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RICHARD EDNEY <-
THE GOVEENOR'S FAMILY.
A KUS-URBAN TALE,
SIMPLE AND POPULAR, YET CULTURED AND NOBLE,
OF
MORALS, SENTIMENT, AND LIFE,
PRACTICALLY TREATED AND PLEASANTLY ILLUSTRATED
CONTAINING, ALSO,
HINTS ON BEING GOOD AND DOING GOOD.
BY THE AUTHOR OF
"MARGARET," AND "PHILO."
"MARGARET, A TALE OP THE REAL AND THE IDEAL," AND " PHILO, AN
FVANGELIAD."
BOSTON:
PHILLIPS, SAMPSON & COMPANY
1850.
^/i
y
>
Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1850,
By Phillips, Sampson &■ Co.,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.
• • • • Stefeotyped by
HOBART 4 ROEBINS;
New England Type and Stereoiype Foundery,
BOSTON.
NOTE,
Just as we have sent the last sheet of the manuscript to the
printer, our publishers write that an Introduction, a brief one, is
desirable. We might yield to their judgment what w^ should
be slow to extract from our own indifference. A Preface is
an author's observation on his own writings. It might be pre-
sumed that a reader would be better prepared to understand, and
more disposed to listen to what an author would say, at the end
of a book than at the beginning. Acting upon this consideration,
we have included in the last chapter certain paragraphs that may
seem to possess a prefatory character. To these all persons inter-
ested are respectfully referred. We have endeavored, moreover,
that, in the progress of the work, the curiosity of the reader should
be duly satisfied on any points that might engage it. A Tale is
not like a hoiise, except in its door-plate, the title-page. It does
not require an entry or a reception-room. It is rather like a rose,
the sura of the qualities of which are visible at a glance ; albeit it
will repay a minute attention, and affords material for prolonged
enjoyment. It is like a landscape, which appeals in like manner to
1*
414588
a comprehensive eye, rather than to critical inquiry. We incline,
then, to the rose and the landscape, notwithstanding there may
be a defective leaf in the first, or a rude hut in the last. Not that
we object to Prefaces ; — we like them, we always read them, and
frequently find them the best part of a book. But this book is
written, and the author has put his best things into it ; he cannot
hope to improve it by anything he might here add, and he is
indisposed to peril its fortunes on any uncertainties of speech or
manner ; and therefore prefers to submit it as it is.
CHAPTER I,
RICHARD COMES TO THE CITY.
It began to snow. What the almanac directed its readers
to look out for about this time — what his mother told Rich-
ard of, as she tied the muffler on his neck in the morning —
what the men in the bar-rooms, where he stopped to warm
himself, seemed to be rubbing out of their hands into the fire
— what the cattle, crouching on the windward side of barn-
yards, rapped to each other with their slim, white horns —
what sleigh-bells, rapidly passing and repassing, jingled to
the air — what the old snow, that lay crisp and hard on the
ground, and the hushed atmosphere, seemed to be expecting
— what a "snow-bank," a dense, bluish cloud in the south,
gradually creeping along the horizon, and looming mid-
heavens, unequivocally presaged, — a snow-storm, came
good at last.
Richard had watched that cloud, as it slowly unfurled
itself to the winds, and little by little let out its canvas, till
it seemed to be the mainsail of the huge earth, and would
bear everything movable and immovable along with it. He
saw the first flakes that skurry forwards so gingerly and
fool-happy through the valleys, as if they had nothing to do
but dance and be merry, and were not threatened by a
howling pack behind. He rejoiced in the feeling of these
herald drops on his cheeks, and caught at them with his
lips, refreshing himself in the dainty moisture ; for he had
walked a long distance, and, though it was mid winter, his
8' • • ■ ' ' ■ rtlCHAkD 'E1>XEY AND
blood was warm, and Lis throat dry. The regular brush
commenced, — a right earnest one it was ; and he had
something else to do than dally with it ; — he must brave
the storm, and cleave his way through it. He had some
miles to go yet, and night was at hand. The pack he bore
grew heavier on his shoulders, his feet labored in the new-
fallen snow, and what with frequent slips on the concealed
ice, his endurance was sore taxed. But he was cheerful
without, and strove to be quiet within ; and made as if he
were independent of circumstance, and free from anxiety.
The storm had a good many plans and purposes of action.
It riddled the apple-trees ; it threw up its embankments
against the fences ; it fell soft and even upon shrubs and
flowers in the woods, as if it were tenderlj"- burjnng its dead;
it brought out the farmer, to defend his herds against it ; it
stirred the pluck of the school-boys, who insulted it with
their backs, and laughed at it with their faces ; and, as if
to spite this, it turned upon an unprotected female, a dress-
maker, going home from her .daily task, and twisted her
hood and snatched off her shawl; but, failing in the attempt
to rend her entire dress to pieces, it blinded her with its
gusts, and pitched her into the gutter. This was too much
for Richard. If his blood was hot before, it boiled now; and
flinging down his bundle, he sprang to the rescue. He raised
the woman, refitted her wardrobe, and sent her on her way
with many thanks. The storm, maddened and unchecked,
rallied, to stifle and subdue this new champion of woman's
rights. It smote Richard violently in the face, snatched
away his morsels of breath, and would have sunk him, by
sheer weight, in the White Sea that surrounded him.
When it could not do this, it flapped its enormous v.ings in
his face, so he could not see his way. Anon it raised its
sweep aloft, and left a little clear space, through which he
THE governor's FAMILY. 9
beheld houses with bright hearth-fires, and tables savor-
ily spread for the evening meal, and little children getting
into their mothers' laps, as if to plague him in this fashion.
The flakes, as if each one had an individual commission,
flew in under the vizor of his cap, settled upon his eye-
lashes, clung to his mufller; some penetrated into his neck;
others explored his nostrils. He tried to whistle ; but the
storm kept his lips so chilled he could not do that : he
attempted to laugh ; certain flakes that sat on his lips seized
the moment to melt and run down his throat. When the
storm could not arrest his course, it began to trick him for
everybody to laugh at : it whitened his black suit, till he
looked like a miller's apprentice ; the flakes piled them-
selves in antic figures on his pack and shoulders, and strewed
his buttons with flaunting wreaths; they danced up and
down on his cap. But he pressed on, with a whistling
heart, as if he thought it was mere facetiousness in the
elements to do so. He knew there was love and gladness
at the core of all things ; and the feathery crystals that
frolicked about him, and then laid themselves down so quietly
to sleep for the dreary months of winter, were full of beauty,
and there was a luminousness of Good Intent in all the haze
and hurly-burly of the storm. Richard was deeply religious ;
and he knew God said to the snow. Be thou on the earth ;
and he felt that the Divine Providence cared for the lilies
of the field as well in their decay as in their bloom ; and
that a ceaseless Benignity was covering the beds where they
lay with the lovely raiment of the season, and cherishing in
the cold ground the juices that should, after a brief interval,
spring forth again, and create a gladsome resurrection of
nature.
He had none but kindly feelings when there passed him
a sleigh, with its occupants neck deep in buffalo-robes and
10 RICHARD EDNEY AND
coats, and comfortably intrenched behind a breastwork of
muffs and tippets ; and the horse, he knew, was merry, by
the way he shook his bells. He even went one side, and
stood knee-deep in the drifts, for a slow ox-sled to pass.
" Ho ! my good fellow ! " he cried to the teamster, who sat
on a strip of board, with his back bowed and braced against
the storm, as if there was to his mind certainly something
in the case suggestive of the knout; " you must bide your
time."
" That is the first truth I have heard to-day," responded
a gloomy voice, which, with the coarse shape in which it
was wrapped, soon swept out of hearing.
" One truth to-day," said Eichard to himself, " is some-
thing, though it is towards night."
He relapsed into musing and philosophizing on the world
and life, the day and hour, and on himself and his objects,
and on the City in which truth was so scarce. Of a sudden,
the Factories burst upon him, or their windows did, — hun-
dreds of bright windows, illuminated every night in honor
of Toil, — and which neither the darkness of the night, nor
the wildness of the storm, could obscure, and which never
bent or blinked before the rage and violence around. The
Factories, and factory life, — how it glowed at that moment
to his eye ! and even his own ideal notions thereof were more
than transfigured before • him, and he envied the girls, some
of whom he knew, who, through that troubled winter night,
were tending their looms as in the Avarmth, beauty, and
quietness of a summer-day. The Factories appeared like an
abode of enchantment ; and the sight revived his heart, and
gave him a pleasant impression of the City, as much as a
splendid church, or a sunny park of trees, or fine gardens,
would have done. He was too much occupied to notice a
spread umbrella that approached him, moving slantwise
THE GOVEKKOR's FAMILY, 11
abreast the storm, now criss-crossing, now plunging forward,
as it were intoxicated. It struck him, and in his insecure
footing, threw him.
" What is it ? " said the umbrella, peering about on every
side.
"It is nothing," replied Eichard, who could hardly be
distinguished from the snow in which he rolled.
The umbrella raised itself, as if it were one great eyelid,
in astonishment, muttering, at the same time, " That 's it ;
I knew I should do it, and now I have ! "
Beneath the umbrella was really a man, but apparently a
cloak, a long and slim cloak, with a shawl about its head
and ears ; and it looked, also, as if this cloak was hung by
some central loop to the handle of the umbrella, and as if
the umbrella was the only live thing in the whole concern ;
and it kept bobbing up and .down in the wind, wrenching
and prying, as if it would draw the vitals from the cloak.
The language of the thing favored the idea of evisceration.
" I am almost dead ! " it said.
" Let me help you," said Richard.
" I have only a little further to go," replied the other.
" How far have you come ? " asked Richard, sjinpatheti-
cally, thinking of the many miles he had fared that day.
" Across the River," was the reply.
"Is it so far ?" rejoined Richard, despairingly.
" A hundred rods or so. But one meets with so many
accidents here ; and nobody's ways are taken care of, and
life fs of no value whatever, in these times."
Richard, delighted at the near end of his journey, did not
conceal his pleasure.
" You will not laugh, when you have experienced what I
have," said the man.
" Is there nothing to do here ? " asked Richard.
12 RICHARD EDNEY AND
" Yes, everything," was the answer.
" Then I am secure," added Eichard.
" Move carefully ! " — such was the advice of the retreat-
ing shadow; " it is a slip, or a slump, all the way through.
You will be running into somebody else, or somebody will
run into you."
Richard grew thoughtful ; but he repelled the phantom of
discouragement, and clung closer to the good angel of com-
mon sense and rational hope, that ever attended him.
He was comhig to Woodylin to find employment. The
construction of mill-dams and railroads had sounded a gen-
eral summons, throughout the country, for capital and labor
to flow in thither. Business, which means the combined
and harmonious activity of capital and labor, was reported
to be good. The City was evidently growing, and there
were those who hesitated to say how large they thought
it would become, lest they should appear vain. Many
young men were attracted thither, and among these
was Richard Edney. He came from a farm, in a small
interior village, and brought with him considerable mechan-
ical expertness ; and now, just turned of age, on the even-
ing of the day in which he set out to seek his fortune, or,
more strictly, to find a snug operative's berth, he appears
before the reader. He had a married sister in town, whose
house he would make his home.
He came to the covered bridge, and entering by the nar-
row turn-stile, found a breathing-place from the storm in that
labyrinth of timbers. He stamped the snow from his feet,
and, unbuttoning his over-coat, seized the lappels with his
two hands, and shook them heartily, as if they were old
friends whom he had not seen for a long time, and then
folded them carefully to his breast.
One or two lamps suggested the idea of light, and that
THE governor's FAMILY. 13
was about all. Their chief effect was shadow ; they made
darkness visible, and very uncomfortably so. They worked
it into uncouth shapes, which were put skulking among the
arches, set astride of the braces, hung up like great spiders
on the rafters, and multitudes of them lay in ambuscade
under the feet of passengers. No ; — if there were kind
feelings in that Bridge, — if any pulse of philanthropy ran
through those huge beams and iron-riveted joints, — if there
were any heart of good-will in that long vault, well studded
at the. sides, close-peni above, and firmly braced under foot,
it was an unfortunate bridge ; unfortunate in its expression,
unfortunate in its efforts to show kindness.
The readers of this story would like to know how Rich-
ard felt. To speak more in detail, there are two popular
impressions anent the Bridge, one of which Richard avoided,
and into the other he fell. The first is, that the Bridge is
of no use, that it is a damage to the community ; in other
words, that it defeats the very object for which it was built,
the facilitation of travel and increase of intercourse. For
instance, you will hear men say they could afford to keep a
horse, if it were not for the Bridge ; some, that they should
ride a great deal more, if it were not for the Bridge ; one,
that while his business is on one side of the water, he
should like to live on the other, but cannot because of the
Bridge; ladies, visiting on the opposite side of the river, are
always in haste to return before sunset, on account of the
Bridge. So business and pleasure, in innumerable forms,
seem to be interrupted by this structure. This feeling, of
course, Richard had not been long enough in the neighbor-
hood to understand or to share. But the other popular im-
pression, which indeed is connected with the first, he did,
in some degree, though perhaps unconsciously, entertain;
this, — that the Bridge is useful as a shelter from storms,
S
14 EICHARD EDNEY AND
from cold, and from the intense heat of summer. It has this
credit with the people ; a passive credit, a credit bestowed
without the least idea of desert on its part; an accidental
good, wholly aside from the original design of the thing,
which it cannot help but bestow, and which it would not
bestow, if it could help. It is as if, in this vale of winds
and rain, the Bridge were a little arbor one side of the
way, to which the wearj' pilgrim can betake himself. So,
in summer, when the mercury is at ninetj^, or at any time
in a storm, or when the roads are muddy, you will see peo-
ple hastening to the Bridge ; w-agons are driven faster, and
foot-people increase their momentum. " We shall soon be
at the Bridge," they say ; or, " Here is the Bridge ; I do not
care, now." Umbrellas are furled, cloaks are loosened, feet
cleaned, and there is a smile of contentment and of home
in all faces, as soon as they reach that pavilion.
How fine a refuge it was from the hurtling snow, how
admirably it was adapted to protect one in this extremitj'of
the season, how dry and warm it was, what a convenient
place to take breath in ; — this Richard felt. He had this
feeling even deeper than most folk. Blinded as he was by
the storm, tired by his long journey, lonely in feeling, know-
ing no one, harrowed a little by the dark intimations that
had accosted him just as he got into the City, even the small
lamp that glimmered aloft had a friendly eye; and he over-
flowed with gratitude to the little twinkler that worked so
patiently and so hopefully in the deathlike, skeleton ribs of
the edifice ; and as he seated himself on a sill, since he did
not know anybody in particular, and had not participated in
those feelings to which w'e have referred, he thanked God
for the Bridge. The tramping of horse-feet, grating of
sleigh-runners, and buzz of lively voices, were heard in the
darkness ; and immediately there passed near him an empty
THE governor's FAMILY. 15
sleigh, driven by a man on foot, and four or five men and
women, likewise walking.
" Horrid ! " exclaimed one. "What a place for robbers ! "
cried another. " I had rather face it out there," added a
third, jerking his head towards the gate, " than have my
shins barked here." " I think the lecturer might have spent
a few evenings in a bridge like this," interposed a fourth ;
" it corresponds to his ideas of Gothic architecture. There
is the dimness, awe, and faint religious light; and there is
no place where one is so reverential, or walks so circum-
spectly, as here." These were young people, returning
from the Athenaeum, and among them were members of
the Governor's Family, — a name that appears on our title-
page ; and these observations fell from them while they
waited for the gate to be opened. " What is that by the
post ? " exclaimed one. " A drunken man ! " echoed another.
The ladies faintly screamed, and rushed towards the gate.
" You are mistaken," said Richard, calmly, but a grain
piqued. His tone and manner recalled the young folk to
their senses, and not the least to a sense of injustice toward
a stranger ; and they all stopped and looked towards him.
The light of the lamp revealed brotherly faces of young
men, and gentle faces of young women, and Richard spoke
freely. " I am very tired," he said ; " I have walked forty
miles since breakfast, and I was glad to sit here. But you
alarm me. Is this such a horrid place ? " " No, indeed,"
replied one of the girls ; it was the Governor's daughter
Melicent, that spoke. "We are addicted to scandalizing
the Bridge, just as one finds fault with his best friends."
"I do not mean that," ansv/ered Richard, "but all through
here — what is about you here — this neighborhood ? "
" There are rum-shops hereabouts, and there is the foot
of Knuckle Lane," said a young man.
16 RICHARD EDXEY AND
"I did not see them," replied Richard.
" We live in St. Agnes-street," said one of the females,
laughing very hard, " and you may have passed our houses,
the minister's, the Governor's, and all. And we all belong
here. I hope you don't think evil of us."
" I was warned of evil hereabouts," responded Richard.
" But I am sure I have nothing to fear from you."
" Melicent ! Barbara ! " cried the laughing voice, " has he
anything to fear from you ? "
"I have been misunderstood," said Richard, laughing in
turn. " But really I have had as pure religious feeling,
while I have been resting myself on this bridge, as I ever
enjoyed, notwithstanding your slight and caricature of the
spot."
" Benjamin ! " cried the same bright voice, " defend your-
self ; it is your ribaldry the young man has overheard."
"We have come from a lecture on Architecture," said
Benjamin Bennington ; " and the rest is obvious. Fantastic
associations are awakened here."
" You will not say," answered Richard, " that religious
sentiment is fantastic ! " This was seriously said, and the
company became silent when he spoke. "I mean," he
added, " may not religious feeling be as pure in this place,
at this hour, as in any place at any hour ? "
" Certainly, certainly," said Melicent. " But who are you
that says this ? "
" I am Richard Edney," said our friend. " I am seeking
employment ; can turn my hand to almost anything ; would
like a chance in a saw-mill. Can you tell me where Asa
Munk lives ? "
" I cannot," said Benjamin ; and none of them could. " I
am shivering with the cold," said the laughing one, " and I
would advise the young man to learn better manners than
THE governor's FAMILY. 17
to sit here and scare folks in the night." " I should think
he might find some place more suitable for his devotions,"
added one of the girls. " Perhaps a mill-log would be as
agreeable for him to kneel upon as a hassock," continued
the laughing one.
" I fear this is a bad place," said Richard. " Farewell to
yoii all, gentle ladies," he added, and went on his way.
" May it fare well with you ! " rejoined Melicent Benning-
ton, sending her voice after him.
Richard crossed the Bridge, and by dint of information
plucked from the few people abroad at that time, he made
his way to a story-and-a-half white house, with doric pilas-
ters, that stood near the bank of the River, just above the
first dam.
He went in at the front door without ringing, traversed
with a quiet step the narrow, dark entry, and let himself
into the kitchen, where he knew he should find his friends.
He was evidently looked for, and warmly welcomed ; his
sister embraced him affectionately, and his brother-in-law
shook his hand very cordially. They were sitting in front
of the stove, near a large table drawn to the centre of the
room, on which burned two well-trimmed lamps. His sister
was mending a child's garment; his brother was smoking,
and reading a newspaper. These people were about thirty
years of age ; his sister had dark eyes and hair, and a face
that had once been handsome, but it now wore a sallow and
anxious expression ; she was neatly dressed in dark-sprigged
calico. The brother-in-law, or Munk, as everybody called
him, had a freer look, and more sprightly bearing. He had
a small, twinkling, blue eye, a long, good-humored chin, and
slender, sorel whiskers. He wore a stout teamster's frock,
girded at the waist. If a shadow of seriousness sometimes
2*
18 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Stole over him, it was instantly dissipated, or illumined, by
a cheerful voice and a jocund laugh.
Kichard laid off his pack and over-coat. " Do not shake
off the snow here, brother," said his sister; "let Asa take
the things into the shed."
Richard took off his boots, and sank into the rocking-
chair his sister drew up for him, with his feet bolstered on
the clean and bright stove-hearth. As he has now got out
of the storm and his storm-gear, and looks like himself, our
readers would like to know how he looks. He, like his
sister, had dark eyes and hair; his features were comely, his
forehead was fairly proportioned, his eyebrows were distinct
and well placed, his mouth was small, and his teeth white.
His predominant expression was cheerfulness, frankness,
earnestness. He had what some would call an intellectual
look; and, judging from the contour of his head, one would
see that he possessed a modicum of moral qualities. His
cheeks were browned by the weather, but his forehead pre-
served a belt of skin of remarkable whiteness. He was of
medium height, and his body was strongly built, and in all
its members very regularly disposed. He wore a red shirt,
and a roundabout, sometimes called a monkey-jacket. His
coat, vest and pantaloons, were of a dark, stout cloth, which
his mother had evidently manufactured, as she possibly had
been the tailoress of her son.
His sister hastened supper for him ; she toasted the bread,
cut fresh slices of corned beef, and prepared a cup of fra-
grant, hot tea. They all sat round the table, and each had
many inquiries to make, and many to answer ; and many
details of home, and friends, and life, to dilate upon. The
supper was abundant, and freely eaten, but it was not satis-
fying; an uneasiness remained — so much so, that, although
Richard resumed his chair by the stove, he could not sit in
THE GOVERNOk's FAMILY. 19
it. He looked from side to side of the kitchen, and at last
thrust his head into a partly-opened door, that led into the
bed-room. " Not to-night," whispered his sister, earnestly.
"I must," said Richard. "Let him, Roxy," said Munk.
"I must see them," said Richard. " You will wake them,"
replied his sister. "I have made it a rule not to have
them waked after they have once been put to sleep. It will
get them into bad habits, and they have troubled me about
going to bed." "I will not wake them," added Richard,
pushing himself still further into the room. " Only let me
see them ; let me have a light, that I may look at them."
" Not on any account ! " exclaimed his sister. " I always
said, if ever I had a child, it should not be waked up after
it was put to sleep." But he seized a lamp, which his
brother, despite the remonstrances of Roxy, handed him, and
shading it with his fingei's, went into the room. Munk fol-
lowed, and leaned upon the door-post, with much fatherly
fondness, and perhaps some brotherly pride. His sister
went too, plainly with the expectation of beholding her pre-
diitions verified, and with the desire, also, of having dis-
played before the eyes of her husband the consequences
she had so often denounced. What appeared ? Two little
children, snugly asleep in their truckle-bed ; two girls they
were, — one about four years old, the other of a year and a
half. Two beautiful cherub heads were all that could be
seen, and if they were not truly alive, they might have been
taken for the best of sculpture. The hair of the oldest one
had been treated with a cap, which had fallen off; and that
of the youngest was free and loose, soft, silvery, and running
every way in little sliining curls, and half-formed natural ring-
lets. " I see," said the mother. " So do I," said the uncle, as,
holding the lamp over his head, he stooped towards the
sweet, tempting faces. " You mean to wake them ! " cried
20 RICHARD EDXEY A>"D
the mother. " I mean to kiss them," responded Richard.
"Let him," whispered the father. "It is impossible," said
the mother ; " it is contrarj' to all the rules I have laid dowii
for the children, and what Mrs. Mellow said." " I will not
do that" added Richard ; and, making an effort, he did not ;
but hovered about the faces of the children, put his mouth
towards one, and then the other, and kissed the air between,
as if that was sweet enough ; experimented with the light
on this side and on that, to get ever)' possible view of them ;
with his thumb and finger took hold of the little velvety-
hands that lay over the quilt. " Did they not know I was
coming?" he asked. "They have talked about nothing
else all da}-," replied his brother; "Memmy asks about
Uncle Richard; Bebb)' can't articulate, but she mows and
winks, and knows all about it." " They have the promise
of seeing you in the morning," said his sister, " and went
quietly to sleep on that." The children slumbered on,
undisturbed alike by the storm above the roof, and the
deep anxieties and affections that were shaking beneath.
" Mother sent them some cakes and apples ; they are in my
luggage. I should love to give them to them to-night."
"How foolish you are, brother!" said Roxy. " I would
not have them eat such things, just before going to bed, for
the world."
But Richard got the apples, large and rosy, which he
held insinuatingly before the closed eyes of the children;
pleased himself with imagining how they would like to eat
them ; put them close to their cheeks, as it were comparing
colors ; and, when he had finished this pantomime, laid them
OH the coverlid in front of their mouths ; and they left the
room.
This slight ripple of discord having spent itself, their
hearts returned to their old and proper level of kindness and
THE governor's FAMILY. 21
brotherly feeling-. They resumed their seats by the fire,
which burned briskly and noisily. Roxy took her sewing;
Muuk leaned back against the wall, with his feet on a
round of. his wife's chair, and continued to smoke; and
Richard, by the warmth of his heart, as well as that of the
fire, tried to subdue the chills with which a long walk in
the open air had infused his system.
" I do not doubt," said Rox)^ " that Richard loves the
children, and that their father does ; but you are very inju-
dicious."
" Perhaps I was hasty," said Richard.
" I believe I shall go to California," said Munk. This
last remark was evidently thrown in, not to aid conversa-
tion, or even to decoy it, but to quench it altogether, when
it happened to take a disagreeable turn.
Richard went to bed. His chamber — such as a story-
and-a-half house affords — was small and low, with sloped
ceiling, but plastered, papered, and quite convenient. It
contained a looking-glass, side-table, and fireplace. The
single window of w^hich it could boast looked out upon the
River, and a beautiful landscape beyond. The bed was soft
and warm ; and, after offering his evening thanksgiving to
the Giver of all good, exhausted and weary, our young
friend sank into a sound sleep.
Early in the morning, he was aroused by the clamor of
voices at his bed-side ; there stood the disputed little ones,
in their night-gowns, each with an apple in its hands, with
which they were pummeling the face of their uncle, and at
the same time making very awkward attempts to clamber
into the bed. One of them, as the father said, could talk,
and the other could make a noise ; but neither lacked the
power of rendering itself intelligible. Their uncle lifted
them up, and had them on either side of him, where he
22 EICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
kissed and embraced their tender bodies to his heart's con-
tent. But they were not for lying there. They mounted
his neck and shoulders ; they took all sorts of liberty with
his nose and eyes, and ended with an endeavor to drag
him from the bed. He yielded to the children what the
storm could not accomplish, and came almost headlong to
the floor. Presently, taking Bebby in his arms, and mount-
ing Memmy on his back, he went below.
CHAPTER II.
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY.
Let us go back to the previous evening, and down St.
Agnes-street, into the Governor's house, soon after the young
people have returned from the lecture.
This house, of a fashion forty years old, was large, three-
story, brick, surrounded by a portico, and pleasantly em-
bayed in trees, some dozen or fourteen rods from the street.
On this boisterous winter night, the family are gathered
in a spacious apartment, calld'd the sitting-room. In the
centre of the room is a large mahogany table, carefully
covered with a damask counterpane, over which a solar
lamp sheds its strong light. Around the table are seated
the family, if we may except the Governor himself, who, in
front of a blazing wood fire, reclines in a rocking-chair, with
his feet on the jamb. The mother of the family, or, as she
is commonly known. Madam Dennington, controls one side
of the table, with her sewing spread before her. She has
also under her special control a spermaceti candle, and a
pair of silver snuffers, with which, in moments of excite-
ment, she makes energetic starts for the candle-wick. It
was not her wish to have the solar lamp. Her father. Judge
Weymouth, used candles, and she had used them for thirty
years ; and they answered their purpose, and she was indis-
posed to see their province invaded. She wore a turban,
out of regard to her mother. She was short, erect, and
retained that vigor of eye and dignity of manner for which
her family were celebrated.
24 RICHARD EDNEY AND
About the table were the children and relatives of the
family. The governor had tweh^e children, of whom eleven
survived. The name of the deceased one, Agnes, was pre-
served in the street on which they resided. Four were
married from home. The others, in order, were Roscoe,
Benjamin, Melicent, Barbara, Eunice, and two smaller ones,
who at this hour were abed. Roscoe was about twenty-six,
and the rest succeeded in due course of nature.
The relatives were Miss Rowena, a cousin of Madam's,
and Mrs. Melbourne, a lady reared in the family of the
Rev. Dr. Dennington, father of the Governor, and who, for
many years, had been a member of the household of the
latter.
Roscoe was addicted to bachelor habits, and bachelor
moods ; he had no fondness for society, and a good educa-
tion he found scope for in the management of his father "s
farm. Benjamin was a lawyer.
Madam was nervous, and, above all things, dreaded a
scene ; and when the wind howled at the house, and shook
the windows, she started, as if one was coming. She was
rehgious, and seasoned her word-s with verses of Scripture.
She was industrious, and plied the needle assiduously; yet
not for herself, but for others ; and not always for the work
to be done, but for the example to be set.
If she relished the old rt'gime, she was charitable to the
new ; and while she sought to preserve the times past, her
good sense and strong faith inspired her with interest in
those to come. She reverenced the clergy, and defended
the reformer.
Her daughters were passing from the flower of youth
into the beauty and richness of womanhood. Their dress
honored the simple taste of their mother ; it was plain,
becoming, and neat without ornament. The two relatives
THE governor's FAMILY. 25
were benevolent looking people, whose happiness seemed to
consist in making the family happy.
Miss Rowena had a lively and jocose turn ; while Mrs.
Melbourne was subject to depression of spirits, in which
moments her vision was hazy, and her feelings petulant.
We have said this was a large room; it had, also, an air
of great amenity and comfort. The lamp wrought a quiet
but deep illumination in all parts of it ; the open fire was
cheerful ; naj?-, it was inspiring, at such times as these, when
tliat well-meaning but stupid creature, with a cast-iron face,
has undertaken to perform for us the office of warmth and
sociability through the long months of winter, but which
the Governor, with a luxurious or an antiquated feeling,
summarily dismissed from his premises. Pictures garnished
the walls, a sofa invited to repose, a piano suggested music,
a stand in one corner was enriched with choice literature ;
under one of the windows was a table, stocked with flower-
pots, and bearing geraniums and roses in bloom, and many
plants whose living verdure was a shelter for the feelings
from the storm ; the mantel-piece constituted a general news
ofiice, and collected the papers, pamphlets, letters, for daily
distribution ; above it was suspended a shell card-rack, the
more select depository of the lace-edged and enameled
missives of fashion and polite society. A large mirror, on
one wall, reproduced, in attractive vista, this pleasant scene,
and prolonged the interest which the room afforded to con-
templation.
The Governor left his rocking-chair, and paced to and fro
on the back side of the room. He had always condemned
rocking-chairs, and now, in his advancing years, he would
not sit in one a great while at a time ; thus keeping on good
terms his age and his principles. His hands locked behind
him under his dressing-gown, his head bent forwards, he
3
26 RICHARD EDNEY AJSID
seemed fo be in a brown study ; — it was a passive habit.
He stopped against the window, and looked askance at the
storm, as if he were suspicious of it, but said nothing. He
had practised, all his life, the school-boy direction of not
speaking until he was spoken to ; and, on the whole, not
without a certain advantage, since he acquired more than
he gave out, and not being over-communicative, he was
deemed very trustworthy ; and since every one has some
things to say which he does not wish to have said again, it
follows that a silent man in society must gather up a vast
deal of confidence, like a well-regulated institution, in which
people like to vest their spare capital, knowing that it will
not break ; — sometimes awfully like the sea, into which
malefactors hurl dead men's bodies, and even their frightful
bags of gold, knowing they will not rise again.
In the kitchen, if any of our readers are disposed to make
a further survey of the premises, is also what must now be
called an old-fashioned fire ; yet one, judging from the size
of the sticks, destined to do good service yet, and of a sort
of wood that, without fruit in its living state, when brought
to the hearth, bears the richest flame-blossoms, and expires
in a ruddy, glowing crop of coals, — rock-maple. Here
were also a man-servant and a maid-servant ; the one, in
one corner of the hearth, engaged, as probably fifty thou-
sand of our population are at this moment, reading a news-
paper, lamp in hand. The woman, modestly retired to the
other corner, at a small table, is turning an old silk dress
into a mantilla.
"A fresh gust of wind, like a wave of the sea, struck the
house, and moaned piteously in every crevice of door and
window.
" God remember the poor ! " said Madam, in an under but
earnest voice, without looking at anybody in particular ; at
THE governor's FAMILY. 87
the same time hurrying the snuffers into the candle, as if
she would extinguish all the poverty in creation, and
pressing the cloth she was sewing with her left hand tightly
on the table, as if she were, in her own mind, stanching the
sorrows of the race.
" They will need some additional help," added the Gov-
ernor, in a quiet way.
" Yes, indeed ! " replied his wife ; and she recited that
passage of Scripture which intimates how vain it is to bid
the destitute be warmed, without giving them what is
needful. Then she asked, " Has that wood gone to the
O'Conners ? "
" I heard the crackling of it in their stove, this afternoon,"
said Melicent, "and saw the joyous glow of it in the faces
of the family."
Once more the stonn thwacked the house, to keep stirring
and active in its inmates the remembrance of humanity ;
and, at this time, to give additional pathos to its proceed-
ings, it roared up and down the chimney, as it were mim-
icking, in condensed reverberations, the hollow, unheeded
moan of universal wretchedness.
Madam acknowledged the force of this appeal ; but she
was not to be thrown from her balance, and she snuffed the
candle with marked deliberation. Marked, in truth ; —
j\Iiss Rowena saw it, and nodded to Melicent across the
table ; Mrs. Melbourne saw it, and grew sombre in the
face. Now, j\Irs. Melbourne had a favorite horse, which
she was very tender of, all weathers. Moreover, this horse
had not once been mentioned in course of the evening; and
Mrs. Melbourne knew Madam was not thinking of it, and
this worried her. Not but that this lady had a regard for
the poor; she had, but she claimed an enlargement of sym-
pathy even to the bounds of the mute creation.
28 KICHARD EDNEY AND
Madam kept to her own thoughts. Turning to her
grandchild, who sat in the comer, she said, " Alice Wey-
mouth ! Alice Weymouth ! " But the child was asleep.
" Asleep ! " exclaimed madam, " asleep, under such
preaching as this? Asleep, when terror is calling, so
hoarse and mournful ? Asleep, when love is summoning all
the elements to speak for it ? " She did not say this loud
and boisterously, but with that subordination of manner
which never deserted her.
" I don't wonder the child sleeps," said Mrs. Melbourne ;
" she went half a mile, with a bed-blanket, before tea ; and I
scruple if the horse in the stable has a shred to his back."
There was a mixture of causticity and kindness in this
observation ; she wished to reproach her cousin, and the
family in general, for their neglect of the brute, at the same
time seeking to shield the child from the apparent severity
of her grandmother. In all this, Mrs. Melbourne had the
habit of flattering herself she was peculiarly, nay, in a
double-fold, benevolent ; and she took the flatteiy more to
heart, because it was wholly a matter of her own contriv-
ance, and no one helped her in it.
" Yes, yes," continued Madam, " bed-blanket is warming
three, by this time ; turkey sent yesterday stayed a whole
table-full of stomachs." Here she raised her voice, as if she
were squaring accounts with the weather, and the weather
was a trifle deaf, and she meant her own side of the case
should be fairly put : " Milk is served regularly every morn-
ing ; have Peter's boys taken the cold meat ? " Hereupon
the wind lulled. This g-ave Madam an opportunity to
declare there never was such a storm.
"■ We have had just such .^torms, every winter, for forty
years," replied the Governor, quietly ; " and you have said
the same thing," he added, " this is now the fortieth time."
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY.
There was no point, no sharpness, in this rejoinder ; it was
only uttered as a pleasant reminiscence.
" Yes, indeed," she replied, twisting a little in her chair,
but soon regaining her composure ; " there is nothing new
imder the sun. What has been, shall be." Nor did she
rejoin this out of servile deference to the Governor, or
because she deemed the Scripture absolute authority on
every topic that might be broached ; but a moment's reflec-
tion recalled to mind those liberal views and permanent con-
victions that lay deep in her nature, and which exciting
events, like the storm, seemed for the instant to obliterate.
These things passed with little or no notice. Miss Row-
ena laughed through her hand; a smile rose to the surface
of the lips of Melicent, like a dolphin at play, and disap-
peared. The room was bright, and all were tranquil. The
Governor went to bed; he went without a light, — he
always did so. He said it facilitated sleep, to go to the
place of recumbency through a long passage of darkness,
and not flash into slumber too suddenly. Benjamin had one
shoulder piled on the end of the table, and the paper as
near his eyes as possible, and his eyes as near the light ;
— he was near-sighted, and wore glasses ; — and his read-
ing was intense, and was evidently fighting its way into
something. Eunice had gone to the piano, and while
the storm was dashing at the keys of her mother's heart,
she was ofiering herself, eyes, ears, imagination, fingers, to
the service of a couple of bars of music, and seemed unmis-
takably wishing that something would fling her bodily on
to the keys of her instrument ; but there was reluctance, or
great short-coming, somewhere ; there were but few reason-
able tones to be heard.
Benjamin laid dowai his paper, and his gla.sses on top of
it, and rubbed his right eye very hard with the knuckle of
3*
30 HICHARD EDXEY AND
his forefinger. " There is something in it," said he, " if it
could only be got at."
" I have no doubt there is," answered Eunice, " but who
shall say what ? "
" I have been thinking there might be," said Barbara.
"What if there is?" interposed Mrs. Melbourne; "who
really cares ? "
" Indeed, there is ! " responded Madam ; " and there are
a good many that care."
" No doubt," echoed Roscoe.
What should happen, at this instant, but that all these
persons were thinking of different things ; Benjamin of
California gold, Eunice of her music, Barbara of Richard
Edney, Mrs. Melbourne of the horse. Madam of the poor,
and Roscoe of the effect of the cold on peach-trees. The
evening wore on, the lights dulled, the fire burnt low ; and
these folk were becoming languid, and relapsing into a half-
stupid, half-unconscious state, in which the mind speaks out
as it were in sleep, or in intoxication ; and each of them, by
a sort of hidden wire-pulling, exposed what had been on his
mind for the last fifteen minutes. They were in a jumble,
a laughable jumble; and when they began to explain, they
fell into a greater jumble, and laughed a good deal harder;
their thoughts twirled one another round, and tripped each
other's heels, — all in play. Their thoughts, secretly con-
trolled by the real harmony of their feelings, fell into
groups and circles, and a sort of wild polka gallopade ;
but Barbara's thought, being the newest and strongest, got
the upper hand, and led off, with all the others following it ;
and Barbara's thought was Richard Edney.
I dare say many of our readers have been having the
same thought ; and since Richard Edney's name is so near
the Governor's Family, on the title-page, they are glad to
THK governor's FAMILY. 31
have it get in there at last, and perhaps wonder how it will
be treated. That is easily told; — it was laughed at. Miss
Rowena loved to laugh, and to be decorous too. To unite
these two things, she bit her lip. If we should sajj- now she
hither lip hard — the fact — it would only be saying she
laughed hard.
Eunice said she hoped he would find Asa Munk's ; Bar-
bara hoped he would find work ; Miss Eowena hoped so
too, and then he would not be out late evenings, frightening
people in strange places ; Melicent desired that his inno-
cence and simplicity might not suffer.
" There would be great danger of it," said Miss Rowena,
" if he had happened in St. Agnes-street."
"What! what!" ejaculated Madam, quickly and ner-
vously. She folded up her work, and unfolded it. She
rolled the edge of it in her fingers, and unrolled it. Just as
she was going to bed, and the storm was subsiding, she was
not prepared for the introduction of a stranger, or a strange
topic ; and while she commiserated any one in distress, she
was not quite prepared, at that late hour, to go in quest of
new objects.
"What is it?" she asked, emphatically ; for all wit-
nessed her agitation, but none answered her directly. There
was a mixture of shame and suspense in their recollections
of what transpired ; and what they said was as confused as
it was lively.
Alice Weymouth, the granddaughter, who had been of
the party to the lecture, related that they had met a drunken
man, or a tired man, or an old man, she hardly knew which;
nor whether he was young or old had she any clear im-
pression ; and had left him to find his way, in an unknown
town. Mrs. Melbourne hinted they might have offered him
a bed. Madam, truly considerate as she was of the world
32 RICHAUD EDNEY AND
at large, slirank from the idea of an utter stranger in the
house ; and in this very thing, Mrs. Melbourne, by pushing
her benevolence a little further than the rest, contrived to
keep up a little quarrel, and attain a brief triumph, on the
gentlest of topics, and with people whom, from the bottom
of her soul, she loved. It was her weakness. Miss Row-
ena intimated that he might sleep with the hired man, who
would take care of him if he was likely to do mischief.
The young ladies drew their chairs about the fire;
Madam turned down the solar lamps, sent Alice to bed,
and admonishing her daughters not to make free with
strangers, or light of miser)', went to her chamber.
The young ladies lifted the smooth folds of their hair over
their ears, undid their belts, and sat musing upon the
embers on the hearth.
" A liberal, hopeful, wise human voice, anywhere," said
Melicent, " anywhere, is something ; but there," she went
on, " there, in that darkness, that solitude, wath the storm
racketing and rending around it, and those weird shadows
behind it, and the bitter, sullen cold piercing it, — how very
strange it is ! "
She thrust her fingers further under her hair, and raised
it higher over her ears, as if she would hear more of that
voice.
" Voices ! " said Barbara. " Speech, a breath, a sigh, a
prolongation of feeling, a flight of wish, an impersonation ;
without properties or relations; without the weights of
flesh and blood ; without the temptations of accident or
position; without poverty, or ignorance, or vice; without
ill-nature or ill-breeding ; without folly or prejudii^e ; with-
out circumstance and without inevitability; — yes, voices
are well enough, and there is plenty of them."
" I have no doubt there are some in my piano," added
THE governor's FAMILY. 33
Eunice ; " and, like the woman and her goose, I should like
to break it open and get at them,"
" Eunice ! " cried one from the chamber, "is it not time
you were abed ? Alice Weymouth would excuse you, but
it would be a trial to her feelings, which are a little tender
such a night as this."
" There is a voice for you," said Eunice, " right from the
pit of your mother's heart. The weather, that has chilled
every fibre of my fingers, has thawed out the great aorta of
her sensibilities. How do you like it ? How did you use
to like it, when you were of my age, — snatching you away
from pleasant company, breaking up your tete-a-tetes with
the low fire, spoiling the pleasant feeling of your own inde-
pendence and womanhood, blasting the enchantment of a
novel or a moonlight, chasing you up stairs, and giving you
no rest till you slipped away from it beneath three heavy
coverlids ? "
Eunice, as one of the younger children, still required, or
received, some motherly looking after. She was an obedient
child, and did what her mother wished her to do ; she shut
the piano, kissed her sisters, and retired.
The two sisters, by this time, were left alone ; one by one,
all had gone ; the last footsteps on the stairs were heard,
the last door was shut, the last muffled creaking in the dis-
tant chambers had died away.
But no gloom or sorrow remained, though but one candle
burned, and but a handful of coals were alive. The storm
was over ; the atmosphere fell into repose ; the moon
looked down upon the hills sleeping beneath their robes
whiter than Marseilles quilts, with a calm, gushing eye,
like a mother upon her little children in bed ; and the clouds,
soft as summer, looked lovingly upon the moon. The par-
lor could not be empty ; for the moonlight came in at the
34 KICHARD EDNEY AND
windows, and brought with it the shadows of the great
ehns that stood before the house, the branches of which
went to extemporizing pretty patterns of things right
over the figures of the carpet, getting up a smart trial
between nature and art, and half persuading us of the
superiority of the first. More than this, the spirit of love
and the sense of a divine presence remained ; parental and
brotherly kindnesses and attentions kept their place good ;
gladness and joy still sat about the table ; wisdom and rev-
erence held its seat in the great rocking-chair ; the words
of the dead and the memories of the absent brooded among
them ; and voices, — a thousand murmuring voices of beauty,
sweetness, ideality, ecstasy, — like a rivulet, flowed around
the piano.
These sisters were alike, and they were unlike. They
were about the same age, height and weight. Strangers
often mistook one for the other. They were fully and sym-
metrically developed. Their constitutions had been rein-
forced by exercise, and nurtured by work. With every
means of luxury, their habits were moderate. The features
of both had rather a Roman than a Grecian cast. They
were light complexioned, but Barbara retained throughout
an infusion of shadow deeper than Melicent ; her eyes were
darker, her skin, and her hair. White was a becoming
color <br both ; while pink was the favorite fancy dress of
Barbara, and blue of ]\lelicent. Melicent was the type of
perfect women ; Barbara was a perfect Avoman : the beauty
of the one softened into the roundness of the whole ;
that of the other was concentrated into the sharpness
of the individual. If you were acquainted with many
excellent women, you would fancy you had seen a dozen
Melicents to one Barbara. They had both been to the
same schools, they read the same books, and belonged
THE governor's FAMILY. 35
to the same church. In dietetics, Melicent drank coffee,
Barbara drank tea. In recreation, Barbara liked to wahz,
Melicent preferred the minuet. ' They were both Chris-
tians ; but Barbara sometimes speculated on the miracles,
— Melicent loved the SaTviour ; Barbara aspired after, and
sometimes stumbled in pursuit of, the infinities of the uni-
verse, — Melicent delighted to yield herself to the serene,
unconscious currents of the immortal life; Melicent bore her
cross with the patience of a martyr, — Barbara carried off hers
more with the ease of a strong man. Barbara had more
ideality, — Melicent more purity ; Barbara more impulse, —
Melicent more firmness. Melicent possessed force -of char-
acter, — Barbara power of manner. In filial devotion they
were equal ; but Melicent staid at home when her mother
wished her to stay, and Barbara went abroad when her
mother wished her to go. Barbara would make a sacrifice
if her parents insisted ; Melicent would make one after they
had ceased to insist. Barbara was more lively, — Melicent
more solid. Barbara could joke with the best of feelings ;
when Melicent had the best of feelings, she could not joke.
In respect of humanity, Barbara was an Abolitionist, — Mel-
icent gave herself to the cause of Peace. Barbara had great
hope for the race, — Melicent a strong faith in it. Both
excelled in music ; but Barbara preferred Beethoven, — Meli-
cent, Strauss. Barbara would create a deeper and stronger
impression, — Melicent a pleasanter and warmer sympathy.
Barbara would suggest a thousand thoughts to you, — Meli-
cent would transfuse you with a certain stillness and seren-
ity that would speedily fill with thoughts.
These sisters looked out on the moonlight ; but they did
not go to the same window, nor did they put their arms
around each other, in the common glow of beautiful entranced
feeling. One went to a window on one side of the chimney,
36 RICHARD EDNEY AND
— the other to the other. They spoke to each other, as it
were, through the chimney ; each heart feh, and uttered,
and reflected back, the glorious world without, not to itself,
but that the other heart might hear. Barbara said, "
Spirit of Eternal Beauty, keep me this night ! " Melicent
responded, " O beautiful love of God, I am thine to-night !"
They set in place the chairs, wheeled back the sofa,
removed the lamp and damask cloth from the table, that it
might be ready for the servants to lay the breakfast in the
morning ; exchanged the elegant, downy hearth-rag for an
obsolete, thread-bare one ; raked up the fire, bolted the
door ; and they too went to bed.
We offer this chapter to our readers, not because it con-
tains matter rare or striking ; — it does not; it is of common
and familiar things; — and because it is of common and
familiar things, we write it. It is a simple picture of a
worthy American family, that we would like to preserve,
but which we are more anxious to present to our distant
readers.
American family! Patagonian ? Esquimaux? Nay;
an United States of North American. Between a barbarism
on the one hand and a falsity on the other, we adopt the
ialsity. A little euphuistic conformity is to be preferred to
a broken pate. We are not puissant enough to throw the
glove to national pride in favor of a proper nomenclature.
The force of this observation will be felt when we drop
down to the next.
Our distant, readers. We mean the English, French,
German, Swedish. But more, much more. Philosophy
teaches that nothing is lost; and this tale must survive.
Morality urges the illimitableness of human influence;
wherefore we may calculate that some wave of kind appre-
ciation will cast these pages on the remotest shores. Now,
THE governor's FAMILY. 37
if license can be had from the Imperial Commission of
Turkey, and our friend, Ees Hawk Effendi, of Constanti-
nople, amidst other engagements, shall be able to complete
the translation, we hope to publish the book in that cele-
brated metropolis.
But there are pirates in that region, who will undoubt-
edlj^ be on the alert, and use so favorable an occasion to
pounce upon the work, and translate it into the language of
contiguous nations, — say the Tartars, — where its circula-
tion, unimpeded by copy-right, must be immense.
Now, it is an established premise of history, that the Tar-
tars, or ancient Scythians, peopled Europe ; that the Anglo-
Saxons and Normans came primarily from the banks of the
Caspian. Whence it follows that we, soi-disant Americans,
deduce our genealogy from a spot renowned as the home of
Genghis Khan and Tamerlane.
Consider, then, the pleasure of introducing a work like
this among our almost forgotten ancestors ! With what
delight must they hail intelligence from their long-lost, but
still alive and well, trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific children !
With what eagerness will the ladies, God bless them ! of
Samarcand, that famous city, order the numbers, as they
successively appear, done , in silk paper — no other is used
there — in the book-stalls of the great bazaar of the place !
How exhilarating for the dear creatures, in loose, flowing
costume, with this volume in hand, to stroll into the valley
of the Sogd, where, says the old geographer, Ibn Haukal,
" we may travel for eight days, and not be out of one deli-
cious garden;" read to each other about their cousins, Rich-
ard and Melicent, and Memmy and Eebby, under the shade
of the glorious plane-trees, and cool their transports in an
atmosphere of musk, which is exhaled indigenously from
4
38 KICHAKD EDNEY, ETC.
the soil ! How it must relieve the tediumjjf the caravan, to
have something of this sort to peruse on the way !
Then, to retrace our steps a few degrees, let us imagine
the ladies of Constantinople, in their frequent excursions on
the Bosphorus, in those cailis, the "neatest and prettiest
boats ever seen," reclined on soft and meditative cushions,
and alternating the magnificent scenery around them with
glances at these simple, domestic pages ; — would it not be a
fine idea ?
But there is a cloud in this bright anticipation, — and that
is the point we would impress, — a cloud arising from the
misnomer just alluded to. Our Usbek relatives and Otto-
man friends will ;iot understand the term, "American
Family." They would naturally associate the Governor,
his kindred and contemporaries, with the Russians of
Alaska. A great mistake. Why not call them a New
England family? For the reason that they are not; but
are an United States of North American one.
This note, addressed, indeed, to our cognates and fellow-
citizens, will nevertheless fulfil its design as regards these
distant literary circles, and explain what would otherwise
be a kind of ethnical and geographical myth. And cer-
tainly, if this volume is to go among the Tartars, we cannot
but be anxious that the introduction be as smooth and
unencumbered as possible.
It will not only shed light on the interesting topic of the
names of places, to which we may again refer ; — it will
likewise support the propriety of certain matters that may
appear in the progress of these chapters.
CHAPTER III.
KICHARD FIXDS EMPLOYMENT,
The next day Munk went with Richard to the Saw-mills,
There were many of these stretched along the canals lead-
ing from the River. They were large buildings; long,
broad and low, and one story high. Busy, busy ; so busy,
as Richard looked into one and another, his first thought
was, they must want assistance ; but he soon found they
all wanted work. In a great city, everybody seems to be
doing something, and it seems as if there was something
for everybody to do ; but try it, just try it ! They came
to one known from its color as the Green Mill.
" Here is Captain Creamer," said Munk, " a great friend
and patron of young operatives ; I will introduce you. He
rents two or three saws."
Captain Creamer was a man whom time dealt gently with,
while advancing years served to ripen his person and
graces; and with a few additions of art, — and art, we aie
told, is the interpreter of nature, as in this instance she
labored to give most certainly the spirit of nature, and na-
ture is kind, — additions of art, we say, as lunar caustic
for his gray hair, and porcelain for his empty gums, he
would pass for quite youthful.
" I hope," said the Captain, speaking politely, " you are
very well, ]\Ir. Munk, and that Mrs. Munk is well. Belle
Fanny I need not inquire after; a bargain, that, Mr. Munk ;
she is the neatest trotter the city can boast. That is my
judgment. Brother-in-law, you say ; I am glad to see Mr.
40 EICHARD EDNEY AND
Edney. I think I have heard of you. A new one seekhig
employment. They come fast. I think I have condemned
ten applications within a week."
" Then you have no chance for him," concluded Mr.
Munk.
" No, no ; I did not say so. But it takes extraordinary, I
might say, mountaineous talents, to succeed. He has friends
who are interested for him, and his own heart is interested
for itself. As the poet has said, he has on the Avhole armor.
Let me see you measure and figure on that stock of
boards."
Richard took the rule and chalk, and in a few minutes
reported an accurate and very neat account.
" Proficiency," replied the Captain, " proficiency. Con-
siderable tact. Mr. Kilmarnok," — he addressed the
head-stock man, — "let this young man take your place
a moment."
The head-stock was the controlling and responsible end
of a stick of timber on the works, and the head-stock man
superintended the whole operation of sawing ; so tliat Rich-
ard was put to a critical task.
" He sights well," said the Captain. " He handles the
bar as if he had seen one before. He must have prac-
tised. Merit, merit, certainly. Talent in his bail-dog ; his
drop-down-feed, Mr. Munk, shines. It shines, as has been
justly observed, like a hole in a blanket."
Richard stood in perspiration and trepidation. The
severity of the eye that followed his movements was fright-
ful.
Trembling and confused, when the log was run through,
in attempting to stop the saw, he seized the " start," or
handle of the lever that belonged to a "cutting-ofF" saw,
near by, and set that going. The Captain was in an
THE governor's FAMILY. 41
uproar ; Mr. Kilmarnok stepped forward, and corrected the
mistake.
" Lame," ejaculated the Captain, " and most unfortunate.
What a pity ! A most shuperior piece of work spoilt hy
these blotches ! I am sorry for him. Let him attempt the
tail-stock. No, no ; he will only disgrace himself. I have
no interest in this matter, Mr. Munk. I am only anxious
that our young men should honor themselves and the cause.
But they should confine themselves to what they can do
well. Head-stock is nice business ; and if he perseveres, we
shall have the happiness of meeting him there, some time or
another. Let him show his butting. I have no doubt he
is a master there."
Richard took an axe, and very neatly proceeded to " butt"
a log ; that is, cut the end of it square off.
" A well-directed blow. A handsome calf. The swing
of his axe is pleasing, — it is positively luxuriating ; as Dr.
Broadwell observed, the little hills of feeling within us clap
their hands." So the Captain echoed -the strokes.
Richard took breath and courage. The men in the mill
were looking at him, and he did not know but he should be
degraded before them ; but these encouraging words of the
Captain revived him. The Captain's teeth glistened with
delight, and his arms shook applause.
" Do you think you shall be able to give me work ? "
asked Richard, quite hopefully.
" Give you work ? " responded the captain, very archly.
" We pay for our work. But it is necessary to begin small ;
you see that it is. In the little and common matter of
chopping, you do well. But, alas ! how many choppers
there are ! W^hy, everybody can chop."
" Then you do not want me," added Richard.
" I did not say that. I only wish you to know your own
4#
42 RICHARD EDNEY AND
powers. I wish you not to adventure too much. This is
a great field. You see Mr. Kihiiarnok ; you think you can
do as well as he does. It seems only a few steps there.
It is a great ways from the butt to the head-stock. How
would he do in the slip, Mr. Munk ? "
" You can try him," replied the latter.
Richard, armed with a picaroon, descended the slip, some
thirty feet, to the basin, where the logs lay in the Avater
ready to be drawn in, and by aid of the tooth of the mill-
chain dog, to be hauled to the bed of the mill. Richard,
standing on one log, and aiming a blow at another, lost his
balance and slipped into the water. Recovering himself, he
pushed still more energetically the experiment on which he
was sent.
" Tut, tut I " so the Captain expressed his disappointment
to Munk. " That it should have happened ! I feel for the
young man. You recollect, Mr. Munk, at the lecture before
the Mechanics' Association we had explained to us the
difference between genius and doing. Now, your brother-
in-law can do many things ; I acknowledge that, — no man
can deny that ; but has he genius ? I ask you. He can do,
and do well, if he will only keep to his sphere. He has
some axe-genius, perhaps ; but he fails on the picaroon, —
utterly fails. He fails on the head-stock. He may have
some slight picaroon doing. He lacks self-oblivimy, and
is too tiercy ; not enough of the barrel and the tub, Mr.
Munk. Ambition ! oh, what a foe ! I am sorry you spoke
to me."
"We applied at several saws," answered Munk, "and
they were full."
Meanwhile Richard was doing up his job very hand-
somely ; and his brother called the Captain's attention to the
fact.
THE GOVEKNOR's FAMILY. 43
Captain Creamer smiled, — he loved to smile ; but with an
air of melancholy.
" He can improve ; I never questioned his capacity." The
Captain shook his head, as if, while affirming so much, there
w^ere still many things he must deny.
Richard reiippeared on the mill-bed, with a look of sus-
pense.
The conversation that ensued will be better understood by
a tabular word or two. The Saw-mills were the property
of companies, or corporations ; and the saws were let, and
sometimes under-let. To each saw belonged, ordinarily, a
" gang " of three men, both for the day and the night ; six
in all. These were the head-stock man, the tail-stock nian,
and a sort of servant of the whole, who tended the slip, and
did the butting, and helped wherever he was called. Five
men could manage two saws. Captain Creamer rented two;
and, of course, in his double gang, employed ten men. This
for the main work of the mill. There was a collateral busi-
ness, as making shingles, laths, clapboards, which used up
the slabs and refuse timber; and which also required a cut-
ting-ofF saw. These operations employed several hands.
If we reckon six principal saws to each mill, we shall have
an aggregate of one or two hundred men in each ; or^e half
of whom were in constant activity, day and night. The
subordinate branches were carried on below, under the
" bed," or main floor of the mill, near the wheel-pit.
" Has your brother worked at shingles ? " asked Captain
Creamer.
" He has," replied Munk ; " but I think he would not care
to go down there."
" Natural, natural," answered the Captain. " As has
justly been observed, we cannot die but once ; and, Mr.
Munk, allow me to say it, we do not like to. But, Mr.
44 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Munlv, how can one succeed without humility ? without
beginning low, — as Dr. Broadwell observes, taking one's
place in the dust ? Not be a shingle-sticker ! Why, the
Kilmarnoks, the Gouches, were all shingle-stickers."
" I had better return home," said Richard.
" Do not deem me unkind," responded the Captain.
" Young men do not appreciate the necessity of industry,
and acquaintance with detail. I fear me, I really fear, you
are ambitious. Odious sin that, as the poet observes, winds
like a hejus snake about the extremities ! You see we are
tolerably full on the bed ; there is hardly room for a flea.
But, ]\Ir. Edney, it is not our interest, but the interest of our
young men, which moves me to speak."
" You have no opening here," said Richard, decisively.
" I would do anything for you ; I would, for your respected
brother's sake. I know how friends feel. Nights — let me
see. Mr. Kilmarnok, how is Clover?"
" No better, sir," answered the man.
" Clover is sick. Yes, there is Clover's night. He has
tended the slip ; he is a man of rare qualities, and can turn
his hand to most anything. What would you say to his
chance for a few days ?"
" I can do anything," replied Richard.
" Bless me — that is it. What a spirit ! "
"What M'ages can you afford?"
" We make no account of such things. We are only
happy to bring the boys forward — to be the instrument of
leading them to greatness. It is worth a world to us to see
a head-stock man, and say, we carried that man forwards.
Howd, the inventor of the patent wheel, was a shingle-
sticker. I suppose Howd is really the greatest man in the
world. Pierson, the improver of the shingle machine, has
claims, and many fine points, and is sometimes named ; but,
THE governor's FAMILY. 45
to use the expression, he cannot hold a candle to Howd. To
be associated with Howd in any way, even in the meanest
capacity, might well fire the heart of a young man. He
mounted from the wheel-pit to the bed, and went through
the slip to glory ! "
" Would you name a sum?" inquired Richard.
" I will be frank with you," replied the Captain, " and
even lay bare our whole affairs. Laths feed themselves, but
we find them ; and so do shingles ; but, in times like these,
they are glad to pay us a premium for being — for the mere
chance of being. What would you say to that?"
Richard shook his head.
" Ah ! " sighed the Captain, " 't is Labor against Capital.
Labor is ravenous ; it scratches Capital, as the poets say, like
a fowl on a danghill. But we are generous ; Green Mill is
generous ; it finds, and repairs, and makes its own insur-
ance ; it does everything, and gives all the profits to labor.
We will offer you eighteen dollars a month, board yourself;
Green Mill does not board. Or, you may form a gang, and
take the saw. We allow two dollars a thousand, piled and
stuck; oil and light yourself, of course; you understand
that."
"I will go by the month," said Richard.
So he found employment for a few weeks, at least ; he
would work nine hours every night ; and have fifteen out
of the twenty-four, wherein to sleep, and do what else he
liked.
CHAPTER IV.
KICHARD AT THE MILL.
It was an extreme night, and the mercury fell to a
great depth before morning. One man, who raised the
largest cucumbers, and had the most satisfactory children,
and drove the prettiest carryall, said his thermometer, at
thirty-eight minutes after seven, stood at five and three-
quarters below zero. At any rate, it was cold enough ; and
Richard felt it, when he left the house, after supper. Its
first onset was suffocating, like a simoom ; then it began to
cut, and sting, and flay, as if it would not only entrap but
torture its victim. A delicate, thin, violet vapor, coming
from we know not where, had clearly mistaken the time of
the year, like birds arriving too early from a sunnier clime ;
benumbed and bewildered by the cold, it lay on the western
hills, still, calm, hard, and dry. The sky was very clear,
as if the cold had driven out of it all those soft clouds, and
gentle zephyrs, and spiritual mists, on which our better feel-
ings float through the universe, and by which our souls are
indefinitely expanded, and our sjTnpathies connected with
unseen orders of beings, and left it the impersonation of
intellect, — sheer, naked intellect, — intellect without love,
without tenderness; awful, dismal intellect, in which the
stars were so many iron, piercing, excruciating eyes — eyes
which one did not wish to look at, but ducked his head, and
hurried on. Or, if one could stand it, — if his fancy would
have its way, in spite of the cold, — he would see the windows
of heaven covered with frost, and the stars so many little
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 47
cr)'stalline sparkling points; and if he looked closely at
Sirius, he would inevitably conclude it had been snowing
there all winter; and the icy, glittering radiance of that star
he would attribute to the reflection of interminable hollows,
and mountains of snow.
There were no loafers about the mill to-night ; and no boys
skating on the river, with their cheerful fires, and the bell-
like ringing of their merry voices. The great doors on the
sides of the mill, that open on horizontal hinges, and are
hoisted by ropes, were dropped. The wind drifted freely
through the building; and the large, cylindrical, red-hot
stoves, seemed to be an invitation to it to come in. Nor was
it ceremonious, or hardly civil ; it crowded about the stoves,
and seemed determined that nobody else should have a
place ; and with a selfishness which nothing human ever
paralleled, as soon as one windy troop got warm, it made
way for another, and so left no chance at all for the work-
men. Green Mill was a large one, — two hundred feet long,
and fifty wide ; and all the saws were running ; not that
they always ran in winter, but these Avere pressing times.
It was one immense hall, where the saws were, mounting to
the ridge-pole, and broken only by the tie-beams, and the
frames in which the saws moved ; and all the men might be
seen, and their varied operations inspected, at a glance. It
was a noisy, busy scene. Lamps hung on the fender-posts
— lamps shaped like a coflTee-pot, with a heavy coil of wick-
ing in the spout, and producing so large a flame the wind
could not blow it out ; and the more it was attempted to be
put down, the brighter it burned. But the lamp was pro-
voking ; it affected great nonchalance ; it made feints of
being beaten ; it fell over from side to side ; it treated the
wind as a rope-dancer might treat his worst enemy, by caper-
ing on a slack wire, and jingling a tambourine in his face ;
48 EICHAUD EDXEY AND
it was as insulting as a runaway monkey, that makes
grimaces at his master from a chimney-top.
On one bed the men were butting ; on another, hauling
up the slip ; on a third, dividing the logs by cross-cut saws ;
the creak of files, and the clink of iron bars, could be heard.
The up-and-down saws sweltered, trembled, gnashed, hissed,
as they made their way through the huge trunks before
them. There was the piteous shriek of the cutting-ofT saw,
and the unearthly rumbling of the wheels in the pit below.
The rag-wheels patiently ticked, as it were time-keepers
of the whole concern. The entire building, ponderous as
were its beams and firm its foundation, seemed to throb and
reel.
Richard was in a strange place, and among strange men,
though he was at home in the business. There was not
much talking, nor a very good opportunity for making
acquaintance. The men were silent in the midst of the
powerful agencies of nature and art ; they were the silent
Mind that wrought through these agencies.
Of the persons with whom Richard was associated, one,
Mr. Gouch, the boss of the gang, was a middle-aged, middle-
sized man, with a heavy face and a dull eye. He wore a
white fur hat, of a very old fashion, — so old, indeed, it would
be difficult to say when it was in fashion, — and which looked
as if it had come down through all the fashions, and each
of them had had a kick at it. He had on an antique sur-
tout, with a very high waist, and an immense collar, riding
the waist, as if it were the porter of a woollen factory.
The lips of Mr. Gouch were large and rough, and kept up
a constant twitching, as if affected with the shaking palsy.
Not that he was a great talker; only his lips stirred, some-
what vacantly, somewhat timorously. Before he spoke, his
lips moved, as it were getting ready for that effort ; after he
THE governor's FAMILY. 49
had spoken, his lips moved, as if the momentum of the effort
did not immediately subside. Along with setting the gauge
and minding the carry-back, another thing occupied a deal
of his attention. This was the orders the mill had received,
and which were nailed to the fender-post. Why did he
dodge so around the corner of this post, and look at the
schedule so often ? Why did he point at it with his crow-
bar ? Why did his lips wag at such a rate, and all to himself?
WJiy did he, from running the crow-bar over the list, like
an overgrown lubber of a schoolboy, who uses his finger to
fescue his eye from line to line, — why did he then jerk it
towards his fellow-laborer, whose back was turned ? Rich-
ard saw this farce, and was curious about it.
This other man seemed wholly indifferent to what was
passing ; he looked, indeed, more like a beast, who could
not be affected by human interests, than anything else. He
was short, and thick, and dark. His small cap, matted to
his head, with its few filaments of fur, and its larger bare
spots, did not look like a cap, but made him look as if he
had a scrubby, stinted growth of hair. Running your eye
down his person, you would imagine that his hair, deserting
his scalp, had reappeared under his chin, and around his
neck ; for here it grew thick, bushy, luxuriant. He had no
neck, apparently, but only a bed of hair, in which his head
lay. He was not deformed, but he seemed to have grown,
or been socketed, into himself; his hair grew into his head,
his head into his neck, his neck into his shoulders, and his
shoulders into his trunk. He wore a short frock, the ends
of which were tied in a large knot on his back, as if it had
something to do in keeping in place this singular structure
that he was. His mouth, except in a strong light, was
invisible ; and then it opened and shut spasmodically, like a
toad's; and then no teeth were seen, but a slight vacuum,
5
50 KICHAED EDNEY A^^D
filled with indistinguishable shapes ; as one gets a glimpse
through the fence at the charred stumps of new-burnt
ground. Smoking was not allowed in the mill ; but this
man had a pipe in his mouth, whether he smoked or not.
He would sometimes smoke of a winter night. This pipe,
like the rest of him, had grown in, till there was nothing
but the black bowl left. Ever in his mouth, it seemed to be
a part of his organism ; and he dipped his finger into the
bowl as frequently when it was empty as when it was full.
The name of this man was Silver.
Mr. Gouch, we have said, looked at Silver; but Silver did
not mind it. Then Mr. Gouch read again the orders :
" While, 4, hemlock 16, 7x9. Smith, 6, gray birch, 10,
3X12, Clover 9, plates, hemlock, 22, 6x8. Clover, joist,
Clover, sills, Clover, furring." These things, from silently
transcribing with his lips, he went on to articulating more
distinctly, and finally spoke out quite loud. As he did so,
he turned his face to Silver; and then, as it were, having
caught the words on the end of his bar, he held that out for
Silver to read ; but Silver neither heard nor read.
During an interi'al when Silver was taking away the
boards on one side of the carriage, and Mr. Gouch and
Richard were at work Avith a cross-cut saw on the other,
Mr. Gouch said, " He '11 get it ! he '11 sweat I — he 's gone !"
" Who '11 get it ? " asked Richard.
"He," replied Mr. Gouch, and thrust his head backwards
towards Silver.
"Get what?"
" I tell you, Clover '11 build I " As he said this, he pushed
the saw forwards, and leaned forwards himself, as if he
were earnest that the communication should reach Richard.
" Don't start so I " he said ; " you are not concerned ; you
have just come ; you need n't be frightened." Now, Richard
THE governor's FAMILY. 51
could not conveniently help starting, since he held one end
of the saw, and must needs retreat as the other advanced.
Still Mr. Gouch kept operating the instrument, and endeav-
oring to impress certain truths on Eichard. The first he
did mechanically and skilfully; as to the last, he was in
an absent state of mind, and continually blundered in the
attempt to reconcile the ideal with the actual. " Don't be
frightened," he said, as he again inclined towards Richard,
who was again obliged to fall back, " I tell you, Clover '11
build ; and he '11 get it," writhing towards Silver, " and we
shall all get it ! Plates, joist, sills and furring, — yes,
furring, — that settles it, that does the business. You are
not alarmed, I hope ? "
" Why should I be ? " replied Richard, laughing. " More
work, more to do."
" Yes, more work ; but how he Avill feel ! how he will
feel!"
" Capt. Creamer told me Clover was sick."
" Clover sick ! The Captain done for, too ! The Captain
slabbed off, thrown among the refiige, flung into the river,
like so much edging. And all through Clover. Clover
sick ! He is too strong to be sick. He would die before he
would be sick."
" He may be sick, and die too," observed Richard.
"He can't die," returned Mr. Gouch; "you can't kill
him. You might as well smite that saw with your fist ;
you might as well put a trig under the dam and stop it,
as to practise on him."
They went to the stove for their lunch ; and as they went,
Mr. Gouch still muttered, " The furring fixes it ; it will be a
house. He '11 get it; Clover '11 build."
Silver said nothing, and Mr. Gouch said more, as if he
would teaze Silver. In an instant, Silver seized the cant-
52 RICHARD EDNEY AND
doo-, and aimed at the head-stock man. Richard sprang
between them, and Mr. Gouch fell backward over a log.
Mr. Gouch laughed, and Silver snapped his lips together in
a way that was intended to imply humor ; and Richard,
seeing that the demonstration was only a naerry one, very
quietly went to wooding up the stove. Mr. Gouch touched
his fingers on the stove, to see how hot it was ; then he
applied them again, to see the hissing and crackling;
and he at last got up a little cannonade, which he let off
against Silver. Silver was not harmed, or cowarded. He
knocked the ashes from his pipe, sliced a new charge of
tobacco, ground it in the hollow of his hand, filled his pipe,
and stooped to light it at the mouth of the stove. Mr. Gouch
suffered quite a drop of water to explode close to Silver's
ear, saying, " Have n't you got it ? Won't Clover build ? "
Silver drew back, and groaned. He sat on the floor, and
groaned. He made a few empty passes at the coals with
his pipe, and thrust it, unlighted, into his lips, and groaned.
" He has got it ! " said Mr. Gouch. " Did 'nt I tell you
he would get it ? Such quantities of furring ! O, what a
nice little house, and what a nice little bed-room, and what
nice fLxings ! "
Silver took a pine stick and whittled it, sharpening and
smoothing it. He then tried the point of it on the palm of
his hand ; then he pricked his cheek with it ; then he made
as if he would stab the stove and the saw.
" There will be family ways and family doings," contin-
ued Mr. Gouch, addressing Richard, who was quietly con-
suming his midnight meal ; " and fires kindled where it is
now bleak cold, and tables set for people that never ate
together, and doors opening on new scenes and new opera-
tions. There will be another stopping-place along the street,
and another yard to set flowers in ; and by and by there
THE GOVEKNOR's FAMILY. 53
will be children, and little ones will climb on their father's
knee, and that father will be Clover ; and little ones for the
mother to put to sleep, and that mother will be "
Silver shrieked not out, but inside, and only a smothered
explosion was heard. He thrust his stick wildly into the
air.
" Don't do that ! " said Mr. Gouch ; " don't hurt Clover;
don't attempt Clover ; don't do anything to him ! "
" It is not that," rejoined Silver ; " it 's myself."
He again tried to light his pipe, and now he was success-
ful ; and he sucked and whiffed, as if he would evaporate
his sorrows, thoughts, and whole being, in the smoke.
"Clover '11 build, and it is your treat," said the head-
stock man ; " and you need not take it so hardly ; a couple
of dimes will hardly be missed."
Sih'er blew the smoke from him, as much as to say,
" That is nothing; I do not care for that." He spi'ang up
with an air which seemed to add, " Bring on the boys ! I
am ready to treat."
The two men from the other saw came towards the stove.
One of them advanced in a jaunty, tambourine sort of way,
appearing to be playing on an invisible instrument of that
kind with his elbow and knuckles, and shuffling to the tune
with his feet. A red handkerchief was tied flauntingly on
his head, and his waist was buttoned with a leathern strap.
He was lively and talkative, and his name was Philemon
Sweetlj\ "Pleasantly cold, Mr. Gouch," said he; "just
enough to make a stove, ordinarily so dull, a very agreeable
companion."
"An Indian could n't stand it," replied Mr. Gouch, rather
solemnly; "a frog would freeze, a barn would be out of its
element."
" I hope," rejoined Philemon, " the cold will bear kind of
5#
54 RICHARD EDNEY ANT>
Strong on the Captain ; just hold him down softly, freeze
him gently, so he will not feel it, and let Helskill out. It is
a precious night for Helskill ; he deserves such a night, now
and then."
" How is Clover, to-day ? " asked Ezra Bess, the fourth
man.
" Better," replied I\Ir. Gouch ; " and Silver will be gen-
erous, — all gold, perhaps."
" That for Clover," added Philemon, heaving the hand-
spike across the mill-bed ; " Helskill is wanted just now."
At this instant, a man was seen entering the mill, and
making his way stealthily through the shadows, as if he
were afraid he might tread on them. And when a roister-
ing lamp flared in his face, he started, like a very polite man
who had intruded too suddenly upon the light. He had on
his arm a basket, over which he exercised incessant watch-
fulness, like a mother bringing her daughter into company.
He had a broad, dark face, and eyebrows to match, aftd
black eyes ; but a timid look, — a remarkably timid, and
almost slippery look ; and a stooping gait, like one who has
the misfortune to be continually seeing obstacles in his path.
He signalized his progress, also, by a cough, — a small, hack-
ing cough, — as a modest token of admonition to any one
against whom he might come in the dark.
The approach of this man was regarded with interest by
the gang.
" The Friend of the People is assiduous and devoted as
ever," said Philemon, affecting a bow to the new-comer.
" Shall I have the honor of introducing to you, Richard, Mr.
Helskill, the Friend of the People ? "
" I am the Friend of the People," replied the other, evi-
dently brightening up and re-collecting his courage, in the
cordiality with which he was received ; " I look after the
THE governor's FAMILY. 55
public good : I vote for it at the polls ; I canvass for it
before election; I harness my horse, and go in pursuit of it;
I bleed for it, — yes, I do, — my purse bleeds, and my heart
bleeds, to see how it is abused ; I attend to it, in my own
little way, at Quiet Arbor ; " — he was still timid, and cast
his eyes from side to side, but he waxed bolder as he went
on: — "I am an advocate of the people: I defend their
rights ; I teach them their independence ; I stand between
them and monopoly ; I take the brunt of oppression ; I be-
lieve that men are to be trusted, — that they ^ai^e discretion."
" Desput cold ! " said Philemon, who, using the liberty
v/hich the timid man scattered broadcast around him, lifted
the cover of the basket, and took from it a brace of bottles
and glasses ; — " but you are the chap for it. You must
have been born in a bog, and nussed on cucumber juice.
That was economical. When you was eight years old, your
father sent you out barefoot in winter to catch titmice for
poor people's breakfast. So you learned benevolence. A
thermometer would have no effect on you; the mercury
might plump down into the bottom andfreeze, — you would n't
mind it ; you would buzz around your little Arbor, as chirk
and bobbish as a fly in spring-time. And how, when it
grew late, and your friends became tired and sleepy, and
wanted to lie down, you would put them out of doors, using
a little force, just to teach them self-denial ! Why, you are
equal to Captain Creamer, — you are the Captain ! Has n't
your wife a receipt for cold weather ? You might send it
South, and they could get up a little ice for their juleps, and
kill off the yellow fever, now and then. You would n't do
for a Methodist church, just now. You might answer for
some other in town ; they could set you up cheap, and you
could do so much good ! You love to do good, don't you ? "
Men from all parts of the mill, having a respite from
56 RICHARD F.DNEY AND
their work, collected around Mr. Helskill, who seemed to be
quite a centre of attraction.
" I knew he would come," said Mr. Merlew, head-stock
man of saw No. 5, a burly, hulchy looking man ; " he
sticks to his word like a bail-dog to a log. He does n't mind
the coldest night, any more than No. 5 does the knots of
white hemlock."
" No. 5, No. 5," said Philemon, who was head-stock man
of No. 2, " will want a little oiling ; will be very thankful to
the Friend of the People for a little help ; will rejoice in the
opportune kindness of that man, or I am mistaken."
The Friend of the People coughed, blushed, and looked
down. So embarrassed was he by these compliments, he
did not perceive that his glasses had escaped, and his bot-
tles were being emptied, while the men were secretly trying
the quality of his wares.
Mr. Gouch, meanwhile, with a medley of playfulness and
timorousness, simplicity and cunning, slid to the door of
the mill and looked out ; hopped over the lumbered floor
back again, and slapped the stove with his wet fingers, chat-
tering to himself, " The Captain won't come ; he can't come
to-night. Clover ivill build ; Silver '11 treat ; he won't be
happy, if he does n't," Silver muddled with his pipe among
the ashes. Richard leisurely hacked the end of a log.
" The honor is Silver's to-night," said Philemon to
Richard, holding a glass in his hand, " It is his to give
merit an opportunity to distinguish itself, and to open to the
Friend of the People a sphere of action. This ordinarily
falls to the new comer ; it should have been yours, as you
are in that capacity ; but it is Silver's to-night."
" I am truly obliged to you, Silver," said Mr. Helskill,
making an effort to show his teeth, as if there resided in
them a particularly pleasing and grateful expression, which
THE governor's FAMILY. 57
he was anxious to communicate ; " you must be a happy-
man."
Silver hurled a chip at the timid man's head, which he
dodged, but manifested no indignation thereat. "Don't
grin at me ! " Silver added, very groutily.
"I must have declined the honor," replied Richard to
Philemon ; " and I think Silver has no satisfaction in doing
it."
"But you will drink?" returned Philemon, tendering
him a glass.
" I think I will not," said Eichard.
" Drink ! " growled Silver, with a quick, deep intonation.
" The laws of the mill forbid drinking, and the law of
conscience forbids it," added Richard.
" Clover '11 build ! " Mr. Gouch's lips began muttering.
This was a magical word ; it worked Silver to a frenzy ;
though Mr. Gouch certainly had no ill intents on his brother
stock-man.
" You shall drink ! you shall all drink ! " screamed Silver,
starting up.
" I am not afraid of Clover, and Clover shall not hurt
you," said Richard.
Silver grew more quiet, and sat down to his pipe, saying,
" Drink, Richard, only drink ! "
" There is mischief here," said Richard, " and I do not
understand it. And there is more mischief here, and I do
understand it : and it is there ; it is that man," — pointing to
Mr. Helskill.
" I hope the young fellow don't accuse me of mischief,"
replied Mr. Helskill, picking up his bottles.
"You needn't hope anything about it," said Richard.
" You may know ; you may be assured."
"Well, accuse me of mischief!"
58 RICHARD EDNEY AND
" I did n't accuse you of anything, and I do not. I said
you were mischief; and you are ! You are deviltry incar-
nate, and your stuff is the same incarnadined ! "
" Not so fast," interposed Philemon.
" There is no time to be slower," answered Eichard.
" Our lunch is out ; and we are here to work, not play."
" They would put on the screws," said Mr. Merlew ;
" they would make nigger-wheels of us, if they could, and
keep us always at it ; they would like to see us saw-dust
under their feet ! "
" There is no harm in fun," said Philemon. " Must
spree it, these tremendous nights."
" Not a drop, friends, not a drop," replied Richard.
• " He is no Friend of the People," observed Mr. Helskill ;
" he is a flinty and tyrannical character. I have seen such
before. I have repelled their malicious attempts ; I have
defeated their mean operations ; I have sacrificed a good
deal to put them down."
" You are a very direct and unequivocal scamp ! " said
Richard.
" Drink, for my sake ! " said Silver.
" I cannot drink," answered Richard.
" He is an unfeeling brute," observed Mr. Helskill. " I
left my warm Arbor ; I exposed myself to the weather. I
knew I had comfort for you ; I knew you needed it ; I knew
Silver wanted me to come. I defied the infamous statute ; I
ran the risk of falling into the hands of some skulking in-
former, and I have fallen into his hands, — I have fallen."
"I am no skulker," said Richard; "I am open-placed,
and open-tongued. I will not inform against you else-
where ; 1 will tell you to your face what you are, and what
you do. You bring in mischief here ; you bring in fightings,
ill-will, neglect of work ; you bring in sickness and disease ;
THE governor's FAMILY. 59
you come a good ways to do it ; you brave the coldest night
of the year to do it; you are desperate in the business ; you
would send these men drunk from the mill ; you would drive
them into a snow-bank. to die; you would pitch them,
reeling and staggering, into their own homes ! Oif with
you, — off!"
" Presently, presently," said Mr. Helsldll. " Alvin shall
have his glass. Alvin shall have the ague taken out of his
fingers." He inclined the bottle towards the person whose
name he called.
" Alvin shall not drink ! " replied Richard. " Alvin is a
boy. He is too young to like it, and too old to be spoilt."
Mr. Helskill persisted. Eichard, quite aroused, with a
handspike, dashed the bottle to atoms. Carried forward
by the impulse, he descended upon the other bottle, and
treated it to the same end ; and then, seizing the basket in
which these things had been borne, he hurled it towards the
door.
The confusion of this scene was heightened by what
immediately followed. The basket, in its rapid transit,
alighted in the face of a person entering the mill. It was
Captain Creamer. Already agitated by what he overheard
as he approached the building, he was exceedingly inflamed
by this latter piece of impertinence. He blustered amongst
the men in a way that boded no good to any of them.
" Don't say you did n't drink ! " whispered earnestly Silver
to Richard, as he saw the Captain approaching; "for my
sake, don't say you did n't ! "
The hands belonging to the other saws fled to their
respective posts. The Friend of the People, already dis-
heartened by the manner in which his intentions were
received, had made an early exit. The Captain's own
gang stood alone before him.
60 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Captain Creamer could not find words to express his
astonishment, his grief, his anger; and he was silent. At
length, composing himself sufficiently to speak, he charged
the men with violating the rules of Green Mill — their own
promises, and duty. He enlarged upon the danger to
which they were exposing themselves, and particularly on
the risk to which the mill was subjected. " Mr. Gouch,"
he said, " my head-stock man, my trusty servant, I had not
expected this."
" Clover '11 build — " began Mr. Gouch.
"Don't name Clover to me !" retorted the Captain. "I
am not afraid of Clover ; Clover does n't rule here. Who
threw that basket at me ? "
" I threw it," answered Richard ; " but I did not intend to
hit any one ; I did not see you."
" Drinking ! In liquor ! Did not know what you were
about ! Could not discern an object of my size ! I made no
impression on you ! "
" I cannot explain," said Eichard. " I can say nothing
about it."
" I presume you cannot," answered the Captain.
" Hoist the gate, Mr. Gouch ! You will work an hour
longer for this. In justice, I could demand more ; I shall
accept of that. I have suspected all was not right; I have
had intimations of your doings. The mill is jeopardized,
the whole corporation is jeopardized, by your conduct.
Frightful as is the cold, I left my bed to look after you."
The men resumed their duties; the Captain, readjusting
himself in his bear-skin coat, strutted to and fro across the
gangAvay.
Not many minutes after, approaching the door, he called
to Richard, and pointing to an angle of the road in front of
THE governor's FAMILY. 61
the mill, he said, " I see something stirring yonder. Be
spry and easy ; catch it, — do not let it escape ! "
Richard, approaching the mysterious object, found it to
be a man filling a basket with waste bits of wood. He trod
catlike, and seized the man firmly by the collar. The latter
dropped a stick he had in his hand, and fell back passively
on Richard's knees. The Captain leaped forvvard, saying,
" Hold on ! " and also fastened himself to the culprit, who in
a low voice replied,
" I did n't succeed, did I ? Don't hurt me ! "
" He is shamming," rejoined the Captain. " Let him not
give us the slip."
They dragged him to the mill. The light revealed the
face of an old man, thin and gray. He was shaking with
the cold.
"Shut down," said the Captain to Mr. Gouch; "there
are other matters to attend to. We have missed things
from the mill ; an entire pile of stuff has been carried off; —
odd ends, to be sure, but such as there is market for, and
without which the mill could not live, — nay, it could n't
stand a day. I think we have got the knave."
" It is an old man," said Mr. Gouch.
" Old, is he?" asked the Captain, who had not noticed
this feature of the case. " Too old to be stealing ; too old to
be in such bad business as this ; too old to set such an
example."
" Who would do it but me ? " answered the ancient ; " who
but Grandfather ? Who would get a pitch-knot in the cold,
and the dark, that they might see the blaze, — that the young
folks might be gladdened ? I am not old, and they will see
I am not." This was said with a sort of doting chuckle.
" What shall we do with him ? " inquired the Captain.
" I would let him go," said Richard.
IBS RICHARD EDNEY AND
"Do you mean to insult me again, young- man?" asked
the Captain. " Has neither your own conduct nor my for-
bearance taught you decency?"
" I think the chips would do the man more good than he
can do us harm," observed Philemon ; " and I would not pro-
ceed against him."
" Who asked what you would do, Mr. Sweetly ?" respond-
ed the Captain.
" You did, sir," answered Philemon.
" I asked what we should do with this criminal. I did
not ask after your private sentiments. The world is full
of them; we have enough of them. I have not been at all
this pains to find them out."
" I replied to your question, sir, the best way I knew
how."
" Call you that doing with the man? — to let him go — to take
no notice of what he has done, — to set this villany at large ? "
" Svippose we duck him in the canal," said Ezra, " then
hang him on the jack-pole to dry."
"Don't do that," said the old man. "I couldn't live
through it. I have n't long to live ; but I want to see the
children in a better way before I die."
" If I could shake him, I would," said the Captain, and
endeavored to suit the action to the word, but the garment
on which he seized parted in his hand ; — " but I do not
like to take the law into my own hands ; I should prefer
bringing him before a justice. I shall enter a complaint, in
the morning."
" He may abscond, in the mean time," suggested Ezra.
" Some one must stay with him," observed the Captain,
directing an inquiring eye to his men.
" I will not," said Philemon.
" Nor I," added Ezra.
THE governor's FAMILY. 63
Silver was brooding over the fire, muncliing his pipe, and
would not answer.
" It is no part of a head-stock man's duty," evasively
replied Mr. Gouch.
" You will do it, Richard," said the Captain, " and I may
think better of you."
" I will," replied Richard.
" Watch him close," enjoined the Captain, hooking Rich-
ard's arm in that of the old man. " He will be called for
about ten o'clock in the morning."
Having given a right direction to the affairs of justice, he
turned to the business of the mill.
The cold had increased. Midnight seemed to be gather-
ing itself up for a final plunge upon the morning. The old
man shook on Richard's arm.
" You are cold," said Richard.
" They are," replied the other.
" They need the wood ? " continued Richard.
" I thought they did," rejoined the old man. " They
seemed to. It may have been fancy; perhaps it was a
dream. I get confused in my head, I have so much to do ;
and it seems sometimes as if I was all a dream."
" They shall have it," said Richard, with emphasis.
" It is too late now. It is over. I never thought I
should do that. I never thought we should come to that ;
but a little blaze is so pretty. God's will be done ! "
" I will pay for it," said Richard, " There shall be no
trouble on that score." He went to the spot where the
basket lay, which he filled ; and giving the old man one
handle, and taking the other himself, he suffered his attend-
ant to lead the way whither he would go. This was in the
direction of the Factory Boarding Houses. Richard in-
quired after the necessity of the fuel he was so unseasonably
64 RICHARD EDNEY AKD
supplying, as a clue to the crime over which he was so
strangely made sentry. He gathered from the old man
that two girls, his grandchildren, had come to work in the
Factories, and he had accompanied them ; that one of them
was sick, and the other lay exhausted at the bedside ; that
their means were short, and while the girls slept, he had
slipped away for the wood.
As they reached the steps of the house, the voice of Cap-
tain Creamer was heard close behind.
"What does this mean?" he asked, angrily. "Have I
set a thief to watch a thief? Through your means, young
man, is the very thing consummated which I have wasted a
whole night to prevent ? "
Richard explained; — the Captam was not propitiated.
Richard offered to deduct the value of the wood from his
wages. How little did he understand Captain Creamer !
" The value of the wood ! A basket of chips ! " The
Captain spurned the thought. "It was the wrong that affect-
ed him," he said ; " the bad beginning of a young man."
However, he could not easily reverse the course of events,
and these accomplices in crime were permitted to enter the
house with their ill-boding freight.
Richard followed his guide up stairs to a chamber under
the roof, in the third story. A lamp in an angle of the
chimney cast a shadow over the room, and faintly revealed
the forms of the two girls on the bed. Weariness had folded
the well one, and an opiate the sick one, in deep slumber ;
and they were not aroused at the entrance of Richard and
his guide.
" We had better not try to make a fire," said Richard ;
" the room is not very cold, and the hearth is v\^arni."
"A few shavings," whispered the old man; "just a
little blaze. Junia loves to see a blaze. It is a comfort
THE governor's FAMILY. 65
to her. And when t' other is gone, and I am gone, — and
that will be soon, — there will only be a little blaze, and the
memory of it, in all this cold world, for her to look upon."
Richard drew some shavings from the basket, and soon had
them lighted. In the flickering glare which they cast over
the room, the old man looked and acted a little strangely
betraying a singular medley of imbecility, pathos and joy,
He leaned over the bed with a deep and passionate interest,
Then turning to Richard, with a playful, but sad infatua
tion, he pointed to the sleepers, and whispered, " That one
the sick one, the one with morning hair, — her child's hair, —
is Violet. The other, with the evening hair, — she was born
in the evening, and there are stars in her soul, — is Junia.
Who called her Violet ? I remember, her mother did, be-
cause she was born in spring, when violets blow. And
she will die in the spring ; it was then her mother died ; she
will die Avhen the birds begin to come, and the weather is
soft. If she could live then ! But she had better not die
noiv. God's will be done ! I know it was spring, for I was
sitting on the bank with the other when the nurse came.
We called the other Junia, because she was born in June;
and there is more summer in her ; she is riper, and stronger,
and can bear up better ; and she is full of warmth and pretty
life ; her hair is darker, — they said it was then, and it is
now, — and she was alwaj's amongst us like the smooth mead-
ow, and her eye came into your heart like noon under
the shady trees. I remember it ; I have a strong memory,
— a very strong memory. I remember a great many more
things than I used to when I was a young man. This one
was more tender, more frail, as the wind-flowers ; she never
seemed to get stronger, and we made a lamb of her. She
hung like dew upon all of us, and all our feelings, — so her
6*
66- EICHARD EDNEY AND
mother said, — only we knew she must go soon ; and when
the buds begin to burst, she will die. God's will be done ! "
There was too much tenderness in the old man, too many-
cherished though bitter and confused reminiscences, too
much vague but corroding sorrow, for Richard not to be
touched. He was silent and reflective ; and his whole spirit
was concentrated on the beauty and the sadness that slum-
bered before him, and the unwearied, tottering affection that
stood by the side of it.
Junia awoke, and, somewhat startled, said, "What is it.
Grandfather ? Has the doctor come ? "
"Nothing has happened, dear," replied the Grandfather.
" I have no business here," said Richard.
"Yes, you have, — j'ou know you have," answered the old
man. " You cannot go."
" Let me make more fire," rejoined Richard.
" "Where did the wood come from ? " asked Junia, ap-
proaching the hearth.
" He brought it," replied her Grandfather, pointing to
Richard.
" We are obliged to you," Junia said ; " but so cold, —
so late in the night — "
There was a mystery about the wood, Avhich neither of
them was ready to explain.
" Have you suffered much ? " asked Ri-^hard.
" Yes," replied Junia, " we do, for Grandfather's sake."
" Have you suffered from cold ? "
" Not much, — not long. Violet feels it sometimes."
" What is" her sickness ? "
" She was always slender, and after our father and moth-
er died, she went to keeping school; but this was too much
for her, and she had an attack of bleeding. One of our
neighbors told us how strong her girls had become in the
THE governor's FAMILY. 67
Factories; and we must earn something — and we came
liere. She was better for a v/hile ; but she is worse now, —
very bad, indeed. We are troubled that Grandfather should
exert hirnself so much."
" They do not know me," said the old man, a good deal
agitated ; " they do not know how able I am, — how much I
can endure. They do not mean I shall know how weak
they are; they would keep it from me; they think it worries
me. But they cannot hide it, and I know she will die when
the season changes ; — her mother did. I could have got
wood alone."
"Did you go out for the wood, Grandfather?" asked
Junia, with surprise.
" I helped him," said Richard, who wished to change that
sul)ject. " We will have a nice fire ; " and he put on more
chips and butts. He felt that his presence must be embar-
rassing ; he knew that the matter of the wood was so ; and
he said, rising from his chair, " If there is anything I can
do for you, I shall be glad to do it." " We are under
obligations to you," Junia replied ; " but we are not in need
of anything." Richard advanced towards the door ; but the
old man laid hands upon him, led him to his chair, adding
that he must stay.
"If Grandfather wishes it, — if it will make him hap-
pier, — we shall be glad to have you stay," said Junia.
Richard was bound to Capt. Creamer, and to the law, and
to his own promise, to stay; and since he could not explain
the real cause of his coming and staying, he said nothing.
" All for Grandfather ! " The old man leaned forward,
with both elbows on his spread knees, rubbing his hands
l.fore the fire, and repeated, with a dry laugh, "All for
Grandfather! They do not know it was all for them, and
that it has come to this all for them ; God's will be done | "
68 KICIIARD EDXEY AST)
" Tell me what has happened," said Junia, with an anxious
tone.
" Nothing," said Richard, " nothing to speak of now.
Your Grandfather was afraid you might suffer ; and you will
suffer if you do not keep quiet. Your sister is waking."
" Will God take care of us ? " she asked.
" He will," answered Richard, solemnly; "and to God let
us trust all things."
Richard's manner was so kind, and his words so soothing,
that Junia, even if her heart had begun to work with some
inexplicable evil, regained her composure, and said "I will,"
and went to the bedside. She raised her sister, and laid
pillows under her head. The golden hair of the invalid,
beneath her white cap, and above her pale, delicate face, was
like a glowing cloud in the clear sky, and her blue eye
beamed deep and far, like the sea, beneath. " That is
Grandfather's friend," said Junia to her. " Yes, my friend,
dear, my friend," echoed the old man. " His name is
Richard."
Violet nodded, and smiled a faint recognition to the
stranger.
" Have you none to help you ? " asked Richard. " Are
there none in the house to take turns with you nights ? "
" There is a number of girls," replied Junia, " but there
has been a good deal of sickness this winter, and they have
been called out often, and broken of their rest. Those that
have strength and leisure are devoting it to Miss Eyre,
getting her ready to be married. She is to be married to
Clover, — you may know him ; a Mr. Clover, who works at
the Saw-mills, — and they say Clover will build, and that he
expects to put up a fine house, and to live in style ; and the
girls are exerting themselves for Plumy Alicia. She is a
fascinating girl, and has many friends ; but I think she never
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY. btf
liked us very well, and I suppose we get less attention, at
this time, on that account. But so long as I have any force
left, I can do without their assistance."
Richard felt another singular, strong twinge. The name
that haunted the Green Mill had got into this sick chamber ;
that man, whom he had never seen, and never until to-day
heard of, seemed to be chasing him like an evil or a mock-
ing genius.
" We have had wood until to-night," continued Junia.
The mention of the wood troubled Richard, as he knew it
did the Grandfather. He would have rushed out doors ; but
that would not help matters within. He struggled with
himself, arresting the natural train of association, and re-
pressing all sense of the strange complexity that surrounded
him, and became calm.
The invalid, wasting under a seated pulmonary attack,
coughed at intervals, breathed heavily, nor could she help
disclosing the pains that invaded her frame.
" When the weather changes," the old man maundered,
— "when the warm days come, when the violets sprout — "
Junia, tranquil as was her manner, lightly as she dis-
charged the offices of the sick room, inured as she had
become to the mournful chant of her Grandfather, and to
the still sadder presages of her own mind, could not resist
the perpetual sorrow that as a storm beat against her breast,
and she wept.
" Have you no friends in the city ? " asked Richard.
" None," she said. " Has no clergyman been to see you ? "
" Not any." " Have no prayers been made here ? " " Many,
many," she said. " We have all prayed."
" Do you ever pray ? " inquired the old man.
" Yes," replied Richard.
" Young men do not pray as they used to," rejoined the
70 RICHARD EDNEY AND
elder. "In my day, they prayed. God was all about us,
and our spirits were lively and growing; and the angels took
prayers from us, as the bees and humming-birds draw
honey from the flowers. The young men are getting old,
very old, and dry, and blasted. I am young, — ha, ha ! "
" I should like to have him pray," said the sick one,
Richard read the twenty-third Psalm, in its motion so
full of spiritual and halcyon-like wafture, in its feeling so
fervid, trustful and joyous; — and prayed. He collected
into one earnest, sympathetic utterance, before God, the
hopes and the fears, the anguish and the aspirations, of the
hour.
The night waned. The Mill bells rang early, sharp, and
clear; all parts of the house resounded with the clatter of
the rising and the departing, of Work resuming its san-
dals, and going forth to its pilgrim's progress for the day.
Some of the girls looked into the chamber, to inquire after
the patient, and hasted away.
1 The landlady entered with a tray, furnished with such
articles of food or nourishment as the invalid might require.
She wore glasses, and had a gingham handkerchief thrown
over her head, under which any quantity of grizzly hair
struggled into view. She cast her eyes over her glasses
twice at Richard, — once as she passed him towards the bed,
and next when she had reached the bed. Addressing Junia
and the old man, she said, " Breakfast is waiting." Did
she intend, thought Richard, they should take their meal
from the tray ? She did not mean that, and they did not
understand her to mean that. She meant that their break-
fast was ready below. " Strangers are to be reported," she
added; "that is the rule of the large boarding-houses, —
front stairs carpeted, and Ladies' Parlor, — as one might see
when they came up, and not act here as Charley Walter
THE governor's family. 71
did. Perhaps he didn't know 'twas Whichcomb's, — see-
ing he come in the night, — and thought' it was Cain's,
where they don't keep any hours ; if they did, they would
stop, some time or other, boiling their knucks. Velzora Ann
Fclty would cry when I spoke about it, and the things no
more touched on her plate than if she had been at Cain's."
Both Junia and the old man said they did not wish for
breakfast ; and certainly that was the last thing Richard
thought of. Junia took charge of what had been brought
for Violet, and the landlady remained in the room only long
enough to reconnoitre the person and purpose of Eichard.
" A cousin, Miss Junia?" "No," replied Junia. "Came
in the night? — an old friend?" "A friend," answered
Richard. "Been here all night — but I shall not be hard
with you; the girls have their wills and ways, — I shall not
provoke them." She retreated through the door.
Presently Mrs. Whichcomb returned for the tray, and to
recover such portion of its contents as were not otherwise
disposed of. Richard, who wished to communicate with
the head of the house touching his rather equivocal and
very unexpected entry into it, followed as she left the room.
He found her descending the stairs, and combining with
each step a nod of the head, and an ejaculation of the
numerals, as if the three things timed each other. " One,
two, great plate, little plate ; three, four, five, six, knife,
fork, tea-spoon, and little jelly-spoon. Six, six! little jelly-
spoon; gone! " She stopped, and looked back up the stairs,
to see if she had miscounted a step. She beheld Richard
watching her from above.
" !" said she, "I was just thinking of you. No rela-
tion, — only a friend. Do you know your friends ? — do you
know them ? " Richard replied that he had never seen
them before that night. " I dare say," answered the woman.
72 KICHARD EDNEY A:>fD
" It is SO in all the first-class houses, which Charley Walter
knew all about it, for he pigged a month at Cain's, where
they are all in a muss. And Velzora Ann Felty could n't
have known it, for she was sick. Sickness is a bad thing in
a house. I had rather have ten well persons than one sick,
at any time." Richard observed it was not strange she
should. " There is a great deal of viciousness in sickness ;
— vice brings it on." Richard said there was truth in that
remark. " The eating and drinking is nothing, — they are
welcome to the sugar, and jelly, and cream, — but when it
comes to the things themselves that one depends on to get
along at all, and purloining and putting out of the way,
which our extra time does not deserve, it is too much.
Many people are sick to gratify their wicked propensities.
You may not know it and would not say so." Richard was
silent. He did not know it, and he could not say so.
" They take to their beds for the sake of being waited on ;
they linger along, that they may have more opportunities
for imposing on the house; and they go to their graves with
silver spoons in their hands !" This climax was awful, and
the landlady felt it to be so ; she staggered under the load
of her conceptions, and would have fallen if the balustrade
had not been a strong one.
It would have helped Richard to be put in possession of
certain particulars relating to this woman. A catastrophe
once came off iia her house, from which she never entirely
recovered. It was known as the Charley Walter affair, or
the Velzora Ann Felty affair. This tinged her mind. She
referred to it when she was speaking of other things, — she
thought of it even when she was thinking of other things.
It was a rock in the current of her being, around which her
feelings perpetually eddied. In addition, she hated Cain's,
a contiguous boarding-house. And, what was most remote
THE governor's FAMILY. 73
from Eichard's thoughts at the moment, she was anxious
about her property.
But Richard, who was simply solicitous to be disencum-
bered of his confused feelings, and to unfold to the landlady
the nature of his position, and why he was in the house,
disgusted at her manner, returned to the chamber.
The officers would soon be there ; the secret would be
forthcoming, do what he might. The more he saw of
Junia, the more he was assured of her true womanliness,
and her capability of encountering evil ; he stifled his
repugnance to giving her pain, and resolved to acquaint her
with the simple state of the case. Taking her one side, he
related what had befallen in the night ; how her grand-
fatlier was detected in theft, and he was appointed to watch
hiin. He doubted if the old man would be convicted,
though he did not know what Captain Creamer might be
able to do.
In the mean time, he would take an instant and run to his
brother's, that they might not be alarmed at his long ab-
sence. Returning forthwith, he encountered on the stairs
the Captain, the City Constable, who was knocking at the
door of the sick room, the landlady, and several others,
women and girls, whom he did not know. " Out," said the
Captain to him; "but is the old manm.?" He said this
with a violent glance at Richard, which he meant to be
ungracious and stinging, and which should sever the young
man in twain. Richard made no reply. The door did not
op'^n, and the Constable rapped again. He wished to be
civil. He held his ear against it, to hear if it manifested
\ signs of relenting. He then looked hard at the door,
auch as to say, " I give you a minute ; and if you do not
open, I shall break in."
The lips of this functionary were tightly compressed, and
7
74 EICHAKD EDNEY A^^D
his eye was vacant and dreamy ; he did not notice the
crowd that was about him ; he did not feel the boys that, in
their eagerness to be in with the foremost, trod on his heels.
Klumpp was a man of one idea, and exactly suited to a
painful or disagreeable duty. Nothing would prevent his
arriving at his main object; nothing extraneous could divert
his mind or mislead his steps. He had recently been elected
to office ; he felt his inexperience, but he wished to be faith-
ful ; he had often heard of the tap on the shoulder, and the
look in the eye, and the whispered " Come with me ; " he
had seen the thing done, when he was a boy, and he had
heard the old constable describe- how he treated desperate
offenders to it, and there was something magical in that tap,
and that look, and that whisper ; and he was now the ma-
gician himself, and he wished to conjure not only with suc-
cess, but with dignity. Hence the uneasy, abstract way he
had. The mercury, even now, stood nearly at zero, but he
did not notice it ; and when Mrs. Whichcomb spurted out
her innuendoes, he did not notice her.
The mistress of the house had exchanged the gingham
handkerchief for a black-bordered cap. She wiped her face
with her apron, and leered at Richard. Her long, scant
fore teeth, that looked like wheel-cogs, seconded the en-
deavor of her lips, and conveyed an expression of very vul-
gar satisfaction. Her manner betokened great intimacy
with Richard, great understanding of his humor, great
insight into what she knew would be his feelings on the
occasion. " The world always turns out just about as wf
calculate," she said; "the world cannot deceive us lon^
He would not believe it, when I told him. But 't is wor^
now. Was there any stealing, then ? — ha! ha!" SIj
laughed, — she giggled. " Miss Eyre, this is the young
man that can tell about it. Have you examined your trunks
THE governor's FAMILY. 75
and drawers, girls ? I have heard Plumy Alicia say, says
she, ' It was so,' says she. Ha ! ha ! "
A young lady in the crowd, whom this last obscrvatiou
seemed to. arouse, and to whom it was directed, raised her
hand, and shook her head, as if she would hush Mrs.
Whichcomb, at the same time suffusing her face with
blushes, that might have aroused the attention of anybody
else.
This must be Miss Plumy Alicia Eyre, thought Richard;
and he turned to look at her; and having looked once, he
looked again. She was worth looking at, and she seemed
even to exact an involuntary regard. She blushed, but in
such a way as to make you blush, and then to set you to
looking at her to see why she made you blush. So Richard
found himself looking at her.
She was of good proportions, and of a suggestive and
energetic countenance. Her hair was elaborated into stream-
ing ringlets and flowing plaits. There were showy hoops
in her ears, and glancing rings on her fingers. She had
what are termed speaking eyes, — eyes full of animation,
and brightness, and deliciousness, — and a pair of splendid
dimples. Plumy Alicia, — we call her by the only species
of titular abridgment she tolerated, — Plumy Alicia had no
previous designs on Richard ; but when he looked so ear-
nestly at her, when he seemed so deeply interested in her,
when she saw his handsome figure, and his intelligent face,
some design took root in her. We do her no injustice in
saying this, for it was evident to all who saw her ; and her
own conscience, if it were questioned, would have confessed
it. But she had no time to pursue her arts, for the atten-
tion and person of Richard were called to other things.
Klumpp got into the room ; but he did not see that it was
a sick room, nor that one lay emaciated on the bed and
76 RICHARD EDNEY AND
another sobbing near her ; nor that the old man sat bend-
ing over both of them, with their arms about his neck. He
only saw the old man, and the white arms — the arms lying
between him and the magical tap — interfering with Justice
and Crime. Klumpp undid the arms, and executed the tap,
and then drew back to see the effect. The old man did
not stir. Klumpp then approached, and whispered the
cabalistic words in his ear, " Come with me ! " Still the old
man moved not. He then raised him up, and looked in his
eye. The eye did it. The old man went ; and it was soon
rumored, in all taverns and stables, and all lairs of boys and
boyish men, what an eye Klumpp had ; and everj'body be-
gan to be afraid of Klumpp's eye.
The old man went to his trial. Richard, a leading wit-
ness, must of course go too. He fell in with the crowd
that dogged the steps of Justice. The seat of judgment was
the office of Benjamin Bennington, Esq., the Governor's
son, — or Squire Benjamin, as he was called, — before whom
the complaint was brought.
Captain Creamer testified to such facts as are in posses-
sion of the reader. It was a plain case, and the prisoner
might as well have confessed his guilt ; which in effect,
though not in words, he did do. But what coloring would
the facts bear ? This was the important question, and the
judge felt it to be so. Squire Benjamin reverenced justice,
and he loved mercy. Richard spoke of some things that
the Captain did not know. He alluded to the imbecility of
the old man, to his affection for his grandchildren, to the
straitened circumstances of the family, to the sick one, to
the devoted Junia. Squire Benjamin had sisters, and his
sympathies, — dangerous things in a judge ! — were stirred.
The Captain saw the danger to his cause, and exploded on
the necessity of justice, strict justice, and of quelling the
THE governor's FAMILY. 77
dangerous temper of the times. Richard was again ques-
tioned. He not only answered what was put to him ; he
enlarged on the subject ; he glowed in depicting the exten-
uating circumstances ; he was even eloquent in his enumer-
ation of the several points of interest. The prisoner was
acquitted with a reprimand.
7*
CHAPTER V.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
Richard Edney was born of worthy parents, in an inte-
rior town of the state. Three things — the Family, the
School, and the Church — contributed to the formation
of his mind and development of his character. To the
first, he owed his gentler feelings ; to the second, his ele-
mentary knowledge ; the last aroused his deeper thought,
and determined his spiritual direction. He boiTowed books
from the village library, and newspapers from the postmas-
ter, and had the reading of a weekly paper at his father's
table. A debating club, maintained by the young men of
the place, in which the topics of the times were discussed,
aroused his invention, enlivened his wit, and while it inured
him to habits of investigation, it directed him to some solid
acquisition. At the Academy, he studied the ordinary com-
pends of philosophy and history, and even made a slight
attempt on the Latin tongue. Nor should it be forgotten
that the reading-books in our common schools, comprising
select pieces from the best authors, exert a permanent effect
on the scholar, correcting the taste and enriching the imag-
ination, aflTording at the same time many admirable senti-
ments, and suggesting some profound thought.
Besides, Richard enjoyed the ministrations of an excel-
lent clergyman, a man of refined culture and earnest piety.
Settled in a rural district, the recreations of this gentleman
were gardening, fishing, hunting. In this way, he was
able to pursue more satisfactorily his parochial duties, since
in the fields most of his people found occupation, while in
niCHAED EDNEY, ETC. 7tf
the woods some prosecuted their lumbering operations, and
on the streams lay their mills. In these rambles, the youth
of the parish sometimes joined their pastor; and no one was
more happy to be thus associated than the lad who forms
the leading character of this story. Eichard was thus
introduced to Nature. He conversed with the phenomena
of creation ; he learned the distinctions and varieties of the
animate and inanimate world ; his sense of the beautiful was
heightened, and his love of being in general, to quote a
phrase of the Schools, was developed.
Pastor Harold was not a Christian alone in doctrine and
discourse ; he aimed to be such in works. He believed that
Christianity was designed to redeem mankind, and that the
Church was a chosen instrument of this redemption. He
sou gilt to develop within the Church an Operative Philan-
thropy ; and this principle he applied wherever it could
subserve its great end. The evening religious meetings he
divided into several sorts. In addition to what the Gospel
could do for their souls, he urged it as a serious point upon
his people, what it would make them do for others. In fur-
therance of this plan, different evenings were assigned to
ditlerent subjects : one to Intemperance; one to War; another
to Slavery ; a fourth to Poverty : and the enumeration went
on till it comprised the entire routine of Practical Chris-
tianity. He called these meetings the Church Militant; and
any particular meeting was appointed as a Conference of the
Church. At these Conferences, tracts, newspapers, circulars,
that are apt to cumber a minister's study, were distributed,
and the specific charities of the Church more wisely and
easily apportioned. These meetings were of service to
Richard ; he gained thereby much valuable information, and
was led to a clearer understanding, and a more vital im-
pression, of his duties and responsibilities. He had access
80 RICHARD EDXEY AND
to his Pastor's library, and in some sense to his heart ; so
that in many forms he shared largely in that renovating,
spiritualizing, and exalting influence, which this good man,
from the pulpit, the fields, the evening meeting, and his
study, shed over the town.
In the Sunday-school he learned the rudiments of the
Gospel ; in the services of the sanctuary he was carried
through a still deeper religious experience ; and the ser-
mons to which he listened, and the prayers in which he
engaged, brought him into nearer communion with the
Father of spirits, and confirmed his progress in the Divine
life.
It became not only the motto on the wall of his chamber,
but the deeper aspiration of his heart, To be good, and to
DO GOOD.
Yet his forte was rather physical than intellectual. He
did not go to college, and adopt one of the learned pro-
fessions ; partly, indeed, by reason of pecuniary impediments.
He had no desire to enter a store, and embark his all on
the frail but exciting bottom of commercial avocation. His
ambition was to be a thorough and upright mechanic.
Manual labor pleased him ; and he was skilled in many
forms of it. His father, besides a farm, carried on a saw-
mill, to both of which he trained his son. A well-regulated
farm demands mechanical care, and is an ample field for the
employment of mechanical genius ; as, indeed, it furnishes
scope for the exercise of almost every faculty of the human
mind. Richard had spent one winter amongst the head-
waters of the River, lumbering.
Suretyship, or loss of crops, or whatever it might be,
excepting that it was no vice of his own, troubled his father
in lifting the mortgage that had lain many years on his
farm. One or two instalments were still due ; — they
THE governor's FAMILY. 81
were due the Governor, of whom the original purchase was
made; and Richard came to Woodylin partly for the purpose
of earning the requisite sum. He came, also, with the
desire, not uncommon in the youthful breast, of seeing
more of the world.
He came with good principles and good feelings ; he was
willing to meet the world on fair grounds ; he neither ex-
pected too much, nor did he bid too freely. He sought to
glorify God, and benefit man ; yet was he ignorant, practi-
cally ignorant, of the many arts by which selfishness,
vanity, and the false systems of society, disintegrate charac-
ter, and undermine virtue.
He made engagements with Capt. Creamer in good faith ;
he brake the bottles of the liquor-pedler with a righteous
zeal ; he was irresistibly concerned for the Old Man and his
unfortunate grandchildren; he did not know Clover or Miss
Eyre ; he loved the children of his sister, if the hyperbole
will not be misunderstood, with his whole soul.
CHAPTER VI.
MEMMY AND BEBBY,
Yes, Eichard loved these children ; and loved to be with
them, and to amuse them, and to be amused by them.
After his nap, — for he had had no sleep since the night
before, and many things had happened, in the mean time, to
excite and tire him, — after his nap, he came down into the
kitchen, and sat by the stove. The children began their
pranks, — they could not let them alone. Their mother was
preparing for baking, and she could neither bear their pranks
nor their presence ; so she sent them into the middle of the
room. They could not stop at that, but went clear over to
Uncle Richard's knee, and rebounding thence, they fetched
up with the other side of the room. They seemed to move
together as we imagine the Siamese twins to have done,
when they were children ; having one will and one centre
of gravitation, like boys in a boat, or leaves in a whirlwind.
Then, again, it was evident they had separate wills, and
sometimes a sharp individuality of will would show itself.
Memmy was the oldest, and the strongest, and we should
expect her to lead ofT. So she did; but not always.
Bebby's little individuality was mighty strong when it got
roused, and it made up in storming what it lacked in solid
weight. It was like a cat frightening a great dog by demon-
stration, — sheer demonstration. But Memmy generally
went ahead ; and Bebby wanted to do what Memmy did.
They climbed to the window, and entertained themselves
with the frost that glittered on the glass. Memmy printed
her hand in it ; holding it there till palm, thumb and fingers,
THE governor's FAMILY. 83
melted their image into the glass ; and Bebhy did the same.
It was-cold work, and Bebby's fingers were red ; but she was
persevering; and when Memmy called to Uncle Richard to
look at what she had done, Bebby did so too. Not that
Bebby could speak a word ; but she had a finger that was
full of the energy of utterance ; and she had a scream, too,
that needed no interpretation, and her lips quivered elo-
quence. And then, — as if she possessed neither finger, nor
throat, nor lips, — there was her eye ; that told everything.
Poor piece of dumbness ! she had a superfluity of organs ;
and her eye alone would have made way for her through
the world, sans everything else.
Memmy laid down to it, as we say, and applied her face
to the window, and she produced chin, lips, nose, eye-brows
thereon ; and turning to Uncle Richard, to show him what
she had done, there glared, from the great ice-mountains
which the frost creates on windows, this hideous ice-mask;
and didn't Uncle pretend to be frightened? and didn't
Memmy laugh ? But Bebby got up something as good, and
more humorous ; for she laughed, herself, while she was
making it; and then her mouth was so pinched with the
cold, she could hardly laugh, and tears streamed down
through what she did laugh.
Memmy then took a slate-pencil, and Uncle had to fit
Bebby a sharp stick, and they set to work, scratching figures
in the frost. Memmy efl'ected rude houses, and ruder rings
for heads, and triangular skirts, and points for feet, and
called the whole boys and girls. Bebby scratched at random,
straight lines, and cross lines; but it was all the same to
her, and she meant it to be all the same to everybody else ;
and she, in her way, called it boys and girls and houses,
and her eyes sparkled, her lungs exploded, her frame
vibrated all over, when she told it.
84 RICHARD EDNEY AND
But we must come back of what we have written, a little ;
we are overstating the case. We say Bebby could not
talk ; people generally said so, and we incidentally fell into
the common error. But it would not do to say this before
Memmy; she would be instantly upon you. "Bebby can
talk ; she can say ' Ma, Ma,' and ' No, No,' and ' dum,
dum,' and ' bye, bye,' and * there ! ' She has got teeth,
now ! " It was an old idea of Memmy's that Bebby could
not talk because she had no teeth ; she said the gums cov-
ered her teeth all up, and the words, too. But the teeth
came, — at least, two or three of them got out of their
entanglement, — and then she could talk ; and she did talk.
So declared Memmy ; and when the Mother of the Child
and the Father spoke of its defect and backwardness in
this respect, Memmy always cam.e forward with a stout
demurrer.
We say this, that the children may have full justice ;
and we say it for Richard's sake, who took Memmy's side
in the controversy, and always defended the ground that
Bebby could talk.
Uncle Richard was reading a newspaper, but — the selfish
imps ! — they would not tolerate that ; they would have no
interference with their rights ; they were news enough for
him ; accident and incident ; hair-breadth escapes ; won-
derful discoveries; they were foreign news and domestic
news; they had their poet's corner, and their page of
romance. And they had some original thoughts on per-
petual motion and the quadrature of the circle, and were
crowded with pictorial advertisements of as many strange
things as Barnum has in his Museum.
Bebby was more blond, and soft, and supple, than Memmy,
or than Memmy ever had been. Memmy's hair was darker,
and lay smooth on her head ; but Bebby's was all in a toss,
THE GO\''ERNOR's FAMILY, 85
and always in a toss ; it was not curly, but floccuknt, and
had a pearly lustre, and it hung on her like the fringe of
the smoke-tree, and looked like a ferment of snow, a httle
cloud of snow-dust flying about the room.
Memmy pulled off her shoes and stockings, — this was not
allowed, but mother's back was turned, and Uncle looked on
so smilingly, — and Bobby's were off in a trice ; and they
went pattering and tripping barefoot. Memmy got into the
bed-room, and hid, and cooped; and Bobby found her; and
there were great bursts of astonishment and pleasure. Then
Bebby undertook to do the same ; but she cooped before she
got to her hiding-place, and then she frisked round trying to
find herself, and this made them still more obstreperous.
Mother went out of the room a moment, leaving a bowl
of Indian meal on the table. No sooner did Memmy spy
this, and see the coast clear, than she pushed a chair along-
side the table, and fell to dabbling in the meal. Bebby
must follow suit ; she shoved a chair all the way across
the room, and they both stood on the margin of the meal-
bowl. This was rare sport ; it was something new for
Bebbj'-, — she never had got so far before, — she had never
thrust her hands into meal. Memmy had, — Memmy was
used to it. But Bebby, she was awed, and she was enrap-
tured ; she was on Pisgah's top, and Canaan lay fairly be-
fore her, — only she was a little afraid of Jordan. Why
should she crow so ? Why should she be so all in a trem-
ble ? What did she want of the meal ? But into it she
dove both arms, to the elbows ; she lifted it with her
hand, she crumpled it in her fist, she sifted it through her
fingers; she made piles of it, and scattered them. Then
she looked at her fingers, and on her dress, and on the
tabic ; and when she saw the meal spilled everywhere, she
seemed half frightened. Hadn't she a conscience, and
8
86 RICHARD EDNEY AND
was n't some fiery young Nemesis scourging her inside ? —
Did she love the feeling of the soft powder ? had she a pas-
sion for dust ? would she wallow in the mire, if she had a
chance ? Inexplicable little meal-stirrer ! Memray sprinkled
some on Bebby's head, and Bebby tried to reciprocate the
favor. Mother came back. " Eichard," she screamed,
" how could you let them do so ?" Richard had done noth-
ing about the matter, except to look on. "Wasn't that
enough ? " said she ; " could n't you see it ? did n't you see
it ? " Seizing Bebby by the shoulders, she held the child
square round, for Richard to look at. " Her tire," she con-
tinued, " was span-clean this morning ; her hair is full of it !
O, I shall go off the handle ! Have you no heart, brother ?
Couldn't you feel, as well as see ?" " It is nothing very
bad, I hope," said Richard. " All covered with this dirty
meal ! " exclaimed Roxy. " Your meal is not dirty, is it,
sister?" "Don't joke, brother ! It is a serious case; the
children are forming very bad habits I "
" Habits of what?" asked Richard.
" Habits of getting into things," she replied.
" That is not a bad habit, — is it ? "
"Habits of getting dirty. And I always said, if ever I
had a child, it should be kept clean. If there is anything
in the world most disagreeable, it is a dirty child."
" The children are not disagreeable to me," said Richard.
" The)r are not to me," rejoined his sister; " but they are
to other people."
" It seems to me," added Richard, " I would not trouble
myself much about other people, if I was satisfied myself.
' Other people ' are numerous ; and if the little ones are to be
adjusted to their caprice, I fear they will have a hard time
of it in life, and will wonder what they were born for. Be-
THE governor's FAMILY. 87
sides, ' other people ' are a good ways off, and have really
small concern in Memmy and Bebby."
" We do not know how far off they are, any more than
we do death ; and we ought always to be prepared, as Elder
Jabson says. If Mrs. Mellow should call, — oh Eichard ! —
Wash your face, Memmy ! — I am expecting callers to-day.
I want you to kinHle a fire in the air-tight in the parlor."
Richard went on this errand, and the children followed
him. But their mother drew them back, saying, " You
shall not go into the parlor ! I have often told you not to go
into the parlor. I always said, if ever I had a child, it
should not go into the parlor. I will have one place in the
house fit to be in ! "
The room, into which Richard had not been before,
acquired all at once a singular consequence to his eye. He
looked carefully around it; he walked softly over it, as if
some rare mystery lurked in the midst of it. It was the
largest room in the house, and apparently the most open
and pleasant. It had windows enough, at least, to favor the
notion of light and freedom ; four of them, that must com-
mand fine views, — views, when the curtains were up, and
the ice and snow were gone. In the mean while, as a sub-
stitute for these out-of-door objects, the curtains afforded
certain attempts at scenery, — a yellow castle, a whittling of
a stream of water ; and on the west side, right in face of the
sunset, was a picture of the sun setting in a botch of green
paint. The room was well furnished with sofa, carpet,
looking-glass, cane-bottomed chairs ; a mahogany card-table
stood under the looking-glass, containing books, a card-bas-
ket, a small solar lamp, and several daguerreotypes. The
mantel-piece was decorated with plated candlesticks, a blue-
tinted cologne-bottle, a bouquet of wax flowers, and a stromb
shell.
88 RICHARD EDNEY A^'D
Richard inspected the contents of the table. He found
the books were gifts, gilded and embossed, — most of them
old ones, and such as his sister received before her marriage.
There were also little books, Christmas presents of the
father to the children. On the sofa lay a cloak and shawl,
and a leghorn bonnet, trimmed wdth green, and lined with
flowers.
"Well," thought Richard, " nothing veiy terrible in this."
Now, our friend was naturally of a serious turn of mind ;
but somehow, at this time, lighter feelings came over him,
and he might have gone as far as a certain Methodist young
man did, who was obliged to confess to his class-leader the
sin of perpetrating a joke. At least, he went so far as to
pretend to joke — pretend to see the ludicrous side of things.
" What can there be in the parlor to render it so frightful ?
Will the chairs fall to pieces ? " He shook a couple of
them. "Are there trap-doors in the floor, to let the children
through ? " He tried two or three places, springing down
with his whole weight on his heels. " Perhaps the harem-
scarems will have the walls down on their heads ! " He
sounded different parts with his fist. "Would the curtain-
pictures terrify them ? That is possible, but it were easy
to roll up the curtains, and there would be a fine view from
the windows. Yes," he continued, " this must be very fine,
in summer. What a lake the dam makes ! it would hold
a thousand like father's. The houses and gardens, trees
and mountains, beyond, must be very fine." The world
without sobered him, and so occupied him he did net per-
ceive the entrance of the children. Somehow they had got
into the room, and Memmy was running to show her Christ-
mas present, and Bebby had climbed the sofa, and got her
mother's bonnet on backside before, and her gloves palm
side up, and was trying to -wrap herself in the cloak.
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY. »y
•Richard's humor had not so far evaporated but he enjoyed
the sight of Bebby, and particularly when she thrust her
hands through the cloak, with the thumbs on the ofT-side,
and the fingers looking as if they would be glad to accom-
modate the little usurper, but had laughed themselves to
death in the attempt, and had no strength left. But this
was recreation at too great cost ; too great for the mother,
who bolted into the room, and soon had her ambitious child
deplumed, and restored to its proper simplicity.
" It troubles you, Roxy," said Richard.
"It does," she answered; "and I think you and Asa are
not considerate, — not considerate of what we women en-
dure. You act as if we had n't any feelings ! "
" You mean, the children act so."
" The children would not act so if they were only rightly
governed ; and there can be no government when the men
do not take hold and help the women. — Get down from the
sofa, Memmy ! I have given you positive orders never to
get on there."
" What is the sofa made for ? " asked Richard.
" Not for children to dirty and wear out with their feet.
We shall have nothing fit for company long, at this rate.
— Put up that book ! "
" It is my present," replied the child ; " papa gave it to
me."
"It is yours to keep, not to be torn up," answered the
mother.
Richard began to think there was some fact in what he
had regarded as fiction, and that there was danger to the
children in the parlor. They touched the card-table, and
their hands were snatched off; they climbed into the chairs,
and were hastily taken down ; they approached the walls,
and were warned away ; and presently, as if the floor itself
8^
90 RICHARD EDNEY AND
might prove treacherous, and let them incontmently into the
cellar, they were driven from the room.
The street-bell rang, and Richard was desired to go to
the door. He found there two ladies, one of whom sur-
prised him a little in the person of Miss Plumy Alicia
Eyre. They were shown to the parlor, where his sister
introduced them. The one whom he had never seen was
Mrs. Cyphers. Miss Eyre had on a small white silk bon-
net, with pink linings, and richly ribboned in the same
color ; a swan's-down victorine floated on her neck ; her
hands were quietly hidden in an African lynx muff. Mrs.
Cyphers wore a straw bonnet, with plaid trimmings; a
drab-colored sack, heavily fringed; and she was further
insured against the weather by a genet muff and tippet.
What did these ladies want ? To make a call ; to dis-
charge a ceremony ; to demonstrate their friendly feelitig ;
to talk about the weather, and say how cold the morning
had been, but that it was growing warmer ?
Miss Eyre inquired for the children, observing, at the
same time, that ]\Irs. Munk had two of the handsomest
children in town.
Now, Mrs. Munk began to be in her element ; now she
would triumph ; now she would show Richard the advan-
tage of keeping children neat. Uncle went for the dar-
lings. Alas for the uncertainty of human expectations,
and the probability that one will not conquer just when he
thinks he is going to ! The children had been to the wet
sink, — then they had got the ash-hole door open, and poked
out the ashes, and nibbled at the coals. But Uncle Rich-
ard, — hard-hearted man! — brought them in just as they
were I What consternation ! His sister would have gone
into hysterics; but Miss Eyre and Mrs. Cyphers said the
children were beautiful, — would take them into their laps,
THE governor's FAMILY. 91
and would kiss them, and all that ; and Uncle Richard
would not take them away ; nay, he seemed determined
that Memmy should go into Miss Eyre's lap, and Bebby
into Mrs. Cyphers'.
This scene was soon ended, and the children dismissed ;
and both Miss Eyre and Mrs. Cyphers seemed more lively
than ever, after it. Both were delighted with the children ;
and to such an extent did they carry their good feelings,
that even Mrs. Munk was willing to drop the subject from
her mind ; and she soon recovered from her humiliation.
" Little things," said Miss Eyre.
" Not worth minding," added Mrs. Cyphers.
" They are not little things," rejoined Richard ; " and I
do mind them."
" You are joking, Mr. Edney," said Plumy Alicia, who
sat next to Richard, on the sofa, and turned her face towards
him engagingly.
" He dotes on the children," observed his sister, who be-
gan to think they would account her brother a dunce ; " and
he has some strange notions about them."
" I thought our young men were not capable of serious
emotion," said Plumy Alicia, — " that they had no deep feel-
ing." The swan's-down victorine, falling from her shoul-
ders and touching his hand, was very soft. There was
tenderness in her Avords, that touched him too. Was he
prepared to meet those fascinations, of which he had ob-
scurely heard ? Why did he look so at her ? Would he
fathom the nature of that power which had, like some invis-
ible engine, shaken the Mill ? Was he so ignorant of him-
self as to suppose he could handle that fire and not be
burned ? But Miss Eyre was engaged to Clover, and he
would only look at her as a strange, singular being, who
was soon to be married to an equally mysterious man.
92 KICIIARD EDNEY AND
Was she ignorant of the power she was capable of exert-
ing ? Was she insensible of the precise moment when it
took effect ? We should answer both these questions in the
negative.
Miss E}Te was one who in certain circles would be reputed
somewhat coarse, — somewhat unlettered. She certainly-
had not that refinement which a more thorough study, and
training in some other form of society, ordinarily impart.
Yet Richard was not in a state to discriminate on these
points ; or, rather, so far as he was curious at all, he attend-
ed not so much the manner as the hidden force and char-
acter of the lady.
It had been rumored that Captain Creamer was a rejected
suitor of Miss Eyre's; indeed, so much as this had been inti-
mated in Richard's hearing at the Mill, — a circumstance
that shed fresh interest on what sat near him.
But what were these things to Richard ? Nothing,
nothing at all ; and he would probably have never thought
of them except, — what we foreboded, — except for the
swan's-dov\Ti victorine, and that piercing, flattering ej^e.
" Did I not see you in the crowd at Whichcomb's, this
morning ? " she asked. Richard answered that he was there.
"They said you were there in the night," she continued;
"but I could not believe it." He replied that the Captain
obliged him to keep guard over the old man. " You had
pleasant prisoners," she said. " They are sadlj' in trouble,"
replied Richard. " Sad to be arraigned as common thieves,"
was the answer.
Richard dropped the victorine as if it had been a cold toad,
and walked towards the stove. " Would you bring that
against them ? " he asked.
" Not that alone, — not that, without other things," replied
Miss Eyre. " I know what poverty is ; I am not ashamed
THE governor's FAMILY. 93
to say I have been poor ; my only boast is, that I have risen
above difficulties."
Kichard was again touched, but he did not resume his
seat on the sofa.
" They are poor," he said.
"Yes," she replied, "but that is not all."
" Proud, perhaps you would add ?"
" I am proud ; I would not give much for a person that
has no pride."
" "What do you mean ? " pursued Richard.
" I mean," she answered, " that they have felt above their
work, — that they would rather do anything than work."
" You do not mean that they are vicious ? "
" I do not mean to say that. They came here poor, and
they have continued poor. But they could not find society
good enough in the Factories, nor in the weave-room, nor
in the superintendent's house ; and they were but spoolers.
Now, Mrs. Cyphers was the wife of a superintendent ; and
in alluding to a house of that name, Miss Eyre played off
the glossy end of her victorine on the person of that lady,
as much as to say, " You see what a woman they rejected.
It seemed," continued she, "as if nothing short of Dr.
Chassford's, or Judge Burp's, or the Governor's, would satisfy
them."
" I do not know these people," replied Richard, " nor do I
appreciate the distinctions to which you refer."
" You will know," replied Miss Eyre. " You have not
been in the city long. They attended Dr. Broadwell's
Church, as if they were as good as the people that go there."
" Is not the Church one ? " asked Richard. " Are not all
the Churches equal ? "
" Mr. Edney surely cannot be so ignorant," rejoined the
lady, with a smile. " The Church is not one ; it is far
94 RICHARD EDNEY AND
from being one. It is a good many. Some of the Churches
are aristocratic, while others keep on the level of common
people."
" Is not Dr. Broadwell a good man ?"
" He may be, for all that I know."
" Are not his people good people ? "
" That is nothing to the point. They are haughty, fash-
ionable, high-stomached."
" There may have been other reasons why these girls
liked to attend there."
" I dare say there are ; I dare say J unia could give you
fifty reasons. She has a tongue of her own ! "
" She did say no clergj^man had been to see them."
" Nothing more likely," interposed Mrs. Cj'phers. " They
boarded a while at Swindler's ; 'then they went to Cain's,
and finally they got up to Whichcomb's ; and no mortal
could tell where they would come out, they rose so fast."
" Whichcomb's is higher than Swindler's ? " observed
Richard.
" Half a dollar a week higher," replied Mrs. C}T)hers.
" Pies for breakfast higher, — an extra course of a Sunday
higher; to say nothing of Mrs. Whichcomb's jellies and
cream. / boarded at Whichcomb's, I would have you to
know, until our marriage."
" There would seem to be aristocracy among the board-
ing-houses," said Richard,
" Who would not try to keep above the mean, ignorant,
stupid Swindler's ? " asked Mrs. Cyphers. " And there is a
difference, Sir, there is a difference between the weave-room
and the warping-room, — between a dresser and a grinder;
and, though I say it that should n't say it, between a super-
intendent's wife and the watchman's wife."
"All have the liberty to rise that wish to? " said Richard.
THE GOVERNOK'S FAMILY. 95
" All that deserve to ! " replied Miss Eyre, casting a
searching, but rather equivocal, glance at Richard.
But Richard did not notice it; he was thinking of the
Orphans. " Violet is very sick." The ladies assented.
" She needs attentions."
"If Junia does not engross them all," added ]\Iiss Eyre.
She added this in a way that sjie meant to be playful ; but
Richard took it quite seriously.
" You are unjust to them," said Richard ; — he said this
sternly.
" We would not be," replied Miss Eyre, deprecatingly.
Richard added nothing.
" We have other calls in hand," said Miss Eyre, " and
must bid you good-morning."
They left the house ; Miss Eyre went out with that
calmness which dignified sorrow can so well assume. But
Richard was not moved.
Having discovered where the Orphans were wont to wor-
ship, he would go and see the minister of the church. He
found the reverend gentleman at home. Doctor Broadwell
was of mature years, — indeed, a little past the meridian of
life. But time, that crowned him with virtues and honors,
had raised the summit so high, — if the little^iece of fancy
will be tolerated, — the top of it was covered with snow.
He was gray. The lines on his forehead were marks of
strength not less than of age ; they indicated rather the
vigor of thought than the corrosions of decay; like the
furrows of the sea, which are large and deep only because
the sea is large and deep. His face shone with benevolence,
that cheered and vivified whatever object it alighted upon,
and invited to its beams all sorrow, want and desolateness.
The Doctor replied to Richard that two girls, with an old
man, had been seen at his church, and partaken of his com-
96 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
munion; that he had endeavored to see them, but could
not trace them, and would be glad to be conducted to their
room.
They went to Whichcomb's, where Richard parted with
the minister, and returned home.
CHAPTER VII.
In popular phrase, the back of the winter was broken.
The weather became milder, the mornings grew a little
longer, and the evenings a little shorter, and the sun at noon
mounted a trifle higher. The vulgar distich runs thus —
" When the days begin to lengthen,
The cold begins to strengthen."
This is true of the few weeks immediately succeeding the
Solstice. But in the latter part of February, and towards
March, the change to which we have referred is so percep-
tible, that the popular voice changes, — "What mild
weather ! How warm it is ! " though it is winter still ; but
winter maimed — winter inefficient.
At these times Richard went out more during the day.
He had, indeed, turned night into day, and was obliged to
sleep partly by sunlight ; but he could secure what rest he
required, and still have some hours to spare. These were
his perquisites, and he employed them as he chose.
One day, as he entered the mill, he encountered Mr.
Gouch, Silver, and Philemon, his fellow night's men, and
he saw another person, whom he had not seen before,
striding a log. " That," whispered Mr. Gouch, " is Clover;
don't go near him ! " But Richard could not be easy
when he knew Clover was near ; at least, he could not keep
his eyes or his thoughts still. He looked at Clover;
looked quite intently at him. " Don't let him see you
looking at him ! " said Mr. Gouch. Well, Richard must
RICHARD EDNEY AND
look at him all the more, — only he did it furtively, and by
snatches. What did he behold ? A man with a very care-
less, indifferent manner, bordering on malapertness and
doughtiness. His face was one that could be easily identi-
fied. His lower lip rowdyishly protruded; it was a pouch
containing a quid of tobacco as large as a pullet's egg. His
upper lip was deeply indented at each corner, making two
niches, where scorn and derision were seated. He held a
cant-dog, with which he amused himself, drawing frightful
figures in the saw-dust on the floor : then he teazed a butter
with it, making as if he would thrust it under his axe. He had
on a Shakspeare hat, with the rim turned up at the sides, and
a silver buckle in front ; and the hat was tilted so much on
his head, it seemed as if it would fall off. His dress con-
sisted of a blue-striped shirt with a large collar, a double-
breasted vest, and a mottled Guernsey jacket. But what,
perhaps, would chiefly arrest the notice of a stranger was
his hair; — his 'whole head seemed to have gone to hair; it
hung in long, coarse folds, like a mop ; it came out along
his cheeks, and under his nose and chin. It was bright
red; and his srtiall, gray eye gleamed in the midst of it,
like a pig's eye. Not only did he annoy the butter with
the cant-dog, but, intermitting this fancy, he would occasion-
ally double his fist at the poor man, straightening his chest,
drawing up and squaring at him, as if he would fight him.
He bent his fist inwards and upwards, thus tightening the
cords of his wrist, and stiffening the skin on his knuckles ;
and in this strained attitude he played it up and down, now
inclining it towards his victim, and then thvunping it
against the log on which he sat ; letting off", apparently, a
vast amount of force and dismay into the insensible wood.
The butter took all this patiently, either from indifference
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY. »S#
to Clover, or out of terror of him — Richard could not tell
which.
Most of -the hands were, or affected to be, afraid of Clo-
ver. Richard was inquisitive as to the secret of the man's
power — whether it lay in his manner, or his character.
Nor was his interest cooled by observing that Clover flung
several significant glances at himself, and did some feats of
fist, which he evidently meant Richard should give a per-
sonal interpretation to.
He asked Mr. Gouch to introduce him ; but the timorous
head-stock man declined the service. When Richard per-
sisted, and said he would speak with Clover, Silver sprang
at his throat, as if he would choke him, and told him to keep
still. Philemon made as if Silver was in earnest, and said
he had Richard within an inch of his life, and it was his
dutj' to stop so dangerous an affray.
Clover himself started at this, and called out for fair play,
or something of the sort. " It is all play," said Richard ;
" do not be alarmed." " I am not alarmed," replied Clover,
resuming his seat on the log, and discharging the cavity of
his lower lip, which ever, like a boiling spring, was inclined
to run over. " I should like to see the man that tells me I
am alarmed ; new comer or old comer, — slip-tender or
head-stock man ! "
Richard, going towards Clover, replied, " Silver was in
sport."
" 0/ course," rejoined Clover; "he dare do nothing else
but be in sport, o/" course. You may make a mark there, .if
you will ! "
" I believe I have your place in the mill," said Richard;
" possibly you would like to take it again."
" I shall take it whenever I please," returned Clover.
100 RICHARD EDXEY AND
" As soon as you are able to take it, I will relinquish it
to you."
" Able ! " he retorted ; " I am able when I please to be
able. Check that ! "
" Have you entirely recovered ? " asked Richard.
"Recovered!" He echoed the word with a very sharp
sarcasm playing about his upper lip, which Richard did not
see any necessity for.
" You have been sick ? " Richard asked.
" Worse than that, — I have been indisposed."
" I thought you were sick."
" 0/ course, I meant you should think so, — I meant the
Captain should think so, — I meant the whole Mill should
think so. Trig that, and take breath ! "
" I am ready to go on again," replied Richard, waggishly.
" Do you mean to insult me, Edney ? " asked Clover, his
eyes flashing fire.
" Do you mean to insult me ?" replied Richard.
" How insult you ? "
" By making me believe you were sick, when j'ou were
not sick."
" I can give myself to you in one word, Edney ; I can
convey the whole in a single phrase ; I am a man of honor ;
I wish to be honorable. Tie a knot there ! "
" I will," rephed Richard ; " and then I must ask you
how you can call such conduct honorable."
" Enlargement, aggrandizement, glorj^, fame, are natural
to the human breast ; they are natural to my breast. Power,
might, are honorable ; and these I study to exercise. To
make you believe I am sick, when I am sick, is nothing, — a
child could do that ; but if I can make you believe I am sick,
when I am not sick, — if I can make the Captain believe it,
THE governor's F'Amily. ; ],Q1
and the whole Mill believe it, — I do something; I exercise
power ; I am enlarged ! "
Clover had the habit of talking sometimes apparently in
Italics, sometimes in small caps, and occasionally mounting
as high as canon. We would do him typographical justice.
" You would not lie ? " observed Richard.
"Lie! lie!" replied Clover; "Z/e.' hem! hum! You
mistake. 'T is means, means ! "
" It is lying," remarked Richard.
" If you were in an enemy's country, Avould you stick at
what you call a lie, to secure your conquest ? Did not
our troops tell, utter, manufacture, publish, a hundred lies,
in Mexico ? Are they to be taunted with lying ? I am
in Mexico ; I am in an enemy's country, and I shall lie to
further my victories : but are you mean enough — have you
no nicer sense of honor than to asperse my acts with the
villanous epithets which a bilious stomach and morbid
imagination know so well how to supply ? Power is sweet ;
might is glorious ; — it gives a man reputation ; it affords him
security ; it protects him from assault. Look round you ;
there is not one in all this mill, from Tillington, of the Cor-
poration, down to Jim Grisp, the shingle-sticker, that dares
touch me. I have acquired this respect simply by the exer-
cise of my power, — by demonstrating to the world the deep
energies of my nature and character." In saying this, he
gored the air, with his tense, vice-like fist, hi the vicinity of
Richard, and even extended it almost to Richard's nose.
Richard shook his head, not violently, not disdainfully,
but rather abstractedly, as a man who is reading does when
a fly alights on his face. Clover had a trick of snapping
his fist, springing it suddenly in the joint of the wrist, as
boys do the blade of a pocket-knife. He snapped it at
Richard, who moved a little in his seat. " Perhaps you do
9*
M/^\'' '■'■'.' , EFPA^D SDNEY AND
not like the smell of it ? " said Clover. " I cannot say that
I do," replied Richard. " Very likelj^" he added ; " and
the taste of it would be still more disagreeable. But I de-
sign you no harm. The air is free ; and what my arm can
compass is mine. I know I am on the borders of my land.
I do not wish to get up a fight with you, or any one ; but if
your nose happens to come within the radius of my fist, —
that is, if you are lying within the proper limit of my power,
— why, take care of yourself, Sir, take care of yourself !
Forewarned, forearmed. I trust you will regard it an in-
stance of my honorable disposition, that I give you this
friendly precaution."
" I think you trespass on neighbors' rights a little," ob-
served Richard. " At least, you are on disputed territory."
" I know I am," he rejoined ; " I know I am ; and where
was Resaca de la Palma? Where was Palo Alto?
There is no great action except on disputed territory ; no
reputation is acquired anywhere else."
The fist continued to exhibit its feats, and to extend its
familiarities a little too near Richard's sense of dignity. He
laid his hand on the fist, — his open hand, — softly and
modestly. He found it a hard and horny fist ; and in other
respects it had a bovine suggestion ; for, like the horn of an
ox, no matter how softly and modestly you grasp it, it is
sure to toss, and wrench, and tear from your hand ; — so
this fist resisted the gentlest pressure ; it grew more stiff,
it hunched violently upwards, grazing Richard's nose, and
hitting the forepiece of his cap, knocked it off."
"I would rather you should not do that," said Richard;
" I should very much prefer that you would not repeat it.
I must respectfully request you to attempt it again in no
form whatever."
" I did not think of knocking up a fight," rejoined Clover.
THE governor's FAMILY. 103
•' I am no brute, — I am a man of honor ; I am ready to
negotiate. Shall we adjourn to the Arbor ? Helskill's is
good ground for an amicaWe adjustment."- Richard would
not go to the Arbor. " Well," added Clover, " if you obsti-
nately reject the only method of conciliation that I can with
honor to myself tender, the consequences be on your own
head. But I am not rash ; I will not even take advantage
of methods of redress which all usage puts in my hands. I
can be lenient. Will you have a cigar ? " Richard declined.
"Don't be mulish," continued Clover. "Will you lift
with me?" " I will," said Richard. "There is a good-
sized hemlock stick ; if you will manage one end, we will
throw it on the stocks." " I am ready," replied Richard,
The saAvj^ers consented to the trial, and gauged the car-
riage to the log in question. " Take that end," said
Clover. " This is the butt," replied Richard. " I know
it is," returned Clover, " and I meant it should be." " All
right," said Richard, " if you will take hold as far in from
the other end as to make the balance good." "I will not
be dictated to, in this affair," retorted Clover, and applied
himself to the extremity of the smallest end. "You take
the butt," said Richard, " and I will lift where the trial
shall be a fair one." Clover refused.
By this time the mill-men had collected to see what was
going on. Richard stated the case to them, and then
repeated his offer to Clover. Clover disdained to concede,
or to parley. " 'T was an honorable proposal," said he, —
" nothing said about ends, — I will have none of this whin-
ing, — he cannot gammon me ! "
"Will you lift fairly, or will you not?" asked Richard.
" I shall lift it as I please," returned Clover.
" Then I brand you," said Richard, " for a cheat, a brute,
and a coward ; — put a pin in there ! I cannot blacken you.
104 RICHARD EDXEY AST)
, — you are too black already ; I should only like to have you
' see how black you ac^ ; — put a spike in there ! Your con-
duct is despicable as your principles are monstrous ; — I rec-
ommend to you to drive a slide-dog there, and go home ! "
The bystanders were a good deal excited. Mr. Gouch
hopped from log to log, as if they were in the water, and he
was. afraid of sinking. Silver, in a paroxysm of astonish-
ment and delight, let his pipe fall from his mouth. Some
were amused ; others manifested a disposition to rally for
the defence of Richard, if Clover should attack him.
But Clover had no such intentions. He had not made up
his mind to be offended. He seemed to recognize a rival in
the field ; and since he could not easily demolish him, he
accounted it wise to come to an understanding of his qual-
ity, and ascertain his intentions.
" I applaud your spirit, Edney," said he, " though j'ou
misjudge me. I shall think the better of you. I should like
to know more of you. Will you try a game of checkers ? "
Now, it was contrary to immemorial and sacred mill usage
to decline a game of this sort, when the men were at leisure.
Richard might have foregone further intimacy with the
man ; but the others, desirous that he should not carry mat-
ters too far, hoped he would play. Perhaps he wished to
know more of Clover, — for he had a good deal of humani-
tarian curiosity. He consented to the proposal.
They took a bench by the stove, with the draught-
board between them. Clover was an experienced player,
and so. was Richard ; but it soon appeared the minds of both
were too much occupied for that deliberation which is need-
ful either for the display of skill or the attainment of suc-
cess. Their moves w^ere made at random, and an acci-
dental jar of the board served to confuse the whole plan of
actign, without, at the same time, awakening the surprise
THE GOVERNOE's FAMILY. 105
of either. In fact, they were thinking' more of each other
than of what was before them. " Where are we now ? "
said Richard. " I don't know," answered Clover ; " my
pieces are on the floor."
Richard nursed some questions that he wanted to put to
Clover. And, as the loungers had left the mill, and he was
sitting confidentially near him, he could not resist the oppor-
tunity of broaching what lay on his mind.
"What ails Silver?" he asked.
" He fell beneath my hands'. " replied Clover.
" What do you mean by that ? " asked Richard.
" His ambition fell, his affections fell, his excessive thirst
for acquisition fell," rejoined Clover, who had lighted a
cigar, cocked his hat, and made some eflfort towards getting
his fist into operation.
" How did it come about ? "
" I entered and took possession of a valuable prize he
coveted."
" What was it ? "
" Miss Plumy Alicia Eyre."
" Did he love her?"
" Of course he did; I should not care to meddle in the
thing, if he had not loved her, and if she had not been an
object to be loved."
" You cut him out ? "
" That is the cant phrase. The simple truth lies here : —
woman is given to man for possession on his part, and pro-
tection on hers. The man who can furnish the best guaran-
tees, in these two particulars, is the favored man ; and the
most desirable woman falls to the most favored man, — that
is, to the strongest man. I am such a man, and Silver is
not. Of course. Miss Eyre preferred to be allied to me,
rather than remain in Silver's hands. She knew that her
106 RICHARD EDNEY AND
true dignity and glory lay in this breast, within these
WHISKERS ! "
" Had Silver no feelings ? "
" What has he to do with feelings ? Why does he not
conquer his feelings ? Why does he not let the will of God
be done to his feelings ? "
" Was she consulted in the premises ? "
"Of course she was, — and she declared for me."
" Was there an engagement between them ? "
" There may have been something of that sort. She
came here a poor, defenceless girl, and was naturally inter-
ested in any one that would be interested in her. Silver
attached himself to her, made her presents, and won over
her ignorance and childishness. I took her under my pro-
tection."
" But Silver suffers."
" The weak always suffer ; it is their misfortune ; we can
pity them. I see you have a noble nature, Edney ; a na-
ture that is not insensible even to what Silver may endure.
It is honorable in you."
" He bleeds inwardly, I think."
" Bleeds ! what is that ? The Indians bleed when their
lands are torn from them, — the slaves bleed when their
children are sold. What hurt does a little bleeding do ? "
" But is there no right in the case ? "
" Most assuredly. Might makes right. Behold how that
saw cuts through the heart and surface of that monster
pine. Behold the majestic Scott cutting his way through
the heart of Mexico ; — veins, arteries, legs, arms, like saw-
dust, lie on either side of him ; he arrives at the Halls of the
Montezumas in a foam of blood ! that proud nation is
humiliated at our feet ! I have gone through Silver's heart.
When I was in it, I felt that I was there, — I felt the warm
THE governor's FAMILV. 107
blood spouting about me, — I knew I severed the tenderest
part of his being ; but, Sir, I attained my end, — I got Miss
Eyre. They gave a dinner to Captain Bragg. I offer
' Clover,' as your next toast.
" Do you intend to build ? "
" I may build, and I may not build."
"It is given out that you are going to."
" I know it is, — I meant it should be. The dimension*
are on the fender-post."
•' But would you deceive ? "
" If I could make it honorable, I would deceive ; if my
interest were advanced thereby, if my power was augment-
ed, I should deceive. Deceive! The Church deceives,
when it can make by it. Edney, you don't know the dear,
lovely, charming sense of power."
" How does the Church deceive ? "
" Does n't it declare that St. Athanasius' Creed can bs
proved by most certain warrants of Scripture, and ought to
be thoroughly received ? Who believes that ? "
" Possibly you would falsify your promises to Miss Eyre
herself?"
" Falsify ! I should certainlj'- retreat from my engage-
ments, if I found them difficult or disagreeable. I must be
sovereign within my own sphere ; and my sphere is what
my abilities naturally comprise, or what my endeavors can
conquer. I am fated to spread, — I am fated to spreao,
Edney ! I might include even another with Miss Plumy
Alicia."
"You are not so unprincipled. You would not pretend
fidelity to Miss Eyre, and at the same time be making over-
tures to another."
" What if I had tioo loomen in my train? I should ap-
pear to the world in a more formidable light, as a man dan-
109 RICHARD EDNEY AND
gerous to be trifled with, and yet a perfect refuge for
oppression."
"I believe you are a scoundrel, Clover, — utterly, and
beyond redemption."
" You do well to tell me so ; — it will not hurt you ; it may
relieve you. You do not know the deliciousness, the ma-
jesty of Power. See that saw, — behold yonder dam, —
think of six run of stone in the Grist-mill, — enumerate
all the engines in the Machine-shop, — contemplate nine
hundred thousand spindles in the Factories, and understand
Avhat Power is. Meditate on this fist of mine, — look into
my eye, — take the dimensions of my whiskers, — survey the
expansiveness of my chest, and learn what POWER is. Im-
agine what it would be to be possessed of the same. Imag-
ine yourself a Clover ! What a wonder is that Tom Hyer !
I have sometimes fancied myself a Hyer, and should like to
find my Sullivan. I have toughened my hands, — I have
employed two Irishmen to rub my body, — I have smeared
my face with an indurating compound. I should like to have
a Sullivan chasing me from saw to saw, from Mill to Board-
ing-house, from Quiet Arbor to Victoria-square ! Under-
take Sullivan, and your Hyer will be on hand ! "
"I may prove a Sullivan," replied Richard; "I may
chase you."
"If, then, you provoke me to it; if we come fairly to
blows, — I must be plain with you, and use plain words, —
you will get all-firedly licked ; — take note, take note ! "
" That is my look-out," returned Richard. " I shall be
plain with you. You are committing an uncommon amount
of rascality with Silver ; you are equally perfidious in respect
of Miss Eyre. And I shall pursue you in that matter until,
most likely, we come to blows. Then, all I have to say to
you is, ' Hardest, fend off ! ' I shall attempt to disgorge you
THE governor's FAMILY. 109
of some of j'our ill-gotten possessions, and diminish the su-
perfluity of your power. I am a stranger in the place, — a
stranger to goings on here, — a stranger to all parties con-
cerned. But 5'ou have introduced me to a measure of
wickedness sufficient to move me, — sufficient to resolve
me."
" I sought you as a noble antagonist."
" I do not intend to be a disguised or a m.ean one."
" Will you go with me to Quiet Arbor ? "
"What' for f"
" To exchange tokens of friendly understanding, and hon-
orable emulation."
" Over a glass of sling ? "
" Yes, and a game of whist."
" You gamble ? "
" I recreate, recreate ! "
" Who is with you ? "
" A select company, of course ; Captain Creamer, Web-
ster Chassford, Glendar, — all worthy m.en, — all charm-
ing acquaintances, — the best families in the cit}'. We
meet in the Grotto, — a cool and pleasant retreat ; Helskdl is
polite, gentlemanly, noble ; yes, I would say of Helskill,
that he is most noble, — that in him cluster every attribute
and all the beauty of an honorable mind."
" I am obliged to you for this information," said Eichard,
" and I will make good use of it."
" That is well uttered, Edney. If I must meet you as an
enemy, let us be fair enemies. But I must caution you on
one point, — Let Miss Eyre alone ! " He said this in a hard-
breathed undertone. " Don't meddle with that, — don't
go near that, — death catch you if you do ! I will not
touch my thumb to my nose, as modem writers recommend,
10
110 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
in tol<en that we understand one another; — I will rub my
fist on your nose, to signify that I "
Eichard brushed off the fist, and rising from his seat, said,
" No symbols are needed ; we do understand each other,"
and left the mill.
CHAPTER VIII.
A STROLL THROTTGH THE CITY.
Richard, we have said, had leisure during the day. This
leisure he would turn to account; he would look about the
city. Richard, we need not say, loved to read ; he had
read not a little for a simple, agricultural lad, and he was
always glad to get new books. Pity he should not have
them, when there is such an abundance. Richard had
been over the world at some length, in his geographies and
histories ; he had travelled with attention and with profit ;
yet with his own feet and walking-stick he had measured
but a few leagues of human affairs, — the merest crumb of
the great ball. He had never been in the business streets
of Woodylin, nor in its fashionable squares. So he sallied
forth, one sunny morning, to reconnoitre.
Woodylin consisted of two portions, — the Old and the
New Town, — divided by the River. The New Town com-
prised the Factories and Saw-mills, which lay in a graceful
and polite bend of the stream. Yet both sides lived in har-
mony, and strangers used to say but one pulse beat there,
whether in the head or feet. Nevertheless, fancy and caprice
must dash this pleasant cup of unity with a little variety.
As the New Town increased in size, and perhaps in conceit,
since it possessed many picturesque spots, and indulged in
much picturesque promise, its inhabitants called it the
Beauty of Woodylin. It became a standing quip (or one to
say he did not live in Woodylin, but in the Beauty of it.
If one side was the city proper, the other would seem
112 HICHARD EDNEY AND
to be the city improper. It would not stop at this ; it
meant to be the city more proper. It erected a School-
house unequalled in the municipality. It hoped to do
many more things ; but it is not so easy to work with hopes,
as with a well-earned fruition ; it had nothing equal to Victo-
ria-square. Elder Jabson's Church was on the Beauty side.
Here was one of the Printing-offices, to which we may
again refer. On this bank, also, was the Light-house, —
a circumstance that originated innumerable smart sayings.
The Custom-house divided its favors with both shores.
The Beauty people built an Athenaeum, founded a library,
and supported a course of lectures, to match the Lyceum
across the River. Here also a division of the Sons of Tem-
perance had sumptuous apartments. Yet as the sun and
rain, summer and winter, were alike on both sides of the
valley, so the greater interests, affections, and preferences
of the people, coalesced.
The Beauty side afforded less to engage the curiosity of
a country youth, like Richard, than the other. So he
crossed the stream. In a rambling way, he paused to look
into a precinct, known as Knuckle Lane ; — a dismal region,
the sewer of poverty, filth and wretchedness, — a sort of
Jews' quarter, where the cast-off clothes of the city — its
old houses, old garments, old furniture, old horses — were
collected, and if not exposed for sale, were certainly exposed
to everything else.
Now, Richard's teacher at the Village High School incul-
cated this doctrine among his scholars, — that they should
use in after life the knowledge they acquired at school ; and
to the Geography class he particularly addressed himself, and
told them that when they saw new objects, they should
associate them with the places whence they came ; that if at
any time they were abroad, they should recall, not only the
THE governor's FAMILY. 113
origin, but the history and use, of what they saw. " For
instance," — and thus he illustrated his meaning, — "this
penknife is from England, — you know where England is;
this silk cravat is from France. The tea your mother uses
is from China ; vain and extravagant dressing is from a
wicked heart ; " — he would laugh when he said this ; —
" rum is from the Devil." So he instructed them on vari-
ous points, especially holding to the main one, that they
should keep their eyes open, — ever be seeing, ever be learn-
ers, and have their minds always alive and active.
Recollecting this principle, Richard had a great many
things to think of, as he looked up Knuckle Lane. Why
this poverty ? Why this meanness ? Why are poverty and
meanness so associated ? Is there no remedy for it ? Thus
he questioned within himself. There is nothing of this sort
in Green Meadow, — his native town. He might have
stood there a month, in obedience to the direction of hij-
teacher, Mr. Willwell, before he could get at the solution
of the matter. So he went on into the street where wood
v/as exposed for sale.
What quantities of it! How the loaded teams crowded
the way !
Faithful to the principle just named, the first thought of
Richard, when he saw the wood, was his own home. The
oxen looked so like his own oxen, — the wood looked so like
wood he had handled, every stick of it ; — he knew the best
kinds, and all kinds. But the oxen; — there came with them,
to his mind, his own barn-yard, and stable, and hay-mow;
he could have shaken the cattle heartily by the hand, every
one of them. Then he knew their best signs, — the broad
breast, the bright color, — and he could tell that there was
a sprinkling of Durham in them, and he knew where I'ijIt
ham was.
10*
114 RICHARD EDNEY AND
And with the barn-yard was connected, in fact, and in his
mind, a little path, and then an apple-tree, and then a well-
sweep, a shed, and a kitchen ; and so he crept along, till
he came pat upon his old Father and Mother ; — but he
could stay there long.
The Surveyor manipulated with his scale on all sides of
the wood, — inspected the ends, peered in among the crev-
ices, rapped on the bark. "The sled is heavier than that,"
said the owner, looking at the bill the official gave him.
" Short lengths," replied the latter. " We measure from
the inside to the tip of the scarf." " There is a round cord,
or my cattle may be ashamed of themselves, and never
expose their sweat and hot flanks in Woodylin again." " It
is not well packed." " It is well packed, — I '11 lea^'e it to
any one that knows. Here, Captain," he called to Richard ;
" you have seen cord-wood, I should say, from your looks ;
you can tell what a load is, and when it 's loaded. Is that
merchantable ? " "I should think it was," replied Richard.
" Is he a Surveyor ? " exclaimed that dignitary ; " has he
been sworn ? " "I have handled wood," added Richard,
"and I call that well stou'ed." "I shall not condescend to
dispute with you," returned the Surveyor. " Nor I with
you," echoed the driver, and he tore up the bill. " Your
wood is forfeited," said the Surveyor. "It sells for a cord,
or I will back about, and fling it into Knuckle Lane. I
guess they won't dispute about it there."
Richard was called to apply his education in a way his
school-master had not provided for; yet, after all, it was
only an amplification of the general rule.
" I advise you, young man," remarked the Surveyor to
our friend, with a sinister tone of voice, " to mind your own
business."
Richard took the hint, and went on. He turned, without
THE governor's FAMILY. 115
inothod in his route, into Lafayette-street, — a broad street,
with fine trees, fine houses, fine churches. This led into
Victoria-square. With all his philosophy, it would have
been difficult to pierce the mysterj' that layabout him now.
lie could, indeed, with his eye comprise the magnificence of
the place, — count the stories of the houses, enumerate the
successive blocks ; but even to his eye, there was an inex-
plicable richness. How splendid those great elms would be
in the summer! — that he knew. But the people, — the
parlors, — the wardrobes, — the feelings ; — he might as
well be looking at the Moon.
He entered St. Agnes-street, where the Governor resided,
and came to a halt in front of the Family mansion. There
were the ornamented fence, the arched gateway, the deep
yard planted with trees and shrubbery, the long piazza with
its Corinthian columns, the windows with rich caps, the
heavy cornice, and the high walls of the building itself,
that arrested his eye. Did he know what was inside ? He
did not — nor even who lived there. He saw what went in
there ; he saw two ladies, with stone-marten muffs, garnet
velvet sacks, and one with a blue satin hat and bird of
paradise feathers. These were Barbara and Melicent.
They turned as they mounted the steps, and cast a leisure
glance around, that alighted upon Eichard, and passed to
other objects. What account should he give of these to his
teacher ? What a distance between his home-spun and
their French velvets ! He drew back a little, as they looked
towards him, and interposing between him and them a fir-
tree, made good his escape. He came into a quarter of
uneven pavements ; he passed houses that had their base-
ments new-furbished, and new-windowed, and let for grocery
stores, while the upper stories remained dingy, brown, and
dark ; the improvement of the city being rapid and great,
116 RICHARD EDNEY AND
and flinging itself in haste into such parts of a building as
it could most conveniently reach. What life, what anima-
tion, began to spread itself before him, in the long -v-istas of
the business streets ! How the sun poured itself do«Ti, cheer-
ful and bright, on those syndromes of modern civilization !
People complained of tight times, a dull season; — there
was no dulness, no tightness, to Richard's eye. Gayly var-
nished sleighs, puffed and pranked with silver-furred robes,
and streaming with a whole pack of tails behind, flashed
by. Pungs of butter, oats, mutton, defiled along. Four
elegant horses, attached to an elegant van, with seats for
twent)% and having a dasher as high as a barn-door, on
which danced an Hungarian girl, under an arch of gilded
flowers and vines, attracted his gaze. He saw men in
buffalo coats, and scarlet leggins, and very red faces,
moving to and fro rather heavily, with the chin sunk, as if
in deep thought. These were stage-drivers, executing their
orders. People from the country were continually arriving,
and hitching their horses at the stone posts by the walk ; —
the females crawling out of their fur beds, then squinting at
the signs over the doors, and darting forwards, as if their
health and salvation were staked on getting in at a particu-
lar door.
There were men with pale faces, and white cravats, and
gray hair, who walked a little stooping and leisurely; —
these were the ancient and venerable fathers of the City.
Young men, well dressed, with bits of paper and little
blank-books in their hands, passed him, walking fast and
straight forwards; — these were clerks. Others, in loose
paletots, with one arm folded round the breast, and cigars
in their mouth, were the gentlemen of leisure.
He came to a store that had an ancient goose hanging
THE governor's FAMILY. 117
one side of the door ; — he knew where geese came from.
A pair of denim over-hauls mated it on the other ; — he
knew where such things came from, but he looked more
closely at them, — not philosophically, but economically, —
for he wanted a pair. He saw in the shop barrels, — rows
of barrels, — piles of barrels ; and on the heads of the bar-
rels he read, N. E. Eum. Devil ! thought he, what a
Devil is here ! He remembered the words of his Teacher,
— " Rum comes from the Devil." There were men in the
store drinking, and other men serving drink. The Devil,
he thought, had set up business for himself there. He
turned hastily away.
He came into a street of new stores, with high brick
walls, and great windows ; and every window, — oh, it was
a realm of enchanted vision, — a gulf opening into Para-
dise, — a portal of Dream-land ! There were oranges and
lemons in the Fruiterer's windows, that brought to Richard's
memory what he had learned of Sicily, Cuba, and the
evergreen Tropics. There were golden watches and brace-
lets, diamond rings, pearl brooches, in the Jeweller's, spread
out in full view, on terraces of black velvet ; and Potosi
came to his mind, Golconda and the Arabian Nights.
At the Confectioner's, glass globes of candies and lozenges,
and all kinds of colored sugars, stood a-row, and there were
sugar dogs, and sugar houses, and sugar everything, — a
whole microcosm of pretty ideas in sugar ; and what should
he think of, — what did he think of, but Memmy and Bebby ?
Richard was a parvenu ; he was fresh from the country,
— this eve r)' body saw ; the way he stared at things
showed it, even if his red shirt, and snuff-colored monkey-
jacket, and striped mittens, did not. But Richard knew
where ever}-body came from, and he had no inquiries to
make about them. But he did not understand the mystery
118 RICHARD EDNEY AND
of all the things he saw in the windows, and he wished the
friend of his youth was there to tell him. This instructor
had a pin that he took from his coat-sleeve, on which he
used to dilate, and spent hours talking about it, and telling
how it was made ; then he illustrated all sorts of things by
it. A pin and a pencil were a whole armory of apparatus
for Mr. Willwell. At the Jeweller's, he longed to ask the
artist some questions ; but there the man sat, right behind
this beautiful display of work, brushing a bit of brass, and
never looking at what was before him, — never looking at
Richard, — but very vacantly laughing and joking with an
idle fellow that stood near by, with his thumbs in his
breeches pockets. Richard was almost bursting with philo-
sophical admiration and inquisitiveness, and the man was
so stupid ! How different from his Teacher !
But when he faced the many-tinted and many-shaped
wonders of the Confectioner's, he wished, he only wished,
if the window should fall out, and those piles of fascination
be tumbled to the ground, Memmy and Bebby might be
there !
As if his fancies were just turning into realities, he heard
a thundering over head, and a crash at his side. The snow,
sliding from the high roof, had fallen to the ground. It
struck among the horses, and frightened them. Richard
attempted to compose them. One beast, frantic and fiery,
broke his halter, and plunged backwards, dragging Richard
after him. Richard was thrown to the ground, but without
relinquishing his hold. The horse turned to run ; Richard,
by a strong jerk of the rein, and a dextrous application of
one foot to the flank of the animal, cast him, and had him
lying quietly on his side, before the people, who rushed to
his assistance, had time to be of much service. It was the
Governor's horse, and in the sleigh was the Governor's
THE GOVERNOK'S FAIMILY. 119
daughter, and the Governor himself appeared in the crowd.
The daughter overflowed with thankfulness ; the Governor
took, with his thumb and finger, from his vest-pocket, it
might be a cent, or a dime, it was a gold piece, which he
quietly dropped into one of the flaring pockets of Richard's
jacket.
The crowd dispersed, and Richard resumed his studies.
He reached the Booksellers' quarter. An immense wooden
book, suspended at the corner of the street, over the walk,
caught his eye, and large pictorial advertisements on the
door-posts held it fast. He read the advertisements; he
went from door to door, reading what was emblazoned at
each, — reading the posts from top to bottom. There were
books by authors familiar to him, and more by those of
whom he had not heard ; there were titles of books that con-
veyed no meaning, and some that aroused all his curiosity
to know what they meant; and others still, so full of mean-
ing he could hardly keep from clutching the bills and run-
ning home. These doors of the Booksellers' Shops, with
their typographical enigmas, were mystic entrances to the
enchanted palace of youthful hope and intellectual idealism,
and to what he had wished to know, and to what he thought
some time he might know, and to those visions his Teacher
unconsciously kindled in his mind, and to things of which
his Pastor spoke. If he could not enter this palace, he
could look into it through the windows; so he ranged
along from window to window, up and down the street.
May no worse impediments to aspiration and desire ever
be offered than transparent glass ! Richard did not feel
that he was denied anything, though he stood outside, and
though it was cold weather ; he thought he had a feast.
He was thankful to the kind people that put these things in
the windows. It seemed to him that the panes of glass
120 RICHARD EDNEY AND
were very large, and very accommodating. He saw the
backs of many beautiful books, and the inside of one great
landscape book. He saw many more things, the nature of
some of which he understood, while others puzzled him.
On the broad shelf of one shop he saw porcelain gentlemen,
in antique costume, standing very erect ; — what they were
for he did not know, but he supposed they were toys, and
he knew toys came from Germany; so Germany was in his
mind. He saw pearl-handled penknives, and all that Teacher
and books had said about Sheffield was remembered. There
was a little marble dog, with a gold chain about its neck; —
he did not comprehend that. There were boxes of toilette
soap, hidden away in silvered paper; — here he was out,
too. There were quantities of Valentines, to which he
could get no clue whatever. A box of gold pencils revived
his confidence. There were patent inkstands, and patent
pickwicks, and patent table-bells ; — good a mechanician as
he might be, he was totally confused. In the broad alcove
of the bay window of another shop, in addition to all this
glitter and richness below, over head were a whole choir of
little white angels, and a bevy of cupids, venuses, and inno-
cent white children. O Memmy ! oh Bebby ! where are you
now 2 And more still ! there were beautiful pictures, Ma-
donna faces, tenderest looks of childhood, many a sweet human
expression, verdant landscapes, quiet pastorals, some of the
deepest affections of the heart. Germany, Sheffield, Art,
Mystery, — good-by ! They all vanish ; nothing tempts
his curiosity now; his spirit is ravished by a new enthusi-
asm ; — these simple pictures sink into his soul, an'd his
imagination swims in ideal feeling.
On the door of this store he read Nefon's. By this time,
also, he recollected that he wanted some paper and pens ;^
and especially were his thoughts quickened, when, among
THE governor's FAMILY. 121
the many things that garnished the door-way, he saw the
words Circulating Library; for he remembered his Pastor
told him to seek one out, — " that is," he added, " if you can
find a good one, a good one." Did Nefon keep a good Cir-
culating Librar)^? What was this Nefon's? He looked
again at the inscription. Then he looked at the window;
he even stepped on the sill, and looked through the glass
door. Was Nefon's so small that one word sufficed to
cover it ? Was it so large that that same pair of syllables
was all the hint it needed to give? Of whatever size, it
was big enough for Richard. He had studied grammar, and
he knew the apostrophe indicated the possessive case ; he
saw at a glance that Nefon possessed what, to his eye, ap-
peared so grand and magnificent ; and Nefon must be a large
man. He was mistaken in this ; Nefon was a small man,
— small in stature, though he had a large heart, and a large
head. Why was not Nefon on the alert, and when there
stood on the walk a stranger who had such interest in his
wares, why did he not open the door and invite him in ?
That was not Nefon's way of doing business. Yet, if he
had known vvho stood there, and what the feelings of the
young man were, and how near that young man's feelings
were like his own, he would not only have invited him, but
even seized him by the collar and snatched him in, and
• saved him the trouble of getting in as he did ; for Richard's
heart beat smartly, — so smartly it might have answered
for a good knock, if there had been any but himself to hear
it, — and he tried the latch twice before it yielded. But he
entered. Did the inside of the shop fulfil its out-door
promise ? Was Nefon equal to Nefon's ? This is the
truth of the matter : if Nefon's face — that is, his show-
window — looked bright and attractive, his heart — that is,
the interior of the store — was less lustrous, but more solid ;
11
122 KICHAKD EDNEY AMD
darker because it was deeper, and more quiet because it
was more substantial. This Kichard felt ; and il" lie won-
dered in the street, he was awed within the walls. ^Vhat
quantities of books! Now, within those books, that tilled
the shelves on either side, and were piled on the counters,
lay many of the purest and profoundest thoughts and feel-
ings that Kichard ever had, and many more which he
expected to have; and it is not strange that he gazed at tlie
books, and forgot Nefon. Nor did Neibn notice Kichard ;
there were other persons with whom he ^^•ns engaged.
Kichard had heard of great lihraries ; — of the AlexaniMiie
library, that was burned ; of the National Library, at Paris ;
— but if all the libraries in all the world had been flung into
one, and opened to liis view, his emotion could not be much
deeper than it was now. Not that Nefon had so many
books, but Kichard had never seen so many.
But before he could set his eye steadily to work, his
imagination must exercise itself a little; and there passed,
as in a trance, before his mind, many a rosy-colored youth-
ful vision of books, and, as it were, a sea of literary mist, in
which floated whole islands of flower-reading; and calm,
shady coves of solid intellectual progress opened in the
scene. These things over, he could observe more literally
the nature of what was about him.
It is an observation of Dr. Johnson, that no place atlbrds
a more striking instance of the vanity of human hopes than
a public library ; for who, he asks, can see the ^vall crowded
on ever)' side by mighty volumes, without considering the
oblivion that covers their authors ? Yet, had these authors
known what eye ^^•as upon them now, — how that heart
coveted them, — how this young man would have gloated
over their dullest lines, and carried to his closet their most
neglected tomes,— they would have smiled within their leaves,
THE GO\'EBNOIl's FAMILY. 123
and, in their own joyous thrill, shaken off the dust that lay
on their lids. The meanest author on Nefon's shelves was
immortal in Richard's feelings ; Richard was fame, fortune,
posterity, to all of them. How much suffering, neglect, and
toil, was recompensed in that single moment !
But as he gazed at these rows of books, reaching higher
than his head, and extending, in shadowy files, far into the
rear of the building, the pleasant sky of things became a
little overcast. He had this feeling, — that he knew noth-
ing, and never should know anything.
He had the feeling which a young and ardent author
may be supposed to have, who enters a book-shop with a
basket of books on his arm, to dispose of his wares, and try
his fortune in the general market. He sees such a multi-
tude of other authors, with their bright, glittering titles,
— some in prett}' blue muslin; some in prettier brown goat-
skin ; some arabesqued in gold ; others fragrant in Russia :
here one, urgent for a purchaser, in two volumes ; there one
in three : here one reposing in princely folio ; there one
gemmed in ISmo: one recommended by his engravings;
another by his tj'pe : some calling attention to the originality
of their sl\-le ; others to the importance of their matter : some
pushed forward bj^ backers ; others buoj-ant in their own
reputation. He feels that he has not written anj-thing, and
never shall write anything ; and contemplates the books in
his basket as a collection of apes, that he had unwittingly
sought to introduce among polite and respectable men,
whose chattering he had mistaken for speech ; and he
would fain set them adrift in the fi^rst piece of woods he caa
find.
So Richard, the admirer of all authors, — so many an
author, — is, in a sense, killed by those authors whom Dr.
124 KICHARD EDNEY AND
Johnson summarily consigns to oblivion. This bibliothecal
dust, after all, has some power in it.
So, we say, Richard, with these treasures, endless gran-
aries, of wisdom, genius, art and science, before him, felt he
knew nothing, and never should know anything. He forgot
even the Circulating Library, and paper and pens ; and was
half resolved to leave the premises, and go home to Memmy
and Bebby, and the Green Mill. But ere he had time to
execute such a purpose, Nefon accosted him with a cool,
How do you do. Sir ? Richard could hardly tell how he
did.
Recollecting himself, however, he asked after a Circu-
lating Library. Nefon replied that he kept one, retailed the
terms, but added, it was an unprofitable part of his establish-
ment, and, moreover, that he had been obliged to adopt the
rule of not lending to strangers, — that was, to people out
of town, and to such as had no . He was at loss for a
word ; he said credentials, or something of that sort. He
meant, to irresponsible persons ; to those, in a word, who
looked as Richard did.
Ah, Nefon, how could you do so ? But Nefon was busy ;
he had many customers, and many cares, and he did not
regard Richard attentively. He had a glimpse at him, and,
not thinking but that he might be a prodigal, good-for-
nothing fellow, like many in the city, who wanted a novel
to read, he answered him as he did. Why did he not look
into Richard's gentle, truthful eye ? why did he not observe
his earnest, honest face ? What did he see in the glimpse
he had ? A red shirt, coarse coat, and rustic manner. The
truth must be told, though Nefon falls. The suit which
Richard's mother had spun and wove for him, which she
had bade him good-by in, and which she had thought, with
a strong motherly feeling, " None will be ashamed of my
THK COVEKNOR's FAMILY. 125
son " in, — that suit well-nigh ruined hiin with Nefon. Nefon
will deny this; but we will put it to him thus: Suppose
Eichard wore a fine linen shirt, a Creinonia doeskin paletot,
and one of Bebee's castors, — would you have answered
him as you did ?
But Richard possessed a last resort. He took from his -
wallet a piece of paper, which, after some hesitation, he gave
to Nefon. That paper was a sort of cosmopolitan passport
for Richard, from the hands of his Pastor. It ran thus : —
" Green Meadow, Dec. 18 — ,
" To whom it may concern.
"This may certify that the bearer, Richard Edney by
name, son of John and Mary Edney, of this town, whose
birth has been duly registered in the town records, and his
baptism in the records of the Church ; having arrived at
man's estate, and profited of such occasions as his native
village affords, being desirous to see other places, and visit
cities and towns more remote, is a member of the Church of
Christ in this town, and has maintained a good walk and
conversation ; that he is a lover of truth, and a friend of
humanity ; is a practical agricultv^rist ; ingenious in the
understanding of mechanics, and industrious in the fulfil-
ment of his tasks. He is believed to be a youth of honor
and trustworthiness. As such, he is recommended to the
fellowship and sympathy of the good, the true, the noble,
everywhere.
(Signed) " Timothy Harold,
" Pastor of the Church."
This was nuts to Nefon ; or it would have been, if he had
forthwith cracked them. But between interruptions on the
one hand and those first impressions on the other, he dal-
lied. He looked at Richard, — looked as if he had not seen
11#
126 EICHARD EBNEY, ETC.
him before, though he had been in the shop twenty min-
utes. He looked again; and Richard, embarrassed and
aggrieved, took the note, and turned away.
Now, why all this ? Could not the three thick volumes
of Lavater outweigh the short jacket ? Why had not
Nefon been appointed Head Phrenological Custom-house
Inspector, — and he might have determined in a trice that
Richard contained no fraud in his composition. We have
said Nefon had a great head and a great heart, though he
was a small man ; but all his greatness would have melted
with kindness and run over, had he imagined how the case
stood. He will not do so again.
He did offer his library to Richard ; he asked him after
his business, and where he lived, and said he should be glad
to see him again.
Richard took a book, and left the shop ; but he could not
go home and face the children with empty hands. So he
got candy and toys, as a sort of ammunition with which to
encounter the onset of their affections.
CHAPTER IX.
SUNDAY AND SUNDAY EVENING.
Saturday night the Mills did not run, and Richard
enjoyed a regular sleep. Sunday he went to Church ; he
went with his brother's family. He wore his strong sur-
tout, and his warm red shirt. He had cotton shirts, but at
this season of the year he did not like to risk a change, and
at home he always wore such a shirt to Church in winter.
In the afternoon he said he would like to go to another
Church ; he named Dr. Broadwell's.
" That is aristocratic," replied his sister, "and your shirt
will not be tolerated there."
" I might sit in a back pew," added Richard.
" I would be as good as anybody," rejoined his sister,
" or I would not go at all."
"We are as good as anybody, at your Church, Roxy ? "
" We stand with the first class, there, and have a centre
pew."
" They are better than we are, at Dr. Broadwell's ? "
"They think they are; that is their conceit, — that is
their silly pretension."
" The real difference between us is the shirt."
" I guess," said Munk, " that is about all. There maybe
a slight odds in the thickness of the hand, but not much.
At any rate, the advantage is on your side. Your shirt is
as clean as theirs, and it is certainly warmer, and it cost
more ; and there is quite as much human nature in your
hand, brother, as in theirs."
128 RICHARD EDNEY AND
" Well, Eichard," — so his sister appealed to him, — " if
you will drag the truth out of me, and excruciate me to tell
the whole, Mrs. Tunny, the grocer's wife, goes to Dr. Broad-
well's, and she has invited us to her house, and I should not
like to have her see you at Church in such trim."
" You did not use to talk and feel like this, w^hen you
were at home, Roxy."
"The city is not the country, Richard, and you cannot
do here as you do there. I have learned many things since
I came here ; I have learned more of the deceitfulness of
the human heart. Elder Jabson is a very different preacher
from Parson Harold. You cannot be so independent here,
with everybody looking at you, and commenting upon you,
and so many slanderous tongues about, and so much de-
pending on propriety and taste. I have changed in some
things, and I hope for the better."
" I will compromise matters," replied Richard ; " I will
not go to Elder Jabson's, for, in fact, I am not accustomed to
such a service, nor such discourse. Nor will I go to Dr.
Broadwell's, lest my shirt should give ijou offence. I will
find some other place."
Richard joined the currents of people that came from
every direction, and went in every direction, — as if nobody
wished to have it known where he was going, as if every-
body was in pursuit of something which he would hide
from everybody ; — up this street and dow^l it, plunging
into that lane and coming out of it, avoiding one another on
the crossings, plumping into one another round the corners,
disappearing in large doors where nobody else went ; — as if
heaven was a gold mine, of which each one had had a
dream, and snugging the dream in his own thought, he fol-
lowed its secret intimation ; or as if religion were a game
of hide and coop, which the whole city was out playing ;
THE governor's FAMILY. 129
and presently you would see these people, joyous and lov-
ing, rushing from their retreats to some central spot of
Christian feeling !
Richard, with no intelligent bent of his own, except to
keep clear of Dr. Broadwell's and Elder Jabson's, adhered
to a bevy of people in which he happened to find himself,
and in their wake entered the first Church he came to. It
was a large Gothic door into which he went ; and in the
porch whom should he see but Nefon ! Now, Nefon had
evidently repented him of his sins. It was Sunday, and it
was sacrament day, and there was good reason for his doing
so. The glare of life was gone, and the encroachments of
traffic had abated; and his feelings were calmer, purer,
truer. He had found his heaven of enlarged, humane, all-
encircling sentiment ; and he was stirred with great kind-
ness and brotherliness towards Richard, and took him cor-
dially by the hand. " Show me a back seat, — the negro's
seat, if you have one," said Richard. " Come with me,"
replied the Bookseller, in a quick but significant way he
had, meaning more than he said ; and most likely haunted
by the recollection of his former dereliction, he led Richard
to his own pew, which was as conspicuous as any in the
Church. Richard could not have appeared to better advan-
tage in Nefon's eye than he did, with his cap off, in meet-
ing, that afternoon. We speak not now of how he ap-
peared to the Omniscient eye, or to the eye of the simple
Spirit of Truth. But Nefon saw that his manner was devout
and earnest, his expression spiritual and intellectual, and
that in worship and instruction his heart was engaged. He
saw, moreover, that in the distribution of the sacred ele-
ments ; Richard was a recipient and he was touched, Nefon
was, and he loved Richard more than ever. There was
130 RICHARD EDNEY AND
little sectarianism in this, — little of mere wonder or admira-
tion.
The religious tie is perhaps as strong as can bind two
hearts together ; the tie that comprises time and eternity,
God and man; that has for its basis the most solemn
and liberal, the most simple and magnificent, exercises of
the soul : that sweeps the earth in quest of objects to pity
or to save, and still finds in the nearest and homeliest duties
the repose of contentment, the affluence of satisfaction, and
the lustre of fame ; that moves with Destiny, and reposes
on Providence ; that loves Love, exults in the Pure, and
swells in the Light as the new-starting bud of the spring
anemone.
Nefon saw no more of Richard's red shirt; it had disap-
peared utterly, — the flame of his virtues burned and con-
sumed it. We wiU not say Richard stood naked before
Nefon ; rather he appeared in the glory and the amiability
with which Christ clothes his disciples. Nefon remembered
Richard after this ; not that he had entirely forgotten him
since he saw him in his shop, but he had thought of him by
inch-meal and flittingly. Now he appealed to him more as
an incarnate, well-favored tangibility.
The after part of the Sabbath, and the twilight, and the
evening, are very pleasant. It is a free, tranquil, cheerful
time. It is an hour favorable to domestic reunions and
social communion. The laboring classes — and that, in
fact, means all classes except professed vagabonds — make
great and very reasonable account of it. The hurly-burly
and wish-wash of existence it visits with a genial humor
and purifying serenity. It is a zephyr that fans the fever-
ishness of the week, and soothes excitement and replenishes
exhaustion. In the most boisterous weather, when no one
goes to meeting, the whole Sabbath has a summery feeling,
THE GOVERXOR's FAIMILY. 131
and many flowers and green leaves of piety, hope, repent-
ance, show their tender faces, which Monday morning is
too apt to nip as an untimely frost. There is a reconcilia-
tion with God and with one another, at these times, which
it is delightful to experience and painful to lose. Heaven
then lets down a golden chain, on which every one loves to
fasten a prayer, and see it drawn up. Even Memmy felt
something of this, for she said to her mother, " How it
seems, Sundays, don't it ? "
Asa Munk was of the firm of ]\Iuuk and St. John, and
their business was with horses. They kept a liverj^-stable,
did some teaming, owned hackney-coaches and an omnibus,
and were interested in a stage-route. Their stand was near
the Factories, and their business grew naturally out of the
rise and increase of the New City.
It will be supposed Munk enjoyed his Sabbaths. He
loved to be at home with his wife and children. He loved
the enfranchisement and the comfort of the Sabbath. Munk
took life easily, though he worked hard. He used to say,
" I am always happy, and Prince Albert can't say more."
" Bless God for Memmy and Bebby ! " he said, this after-
noon, as the children played round him. " Bless God for
Papa ! " echoed Memmy.
The heads of this family could not both be absent to
Church at the same time. One must stay with the chil-
dren, and it had been Munk's turn to do so this afternoon. .
" You should have heard the Elder," observed his wife ;
" he was solemn." " I have great peace of mind in my
children," replied Munk. " Children cannot save your
soul," said she. "They have been preaching to me all
day," said he. " We need something more powerful, more
searching," she added. " Children are eloquent, — so Pas-
tor Harold says," interposed Richard, "for the Scripture de-
132 KICHARD EDNEY AND
clares ' out of the mouths of babes and sucklings Thou
hast ordained praise.' Children, he says, are standards; for
Christ instructs that we must become like them, in order to
enter the kingdom of heaven."
" I hope you will not compare Memmy and Bebby with
Elder Jabson," returned Mrs. Munk, with a slight tartness
of manner, that betokened considerable internal roil.
" The Elder," answered her husband, in a patient, peace-
making way, " is meat, strong meat ; and the children are
nuts and raisins, after it."
There was a point in which Munk was lame, — at least, his
wife and Eichard both thought so. He let horses on the
Sabbath. He qualified this statement, indeed, and extenu-
ated it. Richard replied, quoting Pastor Harold, that the
use of horses on the Sabbath should be confined to occa-
sions of necessity and mercy. Munk said the factory-
girls and mill-men had no leisure except Sundays; and
hinted at their need of recreation. Mrs. Munk said scores
of them had been to dancing-schools that winter. Richard
observed there were ample woods, the margin of streams,
and pleasant roads, where they could walk. Munk said
they must visit their friends. Richard asked if they did not
go to taverns in the neighborhood, and squander the sa-
cred hours in dissipation. "Even," he continued, " has not
Clover had one of your horses to-day for such a purpose ? "
Munk had not reflected. Munk would not permit such a
thing again.
Mrs. Munk was getting tea. Memmy could toast the
bread, and so could Bebby ; at least she could play at it, —
she could hold the empty toast-iron to the fire, and her father
put a chip in, which he said she did brown. Memmy
could set up the chairs, and so could Bebby. There was a
dispute whether Bebby could carry a plate from the closet
THE GOVERNOK's FAMILY. 133
to the table. " There is one thing we can all do," said
Munk ; " we can eat. Let us bless God for that ! " " Can't
everybody eat?" asked Memmy. "No," replied Munk;
" some folks can't eat." " I should think it was very fun-
ny," answered Wemmy. " If you could eat properly,"
said her Mother, after they were seated at the table, " I
should be glad ! You have slobbered your bib, and spilt
milk on the table-cloth ! It was span clean this morning !
I should like to keep a cloth clean, one day! I should like
to see such a thing, where there are children ! It should be
published in the newspapers ! I would send the cloth to
Barnum's ! " Memmy could feed herself, and Bebby could
want to ; and she got a spoon and held lustily to it, in spite
of her Mother's efforts to remove it. " Do you feed her,
Asa," enjoined the Mother; "I always said, if ever I had a
child, it should not feed itself." " You seem to have laid
out pretty largely beforehand, " added her husband. " I
have had experience enough to teach me, at any rate," she
rejoined. " Perhaps our children are precocious," suggested
Munk, in his pleasant way ; " who knows ? — and we can't
expect them to do as other children do." " You have got
them into the pulpit," returned his wife, with a demi-sar-
casm, "and of course they must be masters of themselves
at table. Elder Jabson says we can't be too strict with
children." "The Elder," said Munk, " has driven the chil-
dren from the pulpit, and possibly he would not let them
come to the table at all. He never touched a child but he
seemed to be taking up a caterpillar."
Munk took things by the smooth handle ; but sometimes
the handle was rough, and sometimes there was no handle
at all ; then he seized the vessel bodily. So now, after
tea, he put his arms about his wife, and drew her into his
lap, and kissed her. But the children — munificent little
12
134 RICHARD EDNEY A^D
sly-boots I — thought this was not enough, — that his pitcher
might be a little more brimming; and JMemmy climbed up
after her Mother, and Eebby, betwixt lifting and scrambling,
got to the same spot, and Munk had his pitcher overflow-
ing; audit was so large he could hardly get his arms
around it. But it was all nectar to him, — a glass of joy and
hope, that hummed and chirped, — and he crushed it hand-
somely. " Let us be good, and happy," he said to his wife ;
" let us not borrow trouble ; don't keep your spirits spotted
as a painter's shop, but clean and bright as your own little
kitchen. God has given us many comforts ; let us be grate-
ful and enjoy them, as Pastor Harold used to say. Let us
be just to ourselves, by wisely improving what we have, and
not eat the crib when we have plenty of sweet fodder."
" O ! " sighed his wife, " it is such a responsibility I " " It
is heavier," he rejoined, "because you let it weigh on you.
Put it out of your heart a little ; it gets water-soaked in
your feelings, and sinks. We have house-room enough ;
let it play about now and then. We have chairs enough ;
see if it will not sit down and rest itself. Try and make it
stand on its own feet, dear, and you will be easier, and just
as good." His wife threw herself on his neck, and cried ;
he pressed his arm about her very softly and warmly, and
kissed her cheek, and the little ones kissed their Mother, and
then their Father kissed them.
Richard, meanwhile, went to visit tbe Orphans at Which-
comb's. Here he found a lady to whom he was introduced
as Miss Dennington, daughter of the Governor's. It was
Melicent. She was dressed in a blue satin bonnet with
bird-of-paradise feathers, and a purple velvet sack. Did he
recognize this dress ? He had seen it before. Did she
remember having seen him ? — That she was on an errand
of mercy, appeared in her sitting by the sick-bed, and laying
THE governor's FAMILY. 135
her hand on the head of Violet, to whom she spake in soft,
low tones ; and likewise in the fresh oranges and an
unbroken glass of jelly on the small table at the head of the
bed, which she must have brought.
Violet was no better, and she would never be in this
world ; but she was without pain, mental or bodily, and she
had that look of transparent, moon-light repose, which, if it
be ominous of death, is beautiful as life. Junia, pale with
M-aching and confinement, was still of patient, perennial,
sisterly love and devotion. The Old Man romanced with
the fire, making it seem how he could graduate it exactly to
the necessities of the room, and the state of the wood-box ;
showing his skill in using from the scant pile, and not
diminishing it.
" You achieved a great deed in the street, the other day,"
said Junia to Richard.
" I owe my deliverance to you," added Melicent, " and I
know not but my life. Father said it was a narrow escape."
" I did not know who it was in the sleigh, " replied
Richard. " The horse showed good pluck. I never had
the handling of one before so set on making music out of
my bones."
" Were n't you hurt ? " asked Melicent.
"I should have been," he replied, " but that my mother,
probably anticipating some accident to her son, had encased
his flesh in stout wrappages."
They were interrupted by the entrance of the mistress of
the house with the tray. " How do you do, Miss Denning-
ton ? " she said. " How is the Governor ? We heard he was
unwell ; we could not aflford to lose him. Elder Jabson is
havinga Reformation; well, there is need enough of it, — we
are all bad enough. I do not expect to get to Heaven on
my own merits, according to Parson Smith's doctrine ; —
136 RICHAED EDNEY AND
1 hope I may have none of that sin to answer for. I am
ready to help the sick and the destitute, though they are
ungrateful. Madam has sent some jelly ; my own is most
gone, we have had so much sickness, and there is so much
call for chicken-soup, and nice steaks, and arrow-root, and
lemonade, and jellies, which we never mean to be out of for
a moment; for who knows when another will be taken down,
and all the things in the house called for ? " She took the
paper cover from a jelly-glass that looked as if Noah's wife,
in her haste to disembark, had put it away unwashed in a
closet of the ark, and it now made its appearance for the first
time in Mrs, Whichcomb's tray. But no — it was not its first
appearance ; three times a day, for as many months, that
identical glass, with its identical contents, had been brought
into the chamber on that tray. " I do feel for the unfortunate,"
she added, as she offered the venerable cordial to the sick one.
" Would your sister, Miss Junia, relish a slice of ham, and
a few griddle-cakes, or a dish of stewed oysters, which are
so innocent ? or must we still keep her on the cracker-water
the Doctor recommended ? It is not easy. Miss Bennington,
to know what will agree with the sick, which I have had
some experience that way for thirty years."
Mrs, Whichcomb was complaisant and deferential in
presence of Miss Dennington, and she forebore her gibes
and quirks with Richard. And when she saw Melicent
and our friend freely conversing together, she even went so
far as to commend Richard to her ear. " The coldest night
that ever was," says she, " this young gentleman brought
wood to these poor folk ; and many is the time since, he has
taken their basket to the Saw-mill and filled it, which he
did not know that we had a plenty of it, and country boys
is apt to do. And he has sent his sister, JMrs Munk, to
watch ; and he has got other women to come and spell Miss
THE GOVERNOK's FAMILY, 137
Junia ; and he is almost a stranger in the city, himself;
which shows goodness, if it does not lead to pride, which is
apt to be, as Charley Walter could not think."
]Mrs. Whichcomb retired. Melicent, with an ill-sup-
pressed smile, said to Richard, " Is Asa Munk's related to
you ? " " ]\Ir. Munk is my brother-in-law," replied Rich-
ard. " Did you find it, that night ? " she asked. " I found
it," he answered, " the night I came to Woodjdin." " You
must be the person we encountered on the Bridge," she con-
tinued. " And you of the party that was frightened by a
drunken man," he rejoined. "We were in quite a gale.
The darkness of the Bridge is wont to create 'a giddy, rat-
tling reaction in the spirits of all who cross it." " You must
be Transcendentalists, if I understand Pastor Harold's ac-
count of that thing," said Richard. " Very likely we are,"
she added. " Have you attended the Athenasum Lectures ? "
she asked. Richard said he had not; that he did not know
of them. " Have you ever worshipped at the Church of the
Redemption ? " she asked. " What is that ? " Richard
queried. "In which Parson Smith officiates," she replied.
Richard answered that he was there this afternoon. " This
must be the young man," she said, turning to Junia, " that
defended your Grandfather so ably at his trial." " I have
no doubt of it," replied Junia. " He has been as a brother
to us, and that when we were entire strangers to him." Rich-
ard replied tliat he had only done what he felt to be his duty.
Melicent commended his generosity, and hoped he would
persevere in the practice of usefulness, and ever maintain
those principles of virtue which he seemed to have adopted.
Richard left with a new impression in his heart, — that
light-spirited, lyrical impression, which the approbation of a
refined, high-bred, religious woman is fitted to produce.
At the foot of the stairs he met Miss Eyre, who drew
12*
138 RICHARD EDNEY AND
him into the parlor, and seated herself near him. She had
been weeping ; her face was flushed, and her eye swollen.
She was subdued by an apparent melancholy. She looked
at him tenderly and beseechingly. She said, " Mr. Edney,
you have shown the goodness of your nature by your atten-
tions to the sick; you will exhibit the greatness of your
spirit by commiserating the distressed. Some have disease,
some have sorrows. You know this, — I need not assure
you of it. Have I ever appeared harsh, or resentful, or
haughty, may God forgive me. I can be depressed, — I
am depressed. But why should I say it ? Yet how can a
woman help being weak at times ? I would dash away this
tear, but it is best you should see it. You do see it,
and none but you shall see it. Have you pity, — can
you pity ? " Richard replied that he could, though "clearly
he did not know as an answer was expected. " I have then
only to ask your friendship. I cannot relate my sorrows ;
't is no matter what they are. You will be my friend."
" Certainly," said Richard ; " I am your friend." " I can rely
on you, then." She rose as she said this, and stood like
one on the point of departing. " I shall appeal to you, — I
shall have confidence in you." With her face towards
him, she slowly retreated. " Remember," said she, raising
her jewelled finger, " that you are my friend." " Of
course," rejoined Richard, " I am your friend."
The pleasant impression which Melicent had left in his
soul was not effaced by this rencontre with Miss Eyre ;
albeit a slight confusion of thought was thereby engendered ;
but not sufficient to prevent the calm serenity of the setting
Sabbath sun exerting its full effect, or to darken the many-
tinted, lustrous dew-drops that glittered through the green
wood of his sensibilities.
That affair was like a high suspension-bridge over a dark
THE governor's FAMILY. 139
gulf; but he crossed it rapidly, and was soon on the safe
side of his home. And here he was very happy ; not hap-
pier, indeed, than when he went away ; but it seemed as if
the lamp of his feelings had been turned up a little, and he
gave a little stronger light; or this may have been the mere
reflection of the light and happiness that was about him ;
for his sister was more heartsome, the children more blithe,
and Munk was always sunshine. Moreover, they had
opened the parlor, and the little air-tight was busy as a bee
in summer, filling it with sweetness and pleasantness. The
neighbors, and others, were dropping in, including Tunny, the
Green Grocer, and his wife, Mr. Gouch, head-stock man, and
Mrs. Grint, an aunt of Munk's. There was a heavy stamp-
ing in the entry, and an audible wheezing; and Munk said
it was Winkle, and the children knew it was Winkle, and
Winkle it was. Now, there was not, probably, on all this
polyzonal orb, a pleasanter, we mean a more pleasure-giving
face, and coat, and hand, than Winkle's ; and whip too,
— for he brought his whip into the parlor, — and cap, and
muffler. He was one of Munk and St. John's drivers, and
was employed on a mail route that extended some fifty
miles into the country. He was inclined to corpulency, and
his face was full-blown, and so were his lips, and red as a
tomato ; and his skin was varnished with the cold and the
storms he every day encountered. He wore a blue, shaggy,
lion-skin overcoat, margined with black. But face, coat and
all, were radiant with delight, — we mean everybody felt
delighted where they came. The totality of the man
was a self-working decanter, perpetually discharging satis-
faction into the breasts of all whom he encountered. There
was this difference between Munk and Winkle, — the first
was a subjective, the other an objective, delight. Munk was
always happy in himself. Winkle made everybody else
140 RICHARD EDNEV AND
happy. In other respects they had a good deal in common.
But we cannot say all we ought of Winkle here. What a
man he was, and how he communicated so much joy, and
how people liked him, are matters that \A-ould cram a dozen
pages ; and none that knew him would be satisfied with
what we have now said, and we must compound with these
friends of his by a promise of more hereafter.
But, sakes alive ! what are we doing ? We are in the
midst of Memmy-and-Bebby-dom ; and what have we to do
with Winkle, or anybody else ? Winkle has gone, disap-
peared, swallowed up in a teknocratical tempest. The chil-
dren control the parlor, and the hour. They are sovereigns,
— they are empire. Under the guns of their fort every
vessel that enters must lie to ; they are as big as Caesar
Augustus ; all the world pays tribute to them ; you can't
approach them without bovving as many times as you do to
the Chinese Emperor. Attractive as Winkle is, dry as Aunt
Grint is, proud as Mrs. Tunny is, strong as Mr. Gouch is,
and selfish, independent, consequential, vain, preoccupied,
as everybody is, all cotton to Memmy and Bebby. Even
Winkle's great whip, that four as smart horses as there were
in the county ran from, and all the cows were afraid of, and
dogs leaped stone-walls to get out of the way of, yielded
to them. Winkle himself, weather-seared, porpoise-limbed
as he was, went capering^and rigadooning about them, as if
they were tarantulas, and had bitten him, and kept him
dancing for their amusement. Aunt Grint, chromatic,
grum, hard-mouthed, who looked as if she had been kiln-
dried, and all her natural juices evaporated off, — how she
sweetened to the children, and tiddled them, and caroled to
them ! She was always believing something was going to
happen ; — she had seen a strange-looking, corpse-shaped
substance in the yolk of an egg ; and when a member of the
THE governor's FAMILY. 141
family had died a while ago, they did not hang crape on
the bee-hive. But the children had happened, and there was
no help for it ; they were the event, and Aunt Grint was
confounded before it. Then she thought Munk was no
Christian, because he let his coach carry ladies to balls; but
good a Christian as she was herself, she could not help loving
him when she looked at his children. Then there was Mrs.
Tunny, a sleek, round, fubby piece of mortality, with
bunches of ribbons in her hair, and" bunches in her neck,
who owned a broad-aisle pew in Dr. Broadwell's Church,
— had been to a party at Judge Burp's, — hired a piano for
her daughters, — boasted of a cousin in New York, — who
exchanged bows with the Mayoress, whom she did not
know, and who would not bow to a great many people that
she did know ; — even she, all engulfed in a huge cotton-
velvet sack, paid her duty to the children, — stooped to
them, and toadied about them.
So we might go round the room, and tell how these dear
despots worked their cards, lording it everywhere ; and no-
body could look at anything else, or talk of anything else,
or do for anything else, but them.
Richard and Munk were of course in their glory, for their
countenances seemed to say, " See there ! Just what I told
you; the children are mighty little things; no matter what
Elder Jabson says, they have a masterly power on the hu-
man heart."
There was Tunny, a little man, diffident, white-faced, as
if he had grown up under the shadow of his wife, — how
richly he colored when he held Memmy in his arms, — how
his lank knees puffed and swelled when he trotted her !
Mr. Gouch, who seemed never to have been properly knead-
ed, so loose he was in his joints, so tripping in utterance,
so quivering in the muscles of his face, as if he had done
142 RICHARD EDXEY AND
nothing all his days hut hop over logs, dodge Silver, and
peer after Clover, — ^ came completely into requisition, and
displayed the education of his life in leaping over the chil-
dren on the floor, bopeeping to them behind the sofa, and
mouthing with Bebby,
The children, of course, did their best ; and being in state,
it behoved them to magnify it. Memmy got on the floor,
on all fours, and Winkle trod on her, and tickled her with
his foot ; and Bebby got down too, like a frog, on the floor,
and, like the frog in the fable, she swelled up under his
feet ; and he repeated all he had done to Memmy ; and how
archly she looked up to him, and how she laughed, and
how they all laughed ! Memmy whispered something to
Uncle Richard, as if he was her Prime Minister; and
Bebby likewise sought his ear, and mummed at it ; then she
retreated, and came back again, and mummed some more;
and there were additional peals of laughter. Bebby could
not talk ; but she could dummy and warble and crool and
caw, and look with her eyes and point with her finger ; and
this was a sort of high-born language, which the common-
alty around her Avere not expected to understand; but it
puzzled them, and set them to surmising and gossiping, as
the actions of the great are wont to do.
Uncle Richard got the singing-books, and tliey sang
psalm-tunes ; and Memmy and Bebby sang too, — and
did n't their singing attract more attention than all the rest ?
Bebby, one would think, had learned to sing in that other
state of existence in which metempsychosis places us all ;
and she was not yet familiar enough with our modes of ut-
terance to make herself intelligible ; but all agreed that it
was very wonderful. While the others were singing,
Memmy got up little concerts of her own, and introduced,
with an originality peculiar to herself, a medley of stanzas,
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY.
143
beginning, " My Bible leads to Glory," " Get out of the
way. Old Dan Tucker," " Mary had a little Lamb," " Wild
roved the Indian Girl, bright Alfarata."
" I fear we are too happy," said Aunt Grint ; " oh, I do! "
" You don't ? " answered Mrs. Munk, startled.
" Jabson preaches at the school-house to-night, and we
are not prepared for it," continued the Aunt.
" I know I love the children too well," replied Mrs. Munk.
" There 's it," rejoined the other. " You make idols of
them, and something will happen to them. Jabson looked
very solemn when he went by our house to-day, and I know
it 's a death. It must be a death. He looked so the night
John Creely was taken."
" Come, Aunt," interposed Munk, " let Roxy alone this
time. She has not digested all you have told her before ;
and it is n't best to overload, body or mind."
" I only want you to attend to what I tell you, Asa," she
rejoined, "before it is too late, and not let the children draw
off your affections so."
"I see through you, Aunt," returned Munk; "I under-
stand it all, and you know how 't is, only you are modest,
and won't say so. The more my affections are drawn off,
the more they keep pouring in ; and I have such a pile of
them here, I don't know, Aunt, but I should go crazy, if I
had n't you to love. Bring in Jabson ; I would, love him
to-night. Roxy has been so bad here, this afternoon, get-
ting into my lap, and kissing me, and looking so smiling,
and being so happy," — he pinched his wife's ear, — "oh, if
she had n't any children, how good she would be ! "
" Bad maa ! " replied Aunt Grint ; " bad Asa, you won't
believe anything till you see it ; and when it comes, you say
it is n't there."
" I could sec better if it were not so dark, Roxy," he said j
144 KICHARD EDNEY A:«D
"you must light the solar, — then it will be all as plain as a
pipe-stem."
No sooner did Memmy hear the clinking of the glass
shade than she said, " I can light the taper," and was per-
mitted to demonstrate her ability. She thrust the taper
through the register of the air-tight; but when she attempted
to draw it out, the flame was sucked in and extinguished.
She burned her face, and almost her hand, in the under-
taking, and had to give it up. Memmy-and-Bebby-dom was
over ! Their reign was ended. It is the misfortune of
greatness that, like the Legalist, if it fail in one point, it is
guilty of all, and can indemnify its blunders only by retire-
ment. The children must go to bed. Papa unhooked and
untied Memmy, and Mamma undid Bebby ; but even now,
in disgrace, as it were to show the true imperiality of their
natures, before they could be rearranged for the bed, they
slipped away, and recommenced their tantrums about the
room. But (hey were pursued, seized, endued with the cos-
tume of obscuritj'', and thrust into the truckle-bed.
Aunt Grint exhaled a long sigh, and breathed easier; and
expressed her sense of relief in these words, " I am glad it
is over ! "
" What is over ? " asked Munk.
" The children," she replied.
"That is not over," rejoined Munk; " it has only begun.
I go at it to-morrow, and keep it up all the week."
"If you would only go to the meetings," said his aunt;
" the Reformation is commenced, and they are to be held
every day, as long as the Lord will."
" I am going to the meetings," added he ; " Roxy is
going, Winkle is going, — we are all going."
" Not Tunny and I," exclaimed Mrs. Tunny.
"Yes; Tunny and you," replied Munk.
THE governor's FAMILY. 145
"Not Tunny and I," retorted the lady; "they are noisj-,
riffrafTy, and smell of cowheel and codfisli, — uncomfortable
to polite minds, disrelishable to respectable society, and dan-
gerous to genteel young ladies. Faustina shall not go, nor
Theodoric. Dr. Broadwell does not approve of them, nor
Parson Smith, and they are men of taste."
" Yes, all," continued Munk ; " we have begun to-night,
and we will go on, press on, pray on, sing on. Come, Uncle
Richard, help us to some more music."
"I can't let the chance pass," said Aunt Grint, " without
saying to Mrs. Tunny that what the Lord approves is good
enough for her to approve, and that the souls of the right-
eous will shine at the last day, when some other souls will
not look quite so well."
Mrs. Tunny nodded to Aunt Grint, and smiled.
"All," pursued Munk, as he turned the leaves of the
Psalm-book, " all go to meeting, all sing, all good, all hap-
py. Bless the Lord for what we have, and are, and can be,
and is always a being, and a happening ; bless him for Dr.
Broadwell, Parson Smith, and Elder Jabson, and Meminy
and Bcbby I "
They sang, and softened down ; and becoming very mu-
sical, they sang more. Aunt Grint thought they might have
some praying; and if nobody else would pray, she would.
Richard prayed, and they parted.
13
CHAPTEK X.
A CHAPTER RESPECTING WHICH THERE IS A DOTTBT WHETHER
IT OUGHT TO BE INTRODUCED. N. B. NONE BUT THE
PRINTER OBLIGED TO READ IT.
There is one point which, as faithful historian of Rich-
ard, and his times and place, we shall be obliged to men-
tion. Yet, since it connects us with a controversy of a
nature equally intricate, obscure, and exciting, involving
such numbers of people, and one many of the parties to
which still survive, we would gladly omit it. Still, as the
narrative cannot proceed without allusions thereto, we ad-
dress ourselves to the task before us.
It was a question, in a word, of Cats and Dogs ; yet, insig-
nificant as this may appear, there are few things in the
course of human affairs that have attained so much conse-
quence, or threatened so serious results. The origin of the
dispute it is not easy to trace, but its principal elements are
more readily deduced. Many years anterior to this tale, a
respectable individual of Woodylin had his cat worried by a
dog. A dispute arose with the owner of the dog. Fami-
lies were inflamed, neighborhoods took sides, and at last
the virhole city was drawn into the controversy. One party
would have all the cats killed ; the other denounced the dogs.
There was no harmony of purpose. Those who sought
to destroy the dogs wished to preserve the cats ; on the
other hand, whoever was friendly to a dog became the
determined enemy of a cat. Two parties were formed, and
officered, and drilled, and propagated. The newspapers
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 147
espoused, one doctrine or the other ; and when Richard came
to the place, there were two dailies, discriminated according
to the sentiment of the times. One of these was called
The Catapult, a name borrowed from an ancient piece of
ordnance which was understood to have been employed
against cats. The other bore the name of Dogbane ; the
sense of which is obvious. The people were sometimes
called Dogs, or Cats, according to theirrespective preferences.
The subject-matter was ordinarily denominated " Phuni-
bics." The origin of this term cannot be discovered.
Phumbics, if I may so say, formed much of the spirit and
temper of the city, — became part of the popular feeling,
and entered into many public acts. It opened various and
lucrative offices. It determined the election of Mayor and
Aldermen ; and sometimes, even, it was whispered that a
Clergyman owed his living to his peculiar phumbical senti-
ments. Phumbical meetings were held ; processions insti-
tuted, and flags hoisted ; there were phumbical Reading-
ing-rooms and Hotels.
Whenever the Dogbanians came into power, you would
perceive a violent tremor in all the streets and thorough-
fares of the city. Men, armed with stout clubs pursued the
objects of their fury ; the yelping of dogs tormented the ear;
their blood glaired the sidewalks, and their carcasses filled
the docks.
These measures were of course retaliated, in the event of
a change of administration; the Dog-haters were hurled
from place, and the Cat-killers assumed the reins of affairs.
The hour of their operations was partly in the night, and
the scenes of their attack were chiefly the neighborhood of
houses. They scoured wood-sheds and barns ; they chased
their victims through yards and gardens. Wherever a
148 RICHARD EDNEY AND
mewing was heard, to that point scores of men were seen
staving and hallooing.
Of the merits of this controversy we shall not speak.
The leading arguments were these. The Dogbanians
asserted that dogs were dangerous ; that they frequently
bit people, and dispensed that terrible malady, canine mad-
ness ; and were at all times the terror of the women and chil-
dren. The other party declaimed on the great annoyance
of cats ; their terrific screams in the night, so detrimental
to the sick, and so hostile to the repose of every one. In
addition, their pilfering habits were portraj'^ed, and elaborate
fables published showing the quantities of meat, poultry,
pies, etc., they annually wasted. The number of their
incursions into the larder and the cellar was reckoned up.
They allowed, indeed, the usefulness of the cat as rat-catcher
and hearth-rug companion ; but their aversion chiefly vented
itself against so many foreign cats, and the endless multi-
plication of cats. Foreign cats, they said, injured the util-
ity of- our own cats ; spoiled their habits, and prevented the
proper end for which the cat Avas designed.
The other party, again, commended dogs for their watch-
fulness and sociability, and were willing that the race
should be preserved ; and only sought to impose proper
restrictions upon it, and lessen its liability to evil.
They might have discriminated, and discrimination was
a word ever on their tongue. Yet, practically, were they
always in extremes ; excited feeling, in this, as in most
human afTairs, sweeping off the deliberateness of judgment.
AVere there not some who perceived whatever advantages
and disadvantages pertained to both races, and who would
apply protection wherever it Avas deserved, and practise ex-
termination to the extent it was needed ? There were ; and
these were called fence-men, and had no repute. They
THE governor's FAMILY. 149
Avere accounted persons without decision and without judg--
ment. WhitBers, temporizers, trimmers, were the softest
epithets allowed them.
Let it not be implied that Phumbics was the sole-absorb-
ing topic of Woo;lyliu. It was not ; and only at critical
intervals — just before an election, or something of that
sort — did it rage.
It was, also, tacitly understood among the people, that
there were many subjects, occasions, and places, where it
was not admissible. For instance, it was a part of the con-
stitution of the Lyceum, that the question of Cats and Dogs
should be touched by no lecturer. The Sons of Temper-
ance, by solemn vote, decreed that it should not be named
in their halls. From the Pulpit it was supposed to be ex-
cluded, and one Clergyman gave great offence, and was
charged with violating the comity of the times, by reading
a portion of Scripture, in which the exhortatioir occurs,
Beware of dogs. It was said he emphasized the words, and
uttered them with a peculiar snarl of the voice, whereby the
friends of that race were aggrieved. It was an interdicted
topic in schools ; social parties were not expected to be dis-
turbed by.it, and it was considered no ground of divorce
between man and wife.
It did determine the course of trade somewhat. Cata-
pulters transacted business with Catapulters, and Dogbani-
ans were expected to patronize Dogbanians. Yet a merchant
did not ordinarily ask after the Phumbics of his customer,
when a good bargain was on the threshold.
The even tenor of things, whether it be that of aversion
or amity, however, was interrupted by the rise of another
party, who called themselves Hydriatics, or Water-men.
They said the questions that had so long agitated the pub-
lic mind were trifling and useless, — that weightier issues
13#
150 RICHARD EDNEY AND
should be considered. Their doctrine was, that more water
should be used ; that men ought to be washed, — the city-
cleansed and purified. On these principles, they gained
many adherents; held public meetings, diverted men from the
old parties, and appeared with considerable force at the polls.
Their numbers were composed of simple and well-meaning
people. They established a paper, called The Einser.
Now commenced what was called a triangular fight, each
party having to shoot two ways. But the old parties did not
unite and expel the new sect, — a thing which might easily
have been accomplished ; rather they became more and more
embittered against each other. Still the Hydriatics were
the subjects of not a little abuse from both quarters. It was
said that it was not their real object to benefit the city, but
to arrive at its emoluments. " They would clean it, indeed,
by rifling its offices ! Spunge the inhabitants ! Undoubt-
edly." If a member of the old parties joined the new, he
was said to be a disappointed man, and reviled as a traitor.
The anti-dogs were, at one period, greatly excited. It
was mid-summer, and the Hydriatics were very active. It
got bruited that it was the object of these interlopers to
introduce water into the city, and set the dogs mad, and
fill the place with confusion and death ; and out of the
general distress and alarm extract personal benefit, by plun-
der or usurpation.
Diabolical plots and mischievous artifices were continu-
ally discovered.
If we dwell at all on matters that are familiar to any of
our readers, it is that our distant friends, the Turks and
Tartars, may have a more complete insight into Life in the
New World.
The Editor of the Dogbane, a keen-eyed man, earnestly
devoted to the interests of the city, but quite sensitive to
THE governor's FAMILY. 151
innovation, writes, one morning, as follows : " A new ruse
of the Catapults ! — The leaders of that party, who scruple
at nothing where their own interests are concerned, have
been known to be busy, for a long time, about the Hatters'
and Furriers' shops; and it is understood those trades have
consented to vote the opposition ticket. The secret is out.
These unprincipled demagogues, in case they come into
power, have bargained to make a free-gift of the skins of all
the cats that are killed to those artificers, who work them
into muffs and tippets."
The Editor of the Catapult, likewise keen-eyed, very
Woodylian, but perhaps too much concerned for party,
replied, the next morning, in this wise : " Our neighbor,
across the River, need not attempt to pull wool or fur over our
eyes. He discloses his own baseness. The Apothecaries
have been bribed to desert the only principles on which the
good of the community depends, by a promise of a monopoly
in the sale of strichnine. The city, which is already largely
in debt for that article, is to pay w^hatever price infamy and
treachery shall demand."
We clip the following from the papers of the time.
" Coalition ! — Another Plate of Abominations !
" The Butchers have joined the Hydriatics, under a bar-
gain that if they carry the election the ordinance for the
throwing of the carcasses of cats and dogs into the River
shall be revoked ! A more abominable device to ruin the
credit of Woodylin with the eating public could not have
been got up in the conclave below ! "
" , who vociferated in the Catapultian caucus last
night, true to his instincts, is offended by the loss of a
favorite dog, which had bitten a horse and tw-o children,
152 RICHARD EDNEV AND
before it could be destroyed. Such selfishness is worthy of
the Catapults, and may they make the most of it ! "
" , whom the Dogbanians have taken into favor,
is seeking reparation for injury done to his garden, in the
attempt to break up a nest of cats, whose hideous cries, under
the window of a sick neighbor, caused the patient to re-
lapse into fits. Pay the wretch ! "
The Tanners, having got a charter for a Dog-hide Tan-
ning establishment, applied to Congress for an increase of
duty on that species of merchandise. This measure pro-
voked a singular hash in the public feeling. A violent
debate arose as to whether it would diminish the number
of dogs. Some said, of course it would, — it will kill them
off; others said, Nay, it will be a premium for their produc-
tion. Some, who hated high tariffs and dogs with equal
acerbity, went almost frantic with doubt and uncertainty.
Certain Catapulters, who were alike attached to high tariffs
and to dogs, were on the point of committing suicide. The
parties criminated and recriminated. Again, Catapult-
ers were seen electioneering for Dogbanians. Then they
charged all the evil on the Hydriatics, who had introduced
the project, they said, for the purpose of weakening both
the old parties, and aiding themselves. What gave color
to this suspicion, was the fact that the Tanners had negoti-
ated with the Hydriatics, in case they succeeded in their
plan of bringing an aqueduct into the city, for a supply of
water from that source for their establishment. The Butch-
ers, who had already gone over to the new party, it was
reported, were combining for the purchase of the carcasses.
The Tanners had, also, won over the Shoe-makers, and the
Leather-dealers. It was rumored that the Farmers in the
neighboring towns were making extensive preparations
THE governor's FAMILY. 153
for the raising of dogs; and such as had bark to sell,
were all agog iii anticipation of a lively market. Then
it was suggested that Cat-skin tanning would come into
vogue, and works for that purpose be built, and new duties
demanded ; and this created fresh consternation.
Where the matter might have ended, we cannot say, if
the dogs had not betimes taken the decision into their own
hands, and in mortal dread of the fate that awaited them,
wasted away, so that the Butchers would not have their
flesh, and their hides became too dry and crisp for the Tan-
ners.
We repeat that Phumbics, except at brief periods, was"
not an absorbing theme, save with those who made it a pro-
fession and trade ; and at the time Richard came to the
city, the excitement had materially exhausted itself. The
great interests of life, the diversified occupations of human
beings, the Family, the School, and the Church ; trade and
manufactures; the farm, the factory, and the ship-yard;
wooing and marrj'ing, preserved their balance, and exerted
their supremacy.
CHAPTER XI,
A PARTY AT TUNNY S.
This was to be a grand affair. The note of preparation
sounded long and loud : it rattled at the door of many-
houses ; it purled in the ears of Judges and Clergymen ; it
whirred about the Confectioner's, and rebounded to the
Fruiterer's, and darted away to the Milliner's and Fancy
Goods Dealer's. Munk and his wife and Richard went.
Richard fairly struck his high colors to the persuasions of
his sister, and ran up instead a white collar and bosom-
piece.
The note of preparation, like the wind to which we
thoughtlessly likened it, passed by many persons unheeded.
But there were enough there. The two parlors, connected
by folding-doors, swam with guests. The Milliner's and
Fancy Goods Dealer's had evidently come. Clover was
there, and Plumy Alicia ; Mr. and Mrs. Xyphers, Captain
Creamer, and Judge Burp; and there were many other per-
sons from the Factories and the Mills, and all the region
about. And Mrs. Tunny was there, — indeed she was, and
it seemed as if half the Milliner's and Fancy Goods Dealer's
clustered in her single person ; and what she could spare
had gone to her daughter Faustina. Mrs. Tunny curtsied
to Richard so stiffly, so amazingly, it embarrassed the bow
he was executing, and converted it into a horrid bungle.
Richard himself blushed ; and his sister, who was truly
proud of him, — proud of his fine figure, and fine face, and
proud too, I must say, in justice to her, of his noble heart, - —
KICHARD EDXEY, ETC. 155
blushed also. And by the time he had finished Tunny,
and got through with Faustina, he was in a truly shocking
state. He lost his rudder, his feet, foundered on his hands ;
and made for a blank place on the wall, as a haven, like a
vessel in distress. But here was Plumy Alicia, glittering
with jewelrj^ and beaming with sensibility. Ah, wicked,
wicked Plumy Alicia ! how could you exert your art
to re"»ssure Kichard so? How could you take advantage
of that moment to show him that you did not mind his
awkwardness, but only regarded himself, so? And when
you got him to face the room, right in the midst of the
lights, right in the midst of the Milliner's and Fancy Goods
Dealer's, there stood Clover, with the fingers of one hand
thrust in his vest, and dispensing perfume with a bouquet
of flowers in the other, — so cool, so steady, so strut, and
with a snake-like eye, looking down on Richard so triumph-
antly ; — and you knew it all, — how could you do so ? You
are a medley of elements. And so Richard thought; at
least, you laid the seeds of that thought in his memory,
which was to spring up by-and-by. There was also Captain
Creamer, who looked resentful and surly, even when he did
his best to salute you in a polite way. And there was
Mrs. Xyphers, with whom Clover was talking ; and when
Richard would have exchanged with her the compliments
of the evening, you even drew him back; you pouted, in a
quiet, but stealing, very stealing manner, your pretty lips,
and Richard only half did what he set out to do. Then
you had him all to yourself; and you were so amiable,
so round-cornered, so genteel, — what did you mean?
Would you make Richard love you ? Let me tell you,
Plumy Alicia, Richard could not love you; — I mean, the
depths, the teeming crN'pts, the abej^ant longings of his
nature, you could not thrill; — and I believe you knew it.
156 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Yet, you could exert a magical power ; and that you did
know.
There sat on the sofa, quite unobtrusively and unseduc-
tively ensconced behind the jam of people, a woman plainly
dressed, with dark eyes, and bands of rich black hair. Her
face was comely, but not handsome ; her eye was small and
retreating, but expressive of great earnestness, thought and
animation ; so much so that Richard looked at her twice.
Miss Eyre, kindly attentive to the motions of our friend, said
it was Miss Freeling, a dressmaker. At Richard's request,
she presented him, and he took his seat by the stranger.
If Richard had been flurried by Miss Tunn}% and ravished
by Miss Eyre, he was quite restored by Miss Freeling. They
talked about the weather, as everybody else on first meeting
must do ; and spoke to the mooted question, whether after
so severe a winter we should have an early spring. The
thought of spring, when it did come, gave to Miss Freeling
the same sort of halcyon, saltatory, juvenescent feeling that
Richard had, and this made them seem like old friends.
Moreover, Miss Fneeling expressed the hope that she should
be attacked by no more snow-storms, since, she said, it pain-
fully suggested her inferiority to nature ; and she related
how, a little while before, she had been worsted in such en-
counter, and was rescued by some angel-man, she would be
glad to know who. Now, this angel-man was Richard, and
this, of course, transformed them into the very best of
friends.
Then Miss Freeling knew a great many people ; and she
knew Asa and Roxy, and Aunt Grint, and ]\Iemmy and
Bebby; that was enough. But if she had known a deal
more, — if she had known whether Pope was a poet, or
where Captain Kidd hid his money, or who the man in the
Iron Mask was, — she would have been obliged to stop ; for
THE governor's FAMILY. 157
every one in the room stopped, and Richard turned his
head, and she turned her head, to see Mrs. Tunny advance
to receive Dr. Broadwell. Yes, that lady advanced several
steps, when that venerable form was seen entering the door,
having- on his arm one of his daughters.
"Mrs. Tunny mistakes her part," observed Miss Freeling ;
" she should keep her standing, and wait for the guest to
approach,"
" I am not expert in the rules of good societj^," replied
Eichard.
" Mrs. Tunny should be," said Miss Freeling ; " she tries
hard enough to be."
" The disdain of the woman is more reprehensible than
her want of manners," added Richard,
" She was a dressmaker, and I was apprenticed to her ;
and I know her sufficiently well."
" She must have some good feelings, as Pastor Harold
says."
" She has, but they are buried beneath a mountain of
worldliness and ribbons."
" Elder Jabson is no favorite of hers."
"He was once, until she discovered that Dr. Broadwell's
Church was richer and more fashionable."
" She visits at Mr. Munk's, and his family go to the
Elder's meeting."
" She would forget them speedily, but for her interest.
Munk and St. John are customers of her husband's, and
help to keep her plumes a nodding. For the same reason
her entertainment to-night comprises many from the Facto-
ries and the Mills, whom she draws not in the train of her
feelings, but her necessities. Her dress is not in taste, —
indeed, she never had any taste ; her cap is a mile too small,
14
168 RICHAKD EDNEY AND
her tunic is unsuited to her figure, and her white skirt ter-
minates in yellow slippers."
" At home, we had but one Church, one people, one
rank, one intimacy."
" Here there are many ; and I know something of them
all. I have worked in every family, from the summit to the
base of the social frame. I have made brocade dresses for
Governor Bennington's daughters, and muslin ones for
Tunny's ; Dr. Broad well's daughter was under my fingers
before she came here, and so was j\Irs. Xj'^phers."
"What is the difference ?"
" All women look pretty much alike to a dressmaker.
There is but little odds in waists, upper ten or lower ten.
What we study is forms, and what we aim at is a fit."
" Are they alike ? "
" They are not; but the difference is not perhaps what
you would think. It is good se?ise, more than anything
else. Lacking this, some aspire to what they cannot reach,
— others tread on what they cannot depress. With it
Munk and the Mayor are equally princely. Differences !
There are the Gum-chewers, — all backlotters, and vulgar.
But why, my good Sir, is gum more base in woman than
tobacco in a man ? There are the Rocker-footed and the
Square-footed; the vulgar, in stepping, go over from the
heel to the toe, like the rocker of a cradle ; the genteel tread
square. These are some of the wonderful differences ! "
"The other night, at our house, Mrs. Tunny berated
Elder Jabson's people and meetings ; lessening their char-
acters and deprecating their influence."
" They were vulgar, she said ; and added, I suppose, that
Dr. Broadwell did not approve of them. The Doctor is her
cue ; and she alights about him, and follows his track, as
birds do a ploughman, for the worms that are turned up in
THE governor's FAMILY. 159
the furrow. But the forms of religion, or the modes in
which it is applied, do work characteristic and deep-
seated changes. Into whatever family I go, I can very soon
perceive what Church they attend, and what is the turn of
their religious views. Elder Jabson seems to me like a silly
dressmaker, — and I am sometimes that one myself, — who
instead of studying becomingness, aims at effect ; he pro
duces nothing beautiful, — his labors result in jauntiness
incongruity and distortion. He does not clothe the soul
but finifies it. His flounces are enormous, and he com
presses the chest so that it is almost impossible to breathe
He does not enlighten the mind, or refine the feelings, or re
strain the prejudices, or enlarge the humanity, of his people
He addresses the darker passions, — not the tenderness, or the
love, or the aspirations, of our being."
" Yet," replied Richard, " I should prefer Aunt Grint to
Mrs. Tunny."
" Dr. Broadwell," continued Miss Freeling, " is a most
excellent man ; he has good sense, and, so to say, good
taste; he understands the soul, and how Christianity applies
to it, and endeavors that the robe of righteousness shall be
a seemly one. But he has one fault ; he makes his people
think too much of their dresses ; and he has a freak which
I cannot bear, — that there shall be just five rows of quilling
on the border. Parson Smith has the most perfect theory
of soul-costume, but he does not always succeed in working
it ; or, rather, some of his people are so wild that, like sav-
ages, they will not wear their clothes when he puts them on."
" Is there not good sense," asked Eichard, " among the
lower orders as in the higher ? "
" It is good sense," replied Miss Freeling, " that creates
the higher orders. Joined to this, — sometimes leading it,
sometimes enforcing it, — are education, opportunity, indus-
160 RICHARD EDNEY AND
try, self-denial. It is his good sense in law, politics, busi-
ness, life, that gives to Gov. Dennington his distinction. If
Mrs. Tunny had more of it, she would be a respectable
and worthy woman. She does not make her own daugh-
ter's dresses, as the busy-bodies report, lest the prick of the
needle should appear on her fingers. Faustina is a sensible
girl ; — she is pursued by a young man, a Sailmaker, whose
attentions she discards, as his friends say, because of her
aristocratic feelings ; as her mother unequivocally declares,
because he is a mechanic ; but as I certainly know, simply
and solely by reason of his habits."
Dr. Broadwell, who was exchanging a word wuth those
he knew, recognizing Richard, took hhn cordially by the
hand, presented his daughter, and inquired after the Or-
phans. Ada deeply commiserated those unfortunate ones,
and was pleased to know that Richard had so kindly
befriended them. These attentions of the Doctor were the
signal for attack from other quarters, and several persons
shot at Richard. Mrs. Tunny bestowed herself upon him,
and thrust Faustina into his face and eyes, adding Tunny
gratis. Captain Creamer, though having some scores
against Richard, was more complaisant than usual, and
rejoiced Richard could have a taste of good society. It was
a fine thing, he said, for our young men to imbibe a little pol-
ish as they were coming on to the public stage. Mrs. Tunny
attempted a blush, and with her feather-edged fan tapped the
Captain on the cheek, and called him roguish. A pair of
stern eyes, under a beetling brow, capped by a short tuft of
thick hair, were seen working their way up over the shoul-
ders of Captain Creamer, and scowling at Richard. These
belonged to Measle, the wood-surveyor. " I think," said he,
" that our young men, and all other young men, had better
attend to their own business." "An undoubted truth,"
THE governor's FAMILY. 161
replied the Captain, " and I am glad you have mentioned
it ; but we must allow them moments of relaxation." " I
shall make no reply," rejoined the Surveyor ; " I have said
something, and let those take it to whom it belongs."
Now it happened that the Surveyor was joint-suitor of
Miss Faustina with the Sailmaker ; and of course disagree-
able to the latter, who conceived that this something aimed
at himself, since he was the younger of the two. He
instantly retorted, " I take it, and will hold on to it, and
remember it; and it may be you will see its picture again ! "
Richard, perceiving the misunderstanding, said, " The gen-
tleman does not refer to you. Sir. He recalls a little mat-
ter between himself and me. But I hope it will not prove
serious." "No," interjected Munk, who stood by, "not
serious, — jocose, livelj^ playful as a kitten." The Surveyor
was a Catapulter, and a violent partizan; Munk was a
Hydriatic. This feline allusion of the latter was more than
the other could bear. His back seemed instantly to crook,
and the hair on his head to rise ; and he glared on Munk,
and a faint hissing could be heard. The Sailmaker, a Dog-
bane, instantly contracted his neck, grated his teeth, and
emitted a distinct growl. In this way they stood gnashing
alternately at each other and at Munk, who laughed at them
both. " Now is your time. Tunny," said Mrs. Tunny to
her husband ; " show your patriotism ; snarl, bark, or I shall
do it for you ! "
Scenes of this description were of too common occurrence
either to engage curiosity or excite alarm, and Richard was
glad to make his escape. Threading his way through a
daedalian intricacy of cords and starch, where his breathing
was impeded by a dense vapor of cologne, he encountered
Miss Eyre. She put her arm into his, and drew him
towards the hall. " I should not have left you so long," she
14^
162 RICHARD EDNEY AND
said, " but I knew you would relish your own reflections in
a place like this ; and I have had my reflections, — too
sedate, too grave, for such an hour. You have said you
were my friend. You will be glad of an occasion to prove
that you are my friend, though I am afliicted that it should
be such an occasion. It is but a trifle I ask of you, and
that I know you will do. Come with me up stairs."
He went with her to the upper entry, and she conducted,
him to a sort of recess that overhung the stairs leading to
the rear of the house, and motioned him to listen. Voices
were heard on these stairs, which were clearly distinguisha-
ble as Clover's and Mrs. Xyphers'.
" Edney is out of the way," so Clover was heard to say.
" I vanquished him to-night ; he knows he is a fool, and he
cannot recover."
"But Plumy Alicia — "Mrs. Xyphers replied.
" Is disposed of," answered Clover. Miss Eyre clasped
both hands on Richard's arm.
" Xyphers," rejoined Mrs. Xyphers, " I do not value, — I
cannot value. His name is his nature ; he is nought, and
the additional s only doubles his emptiness."
" Xyphers is something," replied Clover ; " his nothing-
ness is something, or he would not be game. Then he was
interested in you, and that shows that you are an interest-
ing woman, and that you deserve protection ; and I should
be false to my own honor, if I did not rescue you from such
imbecility. You can rely on my honor."
" I think I can," answered Mrs. Xyphers, with some hesi-
tation, as if a new thought had struck her ; " you said you
had money of Plumy Alicia ? " Clover, flustering, said, " I
wish not to talk of irrelevant matters." But Mrs. Xyphers
insisted, and said, "I must talk about it." Miss Eyre took
one of Richard's hands in both of hers. Clover replied,
THE GOYEKNOR's FAMILY. 163
•' Plumy Alicia was lavish ; she would have conciliated me
any way. She knew the value of my friendship; she
deposited with me two hundred dollars ; — a mere tribute —
a sort of hostage."
" How can you repay it?" asked Mrs. Xyphers.
" Repay it ! " sneered Clover. " She feared my anger, she
appreciated my ability, she knew what my alliance was
worth; she feed my discretion." Miss Eyre throbbed on the
breast of Richard.
" Xyphers' money is his own," rejoined that lady, with
emotion ; " it is his own earnings ; he has worked for it ; he
never denied me that ; but he had not hearty and could not
give it. Nay, I will not touch his money."
Dancing being called for below. Dr. Broadwell and daugh-
ter would retire. Mrs. Tunny followed them to the dress-
ing-room up stairs, and servants were summoned to assist
them off. Clover and Mrs. Xyphers fled from their retreat.
Miss Eyre, releasing herself from Richard, said, " Do not
remain here ; go to the drawing-room. I will digest my
sorrow alone." Richard went down.
The dancing lasted till supper, the announcement of
which silenced music and dissolved partnerships. While
the mass crowded up stairs to the eating-room, some stayed
below, and felt of the muslin curtains, looked at the pictures
on the wall, and turned over the burnished books with
which Mrs. Tunny freely loaded her tables. Among the
loiterers were Richard and Miss Freeling.
Now Richard longed to ■ ask Miss Freeling, " Do you
know Miss Eyre? — what sort of a girl is she ?" — but he
knew more about her than Miss Freeling did, and he had
come by his knowledge in so confidential and secret a way,
and it was so sacred a matter withal, he did not dare to put
the question.
164 RICHARD EDNEY AND
But Miss Eyre herself appeared, roaming pensively
across the room, like a mourning shade ; traces of sorrow
descended down her face and dress ; a band of hair lay
pathetically loose on her forehead, and her look was tender
and irresistible, — full of that sort of beauty with which mis^-
fortune, when it has taken everything else away, seems
sometimes to renovate its victim.
Miss Freeling, taking up the subject very nearly where
it lay in Richard's mind, said, " Miss Eyre seems to have
been born out of her place. She has powers, but no sphere.
She is certainly unfortunate ; I should not dare to call her
wicked, until I knew more of the human heart than I do
now. She has some education, but no discipline ; she ob-
serves, but never reflects ; she hides defect of character
with a certain brilliancy of temper. She insinuates herself
by tact and talent, where most people would commend
themselves by prudence and discretion. The attentions of
the coarse and illiterate she cannot reciprocate. The flat-
tery of what I should call super-sensualism inflames her
vanity, while at the same time she can discern its mo-
tive. She creates a sensation wherever she goes, and
contrives to be essential to a good many persons. Yet
modesty condemns her, and rank will not tolerate her.
She might have drudged in Silver's kitchen; — her des-
tiny, I fear, will be to expatiate in larger and more ques-
tionable fields. She might have married Capt. Creamer ;
but he lacks sincerity, which, after all, she loves. Clover
has more art, more power, and more audacity, than she
has, and he may outdo her in her own line. She had a
portion of her bringing up in the Governor's family ; but she
imbibed not the principles, but only the consequence, of the
family. Mrs. Melbourne had her in charge ; and the notions
of that lady, to my thinking, are very — singular — bad.
THE governor's FAMILY. 165
She has the gift of fascination, but cherishes no ideas of
usefulness ; nor is she fitted by culture for stations which
she might otherwise adorn. Where is the home that shall
offer her happiness, contentment, and repose? A man
under these circumstances, if he does not relapse into
drunkenness, will keep his virtue, vindicate his capacity,
and find his place. What shall a Factory-girl do ? "
Richard was oppressed ; he knew too much, and he knew
too little, to say anything, and he kept silence. Besides,
Plumy Alicia turned to him so smiling, sad indeed, but so
grateful and azure a face, that what he would like to have
said was snatched from his tongue's end.
Miss Freeling, without observing these pantomimic pas-
sages, continued. " Yonder," said she, pointing to a man
on the opposite side of the room, " is Mr. Cosgrove, a car-
penter, and a member of Parson Smith's Church, which
you have heard is aristocratic. He came to the city a poor
boy. He possessed intelligence, energy, and ambition. He
pursues a useful trade, and strives to perfect himself in it.
He has good sense, withal. The defects of his early educa-
tion he has repaired by later application. He is a large
contractor for houses, and advances to opulence. He visits
among our nobility, and is welcome in the most polished
circles. His powers have been not only developed, but
employed. Would you like to know him ? "
She introduced Richard to Mr. Cosgrove, and he liked
his new acquaintance very well.
Those who had gone first to the supper beginning to
withdraw, opening was made for the others. Mr. Cosgrove
squired Miss Freeling; Richard, seeing Miss Eyre standing
alone and aloof, offered his arm. But she declined, and
said she would not eat. So Richard proceeded alone to the
rendezvous of attraction. If the Confectioner and the
166 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Fruiterer had been there, so had the Eater, and there only
remained the fragments of a sumptuous fare.
Mr. Cosgrove handed Richard a glass of water, which he
drank. The Surveyor and the Sailmaker, whose frenzy a
liberal drench of wine had not reduced, were at once
aroused. " Mr. Cosgrove dare not offer it ! " said the one.
" The young man dare not drink it ! " said the other. Hav-
ing uttered this, they both underwent the beastly metamor-
phosis, one growling and the other mewing. Clover, a
violent Phumbician, approached ; he had one arm devoted
to Mrs. Xyphers, the other he presented to the attention of
Eichard, giving it the fisticuff form and the snapping mo-
tion in which the expert delighted to display itself. He
said, " The barbarian will do it ; he is mean enough to chip
off an insult into the eyes of the City's honor ; but here is
the power that shall chastise his insolence ! " Richard laid
hold of the arm, and lowered it, and held it down ; and
Clover could not raise it. It was Clover's left arm, and
Richard used his right. It was a strong arm, indeed ; it
labored like the piston of a steam-engine, but it could not
be disengaged. " There is its place," said Richard ; "and
this is mine."
" Tunny ! " cried the female head of the house, " Tunny,
speak ! " " Water," said the little male, answering the call
of his spouse, in a thin, child-like voice, — "water is whole-
some, it is respectable; I am for water, myself, [a hiss,]
but I would not make it an absorbing topic ; we are in dan-
ger of getting one idea on the subject ; I should say half
an idea was better! Shall w^e break up the city with
water ? What danger of falling into the ditches, and losing
our lives ! I am for reasonable water, and will never counte-
nance these sanguinary measures ! But, gentlemen, allow
me to say, our troubles are not water ; but — shall I say
THE governor's FAMILY. 167
it? I must say it — Rats! I do not allude to Cats and
Dogs, [mewling and growling,] I do not, — I will not, — I
dare not ! But I must speak the truth. The tightness of
the times, — the numerous failures we mourn, — the unset-
tled state of the market; — I might name cabbages and
turnips ; — oh, fellow-citizens, it is owing to Rats ! "
" You know I had the honor to be appointed chairman of a
Committee to investigate. We are prepared to report. I
have the schedule in my pocket. There are three thousand
tenements, inclusive of stores, manufactories, barns, wharves,
vessels, &c. ; we estimate ten rats and mice to each tene-
ment, making the enormous aggregate of thirty thousand
of these mischievous non-producers ! [Hear, hear.] Can
the expense of supporting them be less than fifty cents per
head, annually ? Fifteen thousand dollars, then, is our
yearly rat-tax ! Consider some of the items : —
Perforations of meal-bags, doors, drawers, f 50.00
Attacks on cheeses, loaves of bread, joints of meat, .... 200.00
-Eggs sucked, 40.00
Corn and grain pillaged, 300.00
Fruit-trees annually girdled, 80.00
Turnips and apples munched, 35.00
Nuts carried off, 10.00
The cost of preventives : —
Rat-proof cases, tubs, jars, 250.00
Cementing cellars, and pointing walls, 400.00
Sinks in drains, 90.00
Damage to cellars by water coming in at the holes they make, 50.00
Ratsbane and potash, 5.25
Traps of all sorts, 18.00
Annual bill of joiners for repairs, 325.00
Board of 1000 Cats, 2000.00
At this point, there was an outcry, soon hushed, however,
168 filCHARD EDNEY AND
by the overwhelming interest of the topic. The little man
continued, wiping his brow. " I need not go on. You see
the astounding disclosures, and I see your alarm. But we
approach the great question : Is there no remedy ? These
thirty thousand rats, it is estimated, would support sixty
missionaries to foreign lands." "Cats is the remedy! " cried
a Dog-hater. "A plot, a plot I " shouted an enemy of Cats.
There was a scuffle about the table.
" Gentlemen, fellow-citizens, brothers and sisters ! " Tunny
began, again. " Let me be heard ! bear with me one mo-
ment ! I am magnanimous, — I hate incendiarism, and will
spit on a traitor ! There is hope ! I have allowed myself
to receive a consignment of rat-traps; — a new article,
cheap and safe. They will hold every rat that gets into
them, and there is a large size, the A. A., that will hold
more. A child can manage them. Could not a Rat-trap
Stock Company be fornied ? Shall not the Common Council
be petitioned to purchase the patent ? I propose this as a
measure of conciliation."
" I did not agree to the report," rejoined DrafT, a rival
Grocer, " and I should oppose the plan of Tunny's. The
fact, which all overlook, is here, just here, and nowhere
else. The more there is eaten, the more there is sold ;
this is the law of trade — and it matters not who eats, the
merchant makes by it."
There was a storm of suppressed sputtering. But Munk
cried, " Yes, all eat, all sell; I buy a trap, you buy a trap;
catch them if you can. Domestic turkeys, foreign grapes,
some of Mrs. Tunny's nice custards ; nobody can beat Mrs.
Tunny in custards. Catapulter, Dogbane, all like good
things, — all love to be happy." At the same time, he dis-
tributed the viands, and coaxed the belligerents to a softer
mood.
THE governor's FAMILY. 169
The party broke up. Miss Eyre contrived, as young
ladies always will contrive when they undertake it, that
Eichard should beau her home. But she was considerate ;
she did not distress him. She said, " You are my friend ;
I retain you by the strongest tie, — that of confidence ; I
have shown my estimate of your character, by imparting to
you the profoundest affairs of my existence. Good-night."
15
CHAPTER XII.
RICHARD AND CLOVER VNITE.
An Anti-Slavery meeting was gathered at the City Hall.
It comprised men and women from Victoria Square and
Knuckle Lane ; from the Factories and Saw-mills ; from
Taverns and Alehouses.
The lecturer had perhaps more of truth than love in his
composition ; he was one who would not receive a cotton
shirt from a slaveholder, lest, like Edward the Confessor,
when a tax he had imposed was brought before him, he
should see a little devil jumping about it. He seemed to
feel, in regard to Slavery, as is related some of the Puri-
tans felt about Popery, that a thwack at it was the best cure
for the heart-burn. Possibly, acting on an old notion that
enchantment cannot subsist in running water, he thought
that the spell whereby that direful evil infatuates the pop-
ular mind might be broken by setting in motion the currents
of popular feeling.
He was earnest and vehement ; quite Pauline, quite
Savonarolian. His words did not exemplify so much the
rain on the new-mown grass, as the fire and the stubble. It
seemed as if he would burn the grass, rather than be at the
trouble of mowing it.
The audience listened patiently a while ; many with a
deep conviction of the justice of his cause, — others over-
powered by the terror of his language. But uneasiness
manifested itself, either from fright or from offence. The
speaker no whit faltered. He seemed like one who was
BICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 171
used, as the Prophet says, to threshing the mountains, and
making them small as the dust. And though these moun-
tains were, like Olympus, covered with gods, it made no
difference; the gods must come down. Presently there
was hissing, and scraping, and groaning. Diana teas great,
but old, and gouty withal, and she could not be ousted
suddenly.
He spoke of the recent "War, and its connection with his
subject, and with national affairs generally. And now the
gods rallied, and particularly Clover, and his confreres,
young Chassford, Glendar, and others.
" That war," he said, " is the disgrace of the nation, and
the triumph of Slavery. Both are a curse, cleaving like
leprosy to the comeliness of the Republic ; both are a wicked-
ness of such magnitude that perdition is not deep enough
to hold them ! "
" Repeat those words !" cried Clover, springing from his
seat. The speaker repeated them in such a way there
could be no possibility of misapprehending them.
"Drag him from the desk!" "Pitch him from the
window I " rang from different parts. Timorousness took
the alarm, and some would have left the house. Dr.
Broadwell arose and said, " Be quiet, friends ; if the lectur-
er's truth does not hurt us, his rhetoric surely will not.
There is no danger."
Clover, with two or three others, leaped forward to the
platform on which the lecturer stood. "I wish to speak, "
he said. " Certainly," replied the other. " This fellow,"
so Clover harangued, "assaults the nation — he assaults the
people ! He mocks at our institutions — he scofTs at our gov-
ernment ! He would wrench the flag from the mizzen-peak
of our glory ! he would break the band-chain of our destiny !
Might is right; Might rules; Might gives law; Might
J 7>i i;i>'U\U»' Kl>MV ANP
UKnv up \\\o Tovt of Moullm* ; M\}^\\{ thrn^lx'tl th^ Chinono;
,Mi>jl\t bumovl l.it(li> IUmvIhv ; Mi><l»( n\|>(ur.nl (Wrolu;
Might puuisho^l Svillivan ! («i\>a( is MiKl>( ' Who will |oii\
\i\ (hut .xhvmt f Who will ohoov Mij>ht ^ "
Tho iV!<po»»iO ^v^^^ vooil'oivuft, hut s|>iU'm\ Thriv oovtM
\»ot lu\\t> hoou ntoiv thun t\ doaou iudivulurtis, o\it of thivo
luuvvhvvl, ougixjjvil in it. Vot it so\unUnl hw^v, «n*l .MMMurd
(v> till tho houso; luwl hs with ^toutor hin^s tho NoutimtMit
\v!\N »v|Vi\(vHl. *'l}»v«t isMijiht!" (hoiv woiv thoKO who
thought it p»vv!\iU^l. Soiuo wotvU and norvovts onos yioKhvl
{o it, juul loll in with it ; vMMUo wh\> wvt^' op|H»soil t«» it, n»l-
jvulging it to Iv tho sovoivign voiv^o, woi\' dispvisod to t\c^\\\'\-
Ov«vH^ in it; t\nvl it' rt voto \uu\ Uvn taUon on tho instant, it
wouKl jm»lv\My hiwv oaniovl tho hi>uso.
"I question t)u» »vsiH>nso : I ivpiulu<(t> tho s(-ntin)ont I "
kViOil tlvo Uvtvuvv.
" \V\>o l>o unto you I " tvs\H>niloil Clovov. " Might risos ;
Might blots vmt its ouomios; Might cvushos you ! " Ho
laid his arm lunwily on tho shouUlor of tho spoaKor, as if
ho oxiHVtxnl to soo hin\ vanish thn»ugh tho \\oo\\
Instantly thtnv wus a IvUowitig (ixmu all sidos, " Do l\in\,
I'lovor!" " IVvour hin\ ! " •> Tako hin\ up with a jvur of
(v>ugTS ! "
Mt\u\\vlulo. Ku'hai\l, Ivu'kod by son\o frionds, juovnitod
tho dais, attd wUilo CK>\vr W5\s adjusting hin\solf to tho
undortaViug of dt^jvttohing tho Kvtuivr at a single swixllow,
ho swung his cap, and shoutod, "Utxnit is Truth ! " and his
vxMumdv^s vibmtwl tho ory : and by doop, p\ihnonary thnn-
dors. it mlUnl thrvnigh tho Hall ; and tho Might-u>ioos, Ih>-
luannl by tho 'IVuth-vv^iot^, tU\l svMwohing away.
Uut CKwvr. not a littlo inoousvHl, darting his skinny oyo
.\t Kicharvl, said, " Who arv you, that dar\^s orwss tho jvitli
of Mig^\t ? Who art^ y\ni that prx^umos to lilt your pvun
m
^Hm
*T'W.aBe*i»a6«r'«-wi«3^!' proewfed CS»9«t; *y««»aK
ki/i'Tr ~-^.' -hiK M zimadr, yvi tost
sna. swiiena: -as
174 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
liim from his feet, and swinging him lightly, very lightly, in
his arms, laid him backwards on the floor, and bade the
lecturer proceed. Clover did not wince nor stir. The
audience, who had risen in expectation and alarm, resumed
their seats. Without further disturbance, the lecture was
finished, and the people dismissed.
Richard and Clover left the Hall together. Eichard
drew Clover's arm into his, and they went towards their
homes, both of which lay in the Beauty of Woodylin. Few
words were interchanged. Only we can affirm that Clover
went to bed that night soberly, — quite soberly.
CHAPTER XIII.
RICHARD EXHORTS AT A RELIGIOUS MEETING.
One Sunday evening, Richard went, with Aunt Grint
and his sister, to Elder Jabson's meeting, in a neighboring
School-house.
A hymn was given out, the first stanza of which is as
follows :
" Am I a soldier of the Cross,
A follower of the Lamb,
And shall I fear to own his cause,
Or blush to speak his name ? "
The chorister was gone, but Richard, knowing the tune,
and loving the words, led off; and he threw such life and
unction into the singing as never was seen before. It was as
if tutti had been written on his understanding and his spirit,
his lips and his eyes; and his throat was equal to any tuba
mirabilis that was ever invented.
A brother spoke in this wise :
" I feel to bless God that I am here. I think I have known
the Saviour; I was brought to see my wretched and lost
condition, it is now twelve years gone ; it was in just such a
meeting as this I closed with the offers of mercy, and light
fell on my mind. But I have backslidden since ; gay com-
panions and vain amusements drew off my attention ; I know
I have not borne the cross as I should do ; I ask your prayers.
At the last Reformation, I was enabled to come out froni
the world, and set my face toward Zion anew. You know,
brethren, how it has gone with me since ; the business of
this world got the upper hands, and speretual realities were
176 ^ RICHARD EDNEY AND
shoved one side. I feel to be thankful that my life is spared ;
and I think I can say I rejoice in this evening."
Richard, thereupon, spoke, and said : —
" We will pray for our brother ; we will help him to a
confirmation of his wishes, and a renewal of his assurance.
But, my friends, is there not a radical defect here ? Are
we building on the Rock of Ages? Is it possible that the
ordinary winds and floods of life could so easily subvert our
foundations ? Our temptations and besetments, our hin-
drances and cares, are as nothing compared with those to
which the primitive disciples were subject; yet they endured
unto the end. If one has pure and deep love to God and
to man in his heart, I should urge that he cannot lose
it. What is the world but a grand theatre for Christian
usefulness; and how can contact with the world deteriorate
our virtue, or diminish our zeal ? If Christ be truly in us,
he is a well of water, springing up unto everlasting life ; a
source of spiritual vitality, that can neither intermit nor
be exhausted. Are we not depending too much on mere
impulse and gladness, without grappling with the cardinal
principles- of Christianity, and planting them low iri our
natures, and working them into the franie-work of our
characters ? Are the laws of the religious life more variable
than those which regulate every other human concern ? A
peace-man does not lose his interest in peace, nor does an
anti-slavery-man backslide from abolition ; a lawyer perse-
veres in attachment to his profession ; and what mother
present grows lukewarm towards her children ?
" Are we careful of our bodies, even ? Do we make them
fitting t&mples for so glorious a guest as the Holy Ghost ?
When we approach the throne, do we come not only with
hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, but also, as the
Apostle directs, ivith bodies icashed ivith pure ivater ?
THE governor's FAMILY. 177
" Our brother has spoken of amusements. Eecreation, in
the present state of being, is needful as food and clothing.
If we enter upon sportive scenes with right feelings, — if we
pursue what is innocent and joyous in the spirit of inno-
ccncy and joyousness, — if we derive what advantage is
afibrded by a free and unreserved intercourse with our fel-
lows, we shall be better prepared for the graver duties and
severer events of life."
The Elder here reminded Eichard that this was a relig-
ious meeting, and that he should not digress into other
topics.
Richard replied, that it was only of what had a supreme
religious bearing that he wished to speak, and continued : —
" The trouble seems to be that we get religious feeling
without acquiring evangelical principle. We amass the
hay, wood and stubble, of momentary enthusiasm, and have
not the true life of God in the soul. We look for sudden
changes, and have no maturity of growth. The dew of an
evening meeting is speedily exhaled, — the sun of gospel
love mounts to the perfection of the day. We cry, lo here !
and lo there ! lo this meeting ! and lo that church ! while the
infinite gifts of Providence and of the ages, of nature and of
grace, are ever offered to our hands, ever pouring into our
hearts !
" Our religion is like a saw I have seen, which was respect-
able on bass-wood, but birch or a knotty hemlock discovered
its weak points, and condemned its brittleness. It is a glow-
worm religion, that fails by day-light, and disappears in
the glare of occupation. It is a parlor religion, that shifts
its dress and loses its temper when it goes into the kitchen.
The pursuit of salvation in the midst of excitement is like
gunning in a strong wind ; you cannot distinguish your
game, nor steady your sight. Why hurry your converts
178 EICHARD EDNEY AND
into the water, plunging them through the ice in mid-
AA'inter ? — true spirituality, like the witch-hazel, having blos-
somed in the fall, will bear its fruit the next summer. We
need a piety like the plantain, which will flourish even
under the feet of mankind ; and like the sandal-wood, that
bestows its sweetness on those who bruise it most hardl)?-.
Trees flourish where corn dwindles ; — you ought not to ex-
pect the same description of holiness under all circumstances,
nor refuse a fruit of the spirit because it does not happen to
be your favorite crop.
" I am very frank with you, my brethren and sisters ; I
love you all, — I desire that we may each attain to the
stature of perfect ones in Jesus. You invited me to speak;
I thank you for the opportunity. May God bless us all ! "
After the meeting, several of the people spoke with Rich-
ard. One said he had hit the nail on the head; another,
that he had driven it home ; a third thought he had clenched
it ; a fourth hoped he would bring some more nails.
Returning, Aunt Grint said, " Well, I do believe some-
thing is going to happen."
" Why ? " asked Roxy.
"Our Richard," replied Aunt Grint, "has really got
waked up."
" I am usually awake at proper times," observed Richard ;
"and I sleep my eight hours every day. But my soul
never sleeps."
" You do not know, for all the world," rejoined the Aunt,
" what feeble and uncertain creeturs we are ; you have no
experience of the dreadful natur of man. I wish I could
feel as you do, but I can't. Nothing but sovreign grace
will ever save 7?2e. Why, a salt-cellar will upset me; and
there is spots on the finger-nails that make a body so dis-
THE governor's FAMILY, 179
mal ; and when a dog howls in the night, I have n't the least
mite of faith that ever was."
" Your Bible," answered Richard, " would correct these
superstitious fears, and lead you to a constant, unfaltering,
filial faith in God."
"Ah's me! " added the Aunt; "I sometimes am afraid to
open my Bible, for who knows on what verse I may pitch ? "
CHAPTER XIV.
RICHARD CALLED TO NURSE A SICK JLAN.
This was Bill Stonners, a man belonging to one of the
other saws. He was a person of rude manners, intemper-
ate habits, and solitary life. He practised log-booming in
summer, and sawing in winter. Richard knew but little of
huTi. His disease was malignant erysipelas, a fearful form
of St. Anthony's fire. Sj-mptoms of this malady had ap-
peared in different parts of the cit)', and an impression pre-
vailed that it was infectious. Moreover, this case of Bill
Stonners' was represented as the most shocking imaginable ;
and many who would not hesitate at a common instance
were intimidated by this. Bill had no family, and what was
worse, he had no friends ; none were moved by affection or
love to look after him, and so deplorable was his condition,
that even the sense of duty in the strongest minds was
overborne. His home was a miserable hut on the bank of
the stream, within the woods, about half a mile above the
Dam. It had no comforts ; none for the sick man, nonefor
his attendants, none even which the most indulgent benev-
olence could find any satisfaction in applying in such an
emergenc}'-.
It maj' be that corporations have no souls ; but the city
tindertook what individual charity shrank from. It provided
a physician, medicine, emollients, and went in pursuit of
a nurse. The Overseer of the Poor came to the Mill on
this errand. He encountered great reluctance ; — some had
watched with Bill, and were rightly excused. He addressed
KICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 181
Richard. But Captain Creamer interfered ; he thought it
was flinging away a valuable life on a worthless one. Mr.
Gouch opposed even his tears to the idea, and said, with
extreme emotion, that he should never see Richard again.
Silver, who had become strongly attached to Richard,
planted a picaroon in his collar, and declared he should
not go.
But somebody must go; and the city would remunerate
Captain Creamer for the loss of Richard's time, and also
give Richard such compensation as was just.
So Richard went. " O God," he said, " spare my life,
if it pleases thee; but if thou takest it, let it be in the
service of my fellow-men ! "
He reached what, under the circumstances, was a dreary
place, and one sufficiently revolting. The house, a rude
shantee, was perched on a rock, overlooking the frozen
stream below. It might have been deemed a picturesque
spot, but only so to life and health. It was dismal to soli-
tude, and sickness, and death. The roof covered two
apartments, in one of which lay the sick man ; the other
was the repository of his stuff and tools, comprising spike-
poles, raft-pins, raft-rigging, augers, a draw-shave, etc. But
the sick man, — we shall not describe him. He was past
consciousness when Richard arrived ; his head was swollen
to a preternatural size ; his features had all disappeared, and
were submerged in a chaos of whatever is most shocking in
the ravages or the deformities of disease. Bill was intem-
perate, — he had been irregular every way ; and his blood
was corrupt, and vicious humors in incredible quantity, and
with frightful swiftness, determined to his head.
Nor need we describe the room where such a man, with-
out culture, without piety, without a friend, had lived. We
have said he lived alone ; — this is not quite true. There
16
182 RICHARD EDNEY AND
was frequently with him one who was called Bill's Boy;
the soubriquet of this creature was Chuk. Eichard found
this fellow sitting on a block before the fire, nursing his ears
with his fists. He did not rise when Eichard entered, — he did
not speak ; he only gave a sort of hunch with his head.
His dark visage — dark with hair, and beard, and grime
— was freaked by that dull redness which intemperance and
exposure impart; and intermixed with this were traces of
a huffy despair, — a state to which we might suppose a hu-
man heart, uninfluenced by refined affection, unenlightened
by religious truth, would arrive. One might fancy that
Chuk had tended upon Bill, — that he had set up with
him all night, and had ministered to him there in the day ;
that he had done this all alone ; that he had continued to
do it till hope had fled, and his strength was gone, — and
out of sorts with himself and with all things, now surlily
grinning at and daring the issue, had gone to brooding over
the fire ; and such a fancy would not be far out of the way.
Did he not speak ? He did not employ much of what is
understood to be human speech ; — he swore. His every
word seemed to be an oath ; his sentences began and ended
and were sealed with oaths. He could only converse in
oaths. And he swore at Eichard in the first reply he made
to him, when he asked what he should do ; and he damned
Bill, soul and body, to hell ; yet, if we shall be permitted
to say so, he loved Bill.
What should Eichard do ? There was little else to be
done, except to foment the blasted, bloated face of the pa-
tient with alcohol. Eichard thought cold water would be a
better lotion, and said as much to Chuk ; who, having first
sent Eichard to eternal perdition for intimating anything of
the sort, took a pail, and descending to a hole in the ice,
filled it, and brought it to Eichard.
THE governor's FAMILY. 1S3
The Physician, Dr. Chassford, called. He was a quiet
man, of few words, but gifted with pleasant manners,
great professional fidelitj', and much flavor of gentle feel-
ings. His replies extinguished expectation, and provided for
a speedy termination of the sickness ; Bill could not live
twenty-four hours longer. Chuk did not swear at the Doc-
tor ,' he bit at him, he touseled him, he burnt him alive with
oaths.
The Overseer brought candles, food, and such things as
the living might require, but which could have no pertinence
to the dying.
Chuk laid a large heap of drift-wood on the hearth, and
then bestowed his wonted blessing on what he had done.
Richard ventured to expostulate with him ; but it was like
spitting against the wind, — rather like raising sail in a
hurricane.
Having drained a flask of liquor, the Boy doubled himself
into a coarse blanket on the floor, and went to sleep.
Richard was left alone with that sick man, and that Boy,
in that room, for the night. He needed no candle, for the
resinous stuff that Chuk provided emitted an illumination
quite sufficient. The sick man breathed hard and hoarsely;
but he made no motion as if he were in pain. He could
not speak, nor hear, nor understand. Richard's employ-
ment was wringing out the rags afresh in the water, when-
ever they became hot ; and this was very often. He could
hardly pray for mercy on the soul before him, — he could
commend that soul to the Infinite Mercy.
If there was anything to qualify the gloom of the hours,
it was the roaring of the Dam. All the winds played on it,
and it took advantage of all the winds to exhibit its peculiar
powers. The sound rose and fell, — it was plaintive and it
was harsh ; it died away in the distance, and directly it
184 RICHARD EDNEY AND
reappeared under the windorvs of the house, and filled the
adjacent high-ernbanked stream with its tempestuous clamor.
Anon, as it were breaking away from its proper source, the
fall of the water, it leaped into the woods, — it fled through
the forest like a detached volume of smoke; it whispered;
miniardly to the hills, — it howled, goblin-like, in the gul-
lies ; it trapsed out of hearing, to strike up some new and
strange vagar}', in an unexpected quarter of the heavens.
It was now the beginning of spring, and the crows^
attempted the poetic office of heralding the dawn ; and
from many a tall pine, and many a bleak rock — and occa-
sionally facilitating the matter by a short bout on the wingi
— they shrieked the pleasant news.
Their noise awakened Chuk, who, with such utensils and
in such way as he was accustomed to, went about getting
hreakfast.
The eastern sky was bland, prismatic, reviving; and the
sun came into the rooni with warmth and peace, if not
healing, in its beams, and Richard was tempted to the
window,
" Don't look out there ! " said Chuk ; " that is Bill's win-
dow; eat, if you want to, and go to the dogs, but don't sil
there! The city gives the vittles, — it didn't give that!
Don't you see Bill's boom, just Ixilow, norward of the Pint !
No, — he can't see it, and you shan't! "
Richard drew up to the rude table, Chuk poured out
the coffee, and handed him the sugar and milk; and while
Richard was eating, the boy tended his master, and chow*
tcred about the room,
" There is not a boom on the river like that," he said
" and there '11 never be another ; for Bill will be dead, anc
in the lake, where no tirnlxir grows. In three weeks the ic<
will be out, and the logs will run ; and they will all curst
THE GOVERNOU'S FAMILY. 185
Bill, as they go by, for not catching them. He knew the
marks as far as he could see them ; and he never beckoned
with his picaroon at a stick, though it was big as thunder,
that it did not mind him and come in. None could manage
a rip as he could ; and the logs were proud of him, — wan't
they, though? and they would n't quit him, though every
infernal rock in the River was tearing at their bellies ! He
ought not to die ; he is an old fool to die, after such a win-
ter as this, when there has been such a cramming of the
Lake, and such jobs are laid out for us ! "
All at once the Boy seemed to soften ; he changed his
tone, and leaning over the bed, he said, " Did you speak,
Bill? It'sChuk, — Chuk is here. For God's sake, don't
die, Bill ! Shan't I caulk the boat? Shan't 1 overhaul the
Tigging? Swear at me. Bill ! knock me down ! once, only
once, before you can't ! "
Richard had been to the Lakes; he had hauled limber to
the head-waters of the stream ; he had once, in a stress,
helped " drive the River," as the idioni is, atid knew about
the catching of logs in booms ; and he understood a little
of the Boy's feelings, and truly commiserated him, and tried
to cheer his heart. But Chuk would listen to nothing, —
he would be persuaded by nothing.
A low tapping was hoard at the door. " That 's Mysie,"
said Chuk. " Plagues light on her old pate I why does
she come asking after Bill ? She knows he aa't any better ;
she knows he never will be ! "
Mysie entered the room ; and as Chuk did not tell Richard
about her, and as Richard, when he afterwards knew her,
was interested in her, we will venture a word or two for her.
She was called Mysie ; but Mysie what, or what Mysie,
nobody knew. She was quite old ; she might have been
near the allotted period of human life. She was wrinkled,
16*
186 RICHARD EDNEY AND
even beyond the extremest age ; yet her face had a fresh
and vigorous look, and her wrinkles did not seem to be so
much a symptom of natural waste as a part of her constitu-
tion. She was tall, straight, and bony, yet she had nothing
of the Meg Merrilies stamp, nor of any other but her own.
Her costume was shabby and neglected. She wore an old
and dirty straw bonnet, with an immense rim, and a green
plaid cloak, of a kind that was common twenty years before ;
and she towed herself through the mud and splosh in a huge
flaring pair of India-rubbers, like a small boat. She was
not stern, or sharp, or prying, or malevolent ; her reigning
expression was that of quiet good-nature, and innocent self-
complacency.
Mysie, too, like those upon whom she called, lived alone.
She occupied the spare end of a tumble-down house, not far
from the Point. Nor was she wholly alone ; she kept cows
and cats; having five or six of the former, and a dozen of
the latter. In the summer it was her vocation to wait on
the^e cows ; and having no regular pasture-ground, she
drove them into the woods, and led them by the road-side,
•wherever she could find grass. The cats constituted her
immediate domestic circle.
Mysie was never at church. She never entered a house,
she was never known to change her dress ; she claimed
no relatives. She sometimes went into the city to sell
butter.
She was never sick, and though always exposed, she was
never injured. She would be out all day in the rain, tend-
ing her cows, but she took no cold ; she frequented the
loneliest woods, and sauntered in the most out-of-the-way
fields and lanes ; — she was not afraid.
She had led such a life forty years, as she was wont to
say, and was never hurt yet.
THE governor's FAMILY. 187
The children saw her as a grotesque, bug-bearish, sprawl-
ing-looking woman ; a kind of ogress, emerging from the
depths of the forest, or traversing, with an idle, vacant step,
the sludgy swales and courses of the brooks, and were
afraid of her; yet, when they came near enough for her to
speak to them, so pleasant was her smile, so soft her voice,
she easily composed them, and sometimes made them love
her.
She had a fondness for trees and wild-flowers, and some
taste for natural beauty ; and she did all her worship beneath
the sun and the open sky, which she used to say was as
good as a Meeting-house.
In a cold and dry winter, springs of water fail, and the
domestic supply of that essential aliment of life is cut ofF;
aqueducts freeze, and brooks and wells give out. This mis-
fortune befell Mysie, and she was obliged to take her cows
to the Eiver to drink.
For such a purpose had she come down this morning, and
for such a purpose had she come a good many mornings, by
Bill's.
We have said she had no relatives. Nobody knew that
she had any ; there were not five persons, out of eighteen
thousand in the city, to whom she appeared otherwise than
of Melchisidechian origin, without father or mother. She
seemed like a rural anchorite, a social fungus, a tame
female Orson. Yet it was sometimes said, — not that there
was any reason for saying it, or any malice in saying it, but
merely because something must be said — a sort of buzzing
conjecture, that a man must lift his hand and brush away,
— that Bill was her son, and that Chuk was Bill's son; but
of this nobody knew, and nobodywill know.
Chuk swore at JMysie when she entered, and branded
her with many abominable names ; but she did not mind it,
188 RICHARD EDNEV AND
and it neither quickened nor slackened her wonted heavy,
slow-forward gait, nor did it disturb the placid folds of her
wrinkles.
She brought a mug of milk, which Chuk, of course,
damned when he took and emptied; and she poured from
her apron a quantity of poppy-seeds, which, she said, were
for poultices. She turned from the bedside, and, as if it
were a foregone conclusion, said, "He is past being better;
he is gone too far for that ! He would like to have seen the
red heifer when she changed her coat; but he '11 not care ;
and there are not many to care. Everything is best when
it is ended. This going on so without stopping is the only
thing to care about."
Mysie took her mug, and was going, when Chuk caught
at her cloak, as if he would rend it from her shoulders.
" Don't pull so," she said, very gently. " Mother ! " he
cried ; he did not cry it at once, or as if he was used to cry-
ing it. He strangled with it ; he wharled it out ; he yelped
it, as we might suppose a wolf to do in some attempt at
filial ogganition. "I wouldn't call for mothers," replied
Mysie ; " there an't any mothers now, and no children.
We are alone. There is Line-back, that had as pretty calf
as ever you see — "
" Give me something ! " replied the Boy. " He is gone,
and the business is gone, and all is gone. Who was a
child? Who got into somebody's lap ? Who kissed him ?
Did n't she die ? Did n't they put her in a grave ? Where
is that ? who is that ? Don't tell me nobody cares ! don't
call me Chuk! Hadn't he another name? Did she
swear ? "
" I would n't speak so, if I was you," replied Mysie. " It
is a big world we live in, and God Almighty hasn't made
us for nothing, I guess."
THE governor's FAMILY. 189
Hadn't the creature any emotion ? She didn't express
any. She was inflexibly bland. Had she no hopes, no
regrets, no memories, no sympathies? She called after
her cows, - — each of whom had a name, and knew her
name, — who, having come up from the w'ater, were nuz-
zling amid the seared herbage that appeared about the door-
way.
Three ladies approached the house, who addressed Mysie
with a friendly freedom., as if she were an old acquaintance.
These ladies were Ada Broadwell, Barbara Dennington,
and Mrs. Judge Burp. When the Boy saw them, he
retreated from the door, blaspheming like the screech of a
steam -whistle. "More to kill Bill," he said ; " more to tell
me he can't live ; more stufT to help him die ! "
Richard went to the door to answer the inquiries of the
ladies. He thought Barbara was Melicent, and spoke to
her as a friend, and extended his hand to her ; but she did
not know him, and her manner showed that she did not.
But Ada knew them both, and set them to rights with each
other. Barbara said she had heard of Mr. Edney, and was
glad to see him ; and Mrs. Judge Burp, or the Lady
Caroline, as she was generally called, said the same. The
Lady Caroline was very glad he had come to Bill Stonners'.
" Poor wretch ! " she said ; " he is rejected by all ; and, what
is W'Orse, he rejected himself. He has no friends abroad,
and none in his own soul. But it is a Christian duty to
minister to him, and make his situation as comfortable as
may be."
They had brought cordials, and fruit, and rolls of linen ;
but, except as to the last, they were too late, Richard re-
plied.
They would go in. The Boy had flung himself into the
chunney-corner. The Lady Caroline did not hesitate to
190 RICHARD EDNEY AND
apply the fomentation to the sick man's face with her own
hands. Richard feared she was exposing herself; but she
would do it. Richard beheld her, shall we say, with aston-
ishment. She had thrown off her bonnet, and seemed to
act as if she were the chosen nurse of the hour.
And there were other reasons why Richard should regard
her with interest : the Lady Caroline was a noble woman
to look to; she completed the idea of what is called an ele-
gant woman ; and she exceeded it, in that she added thereto
great beauty of spirit, and the charms of religious self-denial.
She was tall and proportionate, with hazel eyes and hair,
arched brows, and a very perfect mouth ; and in the excite-
ment of action, her face kindled with the hues of spiritual
and deep sensibility.
Barbara turned to the Boy, whose distress startled her
tenderness. She spoke kindly to him, — he did not look up ;
she laid her hand on his head, — he hunched it off; she
offered him an orange, — he hunched at that.
Ada talked with Richard ; she ventured to say the room
seemed lacking in comforts and care. Chuk let fly at her
a salvo of oaths. " Bill could n't live anywhere else," he
said; "and you want to bring in your handyjingledoms
here, and kill him before his time ! If you touch a thing,
^ he '11 die ! That block is where he used to set ; that coat is
just where he threw it off, when he took to his bed ; there is
where he spit his tobacco, — he could spit against any man
living; them shavings he whittled from a new paddle: but
he '11 never want it, — he '11 never ask where it is ; and its
there, — there, in the corner, right before his eyes, and,
curse him, he can't see it I " He swore himself into a sort of
blubbering yex, and brayed his eyes with his fingers, as if
he was angry with them for their ability to see, and would
grind them to powder.
THE governor's FAMILY. 191
It was easier to minister to the dying than the living.
The ladies did all they could do, and left. Richard was
not detained in that place a great while. The disease ran
its course that night ; and Bill Stonners died, and was
buried.
The Boy clung with fang-like tenacity to the old spot.
Bill had no other heirs, and Chuk became sole proprietor
of the estate and the business. Every day, Mysie carried
him a mug of milk.
CHAPTER XV.
RICHARD VISITS QUIET ARBOR.
Clover had been fairly beaten at the Anti-Slavery Meet-
ing, but he knew his antagonist was an honorable one ; nay,
he thought that Richard, like one having got a large advan-
tage, might be disposed to make some deduction ; and he
was sure he was rich enough in spoils to offer a handsome
present. " You can't refuse the favor of going with me to
Quiet Arbor." Of course, Richard could not ; it would give
him compunction to refuse Clover even a larger favor.
Quiet Arbor was in the basement of an extensive block
of buildings, lying on the margin of a small stream, called
the Pebbles, a tributary of the River. Red curtains shaded
the windows and the glass door, just to show to the world
how quiet it was ; nothing glary, nothing dazzling, nothing
that should disturb the serenity of the passer-by, or seem
ostentatious to anybody.
And Clover and Richard entered it ver}^ quietly; and the
Friend of the People — the man of the timid eye and a
small hacking cough — was very quiet behind the bar;
very quiet in pouring out liquors, very quiet in stirring the
glasses. Only when a new customer called, or v;hen Hels-
kill dropped the silver in his till, he vented this small, hack-
ing cough. There were men in the room who had drank,
and men who were going to drink ; men in different stages
of drink, and men in all stages of drink ; but they were
quiet ; — perhaps because it was early in the evening, and
like other gatherings of the human species, they were
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 193
not yet waked up, — the fervor of the occasion was slow in
mounting. There were young men, and some gray-headed
men, and, as well as the dim light and clouds of tobacco-
smoke would allow him to ascertain, there were some whom
Richard knew. But Richard, participating in the spirit of
the place, was quiet also, and said nothing.
Helskill's whole soul seemed to start out from under his
heavy eyebrows, and to shrink into a most fearful glance at
Richard, and finally to be cracked off in a quick short cough,
as he saw him advance. But this was soon over, and the
people in the room, who had been aroused by that sudden
cough, relapsed into repose.
Clover led Richard through this room, towards another,
which he gave him to understand was the Grotto. When
Helskill saw Richard approaching that door, he hacked three
or four times in rapid succession, but Clover winked him
into silence. The apartment into which they now entered
was quite subterranean, and hence the pertinence of the
name. Ventilation must have been supported by mysteri-
ously arranged conduits, the course and outlets of which
were invisible. It was well lighted by a brace of solar
lamps suspended over two tables. At these tables sat men
playing cards. There were stakes of money, watches, and
jewelrJ^ Decanters of high-colored beverage adorned the
retreat.
Capt. Creamer was there ; he did not hack when he saw
Richard, — he put his hand to his eye, as if he would cor-
rect his vision, — as if he was not right at first. But he was
right; it was Richard, his slip-tender. And how it pleased
the Captain to know who it was I Dropping his finger to
his lips, he kissed it to Richard ; and jumping up, he seized
him both by the hand and the shoulder, and leading him
forward with a double gripe of honor, introduced him to
17
194 RICHARD EDNEY AND
young Chassford, son of Dr. Chassford, and Glendar, nephew
of Mrs. Melbourne.
" Play ? " said the Captain, snapping a card in a very con-
fidential sort of way. " I do not play," replied Eichard,
affecting a pun ; " I take it more seriously." The Captain,
pretending to understand him, laughed very hard, while
Kichard quietly ensconced himself in a seat by the wall.
Tunny was there, and so was the Sailmaker ; and these
were playing against each other, and so thoughtful of their
sport, they did not notice Richard.
Yes, Tunny was there, and he knew he was there ; even
if Mrs. Tunny did n't know it, and Dr. Broadwell did n't
know it, he knew it, and felt it. He felt it in his forelock,
and was trying to hetchel it out with his fingers ; he felt it
in his chair, that seemed to burn under him ; and he felt it
in his conscience, where the facts in the case were at work
like a miserere met with an hundred hands, wringing, grind-
ing, taughtening, till he seemed paler, and thinner, and
smaller than ever.
And the Sailmaker knew Tunny was there, and meant
he should be there, and would not have him elsewhere for
the world.
Richard saw another man there, whom he had also seen
about the Saw-mill, and who he knew had a young wife and
small children to support, and who, he was well assured,
had better be anywhere else. It was Cornelius Wheelan,
a River-man, who owned a flat-boat, and conveyed lumber
from the Mills to the ships that anchor in the Harbor.
" You were at Tunny's the other night," said the Captain
to Richard. " A pleasant party ; it takes some of our young
men from the country a good while to get the hay-seed out
of their hair ; but no one would imagine, Edney, you had
ever seen a barn. Why did you not dance ? Ah, you are
THE governor's FAMILY. 195
afraid of Dr. Broadwell, I see. I cannot blame you for
that. Yet, between you and me, I think the Doctor carries
matters a little too far. Our young men need recreation ;
perhaps we are too fond of it. Chassford drags me into it.
But one has now and then a spare evening on hand, which
he must, so to say, bolt down, and get rid of. I never will
back out when a noble-hearted fellow wants company.
Cards are perhaps too fascinating for you. We 've a new
kind, — the Merry Andrews, — most comical objects."
Richard replied that they were all alike to him.
" I presume so," rejoined the Captain, affectedly laughing;
" I presume so."
In fact, Richard was not only ignorant of cards, but so
unconscious of the pleasure of gaming, that he quite abruptly
rose to leave the room. On his way out, he looked at
■^ Tunny, and tapped him on the shoulder. O that he had
Klumpp's eye ! — but he had n't. Yet he had an eye, that
operated on Tunny worse than his internal gripes ; and as if
he'was as thin as some of our newspapers, that look seemed
to annihilate what there was left of him. The Sailmaker
resented this interference, but Richard had no controversy
with the Sailmaker. Tunny revived sufficiently to whisper
in Richard's ear, " Don't tell Mrs. Tunny." Richard passed
on to Cornelius Wheelan, and did not tap him, for he was a
stronger man, but thumped him on the back. Now, Corne-
lius was partly in liquor, and did not take the sense of the
blow. He drew upon Richard ; but Richard whispered
something in his ear, — something of his wife and children,
we guess, — and he was still. Interlocking with him, Richard
led him from the room. When he reached the other apart-
xnent, he found the calmness somewhat broken ; and the
Friend of the People, when he saw Richard, and knowing
how he loved quietness, and fearing that the pleasure of his
196 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
visit might be marred, said, " Let us be quiet, friends."
These were the very words he said.
But Richard manifested no uneasiness; only, clinging to
Cornelius, and followed by Clover, he left the Arbor.
Clover followed him, we say, and asked him to go back.
He said there was a private entrance to the Grotto, and they
could reach it unobserved. But Richard went on, arm in
arm with Cornelius ; and Clover himself returned.
Was Clover disappointed in Richard ? Did he not under-
stand him ? Did he suppose he would game, or that he was
game ? If he did, he was very stupid.
Richard went with Cornelius to his own home. It was
now near midnight ; but there sat his wife waiting for him —
there were his children in bed sleeping for him. Cornelius
fell at the feet of his wife ; he rolled on the bed where the
children lay, stinging with remorse and shame, and over-
whelmed by a tumult of recollections.
CHAPTER XVI.
THE ICE GOES OUT.
That which Chuk looked forward to with so sad a
heart ; which thousands of people up and down the valley-
anticipated as the opening in the midst of their towns and
villages of a new, radiant, beautiful realm of existence ;
what the travelling public were on tip-toe for, and mer-
chants and customers, and mill-owners and log-drivers,
were so interested in ; what many a coaster from sunnier
climes was spreading all sail for, and hundreds of fond
souls, awaiting union with other fond souls, in distant
places, had almost despaired of, was at hand, — the ice be-
gan to start. The warm weather, the dissolving snows, the
powerful rains, generously combined for this end.
All who had occasion to use the " Free Bridge," as the
ice was called, hastened to do so. The wood-mongers got
their loads over; those who had bulky articles of any sort
to transport fidgeted lest they should be too late. One of
the last incidents was what befell a gentleman in his ardor
to avoid the odious wooden structure to which we have re-
ferred, — he drove a valuable horse through the ice, and
drowned him. Of course, everybody said the ice must be
very rotten.
Large rocks, that had been hauled on the ice for the con-
struction or repairing of booms, were seen to sink. Mer-
chandise that had been deposited in store-houses on the
wharves was removed, against the possibility of an inun-
dation.
198 RICHARD EDNEY AND
The Bridge too, the reviled Bridge, with its great wood-
en eyes, reposing on its immense stone piers, looked on
very quietly, — it was quiet as Helskill himself; it did not
resent the "Free Bridge," — it did not laugh when the
horse went down, — it did not shake its head when sleighs
galloped by on the ice, and frumped at its slow walk ; it
seemed to fold its arms and say, "I can bide my time.
You will perhaps sing another tune, by and by."
These things were done, and with unacknowledged im-
patience all waited for the issue.
First is the cracking of the ice. This is generally instan-
taneous and universal. The rise of the water, the conflu-
ence of the stream above with a high tide from below, pro-
duce the effect. The entire field is on the instant traversed
with innumerable irregular lines, and divided by a rude
polyhedral fracture, and the whole mass is gently agitated.
There were many who heard the cracking, and some
who saw it, and would asseverate stoutly what time it was,
and where they stood ; and knots of men and boys who
hang about the docks would get into a vociferous scuffle
because they had seen so much.
But the ice is not discharged in a minute. That lying
between the Bridge and the Dam, where the water runs
very swiftly, is first set adrift. This sails with moderation
and dignity, and stops on the piers of the Bridge, awaiting
events. It sometimes lies there three or four days. Below
the Bridge the stream expands in a broad basin, interspersed
with islands, and constitutes the Harbor. Beyond this, and
about a mile from the city, are what are called the Narrows.
These are not yet free, and the loosened ice of the Harbor,
like a fleet of boats ready to put to sea, rocks leisurely on
the current ; the abraded fragments are thrown into heaps,
— the cakes careen and expose their bright edges, — the
THE GOVEENOr's FAMILY. 199
water bubbles up in many dark fissures ; boys go out and
stand on the large cakes, with their hands in their breeches
pockets, — a cool way they have of taunting the ice ; some
creep to the edge of the cakes and look into the water, so
rejoiced are they to see it ; some find the smallest possible
lump that will bear them, as much as to say to the ice its
reign is over ; one or two get dumped into the stream, but
this only shows how near at hand is the long wished-for
crisis ; some set off with billets of wood and thump on it, to
wake it up, and set it stirring.
Presently the Narrows were pronounced clear ; and there,
between the dark, pine-clad hills, on a shining mirror, the
light of the sun was reflected, silvery and exultant ; and an
opening of light and joy glistened in the heart of Woodylin.
Then the loosened pieces next above drifted ofT; they went
in shoals, platoon-like. In the afternoon another division
followed. The next morning beheld the Harbor without a
vestige of its winter bands.
At the Saw-mills these things created their wonted inter-
est. The water lay in a broad, level plain behind the Mills,
now turbid indeed, and beginning to seethe and surge, by
reason of the increased volume pouring over the Dam. The
hollows in the bed of the stream were filled, and the " rips"
concealed from sight. The icicles that form on the fall of
the Dam, — glacial stalactites, a columnar A^eil extending
nearly the whole length of the structure, — these Richard
saw give way and tumble into the stream.
But the end was not yet, — hardly the beginning. The
ice above the Dam, where the waters form a vast pond, had
not started. At the head of the pond was probably also a
jam of ice. And likewise up the River, like the locks of a
canal, rising one above another, and each having its own
level, were other dams, and ponds, and jams. On num-
200 RICHARD EDNEY AND
berless tributaries, the ice, swathed by narrow, winding
shores, stagnated in marshes and on flats, arrested also by-
frequent petty dams, had made little progress. Then, quite
likely, as you approached the sources of the stream, in a
higher latitude, the waters still slumbered in their wintry
solitudes, and gave no vernal intimations whatever. So
that there were hundreds of miles of substance, solid as the
earth itself, and seeming to be a part of its rocky crust, yet
to slide off, yet to mount the crest of the Dam, to be com-
pressed within the piers of the Bridge, and pass through
the city.
But such a finale would require another rain, or more
heat.
Then what might happen ? This : that the ice would be
choked in the Narrows, a dam extemporized, and a jam
created, having at its back these hundred miles of fluent
blocks ; and that the water, indignant at this detention,
recoiling, striking on the right and left at the shores, w^hich
it supposes to be accomplices in this attempt at subjugation,
shall engulf the lower parts of the city, deluging stores,
and barricading streets; overflow the Pebbles, and dis-
turb the repose of Quiet Arbor; and lifting the ponderous
Bridge from its abutments, and the strong mills from their
beds, toss them both into the torrent. Such things were
dreamed of.
But the rain, impatient at the dilatoriness of the heat, —
black in the face, swollen in its veins, — just tightened its
girdle, and began its task. For two days and two nights it
labored like a steam-pump, without once losing its wind.
It created a flood on its ov\ti behalf, independently of the
River, in barn-yards and wood-yards, in cellars and drains ;
the streets were a freshet of mud.
But the eviction of the ice and freedom of the River
THE governor's FAMILY. 201
was its great object ; and this the rain did by a gradual pro-
cess of undermining, beginning at the Bridge, and carried
on to the tips of the fingers of the tributaries, and to the
hairs of the head of the stream ; insinuating itself beneath
the superincumbent mass by millions of sluices dispersed
over millions of acres of soil.
The Mills, to be technically precise, hung up ; the gates
were shut ; the hands scattered, — some busy on repairs,
others idly observing the course of the flood.
Richard saw the first ice flake over the Dam ; then an
immense sheet, many rods square, parting in regular sec-
tions, like snow sliding from the roof of a house, came on.
Then acres of the crystal, so long in suspense, plunged for-
ward, and the broad expanse of water was full of ice, —
like all the blocks of granite Quincy ever produced or ever
will produce, set suddenly afloat. Intermingled with the
seething shoal were peeled logs ; trees that had been ravished
by their roots from the banks ; small buildings, which the
flood picked off* in passing, and the wash of all the woods
and fields. It would take twenty-four hours for the whole
to run by.
Night came on apace, and the people of Woodylin went to
bed with some degree of uncertainty as to what the morning
triight disclose, inasmuch as so sudden a rise was not often
chronicled. In the middle of the night the Church-bells
rang, and the people hurried to the River. Some said it
was flowing back, and, of course, a jam was formed at the
Narrows. Lanterns gleamed ; anxious voices and hurried
steps could be distinguished. The riparians must strip
their houses ; destructibles must be hoisted from the base-
ment of the stores ; the Timid Man fled to the rescue of his
bottles. The Bridge was thronged : beneath it crunched
and rumbled the burdened current ; upright beams, which
202 RICHARD EDNEY AND
the flood bore on its surface, were hurled against it, making
its own beams creak and tremble.
Where vvas Richard ? Where he ought to be, — helping
Mr, Gouch, who lived on the shore, save his furniture.
Where was Tunny ? Sweating over the hatchway of his
cellar, hoisting up potatoes and a rat-trap. Where were
Memmy and Bebby? Fast asleep in their trundle-bed.
Where was Chuk ? He and Mysie were out together and
alone, in that horrible time, trying to secure his boom.
Where vvas the Governor's Family ? Down on the Bridge.
Let us not particularize.
Up the waters came, — up with a rush, — up like a race
horse, up the landing-places, and the passages between the
stores and the end of the streets leading to the River, and
the Pebbles. There was a frightful hiss in the stream, as it
swept under the Bridge, and a melancholy roar in its fast
accumulating waters above, and the dark-ness of the night
was awful. People's hearts swelled as the waters did, and
were as dark as the night was. Now the ice was so high
that it struck the bottom of the Bridge, and every man's
heart seemed to be thwacked and going. Some ran as if
the Bridge was falling; others clenched themselves into
silence.
The Governor, with his hands in his side-pockets, at-
tended by his two oldest sons, walked leisurelj^ across the
Bridge.
" Do you think she will stand ?" said one to him. " I do
not know," he replied ; " if it goes it goes, and there is no
help for it." The same question he was asked forty times,
and he made nearly the same answer. Did he not care ?
He was a share-holder in the concern. O, it was a way he
had. But the people did care. " It rises slower," said one.
' But it is still rising," rejoined another. " Two inches
THE governor's FAMILY. 203
more, and we are gone." It was as if their hearts would go,
in two inches more. " Horrible to think of! " they exclaimed.
" The worst thing that could happen." " The loss of the
Bridge would ruin a whole season's business ! " " What
could we do without it ? "
All at once a voice might have been heard, as of the
Bridge speaking, — a voice that sounded gruffand sepulchral,
from end to end of the dark, timber-teeming vault. " Ye are
scared, ye are troubled," it said, " sinners that ye are ! How
often have ye taunted and scandalized me ! How often have
ye scolded at your tolls, and abused the gate-keeper ! What
conspiracies have ye hatched against me ! What mutterings
have filled your streets about me ! Year after year have I
listened to your complaints, and borne with your revilings.
Year after year have I aided your passage across the stream,
and received in return your ingratitude and scorn. Every
beam and rafter is witness to your maledictions ; every plank
in my floor is worn with the foot of your contempt. What
will ye now, ye poltroons ? Too dark, am I, for your ladies ?
Too exorbitant for your poor ones ? What means your con-
sternation ? "
The people were aghast.
" Ye have wished me out of the way," the Bridge con-
tinued ; " ye have denounced me as a nuisance. Shall I
leap into the water ? "
" JVIercy ! mercy ! " cried the people.
A voice was heard from the Kiver. " I know those fel-
lows," it said. " They thought they had me under their
feet, when the ice was on, and they could cross for nothing.
They thought I was of no consequence, and grudged the
pennies they paid for getting over me. Every curse on
you, my good friend, I have felt as a slight on me. I have
not said much about it, but I have felt it. I am glad you
204 EICHAKD EDNEY AND
have spoken ; I am glad the ice is broke. It was you, Mr.
Bridge, that gave me a sense of my dignity and importance.
When I saw your piers going up, and your sills laying, and
the heavy couplings entering into your superstructure, I felt
that I was something. I am getting ready a jam of ice. I
will help you off, and punish these impudent bipeds."
"Oh! oh! " screamed the people.
" Down upon your knees, every man of you ! down into
the dust ye have hated, and ask our forgiveness," rejoined
the Bridge ; " and we will see what shall be done with
you."
While the Bridge is dealing with the malcontents, let us
follow the Governor into the streets. When he saw how
the water was rising, he bethought him of a widow that
occupied one of his houses on the margin of the Pebbles.
He hastened thither, with his sons. He found the woman
and her family up and alarmed ; but the water never before,
so far as the Governor could recollect, had covered that spot.
The River had lost its recollection too, and on it came,
rushing, like a mill-tail, over the sills of the house. Roscoe
seized one child, Benjamin another, and the mother followed
with a third. The Governor set off with a bed. But the
River, though it was the Governor, and everybody rever-
enced him for his wisdom, thought he might still be taught
a few things, and poured upon him breast high, and threw
in, to increase the weight of its impressions, a boulder of ice.
The Governor, never easily thrown from his balance, never
yet prostrated by adversity, clung to the branch of a tree,
and defended himself with the bed, against the ice.
Now, quicker than this pen can move, Richard was there,
and Munk, and Silver, and the gang that had been relieving
distress elsewhere, and they dashed into the water and
rescued the Governor.
THE governor's FAMILY. 205
Now, also, the River, having concluded terms with the
backbiters, fell off as suddenly as it had risen. Down it
went, in the twinkling of an eye ; the jam had broken, and
the peril was over.
Now, also, since the suspense is ended, and we can speak
of it, it will be expected we should say that Richard was
the first to leap in after the Governor ; that in his young
and athletic arms he grasped the bruised and exhausted
magnate, and bore him to dry land. Poetical justice to
Richard, and to the Governor's Family, and to the whole
scope of this book, and to the hearts of its million, polyglot-
tal, deeply interested readers, requires this. Well, it is so :
fact coincides with fancy, and Richard, who, by the way,
was a very accommodating youth, did just what poetic justice
and all our readers would wish him to do.
The Governor was not much hurt, — he never was ; he
went home, and to bed, and all the city did the same.
The next morning the people turned out to see what had
happened, and to mangonize on what might have happened.
The ice still flowed, and the river luxuriated in the calm
magnificence of inundation. The Dam supplied the princi-
pal attraction, and hither many came.
The water passed the crest at a height of fifteen feet
greater than its common level, and the whole structure
seemed to have suddenly mounted so many degrees. The
entire volume of water had swelled in proportion, and the
River seemed like a vast lake that had broke out within the
precincts of the city. The Dam, a thousand feet long,
poured like a Niagara in its teens. At its foot was the
rabid " boil " and terrific undertow ; caverns were hollowed
out in the liquid rage ; smooth arches sported over the ex-
acerbated surface ; the spray rose soft and beautiful ; jets of
sparkling crystals spurted from the dark depths beneath;
18
206 RICHARD EDNEY AND
an occasional ice-plateau, like the deck of a man-of-war, -was
precipitated down the fall, and borne, a shivering, scattered
wreck, across the field of view.
To Richard this scene was new, and he sat at the back-
door of the Mill looking at it. Many gentlemen and ladies
came to the same spot, among whom were jMelicent and
Barbara Dennington, their little brother, Sebastian Rasle,
and niece, Alice Weymouth. With them were Webster
Chassford and Glendar.
Now Chassford and Glendar had seen Richard a few
nights before, but they did not remember him. The Den-
ningtons remembered him well, and talked with him. The
River repeated its wonders every year, but the beauty and
the grandeur of the scene were continually revealing a new
shape to the minds of these ladies, and awakening fresh trans-
ports of delight; and while the whole was comparatively
novel to Richard, they could meet him quite half way in
the enthusiasm of the hour. Water is always quickening
to the spirit of the beholder, and such water was very
quickening. They had much to say and to feel about it,
and, as it happened, their three sayings and feelings, like
the subject thereof, ran in the same channel. Glendar
dipped in his oar, and rowed with the ladies a while ; finally,
so to speak, he got them into his own boat, and rowed in
another direction. Richard, with his pocket-knife, was
carving toys, out of a piece of pine, for Memmy and Bebbj-.
So he kept at his work, and ht his boat run whither it list.
He tried to talk with Alice Weymouth, but she blushed
deeply, and said little. She was a black-eyed girl, about
twelve years old, with a quick, sensitive face ; and every
time Richard looked at her, she half laughed and wholly
blushed; and, clinging to Aunt Barbara's hand, she seemed
quite unable to support conversation. Melicent did ask
THE governor's FAMILY. 207
what Richard was malv-ing-, and he told her ; and she even
dropped a question or two about the children, and he could
have answered a folio volume. But she was polite, and he
was polite ; and she had other friends to listen to, and he had
no wish to inflict the children upon her.
Barbara asked Richard if he had seen the Boy, Chuk,
since Bill Stonners' death. He had not. She would like
to go and see him. So would Richard andMelicent; and
so would Chassford and Glendar. And they all started for
Bill Stonners' Point.
Rasle ran everywhere ; but little Alice Weymouth kept
in the rear, and little though she was, she seemed to be
laboring with a mighty large arrision all the way up ; and
every time she looked at Richard, she laughed the more ;
but all to herself, all within her ovvn thoughts. If the oth-
ers happened to look back, she coughed and blushed, and
seemed to be trying to cover up her laughter with her blushes.
What was there in Richard so provoking, or so titillating ?
He wore his red shirt, and snuff-colored monkey-jacket, and
had mounted a new Rough and Ready glazed hat ; but
these she ought not to laugh at. They had to cross a small
brook ; and while Chassford and Glendar were attending to
the ladies, Richard would have helped her over ; but she
shrank from him, — she seemed to feel as bad to have him
touch her as Tunny did to have him look at him.
They found Chuk in trouble; his guys had parted, and
his boom-sticks were broken. Richard promised to help
repair the disaster when the water fell. The Boy flung his
pole into the stream, and himself on a rock, and acted quite
desperately. " You an't Bill," said he, " and you need n't
try to he ! You can't swear as he could ; and the ice never
crowded so when he was alive, and could swear ! "
Melicent told hun not to feel so bad. But he would feel
208 BICHARD EDNEV AND
SO bad ; that was his prerogative, — it was his duty. Mysie
brought back the pole, which she went along the shore and
rescued, and gave it to him. She said, " Bill would not do
so ; and I would not do so, if I was you. You can mend the
boom, and there '11 be a plenty of logs by and bye. We did
the best we could." Mysie alone seemed to have power
over the Boy ; but her power did not always prevail. Chass-
ford put a silver dollar into Chuk's hand ; he heaved it from
him, — he flung it with sarcastic swiftness into the water.
"We did n't want money," said he ; " we wanted life ; and
your father would n't give that, and he shan't give t' other.
Let the River have it ! See if you can't buy up its good-will I "
The road to the Point went by Munk's ; and when the
party returned, the children, who had probably already
espied them from the kitchen window, stood on the front
door-step, jiggling, and hooting, and clapping their hands ;
and before Richard could get to them, Bebby had backed
half way down the steps. Their uncle took them both in
his arms, and turned towards the ladies. These were
Memmy and Bebby ! these were the lords paramount of that
mighty dom ! He did not say so, but the fact was so. Mel-
icent dotted one, with her smooth kid-gloved finger, on
the cheek; Barbara chucked the other under its chin.
Alice Weymouth — the tyke ! — laughed outright. It was
all day with her ; she began to splurt, and had to let it go.
And the children laughed too ; this was a god-send for
Alice, since it put her own laughter into countenance, and
she could go ahead without restraint ; and she laughed
herself high and dry. Indeed, they all seemed to have a
merry minute, till Mrs. Munk appeared in the door, calling
after the children, and reproving them for being out, and
saying they would certainly catch their death of a cold to
be there without their hoods on.
THE governor's FAMILY. 209
Alice Weymouth laughed no more till she reached home.
But when the Family were sitting at dinner, she began
again, or rather the imp inside of her began again ; she
herself bliished, — she tried to drown the imp with a glass of
water. But it was n't to be drowned ; it dashed back the
water, — it scattered it over the table. "Why, Alice Wey-
mouth ! " said Madam. " The child is choking ! " exclaimed
Mrs. Melbourne. Cousin Rowena had already begun to
bite her lip, a sign of suppressed emotion ; not that she knew
of anything to laugh at, but only out of an unconscious sym-
pathy of joyous feeling. " It is nothing," said Alice Wey-
mouth, rather in reply to Mrs. Melbourne than anybody
else. " You should not drink so fast," said Madam, qui-
etly. The more attention was drawn to the child, the worse
she acted ; if she had been alone, she would have got through
with it well enough. " Why don't you speak, if you have
anything to say ? " asked Roscoe. " It is nothing," she
said, " only I saw Richard Edney." " So did I," sang out
Rasle. Miss Rowena laughed outright, now ; in fact, they
all laughed. " He did n't hurt you, did he ? " inquired
Cousin. "I was only thinking," replied the child, "it was
he that scared us so on the Bridge, that he was the one that
stopped the horse when Aunt Melicent like to have been run
away with, and that he dragged Grandpa out of the water
last night. I did n't mean to laugh, but I could n't help it."
It was out now, and the child was easier. " Nothing to
laugh at, I am sure," said Mrs. Melbourne. " You are at
leisure to attend to other matters," added Madam; "will
you have some cranberry ? " " How did he look ? " asked
Miss Rowena. " He is real good-looking," replied the child.
" He has an intelligent look, and a noble bearing," observed
Barbara. " He looks the same as anybody looks, out of his
eyes," added Rasle, who had the reputation of being a
18^
210 RICHARD EDNEY AND
smart boy. "I do not know how he looks," said the Gov-
ernor, " but he carries a pair of stout arms. — Let me give
you a thin slice of beef, Mrs. Melbourne."
" It was so funny," pursued Alice Weymouth, "to see him
talking with Aunt Melicent and Aunt Barbara, and to see him
try to help them over the brook, with his queer hat on, and
his red shirt ! " " Where have you been ? what has been
doing ? " asked Madam, rather quick, rather nervously.
"We went up to Bill Stonners'," responded the child, " to
see what had become of his Boy." " This Richard Edney,"
said Madam, " must be a good youth," — here she laid down
her knife, unconsciously, — " a very good youth," — her fork
dropped, — " and you should not laugh at goodness, Alice
Weymouth; nor you, Rasle." "I didn't, Mother," replied
the boy, " and I shan't be likely to laugh at anything again
very soon, with this pickled pepper in my mouth. I wish
peppers was sweet." Madam stirred her tea, and looked at
her spoon, — she had tea at dinner. " Goodness," she con-
tinued, " is too rare in this world to be treated disrespect-
fully when it does come." " I will try not to laugh, next
time," replied Alice Weymouth.
So fared Richard in the Governor's Family, to-day.
He, in the mean time, had displayed his toys to Memmy
and Bebby, and I guess they laughed as hard as Alice Wey-
mouth did. He had made them a little wagon, and a little
old man that he called Uncle Squib, and a very little chub
of a baby that he called Tuckey, to sit in it; and the way
Uncle Squib and Tuckey were whisked across the room was
a caution to rail-roads, to say nothing of Winlde, and the
four best horses in his team.
If we wish to run a further parallel between the heroic
elements of our book, we should say, that at the precise
instant Melicent and Barbara were setting back the table in
THE governor's FAMILY. 211
their dining-room, Richard was helping his sister, Roxy,
with the same office in her kitchen, and that the two tables
struck the wall together.
As Richard returned from the Mill at night, Clover
walked on with him. " Fine girls, those Governor's daugh-
ters," said the latter. " Chassford is engaged to one of
them, and Glendar expects the other." Richard made no
reply.
Richard was more thoughtful than usual after tea that
night. The children were rampant as ever, but he did
not seem to notice them. He had been in the habit of
rocking Bebby to sleep in his arms. She climbed into his
lap, — she lay on one shoulder, then tried the other; nothing
suited her. She pointed to his pocket for his handkerchief,
with which he sometimes cushioned her head ; then she
pointed to the mantel-piece for the match-box, which she
was wont to go to sleep upon, holding it in her hands; but
he did not attend to her ; — she pulled his lips for him to
tell her a story ; he did not answer ; then she cried.
" She wants you to tell her a story," said Memmy. Her
mother took the child away. " You are getting her into
very bad habits," she said. " They are always wanting
things, and you get them." She pacified the child, and put
it to bed.
But Richard kept on thinking. Munk was smoking and
reading, his sister was sewing, and he thought. His
thoughts went down into the neighborhood of his feelings,
and his feelings, like fishes about a ship, kept edging about
his thoughts. He feared Chassford and Glendar were bad
men. He believed the Governor's daughters were the best
of human beings. At least, if he never imagined so much
before, it seemed to him so now. Set off against bad men,
they appeared to him good, very good indeed. The contrast
212 RICHARD EDNET, ETC.
broucrht them into strong relief, — their goodness took a
most palpable, glorious form to his eye. And this got down
into his heart as a sort of divine impression, — a some-
thing that stirred his deepest reverence, — and he could
almost worship it.
At the same hour, while Richard sat by the stove at
Munk's in a sort of brown study, Chassford and Glendar
were making a call at the Governor's. " That fellow," said
Glendar, alluding to Richard, " has an off-hand way, rather
uncommon among his class." " He has true courtesy," re-
plied MeUcent ; " the transparency of a gentle heart through
a gentle demeanor." " He is a strong man," observed Ros-
coe, " a very strong man." " Melicent and your father can
judge best about that," added Madam, looking verj- sharply
at a needle she was trying to thread in the light of the
candle. " I mean," added her son, " he is very strong every
w^ay." " His demonstration at the Abolition meeting was
rather weak, — rather a failure," answered Chassford. " It
was superb, — perfectly ecstatic ! " exclaimed Barbara.
CHAPTER XVII.
THOUBLE IN QUIET ARBOR.
Not many days afterwards, Richard might have been
seen, at mid-evening-, in close conference with Nefon at the
store of the latter. They seemed to have some private
scheme in hand. What it was will better appear in the
history of its execution. Only this we are prepared to say,
— that Nefon was a great friend of Temperance^ and so
was Richard ; and they had often spoken together of the
increase of drunkenness, and the means of quenching that
evil.
They left the store, and proceeded to a building in which
was a Hall of the Sons of Temperance, where this frater-
nity were then in session. While Richard waited on the
walk, Nefon ascended to the Hall, and in a few minutes
returned with a half-dozen sturdy Brothers, in their wbite
collars, including also a W. P., with his scarlet ensigns.
Richard led them forthwith to the Pebbles, on the shore
of which Quiet Arbor was snugly located. Leaving
his accomplices at the door, he entered this sanctuary alone.
Waving ceremony, he abruptly accosted the obliging but
modest head of the establishment in these words : — " You
are the Friend of the People ? " said he, interrogatively.
" I am," responded the Timid Man, hacking. " You are
willing they should be befriended, and that their best friends
should exert themselves for them, and that their liberties
should be achieved ? " "I am," he hacked.
Richard opened the door, and the six Brothers approached.
214 EICHARD EDNEY AND
" These are the Friends of the People," he said. If
another flood had made a sudden onslaught on his bot-
tles, Helskill could not have been more alarmed ; but he
was more than alarmed, — he was incensed; he set his
teeth, and he set his eyes, so that they did not play up and
down, but looked straight forwards. But there the white-
robed phalanx was, and he had to see them, and receive
them, and behave as mannerly as he could under them ;
and when he tried to hack, he could n't ; and when he had
got a little hack half way up, it slipped back, in spite of him.
There were the customary tarriers in this abode of
leisure ; in a sort of mirage of smoke and dim lamp-light,
loomed up a motley group of shabby beards, slouched hats,
blub-cheeks and blistered noses; men, who looked like an
old sheet-iron stove that has been burnt out and dented in ;
men, who lay coiled up in their repose, as a grub lies in the
earth ; men, some of whom retained the power of capering
about in that soothing atmosphere, like a hog in a snow-drift.
Richard proceeded with his plot. He addressed those
men : " Ye are slaves," said he ; " slaves to your appetites
and habits, — slaves to this spot and this hour, — slaves to
sin and shame ! You have no liberty of thought or of feel-
ing, — none of money or of time. You know not the freedom
of health or of strength, — you have no independency of
hope or of happiness. You propagate the evils you
suffer. You, Weasand, have enslaved your wife ; you,
Fuzzle, have broken the spirit of your mother ; you, Horn,
have sent your family to the Alms-house. We come
to-night to give you liberty. We proclaim your freedom.
We have brought the Temperance Pledge. Sign this ;
it is the covenant of your Redemption, — it is the Con-
stitution of your Independence." " Make out the papers,"
cried one. " Mr. Nefon," said Richard, " pass the pen and
THE governor's FAMILY. 215
ink." " One more bouse, and I '11 sign," exclaimed an-
other ; " a stiff one, Helskill ; I must wet both eyes, for
I want to see sharp into what I am about," The Tapster
could not. so far overcome his friendly feelings as not to
favor the man in this his last request. Emptying the glass
to the dregs, and sweeping his lips with his hand, this man
advanced to the table and wrote his name.
" Worthy Patriarch," said Nefon, addressing the scarlet-
robed Brother, " witness the signatures."
"I am so infernally drunk, I can't sign," swore a third.
" Drunk or sober, it makes no difference," replied Richard.
" All sign that will sign."
" If I could get up there, I would sign," jargled one from
the floor. " Brothers Bisbee and Sloan," said the Patriarch,
" lift up Mr. Fuzzle, while he signs."
" I can't wTite," said a fourth. "The Worthy Patriarch
will witness his mark," responded Nefon.
In this way they canvassed the entire room. " Here is
one too stiff to stir," some one said. " Four Brothers cany
him to the Division Room," enjoined the Chief, "and
thither let us all proceed." These Liberators, with their
captives to freedom, departed, and Richard and Nefon were
left alone with the Keeper of the Arbor. If this man was
surprised, he was also stunned. That his guests had taken
their well-being into their own hands, or even committed it
in trust to the Sons of Temperance, was a fact which he
could not gainsay, and a virtue that he dare not revile ;
and he stood behind the bar, looking like one who had just
seen his grandmother's ghost.
Now Nefon was tart — tarter than Richard ; and he longed
to rub the dram-monger's ears a bit, just in an easy way;
and he could not forbear a little pleasantry, even if there
was a needle at the point of it. So he said, " Your Arbor
216 RICHARD EDNEY AND
will be very quiet now, — still as a nether mill-stone ; and
you will have nothing to do but whirl round on it, and grind
out your meditations at your leisure."
He had better not have said this, for it made Helskill
rflad, veiy mad ; and it did no good. Besides, it came
near frustrating part of their plan, which embraced the
Grotto. Richard tried the door that led to that apartment,
but Helskill sprang forward and locked it ; and Chuk-like,
he would see them, and himself, and the whole premises, in
the ashes of perdition, before they should go in.
They retreated to the street. " There is a private en-
trance," said Richard, " and we will find it." They did
find it, and went in, and were hazed in a labyrinth of pas-
sages and darkness. The little Bookseller might have been
frightened, but he was not. " We are in for a job," said he,
" and for a broken head, for all I know. I could not have
done this yesterday. I am warm, very warm; and we
must strike while the iron is hot."
They felt their way onwards, and at length came to the
door of the wizard-room. They entered quite abruptly;
and their arrival seemed to betoken unusual pertinence.
The occupants of the room, — Captain Creamer, Chassford,
Glendar, Tunny and the Sailmaker, — felt this. The Cap-
tain glavered, the Sailmaker blustered; Glendar, leaning
over the table, shuffled cards very vacantly. Tunny, —
what did he do, what could he do, when there was so little
left of him the night before ? If he could have vanished, he
would ; but he had to be there, or let his shadow be there, and
take what might befall.
"I am indebted to you, Sir," Richard said, addressing
the Captain; "you gave me occupation when I was a
stranger in the place. As your servant, I might hesitate
in what I am now upon. But there is a higher relation
THE governor's FAMILY. 217
between us than that of employer and employed, — the
relation of humanity, of Christian fidelity. And this obliges
me to say that you are in a bad way. These practices are
destructive of all that you value in life, or that you would
have me value. I shall not take advantage of what has
come to my knowledge ; but I must affectionately, and very
positively, admonish you."
The Captain, for once in his life, lost his self-posses-
sion, his gay ease, his oily grace ; and he seemed in an in-
stant to sink into his proper age, and reiippear in the furrows
and the palsy of an old man. He stammered, and tripped ;
and, with Glendar and Chassford, hastily left the room.
The Sailmaker was not to be interrupted ; he had got
too valuable a prey in his clutches to admit a rival. He
declaimed against interference, — he snuffed at this med-
dling with other folks' business, — he fanfaronaded on sen-
timental benevolence. " I do not mind that," replied Eich-
ard ; " but you must give up Tunny."
" Any man that comes between me and Tunny is a dead
man ! "
" I am between you and Tunny ; and I am alive, and tol-
erably well, " rejoined Richard. " Tunny," he added, " go
home." There was so slender a remnant of the Grocer on
hand that it did not seem to hear, — it lay passively in the
chair. The Sailmaker stooped to seize it. Richard elbowed
him off. " Go home. Tunny," he repeated, in a still louder
voice. Nefon took the relic by the arm, and led it to the
door. •' I will have it out of you, body and soul, for this ! "
added the Sailmaker. Richard and Nefon supported Tunny
to his house.
The Sailmaker sought to be as good as his word. He
came to the Mill and detained Richard one noon after the
bell had rung the others to dinner.
19
218 RICHARD EDNEY AJfD
" I demand satisfaction for what you have done ! " he said.
"I will give it," replied Eichard; "what shall it be?"
" One of us must die! " he answered, with an emphasis of
pathos and frenzy. " Not so bad as that, I hope," rejoined
Richard. "Just as bad," said the other. "Choose your
weapons, and your own way." " Very well," answered
Richard, " and prepare yourself to meet an antagonism that
comes with weapons not carnal, but spiritual." " You cant-
ing hypocrite, you ! " sneered the Sailmaker ; " sliverly cow-
ard ! you mean to avoid me, — you mean to hush away !
You won't do it, — you are too late for it ! " He drew a dirk,
which he might have done mischief with ; but Richard took
it from him, and breaking the blade, threw the fragments
into the wheel-pit.
The Sailmaker, slackening in physical rage, calmed down
to argument. " You do not know," said he, "what I have
endured. It is not Tunny's money I want; it is revenge.
I scorn him and his dust. But his family have insulted
me, — his wife has planted her flat-footed pride on me,
his son has lost all recollection of me, because I am a Sail-
maker, — because I am what my father was before me.
Who are they but mangy skip-jacks, half-baked upper
crusts ? Did n't Tunny drive a fish-cart ? Has n't he toot-
ed his carrion by our own door ? "
Richard replied, " My friend, I think I understand you, —
I believe I know to what you refer, and I may be deeper in
the secret of your affairs than you are yourself."
" How is that ? " eagerly asked the other.
" You allude to a disruption of intimacy between your-
self and their daughter, Faustina." " I do," answered the
other. " Well, let me tell you," continued Richard, " that
was not owing to your birth or vocation, but to your habits."
" 'T is false ! " answered the Sailmaker. " Mrs. Tunny
THE governor's FAMILY. 219
forbade my visiting her daughter. She said my hands
soiled the door when I entered. I heard her say so."
"That may be," responded Ricliard; "but Faustina
never said so, did she ? "
" Is there any hope for me with her ? If there be, I do
not mind a farthing that soap-bubble of a mother."
"There may be," said Richard, "for all that I know.
But, in my opinion, all depends on one thing."
" What is that ? "
" That you repent of your sins, — that you reform your
manner of life, and by God's grace renovate your spirit.
Avoid the haunts of vice ; consort with what is good and
pure, and come to appear, and to be, a new man."
"I will think of what you say," replied the young man.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE JUNE FRESHET.
So it was denominated, because it commonly happened
in that month ; but it sometimes anticipated its period. In
this instance, it was announced about the middle of May.
This flood was both spring-time and harvest for log-driv-
ers, boom-gatherers, and lumber-men generally. The gates
of the Lake were opened, and vast deposits of logs that
had been accumulating on that invvooded realm of ice
during the winter were turned into the River. Gangs of
men were despatched to break up the jams that formed
on shoals and rips. Others scoured the banks of tributa-
ries, and launched whatever logs they could find into the
current.
A portion of these logs, unlike their predecessor, the ice,
were retained above the Dam ; yet many thousands must
attempt that pass, and be hurried across the Harbor, and
through the Narrows.
Now little boats are seen darting out from the shore, syl-
van buccaneers, in chase of their prey; each manned by two
men — one to row, the other to strike the picaroon. Where
was Chuk ? What should poor Chuk do, all alone ? The
water was very smooth and still where he operated, and his
boom was sheltered in as quiet a little nook as the whole
stream afforded ; indeed, it was generally conceded by those
whose habits would render them competent to form an opin-
ion in the premises, that Bill Stonners' privilege was one of
the best in the County.
The Boy made his picaroon fast to his boat with a rope,
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 221
and then put into the stream, with the double office of row-
ing and striking. He cried when he did so, — cried like a
spoiled child. He had nobody to swear at, and nobody to
swear at him, — and he cried. There, under the shadow of
the rock that formed the shoulder of the Point, and of the
great trees that overhang it, and under the blue sky, and
over the clear sky-and-rock-and-tree-embosoming deep, he
wept while he worked; and there Mysie, whose broad,
gaunt form stood folded and calm on the high shore, saw
him weep as he paddled in and out, and never looked up ;
striking and trailing all alone, without Bill, and with nothing
in the wide world to comfort him.
The logs swept over the Dam just as the ice had done,
and people came to the Saw-mills, and stood on the shores
to see the feat, just as they did before. The logs, with the
bark bruised off and the ends " broomed " up, by reason of the
roughness of their passage, — some of them discolored and
black, from long exposure in the shallows, — many of them
large, now and then one six feet in diameter, — were the
monsters of this deep. They slid tranquilly and gracefully
down the swift, limpid fall. But now their danger com-
menced. They must seethe in the " boil," and be absorbed
by the undertow. Descending to the bed of the stream,
they rebounded, and leaped into the air. Some, forty feet
long, and weighing four or five tons, were tossed like can-
dles ; the water played with them on the ends of its fingers,
as a juggler manoeuvres with a broom-stick. They thrashed
about as if they were the arms of a giant, who was strang-
ling underneath. They would be piled one upon another,
drawn under the fall, and then spurned into the hideous
regions below. Still afloat, — still struggling to escape.
One, that had got away, as it supposes, into clear water, is
deliberately drawn back ; a second one tumbles upon it from
19*
222 KICHARD EDNEV AND
above; a third, rising from beneath, forces their groaning,
aching, battered bodies into fresh catastrophes. In this
commotion hundreds are engaged at the same moment. In
a light mood, you would imagine them whales or porpoises
at their gambols, or beach-bathers rolling in the surf.
They might seem to you instinct with a certain life, v/hich
was to be acted out in that spot. A more terrific suggestion
is that of humanity arrested in its progress, and Faith, Hope
and Charity, writhing in the cataract of evil, — springing to
regain a serener surface, and yet at every instant over-
powered by a relentless destiny ; or of a single heart, stricken
by calamity, panting, pleading to be free, yet doomed to an
irrevocable anguish.
But this did not propose to be a dramatic spectacle of ad-
miration or of terror ; it had more serious matter in hand.
There was a weak spot in the Dam. So the Man of Mind
in the city said. He whispered it to newspaper editors ; he
wrote information to the Dam Corporation about it; he
nudged it to the Sax^'^'ers and the Log-drivers ; he nodded
it to himself, as he walked past the Dam. Some people be-
lieved him. It got to the ears of the logs, and they would
see if it were so. In their submergence, like prisoners in a
dungeon, they found out the defect in the walls, and ma-
tured a plan for breaking through. Certain of the stoutest
of them, rearing concertedly their enormous shafts, fell,
battering-ram fashion, on the structure that detained them.
One broke the cross-ties; another dislodged the ballast-stones;
several, diving out of sight, unearthed the foundations ; and,
before any one but the Man of Mind saw it, the erection
gave way — the bulwark of the River fell. These resolute
logs did not enter the breach they made, but, having effected
their object, they sailed tauntingly awaJ^ In an hour the
entire pond was drained to the natural level of the stream.
THE governor's FAMILY. ^23
One way, it seemed, to get out of difficulty; one way for
Hopes and Hearts to liberate themselves, — turn, full-butt,
on the evil that beleaguers them !
The Man of Mind stood immovable and frowning, and
pointed to the spot; and as they ran from all quarters to
see what had happened, he seemed to have the entire popu-
lation of the city on his finger's end, and they went just
where his finger directed, and believed just what his finger
indicated; and as he stood, immovable and frowning, everj'-
body was abashed by him, as a man of mind, and gave it
up that he was a man of mind.
But the Mill-owners and the Factory-companies cared
nothing for minds ; they wanted water. Their canal was
emptied, and their wheels were silent in the pit. The
work-folk were dismissed. It would take three weeks or a
month to effect repairs.
But the people, whose employment failed so suddenly,
did not grumble, so far as we heard. The girls would have
a vacation, and visit their friends ; Mr. Gouch and his family
would not starve, for he had a little laid by for a rainy or an
idle day. More than all, the indomitableness of " our peo-
ple " would be exhibited. The wounds of Young America
heal quick. A breach in a mill-dam, — fie! it is no more
than a bird-track through our incalculable sky. Then there
were repairs in the Mills that would occupy a number of
hands. Tunny felt bad, because such an event dispersed
his customers. But Chuk was as large a sufferer as any.
His boom was ruined ; the sudden cessation of the water
carried it off, logs and all. He and Mysie held on to the
guys, and retarded the catastrophe, by main strength, as
long as they could ; but when nought availed, and the fabric
of his heart and hope was being swept into the rapid cur-
rent, he flung his paddles into the boat, and sent that down
224 RICHARD EDNEY AND
too. Mysie was only afraid he would follow suit himself,
and clenched his arm to prevent such a piece of folly.
Richard was at work in the Mill when these things took
place. There Avere ladies there, and Melicent and Barbara.
Eichard, cant-dog in hand, would now and then go to the
door and look at the logs, and exchange a syllable with his
new acquaintance. But Captain Creamer, who, however
he might behave at the Grotto, was, reasonably, master on
his own premises, deemed Richard too young to have much
to do with the ladies, kept him engaged in fresh tasks, and,
as if he himself was of an age when such conversation
would be harmless, he monopolized it altogether.
When the accident was announced, it appeared that even
this sort of intimacy had not softened the Captain ; he
stormed at his men. The saw was half through the middle
run, and it seemed as if he would make them urge it to the
foot by their own strength of arm.
Of course, Richard and all hands were afloat, as well as
Chuk's boom. The Captain said they would not expect
wages to go on when nothing was doing, and when he, per-
haps, might find himself a ruined man to-morrow. Of
course they would not. They put on their coats, and went
home.
INIunk had employment for Richard at the stable ; in fact,
his brother-in-law could be of real use to him. The steam-
boats and rail-roads were running, and people were hasten-
ing to overtake them, and these people must have horses;
so that Munk & St. John's business was good. Their
business depended on that of the world at large, and this
was good. The stable was neat as a penny, with its white-
washed walls and well-swept floor. Each horse had his
name fairly inscribed above his stall ; there were Fly, Black
Maria, Beau Savage, Belle Fanny, and many more. A
THE GOVEKNOR's FAMILY. 225
small office was attached to the establishment, where hung
the harnesses and whips, all in Primlico style. Here, also,
was a stove, and a bunk where the boy, Simon, slept. Into
this office a newspaper was dropped every morning. Mr. St.
John, the partner, was a nice man, and Simon was a clever
boy. Simon had an interesting peculiarity. It was the
snatch of a song he sung, that went thus : " O, the break
down, oh; O, the break down!" He sung this when he
groomed the horses, and when he swept the stable ; when
the carriages came in, and when they went out ; indeed, at
all times. What it meant, nobody could tell. It passed as
a mystery of human nature. Moreover, "Winkle appeared
every other afternoon, with his four horses all a-reek with
perspiration, and his face a-reek with good-nature.
There was in the stable a rare animal. Belle Fanny:
so sleek a skin, so arched a neck, so bright and cheer-
ful a countenance, such fleetness of foot, and gentleness of
spirit, were not often the perquisites of a single horse ; but
they were hers. How readily she started ; how freely she
moved ; how quick to stop ; how easy to turn ! — and with
her never shying or stumbling, she was a wonder. Then the
little wagon that belonged to her, — what an equipage
was that ! Ho ! Memmy and Bebby will ride to-day.
Queen Elizabeth, when she started on her Progresses, — the
green and blue Chariot-races of ancient Byzantium, — are
nothing compared with the excitement got up when these
young Imperialnesses went abroad.
We forbear to describe the ride. We can only say, the
weather was pleasant ; the roads were good ; the grass was
green ; the birds were songful ; and Uncle Richard never
was happier, nor the children either.
Sometimes Richard drove the hack to the wharves and
226 niCHARD EDNEY AND
the depot; sometimes he went on family and social excur-
sions with the omnibus.
Munk had a garden, which Richard spaded and sowed.
Munk's lot extended from the street to the River, and com-
prised a quarter of an acre. This Richard resolved to orna-
ment and improve. He applied to the woods in the
neighborhood, where were all varieties of evergreen and
perdifoil. He knew how to dig deeply round the trees, to
sever the roots carefully, and prune the tops judiciously. He
was thoughtful enough, also, to choose a humid day for
this operation. He studied grouping and curves in the
arrangement of the trees. He supplied their roots with
well-rotted manure. Against the kitchen window, where
was the sink, and Roxy did her work, and the summer sun
burned like an oven, he planted a good-sized maple. He
ploughed and graded the rear portion of the lot, and laid
it down to grass. He induced his brother to purchase a
quantit}'- of fruit-trees, for which he discovered an abundance
of suitable locations. On the River-side of the estate was a
gully tufted with willows and alders, and vocal with birds,
where also flourished a willow of remarkable size. Hence
he called the place Willow Croft.
Was Richard in advance of his age and rank in this ?
He may have been : but he was not in advance of the news-
papers, nor of Pastor Harold, to say nothing of his own
taste.
Then, as if he had purposely designed that we should
write his history, how much prettier it is to say Willow
Croft, than Munk's, or his Brother-in-law's. I think there
is no person of refinement who will not rejoice in the new
terminology.
He had assistance ; — Mysie and Chuk volunteered their
services. There was not, probably a clean-bodied, fair-
THE governor's FAMILY. 227
topped staddle within six miles, that Mysie had not talren
particular note of. Then she recollected a thorn that she had
seen in its full snow-bloom, and when it dripped with red
apples ; and she thought there was nothing so handsome in
the whole world, and Richard must have it. Chuk dug,
and pulled, and lifted, with amazing good-will.
But the Boy would take no pay. He seemed to recog-
nize no other cun'ency than that of the River; he made all
his drafts with the picaroon ; the use of the spade was real
bankruptcy to him ; and Richard had behaved so wickedly
at the Point, Chuk deemed his tender of money a sacrilege
on the memory of Bill and the boom ; and even his thanks
he rejected as a device of the adversar}^
But Chuk got his pay, and Richard took his receipt, in
the children, who applauded what was done, and conde-
scended to disport amid the trees; Bebby indicated her
royal interest in the scene by upsetting one of the shrubs.
Chuk, as if he had inhaled magic gas, began to frolic
with the children; he acted as if he were a mere child, and
had never been anything else. He keeled over on the grass,
peeked through the trees, cock-a -whooped to Uncle Richard,
strutted behind Bebby. " This," said he, " is it: it was just
so, then — there was toddling and skirling; it huv stones, it
rolled in the dirt. But where is the woman with the blue
tire and the lasses cake ? " He repeated this question, and
turned towards the door of the house a wild, haggard stare.
He presented a comical, not to say pitiable picture; —
bare-headed, with long, tangled black hair, in the native lux-
uriance of which neither comb nor shears had interfered
for many a month, and a voluminous pepper-and-salt shirt,
that flared wide in the neck.
Roxy appeared in the door with a dry lunch in either
hand for the children. " That is the woman with the blue
228 RICHARD EDNET, ETC.
tire and the lasses cake ! " shouted Chuk, and ran forward
with the children, flapping his arms like a new-fledged
chicken, to receive what the good dame would bestow,
Richard noticed, during this metamorphosis of the Boy,
that he dropped his customary oaths, and that his tone was
milder, and his language less rough and churlish, than at
other times.
CHAPTER XIX.
VIOLET DIES,
Richard was laying out his vegetable beds one morning,
and the children were to their knees and elbows in dirt, pre-
paring for baking, — moulding pie-crust, stirring puddings,
cupping cakes, out of the damp earth. Looking towards
the street, he saw the Old Man, the Grandfather of the Or-
phans, urgently bent upon something, as it were star-gazing,
— now lifting his face into the air, now peering across the
fields, anon putting his hand to his ear. Advancing to the
gate of Willow Croft, he entered it, and came with an ex-
cited step towards the garden. " Did you not hear it? Did
you not see it ? " said he to Richard. " My eyes and ears
are trying to cheat me out of it, because I am an old man ;
but I am too old for them." " What is it ? " asked Richard.
" The hang-bird," he replied. " I see it ! " said Memmy,
whose eyes were sharp as a razor, pointing with the bit of
a shingle she was at work with ; " it is there on the fence."
" That is a robin," answered Richard. " No," said the Old
Man, " it is a hang-bird. I have been out every morning
after it. I know its trump. It carried off her mother, and
now it has come for her."
Aunt Grint, who was making an early morning call on
Roxy, overhearing the conversation, appeared, exclaiming,
" Sakes alive ! what is going to happen now? Death every-
where, — death all around us, and who is ready ? "
" Did you see it ? " asked the Old Man.
" See it ! " she recoilingly answered. " How can you see
it, when a body is frightened to death hearing it ? "
20
230 EICHAED EDNEY AND
"Which way ?" eagerly inquired the other.
" It has n't any way. It is the most invisiblest thing that
ever was. You look right where it is, and it ain't there."
" I heard it in the lot."
" Pshaw ! " she exclaimed, " you can't hear it in the lot;
it is in the chamber. It was there just before our Roseltha
died. I heard it last night. God have mercy on us ! what
is a coming? O I "
" There it is on the tree ! " said Memmy. And Bebby
knew it was there ; she could see it, and she screeched
at it.
" For the love of heaven's sake ! " cried Aunt Grint,
" don't be noisy such a time as this. Who knows but what
it may be one of the children ? "
" It was a hangbird," said the Old Man.
" No, it was n't," rejoined Aunt Grint ; "don't you sup-
pose I should know, when I sat up in bed half an hour, a
hearing it ? And there the wretch kept at it on the left
wall, right over my shoulder, and none of us prepared. It
was a death-watch, as I was telling Roxy. O ! the poor
children ! "
" I would not talk in this way here. Aunt," said Rich-
ard. " Such ideas can do the children no good. It maybe
you are both right. This man's granddaughter is very
sick, and I have not thought she could live long."
They were both right. Death was near ; Violet was
dying.
That afternoon there were assembled about the final bed-
side of the Orphan, Dr. Broadwell, the Denningtons, the
Lady Caroline, Richard, Miss Eyre, and one or two other
girls from the Factories. The Grandfather held the hand
of the dying one, and seemed to be counting the pulses, as
if he had precisely calculated the last one. Junia leaned
THE governor's FAMILY. 2fil
over the pillow of her sister. Kespiration waxed rarer and
fainter, and all was over.
Dr. Broadwell said, "Our friend, we have every reason to
believe, has gone to her rest. She has been received by her
Saviour. She gave good evidence of reconciliation, and a
spiritual life, during the few months that I have been ac-
quainted with her. When our last hour shall come, may it
find us as prepared as she was."
From every eye gushed the silent, irrepressible tear ; every
bosom heaved with the tenderness of funereal anguish. The
Old Man, now that his watchings, his predictions, his little
duties were ended, and all that he had so carefully planned
was so entirely fulfilled, and there was nothing left, moaned,
and wept, and trembled; — forlorn decrepitude, bereft of
its staff, bereft of all on which its heart or its limbs could
lean ! Junia supported herself in Melicent's arms.
It is, in common language, hard parting. However joyous
or certain may be Immortality ; however undesirable, in any
instance, may be the prolongation of this earthly existence ;
however certified we are of the salvable condition of our
friends, — still, it is hard parting. Not the immediate pros-
pect of Heaven, not the presence of the Angel of Bliss, can
prevent the bitterness of emotion. We weep from sympa-
thy, and we weep from sorrow ; and sympathy makes the
sorrow of many one. In a moment, as by electric com-
munication, all hearts coalesce; and Miss Eyre wept as
purely, as deeply, as Barbara.
It is hard parting : the cessation, the giving over, the
farewell, the last view; the absence, the being gone ; nothing
for the eye to look upon, or the hand to feel, or the tongue
to speak to ; the withdrawal of the spirit, the burial of the
body ; the silence, and the lonesomeness.
It is hard parting : the room is bereft, the table is bereft;
232 RICHARD EDNET AND
old clothes and old utensils are bereft ; the trees are stripped,
the landscape is lonely. There is a ceasing to talk, when
the thought is full ; a ceasing to think, when the heart is full ;
a ceasing to inquire and to communicate ; a ceasing to gather
reminiscences and to revive attachments. The subject is
gradually dropped from speech, and from letters ; dropped
from the countenance and the manner; it passes into an
allusion, it withdraws from the world, it cloisters itself in
the eternal sensations of the loving soul.
It is hard parting : — but it is not all parting, — there is a
going, too ; there is an elevation of spirit, as well as depres-
sion of the flesh. The parting takes us along with it. It
raises us from the limitable to the Illimitable. It gives to
Faith its province, and to Hope its destiny. Beyond this
vale of tears, our friends await us in the eternal Bloom !
It is hard parting ; — but there is a remaining, too. AU
does not go. There are blessed memories and sweet relics
still in our hands, still sleeping on our bosoms, still sitting
by the fireside, still coming in at the door. Beauty, Holi-
ness, Love, are never sick; for them is no funeral bell.
That face visits us in our reveries when we wish to be all
alone with it ; an Ascended face, it shines on our despond-
ency, and smiles on our love ; it peoples the solitude with a
sacred invisibility ; it introduces us to the realm of the de-
parted, to converse with spirits — to commune with saints.
The medium between us and the dead is a purifying one.
It cleanses the character ; we see nothing bad in what is
gone ; there is no remembrance any more of sin ; we are
ravished by virtues perhaps too late recognized ; we adore
where we once hardly tolerated ; — a departed friend is
always an image of pure crystal.
And the body, the transient tabernacle, the clayey tene-
ment, has its wonderful mission. It hastens to repair the
THE governor's FAMILY. 233
rent in our hearts, by its look of angelic peace ; as, in the for-
est, a prostrate tree hides its decay in a vesture of green
moss, so the body endues the pain and the waste of sickness
with an expression of health and repose.
When the last agony was over, the features of Violet
resumed their wonted composure ; —beautifully on the
pale cheek lay the long, silken eye-lashes ; on thin lips
flickered a smile, as it were a shadow reflected from the as-
cending, beatified spirit. The Lady Caroline crossed over
the silent breast the lily hands, and smoothed on the fore-
head the flaxen hair ; and the well-defined eyebrows were
still that western cloud, floating between eyes that had set
forever and the azure expanse of the forehead above.
Mrs. Whichcomb, and the tray, came into the room, more
quietly than usual, not to minister to the sick, but to remove
the traces of sickness, and gather up sundry medicinal
vessels, for which there was no further use.
Kichard left the room ; and Landlady followed him.
" It has come to this ! " said the latter. " Yes," replied
Richard, mournfully. "You would hardly have thought
it," she added. " I have feared it a long time," he rejoined.
She was behind him when she said this. Reaching the
landing, he turned towards her, and saw her eye drooping
over the tray, loaded with empty bottles and sundry trifles,
the wrecks of a vain Hygiene. To that tray, as he had
nothing else in particular to look at, his own gaze gravitated.
" How much is gone ! " she said, while a tear swelled in
her eye, which she tried to suppress, and her voice thickened
with emotion. " Yes," replied Richard, touched by her
emotion. " How little comes out of the sick room ! " she
went on ; " but to remember how faithful you was, and you
are kept up under the heavy blow. Then there is the going
up and down stairs, seeing to everything that is wanted, and
20^
234 RICHARD EDNEY AND
with a weak back and so many others to look after, — if I
was n't a Christian, which I sometimes fear, I could n't have
got through it all. Who knows what death is, till it comes
into a body's house, and that a boarding-house, right amongst
so many, who all have their own feelings ? They will not
use the things again, and it takes a good while to get them
back into the room, which we have to do to raw hands, and
never tell them. Then there is the Doctor's bill, and the
Undertaker's, and the grave-digging, which must be paid ;
and you never know where the money is hid." Richard
heard enough, too much for his peace of mind; and he
retorted, with reasonable severity, " How can you so har-
row the sensibilities of the living, and insult the memories
of the dead ! ''
" So-ho ! " snapped the woman; "you would fob me off,
— you would shirk me out of my dues; when I have been
in the business thirty year, and stood between myself and
ruin six months at a time, which death always produces, and
the friends aftervA'-ards have no more hearts than a stone !
Vou shall pay for it; this sickness shall come out of you!"
Richard escaped into the street. He provided for the
obsequies ; he took charge of the services on the burial daJ^
It was a scant procession, but it comprised the elements of
tenderest sorrow. In a quiet lot, in the city burial-ground,
the remains of Violet were laid..
What should become of the Old Man and Junia ? They
were without resources. The expenses incident to what had
transpired more than exliausted their little store. There
was a balance against them of a few dollars, which the
generosity of the Factory Girls, and some others, removed.
They could not remain at Whichcomb's, for two reasons,
— the head of that establishment w^ould not have them
there, and Junia had no wish to be there.
THE governor's FAMILY. 235
Nor was Junia inclined to resume her labors in the Fac-
tor}\ The Old Man had a son-in-law in one of the neigh-
boring counties ; thither they would go. Meanwhile they
were invited to spend a few days at Willow Croft.
But how should they reach that distant town? Munk
& St. John's stage-route led partway to it, and it occurred
to Richard, as it probably would occur to half our readers,
that a free passage would be offered them.
But there was an obstacle. Mr. St. John was a right-
angled man ; he liked to see things square. He would have
the way-bill square with the passengers. He was wont to
follow the stage to the suburbs of the city, to see that the
footings squared with the seats. And he had introduced a
rule into the firm, possibly suggested by the laxity of his
associate, to have no free seats. A good rule, indeed, when
we reflect how a stage company is liable to be pestered by
mendicant applications, or imposed upon by fraudulent ones.
" If men are really poor, let the towns to which they belong,
or their friends, pay their passage. Why are we the sole
public benefactors ? " So Mr. St. John argued.
Richard was compromised with Junia. He had said
there could be no doubt about the conveyance. Munk con-
tributed half a dollar towards the fare, and so did Winkle,
and so did Aunt Grint. As much more was needed. There
were the Denningtons and others, but Junia was already
insolvent to their kindnesses. W^hat should Richard do ?
W'hat should Junia do ? They v;ere both in that pain in
which little things will sometimes involve pure and benevo-
lent minds; — Richard overleaping his means in an attempt
to do good ; Junia sorely perplexed by the trouble she gave
her friends.
Deliverance came in this wise. Munk and St. John
desired to send an agent into the country to purchase grain,
236 RICH^IRD EDNEY, ETC.
and look after stables and other things incident to an import-
ant stage-route, and Richard was deemed a suitable person
for such a trust. He wished to see the country, and was
glad to go ; but stipulated, as a consideration for his services,
that his unfortunate friends should be carried likewise.
So, one morning, after collecting passengers from all the
hotels, and taking in the mails from the Post-office, with his
clean-washed, newly-painted, and highly-enameled coach,
and his team of mettlesome, pawing, bright-haired bays,
Winkle drew up at Willow Croft.
CHAPTER XX.
THE STAGE-DRIVER.
We promised to say something more of Winkle ; and this
is the chapter to do it ; and what we would say is, there
was no such man. This statement is quite true, and quite
false. Such is the nature of human language. The truth
will be understood by Winkle's friends. Is it convertible in
the Tartar tongue ? Let us explain. We suppose, and the
calculation is based on an unanimous popular sentiment,
that if all the Stage-drivers on the North American Conti-
nent were recast and made into one, that one would not be
equal to Winkle. Or thus, — if the essence of all good stage-
driverism on the aforesaid territory were extracted, it would
not compare with what could be got out of the smallest frag-
ment of Winkle.
In the first place. Winkle knew everybody, and every-
thing ; and every body and thing knew Winkle. He knew
all the girls, and the school-children, and the old men, and
the young men ; and bowed to them all, as he rode by, and
they bowed to him. For forty miles, he knew where every-
body lived, and who everj'body was that lived anywhere.
He knew the tall, white house on the hill, and the large
house, with pillars in front, among the trees, and the little
black house over in the field ; and there was always some-
body standing by all the houses, to whom he bowed. Some-
times he bowed to the well-sweep that happened to move in
the wind ; sometimes to a dog that sat on the door-steps.
How many smiling favors he got from the girls, who, after
238 RICHARD EDNEY AND
dinner, and after dressing for the afternoon, sat by the open
front windows ! how many from the children that swarmed
about the school-houses ! In fact, everybody smiled and
bowed when he passed, — black and hard-favored men ;
muggy and obstinate men; coarse and awkward men.
Every day he had a sort of President's tour.
Then, he pointed out the tree where a man hung himself,
and the woods where a bear was shot, and the barn that
was struck by lightning, and the stream where a man was
drowned.
And this, in the second place : because of his unbounded
good-nature. He did errands for all those people ; he ran
a sort of express to the city ; an express, too, from one neigh-
borhood to another. Then, he did his errands so correctly,
so promptly, and so genially. If those for whom he
acted were poor, he charged but little. He knew every
place in Woodylin, and could execute any order, from get-
ting iron castings to purchasing gimp, and matching paper
hangings, and delivering billet-doux. Furthermore — and
herein the beauty of Winkle was seen — he ran express be-
tween Hearts. Nothing pleased him better than to have a
love-case in hand between two persons on different parts of
his route ; there was such a carrj'ing of little notes, and little
remember-me's, and little nods and signs ; and then he could
drop a big bundle of tenderness in a single look, as he passed
the sweetheart, hanging out the washing of a Monday
morning. Then of the widow's son, whom he carried to
the city some five years before, and who had been all this
time at sea, he got the first intelligence ; and as he walked
his horses up a long hill, and the mother sat rocking and
knitting by the roadside, he told her that her boy had been
spoken off the Cape of Good Hope, or that his ship had been
reported from Rio. When anybody was sick along the road
THE governor's FAMILY. 239
he bore the daily intelligence to friends, who stood at their
doors waiting for it ; by what divination it was communi-
cated nobody could tell, but the effect was instantaneous ; so,
by an invisible, and, as it were, omnipotent hand, he dropped
smiles and tears, joy and sorrow, w^herever he went ; and
his own heart was so much in it all, none could help loving
him. In addition, and notwithstanding Mr. St. John, he
gave little gratuitous rides ; he let the boys hang on behind ;
and in the winter we have heard of his taking up half a
dozen school children with their mistress, and helping them
through snow-drifts. Then he carried the mail, which is it-
self a small universe in a leather bag ; — here sweet spring to
some bleak and ice-bound soul, — at the next turn a black
thunder-storm on some tranquil household ; — now singing at
one corner of its mouth, as if it was full of Jenny Linds, —
anon tromboning out its melancholy intelligence ; and, like a
Leyden jar on wheels, giving everybody a shock as it passes,
making some laugh and others scream. Winkle carried
this, and it was as if Winkle himself was it ; and some peo-
ple, notwithstanding they loved him so, hardly dare see him,
or have him open his mouth; they didn't know, any more
than Aunt Grint, w^hat had happened, or what might hap-
pen. In addition, he brought people home ; and as he drove
on, he got the first sight of the old roof and chimneys ; he got
the first sight of the rose-bushes and the lilacs in the yard ;
he saw, too, from the quietness about the house, that a
surprise was on hand ; he knew perfectly well that the
daughter whom he was bringing was not expected, — that
she meant to surprise the old folks. He did not hurry his
horses ; he did not make any sign. He landed the young
lady at the gate, and was taking off the baggage, when he
heard a scream in the door. He had expected it all, and
looked so sober, as he pulled at the strap, with one foot on
240 EICHAED EDNEY AND
the wheel, and his back bent to the ground. " Naughty,
naughty Winkle ! " cried the mother; "why didn't you
tell us Susau was coming ? You have almost killed me."
Winkle loved to kill people so.
In the third place, there is magic in the calling of a
Stage-driver. Everybody knows and aspires to know the
Stage-driver ; everj-body is knonia by, and is proud to be
known by, the Stage-driver. The little boys remember it a
month, if the Stage-driver speaks to them. There is a par-
ticular satisfaction to be able to distinguish, among drivers,
and say, it was Winkle, or it was Nason, or it was Mitch-
ell. The Stage-driver is Prince of a peculiar realm; and
that realm consists of the yellow coach he drives, and the
high seat he occupies, and his four mettlesome horses, and
forty miles of country road, and the heart of several prin-
cipal roads, not to speak of ten thousand little matters of
interest and pleasure, business and profit, news and gossip,
with which he is connected. Hence, he, like a Prince, is
held in reverence by the populace. Of all the people on the
earth, he is the one who rolls by in a gilded coach ; he is
the one who sweeps it high and dry over the world ; he is
the one who rides through his immense estate with the most
lordly and consequential air, and all the rest of us seem
to be but poor tenants, and gaping boors. It is some-
thing to speak to a Stage-driver ; it is a great thing to be
able to joke with him. It is a sign of a great man, to be
recognized by the Stage-driver. To be perchance known by
one who knows nobody, is nothing. To be known, to be
pointed out, to have your name whispered in a bystander's
ear, by one who knows everybody, affects you as if Omnis-
cience were speaking about you. The Stage-driver differs
from a Steamboat captain, in that the latter is not seen to
be so immediately connected with his craft as the former.
THE governor's FAMILY. 241
"We meet the Captain at the breakfast-table : he is nobody ;
he is no more than we ; we can eat as well as he can. But
who dare touch the Stage-driver's ribbons ? Who dare swing
his whip ?
How rapidly and securely he drives down one hill and up
the next, — and that, with fifteen passengers and half a ton
of baggage ! Then how majestically he rounds to, at the
door of the Tavern ! What delicate pomp in the movement
of the four handsome horses ! In what style the cloud of dust,
that has served as an outrider all the way, passes off when
the coach stops ! How the villagers — the blacksmith, the
shoemaker, the thoughtful politician, and the boozy loafers,
that fill the stoop — grin and stare, and make their criticism !
How he flings the reins and the tired horses to the stable-
boy, who presently returns with a splendid relay ! How he
accepts these from the boy with that sort of air with which
a king might be supposed to take his crown from the hands
of a valet ! There are his gloves, withal ; — he always
wears gloves, as much as a Saratoga fine-lady, and would
no sooner touch anything without gloves than such a lady
Avould a glass of Congress water.
There is, moreover, a mystery attaching to the Stage-
driver, — a mystery deeper than the question. Why the car-
casses of elephants are found imbedded in the ice-mountains
of the Arctics ? — even this, Why the Stage-driver is not
frozen to death in our winters ? His punctuality has some-
thing preternatural in it; — how, in the coldest weather,
in the severest storm, in fogs, in sleet, in hail, in lightning,
in mud, when nobody else is abroad, when Madam Denning-
ton hardly dare look out of her windows, when even Hel-
skill expects no customers, — then the Stage-driver appears,
rounding the corner, just as regular and just as quiet as the
old clock in the kitchen.
21
242 RICHARD EDNEY AND
It is no wonder that the height of the ambition of mul-
titudes of young men is to be a Stage-driver. This was
for one month Simon's ambition ; but it was clearly seen he
had not the necessary genius, and he gave it up, and went
on singing as abstractedly as ever, " O, the break down ! O,
the break down ! " The wonder is, that in this world of
uncertainty, and deception, and sin, where the temptations
to wrong are so frequent, and the impulse to it so easily
aroused, so good a driver as Winkle should be found.
Shall we say that Richard had all these thoughts about
Stage-drivers, and Winkle in particular ? He had many of
them ; — he could not help having many of them, for there
he sat on the box with Winkle, and saw whatever trans-
pired relating thereto.
They drove on through a well-cultivated, deep-soiled,
gently undulating country. The landscape did not mount
to the sublime, nor was it remarkable for boldness ; the sky-
line was agreeably scolloped, — qu ite subordinate dome-shaped
hills ever and anon arose into view. They crossed frequent
ravines. The road was skirted with Ponds, — those beauti-
ful collections of water, that singly or in groups challenge
the regard of the traveller in every portion of the country.
Winkle, as he knew the inhabitants, so also knew the hills,
the ponds, and the streams.
He told Richard the names of many of them, and they
were bad enough to be dismissed in silence ; but it is be-
cause they were so bad, Richard could not be silent, neither
shall we be. Many of the places were distinguished by the
name of some man who lived near by ; thus, there were
Vail Hill, Squier's Corner, Sills's Mills. Possibly, in a
country where Man is so respectable, any man may dignify
any spot whereto he is neighbor. There is, however, this
difTicuhj'. Man changes, moves away, dies, while the spot
THE governor's FAMILY. 243
remains, and then it is christened into the next comer. So
it happened that Vail Hill was sometimes called Water's
Hill, and sometimes Wrix's. They passed through " South
Smith," and " Smith Corner," and " North Smith." " Why
Avas this so called ? " asked Eichard. " From one of the
Heroes of the War, who shot a man — or a man shot him,
I forget which," replied 'Winkle. " What is this ? " asked
Kichard, as they stopped at a lovely hamlet on the margin
of a pond. " Mouth-of-the-Klaber Eoad," answered his
companion. " Old Squire Klaber, some years ago, built the
road ; and this was the mouth of it, and it has gone by that
name ever since. And that is Twenty-five-mile Pond."
A town would sometimes be thus discriminated : La
Fayette, La Fayette Centre, La Fayette Bridge, La Fayette
Ferry. There were "Forks" and Cross Roads. A favorite
classification was " Corners." One town had eight " Cor-
ners," — not on its edge, but in its middle.
Consider the effect of this arrangement. In John Gilpin's
race, substitute Stubb's Tavern, or Peacock's, for Belief Ed-
monton, and Cowper would have had a more dolorous time
than his hero. Make some other changes thus : for " Banks
of Air," read Banks of Teagle's Brook. Li the following
passage —
" More pleased, my foot the hidden margin roves
Of Come, bosomed deep in chestnut groves ; "
for " Como " introduce " Long Pond," which is as fairly
bosomed in oaks and beeches, and overhung by as stupen-
dous hills. How could " Foss's Stream " be wTought into
any stanza like this, " Thou sweet flowing Dee, to thy
waters adieu ! " " Think of coming," says a recent trav-
eller, " into Ebkdale, and Ennisdale, of walking four miles
on the bank of UUswater, of looking with your living eyes
on Derwent Water, Grassmere, Windermere ! " Now,
244 RICHARD EDNEY AXD
Richard rode through a beautiful valley belonging to Sam
Jones and Isaac Seymour, and along the margin of a
stream remarkable for its contrasts of thickets and clearing,
wildness and repose, known as " Eight-mile Brook ; " and
while the horses were changing, he went upon an elevation
called " Tumble-down-Dick ]\Iountain," from which was a
view of unequalled tint and variety, rimmed around with
those bright waters, " Spectacle Pond," " the Matthew
Paxson Pond," and " Smith Corner Pond ! "
But in the midst of these reflections, where was Junia ?
She sat on the back seat, with the curtain lifted, leaning on
the side-strap, rapt in her own thoughts. Winkle knew
he was carrying Sorrow that day, and he was graver than
usual. Richard relapsed into frequent reveries. All places,
independent of their names, were beautiful to Junia, —
beautiful, too, was what might be called the Spirit of the
road coming forward to greet Winkle. But this beauty was
shaded with grief. The stage was a teeming News-teller
dropping its items and its bundles of information into hands
that stretched up all along the way to receive them ; but it
would bring no news to her. It was carrj-ing her further
and further from the sacred spot of affection; and as often as
it might return over the same ground, it would bring no
word to her of the absent and the loved.
Richard offered her water, but she could not drink ; at a
hotel, where they stopped to dine, she could not eat ; and
when Richard would have walked with her into the streets
of the town, she could not go.
They reached the terminus of the route about sunset.
The Uncle of Junia lived a few miles distant. Thither,
Richard, taking a horse and wagon belonging to the Com-
pany, drove his friends, and arrived late in the evening.
This family he found very glad to see Junia and her Grand-
THE governor's FAMILY. 245
father, and in very comfortable circumstances. The man
had indeed married a second wife, but a woman who exhib-
ited the tenderness, and preserved the recollections, of the
immediate Aunt of Junia, and daughter of the Old Man.
They were certainly open to affectionate appeal, and some
hidden, strong sensibility could alone have prevented Junia's
having recourse to them sooner. Early on the morrow
Eiohard returned.
Having attended to the business of the route, in a few
days he came back to the city.
21#
CHAPTER XXI
A DOMESTIC SCENE.
"What is the matter?" said Munk, coming in to his
supper, and finding the children in a snarl.
" So much for gratifying the children!" replied his wife ;
"Mrs. Mellow told me never to gratify children, and I always
told you it was not a good plan."
" I hope there is no harm done," rejoined Munk.
" Mamma made us two dough-nut babies," said Memmy,
"and Bebby has eaten hers up, and now she wants mine."
Indeed, she did want it, and screamed lustily for it.
" She may have the head," said Memmy, — but that would
not do ; it was the whole or nothing.
Munk, meanwhile, had taken his seat at the table, and
was stirring his tea, looking at the lumps of sugar as they
turned up in his spoon. Mrs. Munk put Bebby up to the
table in her high chair. The child wanted a cooky. " Eat
your bread and milk first," enjoined the mother. The child
reached forward, and purloined the cooky. " Put it back ! "
cried the mother. The child did not obey. " Put it
back ! " the mother called out, still lou3fer. The child de-
layed. " Put it back ! " the mother screamed. The child
yielded, and began to cry. " Stop your crying! " — so the
mother pursued her. " You shall be whipped ! Asa, will
you take the child and whip her ? " Asa relucted. " We
must be obeyed, — we must be firm," — so the wife expostu-
lated and instructed, — " and I am too weak, you know I
am." Munk was not moved. Again Bebby began to cry
RICHARD EPNEY, ETC. 247
for Memmy's dough-nut. " The children shall never have
another dough-nut in the world ! " threatened their mother,
" Don't say so," replied Munk.
" I shall go off! " bitterly exclaimed Roxy, and covered
her face with her apron.
" Don't do that," said Munk.
" No, no, I may never do anything, only be crazed by the
children !"
" Yes, Roxy, you may do everything, — everything you
wish to do, everything you ought to do. Did n't you love
to make the dough-nuts for them ? "
" I did ; but we are not to be ruled by our affections, but
by a sense of duty, or we shall ruin the children. Have n't
I told you so before ? "
" Were not you happy in doing what you did ? "
" Surely I was. Memmy asked me, and Bebby pleaded
so, and I was happy; but I had no right to be. I yielded
to it, and this comes of it."
The trouble of the parents only seemed to increase that
of the children, whose noise and altercation it became more
and more difficult to bear.
" Give her the whole," said Munk to Memmy.
*' That w'ould not be right, I think," interposed Richard.
" Bebby has not been very well to-day, and she has ap-
peared more fretful than ordinary. You had better look
into the matter, and see if it is not something besides the
dough-nut that ails her."
" She ought to be whipped ! " said Mrs. Munk. "Mrs.
Mellow says a whipping, now and then, does children good."
" Don't say that again, will you, Roxy ? " rejoined her
husband.
" Let me see w^hat can be done," added Richard. He
took the child into the rocking-chair, sang songs, and soon
had her fast asleep.
CHAPTER XXII.
RICHARD AND THE GOVERNOR'S FAMILY AGAIN.
The Governor was in the practice of taking his fam-
ily, in a festive way, sometimes to " Spot," sometimes to
" Speckle," — names of ponds, of which there were several
in the neighborhood of the city, — w^here they spent the
day, and returned at night. This year he w^ould go to
" Spot," and "Climper's," Mr. Climper being the proprietor of
" Spot," and its hotel, its boats, and other recreative addita-
inents. The family, in this instance, meant more than it
does in our title ; it included married children and grand-
children, and it did not include Roscoe or Benjamin.
The Governor's carriage was too small, and he ordered
Munk & St. John's omnibus, and Richard was commis-
sioned to drive it.
Alice Weymouth, emerging from under the trees in the
front yard, was the first to discover Richard Edney on the
box. She smiled and blushed, and turned to Miss Rowena,
who laughed and turned to Barbara ; w'ho did the same to
Melicent, by w'hom the drollery was conveyed to her mother
and Mrs. Melbourne, where it stopped. And for a good
reason, — these were the last out of the house. " What are
)"ou laughing at ? " asked Mrs. Melbourne. Madam laughed
just because the others did, and said, " This is a pleasant
beginning, and we shall have more sport before the day is
over."
Notwithstanding Barbara and Melicent were so much
alike they were often mistaken for each other, they had
RICHARD EDNEV, ETC, 249
their peculiarities ; and one was this, — that Barbara could
not ride on the outside of a coach, and Melicent disliked the
inside. So, when the rest were seated, Melicent mounted
the box with Richard. It had indeed got whispered all
through the party that it was Richard ; but Madam, who
hated an ado, hushed the folks, and Richard drove on
without molestation.
He took the same road that, a few months before, in mid-
winter, he had come to the city on. Grass was sprouting
where the heavy drifts lay. Cattle luxuriously fed in fields
from which they had gladly retreated. Barn-yards that had
been so variously and thickly stocked were open and
empty. Buds that folded themselves from the storm be-
neath the bark of trees were abroad and wantoning in the
sun. Doors that had been doubled, listed, bolted against
winter, were waltzing with summer. Men, whose every
look and step, whose every article of dress, and posture of
body, indicated a struggle with the old temperature,
sparkled and sped in the deliciousness and congeniality of
the new.
Richard remarked these changes, and spoke also of the
woman whom he extricated from a snow-drift. Melicent
knew Miss Freeling well, and liked her much ; and they
talked of that.
Richard went on to thinking of his first coming to the
city ; — of the Bridge, and the lively people from the
Athenaeum ; of the man with the umbrella, and his
solemn warning ; and of other things that had befallen, in
many of which Melicent herself had borne a part ; and now
he sat alone with one of the objects of his thought, and he
wished to know more of her, and she was ready to know
more of him.
How he could talk at random, and think of remote
250 niCHARD EDNEY AND
things, and mind his four horses so well, she would like to
be informed. It was habit, he said, and the horses were well
trained. But attention to the brake now and then inter-
rupted conversation; and she was not sorry it did, for going
down hill on the top of an omnibus inclines a woman to
silence. How could horses be so courteous ? Why should
they not, in some rude moment, jerk the coach into the
ditch ? This brought up the whole question of horses, and
domestication, and the power of the human over the brute ;
all which topics Richard handled very sagely and instruct-
ively.
As they were walking slowly up a hill, Melicent observed,
for the second time since they started, "It is a fine day."
" Exquisitely fine," added Richard. There must have been
something in Richard's mind, or education, or association, to
suggest this expletive, which he pronounced as if he was
used to it, and deeply felt it. And there must have been
something in the day to revive the memory of such an ex-
pletive. And Melicent looked again at the day, and thougljt
of Richard. " A very blue sky, and very white clouds,"
added he. A common remark. But Melicent herself had
hardly noticed the intensity of the blue and the white, and
she looked at them again. " How beautiful an opening
into the sky those two mountains make !" she said, inclining
her fan carelessly in the direction indicated, and letting it
rock back on the pivot of her hand. *' How fine a promon-
tory the sky makes down among the mountains ! " Richard
rejoined. He was ahead of her this time ; but he instantly
apologized by saying, " My teacher, Mr. Willwell, used to
instruct us that there was an earth-line of the sky, as
well as a sky-line of the earth. Instead of calling a moun-
tain high, he said we might call the sky hollow." '' He
must be an ingenious man," observed Melicent. " He is,"
THE governor's FA3IILY. 251
answered Richard. " He told the class in geography there
were harbors in the sky, and capes, and peninsulas ; and took
us out and showed them to us. The sky, he said, was like
a great ocean overhanging us, and bounded by the earth, and
having its shores along the hills and plains. He showed us
clouds at sea, and in a storm, and at anchor in the harbors.
Then he showed us how this earth-line of the sky varied its
height and distance relatively to our position and to sur-
rounding objects. Here was a hill fifty feet high, and sky
above it ; and the sky was fifty feet high, apparently, he
said, and the clouds were the same ; and it looked as he
said. On each side was a range of mountains a mile off,
and there the sky and clouds appeared to be a mile off.
The sky, he said, was not like an inverted bowl, having a
regular edge in the horizon, but rather like a bowl full of
water, that took all the forms of the irregularities of things
about us. — Here the road goes through a piece of woods;
let us see what is there."
" The sky," said Melicent, " is like a river above us ; and
there is a cloud before us, that seems to rest on the trees,
and is just as high as they are, — rather it is a bridge
across the river. Were we spiders or spirits, we might walk
on that bridge, or sail on that river. Your teacher's
theory," she added, as they drove on, "is a good one. As
we ascend, the sky recedes ; as we descend, it comes nearer."
" At the bottom of a well," remarked Richard, " the sky,
he said, would appear to rest on its mouth. We went
down into one, and found the fact to be so."
" A cloud," resumed Melicent, " appears to be stranded on
the top of that pasture-ground, and the cows look as if they
might tear it with their horns. Yet, if we were up there,
I suppose we should see the same cloud on the summit of
252 EICHARD EDNEY AND
some higher hill. — Have you seen paintings much, Mr.
Edney ? "
" I have not," replied Richard.
" I have often thought \A-hat studies the clouds might be
for painting ; yet how much better they are without paint-
ing!"
" They are better than pictures, Mr. Wilhvell said ; and
I doubt if any picture can exceed them."
Melicent wondered that a mill-boy and hack-driver should
be so well informed. There was no wonder about it. He
had had a good village school education, and improved on
what he was taught.
A scream was heard from the inside of the coach. A
bonnet had fallen. Melicent would hold the reins, while
Richard jumped down and recovered it, — she really would.
This pleased Richard, and it pleased Melicent, both equally.
Here was sympathy, harmony, a certain piece of never-to-
be-forgotten mutual good feeling. That Melicent should
offer to hold the reins, that Richard should think she
could hold them, that she did hold them, that she had held
them, — the reins, and the four horses, and the coachful of
people, — oh, these are trifles, but they are such sort of tri-
fles as helped while away a mile of the road, and such as
have their place and mission all along the road of life.
Let us look at this ride, and in fact this entire tale, in one
point of view : — that Richard Edney now had the Govern-
or's Family under his thumb, or, more literally, in his two
hands ; that there they w^ere, closely stowed under his feet,
in a tight vehicle, — a mere box, — and four stout horses in
front. If Richard were evil-disposed, how easy to do them
an injury ! If he were vain, how natural to feel exalted ! If
he were wanton, how pleasant to tease and scare them ! If
he knew the dignity, extent, and value of the Family, how
THE governor's FAMILY. 253
readily he might manage an advantage out of them ! But
his Father told him to treat everybody respectfully, — to
behave properly in all relations. If he were a servant, to be
faithful ; if he were a master, to be kind ; and if he drove,
to do it carefully, — to reverence life, and be tender of sensi-
bility, human or brute. Almost the last word his Mother
said to him was, " Kichard, be a good boy. I need n't say
it, I know ; but it is all that is in my heart, and all that is
in your duty, and I will say it again, Be a good boy."
Richard was a good boy, and of course a good driver, and
treated the Governor's Family becomingly, and drove them
securely.
So he got the party, in good shape, to " Spot," and
" Climper's." The hotel overlooked the water, and com-
manded a picturesque horizon. Climper was fat, and gruff,
— Giles to the contrary notwithstanding, — petulant, and
slow ; and one would think he neither understood the arts
of courtesy, nor the tricks of trade ; — and, furthermore,
that he had been set up in life at Spot Pond, by some cyn-
ical school of philosophers, on purpose to prove that our the-
ories, touching the effect of beauty and goodness on the
character, are moonshine. Every coach that darkened his
yard was not half so dark as he himself was all over his
house. But somehow Climper was the proprietor of
" Climper's," and of the fine view therefrom, and of the
best side of the Pond, and of the boats and bowling-alley;
and everybody liked Climper's, while everybody had an idea
of hating Climper, but did not do it.
This shows there is a difference between a man and
his attributes, — between quality and substance ; for there
might be a Climper's, and no Climper.
So Richard thought, when Climper wheezed forth to let
down the steps and hand the people out. He scowled, when
22
254 KICHAKD EDNEY AND
he did so, and scolded because Richard had not driven a
few feet further, and worried because word had not been
sent that they v/ere coming. The grandchildren were
intimidated by the man, but Madam urged them along.
Still, Melicent would not be squired by such a grumbler,
and tried to find her way down from the box alone. Her foot
caught, and she would have fallen, if Richard had not
caught her. This brought around him the whole Family.
Madam had an inkling as to who the driver was ; and when
she saw him in such near proximity to her daughter, she
cast a searching sidelong^ glance at him, and thanked him.
Miss Rowena, who, on a former occasion, had really sneered
at Richard, was awe-stricken. Blelicent introduced Richard
in form to her several friends.
When this ceremony was ended, Richard proceeded to
look after his team. Climper's boy had already unhitched
the horses, and was leading them to the stable. Richard
took from the box a coarse frock he wore on such occasions,
and followed. While he was rubbing down the horses,
Climper appeared in haste, and said Mrs. Melbourne wanted
to see him. Richard would take off his frock. No ! The
lady could not wait, and Climper drove him off with his
fists. Richard went to the drawing-room, where were
Madam, Mrs. Melbourne, Melicent, and Rasle. " You wish
to see me," said Richard, looking rather indefinitely. " We
are very glad to see you," answered Madam, yet rather
dubiously. " Mrs. Melbourne wishes to see me," particu-
larized Richard. " I do not," answered that lady ; " I am
far from it." Richard was quite blanked. " Mr. Climper
said you did," he explained. They all smiled, and looked
knowing, except Mrs. Melbourne, who looked knowing,
but did not smile. Richard neither smiled nor looked
knowing. "A little pleasantry," said Melicent. " How are
THE governor's FAMILY. 255
your horses, sir?" She wished to turn the subject.
" There was n't anything pleasant about it," spoke out
Rasle. "Aunt Melbourne said she wished to see you pun-
ished for sweating the horses, and she did n't care how
quick." " Never mind, young man," said Madam, coming
kindly towards him, and as it were moving with him towards
the door. " Mrs. Melbourne has a way, and Mr. Climper has
a wa}--, and we all have ways, you know." O yes, Richard
knew; and went back, very pleasantly, to his work. It was
a trick of Climper's.
Having finished the horses, he threw off his frock, went
to the house, where he washed and combed, and loitered to
the verandah; where were Madam and Mrs. Melbourne.
Madam beckoned him to her side. " We owe you an apol-
ogy," she began. " Do not speak of it," said Richard.
"We owe you something — " "Nothing," he persisted.
" We owe you," she went on, " for the deliverance of the
Governor in one instance, and our daughter Melicent in
two, which makes three." "I only did my duty," an-
swered Richard. "And in that," interposed Mrs. Melbourne,
" we all come short. Why, Cousin, make such account of
trifles, when a whole life of sin lies against us?" Madam
was silent; she nev^er argued. This silence was interrupted
by the dashing of the Governor through the hall, followed
by the little ones.
" Hurra for the boats ! " he cried.
The Governor was a grave and reverend man ; but he
could unbend, — he could be quite relaxed, — and with chil-
dren he was playful as a child. Perhaps he remembered a
certain great one who was detected in his library playing
leap-frog with his children.
They scampered to the Pond, and after them puffed and
fretted the head of the domain. When they were well
256 RICHARD EDNEY AND
seated in the boat, Climper shoved them off; and he did it
after a fashion as if they were a cargo of small-pox.
Richard took the oars. He had seen that article before,
on the River, and the Lakes, to say nothing of his father's
mill-pond; and he pulled dextrously and strong. They
rowed to the middle of the Pond, The children dropped
hook ; had much gayety over their glorious expectations and
their insignificant success. They heard the rattle of the
king-fisher ; they descried the black heads of loons floating
upon the surface, like pieces of charcoal ; they saw the taU
firs on the banks, standing base to base, and spiring sub-
stance and shadow, into the skies. There were little holms,
and large islands. On one side, a dark schistous bluff"
faced the sky and darkened the water. On another, paral-
lelogramic farms, with white houses and capacious barns at
the head, and corn and grass lots at the foot, sloped to the
shore. " If sky is like water," said Melicent, " what shall
we do with sky in the water ? " " Sail on it," answered
Richard. " Un-spidered, un-spirited, we can do it, can't
we ? " she rejoined. " I wonder," said Barbara, " how the
fishes relish the arrival of a boat from the air-world, passing
like a cloud over their pleasant prospects. How should we
like to see a galley, having its sides lined with sharp-shoot-
ers, sail out from the Moon, and hover over the city ? " "I
wish I was a fish," spoke out Rasle. " Why ? " asked Mel-
icent. " I would bite Aunt Rowena's hook." That was
Rasle all over, and he made it all over with the rest.
There was great concert of merriment, and great discon-
certion of purpose. Miss Rowena had been soberly watch-
ing her line, and calculating her luck, for half an hour ; and
some others had, too. As it is considered a semi-crime and
a certain disgrace to go a-fishing and not catch fish, this sally
at once aggravated and decided their failure, and they con-
THE governor's FAMILY. 257
eluded to return. " The fish are at the hotel," said the
Governor, " and I have a hook in my pocket that will catch
them." " What was that ? " the little ones asked. " The
round O hook, with a white face," said Easle, addressing
one of his nephews that was beginning to go to school.
Rolling nine-pins was part of " Climper's," and a consid-
erable part to the children.
Who should choose up with Grandfather? Mr. Edney,
he said ; and what he said, everybody said ; and some of
them thought so, and some of them did not tliink so. It
was Richard's first choice, and whom should he choose but
Madam herself ? The Governor took Mrs. Melbourne ;
Then Melicent was matched against Barbara, Eunice an-
swered to Easle, and so on to the very baby end of things.
Miss Rowena kept the tally. Now commenced the solemn
pauses, and the obstreperous outbursts ; the spurrings on to
the alley, and the banterings off"; the flourishes of attempt,
and the blankness of defeat; the young ones jumping up
and spatting their hands, the old ones heroically staid ;
complaints at the unevenness of floor on the one hand,
and quips at the awkwardness of the roller on the other ;
mock condolences, answered by mock applause ; such
screamings after some little runaway partisan, and such
cautions when he was found ; such shouts w^hen Grand-
father got a spare ball, and such shouts when Eunice got
one pin ; (he intense excitement as to who should beat, —
the little ones beating and annihilating each other a dozen
times, with their joyous tongues, before it was decided
which side had beat. Richard led off" handsomely, and
Madam was no mean player ; but the Governor was a great
ball, and so was Mrs. Melbourne : but Richard beat, or his
side did ; and such Yankee-doodling as the little ones, who
22*
258 RICHARD EDNEY AND
had beaten Grandfather, set up, was never heard this side
of the Revolution.
Some staid, and rolled longer ; some rushed to the swing,
and tore at it like a house-a-fire ; others chased one another,
like a troop of dogs, over the grass ; a portion betook them-
selves to the seclusion of a pine grove ; a few explored the
edges of the pond for lilies.
They were summoned to a dance; and the Governor
asked Richard to join them. But Richard, imagining the
invitation to spring more from politeness than cordiality, —
that it was rather from consistency's sake than any single-
ness of feeling, — declined. Now, Climper, fat and mulish,
always on the off side, always plaguing people, declared
Richard should dance; and, pushing him into the hall, said
if he did not dance, he would make him, and rendered
excuse abortive and retreat impossible.
Madam was tired ; so the Governor led out Miss Row-
ena, Melicent paired off with Barbara, and Richard bowed
to Mrs. Melbourne. This lady could not refuse, and Rich-
ard could not but advance ; so he and Mrs. Melbourne
danced together ! There may have been contrivance in
this; and, judging from the way Cousin bit her lip, one
might conclude she had something to do with it.
There was one advantage in Climper's, — it levelled dis-
tinctions. Here the Governor's Family bowled and danced
with their hack-driver. The same thing might not happen
anywhere else; but here, in this out of the way place,
where mirth and good feeling were the presiding genii, the
common sensibilities had free play ; and those tastes and
inclinations, which of themselves know no rank and belong
to all men, were spontaneously developed and harmoniously
exercised. They could all be merry, Richard and the Gov-
ernor alike ; and Mrs. Melbourne had to be, albeit she did
THE CiOVEFNOr's FAMILY. 259
not like to be ; besides, among the oddities of Climper was
the practice of jumbling all sorts of people together, — a
practice, indeed, that might not seem suited either to the
decorum or the policy of a respectable landlord ; but it was
a way he had, and all who went to Climper's must put up
with Climper. More than that : this very way he had, so
repugnant to certain standards of feeling, accomplished the
end every one aimed at in going thither, — to be merry.
After the dance, Richard stood with Melicent on a knoll
overlooking the very pretty sheet of water that formed the
nucleus of the interest of the place.
"I have not thanked you," he said, "for the pleasure I
have had here."
" You have been a part of the pleasure," she replied,
"and may take a portion of the credit to yourself."
" How could such an one as Climper have selected this
beautiful place to dwell in ? "
" It was one of his oddities, I imagine ; he knew that
natural propriety would assign to him a plainer residence,
and out of sheer opposition to his destiny he came hither."
" The love of the Beautiful," continued Richard, "may
have captivated his heart."
" Did you say that ? " rejoined Melicent, in a way rather
abrupt, but earnest.
" Did I say what ? " inquired Richard, as if he was startled
at something he might have said.
"About Beauty and Climper."
" I said what I have heard Parson Harold say."
" Then you do not believe it ? "
" I believe and feel it."
" Repeat what you said."
" You banter me."
" I never was more serious."
260 RICHARD EDNEY AND
"I said the beauty of the place may have captivated
Climper."
" In that Pond," interposed Mrs. Melbourne, who had not
been far off during this conversation, " is plenty of slime
and eel-pouts, and the garbage of a thousand years."
" The slime," replied Richard, " is one of the best of fer-
tilizers ; and eel-pouts are a grateful dish to some people."
" Who told you so ? " asked the lady, quickly.
While Richard seemed to be refreshing his memory, Mel-
icent, laughing, said, " Parson Harold, I suppose."
" Very likely," answered Richard. " The Parson often
says everything in God's world has its use."
" Who is Parson Harold ? — and what does he know
about the wickedness that lies under all this fair surface ? "
Mrs. Melbourne delivered this slattingly, and then pulling
at Melicent, she said the little children w-anted help in get-
ting strawberries; and she asked — she only asked — Richard
if his horses had been watered ; she could not bear that the
poor, dumb beasts should suffer through the folly of men.
Richard went towards the stable.
" I must water my team," he said to Climper, whom he
encountered in the way.
" Don't pull wool over my eyes so ! " replied the latter.
"I smell dogs."
" Dogs ! " echoed Richard.
" Yes, dogs. And if it ain't dogs, it 's pups ; and I won't
have one here ! They bring them out in their coaches, and
hide them under the straw. Climper's is not to be imposed
upon, — Climper's has no hand in it; when they go up to
the polls, they shan't say, ' Climper's is against us, — Clim-
per's harbors dogs.' "
Richard laughed outright; but the more he laughed, the
more Climper blared, until he consented that the carriage
THE governor's FAMILY. 261
should be overhauled. The straw was ransacked, shawls
and tippets were thrown out, but to no purpose, — no sign
of a dog appeared.
" You belong to the anti-dogs ? " asked the landlord.
" I am of no party," replied Richard. " There is some
good in all parties."
" There is n't some good in all parties ! " replied the other,
doggishlj\
" Indeed, there is some good in you."
" No, there is n't any good in me ! Don't tell me that ! "
" You love cats, don't you ? Kitty, Kitty," he called to
his fingers an amiable and womanly looking Maltese, and
taking her in his arms, stroked her back, in face of the wil-
ful man, and added, " That is good ; I love cats, too ! "
The strange Phumbician was touched, and, smiling good-
naturedly, he struck Richard smartly on his shoulders, and
bade him look after the horses, and went with him towards
the barn.
" You love cats," said Richard; " and do you love noth-
ing else ? "
" I love to be odd, — so get along ! "
"And nothing more ? "
" I love to hate dogs and plague folks."
" Do you not love this spot, this hill, this view, this
water ? "
" Yes, and because it plagues folks so to climb the hill,
and because they don't catch any fish, and because they get
ducked in the water, I love to have Mrs. Melbourne come
here, because she finds so many things to fret about ; the
children will get cold, or they will get drowned."
" You love cats, and to plague people ? "
" I did n't say I loved to plague people ; but to see them
262 RICHAED EDNEY AND
plague themselves, if they have a mind to. It is no
business of mine. I only give them the opportunity."
" That is why you settled here ? Come, now, tell me
the whole."
" I never told anybody."
" Tell me."
" I lost my wife and my children, and I had none to
love ; and I bought here, where I could love God alone, and
let the world craze about me as it liked."
" Can't you love me ? "
"Get along I"
" Why hate dogs so ? "
" My child was bitten by one ; don't ask about that.
She died ; don't speak of that ; let me alone of the dogs."
Climper helped Richard lead his horses to the pump ; he
gave them their full measure of oats, then drove our hero
back to where the Family was.
But Richard could not find it, or come near it; for the
whole group was concealed, and monopolized by certain
strangers, young gentlemen who had just arrived from the
city, among whom were young Chassford and Glendar.
The entire aspect of things indicated to Richard that his
company was not wanted, and he strolled to a distance.
He did wish to see Melicent, and make, as he thought, a
great communication to her.
Nor was Melicent indifferent to Richard. She saw his
disappointed look, and watched his retreating steps. She
presentlj'- took the liberty to leave her friends, and go where
he was sitting.
" I have discovered the secret of Climper," said Richard,
with considerable enthusiasm ; and related what Climper
had said. " He has been smitten by adversity, and makes
of this spot a refuge to his spirit."
THE governor's FAMILY. 263
Melicent looked at Richard incredulously, and then with
an expression of wonder.
" Do you doubt what I say ?" asked Richard.
" I am only surprised to hear you say it."
" If it be true — ''
" Yes ; — but that you should discover it."
" Why should I not ? "
'• Why should you not ? Only I did not think it of you."
She gave Richard another direct look, — one of so fixed and
searching a nature, that he started and said, " I hope I have
done no wrong."
" None at all," she replied, and caught a Iwig of the tree,
which she tore off and flung away with great apparent in-
difference.
Richard, not wholly at his ease, was yet sufficiently dis-
embarrassed to say, " This place is a Hermitage, — a queer
one ; but shall we not call it so ? My Teacher used to say
we ought to give pleasant names to pleasant places."
" Call it Mystery," she said.
" Nay," replied Richard, as the little children chased their
Grandfather in and out among the trees, full of gambol, and
breathlessness, and joy, "let us call it Merrywater."
" Climper will not like that."
" I will make him like it. He shall pull down his pres-
ent sign, and run up another."
" Will you be kind enough to see that my horse is rubbed
down, and grained, and put into my phaeton, when we start,
young man ? " said Glendar, who approached at this mo-
ment, and threw a quarter to Richard. " I will," replied
Richard, picking up the money, and going off.
The bell rang for supper, and the party was soon seated
around the sumptuous tables of Climper. Chassford took
care of Barbara, Glendar of Melicent, and the Governor and
264 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
Climper of the whole. There were nice fried, white perch,
and crisp, savory pork; piles of bread, white and light;
yellow and sweet butter; bowls of strawberries, and pitchers
of cream ; cake of all sorts ; and the Family were hungry
and merry. Climper loved to plague people ; and Mrs. Mel-
bourne eschewed gingerbread, but Climper would make her
eat his gingerbread. Madam was sometimes delicate in
her meals, but he made her eat ; and those that loved to eat,
he would force to eat more than they ought to ; and so he
plagued them all. If mouths watered for the strawberries,
the strawberries seemed to water for the mouths, and the
cream foamed for the strawberries ; the bread was piled up
high, on purpose to fall easily into the hand ; and the pies
were in large plates, on purpose to go off in large pieces.
Climper's servants were at hand, with smoking cups of tea ;
and it was as if Climper, out of this abundance of good
things, had determined to destroy them all.
The sun was going down when Climper shut the coach
door, flung up the steps, and cried to Richard to be off with
his load.
Barbara was timid, and did not like the omnibus, and was
persuaded to resign herself to Chassford and his buggy.
Glendar attempted the same arrangement wiih Melicent,
but failed ; and she rode home as she had come out, — on
the box, with Richard.
They returned safely to Woodylin. IMelicent, with ap-
parent sincerity and good intention, invited Richard to call
at her father's. Nay, more, — Madam herself, to the
amazement of all, asked him to tea on a specified evening.
CHAPTER XXIII,
AVE DO NOT KNOW
What is before us ; and Richard did not know what was
before him. Yet Miss Plumy Alicia Eyre was before
Ricliard ; her dark, thrilling eye was before him ; her pale,
pensive, earnest face was before him ; so was her searching,
pleading, piteous heart. But did Richard really know what
was before him? Was not the future hidden from him, and
was not the present even partially veiled ?
But with his body's eye he only saw Miss Eyre ; and
with his mind's eye, if he had striven to look another way
he could not, for she tyrannized over that too.
Miss Eyre was intimate at Munk's, and she brought fruit
and candies to the children. Moreover, Richard had been
sick two or three days, and Miss Eyre frequently called,
exhibiting the gentlest sympathy. She brought cordials to
his bed-side ; she spelled Roxy in the kitchen, while she
watched Avith her brother.
But Miss Eyre, as these pages have had occasion to
record, was unsphered, unhomed. In this she was to be
pitied.
Moreover, she lacked a contented mind ; she would not
submit to the orderings of Providence, or the inevitabilities
of fortune. She was too ambitious to be useful; too confi-
dent to be wise ; too bad to be good. She was too reckless
either to improve advantage or support evil. Here she
was to blame.
A little true humility, — even common candor of feeling,
23
266 EICHAKD EDNEY, ETC.
— a grain of piety, would have saved lier from the agitation
she was in, and the extremity to which she was tending.
Even now, Miss Eyre, with all that you have suffered
still burdening your memory, with all the lacerations of
sorrow yet fresh in your heart, may we not ask you if you
ought not to have been more considerate, — if some sugges-
tions of reason, humanity or religion, ought not to have re-
strained you ? Do not lay all the blame on others, but ask
your own soul if you can fully justify yourself.
Plumy Alicia appealed to the sympathies of Richard ; she
thrilled every commiserant fibre within him; her anguish,
like a troubled wave, beat upon him , her description of her-
self awakened his tenderness, while with consummate nicety
she concealed her design to do so. Her ministry to Richard
when he was sick, she knew, had established a place for her
in his gratitude ; she had imparted some intimate matters to
him, — a movement which, while it secures confidence, in-
spires self-esteem. She laid her hand upon his ; he could not
repudiate the familiarity, because by that act she seemed to
be discharging upon one stronger than herself a load of
sensation too heavy for her to bear. She looked into his
eye, but only to assure him how sad and heavy her own
was.
" Do not say that you love me," she said ; " I do not wish
you to say that ;" — she did wish it, nevertheless. " Kiss
me, and I go, — go with one assurance of friendship and
happiness, which, if it be all that is allowed me, will be a
precious keepsake forever." She said this with her warm
breath pulsating on his face.
CHAPTER XXIV.
RICHARD RETURNS TO THE SAW-MILL.
The Dam in due time was repaired ; the Factories and
Saw-mills resuiTied operations, and the life and activity, rat-
tle and clatter, that attach to extensive mechanical works,
once more resounded.
But Saw No. 1 — Richard's appropriate field of action —
was dead. Captain Creamer had failed ; the breach in the
Dam ruined him. Richard, Mr. Gouch, Silver, and the rest
of the gang, gathered at their old resort; but there was no
one to employ them. None appeared, to rent the saw. The
Corporation, rather than that the instrument should lie idle,
offered to stock it, and let it by the thousand, if the original
hands, of whose ability and fidelity they had proof, would
take it. A bargain was soon struck. Mr. Gouch and
the others retained their several posts, whilst, by unani-
mous consent, it was arranged that Richard should assume
the superA-ision of the concern. An honor to our hero !
For this office, it was evident to his fellows, he was well
qualified, and to it all were happy in raising him. His
readiness in figures, his judgment of timber, the accu-
racy and economy with which he could answer an order,
his familiarity with the several branches of work, — what
had become obvious during the winter, — united to never-
failing vigilance and sagacity, and great kindliness of
feeling and urbanity of intercourse, rendered the choice of
the company as easy to themselves as it was flattering to
him. His wages advanced with his responsibility ; and, if
268 RICHARD EDNEY AND
his labor was less manual, his duties were not less arduous
and exacting.
Clover was missing, — an absence which none regretted.
Affairs moved on harmoniously and prosperously. Mr.
Gouch, unabashed by the presence of Clover, grew a firmer
and more resolute man. Silver was silent and glum, but
not spiteful or rude. All the men had their weaknesses, as
well as their strength, and sport was too nimble and too
needful to be subdued by toil. There is no humor so
genial, no gayety so inspiring, as that which is awakened
among good-natured, hard-laboring men.
Summer was upon them, with its softening and expanding
influences ; — the great doors stood open, — the breeze was
welcome, — the roar of the Dam, which had been sharp
and hard in winter, grew round, limpid, melting, — the
rumbling of the wheels in the pit, the screeching of the
saws, all acknowledged the return of a milder dispensation.
The signs of business about the premises were not a little
pleasing; teams hurrying to and fro, the cries of the team-
sters, wheels laden with boards, carts filled with refuse,
and whatever indicated rapid exchange and a thriving
season.
In transacting the affairs of the concern, Eichard came
in contact with a variety of individuals in the city, — lum-
ber dealers, carpenters, and such as were engaged in the
erection of houses. He did a large amount of what is called
custom work. .
In all things his honesty and intelligence were of use to
him. He had been in the forest, studied trees, and investi-
gated the kinds and properties of wood. The hard and
the soft, the new and the seasoned, — what will bear the
weather and what must be protected, — what is adapted to
one end and what to another, — were familiar matters. In
THE governor's FAMILY. 269
manifold particulars, his opinion was sought, and his advice
followed.
During the summer, Richard and Nefon, the Bookseller,
became better acquainted ; and the more they became
acquainted, the better they liked each other; as if the non-
acquaintance of man with man were not at the foundation
of nine tenths of mortal dislikes ! Now, Nefon applied to
Richard to take a class in the Sunday-school, of which he
was Superintendent. Richard, with natural distrust of
his abilities, yet obedient to the rule he had adopted as the
supreme guide of life, to do good, replied that he would be
glad to do so. But an obstacle intervened, which seemed
at first sight not easy to be surmounted. His sister feared
such a step would alienate him from the church she attend
ed, and consign him remedilessly to Parson Smith's. Rich
ard declared that no position of this sort in the Church of
the Redemption should bind him to its authority or its infiu
ence, beyond the plain teachings of the New Testament
Eoxy promised him her prayers, — albeit she could not
yield him her blessing, as he entered upon this novel duty
To his class he added certain boys, whose abodes were
the shores of the River, the Islands, and the neglected
quarters of the New Town, and whom he had seen playing
the vagrant or the thief about the Mills; and had the satis-
faction of finding them punctual and interested, and of
recording their progress in divine knowledge.
23*
CHAPTER XXV.
HE VISITS THE GOVEEXOR's.
Among the events of not a little interest in this season's
experience was Richard's appointment with Madam Ben-
nington. He ascended the Governor's piazza and pulled at
the bell-handle with a slight palpitation of the heart ; and
the servant who ushered him in might have noticed a cer-
tain rusticity in his manner.
IMadam received him with grace and dignity. Melicent
and Barbara took his hand in a cordial way. With the
Governor, whose greatness of mind and force of character
were alwaj- s at the command of courtesy and kindness, and
replete with the minor social instincts, he was quite at ease.
Cousin Rowena was particularly complacent. There was
cause for this. Mrs. Blelbourne rallied strong against Rich-
ard, when she found attention to the Sawyer going so far as
a summons to a social family gathering. Not that she had
anything against Richard; only, — she could hardly tell
what. This was enough for Cousin, who thought the aver-
sion unreasonable, and was easily inclined to protect Rich-
ard from it.
Tea was carried round. Were Richard's nerves a little
wanton, and his hand a little clumsy ? What with cup and
saucer on his knees, and waiter with sugar and cream,
waiter with sandwiches and cheese, waiter with dough-nuts
and cake, and the gradual filling up of the narrow rim of
the only receptacle for this endless enumeration, and his
own desire to be polite, and his fear that he should not be,
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 271
and Mrs. Melbourne and Miss Kowena both watching him
so closely, — it was not strange there should be a downfall
both of bread and of feeling. But Cousin Rowena picked
up the fragments, and bit her lip.
The Governor's Family owed something to Richard, and
they were disposed to requite in full, and that in modes
at once delicate and honorable. Roscoe talked with him on
farming ; Rasle joked with him ; Barbara showed him the
library and pictures; Eunice played to him; Melicent
walked with him in the garden.
But would these parties square accounts, and be off?
Was this the purpose and upshot of their interview ? Was
there no common ground of humanity or religion, — no con-
sentaneousness of thought or feeling, — no grandeur of
moral aim, — no depth of character, — no aspiration for
ideal progress, — no accidental revelations of approved state
and being, which might suggest a perpetuity of acquaint-
ance, and even protract remembrance when calls were ended ?
In evidence that the invitation to Richard did not spring
from merely personal and private regards, but belonged to a
more expansive and general circle of social sentiments on
the part of the Family, other guests, obviously by invitation,
came in the evening. There were the Mayor Langreen,
the Redfernes of Victoria Square, the Lady Caroline, young
Chassford, Glendar, and other ladies and gentlemen.
Richard was in the centre, and, we might say, in the
centre of the centre, of the nobility of wealth, office and cul-
ture, and, if the worthy Dressmaker aforesaid is to be trust-
ed, of the common se?ise, of Woodylin. How did he carry
himself? He had heard his beloved Pastor speak of God's
and nature's noblemen, and perhaps sometimes thought he
was as good an one as any. He had heard from the lips of
his respected Teacher, and was himself sufficiently versed
272 RICHARD EDXEY AND
in g-eographj'' and history to know, that in some countries
the nobilitj' are distinguished by feathers in their caps, in
others by riding in coaches ; in some by a red patch on the
cheek, in others by a gilt sword ; and that it was once the
law that any man who had made three voyages round the
world should be knighted. But what did his knowledge
and convictions avail him now ? His favorite feeling, that
he was as good as anybody, — his indomitable resolution to
cower to no man, and be confounded by no woman, even
Pastor Harold with his sacred gown, and Teacher Willwell
with his impressive spectacles, — vanished from his recollec-
tion, and wavered in his hold ; and he felt himself amidst
these people, shivering, like a ship suddenly brought to, with
all sails in the wind. He was fidgety, wandering, purblind.
He stood face to face, and shoulder to shoulder, with these
people, not one of whom wore a sword, or had more feath-
ers in his cap, or rode in better coaches, or had made more
voyages round the world, than he ; yet he was not at ease.
To be in the centre of the Family and its appendages, and
compose one of its associates at an evening reiinion, was a
different thing from having them, as we have said, under
his thumb, and driving them in an omnibus. With entire
self-possession, leaning on a cant-dog, he could talk with
Melicent and Barbara in the Mill. Having nothing for his
muscular hands to clutch, how could he talk in that draw-
ing-room? Calm and cool, on a certain occasion, he seized
the Governor, and lifted him bodily out of watery peril ; yet
an introduction to the Governor's niece made him shake like
an aspen. He could take his turn at bowls or a dance with
the best of them ; but, alas for the imperfections of human
nature, he was not adequate to the demands of this social
hour !
Still, Eichard's weakness was sustained and relieved by
THE governor's FAMILY. 273
the intelligent and charitable experience of the Family, and
he was borne in tolerable condition through the shoals and
breakers of first encounter with high life.
The cardinal maxim of his Teacher, that he must inquire
the use of, and derive wisdom from, every new thing he saw,
he was too agitated to apply. It was as much as he could
do to be there, without asking why he was there. If he had
gone on to asking questions, he would, peradventure, have
startled points of a still lower deep, that would choke and
flurry him far more than the superficial aspects of the case did.
In that something which goes by the name of high life, or
good society, is what pesters inquiry as much as it eludes
attempt. When it is said of one, he is aspiring, or of
another, he looks down upon us, what is implied but that
there is a something above, which the first has not reached,
and which, to the last, is an attainment and a power?
There is an Idea in it ; — that idea is supreme excellence ;
or, in that height is centred, and by it evermore is sym-
bolized, the sum of what, in a given community, or country,
or age, is deemed most valuable. There is a divinity in it,
— it is an order of God. Wealth and office are not it;
they are subsidiary to its plan, and typify some of its results ;
and are, remotely, a means of reaching it. Height, excel-
lence, superiority, are indeed tantamount and convertible
terms ; and imply, respectively, that precious something,
which .makes us feel poor and mean without it, and ever-
more hangs out to us its banner of hope, and is an ultimate
desire of the mind. If my neighbor slights me, he makes
me feel he has something which I have not ; and I either
sink into a brutish state of envy, or resolve to gain that
which shall make me his equal. Dr. Broadwell is in good
society partly by position; his position being that which
implies the requisites of good society. Mrs. Tunny means
274 RICHARD EDNET AND
to get into it by the wealth of her husband ; but that will
depend wholly upon how he uses his wealth. Melicent — no
thanks to her — is born in it ; therefore her responsibility is
greater. If Richard shall be established in it, it will be by
hjs virtues. Fashion sometimes sets up for good society in
its own name ; but this is simply a mimicking of the great
Idea, and an attempt to get in by some other way. In
America, since what constitutes the. best society is not de-
termined by Court, it is determined by ideas ; and around
and toward these ideas is the community in city and coun-
try always gravitating. Primary instinct will in the end be
found as absolute as historical precedent. That is a wise
and righteous government which affords to ability the free
opportunity of rising to its proper height. Good society is
therefore not only a measure, but a crown, of exertion.
After all, that is the best society which God loves most ;
and among a depraved people much will pass for good
society which is really bad.
Richard was at his ease in the Saw-mill, and at Mrs.
Tunny's party, and at a public meeting; but he was not at
the Governor's. That mystic something which others pos-
sessed, he was conscious of lacking ; and he might have
retired in great disquiet, if Cousin Rowena had not support-
ed his flickering courage. He told her that he loved music,
and she ordered the young ladies to sing. This tranquil-
lized him, because it equalized him with the rest. He had
a good voice,' and well modulated, not to troubadour songs,
but to pieces of a different description. Sacred melodies
were familiar to him ; and he sang one, popularly known as
a pennyroyal hymn, — a measure that combines unction
and vivacity. It was well received, and he was pleased.
But, ever and anon, in course of the evening, — whether
it was owing to the heat of the room, or the proximity of
THE GOVEKNOK's FAMILY. 275
unfavorable comparison, or the rapid transition of unaccus-
tomed persons and topics, or his own effort to divest himself
of what he most dreaded, — his perceptions clouded, and
his language tripped ; his hands swelled, and his face burnt.
He was glad to find an open door, and disburthen himself
to a draft of air. Blessings on the wind, that did for Rich-
ard what the Governor's Family, with its opulence, its
beauty, its breeding, could not do ! Melicent joined him on
the piazza ; and Richard, being himself again, could converse
and behave more to his satisfaction.
Richard was honest, and had a heart, and spoke of things
that he loved most to those who loved to hear them. Meli-
cent answered to the same description ; and as there were
many things in both their hearts alike, it was natural they
should get up quite an interchange of sentiment on cher-
ished and pleasant topics.
Correspondence of sentiment, connected as it often is
with correspondence of aim, is wont to lead to harmony of
feeling and mutuality of interest ; and Melicent left Richard,
with a strong desire to know more of him, and be more with
him.
Richard went home that night burthened with reflections ;
at one moment reproaching himself for pusillanimity and
weakness, — at another, questioning the authority of that
which exerted so strong a spell over him during the even-
ing; but after vibrating between several disagreeable and
disjointed subjects, he settled at last upon thinking about
Melicent. In her he saw exaltation without arrogance,
purity without demureness, tenderness without insipidity,
piety and no cant, beauty and no affectation, common sense
and yet great ardor and hope.
For the second time was he brought to the direct and
intense contemplation of Melicent ; and that in the night, —
276 EICHAKD EDNEY, ETC.
that with the glare and surroundings of the day withdrawn.
He had formerly thought of her as the Governor's daughter,
— beheld in her a wonderful instance of human and female
excellence, and admired the contrast she afforded to what
sometimes appears a dark back-ground of aristocracy, pride
of wealth, and meanness of station. He now thought of her
as Melicent ; she was individualized to his imagination, —
she was beginning to stand out alone in the universe to his
eye ; vapors or shadowy emptiness separated her from all
others, — an embarrassing, a hazardous state of affairs to a
young man. But, before he slept, the natural order of
things was restored, — her own proper world surrounded
and absorbed her ; and his own world, — his Saw-mill and
his rusticity, — came and took him off.
CHAPTER XXVI,
HOUSEHOLD WORDS.
Richard's chief joy was his nieces ; and his Sundays, and
meal-times, and evenings, that gave him to them. He
played with them, and they made a child of him ; nay,
they made less than that ; they used him as if he had been
a giant moppet in whiskers, and tumbled him about like a
man of straw. He was the child, and they were the mas-
ters. He must listen to their wants, obey their commands,
bide their caprices, go where they wished, do what they
ordered ; they climbed up his chair, tore at his legs, rode
on his back, pilfered his pockets, hid his boots. He brought
blocks for them to build houses with, allotted a quarter of
the garden for their agricultural operations, put up a swing
for them on the willow-tree. Sundays, after church, he
went with them to Bill Stonners' Point, to see Chuk, and
through the woods to Mysie's, He filled their baskets with
box-berries and partridge-berries, and adorned their hats
with belhvorts and laurels. To Chuk the children were
an intelligence, — an incantation, — a glimmering of long-
lost ideas. Mysie showed them her cats and cows.
To add to the wonders, — a wonder it was to Memmy,
and a real wonder it might be to the universe, — Bebby be-
gan to talk ! The teeth came, and the talk would soon fol-
low. This was Memmy's philosophy; and is it not as
good as anybody's ? Who can explain the mystery of
speech ? Is it not God's miracle ? To witness this dull
clay putting itself into tune, — to see unconscious muscle
24
278 KICHAKD EDNEY AND.
adapting itself to articulation ; ideas seizing upon corruptible
flesh and blood, and converting it into a living organism ;
to hear the short words, and the half-uttered long words,
and the endeavors after impossible words ; and how innu-
merable things seem, like bees about a hive, to fly about the
lips of the child, — some going in, some crawling on the edge,
and some falling back, and all keeping up such a buzz ; —
oh, these ivere new things, and well worth reporting to Mas-
ter Willwell ! And how Bebby's eyes would strain when
she tried to say something, and twinkle when she had said
something ; and Memmy's would twinkle too, and so would
Roxy's and Munk's, and the twinkle would be contagious,
and go all round the room. This was pleasant.
And what would the child say? what would be the first
utterance of that which from eternity had been silent, or
which from other worlds had come to take up its abode in
this ? What incipiency from the mystic depth of things
would start into being? It was " mamma " and " pn pa."
These were the first shoots from that thaumatergical seed-
bed, which was' ultimately to produce such harvests of prat-
tle, ratiocination, poetry, and newspapers ; — whereon would
that the dews of divine grace might descend, and adorn
them with heavenly beauty and sweetest charity !
She ere long perpetrated those dreadful words, " I will,"
and " I won't;" as if it were a crime to practise volition, and
presumption insupportable to be supposed capable of the pre-
rogative of free-agency, or to have any preference or aver-
sion. " Say 'I had rather not,' " enjoined the mother. "I
won't ! " answered the child. " You-will, won't you ? " pleaded
the mother. " I wont ! " reechoed the child. Roxy turned
to her husband, and seemed to relieve her sorrow, saying,
" It is just as I always said, and what Elder Jabson teaches :
Children are wicked." " Bebby wicked ! " said Munk, stop-
THE governor's FAMILY. 279
ping what he was at — washing his face at the sink — and
looking- round.
" Bebby is wicked." Roxy said this, and was serene
again.
There is the nativity of ideas as well as words ; and Rich-
ard, being bound to inspect everything new, considered of
this also. Whether our ideas, for instance, of love and of
goodness, have a spiritual or material source, was a ques-
tion on which Master Wilhvell philanthropically descanted.
" You love Papa and Mamma," said he to Memmy, in a sort
of leading way ; " and whom else ? " "I love," replied the
child, " Bebby, and Uncle Rkhard, and — and — pussy, and
peaches." He had a peach in his hand. " Why do you
love peaches ? " He asked this in a playful manner, indeed,
but with earnestness of thought. " Because they are good,"
was the brief, yet, to the child, very complete, reply. " And
you love Papa because he is good ? " The child assented.
This was a poser to Richard. Vainly did he invoke the
lessons of his Teacher. Was it one thing to the child, —
peaches or Papa ? Was it the same goodness, or the same
sense of goodness ? Both yielded pleasure. May it not be
that God awakens the sentiment of goodness, by affording to
sense and contemplation that which pleases usi But there
is a spiritual susceptibility of pleasure, as well as material ;
both sets of instincts were stirred in the child, — only she was
not old enough to distinguish between them. So Richard
found, on inquiry, that she hated badness, whether in Tur-
key rhubarb, or the neighbor's yelping dog, or drunken
Weasand.
Still, vast as these problems were, the children cared not
a straw for them ; they had rather play hide-and-seek among
the trees than among abstractions. They loved play, and
nothing but play, Roxy insisted. " I love Manama," said
280 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Memmy. " Me lub Mamma, too," echoed Bebby, as sbe
stalked, with a made-up air of mixed pomposity and roguish-
ness, out of the room. Under the trees that Richard had
planted was their play-ground, and there they acted out
what their mother seemed to feel was their unhappy destiny,
— play.
Richard had set the trees, not at the corners of the yard,
not in straight lines, but in groups and curves ; thus creating
many little in-and-out places for caprice and pastime to
practise in. " Look at the children among the trees," he
called to his sister. She did look, and smiled. They were
nothing but her children, and these were nothing but trees ;
they were children too, who, in the house, were so often a
sigh on her heart, or an annoyance to her hands ; but now
they were pretty, — simply pretty, exquisitely pretty. She
felt this, and so did Richard ; and they showed it by their
looks, since neither spoke.
Trees, considered as an avenue for the eye to traverse,
enhance the beauty of objects at the end of it. The reader
has looked through trees at water or the sky, and witnessed
this effect. Nature, like Art, seems to require a border, in
order to be finished. The dressmaker hems and ruffles ;
the carpenter has his beads and pilasters ; the painter never
rests till his piece is framed. This appears to be an ulti-
mate law. Whether Master Willwell attempted to explain
it, we know not. We do know he was wont to tell his pu-
pils there were such laws ; stopping-places of thought, —
dykes in the seams where inquiry is ever mining. " Bread,"
said he, " is bread ; and that is the v/hole thing. We may
say, indeed, it is a composition of flour, and 5'east, and
water ; but that is not it. Your mother's bread, that j'ou
get, fresh and warm, every Wednesday afternoon, so sweet
in milk, — why, it is a primitive idea ; it is bread, and that
THE governor's FAMILY. 281
is all we know about bread — " he* looked down on the
bench of little children, who were agape to see whereto so
much wisdom tended, and added, " except to eat it." So,
likewise, he would expatiate upon toads ; " A batrachian rep-
tile ; batrachia, naked body, and two feet ; what is a toad?"
" We are all toads I " cried the class. " Clumsy, harmless,"
Here he paused, " Little babies are toads," answered one
of the scholars. " Body warty and thick," continued the
teacher ; " now who is a toad ? " " Peter Tubby ! " cried a
bright boy. " Yes," said the teacher, with an innocent
smile, "Peter Tubby is a toad. Nay," he added, "a toad
is a toad ; — repeat this in concert." So the class repeated
it, and some went home singing, " A toad is a toad." If we
should say, Nature loves a bordering, as it used to be said,
she abhorred a vacuum, we might state the whole truth.
An uninterrupted plane, — continuity of similar surface, vast,
monotonous, silent, — is intolerable. So a column must have
its cap, and a house its cornice ; so along the edge of the
highway spring innumerable flowers, and on its margin the
forest is lavish of its foliage ; so the sea is terminated by the
sky, and we look at the sky through vistas of embanked
and woofy cloud. Were you ever in a pine grove of a
bright moonlight night? How different from standing
upon a mountain at such a time ! We recommend to any
one on an eminence, to go back from the brink thereof, and
stand in the forest, and look out through the breaks and
crevices. A moss-rose is an instance in point, — beautiful
because it is bordered ; it is a landscape seen through trees.
A house in the midst of shrubbery is an instance ; so are
islands in a pond ; a view through half-raised window-
curtains, and distant scenery through a long suite of rooms;
so are light on foregrounds and shadows on backgrounds, in
all pictures. Glens, valleys, a flower in the grass, a star in
2i*
282 RICHARD EDNEY AND
the sky, belong to the same category. So did Memmy and
Bebby, at this present speaking; they were bordered by
trees, — cedars and birches were about them, like curls on the
face of fair maiden ; and one of Master Willwell's primitive
ideas turned up, — bread was bread ; a toad was a toad ; the
final sense was reached, and Richard and Roxy were pleased.
Then, in this case, the children were on the go, while the
bordering kept still ; they were the picture, dancing up and
down in its frame; they were the blue sky, crisping and
rippling behind the clouds. This great beauty, which they
were, was now in the shadow, now in the shade ; now its
straw hat and ruddy face gleamed through the green spray,
— now its silver, healthful voice carolled in ambuscade. It
ran round the trees that made it so beautiful ; it halted in
front of that which set it off so behind ; its fluttering was
seen through the depth of the little copse. A chipping
sparrow sang in the trees over it ; Munk sat on the steps,
and pressed his arm very tight about his wife's waist as
he beheld it ; passers-by stopped and leaned on the fence
to look at it.
Lo ! now Bebby stands between, and partly screened by,
two little cedars, about as tall as she; — and how beautiful
she is ; what a joy in her father's heart; what a glistening in
her mother's eyes; what a ravishment to Richard, all over,
she is, or the thing that she is ! She is a moss-rose, — a
rose mossed, — bordered. Is the beauty herself, or her cir-
cumstances ?
What is the principle herein involved ? Some refer the
interest of this class of phenomena to ideas of Infinity. It
is a glimpse, an opening, into the vast, they tell us. But
why, if vastness be the ultimate sentiment, is partial vast-
ness more attractive than entire ? Why curtain it, to
heighten the effect ? What has Bebby 's head, stuck through
THE governor's FAMILY. 283
those trees, to do with Infinity ? I should call it, rather,
Limitation. It is rather the reduction of the Infinite to pal-
pable bounds, than an elevation of the Finite to the immeas-
urable. Bebby runs away. Bebby is the same Bebby ;
the trees are the same trees ; but how different apart ! The
rose has lost its moss ; the view its border. Run back, little
additament ! Throw yourself into the middle of the picture,
or what will be a picture when you get there ! Consent to
be bordered. Those happy, blue eyes, — those flocculent,
foamy locks, — were they ever so pretty? The pea-green,
crinkly little cedars, — what enchantment they suddenly as-
sume ! How the beaut}"^ flashes from one to the other, and
centres in the whole ! How it vanishes when Bebby quits !
Memmy had gone to crawling in the grass, full of frolic and
laughter, and Bebby must do so too.
" You will green your drawers all up ; come into the
house ! " cried their mother.
This ended the scene.
Parson Smith's and Dr. Broadwell's Sunday-school chil-
dren and teachers were planning a union picnic, combined
whh a rail-road ride and a sylvan meeting; and Richard
was going, and he wanted to take Memmy, and Memmy
wanted to go ; but Roxy clouded. She feared what might
be the effect of her children associating with Parson Smith's
and Dr. Broadwell's ; — they were aristocratic children ; they
would slight and deride hers ; Parson Smith's and Dr.
Broadwell's people felt themselves above Elder Jabson's, and
so on. But she said to her husband, and here she was more
positive, " They have n't clothes fit to go in, and you know
it ! " Munk need not feign ignorance, or affect to poh the
matter off; he was sufficiently conscious of the state of
affairs. " Always," continued his wife, " something is a
happening, and you are not such a man as you should be ! "
284 HICHARD EDNEY AND
"Do you want me to change into another man? — say into
Tunny, or Clover, or, if you like, into Elder Jabson^"
Munk did not say this iu his usual, that is, a pleasant way,
but in an irritated way ; he was roiled. Eoxy flung her
apron over her eyes, slatted into a chair, and began to cry.
There seemed to be no coming to terms now. Munk
knocked his pipe on the andiron, and looked into it, — cool,
— rapped again, — stinging, — and when the ashes were all
out, he refilled and lighted it, and went to smoking, and
reading the evening Catapult, — past endurance. " You
wicked man, you I " His wife seemed almost to gnash at
him. Munk did not stir. " I guess Memmy's clothes will
do," said Richard, in the way of oily interposition. — "I wish
you would ever have your shoes on ! " Roxy addressed this
to the child, who, insensible to what was going on overhead,
was down on the floor, busily divesting herself of what
clothing she had. " She shall have a new hat," said Munk.
"It was a black beaver, with plumes," rejoined his wife.
" That was last winter ! " explained the other.
" What if it was ? It was all the same then as now.
We don't have anything ! I wanted a Thibet shawl, small
figured, and you were not willing. Mrs. Xyphers had an am-
eline at Tunny's ; and what was I, what was I ? Bobbin &
Shally advertise forty kinds of silks ; and all of Dr. Broad-
well's folks are in there, — I have seen it with my own eyes !
The parlor curtains I am ashamed of! Mrs. Tunny says,
have silk damask and tulip pins, and would have if you
were worth as much as you are ; and you are ! Memmy
might have a China pearl ! " An explosion ; Munk stood
the shock tolerably well. "Memmy shall have a China pearl,
if that will satisfy you." " If that will satisfy me, — as if
you had no feeling, and no sense of things, of yourself, —
as if all the blame must fall on me ! Mrs. Mellow is a
THE governor's FAMILY. 285
woman and a Christian, if there ever was one ! And her
house don't look like this ; and I know what she thinks when
she is here, though she don't say anything! "
Here was a cloud, and a shower ; and Richard was afraid
the children would get wet. " Do not say all this before
them," he interceded.
" Yes, before them ! " rejoined his sister. " They shall
know what a suffering mother they have ! I wish I was dead ! "
Memmy screamed, and Bebby screamed in sympathy;
Munk groaned, his wife sobbed. Richard took the children
out doors.
The upshot of the matter was a compromise; Roxy con-
sented to let Memmy go to the picnic, and Munk agreed
that his wife should have a fashionable dress.
In great spirits, of a clear morning, the children filed to
the depot and entered the cars. They rode on the banks of
the River, that now afforded lively glimpses through the
trees, now exposed its broad Siloam face, now withdrew
behind leafy headlands. They passed lumber-laden sloops,
steamboats, and merchandise packets. They went through
pretty towns, fruitful farms, and cool woods. They unloaded
at Sunny Hours, a grove so called. Here recreation enforced
itself, charity found its sphere, harmony attended freedom,
innocency sanctified mirth ; clean grass and breezy shades
inspired exertion, and invited to repose. The children were
kind to Memmy, the teachers affable with Richard. Memmy
could run among the trees with any of them, and there is no
aristocracy in eating. Unitary sentiments were exchanged;
congratulations of mutual good feeling made ; many hopes of
childhood, the Church, and the world, echoed. They sang
exultant songs, made earnest speeches, and returned.
Memmy got home safe, with her palm-leaf hat prettily
wreathed, and her gown soiled and torn. Roxy was not
286 RICHARD EDNEY AND
sorry that she did not wear China pearl, and Munk prom-
ised the child a new gingham ; and going with Dr. Broad-
well's and Parson Smith's children turned out not so bad a
thing, after all.
The parlor at Munk's was a hidden room, — an inner sanc-
tuarj', — a Blue Beard's chamber ; and Richard longed to
get into it. It was the largest and the pleasantest room in the
house, and he longed to enjoy it. But it was stepping on
corns to say anything about it. The room was not open
long enough for ventilation, and Richard declared the straw
under the carpet was must)^, and smelled damp and close.
The buzzing of a venturesome fly alone relieved the stillness
of the spot ; and a spider, not having the fear of Roxy before
his eyes, was setting his traps to catch the fly. But the
children would litter the carpet, soil the sofa, scratch the
chairs, disturb the things on the table.
Munk was satisfied with the kitchen, because he could
smoke, lean against the wall, put his feet on the stove-hearth,
sit in his shirt-sleeves, — in a word, be what he liked to be, a
free man, — better there than in the parlor ; and he did not
mix with the controversy.
The street-bell rang, and Richard answering it, encoun-
tered Mrs. Mellow, the lady to whom Roxy so often referred.
She was the Secretary of a Home Inspection Society, and
distributor of its tracts. She was well dressed, had a pa-
tronizing air, a soft, gentle voice, blue eyes, and her face
seemed all made up of tender-line and goodness. When
Roxy knew who had called, like a dozen girls let loose from
school, she dispersed in all directions at once ; she chased
the dust-brush, washed the children's faces, swept the hearth,
shut the table-drawer, and hurrying into the bed-room to
adjust her toilette, rapped and righted the pillows on the
bed, and smoothed the window-curtains. Not that ]\Irs.
THE GOVER^•OK■s PA.\ULY. 2S7
Mellow \\Tis in the bed-room, or likely to be ; but she \\-as
in the house, and Eoxy acted as if she felt she was all over
the house. These matters being attended to, she presented
herself in the parlor. Honored as she deemed herself by
the call, she was in no state to do justice to it. Nerv-
ous, bungling, confused, as if she feared the walls of the
room would fall in and crush her visiter, and she had no
power to admonish her of the danger, she stiffly returned the
salutations of the lady, who took her sweetly by the hand,
and went so far as to kiss her. The customary domestic
inquiries ensued in routine, until the children were reached.
But these were on hand to report for themselves. They
bounced into the room, and like captives set free, they made
a wild and rude demonstration of their joj*. " Come to me,
little one," said Mrs. Mellow, holding out a blue-gloved
hand on her silken knee. But Memmy \\-as busy with a
gilt-edged book she had snatched from the table, and Bebby
was urging a chair towards the same forbidden height.
" They act so I " said Roxy, making vicarious confession for
the young transgi:essors, at the same time taking the book
from Menmiy. and the chair from Bebb}-. " Won't you go
see the lady ? " she besought them. Bebby was rolling
^.. ihe carpet, pulling at Memmy's gown, who screamed to
free herself. " They always behave worse before company,"
explained their mother. " I always said — " " "What have
you said ? " asked Mrs. Mellow. " Nothing," answered
Roxy, " only I used to think how children ought to behave
in company. I do believe we have the worst children
that ever was ! " " That depends a tjood deal on circum-
stances," replied Mrs. Mellow. •• Do you teach them
obedience ? "
" I endeavor to," said Roxy, " but they beat me out of it.
I am not so well sustained as I think I ought to be." She
2S8 RICHARD EDNEY JlSD
glanced at Richard, who, having been requested by Mrs.
Mellow to sit, had remained in the room.
" One should never give up to children." Mrs. Mellow
said this positively.
" Never ? " asked Roxy. " Never. When you have laid
down a rule, adhere to it."
" What if the rule is a bad one ? " queried Richard.
Mrs. Mellow, unlike herself, bridled at this, and looked
sharply at Richard. But Richard was not pierced; and per-
haps because he was not, the lady remarked, as if it was
the most effective thing she could do, she was sorry to see
our young men, and laboring men too, imbibing transcen-
dental notions ; at the same time tendering Richard a tract,
which she said she hoped would teach him humility and the
fear of God. Richard accepted the tract, and unceremoni-
ously left the room.
" I fear for that brother of yours, Qlrs. Munk," said Mrs.
Mellow.
Now, Roxy, however she might view and feel some things,
loved Richard, and was proud of him, and was wont to hear
people speak well of him; and though she sometimes
blamed him to his face, she had no idea anybody else would
do so to hers ; and while she entertained a profound regard,
and an almost sen'ile reverence, for Mrs. Mellow, the lan-
guage of that lady served to jar the awe in which she stood,
and set her upon a train of independent thinking. Still,
she made no reply, and in a short time her caller left.
Moreover, she thought Mrs. Mellow reflected on her condi-
tion in life, and that of her brother, as belonging to the
laboring class ; and this was grievous. Mrs. Mellow had
never done such a thing before. She Avas rich, and she
belonged to the best church, and the best society, and lived
in an elegant house ; and Roxy thought she was an uncom-
THE governor's FAMILY. 289
mon Christian, and never before, through the suaviloquy of
patronage and condescension, had the sting of derision ap-
peared. It was as if the dove concealed a serpent's tongue,
and Roxy felt herself bitten.
Still the sentiment of Mrs. Mellow, " Never yield to a
child," and the query of Richard, " What if it be a bad
rule ? " weighed in her mind.
The subject of the freedom of the parlor came up in con-
versation, a short time afterwards. " I always said I would
have a best room," observed Roxy. " That is the best room,"
replied Richard, "which answers its purpose best, and con-
tributes most to the enjoyment of the family. Sometimes
the kitchen is the best room." "Yes," said Munk, not
looking from his paper, " be good and happy, — only be happy,
that 's all." " The best room," continued Richard, " on the
present basis, is the worst room — one that affords the least
satisfaction of any in the house. You are obliged, Roxy, to
defend it as it were with a broomstick against your children,
from morning to night."
" But," answered his sister, " I have made it a rule that
they shall never go into the parlor except we have company.
They will remember this rule, and I shall seem to yield to
them."
" What and if you actually yield to them ? It will be, as
Pastor Harold used to say a concession of arrangement to
affection, — of economy to happiness. It may be an exchange
of what is purely whimsical or fashionable, for what is use-
ful and salutary. How the children are tried and tempted
by that room ; how often it proves too strong for their virtue ;
how their inclinations are teazed, and their humors black-
ened, by your regulation! Take rainy days, and washing
days, and busy days, — the kitchen is too small for the chil-
dren and you, and the parlor is full of sunshine, and green-
25
290 EICHARD EDNEY AND
sward, and blithe freedom to them ; but they must forego it
all, and ?tay here in the suds. Would it be right to set a plate
of cake on that chair, and keep it uncovered before the chil-
dren for a week, and forbid them to touch it, and punish
them for touching it? That parlor is a great plate of cake,
and peaches and pears besides, to them. You say they
spoil things. That is because they are not used to them.
Familiarity with the contents of the room would moderate
the excitement of novelty. It is the rarity of entrance that
leads the children to abuse it so. This is according to Mr.
Willwell, who says, the more you hide things from people,
the more they want to see them."
" But I have said they should n't," answered Roxy.
" What if you said wrong ? That is the question. May
a parent never do wrong, or impose a wrong command ? If
he has done so, he ought to retract, I think. In doing
wrong, you violate God's law, disturb your own feelings, and
confound the moral perceptions of the children. On the
other hand, while you seem to stoop to the children, you are
really rising to the heights of absolute rectitude ; and if they
appear for the moment to gain a triumph over you, they
would soon find they had only arrived at a natural and
simple position ; and instead of using it as an advantage, it
would rather humble them by its responsibility. Parental
concession is provocative of filial obedience. That is Pastor
Harold again ; I have his sermons by heart."
" You will ' Pastor Harold ' me to death I " rejoined Roxy.
" He would kill you by love, as he did me once. But
that is the true Resurrection. Die to sin, that we may live
to holiness. Be firm in what is right, reasonable in what
is doubtful, but give up in what is wrong, — that is his
doctrine. Look into your own heart, Roxy, and see what
your motives are, in this thing. Do you keep the par-
THE governor's FAMILY. 291
lor shut for the good of your children, or for the prosperity
of your house, or even for any reasons of comfort or edifica-
tion ? Is.it not solely for the world, — because you are
ambitious to have as good a parlor as Mrs. Tunnj', or from
fear of what Mrs. Mellow will think, or from a prurient
desire to have the reputation of keeping a handsome parlor?
You talk a good deal about the aristocracy, and pride-and-
vnnity folk, and worldly-minded professors ; and you think
you belong to a very humble and self-denying church; but
it seems to me you commit more sin, and betray more folly,
about your parlor, a hundred fold, than the Mayor's wife,
in allowing danchig at her house, for which you censured
her so ; or the Redferns, in taking the fine house in Victo-
ria Square, and who, you have said, were so abandoned to
the idolatry of this world."
Roxy oh-deared ; and Richard, not knovving but he was
pressing the subject too closely, dropped it.
Roxy was easily persuaded ; and p'erhaps that was one
source of the infelicity of her life. When she left her coun-
try home, the city persuaded her ; when she began to as-
sume a church relation, Elder Jabson persuaded her; when
she went into society, Mrs. Tunny persuaded her; — some-
time? it was Aunt Griiit; sometimes it was a thunder-
storm. Her husband once had great influence with her ;
but she had got used to him, — he had lost his seasoning, his
piquancy, his forcefulness, to her; a word from Elder Jab-
son outweighed whole sermons of Asa's. But Richard was
a fresh ministry, — there was at least the raciness and edge
of novelty to his words, and she was disposed to be per-
suaded once more.
It was agreed that the room should be thrown open, and
all rejoiced in the prospective enlargement.
CHAPTER XXVII.
KNUCKLE LAKE.
During the j^ear, there arose in "Woodylin a movement,
which uhimately embodied itself in what was called the
Knuckle Lane Club. Its object was to remove degradation
from the city ; and no person was deemed fit to join it who
was not willing to spend an evening in Knuckle Lane. This
precinct, extending along a deep gorge, was sinuous, jagged,
damp and dark. It was a result of the city. Its waste
measured the improvement of the city. It was the slag
and dross of the city refinement. Its houses were the old
city houses, that had been replaced by better ones ; and
they looked as if they had been brought to the edge of the
gully, and one after another pitched into the receptacle be-
low, where they lay, in all shapes, at all angles, and in all
predicaments.
This Club did not, however, confine itself to that locality ;
it had a more comprehensive aim. It was a sort of subter-
ranean method of doing good in general. It proposed to
look at vice from beneath. Like the sewers of London,
there are moral sewers in all our cities, extending many
miles, in the labyrinthine passages of which one may travel
days. It would go into these.
The Club resolved, not merely to berate vice, but to fol-
low it home, — see its bed and board; talk with it, and
find out what was on its mind ; listen to its arguments ;
make a stethoscopic examination of it, and trace to their
source some of its streams.
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 293
The enterprise required tact, strength and faith. A num-
ber of individuals Avere combined in it. Some ladies acted
with it, — others sympathized. Some families in Victoria
Square contributed furniture and clothing; some rich men
gave money. But there must be workers, — Putnams of
this den.
The plan had been for some time maturing. There was
no secrecy about it, nor were there any attempts at pub-
licity. There was no desire to provoke opposition, or to be
impeded by prejudice ; therefore, those were chiefly spoken
to who, it was thought, vvouldbe interested in the matter.
Richard and Nefon were particularly interested.
In the coarse of this business, Richard made new acquaint-
ances, and, as he thought, with nice people. Among these was
Augustus Mangil, one of the Brokers. No one dreamed of
Augustus Mangil in such a connection. At his capacious
office window lay all day long piles of gold and silver, and
passers by, seeing the man through the window, and, as it
were, breast-high in the precious stuff, supposed him a sort
of monster, — half a knave, half a fool. He was reputed to
shave notes, get up panics, disturb the street; and, with a
shark-like voracity, devour railroads and factories, and orphan
patrimonies. He had a pleasant, smiling face, — but that was
to w'in your money. He played on the flute, — that w'as to
decoy the unwarj' ; his head was partly bald, and some said
the widow's tears scalded it ; yet he was fat and sleek ; —
still, there were hundreds who knew where his marrow and
oil flowed from.
But Nefon, who prided himself on his insight into human
nature, knew his man, and knew this man. He looked
him in the eye, somewhat as Klumpp would, and said,
" Gus," — he called him Gus, — "you must go with us."
" Go ? go ? go where ? " " Knuckle Lane." " I know
25*
294 RICHARD EDXEY AND
Knuckle Lane. I have just sold some Knuckle Lane
stock." " Don't speak of it. We must tn- to improve the
stock."
" Not speak of it ? " exclaimed the Broker. " I have
saved five dollars for the poor dog. He put all he had in a
railroad share, because they told him it would help his
tracking. Frightened, horse dead, wife confined, and all
that, — would sacrifice. I never stand about such things ;
cashed the bond, divide the profits; and five dollars is his,
— that goes into Knuckle Lane."
" Come along ! " said Nefon ; " \o\i are a man, and the
man, and our man."
In addition, Richard was introduced to a worthy lady, of
whom he had heard, a sister-in-law of the Broker's, Mrs.
Helen Mangil ; and as there was another lady in Woodylia
of the same name, and whose husband bore the same name
with that of the first, this one, in certain circles, was called
Helen the Good.
This Knackle Lane became a cau=:e ; it counted its
friends and supporters, — it grew into a spirit and a feeling.
Maj^or Langreen was its President, Parson Smith its
Secretary, Nefon its Treasurer; then it created a Do-some-
thing Committee, or might be said to resolve itself into such;
and this comprised men and women, among whom were
Richard, Mr. IMangil, Broker, Elder Jabson, Munk, Mr.
Cosgrove, Carpenter, Mr. Horr, Collector of Customs, Mr.
Lawtall, Pianoforte-maker, Ada Broadwell, the Lady Car-
oline, Helen the Good, Melicent, and others.
It will be recollected the condition of membership was
willingness to spend an evening in Knuckle Lane; and this,
in the estimation of many good people of Woodylin, was
narrow and exclusive. It savored of bigotry; it was a
reflection on excellence. ]\Irs, Tunny was shocked at it ;
THE governor's FAMILY. 295
the Redferns in Victoria Square sniffed at it. " But now,"
said Nefon, "we know who is who; if anybody has got
quills, here is a chance to show them. Every man's eyes
must be his own chap in this business."
There must be first a reconnoissance, and a report. Rich-
ard, Mr. Marigil, Elder Jabson, and Nefon, were commis-
sioned to this task. It was a thick and misty night when
they sallied forth. From the height that overlooked
Knuckle Lane, that region, with its pent lights, appeared
like a gully cut through Hades by some deluge, along the
hideousness of which a dim phosphorescence luridly gleamed.
" We must peel and go at it," said Nefon. Not peel, but
wrap up, oh valorous man ! — pull on gutta percha boots, to
wade through that mire and dirt; clothe breast and arms in
faith and hope, to meet that sin and shame. It was the
rendezvous of theft, the resort of bawdery, and a creek into
which whatever is unfortunate in human condition, or de-
praved in human nature, daily set, like the tide,
" There are children there ! " ejaculated Richard. " There
are souls there," said Elder Jabson, with pious eagerness.
" I have a customer there," answered the oily, laughing-
Broker, " and I think we had better corner him."
They entered the house of the truckman, where they
found a sick wife, and a sorrowful looking man vainly
attempting to fill the office of nurse, and keep his infant
child alive. "Where was the Lady Caroline ?" bethought
Richard. It had not been deemed safe or prudent for the
ladies to come out that night. Mr. Mangil had in his
hands a balance of money due the truckman. This was
opportune. It enabled the man to buy a horse ; a horse
would restore him to his business, — his business would
support his family. "A transaction," said the Broker. " I
negotiated his share, and put five dollars into my own
296 KICHARD EDNEY AND
pocket ; if he has any more dealings of the sort, I should
be happy to act for him."
They went next to Fuzzle's, one of the men who had
been induced to sign the temperance pledge at Quiet Arbor,
the winter before. He had been, in his own language, " off
and on " abstemious. His wife was an acetate of bitter-
ness. He spent most of his evenings out ; drank to enjoy
himself; cursed the License law.
They visited a washerwoman, who cared more for others
than herself, and seemed to absorb in her own family all the
dirt she took from the world at large.
Whimp's was a vile and villanous spot, — no culture, no
ideas, no hope, no God.
Slaver's, they attempted to inventory, but it was an end-
less task ; it stood plus nothing, and minus everything.
Yet there were cats, and a pig, broken stools, smoked walls,
unseemly beds, and some of Elder Jabson's " souls," staring
out, wild and savage, through uncut hair, bronzed cheeks,
and shaking about in rags and dirt.
No. 6 was a rookery, — music and dancing, drhiking and
swearing, the Satyrism and Bacchantism of modern civiliza-
tion.
Our Heroes stood their ground at all points, patiently
investigated, kindly counselled, and carefully remembered.
Sometimes the Elder prayed. Nefon had with him tracts,
little picture-books, and embellished cards, which he dis-
tributed.
They made due report of proceedings. The Club was
surprised, horrified ; they inquired. What shall be done ?
They passed resolutions ; they adopted plans ; and all with
an honest purpose at the bottom.
Committees were sent out by twos ; not Knuckle Lane
alone, but other similar spots were visited. They explored
THE governor's FAMILY, 297
the shores of the River, picking their way through drift-
wood, hulks of boats, drag-nets, hog-styes, hen-coops, and
went up the bank to tenements that iiang down from many-
stories above, where the freshet and the cholera sometimes
enter, — where squalidness and destitution are always
entering, — where children, like bank -swallows, are seen
entering, — inhabited by Canadian French, and Connaught
Irish. They traversed the Pebbles. They searched the
purlieus of hotels and stables. Eating-houses on the wharves,
and' boarding-houses in the same vicinity, were remembered.
They risked the most in the rum-shops. It was voted that
two members of the sacred band should sit out an evening
in these retreats. The thing was done. They entered the
curtained door, took chairs in the midst of that congrega-
tion, saw what was done, heard what was said, — staid from
eight o'clock till midnight. Some members of the company
chose gambling-rooms, dancing-halls, and the gallery of the
Theatre, for their field ; others frequented the circuses and
menageries, and entertainments promised by negro mimics,
mesmeric mountebanks, and jugglers of all sorts. Some
spent a portion of the Sabbath at the various Lazy Poles,
and Paradises, and the Islands. The Alms-house and Jail
were rummaged.
Not that this was done at once. Summer hardly sufficed,
and winter was upon them before even their preliminary
operations were concluded.
But Knuckle Lane flourished. Judge Burp joined the
society. Alanson M. Colenutt, the millionnaire, signified
his approval. The Editor of the Dogbane said in his office,
one day, in the presence of a large number of most notable
and keen-sighted Phumbicians, in an earnest but whispered
under-tone, swaying a great newspaper in both hands, he
believed it was a good thing. " I say it, — I will say it; J
gya EICHARD EDNEY AND
say it not as a Phumbician, but as a man, — I believe it is
a good thing." Tode sprang from his chair, and leaving the
office, said, " Stop my paper ! " " Mr. Tode," cried the
Editor, " I am a Phumbician ; every drop of blood in my
veins boils vi^ith Dogbanian fire. I know what is due to our
cause. If they dare to meddle with that, and bring the curs
about our ears, — if a single whelp is heard to bark in con-
sequence of their movements, — no indignation, no scorn,
no blasting, is too great for them ! " Tode resumed his
seat.
It was rumored, the same daj'', on the opposite side of the
Kiver, that the Dogbane had caved in, having announced in
favor of Knuckle Lane, and was making capital out of the
new enterprise. The Catapult wauled, " What if some
poor man's dog was saved, — it was his comfort and de-
fence ; — he shared with the faithful creature his bread and
butter : and when he dies, who watches his grave, — who,
if we may so say, sheds a tear for the departed ? — who,
who, but his dog ? But that is not it ; we warn our read-
ers, it is not hatred to dogs that inspires the cunning of our
amiable contemporary; — it is a covert design to encourage
amongst us that spawn of perdition, the cats. The meat
that was conveyed by worthy members of this Club to a cer-
tain poor family is known to haze been fed out to a cat I
Driblets and bones, they say ! But driblets and bones are
nutritious. Cats are the mothers of Kittens ! ! This is
a momentous truth, and one we hope the people will duly
ponder."
A deputation, consisting of the most respectable members
of Knuckle Lane, headed by Judge Burp, visited both
offices, and explicitly assured the editors that Knuckle
Lane had nothing to do with Phumbics ; and the matter
was dropped from the public prints.
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY. Zif9'
It went on, however, in the hearts of the people. It
gained the affections, and silenced the scruples, of multi-
tudes.
Richard was indefatigable. He had not so much leisure
as many, but he had faith and patience. One evening every
week, and, in emergencies, two, he assigned to Knuckle
Lane.
In these visits he was often aided and directed by Cor-
nelius Wheelan, whom he had rescued from the Grotto and
ruin, and who, so to say, having been pickled in vice and
crime, took a long time to freshen ; but as it is said beef
freshens better in salt water than fresh, so it seemed to take
all this man's humors out of him to go around among his
old associates and haunts; — and he became not only a bet-
ter man, but useful to those who were better than he, and
also to some that were worse.
Richard's special beat was the New Town ; yet sooner or
later, he visited almost the whole of the city. He went
down among the roots of many of its evils. He got into
the bosom, and, so to say, blossom, of much of its sorrow.
He sat by the bed-side of its remorse. He made himself at
home in its dens of iniquity.
It was a rule of Knuckle Lane to give no offensive public-
ity to discoveries they might make. As the historian of
the society, we are bound by the same reserve, and cannot
relate all that fell under the observation of our friend, albeit
they were matters of interest and moment, both to him and
his co-laborers.
We shall briefly advert to one or two results. The Club
had gathered facts and statistics enough, — the map of the
thing was definitely drawn and pretty deeply colored before
their ej-es. Some were overwhelmed, — some disheartened,
— but the majority seemed to derive illumination from afar,
300 RICHARD EDNEY AND
and clearness, on the whole, came to the relief of obscu-
rity-
Knuckle Lane, havhig disentangled itself from Phumbics,
came near falling out with Polemics, What was the Church
to it, and it to the Church ? — that was the question. One
or two Clergymen said it interfered with their labors, —
usurped the prerogative of the Church, and drew off com-
municants. But Clergy and Laity, on the whole, favored it.
Still, among the adherents of the cause, the inquiry arose.
Shall the Church go to Knuckle Lane, or Knuckle Lane
come to the Church ? But Knuckle Lane was too dirty and
too ragged to go to the Church. Shall the Church wash and
clothe it ? It may not stay washed and clothed. Shall the
Church support external Knuckle Lane organizations ? Not
agreed. Prosecute the rum-shops ? General shaking of
heads. Knuckle Lane itself would take it in dudgeon.
Furthermore, the Church is represented partly in Victoria
Square, and La Fayette-street, What have these to do
with Knuckle Lane ? Shall these streets go down to
Knuckle Lane? Shall Knuckle Lane, the Docks, the Sta-
bles, the Islands, go up to Victoria Square ? " Rather
a tight squeeze," said Nefon. "In plain language," ob-
served Mr. Cosgrove, Carpenter, " shall the Redferns and
the Fuzzles meet in one another's parlors and kitchens ? "
"In the existing state of human society," said Judge Burp,
rubbing the palms of his hands, " I should deem it imprac-
ticable. I doubt if Mrs. Redfern and Mrs. Fuzzle, on first
introduction, would not deem it a very awkward and disa-
greeable piece of business."
Why should not Victoria Square deputize its interest in
Knuckle Lane? "A good plan," whispered Mr. Lawtall,
Pianoforte-maker, to Nefon. — Nefon drew his hand hard
over his face, and was still. — Create deputy almoners of its
THE governor's FAMILY. 301
bread, deputy carriers of its compliments, deputy com-
municators of its instruction? But who shall bring back the
thanks, the love, and the evidences of good, from Knuckle
Lane to Victoria Square ? Shall Knuckle Lane have its
deputies, too ? Shall the whole business of Christian inter-
course and human duty be a matter of delegation ? Shall
the Eedferns, and the Tillingtons, and the Tissingtons, of
Victoria Square, — shall Governor Dennington, and Mayor
Langreen, and Judge Burp, of the city generally, — be doing
and acting, — sending bread, and sympathy, and encourage-
ment, to the Puzzles, and Whimps, and Slavers, of Knuckle
Lane, and these parties never see each other ? Shall the
Widow Droop, who lives by the Pebbles, receive a basket of
meat, a bed coverlid, a jacket for her boy, from the May-
oress, and never see the Mayoress, — never give vent to her
glad feelings, which else are quite a-bursting her, — never
kiss the hand that is so open and soft ? Shall the warm-
hearted Mayoress even not know where her beneficence goes,
or whom it blesses? — Great commotion, and a deal of
anxiety. — How shall the rich and poor meet together, and
the Lord be the Maker of them all ? " That is the ques-
tion," said Nefon. " That points to the ring-bolt, I tell youl "
A plan was proposed and achieved somewhat in this
wise.
A building was erected, called The Griped Hand, from a
device of that sort, cut in stone, over the entrance. It was
a three-story house, and divided into a Coffee-room, a Read-
ing-room, and an Assembly-room. It was a large building,
of freestone, tastefully designed, and standing in a con-
venient spot. It was a contribution of the Church, Victoria
Square, and other parts of the city, or of various individuals
in the city, — or, more systematically, of Religion, Wealth,
and Common Sense, — to Knuckle Lane. The Coffee-room
26
302 RICHARD EDNEY AND
supplied cheap refreshments of various kinds ; the Reading-
room was well stocked with newspapers, magazines, and
comprised also a library ; the Assembly-room was devoted
to miscellaneous gatherings, collations, reunions, lectures,
etc., etc.
All who were able paid something for its privileges ; those
without means were admitted gratuitously. Its ultimate
support was chargeable to the charities of the Churches and
individuals.
At the dedication, Dr. Broadwell preached an eloquent
discourse, and the combined Church choirs added excellent
music.
The people of Woodylin were invited to unite freely in
the Griped Hand, and what it could aflord. Members of the
holy brotherhood visited Knuckle Lane, and other places,
and extended the graciousness of the Griped Hand to those
people.
Would Fuzzie enjoy his evenings as well at the Griped
Hand as in Quiet Arbor? He did. Sailors, stevedores,
river-drivers, teamsters, came to the Griped Hand for their
cups of tea and coffee. Victoria Square and Knuckle Lane
did meet in the Assembly-room of the Griped Hand. Eve-
lina Redfern and Sally Whimp did shake hands, and con-
verse together, and appear like two Christians, at a Fourth of
July pic-nic in the same room ; and Evelina and Sally
bowed in the street the next day, and certain people did not
know where it would stop, this intimacy of those two ; indeed,
it would probably go on through this world into the next.
" Victoria Square is on the way to Knuckle Lane, and
Knuckle Lane is moving towards Victoria Square, actu-
ally ! " So Nefon exclaimed, thrusting down his right fist
emphatically on the counter, — his store full of people, —
and no man dared say aught against it.
1
THE GOVEENOR's FAMILY. 303
The Church lost nothing. Indeed, the whole world,
belongs to the Church, through Christ Jesus, and has been
bought with a great price, and paid for ; but how many-
briers and. thorns, how much sour bog, how much gravelly
drift, there is on the farm ! The Church gained in the im-
provement of Knuckle Lane. It was so much muck, and
decayed vegetation, and corrupted life, hauled out and
mixed with Gospel lime and sunlight, and Woodylin culture ;
and it became excellent soil — and it was all clear gain to
the Church.
The rich and the poor met together; benefactor and bene-
ficiary looked each other in the face. The willing hand and
the relieved want poured out their feelings in common ; the
sick man saw his kind physician ; penury and hopelessness
beheld the eye that had been moved to tears over the story
thereof. And were not many glad to see the Lady Caro-
line, so free-hearted, so ready to do, so anxious to know
what she could do ? Many knew how she went up to Bill
Stonners' when nobody else would go, and staid by that
disease when nobody else would stay. She was the woman
that many had heard of, and she was sometimes pointed out
as the woman that was not afraid of Bill or Chuk, or sick-
ness or death ; and the Fuzzles, and Whimps, and Slavers,
stood in awe of her, as a god. Were n't they glad to speak
with her, and see her smile, and to have her elegance, and
wealth, and fashion, about them, as an atmosphere which
they could breathe, — as a little garden right jn the midst of
their bleakness and meanness, where they could play, and
pluck a flower or two? — and this they had at the Griped
Hand. Then how many crowded about Helen the Good,
with eyes, and hands, and hearts, all brimming with delight.
What of Religion? There are Churches enough in the
city, and preachers enough ; let Knuckle Lane go where it
304 RICHARD EUNEY AND
chooses. So it was decided. After meeting in the Griped
Hand, and getting better acquainted, and loving each other
more, Knuckle Lane was more ready to worship with Vic-
toria Square. " Our Church is open to all," said Dr.
Broadwell; and so said Parson Smith, and so said Elder
Jabson.
What of Education? There is plenty of public schools;
let Knuckle Lane, and the Islands, be drawn into them.
Well, in process of time it was found the rum-shops were
a good deal thinned out. The Coffee-room, and kindness,
and cordiality, had superior attractions. " Men have feel-
ings as well as appetites, and a longing for home amidst all
dissipation," Richard used to say, quoting from Pastor
Harold. Then he added, — this he got too from the same
reverend source, — what St. Pierre relates, how the Euro-
pean settlers in the Isle of France said they should be happy
there if they could see a cowslip or a violet. Let us send,
he said, to these wanderers from virtue and peace, a cowslip
and a violet.
The Theatre lost some of its charms, and much of its per-
niciousness. The Griped Hand furnished cheap amuse-
ments for the poor. Knuckle Lane would be amused, and
cannot we amuse it? So asked Benjamin Dennington.
"Happy and good, — good and happy!" cried Munk.
Elder Jabson started, but Nefon held him to his seat,
" Can't go, my man, can't go ; it is rather hot for you, I
know, but you must stand fire."
Popular lectures were had in the Assembly-room, and
singing concerts; panoramas and wax-work were exliib-
ited ; that large class of people who itinerate through the
country with their wisdom and their shows found it for their
interest to employ the same Hall, where indeed Knuckle
THE governor's FAMILY. 305
Lane was admitted ad valorem, while Victoria Square paid
enough to keep the revenue good.
Did this redeem Knuckle Lane ? It went some ways
towards redeeming what was redemptible in it. Would any-
one refuse the blessings of the Griped Hand? He must
indeed be reprobate. Did it Christianize the Church and
Victoria Square ? It helped their Christianization.
Were there no drawbacks ? Yes, a plenty. One or two
of the Clergy and their people drew back. They said
there was no religion in it, — that to introduce the subject
of Knuckle Lane and the Griped Hand into their pulpits
was a desecration, — that they ought to preach the Gospel,
and not exciting topics, etc., etc. I need not enumerate all
they said. Miss Fiddledeeanna Redfern drew back ; —
did n't she, when her sister Evelina came in from the pic-
nic aforesaid ? And when she knew her sister had shaken
hands with Sally Whimp, very facetiously she seized the
tongs and made as if she would throw her sister's glove into
the fire. Mrs. Mellow drew back, because she said the
friends of the enterprise, in their distribution of tracts,
refused to accept those of which she was agent ; while, in
fact, they only said they did not wish to be confined to them.
But the knowing ones declared the true cause of this lady's
opposition lay in an unwillingness to have her children meet
with Knuckle Lane children at a juvenile celebration to be
given at the Griped Hand. Zephaniah O. Tainter, Jr., gen-
eral clacquer and spy of the Catapult club, held back, be-
cause he said he could see a cat in this Knuckle Lane meal.
Mary Crossmore, nurse, ditto, because this movement had
fished up two or three excellent nurses out of Knuckle Lane,
and her business might fall off. Mr. Squabosh, Superin-
tendent of Sewers and Drains, ditto, because it would
interfere with his contract. Mr. Catch, philosopher, sus-
26*
306 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
pended opinion until it should be ascertained whether it
recognized the true theory of capital and labor. Mr.
Gresney, reformer, could not assent to it, because it did not
begin with the distinct enunciation of a principle. The
Man of Mind stood at the corners of the streets and looked
wise.
But why recount expressions and feelings that would fill
a volume, and which would reduce Richard Edney and the
Governor's Family to a very small space in their own book,
and which, in truth," gave Richard and his friends trouble
enough, without being employed to obscure the narration of
events in his story.
What did the Knuckle Lane adventure determine ? Not
whether the Knights Templars were guilty, nor who wrote
Ossian, nor whether mankind have more than one origin.
It did determine this to the mind of Richard, and others,
— that by resolutely undertaking to do good, something
might be done.
These matters, connected indeed with Richard, are yet
somewhat in anticipation of his story. They were two or
three years in progress, and during these years Richard
had other matters to attend to, and to these we must recur.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
NOTES BY THE WAY.
A Tale is like a web ; like muslin, where the thread is
regular, visible, and thin ; like sheeting, where it is the
same, but stout ; and in both cases the fabric is plain and
monotonous. It may be like Brussels carpeting, where
the thread disappears for a time, and is not easily traced, —
one color being now in sight, and then another, — and yet, in
all mutation, the design of the artist is preserved, and what
is lost in clearness of detail is made up in beauty of com-
position. A Tale may be like a garden, one quarter of
which shall be devoted to cereal grains, another to kitchen
sauce, a third shall be reserved for fruits, while the fourth is
gay with flowers, and the connection between the several
parts consists of naked paths alone ; yet it is a garden, —
Horticulture enforces its principles and maintains its dignity
throughout, and the innate garden-love is satisfied. So a
Tale may have its various departments, the only apparent
connection between which shall be the leaves of the book and
enumeration of the chapters, and still please Historical taste.
There is a real connection in both instances ; — in the first,
it is that of the brooding and immanent power of Nature,
which is always a unity and a beauty ; in the last, it is the
- heart of the Author, which is likewise a unity, and should
be a beauty.
A Tale is like this June morning, when I am now writ-
ing. I hear from my open windows the singing of birds,
the rumble of a stage-coach, and the blacksmith's anvil.
The water glides prettily through elms, and willows, and
308 EICHAED EDNEY AND
the back-sides of houses. There are deep shadows in my
landscape, and yonder hill-side, with its blossoming apple-
trees, glows in the sunlight, as if it belonged to some other
realm of being. On the right of my house is a deep gorge,
wet, weedy, where are toads and. snakes ; and fringing this,
and growing up in the midst of it, are all sorts of fresh,
green shrubs, and the flickering, glossy leaves of white
birches. Superb rock-maples overhang the roof of an iron
foundery, down under the hill at my feet. The dew, early
this morning, covered the world, with topazes and rainbows,
and my child got her feet wet in the midst of glory.
Through gully and orchard, basement windows and oriels,
shade and sheen, vibrates a delicious breeze. Over all,
hangs the sun ; down upon the village looks that eye of
infinite blessedness, and into the scene that urn of exhaust-
less beauty pours beauty ; the smoke from the foundery, and
the darkness of the gorge, are beautiful ; cows, feeding in
my neighbor's paddock, are pleasant to look upon ; Paddy,
with pickaxe on his shoulder, is happy; Rusticus, in the
cornfield, is a picture ; and the granite, through the verdure
of a distant mountain-side, gleams out like silver. This
morning's sun idealizes everything. Nature is not shocked
at toads. A Tale might be thus diversified ; and if through
it streamed love and gladness from the soul of the writer,
like sunlight, the structure would still be harmonious, and
the effect pleasing.
A Tale is like human life, — of which, indeed, it pur-
ports to be a transcript, — and human life exhibits some
contrast. The feelings even of a good man, for a single
day, undergo sundry transitions ; the subjects of thought and
occasions of emotion crowd a little upon each other. There
will be great bunches of shadow in one corner of a man's
heart, and right over against them, and looking down upon
THE governor's FAMILY. 309
them, and gilding, it may be, their edges, will be great ex-
panses of brightness. Through all the peace and delight of
one's being will be heard the perpetual wail of some sad
memory, even as I now hear, in this sunny, enlivening morn-
ing, the melancholy note of the peewee.
Richard had his varieties. During this Knuckle Lane
business, other things went on. Memmy and Bebby lived,
— lived in his heart, and in his arms, and in his fingers,
and in his ears, and before his eyes. They ran all over the
carpet of his days ; they sprawled upon it ; sometimes they
blew soap-bubbles on it ; sometimes they were like twin
cherubs asleep in one corner of it. Who shall follow their
thread, or describe their figure ? Plumy Alicia Eyre was
another thread ; or rather she was like the colored pile that
is wrought into the plain warp of Brussels carpeting afore-
said, and is reproduced at odd intervals. Miss Eyre indi-
cated, for a while, an interest in Knuckle Lane ; but, for
reasons which will be hereafter discoursed upon, that at-
tachment was not lasting. Clover, — what has become of
him ? He has been absent a long time, — not a thread in the
carpet, so much as a moth under it, and silently eating into
it ; and when the carpet is taken up and shaken, there will
be found unexpected holes in it, and many rotten places.
The Knuckle Lane attempt did not demolish Clover, nor did
the Griped Hand win his fellowship. He was like a dis-
turbed ghost, strolling through the earth, — a sort of discon-
certed fiend. He appeared at Green Mill occasionally, the
basin of his lower lip, and the crooks in his upper lip, in no
wise diminished. In the night, going home from his meet-
ings, Richard now and then saw, through the darkness before
him, the arms of Clover describing their favorite contor-
tions, like the vanes of a windmill ; and when he got home,
there were giant streaks of shadow playing in his imagina-
310 RICHARD EDNEY AND
tion,and these would sometimes hang over and threaten his
dreams. Captain Creamer seemed to wilt and dry up, after
his failure ; though whether, like the poisonous rhus, there
might not be some mischief in him after he was dry,
remained to be seen.
But we must advert to one or two things that bear upon
the fortune of our friend.
During his perambulations, — and perhaps we should say
his iiocthagancy, if nobody will be troubled at the word —
Here a verbal quiddity plucks at the sleeve of narration, and
obliges us to stop and answer, that it is hard to please
everybody. Leo X. preserved with care, and what whole-
ness he might, the remains of ancient Rome in the mod-
ern city. Sixtus V. would " clear away the ugly an-
tiquities," could not endure the Apollo Belvidere in the
Vatican, and righted the Minerva by substituting a cross for
her spear; and so he went on idealizing the whole city, —
that is, reducing it by what he would call the rules of a
Christian Idealism. As if there were not a higher ideal in
suffering Minerva to remain as she was !
There are those who would clear our language of its
ugly antiquities, as if pagan Latin had not got into the
English, and become a part of it, and the best thing for us
was to make due use of it. We might say night-ioalking,
but that has a bad odor. A certain one was sorely shocked
when he found his good King, in his own palace, playing
with a basket of puppies about his neck ; — that was low.
He was equally shocked, on returning to the street, to see a
cobbler promenading with side-sword and silk stockings ; —
that was too high. Can any one tell us what is the aurea
mediocritas of our tongue ? Besides, even as Richard ad-
dicted himself to observation in behalf of his absent teacher
and friend, Mr. Willwell, so, as has been already premised,
THE governor's FAMILY. 311
we are writing- with a latent reference to our Usbek cousins ;
and might it not be well for us to give them some insight
into the structure and sources of our language, as well as
into our manners and customs ? May it not be conjectured
withal that, in their incursions into the East, the ancient
Eomans dropped some portions of their language in that dis-
tant country, and that even ramifications or dialects of the
Tartar tongue shall at this day be found cognate with our
own
During his noctivagancy, we say, in the cause of Knuckle
Lane, Richard made many discoveries, and some which dis-
turbed him. He encountered the young men, Chassford
and Glendar, at gaming saloons, in tippling houses, and
sundry places where he thought they ought not to be, and
where it reflected no credit on the simplicity of their char-
acters or purity of their principles in being. Already, the
winter before, he saw them at the Grotto, and the sight
afforded him any but pleasant recollections.
Meanwhile he called once or twice at the Governor's, and
found these young men there. Their air was well-bred,
their dress fashionable, their conversation sprightly, and
their ease absolutely overwhelming. With a twirl of his
cane, or a touch of his goatee, Glendar could set Richard's
composure shaking like an earthquake. And Richard was
powerless, — he could not avenge himself. He did not
esteem the young men, but he had no desire to vent his
disesteem there. He sometimes thought he would speak to
Melicent or Barbara about them, but he did not. They
complimented the Knuckle Lane movement ; yet Richard
felt they could not in heart be much concerned for it.
An event of greater interest to Richard was his election
to the Common Council of the city. It was the second
spring after his arrival in Woodylin, when, at a meeting of
312 EICHAED EDNEY AND
those who styled themselves " The Friends of Improve-
ment," he was unanimously nominated. Richard was
young, and a new-comer. Yet, it may be remarked, the
Ward in which he lived, comprising, as it did, the Factories
and Saw-mills, and all the Beauty of Woodylin, had many
new-comers in it, and this class of people were inclined to
sppport one of their own men. More than that, Richard,
by this time, had become sole proprietor of the rent of two
saws. How did this come about ? Richard's father owned
a saw-mill ; lived upon a stream emptying into the River,
and was able to cut more logs than he wanted and send
them down stream. We have said that Bill Stonners'
Point was the best booming privilege on the River. Well,
Chuk, Bill's sole lieir, was sole owner of this chance. And
whom should Chuk want to assist, if not Richard? Whom
would he strike the picaroon week in and week out for, if
not Richard ? So it was arranged that the elder Edney
should furnish the logs, Chuk boom them, and Richard saw
them. More than thai, what Bill never would do, Chuk
was glad to do ; he went up to the stream on which Mr.
Edney lived, and "drove" the logs. He rolled them into
the water ; he helped them over shoals, rafted them, and
tended them as a flock of sheep, till he got them penned
in the boom. He would be out days and nights on this
business, never leaving it, rain or shine, and often waist-
deep in water for twelve hours together. This boom of
Chuk's, lying, as it did, contiguous to the Mills, and so safe
in all ordinary freshets, he was considered a very fortunate
man who could acquire the entire use of; and Richard
was considered a fortunate man. This circumstance added
to Richard's consequence in the eyes of his neighbors.
Then he had so excellent a friend in Mr. Cosgrove, the
THE go^'er>'or's family, 313
princely contractor for buildings, and who purchased of him
to large amounts.
It made a great stir at the Saw-mills when it was known
Richard had obtained control of Chuk's boom, though per-
haps not twenty people elsewhere had the least intelligence
of the matter.
These circumstances aided Kichard's municipal advance-
ment.
Yet, his success was not without impediment. In the
first place, the Catapulters had long ruled the New ToA\ni,
and expected to do so now. Next, the Dogbanes, for the
sake of putting a pretty trick on their hereditary enemies,
"over the River," declared for Richard. To defeat this
ruse, the Catapulters proclaimed Richard a Mydriatic, and
brought up Richard's connection with a certain horse, whose
carcass Muiik tfc St. John had caused to be thro\^^l upon
the ice. The Dogbanes mortally feared water ; and inas-
much as neither part}' could use Richard, they silently con-
certed to pounce upon him, like the animals whose names
they bore, and devour him. li\ other words, they united
upon a ticket which should destroy that of the Friends of
Improvement, and in place of Richard substituted the name
of Clover ! This will hardly be credited by our near or dis-
tant readers, nor would it have been credited in Woodylin
generally, or even among the large body of supporters of
either ticket. It was the result of despair in the two par-
ties, and of indefatigable management on the part of Clover.
At the caucuses. Clover, whose real character could not
have been commonly understood, represented that he was
the only man who could be led against Richard with any
prospect of success. In addition, Clover, as we say, elec-
tioneered for himself and against Richard.
27
314 RICHARD EDNEY AND
The union ticket did not prevail, and Richard carried the
polls by a handsome majority.
In the city councils, Richard found problems enough to
last Euclid one year at least, and grave responsibilities that
would make an impression on the shoulders of a small
At'as. It was a post where a good man could do some good,
and a wise man be of some use. Mr. Langreen was Mayor,
and Nefonwas an Alderman, and Richard was not altogether
without friends at the board. He was able to do something
for the furtherance of his favorite idea, the Knuckle Lane
project. While this, indeed, had been conducted chiefly by
individuals, there were many points in which the city gov-
ernment could render it essential service. It was proposed
to new-lay the street that ran through Knuckle Lane, and
furnish that precinct with water at public expense. A
large space of ground that had lain neglected, quite in the
heart of the city, was purchased, fenced, and planted with
trees, for a park.
A nevv cemetery was consecrated, called Rosemarj^ Dell.
To this some of the tenants of the old ground were con-
veyed ; here, also, a new grave was made for Violet, one of
the Orphans. Richard selected the spot, — his friends
erected a handsome monument ; with his own hands he
planted shrubbery and flowers about it.
On the back side of Woodylin, and yet within ten min-
utes walk of Centre-street Church, was vvliat in some places
is called a valley, in others, a gully, through which the Peb-
bles brook meandered. At a distance, this spot looked like a
vast redoubt of foliage, or a hollow imbedded in trees. With-
in it the trees, elms and oaks, rose to a great height above the
observer. He saw at the bottom the thread-like rivulet, flow-
ing on like a lover's joy, as strolling, too, as lover's walks by
moonlight, crinkling its way along, and scolloping the ground
THE governor's FAMILY. 315
on either side, singing and shining all alone down its deep
bed, feeding the roots of trees, flinging its dew on the mosses,
and creating innumerable little pleasure-grounds for the
frogs. The banks were broken, deeply embayed, and boldly
projected. In this valley grew saxifrage, and spring-beauty,
and wild columbine, and here children came May-flower-
ing. The banks, too, were elevated and terrace-like, and
the ravine narrow ; and, with the canopy of trees overhead,
it was a cool and shady spot, most refreshing to the imagin-
ation and the feelings in a hot summer day, and just such
a place as one would wish to go into out of the sun. Among
the children, this spot had gone by the name of May-flower
Glen. But it had lost what the critics would call its unity,
and was parcelled oflT by rough fences into small lots, and
abandoned to cows and swine, and appropriated by little
moss-trooping children, v^rho crept under the fences, and by
birds, who seem to have a life-estate in all that God hath
made. .Richard, in his rambles with Memmy and Bebby,
had seen it, and admired it.
Through the influence of the Friends of Improvement,
May-flower Glen was conveyed to the city ; by which it was
cleared, its bog drained, gravel-walks laid, and seats con-
structed. It became a favorite resort of the citizens, and
tributary likewise to the cause of Knuckle Lane and the
Griped Hand; since here the rich and poor met together in
ways at once fraternal and respectful, joyous and refined.
So many of the Knuckle Lane people frequented it, there
was danger at one time of its losing caste, and becoming
not fashionable. But Evelina Redfern declared, if nothing
else, she would make a Christian duty of going there, not
to speak of what Ada Broadwell and the Lady Caroline did.
Among the first to call at Willow Croft and congratulate
Richard on his accession to office, was Miss Eyre ; and this
316 RICHARD EDNEY AND
she did in a way touchingly graceful, and insinuatingly del-
icate. Richard's name, as one of the Common Councilmen
for Ward 2, had appeared in all the papers ; and he saw it
in the evening, and again in the morning prints ; and it
seemed to him as if he saw it the next day in everybody's
face. Munk read it, and Roxy must look into the paper,
and even Memmy spelt it out ; and he felt as if in all houses
it had been read, and looked at, and spelt out. Mr. Gouch
and Silver, who were still in his employ, and of CQurse voted
for him, were overjoyed that he had beaten Clover ; and
now that he was, as it were, a part of the city, and was
backed by the whole city power, they realized that Clover
could do him, or them, or anybody else, no more harm.
They colored Richard's triumph and advantage so strongly
to his mind, he must needs feel it was great indeed, and feel,
too, as if he were the whole city, and Clover a very small
spot in it; and they were so enthusiastic for Richard, — they
hurraed him so, with the wink of their eyes, and the legerde-
main of their crowbars and pick-poles, — Richard might be
excused for believing everybody in the New Town and the
Old Town was his friend and constituent. The first little
honors a man receives are very thrilling, and seducing, and
softening, and make one feel as if he was all champagne,
and roses, and fiddle-strings.
These were new sensations to Richard. It may be
doubted if Teacher Willwell or Pastor Harold had prepared
him for the emergency. He could not now make observa-
tions on what he saw, but upon what he was ; and this was
public elevation, and private satisfaction, — it was, being a
Councilman of Woody lin, and an object of so much con-
gratulation. How would his -motto, To be Good axd do
Good, and the great purpose of his heart, to love and serve
God and his fellow-men, apply here ? He mailed three
THE governor's FAMILY. 317
papers, the next day, containing the report of his election, —
to his Father, and particularly for his Mother, and to
his Teacher and Minis-ter. He did think they would all be
glad ; and when he reflected on what they would think and
-ay, and especially on what his pious mother would feel, he
ilently prayed, " O, let me in this be good and do good I "
When he went to drop the papers in the office, the lobby
was full of people. Did these men know what a precious
message was crowding through them ? Could they imagine
what strong delight those three wrappers enclosed ? Did
they dream of the parental fascination in a single line of
small caps in those columns ? One man, intent on a news-
paper, drew in his elbows' to let Richard pass; another,
opening a letter containing a remittance, Richard had to go
round; a third, discussing the last night's play at the The-
atre, and chewing tobacco, turning suddenly, mistook Rich-
ard for the floor. The clerk in the office, jesting at the window
with a Dry Fish Culler touching the removal of the latter
from his post, for a minute did not see the papers that
Richard handed up to him ; and when he did, still laughing
with the other, he asked Richard if they were pamphlets,
and was seen to toss them, like peach-pits, into some hole or
other. The printers' boys jostled him with their great bas-
kets. Who cared for Richard's Mother ?
So Richard had it all to himself ; and there was enough
of it, and it was just as good to him as if everybody else
had it.
The clerk's indifferent look, a hundred people's pre-
occupied look, weighed not a feather against his own feel-
ings ; and, perhaps, if he thought anything about it, he took
some satisfaction in seeing his pride go to the stake, and
having his pleasant little emotions sufTer a slight martyr-
dom. It is natural to do so. If people won't notice us, we
27*
318 RICHARD EDNEY AND
retaliate upon them by calling them very stupid and dull ;
or by inflating our merit in our own eyes, till we fancy our-
selves too great to be appreciated, and then going off like a
hero to oblivion. Our neglect is the measure of our great-
ness. We have a certain bigness ; and he who belittles us
belittles himself, — he who enlarges us enlarges himself.
So Richard was not discomforted. Indeed, he experienced
all reasonable attentions. Nefon took him warmly by the
hand, and expressed great pleasure in the election. Several
smiled upon him, as he passed them, in a manner which
said, " We know what has happened," The " Friends of
Improvement " were delighted.
About this time it was, we say, that Miss Eyre called at
Willow Croft, She only added fuel to the flame of Rich-
ard's self-complaisance. The little ripples that had been
stirring about in his bosom, she set all going again. She
was the breeze on his surface, and covered him all over
with most charming wavelets, and foam, and agitation.
She brought the color to his cheeks, and made the blood
warm in his veins. She talked to him about his mother,
and how glad she would be ; and Clover, and how annoyed
he was ; and the Common Council Chamber, and how hon-
orable to sit there: and, like a magician, she raised a mist
that rose from the floor, transparent and luminous ; her form
and face were emparadized in it, and, like a cloud of trans-
figuration, it expanded, and enfolded them both. Never
was Miss Eyre's voice so musical, never was her eye so ten-
der, never was her sympathy so entrancing ; and Richard's
self-love, his susceptibility of encomium, his deep pleasure
in what had happened, — that weak and soft spot in his and
everybody's nature, — that spot which is so instinct with self,
and so alive to public handling, — that inbred regard to
reputation and character, which she touched so softly, so
THE governor's FAMILY. 319
deliciously, — these were all carried away by her ; and we
might say, Richard himself — for there was not much else left
to him at that moment — Richard himself was carried away
by Miss Eyre. Plumy Alicia's triumph was complete. No,
it was no triumph ; she would not have it so. If he seemed
to surrender, she magnanimously restored his arms ; if he
was like to grow impassioned, she wisely counselled himj
if his eye had any unnatural fervor, she deliberately hushed
it. "Do not say ' love ; ' — speech, words, breath, — what
are they to the doing, being, feeling ? Not if you said it,
but if you were it ; not what you can utter, but what you
can keep." She said this with a kind of memento mori
motion of her finger, and left the room.
What he could keep ! Keep, keep, keep ; — that word
rang a good while in Richard's ear, and with different
inflections; — now upward, the doubtful interrogative; now
circumflective, the ironical; now downwards, the grave and
solemn.
That night, when he retired to his chamber, into his
thought of God and the Holy Spirit Miss Eyre could not
enter; into his hope of the Redemption of the world by
Christ she could not enter; into his calculations for the suc-
cess of the Griped Hand she could not enter; into what he
most loved of the spiritual, the humane, the beautiful, she
could not enter; to the deeper life of his soul she was not
kindred ; of his heart of hearts she was not partaker. Her
only place seemed then to be to him in some little foolish
feelings of the hour. Between her and his principal exist-
ence was a great gulf. He felt remorseful at what he had
done ; h6 was mean and silly in his own sight. Yet he
reasoned that in what he said or did he had not committed
himself to her ; and while he would regard her with all
320 RICHARD EDXEY, ETC.
kindness and affection, he could not allow her to be the mis-
tress of his being.
But of necessity Richard must see Miss Eyre frequently.
She was intimate at Willow Croft. She caressed the chil-
dren ; she was always chirp, limber-hearted, and free', as
Munk wished anybody to be ; she could tell Roxy what was
worn. Then she had ministered to Richard when he was
sick ; she had that hold on his consideration which a com-
munication of sorrows creates ; she sometimes attended the
Knuckle Lane meetings; she loathed and despised Clover;
she was, moreover, in a certain sense, poor and friendless,
— a dependent, an operative ; and she appealed to the sym-
pathies of Richard by whatever lies in the case of those
who are sometimes deemed as belonging to a proscribed
class.
We call her poor. She was an intelligent and industrious
weaver, and could clear three and four dollars a week.
The next time Richard saw her, his manner was cool,
and a little sheepish; — she laughed at him. The second
time, she amused herself in endeavoring to rally him. The
third time, by following the creep-mouse-catch-'em prec-
edent, she brought him more nearly en rapport, as the
mesmerizers say, with herself.
CHAPTER XXIX.
ON CITIES.
In this connection and chapter, and moved bj^ certain
things recorded in the two previous chapters, the author is
induced to break through the proprieties of historical narra-
tive, and, after a hortatory sort, to submit a few obser-
vations on cities and large towns. Discoveries are being
pushed, and revelations made, in the principal cities of the
civilized world, thai, like the old tragedies, awaken terror
and pity ; and while sensibility is shocked, philanthropy is
puzzled. What shall be done with the intemperance, licei>
tiousness, beggary, disease, theft, that abound? Police-
courts, benevolent societies, houses of refuge, foundling hos-
pitals, are instituted ; the pulpit and the press unite in the
work of reformation. But as it is said the Ocean drives
back the w^aters of the Amazon, so this evil deluges and
prostrates the attempt to remove it. What is the cause of
the preponderating and disproportionate vice of our cities?
Why is there nearly ten-fold more crime and misery, in a
given city population, than in the same country population ?
The answer is contained in one word, — Density — that the
people are too crowded. You create a city; you multiply its
facilities, you open inlets to it from all the region round
about ; you boast of its growth, and all at once, like King
Edward, before-mentioned, you see a thousand little devils
jumping about your wealth and your increase. Then you
begin to cry out for sorrow. This density originates the
Wynds and Closes of Edinburgh ; it gives to London its St.
Giles; it develops itself in the Faubourgs of Paris; it turns
322 KICHAED EPNEY AND
to Ann-street and Half Moon-place, in Boston, and the Five
Points and Park Row, in New York. Out of it come what
are named dens of infamy, haunts of iniquity. Density, —
high houses and narrow streets blocked together, inlaid most
mosaically with each other, — we designate as the root of tlie
difficulty. From this spring stem and branches, or second-
ary and tertiary calamities. First comes a want of ventila-
tion, and bad air; — this generates every species of moral and
physical distemperature. Next appears filth, and this turns
into a hot-bed of sorrows. This density of the city, like
night, which it too truly represents, is a covert for vice. In
it the lewd and the rascally nestle; to it, from all parts of
the country, the criminal and the vicious flee for shelter.
To over-people a given spot has the same efTect as to over-
load the stomach, — there must be pain and disorder. Why
should God's children, and Christ's little children, live in
garrets and cellars ? It was one of the Divine promises to
Jerusalem, that the streets of the city should be full of boys
and girls playing in the streets thereof. How could this be
fulfilled in any of our modern cities ? Willis reproaches
the New Yorkers, that they are not willing to live more
than one layer deep. It was a dispute of the Schools, how
many angels could dance on the point of a cambric needle,
and not fall ofT. Will the Home Journal — Home? — de-
signed to bless and beautify the homes of our people, —
will it tell us how many stories, or bodies deep, our people
can live, and be comfortable, virtuous and happy ?
In the State of Maine, we have understood, some distance
up the Kennebec river, near the lumbering region, is a
place where it is commonly reported the Sabbath stops. So,
in New York, if we are correctly informicd, during the hot
season, the Sabbath stops, and the people are obliged to go
to Hoboken, or Staten Island, or Brooklyn Heights, to find
THE governor's FAMILY. 323
it. If these layers go on increasing, how long before there
will be no Sabbath at all? Prithee, Mr. Willis, let the peo-
ple spread, that they may have a Sabbath, and worship, and
enjoyment, and breath, in their own city, of a Sunday.
In Rome, says Beckman," for want of room on the earth,
the buildings were extended towards the heavens. In Ham-
burg, the greater part of our houses are little less than sixty
feet high." He adds that it is difficult to extinguish fires in
these high-housed regions. Are such things a model, even
with Palladio to back them up?
Cities, according to Mr. Alison, may have been the cra-
dles of ancient liberty; they may have contributed, ac-
cording to M. Say, to the overthrow of Feudalism; let it
be, in the language of a writer before me, that " the spirit
of independence was awakened in the streets of Boston,
while it slumbered on the banks of the Connecticut ; " yet
if, under the guiding genius of convenience and parsimony,
we suffer them to go on crowding, — if like Jeshurun they
only wax fat and grow thick, — like him, they will behave
very unseemly.
But of the past we can only speak remedially, while of
the present and the future we can speak more radically and
decisively. A certain tendency, not onlj^ to city charters
but to city actuality, prevails in the nation. Villages are
changing to towns, and towns swell to cities. What would
we have done ? As the cardinal error of cities is Densify,
we would redeem them by Openness. Exterior walls are
gone out of use, for the reason perhaps that the walls are all
on the inside ; as is related of the Irish, there are no old
rags or cast-off hats seen in the windows of their houses, be-
cause they are exhausted on the bodies of the people. We
would make a clean breach through these walls; or, rather,
as we are speaking prospectively, we would not suffer such
324 RICHARD EDNEY AND
walls to exist. No street should be less than four rods in
width ; no lane, or court, less than three. Dwelling-houses
should be blocked together in not more than twos. — Why,
alas! deem the "corner-lot" the most eligible, when every
house might look two ways ? Why should " twenty-seven
feet front " mark the aristocracy ? Why the middle one of
each suite of rooms dark and dungeon-like? — Churches
should be the most conspicuous buildings, and stand in lots
of not less than ten rods square. Every school-house should
have twenty-five square rods. Every dwelling-house should
be removed two rods from the street, and not more than two
families be permitted to reside under the same roof, and
within the same walls. There should be central, or con-
tiguous, reserves of land, of twenty or fifty acres each, for
public parks and promenades. There should be trees in
every street, without exception, — trees about the Markets,
trees in front of the shops, and on the docks, and shading
the manufactories. " A city," says St. Pierre, " were it
even of marble, would appear dismal to me, if I saw in it
no trees and verdure." The glory of Lebanon, the cedar,
came unto God's ancient city, the fir-tree, the pine, and the
box together, to beautify the place of his sanctuary. So
much for Openness. And this is what God gave us when
he lifted the sky so high above our heads, and extended the
earth so broadly at our feet, and made such a breathing-
place for his children to inhabit. This would "countrify"
the city, and that is what we desire. Mr. Downing, in a
recent Horticulturist, proposes a plan for the more specific
distribution of houses and streets, which combines much
taste, neatness, and utility.
What is requisite for this? Land, — and, primarih^, this
is all. Our cities need not be less populous, but only more
dispersed. And have we not land enough ? Look at our
THE governor's FAMILY. _ 325
towTis everywhere that are growing into cities, bunching
together their houses, pinching their streets, stuffing skinny
apartments with men, women and children, as Bologna-
meat ; mowing away, as in a hay-barn, family upon family;
digging cellars where the poor must hutch and burrow; cut-
tin£T down trees, stifling the green-sward, — and have they
not land enough ? The fault is not wholly or primarily
with real estate owners. It lies in the people generally.
Every man is over-anxious to be near his business ; so, in
advertisements of rents, " within five minutes' walk" of Wall-
street, or State-street, or the rail-road station, has becom.e a
leading recommendation. Our merchants and mechanics
will not reside more than "five minutes" from their busi-
ness ; and in this circle of " five minutes," as a Maelstrom,
they draw their homes, their wives and children, their
peace and purity, — and within it, or very near it, must live
the Minister and the Doctor, the drayman and the porter,
the baker and the washerwoman. This is Socialism with a
witness.
Our wishes in this matter are not unreasonable or singu-
lar. " The numerous instances," says Dr-^ Emerson, of
Philadelphia, " wherein the mercenary character of- 4«divid-
als has tempted them to put up nests of contracted tene-
ments in courts and alleys, admitting but little air, and yet
subject to the full influence of heat, has often induced us to
wish there could be some public regulation whereby the evil
could be checked." " Some provision of law should be
made," say the Health Commissioners of Boston, " by which
the number of tenants should be apportioned to the size
and general arrangements of a house."
" The number of cellars," they add, " used as dwelling-
houses, is 586, and each occupied by from five to fifteen
souls." There should be statute law against such things.
28
326 RICHABD EDNEY AND
Very forcibly do this Committee remind us that "the whole
subject of streets, and ways, in respect to width, ventilation,
grade, and drainage, is one of very great and increasing
importance." [See Report of the Cholera in Boston, in
1849.]
To our towns and villages as they are, — pretty, thriving,
hopeful, — let us say a word. Preserve, so far as possible,
the old homesteads ; do not abandon fruitful gardens, and
venerable trees, and time-honored abodes, to shops and
tenements. There is land enough. Keep the burial-places
intact; embellish them, — beautify that sanctuary. Do not
allow petty speculators in lands to lay out your ways and
define your lots for you.^ If strangers are coming to
reside amongst you, encourage them to settle a little further
back, where it will be for your interest to open new streets
and offer convenient grounds. All around you are millions
of forest trees, the most beautiful God has made; — the
elm, unequalled for its majesty; the pine, so glorious in
winter, so musical and balmy in summer; the maple, sweet,
clean, thrifty ; the white birch, that lady of the woods ; the
fir, whose dense foliage and spiral uniformity mingle so
well with the luxuriant freedom of the others ; the walnut,
with its deep green and glossy umbrage. There are tupelos,
hornbeams, beeches, larches, cedars, spruces, all waiting to
be transplanted to your villages, yearning to expand in your
streets, and throw their refreshment and their loveliness
over your grounds and houses, over your old men and chil-
dren, your young men and maidens.
We do not say that Openness or trees will save the city
or the town ; we do say that with such things, those ren-
* All the miserable localities in Boston " are mainly owing to the fact of their
having been originally laid out by private speculators." — Report of the Cholera
in Boston, 1849.
THE governor's FAMILY. 327
dezvous and nests of sin and shame, filth and wretchedness,
— those pests of every sense, which torture sympathy and
exhaust munificence, which tax our religion and morality,
our learning and wisdom, to provide some mitigation of, —
will be rendered impossible.
Says the author of that admirable book, The Studies of
Nature, " I love Paris. Next to the country, and a country
to my fancy, I prefer Paris to every place I have seen in
the world. I love that city for its happy situation ; I love
it because all the conveniences of life are assembled there,
— because it is the centre of all the powers of the kingdom,
and for the other reasons which gained it the attachment of
Michel Montaigne." In like manner, and for the same
cause, as a NewEnglander, I say, I love Boston ; and, as an
American, I love New York. Yet I cannot go to the ex-
tent of the good man before me, who adds, " I should wish
there were not another city in France, — that our provinces
were covered only with hamlets and villages." I could wish
there might be many cities in New England, and in Amer-
ica — each, in its way, beautiful for situation, and the glory
of the earth around it.
CHAPTER XXX.
RICHARD AT THE GOVERNOR'S ONCE MORE.
Months wore away, and Richard was not idle. Green
Mill prospered; "Knuckle Lane " steadilj' advanced ; the
" Friends of Improvement " were able to effect some whole-
some regulations ; the majority of the workmen at the Saw-
mills devoted spare hours to the Griped Hand, and a better
tone of feeling and manner prevailed amongst them ; the
parlor at Willow Croft was open, and Richard had much
delight in it with the children and his friends. His Father
and Mother had been to see him, and he, with Roxy, and
Memmy and Bebby, and Munk & St. John's best carriage,
made a journey to the paternal home.
Richard was happy, — at least, as much so as is ordinarily
the lot of mortals. He was invited to a party at the Mayor's,
to another at Nefon's, and to one at Judge Burp's; and these
were things of which his sister made account.
He called at the Governor's, — he was quite often there ;
and, in fact, Roxy, and Memmy, too, began to suspect he
was specially attracted there. Memmy used to say, " I
know Uncle Richard wants to see Miss Melicent." It was
obvious, on the other side, that his presence in St. Agnes-
street was allowed by the Family, and agreeable to Meli-
cent. So marked was the cordiality of these two persons,
it became rumored, in certain quarters, they were engaged.
The Family authorized no such declaration, — neither did
Richard. " If Melicent has her heart set on Mr. Edney, I
think she had better have him," observed Mrs. Slelbourne.
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 329
Madam never committed herself. She said, still intent cut-
ting out her pieces, " Yes, indeed ; but young folks change
their minds."' " I should never change my mind," added
Cousin Eowena. "Are you young?" asked Madam, with
a start. Cousin tried to laugh. " But how am I to regard
him ? " inquired Eunice, — " as a suitor of Melicent's, or only
a friend of the family ? " " You will not regard him at all,"
replied her mother. " You will only behave properly towards
him." " I think," continued Mrs. Melbourne, " Melicent
ought to know something." " She does know something,
and will have to know more all her life," answered Madam,
" Keep a learning, — go on to wisdom ; she need not be in
haste to do it up at once ; we must summer and winter our
knowledge before we really know anything."
This was about the sum of what a bystander could col-
lect of the feelings of that domestic circle. Not but that
Miss Rowenahad her asides, and pleasant innuendoes; and
Alice Weymouth would not only laugh outright, but even
relapse into great soberness, when she thought of it all.
The Governor in no wise interfered, leaving such matters to
the sense and choice of his children.
I know not that Richard asked any questions, or received
any answers. He was happy with Melicent; happy to
work with her in "Knuckle Lane," — to walk with her in
JMayflower Glen, — to sit with her under the vines of the
piazza. Into the full circle of his being she seemed to flow,
and melt, and be as one with him ; into his adoration of the
Supreme, into his studies of philanthropy, into his estima-
tion of man, and all his conscience of duty, she came. St.
Cuthbert built the windows of his hovel so high he could
not see the earth therefrom, and could only look out upon
the heavens, which became his sole object of contemplation.
Such was not the love of Richard and Melicent ; it did not
28*
330 RICHARD EDXEY AND
look into the heavens, or the ideal and dreamy alone. It
looked upon the world at their feet, at men and things about
them, and life as it is.
But lowly as Richard's feelings were, plain and simple as
were his delights, he Avas still a conspicuous mark for the
shafts of adversity. However, in his love of Melicent, he
may have had no other consciousness than that of the lily-
of-the-valley, there lurked an envious blast that would
reach and rend him. His relation to the Governor's Fam-
ily must of necessity become a topic of remark, — not to
say an occasion of surprise, — to many. Roxy, of course,
as the matter began to come into shape before her eyes, was
overjoyed; Mysie, who knew everybody, said, "I'm glad,
— she is one of the best critturs in the world." Mangil
said, " She 's never hard up." Miss Eyre must say some-
thing, and do something. All that she said and did we
cannot relate.
But Richard ere long became sensible of her attempt at
something; and first, quite negatively, quite silently. She
did not bow as he passed her in the street. That was noth-
ing, — it might have been an accident. Soon he met her
face to face. She did not look at him ; she averted her
eye, and slighted his salutation. That was positive, and
palpable. She came no more to Willow Croft; — that
meant something. He encountered her again at a party at
Tunny's. Her face was dark with apparent rage or con-
tempt. She flung herself from the side of the room where
he stood, as if he were the jaws of a crocodile. This was
awful, — it was dagger-like, — to Richard.
Here was food for speculation. Richard reflected that
he had been friendly, and even indulgent, towards her, —
that she had been free and easy with him. She had even
sometimes rallied him on going to the Governor's so
THE governor's FAMILY. 331
much. There was an outer door, a little porch-way of his
feelings, where he and Miss Eyre could entertain each
other, sit and chat ; but into the inner chamber of his nature
she could not come, and he supposed she knew she could
not. Alas! here he was greatly mistaken. He had got out
of the mist she once raised about him, and could see things
very clearly, and, as he thought, see her very clearly; —
here, too, he was mistaken. He had always been glad to
meet her. She was vivacious, witty, pungent ; and she
seemed glad to meet him. Now, this change, — what did it
purport ? So sudden, too, so unpremised, — what had hap-
pened ? She was absent from the city when the rumor of
his engagement with Melicent transpired. After her re-
turn, he noticed the alteration in her manner. It must have
something to do with that.
But what with that ? — what with anything ? He would
find out, — he would speak with her. No, — she would
not be spoken with ; — she avoided him, — she went by on
the other side, — she was deaf when he addressed her.
Did he communicate this annoyance to Melicent ? He
did not. He thought he would ; — he was on the verge of
opening the subject one evening, when Chassford and Glen-
dar entered the room. This put his purpose to flight. Why
pursue it ? Miss Eyre, and Miss Eyre's coolness, were no
part of him and Melicent ; it was a mere fleck in the sky
that was full of brightness and repose to him ; a fleck, too,
at his back, in some other direction than that towards which
he was looking. It was an irritation, and for that reason he
would avoid it, where all was quietness and joy. He scraped
it 0^ as he entered the door of the pleasant mansion, as so
much mud on the sole of his boot. Was he not confiden-
tial with Melicent ? Exceedingly so. But this was a tran-
sient, temporary grievance, personal to himself, that he need
332 RICHABD EDXEY AND
not trouble her with, — that he would soon surmount or for-
get. When one is introduced to the great and the good, he
instinctively leaves behind his meanness and his littleness ;
and in the movement of the affections, what is hopeful, in-
teresting, fair, clusters together, as in winter we gather about
a bright fire, and forget how many cold and dreary rooms
there are in the house.
Chassford and Glendar were an embarrassment to Rich-
ard ; they embarrassed him by their looks, but more by their
conduct. In the same room with him, they disturbed what
we might call his physical equilibrium; in other rooms, and
other places, they disturbed his moral equanimity. Could
he shake them off? Could he disarm their insolence?
Could he expel the consciousness of their dissipation ? They
were kind of suitors general of the Governor's Family, and
suitors particular of Melicent and Barbara. Glendar was a
fourth nephew and protege of Mrs. Melbourne. His parents
resided in a distant city, and he came to Woodylin to
expatiate. Mrs. Melbourne saw no faults in her favorites.
There was a certain blind passionateness in this woman's
affection. She was, as some thought, the wilful supporter
and prejudiced advocate of those she liked. She saw no
reason why Glendar should not marry into the Family. If
Melicent was preoccupied, he might attach himself to Bar-
bara. But Chassford monopolized Barbara. Certainly,
then, Melicent ought to know, to make up her mind, and
have the thing settled in the house, whether she would have
Eichard or not. However, these were points discussed
rather in her own mind, and just exposed edgewise in the
presence of the senior females, and not produced before the
girls themselves.
Chassford had a fine education, and fine abilities. He
led his class at College, — his professional promise was
THE governor's FAMILY. 333
great. But he was ruining himself by profligacy. And it
so happened, Richard knew more of this than anybody.
The shining talents of the young man, his boyhood fairness,
his visible industry, all the hopes and expectations that had
been garnered in him by doting parents and partial friends,
concealed the defects of his character. With Barbara, he
could be, and really was, musical, poetical, ideal, romantic,
profound, spiritual.
Richard found he had eggs to walk on, and a plenty of
them, and some not very sound ones, in the matter of these
young men. Nor was he sure that duty required, or expe-
diency would justify, any suggestions whatever as to what
he might know or think of them. The Governor's Family,
jvithal, was, to some extent, terra incog?tita to him ; it had
its own customs, preferences, and reasons, — its own con-
nections and law of life, — and Richard might naturally
presume it would take care of itself, and must be indeed its
own keeper. Then it was a juncture of that extreme and
finished delicacy, for which he was not adequate, either in
tact or experience.
Lovers are oblivious ; and when Richard was alone with
]\Ielicent, Miss Eyre, Chassford and Glendar, were like a
dream of the night, which we never think of in the day-
time.
But he could not always be alone with Melicent. One
day he found himself at the Governor's alone with Mrs.
Melbourne. Melicent and Barbara had gone on a journey
with their Father and Mother.
"If you like our Melicent, why do you not propose?"
Mrs. Melbourne said this not reproachfully, — not with any
dislike to Richard, but simply for his sake, and to fetch
things to a focus.
334 RICHABD EDNEY AND
" The Governor and Madam Dennington both sanction
our intimacy, I believe," replied he.
J" Glendar wants her, if you don't have her," added the
lady.
Daggers again ! What could the woman think ? Was
love like a berth in a steamboat, and were lovers to say quick
which they would have ? Had Mrs. Melbourne forgotten
that she was once young, and had the tender passion ? Not
exactly this ; she deemed either of the young men an eligi-
ble match for the young lady, — or, if her judgment con-
sented to Richard, her affection supported Glendar. She
did venture upon liberties with Richard, which she would
not have taken with some others, accounting possibly the
hardness of his early education and habits a sufficient foil
for her own boldness. She was kind-hearted in what she
said, and would have Richard know, if he did not take the
prize, he was only standing in the way of one eager to
grasp it.
Yet it was not so much Richard's sensibilities that were
startled, as his recollections ; — it was that Glendar should
be named, — the Glendar whom he had seen in so many
unfavorable lights, and withal in so deep shadows, — and his
thought of whom was as wide from Melicent as the realm
of outer darkness.
He was moved to speak, and vent his mind. So he told
Mrs. Melbourne that, not a month before, he saw Glendar
drunk in a rookery, — that it was not possible for Melicent
to love him.
Mrs. Melbourne was horrified, — too much so to be calm, or
reasonable. She even went so far as to be more indignant
at the teller than the story ; — she flouted the idea ; she would
not believe such a thing; and, turning upon Richard, she
charged the story to his jealousy.
THE governor's FAMILY. 335
Richard left the house.
A few days afterwards, as he was sitting on the door-
steps at Willow Croft, the Governor's servant appeared at
the gate, and handed him a note, which ran as follows : —
" Mr. Edney is requested to discontinue his visits at the
Governor's. Depravity of heart, foulness of intention, and
viciousness of life, cannot always be concealed. If he
wishes for information, he can inquire of Miss Plumy
Alicia Eyre. In the absence of the Governor and his fam-
ily, the undersigned, retaining sole charge of the house,
deems it her duty to protect its purity and defend its honor;
and she would leave Mr. Edney no possible room to doubt
that an authority assumed by weak and feeble hands will
be supported by others stronger than herself, and as strong
as anybody. Clarissa Melbourne."
If one of those forty-feet logs, that thrash about in such
hair-brained fashion, at the foot of the Dam, in a freshet,
had struck Richard across the breast, it could not have
affected him more sensibly in that region than did this
note.
CHAPTER XXX
THE UNDERTOW.
Miss Plumy Alicia Eyre came to Woodjdin young',
destitute, and unknown. Her first service was in the Gov-
ernor's Family, where she was little maid of all work, and
particular little maid of Mrs. Melbourne. This lady always
had a pet, — if not an animate, an inanimate thing; sometimes
it was the asparagus-bed in the garden ; now the horses in
the barn ; at one moment it was a poor widow in the neigh-
borhood; again it was somebody arrested for murder, a
thousand miles off. In the present instance, it chanced to
be Plumy Alicia. Neglect in any shape fired her compas-
sion, and Plumy Alicia was neglected; her feet were neg-
lected, and her head, — she had no shoes, no bonnet, and a
scant wardrobe. Here was a fine theatre for Mrs. Melbourne's
piety and benevolence, and she improved it. She taught
the child to read and to sew, and gave her books and bright
clothes. She put the little maid under great obligation ; but
the little maid did not like the load. She was froward,
vain, ambitious, or what it may be, and wanted higher
wages and a higher post; and she left the Governor's.
She exchanged Mrs. Melbourne's fine chamber for Mrs.
Tunny's dark kitchen ; but she got better pay, a more inde-
pendent way of life, and a nearer view of the world at large,
— or a view of Mrs. Tunny's view. Whatever aristocratic
aspirations the Green Grocer's lady may have cultivated, she
was free with her domestics, — very free with such as had
lived in good families; and Plumy Alicia had lived at the
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 337
Governor's ; and Mrs. Tunny seemed to feel that her house,
or rather her means of makmg a house, went up a number
of degrees in the acquisition of such a servant. Miss Eyre
left Mrs. Tunny for the Factories and Whichcomb's, where
this Tale found her.
Cessation of intercourse was not the only method by
Avhich IMiss Eyre chose to signify her sentiments towards
Eichard; she matured a story that vitally touched his repu-
tation. With this she went to the Governor's, and sought
an interview with her old mistress. These two had kept
up the remembrance of each other, and Mrs. Melbourne
ever offered to her former servant and pet the assurance of a
perpetual consideration. Miss Eyre looked pensive and
sad ; — she was really distressed ; she was apparently out-
raged. There was truth with a coloring of falsehood, and
falsehood with a coloring of truth, in all she said. Eichard
had been attentive to her, confidential with her, and often
alone with her. These were things not to be questioned.
" He won my heart," said Miss Eyre ; — that might be. " I
had no other friend but him;" — of the same sort. "He
knew that I sacrificed many others for him ;" — that might
admit of question. Mrs. Melbourne could see no question
in it. "I surrendered at discretion;" — true. Here she
shed tears ; — mixed. " Is he so black-hearted ? " flared
Mrs. Melbourne. " Heartless ! " sobbed Miss Eyre. " Black-
hearted ! " continued Mrs. Melbourne. " He unites the vul-
garity of the lower classes with the insolence of the higher.
He is reckless from instinct, and designing from position.
He is ; he must be. That is it ! I understand him now.
I see through him. How blinded I have been ! What crea-
tures we are, when God leaves us to ourselves ! How can I
thank you for opening my eyes, and all our eyes, before it
was too late ? "
29
338 KICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
The result of this interview appeared in the note, a copy
of which has been furnished for the perusal of the reader.
The original remained in Richard's hand, and brain, and
agony.
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE " BOIL."
He went to his chamber, fell upon his bed, and buried his
face in the pillow ; as if his pillow could help him, or cared
for him, or could soothe the sensations that racked his
thought. " Inquire of Miss Plumy Ahcia Eyre." Yes,
Plumy Alicia, you had done it ; you were at the bottom of
this ; you thrust that iron into his soul ! Richard knew
Miss Eyre was rash, fickle, schemy, and fond of adventure ;
he did not believe her so infamous, so utterly abominable,
so abandoned. What should he think now ? What do ?
When he came down to breakfast, the next morning, he
looked pale, and had small appetite. He drank half a cup
of coffee, nibbled at a slice of bread, and refused a piece of
Indian cake Roxy had baked on purpose for him. His sis-
ter took alarm. " Are you sick, Richard ? " " Not much,"
he answered. " Have some cracker toast, and sage tea ? "
No. " A good cold-water bath, with hard rubbing, is the
thing," said Munk, who was a real hydriatic in his way.
"If Uncle Richard is sick," said Memmy, "Plumy will
come, and Miss Melicent will come too ; and we shall have
such nice times, with quince sauce, and lots of candy ! "
" Tanny, tanny ! " shouted Bebby. " Pumy bing tanny ! "
and she wriggled for joy in her high chair, and displaced her
bib, and pulled her dish of bread and milk into her lap.
" Dear me ! " cried Roxy ; " what trouble is in candy ! I have
sometimes wished I could never see the sight of those ladies.
Bebby is all the whole continual time in mischief ! " Rich-
340 RICHARD EDNEY AND
ard availed himself of the slight breeze to make his escape.
Roxy called after him, as he left the room: "You never
will have anything done for you ; and you will come back
dead, the next we know ! "
Richard felt, at the moment, there was more truth in her
words than she always put into them.
He went to the Mill, and assumed his customary duties.
But it was hard to carry them through. There was slipperi-
ness in his hold, and dizziness in his calculations. He was
like a man who undertakes to raise a barrel of flour in a fit
of laughter. " Sick," muttered Mr. Gouch, " sick; and sick
is foolish to be here. Go to bed, — be sick."
That afternoon Richard went to bed, on a cup of sage tea,
and slept soundly ; he slept none the night before.
He made no blunders at tea, but drank two strong cups
of oolong, disposed of a large biscuit, and honored some new
cake, for which Roxy had obtained the receipt of Mrs.
Mellow.
In the evening he went to Whichcomb's, to see Miss Eyre.
" Plumy Alicia may be in to some folk," replied the landlady
to his inquiry at the door. " Is she in to you ? " " She
is," replied Richard, emphatically, endeavoring to smooth the
way through the difficulty of his feeling by pleasantry of
speech. "Not as you knows of," answered Mrs. Which-
comb. " Plumy Alicia said, says she, I am not at home,
says she." " Is she at home to me ? " asked Richard.
" Can I find her ? " He began to push by the doorkeeper.
"Ah! Charley Walter, said I;" so the woman went on.
" ' No such a thing,' said he. They made the awfulest
piece of work of it that ever was. Velzora Ann had on her
spick and span new silk."
" I must see Miss Eyre ! " cried Richard.
" Would you impose on the Ladies' Parlor, which Cain
THE governor's FAMILY. 341
hasn't, and Miss Elbertina Lucetta, Miss Allura, Miss El-
zena, that was an orphan, and always slept four in a bed, till
she found Whichcomb's, and nothing relishing — " "Are
they all there ? " urged the agonized caller. He enforced
his way to the room which on the door was labelled " Ladies'
Parlor." Sev^eral girls fled as he entered, among whom
was not Miss Eyre. He did not wait long, however, before
the object of his quest came in sight. With right thumb
and finger she raised a fold of her muslin dress, trimmed
her face three points to the left, and crushed herself forward
in the direction of the floor, like a ship pitching, and, rising,
sailed away to a chair at some distance from her caller.
" What is the meaning of this ? " asked Richard, or rather a
voice from within Richard, that came up, groping and
trembling, all the way, through the thickness and huskiness
of his feelings. " Mr. Edney, having precipitated himself
through a reserve which has been so long maintained, and
with such obvious propriety imposed, cannot be too much
out of breath to relate the nature of his errand," replied Miss
Eyre, hammering the arm of the chair with her fan.
" Why have you so long avoided me, and why, at last,
have you approached me only to wound me, — approached
my happiness only to destroy it forever?"
" I shall not sit here to be accused," replied Miss Eyre.
" I shall claim the protection of the house."
" The house," rejoined Richard, " and all its walls, and
all its inmates, may tumble down upon us; — you must
hear what I have to say."
Miss Eyre paced the room loftily, as if she were in a pair
of buskins.
She turned and said, " Is your happiness mv happiness,
Mr. Edney ? "
Richard stammered in reply.
29-*
342 RICHARD EDNEY AND
" The question embarrasses you, I see ; you need not
answer it."
" I am at a loss to know why your happiness should aim
so fatally at my wretchedness."
" O, you are unhappy ! I am sorry for you."
" Have done with this, and tell me what has instigated
you to poison the ear of Mrs. Melbourne against me ! "
" Dare you charge that meanness upon me ? "
" You know what you have done ! "
" I told Mrs. Melbourne you had shown an affection
for me."
" Was that all ? "
" All you did ? "
" All you told her ? "
" Will you say it is false ? "
" That I had a love-affection for you, — that I was ear-
nestly interested in you ? "
" Eh ! earnestly, earnestly ! Superficially ? Partly, fan-
cifully ? I see ! I see ! "
" Wh)^, at this hour, and in this place, and under these
circumstances, can you harrow me so ? Read that ! " He
gave her Mrs. Melbourne's note.
She read it, and said, " Do not feel so bad about that.
Aunt Melbourne is a little notional."
" If any other than a bad feeling is proper to the case, I
would dismiss a bad feeling; but I cannot dislodge the
conviction that you have acted very ungratefully."
•' Do you love me, Richard ? "
" You bade me never say that I loved you."
" But do you?"
" How can I answer you ? "
" You can say that you do not. It will be some pleasure
for me to hear the word ' love' on your lips, — to see it pass
THE governor's FAMILY. 343
them ; even if it went reluctantly and slowly, — as if it was
a sweet spot to go through, — as if it loved to linger among
the impediments of feeling, — as if it loved to hear its own
sound. Say ' do not ' love ; say ' do ' love ; — naughty little
' love,' that hides behind the ' not; ' — yet it is ' love,' — and
'love,' or ' not love,' is the same. ' Not love' is love with a
handle."
" I detest you ! " Richard said this in a passion, quite
wrought up. Miss Eyre coolly replied, " We are even, —
let us part."
" Not until I know how you have implicated me with
Mrs. Melbourne ! "
" You did not once kiss me ? You cannot say that.
You have not that to think of. How you blush ! Color
fades from your lips into your cheeks ! — Well, well ;
nothing should inhabit those lips but kisses ; — all the girls
say so. You are biting your lips to bring the blood back ! "
The wretch ! Spurn her, — crush her ! Insane wicked-
ness, intolerable absurdity! the reader is ready to exclaim;
and so, perhaps, was Richard. What business has she
here ? Yet is not all villany absurd, unnatural ? Could
we get at the springs of misconduct, in any case, should we
not be surprised ?
The truth is. Miss Eyre had formed a strong and des-
potic attachment for Richard. She had been resolved to
possess him. Her long silence and reserve was a mode of
ascertaining his inclinations. She heard of his engagement
with Melicent, and knew how often he was at the Gov-
ernor's. Her communication to Mrs. Melbourne had a first
object, to discover the nature of his connection with Meli-
cent ; and, secondly, to dissolve it, and free him for herself;
and finally, if foiled herein, to be avenged upon him. At
this meeting at Whichcomb's, she maintained, with cardinal
344 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Uness, a single point, — the development of the actual
state and movement of his mind and heart.
To be avenged upon him, in the last resort, we say.
How could that be, if she loved him ? ask our gentle, true-
hearted readers. We might refer them to sacred writ, and
Potiphar's wife. Joseph could not be more astonished at
the order for his arrest, than was Richard at the conduct of
Miss Eyre. We run no parallel between these two ladies,
further than to the point of love and vengeance. We have
never said Miss Eyre was ill-intentioned ; — she was ill-regu-
lated. The wrong she did Richard was rather the wan-
tonness of passion than the deliberation of insult. As is
said, the rare and costly manuscripts used in forming the
Complutensian Polygloll; were used for rockets, so it seemed
sometimes as if she tossed up the sacred and precious
feelings of Richard's heart merely for the pleasure of seeing
them explode ; yet it is evident in this pastime her own
deepest sentiments were involved also. She scattered fire-
brands without seeming to think how hot they were. She
followed her ends with great clearness of heart, but with
utter blindness of eye ; or, rather, with a distinct aim, but
confused method. She was more capricious in appearance
than in purpose. But she would sport with her victim,
before she put him to death. Richard seemed to feel that
his death was foreshadowed, while, at the same moment,
Miss Eyre was loth to administer the final stroke.
" Tell me what you have done ! " Richard said this so
sternly and coldly, with look so sullen and menacing, and
tone so hard and inexorable, that Miss Eyre must have seen
the folly of dalliance.
She replied, "I will not tell you what I have done; — I
will tell you what I will do and be. I hate you; yet not
THE governor's FAMILY. 345
vitally, but as death hates, — as a bruised and broken heart
hates, — as a woman that can feel hates ! — "
" Spare me this ! " cried Richard, smiting his hand upon
his brow. "Anything but such a thing ! any torture you
may inflict, but such a torture ! Do not strew my path
with the mutilated fragments of a heart ! do not doom my
vision to the sight of sensibility in ruins ! Kill me in some
other way ! — "
Miss Eyre leaned her head upon the arm of her chair,
and was heard to sob.
" Dear Plumy Alicia ! " said Richard, approaching and
attempting to take her hand. She waved him off. " Go,"
said she ; " your work is done, and mine is done ! "
Richard took himself heavily from the house.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
DRAWTNT UNDER.
Miss Eyke was an enigma ; to Richard, certainly, and to
many who may be inclined to bestow a thought upon her.
She was of the somewhat numerous family of Eyres, — of
an obscure branch, indeed. When she was quite young, she
demonstrated the superiority of her sex by romping with the
boys. As if she had early imbibed exalted notions of
womanhood, she once undertook to break a colt. But she
had no Family, no Church, no School. Her tendencies,
whether good or evil, were xmsoothed by affection,
unmoulded by religion, unrefined by culture. Her manner
in the present instance was contradictory, and her intention
uncertain. She deigned no explanation herself, and we
might be balked to attempt one for her.
In five minutes after Richard left, the girls dashed into
the room; and she was jocose, talkative as ever, and rattled
away wdth the merriest of them, — all traces of concern
having vanished, and her look as bright as if she had
just washed in a sunbeam.
Richard did not recover so easily, — indeed his power of
elasticity seemed for the moment destroyed. To rise from
the blow he had received, was an attainment in his own
estimation impossible. He was naturally of heavier mould
than Miss Eyre ; — such, at least, w^ould be a reasonable
deduction from the facts of the case.
He did not mention what had befallen to his sister, or to
any one. He bore the burden alone.
EICHAED EDNEY, ETC. 347
Alone ? Richard was, or professed to be, a Christian ; and,
like his Master, he might still have the Father with him.
He disburthened his heart to God ; — he poured the an-
guish of his spirit into the ear of Heaven. Like a captive,
he lifted his galled hands, and implored Divine mercy and
love to strike off the chainfe. He listened to the starry-
night, that some voice from dimmest ethereal space might
speak to his troubled soul, saying, Peace, be still !
Had he sinned ? This thought shot like a lightning
gleam through his brain. His conduct, as in a mirage, rose
in sudden, pictorial, prolonged prospective to his view.
Many things wore a sinful aspect. An afirighted imagina-
tion would readily detect many sinful spots. He cried out,
with tenderest contrition, "God be merciful to me a sinner!"
But the worst was yet to come, if there could be any
worse, where the desolation was so entire.
He did not go near the Governor's again. He could
have no further communications with Mrs. Melbourne. His
heart failed him at the thought of seeing her. Melicent
was absent. What on her return ? He did not write her.
-A letter he had from her remained in his desk, unopened.
What would the Governor say, and IVIadam, and Barbara,
or Chassford, or Glendar, or ; but why go over the
series of interested persons, or conjure among possible
events the recollection of any one of which pierced him so
vitally ?
Not many days afterwards, Melicent returned. The Gov-
ernor's consequence in town rendered his movements matter
of public rumor, and in this way Richard ascertained what
by direct inquiry he might not have put himself upon find-
ing out. He realized what was before him, and waited the
progress of events, and the course of the hours, silently and
awfully, as Alcestis did the unfoldings of Fate,
348 RICHARD EDNEY AND
It came, — came like a thunderbolt which one expects j
bowed, tense, hot, and almost shrinking, in the suffocating
silence, and dismal darkness, he hardly dare open his eyes,
lest he should see himself struck. The house shook, and
his sight reeled, and he knew it had come. It came in the
shape of a note from Mrs. Melbourne, covering one from
Melicent.
Mrs. Melbourne flashed thus. " I will not accuse you,
since your own conscience must have done that office for
you. I shall pray for you, that God would lead you to
repentance, and that you may be saved at last. It is unnec-
essary to remind you of the distress you have occasioned
us, as I fear you are incapable of feeling it. The purpose
of this present is answered when I inform you that your
visits here are interdicted. Melicent, poor child, whose hap-
piness you have so rudely and vulgarly assailed, will give
the dismissal under her own hand."
If Melicent flashed, she rained, too ; and her flash showed
rather a confused state of the elements above, — rapid con-
densation of vapors, meeting of adverse winds, — than an
attempt to injure anything below.
Her note had evidently coihmenced with " Dear Richard,"
and " Dear Sir " was the cover of a blot. And this little
incident characterized the entire manuscript. She was in
doubt what to write; — whether to regard Richard in the
light of conscious rascality, or of scandalized innocence. If
she thought that a tender word would be exposed to bar-
barous insolence, she more deeply feared that severe words
would pierce to the quick a virtuous sorrow. So Richard
passed before her imagination like the changing Spectre of
the Brocken, — assuming a new phase of terror, or of beauty,
according to the fluctuating mood of her own mind. She
did say, " I shall delay, — not my decision, for I have none,
THE governor's FAMILY. 349
but my feelings, — as to which I know not what to have. In
my present course, I must be governed by others, who have
always led me wisely and well, and to whom I have loved
to render obedience. It is well that it is so, for at this mo-
ment I am incapable of directing my own steps. I thank you
for your information respecting Glendar, since I persuade
myself it was truthfully spoken and generously intended.
I need not say that my instincts had presaged what your
observation announced. I pray God to have mercy upon
you, and upon me ; — if you have done wrong, that you may
sincerely repent, — if you. have done right, that you may be
vindicated; — if I am in the way of truth, that I may have
strength to support the heavy blow, — if I am in error, that
my eyes may be speedily opened. The excitement of our
family is at present too considerable for deliberation, and too
exacting for candor. I have but one alternative, — to listen
and be silent, or to discuss and despair."
After all, " our family " must be construed as a figure of
speech, or a natural trope of feeling, and, primarily, denoting
Mrs. INIelbourne. The Governor said nothing, though he
looked a good deal. Madam vented her surprise and sor-
row in a brief ejaculation, which she capped with a passage
of Scripture. Barbara knew not what to say. Cousin Row-
ena became very serious. Mrs. Melbourne, as she preoccu-
pied the ground, likewise preoccupied all judgments. She
had seen Miss Eyre, and she knew what was what. She
had the power of raising a breeze in the family, and oblig-
ing its members either to scud under bafe poles, or to haul
to. Then Glendar was sorely, and as she thought, honestly
thought, wickedly involved. Then it was a grave and a
dark matter. What could be done but acquiesce in Mrs.
Melbourne's foregone conclusion, that Richard be interdicted
30
350 RICHARD EDNEY AND
the house. " But," added Madam, " to everything there is
a time and a judgment."
Richard might have gone to the Governor's, and applied
tongue and person to dissipate the gloom and perplexity that
rumor and speculation threw over the subject. He might
have cast his own consciousness at the feet of Melicent, and
said, " That is my vindication ! "
But he was unused to extremities, — he had had but little
taste heretofore of what are called the trials of life. He had
fortitude for distress, and boldness in danger. He lacked
that rashness — sometimes a virtue — which loves a fier^'
peril, and possessed no dexterity adapted to the subtile and
nice points of a dilemma.
More than this, — between Richard and the Governor's
Family was a Brocken Spectre too, dilating in portentous
dimension, and guarding the passage with audacious and
shadowy arms. That was Miss Eyre, and Miss Eyre's
assumed wrongs, and her real distress, and his own unex-
plainable complicity therewith. He could not banish her
image, or dispossess him^self of her impression and power.
She had got into his imagination, and like a vessel in dis-
tress, she seemed to be stranded in his heart.
Now, furthermore, he must prepare himself for the after-
clap. What had befallen must become public. Roxy must
know it, and it would kill her; Munk must know it, and it
would be a damper to his pleasant feelings ; and Memmy
and Bebby must know it, and they would be sorry. The
" World " must know it ; and how rejoiced it would be at this
addition to its Cabinet of Entertaining Knowledge, — how
wise it would become all at once, — how exceedingly en-
dowed, — how sparkling and brilliant! Richard's valued
friends would hear of it, — Mr. Gouch and Silver, Mangil and
Nefon, Mysie and Chuk. The Church would have to con-
THE GOVERNOR S FAMIT.Y,
351?
sider of it, and " Knuckle Lane ! " What icmdd Mrs. Tunny-
say ? There was Clover to be elated, Miss Fiddledeeana
Redfern to sneer, and Mrs. Mellow to deduce a solemn im-
provement. Aunt Grint had already been foretold it.
And Aunt Grint was the first to break it to Willow Croft,
" What has happened ? " she exclaimed, panting and star-
ing; "my wrists ached Saturday, in the afternoon, and
there must be a storm. I met Mrs. Tunny, and she was in
the greatest state of mind. Mrs. Quiddy, who is hauled
up with rheumatis, came out to ask me. Do be quiet,
children ! — pity sakes ! what a noise ! one can't hear one's
self speak ! "
" What has happened ? " cried Roxy, amazed.
" I worked as tight as I could spring to come down. I
had n't no more idea of it than nothing at all, if it had n't
been for running out to hear a woodpecker ; then I knew
there was a rotten tree somewhere, — I knew it before Mr.
Gouch passed the house."
" What is it ? " emphasized Roxy.
"Don't you know," replied Aunt Grint, "that that Miss
Dennington — "
" She is n't dead ! " screamed Roxy.
" No, indeed ! "
" Nor taken the cholera ? "
" Only think ! " Aunt Grint's loud and masculine voice
sank to an unnatural susurration. " She has turned off
Richard; the engagement is broke up. I might have seen
it. The spider, — 't was when I was sewing with my basket
on the table, and Sally a-sweeping the floor, — the crittur
never come nigh, but kept edging round. I told Sally we
should n't have a wedding gown — "
Roxy, meanwhile, let fall the bellows that she had been
trying for five minutes to hang up ; she suffered the milk to
352 RICHARD EDNEY AND
boil over on the coals ; she did not prevent Bebby going to
the sugur-bucket in the closet, — three things that she had not
done or forborne to do, before, all her life. She attempted to
listen ; but her ear was clearer than her mind ; — or, as is
said of the telegraph wires, the auditory nerve was down
somew'here. Sundry exclamations, however, indicated that
she was alarmed, while her rushing to seize Bebby showed
that, if her feelings could find vent somewhere, she might
be calm and self-possessed. She quietly washed the child's
hands, and sat down with her in the little rocking-chair.
She asked Aunt Grint but one question, the reply to which
removed the necessity of all further communications touch-
ing the credibility of the information she had characteris-
tically but crookedly conveyed, and was still. She was very
still, and calm, and motionless ; so much so, the child looked
into her face, as if something was the matter. She stroked
the child's sunny locks.
Presently Richard came in. He perceived the condition
of things. He was composed, but a little flushed ; his lip
quivered, and his voice was tremulous ; — yet a smile shot
up through his face, — a sort of Zodiacal Light, through
which might be seen the gray infinitude of his sorrow,
beneath which the sun of his hope had set, while in the
still vault around burned the stars of pure feeling, like ves-
tal lamps, that burned on only because it was in their des-
tiny never to go out.
Roxy said nothing ; she looked at Richard, and instantly
her gaze was stricken to the floor. She rose, set the child
deliberately on its feet, went to her brother, threw her arms
about his neck, and they both wept.
Aunt Grint trotted her heel on the floor, drummed the
window-sill with her finger, took the boiling milk from the
coals, and went away.
THE governor's FAMILY. 35S
It was a great sorrow to Roxy, and a real one. There
was body to it. The petty annoyances, and transient disa-
greements, that ruffled so many of her hours, were drowned
out by this profound woe; — or, to change the metaphor, as
a heavy rain arrests the agitation of waves, and smooths
the surface of the sea, this pouring event restored the uni-
formity of her spirits, and filled her with serene thought-
fulness. She seemed to comprehend the extent of the
calamity of her brother, and, as by some inspiration, to take
a sense of the mischief secretly working at the centre of it,
and she rose to the height of the evil that so suddenly
unfolded before her.
In sympathizing with her brother, Roxy lost much of her
petulancy and caprice, and ingenuous concern for real sufl^er-
ing supplanted a morbid nettlesomeness to fancied evils.
Richard could but confirm to his sister what Aunt Grint
had stated as to his separation from Melicent. He did not,
however, feel at liberty to discuss all the causes that may
have led to it ; nor did he allude to the probable agency of
Miss Eyre in the affair.
But Roxy, whose keenness of penetration exceeded Rich-
ard's wise reserve, said, in a knowing way, " Has Plumy
Alicia anything to do with it ? " Richard assented, by try-
ing to be silent. " I will not press an answer," said Roxy.
Now Richard nodded and added, " I do not wish to speak
of that; I cannot." His sister replied, " I understand it; I
think I do. I recall many things at this moment that have
a bearing upon it. I will be silent as long as you wish me
to be."
" You are not dead ? " said Richard.
" How you talk ! "
" I thought it would kill you."
" You banter me," answered Roxy. " I have been so
30^
354 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
often at the point of death upon little things, this great
thing may restore me to life."
This remark of Roxy's, generalized into a trait of charac-
ter, is not without distinguished precedent. Great Henry
of France " was less than a woman in a coach, and cried
out whenever it appeared likely to overturn, and betrayed
the utmost timidity. But in the field he was brave even to
intrepidity, and accustomed to regard death in the ranks of
war with the highest composure."
CHAPTER XXXIV.
FLOOD CONTINUES TO KISE.
Richard had now commiseration from his friends, in
place of the congratulations that were still green in his
memory. To be pitied is sometimes more disagreeable
than to be blamed. The latter inspires rejoinder, while the
former leaves us nothing to say. One befogs us in an
uncomfortable stupidity ; the other is like a bomb-shell in
the midst of our activity, and arouses the impulse of flight.
We extenuate our faults ; we tremble at our misfortunes.
We can remonstrate with malediction ; we must submit to
compassion.
The Mill-men expressed their pity chiefly in silence.
When they were filing their saws, or squinting at the mark,
or even bending over a cant-dog, they seemed to have one
eye on Richard, — not tauntingly, not even vulgarly curious,
— but with a sort of sympathy — with some genuine fellow-
feeling ; — for Richard was respected and beloved in the
Mill. If they had only spoken, — if they had asked him.
something, — it v^^ould have been a relief. No : he was
mistaken there. It would do him no good. He could not
continue the conversation.
In the grating, rumbling, screeching, of the building at
large, there was not much kindness indicated, but rather a
sullen mockery.
Silver sat on a pile of boards, and clumsily beckoned
Richard to his side. But Silver could n't speak ; his tongue
was always thick, and now it filled his mouth, — filled it
356 -RICHARD EDNEY AND
even to the exclusion of his pipe, which he was obliged to
withdraw. Taking out the pipe, like unplugging a hogs-
head of liquor, sometimes gives vent to words. It did not
help Silver ; he was still thick and ropy. He struck his
iron bar tremendously on a log before him, and got up.
Mr. Gouch, pointing quickly to the Dam, said, " There ! "
and then, as he knocked up the bail-dog, he said, " There ! "
and every time he struck, he repeated, " There ! "
The Dam, Eichard could render. But driving in the
bail-dog, — did that mean how the iron had gone into his
soul? Perhaps it did.
Mrs. Tunny entered Willow Croft with a mingled air of
disdain, triumph, and pity, over the Avhole of which was
spread a very thin layer of magnanimity. But neither
Eoxy nor Richard was deceived or plagued by her.
Hitherto, Richard's fortune only was involved, while his
character remained untouched. But in a few days, the more
depressing intelligence reached his ears, that he was under
reproach, that baseness of conduct was assigned as the
cause of his dismissal, and that such a statement came
authentically from the Governor's Family itself.
Well, here was blame, if that suited him any better. 1
think it did not. For now he would be expected either to
afhrm or deny ; and he could do neither.
Now, not only the iron entered his soul, but it seemed to
be rusting in, and gangrening everything in its neighbor-
hood. It was like a return stroke of the lightning. His
spirits, that had been bending like willows, appeared to be
fairly draggled in the mire. He had now the world to
encounter in its most dismal form, — that of contumely,
sarcasm, and neglect. Frederick, at the siege of Brescia,
when he could carry his point in no other way, exposed his
prisoners on his battering-rams to the stones of the besieged,
THE governor's FAMILY. 851
their friends. If Richard had one poor virtue in common
with the rest of mankind, he hardly dare present it to what
he conceived would be a general attack upon him. He
would prefer to retire from the contest. The river-logs,
with which his early years were familiar, in a freshet, are
sometimes carried high up the bank, or floated into a contig-
uous flat, where the receding waters suffer them to mildew,
doze, and perish. Recent events, that had borne him a good
distance from his proper source, and precipitated him down
sundry cataracts, had at length landed him in a low thicket,
where he was willing to die.
He lessened his visits to the Old Town. There was
nothing pleasant there. One day he met Melicent. She
stiffly bowed ; but this was owing as much to hesitancy of
feeling, as to purpose of will. Immediately afterwards,
a man inquired if he could direct him to Munk & St.
John's stable. He did not hear him, and replied, " No. 16
Victoria Square." Mrs. Melbourne passed him without a
token of recognition. By this time, his heart had got pretty
well into his mouth, and, like Silver's tongue, there would
seem to be hardly anything else there ; and he found it not
easy to swallow again. It would get into his eyes, too, as
big as a beam, and into his ears. We have said that Miss
Eyre had got into his heart ; of course, she accompanied
that organ occasionally in its visits to the several senses.
He met Glendar, and Glendar looked as if he could eat
him ; and Richard felt he should not be sorry if he did.
But Richard was a Christian, and the impulse of his life
had been, doing good and being good. Nor could he now
forget this original obligation. His closet, and the family-
altar he had helped to rear at Willow Croft, and his Bible,
every day reminded him of it ; — it caught his eye in large
street-bill type on the wall of his chamber, where Pastor
558 KICHARD EDNEY AND
Harold recommended his young parisliioners to post it; Sun-
days, and the " Knuckle Lane " evenings, brought it round
to him.
What should he do ? He read that if he had offended
his brother, before he offered his gift to the Lord, he must
go and be reconciled to his brother. He had offended Mrs.
Melbourne, and Miss Eyre, and perhaps Melicent. But
how to be reconciled ! He would endeavor to be reconciled
in his own heart and before God, if he could not in outward
relation and before his fellows. If reviled, he would revile
not again, and abuse he would return with benisons. But
the wall of offence seemed to grow thicker and higher.
In naval engagements, the Athenians were wont to
reserve huge masses of lead in the tops of their vessels ; and
when they could subdue the enemy in no other way, they
let fall these rather cogent junks, and sank his ship. There
were some things in reserve for Richard.
Now^, Madam Bennington had a feeling in common rather
with her daughter than with her cousin-in-law. To be sure,
if _Richard was what had been represented, there could be
no doubt as to the propriety of the course the Family
adopted respecting him. But had the case been sufficiently
investigated ? Mrs. Melbourne conceded that the examina-
tion might be extended, though she anticipated no favorable
result ; nay, more, as if a new trial had been granted, she
was willing to act in the premises, and collect and revise
the evidence. She had had Mrs. Eyre closeted with her ;
and when, in her black silk and green parasol, she started
on her tour of inquiry, who should be her cicerone but Miss
Eyre ?
The forenoon's work resulted in a sort of council or
inquest, to be holden at Whichcomb's in the afternoon.
Mrs, Melbourne sent a candid and polite note to Richard,
THE governor's FAMILY. 359
informing him of what was a-foot, and inviting him to be
present. He chose rather to appear by attorney, and Roxy
went in his stead.
There were assembled at the Boarding House, — Front
Stairs Carpeted, and that was not Cain's, — in the " Ladies'
Parlor," the head of the establishment, Mrs. Melbourne,
Miss Rowena, Mrs. Tunny, Mrs. Mellow, Mrs. Xyphers,
Miss EjTe, Mrs. Crossmore, Nurse, Miss Elbertina Lucetta,
Factory Girl, and Roxy.
Mrs. Whichcomb introduced the testimony. " It was a
Wednesday," she said; "a Monday we didn't wash, which
sometimes is, and the next day the things froze on the line.
It was one of the coldest days that ever was ; it was a heavy
wash, as Cain's folk know, for it is right in sight of their
basement, where they scour their pewter."
" Won't you tell," said Miss Eyre, " what he did in the
house !"
" It was a Wednesday, for I had been up late ironing,
and tending on the sick, and getting jellies, and carrying up
wood, which is to be found at Whichcomb's, and is a most
an excellent place to board at, as all the girls say, and nigh
upon twelve o'clock, when he came in and went right up to
No. 3. O Charley Walter! where is he now? My bones
were aching in bed when I heard it; and he staid with them
all night ; for Miss Junia, and Violet that 's dead and gone,
would n't dare to deny it. If Velzora Ann had only a
thought; for Miss Elbertina Lucetta was just as sure to tell
of it as the world ; and there was n't a grain of need of his
going in there."
" What did he go there for ? " asked Roxy.
" I won't say it was for the silver spoon ; I scorn to make
such a charge, if folks was sick, and he was mean enough
to do it, for they have what they please at Whichcomb's,
S6(f RICHARD EDNEY AND
and the thino-s are always on the table. He knows what
he was there for, and what never happened here before, as
Charley Walter said; and he owned the next morning, and
our reputation was good, and if they wanted to see them,
they could always do it in the Ladies' Parlor, Miss Elzena
knows, and the new comers know it the first day."
" He must have been there with an evil intention," said
Mrs. Melbourne. Mrs. Tunny winked ; Mrs. Mellow sighed
a response.
" Rowena, what do you say ? " Mrs. Melbourne put this
question.
" I do not know as I can say but it looks bad," Miss Row-
ena replied, with a most uncomfortable attempt at evasion.
" It does so ! " ejaculated Mrs. Whichcomb.
"It is impossible ! " exclaimed Roxy.
Now, Roxy was unfortunately situated. Ostensibly the
advocate of the accused, she really, by imputation, occupied
the dock in his place ; or she appeared an interested and
most partial witness, and her word was worth just as much
as the prisoner's would be in room of it, and no more.
Where was the Old Man? He was an imbecile.
Where was Jiinia? Miss Eyre was willing Junia should
be called ; and added, with an air of confidence that silenced
all expectation from this quarter, she hoped they would send
for her. She had heard, indeed, that she had gone to parts
unknown ; but they might write.
" Did not Captain Creamer order Richard to stay by the
old man ? " asked Roxy.
At this question and moment, a new champion of Rich-
ard appeared, in Miss Freeling, the Dressmaker, She was
at work at Tunny's when Mrs. Melbourne called in the
morning. At some sacrifice of wages, and greater of Mrs.
Tunny's pleasure, she resolved to attend the examination,
THE GOVERNORS FAMILY.
361
and came in just as Eoxy propounded the aforesaid question.
She declared Captain Creamer ought to be sent for, and his
testimony- heard. Mrs. Melbourne saw the reasonableness
of this. Word was accordingly despatched to the old
employer of the arraigned ; but he replied he would have
nothing to do with the fellow, and that nothing was too bad
for him, or after that sort : and this answer, while it palsied
Roxy, and horrified Miss Freeling, was what the rest
expected, as it entirely satisfied Mrs. Melbourne.
Moreover, by well-directed cross-questioning, Miss Eyre
drew from Roxy that Richard seemed very attentive to
Junia ; that he obtained board for her at Willow Croft, and,
finally, that he went with her into the country.
So matters went on. Mrs. Tunny corroborated Miss
Eyre as to Richard's being some time alone with her, on
the back stairs, at a party at her house. What was herein,
insinuated brought Miss Freeling to her feet. She was at
the same party, and had a long conversation with Richard ;
she knew him better; he was a noble, high-minded man.
But Miss Freeling was like a stray grasshopper in a brood
of turkeys, each ready to devour her.
There was more than one mass of lead. Mrs. Crossmore,
disappointed Nurse, resident in Knuckle Lane, had seen
Richard in unseemly places, at unseemly hours.
Mrs. Xyphers, unfortunate woman, divorced from her
husband, fooled by Clover, now a crony, now an enemy of
Miss Eyre, — broken in spirit, confused in judgment, distrust-
ful of everybody, — was induced to say, what she believed
to be true, that she had no doubt Richard was base and
unprincipled.
Miss Elbertina Lucetta attempted no more than the con-
firmation of Mrs. Whichcomb's story, that Richard was at
31
362 RICHARD EDNEY AND
the house, suspiciously, one winter night. She occupied
the next chamber, and was awake with the tooth-ache.
Mrs. Mellow, Tract-distributor, had been in all parts of
the city; she had tried the public pulse on the Knuckle
Lane movement, raked for opposition to it, and collected
whatever gossiping items might w^ork against it, or its
originators ; and she was able to recount some things that
reflected, not positively, she said, but presumptively, on
Richard. But, from a little personal acquaintance, she knew
him to be self-willed, bold, froward, and an instructor of evil
things ; and she was ready to believe anything of him.
Especially, she said, " that a common laborer should seek to
intermarry in our best families; that one should stride from
the Saw-mill to the Governor's house ; that, after rolling
logs and handling lumber all day, he should expect to dis-
pose of his fatigue in the evening on damask lounges, and
wear off his coarseness under silken curtains, — indicated an
effrontery as dangerous as it was detestable."
Why pursue details, when the result announces itself?
Miss Freeling, with all her eloquence and good sense, could
not arrest judgment. Mrs. Melbourne, who had not only
the summing up, but the decision, of the case, said she was
satisfied ; though the full extent of her satisfaction she kept
for other and more private ears.
Miss Rowena remained a silent spectator of proceedings.
She was not inclined to side with Mrs. Melbourne, but she
saw no loop-hole of extrication for Richard. At the close
of the meeting, she drew a long breath of mingled surprise
and disappointment, anguish and sorrow, and went home.
This may seem a tempest in a tea-pot to some ; but it was
a very large tea-pot, and one that held water enough to
scald a good deal of happiness. If considerable events
sprung from small causes, the instance is not unparalleled.
i
THE governor's FAMILY. 363
A silver medal involved the Dutch in a long conflict with
Louis XIV. The true motive of the affair under review-
may not have been apprehended by the majority of those con-
cerned in it ; so Mr. Alison says the real object of a war is
never understood by the people, who are expected to fight
its battles, and not trouble themselves as to its meaning.
Mrs. Melbourne looked only on one side of a subject, and
when that happened to be a dark side, she looked a long
while, — so long, in 'fact, she saw nothing else. Where, iia
all this matter, were Richard's obvious excellences ? where
his piety, his benevolence, his heroism ? where his straight-
forward consistency, and his transparent probity of charac-
ter? She saw nothing of these. This was her position :
she attributed the virtues of Richard to ambition, and his
vices to intention. A feeling lurked in her heart, withal,
which Mrs. Mellow more broadly hinted, that one of Rich-
ard's birth, connections, and calling, was ill-adapted for an
inmate in the Governor's Family. More than this, but in
connection with it, the different classes of society in the city
did not understand each other. Between what Miss Free-
ling called the Pickle-eaters and the Gum-chewers, there
were strange mistakes. The Cashmere shawls mistrusted
what might lie under a Scotch plaid. In plain terms, the
Governor's Family did not perfectly understand Richard ;
certainly the Mrs. Melbournism of the Family did not.
It will be remembered, moreover, that the .evidence elic-
ited at Whichcomb's was not primary, but secondary ; not
essential, but tributary; and, coming as it did on the heel
of Miss Eyre's more private communications, and in the
way of incidental circumstance, which some are so profound
as to tell us never lies, and confirming in all poinrs what
had been directly asserted, it led to an overwhelming verdict
against Richard.
364 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Eoxy reported proceedings at Willow Croft; but Richard, I
as if he had foreseen the course of things, manifested no i
alarm. He had been so diligently racked, an additional
turn of the screw could not aggravate his distress. If he
had any lingering hopes of a favorable turn of affairs, or
plausible scheme for recovering the ground he had lost,
these were finally blasted. The little radicles of a tree
adhere tenaciously to the bank in which they have been
nourished, after the rising flood has mastered the branches
and trunk, and even undermined the main body of the root
itself; so the tenderness of nature cleaves to objects in
which it has had delight, when all energy and resolution
have given out ; but this fond hold of sentiment and feeling
in Richard broke at last.
There were some sad hours at Willow Croft. The house
was shaded, at times, so etTectually, the want of window-
blinds and overhanging trees would not have been felt.
While the matter was in some respects too deep for the
penetration, or rather for the business, of Munk, it was too
serious for him to trifle with ; and at the same time, like the
effect of telling pleasant stories to a sick child, and making it
smile, he could not forbear those feathery sallies and sunny
quips in which he so much abounded. The change in
Roxy, so noble and so visible, gave her husband almost as
much delight as the sorrow of Richard did pain; and
especially as that change employed itself upon the sorrow,
and was an alleviation of it, and a visit of queenliness unto
it ; and as it rejoiced Richard so, and made him sometimes
almost forget his sorrow, and made his sorrow seem so like
a dark night full of glow-worms, Munk could not but keep
some of his old flow of spirits.
" I have just read, in the evening paper, " said he,
knocking his pipe on the palm of his left hand, " that ' Mr ,
THE G0\T;RN0R S FABriLY, 3b&
Brunei acknowledged he had taken his first lessons for
forming the great Thames Tunnel from the ship-worm,
whose motions he observed as it perforated the wood, arch-
ing its way onwards, and varnishing the roof of the passage
with its secretions.' The evil is big enough, — it is like a
mountain ; and we are worms, — but perhaps we shall get
through it at some rate. Queen Victoria has some hard
times, — how she is going to tunnel that great English
nation, so things will run smooth and easy, I don't see;
but let us be good and happy, and happy and good." He
had refilled his pipe, and uttered these last words simulta-
neously with putting it in his mouth, and holding a Lucifer
match over the bowl to light it.
Richard would try to be good, but he found it hard to be
happy. That a sense of innocence will always insure
repose of spirit, — that, if the conscience be clear, the heart
will be light, — is rather a dogma of fancy than a conclusion
of fact. Those nations that employed the rack understood
human nature better than this ; they knew that, as com-
pression of the waist drives the blood into the face, inno-
cence was susceptible of the strictures of pain to an extent
that blushes with apparent guilt ; and demonstrated that
through exquisiteness of agony, the most virtuous man
in the world would confess himself the most criminal and
reprobate, — in a word, that our nature can be implicated in
baseness, by tempting it with sorrow.
Sometimes Richard gasped from a certain internal hollow
of pain ; sometimes cold prickles ran over him from head
to foot, as if one were leisurely sprinkling him with a
water-pot full of fleas and frost; sometimes he played with
the childran, but languidly, as an invalid takes a ride, and
not so much entering into the pleasure of the thing, as that
the pleasure of the thing may enter into him ; sometimes he
31#
366 HICHARD EDNEV, ETC.
fell heavily on }iis bed. — sometimes he paced energetically
his chamber; now he would be all strung up, and clenched,
and wirj', — again he was flaccid, limpsy, dissoluble as water.
He did not shed many tears, but there was a sort of burning
aridness, combined with a swollen tightness, back of his
eyes; at one time, he read all the papers, — at another, he
devoted his leisure to looking from the window.
Roxy was good to him, — very good. She made him the
best cup of tea, boiled his potatoes in the mealiest wa}',
lightened up the bread till it lay in slices on the plate like
tiers of new honeycomb from the Patent boxes. But oh,
she had to be so considerate! If she could have asked him
how he did, instead of complimenting the morning to him ;
if she could have looked at his tongue, instead of half
ignoring his presence ; if she could have asked him what
she should do for him, instead of having to try to do so
much ; if she could liaA-e just inquired if he would have
some arrow-root, or green peas without butter, or a rasher
of pork ; if she could have had the privilege of keeping the
children still, instead of feeling obliged to urge them to
entertain their Uncle ; if she could have driven off" the man
with the hand-organ and the monkey, instead of tempting
him with a few cents to the gate, to grind his organ,
and make his monkey dance ; — then it would seem to be
better.
But there was Richard's Motto ; sometimes it seemed to
fly out of the wall, like a wasp, and sting him in the face
when he looked at it.
CHAPTER XXXV.
INTROSPECTIVE.
He must adjust himself to what was about him. He
must ascertain the extent of his obligations and deficits, and
square accounts with existence. He had relations to man-
kind that involved a personal attention, — offices to fill or
resign, — scenes to be visited or abandoned.
" What will God have me to do ? " he asked. " My
character is questioned, and my influence neutralized ; my
pretensions will be derided, and my efforts opposed."
He was teacher in the same Sunday-school with Melicent
and Barbara, one of whom had a class in the vestry,
directly fronting him. One Sabbath he was at his post ;
but he imagined he could not repeat the endeavor. It was
not so much a cross which he would heroically bear, as an
execution that it were wise to. dispense with. He told his
class, with some emotion, he should instruct them no more,
but that he should be happy to see them at Willow Croft.
The children opened their innocent eyes with quite a burst
of wonderment, for they were attached to their teacher and
ignorant of events ; but he quietly sat down and turned his
back to them.
He had passed some of his happiest and most useful
hours in the cause of Knuckle Lane, and at the Griped
Hand. This was an interest that he loved, and a privilege
that he prized. Shall he attend these meetings no more ?
Shall he maintain the "Be Good," but the "Do Good"
become no other than a lost dream of his youth, — a ruined
368 BICHARD EDNEY AND
attainment of his piety ? But how persevere in duties that
brought him into so scandalized a juxtaposition ? — how,
with such a load on his heart ; — how, with so much shame
in his apprehensions ; — how, with a sort of aha ! aha ! pur-
suing him down the street ?
The Hebrew Scribes used to write in the margin of the
Bible words that were to be pronounced in room of offensive
ones in the text, which they dared not alter. Richard seemed
to have the feeling that he was an offensive word in the
sacred text of those movements in which he had been en-
gaged, — movements that he reverenced and loved, — and
that he ought to betake himself to the margin.
Richard had friends, — friends for adversity, — who ad-
hered to him whatever might befall. Some of his Knuckle
Lane associates, believing in his integrity, not only loaned
him a generous confidence, but would incite him to vindi-
cate his position, and repossess himself of what Mrs. Mel-
bournism had taken away. There were those who did not
like Mrs. Eyre, and were impatient at the injustice she
seemed guilty of. But nothing could dissuade Richard
from letting those matters alone. " Come back to ' Knuckle
Lane,' " said Mangil, the Broker. " Cornered, sharp, hard
getting round ? Poh ! poh ! never heard of such a thing.
Banks refuse ? Come into the street ; call, — you know
where, — 21 Exchange. Never mind backers, — you have
a back of your own ; " — he struck him there ; — " perhaps
you have forgotten some old deposites ; if you don't call for
them, why, they must pass over to your heirs."
Now, Richard made some mistakes, and one very plain
one. He exaggerated the consequence that attached to his
person and action, and seemed to imagine there was a pub-
lic excitement about his affairs. The city appeared to him
one great eye ; and that eye, like the sun, looking straight
THE GOVEKNOk's FAMILY. 369
down upon him, and making his shadow the measure of its
intensity. In fact, there were twenty thousand eyes in the
Old Town and the New ; and it woukl be a miracle, indeed,
if these had all at once become so disinterested, so curious,
or so crazed, as, neglecting their own business, to mind
nothing else but a lessee of Green Mill. It was as if there
were no other self, — no other disappointment, or anxiety, or
sorrow, — but his ; as if the people he passed in the street, —
that looked at him, indeed, but only to take the right side
of him, — were not full of bargains and speculations, of
hurryings and fears, of burdens and woes, of light, love,
and hope, whhout him; as if the houses, that seemed to
stare on him from their windows, were not veiled in their
sick chambers, embroiled in their kitchens, turned topsy-
turvy in their clearings, asleep in their luxuriance or their
solitude, and cared nothing for him.
This turn of Richard's mind was not an uncommon one.
A chambermaid, — I have this out Jonathan Swift, D. D., —
talking with one of her fellow-servants, said, " I hear it is all
over London that I am going to leave my lady." The same
Divine has other instances, which I need not be at pains to
repeat. An Englishman, having written a three-penny
pamphlet against France, hearing that a French privateer
had been seen off the coast, fled to town, and told his
friends " they need not wonder at his haste, for the French
King had sent a privateer on purpose to catch him." In a
book-stall, Mr. Swift says he took up a volume entitled
" Poems, by the author of The Choice." " Poems " were
unendurable ; " But what," asked the Dean, "is The Choice,
or who ever heard of its author ? "
" This," concludes our moralist, " arises from the great
importance which every man supposes himself to be of."
Whatever he undertook, Richard might feel it would be
370 EICHAED EDNEY AND
entitled, " By the author of a Certain Disturbance ! " Yet
how many there were in Woodylin who had never seen the
book, nor heard of the disturbance ! How many who had
only seen the cover of the book, or read its title in a news-
paper advertisement !
Perhaps being deplumed has the same effect as wearing
feathers, in the fancy that one is the observed of all observ-
ers ; and a sense of disgrace excites the reacting imagina-
tion like a love of applause.
We have said Richard's heart, among other vagaries, got
into his eyes and ears. In that heart was a variety of
things, — the "World," the Church, the street, — this and
that man, this and that circle, — many vague and indefinable
objects, and strange and wonderful impressions of things;
and he could hardly look up without seeing or hearing what
pertained to himself, — even as we should suppose, more
literally, the sweet singer of Sweden, who has filled the
earth with her melody, could hardly open her ears any-
where without hearing the echo of her voice, as she cer-
tainly cannot open her eyes without seeing her name in all
places and on all things.
Yet herein he mistook, — I will not say his duty, — but
the fact.
In the city at large, the Old Town especially, and among
the citizens outside of the Family connection, his rejection
by the Governor's daughter was a nine days' wonder, with
an evening or two of commentary, and no more ; and even
in that connection, except in the detached and remote hours
of unreserve and reverie, it gradually dropped from the
tongue.
We say Richard made a mistake. Yet it might have
been difficult for him to be correct.
His great sorrow held up the world to his view as in a
THE governor's FAMILY. 371
kaleidoscope, which by invisible hands it kept turning round ;
and, at each revolution, men and women, — his fellow-
beings, -^ like the glass and beads in the toy aforesaid,
tumbled into unexpected groups, and darted ofT with every
conceivable expression.
It would be hard to determine his precise footing with
such folks.
For the most part, he left the public walks, and attached
himself to the Saw-mill and Willow Croft.
He had plenty of time for reflection; and among the
things that self-examination brought to light, he thought he
espied a lurking ambition. Had he been too ambitious ?
— sinfully so? — or only to the extent that was natural,
laudable, and Christian? His desire to do good, he feared,
had been a desire to do great good ; his actual superiority,
in feeling and comprehension, to many about him, seemed
to have been tinctured with conceit ; his endeavor to rise in
the world, honorable and praiseworthy as were the means,
indicated some narrowness of motive ; his energy and per-
severance, in every benevolent word and work,^ were vitiated
by a regard to human approbation ; — perhaps he had relied
less on God, and too much on his own activity of nature.
Why did he feel, at times, so wretchedly, and mourn sore
like a dove over his disappointment? If he were truly a
child of God, and sanctified in soul, and imbued with res-
ignation, and raised to the tranquillity of life in Jesus, and
heir presumptive of eternal blessedness, would he breathe so
heavily ? These questions he could not revolve without
solicitude.
Was there not a certain swelling up and inflation of self-
ish regard in the whole scheme of his life, and filling a
space that should be occupied solely by God and duty?
Was he not more mortified at the discredit attached to his
372 RICHARD EDNEY AND
reputation, than distressed for detriment accruing to the
cause of Christ ? Would he be willing that the works of
godliness and humanitj^ should go on, and he himself have
no agency, or award, or figure therein ? Startling topics
these, that made his conscience throb, as if its nerve had
been touched by a dentist's needle. It is said that ants, in a
Church of Brazil, having bored through the floor, brought
up from the vaults beneath bits of coffins and shreds of
grave-clothes, and displayed them to the shuddering eyes
of the worshippers. A great sorrow, even in a sanctified
mind, sinks to the depths of one's being, and perforating the
vaults where follies and sins lie dead and buried, will some-
times surprise him with the sight of remnants of things
abhorred and rejected, and which he supposed had perished
forever.
" The importance which ever}' man supposes himself to be
of" assumed an unusual aspect, and dilated in extraordinary
proportions, in Richard's mind, about this time. He never
had such a realization of himself before. If he would ever
be great, he never felt himself so large, never experienced
such an exaggerated consciousness, as now. He seemed
aforetime to have lost sight of his own existence and indi-
vidualit}^; and now that existence and individuality, — what-
ever he had done or been, — all the plans he had engaged
in, — all the intercourse he had enjoyed, — seemed to con-
front him, and inflesh before his eyes, and well up in his
heart, and to be himself, and to double himself, and to shut
out from his attention all things but his attention. He had
no idea of what he had attained, until compelled to retreat,
and contemplate his ground from a distance. One measures
his height more by his fall than by his rise. The fall is
material and perceptible ; the rise is spiritual, gradual,
THE governor's FAMILY. 373
cla\vn-like. One falls with a crash, — he goes up with a
kind of buoyancy.
Sometimes he exclaimed, with Job, " O that I were as in
months past, — as I was in the days of my youth ! " He
wished himself like the boy David, a keeper of sheep again
in his father's pasture; — he sighed for the obscurity and
silence of the old forests where he had cut timber and slept
on boughs. He wished that he had never left the station
of slip-tender, under Captain Creamer ; — he envied his own
boy, the shingle-sticker.
He called to mind Cromwell's lament in Shakspeare. He
had read Shakspeare. It was the advice of Pastor Harold
for young persons to possess the great dramatist, — agreea-
bly, perhaps, to what tradition reports of old Dr. Strong, of
Hartford, Ct., who said he wanted but two books in his
library — the Bible and Shakspeare. He pathetically re-
peated Othello's words : —
" Had it pleased Heaven
To try me with affliction ; had he rained
All kind of sores, and shames, on my bare head ;
Steeped me in poverty to the very lips ; —
* * * But (alas !) to make me
A fixed figure for the lime of scorn
To point his slow, unmoving finger at, —
O! O!"
This " ! ! " came to be quite familiar to Richard. It
was all that remained to him in the way of expression. It
was as a letting off of steam. Eructation is useful in dis-
burthening the heart. The whole course of his days seemed
to have suddenly struck into a funeral procession, and the
noise of the world to be a beat of the muffled drum, and he
himself to be keeping slow and measured tread, as he moved
downwards to obscurity and silence.
Yet Richard recollected duty, and strove to carry forward
32
374 EICHARD EDNEY AND
the intention, if he was obliged to deviate from the method,
of his former goodness.
He went occasionally to Elder Jabson's evening meetings,
in the neighborhood of Willow Croft. The Elder was kind
and attentive to Richard, and, waiving reproachful consider-
ations, treated him as a friend and brother. At this time
the doctrine of the Second Advent was being discussed in
the Elder's parish, and it agitated the meetings. The good
Minister himself was not free of doubt. Some of his flock
were selling out, in anticipation of the great event. Richard
spoke on the subject with some warmth, and not a little
judgment. He explained that the anticipated Coming of
our Lord, so far as concerned this world, was a spiritual phe-
nomenon ; — that it was to be realized in the heart and life,
and to be fulfilled in the amelioration of society and pro-
gress of the race. The fire, said he, is that which consumes
iniquity. The cloud-gloiy is the beauty of holiness. The
light is the radiance of universal love. The new heavens
are what we may have in our families, our towns, our na-
tion. The idea of atmospheric convulsions and geological
ruin, he said, originated in error and superstition ; and he
explained how, in every age and in various places, it had
been productive of terrible evils and unspeakable wretched-
ness. He must have been indebted for some of his facts
to Pastor Harold. Then he expatiated with fert'or, and
almost a Pythian boldness, on the power, solemnity and
grandeur, of the real coming of Jesus.
The Elder was pleased, and most of the congregation
acquiesced. " I have felt under trial," said the former,
" like a cart pressed under sheaves. I have sometimes
thought, in this matter, we had run, before we were sent ;
but I have peace in my soul to-night, — I might say a
shouting, peace. We shall have cause to thank God in the
THE GOVEBNOR's FAMILY. 375
day of eternity for Brother Edney's word. I believe he
spake as he was moved by the Holy Ghost. Let us rejoice
that we are not in hell, but still on praying ground ! "
Richard felt refreshed, that night, by the vision of Jesus
that had been kindled in his imagination. He compared his
feelings when he got home with the thought he had at the
meeting. He was sensible of a harmony between the two,
— that he had uttered not merely what he knew, or what
the occasion momentarily suggested, but what was profound
in his convictions, bedded in his nature, and what, after all,
seemed an indestructible tendency and appetency of his
spirit. He was glad to have those old and beloved sensa-
tions revive ; — it was a coming up from the darkness that
covered them of sentiments and principles that he believed
were eternal within him. The image of the coming king-
dom of his Lord had a brightness and majesty that con-
trasted his situation indeed, but not his purposes ; and if it
discouraged certain forms of overt action, it animated all
the more the interior sphere of his piety.
In the parlor, with Roxy and Munk, before retiring, he
sang the hymn that begins, " I love thy kingdom, Lord."
At these words, —
" If e'er my heart forget
Her welfare or her woe,
Let every joy this heart forsake,
And every grief o'erflow," —
they were all touched. Richard was a good and sincere
singer, and Roxy not only knew that the pathos of his
voice truly interpreted the condition of his soul, but she felt
how with a certain choking resoluteness of heart, and sol-
emn, painful heroism of intent, he sang.
The next day, obedient to the feeling of the night before,
he purchased a small golden cross, which he lodged care-
376 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
fully within his vest, and wore over his heart. Every night
he hung it up directly under his Motto.
Richard would still do good ; n-or was he without oppor-
tunity. Outside of the large and tempting field where he
had so long labored, and from which he imagined himself in
a sense banished, in the "margin" of things where he lived,
he found enclosures, or rather wastes, that demanded Chris-
tian attention, and appealed to Christian fidelity. At Bill
Storiners' Point, collecting his pupils from the neighboring
forest, from the docks, and Islands, including Chuk, and two
or three mill-boys and river-drivers, he formed a sort of
Ragged School ; and Sunday evening he had a small con-
gregation of what are sometimes denominated the Great
Unwashed ; and Miss Freeling would call the Bare Feet.
These had to be instructed, not only in the first principles of
the doctrine of Christ, but in rudiments of behavior and
decency, and the proper use of their mother tongue ; and
some must be taught reading and spelling. I know not
whether it is an honor to Chuk, or a reflection on the rest,
to say he was at the head of the class.
In this, Richard did not forget the Griped Hand and the
Church. He loved and would serve both ; and hoped that
he might make of these "Wild Olives, as he called them,
plants that would do to graft on the domestic and civilized
stock, and such as might adorn and bless those higher
spheres to which he hoped ultimately to commit them.
CHAPTER XXXVI
Mr. Augustits Ma:xgil, the musical money-dealer, — why
should not such a man be musical ? — approached Richard,
as he was " shutting down " the Mill, one day, in his lively
way ; his little eyes pleasantly snapping, his left finger
playing about his ear, and his right knee crooking rather
antic-like. "An investment," said he. "A little down,
but a good deal up. In plain words," he continued, " I have
embarked in hens. Not deep, but high, — high, I call it ;
so ; " — he marked an altitude with his hand in the air.
" Flour-barrel high ; — full-blood Shanghae ; — eight dollars
a pair ; — feathered to the heel ; — an egg a day, and ask no
questions. I want a place to put them. If you will fur-
nish that, it shall be joint-stock. At Willow Croft is just
the spot, and your folks, women and children, are just the
men. "We shall want a few boards and laths."
They walked oa together towards Willow Croft. En-
countering Munk, the Broker's scheme was opened to him.
Richard was ready, and Munk consented. The children
were delighted, and Roxy was to have plenty of fresh eggs.
They selected a place at the foot of the lot, Richard
ordered up the lumber, and Mangil superintended the struc-
ture. In a few days they had a " house " well appointed,
and three or four families of the most notable Asiatic fowls.
Every morning one of the " Wild Olive " boys brought a
box of what was termed fresh meat for chickens, — beetles,
32*
37S RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
spiders, worms ; and there was such a time feeding the
family, and Memmy and Bebby did busk and pudder so,
we cannot tell it all. There were eggs, and there were
chickens ; — the marvel ! Munk liked to eat eggs ; Roxy liked
to cook eggs ; Memmy liked to bring them in in a basket ;
and Bebby liked to hold one in her hand, — just once, — just
a little, — so softly, — so shrinkingly ; and Richard and
the Broker liked to count the profits. There were so many
questions, withal, about lime, sand, water, oats, barley, and
what not; and how to prevent a hen setting when she was
a mind to, and how to make her set when she was not a
mind to ; and which was best, one large egg, or two small
ones ; and about the value of the different importations ;
and there were so many persons to see the hennery, and so
many inquiries to be answered, and so many suggestions to
be considered, and so many wipes to be parried ; — it was
altogether exciting business ; and it was just the sort of
excitement that Richard needed.
Did Mangil know this ? Ah I there is a question. Roxy
said he did ; and that this was a trick of his. INIangil had
his way, the same as Climper had, and the rest of mankind
have.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
INCIDENTS.
We were about to commence this chapter with the word
" Our readers." But while adjusting the nib of our pen on
our thumb-nail ; — the prongs having crossed their arms, —
tired and sleepy, we suppose, — it was late at night ; — that
word, sleepy too, impatient and fretful, began to mutter.
" Readers ! what does he know about readers ? His read-
ers ; I should wonder ! " it seemed to say. This made us
curl a little, and while we were meditating some stifling
rejoinder to this impertinence, the solar lamp suddenly gave
out. There was no help for that, and we sank back resign-
edly in the rocking-chair, and fell into a doze. It may be
added, that we had been engaged, the day before, reading a
work entitled " The true history of the earth and its
INHABITANTS ; sJioiving the analogy between man and brute,
and deducing the human race from Jive varieties of the
oyster, recently discovered in a fossil state under the Frejich
Academy ;" a suggestive volume, with plates of sections and
atoms of shells as microscopically developed, in which,
among other things, are seen human forms in embryo, lobes
of the heart, brain-shaped configurations, finger-nails ; the
chit of an idea, and a veiy perfect approximation to a Gothic
church.
While sleeping, we seemed to be standing on a plain,
where were many animals, and a number of books ; and in
the distance stood anxious-looking umbrae of authors. First
advanced the lion, and.with a slight flourish of the tail, he
380 RICHARD EDNEY AND
devoured fifteen of the newest books ; a dream-allusion, I
suppose, to a habit this animal possesses of taking fifteen
pounds of raw flesh at a meal. Then came a kangaroo, who,
lifting the lid of a book, instantly leaped from the imprima-
tur to the colophon, and proceeded in this way from volume
to volume, as it were playing leap-frog among them. A
chamois goat would open a book, and if he found crags and
chasms in it, he gambolled amongst them, and seemed to be
uneasy at a level spot. A book was seen sinking in a pond
of water; instantly, at the beck of an author, a Newfound-
land dog swam for it, and bore it safe to the shore. Mar-
mots appeared burrowing in books, and making a home for
themselves in the middle of the pile. A squirrel sat on the
cover of one, with a nut in its mouth, A flock of crows
alighted on the spot. The authors trembled ; they seized
the forlorn shade of one of their number, and set it on a
pole for a scare-crow. Chimney-swallows flitted among the
books, in pursuit of dark and smirchy places, where they
could build their nests. An anaconda glided through the
grass, and having first smoothed and polished the volume of
his choice with a sort of mucilage, proceeded to swallow it.
Then he fell into a swollen torpor, with the corners of the
book protruding from his mouth. A rhinoceros came up
from a muddy creek, having a terrible horn on his nose,
which he turned every way ; — the timid umbrae fled. The
creature, approaching the books, gored some and tossed
others. Looking in the direction where we were standing,
he seemed to be aiming his horn at our shadowy self; — in
exceeding terror we awoke.
This dream, mixed and incongruous indeed, as all dreams
are, and the History above mentioned, set us upon reflection.
Is there not, we asked, an analogy between certain zoologi-
cal species and the readers of books ? The law of analogy
THE governor's FAMILY. 381
would seem indeed to be imperfectly developed ; and yet its
accredited results are striking. For instance, Ulrici dis-
covers in the plays of Shakspeare a compend of all the
points of Calvinism. Gardiner classifies musical instru-
ments after the colors of the prism. Even in the Bible, we
find David comparing himself in trouble to a bottle in the
smoke. Should we transcend the proprieties of the case, if,
in a matter of mere speculation, we discriminated readers
of books by the marks of certain faunae ? In fact, is not
this agreeable to the whole method of analogical and deriv-
ative science ?
There is, then, the leopard. It is related this animal may
be taken in a trap with a mirror at the bottom. Let an
author bait his book with a looking-glass; this reader,
discerning in his own image what he supposes is a monster
that he is in duty bound to devour, pitches in headlong, and
may be easily taken. The Newfoundland dog, we should
imagine, would be a favorite of all authors. The cat is the
delight of most persons ; yet, if you chance to tread on the
tail of one that has been a pet for years, the creature will
turn on you teeth and claws. The giraffe goes through the
forest of an author's thoughts, and plucks off the sweet buds
and tender leaves from the tops of the trees ; at the same
time, with dirty hoof, he tramples the pretty stars-of-Bethle-
hem, and useful checkerberries, that grow beneath. Rather
to be avoided, we should suppose. The hippopotamus sinks
into a book, like water, and can be seen walking at his ease
on the bottom. He is obliged to rise to the surface to take
breath. The musk-deer reader is graceful and engaging;
has beautiful dark eyes, with a voice like a sigh ; but is said
to be indolent. Wild turkeys, before proceeding, assemble
on an eminence, and remain in consultation one or two days.
At length the leader gives the signal note, and taking a par-
3e2 RICHARD EDNEY AND
ticular direction, is followed by the rest. — Common in Amer-
ica. It is justly observed, that the sagacity which enables
the domestic cock with such precision to announce the hour
of dawn, is matter of astonishment. One is sufficient. —
The bob-o-link is remarkable for changing his name, note,
and color, as he goes from the North to the South. How
fortunate is that author whose friends are the mocking-
birds ! Would somebody present us a cage of canaries,
to hang in the bay-window of our study, and sing betimes
to our melancholy, and answer when we whistle, we
should deem ourselves happy. At rare and angelic inter-
vals, — a shuttle-like iridescence, a feathery pause in the
stillness of things, — a little humming-bird has been seen
gliding about our verandah, and tasting with nicest relish
the honeysuckles whose nee tared goblets hang out all
day long on the pillars. If we were to name a reader
to be -chiefly recommended, we should find the type in
those very common objects, cows. They begin at the bars,
the title-page, and graze to the end of the pasture, and
regraze ; they drink at the murmuring brooks, the pleasant
fancies of an author, — repose under the shade of the great
trees, and ruminate ; they afford to the public tasteful and
useful results of their labor. The swan offers points of
interest. To see this graceful creature, with arched neck
and half-displayed pinions, sailing over the serene surface of
a great idea, which reflects, as she passes, the sno-wy beauty
of her dress, flatters an author's vanity. The most terrible
of all American snakes is the copper-head. An author
need not be afraid of toads. They are useful about one's
grounds. They feed on insects, and are good against
vermin. There is a vulgar notion concerning this creature,
it being supposed, from the great numbers that appear after
a rain, they descend with the shower. This may be true.
THE governor's FAMILY. 383
The great lantern-fly is remarkable for the light that
emanates from its head, — a light by which it usually reads.
These are some of the kinds of readers distinguished in the
manner above mentioned. They are such as an author will
meet with ; — many of them he will be happy to see ; others
he will do well to shun. At first blush there is something
dismal in a writer's prospect. Quite large portions of his
world seem to consist of jungle overrun with rapacious
beasts and reptiles, or of swamps crowded by venomous
insects. But these must all live. Dr. Good tells us. More-
over, we may remember that insects are useful in disin-
tegrating the soil, and rendering it light, loamy, and fertile.
There is, it may be added, in the East, a tribe of barbarians
who handle the most venomous reptiles with impunity, and
eat them alive, from head to tail. Celsus and Lucan make
mention of them, and they were called by the ancients,
Psylli. A club of authors might import a few. Besides,
Dr. Bell contends that there is no real ferocity in the lion,
for instance ; that his glare is merely excited attention, and
his grin or snarl the natural motion of uncasing his fangs
before using them. How many of the feras, withal, can be
tamed ! In fishes the sense of smell is so acute, that if an
author will rub his hand with extract of rose, or even leaves
of marjoram, and dip it into the water, he can draw any
quantity of these creatures into it. Good Pierre, before
quoted, declares, and supports his opinion by striking testi-
mony, that wild beasts will fly a naked man ; whence I
infer that an author would do well to present his thoughts
simply, directly, as it were naturally, and not rely upon con-
ventional adaptation, or academical canons.
And we are reminded, in this connection, nor can we for-
bear to mention, what a fine race of readers used to exist, —
the Lectores of scholastic days. " Candidus," " ingenuus,"
384 RICHARD EDNEY AND
" benevolens," " vigilans," were universal traits. Has that
race become extinct ?
We digress. We were about to say, our readers would
remember — something. — Yet, after all, does not this
imply considerable ? First, that we have readers ; secondly,
that they have read the book ; and thirdly, that they have
attended to what they read. Can one imply so much,
without a latent reference to other things, — say, to this
whole matter of the different sorts of readers, that we
have so pleasantly discussed ? Nor can it be a thing of
small personal moment for any author to know what sort of
readers he shall be. surrounded by, — whether by swans or
anacondas, nightingales or cougars. If the reader of these
pages has any of the properties of the domestic cat, for
example, we can rely upon him, and while he honors us
with his confidence, and has a place by our fireside, we will
be cautious how we tread ; for this creature inspects every
portion of a new house before she makes up her mind about
it. So our reader will have gone over that passage, and a
short one it is, in Chapter V., where allusion is made to cer-
tain business transactions between the elder Edney and
Governor Dennington ; and will remember — it is a trifle —
that the former was under indentures to the latter as
relating to his farm ; and that one of Richard's objects in
coming to Woodylin was to obtain means for cancelling this
contract. Being so fortunate as to have amassed the
requisite sum, now, while his sorrow was fresh upon him,
he repaired to the Governor's office to apply it. That
gentleman received our friend courteously and quietly, as
was his custom ; greeted him with a cordial " good-morn-
ing ;" shook hands with him ; shoved a chair towards him,
and had him seated by his table ; alluded to the pleasant-
ness of the weather, and inquired after his father. He
THE governor's FAMILY. 385
took from a large file the papers in question, computed the
interest, counted the money, and gave Richard a receipt.
The Governor loved to do business ; he did it in the softest
and easiest way imaginable. Perhaps this made him so
good-natured at the present moment.
Richard arose to leave, when, as if a new thought had
struck him, taking a gold piece from his pocket, he extended
it towards the Governor, and, with suppressed emotion, said,
" Sir, I received that, two or three years since, upon resign-
ing a horse, whose fright in the street had arrested my
attention. I do not wish to keep it." " I recollect," said
the Governor. " My daughter Melicent was in the sleigh.
It showed spirit and nerve." " I do not wish to keep it,"
reiterated Richard, growing paroxysmal inside. "Melicent
said," continued the Governor, unmoved, but bland, " few
acts of heroism were better carried through, or deserved
more honorable remembrance." " Will you have the kind-
ness, Sir," pursued Richard, " to receive back that which.
suggests nothing pleasant to my memory?" The Governor
did not, or could not, or would not, enter into the spirit of
Richard's tender; he merely replied, " It is not mine, — it
is yours." He opened his day-book, and appeared to be
making an entry. Richard would have thrown the gold into
the fireplace, or out of the window; but the manner of the
Governor would not allow this, and, finally, forced it back
into his pocket.
Richard was a little piqued, and a little surprised ; and on
his way home he could but wonder, partly at himself, and
partly at the Governor. It was as if the latter was wholly
ignorant of all recent transactions, and the former was sen-
sible of nothipg else ; and this sensibility, and this ignorance,
had a queer encounter.
. Richard went to the office with any quantity of misgiv-
33
386 RICHARD EDNEY AND
ings and chokings, yet the Governor did not, in any way,
appear to be cognizant of, or willing to revive, disagreeable
recollections. Wherefore ? This puzzled Richard. Did
politeness conceal contempt ? Was the Governor's aversion,
like deep water, silent because it was deep? Did business
keep in abeyance all paternal and moral sentiments ? Yet
he alluded unreservedly to his daughter, and pleasantly to
the reminiscences of Richard, who, on the whole, felt better
after the interview than before.
From this incident we are disposed to draw an inference
for our readers Ruminantes. It is said men are governed
by their interests, — that is, pecuniary interests. We
oppose the example of Richard, point-blank, to that theory.
He would gladly be rid of money. Nay, men are governed
by their emotions ; in other words, moral sentiments.
Again, it is asserted that the golden eagle is one of the
American gods; nay, furthermore, Richard held in his hand
a veritable golden eagle, which he would cheerfully have
flung to the depths of Tartarus; into the face of Pluto him-
self, if he could; — a fact worthy of consideration. Gold,
heavy as it is, will not outweigh a passion, be it individual,
— be it national. This we suggest to those of our read-
ers who do not affect the golden eagle, or the fustian
eagle, and yet are like the mountain eagle, in the grandeur
of their flight, intensity of their gaze, terror of their swoop,
and especially in the way they pounce upon another of their
tribe, the fish-hawk, to disgorge him of his prey.
Another incident. As Richard was walking, towards
dusk, turning the corner of St. Agnes-street, he saw Mel-
icent slowly approaching the gate of her father's house.
Here she stopped, and stood looking in a direction opposite
from him. She was a dozen rods off". Above her were the
branches of the great elms. Beyond was the sunset. She had
THE GOVEKNOr's FAMILY. 387
on the same blue shirred bonnet, white cashmere shawl with
dark spots, and blue muslin dress, — the same that Richard
had seen before. Her hand reposed softly and gracefully on
the latch of the gate ; her parasol was dropped, carelessly
upturned, on the flagging at her feet. Richard's heart went
to throbbing, of course. It was as if the sight diffused a
fragrance, in which all his senses swam. She disengaged
the shawl from her neck, and hung it on her arm, still look-
ing the other way. If Richard had been a German, ho w^ould
have wept; if an Jtalian, torn his hair; if a Frenchman,
leaped towards the beloved one. He was an American, and
did not know what to do. He could not remain stationary ; he
dared not advance. As he was about to retreat, or, rather,
make a detour across the street, on the opposite walk he be-
held Miss Eyre. She was loitering, and had evidently been
watching him and Melicent. Well, go back. But in this
direction, his eye encountered the person of Clover, partially
concealed by the twilight shadows of the trees, who had
been reconnoitring all three. Fly, sink, burst; he would
have rejoiced in any slight miracle, or, as he was sufficiently
distended, why not, like a kernel of corn in the fire, permit
him to pop out of his dilemma, and drop, say, into his little
chamber at Willow Croft? There was the glimmer of an
equivocal smile on Miss Eyre's face; Clover satanically
gloated ; Melicent had her back towards him, with her eyes
on the clouds. Silent, calm, unconscious Melicent, in her
blue dress ; what a fever she created, — what a prairie-on-
fire, with the flames approaching and fencing one in on all
sides, she incontinently aroused ! She went through the
gate, and into the house, and made an escape at once for
Richard's person and alarm.
A reader of the manuscript, — perhaps a lion inspecting
a flock of kids in the distance, — perhaps a musk-deer,
388 RICHARD EDNEY AND
pretty, but languid, — says the wTriter questions, when he
ought to narrate ; hints at what should be developed, is
redundant in unimportant brevities, sparing in what is rich
and copious, and that, hastening through pleasant fields, he
loiters in barrens. For instance, that in this last incident,
while there is much said, there is an omission of what is
essential to the right feeling of the scene, — to wit, that the
dress of Melicent, the contour of her person, the verisimili-
tude of her motion, the way she rested her arm on the gate,
had been endeared to Kichard by the deepest of all associa-
tions — love. That the gate-post supplanted his arm, and
he must needs be pained at the interference. That the con-
trast between the pleasant past and the dismal present was
provoking; that his heart was inflamed with a sense of
repulsed, disdained love, that still loved on. Our reply is,
that we described the case in its phenomena, if not in its
substance ; that we stated the external facts, if not their
spiritual connection ; in a word, acting upon the suggestions
of our respected College Rhetorical Professor, made many
years ago, and living in our memory still, we " left some-
thing to the imagination of the reader."
That night, as sometimes happened, Bebby slept with
Richard. The Moon, bright and full, shone into the
chamber, and upon the bed, and on the child, restoring the
beauty of the features, and illuminating the silvery hair of
the slumberer. Richard raised himself on his elbow, and
bent over the unconscious enchanter with mingled agony
and ecstasy. It was as if a vision of beauty and repose had
been lent to him from some far off heaven. It was as if his
own innocency and early promise had been collected out of
his life, and laid in breathing form at his side. Was it his
Childhood come back to mock him ? Was it put there to
re inspire him ? He worked his fingers in his dark hair, till
THE governor's FAMILY. 389
it hung in tang-Jed locks over the pearly fairness before him,
and his worried brow contrasted strongly with the calm face
of the little one.. It was Despair bending over Hope ; it was
Sorrow confronted with Blessedness ; it was penitent Aspi-
ration weeping at the feet of some long-lost Ideality. He
kissed the child, inhaled its balsamic breath, and laid down
by the side of it to sleep.
Fourth-of-July came, and the evening was to be celebrated
with a new display, — the illumination of May-flower Glen,
by lamps suspended in the trees, and heightened, withal,
by a band of music. Everybody was abroad that day, and
Richard, with Memmy and Bebby, followed in the wake.
Richard's enjoyment seemed rather to lie behind him, in
the children, than before him, in the scenes of the occasion.
He appeared to be hauling his pleasures along, instead of
going in pursuit of them. He labored under the mistake we
have commented upon. There were, at a moderate compu-
tation, 30,000 people in the city and in the streets thereof,
that morning, and all recreating ; and how few knew any-
thing of Richard, and how fewer were intent on anything else
than happiness, or were unwilling that everybody should
be happy loo ! Richard found this out before the day
was over, and that he had really nothing else to do but for-
get himself, and care and sorrow, and be as happy as the
rest. He found out, too, that he was not of any conse-
quence compared with a show-bill of the Theatre, which a
jam of people on the side-walk were almost in a quarrel to
see, and never thought of opening for him to pass. There
were gay processions through the streets, and great crowds
following them ; there were crowds about Dr. Broad well's
Church, where an oration was to be delivered ; >there vvere
multitudes of boys and girls, from the country, filling the
candy-shops and ice-cream saloons. Memmy and Bebby
33*
390 RICHARD EDNEY AND
saw SO many strange sights, and fell into so many novel
situations, their surprise, curiosity and glee, were gradually
communicated to their Uncle.
But May-flower Glen, in the evening, was the greatest
spectacle. Half a thousand lamps shed a palatial, alabas-
trian light through sylvan corridors, and on grassy ter-
races ; they glimmered in the tinkling brook, and glowed
again in thousands of bright countenances. There was the
vacant strolling to and fro, the chattering of animated
groups, the roistering of children, and the quiet looking on
of elderly people. There were fair young ladies, in white
dresses, and lavender-colored dresses, and changeable silk
dresses ; girdled, tuniced, caped ; with flowers in their hands,
and on their breasts, and in their hair; and great luxuriance
of beautiful hair, and great glory of joyous feeling, and a
whole Avoca-vale of sweetness, loveliness, and hope, in their
eyes and on their lips. There were noble-looking young
rnen, in white trowsers and vests, and some with red sashes.
Hidden music filled the place with enchantment, as if Pan
and his nymphs, and their pipes, were concealed in the
grove.
We have not said that Richard had anything to do in
getting this up ; — he had, nevertheless. He was on the
committee of arrangements ; and, if less conspicuous, was as
effective as any. This committee wore red sashes ; — Rich-
ard omitted the badge.
Richard was so caught up, subdued, or etherized^ or
whatever it be, by the pleasantness of the hour, he saw Miss
Eyre pass without a pang, and beheld Melicent in the dis-
tance without emotion, unless it be that of simple gladness.
As he stood, with the two children in front of him, on a
seat, ]\Iangil approached, with Melicent and Helen the Good
on his arm. Mangil bowed, and Richard bowed, and they
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY. dyL
all bowed ; and Mangil took Eichard's hand, and so did
Helen the Good, and Richard and Melicent exchanged the
same, compliment. " Beautiful !" said the Broker; "fine,
inexpressible, — a high quotation ! It carries the board,"
" It was a splendid idea," said Helen the Good. "I enjoy it
exceedingly. Don't you? " said Melicent. Richard replied
that he did. " The children," added Melicent, " are so
happy!" "It is a great treat to them," rejoined Richard.
The children showed a joyous excitement when they saw
Melicent ; but Richard had the advantage of them, and kept
them still. Mangil, being one of the committee, wore a
sash, and, alluding pleasantly to Richard's want of it, said,
" You are not in authority to-night." " It goes off of itself,"
replied Richard. " Then it must have been admirably con-
trived," added Helen the Good. " I think so, too," said
Melicent.
At this moment, a lamp fell in the rear of Richard, and
there was a shriek in the crowd. " Will the ladies please
to look after the children?" said Richard, starting for the
scene of alarm. It was Miss Eyre, whom the accident
frightened into a swoon. Richard helped, bear her to a
seat, where, with due application of fans, and water from
the brook, she presently recovered. Richard returned to the
children, whom he found alone with Melicent. " Helen the
Good," said the latter, "is always foremost in scenes of dis-
tress, and withholds from no terrors ; and she, with Mr.
Mangil, followed you." " I was apprehensive," said Richard,
" in the haste of preparation, that some of the lamps were not
made sufficiently fast. I regret it exceedingly." " Did you
know the person?" asked Melicent. " It was Miss Eyre,"
replied Richard. "It is but a trifle," continued Melicent,
"and produces no sensible effect on the general festivity,"
" More scared than hurt," said Helen the Good, who
392 RICHARD EDNEY AND
returned, laughing. " She is a sensitive creature," re-
joined Melicent. " We were discussing the propriety of
repeating these illuminations," said the Broker. " I should
like it," said Eichard. " So should I," said Helen the
Good. " And I," responded Melicent.
Promenading commenced, and Mangil, with the ladies,
wheeling into the ranks, moved off to music.
As Richard had received and conversed with Melicent, so
he saw her retire, without agitation. He did watch the
rose-bud in her hair, till it was lost in a thicket of flowers
and the glimmering distance.
Ere long the band struck up Home, Sweet Home, the sig-
nal of dispersion, and the people obeyed the hint.
The sentimentalist asks, how could Richard keep his
countenance and heart, during such an interview with Meli-
cent? The reply has already been indicated in what was
said of the general exhilaration of the hour. There is an.
effect in festivity like music, at once exciting and tranquil-
lizing; it clears the atmosphere of the mind, and leaves one
in a state of azure quietude.
But, interposes the lady judge, that may answer for
Eichard ; — it does not explain Melicent. No woman, who
had ever so loved, or was so separated, could be so insensi-
ble and emotionless in a subsequent encounter. We would
not be wise above what is written, nor above what a lady
knows. But we are at liberty to conjecture, — first, that the
laws of emotion in the two sexes are not radically different ;
and,* therefore, secondly, that a woman, under these circum-
stances, might be calm. We believe, furthermore, if the
phrase does not offend, that a woman will swallow down
more emotion than a man, and preserve a face of stone
when the latter is flaming to the roots of his hair. Besides,
it may be stated that the love both of Richard and Melicent
THE governor's FAMILY. 393
was founded, as Miss Edgeworth would say, on esteem, and
not on impulse; and this will afford some key to their sub-
sequent conduct, throughout. Finally, Melicent was not
the aggressor, — she was purely a sufferer; and Christian
principle, to speak of nothing else, would save her from
rudeness, — check the ferment of feeling, and help maintain
the equilibrium of her mind.
What may be called the Philosophy of Blushes, in other
words, the law of the expression of emotion, has not been
written ; or if so, we have not seen it. The subject is a
curious and a serious one. Life and death hang upon it.
How had Melicent borne herself in trials so painful to the
female heart, and to all hearts, through which she had
passed ? If we should say she sometimes lamented and
wept, — that she had her hours of terror and anguish, —
should we hazard any truth ? Richard had arisen to her eye
a splendid model of a human being; and to see this shattered
by one blow, must needs distress her. But she had supports
that Eichard wanted ; — one, in the unequivocalness of her
position ; another, in the multitude of her friends; a third,
in the abundant and elegant ministries of her daily life.
In a letter to a friend, she says, "You will expect me
to be dejected. I am saddened by Richard, and for him.
He was so purely princely to my imagination, I am slow to
comprehend his vulgarity. Could the great Enemy of souls
dissemble so ? My attention was first called to the heroism,
simplicity, and modesty, of his outward life. My interest
was awakened by contact with his sentiments. I first knew
his heart, — was introduced to his reflections, and, so to
say, made the journey of his principles and purposes ; and
found myself a lover. I loved him as soul can love soul,
as sympathy yearns for sympathy, as weakness is won by
strength, as aspiration adores grandeur. Was he great
394 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
enough to deceive me? — simply, coldly, infernally vast
enough ? Harrowing suggestion ! cruel imputation ! ]My
chamber, which, has been enlivened by the flow of every
pleasant feeling, is sacred to silence and to sorrow. A
Sleeping Christ hangs on my walls ; — let me repose on my
God. Above sin and woe, doubt and questioning, is the All
Love ; — let me be the child of its bosom. Sparrows sing
in the trees at my window. Sunshine, and the blue heavens
above, and thegreen earth beneath, enconapass them. In
the midst of the beauty of Virtue and Hope that still sur-
rounds my darkened life, let me sing too."
CHAPTER XXX VIII.
CLOVER DISTINCT.
Clover had been at Green Mill frequently of late, loafer-
wise. The natural insolence of his look was deepened by
a mock complacency. Richard gave little heed to htm,
until, at length, he would be heeded. He sat with his feet
tossing on the mill-chain, — an endless chain, revolving on
a toothed shaft, and running through the entire width of the
building, employed to haul logs from the basin up the slip
to the bed. He blew out the contents of his mouth in stud-
ied and very dramatic directions. With his fists he seemed
to be kneading the air into strange shapes, which he wished
Richard to look at.
" ' Good morning,' did you say, Mr. Edney ? Yes, very
good ; perhaps what some meekly call morally good. Cer-
t&'mlee. How was the night? That good, too? Night, —
shadows, misery ; is there such a thing ? IMisery is heaves
in horses, — what is it in man? In cows, it is the horn-
distemper. La la la, rol la ! "
" I will be obliged to you to regard my feet, in disposing
of your humor," said Richard, punning and reproachful.
"I do," replied Clover; "it is no put-out to me at all.
I was fearful of losing your attention, — I did not know
but you would get abstracted. That cutting-off saw, I
should say, wanted filing; it has seen some hard stuff.
Goose-oil and yellow snuff are good for croup, and all cases
of strangulation, and when a man's heart gets into his
throat, and for a wheezy old mill like this."
396 RICHARD EDNEY AND
"I shall trouble you to remove your feet from that
chain, " said Richard.
" CertainZee ; you want to start it, — you want to see it
go round and round, — you want to see it haul up the great
black trunks of old life and hope ; and I could stop it, — I
could prevent it."
" I only meant, " replied Kichard, " if you did not stand
back, you might get hurt."
" I only mean," rejoined Clover, " that while my feet are
on the chain, you would not wish to or dare to start it.
Off? yes, I take them off; if you want to hear the clank,
clank, and see, coming up the slip, the shivered butts of
things, and the hearts all eaten out, and hollow and dead.
That is the English of it."
«' Of what ? "
" What you have been thinking about, this morning."
"I dislike your presence."
" I know you do."
" I shall take some pains to rid myself of it."
" It cannot be got rid of. You must keep it by you.
Your pains-taking makes it stick closer. It hugs, — abso-
lutely hugs."
Richard had become considerably aroused, to say the least,
by these words of Clover; and could not help but suspect him.
" Speak plain," he said.
" I do," replied Clover, with an unutterable sneer ; " so
plain you perfectly comprehend what I say. Shall I speak
plainer? "
" Come this way," said Richard, and called the fellow to
the rear of the building.
" You are acquainted with Miss Eyre ? " said Clover.
" I know her," replied Richard.
" Too well ! "
THE governor's FAMILY. 397
" None of your innuendoes, or I shall be tempted to pitch
you into the water ! "
" Where you have been, for some time. I doubt if you
can be anxious for my company."
" Why do you assail me in this way ? "
"I am acting out my unspeakable DESTINY ! ! "
" How long have you been at it ? "
" Some months."
" Have )'ou had any particular understanding with Miss
Eyre ? Answer me that."
" I have seen Miss Eyre."
" Have you conspired with her as against me ? "
"A singular question, — a cowardly question; I don't
wonder you look pale in asking it. But why set the chain
a-going ? "
•' What do 3'ou mean by j'our feet being on it ? "
" O, I like to rest them there. I skip and play on it; I
DANCE ON IT ! "
" You are a devil ! "
" Nay, you mistake ; mj'- name is Clover, — John Clover,
— son of Col. Clover, of Clover Hill. Moreover, the world
is clover, and you are clover, and I am — you know what,
— in it ; a little one, a fat one, a bright-eyed one. Tweedle
dum, tweedle dee, dum de dee dum ! "
" You have instigated Miss Eyre."
" I have exercised my rights. Have you forgotten ? I was
afraid you would forget. Now, say your catechism. — Who
was the first man ? "
"Adam," replied Richard; waiting to see what would
come.
" Who was the second man ? "
" In his own estimation, Clover."
" Well done ! a bright lad. You slightly transposed ;
34
398 RICHARD EDNEY A^V
Clover is the first man, and Adam the second. A mere
slip of memory. Try again. By what did the French take
Algiers ? "
" Might."
" Good ! Frame that, and hang it up to look at. By
what right do they hold it ? "
" Might."
" Bravissimo ! Go to the head of your class. By what
right are English laws in force in Calcutta ? "
"Might."
" Make that a postulate of your whole life ! By what
right are men held iia slavery ? "
" Might."
" That is the story ! You are now indoctrinated. Might
IS RIGHT ! ! Might creates right, — sustains right, — is the
sober little thing itself. This is the first principle of human
affairs. It is the universal law. It is the method of the
world ; and I am the world. I am an embodiment of it.
Its principles are seated in my breast;" he thumped his
ribbed hoUowness. " Its laws are codified, if I may use
the expression, in my fist ; " he displayed that member.
" And you have interfered with my happiness ?"
" You have insulted my banner ! You have fished in
my waters ; you have interrupted my business ; you have
usurped authority in my domain ; and I have crushed you !
I could do it, and I did do it ; that is all ! Whooeehoo !
whooeehoo ! "
It flashed upon Richard, — nay, it blazed and burnt upon
him, as if the sun had fallen at his feet, — that Clover was
6ack of the diffiiculty with Miss Eyre, and beneath it ;
remedilessly, diabolically, and everlastingly, there; and,
staggering at the thought, " Good God ! " he cried, quite
unable to contain his emotion.
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY. J»tf
" Perhaps you have not read," continued Clover, " what a
great historian says, that the sufferings of war purge human
nature. 1 mean that your human nature shall be purged.
And as you begin to pray, I doubt not you already feel
humble and penitent, and are ready to sue for peace, — for
peace with me."
" No more ! " said Richard ; " no more ! You have suc-
ceeded. You have crushed me. Heaven shall avenge
itself, — I will not. Could I pray, 'Father, forgive thee !'
I gather myself unto myself and my God. I submit to an
inexplicable Providence. I cease from life in the flesh, that
I may live the life of the spirit. Go, Clover ! I will not
&ay, go and be danmed ; but go and sin no more."
Richard clasped his hands bitterlj'-, and exclaimed, " O
my Father ! had it pleased thee that this cup should pass
from me ! Nevertheless, not my will, but thine, be done ! "
The Mill-men, as if a serious disturbance had arisen, with
axes and poles, ran forward ; and, at a word from Richard,
it seemed as if they would have struck Clover dead. Rich-
ard waved them into silence, and Clover strode from the
spot.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
IN WHICH THE AUTHOR BRIEFLY PHILOSOPHIZES ON MAN.
On a previous page, we undertook to say what a Tale,
with Richard and sundry things in it, was like. We did
not state what Richard, with sundry things in him, was like.
How, with emotion succeeding emotion, excitement spoom-
ing across excitement, and the suppression of all elementaiy
hope and life, could he exist at all ? We found him joyous
and glad in "Knuckle Lane" and Melicent, upset by Miss
Eyre, trembling before Melicent at the gate, calm in May-
flower Glen, lively in the Hennery, and now " crushed " by
Clover. Wave follows wave in the human breast, tumult
vies with tumult. But what is the human breast? What
is left of Richard now ? Let him have a good night's sleep,
some one says, and he will wake up feeling better. Nay,
and let it be all solemnly said, there is an Underv/orking, as
well as All-Encompassing God, who knits together the shat-
tered fibres of existence, and repairs the breaches in the
foundations of the soul. The great reaper, Sorrow, did seem
to have clipped Richard close and clean, and stooked him out
for aye; but there remained charity, truth, duty, and abso-
lute submission to God. And Richard had the spirit of
Christ; — or, at least, we shall for the present beg so much
out of the main question at issue. He was so thoroughly in
the feeling of his Master, that, in this his last trial, as it
were instinctively and unconsciously, he expressed himself
in those words which have become a formula of agony and
piety in all ages. His moral existence, his self-counter-
RICHAED EDNEY, ETC. 401
poise, his capability of sustained exertion, would seem to be
annihilated by the unremitting stroke of misfortune ; yet
he lived and worked on. How could this be, except through
the power of God, in which he trusted, and unto which
he clave ? There is the Gulf Stream, which moves on
betimes and proportionately, straight forwards, forevermore.
The winds would head it off; — they only fret its surface.
The tides invade it ; — it lifts them up, and bears them in
its arms. There may be a Gulf Stream of piety, conscien-
tiousness, rectitude, and faith in man. We hope there was
one in Richard.
34*
CHAPTER XL.
RICHAKD PERSISTS IN TRYING TO DO §00D.
He kept up his Ragged School, and did his best to tame
the Wild Olives. And in this charity he chanced upon two
singular and very unexpected co-laborers. These were none
other than Captain Creamer and Tunny. The Captain had
become reduced in estate and in feeling, — so much so, as
to beg small favors in money from Richard, whom he had
both patronized and abused. This tested Richard's Chris-
tian principle. Would he assist a man who had so an-
noyed him? He did, — he was kind to the Captain when
others abandoned him. The Captain became peevish and
dejected, as he was deserted and despised. Under these
circumstances, Richard not only helped him, but was able to
secure his help. He told him there was work to be done in
the Ragged School, and prevailed with him to unite in that
enterprise. But how should Tunny be there ? The Green
Grocer had fallen, too, — failed, and, like Richard, was
crushed. Worse than the mice, whose inroads he so pathet-
ically described, the vanity and folly of his wife had under-
mined him. He was reduced to what " the law allowed,"
— less then than now ; everything else, even to his credit
and good name, fled. It was rumored that he gambled ; —
and this hurt him.
Richard visited him in his bereavement, and his wife in
her despair, and was a comforter unto both. It was a sight
to melt one's heart, to see Mrs. Tunny in her faded kitchen
dress, without a curl in her hair, or a bow on her bosom.
Richard found employment in the Mill for Theodoric, their
niCTIARD EDNEY, ETC. 403
son. The Sailmaker, who had married their daughter
Faustina, and between whom and Mrs. Tunny alienation
never slumbered, Richard reconciled, and persuaded him to
commiserate his mother-in-law, and take her to live with
him. The husband he summoned in his train of benefi-
cence.
These three men, sufficiently miserable themselves, yet
found a lower misery to which they could minister. It
made Roxy smile to see Richard start off for the Point, of a
Sunday afternoon, with his two fellow-missionaries, on
their work of mercy. Mysie was the sexton of this Church,
— she opened the house, swept the floor, and lighted the
candles.
There was a little pleasant reiiction in Richard's favor.
Captain Creamer repented him of the wrong he did to
Richard, in refusing to testify before the court of females at
Whichcomb's. He knew it was his authoritative injunction
that caused Richard to stay in the chamber with the Old
Man and orphan girls. He would make reparation. Un-
known to Richard, who would not have suffered it, he went
to Miss Frecling, — a sort of flame of the Captain's earlier
and better days, — and reported tlie facts. This lady
repaired immediately to Miss Rowena,whom she knew par-
ticularly well, and repeated what she had heard.
CHAPTER XLI.
RICHARD GOES INTO THE COUNTRY.
Miss Eowena, while she could not doubt Richard's wrong-
doing, still felt that he had been harshly disposed of by Mrs.
Melbourne. In discussing the matter with the latter, she
even went so far as to seem to clear him altogether. She
was not sorry for any fissure of brightness in the case. She
thoroughly disliked Glendar. Keeping her own counsels,
however, she had the boldness, in company with Miss Free-
ling, to come directly to Willow Croft. Could the testimony
of Junia be had ? Would Richard be willing to go and see
her ? "I ask this," said she, " not in relation to any other
thing, or other person, than myself. I should really like to
know if Mrs. Whichcomb misrepresented. For my private
satisfaction, will you go ? " Miss Freeling and Roxy united
in urging the measure. " It can alter nothing," replied
Richard. But go he must.
It was midsummer, and Green Mill was active. — Captain
Creamer, to say nothing of Mr. Gouch and Silver, would
take care of that.
It was midsummer, and Richard had had his Night's
Dream ; and he would be glad of daylight, — he would be
glad of rest and recreation.
So he set off with Winkle on the road he had formerly
traversed. Winkle was kind to Richard, as he was to every-
body, and did all in his power to cheer the journey. What
on his former ride had really interested and delighted Rich-
ard, in Winkle and in the way, now had a melo-dramatic
effect, that served to divert him.
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 405
" That man," Winkle would say, as he passed along^,
" is n't dead yet. He has been dying this two year. — That
girl lost her lover. I did all I could to save him. — The
right eye of that goose has n't winked for twenty years. —
That boy has swung on that gate so long the hinges have
rusted off. — I wonder when Tim Doze finds time to eat !
He began picking his teeth in the door-way under the old
driver, and has kept at it ever since."
Richard at length reached the house whither he had orig-
inally conveyed Junia.
Junia was there, notwithstanding rumors of another sort.
The Old Man, her grandfather, was still alive, but weak and
infirm ; and he remembered the kindness Richard had done
unto him. Their abode was a pleasant one, in a region, on
a moderate scale, of considerable diversity. Elms towered
in shallow coombs. Corn-lots swept from the sky on one
side to a gully on the other. Wheat eddied across sunny
slopes. The light-green mowing was terminated by a belt
of dark forest. In the rear of the house was a flourishing
orchard. Cattle and sheep could be seen lying in clumps
of trees in the pastures. The highway, passing a neighbor-
ing farm-house, disappeared in wooded hills. Venerable
oaks were scattered about the premises. A white school-
house, and its " bordering " of maples, crowned a swell in
the landscape. There were many things that operated to
remind Richard of his own home and childhood, and recall
the days of his innocent and unfettered existence. The
woodbine, that veiled the front of the house, rolled its tide
of verdure over the roof, and shaded the snug parlor, was
like one he himself set out, and had recently seen, in Green
Meadow. The back porch, with its posts all alive with hop-
vines, was so like his mother's. The dairy-room had the
same white shelves and savory neatness as the one he had
406 RICHARD EDNEY AND
passed a thousand times. The gourd-dipper, — how often
had he dipped water with it, and held it by both hands to
drink ! In the garden, too, was the old sage-bed and its
border of marigolds and chrysanthemums. Farmer Cress-
well was an intelligent and industrious, and of course a
thriving man. His wife, the aunt-in-law of Junia, supported
her side of the house. They had a son, who helped his
father, — a daughter, the right hand of her mother, and
little children at school. They bought books, and took a
newspaper. It was a magnanimous and kind-hearted fam-
ily. They welcomed Richard with rural hospitality to rural
joys-
Here Junia had spent the years since she left Woodylin,
The father of Junia, an artist, having gone to Rome to com-
plete his education, on the return voyage was drowned. Her
mother died while the children were young, leaving to them
the legacy of a tender memory and unavailing regrets, — of
a spirit attuned to purest impulses, and a malady that ere
long appeared in Violet. They remained with their grand-
parents until one died, and adversity and weakness pros-
trated the other. The change in their grandfather, united
with alarming symptoms in Violet, induced the girls to
resort to the Factories.
Their aunt, the wife of Farmer Cresswell, and only sur-
viving child of the Old Man, meanwhile had died. Junia
was ignorant of her successor. If she had known what a
woman she was, and what a home the farm might be to her,
she would have been spared, if not her residence, at least
some of her sorrows, at Woodylin.
In her new home, she assumed charge of the school in
the neighborhood ; but tendencies similar to those that pros-
trated her sister disclosing themselves in her constitution,
at length forbade this species of exertion.
THE GOTERXOR S FAitflLY. 9^
The alteration in Junia, apparent to Richard's eye, for an
instant afflicted his imagination as a cloud on the joyousness
of her greeting, and a solemnity pervading the cheerful
courtesies of the house.
But sickness and sorrow are so much alike, this impres-
sion gradually assimilated with the prevailing mood of Rich-
ard's mind ; his sensations became toned down to the color
of Junia, and he seemed in spirit to be brought very near
unto her.
The neighbors said she was threatened with a decline.
She appeared, indeed, to have been summoned by the voice
of Violet, and to be slowly following to the realm of spirits.
The Old Man presaged the result, and, with decrepit hilar-
ity, instructed Richard in the fatal signs, and demonstrated
the veritableness of his predictions.
Yet Junia retained all her equanimity, and a good portion
of her strength. She went with Richard into the fields, and
took a long walk with him to a spring in the mountains ;
he helped her trim and relay the flowers in the garden.
Several days passed in delicious abandonment.
Richard imparted his distress to Junia, and she was
prompt to reply to it. But these communications and this
intercourse were not without a certain perplexity, the nature
of which we will endeavor to unfold.
This brings us to a sacred precinct of the human heart,
and one that we"should shrink from traversing, did not the
proper development of this Tale seem imperatively to
demand it ; and more especially were we not confident that
no handling of ours could detract from the essential interest
and value that invested -the subject to the parties imme-
diately concerned.
Let us briefly state the facts, leaving the mystical and
unknown spirit of things to that interpretation which they
may justly bear. Junia loved Richard, — not with an im»
408 RICHARD EDNEY AND
patient, or imperious, or forestalling love, — but with a
deep, strong love ; — a love constant, if not adhesive, -^ a
love that remembered, even if it was deficient in attention,
Richard's piety and charity, his delicate and constant
assiduity, his devotion to her sister Violet, and subsequent
care of herself, at that early period when this Tale opens,
won upon the heart of Junia, raised her mere enjoyment of
goodness to some desire of its possession, carried her from
the common ground of friendship and esteem to that some-
times called hazardous verge, where such feelings slide into
love, — slide unwittingly and unpurpdsely into it; — into a
love that does not announce itself, but lives in the shadow
of things about it, — lives, nun-like, in its own rriystery, and
novelty, and blessedness ; — and, perhaps, like the nightin-
gale, sings all the more sweetly for its confinement and
seclusion. In all this, as we conceive, no trace of bMme
attaches to Junia. Richard, at the time, had some dim
and unheeding impression of the fact. But, as an honora-
ble man, he encouraged nothing; as a modest man, he was
flattered by nothing; as a young man, preoccupied with
business and apprenticed to a trade, he remembered noth-
ing.
But when it was proposed that he should see Junia, dim
impressions of the past revived, — passively and spontane-
ously revived, — and perhaps worked to confuse his deci-
sion. And really the matter troubled his approach to her.
His errand related to his engagement with another, — re-
lated to what must indicate to Junia how hopelessly she
was separated from him ; — related, in a word, to topics
that must give her pain.
Moreover, Miss Eyre knew of the state of Junia's^eart.
Having early consecrated herself to Richard, Plumy Alicia
was jealous of any intervention or rivalry. She was wit-
THE governor's FAMILY. ■fi)9*-
ness of Richard's fidelity in the sick chamber ; she fol-
lowed Junia when she went to Willow Croft, and, by
methods peculiar to herself, learned the secret that otherwise
might have slumbered forever in the Orphan's breast.
Mrs. Eyre relied upon what she knew for the accom-
plishment of her subsequent purposes, or rather to prevent
Richard accomplish his. She believed that Junia, deeply
attached to Richard, would not lend an influence to facili-
tate his inclinations for another, and would prefer, of the
two, rather to widen, than close, the breach between him
and Mehcent. She felt perfectly safe with Junia, and
hence the freedom with which she alluded to her at the
council at Whichcomb's. Miss Eyre mistook her own sex.
Richard trusted the magnanimity of a virtuous heart !
The short and decisive inquiry he had to make of Junia,
whether his conduct towards her was open to question, she
answered with a prompt No ! " But why do you ask ? "
said she.
"For the gratification of my friends."
"You say you are separated from Miss Dennington?"
"Forever! " he added, with energy.
They were silent. Junia plucked the grass on which she
was sitting. Richard looked at the flickering branches of
the tree overhead.
" You did love her ? "
" I did."
"And do?"
" It is the mystery of my existence," replied Richard,
" that I do when I may not, and the discipline which my
heavenly Father imposes, that I must when I cannot."
" Do and may not, must and cannot," rejoined Junia,
smiling ; " ever and never ; now and now, and no to-mor-
35
410 EICHARD EDNEY AND
row ; — how strange a world this is ! There are others
like you."
This declaration startled Richard. He thought he knew
what it meant, and feared there was more meaning than he
would be able to manage.
" May not a desolate heart," she said, " embrace a deso-
late heart ? Embrace mine ! Hope," she continued, " dis-
tributes flowers in her vases, and keeps them to look at till
their brief day is over, when, like a careful housewife, she
flings them into a heap to die together ! "
She laid her hand upon his shoulder ; then, taking his
arm, they walked into the house.
It was a delightful home she had, and Richard was made
very happy there, and the family kept him many days. He
would hardly be sorry if it were decreed they should keep
him always there. Rarely had he seen the sun shine on
so pleasant a spot, — rarely had he seen so pleasant a spot,
when there was no sun.
" I love you," said Junia, " therefore do not be afraid of
me ; — I love you, therefore I will be your best friend; —
I love you, and I love those that love you. I have no
selfishness, no vanity, and will do what I can to make you
happy. I find my little all of bliss in telling you that I love
you. They say I shall die soon, — I will die for you. You
do not know a woman's heart, — you never can ; — nor a
young girl's heart, such as mine was, and has been, and
must ever be ; — nor how, as a wound in a tender sapling,
even when it heals up, remains in the tree, and becomes a
part of its heart, and gives its own shape to the fibres, and
has veins through which the life of the whole flows, — you
have been to me. And now, when you are lowest and most
degraded, and, if it must be so, most hopeless to my wish,
this love loves you the most."
THE governor's FAMILY.' 411
If Richard ever felt drawn towards any human being, —
if he ever felt repaid a thousand times over for all he had
done for any one, — if he ever felt thankfulness at relief,
like a sudden recoil in the jaws of a vice that held him, —
he felt this now in respect of Junia.
To a paper, like a deposition, or affidavit, vindicating
Richard from the calumny promulgated by Mrs. Which-
comb, and behind which Miss Eyre intrenched herself, com-
prising, likewise, the warmest and most forcible allusions to
his probity and sincerity, Junia affixed her signature, as did
likewise her Grandfather.
With this, Richard returned to Woodylin.
The document was conveyed to Miss Rowena, who, as to
her personal rencontre with Mrs. Melbourne, rejoiced in the
support it furnished. But more : she showed it privately to
Melicent, who derived what consolation she could from its
contents. Mrs. Melbourne, to whom it was communicated,
admitted its truthfulness, and allowed its entire weight.
But, said she, " Rowena, you must see that is not all, — it
is not a beginning. If that was all, the case were quickly
determined. I rejoice as much as you do in this. But the
greater, the stubborn, the wicked facts remain. Our evi-
dence is not like a chain that can be spoilt in its links ; — it
is like a stone-wall ; and though you remove a single rock,
the strength of the whole is not shaken," There was
force in the remark, however it stood with the evidence ; —
and Melicent felt it, and was silent. Cousin Rowena, not
quite abashed, said, " Perhaps we can make a breach through
the wall."
CHAPTER XLII.
QUIET RESUMPTION OF LIFE.
Miss Freeling, who became a sort of messenger between
Richard and the Governor's Family, told him how Miss
Rowena was pleased with the paper; — beyond this, she could
say nothing, and Richard expected nothing. In this, still,
he was repaid for his journey ; and added to this, his spirits
seemed to revive in the remembrance of Junia. He wrote
to her, and she to him ; and her letters were as music in
the night of his sorrows.
Clover clenched the nail of Richard's calamity, which
Miss Eyre had already driven to the head ; and despair be-
coming a habit and law of his mind, and getting himself
used to it, it offered less and less obstruction to the routine
of his days, and uniformity of his feelings.
He bowed to the will of Heaven, and addressed himself
with firmness and sobriety to the days of the years of his
pilgrimage. He read his Bible more diligently, — not to
repine with Job, but to invigorate himself on Paul, and
especially to imitate his Master, who went about doing
There were moments when he would abandon the city,
and retire to the country, returning to the house of his
father, or wedding the shadows of his heart to the evening
of the days of Junia. But his business was extensive, and
its concerns complicated, and it involved the interest of par-
ties very dear to him.
While he would utterly banish Melicent from his thoughts,
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 413
we may suppose he did it somewhat like the poet in Gil
Bias, who, having resolved to abandon his art, bade an eter-
nal adieu to the Muses, in verse !
Did he never complain ? Did no discontent overhang his
brow ? Did no imprecation attempt the purity of his lip ?
There is no trial so severe as that of the heart. There
is no furnace of affliction so hot as that enkindled in the
sensibilities. There is no temptation from which a man
had better pray for quick deliverance than that addressed to
the affections and sentiments.
The fowls were a fortunate affair. They supplied his
purse with cash, and his leisure with amusement. The
crowing of the cocks set Memmy and Bebby to cackling, and
Uncle must of course pipe up a little, too.
The ancient Church used to clothe its penitents in white
sheets. Richard seemed to belong to this class, for Roxy
declared his face was white as a sheet ; but Aunt Grint,
more lenient than those priests who ordered hair-shirts in
addition, recommended the extract of valerian, under which
he visibly amended.
And if still in any sense outside of the Church, he was
willing to serve it in the humble capacity of verger ; and he
sought to get his Ragged children into some of the meet-
ings. At least, he raised them to the Griped Hand, which
was a stepping-stone to the Church. Chuk improved in
manners and speech, and suffered Mysie to comb his hair
and wash his clothes.
The golden apples which Hercules took from the garden
of the Hesperides could not be kept anywhere else, and had
to be conveyed back where they grew. Men may say what
they will about the cultivation of virtue outside the Church,
there will always be a sighing and pining of these virtues
for the Church — the true Church. Richard especially, as
35*
414 RICHARD EDNEY AND
he seemed to have derived the seeds of the good he was able
to effect from the Church, was most happy in being permit-
ted to return thither sonie of the fruit. In truth, are not all
ragamuffins, gamins, sneaks, trulls, topers, Golden Apples,
that at some period or other have been stolen from the
Church?
Richard's old pupils of the Sabbath-school visited him,
and he took them to see his " Olive-garden," and they
assisted him in cultivating it. They brought their little
library-books, full of pictures and pretty ideas, and gave
them to these outcasts. They invited them to their pic-
nics and rural celebrations, and their mothers and aunts
made decent clothes for them. These Sabbath-school boys
led Chuk to the Griped Hand! This was considered a
great exploit, — a crowning triumph.
Dr. Broadwell and Parson Smith honored Richard with a
visit. These gentlemen, while they supposed Richard essen-
tially culpable, relied on his judgment and discretion, and
could not question his good intentions. Parson Smith,
indeed, had frequently seen Richard, and believing in the
soundness of his piety and purity of his aims, notwithstanding
the darkness that shrouded portions of his history, and see-
ing, as he thought, every token of contrition, was unwilling
that his relations to the Church and Christian people should
materially change. If he were a sinner before God, the
Parson argued, he had better keep within reach of the
appointed means of grace.
They called to converse with Richard on the Theatre^
circuses, and similar things, that were the pests of recrea-
tion, and corrupted the proper pastime of the people. The
discussion was harmonious and interesting. To concen-
trate on the Griped Hand, and make that attractive to Lei-
sure and Weariness, to Ignorance and Grossness, and the
THE governor's FAMILY. 415
varied desultory thirsts and instincts of men, was a foregone
conclusion. But could it have a kind of municipal prerog-
ative, — would the city confer upon the Rectors of that insti-
tution a licensing power, and compel the wandering disciples
of Thespis, and rude children of the Centaurs, to submit to
their arbitration, — a point would be gained. So these
Churchmen thought, and Richard with them.
Both these divines, in conversation with Richard, wholly
forgot that Richard was a bad man. The exercise of the
mind on any good object is wont to give a turn of goodness
to the mind. Moreover, Parson Smith theorized that bad
men might have some good qualities, and Dr. Broadwell
practised on the Parson's theory; — thus the working meth-
ods of these two men were identical. It was a favorite
notion with the Parson, that you had better shake hands with
a man's virtues, than kick at his vices. He was known
once to have said he would sooner take virtue from the
devil's back, than see it sprawling under his belly.
Some called this smooth preaching. " There are different
kinds of smoothness," he replied. " There is the smooth-
ing quality of the laundress' iron, the carpenter's plane,
and the farmer's roller ; there is a smooth road, and a
smooth skin ; there is the smoothness of silk and of liquor.
If we can iron down some of the wrinkles in human soci-
ety, — it is already well starched, — or joint religion and
life, or roll the fields we sow, that they may stand a drought,
and the Church be saved from dulling her scythe on stones,
when she mows, — it were smooth preaching something
yrorth."
Richard was an atom distressed by a letter from Junia, in
which, after announcing the death of her grandfather, she
says, " I am going to Woodylin. I long to be where Violet
is buried and Richard suffers. My father's earnest, beauti-
ful soul urges me. My mother's image, as an enmarbled
416 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
pale reminiscence, in the shadows of the past, smiles upon
me. Grandfather heard in the trees the same bird that
foreshadowed the death of Violet, and looking at me, he said
its note was Wood-y-lin ! I tremble for thy misery, good,
kind one ! Have I not caused it all ? Let me, if I cannot
remove it, be where it is. Be not troubled for my coming.
My excellent uncle consents to the journey. My cousin will
convey me to the stage road. Winkle will take care of
me then."
Richard replied, begging her not to come. Her presence,
while it would rejoice him, would do his cause no good ; —
that was past attempt, or hope. Her health, he said, would
be endangered. She would be among strangers, without a
home, or comforts, or friends, like her uncle's.
She rejoined, " Leave me to my resolution and my love.
Give me the ministry of your smile and gladness, for one
day. Conduct me to the spot where Violet lies, and, with
thy arm to lean upon, and the beauty of Rosemary Dell
about me, I shall go cheerfully to my final rest."
Richard gave instructions to Winkle, — who was on the
alert for whatever was pathetic, as well as prompt in what
was purely commercial, on his route, — to be mindful of
Junia, and bring her safely.
But Winkle could manage better than Richard. " Let
herwait another week, and that will be, he said, a full week;
and Mr. St. John will have to fit out an extra, and it shall
be the pleasant little invalid hack, and Simon, the pleasant
little invalid hack-dri^'er, shall drive it ; for Mr. St. John
owes it to the route, ever since he lost his bet on Tunny's
head ; and Munk will not object. I always told them, if we
only had a sick people's carriage, and a carriage with blinds
for lovers, and Simon, with his pleasant way of singing, to
drive it, we should do a swimming business. Did you ever
drive lovers ? It 's rich, driving them for nothing ! "
CHAPTER XLIII.
AN UNEXPECTED VISITER ACTUALLY COMES.
A VIOLENT thumping was heard at the door of Willow
Croft, which, before it could be properly noticed, answered
itself, and burst into the house in the obese and burly shape
of Climper, of Climper's, or rather of Merrywater. He had
on a farmer's frock, and brandished a large whip in his hand.
" I am an odd fish," he said ; " I know I am. People abuse
me, and I let them alone ; — that is odd. They are kind to
me, and I am kind to them ; — that is odd. They won't be
happy, and I make them happy; — that, again, is odd. Out
of this," — he touched Richard with his whip, — " no more
sulking ! You would n't dance with Mrs. Melbourne, and I
made you ; and she likes it, and has had some more of it,
and I mean she shall have more yet. I love to please peo-
ple. Forward ! "
This was concise and forcible, — rather too much so for
Richard, in his present weak state. He would fain have an
explanation. The commentary was as obscure as the text.
But Richard learned as much as this, — that Climper liked
Richard and the Governor's Family ; — there may have been
cause from the fact that the Governor and his Family, and the
coaches belonging to Munk, Richard's brother-in-law, often
visited Merry water, and were profitable customers of Climper;
— that he had heard of the rupture between them, and pos-
sessed, as he imagined, a clue to the origin of it in Clover.
This fellow had been at Merrywater with Miss Eyre, Once,
being out with them on the pond, and drowsily tending the
418 RICHARD EDNEY AND
tiller, and, as they thought, sleepmg, he overheard Clover
urging Miss Eyre to the- assault of Eichard, and particu-
larly suggesting the method of approach, through Mrs. INIel-
bourne. He thought little of it at the time, — believed Rich-
ard could take care of himself. But a party, comprising
Captain Creamer, Mangil, Helen the Good, and Miss Free-
ling, being at his house, told him of the disastrous and irre-
trievable result. This man cherished, moreover, a particu-
lar disrelish for Clover, who ran up bills at Merrywater
v\rhich he never paid, and plagued Climper by a little yelp-
ing terrier that he took with him. Coming to Woodylin
with a load of vegetables for the Market, he went to Wil-
low Croft with purposes that he whimsically and character-
istically unfolded.
He would lead Richard to the Governor's. Richard drew
back. " That 's pleasant," said he. " I like opposition. It
stimulates me. Forward ! I '11 cry fire, if you wish it, and
raise the neighbors. Shall I run off with one of the chil-
dren ? Shall I go and let your hens out of the coop ? Shall
I get the city crier to ring your dumpishness through the
streets, — or you will not start? He laid his hand on
Richard's collar. The children clung to their mother, who
was herself alarmed. " I am not much used to women and
children," he said. " They are flesh, I suppose ; and all
flesh is vanity. If Richard knew this, he would be wiser
than he is now. We must teach him."
At this instant. Aunt Grint entered the room, in one of
her panics, though of a pleasanter sort than usual. " What
is it ? " she exclaimed. " We heard crickets as lively as
could be ! I could n't stop. I told Sally to mind the pot,
and I 'd run out, and see."
" We want this fellow to go to the Governor's," replied
Climper, " and he is n't willing. It 's a dreadful cross, but
he must bear it."
THE governor's FAMILY. 419
" That 's it ! " echoed the old woman. " I knew it was
something pleasant. I could n't stay to put up the dishes,
but come right out in the suds as I was. He shall go."
If Climper pulled at Richard's collar, Aunt Grint seemed
to drub his shoulders.
Resistance was unavailing against this novel pertinac-
ity. Richard took his hat, and went with Climper. Re-
luctantly, and with a shudder of trepidation, he allowed
himself to be taken to and through the Governor's gate, and
across the yard, and up the piazza, and face to face with the
great front-door. He must endure the heavy tramp of his
companion where he wished himself all cat's-paws, and his
violent ringing of the bell when there was not strength
enough in his own arm to shake a cob-web. Climper asked
for Mrs. Melbourne, and they were taken to the drawing-
room, Mrs. Melbourne appeared. She was formal and
reserved. She did not know to what she owed the honor of
the visit or the company. " To the pleasure I have in com-
ing to see you," replied Climper,, — " the same as people
come to see me," " People often behave very rudely at your
house," replied Mrs. Melbourne, " I know they do," re-
joined Climper, " and that is what has brought me here.
This young man — "
" I thought you would reler to his conduct," interrupted
the lady ; " but you need not. We are too well informed.
We (Jo not wish the subject broached in this way, Mr.
Climper."
" There are some things you would be glad to know."
" Nothing, — nothing,"
" There are some things I should like to tell you, I am
an odd man, — very odd; I love to tell the truth."
" If anything more is to be said, I must call witnesses, I
am disinclined to personal communications relating to Mr.
Edaey,"
420 RICHARD EDNEY AKD
She left the room firmly, and returned with Miss Row-
ena, Barbara, and Glendar, — a formidable troop, that
would have abashed anybody but Climper. Cousin took a
seat on the sofa by Richard. Barbara posted herself behind
the centre-table, where she thrust one hand into a book, as
if she would let agitation discharge at the ends of her fin-
gers into its leaves. Glendar sat very stiffly in a chair, with
his hand in his vest. It fell to Mrs. Melbourne to face the
occasion, and support its dignity.
Climper, in his way, related the plot Clover had concerted
against the peace of Richard and the Family.
" I know nothing of Clover, — neither do I desire to,"
interposed Mrs. Melbourne.
" Perhaps you do not," rejoined Climper. " I always go
against people's feelings, you say. I cannot stop that now;
— you must know about him."
" You will not insult my Aunt," said Glendar.
" Nor you either, so long as you run up bills at Merry-
water, which I suppose your Aunt is to pay."
Glendar grew more stiff in his chair, and seemed with the
hand in his vest to be clutching at his heart. Mrs. Mel-
bourne looked angrily at Climper, and worriedly at her
nephew. Cousin bit her lip very hard.
" There is nothing frightful in Clover." Mrs. Melbourne
tried to laugh the matter off". Climper laughed harder, and
added, " You are right. I have got my heel upon him."
" He is not a brute." This was a fling at Climper him-
self.
" He loves dogs, and is a dog ! "
" He is n't Miss Eyre ; — you must know he is n't, Mr.
Climper; and that is where wickedness lies."
Barbara trembled, and Richard, too.
" I have told you the truth about him,'" continued Clim-
per ; "and whether he is Miss Eyre or not, you can see. I
THE governor's FAMILY. 421
rather guess Miss Eyre is n't him, and is somebody else, and
you would do well to think so. He is a villain ; and if she
is n't him, perhaps she is n't a villain. Think of that. It
may do you all good to think of that. And I mean some-
body shall think of that. If you do not, and Miss Melicent
would come in, I would make her think of it."
This allusion to Melicent brought Glendar to his feet, but
it did not anybody else. Spending himself in an effort to
stand, tired, the young man left the room, and was speedily
followed by his indignant Aunt.
Climper said, " My business was with Mrs. Melbourne,
and I will go," — and took his leave.
No sooner was he out of the house than Mrs. Melbourne
returned, in haste, and flushed.
" We have been abused by that man. He was always a
brute ! " she said.
"You are very kind to the brute creation, Mrs. Mel-
bourne," said Cousin, softly.
This was better said than received. It raised a storm, in
which Richard would fain have got away.
" All this is nothing to the point," said Mrs. Melbourne.
" You must see that it is n't, Rowena." She did not deign
to address Richard.
" If it 's Clover's doings — " Cousin Rowena began to say.
" 'T is somebody's else doings ! " Mrs. Melbourne said
this with a tone so terrible, and a look so scathing, Richard
could not contain himself, and quite abruptly left the house.
He did, however, hear other words which Mrs. Melbourne
uttered, with a loud and almost tragic emphasis —
" You must see, Barbara, that Clover's agency don't alter
Miss Eyre's wrongs, nor that fellow's baseness ! "
These words, and the ring of the voice, adhered to Rich-
ard all the way home.
36
CHAPTER XLIV.
JUNLA. FULFILS HER INTENTION.
She came to the relief of Richard's spirits, and, as it
were, to the care of his hands ; and in the last, perhaps,
carried out the idea of the first, since a little outward over-
sight of this sort, and secular responsibility, could do him
no harm.
Simon brought her in the best manner Winkle could
devise. She entered softly and quietly, with an air of lofty
purpose, united to a sense of delicate position ; her face
was not so much sickly pale, as subdued by spiritual con-
cern ; her voice was sweet, but evening-like ; her eye was
mellow with love and enthusiasm. She kissed Roxy and
the children.
After tea, she sat in the rocking-chair in the parlor.
Junia had a more southern cast than Violet ; she was born,
her Grandfather used to say, in a warmer month. She had
dark eyes, and small and firm lips. The twilight, — that
blush with which Night introduces her starry train to the
world, — from over dun hills, crossing silent hollows and
entering the room through the cool trees Richard had
planted in the yard, — was reflected in the pure and exalted
fervor of her countenance. Was she, as one of the clouds
that floated in that burning expanse, turned for a brief
moment to flesh ? Was she a Daughter of God, ready to
be offered on some altar of human sorrow? Her thin
fingers, the delicacy of her frame, and even the sculptured
precision of her features, indicated, that if of mortal essence,
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 423
purged of mortal defilement, she was even then undergoing
translation.
" I have but one duty in life, Eichard," she said, " and
that is to thee ; my next is to join the Immortals. The
recompense and fulfilment of my love, that has been grow-
ing in the lonely places of thought, like the pitcher-plant,
and filling its cup with the dew and rain of an ideal good,
is to pour its contents on your parched life, and to see thee
blessed, thou greatly noble, and greatly wronged one ! "
Almost as if she were divinely inspired, Richard was
subdued before Junia, and ventured no remonstrance to the
course of her inclinations.
She had changed since he saw her ; she was feebler, but
more resolved, — less unreserved in her love, but more self-
forgetful in its intents, — very cheerful and very serious.
In two or three days, having worn off the fatigue of
her journey, she expressed a desire to visit the grave ef
Violet.
Simon, wlio had risen from stable-boy to hack-driA-er, who
loved to serve Richard, and continued to sing, with new
pathos to Richard's ear, that melancholy refrain, like a frag-
ment from the ruin of some old dirge which he carried about
wdth him, was ordered to bring up the invalid coach.
Junia entered the parlor from her chamber, clad in white ;
her dress and gloves were white, and a white rose-bud
adorned her hair. There was a singularly clear and lumin-
ous effect in her person and attire ; throughout, an unusual
carefulness showed, and her appearance was suggestive
almost of a bridal occasion, — an illusion which the pallid
ardor of her look rather heightened than destroyed. Fair to
the senses, her aspect was still more affecting to the imag-
ination ; and Richard, sacredly moved, drew from under his
424 RICHARD EDNEY AND
vest, where he had so sadly worn it, the small golden cross,
which he reverently hung on her neck.
Simon's song was heard at the gate, and Junia, throwing
on her bonnet and shawl, left the house. Richard would
have done more than hand her into the carriage, — he would
go with her; but she said, " Not now." He could do little
else than listen to the wailing cavatina of the boy, as he
drove off with the precious minister to his peace.
She was driven to Rosemary Dell. Under the shadows
of pines, and along circling walks, she wended her way to
the spot where Violet lay. A willow hung over the enclos-
ure ; and those flowers that gave the sleeper her name, in
lowly beauty — little Vestal-fires of Nature — cherished
the sanctity of her grave. Junia leaned upon the willow,
and wept ; in weeping she vented her sisterly sorrow, and
at the same time, as it were, moistened and bedewed the
springs of her own feeling. What went forth in sadness,
like the exlialation of troubled water, returned in gentle
showers of consolation and gladness to the wasting verdure
of her soul. " Soon, soon," she said, " I shall be with you,
thou blessed one ! I thank thee that I can weep for thee, —
I feel how nearly I am at one with thee ! A mission which
thou wouldst bless, for the friend of us both, and for one
whom, oh my sister, thou couldst have loved, — an injured
one of earth, — is the brief distance I must travel, before I
come to thee, — and to you. Father, Mother, — and to Thee,
oh Saviour of men ! "
Having finished her prayer, she returned to the carriage.
Did she perceive that Miss Eyre was in the cemetery,
alone, and apparently thoughtful and pensive, — like some
penitent Spirit of Evil, meditating among those vestiges of
decay ? She was there ; and with steadfast eye, — nor could
it be otherwise than with deep sensitiveness of heart, —
THK GOVEKNOR's FAMILY. 425
behind contiguous shrubbery, she beheld the emotion of
Junia. She followed her as she left the place, and over-
heard her direction to Simon, to Governor Bennington's.
We shall take the liberty to enter with Junia at the
Governor's, and while she waits reception, look at the state
of feeling the Family is in.
Miss Eyre had been summoned as a rejoinder to Climper.
She denied Clover's complicity with her afiixirs ; — this to
Mrs. Melbourne. But to Miss Rowena, who questioned her
more at length, she admitted, not that her wrongs were less,
but that, her delicacy being greater, Clover appeared, and
not only recommended, but potentially and portentously
urged her to the course she had taken. Herein she spoke
absolute truth.
The Family, then, we cannot say were in a stale of
doubt, but in a state of certainty, with its surface somewhat
ruffled. Mrs. Melbourne, however, was ruffled painfully, —
Cousin Rowena pleasantly. The latter rejoiced in the
agitation Climper had given the Family, and was glad
to feel anything like a disturbance in the career of those
terrible convictions down which she was rapidly tending.
Melicent, about whom all the interest and all the moods of
the Family gravitated, must listen to varied accounts, and
be torn by contending emotions.
Miss Eyre having become domiciled equally in Mrs.
Melbourne's heart and rooms, by a side door, entered the
house soon after Junia, and went to the chamber of her
friend.
Junia inquired for Melicent, whom she had seen in
Violet's sickness. Melicent did not recollect Junia. She
extended her hand to the pale figure before her, whose min-
gled look of anxiety and earnestness, as well as the shadowy
features and pure attire, arrested her attention and kindled
36*=
426 RICHARD EDNEY AND
her fancy. " I am Junia," said the latter. " When Violet
was sick, you were with us ; you laid flowers on her bier."
Melicent, moved by this recall of the past, and the vision
of the present, affectionately saluted her.
" I wish to speak of Richard." Junia said this with an
emphasis that quite thrilled Melicent, who, at once surprised
and awed, echoed, " Richard ! " In a moment, collecting
herself, she said, " If of that, come to my chamber," —
whither they went.
" I came," said Junia, when they were seated, " to inter-
cede for Richard. I know him to be pure and good. I
have long known him so. And you, Melicent, -;— you have
known him so. Your heart, your memory, your reason,
remind you of nothing else."
Melicent became pale, — paler, even, than the speaker
before her.
" Do not think of that, — do not confuse yourself with
it at all," continued Junia. " He has erred, — he may have
sinned ; but his sin is not beyond forgiveness or removal.
It is lost in the depth of his piety, — it is swept away by
his virtues, as a leaf on the river."
" I do not think of that," answered Melicent, strongly
agitated ; " I think beyond that, of him."
" And he loves you ! "
" Loves me ? " cried Melicent.
"Loves you," replied Junia, "with unmixed, unchanging
love, — loves as purely as an angel in heaven might love."
" How can you know that ? — alas ! alas ! "
"I know him," replied Junia; "how, I cannot tell, — I
dare not tell. I know him, as your own heart knows him ;
— and tell me, do you love him ?"
" Ah ! " cried Melicent ; " where is that in my deepest
THE governor's FAmLY. 427
heart which I once was, and worshipped, and lost, and
missed ? "
" I recall it," said Junia ; " I bring it back."
" To have once doubted," said Melicent, " not that, for
that might be; but to doubt him, to fear him; to feel the
approach of vague, invisible possibilities, which smite and
stagger you, when you can do nothing ; to have the venom-
ous, bitter uncertainties of things, like reptiles from the Dark
Mountains, get into your heart, and be shut in there, —
there, where a woman's longing, and hope, and ideal, are all
kept; to be once so disturbed and so sickened ; — oh, what
is wom.an ? What are you ? What am I ? "
" Hear me," said Junia ; " listen to me. I speak as a
woman."
"A Great Evil," rejoined Melicent, "has befallen me;
the Good Father knows why. Its terror chills my frame ;
its darkness obscures my thought. O, Parent of the Uni-
verse, teach thy child submission, — guide her heart ! "
She started from her chair, and with mingled despair,
mournfulness, and hope, walked the room, wringing her
hands wildly. She flung herself on a seat in the embrasure
of the window, where the heavy tapestry concealed her face,
but could not hide the voice of her anguish.
Junia rose, and deliberately laid off her bonnet and shawl.
She approached Melicent, and solemnly knelt at her feet.
As if a flash of pathos, inspired by piety, had knelt before her,
the white array, ghostly complexion, and golden cross of
Junia, mystically aroused Melicent.
" What is this I see ?" she exclaimed.
" The lover and the bride of Richard," calmly replied
Junia. " Such I plead with thee for him — "
" What do I hear?'' Melicent cried, still more excited.
" Listen, oh best beloved of the best beloved ! I love
428 RICHARD EDNEY AND
Richard ; — I loved him for his greatness and his purity ; I
loved him with the instinct of girlhood, — I have loved him
with the meditativeness of womanhood. I love you, oh
precious sister of my soul ! because you love him. I know
what you feel ; I share your sufferings. He, too, suffers. I
have been near his heart ; I have heard its lonely anguish ;
I have felt its tortured throbs. I love his happiness ; and
his happiness is your love ; and the happiness of you both
is your mutual reiinion. I am his bride, but through you.
My love for him I give to you. Take it into your heart, —
let it be your love ! Let it survive in the depth of your
affection ! Let it shed its light upon the darkness that sur-
rounds you ! And when, in the rapture of being, you can call
him your own, remember, oh remember, that one, young and
inexperienced, — too susceptible, perhaps too constant, — that
Junia loved him too ! "
"How can I support this?" exclaimed Blelicent. "In
what heavenly transition do I awake ? Art thou a mortal ?"
" I am simple Junia," replied the other ; " but hear me ;
— I am brided to Richard's and your felicitj'-. I put on this
little array, such as a fond girl's heart might choose ; cloth-
ing not my body, but an irrepressible promise of things in
my soul; clothing, it may be, some -old, pleasant feelings,
that once wished to be the bride of Richard ; clothing, too,
the brief remaining hour of my life for marriage with the
ideal vision which your union with him is to my mind, —
the union of Wealth and Worth, — of Refinement and
Nobleness, — of Richard and Melicent ! "
" Dearest Junia ! " cried Melicent ; " purest of beings !
Let me embrace you, — let me fold to my heart its long-lost
tranquillity ! "
" I perish, — I die ! " answered Junia. " The voice of the
oriole has been heard. My happiness is complete when
THE governor's FAMILY. 429
yours begins. I am called to the spirit land, — let me
bless you and Richard ere I go — "
Her voice faltered ; blood on her lips betrayed the violent
hemorrhage that succeeded. She fainted ; and while Meli-
cent was attempting to support her, an outbursting sob, as
of some one in the chamber, was heard. It was Miss Eyre,
who instantly, but trembling with emotion, advanced, and
assisted in carrying the languid frame to the bed.
Miss Eyre had followed Junia, — followed her with
more than usual concern, and even approached the chamber
of Melicent, where, moved by the impassioned language
within, she opened the door, and beheld Junia at Meliceut's
feet, and heard her words.
She was at least awed. Solemn, tender, delicate, she
exerted herself to bring back the spirit that seemed so sud-
denly and so affectingly to have vanished.
Opening her eyes, Junia said, " Ah, Plumy Alicia ! and
you too, — you to bless the hour, — you to make us all
happy ?"
The house was aroused. Madam Dennington, confined
to her room by some illness of the season, could no more
than give directions for the sick one. Miss Ej-re sum-
moned Mrs. Melbourne, who was always kind to the unfor-
tunate, and who forgot everything else in an occasion like
the present.
Dr. Chassford, the family physician, was called, who,
with other specifics, ordered quietness and rest. His man-
ner showed, what all felt, that Junia could not live long.
" I am quiet," she said, a little while afterwards. " I
have unburdened my heart, and I rest."
But she grew weaker, and could not be moved. " Send
word," she said, " to Willow Croft, that 1 cannot return to-
day, but not to be alarmed for me."
CHAPTER XLV.
THE HEART OF MISS EYRE.
The immediate excitement of this casualty having sub-
sided, the Family were left to ponder more serious matters
connected with the visit of Junia. Mrs. Whichcomb and the
council were disposed of, — Clover's villany stood revealed.
What remained, that Richard should not be immediately
summoned, and the reconciliation celebrated? Miss Eyre
remained, broodingly, silently, awfully. She remained
literally with Mrs. Melbourne, who would not suffer her to
leave the house ; — she remained mysticallj^ in all hearts
and apprehensions. Why should not the Family throw
itself upon its intuitions, and act at once in obedience
thereto ? It was not a way it had, — if we except Barbara,
who had such a way, and put on her hat to execute it. But
Roscoe, who was pruning trees in the front yard, prevented
her; — Roscoe, the silent and unsocial one, reputed so queer
and strange. " Plumy Alicia," said he, " has not spoken.
If Richard is recalled, she must be banished; his exonera-
tion is her perdition. We must wait a little. There are
things to be explained yet. Who of us can pretend to
fathom all this mystery ? " Barbara loved Roscoe and
yielded to him.
Melicent and Junia both felt, and they all felt, what
Roscoe expressed. " God will help us, " said Junia. " Let
us wait on him." " I can wait, if you can," responded
Melicent.
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 431
What would Miss Eyre do ? We have said she betrayed
extreme emotion at the sight of Junia and Melicent. What
did she see at that moment ? She saw an old, fond love,
intent, not upon the possession but the welfare of the
beloved; she saw hopelessness pleading with aversion in
behalf of neglect ; she saw virtue seeking to acquit turpi-
tude to conscience ; disinterestedness launched on destruction
to render deliverance. She saw Junia supplicating Melicent
for Richard; she saw woman's heart yielding heroically to
rival supremacy; she saw a young girl's gushing, undying
affection, sacrificing itself on the altar of another's love.
She beheld cheerfulness where she anticipated moodiness,
constancy where she had prophesied hatred ; and was the
witness of a defence from a quarter which to her oa^ti mind
boded nothing but scorn and vengeance.
The sight overcame her ; it^ novelty, mystery, pathos,
amazed her ; its incantation spun through all her frame.
But while it swept like a wind across the forest of her
sensibilities, we are not prepared to say it upturned a single
root of her purpose.
The next day, being alone with Mrs. Melbourne, she
burst into tears.
" I do not wonder )'ou feel bad," said her old mistress.
"If I were not more than usually sustained, I should cry too.
What a height of impudence and vulgarity I "
Miss Eyre made no answer.
" Try the camphor-bottle ; — oh dear, how wicked is man!
how unfeeling are the lower orders ! That Richard would
kill you, if he were left to himself one moment ! I have
seen him strike a horse that was all in a foam of sweat. —
Open the window, where you can breathe." This did not
abate Miss Eyre's distress.
" I do not blame you, Plumy Alicia," continued her com-
432 RICHARD EDNEY AND
forter. " I cannot ; I have it not in my heart to see the least
of God's creatures suffer, except some who deserve it. —
Well, I will not, — I know you are tender on that point.
Don't cry so, dear girl ! you shall marry Kichard. Lie
on my bed, — smell of this chamomile. If Richard has
wronged you, and you still love him, you shall have him.
I know we cannot help our feelings. When I was young —
oh God forgive me ! — There, there ; I will never speak
against Richard again."
Miss Eyre wept herself to sleep, and sank from convul-
sions to repose.
Mrs. Melbourne smoothed her hair and dress, and sat
tenderly by her side. " I did not know," she said within
herself, " she could feel so much. But she shall not be dis-
appointed. What could have induced that country girl to
undertake such a thing? Why is she sick? Do we not
see God's finger in it? — That Glendar should be rejected,
and that bad man promoted, is impossible."
When Miss Eyre awoke, it was with a manner apparently
averted from Mrs. Melbourne ; so much so that this lady
regarded her with surprise.
" Why don't you speak ? " she said.
" I can't to you," replied Miss Eyre.
" Why not to me ? I am your friend. What are you
going to do ? " She asked this with consternation, as Miss
Eyre, with hidden determination in her eye, left the bed.
" To see Junia," answered Miss Eyre.
" She has told her story," murmured Mrs. Melbourne.
" What if there were some truth in it ? " rejoined the
other.
Mrs. Melbourne would have screamed ; but she hushed
herself, and said, " Plumy Alicia, how rash ! Will you
ruin yourself, and disgrace us all? May she not have
THE governor's FAMILY. 433
deceived ? There is nothing too bad for some people to do !
Who sent her here, — who ? I wish the truth might be told,
— all the truth, — and I am glad there area few honest
ears to hear it ! "
Miss Eyre disappeared. She went to the bed-side of
Junia.
Junia looked up, with a serene, rill-like smile, and laid
her thin, transparent hand outside the bed, as it were invit-
ing Miss Eyre's into it.
" Did you love Richard ? " said Miss Eyre.
" You know I loved him," replied Junia.
" And you gave him up ? "
" God took him, and gave him to another."
. " I am not religious. Tell Mrs. Melbourne of that.
Had you no hatred to him for leaving you ? "
" He never left me; — I only clung to him."
" In that clinging, Junia, w-as there not joy, rapture,
life ? "
" Alas, dear Plumy Alicia, yes ! "
" But you gave it all up, and have helped another one to
cling where you were clinging, and to exult in what was
your bliss ? "
" She had a better right than I. Besides, his happiness
was concerned, and her happiness, and the happiness of so
many. And, dear Plumy Alicia, I have never been so happy
as I am now ; — I have done no more than my duty, and
what God would have me do. You will not make Richard
unhappj% will you? You will not do anything to distress
his noble spirit, will you ? You have been weeping ; you
will never weep again when Richard is happy ; — you will be
happy too."
Miss Eyre could not answer ; she meditated.
Junia resumed. " I could not go into the next world, —
37
434 RICHARD EDNEY AND
and we must all go there, — with the sin of unkindness to
Richard, and Melicent, and all these excellent ones, on my
soul."
Miss Eyre withdrew to the window, and sat where Mel-
icent sat and Junia kneeled.
The same day. Miss Rowena did slip away to Willow
Croft, but simply to tell them how Junia was, and to tell
Richard how nobly she had vindicated him. She dared
only allude to Miss Eyre ; and Richard, perhaps, wished
her to do no more than that. He had himself a feeling
about Miss Eyre which Miss Rowena could not fathom.
Another night passed in the Family, — a night of thick,
silent darkness, w^hen the clouds seem to be in the streets,
and walking about the houses, — when the windows all
become black mirrors of things in the room, and if the
heart is sad, these images look very gloomy. The whisk-
ing of wind in the trees, or the pattering of rain on the
piazza, would have been a relief. Mrs. Melbourne was very
melancholy, and Miss Eyre very pale.
Junia was a little day-time in her own heart and chamber,
— a pleasant taper of resignation and patience ; and she
made Melicent and Barbara, who sat with her, feel hopeful
and cheerful.
The next morning, Miss Eyre sought a private moment
with Melicent. She said, " Neither yoU nor I can abide
this much longer. I do not speak. Do you wish me to ?
Do you wish me to open my mouth ? Do you wish to look
through fair lips and beautiful teeth — they say I have
them, — and beyond the smoothness of my tongue, into the
depths of what I am, — into here, — into this, — which
they call a heart ? "
"Let me see everything it is in your power to show, that
will be of any use to see," replied Melicent.
THE governor's FAMILY. 436
" Under this roof," continued Miss Eyre, " that now
accuses me, derived I the elements of my crime. Some of
them, — not all. Here were sown the seeds of. the bitter
night-shade you now taste in me. Not you, gentle, great
one ; — not Barbara ; — not the Governor. Mrs. Melbourne
taught me the essential worthlessness of that large class of
people among whom I was born, and with whom it might be
my fortune to spend my days. Mrs. Melbourne is generous,
humane, tender-hearted. I am under a thousand obliga-
tions to her kindness ; but she despises the lower orders, and
she would have me despise, betray, disinherit my own kith
and kin. I was ambitious, — proud, they call it. What is
That ? You know not. You were born great. You cannot
step out without stepping into littleness. Then how easy,
how pleasant, to take a few steps in that direction, — merely
passing from Wilton carpets to dusty streets, — and go
home to your own greatness ! But for me, born little, to
step into greatness, — how hard, how hazardous ! Then to
go home to littleness, — to creep back, after a pleasant
exaltation, into one's mean hovel, — you know not what
that is !
" Then there is love. O burden, unreilcting fatality, or-
ganic sigh, of woman ! But whom love ? Where my
hearth-stone ? Who lie in these arms ? You cannot under-
stand this. You are in a gallery of fine portraits, and can
take any one. I am surrounded by daubs, and must hunt
for what is tolerable. Have I no desire for what is excel-
lent? Pulsates not every fibre of this woman's frame for
the embrace of purity, elevation, nobleness ? I saw Rich-
ard, — I liked him; — I tell you I liked him! He united
the loftiness of the higher classes with the solid virtues of
his own. I sprang towards him, in my heart, wantonly
wildly. His reserve and moderation the rather inflamed
436 RICHARD EDNEY AND
me. I intrigued, — yes, I was trained to that. What self-
ishness of voluptuousness, what shallowness of mediocrity,
what cravings of the hod-clopperhood, have importuned for
me, and sighed at my feet, and cajoled my vanity ! I tor-
tured him. The Redferns tortured me, more than you
know of, — more than I can relate. Virtue, — I am not
virtuous ! Is Mrs. Melbourne, who has so perverted my
existence, virtuous ? Is F.iddledeeana Redfern, who has so
wounded every womanly sensibility within me, virtuous ?
Do not look so upbraidingly at me ! "
" I do not upbraid you. I am only deeply concerned in
what you say."
" Give me your smelling-bottle. I am not going to faint.
I want to carry off my excitement with spirit. You cannot
think of my faults worse than I suffer from them. I abhor
Clover ; but he menaced me, — menaced not only my happi-
ness, but even my life. I should support his cause, he
said, or he would overrun me, — he would destroy me. He
would have plunged me into the depths of Merrywater.
Well if he had ! I could not endure Richard's union with,
you. Hear the whole, and then do with me as you will. It
rankled here. I could not help it."
" You mean," said Melicent, " you did not help it. You
never practised self-control ; you had no religious humil-
ity."
" Practised nothing, — had nothing, that you call good.
No, no! Little of that has addressed itself to me. Good
men, — your good men, — do not speak to me; — bad
men are false and selfish with me. My regard for Rich-
ard was the only good thing of my life ! I believed he
loved me ; at least, I believed I could make him love
me, — that I had made him love me. Others managed for
my approbation, — why should I not for his? Glendar has
THE governor's FAMILY. 437
adored my smile, — why should I not fawn on Eichard's
heart ? You are interested, — you may well be. I come to
the quick of the thing. / have told Jio miti-uths about Rich-
ard .' — Do not destroy your fan; you may be glad to use
it before I have done. — Have you not learned that nobody
tells lies ? They tell truths so that they shall seem a lie,
— that is all. I let untruths be told ; — or rather, surrounded
by stupidity and fanaticism, I had only to let the false im-
pressions of people take their own course. I gave to truth
a little of the rouge, the twinkle, the fine airs, of falsehood,
and I had no further trouble. I knew not precisely the na-
ture of his visits at the sick chamber of Violet ; nor did I
care to know, — it was little to me, any way. • Mrs. Which-
comb believed, or made herself believe, he had other objects
than charity ; and she made more than one bejieve it, too.
The lower orders have their faults and vices. They do not
understand nobleness, or intellectuality, or cultured simplic-
ity and freedom. They misappreciate you, Melicent, and
your father, and your church, and your minister, and your
whole social circle and position. It is not a month since,
down on the Islands, I heard a man say he hoped the Gov-
ernor would come to his last crust, — he did not care how
soon I How easy, then, to pervert a visit to a sick chamber !
I knew Junia loved Richard ; and that I did care to know.
I first dreaded, then hated her. And afterwards, so far as
his connection with )'ou was concerned, I thought she would
hate him. Here I was mistaken. Of that, presently."
" You acquit Richard of the aspersions that have been
thrown upon him ? " said Melicent, with some earnestness.
" Do not be impassioned ; — that is reserved for me. Junia
disappointed me ; she appalled me ; she has wrung my heart,
— ^vrung its animosity, its fire, its intention, all out of it.
She is the first gleam of light in this dark world of affections
37*
438 RICHARD EDNEY AND
and passions that surrounds me. As Clover says, she has
crushed me ! Sorrow, remorse, hurtle pitilessly through this
ruin of my being. Eichard is too innocent, -;— too harm-
less. If he had only been guilty, — not that, — if he had
been selfish or forward, — I should have loved him more : —
nay, I should have scorned him ! He has his weak points ;
and his weak ones are my strong ones, and there I should
have mastered him, but for a something beyond. — What is
that something ? "
" Eeligion, — Conscience, — God."
" I did not ask to be told of that. I only asked in a
reverie sort of way. Richard relies on the simplicity of
things, and what he supposes to be the goodness of men.
He deceives himself."
" Are you never deceived ?"
" Richard is sorry for me. He knows I am not exempt
from pangs. He feels committed, not to me, but to my mis-
ery. You can break a man's heart, sometimes, by breaking
your own."
"Angelic Richard! Wicked, wicked Plumy Alicia I "
" Not on purpose, — not altogether with guile. — I was
broken. He has even now to step over my desolation to
reach you."
Melicent raised her handkerchief to her face.
" You can weep, Melicent. I have wept. I have
drained myself dry, as the stubble after reaping.
" Did Richard have no intention and respect of love
towards me ? Could I raise none such ? Ah ! he said he
detested me! I have been deceived, — I deceived myself.
Junia ! Junia ! thou wert a woman ; I was a —
" Where am I ? Whither shall I turn ? The world, that
clutched at my story, and, bartering its respect for its envy,
THE governor's FAMILY. 439
patronized my cause, and poured its venom on Richard, will
whirl upon me."
"Is there not such a thing as duty?"
" Junia said so, and you say so; and I suppose it is so."
" You speak," said Melicent, " as if there were no good-
ness. Is there none in the Church, — none in the Griped
Hand, — none in the little children, — none in every street
of the city, or in a thousand families, and in innumerable
individuals ? "
" Yes, there are good, honest men and women among
what are called the lower orders, — young men and young
women, whom I have associated with, and worked with, —
who would not do a wrong thing for the world, — who are
goodness itself, more than you know of. But I must, for-
sooth, look down upon them ! I nmst see among them a
lower order of taste and feeling! And, in fact, I must find
amongst many of them an ignorant, indeed, but systematic
depreciation of what is ever and deeply to my eye socially
bright and glorious, the Governor's Family. Who of them
could afford me that sympathy which my heart craved, or
my judgment would select? I must either marry a man
whom I despised, or be the mistress of a man who despised
me. I would do and be neither. A man like Richard, Lum-
berer though he be, can marry the Governor's daughter ! "
" What if you should marry the Governor's son ? " said
Melicent, playfully. " There is Brother Roscoe, the odd
one. He used to like you ; he left his books to be with
you ; he used to swing you under the elms, and run of
your errands. He is not fond of our society ; he attaches
himself to none of the young ladies that visit us. In all
this dreadful affair, I have noticed that he abstained from
reproaching you. I am not certain but you carried away a
portion of his heart."
440 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
" Are you willing that I should marry him ? " asked Miss
Eyre.
" Indeed, I am."
" Pure, good, magnanimous Melicent, how I thank you,
— how I love you — how I am all vanquished again, —
killed by goodness ! Not that I will marry him ; I will not,
— never, never! — but that you reveal yourself so, — you
look out so prettily, and so Junia-like ! "
" Then you give me Richard, if I give you Roscoe ? "
This, also, playfully.
"Richard is all yours, — was ever yours ; his fair, large
being, hidden to me, broods over you. I am healed, not by
your promises, but by your goodness. Richard will see no
bruises in me. But to the world I am dead, — I must be as
dead. How can I be obscure enough ? How shall I escape
Mrs. Melbourne ? Cousin Rowena, and Barbara, and all
of you, must loathe me. I do not ask you to save me.
Junia yielded up all her love for you ; — you yield all the
sentiments of your rank for me. What is left for me but
to yield myself to — fate ?
"God — "
"I am humbled ; — teach me to be pious."
"And to my discretion."
"I am a child ; — lead me where you will."
"I can take care of Mrs. Melbourne, and our family can
take care of itself, and Providence \\nll take care of the
world."
CHAPTER XLVI.
THE SUN BREAKS OUT,
Richard walked down St. Agnes-street, with a tranquil,
lydian step. At the gate of the Governor's, he saw Meli-
cent standing in the vine-wreathed piazza, where she had
come out to wait for him. She was dressed in her peculiar
blue, which she remembered Richard liked ; and she was a
pure blue thought already, in Richard's imagination, and
looked as if her Guardian Angel had bathed her in the
azure of the sky, and the azure of Richard's feelings, and
placed her there on purpose to meet her old and good
beloved.
She received him with an affectionate smile, — a smile
that bared her teeth beautifully, but pensively, as if joy
still swam in the remembrance of a long sorrow ; — a smile
that, descending, clove asunder her arms, and parted the
Doubt and the Fear that had hung over her being, and
turned them into silvery clouds, on the right hand and the
left, through which Richard passed to the brightness of her
spirit.
CHAPTER XLVII.
ORANGE-BLOSSOMS.
The Wedding Eve of Richard and Melicent was a splen-
did one, — splendid in its feelings, in its guests, in its
appointments. All the friends of Richard and all the
friends of Melicent were there, and this was a multitude.
The Father and Mother of Richard were there, and his
early spiritual and intellectual guides. Pastor Harold and
Teacher Willwell. Through an illuminated archway of
trees, and an illuminated portal, the guests swept to bright
chambers, — bright as the day-spring of joy that had arisen
on the house. The brightness flowed down and culminated
in the ample drawing-room, — raying from astrals and wax-
lights, from minstrel hearts and evening-star eyes, from
fragrant fiovv^ers and glorified dresses, and, more than all,
from the deep, central fires of holy, fervent felicitation.
Beneath one of the antique arches that garnished the
space on either side of the chimney stood Miss Eyre and
Chassford. Parson Smith was not sorry to be called to
marry Richard and Melicent, and it is said- clergymen
generally are happy at weddings, and fond of wedding-cake.
If there was one person in the room not fully penetrated with
the spirit of the occasion, it was Mrs. Melbourne. She had
the habit of saying a wedding was like a funeral ; and, as if
to actualize the sentiment, she came out in black.
There entered, to make the vow and receive the covenant
which the State ordains and the Church supports, — which
in all ages has been agreeable to the reason and religion
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC, 443
of mankind, — Richard and Melicent, with their train of
attendants.
The service was simple and affecting, brief and full, edi-
fying and hopeful. Before the benediction, an appropriate
hymn was sung, led by Mangil, chorister in the Church of
the Redemption. There was a movement as of a flocking
to kiss the bride, Avhen Junia entered the room. The
crowd held back ; all eyes were suspended on her, while as
a vision she passed through. She approached the altar-
place, and kissed Melicent. Taking from her breast the
golden cross of Richard, she hung it on Melicent's neck.
She tenderly kissed Richard ; it was her first and her last
kiss. She was supported out of the room, and was seen no
more alive on the earth.
The returning and irresistible wave of joy brought the
whole room about the Bride and Groom, and kisses and con-
gratulations fell upon them, like bouquets at the feet of
Jenny Lind ; — we cannot keep that woman out of our mind,
though we have never seen or heard her, and never expect
to do so; — not as if the spot Junia's lips had touched was
holy ground, where no one might tread, but as if her com-
ing in had been a ray of the sunshine of God on pleasant
fields, where old men and children, young men and maidens,
might freely disport. Cake and wine ; — and, lest some
feral reader shall find here a bone to pick with us, we will
tell the whole truth, — it was Cousin Rowena's raspberry
wine ; — cake and wine were brought in, and quickly and
pleasantly disposed of. Then followed the Bride Cake ; the
May Queen, in this procession of good things, mounted on a
silver basket, and daintily adorned with flowers and shrub-
bery. This, appropriated to the unmarried, contained a
diamond ring, with the significance that whoever got the
rina: would be married first. Bachelors and maidens were
444 RICHARD EDNEY, ETC.
instantly as wounded birds. Cousin Eowena bit her lip.
She made the cake, and knew where the ring lay, and
superintended the distribution. Barbara got the ring.
This was hardly fair, as she belonged to the house ; but
there remained only one piece, and there could be no collu-
sion about that ; and it was to Cousin's mind as if Provi-
dence directed the matter, and she said, slyly, " Take it,
take it ;" so the talismanic bauble fell into the hands of
Barbara.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
ATHANATOPSIS.
Toll heavily, — toll sadly ! Ring out, oh Funeral Bell !
Thou hast a place in this our world. Thy knell is needed
as well as thy chime, and w^ill find as many hearts prepared
for it. There is a peal, not of exultation as of success, —
not of terror as of the grave ; but between these, and yet
louder and deeper, more thrilling, more ecstasizing; pro-
longed in all the exercises of profoundest sentiment, —
awakening dim and heavenly responses in the furthest-
reaching glimpses of the imagination, — drowning the voices
of the world, — attempering every vain, every selfish im-
pulse, — coming upon the hours of meditation and feeling,
like the pensive rhythm of the sea on the beach at midnight ;
breaking in upon the abodes of sordidness, lust, and all
unrighteousness, with the hoarse clangor of gathering doom ;
a peal that kindles a thousand chords in every heart — new
and strange chords — and shakes with a master hand old
chords, — chords that strike through, eliminate from, and
push beyond, all ordinary pulses of existence, — chords that,
starting in the slumbering ages that have gone by, vibrat-
ing amid the turmoil and din of the present hour, carry
forward the feelings to the regions of Light, Hope, Proph-
ecy : — it is the peal of Immortality !
Toll on, — toll out, thou Passing Bell ! At thy voice, the
solemn owl awakes, and the cry of the whippoorwill is
heard ; amaranths and myrtles grow, and daisies and violets
start in their humble beds; willows and cypresses, green
38
446 RICHARD EDNEY AND
fountains of sorrow, break out on the hill-side and in the
valley J the rock sprouts in obelisks, and sterile marble
yields fair cherubic forms ; slips of roses are planted, to be
tended in the long coming years of sorrow; and slips of old,
departed feelings are gathered up, and reanimated in the
bosom of loneliness.
Toll on, — toll out ! At thy wail, softness comes over
the sky, and piety into the heart ; friendship and love throng
to the cemetery, and tears distil as the dew on the green
leaves that grow about the tomb, and climb as the ivy over
ancient and beloved reminiscences ; taste and art go forth
on feet of affection, and, with an eye of tender inspiration,
from all God's earth select the fairest spots for the dead,
to lie in.
Toll, toll ! Envy departs, animosities subside, alienations
are reconciled ; the fretful insect that weaves in the loom of
discord and strife intermits its labor ; the corroding worm
at the root of faction and party stops its gnawing.
Toll, toll! Thy plaintive reverberations spread every-
where, and melt humanity into one ; the rich man speaks
gently to the poor, and the poor man pities the rich ; the
bereaved Pagan mother folds to her bosom the weeping
Christian mother; the ferocity of revolution pauses, muffles
its grimness and its arms on the threshold of the chamber of
the dying prince. Thy pathos sways the earth, and as the
wind, in eddies of light and shadow, with lulling murmur,
flovvs across a field of supple wheat, so mournfulness, in
endless, soothing measures, rolls over the hearts of the peo-
ple of the world ; and from the line to either pole, all tribes
and tongues undulate in one long, ever-recurring, harmoni-
ous tremor of sad sensibility.
Toll long, — toll loud, oh Soul-Bell ! the requiem of time,
— the matin of eternity ; the dirge of earth, — the anthem
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY.
447
of heaven ; the bell that Faith rings at the door of Futurity,
— the bell that summons the guests to the marriage supper of
the Lamb ! " Foolish man ! that which thou sowest is not
quickened except it die ; this corruption shall put on incor-
ruption, and this mortal immortality." The bell which ye
hear is the signal-note of the great transition ; it announces
the final Germination, — it heralds the released soul to the
paradise above. It rings out over the successive ages and
generations, proclaiming the Quickening era of human
existence, and conducting the grand emergence through
Death to Life.
Strike once more. Christened Bell ! Thou art not unwel-
come. Thy solemnity jars not our festivity. As evening
opens a higher, more studded immensity than the day, thy
shadowiness 'reveals the dim, unspeakable glory which the
sunshine of joy hides to our eye. The twilight of the mortal
is the dawn of the immortal. A burial may succeed a wed-
ding ; — the burial-day of Junia comes not harshly on the
wedding-day of Eichard and Melicent.
Slowly, — tenderly ! The city is hushed, and the peo-
ple thereof listen reverently. Young maidens bring flowers
to her bier, and young men bear her on their shoulders.
Diligent girls from the Factories, and strong men from the
Mills, come out; for Junia had worked in the first, and
Eichard belonged to the last. Many knew how Junia had
contributed to the nuptials that had been so universally
celebrated ; and she died at the Governor's, and was buried
from his house ; and there were united in her death and
burial not only the popular sympathies, but the prestige of
the Family, and there fell into the procession a long con-
course of citizens.
Slowly and tenderly ! for Eichard and Melicent follow as
chief mourners; and there glide into the procession the
448 RICHARD EDNEY AND
fondness and true-heartedness of maidenhood, and the kin-
dling and respectful admiration of young men ; and much
pursed and austere meanness of manhood relaxes, and
walks after. Old and warm recollections of what once
was, and the cherished but fading idealism of what may be,
moved by the sound of the bell, lengthen out the throng.
Aspiration comes up from the lowly hovel, humility leaves
the lordly chamber, and pity breaks from many a hard and
coarse environment, to wait on the burial.
Toll cheerfully ! cheerfully ! Memmy and Bebby are
there, and other little children, walking two and two.
There was a tear in Memmy's eye, for she had thought that
she might become an angel too. In that morning of her
days, and early dawn of thought, the dews of immortal feeling
fell on her eye-lids. The " reminiscence of heaven" within
her got glimpses of its bright home, and it seemed not a
great way to Jesus, who she knew took little children into
his arms and blessed them.
Toll mercifully, oh mercifully ! for the traducer is there.
In deep black, folded in a deeper night of sorrow and con-
trition, slowly follows Miss Eyre, — " the woman which was
a sinner," weeping at the feet of that great Blessedness, so
lately revealed, so suddenly snatched away, but from which
to her soul descended the words of peace and forgiveness,
which may yet dry her tears, and animate her for the duties
of life.
On, on, to Rosemary Dell, through solemn shades and
soft circuits, to the grave by the side of Violet !
The Minister sprinkled dust on the coffin, and said,
"Dust to dust, — earth to earth;" and, looking aloft, he
added, " Spirit to spirit, — the soul to its God ! Behold,"
he continued, " where they have laid her ! Sweet is the
sleep of death, — beautiful the repose of the grave ! No
THE GOVERNOR S FAMILY. 44^
more shall storm disturb her peace ; no more shall calamity
afflict her days ! But," he added " she is not here, — she
is risen. The grave cannot contain the immortal essence.
She has ascended to her Father and our Father, to her
God and our God. A flower of the Spiritual life, she was
permitted to blossom beneath our skies, on this our soil.
We beheld her beauty, — we inhaled her fragrance. But
that Spiritual life has not its eternal home here. She died,
and is quickened ; — she was quickened even to our sight.
Dropping the perishable tabernacle of the flesh, her soul
rises to the beatitude of the life beyond our life. The mem-
ory and power of her virtues remain for our comfort and
edification."
38^
CHAPTER XLIX.
E PITH A LAM Y.
Not incongruous, we trust, with any one's presentiments,
or with the spirit of these pages, or with the solemnities of
a preceding day, as we have reason to think it was not with
the feelings of Richard Edney and the Governor's Family,
was a festivity that came off a short time afterward, — a
sort of bridal party thrown open to the public. It was a
gift of the Governor to the city, or that portion of the city
immediately concerned. No house had room enough, and
Mayflower Glen offered its commodiousness and beauty.
The invitation was to the Griped Hand and all interested
therein ; and of course included a multitude of the Church,
many of the first and last families in Woodylin, the Friends
of Improvement, Knuckle Lane, the Wild Olives, and the
Islands. The Glen was lighted ; music enlivened the
scene ; refreshments abounded. None were excluded save
such as banished themselves by indifTerence to the Griped
Hand, of which Richard was co-founder, and those who
could have no interest in the Glen, — a part of the system
of urban regeneration that had been undertaken. Bronze-
faced and tow-headed Wild Olive boys, in whole jackets,
were there; River Drivers and Islanders, in clean shirts,
were there ; Chuk, looking like a tame, Christianized, happy
young Orson, was there ; Mysie, in a new blanket shawl,
— a benison she prized above all things, folded about her
huge figure with a kind of Indian stateliness, — was there ;
the clerg}^ and their deacons, representatives from Victoria
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 451
Square and La Fayette-street, parents and children, enthu-
siastic young men, and a flowery troop of young girls, were
there.
Richard and Melicent came, with their grooms-men and
bride-maids, and other friends. They entered the Glen under
a sylvan arch. Young children threw roses, white lilies,
pansies, and sweet herbs, on the walks before them. Joyous
music saluted them. As they approached the centre of the
spot, an illuminated device sprang up as by magic over their
heads, consisting of a True Love Knot, woven of laurel, and
enclosing the two words, Virtue and Honor, and supported
on one side by Wild Olive boys, and on the other by Clar-
ence Redfern and Herder Langreen. At a turn in the prome-
nade, in a mossy nook under the trees, and so lighted as to
have the effect of a distant mountain side, they saw two
figures in white, representing Junia bestowing a chaplet on
Melicent. The procession broke up, and the multitude
mingled together, and did what free and joyous folk are
wont to do on free and joyous occasions, in the midst of so
many pleasant surroundings, and moved by so many pleas-
ant impulses.
This festivity, originating, indeed, with the Governor, had
been prosecuted in detail by the benevolent and ingenious
friends of Richard and Melicent.
CHAPTER L.
THE END OF CLOVER.
Without book, bell or prayer, unshriven, unhousled, with
no procession and no sorrow. Clover died, and was buried.
There are bad men in our world, and bad things. That
the substance of the first, or the type of the last, should
perish, can excite no regret.
Clover, if we may rely on his own account of himself,
however he possessed the first, certainly instanced the last ;
— he was an embodiment of all horridness.
Not merely poetic, but historic, or, we might saj^, pro-
phetic justice, requires that he should die.
Nor, powerful as has hitherto been his influence, and
great "his terror, shall we be troubled to dispose of him, —
for God took him away.
In the suburbs of the city was a tavern known as the
Bay Horse, — almost the only spot within the municipality
that had not been purged of alcoholic infection. It was
kept by Helskill, — hacking, timid Helskill, — formerly of
Quiet Arbor, who had fled thither with the relics of his
propertj', his disinterestedness, and his customers. It was a
stopping-place of teamsters, and the lounge of Belialism. In
the bar-room, or " office," of this place, one night. Clover
and his confreres were met. The " oflice," like many others
of its kind, was a ding}', sultry, mephitic room, and its
walls were plastered many layers deep with show-bills, cir-
cus pictures, and lithographic battle-pieces and heads of the
P*residents. A large box of sand supported a Franklin
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 453
Stove, serving to insure the house against fire, and the deli-
cacy of its inmates against alarm at not having a place to
dispose of tobacco-quids, and other matters that distinguish
man from the brute. Lamps burned as in a fog, the smoke
of the room and dust of the ceiling absorbing most of the
rays, and leaving the less volatile accumulations on the floor
quite in the lurch.
It vt'as a night of pitchy darkness, and cavernous winds,
interspersed with thunder and lightning.
The fellows there assembled had been drinking, and some
of them were quite " balmy."
There was Philemon Sweetly, whom we have before
seen at the Green Mill, so lively and reckless. Clover had
seduced him, and he was now out at his elbows, out at his
purse, out at his cheeks, out everywhere save in his invisi-
ble tambourine. There was Weasand, an old attache of
Quiet Arbor, who had adhered to Helskill through all
mutations of place and fortune. Mr. Serme, a broken-down
Theatre-manager, Mr. Graver, an inhabitant of the hamlet
of which the Bay Horse was the principal house, and one
or two teamsters, made up the group.
Gusts of rain smote the house ; flashes of lightning, —
what perhaps nothing else would do, — revealed these men
to themselves ; thunder "rolled and exploded over their
heads ; the windows became alternate mirrors of dismalness
within, and breaks into yawning, blazing gulfs without.
" I suppose I am Jove's bird," said Clover, pacing the
floor. " They reckon me in the family, I think."
" Your upper lip," replied Philemon, " favors the idea ; —
it is hooked, and dragonish."
"That is nothing to my talons, Phil." He clutched at
Helskill ; and Helskill, being a pliant man, suffered himself
454 RICHARD EDMEY AND
to be pulled to the floor. " But," continued Clover, " I am
gorged. I have repasted on Richard."
" And feel qualmish ? "
"I shall revive,^^ replied Clover. "I vrorsted Richard,
and he capitulated. But the smothered fire of rebellion
breaks out, and that must be smothered by the fires of this
red right arm ! "
" Let us be easy where we are," said Weasand, scraping
his thumb-nail with a jack-knife ; " Helskill is accommo-
dating, the old ' Horse ' is in tolerable flesh, and we can
have a few more pleasant rides before the Black Car comes
along."
" I would n't speak of it," said Mr. Serme, who, stretched
on a table, was trying to cover his eyes from the storm. " I
feel as if it was here now, — as if it was all around us,
and we were in it."
" Repeat it ! " said Clover,
" Let us not be too free," said Mr. Craver, a red-visaged
but white-livered man, who preferred the Bay Horse to his
own parlor and wife and children. He occupied a corner
of the settee, and was trying very hard to locate his chin
on the knob of his cane. " I see a coffin in the lamp, and a
dead woman's eyes are looking in at the window. Let us
be as easy as we can. I never wished to wrong an^'body."
" mighty thunderbolt ! " — thus apostrophized Clover, —
" I am thy fellow ! "
A blinding flash, that made Helskill shriek, and cry,
«' Don't ! Clover, don't ! "
" Say, Do ! " rejoined Clover.
"O dear! yes, — do, then, do!" answered the peaceful,
willowy host.
" I smite, like thee ! " contirmed Clover.
THE governor's FAMILY. 455
" I wonder if it ever gets its knuckles hurt, and bunged
in the eye ? " asked Philemon.
" It is not afraid to try them," replied Clover, aiming a
blow at Philemon, which the latter avoided by a little tam-
bourining of the head.
" 'T is horrible to die so, Mr. Graver," said Mr. Serme.
" You can't even turn on your side to get rid of it, or take
it easier."
" There will be one less to eat corn," observed a teamster,
who sat in a broken-bottomed chair, with his cheeks repos-
ing in the palms of his hands.
" I don't see why my wife takes it so hard," marvelled
Mr. Graver. " What is she out such a night as this for? I
always said to her, says I, ' Mrs. Graver, you have enough
to eat.' Need she shriek so, and my daughters hang
shrouds on the trees for me to look at ? "
" I DEFY it ! " said Glover.
"Please," said Weasand, "stand out of my light, the
next time it comes ; I want to get a look at Helskill's face."
" I am awful," continued Clover, " but useful ; and, if
severe, yet just."
" Just so, exactly," remarked the teamster.
" Look at Glover, Helskill," said Philemon ; " I command
you to look at him I "
" I will, I will," replied the obliging man. " Only this; "
— he shook his head as if the lightnings annoyed him.
" History," Glover went on, " makes more mention of me
than of any other living man. Art adores me, — lo ! " He
pointed to the pictures on the walls. There was a battle of
the Florida War, supported by a figure of Liberty on one
side of the piece, and Justice on the other. " 0, reverend
gods I " he exclaimed ; " ye know, ye appreciate my worth !
456 RICHAUD EDNEY AND
O Divine Providence, how couldst thou get on vsrithout
me
" Devils and damned spirits ! " groaned Mr. Serme ; " I
am not ready. Hell opens to receive me ! Mr. Graver, take
my conscience, — cut it out, — hide it, — burn it ! Quick !
— they are after it."
"A man has a right to drink," replied Mr. Graver; "I
always told Mrs. Graver so."
" What hands the flies are to get into things ! " remarked
the teamster ; " here is one crawling under my shirt
sleeve."
" Good Helskill, — kind, hospitable Helskill, — would you
let a dry, a very dry man, have something to moisten him-
self? " asked Weasand.
A vivid and deafening bolt, that silenced them all.
" Appalling ! " said Glover ; " but sweet, and refreshing,
like glory."
" Glover is a knowing 'un," said Philemon. " I wonder
if he Avould n't like to go up among the lightnings, about
this time, and touch them off, — perhaps ram cartridges for
some of the big guns."
"Would they dare to touch me ofFi ! Gompeer of the
Almighty, I, Glover, am ; — the first and last resort of kings I
I am lightnings ! I wish I could fall to-night on two devoted
heads. It is with difliculty, with self-denial, my friends,
that I restrain myself."
" Folderol ! " answered Philemon ; " let them sleep.
They are just married. You have done mischief enough."
" Mischief! If it was not you, Phil, — if you was any-
body else, I would kill you, Phil. Thr'pence a pound on
tea is nothing to what I feel. I can feel, — I can feel an
insult. I can feel an invasion of my rights, — the rights
of all governments, — the rights of the stronger. Mischief!
THE governor's fabiily. 457
You have not heard of Trajan's column, or Nelson's mon-
ument, or the Temple of Fame ? Lie still, puppy ! I dare
Almighty God ! "
" Not that ; — don't say that; — we are not quite up to
that," said Philemon,
" God says," continued Clover," Thou shalt not kill ; — I
kill. He says, Keep the Sabbath ; — ■ I never yet kept one.
He says. Love your enemy ; — now it strikes one it is
rather presumptuous to say that to me ! Why, I suppose I
am the only regular. Old Line, opposition left. If I were
out of the way, these numbskulls of humanity would have
a great time. My ancestors lived to a good old age, and I
shall do the same. Consult the Clover genealogy ! "
" Drink, Clover, and sit down."
" Not while you try to cow me, Phil. Not till my power
is acknowledged."
Another flash.
" Ha ! ha ! that 's some. They smell me ! They know
I am up and dressed ! I defy the storm ! I challenge all
the fires of heaven ! Meet me, ye dread ministers, where
YE WILL, I Mil READY ! ! "
" Don't ! " cried Helskill.
" Mercy ! Clover, God, Devil ! " agonized Mr. Serme.
" It is n't best," said Mr. Craver. " If the children would
go to bed, and not be rummaging gullies so. It is n't best,
Mr. Clover. I hold to moderation. If Mrs. Craver — [a
flash] — wife, don't sweep that rock ; — put up your broom !
Take in more sewing."
" I '11 stump him to do it ! " exclaimed* the teamster.
" Yes," said Philemon, " let him do it, — he wants to so
much."
" Do is the word ! " responded Clover. " I will meet
them at the Old Oak in the Stone Pasture ! I will meet
39
458 RICHARD EDNEY AND
their Goliath, the lightnings, there! I will tweak the nose
of Vengeance ! Come, boys, — follow bie ! "
He seized his hat, and rushed out of doors, followed by
the rest. Neither Mr. Serme nor Mr. Graver dared be left
alone ; and they went too. Helskill, whom no emergency
could deter from the systematic pursuit of his business, ran
after, with a bottle in each hand.
It was a fearful hour ; — gutters running in torrents,
winds whisking the helpless trees, the wizard glare of the
lightnings, the thunder bellowing a call to some unheard-of
catastrophe, filled them with excitement and forebodings.
On they went, across brook and bog, over fences and rock,
dripping, blaspheming, headed by the satanic Clover.
They reached the Old Oak, a large, skeleton-likV, wiry
tree, whose stubborn branches unbent to the storm, and only
the leaves were shaken, even as moss on a rock twinkles in
the wind.
Clover smote his fist on the tree, and, looking up, said,
" Ye powers of heaven, or hell, I have come ! ! ! "
A flash of lightning struck him dead ! It stunned his
comrades, who recovered to find their old leader, whose last
impious attitude the blaze at the same instant revealed and
extinguished, prostrate and dishevelled at the foot of the
tree.
That steel-nerved arm was wilted; — those scorn-glancing
eyes were upturned in glassy impotence ; — that redoubtable
chest should heave no more. His long red locks seemed to
sweal in the pouring rain ; — his trunk and limbs dammed
a brief rivulet that hasted to bury him.
Alarm of conscience crowding upon the shock of incident,
these infatuated rnen knew not what to do. They con-
sulted hurriedly and wildly, and proceeded to bury the car-
cass where it lay.
THE governor's FAMILY. 459
Turf, swale grass, stones, stumps, were brought together,
and piled upon it. Philemon, snatching the bottles of Hel-
skill, threw them upon the body of this wickedness, and
they were buried, too.
Through long hours these men worked.
The rain chilled and impeded exertion ; the lightning dis-
played a ghastly object to their eyes, and quickened more
ghastly apprehensions in their bosoms ; unrelenting thun-
ders rung out a judgment-day alarum ; Terror seemed to
winnow with its wings the air they breathed.
Their task done, they returned to the tavern soberer, and
we will hope, better men.
CHAPTER LI.
GATHERED FRAGMENTS.
We might say more things of Richard, and of what per-
tains to him ; we might relate how, through the Governor,
who was one of the corporators of the Dam and Mills, he
became Agent of that extensive interest; how he built a
fine house on land near Bill Stonners' Point, deemed one
of the most picturesque spots in the Beauty of Woodylin ;
and how he got the land, with its fine park of forest trees,
of Mysie and Chuk, who would part mth it to nobody else ;
how he was respected and beloved by his fellow-citizens,
and became Mayor of the city ; and how the Griped Hand
continued to flourish, recruiting the Church on the one
hand, and replenishing the purity and beauty, the law and
order, of the city, on the other. But, leaving these things,
as, perhaps, we are bound in justice to do, " to the imagina-
tion of the reader," we shall briefly advert to one or two
other topics.
Barbara, as Cousin Rowena forethought, and the ring
seemed to announce, married Chassford. Their nuptials
were celebrated with becoming dignity and lustre. Richard
facilitated this consummation, — first, by his faithful dealing
with Chassford's vices ; secondly, by the support he afforded
to his virtues. We have so far outlined the character both
of Barbara and Chassford as possibly to afford ground for
the opinion that they were eminently fit for each other, as
regards native and genuine qualities of mind and heart, and
in matter of taste and education.
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 461
There interfered a melancholy barrier to their mutual
wishes, in the incipient profligacy of Chassford. If Richard
had his sorrows, Barbara was not without hers. And it is
worthy of remark, that while Richard was secretly laboring
to reform Chassford, Barbara was equally active, in a silent
way, for the restoration of Richard. Cousin Rowena was
not a little inspired by Barbara. In fact, Richard under-
stood Chassford better than Barbara did, and Barbara under-
stood Richard better than Melicent did ; and not unnaturally.
A great sorrow often disturbs the judgment in the direction
in which it moves, leaving it clear in other quarters. So
Barbara, darkened in regard to Chassford, thought she
could distinctly translate Richard to Melicent, as Richard
presumed he had the key to Chassford. After his return to
Melicent, Richard had freer opportunity to work for the
hearts and happiness of these unfortunate ones. If the
repentance of the sinner communicates joy to the heavenly
world, there must be pleasure in the sight of Fidelity fondly
sweeping among the waste of things for the lost piece of
virtue, — Hope sitting on the shore of evil, trying to discern
the form of the beloved one in the distant wreck, — Affec-
tion welcoming the weather-worn memories of other days,
opening its doors to the promise and aspiration of a new life,
and healing the wounds which sin has made. If Love can-
not forgive, how shall Justice ever ?
Glendar bowed himself politely from the Governor's
Family and from the city, as he does from this Tale.
Mrs. Melbourne bore no malice, and would allow that
she was actuated by no meanness, toward Richard. She
believed Miss Eyre, — her prejudices reinforced her belief;
her energy, having so strong a team in hand, would easily
haul Richard to perdition. His elevation, compassed in
39*
462 RICHARD EDNEY AND
spite of herself, she had at length the good sense to see was
deserved, and the candor to applaud.
We take our leave of Miss Eyre with an unaffected
interest and the tenderest compassion. Forgiven by others,
she could not forgive herself. She would lay a daily offer-
ing of loneliness and woe on the altar of the Great Good
she had impeded. Koscoe would really have married her;
there was an oddity in the thing that suited the oddity of
his temper ; — or, rather, there was romance in her history
which kindled his imagination ; and more, there was a deep,
underlying vividness, freedom, struggle, in all her life,
which comported with the sensibilities of his own nature, —
sensibilities hidden by the roughness and reserve of his
ordinary manner. She replied, " There is a spot sacred to
the memory and peace of Junia, where she practised sub-
mission and obtained serenity ; and, what I have never done,
by schooling the importunities of her heart, and frowardness
of her will, she became strong in faith, and heroic in action.
Thither I would go. I have lived, I know not to what end,
or with what motive. I must ripen in seclusion those
virtues which can alone make life tolerable, or endeavor
useful. If you can love me, remember me; and if you
remember me, it will help me." She went to the farm-cot-
tage where Junia spent so many agreeable months.
Miss Freeling married Mr. Cosgrove, and Cousin Rowena
Teacher Willwell. This was Richard's doings, — nay,
Teacher Willwell did it himself. Practising the rule he
taught, — to see what things are made for, — at the nuptials
of Richard and Melicent, he decided that Cousin was made
for himself. She marvelled that so simple a rule could be
so accurate.
Simon rose to the post of Richard's hack-driver.
Captain Creamer so far prospered as to be able to take of
THE governor's FAMILY. 463
Eichard the rent of the identical saw at which he had
originally offered Richard the chance of the slip.
Memmy and Bobby, — God bless their little hearts !
words fail to describe their joy in seeing Uncle Richard
happy again, and particularly at the sight of his new house ;
and all the fleeting, bird-like ways they took to show it, —
and how they ran of errands between Mamma and Aunt
Melicent, — and in a little basket, under a little cover, car-
ried dishes of strawberries, and rounds of warm, light cake,
and an occasional potted pigeon.
CHAPTER LII.
PARTING WORDS.
1. To the inquiry, " What business has Clover in these
pages ?" The same that what he represents has in the
world at large.
There is a Something both principle and practice, organ-
ized, constitutional, customary, bepraised, canonized, conse-
crated in the Prayer Book, and in many pulpits, — in the
public relations of the human kind, precisely like Clover in
the urban and domestic connections of this Tale. Clover
acts from the same impulse that that acts. That Something
is a gigantic, international Clover. Clover is the same
epitomized. It was agreeable to the original cast, as well
as ulterior purpose, of this volume, that that Something, his-
torically so conspicuous, should take a biographical form.
Let it be incarnated, and in personal unity inhabit a town,
and reside in our houses, and see how it looks !
2. To those authors from whom, in the composition of
this Tale, we have borrowed, we return sincere thanks. If
our publishers, who are obliging gentlemen, consent, we
would like to forward a copy of the book to each of them.
If they dislike anything of theirs in this connection, they
will of course withdraw it ; — should they chance to like
anything of ours, they have full permission to use it. This
would seem to be fair.
Pope Gregory VII. burned the works of Varro, from whom
Augustine had largely drawn, that the Saint might not be
accused of plagiarism. We have no such extreme intention.
RICHARD EDNEY, ETC. 465
First, it would be an endless task. What consteraation in
the literary world, should even the humblest author under-
take such a thing ! And such authors are the ones who
would be most inclined to cancel their obligations in this
way. We might fire the Cambridge librarj' ; but, alas ! the
assistant librarian, whose pleasant face has beguiled for us
so much weary research in those alcoves, and, as it were,
illuminated the black letter of so many recondite volumes,
— to see him shedding tears over their ashes, would undo
us ! We are weak there. Secondly, it comports at once
with manliness and humility to confess one's indebtedness.
Thirdly, as a matter of expediency, it is better to avail one's
self of a favorable wind and general convoy to fame, than
run the risk of being becalmed, and perhaps devoured, on
some private and unknown route. But, lastly, and chiefly,
let it be recorded, there is a social feeling among authors,
— they cherish convivial sentiments, — they are never
envious of a fellow; there is not, probably, a great author
living, but that, like a certain great king, would gladly
throw a chicken, or a chicken's wing, from his feathered
abundance, to any poor author, and enjoy its effect in light-
ing up the countenances of the poor author's wife and chil-
dren. Wherefore it is that plagiarism, after all, is to be
considered rather in the light of good cheer and kindly
intercourse, than as evidence of meanness of disposition, or
paucity of ideas.
3. To the tourist, who, with guide-book in hand, and
curious pains-taking, seeks to recover scenes and places
fleetingly commemorated in these pages, we are obliged to
say, he will be disappointed. This Tale, in the language
of art, is a composition, not a sketch. There is no such
city as Woodylin; or, more truly, we might affirm, the
materials of it exist throughout the country. Its population
466 KICHARO EDXEY AND
and its pursuits are confined to no single locality, but are
scattered everywhere. Its elements of good, hope, progress,
may be developed everywhere ; — would, too, that whatever
it contains prejudicial to human weal might be depressed in
all regions of the earth I
4. To the book itself.
" Vade Liber."
Go, Little Book.
" Qualis, non ausim dicere, felix."
What will be your fortune, I cannot tell.
" Vade tamen quocunque lubet, quascunque per oras,
I blandas inter Charites, mystamque saluta
Musarum quemvis, si tibi lector erit.
Rura colas, urbemque."
Yet go •wherever you like, — go everywhere, — go among kind people ;
you may even venture to introduce yourself to the severer sort, if they will
admit you. Visit the city and the country.
"Si criticus lector, tumidus censorque molestus,
Zoilus et Momus, si rabiosa cohors," — approach,
"Fac fugias," — fly.
"Lseto omnes accipe vultu,
Quos, quas, vel quales, inde vel unde viros."
Look cheerfully upon all, men and women, and all of ever}' condition.
Go into farm-houses and rustic work-shops ; call at the
homes of the opulent and the powerful ; visit schools ; say
to the minister you have a word for the Church. I know
you will love the family ; — you may stay in the kitchen,
and, as you are so neatly dressed, and behave so prettily,
they will let you sit in the parlor. Let the hard hand of
the laboring classes hold you, nor need you shrink from the
soft hand of fair maiden. Speak pleasantly to the little
children ; — I need not fear on that score ; — speak wisely
and respectfully to parents. You may enter the haunts of
iniquity, and preach repentance there ; you may show your
THE governor's fasiilt. 467
cheerful face in sordid abodes, and inspire a love for purity
and blessedness. Go West, — go South ; you need not fear
to utter a true word anywhere. Especially — and these
are your private instructions — speak to our Young Men,
and tell them not to be so anxious to exchange the sure
results of labor for the shifting promise of calculation, — tell
them that the hoe is better than the yard-stick. Instruct
them that the farmer's frock and the mechanic's apron are
as honorable as the merchant's clerk's paletot or the student's
cap. Show them how to rise in their calling, not out of it ;
and that intelligence, industry and virtue, are the only
decent way to honor and emolument. Help them to bear
sorrow, disappointment, and trial, which are wont to be the
lot of humanity. And, more especially, demonstrate to
them, and to all, how they may Be Good and Do Goon !
^' If it is thought worth while to take j'ou to Tartary, be
not afraid to go. Look up bright and strong. When those
people come to understand your language, I think they will
like you very much.
Should inquiries arise touching your parentage and con-
nections, — a natural' and laudable curiosity, which, as a
stranger in the world, you will be expected to enlighten, —
you may say that you are one of three, believed to be a
worthy family, comprising two brothers and one sister.
That a few years since, your author published the history
of a young woman, entitled " Margaret : a Tale of the Eeal
and the Ideal ; " — and that at the same time, and as a sort
of counterpart and sequel to this, he embraced the design of
writing the history of a young man, and you are the result.
The first shows what, in given circumstances, a woman can
do ; the last indicates what may be expected of a man ; — the
first is more antique ; the last, modern. Both are local in
action, but diflfusive in spirit. In the mean time, he has
4ba RICHARD EDNEY, ETC,
written " Philo, an Evangeliad : " cosmopolitan, (ecumen-
ical, sempiternal, in its scope, embodying ideas rather than
facts, and uniting times and places ; and cast in the only-
form in which such subjects could be disposed of, the alle-
goric and symbolical, — or, as it is sometimes termed, the
poetic. The two first are individual workers ; the last is a
representative life. " Philo " is as an angel of the everlast-
ing Gospel ; you and " Margaret," one in the shop, and the
other on the farm, are practical Christians. However dif-
ferent your sphere or your manners, you may say you all
originate on the part of your author in a single desire to
glorify God and bless his fellow-men. "Philo "has been
called prosy ; " Margaret " was accounted tedious. You,
" Kichard," I know, will appear as well as you can, and be
Avhat you are, — honest certainly, pleasing if possible.
God bless thee. Little Book, and anoint thee for thy work,
and make thee a savor of good to many ! We shall meet
again, in other years or worlds. May we meet for good,
and not for evil ! If there is any evil in thy heart or thy
ways, God purge it from thee !
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