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diff --git a/13707-0.txt b/13707-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..493595f --- /dev/null +++ b/13707-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,14468 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13707 *** + +TWICE-TOLD TALES + +by NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE + +PHILADELPHIA: +DAVID McKAY, PUBLISHER, +23 SOUTH NINTH STREET + +1889 + + +CONTENTS + + THE GRAY CHAMPION + SUNDAY AT HOME + THE WEDDING-KNELL + THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL + THE MAYPOLE OF MERRY MOUNT + THE GENTLE BOY + MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE + LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE + WAKEFIELD + A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP + THE GREAT CARBUNCLE + THE PROPHETIC PICTURES + DAVID SWAN + SIGHTS FROM A STEEPLE + THE HOLLOW OF THE THREE HILLS + THE TOLL-GATHERER’S DAY + THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN + FANCY’S SHOW-BOX + DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT + LEGENDS OF THE PROVINCE HOUSE: + I. HOWE’S MASQUERADE + II. EDWARD RANDOLPH’S PORTRAIT + III. LADY ELEANORE’S MANTLE + IV. OLD ESTHER DUDLEY + THE HAUNTED MIND + THE VILLAGE UNCLE + THE AMBITIOUS GUEST + THE SISTER-YEARS + SNOWFLAKES + THE SEVEN VAGABONDS + THE WHITE OLD MAID + PETER GOLDTHWAITE’S TREASURE + CHIPPINGS WITH A CHISEL + THE SHAKER BRIDAL + NIGHT-SKETCHES + ENDICOTT AND THE RED CROSS + THE LILY’S QUEST + FOOTPRINTS ON THE SEASHORE + EDWARD FANE’S ROSEBUD + THE THREEFOLD DESTINY + + + + +Twice-Told Tales + + + + +THE GRAY CHAMPION + + +There was once a time when New England groaned under the actual +pressure of heavier wrongs than those threatened ones which brought on +the Revolution. James II., the bigoted successor of Charles the +Voluptuous, had annulled the charters of all the colonies and sent a +harsh and unprincipled soldier to take away our liberties and endanger +our religion. The administration of Sir Edmund Andros lacked scarcely a +single characteristic of tyranny—a governor and council holding office +from the king and wholly independent of the country; laws made and +taxes levied without concurrence of the people, immediate or by their +representatives; the rights of private citizens violated and the titles +of all landed property declared void; the voice of complaint stifled by +restrictions on the press; and finally, disaffection overawed by the +first band of mercenary troops that ever marched on our free soil. For +two years our ancestors were kept in sullen submission by that filial +love which had invariably secured their allegiance to the +mother-country, whether its head chanced to be a Parliament, Protector +or popish monarch. Till these evil times, however, such allegiance had +been merely nominal, and the colonists had ruled themselves, enjoying +far more freedom than is even yet the privilege of the native subjects +of Great Britain. + +At length a rumor reached our shores that the prince of Orange had +ventured on an enterprise the success of which would be the triumph of +civil and religious rights and the salvation of New England. It was but +a doubtful whisper; it might be false or the attempt might fail, and in +either case the man that stirred against King James would lose his +head. Still, the intelligence produced a marked effect. The people +smiled mysteriously in the streets and threw bold glances at their +oppressors, while far and wide there was a subdued and silent +agitation, as if the slightest signal would rouse the whole land from +its sluggish despondency. Aware of their danger, the rulers resolved to +avert it by an imposing display of strength, and perhaps to confirm +their despotism by yet harsher measures. + +One afternoon in April, 1689, Sir Edmund Andros and his favorite +councillors, being warm with wine, assembled the red-coats of the +governor’s guard and made their appearance in the streets of Boston. +The sun was near setting when the march commenced. The roll of the drum +at that unquiet crisis seemed to go through the streets less as the +martial music of the soldiers than as a muster-call to the inhabitants +themselves. A multitude by various avenues assembled in King street, +which was destined to be the scene, nearly a century afterward, of +another encounter between the troops of Britain and a people struggling +against her tyranny. + +Though more than sixty years had elapsed since the Pilgrims came, this +crowd of their descendants still showed the strong and sombre features +of their character perhaps more strikingly in such a stern emergency +than on happier occasions. There was the sober garb, the general +severity of mien, the gloomy but undismayed expression, the scriptural +forms of speech and the confidence in Heaven’s blessing on a righteous +cause which would have marked a band of the original Puritans when +threatened by some peril of the wilderness. Indeed, it was not yet time +for the old spirit to be extinct, since there were men in the street +that day who had worshipped there beneath the trees before a house was +reared to the God for whom they had become exiles. Old soldiers of the +Parliament were here, too, smiling grimly at the thought that their +aged arms might strike another blow against the house of Stuart. Here, +also, were the veterans of King Philip’s war, who had burned villages +and slaughtered young and old with pious fierceness while the godly +souls throughout the land were helping them with prayer. Several +ministers were scattered among the crowd, which, unlike all other mobs, +regarded them with such reverence as if there were sanctity in their +very garments. These holy men exerted their influence to quiet the +people, but not to disperse them. + +Meantime, the purpose of the governor in disturbing the peace of the +town at a period when the slightest commotion might throw the country +into a ferment was almost the Universal subject of inquiry, and +variously explained. + +“Satan will strike his master-stroke presently,” cried some, “because +he knoweth that his time is short. All our godly pastors are to be +dragged to prison. We shall see them at a Smithfield fire in King +street.” + +Hereupon the people of each parish gathered closer round their +minister, who looked calmly upward and assumed a more apostolic +dignity, as well befitted a candidate for the highest honor of his +profession—a crown of martyrdom. It was actually fancied at that period +that New England might have a John Rogers of her own to take the place +of that worthy in the _Primer_. + +“The pope of Rome has given orders for a new St. Bartholomew,” cried +others. “We are to be massacred, man and male-child.” + +Neither was this rumor wholly discredited; although the wiser class +believed the governor’s object somewhat less atrocious. His predecessor +under the old charter, Bradstreet, a venerable companion of the first +settlers, was known to be in town. There were grounds for conjecturing +that Sir Edmund Andros intended at once to strike terror by a parade of +military force and to confound the opposite faction by possessing +himself of their chief. + +“Stand firm for the old charter-governor!” shouted the crowd, seizing +upon the idea—“the good old Governor Bradstreet!” + +While this cry was at the loudest the people were surprised by the +well-known figure of Governor Bradstreet himself, a patriarch of nearly +ninety, who appeared on the elevated steps of a door and with +characteristic mildness besought them to submit to the constituted +authorities. + +“My children,” concluded this venerable person, “do nothing rashly. Cry +not aloud, but pray for the welfare of New England and expect patiently +what the Lord will do in this matter.” + +The event was soon to be decided. All this time the roll of the drum +had been approaching through Cornhill, louder and deeper, till with +reverberations from house to house and the regular tramp of martial +footsteps it burst into the street. A double rank of soldiers made +their appearance, occupying the whole breadth of the passage, with +shouldered matchlocks and matches burning, so as to present a row of +fires in the dusk. Their steady march was like the progress of a +machine that would roll irresistibly over everything in its way. Next, +moving slowly, with a confused clatter of hoofs on the pavement, rode a +party of mounted gentlemen, the central figure being Sir Edmund Andros, +elderly, but erect and soldier-like. Those around him were his favorite +councillors and the bitterest foes of New England. At his right hand +rode Edward Randolph, our arch-enemy, that “blasted wretch,” as Cotton +Mather calls him, who achieved the downfall of our ancient government +and was followed with a sensible curse-through life and to his grave. +On the other side was Bullivant, scattering jests and mockery as he +rode along. Dudley came behind with a downcast look, dreading, as well +he might, to meet the indignant gaze of the people, who beheld him, +their only countryman by birth, among the oppressors of his native +land. The captain of a frigate in the harbor and two or three civil +officers under the Crown were also there. But the figure which most +attracted the public eye and stirred up the deepest feeling was the +Episcopal clergyman of King’s Chapel riding haughtily among the +magistrates in his priestly vestments, the fitting representative of +prelacy and persecution, the union of Church and State, and all those +abominations which had driven the Puritans to the wilderness. Another +guard of soldiers, in double rank, brought up the rear. + +The whole scene was a picture of the condition of New England, and its +moral, the deformity of any government that does not grow out of the +nature of things and the character of the people—on one side the +religious multitude with their sad visages and dark attire, and on the +other the group of despotic rulers with the high churchman in the midst +and here and there a crucifix at their bosoms, all magnificently clad, +flushed with wine, proud of unjust authority and scoffing at the +universal groan. And the mercenary soldiers, waiting but the word to +deluge the street with blood, showed the only means by which obedience +could be secured. + +“O Lord of hosts,” cried a voice among the crowd, “provide a champion +for thy people!” + +This ejaculation was loudly uttered, and served as a herald’s cry to +introduce a remarkable personage. The crowd had rolled back, and were +now huddled together nearly at the extremity of the street, while the +soldiers had advanced no more than a third of its length. The +intervening space was empty—a paved solitude between lofty edifices +which threw almost a twilight shadow over it. Suddenly there was seen +the figure of an ancient man who seemed to have emerged from among the +people and was walking by himself along the centre of the street to +confront the armed band. He wore the old Puritan dress—a dark cloak and +a steeple-crowned hat in the fashion of at least fifty years before, +with a heavy sword upon his thigh, but a staff in his hand to assist +the tremulous gait of age. + +When at some distance from the multitude, the old man turned slowly +round, displaying a face of antique majesty rendered doubly venerable +by the hoary beard that descended on his breast. He made a gesture at +once of encouragement and warning, then turned again and resumed his +way. + +“Who is this gray patriarch?” asked the young men of their sires. + +“Who is this venerable brother?” asked the old men among themselves. + +But none could make reply. The fathers of the people, those of +fourscore years and upward, were disturbed, deeming it strange that +they should forget one of such evident authority whom they must have +known in their early days, the associate of Winthrop and all the old +councillors, giving laws and making prayers and leading them against +the savage. The elderly men ought to have remembered him, too, with +locks as gray in their youth as their own were now. And the young! How +could he have passed so utterly from their memories—that hoary sire, +the relic of long-departed times, whose awful benediction had surely +been bestowed on their uncovered heads in childhood? + +“Whence did he come? What is his purpose? Who can this old man be?” +whispered the wondering crowd. + +Meanwhile, the venerable stranger, staff in hand, was pursuing his +solitary walk along the centre of the street. As he drew near the +advancing soldiers, and as the roll of their drum came full upon his +ear, the old man raised himself to a loftier mien, while the +decrepitude of age seemed to fall from his shoulders, leaving him in +gray but unbroken dignity. Now he marched onward with a warrior’s step, +keeping time to the military music. Thus the aged form advanced on one +side and the whole parade of soldiers and magistrates on the other, +till, when scarcely twenty yards remained between, the old man grasped +his staff by the middle and held it before him like a leader’s +truncheon. + +“Stand!” cried he. + +The eye, the face and attitude of command, the solemn yet warlike peal +of that voice—fit either to rule a host in the battle-field or be +raised to God in prayer—were irresistible. At the old man’s word and +outstretched arm the roll of the drum was hushed at once and the +advancing line stood still. A tremulous enthusiasm seized upon the +multitude. That stately form, combining the leader and the saint, so +gray, so dimly seen, in such an ancient garb, could only belong to some +old champion of the righteous cause whom the oppressor’s drum had +summoned from his grave. They raised a shout of awe and exultation, and +looked for the deliverance of New England. + +The governor and the gentlemen of his party, perceiving themselves +brought to an unexpected stand, rode hastily forward, as if they would +have pressed their snorting and affrighted horses right against the +hoary apparition. He, however, blenched not a step, but, glancing his +severe eye round the group, which half encompassed him, at last bent it +sternly on Sir Edmund Andros. One would have thought that the dark old +man was chief ruler there, and that the governor and council with +soldiers at their back, representing the whole power and authority of +the Crown, had no alternative but obedience. + +“What does this old fellow here?” cried Edward Randolph, fiercely.—“On, +Sir Edmund! Bid the soldiers forward, and give the dotard the same +choice that you give all his countrymen—to stand aside or be trampled +on.” + +“Nay, nay! Let us show respect to the good grandsire,” said Bullivant, +laughing. “See you not he is some old round-headed dignitary who hath +lain asleep these thirty years and knows nothing of the change of +times? Doubtless he thinks to put us down with a proclamation in Old +Noll’s name.” + +“Are you mad, old man?” demanded Sir Edmund Andros, in loud and harsh +tones. “How dare you stay the march of King James’s governor?” + +“I have stayed the march of a king himself ere now,” replied the gray +figure, with stern composure. “I am here, Sir Governor, because the cry +of an oppressed people hath disturbed me in my secret place, and, +beseeching this favor earnestly of the Lord, it was vouchsafed me to +appear once again on earth in the good old cause of his saints. And +what speak ye of James? There is no longer a popish tyrant on the +throne of England, and by to-morrow noon his name shall be a by-word in +this very street, where ye would make it a word of terror. Back, thou +that wast a governor, back! With this night thy power is ended. +To-morrow, the prison! Back, lest I foretell the scaffold!” + +The people had been drawing nearer and nearer and drinking in the words +of their champion, who spoke in accents long disused, like one +unaccustomed to converse except with the dead of many years ago. But +his voice stirred their souls. They confronted the soldiers, not wholly +without arms and ready to convert the very stones of the street into +deadly weapons. Sir Edmund Andros looked at the old man; then he cast +his hard and cruel eye over the multitude and beheld them burning with +that lurid wrath so difficult to kindle or to quench, and again he +fixed his gaze on the aged form which stood obscurely in an open space +where neither friend nor foe had thrust himself. What were his thoughts +he uttered no word which might discover, but, whether the oppressor +were overawed by the Gray Champion’s look or perceived his peril in the +threatening attitude of the people, it is certain that he gave back and +ordered his soldiers to commence a slow and guarded retreat. Before +another sunset the governor and all that rode so proudly with him were +prisoners, and long ere it was known that James had abdicated King +William was proclaimed throughout New England. + +But where was the Gray Champion? Some reported that when the troops had +gone from King street and the people were thronging tumultuously in +their rear, Bradstreet, the aged governor, was seen to embrace a form +more aged than his own. Others soberly affirmed that while they +marvelled at the venerable grandeur of his aspect the old man had faded +from their eyes, melting slowly into the hues of twilight, till where +he stood there was an empty space. But all agreed that the hoary shape +was gone. The men of that generation watched for his reappearance in +sunshine and in twilight, but never saw him more, nor knew when his +funeral passed nor where his gravestone was. + +And who was the Gray Champion? Perhaps his name might be found in the +records of that stern court of justice which passed a sentence too +mighty for the age, but glorious in all after-times for its humbling +lesson to the monarch and its high example to the subject. I have heard +that whenever the descendants of the Puritans are to show the spirit of +their sires the old man appears again. When eighty years had passed, he +walked once more in King street. Five years later, in the twilight of +an April morning, he stood on the green beside the meeting-house at +Lexington where now the obelisk of granite with a slab of slate inlaid +commemorates the first-fallen of the Revolution. And when our fathers +were toiling at the breastwork on Bunker’s Hill, all through that night +the old warrior walked his rounds. Long, long may it be ere he comes +again! His hour is one of darkness and adversity and peril. But should +domestic tyranny oppress us or the invader’s step pollute our soil, +still may the Gray Champion come! for he is the type of New England’s +hereditary spirit, and his shadowy march on the eve of danger must ever +be the pledge that New England’s sons will vindicate their ancestry. + + + + +SUNDAY AT HOME + + +Every Sabbath morning in the summer-time I thrust back the curtain to +watch the sunrise stealing down a steeple which stands opposite my +chamber window. First the weathercock begins to flash; then a fainter +lustre gives the spire an airy aspect; next it encroaches on the tower +and causes the index of the dial to glisten like gold as it points to +the gilded figure of the hour. Now the loftiest window gleams, and now +the lower. The carved framework of the portal is marked strongly out. +At length the morning glory in its descent from heaven comes down the +stone steps one by one, and there stands the steeple glowing with fresh +radiance, while the shades of twilight still hide themselves among the +nooks of the adjacent buildings. Methinks though the same sun brightens +it every fair morning, yet the steeple has a peculiar robe of +brightness for the Sabbath. + +By dwelling near a church a person soon contracts an attachment for the +edifice. We naturally personify it, and conceive its massy walls and +its dim emptiness to be instinct with a calm and meditative and +somewhat melancholy spirit. But the steeple stands foremost in our +thoughts, as well as locally. It impresses us as a giant with a mind +comprehensive and discriminating enough to care for the great and small +concerns of all the town. Hourly, while it speaks a moral to the few +that think, it reminds thousands of busy individuals of their separate +and most secret affairs. It is the steeple, too, that flings abroad the +hurried and irregular accents of general alarm; neither have gladness +and festivity found a better utterance than by its tongue; and when the +dead are slowly passing to their home, the steeple has a melancholy +voice to bid them welcome. Yet, in spite of this connection with human +interests, what a moral loneliness on week-days broods round about its +stately height! It has no kindred with the houses above which it +towers; it looks down into the narrow thoroughfare—the lonelier because +the crowd are elbowing their passage at its base. A glance at the body +of the church deepens this impression. Within, by the light of distant +windows, amid refracted shadows we discern the vacant pews and empty +galleries, the silent organ, the voiceless pulpit and the clock which +tells to solitude how time is passing. Time—where man lives not—what is +it but eternity? And in the church, we might suppose, are garnered up +throughout the week all thoughts and feelings that have reference to +eternity, until the holy day comes round again to let them forth. Might +not, then, its more appropriate site be in the outskirts of the town, +with space for old trees to wave around it and throw their solemn +shadows over a quiet green? We will say more of this hereafter. + +But on the Sabbath I watch the earliest sunshine and fancy that a +holier brightness marks the day when there shall be no buzz of voices +on the Exchange nor traffic in the shops, nor crowd nor business +anywhere but at church. Many have fancied so. For my own part, whether +I see it scattered down among tangled woods, or beaming broad across +the fields, or hemmed in between brick buildings, or tracing out the +figure of the casement on my chamber floor, still I recognize the +Sabbath sunshine. And ever let me recognize it! Some illusions—and this +among them—are the shadows of great truths. Doubts may flit around me +or seem to close their evil wings and settle down, but so long as I +imagine that the earth is hallowed and the light of heaven retains its +sanctity on the Sabbath—while that blessed sunshine lives within +me—never can my soul have lost the instinct of its faith. If it have +gone astray, it will return again. + +I love to spend such pleasant Sabbaths from morning till night behind +the curtain of my open window. Are they spent amiss? Every spot so near +the church as to be visited by the circling shadow of the steeple +should be deemed consecrated ground to-day. With stronger truth be it +said that a devout heart may consecrate a den of thieves, as an evil +one may convert a temple to the same. My heart, perhaps, has no such +holy, nor, I would fain trust, such impious, potency. It must suffice +that, though my form be absent, my inner man goes constantly to church, +while many whose bodily presence fills the accustomed seats have left +their souls at home. But I am there even before my friend the sexton. +At length he comes—a man of kindly but sombre aspect, in dark gray +clothes, and hair of the same mixture. He comes and applies his key to +the wide portal. Now my thoughts may go in among the dusty pews or +ascend the pulpit without sacrilege, but soon come forth again to enjoy +the music of the bell. How glad, yet solemn too! All the steeples in +town are talking together aloft in the sunny air and rejoicing among +themselves while their spires point heavenward. Meantime, here are the +children assembling to the Sabbath-school, which is kept somewhere +within the church. Often, while looking at the arched portal, I have +been gladdened by the sight of a score of these little girls and boys +in pink, blue, yellow and crimson frocks bursting suddenly forth into +the sunshine like a swarm of gay butterflies that had been shut up in +the solemn gloom. Or I might compare them to cherubs haunting that holy +place. + +About a quarter of an hour before the second ringing of the bell +individuals of the congregation begin to appear. The earliest is +invariably an old woman in black whose bent frame and rounded shoulders +are evidently laden with some heavy affliction which she is eager to +rest upon the altar. Would that the Sabbath came twice as often, for +the sake of that sorrowful old soul! There is an elderly man, also, who +arrives in good season and leans against the corner of the tower, just +within the line of its shadow, looking downward with a darksome brow. I +sometimes fancy that the old woman is the happier of the two. After +these, others drop in singly and by twos and threes, either +disappearing through the doorway or taking their stand in its vicinity. +At last, and always with an unexpected sensation, the bell turns in the +steeple overhead and throws out an irregular clangor, jarring the tower +to its foundation. As if there were magic in the sound, the sidewalks +of the street, both up and down along, are immediately thronged with +two long lines of people, all converging hitherward and streaming into +the church. Perhaps the far-off roar of a coach draws nearer—a deeper +thunder by its contrast with the surrounding stillness—until it sets +down the wealthy worshippers at the portal among their humblest +brethren. Beyond that entrance—in theory, at least—there are no +distinctions of earthly rank; nor, indeed, by the goodly apparel which +is flaunting in the sun would there seem to be such on the hither side. +Those pretty girls! Why will they disturb my pious meditations? Of all +days in the week, they should strive to look least fascinating on the +Sabbath, instead of heightening their mortal loveliness, as if to rival +the blessed angels and keep our thoughts from heaven. Were I the +minister himself, I must needs look. One girl is white muslin from the +waist upward and black silk downward to her slippers; a second blushes +from top-knot to shoe-tie, one universal scarlet; another shines of a +pervading yellow, as if she had made a garment of the sunshine. The +greater part, however, have adopted a milder cheerfulness of hue. Their +veils, especially when the wind raises them, give a lightness to the +general effect and make them appear like airy phantoms as they flit up +the steps and vanish into the sombre doorway. Nearly all—though it is +very strange that I should know it—wear white stockings, white as snow, +and neat slippers laced crosswise with black ribbon pretty high above +the ankles. A white stocking is infinitely more effective than a black +one. + +Here comes the clergyman, slow and solemn, in severe simplicity, +needing no black silk gown to denote his office. His aspect claims my +reverence, but cannot win my love. Were I to picture Saint Peter +keeping fast the gate of Heaven and frowning, more stern than pitiful, +on the wretched applicants, that face should be my study. By middle +age, or sooner, the creed has generally wrought upon the heart or been +attempered by it. As the minister passes into the church the bell holds +its iron tongue and all the low murmur of the congregation dies away. +The gray sexton looks up and down the street and then at my +window-curtain, where through the small peephole I half fancy that he +has caught my eye. Now every loiterer has gone in and the street lies +asleep in the quiet sun, while a feeling of loneliness comes over me, +and brings also an uneasy sense of neglected privileges and duties. Oh, +I ought to have gone to church! The bustle of the rising congregation +reaches my ears. They are standing up to pray. Could I bring my heart +into unison with those who are praying in yonder church and lift it +heavenward with a fervor of supplication, but no distinct request, +would not that be the safest kind of prayer?—“Lord, look down upon me +in mercy!” With that sentiment gushing from my soul, might I not leave +all the rest to him? + +Hark! the hymn! This, at least, is a portion of the service which I can +enjoy better than if I sat within the walls, where the full choir and +the massive melody of the organ would fall with a weight upon me. At +this distance it thrills through my frame and plays upon my +heart-strings with a pleasure both of the sense and spirit. Heaven be +praised! I know nothing of music as a science, and the most elaborate +harmonies, if they please me, please as simply as a nurse’s lullaby. +The strain has ceased, but prolongs itself in my mind with fanciful +echoes till I start from my reverie and find that the sermon has +commenced. It is my misfortune seldom to fructify in a regular way by +any but printed sermons. The first strong idea which the preacher +utters gives birth to a train of thought and leads me onward step by +step quite out of hearing of the good man’s voice unless he be indeed a +son of thunder. At my open window, catching now and then a sentence of +the “parson’s saw,” I am as well situated as at the foot of the pulpit +stairs. The broken and scattered fragments of this one discourse will +be the texts of many sermons preached by those colleague +pastors—colleagues, but often disputants—my Mind and Heart. The former +pretends to be a scholar and perplexes me with doctrinal points; the +latter takes me on the score of feeling; and both, like several other +preachers, spend their strength to very little purpose. I, their sole +auditor, cannot always understand them. + +Suppose that a few hours have passed, and behold me still behind my +curtain just before the close of the afternoon service. The hour-hand +on the dial has passed beyond four o’clock. The declining sun is hidden +behind the steeple and throws its shadow straight across the street; so +that my chamber is darkened as with a cloud. Around the church door all +is solitude, and an impenetrable obscurity beyond the threshold. A +commotion is heard. The seats are slammed down and the pew doors thrown +back; a multitude of feet are trampling along the unseen aisles, and +the congregation bursts suddenly through the portal. Foremost scampers +a rabble of boys, behind whom moves a dense and dark phalanx of grown +men, and lastly a crowd of females with young children and a few +scattered husbands. This instantaneous outbreak of life into loneliness +is one of the pleasantest scenes of the day. Some of the good people +are rubbing their eyes, thereby intimating that they have been wrapped, +as it were, in a sort of holy trance by the fervor of their devotion. +There is a young man, a third-rate coxcomb, whose first care is always +to flourish a white handkerchief and brush the seat of a tight pair of +black silk pantaloons which shine as if varnished. They must have been +made of the stuff called “everlasting,” or perhaps of the same piece as +Christian’s garments in the _Pilgrim’s Progress_, for he put them on +two summers ago and has not yet worn the gloss off. I have taken a +great liking to those black silk pantaloons. But now, with nods and +greetings among friends, each matron takes her husband’s arm and paces +gravely homeward, while the girls also flutter away after arranging +sunset walks with their favored bachelors. The Sabbath eve is the eve +of love. At length the whole congregation is dispersed. No; here, with +faces as glossy as black satin, come two sable ladies and a sable +gentleman, and close in their rear the minister, who softens his severe +visage and bestows a kind word on each. Poor souls! To them the most +captivating picture of bliss in heaven is “There we shall be white!” + +All is solitude again. But hark! A broken warbling of voices, and now, +attuning its grandeur to their sweetness, a stately peal of the organ. +Who are the choristers? Let me dream that the angels who came down from +heaven this blessed morn to blend themselves with the worship of the +truly good are playing and singing their farewell to the earth. On the +wings of that rich melody they were borne upward. + +This, gentle reader, is merely a flight of poetry. A few of the +singing-men and singing-women had lingered behind their fellows and +raised their voices fitfully and blew a careless note upon the organ. +Yet it lifted my soul higher than all their former strains. They are +gone—the sons and daughters of Music—and the gray sexton is just +closing the portal. For six days more there will be no face of man in +the pews and aisles and galleries, nor a voice in the pulpit, nor music +in the choir. Was it worth while to rear this massive edifice to be a +desert in the heart of the town and populous only for a few hours of +each seventh day? Oh, but the church is a symbol of religion. May its +site, which was consecrated on the day when the first tree was felled, +be kept holy for ever, a spot of solitude and peace amid the trouble +and vanity of our week-day world! There is a moral, and a religion too, +even in the silent walls. And may the steeple still point heavenward +and be decked with the hallowed sunshine of the Sabbath morn! + + + + +THE WEDDING-KNELL + + +There is a certain church, in the city of New York which I have always +regarded with peculiar interest on account of a marriage there +solemnized under very singular circumstances in my grandmother’s +girlhood. That venerable lady chanced to be a spectator of the scene, +and ever after made it her favorite narrative. Whether the edifice now +standing on the same site be the identical one to which she referred I +am not antiquarian enough to know, nor would it be worth while to +correct myself, perhaps, of an agreeable error by reading the date of +its erection on the tablet over the door. It is a stately church +surrounded by an enclosure of the loveliest green, within which appear +urns, pillars, obelisks, and other forms of monumental marble, the +tributes of private affection or more splendid memorials of historic +dust. With such a place, though the tumult of the city rolls beneath +its tower, one would be willing to connect some legendary interest. + +The marriage might be considered as the result of an early engagement, +though there had been two intermediate weddings on the lady’s part and +forty years of celibacy on that of the gentleman. At sixty-five Mr. +Ellenwood was a shy but not quite a secluded man; selfish, like all men +who brood over their own hearts, yet manifesting on rare occasions a +vein of generous sentiment; a scholar throughout life, though always an +indolent one, because his studies had no definite object either of +public advantage or personal ambition; a gentleman, high-bred and +fastidiously delicate, yet sometimes requiring a considerable +relaxation in his behalf of the common rules of society. In truth, +there were so many anomalies in his character, and, though shrinking +with diseased sensibility from public notice, it had been his fatality +so often to become the topic of the day by some wild eccentricity of +conduct, that people searched his lineage for a hereditary taint of +insanity. But there was no need of this. His caprices had their origin +in a mind that lacked the support of an engrossing purpose, and in +feelings that preyed upon themselves for want of other food. If he were +mad, it was the consequence, and not the cause, of an aimless and +abortive life. + +The widow was as complete a contrast to her third bridegroom in +everything but age as can well be conceived. Compelled to relinquish +her first engagement, she had been united to a man of twice her own +years, to whom she became an exemplary wife, and by whose death she was +left in possession of a splendid fortune. A Southern gentleman +considerably younger than herself succeeded to her hand and carried her +to Charleston, where after many uncomfortable years she found herself +again a widow. It would have been singular if any uncommon delicacy of +feeling had survived through such a life as Mrs. Dabney’s; it could not +but be crushed and killed by her early disappointment, the cold duty of +her first marriage, the dislocation of the heart’s principles +consequent on a second union, and the unkindness of her Southern +husband, which had inevitably driven her to connect the idea of his +death with that of her comfort. To be brief, she was that wisest but +unloveliest variety of woman, a philosopher, bearing troubles of the +heart with equanimity, dispensing with all that should have been her +happiness and making the best of what remained. Sage in most matters, +the widow was perhaps the more amiable for the one frailty that made +her ridiculous. Being childless, she could not remain beautiful by +proxy in the person of a daughter; she therefore refused to grow old +and ugly on any consideration; she struggled with Time, and held fast +her roses in spite of him, till the venerable thief appeared to have +relinquished the spoil as not worth the trouble of acquiring it. + +The approaching marriage of this woman of the world with such an +unworldly man as Mr. Ellenwood was announced soon after Mrs. Dabney’s +return to her native city. Superficial observers, and deeper ones, +seemed to concur in supposing that the lady must have borne no inactive +part in arranging the affair; there were considerations of expediency +which she would be far more likely to appreciate than Mr. Ellenwood, +and there was just the specious phantom of sentiment and romance in +this late union of two early lovers which sometimes makes a fool of a +woman who has lost her true feelings among the accidents of life. All +the wonder was how the gentleman, with his lack of worldly wisdom and +agonizing consciousness of ridicule, could have been induced to take a +measure at once so prudent and so laughable. But while people talked +the wedding-day arrived. The ceremony was to be solemnized according to +the Episcopalian forms and in open church, with a degree of publicity +that attracted many spectators, who occupied the front seats of the +galleries and the pews near the altar and along the broad aisle. It had +been arranged, or possibly it was the custom of the day, that the +parties should proceed separately to church. By some accident the +bridegroom was a little less punctual than the widow and her bridal +attendants, with whose arrival, after this tedious but necessary +preface, the action of our tale may be said to commence. + +The clumsy wheels of several old-fashioned coaches were heard, and the +gentlemen and ladies composing the bridal-party came through the church +door with the sudden and gladsome effect of a burst of sunshine. The +whole group, except the principal figure, was made up of youth and +gayety. As they streamed up the broad aisle, while the pews and pillars +seemed to brighten on either side, their steps were as buoyant as if +they mistook the church for a ball-room and were ready to dance hand in +hand to the altar. So brilliant was the spectacle that few took notice +of a singular phenomenon that had marked its entrance. At the moment +when the bride’s foot touched the threshold the bell swung heavily in +the tower above her and sent forth its deepest knell. The vibrations +died away, and returned with prolonged solemnity as she entered the +body of the church. + +“Good heavens! What an omen!” whispered a young lady to her lover. + +“On my honor,” replied the gentleman, “I believe the bell has the good +taste to toll of its own accord. What has she to do with weddings? If +you, dearest Julia, were approaching the altar, the bell would ring out +its merriest peal. It has only a funeral-knell for her.” + +The bride and most of her company had been too much occupied with the +bustle of entrance to hear the first boding stroke of the bell—or, at +least, to reflect on the singularity of such a welcome to the altar. +They therefore continued to advance with undiminished gayety. The +gorgeous dresses of the time—the crimson velvet coats, the gold-laced +hats, the hoop-petticoats, the silk, satin, brocade and embroidery, the +buckles, canes and swords, all displayed to the best advantage on +persons suited to such finery—made the group appear more like a +bright-colored picture than anything real. But by what perversity of +taste had the artist represented his principal figure as so wrinkled +and decayed, while yet he had decked her out in the brightest splendor +of attire, as if the loveliest maiden had suddenly withered into age +and become a moral to the beautiful around her? On they went, however, +and had glittered along about a third of the aisle, when another stroke +of the bell seemed to fill the church with a visible gloom, dimming and +obscuring the bright-pageant till it shone forth again as from a mist. + +This time the party wavered, stopped and huddled closer together, while +a slight scream was heard from some of the ladies and a confused +whispering among the gentlemen. Thus tossing to and fro, they might +have been fancifully compared to a splendid bunch of flowers suddenly +shaken by a puff of wind which threatened to scatter the leaves of an +old brown, withered rose on the same stalk with two dewy buds, such +being the emblem of the widow between her fair young bridemaids. But +her heroism was admirable. She had started with an irrepressible +shudder, as if the stroke of the bell had fallen directly on her heart; +then, recovering herself, while her attendants were yet in dismay, she +took the lead and paced calmly up the aisle. The bell continued to +swing, strike and vibrate with the same doleful regularity as when a +corpse is on its way to the tomb. + +“My young friends here have their nerves a little shaken,” said the +widow, with a smile, to the clergyman at the altar. “But so many +weddings have been ushered in with the merriest peal of the bells, and +yet turned out unhappily, that I shall hope for better fortune under +such different auspices.” + +“Madam,” answered the rector, in great perplexity, “this strange +occurrence brings to my mind a marriage-sermon of the famous Bishop +Taylor wherein he mingles so many thoughts of mortality and future woe +that, to speak somewhat after his own rich style, he seems to hang the +bridal-chamber in black and cut the wedding-garment out of a +coffin-pall. And it has been the custom of divers nations to infuse +something of sadness into their marriage ceremonies, so to keep death +in mind while contracting that engagement which is life’s chiefest +business. Thus we may draw a sad but profitable moral from this +funeral-knell.” + +But, though the clergyman might have given his moral even a keener +point, he did not fail to despatch an attendant to inquire into the +mystery and stop those sounds so dismally appropriate to such a +marriage. A brief space elapsed, during which the silence was broken +only by whispers and a few suppressed titterings among the +wedding-party and the spectators, who after the first shock were +disposed to draw an ill-natured merriment from the affair. The young +have less charity for aged follies than the old for those of youth. The +widow’s glance was observed to wander for an instant toward a window of +the church, as if searching for the time-worn marble that she had +dedicated to her first husband; then her eyelids dropped over their +faded orbs and her thoughts were drawn irresistibly to another grave. +Two buried men with a voice at her ear and a cry afar off were calling +her to lie down beside them. Perhaps, with momentary truth of feeling, +she thought how much happier had been her fate if, after years of +bliss, the bell were now tolling for her funeral and she were followed +to the grave by the old affection of her earliest lover, long her +husband. But why had she returned to him when their cold hearts shrank +from each other’s embrace? + +Still the death-bell tolled so mournfully that the sunshine seemed to +fade in the air. A whisper, communicated from those who stood nearest +the windows, now spread through the church: a hearse with a train of +several coaches was creeping along the street, conveying some dead man +to the churchyard, while the bride awaited a living one at the altar. +Immediately after, the footsteps of the bridegroom and his friends were +heard at the door. The widow looked down the aisle and clenched the arm +of one of her bridemaids in her bony hand with such unconscious +violence that the fair girl trembled. + +“You frighten me, my dear madam,” cried she. “For heaven’s sake, what +is the matter?” + +“Nothing, my dear—nothing,” said the widow; then, whispering close to +her ear, “There is a foolish fancy that I cannot get rid of. I am +expecting my bridegroom to come into the church with my two first +husbands for groomsmen.” + +“Look! look!” screamed the bridemaid. “What is here? The funeral!” + +As she spoke a dark procession paced into the church. First came an old +man and woman, like chief mourners at a funeral, attired from head to +foot in the deepest black, all but their pale features and hoary hair, +he leaning on a staff and supporting her decrepit form with his +nerveless arm. Behind appeared another and another pair, as aged, as +black and mournful as the first. As they drew near the widow recognized +in every face some trait of former friends long forgotten, but now +returning as if from their old graves to warn her to prepare a shroud, +or, with purpose almost as unwelcome, to exhibit their wrinkles and +infirmity and claim her as their companion by the tokens of her own +decay. Many a merry night had she danced with them in youth, and now in +joyless age she felt that some withered partner should request her hand +and all unite in a dance of death to the music of the funeral-bell. + +While these aged mourners were passing up the aisle it was observed +that from pew to pew the spectators shuddered with irrepressible awe as +some object hitherto concealed by the intervening figures came full in +sight. Many turned away their faces; others kept a fixed and rigid +stare, and a young girl giggled hysterically and fainted with the +laughter on her lips. When the spectral procession approached the +altar, each couple separated and slowly diverged, till in the centre +appeared a form that had been worthily ushered in with all this gloomy +pomp, the death-knell and the funeral. It was the bridegroom in his +shroud. + +No garb but that of the grave could have befitted such a death-like +aspect. The eyes, indeed, had the wild gleam of a sepulchral lamp; all +else was fixed in the stern calmness which old men wear in the coffin. +The corpse stood motionless, but addressed the widow in accents that +seemed to melt into the clang of the bell, which fell heavily on the +air while he spoke. + +“Come, my bride!” said those pale lips. “The hearse is ready; the +sexton stands waiting for us at the door of the tomb. Let us be +married, and then to our coffins!” + +How shall the widow’s horror be represented? It gave her the +ghastliness of a dead man’s bride. Her youthful friends stood apart, +shuddering at the mourners, the shrouded bridegroom and herself; the +whole scene expressed by the strongest imagery the vain struggle of the +gilded vanities of this world when opposed to age, infirmity, sorrow +and death. + +The awestruck silence was first broken by the clergyman. + +“Mr. Ellenwood,” said he, soothingly, yet with somewhat of authority, +“you are not well. Your mind has been agitated by the unusual +circumstances in which you are placed. The ceremony must be deferred. +As an old friend, let me entreat you to return home.” + +“Home—yes; but not without my bride,” answered he, in the same hollow +accents. “You deem this mockery—perhaps madness. Had I bedizened my +aged and broken frame with scarlet and embroidery, had I forced my +withered lips to smile at my dead heart, that might have been mockery +or madness; but now let young and old declare which of us has come +hither without a wedding-garment—the bridegroom or the bride.” + +He stepped forward at a ghostly pace and stood beside the widow, +contrasting the awful simplicity of his shroud with the glare and +glitter in which she had arrayed herself for this unhappy scene. None +that beheld them could deny the terrible strength of the moral which +his disordered intellect had contrived to draw. + +“Cruel! cruel!” groaned the heartstricken bride. + +“Cruel?” repeated he; then, losing his deathlike composure in a wild +bitterness, “Heaven judge which of us has been cruel to the other! In +youth you deprived me of my happiness, my hopes, my aims; you took away +all the substance of my life and made it a dream without reality enough +even to grieve at—with only a pervading gloom, through which I walked +wearily and cared not whither. But after forty years, when I have built +my tomb and would not give up the thought of resting there—no, not for +such a life as we once pictured—you call me to the altar. At your +summons I am here. But other husbands have enjoyed your youth, your +beauty, your warmth of heart and all that could be termed your life. +What is there for me but your decay and death? And therefore I have +bidden these funeral-friends, and bespoken the sexton’s deepest knell, +and am come in my shroud to wed you as with a burial-service, that we +may join our hands at the door of the sepulchre and enter it together.” + +It was not frenzy, it was not merely the drunkenness of strong emotion +in a heart unused to it, that now wrought upon the bride. The stern +lesson of the day had done its work; her worldliness was gone. She +seized the bridegroom’s hand. + +“Yes!” cried she; “let us wed even at the door of the sepulchre. My +life is gone in vanity and emptiness, but at its close there is one +true feeling. It has made me what I was in youth: it makes me worthy of +you. Time is no more for both of us. Let us wed for eternity.” + +With a long and deep regard the bridegroom looked into her eyes, while +a tear was gathering in his own. How strange that gush of human feeling +from the frozen bosom of a corpse! He wiped away the tear, even with +his shroud. + +“Beloved of my youth,” said he, “I have been wild. The despair of my +whole lifetime had returned at once and maddened me. Forgive and be +forgiven. Yes; it is evening with us now, and we have realized none of +our morning dreams of happiness. But let us join our hands before the +altar as lovers whom adverse circumstances have separated through life, +yet who meet again as they are leaving it and find their earthly +affection changed into something holy as religion. And what is time to +the married of eternity?” + +Amid the tears of many and a swell of exalted sentiment in those who +felt aright was solemnized the union of two immortal souls. The train +of withered mourners, the hoary bridegroom in his shroud, the pale +features of the aged bride and the death-bell tolling through the whole +till its deep voice overpowered the marriage-words,—all marked the +funeral of earthly hopes. But as the ceremony proceeded, the organ, as +if stirred by the sympathies of this impressive scene, poured forth an +anthem, first mingling with the dismal knell, then rising to a loftier +strain, till the soul looked down upon its woe. And when the awful rite +was finished and with cold hand in cold hand the married of eternity +withdrew, the organ’s peal of solemn triumph drowned the wedding-knell. + + + + + THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL + +A PARABLE[1] + +The sexton stood in the porch of Milford meeting-house pulling lustily +at the bell-rope. The old people of the village came stooping along the +street. Children with bright faces tripped merrily beside their parents +or mimicked a graver gait in the conscious dignity of their Sunday +clothes. Spruce bachelors looked sidelong at the pretty maidens, and +fancied that the Sabbath sunshine made them prettier than on week-days. +When the throng had mostly streamed into the porch, the sexton began to +toll the bell, keeping his eye on the Reverend Mr. Hooper’s door. The +first glimpse of the clergyman’s figure was the signal for the bell to +cease its summons. + +“But what has good Parson Hooper got upon his face?” cried the sexton, +in astonishment. + +All within hearing immediately turned about and beheld the semblance of +Mr. Hooper pacing slowly his meditative way toward the meeting-house. +With one accord they started, expressing more wonder than if some +strange minister were coming to dust the cushions of Mr. Hooper’s +pulpit. + +“Are you sure it is our parson?” inquired Goodman Gray of the sexton. + +“Of a certainty it is good Mr. Hooper,” replied the sexton. “He was to +have exchanged pulpits with Parson Shute of Westbury, but Parson Shute +sent to excuse himself yesterday, being to preach a funeral sermon.” + +The cause of so much amazement may appear sufficiently slight. Mr. +Hooper, a gentlemanly person of about thirty, though still a bachelor, +was dressed with due clerical neatness, as if a careful wife had +starched his band and brushed the weekly dust from his Sunday’s garb. +There was but one thing remarkable in his appearance. Swathed about his +forehead and hanging down over his face, so low as to be shaken by his +breath, Mr. Hooper had on a black veil. On a nearer view it seemed to +consist of two folds of crape, which entirely concealed his features +except the mouth and chin, but probably did not intercept his sight +further than to give a darkened aspect to all living and inanimate +things. With this gloomy shade before him good Mr. Hooper walked onward +at a slow and quiet pace, stooping somewhat and looking on the ground, +as is customary with abstracted men, yet nodding kindly to those of his +parishioners who still waited on the meeting-house steps. But so +wonder-struck were they that his greeting hardly met with a return. + +“I can’t really feel as if good Mr. Hooper’s face was behind that piece +of crape,” said the sexton. + +“I don’t like it,” muttered an old woman as she hobbled into the +meeting-house. “He has changed himself into something awful only by +hiding his face.” + +“Our parson has gone mad!” cried Goodman Gray, following him across the +threshold. + +A rumor of some unaccountable phenomenon had preceded Mr. Hooper into +the meeting-house and set all the congregation astir. Few could refrain +from twisting their heads toward the door; many stood upright and +turned directly about; while several little boys clambered upon the +seats, and came down again with a terrible racket. There was a general +bustle, a rustling of the women’s gowns and shuffling of the men’s +feet, greatly at variance with that hushed repose which should attend +the entrance of the minister. But Mr. Hooper appeared not to notice the +perturbation of his people. He entered with an almost noiseless step, +bent his head mildly to the pews on each side and bowed as he passed +his oldest parishioner, a white-haired great-grandsire, who occupied an +arm-chair in the centre of the aisle. It was strange to observe how +slowly this venerable man became conscious of something singular in the +appearance of his pastor. He seemed not fully to partake of the +prevailing wonder till Mr. Hooper had ascended the stairs and showed +himself in the pulpit, face to face with his congregation except for +the black veil. That mysterious emblem was never once withdrawn. It +shook with his measured breath as he gave out the psalm, it threw its +obscurity between him and the holy page as he read the Scriptures, and +while he prayed the veil lay heavily on his uplifted countenance. Did +he seek to hide it from the dread Being whom he was addressing? + +Such was the effect of this simple piece of crape that more than one +woman of delicate nerves was forced to leave the meeting-house. Yet +perhaps the pale-faced congregation was almost as fearful a sight to +the minister as his black veil to them. + +Mr. Hooper had the reputation of a good preacher, but not an energetic +one: he strove to win his people heavenward by mild, persuasive +influences rather than to drive them thither by the thunders of the +word. The sermon which he now delivered was marked by the same +characteristics of style and manner as the general series of his pulpit +oratory, but there was something either in the sentiment of the +discourse itself or in the imagination of the auditors which made it +greatly the most powerful effort that they had ever heard from their +pastor’s lips. It was tinged rather more darkly than usual with the +gentle gloom of Mr. Hooper’s temperament. The subject had reference to +secret sin and those sad mysteries which we hide from our nearest and +dearest, and would fain conceal from our own consciousness, even +forgetting that the Omniscient can detect them. A subtle power was +breathed into his words. Each member of the congregation, the most +innocent girl and the man of hardened breast, felt as if the preacher +had crept upon them behind his awful veil and discovered their hoarded +iniquity of deed or thought. Many spread their clasped hands on their +bosoms. There was nothing terrible in what Mr. Hooper said—at least, no +violence; and yet with every tremor of his melancholy voice the hearers +quaked. An unsought pathos came hand in hand with awe. So sensible were +the audience of some unwonted attribute in their minister that they +longed for a breath of wind to blow aside the veil, almost believing +that a stranger’s visage would be discovered, though the form, gesture +and voice were those of Mr. Hooper. + +At the close of the services the people hurried out with indecorous +confusion, eager to communicate their pent-up amazement, and conscious +of lighter spirits the moment they lost sight of the black veil. Some +gathered in little circles, huddled closely together, with their mouths +all whispering in the centre; some went homeward alone, wrapped in +silent meditation; some talked loudly and profaned the Sabbath-day with +ostentatious laughter. A few shook their sagacious heads, intimating +that they could penetrate the mystery, while one or two affirmed that +there was no mystery at all, but only that Mr. Hooper’s eyes were so +weakened by the midnight lamp as to require a shade. + +After a brief interval forth came good Mr. Hooper also, in the rear of +his flock. Turning his veiled face from one group to another, he paid +due reverence to the hoary heads, saluted the middle-aged with kind +dignity as their friend and spiritual guide, greeted the young with +mingled authority and love, and laid his hands on the little children’s +heads to bless them. Such was always his custom on the Sabbath-day. +Strange and bewildered looks repaid him for his courtesy. None, as on +former occasions, aspired to the honor of walking by their pastor’s +side. Old Squire Saunders—doubtless by an accidental lapse of +memory—neglected to invite Mr. Hooper to his table, where the good +clergyman had been wont to bless the food almost every Sunday since his +settlement. He returned, therefore, to the parsonage, and at the moment +of closing the door was observed to look back upon the people, all of +whom had their eyes fixed upon the minister. A sad smile gleamed +faintly from beneath the black veil and flickered about his mouth, +glimmering as he disappeared. + +“How strange,” said a lady, “that a simple black veil, such as any +woman might wear on her bonnet, should become such a terrible thing on +Mr. Hooper’s face!” + +“Something must surely be amiss with Mr. Hooper’s intellects,” observed +her husband, the physician of the village. “But the strangest part of +the affair is the effect of this vagary even on a sober-minded man like +myself. The black veil, though it covers only our pastor’s face, throws +its influence over his whole person and makes him ghost-like from head +to foot. Do you not feel it so?” + +“Truly do I,” replied the lady; “and I would not be alone with him for +the world. I wonder he is not afraid to be alone with himself.” + +“Men sometimes are so,” said her husband. + +The afternoon service was attended with similar circumstances. At its +conclusion the bell tolled for the funeral of a young lady. The +relatives and friends were assembled in the house and the more distant +acquaintances stood about the door, speaking of the good qualities of +the deceased, when their talk was interrupted by the appearance of Mr. +Hooper, still covered with his black veil. It was now an appropriate +emblem. The clergyman stepped into the room where the corpse was laid, +and bent over the coffin to take a last farewell of his deceased +parishioner. As he stooped the veil hung straight down from his +forehead, so that, if her eye-lids had not been closed for ever, the +dead maiden might have seen his face. Could Mr. Hooper be fearful of +her glance, that he so hastily caught back the black veil? A person who +watched the interview between the dead and living scrupled not to +affirm that at the instant when the clergyman’s features were disclosed +the corpse had slightly shuddered, rustling the shroud and muslin cap, +though the countenance retained the composure of death. A superstitious +old woman was the only witness of this prodigy. + +From the coffin Mr. Hooper passed into the chamber of the mourners, and +thence to the head of the staircase, to make the funeral prayer. It was +a tender and heart-dissolving prayer, full of sorrow, yet so imbued +with celestial hopes that the music of a heavenly harp swept by the +fingers of the dead seemed faintly to be heard among the saddest +accents of the minister. The people trembled, though they but darkly +understood him, when he prayed that they and himself, and all of mortal +race, might be ready, as he trusted this young maiden had been, for the +dreadful hour that should snatch the veil from their faces. The bearers +went heavily forth and the mourners followed, saddening all the street, +with the dead before them and Mr. Hooper in his black veil behind. + +“Why do you look back?” said one in the procession to his partner. + +“I had a fancy,” replied she, “that the minister and the maiden’s +spirit were walking hand in hand.” + +“And so had I at the same moment,” said the other. + +That night the handsomest couple in Milford village were to be joined +in wedlock. Though reckoned a melancholy man, Mr. Hooper had a placid +cheerfulness for such occasions which often excited a sympathetic smile +where livelier merriment would have been thrown away. There was no +quality of his disposition which made him more beloved than this. The +company at the wedding awaited his arrival with impatience, trusting +that the strange awe which had gathered over him throughout the day +would now be dispelled. But such was not the result. When Mr. Hooper +came, the first thing that their eyes rested on was the same horrible +black veil which had added deeper gloom to the funeral and could +portend nothing but evil to the wedding. Such was its immediate effect +on the guests that a cloud seemed to have rolled duskily from beneath +the black crape and dimmed the light of the candles. The bridal pair +stood up before the minister, but the bride’s cold fingers quivered in +the tremulous hand of the bridegroom, and her death-like paleness +caused a whisper that the maiden who had been buried a few hours before +was come from her grave to be married. If ever another wedding were so +dismal, it was that famous one where they tolled the wedding-knell. + +After performing the ceremony Mr. Hooper raised a glass of wine to his +lips, wishing happiness to the new-married couple in a strain of mild +pleasantry that ought to have brightened the features of the guests +like a cheerful gleam from the hearth. At that instant, catching a +glimpse of his figure in the looking-glass, the black veil involved his +own spirit in the horror with which it overwhelmed all others. His +frame shuddered, his lips grew white, he spilt the untasted wine upon +the carpet and rushed forth into the darkness, for the Earth too had on +her black veil. + +The next day the whole village of Milford talked of little else than +Parson Hooper’s black veil. That, and the mystery concealed behind it, +supplied a topic for discussion between acquaintances meeting in the +street and good women gossipping at their open windows. It was the +first item of news that the tavernkeeper told to his guests. The +children babbled of it on their way to school. One imitative little imp +covered his face with an old black handkerchief, thereby so affrighting +his playmates that the panic seized himself and he wellnigh lost his +wits by his own waggery. + +It was remarkable that, of all the busybodies and impertinent people in +the parish, not one ventured to put the plain question to Mr. Hooper +wherefore he did this thing. Hitherto, whenever there appeared the +slightest call for such interference, he had never lacked advisers nor +shown himself averse to be guided by their judgment. If he erred at +all, it was by so painful a degree of self-distrust that even the +mildest censure would lead him to consider an indifferent action as a +crime. Yet, though so well acquainted with this amiable weakness, no +individual among his parishioners chose to make the black veil a +subject of friendly remonstrance. There was a feeling of dread, neither +plainly confessed nor carefully concealed, which caused each to shift +the responsibility upon another, till at length it was found expedient +to send a deputation of the church, in order to deal with Mr. Hooper +about the mystery before it should grow into a scandal. Never did an +embassy so ill discharge its duties. The minister received them with +friendly courtesy, but became silent after they were seated, leaving to +his visitors the whole burden of introducing their important business. +The topic, it might be supposed, was obvious enough. There was the +black veil swathed round Mr. Hooper’s forehead and concealing every +feature above his placid mouth, on which, at times, they could perceive +the glimmering of a melancholy smile. But that piece of crape, to their +imagination, seemed to hang down before his heart, the symbol of a +fearful secret between him and them. Were the veil but cast aside, they +might speak freely of it, but not till then. Thus they sat a +considerable time, speechless, confused and shrinking uneasily from Mr. +Hooper’s eye, which they felt to be fixed upon them with an invisible +glance. Finally, the deputies returned abashed to their constituents, +pronouncing the matter too weighty to be handled except by a council of +the churches, if, indeed, it might not require a General Synod. + +But there was one person in the village unappalled by the awe with +which the black veil had impressed all besides herself. When the +deputies returned without an explanation, or even venturing to demand +one, she with the calm energy of her character determined to chase away +the strange cloud that appeared to be settling round Mr. Hooper every +moment more darkly than before. As his plighted wife it should be her +privilege to know what the black veil concealed. At the minister’s +first visit, therefore, she entered upon the subject with a direct +simplicity which made the task easier both for him and her. After he +had seated himself she fixed her eyes steadfastly upon the veil, but +could discern nothing of the dreadful gloom that had so overawed the +multitude; it was but a double fold of crape hanging down from his +forehead to his mouth and slightly stirring with his breath. + +“No,” said she, aloud, and smiling, “there is nothing terrible in this +piece of crape, except that it hides a face which I am always glad to +look upon. Come, good sir; let the sun shine from behind the cloud. +First lay aside your black veil, then tell me why you put it on.” + +Mr. Hooper’s smile glimmered faintly. + +“There is an hour to come,” said he, “when all of us shall cast aside +our veils. Take it not amiss, beloved friend, if I wear this piece of +crape till then.” + +“Your words are a mystery too,” returned the young lady. “Take away the +veil from them, at least.” + +“Elizabeth, I will,” said he, “so far as my vow may suffer me. Know, +then, this veil is a type and a symbol, and I am bound to wear it ever, +both in light and darkness, in solitude and before the gaze of +multitudes, and as with strangers, so with my familiar friends. No +mortal eye will see it withdrawn. This dismal shade must separate me +from the world; even you, Elizabeth, can never come behind it.” + +“What grievous affliction hath befallen you,” she earnestly inquired, +“that you should thus darken your eyes for ever?” + +“If it be a sign of mourning,” replied Mr. Hooper, “I, perhaps, like +most other mortals, have sorrows dark enough to be typified by a black +veil.” + +“But what if the world will not believe that it is the type of an +innocent sorrow?” urged Elizabeth. “Beloved and respected as you are, +there may be whispers that you hide your face under the consciousness +of secret sin. For the sake of your holy office do away this scandal.” + +The color rose into her cheeks as she intimated the nature of the +rumors that were already abroad in the village. But Mr. Hooper’s +mildness did not forsake him. He even smiled again—that same sad smile +which always appeared like a faint glimmering of light proceeding from +the obscurity beneath the veil. + +“If I hide my face for sorrow, there is cause enough,” he merely +replied; “and if I cover it for secret sin, what mortal might not do +the same?” And with this gentle but unconquerable obstinacy did he +resist all her entreaties. + +At length Elizabeth sat silent. For a few moments she appeared lost in +thought, considering, probably, what new methods might be tried to +withdraw her lover from so dark a fantasy, which, if it had no other +meaning, was perhaps a symptom of mental disease. Though of a firmer +character than his own, the tears rolled down her cheeks. But in an +instant, as it were, a new feeling took the place of sorrow: her eyes +were fixed insensibly on the black veil, when like a sudden twilight in +the air its terrors fell around her. She arose and stood trembling +before him. + +“And do you feel it, then, at last?” said he, mournfully. + +She made no reply, but covered her eyes with her hand and turned to +leave the room. He rushed forward and caught her arm. + +“Have patience with me, Elizabeth!” cried he, passionately. “Do not +desert me though this veil must be between us here on earth. Be mine, +and hereafter there shall be no veil over my face, no darkness between +our souls. It is but a mortal veil; it is not for eternity. Oh, you +know not how lonely I am, and how frightened to be alone behind my +black veil! Do not leave me in this miserable obscurity for ever.” + +“Lift the veil but once and look me in the face,” said she. + +“Never! It cannot be!” replied Mr. Hooper. + +“Then farewell!” said Elizabeth. + +She withdrew her arm from his grasp and slowly departed, pausing at the +door to give one long, shuddering gaze that seemed almost to penetrate +the mystery of the black veil. But even amid his grief Mr. Hooper +smiled to think that only a material emblem had separated him from +happiness, though the horrors which it shadowed forth must be drawn +darkly between the fondest of lovers. + +From that time no attempts were made to remove Mr. Hooper’s black veil +or by a direct appeal to discover the secret which it was supposed to +hide. By persons who claimed a superiority to popular prejudice it was +reckoned merely an eccentric whim, such as often mingles with the sober +actions of men otherwise rational and tinges them all with its own +semblance of insanity. But with the multitude good Mr. Hooper was +irreparably a bugbear. He could not walk the street with any peace of +mind, so conscious was he that the gentle and timid would turn aside to +avoid him, and that others would make it a point of hardihood to throw +themselves in his way. The impertinence of the latter class compelled +him to give up his customary walk at sunset to the burial-ground; for +when he leaned pensively over the gate, there would always be faces +behind the gravestones peeping at his black veil. A fable went the +rounds that the stare of the dead people drove him thence. It grieved +him to the very depth of his kind heart to observe how the children +fled from his approach, breaking up their merriest sports while his +melancholy figure was yet afar off. Their instinctive dread caused him +to feel more strongly than aught else that a preternatural horror was +interwoven with the threads of the black crape. In truth, his own +antipathy to the veil was known to be so great that he never willingly +passed before a mirror nor stooped to drink at a still fountain lest in +its peaceful bosom he should be affrighted by himself. This was what +gave plausibility to the whispers that Mr. Hooper’s conscience tortured +him for some great crime too horrible to be entirely concealed or +otherwise than so obscurely intimated. Thus from beneath the black veil +there rolled a cloud into the sunshine, an ambiguity of sin or sorrow, +which enveloped the poor minister, so that love or sympathy could never +reach him. It was said that ghost and fiend consorted with him there. +With self-shudderings and outward terrors he walked continually in its +shadow, groping darkly within his own soul or gazing through a medium +that saddened the whole world. Even the lawless wind, it was believed, +respected his dreadful secret and never blew aside the veil. But still +good Mr. Hooper sadly smiled at the pale visages of the worldly throng +as he passed by. + +Among all its bad influences, the black veil had the one desirable +effect of making its wearer a very efficient clergyman. By the aid of +his mysterious emblem—for there was no other apparent cause—he became a +man of awful power over souls that were in agony for sin. His converts +always regarded him with a dread peculiar to themselves, affirming, +though but figuratively, that before he brought them to celestial light +they had been with him behind the black veil. Its gloom, indeed, +enabled him to sympathize with all dark affections. Dying sinners cried +aloud for Mr. Hooper and would not yield their breath till he appeared, +though ever, as he stooped to whisper consolation, they shuddered at +the veiled face so near their own. Such were the terrors of the black +veil even when Death had bared his visage. Strangers came long +distances to attend service at his church with the mere idle purpose of +gazing at his figure because it was forbidden them to behold his face. +But many were made to quake ere they departed. Once, during Governor +Belcher’s administration, Mr. Hooper was appointed to preach the +election sermon. Covered with his black veil, he stood before the chief +magistrate, the council and the representatives, and wrought so deep an +impression that the legislative measures of that year were +characterized by all the gloom and piety of our earliest ancestral +sway. + +In this manner Mr. Hooper spent a long life, irreproachable in outward +act, yet shrouded in dismal suspicions; kind and loving, though unloved +and dimly feared; a man apart from men, shunned in their health and +joy, but ever summoned to their aid in mortal anguish. As years wore +on, shedding their snows above his sable veil, he acquired a name +throughout the New England churches, and they called him Father Hooper. +Nearly all his parishioners who were of mature age when he was settled +had been borne away by many a funeral: he had one congregation in the +church and a more crowded one in the churchyard; and, having wrought so +late into the evening and done his work so well, it was now good Father +Hooper’s turn to rest. + +Several persons were visible by the shaded candlelight in the +death-chamber of the old clergyman. Natural connections he had none. +But there was the decorously grave though unmoved physician, seeking +only to mitigate the last pangs of the patient whom he could not save. +There were the deacons and other eminently pious members of his church. +There, also, was the Reverend Mr. Clark of Westbury, a young and +zealous divine who had ridden in haste to pray by the bedside of the +expiring minister. There was the nurse—no hired handmaiden of Death, +but one whose calm affection had endured thus long in secrecy, in +solitude, amid the chill of age, and would not perish even at the +dying-hour. Who but Elizabeth! And there lay the hoary head of good +Father Hooper upon the death-pillow with the black veil still swathed +about his brow and reaching down over his face, so that each more +difficult gasp of his faint breath caused it to stir. All through life +that piece of crape had hung between him and the world; it had +separated him from cheerful brotherhood and woman’s love and kept him +in that saddest of all prisons his own heart; and still it lay upon his +face, as if to deepen the gloom of his darksome chamber and shade him +from the sunshine of eternity. + +For some time previous his mind had been confused, wavering doubtfully +between the past and the present, and hovering forward, as it were, at +intervals, into the indistinctness of the world to come. There had been +feverish turns which tossed him from side to side and wore away what +little strength he had. But in his most convulsive struggles and in the +wildest vagaries of his intellect, when no other thought retained its +sober influence, he still showed an awful solicitude lest the black +veil should slip aside. Even if his bewildered soul could have +forgotten, there was a faithful woman at his pillow who with averted +eyes would have covered that aged face which she had last beheld in the +comeliness of manhood. + +At length the death-stricken old man lay quietly in the torpor of +mental and bodily exhaustion, with an imperceptible pulse and breath +that grew fainter and fainter except when a long, deep and irregular +inspiration seemed to prelude the flight of his spirit. + +The minister of Westbury approached the bedside. + +“Venerable Father Hooper,” said he, “the moment of your release is at +hand. Are you ready for the lifting of the veil that shuts in time from +eternity?” + +Father Hooper at first replied merely by a feeble motion of his head; +then—apprehensive, perhaps, that his meaning might be doubtful—he +exerted himself to speak. + +“Yea,” said he, in faint accents; “my soul hath a patient weariness +until that veil be lifted.” + +“And is it fitting,” resumed the Reverend Mr. Clark, “that a man so +given to prayer, of such a blameless example, holy in deed and thought, +so far as mortal judgment may pronounce,—is it fitting that a father in +the Church should leave a shadow on his memory that may seem to blacken +a life so pure? I pray you, my venerable brother, let not this thing +be! Suffer us to be gladdened by your triumphant aspect as you go to +your reward. Before the veil of eternity be lifted let me cast aside +this black veil from your face;” and, thus speaking, the Reverend Mr. +Clark bent forward to reveal the mystery of so many years. + +But, exerting a sudden energy that made all the beholders stand aghast, +Father Hooper snatched both his hands from beneath the bedclothes and +pressed them strongly on the black veil, resolute to struggle if the +minister of Westbury would contend with a dying man. + +“Never!” cried the veiled clergyman. “On earth, never!” + +“Dark old man,” exclaimed the affrighted minister, “with what horrible +crime upon your soul are you now passing to the judgment?” + +Father Hooper’s breath heaved: it rattled in his throat; but, with a +mighty effort grasping forward with his hands, he caught hold of life +and held it back till he should speak. He even raised himself in bed, +and there he sat shivering with the arms of Death around him, while the +black veil hung down, awful at that last moment in the gathered terrors +of a lifetime. And yet the faint, sad smile so often there now seemed +to glimmer from its obscurity and linger on Father Hooper’s lips. + +“Why do you tremble at me alone?” cried he, turning his veiled face +round the circle of pale spectators. “Tremble also at each other. Have +men avoided me and women shown no pity and children screamed and fled +only for my black veil? What but the mystery which it obscurely +typifies has made this piece of crape so awful? When the friend shows +his inmost heart to his friend, the lover to his best-beloved; when man +does not vainly shrink from the eye of his Creator, loathsomely +treasuring up the secret of his sin,—then deem me a monster for the +symbol beneath which I have lived and die. I look around me, and, lo! +on every visage a black veil!” + +While his auditors shrank from one another in mutual affright, Father +Hooper fell back upon his pillow, a veiled corpse with a faint smile +lingering on the lips. Still veiled, they laid him in his coffin, and a +veiled corpse they bore him to the grave. The grass of many years has +sprung up and withered on that grave, the burial-stone is moss-grown, +and good Mr. Hooper’s face is dust; but awful is still the thought that +it mouldered beneath the black veil. + + + + + THE MAYPOLE OF MERRY MOUNT + + +There is an admirable foundation for a philosophic romance in the +curious history of the early settlement of Mount Wollaston, or Merry +Mount. In the slight sketch here attempted the facts recorded on the +grave pages of our New England annalists have wrought themselves almost +spontaneously into a sort of allegory. The masques, mummeries and +festive customs described in the text are in accordance with the +manners of the age. Authority on these points may be found in Strutt’s +_Book of English Sports and Pastimes_. + +Bright were the days at Merry Mount when the Maypole was the +banner-staff of that gay colony. They who reared it, should their +banner be triumphant, were to pour sunshine over New England’s rugged +hills and scatter flower-seeds throughout the soil. Jollity and gloom +were contending for an empire. Midsummer eve had come, bringing deep +verdure to the forest, and roses in her lap of a more vivid hue than +the tender buds of spring. But May, or her mirthful spirit, dwelt all +the year round at Merry Mount, sporting with the summer months and +revelling with autumn and basking in the glow of winter’s fireside. +Through a world of toil and care she flitted with a dream-like smile, +and came hither to find a home among the lightsome hearts of Merry +Mount. + +Never had the Maypole been so gayly decked as at sunset on Midsummer +eve. This venerated emblem was a pine tree which had preserved the +slender grace of youth, while it equalled the loftiest height of the +old wood-monarchs. From its top streamed a silken banner colored like +the rainbow. Down nearly to the ground the pole was dressed with +birchen boughs, and others of the liveliest green, and some with +silvery leaves fastened by ribbons that fluttered in fantastic knots of +twenty different colors, but no sad ones. Garden-flowers and blossoms +of the wilderness laughed gladly forth amid the verdure, so fresh and +dewy that they must have grown by magic on that happy pine tree. Where +this green and flowery splendor terminated the shaft of the Maypole was +stained with the seven brilliant hues of the banner at its top. On the +lowest green bough hung an abundant wreath of roses—some that had been +gathered in the sunniest spots of the forest, and others, of still +richer blush, which the colonists had reared from English seed. O +people of the Golden Age, the chief of your husbandry was to raise +flowers! + +But what was the wild throng that stood hand in hand about the Maypole? +It could not be that the fauns and nymphs, when driven from their +classic groves and homes of ancient fable, had sought refuge, as all +the persecuted did, in the fresh woods of the West. These were Gothic +monsters, though perhaps of Grecian ancestry. On the shoulders of a +comely youth uprose the head and branching antlers of a stag; a second, +human in all other points, had the grim visage of a wolf; a third, +still with the trunk and limbs of a mortal man, showed the beard and +horns of a venerable he-goat. There was the likeness of a bear erect, +brute in all but his hind legs, which were adorned with pink silk +stockings. And here, again, almost as wondrous, stood a real bear of +the dark forest, lending each of his forepaws to the grasp of a human +hand and as ready for the dance as any in that circle. His inferior +nature rose halfway to meet his companions as they stooped. Other faces +wore the similitude of man or woman, but distorted or extravagant, with +red noses pendulous before their mouths, which seemed of awful depth +and stretched from ear to ear in an eternal fit of laughter. Here might +be seen the salvage man—well known in heraldry—hairy as a baboon and +girdled with green leaves. By his side—a nobler figure, but still a +counterfeit—appeared an Indian hunter with feathery crest and +wampum-belt. Many of this strange company wore foolscaps and had little +bells appended to their garments, tinkling with a silvery sound +responsive to the inaudible music of their gleesome spirits. Some +youths and maidens were of soberer garb, yet well maintained their +places in the irregular throng by the expression of wild revelry upon +their features. + +Such were the colonists of Merry Mount as they stood in the broad smile +of sunset round their venerated Maypole. Had a wanderer bewildered in +the melancholy forest heard their mirth and stolen a half-affrighted +glance, he might have fancied them the crew of Comus, some already +transformed to brutes, some midway between man and beast, and the +others rioting in the flow of tipsy jollity that foreran the change; +but a band of Puritans who watched the scene, invisible themselves, +compared the masques to those devils and ruined souls with whom their +superstition peopled the black wilderness. + +Within the ring of monsters appeared the two airiest forms that had +ever trodden on any more solid footing than a purple-and-golden cloud. +One was a youth in glistening apparel with a scarf of the rainbow +pattern crosswise on his breast. His right hand held a gilded staff—the +ensign of high dignity among the revellers—and his left grasped the +slender fingers of a fair maiden not less gayly decorated than himself. +Bright roses glowed in contrast with the dark and glossy curls of each, +and were scattered round their feet or had sprung up spontaneously +there. Behind this lightsome couple, so close to the Maypole that its +boughs shaded his jovial face, stood the figure of an English priest, +canonically dressed, yet decked with flowers, in heathen fashion, and +wearing a chaplet of the native vine leaves. By the riot of his rolling +eye and the pagan decorations of his holy garb, he seemed the wildest +monster there, and the very Comus of the crew. + +“Votaries of the Maypole,” cried the flower-decked priest, “merrily all +day long have the woods echoed to your mirth. But be this your merriest +hour, my hearts! Lo! here stand the Lord and Lady of the May, whom I, a +clerk of Oxford and high priest of Merry Mount, am presently to join in +holy matrimony.—Up with your nimble spirits, ye morrice-dancers, green +men and glee-maidens, bears and wolves and horned gentlemen! Come! a +chorus now rich with the old mirth of Merry England and the wilder glee +of this fresh forest, and then a dance, to show the youthful pair what +life is made of and how airily they should go through it!—All ye that +love the Maypole, lend your voices to the nuptial song of the Lord and +Lady of the May!” + +This wedlock was more serious than most affairs of Merry Mount, where +jest and delusion, trick and fantasy, kept up a continual carnival. The +Lord and Lady of the May, though their titles must be laid down at +sunset, were really and truly to be partners for the dance of life, +beginning the measure that same bright eve. The wreath of roses that +hung from the lowest green bough of the Maypole had been twined for +them, and would be thrown over both their heads in symbol of their +flowery union. When the priest had spoken, therefore, a riotous uproar +burst from the rout of monstrous figures. + +“Begin you the stave, reverend sir,” cried they all, “and never did the +woods ring to such a merry peal as we of the Maypole shall send up.” + +Immediately a prelude of pipe, cittern and viol, touched with practised +minstrelsy, began to play from a neighboring thicket in such a mirthful +cadence that the boughs of the Maypole quivered to the sound. But the +May-lord—he of the gilded staff—chancing to look into his lady’s eyes, +was wonder-struck at the almost pensive glance that met his own. + +“Edith, sweet Lady of the May,” whispered he, reproachfully, “is yon +wreath of roses a garland to hang above our graves that you look so +sad? Oh, Edith, this is our golden time. Tarnish it not by any pensive +shadow of the mind, for it may be that nothing of futurity will be +brighter than the mere remembrance of what is now passing.” + +“That was the very thought that saddened me. How came it in your mind +too?” said Edith, in a still lower tone than he; for it was high +treason to be sad at Merry Mount. “Therefore do I sigh amid this +festive music. And besides, dear Edgar, I struggle as with a dream, and +fancy that these shapes of our jovial friends are visionary and their +mirth unreal, and that we are no true lord and lady of the May. What is +the mystery in my heart?” + +Just then, as if a spell had loosened them, down came a little shower +of withering rose-leaves from the Maypole. Alas for the young lovers! +No sooner had their hearts glowed with real passion than they were +sensible of something vague and unsubstantial in their former +pleasures, and felt a dreary presentiment of inevitable change. From +the moment that they truly loved they had subjected themselves to +earth’s doom of care and sorrow and troubled joy, and had no more a +home at Merry Mount. That was Edith’s mystery. Now leave we the priest +to marry them, and the masquers to sport round the Maypole till the +last sunbeam be withdrawn from its summit and the shadows of the forest +mingle gloomily in the dance. Meanwhile, we may discover who these gay +people were. + +Two hundred years ago, and more, the Old World and its inhabitants +became mutually weary of each other. Men voyaged by thousands to the +West—some to barter glass and such like jewels for the furs of the +Indian hunter, some to conquer virgin empires, and one stern band to +pray. But none of these motives had much weight with thecolonists of +Merry Mount. Their leaders were men who had sported so long with life, +that when Thought and Wisdom came, even these unwelcome guests were led +astray by the crowd of vanities which they should have put to flight. +Erring Thought and perverted Wisdom were made to put on masques, and +play the fool. The men of whom we speak, after losing the heart’s fresh +gayety, imagined a wild philosophy of pleasure, and came hither to act +out their latest day-dream. They gathered followers from all that giddy +tribe whose whole life is like the festal days of soberer men. In their +train were minstrels, not unknown in London streets; wandering players, +whose theatres had been the halls of noblemen; mummers, rope-dancers, +and mountebanks, who would long be missed at wakes, church ales, and +fairs; in a word, mirth makers of every sort, such as abounded in that +age, but now began to be discountenanced by the rapid growth of +Puritanism. Light had their footsteps been on land, and as lightly they +came across the sea. Many had been maddened by their previous troubles +into a gay despair; others were as madly gay in the flush of youth, +like the May Lord and his Lady; but whatever might be the quality of +their mirth, old and young were gay at Merry Mount. The young deemed +themselves happy. The elder spirits, if they knew that mirth was but +the counterfeit of happiness, yet followed the false shadow wilfully, +because at least her garments glittered brightest. Sworn triflers of a +lifetime, they would not venture among the sober truths of life not +even to be truly blest. + +All the hereditary pastimes of Old England were transplanted hither. +The King of Christmas was duly crowned, and the Lord of Misrule bore +potent sway. On the Eve of St. John, they felled whole acres of the +forest to make bonfires, and danced by the blaze all night, crowned +with garlands, and throwing flowers into the flame. At harvest time, +though their crop was of the smallest, they made an image with the +sheaves of Indian corn, and wreathed it with autumnal garlands, and +bore it home triumphantly. But what chiefly characterized the colonists +of Merry Mount was their veneration for the Maypole. It has made their +true history a poet’s tale. Spring decked the hallowed emblem with +young blossoms and fresh green boughs; Summer brought roses of the +deepest blush, and the perfected foliage of the forest; Autumn enriched +it with that red and yellow gorgeousness which converts each wildwood +leaf into a painted flower; and Winter silvered it with sleet, and hung +it round with icicles, till it flashed in the cold sunshine, itself a +frozen sunbeam. Thus each alternate season did homage to the Maypole, +and paid it a tribute of its own richest splendor. Its votaries danced +round it, once, at least, in every month; sometimes they called it +their religion, or their altar; but always, it was the banner staff of +Merry Mount. + +Unfortunately, there were men in the new world of a sterner faith than +those Maypole worshippers. Not far from Merry Mount was a settlement of +Puritans, most dismal wretches, who said their prayers before daylight, +and then wrought in the forest or the cornfield till evening made it +prayer time again. Their weapons were always at hand to shoot down the +straggling savage. When they met in conclave, it was never to keep up +the old English mirth, but to hear sermons three hours long, or to +proclaim bounties on the heads of wolves and the scalps of Indians. +Their festivals were fast days, and their chief pastime the singing of +psalms. Woe to the youth or maiden who did but dream of a dance! The +selectman nodded to the constable; and there sat the light-heeled +reprobate in the stocks; or if he danced, it was round the +whipping-post, which might be termed the Puritan Maypole. + +A party of these grim Puritans, toiling through the difficult woods, +each with a horseload of iron armor to burden his footsteps, would +sometimes draw near the sunny precincts of Merry Mount. There were the +silken colonists, sporting round their Maypole; perhaps teaching a bear +to dance, or striving to communicate their mirth to the grave Indian, +or masquerading in the skins of deer and wolves which they had hunted +for that especial purpose. Often the whole colony were playing at +Blindman’s Buff, magistrates and all with their eyes bandaged, except a +single scapegoat, whom the blinded sinners pursued by the tinkling of +the bells at his garments. Once, it is said, they were seen following a +flower-decked corpse with merriment and festive music to his grave. But +did the dead man laugh? In their quietest times they sang ballads and +told tales for the edification of their pious visitors, or perplexed +them with juggling tricks, or grinned at them through horse-collars; +and when sport itself grew wearisome, they made game of their own +stupidity and began a yawning-match. At the very least of these +enormities the men of iron shook their heads and frowned so darkly that +the revellers looked up, imagining that a momentary cloud had overcast +the sunshine which was to be perpetual there. On the other hand, the +Puritans affirmed that when a psalm was pealing from their place of +worship the echo which the forest sent them back seemed often like the +chorus of a jolly catch, closing with a roar of laughter. Who but the +fiend and his bond-slaves the crew of Merry Mount had thus disturbed +them? In due time a feud arose, stern and bitter on one side, and as +serious on the other as anything could be among such light spirits as +had sworn allegiance to the Maypole. The future complexion of New +England was involved in this important quarrel. Should the grisly +saints establish their jurisdiction over the gay sinners, then would +their spirits darken all the clime and make it a land of clouded +visages, of hard toil, of sermon and psalm for ever; but should the +banner-staff of Merry Mount be fortunate, sunshine would break upon the +hills, and flowers would beautify the forest and late posterity do +homage to the Maypole. + +After these authentic passages from history we return to the nuptials +of the Lord and Lady of the May. Alas! we have delayed too long, and +must darken our tale too suddenly. As we glance again at the Maypole a +solitary sunbeam is fading from the summit, and leaves only a faint +golden tinge blended with the hues of the rainbow banner. Even that dim +light is now withdrawn, relinquishing the whole domain of Merry Mount +to the evening gloom which has rushed so instantaneously from the black +surrounding woods. But some of these black shadows have rushed forth in +human shape. + +Yes, with the setting sun the last day of mirth had passed from Merry +Mount. The ring of gay masquers was disordered and broken; the stag +lowered his antlers in dismay; the wolf grew weaker than a lamb; the +bells of the morrice-dancers tinkled with tremulous affright. The +Puritans had played a characteristic part in the Maypole mummeries. +Their darksome figures were intermixed with the wild shapes of their +foes, and made the scene a picture of the moment when waking thoughts +start up amid the scattered fantasies of a dream. The leader of the +hostile party stood in the centre of the circle, while the rout of +monsters cowered around him like evil spirits in the presence of a +dread magician. No fantastic foolery could look him in the face. So +stern was the energy of his aspect that the whole man, visage, frame +and soul, seemed wrought of iron gifted with life and thought, yet all +of one substance with his headpiece and breastplate. It was the Puritan +of Puritans: it was Endicott himself. + +“Stand off, priest of Baal!” said he, with a grim frown and laying no +reverent hand upon the surplice. “I know thee, Blackstone![2] Thou art +the man who couldst not abide the rule even of thine own corrupted +Church, and hast come hither to preach iniquity and to give example of +it in thy life. But now shall it be seen that the Lord hath sanctified +this wilderness for his peculiar people. Woe unto them that would +defile it! And first for this flower-decked abomination, the altar of +thy worship!” + +And with his keen sword Endicott assaulted the hallowed Maypole. Nor +long did it resist his arm. It groaned with a dismal sound, it showered +leaves and rosebuds upon the remorseless enthusiast, and finally, with +all its green boughs and ribbons and flowers, symbolic of departed +pleasures, down fell the banner-staff of Merry Mount. As it sank, +tradition says, the evening sky grew darker and the woods threw forth a +more sombre shadow. + +“There!” cried Endicott, looking triumphantly on his work; “there lies +the only Maypole in New England. The thought is strong within me that +by its fall is shadowed forth the fate of light and idle mirthmakers +amongst us and our posterity. Amen, saith John Endicott!” + +“Amen!” echoed his followers. + +But the votaries of the Maypole gave one groan for their idol. At the +sound the Puritan leader glanced at the crew of Comus, each a figure of +broad mirth, yet at this moment strangely expressive of sorrow and +dismay. + +“Valiant captain,” quoth Peter Palfrey, the ancient of the band, “what +order shall be taken with the prisoners?” + +“I thought not to repent me of cutting down a Maypole,” replied +Endicott, “yet now I could find in my heart to plant it again and give +each of these bestial pagans one other dance round their idol. It would +have served rarely for a whipping-post.” + +“But there are pine trees enow,” suggested the lieutenant. + +“True, good ancient,” said the leader. “Wherefore bind the heathen crew +and bestow on them a small matter of stripes apiece as earnest of our +future justice. Set some of the rogues in the stocks to rest themselves +so soon as Providence shall bring us to one of our own well-ordered +settlements where such accommodations may be found. Further penalties, +such as branding and cropping of ears, shall be thought of hereafter.” + +“How many stripes for the priest?” inquired Ancient Palfrey. + +“None as yet,” answered Endicott, bending his iron frown upon the +culprit. “It must be for the Great and General Court to determine +whether stripes and long imprisonment, and other grievous penalty, may +atone for his transgressions. Let him look to himself. For such as +violate our civil order it may be permitted us to show mercy, but woe +to the wretch that troubleth our religion!” + +“And this dancing bear?” resumed the officer. “Must he share the +stripes of his fellows?” + +“Shoot him through the head!” said the energetic Puritan. “I suspect +witchcraft in the beast.” + +“Here be a couple of shining ones,” continued Peter Palfrey, pointing +his weapon at the Lord and Lady of the May. “They seem to be of high +station among these misdoers. Methinks their dignity will not be fitted +with less than a double share of stripes.” + +Endicott rested on his sword and closely surveyed the dress and aspect +of the hapless pair. There they stood, pale, downcast and apprehensive, +yet there was an air of mutual support and of pure affection seeking +aid and giving it that showed them to be man and wife with the sanction +of a priest upon their love. The youth in the peril of the moment, had +dropped his gilded staff and thrown his arm about the Lady of the May, +who leaned against his breast too lightly to burden him, but with +weight enough to express that their destinies were linked together for +good or evil. They looked first at each other and then into the grim +captain’s face. There they stood in the first hour of wedlock, while +the idle pleasures of which their companions were the emblems had given +place to the sternest cares of life, personified by the dark Puritans. +But never had their youthful beauty seemed so pure and high as when its +glow was chastened by adversity. + +“Youth,” said Endicott, “ye stand in an evil case—thou and thy +maiden-wife. Make ready presently, for I am minded that ye shall both +have a token to remember your wedding-day.” + +“Stern man,” cried the May-lord, “how can I move thee? Were the means +at hand, I would resist to the death; being powerless, I entreat. Do +with me as thou wilt, but let Edith go untouched.” + +“Not so,” replied the immitigable zealot. “We are not wont to show an +idle courtesy to that sex which requireth the stricter discipline.—What +sayest thou, maid? Shall thy silken bridegroom suffer thy share of the +penalty besides his own?” + +“Be it death,” said Edith, “and lay it all on me.” + +Truly, as Endicott had said, the poor lovers stood in a woeful case. +Their foes were triumphant, their friends captive and abased, their +home desolate, the benighted wilderness around them, and a rigorous +destiny in the shape of the Puritan leader their only guide. Yet the +deepening twilight could not altogether conceal that the iron man was +softened. He smiled at the fair spectacle of early love; he almost +sighed for the inevitable blight of early hopes. + +“The troubles of life have come hastily on this young couple,” observed +Endicott. “We will see how they comport themselves under their present +trials ere we burden them with greater. If among the spoil there be any +garments of a more decent fashion, let them be put upon this May-lord +and his Lady instead of their glistening vanities. Look to it, some of +you.” + +“And shall not the youth’s hair be cut?” asked Peter Palfrey, looking +with abhorrence at the lovelock and long glossy curls of the young man. + +“Crop it forthwith, and that in the true pumpkin-shell fashion,” +answered the captain. “Then bring them along with us, but more gently +than their fellows. There be qualities in the youth which may make him +valiant to fight and sober to toil and pious to pray, and in the maiden +that may fit her to become a mother in our Israel, bringing up babes in +better nurture than her own hath been.—Nor think ye, young ones, that +they are the happiest, even in our lifetime of a moment, who misspend +it in dancing round a Maypole.” + +And Endicott, the severest Puritan of all who laid the rock-foundation +of New England, lifted the wreath of roses from the ruin of the Maypole +and threw it with his own gauntleted hand over the heads of the Lord +and Lady of the May. It was a deed of prophecy. As the moral gloom of +the world overpowers all systematic gayety, even so was their home of +wild mirth made desolate amid the sad forest. They returned to it no +more. But as their flowery garland was wreathed of the brightest roses +that had grown there, so in the tie that united them were intertwined +all the purest and best of their early joys. They went heavenward +supporting each other along the difficult path which it was their lot +to tread, and never wasted one regretful thought on the vanities of +Merry Mount. + + + + + THE GENTLE BOY + + +In the course of the year 1656 several of the people called +Quakers—led, as they professed, by the inward movement of the +spirit—made their appearance in New England. Their reputation as +holders of mystic and pernicious principles having spread before them, +the Puritans early endeavored to banish and to prevent the further +intrusion of the rising sect. But the measures by which it was intended +to purge the land of heresy, though more than sufficiently vigorous, +were entirely unsuccessful. The Quakers, esteeming persecution as a +divine call to the post of danger, laid claim to a holy courage unknown +to the Puritans themselves, who had shunned the cross by providing for +the peaceable exercise of their religion in a distant wilderness. +Though it was the singular fact that every nation of the earth rejected +the wandering enthusiasts who practised peace toward all men, the place +of greatest uneasiness and peril, and therefore in their eyes the most +eligible, was the province of Massachusetts Bay. + +The fines, imprisonments and stripes liberally distributed by our pious +forefathers, the popular antipathy, so strong that it endured nearly a +hundred years after actual persecution had ceased, were attractions as +powerful for the Quakers as peace, honor and reward would have been for +the worldly-minded. Every European vessel brought new cargoes of the +sect, eager to testify against the oppression which they hoped to +share; and when shipmasters were restrained by heavy fines from +affording them passage, they made long and circuitous journeys through +the Indian country, and appeared in the province as if conveyed by a +supernatural power. Their enthusiasm, heightened almost to madness by +the treatment which they received, produced actions contrary to the +rules of decency as well as of rational religion, and presented a +singular contrast to the calm and staid deportment of their sectarian +successors of the present day. The command of the Spirit, inaudible +except to the soul and not to be controverted on grounds of human +wisdom, was made a plea for most indecorous exhibitions which, +abstractedly considered, well deserved the moderate chastisement of the +rod. These extravagances, and the persecution which was at once their +cause and consequence, continued to increase, till in the year 1659 the +government of Massachusetts Bay indulged two members of the Quaker sect +with the crown of martyrdom. + +An indelible stain of blood is upon the hands of all who consented to +this act, but a large share of the awful responsibility must rest upon +the person then at the head of the government. He was a man of narrow +mind and imperfect education, and his uncompromising bigotry was made +hot and mischievous by violent and hasty passions; he exerted his +influence indecorously and unjustifiably to compass the death of the +enthusiasts, and his whole conduct in respect to them was marked by +brutal cruelty. The Quakers, whose revengeful feelings were not less +deep because they were inactive, remembered this man and his associates +in after-times. The historian of the sect affirms that by the wrath of +Heaven a blight fell upon the land in the vicinity of the “bloody town” +of Boston, so that no wheat would grow there; and he takes his stand, +as it were, among the graves of the ancient persecutors, and +triumphantly recounts the judgments that overtook them in old age or at +the parting-hour. He tells us that they died suddenly and violently and +in madness, but nothing can exceed the bitter mockery with which he +records the loathsome disease and “death by rottenness” of the fierce +and cruel governor. + + +On the evening of the autumn day that had witnessed the martyrdom of +two men of the Quaker persuasion, a Puritan settler was returning from +the metropolis to the neighboring country-town in which he resided. The +air was cool, the sky clear, and the lingering twilight was made +brighter by the rays of a young moon which had now nearly reached the +verge of the horizon. The traveller, a man of middle age, wrapped in a +gray frieze cloak, quickened his pace when he had reached the outskirts +of the town, for a gloomy extent of nearly four miles lay between him +and his home. The low straw-thatched houses were scattered at +considerable intervals along the road, and, the country having been +settled but about thirty years, the tracts of original forest still +bore no small proportion to the cultivated ground. The autumn wind +wandered among the branches, whirling away the leaves from all except +the pine trees and moaning as if it lamented the desolation of which it +was the instrument. The road had penetrated the mass of woods that lay +nearest to the town, and was just emerging into an open space, when the +traveller’s ears were saluted by a sound more mournful than even that +of the wind. It was like the wailing of some one in distress, and it +seemed to proceed from beneath a tall and lonely fir tree in the centre +of a cleared but unenclosed and uncultivated field. The Puritan could +not but remember that this was the very spot which had been made +accursed a few hours before by the execution of the Quakers, whose +bodies had been thrown together into one hasty grave beneath the tree +on which they suffered. He struggled, however, against the +superstitious fears which belonged to the age, and compelled himself to +pause and listen. + +“The voice is most likely mortal, nor have I cause to tremble if it be +otherwise,” thought he, straining his eyes through the dim moonlight. +“Methinks it is like the wailing of a child—some infant, it may be, +which has strayed from its mother and chanced upon this place of death. +For the ease of mine own conscience I must search this matter out.” He +therefore left the path and walked somewhat fearfully across the field. +Though now so desolate, its soil was pressed down and trampled by the +thousand footsteps of those who had witnessed the spectacle of that +day, all of whom had now retired, leaving the dead to their loneliness. + +The traveller at length reached the fir tree, which from the middle +upward was covered with living branches, although a scaffold had been +erected beneath, and other preparations made for the work of death. +Under this unhappy tree—which in after-times was believed to drop +poison with its dew—sat the one solitary mourner for innocent blood. It +was a slender and light-clad little boy who leaned his face upon a +hillock of fresh-turned and half-frozen earth and wailed bitterly, yet +in a suppressed tone, as if his grief might receive the punishment of +crime. The Puritan, whose approach had been unperceived, laid his hand +upon the child’s shoulder and addressed him compassionately. + +“You have chosen a dreary lodging, my poor boy, and no wonder that you +weep,” said he. “But dry your eyes and tell me where your mother +dwells; I promise you, if the journey be not too far, I will leave you +in her arms tonight.” + +The boy had hushed his wailing at once, and turned his face upward to +the stranger. It was a pale, bright-eyed countenance, certainly not +more than six years old, but sorrow, fear and want had destroyed much +of its infantile expression. The Puritan, seeing the boy’s frightened +gaze and feeling that he trembled under his hand, endeavored to +reassure him: + +“Nay, if I intended to do you harm, little lad, the readiest way were +to leave you here. What! you do not fear to sit beneath the gallows on +a new-made grave, and yet you tremble at a friend’s touch? Take heart, +child, and tell me what is your name and where is your home.” + +“Friend,” replied the little boy, in a sweet though faltering voice, +“they call me Ilbrahim, and my home is here.” + +The pale, spiritual face, the eyes that seemed to mingle with the +moonlight, the sweet, airy voice and the outlandish name almost made +the Puritan believe that the boy was in truth a being which had sprung +up out of the grave on which he sat; but perceiving that the apparition +stood the test of a short mental prayer, and remembering that the arm +which he had touched was lifelike, he adopted a more rational +supposition. “The poor child is stricken in his intellect,” thought he, +“but verily his words are fearful in a place like this.” He then spoke +soothingly, intending to humor the boy’s fantasy: + +“Your home will scarce be comfortable, Ilbrahim, this cold autumn +night, and I fear you are ill-provided with food. I am hastening to a +warm supper and bed; and if you will go with me, you shall share them.” + +“I thank thee, friend, but, though I be hungry and shivering with cold, +thou wilt not give me food nor lodging,” replied the boy, in the quiet +tone which despair had taught him even so young. “My father was of the +people whom all men hate; they have laid him under this heap of earth, +and here is my home.” + +The Puritan, who had laid hold of little Ilbrahim’s hand, relinquished +it as if he were touching a loathsome reptile. But he possessed a +compassionate heart which not even religious prejudice could harden +into stone. “God forbid that I should leave this child to perish, +though he comes of the accursed sect,” said he to himself. “Do we not +all spring from an evil root? Are we not all in darkness till the light +doth shine upon us? He shall not perish, neither in body nor, if prayer +and instruction may avail for him, in soul.” He then spoke aloud and +kindly to Ilbrahim, who had again hid his face in the cold earth of the +grave: + +“Was every door in the land shut against you, my child, that you have +wandered to this unhallowed spot?” + +“They drove me forth from the prison when they took my father thence,” +said the boy, “and I stood afar off watching the crowd of people; and +when they were gone, I came hither, and found only this grave. I knew +that my father was sleeping here, and I said, ‘This shall be my home.’” + +“No, child, no, not while I have a roof over my head or a morsel to +share with you,” exclaimed the Puritan, whose sympathies were now fully +excited. “Rise up and come with me, and fear not any harm.” + +The boy wept afresh, and clung to the heap of earth as if the cold +heart beneath it were warmer to him than any in a living breast. The +traveller, however, continued to entreat him tenderly, and, seeming to +acquire some degree of confidence, he at length arose; but his slender +limbs tottered with weakness, his little head grew dizzy, and he leaned +against the tree of death for support. + +“My poor boy, are you so feeble?” said the Puritan. “When did you taste +food last?” + +“I ate of bread and water with my father in the prison,” replied +Ilbrahim, “but they brought him none neither yesterday nor to-day, +saying that he had eaten enough to bear him to his journey’s end. +Trouble not thyself for my hunger, kind friend, for I have lacked food +many times ere now.” + +The traveller took the child in his arms and wrapped his cloak about +him, while his heart stirred with shame and anger against the +gratuitous cruelty of the instruments in this persecution. In the +awakened warmth of his feelings he resolved that at whatever risk he +would not forsake the poor little defenceless being whom Heaven had +confided to his care. With this determination he left the accursed +field and resumed the homeward path from which the wailing of the boy +had called him. The light and motionless burden scarcely impeded his +progress, and he soon beheld the fire-rays from the windows of the +cottage which he, a native of a distant clime, had built in the Western +wilderness. It was surrounded by a considerable extent of cultivated +ground, and the dwelling was situated in the nook of a wood-covered +hill, whither it seemed to have crept for protection. + +“Look up, child,” said the Puritan to Ilbrahim, whose faint head had +sunk upon his shoulder; “there is our home.” + +At the word “home” a thrill passed through the child’s frame, but he +continued silent. A few moments brought them to the cottage door, at +which the owner knocked; for at that early period, when savages were +wandering everywhere among the settlers, bolt and bar were +indispensable to the security of a dwelling. The summons was answered +by a bond-servant, a coarse-clad and dull-featured piece of humanity, +who, after ascertaining that his master was the applicant, undid the +door and held a flaring pine-knot torch to light him in. Farther back +in the passageway the red blaze discovered a matronly woman, but no +little crowd of children came bounding forth to greet their father’s +return. + +As the Puritan entered he thrust aside his cloak and displayed +Ilbrahim’s face to the female. + +“Dorothy, here is a little outcast whom Providence hath put into our +hands,” observed he. “Be kind to him, even as if he were of those dear +ones who have departed from us.” + +“What pale and bright-eyed little boy is this, Tobias?” she inquired. +“Is he one whom the wilderness-folk have ravished from some Christian +mother?” + +“No, Dorothy; this poor child is no captive from the wilderness,” he +replied. “The heathen savage would have given him to eat of his scanty +morsel and to drink of his birchen cup, but Christian men, alas! had +cast him out to die.” Then he told her how he had found him beneath the +gallows, upon his father’s grave, and how his heart had prompted him +like the speaking of an inward voice to take the little outcast home +and be kind unto him. He acknowledged his resolution to feed and clothe +him as if he were his own child, and to afford him the instruction +which should counteract the pernicious errors hitherto instilled into +his infant mind. + +Dorothy was gifted with even a quicker tenderness than her husband, and +she approved of all his doings and intentions. + +“Have you a mother, dear child?” she inquired. + +The tears burst forth from his full heart as he attempted to reply, but +Dorothy at length understood that he had a mother, who like the rest of +her sect was a persecuted wanderer. She had been taken from the prison +a short time before, carried into the uninhabited wilderness and left +to perish there by hunger or wild beasts. This was no uncommon method +of disposing of the Quakers, and they were accustomed to boast that the +inhabitants of the desert were more hospitable to them than civilized +man. + +“Fear not, little boy; you shall not need a mother, and a kind one,” +said Dorothy, when she had gathered this information. “Dry your tears, +Ilbrahim, and be my child, as I will be your mother.” + +The good woman prepared the little bed from which her own children had +successively been borne to another resting-place. Before Ilbrahim would +consent to occupy it he knelt down, and as Dorothy listed to his simple +and affecting prayer she marvelled how the parents that had taught it +to him could have been judged worthy of death. When the boy had fallen +asleep, she bent over his pale and spiritual countenance, pressed a +kiss upon his white brow, drew the bedclothes up about his neck, and +went away with a pensive gladness in her heart. + +Tobias Pearson was not among the earliest emigrants from the old +country. He had remained in England during the first years of the Civil +War, in which he had borne some share as a cornet of dragoons under +Cromwell. But when the ambitious designs of his leader began to develop +themselves, he quitted the army of the Parliament and sought a refuge +from the strife which was no longer holy among the people of his +persuasion in the colony of Massachusetts. A more worldly consideration +had perhaps an influence in drawing him thither, for New England +offered advantages to men of unprosperous fortunes as well as to +dissatisfied religionists, and Pearson had hitherto found it difficult +to provide for a wife and increasing family. To this supposed impurity +of motive the more bigoted Puritans were inclined to impute the removal +by death of all the children for whose earthly good the father had been +over-thoughtful. They had left their native country blooming like +roses, and like roses they had perished in a foreign soil. Those +expounders of the ways of Providence, who had thus judged their brother +and attributed his domestic sorrows to his sin, were not more +charitable when they saw him and Dorothy endeavoring to fill up the +void in their hearts by the adoption of an infant of the accursed sect. +Nor did they fail to communicate their disapprobation to Tobias, but +the latter in reply merely pointed at the little quiet, lovely boy, +whose appearance and deportment were indeed as powerful arguments as +could possibly have been adduced in his own favor. Even his beauty, +however, and his winning manners sometimes produced an effect +ultimately unfavorable; for the bigots, when the outer surfaces of +their iron hearts had been softened and again grew hard, affirmed that +no merely natural cause could have so worked upon them. Their antipathy +to the poor infant was also increased by the ill-success of divers +theological discussions in which it was attempted to convince him of +the errors of his sect. Ilbrahim, it is true, was not a skilful +controversialist, but the feeling of his religion was strong as +instinct in him, and he could neither be enticed nor driven from the +faith which his father had died for. + +The odium of this stubbornness was shared in a great measure by the +child’s protectors, insomuch that Tobias and Dorothy very shortly began +to experience a most bitter species of persecution in the cold regards +of many a friend whom they had valued. The common people manifested +their opinions more openly. Pearson was a man of some consideration, +being a representative to the General Court and an approved lieutenant +in the train-bands, yet within a week after his adoption of Ilbrahim he +had been both hissed and hooted. Once, also, when walking through a +solitary piece of woods, he heard a loud voice from some invisible +speaker, and it cried, “What shall be done to the backslider? Lo! the +scourge is knotted for him, even the whip of nine cords, and every cord +three knots.” These insults irritated Pearson’s temper for the moment; +they entered also into his heart, and became imperceptible but powerful +workers toward an end which his most secret thought had not yet +whispered. + + +On the second Sabbath after Ilbrahim became a member of their family, +Pearson and his wife deemed it proper that he should appear with them +at public worship. They had anticipated some opposition to this measure +from the boy, but he prepared himself in silence, and at the appointed +hour was clad in the new mourning-suit which Dorothy had wrought for +him. As the parish was then, and during many subsequent years, +unprovided with a bell, the signal for the commencement of religious +exercises was the beat of a drum. At the first sound of that martial +call to the place of holy and quiet thoughts Tobias and Dorothy set +forth, each holding a hand of little Ilbrahim, like two parents linked +together by the infant of their love. On their path through the +leafless woods they were overtaken by many persons of their +acquaintance, all of whom avoided them and passed by on the other side; +but a severer trial awaited their constancy when they had descended the +hill and drew near the pine-built and undecorated house of prayer. +Around the door, from which the drummer still sent forth his thundering +summons, was drawn up a formidable phalanx, including several of the +oldest members of the congregation, many of the middle-aged and nearly +all the younger males. Pearson found it difficult to sustain their +united and disapproving gaze, but Dorothy, whose mind was differently +circumstanced, merely drew the boy closer to her and faltered not in +her approach. As they entered the door they overheard the muttered +sentiments of the assemblage; and when the reviling voices of the +little children smote Ilbrahim’s ear, he wept. + +The interior aspect of the meeting-house was rude. The low ceiling, the +unplastered walls, the naked woodwork and the undraperied pulpit +offered nothing to excite the devotion which without such external aids +often remains latent in the heart. The floor of the building was +occupied by rows of long cushionless benches, supplying the place of +pews, and the broad aisle formed a sexual division impassable except by +children beneath a certain age. + +Pearson and Dorothy separated at the door of the meeting-house, and +Ilbrahim, being within the years of infancy, was retained under the +care of the latter. The wrinkled beldams involved themselves in their +rusty cloaks as he passed by; even the mild-featured maidens seemed to +dread contamination; and many a stern old man arose and turned his +repulsive and unheavenly countenance upon the gentle boy, as if the +sanctuary were polluted by his presence. He was a sweet infant of the +skies that had strayed away from his home, and all the inhabitants of +this miserable world closed up their impure hearts against him, drew +back their earth-soiled garments from his touch and said, “We are +holier than thou.” + +Ilbrahim, seated by the side of his adopted mother and retaining fast +hold of her hand, assumed a grave and decorous demeanor such as might +befit a person of matured taste and understanding who should find +himself in a temple dedicated to some worship which he did not +recognize, but felt himself bound to respect. The exercises had not yet +commenced, however, when the boy’s attention was arrested by an event +apparently of trifling interest. A woman having her face muffled in a +hood and a cloak drawn completely about her form advanced slowly up the +broad aisle and took place upon the foremost bench. Ilbrahim’s faint +color varied, his nerves fluttered; he was unable to turn his eyes from +the muffled female. + +When the preliminary prayer and hymn were over, the minister arose, +and, having turned the hour-glass which stood by the great Bible, +commenced his discourse. He was now well stricken in years, a man of +pale, thin countenance, and his gray hairs were closely covered by a +black velvet skull-cap. In his younger days he had practically learned +the meaning of persecution from Archbishop Laud, and he was not now +disposed to forget the lesson against which he had murmured then. +Introducing the often-discussed subject of the Quakers, he gave a +history of that sect and a description of their tenets in which error +predominated and prejudice distorted the aspect of what was true. He +adverted to the recent measures in the province, and cautioned his +hearers of weaker parts against calling in question the just severity +which God-fearing magistrates had at length been compelled to exercise. +He spoke of the danger of pity—in some cases a commendable and +Christian virtue, but inapplicable to this pernicious sect. He observed +that such was their devilish obstinacy in error that even the little +children, the sucking babes, were hardened and desperate heretics. He +affirmed that no man without Heaven’s especial warrant should attempt +their conversion lest while he lent his hand to draw them from the +slough he should himself be precipitated into its lowest depths. + +The sands of the second hour were principally in the lower half of the +glass when the sermon concluded. An approving murmur followed, and the +clergyman, having given out a hymn, took his seat with much +self-congratulation, and endeavored to read the effect of his eloquence +in the visages of the people. But while voices from all parts of the +house were tuning themselves to sing a scene occurred which, though not +very unusual at that period in the province, happened to be without +precedent in this parish. + +The muffled female, who had hitherto sat motionless in the front rank +of the audience, now arose and with slow, stately and unwavering step +ascended the pulpit stairs. The quaverings of incipient harmony were +hushed and the divine sat in speechless and almost terrified +astonishment while she undid the door and stood up in the sacred desk +from which his maledictions had just been thundered. She then divested +herself of the cloak and hood, and appeared in a most singular array. A +shapeless robe of sackcloth was girded about her waist with a knotted +cord; her raven hair fell down upon her shoulders, and its blackness +was defiled by pale streaks of ashes, which she had strewn upon her +head. Her eyebrows, dark and strongly defined, added to the deathly +whiteness of a countenance which, emaciated with want and wild with +enthusiasm and strange sorrows, retained no trace of earlier beauty. +This figure stood gazing earnestly on the audience, and there was no +sound nor any movement except a faint shuddering which every man +observed in his neighbor, but was scarcely conscious of in himself. At +length, when her fit of inspiration came, she spoke for the first few +moments in a low voice and not invariably distinct utterance. Her +discourse gave evidence of an imagination hopelessly entangled with her +reason; it was a vague and incomprehensible rhapsody, which, however, +seemed to spread its own atmosphere round the hearer’s soul, and to +move his feelings by some influence unconnected with the words. As she +proceeded beautiful but shadowy images would sometimes be seen like +bright things moving in a turbid river, or a strong and singularly +shaped idea leapt forth and seized at once on the understanding or the +heart. But the course of her unearthly eloquence soon led her to the +persecutions of her sect, and from thence the step was short to her own +peculiar sorrows. She was naturally a woman of mighty passions, and +hatred and revenge now wrapped themselves in the garb of piety. The +character of her speech was changed; her images became distinct though +wild, and her denunciations had an almost hellish bitterness. + +“The governor and his mighty men,” she said, “have gathered together, +taking counsel among themselves and saying, ‘What shall we do unto this +people—even unto the people that have come into this land to put our +iniquity to the blush?’ And, lo! the devil entereth into the +council-chamber like a lame man of low stature and gravely apparelled, +with a dark and twisted countenance and a bright, downcast eye. And he +standeth up among the rulers; yea, he goeth to and fro, whispering to +each; and every man lends his ear, for his word is ‘Slay! Slay!rsquo; +But I say unto ye, Woe to them that slay! Woe to them that shed the +blood of saints! Woe to them that have slain the husband and cast forth +the child, the tender infant, to wander homeless and hungry and cold +till he die, and have saved the mother alive in the cruelty of their +tender mercies! Woe to them in their lifetime! Cursed are they in the +delight and pleasure of their hearts! Woe to them in their death-hour, +whether it come swiftly with blood and violence or after long and +lingering pain! Woe in the dark house, in the rottenness of the grave, +when the children’s children shall revile the ashes of the fathers! +Woe, woe, woe, at the judgment, when all the persecuted and all the +slain in this bloody land, and the father, the mother and the child, +shall await them in a day that they cannot escape! Seed of the faith, +seed of the faith, ye whose hearts are moving with a power that ye know +not, arise, wash your hands of this innocent blood! Lift your voices, +chosen ones, cry aloud, and call down a woe and a judgment with me!” + +Having thus given vent to the flood of malignity which she mistook for +inspiration, the speaker was silent. Her voice was succeeded by the +hysteric shrieks of several women, but the feelings of the audience +generally had not been drawn onward in the current with her own. They +remained stupefied, stranded, as it were, in the midst of a torrent +which deafened them by its roaring, but might not move them by its +violence. The clergyman, who could not hitherto have ejected the +usurper of his pulpit otherwise than by bodily force, now addressed her +in the tone of just indignation and legitimate authority. + +“Get you down, woman, from the holy place which you profane,” he said, +“Is it to the Lord’s house that you come to pour forth the foulness of +your heart and the inspiration of the devil? Get you down, and remember +that the sentence of death is on you—yea, and shall be executed, were +it but for this day’s work.” + +“I go, friend, I go, for the voice hath had its utterance,” replied +she, in a depressed, and even mild, tone. “I have done my mission unto +thee and to thy people; reward me with stripes, imprisonment or death, +as ye shall be permitted.” The weakness of exhausted passion caused her +steps to totter as she descended the pulpit stairs. + +The people, in the mean while, were stirring to and fro on the floor of +the house, whispering among themselves and glancing toward the +intruder. Many of them now recognized her as the woman who had +assaulted the governor with frightful language as he passed by the +window of her prison; they knew, also, that she was adjudged to suffer +death, and had been preserved only by an involuntary banishment into +the wilderness. The new outrage by which she had provoked her fate +seemed to render further lenity impossible, and a gentleman in military +dress, with a stout man of inferior rank, drew toward the door of the +meetinghouse and awaited her approach. Scarcely did her feet press the +floor, however, when an unexpected scene occurred. In that moment of +her peril, when every eye frowned with death, a little timid boy threw +his arms round his mother. + +“I am here, mother; it is I, and I will go with thee to prison,” he +exclaimed. + +She gazed at him with a doubtful and almost frightened expression, for +she knew that the boy had been cast out to perish, and she had not +hoped to see his face again. She feared, perhaps, that it was but one +of the happy visions with which her excited fancy had often deceived +her in the solitude of the desert or in prison; but when she felt his +hand warm within her own and heard his little eloquence of childish +love, she began to know that she was yet a mother. + +“Blessed art thou, my son!” she sobbed. “My heart was withered—yea, +dead with thee and with thy father—and now it leaps as in the first +moment when I pressed thee to my bosom.” + +She knelt down and embraced him again and again, while the joy that +could find no words expressed itself in broken accents, like the +bubbles gushing up to vanish at the surface of a deep fountain. The +sorrows of past years and the darker peril that was nigh cast not a +shadow on the brightness of that fleeting moment. Soon, however, the +spectators saw a change upon her face as the consciousness of her sad +estate returned, and grief supplied the fount of tears which joy had +opened. By the words she uttered it would seem that the indulgence of +natural love had given her mind a momentary sense of its errors, and +made her know how far she had strayed from duty in following the +dictates of a wild fanaticism. + +“In a doleful hour art thou returned to me, poor boy,” she said, “for +thy mother’s path has gone darkening onward, till now the end is death. +Son, son, I have borne thee in my arms when my limbs were tottering, +and I have fed thee with the food that I was fainting for; yet I have +ill-performed a mother’s part by thee in life, and now I leave thee no +inheritance but woe and shame. Thou wilt go seeking through the world, +and find all hearts closed against thee and their sweet affections +turned to bitterness for my sake. My child, my child, how many a pang +awaits thy gentle spirit, and I the cause of all!” + +She hid her face on Ilbrahim’s head, and her long raven hair, +discolored with the ashes of her mourning, fell down about him like a +veil. A low and interrupted moan was the voice of her heart’s anguish, +and it did not fail to move the sympathies of many who mistook their +involuntary virtue for a sin. Sobs were audible in the female section +of the house, and every man who was a father drew his hand across his +eyes. + +Tobias Pearson was agitated and uneasy, but a certain feeling like the +consciousness of guilt oppressed him; so that he could not go forth and +offer himself as the protector of the child. Dorothy, however, had +watched her husband’s eye. Her mind was free from the influence that +had begun to work on his, and she drew near the Quaker woman and +addressed her in the hearing of all the congregation. + +“Stranger, trust this boy to me, and I will be his mother,” she said, +taking Ilbrahim’s hand. “Providence has signally marked out my husband +to protect him, and he has fed at our table and lodged under our roof +now many days, till our hearts have grown very strongly unto him. Leave +the tender child with us, and be at ease concerning his welfare.” + +The Quaker rose from the ground, but drew the boy closer to her, while +she gazed earnestly in Dorothy’s face. Her mild but saddened features +and neat matronly attire harmonized together and were like a verse of +fireside poetry. Her very aspect proved that she was blameless, so far +as mortal could be so, in respect to God and man, while the enthusiast, +in her robe of sackcloth and girdle of knotted cord, had as evidently +violated the duties of the present life and the future by fixing her +attention wholly on the latter. The two females, as they held each a +hand of Ilbrahim, formed a practical allegory: it was rational piety +and unbridled fanaticism contending for the empire of a young heart. + +“Thou art not of our people,” said the Quaker, mournfully. + +“No, we are not of your people,” replied Dorothy, with mildness, “but +we are Christians looking upward to the same heaven with you. Doubt not +that your boy shall meet you there, if there be a blessing on our +tender and prayerful guidance of him. Thither, I trust, my own children +have gone before me, for I also have been a mother. I am no longer so,” +she added, in a faltering tone, “and your son will have all my care.” + +“But will ye lead him in the path which his parents have trodden?” +demanded the Quaker. “Can ye teach him the enlightened faith which his +father has died for, and for which I—even I—am soon to become an +unworthy martyr? The boy has been baptized in blood; will ye keep the +mark fresh and ruddy upon his forehead?” + +“I will not deceive you,” answered Dorothy. “If your child become our +child, we must breed him up in the instruction which Heaven has +imparted to us; we must pray for him the prayers of our own faith; we +must do toward him according to the dictates of our own consciences, +and not of yours. Were we to act otherwise, we should abuse your trust, +even in complying with your wishes.” + +The mother looked down upon her boy with a troubled countenance, and +then turned her eyes upward to heaven. She seemed to pray internally, +and the contention of her soul was evident. + +“Friend,” she said, at length, to Dorothy, “I doubt not that my son +shall receive all earthly tenderness at thy hands. Nay, I will believe +that even thy imperfect lights may guide him to a better world, for +surely thou art on the path thither. But thou hast spoken of a husband. +Doth he stand here among this multitude of people? Let him come forth, +for I must know to whom I commit this most precious trust.” + +She turned her face upon the male auditors, and after a momentary delay +Tobias Pearson came forth from among them. The Quaker saw the dress +which marked his military rank, and shook her head; but then she noted +the hesitating air, the eyes that struggled with her own and were +vanquished, the color that went and came and could find no +resting-place. As she gazed an unmirthful smile spread over her +features, like sunshine that grows melancholy in some desolate spot. +Her lips moved inaudibly, but at length she spake: + +“I hear it, I hear it! The voice speaketh within me and saith, ‘Leave +thy child, Catharine, for his place is here, and go hence, for I have +other work for thee. Break the bonds of natural affection, martyr thy +love, and know that in all these things eternal wisdom hath its ends.’ +I go, friends, I go. Take ye my boy, my precious jewel. I go hence +trusting that all shall be well, and that even for his infant hands +there is a labor in the vineyard.” + +She knelt down and whispered to Ilbrahim, who at first struggled and +clung to his mother with sobs and tears, but remained passive when she +had kissed his cheek and arisen from the ground. Having held her hands +over his head in mental prayer, she was ready to depart. + +“Farewell, friends in mine extremity,” she said to Pearson and his +wife; “the good deed ye have done me is a treasure laid up in heaven, +to be returned a thousandfold hereafter.—And farewell, ye mine enemies, +to whom it is not permitted to harm so much as a hair of my head, nor +to stay my footsteps even for a moment. The day is coming when ye shall +call upon me to witness for ye to this one sin uncommitted, and I will +rise up and answer.” + +She turned her steps toward the door, and the men who had stationed +themselves to guard it withdrew and suffered her to pass. A general +sentiment of pity overcame the virulence of religious hatred. +Sanctified by her love and her affliction, she went forth, and all the +people gazed after her till she had journeyed up the hill and was lost +behind its brow. She went, the apostle of her own unquiet heart, to +renew the wanderings of past years. For her voice had been already +heard in many lands of Christendom, and she had pined in the cells of a +Catholic Inquisition before she felt the lash and lay in the dungeons +of the Puritans. Her mission had extended also to the followers of the +Prophet, and from them she had received the courtesy and kindness which +all the contending sects of our purer religion united to deny her. Her +husband and herself had resided many months in Turkey, where even the +sultan’s countenance was gracious to them; in that pagan land, too, was +Ilbrahim’s birthplace, and his Oriental name was a mark of gratitude +for the good deeds of an unbeliever. + + +When Pearson and his wife had thus acquired all the rights over +Ilbrahim that could be delegated, their affection for him became, like +the memory of their native land or their mild sorrow for the dead, a +piece of the immovable furniture of their hearts. The boy, also, after +a week or two of mental disquiet, began to gratify his protectors by +many inadvertent proofs that he considered them as parents and their +house as home. Before the winter snows were melted the persecuted +infant, the little wanderer from a remote and heathen country, seemed +native in the New England cottage and inseparable from the warmth and +security of its hearth. Under the influence of kind treatment, and in +the consciousness that he was loved, Ilbrahim’s demeanor lost a +premature manliness which had resulted from his earlier situation; he +became more childlike and his natural character displayed itself with +freedom. It was in many respects a beautiful one, yet the disordered +imaginations of both his father and mother had perhaps propagated a +certain unhealthiness in the mind of the boy. In his general state +Ilbrahim would derive enjoyment from the most trifling events and from +every object about him; he seemed to discover rich treasures of +happiness by a faculty analogous to that of the witch-hazel, which +points to hidden gold where all is barren to the eye. His airy gayety, +coming to him from a thousand sources, communicated itself to the +family, and Ilbrahim was like a domesticated sunbeam, brightening moody +countenances and chasing away the gloom from the dark corners of the +cottage. + +On the other hand, as the susceptibility of pleasure is also that of +pain, the exuberant cheerfulness of the boy’s prevailing temper +sometimes yielded to moments of deep depression. His sorrows could not +always be followed up to their original source, but most frequently +they appeared to flow—though Ilbrahim was young to be sad for such a +cause—from wounded love. The flightiness of his mirth rendered him +often guilty of offences against the decorum of a Puritan household, +and on these occasions he did not invariably escape rebuke. But the +slightest word of real bitterness, which he was infallible in +distinguishing from pretended anger, seemed to sink into his heart and +poison all his enjoyments till he became sensible that he was entirely +forgiven. Of the malice which generally accompanies a superfluity of +sensitiveness Ilbrahim was altogether destitute. When trodden upon, he +would not turn; when wounded, he could but die. His mind was wanting in +the stamina of self-support. It was a plant that would twine +beautifully round something stronger than itself; but if repulsed or +torn away, it had no choice but to wither on the ground. Dorothy’s +acuteness taught her that severity would crush the spirit of the child, +and she nurtured him with the gentle care of one who handles a +butterfly. Her husband manifested an equal affection, although it grew +daily less productive of familiar caresses. + +The feelings of the neighboring people in regard to the Quaker infant +and his protectors had not undergone a favorable change, in spite of +the momentary triumph which the desolate mother had obtained over their +sympathies. The scorn and bitterness of which he was the object were +very grievous to Ilbrahim, especially when any circumstance made him +sensible that the children his equals in age partook of the enmity of +their parents. His tender and social nature had already overflowed in +attachments to everything about him, and still there was a residue of +unappropriated love which he yearned to bestow upon the little ones who +were taught to hate him. As the warm days of spring came on Ilbrahim +was accustomed to remain for hours silent and inactive within hearing +of the children’s voices at their play, yet with his usual delicacy of +feeling he avoided their notice, and would flee and hide himself from +the smallest individual among them. Chance, however, at length seemed +to open a medium of communication between his heart and theirs; it was +by means of a boy about two years older than Ilbrahim, who was injured +by a fall from a tree in the vicinity of Pearson’s habitation. As the +sufferer’s own home was at some distance, Dorothy willingly received +him under her roof and became his tender and careful nurse. + +Ilbrahim was the unconscious possessor of much skill in physiognomy, +and it would have deterred him in other circumstances from attempting +to make a friend of this boy. The countenance of the latter immediately +impressed a beholder disagreeably, but it required some examination to +discover that the cause was a very slight distortion of the mouth and +the irregular, broken line and near approach of the eyebrows. +Analogous, perhaps, to these trifling deformities was an almost +imperceptible twist of every joint and the uneven prominence of the +breast, forming a body regular in its general outline, but faulty in +almost all its details. The disposition of the boy was sullen and +reserved, and the village schoolmaster stigmatized him as obtuse in +intellect, although at a later period of life he evinced ambition and +very peculiar talents. But, whatever might be his personal or moral +irregularities, Ilbrahim’s heart seized upon and clung to him from the +moment that he was brought wounded into the cottage; the child of +persecution seemed to compare his own fate with that of the sufferer, +and to feel that even different modes of misfortune had created a sort +of relationship between them. Food, rest and the fresh air for which he +languished were neglected; he nestled continually by the bedside of the +little stranger and with a fond jealousy endeavored to be the medium of +all the cares that were bestowed upon him. As the boy became +convalescent Ilbrahim contrived games suitable to his situation or +amused him by a faculty which he had perhaps breathed in with the air +of his barbaric birthplace. It was that of reciting imaginary +adventures on the spur of the moment, and apparently in inexhaustible +succession. His tales were, of course, monstrous, disjointed and +without aim, but they were curious on account of a vein of human +tenderness which ran through them all and was like a sweet familiar +face encountered in the midst of wild and unearthly scenery. The +auditor paid much attention to these romances and sometimes interrupted +them by brief remarks upon the incidents, displaying shrewdness above +his years, mingled with a moral obliquity which grated very harshly +against Ilbrahim’s instinctive rectitude. Nothing, however, could +arrest the progress of the latter’s affection, and there were many +proofs that it met with a response from the dark and stubborn nature on +which it was lavished. The boy’s parents at length removed him to +complete his cure under their own roof. + +Ilbrahim did not visit his new friend after his departure, but he made +anxious and continual inquiries respecting him and informed himself of +the day when he was to reappear among his playmates. On a pleasant +summer afternoon the children of the neighborhood had assembled in the +little forest-crowned amphitheatre behind the meeting-house, and the +recovering invalid was there, leaning on a staff. The glee of a score +of untainted bosoms was heard in light and airy voices, which danced +among the trees like sunshine become audible; the grown men of this +weary world as they journeyed by the spot marvelled why life, beginning +in such brightness, should proceed in gloom, and their hearts or their +imaginations answered them and said that the bliss of childhood gushes +from its innocence. But it happened that an unexpected addition was +made to the heavenly little band. It was Ilbrahim, who came toward the +children with a look of sweet confidence on his fair and spiritual +face, as if, having manifested his love to one of them, he had no +longer to fear a repulse from their society. A hush came over their +mirth the moment they beheld him, and they stood whispering to each +other while he drew nigh; but all at once the devil of their fathers +entered into the unbreeched fanatics, and, sending up a fierce, shrill +cry, they rushed upon the poor Quaker child. In an instant he was the +centre of a brood of baby-fiends, who lifted sticks against him, pelted +him with stones and displayed an instinct of destruction far more +loathsome than the bloodthirstiness of manhood. + +The invalid, in the mean while, stood apart from the tumult, crying out +with a loud voice, “Fear not, Ilbrahim; come hither and take my hand,” +and his unhappy friend endeavored to obey him. After watching the +victim’s struggling approach with a calm smile and unabashed eye, the +foul-hearted little villain lifted his staff and struck Ilbrahim on the +mouth so forcibly that the blood issued in a stream. The poor child’s +arms had been raised to guard his head from the storm of blows, but now +he dropped them at once. His persecutors beat him down, trampled upon +him, dragged him by his long fair locks, and Ilbrahim was on the point +of becoming as veritable a martyr as ever entered bleeding into heaven. +The uproar, however, attracted the notice of a few neighbors, who put +themselves to the trouble of rescuing the little heretic, and of +conveying him to Pearson’s door. + +Ilbrahim’s bodily harm was severe, but long and careful nursing +accomplished his recovery; the injury done to his sensitive spirit was +more serious, though not so visible. Its signs were principally of a +negative character, and to be discovered only by those who had +previously known him. His gait was thenceforth slow, even and unvaried +by the sudden bursts of sprightlier motion which had once corresponded +to his overflowing gladness; his countenance was heavier, and its +former play of expression—the dance of sunshine reflected from moving +water—was destroyed by the cloud over his existence; his notice was +attracted in a far less degree by passing events, and he appeared to +find greater difficulty in comprehending what was new to him than at a +happier period. A stranger founding his judgment upon these +circumstances would have said that the dulness of the child’s intellect +widely contradicted the promise of his features, but the secret was in +the direction of Ilbrahim’s thoughts, which were brooding within him +when they should naturally have been wandering abroad. An attempt of +Dorothy to revive his former sportiveness was the single occasion on +which his quiet demeanor yielded to a violent display of grief; he +burst into passionate weeping and ran and hid himself, for his heart +had become so miserably sore that even the hand of kindness tortured it +like fire. Sometimes at night, and probably in his dreams, he was heard +to cry, “Mother! Mother!” as if her place, which a stranger had +supplied while Ilbrahim was happy, admitted of no substitute in his +extreme affliction. Perhaps among the many life-weary wretches then +upon the earth there was not one who combined innocence and misery like +this poor broken-hearted infant so soon the victim of his own heavenly +nature. + +While this melancholy change had taken place in Ilbrahim, one of an +earlier origin and of different character had come to its perfection in +his adopted father. The incident with which this tale commences found +Pearson in a state of religious dulness, yet mentally disquieted and +longing for a more fervid faith than he possessed. The first effect of +his kindness to Ilbrahim was to produce a softened feeling, an +incipient love for the child’s whole sect, but joined to this, and +resulting, perhaps, from self-suspicion, was a proud and ostentatious +contempt of their tenets and practical extravagances. In the course of +much thought, however—for the subject struggled irresistibly into his +mind—the foolishness of the doctrine began to be less evident, and the +points which had particularly offended his reason assumed another +aspect or vanished entirely away. The work within him appeared to go on +even while he slept, and that which had been a doubt when he laid down +to rest would often hold the place of a truth confirmed by some +forgotten demonstration when he recalled his thoughts in the morning. +But, while he was thus becoming assimilated to the enthusiasts, his +contempt, in nowise decreasing toward them, grew very fierce against +himself; he imagined, also, that every face of his acquaintance wore a +sneer, and that every word addressed to him was a gibe. Such was his +state of mind at the period of Ilbrahim’s misfortune, and the emotions +consequent upon that event completed the change of which the child had +been the original instrument. + +In the mean time, neither the fierceness of the persecutors nor the +infatuation of their victims had decreased. The dungeons were never +empty; the streets of almost every village echoed daily with the lash; +the life of a woman whose mild and Christian spirit no cruelty could +embitter had been sacrificed, and more innocent blood was yet to +pollute the hands that were so often raised in prayer. Early after the +Restoration the English Quakers represented to Charles II. that a “vein +of blood was open in his dominions,” but, though the displeasure of the +voluptuous king was roused, his interference was not prompt. And now +the tale must stride forward over many months, leaving Pearson to +encounter ignominy and misfortune; his wife, to a firm endurance of a +thousand sorrows; poor Ilbrahim, to pine and droop like a cankered +rose-bud; his mother, to wander on a mistaken errand, neglectful of the +holiest trust which can be committed to a woman. + + +A winter evening, a night of storm, had darkened over Pearson’s +habitation, and there were no cheerful faces to drive the gloom from +his broad hearth. The fire, it is true, sent forth a glowing heat and a +ruddy light, and large logs dripping with half-melted snow lay ready to +cast upon the embers. But the apartment was saddened in its aspect by +the absence of much of the homely wealth which had once adorned it, for +the exaction of repeated fines and his own neglect of temporal affairs +had greatly impoverished the owner. And with the furniture of peace the +implements of war had likewise disappeared; the sword was broken, the +helm and cuirass were cast away for ever: the soldier had done with +battles, and might not lift so much as his naked hand to guard his +head. But the Holy Book remained, and the table on which it rested was +drawn before the fire, while two of the persecuted sect sought comfort +from its pages. + +He who listened while the other read was the master of the house, now +emaciated in form and altered as to the expression and healthiness of +his countenance, for his mind had dwelt too long among visionary +thoughts and his body had been worn by imprisonment and stripes. The +hale and weatherbeaten old man who sat beside him had sustained less +injury from a far longer course of the same mode of life. In person he +was tall and dignified, and, which alone would have made him hateful to +the Puritans, his gray locks fell from beneath the broad-brimmed hat +and rested on his shoulders. As the old man read the sacred page the +snow drifted against the windows or eddied in at the crevices of the +door, while a blast kept laughing in the chimney and the blaze leaped +fiercely up to seek it. And sometimes, when the wind struck the hill at +a certain angle and swept down by the cottage across the wintry plain, +its voice was the most doleful that can be conceived; it came as if the +past were speaking, as if the dead had contributed each a whisper, as +if the desolation of ages were breathed in that one lamenting sound. + +The Quaker at length closed the book, retaining, however, his hand +between the pages which he had been reading, while he looked +steadfastly at Pearson. The attitude and features of the latter might +have indicated the endurance of bodily pain; he leaned his forehead on +his hands, his teeth were firmly closed and his frame was tremulous at +intervals with a nervous agitation. + +“Friend Tobias,” inquired the old man, compassionately, “hast thou +found no comfort in these many blessed passages of Scripture?” + +“Thy voice has fallen on my ear like a sound afar off and indistinct,” +replied Pearson, without lifting his eyes. “Yea; and when I have +hearkened carefully, the words seemed cold and lifeless and intended +for another and a lesser grief than mine. Remove the book,” he added, +in a tone of sullen bitterness; “I have no part in its consolations, +and they do but fret my sorrow the more.” + +“Nay, feeble brother; be not as one who hath never known the light,” +said the elder Quaker, earnestly, but with mildness. “Art thou he that +wouldst be content to give all and endure all for conscience’ sake, +desiring even peculiar trials that thy faith might be purified and thy +heart weaned from worldly desires? And wilt thou sink beneath an +affliction which happens alike to them that have their portion here +below and to them that lay up treasure in heaven? Faint not, for thy +burden is yet light.” + +“It is heavy! It is heavier than I can bear!” exclaimed Pearson, with +the impatience of a variable spirit. “From my youth upward I have been +a man marked out for wrath, and year by year—yea, day after day—I have +endured sorrows such as others know not in their lifetime. And now I +speak not of the love that has been turned to hatred, the honor to +ignominy, the ease and plentifulness of all things to danger, want and +nakedness. All this I could have borne and counted myself blessed. But +when my heart was desolate with many losses, I fixed it upon the child +of a stranger, and he became dearer to me than all my buried ones; and +now he too must die as if my love were poison. Verily, I am an accursed +man, and I will lay me down in the dust and lift up my head no more.” + +“Thou sinnest, brother, but it is not for me to rebuke thee, for I also +have had my hours of darkness wherein I have murmured against the +cross,” said the old Quaker. He continued, perhaps in the hope of +distracting his companion’s thoughts from his own sorrows: “Even of +late was the light obscured within me, when the men of blood had +banished me on pain of death and the constables led me onward from +village to village toward the wilderness. A strong and cruel hand was +wielding the knotted cords; they sunk deep into the flesh, and thou +mightst have tracked every reel and totter of my footsteps by the blood +that followed. As we went on—” + +“Have I not borne all this, and have I murmured?” interrupted Pearson, +impatiently. + +“Nay, friend, but hear me,” continued the other. “As we journeyed on +night darkened on our path, so that no man could see the rage of the +persecutors or the constancy of my endurance, though Heaven forbid that +I should glory therein. The lights began to glimmer in the cottage +windows, and I could discern the inmates as they gathered in comfort +and security, every man with his wife and children by their own evening +hearth. At length we came to a tract of fertile land. In the dim light +the forest was not visible around it, and, behold, there was a +straw-thatched dwelling which bore the very aspect of my home far over +the wild ocean—far in our own England. Then came bitter thoughts upon +me—yea, remembrances that were like death to my soul. The happiness of +my early days was painted to me, the disquiet of my manhood, the +altered faith of my declining years. I remembered how I had been moved +to go forth a wanderer when my daughter, the youngest, the dearest of +my flock, lay on her dying-bed, and—” + +“Couldst thou obey the command at such a moment?” exclaimed Pearson, +shuddering. + +“Yea! yea!” replied the old man, hurriedly. “I was kneeling by her +bedside when the voice spoke loud within me, but immediately I rose and +took my staff and gat me gone. Oh that it were permitted me to forget +her woeful look when I thus withdrew my arm and left her journeying +through the dark valley alone! for her soul was faint and she had +leaned upon my prayers. Now in that night of horror I was assailed by +the thought that I had been an erring Christian and a cruel parent; +yea, even my daughter with her pale dying features seemed to stand by +me and whisper, ‘Father, you are deceived; go home and shelter your +gray head.’—O Thou to whom I have looked in my furthest wanderings,” +continued the Quaker, raising his agitated eyes to heaven, “inflict not +upon the bloodiest of our persecutors the unmitigated agony of my soul +when I believed that all I had done and suffered for thee was at the +instigation of a mocking fiend!—But I yielded not; I knelt down and +wrestled with the tempter, while the scourge bit more fiercely into the +flesh. My prayer was heard, and I went on in peace and joy toward the +wilderness.” + +The old man, though his fanaticism had generally all the calmness of +reason, was deeply moved while reciting this tale, and his unwonted +emotion seemed to rebuke and keep down that of his companion. They sat +in silence, with their faces to the fire, imagining, perhaps, in its +red embers new scenes of persecution yet to be encountered. The snow +still drifted hard against the windows, and sometimes, as the blaze of +the logs had gradually sunk, came down the spacious chimney and hissed +upon the hearth. A cautious footstep might now and then be heard in a +neighboring apartment, and the sound invariably drew the eyes of both +Quakers to the door which led thither. When a fierce and riotous gust +of wind had led his thoughts by a natural association to homeless +travellers on such a night, Pearson resumed the conversation. + +“I have wellnigh sunk under my own share of this trial,” observed he, +sighing heavily; “yet I would that it might be doubled to me, if so the +child’s mother could be spared. Her wounds have been deep and many, but +this will be the sorest of all.” + +“Fear not for Catharine,” replied the old Quaker, “for I know that +valiant woman and have seen how she can bear the cross. A mother’s +heart, indeed, is strong in her, and may seem to contend mightily with +her faith; but soon she will stand up and give thanks that her son has +been thus early an accepted sacrifice. The boy hath done his work, and +she will feel that he is taken hence in kindness both to him and her. +Blessed, blessed are they that with so little suffering can enter into +peace!” + +The fitful rush of the wind was now disturbed by a portentous sound: it +was a quick and heavy knocking at the outer door. Pearson’s wan +countenance grew paler, for many a visit of persecution had taught him +what to dread; the old man, on the other hand, stood up erect, and his +glance was firm as that of the tried soldier who awaits his enemy. + +“The men of blood have come to seek me,” he observed, with calmness. +“They have heard how I was moved to return from banishment, and now am +I to be led to prison, and thence to death. It is an end I have long +looked for. I will open unto them lest they say, ‘Lo, he +feareth!rsquo;” + +“Nay; I will present myself before them,” said Pearson, with recovered +fortitude. “It may be that they seek me alone and know not that thou +abidest with me.” + +“Let us go boldly, both one and the other,” rejoined his companion. “It +is not fitting that thou or I should shrink.” + +They therefore proceeded through the entry to the door, which they +opened, bidding the applicant “Come in, in God’s name!” A furious blast +of wind drove the storm into their faces and extinguished the lamp; +they had barely time to discern a figure so white from head to foot +with the drifted snow that it seemed like Winter’s self come in human +shape to seek refuge from its own desolation. + +“Enter, friend, and do thy errand, be it what it may,” said Pearson. +“It must needs be pressing, since thou comest on such a bitter night.” + +“Peace be with this household!” said the stranger, when they stood on +the floor of the inner apartment. + +Pearson started; the elder Quaker stirred the slumbering embers of the +fire till they sent up a clear and lofty blaze. It was a female voice +that had spoken; it was a female form that shone out, cold and wintry, +in that comfortable light. + +“Catharine, blessed woman,” exclaimed the old man, “art thou come to +this darkened land again? Art thou come to bear a valiant testimony as +in former years? The scourge hath not prevailed against thee, and from +the dungeon hast thou come forth triumphant, but strengthen, strengthen +now thy heart, Catharine, for Heaven will prove thee yet this once ere +thou go to thy reward.” + +“Rejoice, friends!” she replied. “Thou who hast long been of our +people, and thou whom a little child hath led to us, rejoice! Lo, I +come, the messenger of glad tidings, for the day of persecution is +over-past. The heart of the king, even Charles, hath been moved in +gentleness toward us, and he hath sent forth his letters to stay the +hands of the men of blood. A ship’s company of our friends hath arrived +at yonder town, and I also sailed joyfully among them.” + +As Catharine spoke her eyes were roaming about the room in search of +him for whose sake security was dear to her. Pearson made a silent +appeal to the old man, nor did the latter shrink from the painful task +assigned him. + +“Sister,” he began, in a softened yet perfectly calm tone, “thou +tellest us of his love manifested in temporal good, and now must we +speak to thee of that selfsame love displayed in chastenings. Hitherto, +Catharine, thou hast been as one journeying in a darksome and difficult +path and leading an infant by the hand; fain wouldst thou have looked +heavenward continually, but still the cares of that little child have +drawn thine eyes and thy affections to the earth. Sister, go on +rejoicing, for his tottering footsteps shall impede thine own no more.” + +But the unhappy mother was not thus to be consoled. She shook like a +leaf; she turned white as the very snow that hung drifted into her +hair. The firm old man extended his hand and held her up, keeping his +eye upon hers as if to repress any outbreak of passion. + +“I am a woman—I am but a woman; will He try me above my strength?” said +Catharine, very quickly and almost in a whisper. “I have been wounded +sore; I have suffered much—many things in the body, many in the mind; +crucified in myself and in them that were dearest to me. Surely,” added +she, with a long shudder, “he hath spared me in this one thing.” She +broke forth with sudden and irrepressible violence: “Tell me, man of +cold heart, what has God done to me? Hath he cast me down never to rise +again? Hath he crushed my very heart in his hand?—And thou to whom I +committed my child, how hast thou fulfilled thy trust? Give me back the +boy well, sound, alive—alive—or earth and heaven shall avenge me!” + +The agonized shriek of Catharine was answered by the faint—the very +faint—voice of a child. + +On this day it had become evident to Pearson, to his aged guest and to +Dorothy that Ilbrahim’s brief and troubled pilgrimage drew near its +close. The two former would willingly have remained by him to make use +of the prayers and pious discourses which they deemed appropriate to +the time, and which, if they be impotent as to the departing +traveller’s reception in the world whither he goes, may at least +sustain him in bidding adieu to earth. But, though Ilbrahim uttered no +complaint, he was disturbed by the faces that looked upon him; so that +Dorothy’s entreaties and their own conviction that the child’s feet +might tread heaven’s pavement and not soil it had induced the two +Quakers to remove. Ilbrahim then closed his eyes and grew calm, and, +except for now and then a kind and low word to his nurse, might have +been thought to slumber. As nightfall came on, however, and the storm +began to rise, something seemed to trouble the repose of the boy’s mind +and to render his sense of hearing active and acute. If a passing wind +lingered to shake the casement, he strove to turn his head toward it; +if the door jarred to and fro upon its hinges, he looked long and +anxiously thitherward; if the heavy voice of the old man as he read the +Scriptures rose but a little higher, the child almost held his +dying-breath to listen; if a snowdrift swept by the cottage with a +sound like the trailing of a garment, Ilbrahim seemed to watch that +some visitant should enter. But after a little time he relinquished +whatever secret hope had agitated him and with one low complaining +whisper turned his cheek upon the pillow. He then addressed Dorothy +with his usual sweetness and besought her to draw near him; she did so, +and Ilbrahim took her hand in both of his, grasping it with a gentle +pressure, as if to assure himself that he retained it. At intervals, +and without disturbing the repose of his countenance, a very faint +trembling passed over him from head to foot, as if a mild but somewhat +cool wind had breathed upon him and made him shiver. + +As the boy thus led her by the hand in his quiet progress over the +borders of eternity, Dorothy almost imagined that she could discern the +near though dim delightfulness of the home he was about to reach; she +would not have enticed the little wanderer back, though she bemoaned +herself that she must leave him and return. But just when Ilbrahim’s +feet were pressing on the soil of Paradise he heard a voice behind him, +and it recalled him a few, few paces of the weary path which he had +travelled. As Dorothy looked upon his features she perceived that their +placid expression was again disturbed. Her own thoughts had been so +wrapped in him that all sounds of the storm and of human speech were +lost to her; but when Catharine’s shriek pierced through the room, the +boy strove to raise himself. + +“Friend, she is come! Open unto her!” cried he. + +In a moment his mother was kneeling by the bedside; she drew Ilbrahim +to her bosom, and he nestled there with no violence of joy, but +contentedly as if he were hushing himself to sleep. He looked into her +face, and, reading its agony, said with feeble earnestness, + +“Mourn not, dearest mother. I am happy now;” and with these words the +gentle boy was dead. + + +The king’s mandate to stay the New England persecutors was effectual in +preventing further martyrdoms, but the colonial authorities, trusting +in the remoteness of their situation, and perhaps in the supposed +instability of the royal government, shortly renewed their severities +in all other respects. Catharine’s fanaticism had become wilder by the +sundering of all human ties; and wherever a scourge was lifted, there +was she to receive the blow; and whenever a dungeon was unbarred, +thither she came to cast herself upon the floor. But in process of time +a more Christian spirit—a spirit of forbearance, though not of +cordiality or approbation—began to pervade the land in regard to the +persecuted sect. And then, when the rigid old Pilgrims eyed her rather +in pity than in wrath, when the matrons fed her with the fragments of +their children’s food and offered her a lodging on a hard and lowly +bed, when no little crowd of schoolboys left their sports to cast +stones after the roving enthusiast,—then did Catharine return to +Pearson’s dwelling, and made that her home. + +As if Ilbrahim’s sweetness yet lingered round his ashes, as if his +gentle spirit came down from heaven to teach his parent a true +religion, her fierce and vindictive nature was softened by the same +griefs which had once irritated it. When the course of years had made +the features of the unobtrusive mourner familiar in the settlement, she +became a subject of not deep but general interest—a being on whom the +otherwise superfluous sympathies of all might be bestowed. Every one +spoke of her with that degree of pity which it is pleasant to +experience; every one was ready to do her the little kindnesses which +are not costly, yet manifest good-will; and when at last she died, a +long train of her once bitter persecutors followed her with decent +sadness and tears that were not painful to her place by Ilbrahim’s +green and sunken grave. + + + + + MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE + + +A young fellow, a tobacco-pedler by trade, was on his way from +Morristown, where he had dealt largely with the deacon of the Shaker +settlement, to the village of Parker’s Falls, on Salmon River. He had a +neat little cart painted green, with a box of cigars depicted on each +side-panel, and an Indian chief holding a pipe and a golden +tobacco-stalk on the rear. The pedler drove a smart little mare and was +a young man of excellent character, keen at a bargain, but none the +worse liked by the Yankees, who, as I have heard them say, would rather +be shaved with a sharp razor than a dull one. Especially was he beloved +by the pretty girls along the Connecticut, whose favor he used to court +by presents of the best smoking-tobacco in his stock, knowing well that +the country-lasses of New England are generally great performers on +pipes. Moreover, as will be seen in the course of my story, the pedler +was inquisitive and something of a tattler, always itching to hear the +news and anxious to tell it again. + +After an early breakfast at Morristown the tobacco-pedler—whose name +was Dominicus Pike—had travelled seven miles through a solitary piece +of woods without speaking a word to anybody but himself and his little +gray mare. It being nearly seven o’clock, he was as eager to hold a +morning gossip as a city shopkeeper to read the morning paper. An +opportunity seemed at hand when, after lighting a cigar with a +sun-glass, he looked up and perceived a man coming over the brow of the +hill at the foot of which the pedler had stopped his green cart. +Dominicus watched him as he descended, and noticed that he carried a +bundle over his shoulder on the end of a stick and travelled with a +weary yet determined pace. He did not look as if he had started in the +freshness of the morning, but had footed it all night, and meant to do +the same all day. + +“Good-morning, mister,” said Dominicus, when within speaking-distance. +“You go a pretty good jog. What’s the latest news at Parker’s Falls?” + +The man pulled the broad brim of a gray hat over his eyes, and +answered, rather sullenly, that he did not come from Parker’s Falls, +which, as being the limit of his own day’s journey, the pedler had +naturally mentioned in his inquiry. + +“Well, then,” rejoined Dominicus Pike, “let’s have the latest news +where you did come from. I’m not particular about Parker’s Falls. Any +place will answer.” + +Being thus importuned, the traveller—who was as ill-looking a fellow as +one would desire to meet in a solitary piece of woods—appeared to +hesitate a little, as if he was either searching his memory for news or +weighing the expediency of telling it. At last, mounting on the step of +the cart, he whispered in the ear of Dominicus, though he might have +shouted aloud and no other mortal would have heard him. + +“I do remember one little trifle of news,” said he. “Old Mr. +Higginbotham of Kimballton was murdered in his orchard at eight o’clock +last night by an Irishman and a nigger. They strung him up to the +branch of a St. Michael’s pear tree where nobody would find him till +the morning.” + +As soon as this horrible intelligence was communicated the stranger +betook himself to his journey again with more speed than ever, not even +turning his head when Dominicus invited him to smoke a Spanish cigar +and relate all the particulars. The pedler whistled to his mare and +went up the hill, pondering on the doleful fate of Mr. Higginbotham, +whom he had known in the way of trade, having sold him many a bunch of +long nines and a great deal of pig-tail, lady’s twist and fig tobacco. +He was rather astonished at the rapidity with which the news had +spread. Kimballton was nearly sixty miles distant in a straight line; +the murder had been perpetrated only at eight o’clock the preceding +night, yet Dominicus had heard of it at seven in the morning, when, in +all probability, poor Mr. Higginbotham’s own family had but just +discovered his corpse hanging on the St. Michael’s pear tree. The +stranger on foot must have worn seven-league boots, to travel at such a +rate. + +“Ill-news flies fast, they say,” thought Dominicus Pike, “but this +beats railroads. The fellow ought to be hired to go express with the +President’s message.” + +The difficulty was solved by supposing that the narrator had made a +mistake of one day in the date of the occurrence; so that our friend +did not hesitate to introduce the story at every tavern and +country-store along the road, expending a whole bunch of Spanish +wrappers among at least twenty horrified audiences. He found himself +invariably the first bearer of the intelligence, and was so pestered +with questions that he could not avoid filling up the outline till it +became quite a respectable narrative. He met with one piece of +corroborative evidence. Mr. Higginbotham was a trader, and a former +clerk of his to whom Dominicus related the facts testified that the old +gentleman was accustomed to return home through the orchard about +nightfall with the money and valuable papers of the store in his +pocket. The clerk manifested but little grief at Mr. Higginbotham’s +catastrophe, hinting—what the pedler had discovered in his own dealings +with him—that he was a crusty old fellow as close as a vise. His +property would descend to a pretty niece who was now keeping school in +Kimballton. + +What with telling the news for the public good and driving bargains for +his own, Dominicus was so much delayed on the road that he chose to put +up at a tavern about five miles short of Parker’s Falls. After supper, +lighting one of his prime cigars, he seated himself in the bar-room and +went through the story of the murder, which had grown so fast that it +took him half an hour to tell. There were as many as twenty people in +the room, nineteen of whom received it all for gospel. But the +twentieth was an elderly farmer who had arrived on horseback a short +time before and was now seated in a corner, smoking his pipe. When the +story was concluded, he rose up very deliberately, brought his chair +right in front of Dominicus and stared him full in the face, puffing +out the vilest tobacco-smoke the pedler had ever smelt. + +“Will you make affidavit,” demanded he, in the tone of a +country-justice taking an examination, “that old Squire Higginbotham of +Kimballton was murdered in his orchard the night before last and found +hanging on his great pear tree yesterday morning?” + +“I tell the story as I heard it, mister,” answered Dominicus, dropping +his half-burnt cigar. “I don’t say that I saw the thing done, so I +can’t take my oath that he was murdered exactly in that way.” + +“But I can take mine,” said the farmer, “that if Squire Higginbotham +was murdered night before last I drank a glass of bitters with his +ghost this morning. Being a neighbor of mine, he called me into his +store as I was riding by, and treated me, and then asked me to do a +little business for him on the road. He didn’t seem to know any more +about his own murder than I did.” + +“Why, then it can’t be a fact!” exclaimed Dominicus Pike. + +“I guess he’d have mentioned, if it was,” said the old farmer; and he +removed his chair back to the corner, leaving Dominicus quite down in +the mouth. + +Here was a sad resurrection of old Mr. Higginbotham! The pedler had no +heart to mingle in the conversation any more, but comforted himself +with a glass of gin and water and went to bed, where all night long he +dreamed of hanging on the St. Michael’s pear tree. + +To avoid the old farmer (whom he so detested that his suspension would +have pleased him better than Mr. Higginbotham’s), Dominicus rose in the +gray of the morning, put the little mare into the green cart and +trotted swiftly away toward Parker’s Falls. The fresh breeze, the dewy +road and the pleasant summer dawn revived his spirits, and might have +encouraged him to repeat the old story had there been anybody awake to +bear it, but he met neither ox-team, light wagon, chaise, horseman nor +foot-traveller till, just as he crossed Salmon River, a man came +trudging down to the bridge with a bundle over his shoulder, on the end +of a stick. + +“Good-morning, mister,” said the pedler, reining in his mare. “If you +come from Kimballton or that neighborhood, maybe you can tell me the +real fact about this affair of old Mr. Higginbotham. Was the old fellow +actually murdered two or three nights ago by an Irishman and a nigger?” + +Dominicus had spoken in too great a hurry to observe at first that the +stranger himself had a deep tinge of negro blood. On hearing this +sudden question the Ethiopian appeared to change his skin, its yellow +hue becoming a ghastly white, while, shaking and stammering, he thus +replied: + +“No, no! There was no colored man. It was an Irishman that hanged him +last night at eight o’clock; I came away at seven. His folks can’t have +looked for him in the orchard yet.” + +Scarcely had the yellow man spoken, when he interrupted himself and, +though he seemed weary enough before, continued his journey at a pace +which would have kept the pedler’s mare on a smart trot. Dominicus +stared after him in great perplexity. If the murder had not been +committed till Tuesday night, who was the prophet that had foretold it +in all its circumstances on Tuesday morning? If Mr. Higginbotham’s +corpse were not yet discovered by his own family, how came the mulatto, +at above thirty miles’ distance, to know that he was hanging in the +orchard, especially as he had left Kimballton before the unfortunate +man was hanged at all? These ambiguous circumstances, with the +stranger’s surprise and terror, made Dominicus think of raising a +hue-and-cry after him as an accomplice in the murder, since a murder, +it seemed, had really been perpetrated. + +“But let the poor devil go,” thought the pedler. “I don’t want his +black blood on my head, and hanging the nigger wouldn’t unhang Mr. +Higginbotham. Unhang the old gentleman? It’s a sin, I know, but I +should hate to have him come to life a second time and give me the +lie.” + +With these meditations Dominicus Pike drove into the street of Parker’s +Falls, which, as everybody knows, is as thriving a village as three +cotton-factories and a slitting-mill can make it. The machinery was not +in motion and but a few of the shop doors unbarred when he alighted in +the stable-yard of the tavern and made it his first business to order +the mare four quarts of oats. His second duty, of course, was to impart +Mr. Higginbotham’s catastrophe to the hostler. He deemed it advisable, +however, not to be too positive as to the date of the direful fact, and +also to be uncertain whether it were perpetrated by an Irishman and a +mulatto or by the son of Erin alone. Neither did he profess to relate +it on his own authority or that of any one person, but mentioned it as +a report generally diffused. + +The story ran through the town like fire among girdled trees, and +became so much the universal talk that nobody could tell whence it had +originated. Mr. Higginbotham was as well known at Parker’s Falls as any +citizen of the place, being part-owner of the slitting-mill and a +considerable stockholder in the cotton-factories. The inhabitants felt +their own prosperity interested in his fate. Such was the excitement +that the Parker’s Falls _Gazette_ anticipated its regular day of +publication, and came out with half a form of blank paper and a column +of double pica emphasized with capitals and headed “HORRID MURDER OF +MR. HIGGINBOTHAM!” Among other dreadful details, the printed account +described the mark of the cord round the dead man’s neck and stated the +number of thousand dollars of which he had been robbed; there was much +pathos, also, about the affliction of his niece, who had gone from one +fainting-fit to another ever since her uncle was found hanging on the +St. Michael’s pear tree with his pockets inside out. The village poet +likewise commemorated the young lady’s grief in seventeen stanzas of a +ballad. The selectmen held a meeting, and in consideration of Mr. +Higginbotham’s claims on the town determined to issue handbills +offering a reward of five hundred dollars for the apprehension of his +murderers and the recovery of the stolen property. + +Meanwhile, the whole population of Parker’s Falls, consisting of +shopkeepers, mistresses of boarding-houses, factory-girls, mill-men and +schoolboys, rushed into the street and kept up such a terrible +loquacity as more than compensated for the silence of the +cotton-machines, which refrained from their usual din out of respect to +the deceased. Had Mr. Higginbotham cared about posthumous renown, his +untimely ghost would have exulted in this tumult. + +Our friend Dominicus in his vanity of heart forgot his intended +precautions, and, mounting on the town-pump, announced himself as the +bearer of the authentic intelligence which had caused so wonderful a +sensation. He immediately became the great man of the moment, and had +just begun a new edition of the narrative with a voice like a +field-preacher when the mail-stage drove into the village street. It +had travelled all night, and must have shifted horses at Kimballton at +three in the morning. + +“Now we shall hear all the particulars!” shouted the crowd. + +The coach rumbled up to the piazza of the tavern followed by a thousand +people; for if any man had been minding his own business till then, he +now left it at sixes and sevens to hear the news. The pedler, foremost +in the race, discovered two passengers, both of whom had been startled +from a comfortable nap to find themselves in the centre of a mob. Every +man assailing them with separate questions, all propounded at once, the +couple were struck speechless, though one was a lawyer and the other a +young lady. + +“Mr. Higginbotham! Mr. Higginbotham! Tell us the particulars about old +Mr. Higginbotham!” bawled the mob. “What is the coroner’s verdict? Are +the murderers apprehended? Is Mr. Higginbotham’s niece come out of her +fainting-fits? Mr. Higginbotham! Mr. Higginbotham!” + +The coachman said not a word except to swear awfully at the hostler for +not bringing him a fresh team of horses. The lawyer inside had +generally his wits about him even when asleep; the first thing he did +after learning the cause of the excitement was to produce a large red +pocketbook. Meantime, Dominicus Pike, being an extremely polite young +man, and also suspecting that a female tongue would tell the story as +glibly as a lawyer’s, had handed the lady out of the coach. She was a +fine, smart girl, now wide awake and bright as a button, and had such a +sweet, pretty mouth that Dominicus would almost as lief have heard a +love-tale from it as a tale of murder. + +“Gentlemen and ladies,” said the lawyer to the shopkeepers, the +mill-men and the factory-girls, “I can assure you that some +unaccountable mistake—or, more probably, a wilful falsehood maliciously +contrived to injure Mr. Higginbotham’s credit—has excited this singular +uproar. We passed through Kimballton at three o’clock this morning, and +most certainly should have been informed of the murder had any been +perpetrated. But I have proof nearly as strong as Mr. Higginbotham’s +own oral testimony in the negative. Here is a note relating to a suit +of his in the Connecticut courts which was delivered me from that +gentleman himself. I find it dated at ten o’clock last evening.” + +So saying, the lawyer, exhibited the date and signature of the note, +which irrefragably proved either that this perverse Mr. Higginbotham +was alive when he wrote it, or, as some deemed the more probable case +of two doubtful ones, that he was so absorbed in worldly business as to +continue to transact it even after his death. But unexpected evidence +was forthcoming. The young lady, after listening to the pedler’s +explanation, merely seized a moment to smooth her gown and put her +curls in order, and then appeared at the tavern door, making a modest +signal to be heard. + +“Good people,” said she, “I am Mr. Higginbotham’s niece.” + +A wondering murmur passed through the crowd on beholding her so rosy +and bright—that same unhappy niece whom they had supposed, on the +authority of the Parker’s Falls _Gazette_, to be lying at death’s door +in a fainting-fit. But some shrewd fellows had doubted all along +whether a young lady would be quite so desperate at the hanging of a +rich old uncle. + +“You see,” continued Miss Higginbotham, with a smile, “that this +strange story is quite unfounded as to myself, and I believe I may +affirm it to be equally so in regard to my dear uncle Higginbotham. He +has the kindness to give me a home in his house, though I contribute to +my own support by teaching a school. I left Kimballton this morning to +spend the vacation of commencement-week with a friend about five miles +from Parker’s Falls. My generous uncle, when he heard me on the stairs, +called me to his bedside and gave me two dollars and fifty cents to pay +my stage-fare, and another dollar for my extra expenses. He then laid +his pocketbook under his pillow, shook hands with me, and advised me to +take some biscuit in my bag instead of breakfasting on the road. I feel +confident, therefore, that I left my beloved relative alive, and trust +that I shall find him so on my return.” + +The young lady courtesied at the close of her speech, which was so +sensible and well worded, and delivered with such grace and propriety, +that everybody thought her fit to be preceptress of the best academy in +the State. But a stranger would have supposed that Mr. Higginbotham was +an object of abhorrence at Parker’s Falls and that a thanksgiving had +been proclaimed for his murder, so excessive was the wrath of the +inhabitants on learning their mistake. The mill-men resolved to bestow +public honors on Dominicus Pike, only hesitating whether to tar and +feather him, ride him on a rail or refresh him with an ablution at the +town-pump, on the top of which he had declared himself the bearer of +the news. The selectmen, by advice of the lawyer, spoke of prosecuting +him for a misdemeanor in circulating unfounded reports, to the great +disturbance of the peace of the commonwealth. Nothing saved Dominicus +either from mob-law or a court of justice but an eloquent appeal made +by the young lady in his behalf. Addressing a few words of heartfelt +gratitude to his benefactress, he mounted the green cart and rode out +of town under a discharge of artillery from the schoolboys, who found +plenty of ammunition in the neighboring clay-pits and mud-holes. As he +turned his head to exchange a farewell glance with Mr. Higginbotham’s +niece a ball of the consistence of hasty-pudding hit him slap in the +mouth, giving him a most grim aspect. His whole person was so +bespattered with the like filthy missiles that he had almost a mind to +ride back and supplicate for the threatened ablution at the town-pump; +for, though not meant in kindness, it would now have been a deed of +charity. + +However, the sun shone bright on poor Dominicus, and the mud—an emblem +of all stains of undeserved opprobrium—was easily brushed off when dry. +Being a funny rogue, his heart soon cheered up; nor could he refrain +from a hearty laugh at the uproar which his story had excited. The +handbills of the selectmen would cause the commitment of all the +vagabonds in the State, the paragraph in the Parker’s Falls _Gazette_ +would be reprinted from Maine to Florida, and perhaps form an item in +the London newspapers, and many a miser would tremble for his moneybags +and life on learning the catastrophe of Mr. Higginbotham. The pedler +meditated with much fervor on the charms of the young schoolmistress, +and swore that Daniel Webster never spoke nor looked so like an angel +as Miss Higginbotham while defending him from the wrathful populace at +Parker’s Falls. + +Dominicus was now on the Kimballton turnpike, having all along +determined to visit that place, though business had drawn, him out of +the most direct road from Morristown. As he approached the scene of the +supposed murder he continued to revolve the circumstances in his mind, +and was astonished at the aspect which the whole case assumed. Had +nothing occurred to corroborate the story of the first traveller, it +might now have been considered as a hoax; but the yellow man was +evidently acquainted either with the report or the fact, and there was +a mystery in his dismayed and guilty look on being abruptly questioned. +When to this singular combination of incidents it was added that the +rumor tallied exactly with Mr. Higginbotham’s character and habits of +life, and that he had an orchard and a St. Michael’s pear tree, near +which he always passed at nightfall, the circumstantial evidence +appeared so strong that Dominicus doubted whether the autograph +produced by the lawyer, or even the niece’s direct testimony, ought to +be equivalent. Making cautious inquiries along the road, the pedler +further learned that Mr. Higginbotham had in his service an Irishman of +doubtful character whom he had hired without a recommendation, on the +score of economy. + +“May I be hanged myself,” exclaimed Dominicus Pike, aloud, on reaching +the top of a lonely hill, “if I’ll believe old Higginbotham is unhanged +till I see him with my own eyes and hear it from his own mouth. And, as +he’s a real shaver, I’ll have the minister, or some other responsible +man, for an endorser.” + +It was growing dusk when he reached the toll-house on Kimballton +turnpike, about a quarter of a mile from the village of this name. His +little mare was fast bringing him up with a man on horseback who +trotted through the gate a few rods in advance of him, nodded to the +toll-gatherer and kept on towards the village. Dominicus was acquainted +with the toll-man, and while making change the usual remarks on the +weather passed between them. + +“I suppose,” said the pedler, throwing back his whiplash to bring it +down like a feather on the mare’s flank, “you have not seen anything of +old Mr. Higginbotham within a day or two?” + +“Yes,” answered the toll-gatherer; “he passed the gate just before you +drove up, and yonder he rides now, if you can see him through the dusk. +He’s been to Woodfield this afternoon, attending a sheriff’s sale +there. The old man generally shakes hands and has a little chat with +me, but to-night he nodded, as if to say, ‘Charge my toll,’ and jogged +on; for, wherever he goes, he must always be at home by eight o’clock.” + +“So they tell me,” said Dominicus. + +“I never saw a man look so yellow and thin as the squire does,” +continued the toll-gatherer. “Says I to myself tonight, ‘He’s more like +a ghost or an old mummy than good flesh and blood.’” + +The pedler strained his eyes through the twilight, and could just +discern the horseman now far ahead on the village road. He seemed to +recognize the rear of Mr. Higginbotham, but through the evening shadows +and amid the dust from the horse’s feet the figure appeared dim and +unsubstantial, as if the shape of the mysterious old man were faintly +moulded of darkness and gray light. + +Dominicus shivered. “Mr. Higginbotham has come back from the other +world by way of the Kimballton turnpike,” thought he. He shook the +reins and rode forward, keeping about the same distance in the rear of +the gray old shadow till the latter was concealed by a bend of the +road. On reaching this point the pedler no longer saw the man on +horseback, but found himself at the head of the village street, not far +from a number of stores and two taverns clustered round the +meeting-house steeple. On his left was a stone wall and a gate, the +boundary of a wood-lot beyond which lay an orchard, farther still a +mowing-field, and last of all a house. These were the premises of Mr. +Higginbotham, whose dwelling stood beside the old highway, but had been +left in the background by the Kimballton turnpike. + +Dominicus knew the place, and the little mare stopped short by +instinct, for he was not conscious of tightening the reins. “For the +soul of me, I cannot get by this gate!” said he, trembling. “I never +shall be my own man again till I see whether Mr. Higginbotham is +hanging on the St. Michael’s pear tree.” He leaped from the cart, gave +the rein a turn round the gate-post, and ran along the green path of +the wood-lot as if Old Nick were chasing behind. Just then the village +clock tolled eight, and as each deep stroke fell Dominicus gave a fresh +bound and flew faster than before, till, dim in the solitary centre of +the orchard, he saw the fated pear tree. One great branch stretched +from the old contorted trunk across the path and threw the darkest +shadow on that one spot. But something seemed to struggle beneath the +branch. + +The pedler had never pretended to more courage than befits a man of +peaceable occupation, nor could he account for his valor on this awful +emergency. Certain it is, however, that he rushed forward, prostrated a +sturdy Irishman with the butt-end of his whip, and found—not, indeed, +hanging on the St. Michael’s pear tree, but trembling beneath it with a +halter round his neck—the old identical Mr. Higginbotham. + +“Mr. Higginbotham,” said Dominicus, tremulously, “you’re an honest man, +and I’ll take your word for it. Have you been hanged, or not?” + +If the riddle be not already guessed, a few words will explain the +simple machinery by which this “coming event” was made to cast its +“shadow before.” Three men had plotted the robbery and murder of Mr. +Higginbotham; two of them successively lost courage and fled, each +delaying the crime one night by their disappearance; the third was in +the act of perpetration, when a champion, blindly obeying the call of +fate, like the heroes of old romance, appeared in the person of +Dominicus Pike. + +It only remains to say that Mr. Higginbotham took the pedler into high +favor, sanctioned his addresses to the pretty schoolmistress and +settled his whole property on their children, allowing themselves the +interest. In due time the old gentleman capped the climax of his favors +by dying a Christian death in bed; since which melancholy event, +Dominicus Pike has removed from Kimballton and established a large +tobacco-manufactory in my native village. + + + + + LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE + + +Ding-dong! Ding-dong! Ding-dong! + +The town-crier has rung his bell at a distant corner, and little Annie +stands on her father’s doorsteps trying to hear what the man with the +loud voice is talking about. Let me listen too. Oh, he is telling the +people that an elephant and a lion and a royal tiger and a horse with +horns, and other strange beasts from foreign countries, have come to +town and will receive all visitors who choose to wait upon them. +Perhaps little Annie would like to go? Yes, and I can see that the +pretty child is weary of this wide and pleasant street with the green +trees flinging their shade across the quiet sunshine and the pavements +and the sidewalks all as clean as if the housemaid had just swept them +with her broom. She feels that impulse to go strolling away—that +longing after the mystery of the great world—which many children feel, +and which I felt in my childhood. Little Annie shall take a ramble with +me. See! I do but hold out my hand, and like some bright bird in the +sunny air, with her blue silk frock fluttering upward from her white +pantalets, she comes bounding on tiptoe across the street. + +Smooth back your brown curls, Annie, and let me tie on your bonnet, and +we will set forth. What a strange couple to go on their rambles +together! One walks in black attire, with a measured step and a heavy +brow and his thoughtful eyes bent down, while the gay little girl trips +lightly along as if she were forced to keep hold of my hand lest her +feet should dance away from the earth. Yet there is sympathy between +us. If I pride myself on anything, it is because I have a smile that +children love; and, on the other hand, there are few grown ladies that +could entice me from the side of little Annie, for I delight to let my +mind go hand in hand with the mind of a sinless child. So come, Annie; +but if I moralize as we go, do not listen to me: only look about you +and be merry. + +Now we turn the corner. Here are hacks with two horses and +stage-coaches with four thundering to meet each other, and trucks and +carts moving at a slower pace, being heavily laden with barrels from +the wharves; and here are rattling gigs which perhaps will be smashed +to pieces before our eyes. Hitherward, also, comes a man trundling a +wheelbarrow along the pavement. Is not little Annie afraid of such a +tumult? No; she does not even shrink closer to my side, but passes on +with fearless confidence, a happy child amidst a great throng of grown +people who pay the same reverence to her infancy that they would to +extreme old age. Nobody jostles her: all turn aside to make way for +little Annie; and, what is most singular, she appears conscious of her +claim to such respect. Now her eyes brighten with pleasure. A +street-musician has seated himself on the steps of yonder church and +pours forth his strains to the busy town—a melody that has gone astray +among the tramp of footsteps, the buzz of voices and the war of passing +wheels. Who heeds the poor organ-grinder? None but myself and little +Annie, whose feet begin to move in unison with the lively tune, as if +she were loth that music should be wasted without a dance. But where +would Annie find a partner? Some have the gout in their toes or the +rheumatism in their joints; some are stiff with age, some feeble with +disease; some are so lean that their bones would rattle, and others of +such ponderous size that their agility would crack the flagstones; but +many, many have leaden feet because their hearts are far heavier than +lead. It is a sad thought that I have chanced upon. What a company of +dancers should we be! For I too am a gentleman of sober footsteps, and +therefore, little Annie, let us walk sedately on. + +It is a question with me whether this giddy child or my sage self have +most pleasure in looking at the shop-windows. We love the silks of +sunny hue that glow within the darkened premises of the spruce +dry-goods men; we are pleasantly dazzled by the burnished silver and +the chased gold, the rings of wedlock and the costly love-ornaments, +glistening at the window of the jeweller; but Annie, more than I, seeks +for a glimpse of her passing figure in the dusty looking-glasses at the +hardware-stores. All that is bright and gay attracts us both. + +Here is a shop to which the recollections of my boyhood as well as +present partialities give a peculiar magic. How delightful to let the +fancy revel on the dainties of a confectioner—those pies with such +white and flaky paste, their contents being a mystery, whether rich +mince with whole plums intermixed, or piquant apple delicately +rose-flavored; those cakes, heart-shaped or round, piled in a lofty +pyramid; those sweet little circlets sweetly named kisses; those dark +majestic masses fit to be bridal-loaves at the wedding of an heiress, +mountains in size, their summits deeply snow-covered with sugar! Then +the mighty treasures of sugarplums, white and crimson and yellow, in +large glass vases, and candy of all varieties, and those little +cockles—or whatever they are called—much prized by children for their +sweetness, and more for the mottoes which they enclose, by love-sick +maids and bachelors! Oh, my mouth waters, little Annie, and so doth +yours, but we will not be tempted except to an imaginary feast; so let +us hasten onward devouring the vision of a plum-cake. + +Here are pleasures, as some people would say, of a more exalted kind, +in the window of a bookseller. Is Annie a literary lady? Yes; she is +deeply read in Peter Parley’s tomes and has an increasing love for +fairy-tales, though seldom met with nowadays, and she will subscribe +next year to the _Juvenile Miscellany_. But, truth to tell, she is apt +to turn away from the printed page and keep gazing at the pretty +pictures, such as the gay-colored ones which make this shop-window the +continual loitering-place of children. What would Annie think if, in +the book which I mean to send her on New Year’s day, she should find +her sweet little self bound up in silk or morocco with gilt edges, +there to remain till she become a woman grown with children of her own +to read about their mother’s childhood? That would be very queer. + +Little Annie is weary of pictures and pulls me onward by the hand, till +suddenly we pause at the most wondrous shop in all the town. Oh, my +stars! Is this a toyshop, or is it fairy-land? For here are gilded +chariots in which the king and queen of the fairies might ride side by +side, while their courtiers on these small horses should gallop in +triumphal procession before and behind the royal pair. Here, too, are +dishes of chinaware fit to be the dining-set of those same princely +personages when they make a regal banquet in the stateliest hall of +their palace—full five feet high—and behold their nobles feasting adown +the long perspective of the table. Betwixt the king and queen should +sit my little Annie, the prettiest fairy of them all. Here stands a +turbaned Turk threatening us with his sabre, like an ugly heathen as he +is, and next a Chinese mandarin who nods his head at Annie and myself. +Here we may review a whole army of horse and foot in red-and-blue +uniforms, with drums, fifes, trumpets, and all kinds of noiseless +music; they have halted on the shelf of this window after their weary +march from Liliput. But what cares Annie for soldiers? No conquering +queen is she—neither a Semiramis nor a Catharine; her whole heart is +set upon that doll who gazes at us with such a fashionable stare. This +is the little girl’s true plaything. Though made of wood, a doll is a +visionary and ethereal personage endowed by childish fancy with a +peculiar life; the mimic lady is a heroine of romance, an actor and a +sufferer in a thousand shadowy scenes, the chief inhabitant of that +wild world with which children ape the real one. Little Annie does not +understand what I am saying, but looks wishfully at the proud lady in +the window. We will invite her home with us as we return.—Meantime, +good-bye, Dame Doll! A toy yourself, you look forth from your window +upon many ladies that are also toys, though they walk and speak, and +upon a crowd in pursuit of toys, though they wear grave visages. Oh, +with your never-closing eyes, had you but an intellect to moralize on +all that flits before them, what a wise doll would you be!—Come, little +Annie, we shall find toys enough, go where we may. + +Now we elbow our way among the throng again. It is curious in the most +crowded part of a town to meet with living creatures that had their +birthplace in some far solitude, but have acquired a second nature in +the wilderness of men. Look up, Annie, at that canary-bird hanging out +of the window in his cage. Poor little fellow! His golden feathers are +all tarnished in this smoky sunshine; he would have glistened twice as +brightly among the summer islands, but still he has become a citizen in +all his tastes and habits, and would not sing half so well without the +uproar that drowns his music. What a pity that he does not know how +miserable he is! There is a parrot, too, calling out, “Pretty Poll! +Pretty Poll!” as we pass by. Foolish bird, to be talking about her +prettiness to strangers, especially as she is not a pretty Poll, though +gaudily dressed in green and yellow! If she had said “Pretty Annie!” +there would have been some sense in it. See that gray squirrel at the +door of the fruit-shop whirling round and round so merrily within his +wire wheel! Being condemned to the treadmill, he makes it an amusement. +Admirable philosophy! + +Here comes a big, rough dog—a countryman’s dog—in search of his master, +smelling at everybody’s heels and touching little Annie’s hand with his +cold nose, but hurrying away, though she would fain have patted +him.—Success to your search, Fidelity!—And there sits a great yellow +cat upon a window-sill, a very corpulent and comfortable cat, gazing at +this transitory world with owl’s eyes, and making pithy comments, +doubtless, or what appear such, to the silly beast.—Oh, sage puss, make +room for me beside you, and we will be a pair of philosophers. + +Here we see something to remind us of the town-crier and his +ding-dong-bell. Look! look at that great cloth spread out in the air, +pictured all over with wild beasts, as if they had met together to +choose a king, according to their custom in the days of Æsop. But they +are choosing neither a king nor a President, else we should hear a most +horrible snarling! They have come from the deep woods and the wild +mountains and the desert sands and the polar snows only to do homage to +my little Annie. As we enter among them the great elephant makes us a +bow in the best style of elephantine courtesy, bending lowly down his +mountain bulk, with trunk abased and leg thrust out behind. Annie +returns the salute, much to the gratification of the elephant, who is +certainly the best-bred monster in the caravan. The lion and the +lioness are busy with two beef-bones. The royal tiger, the beautiful, +the untamable, keeps pacing his narrow cage with a haughty step, +unmindful of the spectators or recalling the fierce deeds of his former +life, when he was wont to leap forth upon such inferior animals from +the jungles of Bengal. + +Here we see the very same wolf—do not go near him, Annie!—the selfsame +wolf that devoured little Red Riding-Hood and her grandmother. In the +next cage a hyena from Egypt who has doubtless howled around the +pyramids and a black bear from our own forests are fellow-prisoners and +most excellent friends. Are there any two living creatures who have so +few sympathies that they cannot possibly be friends? Here sits a great +white bear whom common observers would call a very stupid beast, though +I perceive him to be only absorbed in contemplation; he is thinking of +his voyages on an iceberg, and of his comfortable home in the vicinity +of the north pole, and of the little cubs whom he left rolling in the +eternal snows. In fact, he is a bear of sentiment. But oh those +unsentimental monkeys! The ugly, grinning, aping, chattering, +ill-natured, mischievous and queer little brutes! Annie does not love +the monkeys; their ugliness shocks her pure, instinctive delicacy of +taste and makes her mind unquiet because it bears a wild and dark +resemblance to humanity. But here is a little pony just big enough for +Annie to ride, and round and round he gallops in a circle, keeping time +with his trampling hoofs to a band of music. And here, with a laced +coat and a cocked hat, and a riding-whip in his hand—here comes a +little gentleman small enough to be king of the fairies and ugly enough +to be king of the gnomes, and takes a flying leap into the saddle. +Merrily, merrily plays the music, and merrily gallops the pony, and +merrily rides the little old gentleman.—Come, Annie, into the street +again; perchance we may see monkeys on horseback there. + +Mercy on us! What a noisy world we quiet people live in! Did Annie ever +read the cries of London city? With what lusty lungs doth yonder man +proclaim that his wheelbarrow is full of lobsters! Here comes another, +mounted on a cart and blowing a hoarse and dreadful blast from a tin +horn, as much as to say, “Fresh fish!” And hark! a voice on high, like +that of a muezzin from the summit of a mosque, announcing that some +chimney-sweeper has emerged from smoke and soot and darksome caverns +into the upper air. What cares the world for that? But, well-a-day, we +hear a shrill voice of affliction—the scream of a little child, rising +louder with every repetition of that smart, sharp, slapping sound +produced by an open hand on tender flesh. Annie sympathizes, though +without experience of such direful woe. + +Lo! the town-crier again, with some new secret for the public ear. Will +he tell us of an auction, or of a lost pocket-book or a show of +beautiful wax figures, or of some monstrous beast more horrible than +any in the caravan? I guess the latter. See how he uplifts the bell in +his right hand and shakes it slowly at first, then with a hurried +motion, till the clapper seems to strike both sides at once, and the +sounds are scattered forth in quick succession far and near. + +Ding-dong! Ding-dong! Ding-dong! + +Now he raises his clear loud voice above all the din of the town. It +drowns the buzzing talk of many tongues and draws each man’s mind from +his own business; it rolls up and down the echoing street, and ascends +to the hushed chamber of the sick, and penetrates downward to the +cellar kitchen where the hot cook turns from the fire to listen. Who of +all that address the public ear, whether in church or court-house or +hall of state, has such an attentive audience as the town-crier! What +saith the people’s orator? + +“Strayed from her home, a LITTLE GIRL of five years old, in a blue silk +frock and white pantalets, with brown curling hair and hazel eyes. +Whoever will bring her back to her afflicted mother—” + +Stop, stop, town-crier! The lost is found.—Oh, my pretty Annie, we +forgot to tell your mother of our ramble, and she is in despair and has +sent the town-crier to bellow up and down the streets, affrighting old +and young, for the loss of a little girl who has not once let go my +hand? Well, let us hasten homeward; and as we go forget not to thank +Heaven, my Annie, that after wandering a little way into the world you +may return at the first summons with an untainted and unwearied heart, +and be a happy child again. But I have gone too far astray for the +town-crier to call me back. + +Sweet has been the charm of childhood on my spirit throughout my ramble +with little Annie. Say not that it has been a waste of precious +moments, an idle matter, a babble of childish talk and a reverie of +childish imaginations about topics unworthy of a grown man’s notice. +Has it been merely this? Not so—not so. They are not truly wise who +would affirm it. As the pure breath of children revives the life of +aged men, so is our moral nature revived by their free and simple +thoughts, their native feeling, their airy mirth for little cause or +none, their grief soon roused and soon allayed. Their influence on us +is at least reciprocal with ours on them. When our infancy is almost +forgotten and our boyhood long departed, though it seems but as +yesterday, when life settles darkly down upon us and we doubt whether +to call ourselves young any more,—then it is good to steal away from +the society of bearded men, and even of gentler woman, and spend an +hour or two with children. After drinking from those fountains of still +fresh existence we shall return into the crowd, as I do now, to +struggle onward and do our part in life—perhaps as fervently as ever, +but for a time with a kinder and purer heart and a spirit more lightly +wise. All this by thy sweet magic, dear little Annie! + + + + +WAKEFIELD + + +In some old magazine or newspaper I recollect a story, told as truth, +of a man—let us call him Wakefield—who absented himself for a long time +from his wife. The fact, thus abstractedly stated, is not very +uncommon, nor, without a proper distinction of circumstances, to be +condemned either as naughty or nonsensical. Howbeit, this, though far +from the most aggravated, is perhaps the strangest instance on record +of marital delinquency, and, moreover, as remarkable a freak as may be +found in the whole list of human oddities. The wedded couple lived in +London. The man, under pretence of going a journey, took lodgings in +the next street to his own house, and there, unheard of by his wife or +friends and without the shadow of a reason for such self-banishment, +dwelt upward of twenty years. During that period he beheld his home +every day, and frequently the forlorn Mrs. Wakefield. And after so +great a gap in his matrimonial felicity—when his death was reckoned +certain, his estate settled, his name dismissed from memory and his +wife long, long ago resigned to her autumnal widowhood—he entered the +door one evening quietly as from a day’s absence, and became a loving +spouse till death. + +This outline is all that I remember. But the incident, though of the +purest originality, unexampled, and probably never to be repeated, is +one, I think, which appeals to the general sympathies of mankind. We +know, each for himself, that none of us would perpetrate such a folly, +yet feel as if some other might. To my own contemplations, at least, it +has often recurred, always exciting wonder, but with a sense that the +story must be true and a conception of its hero’s character. Whenever +any subject so forcibly affects the mind, time is well spent in +thinking of it. If the reader choose, let him do his own meditation; or +if he prefer to ramble with me through the twenty years of Wakefield’s +vagary, I bid him welcome, trusting that there will be a pervading +spirit and a moral, even should we fail to find them, done up neatly +and condensed into the final sentence. Thought has always its efficacy +and every striking incident its moral. + +What sort of a man was Wakefield? We are free to shape out our own idea +and call it by his name. He was now in the meridian of life; his +matrimonial affections, never violent, were sobered into a calm, +habitual sentiment; of all husbands, he was likely to be the most +constant, because a certain sluggishness would keep his heart at rest +wherever it might be placed. He was intellectual, but not actively so; +his mind occupied itself in long and lazy musings that tended to no +purpose or had not vigor to attain it; his thoughts were seldom so +energetic as to seize hold of words. Imagination, in the proper meaning +of the term, made no part of Wakefield’s gifts. With a cold but not +depraved nor wandering heart, and a mind never feverish with riotous +thoughts nor perplexed with originality, who could have anticipated +that our friend would entitle himself to a foremost place among the +doers of eccentric deeds? Had his acquaintances been asked who was the +man in London the surest to perform nothing to-day which should be +remembered on the morrow, they would have thought of Wakefield. Only +the wife of his bosom might have hesitated. She, without having +analyzed his character, was partly aware of a quiet selfishness that +had rusted into his inactive mind; of a peculiar sort of vanity, the +most uneasy attribute about him; of a disposition to craft which had +seldom produced more positive effects than the keeping of petty secrets +hardly worth revealing; and, lastly, of what she called a little +strangeness sometimes in the good man. This latter quality is +indefinable, and perhaps non-existent. + +Let us now imagine Wakefield bidding adieu to his wife. It is the dusk +of an October evening. His equipment is a drab greatcoat, a hat covered +with an oil-cloth, top-boots, an umbrella in one hand and a small +portmanteau in the other. He has informed Mrs. Wakefield that he is to +take the night-coach into the country. She would fain inquire the +length of his journey, its object and the probable time of his return, +but, indulgent to his harmless love of mystery, interrogates him only +by a look. He tells her not to expect him positively by the +return-coach nor to be alarmed should he tarry three or four days, but, +at all events, to look for him at supper on Friday evening. Wakefield, +himself, be it considered, has no suspicion of what is before him. He +holds out his hand; she gives her own and meets his parting kiss in the +matter-of-course way of a ten years’ matrimony, and forth goes the +middle-aged Mr. Wakefield, almost resolved to perplex his good lady by +a whole week’s absence. After the door has closed behind him, she +perceives it thrust partly open and a vision of her husband’s face +through the aperture, smiling on her and gone in a moment. For the time +this little incident is dismissed without a thought, but long +afterward, when she has been more years a widow than a wife, that smile +recurs and flickers across all her reminiscences of Wakefield’s visage. +In her many musings she surrounds the original smile with a multitude +of fantasies which make it strange and awful; as, for instance, if she +imagines him in a coffin, that parting look is frozen on his pale +features; or if she dreams of him in heaven, still his blessed spirit +wears a quiet and crafty smile. Yet for its sake, when all others have +given him up for dead, she sometimes doubts whether she is a widow. + +But our business is with the husband. We must hurry after him along the +street ere he lose his individuality and melt into the great mass of +London life. It would be vain searching for him there. Let us follow +close at his heels, therefore, until, after several superfluous turns +and doublings, we find him comfortably established by the fireside of a +small apartment previously bespoken. He is in the next street to his +own and at his journey’s end. He can scarcely trust his good-fortune in +having got thither unperceived, recollecting that at one time he was +delayed by the throng in the very focus of a lighted lantern, and again +there were footsteps that seemed to tread behind his own, distinct from +the multitudinous tramp around him, and anon he heard a voice shouting +afar and fancied that it called his name. Doubtless a dozen busybodies +had been watching him and told his wife the whole affair. + +Poor Wakefield! little knowest thou thine own insignificance in this +great world. No mortal eye but mine has traced thee. Go quietly to thy +bed, foolish man, and on the morrow, if thou wilt be wise, get thee +home to good Mrs. Wakefield and tell her the truth. Remove not thyself +even for a little week from thy place in her chaste bosom. Were she for +a single moment to deem thee dead or lost or lastingly divided from +her, thou wouldst be woefully conscious of a change in thy true wife +for ever after. It is perilous to make a chasm in human affections—not +that they gape so long and wide, but so quickly close again. + +Almost repenting of his frolic, or whatever it may be termed, Wakefield +lies down betimes, and, starting from his first nap, spreads forth his +arms into the wide and solitary waste of the unaccustomed bed, “No,” +thinks he, gathering the bedclothes about him; “I will not sleep alone +another night.” In the morning he rises earlier than usual and sets +himself to consider what he really means to do. Such are his loose and +rambling modes of thought that he has taken this very singular step +with the consciousness of a purpose, indeed, but without being able to +define it sufficiently for his own contemplation. The vagueness of the +project and the convulsive effort with which he plunges into the +execution of it are equally characteristic of a feeble-minded man. +Wakefield sifts his ideas, however, as minutely as he may, and finds +himself curious to know the progress of matters at home—how his +exemplary wife will endure her widowhood of a week, and, briefly, how +the little sphere of creatures and circumstances in which he was a +central object will be affected by his removal. A morbid vanity, +therefore, lies nearest the bottom of the affair. But how is he to +attain his ends? Not, certainly, by keeping close in this comfortable +lodging, where, though he slept and awoke in the next street to his +home, he is as effectually abroad as if the stage-coach had been +whirling him away all night. Yet should he reappear, the whole project +is knocked in the head. His poor brains being hopelessly puzzled with +this dilemma, he at length ventures out, partly resolving to cross the +head of the street and send one hasty glance toward his forsaken +domicile. Habit—for he is a man of habits—takes him by the hand and +guides him, wholly unaware, to his own door, where, just at the +critical moment, he is aroused by the scraping of his foot upon the +step.—Wakefield, whither are you going? + +At that instant his fate was turning on the pivot. Little dreaming of +the doom to which his first backward step devotes him, he hurries away, +breathless with agitation hitherto unfelt, and hardly dares turn his +head at the distant corner. Can it be that nobody caught sight of him? +Will not the whole household—the decent Mrs. Wakefield, the smart +maid-servant and the dirty little footboy—raise a hue-and-cry through +London streets in pursuit of their fugitive lord and master? Wonderful +escape! He gathers courage to pause and look homeward, but is perplexed +with a sense of change about the familiar edifice such as affects us +all when, after a separation of months or years, we again see some hill +or lake or work of art with which we were friends of old. In ordinary +cases this indescribable impression is caused by the comparison and +contrast between our imperfect reminiscences and the reality. In +Wakefield the magic of a single night has wrought a similar +transformation, because in that brief period a great moral change has +been effected. But this is a secret from himself. Before leaving the +spot he catches a far and momentary glimpse of his wife passing athwart +the front window with her face turned toward the head of the street. +The crafty nincompoop takes to his heels, scared with the idea that +among a thousand such atoms of mortality her eye must have detected +him. Right glad is his heart, though his brain be somewhat dizzy, when +he finds himself by the coal-fire of his lodgings. + +So much for the commencement of this long whim-wham. After the initial +conception and the stirring up of the man’s sluggish temperament to put +it in practice, the whole matter evolves itself in a natural train. We +may suppose him, as the result of deep deliberation, buying a new wig +of reddish hair and selecting sundry garments, in a fashion unlike his +customary suit of brown, from a Jew’s old-clothes bag. It is +accomplished: Wakefield is another man. The new system being now +established, a retrograde movement to the old would be almost as +difficult as the step that placed him in his unparalleled position. +Furthermore, he is rendered obstinate by a sulkiness occasionally +incident to his temper and brought on at present by the inadequate +sensation which he conceives to have been produced in the bosom of Mrs. +Wakefield. He will not go back until she be frightened half to death. +Well, twice or thrice has she passed before his sight, each time with a +heavier step, a paler cheek and more anxious brow, and in the third +week of his non-appearance he detects a portent of evil entering the +house in the guise of an apothecary. Next day the knocker is muffled. +Toward nightfall comes the chariot of a physician and deposits its +big-wigged and solemn burden at Wakefield’s door, whence after a +quarter of an hour’s visit he emerges, perchance the herald of a +funeral. Dear woman! will she die? + +By this time Wakefield is excited to something like energy of feeling, +but still lingers away from his wife’s bedside, pleading with his +conscience that she must not be disturbed at such a juncture. If aught +else restrains him, he does not know it. In the course of a few weeks +she gradually recovers. The crisis is over; her heart is sad, perhaps, +but quiet, and, let him return soon or late, it will never be feverish +for him again. Such ideas glimmer through the mist of Wakefield’s mind +and render him indistinctly conscious that an almost impassable gulf +divides his hired apartment from his former home. “It is but in the +next street,” he sometimes says. Fool! it is in another world. Hitherto +he has put off’ his return from one particular day to another; +henceforward he leaves the precise time undetermined—not to-morrow; +probably next week; pretty soon. Poor man! The dead have nearly as much +chance of revisiting their earthly homes as the self-banished +Wakefield. + +Would that I had a folio to write, instead of an article of a dozen +pages! Then might I exemplify how an influence beyond our control lays +its strong hand on every deed which we do and weaves its consequences +into an iron tissue of necessity. + +Wakefield is spellbound. We must leave him for ten years or so to haunt +around his house without once crossing the threshold, and to be +faithful to his wife with all the affection of which his heart is +capable, while he is slowly fading out of hers. Long since, it must be +remarked, he has lost the perception of singularity in his conduct. + +Now for a scene. Amid the throng of a London street we distinguish a +man, now waxing elderly, with few characteristics to attract careless +observers, yet bearing in his whole aspect the handwriting of no common +fate for such as have the skill to read it. He is meagre; his low and +narrow forehead is deeply wrinkled; his eyes, small and lustreless, +sometimes wander apprehensively about him, but oftener seem to look +inward. He bends his head and moves with an indescribable obliquity of +gait, as if unwilling to display his full front to the world. Watch him +long enough to see what we have described, and you will allow that +circumstances—which often produce remarkable men from Nature’s ordinary +handiwork—have produced one such here. Next, leaving him to sidle along +the footwalk, cast your eyes in the opposite direction, where a portly +female considerably in the wane of life, with a prayer-book in her +hand, is proceeding to yonder church. She has the placid mien of +settled widowhood. Her regrets have either died away or have become so +essential to her heart that they would be poorly exchanged for joy. +Just as the lean man and well-conditioned woman are passing a slight +obstruction occurs and brings these two figures directly in contact. +Their hands touch; the pressure of the crowd forces her bosom against +his shoulder; they stand face to face, staring into each other’s eyes. +After a ten years’ separation thus Wakefield meets his wife. The throng +eddies away and carries them asunder. The sober widow, resuming her +former pace, proceeds to church, but pauses in the portal and throws a +perplexed glance along the street. She passes in, however, opening her +prayer-book as she goes. + +And the man? With so wild a face that busy and selfish London stands to +gaze after him he hurries to his lodgings, bolts the door and throws +himself upon the bed. The latent feelings of years break out; his +feeble mind acquires a brief energy from their strength; all the +miserable strangeness of his life is revealed to him at a glance, and +he cries out passionately, “Wakefield, Wakefield! You are mad!” Perhaps +he was so. The singularity of his situation must have so moulded him to +itself that, considered in regard to his fellow-creatures and the +business of life, he could not be said to possess his right mind. He +had contrived—or, rather, he had happened—to dissever himself from the +world, to vanish, to give up his place and privileges with living men +without being admitted among the dead. The life of a hermit is nowise +parallel to his. He was in the bustle of the city as of old, but the +crowd swept by and saw him not; he was, we may figuratively say, always +beside his wife and at his hearth, yet must never feel the warmth of +the one nor the affection of the other. It was Wakefield’s +unprecedented fate to retain his original share of human sympathies and +to be still involved in human interests, while he had lost his +reciprocal influence on them. It would be a most curious speculation to +trace out the effect of such circumstances on his heart and intellect +separately and in unison. Yet, changed as he was, he would seldom be +conscious of it, but deem himself the same man as ever; glimpses of the +truth, indeed, would come, but only for the moment, and still he would +keep saying, “I shall soon go back,” nor reflect that he had been +saying so for twenty years. + +I conceive, also, that these twenty years would appear in the +retrospect scarcely longer than the week to which Wakefield had at +first limited his absence. He would look on the affair as no more than +an interlude in the main business of his life. When, after a little +while more, he should deem it time to re-enter his parlor, his wife +would clap her hands for joy on beholding the middle-aged Mr. +Wakefield. Alas, what a mistake! Would Time but await the close of our +favorite follies, we should be young men—all of us—and till Doomsday. + +One evening, in the twentieth year since he vanished, Wakefield is +taking his customary walk toward the dwelling which he still calls his +own. It is a gusty night of autumn, with frequent showers that patter +down upon the pavement and are gone before a man can put up his +umbrella. Pausing near the house, Wakefield discerns through the +parlor-windows of the second floor the red glow and the glimmer and +fitful flash of a comfortable fire. On the ceiling appears a grotesque +shadow of good Mrs. Wakefield. The cap, the nose and chin and the broad +waist form an admirable caricature, which dances, moreover, with the +up-flickering and down-sinking blaze almost too merrily for the shade +of an elderly widow. At this instant a shower chances to fall, and is +driven by the unmannerly gust full into Wakefield’s face and bosom. He +is quite penetrated with its autumnal chill. Shall he stand wet and +shivering here, when his own hearth has a good fire to warm him and his +own wife will run to fetch the gray coat and small-clothes which +doubtless she has kept carefully in the closet of their bedchamber? No; +Wakefield is no such fool. He ascends the steps—heavily, for twenty +years have stiffened his legs since he came down, but he knows it +not.—Stay, Wakefield! Would you go to the sole home that is left you? +Then step into your grave.—The door opens. As he passes in we have a +parting glimpse of his visage, and recognize the crafty smile which was +the precursor of the little joke that he has ever since been playing +off at his wife’s expense. How unmercifully has he quizzed the poor +woman! Well, a good night’s rest to Wakefield! + +This happy event—supposing it to be such—could only have occurred at an +unpremeditated moment. We will not follow our friend across the +threshold. He has left us much food for thought, a portion of which +shall lend its wisdom to a moral and be shaped into a figure. Amid the +seeming confusion of our mysterious world individuals are so nicely +adjusted to a system, and systems to one another and to a whole, that +by stepping aside for a moment a man exposes himself to a fearful risk +of losing his place for ever. Like Wakefield, he may become, as it +were, the outcast of the universe. + + + + +A RILL FROM THE TOWN-PUMP + + +(SCENE, _the corner of two principal streets_,[3] _the_ TOWN-PUMP +_talking through its nose_.) + +Noon by the north clock! Noon by the east! High noon, too, by these hot +sunbeams, which full, scarcely aslope, upon my head and almost make the +water bubble and smoke in the trough under my nose. Truly, we public +characters have a tough time of it! And among all the town-officers +chosen at March meeting, where is he that sustains for a single year +the burden of such manifold duties as are imposed in perpetuity upon +the town-pump? The title of “town-treasurer” is rightfully mine, as +guardian of the best treasure that the town has. The overseers of the +poor ought to make me their chairman, since I provide bountifully for +the pauper without expense to him that pays taxes. I am at the head of +the fire department and one of the physicians to the board of health. +As a keeper of the peace all water-drinkers will confess me equal to +the constable. I perform some of the duties of the town-clerk by +promulgating public notices when they are posted on my front. To speak +within bounds, I am the chief person of the municipality, and exhibit, +moreover, an admirable pattern to my brother-officers by the cool, +steady, upright, downright and impartial discharge of my business and +the constancy with which I stand to my post. Summer or winter, nobody +seeks me in vain, for all day long I am seen at the busiest corner, +just above the market, stretching out my arms to rich and poor alike, +and at night I hold a lantern over my head both to show where I am and +keep people out of the gutters. At this sultry noontide I am cupbearer +to the parched populace, for whose benefit an iron goblet is chained to +my waist. Like a dramseller on the mall at muster-day, I cry aloud to +all and sundry in my plainest accents and at the very tiptop of my +voice. + +Here it is, gentlemen! Here is the good liquor! Walk up, walk up, +gentlemen! Walk up, walk up! Here is the superior stuff! Here is the +unadulterated ale of Father Adam—better than Cognac, Hollands, Jamaica, +strong beer or wine of any price; here it is by the hogshead or the +single glass, and not a cent to pay! Walk up, gentlemen, walk up, and +help yourselves! + +It were a pity if all this outcry should draw no customers. Here they +come.—A hot day, gentlemen! Quaff and away again, so as to keep +yourselves in a nice cool sweat.—You, my friend, will need another +cupful to wash the dust out of your throat, if it be as thick there as +it is on your cowhide shoes. I see that you have trudged half a score +of miles to-day, and like a wise man have passed by the taverns and +stopped at the running brooks and well-curbs. Otherwise, betwixt heat +without and fire within, you would have been burnt to a cinder or +melted down to nothing at all, in the fashion of a jelly-fish. Drink +and make room for that other fellow, who seeks my aid to quench the +fiery fever of last night’s potations, which he drained from no cup of +mine.—Welcome, most rubicund sir! You and I have been great strangers +hitherto; nor, to confess the truth, will my nose be anxious for a +closer intimacy till the fumes of your breath be a little less potent. +Mercy on you, man! the water absolutely hisses down your red-hot gullet +and is converted quite to steam in the miniature Tophet which you +mistake for a stomach. Fill again, and tell me, on the word of an +honest toper, did you ever, in cellar, tavern, or any kind of a +dram-shop, spend the price of your children’s food for a swig half so +delicious? Now, for the first time these ten years, you know the flavor +of cold water. Good-bye; and whenever you are thirsty, remember that I +keep a constant supply at the old stand.—Who next?—Oh, my little +friend, you are let loose from school and come hither to scrub your +blooming face and drown the memory of certain taps of the ferule, and +other schoolboy troubles, in a draught from the town-pump? Take it, +pure as the current of your young life. Take it, and may your heart and +tongue never be scorched with a fiercer thirst than now! There, my dear +child! put down the cup and yield your place to this elderly gentleman +who treads so tenderly over the paving-stones that I suspect he is +afraid of breaking them. What! he limps by without so much as thanking +me, as if my hospitable offers were meant only for people who have no +wine-cellars.—Well, well, sir, no harm done, I hope? Go draw the cork, +tip the decanter; but when your great toe shall set you a-roaring, it +will be no affair of mine. If gentlemen love the pleasant titillation +of the gout, it is all one to the town-pump. This thirsty dog with his +red tongue lolling out does not scorn my hospitality, but stands on his +hind legs and laps eagerly out of the trough. See how lightly he capers +away again!—Jowler, did your worship ever have the gout? + +Are you all satisfied? Then wipe your mouths, my good friends, and +while my spout has a moment’s leisure I will delight the town with a +few historical remniscences. In far antiquity, beneath a darksome +shadow of venerable boughs, a spring bubbled out of the leaf-strewn +earth in the very spot where you now behold me on the sunny pavement. +The water was as bright and clear and deemed as precious as liquid +diamonds. The Indian sagamores drank of it from time immemorial till +the fatal deluge of the firewater burst upon the red men and swept +their whole race away from the cold fountains. Endicott and his +followers came next, and often knelt down to drink, dipping their long +beards in the spring. The richest goblet then was of birch-bark. +Governor Winthrop, after a journey afoot from Boston, drank here out of +the hollow of his hand. The elder Higginson here wet his palm and laid +it on the brow of the first town-born child. For many years it was the +watering-place, and, as it were, the washbowl, of the vicinity, whither +all decent folks resorted to purify their visages and gaze at them +afterward—at least, the pretty maidens did—in the mirror which it made. +On Sabbath-days, whenever a babe was to be baptized, the sexton filled +his basin here and placed it on the communion-table of the humble +meeting-house, which partly covered the site of yonder stately brick +one. Thus one generation after another was consecrated to Heaven by its +waters, and cast their waxing and waning shadows into its glassy bosom, +and vanished from the earth, as if mortal life were but a flitting +image in a fountain. Finally the fountain vanished also. Cellars were +dug on all sides and cart-loads of gravel flung upon its source, whence +oozed a turbid stream, forming a mud-puddle at the corner of two +streets. In the hot months, when its refreshment was most needed, the +dust flew in clouds over the forgotten birthplace of the waters, now +their grave. But in the course of time a town-pump was sunk into the +source of the ancient spring; and when the first decayed, another took +its place, and then another, and still another, till here stand I, +gentlemen and ladies, to serve you with my iron goblet. Drink and be +refreshed. The water is as pure and cold as that which slaked the +thirst of the red sagamore beneath the aged boughs, though now the gem +of the wilderness is treasured under these hot stones, where no shadow +falls but from the brick buildings. And be it the moral of my story +that, as this wasted and long-lost fountain is now known and prized +again, so shall the virtues of cold water—too little valued since your +fathers’ days—be recognized by all. + +Your pardon, good people! I must interrupt my stream of eloquence and +spout forth a stream of water to replenish the trough for this teamster +and his two yoke of oxen, who have come from Topsfield, or somewhere +along that way. No part of my business is pleasanter than the watering +of cattle. Look! how rapidly they lower the water-mark on the sides of +the trough, till their capacious stomachs are moistened with a gallon +or two apiece and they can afford time to breathe it in with sighs of +calm enjoyment. Now they roll their quiet eyes around the brim of their +monstrous drinking-vessel. An ox is your true toper. + +But I perceive, my dear auditors, that you are impatient for the +remainder of my discourse. Impute it, I beseech you, to no defect of +modesty if I insist a little longer on so fruitful a topic as my own +multifarious merits. It is altogether for your good. The better you +think of me, the better men and women you will find yourselves. I shall +say nothing of my all-important aid on washing-days, though on that +account alone I might call myself the household god of a hundred +families. Far be it from me, also, to hint, my respectable friends, at +the show of dirty faces which you would present without my pains to +keep you clean. Nor will I remind you how often, when the midnight +bells make you tremble for your combustible town, you have fled to the +town-pump and found me always at my post firm amid the confusion and +ready to drain my vital current in your behalf. Neither is it worth +while to lay much stress on my claims to a medical diploma as the +physician whose simple rule of practice is preferable to all the +nauseous lore which has found men sick, or left them so, since the days +of Hippocrates. Let us take a broader view of my beneficial influence +on mankind. + +No; these are trifles, compared with the merits which wise men concede +to me—if not in my single self, yet as the representative of a class—of +being the grand reformer of the age. From my spout, and such spouts as +mine, must flow the stream that shall cleanse our earth of the vast +portion of its crime and anguish which has gushed from the fiery +fountains of the still. In this mighty enterprise the cow shall be my +great confederate. Milk and water—the TOWN-PUMP and the Cow! Such is +the glorious copartnership that shall tear down the distilleries and +brewhouses, uproot the vineyards, shatter the cider-presses, ruin the +tea and coffee trade, and finally monopolize the whole business of +quenching thirst. Blessed consummation! Then Poverty shall pass away +from the land, finding no hovel so wretched where her squalid form may +shelter herself. Then Disease, for lack of other victims, shall gnaw +its own heart and die. Then Sin, if she do not die, shall lose half her +strength. Until now the frenzy of hereditary fever has raged in the +human blood, transmitted from sire to son and rekindled in every +generation by fresh draughts of liquid flame. When that inward fire +shall be extinguished, the heat of passion cannot but grow cool, and +war—the drunkenness of nations—perhaps will cease. At least, there will +be no war of households. The husband and wife, drinking deep of +peaceful joy—a calm bliss of temperate affections—shall pass hand in +hand through life and lie down not reluctantly at its protracted close. +To them the past will be no turmoil of mad dreams, nor the future an +eternity of such moments as follow the delirium of the drunkard. Their +dead faces shall express what their spirits were and are to be by a +lingering smile of memory and hope. + +Ahem! Dry work, this speechifying, especially to an unpractised orator. +I never conceived till now what toil the temperance lecturers undergo +for my sake; hereafter they shall have the business to themselves.—Do, +some kind Christian, pump a stroke or two, just to wet my +whistle.—Thank you, sir!—My dear hearers, when the world shall have +been regenerated by my instrumentality, you will collect your useless +vats and liquor-casks into one great pile and make a bonfire in honor +of the town-pump. And when I shall have decayed like my predecessors, +then, if you revere my memory, let a marble fountain richly sculptured +take my place upon this spot. Such monuments should be erected +everywhere and inscribed with the names of the distinguished champions +of my cause. Now, listen, for something very important is to come next. + +There are two or three honest friends of mine—and true friends I know +they are—who nevertheless by their fiery pugnacity in my behalf do put +me in fearful hazard of a broken nose, or even a total overthrow upon +the pavement and the loss of the treasure which I guard.—I pray you, +gentlemen, let this fault be amended. Is it decent, think you, to get +tipsy with zeal for temperance and take up the honorable cause of the +town-pump in the style of a toper fighting for his brandy-bottle? Or +can the excellent qualities of cold water be no otherwise exemplified +than by plunging slapdash into hot water and woefully scalding +yourselves and other people? Trust me, they may. In the moral warfare +which you are to wage—and, indeed, in the whole conduct of your +lives—you cannot choose a better example than myself, who have never +permitted the dust and sultry atmosphere, the turbulence and manifold +disquietudes, of the world around me to reach that deep, calm well of +purity which may be called my soul. And whenever I pour out that soul, +it is to cool earth’s fever or cleanse its stains. + +One o’clock! Nay, then, if the dinner-bell begins to speak, I may as +well hold my peace. Here comes a pretty young girl of my acquaintance +with a large stone pitcher for me to fill. May she draw a husband while +drawing her water, as Rachel did of old!—Hold out your vessel, my dear! +There it is, full to the brim; so now run home, peeping at your sweet +image in the pitcher as you go, and forget not in a glass of my own +liquor to drink “SUCCESS TO THE TOWN-PUMP.” + + + + +THE GREAT CARBUNCLE[4] + +A MYSTERY OF THE WHITE MOUNTAINS + +At nightfall once in the olden time, on the rugged side of one of the +Crystal Hills, a party of adventurers were refreshing themselves after +a toilsome and fruitless quest for the Great Carbuncle. They had come +thither, not as friends nor partners in the enterprise, but each, save +one youthful pair, impelled by his own selfish and solitary longing for +this wondrous gem. Their feeling of brotherhood, however, was strong +enough to induce them to contribute a mutual aid in building a rude hut +of branches and kindling a great fire of shattered pines that had +drifted down the headlong current of the Amonoosuck, on the lower bank +of which they were to pass the night. There was but one of their +number, perhaps, who had become so estranged from natural sympathies by +the absorbing spell of the pursuit as to acknowledge no satisfaction at +the sight of human faces in the remote and solitary region whither they +had ascended. A vast extent of wilderness lay between them and the +nearest settlement, while scant a mile above their heads was that bleak +verge where the hills throw off their shaggy mantle of forest-trees and +either robe themselves in clouds or tower naked into the sky. The roar +of the Amonoosuck would have been too awful for endurance if only a +solitary man had listened while the mountain-stream talked with the +wind. + +The adventurers, therefore, exchanged hospitable greetings and welcomed +one another to the hut where each man was the host and all were the +guests of the whole company. They spread their individual supplies of +food on the flat surface of a rock and partook of a general repast; at +the close of which a sentiment of good-fellowship was perceptible among +the party, though repressed by the idea that the renewed search for the +Great Carbuncle must make them strangers again in the morning. Seven +men and one young woman, they warmed themselves together at the fire, +which extended its bright wall along the whole front of their wigwam. +As they observed the various and contrasted figures that made up the +assemblage, each man looking like a caricature of himself in the +unsteady light that flickered over him, they came mutually to the +conclusion that an odder society had never met in city or wilderness, +on mountain or plain. + +The eldest of the group—a tall, lean, weatherbeaten man some sixty +years of age—was clad in the skins of wild animals whose fashion of +dress he did well to imitate, since the deer, the wolf and the bear had +long been his most intimate companions. He was one of those ill-fated +mortals, such as the Indians told of, whom in their early youth the +Great Carbuncle smote with a peculiar madness and became the passionate +dream of their existence. All who visited that region knew him as “the +Seeker,” and by no other name. As none could remember when he first +took up the search, there went a fable in the valley of the Saco that +for his inordinate lust after the Great Carbuncle he had been condemned +to wander among the mountains till the end of time, still with the same +feverish hopes at sunrise, the same despair at eve. Near this miserable +Seeker sat a little elderly personage wearing a high-crowned hat shaped +somewhat like a crucible. He was from beyond the sea—a Doctor +Cacaphodel, who had wilted and dried himself into a mummy by +continually stooping over charcoal-furnaces and inhaling unwholesome +fumes during his researches in chemistry and alchemy. It was told of +him—whether truly or not—that at the commencement of his studies he had +drained his body of all its richest blood and wasted it, with other +inestimable ingredients, in an unsuccessful experiment, and had never +been a well man since. Another of the adventurers was Master Ichabod +Pigsnort, a weighty merchant and selectman of Boston, and an elder of +the famous Mr. Norton’s church. His enemies had a ridiculous story that +Master Pigsnort was accustomed to spend a whole hour after prayer-time +every morning and evening in wallowing naked among an immense quantity +of pine-tree shillings, which were the earliest silver coinage of +Massachusetts. The fourth whom we shall notice had no name that his +companions knew of, and was chiefly distinguished by a sneer that +always contorted his thin visage, and by a prodigious pair of +spectacles which were supposed to deform and discolor the whole face of +nature to this gentleman’s perception. The fifth adventurer likewise +lacked a name, which was the greater pity, as he appeared to be a poet. +He was a bright-eyed man, but woefully pined away, which was no more +than natural if, as some people affirmed, his ordinary diet was fog, +morning mist and a slice of the densest cloud within his reach, sauced +with moonshine whenever he could get it. Certain it is that the poetry +which flowed from him had a smack of all these dainties. The sixth of +the party was a young man of haughty mien and sat somewhat apart from +the rest, wearing his plumed hat loftily among his elders, while the +fire glittered on the rich embroidery of his dress and gleamed +intensely on the jewelled pommel of his sword. This was the lord De +Vere, who when at home was said to spend much of his time in the +burial-vault of his dead progenitors rummaging their mouldy coffins in +search of all the earthly pride and vainglory that was hidden among +bones and dust; so that, besides his own share, he had the collected +haughtiness of his whole line of ancestry. Lastly, there was a handsome +youth in rustic garb, and by his side a blooming little person in whom +a delicate shade of maiden reserve was just melting into the rich glow +of a young wife’s affection. Her name was Hannah, and her husband’s +Matthew—two homely names, yet well enough adapted to the simple pair +who seemed strangely out of place among the whimsical fraternity whose +wits had been set agog by the Great Carbuncle. + +Beneath the shelter of one hut, in the bright blaze of the same fire, +sat this varied group of adventurers, all so intent upon a single +object that of whatever else they began to speak their closing words +were sure to be illuminated with the Great Carbuncle. Several related +the circumstances that brought them thither. One had listened to a +traveller’s tale of this marvellous stone in his own distant country, +and had immediately been seized with such a thirst for beholding it as +could only be quenched in its intensest lustre. Another, so long ago as +when the famous Captain Smith visited these coasts, had seen it blazing +far at sea, and had felt no rest in all the intervening years till now +that he took up the search. A third, being encamped on a +hunting-expedition full forty miles south of the White Mountains, awoke +at midnight and beheld the Great Carbuncle gleaming like a meteor, so +that the shadows of the trees fell backward from it. They spoke of the +innumerable attempts which had been made to reach the spot, and of the +singular fatality which had hitherto withheld success from all +adventurers, though it might seem so easy to follow to its source a +light that overpowered the moon and almost matched the sun. It was +observable that each smiled scornfully at the madness of every other in +anticipating better fortune than the past, yet nourished a +scarcely-hidden conviction that he would himself be the favored one. As +if to allay their too sanguine hopes, they recurred to the Indian +traditions that a spirit kept watch about the gem and bewildered those +who sought it either by removing it from peak to peak of the higher +hills or by calling up a mist from the enchanted lake over which it +hung. But these tales were deemed unworthy of credit, all professing to +believe that the search had been baffled by want of sagacity or +perseverance in the adventurers, or such other causes as might +naturally obstruct the passage to any given point among the intricacies +of forest, valley and mountain. + +In a pause of the conversation the wearer of the prodigious spectacles +looked round upon the party, making each individual in turn the object +of the sneer which invariably dwelt upon his countenance. + +“So, fellow-pilgrims,” said he, “here we are, seven wise men and one +fair damsel, who doubtless is as wise as any graybeard of the company. +Here we are, I say, all bound on the same goodly enterprise. Methinks, +now, it were not amiss that each of us declare what he proposes to do +with the Great Carbuncle, provided he have the good hap to clutch +it.—What says our friend in the bearskin? How mean you, good sir, to +enjoy the prize which you have been seeking the Lord knows how long +among the Crystal Hills?” + +“How enjoy it!” exclaimed the aged Seeker, bitterly. “I hope for no +enjoyment from it--that folly has past, long ago! I keep up the search +for this accursed stone, because the vain ambition of my youth has +become a fate upon me, in old age. The pursuit alone is my +strength--the energy of my soul--the warmth of my blood, and the pith +and marrow of my bones! Were I to turn my back upon it, I should fall +down dead, on the hither side of the Notch, which is the gate-way of +this mountain region. Yet, not to have my wasted life time back again, +would I give up my hopes of the Great Carbuncle! Having found it, I +shall bear it to a certain cavern that I wot of, and there, grasping it +in my arms, lie down and die, and keep it buried with me for ever.” + +“Oh, wretch, regardless of the interests of science!” cried Doctor +Cacaphodel, with philosophic indignation. “Thou art not worthy to +behold, even from afar off, the lustre of this most precious gem that +ever was concocted in the laboratory of Nature. Mine is the sole +purpose for which a wise man may desire the possession of the Great +Carbuncle. Immediately on obtaining it--for I have a presentiment, good +people, that the prize is reserved to crown my scientific reputation--I +shall return to Europe, and employ my remaining years in reducing it to +its first elements. A portion of the stone will I grind to impalpable +powder; other parts shall be dissolved in acids, or whatever solvents +will act upon so admirable a composition; and the remainder I design to +melt in the crucible, or set on fire with the blow-pipe. By these +various methods, I shall gain an accurate analysis, and finally bestow +the result of my labours upon the world, in a folio volume.” + +“Excellent!” quoth the man with the spectacles. “Nor need you hesitate, +learned Sir, on account of the necessary destruction of the gem; since +the perusal of your folio may teach every mother’s son of us to concoct +a Great Carbuncle of his own.” + +“But, verily,” said Master Ichabod Pigsnort, “for mine own part, I +object to the making of these counterfeits, as being calculated to +reduce the marketable value of the true gem. I tell ye frankly, Sirs, I +have an interest in keeping up the price. Here have I quitted my +regular traffic, leaving my warehouse in the care of my clerks, and +putting my credit to great hazard, and furthermore, have put myself to +peril of death or captivity by the accursed heathen savages--and all +this without daring to ask the prayers of the congregation, because the +quest for the Great Carbuncle is deemed little better than a traffic +with the evil one. Now think ye that I would have done this grievous +wrong to my soul, body, reputation and estate, without a reasonable +chance of profit?” + +“Not I, pious Master Pigsnort,” said the man with the spectacles. “I +never laid such a great folly to thy charge.” + +“Truly, I hope not,” said the merchant. “Now, as touching this Great +Carbuncle, I am free to own that I have never had a glimpse of it, but, +be it only the hundredth part so bright as people tell, it will surely +outvalue the Great Mogul’s best diamond, which he holds at an +incalculable sum; wherefore I am minded to put the Great Carbuncle on +shipboard and voyage with it to England, France, Spain, Italy, or into +heathendom if Providence should send me thither, and, in a word, +dispose of the gem to the best bidder among the potentates of the +earth, that he may place it among his crown-jewels. If any of ye have a +wiser plan, let him expound it.” + +“That have I, thou sordid man!” exclaimed the poet. “Dost thou desire +nothing brighter than gold, that thou wouldst transmute all this +ethereal lustre into such dross as thou wallowest in already? For +myself, hiding the jewel under my cloak, I shall hie me back to my +attic-chamber in one of the darksome alleys of London. There night and +day will I gaze upon it. My soul shall drink its radiance; it shall be +diffused throughout my intellectual powers and gleam brightly in every +line of poesy that I indite. Thus long ages after I am gone the +splendor of the Great Carbuncle will blaze around my name.” + +“Well said, Master Poet!” cried he of the spectacles. “Hide it under +thy cloak, sayest thou? Why, it will gleam through the holes and make +thee look like a jack-o’-lantern!” + +“To think,” ejaculated the lord De Vere, rather to himself than his +companions, the best of whom he held utterly unworthy of his +intercourse—“to think that a fellow in a tattered cloak should talk of +conveying the Great Carbuncle to a garret in Grubb street! Have not I +resolved within myself that the whole earth contains no fitter ornament +for the great hall of my ancestral castle? There shall it flame for +ages, making a noonday of midnight, glittering on the suits of armor, +the banners and escutcheons, that hang around the wall, and keeping +bright the memory of heroes. Wherefore have all other adventurers +sought the prize in vain but that I might win it and make it a symbol +of the glories of our lofty line? And never on the diadem of the White +Mountains did the Great Carbuncle hold a place half so honored as is +reserved for it in the hall of the De Veres.” + +“It is a noble thought,” said the cynic, with an obsequious sneer. +“Yet, might I presume to say so, the gem would make a rare sepulchral +lamp, and would display the glories of Your Lordship’s progenitors more +truly in the ancestral vault than in the castle-hall.” + +“Nay, forsooth,” observed Matthew, the young rustic, who sat hand in +hand with his bride, “the gentleman has bethought himself of a +profitable use for this bright stone. Hannah here and I are seeking it +for a like purpose.” + +“How, fellow?” exclaimed His Lordship, in surprise. “What castle-hall +hast thou to hang it in?” + +“No castle,” replied Matthew, “but as neat a cottage as any within +sight of the Crystal Hills. Ye must know, friends, that Hannah and I, +being wedded the last week, have taken up the search of the Great +Carbuncle because we shall need its light in the long winter evenings +and it will be such a pretty thing to show the neighbors when they +visit us! It will shine through the house, so that we may pick up a pin +in any corner, and will set all the windows a-glowing as if there were +a great fire of pine-knots in the chimney. And then how pleasant, when +we awake in the night, to be able to see one another’s faces!” + +There was a general smile among the adventurers at the simplicity of +the young couple’s project in regard to this wondrous and invaluable +stone, with which the greatest monarch on earth might have been proud +to adorn his palace. Especially the man with spectacles, who had +sneered at all the company in turn, now twisted his visage into such an +expression of ill-natured mirth that Matthew asked him rather peevishly +what he himself meant to do with the Great Carbuncle. + +“The Great Carbuncle!” answered the cynic, with ineffable scorn. “Why, +you blockhead, there is no such thing in _rerum naturâ_. I have come +three thousand miles, and am resolved to set my foot on every peak of +these mountains and poke my head into every chasm for the sole purpose +of demonstrating to the satisfaction of any man one whit less an ass +than thyself that the Great Carbuncle is all a humbug.” + +Vain and foolish were the motives that had brought most of the +adventurers to the Crystal Hills, but none so vain, so foolish, and so +impious too, as that of the scoffer with the prodigious spectacles. He +was one of those wretched and evil men whose yearnings are downward to +the darkness instead of heavenward, and who, could they but extinguish +the lights which God hath kindled for us, would count the midnight +gloom their chiefest glory. + +As the cynic spoke several of the party were startled by a gleam of red +splendor that showed the huge shapes of the surrounding mountains and +the rock-bestrewn bed of the turbulent river, with an illumination +unlike that of their fire, on the trunks and black boughs of the +forest-trees. They listened for the roll of thunder, but heard nothing, +and were glad that the tempest came not near them. The stars—those +dial-points of heaven—now warned the adventurers to close their eyes on +the blazing logs and open them in dreams to the glow of the Great +Carbuncle. + +The young married couple had taken their lodgings in the farthest +corner of the wigwam, and were separated from the rest of the party by +a curtain of curiously-woven twigs such as might have hung in deep +festoons around the bridal-bower of Eve. The modest little wife had +wrought this piece of tapestry while the other guests were talking. She +and her husband fell asleep with hands tenderly clasped, and awoke from +visions of unearthly radiance to meet the more blessed light of one +another’s eyes. They awoke at the same instant and with one happy smile +beaming over their two faces, which grew brighter with their +consciousness of the reality of life and love. But no sooner did she +recollect where they were than the bride peeped through the interstices +of the leafy curtain and saw that the outer room of the hut was +deserted. + +“Up, dear Matthew!” cried she, in haste. “The strange folk are all +gone. Up this very minute, or we shall lose the Great Carbuncle!” + +In truth, so little did these poor young people deserve the mighty +prize which had lured them thither that they had slept peacefully all +night and till the summits of the hills were glittering with sunshine, +while the other adventurers had tossed their limbs in feverish +wakefulness or dreamed of climbing precipices, and set off to realize +their dreams with the curliest peep of dawn. But Matthew and Hannah +after their calm rest were as light as two young deer, and merely +stopped to say their prayers and wash themselves in a cold pool of the +Amonoosuck, and then to taste a morsel of food ere they turned their +faces to the mountain-side. It was a sweet emblem of conjugal affection +as they toiled up the difficult ascent gathering strength from the +mutual aid which they afforded. + +After several little accidents, such as a torn robe, a lost shoe and +the entanglement of Hannah’s hair in a bough, they reached the upper +verge of the forest and were now to pursue a more adventurous course. +The innumerable trunks and heavy foliage of the trees had hitherto shut +in their thoughts, which now shrank affrighted from the region of wind +and cloud and naked rocks and desolate sunshine that rose immeasurably +above them. They gazed back at the obscure wilderness which they had +traversed, and longed to be buried again in its depths rather than +trust themselves to so vast and visible a solitude. + +“Shall we go on?” said Matthew, throwing his arm round Hannah’s waist +both to protect her and to comfort his heart by drawing her close to +it. + +But the little bride, simple as she was, had a woman’s love of jewels, +and could not forego the hope of possessing the very brightest in the +world, in spite of the perils with which it must be won. + +“Let us climb a little higher,” whispered she, yet tremulously, as she +turned her face upward to the lonely sky. + +“Come, then,” said Matthew, mustering his manly courage and drawing her +along with him; for she became timid again the moment that he grew +bold. + +And upward, accordingly, went the pilgrims of the Great Carbuncle, now +treading upon the tops and thickly-interwoven branches of dwarf pines +which by the growth of centuries, though mossy with age, had barely +reached three feet in altitude. Next they came to masses and fragments +of naked rock heaped confusedly together like a cairn reared by giants +in memory of a giant chief. In this bleak realm of upper air nothing +breathed, nothing grew; there was no life but what was concentred in +their two hearts; they had climbed so high that Nature herself seemed +no longer to keep them company. She lingered beneath them within the +verge of the forest-trees, and sent a farewell glance after her +children as they strayed where her own green footprints had never been. +But soon they were to be hidden from her eye. Densely and dark the +mists began to gather below, casting black spots of shadow on the vast +landscape and sailing heavily to one centre, as if the loftiest +mountain-peak had summoned a council of its kindred clouds. Finally the +vapors welded themselves, as it were, into a mass, presenting the +appearance of a pavement over which the wanderers might have trodden, +but where they would vainly have sought an avenue to the blessed earth +which they had lost. And the lovers yearned to behold that green earth +again—more intensely, alas! than beneath a clouded sky they had ever +desired a glimpse of heaven. They even felt it a relief to their +desolation when the mists, creeping gradually up the mountain, +concealed its lonely peak, and thus annihilated—at least, for them—the +whole region of visible space. But they drew closer together with a +fond and melancholy gaze, dreading lest the universal cloud should +snatch them from each other’s sight. Still, perhaps, they would have +been resolute to climb as far and as high between earth and heaven as +they could find foothold if Hannah’s strength had not begun to fail, +and with that her courage also. Her breath grew short. She refused to +burden her husband with her weight, but often tottered against his +side, and recovered herself each time by a feebler effort. At last she +sank down on one of the rocky steps of the acclivity. + +“We are lost, dear Matthew,” said she, mournfully; “we shall never find +our way to the earth again. And oh how happy we might have been in our +cottage!” + +“Dear heart, we will yet be happy there,” answered Matthew. “Look! In +this direction the sunshine penetrates the dismal mist; by its aid I +can direct our course to the passage of the Notch. Let us go back, +love, and dream no more of the Great Carbuncle.” + +“The sun cannot be yonder,” said Hannah, with despondence. “By this +time it must be noon; if there could ever be any sunshine here, it +would come from above our heads.” + +“But look!” repeated Matthew, in a somewhat altered tone. “It is +brightening every moment. If not sunshine, what can it be?” + +Nor could the young bride any longer deny that a radiance was breaking +through the mist and changing its dim hue to a dusky red, which +continually grew more vivid, as if brilliant particles were interfused +with the gloom. Now, also, the cloud began to roll away from the +mountain, while, as it heavily withdrew, one object after another +started out of its impenetrable obscurity into sight with precisely the +effect of a new creation before the indistinctness of the old chaos had +been completely swallowed up. As the process went on they saw the +gleaming of water close at their feet, and found themselves on the very +border of a mountain-lake, deep, bright, clear and calmly beautiful, +spreading from brim to brim of a basin that had been scooped out of the +solid rock. A ray of glory flashed across its surface. The pilgrims +looked whence it should proceed, but closed their eyes, with a thrill +of awful admiration, to exclude the fervid splendor that glowed from +the brow of a cliff impending over the enchanted lake. + +For the simple pair had reached that lake of mystery and found the +long-sought shrine of the Great Carbuncle. They threw their arms around +each other and trembled at their own success, for as the legends of +this wondrous gem rushed thick upon their memory they felt themselves +marked out by fate, and the consciousness was fearful. Often from +childhood upward they had seen it shining like a distant star, and now +that star was throwing its intensest lustre on their hearts. They +seemed changed to one another’s eyes in the red brilliancy that flamed +upon their cheeks, while it lent the same fire to the lake, the rocks +and sky, and to the mists which had rolled back before its power. But +with their next glance they beheld an object that drew their attention +even from the mighty stone. At the base of the cliff, directly beneath +the Great Carbuncle, appeared the figure of a man with his arms +extended in the act of climbing and his face turned upward as if to +drink the full gush of splendor. But he stirred not, no more than if +changed to marble. + +“It is the Seeker,” whispered Hannah, convulsively grasping her +husband’s arm. “Matthew, he is dead.” + +“The joy of success has killed him,” replied Matthew, trembling +violently. “Or perhaps the very light of the Great Carbuncle was +death.” + +“‘The Great Carbuncle’!” cried a peevish voice behind them. “The great +humbug! If you have found it, prithee point it out to me.” + +They turned their heads, and there was the cynic with his prodigious +spectacles set carefully on his nose, staring now at the lake, now at +the rocks, now at the distant masses of vapor, now right at the Great +Carbuncle itself, yet seemingly as unconscious of its light as if all +the scattered clouds were condensed about his person. Though its +radiance actually threw the shadow of the unbeliever at his own feet as +he turned his back upon the glorious jewel, he would not be convinced +that there was the least glimmer there. + +“Where is your great humbug?” he repeated. “I challenge you to make me +see it.” + +“There!” said Matthew, incensed at such perverse blindness, and turning +the cynic round toward the illuminated cliff. “Take off those +abominable spectacles, and you cannot help seeing it.” + +Now, these colored spectacles probably darkened the cynic’s sight in at +least as great a degree as the smoked glasses through which people gaze +at an eclipse. With resolute bravado, however, he snatched them from +his nose and fixed a bold stare full upon the ruddy blaze of the Great +Carbuncle. But scarcely had he encountered it when, with a deep, +shuddering groan, he dropped his head and pressed both hands across his +miserable eyes. Thenceforth there was in very truth no light of the +Great Carbuncle, nor any other light on earth, nor light of heaven +itself, for the poor cynic. So long accustomed to view all objects +through a medium that deprived them of every glimpse of brightness, a +single flash of so glorious a phenomenon, striking upon his naked +vision, had blinded him for ever. + +“Matthew,” said Hannah, clinging to him, “let us go hence.” + +Matthew saw that she was faint, and, kneeling down, supported her in +his arms while he threw some of the thrillingly-cold water of the +enchanted lake upon her face and bosom. It revived her, but could not +renovate her courage. + +“Yes, dearest,” cried Matthew, pressing her tremulous form to his +breast; “we will go hence and return to our humble cottage. The blessed +sunshine and the quiet moonlight shall come through our window. We will +kindle the cheerful glow of our hearth at eventide and be happy in its +light. But never again will we desire more light than all the world may +share with us.” + +“No,” said his bride, “for how could we live by day or sleep by night +in this awful blaze of the Great Carbuncle?” + +Out of the hollow of their hands they drank each a draught from the +lake, which presented them its waters uncontaminated by an earthly lip. +Then, lending their guidance to the blinded cynic, who uttered not a +word, and even stifled his groans in his own most wretched heart, they +began to descend the mountain. Yet as they left the shore, till then +untrodden, of the spirit’s lake, they threw a farewell glance toward +the cliff and beheld the vapors gathering in dense volumes, through +which the gem burned duskily. + +As touching the other pilgrims of the Great Carbuncle, the legend goes +on to tell that the worshipful Master Ichabod Pigsnort soon gave up the +quest as a desperate speculation, and wisely resolved to betake himself +again to his warehouse, near the town-dock, in Boston. But as he passed +through the Notch of the mountains a war-party of Indians captured our +unlucky merchant and carried him to Montreal, there holding him in +bondage till by the payment of a heavy ransom he had woefully +subtracted from his hoard of pine-tree shillings. By his long absence, +moreover, his affairs had become so disordered that for the rest of his +life, instead of wallowing in silver, he had seldom a sixpence-worth of +copper. Doctor Cacaphodel, the alchemist, returned to his laboratory +with a prodigious fragment of granite, which he ground to powder, +dissolved in acids, melted in the crucible and burnt with the blowpipe, +and published the result of his experiments in one of the heaviest +folios of the day. And for all these purposes the gem itself could not +have answered better than the granite. The poet, by a somewhat similar +mistake, made prize of a great piece of ice which he found in a sunless +chasm of the mountains, and swore that it corresponded in all points +with his idea of the Great Carbuncle. The critics say that, if his +poetry lacked the splendor of the gem, it retained all the coldness of +the ice. The lord De Vere went back to his ancestral hall, where he +contented himself with a wax-lighted chandelier, and filled in due +course of time another coffin in the ancestral vault. As the funeral +torches gleamed within that dark receptacle, there was no need of the +Great Carbuncle to show the vanity of earthly pomp. + +The cynic, having cast aside his spectacles, wandered about the world a +miserable object, and was punished with an agonizing desire of light +for the wilful blindness of his former life. The whole night long he +would lift his splendor-blasted orbs to the moon and stars; he turned +his face eastward at sunrise as duly as a Persian idolater; he made a +pilgrimage to Rome to witness the magnificent illumination of Saint +Peter’s church, and finally perished in the Great Fire of London, into +the midst of which he had thrust himself with the desperate idea of +catching one feeble ray from the blaze that was kindling earth and +heaven. + +Matthew and his bride spent many peaceful years and were fond of +telling the legend of the Great Carbuncle. The tale, however, toward +the close of their lengthened lives, did not meet with the full +credence that had been accorded to it by those who remembered the +ancient lustre of the gem. For it is affirmed that from the hour when +two mortals had shown themselves so simply wise as to reject a jewel +which would have dimmed all earthly things its splendor waned. When our +pilgrims reached the cliff, they found only an opaque stone with +particles of mica glittering on its surface. There is also a tradition +that as the youthful pair departed the gem was loosened from the +forehead of the cliff and fell into the enchanted lake, and that at +noontide the Seeker’s form may still be seen to bend over its +quenchless gleam. + +Some few believe that this inestimable stone is blazing as of old, and +say that they have caught its radiance, like a flash of summer +lightning, far down the valley of the Saco. And be it owned that many a +mile from the Crystal Hills I saw a wondrous light around their +summits, and was lured by the faith of poesy to be the latest pilgrim +of the Great Carbuncle. + + + + +THE PROPHETIC PICTURES[5] + + +“But this painter!” cried Walter Ludlow, with animation. “He not only +excels in his peculiar art, but possesses vast acquirements in all +other learning and science. He talks Hebrew with Dr. Mather and gives +lectures in anatomy to Dr. Boylston. In a word, he will meet the +best-instructed man among us on his own ground. Moreover, he is a +polished gentleman, a citizen of the world—yes, a true cosmopolite; for +he will speak like a native of each clime and country on the globe, +except our own forests, whither he is now going. Nor is all this what I +most admire in him.” + +“Indeed!” said Elinor, who had listened with a women’s interest to the +description of such a man. “Yet this is admirable enough.” + +“Surely it is,” replied her lover, “but far less so than his natural +gift of adapting himself to every variety of character, insomuch that +all men—and all women too, Elinor—shall find a mirror of themselves in +this wonderful painter. But the greatest wonder is yet to be told.” + +“Nay, if he have more wonderful attributes than these,” said Elinor, +laughing, “Boston is a perilous abode for the poor gentleman. Are you +telling me of a painter, or a wizard?” + +“In truth,” answered he, “that question might be asked much more +seriously than you suppose. They say that he paints not merely a man’s +features, but his mind and heart. He catches the secret sentiments and +passions and throws them upon the canvas like sunshine, or perhaps, in +the portraits of dark-souled men, like a gleam of infernal fire. It is +an awful gift,” added Walter, lowering his voice from its tone of +enthusiasm. “I shall be almost afraid to sit to him.” + +“Walter, are you in earnest?” exclaimed Elinor. + +“For Heaven’s sake, dearest Elinor, do not let him paint the look which +you now wear,” said her lover, smiling, though rather perplexed. +“There! it is passing away now; but when you spoke, you seemed +frightened to death, and very sad besides. What were you thinking of?” + +“Nothing, nothing!” answered Elinor, hastily. “You paint my face with +your own fantasies. Well, come for me tomorrow, and we will visit this +wonderful artist.” + +But when the young man had departed, it cannot be denied that a +remarkable expression was again visible on the fair and youthful face +of his mistress. It was a sad and anxious look, little in accordance +with what should have been the feelings of a maiden on the eve of +wedlock. Yet Walter Ludlow was the chosen of her heart. + +“A look!” said Elinor to herself. “No wonder that it startled him if it +expressed what I sometimes feel. I know by my own experience how +frightful a look may be. But it was all fancy. I thought nothing of it +at the time; I have seen nothing of it since; I did but dream it;” and +she busied herself about the embroidery of a ruff in which she meant +that her portrait should be taken. + +The painter of whom they had been speaking was not one of those native +artists who at a later period than this borrowed their colors from the +Indians and manufactured their pencils of the furs of wild beasts. +Perhaps, if he could have revoked his life and prearranged his destiny, +he might have chosen to belong to that school without a master in the +hope of being at least original, since there were no works of art to +imitate nor rules to follow. But he had been born and educated in +Europe. People said that he had studied the grandeur or beauty of +conception and every touch of the master-hand in all the most famous +pictures in cabinets and galleries and on the walls of churches till +there was nothing more for his powerful mind to learn. Art could add +nothing to its lessons, but Nature might. He had, therefore, visited a +world whither none of his professional brethren had preceded him, to +feast his eyes on visible images that were noble and picturesque, yet +had never been transferred to canvas. America was too poor to afford +other temptations to an artist of eminence, though many of the colonial +gentry on the painter’s arrival had expressed a wish to transmit their +lineaments to posterity by moans of his skill. Whenever such proposals +were made, he fixed his piercing eyes on the applicant and seemed to +look him through and through. If he beheld only a sleek and comfortable +visage, though there were a gold-laced coat to adorn the picture and +golden guineas to pay for it, he civilly rejected the task and the +reward; but if the face were the index of anything uncommon in thought, +sentiment or experience, or if he met a beggar in the street with a +white beard and a furrowed brow, or if sometimes a child happened to +look up and smile, he would exhaust all the art on them that he denied +to wealth. + +Pictorial skill being so rare in the colonies, the painter became an +object of general curiosity. If few or none could appreciate the +technical merit of his productions, yet there were points in regard to +which the opinion of the crowd was as valuable as the refined judgment +of the amateur. He watched the effect that each picture produced on +such untutored beholders, and derived profit from their remarks, while +they would as soon have thought of instructing Nature herself as him +who seemed to rival her. Their admiration, it must be owned, was +tinctured with the prejudices of the age and country. Some deemed it an +offence against the Mosaic law, and even a presumptuous mockery of the +Creator, to bring into existence such lively images of his creatures. +Others, frightened at the art which could raise phantoms at will and +keep the form of the dead among the living, were inclined to consider +the painter as a magician, or perhaps the famous Black Man of old +witch-times plotting mischief in a new guise. These foolish fancies +were more than half believed among the mob. Even in superior circles +his character was invested with a vague awe, partly rising like +smoke-wreaths from the popular superstitions, but chiefly caused by the +varied knowledge and talents which he made subservient to his +profession. + +Being on the eve of marriage, Walter Ludlow and Elinor were eager to +obtain their portraits as the first of what, they doubtless hoped, +would be a long series of family pictures. The day after the +conversation above recorded they visited the painter’s rooms. A servant +ushered them into an apartment where, though the artist himself was not +visible, there were personages whom they could hardly forbear greeting +with reverence. They knew, indeed, that the whole assembly were but +pictures, yet felt it impossible to separate the idea of life and +intellect from such striking counterfeits. Several of the portraits +were known to them either as distinguished characters of the day or +their private acquaintances. There was Governor Burnett, looking as if +he had just received an undutiful communication from the House of +Representatives and were inditing a most sharp response. Mr. Cooke hung +beside the ruler whom he opposed, sturdy and somewhat puritanical, as +befitted a popular leader. The ancient lady of Sir William Phipps eyed +them from the wall in ruff and farthingale, an imperious old dame not +unsuspected of witchcraft. John Winslow, then a very young man, wore +the expression of warlike enterprise which long afterward made him a +distinguished general. Their personal friends were recognized at a +glance. In most of the pictures the whole mind and character were +brought out on the countenance and concentrated into a single look; so +that, to speak paradoxically, the originals hardly resembled themselves +so strikingly as the portraits did. + +Among these modern worthies there were two old bearded saints who had +almost vanished into the darkening canvas. There was also a pale but +unfaded Madonna who had perhaps been worshipped in Rome, and now +regarded the lovers with such a mild and holy look that they longed to +worship too. + +“How singular a thought,” observed Walter Ludlow, “that this beautiful +face has been beautiful for above two hundred years! Oh, if all beauty +would endure so well! Do you not envy her, Elinor?” + +“If earth were heaven, I might,” she replied. “But, where all things +fade, how miserable to be the one that could not fade!” + +“This dark old St. Peter has a fierce and ugly scowl, saint though he +be,” continued Walter; “he troubles me. But the Virgin looks kindly at +us.” + +“Yes, but very sorrowfully, methinks,” said Elinor. + +The easel stood beneath these three old pictures, sustaining one that +had been recently commenced. After a little inspection they began to +recognize the features of their own minister, the Rev. Dr. Colman, +growing into shape and life, as it were, out of a cloud. + +“Kind old man!” exclaimed Elinor. “He gazes at me as if he were about +to utter a word of paternal advice.” + +“And at me,” said Walter, “as if he were about to shake his head and +rebuke me for some suspected iniquity. But so does the original. I +shall never feel quite comfortable under his eye till we stand before +him to be married.” + +They now heard a footstep on the floor, and, turning, beheld the +painter, who had been some moments in the room and had listened to a +few of their remarks. He was a middle-aged man with a countenance well +worthy of his own pencil. Indeed, by the picturesque though careless +arrangement of his rich dress, and perhaps because his soul dwelt +always among painted shapes, he looked somewhat like a portrait +himself. His visitors were sensible of a kindred between the artist and +his works, and felt as if one of the pictures had stepped from the +canvas to salute them. + +Walter Ludlow, who was slightly known to the painter, explained the +object of their visit. While he spoke a sunbeam was falling athwart his +figure and Elinor’s with so happy an effect that they also seemed +living pictures of youth and beauty gladdened by bright fortune. The +artist was evidently struck. + +“My easel is occupied for several ensuing days, and my stay in Boston +must be brief,” said he, thoughtfully; then, after an observant glance, +he added, “But your wishes shall be gratified though I disappoint the +chief-justice and Madame Oliver. I must not lose this opportunity for +the sake of painting a few ells of broadcloth and brocade.” + +The painter expressed a desire to introduce both their portraits into +one picture and represent them engaged in some appropriate action. This +plan would have delighted the lovers, but was necessarily rejected +because so large a space of canvas would have been unfit for the room +which it was intended to decorate. Two half-length portraits were +therefore fixed upon. After they had taken leave, Walter Ludlow asked +Elinor, with a smile, whether she knew what an influence over their +fates the painter was about to acquire. + +“The old women of Boston affirm,” continued he, “that after he has once +got possession of a person’s face and figure he may paint him in any +act or situation whatever, and the picture will be prophetic. Do you +believe it?” + +“Not quite,” said Elinor, smiling. “Yet if he has such magic, there is +something so gentle in his manner that I am sure he will use it well.” + +It was the painter’s choice to proceed with both the portraits at the +same time, assigning as a reason, in the mystical language which he +sometimes used, that the faces threw light upon each other. +Accordingly, he gave now a touch to Walter and now to Elinor, and the +features of one and the other began to start forth so vividly that it +appeared as if his triumphant art would actually disengage them from +the canvas. Amid the rich light and deep shade they beheld their +phantom selves, but, though the likeness promised to be perfect, they +were not quite satisfied with the expression: it seemed more vague than +in most of the painter’s works. He, however, was satisfied with the +prospect of success, and, being much interested in the lovers, employed +his leisure moments, unknown to them, in making a crayon sketch of +their two figures. During their sittings he engaged them in +conversation and kindled up their faces with characteristic traits, +which, though continually varying, it was his purpose to combine and +fix. At length he announced that at their next visit both the portraits +would be ready for delivery. + +“If my pencil will but be true to my conception in the few last touches +which I meditate,” observed he, “these two pictures will be my very +best performances. Seldom indeed has an artist such subjects.” While +speaking he still bent his penetrative eye upon them, nor withdrew it +till they had reached the bottom of the stairs. + +Nothing in the whole circle of human vanities takes stronger hold of +the imagination than this affair of having a portrait painted. Yet why +should it be so? The looking-glass, the polished globes of the +andirons, the mirror-like water, and all other reflecting surfaces, +continually present us with portraits—or, rather, ghosts—of ourselves +which we glance at and straightway forget them. But we forget them only +because they vanish. It is the idea of duration—of earthly +immortality—that gives such a mysterious interest to our own portraits. + +Walter and Elinor were not insensible to this feeling, and hastened to +the painter’s room punctually at the appointed hour to meet those +pictured shapes which were to be their representatives with posterity. +The sunshine flashed after them into the apartment, but left it +somewhat gloomy as they closed the door. Their eyes were immediately +attracted to their portraits, which rested against the farthest wall of +the room. At the first glance through the dim light and the distance, +seeing themselves in precisely their natural attitudes and with all the +air that they recognized so well, they uttered a simultaneous +exclamation of delight. + +“There we stand,” cried Walter, enthusiastically, “fixed in sunshine +for ever. No dark passions can gather on our faces.” + +“No,” said Elinor, more calmly; “no dreary change can sadden us.” + +This was said while they were approaching and had yet gained only an +imperfect view of the pictures. The painter, after saluting them, +busied himself at a table in completing a crayon sketch, leaving his +visitors to form their own judgment as to his perfected labors. At +intervals he sent a glance from beneath his deep eyebrows, watching +their countenances in profile with his pencil suspended over the +sketch. They had now stood some moments, each in front of the other’s +picture, contemplating it with entranced attention, but without +uttering a word. At length Walter stepped forward, then back, viewing +Elinor’s portrait in various lights, and finally spoke. + +“Is there not a change?” said he, in a doubtful and meditative tone. +“Yes; the perception of it grows more vivid the longer I look. It is +certainly the same picture that I saw yesterday; the dress, the +features, all are the same, and yet something is altered.” + +“Is, then, the picture less like than it was yesterday?” inquired the +painter, now drawing near with irrepressible interest. + +“The features are perfect Elinor,” answered Walter, “and at the first +glance the expression seemed also hers; but I could fancy that the +portrait has changed countenance while I have been looking at it. The +eyes are fixed on mine with a strangely sad and anxious expression. +Nay, it is grief and terror. Is this like Elinor?” + +“Compare the living face with the pictured one,” said the painter. + +Walter glanced sidelong at his mistress, and started. Motionless and +absorbed, fascinated, as it were, in contemplation of Walter’s +portrait, Elinor’s face had assumed precisely the expression of which +he had just been complaining. Had she practised for whole hours before +a mirror, she could not have caught the look so successfully. Had the +picture itself been a mirror, it could not have thrown back her present +aspect with stronger and more melancholy truth. She appeared quite +unconscious of the dialogue between the artist and her lover. + +“Elinor,” exclaimed Walter, in amazement, “what change has come over +you?” + +She did not hear him nor desist from her fixed gaze till he seized her +hand, and thus attracted her notice; then with a sudden tremor she +looked from the picture to the face of the original. + +“Do you see no change in your portrait?” asked she. + +“In mine? None,” replied Walter, examining it. “But let me see. Yes; +there is a slight change—an improvement, I think, in the picture, +though none in the likeness. It has a livelier expression than +yesterday, as if some bright thought were flashing from the eyes and +about to be uttered from the lips. Now that I have caught the look, it +becomes very decided.” + +While he was intent on these observations Elinor turned to the painter. +She regarded him with grief and awe, and felt that he repaid her with +sympathy and commiseration, though wherefore she could but vaguely +guess. + +“That look!” whispered she, and shuddered. “How came it there?” + +“Madam,” said the painter, sadly, taking her hand and leading her +apart, “in both these pictures I have painted what I saw. The +artist—the true artist—must look beneath the exterior. It is his +gift—his proudest, but often a melancholy one—to see the inmost soul, +and by a power indefinable even to himself to make it glow or darken +upon the canvas in glances that express the thought and sentiment of +years. Would that I might convince myself of error in the present +instance!” + +They had now approached the table, on which were heads in chalk, hands +almost as expressive as ordinary faces, ivied church-towers, thatched +cottages, old thunder-stricken trees, Oriental and antique costume, and +all such picturesque vagaries of an artist’s idle moments. Turning them +over with seeming carelessness, a crayon sketch of two figures was +disclosed. + +“If I have failed,” continued he—“if your heart does not see itself +reflected in your own portrait, if you have no secret cause to trust my +delineation of the other—it is not yet too late to alter them. I might +change the action of these figures too. But would it influence the +event?” He directed her notice to the sketch. + +A thrill ran through Elinor’s frame; a shriek was upon her lips, but +she stifled it with the self-command that becomes habitual to all who +hide thoughts of fear and anguish within their bosoms. Turning from the +table, she perceived that Walter had advanced near enough to have seen +the sketch, though she could not determine whether it had caught his +eye. + +“We will not have the pictures altered,” said she, hastily. “If mine is +sad, I shall but look the gayer for the contrast.” + +“Be it so,” answered the painter, bowing. “May your griefs be such +fanciful ones that only your pictures may mourn for them! For your +joys, may they be true and deep, and paint themselves upon this lovely +face till it quite belie my art!” + +After the marriage of Walter and Elinor the pictures formed the two +most splendid ornaments of their abode. They hung side by side, +separated by a narrow panel, appearing to eye each other constantly, +yet always returning the gaze of the spectator. Travelled gentlemen who +professed a knowledge of such subjects reckoned these among the most +admirable specimens of modern portraiture, while common observers +compared them with the originals, feature by feature, and were +rapturous in praise of the likeness. But it was on a third +class—neither travelled connoisseurs nor common observers, but people +of natural sensibility—that the pictures wrought their strongest +effect. Such persons might gaze carelessly at first, but, becoming +interested, would return day after day and study these painted faces +like the pages of a mystic volume. Walter Ludlow’s portrait attracted +their earliest notice. In the absence of himself and his bride they +sometimes disputed as to the expression which the painter had intended +to throw upon the features, all agreeing that there was a look of +earnest import, though no two explained it alike. There was less +diversity of opinion in regard to Elinor’s picture. They differed, +indeed, in their attempts to estimate the nature and depth of the gloom +that dwelt upon her face, but agreed that it was gloom and alien from +the natural temperament of their youthful friend. A certain fanciful +person announced as the result of much scrutiny that both these +pictures were parts of one design, and that the melancholy strength of +feeling in Elinor’s countenance bore reference to the more vivid +emotion—or, as he termed it, the wild passion—in that of Walter. Though +unskilled in the art, he even began a sketch in which the action of the +two figures was to correspond with their mutual expression. + +It was whispered among friends that day by day Elinor’s face was +assuming a deeper shade of pensiveness which threatened soon to render +her too true a counterpart of her melancholy picture. Walter, on the +other hand, instead of acquiring the vivid look which the painter had +given him on the canvas, became reserved and downcast, with no outward +flashes of emotion, however it might be smouldering within. In course +of time Elinor hung a gorgeous curtain of purple silk wrought with +flowers and fringed with heavy golden tassels before the pictures, +under pretence that the dust would tarnish their hues or the light dim +them. It was enough. Her visitors felt that the massive folds of the +silk must never be withdrawn nor the portraits mentioned in her +presence. + +Time wore on, and the painter came again. He had been far enough to the +north to see the silver cascade of the Crystal Hills, and to look over +the vast round of cloud and forest from the summit of New England’s +loftiest mountain. But he did not profane that scene by the mockery of +his art. He had also lain in a canoe on the bosom of Lake George, +making his soul the mirror of its loveliness and grandeur till not a +picture in the Vatican was more vivid than his recollection. He had +gone with the Indian hunters to Niagara, and there, again, had flung +his hopeless pencil down the precipice, feeling that he could as soon +paint the roar as aught else that goes to make up the wondrous +cataract. In truth, it was seldom his impulse to copy natural scenery +except as a framework for the delineations of the human form and face, +instinct with thought, passion or suffering. With store of such his +adventurous ramble had enriched him. The stern dignity of Indian +chiefs, the dusky loveliness of Indian girls, the domestic life of +wigwams, the stealthy march, the battle beneath gloomy pine trees, the +frontier fortress with its garrison, the anomaly of the old French +partisan bred in courts, but grown gray in shaggy deserts,—such were +the scenes and portraits that he had sketched. The glow of perilous +moments, flashes of wild feeling, struggles of fierce power, love, +hate, grief, frenzy—in a word, all the worn-out heart of the old +earth—had been revealed to him under a new form. His portfolio was +filled with graphic illustrations of the volume of his memory which +genius would transmute into its own substance and imbue with +immortality. He felt that the deep wisdom in his art which he had +sought so far was found. + +But amid stern or lovely nature, in the perils of the forest or its +overwhelming peacefulness, still there had been two phantoms, the +companions of his way. Like all other men around whom an engrossing +purpose wreathes itself, he was insulated from the mass of humankind. +He had no aim, no pleasure, no sympathies, but what were ultimately +connected with his art. Though gentle in manner and upright in intent +and action, he did not possess kindly feelings; his heart was cold: no +living creature could be brought near enough to keep him warm. For +these two beings, however, he had felt in its greatest intensity the +sort of interest which always allied him to the subjects of his pencil. +He had pried into their souls with his keenest insight and pictured the +result upon their features with his utmost skill, so as barely to fall +short of that standard which no genius ever reached, his own severe +conception. He had caught from the duskiness of the future—at least, so +he fancied—a fearful secret, and had obscurely revealed it on the +portraits. So much of himself—of his imagination and all other +powers—had been lavished on the study of Walter and Elinor that he +almost regarded them as creations of his own, like the thousands with +which he had peopled the realms of Picture. Therefore did they flit +through the twilight of the woods, hover on the mist of waterfalls, +look forth from the mirror of the lake, nor melt away in the noontide +sun. They haunted his pictorial fancy, not as mockeries of life nor +pale goblins of the dead, but in the guise of portraits, each with an +unalterable expression which his magic had evoked from the caverns of +the soul. He could not recross the Atlantic till he had again beheld +the originals of those airy pictures. + +“O glorious Art!” Thus mused the enthusiastic painter as he trod the +street. “Thou art the image of the Creator’s own. The innumerable forms +that wander in nothingness start into being at thy beck. The dead live +again; thou recallest them to their old scenes and givest their gray +shadows the lustre of a better life, at once earthly and immortal. Thou +snatchest back the fleeting moments of history. With thee there is no +past, for at thy touch all that is great becomes for ever present, and +illustrious men live through long ages in the visible performance of +the very deeds which made them what they are. O potent Art! as thou +bringest the faintly-revealed past to stand in that narrow strip of +sunlight which we call ‘now,’ canst thou summon the shrouded future to +meet her there? Have I not achieved it? Am I not thy prophet?” + +Thus with a proud yet melancholy fervor did he almost cry aloud as he +passed through the toilsome street among people that knew not of his +reveries nor could understand nor care for them. It is not good for man +to cherish a solitary ambition. Unless there be those around him by +whose example he may regulate himself, his thoughts, desires and hopes +will become extravagant and he the semblance—perhaps the reality—of a +madman. Reading other bosoms with an acuteness almost preternatural, +the painter failed to see the disorder of his own. + +“And this should be the house,” said he, looking up and down the front +before he knocked. “Heaven help my brains! That picture! Methinks it +will never vanish. Whether I look at the windows or the door, there it +is framed within them, painted strongly and glowing in the richest +tints—the faces of the portraits, the figures and action of the +sketch!” + +He knocked. + +“The portraits—are they within?” inquired he of the domestic; then, +recollecting himself, “Your master and mistress—are they at home?” + +“They are, sir,” said the servant, adding, as he noticed that +picturesque aspect of which the painter could never divest himself, +“and the portraits too.” + +The guest was admitted into a parlor communicating by a central door +with an interior room of the same size. As the first apartment was +empty, he passed to the entrance of the second, within which his eyes +were greeted by those living personages, as well as their pictured +representatives, who had long been the objects of so singular an +interest. He involuntarily paused on the threshold. + +They had not perceived his approach. Walter and Elinor were standing +before the portraits, whence the former had just flung back the rich +and voluminous folds of the silken curtain, holding its golden tassel +with one hand, while the other grasped that of his bride. The pictures, +concealed for months, gleamed forth again in undiminished splendor, +appearing to throw a sombre light across the room rather than to be +disclosed by a borrowed radiance. That of Elinor had been almost +prophetic. A pensiveness, and next a gentle sorrow, had successively +dwelt upon her countenance, deepening with the lapse of time into a +quiet anguish. A mixture of affright would now have made it the very +expression of the portrait. Walter’s face was moody and dull or +animated only by fitful flashes which left a heavier darkness for their +momentary illumination. He looked from Elinor to her portrait, and +thence to his own, in the contemplation of which he finally stood +absorbed. + +The painter seemed to hear the step of Destiny approaching behind him +on its progress toward its victims. A strange thought darted into his +mind. Was not his own the form in which that Destiny had embodied +itself, and he a chief agent of the coming evil which he had +foreshadowed? + +Still, Walter remained silent before the picture, communing with it as +with his own heart and abandoning himself to the spell of evil +influence that the painter had cast upon the features. Gradually his +eyes kindled, while as Elinor watched the increasing wildness of his +face her own assumed a look of terror; and when, at last, he turned +upon her, the resemblance of both to their portraits was complete. + +“Our fate is upon us!” howled Walter. “Die!” + +Drawing a knife, he sustained her as she was sinking to the ground, and +aimed it at her bosom. In the action and in the look and attitude of +each the painter beheld the figures of his sketch. The picture, with +all its tremendous coloring, was finished. + +“Hold, madman!” cried he, sternly. + +He had advanced from the door and interposed himself between the +wretched beings with the same sense of power to regulate their destiny +as to alter a scene upon the canvas. He stood like a magician +controlling the phantoms which he had evoked. + +“What!” muttered Walter Ludlow as he relapsed from fierce excitement +into sullen gloom. “Does Fate impede its own decree?” + +“Wretched lady,” said the painter, “did I not warn you?” + +“You did,” replied Elinor, calmly, as her terror gave place to the +quiet grief which it had disturbed. “But I loved him.” + +Is there not a deep moral in the tale? Could the result of one or all +our deeds be shadowed forth and set before us, some would call it fate +and hurry onward, others be swept along by their passionate desires, +and none be turned aside by the prophetic pictures. + + + + +DAVID SWAN + +A FANTASY + +We can be but partially acquainted even with the events which actually +influence our course through life and our final destiny. There are +innumerable other events, if such they may be called, which come close +upon us, yet pass away without actual results or even betraying their +near approach by the reflection of any light or shadow across our +minds. Could we know all the vicissitudes of our fortunes, life would +be too full of hope and fear, exultation or disappointment, to afford +us a single hour of true serenity. This idea may be illustrated by a +page from the secret history of David Swan. + +We have nothing to do with David until we find him, at the age of +twenty, on the high road from his native place to the city of Boston, +where his uncle, a small dealer in the grocery line, was to take him +behind the counter. Be it enough to say that he was a native of New +Hampshire, born of respectable parents, and had received an ordinary +school education with a classic finish by a year at Gilmanton Academy. +After journeying on foot from sunrise till nearly noon of a summer’s +day, his weariness and the increasing heat determined him to sit down +in the first convenient shade and await the coming up of the +stage-coach. As if planted on purpose for him, there soon appeared a +little tuft of maples with a delightful recess in the midst, and such a +fresh bubbling spring that it seemed never to have sparkled for any +wayfarer but David Swan. Virgin or not, he kissed it with his thirsty +lips and then flung himself along the brink, pillowing his head upon +some shirts and a pair of pantaloons tied up in a striped cotton +handkerchief. The sunbeams could not reach him; the dust did not yet +rise from the road after the heavy rain of yesterday, and his grassy +lair suited the young man better than a bed of down. The spring +murmured drowsily beside him; the branches waved dreamily across the +blue sky overhead, and a deep sleep, perchance hiding dreams within its +depths, fell upon David Swan. But we are to relate events which he did +not dream of. + +While he lay sound asleep in the shade other people were wide awake, +and passed to and fro, afoot, on horseback and in all sorts of +vehicles, along the sunny road by his bedchamber. Some looked neither +to the right hand nor the left and knew not that he was there; some +merely glanced that way without admitting the slumberer among their +busy thoughts; some laughed to see how soundly he slept, and several +whose hearts were brimming full of scorn ejected their venomous +superfluity on David Swan. A middle-aged widow, when nobody else was +near, thrust her head a little way into the recess, and vowed that the +young fellow looked charming in his sleep. A temperance lecturer saw +him, and wrought poor David into the texture of his evening’s discourse +as an awful instance of dead drunkenness by the roadside. + +But censure, praise, merriment, scorn and indifference were all one—or, +rather, all nothing—to David Swan. He had slept only a few moments when +a brown carriage drawn by a handsome pair of horses bowled easily along +and was brought to a standstill nearly in front of David’s +resting-place. A linch-pin had fallen out and permitted one of the +wheels to slide off. The damage was slight and occasioned merely a +momentary alarm to an elderly merchant and his wife, who were returning +to Boston in the carriage. While the coachman and a servant were +replacing the wheel the lady and gentleman sheltered themselves beneath +the maple trees, and there espied the bubbling fountain and David Swan +asleep beside it. Impressed with the awe which the humblest sleeper +usually sheds around him, the merchant trod as lightly as the gout +would allow, and his spouse took good heed not to rustle her silk gown +lest David should start up all of a sudden. + +“How soundly he sleeps!” whispered the old gentleman. “From what a +depth he draws that easy breath! Such sleep as that, brought on without +an opiate, would be worth more to me than half my income, for it would +suppose health and an untroubled mind.” + +“And youth besides,” said the lady. “Healthy and quiet age does not +sleep thus. Our slumber is no more like his than our wakefulness.” + +The longer they looked, the more did this elderly couple feel +interested in the unknown youth to whom the wayside and the maple shade +were as a secret chamber with the rich gloom of damask curtains +brooding over him. Perceiving that a stray sunbeam glimmered down upon +his face, the lady contrived to twist a branch aside so as to intercept +it, and, having done this little act of kindness, she began to feel +like a mother to him. + +“Providence seems to have laid him here,” whispered she to her husband, +“and to have brought us hither to find him, after our disappointment in +our cousin’s son. Methinks I can see a likeness to our departed Henry. +Shall we waken him?” + +“To what purpose?” said the merchant, hesitating. “We know nothing of +the youth’s character.” + +“That open countenance!” replied his wife, in the same hushed voice, +yet earnestly. “This innocent sleep!” + +While these whispers were passing, the sleeper’s heart did not throb, +nor his breath become agitated, nor his features betray the least token +of interest. Yet Fortune was bending over him, just ready to let fall a +burden of gold. The old merchant had lost his only son, and had no heir +to his wealth except a distant relative with whose conduct he was +dissatisfied. In such cases people sometimes do stranger things than to +act the magician and awaken a young man to splendor who fell asleep in +poverty. + +“Shall we not waken him?” repeated the lady, persuasively. + +“The coach is ready, sir,” said the servant, behind. + +The old couple started, reddened and hurried away, mutually wondering +that they should ever have dreamed of doing anything so very +ridiculous. The merchant threw himself back in the carriage and +occupied his mind with the plan of a magnificent asylum for unfortunate +men of business. Meanwhile, David Swan enjoyed his nap. + +The carriage could not have gone above a mile or two when a pretty +young girl came along with a tripping pace which showed precisely how +her little heart was dancing in her bosom. Perhaps it was this merry +kind of motion that caused—is there any harm in saying it?—her garter +to slip its knot. Conscious that the silken girth—if silk it were—was +relaxing its hold, she turned aside into the shelter of the maple +trees, and there found a young man asleep by the spring. Blushing as +red as any rose that she should have intruded into a gentleman’s +bedchamber, and for such a purpose too, she was about to make her +escape on tiptoe. But there was peril near the sleeper. A monster of a +bee had been wandering overhead—buzz, buzz, buzz—now among the leaves, +now flashing through the strips of sunshine, and now lost in the dark +shade, till finally he appeared to be settling on the eyelid of David +Swan. The sting of a bee is sometimes deadly. As free-hearted as she +was innocent, the girl attacked the intruder with her handkerchief, +brushed him soundly and drove him from beneath the maple shade. How +sweet a picture! This good deed accomplished, with quickened breath and +a deeper blush she stole a glance at the youthful stranger for whom she +had been battling with a dragon in the air. + +“He is handsome!” thought she, and blushed redder yet. + +How could it be that no dream of bliss grew so strong within him that, +shattered by its very strength, it should part asunder and allow him to +perceive the girl among its phantoms? Why, at least, did no smile of +welcome brighten upon his face? She was come, the maid whose soul, +according to the old and beautiful idea, had been severed from his own, +and whom in all his vague but passionate desires he yearned to meet. +Her only could he love with a perfect love, him only could she receive +into the depths of her heart, and now her image was faintly blushing in +the fountain by his side; should it pass away, its happy lustre would +never gleam upon his life again. + +“How sound he sleeps!” murmured the girl. She departed, but did not +trip along the road so lightly as when she came. + +Now, this girl’s father was a thriving country merchant in the +neighborhood, and happened at that identical time to be looking out for +just such a young man as David Swan. Had David formed a wayside +acquaintance with the daughter, he would have become the father’s +clerk, and all else in natural succession. So here, again, had good +fortune—the best of fortunes—stolen so near that her garments brushed +against him, and he knew nothing of the matter. + +The girl was hardly out of sight when two men turned aside beneath the +maple shade. Both had dark faces set off by cloth caps, which were +drawn down aslant over their brows. Their dresses were shabby, yet had +a certain smartness. These were a couple of rascals who got their +living by whatever the devil sent them, and now, in the interim of +other business, had staked the joint profits of their next piece of +villainy on a game of cards which was to have been decided here under +the trees. But, finding David asleep by the spring, one of the rogues +whispered to his fellow: + +“Hist! Do you see that bundle under his head?” + +The other villain nodded, winked and leered. + +“I’ll bet you a horn of brandy,” said the first, “that the chap has +either a pocketbook or a snug little hoard of small change stowed away +amongst his shirts. And if not there, we will find it in his pantaloons +pocket.” + +“But how if he wakes?” said the other. + +His companion thrust aside his waistcoat, pointed to the handle of a +dirk and nodded. + +“So be it!” muttered the second villain. + +They approached the unconscious David, and, while one pointed the +dagger toward his heart, the other began to search the bundle beneath +his head. Their two faces, grim, wrinkled and ghastly with guilt and +fear, bent over their victim, looking horrible enough to be mistaken +for fiends should he suddenly awake. Nay, had the villains glanced +aside into the spring, even they would hardly have known themselves as +reflected there. But David Swan had never worn a more tranquil aspect, +even when asleep on his mother’s breast. + +“I must take away the bundle,” whispered one. + +“If he stirs, I’ll strike,” muttered the other. + +But at this moment a dog scenting along the ground came in beneath the +maple trees and gazed alternately at each of these wicked men and then +at the quiet sleeper. He then lapped out of the fountain. + +“Pshaw!” said one villain. “We can do nothing now. The dog’s master +must be close behind.” + +“Let’s take a drink and be off,” said the other. + +The man with the dagger thrust back the weapon into his bosom and drew +forth a pocket-pistol, but not of that kind which kills by a single +discharge. It was a flask of liquor with a block-tin tumbler screwed +upon the mouth. Each drank a comfortable dram, and left the spot with +so many jests and such laughter at their unaccomplished wickedness that +they might be said to have gone on their way rejoicing. In a few hours +they had forgotten the whole affair, nor once imagined that the +recording angel had written down the crime of murder against their +souls in letters as durable as eternity. As for David Swan, he still +slept quietly, neither conscious of the shadow of death when it hung +over him nor of the glow of renewed life when that shadow was +withdrawn. He slept, but no longer so quietly as at first. An hour’s +repose had snatched from his elastic frame the weariness with which +many hours of toil had burdened it. Now he stirred, now moved his lips +without a sound, now talked in an inward tone to the noonday spectres +of his dream. But a noise of wheels came rattling louder and louder +along the road, until it dashed through the dispersing mist of David’s +slumber; and there was the stagecoach. He started up with all his ideas +about him. + +“Halloo, driver! Take a passenger?” shouted he. + +“Room on top!” answered the driver. + +Up mounted David, and bowled away merrily toward Boston without so much +as a parting glance at that fountain of dreamlike vicissitude. He knew +not that a phantom of Wealth had thrown a golden hue upon its waters, +nor that one of Love had sighed softly to their murmur, nor that one of +Death had threatened to crimson them with his blood, all in the brief +hour since he lay down to sleep. Sleeping or waking, we hear not the +airy footsteps of the strange things that almost happen. Does it not +argue a superintending Providence that, while viewless and unexpected +events thrust themselves continually athwart our path, there should +still be regularity enough in mortal life to render foresight even +partially available? + + + + +SIGHTS FROM A STEEPLE + + +So! I have climbed high, and my reward is small. Here I stand with +wearied knees—earth, indeed, at a dizzy depth below, but heaven far, +far beyond me still. Oh that I could soar up into the very zenith, +where man never breathed nor eagle ever flew, and where the ethereal +azure melts away from the eye and appears only a deepened shade of +nothingness! And yet I shiver at that cold and solitary thought. What +clouds are gathering in the golden west with direful intent against the +brightness and the warmth of this summer afternoon? They are ponderous +air-ships, black as death and freighted with the tempest, and at +intervals their thunder—the signal-guns of that unearthly +squadron—rolls distant along the deep of heaven. These nearer heaps of +fleecy vapor—methinks I could roll and toss upon them the whole day +long—seem scattered here and there for the repose of tired pilgrims +through the sky. Perhaps—for who can tell?—beautiful spirits are +disporting themselves there, and will bless my mortal eye with the +brief appearance of their curly locks of golden light and laughing +faces fair and faint as the people of a rosy dream. Or where the +floating mass so imperfectly obstructs the color of the firmament a +slender foot and fairy limb resting too heavily upon the frail support +may be thrust through and suddenly withdrawn, while longing fancy +follows them in vain. Yonder, again, is an airy archipelago where the +sunbeams love to linger in their journeyings through space. Every one +of those little clouds has been dipped and steeped in radiance which +the slightest pressure might disengage in silvery profusion like water +wrung from a sea-maid’s hair. Bright they are as a young man’s visions, +and, like them, would be realized in dullness, obscurity and tears. I +will look on them no more. + +In three parts of the visible circle whose centre is this spire I +discern cultivated fields, villages, white country-seats, the waving +lines of rivulets, little placid lakes, and here and there a rising +ground that would fain be termed a hill. On the fourth side is the sea, +stretching away toward a viewless boundary, blue and calm except where +the passing anger of a shadow flits across its surface and is gone. +Hitherward a broad inlet penetrates far into the land; on the verge of +the harbor formed by its extremity is a town, and over it am I, a +watchman, all-heeding and unheeded. Oh that the multitude of chimneys +could speak, like those of Madrid, and betray in smoky whispers the +secrets of all who since their first foundation have assembled at the +hearths within! Oh that the Limping Devil of Le Sage would perch beside +me here, extend his wand over this contiguity of roofs, uncover every +chamber and make me familiar with their inhabitants! The most desirable +mode of existence might be that of a spiritualized Paul Pry hovering +invisible round man and woman, witnessing their deeds, searching into +their hearts, borrowing brightness from their felicity and shade from +their sorrow, and retaining no emotion peculiar to himself. But none of +these things are possible; and if I would know the interior of brick +walls or the mystery of human bosoms, I can but guess. + +Yonder is a fair street extending north and south. The stately mansions +are placed each on its carpet of verdant grass, and a long flight of +steps descends from every door to the pavement. Ornamental trees—the +broadleafed horse-chestnut, the elm so lofty and bending, the graceful +but infrequent willow, and others whereof I know not the names—grow +thrivingly among brick and stone. The oblique rays of the sun are +intercepted by these green citizens and by the houses, so that one side +of the street is a shaded and pleasant walk. On its whole extent there +is now but a single passenger, advancing from the upper end, and he, +unless distance and the medium of a pocket spyglass do him more than +justice, is a fine young man of twenty. He saunters slowly forward, +slapping his left hand with his folded gloves, bending his eyes upon +the pavement, and sometimes raising them to throw a glance before him. +Certainly he has a pensive air. Is he in doubt or in debt? Is he—if the +question be allowable—in love? Does he strive to be melancholy and +gentlemanlike, or is he merely overcome by the heat? But I bid him +farewell for the present. The door of one of the houses—an aristocratic +edifice with curtains of purple and gold waving from the windows—is now +opened, and down the steps come two ladies swinging their parasols and +lightly arrayed for a summer ramble. Both are young, both are pretty; +but methinks the left-hand lass is the fairer of the twain, and, though +she be so serious at this moment, I could swear that there is a +treasure of gentle fun within her. They stand talking a little while +upon the steps, and finally proceed up the street. Meantime, as their +faces are now turned from me, I may look elsewhere. + +Upon that wharf and down the corresponding street is a busy contrast to +the quiet scene which I have just noticed. Business evidently has its +centre there, and many a man is wasting the summer afternoon in labor +and anxiety, in losing riches or in gaining them, when he would be +wiser to flee away to some pleasant country village or shaded lake in +the forest or wild and cool sea-beach. I see vessels unlading at the +wharf and precious merchandise strown upon the ground abundantly as at +the bottom of the sea—that market whence no goods return, and where +there is no captain nor supercargo to render an account of sales. Here +the clerks are diligent with their paper and pencils and sailors ply +the block and tackle that hang over the hold, accompanying their toil +with cries long-drawn and roughly melodious till the bales and +puncheons ascend to upper air. At a little distance a group of +gentlemen are assembled round the door of a warehouse. Grave seniors be +they, and I would wager—if it were safe, in these times, to be +responsible for any one—that the least eminent among them might vie +with old Vincentio, that incomparable trafficker of Pisa. I can even +select the wealthiest of the company. It is the elderly personage in +somewhat rusty black, with powdered hair the superfluous whiteness of +which is visible upon the cape of his coat. His twenty ships are wafted +on some of their many courses by every breeze that blows, and his name, +I will venture to say, though I know it not, is a familiar sound among +the far-separated merchants of Europe and the Indies. + +But I bestow too much of my attention in this quarter. On looking again +to the long and shady walk I perceive that the two fair girls have +encountered the young man. After a sort of shyness in the recognition, +he turns back with them. Moreover, he has sanctioned my taste in regard +to his companions by placing himself on the inner side of the pavement, +nearest the Venus to whom I, enacting on a steeple-top the part of +Paris on the top of Ida, adjudged the golden apple. + +In two streets converging at right angles toward my watch-tower I +distinguish three different processions. One is a proud array of +voluntary soldiers in bright uniform, resembling, from the height +whence I look down, the painted veterans that garrison the windows of a +toy-shop. And yet it stirs my heart. Their regular advance, their +nodding plumes, the sun-flash on their bayonets and musket-barrels, the +roll of their drums ascending past me, and the fife ever and anon +piercing through,—these things have wakened a warlike fire, peaceful +though I be. Close to their rear marches a battalion of schoolboys +ranged in crooked and irregular platoons, shouldering sticks, thumping +a harsh and unripe clatter from an instrument of tin and ridiculously +aping the intricate manoeuvres of the foremost band. Nevertheless, as +slight differences are scarcely perceptible from a church-spire, one +might be tempted to ask, “Which are the boys?” or, rather, “Which the +men?” But, leaving these, let us turn to the third procession, which, +though sadder in outward show, may excite identical reflections in the +thoughtful mind. It is a funeral—a hearse drawn by a black and bony +steed and covered by a dusty pall, two or three coaches rumbling over +the stones, their drivers half asleep, a dozen couple of careless +mourners in their every-day attire. Such was not the fashion of our +fathers when they carried a friend to his grave. There is now no +doleful clang of the bell to proclaim sorrow to the town. Was the King +of Terrors more awful in those days than in our own, that wisdom and +philosophy have been able to produce this change? Not so. Here is a +proof that he retains his proper majesty. The military men and the +military boys are wheeling round the corner, and meet the funeral full +in the face. Immediately the drum is silent, all but the tap that +regulates each simultaneous footfall. The soldiers yield the path to +the dusty hearse and unpretending train, and the children quit their +ranks and cluster on the sidewalks with timorous and instinctive +curiosity. The mourners enter the churchyard at the base of the steeple +and pause by an open grave among the burial-stones; the lightning +glimmers on them as they lower down the coffin, and the thunder rattles +heavily while they throw the earth upon its lid. Verily, the shower is +near, and I tremble for the young man and the girls, who have now +disappeared from the long and shady street. + +How various are the situations of the people covered by the roofs +beneath me, and how diversified are the events at this moment befalling +them! The new-born, the aged, the dying, the strong in life and the +recent dead are in the chambers of these many mansions. The full of +hope, the happy, the miserable and the desperate dwell together within +the circle of my glance. In some of the houses over which my eyes roam +so coldly guilt is entering into hearts that are still tenanted by a +debased and trodden virtue; guilt is on the very edge of commission, +and the impending deed might be averted; guilt is done, and the +criminal wonders if it be irrevocable. There are broad thoughts +struggling in my mind, and, were I able to give them distinctness, they +would make their way in eloquence. Lo! the raindrops are descending. + +The clouds within a little time have gathered over all the sky, hanging +heavily, as if about to drop in one unbroken mass upon the earth. At +intervals the lightning flashes from their brooding hearts, quivers, +disappears, and then comes the thunder, travelling slowly after its +twin-born flame. A strong wind has sprung up, howls through the +darkened streets, and raises the dust in dense bodies to rebel against +the approaching storm. The disbanded soldiers fly, the funeral has +already vanished like its dead, and all people hurry homeward—all that +have a home—while a few lounge by the corners or trudge on desperately +at their leisure. In a narrow lane which communicates with the shady +street I discern the rich old merchant putting himself to the top of +his speed lest the rain should convert his hair-powder to a paste. +Unhappy gentleman! By the slow vehemence and painful moderation +wherewith he journeys, it is but too evident that Podagra has left its +thrilling tenderness in his great toe. But yonder, at a far more rapid +pace, come three other of my acquaintance, the two pretty girls and the +young man unseasonably interrupted in their walk. Their footsteps are +supported by the risen dust, the wind lends them its velocity, they fly +like three sea-birds driven landward by the tempestuous breeze. The +ladies would not thus rival Atalanta if they but knew that any one were +at leisure to observe them. Ah! as they hasten onward, laughing in the +angry face of nature, a sudden catastrophe has chanced. At the corner +where the narrow lane enters into the street they come plump against +the old merchant, whose tortoise-motion has just brought him to that +point. He likes not the sweet encounter; the darkness of the whole air +gathers speedily upon his visage, and there is a pause on both sides. +Finally he thrusts aside the youth with little courtesy, seizes an arm +of each of the two girls, and plods onward like a magician with a prize +of captive fairies. All this is easy to be understood. How disconsolate +the poor lover stands, regardless of the rain that threatens an +exceeding damage to his well-fashioned habiliments, till he catches a +backward glance of mirth from a bright eye, and turns away with +whatever comfort it conveys! + +The old man and his daughters are safely housed, and now the storm lets +loose its fury. In every dwelling I perceive the faces of the +chambermaids as they shut down the windows, excluding the impetuous +shower and shrinking away from the quick fiery glare. The large drops +descend with force upon the slated roofs and rise again in smoke. There +is a rush and roar as of a river through the air, and muddy streams +bubble majestically along the pavement, whirl their dusky foam into the +kennel, and disappear beneath iron grates. Thus did Arethusa sink. I +love not my station here aloft in the midst of the tumult which I am +powerless to direct or quell, with the blue lightning wrinkling on my +brow and the thunder muttering its first awful syllables in my ear. I +will descend. Yet let me give another glance to the sea, where the foam +breaks out in long white lines upon a broad expanse of blackness or +boils up in far-distant points like snowy mountain-tops in the eddies +of a flood; and let me look once more at the green plain and little +hills of the country, over which the giant of the storm is striding in +robes of mist, and at the town whose obscured and desolate streets +might beseem a city of the dead; and, turning a single moment to the +sky, now gloomy as an author’s prospects, I prepare to resume my +station on lower earth. But stay! A little speck of azure has widened +in the western heavens; the sunbeams find a passage and go rejoicing +through the tempest, and on yonder darkest cloud, born like hallowed +hopes of the glory of another world and the trouble and tears of this, +brightens forth the rainbow. + + + + +THE HOLLOW OF THE THREE HILLS + + +In those strange old times when fantastic dreams and madmen’s reveries +were realized among the actual circumstances of life, two persons met +together at an appointed hour and place. One was a lady graceful in +form and fair of feature, though pale and troubled and smitten with an +untimely blight in what should have been the fullest bloom of her +years; the other was an ancient and meanly-dressed woman of ill-favored +aspect, and so withered, shrunken and decrepit that even the space +since she began to decay must have exceeded the ordinary term of human +existence. In the spot where they encountered no mortal could observe +them. Three little hills stood near each other, and down in the midst +of them sunk a hollow basin almost mathematically circular, two or +three hundred feet in breadth and of such depth that a stately cedar +might but just be visible above the sides. Dwarf pines were numerous +upon the hills and partly fringed the outer verge of the intermediate +hollow, within which there was nothing but the brown grass of October +and here and there a tree-trunk that had fallen long ago and lay +mouldering with no green successor from its roots. One of these masses +of decaying wood, formerly a majestic oak, rested close beside a pool +of green and sluggish water at the bottom of the basin. Such scenes as +this (so gray tradition tells) were once the resort of a power of evil +and his plighted subjects, and here at midnight or on the dim verge of +evening they were said to stand round the mantling pool disturbing its +putrid waters in the performance of an impious baptismal rite. The +chill beauty of an autumnal sunset was now gilding the three hill-tops, +whence a paler tint stole down their sides into the hollow. + +“Here is our pleasant meeting come to pass,” said the aged crone, +“according as thou hast desired. Say quickly what thou wouldst have of +me, for there is but a short hour that we may tarry here.” + +As the old withered woman spoke a smile glimmered on her countenance +like lamplight on the wall of a sepulchre. The lady trembled and cast +her eyes upward to the verge of the basin, as if meditating to return +with her purpose unaccomplished. But it was not so ordained. + +“I am stranger in this land, as you know,” said she, at length. “Whence +I come it matters not, but I have left those behind me with whom my +fate was intimately bound, and from whom I am cut off for ever. There +is a weight in my bosom that I cannot away with, and I have come hither +to inquire of their welfare.” + +“And who is there by this green pool that can bring thee news from the +ends of the earth?” cried the old woman, peering into the lady’s face. +“Not from my lips mayst thou hear these tidings; yet be thou bold, and +the daylight shall not pass away from yonder hilltop before thy wish be +granted.” + +“I will do your bidding though I die,” replied the lady, desperately. + +The old woman seated herself on the trunk of the fallen tree, threw +aside the hood that shrouded her gray locks and beckoned her companion +to draw near. + +“Kneel down,” she said, “and lay your forehead on my knees.” + +She hesitated a moment, but the anxiety that had long been kindling +burned fiercely up within her. As she knelt down the border of her +garment was dipped into the pool; she laid her forehead on the old +woman’s knees, and the latter drew a cloak about the lady’s face, so +that she was in darkness. Then she heard the muttered words of prayer, +in the midst of which she started and would have arisen. + +“Let me flee! Let me flee and hide myself, that they may not look upon +me!” she cried. But, with returning recollection, she hushed herself +and was still as death, for it seemed as if other voices, familiar in +infancy and unforgotten through many wanderings and in all the +vicissitudes of her heart and fortune, were mingling with the accents +of the prayer. At first the words were faint and indistinct—not +rendered so by distance, but rather resembling the dim pages of a book +which we strive to read by an imperfect and gradually brightening +light. In such a manner, as the prayer proceeded, did those voices +strengthen upon the ear, till at length the petition ended, and the +conversation of an aged man and of a woman broken and decayed like +himself became distinctly audible to the lady as she knelt. But those +strangers appeared not to stand in the hollow depth between the three +hills. Their voices were encompassed and re-echoed by the walls of a +chamber the windows of which were rattling in the breeze; the regular +vibration of a clock, the crackling of a fire and the tinkling of the +embers as they fell among the ashes rendered the scene almost as vivid +as if painted to the eye. By a melancholy hearth sat these two old +people, the man calmly despondent, the woman querulous and tearful, and +their words were all of sorrow. They spoke of a daughter, a wanderer +they knew not where, bearing dishonor along with her and leaving shame +and affliction to bring their gray heads to the grave. They alluded +also to other and more recent woe, but in the midst of their talk their +voices seemed to melt into the sound of the wind sweeping mournfully +among the autumn leaves; and when the lady lifted her eyes, there was +she kneeling in the hollow between three hills. + +“A weary and lonesome time yonder old couple have of it,” remarked the +old woman, smiling in the lady’s face. + +“And did you also hear them?” exclaimed she, a sense of intolerable +humiliation triumphing over her agony and fear. + +“Yea, and we have yet more to hear,” replied the old woman, “wherefore +cover thy face quickly.” + +Again the withered hag poured forth the monotonous words of a prayer +that was not meant to be acceptable in heaven, and soon in the pauses +of her breath strange murmurings began to thicken, gradually +increasing, so as to drown and overpower the charm by which they grew. +Shrieks pierced through the obscurity of sound and were succeeded by +the singing of sweet female voices, which in their turn gave way to a +wild roar of laughter broken suddenly by groanings and sobs, forming +altogether a ghastly confusion of terror and mourning and mirth. Chains +were rattling, fierce and stern voices uttered threats and the scourge +resounded at their command. All these noises deepened and became +substantial to the listener’s ear, till she could distinguish every +soft and dreamy accent of the love-songs that died causelessly into +funeral-hymns. She shuddered at the unprovoked wrath which blazed up +like the spontaneous kindling of flume, and she grew faint at the +fearful merriment raging miserably around her. In the midst of this +wild scene, where unbound passions jostled each other in a drunken +career, there was one solemn voice of a man, and a manly and melodious +voice it might once have been. He went to and fro continually, and his +feet sounded upon the floor. In each member of that frenzied company +whose own burning thoughts had become their exclusive world he sought +an auditor for the story of his individual wrong, and interpreted their +laughter and tears as his reward of scorn or pity. He spoke of woman’s +perfidy, of a wife who had broken her holiest vows, of a home and heart +made desolate. Even as he went on, the shout, the laugh, the shriek, +the sob, rose up in unison, till they changed into the hollow, fitful +and uneven sound of the wind as it fought among the pine trees on those +three lonely hills. + +The lady looked up, and there was the withered woman smiling in her +face. + +“Couldst thou have thought there were such merry times in a mad-house?” +inquired the latter. + +“True, true!” said the lady to herself; “there is mirth within its +walls, but misery, misery without.” + +“Wouldst thou hear more?” demanded the old woman. + +“There is one other voice I would fain listen to again,” replied the +lady, faintly. + +“Then lay down thy head speedily upon my knees, that thou mayst get +thee hence before the hour be past.” + +The golden skirts of day were yet lingering upon the hills, but deep +shades obscured the hollow and the pool, as if sombre night were rising +thence to overspread the world. Again that evil woman began to weave +her spell. Long did it proceed unanswered, till the knolling of a bell +stole in among the intervals of her words like a clang that had +travelled far over valley and rising ground and was just ready to die +in the air. The lady shook upon her companion’s knees as she heard that +boding sound. Stronger it grew, and sadder, and deepened into the tone +of a death-bell, knolling dolefully from some ivy-mantled tower and +bearing tidings of mortality and woe to the cottage, to the hall and to +the solitary wayfarer, that all might weep for the doom appointed in +turn to them. Then came a measured tread, passing slowly, slowly on, as +of mourners with a coffin, their garments trailing on the ground, so +that the ear could measure the length of their melancholy array. Before +them went the priest, reading the burial-service, while the leaves of +his book were rustling in the breeze. And though no voice but his was +heard to speak aloud, still there were revilings and anathemas, +whispered but distinct, from women and from men, breathed against the +daughter who had wrung the aged hearts of her parents, the wife who had +betrayed the trusting fondness of her husband, the mother who had +sinned against natural affection and left her child to die. The +sweeping sound of the funeral train faded away like a thin vapor, and +the wind, that just before had seemed to shake the coffin-pall, moaned +sadly round the verge of the hollow between three hills. But when the +old woman stirred the kneeling lady, she lifted not her head. + +“Here has been a sweet hour’s sport!” said the withered crone, +chuckling to herself. + + + + +THE TOLL-GATHERER’S DAY + +A SKETCH OF TRANSITORY LIFE + +Methinks, for a person whose instinct bids him rather to pore over the +current of life than to plunge into its tumultuous waves, no +undesirable retreat were a toll-house beside some thronged thoroughfare +of the land. In youth, perhaps, it is good for the observer to run +about the earth, to leave the track of his footsteps far and wide, to +mingle himself with the action of numberless vicissitudes, and, +finally, in some calm solitude to feed a musing spirit on all that he +has seen and felt. But there are natures too indolent or too sensitive +to endure the dust, the sunshine or the rain, the turmoil of moral and +physical elements, to which all the wayfarers of the world expose +themselves. For such a man how pleasant a miracle could life be made to +roll its variegated length by the threshold of his own hermitage, and +the great globe, as it were, perform its revolutions and shift its +thousand scenes before his eyes without whirling him onward in its +course! If any mortal be favored with a lot analogous to this, it is +the toll-gatherer. So, at least, have I often fancied while lounging on +a bench at the door of a small square edifice which stands between +shore and shore in the midst of a long bridge. Beneath the timbers ebbs +and flows an arm of the sea, while above, like the life-blood through a +great artery, the travel of the north and east is continually +throbbing. Sitting on the aforesaid bench, I amuse myself with a +conception, illustrated by numerous pencil-sketches in the air, of the +toll-gatherer’s day. + +In the morning—dim, gray, dewy summer’s morn—the distant roll of +ponderous wheels begins to mingle with my old friend’s slumbers, +creaking more and more harshly through the midst of his dream and +gradually replacing it with realities. Hardly conscious of the change +from sleep to wakefulness, he finds himself partly clad and throwing +wide the toll-gates for the passage of a fragrant load of hay. The +timbers groan beneath the slow-revolving wheels; one sturdy yeoman +stalks beside the oxen, and, peering from the summit of the hay, by the +glimmer of the half-extinguished lantern over the toll-house is seen +the drowsy visage of his comrade, who has enjoyed a nap some ten miles +long. The toll is paid; creak, creak, again go the wheels, and the huge +hay-mow vanishes into the morning mist. As yet nature is but half +awake, and familiar objects appear visionary. But yonder, dashing from +the shore with a rattling thunder of the wheels and a confused clatter +of hoofs, comes the never-tiring mail, which has hurried onward at the +same headlong, restless rate all through the quiet night. The bridge +resounds in one continued peal as the coach rolls on without a pause, +merely affording the toll-gatherer a glimpse at the sleepy passengers, +who now bestir their torpid limbs and snuff a cordial in the briny air. +The morn breathes upon them and blushes, and they forget how wearily +the darkness toiled away. And behold now the fervid day in his bright +chariot, glittering aslant over the waves, nor scorning to throw a +tribute of his golden beams on the toll-gatherer’s little hermitage. +The old man looks eastward, and (for he is a moralizer) frames a simile +of the stage-coach and the sun. + +While the world is rousing itself we may glance slightly at the scene +of our sketch. It sits above the bosom of the broad flood—a spot not of +earth, but in the midst of waters which rush with a murmuring sound +among the massive beams beneath. Over the door is a weatherbeaten board +inscribed with the rates of toll in letters so nearly effaced that the +gilding of the sunshine can hardly make them legible. Beneath the +window is a wooden bench on which a long succession of weary wayfarers +have reposed themselves. Peeping within-doors, we perceive the +whitewashed walls bedecked with sundry lithographic prints and +advertisements of various import and the immense show-bill of a +wandering caravan. And there sits our good old toll-gatherer, glorified +by the early sunbeams. He is a man, as his aspect may announce, of +quiet soul and thoughtful, shrewd, yet simple mind, who of the wisdom +which the passing world scatters along the wayside has gathered a +reasonable store. + +Now the sun smiles upon the landscape and earth smiles back again upon +the sky. Frequent now are the travellers. The toll-gatherer’s practised +ear can distinguish the weight of every vehicle, the number of its +wheels and how many horses beat the resounding timbers with their iron +tramp. Here, in a substantial family chaise, setting forth betimes to +take advantage of the dewy road, come a gentleman and his wife with +their rosy-cheeked little girl sitting gladsomely between them. The +bottom of the chaise is heaped with multifarious bandboxes and +carpet-bags, and beneath the axle swings a leathern trunk dusty with +yesterday’s journey. Next appears a four-wheeled carryall peopled with +a round half dozen of pretty girls, all drawn by a single horse and +driven by a single gentleman. Luckless wight doomed through a whole +summer day to be the butt of mirth and mischief among the frolicsome +maidens! Bolt upright in a sulky rides a thin, sour-visaged man who as +he pays his toll hands the toll-gatherer a printed card to stick upon +the wall. The vinegar-faced traveller proves to be a manufacturer of +pickles. Now paces slowly from timber to timber a horseman clad in +black, with a meditative brow, as of one who, whithersoever his steed +might bear him, would still journey through a mist of brooding thought. +He is a country preacher going to labor at a protracted meeting. The +next object passing townward is a butcher’s cart canopied with its arch +of snow-white cotton. Behind comes a “sauceman” driving a wagon full of +new potatoes, green ears of corn, beets, carrots, turnips and summer +squashes, and next two wrinkled, withered witch-looking old gossips in +an antediluvian chaise drawn by a horse of former generations and going +to peddle out a lot of huckleberries. See, there, a man trundling a +wheelbarrow-load of lobsters. And now a milk-cart rattles briskly +onward, covered with green canvas and conveying the contributions of a +whole herd of cows, in large tin canisters. + +But let all these pay their toll and pass. Here comes a spectacle that +causes the old toll-gatherer to smile benignantly, as if the travellers +brought sunshine with them and lavished its gladsome influence all +along the road. It is a barouche of the newest style, the varnished +panels of which reflect the whole moving panorama of the landscape, and +show a picture, likewise, of our friend with his visage broadened, so +that his meditative smile is transformed to grotesque merriment. Within +sits a youth fresh as the summer morn, and beside him a young lady in +white with white gloves upon her slender hands and a white veil flowing +down over her face. But methinks her blushing cheek burns through the +snowy veil. Another white-robed virgin sits in front. And who are these +on whom, and on all that appertains to them, the dust of earth seems +never to have settled? Two lovers whom the priest has blessed this +blessed morn and sent them forth, with one of the bride-maids, on the +matrimonial tour.—Take my blessing too, ye happy ones! May the sky not +frown upon you nor clouds bedew you with their chill and sullen rain! +May the hot sun kindle no fever in your hearts! May your whole life’s +pilgrimage be as blissful as this first day’s journey, and its close be +gladdened with even brighter anticipations than those which hallow your +bridal-night! They pass, and ere the reflection of their joy has faded +from his face another spectacle throws a melancholy shadow over the +spirit of the observing man. In a close carriage sits a fragile figure +muffled carefully and shrinking even from the mild breath of summer. +She leans against a manly form, and his arm enfolds her as if to guard +his treasure from some enemy. Let but a few weeks pass, and when he +shall strive to embrace that loved one, he will press only desolation +to his heart. + +And now has Morning gathered up her dewy pearls and fled away. The sun +rolls blazing through the sky, and cannot find a cloud to cool his face +with. The horses toil sluggishly along the bridge, and heave their +glistening sides in short quick pantings when the reins are tightened +at the toll-house. Glisten, too, the faces of the travellers. Their +garments are thickly bestrewn with dust; their whiskers and hair look +hoary; their throats are choked with the dusty atmosphere which they +have left behind them. No air is stirring on the road. Nature dares +draw no breath lest she should inhale a stifling cloud of dust. “A hot +and dusty day!” cry the poor pilgrims as they wipe their begrimed +foreheads and woo the doubtful breeze which the river bears along with +it.—“Awful hot! Dreadful dusty!” answers the sympathetic toll-gatherer. +They start again to pass through the fiery furnace, while he re-enters +his cool hermitage and besprinkles it with a pail of briny water from +the stream beneath. He thinks within himself that the sun is not so +fierce here as elsewhere, and that the gentle air doth not forget him +in these sultry days. Yes, old friend, and a quiet heart will make a +dog-day temperate. He hears a weary footstep, and perceives a traveller +with pack and staff, who sits down upon the hospitable bench and +removes the hat from his wet brow. The toll-gatherer administers a cup +of cold water, and, discovering his guest to be a man of homely sense, +he engages him in profitable talk, uttering the maxims of a philosophy +which he has found in his own soul, but knows not how it came there. +And as the wayfarer makes ready to resume his journey he tells him a +sovereign remedy for blistered feet. + +Now comes the noontide hour—of all the hours, nearest akin to midnight, +for each has its own calmness and repose. Soon, however, the world +begins to turn again upon its axis, and it seems the busiest epoch of +the day, when an accident impedes the march of sublunary things. The +draw being lifted to permit the passage of a schooner laden with wood +from the Eastern forests, she sticks immovably right athwart the +bridge. Meanwhile, on both sides of the chasm a throng of impatient +travellers fret and fume. Here are two sailors in a gig with the top +thrown back, both puffing cigars and swearing all sorts of forecastle +oaths; there, in a smart chaise, a dashingly-dressed gentleman and +lady, he from a tailor’s shop-board and she from a milliner’s back +room—the aristocrats of a summer afternoon. And what are the haughtiest +of us but the ephemeral aristocrats of a summer’s day? Here is a +tin-pedler whose glittering ware bedazzles all beholders like a +travelling meteor or opposition sun, and on the other side a seller of +spruce beer, which brisk liquor is confined in several dozen of stone +bottles. Here conic a party of ladies on horseback, in green ridings +habits, and gentlemen attendant, and there a flock of sheep for the +market, pattering over the bridge with a multitude nous clatter of +their little hoofs; here a Frenchman with a hand-organ on his shoulder, +and there an itinerant Swiss jeweller. On this side, heralded by a +blast of clarions and bugles, appears a train of wagons conveying all +the wild beasts of a caravan; and on that a company of summer soldiers +marching from village to village on a festival campaign, attended by +the “brass band.” Now look at the scene, and it presents an emblem of +the mysterious confusion, the apparently insolvable riddle, in which +individuals, or the great world itself, seem often to be involved. What +miracle shall set all things right again? + +But see! the schooner has thrust her bulky carcase through the chasm; +the draw descends; horse and foot pass onward and leave the bridge +vacant from end to end. “And thus,” muses the toll-gatherer, “have I +found it with all stoppages, even though the universe seemed to be at a +stand.” The sage old man! + +Far westward now the reddening sun throws a broad sheet of splendor +across the flood, and to the eyes of distant boatmen gleams brightly +among the timbers of the bridge. Strollers come from the town to quaff +the freshening breeze. One or two let down long lines and haul up +flapping flounders or cunners or small cod, or perhaps an eel. Others, +and fair girls among them, with the flush of the hot day still on their +cheeks, bend over the railing and watch the heaps of seaweed floating +upward with the flowing tide. The horses now tramp heavily along the +bridge and wistfully bethink them of their stables.—Rest, rest, thou +weary world! for to-morrow’s round of toil and pleasure will be as +wearisome as to-day’s has been, yet both shall bear thee onward a day’s +march of eternity.—Now the old toll-gatherer looks seaward and discerns +the lighthouse kindling on a far island, and the stars, too, kindling +in the sky, as if but a little way beyond; and, mingling reveries of +heaven with remembrances of earth, the whole procession of mortal +travellers, all the dusty pilgrimage which he has witnessed, seems like +a flitting show of phantoms for his thoughtful soul to muse upon. + + + + +THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN + + +At fifteen I became a resident in a country village more than a hundred +miles from home. The morning after my arrival—a September morning, but +warm and bright as any in July—I rambled into a wood of oaks with a few +walnut trees intermixed, forming the closest shade above my head. The +ground was rocky, uneven, overgrown with bushes and clumps of young +saplings and traversed only by cattle-paths. The track which I chanced +to follow led me to a crystal spring with a border of grass as freshly +green as on May morning, and overshadowed by the limb of a great oak. +One solitary sunbeam found its way down and played like a goldfish in +the water. + +From my childhood I have loved to gaze into a spring. The water filled +a circular basin, small but deep and set round with stones, some of +which were covered with slimy moss, the others naked and of variegated +hue—reddish, white and brown. The bottom was covered with coarse sand, +which sparkled in the lonely sunbeam and seemed to illuminate the +spring with an unborrowed light. In one spot the gush of the water +violently agitated the sand, but without obscuring the fountain or +breaking the glassiness of its surface. It appeared as if some living +creature were about to emerge—the naiad of the spring, perhaps, in the +shape of a beautiful young woman with a gown of filmy water-moss, a +belt of rainbow-drops and a cold, pure, passionless countenance. How +would the beholder shiver, pleasantly yet fearfully, to see her sitting +on one of the stones, paddling her white feet in the ripples and +throwing up water to sparkle in the sun! Wherever she laid her hands on +grass and flowers, they would immediately be moist, as with morning +dew. Then would she set about her labors, like a careful housewife, to +clear the fountain of withered leaves, and bits of slimy wood, and old +acorns from the oaks above, and grains of corn left by cattle in +drinking, till the bright sand in the bright water were like a treasury +of diamonds. But, should the intruder approach too near, he would find +only the drops of a summer shower glistening about the spot where he +had seen her. + +Reclining on the border of grass where the dewy goddess should have +been, I bent forward, and a pair of eyes met mine within the watery +mirror. They were the reflection of my own. I looked again, and, lo! +another face, deeper in the fountain than my own image, more distinct +in all the features, yet faint as thought. The vision had the aspect of +a fair young girl with locks of paly gold. A mirthful expression +laughed in the eyes and dimpled over the whole shadowy countenance, +till it seemed just what a fountain would be if, while dancing merrily +into the sunshine, it should assume the shape of woman. Through the dim +rosiness of the cheeks I could see the brown leaves, the slimy twigs, +the acorns and the sparkling sand. The solitary sunbeam was diffused +among the golden hair, which melted into its faint brightness and +became a glory round that head so beautiful. + +My description can give no idea how suddenly the fountain was thus +tenanted and how soon it was left desolate. I breathed, and there was +the face; I held my breath, and it was gone. Had it passed away or +faded into nothing? I doubted whether it had ever been. + +My sweet readers, what a dreamy and delicious hour did I spend where +that vision found and left me! For a long time I sat perfectly still, +waiting till it should reappear, and fearful that the slightest motion, +or even the flutter of my breath, might frighten it away. Thus have I +often started from a pleasant dream, and then kept quiet in hopes to +wile it back. Deep were my musings as to the race and attributes of +that ethereal being. Had I created her? Was she the daughter of my +fancy, akin to those strange shapes which peep under the lids of +children’s eyes? And did her beauty gladden me for that one moment and +then die? Or was she a water-nymph within the fountain, or fairy or +woodland goddess peeping over my shoulder, or the ghost of some +forsaken maid who had drowned herself for love? Or, in good truth, had +a lovely girl with a warm heart and lips that would bear pressure +stolen softly behind me and thrown her image into the spring? + +I watched and waited, but no vision came again. I departed, but with a +spell upon me which drew me back that same afternoon to the haunted +spring. There was the water gushing, the sand sparkling and the sunbeam +glimmering. There the vision was not, but only a great frog, the hermit +of that solitude, who immediately withdrew his speckled snout and made +himself invisible—all except a pair of long legs—beneath a stone. +Methought he had a devilish look. I could have slain him as an +enchanter who kept the mysterious beauty imprisoned in the fountain. + +Sad and heavy, I was returning to the village. Between me and the +church-spire rose a little hill, and on its summit a group of trees +insulated from all the rest of the wood, with their own share of +radiance hovering on them from the west and their own solitary shadow +falling to the east. The afternoon being far declined, the sunshine was +almost pensive and the shade almost cheerful; glory and gloom were +mingled in the placid light, as if the spirits of the Day and Evening +had met in friendship under those trees and found themselves akin. I +was admiring the picture when the shape of a young girl emerged from +behind the clump of oaks. My heart knew her: it was the vision, but so +distant and ethereal did she seem, so unmixed with earth, so imbued +with the pensive glory of the spot where she was standing, that my +spirit sunk within me, sadder than before. How could I ever reach her? + +While I gazed a sudden shower came pattering down upon the leaves. In a +moment the air was full of brightness, each raindrop catching a portion +of sunlight as it fell, and the whole gentle shower appearing like a +mist, just substantial enough to bear the burden of radiance. A rainbow +vivid as Niagara’s was painted in the air. Its southern limb came down +before the group of trees and enveloped the fair vision as if the hues +of heaven were the only garment for her beauty. When the rainbow +vanished, she who had seemed a part of it was no longer there. Was her +existence absorbed in nature’s loveliest phenomenon, and did her pure +frame dissolve away in the varied light? Yet I would not despair of her +return, for, robed in the rainbow, she was the emblem of Hope. + +Thus did the vision leave me, and many a doleful day succeeded to the +parting moment. By the spring and in the wood and on the hill and +through the village, at dewy sunrise, burning noon, and at that magic +hour of sunset, when she had vanished from my sight, I sought her, but +in vain. Weeks came and went, months rolled away, and she appeared not +in them. I imparted my mystery to none, but wandered to and fro or sat +in solitude like one that had caught a glimpse of heaven and could take +no more joy on earth. I withdrew into an inner world where my thoughts +lived and breathed, and the vision in the midst of them. Without +intending it, I became at once the author and hero of a romance, +conjuring up rivals, imagining events, the actions of others and my +own, and experiencing every change of passion, till jealousy and +despair had their end in bliss. Oh, had I the burning fancy of my early +youth with manhood’s colder gift, the power of expression, your hearts, +sweet ladies, should flutter at my tale. + +In the middle of January I was summoned home. The day before my +departure, visiting the spots which had been hallowed by the vision, I +found that the spring had a frozen bosom, and nothing but the snow and +a glare of winter sunshine on the hill of the rainbow. “Let me hope,” +thought I, “or my heart will be as icy as the fountain and the whole +world as desolate as this snowy hill.” Most of the day was spent in +preparing for the journey, which was to commence at four o’clock the +next morning. About an hour after supper, when all was in readiness, I +descended from my chamber to the sitting-room to take leave of the old +clergyman and his family with whom I had been an inmate. A gust of wind +blew out my lamp as I passed through the entry. + +According to their invariable custom—so pleasant a one when the fire +blazes cheerfully—the family were sitting in the parlor with no other +light than what came from the hearth. As the good clergyman’s scanty +stipend compelled him to use all sorts of economy, the foundation of +his fires was always a large heap of tan, or ground bark, which would +smoulder away from morning till night with a dull warmth and no flame. +This evening the heap of tan was newly put on and surmounted with three +sticks of red oak full of moisture, and a few pieces of dry pine that +had not yet kindled. There was no light except the little that came +sullenly from two half-burnt brands, without even glimmering on the +andirons. But I knew the position of the old minister’s arm-chair, and +also where his wife sat with her knitting-work, and how to avoid his +two daughters—one a stout country lass, and the other a consumptive +girl. Groping through the gloom, I found my own place next to that of +the son, a learned collegian who had come home to keep school in the +village during the winter vacation. I noticed that there was less room +than usual to-night between the collegian’s chair and mine. + +As people are always taciturn in the dark, not a word was said for some +time after my entrance. Nothing broke the stillness but the regular +click of the matron’s knitting-needles. At times the fire threw out a +brief and dusky gleam which twinkled on the old man’s glasses and +hovered doubtfully round our circle, but was far too faint to portray +the individuals who composed it. Were we not like ghosts? Dreamy as the +scene was, might it not be a type of the mode in which departed people +who had known and loved each other here would hold communion in +eternity? We were aware of each other’s presence, not by sight nor +sound nor touch, but by an inward consciousness. Would it not be so +among the dead? + +The silence was interrupted by the consumptive daughter addressing a +remark to some one in the circle whom she called Rachel. Her tremulous +and decayed accents were answered by a single word, but in a voice that +made me start and bend toward the spot whence it had proceeded. Had I +ever heard that sweet, low tone? If not, why did it rouse up so many +old recollections, or mockeries of such, the shadows of things familiar +yet unknown, and fill my mind with confused images of her features who +had spoken, though buried in the gloom of the parlor? Whom had my heart +recognized, that it throbbed so? I listened to catch her gentle +breathing, and strove by the intensity of my gaze to picture forth a +shape where none was visible. + +Suddenly the dry pine caught; the fire blazed up with a ruddy glow, and +where the darkness had been, there was she—the vision of the fountain. +A spirit of radiance only, she had vanished with the rainbow and +appeared again in the firelight, perhaps to flicker with the blaze and +be gone. Yet her cheek was rosy and lifelike, and her features, in the +bright warmth of the room, were even sweeter and tenderer than my +recollection of them. She knew me. The mirthful expression that had +laughed in her eyes and dimpled over her countenance when I beheld her +faint beauty in the fountain was laughing and dimpling there now. One +moment our glance mingled; the next, down rolled the heap of tan upon +the kindled wood, and darkness snatched away that daughter of the +light, and gave her back to me no more! + +Fair ladies, there is nothing more to tell. Must the simple mystery be +revealed, then, that Rachel was the daughter of the village squire and +had left home for a boarding-school the morning after I arrived and +returned the day before my departure? If I transformed her to an angel, +it is what every youthful lover does for his mistress. Therein consists +the essence of my story. But slight the change, sweet maids, to make +angels of yourselves. + + + + +FANCY’S SHOW-BOX + +A MORALITY + +What is guilt? A stain upon the soul. And it is a point of vast +interest whether the soul may contract such stains in all their depth +and flagrancy from deeds which may have been plotted and resolved upon, +but which physically have never had existence. Must the fleshly hand +and visible frame of man set its seal to the evil designs of the soul, +in order to give them their entire validity against the sinner? Or, +while none but crimes perpetrated are cognizable before an earthly +tribunal, will guilty thoughts—of which guilty deeds are no more than +shadows,—will these draw down the full weight of a condemning sentence +in the supreme court of eternity? In the solitude of a midnight chamber +or in a desert afar from men or in a church while the body is kneeling +the soul may pollute itself even with those crimes which we are +accustomed to deem altogether carnal. If this be true, it is a fearful +truth. + +Let us illustrate the subject by an imaginary example. A venerable +gentleman—one Mr. Smith—who had long been regarded as a pattern of +moral excellence was warming his aged blood with a glass or two of +generous wine. His children being gone forth about their worldly +business and his grandchildren at school, he sat alone in a deep +luxurious arm-chair with his feet beneath a richly-carved mahogany +table. Some old people have a dread of solitude, and when better +company may not be had rejoice even to hear the quiet breathing of a +babe asleep upon the carpet. But Mr. Smith, whose silver hair was the +bright symbol of a life unstained except by such spots as are +inseparable from human nature—he had no need of a babe to protect him +by its purity, nor of a grown person to stand between him and his own +soul. Nevertheless, either manhood must converse with age, or womanhood +must soothe him with gentle cares, or infancy must sport around his +chair, or his thoughts will stray into the misty region of the past and +the old man be chill and sad. Wine will not always cheer him. + +Such might have been the case with Mr. Smith, when, through the +brilliant medium of his glass of old Madeira, he beheld three figures +entering the room. These were Fancy, who had assumed the garb and +aspect of an itinerant showman, with a box of pictures on her back; and +Memory, in the likeness of a clerk, with a pen behind her ear, an +inkhorn at her buttonhole and a huge manuscript volume beneath her arm; +and lastly, behind the other two, a person shrouded in a dusky mantle +which concealed both face and form. But Mr. Smith had a shrewd idea +that it was Conscience. How kind of Fancy, Memory and Conscience to +visit the old gentleman just as he was beginning to imagine that the +wine had neither so bright a sparkle nor so excellent a flavor as when +himself and the liquor were less aged! Through the dim length of the +apartment, where crimson curtains muffled the glare of sunshine and +created a rich obscurity, the three guests drew near the silver-haired +old man. Memory, with a finger between the leaves of her huge volume, +placed herself at his right hand; Conscience, with her face still +hidden in the dusky mantle, took her station on the left, so as to be +next his heart; while Fancy set down her picture-box upon the table +with the magnifying-glass convenient to his eye. + +We can sketch merely the outlines of two or three out of the many +pictures which at the pulling of a string successively peopled the box +with the semblances of living scenes. One was a moonlight picture, in +the background a lowly dwelling, and in front, partly shadowed by a +tree, yet besprinkled with flakes of radiance, two youthful figures, +male and female. The young man stood with folded arms, a haughty smile +upon his lip and a gleam of triumph in his eye as he glanced downward +at the kneeling girl. She was almost prostrate at his feet, evidently +sinking under a weight of shame and anguish which hardly allowed her to +lift her clasped hands in supplication. Her eyes she could not lift. +But neither her agony, nor the lovely features on which it was +depicted, nor the slender grace of the form which it convulsed, +appeared to soften the obduracy of the young man. He was the +personification of triumphant scorn. + +Now, strange to say, as old Mr. Smith peeped through the +magnifying-glass, which made the objects start out from the canvas with +magical deception, he began to recognize the farmhouse, the tree and +both the figures of the picture. The young man in times long past had +often met his gaze within the looking-glass; the girl was the very +image of his first love—his cottage-love, his Martha Burroughs. Mr. +Smith was scandalized. “Oh, vile and slanderous picture!” he exclaims. +“When have I triumphed over ruined innocence? Was not Martha wedded in +her teens to David Tomkins, who won her girlish love and long enjoyed +her affection as a wife? And ever since his death she has lived a +reputable widow!” + +Meantime, Memory was turning over the leaves of her volume, rustling +them to and fro with uncertain fingers, until among the earlier pages +she found one which had reference to this picture. She reads it close +to the old gentleman’s ear: it is a record merely of sinful thought +which never was embodied in an act, but, while Memory is reading, +Conscience unveils her face and strikes a dagger to the heart of Mr. +Smith. Though not a death-blow, the torture was extreme. + +The exhibition proceeded. One after another Fancy displayed her +pictures, all of which appeared to have been painted by some malicious +artist on purpose to vex Mr. Smith. Not a shadow of proof could have +been adduced in any earthly court that he was guilty of the slightest +of those sins which were thus made to stare him in the face. In one +scene there was a table set out, with several bottles and glasses half +filled with wine, which threw back the dull ray of an expiring lamp. +There had been mirth and revelry until the hand of the clock stood just +at midnight, when Murder stepped between the boon-companions. A young +man had fallen on the floor, and lay stone dead with a ghastly wound +crushed into his temple, while over him, with a delirium of mingled +rage and horror in his countenance, stood the youthful likeness of Mr. +Smith. The murdered youth wore the features of Edward Spencer. “What +does this rascal of a painter mean?” cries Mr. Smith, provoked beyond +all patience. “Edward Spencer was my earliest and dearest friend, true +to me as I to him through more than half a century. Neither I nor any +other ever murdered him. Was he not alive within five years, and did he +not, in token of our long friendship, bequeath me his gold-headed cane +and a mourning-ring?” + +Again had Memory been turning over her volume, and fixed at length upon +so confused a page that she surely must have scribbled it when she was +tipsy. The purport was, however, that while Mr. Smith and Edward +Spencer were heating their young blood with wine a quarrel had flashed +up between them, and Mr. Smith, in deadly wrath, had flung a bottle at +Spencer’s head. True, it missed its aim and merely smashed a +looking-glass; and the next morning, when the incident was imperfectly +remembered, they had shaken hands with a hearty laugh. Yet, again, +while Memory was reading, Conscience unveiled her face, struck a dagger +to the heart of Mr. Smith and quelled his remonstrance with her iron +frown. The pain was quite excruciating. + +Some of the pictures had been painted with so doubtful a touch, and in +colors so faint and pale, that the subjects could barely be +conjectured. A dull, semi-transparent mist had been thrown over the +surface of the canvas, into which the figures seemed to vanish while +the eye sought most earnestly to fix them. But in every scene, however +dubiously portrayed, Mr. Smith was invariably haunted by his own +lineaments at various ages as in a dusty mirror. After poring several +minutes over one of these blurred and almost indistinguishable +pictures, he began to see that the painter had intended to represent +him, now in the decline of life, as stripping the clothes from the +backs of three half-starved children. “Really, this puzzles me!” quoth +Mr. Smith, with the irony of conscious rectitude. “Asking pardon of the +painter, I pronounce him a fool as well as a scandalous knave. A man of +my standing in the world to be robbing little children of their +clothes! Ridiculous!” + +But while he spoke Memory had searched her fatal volume and found a +page which with her sad calm voice she poured into his ear. It was not +altogether inapplicable to the misty scene. It told how Mr. Smith had +been grievously tempted by many devilish sophistries, on the ground of +a legal quibble, to commence a lawsuit against three orphan-children, +joint-heirs to a considerable estate. Fortunately, before he was quite +decided, his claims had turned out nearly as devoid of law as justice. +As Memory ceased to read Conscience again thrust aside her mantle, and +would have struck her victim with the envenomed dagger only that he +struggled and clasped his hands before his heart. Even then, however, +he sustained an ugly gash. + +Why should we follow Fancy through the whole series of those awful +pictures? Painted by an artist of wondrous power and terrible +acquaintance with the secret soul, they embodied the ghosts of all the +never-perpetrated sins that had glided through the lifetime of Mr. +Smith. And could such beings of cloudy fantasy, so near akin to +nothingness, give valid evidence against him at the day of judgment? Be +that the case or not, there is reason to believe that one truly +penitential tear would have washed away each hateful picture and left +the canvas white as snow. But Mr. Smith, at a prick of Conscience too +keen to be endured, bellowed aloud with impatient agony, and suddenly +discovered that his three guests were gone. There he sat alone, a +silver-haired and highly-venerated old man, in the rich gloom of the +crimsoned-curtained room, with no box of pictures on the table, but +only a decanter of most excellent Madeira. Yet his heart still seemed +to fester with the venom of the dagger. + +Nevertheless, the unfortunate old gentleman might have argued the +matter with Conscience and alleged many reasons wherefore she should +not smite him so pitilessly. Were we to take up his cause, it should be +somewhat in the following fashion. A scheme of guilt, till it be put in +execution, greatly resembles a train of incidents in a projected tale. +The latter, in order to produce a sense of reality in the reader’s +mind, must be conceived with such proportionate strength by the author +as to seem in the glow of fancy more like truth, past, present or to +come, than purely fiction. The prospective sinner, on the other hand, +weaves his plot of crime, but seldom or never feels a perfect certainty +that it will be executed. There is a dreaminess diffused about his +thoughts; in a dream, as it were, he strikes the death-blow into his +victim’s heart and starts to find an indelible blood-stain on his hand. +Thus a novel-writer or a dramatist, in creating a villain of romance +and fitting him with evil deeds, and the villain of actual life in +projecting crimes that will be perpetrated, may almost meet each other +halfway between reality and fancy. It is not until the crime is +accomplished that Guilt clenches its gripe upon the guilty heart and +claims it for his own. Then, and not before, sin is actually felt and +acknowledged, and, if unaccompanied by repentance, grows a thousandfold +more virulent by its self-consciousness. Be it considered, also, that +men often overestimate their capacity for evil. At a distance, while +its attendant circumstances do not press upon their notice and its +results are dimly seen, they can bear to contemplate it. They may take +the steps which lead to crime, impelled by the same sort of mental +action as in working out a mathematical problem, yet be powerless with +compunction at the final moment. They knew not what deed it was that +they deemed themselves resolved to do. In truth, there is no such thing +in man’s nature as a settled and full resolve, either for good or evil, +except at the very moment of execution. Let us hope, therefore, that +all the dreadful consequences of sin will not be incurred unless the +act have set its seal upon the thought. + +Yet, with the slight fancy-work which we have framed, some sad and +awful truths are interwoven. Man must not disclaim his brotherhood even +with the guiltiest, since, though his hand be clean, his heart has +surely been polluted by the flitting phantoms of iniquity. He must feel +that when he shall knock at the gate of heaven no semblance of an +unspotted life can entitle him to entrance there. Penitence must kneel +and Mercy come from the footstool of the throne, or that golden gate +will never open. + + + + +DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT + + +That very singular man old Dr. Heidegger once invited four venerable +friends to meet him in his study. There were three white-bearded +gentlemen—Mr. Medbourne, Colonel Killigrew and Mr. Gascoigne—and a +withered gentlewoman whose name was the widow Wycherly. They were all +melancholy old creatures who had been unfortunate in life, and whose +greatest misfortune it was that they were not long ago in their graves. +Mr. Medbourne, in the vigor of his age, had been a prosperous merchant, +but had lost his all by a frantic speculation, and was now little +better than a mendicant. Colonel Killigrew had wasted his best years +and his health and substance in the pursuit of sinful pleasures which +had given birth to a brood of pains, such as the gout and divers other +torments of soul and body. Mr. Gascoigne was a ruined politician, a man +of evil fame—or, at least, had been so till time had buried him from +the knowledge of the present generation and made him obscure instead of +infamous. As for the widow Wycherly, tradition tells us that she was a +great beauty in her day, but for a long while past she had lived in +deep seclusion on account of certain scandalous stories which had +prejudiced the gentry of the town against her. It is a circumstance +worth mentioning that each of these three old gentlemen—Mr. Medbourne, +Colonel Killigrew and Mr. Gascoigne—were early lovers of the widow +Wycherly, and had once been on the point of cutting each other’s +throats for her sake. And before proceeding farther I will merely hint +that Dr. Heidegger and all his four guests were sometimes thought to be +a little beside themselves, as is not infrequently the case with old +people when worried either by present troubles or woeful recollections. + +“My dear old friends,” said Dr. Heidegger, motioning them to be seated, +“I am desirous of your assistance in one of those little experiments +with which I amuse myself here in my study.” + +If all stories were true, Dr. Heidegger’s study must have been a very +curious place. It was a dim, old-fashioned chamber festooned with +cobwebs and besprinkled with antique dust. Around the walls stood +several oaken bookcases, the lower shelves of which were filled with +rows of gigantic folios and black-letter quartos, and the upper with +little parchment-covered duodecimos. Over the central bookcase was a +bronze bust of Hippocrates, with which, according to some authorities, +Dr. Heidegger was accustomed to hold consultations in all difficult +cases of his practice. In the obscurest corner of the room stood a tall +and narrow oaken closet with its door ajar, within which doubtfully +appeared a skeleton. Between two of the bookcases hung a looking-glass, +presenting its high and dusty plate within a tarnished gilt frame. +Among many wonderful stories related of this mirror, it was fabled that +the spirits of all the doctor’s deceased patients dwelt within its +verge and would stare him in the face whenever he looked thitherward. +The opposite side of the chamber was ornamented with the full-length +portrait of a young lady arrayed in the faded magnificence of silk, +satin and brocade, and with a visage as faded as her dress. Above half +a century ago Dr. Heidegger had been on the point of marriage with this +young lady, but, being affected with some slight disorder, she had +swallowed one of her lover’s prescriptions and died on the +bridal-evening. The greatest curiosity of the study remains to be +mentioned: it was a ponderous folio volume bound in black leather, with +massive silver clasps. There were no letters on the back, and nobody +could tell the title of the book. But it was well known to be a book of +magic, and once, when a chambermaid had lifted it merely to brush away +the dust, the skeleton had rattled in its closet, the picture of the +young lady had stepped one foot upon the floor and several ghastly +faces had peeped forth from the mirror, while the brazen head of +Hippocrates frowned and said, “Forbear!” + +Such was Dr. Heidegger’s study. On the summer afternoon of our tale a +small round table as black as ebony stood in the centre of the room, +sustaining a cut-glass vase of beautiful form and elaborate +workmanship. The sunshine came through the window between the heavy +festoons of two faded damask curtains and fell directly across this +vase, so that a mild splendor was reflected from it on the ashen +visages of the five old people who sat around. Four champagne-glasses +were also on the table. + +“My dear old friends,” repeated Dr. Heidegger, “may I reckon on your +aid in performing an exceedingly curious experiment?” + +Now, Dr. Heidegger was a very strange old gentleman whose eccentricity +had become the nucleus for a thousand fantastic stories. Some of these +fables—to my shame be it spoken—might possibly be traced back to mine +own veracious self; and if any passages of the present tale should +startle the reader’s faith, I must be content to bear the stigma of a +fiction-monger. + +When the doctor’s four guests heard him talk of his proposed +experiment, they anticipated nothing more wonderful than the murder of +a mouse in an air-pump or the examination of a cobweb by the +microscope, or some similar nonsense with which he was constantly in +the habit of pestering his intimates. But without waiting for a reply +Dr. Heidegger hobbled across the chamber and returned with the same +ponderous folio bound in black leather which common report affirmed to +be a book of magic. Undoing the silver clasps, he opened the volume and +took from among its black-letter pages a rose, or what was once a rose, +though now the green leaves and crimson petals had assumed one brownish +hue and the ancient flower seemed ready to crumble to dust in the +doctor’s hands. + +“This rose,” said Dr. Heidegger, with a sigh—“this same withered and +crumbling flower—blossomed five and fifty years ago. It was given me by +Sylvia Ward, whose portrait hangs yonder, and I meant to wear it in my +bosom at our wedding. Five and fifty years it has been treasured +between the leaves of this old volume. Now, would you deem it possible +that this rose of half a century could ever bloom again?” + +“Nonsense!” said the widow Wycherly, with a peevish toss of her head. +“You might as well ask whether an old woman’s wrinkled face could ever +bloom again.” + +“See!” answered Dr. Heidegger. He uncovered the vase and threw the +faded rose into the water which it contained. At first it lay lightly +on the surface of the fluid, appearing to imbibe none of its moisture. +Soon, however, a singular change began to be visible. The crushed and +dried petals stirred and assumed a deepening tinge of crimson, as if +the flower were reviving from a deathlike slumber, the slender stalk +and twigs of foliage became green, and there was the rose of half a +century, looking as fresh as when Sylvia Ward had first given it to her +lover. It was scarcely full-blown, for some of its delicate red leaves +curled modestly around its moist bosom, within which two or three +dewdrops were sparkling. + +“That is certainly a very pretty deception,” said the doctor’s +friends—carelessly, however, for they had witnessed greater miracles at +a conjurer’s show. “Pray, how was it effected?” + +“Did you never hear of the Fountain of Youth?” asked Dr. Heidegger, +“which Ponce de Leon, the Spanish adventurer, went in search of two or +three centuries ago?” + +“But did Ponce de Leon ever find it?” said the widow Wycherly. + +“No,” answered Dr. Heidegger, “for he never sought it in the right +place. The famous Fountain of Youth, if I am rightly informed, is +situated in the southern part of the Floridian peninsula, not far from +Lake Macaco. Its source is overshadowed by several gigantic magnolias +which, though numberless centuries old, have been kept as fresh as +violets by the virtues of this wonderful water. An acquaintance of +mine, knowing my curiosity in such matters, has sent me what you see in +the vase.” + +“Ahem!” said Colonel Killigrew, who believed not a word of the doctor’s +story; “and what may be the effect of this fluid on the human frame?” + +“You shall judge for yourself, my dear colonel,” replied Dr. +Heidegger.—“And all of you, my respected friends, are welcome to so +much of this admirable fluid as may restore to you the bloom of youth. +For my own part, having had much trouble in growing old, I am in no +hurry to grow young again. With your permission, therefore, I will +merely watch the progress of the experiment.” + +While he spoke Dr. Heidegger had been filling the four +champagne-glasses with the water of the Fountain of Youth. It was +apparently impregnated with an effervescent gas, for little bubbles +were continually ascending from the depths of the glasses and bursting +in silvery spray at the surface. As the liquor diffused a pleasant +perfume, the old people doubted not that it possessed cordial and +comfortable properties, and, though utter sceptics as to its +rejuvenescent power, they were inclined to swallow it at once. But Dr. +Heidegger besought them to stay a moment. + +“Before you drink, my respectable old friends,” said he, “it would be +well that, with the experience of a lifetime to direct you, you should +draw up a few general rules for your guidance in passing a second time +through the perils of youth. Think what a sin and shame it would be if, +with your peculiar advantages, you should not become patterns of virtue +and wisdom to all the young people of the age!” + +The doctor’s four venerable friends made him no answer except by a +feeble and tremulous laugh, so very ridiculous was the idea that, +knowing how closely Repentance treads behind the steps of Error, they +should ever go astray again. + +“Drink, then,” said the doctor, bowing; “I rejoice that I have so well +selected the subjects of my experiment.” + +With palsied hands they raised the glasses to their lips. The liquor, +if it really possessed such virtues as Dr. Heidegger imputed to it, +could not have been bestowed on four human beings who needed it more +woefully. They looked as if they had never known what youth or pleasure +was, but had been the offspring of Nature’s dotage, and always the +gray, decrepit, sapless, miserable creatures who now sat stooping round +the doctor’s table without life enough in their souls or bodies to be +animated even by the prospect of growing young again. They drank off +the water and replaced their glasses on the table. + +Assuredly, there was an almost immediate improvement in the aspect of +the party—not unlike what might have been produced by a glass of +generous wine—together with a sudden glow of cheerful sunshine, +brightening over all their visages at once. There was a healthful +suffusion on their cheeks instead of the ashen hue that had made them +look so corpse-like. They gazed at one another, and fancied that some +magic power had really begun to smooth away the deep and sad +inscriptions which Father Time had been so long engraving on their +brows. The widow Wycherly adjusted her cap, for she felt almost like a +woman again. + +“Give us more of this wondrous water,” cried they, eagerly. “We are +younger, but we are still too old. Quick! give us more!” + +“Patience, patience!” quoth Dr. Heidegger, who sat, watching the +experiment with philosophic coolness. “You have been a long time +growing old; surely you might be content to grow young in half an hour. +But the water is at your service.” Again he filled their glasses with +the liquor of youth, enough of which still remained in the vase to turn +half the old people in the city to the age of their own grandchildren. + +While the bubbles were yet sparkling on the brim the doctor’s four +guests snatched their glasses from the table and swallowed the contents +at a single gulp. Was it delusion? Even while the draught was passing +down their throats it seemed to have wrought a change on their whole +systems. Their eyes grew clear and bright; a dark shade deepened among +their silvery locks: they sat around the table three gentlemen of +middle age and a woman hardly beyond her buxom prime. + +“My dear widow, you are charming!” cried Colonel Killigrew, whose eyes +had been fixed upon her face while the shadows of age were flitting +from it like darkness from the crimson daybreak. + +The fair widow knew of old that Colonel Killigrew’s compliments were +not always measured by sober truth; so she started up and ran to the +mirror, still dreading that the ugly visage of an old woman would meet +her gaze. + +Meanwhile, the three gentlemen behaved in such a manner as proved that +the water of the Fountain of Youth possessed some intoxicating +qualities—unless, indeed, their exhilaration of spirits were merely a +lightsome dizziness caused by the sudden removal of the weight of +years. Mr. Gascoigne’s mind seemed to run on political topics, but +whether relating to the past, present or future could not easily be +determined, since the same ideas and phrases have been in vogue these +fifty years. Now he rattled forth full-throated sentences about +patriotism, national glory and the people’s right; now he muttered some +perilous stuff or other in a sly and doubtful whisper, so cautiously +that even his own conscience could scarcely catch the secret; and now, +again, he spoke in measured accents and a deeply-deferential tone, as +if a royal ear were listening to his well-turned periods. Colonel +Killigrew all this time had been trolling forth a jolly bottle-song and +ringing his glass in symphony with the chorus, while his eyes wandered +toward the buxom figure of the widow Wycherly. On the other side of the +table, Mr. Medbourne was involved in a calculation of dollars and cents +with which was strangely intermingled a project for supplying the East +Indies with ice by harnessing a team of whales to the polar icebergs. +As for the widow Wycherly, she stood before the mirror courtesying and +simpering to her own image and greeting it as the friend whom she loved +better than all the world besides. She thrust her face close to the +glass to see whether some long-remembered wrinkle or crow’s-foot had +indeed vanished; she examined whether the snow had so entirely melted +from her hair that the venerable cap could be safely thrown aside. At +last, turning briskly away, she came with a sort of dancing step to the +table. + +“My dear old doctor,” cried she, “pray favor me with another glass.” + +“Certainly, my dear madam—certainly,” replied the complaisant doctor. +“See! I have already filled the glasses.” + +There, in fact, stood the four glasses brimful of this wonderful water, +the delicate spray of which, as it effervesced from the surface, +resembled the tremulous glitter of diamonds. + +It was now so nearly sunset that the chamber had grown duskier than +ever, but a mild and moonlike splendor gleamed from within the vase and +rested alike on the four guests and on the doctor’s venerable figure. +He sat in a high-backed, elaborately-carved oaken arm-chair with a gray +dignity of aspect that might have well befitted that very Father Time +whose power had never been disputed save by this fortunate company. +Even while quaffing the third draught of the Fountain of Youth, they +were almost awed by the expression of his mysterious visage. But the +next moment the exhilarating gush of young life shot through their +veins. They were now in the happy prime of youth. Age, with its +miserable train of cares and sorrows and diseases, was remembered only +as the trouble of a dream from which they had joyously awoke. The fresh +gloss of the soul, so early lost and without which the world’s +successive scenes had been but a gallery of faded pictures, again threw +its enchantment over all their prospects. They felt like new-created +beings in a new-created universe. + +“We are young! We are young!” they cried, exultingly. + +Youth, like the extremity of age, had effaced the strongly-marked +characteristics of middle life and mutually assimilated them all. They +were a group of merry youngsters almost maddened with the exuberant +frolicsomeness of their years. The most singular effect of their gayety +was an impulse to mock the infirmity and decrepitude of which they had +so lately been the victims. They laughed loudly at their old-fashioned +attire—the wide-skirted coats and flapped waistcoats of the young men +and the ancient cap and gown of the blooming girl. One limped across +the floor like a gouty grandfather; one set a pair of spectacles +astride of his nose and pretended to pore over the black-letter pages +of the book of magic; a third seated himself in an arm-chair and strove +to imitate the venerable dignity of Dr. Heidegger. Then all shouted +mirthfully and leaped about the room. + +The widow Wycherly—if so fresh a damsel could be called a widow—tripped +up to the doctor’s chair with a mischievous merriment in her rosy face. + +“Doctor, you dear old soul,” cried she, “get up and dance with me;” and +then the four young people laughed louder than ever to think what a +queer figure the poor old doctor would cut. + +“Pray excuse me,” answered the doctor, quietly. “I am old and +rheumatic, and my dancing-days were over long ago. But either of these +gay young gentlemen will be glad of so pretty a partner.” + +“Dance with me, Clara,” cried Colonel Killigrew. + +“No, no! I will be her partner,” shouted Mr. Gascoigne. + +“She promised me her hand fifty years ago,” exclaimed Mr. Medbourne. + +They all gathered round her. One caught both her hands in his +passionate grasp, another threw his arm about her waist, the third +buried his hand among the glossy curls that clustered beneath the +widow’s cap. Blushing, panting, struggling, chiding, laughing, her warm +breath fanning each of their faces by turns, she strove to disengage +herself, yet still remained in their triple embrace. Never was there a +livelier picture of youthful rivalship, with bewitching beauty for the +prize. Yet, by a strange deception, owing to the duskiness of the +chamber and the antique dresses which they still wore, the tall mirror +is said to have reflected the figures of the three old, gray, withered +grand-sires ridiculously contending for the skinny ugliness of a +shrivelled grandam. But they were young: their burning passions proved +them so. + +Inflamed to madness by the coquetry of the girl-widow, who neither +granted nor quite withheld her favors, the three rivals began to +interchange threatening glances. Still keeping hold of the fair prize, +they grappled fiercely at one another’s throats. As they struggled to +and fro the table was overturned and the vase dashed into a thousand +fragments. The precious Water of Youth flowed in a bright stream across +the floor, moistening the wings of a butterfly which, grown old in the +decline of summer, had alighted there to die. The insect fluttered +lightly through the chamber and settled on the snowy head of Dr. +Heidegger. + +“Come, come, gentlemen! Come, Madam Wycherly!” exclaimed the doctor. “I +really must protest against this riot.” + +They stood still and shivered, for it seemed as if gray Time were +calling them back from their sunny youth far down into the chill and +darksome vale of years. They looked at old Dr. Heidegger, who sat in +his carved armchair holding the rose of half a century, which he had +rescued from among the fragments of the shattered vase. At the motion +of his hand the four rioters resumed their seats—the more readily +because their violent exertions had wearied them, youthful though they +were. + +“My poor Sylvia’s rose!” ejaculated Dr. Heidegger, holding it in the +light of the sunset clouds. “It appears to be fading again.” + +And so it was. Even while the party were looking at it the flower +continued to shrivel up, till it became as dry and fragile as when the +doctor had first thrown it into the vase. He shook off the few drops of +moisture which clung to its petals. + +“I love it as well thus as in its dewy freshness,” observed he, +pressing the withered rose to his withered lips. + +While he spoke the butterfly fluttered down from the doctor’s snowy +head and fell upon the floor. His guests shivered again. A strange +dullness—whether of the body or spirit they could not tell—was creeping +gradually over them all. They gazed at one another, and fancied that +each fleeting moment snatched away a charm and left a deepening furrow +where none had been before. Was it an illusion? Had the changes of a +lifetime been crowded into so brief a space, and were they now four +aged people sitting with their old friend Dr. Heidegger? + +“Are we grown old again so soon?” cried they, dolefully. + +In truth, they had. The Water of Youth possessed merely a virtue more +transient than that of wine; the delirium which it created had +effervesced away. Yes, they were old again. With a shuddering impulse +that showed her a woman still, the widow clasped her skinny hands +before her face and wished that the coffin-lid were over it, since it +could be no longer beautiful. + +“Yes, friends, ye are old again,” said Dr. Heidegger, “and, lo! the +Water of Youth is all lavished on the ground. Well, I bemoan it not; +for if the fountain gushed at my very doorstep, I would not stoop to +bathe my lips in it—no, though its delirium were for years instead of +moments. Such is the lesson ye have taught me.” + +But the doctor’s four friends had taught no such lesson to themselves. +They resolved forthwith to make a pilgrimage to Florida and quaff at +morning, noon and night from the Fountain of Youth. + + + + +Legends of the Province-House + + + + +I. +HOWE’S MASQUERADE + + +One afternoon last summer, while walking along Washington street, my +eye was attracted by a sign-board protruding over a narrow archway +nearly opposite the Old South Church. The sign represented the front of +a stately edifice which was designated as the “OLD PROVINCE HOUSE, kept +by Thomas Waite.” I was glad to be thus reminded of a purpose, long +entertained, of visiting and rambling over the mansion of the old royal +governors of Massachusetts, and, entering the arched passage which +penetrated through the middle of a brick row of shops, a few steps +transported me from the busy heart of modern Boston into a small and +secluded court-yard. One side of this space was occupied by the square +front of the Province House, three stories high and surmounted by a +cupola, on the top of which a gilded Indian was discernible, with his +bow bent and his arrow on the string, as if aiming at the weathercock +on the spire of the Old South. The figure has kept this attitude for +seventy years or more, ever since good Deacon Drowne, a cunning carver +of wood, first stationed him on his long sentinel’s watch over the +city. + +The Province House is constructed of brick, which seems recently to +have been overlaid with a coat of light-colored paint. A flight of red +freestone steps fenced in by a balustrade of curiously wrought iron +ascends from the court-yard to the spacious porch, over which is a +balcony with an iron balustrade of similar pattern and workmanship to +that beneath. These letters and figures—“16 P.S. 79”—are wrought into +the ironwork of the balcony, and probably express the date of the +edifice, with the initials of its founder’s name. + +A wide door with double leaves admitted me into the hall or entry, on +the right of which is the entrance to the bar-room. It was in this +apartment, I presume, that the ancient governors held their levees with +vice-regal pomp, surrounded by the military men, the counsellors, the +judges, and other officers of the Crown, while all the loyalty of the +province thronged to do them honor. But the room in its present +condition cannot boast even of faded magnificence. The panelled +wainscot is covered with dingy paint and acquires a duskier hue from +the deep shadow into which the Province House is thrown by the brick +block that shuts it in from Washington street. A ray of sunshine never +visits this apartment any more than the glare of the festal torches +which have been extinguished from the era of the Revolution. The most +venerable and ornamental object is a chimney-piece set round with Dutch +tiles of blue-figured china, representing scenes from Scripture, and, +for aught I know, the lady of Pownall or Bernard may have sat beside +this fireplace and told her children the story of each blue tile. A bar +in modern style, well replenished with decanters, bottles, cigar-boxes +and network bags of lemons, and provided with a beer-pump and a +soda-fount, extends along one side of the room. + +At my entrance an elderly person was smacking his lips with a zest +which satisfied me that the cellars of the Province House still hold +good liquor, though doubtless of other vintages than were quaffed by +the old governors. After sipping a glass of port-sangaree prepared by +the skilful hands of Mr. Thomas Waite, I besought that worthy successor +and representative of so many historic personages to conduct me over +their time-honored mansion. He readily complied, but, to confess the +truth, I was forced to draw strenuously upon my imagination in order to +find aught that was interesting in a house which, without its historic +associations, would have seemed merely such a tavern as is usually +favored by the custom of decent city boarders and old-fashioned country +gentlemen. The chambers, which were probably spacious in former times, +are now cut up by partitions and subdivided into little nooks, each +affording scanty room for the narrow bed and chair and dressing-table +of a single lodger: The great staircase, however, may be termed, +without much hyperbole, a feature of grandeur and magnificence. It +winds through the midst of the house by flights of broad steps, each +flight terminating in a square landing-place, whence the ascent is +continued toward the cupola. A carved balustrade, freshly painted in +the lower stories, but growing dingier as we ascend, borders the +staircase with its quaintly twisted and intertwined pillars, from top +to bottom. Up these stairs the military boots, or perchance the gouty +shoes, of many a governor have trodden as the wearers mounted to the +cupola which afforded them so wide a view over their metropolis and the +surrounding country. The cupola is an octagon with several windows, and +a door opening upon the roof. From this station, as I pleased myself +with imagining, Gage may have beheld his disastrous victory on Bunker +Hill (unless one of the tri-mountains intervened), and Howe have marked +the approaches of Washington’s besieging army, although the buildings +since erected in the vicinity have shut out almost every object save +the steeple of the Old South, which seems almost within arm’s length. +Descending from the cupola, I paused in the garret to observe the +ponderous white-oak framework, so much more massive than the frames of +modern houses, and thereby resembling an antique skeleton. The brick +walls, the materials of which were imported from Holland, and the +timbers of the mansion, are still as sound as ever, but, the floors and +other interior parts being greatly decayed, it is contemplated to gut +the whole and build a new house within the ancient frame-and brickwork. +Among other inconveniences of the present edifice, mine host mentioned +that any jar or motion was apt to shake down the dust of ages out of +the ceiling of one chamber upon the floor of that beneath it. + +We stepped forth from the great front window into the balcony where in +old times it was doubtless the custom of the king’s representative to +show himself to a loyal populace, requiting their huzzas and tossed-up +hats with stately bendings of his dignified person. In those days the +front of the Province House looked upon the street, and the whole site +now occupied by the brick range of stores, as well as the present +court-yard, was laid out in grass-plats overshadowed by trees and +bordered by a wrought-iron fence. Now the old aristocratic edifice +hides its time-worn visage behind an upstart modern building; at one of +the back windows I observed some pretty tailoresses sewing and chatting +and laughing, with now and then a careless glance toward the balcony. +Descending thence, we again entered the bar-room, where the elderly +gentleman above mentioned—the smack of whose lips had spoken so +favorably for Mr. Waite’s good liquor—was still lounging in his chair. +He seemed to be, if not a lodger, at least a familiar visitor of the +house who might be supposed to have his regular score at the bar, his +summer seat at the open window and his prescriptive corner at the +winter’s fireside. Being of a sociable aspect, I ventured to address +him with a remark calculated to draw forth his historical +reminiscences, if any such were in his mind, and it gratified me to +discover that, between memory and tradition, the old gentleman was +really possessed of some very pleasant gossip about the Province House. +The portion of his talk which chiefly interested me was the outline of +the following legend. He professed to have received it at one or two +removes from an eye-witness, but this derivation, together with the +lapse of time, must have afforded opportunities for many variations of +the narrative; so that, despairing of literal and absolute truth, I +have not scrupled to make such further changes as seemed conducive to +the reader’s profit and delight. + + +At one of the entertainments given at the province-house during the +latter part of the siege of Boston there passed a scene which has never +yet been satisfactorily explained. The officers of the British army and +the loyal gentry of the province, most of whom were collected within +the beleaguered town, had been invited to a masqued ball, for it was +the policy for Sir William Howe to hide the distress and danger of the +period and the desperate aspect of the siege under an ostentation of +festivity. The spectacle of this evening, if the oldest members of the +provincial court circle might be believed, was the most gay and +gorgeous affair that had occurred in the annals of the government. The +brilliantly-lighted apartments were thronged with figures that seemed +to have stepped from the dark canvas of historic portraits or to have +flitted forth from the magic pages of romance, or at least to have +flown hither from one of the London theatres without a change of +garments. Steeled knights of the Conquest, bearded statesmen of Queen +Elizabeth and high-ruffed ladies of her court were mingled with +characters of comedy, such as a parti-colored Merry Andrew jingling his +cap and bells, a Falstaff almost as provocative of laughter as his +prototype, and a Don Quixote with a bean-pole for a lance and a pot-lid +for a shield. + +But the broadest merriment was excited by a group of figures +ridiculously dressed in old regimentals which seemed to have been +purchased at a military rag-fair or pilfered from some receptacle of +the cast-off clothes of both the French and British armies. Portions of +their attire had probably been worn at the siege of Louisburg, and the +coats of most recent cut might have been rent and tattered by sword, +ball or bayonet as long ago as Wolfe’s victory. One of these worthies—a +tall, lank figure brandishing a rusty sword of immense +longitude—purported to be no less a personage than General George +Washington, and the other principal officers of the American army, such +as Gates, Lee, Putnam, Schuyler, Ward and Heath, were represented by +similar scarecrows. An interview in the mock-heroic style between the +rebel warriors and the British commander-in-chief was received with +immense applause, which came loudest of all from the loyalists of the +colony. + +There was one of the guests, however, who stood apart, eying these +antics sternly and scornfully at once with a frown and a bitter smile. +It was an old man formerly of high station and great repute in the +province, and who had been a very famous soldier in his day. Some +surprise had been expressed that a person of Colonel Joliffe’s known +Whig principles, though now too old to take an active part in the +contest, should have remained in Boston during the siege, and +especially that he should consent to show himself in the mansion of Sir +William Howe. But thither he had come with a fair granddaughter under +his arm, and there, amid all the mirth and buffoonery, stood this stern +old figure, the best-sustained character in the masquerade, because so +well representing the antique spirit of his native land. The other +guests affirmed that Colonel Joliffe’s black puritanical scowl threw a +shadow round about him, although, in spite of his sombre influence, +their gayety continued to blaze higher, like—an ominous comparison—the +flickering brilliancy of a lamp which has but a little while to burn. + +Eleven strokes full half an hour ago had pealed from the clock of the +Old South, when a rumor was circulated among the company that some new +spectacle or pageant was about to be exhibited which should put a +fitting close to the splendid festivities of the night. + +“What new jest has Your Excellency in hand?” asked the Reverend Mather +Byles, whose Presbyterian scruples had not kept him from the +entertainment. “Trust me, sir, I have already laughed more than beseems +my cloth at your Homeric confabulation with yonder ragamuffin general +of the rebels. One other such fit of merriment, and I must throw off my +clerical wig and band.” + +“Not so, good Dr. Byles,” answered Sir William Howe; “if mirth were a +crime, you had never gained your doctorate in divinity. As to this new +foolery, I know no more about it than yourself—perhaps not so much. +Honestly, now, doctor, have you not stirred up the sober brains of some +of your countrymen to enact a scene in our masquerade?” + +“Perhaps,” slyly remarked the granddaughter of Colonel Joliffe, whose +high spirit had been stung by many taunts against New England—“perhaps +we are to have a masque of allegorical figures—Victory with trophies +from Lexington and Bunker Hill, Plenty with her overflowing horn to +typify the present abundance in this good town, and Glory with a wreath +for His Excellency’s brow.” + +Sir William Howe smiled at words which he would have answered with one +of his darkest frowns had they been uttered by lips that wore a beard. +He was spared the necessity of a retort by a singular interruption. A +sound of music was heard without the house, as if proceeding from a +full band of military instruments stationed in the street, playing, not +such a festal strain as was suited to the occasion, but a slow +funeral-march. The drums appeared to be muffled, and the trumpets +poured forth a wailing breath which at once hushed the merriment of the +auditors, filling all with wonder and some with apprehension. The idea +occurred to many that either the funeral procession of some great +personage had halted in front of the province-house, or that a corpse +in a velvet-covered and gorgeously-decorated coffin was about to be +borne from the portal. After listening a moment, Sir William Howe +called in a stern voice to the leader of the musicians, who had +hitherto enlivened the entertainment with gay and lightsome melodies. +The man was drum-major to one of the British regiments. + +“Dighton,” demanded the general, “what means this foolery? Bid your +band silence that dead march, or, by my word, they shall have +sufficient cause for their lugubrious strains. Silence it, sirrah!” + +“Please, Your Honor,” answered the drum-major, whose rubicund visage +had lost all its color, “the fault is none of mine. I and my band are +all here together, and I question whether there be a man of us that +could play that march without book. I never heard it but once before, +and that was at the funeral of his late Majesty, King George II.” + +“Well, well!” said Sir William Howe, recovering his composure; “it is +the prelude to some masquerading antic. Let it pass.” + +A figure now presented itself, but among the many fantastic masks that +were dispersed through the apartments none could tell precisely from +whence it came. It was a man in an old-fashioned dress of black serge +and having the aspect of a steward or principal domestic in the +household of a nobleman or great English landholder. This figure +advanced to the outer door of the mansion, and, throwing both its +leaves wide open, withdrew a little to one side and looked back toward +the grand staircase, as if expecting some person to descend. At the +same time, the music in the street sounded a loud and doleful summons. +The eyes of Sir William Howe and his guests being directed to the +staircase, there appeared on the uppermost landing-place, that was +discernible from the bottom, several personages descending toward the +door. The foremost was a man of stern visage, wearing a steeple-crowned +hat and a skull-cap beneath it, a dark cloak and huge wrinkled boots +that came halfway up his legs. Under his arm was a rolled-up banner +which seemed to be the banner of England, but strangely rent and torn; +he had a sword in his right hand and grasped a Bible in his left. The +next figure was of milder aspect, yet full of dignity, wearing a broad +ruff, over which descended a beard, a gown of wrought velvet and a +doublet and hose of black satin; he carried a roll of manuscript in his +hand. Close behind these two came a young man of very striking +countenance and demeanor with deep thought and contemplation on his +brow, and perhaps a flash of enthusiasm in his eye; his garb, like that +of his predecessors, was of an antique fashion, and there was a stain +of blood upon his ruff. In the same group with these were three or four +others, all men of dignity and evident command, and bearing themselves +like personages who were accustomed to the gaze of the multitude. It +was the idea of the beholders that these figures went to join the +mysterious funeral that had halted in front of the province-house, yet +that supposition seemed to be contradicted by the air of triumph with +which they waved their hands as they crossed the threshold and vanished +through the portal. + +“In the devil’s name, what is this?” muttered Sir William Howe to a +gentleman beside him. “A procession of the regicide judges of King +Charles the martyr?” + +“These,” said Colonel Joliffe, breaking silence almost for the first +time that evening—“these, if I interpret them aright, are the Puritan +governors, the rulers of the old original democracy of +Massachusetts—Endicott with the banner from which he had torn the +symbol of subjection, and Winthrop and Sir Henry Vane and Dudley, +Haynes, Bellingham and Leverett.” + +“Why had that young man a stain of blood upon his ruff?” asked Miss +Joliffe. + +“Because in after-years,” answered her grandfather, “he laid down the +wisest head in England upon the block for the principles of liberty.” + +“Will not Your Excellency order out the guard?” whispered Lord Percy, +who, with other British officers, had now assembled round the general. +“There may be a plot under this mummery.” + +“Tush! we have nothing to fear,” carelessly replied Sir William Howe. +“There can be no worse treason in the matter than a jest, and that +somewhat of the dullest. Even were it a sharp and bitter one, our best +policy would be to laugh it off. See! here come more of these gentry.” + +Another group of characters had now partly descended the staircase. The +first was a venerable and white-bearded patriarch who cautiously felt +his way downward with a staff. Treading hastily behind him, and +stretching forth his gauntleted hand as if to grasp the old man’s +shoulder, came a tall soldier-like figure equipped with a plumed cap of +steel, a bright breastplate and a long sword, which rattled against the +stairs. Next was seen a stout man dressed in rich and courtly attire, +but not of courtly demeanor; his gait had the swinging motion of a +seaman’s walk, and, chancing to stumble on the staircase, he suddenly +grew wrathful and was heard to mutter an oath. He was followed by a +noble-looking personage in a curled wig such as are represented in the +portraits of Queen Anne’s time and earlier, and the breast of his coat +was decorated with an embroidered star. While advancing to the door he +bowed to the right hand and to the left in a very gracious and +insinuating style, but as he crossed the threshold, unlike the early +Puritan governors, he seemed to wring his hands with sorrow. + +“Prithee, play the part of a chorus, good Dr. Byles,” said Sir William +Howe. “What worthies are these?” + +“If it please Your Excellency, they lived somewhat before my day,” +answered the doctor; “but doubtless our friend the colonel has been +hand and glove with them.” + +“Their living faces I never looked upon,” said Colonel Joliffe, +gravely; “although I have spoken face to face with many rulers of this +land, and shall greet yet another with an old man’s blessing ere I die. +But we talk of these figures. I take the venerable patriarch to be +Bradstreet, the last of the Puritans, who was governor at ninety or +thereabouts. The next is Sir Edmund Andros, a tyrant, as any New +England schoolboy will tell you, and therefore the people cast him down +from his high seat into a dungeon. Then comes Sir William Phipps, +shepherd, cooper, sea-captain and governor. May many of his countrymen +rise as high from as low an origin! Lastly, you saw the gracious earl +of Bellamont, who ruled us under King William.” + +“But what is the meaning of it all?” asked Lord Percy. + +“Now, were I a rebel,” said Miss Joliffe, half aloud, “I might fancy +that the ghosts of these ancient governors had been summoned to form +the funeral procession of royal authority in New England.” + +Several other figures were now seen at the turn of the staircase. The +one in advance had a thoughtful, anxious and somewhat crafty expression +of face, and in spite of his loftiness of manner, which was evidently +the result both of an ambitious spirit and of long continuance in high +stations, he seemed not incapable of cringing to a greater than +himself. A few steps behind came an officer in a scarlet and +embroidered uniform cut in a fashion old enough to have been worn by +the duke of Marlborough. His nose had a rubicund tinge, which, together +with the twinkle of his eye, might have marked him as a lover of the +wine-cup and good-fellowship; notwithstanding which tokens, he appeared +ill at ease, and often glanced around him as if apprehensive of some +secret mischief. Next came a portly gentleman wearing a coat of shaggy +cloth lined with silken velvet; he had sense, shrewdness and humor in +his face and a folio volume under his arm, but his aspect was that of a +man vexed and tormented beyond all patience and harassed almost to +death. He went hastily down, and was followed by a dignified person +dressed in a purple velvet suit with very rich embroidery; his demeanor +would have possessed much stateliness, only that a grievous fit of the +gout compelled him to hobble from stair to stair with contortions of +face and body. When Dr. Byles beheld this figure on the staircase, he +shivered as with an ague, but continued to watch him steadfastly until +the gouty gentleman had reached the threshold, made a gesture of +anguish and despair and vanished into the outer gloom, whither the +funeral music summoned him. + +“Governor Belcher—my old patron—in his very shape and dress!” gasped +Dr. Byles. “This is an awful mockery.” + +“A tedious foolery, rather,” said Sir William Howe, with an air of +indifference. “But who were the three that preceded him?” + +“Governor Dudley, a cunning politician; yet his craft once brought him +to a prison,” replied Colonel Joliffe. “Governor Shute, formerly a +colonel under Marlborough, and whom the people frightened out of the +province, and learned Governor Burnett, whom the legislature tormented +into a mortal fever.” + +“Methinks they were miserable men—these royal governors of +Massachusetts,” observed Miss Joliffe. “Heavens! how dim the light +grows!” + +It was certainly a fact that the large lamp which illuminated the +staircase now burned dim and duskily; so that several figures which +passed hastily down the stairs and went forth from the porch appeared +rather like shadows than persons of fleshly substance. + +Sir William Howe and his guests stood at the doors of the contiguous +apartments watching the progress of this singular pageant with various +emotions of anger, contempt or half-acknowledged fear, but still with +an anxious curiosity. The shapes which now seemed hastening to join the +mysterious procession were recognized rather by striking peculiarities +of dress or broad characteristics of manner than by any perceptible +resemblance of features to their prototypes. Their faces, indeed, were +invariably kept in deep shadow, but Dr. Byles and other gentlemen who +had long been familiar with the successive rulers of the province were +heard to whisper the names of Shirley, of Pownall, of Sir Francis +Bernard and of the well-remembered Hutchinson, thereby confessing that +the actors, whoever they might be, in this spectral march of governors +had succeeded in putting on some distant portraiture of the real +personages. As they vanished from the door, still did these shadows +toss their arms into the gloom of night with a dread expression of woe. +Following the mimic representative of Hutchinson came a military figure +holding before his face the cocked hat which he had taken from his +powdered head, but his epaulettes and other insignia of rank were those +of a general officer, and something in his mien reminded the beholders +of one who had recently been master of the province-house and chief of +all the land. + +“The shape of Gage, as true as in a looking-glass!” exclaimed Lord +Percy, turning pale. + +“No, surely,” cried Miss Joliffe, laughing hysterically; “it could not +be Gage, or Sir William would have greeted his old comrade in arms. +Perhaps he will not suffer the next to pass unchallenged.” + +“Of that be assured, young lady,” answered Sir William Howe, fixing his +eyes with a very marked expression upon the immovable visage of her +grandfather. “I have long enough delayed to pay the ceremonies of a +host to these departing guests; the next that takes his leave shall +receive due courtesy.” + +A wild and dreary burst of music came through the open door. It seemed +as it the procession, which had been gradually filling up its ranks, +were now about to move, and that this loud peal of the wailing trumpets +and roll of the muffled drums were a call to some loiterer to make +haste. Many eyes, by an irresistible impulse, were turned upon Sir +William Howe, as if it were he whom the dreary music summoned to the +funeral of departed power. + +“See! here comes the last,” whispered Miss Joliffe, pointing her +tremulous finger to the staircase. + +A figure had come into view as if descending the stairs, although so +dusky was the region whence it emerged some of the spectators fancied +that they had seen this human shape suddenly moulding itself amid the +gloom. Downward the figure came with a stately and martial tread, and, +reaching the lowest stair, was observed to be a tall man booted and +wrapped in a military cloak, which was drawn up around the face so as +to meet the napped brim of a laced hat; the features, therefore, were +completely hidden. But the British officers deemed that they had seen +that military cloak before, and even recognized the frayed embroidery +on the collar, as well as the gilded scabbard of a sword which +protruded from the folds of the cloak and glittered in a vivid gleam of +light. Apart from these trifling particulars there were characteristics +of gait and bearing which impelled the wondering guests to glance from +the shrouded figure to Sir William Howe, as if to satisfy themselves +that their host had not suddenly vanished from the midst of them. With +a dark flush of wrath upon his brow, they saw the general draw his +sword and advance to meet the figure in the cloak before the latter had +stepped one pace upon the floor. + +“Villain, unmuffle yourself!” cried he. “You pass no farther.” + +The figure, without blenching a hair’s-breadth from the sword which was +pointed at his breast, made a solemn pause and lowered the cape of the +cloak from about his face, yet not sufficiently for the spectators to +catch a glimpse of it. But Sir William Howe had evidently seen enough. +The sternness of his countenance gave place to a look of wild +amazement, if not horror, while he recoiled several steps from the +figure and let fall his sword upon the floor. The martial shape again +drew the cloak about his features and passed on, but, reaching the +threshold with his back toward the spectators, he was seen to stamp his +foot and shake his clenched hands in the air. It was afterward affirmed +that Sir William Howe had repeated that selfsame gesture of rage and +sorrow when for the last time, and as the last royal governor, he +passed through the portal of the province-house. + +“Hark! The procession moves,” said Miss Joliffe. + +The music was dying away along the street, and its dismal strains were +mingled with the knell of midnight from the steeple of the Old South +and with the roar of artillery which announced that the beleaguered +army of Washington had intrenched itself upon a nearer height than +before. As the deep boom of the cannon smote upon his ear Colonel +Joliffe raised himself to the full height of his aged form and smiled +sternly on the British general. + +“Would Your Excellency inquire further into the mystery of the +pageant?” said he. + +“Take care of your gray head!” cried Sir William Howe, fiercely, though +with a quivering lip. “It has stood too long on a traitor’s shoulders.” + +“You must make haste to chop it off, then,” calmly replied the colonel, +“for a few hours longer, and not all the power of Sir William Howe, nor +of his master, shall cause one of these gray hairs to fall. The empire +of Britain in this ancient province is at its last gasp to-night; +almost while I speak it is a dead corpse, and methinks the shadows of +the old governors are fit mourners at its funeral.” + +With these words Colonel Joliffe threw on his cloak, and, drawing his +granddaughter’s arm within his own, retired from the last festival that +a British ruler ever held in the old province of Massachusetts Bay. It +was supposed that the colonel and the young lady possessed some secret +intelligence in regard to the mysterious pageant of that night. However +this might be, such knowledge has never become general. The actors in +the scene have vanished into deeper obscurity than even that wild +Indian hand who scattered the cargoes of the tea-ships on the waves and +gained a place in history, yet left no names. But superstition, among +other legends of this mansion, repeats the wondrous tale that on the +anniversary night of Britain’s discomfiture the ghosts of the ancient +governors of Massachusetts still glide through the portal of the +Province House. And last of all comes a figure shrouded in a military +cloak, tossing his clenched hands into the air and stamping his +iron-shod boots upon the broad freestone steps with a semblance of +feverish despair, but without the sound of a foot-tramp. + + +When the truth-telling accents of the elderly gentleman were hushed, I +drew a long breath and looked round the room, striving with the best +energy of my imagination to throw a tinge of romance and historic +grandeur over the realities of the scene. But my nostrils snuffed up a +scent of cigar-smoke, clouds of which the narrator had emitted by way +of visible emblem, I suppose, of the nebulous obscurity of his tale. +Moreover, my gorgeous fantasies were woefully disturbed by the rattling +of the spoon in a tumbler of whiskey-punch which Mr. Thomas Waite was +mingling for a customer. Nor did it add to the picturesque appearance +of the panelled walls that the slate of the Brookline stage was +suspended against them, instead of the armorial escutcheon of some +far-descended governor. A stage-driver sat at one of the windows +reading a penny paper of the day—the Boston _Times_—and presenting a +figure which could nowise be brought into any picture of “Times in +Boston” seventy or a hundred years ago. On the window-seat lay a bundle +neatly done up in brown paper, the direction of which I had the idle +curiosity to read: “MISS SUSAN HUGGINS, at the PROVINCE HOUSE.” A +pretty chambermaid, no doubt. In truth, it is desperately hard work +when we attempt to throw the spell of hoar antiquity over localities +with which the living world and the day that is passing over us have +aught to do. Yet, as I glanced at the stately staircase down which the +procession of the old governors had descended, and as I emerged through +the venerable portal whence their figures had preceded me, it gladdened +me to be conscious of a thrill of awe. Then, diving through the narrow +archway, a few strides transported me into the densest throng of +Washington street. + + + + +II. +EDWARD RANDOLPH’S PORTRAIT + + +The old legendary guest of the Province House abode in my remembrance +from midsummer till January. One idle evening last winter, confident +that he would be found in the snuggest corner of the bar-room, I +resolved to pay him another visit, hoping to deserve well of my country +by snatching from oblivion some else unheard-of fact of history. The +night was chill and raw, and rendered boisterous by almost a gale of +wind which whistled along Washington street, causing the gaslights to +flare and flicker within the lamps. + +As I hurried onward my fancy was busy with a comparison between the +present aspect of the street and that which it probably wore when the +British governors inhabited the mansion whither I was now going. Brick +edifices in those times were few till a succession of destructive fires +had swept, and swept again, the wooden dwellings and warehouses from +the most populous quarters of the town. The buildings stood insulated +and independent, not, as now, merging their separate existences into +connected ranges with a front of tiresome identity, but each possessing +features of its own, as if the owner’s individual taste had shaped it, +and the whole presenting a picturesque irregularity the absence of +which is hardly compensated by any beauties of our modern architecture. +Such a scene, dimly vanishing from the eye by the ray of here and there +a tallow candle glimmering through the small panes of scattered +windows, would form a sombre contrast to the street as I beheld it with +the gaslights blazing from corner to corner, flaming within the shops +and throwing a noonday brightness through the huge plates of glass. But +the black, lowering sky, as I turned my eyes upward, wore, doubtless, +the same visage as when it frowned upon the ante-Revolutionary New +Englanders. The wintry blast had the same shriek that was familiar to +their ears. The Old South Church, too, still pointed its antique spire +into the darkness and was lost between earth and heaven, and, as I +passed, its clock, which had warned so many generations how transitory +was their lifetime, spoke heavily and slow the same unregarded moral to +myself. “Only seven o’clock!” thought I. “My old friend’s legends will +scarcely kill the hours ’twixt this and bedtime.” + +Passing through the narrow arch, I crossed the courtyard, the confined +precincts of which were made visible by a lantern over the portal of +the Province House. On entering the bar-room, I found, as I expected, +the old tradition-monger seated by a special good fire of anthracite, +compelling clouds of smoke from a corpulent cigar. He recognized me +with evident pleasure, for my rare properties as a patient listener +invariably make me a favorite with elderly gentlemen and ladies of +narrative propensites. Drawing a chair to the fire, I desired mine host +to favor us with a glass apiece of whiskey-punch, which was speedily +prepared, steaming hot, with a slice of lemon at the bottom, a dark-red +stratum of port wine upon the surface and a sprinkling of nutmeg strewn +over all. As we touched our glasses together, my legendary friend made +himself known to me as Mr. Bela Tiffany, and I rejoiced at the oddity +of the name, because it gave his image and character a sort of +individuality in my conception. The old gentleman’s draught acted as a +solvent upon his memory, so that it overflowed with tales, traditions, +anecdotes of famous dead people and traits of ancient manners, some of +which were childish as a nurse’s lullaby, while others might have been +worth the notice of the grave historian. Nothing impressed me more than +a story of a black mysterious picture which used to hang in one of the +chambers of the Province House, directly above the room where we were +now sitting. The following is as correct a version of the fact as the +reader would be likely to obtain from any other source, although, +assuredly, it has a tinge of romance approaching to the marvellous. + + +In one of the apartments of the province-house there was long preserved +an ancient picture the frame of which was as black as ebony, and the +canvas itself so dark with age, damp and smoke that not a touch of the +painter’s art could be discerned. Time had thrown an impenetrable veil +over it and left to tradition and fable and conjecture to say what had +once been there portrayed. During the rule of many successive governors +it had hung, by prescriptive and undisputed right, over the mantel +piece of the same chamber, and it still kept its place when +Lieutenant-governor Hutchinson assumed the administration of the +province on the departure of Sir Francis Bernard. + +The lieutenant-governor sat one afternoon resting his head against the +carved back of his stately arm-chair and gazing up thoughtfully at the +void blackness of the picture. It was scarcely a time for such inactive +musing, when affairs of the deepest moment required the ruler’s +decision; for within that very hour Hutchinson had received +intelligence of the arrival of a British fleet bringing three regiments +from Halifax to overawe the insubordination of the people. These troops +awaited his permission to occupy the fortress of Castle William and the +town itself, yet, instead of affixing his signature to an official +order, there sat the lieutenant-governor so carefully scrutinizing the +black waste of canvas that his demeanor attracted the notice of two +young persons who attended him. One, wearing a military dress of buff, +was his kinsman, Francis Lincoln, the provincial captain of Castle +William; the other, who sat on a low stool beside his chair, was Alice +Vane, his favorite niece. She was clad entirely in white—a pale, +ethereal creature who, though a native of New England, had been +educated abroad and seemed not merely a stranger from another clime, +but almost a being from another world. For several years, until left an +orphan, she had dwelt with her father in sunny Italy, and there had +acquired a taste and enthusiasm for sculpture and painting which she +found few opportunities of gratifying in the undecorated dwellings of +the colonial gentry. It was said that the early productions of her own +pencil exhibited no inferior genius, though perhaps the rude atmosphere +of New England had cramped her hand and dimmed the glowing colors of +her fancy. But, observing her uncle’s steadfast gaze, which appeared to +search through the mist of years to discover the subject of the +picture, her curiosity was excited. + +“Is it known, my dear uncle,” inquired she, “what this old picture once +represented? Possibly, could it be made visible, it might prove a +masterpiece of some great artist; else why has it so long held such a +conspicuous place?” + +As her uncle, contrary to his usual custom—for he was as attentive to +all the humors and caprices of Alice as if she had been his own +best-beloved child—did not immediately reply, the young captain of +Castle William took that office upon himself. + +“This dark old square of canvas, my fair cousin,” said he, “has been an +heirloom in the province-house from time immemorial. As to the painter, +I can tell you nothing; but if half the stories told of it be true, not +one of the great Italian masters has ever produced so marvellous a +piece of work as that before you.” + +Captain Lincoln proceeded to relate some of the strange fables and +fantasies which, as it was impossible to refute them by ocular +demonstration, had grown to be articles of popular belief in reference +to this old picture. One of the wildest, and at the same time the +best-accredited, accounts stated it to be an original and authentic +portrait of the evil one, taken at a witch-meeting near Salem, and that +its strong and terrible resemblance had been confirmed by several of +the confessing wizards and witches at their trial in open court. It was +likewise affirmed that a familiar spirit or demon abode behind the +blackness of the picture, and had shown himself at seasons of public +calamity to more than one of the royal governors. Shirley, for +instance, had beheld this ominous apparition on the eve of General +Abercrombie’s shameful and bloody defeat under the walls of +Ticonderoga. Many of the servants of the province-house had caught +glimpses of a visage frowning down upon them at morning or evening +twilight, or in the depths of night while raking up the fire that +glimmered on the hearth beneath, although, if any were, bold enough to +hold a torch before the picture, it would appear as black and +undistinguishable as ever. The oldest inhabitant of Boston recollected +that his father—in whose days the portrait had not wholly faded out of +sight—had once looked upon it, but would never suffer himself to be +questioned as to the face which was there represented. In connection +with such stories, it was remarkable that over the top of the frame +there were some ragged remnants of black silk, indicating that a veil +had formerly hung down before the picture until the duskiness of time +had so effectually concealed it. But, after all, it was the most +singular part of the affair that so many of the pompous governors of +Massachusetts had allowed the obliterated picture to remain in the +state-chamber of the province-house. + +“Some of these fables are really awful,” observed Alice Vane, who had +occasionally shuddered as well as smiled while her cousin spoke. “It +would be almost worth while to wipe away the black surface of the +canvas, since the original picture can hardly be so formidable as those +which fancy paints instead of it.” + +“But would it be possible,” inquired her cousin,” to restore this dark +picture to its pristine hues?” + +“Such arts are known in Italy,” said Alice. + +The lieutenant-governor had roused himself from his abstracted mood, +and listened with a smile to the conversation of his young relatives. +Yet his voice had something peculiar in its tones when he undertook the +explanation of the mystery. + +“I am sorry, Alice, to destroy your faith in the legends of which you +are so fond,” remarked he, “but my antiquarian researches have long +since made me acquainted with the subject of this picture—if picture it +can be called—which is no more visible, nor ever will be, than the face +of the long-buried man whom it once represented. It was the portrait of +Edward Randolph, the founder of this house, a person famous in the +history of New England.” + +“Of that Edward Randolph,” exclaimed Captain Lincoln, “who obtained the +repeal of the first provincial charter, under which our forefathers had +enjoyed almost democratic privileges—he that was styled the arch-enemy +of New England, and whose memory is still held in detestation as the +destroyer of our liberties?” + +“It was the same Randolph,” answered Hutchinson, moving uneasily in his +chair. “It was his lot to taste the bitterness of popular odium.” + +“Our annals tell us,” continued the captain of Castle William, “that +the curse of the people followed this Randolph where he went and +wrought evil in all the subsequent events of his life, and that its +effect was seen, likewise, in the manner of his death. They say, too, +that the inward misery of that curse worked itself outward and was +visible on the wretched man’s countenance, making it too horrible to be +looked upon. If so, and if this picture truly represented his aspect, +it was in mercy that the cloud of blackness has gathered over it.” + +“These traditions are folly to one who has proved, as I have, how +little of historic truth lies at the bottom,” said the +lieutenant-governor. “As regards the life and character of Edward +Randolph, too implicit credence has been given to Dr. Cotton Mather, +who—I must say it, though some of his blood runs in my veins—has filled +our early history with old women’s tales as fanciful and extravagant as +those of Greece or Rome.” + +“And yet,” whispered Alice Vane, “may not such fables have a moral? And +methinks, if the visage of this portrait be so dreadful, it is not +without a cause that it has hung so long in a chamber of the +province-house. When the rulers feel themselves irresponsible, it were +well that they should be reminded of the awful weight of a people’s +curse.” + +The lieutenant-governor started and gazed for a moment at his niece, as +if her girlish fantasies had struck upon some feeling in his own breast +which all his policy or principles could not entirely subdue. He knew, +indeed, that Alice, in spite of her foreign education, retained the +native sympathies of a New England girl. + +“Peace, silly child!” cried he, at last, more harshly than he had ever +before addressed the gentle Alice. “The rebuke of a king; is more to be +dreaded than the clamor of a wild, misguided multitude.—Captain +Lincoln, it is decided: the fortress of Castle William must be occupied +by the royal troops. The two remaining regiments shall be billeted in +the town or encamped upon the Common. It is time, after years of +tumult, and almost rebellion, that His Majesty’s government should have +a wall of strength about it.” + +“Trust, sir—trust yet a while to the loyalty of the people,” said +Captain Lincoln, “nor teach them that they can ever be on other terms +with British soldiers than those of brotherhood, as when they fought +side by side through the French war. Do not convert the streets of your +native town into a camp. Think twice before you give up old Castle +William, the key of the province, into other keeping than that of +true-born New Englanders.” + +“Young man, it is decided,” repeated Hutchinson, rising from his chair. +“A British officer will be in attendance this evening to receive the +necessary instructions for the disposal of the troops. Your presence +also will be required. Till then, farewell.” + +With these words the lieutenant-governor hastily left the room, while +Alice and her cousin more slowly followed, whispering together, and +once pausing to glance back at the mysterious picture. The captain of +Castle William fancied that the girl’s air and mien were such as might +have belonged to one of those spirits of fable—fairies or creatures of +a more antique mythology—who sometimes mingled their agency with mortal +affairs, half in caprice, yet with a sensibility to human weal or woe. +As he held the door for her to pass Alice beckoned to the picture and +smiled. + +“Come forth, dark and evil shape!” cried she. “It is thine hour.” + +In the evening Lieutenant-governor Hutchinson sat in the same chamber +where the foregoing scene had occurred, surrounded by several persons +whose various interests had summoned them together. There were the +selectmen of Boston—plain patriarchal fathers of the people, excellent +representatives of the old puritanical founders whose sombre strength +had stamped so deep an impress upon the New England character. +Contrasting with these were one or two members of council, richly +dressed in the white wigs, the embroidered waistcoats and other +magnificence of the time, and making a somewhat ostentatious display of +courtier-like ceremonial. In attendance, likewise, was a major of the +British army, awaiting the lieutenant-governor’s orders for the landing +of the troops, which still remained on board the transports. The +captain of Castle William stood beside Hutchinson’s chair, with folded +arms, glancing rather haughtily at the British officer by whom he was +soon to be superseded in his command. On a table in the centre of the +chamber stood a branched silver candlestick, throwing down the glow of +half a dozen waxlights upon a paper apparently ready for the +lieutenant-governor’s signature. + +Partly shrouded in the voluminous folds of one of the window-curtains, +which fell from the ceiling to the floor, was seen the white drapery of +a lady’s robe. It may appear strange that Alice Vane should have been +there at such a time, but there was something so childlike, so wayward, +in her singular character, so apart from ordinary rules, that her +presence did not surprise the few who noticed it. Meantime, the +chairman of the selectmen was addressing to the lieutenant-governor a +long and solemn protest against the reception of the British troops +into the town. + +“And if Your Honor,” concluded this excellent but somewhat prosy old +gentleman, “shall see fit to persist in bringing these mercenary +sworders and musketeers into our quiet streets, not on our heads be the +responsibility. Think, sir, while there is yet time, that if one drop +of blood be shed, that blood shall be an eternal stain upon Your +Honor’s memory. You, sir, have written with an able pen the deeds of +our forefathers; the more to be desired is it, therefore, that yourself +should deserve honorable mention as a true patriot and upright ruler +when your own doings shall be written down in history.” + +“I am not insensible, my good sir, to the natural desire to stand well +in the annals of my country,” replied Hutchinson, controlling his +impatience into courtesy, “nor know I any better method of attaining +that end than by withstanding the merely temporary spirit of mischief +which, with your pardon, seems to have infected older men than myself. +Would you have me wait till the mob shall sack the province-house as +they did my private mansion? Trust me, sir, the time may come when you +will be glad to flee for protection to the king’s banner, the raising +of which is now so distasteful to you.” + +“Yes,” said the British major, who was impatiently expecting the +lieutenant-governor’s orders. “The demagogues of this province have +raised the devil, and cannot lay him again. We will exorcise him in +God’s name and the king’s.” + +“If you meddle with the devil, take care of his claws,” answered the +captain of Castle William, stirred by the taunt against his countrymen. + +“Craving your pardon, young sir,” said the venerable selectman, “let +not an evil spirit enter into your words. We will strive against the +oppressor with prayer and fasting, as our forefathers would have done. +Like them, moreover, we will submit to whatever lot a wise Providence +may send us—always after our own best exertions to amend it.” + +“And there peep forth the devil’s claws!” muttered Hutchinson, who well +understood the nature of Puritan submission. “This matter shall be +expedited forthwith. When there shall be a sentinel at every corner and +a court of guard before the town-house, a loyal gentleman may venture +to walk abroad. What to me is the outcry of a mob in this remote +province of the realm? The king is my master, and England is my +country; upheld by their armed strength, I set my foot upon the rabble +and defy them.” + +He snatched a pen and was about to affix his signature to the paper +that lay on the table, when the captain of Castle William placed his +hand upon his shoulder. The freedom of the action, so contrary to the +ceremonious respect which was then considered due to rank and dignity, +awakened general surprise, and in none more than in the +lieutenant-governor himself. Looking angrily up, he perceived that his +young relative was pointing his finger to the opposite wall. +Hutchinson’s eye followed the signal, and he saw what had hitherto been +unobserved—that a black silk curtain was suspended before the +mysterious picture, so as completely to conceal it. His thoughts +immediately recurred to the scene of the preceding afternoon, and in +his surprise, confused by indistinct emotions, yet sensible that his +niece must have had an agency in this phenomenon, he called loudly upon +her: + +“Alice! Come hither, Alice!” + +No sooner had he spoken than Alice Vane glided from her station, and, +pressing one hand across her eyes, with the other snatched away the +sable curtain that concealed the portrait. An exclamation of surprise +burst from every beholder, but the lieutenant-governor’s voice had a +tone of horror. + +“By Heaven!” said he, in a low inward murmur, speaking rather to +himself than to those around him; “if the spirit of Edward Randolph +were to appear among us from the place of torment, he could not wear +more of the terrors of hell upon his face.” + +“For some wise end,” said the aged selectman, solemnly, “hath +Providence scattered away the mist of years that had so long hid this +dreadful effigy. Until this hour no living man hath seen what we +behold.” + +Within the antique frame which so recently had enclosed a sable waste +of canvas now appeared a visible picture-still dark, indeed, in its +hues and shadings, but thrown forward in strong relief. It was a +half-length figure of a gentleman in a rich but very old-fashioned +dress of embroidered velvet, with a broad ruff and a beard, and wearing +a hat the brim of which overshadowed his forehead. Beneath this cloud +the eyes had a peculiar glare which was almost lifelike. The whole +portrait started so distinctly out of the background that it had the +effect of a person looking down from the wall at the astonished and +awe-stricken spectators. The expression of the face, if any words can +convey an idea of it, was that of a wretch detected in some hideous +guilt and exposed to the bitter hatred and laughter and withering scorn +of a vast surrounding multitude. There was the struggle of defiance, +beaten down and overwhelmed by the crushing weight of ignominy. The +torture of the soul had come forth upon the countenance. It seemed as +if the picture, while hidden behind the cloud of immemorial years, had +been all the time acquiring an intenser depth and darkness of +expression, till now it gloomed forth again and threw its evil omen +over the present hour. Such, if the wild legend may be credited, was +the portrait of Edward Randolph as he appeared when a people’s curse +had wrought its influence upon his nature. + +“’Twould drive me mad, that awful face,” said Hutchinson, who seemed +fascinated by the contemplation of it. + +“Be warned, then,” whispered Alice. “He trampled on a people’s rights. +Behold his punishment, and avoid a crime like his.” + +The lieutenant-governor actually trembled for an instant, but, exerting +his energy—which was not, however, his most characteristic feature—he +strove to shake off the spell of Randolph’s countenance. + +“Girl,” cried he, laughing bitterly, as he turned to Alice, “have you +brought hither your painter’s art, your Italian spirit of intrigue, +your tricks of stage-effect, and think to influence the councils of +rulers and the affairs of nations by such shallow contrivances? See +here!” + +“Stay yet a while,” said the selectman as Hutchinson again snatched the +pen; “for if ever mortal man received a warning from a tormented soul, +Your Honor is that man.” + +“Away!” answered Hutchinson, fiercely. “Though yonder senseless picture +cried ‘Forbear!rsquo; it should not move me!” + +Casting a scowl of defiance at the pictured face—which seemed at that +moment to intensify the horror of its miserable and wicked look—he +scrawled on the paper, in characters that betokened it a deed of +desperation, the name of Thomas Hutchinson. Then, it is said, he +shuddered, as if that signature had granted away his salvation. + +“It is done,” said he, and placed his hand upon his brow. + +“May Heaven forgive the deed!” said the soft, sad accents of Alice +Vane, like the voice of a good spirit flitting away. + +When morning came, there was a stifled whisper through the household, +and spreading thence about the town, that the dark mysterious picture +had started from the wall and spoken face to face with +Lieutenant-governor Hutchinson. If such a miracle had been wrought, +however, no traces of it remained behind; for within the antique frame +nothing could be discerned save the impenetrable cloud which had +covered the canvas since the memory of man. If the figure had, indeed, +stepped forth, it had fled back, spirit-like, at the day-dawn, and +hidden itself behind a century’s obscurity. The truth probably was that +Alice Vane’s secret for restoring the hues of the picture had merely +effected a temporary renovation. But those who in that brief interval +had beheld the awful visage of Edward Randolph desired no second +glance, and ever afterward trembled at the recollection of the scene, +as if an evil spirit had appeared visibly among them. And, as for +Hutchinson, when, far over the ocean, his dying-hour drew on, he gasped +for breath and complained that he was choking with the blood of the +Boston Massacre, and Francis Lincoln, the former captain of Castle +William, who was standing at his bedside, perceived a likeness in his +frenzied look to that of Edward Randolph. Did his broken spirit feel at +that dread hour the tremendous burden of a people’s curse? + + +At the conclusion of this miraculous legend I inquired of mine host +whether the picture still remained in the chamber over our heads, but +Mr. Tiffany informed me that it had long since been removed, and was +supposed to be hidden in some out-of-the-way corner of the New England +Museum. Perchance some curious antiquary may light upon it there, and, +with the assistance of Mr. Howorth, the picture-cleaner, may supply a +not unnecessary proof of the authenticity of the facts here set down. + +During the progress of the story a storm had been gathering abroad and +raging and rattling so loudly in the upper regions of the Province +House that it seemed as if all the old governors and great men were +running riot above stairs while Mr. Bela Tiffany babbled of them below. +In the course of generations, when many people have lived and died in +an ancient house, the whistling of the wind through its crannies and +the creaking of its beams and rafters become strangely like the tones +of the human voice, or thundering laughter, or heavy footsteps treading +the deserted chambers. It is as if the echoes of half a century were +revived. Such were the ghostly sounds that roared and murmured in our +ears when I took leave of the circle round the fireside of the Province +House and, plunging down the doorsteps, fought my way homeward against +a drifting snow-storm. + + + + +III. +LADY ELEANORE’S MANTLE + + +Mine excellent friend the landlord of the Province House was pleased +the other evening to invite Mr. Tiffany and myself to an oyster-supper. +This slight mark of respect and gratitude, as he handsomely observed, +was far less than the ingenious tale-teller, and I, the humble +note-taker of his narratives, had fairly earned by the public notice +which our joint lucubrations had attracted to his establishment. Many a +cigar had been smoked within his premises, many a glass of wine or more +potent _aqua vitæ_ had been quaffed, many a dinner had been eaten, by +curious strangers who, save for the fortunate conjunction of Mr. +Tiffany and me, would never have ventured through that darksome avenue +which gives access to the historic precincts of the Province House. In +short, if any credit be due to the courteous assurances of Mr. Thomas +Waite, we had brought his forgotten mansion almost as effectually into +public view as if we had thrown down the vulgar range of shoe-shops and +dry-good stores which hides its aristocratic front from Washington +street. It may be unadvisable, however, to speak too loudly of the +increased custom of the house, lest Mr. Waite should find it difficult +to renew the lease on so favorable terms as heretofore. + +Being thus welcomed as benefactors, neither Mr. Tiffany nor myself felt +any scruple in doing full justice to the good things that were set +before us. If the feast were less magnificent than those same panelled +walls had witnessed in a bygone century; if mine host presided with +somewhat less of state than might have befitted a successor of the +royal governors; if the guests made a less imposing show than the +bewigged and powdered and embroidered dignitaries who erst banqueted at +the gubernatorial table and now sleep within their armorial tombs on +Copp’s Hill or round King’s Chapel,—yet never, I may boldly say, did a +more comfortable little party assemble in the province-house from Queen +Anne’s days to the Revolution. The occasion was rendered more +interesting by the presence of a venerable personage whose own actual +reminiscences went back to the epoch of Gage and Howe, and even +supplied him with a doubtful anecdote or two of Hutchinson. He was one +of that small, and now all but extinguished, class whose attachment to +royalty, and to the colonial institutions and customs that were +connected with it, had never yielded to the democratic heresies of +after-times. The young queen of Britain has not a more loyal subject in +her realm—perhaps not one who would kneel before her throne with such +reverential love—as this old grandsire whose head has whitened beneath +the mild sway of the republic which still in his mellower moments he +terms a usurpation. Yet prejudices so obstinate have not made him an +ungentle or impracticable companion. If the truth must be told, the +life of the aged loyalist has been of such a scrambling and unsettled +character—he has had so little choice of friends and been so often +destitute of any—that I doubt whether he would refuse a cup of kindness +with either Oliver Cromwell or John Hancock, to say nothing of any +democrat now upon the stage. In another paper of this series I may +perhaps give the reader a closer glimpse of his portrait. + +Our host in due season uncorked a bottle of Madeira of such exquisite +perfume and admirable flavor that he surely must have discovered it in +an ancient bin down deep beneath the deepest cellar where some jolly +old butler stored away the governor’s choicest wine and forgot to +reveal the secret on his death-bed. Peace to his red-nosed ghost and a +libation to his memory! This precious liquor was imbibed by Mr. Tiffany +with peculiar zest, and after sipping the third glass it was his +pleasure to give us one of the oddest legends which he had yet raked +from the storehouse where he keeps such matters. With some suitable +adornments from my own fancy, it ran pretty much as follows. + + +Not long after Colonel Shute had assumed the government of +Massachusetts Bay—now nearly a hundred and twenty years ago—a young +lady of rank and fortune arrived from England to claim his protection +as her guardian. He was her distant relative, but the nearest who had +survived the gradual extinction of her family; so that no more eligible +shelter could be found for the rich and high-born Lady Eleanore +Rochcliffe than within the province-house of a Transatlantic colony. +The consort of Governor Shute, moreover, had been as a mother to her +childhood, and was now anxious to receive her in the hope that a +beautiful young woman would be exposed to infinitely less peril from +the primitive society of New England than amid the artifices and +corruptions of a court. If either the governor or his lady had +especially consulted their own comfort, they would probably have sought +to devolve the responsibility on other hands, since with some noble and +splendid traits of character Lady Eleanore was remarkable for a harsh, +unyielding pride, a haughty consciousness of her hereditary and +personal advantages, which made her almost incapable of control. +Judging from many traditionary anecdotes, this peculiar temper was +hardly less than a monomania; or if the acts which it inspired were +those of a sane person, it seemed due from Providence that pride so +sinful should be followed by as severe a retribution. That tinge of the +marvellous which is thrown over so many of these half-forgotten legends +has probably imparted an additional wildness to the strange story of +Lady Eleanore Rochcliffe. + +The ship in which she came passenger had arrived at Newport, whence +Lady Eleanore was conveyed to Boston in the governor’s coach, attended +by a small escort of gentlemen on horseback. The ponderous equipage, +with its four black horses, attracted much notice as it rumbled through +Cornhill surrounded by the prancing steeds of half a dozen cavaliers +with swords dangling to their stirrups and pistols at their holsters. +Through the large glass windows of the coach, as it rolled along, the +people could discern the figure of Lady Eleanore, strangely combining +an almost queenly stateliness with the grace and beauty of a maiden in +her teens. A singular tale had gone abroad among the ladies of the +province that their fair rival was indebted for much of the +irresistible charm of her appearance to a certain article of dress—an +embroidered mantle—which had been wrought by the most skilful artist in +London, and possessed even magical properties of adornment. On the +present occasion, however, she owed nothing to the witchery of dress, +being clad in a riding-habit of velvet which would have appeared stiff +and ungraceful on any other form. + +The coachman reined in his four black steeds, and the whole cavalcade +came to a pause in front of the contorted iron balustrade that fenced +the province-house from the public street. It was an awkward +coincidence that the bell of the Old South was just then tolling for a +funeral; so that, instead of a gladsome peal with which it was +customary to announce the arrival of distinguished strangers, Lady +Eleanore Rochcliffe was ushered by a doleful clang, as if calamity had +come embodied in her beautiful person. + +“A very great disrespect!” exclaimed Captain Langford, an English +officer who had recently brought despatches to Governor Shute. “The +funeral should have been deferred lest Lady Eleanore’s spirits be +affected by such a dismal welcome.” + +“With your pardon, sir,” replied Dr. Clarke, a physician and a famous +champion of the popular party, “whatever the heralds may pretend, a +dead beggar must have precedence of a living queen. King Death confers +high privileges.” + +These remarks-were interchanged while the speakers waited a passage +through the crowd which had gathered on each side of the gateway, +leaving an open avenue to the portal of the province-house. A black +slave in livery now leaped from behind the coach and threw open the +door, while at the same moment Governor Shute descended the flight of +steps from his mansion to assist Lady Eleanore in alighting. But the +governor’s stately approach was anticipated in a manner that excited +general astonishment. A pale young man with his black hair all in +disorder rushed from the throng and prostrated himself beside the +coach, thus offering his person as a footstool for Lady Eleanore +Rochcliffe to tread upon. She held back an instant, yet with an +expression as if doubting whether the young man were worthy to bear the +weight of her footstep rather than dissatisfied to receive such awful +reverence from a fellow-mortal. + +“Up, sir!” said the governor, sternly, at the same time lifting his +cane over the intruder. “What means the Bedlamite by this freak?” + +“Nay,” answered Lady Eleanore, playfully, but with more scorn than pity +in her tone; “Your Excellency shall not strike him. When men seek only +to be trampled upon, it were a pity to deny them a favor so easily +granted—and so well deserved!” Then, though as lightly as a sunbeam on +a cloud, she placed her foot upon the cowering form and extended her +hand to meet that of the governor. + +There was a brief interval during which Lady Eleanore retained this +attitude, and never, surely, was there an apter emblem of aristocracy +and hereditary pride trampling on human sympathies and the kindred of +nature than these two figures presented at that moment. Yet the +spectators were so smitten with her beauty, and so essential did pride +seem to the existence of such a creature, that they gave a simultaneous +acclamation of applause. + +“Who is this insolent young fellow?” inquired Captain Langford, who +still remained beside Dr. Clarke. “If he be in his senses, his +impertinence demands the bastinado; if mad, Lady Eleanore should be +secured from further inconvenience by his confinement.” + +“His name is Jervase Helwyse,” answered the doctor—“a youth of no birth +or fortune, or other advantages save the mind and soul that nature gave +him; and, being secretary to our colonial agent in London, it was his +misfortune to meet this Lady Eleanore Rochcliffe. He loved her, and her +scorn has driven him mad.” + +“He was mad so to aspire,” observed the English officer. + +“It may be so,” said Dr. Clarke, frowning as he spoke; “but I tell you, +sir, I could wellnigh doubt the justice of the Heaven above us if no +signal humiliation overtake this lady who now treads so haughtily into +yonder mansion. She seeks to place herself above the sympathies of our +common nature, which envelops all human souls; see if that nature do +not assert its claim over her in some mode that shall bring her level +with the lowest.” + +“Never!” cried Captain Langford, indignantly—“neither in life nor when +they lay her with her ancestors.” + +Not many days afterward the governor gave a ball in honor of Lady +Eleanore Rochcliffe. The principal gentry of the colony received +invitations, which were distributed to their residences far and near by +messengers on horseback bearing missives sealed with all the formality +of official despatches. In obedience to the summons, there was a +general gathering of rank, wealth and beauty, and the wide door of the +province-house had seldom given admittance to more numerous and +honorable guests than on the evening of Lady Eleanore’s ball. Without +much extravagance of eulogy, the spectacle might even be termed +splendid, for, according to the fashion of the times, the ladies shone +in rich silks and satins outspread over wide-projecting hoops, and the +gentlemen glittered in gold embroidery laid unsparingly upon the purple +or scarlet or sky-blue velvet which was the material of their coats and +waistcoats. The latter article of dress was of great importance, since +it enveloped the wearer’s body nearly to the knees and was perhaps +bedizened with the amount of his whole year’s income in golden flowers +and foliage. The altered taste of the present day—a taste symbolic of a +deep change in the whole system of society—would look upon almost any +of those gorgeous figures as ridiculous, although that evening the +guests sought their reflections in the pier-glasses and rejoiced to +catch their own glitter amid the glittering crowd. What a pity that one +of the stately mirrors has not preserved a picture of the scene which +by the very traits that were so transitory might have taught us much +that would be worth knowing and remembering! + +Would, at least, that either painter or mirror could convey to us some +faint idea of a garment already noticed in this legend—the Lady +Eleanore’s embroidered mantle, which the gossips whispered was invested +with magic properties, so as to lend a new and untried grace to her +figure each time that she put it on! Idle fancy as it is, this +mysterious mantle has thrown an awe around my image of her, partly from +its fabled virtues and partly because it was the handiwork of a dying +woman, and perchance owed the fantastic grace of its conception to the +delirium of approaching death. + +After the ceremonial greetings had been paid, Lady Eleanore Rochcliffe +stood apart from the mob of guests, insulating herself within a small +and distinguished circle to whom she accorded a more cordial favor than +to the general throng. The waxen torches threw their radiance vividly +over the scene, bringing out its brilliant points in strong relief, but +she gazed carelessly, and with now and then an expression of weariness +or scorn tempered with such feminine grace that her auditors scarcely +perceived the moral deformity of which it was the utterance. She beheld +the spectacle not with vulgar ridicule, as disdaining to be pleased +with the provincial mockery of a court-festival, but with the deeper +scorn of one whose spirit held itself too high to participate in the +enjoyment of other human souls. Whether or no the recollections of +those who saw her that evening were influenced by the strange events +with which she was subsequently connected, so it was that her figure +ever after recurred to them as marked by something wild and unnatural, +although at the time the general whisper was of her exceeding beauty +and of the indescribable charm which her mantle threw around her. Some +close observers, indeed, detected a feverish flush and alternate +paleness of countenance, with a corresponding flow and revulsion of +spirits, and once or twice a painful and helpless betrayal of +lassitude, as if she were on the point of sinking to the ground. Then, +with a nervous shudder, she seemed to arouse her energies, and threw +some bright and playful yet half-wicked sarcasm into the conversation. +There was so strange a characteristic in her manners and sentiments +that it astonished every right-minded listener, till, looking in her +face, a lurking and incomprehensible glance and smile perplexed them +with doubts both as to her seriousness and sanity. Gradually, Lady +Eleanore Rochcliffe’s circle grew smaller, till only four gentlemen +remained in it. These were Captain Langford, the English officer before +mentioned; a Virginian planter who had come to Massachusetts on some +political errand; a young Episcopal clergyman, the grandson of a +British earl; and, lastly, the private secretary of Governor Shute, +whose obsequiousness had won a sort of tolerance from Lady Eleanore. + +At different periods of the evening the liveried servants of the +province-house passed among the guests bearing huge trays of +refreshments and French and Spanish wines. Lady Eleanore Rochcliffe, +who refused to wet her beautiful lips even with a bubble of champagne, +had sunk back into a large damask chair, apparently overwearied either +with the excitement of the scene or its tedium; and while, for an +instant, she was unconscious of voices, laughter and music, a young man +stole forward and knelt down at her feet. He bore a salver in his hand +on which was a chased silver goblet filled to the brim with wine, which +he offered as reverentially as to a crowned queen—or, rather, with the +awful devotion of a priest doing sacrifice to his idol. Conscious that +some one touched her robe, Lady Eleanore started, and unclosed her eyes +upon the pale, wild features and dishevelled hair of Jervase Helwyse. + +“Why do you haunt me thus?” said she, in a languid tone, but with a +kindlier feeling than she ordinarily permitted herself to express. +“They tell me that I have done you harm.” + +“Heaven knows if that be so,” replied the young man, solemnly. “But, +Lady Eleanore, in requital of that harm, if such there be, and for your +own earthly and heavenly welfare, I pray you to take one sip of this +holy wine and then to pass the goblet round among the guests. And this +shall be a symbol that you have not sought to withdraw yourself from +the chain of human sympathies, which whoso would shake off must keep +company with fallen angels.” + +“Where has this mad fellow stolen that sacramental vessel?” exclaimed +the Episcopal clergyman. + +This question drew the notice of the guests to the silver cup, which +was recognized as appertaining to the communion-plate of the Old South +Church, and, for aught that could be known, it was brimming over with +the consecrated wine. + +“Perhaps it is poisoned,” half whispered the governor’s secretary. + +“Pour it down the villain’s throat!” cried the Virginian, fiercely. + +“Turn him out of the house!” cried Captain Langford, seizing Jervase +Helwyse so roughly by the shoulder that the sacramental cup was +overturned and its contents sprinkled upon Lady Eleanore’s mantle. +“Whether knave, fool or Bedlamite, it is intolerable that the fellow +should go at large.” + +“Pray, gentlemen, do my poor admirer no harm,” said Lady Eleanore, with +a faint and weary smile. “Take him out of my sight, if such be your +pleasure, for I can find in my heart to do nothing but laugh at him, +whereas, in all decency and conscience, it would become me to weep for +the mischief I have wrought.” + +But while the bystanders were attempting to lead away the unfortunate +young man he broke from them and with a wild, impassioned earnestness +offered a new and equally strange petition to Lady Eleanore. It was no +other than that she should throw off the mantle, which while he pressed +the silver cup of wine upon her she had drawn more closely around her +form, so as almost to shroud herself within it. + +“Cast it from you,” exclaimed Jervase Helwyse, clasping his hands in an +agony of entreaty. “It may not yet be too late. Give the accursed +garment to the flames.” + +But Lady Eleanore, with a laugh of scorn, drew the rich folds of the +embroidered mantle over her head in such a fashion as to give a +completely new aspect to her beautiful face, which, half hidden, half +revealed, seemed to belong to some being of mysterious character and +purposes. + +“Farewell, Jervase Helwyse!” said she. “Keep my image in your +remembrance as you behold it now.” + +“Alas, lady!” he replied, in a tone no longer wild, but sad as a +funeral-bell; “we must meet shortly when your face may wear another +aspect, and that shall be the image that must abide within me.” He made +no more resistance to the violent efforts of the gentlemen and servants +who almost dragged him out of the apartment and dismissed him roughly +from the iron gate of the province-house. + +Captain Langford, who had been very active in this affair, was +returning to the presence of Lady Eleanore Rochcliffe, when he +encountered the physician, Dr. Clarke, with whom he had held some +casual talk on the day of her arrival. The doctor stood apart, +separated from Lady Eleanore by the width of the room, but eying her +with such keen sagacity that Captain Langford involuntarily gave him +credit for the discovery of some deep secret. + +“You appear to be smitten, after all, with the charms of this queenly +maiden,” said he, hoping thus to draw forth the physician’s hidden +knowledge. + +“God forbid!” answered Dr. Clarke, with a grave smile; “and if you be +wise, you will put up the same prayer for yourself. Woe to those who +shall be smitten by this beautiful Lady Eleanore! But yonder stands the +governor, and I have a word or two for his private ear. Good-night!” He +accordingly advanced to Governor Shute and addressed him in so low a +tone that none of the bystanders could catch a word of what he said, +although the sudden change of His Excellency’s hitherto cheerful visage +betokened that the communication could be of no agreeable import. A +very few moments afterward it was announced to the guests that an +unforeseen circumstance rendered it necessary to put a premature close +to the festival. + +The ball at the province-house supplied a topic of conversation for the +colonial metropolis for some days after its occurrence, and might still +longer have been the general theme, only that a subject of +all-engrossing interest thrust it for a time from the public +recollection. This was the appearance of a dreadful epidemic which in +that age, and long before and afterward, was wont to slay its hundreds +and thousands on both sides of the Atlantic. On the occasion of which +we speak it was distinguished by a peculiar virulence, insomuch that it +has left its traces—its pitmarks, to use an appropriate figure—on the +history of the country, the affairs of which were thrown into confusion +by its ravages. At first, unlike its ordinary course, the disease +seemed to confine itself to the higher circles of society, selecting +its victims from among the proud, the well-born and the wealthy, +entering unabashed into stately chambers and lying down with the +slumberers in silken beds. Some of the most distinguished guests of the +province-house—even those whom the haughty Lady Eleanore Rochcliffe had +deemed not unworthy of her favor—were stricken by this fatal scourge. +It was noticed with an ungenerous bitterness of feeling that the four +gentlemen—the Virginian, the British officer, the young clergyman and +the governor’s secretary—who had been her most devoted attendants on +the evening of the ball were the foremost on whom the plague-stroke +fell. But the disease, pursuing its onward progress, soon ceased to be +exclusively a prerogative of aristocracy. Its red brand was no longer +conferred like a noble’s star or an order of knighthood. It threaded +its way through the narrow and crooked streets, and entered the low, +mean, darksome dwellings and laid its hand of death upon the artisans +and laboring classes of the town. It compelled rich and poor to feel +themselves brethren then, and stalking to and fro across the Three +Hills with a fierceness which made it almost a new pestilence, there +was that mighty conqueror—that scourge and horror of our +forefathers—the small-pox. + +We cannot estimate the affright which this plague inspired of yore by +contemplating it as the fangless monster of the present day. We must +remember, rather, with what awe we watched the gigantic footsteps of +the Asiatic cholera striding from shore to shore of the Atlantic and +marching like Destiny upon cities far remote which flight had already +half depopulated. There is no other fear so horrible and unhumanizing +as that which makes man dread to breathe heaven’s vital air lest it be +poison, or to grasp the hand of a brother or friend lest the grip of +the pestilence should clutch him. Such was the dismay that now followed +in the track of the disease or ran before it throughout the town. +Graves were hastily dug and the pestilential relics as hastily covered, +because the dead were enemies of the living and strove to draw them +headlong, as it were, into their own dismal pit. The public councils +were suspended, as if mortal wisdom might relinquish its devices now +that an unearthly usurper had found his way into the ruler’s mansion. +Had an enemy’s fleet been hovering on the coast or his armies trampling +on our soil, the people would probably have committed their defence to +that same direful conqueror who had wrought their own calamity and +would permit no interference with his sway. This conqueror had a symbol +of his triumphs: it was a blood-red flag that fluttered in the tainted +air over the door of every dwelling into which the small-pox had +entered. + +Such a banner was long since waving over the portal of the +province-house, for thence, as was proved by tracking its footsteps +back, had all this dreadful mischief issued. It had been traced back to +a lady’s luxurious chamber, to the proudest of the proud, to her that +was so delicate and hardly owned herself of earthly mould, to the +haughty one who took her stand above human sympathies—to Lady Eleanore. +There remained no room for doubt that the contagion had lurked in that +gorgeous mantle which threw so strange a grace around her at the +festival. Its fantastic splendor had been conceived in the delirious +brain of a woman on her death-bed and was the last toil of her +stiffening fingers, which had interwoven fate and misery with its +golden threads. This dark tale, whispered at first, was now bruited far +and wide. The people raved against the Lady Eleanore and cried out that +her pride and scorn had evoked a fiend, and that between them both this +monstrous evil had been born. At times their rage and despair took the +semblance of grinning mirth; and whenever the red flag of the +pestilence was hoisted over another and yet another door, they clapped +their hands and shouted through the streets in bitter mockery: “Behold +a new triumph for the Lady Eleanore!” + +One day in the midst of these dismal times a wild figure approached the +portal of the province-house, and, folding his arms, stood +contemplating the scarlet banner, which a passing breeze shook +fitfully, as if to fling abroad the contagion that it typified. At +length, climbing one of the pillars by means of the iron balustrade, he +took down the flag, and entered the mansion waving it above his head. +At the foot of the staircase he met the governor, booted and spurred, +with his cloak drawn around him, evidently on the point of setting +forth upon a journey. + +“Wretched lunatic, what do you seek here?” exclaimed Shute, extending +his cane to guard himself from contact. “There is nothing here but +Death; back, or you will meet him.” + +“Death will not touch me, the banner-bearer of the pestilence,” cried +Jervase Helwyse, shaking the red flag aloft. “Death and the pestilence, +who wears the aspect of the Lady Eleanore, will walk through the +streets to-night, and I must march before them with this banner.” + +“Why do I waste words on the fellow?” muttered the governor, drawing +his cloak across his mouth. “What matters his miserable life, when none +of us are sure of twelve hours’ breath?—On, fool, to your own +destruction!” + +He made way for Jervase Helwyse, who immediately ascended the +staircase, but on the first landing-place was arrested by the firm +grasp of a hand upon his shoulder. Looking fiercely up with a madman’s +impulse to struggle with and rend asunder his opponent, he found +himself powerless beneath a calm, stern eye which possessed the +mysterious property of quelling frenzy at its height. The person whom +he had now encountered was the physician, Dr. Clarke, the duties of +whose sad profession had led him to the province-house, where he was an +infrequent guest in more prosperous times. + +“Young man, what is your purpose?” demanded he. + +“I seek the Lady Eleanore,” answered Jervase Helwyse, submissively. + +“All have fled from her,” said the physician. “Why do you seek her now? +I tell you, youth, her nurse fell death-stricken on the threshold of +that fatal chamber. Know ye not that never came such a curse to our +shores as this lovely Lady Eleanore, that her breath has filled the air +with poison, that she has shaken pestilence and death upon the land +from the folds of her accursed mantle?” + +“Let me look upon her,” rejoined the mad youth, more wildly. “Let me +behold her in her awful beauty, clad in the regal garments of the +pestilence. She and Death sit on a throne together; let me kneel down +before them.” + +“Poor youth!” said Dr. Clarke, and, moved by a deep sense of human +weakness, a smile of caustic humor curled his lip even then. “Wilt thou +still worship the destroyer and surround her image with fantasies the +more magnificent the more evil she has wrought? Thus man doth ever to +his tyrants. Approach, then. Madness, as I have noted, has that good +efficacy that it will guard you from contagion, and perhaps its own +cure may be found in yonder chamber.” Ascending another flight of +stairs, he threw open a door and signed to Jervase Helwyse that he +should enter. + +The poor lunatic, it seems probable, had cherished a delusion that his +haughty mistress sat in state, unharmed herself by the pestilential +influence which as by enchantment she scattered round about her. He +dreamed, no doubt, that her beauty was not dimmed, but brightened into +superhuman splendor. With such anticipations he stole reverentially to +the door at which the physician stood, but paused upon the threshold, +gazing fearfully into the gloom of the darkened chamber. + +“Where is the Lady Eleanore?” whispered he. + +“Call her,” replied the physician. + +“Lady Eleanore! princess! queen of Death!” cried Jervase Helwyse, +advancing three steps into the chamber. “She is not here. There, on +yonder table, I behold the sparkle of a diamond which once she wore +upon her bosom. There”—and he shuddered—“there hangs her mantle, on +which a dead woman embroidered a spell of dreadful potency. But where +is the Lady Eleanore?” + +Something stirred within the silken curtains of a canopied bed and a +low moan was uttered, which, listening intently, Jervase Helwyse began +to distinguish as a woman’s voice complaining dolefully of thirst. He +fancied, even, that he recognized its tones. + +“My throat! My throat is scorched,” murmured the voice. “A drop of +water!” + +“What thing art thou?” said the brain-stricken youth, drawing near the +bed and tearing asunder its curtains. “Whose voice hast thou stolen for +thy murmurs and miserable petitions, as if Lady Eleanore could be +conscious of mortal infirmity? Fie! Heap of diseased mortality, why +lurkest thou in my lady’s chamber?” + +“Oh, Jervase Helwyse,” said the voice—and as it spoke the figure +contorted itself, struggling to hide its blasted face—“look not now on +the woman you once loved. The curse of Heaven hath stricken me because +I would not call man my brother nor woman sister. I wrapped myself in +pride as in a mantle and scorned the sympathies of nature, and +therefore has Nature made this wretched body the medium of a dreadful +sympathy. You are avenged, they are all avenged, Nature is avenged; for +I am Eleanore Rochcliffe.” + +The malice of his mental disease, the bitterness lurking at the bottom +of his heart, mad as he was, for a blighted and ruined life and love +that had been paid with cruel scorn, awoke within the breast of Jervase +Helwyse. He shook his finger at the wretched girl, and the chamber +echoed, the curtains of the bed were shaken, with his outburst of +insane merriment. + +“Another triumph for the Lady Eleanore!” he cried. “All have been her +victims; who so worthy to be the final victim as herself?” Impelled by +some new fantasy of his crazed intellect, he snatched the fatal mantle +and rushed from the chamber and the house. + +That night a procession passed by torchlight through the streets, +bearing in the midst the figure of a woman enveloped with a +richly-embroidered mantle, while in advance stalked Jervase Helwyse +waving the red flag of the pestilence. Arriving opposite the +province-house, the mob burned the effigy, and a strong wind came and +swept away the ashes. It was said that from that very hour the +pestilence abated, as if its sway had some mysterious connection, from +the first plague-stroke to the last, with Lady Elcanore’s mantle. A +remarkable uncertainty broods over that unhappy lady’s fate. There is a +belief, however, that in a certain chamber of this mansion a female +form may sometimes be duskily discerned shrinking into the darkest +corner and muffling her face within an embroidered mantle. Supposing +the legend true, can this be other than the once proud Lady Eleanore? + + +Mine host and the old loyalist and I bestowed no little Warmth of +applause upon this narrative, in which we had all been deeply +interested; for the reader can scarcely conceive how unspeakably the +effect of such a tale is heightened when, as in the present case, we +may repose perfect confidence in the veracity of him who tells it. For +my own part, knowing how scrupulous is Mr. Tiffany to settle the +foundation of his facts, I could not have believed him one whit the +more faithfully had he professed himself an eyewitness of the doings +and sufferings of poor Lady Eleanore. Some sceptics, it is true, might +demand documentary evidence, or even require him to produce the +embroidered mantle, forgetting that—Heaven be praised!—it was consumed +to ashes. + +But now the old loyalist, whose blood was warmed by the good cheer, +began to talk, in his turn, about the traditions of the Province House, +and hinted that he, if it were agreeable, might add a few reminiscences +to our legendary stock. Mr. Tiffany, having no cause to dread a rival, +immediately besought him to favor us with a specimen; my own +entreaties, of course, were urged to the same effect; and our venerable +guest, well pleased to find willing auditors, awaited only the return +of Mr. Thomas Waite, who had been summoned forth to provide +accommodations for several new arrivals. Perchance the public—but be +this as its own caprice and ours shall settle the matter—may read the +result in another tale of the Province House. + + + + +IV. +OLD ESTHER DUDLEY + + +Our host having resumed the chair, he as well as Mr. Tiffany and myself +expressed much eagerness to be made acquainted with the story to which +the loyalist had alluded. That venerable man first of all saw lit to +moisten his throat with another glass of wine, and then, turning his +face toward our coal-fire, looked steadfastly for a few moments into +the depths of its cheerful glow. Finally he poured forth a great +fluency of speech. The generous liquid that he had imbibed, while it +warmed his age-chilled blood, likewise took off the chill from his +heart and mind, and gave him an energy to think and feel which we could +hardly have expected to find beneath the snows of fourscore winters. +His feelings, indeed, appeared to me more excitable than those of a +younger man—or, at least, the same degree of feeling manifested itself +by more visible effects than if his judgment and will had possessed the +potency of meridian life. At the pathetic passages of his narrative he +readily melted into tears. When a breath of indignation swept across +his spirit, the blood flushed his withered visage even to the roots of +his white hair, and he shook his clinched fist at the trio of peaceful +auditors, seeming to fancy enemies in those who felt very kindly toward +the desolate old soul. But ever and anon, sometimes in the midst of his +most earnest talk, this ancient person’s intellect would wander +vaguely, losing its hold of the matter in hand and groping for it amid +misty shadows. Then would he cackle forth a feeble laugh and express a +doubt whether his wits—for by that phrase it pleased our ancient friend +to signify his mental powers—were not getting a little the worse for +wear. + +Under these disadvantages, the old loyalist’s story required more +revision to render it fit for the public eye than those of the series +which have preceded it; nor should it be concealed that the sentiment +and tone of the affair may have undergone some slight—or perchance more +than slight—metamorphosis in its transmission to the reader through the +medium of a thoroughgoing democrat. The tale itself is a mere sketch +with no involution of plot nor any great interest of events, yet +possessing, if I have rehearsed it aright, that pensive influence over +the mind which the shadow of the old Province House flings upon the +loiterer in its court-yard. + + +The hour had come—the hour of defeat and humiliation—when Sir William +Howe was to pass over the threshold of the province-house and embark, +with no such triumphal ceremonies as he once promised himself, on board +the British fleet. He bade his servants and military attendants go +before him, and lingered a moment in the loneliness of the mansion to +quell the fierce emotions that struggled in his bosom as with a +death-throb. Preferable then would he have deemed his fate had a +warrior’s death left him a claim to the narrow territory of a grave +within the soil which the king had given him to defend. With an ominous +perception that as his departing footsteps echoed adown the staircase +the sway of Britain was passing for ever from New England, he smote his +clenched hand on his brow and cursed the destiny that had flung the +shame of a dismembered empire upon him. + +“Would to God,” cried he, hardly repressing his tears of rage, “that +the rebels were even now at the doorstep! A blood-stain upon the floor +should then bear testimony that the last British ruler was faithful to +his trust.” + +The tremulous voice of a woman replied to his exclamation. + +“Heaven’s cause and the king’s are one,” it said. “Go forth, Sir +William Howe, and trust in Heaven to bring back a royal governor in +triumph.” + +Subduing at once the passion to which he had yielded only in the faith +that it was unwitnessed, Sir William Howe became conscious that an aged +woman leaning on a gold-headed staff was standing betwixt him and the +door. It was old Esther Dudley, who had dwelt almost immemorial years +in this mansion, until her presence seemed as inseparable from it as +the recollections of its history. She was the daughter of an ancient +and once eminent family which had fallen into poverty and decay and +left its last descendant no resource save the bounty of the king, nor +any shelter except within the walls of the province-house. An office in +the household with merely nominal duties had been assigned to her as a +pretext for the payment of a small pension, the greater part of which +she expended in adorning herself with an antique magnificence of +attire. The claims of Esther Dudley’s gentle blood were acknowledged by +all the successive governors, and they treated her with the punctilious +courtesy which it was her foible to demand, not always with success, +from a neglectful world. The only actual share which she assumed in the +business of the mansion was to glide through its passages and public +chambers late at night to see that the servants had dropped no fire +from their flaring torches nor left embers crackling and blazing on the +hearths. Perhaps it was this invariable custom of walking her rounds in +the hush of midnight that caused the superstition of the times to +invest the old woman with attributes of awe and mystery, fabling that +she had entered the portal of the province-house—none knew whence—in +the train of the first royal governor, and that it was her fate to +dwell there till the last should have departed. + +But Sir William Howe, if he ever heard this legend, had forgotten it. + +“Mistress Dudley, why are you loitering here?” asked he, with some +severity of tone. “It is my pleasure to be the last in this mansion of +the king.” + +“Not so, if it please Your Excellency,” answered the time-stricken +woman. “This roof has sheltered me long; I will not pass from it until +they bear me to the tomb of my forefathers. What other shelter is there +for old Esther Dudley save the province-house or the grave?” + +“Now, Heaven forgive me!” said Sir William Howe to himself. “I was +about to leave this wretched old creature to starve or beg.—Take this, +good Mistress Dudley,” he added, putting a purse into her hands. “King +George’s head on these golden guineas is sterling yet, and will +continue so, I warrant you, even should the rebels crown John Hancock +their king. That purse will buy a better shelter than the +province-house can now afford.” + +“While the burden of life remains upon me I will have no other shelter +than this roof,” persisted Esther Dudley, striking her staff upon the +floor with a gesture that expressed immovable resolve; “and when Your +Excellency returns in triumph, I will totter into the porch to welcome +you.” + +“My poor old friend!” answered the British general, and all his manly +and martial pride could no longer restrain a gush of bitter tears. +“This is an evil hour for you and me. The province which the king +entrusted to my charge is lost. I go hence in misfortune—perchance in +disgrace—to return no more. And you, whose present being is +incorporated with the past, who have seen governor after governor in +stately pageantry ascend these steps, whose whole life has been an +observance of majestic ceremonies and a worship of the king,—how will +you endure the change? Come with us; bid farewell to a land that has +shaken off its allegiance, and live still under a royal government at +Halifax.” + +“Never! never!” said the pertinacious old dame. “Here will I abide, and +King George shall still have one true subject in his disloyal +province.” + +“Beshrew the old fool!” muttered Sir William Howe, growing impatient of +her obstinacy and ashamed of the emotion into which he had been +betrayed. “She is the very moral of old-fashioned prejudice, and could +exist nowhere but in this musty edifice.—Well, then, Mistress Dudley, +since you will needs tarry, I give the province-house in charge to you. +Take this key, and keep it safe until myself or some other royal +governor shall demand it of you.” Smiling bitterly at himself and her, +he took the heavy key of the province-house, and, delivering it into +the old lady’s hands, drew his cloak around him for departure. + +As the general glanced back at Esther Dudley’s antique figure he deemed +her well fitted for such a charge, as being so perfect a representative +of the decayed past—of an age gone by, with its manners, opinions, +faith and feelings all fallen into oblivion or scorn, of what had once +been a reality, but was now merely a vision of faded magnificence. Then +Sir William Howe strode forth, smiting his clenched hands together in +the fierce anguish of his spirit, and old Esther Dudley was left to +keep watch in the lonely province-house, dwelling there with Memory; +and if Hope ever seemed to flit around her, still it was Memory in +disguise. + +The total change of affairs that ensued on the departure of the British +troops did not drive the venerable lady from her stronghold. There was +not for many years afterward a governor of Massachusetts, and the +magistrates who had charge of such matters saw no objection to Esther +Dudley’s residence in the province-house, especially as they must +otherwise have paid a hireling for taking care of the premises, which +with her was a labor of love; and so they left her the undisturbed +mistress of the old historic edifice. Many and strange were the fables +which the gossips whispered about her in all the chimney-corners of the +town. + +Among the time-worn articles of furniture that had been left in the +mansion, there was a tall antique mirror which was well worthy of a +tale by itself, and perhaps may hereafter be the theme of one. The gold +of its heavily-wrought frame was tarnished, and its surface so blurred +that the old woman’s figure, whenever she paused before it, looked +indistinct and ghostlike. But it was the general belief that Esther +could cause the governors of the overthrown dynasty, with the beautiful +ladies who had once adorned their festivals, the Indian chiefs who had +come up to the province-house to hold council or swear allegiance, the +grim provincial warriors, the severe clergymen—in short, all the +pageantry of gone days, all the figures that ever swept across the +broad-plate of glass in former times,—she could cause the whole to +reappear and people the inner world of the mirror with shadows of old +life. Such legends as these, together with the singularity of her +isolated existence, her age and the infirmity that each added winter +flung upon her, made Mistress Dudley the object both of fear and pity, +and it was partly the result of either sentiment that, amid all the +angry license of the times, neither wrong nor insult ever fell upon her +unprotected head. Indeed, there was so much haughtiness in her demeanor +toward intruders—among whom she reckoned all persons acting under the +new authorities—that it was really an affair of no small nerve to look +her in the face. And, to do the people justice, stern republicans as +they had now become, they were well content that the old gentlewoman, +in her hoop-petticoat and faded embroidery, should still haunt the +palace of ruined pride and overthrown power, the symbol of a departed +system, embodying a history in her person. So Esther Dudley dwelt year +after year in the province-house, still reverencing all that others had +flung aside, still faithful to her king, who, so long as the venerable +dame yet held her post, might be said to retain one true subject in New +England and one spot of the empire that had been wrested from him. + +And did she dwell there in utter loneliness? Rumor said, “Not so.” +Whenever her chill and withered heart desired warmth, she was wont to +summon a black slave of Governor Shirley’s from the blurred mirror and +send him in search of guests who had long ago been familiar in those +deserted chambers. Forth went the sable messenger, with the starlight +or the moonshine gleaming through him, and did his errand in the +burial-grounds, knocking at the iron doors of tombs or upon the marble +slabs that covered them, and whispering to those within, “My mistress, +old Esther Dudley, bids you to the province-house at midnight;” and +punctually as the clock of the Old South told twelve came the shadows +of the Olivers, the Hutchinsons, the Dudleys—all the grandees of a +bygone generation—gliding beneath the portal into the well-known +mansion, where Esther mingled with them as if she likewise were a +shade. Without vouching for the truth of such traditions, it is certain +that Mistress Dudley sometimes assembled a few of the stanch though +crestfallen old Tories who had lingered in the rebel town during those +days of wrath and tribulation. Out of a cobwebbed bottle containing +liquor that a royal governor might have smacked his lips over they +quaffed healths to the king and babbled treason to the republic, +feeling as if the protecting shadow of the throne were still flung +around them. But, draining the last drops of their liquor, they stole +timorously homeward, and answered not again if the rude mob reviled +them in the street. + +Yet Esther Dudley’s most frequent and favored guests were the children +of the town. Toward them she was never stern. A kindly and loving +nature hindered elsewhere from its free course by a thousand rocky +prejudices lavished itself upon these little ones. By bribes of +gingerbread of her own making, stamped with a royal crown, she tempted +their sunny sportiveness beneath the gloomy portal of the +province-house, and would often beguile them to spend a whole play-day +there, sitting in a circle round the verge of her hoop-petticoat, +greedily attentive to her stories of a dead world. And when these +little boys and girls stole forth again from the dark, mysterious +mansion, they went bewildered, full of old feelings that graver people +had long ago forgotten, rubbing their eyes at the world around them as +if they had gone astray into ancient times and become children of the +past. At home, when their parents asked where they had loitered such a +weary while and with whom they had been at play, the children would +talk of all the departed worthies of the province as far back as +Governor Belcher and the haughty dame of Sir William Phipps. It would +seem as though they had been sitting on the knees of these famous +personages, whom the grave had hidden for half a century, and had toyed +with the embroidery of their rich waistcoats or roguishly pulled the +long curls of their flowing wigs. “But Governor Belcher has been dead +this many a year,” would the mother say to her little boy. “And did you +really see him at the province-house?”—“Oh yes, dear mother—yes!” the +half-dreaming child would answer. “But when old Esther had done +speaking about him, he faded away out of his chair.” Thus, without +affrighting her little guests, she led them by the hand into the +chambers of her own desolate heart and made childhood’s fancy discern +the ghosts that haunted there. + +Living so continually in her own circle of ideas, and never regulating +her mind by a proper reference to present things, Esther Dudley appears +to have grown partially crazed. It was found that she had no right +sense of the progress and true state of the Revolutionary war, but held +a constant faith that the armies of Britain were victorious on every +field and destined to be ultimately triumphant. Whenever the town +rejoiced for a battle won by Washington or Gates or Morgan or Greene, +the news, in passing through the door of the province-house as through +the ivory gate of dreams, became metamorphosed into a strange tale of +the prowess of Howe, Clinton or Cornwallis. Sooner or later, it was her +invincible belief, the colonies would be prostrate at the footstool of +the king. Sometimes she seemed to take for granted that such was +already the case. On one occasion she startled the townspeople by a +brilliant illumination of the province-house with candles at every pane +of glass and a transparency of the king’s initials and a crown of light +in the great balcony-window. The figure of the aged woman in the most +gorgeous of her mildewed velvets and brocades was seen passing from +casement to casement, until she paused before the balcony and +flourished a huge key above her head. Her wrinkled visage actually +gleamed with triumph, as if the soul within her were a festal lamp. + +“What means this blaze of light? What does old Esther’s joy portend?” +whispered a spectator. “It is frightful to see her gliding about the +chambers and rejoicing there without a soul to bear her company.” + +“It is as if she were making merry in a tomb,” said another. + +“Pshaw! It is no such mystery,” observed an old man, after some brief +exercise of memory. “Mistress Dudley is keeping jubilee for the king of +England’s birthday.” + +Then the people laughed aloud, and would have thrown mud against the +blazing transparency of the king’s crown and initials, only that they +pitied the poor old dame who was so dismally triumphant amid the wreck +and ruin of the system to which she appertained. + +Oftentimes it was her custom to climb the weary staircase that wound +upward to the cupola, and thence strain her dimmed eyesight seaward and +countryward, watching for a British fleet or for the march of a grand +procession with the king’s banner floating over it. The passengers in +the street below would discern her anxious visage and send up a shout: +“When the golden Indian on the province-house shall shoot his arrow, +and when the cock on the Old South spire shall crow, then look for a +royal governor again!” for this had grown a by-word through the town. +And at last, after long, long years, old Esther Dudley knew—or +perchance she only dreamed—that a royal governor was on the eve of +returning to the province-house to receive the heavy key which Sir +William Howe had committed to her charge. Now, it was the fact that +intelligence bearing some faint analogy to Esther’s version of it was +current among the townspeople. She set the mansion in the best order +that her means allowed, and, arraying herself in silks and tarnished +gold, stood long before the blurred mirror to admire her own +magnificence. As she gazed the gray and withered lady moved her ashen +lips, murmuring half aloud, talking to shapes that she saw within the +mirror, to shadows of her own fantasies, to the household friends of +memory, and bidding them rejoice with her and come forth to meet the +governor. And while absorbed in this communion Mistress Dudley heard +the tramp of many footsteps in the street, and, looking out at the +window, beheld what she construed as the royal governor’s arrival. + +“Oh, happy day! Oh, blessed, blessed hour!” she exclaimed. “Let me but +bid him welcome within the portal, and my task in the province-house +and on earth is done.” Then, with tottering feet which age and +tremulous joy caused to tread amiss, she hurried down the grand +staircase, her silks sweeping and rustling as she went; so that the +sound was as if a train of special courtiers were thronging from the +dim mirror. + +And Esther Dudley fancied that as soon as the wide door should be flung +open all the pomp and splendor of bygone times would pace majestically +into the province-house and the gilded tapestry of the past would be +brightened by the sunshine of the present. She turned the key, withdrew +it from the lock, unclosed the door and stepped across the threshold. +Advancing up the court-yard appeared a person of most dignified mien, +with tokens, as Esther interpreted them, of gentle blood, high rank and +long-accustomed authority even in his walk and every gesture. He was +richly dressed, but wore a gouty shoe, which, however, did not lessen +the stateliness of his gait. Around and behind him were people in plain +civic dresses and two or three war-worn veterans—evidently officers of +rank—arrayed in a uniform of blue and buff. But Esther Dudley, firm in +the belief that had fastened its roots about her heart, beheld only the +principal personage, and never doubted that this was the +long-looked-for governor to whom she was to surrender up her charge. As +he approached she involuntarily sank down on her knees and tremblingly +held forth the heavy key. + +“Receive my trust! Take it quickly,” cried she, “for methinks Death is +striving to snatch away my triumph. But he comes too late. Thank Heaven +for this blessed hour! God save King George!” + +“That, madam, is a strange prayer to be offered up at such a moment,” +replied the unknown guest of the province-house, and, courteously +removing his hat, he offered his arm to raise the aged woman. “Yet, in +reverence for your gray hairs and long-kept faith, Heaven forbid that +any here should say you nay. Over the realms which still acknowledge +his sceptre, God save King George!” + +Esther Dudley started to her feet, and, hastily clutching back the key, +gazed with fearful earnestness at the stranger, and dimly and +doubtfully, as if suddenly awakened from a dream, her bewildered eyes +half recognized his face. Years ago she had known him among the gentry +of the province, but the ban of the king had fallen upon him. How, +then, came the doomed victim here? Proscribed, excluded from mercy, the +monarch’s most dreaded and hated foe, this New England merchant had +stood triumphantly against a kingdom’s strength, and his foot now trod +upon humbled royalty as he ascended the steps of the province-house, +the people’s chosen governor of Massachusetts. + +“Wretch, wretch that I am!” muttered the old woman, with such a +heartbroken expression that the tears gushed from the stranger’s eyes. +“Have I bidden a traitor welcome?—Come, Death! come quickly!” + +“Alas, venerable lady!” said Governor Hancock, lending her his support +with all the reverence that a courtier would have shown to a queen, +“your life has been prolonged until the world has changed around you. +You have treasured up all that time has rendered worthless—the +principles, feelings, manners, modes of being and acting which another +generation has flung aside—and you are a symbol of the past. And I and +these around me—we represent a new race of men, living no longer in the +past, scarcely in the present, but projecting our lives forward into +the future. Ceasing to model ourselves on ancestral superstitions, it +is our faith and principle to press onward—onward.—Yet,” continued he, +turning to his attendants, “let us reverence for the last time the +stately and gorgeous prejudices of the tottering past.” + +While the republican governor spoke he had continued to support the +helpless form of Esther Dudley; her weight grew heavier against his +arm, but at last, with a sudden effort to free herself, the ancient +woman sank down beside one of the pillars of the portal. The key of the +province-house fell from her grasp and clanked against the stone. + +“I have been faithful unto death,” murmured she. “God save the king!” + +“She hath done her office,” said Hancock, solemnly. “We will follow her +reverently to the tomb of her ancestors, and then, my fellow-citizens, +onward—onward. We are no longer children of the past.” + +As the old loyalist concluded his narrative the enthusiasm which had +been fitfully flashing within his sunken eyes and quivering across his +wrinkled visage faded away, as if all the lingering fire of his soul +were extinguished. Just then, too, a lamp upon the mantelpiece threw +out a dying gleam, which vanished as speedily as it shot upward, +compelling our eyes to grope for one another’s features by the dim glow +of the hearth. With such a lingering fire, methought, with such a dying +gleam, had the glory of the ancient system vanished from the +province-house when the spirit of old Esther Dudley took its flight. +And now, again, the clock of the Old South threw its voice of ages on +the breeze, knolling the hourly knell of the past, crying out far and +wide through the multitudinous city, and filling our ears, as we sat in +the dusky chamber, with its reverberating depth of tone. In that same +mansion—in that very chamber—what a volume of history had been told off +into hours by the same voice that was now trembling in the air! Many a +governor had heard those midnight accents and longed to exchange his +stately cares for slumber. And, as for mine host and Mr. Bela Tiffany +and the old loyalist and me, we had babbled about dreams of the past +until we almost fancied that the clock was still striking in a bygone +century. Neither of us would have wondered had a hoop-petticoated +phantom of Esther Dudley tottered into the chamber, walking her rounds +in the hush of midnight as of yore, and motioned us to quench the +fading embers of the fire and leave the historic precincts to herself +and her kindred shades. But, as no such vision was vouchsafed, I +retired unbidden, and would advise Mr. Tiffany to lay hold of another +auditor, being resolved not to show my face in the Province House for a +good while hence—if ever. + + + + +THE HAUNTED MIND + + +What a singular moment is the first one, when you have hardly begun to +recollect yourself, after starting from midnight slumber! By unclosing +your eyes so suddenly you seem to have surprised the personages of your +dream in full convocation round your bed, and catch one broad glance at +them before they can flit into obscurity. Or, to vary the metaphor, you +find yourself for a single instant wide awake in that realm of +illusions whither sleep has been the passport, and behold its ghostly +inhabitants and wondrous scenery with a perception of their strangeness +such as you never attain while the dream is undisturbed. The distant +sound of a church-clock is borne faintly on the wind. You question with +yourself, half seriously, whether it has stolen to your waking ear from +some gray tower that stood within the precincts of your dream. While +yet in suspense another clock flings its heavy clang over the +slumbering town with so full and distinct a sound, and such a long +murmur in the neighboring air, that you are certain it must proceed +from the steeple at the nearest corner; You count the strokes—one, two; +and there they cease with a booming sound like the gathering of a third +stroke within the bell. + +If you could choose an hour of wakefulness out of the whole night, it +would be this. Since your sober bedtime, at eleven, you have had rest +enough to take off the pressure of yesterday’s fatigue, while before +you, till the sun comes from “Far Cathay” to brighten your window, +there is almost the space of a summer night—one hour to be spent in +thought with the mind’s eye half shut, and two in pleasant dreams, and +two in that strangest of enjoyments the forgetfulness alike of joy and +woe. The moment of rising belongs to another period of time, and +appears so distant that the plunge out of a warm bed into the frosty +air cannot yet be anticipated with dismay. Yesterday has already +vanished among the shadows of the past; to-morrow has not yet emerged +from the future. You have found an intermediate space where the +business of life does not intrude, where the passing moment lingers and +becomes truly the present; a spot where Father Time, when he thinks +nobody is watching him, sits down by the wayside to take breath. Oh +that he would fall asleep and let mortals live on without growing +older! + +Hitherto you have lain perfectly still, because the slightest motion +would dissipate the fragments of your slumber. Now, being irrevocably +awake, you peep through the half-drawn window-curtain, and observe that +the glass is ornamented with fanciful devices in frost-work, and that +each pane presents something like a frozen dream. There will be time +enough to trace out the analogy while waiting the summons to breakfast. +Seen through the clear portion of the glass where the silvery +mountain-peaks of the frost-scenery do not ascend, the most conspicuous +object is the steeple, the white spire of which directs you to the +wintry lustre of the firmament. You may almost distinguish the figures +on the clock that has just told the hour. Such a frosty sky and the +snow-covered roofs and the long vista of the frozen street, all white, +and the distant water hardened into rock, might make you shiver even +under four blankets and a woollen comforter. Yet look at that one +glorious star! Its beams are distinguishable from all the rest, and +actually cast the shadow of the casement on the bed with a radiance of +deeper hue than moonlight, though not so accurate an outline. + +You sink down and muffle your head in the clothes, shivering all the +while, but less from bodily chill than the bare idea of a polar +atmosphere. It is too cold even for the thoughts to venture abroad. You +speculate on the luxury of wearing out a whole existence in bed like an +oyster in its shell, content with the sluggish ecstasy of inaction, and +drowsily conscious of nothing but delicious warmth such as you now feel +again. Ah! that idea has brought a hideous one in its train. You think +how the dead are lying in their cold shrouds and narrow coffins through +the drear winter of the grave, and cannot persuade your fancy that they +neither shrink nor shiver when the snow is drifting over their little +hillocks and the bitter blast howls against the door of the tomb. That +gloomy thought will collect a gloomy multitude and throw its complexion +over your wakeful hour. + +In the depths of every heart there is a tomb and a dungeon, though the +lights, the music and revelry, above may cause us to forget their +existence and the buried ones or prisoners whom they hide. But +sometimes, and oftenest at midnight, those dark receptacles are flung +wide open. In an hour like this, when the mind has a passive +sensibility, but no active strength—when the imagination is a mirror +imparting vividness to all ideas without the power of selecting or +controlling them—then pray that your griefs may slumber and the +brotherhood of remorse not break their chain. It is too late. A funeral +train comes gliding by your bed in which passion and feeling assume +bodily shape and things of the mind become dim spectres to the eye. +There is your earliest sorrow, a pale young mourner wearing a sister’s +likeness to first love, sadly beautiful, with a hallowed sweetness in +her melancholy features and grace in the flow of her sable robe. Next +appears a shade of ruined loveliness with dust among her golden hair +and her bright garments all faded and defaced, stealing from your +glance with drooping head, as fearful of reproach: she was your fondest +hope, but a delusive one; so call her Disappointment now. A sterner +form succeeds, with a brow of wrinkles, a look and gesture of iron +authority; there is no name for him unless it be Fatality—an emblem of +the evil influence that rules your fortunes, a demon to whom you +subjected yourself by some error at the outset of life, and were bound +his slave for ever by once obeying him. See those fiendish lineaments +graven on the darkness, the writhed lip of scorn, the mockery of that +living eye, the pointed finger touching the sore place in your heart! +Do you remember any act of enormous folly at which you would blush even +in the remotest cavern of the earth? Then recognize your shame. + +Pass, wretched band! Well for the wakeful one if, riotously miserable, +a fiercer tribe do not surround him—the devils of a guilty heart that +holds its hell within itself. What if Remorse should assume the +features of an injured friend? What if the fiend should come in woman’s +garments with a pale beauty amid sin and desolation, and lie down by +your side? What if he should stand at your bed’s foot in the likeness +of a corpse with a bloody stain upon the shroud? Sufficient without +such guilt is this nightmare of the soul, this heavy, heavy sinking of +the spirits, this wintry gloom about the heart, this indistinct horror +of the mind blending itself with the darkness of the chamber. + +By a desperate effort you start upright, breaking from a sort of +conscious sleep and gazing wildly round the bed, as if the fiends were +anywhere but in your haunted mind. At the same moment the slumbering +embers on the hearth send forth a gleam which palely illuminates the +whole outer room and flickers through the door of the bedchamber, but +cannot quite dispel its obscurity. Your eye searches for whatever may +remind you of the living world. With eager minuteness you take note of +the table near the fireplace, the book with an ivory knife between its +leaves, the unfolded letter, the hat and the fallen glove. Soon the +flame vanishes, and with it the whole scene is gone, though its image +remains an instant in your mind’s eye when darkness has swallowed the +reality. Throughout the chamber there is the same obscurity as before, +but not the same gloom within your breast. + +As your head falls back upon the pillow you think—in a whisper be it +spoken—how pleasant in these night solitudes would be the rise and fall +of a softer breathing than your own, the slight pressure of a tenderer +bosom, the quiet throb of a purer heart, imparting its peacefulness to +your troubled one, as if the fond sleeper were involving you in her +dream. Her influence is over you, though she have no existence but in +that momentary image. You sink down in a flowery spot on the borders of +sleep and wakefulness, while your thoughts rise before you in pictures, +all disconnected, yet all assimilated by a pervading gladsomeness and +beauty. The wheeling of gorgeous squadrons that glitter in the sun is +succeeded by the merriment of children round the door of a schoolhouse +beneath the glimmering shadow of old trees at the corner of a rustic +lane. You stand in the sunny rain of a summer shower, and wander among +the sunny trees of an autumnal wood, and look upward at the brightest +of all rainbows overarching the unbroken sheet of snow on the American +side of Niagara. Your mind struggles pleasantly between the dancing +radiance round the hearth of a young man and his recent bride and the +twittering flight of birds in spring about their new-made nest. You +feel the merry bounding of a ship before the breeze, and watch the +tuneful feet of rosy girls as they twine their last and merriest dance +in a splendid ball-room, and find yourself in the brilliant circle of a +crowded theatre as the curtain falls over a light and airy scene. + +With an involuntary start you seize hold on consciousness, and prove +yourself but half awake by running a doubtful parallel between human +life and the hour which has now elapsed. In both you emerge from +mystery, pass through a vicissitude that you can but imperfectly +control, and are borne onward to another mystery. Now comes the peal of +the distant clock with fainter and fainter strokes as you plunge +farther into the wilderness of sleep. It is the knell of a temporary +death. Your spirit has departed, and strays like a free citizen among +the people of a shadowy world, beholding strange sights, yet without +wonder or dismay. So calm, perhaps, will be the final change—so +undisturbed, as if among familiar things, the entrance of the soul to +its eternal home. + + + + +THE VILLAGE UNCLE + +AN IMAGINARY RETROSPECT + +Come! another log upon the hearth. True, our little parlor is +comfortable, especially here where the old man sits in his old +arm-chair; but on Thanksgiving-night the blaze should dance higher up +the chimney and send a shower of sparks into the outer darkness. Toss +on an armful of those dry oak chips, the last relicts of the Mermaid’s +knee-timbers—the bones of your namesake, Susan. Higher yet, and +clearer, be the blaze, till our cottage windows glow the ruddiest in +the village and the light of our household mirth flash far across the +bay to Nahant. + +And now come, Susan; come, my children. Draw your chairs round me, all +of you. There is a dimness over your figures. You sit quivering +indistinctly with each motion of the blaze, which eddies about you like +a flood; so that you all have the look of visions or people that dwell +only in the firelight, and will vanish from existence as completely as +your own shadows when the flame shall sink among the embers. + +Hark! let me listen for the swell of the surf; it should be audible a +mile inland on a night like this. Yes; there I catch the sound, but +only an uncertain murmur, as if a good way down over the beach, though +by the almanac it is high tide at eight o’clock, and the billows must +now be dashing within thirty yards of our door. Ah! the old man’s ears +are failing him, and so is his eyesight, and perhaps his mind, else you +would not all be so shadowy in the blaze of his Thanksgiving fire. + +How strangely the past is peeping over the shoulders of the present! To +judge by my recollections, it is but a few moments since I sat in +another room. Yonder model of a vessel was not there, nor the old chest +of drawers, nor Susan’s profile and mine in that gilt frame—nothing, in +short, except this same fire, which glimmered on books, papers and a +picture, and half discovered my solitary figure in a looking-glass. But +it was paler than my rugged old self, and younger, too, by almost half +a century. + +Speak to me, Susan; speak, my beloved ones; for the scene is glimmering +on my sight again, and as it brightens you fade away. Oh, I should be +loth to lose my treasure of past happiness and become once more what I +was then—a hermit in the depths of my own mind, sometimes yawning over +drowsy volumes and anon a scribbler of wearier trash than what I read; +a man who had wandered out of the real world and got into its shadow, +where his troubles, joys and vicissitudes were of such slight stuff +that he hardly knew whether he lived or only dreamed of living. Thank +Heaven I am an old man now and have done with all such vanities! + +Still this dimness of mine eyes!—Come nearer, Susan, and stand before +the fullest blaze of the hearth. Now I behold you illuminated from head +to foot, in your clean cap and decent gown, with the dear lock of gray +hair across your forehead and a quiet smile about your mouth, while the +eyes alone are concealed by the red gleam of the fire upon your +spectacles. There! you made me tremble again. When the flame quivered, +my sweet Susan, you quivered with it and grew indistinct, as if melting +into the warm light, that my last glimpse of you might be as visionary +as the first was, full many a year since. Do you remember it? You stood +on the little bridge over the brook that runs across King’s Beach into +the sea. It was twilight, the waves rolling in, the wind sweeping by, +the crimson clouds fading in the west and the silver moon brightening +above the hill; and on the bridge were you, fluttering in the breeze +like a sea-bird that might skim away at your pleasure. You seemed a +daughter of the viewless wind, a creature of the ocean-foam and the +crimson light, whose merry life was spent in dancing on the crests of +the billows that threw up their spray to support your footsteps. As I +drew nearer I fancied you akin to the race of mermaids, and thought how +pleasant it would be to dwell with you among the quiet coves in the +shadow of the cliffs, and to roam along secluded beaches of the purest +sand, and, when our Northern shores grew bleak, to haunt the islands, +green and lonely, far amid summer seas. And yet it gladdened me, after +all this nonsense, to find you nothing but a pretty young girl sadly +perplexed with the rude behavior of the wind about your petticoats. +Thus I did with Susan as with most other things in my earlier days, +dipping her image into my mind and coloring it of a thousand fantastic +hues before I could see her as she really was. + +Now, Susan, for a sober picture of our village. It was a small +collection of dwellings that seemed to have been cast up by the sea +with the rock-weed and marine plants that it vomits after a storm, or +to have come ashore among the pipe-staves and other lumber which had +been washed from the deck of an Eastern schooner. There was just space +for the narrow and sandy street between the beach in front and a +precipitous hill that lifted its rocky forehead in the rear among a +waste of juniper-bushes and the wild growth of a broken pasture. The +village was picturesque in the variety of its edifices, though all were +rude. Here stood a little old hovel, built, perhaps, of driftwood, +there a row of boat-houses, and beyond them a two-story dwelling of +dark and weatherbeaten aspect, the whole intermixed with one or two +snug cottages painted white, a sufficiency of pig-styes and a +shoemaker’s shop. Two grocery stores stood opposite each other in the +centre of the village. These were the places of resort at their idle +hours of a hardy throng of fishermen in red baize shirts, oilcloth +trousers and boots of brown leather covering the whole leg—true +seven-league boots, but fitter to wade the ocean than walk the earth. +The wearers seemed amphibious, as if they did but creep out of salt +water to sun themselves; nor would it have been wonderful to see their +lower limbs covered with clusters of little shellfish such as cling to +rocks and old ship-timber over which the tide ebbs and flows. When +their fleet of boats was weather-bound, the butchers raised their +price, and the spit was busier than the frying-pan; for this was a +place of fish, and known as such to all the country round about. The +very air was fishy, being perfumed with dead sculpins, hard-heads and +dogfish strewn plentifully on the beach.—You see, children, the village +is but little changed since your mother and I were young. + +How like a dream it was when I bent over a pool of water one pleasant +morning and saw that the ocean had dashed its spray over me and made me +a fisherman! There was the tarpaulin, the baize shirt, the oilcloth +trousers and seven-league boots, and there my own features, but so +reddened with sunburn and sea-breezes that methought I had another +face, and on other shoulders too. The seagulls and the loons and I had +now all one trade: we skimmed the crested waves and sought our prey +beneath them, the man with as keen enjoyment as the birds. Always when +the east grew purple I launched my dory, my little flat-bottomed skiff, +and rowed cross-handed to Point Ledge, the Middle Ledge, or perhaps +beyond Egg Rock; often, too, did I anchor off Dread Ledge—a spot of +peril to ships unpiloted—and sometimes spread an adventurous sail and +tracked across the bay to South Shore, casting my lines in sight of +Scituate. Ere nightfall I hauled my skiff high and dry on the beach, +laden with red rock-cod or the white-bellied ones of deep water, +haddock bearing the black marks of St. Peter’s fingers near the gills, +the long-bearded hake whose liver holds oil enough for a midnight lamp, +and now and then a mighty halibut with a back broad as my boat. In the +autumn I toled and caught those lovely fish the mackerel. When the wind +was high, when the whale-boats anchored off the Point nodded their +slender masts at each other and the dories pitched and tossed in the +surf, when Nahant Beach was thundering three miles off and the spray +broke a hundred feet in the air round the distant base of Egg Rock, +when the brimful and boisterous sea threatened to tumble over the +street of our village,—then I made a holiday on shore. + +Many such a day did I sit snugly in Mr. Bartlett’s store, attentive to +the yarns of Uncle Parker—uncle to the whole village by right of +seniority, but of Southern blood, with no kindred in New England. His +figure is before me now enthroned upon a mackerel-barrel—a lean old man +of great height, but bent with years and twisted into an uncouth shape +by seven broken limbs; furrowed, also, and weatherworn, as if every +gale for the better part of a century had caught him somewhere on the +sea. He looked like a harbinger of tempest—a shipmate of the Flying +Dutchman. After innumerable voyages aboard men-of-war and merchantmen, +fishing-schooners and chebacco-boats, the old salt had become master of +a hand-cart, which he daily trundled about the vicinity, and sometimes +blew his fish-horn through the streets of Salem. One of Uncle Parker’s +eyes had been blown out with gunpowder, and the other did but glimmer +in its socket. Turning it upward as he spoke, it was his delight to +tell of cruises against the French and battles with his own shipmates, +when he and an antagonist used to be seated astride of a sailor’s +chest, each fastened down by a spike-nail through his trousers, and +there to fight it out. Sometimes he expatiated on the delicious flavor +of the hagden, a greasy and goose-like fowl which the sailors catch +with hook and line on the Grand Banks. He dwelt with rapture on an +interminable winter at the Isle of Sables, where he had gladdened +himself amid polar snows with the rum and sugar saved from the wreck of +a West India schooner. And wrathfully did he shake his fist as he +related how a party of Cape Cod men had robbed him and his companions +of their lawful spoils and sailed away with every keg of old Jamaica, +leaving him not a drop to drown his sorrow. Villains they were, and of +that wicked brotherhood who are said to tie lanterns to horses’ tails +to mislead the mariner along the dangerous shores of the Cape. + +Even now I seem to see the group of fishermen with that old salt in the +midst. One fellow sits on the counter, a second bestrides an +oil-barrel, a third lolls at his length on a parcel of new cod-lines, +and another has planted the tarry seat of his trousers on a heap of +salt which will shortly be sprinkled over a lot of fish. They are a +likely set of men. Some have voyaged to the East Indies or the Pacific, +and most of them have sailed in Marblehead schooners to Newfoundland; a +few have been no farther than the Middle Banks, and one or two have +always fished along the shore; but, as Uncle Parker used to say, they +have all been christened in salt water and know more than men ever +learn in the bushes. A curious figure, by way of contrast, is a +fish-dealer from far up-country listening with eyes wide open to +narratives that might startle Sinbad the Sailor.—Be it well with you, +my brethren! Ye are all gone—some to your graves ashore and others to +the depths of ocean—but my faith is strong that ye are happy; for +whenever I behold your forms, whether in dream or vision, each departed +friend is puffing his long nine, and a mug of the right blackstrap goes +round from lip to lip. + +But where was the mermaid in those delightful times? At a certain +window near the centre of the village appeared a pretty display of +gingerbread men and horses, picture-books and ballads, small +fish-hooks, pins, needles, sugarplums and brass thimbles—articles on +which the young fishermen used to expend their money from pure +gallantry. What a picture was Susan behind the counter! A slender +maiden, though the child of rugged parents, she had the slimmest of all +waists, brown hair curling on her neck, and a complexion rather pale +except when the sea-breeze flushed it. A few freckles became +beauty-spots beneath her eyelids.—How was it, Susan, that you talked +and acted so carelessly, yet always for the best, doing whatever was +right in your own eyes, and never once doing wrong in mine, nor shocked +a taste that had been morbidly sensitive till now? And whence had you +that happiest gift of brightening every topic with an unsought gayety, +quiet but irresistible, so that even gloomy spirits felt your sunshine +and did not shrink from it? Nature wrought the charm. She made you a +frank, simple, kind-hearted, sensible and mirthful girl. Obeying +Nature, you did free things without indelicacy, displayed a maiden’s +thoughts to every eye, and proved yourself as innocent as naked Eve.—It +was beautiful to observe how her simple and happy nature mingled itself +with mine. She kindled a domestic fire within my heart and took up her +dwelling there, even in that chill and lonesome cavern hung round with +glittering icicles of fancy. She gave me warmth of feeling, while the +influence of my mind made her contemplative. I taught her to love the +moonlight hour, when the expanse of the encircled bay was smooth as a +great mirror and slept in a transparent shadow, while beyond Nahant the +wind rippled the dim ocean into a dreamy brightness which grew faint +afar off without becoming gloomier. I held her hand and pointed to the +long surf-wave as it rolled calmly on the beach in an unbroken line of +silver; we were silent together till its deep and peaceful murmur had +swept by us. When the Sabbath sun shone down into the recesses of the +cliffs, I led the mermaid thither and told her that those huge gray, +shattered rocks, and her native sea that raged for ever like a storm +against them, and her own slender beauty in so stern a scene, were all +combined into a strain of poetry. But on the Sabbath-eve, when her +mother had gone early to bed and her gentle sister had smiled and left +us, as we sat alone by the quiet hearth with household things around, +it was her turn to make me feel that here was a deeper poetry, and that +this was the dearest hour of all. Thus went on our wooing, till I had +shot wild-fowl enough to feather our bridal-bed, and the daughter of +the sea was mine. + +I built a cottage for Susan and myself, and made a gateway in the form +of a Gothic arch by setting up a whale’s jaw-bones. We bought a heifer +with her first calf, and had a little garden on the hillside to supply +us with potatoes and green sauce for our fish. Our parlor, small and +neat, was ornamented with our two profiles in one gilt frame, and with +shells and pretty pebbles on the mantelpiece, selected from the sea’s +treasury of such things on Nahant Beach. On the desk, beneath the +looking-glass, lay the Bible, which I had begun to read aloud at the +book of Genesis, and the singing-book that Susan used for her evening +psalm. Except the almanac, we had no other literature. All that I heard +of books was when an Indian history or tale of shipwreck was sold by a +pedler or wandering subscription-man to some one in the village, and +read through its owner’s nose to a slumbrous auditory. + +Like my brother-fishermen, I grew into the belief that all human +erudition was collected in our pedagogue, whose green spectacles and +solemn phiz as he passed to his little schoolhouse amid a waste of sand +might have gained him a diploma from any college in New England. In +truth, I dreaded him.—When our children were old enough to claim his +care, you remember, Susan, how I frowned, though you were pleased at +this learned man’s encomiums on their proficiency. I feared to trust +them even with the alphabet: it was the key to a fatal treasure. But I +loved to lead them by their little hands along the beach and point to +nature in the vast and the minute—the sky, the sea, the green earth, +the pebbles and the shells. Then did I discourse of the mighty works +and coextensive goodness of the Deity with the simple wisdom of a man +whose mind had profited by lonely days upon the deep and his heart by +the strong and pure affections of his evening home. Sometimes my voice +lost itself in a tremulous depth, for I felt his eye upon me as I +spoke. Once, while my wife and all of us were gazing at ourselves in +the mirror left by the tide in a hollow of the sand, I pointed to the +pictured heaven below and bade her observe how religion was strewn +everywhere in our path, since even a casual pool of water recalled the +idea of that home whither we were travelling to rest for ever with our +children. Suddenly your image, Susan, and all the little faces made up +of yours and mine, seemed to fade away and vanish around me, leaving a +pale visage like my own of former days within the frame of a large +looking-glass. Strange illusion! + +My life glided on, the past appearing to mingle with the present and +absorb the future, till the whole lies before me at a glance. My +manhood has long been waning with a stanch decay; my earlier +contemporaries, after lives of unbroken health, are all at rest without +having known the weariness of later age; and now with a wrinkled +forehead and thin white hair as badges of my dignity I have become the +patriarch—the uncle—of the village. I love that name: it widens the +circle of my sympathies; it joins all the youthful to my household in +the kindred of affection. + +Like Uncle Parker, whose rheumatic bones were dashed against Egg Rock +full forty years ago, I am a spinner of long yarns. Seated on the +gunnel of a dory or on the sunny side of a boat-house, where the warmth +is grateful to my limbs, or by my own hearth when a friend or two are +there, I overflow with talk, and yet am never tedious. With a broken +voice I give utterance to much wisdom. Such, Heaven be praised! is the +vigor of my faculties that many a forgotten usage, and traditions +ancient in my youth, and early adventures of myself or others hitherto +effaced by things more recent, acquire new distinctness in my memory. I +remember the happy days when the haddock were more numerous on all the +fishing-grounds than sculpins in the surf—when the deep-water cod swam +close in-shore, and the dogfish, with his poisonous horn, had not +learnt to take the hook. I can number every equinoctial storm in which +the sea has overwhelmed the street, flooded the cellars of the village +and hissed upon our kitchen hearth. I give the history of the great +whale that was landed on Whale Beach, and whose jaws, being now my +gateway, will last for ages after my coffin shall have passed beneath +them. Thence it is an easy digression to the halibut—scarcely smaller +than the whale—which ran out six codlines and hauled my dory to the +mouth of Boston harbor before I could touch him with the gaff. + +If melancholy accidents be the theme of conversation, I tell how a +friend of mine was taken out of his boat by an enormous shark, and the +sad, true tale of a young man on the eve of marriage who had been nine +days missing, when his drowned body floated into the very pathway on +Marble-head Neck that had often led him to the dwelling of his bride, +as if the dripping corpse would have come where the mourner was. With +such awful fidelity did that lover return to fulfil his vows! Another +favorite story is of a crazy maiden who conversed with angels and had +the gift of prophecy, and whom all the village loved and pitied, though +she went from door to door accusing us of sin, exhorting to repentance +and foretelling our destruction by flood or earthquake. If the young +men boast their knowledge of the ledges and sunken rocks, I speak of +pilots who knew the wind by its scent and the wave by its taste, and +could have steered blindfold to any port between Boston and Mount +Desert guided only by the rote of the shore—the peculiar sound of the +surf on each island, beach and line of rocks along the coast. Thus do I +talk, and all my auditors grow wise while they deem it pastime. + +I recollect no happier portion of my life than this my calm old age. It +is like the sunny and sheltered slope of a valley where late in the +autumn the grass is greener than in August, and intermixed with golden +dandelions that had not been seen till now since the first warmth of +the year. But with me the verdure and the flowers are not frost-bitten +in the midst of winter. A playfulness has revisited my mind—a sympathy +with the young and gay, an unpainful interest in the business of +others, a light and wandering curiosity—arising, perhaps, from the +sense that my toil on earth is ended and the brief hour till bedtime +may be spent in play. Still, I have fancied that there is a depth of +feeling and reflection under this superficial levity peculiar to one +who has lived long and is soon to die. + +Show me anything that would make an infant smile, and you shall behold +a gleam of mirth over the hoary ruin of my visage. I can spend a +pleasant hour in the sun watching the sports of the village children on +the edge of the surf. Now they chase the retreating wave far down over +the wet sand; now it steals softly up to kiss their naked feet; now it +comes onward with threatening front, and roars after the laughing crew +as they scamper beyond its reach. Why should not an old man be merry +too, when the great sea is at play with those little children? I +delight, also, to follow in the wake of a pleasure-party of young men +and girls strolling along the beach after an early supper at the Point. +Here, with handkerchiefs at nose, they bend over a heap of eel-grass +entangled in which is a dead skate so oddly accoutred with two legs and +a long tail that they mistake him for a drowned animal. A few steps +farther the ladies scream, and the gentlemen make ready to protect them +against a young shark of the dogfish kind rolling with a lifelike +motion in the tide that has thrown him up. Next they are smit with +wonder at the black shells of a wagon-load of live lobsters packed in +rock-weed for the country-market. And when they reach the fleet of +dories just hauled ashore after the day’s fishing, how do I laugh in my +sleeve, and sometimes roar outright, at the simplicity of these young +folks and the sly humor of the fishermen! In winter, when our village +is thrown into a bustle by the arrival of perhaps a score of country +dealers bargaining for frozen fish to be transported hundreds of miles +and eaten fresh in Vermont or Canada, I am a pleased but idle spectator +in the throng. For I launch my boat no more. + +When the shore was solitary, I have found a pleasure that seemed even +to exalt my mind in observing the sports or contentions of two gulls as +they wheeled and hovered about each other with hoarse screams, one +moment flapping on the foam of the wave, and then soaring aloft till +their white bosoms melted into the upper sunshine. In the calm of the +summer sunset I drag my aged limbs with a little ostentation of +activity, because I am so old, up to the rocky brow of the hill. There +I see the white sails of many a vessel outward bound or homeward from +afar, and the black trail of a vapor behind the Eastern steamboat; +there, too, is the sun, going down, but not in gloom, and there the +illimitable ocean mingling with the sky, to remind me of eternity. + +But sweetest of all is the hour of cheerful musing and pleasant talk +that comes between the dusk and the lighted candle by my glowing +fireside. And never, even on the first Thanksgiving-night, when Susan +and I sat alone with our hopes, nor the second, when a stranger had +been sent to gladden us and be the visible image of our affection, did +I feel such joy as now. All that belongs to me are here: Death has +taken none, nor Disease kept them away, nor Strife divided them from +their parents or each other; with neither poverty nor riches to disturb +them, nor the misery of desires beyond their lot, they have kept New +England’s festival round the patriarch’s board. For I am a patriarch. +Here I sit among my descendants, in my old arm-chair and immemorial +corner, while the firelight throws an appropriate glory round my +venerable frame.—Susan! My children! Something whispers me that this +happiest hour must be the final one, and that nothing remains but to +bless you all and depart with a treasure of recollected joys to heaven. +Will you meet me there? Alas! your figures grow indistinct, fading into +pictures on the air, and now to fainter outlines, while the fire is +glimmering on the walls of a familiar room, and shows the book that I +flung down and the sheet that I left half written some fifty years ago. +I lift my eyes to the looking-glass, and perceive myself alone, unless +those be the mermaid’s features retiring into the depths of the mirror +with a tender and melancholy smile. + +Ah! One feels a chilliness—not bodily, but about the heart—and, +moreover, a foolish dread of looking behind him, after these pastimes. +I can imagine precisely how a magician would sit down in gloom and +terror after dismissing the shadows that had personated dead or distant +people and stripping his cavern of the unreal splendor which had +changed it to a palace. + +And now for a moral to my reverie. Shall it be that, since fancy can +create so bright a dream of happiness, it were better to dream on from +youth to age than to awake and strive doubtfully for something real? +Oh, the slight tissue of a dream can no more preserve us from the stern +reality of misfortune than a robe of cobweb could repel the wintry +blast. Be this the moral, then: In chaste and warm affections, humble +wishes and honest toil for some useful end there is health for the mind +and quiet for the heart, the prospect of a happy life and the fairest +hope of heaven. + + + + +THE AMBITIOUS GUEST + + +One September night a family had gathered round their hearth and piled +it high with the driftwood of mountain-streams, the dry cones of the +pine, and the splintered ruins of great trees that had come crashing +down the precipice. Up the chimney roared the fire, and brightened the +room with its broad blaze. The faces of the father and mother had a +sober gladness; the children laughed. The eldest daughter was the image +of Happiness at seventeen, and the aged grandmother, who sat knitting +in the warmest place, was the image of Happiness grown old. They had +found the “herb heart’s-ease” in the bleakest spot of all New England. +This family were situated in the Notch of the White Hills, where the +wind was sharp throughout the year and pitilessly cold in the winter, +giving their cottage all its fresh inclemency before it descended on +the valley of the Saco. They dwelt in a cold spot and a dangerous one, +for a mountain towered above their heads so steep that the stones would +often rumble down its sides and startle them at midnight. + +The daughter had just uttered some simple jest that filled them all +with mirth, when the wind came through the Notch and seemed to pause +before their cottage, rattling the door with a sound of wailing and +lamentation before it passed into the valley. For a moment it saddened +them, though there was nothing unusual in the tones. But the family +were glad again when they perceived that the latch was lifted by some +traveller whose footsteps had been unheard amid the dreary blast which +heralded his approach and wailed as he was entering and went moaning +away from the door. + +Though they dwelt in such a solitude, these people held daily converse +with the world. The romantic pass of the Notch is a great artery +through which the life-blood of internal commerce is continually +throbbing between Maine on one side and the Green Mountains and the +shores of the St. Lawrence on the other. The stage-coach always drew up +before the door of the cottage. The wayfarer with no companion but his +staff paused here to exchange a word, that the sense of loneliness +might not utterly overcome him ere he could pass through the cleft of +the mountain or reach the first house in the valley. And here the +teamster on his way to Portland market would put up for the night, and, +if a bachelor, might sit an hour beyond the usual bedtime and steal a +kiss from the mountain-maid at parting. It was one of those primitive +taverns where the traveller pays only for food and lodging, but meets +with a homely kindness beyond all price. When the footsteps were heard, +therefore, between the outer door and the inner one, the whole family +rose up, grandmother, children and all, as if about to welcome some one +who belonged to them, and whose fate was linked with theirs. + +The door was opened by a young man. His face at first wore the +melancholy expression, almost despondency, of one who travels a wild +and bleak road at nightfall and alone, but soon brightened up when he +saw the kindly warmth of his reception. He felt his heart spring +forward to meet them all, from the old woman who wiped a chair with her +apron to the little child that held out its arms to him. One glance and +smile placed the stranger on a footing of innocent familiarity with the +eldest daughter. + +“Ah! this fire is the right thing,” cried he, “especially when there is +such a pleasant circle round it. I am quite benumbed, for the Notch is +just like the pipe of a great pair of bellows; it has blown a terrible +blast in my face all the way from Bartlett.” + +“Then you are going toward Vermont?” said the master of the house as he +helped to take a light knapsack off the young man’s shoulders. + +“Yes, to Burlington, and far enough beyond,” replied he. “I meant to +have been at Ethan Crawford’s to-night, but a pedestrian lingers along +such a road as this. It is no matter; for when I saw this good fire and +all your cheerful faces, I felt as if you had kindled it on purpose for +me and were waiting my arrival. So I shall sit down among you and make +myself at home.” + +The frank-hearted stranger had just drawn his chair to the fire when +something like a heavy footstep was heard without, rushing down the +steep side of the mountain as with long and rapid strides, and taking +such a leap in passing the cottage as to strike the opposite precipice. +The family held their breath, because they knew the sound, and their +guest held his by instinct. + +“The old mountain has thrown a stone at us for fear we should forget +him,” said the landlord, recovering himself. “He sometimes nods his +head and threatens to come down, but we are old neighbors, and agree +together pretty well, upon the whole. Besides, we have a sure place of +refuge hard by if he should be coming in good earnest.” + +Let us now suppose the stranger to have finished his supper of bear’s +meat, and by his natural felicity of manner to have placed himself on a +footing of kindness with the whole family; so that they talked as +freely together as if he belonged to their mountain-brood. He was of a +proud yet gentle spirit, haughty and reserved among the rich and great, +but ever ready to stoop his head to the lowly cottage door and be like +a brother or a son at the poor man’s fireside. In the household of the +Notch he found warmth and simplicity of feeling, the pervading +intelligence of New England, and a poetry of native growth which they +had gathered when they little thought of it from the mountain-peaks and +chasms, and at the very threshold of their romantic and dangerous +abode. He had travelled far and alone; his whole life, indeed, had been +a solitary path, for, with the lofty caution of his nature, he had kept +himself apart from those who might otherwise have been his companions. +The family, too, though so kind and hospitable, had that consciousness +of unity among themselves and separation from the world at large which +in every domestic circle should still keep a holy place where no +stranger may intrude. But this evening a prophetic sympathy impelled +the refined and educated youth to pour out his heart before the simple +mountaineers, and constrained them to answer him with the same free +confidence. And thus it should have been. Is not the kindred of a +common fate a closer tie than that of birth? + +The secret of the young man’s character was a high and abstracted +ambition. He could have borne to live an undistinguished life, but not +to be forgotten in the grave. Yearning desire had been transformed to +hope, and hope, long cherished, had become like certainty that, +obscurely as he journeyed now, a glory was to beam on all his pathway, +though not, perhaps, while he was treading it. But when posterity +should gaze back into the gloom of what was now the present, they would +trace the brightness of his footsteps, brightening as meaner glories +faded, and confess that a gifted one had passed from his cradle to his +tomb with none to recognize him. + +“As yet,” cried the stranger, his cheek glowing and his eye flashing +with enthusiasm—“as yet I have done nothing. Were I to vanish from the +earth to-morrow, none would know so much of me as you—that a nameless +youth came up at nightfall from the valley of the Saco, and opened his +heart to you in the evening, and passed through the Notch by sunrise, +and was seen no more. Not a soul would ask, ‘Who was he? Whither did +the wanderer go?’ But I cannot die till I have achieved my destiny. +Then let Death come: I shall have built my monument.” + +There was a continual flow of natural emotion gushing forth amid +abstracted reverie which enabled the family to understand this young +man’s sentiments, though so foreign from their own. With quick +sensibility of the ludicrous, he blushed at the ardor into which he had +been betrayed. + +“You laugh at me,” said he, taking the eldest daughter’s hand and +laughing himself. “You think my ambition as nonsensical as if I were to +freeze myself to death on the top of Mount Washington only that people +might spy at me from the country roundabout. And truly that would be a +noble pedestal for a man’s statue.” + +“It is better to sit here by this fire,” answered the girl, blushing, +“and be comfortable and contented, though nobody thinks about us.” + +“I suppose,” said her father, after a fit of musing, “there is +something natural in what the young man says; and if my mind had been +turned that way, I might have felt just the same.—It is strange, wife, +how his talk has set my head running on things that are pretty certain +never to come to pass.” + +“Perhaps they may,” observed the wife. “Is the man thinking what he +will do when he is a widower?” + +“No, no!” cried he, repelling the idea with reproachful kindness. “When +I think of your death, Esther, I think of mine too. But I was wishing +we had a good farm in Bartlett or Bethlehem or Littleton, or some other +township round the White Mountains, but not where they could tumble on +our heads. I should want to stand well with my neighbors and be called +squire and sent to General Court for a term or two; for a plain, honest +man may do as much good there as a lawyer. And when I should be grown +quite an old man, and you an old woman, so as not to be long apart, I +might die happy enough in my bed, and leave you all crying around me. A +slate gravestone would suit me as well as a marble one, with just my +name and age, and a verse of a hymn, and something to let people know +that I lived an honest man and died a Christian.” + +“There, now!” exclaimed the stranger; “it is our nature to desire a +monument, be it slate or marble, or a pillar of granite, or a glorious +memory in the universal heart of man.” + +“We’re in a strange way to-night,” said the wife, with tears in her +eyes. “They say it’s a sign of something when folks’ minds go +a-wandering so. Hark to the children!” + +They listened accordingly. The younger children had been put to bed in +another room, but with an open door between; so that they could be +heard talking busily among themselves. One and all seemed to have +caught the infection from the fireside circle, and were outvying each +other in wild wishes and childish projects of what they would do when +they came to be men and women. At length a little boy, instead of +addressing his brothers and sisters, called out to his mother. + +“I’ll tell you what I wish, mother,” cried he: “I want you and father +and grandma’m, and all of us, and the stranger too, to start right away +and go and take a drink out of the basin of the Flume.” + +Nobody could help laughing at the child’s notion of leaving a warm bed +and dragging them from a cheerful fire to visit the basin of the +Flume—a brook which tumbles over the precipice deep within the Notch. + +The boy had hardly spoken, when a wagon rattled along the road and +stopped a moment before the door. It appeared to contain two or three +men who were cheering their hearts with the rough chorus of a song +which resounded in broken notes between the cliffs, while the singers +hesitated whether to continue their journey or put up here for the +night. + +“Father,” said the girl, “they are calling you by name.” + +But the good man doubted whether they had really called him, and was +unwilling to show himself too solicitous of gain by inviting people to +patronize his house. He therefore did not hurry to the door, and, the +lash being soon applied, the travellers plunged into the Notch, still +singing and laughing, though their music and mirth came back drearily +from the heart of the mountain. + +“There, mother!” cried the boy, again; “they’d have given us a ride to +the Flume.” + +Again they laughed at the child’s pertinacious fancy for a +night-ramble. But it happened that a light cloud passed over the +daughter’s spirit; she looked gravely into the fire and drew a breath +that was almost a sigh. It forced its way, in spite of a little +struggle to repress it. Then, starting and blushing, she looked quickly +around the circle, as if they had caught a glimpse into her bosom. The +stranger asked what she had been thinking of. + +“Nothing,” answered she, with a downcast smile; “only I felt lonesome +just then.” + +“Oh, I have always had a gift of feeling what is in other people’s +hearts,” said he, half seriously. “Shall I tell the secrets of yours? +For I know what to think when a young girl shivers by a warm hearth and +complains of lonesomeness at her mother’s side. Shall I put these +feelings into words?” + +“They would not be a girl’s feelings any longer if they could be put +into words,” replied the mountain-nymph, laughing, but avoiding his +eye. + +All this was said apart. Perhaps a germ of love was springing in their +hearts so pure that it might blossom in Paradise, since it could not be +matured on earth; for women worship such gentle dignity as his, and the +proud, contemplative, yet kindly, soul is oftenest captivated by +simplicity like hers. But while they spoke softly, and he was watching +the happy sadness, the lightsome shadows, the shy yearnings, of a +maiden’s nature, the wind through the Notch took a deeper and drearier +sound. It seemed, as the fanciful stranger said, like the choral strain +of the spirits of the blast who in old Indian times had their dwelling +among these mountains and made their heights and recesses a sacred +region. There was a wail along the road as if a funeral were passing. +To chase away the gloom, the family threw pine-branches on their fire +till the dry leaves crackled and the flame arose, discovering once +again a scene of peace and humble happiness. The light hovered about +them fondly and caressed them all. There were the little faces of the +children peeping from their bed apart, and here the father’s frame of +strength, the mother’s subdued and careful mien, the high-browed youth, +the budding girl and the good old grandam, still knitting in the +warmest place. + +The aged woman looked up from her task, and with fingers ever busy was +the next to speak. + +“Old folks have their notions,” said she, “as well as young ones. +You’ve been wishing and planning and letting your heads run on one +thing and another till you’ve set my mind a-wandering too. Now, what +should an old woman wish for, when she can go but a step or two before +she comes to her grave? Children, it will haunt me night and day till I +tell you.” + +“What is it, mother?” cried the husband and wife at once. + +Then the old woman, with an air of mystery which drew the circle closer +round the fire, informed them that she had provided her grave-clothes +some years before—a nice linen shroud, a cap with a muslin ruff, and +everything of a finer sort than she had worn since her wedding-day. But +this evening an old superstition had strangely recurred to her. It used +to be said in her younger days that if anything were amiss with a +corpse—if only the ruff were not smooth or the cap did not set +right—the corpse, in the coffin and beneath the clods, would strive to +put up its cold hands and arrange it. The bare thought made her +nervous. + +“Don’t talk so, grandmother,” said the girl, shuddering. + +“Now,” continued the old woman, with singular earnestness, yet smiling +strangely at her own folly, “I want one of you, my children, when your +mother is dressed and in the coffin,—I want one of you to hold a +looking-glass over my face. Who knows but I may take a glimpse at +myself and see whether all’s right?” + +“Old and young, we dream of graves and monuments,” murmured the +stranger-youth. “I wonder how mariners feel when the ship is sinking +and they, unknown and undistinguished, are to be buried together in the +ocean, that wide and nameless sepulchre?” + +For a moment the old woman’s ghastly conception so engrossed the minds +of her hearers that a sound abroad in the night, rising like the roar +of a blast, had grown broad, deep and terrible before the fated group +were conscious of it. The house and all within it trembled; the +foundations of the earth seemed to be shaken, as if this awful sound +were the peal of the last trump. Young and old exchanged one wild +glance and remained an instant pale, affrighted, without utterance or +power to move. Then the same shriek burst simultaneously from all their +lips: + +“The slide! The slide!” + +The simplest words must intimate, but not portray, the unutterable +horror of the catastrophe. The victims rushed from their cottage and +sought refuge in what they deemed a safer spot, where, in contemplation +of such an emergency, a sort of barrier had been reared. Alas! they had +quitted their security and fled right into the pathway of destruction. +Down came the whole side of the mountain in a cataract of ruin. Just +before it reached the house the stream broke into two branches, +shivered not a window there, but overwhelmed the whole vicinity, +blocked up the road and annihilated everything in its dreadful course. +Long ere the thunder of that great slide had ceased to roar among the +mountains the mortal agony had been endured and the victims were at +peace. Their bodies were never found. + +The next morning the light smoke was seen stealing from the cottage +chimney up the mountain-side. Within, the fire was yet smouldering on +the hearth, and the chairs in a circle round it, as if the inhabitants +had but gone forth to view the devastation of the slide and would +shortly return to thank Heaven for their miraculous escape. All had +left separate tokens by which those who had known the family were made +to shed a tear for each. Who has not heard their name? The story has +been told far and wide, and will for ever be a legend of these +mountains. Poets have sung their fate. + +There were circumstances which led some to suppose that a stranger had +been received into the cottage on this awful night, and had shared the +catastrophe of all its inmates; others denied that there were +sufficient grounds for such a conjecture. Woe for the high-souled youth +with his dream of earthly immortality! His name and person utterly +unknown, his history, his way of life, his plans, a mystery never to be +solved, his death and his existence equally a doubt,—whose was the +agony of that death-moment? + + + + +THE SISTER-YEARS + + +Last night, between eleven and twelve o’clock, when the Old Year was +leaving her final footprints on the borders of Time’s empire, she found +herself in possession of a few spare moments, and sat down—of all +places in the world—on the steps of our new city-hall. The wintry +moonlight showed that she looked weary of body and sad of heart, like +many another wayfarer of earth. Her garments, having been exposed to +much foul weather and rough usage, were in very ill condition, and, as +the hurry of her journey had never before allowed her to take an +instant’s rest, her shoes were so worn as to be scarcely worth the +mending. But after trudging only a little distance farther this poor +Old Year was destined to enjoy a long, long sleep. I forgot to mention +that when she seated herself on the steps she deposited by her side a +very capacious bandbox in which, as is the custom among travellers of +her sex, she carried a great deal of valuable property. Besides this +luggage, there was a folio book under her arm very much resembling the +annual volume of a newspaper. Placing this volume across her knees and +resting her elbows upon it, with her forehead in her hands, the weary, +bedraggled, world-worn Old Year heaved a heavy sigh and appeared to be +taking no very pleasant retrospect of her past existence. + +While she thus awaited the midnight knell that was to summon her to the +innumerable sisterhood of departed years, there came a young maiden +treading lightsomely on tip-toe along the street from the direction of +the railroad dépôt. She was evidently a stranger, and perhaps had come +to town by the evening train of cars. There was a smiling cheerfulness +in this fair maiden’s face which bespoke her fully confident of a kind +reception from the multitude of people with whom she was soon to form +acquaintance. Her dress was rather too airy for the season, and was +bedizened with fluttering ribbons and other vanities which were likely +soon to be rent away by the fierce storms or to fade in the hot +sunshine amid which she was to pursue her changeful course. But still +she was a wonderfully pleasant-looking figure, and had so much promise +and such an indescribable hopefulness in her aspect that hardly anybody +could meet her without anticipating some very desirable thing—the +consummation of some long-sought good—from her kind offices. A few +dismal characters there may be here and there about the world who have +so often been trifled with by young maidens as promising as she that +they have now ceased to pin any faith upon the skirts of the New Year. +But, for my own part, I have great faith in her, and, should I live to +see fifty more such, still from each of those successive sisters I +shall reckon upon receiving something that will be worth living for. + +The New Year—for this young maiden was no less a personage—carried all +her goods and chattels in a basket of no great size or weight, which +hung upon her arm. She greeted the disconsolate Old Year with great +affection, and sat down beside her on the steps of the city-hall, +waiting for the signal to begin her rambles through the world. The two +were own sisters, being both granddaughters of Time, and, though one +looked so much older than the other, it was rather owing to hardships +and trouble than to age, since there was but a twelvemonth’s difference +between them. + +“Well, my dear sister,” said the New Year, after the first salutations, +“you look almost tired to death. What have you been about during your +sojourn in this part of infinite space?” + +“Oh, I have it all recorded here in my book of chronicles,” answered +the Old Year, in a heavy tone. “There is nothing that would amuse you, +and you will soon get sufficient knowledge of such matters from your +own personal experience. It is but tiresome reading.” + +Nevertheless, she turned over the leaves of the folio and glanced at +them by the light of the moon, feeling an irresistible spell of +interest in her own biography, although its incidents were remembered +without pleasure. The volume, though she termed it her book of +chronicles, seemed to be neither more nor less than the Salem _Gazette_ +for 1838; in the accuracy of which journal this sagacious Old Year had +so much confidence that she deemed it needless to record her history +with her own pen. + +“What have you been doing in the political way?” asked the New Year. + +“Why, my course here in the United States,” said the Old Year—“though +perhaps I ought to blush at the confession—my political course, I must +acknowledge, has been rather vacillatory, sometimes inclining toward +the Whigs, then causing the administration party to shout for triumph, +and now again uplifting what seemed the almost prostrate banner of the +opposition; so that historians will hardly know what to make of me in +this respect. But the Loco-Focos—” + +“I do not like these party nicknames,” interrupted her sister, who +seemed remarkably touchy about some points. “Perhaps we shall part in +better humor if we avoid any political discussion.” + +“With all my heart,” replied the Old Year, who had already been +tormented half to death with squabbles of this kind. “I care not if the +name of Whig or Tory, with their interminable brawls about banks and +the sub-treasury, abolition, Texas, the Florida war, and a million of +other topics which you will learn soon enough for your own comfort,—I +care not, I say, if no whisper of these matters ever reaches my ears +again. Yet they have occupied so large a share of my attention that I +scarcely know what else to tell you. There has, indeed been a curious +sort of war on the Canada border, where blood has streamed in the names +of liberty and patriotism; but it must remain for some future, perhaps +far-distant, year to tell whether or no those holy names have been +rightfully invoked. Nothing so much depresses me in my view of mortal +affairs as to see high energies wasted and human life and happiness +thrown away for ends that appear oftentimes unwise, and still oftener +remain unaccomplished. But the wisest people and the best keep a +steadfast faith that the progress of mankind is onward and upward, and +that the toil and anguish of the path serve to wear away the +imperfections of the immortal pilgrim, and will be felt no more when +they have done their office.” + +“Perhaps,” cried the hopeful New Year—“perhaps I shall see that happy +day.” + +“I doubt whether it be so close at hand,” answered the Old Year, +gravely smiling. “You will soon grow weary of looking for that blessed +consummation, and will turn for amusement—as has frequently been my own +practice—to the affairs of some sober little city like this of Salem. +Here we sit on the steps of the new city-hall which has been completed +under my administration, and it would make you laugh to see how the +game of politics of which the Capitol at Washington is the great +chess-board is here played in miniature. Burning Ambition finds its +fuel here; here patriotism speaks boldly in the people’s behalf and +virtuous economy demands retrenchment in the emoluments of a +lamplighter; here the aldermen range their senatorial dignity around +the mayor’s chair of state and the common council feel that they have +liberty in charge. In short, human weakness and strength, passion and +policy, man’s tendencies, his aims and modes of pursuing them, his +individual character and his character in the mass, may be studied +almost as well here as on the theatre of nations, and with this great +advantage—that, be the lesson ever so disastrous, its Liliputian scope +still makes the beholder smile.” + +“Have you done much for the improvement of the city?” asked the New +Year. “Judging from what little I have seen, it appears to be ancient +and time-worn.” + +“I have opened the railroad,” said the elder Year, “and half a dozen +times a day you will hear the bell which once summoned the monks of a +Spanish convent to their devotions announcing the arrival or departure +of the cars. Old Salem now wears a much livelier expression than when I +first beheld her. Strangers rumble down from Boston by hundreds at a +time. New faces throng in Essex street. Railroad-hacks and omnibuses +rattle over the pavements. There is a perceptible increase of +oyster-shops and other establishments for the accommodation of a +transitory diurnal multitude. But a more important change awaits the +venerable town. An immense accumulation of musty prejudices will be +carried off by the free circulation of society. A peculiarity of +character of which the inhabitants themselves are hardly sensible will +be rubbed down and worn away by the attrition of foreign substances. +Much of the result will be good; there will likewise be a few things +not so good. Whether for better or worse, there will be a probable +diminution of the moral influence of wealth, and the sway of an +aristocratic class which from an era far beyond my memory has held +firmer dominion here than in any other New England town.” + +The Old Year, having talked away nearly all of her little remaining +breath, now closed her book of chronicles, and was about to take her +departure, but her sister detained her a while longer by inquiring the +contents of the huge bandbox which she was so painfully lugging along +with her. + +“These are merely a few trifles,” replied the Old Year, “which I have +picked up in my rambles and am going to deposit in the receptacle of +things past and forgotten. We sisterhood of years never carry anything +really valuable out of the world with us. Here are patterns of most of +the fashions which I brought into vogue, and which have already lived +out their allotted term; you will supply their place with others +equally ephemeral. Here, put up in little china pots, like rouge, is a +considerable lot of beautiful women’s bloom which the disconsolate fair +ones owe me a bitter grudge for stealing. I have likewise a quantity of +men’s dark hair, instead of which I have left gray locks or none at +all. The tears of widows and other afflicted mortals who have received +comfort during the last twelve months are preserved in some dozens of +essence-bottles well corked and sealed. I have several bundles of +love-letters eloquently breathing an eternity of burning passion which +grew cold and perished almost before the ink was dry. Moreover, here is +an assortment of many thousand broken promises and other broken ware, +all very light and packed into little space. The heaviest articles in +my possession are a large parcel of disappointed hopes which a little +while ago were buoyant enough to have inflated Mr. Lauriat’s balloon.” + +“I have a fine lot of hopes here in my basket,” remarked the New Year. +“They are a sweet-smelling flower—a species of rose.” + +“They soon lose their perfume,” replied the sombre Old Year. “What else +have you brought to insure a welcome from the discontented race of +mortals?” + +“Why, to say the truth, little or nothing else,” said her sister, with +a smile, “save a few new _Annuals_ and almanacs, and some New Year’s +gifts for the children. But I heartily wish well to poor mortals, and +mean to do all I can for their improvement and happiness.” + +“It is a good resolution,” rejoined the Old Year. “And, by the way, I +have a plentiful assortment of good resolutions which have now grown so +stale and musty that I am ashamed to carry them any farther. Only for +fear that the city authorities would send Constable Mansfield with a +warrant after me, I should toss them into the street at once. Many +other matters go to make up the contents of my bandbox, but the whole +lot would not fetch a single bid even at an auction of worn-out +furniture; and as they are worth nothing either to you or anybody else, +I need not trouble you with a longer catalogue.” + +“And must I also pick up such worthless luggage in my travels?” asked +the New Year. + +“Most certainly, and well if you have no heavier load to bear,” replied +the other. “And now, my dear sister, I must bid you farewell, earnestly +advising and exhorting you to expect no gratitude nor good-will from +this peevish, unreasonable, inconsiderate, ill-intending and +worse-behaving world. However warmly its inhabitants may seem to +welcome you, yet, do what you may and lavish on them what means of +happiness you please, they will still be complaining, still craving +what it is not in your power to give, still looking forward to some +other year for the accomplishment of projects which ought never to have +been formed, and which, if successful, would only provide new occasions +of discontent. If these ridiculous people ever see anything tolerable +in you, it will be after you are gone for ever.” + +“But I,” cried the fresh-hearted New Year—“I shall try to leave men +wiser than I find them. I will offer them freely whatever good gifts +Providence permits me to distribute, and will tell them to be thankful +for what they have and humbly hopeful for more; and surely, if they are +not absolute fools, they will condescend to be happy, and will allow me +to be a happy year. For my happiness must depend on them.” + +“Alas for you, then, my poor sister!” said the Old Year, sighing, as +she uplifted her burden. “We grandchildren of Time are born to trouble. +Happiness, they say, dwells in the mansions of eternity, but we can +only lead mortals thither step by step with reluctant murmurings, and +ourselves must perish on the threshold. But hark! my task is done.” + +The clock in the tall steeple of Dr. Emerson’s church struck twelve; +there was a response from Dr. Flint’s, in the opposite quarter of the +city; and while the strokes were yet dropping into the air the Old Year +either flitted or faded away, and not the wisdom and might of angels, +to say nothing of the remorseful yearnings of the millions who had used +her ill, could have prevailed with that departed year to return one +step. But she, in the company of Time and all her kindred, must +hereafter hold a reckoning with mankind. So shall it be, likewise, with +the maidenly New Year, who, as the clock ceased to strike, arose from +the steps of the city-hall and set out rather timorously on her earthly +course. + +“A happy New Year!” cried a watchman, eying her figure very +questionably, but without the least suspicion that he was addressing +the New Year in person. + +“Thank you kindly,” said the New Year; and she gave the watchman one of +the roses of hope from her basket. “May this flower keep a sweet smell +long after I have bidden you good-bye!” + +Then she stepped on more briskly through the silent streets, and such +as were awake at the moment heard her footfall and said, “The New Year +is come!” Wherever there was a knot of midnight roisterers, they +quaffed her health. She sighed, however, to perceive that the air was +tainted—as the atmosphere of this world must continually be—with the +dying breaths of mortals who had lingered just long enough for her to +bury them. But there were millions left alive to rejoice at her coming, +and so she pursued her way with confidence, strewing emblematic flowers +on the doorstep of almost every dwelling, which some persons will +gather up and wear in their bosoms, and others will trample under foot. +The carrier-boy can only say further that early this morning she filled +his basket with New Year’s addresses, assuring him that the whole city, +with our new mayor and the aldermen and common council at its head, +would make a general rush to secure copies. Kind patrons, will not you +redeem the pledge of the New Year? + + + + +SNOWFLAKES + + +There is snow in yonder cold gray sky of the morning, and through the +partially-frosted window-panes I love to watch the gradual beginning of +the storm. A few feathery flakes are scattered widely through the air +and hover downward with uncertain flight, now almost alighting on the +earth, now whirled again aloft into remote regions of the atmosphere. +These are not the big flakes heavy with moisture which melt as they +touch the ground and are portentous of a soaking rain. It is to be in +good earnest a wintry storm. The two or three people visible on the +sidewalks have an aspect of endurance, a blue-nosed, frosty fortitude, +which is evidently assumed in anticipation of a comfortless and +blustering day. By nightfall—or, at least, before the sun sheds another +glimmering smile upon us—the street and our little garden will be +heaped with mountain snowdrifts. The soil, already frozen for weeks +past, is prepared to sustain whatever burden may be laid upon it, and +to a Northern eye the landscape will lose its melancholy bleakness and +acquire a beauty of its own when Mother Earth, like her children, shall +have put on the fleecy garb of her winter’s wear. The cloud-spirits are +slowly weaving her white mantle. As yet, indeed, there is barely a rime +like hoar-frost over the brown surface of the street; the withered +green of the grass-plat is still discernible, and the slated roofs of +the houses do but begin to look gray instead of black. All the snow +that has yet fallen within the circumference of my view, were it heaped +up together, would hardly equal the hillock of a grave. Thus gradually +by silent and stealthy influences are great changes wrought. These +little snow-particles which the storm-spirit flings by handfuls through +the air will bury the great Earth under their accumulated mass, nor +permit her to behold her sister Sky again for dreary months. We +likewise shall lose sight of our mother’s familiar visage, and must +content ourselves with looking heavenward the oftener. + +Now, leaving the Storm to do his appointed office, let us sit down, pen +in hand, by our fireside. Gloomy as it may seem, there is an influence +productive of cheerfulness and favorable to imaginative thought in the +atmosphere of a snowy day. The native of a Southern clime may woo the +Muse beneath the heavy shade of summer foliage reclining on banks of +turf, while the sound of singing-birds and warbling rivulets chimes in +with the music of his soul. In our brief summer I do not think, but +only exist in the vague enjoyment of a dream. My hour of inspiration—if +that hour ever comes—is when the green log hisses upon the hearth, and +the bright flame, brighter for the gloom of the chamber, rustles high +up the chimney, and the coals drop tinkling down among the growing +heaps of ashes. When the casement rattles in the gust and the +snowflakes or the sleety raindrops pelt hard against the window-panes, +then I spread out my sheet of paper with the certainty that thoughts +and fancies will gleam forth upon it like stars at twilight or like +violets in May, perhaps to fade as soon. However transitory their glow, +they at least shine amid the darksome shadow which the clouds of the +outward sky fling through the room. Blessed, therefore, and reverently +welcomed by me, her true-born son, be New England’s winter, which makes +us one and all the nurslings of the storm and sings a familiar lullaby +even in the wildest shriek of the December blast. Now look we forth +again and see how much of his task the storm-spirit has done. + +Slow and sure! He has the day—perchance the week—before him, and may +take his own time to accomplish Nature’s burial in snow. A smooth +mantle is scarcely yet thrown over the withered grass-plat, and the dry +stalks of annuals still thrust themselves through the white surface in +all parts of the garden. The leafless rose-bushes stand shivering in a +shallow snowdrift, looking, poor things! as disconsolate as if they +possessed a human consciousness of the dreary scene. This is a sad time +for the shrubs that do not perish with the summer. They neither live +nor die; what they retain of life seems but the chilling sense of +death. Very sad are the flower-shrubs in midwinter. The roofs of the +houses are now all white, save where the eddying wind has kept them +bare at the bleak corners. To discern the real intensity of the storm, +we must fix upon some distant object—as yonder spire—and observe how +the riotous gust fights with the descending snow throughout the +intervening space. Sometimes the entire prospect is obscured; then, +again, we have a distinct but transient glimpse of the tall steeple, +like a giant’s ghost; and now the dense wreaths sweep between, as if +demons were flinging snowdrifts at each other in mid-air. Look next +into the street, where we have an amusing parallel to the combat of +those fancied demons in the upper regions. It is a snow-battle of +schoolboys. What a pretty satire on war and military glory might be +written in the form of a child’s story by describing the snow-ball +fights of two rival schools, the alternate defeats and victories of +each, and the final triumph of one party, or perhaps of neither! What +pitched battles worthy to be chanted in Homeric strains! What storming +of fortresses built all of massive snow-blocks! What feats of +individual prowess and embodied onsets of martial enthusiasm! And when +some well-contested and decisive victory had put a period to the war, +both armies should unite to build a lofty monument of snow upon the +battlefield and crown it with the victor’s statue hewn of the same +frozen marble. In a few days or weeks thereafter the passer-by would +observe a shapeless mound upon the level common, and, unmindful of the +famous victory, would ask, “How came it there? Who reared it? And what +means it?” The shattered pedestal of many a battle-monument has +provoked these questions when none could answer. + +Turn we again to the fireside and sit musing there, lending our ears to +the wind till perhaps it shall seem like an articulate voice and +dictate wild and airy matter for the pen. Would it might inspire me to +sketch out the personification of a New England winter! And that idea, +if I can seize the snow-wreathed figures that flit before my fancy, +shall be the theme of the next page. + +How does Winter herald his approach? By the shrieking blast of latter +autumn which is Nature’s cry of lamentation as the destroyer rushes +among the shivering groves where she has lingered and scatters the sear +leaves upon the tempest. When that cry is heard, the people wrap +themselves in cloaks and shake their heads disconsolately, saying, +“Winter is at hand.” Then the axe of the woodcutter echoes sharp and +diligently in the forest; then the coal-merchants rejoice because each +shriek of Nature in her agony adds something to the price of coal per +ton; then the peat-smoke spreads its aromatic fragrance through the +atmosphere. A few days more, and at eventide the children look out of +the window and dimly perceive the flaunting of a snowy mantle in the +air. It is stern Winter’s vesture. They crowd around the hearth and +cling to their mother’s gown or press between their father’s knees, +affrighted by the hollow roaring voice that bellows adown the wide flue +of the chimney. + +It is the voice of Winter; and when parents and children hear it, they +shudder and exclaim, “Winter is come. Cold Winter has begun his reign +already.” Now throughout New England each hearth becomes an altar +sending up the smoke of a continued sacrifice to the immitigable deity +who tyrannizes over forest, country-side and town. Wrapped in his white +mantle, his staff a huge icicle, his beard and hair a wind-tossed +snowdrift, he travels over the land in the midst of the northern blast, +and woe to the homeless wanderer whom he finds upon his path! There he +lies stark and stiff, a human shape of ice, on the spot where Winter +overtook him. On strides the tyrant over the rushing rivers and broad +lakes, which turn to rock beneath his footsteps. His dreary empire is +established; all around stretches the desolation of the pole. Yet not +ungrateful be his New England children (for Winter is our sire, though +a stern and rough one)—not ungrateful even for the severities which +have nourished our unyielding strength of character. And let us thank +him, too, for the sleigh-rides cheered by the music of merry bells; for +the crackling and rustling hearth when the ruddy firelight gleams on +hardy manhood and the blooming cheek of woman: for all the +home-enjoyments and the kindred virtues which flourish in a frozen +soil. Not that we grieve when, after some seven months of storm and +bitter frost, Spring, in the guise of a flower-crowned virgin, is seen +driving away the hoary despot, pelting him with violets by the handful +and strewing green grass on the path behind him. Often ere he will give +up his empire old Winter rushes fiercely buck and hurls a snowdrift at +the shrinking form of Spring, yet step by step he is compelled to +retreat northward, and spends the summer month within the Arctic +circle. + +Such fantasies, intermixed among graver toils of mind, have made the +winter’s day pass pleasantly. Meanwhile, the storm has raged without +abatement, and now, as the brief afternoon declines, is tossing denser +volumes to and fro about the atmosphere. On the window-sill there is a +layer of snow reaching halfway up the lowest pane of glass. The garden +is one unbroken bed. Along the street are two or three spots of +uncovered earth where the gust has whirled away the snow, heaping it +elsewhere to the fence-tops or piling huge banks against the doors of +houses. A solitary passenger is seen, now striding mid-leg deep across +a drift, now scudding over the bare ground, while his cloak is swollen +with the wind. And now the jingling of bells—a sluggish sound +responsive to the horse’s toilsome progress through the unbroken +drifts—announces the passage of a sleigh with a boy clinging behind and +ducking his head to escape detection by the driver. Next comes a sledge +laden with wood for some unthrifty housekeeper whom winter has +surprised at a cold hearth. But what dismal equipage now struggles +along the uneven street? A sable hearse bestrewn with snow is bearing a +dead man through the storm to his frozen bed. Oh how dreary is a burial +in winter, when the bosom of Mother Earth has no warmth for her poor +child! + +Evening—the early eve of December—begins to spread its deepening veil +over the comfortless scene. The firelight gradually brightens and +throws my flickering shadow upon the walls and ceiling of the chamber, +but still the storm rages and rattles against the windows. Alas! I +shiver and think it time to be disconsolate, but, taking a farewell +glance at dead Nature in her shroud, I perceive a flock of snowbirds +skimming lightsomely through the tempest and flitting from drift to +drift as sportively as swallows in the delightful prime of summer. +Whence come they? Where do they build their nests and seek their food? +Why, having airy wings, do they not follow summer around the earth, +instead of making themselves the playmates of the storm and fluttering +on the dreary verge of the winter’s eve? I know not whence they come, +nor why; yet my spirit has been cheered by that wandering flock of +snow-birds. + + + + +THE SEVEN VAGABONDS + + +Rambling on foot in the spring of my life and the summer of the year, I +came one afternoon to a point which gave me the choice of three +directions. Straight before me the main road extended its dusty length +to Boston; on the left a branch went toward the sea, and would have +lengthened my journey a trifle of twenty or thirty miles, while by the +right-hand path I might have gone over hills and lakes to Canada, +visiting in my way the celebrated town of Stamford. On a level spot of +grass at the foot of the guide-post appeared an object which, though +locomotive on a different principle, reminded me of Gulliver’s portable +mansion among the Brobdignags. It was a huge covered wagon—or, more +properly, a small house on wheels—with a door on one side and a window +shaded by green blinds on the other. Two horses munching provender out +of the baskets which muzzled them were fastened near the vehicle. A +delectable sound of music proceeded from the interior, and I +immediately conjectured that this was some itinerant show halting at +the confluence of the roads to intercept such idle travellers as +myself. A shower had long been climbing up the western sky, and now +hung so blackly over my onward path that it was a point of wisdom to +seek shelter here. + +“Halloo! Who stands guard here? Is the doorkeeper asleep?” cried I, +approaching a ladder of two or three steps which was let down from the +wagon. + +The music ceased at my summons, and there appeared at the door, not the +sort of figure that I had mentally assigned to the wandering showman, +but a most respectable old personage whom I was sorry to have addressed +in so free a style. He wore a snuff-colored coat and small-clothes, +with white top-boots, and exhibited the mild dignity of aspect and +manner which may often be noticed in aged schoolmasters, and sometimes +in deacons, selectmen or other potentates of that kind. A small piece +of silver was my passport within his premises, where I found only one +other person, hereafter to be described. + +“This is a dull day for business,” said the old gentleman as he ushered +me in; “but I merely tarry here to refresh the cattle, being bound for +the camp-meeting at Stamford.” + +Perhaps the movable scene of this narrative is still peregrinating New +England, and may enable the reader to test the accuracy of my +description. The spectacle—for I will not use the unworthy term of +“puppet-show”—consisted of a multitude of little people assembled on a +miniature stage. Among them were artisans of every kind in the +attitudes of their toil, and a group of fair ladies and gay gentlemen +standing ready for the dance; a company of foot-soldiers formed a line +across the stage, looking stern, grim and terrible enough to make it a +pleasant consideration that they were but three inches high; and +conspicuous above the whole was seen a Merry Andrew in the pointed cap +and motley coat of his profession. All the inhabitants of this mimic +world were motionless, like the figures in a picture, or like that +people who one moment were alive in the midst of their business and +delights and the next were transformed to statues, preserving an +eternal semblance of labor that was ended and pleasure that could be +felt no more. Anon, however, the old gentleman turned the handle of a +barrel-organ, the first note of which produced a most enlivening effect +upon the figures and awoke them all to their proper occupations and +amusements. By the selfsame impulse the tailor plied his needle, the +blacksmith’s hammer descended upon the anvil and the dancers whirled +away on feathery tiptoes; the company of soldiers broke into platoons, +retreated from the stage, and were succeeded by a troop of horse, who +came prancing onward with such a sound of trumpets and trampling of +hoofs as might have startled Don Quixote himself; while an old toper of +inveterate ill-habits uplifted his black bottle and took off a hearty +swig. Meantime, the Merry Andrew began to caper and turn somersets, +shaking his sides, nodding his head and winking his eyes in as lifelike +a manner as if he were ridiculing the nonsense of all human affairs and +making fun of the whole multitude beneath him. At length the old +magician (for I compared the showman to Prospero entertaining his +guests with a masque of shadows) paused that I might give utterance to +my wonder. + +“What an admirable piece of work is this!” exclaimed I, lifting up my +hands in astonishment. + +Indeed, I liked the spectacle and was tickled with the old man’s +gravity as he presided at it, for I had none of that foolish wisdom +which reproves every occupation that is not useful in this world of +vanities. If there be a faculty which I possess more perfectly than +most men, it is that of throwing myself mentally into situations +foreign to my own and detecting with a cheerful eye the desirable +circumstances of each. I could have envied the life of this gray-headed +showman, spent as it had been in a course of safe and pleasurable +adventure in driving his huge vehicle sometimes through the sands of +Cape Cod and sometimes over the rough forest-roads of the north and +east, and halting now on the green before a village meeting-house and +now in a paved square of the metropolis. How often must his heart have +been gladdened by the delight of children as they viewed these animated +figures, or his pride indulged by haranguing learnedly to grown men on +the mechanical powers which produced such wonderful effects, or his +gallantry brought into play—for this is an attribute which such grave +men do not lack—by the visits of pretty maidens! And then with how +fresh a feeling must he return at intervals to his own peculiar home! +“I would I were assured of as happy a life as his,” thought I. + +Though the showman’s wagon might have accommodated fifteen or twenty +spectators, it now contained only himself and me and a third person, at +whom I threw a glance on entering. He was a neat and trim young man of +two or three and twenty; his drab hat and green frock-coat with velvet +collar were smart, though no longer new, while a pair of green +spectacles that seemed needless to his brisk little eyes gave him +something of a scholar-like and literary air. After allowing me a +sufficient time to inspect the puppets, he advanced with a bow and drew +my attention to some books in a corner of the wagon. These he forthwith +began to extol with an amazing volubility of well-sounding words and an +ingenuity of praise that won him my heart as being myself one of the +most merciful of critics. Indeed, his stock required some considerable +powers of commendation in the salesman. There were several ancient +friends of mine—the novels of those happy days when my affections +wavered between the _Scottish Chiefs_ and _Thomas Thumb_—besides a few +of later date whose merits had not been acknowledged by the public. I +was glad to find that dear little venerable volume the _New England +Primer_, looking as antique as ever, though in its thousandth new +edition; a bundle of superannuated gilt picture-books made such a child +of me that, partly for the glittering covers and partly for the +fairy-tales within, I bought the whole, and an assortment of ballads +and popular theatrical songs drew largely on my purse. To balance these +expenditures, I meddled neither with sermons nor science nor morality, +though volumes of each were there, nor with a _Life of Franklin_ in the +coarsest of paper, but so showily bound that it was emblematical of the +doctor himself in the court-dress which he refused to wear at Paris, +nor with Webster’s spelling-book, nor some of Byron’s minor poems, nor +half a dozen little Testaments at twenty-five cents each. Thus far the +collection might have been swept from some great bookstore or picked up +at an evening auction-room, but there was one small blue-covered +pamphlet which the pedler handed me with so peculiar an air that I +purchased it immediately at his own price; and then for the first time +the thought struck me that I had spoken face to face with the veritable +author of a printed book. + +The literary-man now evinced a great kindness for me, and I ventured to +inquire which way he was travelling. + +“Oh,” said he, “I keep company with this old gentlemen here, and we are +moving now toward the camp-meeting at Stamford.” + +He then explained to me that for the present season he had rented a +corner of the wagon as a book-store, which, as he wittily observed, was +a true circulating library, since there were few parts of the country +where it had not gone its rounds. I approved of the plan exceedingly, +and began to sum up within my mind the many uncommon felicities in the +life of a book-pedler, especially when his character resembled that of +the individual before me. At a high rate was to be reckoned the daily +and hourly enjoyment of such interviews as the present, in which he +seized upon the admiration of a passing stranger and made him aware +that a man of literary taste, and even of literary achievement, was +travelling the country in a showman’s wagon. A more valuable yet not +infrequent triumph might be won in his conversations with some elderly +clergyman long vegetating in a rocky, woody, watery back-settlement of +New England, who as he recruited his library from the pedler’s stock of +sermons would exhort him to seek a college education and become the +first scholar in his class. Sweeter and prouder yet would be his +sensations when, talking poetry while he sold spelling-books, he should +charm the mind, and haply touch the heart, of a fair country +schoolmistress, herself an unhonored poetess, a wearer of blue +stockings which none but himself took pains to look at. But the scene +of his completest glory would be when the wagon had halted for the +night and his stock of books was transferred to some crowded bar-room. +Then would he recommend to the multifarious company, whether traveller +from the city, or teamster from the hills, or neighboring squire, or +the landlord himself, or his loutish hostler, works suited to each +particular taste and capacity, proving, all the while, by acute +criticism and profound remark, that the lore in his books was even +exceeded by that in his brain. Thus happily would he traverse the land, +sometimes a herald before the march of Mind, sometimes walking arm in +arm with awful Literature, and reaping everywhere a harvest of real and +sensible popularity which the secluded bookworms by whose toil he lived +could never hope for. + +“If ever I meddle with literature,” thought I, fixing myself in +adamantine resolution, “it shall be as a travelling bookseller.” + +Though it was still mid-afternoon, the air had now grown dark about us, +and a few drops of rain came down upon the roof of our vehicle, +pattering like the feet of birds that had flown thither to rest. A +sound of pleasant voices made us listen, and there soon appeared +halfway up the ladder the pretty person of a young damsel whose rosy +face was so cheerful that even amid the gloomy light it seemed as if +the sunbeams were peeping under her bonnet. We next saw the dark and +handsome features of a young man who, with easier gallantry than might +have been expected in the heart of Yankee-land, was assisting her into +the wagon. It became immediately evident to us, when the two strangers +stood within the door, that they were of a profession kindred to those +of my companions, and I was delighted with the more than hospitable—the +even paternal—kindness of the old showman’s manner as he welcomed them, +while the man of literature hastened to lead the merry-eyed girl to a +seat on the long bench. + +“You are housed but just in time, my young friends,” said the master of +the wagon; “the sky would have been down upon you within five minutes.” + +The young man’s reply marked him as a foreigner—not by any variation +from the idiom and accent of good English, but because he spoke with +more caution and accuracy than if perfectly familiar with the language. + +“We knew that a shower was hanging over us,” said he, “and consulted +whether it were best to enter the house on the top of yonder hill, but, +seeing your wagon in the road—” + +“We agreed to come hither,” interrupted the girl, with a smile, +“because we should be more at home in a wandering house like this.” + +I, meanwhile, with many a wild and undetermined fantasy was narrowly +inspecting these two doves that had flown into our ark. The young man, +tall, agile and athletic, wore a mass of black shining curls clustering +round a dark and vivacious countenance which, if it had not greater +expression, was at least more active and attracted readier notice, than +the quiet faces of our countrymen. At his first appearance he had been +laden with a neat mahogany box of about two feet square, but very light +in proportion to its size, which he had immediately unstrapped from his +shoulders and deposited on the floor of the wagon. + +The girl had nearly as fair a complexion as our own beauties, and a +brighter one than most of them; the lightness of her figure, which +seemed calculated to traverse the whole world without weariness, suited +well with the glowing cheerfulness of her face, and her gay attire, +combining the rainbow hues of crimson, green and a deep orange, was as +proper to her lightsome aspect as if she had been born in it. This gay +stranger was appropriately burdened with that mirth-inspiring +instrument the fiddle, which her companion took from her hands, and +shortly began the process of tuning. Neither of us the previous company +of the wagon needed to inquire their trade, for this could be no +mystery to frequenters of brigade-musters, ordinations, cattle-shows, +commencements, and other festal meetings in our sober land; and there +is a dear friend of mine who will smile when this page recalls to his +memory a chivalrous deed performed by us in rescuing the show-box of +such a couple from a mob of great double-fisted countrymen. + +“Come,” said I to the damsel of gay attire; “shall we visit all the +wonders of the world together?” + +She understood the metaphor at once, though, indeed, it would not much +have troubled me if she had assented to the literal meaning of my +words. The mahogany box was placed in a proper position, and I peeped +in through its small round magnifying-window while the girl sat by my +side and gave short descriptive sketches as one after another the +pictures were unfolded to my view. We visited together—at least, our +imaginations did—full many a famous city in the streets of which I had +long yearned to tread. Once, I remember, we were in the harbor of +Barcelona, gazing townward; next, she bore me through the air to Sicily +and bade me look up at blazing Ætna; then we took wing to Venice and +sat in a gondola beneath the arch of the Rialto, and anon she set me +down among the thronged spectators at the coronation of Napoleon. But +there was one scene—its locality she could not tell—which charmed my +attention longer than all those gorgeous palaces and churches, because +the fancy haunted me that I myself the preceding summer had beheld just +such a humble meeting-house, in just such a pine-surrounded nook, among +our own green mountains. All these pictures were tolerably executed, +though far inferior to the girl’s touches of description; nor was it +easy to comprehend how in so few sentences, and these, as I supposed, +in a language foreign to her, she contrived to present an airy copy of +each varied scene. + +When we had travelled through the vast extent of the mahogany box, I +looked into my guide’s face. + +“‘Where are you going, my pretty maid?’” inquired I, in the words of an +old song. + +“Ah!” said the gay damsel; “you might as well ask where the summer wind +is going. We are wanderers here and there and everywhere. Wherever +there is mirth our merry hearts are drawn to it. To-day, indeed, the +people have told us of a great frolic and festival in these parts; so +perhaps we may be needed at what you call the camp-meeting at +Stamford.” + +Then, in my happy youth, and while her pleasant voice yet sounded in my +ears, I sighed; for none but myself, I thought, should have been her +companion in a life which seemed to realize my own wild fancies +cherished all through visionary boyhood to that hour. To these two +strangers the world was in its Golden Age—not that, indeed, it was less +dark and sad than ever, but because its weariness and sorrow had no +community with their ethereal nature. Wherever they might appear in +their pilgrimage of bliss, Youth would echo back their gladness, +care-stricken Maturity would rest a moment from its toil, and Age, +tottering among the graves, would smile in withered joy for their +sakes. The lonely cot, the narrow and gloomy street, the sombre shade, +would catch a passing gleam like that now shining on ourselves as these +bright spirits wandered by. Blessed pair, whose happy home was +throughout all the earth! I looked at my shoulders, and thought them +broad enough to sustain those pictured towns and mountains; mine, too, +was an elastic foot as tireless as the wing of the bird of Paradise; +mine was then an untroubled heart that would have gone singing on its +delightful way. + +“Oh, maiden,” said I aloud, “why did you not come hither alone?” + +While the merry girl and myself were busy with the show-box the +unceasing rain had driven another wayfarer into the wagon. He seemed +pretty nearly of the old showman’s age, but much smaller, leaner and +more withered than he, and less respectably clad in a patched suit of +gray; withal, he had a thin, shrewd countenance and a pair of +diminutive gray eyes, which peeped rather too keenly out of their +puckered sockets. This old fellow had been joking with the showman in a +manner which intimated previous acquaintance, but, perceiving that the +damsel and I had terminated our affairs, he drew forth a folded +document and presented it to me. As I had anticipated, it proved to be +a circular, written in a very fair and legible hand and signed by +several distinguished gentlemen whom I had never heard of, stating that +the bearer had encountered every variety of misfortune and recommending +him to the notice of all charitable people. Previous disbursements had +left me no more than a five-dollar bill, out of which, however, I +offered to make the beggar a donation provided he would give me change +for it. The object of my beneficence looked keenly in my face, and +discerned that I had none of that abominable spirit, characteristic +though it be, of a full-blooded Yankee, which takes pleasure in +detecting every little harmless piece of knavery. + +“Why, perhaps,” said the ragged old mendicant, “if the bank is in good +standing, I can’t say but I may have enough about me to change your +bill.” + +“It is a bill of the Suffolk Bank,” said I, “and better than the +specie.” + +As the beggar had nothing to object, he now produced a small buff +leather bag tied up carefully with a shoe-string. When this was opened, +there appeared a very comfortable treasure of silver coins of all sorts +and sizes, and I even fancied that I saw gleaming among them the golden +plumage of that rare bird in our currency the American eagle. In this +precious heap was my bank-note deposited, the rate of exchange being +considerably against me. + +His wants being thus relieved, the destitute man pulled out of his +pocket an old pack of greasy cards which had probably contributed to +fill the buff leather bag in more ways than one. + +“Come!” said he; “I spy a rare fortune in your face, and for +twenty-five cents more I’ll tell you what it is.” + +I never refuse to take a glimpse into futurity; so, after shuffling the +cards and when the fair damsel had cut them, I dealt a portion to the +prophetic beggar. Like others of his profession, before predicting the +shadowy events that were moving on to meet me he gave proof of his +preternatural science by describing scenes through which I had already +passed. + +Here let me have credit for a sober fact. When the old man had read a +page in his book of fate, he bent his keen gray eyes on mine and +proceeded to relate in all its minute particulars what was then the +most singular event of my life. It was one which I had no purpose to +disclose till the general unfolding of all secrets, nor would it be a +much stranger instance of inscrutable knowledge or fortunate conjecture +if the beggar were to meet me in the street today and repeat word for +word the page which I have here written. + +The fortune-teller, after predicting a destiny which time seems loth to +make good, put up his cards, secreted his treasure-bag and began to +converse with the other occupants of the wagon. + +“Well, old friend,” said the showman, “you have not yet told us which +way your face is turned this afternoon.” + +“I am taking a trip northward this warm weather,” replied the conjurer, +“across the Connecticut first, and then up through Vermont, and maybe +into Canada before the fall. But I must stop and see the breaking up of +the camp-meeting at Stamford.” + +I began to think that all the vagrants in New England were converging +to the camp-meeting and had made this wagon, their rendezvous by the +way. + +The showman now proposed that when the shower was over they should +pursue the road to Stamford together, it being sometimes the policy of +these people to form a sort of league and confederacy. + +“And the young lady too,” observed the gallant bibliopolist, bowing to +her profoundly, “and this foreign gentleman, as I understand, are on a +jaunt of pleasure to the same spot. It would add incalculably to my own +enjoyment, and I presume to that of my colleague and his friend, if +they could be prevailed upon to join our party.” + +This arrangement met with approbation on all hands, nor were any of +those concerned more sensible of its advantages than myself, who had no +title to be included in it. + +Having already satisfied myself as to the several modes in which the +four others attained felicity, I next set my mind at work to discover +what enjoyments were peculiar to the old “straggler,” as the people of +the country would have termed the wandering mendicant and prophet. As +he pretended to familiarity with the devil, so I fancied that he was +fitted to pursue and take delight in his way of life by possessing some +of the mental and moral characteristics—the lighter and more comic +ones—of the devil in popular stories. Among them might be reckoned a +love of deception for its own sake, a shrewd eye and keen relish for +human weakness and ridiculous infirmity, and the talent of petty fraud. +Thus to this old man there would be pleasure even in the +consciousness—so insupportable to some minds—that his whole life was a +cheat upon the world, and that, so far as he was concerned with the +public, his little cunning had the upper hand of its united wisdom. +Every day would furnish him with a succession of minute and pungent +triumphs—as when, for instance, his importunity wrung a pittance out of +the heart of a miser, or when my silly good-nature transferred a part +of my slender purse to his plump leather bag, or when some ostentatious +gentleman should throw a coin to the ragged beggar who was richer than +himself, or when—though he would not always be so decidedly +diabolical—his pretended wants should make him a sharer in the scanty +living of real indigence. And then what an inexhaustible field of +enjoyment, both as enabling him to discern so much folly and achieve +such quantities of minor mischief, was opened to his sneering spirit by +his pretensions to prophetic knowledge. + +All this was a sort of happiness which I could conceive of, though I +had little sympathy with it. Perhaps, had I been then inclined to admit +it, I might have found that the roving life was more proper to him than +to either of his companions; for Satan, to whom I had compared the poor +man, has delighted, ever since the time of Job, in “wandering up and +down upon the earth,” and, indeed, a crafty disposition which operates +not in deep-laid plans, but in disconnected tricks, could not have an +adequate scope, unless naturally impelled to a continual change of +scene and society. + +My reflections were here interrupted. + +“Another visitor!” exclaimed the old showman. + +The door of the wagon had been closed against the tempest, which was +roaring and blustering with prodigious fury and commotion and beating +violently against our shelter, as if it claimed all those homeless +people for its lawful prey, while we, caring little for the displeasure +of the elements, sat comfortably talking. There was now an attempt to +open the door, succeeded by a voice uttering some strange, +unintelligible gibberish which my companions mistook for Greek and I +suspected to be thieves’ Latin. However, the showman stepped forward +and gave admittance to a figure which made me imagine either that our +wagon had rolled back two hundred years into past ages or that the +forest and its old inhabitants had sprung up around us by enchantment. +It was a red Indian armed with his bow and arrow. His dress was a sort +of cap adorned with a single feather of some wild bird, and a frock of +blue cotton girded tight about him; on his breast, like orders of +knighthood, hung a crescent and a circle and other ornaments of silver, +while a small crucifix betokened that our father the pope had +interposed between the Indian and the Great Spirit whom he had +worshipped in his simplicity. This son of the wilderness and pilgrim of +the storm took his place silently in the midst of us. When the first +surprise was over, I rightly conjectured him to be one of the Penobscot +tribe, parties of which I had often seen in their summer excursions +down our Eastern rivers. There they paddle their birch canoes among the +coasting-schooners, and build their wigwam beside some roaring +mill-dam, and drive a little trade in basket-work where their fathers +hunted deer. Our new visitor was probably wandering through the country +toward Boston, subsisting on the careless charity of the people while +he turned his archery to profitable account by shooting at cents which +were to be the prize of his successful aim. + +The Indian had not long been seated ere our merry damsel sought to draw +him into conversation. She, indeed, seemed all made up of sunshine in +the month of May, for there was nothing so dark and dismal that her +pleasant mind could not cast a glow over it; and the wild man, like a +fir tree in his native forest, soon began to brighten into a sort of +sombre cheerfulness. At length she inquired whether his journey had any +particular end or purpose. + +“I go shoot at the camp-meeting at Stamford,” replied the Indian. + +“And here are five more,” said the girl, “all aiming at the +camp-meeting too. You shall be one of us, for we travel with light +hearts; and, as for me, I sing merry songs and tell merry tales and am +full of merry thoughts, and I dance merrily along the road, so that +there is never any sadness among them that keep me company. But oh, you +would find it very dull indeed to go all the way to Stamford alone.” + +My ideas of the aboriginal character led me to fear that the Indian +would prefer his own solitary musings to the gay society thus offered +him; on the contrary, the girl’s proposal met with immediate acceptance +and seemed to animate him with a misty expectation of enjoyment. + +I now gave myself up to a course of thought which, whether it flowed +naturally from this combination of events or was drawn forth by a +wayward fancy, caused my mind to thrill as if I were listening to deep +music. I saw mankind in this weary old age of the world either enduring +a sluggish existence amid the smoke and dust of cities, or, if they +breathed a purer air, still lying down at night with no hope but to +wear out to-morrow, and all the to-morrows which make up life, among +the same dull scenes and in the same wretched toil that had darkened +the sunshine of today. But there were some full of the primeval +instinct who preserved the freshness of youth to their latest years by +the continual excitement of new objects, new pursuits and new +associates, and cared little, though their birthplace might have been +here in New England, if the grave should close over them in Central +Asia. Fate was summoning a parliament of these free spirits; +unconscious of the impulse which directed them to a common centre, they +had come hither from far and near, and last of all appeared the +representatives of those mighty vagrants who had chased the deer during +thousands of years, and were chasing it now in the spirit-land. +Wandering down through the waste of ages, the woods had vanished around +his path; his arm had lost somewhat of its strength, his foot of its +fleetness, his mien of its wild regality, his heart and mind of their +savage virtue and uncultured force, but here, untamable to the routine +of artificial life, roving now along the dusty road as of old over the +forest-leaves,—here was the Indian still. + +“Well,” said the old showman, in the midst of my meditations, “here is +an honest company of us—one, two, three, four, five, six—all going to +the camp-meeting at Stamford. Now, hoping no offence, I should like to +know where this young gentleman may be going?” + +I started. How came I among these wanderers? The free mind that +preferred its own folly to another’s wisdom, the open spirit that found +companions everywhere—above all, the restless impulse that had so often +made me wretched in the midst of enjoyments,—these were my claims to be +of their society. + +“My friends,” cried I, stepping into the centre of the wagon, “I am +going with you to the camp-meeting at Stamford.” + +“But in what capacity?” asked the old showman, after a moment’s +silence. “All of us here can get our bread in some creditable way. +Every honest man should have his livelihood. You, sir, as I take it, +are a mere strolling gentleman.” + +I proceeded to inform the company that when Nature gave me a propensity +to their way of life she had not left me altogether destitute of +qualifications for it, though I could not deny that my talent was less +respectable, and might be less profitable, than the meanest of theirs. +My design, in short, was to imitate the story-tellers of whom Oriental +travellers have told us, and become an itinerant novelist, reciting my +own extemporaneous fictions to such audiences as I could collect. + +“Either this,” said I, “is my vocation, or I have been born in vain.” + +The fortune-teller, with a sly wink to the company, proposed to take me +as an apprentice to one or other of his professions, either of which +undoubtedly would have given full scope to whatever inventive talent I +might possess. The bibliopolist spoke a few words in opposition to my +plan—influenced partly, I suspect, by the jealousy of authorship, and +partly by an apprehension that the _vivâ-voce_ practice would become +general among novelists, to the infinite detriment of the book trade. + +Dreading a rejection, I solicited the interest of the merry damsel. + +“‘Mirth,’” cried I, most aptly appropriating the words of L’Allegro, +“‘to thee I sue! Mirth, admit me of thy crew!rsquo;” + +“Let us indulge the poor youth,” said Mirth, with a kindness which made +me love her dearly, though I was no such coxcomb as to misinterpret her +motives. “I have espied much promise in him. True, a shadow sometimes +flits across his brow, but the sunshine is sure to follow in a moment. +He is never guilty of a sad thought but a merry one is twin-born with +it. We will take him with us, and you shall see that he will set us all +a-laughing before we reach the camp-meeting at Stamford.” Her voice +silenced the scruples of the rest and gained me admittance into the +league; according to the terms of which, without a community of goods +or profits, we were to lend each other all the aid and avert all the +harm that might be in our power. + +This affair settled, a marvellous jollity entered into the whole tribe +of us, manifesting itself characteristically in each individual. The +old showman, sitting down to his barrel-organ, stirred up the souls of +the pigmy people with one of the quickest tunes in the music-book; +tailors, blacksmiths, gentlemen and ladies all seemed to share in the +spirit of the occasion, and the Merry Andrew played his part more +facetiously than ever, nodding and winking particularly at me. The +young foreigner flourished his fiddle-bow with a master’s hand, and +gave an inspiring echo to the showman’s melody. The bookish man and the +merry damsel started up simultaneously to dance, the former enacting +the double shuffle in a style which everybody must have witnessed ere +election week was blotted out of time, while the girl, setting her arms +akimbo with both hands at her slim waist, displayed such light rapidity +of foot and harmony of varying attitude and motion that I could not +conceive how she ever was to stop, imagining at the moment that Nature +had made her, as the old showman had made his puppets, for no earthly +purpose but to dance jigs. The Indian bellowed forth a succession of +most hideous outcries, somewhat affrighting us till we interpreted them +as the war-song with which, in imitation of his ancestors, he was +prefacing the assault on Stamford. The conjurer, meanwhile, sat +demurely in a corner extracting a sly enjoyment from the whole scene, +and, like the facetious Merry Andrew, directing his queer glance +particularly at me. As for myself, with great exhilaration of fancy, I +began to arrange and color the incidents of a tale wherewith I proposed +to amuse an audience that very evening; for I saw that my associates +were a little ashamed of me, and that no time was to be lost in +obtaining a public acknowledgment of my abilities. + +“Come, fellow-laborers,” at last said the old showman, whom we had +elected president; “the shower is over, and we must be doing our duty +by these poor souls at Stamford.” + +“We’ll come among them in procession, with music and dancing,” cried +the merry damsel. + +Accordingly—for it must be understood that our pilgrimage was to be +performed on foot—we sallied joyously out of the wagon, each of us, +even the old gentleman in his white top-boots, giving a great skip as +we came down the ladder. Above our heads there was such a glory of +sunshine and splendor of clouds, and such brightness of verdure below, +that, as I modestly remarked at the time, Nature seemed to have washed +her face and put on the best of her jewelry and a fresh green gown in +honor of our confederation. Casting our eyes northward, we beheld a +horseman approaching leisurely and splashing through the little puddle +on the Stamford road. Onward he came, sticking up in his saddle with +rigid perpendicularity, a tall, thin figure in rusty black, whom the +showman and the conjurer shortly recognized to be what his aspect +sufficiently indicated—a travelling preacher of great fame among the +Methodists. What puzzled us was the fact that his face appeared turned +from, instead of to, the camp-meeting at Stamford. However, as this new +votary of the wandering life drew near the little green space where the +guide-post and our wagon were situated, my six fellow-vagabonds and +myself rushed forward and surrounded him, crying out with united +voices, “What news? What news from the camp-meeting at Stamford?” + +The missionary looked down in surprise at as singular a knot of people +as could have been selected from all his heterogeneous auditors. +Indeed, considering that we might all be classified under the general +head of Vagabond, there was great diversity of character among the +grave old showman, the sly, prophetic beggar, the fiddling foreigner +and his merry damsel, the smart bibliopolist, the sombre Indian and +myself, the itinerant novelist, a slender youth of eighteen. I even +fancied that a smile was endeavoring to disturb the iron gravity of the +preacher’s mouth. + +“Good people,” answered he, “the camp-meeting is broke up.” + +So saying, the Methodist minister switched his steed and rode westward. +Our union being thus nullified by the removal of its object, we were +sundered at once to the four winds of heaven. The fortune-teller, +giving a nod to all and a peculiar wink to me, departed on his Northern +tour, chuckling within himself as he took the Stamford road. The old +showman and his literary coadjutor were already tackling their horses +to the wagon with a design to peregrinate south-west along the +sea-coast. The foreigner and the merry damsel took their laughing leave +and pursued the eastern road, which I had that day trodden; as they +passed away the young man played a lively strain and the girl’s happy +spirit broke into a dance, and, thus dissolving, as it were, into +sunbeams and gay music, that pleasant pair departed from my view. +Finally, with a pensive shadow thrown across my mind, yet emulous of +the light philosophy of my late companions, I joined myself to the +Penobscot Indian and set forth toward the distant city. + + + + +THE WHITE OLD MAID + + +The moonbeams came through two deep and narrow windows and showed a +spacious chamber richly furnished in an antique fashion. From one +lattice the shadow of the diamond panes was thrown upon the floor; the +ghostly light through the other slept upon a bed, falling between the +heavy silken curtains and illuminating the face of a young man. But how +quietly the slumberer lay! how pale his features! And how like a shroud +the sheet was wound about his frame! Yes, it was a corpse in its +burial-clothes. + +Suddenly the fixed features seemed to move with dark emotion. Strange +fantasy! It was but the shadow of the fringed curtain waving betwixt +the dead face and the moonlight as the door of the chamber opened and a +girl stole softly to the bedside. Was there delusion in the moonbeams, +or did her gesture and her eye betray a gleam of triumph as she bent +over the pale corpse, pale as itself, and pressed her living lips to +the cold ones of the dead? As she drew back from that long kiss her +features writhed as if a proud heart were fighting with its anguish. +Again it seemed that the features of the corpse had moved responsive to +her own. Still an illusion. The silken curtains had waved a second time +betwixt the dead face and the moonlight as another fair young girl +unclosed the door and glided ghostlike to the bedside. There the two +maidens stood, both beautiful, with the pale beauty of the dead between +them. But she who had first entered was proud and stately, and the +other a soft and fragile thing. + +“Away!” cried the lofty one. “Thou hadst him living; the dead is mine.” + +“Thine!” returned the other, shuddering. “Well hast thou spoken; the +dead is thine.” + +The proud girl started and stared into her face with a ghastly look, +but a wild-and mournful expression passed across the features of the +gentle one, and, weak and helpless, she sank down on the bed, her head +pillowed beside that of the corpse and her hair mingling with his dark +locks. A creature of hope and joy, the first draught of sorrow had +bewildered her. + +“Edith!” cried her rival. + +Edith groaned as with a sudden compression of the heart, and, removing +her cheek from the dead youth’s pillow, she stood upright, fearfully +encountering the eyes of the lofty girl. + +“Wilt thou betray me?” said the latter, calmly. + +“Till the dead bid me speak I will be silent,” answered Edith. “Leave +us alone together. Go and live many years, and then return and tell me +of thy life. He too will be here. Then, if thou tellest of sufferings +more than death, we will both forgive thee.” + +“And what shall be the token?” asked the proud girl, as if her heart +acknowledged a meaning in these wild words. + +“This lock of hair,” said Edith, lifting one of the dark clustering +curls that lay heavily on the dead man’s brow. + +The two maidens joined their hands over the bosom of the corpse and +appointed a day and hour far, far in time to come for their next +meeting in that chamber. The statelier girl gave one deep look at the +motionless countenance and departed, yet turned again and trembled ere +she closed the door, almost believing that her dead lover frowned upon +her. And Edith, too! Was not her white form fading into the moonlight? +Scorning her own weakness, she went forth and perceived that a negro +slave was waiting in the passage with a waxlight, which he held between +her face and his own and regarded her, as she thought, with an ugly +expression of merriment. Lifting his torch on high, the slave lighted +her down the staircase and undid the portal of the mansion. The young +clergyman of the town had just ascended the steps, and, bowing to the +lady, passed in without a word. + +Years—many years—rolled on. The world seemed new again, so much older +was it grown since the night when those pale girls had clasped their +hands across the bosom of the corpse. In the interval a lonely woman +had passed from youth to extreme age, and was known by all the town as +the “Old Maid in the Winding-Sheet.” A taint of insanity had affected +her whole life, but so quiet, sad and gentle, so utterly free from +violence, that she was suffered to pursue her harmless fantasies +unmolested by the world with whose business or pleasures she had naught +to do. She dwelt alone, and never came into the daylight except to +follow funerals. Whenever a corpse was borne along the street, in +sunshine, rain or snow, whether a pompous train of the rich and proud +thronged after it or few and humble were the mourners, behind them came +the lonely woman in a long white garment which the people called her +shroud. She took no place among the kindred or the friends, but stood +at the door to hear the funeral prayer, and walked in the rear of the +procession as one whose earthly charge it was to haunt the house of +mourning and be the shadow of affliction and see that the dead were +duly buried. So long had this been her custom that the inhabitants of +the town deemed her a part of every funeral, as much as the coffin-pall +or the very corpse itself, and augured ill of the sinner’s destiny +unless the Old Maid in the Winding-Sheet came gliding like a ghost +behind. Once, it is said, she affrighted a bridal-party with her pale +presence, appearing suddenly in the illuminated hall just as the priest +was uniting a false maid to a wealthy man before her lover had been +dead a year. Evil was the omen to that marriage. Sometimes she stole +forth by moonlight and visited the graves of venerable integrity and +wedded love and virgin innocence, and every spot where the ashes of a +kind and faithful heart were mouldering. Over the hillocks of those +favored dead would she stretch out her arms with a gesture as if she +were scattering seeds, and many believed that she brought them from the +garden of Paradise, for the graves which she had visited were green +beneath the snow and covered with sweet flowers from April to November. +Her blessing was better than a holy verse upon the tombstone. Thus wore +away her long, sad, peaceful and fantastic life till few were so old as +she, and the people of later generations wondered how the dead had ever +been buried or mourners had endured their grief without the Old Maid in +the Winding-Sheet. Still years went on, and still she followed funerals +and was not yet summoned to her own festival of death. + +One afternoon the great street of the town was all alive with business +and bustle, though the sun now gilded only the upper half of the +church-spire, having left the housetops and loftiest trees in shadow. +The scene was cheerful and animated in spite of the sombre shade +between the high brick buildings. Here were pompous merchants in white +wigs and laced velvet, the bronzed faces of sea-captains, the foreign +garb and air of Spanish Creoles, and the disdainful port of natives of +Old England, all contrasted with the rough aspect of one or two +back-settlers negotiating sales of timber from forests where axe had +never sounded. Sometimes a lady passed, swelling roundly forth in an +embroidered petticoat, balancing her steps in high-heeled shoes and +courtesying with lofty grace to the punctilious obeisances of the +gentlemen. The life of the town seemed to have its very centre not far +from an old mansion that stood somewhat back from the pavement, +surrounded by neglected grass, with a strange air of loneliness rather +deepened than dispelled by the throng so near it. Its site would have +been suitably occupied by a magnificent Exchange or a brick block +lettered all over with various signs, or the large house itself might +have made a noble tavern with the “King’s Arms” swinging before it and +guests in every chamber, instead of the present solitude. But, owing to +some dispute about the right of inheritance, the mansion had been long +without a tenant, decaying from year to year and throwing the stately +gloom of its shadow over the busiest part of the town. + +Such was the scene, and such the time, when a figure unlike any that +have been described was observed at a distance down the street. + +“I espy a strange sail yonder,” remarked a Liverpool captain—“that +woman in the long white garment.” + +The sailor seemed much struck by the object, as were several others who +at the same moment caught a glimpse of the figure that had attracted +his notice. Almost immediately the various topics of conversation gave +place to speculations in an undertone on this unwonted occurrence. + +“Can there be a funeral so late this afternoon?” inquired some. + +They looked for the signs of death at every door—the sexton, the +hearse, the assemblage of black-clad relatives, all that makes up the +woeful pomp of funerals. They raised their eyes, also, to the sun-gilt +spire of the church, and wondered that no clang proceeded from its +bell, which had always tolled till now when this figure appeared in the +light of day. But none had heard that a corpse was to be borne to its +home that afternoon, nor was there any token of a funeral except the +apparition of the Old Maid in the Winding-Sheet. + +“What may this portend?” asked each man of his neighbor. + +All smiled as they put the question, yet with a certain trouble in +their eyes, as if pestilence, or some other wide calamity, were +prognosticated by the untimely intrusion among the living of one whose +presence had always been associated with death and woe. What a comet is +to the earth was that sad woman to the town. Still she moved on, while +the hum of surprise was hushed at her approach, and the proud and the +humble stood aside that her white garment might not wave against them. +It was a long, loose robe of spotless purity. Its wearer appeared very +old, pale, emaciated and feeble, yet glided onward without the unsteady +pace of extreme age. At one point of her course a little rosy boy burst +forth from a door and ran with open arms toward the ghostly woman, +seeming to expect a kiss from her bloodless lips. She made a slight +pause, fixing her eye upon him with an expression of no earthly +sweetness, so that the child shivered and stood awestruck rather than +affrighted while the Old Maid passed on. Perhaps her garment might have +been polluted even by an infant’s touch; perhaps her kiss would have +been death to the sweet boy within the year. + +“She is but a shadow,” whispered the superstitious. “The child put +forth his arms and could not grasp her robe.” + +The wonder was increased when the Old Maid passed beneath the porch of +the deserted mansion, ascended the moss-covered steps, lifted the iron +knocker and gave three raps. The people could only conjecture that some +old remembrance, troubling her bewildered brain, had impelled the poor +woman hither to visit the friends of her youth—all gone from their home +long since and for ever unless their ghosts still haunted it, fit +company for the Old Maid in the Winding-Sheet. + +An elderly man approached the steps, and, reverently uncovering his +gray locks, essayed to explain the matter. + +“None, madam,” said he, “have dwelt in this house these fifteen years +agone—no, not since the death of old Colonel Fenwicke, whose funeral +you may remember to have followed. His heirs, being ill-agreed among +themselves, have let the mansion-house go to ruin.” + +The Old Maid looked slowly round with a slight gesture of one hand and +a finger of the other upon her lip, appearing more shadow-like than +ever in the obscurity of the porch. But again she lifted the hammer, +and gave, this time, a single rap. Could it be that a footstep was now +heard coming down the staircase of the old mansion which all conceived +to have been so long untenanted? Slowly, feebly, yet heavily, like the +pace of an aged and infirm person, the step approached, more distinct +on every downward stair, till it reached the portal. The bar fell on +the inside; the door was opened. One upward glance toward the +church-spire, whence the sunshine had just faded, was the last that the +people saw of the Old Maid in the Winding-Sheet. + +“Who undid the door?” asked many. + +This question, owing to the depth of shadow beneath the porch, no one +could satisfactorily answer. Two or three aged men, while protesting +against an inference which might be drawn, affirmed that the person +within was a negro and bore a singular resemblance to old Cæsar, +formerly a slave in the house, but freed by death some thirty years +before. + +“Her summons has waked up a servant of the old family,” said one, half +seriously. + +“Let us wait here,” replied another; “more guests will knock at the +door anon. But the gate of the graveyard should be thrown open.” + +Twilight had overspread the town before the crowd began to separate or +the comments on this incident were exhausted. One after another was +wending his way homeward, when a coach—no common spectacle in those +days—drove slowly into the street. It was an old-fashioned equipage, +hanging close to the ground, with arms on the panels, a footman behind +and a grave, corpulent coachman seated high in front, the whole giving +an idea of solemn state and dignity. There was something awful in the +heavy rumbling of the wheels. + +The coach rolled down the street, till, coming to the gateway of the +deserted mansion, it drew up, and the footman sprang to the ground. + +“Whose grand coach is this?” asked a very inquisitive body. + +The footman made no reply, but ascended the steps of the old house, +gave three taps with the iron hammer, and returned to open the coach +door. An old man possessed of the heraldic lore so common in that day +examined the shield of arms on the panel. + +“Azure, a lion’s head erased, between three flowers de luce,” said he, +then whispered the name of the family to whom these bearings belonged. +The last inheritor of its honors was recently dead, after a long +residence amid the splendor of the British court, where his birth and +wealth had given him no mean station. “He left no child,” continued the +herald, “and these arms, being in a lozenge, betoken that the coach +appertains to his widow.” + +Further disclosures, perhaps, might have been made had not the speaker +been suddenly struck dumb by the stern eye of an ancient lady who +thrust forth her head from the coach, preparing to descend. As she +emerged the people saw that her dress was magnificent, and her figure +dignified in spite of age and infirmity—a stately ruin, but with a look +at once of pride and wretchedness. Her strong and rigid features had an +awe about them unlike that of the white Old Maid, but as of something +evil. She passed up the steps, leaning on a gold-headed cane. The door +swung open as she ascended, and the light of a torch glittered on the +embroidery of her dress and gleamed on the pillars of the porch. After +a momentary pause, a glance backward and then a desperate effort, she +went in. + +The decipherer of the coat-of-arms had ventured up the lower step, and, +shrinking back immediately, pale and tremulous, affirmed that the torch +was held by the very image of old Cæsar. + +“But such a hideous grin,” added he, “was never seen on the face of +mortal man, black or white. It will haunt me till my dying-day.” + +Meantime, the coach had wheeled round with a prodigious clatter on the +pavement and rumbled up the street, disappearing in the twilight, while +the ear still tracked its course. Scarcely was it gone when the people +began to question whether the coach and attendants, the ancient lady, +the spectre of old Cæsar and the Old Maid herself were not all a +strangely-combined delusion with some dark purport in its mystery. The +whole town was astir, so that, instead of dispersing, the crowd +continually increased, and stood gazing up at the windows of the +mansion, now silvered by the brightening moon. The elders, glad to +indulge the narrative propensity of age, told of the long-faded +splendor of the family, the entertainments they had given and the +guests, the greatest of the land, and even titled and noble ones from +abroad, who had passed beneath that portal. These graphic reminiscences +seemed to call up the ghosts of those to whom they referred. So strong +was the impression on some of the more imaginative hearers that two or +three were seized with trembling fits at one and the same moment, +protesting that they had distinctly heard three other raps of the iron +knocker. + +“Impossible!” exclaimed others. “See! The moon shines beneath the +porch, and shows every part of it except in the narrow shade of that +pillar. There is no one there.” + +“Did not the door open?” whispered one of these fanciful persons. + +“Didst thou see it too?” said his companion, in a startled tone. + +But the general sentiment was opposed to the idea that a third visitant +had made application at the door of the deserted house. A few, however, +adhered to this new marvel, and even declared that a red gleam like +that of a torch had shone through the great front window, as if the +negro were lighting a guest up the staircase. This too was pronounced a +mere fantasy. + +But at once the whole multitude started, and each man beheld his own +terror painted in the faces of all the rest. + +“What an awful thing is this!” cried they. + +A shriek too fearfully distinct for doubt had been heard within the +mansion, breaking forth suddenly and succeeded by a deep stillness, as +if a heart had burst in giving it utterance. The people knew not +whether to fly from the very sight of the house or to rush trembling in +and search out the strange mystery. Amid their confusion and affright +they were somewhat reassured by the appearance of their clergyman, a +venerable patriarch, and equally a saint, who had taught them and their +fathers the way to heaven for more than the space of an ordinary +lifetime. He was a reverend figure with long white hair upon his +shoulders, a white beard upon his breast and a back so bent over his +staff that he seemed to be looking downward continually, as if to +choose a proper grave for his weary frame. It was some time before the +good old man, being deaf and of impaired intellect, could be made to +comprehend such portions of the affair as were comprehensible at all. +But when possessed of the facts, his energies assumed unexpected vigor. + +“Verily,” said the old gentleman, “it will be fitting that I enter the +mansion-house of the worthy Colonel Fenwicke, lest any harm should have +befallen that true Christian woman whom ye call the ‘Old Maid in the +Winding-Sheet.’” + +Behold, then, the venerable clergyman ascending the steps of the +mansion with a torch-bearer behind him. It was the elderly man who had +spoken to the Old Maid, and the same who had afterward explained the +shield of arms and recognized the features of the negro. Like their +predecessors, they gave three raps with the iron hammer. + +“Old Cæsar cometh not,” observed the priest. “Well, I wot he no longer +doth service in this mansion.” + +“Assuredly, then, it was something worse in old Cæsar’s likeness,” said +the other adventurer. + +“Be it as God wills,” answered the clergyman. “See! my strength, though +it be much decayed, hath sufficed to open this heavy door. Let us enter +and pass up the staircase.” + +Here occurred a singular exemplification of the dreamy state of a very +old man’s mind. As they ascended the wide flight of stairs the aged +clergyman appeared to move with caution, occasionally standing aside, +and oftener bending his head, as it were in salutation, thus practising +all the gestures of one who makes his way through a throng. Reaching +the head of the staircase, he looked around with sad and solemn +benignity, laid aside his staff, bared his hoary locks, and was +evidently on the point of commencing a prayer. + +“Reverend sir,” said his attendant, who conceived this a very suitable +prelude to their further search, “would it not be well that the people +join with us in prayer?” + +“Well-a-day!” cried the old clergyman, staring strangely around him. +“Art thou here with me, and none other? Verily, past times were present +to me, and I deemed that I was to make a funeral prayer, as many a time +heretofore, from the head of this staircase. Of a truth, I saw the +shades of many that are gone. Yea, I have prayed at their burials, one +after another, and the Old Maid in the Winding-Sheet hath seen them to +their graves.” + +Being now more thoroughly awake to their present purpose, he took his +staff and struck forcibly on the floor, till there came an echo from +each deserted chamber, but no menial to answer their summons. They +therefore walked along the passage, and again paused, opposite to the +great front window, through which was seen the crowd in the shadow and +partial moonlight of the street beneath. On their right hand was the +open door of a chamber, and a closed one on their left. + +The clergyman pointed his cane to the carved oak panel of the latter. + +“Within that chamber,” observed he, “a whole lifetime since, did I sit +by the death-bed of a goodly young man who, being now at the last +gasp—” Apparently, there was some powerful excitement in the ideas +which had now flashed across his mind. He snatched the torch from his +companion’s hand, and threw open the door with such sudden violence +that the flame was extinguished, leaving them no other light than the +moonbeams which fell through two windows into the spacious chamber. It +was sufficient to discover all that could be known. In a high-backed +oaken arm-chair, upright, with her hands clasped across her breast and +her head thrown back, sat the Old Maid in the Winding-Sheet. The +stately dame had fallen on her knees with her forehead on the holy +knees of the Old Maid, one hand upon the floor and the other pressed +convulsively against her heart. It clutched a lock of hair—once sable, +now discolored with a greenish mould. + +As the priest and layman advanced into the chamber the Old Maid’s +features assumed such a semblance of shifting expression that they +trusted to hear the whole mystery explained by a single word. But it +was only the shadow of a tattered curtain waving betwixt the dead face +and the moonlight. + +“Both dead!” said the venerable man. “Then who shall divulge the +secret? Methinks it glimmers to and fro in my mind like the light and +shadow across the Old Maid’s face. And now ’tis gone!” + + + + +PETER GOLDTHWAITE’S TREASURE + + +“And so, Peter, you won’t even consider of the business?” said Mr. John +Brown, buttoning his surtout over the snug rotundity of his person and +drawing on his gloves. “You positively refuse to let me have this crazy +old house, and the land under and adjoining, at the price named?” + +“Neither at that, nor treble the sum,” responded the gaunt, grizzled +and threadbare Peter Goldthwaite. “The fact is, Mr. Brown, you must +find another site for your brick block and be content to leave my +estate with the present owner. Next summer I intend to put a splendid +new mansion over the cellar of the old house.” + +“Pho, Peter!” cried Mr. Brown as he opened the kitchen door; “content +yourself with building castles in the air, where house-lots are cheaper +than on earth, to say nothing of the cost of bricks and mortar. Such +foundations are solid enough for your edifices, while this underneath +us is just the thing for mine; and so we may both be suited. What say +you, again?” + +“Precisely what I said before, Mr. Brown,” answered Peter Goldthwaite. +“And, as for castles in the air, mine may not be as magnificent as that +sort of architecture, but perhaps as substantial, Mr. Brown, as the +very respectable brick block with dry-goods stores, tailors’ shops and +banking-rooms on the lower floor, and lawyers’ offices in the second +story, which you are so anxious to substitute.” + +“And the cost, Peter? Eh?” said Mr. Brown as he withdrew in something +of a pet. “That, I suppose, will be provided for off-hand by drawing a +check on Bubble Bank?” + +John Brown and Peter Goldthwaite had been jointly known to the +commercial world between twenty and thirty years before under the firm +of Goldthwaite & Brown; which copartnership, however, was speedily +dissolved by the natural incongruity of its constituent parts. Since +that event, John Brown, with exactly the qualities of a thousand other +John Browns, and by just such plodding methods as they used, had +prospered wonderfully and become one of the wealthiest John Browns on +earth. Peter Goldthwaite, on the contrary, after innumerable schemes +which ought to have collected all the coin and paper currency of the +country into his coffers, was as needy a gentleman as ever wore a patch +upon his elbow. The contrast between him and his former partner may be +briefly marked, for Brown never reckoned upon luck, yet always had it, +while Peter made luck the main condition of his projects, and always +missed it. While the means held out his speculations had been +magnificent, but were chiefly confined of late years to such small +business as adventures in the lottery. Once he had gone on a +gold-gathering expedition somewhere to the South, and ingeniously +contrived to empty his pockets more thoroughly than ever, while others, +doubtless, were filling theirs with native bullion by the handful. More +recently he had expended a legacy of a thousand or two of dollars in +purchasing Mexican scrip, and thereby became the proprietor of a +province; which, however, so far as Peter could find out, was situated +where he might have had an empire for the same money—in the clouds. +From a search after this valuable real estate Peter returned so gaunt +and threadbare that on reaching New England the scarecrows in the +corn-fields beckoned to him as he passed by. “They did but flutter in +the wind,” quoth Peter Goldthwaite. No, Peter, they beckoned, for the +scarecrows knew their brother. + +At the period of our story his whole visible income would not have paid +the tax of the old mansion in which we find him. It was one of those +rusty, moss-grown, many-peaked wooden houses which are scattered about +the streets of our elder towns, with a beetle-browed second story +projecting over the foundation, as if it frowned at the novelty around +it. This old paternal edifice, needy as he was, and though, being +centrally situated on the principal street of the town, it would have +brought him a handsome sum, the sagacious Peter had his own reasons for +never parting with, either by auction or private sale. There seemed, +indeed, to be a fatality that connected him with his birthplace; for, +often as he had stood on the verge of ruin, and standing there even +now, he had not yet taken the step beyond it which would have compelled +him to surrender the house to his creditors. So here he dwelt with bad +luck till good should come. + +Here, then, in his kitchen—the only room where a spark of fire took off +the chill of a November evening—poor Peter Goldthwaite had just been +visited by his rich old partner. At the close of their interview, +Peter, with rather a mortified look, glanced downward at his dress, +parts of which appeared as ancient as the days of Goldthwaite & Brown. +His upper garment was a mixed surtout, woefully faded, and patched with +newer stuff on each elbow; beneath this he wore a threadbare black +coat, some of the silk buttons of which had been replaced with others +of a different pattern; and, lastly, though he lacked not a pair of +gray pantaloons, they were very shabby ones, and had been partially +turned brown by the frequent toasting of Peter’s shins before a scanty +fire. Peter’s person was in keeping with his goodly apparel. +Gray-headed, hollow-eyed, pale-cheeked and lean-bodied, he was the +perfect picture of a man who had fed on windy schemes and empty hopes +till he could neither live on such unwholesome trash nor stomach more +substantial food. But, withal, this Peter Goldthwaite, crack-brained +simpleton as, perhaps, he was, might have cut a very brilliant figure +in the world had he employed his imagination in the airy business of +poetry instead of making it a demon of mischief in mercantile pursuits. +After all, he was no bad fellow, but as harmless as a child, and as +honest and honorable, and as much of the gentleman which Nature meant +him for, as an irregular life and depressed circumstances will permit +any man to be. + +As Peter stood on the uneven bricks of his hearth looking round at the +disconsolate old kitchen his eyes began to kindle with the illumination +of an enthusiasm that never long deserted him. He raised his hand, +clenched it and smote it energetically against the smoky panel over the +fireplace. + +“The time is come,” said he; “with such a treasure at command, it were +folly to be a poor man any longer. Tomorrow morning I will begin with +the garret, nor desist till I have torn the house down.” + +Deep in the chimney-corner, like a witch in a dark cavern, sat a little +old woman mending one of the two pairs of stockings wherewith Peter +Goldthwaite kept his toes from being frost-bitten. As the feet were +ragged past all darning, she had cut pieces out of a cast-off flannel +petticoat to make new soles. Tabitha Porter was an old maid upward of +sixty years of age, fifty-five of which she had sat in that same +chimney-corner, such being the length of time since Peter’s grandfather +had taken her from the almshouse. She had no friend but Peter, nor +Peter any friend but Tabitha; so long as Peter might have a shelter for +his own head, Tabitha would know where to shelter hers, or, being +homeless elsewhere, she would take her master by the hand and bring him +to her native home, the almshouse. Should it ever be necessary, she +loved him well enough to feed him with her last morsel and clothe him +with her under-petticoat. But Tabitha was a queer old woman, and, +though never infected with Peter’s flightiness, had become so +accustomed to his freaks and follies that she viewed them all as +matters of course. Hearing him threaten to tear the house down, she +looked quietly up from her work. + +“Best leave the kitchen till the last, Mr. Peter,” said she. + +“The sooner we have it all down, the better,” said Peter Goldthwaite. +“I am tired to death of living in this cold, dark, windy, smoky, +creaking, groaning, dismal old house. I shall feel like a younger man +when we get into my splendid brick mansion, as, please Heaven, we shall +by this time next autumn. You shall have a room on the sunny side, old +Tabby, finished and furnished as best may suit your own notions.” + +“I should like it pretty much such a room as this kitchen,” answered +Tabitha. “It will never be like home to me till the chimney-corner gets +as black with smoke as this, and that won’t be these hundred years. How +much do you mean to lay out on the house, Mr. Peter?” + +“What is that to the purpose?” exclaimed Peter, loftily. “Did not my +great-grand-uncle, Peter Goldthwaite, who died seventy years ago, and +whose namesake I am, leave treasure enough to build twenty such?” + +“I can’t say but he did, Mr. Peter,” said Tabitha, threading her +needle. + +Tabitha well understood that Peter had reference to an immense hoard of +the precious metals which was said to exist somewhere in the cellar or +walls, or under the floors, or in some concealed closet or other +out-of-the-way nook of the old house. This wealth, according to +tradition, had been accumulated by a former Peter Goldthwaite whose +character seems to have borne a remarkable similitude to that of the +Peter of our story. Like him, he was a wild projector, seeking to heap +up gold by the bushel and the cart-load instead of scraping it together +coin by coin. Like Peter the second, too, his projects had almost +invariably failed, and, but for the magnificent success of the final +one, would have left him with hardly a coat and pair of breeches to his +gaunt and grizzled person. Reports were various as to the nature of his +fortunate speculation, one intimating that the ancient Peter had made +the gold by alchemy; another, that he had conjured it out of people’s +pockets by the black art; and a third—still more unaccountable—that the +devil had given him free access to the old provincial treasury. It was +affirmed, however, that some secret impediment had debarred him from +the enjoyment of his riches, and that he had a motive for concealing +them from his heir, or, at any rate, had died without disclosing the +place of deposit. The present Peter’s father had faith enough in the +story to cause the cellar to be dug over. Peter himself chose to +consider the legend as an indisputable truth, and amid his many +troubles had this one consolation—that, should all other resources +fail, he might build up his fortunes by tearing his house down. Yet, +unless he felt a lurking distrust of the golden tale, it is difficult +to account for his permitting the paternal roof to stand so long, since +he had never yet seen the moment when his predecessor’s treasure would +not have found plenty of room in his own strong-box. But now was the +crisis. Should he delay the search a little longer, the house would +pass from the lineal heir, and with it the vast heap of gold, to remain +in its burial-place till the ruin of the aged walls should discover it +to strangers of a future generation. + +“Yes,” cried Peter Goldthwaite, again; “to-morrow I will set about it.” + +The deeper he looked at the matter, the more certain of success grew +Peter. His spirits were naturally so elastic that even now, in the +blasted autumn of his age, he could often compete with the springtime +gayety of other people. Enlivened by his brightening prospects, he +began to caper about the kitchen like a hobgoblin, with the queerest +antics of his lean limbs and gesticulations of his starved features. +Nay, in the exuberance of his feelings, he seized both of Tabitha’s +hands and danced the old lady across the floor till the oddity of her +rheumatic motions set him into a roar of laughter, which was echoed +back from the rooms and chambers, as if Peter Goldthwaite were laughing +in every one. Finally, he bounded upward, almost out of sight, into the +smoke that clouded the roof of the kitchen, and, alighting safely on +the floor again, endeavored to resume his customary gravity. + +“To-morrow, at sunrise,” he repeated, taking his lamp to retire to bed, +“I’ll see whether this treasure be hid in the wall of the garret.” + +“And, as we’re out of wood, Mr. Peter,” said Tabitha, puffing and +panting with her late gymnastics, “as fast as you tear the house down +I’ll make a fire with the pieces.” + +Gorgeous that night were the dreams of Peter Goldthwaite. At one time +he was turning a ponderous key in an iron door not unlike the door of a +sepulchre, but which, being opened, disclosed a vault heaped up with +gold coin as plentifully as golden corn in a granary. There were chased +goblets, also, and tureens, salvers, dinner-dishes and dish-covers of +gold or silver-gilt, besides chains and other jewels, incalculably +rich, though tarnished with the damps of the vault; for, of all the +wealth that was irrevocably lost to man, whether buried in the earth or +sunken in the sea, Peter Goldthwaite had found it in this one +treasure-place. Anon he had returned to the old house as poor as ever, +and was received at the door by the gaunt and grizzled figure of a man +whom he might have mistaken for himself, only that his garments were of +a much elder fashion. But the house, without losing its former aspect, +had been changed into a palace of the precious metals. The floors, +walls and ceilings were of burnished silver; the doors, the +window-frames, the cornices, the balustrades and the steps of the +staircase, of pure gold; and silver, with gold bottoms, were the +chairs, and gold, standing on silver legs, the high chests of drawers, +and silver the bedsteads, with blankets of woven gold and sheets of +silver tissue. The house had evidently been transmuted by a single +touch, for it retained all the marks that Peter remembered, but in gold +or silver instead of wood, and the initials of his name—which when a +boy he had cut in the wooden door-post—remained as deep in the pillar +of gold. A happy man would have been Peter Goldthwaite except for a +certain ocular deception which, whenever he glanced backward, caused +the house to darken from its glittering magnificence into the sordid +gloom of yesterday. + +Up betimes rose Peter, seized an axe, hammer and saw which he had +placed by his bedside, and hied him to the garret. It was but scantily +lighted up as yet by the frosty fragments of a sunbeam which began to +glimmer through the almost opaque bull-eyes of the window. A moralizer +might find abundant themes for his speculative and impracticable wisdom +in a garret. There is the limbo of departed fashions, aged trifles of a +day and whatever was valuable only to one generation of men, and which +passed to the garret when that generation passed to the grave—not for +safekeeping, but to be out of the way. Peter saw piles of yellow and +musty account-books in parchment covers, wherein creditors long dead +and buried had written the names of dead and buried debtors in ink now +so faded that their moss-grown tombstones were more legible. He found +old moth-eaten garments, all in rags and tatters, or Peter would have +put them on. Here was a naked and rusty sword—not a sword of service, +but a gentleman’s small French rapier—which had never left its scabbard +till it lost it. Here were canes of twenty different sorts, but no +gold-headed ones, and shoebuckles of various pattern and material, but +not silver nor set with precious stones. Here was a large box full of +shoes with high heels and peaked toes. Here, on a shelf, were a +multitude of phials half filled with old apothecary’s stuff which, when +the other half had done its business on Peter’s ancestors, had been +brought hither from the death-chamber. Here—not to give a longer +inventory of articles that will never be put up at auction—was the +fragment of a full-length looking-glass which by the dust and dimness +of its surface made the picture of these old things look older than the +reality. When Peter, not knowing that there was a mirror there, caught +the faint traces of his own figure, he partly imagined that the former +Peter Goldthwaite had come back either to assist or impede his search +for the hidden wealth. And at that moment a strange notion glimmered +through his brain that he was the identical Peter who had concealed the +gold, and ought to know whereabout it lay. This, however, he had +unaccountably forgotten. + +“Well, Mr. Peter!” cried Tabitha, on the garret stairs. “Have you torn +the house down enough to heat the teakettle?” + +“Not yet, old Tabby,” answered Peter, “but that’s soon done, as you +shall see.” With the word in his mouth, he uplifted the axe, and laid +about him so vigorously that the dust flew, the boards crashed, and in +a twinkling the old woman had an apron full of broken rubbish. + +“We shall get our winter’s wood cheap,” quoth Tabitha. + +The good work being thus commenced, Peter beat down all before him, +smiting and hewing at the joints and timbers, unclenching spike-nails, +ripping and tearing away boards, with a tremendous racket from morning +till night. He took care, however, to leave the outside shell of the +house untouched, so that the neighbors might not suspect what was going +on. + +Never, in any of his vagaries, though each had made him happy while it +lasted, had Peter been happier than now. Perhaps, after all, there was +something in Peter Goldthwaite’s turn of mind which brought him an +inward recompense for all the external evil that it caused. If he were +poor, ill-clad, even hungry and exposed, as it were, to be utterly +annihilated by a precipice of impending ruin, yet only his body +remained in these miserable circumstances, while his aspiring soul +enjoyed the sunshine of a bright futurity. It was his nature to be +always young, and the tendency of his mode of life to keep him so. Gray +hairs were nothing—no, nor wrinkles nor infirmity; he might look old, +indeed, and be somewhat disagreeably connected with a gaunt old figure +much the worse for wear, but the true, the essential Peter was a young +man of high hopes just entering on the world. At the kindling of each +new fire his burnt-out youth rose afresh from the old embers and ashes. +It rose exulting now. Having lived thus long—not too long, but just to +the right age—a susceptible bachelor with warm and tender dreams, he +resolved, so soon as the hidden gold should flash to light, to go +a-wooing and win the love of the fairest maid in town. What heart could +resist him? Happy Peter Goldthwaite! + +Every evening—as Peter had long absented himself from his former +lounging-places at insurance offices, news-rooms, and book-stores, and +as the honor of his company was seldom requested in private circles—he +and Tabitha used to sit down sociably by the kitchen hearth. This was +always heaped plentifully with the rubbish of his day’s labor. As the +foundation of the fire there would be a goodly-sized back-log of red +oak, which after being sheltered from rain or damp above a century +still hissed with the heat and distilled streams of water from each +end, as if the tree had been cut down within a week or two. Next there +were large sticks, sound, black and heavy, which had lost the principle +of decay and were indestructible except by fire, wherein they glowed +like red-hot bars of iron. On this solid basis Tabitha would rear a +lighter structure, composed of the splinters of door-panels, ornamented +mouldings, and such quick combustibles, which caught like straw and +threw a brilliant blaze high up the spacious flue, making its sooty +sides visible almost to the chimney-top. Meantime, the gloom of the old +kitchen would be chased out of the cobwebbed corners and away from the +dusky cross-beams overhead, and driven nobody could tell whither, while +Peter smiled like a gladsome man and Tabitha seemed a picture of +comfortable age. All this, of course, was but an emblem of the bright +fortune which the destruction of the house would shed upon its +occupants. + +While the dry pine was flaming and crackling like an irregular +discharge of fairy-musketry, Peter sat looking and listening in a +pleasant state of excitement; but when the brief blaze and uproar were +succeeded by the dark-red glow, the substantial heat and the deep +singing sound which were to last throughout the evening, his humor +became talkative. One night—the hundredth time—he teased Tabitha to +tell him something new about his great-granduncle. + +“You have been sitting in that chimney-corner fifty-five years, old +Tabby, and must have heard many a tradition about him,” said Peter. +“Did not you tell me that when you first came to the house there was an +old woman sitting where you sit now who had been housekeeper to the +famous Peter Goldthwaite?” + +“So there was, Mr. Peter,” answered Tabitha, “and she was near about a +hundred years old. She used to say that she and old Peter Goldthwaite +had often spent a sociable evening by the kitchen fire—pretty much as +you and I are doing now, Mr. Peter.” + +“The old fellow must have resembled me in more points than one,” said +Peter, complacently, “or he never would have grown so rich. But +methinks he might have invested the money better than he did. No +interest! nothing but good security! and the house to be torn down to +come at it! What made him hide it so snug, Tabby?” + +“Because he could not spend it,” said Tabitha, “for as often as he went +to unlock the chest the Old Scratch came behind and caught his arm. The +money, they say, was paid Peter out of his purse, and he wanted Peter +to give him a deed of this house and land, which Peter swore he would +not do.” + +“Just as I swore to John Brown, my old partner,” remarked Peter. “But +this is all nonsense, Tabby; I don’t believe the story.” + +“Well, it may not be just the truth,” said Tabitha, “for some folks say +that Peter did make over the house to the Old Scratch, and that’s the +reason it has always been so unlucky to them that lived in it. And as +soon as Peter had given him the deed the chest flew open, and Peter +caught up a handful of the gold. But, lo and behold! there was nothing +in his fist but a parcel of old rags.” + +“Hold your tongue, you silly old Tabby!” cried Peter, in great wrath. +“They were as good golden guineas as ever bore the effigies of the king +of England. It seems as if I could recollect the whole circumstance, +and how I, or old Peter, or whoever it was, thrust in my hand, or his +hand, and drew it out all of a blaze with gold. Old rags indeed!” + +But it was not an old woman’s legend that would discourage Peter +Goldthwaite. All night long he slept among pleasant dreams, and awoke +at daylight with a joyous throb of the heart which few are fortunate +enough to feel beyond their boyhood. Day after day he labored hard +without wasting a moment except at meal-times, when Tabitha summoned +him to the pork and cabbage, or such other sustenance as she had picked +up or Providence had sent them. Being a truly pious man, Peter never +failed to ask a blessing—if the food were none of the best, then so +much the more earnestly, as it was more needed—nor to return thanks, if +the dinner had been scanty, yet for the good appetite which was better +than a sick stomach at a feast. Then did he hurry back to his toil, and +in a moment was lost to sight in a cloud of dust from the old walls, +though sufficiently perceptible to the ear by the clatter which he +raised in the midst of it. + +How enviable is the consciousness of being usefully employed! Nothing +troubled Peter, or nothing but those phantoms of the mind which seem +like vague recollections, yet have also the aspect of presentiments. He +often paused with his axe uplifted in the air, and said to himself, +“Peter Goldthwaite, did you never strike this blow before?” or “Peter, +what need of tearing the whole house down? Think a little while, and +you will remember where the gold is hidden.” Days and weeks passed on, +however, without any remarkable discovery. Sometimes, indeed, a lean +gray rat peeped forth at the lean gray man, wondering what devil had +got into the old house, which had always been so peaceable till now. +And occasionally Peter sympathized with the sorrows of a female mouse +who had brought five or six pretty, little, soft and delicate young +ones into the world just in time to see them crushed by its ruin. But +as yet no treasure. + +By this time, Peter, being as determined as fate and as diligent as +time, had made an end with the uppermost regions and got down to the +second story, where he was busy in one of the front chambers. It had +formerly been the state-bedchamber, and was honored by tradition as the +sleeping-apartment of Governor Dudley and many other eminent guests. +The furniture was gone. There were remnants of faded and tattered +paper-hangings, but larger spaces of bare wall ornamented with charcoal +sketches, chiefly of people’s heads in profile. These being specimens +of Peter’s youthful genius, it went more to his heart to obliterate +them than if they had been pictures on a church wall by Michael Angelo. +One sketch, however, and that the best one, affected him differently. +It represented a ragged man partly supporting himself on a spade and +bending his lean body over a hole in the earth, with one hand extended +to grasp something that he had found. But close behind him, with a +fiendish laugh on his features, appeared a figure with horns, a tufted +tail and a cloven hoof. + +“Avaunt, Satan!” cried Peter. “The man shall have his gold.” Uplifting +his axe, he hit the horned gentleman such a blow on the head as not +only demolished him, but the treasure-seeker also, and caused the whole +scene to vanish like magic. Moreover, his axe broke quite through the +plaster and laths and discovered a cavity. + +“Mercy on us, Mr. Peter! Are you quarrelling with the Old Scratch?” +said Tabitha, who was seeking some fuel to put under the dinner-pot. + +Without answering the old woman, Peter broke down a further space of +the wall, and laid open a small closet or cupboard on one side of the +fireplace, about breast-high from the ground. It contained nothing but +a brass lamp covered with verdigris, and a dusty piece of parchment. +While Peter inspected the latter, Tabitha seized the lamp and began to +rub it with her apron. + +“There is no use in rubbing it, Tabitha,” said Peter. “It is not +Aladdin’s lamp, though I take it to be a token of as much luck. Look +here, Tabby!” + +Tabitha took the parchment and held it close to her nose, which was +saddled with a pair of iron-bound spectacles. But no sooner had she +begun to puzzle over it than she burst into a chuckling laugh, holding +both her hands against her sides. + +“You can’t make a fool of the old woman,” cried she. “This is your own +handwriting, Mr. Peter, the same as in the letter you sent me from +Mexico.” + +“There is certainly a considerable resemblance,” said Peter, again +examining the parchment. “But you know yourself, Tabby, that this +closet must have been plastered up before you came to the house or I +came into the world. No; this is old Peter Goldthwaite’s writing. These +columns of pounds, shillings and pence are his figures, denoting the +amount of the treasure, and this, at the bottom, is doubtless a +reference to the place of concealment. But the ink has either faded or +peeled off, so that it is absolutely illegible. What a pity!” + +“Well, this lamp is as good as new. That’s some comfort,” said Tabitha. + +“A lamp!” thought Peter. “That indicates light on my researches.” + +For the present Peter felt more inclined to ponder on this discovery +than to resume his labors. After Tabitha had gone down stairs he stood +poring over the parchment at one of the front windows, which was so +obscured with dust that the sun could barely throw an uncertain shadow +of the casement across the floor. Peter forced it open and looked out +upon the great street of the town, while the sun looked in at his old +house. The air, though mild, and even warm, thrilled Peter as with a +dash of water. + +It was the first day of the January thaw. The snow lay deep upon the +housetops, but was rapidly dissolving into millions of water-drops, +which sparkled downward through the sunshine with the noise of a summer +shower beneath the eaves. Along the street the trodden snow was as hard +and solid as a pavement of white marble, and had not yet grown moist in +the spring-like temperature. But when Peter thrust forth his head, he +saw that the inhabitants, if not the town, were already thawed out by +this warm day, after two or three weeks of winter weather. It gladdened +him—a gladness with a sigh breathing through it—to see the stream of +ladies gliding along the slippery sidewalks with their red cheeks set +off by quilted hoods, boas and sable capes like roses amidst a new kind +of foliage. The sleigh bells jingled to and fro continually, sometimes +announcing the arrival of a sleigh from Vermont laden with the frozen +bodies of porkers or sheep, and perhaps a deer or two; sometimes, of a +regular marketman with chickens, geese and turkeys, comprising the +whole colony of a barn-yard; and sometimes, of a farmer and his dame +who had come to town partly for the ride, partly to go a-shopping and +partly for the sale of some eggs and butter. This couple rode in an +old-fashioned square sleigh which had served them twenty winters and +stood twenty summers in the sun beside their door. Now a gentleman and +lady skimmed the snow in an elegant car shaped somewhat like a +cockle-shell; now a stage-sleigh with its cloth curtains thrust aside +to admit the sun dashed rapidly down the street, whirling in and out +among the vehicles that obstructed its passage; now came round a corner +the similitude of Noah’s ark on runners, being an immense open sleigh +with seats for fifty people and drawn by a dozen horses. This spacious +receptacle was populous with merry maids and merry bachelors, merry +girls and boys and merry old folks, all alive with fun and grinning to +the full width of their mouths. They kept up a buzz of babbling voices +and low laughter, and sometimes burst into a deep, joyous shout which +the spectators answered with three cheers, while a gang of roguish boys +let drive their snow-balls right among the pleasure-party. The sleigh +passed on, and when concealed by a bend of the street was still audible +by a distant cry of merriment. + +Never had Peter beheld a livelier scene than was constituted by all +these accessories—the bright sun, the flashing water-drops, the +gleaming snow, the cheerful multitude, the variety of rapid vehicles +and the jingle-jangle of merry bells which made the heart dance to +their music. Nothing dismal was to be seen except that peaked piece of +antiquity Peter Goldthwaite’s house, which might well look sad +externally, since such a terrible consumption was preying on its +insides. And Peter’s gaunt figure, half visible in the projecting +second story, was worthy of his house. + +“Peter! How goes it, friend Peter?” cried a voice across the street as +Peter was drawing in his head. “Look out here, Peter!” + +Peter looked, and saw his old partner, Mr. John Brown, on the opposite +sidewalk, portly and comfortable, with his furred cloak thrown open, +disclosing a handsome surtout beneath. His voice had directed the +attention of the whole town to Peter Goldthwaite’s window, and to the +dusty scarecrow which appeared at it. + +“I say, Peter!” cried Mr. Brown, again; “what the devil are you about +there, that I hear such a racket whenever I pass by? You are repairing +the old house, I suppose, making a new one of it? Eh?” + +“Too late for that, I am afraid, Mr. Brown,” replied Peter. “If I make +it new, it will be new inside and out, from the cellar upward.” + +“Had not you better let me take the job?” said Mr. Brown, +significantly. + +“Not yet,” answered Peter, hastily shutting the window; for ever since +he had been in search of the treasure he hated to have people stare at +him. + +As he drew back, ashamed of his outward poverty, yet proud of the +secret wealth within his grasp, a haughty smile shone out on Peter’s +visage with precisely the effect of the dim sunbeams in the squalid +chamber. He endeavored to assume such a mien as his ancestor had +probably worn when he gloried in the building of a strong house for a +home to many generations of his posterity. But the chamber was very +dark to his snow-dazzled eyes, and very dismal, too, in contrast with +the living scene that he had just looked upon. His brief glimpse into +the street had given him a forcible impression of the manner in which +the world kept itself cheerful and prosperous by social pleasures and +an intercourse of business, while he in seclusion was pursuing an +object that might possibly be a phantasm by a method which most people +would call madness. It is one great advantage of a gregarious mode of +life that each person rectifies his mind by other minds and squares his +conduct to that of his neighbors, so as seldom to be lost in +eccentricity. Peter Goldthwaite had exposed himself to this influence +by merely looking out of the window. For a while he doubted whether +there were any hidden chest of gold, and in that case whether it was so +exceedingly wise to tear the house down only to be convinced of its +non-existence. + +But this was momentary. Peter the Destroyer resumed the task which Fate +had assigned him, nor faltered again till it was accomplished. In the +course of his search he met with many things that are usually found in +the ruins of an old house, and also with some that are not. What seemed +most to the purpose was a rusty key which had been thrust into a chink +of the wall, with a wooden label appended to the handle, bearing the +initials “P.G.” Another singular discovery was that of a bottle of wine +walled up in an old oven. A tradition ran in the family that Peter’s +grandfather, a jovial officer in the old French war, had set aside many +dozens of the precious liquor for the benefit of topers then unborn. +Peter needed no cordial to sustain his hopes, and therefore kept the +wine to gladden his success. Many half-pence did he pick up that had +been lost through the cracks of the floor, and some few Spanish coins, +and the half of a broken sixpence which had doubtless been a +love-token. There was likewise a silver coronation medal of George III. +But old Peter Goldthwaite’s strong-box fled from one dark corner to +another, or otherwise eluded the second Peter’s clutches till, should +he seek much farther, he must burrow into the earth. + +We will not follow him in his triumphant progress step by step. Suffice +it that Peter worked like a steam-engine and finished in that one +winter the job which all the former inhabitants of the house, with time +and the elements to aid them, had only half done in a century. Except +the kitchen, every room and chamber was now gutted. The house was +nothing but a shell, the apparition of a house, as unreal as the +painted edifices of a theatre. It was like the perfect rind of a great +cheese in which a mouse had dwelt and nibbled till it was a cheese no +more. And Peter was the mouse. + +What Peter had torn down, Tabitha had burnt up, for she wisely +considered that without a house they should need no wood to warm it, +and therefore economy was nonsense. Thus the whole house might be said +to have dissolved in smoke and flown up among the clouds through the +great black flue of the kitchen chimney. It was an admirable parallel +to the feat of the man who jumped down his own throat. + +On the night between the last day of winter and the first of spring +every chink and cranny had been ransacked except within the precincts +of the kitchen. This fated evening was an ugly one. A snow-storm had +set in some hours before, and was still driven and tossed about the +atmosphere by a real hurricane which fought against the house as if the +prince of the air in person were putting the final stroke to Peter’s +labors. The framework being so much weakened and the inward props +removed, it would have been no marvel if in some stronger wrestle of +the blast the rotten walls of the edifice and all the peaked roofs had +come crashing down upon the owner’s head. He, however, was careless of +the peril, but as wild and restless as the night itself, or as the +flame that quivered up the chimney at each roar of the tempestuous +wind. + +“The wine, Tabitha,” he cried—“my grandfather’s rich old wine! We will +drink it now.” + +Tabitha arose from her smoke-blackened bench in the chimney-corner and +placed the bottle before Peter, close beside the old brass lamp which +had likewise been the prize of his researches. Peter held it before his +eyes, and, looking through the liquid medium, beheld the kitchen +illuminated with a golden glory which also enveloped Tabitha and gilded +her silver hair and converted her mean garments into robes of queenly +splendor. It reminded him of his golden dream. + +“Mr. Peter,” remarked Tabitha, “must the wine be drunk before the money +is found?” + +“The money _is_ found!” exclaimed Peter, with a sort of fierceness. +“The chest is within my reach; I will not sleep till I have turned this +key in the rusty lock. But first of all let us drink.” + +There being no corkscrew in the house, he smote the neck of the bottle +with old Peter Goldthwaite’s rusty key, and decapitated the sealed cork +at a single blow. He then filled two little china teacups which Tabitha +had brought from the cupboard. So clear and brilliant was this aged +wine that it shone within the cups and rendered the sprig of scarlet +flowers at the bottom of each more distinctly visible than when there +had been no wine there. Its rich and delicate perfume wasted itself +round the kitchen. + +“Drink, Tabitha!” cried Peter. “Blessings on the honest old fellow who +set aside this good liquor for you and me! And here’s to Peter +Goldthwaite’s memory!” + +“And good cause have we to remember him,” quoth Tabitha as she drank. + +How many years, and through what changes of fortune and various +calamity, had that bottle hoarded up its effervescent joy, to be +quaffed at last by two such boon-companions! A portion of the happiness +of a former age had been kept for them, and was now set free in a crowd +of rejoicing visions to sport amid the storm and desolation of the +present time. Until they have finished the bottle we must turn our eyes +elsewhere. + +It so chanced that on this stormy night Mr. John Brown found himself +ill at ease in his wire-cushioned arm-chair by the glowing grate of +anthracite which heated his handsome parlor. He was naturally a good +sort of a man, and kind and pitiful whenever the misfortunes of others +happened to reach his heart through the padded vest of his own +prosperity. This evening he had thought much about his old partner, +Peter Goldthwaite, his strange vagaries and continual ill-luck, the +poverty of his dwelling at Mr. Brown’s last visit, and Peter’s crazed +and haggard aspect when he had talked with him at the window. + +“Poor fellow!” thought Mr. John Brown. “Poor crack-brained Peter +Goldthwaite! For old acquaintance’ sake I ought to have taken care that +he was comfortable this rough winter.” These feelings grew so powerful +that, in spite of the inclement weather, he resolved to visit Peter +Goldthwaite immediately. + +The strength of the impulse was really singular. Every shriek of the +blast seemed a summons, or would have seemed so had Mr. Brown been +accustomed to hear the echoes of his own fancy in the wind. Much amazed +at such active benevolence, he huddled himself in his cloak, muffled +his throat and ears in comforters and handkerchiefs, and, thus +fortified, bade defiance to the tempest. But the powers of the air had +rather the best of the battle. Mr. Brown was just weathering the corner +by Peter Goldthwaite’s house when the hurricane caught him off his +feet, tossed him face downward into a snow-bank and proceeded to bury +his protuberant part beneath fresh drifts. There seemed little hope of +his reappearance earlier than the next thaw. At the same moment his hat +was snatched away and whirled aloft into some far-distant region whence +no tidings have as yet returned. + +Nevertheless Mr. Brown contrived to burrow a passage through the +snow-drift, and with his bare head bent against the storm floundered +onward to Peter’s door. There was such a creaking and groaning and +rattling, and such an ominous shaking, throughout the crazy edifice +that the loudest rap would have been inaudible to those within. He +therefore entered without ceremony, and groped his way to the kitchen. +His intrusion even there was unnoticed. Peter and Tabitha stood with +their backs to the door, stooping over a large chest which apparently +they had just dragged from a cavity or concealed closet on the left +side of the chimney. By the lamp in the old woman’s hand Mr. Brown saw +that the chest was barred and clamped with iron, strengthened with iron +plates and studded with iron nails, so as to be a fit receptacle in +which the wealth of one century might be hoarded up for the wants of +another. + +Peter Goldthwaite was inserting a key into the lock. + +“Oh, Tabitha,” cried he, with tremulous rapture, “how shall I endure +the effulgence? The gold!—the bright, bright gold! Methinks I can +remember my last glance at it just as the iron-plated lid fell down. +And ever since, being seventy years, it has been blazing in secret and +gathering its splendor against this glorious moment. It will flash upon +us like the noonday sun.” + +“Then shade your eyes, Mr. Peter!” said Tabitha, with somewhat less +patience than usual. “But, for mercy’s sake, do turn the key!” + +And with a strong effort of both hands Peter did force the rusty key +through the intricacies of the rusty lock. Mr. Brown, in the mean time, +had drawn near and thrust his eager visage between those of the other +two at the instant that Peter threw up the lid. No sudden blaze +illuminated the kitchen. + +“What’s here?” exclaimed Tabitha, adjusting her spectacles and holding +the lamp over the open chest. “Old Peter Goldthwaite’s hoard of old +rags!” + +“Pretty much so, Tabby,” said Mr. Brown, lifting a handful of the +treasure. + +Oh what a ghost of dead and buried wealth had Peter Goldthwaite raised +to scare himself out of his scanty wits withal! Here was the semblance +of an incalculable sum, enough to purchase the whole town and build +every street anew, but which, vast as it was, no sane man would have +given a solid sixpence for. What, then, in sober earnest, were the +delusive treasures of the chest? Why, here were old provincial bills of +credit and treasury notes and bills of land-banks, and all other +bubbles of the sort, from the first issue—above a century and a half +ago—down nearly to the Revolution. Bills of a thousand pounds were +intermixed with parchment pennies, and worth no more than they. + +“And this, then, is old Peter Goldthwaite’s treasure!” said John Brown. +“Your namesake, Peter, was something like yourself; and when the +provincial currency had depreciated fifty or seventy-five per cent, he +bought it up in expectation of a rise. I have heard my grandfather say +that old Peter gave his father a mortgage of this very house and land +to raise cash for his silly project. But the currency kept sinking till +nobody would take it as a gift, and there was old Peter Goldthwaite, +like Peter the second, with thousands in his strong-box and hardly a +coat to his back. He went mad upon the strength of it. But never mind, +Peter; it is just the sort of capital for building castles in the air.” + +“The house will be down about our ears,” cried Tabitha as the wind +shook it with increasing violence. + +“Let it fall,” said Peter, folding his arms, as he seated himself upon +the chest. + +“No, no, my old friend Peter!” said John Brown. “I have house-room for +you and Tabby, and a safe vault for the chest of treasure. To-morrow we +will try to come to an agreement about the sale of this old house; real +estate is well up, and I could afford you a pretty handsome price.” + +“And I,” observed Peter Goldthwaite, with reviving spirits, “have a +plan for laying out the cash to great advantage.” + +“Why, as to that,” muttered John Brown to himself, “we must apply to +the next court for a guardian to take care of the solid cash; and if +Peter insists upon speculating, he may do it to his heart’s content +with old Peter Goldthwaite’s treasure.” + + + + +CHIPPINGS WITH A CHISEL + + +Passing a summer several years since at Edgartown, on the island of +Martha’s Vineyard, I became acquainted with a certain carver of +tombstones who had travelled and voyaged thither from the interior of +Massachusetts in search of professional employment. The speculation had +turned out so successful that my friend expected to transmute slate and +marble into silver and gold to the amount of at least a thousand +dollars during the few months of his sojourn at Nantucket and the +Vineyard. The secluded life and the simple and primitive spirit which +still characterizes the inhabitants of those islands, especially of +Martha’s Vineyard, insure their dead friends a longer and dearer +remembrance than the daily novelty and revolving bustle of the world +can elsewhere afford to beings of the past. Yet, while every family is +anxious to erect a memorial to its departed members, the untainted +breath of Ocean bestows such health and length of days upon the people +of the isles as would cause a melancholy dearth of business to a +resident artist in that line. His own monument, recording his decease +by starvation, would probably be an early specimen of his skill. +Gravestones, therefore, have generally been an article of imported +merchandise. + +In my walks through the burial-ground of Edgartown—where the dead have +lain so long that the soil, once enriched by their decay, has returned +to its original barrenness—in that ancient burial-ground I noticed much +variety of monumental sculpture. The elder stones, dated a century back +or more, have borders elaborately carved with flowers and are adorned +with a multiplicity of death’s-heads, crossbones, scythes, +hour-glasses, and other lugubrious emblems of mortality, with here and +there a winged cherub to direct the mourner’s spirit upward. These +productions of Gothic taste must have been quite beyond the colonial +skill of the day, and were probably carved in London and brought across +the ocean to commemorate the defunct worthies of this lonely isle. The +more recent monuments are mere slabs of slate in the ordinary style, +without any superfluous flourishes to set off the bald inscriptions. +But others—and those far the most impressive both to my taste and +feelings—were roughly hewn from the gray rocks of the island, evidently +by the unskilled hands of surviving friends and relatives. On some +there were merely the initials of a name; some were inscribed with +misspelt prose or rhyme, in deep letters which the moss and wintry rain +of many years had not been able to obliterate. These, these were graves +where loved ones slept. It is an old theme of satire, the falsehood and +vanity of monumental eulogies; but when affection and sorrow grave the +letters with their own painful labor, then we may be sure that they +copy from the record on their hearts. + +My acquaintance the sculptor—he may share that title with Greenough, +since the dauber of signs is a painter as well as Raphael—had found a +ready market for all his blank slabs of marble and full occupation in +lettering and ornamenting them. He was an elderly man, a descendant of +the old Puritan family of Wigglesworth, with a certain simplicity and +singleness both of heart and mind which, methinks, is more rarely found +among us Yankees than in any other community of people. In spite of his +gray head and wrinkled brow, he was quite like a child in all matters +save what had some reference to his own business; he seemed, unless my +fancy misled me, to view mankind in no other relation than as people in +want of tombstones, and his literary attainments evidently comprehended +very little either of prose or poetry which had not at one time or +other been inscribed on slate or marble. His sole task and office among +the immortal pilgrims of the tomb—the duty for which Providence had +sent the old man into the world, as it were with a chisel in his +hand—was to label the dead bodies, lest their names should be forgotten +at the resurrection. Yet he had not failed, within a narrow scope, to +gather a few sprigs of earthly, and more than earthly, wisdom—the +harvest of many a grave. And, lugubrious as his calling might appear, +he was as cheerful an old soul as health and integrity and lack of care +could make him, and used to set to work upon one sorrowful inscription +or another with that sort of spirit which impels a man to sing at his +labor. On the whole, I found Mr. Wigglesworth an entertaining, and +often instructive, if not an interesting, character; and, partly for +the charm of his society, and still more because his work has an +invariable attraction for “man that is born of woman,” I was accustomed +to spend some hours a day at his workshop. The quaintness of his +remarks and their not infrequent truth—a truth condensed and pointed by +the limited sphere of his view—gave a raciness to his talk which mere +worldliness and general cultivation would at once have destroyed. + +Sometimes we would discuss the respective merits of the various +qualities of marble, numerous slabs of which were resting against the +walls of the shop, or sometimes an hour or two would pass quietly +without a word on either side while I watched how neatly his chisel +struck out letter after letter of the names of the Nortons, the +Mayhews, the Luces, the Daggets, and other immemorial families of the +Vineyard. Often with an artist’s pride the good old sculptor would +speak of favorite productions of his skill which were scattered +throughout the village graveyards of New England. But my chief and most +instructive amusement was to witness his interviews with his customers, +who held interminable consultations about the form and fashion of the +desired monuments, the buried excellence to be commemorated, the +anguish to be expressed, and finally the lowest price in dollars and +cents for which a marble transcript of their feelings might be +obtained. Really, my mind received many fresh ideas which perhaps may +remain in it even longer than Mr. Wigglesworth’s hardest marble will +retain the deepest strokes of his chisel. + +An elderly lady came to bespeak a monument for her first love, who had +been killed by a whale in the Pacific Ocean no less than forty years +before. It was singular that so strong an impression of early feeling +should have survived through the changes of her subsequent life, in the +course of which she had been a wife and a mother, and, so far as I +could judge, a comfortable and happy woman. Reflecting within myself, +it appeared to me that this lifelong sorrow—as, in all good faith, she +deemed it—was one of the most fortunate circumstances of her history. +It had given an ideality to her mind; it had kept her purer and less +earthy than she would otherwise have been by drawing a portion of her +sympathies apart from earth. Amid the throng of enjoyments and the +pressure of worldly care and all the warm materialism of this life she +had communed with a vision, and had been the better for such +intercourse. Faithful to the husband of her maturity, and loving him +with a far more real affection than she ever could have felt for this +dream of her girlhood, there had still been an imaginative faith to the +ocean-buried; so that an ordinary character had thus been elevated and +refined. Her sighs had been the breath of Heaven to her soul. The good +lady earnestly desired that the proposed monument should be ornamented +with a carved border of marine plants interwined with twisted +sea-shells, such as were probably waving over her lover’s skeleton or +strewn around it in the far depths of the Pacific. But, Mr. +Wigglesworth’s chisel being inadequate to the task, she was forced to +content herself with a rose hanging its head from a broken stem. + +After her departure I remarked that the symbol was none of the most +apt. + +“And yet,” said my friend the sculptor, embodying in this image the +thoughts that had been passing through my own mind, “that broken rose +has shed its sweet smell through forty years of the good woman’s life.” + +It was seldom that I could find such pleasant food for contemplation as +in the above instance. None of the applicants, I think, affected me +more disagreeably than an old man who came, with his fourth wife +hanging on his arm, to bespeak gravestones for the three former +occupants of his marriage-bed. I watched with some anxiety to see +whether his remembrance of either were more affectionate than of the +other two, but could discover no symptom of the kind. The three +monuments were all to be of the same material and form, and each +decorated in bas-relief with two weeping willows, one of these +sympathetic trees bending over its fellow, which was to be broken in +the midst and rest upon a sepulchral urn. This, indeed, was Mr. +Wigglesworth’s standing emblem of conjugal bereavement. I shuddered at +the gray polygamist who had so utterly lost the holy sense of +individuality in wedlock that methought he was fain to reckon upon his +fingers how many women who had once slept by his side were now sleeping +in their graves. There was even—if I wrong him, it is no great matter—a +glance sidelong at his living spouse, as if he were inclined to drive a +thriftier bargain by bespeaking four gravestones in a lot. + +I was better pleased with a rough old whaling-captain who gave +directions for a broad marble slab divided into two compartments, one +of which was to contain an epitaph on his deceased wife and the other +to be left vacant till death should engrave his own name there. As is +frequently the case among the whalers of Martha’s Vineyard, so much of +this storm-beaten widower’s life had been tossed away on distant seas +that out of twenty years of matrimony he had spent scarce three, and +those at scattered intervals, beneath his own roof. Thus the wife of +his youth, though she died in his and her declining age, retained the +bridal dewdrops fresh around her memory. + +My observations gave me the idea, and Mr. Wigglesworth confirmed it, +that husbands were more faithful in setting up memorials to their dead +wives than widows to their dead husbands. I was not ill-natured enough +to fancy that women less than men feel so sure of their own constancy +as to be willing to give a pledge of it in marble. It is more probably +the fact that, while men are able to reflect upon their lost companions +as remembrances apart from themselves, women, on the other hand, are +conscious that a portion of their being has gone with the departed +whithersoever he has gone. Soul clings to soul, the living dust has a +sympathy with the dust of the grave; and by the very strength of that +sympathy the wife of the dead shrinks the more sensitively from +reminding the world of its existence. The link is already strong +enough; it needs no visible symbol. And, though a shadow walks ever by +her side and the touch of a chill hand is on her bosom, yet life, and +perchance its natural yearnings, may still be warm within her and +inspire her with new hopes of happiness. Then would she mark out the +grave the scent of which would be perceptible on the pillow of the +second bridal? No, but rather level its green mound with the +surrounding earth, as if, when she dug up again her buried heart, the +spot had ceased to be a grave. + +Yet, in spite of these sentimentalities, I was prodigiously amused by +an incident of which I had not the good-fortune to be a witness, but +which Mr. Wigglesworth related with considerable humor. A gentlewoman +of the town, receiving news of her husband’s loss at sea, had bespoken +a handsome slab of marble, and came daily to watch the progress of my +friend’s chisel. One afternoon, when the good lady and the sculptor +were in the very midst of the epitaph—which the departed spirit might +have been greatly comforted to read—who should walk into the workshop +but the deceased himself, in substance as well as spirit! He had been +picked up at sea, and stood in no present need of tombstone or epitaph. + +“And how,” inquired I, “did his wife bear the shock of joyful +surprise?” + +“Why,” said the old man, deepening the grin of a death’s-head on which +his chisel was just then employed, “I really felt for the poor woman; +it was one of my best pieces of marble—and to be thrown away on a +living man!” + +A comely woman with a pretty rosebud of a daughter came to select a +gravestone for a twin-daughter, who had died a month before. I was +impressed with the different nature of their feelings for the dead. The +mother was calm and woefully resigned, fully conscious of her loss, as +of a treasure which she had not always possessed, and therefore had +been aware that it might be taken from her; but the daughter evidently +had no real knowledge of what Death’s doings were. Her thoughts knew, +but not her heart. It seemed to me that by the print and pressure which +the dead sister had left upon the survivor’s spirit her feelings were +almost the same as if she still stood side by side and arm in arm with +the departed, looking at the slabs of marble, and once or twice she +glanced around with a sunny smile, which, as its sister-smile had faded +for ever, soon grew confusedly overshadowed. Perchance her +consciousness was truer than her reflection; perchance her dead sister +was a closer companion than in life. + +The mother and daughter talked a long while with Mr. Wigglesworth about +a suitable epitaph, and finally chose an ordinary verse of ill-matched +rhymes which had already been inscribed upon innumerable tombstones. +But when we ridicule the triteness of monumental verses, we forget that +Sorrow reads far deeper in them than we can, and finds a profound and +individual purport in what seems so vague and inexpressive unless +interpreted by her. She makes the epitaph anew, though the selfsame +words may have served for a thousand graves. + +“And yet,” said I afterward to Mr. Wigglesworth, “they might have made +a better choice than this. While you were discussing the subject I was +struck by at least a dozen simple and natural expressions from the lips +of both mother and daughter. One of these would have formed an +inscription equally original and appropriate.” + +“No, no!” replied the sculptor, shaking his head; “there is a good deal +of comfort to be gathered from these little old scraps of poetry, and +so I always recommend them in preference to any new-fangled ones. And +somehow they seem to stretch to suit a great grief and shrink to fit a +small one.” + +It was not seldom that ludicrous images were excited by what took place +between Mr. Wigglesworth and his customers. A shrewd gentlewoman who +kept a tavern in the town was anxious to obtain two or three +gravestones for the deceased members of her family, and to pay for +these solemn commodities by taking the sculptor to board. Hereupon a +fantasy arose in my mind of good Mr. Wigglesworth sitting down to +dinner at a broad, flat tombstone carving one of his own plump little +marble cherubs, gnawing a pair of crossbones and drinking out of a +hollow death’s-head or perhaps a lachrymatory vase or sepulchral urn, +while his hostess’s dead children waited on him at the ghastly banquet. +On communicating this nonsensical picture to the old man he laughed +heartily and pronounced my humor to be of the right sort. + +“I have lived at such a table all my days,” said he, “and eaten no +small quantity of slate and marble.” + +“Hard fare,” rejoined I, smiling, “but you seemed to have found it +excellent of digestion, too.” + +A man of fifty or thereabouts with a harsh, unpleasant countenance +ordered a stone for the grave of his bitter enemy, with whom he had +waged warfare half a lifetime, to their mutual misery and ruin. The +secret of this phenomenon was that hatred had become the sustenance and +enjoyment of the poor wretch’s soul; it had supplied the place of all +kindly affections; it had been really a bond of sympathy between +himself and the man who shared the passion; and when its object died, +the unappeasable foe was the only mourner for the dead. He expressed a +purpose of being buried side by side with his enemy. + +“I doubt whether their dust will mingle,” remarked the old sculptor to +me; for often there was an earthliness in his conceptions. + +“Oh yes,” replied I, who had mused long upon the incident; “and when +they rise again, these bitter foes may find themselves dear friends. +Methinks what they mistook for hatred was but love under a mask.” + +A gentleman of antiquarian propensities provided a memorial for an +Indian of Chabbiquidick—one of the few of untainted blood remaining in +that region, and said to be a hereditary chieftain descended from the +sachem who welcomed Governor Mayhew to the Vineyard. Mr. Wiggles-worth +exerted his best skill to carve a broken bow and scattered sheaf of +arrows in memory of the hunters and warriors whose race was ended here, +but he likewise sculptured a cherub, to denote that the poor Indian had +shared the Christian’s hope of immortality. + +“Why,” observed I, taking a perverse view of the winged boy and the bow +and arrows, “it looks more like Cupid’s tomb than an Indian chief’s.” + +“You talk nonsense,” said the sculptor, with the offended pride of art. +He then added with his usual good-nature, “How can Cupid die when there +are such pretty maidens in the Vineyard?” + +“Very true,” answered I; and for the rest of the day I thought of other +matters than tombstones. + +At our next meeting I found him chiselling an open book upon a marble +headstone, and concluded that it was meant to express the erudition of +some black-letter clergyman of the Cotton Mather school. It turned out, +however, to be emblematical of the scriptural knowledge of an old woman +who had never read anything but her Bible, and the monument was a +tribute to her piety and good works from the orthodox church of which +she had been a member. In strange contrast with this Christian woman’s +memorial was that of an infidel whose gravestone, by his own direction, +bore an avowal of his belief that the spirit within him would be +extinguished like a flame, and that the nothingness whence he sprang +would receive him again. + +Mr. Wigglesworth consulted me as to the propriety of enabling a dead +man’s dust to utter this dreadful creed. + +“If I thought,” said he, “that a single mortal would read the +inscription without a shudder, my chisel should never cut a letter of +it. But when the grave speaks such falsehoods, the soul of man will +know the truth by its own horror.” + +“So it will,” said I, struck by the idea. “The poor infidel may strive +to preach blasphemies from his grave, but it will be only another +method of impressing the soul with a consciousness of immortality.” + +There was an old man by the name of Norton, noted throughout the island +for his great wealth, which he had accumulated by the exercise of +strong and shrewd faculties combined with a most penurious disposition. +This wretched miser, conscious that he had not a friend to be mindful +of him in his grave, had himself taken the needful precautions for +posthumous remembrance by bespeaking an immense slab of white marble +with a long epitaph in raised letters, the whole to be as magnificent +as Mr. Wigglesworth’s skill could make it. There was something very +characteristic in this contrivance to have his money’s worth even from +his own tombstone, which, indeed, afforded him more enjoyment in the +few months that he lived thereafter than it probably will in a whole +century, now that it is laid over his bones. + +This incident reminds me of a young girl—a pale, slender, feeble +creature most unlike the other rosy and healthful damsels of the +Vineyard, amid whose brightness she was fading away. Day after day did +the poor maiden come to the sculptor’s shop and pass from one piece of +marble to another, till at last she pencilled her name upon a slender +slab which, I think, was of a more spotless white than all the rest. I +saw her no more, but soon afterward found Mr. Wigglesworth cutting her +virgin-name into the stone which she had chosen. + +“She is dead, poor girl!” said he, interrupting the tune which he was +whistling, “and she chose a good piece of stuff for her headstone. Now, +which of these slabs would you like best to see your own name upon?” + +“Why, to tell you the truth, my good Mr. Wigglesworth,” replied I, +after a moment’s pause, for the abruptness of the question had somewhat +startled me—“to be quite sincere with you, I care little or nothing +about a stone for my own grave, and am somewhat inclined to scepticism +as to the propriety of erecting monuments at all over the dust that +once was human. The weight of these heavy marbles, though unfelt by the +dead corpse or the enfranchised soul, presses drearily upon the spirit +of the survivor and causes him to connect the idea of death with the +dungeon-like imprisonment of the tomb, instead of with the freedom of +the skies. Every gravestone that you ever made is the visible symbol of +a mistaken system. Our thoughts should soar upward with the butterfly, +not linger with the exuviæ that confined him. In truth and reason, +neither those whom we call the living, and still less the departed, +have anything to do with the grave.” + +“I never heard anything so heathenish,” said Mr. Wigglesworth, +perplexed and displeased at sentiments which controverted all his +notions and feelings and implied the utter waste, and worse, of his +whole life’s labor. “Would you forget your dead friends the moment they +are under the sod?” + +“They are not under the sod,” I rejoined; “then why should I mark the +spot where there is no treasure hidden? Forget them? No; but, to +remember them aright, I would forget what they have cast off. And to +gain the truer conception of death I would forget the grave.” + +But still the good old sculptor murmured, and stumbled, as it were, +over the gravestones amid which he had walked through life. Whether he +were right or wrong, I had grown the wiser from our companionship and +from my observations of nature and character as displayed by those who +came, with their old griefs or their new ones, to get them recorded +upon his slabs of marble. And yet with my gain of wisdom I had likewise +gained perplexity; for there was a strange doubt in my mind whether the +dark shadowing of this life, the sorrows and regrets, have not as much +real comfort in them—leaving religious influences out of the +question—as what we term life’s joys. + + + + +THE SHAKER BRIDAL + + +One day, in the sick-chamber of Father Ephraim, who had been forty +years the presiding elder over the Shaker settlement at Goshen, there +was an assemblage of several of the chief men of the sect. Individuals +had come from the rich establishment at Lebanon, from Canterbury, +Harvard and Alfred, and from all the other localities where this +strange people have fertilized the rugged hills of New England by their +systematic industry. An elder was likewise there who had made a +pilgrimage of a thousand miles from a village of the faithful in +Kentucky to visit his spiritual kindred the children of the sainted +Mother Ann. He had partaken of the homely abundance of their tables, +had quaffed the far-famed Shaker cider, and had joined in the sacred +dance every step of which is believed to alienate the enthusiast from +earth and bear him onward to heavenly purity and bliss. His brethren of +the North had now courteously invited him to be present on an occasion +when the concurrence of every eminent member of their community was +peculiarly desirable. + +The venerable Father Ephraim sat in his easy-chair, not only +hoary-headed and infirm with age, but worn down by a lingering disease +which it was evident would very soon transfer his patriarchal staff to +other hands. At his footstool stood a man and woman, both clad in the +Shaker garb. + +“My brethren,” said Father Ephraim to the surrounding elders, feebly +exerting himself to utter these few words, “here are the son and +daughter to whom I would commit the trust of which Providence is about +to lighten my weary shoulders. Read their faces, I pray you, and say +whether the inward movement of the spirit hath guided my choice +aright.” + +Accordingly, each elder looked at the two candidates with a most +scrutinizing gaze. The man—whose name was Adam Colburn—had a face +sunburnt with labor in the fields, yet intelligent, thoughtful and +traced with cares enough for a whole lifetime, though he had barely +reached middle age. There was something severe in his aspect and a +rigidity throughout his person—characteristics that caused him +generally to be taken for a schoolmaster; which vocation, in fact, he +had formerly exercised for several years. The woman, Martha Pierson, +was somewhat above thirty, thin and pale, as a Shaker sister almost +invariably is, and not entirely free from that corpse-like appearance +which the garb of the sisterhood is so well calculated to impart. + +“This pair are still in the summer of their years,” observed the elder +from Harvard, a shrewd old man. “I would like better to see the +hoar-frost of autumn on their heads. Methinks, also, they will be +exposed to peculiar temptations on account of the carnal desires which +have heretofore subsisted between them.” + +“Nay, brother,” said the elder from Canterbury; “the hoar-frost and the +black frost hath done its work on Brother Adam and Sister Martha, even +as we sometimes discern its traces in our cornfields while they are yet +green. And why should we question the wisdom of our venerable Father’s +purpose, although this pair in their early youth have loved one another +as the world’s people love? Are there not many brethren and sisters +among us who have lived long together in wedlock, yet, adopting our +faith, find their hearts purified from all but spiritual affection?” + +Whether or no the early loves of Adam and Martha had rendered it +inexpedient that they should now preside together over a Shaker +village, it was certainly most singular that such should be the final +result of many warm and tender hopes. Children of neighboring families, +their affection was older even than their school-days; it seemed an +innate principle interfused among all their sentiments and feelings, +and not so much a distinct remembrance as connected with their whole +volume of remembrances. But just as they reached a proper age for their +union misfortunes had fallen heavily on both and made it necessary that +they should resort to personal labor for a bare subsistence. Even under +these circumstances Martha Pierson would probably have consented to +unite her fate with Adam Colburn’s, and, secure of the bliss of mutual +love, would patiently have awaited the less important gifts of Fortune. +But Adam, being of a calm and cautious character, was loth to +relinquish the advantages which a single man possesses for raising +himself in the world. Year after year, therefore, their marriage had +been deferred. + +Adam Colburn had followed many vocations, had travelled far and seen +much of the world and of life. Martha had earned her bread sometimes as +a sempstress, sometimes as help to a farmer’s wife, sometimes as +schoolmistress of the village children, sometimes as a nurse or watcher +of the sick, thus acquiring a varied experience the ultimate use of +which she little anticipated. But nothing had gone prosperously with +either of the lovers; at no subsequent moment would matrimony have been +so prudent a measure as when they had first parted, in the opening +bloom of life, to seek a better fortune. Still, they had held fast +their mutual faith. Martha might have been the wife of a man who sat +among the senators of his native State, and Adam could have won the +hand, as he had unintentionally won the heart, of a rich and comely +widow. But neither of them desired good-fortune save to share it with +the other. + +At length that calm despair which occurs only in a strong and somewhat +stubborn character and yields to no second spring of hope settled down +on the spirit of Adam Colburn. He sought an interview with Martha and +proposed that they should join the Society of Shakers. The converts of +this sect are oftener driven within its hospitable gates by worldly +misfortune than drawn thither by fanaticism, and are received without +inquisition as to their motives. Martha, faithful still, had placed her +hand in that of her lover and accompanied him to the Shaker village. +Here the natural capacity of each, cultivated and strengthened by the +difficulties of their previous lives, had soon gained them an important +rank in the society, whose members are generally below the ordinary +standard of intelligence. Their faith and feelings had in some degree +become assimilated to those of their fellow-worshippers. Adam Colburn +gradually acquired reputation not only in the management of the +temporal affairs of the society, but as a clear and efficient preacher +of their doctrines. Martha was not less distinguished in the duties +proper to her sex. Finally, when the infirmities of Father Ephraim had +admonished him to seek a successor in his patriarchal office, he +thought of Adam and Martha, and proposed to renew in their persons the +primitive form of Shaker government as established by Mother Ann. They +were to be the father and mother of the village. The simple ceremony +which would constitute them such was now to be performed. + +“Son Adam and daughter Martha,” said the venerable Father Ephraim, +fixing his aged eyes piercingly upon them, “if ye can conscientiously +undertake this charge, speak, that the brethren may not doubt of your +fitness.” + +“Father,” replied Adam, speaking with the calmness of his character, “I +came to your village a disappointed man, weary of the world, worn out +with continual trouble, seeking only a security against evil fortune, +as I had no hope of good. Even my wishes of worldly success were almost +dead within me. I came hither as a man might come to a tomb willing to +lie down in its gloom and coldness for the sake of its peace and quiet. +There was but one earthly affection in my breast, and it had grown +calmer since my youth; so that I was satisfied to bring Martha to be my +sister in our new abode. We are brother and sister, nor would I have it +otherwise. And in this peaceful village I have found all that I hope +for—all that I desire. I will strive with my best strength for the +spiritual and temporal good of our community. My conscience is not +doubtful in this matter. I am ready to receive the trust.” + +“Thou hast spoken well, son Adam,” said the father. “God will bless +thee in the office which I am about to resign.” + +“But our sister,” observed the elder from Harvard. “Hath she not +likewise a gift to declare her sentiments?” + +Martha started and moved her lips as if she would have made a formal +reply to this appeal. But, had she attempted it, perhaps the old +recollections, the long-repressed feelings of childhood, youth and +womanhood, might have gushed from her heart in words that it would have +been profanation to utter there. + +“Adam has spoken,” said she, hurriedly; “his sentiments are likewise +mine.” + +But while speaking these few words Martha grew so pale that she looked +fitter to be laid in her coffin than to stand in the presence of Father +Ephraim and the elders; she shuddered, also, as if there were something +awful or horrible in her situation and destiny. It required, indeed, a +more than feminine strength of nerve to sustain the fixed observance of +men so exalted and famous throughout the sect as these were. They had +overcome their natural sympathy with human frailties and affections. +One, when he joined the society, had brought with him his wife and +children, but never from that hour had spoken a fond word to the former +or taken his best-loved child upon his knee. Another, whose family +refused to follow him, had been enabled—such was his gift of holy +fortitude—to leave them to the mercy of the world. The youngest of the +elders, a man of about fifty, had been bred from infancy in a Shaker +village, and was said never to have clasped a woman’s hand in his own, +and to have no conception of a closer tie than the cold fraternal one +of the sect. Old Father Ephraim was the most awful character of all. In +his youth he had been a dissolute libertine, but was converted by +Mother Ann herself, and had partaken of the wild fanaticism of the +early Shakers. Tradition whispered at the firesides of the village that +Mother Ann had been compelled to sear his heart of flesh with a red-hot +iron before it could be purified from earthly passions. + +However that might be, poor Martha had a woman’s heart, and a tender +one, and it quailed within her as she looked round at those strange old +men, and from them to the calm features of Adam Colburn. But, +perceiving that the elders eyed her doubtfully, she gasped for breath +and again spoke. + +“With what strength is left me by my many troubles,” said she, “I am +ready to undertake this charge, and to do my best in it.” + +“My children, join your hands,” said Father Ephraim. + +They did so. The elders stood up around, and the father feebly raised +himself to a more erect position, but continued sitting in his great +chair. + +“I have bidden you to join your hands,” said he, “not in earthly +affection, for ye have cast off its chains for ever, but as brother and +sister in spiritual love and helpers of one another in your allotted +task. Teach unto others the faith which ye have received. Open wide +your gates—I deliver you the keys thereof—open them wide to all who +will give up the iniquities of the world and come hither to lead lives +of purity and peace. Receive the weary ones who have known the vanity +of earth; receive the little children, that they may never learn that +miserable lesson. And a blessing be upon your labors; so that the time +may hasten on when the mission of Mother Ann shall have wrought its +full effect, when children shall no more be born and die, and the last +survivor of mortal race—some old and weary man like me—shall see the +sun go down nevermore to rise on a world of sin and sorrow.” + +The aged father sank back exhausted, and the surrounding elders deemed, +with good reason, that the hour was come when the new heads of the +village must enter on their patriarchal duties. In their attention to +Father Ephraim their eyes were turned from Martha Pierson, who grew +paler and paler, unnoticed even by Adam Colburn. He, indeed, had +withdrawn his hand from hers and folded his arms with a sense of +satisfied ambition. But paler and paler grew Martha by his side, till, +like a corpse in its burial-clothes, she sank down at the feet of her +early lover; for, after many trials firmly borne, her heart could +endure the weight of its desolate agony no longer. + + + + +NIGHT-SKETCHES, + +BENEATH AN UMBRELLA + +Pleasant is a rainy winter’s day within-doors. The best study for such +a day—or the best amusement: call it what you will—is a book of travels +describing scenes the most unlike that sombre one which is mistily +presented through the windows. I have experienced that Fancy is then +most successful in imparting distinct shapes and vivid colors to the +objects which the author has spread upon his page, and that his words +become magic spells to summon up a thousand varied pictures. Strange +landscapes glimmer through the familiar walls of the room, and +outlandish figures thrust themselves almost within the sacred precincts +of the hearth. Small as my chamber is, it has space enough to contain +the ocean-like circumference of an Arabian desert, its parched sands +tracked by the long line of a caravan with the camels patiently +journeying through the heavy sunshine. Though my ceiling be not lofty, +yet I can pile up the mountains of Central Asia beneath it till their +summits shine far above the clouds of the middle atmosphere. And with +my humble means—a wealth that is not taxable—I can transport hither the +magnificent merchandise of an Oriental bazaar, and call a crowd of +purchasers from distant countries to pay a fair profit for the precious +articles which are displayed on all sides. True it is, however, that +amid the bustle of traffic, or whatever else may seem to be going on +around me, the raindrops will occasionally be heard to patter against +my window-panes, which look forth upon one of the quietest streets in a +New England town. After a time, too, the visions vanish, and will not +appear again at my bidding. Then, it being nightfall, a gloomy sense of +unreality depresses my spirits, and impels me to venture out before the +clock shall strike bedtime to satisfy myself that the world is not +entirely made up of such shadowy materials as have busied me throughout +the day. A dreamer may dwell so long among fantasies that the things +without him will seem as unreal as those within. + +When eve has fairly set in, therefore, I sally forth, tightly buttoning +my shaggy overcoat and hoisting my umbrella, the silken dome of which +immediately resounds with the heavy drumming of the invisible +raindrops. Pausing on the lowest doorstep, I contrast the warmth and +cheerfulness of my deserted fireside with the drear obscurity and chill +discomfort into which I am about to plunge. Now come fearful auguries +innumerable as the drops of rain. Did not my manhood cry shame upon me, +I should turn back within-doors, resume my elbow-chair, my slippers and +my book, pass such an evening of sluggish enjoyment as the day has +been, and go to bed inglorious. The same shivering reluctance, no +doubt, has quelled for a moment the adventurous spirit of many a +traveller when his feet, which were destined to measure the earth +around, were leaving their last tracks in the home-paths. + +In my own case poor human nature may be allowed a few misgivings. I +look upward and discern no sky, not even an unfathomable void, but only +a black, impenetrable nothingness, as though heaven and all its lights +were blotted from the system of the universe. It is as if Nature were +dead and the world had put on black and the clouds were weeping for +her. With their tears upon my cheek I turn my eyes earthward, but find +little consolation here below. A lamp is burning dimly at the distant +corner, and throws just enough of light along the street to show, and +exaggerate by so faintly showing, the perils and difficulties which +beset my path. Yonder dingily-white remnant of a huge snowbank, which +will yet cumber the sidewalk till the latter days of March, over or +through that wintry waste must I stride onward. Beyond lies a certain +Slough of Despond, a concoction of mud and liquid filth, ankle-deep, +leg-deep, neck-deep—in a word, of unknown bottom—on which the lamplight +does not even glimmer, but which I have occasionally watched in the +gradual growth of its horrors from morn till nightfall. Should I +flounder into its depths, farewell to upper earth! And hark! how +roughly resounds the roaring of a stream the turbulent career of which +is partially reddened by the gleam of the lamp, but elsewhere brawls +noisily through the densest gloom! Oh, should I be swept away in +fording that impetuous and unclean torrent, the coroner will have a job +with an unfortunate gentleman who would fain end his troubles anywhere +but in a mud-puddle. + +Pshaw! I will linger not another instant at arm’s-length from these dim +terrors, which grow more obscurely formidable the longer I delay to +grapple with them. Now for the onset, and, lo! with little damage save +a dash of rain in the face and breast, a splash of mud high up the +pantaloons and the left boot full of ice-cold water, behold me at the +corner of the street. The lamp throws down a circle of red light around +me, and twinkling onward from corner to corner I discern other beacons, +marshalling my way to a brighter scene. But this is a lonesome and +dreary spot. The tall edifices bid gloomy defiance to the storm with +their blinds all closed, even as a man winks when he faces a spattering +gust. How loudly tinkles the collected rain down the tin spouts! The +puffs of wind are boisterous, and seem to assail me from various +quarters at once. I have often observed that this corner is a haunt and +loitering-place for those winds which have no work to do upon the deep +dashing ships against our iron-bound shores, nor in the forest tearing +up the sylvan giants with half a rood of soil at their vast roots. Here +they amuse themselves with lesser freaks of mischief. See, at this +moment, how they assail yonder poor woman who is passing just within +the verge of the lamplight! One blast struggles for her umbrella and +turns it wrong side outward, another whisks the cape of her cloak +across her eyes, while a third takes most unwarrantable liberties with +the lower part of her attire. Happily, the good dame is no gossamer, +but a figure of rotundity and fleshly substance; else would these +aerial tormentors whirl her aloft like a witch upon a broomstick, and +set her down, doubtless, in the filthiest kennel hereabout. + +From hence I tread upon firm pavements into the centre of the town. +Here there is almost as brilliant an illumination as when some great +victory has been won either on the battlefield or at the polls. Two +rows of shops with windows down nearly to the ground cast a glow from +side to side, while the black night hangs overhead like a canopy, and +thus keeps the splendor from diffusing itself away. The wet sidewalks +gleam with a broad sheet of red light. The raindrops glitter as if the +sky were pouring down rubies. The spouts gush with fire. Methinks the +scene is an emblem of the deceptive glare which mortals throw around +their footsteps in the moral world, thus bedazzling themselves till +they forget the impenetrable obscurity that hems them in, and that can +be dispelled only by radiance from above. + +And, after all, it is a cheerless scene, and cheerless are the +wanderers in it. Here comes one who has so long been familiar with +tempestuous weather that he takes the bluster of the storm for a +friendly greeting, as if it should say, “How fare ye, brother?” He is a +retired sea-captain wrapped in some nameless garment of the pea-jacket +order, and is now laying his course toward the marine-insurance office, +there to spin yarns of gale and shipwreck with a crew of old seadogs +like himself. The blast will put in its word among their hoarse voices, +and be understood by all of them. Next I meet an unhappy slipshod +gentleman with a cloak flung hastily over his shoulders, running a race +with boisterous winds and striving to glide between the drops of rain. +Some domestic emergency or other has blown this miserable man from his +warm fireside in quest of a doctor. See that little vagabond! How +carelessly he has taken his stand right underneath a spout while +staring at some object of curiosity in a shop-window! Surely the rain +is his native element; he must have fallen with it from the clouds, as +frogs are supposed to do. + +Here is a picture, and a pretty one—a young man and a girl, both +enveloped in cloaks and huddled beneath the scanty protection of a +cotton umbrella. She wears rubber overshoes, but he is in his +dancing-pumps, and they are on their way no doubt, to some +cotillon-party or subscription-ball at a dollar a head, refreshments +included. Thus they struggle against the gloomy tempest, lured onward +by a vision of festal splendor. But ah! a most lamentable disaster! +Bewildered by the red, blue and yellow meteors in an apothecary’s +window, they have stepped upon a slippery remnant of ice, and are +precipitated into a confluence of swollen floods at the corner of two +streets. Luckless lovers! Were it my nature to be other than a +looker-on in life, I would attempt your rescue. Since that may not be, +I vow, should you be drowned, to weave such a pathetic story of your +fate as shall call forth tears enough to drown you both anew. Do ye +touch bottom, my young friends? Yes; they emerge like a water-nymph and +a river-deity, and paddle hand in hand out of the depths of the dark +pool. They hurry homeward, dripping, disconsolate, abashed, but with +love too warm to be chilled by the cold water. They have stood a test +which proves too strong for many. Faithful though over head and ears in +trouble! + +Onward I go, deriving a sympathetic joy or sorrow from the varied +aspect of mortal affairs even as my figure catches a gleam from the +lighted windows or is blackened by an interval of darkness. Not that +mine is altogether a chameleon spirit with no hue of its own. Now I +pass into a more retired street where the dwellings of wealth and +poverty are intermingled, presenting a range of strongly-contrasted +pictures. Here, too, may be found the golden mean. Through yonder +casement I discern a family circle—the grandmother, the parents and the +children—all flickering, shadow-like, in the glow of a +wood-fire.—Bluster, fierce blast, and beat, thou wintry rain, against +the window-panes! Ye cannot damp the enjoyment of that fireside.—Surely +my fate is hard that I should be wandering homeless here, taking to my +bosom night and storm and solitude instead of wife and children. Peace, +murmurer! Doubt not that darker guests are sitting round the hearth, +though the warm blaze hides all but blissful images. + +Well, here is still a brighter scene—a stately mansion illuminated for +a ball, with cut-glass chandeliers and alabaster lamps in every room, +and sunny landscapes hanging round the walls. See! a coach has stopped, +whence emerges a slender beauty who, canopied by two umbrellas, glides +within the portal and vanishes amid lightsome thrills of music. Will +she ever feel the night-wind and the rain? Perhaps—perhaps! And will +Death and Sorrow ever enter that proud mansion? As surely as the +dancers will be gay within its halls to-night. Such thoughts sadden yet +satisfy my heart, for they teach me that the poor man in this mean, +weatherbeaten hovel, without a fire to cheer him, may call the rich his +brother—brethren by Sorrow, who must be an inmate of both their +households; brethren by Death, who will lead them both to other homes. + +Onward, still onward, I plunge into the night. Now have I reached the +utmost limits of the town, where the last lamp struggles feebly with +the darkness like the farthest star that stands sentinel on the borders +of uncreated space. It is strange what sensations of sublimity may +spring from a very humble source. Such are suggested by this hollow +roar of a subterranean cataract where the mighty stream of a kennel +precipitates itself beneath an iron grate and is seen no more on earth. +Listen a while to its voice of mystery, and Fancy will magnify it till +you start and smile at the illusion. And now another sound—the rumbling +of wheels as the mail-coach, outward bound, rolls heavily off the +pavements and splashes through the mud and water of the road. All night +long the poor passengers will be tossed to and fro between drowsy watch +and troubled sleep, and will dream of their own quiet beds and awake to +find themselves still jolting onward. Happier my lot, who will +straightway hie me to my familiar room and toast myself comfortably +before the fire, musing and fitfully dozing and fancying a strangeness +in such sights as all may see. But first let me gaze at this solitary +figure who comes hitherward with a tin lantern which throws the +circular pattern of its punched holes on the ground about him. He +passes fearlessly into the unknown gloom, whither I will not follow +him. + +This figure shall supply me with a moral wherewith, for lack of a more +appropriate one, I may wind up my sketch. He fears not to tread the +dreary path before him, because his lantern, which was kindled at the +fireside of his home, will light him back to that same fireside again. +And thus we, night-wanderers through a stormy and dismal world, if we +bear the lamp of Faith enkindled at a celestial fire, it will surely +lead us home to that heaven whence its radiance was borrowed. + + + + +ENDICOTT AND THE RED CROSS + + +At noon of an autumnal day more than two centuries ago the English +colors were displayed by the standard bearer of the Salem train-band, +which had mustered for martial exercise under the orders of John +Endicott. It was a period when the religious exiles were accustomed +often to buckle on their armor and practise the handling of their +weapons of war. Since the first settlement of New England its prospects +had never been so dismal. The dissensions between Charles I. and his +subjects were then, and for several years afterward, confined to the +floor of Parliament. The measures of the king and ministry were +rendered more tyrannically violent by an opposition which had not yet +acquired sufficient confidence in its own strength to resist royal +injustice with the sword. The bigoted and haughty primate Laud, +archbishop of Canterbury, controlled the religious affairs of the +realm, and was consequently invested with powers which might have +wrought the utter ruin of the two Puritan colonies, Plymouth and +Massachusetts. There is evidence on record that our forefathers +perceived their danger, but were resolved that their infant country +should not fall without a struggle, even beneath the giant strength of +the king’s right arm. + +Such was the aspect of the times when the folds of the English banner +with the red cross in its field were flung out over a company of +Puritans. Their leader, the famous Endicott, was a man of stern and +resolute countenance, the effect of which was heightened by a grizzled +beard that swept the upper portion of his breastplate. This piece of +armor was so highly polished that the whole surrounding scene had its +image in the glittering steel. The central object in the mirrored +picture was an edifice of humble architecture with neither steeple nor +bell to proclaim it—what, nevertheless, it was—the house of prayer. A +token of the perils of the wilderness was seen in the grim head of a +wolf which had just been slain within the precincts of the town, and, +according to the regular mode of claiming the bounty, was nailed on the +porch of the meeting-house. The blood was still plashing on the +doorstep. There happened to be visible at the same noontide hour so +many other characteristics of the times and manners of the Puritans +that we must endeavor to represent them in a sketch, though far less +vividly than they were reflected in the polished breastplate of John +Endicott. + +In close vicinity to the sacred edifice appeared that important engine +of Puritanic authority the whipping-post, with the soil around it well +trodden by the feet of evil-doers who had there been disciplined. At +one corner of the meeting-house was the pillory and at the other the +stocks, and, by a singular good fortune for our sketch, the head of an +Episcopalian and suspected Catholic was grotesquely encased in the +former machine, while a fellow-criminal who had boisterously quaffed a +health to the king was confined by the legs in the latter. Side by side +on the meeting-house steps stood a male and a female figure. The man +was a tall, lean, haggard personification of fanaticism, bearing on his +breast this label, “A WANTON GOSPELLER,” which betokened that he had +dared to give interpretations of Holy Writ unsanctioned by the +infallible judgment of the civil and religious rulers. His aspect +showed no lack of zeal to maintain his heterodoxies even at the stake. +The woman wore a cleft stick on her tongue, in appropriate retribution +for having wagged that unruly member against the elders of the church, +and her countenance and gestures gave much cause to apprehend that the +moment the stick should be removed a repetition of the offence would +demand new ingenuity in chastising it. + +The above-mentioned individuals had been sentenced to undergo their +various modes of ignominy for the space of one hour at noonday. But +among the crowd were several whose punishment would be lifelong—some +whose ears had been cropped like those of puppy-dogs, others whose +cheeks had been branded with the initials of their misdemeanors; one +with his nostrils slit and seared, and another with a halter about his +neck, which he was forbidden ever to take off or to conceal beneath his +garments. Methinks he must have been grievously tempted to affix the +other end of the rope to some convenient beam or bough. There was +likewise a young woman with no mean share of beauty whose doom it was +to wear the letter A on the breast of her gown in the eyes of all the +world and her own children. And even her own children knew what that +initial signified. Sporting with her infamy, the lost and desperate +creature had embroidered the fatal token in scarlet cloth with golden +thread and the nicest art of needlework; so that the capital A might +have been thought to mean “Admirable,” or anything rather than +“Adulteress.” + +Let not the reader argue from any of these evidences of iniquity that +the times of the Puritans were more vicious than our own, when as we +pass along the very street of this sketch we discern no badge of infamy +on man or woman. It was the policy of our ancestors to search out even +the most secret sins and expose them to shame, without fear or favor, +in the broadest light of the noonday sun. Were such the custom now, +perchance we might find materials for a no less piquant sketch than the +above. + +Except the malefactors whom we have described and the diseased or +infirm persons, the whole male population of the town, between sixteen +years and sixty were seen in the ranks of the train-band. A few stately +savages in all the pomp and dignity of the primeval Indian stood gazing +at the spectacle. Their flint-headed arrows were but childish weapons, +compared with the matchlocks of the Puritans, and would have rattled +harmlessly against the steel caps and hammered iron breastplates which +enclosed each soldier in an individual fortress. The valiant John +Endicott glanced with an eye of pride at his sturdy followers, and +prepared to renew the martial toils of the day. + +“Come, my stout hearts!” quoth he, drawing his sword. “Let us show +these poor heathen that we can handle our weapons like men of might. +Well for them if they put us not to prove it in earnest!” + +The iron-breasted company straightened their line, and each man drew +the heavy butt of his matchlock close to his left foot, thus awaiting +the orders of the captain. But as Endicott glanced right and left along +the front he discovered a personage at some little distance with whom +it behoved him to hold a parley. It was an elderly gentleman wearing a +black cloak and band and a high-crowned hat beneath which was a velvet +skull-cap, the whole being the garb of a Puritan minister. This +reverend person bore a staff which seemed to have been recently cut in +the forest, and his shoes were bemired, as if he had been travelling on +foot through the swamps of the wilderness. His aspect was perfectly +that of a pilgrim, heightened also by an apostolic dignity. Just as +Endicott perceived him he laid aside his staff and stooped to drink at +a bubbling fountain which gushed into the sunshine about a score of +yards from the corner of the meeting-house. But ere the good man drank +he turned his face heavenward in thankfulness, and then, holding back +his gray beard with one hand, he scooped up his simple draught in the +hollow of the other. + +“What ho, good Mr. Williams!” shouted Endicott. “You are welcome back +again to our town of peace. How does our worthy Governor Winthrop? And +what news from Boston?” + +“The governor hath his health, worshipful sir,” answered Roger +Williams, now resuming his staff and drawing near. “And, for the news, +here is a letter which, knowing I was to travel hitherward to-day, His +Excellency committed to my charge. Belike it contains tidings of much +import, for a ship arrived yesterday from England.” + +Mr. Williams, the minister of Salem, and of course known to all the +spectators, had now reached the spot where Endicott was standing under +the banner of his company, and put the governor’s epistle into his +hand. The broad seal was impressed with Winthrop’s coat-of-arms. +Endicott hastily unclosed the letter and began to read, while, as his +eye passed down the page, a wrathful change came over his manly +countenance. The blood glowed through it till it seemed to be kindling +with an internal heat, nor was it unnatural to suppose that his +breastplate would likewise become red hot with the angry fire of the +bosom which it covered. Arriving at the conclusion, he shook the letter +fiercely in his hand, so that it rustled as loud as the flag above his +head. + +“Black tidings these, Mr. Williams,” said he; “blacker never came to +New England. Doubtless you know their purport?” + +“Yea, truly,” replied Roger Williams, “for the governor consulted +respecting this matter with my brethren in the ministry at Boston, and +my opinion was likewise asked. And His Excellency entreats you by me +that the news be not suddenly noised abroad, lest the people be stirred +up unto some outbreak, and thereby give the king and the archbishop a +handle against us.” + +“The governor is a wise man—a wise man, and a meek and moderate,” said +Endicott, setting his teeth grimly. “Nevertheless, I must do according +to my own best judgment. There is neither man, woman nor child in New +England but has a concern as dear as life in these tidings; and if John +Endicott’s voice be loud enough, man, woman and child shall hear +them.—Soldiers, wheel into a hollow square.—Ho, good people! Here are +news for one and all of you.” + +The soldiers closed in around their captain, and he and Roger Williams +stood together under the banner of the red cross, while the women and +the aged men pressed forward and the mothers held up their children to +look Endicott in the face. A few taps of the drum gave signal for +silence and attention. + +“Fellow-soldiers, fellow-exiles,” began Endicott, speaking under strong +excitement, yet powerfully restraining it, “wherefore did ye leave your +native country? Wherefore, I say, have we left the green and fertile +fields, the cottages, or, perchance, the old gray halls, where we were +born and bred, the churchyards where our forefathers lie buried? +Wherefore have we come hither to set up our own tombstones in a +wilderness? A howling wilderness it is. The wolf and the bear meet us +within halloo of our dwellings. The savage lieth in wait for us in the +dismal shadow of the woods. The stubborn roots of the trees break our +ploughshares when we would till the earth. Our children cry for bread, +and we must dig in the sands of the seashore to satisfy them. +Wherefore, I say again, have we sought this country of a rugged soil +and wintry sky? Was it not for the enjoyment of our civil rights? Was +it not for liberty to worship God according to our conscience?” + +“Call you this liberty of conscience?” interrupted a voice on the steps +of the meeting-house. + +It was the wanton gospeller. A sad and quiet smile flitted across the +mild visage of Roger Williams, but Endicott, in the excitement of the +moment, shook his sword wrathfully at the culprit—an ominous gesture +from a man like him. + +“What hast thou to do with conscience, thou knave?” cried he. “I said +liberty to worship God, not license to profane and ridicule him. Break +not in upon my speech, or I will lay thee neck and heels till this time +to-morrow.—Hearken to me, friends, nor heed that accursed rhapsodist. +As I was saying, we have sacrificed all things, and have come to a land +whereof the Old World hath scarcely heard, that we might make a new +world unto ourselves and painfully seek a path from hence to heaven. +But what think ye now? This son of a Scotch tyrant—this grandson of a +papistical and adulterous Scotch woman whose death proved that a golden +crown doth not always save an anointed head from the block—” + +“Nay, brother, nay,” interposed Mr. Williams; “thy words are not meet +for a secret chamber, far less for a public street.” + +“Hold thy peace, Roger Williams!” answered Endicott, imperiously. “My +spirit is wiser than thine for the business now in hand.—I tell ye, +fellow-exiles, that Charles of England and Laud, our bitterest +persecutor, arch-priest of Canterbury, are resolute to pursue us even +hither. They are taking counsel, saith this letter, to send over a +governor-general in whose breast shall be deposited all the law and +equity of the land. They are minded, also, to establish the idolatrous +forms of English episcopacy; so that when Laud shall kiss the pope’s +toe as cardinal of Rome he may deliver New England, bound hand and +foot, into the power of his master.” + +A deep groan from the auditors—a sound of wrath as well as fear and +sorrow—responded to this intelligence. + +“Look ye to it, brethren,” resumed Endicott, with increasing energy. +“If this king and this arch-prelate have their will, we shall briefly +behold a cross on the spire of this tabernacle which we have builded, +and a high altar within its walls, with wax tapers burning round it at +noon-day. We shall hear the sacring-bell and the voices of the Romish +priests saying the mass. But think ye, Christian men, that these +abominations may be suffered without a sword drawn, without a shot +fired, without blood spilt—yea, on the very stairs of the pulpit? No! +Be ye strong of hand and stout of heart. Here we stand on our own soil, +which we have bought with our goods, which we have won with our swords, +which we have cleared with our axes, which we have tilled with the +sweat of our brows, which we have sanctified with our prayers to the +God that brought us hither! Who shall enslave us here? What have we to +do with this mitred prelate—with this crowned king? What have we to do +with England?” + +Endicott gazed round at the excited countenances of the people, now +full of his own spirit, and then turned suddenly to the +standard-bearer, who stood close behind him. + +“Officer, lower your banner,” said he. + +The officer obeyed, and, brandishing his sword, Endicott thrust it +through the cloth and with his left hand rent the red cross completely +out of the banner. He then waved the tattered ensign above his head. + +“Sacrilegious wretch!” cried the high-churchman in the pillory, unable +longer to restrain himself; “thou hast rejected the symbol of our holy +religion.” + +“Treason! treason!” roared the royalist in the stocks. “He hath defaced +the king’s banner!” + +“Before God and man I will avouch the deed,” answered Endicott.—“Beat a +flourish, drummer—shout, soldiers and people—in honor of the ensign of +New England. Neither pope nor tyrant hath part in it now.” + +With a cry of triumph the people gave their sanction to one of the +boldest exploits which our history records. And for ever honored be the +name of Endicott! We look back through the mist of ages, and recognize +in the rending of the red cross from New England’s banner the first +omen of that deliverance which our fathers consummated after the bones +of the stern Puritan had lain more than a century in the dust. + + + + +THE LILY’S QUEST + +AN APOLOGUE + +Two lovers once upon a time had planned a little summer-house in the +form of an antique temple which it was their purpose to consecrate to +all manner of refined and innocent enjoyments. There they would hold +pleasant intercourse with one another and the circle of their familiar +friends; there they would give festivals of delicious fruit; there they +would hear lightsome music intermingled with the strains of pathos +which make joy more sweet; there they would read poetry and fiction and +permit their own minds to flit away in day-dreams and romance; there, +in short—for why should we shape out the vague sunshine of their +hopes?—there all pure delights were to cluster like roses among the +pillars of the edifice and blossom ever new and spontaneously. + +So one breezy and cloudless afternoon Adam Forrester and Lilias Fay set +out upon a ramble over the wide estate which they were to possess +together, seeking a proper site for their temple of happiness. They +were themselves a fair and happy spectacle, fit priest and priestess +for such a shrine, although, making poetry of the pretty name of +Lilias, Adam Forrester was wont to call her “Lily” because her form was +as fragile and her cheek almost as pale. As they passed hand in hand +down the avenue of drooping elms that led from the portal of Lilias +Fay’s paternal mansion they seemed to glance like winged creatures +through the strips of sunshine, and to scatter brightness where the +deep shadows fell. + +But, setting forth at the same time with this youthful pair, there was +a dismal figure wrapped in a black velvet cloak that might have been +made of a coffin-pall, and with a sombre hat such as mourners wear +drooping its broad brim over his heavy brows. Glancing behind them, the +lovers well knew who it was that followed, but wished from their hearts +that he had been elsewhere, as being a companion so strangely unsuited +to their joyous errand. It was a near relative of Lilias Fay, an old +man by the name of Walter Gascoigne, who had long labored under the +burden of a melancholy spirit which was sometimes maddened into +absolute insanity and always had a tinge of it. What a contrast between +the young pilgrims of bliss and their unbidden associate! They looked +as if moulded of heaven’s sunshine and he of earth’s gloomiest shade; +they flitted along like Hope and Joy roaming hand in hand through life, +while his darksome figure stalked behind, a type of all the woeful +influences which life could fling upon them. + +But the three had not gone far when they reached a spot that pleased +the gentle Lily, and she paused. + +“What sweeter place shall we find than this?” said she. “Why should we +seek farther for the site of our temple?” + +It was indeed a delightful spot of earth, though undistinguished by any +very prominent beauties, being merely a nook in the shelter of a hill, +with the prospect of a distant lake in one direction and of a +church-spire in another. There were vistas and pathways leading onward +and onward into the green woodlands and vanishing away in the +glimmering shade. The temple, if erected here, would look toward the +west; so that the lovers could shape all sorts of magnificent dreams +out of the purple, violet and gold of the sunset sky, and few of their +anticipated pleasures were dearer than this sport of fantasy. + +“Yes,” said Adam Forrester; “we might seek all day and find no lovelier +spot. We will build our temple here.” + +But their sad old companion, who had taken his stand on the very site +which they proposed to cover with a marble floor, shook his head and +frowned, and the young man and the Lily deemed it almost enough to +blight the spot and desecrate it for their airy temple that his dismal +figure had thrown its shadow there. He pointed to some scattered +stones, the remnants of a former structure, and to flowers such as +young girls delight to nurse in their gardens, but which had now +relapsed into the wild simplicity of nature. + +“Not here,” cried old Walter Gascoigne. “Here, long ago, other mortals +built their temple of happiness; seek another site for yours.” + +“What!” exclaimed Lilias Fay. “Have any ever planned such a temple save +ourselves?” + +“Poor child!” said her gloomy kinsman. “In one shape or other every +mortal has dreamed your dream.” Then he told the lovers, how—not, +indeed, an antique temple, but a dwelling—had once stood there, and +that a dark-clad guest had dwelt among its inmates, sitting for ever at +the fireside and poisoning all their household mirth. + +Under this type Adam Forrester and Lilias saw that the old man spake of +sorrow. He told of nothing that might not be recorded in the history of +almost every household, and yet his hearers felt as if no sunshine +ought to fall upon a spot where human grief had left so deep a +stain—or, at least, that no joyous temple should be built there. + +“This is very sad,” said the Lily, sighing. + +“Well, there are lovelier spots than this,” said Adam Forrester, +soothingly—“spots which sorrow has not blighted.” + +So they hastened away, and the melancholy Gascoigne followed them, +looking as if he had gathered up all the gloom of the deserted spot and +was bearing it as a burden of inestimable treasure. But still they +rambled on, and soon found themselves in a rocky dell through the midst +of which ran a streamlet with ripple and foam and a continual voice of +inarticulate joy. It was a wild retreat walled on either side with gray +precipices which would have frowned somewhat too sternly had not a +profusion of green shrubbery rooted itself into their crevices and +wreathed gladsome foliage around their solemn brows. But the chief joy +of the dell was in the little stream which seemed like the presence of +a blissful child with nothing earthly to do save to babble merrily and +disport itself, and make every living soul its playfellow, and throw +the sunny gleams of its spirit upon all. + +“Here, here is the spot!” cried the two lovers, with one voice, as they +reached a level space on the brink of a small cascade. “This glen was +made on purpose for our temple.” + +“And the glad song of the brook will be always in our ears,” said +Lilias Fay. + +“And its long melody shall sing the bliss of our lifetime,” said Adam +Forrester. + +“Ye must build no temple here,” murmured their dismal companion. + +And there again was the old lunatic standing just on the spot where +they meant to rear their lightsome dome, and looking like the embodied +symbol of some great woe that in forgotten days had happened there. +And, alas! there had been woe, nor that alone. A young man more than a +hundred years before had lured hither a girl that loved him, and on +this spot had murdered her and washed his bloody hands in the stream +which sang so merrily, and ever since the victim’s death-shrieks were +often heard to echo between the cliffs. + +“And see!” cried old Gascoigne; “is the stream yet pure from the stain +of the murderer’s hands?” + +“Methinks it has a tinge of blood,” faintly answered the Lily; and, +being as slight as the gossamer, she trembled and clung to her lover’s +arm, whispering, “Let us flee from this dreadful vale.” + +“Come, then,” said Adam Forrester as cheerily as he could; “we shall +soon find a happier spot.” + +They set forth again, young pilgrims on that quest which millions—which +every child of earth—has tried in turn. + +And were the Lily and her lover to be more fortunate than all those +millions? For a long time it seemed not so. The dismal shape of the old +lunatic still glided behind them, and for every spot that looked lovely +in their eyes he had some legend of human wrong or suffering so +miserably sad that his auditors could never afterward connect the idea +of joy with the place where it had happened. Here a heartbroken woman +kneeling to her child had been spurned from his feet; here a desolate +old creature had prayed to the evil one, and had received a fiendish +malignity of soul in answer to her prayer; here a new-born infant, +sweet blossom of life, had been found dead with the impress of its +mother’s fingers round its throat; and here, under a shattered oak, two +lovers had been stricken by lightning and fell blackened corpses in +each other’s arms. The dreary Gascoigne had a gift to know whatever +evil and lamentable thing had stained the bosom of Mother Earth; and +when his funereal voice had told the tale, it appeared like a prophecy +of future woe as well as a tradition of the past. And now, by their sad +demeanor, you would have fancied that the pilgrim-lovers were seeking, +not a temple of earthly joy, but a tomb for themselves and their +posterity. + +“Where in this world,” exclaimed Adam Forrester, despondingly, “shall +we build our temple of happiness?” + +“Where in this world, indeed?” repeated Lilias Fay; and, being faint +and weary—the more so by the heaviness of her heart—the Lily drooped +her head and sat down on the summit of a knoll, repeating, “Where in +this world shall we build our temple?” + +“Ah! have you already asked yourselves that question?” said their +companion, his shaded features growing even gloomier with the smile +that dwelt on them. “Yet there is a place even in this world where ye +may build it.” + +While the old man spoke Adam Forrester and Lilias had carelessly thrown +their eyes around, and perceived that the spot where they had chanced +to pause possessed a quiet charm which was well enough adapted to their +present mood of mind. It was a small rise of ground with a certain +regularity of shape that had perhaps been bestowed by art, and a group +of trees which almost surrounded it threw their pensive shadows across +and far beyond, although some softened glory of the sunshine found its +way there. The ancestral mansion wherein the lovers would dwell +together appeared on one side, and the ivied church where they were to +worship on another. Happening to cast their eyes on the ground, they +smiled, yet with a sense of wonder, to see that a pale lily was growing +at their feet. + +“We will build our temple here,” said they, simultaneously, and with an +indescribable conviction that they had at last found the very spot. + +Yet while they uttered this exclamation the young man and the Lily +turned an apprehensive glance at their dreary associate, deeming it +hardly possible that some tale of earthly affliction should not make +those precincts loathsome, as in every former case. The old man stood +just behind them, so as to form the chief figure in the group, with his +sable cloak muffling the lower part of his visage and his sombre hat +overshadowing his brows. But he gave no word of dissent from their +purpose, and an inscrutable smile was accepted by the lovers as a token +that here had been no footprint of guilt or sorrow to desecrate the +site of their temple of happiness. + +In a little time longer, while summer was still in its prime, the +fairy-structure of the temple arose on the summit of the knoll amid the +solemn shadows of the trees, yet often gladdened with bright sunshine. +It was built of white marble, with slender and graceful pillars +supporting a vaulted dome, and beneath the centre of this dome, upon a +pedestal, was a slab of dark-veined marble on which books and music +might be strewn. But there was a fantasy among the people of the +neighborhood that the edifice was planned after an ancient mausoleum +and was intended for a tomb, and that the central slab of dark-veined +marble was to be inscribed with the names of buried ones. They doubted, +too, whether the form of Lilias Fay could appertain to a creature of +this earth, being so very delicate and growing every day more fragile, +so that she looked as if the summer breeze should snatch her up and +waft her heavenward. But still she watched the daily growth of the +temple, and so did old Walter Gascoigne, who now made that spot his +continual haunt, leaning whole hours together on his staff and giving +as deep attention to the work as though it had been indeed a tomb. In +due time it was finished and a day appointed for a simple rite of +dedication. + +On the preceding evening, after Adam Forrester had taken leave of his +mistress, he looked back toward the portal of her dwelling and felt a +strange thrill of fear, for he imagined that as the setting sunbeams +faded from her figure she was exhaling away, and that something of her +ethereal substance was withdrawn with each lessening gleam of light. +With his farewell glance a shadow had fallen over the portal, and +Lilias was invisible. His foreboding spirit deemed it an omen at the +time, and so it proved; for the sweet earthly form by which the Lily +had been manifested to the world was found lifeless the next morning in +the temple with her head resting on her arms, which were folded upon +the slab of dark-veined marble. The chill winds of the earth had long +since breathed a blight into this beautiful flower; so that a loving +hand had now transplanted it to blossom brightly in the garden of +Paradise. + +But alas for the temple of happiness! In his unutterable grief Adam +Forrester had no purpose more at heart than to convert this temple of +many delightful hopes into a tomb and bury his dead mistress there. +And, lo! a wonder! Digging a grave beneath the temple’s marble floor, +the sexton found no virgin earth such as was meet to receive the +maiden’s dust, but an ancient sepulchre in which were treasured up the +bones of generations that had died long ago. Among those forgotten +ancestors was the Lily to be laid; and when the funeral procession +brought Lilias thither in her coffin, they beheld old Walter Gascoigne +standing beneath the dome of the temple with his cloak of pall and face +of darkest gloom, and wherever that figure might take its stand the +spot would seem a sepulchre. He watched the mourners as they lowered +the coffin down. + +“And so,” said he to Adam Forrester, with the strange smile in which +his insanity was wont to gleam forth, “you have found no better +foundation for your happiness than on a grave?” + +But as the shadow of Affliction spoke a vision of hope and joy had its +birth in Adam’s mind even from the old man’s taunting words, for then +he knew what was betokened by the parable in which the Lily and himself +had acted, and the mystery of life and death was opened to him. + +“Joy! joy!” he cried, throwing his arms toward heaven. “On a grave be +the site of our temple, and now our happiness is for eternity.” + +With those words a ray of sunshine broke through the dismal sky and +glimmered down into the sepulchre, while at the same moment the shape +of old Walter Gascoigne stalked drearily away, because his gloom, +symbolic of all earthly sorrow, might no longer abide there now that +the darkest riddle of humanity was read. + + + + +FOOTPRINTS ON THE SEASHORE + + +It must be a spirit much unlike my own which can keep itself in health +and vigor without sometimes stealing from the sultry sunshine of the +world to plunge into the cool bath of solitude. At intervals, and not +infrequent ones, the forest and the ocean summon me—one with the roar +of its waves, the other with the murmur of its boughs—forth from the +haunts of men. But I must wander many a mile ere I could stand beneath +the shadow of even one primeval tree, much less be lost among the +multitude of hoary trunks and hidden from the earth and sky by the +mystery of darksome foliage. Nothing is within my daily reach more like +a forest than the acre or two of woodland near some suburban farmhouse. +When, therefore, the yearning for seclusion becomes a necessity within +me, I am drawn to the seashore which extends its line of rude rocks and +seldom-trodden sands for leagues around our bay. Setting forth at my +last ramble on a September morning, I bound myself with a hermit’s vow +to interchange no thoughts with man or woman, to share no social +pleasure, but to derive all that day’s enjoyment from shore and sea and +sky, from my soul’s communion with these, and from fantasies and +recollections or anticipated realities. Surely here is enough to feed a +human spirit for a single day.—Farewell, then, busy world! Till your +evening lights shall shine along the street—till they gleam upon my +sea-flushed face as I tread homeward—free me from your ties and let me +be a peaceful outlaw. + +Highways and cross-paths are hastily traversed, and, clambering down a +crag, I find myself at the extremity of a long beach. How gladly does +the spirit leap forth and suddenly enlarge its sense of being to the +full extent of the broad blue, sunny deep! A greeting and a homage to +the sea! I descend over its margin and dip my hand into the wave that +meets me, and bathe my brow. That far-resounding roar is Ocean’s voice +of welcome. His salt breath brings a blessing along with it. Now let us +pace together—the reader’s fancy arm in arm with mine—this noble beach, +which extends a mile or more from that craggy promontory to yonder +rampart of broken rocks. In front, the sea; in the rear, a precipitous +bank the grassy verge of which is breaking away year after year, and +flings down its tufts of verdure upon the barrenness below. The beach +itself is a broad space of sand, brown and sparkling, with hardly any +pebbles intermixed. Near the water’s edge there is a wet margin which +glistens brightly in the sunshine and reflects objects like a mirror, +and as we tread along the glistening border a dry spot flashes around +each footstep, but grows moist again as we lift our feet. In some spots +the sand receives a complete impression of the sole, square toe and +all; elsewhere it is of such marble firmness that we must stamp heavily +to leave a print even of the iron-shod heel. Along the whole of this +extensive beach gambols the surf-wave. Now it makes a feint of dashing +onward in a fury, yet dies away with a meek murmur and does but kiss +the strand; now, after many such abortive efforts, it rears itself up +in an unbroken line, heightening as it advances, without a speck of +foam on its green crest. With how fierce a roar it flings itself +forward and rushes far up the beach! + +As I threw my eyes along the edge of the surf I remember that I was +startled, as Robinson Crusoe might have been, by the sense that human +life was within the magic circle of my solitude. Afar off in the remote +distance of the beach, appearing like sea-nymphs, or some airier things +such as might tread upon the feathery spray, was a group of girls. +Hardly had I beheld them, when they passed into the shadow of the rocks +and vanished. To comfort myself—for truly I would fain have gazed a +while longer—I made acquaintance with a flock of beach-birds. These +little citizens of the sea and air preceded me by about a stone’s-throw +along the strand, seeking, I suppose, for food upon its margin. Yet, +with a philosophy which mankind would do well to imitate, they drew a +continual pleasure from their toil for a subsistence. The sea was each +little bird’s great playmate. They chased it downward as it swept back, +and again ran up swiftly before the impending wave, which sometimes +overtook them and bore them off their feet. But they floated as lightly +as one of their own feathers on the breaking crest. In their airy +flutterings they seemed to rest on the evanescent spray. Their +images—long-legged little figures with gray backs and snowy bosoms—were +seen as distinctly as the realities in the mirror of the glistening +strand. As I advanced they flew a score or two of yards, and, again +alighting, recommenced their dalliance with the surf-wave; and thus +they bore me company along the beach, the types of pleasant fantasies, +till at its extremity they took wing over the ocean and were gone. +After forming a friendship with these small surf-spirits, it is really +worth a sigh to find no memorial of them save their multitudinous +little tracks in the sand. + +When we have paced the length of the beach, it is pleasant and not +unprofitable to retrace our steps and recall the whole mood and +occupation of the mind during the former passage. Our tracks, being all +discernible, will guide us with an observing consciousness through +every unconscious wandering of thought and fancy. Here we followed the +surf in its reflux to pick up a shell which the sea seemed loth to +relinquish. Here we found a seaweed with an immense brown leaf, and +trailed it behind us by its long snake-like stalk. Here we seized a +live horseshoe by the tail, and counted the many claws of that queer +monster. Here we dug into the sand for pebbles, and skipped them upon +the surface of the water. Here we wet our feet while examining a +jelly-fish which the waves, having just tossed it up, now sought to +snatch away again. Here we trod along the brink of a fresh-water +brooklet which flows across the beach, becoming shallower and more +shallow, till at last it sinks into the sand and perishes in the effort +to bear its little tribute to the main. Here some vagary appears to +have bewildered us, for our tracks go round and round and are +confusedly intermingled, as if we had found a labyrinth upon the level +beach. And here amid our idle pastime we sat down upon almost the only +stone that breaks the surface of the sand, and were lost in an +unlooked-for and overpowering conception of the majesty and awfulness +of the great deep. Thus by tracking our footprints in the sand we track +our own nature in its wayward course, and steal a glance upon it when +it never dreams of being so observed. Such glances always make us +wiser. + +This extensive beach affords room for another pleasant pastime. With +your staff you may write verses—love-verses if they please you best—and +consecrate them with a woman’s name. Here, too, may be inscribed +thoughts, feelings, desires, warm outgushings from the heart’s secret +places, which you would not pour upon the sand without the certainty +that almost ere the sky has looked upon them the sea will wash them +out. Stir not hence till the record be effaced. Now (for there is room +enough on your canvas) draw huge faces—huge as that of the Sphynx on +Egyptian sands—and fit them with bodies of corresponding immensity and +legs which might stride halfway to yonder island. Child’s-play becomes +magnificent on so grand a scale. But, after all, the most fascinating +employment is simply to write your name in the sand. Draw the letters +gigantic, so that two strides may barely measure them, and three for +the long strokes; cut deep, that the record may be permanent. Statesmen +and warriors and poets have spent their strength in no better cause +than this. Is it accomplished? Return, then, in an hour or two, and +seek for this mighty record of a name. The sea will have swept over it, +even as time rolls its effacing waves over the names of statesmen and +warriors and poets. Hark! the surf-wave laughs at you. + +Passing from the beach, I begin to clamber over the crags, making my +difficult way among the ruins of a rampart shattered and broken by the +assaults of a fierce enemy. The rocks rise in every variety of +attitude. Some of them have their feet in the foam and are shagged +halfway upward with seaweed; some have been hollowed almost into +caverns by the unwearied toil of the sea, which can afford to spend +centuries in wearing away a rock, or even polishing a pebble. One huge +rock ascends in monumental shape, with a face like a giant’s tombstone, +on which the veins resemble inscriptions, but in an unknown tongue. We +will fancy them the forgotten characters of an antediluvian race, or +else that Nature’s own hand has here recorded a mystery which, could I +read her language, would make mankind the wiser and the happier. How +many a thing has troubled me with that same idea! Pass on and leave it +unexplained. Here is a narrow avenue which might seem to have been hewn +through the very heart of an enormous crag, affording passage for the +rising sea to thunder back and forth, filling it with tumultuous foam +and then leaving its floor of black pebbles bare and glistening. In +this chasm there was once an intersecting vein of softer stone, which +the waves have gnawed away piecemeal, while the granite walls remain +entire on either side. How sharply and with what harsh clamor does the +sea rake back the pebbles as it momentarily withdraws into its own +depths! At intervals the floor of the chasm is left nearly dry, but +anon, at the outlet, two or three great waves are seen struggling to +get in at once; two hit the walls athwart, while one rushes straight +through, and all three thunder as if with rage and triumph. They heap +the chasm with a snow-drift of foam and spray. While watching this +scene I can never rid myself of the idea that a monster endowed with +life and fierce energy is striving to burst his way through the narrow +pass. And what a contrast to look through the stormy chasm and catch a +glimpse of the calm bright sea beyond! + +Many interesting discoveries may be made among these broken cliffs. +Once, for example, I found a dead seal which a recent tempest had +tossed into the nook of the rocks, where his shaggy carcase lay rolled +in a heap of eel-grass as if the sea-monster sought to hide himself +from my eye. Another time a shark seemed on the point of leaping from +the surf to swallow me, nor did I wholly without dread approach near +enough to ascertain that the man-eater had already met his own death +from some fisherman in the bay. In the same ramble I encountered a +bird—a large gray bird—but whether a loon or a wild goose or the +identical albatross of the Ancient Mariner was beyond my ornithology to +decide. It reposed so naturally on a bed of dry seaweed, with its head +beside its wing, that I almost fancied it alive, and trod softly lest +it should suddenly spread its wings skyward. But the sea-bird would +soar among the clouds no more, nor ride upon its native waves; so I +drew near and pulled out one of its mottled tail-feathers for a +remembrance. Another day I discovered an immense bone wedged into a +chasm of the rocks; it was at least ten feet long, curved like a +scymitar, bejewelled with barnacles and small shellfish and partly +covered with a growth of seaweed. Some leviathan of former ages had +used this ponderous mass as a jaw-bone. Curiosities of a minuter order +may be observed in a deep reservoir which is replenished with water at +every tide, but becomes a lake among the crags save when the sea is at +its height. At the bottom of this rocky basin grow marine plants, some +of which tower high beneath the water and cast a shadow in the +sunshine. Small fishes dart to and fro and hide themselves among the +seaweed; there is also a solitary crab who appears to lead the life of +a hermit, communing with none of the other denizens of the place, and +likewise several five-fingers; for I know no other name than that which +children give them. If your imagination be at all accustomed to such +freaks, you may look down into the depths of this pool and fancy it the +mysterious depth of ocean. But where are the hulks and scattered +timbers of sunken ships? where the treasures that old Ocean hoards? +where the corroded cannon? where the corpses and skeletons of seamen +who went down in storm and battle? + +On the day of my last ramble—it was a September day, yet as warm as +summer—what should I behold as I approached the above-described basin +but three girls sitting on its margin and—yes, it is veritably +so—laving their snowy feet in the sunny water? These, these are the +warm realities of those three visionary shapes that flitted from me on +the beach. Hark their merry voices as they toss up the water with their +feet! They have not seen me. I must shrink behind this rock and steal +away again. + +In honest truth, vowed to solitude as I am, there is something in this +encounter that makes the heart flutter with a strangely pleasant +sensation. I know these girls to be realities of flesh and blood, yet, +glancing at them so briefly, they mingle like kindred creatures with +the ideal beings of my mind. It is pleasant, likewise, to gaze down +from some high crag and watch a group of children gathering pebbles and +pearly shells and playing with the surf as with old Ocean’s hoary +beard. Nor does it infringe upon my seclusion to see yonder boat at +anchor off the shore swinging dreamily to and fro and rising and +sinking with the alternate swell, while the crew—four gentlemen in +roundabout jackets—are busy with their fishing-lines. But with an +inward antipathy and a headlong flight do I eschew the presence of any +meditative stroller like myself, known by his pilgrim-staff, his +sauntering step, his shy demeanor, his observant yet abstracted eye. + +From such a man as if another self had scared me I scramble hastily +over the rocks, and take refuge in a nook which many a secret hour has +given me a right to call my own. I would do battle for it even with the +churl that should produce the title-deeds. Have not my musings melted +into its rocky walls and sandy floor and made them a portion of myself? +It is a recess in the line of cliffs, walled round by a rough, high +precipice which almost encircles and shuts in a little space of sand. +In front the sea appears as between the pillars of a portal; in the +rear the precipice is broken and intermixed with earth which gives +nourishment not only to clinging and twining shrubs, but to trees that +grip the rock with their naked roots and seem to struggle hard for +footing and for soil enough to live upon. These are fir trees, but oaks +hang their heavy branches from above, and throw down acorns on the +beach, and shed their withering foliage upon the waves. At this +autumnal season the precipice is decked with variegated splendor. +Trailing wreaths of scarlet flaunt from the summit downward; tufts of +yellow-flowering shrubs and rose-bushes, with their reddened leaves and +glossy seed-berries, sprout from each crevice; at every glance I detect +some new light or shade of beauty, all contrasting with the stern gray +rock. A rill of water trickles down the cliff and fills a little +cistern near the base. I drain it at a draught, and find it fresh and +pure. This recess shall be my dining-hall. And what the feast? A few +biscuits made savory by soaking them in sea-water, a tuft of samphire +gathered from the beach, and an apple for the dessert. By this time the +little rill has filled its reservoir again, and as I quaff it I thank +God more heartily than for a civic banquet that he gives me the +healthful appetite to make a feast of bread and water. + +Dinner being over, I throw myself at length upon the sand and, basking +in the sunshine, let my mind disport itself at will. The walls of this +my hermitage have no tongue to tell my follies, though I sometimes +fancy that they have ears to hear them and a soul to sympathize. There +is a magic in this spot. Dreams haunt its precincts and flit around me +in broad sunlight, nor require that sleep shall blindfold me to real +objects ere these be visible. Here can I frame a story of two lovers, +and make their shadows live before me and be mirrored in the tranquil +water as they tread along the sand, leaving no footprints. Here, should +I will it, I can summon up a single shade and be myself her lover.—Yes, +dreamer, but your lonely heart will be the colder for such +fancies.—Sometimes, too, the Past comes back, and finds me here, and in +her train come faces which were gladsome when I knew them, yet seem not +gladsome now. Would that my hiding-place were lonelier, so that the +Past might not find me!—Get ye all gone, old friends, and let me listen +to the murmur of the sea—a melancholy voice, but less sad than yours. +Of what mysteries is it telling? Of sunken ships and whereabouts they +lie? Of islands afar and undiscovered whose tawny children are +unconscious of other islands and of continents, and deem the stars of +heaven their nearest neighbors? Nothing of all this. What, then? Has it +talked for so many ages and meant nothing all the while? No; for those +ages find utterance in the sea’s unchanging voice, and warn the +listener to withdraw his interest from mortal vicissitudes and let the +infinite idea of eternity pervade his soul. This is wisdom, and +therefore will I spend the next half-hour in shaping little boats of +driftwood and launching them on voyages across the cove, with the +feather of a sea-gull for a sail. If the voice of ages tell me true, +this is as wise an occupation as to build ships of five hundred tons +and launch them forth upon the main, bound to “Far Cathay.” Yet how +would the merchant sneer at me! + +And, after all, can such philosophy be true? Methinks I could find a +thousand arguments against it. Well, then, let yonder shaggy rock +mid-deep in the surf—see! he is somewhat wrathful: he rages and roars +and foams,—let that tall rock be my antagonist, and let me exercise my +oratory like him of Athens who bandied words with an angry sea and got +the victory. My maiden-speech is a triumphant one, for the gentleman in +seaweed has nothing to offer in reply save an immitigable roaring. His +voice, indeed, will be heard a long while after mine is hushed. Once +more I shout and the cliffs reverberate the sound. Oh what joy for a +shy man to feel himself so solitary that he may lift his voice to its +highest pitch without hazard of a listener!—But hush! Be silent, my +good friend! Whence comes that stifled laughter? It was musical, but +how should there be such music in my solitude? Looking upward, I catch +a glimpse of three faces peeping from the summit of the cliff like +angels between me and their native sky.—Ah, fair girls! you may make +yourself merry at my eloquence, but it was my turn to smile when I saw +your white feet in the pool. Let us keep each other’s secrets. + +The sunshine has now passed from my hermitage, except a gleam upon the +sand just where it meets the sea. A crowd of gloomy fantasies will come +and haunt me if I tarry longer here in the darkening twilight of these +gray rocks. This is a dismal place in some moods of the mind. Climb we, +therefore, the precipice, and pause a moment on the brink gazing down +into that hollow chamber by the deep where we have been what few can +be—sufficient to our own pastime. Yes, say the word outright: +self-sufficient to our own happiness. How lonesome looks the recess +now, and dreary too, like all other spots where happiness has been! +There lies my shadow in the departing sunshine with its head upon the +sea. I will pelt it with pebbles. A hit! a hit! I clap my hands in +triumph, and see my shadow clapping its unreal hands and claiming the +triumph for itself. What a simpleton must I have been all day, since my +own shadow makes a mock of my fooleries! + +Homeward! homeward! It is time to hasten home. It is time—it is time; +for as the sun sinks over the western wave the sea grows melancholy and +the surf has a saddened tone. The distant sails appear astray and not +of earth in their remoteness amid the desolate waste. My spirit wanders +forth afar, but finds no resting-place and comes shivering back. It is +time that I were hence. But grudge me not the day that has been spent +in seclusion which yet was not solitude, since the great sea has been +my companion, and the little sea-birds my friends, and the wind has +told me his secrets, and airy shapes have flitted around me in my +hermitage. Such companionship works an effect upon a man’s character as +if he had been admitted to the society of creatures that are not +mortal. And when, at noontide, I tread the crowded streets, the +influence of this day will still be felt; so that I shall walk among +men kindly and as a brother, with affection and sympathy, but yet shall +not melt into the indistinguishable mass of humankind. I shall think my +own thoughts and feel my own emotions and possess my individuality +unviolated. + +But it is good at the eve of such a day to feel and know that there are +men and women in the world. That feeling and that knowledge are mine at +this moment, for on the shore, far below me, the fishing-party have +landed from their skiff and are cooking their scaly prey by a fire of +driftwood kindled in the angle of two rude rocks. The three visionary +girls are likewise there. In the deepening twilight, while the surf is +dashing near their hearth, the ruddy gleam of the fire throws a strange +air of comfort over the wild cove, bestrewn as it is with pebbles and +seaweed and exposed to the “melancholy main.” Moreover, as the smoke +climbs up the precipice, it brings with it a savory smell from a pan of +fried fish and a black kettle of chowder, and reminds me that my dinner +was nothing but bread and water and a tuft of samphire and an apple. +Methinks the party might find room for another guest at that flat rock +which serves them for a table; and if spoons be scarce, I could pick up +a clam-shell on the beach. They see me now; and—the blessing of a +hungry man upon him!—one of them sends up a hospitable shout: “Halloo, +Sir Solitary! Come down and sup with us!” The ladies wave their +handkerchiefs. Can I decline? No; and be it owned, after all my +solitary joys, that this is the sweetest moment of a day by the +seashore. + + + + +EDWARD FANE’S ROSEBUD + + +There is hardly a more difficult exercise of fancy than, while gazing +at a figure of melancholy age, to recreate its youth, and without +entirely obliterating the identity of form and features to restore +those graces which Time has snatched away. Some old people—especially +women—so age-worn and woeful are they, seem never to have been young +and gay. It is easier to conceive that such gloomy phantoms were sent +into the world as withered and decrepit as we behold them now, with +sympathies only for pain and grief, to watch at death-beds and weep at +funerals. Even the sable garments of their widowhood appear essential +to their existence; all their attributes combine to render them +darksome shadows creeping strangely amid the sunshine of human life. +Yet it is no unprofitable task to take one of these doleful creatures +and set Fancy resolutely at work to brighten the dim eye, and darken +the silvery locks, and paint the ashen cheek with rose-color, and +repair the shrunken and crazy form, till a dewy maiden shall be seen in +the old matron’s elbow-chair. The miracle being wrought, then let the +years roll back again, each sadder than the last, and the whole weight +of age and sorrow settle down upon the youthful figure. Wrinkles and +furrows, the handwriting of Time, may thus be deciphered and found to +contain deep lessons of thought and feeling. + +Such profit might be derived by a skilful observer from my +much-respected friend the Widow Toothaker, a nurse of great repute who +has breathed the atmosphere of sick-chambers and dying-breaths these +forty years. See! she sits cowering over her lonesome hearth with her +gown and upper petticoat drawn upward, gathering thriftily into her +person the whole warmth of the fire which now at nightfall begins to +dissipate the autumnal chill of her chamber. The blaze quivers +capriciously in front, alternately glimmering into the deepest chasms +of her wrinkled visage, and then permitting a ghostly dimness to mar +the outlines of her venerable figure. And Nurse Toothaker holds a +teaspoon in her right hand with which to stir up the contents of a +tumbler in her left, whence steams a vapory fragrance abhorred of +temperance societies. Now she sips, now stirs, now sips again. Her sad +old heart has need to be revived by the rich infusion of Geneva which +is mixed half and half with hot water in the tumbler. All day long she +has been sitting by a death-pillow, and quitted it for her home only +when the spirit of her patient left the clay and went homeward too. But +now are her melancholy meditations cheered and her torpid blood warmed +and her shoulders lightened of at least twenty ponderous years by a +draught from the true fountain of youth in a case-bottle. It is strange +that men should deem that fount a fable, when its liquor fills more +bottles than the Congress-water.—Sip it again, good nurse, and see +whether a second draught will not take off another score of years, and +perhaps ten more, and show us in your high-backed chair the blooming +damsel who plighted troths with Edward Fane.—Get you gone, Age and +Widowhood!—Come back, unwedded Youth!—But, alas! the charm will not +work. In spite of Fancy’s most potent spell, I can see only an old dame +cowering over the fire, a picture of decay and desolation, while the +November blast roars at her in the chimney and fitful showers rush +suddenly against the window. + +Yet there was a time when Rose Grafton—such was the pretty maiden-name +of Nurse Toothaker—possessed beauty that would have gladdened this dim +and dismal chamber as with sunshine. It won for her the heart of Edward +Fane, who has since made so great a figure in the world and is now a +grand old gentleman with powdered hair and as gouty as a lord. These +early lovers thought to have walked hand in hand through life. They had +wept together for Edward’s little sister Mary, whom Rose tended in her +sickness—partly because she was the sweetest child that ever lived or +died, but more for love of him. She was but three years old. Being such +an infant, Death could not embody his terrors in her little corpse; nor +did Rose fear to touch the dead child’s brow, though chill, as she +curled the silken hair around it, nor to take her tiny hand and clasp a +flower within its fingers. Afterward, when she looked through the pane +of glass in the coffin-lid and beheld Mary’s face, it seemed not so +much like death or life as like a wax-work wrought into the perfect +image of a child asleep and dreaming of its mother’s smile. Rose +thought her too fair a thing to be hidden in the grave, and wondered +that an angel did not snatch up little Mary’s coffin and bear the +slumbering babe to heaven and bid her wake immortal. But when the sods +were laid on little Mary, the heart of Rose was troubled. She shuddered +at the fantasy that in grasping the child’s cold fingers her virgin +hand had exchanged a first greeting with mortality and could never lose +the earthy taint. How many a greeting since! But as yet she was a fair +young girl with the dewdrops of fresh feeling in her bosom, and, +instead of “Rose”—which seemed too mature a name for her half-opened +beauty—her lover called her “Rosebud.” + +The rosebud was destined never to bloom for Edward Fane. His mother was +a rich and haughty dame with all the aristocratic prejudices of +colonial times. She scorned Rose Grafton’s humble parentage and caused +her son to break his faith, though, had she let him choose, he would +have prized his Rosebud above the richest diamond. The lovers parted, +and have seldom met again. Both may have visited the same mansions, but +not at the same time, for one was bidden to the festal hall and the +other to the sick-chamber; he was the guest of Pleasure and Prosperity, +and she of Anguish. Rose, after their separation, was long secluded +within the dwelling of Mr. Toothaker, whom she married with the +revengeful hope of breaking her false lover’s heart. She went to her +bridegroom’s arms with bitterer tears, they say, than young girls ought +to shed at the threshold of the bridal-chamber. Yet, though her +husband’s head was getting gray and his heart had been chilled with an +autumnal frost, Rose soon began to love him, and wondered at her own +conjugal affection. He was all she had to love; there were no children. + +In a year or two poor Mr. Toothaker was visited with a wearisome +infirmity which settled in his joints and made him weaker than a child. +He crept forth about his business, and came home at dinner-time and +eventide, not with the manly tread that gladdens a wife’s heart, but +slowly, feebly, jotting down each dull footstep with a melancholy dub +of his staff. We must pardon his pretty wife if she sometimes blushed +to own him. Her visitors, when they heard him coming, looked for the +appearance of some old, old man, but he dragged his nerveless limbs +into the parlor—and there was Mr. Toothaker! The disease increasing, he +never went into the sunshine save with a staff in his right hand and +his left on his wife’s shoulder, bearing heavily downward like a dead +man’s hand. Thus, a slender woman still looking maiden-like, she +supported his tall, broad-chested frame along the pathway of their +little garden, and plucked the roses for her gray-haired husband, and +spoke soothingly as to an infant. His mind was palsied with his body; +its utmost energy was peevishness. In a few months more she helped him +up the staircase with a pause at every step, and a longer one upon the +landing-place, and a heavy glance behind as he crossed the threshold of +his chamber. He knew, poor man! that the precincts of those four walls +would thenceforth be his world—his world, his home, his tomb, at once a +dwelling-and a burial-place—till he were borne to a darker and a +narrower one. But Rose was with him in the tomb. He leaned upon her in +his daily passage from the bed to the chair by the fireside, and back +again from the weary chair to the joyless bed—his bed and hers, their +marriage-bed—till even this short journey ceased and his head lay all +day upon the pillow and hers all night beside it. How long poor Mr. +Toothaker was kept in misery! Death seemed to draw near the door, and +often to lift the latch, and sometimes to thrust his ugly skull into +the chamber, nodding to Rose and pointing at her husband, but still +delayed to enter. “This bedridden wretch cannot escape me,” quoth +Death. “I will go forth and run a race with the swift and fight a +battle with the strong, and come back for Toothaker at my leisure.” Oh, +when the deliverer came so near, in the dull anguish of her worn-out +sympathies did she never long to cry, “Death, come in”? + +But no; we have no right to ascribe such a wish to our friend Rose. She +never failed in a wife’s duty to her poor sick husband. She murmured +not though a glimpse of the sunny sky was as strange to her as him, nor +answered peevishly though his complaining accents roused her from +sweetest dream only to share his wretchedness. He knew her faith, yet +nourished a cankered jealousy; and when the slow disease had chilled +all his heart save one lukewarm spot which Death’s frozen fingers were +searching for, his last words were, “What would my Rose have done for +her first love, if she has been so true and kind to a sick old man like +me?” And then his poor soul crept away and left the body lifeless, +though hardly more so than for years before, and Rose a widow, though +in truth it was the wedding-night that widowed her. She felt glad, it +must be owned, when Mr. Toothaker was buried, because his corpse had +retained such a likeness to the man half alive that she hearkened for +the sad murmur of his voice bidding her shift his pillow. But all +through the next winter, though the grave had held him many a month, +she fancied him calling from that cold bed, “Rose, Rose! Come put a +blanket on my feet!” + +So now the Rosebud was the widow Toothaker. Her troubles had come +early, and, tedious as they seemed, had passed before all her bloom was +fled. She was still fair enough to captivate a bachelor, or with a +widow’s cheerful gravity she might have won a widower, stealing into +his heart in the very guise of his dead wife. But the widow Toothaker +had no such projects. By her watchings and continual cares her heart +had become knit to her first husband with a constancy which changed its +very nature and made her love him for his infirmities, and infirmity +for his sake. When the palsied old man was gone, even her early lover +could not have supplied his place. She had dwelt in a sick-chamber and +been the companion of a half-dead wretch till she could scarcely +breathe in a free air and felt ill at ease with the healthy and the +happy. She missed the fragrance of the doctor’s stuff. She walked the +chamber with a noiseless footfall. If visitors came in, she spoke in +soft and soothing accents, and was startled and shocked by their loud +voices. Often in the lonesome evening she looked timorously from the +fireside to the bed, with almost a hope of recognizing a ghastly face +upon the pillow. Then went her thoughts sadly to her husband’s grave. +If one impatient throb had wronged him in his lifetime, if she had +secretly repined because her buoyant youth was imprisoned with his +torpid age, if ever while slumbering beside him a treacherous dream had +admitted another into her heart,—yet the sick man had been preparing a +revenge which the dead now claimed. On his painful pillow he had cast a +spell around her; his groans and misery had proved more captivating +charms than gayety and youthful grace; in his semblance Disease itself +had won the Rosebud for a bride, nor could his death dissolve the +nuptials. By that indissoluble bond she had gained a home in every +sick-chamber, and nowhere else; there were her brethren and sisters; +thither her husband summoned her with that voice which had seemed to +issue from the grave of Toothaker. At length she recognized her +destiny. + +We have beheld her as the maid, the wife, the widow; now we see her in +a separate and insulated character: she was in all her attributes Nurse +Toothaker. And Nurse Toothaker alone, with her own shrivelled lips, +could make known her experience in that capacity. What a history might +she record of the great sicknesses in which she has gone hand in hand +with the exterminating angel! She remembers when the small-pox hoisted +a red banner on almost every house along the street. She has witnessed +when the typhus fever swept off a whole household, young and old, all +but a lonely mother, who vainly shrieked to follow her last loved one. +Where would be Death’s triumph if none lived to weep? She can speak of +strange maladies that have broken out as if spontaneously, but were +found to have been imported from foreign lands with rich silks and +other merchandise, the costliest portion of the cargo. And once, she +recollects, the people died of what was considered a new pestilence, +till the doctors traced it to the ancient grave of a young girl who +thus caused many deaths a hundred years after her own burial. Strange +that such black mischief should lurk in a maiden’s grave! She loves to +tell how strong men fight with fiery fevers, utterly refusing to give +up their breath, and how consumptive virgins fade out of the world, +scarcely reluctant, as if their lovers were wooing them to a far +country.—Tell us, thou fearful woman; tell us the death-secrets. Fain +would I search out the meaning of words faintly gasped with +intermingled sobs and broken sentences half-audibly spoken between +earth and the judgment-seat. + +An awful woman! She is the patron-saint of young physicians and the +bosom-friend of old ones. In the mansions where she enters the inmates +provide themselves black garments; the coffin-maker follows her, and +the bell tolls as she comes away from the threshold. Death himself has +met her at so many a bedside that he puts forth his bony hand to greet +Nurse Toothaker. She is an awful woman. And oh, is it conceivable that +this handmaid of human infirmity and affliction—so darkly stained, so +thoroughly imbued with all that is saddest in the doom of mortals—can +ever again be bright and gladsome even though bathed in the sunshine of +eternity? By her long communion with woe has she not forfeited her +inheritance of immortal joy? Does any germ of bliss survive within her? + +Hark! an eager knocking st Nurse Toothaker’s door. She starts from her +drowsy reverie, sets aside the empty tumbler and teaspoon, and lights a +lamp at the dim embers of the fire. “Rap, rap, rap!” again, and she +hurries adown the staircase, wondering which of her friends can be at +death’s door now, since there is such an earnest messenger at Nurse +Toothaker’s. Again the peal resounds just as her hand is on the lock. +“Be quick, Nurse Toothaker!” cries a man on the doorstep. “Old General +Fane is taken with the gout in his stomach and has sent for you to +watch by his death-bed. Make haste, for there is no time to +lose.”—“Fane! Edward Fane! And has he sent for me at last? I am ready. +I will get on my cloak and begone. So,” adds the sable-gowned, +ashen-visaged, funereal old figure, “Edward Fane remembers his +Rosebud.” + +Our question is answered. There is a germ of bliss within her. Her +long-hoarded constancy, her memory of the bliss that was remaining amid +the gloom of her after-life like a sweet-smelling flower in a coffin, +is a symbol that all may be renewed. In some happier clime the Rosebud +may revive again with all the dewdrops in its bosom. + + + + +THE THREEFOLD DESTINY + +A FAËRY LEGEND + +I have sometimes produced a singular and not unpleasing effect, so far +as my own mind was concerned, by imagining a train of incidents in +which the spirit and mechanism of the faëry legend should be combined +with the characters and manners of familiar life. In the little tale +which follows a subdued tinge of the wild and wonderful is thrown over +a sketch of New England personages and scenery, yet, it is hoped, +without entirely obliterating the sober hues of nature. Rather than a +story of events claiming to be real, it may be considered as an +allegory such as the writers of the last century would have expressed +in the shape of an Eastern tale, but to which I have endeavored to give +a more lifelike warmth than could be infused into those fanciful +productions. + +In the twilight of a summer eve a tall dark figure over which long and +remote travel had thrown an outlandish aspect was entering a village +not in “faëry londe,” but within our own familiar boundaries. The staff +on which this traveller leaned had been his companion from the spot +where it grew in the jungles of Hindostan; the hat that overshadowed +his sombre brow, had shielded him from the suns of Spain; but his cheek +had been blackened by the red-hot wind of an Arabian desert and had +felt the frozen breath of an Arctic region. Long sojourning amid wild +and dangerous men, he still wore beneath his vest the ataghan which he +had once struck into the throat of a Turkish robber. In every foreign +clime he had lost something of his New England characteristics, and +perhaps from every people he had unconsciously borrowed a new +peculiarity; so that when the world-wanderer again trod the street of +his native village it is no wonder that he passed unrecognized, though +exciting the gaze and curiosity of all. Yet, as his arm casually +touched that of a young woman who was wending her way to an evening +lecture, she started and almost uttered a cry. + +“Ralph Cranfield!” was the name that she half articulated. + +“Can that be my old playmate Faith Egerton?” thought the traveller, +looking round at her figure, but without pausing. + +Ralph Cranfield from his youth upward had felt himself marked out for a +high destiny. He had imbibed the idea—we say not whether it were +revealed to him by witchcraft or in a dream of prophecy, or that his +brooding fancy had palmed its own dictates upon him as the oracles of a +sybil, but he had imbibed the idea, and held it firmest among his +articles of faith—that three marvellous events of his life were to be +confirmed to him by three signs. + +The first of these three fatalities, and perhaps the one on which his +youthful imagination had dwelt most fondly, was the discovery of the +maid who alone of all the maids on earth could make him happy by her +love. He was to roam around the world till he should meet a beautiful +woman wearing on her bosom a jewel in the shape of a heart—whether of +pearl or ruby or emerald or carbuncle or a changeful opal, or perhaps a +priceless diamond, Ralph Cranfield little cared, so long as it were a +heart of one peculiar shape. On encountering this lovely stranger he +was bound to address her thus: “Maiden, I have brought you a heavy +heart. May I rest its weight on you?” And if she were his fated +bride—if their kindred souls were destined to form a union here below +which all eternity should only bind more closely—she would reply, with +her finger on the heart-shaped jewel, “This token which I have worn so +long is the assurance that you may.” + +And, secondly, Ralph Cranfield had a firm belief that there was a +mighty treasure hidden somewhere in the earth of which the burial-place +would be revealed to none but him. When his feet should press upon the +mysterious spot, there would be a hand before him pointing +downward—whether carved of marble or hewn in gigantic dimensions on the +side of a rocky precipice, or perchance a hand of flame in empty air, +he could not tell, but at least he would discern a hand, the forefinger +pointing downward, and beneath it the Latin word “_Effode_”—“Dig!” And, +digging thereabouts, the gold in coin or ingots, the precious stones, +or of whatever else the treasure might consist, would be certain to +reward his toil. + +The third and last of the miraculous events in the life of this +high-destined man was to be the attainment of extensive influence and +sway over his fellow-creatures. Whether he were to be a king and +founder of a hereditary throne, or the victorious leader of a people +contending for their freedom, or the apostle of a purified and +regenerated faith, was left for futurity to show. As messengers of the +sign by which Ralph Cranfield might recognize the summons, three +venerable men were to claim audience of him. The chief among them—a +dignified and majestic person arrayed, it may be supposed, in the +flowing garments of an ancient sage—would be the bearer of a wand or +prophet’s rod. With this wand or rod or staff the venerable sage would +trace a certain figure in the air, and then proceed to make known his +Heaven-instructed message, which, if obeyed, must lead to glorious +results. + +With this proud fate before him, in the flush of his imaginative youth +Ralph Cranfield had set forth to seek the maid, the treasure, and the +venerable sage with his gift of extended empire. And had he found them? +Alas! it was not with the aspect of a triumphant man who had achieved a +nobler destiny than all his fellows, but rather with the gloom of one +struggling against peculiar and continual adversity, that he now passed +homeward to his mother’s cottage. He had come back, but only for a +time, to lay aside the pilgrim’s staff, trusting that his weary manhood +would regain somewhat of the elasticity of youth in the spot where his +threefold fate had been foreshown him. There had been few changes in +the village, for it was not one of those thriving places where a year’s +prosperity makes more than the havoc of a century’s decay, but, like a +gray hair in a young man’s head, an antiquated little town full of old +maids and aged elms and moss-grown dwellings. Few seemed to be the +changes here. The drooping elms, indeed, had a more majestic spread, +the weather-blackened houses were adorned with a denser thatch of +verdant moss, and doubtless there were a few more gravestones in the +burial-ground inscribed with names that had once been familiar in the +village street; yet, summing up all the mischief that ten years had +wrought, it seemed scarcely more than if Ralph Cranfield had gone forth +that very morning and dreamed a day-dream till the twilight, and then +turned back again. But his heart grew cold because the village did not +remember him as he remembered the village. + +“Here is the change,” sighed he, striking his hand upon his breast. +“Who is this man of thought and care, weary with world-wandering and +heavy with disappointed hopes? The youth returns not who went forth so +joyously.” + +And now Ralph Cranfield was at his mother’s gate, in front of the small +house where the old lady, with slender but sufficient means, had kept +herself comfortable during her son’s long absence. Admitting himself +within the enclosure, he leaned against a great old tree, trifling with +his own impatience as people often do in those intervals when years are +summed into a moment. He took a minute survey of the dwelling—its +windows brightened with the sky-gleam, its doorway with the half of a +millstone for a step, and the faintly-traced path waving thence to the +gate. He made friends again with his childhood’s friend—the old tree +against which he leaned—and, glancing his eye down its trunk, beheld +something that excited a melancholy smile. It was a half-obliterated +inscription—the Latin word “_Effode_”—which he remembered to have +carved in the bark of the tree with a whole day’s toil when he had +first begun to muse about his exalted destiny. It might be accounted a +rather singular coincidence that the bark just above the inscription +had put forth an excrescence shaped not unlike a hand, with the +forefinger pointing obliquely at the word of fate. Such, at least, was +its appearance in the dusky light. + +“Now, a credulous man,” said Ralph Cranfield, carelessly, to himself, +“might suppose that the treasure which I have sought round the world +lies buried, after all, at the very door of my mother’s dwelling. That +would be a jest indeed.” + +More he thought not about the matter, for now the door was opened and +an elderly woman appeared on the threshold, peering into the dusk to +discover who it might be that had intruded on her premises and was +standing in the shadow of her tree. It was Ralph Cranfield’s mother. +Pass we over their greeting, and leave the one to her joy and the other +to his rest—if quiet rest he found. + +But when morning broke, he arose with a troubled brow, for his sleep +and his wakefulness had alike been full of dreams. All the fervor was +rekindled with which he had burned of yore to unravel the threefold +mystery of his fate. The crowd of his early visions seemed to have +awaited him beneath his mother’s roof and thronged riotously around to +welcome his return. In the well-remembered chamber, on the pillow where +his infancy had slumbered, he had passed a wilder night than ever in an +Arab tent or when he had reposed his head in the ghastly shades of a +haunted forest. A shadowy maid had stolen to his bedside and laid her +finger on the scintillating heart; a hand of flame had glowed amid the +darkness, pointing downward to a mystery within the earth; a hoary sage +had waved his prophetic wand and beckoned the dreamer onward to a chair +of state. The same phantoms, though fainter in the daylight, still +flitted about the cottage and mingled among the crowd of familiar faces +that were drawn thither by the news of Ralph Cranfield’s return to bid +him welcome for his mother’s sake. There they found him, a tall, dark, +stately man of foreign aspect, courteous in demeanor and mild of +speech, yet with an abstracted eye which seemed often to snatch a +glance at the invisible. + +Meantime, the widow Cranfield went bustling about the house full of joy +that she again had somebody to love and be careful of, and for whom she +might vex and tease herself with the petty troubles of daily life. It +was nearly noon when she looked forth from the door and descried three +personages of note coming along the street through the hot sunshine and +the masses of elm-tree shade. At length they reached her gate and undid +the latch. + +“See, Ralph!” exclaimed she, with maternal pride; “here is Squire +Hawkwood and the two other selectmen coming on purpose to see you. Now, +do tell them a good long story about what you have seen in foreign +parts.” + +The foremost of the three visitors, Squire Hawkwood, was a very pompous +but excellent old gentleman, the head and prime-mover in all the +affairs of the village, and universally acknowledged to be one of the +sagest men on earth. He wore, according to a fashion even then becoming +antiquated, a three-cornered hat, and carried a silver-headed cane the +use of which seemed to be rather for flourishing in the air than for +assisting the progress of his legs. His two companions were elderly and +respectable yeomen who, retaining an ante-Revolutionary reverence for +rank and hereditary wealth, kept a little in the squire’s rear. + +As they approached along the pathway Ralph Cranfield sat in an oaken +elbow-chair half unconsciously gazing at the three visitors and +enveloping their homely figures in the misty romance that pervaded his +mental world. “Here,” thought he, smiling at the conceit—“here come +three elderly personages, and the first of the three is a venerable +sage with a staff. What if this embassy should bring me the message of +my fate?” + +While Squire Hawkwood and his colleagues entered, Ralph rose from his +seat and advanced a few steps to receive them, and his stately figure +and dark countenance as he bent courteously toward his guests had a +natural dignity contrasting well with the bustling importance of the +squire. The old gentleman, according to invariable custom, gave an +elaborate preliminary flourish with his cane in the air, then removed +his three-cornered hat in order to wipe his brow, and finally proceeded +to make known his errand. + +“My colleagues and myself,” began the squire, “are burdened with +momentous duties, being jointly selectmen of this village. Our minds +for the space of three days past have been laboriously bent on the +selection of a suitable person to fill a most important office and take +upon himself a charge and rule which, wisely considered, may be ranked +no lower than those of kings and potentates. And whereas you, our +native townsman, are of good natural intellect and well cultivated by +foreign travel, and that certain vagaries and fantasies of your youth +are doubtless long ago corrected,—taking all these matters, I say, into +due consideration, we are of opinion that Providence hath sent you +hither at this juncture for our very purpose.” + +During this harangue Cranfield gazed fixedly at the speaker, as if he +beheld something mysterious and unearthly in his pompous little figure, +and as if the squire had worn the flowing robes of an ancient sage +instead of a square-skirted coat, flapped waistcoat, velvet breeches +and silk stockings. Nor was his wonder without sufficient cause, for +the flourish of the squire’s staff, marvellous to relate, had described +precisely the signal in the air which was to ratify the message of the +prophetic sage whom Cranfield had sought around the world. + +“And what,” inquired Ralph Cranfield, with a tremor in his voice—“what +may this office be which is to equal me with kings and potentates?” + +“No less than instructor of our village school,” answered Squire +Hawkwood, “the office being now vacant by the death of the venerable +Master Whitaker after a fifty years’ incumbency.” + +“I will consider of your proposal,” replied Ralph Cranfield, hurriedly, +“and will make known my decision within three days.” + +After a few more words the village dignitary and his companions took +their leave. But to Cranfield’s fancy their images were still present, +and became more and more invested with the dim awfulness of figures +which had first appeared to him in a dream, and afterward had shown +themselves in his waking moments, assuming homely aspects among +familiar things. His mind dwelt upon the features of the squire till +they grew confused with those of the visionary sage and one appeared +but the shadow of the other. The same visage, he now thought, had +looked forth upon him from the Pyramid of Cheops; the same form had +beckoned to him among the colonnades of the Alhambra; the same figure +had mistily revealed itself through the ascending steam of the Great +Geyser. At every effort of his memory he recognized some trait of the +dreamy messenger of destiny in this pompous, bustling, self-important, +little-great man of the village. Amid such musings Ralph Cranfield sat +all day in the cottage, scarcely hearing and vaguely answering his +mother’s thousand questions about his travels and adventures. At sunset +he roused himself to take a stroll, and, passing the aged elm tree, his +eye was again caught by the semblance of a hand pointing downward at +the half-obliterated inscription. + +As Cranfield walked down the street of the village the level sunbeams +threw his shadow far before him, and he fancied that, as his shadow +walked among distant objects, so had there been a presentiment stalking +in advance of him throughout his life. And when he drew near each +object over which his tall shadow had preceded him, still it proved to +be one of the familiar recollections of his infancy and youth. Every +crook in the pathway was remembered. Even the more transitory +characteristics of the scene were the same as in by-gone days. A +company of cows were grazing on the grassy roadside, and refreshed him +with their fragrant breath. “It is sweeter,” thought he, “than the +perfume which was wafted to our ship from the Spice Islands.” The round +little figure of a child rolled from a doorway and lay laughing almost +beneath Cranfield’s feet. The dark and stately man stooped down, and, +lifting the infant, restored him to his mother’s arms. “The children,” +said he to himself, and sighed and smiled—“the children are to be my +charge.” And while a flow of natural feeling gushed like a well-spring +in his heart he came to a dwelling which he could nowise forbear to +enter. A sweet voice which seemed to come from a deep and tender soul +was warbling a plaintive little air within. He bent his head and passed +through the lowly door. As his foot sounded upon the threshold a young +woman advanced from the dusky interior of the house, at first hastily, +and then with a more uncertain step, till they met face to face. There +was a singular contrast in their two figures—he dark and picturesque, +one who had battled with the world, whom all suns had shone upon and +whom all winds had blown on a varied course; she neat, comely and +quiet—quiet even in her agitation—as if all her emotions had been +subdued to the peaceful tenor of her life. Yet their faces, all unlike +as they were, had an expression that seemed not so alien—a glow of +kindred feeling flashing upward anew from half-extinguished embers. + +“You are welcome home,” said Faith Egerton. + +But Cranfield did not immediately answer, for his eye had, been caught +by an ornament in the shape of a heart which Faith wore as a brooch +upon her bosom. The material was the ordinary white quartz, and he +recollected having himself shaped it out of one of those Indian +arrowheads which are so often found in the ancient haunts of the red +men. It was precisely on the pattern of that worn by the visionary +maid. When Cranfield departed on his shadowy search, he had bestowed +this brooch, in a gold setting, as a parting gift to Faith Egerton. + +“So, Faith, you have kept the heart?” said he, at length. + +“Yes,” said she, blushing deeply; then, more gayly, “And what else have +you brought me from beyond the sea?” + +“Faith,” replied Ralph Cranfield, uttering the fated words by an +uncontrollable impulse, “I have brought you nothing but a heavy heart. +May I rest its weight on you?” + +“This token which I have worn so long,” said Faith, laying her +tremulous finger on the heart, “is the assurance that you may.” + +“Faith, Faith!” cried Cranfield, clasping her in his arms; “you have +interpreted my wild and weary dream!” + +Yes, the wild dreamer was awake at last. To find the mysterious +treasure he was to till the earth around his mother’s dwelling and reap +its products; instead of warlike command or regal or religious sway, he +was to rule over the village children; and now the visionary maid had +faded from his fancy, and in her place he saw the playmate of his +childhood. + +Would all who cherish such wild wishes but look around them, they would +oftenest find their sphere of duty, of prosperity and happiness, within +those precincts and in that station where Providence itself has cast +their lot. Happy they who read the riddle without a weary world-search +or a lifetime spent in vain! + + + + +Footnotes: + + [1] Another clergyman in New England, Mr. Joseph Moody, of York, + Maine, who died about eighty years since, made himself remarkable by + the same eccentricity that is here related of the Reverend Mr. Hooper. + In his case, however, the symbol had a different import. In early life + he had accidentally killed a beloved friend, and from that day till + the hour of his own death he hid his face from men. + + [2] Did Governor Endicott speak less positively, we should suspect a + mistake here. The Rev. Mr. Blackstone, though an eccentric, is not + known to have been an immoral man. We rather doubt his identity with + the priest of Merry Mount. + + [3] Essex and Washington streets, Salem. + + [4] The Indian tradition on which this somewhat extravagant tale is + founded is both too wild and too beautiful to be adequately wrought up + in prose. Sullivan, in his history of Maine, written since the + Revolution, remarks that even then the existence of the Great + Carbuncle was not entirely discredited. + + [5] This story was suggested by an anecdote of Stuart related in + Dunlap’s _History of the Arts of Designs_—a most entertaining book to + the general reader, and a deeply-interesting one, we should think, to + the artist. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13707 *** |