twill be but the one task to appease 
 his resentment on all accounts, — to inform 
 him of the whole truth, which he certainly 
 will not have heard. And my father's ill- 
 judged plan of concealment will so be done 
 away with. — I am determined — there is no use 
 in your attempts to dissuade. You have hi- 
 therto evinced friendship for us, and will not 
 in this instance permit me to be badly in- 
 sulted." 
 
 " As far as my arm and devotion can serve 
 you, lady, count upon it. Yet I wish Colonel 
 Girouette had been allowed to accompany us, 
 as much for his peace as for our safety." 
 
 " What Girouette knows, Paris knows. And 
 my father would be outrageous, if he thought 
 the Colonel acquainted with this unfortunate
 
 174 the regicide's 
 
 connexion, or more unfortunate homicide of 
 Oscar's. It were impossible to tell him." 
 
 "Nay, but your cruelty was extreme." 
 
 " Be not so lavish of your sympathy, as to 
 bestow it upon Colonel Girouette. He is so 
 profoundly selfish, that man, that whatever 
 may be his sufferings, he will surely extract 
 some gratification from them, either in the way 
 of his interest or his vanity. I have known 
 him to evince the keenest sensibility one mo- 
 ment, to boast of his feelings the second, and 
 the third to turn them into derision, and in all 
 he was sincere." 
 
 I smiled at such depth and penetration, espe- 
 cially in a character of great traits, if I may use 
 the expression. For the penetration and know- 
 ledge of their fellows, possessed by some men 
 to an eminent degree, springs chiefly from their 
 self-knowledge, and their similarity in petty 
 motives to the brethren, whom they read so 
 truly. 
 
 She continued, " He pretends to consider
 
 FAMILY. 175 
 
 you as the occasion of this, and to transfer the 
 grudge to you." 
 
 " He honours me, more than he doth Cor- 
 nelie La Versiere." 
 
 " There is the true Englishman, stiff and 
 courteous, as an old Spaniard, when it behoves 
 him to speak gallant." 
 
 " Ah ! Cornelie — if I were not past the young 
 years of love, and did not the memory of one 
 that is no more, at least to me, deter each 
 tender thought, he might indeed see a rival in 
 me, or more properly 1 in him." 
 
 " At another moment I could be merry on 
 this score," replied she, " and at another I 
 would hear, if you would deign to tell it, the 
 story of her, who reigns the queen of your 
 thoughts — we shall be the better friends for that 
 confession, for there is a free-masonry of passion, 
 which binds the initiated together — but as to 
 his jealousy, heed it not, 'tis like his love, put on." 
 
 " I do think, you wrong his sincerity, Cor- 
 nelie."
 
 176 the regicide's 
 
 "Do you think so?" and she mused, as if 
 the contradiction pleased her. Perhaps she 
 had been thus severe in her character of Gi- 
 rouette, in order to induce me to become his 
 defender — but I am so dull, that these little 
 tricks of woman never reach my perceptions, 
 till it is too late to play in their favour. 
 
 Meantime we had made progress on our 
 mountain road, which, though not the same, 
 lay pretty much in the same direction with 
 that, which I had pursued in company with 
 the brothers. It was much more tedious than 
 that straight foot-path, but in company with 
 Cornelie I noted little its descents and ascents, 
 and interminable windings. Although indeed 
 she was too much absorbed in the anxious 
 causes and object of her journey to continue 
 or renew the conversation. 
 
 Breque, I remember, was the name of the 
 unhappy father of Paul and Marie. We espied 
 his habitation, high and far, long ere we ap- 
 proached it, and even the first distant sight of
 
 FAMILY. 177 
 
 a place, whither we were bound on such a 
 fearful errand, to face the just fury of an 
 agonized parent, was not marked, even by me, 
 without a nervous sensation. Cornelie, who 
 was not without similar misgivings, but 
 hastened her speed on that account, to shorten 
 the painful prelude of anxiety. And in a 
 little time we found ourselves at the outer 
 gate of M. Breque's dwelling. 
 
 No sound came from within; not one of the 
 crowd that loiter round a Swiss farm was to 
 be seen : — herds and shepherds had been dis- 
 patched far away, that their bustle might not 
 break in upon the gloom of the house of sor- 
 row. We entered, and tied our horses to the 
 gate, menaced rather than welcomed by the 
 hovvlings of a pair of hounds. 
 
 Their warnings, however, did not seem to 
 arouse any of the inmates, for, as we entered 
 the house, Breque himself sate in his arm chair 
 opposite the rude poele, or stove, that formed 
 the fire-place of the apartment. It was a chill 
 
 1 3
 
 178 the regicide's 
 
 day upon these heights, though autumn drew 
 not yet near to its close : and the old man 
 sate with hands stretched forth, as if to gather 
 heat from the stove, that was yet without fire. 
 
 He started from his reverie, as he beheld us, 
 but instead of rising, he merely waved his 
 arm, and put it from him, signifying that we 
 should begone, and not intrude upon his soli- 
 tude. Cornelie, however, continued to advance. 
 The old man struck his hand upon his head 
 as fretfully, as if he had been disturbed in a 
 dream of pleasure ; and then in abstraction, 
 more than in anger, for he scarcely looked to 
 note who we were, he seized the arm of Cor- 
 nelie, to put her gently forth from the door. 
 His countenance seemed to say, I need no idle 
 visits of consolation. 
 
 Cornelie seized the arm that forced her 
 along, and hanging from it, said, " Let me 
 stay, and speak with you, Sir; I am the 
 daughter of La Versiere." 
 
 As if he had discovered that he held a viper,
 
 FAMILY. 179 
 
 the old man loosened his grasp, and recoiled ; 
 " Thou, the daughter of the regicide — have I 
 within my reach one of that deceitful mur- 
 derous family?" and after gazing an instant, 
 he clenched his teeth, and pressed his closed 
 hands to his eyes, delighted and yet struggling 
 with the horrid idea of vengeance, that was 
 present to his mind. 
 
 " Go away," cried he, stamping, " quit my 
 house, my mountains, fly, or I cannot resist — 
 if it once more were thy brother," and he ran 
 forward and seized her, whilst I stood betwixt 
 him and the object of his passion, and com- 
 pelled him to loose his hold, "I would, I 
 would — " and disengaged from Cornelie, he 
 took from the wall a knife, of that vulgar and 
 horrid kind, which was daily imbrued in the 
 blood of his flock. 
 
 " Would you assassinate a woman, and 
 within your own walls ?" cried I to him, at the 
 same time vainly endeavouring to urge Cor- 
 nelie to retire.
 
 180 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 " No, no," roared he ; " but it is pleasure to 
 think what I might do, and do in justice — 
 'twould be but blood for blood." 
 
 "Think it not, — my brother has not been 
 guilty of blood," said Cornelie. 
 
 " Where then is Paul, my son ?" 
 
 "Has he too perished?" asked I, wishing to 
 draw from the old man how much of his mis- 
 fortunes he knew, and at the same time in- 
 citing him to vent his sorrow and resentment 
 in words. 
 
 "Hath he, Sir? Ask at home, or of this 
 girl, — look here" — and he displayed the tat- 
 tered rags of the unfortunate youth's garment 
 — "look here — my son's body, my own flesh 
 
 was" — and the old man sunk faint in his 
 chair. 
 
 "Oh Heaven!" cried Cornelie, in agony, 
 "that it were no crime to kill me, and that he 
 would, so blotting out his sorrow, his ven- 
 geance, and the crimes of Oscar." 
 
 The head and pale countenance of the for- 

 
 FAMILY. 
 
 181 
 
 lorn father, rolled on the high chair's back, 
 and he muttered, " The child of my old age, 
 mine only son, and my Marie too — why did 
 they tear me from him" (rousing up) "why 
 was I not let to wreak my vengeance on him, 
 when he was in my power— they gave me my 
 dead child for comfort, two, three, all dead — 
 murdered, and no vengeance — " 
 
 Cornelie again seized his hand. " It was 
 Oscar's misfortune," she said, "more than his 
 crime. Paul sought vengeance, there was a 
 struggle for life, and one succumbed." 
 
 "Fiend," said Breque, "fiend, beautiful as 
 thou art, is it for this you have come, to in- 
 crease my anguish by these mock excuses, — 
 or would you tempt me to crime, to murder — 
 me—" 
 
 "Will my tears, will any suffering, wash 
 away those crimes ?" 
 
 " Why have ye come ? what brought you ?" 
 roared the frantic old man, as the only an- 
 swer.
 
 182 the regicide's 
 
 "To beseech you, to win you to forgive 
 Marie—" 
 
 " Ha ! ha !" Breque gave two sounds of an 
 hideous laugh, " forgive Marie" — and he gazed 
 at her, staring with anger, frenzy, astonish- 
 ment, and yet with some horrible delight 
 mingled. 
 
 " Yes, to forgive her, to forgive us, to know 
 her as one of us, the wife of Oscar, my sister, 
 allied with souls of purity and honour, though 
 the world has blackened our name." 
 
 " How fair and soft she speaks, with what a 
 tone and truth, as if — nothing had happened. 
 Gentle as my own child — the regicide's, the 
 atheist's daughter — " 
 
 " Do not, Sir, echo back the senseless cla- 
 mours of the ignorant. My father would not 
 harm a fly." 
 
 " No, for a fly's not human — the vulture, 
 that preys on man, disdains to stoop on lesser 
 quarry." 
 
 "What shall I say— what plead ?" said Cor-
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 183 
 
 nelie, "he is frantic and inexorable. Will 
 you forgive your daughter ?" 
 
 " Forgive — the sinless girl — who could 
 have found crime in her — it was her curse, 
 not crime, to listen to that fiend — Heaven 
 knows that I forgive her," exclaimed he, 
 clasping his hands. 
 
 "And you will see her?" said Cornelie, 
 forcing herself to smile. 
 
 " Have you seen her ?" asked Breque. 
 " No, but I fly this instant to bear your pro- 
 mise to her." 
 " She is here." 
 "Who? Marie?" 
 "Would you see her?" 
 The expression of Breque's countenance 
 was indescribable, 'twas petrifying — there was 
 a horrid something in its calmness that held 
 Cornelie dumb. 
 
 He rose, took hold of her, and passing his 
 hand convulsively across his brow, he moved 
 towards an inner apartment. I followed,
 
 184 the regicide's family. 
 
 spell-bound ; but had not entered, when a 
 shriek from Cornelie precipitated my steps. 
 
 The beautiful form of Marie, that I had last 
 seen clinging round the neck of Oscar, here 
 lay extended, pale in death, her little infant, 
 to which she had since given birth, in her 
 arms, slumbering the same last sleep with its 
 mother. 
 
 The father, with rigid countenance, pointed 
 to his child and grandchild, holding up at the 
 same time the wretched tatters, all that re- 
 mained of his beloved son. Cornelie sunk 
 senseless to the earth ; after an instant's stu- 
 por, I bore her from the apartment: and it 
 was many minutes, ere the old man broke 
 from his fixed and silent attitude; and as I 
 beheld La Versiere's daughter slowly recover, 
 I was glad to hear the hapless father fling 
 himself down, and vent his sorrow in a flood 
 of tears.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 I could not hope for some time to raise 
 Cornelie upon her steed, and recommence 
 our journey homewards. She lay upon the 
 threshold. Some of the family, the sisters of 
 the unfortunate Marie, had come forth from 
 the hiding and weeping-places, whither the 
 terror of their father, as well as sorrow, had 
 driven them. Monsieur Thouin also soon 
 after made his appearance — to my delight, for 
 t feared some fresh paroxysm or extravagance 
 on the part of the old man. 
 
 He was surprised indeed at seeing us. He 
 did all to soothe and restore Cornelie, but she 
 still remained in a state of torpid grief. From
 
 186 the regicide's 
 
 him too I learned all the circumstances, which 
 were yet unknown to me, and which had pro- 
 duced the fatal catastrophe. 
 
 Some straggling hunter had lit upon the re- 
 mains of Paul, and had instantly brought 
 word to the Breques, as it was known that 
 for a day or two the youth had been missing. 
 Breque instantly sallied forth, and was soon 
 too well convinced of his son's fate. His peo- 
 ple climbed the rocks; on the snow above, 
 and on the fatal ledge, marks and footsteps 
 were discovered — following the track of these 
 led them to the hidden chalet. Marie was 
 there, the crisis of her dangerous state ap- 
 proaching, which the sudden appearance of* 
 her angry father hastened, rendered more dan- 
 gerous and finally fatal. The wounded Oscar 
 was too weak to defend himself or her : still 
 he rose and made the attempt. It was in 
 vain. He was not killed ; though it was with 
 the utmost difficulty, that the followers of 
 Breque, in dread of the consequences to their
 
 FAMILY. 187 
 
 master, more than from humanity, restrained 
 him from taking life for life. In the end, he 
 was flung from the chalet, unpierced by wea- 
 pon, but not without the expectation that he 
 must perish from neglect and cold. Marie 
 was borne home, where she had scarcely ar- 
 rived, when she gave birth to a child. The 
 rest I knew — more even than Thouin, who in 
 his humanity was anxious that some one 
 should be dispatched to rescue the unfortu- 
 nate and imprudent Oscar. I told him, that 
 his father and brother must have found him 
 on the preceding evening, not many hours 
 after the discovery and catastrophe had taken 
 place. This satisfied the pastor, who, after a 
 few words of consolation to Cornelie, entered, 
 and hastened to calm the intemperate grief of 
 Breque. 
 
 The old man welcomed and humbled him- 
 self before his spiritual guide and friend ; and 
 during the remainder of a long interview, the 
 sounds of outrageous grief, of vengeance, or de-
 
 188 the regicide's 
 
 lirium were no longer heard to burst from him. 
 Quiet again reigned in the house of death, 
 and Cornelie at length recovered strength 
 sufficient to express her wish to me that we 
 should depart. With my aid she arose, yet 
 lingered in doubt, wishing to speak a parting 
 word to some of the family. But the daugh- 
 ters shunned her as a spectre, and although 
 one or two had been in the apartment whilst 
 she lay quiescent, she no sooner stirred to 
 arise, than they fled with one accord. 
 
 We turned therefore to depart, when Mon- 
 sieur Thouin and Breque came from the 
 apartment, in which they had been together, 
 and the latter, with a calm in his demeanour, 
 that we had not before observed, approached 
 Cornelie. 
 
 " I thank you for your coming," said he, 
 checking himself as he was about to pro- 
 nounce the word ' daughter' ; " M. Thouin as- 
 sures me, it was well meant. — You have suf- 
 fered too — the shock I gave, I did not intend
 
 FAMILY. 189 
 
 — I knew not what I did. Forgive me" — and 
 the old man seized her hand, and shed tears. 
 
 " Forgive you," replied Cornelie, with a 
 piercing voice, " it is not my part to forgive — 
 alas ! it is yours, and, I fear, cannot be hoped 
 from you. It were not just." 
 
 " Forgiveness is a Christian virtue," said 
 the pastor, " we all require it, and must ex- 
 tend it." 
 
 " Justice must take its course," said Breque. 
 " We have no cause to fear that." 
 The old man smiled, and shook his head. 
 We departed. We rode for some distance 
 slowly. Cornelie at length said, 
 
 " What power Monsieur Thouin seemed to 
 have Jiad over the despair and fury of this 
 unfortunate parent. My entreaties were not 
 less urgent, not less eloquent, for I felt. Yet 
 at my voice his fury raged the more — at his 
 'twas calm." 
 
 " The power of his ministry," said I, " of 
 the creed he preaches."
 
 190 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 " I have seen indeed an example of its 
 power in sorrow. But it did not overcome 
 M. Breque's vengeful thoughts, although it 
 brought him to calmness, and to profess for- 
 giveness." 
 
 " Even that was much — beyond my expec- 
 tation." 
 
 " Poor Marie !" 
 
 We exchanged not another word, till we 
 reached home, which was not for some hours 
 after night had fallen. La Versiere was in 
 doubt and fear on account of her absence, 
 which the circumstance of Girouette's pre- 
 sence and surmises increased. He and Ossian 
 had succeeded in bringing home Oscar, who 
 was delirious, but who had nevertheless made 
 known to them the discovery and bearing off 
 of Marie by her parent. Her untimely death 
 was yet to burst on the youth's ear, to crown 
 his misfortunes and despair. Cornelie related 
 to her father the journey we had taken, what 
 we had heard and seen. And now that the
 
 FAMILY. ]91 
 
 hazard was past, he was not a little pleased 
 that it had taken place— its boldness would 
 contradict any imputation of that plan of con- 
 cealment, which he had first recommended 
 and had since repented. And the ire of 
 Breque, softened already, must be still more 
 so, when he came to reflect on the way in 
 which La Versiere's daughter had flung herself 
 upon him, and had braved his resentment for 
 the sake, as she hoped, of reconciling him to 
 his lost daughter. 
 
 There remained, however, still sufficient to 
 keep his fears alive, for Oscar's health, for 
 the criminal process that might be instituted 
 against him, and his own tranquillity, likely to 
 be disturbed, when this fresh cause of noto- 
 riety would cause the ex-conventionalist's re- 
 sidence in their territory to be discussed in 
 the senate of Berne. In addition to these, 
 Colonel Girouette's inopportune arrival had 
 made him acquainted with fresh points of the 
 family history, calculated still more to alienate
 
 192 the regicide's 
 
 him, and to offend the of late scrupulous pre- 
 judices of the royalist." 
 
 How little such thoughts allowed him to 
 sleep, I could conjecture, from the wakeful- 
 ness, in which they kept even me, fatigued, and 
 comparatively unimplicated, though not uninte- 
 rested. The light beamed through my lattice, 
 and the fresh morning breeze shook the vine- 
 shoots against it, ere I sunk into slumber. 
 But even this late rest I was not permitted to 
 enjoy — being startled out of it by — no other 
 than my friend Girouette. The Colonel came, 
 armed and caparisoned, to my chamber, and 
 begged, without phrase or circumlocution, that 
 I would descend with him to the garden, and 
 satisfy him by defending myself against his 
 sabre. I never was in less humour, even for 
 the necessary preliminaries to such a step, viz. 
 getting up in the first instance, and other ex- 
 ertions equally troublesome. The soldier, how- 
 ever, insisted. He was determined to begone, 
 he said, but not without some satisfaction.
 
 FAMILY. 193 
 
 To begone, I saw, was his intent, and that 
 also an excuse for going was another requisite 
 for him, which an encounter with me, afford- 
 ing flagrant proof of his jealousy, would give 
 him. The circumstances, he had just heard 
 or witnessed, had evidently made impression 
 upon his fickle mind, and had thrown him 
 back into his previous irresolution — to which, 
 moreover, Cornelie's just severity on the pre- 
 ceding day largely contributed. Not that he 
 was resolved to forsake her: — like all weak 
 characters, not resolution, but irresolution was 
 his repose — and he longed to be at a distance, 
 where he might calmly re-consider the state of 
 the case, taking into account the new events, 
 which threw fresh light on the amiability and 
 respectability of La Versiere's family. 
 
 With these profound and profoundly selfish 
 motives the Colonel awoke me from my slum- 
 ber by a challenge to single combat, to which 
 I lent a very slumbrous ear. He insisted, I 
 expostulated, and pleaded the idleness of his
 
 194 the regicide's 
 
 suspicions, — but he was no longer to be con- 
 vinced : and his obstinacy restored me to the 
 courage or rather alacrity, which dowsiness 
 kept down. I therefore did arise, but ob- 
 jected in limine to sword or sabre, as an instru- 
 ment of decision betwixt us, declaring, and 
 with truth, that I had never wielded a piece of 
 offensive iron, since and save once a poker in 
 the days of my college life. Very valiantly, 
 however, I promised to acquiesce in any spe- 
 cies of fire-arms he should select, or in any 
 distance for discharging them not exceeding 
 eight paces, for being no experienced shot, I 
 love that arrangement which sets skill at par 
 with simple straight-forwardness. 
 
 I do not wish to impute the least want of 
 courage to the Colonel, but in truth he did not 
 seem to relish the arrangement, nor to admire 
 the purchase of a good excuse at so extrava- 
 gant a risk. Luckily, however, for both of us, 
 there were no fire-arms of any kind to be pro- 
 cured without rousing Ossian and disturbing
 
 FAMILY. 195 
 
 his wounded brother. The Colonel had de- 
 pended on his sword for defence both to his 
 person and honour during his journey— and 
 my neat English pocket-pistols I had many 
 weeks previous presented to Oscar, who had 
 admired them. 
 
 Thus disappointed, Colonel Girouette shook 
 me cordially by the hand, and rode off Stras- 
 burgh-ward. 
 
 At any other moment his abrupt departure 
 would have affected Cornelie, if not grieved 
 her. At present she learned it from me at the 
 breakfast-table with no emotion, save the smile 
 that evinced she knew him. To old La Ver- 
 siere on the contrary, this appeared the most 
 dreadful blow of all ; he ardently wished for 
 Cornelie's union with the officer of rank ; and, 
 I believe, such wish of his being thwarted, 
 was the only pang Cornelie felt in what she 
 understood to be Girouette's final >dieu to 
 her. 
 
 But the state and sufferings of Oscar ab- 
 
 k 2
 
 196 the regicide's 
 
 sorbed the attention of every one, and for the 
 present shut out all other considerations. He 
 was wild and delirious, even believing as he 
 did, that Marie was safe in the hands of her 
 father. What, if he knew the truth? was the 
 ejaculation that we all uttered. I need not 
 say, how affectionately and unremittingly Cor- 
 nelie tended the bedside of her brother. Yet 
 Ossian's love was, if possible, even more de- 
 voted and affectionate. Other considerations 
 than Oscar's actual danger, occurred to the 
 mind of Cornelie, of his possible process, of his 
 probable revenge and intemperate conduct, 
 when he should be recovered, and of the ill- 
 omened future that awaited a youth of such 
 rash and ungoverned passions. But Ossian's 
 interest was for the present altogether absorbed 
 in his brother's health and recovery : — he was 
 not so acquainted with sorrow as his sister, 
 and like her and most persons so sadly expe- 
 rienced, he had not learned to make light of 
 the present misfortune by looking forward to
 
 FAMILY. 197 
 
 future ones. For myself I began to feel that 
 I could no longer trespass upon the hospita- 
 lity of this kind family, or intrude my pre- 
 sence upon their private sorrows, welcome al- 
 though in truth I believe I was to share both. 
 But other objects called me away, and other 
 purposes, which I had forgotten in my listless 
 wanderings by the Doubs. Even had there 
 not been these reasons for my removal, my 
 restless spirit would not have failed to in- 
 vent some very cogent ones to effect its 
 everlasting and unwearied whims of loco- 
 motion. 
 
 I signified my intentions therefore to my 
 sorrowing and anxious friends. They no longer 
 pressed my stay. But the warmth of their 
 farewell, told me that they were weary nei- 
 ther of my company nor friendship. To re- 
 visit the family, I promised faithfully both to 
 myself and them : and both Cornelie and 
 Ossian were to correspond with me. I em- 
 braced them, as I dare not even a brother in
 
 198 the regicide's family. 
 
 England. Nor during my leisurely-performed 
 journey to Coire, did one of my old poco-cu- 
 rante thoughts occur to profane my fervour 
 and my friendship.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 'Twas coming winter, and every wanderer, 
 like myself, was scaping, or indeed had scaped, 
 from the snows of Switzerland. I crossed the 
 Splugen, that had the charm to me of being 
 the wildest and most untrodden pass over the 
 higher Alps to Italy. Its greatest charm, 
 however, is the contrast which it affords in its 
 descent — from Mont Cenis,the traveller drops 
 into the plain of Piedmont, as vast and un- 
 varied in its kind as the mountains he has 
 quitted, — from Mont St. Bernard and the Sim- 
 plon are reached the vallies of Aosta and 
 Domo d'Ossola, lovely and luxuriant, it is 
 true, but still we are introduced by degrees 
 to their peculiar charms, which after all are not 
 unique from the wild and rugged Splugen,
 
 200 the regicide's 
 
 on the contrary, untamed even by the imperial 
 road-maker and engineer, you may descend, 
 figuratively speaking, a la ramasse, and after 
 being launched from its rocks and snows, find 
 your descent terminate in decidedly the love- 
 liest and most unrivalled of earth's scenes — 
 the Lake of Como. 
 
 Methought I had left woe and winter both 
 behind, when I embarked upon its limpid 
 wave, fanned by the mild and luckily adverse 
 gale of autumn — for had it been favourable 
 'twould have blown from the chill Alps, and 
 forced me to exchange my sentiment for a boat- 
 cloak. — Its waters were as clear and sparkling, 
 its palaces as white, its ever-greens as verdant, 
 as if winter, its very next-door neighbour, 
 never deigned to visit it. 'Tis sweet, saith the 
 Italian poet, when at peace and in happiness, 
 to recollect the woe that we have witnessed, 
 and that is past. 'Tis sweeter still in such 
 lovely scenes as these, where nature spreads a 
 contrast to all sense of sadness, and where,
 
 FAMILY. 201 
 
 such is the vivifying and inspiriting gaiety 
 that reigns around, the sojourner may give 
 himself to the enjoyment of sensibility and 
 sorrow, without fear of external gloom coming 
 to deepen the shade, and darken pleasure into 
 pain. There did I sit down, and write, fresh 
 from memory, what the reader has perused. 
 
 The pens of Ossian and his sister have, for 
 a few pages' further progress in the story, re- 
 lieved mine. It was from their correspondence, 
 that I myself derived the knowledge of the 
 circumstances that happened during my ab- 
 sence in Italy ; and their simple substitution, 
 in lieu of recomposing their contents, may 
 serve to vary the tone of my narrative. 
 
 The first letter, from Ossian, I received at 
 Milan, where other, though not more powerful 
 fascinations, than those of the exile's Swiss 
 cottage, detained me some time: 
 
 k 3
 
 202 the kegicide's 
 
 " Oscar is out of danger. Let me mention 
 this first, that I may proceed more at my ease 
 with this letter. 
 
 " I am used to have few wishes, but one that 
 I have always entertained, was to light upon 
 a friend of a foreign country — and that not an 
 Italian or Spaniard, or any native of those un- 
 intellectual countries, where friendship or love 
 is mere herding — nor did I fancy a German in- 
 timate, being one of such a disjoined and scat- 
 tered nation, is tantamount to being of none. 
 When I said to myself/bragw, I meant one of 
 that uncontinental country, whom from rivality 
 we are prepared to respect ; in short, I meant 
 an Englishman, like yourself. And I have 
 been gratified, certainly at the expense of some 
 little vanities, and the paring away of not a 
 few prejudices, the operation of losing which 
 pained me to the quick. How soon a mind 
 with books and solitude arrives at a summit in 
 knowledge ? — how high, how perfect, he thinks 
 his self-piled pyramid ? — how satisfied he
 
 FAMILY. 203 
 
 rests? — how vain and idle he grows in his con- 
 fidence? — Chance sends another individual to 
 break upon the sameness of this solitude — 
 another mind with a new view of things and 
 another world of ideas. In an instant the 
 charm is broken — the system unhinged — and 
 the fabrics of the solitary's reason and judg- 
 ment prove as frail and evanescent before the 
 rude arguments of a brother, as the more pro- 
 verbially frail castles of the imagination are 
 found before a broad gleam of daylight, or an 
 abrupt intrusion. 
 
 " What a revolution such an accident as thy 
 visit has wrought in my mind, for example? 
 Let us pass by matters of taste, though there 
 the change is infinite. But in more serious 
 objects : — even now I look forth from my win- 
 dow on the setting sun, that glorious object 
 which I have so often contemplated with the 
 melancholy but contented thoughts of one, 
 that knows no future beyond the span of his 
 mortal existence, and my reflection is, that
 
 204 the regicide's 
 
 though we must all set in daikness like that 
 luminary, we may promise ourselves a more glo- 
 rious rising, a morrow, and an imperishable 
 existence. This obvious thought must be com- 
 mon-place to you, but to me how new, how 
 consoling, to me whom fate has marked as an 
 outcast and a predestined sufferer! Mark, I 
 do as yet but contemplate the possibility of 
 such a gigantic truth, but that possibility ! 
 that glimpse ! — how my imagination rushes 
 through the vista, and revels in the endless 
 future. 
 
 "If I ever believe, what I earnestly wish to 
 believe, I shall thank my stars for not having 
 been born a Christian ; you may talk of the 
 firmness and sweetness consequent on early 
 thoughts and associations being blended with 
 faith, — but no, nothing of that kind can at all 
 rival or resemble the delight I feel, at what is 
 to me a sublime discovery. Ye cannot com- 
 pare a state of ignorance with a state of know- 
 ledge, a life of blank content or despair with
 
 FAMILY. 205 
 
 one of hope, a bestial looking forward to anni- 
 hilation, like a brute dignified with the pre- 
 science of seeing the butcher's knife in the fu- 
 ture, and no more — this not having known, you 
 cannot compare with the sublime conscious- 
 ness of immortality : — But I can. I have ex- 
 perienced both. And the charm, not of mere 
 novelty, but of having so noble and novel a 
 world unexpectedly opened to one, is a higher 
 source of pleasure, even to consider it in no 
 other light, than any I have experienced or 
 could imagine. — But you have already warned 
 me to be sparing of these subjects in a letter, 
 a sort of study which we never betake ourselves 
 to in a reasoning mood ; so I leave much for 
 some future conversation on some solemn calm 
 eve, if not in our Swiss pine-grove, which daily 
 becomes less likely to continue our haunt, in 
 some other solitude at least, for that must be 
 the exile's abode : and of a solitude, be the as- 
 pect what it will, the mind can always make a 
 sublime.
 
 206 the regicide's 
 
 " Respecting Oscar, who is fast recovering, 
 there is no likelihood of what you most feared, 
 a trial ; although powerful influence has been 
 exerted against us. Such accidents could not 
 pass, you observed, in your country, whatever 
 be the appearance of innocence, without in- 
 vestigation. Perhaps with you this is neces- 
 sary. But in this simple land, they have a 
 dread of criminal processes — the magistrates 
 recoil from such tasks, as a coward from an 
 engagement, or a girl from a tale of horror; and 
 all are glad, that crimes, extreme in event, 
 though not diabolical in purpose, be slurred 
 over and forgotten. This forbearance we find 
 on the present melancholy occasion, though we 
 see at the same time that it is not from tender- 
 ness towards us. All the petty means of un- 
 derhand persecution are beginning to be put in 
 practice; and we already feel the first arrows 
 directed against us. Most probably we shall 
 be obliged to quit the canton, which indeed 
 becomes otherwise adviseable, as the blind and
 
 FAMILY. 207 
 
 causeless enmity borne to us by the vulgar, 
 has svvoln greatly since the late circumstances. 
 Bigotry hath in this instance unfortunately got 
 the support of reason, and we must submit. 
 Indeed how can we complain, with Motiers 
 almost in our view — Motiers, whence the mild, 
 philanthropic, almost infantine Rousseau, was 
 stoned forth by a mob, that mistook his inno- 
 cence for sorcery, the fame of his eloquence 
 and feeling, for impiety. 
 
 " The present object of our solicitude is to 
 acquaint Oscar with his loss, with the whole 
 truth respecting Marie. I would inform him 
 of it by degrees, but my father says, no — and 
 adds, that he must reprove Oscar seriously, 
 and conclude his reproof with that fearful 
 moral consequent upon his imprudent and 
 passionate conduct. I argue and protest 
 strongly against this resolution. I know Oscar, 
 and think it far more likely to make him ten 
 times more rash and ungoverned, than he has 
 been. But my pour father dreams that he is
 
 208 the regicide's 
 
 a parent of antiquity, and Cornelie approves 
 those rigid purposes, for which past parental 
 tenderness hath ill prepared us. 
 
 " Cornelie herself droops less than usual : — 
 these late accidents seem to have called forth 
 her energies. Misfortunes, provided they be 
 active and bustling ones, animate her, whilst 
 they oppress me; the silent sorrow, that eats, 
 like a canker, into her health and spirits, would 
 but agree perfectly with my temperament. 
 Strange contrariness of circumstances — she 
 who could live contented with an untouched 
 heart, and think it a source of pride to be ex- 
 empted from the weak sentiments of love, who 
 could buoy herself with high hopes, and, wo- 
 man as she is, could embrace in her aspirations 
 and sympathies the whole world, political and 
 moral, she is bowed down and tortured by her 
 affection to an individual — whilst I, who was 
 born for the spes mutui animi, a weak creature, 
 full of sensibility and affection, who, as your 
 beautiful poet says,
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 209 
 
 " like the ivy, was formed to entwine, 
 
 And to lean to the nearest and loveliest thing," 
 
 have never yet been doomed to find the ohject, 
 in which I wish to pour forth my whole soul. 
 And in the absence of that love, which is a 
 want to a soul like mine, I am driven perforce 
 to speculate, and to exert my imagination and 
 sympathies on objects foreign to my nature — 
 I search the wide regions of philosophy, of 
 politics too, for somewhat to absorb my inte- 
 rest. I find at times some name that, I fancy, 
 does so — liberty perhaps, or Platonic virtue, 
 on the perfectibility of some other teacher — but 
 it is all in vain — one short revolution of the 
 sun disgusts me with m\ T fancied idol, and so, 
 half eager, half disgusted, I flit, like a butter- 
 fly, in search of another. What idle dreams 
 are mine ? what mad projects? — Do you know, 
 I have been meditating seriouslv for these two 
 days past, setting forth to South America, to 
 combat by the side of the patriots against the 
 despot's slave, Morillo. For Oscar, too, it
 
 210 THE REGICIDE'S 
 
 would be the fit scene — But our parent, but 
 Cornelie — the project may vanish, like so many 
 of its fellows ; I have at any rate derived much 
 pleasure from the idea, and have, as usual, 
 made it minister materials to the poetic task 
 of the day. I have scribbled many pages of 
 Byronism, for since you introduced me to 
 Childe Harold, I cannot cast my thoughts in 
 any other mould. Let me gratify myself by 
 transcribing some of the stanzas, that you may 
 see I have profited by your lessons, in imbib- 
 ing the spirit of the modern poets of your 
 country : 
 
 Is the ship moving ? — yes — all steadily, 
 And sporting with the waves, that round her prow 
 Leap emulous, and sing their sweet good-by, 
 Reluctant wheeling round the churlish bow. — 
 I have a love for them, I know not how, 
 And with a shade of sadness look behind 
 On the calm path of waters, where but now 
 We glid in peace along — the lonely mind 
 Even in the passing wave companionship will find. 
 
 The breeze leans silently upon the sail, 
 And wafts us on, like Fate, unheard, unseen, 
 To where Cumana's sons uplift their wail, 
 And Andes wraps her in her misty screen. —
 
 FAMILY. 211 
 
 Unfurl thy pennon wide, thou mountain queen, 
 Let thy volcanoes thunder o'er the wave. 
 And pour their lava-tribute to the main 
 To greet our flag of freedom, and the brave, 
 Who come to plant it firm, albeit on their grave. 
 
 Sweep on, ye lazy clouds, and you, my bark, 
 On, swiftly on, that in your fleet career 
 My soul may mingle, and relume its spark, 
 That this still eve has quenched ; for in mine ear 
 These shallow murmurings clamour for a tear. 
 Lift up thy voice, old Ocean, as thou wert 
 Right conscious of the glorious freight you bear, 
 And this sad flow of childish thought divert, 
 That ill befits the bard's, and less the warrior's heart. 
 
 Hark ! the breeze freshens, and th' awakened surge 
 Grows loud in its acclaim, and lashes strong 
 The stubborn vessel with its foaming scourge, 
 Yet still she sweeps unswervingly along, 
 In giant measure to the wind-harp's song. 
 The sick mast strains, till th' ear expects a crash ; 
 The tight cord whistles with its frittering tongue, 
 And should the prow yield from the ocean's lash, 
 The helmsman windward wheels her with a bounding plash, 
 
 O'ersheeting the slant deck with silvery spray, 
 That falls, like snow-flakes, melting to a tide, 
 In gurgling channels fretting its steep way 
 To meet its parent brine. While ocean- plied 
 Bold swings the barK, the cradle of young Pride 
 Rocked by Enthusiasm, as it were, 
 By the all-hushing tempest lullabied,
 
 212 the regicide's 
 
 Darkness fit canopy . But see, afar, 
 
 How gently comes, unveiling it, the morning star. 
 
 Oh ! that I were less wise, and born of yore 
 Mid that Promethean, spirit-giving race, 
 Which erst in Hellas taught, that I might pour 
 Mine orisons to thee, and in thy place, 
 Bright star, behold Aurora's ruddy face, 
 Feel that a zephyr's living pinion fanned 
 My fevered cheek, and in the rude gust trace 
 The passage of some spirit of command, 
 Or that of milder Genius in a breath more bland. 
 
 Yet now for us a nobler spirit is 
 The monarch of the mind. I may not raise 
 To such my thoughts, my hopes, my sympathies, 
 For they have grown and grovelled all their days, 
 And they have met sweet flowerets in their waya, 
 Though they were earthly — there they cling, 
 Contented as their freshliness decays, 
 Content to burst forth with some future spring, 
 Content to be no more, if there be no such thing. 
 
 "I see you upon reading this, not exactly 
 knit your brows, such being never your sig- 
 nification of displeasure, but rather assume 
 that habitual smile, which all might mistake 
 for good nature, if they knew it not to be 
 contempt. Be pacified, nevertheless. Fast as 
 my old ideas are ebbing, they do roll back at 
 times upon me in an overpowering wave — it is
 
 FAMILY. 213 
 
 but, however, to hasten and continue their 
 retreat. My muse mopes somewhat after this, 
 but the concluding stanzas bespeak better 
 thoughts. 
 
 It shall not he : — the pride of thought forbid, 
 That doth uplift its watch-tower to the Heaven, 
 From whom the past and future aie unhid, 
 The caverns of th' abyss asunder riven, 
 To whom the keys of fate are darkly given, — 
 Whose birthright is to live immortally 
 A spirit of unwearied wing, — whose haven 
 Lies where the stars are moored in yon blue sea, 
 Where ebbless sleeps the tide of deep eternity. 
 
 Forbid it, oh ! ye winged messengers, 
 Who to mine hours of contemplation stoop, 
 Iris-like, from on high, suffused in tears, 
 Yet redolent of promise and of hope. 
 Here, as through Fancy's idle maze I grope 
 In speculation blind, fair form, descend — 
 Teach me with Sorrow's suasive power to cope, 
 Shake off her cypress bonds, and manly wend 
 My liberated steps to some more glorious end. 
 
 P. S. " I really know not what to think of 
 Girouette's brief visit and abrupt departure. 
 My father is grieved beyond measure. Cor- 
 nelie will not speak. 1 am sorry that I did
 
 214 the regicide's family. 
 
 not talk more with you on the subject. You 
 were here and observed him, and could tell me 
 at least what you think. His coming would 
 look like sincerity, if his departure did not 
 lead one to construe all as an insult. Cor- 
 nelie reproached him. Had she not cause? 
 To assume such as a pretext for being offended 
 is meanness. I know not what to make of 
 that man, I never knew : — but villain or ho- 
 nest, he shall not have trifled with us with 
 impunity."
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 After a short interval Cornelie wrote to 
 me to Genoa : 
 
 " Monsieur et ami, 
 
 " I must keep my promise of assisting 
 Ossian to transmit to you an account of 
 Oscar's health. He suffered a dreadful re- 
 lapse, owing to his being told suddenly and 
 angrily by our father of the fate of Marie, 
 which he had caused. All the strength of 
 the house was scarcely sufficient to confine 
 him to his bed. His frenzy raged beyond all 
 bounds. He vowed a hundred times the death 
 of Breque, upon whom, as we told him, ven-
 
 216 the regicide's 
 
 geance could not heap more punishment, than 
 he had inflicted by anticipation : and had he 
 been but in possession of his habitual strength, 
 another crime might have been added to a ca- 
 talogue already too weighty. He is calm at 
 present, mute stricken at the blow, but full of 
 suppressed vengeance, if not against Breque, 
 against the whole of human kind. We know 
 not how to resist or overcome this rancorous 
 misanthropy, which in him would not rest 
 passive, or satisfied to vent itself in words. 
 Even my father, whose slightest word Oscar 
 used to reverence, now finds his precepts 
 mocked at, and all the noble stoicism, which 
 he knows so well how to act upon and to 
 teach, bitterly ridiculed and vehemently con- 
 temned by his son. This grieves him, and us 
 all, beyond measure. 
 
 " As to Ossian, he has turned devotee, and 
 has become of no manner of use, save to utter 
 mad paradoxes, and expound them in still 
 more mad couplets. You have infected him,
 
 FAMILY. 217 
 
 Sir ; and my father says, that if the Breques 
 have occasioned him the loss of one son, you 
 and M. Thouin, but principally you, have 
 robbed him of another. He has learned to 
 exclaim in your superstitious tongue, 
 
 " Hang up philosophy ;" 
 
 and argues that the best and noblest ethics, 
 such as actuated and contented the heroes 
 and statesmen of the ancient world, are 
 wretched nostrums, inefficient as guide or 
 medicine to a passionate mind — nay, he 
 preaches resignation to Oscar on a Jesuit's 
 terms. Oscar raves at this — my father says, 
 his sons are fit personifications of madness 
 and folly. I could be angry, did I not think 
 both to be paro sms, that will exhaust them- 
 selves and disappear, but for the present they 
 are truly troublesome and degrading. 
 
 "There is no longer any doubt that we 
 shall leave this. We have already commenced 
 preparations for removal. The neighbourhood 
 of Basle my father fixes upon for his next 
 
 L
 
 218 the kegicide's 
 
 resting-place, — but whether to be his final one 
 or not, remains with fate and his persecutors. 
 To me, all corners of the world are alike wel- 
 come and agreeable — the same feeling of un- 
 merited misfortune will hallow the barren 
 scene, that will sadden the smiling one ; and 
 fortunately my past life and future hopes offer 
 on either side neither causes of regret or of 
 impatience. 
 
 " No tidings since from the strange being 
 whom you met here, who indeed had every 
 cause for his abrupt departure and subsequent 
 silence. My brothers, however, will not be- 
 lieve this. Pray do you bear me out in writing 
 the truth to them. I would not for the world, 
 that such trifling acquaintanceship of mine 
 should prove another cause of strife. But 
 Oscar is in search of objects of anger, and 
 even Ossian joins him in unjust indignation 
 against C. Girouette. They talk of writing, 
 demanding explication, and involving ns again 
 in anxiety and despair. Do exert yourself on
 
 FAMILY. 219 
 
 this occasion. You have influence over 
 Ossian at least, and he, perhaps, is in this 
 instance the most unreasonable." 
 
 Meantime the winter rolled over my head at 
 Chiavari, where I had arranged to spend it 
 with a friend suffering under ill health and de- 
 jection, maladies that wore off in that deli- 
 cious clime. The great and only excitement 
 that we needed there, was afforded us by our 
 weekly receipt of letters from friends o'er the 
 sea. I had few indeed even in my own land. 
 But I enjoyed my friend's solicitude, as he 
 broke the well-known seals ; his family became 
 mine for the moment ; and although I scarcely 
 would, and scarcely did speak with these on 
 my return, distance made them seem there to 
 me the affectionate relatives, that fate has al- 
 together denied- However, if my friend com- 
 municated to me and made me participate in 
 his epistolary pleasures and pains, I in turn 
 repaid him by communicating the correspon- 
 dence of the La Yersieres. And well do I 
 
 l2
 
 220 the regicide's 
 
 remember how often we have traversed that 
 lovely beach to Sestri along the Mediterranean 
 shores, mingling our delight at the calm sea, 
 and the olive and orange-clothed precipices on 
 either side of us, with converse, wishes, and 
 conjectures respecting the exile's family — how 
 eagerly, in the dwarf, cool porticoes of the 
 town, I perused the long letters of Ossian, verse 
 and prose, and the more brief and capricious 
 ones of his sister. Ossian's moral and religious 
 disquisitions, however, although interspersed 
 with rhyme, and interesting to me, might prove 
 mere prose to the reader ; at any rate they 
 would be misplaced in this narrative. Suffice 
 it to extract from them, that he became a Chris- 
 tian — that Cornelie was in astonishment, in- 
 dignation, and despair on that account — and 
 that his father shook his head, and said no- 
 thing, grieved at times when his warm and 
 eloquent son overpowered or rather overtalked 
 him in argument, but otherwise little affected 
 by a conversion, which the old man at length
 
 FAMILY. 221 
 
 began to see might tend to improve Ossian's 
 prospects in life. 
 
 The last post-marks were those of Basle. I 
 had obej^ed the injunctions of Cornelie in 
 writing to Ossian all that I had witnessed and 
 thought respecting Colonel Girouette; and I 
 was sorry to observe, that in reply the youth 
 made no mention of the Colonel, nor of my 
 opinions, an appearance that made me suspect 
 a resolution fixed, and that perhaps neither the 
 most prudent, nor most just. Oscar was re- 
 ported to me, as recovered, and meditating 
 some such plans of emigration, as Ossian, his 
 poetic brother, had sung in one of his letters, 
 but had since never thought of executing. 
 
 Correspondence, however, even between the 
 oldest friends, is of that species of flower called 
 annual — meeting, converse, and social enjoy- 
 ments, must recur at intervals to put the fresh 
 seed of friendship in the ground, else the soil 
 will fail to sprout epistles in due season. This 
 is pedantic — however it conveys my idea to the
 
 222 the regicide's family. 
 
 reader, who may be, if he be not already, con- 
 vinced of its truth. Great and unfeigned as 
 was the interest and friendship I bore to the 
 La Versieres, latterly, of days when I should 
 pen replies to them, I happened to be weary, 
 drowsy, busy, or relaxed. I was not in the 
 vein. The task was deferred. Then the ideas 
 were flown. I had to re-read their letters — 
 but their freshness, which inspired me with 
 corresponding vigour, was gone. I did not 
 write for a month, and even then there went 
 but a sorry excuse. They thought me worth- 
 less, proud, forgetful perhaps, and they were 
 wrong : — or more likely still, they were pre- 
 cisely in my own predicament, and thought 
 nothing about the matter. How often have I 
 cursed my neglect, my ingratitude, my self- 
 ingratitude, when wandering dull and solitary 
 to the post, I found not there the wonted ex- 
 citement and delight of a letter from my friends 
 in Switzerland ?.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 " Zephiro torna, e il hel tempo rimene, &c." 
 
 We were able to repeat the beautiful sonnet 
 of Petrarch at Chiavari a long time ere winter 
 had forsaken less favoured regions, even of 
 Italy. And when the spring did really make 
 its advances, I felt, like the swallow, my mi- 
 gratory propensities return. My friend too, 
 in restored health, bent his course eagerly to- 
 wards old England, his eagerness envied by 
 me, but being without the eagerness I envied 
 not his destination. The valleys of the Rhine 
 were the mines of the picturesque, which I 
 purposed during summer to explore ; and part- 
 ing from my compatriot, I bent my course
 
 224 the regicide's 
 
 once more by Milan, oud across the Sira- 
 plon. 
 
 Again did I follow the course of the Doubs, 
 and again demand a night's hospitality from 
 my old friend, the curt. He was elated on be- 
 holding me, — discarded with delight, which he 
 would not have done for an ordinary visitor, 
 the volume of the Genie du CJiristianisme, that 
 he was perusing, and even carried his atten- 
 tions so far as to exchange the bottle of light 
 Cote wine, which stood already on the oaken 
 table, for one of more generous Burgundy. I 
 asked for Breque. Nothing extraordinary, was 
 the answer. The good man tended his flocks 
 and herds, and lived in usual fashion, praying 
 against the intrusion or vicinity of an atheist 
 and his family, as he did against a blight of his 
 scanty crop, or the more dreaded destruction 
 of his flocks by lightning or lavange. A huge 
 cross, he informed me, marked where Paul had 
 fallen ; and report had so exaggerated the cir- 
 cumstances of the homicide, that if tradition
 
 FAMILY. 225 
 
 at all performs its duty of amplification by the 
 story, it bids fair to rival the most fearful one 
 in romance. And had I learned at second- 
 hand, instead of witnessing the event, it had 
 gained a far greater interest for readers, than I 
 have been able to communicate to it. One in- 
 terpolation indeed by no means pleased me, 
 which was the part which a certain English- 
 man, atheist also and Jacobin, was said to have 
 had in the affair. The mention of this caused 
 me instantly to alter the resolution I had 
 formed, of spending the next day with the 
 worthy curate. 
 
 He in his turn questioned me respecting the 
 La Versieres ; giving me first, however, to un- 
 derstand that he had heard of Qssian's conver- 
 sion. I was able to afford him little additional 
 information, as a letter had not reached, nor 
 indeed been merited by me for the preceding- 
 three months. We talked together, to our mu- 
 tual delight, on various matters, chiefly seri- 
 ous j during which the good old man grew so 
 
 l3
 
 226 the regicide's 
 
 heated, and I myself so enthusiastic, that he 
 recommended and even prayed me to become 
 a cleric and a missionary, and to sail forth to 
 convert the savage and the heathen of far 
 climes. It was not with the smile of ridicule 
 that I met the old cure's proposal, although I 
 did not think proper to follow it up. Good old 
 man ! never do I take up a Zimmerman, without 
 my thoughts instantly recurring to thee, and 
 often do I take up the, still to my manhood, de- 
 lightful work on Solitude, which made me crazy 
 when a boy, that I may revert to thee and Locle. 
 A few days more brought me to Basle, and 
 to the exile's new retreat. It was pointed out 
 to my inquiries, in a gay, though sequestered 
 spot, commanding a view of the distant Rhine. 
 And delightful were the anticipations, with 
 which I approached it — once more to see the 
 old exile himself, and to converse with him on 
 the revolutionary times, in which he was so 
 personally read, — to renew my friendship, my 
 romance and argument with Ossian — to hear
 
 FAMILY. 227 
 
 the sweet tingle of Cornelie's harp, and listen 
 to her mellow voice. As I entered the gate 
 of the little demesne, I bethought me of the re- 
 proaches about to be poured forth upon me, 
 and of the necessary excuses with which these 
 were to be met- The silence that prevailed in 
 and around the cottage, joined to the neglect, 
 I knew unusual, in which its parterres and 
 flower-knots lay, caused me to exchange this 
 for another species of anxiety. Cornelie met 
 me in the hall, as she descended the stairs, and 
 a loud exclamation that burst from her, who 
 was wont to be so firm, told that late watching 
 and anxiety had enfeebled her. Her looks 
 bore witness to the same. 
 
 "Come," said she, " you have been of the 
 family in trying moments — there is another 
 now for you to witness." 
 
 She led the way upstairs, as she spoke ; and 
 I found myself immediately with the assembled 
 family in the sick room of the old Convention- 
 alist. The first glance convinced me, that he
 
 228 the regicide's 
 
 was on his death-bed. I could read it in the 
 visages of his children, as well as in his own. 
 
 Ossian had been speaking, for his cheek was 
 flushed beneath his tears. But the old man 
 made him no answer, except by requesting the 
 window to be thrown open, that, like Rousseau, 
 he might take a last farewell of the green fields 
 and of the sun. It was done, and the per- 
 fume of the spring's fresh verdure gratefully 
 filled the room. La Versiere strained his gray, 
 dim eyes, to take the last look, that vanity 
 even in death, rather than sentiment, suggested 
 to him, and then closed them. It was an an- 
 swer to Ossian, and a melancholy one. The 
 eyes of Cornelie glistened proudly through her 
 tears. La Versiere made a sign, that he wished 
 to be left alone. All withdrew, save Cornelie, 
 who concealed herself behind the hangings of 
 his couch. We had not long descended, when 
 the brothers were recalled by her cry of grief. 
 Their parent had ceased to breathe. He died, 
 " and made no sign." Nor was the death of
 
 FAMILY. 229 
 
 the unbelieving regicide aught but calm, re- 
 signed, fearless, and in all becoming a philo- 
 sopher. 
 
 There are some preachers, who seem to think 
 that the chief excellence of relioious belief 
 consists in its being a kind of cordial. This 
 is not my view, seeing pride or stupidity oft 
 as powerful. I, for my part, can compare the 
 very different ends of Hume and Johnson, 
 without drawing from them any conclusion 
 whatsoever, save such as respects the nerves 
 of these illustrious men. 
 
 About a month after the death of their pa- 
 rent, I visited the La Versiere's at Basle. 
 They were preparing to return to Paris, the 
 connexions of Cornelie being there resident — 
 it was the field too, however hostile were to 
 them all powers that be, for both Ossian and 
 Oscar to pursue some or any possible career. 
 Ossian was eager to enter the lists of fame, as 
 a poet and a man of letters, and no doubt the 
 youth thought himself sufficiently skilled, even
 
 230 the kegicide's 
 
 in politics, to become instructor to the nation. 
 I listened to these schemes, and took care not 
 to speak my ideas thereon, which would have 
 only lost me a friend, without going farther to 
 cure his delirium, than a little momentary 
 mortification. When consulted in these 
 points by enthusiastic and sanguine youth, 
 as a pilot taken on board by a ship in full 
 sail, I never presume to call in question the 
 prudence of making for a certain port, I merely 
 confine my influence to rendering the voyage 
 as little hazardous as may be, to pointing out 
 the rocks and currents likely to beset the 
 giddy navigator. To endeavour to turn the 
 ship about in such a case, merely incurs the 
 risk of being sent overboard, and having a 
 more obsequious and interested pilot taken in 
 one's place. So did I listen, so reply to Os- 
 sian. He thought me cold, and our friendship 
 in consequence cooled greatly; but it still 
 held on, and I had no doubt that a little time 
 and experience on his part would reknit it.
 
 FAMILY. 231 
 
 Colonel Girouette had written, immediately 
 upon the Conventionalist's decease, to his fa- 
 mily, offering warmly his services, his interest, 
 his friendship. But with respect to Cornelie, 
 his letter was in the same tone of pique, 
 ambiguity, and irresolution, that his past con- 
 duct had evinced. She was at that time still 
 drooping under her recent loss, and Ossian 
 intercepted and concealed the Colonel's letter, 
 mentioning it to Oscar and myself, and charg- 
 ing himself with the task of answering it. 
 
 It so happened, that we all set off" together 
 from Basle, in our way to Paris. I had given 
 up the Rhine for other considerations. Al- 
 though more sincere or more affectionate chil- 
 dren never mourned parent, than did my com- 
 panions, yet were we not without cheerful and 
 pleasant hours upon our journey. The young 
 men were both sanguine and full of anticipa- 
 tions : Cornelie, sad as she remained from 
 past and recent misfortunes, as well as from 
 habitual temper, brightened up on being about
 
 232 THE REGICIDE S 
 
 to revisit the scenes and friends of her youth ; 
 some changed no doubt, but others, she hoped, 
 unchanged. In Paris too, she knew that 
 bigotry and ultra-royalism did not prevail so 
 fiercely as in provincial towns and villages, 
 where her name had been sufficient to exclude 
 her from respect, as well as from society. 
 
 One of the stages where we stopped in our 
 route, was Nogent-sur-Seine. It struck me, 
 as well as Ossian, that in the vicinity of this 
 town stood the Paraclete, famed as the retreat 
 of the celebrated Eloise, and whence those 
 ardent letters, which Pope has paraphrased 
 (on which avowed, but unconsidered plagiary, 
 by the by, rests all his claims to tenderness 
 and feeling as a poet), were addressed to the 
 more selfish and unhappy Abelard. It was 
 proposed and resolved to delay and visit the 
 ruins, for we conjectured, and with justice, 
 that the convent had not escaped revolutionary 
 destruction. 
 
 We thus lingered a day on the banks of the
 
 FAMILY. 233 
 
 Seine ; and it may be supposed, how much 
 our conversation turned on the ideas asso- 
 ciated with such a spot. 
 
 " I cannot imagine," said Cornelie, who 
 had rather reluctantly yielded to Ossian's 
 proposal of devoting a day to the Paraclete, 
 " what secret charm lay hid in this intrigue be- 
 tween a monk and nun, to cause it so to com- 
 mand the sympathies not only of their own 
 ap*e, but of succeeding centuries. It must 
 have been man's innate love of scandal, es- 
 pecially when told against the gravest of all 
 hypocrites, the nuns and friars, which secured 
 the tale such universal interest and attention." 
 " Go, thou doubly profane," said Ossian, 
 " to ask such question or assign such cause, 
 and not to know, that genius recording pas- 
 sion is at once the most powerful and immor- 
 tal of mental agencies." 
 
 " Abelard," said I, " was a man of learning 
 also, the mostpopular literary character of his 
 century, although his literature did come
 
 234 the regicide's 
 
 forth in the shape of syllogisms — he was the 
 Rousseau of his day. Is not that too a 
 reason?" 
 
 " A more sober and comprehensible one 
 than Ossian's. But I could supply even an- 
 other ?" 
 
 " Do, by all means." 
 
 " The satisfaction and delight of common 
 sense to behold nature avenging itself on the 
 absurd prohibitions of priestcraft, passion 
 breaking through the grates, and eluding the 
 inhuman vows of a cloister." 
 
 There is no stop in the zeal of a young pro- 
 selyte, and Ossian was flying, or rather draw- 
 ing breath, to defend monks and monastic in- 
 stitutions, on the same principle of confor- 
 mity that made Gibbon argue in support of 
 the Inquisition, when I stepped in to save him 
 the absurdity. 
 
 " If love had not such obstacles, where 
 would be romance ? But for the existence of 
 cloisters, we should have been this day tra-
 
 FAMILY. 235 
 
 versing the dusty pave, without giving one 
 hour to sentiment and idleness — Abelard 
 would have been no hero — " 
 
 "Nor Melanie no heroine," said Ossian, 
 alluding to the popular drama of La 
 Harpe. 
 
 " Man alone," observed Cornelie, " would 
 prove sooner sufficient for woman's unhappi- 
 ness, if there were never such things in the 
 world as grim cloisters, or peremptory pa- 
 rents." 
 
 Oscar looked at his sister, but she was un- 
 conscious of the pang she had inflicted. 
 
 "Man might tell the same tale of woman," 
 replied Ossian, " and with as deep a sigh." 
 
 "Have you cause to say so, Ossian?" said 
 Cornelie, " you, who, I believe, never tasted 
 pain or pleasure, that was not the unreal pro- 
 duce of the imagination." 
 
 " For that matter," exclaimed I, " all our 
 woes shall be unreal. We approach the ter- 
 restrial paradise, in the opinion of all true
 
 236 the regicide's 
 
 French-born, Paris — and there shall all sus- 
 picion and disappointment be cleared up." 
 
 " We accept your prophecy," cried Ossian ; 
 " shall we not, Cornelie ?" 
 
 " It shall weigh with me fully as much as 
 any other." 
 
 Thus did we while away the hours amidst 
 the ruins, and in the ancient garden of the 
 Convent of the Paraclete. 
 
 We returned to Nogent, in excellent spirits, 
 and with impatient appetites, that ill befitted 
 our late pilgrimage. The repast however was 
 not prepared, and in the mean time I took up 
 the Journal de Paris of a recent date, that lay 
 in the apartment. The very first paragraph 
 that struck my eye, was the following : 
 
 " Yesterday, Sunday, the king has signed 
 the contract of marriage between Colonel 
 Amedee Girouette and Mademoiselle Jose- 
 phine Mix, daughter of the late Count Alix, 
 and niece of the General of that name." 
 
 The paper fell from my hands. Ossian
 
 FAMILY. 237 
 
 took it from the ground, read the fatal para- 
 graph, and attempted to fold the journal. 
 But Cornelie's prophetic eye had seen both of 
 us peruse. 
 
 " Give it to me. It concerns me. Nay, I 
 know it. Let me read." 
 
 And she snatched it from her brother's 
 hand. She read the paragraph aloud with a 
 voice that did not even tremble, with a cheek 
 that did not blench. I no longer feared for 
 her, but looked towards Oscar, whose rising 
 fury was to be expected. The assumed im- 
 passibility of poor Cornelie was false ; without 
 betraying any external symptoms of grief, the 
 blow had struck within, and her sudden 
 swooning first and alone in/ormed us how 
 much she had been stricken.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 On arriving in Paris, I betook myself of 
 course to my wonted gite, far removed from 
 the La Versieres, who, from old associations, 
 as well as to avoid being jostled by strangers, 
 settled themselves in the remote quarter called 
 the Marais. At first I saw them daily, less 
 often as time advanced : Ossian and I, owing 
 to the reason previously mentioned, were not 
 on such cordial terms of friendship as usual ; 
 and Cornelie had not, since her arrival, 
 quitted the walls of her apartment. 
 
 I met Colonel Amedee Girouette in the 
 Thuilleries, and endeavoured to the utmost to 
 avoid him. He would, however, and did ac-
 
 THE REGICIDE'S FAMILY. 239 
 
 cost me. He asked of my health, pleasures, 
 and peregrinations, touched on fifty topics in 
 as many seconds, and ere I could put in one 
 sullen or ill-humoured remark to check his 
 volubility, he was deep in the Befort con- 
 spiracy, which had just at that time alarmed 
 the government. 
 
 "There will be no quarter shewn for the 
 future to the revolutionists," concluded he, 
 " their own rashness has put the last hand to 
 their ruin. Suspected as I was, from my old 
 connexion, I was obliged to signify my firm 
 adhesion by marrying right royally, and sub- 
 scribing to the society of Bonnes Lettres, in 
 order to save myself from epuration." 
 
 "This then was your disinterested motive, 
 Colonel," observed I. 
 
 " What other — and yet those boys are dis- 
 satisfied — what would they have?" and he 
 shrugged his shoulders with an air of most 
 interesting innocence. 
 
 " And this," said I, " was the depth of your
 
 240 the regicide's 
 
 affection for Mademoiselle La Versiere, to 
 which you were willing to sacrifice me." 
 
 " Oh! bagatelle" exclaimed the Colonel. 
 
 I could have insulted the fellow. But his 
 volubility was again alive on some topic of the 
 day ; till of a sudden he stopped short with 
 the recollection that he must hasten to the 
 palace. 
 
 " But, Colonel," said I, " you spoke of those 
 boys. How have they betrayed their dissatis- 
 faction?" 
 
 fi How ? — oh ! — letters, challenges, menaces, 
 discharged from morn till noon like minute- 
 guns. That boy, Ossian, wants me to walk to 
 the Bois de Boulogne for the mere purpose of 
 putting an end to him, which would certainly 
 be the consequence — and not the worst con- 
 sequence — for the whole affair would be blown 
 by the same morning's wind over the Thuille- 
 ries to my disrepute. Besides, I really pity 
 the youth." 
 
 " I wish from my soul," said I, " that the
 
 FAMILY. 241 
 
 just resentment of the youths against you was 
 appeased by a meeting that would bring no 
 fatal consequences." 
 
 " Be assured, that if forced to go out, I 
 shall not act the debonnaire. But I had rather 
 hush up the matter, and throw a veil over my 
 past connexion with the name." He here 
 whispered me, that " old La Versiere was 
 suspected of having joined in the late plots, 
 and his sons were suspected likewise of having 
 been ready to join the standard. They will be 
 watched here closelv, and soon got rid of in 
 some other fashion than by my hand." 
 
 I parted from the Colonel ; and was sur- 
 prised the next morning, though not so much 
 as I should have been without Girouette's in- 
 formation, to receive a note from Cornelie, 
 stating, in some alarm, that Ossian was in the 
 prison of La Force. I hurried thither in- 
 stantly. The wily keepers of the prison made 
 at first semblance of admitting me, till they had 
 learned and noted down my name, abode, &c. 
 
 M
 
 242 the kegicide's 
 
 and my knowledge of the prisoner, in 
 which having gratified them, I was conducted 
 outside of the prison, instead of being, as I 
 hoped, permitted to enter and visit Ossian. 
 Proceeding to the Marais, I found Cornelie 
 distracted, and Oscar refusing to her any ex- 
 plication of what he evidently was acquainted 
 with. When his sister withdrew, however, he 
 was more communicative to me, and he told 
 me, that Girouette, and Girouette alone, must 
 have occasioned Ossian's imprisonment, in 
 order to avoid the meeting that the youth was 
 forcing; him to. Oscar attributed this conduct 
 to the Colonel's want of courage, a conclusion 
 in which I did not agree. I mentioned the 
 reasons that Girouette himself pleaded to me.- 
 Oscar laughed at them, and asserted that the 
 supposed implication in the Befort conspiracy 
 must have been a ready invention on his part, 
 both to me and perhaps to the government, in 
 order to cloak, and provide a pretext, for 
 Ossian's arrest. Oscar concluded by saying,
 
 FAMILY. 243 
 
 that his resolution was taken. I pressed to 
 know what this was, but he would not inform 
 me. He was calm too, and his deportment did 
 not inspire me with fears that his determination 
 was either rash or violent. 
 
 It was so, however, as the event awfully 
 proved. On the evening of that day, Oscar 
 La Versiere forced himself into the apartments 
 of Colonel Girouette, and demanding peremp- 
 torily to speak with him, was shewn into the 
 Colonel's cabinet. It is difficult to say ex- 
 actly what passed between them. Oscar re- 
 proached him with his baseness, both in his 
 conduct towards his sister, and also in the 
 contrived imprisonment of his brother. Gi- 
 rouette denied. Oscar bade him defend him- 
 self where he stood, and without clamour, else 
 the fire-arms which he carried should take a 
 speedier vengeance than he meditated with 
 his sword. Young La Versiere asserted after- 
 ward that Girouette did defend himself, but as 
 no sword of his was discovered drawn, or 
 
 m 2
 
 244 the regicide's 
 
 weapon near him, the youth in his fury must 
 have been mistaken. Colonel Girouette was 
 found pierced with a sword, and weltering in 
 his blood. Oscar had withdrawn. And the 
 hue and cry of the assassination was rumoured 
 at least around the court, where it gave rise to 
 some panic, doubling of guards, and precau- 
 tions used upon similar occasions. The next 
 morning's journal first conveyed the staring 
 intelligence to my eyes. 
 
 I was now, however, almost too well pre- 
 pared for any fatal occurrence befalling the 
 family of the unfortunate regicide, to be so 
 much shocked es T ought to have been. Yet 
 how much was I shocked ? Blood, thought I, 
 running over the many fearful proverbs, that 
 doom the homicide to the fate which he has 
 inflicted. I issued forth without delay, scarcely 
 knowing whither; the crime of the preceding 
 evening was on every one's tongue. I hastened 
 to Cornelie's abode. But other friends, com- 
 patriots, with higher claims than mine to in- 

 
 FAMILY. 245 
 
 timacy, had flocked around her, to bring 
 consolation, or satisfy curiosity. Great ill 
 fortune, as well as great good fortune, imparts 
 attraction to its victims ; and many acquaint- 
 ances of Cornelie, who had not noticed her or 
 entered her abode since her return, now rushed 
 in haste to shew sympathy and offer aid. It 
 was useless again attempting to see Ossian, 
 and I returned to my solitary chamber. 
 
 How full were my thoughts! Such events 
 strike the mind with awe, and incline it to 
 superstition. I could not in my horror, but 
 look upon the fate of Oscar La Versiere, twice 
 imbruing his hands in blood, and in all proba- 
 bility to perish by a disgraceful and merited 
 punishment, to be a kind of doom entailed 
 upon the son of the regicide, of him who had 
 joined his brother Conventionalists in decree- 
 ing, that there was no God in heaven ! He 
 indeed had departed on a tranquil death-bed, 
 but vengeance seemed reserved for his off- 
 spring. For the rest of that offspring too,
 
 246 the regicide's 
 
 what calamities might not be in store ? Such 
 thoughts will haunt the most rational of us ; 
 and though in a cooler and later hour I 
 spurned at the unjust and bigot conclusion, 
 suggested to me no doubt by the law of an 
 obsolete religious code, still it at the moment 
 imposed upon my mind, and to my awe- 
 struck senses wore the mysterious semblance 
 of truth. 
 
 Oscar was taken. Indeed he made no en- 
 deavour to escape. Girouette's life, though it 
 lingered, was still despaired of; and no doubt 
 seemed to rest on the certainty of Oscar's fate. 
 Ossian was released, and all his energies were 
 exerted to save his brother. I saw little of 
 him during the awful interval of suspense. 
 Other friends, I was about to say self-called 
 friends, but in such a moment they could not 
 be aught but real, surrounded Cornelie and 
 her brother. They were more versed in cir- 
 cumstances, in French life and law, and better 
 calculated to be of service than me. I did not
 
 FAMILY. 
 
 247 
 
 repine. Nor did my interest and anxiety- 
 slacken upon that account. I saw then, for 
 the first time, what I have since proved, that 
 friendships with foreigners are but silken 
 links, — the strength wears out along with the 
 gloss. 
 
 I inquired daily after Girouette, and learned 
 at length that hopes were entertained of his 
 recovery. " The worthless are vivacious," 
 replied to me one of whom I made the inquiry, 
 "if any one could survive, Girouette will." 
 He did. But this not in the least extenuated 
 the crime of Oscar La Versiere, nor seemed 
 likely to have any influence in the judgment 
 that awaited him. 
 
 He was brought to trial. It was the affair 
 of the day, and all Paris flocked to it. When 
 the circumstances of the case became fully 
 known, the indignation of the public was 
 awakened against the soldier, and their pity 
 somewhat excited for the culprit. There exists 
 no country in which infidelity to woman is 
 more considered a crime, than in mo 1 '
 
 248 the regicide's 
 
 France : — in the last century and the same 
 country it was a title to honour. Girouette 
 was generally reprobated, and the universal 
 opinion did not fail to have weight upon the 
 judges who presided. Political considerations 
 too mingled with the question, and the ac- 
 quittal or condemnation of the accused came 
 from a private to be in a great degree a party 
 question. 
 
 In conclusion, Oscar La Versiere was sen- 
 tenced to the gallies. The shame of a capital 
 punishment was spared, but that inflicted was 
 scarcely less ignominious and severe* 
 
 Of Oscar I saw no more. Nor was it till 
 long after the unfortunate affair, until it had 
 lost its freshness not only for the world but 
 for them, that I once more intruded myself on 
 Ossian and his sister. The crowd of the 
 curious was no longer around them, the brief 
 sympathy of their compatriots and acquaint- 
 ances had evaporated. The relatives of the
 
 FAMILY. 249 
 
 regicide and the assassin, after the excitement 
 of braving public opinion, which had called 
 friends and adherents around them, had passed, 
 found their name to bring its natural repulsion. 
 - And I now rejoined them in that comparative 
 state of abandonment and solitude, which had 
 recently and momentarily ceased, and with 
 which had ceased my intimacy with them. 
 
 All this did not fail to strike them on my 
 re-appearance : and the flood of tears, with 
 which Cornelie welcomed me, sprung from, 
 and mingled with, other thoughts than those 
 connected with the unfortunate Oscar. Os- 
 sian's silent grasp of the hand spoke as much. 
 The meeting resembled a reconciliation, though 
 it could not be called such. 
 
 " And what consoling thought, Cornelie, 
 supported you through all these trials?" 
 
 "None," replied she. "I should have 
 scorned to seek any. I am now hardened 
 against fate." 
 
 " The very pride of that thought," said 1, 
 
 m 3
 
 250 the regicide's 
 
 " can have proved no feeble support, though 
 perhaps an impious one." 
 
 "What! impious the stoic hardihood, 
 
 than can defy alike vice and suffering." 
 
 " If not impious, it is at least vain-glorious- 
 ness, to flatter ourselves, that we resist or can 
 be independent of the power that rules and 
 influences our destiny." 
 
 Cornelie replied by a classic quotation, the 
 pride of heroism kindling in her eye, as she re- 
 peated it. 
 
 " Such thoughts may allay suffering," said 
 Ossian, "but deep as my poor father instilled 
 them into our minds, they could not keep one 
 of us from crime." 
 
 " For me they ever have, they ever will be 
 sufficient." 
 
 " So they may seem. Such principles are 
 golden chains, that, whilst they seem to bind, 
 do but adorn the. naturally virtuous. The pas- 
 sionate and the rash break at once through 
 their idle links."
 
 FAMILY. 251 
 
 '* Ossian, let us not awaken griefs, so lately 
 lulled to rest. We have our lives before us to 
 prove, as well as to reason upon these points. 
 Our friend will be the umpire, though, I fear, 
 not an impartial one." 
 
 Thus did sad tranquillity revisit the solitary 
 survivors of the exile's family. Though here 
 for the present I close their story, it is not to 
 bid adieu altogether to characters and friends, 
 such as Ossian and Corn61ie La Versiere. If 
 they re-appear not for the present, it is that the 
 years which immediately ensued for them, were 
 too unvaried to interest my readers, already 
 perhaps somewhat wearied by the gravity of 
 their discussions, and the too unadorned nar- 
 rative of their fortunes and sorrows. 
 
 END OF THE REGICIDE'S FAMIL\.

 
 WEEK AT TOURS.
 

 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 It has been seriously objected to me, that 
 in "The English in Italy," I have actually 
 endowed an Italian with courage; — to this 
 I plead guilty : — moreover, that I have made 
 a gallant of the same nation expel an English 
 youth from the heart of an English maiden, 
 and allowed him, in defiance of the rules and 
 creed of patriotism, to overcome one of our 
 own countrymen at once in combat and in love. 
 
 In answer to this I can only observe, it is 
 unfortunate that I drew from nature, in that 
 she is sadly capricious, and does certainly re- 
 present most unorthodox pictures at times. 
 The said nature, however, like the shield in
 
 256 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 the cross-roads, hath two sides and two de- 
 vices, both true, however contradictory in 
 seeming. Having already exposed one of these 
 to my readers, and they having, I trust, been 
 amused and contented with the same, I can- 
 not now mock at their feelings by recanting, 
 and asserting that it was false. I shall rather 
 beg of them to survey the other side of the 
 shield, and will endeavour to satisfy the 
 patriotism of my readers in a story equally 
 true, and as well witnessed by me as that of 
 the " Amoroso," and in which it shall be 
 shewn that we too may bear away the palm in 
 gallantry. 
 
 The reader will remark, and perhaps object 
 to the dramatic and very dialogic form, in 
 which the story opens and is carried on. I 
 may confess, that it had at first struck me as 
 more adapted for the scene than the page, 
 and was consequently turned over and mould- 
 ed in my mind with a view towards its appear- 
 ance in that shape. But recollecting subse-
 
 INTRODUCTION. 257 
 
 quently my custom of allowing my characters 
 to indulge at times in pshaws and pishes, and 
 other equally profane ejaculations, as also my 
 own habitual freedom of allusion to kings 
 and tetrarchs, their serving-men and women, I 
 abandoned as hopeless all dramatic effort, too 
 well aware that my production could never be ' 
 sufficiently immaculate to please the rigid and 
 virgin taste of our great dramatic censor, 
 whom long preserve.
 
 WEEK AT TOURS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 " Ah ! Rutledcre ! — who the deuce would 
 have thought of seeing you here in Touraine, 
 in the very heart of la belle France'*" 
 
 " Not I, in truth, a week since." 
 
 " You, a born, sworn John Bull, whom the 
 sound of aught but old vernacular, you used 
 to declare, made you sick ; and who to my re- 
 membrance hast, from a schoolboy up, consi- 
 dered a Frenchman in the same category with 
 a frog." 
 
 " And still do, by my patriotism. Witness 
 my sore bones and sour stomach — shaken to 
 a mummy by jolting over some three hundred 
 miles of cursed French paving-stones — my
 
 260 A WEEK 
 
 daily food, pullets lean as my tooth-pick, and 
 beef, good lack ! the very ghost of viand — 
 vinegar, sour and sad, though honoured with 
 the name of wine, for my daily and nightly 
 beverage — all this, do you think, has recon- 
 ciled me to the land of frogs V 
 
 '' Come, come. I wonder the smiling vine- 
 yards, as you passed along, did not put you 
 in a better humour." 
 
 "Vineyards — do you call those dwarf 
 gooseberry-bushes vines ? Why, our own hop, 
 or John Barleycorn himself, presents a nobler 
 crop." 
 
 "Nay, you are incorrigible — but will mend. 
 John, when he comes abroad, is like a bottle 
 of his own ale. The moment you broach him, 
 first comes the fizz of his spleen, then bubbles 
 the froth of his prejudice, and anon flows the 
 honest, generous, mellow liquor of his good 
 nature." 
 
 " Out upon your simile. I've read in some 
 Frenchman something like it."
 
 AT TOURS. 261 
 
 " But come — 'tis time you tell at length, 
 what make you from the courts at Westmin- 
 ster, Horatio?" 
 
 "No truant disposition, good my Lord. 
 Morn, noon, and night have Coke and Black- 
 stone — " 
 
 " Nay, out upon your law, since you have 
 no quarter for my similes. What is the 
 cause ?" 
 
 " A jade simply, a jade." 
 
 " Indeed. Why this is even more astonish- 
 ing than to see you at Tours. Rutledge turn- 
 ed gallant ! the sober, settled Rutledge, who 
 chose a wife ere he was bearded, and resolved 
 prudentially not to marry her, till he had at- 
 tained the age of reason!" 
 
 ' The res angusta domi, ; my poverty, not 
 
 my will consented." 
 
 " Go to. By George, thou deservest to lose 
 her! But say, thou mongrel lover, half ba- 
 chelor, half husband, has thy spouse jilted 
 thee? Is it in search of her, or of some other
 
 262 A WEEK 
 
 fair, that you have ventured your legal head 
 and right precious person within the fearful 
 realms of his Majesty of France." 
 
 " In search of her and of no other, of So- 
 phia Mordaunt." 
 
 " Ah, ah ! my lover of the long robe, this 
 comes of putting oft' trial." 
 
 "No mocking, fellow-student. There is 
 more at stake with me, than will bear a jest." 
 "Nay then." 
 
 " I must demand still more than your for- 
 bearance. You have a plotting head, and 
 know the world, that is, the world of women 
 and watering places, better than I do. Can 
 you not help me to recover this fickle 
 gipsy?" 
 
 " But if she be giddy and fickle, I couldn't 
 advise — " 
 
 " Nay, she is honest, warm, good-hearted 
 at core ; only these new-fangled notions — " 
 
 " Tell it me at length. You must com- 
 mence by making me your confidant. It is
 
 AT TOURS. 263 
 
 the rule, you know, in the first act of the 
 comedy." 
 
 "This, then, it is. In the good, old times, 
 when we were at war with this confounded 
 country, I wooed and won the fair, and, I may 
 add, not fortuneless Sophia — not that I valued 
 the latter consideration." 
 
 " Oh, no one does!" 
 
 " Not I, o' my conscience, except that it ex- 
 poses her to more interested suitors." 
 
 " Well." 
 
 " Our marriage was a thing settled, as you 
 know, though deferred, until I could vet 
 called." 
 
 " That I know too." 
 
 " Old people satisfied, she no less so. I 
 happy in all the dreams that study left me 
 leisure for. When lo ! my evil genius, and 
 hers, and, I believe, that of all Englishmen, 
 whispered to her at a fashionable rout, that 
 she was the only hapless damsel present, who 
 had not visited the continent."
 
 264 A WEEK 
 
 " Dreadful !" 
 
 " Nay, it came out soon after, that the wife 
 of the grocer of the family had made a trip to 
 Boulogne in the steam-packet." 
 
 " Degradation and dismay — what followed ?" 
 
 " What you may conceive.:— The old folks 
 were soon wheedled, band-boxes packed, a 
 rascally Irish valet metamorphosed into a 
 Swiss one by means of a newly braided jacket ; 
 and my betrothed, with her respectable pa- 
 rents, transported up some dozen pair of stairs 
 in the Rue Rivoli, at ten times the rent of 
 what the family mansion would let for at home ; 
 escorted in the Thuilleries by hungry gardes 
 du corps, ready to leap at her thousands, al- 
 though they were hundreds, and Miss lost in 
 admiration of blouges, boulevards, and the su- 
 perior politeness of the Great Nation." 
 
 " In short she has pitched you and the 
 courts at Westminster to ." 
 
 " Why, how you swear?" 
 
 " Pardon — I forgot you had just come from
 
 AT TOURS. 265 
 
 that moral country, where oaths are once more 
 considered treason against the puritanic ma- 
 jesty of the people, and where an old sinner 
 has been paid to assume the office and dignity 
 of Cato, in order to preserve the stage from the 
 profanation of a Damme." 
 
 " Set a thief to catch a thief, is the maxim 
 of the police of Montrose, as well as of that of 
 Birnie." 
 
 " But this fickle, frenchified fair, where is 
 she?" 
 
 " Here." 
 
 "What, in Tours?" 
 
 " Even in this town." 
 
 "Why, that is well. She hath then es- 
 caped the hungry garde du corps you spoke 
 of." 
 
 " Not so fast. Monsieur hath a quicker 
 eye to his interest ; and no sooner did Mamma 
 bring off Miss from Paris, than my garde du 
 corps has got himself appointed to a regiment 
 on the Loire. And here he is at this moment, 
 
 N
 
 266 A WEEK 
 
 I understand, making his hopeful advances to 
 my betrothed." 
 
 "And you have come, I suppose, to make 
 him shew cause. 1 ' 
 
 "That is as it may be." 
 
 "The name of this blade?" 
 
 " Florville." 
 
 " Florville ! what of the Garde du Corps de 
 Monsieur?" 
 
 " Don't ask me. I know not one Monsieur 
 from another." 
 
 " Green uniform?" 
 
 " Ay ! that is he, as I have been informed." 
 
 " A gay, honest, light-hearted fellow, as ever 
 wielded sabre. I know him well, and know 
 also, what seems to me most strangely to dis- 
 agree with your account, that he has been long 
 attached to the pretty Julie Le Normand, 
 without disparagement to Sophia, as lovely a 
 creature as trips in France. You must cer- 
 tainly have been misinformed, my dear fel- 
 low."
 
 AT TOURS. 267 
 
 " Not at all, not at all. At least I place 
 more reliance on my informant, than to disbe- 
 lieve him on your opinion of a Frenchman's 
 constancy." 
 
 " Go to, thou bigot. I tell thee there is 
 more love in one province of this sunny land, 
 than throughout your whole clime of fogs, and 
 withal as much honour." 
 
 " Well, in this case we shall see." 
 
 " Nay, I will stake no such truth, nor any 
 such great question as that of national cha- 
 racter, upon an individual's conduct. Florville 
 may be worthless ; if he be, I merely say, that 
 he belies his seeming." 
 
 " Really that is a very beautiful woman in 
 yon caleche," observed Rutledge abruptly, 
 " she is the very first Frenchwoman — " 
 
 " How do'ye do? — I'm quite charmed." 
 
 It was no other than Julie Le Normand and 
 her mother. The reader need not be informed, 
 perhaps, that it is I myself who have been 
 chatting this half hour past with my friend 
 
 n 2
 
 268 A WEEK 
 
 Rutledge in the market-place at Tours. The 
 apparition of the fair Julie marred oui dia- 
 logue, and substituted another, to me far more 
 interesting. I introduced Rutledge, who made 
 a passable bow for a cockney, and spoke forth 
 his compliments in astonishingly good French, 
 only that he kept his teeth shut. Being 
 questioned respecting their journey, Madame 
 Le Normand said, " they had come to ru- 
 ralize and spend the summer months at Tours; 
 Paris had grown so hot in summer of late 
 years." 
 
 " And only of late years?" 
 
 " I don't think we used to perceive it, indeed, 
 in the Emperor's time." 
 
 "What might the natural cause be of such 
 a phenomenon?" 
 
 " Ma foi, I know not. We had no leisure 
 for ennui then. And ye English had not 
 come to infect us, or to tell us that a me- 
 tropolis was an intolerable residence in Au- 
 gust."
 
 AT TOURS. 269 
 
 " And so you travel southward in search of 
 cooler air. But, by the by, Florville is here." 
 
 Julie blushed. 
 
 " We had no idea of it," said Madame ; 
 "Julie told me, he was — where is it, dear, you 
 told me he was ?" 
 
 " At Bourdeaux, ma mere." 
 
 " He is here, I assure you." 
 
 " Drive on," said she to the coachman ; " we 
 are lodged so and so — you know our visiting 
 hours and evenings — your friend will do us the 
 pleasure of accompanying you." Rutledge 
 bowed ; and I allowed them to drive off with- 
 out any further allusion to the cause of Julie's 
 confusion. 
 
 " It is but too true, Rutledge," said I, " you 
 have but one revenge." 
 
 "What's that?" 
 
 "Make love to Julie." 
 
 " I shall leave that task to you." 
 
 " Nay, I am cclibataire sworn, as much as 
 Delavigne's Bonnard, and could quote some
 
 270 A WEEK 
 
 of his couplets to my purpose, if I remembered 
 them. But you — " 
 
 "What if I succeeded?" 
 
 " Marry her." 
 
 " Sincerely speaking, I love Sophia." 
 
 "And Julie, poor Julie, has not her thou- 
 sands, a pity. But to allay your terrible fears 
 of success, which savour somewhat of vanity 
 — I can tell your learned self, that with the 
 lively, lovely Julie, you bave not the least 
 chance of it. Your gallantry, however, will 
 be welcome, and will serve the purposes both 
 of Julie and yourself. Try it, my good fellow. 
 It may pique Florville, and draw him from the 
 pursuit of Sophia." 
 
 " I begin to relish your plan. But here 
 comes an old acquaintance of mine too : — this 
 seems a general rendezvous." 
 
 " Ay, there's the advantage of places and 
 piazze — they are what I love most in a conti- 
 nental town. A place is a public saloon, 
 where not a new face nor a piece of scandal
 
 AT TOURS. 271 
 
 can escape you — it makes the whole popula- 
 tion one family. Here is none of your churlish, 
 bullish, nervous sort of acquaintanceship — 
 none either of the pride that cuts, nor the 
 meanness that canvasses a salute." 
 
 " Give me the solitude or the society, either 
 always at command, of a metropolis, where 
 neither scandal nor impertinence intrude, 
 where every man's habits and whims, as well 
 as his house, are included in the Englishman's 
 castle, — dear London, where alone, throughout 
 the habitable globe, my uncle Toby himself 
 might ride his hobby-horse, without fear of 
 ridicule or detection, to the end of the 
 chapter." 
 
 The approach of the personage alluded to, 
 stopped the argument between Rutledge and 
 myself. He was a fellow in a terribly o'er- 
 braided jacket, embroidered pantaloons, a hat 
 and solitary long green feather, that might 
 become a marshal himself; and a straight, short 
 sword, that Achilles might have wielded, hung
 
 272 A WEEK 
 
 moreover from his broad belt. This military 
 looking personage was no other than the 
 courier, crrasseur, and valet of the Mordaunts 
 — an Irish rascal thus advanced into an orna- 
 mented French one; or, as he preferred setting 
 himself forth, a Swiss, by the grace of his own 
 impudence. 
 
 " Rutledge," said I, "this fellow must not 
 know that you are here, 'twill mar a plan of 
 mine outright." 
 
 "The hawk is past hood-winking," replied 
 my friend ; " he is keen as the valet of a 
 Spanish farce." 
 
 " He must be bribed then, to secrecy." 
 
 " That will be incomparably the most 
 feasible, and withal most sure. Thx, fellow 
 is pretty well aware that I know him, and 
 will be glad to purchase my silence by his 
 own." 
 
 Up walked Dennis, or Monsieur Denis, at the 
 moment, Irish honesty struggling in his coun- 
 tenance with French grimace.
 
 AT TOURS. 273 
 
 *' Ah ! Monsieur Rootlege, I be very easy 
 to see you." 
 
 "And how do you like France, Dennis?" 
 
 " Arrah, how would I like Skibbereen, 
 agra : I mane, how would a Pat like the land 
 of potatoes in which he was born?" 
 
 " You do not mean to say, you are a Pat, 
 Dennis?" 
 
 "I do and I doesn't. For thof I was born, 
 bred, and rared in Genevy, I own to a bit 
 of the brogue, and a taste of the Irish blood 
 in my veins. My fadther and my modther, 
 troth and I can't tell which, was from the little 
 island, sure enough, God bless it." 
 
 " Poor fellow, born in a strange land. But, 
 Dennis, why did not your respectable parent 
 teach you at least your mother tongue?" 
 
 " Th' Irish, you inane.'' 
 
 "Ay, the Irish, if not the language, at least 
 the accent, which you have none of." 
 
 " And now how could the craturs?" said 
 Dennis, with a smile of pity for our lack of 
 
 n3
 
 274 A WEEK 
 
 discernment, and another smile, immediately 
 following, of pity for himself, " Sure they died 
 one day arely, and left me, orphan as I am, at 
 the foot of the could Alps/' 
 
 Thiswas irresistible : — a big, lubberly, broad- 
 shouldered, black-whiskered orphan, aban- 
 doned too at the foot of the could Alps, moun- 
 tains that the fellow most likely never beheld 
 — we forgot schemes, concealment, Sophia, 
 Julie, all, in a laugh outright, which awakened 
 Monsieur Denis at once to suspicion and his 
 French accent. He was somewhat angered 
 too, and prepared to be tart. 
 
 " If ye cam after Ma'amselle, Mister Root- 
 lege, I can tell ye, you be le jour apres lafoire.'" 
 
 " Hear to him, translating English proverbs 
 into his Genevese dialect ! But why, why,, 
 good Dennis V* 
 
 "Because ye see, ye are not able for theFrench- 
 men. They have a gay, oily way with them, 
 just like the Pats, and run away with the women, 
 whilst ye are humming and hawing about it.'"
 
 AT TOURS. 275 
 
 ** And, my dear Dennis" — here the hand of 
 Rutledge touched that of the courier, and that 
 not emptily nor insignificantly, " can you stand 
 by, and see this — see your old acquaintance 
 outwitted, and allow your young mistress to 
 
 be carried off by a pennyless, French 
 
 countryman of yours.'' 
 
 Dennis grinned, " understanding and un- 
 derstood." 
 
 " Mais que voulez-vous, what would you have 
 me do?" asked he. 
 
 <{ Nothing for the present, good Dennis; say 
 nought whatever of having seen me in Tours: 
 this first, you mark us." 
 
 " Mum for me," said Dennis, with an arch 
 Irish smile. " Messieurs, je vous salue," said 
 the same personage, being the French chasseur, 
 touching his hat and feather, and taking his 
 courteous departure. 
 
 " What an invaluable rascal — impayabk, as 
 they say here." 
 
 " I hope I shall not find him so," said Rut- 
 ledge. " But this scheme— what is it ?"
 
 276 A WEEK AT TOURS. 
 
 "Nay, fairly and softly. You are deeply 
 smitten with Julie, and commence by directing 
 your addresses to her. If that fail to draw off 
 Florville, we must prepare a bolder stroke. 
 Leave all to me. But mark, it will be neces- 
 sary to remain utterly concealed from So- 
 phia?" 
 
 ** I should like to catch, as well as give, a 
 glimpse, just to waken remorse in the jade." 
 
 " Coxcomieal and idle; it must not be. 
 Change your name, even at LeNormand's, lest 
 Florville should repeat it. But that perhaps 
 is not necessary. The name Rutledge would 
 perplex his jaws, as much as that of Thistle- 
 wood did those of the Parisians, when Cato- 
 street was the topic of the day." 
 
 " Well, as you will for the present, I am al- 
 most dead with fatigue." 
 
 "Take your sciesta, and then you know, on 
 the Realto I expect you."
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 The Mordaunts made their appearance at 
 the evening promenade ; by the side of Sophia 
 was Florville, who endeavoured to entertain 
 her with remarks upon her robe, bonnet, shoes, 
 ribands, 8cc, none of which had the effect of 
 exciting the English girl to converse or reply. 
 
 Frenchmen, who are so much at home, at 
 their ease, and so truly delightful with females 
 of their own nation, that understand their light 
 badinage, and as light seriousness, are sadly 
 awkward in addressing or entertaining females 
 of another nation, especially the English, whose 
 apathy, whose airs, whose assumed caprices 
 they can never fathom nor understand. If they
 
 278 A WEEK 
 
 captivate some of our fair countrywomen, and 
 that they do, the marriage-registers of the 
 Mairies of the English quarters at Paris and 
 elsewhere can testify, it must be chiefly by the 
 magic of their name, the charm of their 
 etrangete, for nothing certainly can in general 
 be more blank and puerile than their wit, more 
 childish than their discourse, nothing more 
 unimposing than their whole manner and con- 
 verse, when fascinated by the spell of our blue- 
 eyed blondes. Even the mercurial spirits of the 
 French, so proverbially inexhaustible amongst 
 one another, sink and disappear, when they 
 are amongst us. They seem the nightingales 
 in the rook's nest, of Quarle's emblems. They 
 are so morne, so sombre, so well-behaved, that 
 the general verdict passed seems to be, that 
 the French are a very grave nation. 
 
 Another fault, and an impertinent fault, 
 moreover, of the French in conversation, is, that 
 they carry it on by question rather than by re- 
 mark. They never waste breath in mere un-
 
 AT TOURS. 279 
 
 addressed observations, and leave their com- 
 panions to answer or not, according to his or to 
 her depth or humour. Each idea is expressed 
 in the form of a demand, and the silent or the 
 diffident companions are thus infallibly put to 
 the torture of a distressing interrogatory. 
 
 When Florville had exhausted all the visible 
 wardrobe of Sophia, and when still the conver- 
 sation did not flow, he asked, how many bro- 
 thers and sisters she had? knowing right well 
 already that she had none, Whether she had 
 had ever any ? Whether her papa had been a 
 knight, and of what order, and whether he had 
 seen service, or perished in the champ cVhonneur? 
 Whether English ladies wore dimity in the 
 morning, as asserted by Lord Byron, and whe- 
 ther they made a general practice of infanti- 
 cide, as declared by General Pillet. The young 
 lady stared, nay blushed at the latter question, 
 but the Frenchman, attributing her crimson 
 cheek to some other cause, went on with his 
 catechism.
 
 280 A WEEK 
 
 Still was Sophia enchanted, and she de- 
 clared, that she had never known so entertain- 
 ing a companion. The only foreigner she had 
 been ever intimate with, could not be other- 
 wise. Florville's ideas, however, were by no 
 means so favourable to her, for the young offi- 
 cer not only set down his bride elect as bite, 
 ignorant, and lifeless, but declared to himself, 
 that he must ponder, ere he could resign the 
 lovely Julie for such dull charms, even though 
 garnished with a fortune of some English 
 thousands. 
 
 In this seasonable mood the young French- 
 man was visited by Monsieur Denis, who, as 
 a friend (foreign servants have such amicable 
 and familiar ways), came to inform him of Ma- 
 dame and Mademoiselle Le Normand's arrival. 
 At the news, Florville threw his military cap 
 in air, crying the die was cast, and hurried 
 forth instantly, his heart overflowing with all 
 the warm and generous thoughts of first love. 
 He sought out the La Normands, and lo ! hia
 
 AT TOURS. 281 
 
 ancient place was occupied, for my friend Rut- 
 ledsre was, with some toil, it is true — but 
 that wore lighter for him momentarily, acting 
 the amiable by the side of the fascinating 
 Julie. 
 
 " Ah ! Monsieur Florville," exclaimed Ma- 
 dame La Normand, welcoming him with well- 
 feigned surprise, a sentiment that appeared 
 less sweetly expressed in his countenance, 
 " introduce our friend — notre ami le plus in- 
 time, Monsieur Roote," and Madame unluckily 
 forgot or could not master the name of her 
 most intimate friend. 
 
 " Monsieur is lately arrived in Tours?" said 
 Florville. 
 
 " This day, as well as ourselves," replied 
 Madame. 
 
 " Together no doubt," thought Florville. 
 
 " Monsieur voyage, Monsieur travels?" con- 
 tinued the interrogating Florville. 
 
 " Fixed for the present at all events," re- 
 plied Rutledge, keeping his place adhesively.
 
 282 A WEEK 
 
 " Monsieur est militaire?" was the next ques- 
 tion, and rather fiercely delivered. 
 
 " Je suis Templier," replied Rutledge, as 
 fiercely, emboldened by elation, success, and 
 the presence of his rival, into absurdity. 
 
 *' Voits devez etre un peu passt, you ought to 
 be somewhat ancient by this time, Monsieur 
 Le Chevalier," remarked Florville, construing 
 the title, which Rutledge had given himself, 
 literally. 
 
 " I am no woman, Sir, to be ashamed of 
 having seen a quarter of a century." 
 
 " But you ought to be ashamed of having 
 seen near four full centuries, during which 
 time a Knight Templar has not been created; 
 and at which time most of your compeers, if 
 not yourself, were deservedly hanged. Your 
 monopoly of life, Sir, is a nuisance." 
 
 The rising wrath of Rutledge was extin- 
 guished in my laugh, which was echoed by 
 the ladies, though somewhat puzzled and mys- 
 tified by the blunder, which they could not
 
 AT TOURS. 283 
 
 altogether read. A little explication, how- 
 ever, vastly improved the serenity of the even- 
 ing, and at least the apparent amity of the 
 rivals. 
 
 Florville contrived soon after to direct his 
 whispered interrogatories to me touching Rut- 
 ledge, and I informed him fully, that he was 
 bien riche, magnificently extravagant, and a lord 
 Anglais. As is the case, however, in most 
 schemes of this kind, we found that we had 
 overdone the matter. Florville was too much 
 piqued, and at each blow levelled at his vanity, 
 he recurred to his more certain conquest, and 
 more interested flame, in short, to Sophia. He 
 even took rallying on that score stoutly, and 
 instead of wearing penitence, he became hard- 
 ened in his fickleness, and spoke vauntingly 
 of being appreciated elsewhere. This had nearly 
 converted our comic into a tragic scene : dis- 
 guise and dissimulation, whether gay or so- 
 lemn, wear off in a long parley; and the pique 
 and passion of both Florville and Julie were
 
 284 A WEEK 
 
 more than once on the point of displaying 
 openly, and marring all our schemes by an 
 angry denouement. 
 
 Madame Le Normand, however, contrived 
 to turn the conversation adroitly off, upon the 
 scandal of the town of Tours, a fertile and inex- 
 haustible subject, useful in general society, as a 
 bed of mud in unsafe harbours, on which a vessel 
 may run aground, and remain firmly moored, 
 at the expense of being surrounded by filth 
 and turbid waters. The duel of last week and 
 its cause formed an interesting topic of con- 
 versation; the last economist and his family 
 arrived, another ; and the last milord, that had 
 run from his debts, another — all hebdomadal 
 occurrences, however, that excite little surprise 
 and no extraordinary interest. Madame Le 
 Normand, though she had introduced the sub- 
 ject, was by no means rich in the stores of 
 knowledge and anecdote necessary for discus- 
 sins: it ; but visitors had in the mean time 
 joined and swelled the party, who most will- 

 
 AT TOURS. 285 
 
 ingly undertook to discourse gratuitously on 
 so delightful a theme. 
 
 Rutletlge, like a true cockney, exclaimed 
 against this horrid scandal, making at the 
 same time the vulgar and common-place allu- 
 sion to the tea-table, which drew down upon 
 him at once the resentment and assent of every 
 dowager present. 
 
 " Really," observed I, " the only conversa- 
 tion that appears to me either allowed, possi- 
 ble, or worth listening to in mixed society, is 
 scandal." 
 
 The one score of hands of two score of 
 scandal-mongers were thrown up in horror at 
 the delightful assertion. 
 
 " Come," said I, " what else shall ladies 
 speak, or gentlemen either?" 
 
 " Literature and the belles lettres" firmly 
 cried Miss Pike. 
 
 " Blue, blue," said several voices, sparing 
 me the trouble of the exclamation, and turning
 
 286 A WEEK 
 
 up what of their noses was not naturally so 
 turned, in contempt. 
 
 "Politics and philosophy," said another, 
 whom none had the courage to second. 
 
 " The arts. " 
 
 The quotation of 
 
 "Sciences and arts, 
 
 And knowledge gained in foreign parts," 
 
 was enough to silence the fair sketcher. And 
 all in short agreed that observation of each 
 other's characters and behaviour was the only 
 legitimate source, and topic of conversation. 
 
 " And a very interesting and fertile topic 
 it is." 
 
 " Nothing but the necessity of exaggera- 
 tion to the dramatist's trade could have made 
 him, and after him the world, attribute ma- 
 lignity to the very staple material of all dis- 
 
 course." 
 
 " Agreed, agreed, nothing else." 
 
 " For my part, the best-natured and most
 
 AT TOURS. 287 
 
 truly generous and sympathetic creatures I 
 ever knew in my life, were kind old ladies, 
 who lived on what moralists would call scan- 
 dal. The sorrows and sufferings of others 
 were their food, their interest, their occupa- 
 tion, their living novel, of whose pages they 
 were never sated — nay, even when their tongue 
 was cruel, and might seem malignant, their 
 hearts were tender, and commiserated the very 
 wretches whom they lacerated." 
 
 All seemed struck, nay, affected by this 
 appeal in favour of the calumniated class of 
 gossips, those most innocent even of village 
 inhabitants. And I have no doubt, that, had 
 it been decorous, I should have had a vote of 
 thanks decreed to me from the assembled 
 damosels and dowagers of Tours, and other 
 such sweet, picturesque emporiums of small 
 talk and small fortunes. 
 
 Meanwhile Florville had made his indignant 
 escape, in doubt whether he should run Rut-
 
 288 A WEEK AT TOURS. 
 
 ledge through the body, and fall at the feet of 
 Julie in hopes of forgiveness, or else gratify 
 more his spite and avarice than his affection in 
 carrying to a-conclusion his addresses toward 
 Sophia. He left Rutledge and Julie in secret 
 hopes, that pique would prompt him to the 
 more honourable resolve.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 "Well, Dennis, mon brave, what news?" 
 demanded Rutledge eagerly of the courier on 
 the following day. 
 
 " Ah ! pire que jamais, worse than ever," re- 
 plied the dandy serving-man ; " cest une affaire 
 arrangee, it is all settled, Monsieur Le Capitaine 
 has been with Madame Mordaunt to dejeune, 
 and with a countenance most matrimonial." 
 
 " What kind of a countenance is that, 
 Dennis?" 
 
 " All as one, Sir, as if a body was going to 
 be hanged." 
 
 "Well said, Monsieur Pat; But have you 
 no other grounds ?" 
 
 o
 
 290 A WEEK 
 
 " Mademoiselle has shut herself up. Mr, 
 Florville and Madame talk earnestly in the 
 cabinet— the house is silent, an ear at each 
 key-hole. And the general presentiment is, 
 that the crise you so much dread is approach- 
 ing." 
 
 " What an invaluable diplomatist, Rutledge, 
 we have hit upon." 
 
 " Shall we believe him?" 
 "Parole d'honneur, upon my word of ho- 
 nour," exclaimed seriously the valet, laying 
 his open hand upon his embroidered breast, 
 " you may depend upon my veracity." 
 
 " Oh," said we, with my Lord Duke, in the 
 farce, " there is no room for farther doubt." — 
 " Seriously not," added I, " we must have re- 
 course, if time is yet left, to the rest of our 
 stratagem." 
 
 " I dread the attempt," said Rutledge, " it 
 is really too much for me. I shall never be 
 able to go through with it. With my slight 
 knowledge of French, Sophia's thorough
 
 AT TOURS. 291 
 
 knowledge of me, it will be impossible to es- 
 cape detection in this disguise." 
 
 " Nay, you know far more of French than 
 she does ; the concealment may be complete, 
 your visit short and to the purpose, and I will 
 always be at hand to aid and bear you out. 
 Sophia, in short, is, as you say, taken not with 
 Florville, but with the Frenchman, and as 
 rank and title in such light chimeras as these 
 must have considerable weight in the balance, 
 you shall be French, and not a mere lieute- 
 nant, but a Colonel, and a Count to boot. 
 She must be right well and suddenly cured of 
 her foreign mania, if she can resist all that. 
 It will at any rate make her waver, and allow 
 time for these absurd whims to evaporate. At 
 all events, you have but to choose between this 
 and shootins: Florville. Even if discovered, 
 what can ensue, beyond a laugh ?" 
 
 " — , but I should look so ridiculous." 
 " As many a wiser man did before you. 
 
 o 2
 
 292 A WEEK 
 
 Consent, or I give you up, as you do Sophia* 
 from pusillanimity." 
 
 " Well, be it so. But if Florville should 
 come upon us ?" 
 
 "That is the only danger. But betwixt 
 me and Dennis, it is strange, if his motions are 
 not better observed." 
 
 " Moi seul," said Dermis, " I will alone an- 
 swer for directing him as far out of the way as 
 you can wish, at certain hours. For I am hi& 
 very index, his confidant." 
 
 "What! and ours too V 
 
 " Mais oui — his at vingt sous, yours at vingt 
 Uvres — those great inequalities are so recon- 
 cileable to the conscience." 
 
 " And you have a conscience, Dennis?" 
 
 " Mafoi, sije n'en avois pas — if I had none,, 
 you would feel it, mais essayer, try me." And 
 as Rutledge again touched the courier's hand, 
 the latter, like a generous physician, returned^ 
 as " stuff o' the conscience," half his fee.
 
 AT TOURS. 293 
 
 He had scarcely departed when Florville 
 came up, and greeted us amicably, asking 
 Rutledge, " how was the pretty Julie V 
 
 " Triste enough, when we last saw her," was 
 my volunteered reply, as evidently my friend's 
 rivalry on the preceding evening had been 
 pushed too far. 
 
 " Triste," repeated the young Frenchman, 
 demolishing betwixt his teeth the nail of his 
 forefinger, "how is that?" 
 
 A shrug was the best reply of both of us. 
 
 " I thought she seemed the gayest of the 
 gay in your company, Monsieur. Did you 
 not think her so V 
 
 A shrug again came to Rutledge's relief. 
 
 "What Jesuits you other English are in 
 affairs of gallantry — bouche fermce, bourse 
 p/eine, closed mouth, full purse, is your device. 
 But why should I press you — it is now too 
 late." 
 
 " I hope not, Sir," said Rutledge, imitating 
 his rival in the demolition of a nail.
 
 294 A WEEK 
 
 " Et pourquoi, why ?" said, and stared Flor- 
 ville. 
 
 " I don't know," replied the confused Rut- 
 ledge. 
 
 " What a droll gallant to have captivated 
 Julie," muttered Florville, who attributed my 
 friend's perplexity to betise. 
 
 " Well, Florville, I wish you joy," said I. 
 
 "Wish me confusion rather." 
 
 " Nay, that you seem to have. But why, 
 have you failed?" 
 
 "You know the matter then. No, not 
 failed, rather the contrary. But still, I can- 
 not resolve — at once — sacreb/eu, if you knew 
 how I am tortured. I'll excuse myself, and 
 join my regiment at Blois for a day, and see 
 what cool reflection shall decide." 
 
 " All this is an enigma to us, my good 
 fellow." 
 
 '.* So let it rest, bonjour." And away walk- 
 ed poor Florville, embarrassed by the success 
 of his amiabilitv.
 
 AT TOURS. 295 
 
 " Now if he hold to this resolution it is most 
 seasonable." 
 
 " Exprts pour nous, the very thing for us." 
 And so we parted. 
 
 Florville, as he had threatened, turned his 
 horse's head to Blois, to seek advice, as he 
 promised himself openly, from his own 
 thoughts, as he promised himself less openly 
 from time, and, as he did not at all promise 
 himself, from his comrades, whose raillery 
 was most likely to have influence upon him. 
 I know not, from my soul, how the officers of 
 a French regiment contrive to kill time. They 
 are no martinets, and discipline hangs as loose 
 on them as do their uniforms. Drink they do 
 not, and few of them know half so well as our 
 subalterns the difference between plain Me- 
 doc and first rate Lefitte. They have neither 
 race-horses, game-cocks, nor bull-dogs, on 
 which to stake a month's pay ; and save do- 
 minos, or in superlative good quarters, bil- 
 liards, they have games neither of skill nor
 
 296 
 
 A WEEK 
 
 chance. They are either such canaille, or else 
 taken for granted to be so, that chateaus and 
 society around, empty as are the first, and 
 scant as is the latter, are quite preserved against 
 their admittance. And how, in short, they do 
 contrive to live, would be quite beyond the 
 conception of any of our military dandies, 
 
 They are, however, a grown and good-na- 
 tured race of schoolboys, brethren and com- 
 rades in every sense of the word, without any 
 of the cat-o'-nine tails' austerity of our field- 
 officers when addressing an inferior in rank. 
 Then have they no vying in coxcombry or ex- 
 pense, in nought, in fact, save address at their 
 weapon, and forwardness in the field. 
 
 Florville's regiment was composed chiefly of 
 boys at and under his own age, save one or two 
 gray-haired veterans, who in despite of their 
 laurels, crosses, and having seen Austerlitz and 
 Eylau, still held their commissions by a discreet 
 zeal for the restored dynasty, and by carefully 
 attaching the order of the lis to their breast by
 
 AT TOURS. 297 
 
 the side of that of the legion of honour. But 
 those seniors mingled little with their juvenile 
 comrades, who thronged around Florville, and 
 by a mixture of raillery and perseverance, soon 
 made common property of the weighty se- 
 crets, that pressed upon his mind. But what 
 resolution or step they urged him to, lies 
 farther on in our narration. 
 
 Whilst he is bent upon his journey, the 
 reader's humble servant assumed the liberty of 
 dropping in upon the Mordaunts in the even- 
 ing, accompanied by no less a personage than 
 the General Count St. Aubin. That both I 
 and my friend were welcome to ladies, one of 
 whom at least had no two desires on earth 
 greater than to know a French Count, and to 
 speak with a French General, need not be told. 
 Nay, the civilities paid to me on the score of 
 gratitude were even greater than those with 
 which the Count was honoured. He moreover 
 was a reserved and silent personage, not very 
 entertaining, I whispered, unless it was his 
 
 o 3
 
 298 A WEEK 
 
 humour; but then he had seen service, had 
 been of the Imperial guard, was at the Pyra- 
 mids, at Moscow, Waterloo, and all the world 
 over. Yet was he young, and the glossy 
 blackness of his mustachio unsilvered. That 
 part of his visage spoke for itself, and indeed 
 for other features which it concealed, and it 
 was certainly formidable. 
 
 Sophia's cheek was flushed with pleasure, 
 her good mother's with scarcely less ; and 
 while they feasted their eyes with furtive 
 glances at the hero, they prepared their ears 
 for marvel and tales of bloodshed. Desde- 
 mona never did her ear incline more seriously, 
 than did Sophia. But sometime in vain, for 
 the General, with all the perils he had encoun- 
 tered, seemed as modest and diffident as one 
 on whose lip no mustachio could flourish. 
 
 At length the young lady, like most young 
 ladies, resolved to come to the point of interest 
 at once, and boldly asked the distinguished 
 visiter, " if he had known Bonaparte?"
 
 AT TOURS. 299 
 
 " Oui," responded the general, with an in- 
 firm intonation that made me tremble. 
 
 " And spoken with him ?" 
 
 The second " Oui," in reply to this, was 
 firmer and promised better. And at length it 
 came out boldly that he was aid-de-camp, &c. 
 But still it would not do. The General would 
 not launch forth, would not narrate, began to 
 gaze upon the young lady most fixedly and 
 dully, and his tongue seemed at each reply to 
 acquire fresh reluctance to exercise. 
 
 This excessive ill behaviour on the part of 
 my lion nettled me sorely ; and I was resolved 
 to have my revenge, abandon my scheme, and 
 at the same time afford us both a pretext for 
 immediate escape, as I saw no chance of any 
 good coming of the General's longer stay. In 
 one of the lapses of my companion's stupidity 
 and silence, I therefore took the opportunity 
 of observing to Miss Mordaunt, that my friend 
 was ill at ease, thereby offering an implied ex- 
 cuse for his dullness ; that being an old cam-
 
 300 
 
 A WEEK 
 
 paigner, he was nightly accustomed to his 
 pipe, the want of which afflicted him with a 
 headache, vertigo, and a variety of complaints, 
 and which therefore we were under the imme- 
 diate necessity of retiring to seek at some esta- 
 minet less elegant than ladies' apartments. 
 
 The looks of the General during this speech 
 of mine did not refrain from denouncing 
 much both of surprise and displeasure. But 
 there was no gainsaying so plausible, and in- 
 deed so necessary a tale. We therefore rose 
 simultaneously to depart. But here we were 
 unexpectedly discomfited. The ladies would 
 not permit of our departure, nor admit the ex- 
 cuse — a Count and a General leave their house, 
 forsooth, for want of the soldierlike and notun- 
 gentlemanly solace of a pipe! — They did not 
 smoke — so they thought fit to assert. But to 
 the odour of tobacco they had no objection, 
 not in the least, — on the contrary, rather a 
 predilection — they would procure the weed 
 and the pipe — we must sit still — it could be
 
 AT TOURS. 
 
 301 
 
 got in an instant— it was not the least incon- 
 venience—Mr. Mordaunt smoked. In short 
 stay we must, and smoke we must. 
 
 I shall never forget the piteous look which 
 my companion cast on me. My friend Rut- 
 ledge, for he was no other, had, I knew, an ab- 
 solute horror of tobacco in any shape, and 
 three whiffs would most probably put the old 
 campaigner, as I had announced him, sick, and 
 most unamiablv under the table. However, 
 though not without participating in his per- 
 plexity, I was somewhat amused by the me- 
 rited vengeance which I had inflicted without 
 meditating. 
 
 After some time Dennis walked in with the 
 pipes and their provender, placing one, with 
 the most knavish expression of countenance, 
 apt to the visitor's hand. That personage pre- 
 ferred a segar, which, upon trial, he found he 
 could not light, whether it was from will, or 
 unskilfulness, or both, I leave the reader to 
 determine. The ladies were in pain, lest their
 
 302 A WEEK 
 
 segarmight not please the renowned personage; 
 the said personage in agony upon a thousand 
 accounts, not the least of which was the simple 
 horror of committing such a nuisance in the 
 presence of the fair; then his dreaded sickness, 
 the character of gallant which he came to as- 
 sume, so ill assorting with the habits of the 
 old campaigner, all put Rutledge into such 
 perplexity, that the only approach he could 
 make towards enjoyment of the luxurious weed, 
 was the circumstance of burning his fingers. 
 
 A thought, however, that I wonder did not 
 before occur to us, here came to our relief. 
 The General, I bethought me, had been for 
 some time prisoner in England, and spoke our 
 language, though with difficulty and a foreign 
 accent, a circumstance that would no doubt 
 render him more intelligible and agreeable to 
 the ladies. I mentioned forthwith the disco- 
 very, which appeared so happy to the General, 
 that he flung down his pipe, and poured forth 
 at once a variety of hitherto suppressed com-
 
 AT TOURS. 303 
 
 plimentsinEnglish exaggeratedly broken. Mrs. 
 Mordaunt protested she understood French 
 perfectly, and that there was no occasion for 
 putting the General to such trouble. But the 
 trouble was decidedly a pleasure. So the pipes 
 passed to their deserved oblivion, and the 
 conversation revived, or rather, indeed, com- 
 menced. 
 
 We had at last touched upon the right vein, 
 and nought could be more fluent or fascinating 
 than the flow of the General's talk ; somewhat 
 flighty in its excursions from Moscow to 
 Madrid, and flighty perhaps in the other and 
 Munchausen signification of the word, but 
 still all was in due keeping, gravity, and dis- 
 guise, so that the credulity of the fair listeners 
 was not once over-charged nor their suspicions 
 once alarmed. They were delighted in the ex- 
 treme, and Sophia Mordaunt forgot all her 
 English reserve in her eagerness to satisfy her 
 curiosity by questioning so interesting and so 
 valiant a personage. Success could not smile
 
 304 A WEEK AT TOURS. 
 
 more fully on our scheme. Sophia's fancy was 
 taken by a coup-de-main. And we saw at 
 once that Florville was utterly and irrevocably 
 forgotten. After having audaciously sung a 
 Spanish song, and given a Russian hurraw, 
 General Count St. Aubin took his leave of the 
 ladies, not without vowing to bestow on thera 
 the frequent honour of his company and assi- 
 duities.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 During Florville'sopportune absence, which 
 by the by was ill construed by the English ob- 
 ject of his vows, however he had pleaded ne- 
 cessity for it, the General Count St. Aubin did 
 not fail a single evening in his visits ; nor did 
 the Mordaunts fail to be at home. It was un- 
 lucky that he was so averse to promenade and 
 soiree; but this, though churlish, suited well 
 with his heroic character. The evening was 
 his only time of going forth, as for particular 
 reasons he avoided scrutiny by day ; but then 
 the twilight hour was most favourable to the 
 impression that he sought to make. Of his
 
 306 
 
 A WEEK 
 
 identity no doubt was entertained. Dennis 
 had even the boldness and kindness to assert, 
 that he had served under him, and gladly would 
 take up a rausquet again under so distinguished 
 a commander. Latterly too, in despite of his 
 moustaches, he was not wanting in the pa- 
 thetic, nor defective in sensibility, as he took 
 opportunities of evincing. He was soon struck 
 with the naivete, the beauty, and the amiability 
 of Miss Mordaunt ; and it became manifest to 
 both Sophia and her mamma, that the former 
 had made a conquest of the General Count 
 St. Aubin. 
 
 Meantime the pretty Julie was in despair at 
 the abandonment both of her real and her pre- 
 tended lover. Pride or just resentment could 
 not come to her relief; for she had justly me- 
 rited the conduct of Florville by all the co- 
 quetry and caprice, with which the air of a 
 metropolis inspires young ladies. Nor had the 
 young garde -du- corps attached himself to the 
 rich and handsome Englishwoman, until the
 
 AT TOURS. 
 
 307 
 
 whims of Julie, the alternate hot and cold fits 
 of that tertian, a woman's humour, had really 
 driven him for consolation, amusement, and 
 even self-respect, elsewhere. Having come, 
 however, to the comparative solitude of the 
 country and to her senses at the same time, 
 she was anxious to make every reparation to 
 her injured admirer, and to herself internal pro- 
 mises of the most reserved conduct. In de- 
 spite of this resolve, it is true, she could not 
 refrain from some flirtation, as we have seen, 
 with Rutledge ; but still, it was with the best 
 and most innocent intention, vain and unlucky 
 as it had proved. 
 
 Affairs being in this state, Florville returned 
 from Blois, his ideas ten times more worldly 
 than when he had set forth. The company of 
 one's own sex, whatever that may be, is sure 
 to increase our selfishness hourly, whilst con- 
 verse with a different sex, is sure to have the 
 opposite effect. There is always a mean 
 rivalry, an affectation of cunning, and conse-
 
 308 
 
 A WEEK 
 
 quently an emulation towards it, betwixt males, 
 or betwixt females who herd exclusively toge- 
 ther, and which alway forms the esprit de corps 
 of such societies. Look at schoolboys, sol- 
 diers, old maids, &c. for example, and you will 
 find the maxim true. 
 
 Be it so or not, Florville returned from his 
 comrades, fraught certainly with a higher com- 
 parative idea of money over love, than the sort 
 of balance which both contesting principles 
 held in his mind ere his departure. The ad- 
 vice in consequence, which he professed to 
 have gone to seek from reflection, proved to be 
 that he should marry Sophia Mordaunt and 
 possess himself of her fortune without loss of 
 time, or without bestowing a thought on Julie, 
 who had the impertinence to be at once poor 
 and a coquette. Such was the resolution with 
 which the young officer re-entered Tours. 
 
 Florville was a confident youth, like many 
 youths and most Frenchmen, and accordingly 
 stepped up the Mordaunts' stair without any
 
 AT TOURS. 309 
 
 misgivings as to the probability of success, or 
 the least suspicion of the revolution which had 
 taken place during his absence. The first sa- 
 lute, which he received from the fair Sophia, 
 was a cry of surprise, which indicated, that, 
 whether welcome or not, his coming was not 
 expected, not looked for, and therefore might 
 whisper jealousy, not very ardently hoped for. 
 But Florville, not being in love, was not so 
 readily jealous. Miss Mordaunt's first coldness 
 and carelessness of manner also, he attributed 
 to betise, the stupidity before observed ; but 
 before he took his leave he began to perceive 
 somewhat more than usual, something that re- 
 quired another cause. He departed somewhat 
 abruptly, scarcely venturing as yet to shew re- 
 sentment. It might be a momentary whim, a 
 woman's humour. It was sufficient, however, 
 to make him feel awkward and uneasy respect- 
 ing the promised thousands. 
 
 It was evening, Dennis watched the young 
 French spark to his home, and reporting him
 
 310 
 
 A WEEK 
 
 safely lodged, gave word thereof to Rutledge, 
 who, in the person of the General, accordingly- 
 hastened in his turn to pay his evening respects 
 to his mistress. His reception was even more 
 cordial, than ever it had been previously. The 
 moustache-less lieutenant had sunk in the 
 scale, and the Count and the General kicked 
 the beam. There wanted but a declaration ; 
 all appearances, facilities, smiles, and tender- 
 ness drew thitherwards : and how it could have 
 been escaped, for that was the General's per- 
 plexity, seemed beyond his skill — when once 
 again Florville entered. 
 
 Unable to support the fresh suspense into 
 which he had been thrown, he hurried back to 
 make himself more sure, and found in the shape 
 of the General Count St. Aubin a more sub- 
 stantial proof of his disgrace, than he could 
 have expected. Luckily for Rutledge the 
 young Frenchman lost at once his temper, and 
 with his temper his discernment. He eyed his 
 rival however with a glance, which the General,
 
 AT TOURS. 311 
 
 most unhero-like, shrank from. The twilight, 
 like a seven-fold shield, warded off all danger 
 of detection. The impatient Florville in a lit- 
 tle time began to wield his interrogatory, and 
 soon extracted the name, rank, and title of the 
 strange visitor from Miss Mordaunt. He knew 
 no such General, and no such Count, a remark 
 to which Sophia's smile replied, that it was 
 very probable. He then attacked the General's 
 self, who, for the benefit of the ladies, replied 
 the little that he did reply, in the same broken 
 English, that he had hitherto found so conve- 
 nient. 
 
 There was a skirmish of some ten minutes, 
 very nervous to me, who was a looker on, not 
 union plicated. The General was sadly defi- 
 cient in the military knowledge, that of corps, 
 acquaintance with garrisons and officers, &c. all 
 of which was familiar to Florville. But then 
 the veteran pleaded being of the old, not of the 
 new army, and covered well his ignorance with 
 contempt of all that savoured of the new re-
 
 312 A WEEK 
 
 gime. This was a new cause of quarrel, for 
 Florville as garde-du-corps, was ultra to the 
 point of his sword. He accused the General 
 at length boldly, though politely, of not being 
 a Frenchman, either in sentiment or tongue. 
 Rutledge, who was not aware what a terrible 
 insult the assertion of " Tu n'es pas Francais," 
 is in France, replied calmly, as had been pre- 
 concerted, that he was Alsacier, and that his 
 tongue might therefore somewhat smack of 
 provincialism. But that, en revanche, the beauty 
 of his estates on the Rhine so far excelled those 
 of the flatter and purer tongued provinces of 
 France, that their romance at least recompensed 
 their patois. If this .excuse did not satisfy 
 Florville, it certainly did Sophia, whose ima- 
 gination immediately took its flight between 
 the lovely banks of the Rhine, and revelled 
 amongst its scenery and castles. 
 
 " Monsieur Le Comte, then, speaks German, 
 without doubt?" 
 
 " Every dialect of it," replied I boldly for
 
 AT TOURS. 313 
 
 my quaking friend ; " have you ever read 
 Faustus, Miss Mordaunt?" 
 
 "No; but I should like to read it of all 
 things. It was my intention, my serious in- 
 tention, to have a German master, and — " 
 
 Here Florville spoke some Deutsch gib- 
 berish at the Rhenish Count, who was too 
 much occupied with Miss Mordaunt's -an- 
 nounced intentions to have any attention for 
 the impertinent Lieutenant. 
 
 "And learn it of course," said I; "though 
 that does not always follow." 
 
 Florville reiterated his gibberish, to which 
 the Count offering no intelligence, I was 
 obliged to say, that " the only German dialect 
 my friend did not understand was the Pa- 
 risian." 
 
 This turned the spark's resentment uponme. 
 He assured me, he had himself taken lessons 
 from a noble, a Count of the Holy Roman em- 
 pire, and more certainly one than many who 
 falsely pretended to the title. 
 
 p
 
 314 A WEEK 
 
 At this insult all eyes were turned towards 
 the Count, who sate as phlegmatic as could 
 have become his adopted country, not deigning 
 to notice the insinuation of the pert subaltern. 
 The ladies were not so forbearant ; the elder 
 expressed her hopes that such a breach of good 
 breeding would not be repeated, and the 
 younger looked a reproof ten times more cut- 
 ting. Nought was left to Florville, save 
 retreat ; which at length he made, casting 
 indignant glances, and muttering indignant 
 expressions against the General Count St. 
 Aubin, and me, his ally. 
 
 No sooner had he departed once more, than 
 Monsieur Denis was summoned, and the im- 
 pertinent Dennis entered exclaiming in a fa- 
 miliar tone, 
 
 . "Je sais bien, Mesdames, ce que vous voulez avec 
 moi — I know very well, ladies, what you want 
 with me." 
 
 " Eh bien, Denise, ce que c'est que we 
 want with ye," asked Mrs. Mordaunt,
 
 AT TOURS. 315 
 
 putting to the proof the courier's inge- 
 nuity. 
 
 " Tis that ye are not at home for Lieutenant, 
 now that the General's come to quarters." 
 
 " Fie, fie, go about your business." 
 
 "Jen'ai pas d'affaire — I have no business." 
 
 " Allez vous ong, Denise." 
 
 "Nor Madame, nor Mademoiselle are at 
 home then to Monsieur Florville." 
 
 " No, Denise, that is it exactly." 
 
 "Then, fy could you not tell at vonce?" 
 cried Dennis, closing the door in a most un- 
 domestic manner. 
 
 " Really, French servants are so rude," ob- 
 served Mrs. Mordaunt. 
 
 And at the moment I perceived that all the 
 smothered Englishman in Rutledge had risen 
 to crimson his face, and to trouble him with 
 an almost irresistible desire to kick Mister 
 Dennis down stairs ; but prudence, patience, 
 and German phlegm prevailed. Having seen 
 my friend so far and fairly out of the danger 
 
 p 2
 
 316 A WEEK 
 
 which threatened, and so fully in favour with 
 the dames upon whose will his happiness de- 
 pended, I resolved to leave him to make the 
 best of the advantages in his power. I there- 
 fore also took my departure. 
 
 I was in a right good humour, and wended 
 my way homeward, laughing, internally at 
 least, if not aloud, at the success of our ad- 
 venture, and by the light of as lovely a moon 
 as ever silvered the Loire. I certainly thought 
 little upon stilets, ambushes, and such Italian 
 adventures, when the shadow of a figure, that 
 was evidently lurking in expectation of my 
 coming, behind the corner of a street in shade, 
 advanced, and recalled me at once to suspicion 
 and defence. It was no other than my friend 
 the garde-du-corps, and he seemed considera- 
 bly disappointed at my not being accompanied 
 by my noble and military acquaintance. 
 "What! Florville, you turned bravo?" 
 " Ay, any thing for vengeance. Where is. 
 this pseudo Count of your creation?"
 
 AT TOURS. 317 
 
 " With the ladies, I suppose. But why, my 
 creation ? I am neither count, nor king maker, 
 neither Napoleon, nor an Austrian Caesar. But 
 come, Florville, be romantic, if you will, but 
 cool, and let us take a moonlight stroll by the 
 Loire." 
 
 "This Count must fight me to-morrow." 
 
 ' Unless the inequality of his rank and 
 yours, which weighs vou know with those Holv 
 Roman nobles, should stand in the way, I am 
 sure, he will have no objection." 
 
 " Rank !" and the impatience of Florville 
 denied him the utterance of aught save 
 oaths — "rank ! I will unmask the im- 
 postor ; I will expose him in the public 
 place." 
 
 " All I hope is, that he may prove an amena- 
 ble monster." 
 
 " I see how it is. Ye are jealous that I 
 captivate one of your countrywomen." 
 
 " Me ! I care not, Florville, if all womankind 
 were dying for love of thee. Nay, I would
 
 318 A WEEK 
 
 wish the rest of mankind joy, and bless thee 
 
 for thy benevolence." 
 
 '* You are angry, that I should carry off the 
 
 fortune of Miss Mordaunt." 
 
 " A little or so, supposing at the same time 
 
 that you cared not for her." 
 
 " Why, what is that to the purpose ?" 
 *' The happiness of a countrywoman." 
 " And so from this disinterested patriotism 
 
 you have dressed up a Count to rival me." 
 " And if he rival thee by the mere name of 
 
 Count, of what depth are the affections of thy 
 
 .1 
 
 fair one ?" 
 
 " Deep enough for me, sacre, I will teach 
 those who have meddled." 
 
 " Nothing, my good fellow, remains to teach, 
 on your part at least ; and as little now, I be- 
 lieve, to learn. I thought, in Paris, that you 
 were attached to Julie Le Normand." 
 
 " There again, ventrebleu, I find another friend 
 of yours installed. Do you keep friends, Sir, 
 For folk's annoyance ?"
 
 AT TOURS. 319 
 
 " F faith, Florville, a great deal oftener for 
 my own. But you say true. There is Rut- 
 ledge, rivalling you with Julie — why not chal- 
 lenge him ?" 
 
 " Why not, indeed, — as if it were not my in- 
 tention. I will have wide revenge. Vengeance 
 on all sides of me, T will run both through, 
 Count and gentleman ." 
 
 " And marry, I hope, both the charmers, by 
 way of compensation." 
 
 " I should like it of all things — the person 
 of one, and the fortune of the other — but that 
 would never do." 
 
 " Would it not? Nay then, you must choose, 
 Florville. Look, how beautifully the moon 
 sleeps upon that water, its waving line of light, 
 andithose old trees, likedozing sentinels, around 
 that fine old chateau, yet stirring themselves 
 lightly betimes, as if to intimate their watch. 
 This tattling town is quiet, and all eyes, save 
 those which love keeps waking, are closed. 
 What an hour &c." The reader may con-
 
 320 A WEEK 
 
 ceive another page full of this nonsense, which 
 nevertheless sounded very well, I assure him, 
 by moonlight, on the Loire. 
 
 In continuance I grew far more sentimental, 
 than I dare do upon paper. Florville was touched. 
 I told him the story of my first love, and a most 
 baseless story it was, from beginning to end — 
 sheer invention, without truth, but with pathos, 
 which is ever more to the purpose. Poor Flor- 
 ville, he ejaculated the name of Julie* I begged 
 his confidence ; and he told me, warm and ge- 
 nerous youth, all that I knew before ; which 
 I, equally warm and sympathetic friend, heard 
 without a murmur. 
 
 " And can you sacrifice love to gold ?" asked 
 I, in the moon-light. 
 
 " No, no," exclaimed Florville, striking his 
 clenched hand against his forehead. " No, 
 Julie, another's will I never be." 
 
 ft And the Count ?" 
 
 " Peste, let him take her and her gui- 
 neas."
 
 AT TOURS. 321 
 
 The latter declaration and disinterested reso- 
 lution came the tardiest. But it was final and 
 sincere. 
 
 "And Rutledge?" 
 
 "I'll tear the buttons from my foils this 
 night for him." 
 
 " Nay, but this is the effervescence of the 
 moment. Self will return with the morrow." 
 
 " If it doth — may this hilt," and Florville 
 grasped his sword, " fall from the dishonoured 
 hand that holds it." 
 
 " Bravely said, Florville. But I must home 
 to bed." 
 
 " Stay but an hour longer, my dear fellow." 
 
 " Not an instant. I am neither ghost nor 
 lover, to live on the midnight air. Good night." 
 
 " Good night," and his parting grasp was 
 worthy of the most sworn brothers in the days 
 of chivalry. 
 
 i
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Meantime the conversation of the pseudo- 
 Count with Sophia took as interesting a turn, 
 as the ingenuity of the former could bring 
 about. But its success was not so full as his 
 expectations; the admiration of the English 
 damsel for her foreign admirers whether garde- 
 du-corps or General, seemed not to go farther 
 than vanity and a love of flirtation. Serious 
 hints she seemed either to avoid or play with, 
 and the General found, to his internal delight, 
 that if either he himself or the young garde-du- 
 corps had succeeded in gaining the hand of the 
 lady, it should be by that system of persever-
 
 A WEEK AT TOURS. 323 
 
 ance, which can always force a weak girl to es- 
 pouse whomsoever she has once tolerated. 
 
 With joy Rutledge communicated this dis- 
 covery to me on the following morning; and 
 I, for my part, did not want news equally agree- 
 able to him. I told him of Florville's ambus- 
 cade, and the sentimental scene on the banks 
 of the Loire in which it had ended. My friend 
 was as grateful as he was amused. But still 
 how to bring about an advantageous denouement 
 remained a difficulty. Florville's determination 
 to quarrel with Rutledge seemed to offer means 
 of proving openly where his attachment was 
 fixed, and this might be turned to advantage. 
 The General Count St. Aubin too still remained 
 in reserve to punish Sophia, if nought remained 
 but to punish her. But notwithstanding Rut- 
 ledge's confidence, I still dreaded that the pre- 
 dilections of the capricious maiden had been 
 more firmly turned towards the gay young 
 garde-du-corps than he imagined. 
 
 While thus communing, the arrival ot a de-
 
 324 A WEEK 
 
 fiant epistle from Florville, written evidently, 
 from the high and heated tone of it, on the 
 preceding night immediately after the determi- 
 nation taken, was delivered to Rutledge, and 
 fulfilled for us the chief point of whatwe were 
 supposing. It commanded the immediate ces- 
 sion of all pretensions, else vengeance the most 
 speedy and hyperbolical was denounced, and 
 a meeting for that purpose instantly requested. 
 This was addressed to Monsieur Root, who laid 
 up the document with care, and in answer re- 
 ferred Florville of course to me, his friend, for 
 all arrangements or explanations. His next 
 step was to call on the Le Normands, to make 
 the despairing Julie happy by a display of what 
 menaces and perils he causelessly incurred on 
 her account, to expostulate with her in mock 
 seriousness on the danger of such charms, and 
 to ask her advice as to what conduct he was 
 to pursue. Poor Julie was amazed, confused, 
 delighted, knew not what to say, but depre- 
 cated a duel — had the highest esteem for Mob-
 
 AT TOURS. 325 
 
 sieur Root, but hoped he would not expose his 
 own life, as well as that of another, for nothing. 
 She was confusedly happy, and would have 
 been rendered completely so, had not that ma- 
 licious sprite, which never allows good luck to 
 come without alloy, so ordered it, that Flor- 
 ville at the instant came, besought admittance, 
 and was denied. 
 
 More hurt and exasperated at this, the angry 
 Lieutenant sought me out, and poured forth at 
 once a torrent of voluble complaints against 
 fortune, me, the world, the English, and wo- 
 mankind. 
 
 " What can have crossed you, Florville," 
 said I, " if you hold to the honourable resolu- 
 tion of last night." 
 
 "I have been deceived, tricked everyway, 
 and n< mg is left me but revenge. Hath this 
 Root appointed an hour of meeting ? And this 
 Count or Baron, I must look to him also." 
 
 "Him too? then you still hanker after the 
 guineas ?"
 
 326 A WEEK 
 
 " If you knew what need I had of them, you 
 would give me credit for self-denial in the aban- 
 donment." 
 
 " What, in the name of wonder, can you, a 
 young soldier, want with the incumbrance of 
 wealth?" 
 
 Florville here related to me a sort of pendant 
 to the story of the previous night. That was 
 all love and romance, this all debt and difficul- 
 ties ; a singular story, be it remarked, for a 
 young Frenchman to tell, prudence, economy, 
 and honour in pecuniary matters being as much 
 the characteristic of the young French, as the 
 very contrary is of the greater part of the 
 young English. However, the gay Florville 
 was an exception, and in some of the dissipa- 
 tions of the metropolis, he had been into some 
 scenes, the consequences of which might mar 
 even his advancement in his profession. Those 
 considerations, together with the unkindness 
 of Julie, had shaken his resolution. And his 
 present fit of jealousy was more against the
 
 AT TOURS. 327 
 
 gallant St. Aubin, than even against Monsieur 
 Root. 
 
 Who should make his appearance at the 
 moment but Monsieur Root himself! And the 
 Lieutenant's amicable conversation with me 
 was immediately turned to an angry expostu- 
 lation with my friend. Rutledge was all sua- 
 vity in reply ; he had no objection >to the hos- 
 tile meeting, but proposed as a more amicable 
 adjustment, to refer the difference to the deci- 
 sion of the fair Julie. Florville, however, still 
 blustered, being still irresolute. I pressed 
 him, on perceiving this, and accused him of 
 duplicity, as well as heartlessness ; aud he 
 defended himself by saying, that he would 
 willingly abandon his pretensions to Miss 
 Mordaunt, but such a step would seem forced 
 on him by the Count St. Aubin, whom he would 
 thus seem to dread or to yield to. A previous 
 meeting or explication with him became the 
 necessary preliminary to any step. There was 
 some reason in this. And some consultatory
 
 328 A WEEK 
 
 glances passed immediately betwixt Rutledge 
 and myself. 
 
 " Come, Florville," said I, " you have been 
 frank with me, and we intend to be more than 
 frank with you. Monsieur Root here is no 
 other than the General Count St. Aubin." 
 
 " Ah bah! do you think I am a fool — " 
 
 " I have de honour to assure you, that I am 
 Alsacier, Sair, and dat my chateau on de 
 Rhine — " 
 
 " Flambe de tons les cotes, every way tricked 
 — and why, my good Monsieur Le Comte Root 
 St. Aubin, to what purpose all this moquerie 
 of me, and travestissement of yourself. Think 
 you, I am a fit subject ?" 
 
 " Monsieur Root, as you call him, Florville," 
 said I, " is the ancient and accepted lover of 
 Miss Mordaunt, come on purpose to reclaim 
 her from your fascinations." 
 
 " The ancient? — make me sure of that, — the 
 ancient, mark me, not a new, and I am satis- 
 fied."
 
 AT TOURS. 329 
 
 " And Mademoiselle Le Normand, is he the 
 ancient lover there too, ha?" 
 
 " No, i' faith, a very recent and a very false 
 one." 
 
 " This is something," said Florville, taking 
 a satisfactory pinch of snuff. " And so the 
 Count St. Aubin has become the rival of both 
 Messieurs Florville and Root — it is a vaudeville 
 parfaite. But allons, what more? Tell me 
 thus much — how far has the Count been suc- 
 cessful near Miss Sophie ?" 
 
 " Nothing express, the tenderest of re- 
 ception, the warmest of grasps, every thing 
 that could fan hope, and bid affection 
 live." 
 
 " The same story exactly I could tell. I 
 wish you joy of her. I give her up. She is 
 btte, and coquette, two characters I never met 
 united before — but ye English are all prodi- 
 gies." 
 
 " Wit and worth, if misunderstood, what are 
 they but bitise?" said Rutledge.
 
 330 A WEEK 
 
 " Well, as you wish, chacun a son gout. I 
 will visit Julie, and if — " 
 
 " Nay, no ifs; I promise for her, as for all 
 that has been said. But, Florville, before we 
 part, I have mentioned to my friend here, your 
 friend too, I trust, what you mentioned to me. 
 He is a monied rascal, and might unjewishiy 
 convenience you." 
 
 " Nay, a year would be sufficient for me to 
 repay it." 
 
 " How much might it be ?" 
 
 " It is much." 
 
 " Nay — is it five hundred louis ?" 
 
 " Five hundred francs — more — double the 
 sum." 
 
 " A thousand francs only, — and a good fel- 
 low's peace at stake for such a sum ! My dear 
 fellow, you shall have it in one second." 
 
 The astonishment of poor Florville was as 
 great as his pleasure. With a heart, on which 
 nought no longer weighed to depress its natu- 
 ral buoyancy, he hurried, and found that part
 
 AT TOURS. 331 
 
 of our assertions, which most concerned him, 
 true. 
 
 Rutledge and myself waited the auspicious 
 hour of evening. And then the General Count 
 St. Aubin hastened to visit the Mordaunts. 
 Half an hour's space of the usual conversation 
 ensued, of la belle France, and its lovely vine- 
 yard ; of the Rhine, its castles ; Italy, its ruins 
 and olives; in short of all the delights of the 
 Continent ; we forgot not to speak of Blois, of 
 Florville's regiment, and Florville himself. 
 And, in truth, Sophia seemed curious to hear 
 respecting him, yet not anxious — there was no 
 agitated nerve, nor checked respiration, at- 
 tending her questions. It was cold curiosity. 
 Anon the conversation turned to old England* 
 and though not entered upon warmly, still fa- 
 miliar names and old recollections forced pro- 
 per interest. Nay, the conversation flowed 
 more trippingly upon a theme so long forgotten. 
 How speak of absent home, and not of deaths 
 and marriages, and of such like adventures?
 
 332 
 
 A WEEK 
 
 " Did you hear of poor Rutledge's sudden 
 disappearance from England ?" came at last. 
 
 "No," was breathlessly replied. 
 N " Gone for certain, and has not since been 
 heard of at home." 
 
 " What can have become of him ?" asked 
 Mrs. Mordaunt. Her daughter had not strength 
 for the question. 
 
 I mentioned three probable rendezvous of 
 the missing at that time — Colombia, the North 
 Pole, and the bottom of the sea. 
 
 My jest was ill received, and the young lady 
 grew pale. The General Count St. Aubin flew 
 to her relief, but in his hurry unluckily forgot 
 both generalship and countship. 
 
 "My dearest Sophia," was the exclamation, 
 in pure vernacular English too, in which the 
 Rhenish Count called on the fainting maiden. 
 
 Sophia opened her eyes, and a shriek in- 
 stantly came. For bending over her, she 
 beheld the mustachio-less and undisguised 
 Rutledge.
 
 AT TOURS. 333 
 
 The passionate hysteric, that his supposed 
 fate had nearly produced, was of course sus- 
 pended, and not without the ire of the lady, 
 who, glad a^ she was at the recovery of her 
 lover, was still indignant at being so grossly 
 deceived. She stood up with dignity, and 
 spoke some words of resentment and pride. 
 "It was unjustifiable, and wrong in the ex- 
 treme. She would never forgive it, never." 
 So saying with a dreadful emphasis, she re- 
 tired. 
 
 The next morning Sophia not only granted, 
 but her good sense made her even crave pardon 
 of her lover. Her nationality, her natural feel- 
 ings, and old, familiar thoughts returned ; and 
 as in a little re-union of all friends, Florville 
 and Julie met Rutledge with Sophia, the 
 first allowed that the last was no longer 
 bete. 
 
 END OF A WEEK AT TOURS, AND 
 OF THE FIRST VOLUME.
 
 Printed by J. F. Dove, St. John's Square.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. 

 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 Los Angeles 
 
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