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diff --git a/30076-h/30076-h.htm b/30076-h/30076-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7e4a22b --- /dev/null +++ b/30076-h/30076-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,8298 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg Canada eBook of "Graham's Magazine + Volume XXXIII No. 3 September 1848", + by George R. Graham. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + + + p {margin-top: .75em; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: .75em; } + + p.main {font-style: normal; font-size: 100%; text-indent: 0em;} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 {text-align: center; clear: both;} + hr {width: 33%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; clear: both;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + font-family: serif} + + .cen {text-align: center; text-indent: 0em;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps; font-size: 95%;} + .right {text-align: right; padding-right: 2em;} + + .rfloat {position: absolute;right:18%; text-align: right; width: auto;} + + .blockquot {margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%; font-size: 90%;} + + + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 2em; font-size: 70%; text-align: right; color: #A9A9A9} + + .totoc {position: absolute; left: 2em; font-size: 70%; text-align: right;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + .figleft {float: left; width: auto; clear: left; margin-left: + 0; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-top: + -0.5em; margin-right: 0.2em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; width: auto; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + .tdr {text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;} + + .tdl {text-align: left; padding-left: .25em;} + + .tdc {text-align: center; vertical-align: bottom;} + + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i1 {display: block; margin-left: 1em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i3 {display: block; margin-left: 3em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i10 {display: block; margin-left: 10em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i8 {display: block; margin-left: 8em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + + .linenum {position: absolute; left: 5%; right: 91%; } + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px; margin-top: 1em; clear: both;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {float:left; width: auto; text-align: left;} + .fnanchor {font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + + </style> + </head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30076 ***</div> + +<br /><br /> +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 615px;"> +<img src="images/illus120.png" width="615" height="800" +alt="ANGILA MERVALE" title="" /></div> +<h5>J. Addison</h5> +<h4>ANGILA MERVALE</h4> +<h5><span class="smcap">or</span></h5> +<h4>SIX MONTHS BEFORE MARRIAGE.</h4> +<h5><i>Engraved Expressly for Graham's Magazine</i></h5> +<br /><br /> + +<h1>GRAHAM'S MAGAZINE.</h1> +<br /> +<h4><span class="smcap">Vol. XXXIII.</span> + PHILADELPHIA, SEPTEMBER, 1848. + <span class="smcap">No.</span> 3.</h4> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span> + +<h3>TABLE OF CONTENTS</h3><br /> +<table summary="TOC" width="80%"> +<tr><td><a href="#ANGILA_MERVALE"><b>ANGILA MERVALE.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">121</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#A_NEW_ENGLAND_LEGEND"><b>A NEW ENGLAND LEGEND.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">126</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#SONG_OF_SLEEP"><b>SONG OF SLEEP.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">128</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_CRUISE_OF_THE_RAKER"><b>THE CRUISE OF THE RAKER.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">129</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_PRAYER_OF_THE_DYING_GIRL"><b>THE PRAYER OF THE DYING GIRL.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">136</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#A_WRITTEN_LEAF_OF_MEMORY"><b>A WRITTEN LEAF OF MEMORY.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">137</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_SPANISH_PRINCESS_TO_THE_MOORISH_KNIGHT"> +<b>THE SPANISH PRINCESS TO THE MOORISH KNIGHT.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">146</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_LIGHT_OF_OUR_HOME"><b>THE LIGHT OF OUR HOME.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">146</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#AN_INDIAN-SUMMER_RAMBLE"><b>AN INDIAN-SUMMER RAMBLE.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">147</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_LOST_PET"><b>THE LOST PET.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">152</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#FIEL_A_LA_MUERTE_OR_TRUE_LOVES_DEVOTION"> +<b>FIEL A LA MUERTE, OR TRUE LOVE'S DEVOTION.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">153</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_POETS_HEART_TO_MISS_O_B"> +<b>THE POET'S HEART.—TO MISS O. B.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">161</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_RETURN_TO_SCENES_OF_CHILDHOOD"> +<b>THE RETURN TO SCENES OF CHILDHOOD.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">162</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#SUNSHINE_AND_RAIN"><b>SUNSHINE AND RAIN.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">162</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_CHRISTMAS_GARLAND"><b>THE CHRISTMAS GARLAND.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">163</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#HEADS_OF_THE_POETS"><b>HEADS OF THE POETS.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">170</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#HOPE_ON_HOPE_EVER"><b>HOPE ON—HOPE EVER.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">171</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#MEXICAN_JEALOUSY"><b>MEXICAN JEALOUSY.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">172</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#TO_GUADALUPE"><b>TO GUADALUPE.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">174</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_FADED_ROSE"><b>THE FADED ROSE.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">174</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_CHILDS_APPEAL"><b>THE CHILD'S APPEAL.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">175</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#THE_OLD_FARM-HOUSE"><b>THE OLD FARM-HOUSE.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">175</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#TIS_HOME_WHERE_THE_HEART_IS"> +<b>"'TIS HOME WHERE THE HEART IS."</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">176</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#REVIEW_OF_NEW_BOOKS"><b>REVIEW OF NEW BOOKS.</b></a></td> +<td class="tdr">178</td></tr> +</table> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ANGILA_MERVALE" id="ANGILA_MERVALE"></a>ANGILA MERVALE;</h2> + +<h3>OR SIX MONTHS BEFORE MARRIAGE.</h3> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY F. E. F., AUTHOR OF "AARON'S ROD," "TELLING SECRETS," ETC.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<p>"They say Miss Morton is engaged to Robert +Hazlewood," said Augusta Lenox.</p> + +<p>"So I hear," replied Angila Mervale, to whom +this piece of news had been communicated. "How +can she?"</p> + +<p>"How can she, indeed?" replied Augusta. "He's +an ugly fellow."</p> + +<p>"Ugly! yes," continued Angila, "and a disagreeable +ugliness, too. I don't care about a man's +being handsome—a plain black ugliness I don't +object to—but <i>red</i> ugliness, ah!"</p> + +<p>"They say he's clever," said Augusta.</p> + +<p>"They always say that, my dear, of any one +that's so ugly," replied Angila. "I don't believe it. +He's conceited, and I think disagreeable; and I +don't believe he's clever."</p> + +<p>"I remarked last night that he was very attentive +to Mary Morton," continued Augusta. "They +waltzed together several times."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and how badly he waltzes," said Angila. +"Mary Morton is too pretty a girl for such an awkward, +ugly man. How lovely she looked last night. +I hope it's not an engagement, for I quite like her."</p> + +<p>"Well, perhaps it is not. It's only one of the +<i>on dits</i>, and probably a mere report."</p> + +<p>"Who are you discussing, girls?" asked Mrs. +Mervale, from the other side of the room.</p> + +<p>"Robert Hazlewood and Miss Morton," replied +Augusta, "they are said to be engaged."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Mrs. Mervale. "Is it a good match +for her?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no! chimed in both the girls at once. "He's +neither handsome, nor rich, nor any thing."</p> + +<p>"Nor any thing!" repeated Mrs. Mervale, laughing. +"Well, that's comprehensive. A young man +may be a very respectable young man, and be a very +fair match for a girl without being either handsome or +rich; but if he is positively 'nothing,' why, then, I +grant you, it is bad indeed."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I believe he is respectable enough," replied +Augusta, carelessly, for, like most young girls, the +word "respectable" did not rank very high in her +vocabulary.</p> + +<p>"And if he is not rich, what are they to live on," +asked Mrs. Mervale.</p> + +<p>"Love and the law, I suppose," replied her +daughter, laughing. "He's a lawyer, is he not +Augusta?"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" resumed Mrs. Mervale, "he's a son, then, +I suppose, of old John Hazlewood."</p> + +<p>"Yes," replied Augusta.</p> + +<p>"Then he may do very well in his profession," +continued Mrs. Mervale, "for his father has a large +practice I know, and is a very respectable man. If +this is a clever young man, he may tread in his +father's footsteps."</p> + +<p>This did not convey any very high eulogium to the +young ladies' ears. That young Robert Hazlewood +might be an old John Hazlewood in his turn and +time, did not strike them as a very brilliant future. +In fact they did not think more of the old man than +they did of the young one.</p> + +<p>Old gentlemen, however, were not at quite such a +discount with Mrs. Mervale as with her daughter +and her friend; and she continued to descant upon +the high standing of Mr. Hazlewood the elder, not +one word in ten of which the girls heard, for she, +like most old ladies, once started upon former times, +was thinking of the pleasant young John Hazlewood +of early days, who brought back with him a host +of reminiscences, with which she indulged herself +and the girls, while they, their heads full of last +night's party and Mary Morton and Robert Hazlewood, +listened as civilly as they could, quite unable +to keep the thread of her discourse, confounding in +her history Robert Hazlewood's mother with his +grandmother, and wondering all the while when she +would stop, that they might resume their gossip.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You visit his sister, Mrs. Constant, don't you?" +asked Augusta.</p> + +<p>"Yes, we have always visited the Hazlewoods," +replied Angila, "but I am not intimate with any of +them. They always seemed to me those kind of +pattern people I dislike."</p> + +<p>"Is Mr. Constant well off?" inquired Mrs. +Mervale.</p> + +<p>"No, I should think not," replied Angila, "from +the way in which they live. They have a little +bit of a two-story house, and keep only a waiter +girl. How I do hate to see a woman open the door," +she continued, addressing Augusta.</p> + +<p>"So do I," replied her friend. "I would have a +man servant—a woman looks so shabby."</p> + +<p>"Yes," returned Angila. "There's nothing I +dislike so much. No woman shall ever go to my +door."</p> + +<p>"If you have a man servant," suggested Mrs. +Mervale.</p> + +<p>"Of course," said Angila; "and that I will."</p> + +<p>"But suppose you cannot afford it," said her +mother.</p> + +<p>"I don't choose to suppose any thing so disagreeable +or improbable," replied her daughter, +gayly.</p> + +<p>"It may be disagreeable," continued Mrs. Mervale, +"but I don't see the improbability of the thing, +Angila, nor, indeed, the disagreeability even. The +Constants are young people with a small family, and +I think a woman is quite sufficient for them. Their +house is small, I suppose."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, a little bit of a place."</p> + +<p>"Large enough for them," replied Mrs. Mervale, +whose ideas were not as enlarged as her daughter's.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps so," said Angila, "but I do hate low +ceilings so. I don't care about a large house, but I +do like large rooms."</p> + +<p>"You can hardly have large rooms in a small +house," remarked Mrs. Mervale, smiling.</p> + +<p>"Why, Mrs. Astley's is only a two-story house, +mamma, and her rooms are larger than these."</p> + +<p>"Yes, my dear, Mrs. Astley's is an expensive +house; the lot must be thirty feet by—"</p> + +<p>But Angila had no time to go into the dimensions +of people's "lots." She and Augusta were back to +the party again; and they discussed dresses, and +looks, and manners, with great <i>goût</i>.</p> + +<p>Their criticisms were, like most young people's, +always in extremes. The girls had either looked +"lovely" or "frightful," and the young men were +either "charming" or "odious;" and they themselves, +from their own account, had been in a constant state +of either delight or terror.</p> + +<p>"I was so afraid Robert Hazlewood was going to +ask me to waltz," said Angila; "and he waltzes so +abominably that I did not know what I should do. +But, to my delight, he asked me only for a cotillion, +and I fortunately was engaged. I was so glad it +was so."</p> + +<p>"Then you did not dance with him at all?"</p> + +<p>"No—to my great joy, he walked off, angry, I +believe."</p> + +<p>"Oh, my dear!" remonstrated her mother.</p> + +<p>"Why not, mother," replied Angila. "He's my +'favorite aversion.' Well, Augusta," she continued, +turning to her friend, "and when do you sail for +New Orleans?"</p> + +<p>"On Monday," replied Augusta.</p> + +<p>"On Monday!—so soon! Oh, what shall I do +without you, Augusta!" said Angila, quite pathetically. +"And you will be gone six months, you +think?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, so papa says," replied the young lady. +"He does not expect to be able to return before +May."</p> + +<p>"Not before May! And its only November now!" +said Angila, in prolonged accents of grief. "How +much may happen in that time!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," returned her friend, gaily, "you may be +engaged before that."</p> + +<p>"Not much danger," replied Angila, laughing.</p> + +<p>"But remember, I am to be bridemaid," continued +Augusta.</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said Angila, in the same tone, "I +shall expect you from New Orleans on purpose."</p> + +<p>"And who will it be to, Angila," said Augusta.</p> + +<p>"That's more than I can tell," replied Angila; +"but somebody that's very charming, I promise +you."</p> + +<p>"By the way, what is your <i>beau ideal</i>, Angila, I +never heard you say," continued Augusta.</p> + +<p>"My <i>beau ideal</i> is as shadowy and indistinct as +one of Ossian's heroes," replied Angila, laughing; +"something very distinguished in air and manners, +with black eyes and hair, are the only points decided +on. For the rest, Augusta, I refer you to Futurity," +she added, gayly.</p> + +<p>"I wonder who you will marry!" said Augusta, +with the sudden fervor of a young lady on so interesting +a topic.</p> + +<p>"I don't know, only nobody that I have ever seen +yet," replied Angila, with animation.</p> + +<p>"He must be handsome, I suppose," said Augusta.</p> + +<p>"No," replied Angila, "I don't care for beauty. +A man should have a decided air of the gentleman, +with an expression of talent, height, and all that—but +I don't care about what you call beauty."</p> + +<p>"You are very moderate, indeed, in your requirements, +my dear," said her mother, laughing. "And +pray, my love, what have you to offer this <i>rara avis</i> +in return for such extraordinary charms."</p> + +<p>"Love, mamma," replied the gay girl, smiling.</p> + +<p>"And suppose, my dear," pursued her mother, +"that your hero should set as high an estimate upon +himself as you do upon yourself. Your tall, elegant, +talented man, may expect a wife who has fortune, +beauty and talents, too."</p> + +<p>Angila laughed. She was not vain, but she knew +she was pretty, and she was sufficiently of a belle to +be satisfied with her own powers if she could only +meet with the man, so she said, playfully.</p> + +<p>"Well, then, mamma, he won't be <i>my</i> hero, that's +all."</p> + +<p>And no doubt she answered truly. The possession +of such gifts are very apt to vary in young ladies'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span> +eyes according to the gentleman's perception of their +charms. And heroes differ from one another, according +as the pronouns "mine and thine," may be pre-fixed +to his title.</p> + +<p>"And such a bijou of a house as I mean to have," +continued Angila, with animation. "The back +parlor and dining-room shall open into a conservatory, +where I shall have any quantity of canary-birds—"</p> + +<p>"My dear," interrupted her mother, "what nonsense +you do talk."</p> + +<p>"Why, mamma," said Angila, opening her eyes +very wide, "don't you like canaries?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, my dear," replied her mother, "I don't +object to aviaries or conservatories, only to your +talking of them in this way, as matters of course and +necessity. They are all very well for rich people."</p> + +<p>"Well, then, I mean to be rich," continued Angila, +playfully.</p> + +<p>"That's the very nonsense I complain of," said +her mother. "It's barely possible, but certainly +very improbable, Angila, that you ever should be +rich; and considering you have been used to nothing +of the kind, it really amuses me to hear you talk so. +Your father and I have lived all our lives very comfortably +and happily, Angila, without either aviary +or conservatory, and I rather think you will do the +same, my love."</p> + +<p>"Your father and I!" What a falling off was +there! for although Angila loved her father and +mother dearly, she could not imagine herself intent +upon household occupations, an excellent motherly +woman some thirty years hence, any more than that +her <i>beau ideal</i> should wear pepper and salt like her +father.</p> + +<p>"It was all very well for papa and mamma," but +to persuade a girl of eighteen that she wants no more +than her mother, whose heart happens to be like Mrs. +Mervale, just then full of a new carpet that Mr. +Mervale is hesitating about affording, is out of the +question.</p> + +<p>And, unreasonable as it may be, whoever would +make a young girl more rational, destroys at once +the chief charm of her youth—the exuberance of her +fresh imagination, that gilds not only the future, but +throws a rosy light upon all surrounding objects. +Her visions, I grant you, are absurd, but the girl +without visions is a clod of the valley, for she is +without imagination—and without imagination, what +is life? what is love?"</p> + +<p>Never fear that her visions will not be fulfilled, +and therefore bring disappointment—for the power +carries the pleasure with it. The same gift that +traces the outline, fills up the sketch. The girls +who dream of heroes are those most ready to fall in +love with any body—and no woman is so hard to +interest as she who never had a vision, and consequently +sees men just as they are; and so if Angila +talked nonsense, Mrs. Mervale's sense was not much +wiser.</p> + +<p>Angila was a pretty, playful, romantic girl, rather +intolerant of the people she did not like, and enthusiastic +about those she did; full of life and animation, +she was a decided belle in the gay circle in which +she moved.</p> + +<p>Miss Lenox was her dearest friend for the time +being, and the proposed separation for the next six +months was looked upon as a cruel affliction, only to +be softened by the most frequent and confidential +correspondence.</p> + +<p>For the first few weeks of Augusta's absence, the +promises exchanged on both sides were vehemently +fulfilled. Letters were written two or three limes a +week, detailing every minute circumstance that +happened to either. But at the end of that time +Angila was at a party where she met Robert Hazlewood, +who talked to her for some time. It was not +a dancing party, and consequently they conversed +together more than they had ever done before. He +seemed extremely amused with her liveliness, and +looked at her with unmistakable admiration. Had +Augusta Lenox been there to see, perhaps Angila +would not have received his attentions so graciously; +but there being nothing to remind her of his being +her "favorite aversion," she talked with animation, +pleased with the admiration she excited, without +being annoyed by any inconvenient reminiscences. +And not only was Miss Lenox absent, but Miss +Morton was present, and Angila thought she looked +over at them a little anxiously; so that a little spirit +of rivalry heightened, if not her pleasure, certainly +Hazlewood's consequence in her eyes. Girls are +often much influenced by each other in these +matters—and the absence of Miss Lenox, who "did not +think much of Robert Hazlewood," with the presence +of Miss Morton who did, had no small influence in +Angila's future fate.</p> + +<p>"Did you have a pleasant party?" asked Mrs. +Mervale, who had not been with her daughter the +evening before.</p> + +<p>"Yes, very pleasant," replied Angila; "one of +the pleasantest 'conversation parties' I have ever +been at."</p> + +<p>And "who was there—and who did you talk to?" +were the next questions, which launched Angila in +a full length description of every thing and every +body—and among them figured quite conspicuously +Robert Hazlewood.</p> + +<p>"And you found him really clever?" said her +mother.</p> + +<p>"Oh, decidedly," replied her daughter.</p> + +<p>"Who," said her brother, looking up from his +breakfast, "Hazlewood? Certainly he is. He's +considered one of the cleverest among the young +lawyers. Decidedly a man of talent."</p> + +<p>Angila looked pleased.</p> + +<p>"His father is a man of talent before him," observed +Mrs. Mervale. "As a family, the Hazlewoods +have always been distinguished for ability. +This young man is ugly, you say, Angila?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—" replied Angila, though with some hesitation. +"Yes, he is ugly, certainly—but he has a good +countenance; and when he converses he is better +looking than I thought him."</p> + +<p>"It's a pity he's conceited," said Mrs. Mervale, +innocently; her impression of the young man being<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span> +taken from her daughter's previous description of +him. "Since he is really clever, it's a pity, for it's +such a drawback always."</p> + +<p>"Conceited! I don't think he's conceited," said +Angila, quite forgetting her yesterday's opinion.</p> + +<p>"Don't you? I thought it was you who said so, +my dear," replied her mother, quietly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I did once think so," said Angila, slightly +blushing at her own inconsistency. "I don't know +why I took the idea in my head—but in fact I talked +more to him, and became better acquainted with him +last evening than I ever have before. When there +is dancing, there is so little time for conversation; +and he really talks very well."</p> + +<p>"He is engaged to Miss Morton, you say?" continued +Mrs. Mervale.</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't know," replied Angila, adding, as +she remembered the animated looks of admiration +he had bestowed upon herself, "I doubt it—that is +the report, however."</p> + +<p>"Hazlewood's no more engaged to Mary Morton +than I am," said young Mervale, carelessly. "Where +did you get that idea?"</p> + +<p>"Why every body says so, George," said Angila.</p> + +<p>"Pshaw! every body's saying so don't make it so."</p> + +<p>"But he's very attentive to her," replied Angila.</p> + +<p>"Well, and if he is," retorted Mervale, "it does +not follow that he must be in love with her. You +women do jump to conclusions, and make up matches +in such a way," he continued, almost angrily.</p> + +<p>"I think she likes him," pursued Angila. "I +think she would have him."</p> + +<p>"Have him! to be sure she would," replied +George, in the same tone; not that he considered the +young lady particularly in love with his friend, but +as if any girl might be glad to have him—for brothers +are very apt to view such cases differently from +sisters, who refuse young gentlemen for their friends +without mercy.</p> + +<p>"But he's ugly, you say," continued Mrs. Mervale, +sorrowfully, who, old lady as she was, liked a handsome +young man, and always lamented when she +found mental gifts unaccompanied by personal +charms.</p> + +<p>"Yes, he's no beauty, that's certain," said Angila, +gayly.</p> + +<p>"Has he a good air and figure?" pursued Mrs. +Mervale, still hoping so clever a man might be +better looking after all.</p> + +<p>"Yes, tolerable—middle height—nothing remarkable +one way or the other." And then the young +lady went off to tell some piece of news, that quite +put Mr. Hazlewood out of her mother's head for the +present.</p> + +<p>When Angila next wrote to Augusta, although she +spoke of Mrs. Carpenter's party, a little consciousness +prevented her saying much about Robert Hazlewood, +and consequently her friend was quite unsuspicious +of the large share he had in making the party +she described so pleasant.</p> + +<p>Hazlewood had really been pleased by Angila. +She was pretty—and he found her lively and intelligent. +He had always been inclined to admire her, +but she had turned from him once or twice in what +he had thought a haughty manner, and consequently +he had scarcely known her until they met at this +little <i>conversazione</i> of Mrs. Carpenter's, where +accident placed them near each other. The party +was so small that where people happened to find +themselves, there they staid—it requiring some +courage for a young man to break the charmed ring, +and deliberately plant himself before any lady, or +attempt to talk to any one except her beside whom +fate had placed him.</p> + +<p>Now Angila had the corner seat on a sofa near the +fire-place, and Hazlewood was standing, leaning +against the chimney-piece, so that a nicer, more +cosy position for a pleasant talk could hardly be conceived +in so small a circle. Miss Morton was on +the other side of the fire-place, occupying the corresponding +situation to Angila, and Angila could see +her peeping forward from time to time to see if +Hazlewood still maintained his place. His back was +turned toward her, so if she did throw any anxious +glances that way, he did not see them.</p> + +<p>Angila met him a few evenings after this at the +Opera, and found that he was a passionate lover of +music. They talked again, and he very well, for he +really was a sensible, well-educated young man. +Music is a favorite source of inspiration, and Hazlewood +was a connoisseur as well as amateur. She +found that he seldom missed a night at the Opera, +and "she was surprised she had not seen him there +before, as she went herself very often."</p> + +<p>"He had seen her, however;" and he looked as if +it were not easy not to see <i>her</i> when she was there.</p> + +<p>She blushed and was pleased, for it evidently was +not an unmeaning compliment.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Hazlewood's very clever," she said the next +day; "and his tastes are so cultivated and refined. +He is very different from the usual run of young +men." (When a girl begins to think a man different +from the "usual run," you may be sure she herself +is off the common track.) "There's something very +manly in all his sentiments, independent and high-toned. +He cannot be engaged to Mary Morton, for +I alluded to the report, and he seemed quite amused +at the idea. I can see he thinks her very silly, which +she is, though pretty—though he was two gentlemanly +to say so."</p> + +<p>"How, then, did you find out that he thought so," +asked George, smiling.</p> + +<p>"Oh, from one or two little things. We were +speaking of a German poem that I was trying to get +the other day, and he said he had it, but had lent it +to Miss Morton. 'However,' he added, with a +peculiar smile, 'he did not believe she wanted to read +it, and at any rate, he would bring it to me as soon +as she returned it. He doubted whether she was +much of a German reader.' But it was more the +smile and the manner in which he said it, than the +words, that made me think he had no very high +opinion of her literary tastes."</p> + +<p>"He may not like her any the less for that," said +George, carelessly. "I think your clever literary +men rarely do value a woman less for her ignorance."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span></p> + +<p>But there was an expression in Angila's pretty +face that seemed to contradict this assertion; for, like +most pretty women, the was vainer of her talents than +her beauty—and she thought Hazlewood had been +quite struck by some of her criticisms the night before.</p> + +<p>However this might be, the intimacy seemed to +progress at a wonderful rate. He called and brought +her books; and they had a world to say every time +they met, which, whether by accident or design, was +now beginning to be very often.</p> + +<p>"You knew old Mr. Hazlewood, mamma, did not +you?" said Angila. "And who did you say Mrs. +Hazlewood was?" And now she listened very +differently from the last time that her mother had +launched forth on the topic of old times and friends. +Angila was wonderfully interested in all the history +of the whole race, for Mrs. Mervale began with the +great grandfathers, maternal and paternal; and she +kept the thread of the story with surprising distinctness, +and made out the family pedigree with amazing +correctness.</p> + +<p>"Then they are an excellent family, mamma," +she said.</p> + +<p>"To be sure they are," replied Mrs. Mervale, +"one of the oldest and best in the city."</p> + +<p>It was wonderful what a quantity of books Angila +read just about this time; but Hazlewood was always +sending her something, which she seemed to take +peculiar pleasure in surprising him by having finished +before they met again. And her bright eyes grew +brighter, and occasionally, and that not unfrequently, +they had an abstracted, dreamy look, as if her thoughts +were far away, occupied in very pleasant visions—whether +they were now of Ossian-heroes, dark-eyed +and dim, we doubt.</p> + +<p>She was rather unpleasantly roused to a waking +state, however, by a passage in one of Augusta +Lenox's last letters, which was,</p> + +<p>"What has become of your 'favorite aversion,' +Robert Hazlewood? When are he and Mary Morton +to be married? I give her joy of him—as you say, +how can she?"</p> + +<p>Angila colored scarlet with indignation as she read +this, almost wondering at first what Augusta meant.</p> + +<p>She did not answer the letter; some consciousness, +mixed with a good deal of vexation, prevented her.</p> + +<p>Hazlewood's attentions to Angila began to be +talked of a good deal. Her mother was congratulated, +and she was complimented, for every body spoke +well of him. "A remarkably clever young man +with excellent prospects," the old people said. The +young girls talked of him probably pretty much as +Angila and Augusta had done—but she did not hear +that, and the young men said,</p> + +<p>"Hazlewood was a devilish clever fellow, and +that Angila Mervale would do very well if she could +get him."</p> + +<p>That the gentleman was desperately in love there +was no doubt; and as for the young lady—that she +was flattered and pleased and interested, was hardly +less clear. Her bright eyes grew softer and more +dreamy every day.</p> + +<p>Of what was she dreaming? What could her +visions be now? Can she by any possibility make +a hero of Robert Hazlewood? Sober common sense +would say "No!" but bright-eyed, youthful imagination +may boldly answer, "Why not?" Time, however, +can only decide that point.</p> + +<p>Two more letters came from Augusta Lenox about +this time, and remained unanswered. "Wait till I +am engaged," Angila had unconsciously said to herself, +and then blushed the deepest blush, as she +caught the words that had risen to her lips.</p> + +<p>She did not wait long, however. Bright, beaming, +blushing and tearful, she soon announced the intelligence +to her mother, asking her consent, and permission +to refer Mr. Hazlewood to her father.</p> + +<p>The Mervales were very well pleased with the +match, which, in fact, was an excellent one, young +Hazlewood being in every respect Angila's superior, +except in appearance, where she, as is the woman's +right, bore the palm of beauty. Not but that she was +quick, intelligent, and well cultivated; but there are +more such girls by hundreds in our community, than +there are men of talent, reading, industry and worth +to merit them; and Angila was amazingly happy to +have been one of the fortunate few to whose lot such +a man falls.</p> + +<p>And now, indeed, she wrote a long, long letter to +Augusta—so full of happiness, describing Hazlewood, +as she thought, so distinctly, that Augusta must recognize +him at once—so she concluded by saying,</p> + +<p>"And now I need not name him, as you must know +who I mean."</p> + +<p>"I must know who she means!" said Augusta, +much perplexed. "Why I am sure I cannot imagine +who she means! Talented, agreeable, with cultivated +tastes! Who can it be? 'Not handsome, but very +gentlemanlike-looking.' Well, I have no idea who it +is—I certainly cannot know the man. But as we +sail next week, I shall be at home in time for the +wedding. How odd that I should be really her +bridemaid in May after all!"</p> + +<p>Miss Lenox arrived about two months after Angila's +engagement had been announced, and found +her friend brilliant with happiness. After the first +exclamations and greetings, Augusta said with impatient +curiosity,</p> + +<p>"But who is it, Angila—you never told me?"</p> + +<p>"But surely you guessed at once," said Angila, +incredulously.</p> + +<p>"No, indeed," replied her friend, earnestly, "I +have not the most distant idea."</p> + +<p>"Why, Robert Hazlewood, to be sure!"</p> + +<p>"Robert Hazlewood! Oh, Angila! You are jesting," +exclaimed her friend, thrown quite off her +guard by astonishment.</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed!" replied Angila, with eager delight, +attributing Augusta's surprise and incredulous +tones to quite another source. "You may well be +surprised, Augusta. Is it not strange that such a +man—one of his superior talents—should have fallen +in love with such a mad-cap as me."</p> + +<p>Augusta could hardly believe her ears. But the +truth was, that Angila had so long since forgotten her +prejudice, founded on nothing, against Hazlewood,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span> +that she was not conscious now that she had ever +entertained any such feelings. She was not obliged, +in common phrase, to "eat her own words," for +she quite forgot that she had ever uttered them. And +now, with the utmost enthusiasm, she entered into +all her plans and prospects—told Augusta, with the +greatest interest, as if she thought the theme must be +equally delightful to her friend—all her mother's +long story about the old Hazlewoods, and what a +"charming nice family they were," ("those pattern +people that she hated so," as Augusta remembered, +but all of which was buried in the happiest oblivion +with Angila,) and the dear little house that was being +furnished like a bijou next to Mrs. Constant's, (next +to Mrs. Constant's!—one of those small houses with +low ceilings! Augusta gasped;) and how many servants +she was going to keep; and what a nice young +girl she had engaged already as waiter.</p> + +<p>"You mean, then, to have a woman waiter?" +Augusta could not help saying.</p> + +<p>"Oh, to be sure!" said Angila. "What should I +do with a man in such a pretty little establishment +as I mean to have. And then you know we must +be economical—Mr. Hazlewood is a young lawyer, +and I don't mean to let him slave himself to make +the two ends meet. You'll see what a nice economical +little housekeeper I'll be."</p> + +<p>And, in short, Augusta found that the same bright, +warm imagination that had made Angila once dream +of Ossian-heroes, now endowed Robert Hazlewood +with every charm she wanted, and even threw a +romantic glow over a small house, low ceilings, +small economies, and all but turned the woman-servant +into a man. Cinderella's godmother could +hardly have done more. Such is the power of +love!</p> + +<p>"Well," said Augusta, in talking it all over with +her brother, "I cannot comprehend it yet; Angila, +who used to be so fastidious, so critical, who expected +so much in the man she was to marry!"</p> + +<p>"She is not the first young lady who has come +down from her pedestal," replied her brother, +laughing.</p> + +<p>"No, but she has not," returned Augusta, "that's +the oddest part of the whole—she has only contrived +somehow to raise Hazlewood on a pedestal, too. +You'd think they were the only couple in the world +going to be married. She's actually in love with +him, desperately in love with him; and it was only +just before I went to New Orleans that she said—"</p> + +<p>"My dear," interrupted her mother, "there's no +subject on which women change their minds oftener +than on this. Love works wonders—indeed, the +only miracles left in the world are of his creation."</p> + +<p>"But she used to wonder at Mary Morton's liking +him, mamma."</p> + +<p>"Ah, my dear," replied her mother, "that was +when he was attentive to Mary Morton and not her. +It makes a wonderful difference when the thing +becomes personal. And if you really love Angila, +my dear, you will forget, or at least not repeat, what +she said six months before marriage."</p> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_NEW_ENGLAND_LEGEND" id="A_NEW_ENGLAND_LEGEND"></a>A NEW ENGLAND LEGEND</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY CAROLINE F. ORNE.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<h5>[The subject of the following ballad may be found in the "Christus +Super Aquas" of Mather's Magnalia.]</h5> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"God's blessing on the bonny barque!" the gallant seamen cried,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As with her snowy sails outspread she cleft the yielding tide—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"God's blessing on the bonny barque!" cried the landsmen from the shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As with a swallow's rapid flight she skimmed the waters o'er.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh never from the good old Bay, a fairer ship did sail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or in more trim and brave array did court the favoring gale.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cheerily sung the marinere as he climbed the high, high mast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mast that was made of the Norway pine, that scorned the mountain-blast.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But brave Mark Edward dashed a tear in secret from his eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As he saw green Trimount dimmer grow against the distant sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fast before the gathering breeze his noble vessel fly.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, youth will cherish many a hope, and many a fond desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And nurse in secret in the heart the hidden altar-fire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And though young Mark Edward trode his deck with footstep light and free,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet a shadow was on his manly brow as his good ship swept the sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A shadow was on his manly brow as he marked the fading shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the faint line of the far green hills where dwelt his loved Lenore.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Merrily sailed the bonny barque toward her destined port,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the white waves curled around her prow as if in wanton sport.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Merrily sailed the bonny barque till seven days came and past,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When her snowy canvas shivered and rent before the northern blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And out of her course, and away, away, careered she wild and fast.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Black lowered the heavens, loud howled the winds, as the gallant barque drove on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"God save her from the stormy seas," prayed the sailors every one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hither and thither the mad winds bore her, careening wildly on.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, a fearful thing is the mighty wind as it raves the land along,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span> +<span class="i0">And the forests rock beneath the shock of the fierce blasts and the strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when the wild and angry waves come rushing on their prey,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to and fro the good ship reels with the wind's savage play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! then it is more fearful far in that frail barque to be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At the mercy of the wind and wave, alone upon the sea.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mark Edward's eye grew stern and calm as day by day went on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And farther from the destined port the gallant barque was borne.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From her tall masts the sails were rent, yet fast and far she flew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But whither she drove there knew not one among her gallant crew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor the captain, nor the marineres, not one among them knew.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now there had come and past away full many weary days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And each looked in each other's face with sad and blank amaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For ghastly Famine's bony hand was stretched to clutch his prey,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still the adverse winds blew on as they would blow alway.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dark and fearful whispered words from man to man went past,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As of some dread and fatal deed which they must do at last.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And night and morn and noon they prayed, oh blessed voice of prayer!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That God would bring their trembling souls out of this great despair.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And every straining eye was bent out o'er the ocean-wave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But they saw no sail, there came no ship the storm-tost barque to save.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fatal die was cast at length; and tears filled every eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As forth a gentle stripling slept and gave himself to die.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They looked upon his pure white brow, and his face so fair to see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all with one accord cried out, "Oh, God! this must not be!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And brave Mark Edward calmly said, "Let the lot fall on me."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Not so," the generous youth exclaimed, "of little worth am I,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But 'twould strike the life from out us all were it thy lot to die."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Let us once more entreat the Lord; he yet our souls may spare,"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And kneeling down the gray-haired man sent up a fervent prayer.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh mighty is the voice of prayer! to him that asks is given,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as to Israel of old was manna sent from heaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So now their prayer was answered, for, leaping from the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A mighty fish fell in their midst, where they astonished be.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Now glory to the Father be, and to the Son be praise!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the deep He walketh, in the ocean are His ways,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis meet that we should worship Him who doeth right always."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then from all that noble crew a hymn of joy arose—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It flowed from grateful hearts as free as running water flows.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Day after day still passed away, gaunt Famine pressed again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each turned away from each, as if smit with a sudden pain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They feared to meet each other's eyes and read the secret there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And each his pangs in silence strove a little yet to bear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The eye grew dim with looking out upon the weary main,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wave rolling after wave was all that answered back again.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But night and morn and noon they prayed—oh blessed voice of prayer!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That God would bring their trembling souls out of this great despair.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Again the fatal die was cast; a man of powerful frame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Slowly and with reluctant step to the dread summons came.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Large drops of anguish on his brow—his lips were white with fear—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh 'tis a dreadful death to die! Is there no succor near?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They looked around on every side, but saw no sight of cheer.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"It is not for myself I dread," the sailor murmured low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"But for my wife and little babes, oh what a tale of wo!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"It shall not be," Mark Edward cried, "for their dear sakes go free.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I have no wife to mourn my fate, let the lot fall on me."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Not so, oh generous and brave!" the sailor grateful said,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"The lot is mine, but cheer thou her and them when I am dead."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And turning with a calmer front he bade the waiting crew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What not themselves but fate compelled, to haste and quickly do.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But who shall do the dismal work? The innocent life who take?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One after one each shrunk away, but no word any spake.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still hunger pressed them sore, and pangs too dreadful to be borne.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Be merciful, oh Father, hear! To thee again we turn."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then in their agony they strove, and wrestled long in prayer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till suddenly they heard a sound come from the upper air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sound of rushing wings, and lo! oh sight of joy! on high<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A great bird circles round the masts, and ever draws more nigh.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In lightning play of hope and fear one breathless moment passed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The next, the bird has lighted down and settled on the mast.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And soon within his grasp secure a seaman holds him fast.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Now glory be unto our God—and to His name be praise!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the deep he walketh, in the ocean are his ways,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From ghastly fear our suppliant souls he royally hath freed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sent us succor from the air in this our sorest need."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But day by day still passed away, and Famine fiercer pressed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still the adverse winds blew on and knew no change or rest.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet strove they in their agony to let no murmuring word<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Against the good and gracious Lord, from out their lips be heard.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But with their wildly gleaming eyes they gazed out o'er the main.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wave rolling after wave was all that answered back again.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the horizon's distant verge not even a speck was seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the cresting foam of breaking waves still shimmering between.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fiercer yet, as hour by hour went slowly creeping by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The famine wrung their tortured frames till it were bliss to die.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hopes of further aid grew faint, and it did seem that they<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Out on the waste of waters wide of Heaven forgotten lay.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But night and morn and noon they prayed—oh blessed voice of prayer!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That God would save their trembling souls out of this great despair.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span> +<span class="i0">Again the fatal die was cast, and 'mid a general gloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mark Edward calmly forward came to meet the appointed doom.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when they saw his noble port, and his manly bearing brave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each would have given up his life that bold young heart to save.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They would have wept, but their hot eyes refused the grateful tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet with sorrowful and suppliant looks they drew themselves more near.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mark Edward turned aside and spoke in accents calm and low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unto a man with silver hair, whose look was full of wo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bade him if the Lord should spare, and they should reach the shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bear a message from his lips to his beloved Lenore.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Tell her my thoughts were God's and hers," the brave young spirit cried,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Tell her not how it came to pass, say only that I died."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then with a brief and earnest prayer his soul to God he gave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beseeching that the sacrifice the lives of all might save.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each looked on each, but not a hand would strike the fatal blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was a death pang but to think what hand should lay him low.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sick at heart they turned away their misery to bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wrestled once again with God in agony of prayer.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As drops of blood wrung from the heart fell each imploring word,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, God of Heaven! and can it be such prayer is still unheard?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They strained once more each aching orb out o'er the gloomy main,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wave rolling after wave was all that answered back again.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They waited yet—they lingered yet—they searched the horizon round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No sight of land, no blessed sail, no living thing was found.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They lingered yet—hope faded fast from out the hearts of all.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They waited yet—till black Despair sunk o'er them like a pall.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They turned to where Mark Edward stood with his unblenching brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or he must die their lives to save, or all must perish now.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They lingered yet—they waited yet—a sudden shriek rung out—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"A sail! A sail! Oh, blessed Lord!" burst forth one joyful shout.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">New strength those famished men received; fervent their thanks, but brief—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They man their boat, they reach the ship, they ask a swift relief.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strange faces meet their view, they hear strange words in tongues unknown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And evil eyes with threatening gaze are sternly looking down.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They pause—for a new terror bids their hearts' warm current freeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For they have met a pirate ship, the scourge of all the seas.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But up and out Mark Edward spake, and in the pirates' tongue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when the pirate captain heard, quick to his side he sprung,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And vowed by all the saints of France—the living and the dead—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There should not even a hair be harmed upon a single head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For once, when in a dismal strait, Mark Edward gave him aid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now the debt long treasured up should amply be repaid.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gave them water from his casks, and bread, and all things store,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And showed them how to lay their course to reach the destined shore.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the blessing of those famished men went with him evermore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Again the favoring gale arose, the barque went bounding on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And speedily her destined port was now in safety won.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And after, when green Trimount's hills greet their expectant eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">New thanks to Heaven, new hymns of joy unto the Lord arise.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For glory be unto our Lord, and to His name be praise!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the deep he walketh, in the ocean are his ways.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis meet that we should worship him who doeth right always.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SONG_OF_SLEEP" id="SONG_OF_SLEEP"></a>SONG OF SLEEP.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY G. G. FOSTER.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh the dreamy world of sleep for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With its visions pure and bright,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its fairy throngs in revelry,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Under the pale moonlight!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep, sleep, I wait for thy spell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For my eyes are heavy with watching well<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the starry night, and the world of dreams<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ever in sleep on my spirit beams.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The day, the day, I cannot 'bide,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">'Tis dull and dusty and drear—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, owl-like, away from the sun I hide,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That in dreams I may wander freer.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep, sleep, come to my eyes—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Welcome as blue to the midnight skies—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Faithful as dew to drooping flowers—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I only live in thy dreamy bowers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun is purpling down the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Day's death-robes glitter fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And weary men, agasp for rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For the solemn night prepare.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep, sleep, hasten to me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The shadows lengthen across the lea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The birds are weary, and so am I;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tired world and dying day good-bye!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_CRUISE_OF_THE_RAKER" id="THE_CRUISE_OF_THE_RAKER"></a>THE CRUISE OF THE RAKER.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span> + +<h3>A TALE OF THE WAR OF 1812-15.</h3> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY HENRY A. CLARK.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<h5>(<i>Continued from page</i> 74.)</h5> +<br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER III.</h3> + +<h4><i>The Chase and the Capture.</i></h4> + + +<p>On the deck of the pirate craft stood a young man +of powerful frame, and singularly savage features, +rendered more repulsive by the disposition of the hair +which was allowed to grow almost over the entire +mouth, and hung from the chin in heavy masses +nearly to the waist. With his elbow resting against +the fore-mast of the vessel, he was gazing through a +spy-glass upon the brig he had been so long pursuing. +A burly negro stood at the helm, holding the tiller, +and steering the brig with an ease which denoted his +vast strength, scarcely moving his body, but meeting +the long waves, which washed over the side of the +vessel, and rushed in torrents through the hawse-holes, +merely by the power of his arm.</p> + +<p>"Keep her more in the wind," shouted the commander, +with an oath, to the helmsman.</p> + +<p>"Ay, ay sir," responded the negro gruffly.</p> + +<p>"Don't let me hear a sail flap again or I'll score +your back for you, you son of a sea-cook."</p> + +<p>With this pleasant admonition the young man resumed +his night-glass.</p> + +<p>The captain of the pirate brig was an Englishman +by birth; his history was little known even to his +own crew, but it was remarkable that though always +savage and blood-thirsty, he was peculiarly so to his +own countrymen, evincing a hatred and malignancy +toward every thing connected with his native land, +that seemed more than fiendish—never smiling but +when his sword was red with the blood of his countrymen, +and his foot planted upon her conquered +banner. It was evident that some deep wrong had +driven him forth to become an outcast and a fiend. +A close inspection of his features developed the outlines +of a noble countenance yet remaining, though +marred and deformed by years of passion and of +crime. His crew, which numbered nearly fifty, were +gathered from almost every nation of the civilized +world, yet were all completely under his command. +They were now scattered over the vessel in various +lounging attitudes, apparently careless of every thing +beyond the ease of the passing moment, leaving the +management of the brig to the two or three hands +necessary to control the graceful and obedient craft.</p> + +<p>For long hours the captain of the pirate brig stood +following the motions of the flying merchantman; he +thought not of sleep or of refreshment, it was enough +for him that he was in pursuit of an English vessel, +that his revenge was again to be gratified with English +blood.</p> + +<p>He was roused by a light touch of the arm—he +turned impatiently.</p> + +<p>"Why, Florette."</p> + +<p>A beautiful girl stood beside him, gazing into his +face half with fear and half with love. Her dress +was partly that of a girl and partly of a boy; over a +pair of white loose sailor's trowsers a short gown +was thrown, fastened with a blue zone, and her long +hair fell in thick, luxuriant masses from beneath a +gracefully shaped little straw hat—altogether she +was as lovely in feature and form as Venus herself, +with an eye blue as the ocean, and a voice soft and +sweet as the southern breeze.</p> + +<p>"Dear William, will you not go below and take +some rest?"</p> + +<p>"I want none, girl; I shall not sleep till every +man on yonder vessel has gone to rest in the caves +of ocean."</p> + +<p>"But you will eat?"</p> + +<p>"Pshaw! Florette, leave me; your place is below."</p> + +<p>The girl said no more, but slowly glided to the +companion-way and disappeared into the little cabin.</p> + +<p>The long night at length wore away, and as the +clear light of morning shone upon the waters the +merchant vessel was no longer visible from the deck +of the pirate.</p> + +<p>"A thousand devils! has he escaped me. Ho! +the one of you with the sharpest eyes up to the mast-head. +Stay, I will go myself."</p> + +<p>Thus speaking, the captain mounted the main-mast +and gazed long and anxiously; he could see nothing +of the vessel. He mounted still higher, climbing the +slender top-mast till with his hand resting upon the +main-truck he once more looked over the horizon. +Thus far his gaze had been directed to windward, in +the course where the vanished brig had last been +seen. At length he turned to leeward, and far in the +distant horizon his eagle eye caught faint sight of a +sail, like the white and glancing wing of a bird. +With wonderful rapidity he slid to the deck, and +gave orders to set the brig before the wind. The +beautiful little bark fell off gracefully, and in a moment +was swiftly retracing the waters it had beaten +over during the night.</p> + +<p>"The revenge will be no less sweet that it is deferred," +exclaimed the pirate captain, as he threw +himself upon the companion-way. "Thirty English<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span> +vessels have I sunk in the deep, and I am not yet +satisfied—no, no, curses on her name, curses on her +laws, they have driven me forth from a lordly heritage +and an ancient name to die an outcast and a +pirate."</p> + +<p>Pulling his hat over his dark brow, he sat long in +deep thought, and not one in all his savage crew but +would have preferred to board a vessel of twice +their size than to rouse his commander from his +thoughtful mood.</p> + +<p>Captain Horton for some hours after it had become +dark the preceding night, had kept his vessel on the +same course, perplexing his mind with some scheme +by which he might deceive the pirate. At length he +gave orders to lower away the yawl boat, and fit a +mast to it, which was speedily done. When all was +ready, he hung a lantern to the mast, with a light that +would burn but a short time, and then putting out his +own ship-light, he fastened the tiller of the yawl and +set it adrift, knowing that it would keep its course +until some sudden gust of wind should overcome its +steerage way. As soon as he had accomplished this, +he fell off before the wind, and setting his brig on +the opposite tack, as soon as he had got to a good +distance from the light of the yawl, took in all sail +till not a rag was left standing. He kept his brig in +this position until he had the satisfaction of seeing +the pirate brig pass to windward in pursuit of his +boat, whose light he knew would go out before the +pirate could overtake it. When the light of the +chase had become faint in the distance, he immediately +crowded on all sail, and stood off boldly on +his original course.</p> + +<p>None of his crew had gone below to turn in, for +all were too anxious to sleep, and his passengers still +stood beside him upon the quarter-deck; John with +a large bundle under his arm, which, in answer to +an inquiry from the merchant, he said was merely a +change of dress.</p> + +<p>"I think we have given them the slip this time, +Mr. Williams," said Captain Horton.</p> + +<p>"I hope so, captain."</p> + +<p>"You can sleep now without danger of being disturbed +by unwelcome visiters, Miss Julia."</p> + +<p>"Well, captain, I am as glad as my father you +have escaped. I wish we had got near enough to +see how they looked though."</p> + +<p>"We ought rather, my dear girl, to thank God that +they came no nearer than they did," said her father +half reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"True, father, true," and bidding Captain Horton +good-night, they retired to the cabin.</p> + +<p>"You did fool them nice, didn't you, captin?" +said John.</p> + +<p>"Yes, John, it was tolerably well done, I think +myself," replied the captain, who, like all of mankind, +was more or less vain, and prided himself peculiarly +upon his skill in his own avocation.</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't ha' been much afraid on 'em myself +if they had caught us," said John.</p> + +<p>"You wouldn't, ah!"</p> + +<p>"No! I should ha' hated to see all the crew walk +on the plank as they call it, specially Dick Halyard, +but I thinks I should ha' come it over 'em +myself."</p> + +<p>"Well, John, I hope you'll never have such occasion +to try your powers of deceit, for I fear you +would find yourself wofully mistaken."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps not, captin, but I'm confounded sleepy, +now we've got away from the bloody pirates, so +I'll just lie down here, captin; I haint learned to +sleep in a hammock yet. I wish you'd let me have +a berth, captin, I hate lying in a circle, it cramps a +fellow plaguily."</p> + +<p>John talked himself to sleep upon the companion-way, +where the good-natured master of the brig +allowed him to remain unmolested, and soon after +yielding the helm to one of the mates, himself +"turned in."</p> + +<p>As the morning broke over the sea clear and cloudless, +while not a sail was visible in any quarter of the +horizon, the revulsion of feeling occasioned by the +transition from despair to confidence, and indeed entire +assurance of safety, was plainly depicted in the +joyous countenances of all on the Betsy Allen. The +worthy captain made no endeavor to check the boisterous +merriment of his crew, but lighting his pipe, +seated himself upon the companion-way, with a +complacent smile expanding his sun-browned features, +which developed itself into a self-satisfied and +happy laugh as Mr. Williams appeared at the cabin-door, +leading up his daughter to enjoy the pure morning +air, fresh from the clear sky and the bounding +waters.</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha! Mr. Williams, told you so, not a sail in +sight, and a fine breeze."</p> + +<p>"Our thanks are due to you, Captain Horton, for +the skillful manner in which you eluded the pirate +ship."</p> + +<p>"Oh! I was as glad to get out of sight of the rascal +as you could have been, my dear sir, I assure you; +now that we are clear of him, I ain't afraid to tell +Miss Julia that if he had overhauled us we should +have all gone to Davy Jones' locker, and the Betsy +Allen would by this time have been burnt to the +water's edge."</p> + +<p>"I was not ignorant of the danger at any time, +Captain Horton."</p> + +<p>"Well, you are a brave girl, and deserve to be a +sailor's wife, but I'm married myself."</p> + +<p>"That is unfortunate, captain," said Julia, with a +merry laugh, so musical in its intonations that the +rough sailors who heard its sweet cadence could not +resist the contagion, and a bright smile lit up each +weather-beaten countenance within the sound of the +merry music.</p> + +<p>"Well, I think so myself, though I wouldn't like +Mrs. Horton to hear me say it, or I should have a +rougher breeze to encounter than I ever met round +Cape Horn—ha! ha! ha! You must excuse me, Miss +Julia, but I feel in fine spirits this morning, not a sail +in sight."</p> + +<p>"Sail ho!" shouted the look-out from the main +cross-trees.</p> + +<p>"Ah!—where away?"</p> + +<p>"Right astern."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Can it be that they have got in our wake again. +I'll mount to the mast-head and see myself."</p> + +<p>Seizing the glass the captain ascended to the cross-trees, +where he remained for a long time, watching +the distant sail. At length he returned to the deck.</p> + +<p>"They've got our bearings again somehow, confound +the cunning rascals; and, by the way they +are overhauling us, I judge they can beat us as well +afore the wind as on a tack."</p> + +<p>"Well, Captain Horton, we must be resigned to +our fate then. It matters not so much for me, but +it is hard, my daughter, that you should be torn from +your peaceful home in England to fall a prey to these +fiends."</p> + +<p>"They are a long way from us yet, father; let us +hope something may happen for our relief, and not +give up till we are taken."</p> + +<p>"That's the right feeling, Miss Julia," said the +captain. "I will do all I can to prolong the chase, +and we will trust in God for the result."</p> + +<p>Every device which skillful seamanship could +practice was put in immediate operation to increase +the speed of the brig. There was but a solitary hope +remaining, that they might fall in with some national +vessel able to protect them from the pirate. The +sails were frequently wet, the halyards drawn taut, +and the captain himself took the helm. When all this +was done, each sailor stood gazing upon the pirate +as if to calculate the speed of his approach by the +lifting of his sails above the water. The greater +part of his top-sails were already in sight, and soon +the heads of her courses appeared above the wave, +seeming to sweep up like the long, white wings of a +lazy bird, whose flight clung to the breast of the sea, +as if seeking a resting-place.</p> + +<p>By the middle of the day the pirate was within +three miles of the merchantman, and had already +opened upon her with his long gun. Captain Horton +pressed onward without noticing the balls, which as +yet had not injured hull or sail. But as the chase +approached nearer and nearer, the shots began to +take effect—a heavy ball made a huge rent in the +mizzen-topsail—another dashed in the galley, and +a third tore up the companion-way, and still another +cut down the fore-topmast, and materially decreased +the speed of the vessel.</p> + +<p>Noticing this the pirate ceased his fire, and soon +drew up within hail of the merchantman.</p> + +<p>"Ship ahoy—what ship?"</p> + +<p>"The Betsy Allen, London."</p> + +<p>"Lay-by till I send a boat aboard."</p> + +<p>Captain Horton gave orders to his crew to wait the +word of command before they altered the vessel's +course, and then seizing the trumpet, hailed the +pirate.</p> + +<p>"What ship's that?"</p> + +<p>"The brig Death—don't you see the flag?"</p> + +<p>"I know the character of your ship, doubtless."</p> + +<p>"Well, lay-by, or we'll bring you to with a +broadside."</p> + +<p>Perceiving the inutility of further effort, Captain +Horton brought-to, and hauled down his flag.</p> + +<p>In a short time the jolly-boat of the pirate was +lowered from the stern, and the commander jumped +in, followed by a dozen of his crew.</p> + +<p>The vigorous arms of the oarsmen soon brought +the boat to the merchantman, and the pirate stood +upon the deck of the captured vessel.</p> + +<p>"Well, sir, you have given us some trouble to +overhaul you," said he, in a manner rather gentlemanly +than savage.</p> + +<p>"We should have been fools if we had not tried +our best to escape."</p> + +<p>"True, true—will you inform me how you eluded +our pursuit last night. I ask merely from motives of +curiosity?"</p> + +<p>Captain Horton briefly related the deception of the +boat.</p> + +<p>"Ah! ha! very well done. Here Diego," said he +to one of the sailors who had followed him, "go +below and bring up the passengers."</p> + +<p>The swarthy rascal disappeared with a malignant +grin through the cabin-door, and speedily escorted +Mr. Williams to the deck, followed by Julia, and, to +the surprise of Captain Horton and his crew, another +female.</p> + +<p>"Now, captain," said the pirate, with a fiendish +smile, "I shall proceed to convey your merchandize +to my brig, including these two ladies, though, by +my faith, we shall have little use for one of them. +After which I will leave you in quiet."</p> + +<p>"I could expect no better terms," said Captain +Horton, resignedly.</p> + +<p>"O, you will soon be relieved from my presence."</p> + +<p>Julia clung to her father, but was torn from his +grasp, and the good old man was pushed back by the +laughing fiends, as he attempted to follow her to the +boat. The father and daughter parted with a look of +strong anguish, relieved in the countenance of Julia +by a deep expression of firmness and resolution.</p> + +<p>John was also seized by the pirates, but he had +overheard the words of their captain that they would +soon be left in quiet, and had already commenced +throwing off his woman's dress.</p> + +<p>"Hillo! is the old girl going to strip? Bear a hand +here, Mike," shouted Diego, to one of his comrades, +"just make fast those tow-lines, and haul up her +rigging."</p> + +<p>Mr. Williams, who immediately conceived the +possible advantage it might be to Julia to have even +so inefficient a protector with her as John, addressed +him in a stern tone.</p> + +<p>"What, will you desert your mistress?"</p> + +<p>John stood in doubt, but he was a kind-hearted +fellow, and loved Julia better than he did any thing +else in the world except himself; and without further +resistance or explanation, allowed himself to be +conveyed to the boat, though the big tears rolled +down his cheeks, and nothing even then would have +prevented his avowing his original sex, but a strong +feeling of shame at the thought of leaving Julia.</p> + +<p>For hours the pirate's jolly-boat passed backward and +forward between the two brigs; the sea had become +too rough to allow the vessels to be fastened together +without injury to the light frame of the pirate bark; +and night had already set in before all the cargo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span> +which the pirates desired had been removed from the +merchantman; but it was at length accomplished, +and once more the pirates stood upon the deck of +their own brig.</p> + +<p>In a few words their captain explained his plan of +destruction to his crew, which was willingly assented +to, as it was sufficiently cruel and vindictive. Three +loud cheers burst from their lips, startling the crew +of the Betsey Allen with its wild cadence, and in another +moment the pirate-captain leaped into his boat, +and followed by a number of his crew, returned to +the merchantman.</p> + +<p>Still preserving his suavity of manner, he addressed +Captain Horton as he stepped upon the deck, after +first ordering the crew to the bows, and drawing up +his own men with pointed muskets before the companion-way.</p> + +<p>"Captain Horton, as you are, perhaps, aware it is +our policy to act upon the old saying that 'dead +men tell no tales,' and after consultation among ourselves, +we have concluded to set your vessel on fire, +and then depart in peace, leaving you to the quiet I +promised you."</p> + +<p>"Blood-thirsty villain!" shouted the captain of the +merchantman, and suddenly drawing a pistol, he +discharged it full at the pirate's breast. The latter +was badly wounded, but falling back against the +main-mast, was able to order his men to pursue their +original design before he fell fainting in the arms of +one of his men, who immediately conveyed him +to the boat.</p> + +<p>The savages proceeded then to fire the vessel in +several different places, meeting with no resistance +from the crew, as a dozen muskets pointed at their +heads admonished them that immediate death would +be the consequence.</p> + +<p>As soon as the subtle element had so far progressed +in its work of destruction that the hand of man could +not stay it, the pirates jumped into their boat, and +with a fiendish yell, pulled off for their own vessel.</p> + +<p>For a very short time the crew of the merchantman +stood watching the flame and smoke which was +fast encircling them, then rousing their native energies, +and perceiving the utter impossibility of conquering +the fire, they turned their attention to the +only resource left—the construction of some sort of +a raft that would sustain their united weight.</p> + +<p>The progress of the flames, however, was so rapid, +that though a score of busy hands were employed +with axes and hatchets, the most that could be done +was to hurl overboard a few spars and boards, cut +away the bowsprit and part of the bulwarks, before +the exceeding heat compelled them to leave the brig.</p> + +<p>Mr. Williams, who had remained in a state of +stupor since the loss of his daughter, was borne to the +ship's side, and hurriedly fastened to a spar; and then +all the crew boldly sprung into the water, and +pushing the fragments of boards and spars from the +burning brig, as soon as they attained a safe distance, +commenced the construction of their raft in the +water. This was an exceedingly difficult undertaking; +but they were working with the energies of +despair, and board after board was made fast by means +of the rope they had thrown over with themselves; +and in the light of their burning vessel they managed +at length to build a raft sufficiently strong to bear +their weight.</p> + +<p>Then seating themselves upon it, they almost gave +way to despair; they had lost the excitement of +occupation, and now, in moody silence, watched +the mounting flames. They were without food, and +the sea ran high; their condition did, indeed, seem +hopeless—and their only refuge, death.</p> +<br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER IV.</h3> + +<h4><i>The Escape.</i></h4> + +<p>The fire had made swift work during the time the +unfortunate crew were occupied in building the +raft, and the little brig was now almost enveloped in +smoke and flame. A burst of fire from her main +hatchway threw a red glare over the turbulent waters, +and showed the vessel's masts and rigging brightly displayed +against the dark sky above and beyond them. +The main-sail by this time caught fire, and was +blazing away along the yard fiercely; and the flame +soon reached the loftier sails and running rigging; +the fire below was raging between decks, and rising +in successive bursts of flame from the hatchways. +The vessel had been filled with combustible material, +and the doomed brig, in a short space of time, was +one mass of flame.</p> + +<p>To a spectator beholding the sight in safety, +it would have been a magnificent spectacle—the +grandest, the most terrific, perhaps, it is possible to +conceive—a ship on fire at night in the mid-ocean. +The hull of the vessel lay flaming like an immense +furnace on the surface of the deep; her masts, and +the lower and topsail-yards, with fragments of the +rigging hanging round them, sparkling, and scattering +the fire-flakes, rose high above it, while huge volumes +of smoke ever and anon obscured the whole, then +borne away by the strong breeze, left the burning +brig doubly distinct, placed in strong relief against +the dark vault of heaven behind. The lofty spars, as +their fastenings were burnt through, fell, one by one, +into the hissing water, and at length the tall masts, +no longer supported by the rigging, and nearly burnt +into below the deck, fell over, one after the other, +into the deep.</p> + +<p>Suddenly Captain Horton started to his feet,</p> + +<p>"It is, it is a sail—look, do you now see it coming +up in the light of the brig?"</p> + +<p>"It is so, captain," responded his men one after +the other.</p> + +<p>"Thank God we shall yet be saved! If the pirate +had scuttled the ship we should have had no chance; +but his cruel course has saved us, for the flame has +attracted some vessel to our succor."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps the pirate returning," remarked Mr. +Williams.</p> + +<p>"No, that kept on before the wind, and this is +coming up. God grant it be an English vessel, and +a swift one, and we may yet save your daughter!"</p> + +<p>This remark struck a chord of hope in the heart +of Mr. Williams, and roused him to his native manliness.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But," said he, "our own vessel has drifted far +from us, and we shall not be seen by this one."</p> + +<p>"I think they will come within hail; they will at +least sail round the burning vessel, in the hopes of +picking up somebody. Come, my men, let's make +some kind of sail of our jackets, a half a mile nearer +the ship may save us all our lives."</p> + +<p>With a cheer as merry as ever broke from their +lips when on board ship, the reanimated sailors went +to work, and soon reared a small sail made of their +clothing, which caught enough wind to move them +slowly onward.</p> + +<p>"Steer in the wake of our own vessel, my men, +and the strange sail will come right on to us—get +between them."</p> + +<p>"Ay, ay, sir!"</p> + +<p>As the approaching vessel drew nearer, the crew +of the Betsy Allen sent up a cheer from their united +voices which, to their great joy, was answered from +the strange sail.</p> + +<p>"Ahoy, where away?"</p> + +<p>"Three points on your weather bow—starboard +your helm, and you'll be on us."</p> + +<p>"Ay, ay."</p> + +<p>In a very short time the shipwrecked crew stood +on the deck of the privateer Raker, which, attracted +by the light of their burning brig, had varied somewhat +from its course, to render assistance if any were +needed. Captain Greene and his men soon became +acquainted with the history of the crew of the lost +brig, and every attention was shown to them.</p> + +<p>Captain Horton gave them a brief account of the +pirate's assault, and the abduction of Julia.</p> + +<p>"O Captain Greene, save my child, if possible. +She is my only one," exclaimed Mr. Williams.</p> + +<p>"Which way did she steer, Captain Horton?"</p> + +<p>"She went off right before the wind, sir, and is +not three hours ahead of us."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Williams I will immediately give chase, and +God grant that I may overtake the scoundrels."</p> + +<p>"A father's thanks shall be yours, sir."</p> + +<p>"Never mind that—you had all better turn in; I +will steer the same course with the pirate till morning, +sir; and if he is then in sight, I think he is ours—for +there are few things afloat that can outsail +the Raker."</p> + +<p>The crew of the Betsy Allen, whose anxiety and +exertions during the last few hours had been excessive, +gladly accepted the captain's offer, and were +soon snoring in their hammocks. Captain Horton +and Mr. Williams remained on the deck of the +Raker, the one too anxious for revenge upon the +pirate who had destroyed his brig, to sleep, and the +other too much afflicted by the loss of his daughter, +and the painful thoughts which it engendered, to +think of any thing but her speedy recovery.</p> + +<p>The long night at length wore away, and with the +first beams of the morning sun the mists rolled +heavily upward from the ocean. To the great joy +of all on board the Raker, the pirate-brig was in +sight, though beyond the reach of shot from the +privateer.</p> + +<p>Although the captain of the Raker had sufficient +confidence in the superior speed of his own vessel, +yet to avoid the possibility of being deceived, he +decided to pretend flight, well assured that the pirate +would give chase. He accordingly bore off, as if +anxious to avoid speaking him, and displaying every +sign of fear, had the satisfaction of perceiving the +pirate change his course, and set all sail in pursuit.</p> + +<p>In order to test the relative speed of the two +vessels he did not at first slacken his own sail, but +put his brig to its swiftest pace. He had reason to +congratulate himself upon the wisdom of his manœuvre +when he perceived that in spite of every +exertion the chase gained upon him, and it was evident +that unless he was crippled by a shot, he might +yet escape.</p> + +<p>As the pirate bore down upon his brig, Captain +Greene perceived, by aid of his glass, that the number +of the crew on board was considerably superior +to his own, even with the addition of the crew of the +Betsy Allen. In consideration of this fact, he determined +to fight her at a distance with his long gun. +This he still kept concealed amidships, under the +canvas, desiring to impress fully upon his opponent +the idea of his inferiority.</p> + +<p>Leaving the vessels thus situated, let us visit the +pirate again.</p> + +<p>Julia, and John in his disguise, were conveyed to +his deck, where they were speedily separated. Julia +was conducted below, where, to her surprise and +joy, she found a companion of her own sex, in the +person of Florette.</p> + +<p>The wounded commander of the pirate was also +conveyed to his berth, where Florette, with much +grief, attended to nurse him. It was in her first +passionate burst of sorrow that Julia discovered her +love for the pirate, from which circumstance she +also derived consolation and relief; and having +already, with the natural firmness of her mind, +shaken off the deep despondency which had settled +upon it when first torn from her father, she began to +resolve upon the course of action she would pursue, +in every probable event which might befall her.</p> + +<p>During the long night the pirate lay groaning and +helpless; but such was the strength of his will, and +the all absorbing nature of his hatred, that when informed +on the succeeding morning that a vessel was +in sight, he aroused his physical powers sufficiently +to reach the deck, where, seating himself on the +companion-way, he watched the strange sail with +an interest so intense, that he almost forgot his painful +wounds.</p> + +<p>He had hardly taken his position before the captain +of the Raker uncovered and ran out his long gun, +and to the surprise of all on board the pirate, a huge +shot, evidently sent from a gun much larger than +they had supposed their antagonist to possess, came +crashing through their main-sail.</p> + +<p>Too late the pirates perceived the error into which +they had fallen; and were aware of the immense +advantage which the long gun gave their opponent, +enabling him, in fact, to maintain his own position +beyond the reach of their fire, and at the same time +cut every mast and spar on board the pirate-brig to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span> +pieces, unless, indeed, the latter might be fortunate +enough, by superior sailing, to get beyond the reach +of shot without suffering material injury.</p> + +<p>Perceiving this to be his only resource, orders +were given on board the pirate again to 'bout ship, +and instead of pursuing to be themselves in turn +fugitives. But they were not destined to escape +without injury. Another shot from the Raker bore +away their foretop-sail, and sensibly checked their +speed. To remedy this misfortune, studding-sails +were set below and aloft, and for a long time the +chase was continued without the shot from the Raker +taking serious effect on the pirate; and, indeed, the +latter in a considerable degree increased the distance +between the two vessels. But while the captain +and crew of the Raker were confident of eventually +overtaking their antagonist, the men in the pirate-brig +had already become convinced that in such a +harassing and one-sided mode of warfare, they stood +no chance whatever, and demanded of their captain +that he should make the attempt to close with the +Raker and board. This he sternly refused, and +pointed out to his men the folly of such a course, as +upon a nearer approach to the privateer, his rigging +and masts must necessarily suffer in such a manner +as to place his brig entirely at the command of the +Raker. His men admitted the truth of his reasoning, +but at the same time evinced so much dissatisfaction +at their present vexatious situation, that their +captain plainly perceived it was necessary to pursue +some course of action to appease their turbulent +spirits.</p> + +<p>With a clouded brow he returned to his cabin +with the assistance of Florette, who had watched +with a woman's love to take advantage of every +opportunity to aid him.</p> + +<p>Reaching the cabin, his eyes fell upon the form of +Julia, eagerly bending from the little window as she +watched the pursuing brig, fervently praying that its +chase might be successful.</p> + +<p>As she turned her eyes in-doors at the noise made +by the entrance of the pirate, his keen glance noticed +the light of hope which shone in her beautiful eyes, +which she strove not and cared not to conceal.</p> + +<p>"My fair captive," said he, with a sneering smile, +"do you see hope of escape in yonder approaching +vessel?"</p> + +<p>"My hope is in God," was the calm reply of the +lovely girl.</p> + +<p>"That trust will fail you now, sweet lady."</p> + +<p>"I believe it not; when has He deserted those +whose trust was in him?"</p> + +<p>"So have you been taught, doubtless, so you may +yet believe; but you have still to learn that if there +is such a being, he meddles not with the common +purposes of man. It is his government to punish, +not prevent; and man here on earth pursues his own +course, be it dark or bright—and God's hand is not +interposed to stay the natural and inevitable workings +of cause and effect. No, no! here, on this, my own +good ship, <i>I</i> rule; and there is no hand, human or +divine, that will interpose between my determination +and the execution of my purpose."</p> + +<p>"Impious man! you may yet learn to fear the +power you now despise."</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha! ha!—do I look like a man to be frightened +by the words of a weak girl, or by the name of +a mysterious being, whose agency I have never seen +in the workings of earthly affairs."</p> + +<p>"I have no mercy to expect from one who has +consigned a whole ship's crew, without remorse, to +a cruel death."</p> + +<p>"Well, were they not Englishmen? I have not +for years, lady, spared an Englishman in my deep +hatred, or an Englishwoman in my lust!"</p> + +<p>"Yet are they not your own countrymen?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Unnatural monster!"</p> + +<p>The pirate smiled. "I could relate a history of +wrong that would justify me even in your eyes. If +I have proved a viper to my native land, it is because +her heel has crushed me—but the tale cannot be told +now. If yonder vessel overtake us, and escape become +impossible, my own hand will apply the +match that shall blow up my brig, and all it contains. +Before that time you will be a dishonored woman, to +whom death were a relief. Nothing but this wound +has preserved you thus long. With this assurance I +leave you."</p> + +<p>The pirate returned to the deck, where, notwithstanding +the pain of his injuries, he continued to take +command of the brig.</p> + +<p>He had hardly vanished from the cabin before +Florette stood by the side of Julia.</p> + +<p>"Lady," said she, "I overheard your conversation +with the captain of this brig, and I pity you most +truly."</p> + +<p>"Pity will little avail," replied Julia.</p> + +<p>"That is true, yet I would aid you if possible."</p> + +<p>"And you—do not you, too, desire to escape from +this savage?"</p> + +<p>"Alas! lady, I have learned to love him."</p> + +<p>"<i>Love</i> him!"</p> + +<p>"I have now been on this brig more than three +years. I was taken from a French merchant vessel +in which I was proceeding to French Guinea, to live +with a relative there, having lost all my immediate +kindred in France. While crossing the Bay of +Biscay, a heavy storm drove us out to sea, and while +endeavoring to return in shore, we fell in with this +vessel—all on board were murdered but myself, so I +have been told. I was borne to this cabin, which +has since been my home. I was treated with much +respect by the captain, and being all alone, I don't +know why it was, I forgot all his crimes, and at +length became his willing mistress. You turn from +me in disgust, and in pity—yet so it is. And now, +lady, if you are bold enough to risk your life, you +may escape."</p> + +<p>"I would gladly give my life to save my honor."</p> + +<p>Florette gazed with a melancholy smile upon her +companion; perhaps thoughts of her own former +purity came over her mind.</p> + +<p>"It is a bold plan," said she, "but it is on that +account that I am more confident of success, as all +chance of escape will be deemed hopeless."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span></p> + +<p>"What is your plan?"</p> + +<p>"Night is now approaching, and it is probable the +pursuing brig will not gain on us before dark. I +have noticed that the ship's boat hangs at the stern, +only fastened by the painter. If you have courage +enough to descend to the boat by the painter, I will +cut it, and you will then be directly in the course of +the pursuing brig, and will be easily picked up."</p> + +<p>"But how can I get to the vessel's deck without +being seen?"</p> + +<p>"I have thought of that; we will wait till dark, +when you shall put on a similar dress with mine, +and then you can go to any part of the vessel you +choose without being suspected. You must watch +your time to steal unobserved behind the man at the +helm, and drop yourself into the boat; I will soon +after appear on deck, and if you are successful in +escaping observation, I shall be able then to cut the +painter without difficulty, as the darkness will conceal +my movements. Do you understand the plan?"</p> + +<p>"I do."</p> + +<p>"And you are not afraid to put it into execution?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, no! and I thank you for your kind aid."</p> + +<p>"I am not wholly disinterested, lady; you are +beautiful, and may steal away the captain's heart +from me."</p> + +<p>Julia shuddered.</p> + +<p>"Be ready," continued Florette, "and as soon as +possible after it becomes dark we will make the +attempt."</p> + +<p>It was as Florette had called it, a bold plan, but not +impracticable, as any one acquainted with the position +of things will at once acknowledge. Only one +man would be at the tiller, and he might or might not +notice the passing of any other person behind him. +This passage once accomplished, it would be an easy +undertaking to slide down the strong painter, or rope +which made fast the boat to the stern of the brig. It +was a plan in which the chances were decidedly in +favor of the success of the attempt.</p> + +<p>The Raker had for some time ceased firing, and +set studding-sails in hopes of gaining on the pirate; +but the most the privateer was able to do, was to still +preserve the relative positions of the two vessels.</p> + +<p>The sun sunk beneath the waters, leaving a cloudless +sky shedding such a light from its starry orbs, +that if the pirate had hoped to escape under cover +of the night, he speedily saw the impossibility of +such an attempt eluding the watch from the privateer.</p> + +<p>The captain of the pirate still kept his position +upon the companion-way, with his head bent upon +his breast, either buried in thought, or yielding to the +weakness of his physical powers, occasioned by the +loss of blood from his wound.</p> + +<p>Florette, who was continually passing up and +down through the cabin-door, carefully noted the +state of things upon the quarter-deck, and perceiving +every thing to be as favorable as could be expected, +soon had Julia in readiness for her share in the +undertaking.</p> + +<p>"But first," said she, "let me put out the light in +the binnacle."</p> + +<p>The girl stood for a moment in deep thought, when +her ready wit suggested a way to accomplish this +feat, sufficiently simple to avoid suspicion. Seizing +the broad palmetto hat of the pirate, and bidding +Julia to be in readiness to profit by the moment of +darkness which would ensue, she returned to the +deck, and approaching the pirate, exclaimed,</p> + +<p>"William, I have brought you your hat."</p> + +<p>At the moment of presenting it to him, as it passed +the binnacle-light, she gave it a swift motion, which +at once extinguished the flame.</p> + +<p>"Curses on the girl!" muttered the man at the +helm.</p> + +<p>"O, I was careless, Diego; I will bring the lantern +in a moment;" and laying down the hat on the companion-way +beside the pirate, who paid no attention +to the movements around him, she glided back to the +cabin.</p> + +<p>"Here, lady," said she, "be quick—hand this +lantern to the man at the helm, and then drop silently +behind him while he is lighting it. I will immediately +follow and take your place beside him. You +understand me?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, clearly."</p> + +<p>"Well, as soon as I begin to speak with him, let +yourself down into the boat by the painter, which I +will soon cut apart, and then you will at least be out +of the hands of your enemies."</p> + +<p>Julia took the hand of Florette in her own, and +warmly thanked her, but the girl impatiently checked +her.</p> + +<p>"Take this pistol with you also."</p> + +<p>"But why?" inquired Julia, with a woman's instinctive +dread of such weapons.</p> + +<p>"O, I don't mean you should shoot any body, but +if the boat drifts a little out of the brig's course, you +might not be able to make yourself heard on her +deck."</p> + +<p>"True, true."</p> + +<p>"The night is so still that a pistol-shot would be +heard at a good distance."</p> + +<p>"O, yes, I see it all now; I was so anxious to +escape from this terrible ship that I thought of nothing +else; and there is poor John."</p> + +<p>"You must not think of him—it will be no worse +for him if you go, no better if you remain. Here, +take the lantern—say nothing as you hand it to the +man at the tiller, but do as I told you."</p> + +<p>Pressing the hand of Florette, Julia mounted to +the deck with a painfully beating heart, but with a +firm step. She handed the lantern to the steersman, +who received it surlily, growling some rough oath, +half to himself, at her delay, and leaning upon the +tiller, proceeded to relight the binnacle-lamp. Julia +fell back cautiously, and in another moment the light +form of Florette filled her place.</p> + +<p>"I was very careless, Diego," said she.</p> + +<p>"Yes," replied he, gruffly.</p> + +<p>"Well, I will be more careful next time."</p> + +<p>"You'd better."</p> + +<p>Julia, during the short time of this conversation, +had disappeared over the stern, and as the vessel +was sailing before a steady wind, found little difficulty +in sliding down the painter into the yawl.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span> +She could hardly suppress an exclamation when a +moment afterward she found the ship rapidly gliding +away from her, and leaving her alone upon the +waters in so frail a support. Her situation was, +indeed, one that might well appall any of her sex. +To a sailor it would already have been one of entire +safety, but to her it seemed as if every succeding +wave would sink the little boat as it gracefully rose and +fell upon their swell; but seating herself by the tiller, +she managed to guide its motions, and with a calm +reliance upon that God whose supporting arm she +knew to be as much around her, when alone in the +wide waste of waters, as when beside her own +hearth-stone, in quiet and happy England, she +patiently awaited the issue of her bold adventure.</p> + +<p>She had but a short time to wait when she perceived +the dark outlines of the Raker bearing directly +down upon her. As it approached it seemed as if it +would run directly over her boat, and excited by the +fear of the moment, and the anxiety to be heard, she +gave a louder shriek than she supposed herself capable +of uttering, and at the same time fired off her +pistol.</p> + +<p>Both were heard on board the Raker.</p> + +<p>"Man overboard!" shouted the look-out.</p> + +<p>"Woman overboard, you lubber," said a brother +tar; "didn't you hear that screech?"</p> + +<p>"Hard a port!"</p> + +<p>"Hard a port 'tis."</p> + +<p>"Right under the lee bow."</p> + +<p>"Well, pitch over a rope whoever it is. What does +this mean?" said Lieutenant Morris, as he approached +the bows.</p> + +<p>"Can't say, sir—some deviltry of the pirates, I +reckon, to make us lose way."</p> + +<p>"By heavens! it is a woman," cried the lieutenant, +"let me throw that rope, we shall be on the +boat in a minute. Hard a port!"</p> + +<p>The rope, skillfully thrown by the young lieutenant, +struck directly at the feet of Julia. With +much presence of mind she gave it several turns +around one of the oar-locks, and her boat was immediately +hauled up to the side of the brig, without +compelling the latter to slacken sail.</p> + +<p>In another moment she was lifted to the deck of +the Raker.</p> + +<p>"Julia! thank Heaven!" exclaimed her father.</p> + +<p>With a cry of joy she fainted in his arms, and was +borne below, where she speedily recovered, and +related the manner of her escape from the pirate.</p> + +<p>All admired the courage of the attempt, and Lieutenant +Morris, as he gazed upon the lovely countenance, +which returning sensation was restoring to +all its wonted bloom and beauty, one day of intense +sorrow having left but slight traces upon it, he felt +emotions to which he had hitherto been an entire +stranger, and sought the deck with a flushed brow +and animated eye, wondering at the vision of beauty +which had risen, like Cytherea, from the sea.</p> + +<p class="right">[<i>To be continued.</i></p> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_PRAYER_OF_THE_DYING_GIRL" id="THE_PRAYER_OF_THE_DYING_GIRL"></a>THE PRAYER OF THE DYING GIRL.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY SAMUEL D. PATTERSON.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! take me back again, mother, to that home I love so well,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose memory rules my fluttering heart with a mysterious spell:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think of it when lying on my weary couch of pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I feel that I am dying, mother—Oh! take me home again!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They tell me that this sunny clime strength to the wasted brings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the zephyr's balmy breezes come with healing on their wings;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to me the sun's rich glow is naught—the perfumed air is vain—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For I know that I am dying—Oh! then, take me home again!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I long to find myself once more beside the little stream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That courses through our valley green, of which I often dream:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I fancy that a cooling draught from that sweet fount I drain—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It stills the fever of my blood—Oh! take me home again!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And then I lie and ponder, as I feel my life decline,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the happy days that there I spent when health and strength were mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I climbed the mountain-side, and roved the valley and the plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my bosom never knew a pang of sorrow or of pain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when the sun was sinking in the far and glowing west,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I came and sat me by thy side, or nestled in thy breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And heard thy gentle words of love, and listened to the strain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of thy sweet favorite evening hymn—Oh! take me home again!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How bright and joyous was my life! Night brought refreshing rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And morning's dawn awakened naught but rapture in my breast:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now, sad and languid, weak and faint, I seek, but seek in vain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lay me down in soft repose—Oh! take me home again!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The hand of death is laid upon thy child's devoted head—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I feel its damp and chilling touch, so cold, so full of dread—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It palsies every nerve of mine—it freezes every vein—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! take me then, dear mother—Oh! take me home again!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There, with my wan brow lying on thy fond and faithful breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me calmly wait the summons that calls me to my rest:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when the struggle's o'er, mother—the parting throe of pain—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou'lt joy to know thy daughter saw her own loved home again!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="A_WRITTEN_LEAF_OF_MEMORY" id="A_WRITTEN_LEAF_OF_MEMORY"></a>A WRITTEN LEAF OF MEMORY.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY FANNY LEE.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<p>Poor Fanny Layton! Oh! how well I remember +the last time I ever saw her! 'Twas in the dear old +church whither from early childhood my footsteps +were bent. What feelings of holy awe and reverence +crept into my heart as I gazed, with eyes in +which saddened tears were welling, upon the sacred +spot! How my thoughts reverted to other days—the +days of my early youth—that sweet "spring-time" +of life, when I trod the blooming pathway before me +so fetterless and free, with no overshadowing of +coming ill—no anxious, fearful gazing into the dim +future, as in after years, but with the bounding step +that bespeaks the careless joyousness which Time, +oh all too soon! brushes from the heart with "rude, +relentless wing." How eagerly I would strive to +subdue my impatient footsteps then to the calmer +pace of more thoughtful years, as I gradually drew +nearer to the holy sanctuary, although mine eyes +would oft, despite my utmost endeavors, wander to +the eaves of that time-worn, low-browed church, to +watch the flight of the twittering host who came +forth, I fancied, at my approach to bid me welcome! +How I would cast one "longing, lingering look" at +the warm, bright sunshine that irradiated even those +gray walls, ere I entered the low porch whence it +was all excluded by the ivy which seemed to delight +in entwining its slender leaves around the crumbling +pillars, as if it would fain impart strength and beauty +to the consecrated building in its declining years.</p> + +<p>But a long—long time had passed since then, and +I had come to revisit my village-home, and the +memory-endeared haunts of my girlhood, for the last +time, ere journeying to a distant land. The place +was little changed, and every thing around that well-remembered +spot came laden with so many sweet +and early associations, that the memory of by-gone +hours swept thrillingly across my heart-strings, and +it was not until after I had taken my accustomed +seat in the old-fashioned high-backed pew, that I was +roused from my busy wanderings in the "shadowy +past," by the voice of our pastor—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Years had gone by, and given his honored head<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A <i>diadem of snow</i>—his eye was dim"—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>his voice grown weak and tremulous with increasing +years, although there was a something in its tone so +full of simple-hearted earnestness, that had never +failed to find its way to the most gay and thoughtless +spirits of his little flock. And now how reverently +I gazed upon the silvered locks of him who had been +mine own faithful guide and counselor along the devious +pathway of youth—feeling that his pilgrimage +was almost ended—his loving labors well nigh over—and +soon he would go down to the grave</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around him and lies down to peaceful dreams."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I looked around—and it was sad to see how few +there were of all the familiar faces I had left—and +those few—oh, how changed! But there was one to +whom my glance reverted constantly, nor could I +account for the strange fascination which seemed to +fix mine eyes upon her. And yet, as I looked, the +spring of memory seemed touched, and suddenly +there appeared before me <i>two</i> faces, which I found +it impossible to separate in my bewildered rememberings—although +so very unlike as they were! The +one so bright and joyous, with blue laughter-loving +eyes, in which an unshadowed heart was mirrored—and +the other—the one on which my gaze was now +fixed so dreamily—wan and faded, although it must +once have been singularly beautiful, so delicate and +fair were the features, and so pure and spiritual was +the white brow resting beneath those waving masses +of golden hair—a temple meet, methought, for all +high and earnest feeling—then, too, there was a +sweet—yet oh! how sorrow-shaded and subdued—expression +flitting around the small mouth, as though +a world-torn and troubled spirit, yet meek and long-suffering, +had left its impress there! Her eyes—those +large, deep, earnest eyes—how they haunted +me with their eager restlessness, wandering to and +fro with a perturbed, anxious, asking look, and then +upturned with a fixed and pleading gaze, which +moved one's very heart to see. Her dress was very +simple, and yet I could not help thinking it strangely +contrasted with the sorrow-stricken expression of +that fair though faded face.</p> + +<p>A wreath of orange-blossoms encircled the small +cottage-bonnet, and a long white veil half concealed +in its ample folds the fragile form, which, if it had +lost the roundness of early youth, still retained the +most delicate symmetry of outline; upon her breast +lay, half hidden, a withered rose, fit emblem, methought, +for her who wore it. Oft-times her pale +thin hands were clasped, and once, when our pastor +repeated in his own low, fervent tone—"Come unto +me, all ye heavy-laden, and I will give you rest"—her +lip quivered, and she looked quickly up, with</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"A glance of hurried wildness, fraught<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With some unfathomable thought."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My sympathies were all out-gushing for her, and +when the full tones of the organ peeled forth their +parting strain and we went forth from the sanctuary, +my busy dreamings of the present and the past all +were merged in one honest desire to know the poor +girl's history. I learned it afterward from the lips of +Aunt Nora Meriwether.</p> + +<p>Dear Aunt Nora! If thou <i>wert</i> yclept "spinster," +never did a heart more filled with good and pure and +kindly impulses beat than thine! Indeed, I have ever +ascribed my deep reverence for the sisterhood in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span> +general to my affectionate remembrances of this +childhood's friend. The oracle of our village was +Aunt Nora Meriwether—and how could "old maid" +be a stigma upon her name, when it was by virtue +of this very title that she was enabled to perform all +those little kindly offices which her heart was ever +prompting, and which made up the sum of her simple +daily existence! It was said that Aunt Nora was +"disappointed" in early life—but however this may +have been, certain it was that the tales (and they <i>did</i> +intimate—did the good people of our village—that if +Aunt Nora had a weakness, it consisted in over-fondness +for story-telling) she treasured longest, and +oftenest repeated, were those in which the fair heroine +was crossed in love.</p> + +<p>Many a time have we, a group of gay and happy-hearted +children, gathered round her feet, as she sat +in the low doorway of her cottage-home, and listened +with intense interest to a tale of her youthful days, +gazing the while with eyes in which the bright drops +of sympathy oft would glisten, upon the kind face +bent upon our own in such loveful earnestness. And +we would hope, in child-like innocence of heart, that +<i>we</i> might never "fall in love," but grow up and be +"old maids," just like our own dear Aunt Nora! +Whether we still continued to hope so, after we had +grown in years and wisdom, it behoveth me not to +say! I am quite sure you would rather listen to the +tale now before thee, dear reader, from the good old +lady's own lips—for it is but a simple sketch at best, +and needeth the charm thrown around it by a heart +which the frost of many winters had not sealed to +the tenderest sympathies of our nature—and the low-toned +voice, too, that often during her narrative +would grow tremulous with the emotion it excited. +But, alas! this may not be! that low voice is hushed—the +little wicket-gate now closed—the path which +led to her cottage-door untrodden now for many a +day—and that kind and gentle heart is laid at rest +beneath bright flowers, planted there by loving hands, +in the humble church-yard. But this day is so lovely—is +it not? With that soft and shadowy mist hanging +like a gossamer veil over Nature's face, through +which the glorious god of day looks with a quiet +smile, as though he loved to dwell upon a scene so +replete with home-breathing beauty! And that smile! +how lovingly it rests upon the lawn and the meadow +and the brook! How it lingers upon the sweet +flowerets which have not yet brushed the tears from +their eyes, until those dewy tear-drops seem—as if +touched by a fairy wand—to change to radiant gems! +How it peeps into every nook and dell, until the +silent places of the earth rejoice in the light of that +glory-beaming smile! The busy hum of countless +insects—the soft chime of the distant water-fall—the +thrilling notes of the woodland choristers—the happy +voice of the streamlet, which hurries on ever murmuring +the same glad strain—the gentle zephyr, now +whispering through the leafy trees with low, mysterious +tone, and then stealing so gently, noiselessly +through the shadowy grass, till each tiny blade quivers +as if trembling to the touch of fairy feet. These +are Nature's voices, and do they not seem on a day +like this in the sweet summer-time to unite and swell +forth in one full anthem of harmony and praise to the +great Creator of all? And does it not seem, too, as +we gaze (for thou art sitting now with me, art thou +not, gentle reader? on the mossy bank beneath the +noble elm which has for many years stretched out +its arms protectingly over mine own old homestead, +while I recount to thee this simple tale of "long ago") +upon the scene before us, so replete with quiet loveliness +it is—that in every heart within the precincts +of our smiling village there must be a chord attuned +to echo back in voiceless melody the brightness and +the beauty around? Yet oh! how many there may +be, even here, whose sun of happiness hath set on +earth forever! How many whose tear-dimmed +glance can descry naught in the far future but a +weary waste—whose life-springs all are dried—whose +up-springing hopes all withered by the blighting +touch of Sorrow!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Dost thou see that little cot nestled so closely beneath +the hill-side? and covered with the woodland +vine which hath enfolded its tendrils clingingly +around it—peeping in and out at the deserted windows, +or climbing at will over the latticed porch, or +trailing on the ground and looking up forlornly, as +though it wondered where were the careful hands +which erst nourished it so tenderly. The place seems +very mournful—with the long grass growing rankly +over the once carefully-kept pathway, and a few +bright flowers, on either side, striving to uprear +their beauteous heads above the tangled weeds which +have well nigh supplanted them. Neglect—desolation +is engraven on all around, and even the little +wicket, as it swings slowly to and fro, seems to say, +"All gone! go-ne!" The wind, how meaningly +it steals through the deserted rooms, as though breathing +a funereal dirge over the departed! How "eloquent +of wo" is that sound! Now swelling forth, as +it were, in wild and uncontrollable grief, and now +sinking exhaustedly into a low and touching mournfulness +which seems almost human! But to our tale.</p> + +<p>One bright morning, now many years ago, a lady +clothed in garb of mourning, accompanied by a little +bright-eyed girl of perhaps some nine summers, and +her old nurse, alighted at the village inn. Now this +seemingly trivial circumstance was in reality quite +an event in our quiet community, and considerably +disturbed the good people thereof from the "even +tenor of their way." Indeed, there were many more +curious eyes bent upon the new-comers than they +seemed to be at all aware of, if one might judge +from the cold and calm features of the lady, or the +assiduous care which her companion was bestowing +upon one particular bandbox, which the gruff driver +of the stage-coach was, to be sure, handling rather +irreverently, actually seeming to enjoy the ill-concealed +anxiety of the poor old woman for the safety +of her goods and chattels, while the child followed +close beside her mamma, her sparkling eyes glancing +hither and thither with that eager love of novelty so +natural to the young. At length, however, the trunks, +boxes, packages, &c., &c., all were duly deposited,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span> +and duly inspected also, by the several pairs of eyes +which were peering through the narrowest imaginable +strips of glass at neighboring window-curtains or +half-closed shutters. The driver once more mounted +his box, cracked his whip, and the lumbering coach +rattled rapidly away, while the travelers, obeyed the +call of the smiling and curtseying landlady, and disappeared +within the open door of the inn.</p> + +<p>Oh, what whisperings and surmisings were afloat +throughout our village during the succeeding week! +"Who <i>can</i> this stranger-lady be? From whence has +she come, and how long intend remaining here?" +seemed to be the all-important queries of the day; +and so gravely were they discussed, each varying +supposition advanced or withdrawn as best suited +the charity or credulity of the respective interrogators, +that one would certainly have thought them questions +of vital importance to their own immediate interests. +Strange to say, however, with all this unwonted +zeal and perseverance, at the end of the nine days, +(the legitimate time for wonderment,) all that the +very wisest of the group of gossips could bring forward +as the fruits of her patient and untiring investigation, +was the simple fact that the lady's name +was Layton—the nurse's Jeffries—and that the child, +who soon became the pet of the whole household, +was always addressed by the servants at the inn as +"Miss Fanny," and, moreover, that Mrs. L. was +certainly in mourning for her husband, as she had +been seen one morning by the chambermaid weeping +over the miniature of a "very fine-looking man, +dressed in uniform," and had, in all probability, +come to take up her residence in our quiet Aberdeen, +as she had been heard inquiring about the +small cottage beneath the hill, (the self-same, dear +reader, the neglect and desertion of which were but +now lamented.)</p> + +<p>Truth to tell, it <i>was</i> shrewdly surmised that the +landlady at the "Golden Eagle" had gleaned more particular +information than this, although whenever she +was questioned concerning the matter, she did only +reply by a very grave shake of the head, each vibration +of which (particularly when accompanied by a +pursing of the mouth, and a mysterious looking +round) more and more convinced her simple-minded +auditors (i.e. some of them, for it is not to be denied +that there were a few incredulous ones who, either +from former experiences, or natural sagacity, or some +cause unknown, hesitated not to declare it to be +their fixed and unalterable opinion that these seeming +indications of superior knowledge on the part of +good Mrs. Gordon, were but "a deceitful show," +"for their '<i>delusion</i>' given,") that she, Mrs. G., had +been entrusted either by Mistress Jeffries, the nurse, +or perhaps by the lady herself, with a weighty and +important secret, which it would be very dreadful, +indeed, to disclose. And yet, when such a possibility +was vaguely hinted to her, she did not, (as one +would be disposed to do who was really striving to +deceive the eager questioners around her, by giving +them an erroneous impression as to the amount of +her knowledge on the subject,) seize the idea with +avidity, and seem manifestly anxious to encourage +such a supposition. On the contrary, it was evidently +deeply distressing to her that any one should +cherish such a thought for a moment; and she begged +them so earnestly, almost with tears in her eyes, not +to mention it again, and said so much about it, reverting +to the theme invariably when the conversation +chanced to turn upon some other topic, as +though it quite weighed upon her mind, that at +length her companions inwardly wondered what had +given rise to the belief in their minds, and yet, as +one old lady said, looking sagaciously over her +spectacles, "that belief waxed stronger and +stronger."</p> + +<p>Time passed on—days merged themselves into +weeks, and weeks to months, and the harmony and +quietude of Aberdeen was fully restored. The +"Widow Layton," (for thus, from that time, was +she invariably styled,) after all due preliminaries, +had taken quiet possession of the little vine-clad cot; +and although she was not as "neighborly" as she +might have been, and never communicative as to her +previous history, still might the feeling of pique +with which they at first received such a rebuff +to their curiosity, have been a very evanescent +one in the minds of the villagers, had it not chanced +that Aberdeen was blessed (?) with two prim sister-spinsters, +(was it they or Aunt Nora, who formed +the exception to the general rule? I leave it for thee, +dear reader, to decide, since with that early-instilled +reverence before mentioned, I cannot consider my +humble opinion infallible,) whose hearts, according +to their <i>own</i> impression on the subject, quite overflowed +with charity and benevolence, which manifested +itself in the somewhat singular method of +making every one around them uncomfortable, and +in the happy faculty which they possessed in an +eminent degree, of imparting injurious doubts and +covert insinuations as to the manners and habits of +their neighbors, who else might have journeyed +peacefully adown the vale of life in perfect good +faith with all the world; moreover, they hated a +mystery, did these two sister-spinsters, from their +own innate frankness and openness of disposition, +they said, and considered themselves so much in +duty bound to ferret out the solution of any thing +which bore the semblance to an enigma, that they +gave themselves no rest, poor, self-sacrificing creatures, +until they had obtained their object. And well +were they rewarded for this indefatigable zeal, for +they had the satisfaction of knowing that they had +found out more family secrets, destroyed more once-thought +happy marriages, and embittered more hearts +than any two persons in all the country round.</p> + +<p>They lived in the heart of our village, (and never +did that heart quicken with one pulsation of excitement +or surprise, or joy or sorrow, but they were +the first to search into the why and wherefore,) +in a large two story house, isolated from the rest, +which seemed to emulate its occupants in stiffness +and rigidity, and whose glassy eyes looked out as +coldly upon the beauteous face of nature, as they +from their own stern "windows of the soul," upon +the human face divine. There was no comfort, no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span> +home-look about the place; even the flowers seemed +not to grow by their own sweet will, but came up +as they were bidden, tall and straight, and stiff. And +the glorious rays of the sun glanced off from the +dazzling whiteness of the forbidding mansion, as +though they had met with a sudden rebuff, and had +failed to penetrate an atmosphere where every thing +seemed to possess an antipathy to the bright and +the joyous. It was strange to see what a chilliness +pervaded the spot. The interior of the house (which +I once saw when a child; and, oh! I never <i>can</i> +forget the long, long-drawn sigh that escaped my +lips as I once more found myself without the precincts +of a place where my buoyant spirits seemed +suddenly frozen beneath the glance of those two +spinsters, where even the large, lean cat paced the +floor with such a prim, stately step, now and then +pausing to fix her cold, gray eyes upon my face, as +though to question the cause of my intrusion, and +also to intimate that she had no sort of sympathy +with either my feelings, or those of children in +general.) Every thing bore the same immovable +look—the narrow, high-backed chairs seemed as if +they had grown out of the floor, and were destined +to remain as stationary as the oaks of the forest; +the "primeval carpet," over which the Misses Nancy +and Jerusha Simpkins walked as though mentally +enumerating the lines that crossed each other in such +exact squares, never was littered by a single shred; +and the high, old-fashioned clock still maintained its +position in the corner from year to year, seeming to +take a sort of malicious satisfaction in calmly ticking +the hours away which bore the Misses Simpkins +nearer and nearer to that <i>certain</i> age (which they, if +truth must be told, were in nowise desirous to reach) +when all further endeavors to conceal the foot-marks +of stern old Father Time would be of no avail.</p> + +<p>It was at the close of a chilly evening late in +autumn—old Boreas was abroad, and had succeeded, +it would seem, in working himself into an ungovernable +fit of rage, for he went about screaming most +boisterously, now hurrying the poor bewildered +leaves along, maliciously causing them to perform +very undignified antics for their <i>time of life</i>, while +they, poor old withered things, thus suddenly torn +from the protecting arms of their parental tree, flew +by, like frightened children, vainly striving to gain +some place of shelter. Alas! alas! no rest was there +for them. What infinite delight their inveterate +persecutor seemed to take in whirling them round +and round, dodging about, and seeking them in the +most unheard-of places, where they lay panting from +very fright and fatigue. And then off he would start +again, shaking the window-sashes as he passed, with +wild, though impatient fury, remorselessly tearing +down the large gilt signs which had from time immemorial +rejoiced in the respective and respectable +names of several worthies of our village, and then +speeding away to the homes of said worthies, to proclaim +the audacious deed through the key-hole, in +the most impudent and incomprehensible manner +possible. It was on such an evening as this, a few +months after the arrival of the Laytons at Aberdeen, +that the Misses Simpkins sat in their cheerless +back-room, hovering over a small fire, busily plying +their noisy knitting-needles, and meantime indulging +in their usual dish of scandal, which, however, it +is but justice to say, was not quite so highly seasoned +with the spice of envy and malice as was its wont. +Whether it was that the memory of a bright and +beaming little face that had intruded upon their +solitude during the afternoon, had half succeeded in +awakening the slumbering better nature which had +slept so long, it was somewhat doubted if any effort +could resuscitate it again; whether it was that the +lingering echo of a certain sweet, childish voice that +had beguiled the weary hours of their dullness and +monotony, and with its innocent prattle, had, in some +degree, forced an opening through the firm frost-work +which had been gradually gathering for years round +their hearts, I cannot tell; but true it is that as the +sister spinsters sat there, with the faint and feeble flame +struggling up from the small fire, and the light from +the one tall candle flickering and growing unsteady +as it flashed upon the two thin, sharp faces close +beside it, while the antique furniture looked more +grotesque and grim than ever in the deep shadow, +and the never-wearying clock still ticked calmly on, +regardless alike of the contending elements without +and the wordy warfare within; true it is that the conversation +between the sisters was divested of one +half its wonted acrimony.</p> + +<p>"To be sure," said Miss Simpkins the younger, at +length, after a pause, in which the half-awakened +better nature seemed strongly disposed to resume its +slumbers again, "little civility has the Widow +Layton to expect from any body with her distant +bows and uppish airs, when one ventures to express +an interest in her; and if I hadn't a very forgiving +disposition, oh! Jerusha! Jerusha! I don't think +I'd trouble myself to call upon her again. But I +feel it to be my duty to advise her to put little Fanny +to school, for she's a good child and winsome-like, +and running at large so will just be the spoiling +of her."</p> + +<p>"Well, Jerusha," responded Miss Nancy, who +had, perhaps, a little leaven more than her sister, of +tartness in her disposition, and on whose face an +habitual expression of acidity was rapidly increasing, +"you know very well that the widow considers +herself a little above every body else in Aberdeen, +and you might as well talk to a stone wall as to her +about sending the child to school. Why haven't I +done my best at talking to her? Haven't I told her +of Miss Birch's school, where the children don't so +much as turn round without their teacher's leave, +and where you might hear a pin drop at any time. +Haven't I told her that she might easily save a good +deal in the year, by renting one half of that snug little +cottage—and what thanks did I get? A reply as +haughty as if she were the greatest lady in the land, +instead of being, as she is, a nameless, homeless +stranger, who cannot be 'any better than she should +be,' or she would never make such a mighty mystery +about her past life, that she 'trusted Miss Simpkins +would allow her to be the best judge as to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span> +proper method of educating her child, and also as to +the means of retrenching her own expenses if she +found it needful.'"</p> + +<p>Unkind, unjust, unfeeling Nancy Simpkins! and +has not that settled, ever-present sorrow upon those +pale features; have not those grief-traced lines around +the compressed mouth, and across the once smooth +and polished brow; has not the sad garb of the +mourner, which speaks of the lone vigil, the weary +watching, the hope deferred, or it may be the sudden +stroke of the dread tyrant Death, no appeal to thy +frozen sympathies? Canst thou suffer thy better +nature to resume its deep and trance-like sleep again, +and rob that poor widowed mother of her only hope +on earth, that bright, glad creature, who carries sunshine +to her otherwise desolate home, but to pinion +her free and fetterless spirit beneath the iron rule +and despotic sway of the village task-mistress?</p> + +<p>We will leave the Misses Simpkins, and thou +pleasest, reader mine, to the enjoyment of their +envy-tinctured converse, and turn the page of Mrs. +Layton's life.</p> + +<p>An only child of wealthy parents, petted, caressed +and idolized, she had sprung into womanhood, with +every wish anticipated, every desire gratified ere +half expressed, if within the reach of human possibility, +what wonder, then, that she grew wayward +and willful, and at length rashly dashed the cup of +happiness of which she had drank so freely in her +sunny youth from her lip, by disobeying her too fond +and doating parents, in committing her life's destiny +to the keeping of one who they, with the anxious +foresight of love, too well knew would not hold the +precious trust as sacred. Brave and handsome and +gifted he might be, but the seeds of selfishness had +been too surely sown within his heart; and he had +won the idol of a worshiping crowd, more, perchance, +from a feeling of exultation and pride in +being able to bear away the prize from so many +eager aspirants, than any deep-rooted affection he +felt for the fair object of his solicitude. The novelty +and the charm soon wore away, and then his beautiful +bride was neglected for his former dissolute +associates. He afterward entered the navy, and +somewhat more than ten years after they were +wedded, fell in a duel provoked by his own rash, +temper. From the moment that Mrs. Layton recovered +from the trance-like swoon which followed +the first sight of her husband's bleeding corpse, she +seemed utterly, entirely changed. She had truly +loved him, he who lay before her now, a victim of his +own rash and selfish folly, and with all a woman's +earnest devotion would have followed him to the +remotest extremes of earth; but her feelings had been +too long trampled upon, her heart too bruised and +crushed ever to be upraised again. She had leaned +upon a broken reed, and had awakened to find herself +widowed, broken-hearted. And she arose, that desolate +and bereaved one, and folding her child closer +to her breast, went forth into the cold world friendless—alone! +Once would her grief have been loud +and passionate and wild, but she had passed through +a weary probation, and had learned "to suffer and +be still." How, in that dark hour, did her lost +mother's prayer-breathed words, her father's earnest +entreaties come back to smite heavily upon her +sorrow-stricken spirit—but remorse and repentance +were now all too late. And yet not too late, she +murmured inly, for had she not a duty to perform +toward the little being, her only, and, oh! how +heaven-hallowed, tie to earth, consigned to her +guardianship and care. Did she not firmly resolve +never by ill-judged and injudicious fondness to mark +out a pathway filled with thorns for her darling. It +may be that that widowed mother erred even in +excess of zeal, for she would resist the natural +promptings of her heart, and check the gushing +affection which welled from the deepest, purest +fountain in the human heart, lest its expression +might prove injurious to the loved one in after years. +And thus there grew a restraint and a seeming coldness +on the part of the mother, a constant craving +for love, which was never satisfied, and a feeling of +fear on the child's, which shut them out from that +pure trust and confidence, which are such bright +links in the chain that binds a mother to her child.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>This, then, was the Widow Layton who with her +little one and nurse had sought our village, immediately +after the decease of her husband, as a peaceful +asylum from the noise and tumult of a world +where, in happier days, she had played so conspicuous +a part. It was not so much that she sedulously +avoided all mention of her past history to the +eager questioners around her, from a disinclination +that it should be known, as that she little understood +the character of the villagers themselves—ofttimes +mistaking a really well-meant interest in her welfare +for an idle and impertinent curiosity. Mrs. Layton +had been highly born and nurtured, and there seemed +to her delicate mind a something rude and unfeeling +in the manner with which her too officious friends +and neighbors would touch upon the sources of grief +which were to her so sacred. And therefore, perhaps +unwisely, she held herself aloof from them, replying +to their different queries with that calm and +easy dignity which effectually precluded all approach +to familiarity, and engendered a dislike in the minds +of those who were little accustomed to meet one who +could not enter into all their feelings, plans and projects—which +dislike was constantly kept alive and +fostered by the united exertions of the two sister +spinsters. Good Mrs. Jeffries, too, the fond old nurse +who had never left her beloved mistress through all +her varying fortunes, was all too faithful and true to +reveal aught that that kind mistress might wish untold; +and thus it was that the curiosity of the good +people of Aberdeen was kept continually in check, +and about the unsuspecting inmates of Woodbine +Cottage was thrown a mystery that was becoming +constantly augmented by their incomprehensible +silence on the subject.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Weeks—months—years sped swiftly away, and the +widow, by her free and unostentatious charities and +her angel-ministering to the poor, the afflicted and +the bereaved, had almost eradicated the first unpleas<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>ing +impression made upon the simple-hearted people +of Aberdeen; so that, although the Misses Simpkins +still held their nightly confabulations, they did not +venture as at first, so openly to propagate their animadversions +concerning the "mysterious stranger," +but on the contrary, always made it a point to preface +any sudden and amiable suggestion that presented +itself to their minds with "not that I would +say any thing against her, but it does seem a little +singular," &c. But of Miss Fanny—sweet, witching +Fanny Layton! who had grown in beauty and +grace day by day, not one word did they dare to +speak in her dispraise! For was there one in all +Aberdeen who would not have resented the slightest +intimation of disrespect to our lily of the valley—whose +joy-inspiring and sorrow-banishing presence +was welcomed delightedly by young and old, both +far and near? And oh! was there ever music like +her sweet, ringing laugh, or melody like the low-toned +voice which was always eloquent of joyousness. +Whether she sat in the humble cottage, lending +kind and ready assistance to the care-worn matron, +by playfully imprisoning the little hands of the +children within her own petite palms, while she recounted +to them some wonderful tale, her brilliant +fancy, meantime, never soaring above their childish +comprehension, although she was regarded by her +little auditors as nothing less than a bright fairy herself, +who was thus familiar with all that witching +tribe, and who could with her own magic wand thus +open to them stores of such strange and delightful +things as was never before dreamed of in their +youthful philosophy—while their patient, painstaking +mother would now and then glance up from +her never-ending task, with a smile of such beaming +pleasure and gratitude as amply repaid the gentle being, +who seemed in her loveful employ to be the presiding +angel of that humble dwelling-place. Whether +she would "happen-in" of a long, warm summer +afternoon to take a cup of tea with a neighboring +farmer's wife—an honor that never failed to +throw that worthy woman into a perfect fever of +anxiety and delight—who would proffer a thousand +and one apologies for the deficiencies that only existed +in her own perverse imagination, if, indeed, +they existed even there, for her bright eyes were +contradicting a pair of rosy lips all the while, as they +glanced with a lurking—yet I am sure laudable—pride, +from the "new chany sett" (which was wont +on great occasions to be brought forward) to the rich +treasures of her well-kept dairy, that her busy feet +had been going pat-a-pat from cupboard to cellar, and +cellar to cupboard, for a whole hour previous collecting, +to place in all their tempting freshness before +her beloved guest. Or whether she came with +her simple offering of fresh flowers—her word of +sympathy and comfort—or some choice dainty, that +seemed "<i>so</i> nice" to the sick and suffering, who had +turned away with loathing from every thing before, +but who could not fail to find <i>this</i> delicious, for was +it not made and brought by the hands of dear Miss +Fanny's self? Still did her presence seem to make +sunlight wherever she went!</p> + +<p>Fanny was a young lady now—although you would +scarce believe it, for she was a very child at heart, +with all a child's unworldliness, unsuspecting confidence, +and winning innocence. And yet there was +deep, deep down in that loveful, earnest heart, that +Joy and all Joy's sister spirits seemed to have taken +captive, a fount whose seal had never been found.</p> + +<p>Oh, Fanny, dear, darling Fanny Layton! wo, wo +for thee the day when first that hidden seal was broken! +When Hope and Doubt and Fear by turns +played sentinel to the hidden treasure, the door to +which, when once flung back, never can be reclosed +again! When joy and gladness but tarried a little +while to dispute their prior right to revel undisturbed +in that buoyant heart of thine, and then went tearfully +forth, leaving for aye a dreary void, and a deep, +dark shadow, where all had been but brightness and +beauty before! Oh, why must the night-time of sorrow +come to thee, thou gentle and pure-hearted one? +Thou for whom such fervent and fond prayers have +ascended, as should, methinks, have warded off from, +thee each poisoned shaft, and proved an amulet to +guard thee from all life's ills! Thy sixteenth summer, +was it not a very, very happy one to thee, +sweet Fanny Layton? But happiness, alas! in this +cold world of ours, is never an unfading flower; and +although so coveted and so sought, still will droop in +the eager hands which grasped it, and die while yet +the longing eyes are watching its frail brightness +with dim and shadowful foreboding!</p> + +<p>Just on the outskirts of our village there slept a +silent, secluded little nook, which the thickly-growing +trees quite enclosed, only permitting the bright +sun to glance glimmeringly through their interwoven +leaves and look upon the blue-eyed violets that held +their mute confabulations—each and all perking up +their pretty heads to receive the diurnal kiss of their +god-father Sol—in little lowly knots at their feet. +Kind reader, I am sure I cannot make you know +how very lovely it was, unless you yourself have +peeped into this sheltered spot—seen the cool, dark +shadows stretching across the velvet turf, and making +the bright patches of sunlight look brighter still—have +stood by the murmuring brook on which the +sun-bright leaves overhead are mirrored tremulously, +and upon whose brink there grows so many a lovely +"denizen of the wild"—gazed admiringly upon the +beautiful white rose Dame Nature hath set in the +heart of this hidden sanctuary, as a seal of purity and +innocence—and more than this, have turned from all +these to watch the fairy form flitting from flower to +flower, with so light a step that one might mistake it +for some bright fay sent on a love-mission to this +actual world of ours—if one did not know that this +was Fanny Layton's dream-dell—that in this lovely +spot she would spend hours during the long, warm +summer days, poring over the pages of some favorite +author, or twining the sweet wild flowers in fragrant +wreaths to bedeck her invalid mother's room—or, +perchance, staying for awhile those busy fingers, to +indulge in those dreamy, delicious reveries with +which the scene and hour so harmonized.</p> + +<p>One day—and that day was an era in poor Fanny's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span> +life which was never afterward to be forgotten—our +lovely heroine might have been seen tripping lightly +over the smooth sward, the green trees rustling musically +in the summer breeze, and Nature's myriad +tones "concerting harmonies" on hill and dale. And +one needed but to see the smiling lip, and those clear, +laughter-loving eyes peeping from beneath just the +richest and brightest golden curls in the world, to +know what a joyous heart was beating to that fairy-light +and bounding step. Wonder none could be, +that many an eye brightened as she passed, and many +a kindly wish—that was never the less trustful and +sincere for that it was couched in homely phrase—sped +her on her way. Dream-dell was reached at +length—the flowering shrubs which formed the rural +gate-way parted, and Fanny threw herself on the +waving grass, with a careless grace which not all +the fashionable female attitudinizers in the world +could have imitated, so full of unstudied ease and +naturalness it was—with her small cottage bonnet +thrown off that wealth of clustering curls which were +lifted by the soft summer wind, and fell shadowingly +over the brightest and most beaming little face upon +which ever fond lover gazed admiringly—with eyes +which seemed to have caught their deep and dewy +blue from the violets she clasped in one small hand, +and on which they were bent with a silent glance of +admiration—for Fanny was a dear lover of wild-wood +flowers, as who is not who bears a heart untouched +by the sullying stains of earth? One tiny +foot had escaped from the folds of her simple muslin +dress, and lay half-buried in the green turf—a wee, +wee foot it was, so small, indeed, that it seemed just +the easiest thing possible to encase it within the lost +slipper of Cinderella, if said slipper could but have +been produced; at least so said a pair of eyes, as +plainly as pair of eyes <i>could</i> say it, which peering +from behind a leafy screen, were now upon it fixed +in most eager intensity, and now wandered to the +face of the fair owner thereof, who was still bent +over the flowers in the small hand, as if seeking some +hidden spell in their many-colored leaves.</p> + +<p>That pair of eyes were the appurtenances belonging +to a face that might have proved no uninteresting +study to the physiognomist, albeit it would have +puzzled one not a little, methinks, to have formed a +satisfactory conclusion therefrom, so full of contradictions +did it seem. A mass of waving hair fell +around a brow high and well-developed, though +somewhat darkly tinged by the warmth, mayhap, of +a southern sun, and the eyes were large and lustrous, +yet there was a something unfathomable in their +depths, which made one doubt if they were truly the +index of the soul, and might not be made to assume +whatever expression the mind within willed. At +present, however, they were filled only with deep +admiration mingled with surprise, while around the +mouth, which, in repose, wore a slightly scornful +curve, there played a frank and winning smile, as, +advancing with a quiet courtesy that at once bespoke +him a man of the world, despite slouched hat and +hunting-frock, the intruder upon our heroine's solitude +exclaimed, with half-earnest, half-jesting gallantry, +"Prithee, fair woodland nymph, suffer a lone +knight, who has wandered to the confines of a Paradise +unawares, to bow the knee in thy service, and as atonement +meet for venturing unbidden into thy hidden +sanctum, to proffer thee the homage of his loyal heart!"</p> + +<p>Fanny was but a simple country maiden, all unskilled +in the light and graceful nothings which form +the substance of worldly converse, and so the warm, +rich crimson crept into her cheek,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"The color which his gaze had thrown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon a cheek else pale and fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As lilies in the summer air."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and the wee foot forthwith commenced beating a +tatoo upon the heads of the unoffending flowers +around, who breathed forth their perfumed sighs in +mute reproachfulness; but she was still a woman, +and so with all a woman's ready tact she replied, +though with the flush deepening on her cheek, and a +scarce-perceptible tremor in her voice,</p> + +<p>"Indeed, sir stranger, since thou hast given me +such unwonted power, I must first use my sceptre +of command in banishing all intruders into my august +presence, and invaders of this 'hidden sanctum,' +which is held sacred to mine own idle feet alone!"</p> + +<p>And there was a merry look of mischievous meaning +stealing in and out of those bright eyes as they +were for a moment uplifted to the face of the stranger, +and then again were shadowed by the drooping lid. +Whether it was that said "intruder" detected a something +in the tone or the demure glance of the fair girl +which contradicted the words she spoke, or whether +that very glance transfixed him to the spot, history +telleth not, but stay he did; and if his tarrying was very +<i>heart</i>ily objected to by his companion, if the words +which fell from his lip in utterance how musical, for the +space of two fastly-fleeting hours, were not pleasing +to the ear of the maiden, then, indeed, did that soft, +bright glow which mantled her fair cheek, and the +rosy lip, half-parted and eloquent of interest, sadly +belie the beating heart within, as the twain walked +lingeringly homeward, the dark shadows lengthening +on the green grass, and the setting sun flinging a +flood of golden-tinted light upon the myriad leaves +which were trembling to the love-voice of the soft +summer breeze.</p> + +<p>Softly was the latch of the wicket lifted, and light +was the maiden's step upon the stair, as she sought +her own little chamber. Was she gazing forth from +the open window to admire the brilliancy of that +gorgeous sunset? Was it to drink in the beauty and +brightness of that sweet summer eve, or to feel the +soft breeze freshly fanning her flushed cheek? Nay, +none of these. See how earnestly her gaze is bent +upon the retreating form of the stranger; and now +that he is lost to view, behold her sitting with head +resting on one little hand, quite lost in a reverie that +is not like those of Dream-dell memory, for now +there comes a tangible shape in place of those ideal +ones, and the echo of a manly voice, breathing devotion +and deference in every tone, still is lingering in +her enchained ear. For the first time she forgets to +carry her offering of fresh flowers to her mother's +room. Ah! her busy fingers have been strewing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span> +the bright leaves around unconsciously, and she +blushingly gathers the few remaining ones, and, with +a pang of self-reproach, hastens to her mother's side.</p> + +<p>It is with a sigh of relief that Fanny beholds her +invalid parent sleeping sweetly—a relief that was +augmented by the question which burst suddenly +upon her mind, "Can I tell her that I have had a +stranger-companion in my wanderings?" Wonder +not at the query, gentle reader, for remember that +the life of our sweet Fanny had not been blessed with +that loving confidence which is the tenderest tie in +the relation of mother and child. Her love was ever +intermingled with too much fear and restraint from +earliest youth, for that interchange of counsel and +trust which might have been a sure safeguard against +many of earth's ills. And it was perhaps that very +yearning to fill the only void left in her happy heart +which prompted her to give the helm of her barque +of life, so soon and so confidingly into the hands of +a stranger.</p> + +<p>Day succeeded day, and still the lovers, for they +were lovers now, were found at their sweet trysting +spot, seeking every pretext for frequent meetings, as +lovers will, until many were the heads in Aberdeen +which were shaken in wise prognostication; and the +Misses Simpkins, to their unspeakable relief, had +found a new theme whereon to exercise their powers +conversational, while the children of the village +mourned the absence of their kind "Fairy," and +wished with all their little hearts that Miss Fanny +would send away that "naughty man" who kept +her from their homes.</p> + +<p>Poor Fanny! the hidden seal had been touched at +length, and on the deep waters beneath was shining +Love's own meteor-light—a light that was reflected +on every thing around.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"It was as her heart's full happiness<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poured over <i>all</i> its own excess."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>How swiftly the days flew by, "like winged birds, +as lightly and as free." And, oh! how priceless, +peerless was the gift she was yielding to the stranger +in such child-like confidence and trust. There was +so much up-looking in her love for him; it seemed +so sweet to recognize the thoughts which had lain +dormant in her own soul, for want of fitting expression, +flowing from his lip clothed in such a beauty-breathing +garmenture. And now Fanny Layton +was a child no longer. She had crossed the threshold, +and the "spirit of unrest" had descended upon her, +albeit as yet she knew it not. Her heart seemed so +full of sunshine, that when she ventured to peep into +its depths, she was dazzled by that flood of radiance—and +how could she descry the still shadow. Alas! +that on this earth of ours with the sunlight ever +comes the shadows, too, which was sleeping there, +but to widen and grow deeper and darker when +love's waters should cease to gush and sparkle as at +the first opening of that sweet fount.</p> + +<p>But the day of parting came at length—how it had +been dwelt upon with intermingling vows, promises, +caresses on his part, with trust, and tenderness, and +tears on hers! A sad, sad day it was for Fanny Layton, +the first she had ever known that was ever heralded by +sorrow's messenger. How she strove to dwell upon +Edward Morton's words, "It will not be for long;" and +banish from her heart those nameless, undefinable +fears which <i>would</i> not away at her bidding. The sky +looked no longer blue—the green earth no longer +glad; and traces of tears, the bitterest she had ever +shed, were on that poor girl's cheek, as she went +forth to meet her beloved, for the last time.</p> + +<p>It matters not to say how each familiar haunt was +visited that day; how each love-hallowed spot bore +witness to those low murmured words which are +earth's dearest music; how time wore on, as time +will, whether it bears on its resistless tide a freightage +of joys or sorrows, pleasures, or pains, until at length +the last word had been said, the last silent embrace +taken; and now poor Fanny Layton stood alone, +gazing through blinding tears upon the solitary horseman +who rode swiftly away, as if another glance at +the fair creature who stood with straining gaze and +pallid cheek and drooping form, would all unman +him. Was it this, or was it that in that hour he felt his +own unworthiness of the sacred trust reposed in him?</p> + +<p>We will believe, dear reader, that whatever after +influences may have exercised dominion over his +heart; however he may have been swerved from his +plighted faith by dreams of worldly ambition, or +wealth, or power; however cold policy may have +up-rooted all finer feeling from his soul, we will believe +that no thoughts of treachery, no meditated +falsehood mingled with that parting embrace and +blessing; that although he had bowed at many a +shrine before, and therefore could not feel all the +depth and purity of the unworldly affection which he +had won, still he did not, could not believe it possible +that that priceless love would be bartered for pomp +and station, he did mean, when he placed the white +rose, plucked from the heart of Dream-dell, in the +little trembling hand which rested on his shoulder, +and murmured "Fanny, darling, ere this bud hath +scarce withered, I shall be with you again," that it +should be even as he said. Alas! alas! for the frailty +of human nature!</p> + +<p>That night poor Fanny pressed the precious rose +to her quivering lip, and sobbed herself, like a child, +to sleep.</p> + +<p>The next day wore away—the next—the next—still +no tidings from the absent one; and he had promised +to write as soon as he arrived "in town!" +What could it mean?</p> + +<p>Oh, that weary watching! The hours moved, oh, +so leaden-paced and slow! Every day the poor girl +waited for the coming of the post-man; and every +day, with a pang at her heart, and tear-dimmed eyes, +she saw him pass the door. "Edward has been detained; +he will come yet, I'm sure," a fond inner +voice whispered; "perhaps he has sent no letter, because +he'll be here himself so soon!" Poor Fanny! +another week, and still no letter, no tidings. "Oh! he +must be ill!" she whispered, anxiously, but never +thought him false. Oh, no! she was too single-hearted, +too relying in her trust fora doubt so dreadful; +but her step grew heavier day by day—her cheek so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span> +very, very pale, except at the post-man's hour, when +it would burn with a feverish brightness, and then +fade to its former pallid hue again; her sweet voice +was heard no longer trilling forth those thrilling +melodies which had gladdened the heart of young +and old to hear. The visits to Dream-dell were less +and less frequent, for now how each remembrance +so fondly connected with that spot, came fraught +with pain; the works of her favorite author's lay +opened, but unread, upon her knee; and the fastly-falling +tears half-blotted out the impassioned words +she had once read with <i>him</i> with so happy a heart-thrill.</p> + +<p>The widow saw with anxiety and alarm this +sudden change; but she was an invalid—and the poor +suffering one strove to hide her sickness of the heart, +and mother though she was, Mrs. Layton discovered +not the canker-worm which was nipping her bud of +promise, but would whisper, "You confine yourself +too much to my room, my child, and must go out +into the bright sunshine, so that the smile may come +back to your lip, the roses to your cheek."</p> + +<p>One day, now three months after Edward Morton's +departure, Miss Jerusha Simpkins was seen threading +her way to Woodbine Cottage. She held a newspaper +carefully folded in her hand, and on her +pinched and withered face a mingled expression of +caution and importance was struggling.</p> + +<p>Lifting the latch of the embowered door, the +spinster walked into the small parlor, where Fanny +Layton was engaged in feeding her pet canaries; +poor things! they were looking strangely at the wan +face beside the cage, as if they wondered if it could +be the same which used to come with wild warblings +as sweet and untutored as their own. Fanny turned +to welcome the intruder, but recognized Miss Simpkins +with a half-drawn sigh, and a shrinking of the +heart, for she was ever so minute in her inquiries +for that "runaway Mr. Morton."</p> + +<p>"A beautiful day, Miss Fanny," commenced the +spinster, looking sharply around, (she always made +a point of doing two things i.e. entering the houses +of her neighbors without knocking, and then taking +in at a glance not only every thing the room contained, +but the occupation, dress, &c. of the inmates +for after comment,) and then throwing back her +bonnet, and commencing to fan herself vigorously +with the folded paper, "I thought I must run round +to-day and see how your mother did, and bring her +to-day's paper. I happened to be standing by the +window when the penny-post came by, and Nancy +says to me, 'Jerusha,' says she, 'do run to the door +and get the Times—I haven't seen it for an age,' for +we aint no great readers at our house; so I steps to +the door and gets one from neighbor Wilkins—he is +a very pleasant-spoken man, and often drops in of a +morning to have a chat with me and Nancy. Well, +what should I see the first thing (for I always turn to +the marriages and deaths) but Mr. Edward Morton's +marriage to the elegant and rich Miss—Miss—dear +me! I've forgot the name now—do you see if you +can make it out," handing her the paper; "but, +bless me! what is the matter, Miss Fanny? I don't +wonder you're surprised; Nancy and me was—for we +did think at one time that he had an attachment to +Aberdeen; but, la! one can't put any dependence on +these wild-flys!"</p> + +<p>The last part of the cruel sentence was wholly +lost upon poor Fanny, who sat with fixed and stony +gaze upon the dreadful announcement, while it +seemed as if her heart-strings were breaking one by +one. In vain Miss Simpkins, thoroughly alarmed +at length, strove to rouse her from this stupor of +grief. In vain did her dear old nurse, who ran in +affrighted at the loud ejaculations of the terrified but +unfeeling creature who had dealt the blow, use every +epithet of endearment, and strive to win one look +from the poor sufferer, into whose inmost soul the +iron had entered, upon whose heart a weight had +fallen, that could never, never be uplifted again on +earth. Every effort alike was useless; and for days +she sat in one spot low murmuring a plaintive strain, +rocking to and fro, with the white rose, <i>his</i> parting +gift, tightly clasped in her pale fingers, or gazing +fixedly and vacantly upon the birds who sang still, unconsciously +above her head. After a time she became +more docile, and would retire to rest at night, +at the earnest entreaties of her poor old nurse—but +reason's light, from that fearful moment, was darkened +evermore. She would suffer herself to be led +out into the open air, and soon grew fond again of +being with her old playmates, the children; but her +words were unintelligible now to them, and she +would often throw down the wreath she was twining, +and starting up, would exclaim, in a tone that thrilled +to one's very heart, "Oh, has he come? Are you sure +he has not come yet—<i>my rose</i> is almost <i>withered</i>?"</p> + +<p>Poor, poor Fanny Layton! She would go to +church regularly—it was there, dear reader, that +her faded face had brought to me such bewildered +rememberings of the Fanny Layton of other years—and +always dressed in the same mock-bridal attire. +And there was not an eye in that village-church but +glistened as it rested upon the poor, weary, stricken +one, in her mournful spirit-darkness, and no lip but +murmured brokenly, "Heaven bless her!"</p> + +<p>This was the last drop in the cup of the bereaved +desolate widow. She soon found that rest and peace +"which the world cannot give or take away." She +sleeps her last, long, dreamless sleep.</p> + +<p>It was not long ere another mound was raised in +the humble church-yard, on which was ever blooming +the sweetest and freshest flowers of summer, watered +by the tears of many who yet weep and lament the +early perishing of that fairest flower of all. And a +marble slab, on which is simply graven a dove, with +an arrow driven to its very heart, marks the last +earthly resting-place of our Lily of the Valley.</p> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_SPANISH_PRINCESS_TO_THE_MOORISH_KNIGHT" id="THE_SPANISH_PRINCESS_TO_THE_MOORISH_KNIGHT"></a>THE SPANISH PRINCESS TO THE MOORISH KNIGHT.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY GRACE GREENWOOD.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou darest not love me!—thou canst only see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The great gulf set between us—had'st thou <i>love</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Twould bear thee o'er it on a wing of fire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wilt put from thy faint lip the mantling cup,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The draught thou'st prayed for with divinest thirst,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For fear a poison in the chalice lurks?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wilt thou be barred from thy soul's heritage,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The power, the rapture, and the crown of life,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the poor guard of danger set about it?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I tell thee that the richest flowers of heaven<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bloom on the brink of darkness. Thou hast marked<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How sweetly o'er the beetling precipice<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hangs the young June-rose with its crimson heart—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And would'st not sooner peril life to win<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That royal flower, that thou might'st proudly wear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The trophy on thy breast, than idly pluck<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A thousand meek-faced daisies by the way?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How dost thou shudder at Love's gentle tones,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As though a serpent's hiss were in thine ear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Albeit thy heart throbs echo to each word.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why wilt not rest, oh weary wanderer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the couch of flowers Love spreads for thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On banks of sunshine?—voices silver-toned<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall lull thy soul with strange, wild harmonies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rock thee to sleep upon the waves of song.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope shall watch o'er thee with her breath of dreams.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Joy hover near, impatient for thy waking,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her quick wing glancing through the fragrant air.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why dost thou pause hard by the rose-wreathed gate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why turn thee from the paradise of youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Love's immortal summer blooms and glows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wrap thyself in coldness as a shroud?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perchance 'tis well for <i>thee</i>—yet does the flame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That glows with heat intense and mounts toward heaven.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As fitly emblem holiest purity,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As the still snow-wreath on the mountain's brow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou darest not say I love, and yet thou <i>lovest</i>,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And think'st to crush the mighty yearning down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That in thy spirit shall upspring forever!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twinned with thy soul, it lived in thy first thoughts—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It haunted with strange dreams thy boyish years,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And colored with its deep, empurpled hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The passionate aspirations of thy youth.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go, take from June her roses—from her streams<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bubbling fountain-springs—from life, take <i>love</i>,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou hast its all of sweetness, bloom and strength.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There is a grandeur in the soul that dares<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To live out all the life God lit within;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That battles with the passions hand to hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wears no mail, and hides behind no shield!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That plucks its joy in the shadow of death's wing—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That drains with one deep draught the wine of life,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that with fearless foot and heaven-turned eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May stand upon a dizzy precipice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">High o'er the abyss of ruin, and not <i>fall</i>!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_LIGHT_OF_OUR_HOME" id="THE_LIGHT_OF_OUR_HOME"></a>THE LIGHT OF OUR HOME.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY THOMAS BUCHANAN READ.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, thou whose beauty on us beams<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With glimpses of celestial light;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou halo of our waking dreams,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And early star that crown'st our night—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy light is magic where it falls;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To thee the deepest shadow yields;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou bring'st unto these dreary halls<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The lustre of the summer-fields.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There is a freedom in thy looks<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To make the prisoned heart rejoice;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In thy blue eyes I see the brooks,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And hear their music in thy voice.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And every sweetest bird that sings<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Hath poured a charm upon thy tongue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where the bee enamored clings,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">There surely thou in love hast clung:—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For when I hear thy laughter free,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And see thy morning-lighted hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As in a dream, at once I see<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Fair upland scopes and valleys fair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I see thy feet empearled with dews,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The violet's and the lily's loss;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where the waving woodland woos<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Thou lead'st me over beds of moss;—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And by the busy runnel's side,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whose waters, like a bird afraid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dart from their fount, and, flashing, glide<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Athwart the sunshine and the shade.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Or larger streams our steps beguile;—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">We see the cascade, broad and fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dashed headlong down to foam, the while<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its iris-spirit leaps to air!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Alas! as by a loud alarm,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The fancied turmoil of the falls<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hath driven me back and broke the charm<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Which led me from these alien walls:—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yes, alien, dearest child, are these<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Close city walls to thee and me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My homestead was embowered with trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And such thy heritage should be:—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And shall be;—I will make for thee<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A home within my native vale<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where every brook and ancient tree<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Shall whisper some ancestral tale.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now once again I see thee stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As down the future years I gaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fairest maiden of the land—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The spirit of those sylvan ways.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And in thy looks again I trace<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The light of her who gave thee birth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She who endowed thy form and face<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With glory which is not of Earth.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And as I gaze upon her now,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">My heart sends up a prayer for thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That thou may'st wear upon thy brow<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The light which now she beams on me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And thou wilt wear that love and light<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For thou'rt the bud to such a flower:—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh fair the day, how blest and bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Which finds thee in thy native bower!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="AN_INDIAN-SUMMER_RAMBLE" id="AN_INDIAN-SUMMER_RAMBLE"></a>AN INDIAN-SUMMER RAMBLE.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY ALFRED B. STREET.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<p>It was now the middle of October. White frosts +had for some time been spreading their sheets of +pearl over the gardens and fields, but the autumn +rainbows in the forests were wanting. At last, however, +the stern black frost came and wrought its +customary magic. For about a week there was a +gorgeous pageantry exhibited, "beautiful, exceedingly." +But one morning I awoke, and found that +the mist had made a common domain both of earth +and sky. Every thing was merged into a gray dimness. +I could just discern the tops of trees a few +feet off, and here and there a chimney. There was +a small bit of fence visible, bordering "our lane," +and I could with difficulty see a glimmering portion +of the village street. Some gigantic cloud appeared +to have run against something in the heavens and +dropped down amongst us. There were various +outlines a few rods off, belonging to objects we +scarce knew what. Horses pushed out of the +fog with the most sudden effect, followed by their +wagons, and disappeared again in the opposite fleecy +barrier; pedestrians were first seen like spectres, then +their whole shapes were exhibited, and finally they +melted slowly away again, whilst old Shadbolt's +cow, grazing along the grassy margin of the street, +loomed up through the vapor almost as large as an +elephant.</p> + +<p>About noon the scene became clearer, so that the +outline of the village houses, and even the checkered +splendors of the neighboring woods could be seen; +so much of Nate's sign, "Hammond's sto—" became +visible, and even Hamble's great red stage-coach was +exhibited, thrusting its tongue out as if in scorn of +the weather.</p> + +<p>In the afternoon, however, the mist thickened +again, and the whole village shrunk again within it, +like a turtle within its shell. The next morning +dawned without its misty mask, but with it rose a +gusty wind that commenced howling like a famished +wolf. Alas! for the glories of the woods! As the +rude gusts rushed from the slaty clouds, the rich +leaves came fluttering upon them, blotting the air +and falling on the earth thick as snow-flakes. Now +a maple-leaf, like a scalloped ruby, would fly whirling +over and over; next a birch one would flash +across the sight, as if a topaz had acquired wings; +and then a shred of the oak's imperial mantle, flushed +like a sardonyx, would cut a few convulsive capers +in the air, like a clown in a circus, and dash itself +headlong upon the earth. Altogether it was an +exciting time, this fall of the leaf. Ah! a voice also +was constantly whispering in my ear, "we all do +fade as the leaf!"</p> + +<p>I took a walk in the woods. What a commotion +was there! The leaves were absolutely frantic. +Now they would sweep up far into the air as if they +never intended to descend again, and then taking +curvatures, would skim away like birds; others +would cluster together, and then roll along like a +great quivering billow; others again would circle +around in eddies like whirlpools, soaring up now +and then in the likeness of a water-spout, whilst +frequently tall columns would march down the broad +aisles of the forest in the most majestic manner, and +finally fall to pieces in a violent spasm of whirling +atoms. Even after the leaves had found their way +to the earth they were by no means quiet. Some +skipped uneasily over the surface; some stood on one +leg, as it were, and pirouetted; some crept further +and further under banks; some ran merry races over +the mounds, and some danced up and down in the +hollows. As for the trees themselves, they were +cowering and shivering at a tremendous rate, apparently +from want of the cloaks of which every blast +was thus stripping them.</p> + +<p>A day or two after came the veritable soft-looking, +sweet-breathing Indian-Summer—"our thunder." +No other clime has it. Autumn expires in a rain-storm +of three months in Italy; and it is choked to +death with a wet fog in England; but in this new +world of ours, "our own green forest land," as +Halleck beautifully says, it swoons away often in a +delicious trance, during which the sky is filled with +sleep, and the earth hushes itself into the most peaceful +and placid repose. There it lies basking away +until with one growl old Winter springs upon Nature, +locks her in icy fetters, and covers her bosom with +a white mantle that generally stays there until Spring +comes with her soft eye and blue-bird voice to make +us all glad again.</p> + +<p>Well, this beautiful season arrived as aforesaid, +and a day "turned up" that seemed to be extracted +from the very core of the season's sweetness. The +landscape was plunged into a thick mist at sunrise, +but that gradually dwindled away until naught remained +but a delicate dreamy film of tremulous +purple, that seemed every instant as if it would melt +from the near prospect. Further off, however, the +film deepened into rich smoke, and at the base of the +horizon it was decided mist, bearing a tinge, however, +borrowed from the wood-violet. The mountains +could be discerned, and that was all, and they +only by reason of a faint jagged line struggling +through the veil proclaiming their summits. The +dome above was a tender mixture of blue and silver; +and as for the sunshine, it was tempered and shaded +down into a tint like the blush in the tinted hollow +of the sea-shell.</p> + +<p>It was the very day for a ramble in the woods; so +Benning, Watson, and I, called at the dwelling of three<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span> +charming sisters, to ask their mamma's consent (and +their own) to accompany us. These three Graces all +differed from each other in their styles of beauty. +The eyes of one were of sparkling ebony, those of +the other looked as if the "summer heaven's delicious +blue" had stained them, whilst the third's +seemed as though they had caught their hue from +the glittering gray that is sometimes seen just above +the gold of a cloudless sunset.</p> + +<p>We turned down the green lane that led from the +village street, and were soon in the forests. The +half-muffled sunlight stole down sweetly and tenderly +through the chaos of naked branches overhead; and +there was a light crisp, crackling sound running +through the dry fallen leaves, as though they had become +tired of their position, and were striving to +turn over. So quiet was the air that even this faint +sound was distinctly audible. Hark! whang! +whang! there rings the woodman's axe—crack! +crash! b-o-o-m!—Hurrah! what thunder that little +keen instrument has waked up there, and what +power it has! Say, ye wild, deep forests, that have +shrunk into rocky ravines, and retreated to steep +mountains, what caused ye to flee away from the +valleys and uplands of your dominion? Answer, fierce +eagle! what drove thee from thy pine of centuries +to the desolate and wind-swept peak, where alone +thou couldst rear thy brood in safety? Tell, thou +savage panther, what made the daylight flash into +thy den so suddenly, that thou didst think thy eye-balls +were extinguished?</p> + +<p>And thou, too, busy city, that dost point up thy +spires where two score years ago the forest stood a +frown upon the face of Nature—what mowed the way +for thee? And, lastly, thou radiant grain-field, what +prepared the room for thy bright and golden presence? +Whew! if that isn't a tremendous flight, I +don't know what is! But the axe, as Uncle Jack +Lummis says of his brown mare, is "a tarnal great +critter, any how!"</p> + +<p>How Settler Jake's cabin will gleam those approaching +winter nights from the "sticks" that axe +of his will give him out of the tree he has just prostrated. +It is really pleasant to think of it. There +will be the great fire-place, with a huge block for a +back-log; then a pile will be built against it large +enough for a bonfire—and then such a crackling and +streaming! why the dark night just around there will +be all in a blush with it. And the little window will +glow like a red star to the people of the village; and +then within, there will be the immense antlers over +the door, belonging to a moose Jake shot the first +year he came into the country, all tremulous with +the light, and the long rifle thrust through it will +glitter quick and keen; and the scraped powder-horn +hung by it will be transparent in redness; even the +row of bullets on the rude shelf near the window +will give a dull gleam, whilst our old acquaintance, +the axe, will wink as if a dozen eyes were strewn +along its sharp, bright edge. And then the brown +and tortoise-shell cat belonging to the "old woman" +will partake of the lustre; and the old woman herself—a +little, active, bustling body, will be seated +in one corner of the fire-place, after having swept +clean the hearth; and "Sport" will have coiled his +long body on a bear-skin near her. Lastly, the +settler himself will be sitting upon a stool opposite +"Betsey," with his elbows on his knees, +smoking a pipe as black as his face at the "spring +logging." But stop—where was I? Oh, in the +woods!"</p> + +<p>"Look! look!" cries Susan, the owner of the +gray orbs, with an accent of delight, "see that beautiful +black squirrel eating!"</p> + +<p>We all looked, and sure enough, there is the little +object in a nook of warm bronze light, with his +paws to his whiskered face, cracking nuts, one +after another, as fast as possible. But he stops, with +his paws still uplifted, looks askance for a moment, +and away he shoots then through the "brush-fence" +at our side like a dart.</p> + +<p>We soon find the tree whence he gathered his fruit. +It is a noble hickory, with here and there a brown +leaf clinging to its boughs. A stone or two brings +the globes that hold the nuts to the earth. They have +commenced cracking, and with a little exertion we +uncover the snow-white balls. We are now all determined +to rob the tree. It has no business to be +displaying its round wealth so temptingly. And, beside, +it will, if let alone, most probably entice boys +from the little black school-house out yonder to +"play truant." So it is unanimously voted that +Benning, who is light and active, should climb the +tree. Up he goes, like one of those little striped +woodpeckers that are so often seen in the woods +tapping up the trees, and immediately his hands and +feet make the branches dance, whilst the green globes +drop like great hail-stones on the earth. We then +commence stripping the nuts from their covers, and +soon the base of the tree is covered with them. We +then stow the ivories away in our bags, and start for +new havoc.</p> + +<p>We come now to the brush-fence. It is a perfect +<i>chevau-de-frize</i>. It looks at us with a sort of defying, +bristling air, as if it said as Wilson, the horse-jockey, +says when some one endeavors to hoodwink him in +a bargain, "You can't come it!"</p> + +<p>We wont try here, but a little lower down there is +a gap made by John Huff's cow, that uses her horns +so adroitly in the attack of a fence, no matter how +difficult, that I verily believe she could pick a lock. +We pass through the kindly breach and skirt the +fence for some little distance to regain the path. The +fence on this side is densely plumed with blackberry +vines. What a revel I held there two months ago. +The fruit hung around in rich masses of ebony, each +little atom composing the cone having a glittering +spot upon it like a tiny eye. How the black beauties +melted on my tongue in their dead-ripe richness. +One bush in particular was heavy with the clusters. +After despoiling the edges I opened the heart, and +there, hidden snugly away, as if for the wood-fairies, +were quantities of the sable clusters, larger and more +splendid than any I had seen. I immediately made +my way into the defences of that fortress. There +was a merciless sacking there, reader, allow me to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span> +tell you. But that is neither "here nor there" on the +present occasion.</p> + +<p>How beautifully the soft, tender dark light slumbers +on objects where the great roof of the forest will +allow it. There is an edge of deep golden lace +gleaming upon that mound of moss, and here, the +light, breaking through the overhanging beech, has +so mottled the tawny surface of the leaves beneath +as to make it appear as if a leopard-skin had been +dropped there.</p> + +<p>B-o-o-m, b-o-o-m, boom-boom—whi-r-r-r-r-r—there +sounds the drum of the partridge. We'll +rouse his speckled lordship probably below, causing +him to give his low, quick thunder-clap so as to send +the heart on a leaping visit to the throat.</p> + +<p>We now descend the ridge upon which we have +been for some time, to a glade at the foot. The sweet +haze belonging to the season is shimmering over it. +It is a broad space surrounded on all sides by the +forest. The first settler in this part of the country +had "located" himself here, and this was his little +clearing. His hut stood on an eminence in one +corner. He lived there a number of years. He was +a reserved, unsocial man, making the forest his only +haunt, and his rifle his only companion. He was at +last found dead in his cabin. Alone and unattended +he had died, keeping to the last aloof from human +society. The hut was next occupied by a singular +couple—an old man and his idiot son. The father +was of a fierce, savage temper, but seemed very fond, +although capriciously so, of his child. Sometimes +he would treat him with the greatest tenderness, +then again, at some wayward action of the idiot, he +would burst upon him with an awful explosion of +passion. The old man had evidently been a reckless +desperado in other days, and many in the village +suspected strongly that he had once been a pirate. +He was addicted to drinking, and now and then, +when bitten by the adder, would talk strangely. He +would commence narrating some wonderful hurricane +he had experienced on the Spanish Main, and +would launch out upon the number of times he had +headed boarding parties, and once, in a state of great +intoxication at the village tavern, he rambled off into +a story about his having made an old man walk the +plank. He would, however, check himself on all +these occasions before he went far. He became involved +in a fight one time with a great lounging +fellow about the village, whose propensity to bully +was the only salient point in his character. They +clinched—the old man was thrown, and the bystanders +had just time to pull the bully away, to prevent a +long keen knife in the grasp of Murdock (for such +was the old man's name) from being plunged into +his side.</p> + +<p>Suddenly the idiot-boy disappeared. The passers-by +had frequently seen him (for he was an industrious +lad) working in the little patch belonging to the +cabin, but from a certain time he was seen no more, +and the old man lived alone in his cabin. A change, +too, gradually grew over him. He became silent and +deeply melancholy, and his countenance settled into +an expression of stern, rigid sorrow. His eye was +awful. Wild and red, it seemed as if you could look +through it into a brain on fire.</p> + +<p>At last he commenced rubbing his right hand with +his left. There he would fasten his gaze, and chafe +with the most determined energy. He would frequently +stop and hold the hand to his eye for a +moment, and then recommence his strange work. +To the inquiries of the village people concerning his +son, he would give no answer. He would roll upon +the inquirer for an instant his fierce, mad eye, and +then prosecute his mysterious chafing more rigorously +than ever.</p> + +<p>Things continued so for about a fortnight after the +disappearance of the idiot, when one dark night the +village was alarmed by the appearance of flames +from the clearing. Hurrying to the spot, they were +just in time to see the blazing roof of the hut fall in. +The next morning disclosed, amidst the smouldering +ashes, a few charred bones. Murdock was not again +seen or heard of from that night.</p> + +<p>The glade is now quiet and lonely as if human +passions had never been unloosed there in the terrific +crime of parricide—the consequent remorse merging +into madness, and a fiery retributory death. Upon +the grassy mound, which the frost has not yet blighted, +a beautiful white rabbit has just glided. The lovely +creature darts onward, then crouches—now lays his +long ears flat upon his shoulders, and now points +them forward in the most knowing and cunning +manner. He plays there in his white, pure beauty, +as if in purposed contrast to the blood-stained and +guilty wretch who expired on the same spot in his +flaming torture. But the little shape now points his +long, rose-tinted ears in our direction, and then he +does not disappear as much as melt from our sight +like the vanishing of breath from polished steel. +We then enter fully into the glade. One of the trees +at the border is a magnificent chestnut. I remember +it in June, with its rich green leaves hung over with +short, braided cords of pale gold. These braided +blossoms have yielded fruit most plenteously. How +thickly the chestnuts, with their autumn-colored coats +and gray caps, are scattered around the tree, whilst +the large yellow burrs on the branches, gaping wide +open, are displaying their soft velvet inner lining in +which the embedded nuts have ripened, and which +in their maturity they have deserted.</p> + +<p>After changing the position of the little glossy +things from the earth to our satchels, we cross the +glade, and strike a narrow road that enters the forests +in that direction. We pass along, our feet sinking +deep in the dead leaves, until we come to an opening +where a bridge spans a stream. It is a slight, rude +structure, such as the emigrating settler would (and +probably did) make in a brief hour to facilitate his +passage across. Let us sketch the picture to our +imagination for a moment. We will suppose it +about an hour to sunset of a summer's day. There +is a soft richness amidst the western trees, and the +little grassy opening here is dappled with light and +shade. The emigrant's wagon is standing near the +brink, with its curved canvas top, white as silver, +in a slanting beam, and the broad tires of its huge<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span> +wheels stained green with the wood-plants and vines +they have crushed in their passage during the day. +The patient oxen, which have drawn the wagon so +far, are chewing their cud, with their honest countenances +fixed straight forward. Around the wagon +is hung a multitude of household articles—pans, pails, +kettles, brooms, and what not; and on a heap of +beds, bedding, quilts, striped blankets, &c., is the +old woman, the daughter, about eighteen, and a perfect +swarm of white-headed little ones. The father, +and his two stalwort sons, are busy in the forest +close at hand. How merrily the echoes ring out at +each blow of their axes, and how the earth groans +with the shock of the falling trees. The two largest +of the woodland giants are cut into logs—the others +are also divided into the proper lengths. The logs +are placed athwart the stream several feet distant +from each other—the rest are laid in close rows +athwart, and lo! the bridge. Over the whole scene +the warm glow of the setting sun is spread, and a +black bear, some little distance in the forest, is +thrusting his great flat head out of a hollow tree, +overseeing the proceedings with the air of a connoisseur.</p> + +<p>The bridge is now old and black, and has decayed +and been broken into quite a picturesque object. +One of the platform pieces has been fractured in the +middle, and the two ends slant upwards, as if to take +observations of the sky; and there is a great hole in +the very centre of the bridge. Add to this the moss, +which has crept over the whole structure, making +what remains of the platform a perfect cushion, and +hanging in long flakes of emerald, which fairly dip +in the water, and the whole object is before you. +The stream has a slow, still motion, with eddies, +here coiling up into wrinkles like an old man's face, +and there dimpling around some stone like the smiling +cheek of a young maiden, but in no case suffering its +demureness to break into a broad laugh of ripples. +In one spot tall bullrushes show their slender shapes +and brown wigs; in another there is a collection of +waterflags; in another there are tresses of long grass +streaming in the light flow of the current, whilst in a +nook, formed by the roots of an immense elm on +one side, and a projection of the bank on the other, +is a thick coat of stagnant green—a perfect meadow +for the frogs to hold their mass meetings in, differing +from ours, however, from the fact of theirs being +composed of all talkers and no listeners.</p> + +<p>Let us look at the stream a little, which has here +expanded into a broad surface, and view its "goings +on." There is a water-spider taking most alarming +leaps, as if afraid of wetting his feet; a dragon-fly +is darting hither and yon, his long, slender body +flashing with green, golden and purple hues; a large +dace has just apparently flattened his nose against +the dark glass inward, dotting a great and increasing +period outward. A bright birch-leaf, "the last of its +clan," has just fallen down, and been snapped at +most probably by a little spooney of a trout, thinking +it a yellow butterfly; and on the bottom, which, +directly under our eyes is shallow, are several +water-insects crawling along like locomotive spots +of shadow and reflected through the tremulous medium +into distorted shapes. However, we have +lingered here long enough—let us onward.</p> + +<p>What on earth is that uproar which is now striking +our ear. Such hoarse notes, such rapid flutterings, +whizzings, deep rumbling sounds, and such a rustle +of dead leaves surely betoken something. We turn +an elbow of the road, and a flashing of blue wings, +and darting of blue shapes in the air, now circling +round, now shooting up, and now down, with a +large beech tree for the centre, meet our eyes. The +tumult is explained. A colony of wild pigeons is +busy amongst the beech-nuts, which the frost has +showered upon the earth. The ground for some distance +around the tree is perfectly blue with the birds +picking, and fighting, and scrambling. It is ludicrous +to see them. Here a score or two are busy eating, +looking like a collection of big-paunched, blue-coated +aldermen at a city feast; there, all are hurrying and +jostling, and tumbling over one another like the +passengers of a steamboat when the bell rings for +dinner. By the side of yonder bush there is a perfect +duel transpiring between two pugnacious pigeons +dashing out their wings fiercely at each other with +angry tones, their beautiful purple necks all swollen, +and their red eyes casting devouring looks, whilst +two others are very quietly, yet swiftly, as if making +the most of their time, causing all the nuts in sight, +and which probably induced the quarrel, disappear +down their own throats. See! here is a pigeon who +has over-estimated his capacity of swallowing, or +has encountered a larger nut than usual, for he is +exhibiting the most alarming symptoms of choking. +He stretches his neck and opens his bill like a cock +in the act of crowing, at the same time dancing up +and down on his pink legs as if his toes had caught +fire. However, he has mastered the nut at last with +a vigorous shake of his neck, and bobs industriously +again at his feast.</p> + +<p>Determining to have some of the brown luscious +mast, we make a foray amongst the gorging host, +and succeeded in causing a cloud of them to take wing, +and in securing a quantity of the spoil.</p> + +<p>We then start again on our way, but do not advance +far before—b-r-r-r-r-r-h—off bursts a partridge, +and shoots down the vista of the road, with the dark +sunshine glancing from his mottled back. If little +"Spitfire" was here, how he would yelp and dance, +and dart backward and forward, and shake his tail, +so as to render it doubtful whether it wouldn't fly +off in a tangent.</p> + +<p>Rattat, tattat, tat—tat—t-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r—there is the +great red-headed woodpecker, or woodcock, as he +is called by the country people, looking like a miniature +man with a crimson turban and sable spear, +attacking the bark of yon old oak. He is making a +sounding-board of the seamed mail of the venerable +monarch, to detect by the startled writhing within +the grub snugly ensconced, as it thinks, there, in +order to transfix it with his sharp tongue through the +hole made by his bill. He ceases his work though as +we approach—and now he flies away.</p> + +<p>A mile farther, we come to the strawberry-field<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span> +belonging to Deacon Gravespeech, the outlines of +whose dark, low farm-house are etched on the mist +which is again slowly spreading over the landscape, +for it is now near sunset. Having left the +forest, we see the mild red orb, like an immense +ruby, just in the act of sinking in the bank of pale +blue which now thickens the Western horizon. But +what have we here? A splendid butternut tree, +with quantities of the oval fruit scattered about +amidst the brown leaves, in their coats of golden +green. What a rich lustre is upon them, made +brighter by the varnish, and how delightful their +pungent perfume. Let us crack a few of the strong, +deeply-fluted shells. In their tawny nooks nestle +the dark, golden-veined meats, which with the most +delicious sweetness crumble in the mouth.</p> + +<p>Of all the fruits of the Northern forests give me +the butternut; and, speaking of fruits puts me in +mind of the strawberry field. I was here with a +small party one day last June. The field was then +scattered thickly over with the bright crimson spotting +fruit, and the fingers of all of us were soon dyed +deeply with the sweet blood. There is great skill in +picking strawberries, let me tell you, reader, although +it is a trifle. Go to work systematically, and don't +get excited. Gather all as you go, indiscriminately. +Don't turn to the right for two splendid berries, and +leave the one in front, for it is just as likely, before +you gather the two, a cluster, with five ripe tempting +fellows, will cause you to forget the others, and +in whirling yourself around, and stretching over to +seize the latest prize, your feet and limbs not only +destroy the first and second, but a whole collection +of the blushing beauties hid away in a little hollow +of buttercups and dandelions.</p> + +<p>Well, "as I was saying," I was here with a small +party, and had fine sport picking, but the next day +a precept, at the suit of Peter Gravespeech, was +served upon Hull and myself, (the two gentlemen of +the party,) issued from "Pettifogger's Delight," as +the office of Squire Tappit, the justice, was called +throughout the village: action, trespass. "For the +fun of the thing" we stood trial. The day came, +and all the vagabonds of the village,—those whose +continual cry is that they "can never get any thing +to do," and therefore drive a brisk business at doing +nothing,—were in attendance. The justice was a +hot-tempered old fellow, somewhat deaf, and,—if his +nose was any evidence,—fond of the brandy bottle.</p> + +<p>The witness of the trespass, who was a "hired +hand" of Deacon Gravespeech, was present, and +after the cause had been called in due order, was +summoned by the deacon (who appeared in proper +person) to the stand. He was generally very irascible, +a good deal of a bully, rather stupid, and, on the +present occasion, particularly drunk.</p> + +<p>"Now, Mr. Hicks," said the deacon, respectfully, +(knowing his man,) after he had 'kissed the book,' +"now, Mr. Hicks (his name was Joe Hicks, but +universally called 'Saucy Joe,') please tell the justice +what you know of this transaction."</p> + +<p>"Well, squire, I seed 'em!" replied Joe, to this +appeal, facing the justice.</p> + +<p>"Who?" ejaculated the justice, quickly.</p> + +<p>"Who!" answered Joe, "why, who do you +spose, but that'ere sour-faced feller, (pointing at Hull,) +what looks like a cow swelled on clover, and that 'ere +little nimshi, who isn't bigger than my Poll's knitten +needle. They was with four female critters."</p> + +<p>"Well, what were they about?" asked the deacon.</p> + +<p>"What was they about!" (a little angrily,) "you +know as well as I do, deacon, for I telled ye all +about it at the time."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but you must tell the justice."</p> + +<p>"Answer, witness!" exclaimed the justice, somewhat +sternly.</p> + +<p>"Oh! you needn't be flusterfied, Squire Tappit; +I knowed ye long afore ye was squire, and drinked +with ye, too. For that matter, I stood treat last!"</p> + +<p>"That's of no consequence now, Mr. Hicks," interposed +the deacon, throwing at the same time a +deprecatory glance at the old justice, whose nose +was growing redder, and whose eye began to twinkle +in incipient wrath.</p> + +<p>"Let the gentleman proceed with his interesting +developments," said Hull, rising with the most ludicrous +gravity, and waving his hand in a solemn +and dignified manner.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Joe, a little mollified at the word +'gentleman,' "ef I must tell it agin, I must, that's +all. They was a picken strawberries like Old +Sanko."</p> + +<p>"How long do you think they were there, trampling +down the grass?" asked the deacon.</p> + +<p>"Why, I spose from the time I seed 'em"—here +he stopped abruptly, glanced out of the window +toward the tavern, spit thirstily, and then looked at +the deacon.</p> + +<p>"Let the gentleman proceed," again cried Hull, +half rising, in mock respect.</p> + +<p>"<i>Pro</i>ceed!" said the justice, angrily.</p> + +<p>"Well, as I was a sayen, from the time I seed +'em—— But I say, deacon, I'm monstrous dry. +You're temp'rance I know; but sposen as how you +treat me and old Squire Tappit there to some red +eye. He won't refuse, no how you can fix it, and +as for me, I am so dry I really can't talk."</p> + +<p>"Go on with your story, you scoundrel!" shouted +the justice, exasperated beyond all bounds, "or I'll +commit you to prison."</p> + +<p>"Commit me to prison, you old brandy-jug!" +yelled Joe, swinging off his ragged coat at a jerk, +and throwing it on the floor, "commit <i>me</i>, you mahogany-nosed +old sarpent!" advancing close to the +justice, with both of his great fists ready.</p> + +<p>"Let the gentleman proceed," here broke in Hull +again, in an agony of laughter.</p> + +<p>And, sure enough, the "gentleman" did proceed. +Launching out his right fist in the most approved +fashion at the nose of the justice, Joe was in an +instant the center of a perfect Pandemonium. The +constable rushed in to protect the justice, who was +shouting continually, "I command the peace;" the +bystanders, ready for a fight at any time, followed his +example, and, for a few minutes, there was a perfect<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span> +chaos of arms, legs, and heads, sticking out in every +direction.</p> + +<p>The first thing Hull and I saw were the heels of +the justice flourishing in the air, and the last was +Joe going off to jail in the grasp of the constable one +way, and the deacon sneaking off another. We +never heard afterward of the suit, but "Let the +gentleman proceed," was for a long time a by-word +amongst us in the village.</p> + +<p>After crossing the strawberry field we came to a +"cross-road" leading to the turnpike. In a few +minutes we arrived at "Cold Spring," where a little +streak of water ran through a hollowed log, green +with moss, from the fountain a short distance in the +forest, and fell into a pebbly basin at the road-side. +We here refreshed ourselves with repeated draughts +of the sweet, limpid element, and then, resuming +our walk, soon found ourselves upon the broad, gray +turnpike, with the village upon the summit of the +hill, about half a mile in front.</p> + +<p>The sun had long since plunged into the slate-colored +haze of the West; the thickening landscape +looked dull and faded; the mist was glimmering before +the darkened forests; the cows were wending +homeward, lowing; the woodsmen passed us with +axes on their shoulders; and, mounting the hill, we +saw here and there, a light sparkling in the village, +following the example of the scattered stars that +were timidly glancing from the dome of the purpled +heavens.</p> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_LOST_PET" id="THE_LOST_PET"></a>THE LOST PET</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY MRS. LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<h5>[SEE ENGRAVING.]</h5> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Mary's brother went to sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">He lingered near the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beside the old, familiar tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">He ne'er had left before,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And though gay boyhood loves to seek<br /></span> +<span class="i1">New regions where to tread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A pearl-drop glittered on his cheek<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As tenderly he said—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"The gentle dove I reared with care,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Sister, I leave to thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let it thy protection share<br /></span> +<span class="i1">When I am far at sea."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whene'er for Willy's loss she grieved,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">His darling she caressed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That from her hand its food received,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or nestled in her breast;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And sometimes, at the twilight dim,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">When blossoms bow to sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She thought it murmuring asked for him<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Whose home was on the deep.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And if her mother's smile of joy<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Was lost in anxious thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As memories of her sailor-boy<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Some gathering tempest wrought,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She showed his pet, the cooing dove,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Perched on her sheltering arm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And felt how innocence and love<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Can rising wo disarm.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When summer decked the leafy bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And pranked the russet plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She bore his cage where breathing flowers<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Inspired a tuneful strain;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now and then, through open door,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Indulged a wish to roam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though soon, the brief excursion o'er,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The wanderer sought its home.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She laughed to see it brush the dew<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From bough and budding spray.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And deemed its snow-white plumage grew<br /></span> +<span class="i1">More beauteous, day by day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The rose of June was in its flush,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And 'neath the fragrant shade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of her own fullest, fairest bush<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The favorite's house was staid,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While roving, bird-like, here and there,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Amid her flow'rets dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She culled a nosegay, rich and rare,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A mother's heart to cheer.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A shriek! A flutter! Swift as thought<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Her startled footstep flew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But full of horror was the sight<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That met her eager view—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her treasure in a murderer's jaws!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">One of that feline race<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose wily looks and velvet paws<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Conceal their purpose base.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And scarce the victim's gushing breast<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Heaved with one feeble breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though raised to hers, its glance exprest<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Affection even in death.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, stricken child! though future years<br /></span> +<span class="i1">May frown with heavier shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When woman's lot of love and tears<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Is on thy spirit laid—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet never can a wilder cry<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Thy heart-wrung anguish prove<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than when before thy swimming eye<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Expired that wounded dove.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 656px;"> +<img src="images/illus195.png" width="656" height="800" +alt="THE LOST PET" title="" /></div> +<h4>THE LOST PET</h4> +<h5>Engraved Expressly for Graham's Magazine</h5> +<h5>Figure from I. M. Wright. Drawn with original scenery & engraved by Ellis.</h5> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIEL_A_LA_MUERTE_OR_TRUE_LOVES_DEVOTION" +id="FIEL_A_LA_MUERTE_OR_TRUE_LOVES_DEVOTION"></a> +FIEL A LA MUERTE, OR TRUE LOVE'S DEVOTION.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span> + +<h3>A TALE OF THE TIMES OF LOUIS QUINZE.</h3> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT, AUTHOR OF "THE ROMAN TRAITOR," "MARMADUKE WYVIL," "CROMWELL," ETC.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<h5>(<i>Concluded from page</i> 91.)</h5> + + +<h3>PART III.</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For there were seen in that dark wall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Two niches, narrow, dark and tall.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who enters by such grisly door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall ne'er, I ween, find exit more.—<span class="smcap">Walter Scott.</span><br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<p>It would be wonderful, were it not of daily occurrence, +and to be observed by all who give attention +to the characteristics of the human mind, how quickly +confidence, even when shaken to its very foundations, +and almost obliterated, springs up again, and +recovers all its strength in the bosoms of the young +of either sex.</p> + +<p>Let but a few more years pass over the heart, and +when once broken, if it be only by a slight suspicion, +or a half unreal cause, it will scarce revive again in +a life-time; nor then, unless proofs the strongest and +most unquestionable can be adduced to overpower +the doubts which have well-nigh annihilated it.</p> + +<p>In early youth, however, before long contact with +the world has blunted the susceptibilities, and hardened +the sympathies of the soul, before the constant +experience of the treachery, the coldness, the ingratitude +of men has given birth to universal doubt and +general distrust, the shadow vanishes as soon as the +cloud which cast it is withdrawn, and the sufferer +again believes, alas! too often, only to be again +deceived.</p> + +<p>Thus it was with St. Renan, who a few minutes +before had given up even the last hope, who had +ceased, as he thought, to believe even in the possibility +of faith or honor among men, of constancy, or +purity, or truth in women, no sooner saw his Melanie, +whom he knew to be the wife of another, solitary +and in tears, no sooner felt her inanimate form reclining +on his bosom, than he was prepared to believe +any thing, rather than believe her false.</p> + +<p>Indeed, her consternation at his appearance, her +evident dismay, not unnatural in an age wherein +skepticism and infidelity were marvelously mingled +with credulity and superstition, her clear conviction +that it was not himself in mortal blood and being, did +go far to establish the fact, that she had been deceived +either casually or—which was far more probable—by +foul artifice, into the belief that her beloved and +plighted husband was no longer with the living.</p> + +<p>The very exclamation which she uttered last, ere +she sunk senseless into his arms, uttered, as she +imagined, in the presence of the immortal spirit of +the injured dead, "I am true, Raoul—true to the last, +my beloved!" rang in his ears with a power and a +meaning which convinced him of her veracity.</p> + +<p>"She could not lie!" he muttered to himself, "in +the presence of the living dead! God be praised! +she is true, and we shall yet be happy!"</p> + +<p>How beautiful she looked, as she lay there, unconscious +and insensible even of her own existence. +If time and maturity had improved Raoul's person, +and added the strength and majesty of manhood to +the grace and pliability of youth, infinitely more had +it bestowed on the beauty of his betrothed. He +had left her a beautiful girl just blooming out of girlhood, +he found her a mature, full-blown woman, +with all the flush and flower of complete feminine +perfection, before one charm has become too luxuriant, +or one drop of the youthful dew exhaled from +the new expanded blossom.</p> + +<p>She had shot up, indeed, to a height above the +ordinary stature of women—straight, erect, and +graceful as a young poplar, slender, yet full withal, +exquisitely and voluptuously rounded, and with +every sinuous line and swelling curve of her soft +form full of the poetry and beauty both of repose and +motion.</p> + +<p>Her complexion was pale as alabaster; even her +cheeks, except when some sudden tide of passion, or +some strong emotion sent the impetuous blood coursing +thither more wildly than its wont, were colorless, +but there was nothing sallow or sickly, nothing of +that which is ordinarily understood by the word +pallid, in their clear, warm, transparent purity; +nothing, in a word, of that lividness which the French, +with more accuracy than we, distinguish from the +healthful paleness which is so beautiful in southern +women.</p> + +<p>Her hair, profuse almost to redundance, was perfectly +black, but of that warm and lustrous blackness +which is probably the hue expressed by the ancient +Greeks by the term hyacinthine, and which in certain +lights has a purplish metallic gloss playing over +it, like the varying reflections on the back of the +raven. Her strongly defined, and nearly straight +eyebrows, were dark as night, as were the long, +silky lashes which were displayed in clear relief +against the fair, smooth cheek, as the lids lay closed +languidly over the bright blue eyes.</p> + +<p>It was a minute or two before Melanie moved or +gave any symptoms of recovering from her fainting +fit, and during those minutes the lips of Raoul had +been pressed so often and so warmly to those of the +fair insensible, that had any spark of perception remained +to her, the fond and lingering pressure could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span> +not have failed to call the "purple light of love," to +her ingenuous face.</p> + +<p>At length a long, slow shiver ran through the +form of the senseless girl, and thrilled, like the touch +of the electric wire, every nerve in St. Renan's +body.</p> + +<p>Then the soft rosy lips were unclosed, and forth +rushed the ambrosial breath in a long, gentle sigh, +and the beautiful bust heaved and undulated, like +the bosom of the calm sea, when the first breathings +of the coming storm steal over it, and wake, as if by +sympathy, its deep pulsations.</p> + +<p>He clasped her closer to his heart, half fearful that +when life and perfect consciousness should be restored +to that exquisite frame, it would start from +his embrace, if not in anger or alarm, at least as if +from a forbidden and illicit pleasure.</p> + +<p>Gradually a faint rosy hue, slight as the earliest +blushes of the morning sky, crept over her white +cheeks, and deepened into a rich passionate flush; +and at the same moment the azure-tinctured lids were +unclosed slowly, and the large, radiant, bright-blue +eyes beamed up into his own, half languid still, but +gleaming through their dewy languor, with an expression +which he must have been, indeed, blind to +mistake for aught but the strongest of unchanged, +unchangeable affection.</p> + +<p>It was evident that she knew him now; that the +momentary terror, arising rather, perhaps, from fear +than from superstition, which had converted the +young ardent soldier into a visitant from beyond +those gloomy portals through which no visitant returns, +had passed from her mind, and that she had +already recognized, although she spoke not, her +living lover.</p> + +<p>And though she recognized him, she sought not to +withdraw herself from the enclosure of his sheltering +arms, but lay there on his bosom, with her head +reclined on his shoulder, and her eyes drinking long +draughts of love from his fascinated gaze, as if she +were his own, and that her appropriate place of refuge +and protection.</p> + +<p>"Oh! Raoul," she exclaimed, at length, in a low, +soft whisper, "is it, indeed, you—you, whom I have +so long wept as dead—you, whom I was even now +weeping as one lost to me forever, when you are +thus restored to me!"</p> + +<p>"It is I, Melanie," he answered mournfully, "it is +I, alive, and in health; but better far had I been in +truth dead, as they have told you, rather than thus a +survivor of all happiness, of all hopes; spared only +from the grave to know <i>you</i> false, and myself forgotten."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, Raoul, not false!" she cried wildly, as +she started from his arms, "oh, not forgotten! think +you," she added, blushing crimson, "that had I loved +any but you, that had I not loved you with my whole +heart and being, I had lain thus on your bosom, thus +endured your caresses? Oh, no, no, never false! nor +for one moment forgotten?"</p> + +<p>"But what avails it, if you do love no other—what +profits it, if you do love me? Are you not—are +you not, false girl,—alas! that these lips should +speak it,—the wife of another—the promised mistress +of the king?"</p> + +<p>"I—I—Raoul!" she exclaimed, with such a +blending of wonder and loathing in her face, such an +expression of indignation on her tongue, that her +lover perceived at once, that, whatever might be the +infamy of her father, of her husband, of this climax +of falsehood and self-degradation, she, at least, was +guiltless.</p> + +<p>"The mistress of the king! what king? what mean +you? are you distraught?"</p> + +<p>"Ha! you are ignorant, you are innocent of that, +then. You are not yet indoctrinated into the noble +uses for which your honorable lord intends you. It +is the town's talk, Melanie. How is it you, whom +it most concerns, alone have not heard it?"</p> + +<p>"Raoul," she said, earnestly, imploringly, "I +know not if there be any meaning in your words, +except to punish me, to torture me, for what you +deem my faithlessness, but if there be, I implore +you, I conjure you, by your father's noble name; by +your mother's honor, show me the worst; but listen +to me first, for by the God that made us both, and +now hears my words, I am not faithless."</p> + +<p>"Not faithless? Are you not the wife of another?"</p> + +<p>"No!" she replied enthusiastically. "I am not. +For I am yours, and while you live I cannot wed +another. Whom God hath joined man cannot put +asunder."</p> + +<p>"I fear me that plea will avail us little," Raoul +answered. "But say on, dearest Melanie, and believe +that there is nothing you can ask which I will +not give you gladly—even if it were my own life-blood. +Say on, so shall we best arrive at the truth +of this intricate and black affair."</p> + +<p>"Mark me, then, Raoul, for every word I shall +speak is as true as the sun in heaven. It is near two +years now since we heard that you had fallen in +battle, and that your body had been carried off by the +barbarians. Long! long I hoped and prayed, but +prayers and hopes were alike in vain. I wrote to +you often, as I promised, but no line from you has +reached me, since the day when you sailed for India, +and that made me fear that the dread news was true. +But at the last, to make assurance doubly sure, all +my own letters were returned to me six months since, +with their seals unbroken, and an endorsement from +the authorities in India that the person addressed was +not to be found. Then hope itself was over; and my +father, who never from the first had doubted that you +were no more—"</p> + +<p>"Out on him! out on him! the heartless villain!" +the young man interrupted her indignantly. "He +knows, as well as I myself, that I am living; although +it is no fault of his or his coadjutors that I am so. +He knows not as yet, however, that I am <i>here</i>; but +he shall know it ere long to his cost, my Melanie."</p> + +<p>"At least," she answered in a faltering voice, "at +least he <i>swore</i> to me that you were dead; and never +having ceased to persecute me, since the day that +fatal tidings reached, to become the wife of La +Rochederrien, now Marquis de Ploermel, he now +became doubly urgent—"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span></p> + +<p>"And you, Melanie! you yielded! I had thought +you would have died sooner."</p> + +<p>"I had no choice but to yield, Raoul. Or at least +but the choice of that old man's hand, or an eternal +dungeon. The <i>lettres de cachet</i> were signed, and +you dead, and on the conditions I extorted from the +marquis, I became in name, Raoul, only in name, by +all my hopes of Heaven! the wife of the man whom +you pronounce, wherefore, I cannot dream, the basest +of mankind. Now tell me."</p> + +<p>"And did it never strike you as being wonderful +and most unnatural that this Ploermel, who is neither +absolutely a dotard nor an old woman, should accept +your hand upon this condition?"</p> + +<p>"I was too happy to succeed in extorting it to +think much of that," she answered.</p> + +<p>"<i>Extorted!</i>" replied Raoul bitterly, "And how, +I pray you, is this condition which you extorted +ratified or made valid?"</p> + +<p>"It is signed by himself, and witnessed by my own +father, that, being I regard myself the wife of the +dead, he shall ask no more of familiarity from me +than if I were the bride of heaven!"</p> + +<p>"The double villains!"</p> + +<p>"But wherefore villains, Raoul?" exclaimed Melanie.</p> + +<p>"I tell you, girl, it is a compact—a base, hellish +compact—with the foul despot, the disgrace of kings, +the opprobrium of France, who sits upon the throne, +dishonoring it daily! A compact such as yet was +never entered into by a father and a husband, even +of the lowest of mankind! A compact to deliver +you a spotless virgin-victim to the vile-hearted and +luxurious tyrant. Curses! a thousand curses on his +soul! and on my own soul! who have fought and +bled for him, and all to meet with this, as my reward +of service!"</p> + +<p>"Great God! can these things be," she exclaimed, +almost fainting with horror and disgust. "Can these +things indeed be? But speak, Raoul, speak; how +can you know all this?"</p> + +<p>"I tell you, Melanie, it is the talk, the very daily, +hourly gossip of the streets, the alleys, nay, even the +very kennels of Paris. Every one knows it—every +one believes it, from the monarch in the Louvre to +the lowest butcher of the Faubourg St. Antoine!</p> + +<p>"And they believe it—of me, of <i>me</i>, they believe +this infamy!"</p> + +<p>"With this addition, if any addition were needed, +that you are not a deceived victim, but a willing and +proud participator in the shame."</p> + +<p>"I will—that is—" she corrected herself, speaking +very rapidly and energetically—"I <i>would</i> die sooner. +But there is no need now to die. You have come +back to me, and all will yet go well with us!"</p> + +<p>"It never can go well with us again," St. Renan +answered gloomily. "The king never yields his +purpose, he is as tenacious in his hold as reckless +in his promptitude to seize. And they are paid beforehand."</p> + +<p>"Paid!" exclaimed the girl, shuddering at the +word. "What atrocity! How paid?"</p> + +<p>"How, think you, did your good father earn his +title and the rich governorship of Morlaix? What +great deeds were rewarded to La Rochederrien by +his marquisate, and this captaincy of mousquetaires. +You know not yet, young lady, what virtue there is +nowadays in being the accommodating father, or +the convenient husband of a beauty!"</p> + +<p>"You speak harshly, St. Renan, and bitterly."</p> + +<p>"And if I do, have I not cause enough for bitterness +and harshness?" he replied almost angrily.</p> + +<p>"Not against me, Raoul."</p> + +<p>"I am not bitter against you, Melanie. And yet—and +yet—"</p> + +<p>"And yet <i>what</i>, Raoul?"</p> + +<p>"And yet had you resisted three days longer, we +might have been saved—you might have been +mine—"</p> + +<p>"I am yours, Raoul de St. Renan. Yours, ever +and forever! No one's but only yours."</p> + +<p>"You speak but madness—your vow—the sacrament!"</p> + +<p>"To the winds with my vow—to the abyss with +the fraudful sacrament!" she cried, almost fiercely. +By sin it was obtained and sanctioned—in sin let it +perish. I say—I swear, Raoul, if you will take me, +I am yours."</p> + +<p>"Mine? Mine?" cried the young man, half bewildered. +"How mine, and when?"</p> + +<p>"Thus," she replied, casting herself upon his +breast, and winding her arms around his neck, and +kissing his lips passionately and often. "Thus, +Raoul, thus, and now!"</p> + +<p>He returned her embrace fondly once, but the next +instant he removed her almost forcibly from his +breast, and held her at arm's length.</p> + +<p>"No, no!" he exclaimed, "not thus, not thus! If +at all, honestly, openly, holily, in the face of day! +May my soul perish, ere cause come through me +why you should ever blush to show your front aloft +among the purest and the proudest. No, no, not thus, +my own Melanie!"</p> + +<p>The girl burst into a paroxysm of tears and sobbing, +through which she hardly could contrive to make her +interrupted and faultering words audible.</p> + +<p>"If not now," she said at length, "it will never +be. For, hear me, Raoul, and pity me, to-morrow +they are about to drag me to Paris."</p> + +<p>The lover mused for several moments very deeply, +and then replied, "Listen to me, Melanie. If you +are in earnest, if you are true, and can be firm, there +may yet be happiness in store for us, and that very +shortly."</p> + +<p>"Do you doubt me, Raoul?"</p> + +<p>"I do not doubt you, Melanie. But ever as in +my own wildest rapture, even to gain my own extremest +bliss, I would not do aught that could possibly +cast one shadow on your pure renown, so, mark me, +would I not take you to my heart were there one +spot, though it were but as a speck in the all-glorious +sun, upon the brightness of your purity."</p> + +<p>"I believe you, Raoul. I feel, I know that my +honor, that my purity is all in all to you.</p> + +<p>"I would die a thousand deaths," he made answer, +"ere even a false report should fall on it, to mar its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span> +virgin whiteness. Marvel not then that I ask as +much of you."</p> + +<p>"Ask anything, St. Renan. It <i>is</i> granted."</p> + +<p>"In France we can hope for nothing. But there +are other lands than France. We must fly; and +thanks to these documents which you have wrung +from them, and the proofs which I can easily obtain, +this cursed marriage can be set aside, and then, in +honor and in truth you can be mine, mine own Melanie."</p> + +<p>"God grant it so, Raoul."</p> + +<p>"It shall be so, beloved. Be you but firm, and it +may be done right speedily. I will sell the estates +of St. Renan—by a good chance, supposing me dead, +the Lord of Yrvilliac was in treaty for it with my +uncle. That can be arranged forthwith. Conduct +yourself according to your wont, cool and as distant +as may be with this villain of Ploermel; avoid above +all things to let your father see that you are buoyed +by any hope, or moved by any passion. Treat the +king with deliberate scorn, if he approach you over +boldly. Beware how you eat or drink in his company, +for he is capable of all things, even of drugging +you into insensibility, and here," he added, taking a +small poniard, of exquisite workmanship, with a +gold hilt and scabbard, from his girdle, and giving it +to her, "wear <i>this</i> at all times, and if he dare attempt +violence, were he thrice a king, <i>use it</i>!"</p> + +<p>"I will—I will—trust me, Raoul! I <i>will</i> use it, and +that to his sorrow! My heart is strong, and my hand +brave <i>now</i>—now that I know you to be living. Now +that I have hope to nerve me, I will fear nothing, but +dare all things."</p> + +<p>"Do so, do so, my beloved, and you shall have +no cause to fear, for I will be ever near you. I will +tarry here but one day; and ere you reach Paris, I +will be there, be certain. Within ten days, I doubt +not I can convert my acres into gold, and ship that +gold across the narrow straits; and that done, the +speed of horses, and a swift sailing ship will soon +have us safe in England; and if that land be not so +fair, or so dear as our own France, at least there are +no tyrants there, like this Louis; and there are laws, +they say, which guard the meanest man as safely and +as surely as the proudest noble."</p> + +<p>"A happy land, Raoul. I would that we were +there even now."</p> + +<p>"We will be there ere long, fear nothing. But +tell me, whom have you near your person on whom +we may rely. There must be some one through +whom we may communicate in Paris. It may be +that I shall require to see you."</p> + +<p>"Oh! you remember Rose, Raoul—little Rose +Faverney, who has lived with me ever since she +was a child—a pretty little black-eyed damsel."</p> + +<p>"Surely I do remember her. Is she with you yet? +That will do admirably, then, if she be faithful, as I +think she is; and unless I forget, what will serve us +better yet, she loves my page Jules de Marliena. +He has not forgotten her, I promise you."</p> + +<p>"Ah! Jules—we grow selfish, I believe, as we +grow old, Raoul. I have not thought to ask after one +of your people. So Jules remembers little Rose, +and loves her yet; that will, indeed, secure her, even +had she been doubtful, which she is not. She is as +true as steel—truer, I fear, than even I; for she reproached +me bitterly four evenings since, and swore +she would be buried alive, much more willingly imprisoned, +than be married to the Marquis de Ploermel, +though she was only plighted to the Vicomte Raoul's +page! Oh! we may trust in her with all certainty."</p> + +<p>"Send her, then, on the very same night that you +reach Paris, so soon as it is dark, to my uncle's +house in the Place de St. Louis. I think she knows +it, and let her ask—not for me—but for Jules. Ere +then I will know something definite of our future; +and fear nothing, love, all shall go well with us. +Love such as ours, with faith, and right, and honesty +and honor to support it, cannot fail to win, blow what +wind may. And now, sweet Melanie, the night +is wearing onward, and I fear that they may miss +you. Kiss me, then, once more, sweet girl, and +farewell."</p> + +<p>"Not for the last, Raoul," she cried, with a gay +smile, casting herself once again into her lover's +arms, and meeting his lips with a long, rapturous kiss.</p> + +<p>"Not by a thousand, and a thousand! But now, +angel, farewell for a little space. I hate to bid you +leave me, but I dare not ask you to stay; even now +I tremble lest you should be missed and they should +send to seek you. For were they but to suspect that +I am here and have seen you, it would, at the best, +double all our difficulties. Fare you well, sweetest +Melanie."</p> + +<p>"Fare you well," she replied; "fare you well, +my own best beloved Raoul," and she put up the +glittering dagger, as she spoke, into the bosom of +her dress; but as she did so, she paused and said, "I +wish <i>this</i> had not been your first gift to me, Raoul, +for they say that such gifts are fatal, to love at least, +if not to life."</p> + +<p>"Fear not! fear not!" answered the young man, +laughing gayly, "our love is immortal. It may defy +the best steel blade that was ever forged on Milan +stithy to cut it asunder. Fare you—but, hush! who +comes here; it is too late, yet fly—fly, Melanie!"</p> + +<p>But she did not fly, for as he spoke, a tall, gayly +dressed cavalier burst through the coppice on the +side next the château d'Argenson, exclaiming, "So, +my fair cousin!—this is your faith to my good brother +of Ploermel is it?"</p> + +<p>But, before he spoke, she had whispered to Raoul, +"It is the Chevalier de Pontrein, de Ploermel's half +brother. Alas! all is lost."</p> + +<p>"Not so! not so!" answered her lover, also in a +whisper, "leave him to me, I will detain him. Fly, +by the upper pathway and through the orchard to the +château, and remember—you have not seen this dog. +So much deceit is pardonable. Fly, I say, Melanie. +Look not behind for your life, whatever you may +hear, nor tarry. All rests now on your steadiness +and courage."</p> + +<p>"Then all is safe," she answered firmly and aloud, +and without casting a glance toward the cavalier, +who was now within ten paces of her side, or taking +the smallest notice of his words, she kissed her hand<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span> +to St. Renan, and bounded up the steep path, in the +opposite direction, with so fleet a step as soon carried +her beyond the sound of all that followed, though +that was neither silent nor of small interest.</p> + +<p>"Do you not hear me, madam. By Heaven! but +you carry it off easily!" cried the young cavalier, setting +off at speed, as if to follow her. "But you must +run swifter than a roe if you look to 'scape me;" +and with the words, he attempted to rush past Raoul, +of whom he affected, although he knew him well, to +take no notice.</p> + +<p>But in that intent he was quickly frustrated, for +the young count grasped him by the collar as he endeavored +to pass, with a grasp of iron, and said to +him in an ironical tone of excessive courtesy,</p> + +<p>"Sweet sir, I fear you have forgotten me, that +you should give me the go-by thus, when it is so long +a time since we have met, and we such dear friends, +too,"</p> + +<p>But the young man was in earnest, and very angry, +and struggled to release himself from St. Renan's +grasp, until, having no strong reasons for forbearance, +but many for the reverse, Raoul, too, lost his temper.</p> + +<p>"By heaven!" he exclaimed, "I believe that you +do <i>not</i> know me, or you would not dare to suppose +that I would suffer you to follow a lady who seeks +not your presence or society."</p> + +<p>"Let me go, St. Renan!" returned the other fiercely, +laying his hand on his dagger's hilt. "Let me go, +villain, or you shall rue it!"</p> + +<p>"Villain!" Raoul repeated, calmly, "villain! It +is so you call me, hey?" and he did instantly release +him, drawing his sword as he did so. "Draw, De +Pontrien—that word has cost you your life!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, villain!" repeated the other, "villain to +you teeth! But you lie! it is your life that is forfeit—forfeit +to my brother's honor!"</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha!" laughed Raoul, savagely. "Ha-ha-ha-ha! +your brother's honor! who the devil ever +heard before of a pandar's honor—even if he were +Sir Pandarus to a king? Sa! sa!—have at you!"</p> + +<p>Their blades crossed instantly, and they fought +fiercely, and with something like equality for some +ten minutes. The Chevalier de Pontrien was far +more than an ordinary swordsman, and he was in +earnest, not angry, but savage and determined, and +full of bitter hatred, and a fixed resolution to punish +the familiarity of Raoul with his brother's wife. +But that was a thing easier proposed than executed; +for St. Renan, who had left France as a boy already +a perfect master of fence, had learned the practice +of the blade against the swordsmen of the East, the +finest swordsmen of the world, and had added to skill, +science and experience, the iron nerves, the deep +breath, and the unwearied strength of a veteran.</p> + +<p>If he fought slowly, it was that he fought carefully—that +he meant the first wound to be the last. He +was resolved that De Pontrien never should return +home again to divulge what he had seen, and he had +the coolness, the skill, and the power to carry out +his resolution.</p> + +<p>At the end of ten minutes he attacked. Six times +within as many seconds he might have inflicted a +severe, perhaps a deadly wound on his antagonist; +and he, too, perceived it, but it would not have been +surely mortal.</p> + +<p>"Come, come!" cried De Pontrien, at last, growing +impatient and angry at the idea of being played +with. "Come, sir, you are my master, it seems. +Make an end of this."</p> + +<p>"Do not be in a hurry," replied St. Renan, with a +deadly smile, "it will come soon enough. There! +will that suit you?"</p> + +<p>And with the word he made a treble feint and +lounged home. So true was the thrust that the +point pierced the very cavity of his heart. So strongly +was it sent home that the hilt smote heavily on +his breast-bone. He did not speak or groan, but +drew one short, broken sigh, and fell dead on the +instant.</p> + +<p>"The fool!" muttered St. Renan. "Wherefore +did he meddle where he had no business? But what +the devil shall I do with him? He must not be found, +or all will out—and that were ruin."</p> + +<p>As he spoke, a distant clap of thunder was heard +to the eastward, and a few heavy drops of rain began +to fall, while a heavy mass of black thunder-clouds +began to rise rapidly against the wind.</p> + +<p>"There will be a fierce storm in ten minutes, +which will soon wash out all this evidence," he said, +looking down at the trampled and blood-stained +greensward. "One hour hence, and there will not +be a sign of this, if I can but dispose of him. Ha!" +he added, as a quick thought struck him, "The +Devil's Drinking-Cup! Enough! it is done!"</p> + +<p>Within a minute's space he had swathed the corpse +tightly in the cloak, which had fallen from the +wretched man's shoulders as the fray began, bound it +about the waist by the scarf, to which he attached +firmly an immense block of stone, which lay at the +brink of the fearful well, which was now—for the +tide was up—brimful of white boiling surf, and +holding his breath atween resolution and abhorrence, +hurled it into the abyss.</p> + +<p>It sunk instantly, so well was the stone secured to +it; and the fate of the Chevalier de Pontrien never +was suspected, for that fatal pool never gave up its +dead, nor will until the judgment-day.</p> + +<p>Meantime the flood-gates of heaven were opened, +and a mimic torrent, rushing down the dark glen, +soon obliterated every trace of that stern, short +affray.</p> + +<p>Calmly Raoul strode homeward, and untouched +by any conscience, for those were hard and ruthless +times, and he had undergone so much wrong at the +hands of his victim's nearest relatives, and dearest +friends, that it was no great marvel if his blood were +heated, and his heart pitiless.</p> + +<p>"I will have masses said for his soul in Paris," +he muttered to himself; and therewith, thinking that +he had more than discharged all a Christian's duty, +he dismissed all further thoughts of the matter, and +actually hummed a gay opera tune as he strode +homeward through the pelting storm, thinking how +soon he should be blessed by the possession of his +own Melanie.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span></p> + +<p>No observation was made on his absence, either +by the steward or any of the servants, on his return, +though he was well-nigh drenched with rain, for they +remembered his old half-boyish, half-romantic habits, +and it seemed natural to them that on his first return, +after so many years of wandering, to scenes endeared +to him by innumerable fond recollections, he should +wander forth alone to muse with his own soul in +secret.</p> + +<p>There was great joy, however, in the hearts of +the old servitors and tenants in consequence of his +return, and on the following morning, and still on +the third day, that feeling of joy and security continued +to increase, for it soon got abroad that the +young lord's grief and gloominess of mood was +wearing hourly away, and that his lip, and his whole +countenance were often lighted up with an expression +which showed, as they fondly augured, that +days and years of happiness were yet in store for +him.</p> + +<p>It was not long before the tidings reached him that +the house of D'Argenson was in great distress concerning +the sudden and unaccountable disappearance +of the Chevalier de Pontrien, who had walked out, +it was said, on the preceding afternoon, promising to +be back at supper-time, and who had not been heard +of since.</p> + +<p>Raoul smiled grimly at the intimation, but said +nothing, and the narrator judging that St. Renan was +not likely to take offence at the imputations against +the family of Ploermel, proceeded to inform him, +that in the opinion of the neighborhood there was +nothing very mysterious, after all, in the disappearance +of the chevalier, since he was known to be +very heavily in debt, and was threatened with +deadly feud by the old Sieur de Plouzurde, whose +fair daughter he had deceived to her undoing. +Robinet, the smuggler's boat, had been seen off the +Penmarcks when the moon was setting, and no one +doubted that the gay gallant was by this time off the +coast of Spain.</p> + +<p>To all this, though he affected to pay little heed to +it, Raoul inclined an eager and attentive ear, and +as a reward for his patient listening, was soon informed, +furthermore, that the bridegroom marquis +and the beautiful bride, being satisfied, it was supposed, +of the chevalier's safety, had departed for +Paris, their journey having been postponed only in +consequence of the research for the missing gentleman, +from the morning when it should have taken +place, to the afternoon of the same day.</p> + +<p>For two days longer did Raoul tarry at St. Renan, +apparently as free from concern or care about the +fair Melanie de Ploermel, as if he had never heard +her name. And on this point alone, for all men +knew that he once loved her, did his conduct excite +any observation, or call forth comment. His silence, +however, and external nonchalance were attributed +at all hands to a proper sense of pride and self-respect; +and as the territorial vassals of those days +held themselves in some degree ennobled or disgraced +by the high bearing or recreancy of their +lords, it was very soon determined by the men of St. +Renan that it would have been very disgraceful and +humiliating had their lord, the Lord of Douarnez +and St. Renan, condescended to trouble his head +about the little demoiselle d'Argenson.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile our lover, whose head was in truth occupied +about no other thing than that very same little +demoiselle, for whom he was believed to feel a contempt +so supreme, had thoroughly investigated all +his affairs, thereby acquiring from his old steward +the character of an admirable man of business, had +made himself perfectly master of the real value of +his estates, droits, dues and all connected with the +same, and had packed up all his papers, and such of +his valuables as were movable, so as to be transported +easily by means of pack-horses.</p> + +<p>This done, leaving orders for a retinue of some +twenty of his best and most trusty servants to follow +him as soon as the train and relays of horses could +be prepared, he set off with two followers only to +return, riding post, as he had come, from Paris.</p> + +<p>He was three days behind the lady of his love +at starting; but the journey from the western extremity +of Bretagne to the metropolis is at all times +a long and tedious undertaking; and as the roads +and means of conveyance were in those days, he +found it no difficult task to catch up with the carriages +of the marquis, and to pass them on the road long +enough before they reached Paris.</p> + +<p>Indeed, though he had set out three days behind +them, he succeeded in anticipating their arrival by +as many, and had succeeded in transacting more than +half the business on which his heart was bent, before +he received the promised visit from the pretty Rose +Faverney, who, prompted by her desire to renew her +intimacy with the handsome page, came punctual +to her appointment. He had not, of course, admitted +the good old churchman, his uncle, into all his +secrets; he had not even told him that he had seen +the lady, much less what were his hopes and views +concerning her.</p> + +<p>But he did tell him that he was so deeply mortified +and wounded by her desertion, that he had determined +to sell his estates, to leave France forever, and +to betake himself to the new American colonies on +the St. Lawrence.</p> + +<p>There was not in the state of France in those days +much to admire, or much to induce wise men to +exert their influence over the young and noble, to +induce them to linger in the neighborhood of a court +which was in itself a very sink of corruption. It +was with no great difficulty, therefore, that Raoul +obtained the concurrence of his uncle, who was +naturally a friend to gallant and adventurous daring. +The estates of St. Renan, the old castle and the home +park, with a few hundred acres in its immediate +vicinity only excepted, were converted into gold +with almost unexampled rapidity.</p> + +<p>A part of the gold was in its turn converted into +a gallant brigantine of some two hundred tons, which +was despatched at once along the coast of Douarnez +bay, there to take in a crew of the hardy fishermen +and smugglers of that stormy shore, all men well-known +to Raoul de St. Renan, and well content to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span> +follow their young lord to the world's end, should +such be his will.</p> + +<p>Here, indeed, I have anticipated something the +progress of events, for hurry it as much as he +could in those days, St. Renan could not, of course, +work miracles; and though the brigantine was purchased, +where she lay ready to sail, at Calais, the +instant the sale of St. Renan was determined, without +awaiting the completion of the transfer, or the payment +of the purchase-money, many days had elapsed +before the news could be sent from the capital to +the coast, and the vessel despatched to Britanny.</p> + +<p>Every thing was, however, determined; nay, +every thing was in process of accomplishment before +the arrival of the fair lady and her nominal +husband, so that at his first interview with Rose, +Raoul was enabled to lay all his plans before her, +and to promise that within a month at the furthest, +every thing would be ready for their certain and +safe evasion.</p> + +<p>He did not fail, however, on that account to impress +upon the pretty maiden, who, as Jules was to +accompany his lord, though not a hint of whither had +been breathed to any one, was doubly devoted to +the success of the scheme, that a method must be +arranged by which he could have daily interviews +with the lovely Melanie; and this she promised that +she would use all her powers to induce her mistress +to permit, saying, with a gay laugh, that her permission +gained, all the rest was easy.</p> + +<p>The next day, the better to avoid suspicion, Raoul +was presented to the king, in full court, by his uncle, +on the double event of his return from India, and of +his approaching departure for the colony of Acadie, +for which it was his present purpose to sue for his +majesty's consent and approbation.</p> + +<p>The king was in great good humor, and nothing +could have been more flattering or more gracious +than Raoul de St. Renan's reception. Louis had +heard that very morning of the fair Melanie's arrival +in the city, and nothing could have fallen out more +<i>apropos</i> than the intention of her quondam lover to +depart at this very juncture, and that, too, for an +indefinite period from the land of his birth.</p> + +<p>Rejoicing inwardly at his good fortune, and of +course, ascribing the conduct of the young man to +pique and disappointment, the king, while he loaded +him with honors and attentions, did not neglect to +encourage him in his intention of departing on a +very early day, and even offered to facilitate his departure +by making some remissions in his behalf +from the strict regulations of the Douane.</p> + +<p>All this was perfectly comprehensible to Raoul; +but he was far too wise to suffer any one, even his +uncle, to perceive that he understood it; and while +he profited to the utmost by the readiness which he +found in high places to smooth away all the difficulties +from his path, he laughed in his sleeve as he +thought what would be the fury of the licentious +and despotic sovereign when he should discover that +the very steps which he had taken to remove a +dangerous rival, had actually cast the lady into that +rival's arms.</p> + +<p>Nor had this measure of Raoul's been less effectual +in sparing Melanie much grief and vexation, than it +had proved in facilitating his own schemes of escape; +for on that very day, within an hour after his reception +of St. Renan, the king caused information to be +conveyed to the Marquis de Ploermel that the presentation +of Madame should be deferred until such +time as the Vicomte de St. Renan should have set +sail for Acadie, which it was expected would take +place within a month at the furthest.</p> + +<p>That evening, when Rose Faverney was admitted +to the young lord's presence, through the agency of +the enamored Jules, she brought him permission to +visit her lady at midnight in her own chamber; and +she brought with her a plan, sketched by Melanie's +own hand, of the garden, through which, by the aid +of a master-key and a rope-ladder, he was to gain +access to her presence.</p> + +<p>"My lady says, Monsieur Raoul," added the +merry girl, with a light laugh, "that she admits you +only on the faith that you will keep the word which +you plighted to her, when last you met, and on the +condition that I shall be present at all your interviews +with her."</p> + +<p>"Her honor were safe in my hands," replied the +young man, "without that precaution. But I appreciate +the motive, and accept the condition."</p> + +<p>"You will remember, then, my lord—at midnight. +There will be one light burning in the window, when +that is extinguished, all will be safe, and you may +enter fearless. Will you remember?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing but death shall prevent me. Nor that, +if the spirits of the dead may visit what they love +best on earth. So tell her, Rose. Farewell!"</p> + +<p>Four hours afterward St. Renan stood in the +shadow of a dense trellice in the garden, watching +the moment when that love-beacon should expire. +The clock of St. Germain l'Auxerre struck twelve, +and at the instant all was darkness. Another minute +and the lofty wall was scaled, and Melanie was in +the arms of Raoul.</p> + +<p>It was a strange, grim, gloomy gothic chamber, +full of strange niches and recesses of old stone-work. +The walls were hung with gilded tapestries of +Spanish leather, but were interrupted in many places +by the antique stone groinings of alcoves and cup-boards, +one of which, close beside the mantlepiece, +was closed by a curiously carved door of heavy +oak-work, itself sunk above a foot within the embrasure +of the wall.</p> + +<p>Lighted as it was only by the flickering of the +wood-fire on the hearth, for the thickness of the +walls, and the damp of the old vaulted room rendered +a fire acceptable even at midsummer, that antique +chamber appeared doubly grim and ghostly; but +little cared the young lovers for its dismal seeming; +and if they noticed it at all, it was but to jest at +the contrast of its appearance with the happy hours +which they passed within it.</p> + +<p>Happy, indeed, they were—almost too happy—though +as pure and guiltless as if they had been hours +spent within a nunnery of the strictest rule, and in +the presence of a sainted abbess.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span></p> + +<p>Happy, indeed, they were; and although brief, oft +repeated. For, thenceforth, not a night passed but +Raoul visited his Melanie, and tarried there enjoying +her sweet converse, and bearing to her every day +glad tidings of the process of his schemes, and of the +certainty of their escape, until the approach of +morning warned him to make good his retreat ere +envious eyes should be abroad to make espials.</p> + +<p>And ever the page, Jules, kept watch at the ladder-foot +in the garden; and the true maiden, Rose, who +ever sate within the chamber with the lovers during +their stolen interviews, guarded the door, with ears +as keen as those of Cerberus.</p> + +<p>A month had passed, and the last night had come, +and all was successful—all was ready. The brigantine +lay manned and armed, and at all points prepared +for her brief voyage at an instant's notice at +Calais. Relays of horses were at each post on the +road. Raoul had taken formal leave of the delighted +monarch. His passport was signed—his treasures +were on board his good ship—his pistols were loaded—his +horses were harnessed for the journey.</p> + +<p>For the last time he scaled the ladder—for the last +time he stood within the chamber.</p> + +<p>Too happy! ay, they were too happy on that night, +for all was done, all was won; and nothing but the +last step remained, and that step so easy. The next +morning Melanie was to go forth, as if to early mass, +with Rose and a single valet. The valet was to be +mastered and overthrown as if in a street broil, the +lady, with her damsel, was to step into a light caleshe, +which should await her, with her lover mounted at +its side, and high for Calais—England—without the +risk—the possibility of failure.</p> + +<p>That night he would not tarry. He told his happy +tidings, clasped her to his heart, bid her farewell +till to-morrow, and in another moment would have +been safe—a step sounded close to the door. Rose +sprang to her feet, with her finger to her lip, pointing +with her left hand to the deep cupboard-door.</p> + +<p>She was right—there was not time to reach the +window—at the same instant, as Melanie relighted +the lamp, not to be taken in mysterious and suspicious +darkness, the one door closed upon the lover just as +the other opened to the husband.</p> + +<p>But rapid and light as were the motions of Raoul, +the treacherous door by which he had passed into his +concealment, trembled still as Ploermel entered. +And Rose's quick eye saw that he marked it.</p> + +<p>But if he saw it, he gave no token, made no allusion +to the least doubt or suspicion; on the contrary, +he spoke more gayly and kindly than his wont. He +apologized for his untimely intrusion, saying that +her father had come suddenly to speak with them, +concerning her presentation at court, which the king +had appointed for the next day, and wished, late as +it was, to see her in the saloon below.</p> + +<p>Nothing doubting the truth of his statement, which +Raoul's intended departure rendered probable, Melanie +started from her chair, and telling Rose to wait, +for she would back in an instant, hurried out of the +room, and took her way toward the great staircase.</p> + +<p>The marquis ordered Rose to light her mistress, for +the corridor was dark; and as the girl went out to do +so, a suppressed shriek, and the faint sounds of a +momentary scuffle followed, and then all was still.</p> + +<p>A hideous smile flitted across the face of de Ploermel, +as he cast himself heavily into an arm-chair, +opposite to the door of the cupboard in which St. +Renan was concealed, and taking up a silver bell +which stood on the table, rung it repeatedly and +loudly for a servant.</p> + +<p>"Bring wine," he said, as the man entered. "And, +hark you, the masons are at work in the great hall, +and have left their tools and materials for building. +Let half a dozen of the grooms come up hither, and +bring with them brick and mortar. I hate the sight +of that cupboard, and before I sleep this night, it +shall be built up solid with a good wall of mason-work; +and so here's a health to the rats within it, +and a long life to them!" and he quaffed off the wine +in fiendish triumph.</p> + +<p>He spoke so loud, and that intentionally, that Raoul +heard every word that he uttered.</p> + +<p>But if he hoped thereby to terrify the lover into +discovering himself, and so convicting his fair and +innocent wife, the villain was deceived. Raoul heard +every word—knew his fate—knew that one word, +one motion would have saved him; but that one +word, one motion would have destroyed the fair +fame of his Melanie.</p> + +<p>The memory of the death of that unhappy Lord +of Kerguelen came palpably upon his mind in that +dread moment, and the comments of his dead father.</p> + +<p>"I, at least," he muttered, between his hard set +teeth, "I at least, will not be evidence against her. +I will die silent—<i>fiel a la muerte</i>!"</p> + +<p>And when the brick and mortar were piled by the +hands of the unconscious grooms, and when the +fatal trowels clanged and jarred around him, he spake +not—stirred not—gave no sign.</p> + +<p>Even the savage wretch, de Ploermel, unable to +believe in the existence of such chivalry, such honor, +half doubted if he were not deceived, and the cupboard +were not untenanted by the true victim.</p> + +<p>Higher and higher rose the wall before the oaken +door; and by the exclusion of the light of the many +torches by which the men were working, the victim +must have marked, inch by inch, the progress of his +living immersement. The page, Jules, had climbed +in silence to the window's ledge, and was looking in, +an unseen spectator, for he had heard all that passed +from without, and suspected his lord's presence in +the fatal precinct.</p> + +<p>But as he saw the wall rise higher—higher—as he +saw the last brick fastened in its place solid, immovable +from within, and that without strife or +opposition, he doubted not but that there was some +concealed exit by which St. Renan had escaped, and +he descended hastily and hurried homeward.</p> + +<p>Now came the lady's trial—the trial that shall +prove to de Ploermel whether his vengeance was +complete. She was led in with Rose, a prisoner. +<i>Lettres de cachet</i> had been obtained, when the +treason of some wretched subordinate had revealed +the secret of her intended flight with Raoul; and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span> +officers had seized the wife by the connivance of the +shameless husband.</p> + +<p>"See!" he said, as she entered, "see, the fool +suffered himself to be walled up there in silence. +There let him die in agony. You, madam, may live +as long as you please in the Bastille, <i>au secret</i>."</p> + +<p>She saw that all was lost—her lover's sacrifice was +made—she could not save him! Should she, by a +weak divulging of the truth, render his grand devotion +fruitless? Never!</p> + +<p>Her pale cheek did not turn one shade the paler, but +her keen eye flashed living fire, and her beautiful +lip writhed with loathing and scorn irrepressible.</p> + +<p>"It is thou who art the fool!" she said, "who hast +made all this coil, to wall up a poor cat in a cupboard, +as it is thou who art the base knave and +shameless pandar, who hast attempted to do murther, +and all to sell thine own wife to a corrupt and loathsome +tyrant!"</p> + +<p>All stood aghast at her fierce words, uttered with +all the eloquence and vehemence of real passion, but +none so much as Rose, who had never beheld her +other than the gentlest of the gentle. Now she wore +the expression, and spoke with the tone of a young +Pythoness, full of the fury of the god.</p> + +<p>She sprung forward as she uttered the last words, +extricating herself from the slight hold of the astonished +officers, and rushed toward her cowed and +craven husband.</p> + +<p>"But in all things, mean wretch," she continued, +in tones of fiery scorn, "in all things thou art frustrate—thy +vengeance is naught, thy vile ambition +naught, thyself and thy king, fools, knaves, and +frustrate equally. And now," she added, snatching +the dagger which Raoul had given her from the +scabbard, "now die, infamous, accursed pandar!" +and with the word she buried the keen weapon at +one quick and steady stroke to the very hilt in his +base and brutal heart.</p> + +<p>Then, ere the corpse had fallen to the earth, or +one hand of all those that were stretched out to seize +her had touched her person, she smote herself mortally +with the same reeking weapon, and only crying +out in a clear, high voice, "Bear witness, Rose, +bear witness to my honor! Bear witness all that I +die spotless!" fell down beside the body of her husband, +and expired without a struggle or a groan.</p> + +<p>Awfully was she tried, and awfully she died. Rest +to her soul if it be possible.</p> + +<p>The caitiff Marquis de Ploermel perished, as she +had said, in all things frustrated; for though his vengeance +was in very deed complete, he believed that +it had failed, and in his very agony that failure was +his latest and his worst regret.</p> + +<p>On the morrow, when St. Renan returned not to +his home, the page gave the alarm, and the fatal +wall was torn down, but too late.</p> + +<p>The gallant victim of love's honor was no more. +Doomed to a lingering death he had died speedily, +though by no act of his own. A blood-vessel had +burst within, through the violence of his own emotions. +Ignorant of the fate of his sweet Melanie, he +had died, as he had lived, the very soul of honor; and +when they buried him, in the old chapel of his +Breton castle, beside his famous ancestors, none +nobler lay around him; and the brief epitaph they +carved upon his stone was true, at least, if it were +short and simple, for it ran only thus—</p> +<br /> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 250px;"> +<img src="images/illus215.png" width="250" height="86" +alt="Raoul de St. Renan" title="" /></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_POETS_HEART_TO_MISS_O_B" id="THE_POETS_HEART_TO_MISS_O_B"> +</a>THE POET'S HEART.—TO MISS O. B.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY CHARLES E. TRAIL.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Like rays of light, divinely bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Thy sunny smiles o'er all disperse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let the music of thy voice,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">More softly flow than Lesbian verse.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By all the witchery of love,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">By every fascinating art—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The worldly spirit strive to move,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">But spare, O spare, the Poet's heart!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Within its pure recesses, deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A fount of tender feeling lies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose crystal waters, while they sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Reflect the light of starry skies.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy voice might prophet-like unclose<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its bonds, and bid those waters start,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But why disturb their sweet repose?<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Spare, lady, spare the Poet's heart!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It cannot be that one so fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The idol of the courtly throng—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would condescend his lot to share,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And bless the lowly child of song,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would realize the soul-wrought dreams,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That of his being form a part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mingle with his sweetest themes;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Then spare, O spare, the poet's heart!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The poet's heart! ye know it not,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its hopes, its sympathies, its fears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The joys that glad its humble lot;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The griefs that melt it into tears.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis like some flower, that from the ground<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Scarce dares to lift its petals up,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though honeyed sweets are ever found<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Indwelling in its golden cup.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Love comes to him in sweeter guise,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Than he appears to other men—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heav'n-born, descended from the skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And longing to return again.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But bid him not with me abide,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">If he can no relief impart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah, hide those smiles, those glances hide,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And spare, O spare, the Poet's heart!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_RETURN_TO_SCENES_OF_CHILDHOOD" id="THE_RETURN_TO_SCENES_OF_CHILDHOOD"> +</a>THE RETURN TO SCENES OF CHILDHOOD.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY GRETTA.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"You have come again," said the dark old trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As I entered my childhood's home.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"You have come again," said the whispering breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">"And wherefore have you come?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"When last I played round your youthful brow<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Its morning's light was there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But you bring back a shadow upon it now,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And a saddened look of care.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Have you come, have you left earth's noisy strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To seek your favorite flowers?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They are gone, like the hopes which lit your life,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Like your childhood's sunny hours.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Have you come to seek for your shady dell,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For that spot in the moonlit grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where first you were bound by the magic spell,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And thrilled to the voice of love?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Has your heart been true to that early vow,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And pure as that trickling tear?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Does that voice of music charm you now<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As once it charmed you here?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Years have been short, and few, since last<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As a child you roamed the glen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what have you learned since hence you passed,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">What have you lost since then?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"You have brought back a woman's ruddier cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A woman's fuller form,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But where is the look so timid and meek,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The blush so quick and warm?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Have you come to seek for the smiles of yore,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For your brief life's faded light?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Do you hope to hear in these shades once more<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The blessing and 'good-night?'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Do you come again for the kisses sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Do you look as you onward pass<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the mingled prints of the tiny feet<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In the fresh and springing grass?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Have you come to sit on a parent's knee<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And gaze on his reverend brow?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or to nestle in love and childish glee<br /></span> +<span class="i1">On her bosom, that's pulseless now?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Why come you back? We can give you naught,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No more the past is ours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thine early scenes with their blessings fraught,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Thy childhood's golden hours."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I have come, I have come, oh haunts of youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With a worn and weary heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I have come to recall the love and truth<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Of my young life's guileless part.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I have come to bend o'er the holy spot<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where I prayed by a father's knee—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh I am changed—but I ne'er forgot<br /></span> +<span class="i1">His look, his smile for me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I have not been true to my heart's first love<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Here pledged 'neath the moonlit heaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I come to kneel in the lonely grove<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And ask to be forgiven.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I have not brought back the hopes of youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or the gentle look so meek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I mourn o'er my perished faith and truth<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And the quick blush of my cheek.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, oh ye scenes, that have once beguiled,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In the peaceful days of yore.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I would come again like a little child<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With the trust I knew before.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I would call back every hope and fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The heart throbs full and high,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The prattling child that rambled here,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And ask if it were <i>I</i>?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And I would recall the murmured prayer,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And the dark eyes look of love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While unseen angels hovered there<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From the starry worlds above.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And I've come to seek one flower here,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Just one, in its fading bloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though it must be culled with a gushing tear<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From a parent's grassy tomb.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And I'll bear it away on my lonely breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">As a charm 'mid earth's stormy strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An amulet, worn to give me rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">On the billowy waves of life.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I wait not now by the dancing rill<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For the steps of my playmates fair—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They are gone—but yon heaven is o'er me still,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And I'll seek to meet them there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Parents, and friends, and hopes are gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And these memories only given,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But they shall be links, while the heart is lone,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In the "chain" that reaches heaven.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SUNSHINE_AND_RAIN" id="SUNSHINE_AND_RAIN"></a>SUNSHINE AND RAIN.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY GEORGE S. BURLEIGH.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Blessed sunshine, and thrice-blessed rain,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">How ye do warm and melt the rugged soil,—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Which else were barren, nathless all my toil<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And summon Beauty from her grave again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To breathe live odors o'er my scant domain:<br /></span> +<span class="i1">How softly from their parting buds uncoil<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The furléd sweets, no more a shriveled spoil<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the loud storm, or canker's silent bane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were it all sun, the heat would shrink them up;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Were it all shower, then piteous blight were sure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now hangs the dew in every nodding cup,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Shooting new glories from its orblets pure.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sunshine and shower, I shrink from your extremes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But with delight behold your blended gleams.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_CHRISTMAS_GARLAND" id="THE_CHRISTMAS_GARLAND"></a>THE CHRISTMAS GARLAND.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY MISS EMMA WOOD.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<h3>CHAPTER I.</h3> + +<h4>THE BOARDING-SCHOOL.</h4> + + +<p>Christmas is coming! The glad sound awakes a +thrill of joy in many a heart. The children clap their +tiny hands and laugh aloud in the exuberance of their +mirth as bright visions of varied toys and rich confectionary +flit before their minds. The sound of +merry sports—the gathering of the social band—the +banquet—all are scenes of joy. Shout on bright +children, for your innocent mirth will rise as incense +to Him who was even as one of you. The Son of +God once reposed his head upon a mortal breast and +wept the tears of infancy. Now risen to His throne +of glory, his smile is still upon you, bright Blossoms +of Blessedness.</p> + +<p>Christmas is coming! is the cry of the young and +gay, and with light hearts they prepare for the approaching +festival. The holyday robes are chosen, +and the presents selected which shall bring joy to so +many hearts. The lover studies to determine what +gift will be acceptable to his mistress, and the maiden +dreams of love-tokens and honeyed words. Nor is +the church forgotten amid the gathering of holyday +array, for that, too, must be robed in beauty. The +young claim its adornment as their appropriate +sphere, and rich garlands of evergreen, mingled with +scarlet berries, are twined around its pillars, or festooned +along its walls. Swiftly speeds their welcome +task, and a calm delight fills their hearts, as +they remember Him who assumed mortality, and +passed the ordeal of earthly life, that he might be, +in all things, like unto mankind. Blessed be this +thought, ye joyous ones, and if after-years shall bring +sorrow or bitterness, ye may remember that the Holiest +has trod that path before, and that deeper sorrow +than mortality can suffer, once rested upon his guiltless +head.</p> + +<p>Christmas is coming! is the thought of the aged, +and memory goes back to the joys of other years, +when the pulses of life beat full and free, and their +keen sensibilities were awake to the perception of +the beautiful. Now the dim eye can no longer enjoy +the full realization of beauty, and the ear is deaf to +the melodies of Nature, but they can drink from the +fountain of memory, and while looking upon the +mirth of the youthful, recollect that once they, too, +were light-hearted and joyous. Blessed to them is +the approaching festival, and as they celebrate the +birth of the Redeemer, they may remember that He +bore the trials of life without a murmur, and laid +down in the lone grave, to ensure the resurrection of +the believer, while faith points to the hour when they +shall inherit the glory prepared for them by His mission +of suffering.</p> + +<p>Christmas is coming! shouted we, the school-girls +of Monteparaiso Seminary, as we rushed from the +school-room, in glad anticipation, of the holydays. +How gladly we laid down the books over which we +had been poring, vainly endeavoring to fix our +minds upon their pages, and gathered in various +groups to plan amusements for the coming festival. +One week only, and the day would come, the pleasures +of which we had been anticipating for months. +Our stockings must be hung up on Christmas Eve, +though the pleasure was sadly marred because each +of us must, in our turn, represent the good Santa-Claus, +and contribute to the stockings of our schoolmates, +instead of going quietly to bed, and finding +them filled on Christmas morning by the good saint, +or some of his representatives. How eagerly we +watched the Hudson each morning, to see if its +waves remained unfettered by ice, not only because +the daily arrival of the steamboat from New York +was an era in our un-eventful lives, but there were +many of our number whose parents or friends resided +in the city, from whom they expected visits or presents. +We were like a prisoned sisterhood, yet we +did not pine in our solitude, for there were always +wild, mirth-loving spirits in our midst, so full of fun +and frolic that the exuberance of their spirits was +continually breaking out, much to the discomfort of +tutors and governesses. When the holydays were +approaching, and the strict discipline usually maintained +among the pupils was somewhat relaxed, these +outbreaks became more numerous, insomuch that +lessons were carelessly omitted, or left unlearned. +When study hours were over misrule was triumphant. +Lizzie Lincoln could not find a seat at the +table where some of the older girls were manufacturing +fancy articles for Christmas presents, and +avenged herself by pinning together the dresses of +the girls who were seated around the table, and +afterward fastening each dress to the carpet. Fan +Selby saw the manœuvre, and ran to her room, +where she equipped herself in a frightful looking +mask, which she had manufactured of brown paper, +painted in horrid devices. Arrayed in this mask, +and a long white wrapper, she came stalking in at +the door of the sitting-room. In their fright the girls +screamed and tried to rush from the table, when a +scene of confusion ensued which beggars description. +The noise reached the ears of the teachers, who +came from different parts of the house to the scene +of the riot, but ere they reached it, Fan had deposited +the mask out of sight in her own room, and was +again in her place, looking as innocent as if nothing +had happened. She even aided the teachers in their +search for the missing "fright." When this fruitless +search was ended, and a monitress placed in the sit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>ting-room +to prevent further riots, a new alarm was +raised. Mary Lee blackened her face with burnt +cork, and entered the kitchen by the outside door, +begging for cold victuals, much to the terror of the +raw Hibernians who were very quietly sitting before +the fire, and telling tales of the Emerald Isle, for they +feared a negro as they would some wild beast. +They ran up stairs to give the alarm, but when they +returned the bird had flown, and while a fruitless +search was instituted throughout the basement, Mary +was in her own room, hastily removing the ebon tinge +from her face. Such were a few among the many wild +pranks of the mischief spirits, invented to while away +the time. Quite different from this was the employment +of the "sisterhood." A number of the older +pupils of the school had seated themselves night after +night around the table which stood in the centre of the +sitting-room, in nearly the same places, with their +needle-work, until it was finally suggested, that, after +the manner of the older people, we should form a regularly +organized society. Each member should every +night take her accustomed place, and one should +read while the others were busy with their needle-work. +To add a tinge of romance to the whole, we +gave to each of our members the name of some +flower as a soubriquet by which we might be +known, and Lizzie Lincoln (our secretary) kept a +humorous diary of the "Sayings and Doings of +Flora's Sisterhood." Anna Lincoln was the presidentess +of our society, and we gave her the name of +Rose, because the queen of flowers seemed a fitting +type of her majestic beauty. But the favorite of all +was Clara Adams, to whom the name of Violet +seemed equally appropriate. Her modesty, gentleness, +and affectionate disposition had won the love +of all, from Annie Lincoln, the oldest pupil, down to +little Ella Selby, who lisped her praises of dear Clara +Adams, and seemed to love her far better than she +did her own mad-cap sister.</p> + +<p>When we celebrated May-day Clara was chosen +queen of May, though Lizzie Lincoln was more +beautiful, and Anna seemed more queenly. It was +the instinctive homage that young hearts will pay to +goodness and purity, which made us feel as if she +deserved the brightest crown we could bestow. If +one of us were ill, Clara could arrange the pillows +or bathe the throbbing temples more tenderly than +any other, and bitter medicines seemed less disgusting +when administered by her. Was there a hard lesson +to learn, a difficult problem to solve, a rebellious +drawing that would take any form or shadowing but +the right one, Clara was the kind assistant, and either +task seemed equally easy to her. While we sat +around the table that evening, little Ella Selby was +leaning on the back of Clara's chair, and telling, in her +own childish way, of the manifold perfections of one +Philip Sidney, a classmate of her brother in college, +who had spent a vacation with him at her home. +Ella was quite sure that no other gentleman was +half so handsome, so good, or kind as Mr. Sidney, +and she added,</p> + +<p>"I know he loves Clara, for I have told him a great +deal about her, and he says that he does."</p> + +<p>The girls all laughed at her simple earnestness, and +bright blushes rose in Clara's face. Many prophecies +for the future were based on this slight foundation, +and Clara was raised to the rank of a heroine. It +needs but slight fuel to feed the flame of romance in +a school-girl's breast, and these dreamings might long +have been indulged but for an interruption. A servant +came, bringing a basket, with a note from the +ladies engaged in decorating the church, requesting +the young ladies of the school to prepare the letters +for a motto on the walls of the church. The letters +were cut from pasteboard, to be covered with small +sprigs of box. Pleased with the novelty of our task +we were soon busily engaged, under the direction +of Clara and Anna Lincoln. Even the "mischief +spirits" ceased their revels to watch our progress. +Thus passed that evening, and as the next day was +Saturday, and of course a holyday, we completed +our work. The garlands were not to be hung in the +church until the Wednesday following, as Friday +was Christmas day. We employed ourselves after +study hours the intervening days in finishing the +presents we had commenced for each other. On +Wednesday morning Lucy Gray, one of our day-scholars, +brought a note from her mother, requesting +that she might be excused from her afternoon lessons, +and inviting the teachers and young ladies of the +school to join them in dressing the church. Here +was a prospect for us of some rare enjoyment; and +how we plead for permission, and promised diligence +and good behaviour for the future, those who remember +their own school-days can easily imagine. +At length permission was granted that Anna and +Lizzie Lincoln, Fan Selby, Clara Adams, and I, accompanied +by one of the teachers, might assist them +for an hour or two in the afternoon. Never did +hours seem longer to us than those that passed after +the permission was given till we were on our way. +The village was about half a mile from our seminary, +but the walk was a very pleasant one, and when +we reached the church our faces glowed with exercise +in the keen December air. We found a very +agreeable company assembled there, laughing and +chatting gayly as they bound the branches of evergreen +together in rich wreaths. Our letters were +fastened to the walls, forming a beautiful inscription, +and little remained to be done, save arranging the +garlands. Clara and Fan Selby finished the wreaths +for the altar, and were fastening them in their places, +when a new arrival caused Fan to drop her wreath, +and hasten toward the new-comers, exclaiming,</p> + +<p>"Brother Charles, I am so glad to see you!"</p> + +<p>Then, after cordially greeting his companion, she +asked eagerly of her brother,</p> + +<p>"Have you come to take us home?"</p> + +<p>"No, mad-cap," was the laughing reply, "we are +but too glad to be free for one Christmas from your +wild pranks. Sidney is spending the Christmas +holydays with me, and as the day was fine we +thought we would visit you. When we reached the +village we learned that several of the young ladies +of the school were at the church, and called, thinking +that you might be of the number."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span></p> + +<p>Turning to Sidney, Fan said, playfully,</p> + +<p>"Follow me, and I will introduce you to Ella's +favorite, Clara Adams."</p> + +<p>Before Clara had time to recover from her confusion +caused by their entrance Fan had led Philip Sidney +to her, and introduced him as the friend of whom +little Ella had told her so much. The eloquent +blushes in Clara's face revealed in part the dreams +that had been excited in her breast, while Philip, +with self-possessed gallantry, begged leave to assist +her in her task, and uttered some commonplace expressions, +till Clara was sufficiently composed to take +her part in conversation. The teacher who accompanied +us, alarmed at his attention, placed herself +near them, but his manner was so respectful that she +could find no excuse to interrupt their conversation. +Philip Sidney was eminently handsome, and as his +dark eye rested admiringly upon her, who will +wonder that Clara became more than usually animated! +nor is it strange that the low, musical tones +of his voice, breathing thoughts of poetry with the +earnestness of love, should awaken a new train of +thought in the simple school-girl. She answered in +few words, but the drooping of her fringed lids and +the bright color in her cheek replied more eloquently +than words. The moments flew swiftly, the garlands +were placed, and the teacher who had watched +them with an anxious eye, announced that it was +time to return to the seminary. Philip knew too +well the strictness of boarding-school rules to hope +for a longer interview, yet even for the sake of looking +longer on her graceful figure, and perchance +stealing another glance from her bright eyes, he insisted +upon seeing little Ella. Charles Selby objected, +as it was growing late, and he had an engagement +for the evening in the city. Reluctantly Philip +bade Clara farewell, and from the door of the church +watched her receding figure until she disappeared +around the turn of the road. From that moment +Clara was invested by her schoolmates with all the +dignity of a heroine of romance, and half the giddy +girls in school teazed her mercilessly, and then laid +their heads upon their pillows only to dream of +lovers.</p> + +<p>Christmas eve came. The elder ladies of the +school accompanied our Principal to the church to +listen to the services of the evening. We were +scarcely seated when we perceived nearly opposite +to us, that same Philip Sidney, who was the hero of +our romance. Poor Clara! I sat by her side, and +fancied I could hear the throbbing of her heart as +those dark, expressive eyes were fixed again on hers, +speaking the language of admiration too plainly to +be mistaken. Then as the services proceeded, his +countenance wore a shadow of deeper thought, and +his eyes were fixed upon the speaker. Thus he remained +in earnest attention till the services closed. +When we left the church, a smile, and bow of recognition +passed between him and Clara, but no word +was spoken. Our sports that evening had no power +to move her to mirth, but she remained silent and +abstracted. The next Saturday Mrs. Selby came to +see her daughter, and soon after her arrival, Fan laid +a small package on the table mysteriously, saying to +Clara, "You must answer it immediately," and left +the room. Clara broke the seal, and as she removed +the envelope, a ring, containing a small diamond, +beautifully set, fell to the floor. I picked it up, and +looking on the inside, saw the name of Philip Sidney. +As soon as she had read the note, she gave it +to me, and placed the ring upon her finger. Then +severing a small branch from a myrtle plant, which +we kept in our room as a relic of home, she placed +it, with a sprig of box, in an envelope, and, after directing +it to Philip Sidney, gave it to Fan, who enclosed +it in a letter to her brother. The note which +Clara gave me was as follows:</p> + +<p>"Forgive my presumption, dear Clara, in addressing +you, so lately a stranger. Think not that I am an +idle flatterer, when I say that your beauty and worth +have awakened a deep love for you in my heart, and +this love must be my excuse. I would have sought +another interview with you, but I know the rules of +your school would have forbid, and the only alternative +remaining is to make this avowal, or be forgotten +by you. I do not ask you now to promise to be +mine, or even to love me, till I have proved myself +worthy of your affection. My past life has been one +of thoughtlessness and inaction, but it shall be my +endeavor in future to atone for those misspent years. +Your image will ever be with me as a bright spirit +from whose presence I cannot flee, and whisper +hope when my energies would fail. I only ask +your remembrance till I am worthy to claim your +love. If you do not see me or hear from me at the +end of five years, you may believe that I have failed +to secure the desired position in the world, or am no +longer living. Will you grant me this favor—to +wear the ring enclosed, and sometimes think of me? +If so, send me some token by Mrs. S., to tell me that +I may hope."</p> + +<p>The evergreens, with their language of love and +constancy were the token, and the ring sparkled +upon Clara's finger, so that I knew well that Philip +Sidney would not soon be forgotten.</p> +<br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER II.</h3> + +<h4>A GLANCE AT HOME.</h4> + +<p>The little village of Willowdale is situated in one +of those romantic dells which are found here and +there among the hills of Massachusetts. A small +stream, tributary to the Connecticut, flows through +the village, so small that it is barely sufficient to furnish +the necessary mill-seats for the accommodation +of a community of farmers, but affording no encouragement +to manufacturers. It is to this reason, perhaps, +that we may attribute the fact that a place, +which was amongst the earliest settlements of Massachusetts, +should remain to this day so thinly inhabited. +The rage for manufactures, so prevalent in +New England, has led speculators to place factories +on every stream of sufficient power to keep them in +operation, and a spirit of enterprise and locomotion +has caused railroads to pass through sections of the +country hitherto unfrequented by others than tillers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span> +of the soil. Cities have sprung up where before +were only small villages, and brisk little villages are +found, where a few years ago were only solitary +farm-houses. But in spite of all such changes, Willowdale +has escaped the ravages of these merciless +innovators. The glassy river still glides on in its +natural bed, and even the willows on its banks, from +which the village takes its name, are suffered to +stand, unscathed by the woodman's axe. The "iron +horse" has never disturbed the inhabitants by his +shrill voice, and the rattling of cars has not broken +upon the stillness of a summer-day. The village is +not on the direct route from any of the principal +cities to others, consequently the inhabitants suffer +little apprehension of having their fine farms cut up +by rail-road tracks. The village consists of one principal +street, with houses built on both sides, at sufficient +distances from the street and each other, to +admit of those neat yards, with shade-trees, flowers, +and white fences, which are the pride of New England, +and scattered among the surrounding fields are +tasteful farm-houses.</p> + +<p>There are two houses of worship in the place: the +Episcopal church, which was erected by the first +settlers, before the revolution; and the Congregationalist +house, more recently built. There is but +little trade carried on in the place, and one store +is sufficient to supply the wants of the inhabitants. +The Episcopal church stands on a slight eminence, +at a little distance from the main street of the village, +and a lane extending beyond it leads to the parsonage. +A little farther down this lane is my father's house, +and nearly opposite the house of Deacon Lee, the +home of Clara Adams. Clara was left an orphan at +an early age. Her father was the son of an early +friend of the old rector. The latter, having no children, +adopted Henry Adams, and educated him as his +own son, in the hope of preparing him for the ministry, +but with that perversity so common in human +nature, the youth determined to become an artist. +The rector, not wishing to force him unwillingly +into the sacred office, consented that he should pursue +his favorite art. He placed him under the tuition of +one of the first painters in a neighboring city, hoping +that his natural genius, aided by his ambition, might +enable him to excel. Henry Adams followed his +new pursuit with all the ardor of an impetuous nature, +till the bright eyes of Clara Lee won his heart, +and his thoughts were directed in a new channel, +until he had persuaded her to share his lot. It proved, +indeed, a darkened lot to the young bride. Her husband +was a reckless, unsatisfied being, and though +he ever loved her with all the affection of which +such natures are capable, the warm expressions of +his love, varied by fits of peevishness and ill-humor, +were so unlike the calm, unchanging devotedness of +her nature that she felt a bitter disappointment. +Soon after the birth of their daughter his health +failed, and he repaired to Italy for the benefit of a +more genial climate, and in the hope of perfecting +himself in his art. He lived but a few months after +his arrival there, and the sad intelligence came like +a death-blow to his bereaved wife. She lingered a +year at the parsonage, a saddened mourner, and then +her wearied spirit found its rest. The old rector +would gladly have nurtured the little orphan as his own +child, but he could not resist the entreaties of Deacon +Lee, her mother's brother, and reluctantly consented +to have her removed to his house. Yet much of her +time was spent at the parsonage, and growing up as +it were in an atmosphere of love, it is not strange +that gentleness was the ruling trait of her character. +Deacon Lee was one of that much-scandalized class, +the Congregationalist deacons of New England, who +have so often been described with a pen dipped in +gall, if we may judge from the bitterness of the +sketches. Scribblers delight in portraying them as +rum-selling hypocrites, sly topers, lovers of gain, +and fomenters of dissension, and so far has this been +carried, that no tale of Yankee cunning or petty +fraud is complete unless the hero is a deacon. It is +true there are far too many such instances in real +life, where eminence in the church is their only high +standing, and the name of religion is but a cloak for +selfish vices, but it is equally true that among this +class of men are the good, the true, and kind, of the +earth, whose lives are ruled by the same pure principles +which they profess. Such was Deacon Lee, +and it were well if there were more like him, to remove +the stain which others of an opposite character +have brought upon the office. He was one of those +whom sorrow purifies, and had bowed in humble +resignation to heavy afflictions. Of a large family +only one son had lived to attain the years of manhood. +The mother of Clara had been very dear to +him, and he felt that her orphan child would supply, +in a measure, the place of his own lost ones. His +wife was his opposite, and theirs was one of those +unaccountable unions where there is apparently no +bond of sympathy. Stern and exact in the performance +of every duty, she wished to enforce the same +rigid observance upon others. The loss of her children +had roused in her a zeal for religion, which, in +one of a warmer temperament, would have been +fanaticism. While her husband was a worshiper +from a love of God and his holy laws, she was +prompted by fears of the wrath to come. He bowed +in thankfulness, even while he wept their loss, to the +Power that had borne his little ones to a brighter +world, while her life gained new austerity from the +thought that they had been taken from her as a judgment +on her worldliness and idolatry. She loved to +dwell upon the sufferings of the Pilgrim Fathers of +New England, and emulate their rigid lives, forgetting +that it was the dark persecution of the times in +which they lived that left this impress upon their +characters. Her husband loved to commend the +good deeds of their neighbors, while she was equally +fond of censuring transgressors. Perhaps the result +of their efforts was better than it would have been +had both possessed the disposition of either one of +them. Her firmness and energy atoned for the negligence +resulting from his easy temper, and his sunny +smile and kind words softened the asperity with +which she would have ruled her household. Their +son was engaged in mercantile business in a neigh<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>boring +city, and their home would have been desolate +but for the presence of little Clara. She was the +sunshine of the old man's heart, and he forgot toil +and weariness when he sat down by his own fireside, +with the merry prattler upon his knee, and her +little arms were twined about his neck. She was the +image of his lost sister, and it seemed to him but a +little while since her mother had sat thus upon his +knee, and lavished her caresses upon him. In spite +of the predictions of the worthy dame that she would +be spoiled, he indulged her every wish, checking +only the inclination to do wrong. Nor was the good +lady herself without affection for the little orphan, but +she wished to engraft a portion of her own sternness +into her nature, and in her horror of prelacy she did +not like to have such a connecting link between her +family and that of the rector. She had never loved +Clara's father, yet she could not find it in her heart +to be unkind to the little orphan, so she contented +herself with laying his faults and follies at the door +of the church to which he belonged. Clara had been +my playfellow from infancy, and at the village +school we had pursued our studies together. When +my parents decided to place me at a boarding-school +on the banks of the Hudson, I plead earnestly with +the deacon that Clara might go with me. Her aunt +objected strenuously to her acquiring the superficial +accomplishments of the world, but the old man for +once in his life was firm, and declared that Clara +should have as good an education as any one in the +vicinity. Accordingly we were placed at Monteparaiso +Seminary, where was laid the scene of the last +chapter.</p> +<br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER III.</h3> + +<h4>THE RETURN HOME.</h4> + +<p>Our school-days passed, as school-days ever will, +sometimes happily, and again lingering as if they +would never be gone. Clara was still the same +sweet, simple-minded innocent girl, but her mirth +was subdued by thoughtfulness, though the calm +tranquillity of her life was unruffled by the new feeling +that had found a place in her heart. She pursued +her studies with constant assiduity, and at the close +of our third year at school, was the first scholar in +the institution. She was advanced beyond others of +her age when she entered, and had improved every +opportunity to the best of her abilities after becoming +a member of the school. Three years was the period +assigned for our school-days, and we were to return +to Willowdale at the close of that time. Though we +loved our schoolmates dearly, we were happy to +think of meeting once more with the friends from +whom we had so long been separated. Anna Lincoln +had left the year before, and Lizzie had taken her +place as Presidentess of "the Sisterhood." Fan +Selby had left off her wild pranks and become quite +sedate. Mary Lee was less boisterous in her mirth +than formerly, and the younger members of the +school seemed ready to take the places of those who +were about to leave. It was sad for us when we +bade farewell to the companions of years, though +we were pleased with the thought of seeing more of +the world than a school-girl's life would allow. I +will not attempt to describe our joy when we were +once more at our homes, nor the warm reception +of those around our own firesides. Never was +there a happier man than old Deacon Lee, as he led +Clara to the window, that he might better see the +rich bloom on her cheek, and the light of her eye. +"Thank God!" was his fervent ejaculation, "that +you have come to us in health. I was afraid that +so much poring over books would make you look +pale and delicate, as your poor mother did before she +died. How much you are like what she was at your +age." Then with a feeling of childish delight he +opened the door of their rustic parlor, and showed +her a small collection of new books, a present from the +rector, and a neat piano, which he had purchased +himself in Boston to surprise her on her return.</p> + +<p>"You are still the same dear, kind uncle," said +Clara, as she run her fingers over the keys, and found +its tone excellent; "you are always thinking of +something to make me happy. How shall I ever +repay your kindness?"</p> + +<p>"By enjoying it," was his reply. "The old man +has a right to indulge his darling, and nothing else in +this world can make him so happy as to see your +rosy cheeks and bright eyes, and hear your merry +voice; but let us hear you sing and play."</p> + +<p>Tears of delight glistened in the old man's eyes as +she warbled several simple airs to a graceful accompaniment. +Mrs. Lee sighed deeply, and would have +given them a long lecture upon the vanities and +frivolities of the world, had not Clara changed the +strain, and sung some of her favorite hymns.</p> + +<p>"Are you not tired?" asked her uncle, with his +usual considerate kindness. "Come, let us go to +the garden, and see the dahlias I planted, because I +knew the other flowers would be killed by the frost +before you came home."</p> + +<p>"With pleasure," answered Clara; "but first let +me sing a song that I have learned on purpose to +please you."</p> + +<p>Then she sung the beautiful words, "He doeth +all things well." The old man's eyes beamed with +a holy light as he listened to the exquisite music +which expressed the sentiments that had pervaded +his life. As she rose from the piano, he laid his +hands upon her head caressingly, saying, "Blessed +be His name, who guards my treasures in Heaven, +and has still left me this rich possession on earth." +The old lady, melted by the sight of his emotion, and +the sentiment expressed, clasped her to her heart, +and called her her own dear child.</p> + +<p>Months glided on with swift wings, and even Mrs. +Lee was forced to give up her arguments against +a fashionable education. She had predicted that +Clara would be a fine lady, and feel above performing +the common duties of life; but every morning with +the early dawn she shared the tasks of her aunt, and +seemed as much at home in the dairy or kitchen as +when seated at her piano. Her step was as light and +graceful while tripping over the fields as it had been +in the dance, and her fingers as skillful in making<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span> +her own and her aunt's dresses, as they had been at +her embroidery. The good dame had learned to love +the piano, and more than once admitted that she +would feel quite lonely without it. So she was fain +to retreat from her position, by saying that her old +opinions held good as general rules, though Clara +was an exception, for no one else was ever like her. +At length her old feelings revived when a young +farmer in the neighborhood aspired to the hand of +Clara, and was kindly, though firmly, refused. She +was sure that it came of pride, and that the novels +she had read had filled her head with ideas of high +life. But her good uncle came to the rescue, and +declared that her inclinations should not be crossed, +and he had no wish that she should marry till she +could be happier with another than she was with +them. Clara longed to tell him of her acquaintance +with Philip Sidney, but she feared it would make +him anxious, and resolved to say nothing till time +had proved the truth of her lover. From this time +forth the subject of her marriage was not mentioned, +and Clara was left free to pursue her own inclinations. +Her presence was a continual source of happiness +to her uncle, and her life flowed on like a gentle +stream, diffusing blessings on all around her, while +a sense of happiness conferred threw a lustre around +every hour.</p> +<br /> + +<h3>CHAPTER IV.</h3> + +<h4>CONCLUSION.</h4> + +<p>Five years had passed since the commencement +of our tale, and Clara and I still remained at our +homes in Willowdale. Life had passed gently with +us, and the friendship formed in our school-days remained +unbroken. It was sweet to recall those days; +and we passed many a pleasant hour in the renewal +of old memories. Clara had heard nothing from +Philip Sidney, save once, about a year before, when +a letter from Fan Selby informed her that he had +called on them. He had inquired very particularly +after Clara, and said that he intended to visit Willowdale +the following year, but where the intervening +time was to be passed she did not know. It seemed +very strange to me that Clara should not doubt his +truth from his long silence, but her faith remained +unshaken.</p> + +<p>It was the day before Christmas, and the young +people of Willowdale were assembled to finish the +decorations of the church. The garlands were hung +in deep festoons along the walls, and twined around +the pillars. The pulpit and altar were adorned with +wreaths tastefully woven of branches of box mingled +with the dark-green leaves and scarlet berries of the +holly, the latter gathered from trees which the old +rector had planted in his youth, and carefully preserved +for this purpose. On the walls over the +entrance was the inscription, "Glory to God in the +highest, on earth peace and good-will to men," in +letters covered with box, after the model of those +we had seen in our school-days. We surveyed our +work with pleasure, mingled with anxiety to discover +any improvement that might be made, for we +knew that a stranger was that night to address us. +The growing infirmities of the old rector had for a +long time rendered the duties of a pastor very +fatiguing to him, and he had announced to us the +Sabbath before, that a young relative who had lately +taken orders, would be with him on Christmas Eve, +and assist him until his health should be improved. +The news was unwelcome to the older members of +the congregation, who had been so long accustomed +to hear instruction from their aged pastor that the +thought of seeing another stand in his place was +fraught with pain to them. He had been truly their +friend, sharing their joys and sorrows—and their +hearts were linked to him as childrens' to a parent. +At the baptismal font, the marriage altar, and the +last sad rites of the departed, he had presided, and it +seemed as if the voice of a stranger must strike +harshly upon their ears. But to the young there was +pleasure in the thought of change; and though they +dearly loved the old man, the charm of novelty was +thrown around their dreams of his successor. No +one knew his name, though rumor whispered that +he had just returned from England, where he had +spent the last year. No wonder, then, that we looked +with critic eyes upon our work, eager to know how +it must appear to one who had traveled abroad, and +lingered among the rich cathedrals of our fatherland. +Clara alone seemed indifferent, and was often +rallied on her want of interest in the young stranger, +I alone read her secret, as she glanced at the gem +which sparkled upon her finger, for I knew that her +thoughts were with the past—and Philip Sidney.</p> + +<p>Christmas Eve arrived, as bright and beautiful as +the winter nights of the North. A light snow covered +the ground, and the Frost King had encrusted it +with thousands of glittering diamonds. The broad +expanse of the valley was radiant in the moonbeams, +and the branches of the willows were glittering with +frosty gems. The church was brilliantly lighted, +and the blaze from its long windows left a bright +reflection upon the pure surface of the snow. The +merry ringing of sleigh-bells were heard in every +direction, and numerous sleighs deposited their fair +burden at the door. There was a general gathering +of the young people from ours and the neighboring +villages, to witness the services of the evening, and +brighter eyes than a city assembly could boast, flashed +in the lamp-light. The garlands were more beautiful +in this subdued light than they had been in the glare +of day, and their richness was like a magic spell of +beauty to enthrall the senses of the beholder. Clara +and I were seated in one of the pews directly in +front of the altar, occasionally looking back to see the +new arrivals, and return the greetings of friends from +other villages. Suddenly the organ swelled in a rich +peal of music, and the old pastor entered, followed +by the youthful stranger. There was no time to +scrutinize the features of the latter ere he knelt and +concealed his face, yet there was something in the +jetty curls that rested upon his snowy surplice, as his +head laid within his folded hands that looked familiar, +and Clara involuntarily grasped my hand. As he +arose and opened the prayer-book to turn to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span> +services of the evening, he took a momentary survey +of the congregation. That glance was enough to +tell us that the stranger was Philip Sidney. As his +eye met Clara's, a crimson flush spread over his +pale face, his dark eye glowed, and his hand trembled +slightly as he turned over the leaves. It was +but a moment ere he was calm and self-possessed +again, and when he commenced reading the services +his voice was clear and rich. The deepest silence +pervaded the assembly, save when the responses +rose from every part of the house. Then the organ +peals, and the sweet voices of the choir joined in the +anthems, and again all was still. The charm of +eloquence is universally acknowledged, and the +statesman, the warrior, and votary of science have +all wielded it as a weapon of might, but we can +never feel its irresistible power so fully as when +listening to its richness from the pulpit. The perfect +wisdom of holy writ, the majesty of thought, and +purity of sentiment it inspires, will elevate the +mind of the hearer above surrounding objects, and +when to this power is added beauty of language and +a musical voice, the spell is deeper. Such was the +charm that held all in silent attention while Philip +Sidney spoke. The scene was one which would +tend to fix the mind on the event it was designed to +commemorate, and the sweet music of his words +might remind one of the angel's song proclaiming +"Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace and +good-will to men." Richer seemed its melody, and +more beautiful his language, as he dwelt upon the +love and mercy of the Redeemer's mission, and the +hope of everlasting life it brought to the perishing. +He led them back to the hour when moral darkness +enshrouded the world, and mankind were doomed to +perish under the frown of an offended God. There +was but one ray to cheer the gloom, the prophetic +promise of the Messiah who should come to redeem +the world. To this they looked, and vainly +dreamed that he should appear in regal splendor, to +gather his followers and form a temporal kingdom. +Far from this, the angel's song was breathed to simple +shepherds, and the star in the East pointed out a +stable as the lowly birth-place of the Son of God. +He came, not to rule in splendor in the palaces of +kings, but to bring the gospel of peace to the lowliest +habitations, and fix his throne in the hearts of the +meek and humble-minded. He claimed no tribute +of this world's wealth as an offering, but the love and +obedience of those whom he came to save. Earnestly +the speaker besought his hearers to yield to their +Saviour the adoration which was his due, and requite +His all-excelling love with the purest and +deepest affections of their hearts. Every eye was +fixed upon the speaker, every ear intently listened +to catch his words, and tears suffused the eyes so +lately beaming with gayety. At the close of his +eloquent appeal, there were few in that congregation +unmoved. The closing prayers were read, the +benediction pronounced, and the audience gradually +left the house. Clara and I were the last to leave +our seats, and as we followed the crowd that had +gathered in the aisles before us she did not speak, but +the hand that rested in mine trembled like a frightened +bird. Suddenly a voice behind us whispered the +name of Clara. She turned and met the gaze of +Philip Sidney. The trusting faith of years had its +reward, and those so long severed met again. Not +wishing to intrude upon the joy of that moment, I +left them, and followed on with the old rector. We +walked on in the little foot-path that led to our homes; +and while Clara's hand rested upon his arm, the young +clergyman told the tale of his life since their parting.</p> + +<p>"But how did it come," asked Clara, "that you +chose the sacred profession of the ministry?"</p> + +<p>"I cannot fully trace the source of the emotions +that led me to become a worshiper at the throne of +the Holiest, unless it is true that the love of the pure +and good of earth is the first pluming of the soul's +pinions for heaven. I went to church that Christmas +eve, urged only by the wish to look upon your face +once more, yet, when there, the words of the speaker +won my attention. I had listened to others equally +eloquent many times before; but that night my heart +seemed more susceptible to religious impressions. I +felt a deep sense of the folly and ingratitude of my +past life, and firmly resolved for the future to live +more worthily of the immortal treasure that was +committed to my charge. Prayerfully and earnestly +I studied the Word of Life, and resolved to devote +myself to the ministry. I wrote to my worthy relative, +the rector of Willowdale, for his advice, and +found, to my great joy, that he was your devoted +friend. He condemned my rashness in the avowal I +had made to you, and insisted that there should be no +communication between us until I had finished my +studies. I consented, on condition that he should +write frequently and inform me of your welfare. +One year ago I had completed my studies, and would +have hastended to you, but my stern Mentor insisted +that I should travel abroad, as he said, to give me a +better knowledge of human nature, and test the truth +of my early affection. I have passed the ordeal, and +now, after an absence of five years, returned to you +unchanged in heart."</p> + +<p>The rest of the conversation was lost to me, as I +reached my home; but that it was satisfactory to +those engaged in it I know from the fact, that the next +day I had the pleasure of congratulating Clara upon +her engagement, with the full consent of her relatives. +The remainder of the tale is quickly told. The old +rector resigned his pastoral charge to Philip Sidney, +with the full approbation of his parishioners; and it +was arranged that the old rector and his wife should +remain at the parsonage with the young clergyman +and his bride. Deacon Lee became warmly attached +to Philip, and felt a father's interest in the happiness +of Clara, though he sometimes chid her playfully for +keeping their early acquaintance a secret from him. +As for Mrs. Lee, she was so proud of the honor of +being aunt to a minister, that she almost forgot her +dislike to prelacy. It is true she was once heard to +say to one of her gossiping acquaintances, that she +would have been better pleased if Clara had married +a good Congregationalist minister, even if he had not +preached quite so flowery sermons as Philip Sidney.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span></p> + +<p>One bright day in the month of May following +was their wedding-day. The bride looked beautiful +in her pure white dress of muslin, with a wreath of +May-blossoms in her hair. Blessings were invoked +on the youthful pair by all, both high and low, and +sincere good wishes expressed for their future happiness. +Here I will leave them, with the wish that the +affection of early years may remain through life undimmed, +and that the Christmas Garland, so linked +with the history of their loves, may be their emblem.</p> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="HEADS_OF_THE_POETS" id="HEADS_OF_THE_POETS"></a>HEADS OF THE POETS.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY W. GILMORE SIMMS.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<h5>I.—CHAUCER.</h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">——Chaucer's healthy Muse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did wisely one sweet instrument to choose—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The native reed; which, tutored with rare skill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Brought other Muses<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a> +<a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> down to aid its trill!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A cheerful song that sometimes quaintly masked<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fancy, as the affections sweetly tasked;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And won from England's proud and <i>foreign</i> +<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a> +<a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> court,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For native England's <i>tongue</i>, a sweet report—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sympathy—till in due time it grew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A permanent voice that proved itself the true,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And rescued the brave language of the land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From that<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a> +<a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> + which helped to strength the invader's hand.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus, with great patriot service, making clear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The way to other virtues quite as dear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In English liberty—which could grow alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When English speech grew pleasant to be known;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To spell the ears of princes, and to make<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The peasant worthy for his poet's sake.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h5>II.—SHAKSPEARE.</h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">——'T were hard to say,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon what instrument did Shakspeare play—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still harder what he did not! He had all<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The orchestra at service, and could call<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To use, still other implements, unknown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or only valued in his hands alone!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Lyre, whose burning inspiration came<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still darting upward, sudden as the flame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The murmuring wind-harp, whose melodious sighs<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seem still from hopefullest heart of love to rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gladden even while grieving; the wild strain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That night-winds wake from reeds that breathe in pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though breathing still in music; and that voice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which most he did affect—whose happy choice<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Made sweet flute-accents for humanity<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Out of that living heart which cannot die,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Catholic, born of love, that still controls<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While man is man, the tide in human souls.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h5>III.—THE SAME.</h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">——His universal song<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who sung by Avon, and with purpose strong<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Compelled a voice from native oracles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That still survive their altars by their spells—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Guarding with might each avenue to fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where, trophied over all, glows Shakspeare's name!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mighty master-hand in his we trace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If erring often, never commonplace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forever frank and cheerful, even when wo<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Commands the tear to speak, the sigh to flow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet without weakness, without storming, strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jest not o'erstrained, nor argument too long;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still true to reason, though intent on sport,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His wit ne'er drives his wisdom out of court;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A brooklet now, a noble stream anon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Careering in the meadows and the sun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A mighty ocean next, deep, far and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Earth, life and Heaven, all imaged in its tide!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! when the master bends him to his art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How the mind follows, how vibrates the heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mighty grief o'ercomes us as we hear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the soul hurries, hungering, to the ear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The willing nature, yielding as he sings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unfolds her secret and bestows her wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glad of that best interpreter, whose skill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Brings hosts to worship at her sacred hill!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h5>IV.—SPENSER.</h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was for Spenser, by his quaint device<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To spiritualize the passionate, and subdue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wild, coarse temper of the British Muse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By meet diversion from the absolute:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lift the fancy, and, where still the song<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Proclaimed a wild humanity, to sway<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soothingly soft, and by fantastic wiles<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Persuade the passions to a milder clime!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His was the song of chivalry, and wrought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For like results upon society;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Artful in high degree, with plan obscure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That mystified to lure, and, by its spells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Making the heart forgetful of itself<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To follow out and trace its labyrinths,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In that forgetfulness made visible!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such were the uses of his Muse; to say<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How proper and how exquisite his lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How quaintly rich his masking—with what art<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He fashioned fairy realms and paints their queen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How purely—with how delicate a skill—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It needs not, since his song is with us still!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h5>V.—MILTON.</h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The master of a single instrument,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But that the Cathedral Organ; Milton sings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With drooping spheres about him, and his eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fixed steadily upward, through its mortal cloud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seeing the glories of Eternity!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sense of the invisible and true<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still present to his soul, and in his song;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The consciousness of duration through all time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of work in each condition, and of hopes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ineffable, that well sustain through life,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Encouraging through danger and in death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cheering, as with a promise rich in wings!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A godlike voice that, through cathedral towers<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still rolls, prolonged in echoes, whose deep tones<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seem born of thunder, that subdued to music<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soothe when they startle most! A Prophet Bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With utt'rance equal to his mission of power,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And harmonies that, not unworthy heaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Might well lift earth to equal worthiness.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h5>VI.—BURNS AND SCOTT.</h5> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">——Not forgotten or denied,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scott's trumpet-lay, and Burns's violin-song;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The one a call to arms, of action fond;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The other, still discoursing to the heart—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lowly human heart—of loves and joys—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such as beseem the cotter's calm fireside—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cheerful and buoyant still amid a sadness—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such sadness as still couples love with care!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h5>VII.—BYRON.</h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">——For Byron's home and fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It needed manhood only! Had he known<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How sorrow should be borne, nor sunk in shame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For that his destiny decreed to moan—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His Muse had been triumphant over Time<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As still she is o'er Passion; still sublime—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Having subdued her soul's infirmity<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To aliment; and, with herself o'ercome,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'ercome the barriers of Eternity,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lived through all the ages, with a sway<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Complete, and unembarrassed by the doom<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That makes of Nature's porcelain, common clay!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h5>VIII.-A GROUP.</h5> + +<h5><i>Shelly and Wordsworth,—Tennyson, Barrett, Horne and +Browning;—Baily and Taylor;—Campbell and Moore.</i></h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">——As one who had been brought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By Fairy hands, and as a changeling left<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In human cradle, the sad substitute<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a more smiling infant—Shelly sings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Vague minstrelsies that speak a foreign birth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Among erratic tribes; yet not in vain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His moral, and the fancies in his flight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not without profit for another race!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He left his spirit with his voice—a voice<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Solely spiritual, which will long suffice<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To wing the otherwise earthy of the time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, with the subtler leaven of the soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Inform the impetuous passions!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With him came<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Antagonist, yet still with sympathy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wordsworth, the Bard of the contemplative,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A voice of purest thought in sweetest music!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">—These, in themselves unlike, together linked,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Appear in unison in after days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Making progressive still, the mental births,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That pass successively through rings of time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each to a several conquest; most unlike<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That of its sire, yet borrowing of its strength,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where needful, and endowing it with new,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To meet the new necessity which still<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Haunts the free progress of each conquering race.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">—Thus, Tennyson and Barrett, Browning, Horne,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blend their opposing faculties, and speak<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For that fresh nature, which in daily things<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beholds the immortal, and from common forms<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Extorts the Eternal still! So Baily sings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Festus; so, upon a humbler rank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Testing the worth of social policies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As working through a single human will,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Muse of Taylor argues—Artevelde,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Being the man who marks a popular growth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And notes the transit of a thought through time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Growing as still it speeds.....<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Exquisite<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ballads of Campbell, and the lays of Moore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Appealing to our tastes, our gentler moods,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The play of the affections, or the thoughts<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That come with national pride; and as we pause<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In our own march, delight the sentiment!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But nothing they make for progress. They perfect<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The language, and diversify its powers—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Please and beguile, and, for the forms of art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prove what they are, and may be. But they lift<br /></span> +<span class="i0">None of our standards; help us not in growth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Compel no prosecution of our search,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And leave us, where they found us—with the time!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="HOPE_ON_HOPE_EVER" id="HOPE_ON_HOPE_EVER"></a>HOPE ON—HOPE EVER.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY H. CURTISS HINE, U. S. N.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor stricken one! whose toil can gain,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And barely gain, the coarsest fare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From bitter thoughts and words refrain;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Yield not to dark despair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blackest night that e'er was born<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was followed by a radiant morn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heed not the world's unfeeling scorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor think life's brittle thread to sever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope on—hope ever!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hope, though your sun is hid in gloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And o'er your care-worn, wrinkled brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grief spreads his shadow—'tis the doom<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That falls on many now.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grim Poverty, with icy hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May bind to earth with ruthless band<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bright gifted ones throughout the land;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But struggle still that band to sever—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope on—hope ever!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sit not and pine that FORTUNE led<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Another on to grasp her wreath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The same blue sky is o'er thy head,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The same green earth beneath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The same bright angel-eyes look down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each night upon the humblest clown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sees the king with jeweled crown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of these, stern fate can rob thee never—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope on—hope ever!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What though the proud should pass thee by,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And curl their haughty lips with scorn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like thee, they soon must droop and die,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For all of woman born,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are journeying to a shadowy land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where each devoid of pride must stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By hovering wings of angels' fanned;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There sorrow can assail thee never—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope on—hope ever!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then plod along with tearless eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Poor son of toil! and ne'er repine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The road through barren wastes may lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And thorns, as oft hath mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But there was <span class="smcap">One</span> who came to earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Star-heralded at hour of birth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Humble, obscure, unknown his worth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose path was thornier far. Weep never!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope on—hope ever!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="MEXICAN_JEALOUSY" id="MEXICAN_JEALOUSY"></a>MEXICAN JEALOUSY.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span> + +<h3>A SKETCH OF THE LATE CAMPAIGN.</h3> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY ECOTIER.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<p>On the 15th of September, two days after the +storming of Chapultepec, a small party of soldiers, in +dark uniforms, were seen to issue from the great +gate of that castle, and, winding down the Calzada, +turn towards the City of Mexico. This occurred at +10 o'clock in the morning. The day was very hot, +and the sun, glancing vertically upon the flinty rocks +that paved the causeway, rendered the heat more +oppressive.</p> + +<p>At the foot of the hill the party halted, taking advantage +of the shade of a huge cypress tree, to set +down a litera, which four men carried upon their +shoulders. This they deposited under one of the +arches of the aqueduct in order the better to protect +its occupant from the hot rays of the sun.</p> + +<p>The occupant of the litera was a wounded man, +and the pale and bloodless cheek, and fevered eye +showed that his wound was not a slight one. There +was nothing around to denote his rank, but the camp +cloak, of dark blue, and the crimson sash, which lay +upon the litera, showed that the wounded man was an +officer. The sash had evidently been saturated with +blood, which was now dried upon it, leaving parts of +it shriveled like, and of a darker shade of crimson. +It had staunched the life-blood of its wearer upon the +13th. The soldiers stood around the litter, their +bronzed faces turned upon its occupant, apparently +attentive to his requests. There was something in +the gentle care with which these rude men seemed +to wait upon the young officer, that bespoke the existence +of a stronger feeling than mere humanity. +There was that admiration which the brave soldiers +feel for him who has led them in the field of battle, +<i>at their head</i>. That small group were among the +first who braved the frowning muzzles of the cannon +upon the parapets of Chapultepec. The wounded +officer had led them to those parapets.</p> + +<p>The scene around exhibited the usual indications +of a recent field of battle. There were batteries +near, with dismounted cannon, broken carriages, +fragments of shells, dead horses, whose riders lay by +them, dead too, and still unburied. Parties were +strolling about, busied with this sad duty, but heaps +of mangled carcases still lay above ground, exhibiting +the swollen limbs and distorted features of +decomposition. The atmosphere was heavy with +the disagreeable odor, and the wounded man, turning +upon his pillow, gently commanded the escort to proceed. +Four stout soldiers again took up the litera, +and the party moved slowly along the aqueduct, toward +the Garita Belen. The little escort halted at +intervals for rest and to change bearers. The fine +trees that line the great aqueduct on the Tacubaya +road, though much torn and mangled by the cannonade +of the 13th, afforded a fine shelter from the hot +sun-beams. In two hours after leaving Chapultepec, +the escort entered the Garita Belen, passed up the +Paseo Nuevo, and halted in front of the Alameda.</p> + +<p>Any one who has visited the City of Mexico will +recollect, that opposite the Alameda, on its southern +front, is a row of fine houses, which continue on to +the Calle San Francisco, and thence to the Great +Plaza, forming the Calles Correo, Plateros, &c. +These streets are inhabited principally by foreigners, +particularly that of Plateros, which is filled with +Frenchmen. To prevent their houses from being +entered by the American soldiery upon the 14th, the +windows were filled with national flags, indicating +to what nation the respective owners of the houses +belonged. There were Belgians, French, English, +Prussians, Spanish, Danes, and Austrians—in fact, +every kind of flag. Mexican flags alone were not to +be seen. Where these should have been, at times, +the white flag—the banner of peace—hung through +the iron railings, or from the balcony. In front of a +house that bore this simple ensign, the escort, with +the litera, had accidentally stopped.</p> + +<p>The eye of the wounded officer rested mechanically +upon the little flag over his head, when his +attention was arrested by noticing that this consisted +of a small, white lace handkerchief, handsomely embroidered +upon the corners, and evidently such as +belonged to some fair being. Though suffering from +the agony of his wound, there was something so attractive +in this discovery, that the eyes of the invalid +were immediately turned upon the window, or rather +grating, from which the flag was suspended, and his +countenance changed at once, from the listless apathy +of pain to an expression of eager interest. A young +girl was in the window, leaning her forehead against +the <i>reja</i>, or grating, and looking down with more of +painful interest than curiosity upon the pale face +beneath her. It was the window of the <i>entresol</i>, +slightly raised above the street, and the young girl +herself was evidently of that class known to the +aristocracy of Mexico as the "leperos." She was +tastefully dressed, however, in the picturesque costume +of her class and country, and her beautiful +black hair, her dark Indian eye, the half olive, half +carmine tinge upon her soft cheek, formed a countenance +at once strange, and strikingly beautiful. Her +neck, bosom, and shoulders, seen over the window-stone, +were of that form which strikes you as possessing +more of the oval than the rotund, in short +the model of the perfect woman.</p> + +<p>On seeing the gaze of the wounded man so intently +fixed upon her, the young girl blushed, and drew +back. The officer felt disappointed and sorry, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span> +one feels when the light, or a beautiful object is suddenly +removed from his sight; still, however, keeping +his eyes intently fixed upon the window, as +though unable to unrivet his gaze. This continued +for some moments, when a beautiful arm was plunged +through the iron grating, holding in the most delicate +little fingers a glass of piñal.</p> + +<p>A soldier stepped up, and taking the proffered glass, +held it to the lips of the wounded officer, who gladly +drank of the cool and refreshing beverage, without +being able to thank the fair donor, who had withdrawn +her hand at parting with the glass. The glass +was held up to the window, but the hand that clutched +it was coarse and large, and evidently that of a man. +A muttered curse, too, in the Spanish language, was +heard to proceed from within. This was heard but +indistinctly. The invalid gazed at the window for +some minutes, expecting the return of the beautiful +apparition, then as if he had given up all hope, he +called out a "gracias-adios!" and ordered the escort +to move on. The soldiers, once more shouldering +the litera, passed up the Calle Correo, and entered +the Hotel Compagnon, in the street of Espiritu +Santo.</p> + +<p>For two months the invalid was confined to his +chamber, but often, during that time, both waking +and dreaming, the face of the beautiful Mexican girl +would flit across his fevered fancy. At the end of +this time his surgeon gave him permission to ride +out in an easy carriage. He was driven to the Alameda, +where he ordered the carriage to halt under +the shade of its beautiful trees, and directly in front +of the spot where he had rested on entering the city. +He recognized the little window. The white flag +was not now there, and he could see nothing of the +inmates. He remained a considerable time seated +in the carriage, gazing upon the house, but no face +appeared at the cold iron grating, no smile to cheer +his vigil. Tired and disappointed, he ordered his +carriage to be driven back to the hotel.</p> + +<p>Next day he repeated the manœuvre, and the next, +and the next, with a like success. Probably he had +not chosen the proper time of day. It was certainly +not the hour when the lovely faces of the Mexican +women appear in their balconies. This reflection +induced him to change the hour, and, upon the day +following, he ordered his carriage in the evening. +Just before twilight, it drew up as usual under the +tall trees of the Alameda. Imagine the delight of the +young officer, at seeing the face of the beautiful +Mexican through the gratings of the <i>reja</i>.</p> + +<p>The stir made by the stopping of the carriage had +attracted her. The uniform of its inmate was the +next object of her attention, but when her eyes fell +upon the face of the wearer, a strange expression +came over her countenance, as if she were struggling +with some indistinct recollections, and all at once +that beautiful countenance was suffused with a smile +of joy. She had recognized the officer. The latter, +who had been an anxious observer of every change +of expression, smiled in return, and bowed an acknowledgment, +then turning to his servant, who was +a Mexican, he told him, in Spanish, to approach the +window, and offer his thanks to the young lady for +her act of kindness upon the 15th of September.</p> + +<p>The servant delivered the message, and shortly +afterward the carriage drove off. For several evenings +the same carriage might be seen standing under +the trees of the Alameda. An interesting acquaintance +had been established between the young officer +and the Mexican girl. About a week afterward, and +the carriage appeared no more. The invalid had +been restored to perfect strength.</p> + +<p>December came, and upon the 15th of this month, +about half an hour before twilight, an American officer, +wrapped in a light Mexican cloak, passed down +the Calle San Francisco, and crossed into the Alameda. +Here he stopped, leaning against a tree, as +though observing the various groups of citizens, who +passed in their picturesque dresses. His eye, however, +was occasionally turned upon the houses upon +the opposite side of the street, and with a glance of +stealthy, but eager inquiry. At length the well-known +form of the beautiful "lepera" appeared at +the window, who, holding up her hand, adroitly signaled +the officer with her taper, fan-like fingers. +The signal was answered. She had scarcely withdrawn +her hand inside the reja when a dark, scowling +face made its appearance at her side, her hand +was rudely seized, and with a scream she disappeared. +The young officer fancied he saw the bright +gleaming of a stiletto within the gloomy grating.</p> + +<p>He rushed across the street, and in a moment stood +beneath the window. Grasping the strong iron bars, +he lifted himself up so as to command a view of the +inside, which was now in perfect silence. His horror +may be imagined when, on looking into the +room, he saw the young girl stretched upon the +floor, and, to all appearances, dead. A stream of +blood was running from beneath her clothes, and her +dress was stained with blood over the waist and +bosom. With frantic energy the young man clung +to the bars, and endeavored to wrench them apart. +It was to no purpose, and letting go his hold, he +dropped into the street. The large gate of the house +was open. Into this he rushed, and reached the +<i>patio</i> just in time to catch a glimpse of a figure +escaping along the azotea. He rushed up the steep +stone stairway, and grasping the parapet, raised himself +on the roof. The fugitive had run along a series +of platforms of different heights, composed by the +azoteas of houses, and had reached a low roof, from +which he was about to leap into an adjoining street, +where he would, in all probability, have made good +his escape. He stood upon the edge of the parapet, +calculating his leap, which was still a fearful plunge. +It was not left to his choice whether to take or refuse +it. A pistol flashed behind him, and almost simultaneously +with the report he fell forward upon his +head, and lay upon the pavement below, a bruised +and bleeding corpse. His pursuer approached the +parapet, and looked over into the street, as if to assure +himself that his aim had been true, then turned +with a fearful foreboding, and retraced his way over +the azoteas. His fears, alas! were but too just. She +was dead.</p> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TO_GUADALUPE" id="TO_GUADALUPE"></a>TO GUADALUPE.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY MAYNE REID.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">Adieu! oh, in the heart's recess how wildly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Echo those painful accents of despair—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And spite our promise given to bear it mildly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We little knew how hard it was to bear<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A destiny so dark: how hard to sever<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hearts linked as ours, hands joined as now I grasp thee<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In trembling touch: oh! e'er we part forever,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Once more unto my heart love's victim let me clasp thee!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">It is my love's last echo—lone and lonely<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart goes forth to seek another shrine,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where it may worship pronely, deeming only<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such images as thee to be divine—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">It is the echo of the last link breaking,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For still that link held out while lingering near thee—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A secret joy although with heart-strings aching<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To breathe the air you breathed—to see, to hear thee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">And this link now must break—our paths obliquing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May never meet again—oh! say not never—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For while thus speaking, still my soul is seeking<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some hope our parting may not be forever—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And like the drowning straggler on the billow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or he that eager watches for the day,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With throbbing brain upon a sleepless pillow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis catching at the faintest feeblest ray.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">Now faint and fainter growing, from thee going,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seems every hope more vague and undefined—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Oh! as the fiend might suffer when bestowing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A last look on the heaven he left behind:<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or as earth's first-born children when they parted<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Slowly, despairingly, from Eden's bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Looked back with many a sigh—though broken-hearted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Less hopeless was their future still than ours.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">If we have loved—if in our hearts too blindly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We have enthroned that element divine—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In this, at least, hath fate dealt with us kindly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our mutual images have found a shrine—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">An altar for our mutual sacrifice:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And spite this destiny that bids us sever,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Within our hearts that fire never dies—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In mine, at least, 'twill burn and worship on forever.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">Thee not upbraiding—thou has not deceived me—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For from the first I knew <i>thy compromise</i>—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No, Guadalupe—this hath never grieved me—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I won thy love—so spoke thy lips and eyes:—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The consolation of this proud possessing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should almost change my sorrow into bliss:<br /></span> +<span class="i1">I have thy heart—enough for me of blessing—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Another may take all since I am lord of this.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">Why we have torn our hearts and hands asunder—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why we have given o'er those sweet caresses—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The world without will coldly guess and wonder—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let them guess on, what care we for their guesses!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The secret shall be ours, as ours the pain—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A secret still unheeding friendship's pleading:<br /></span> +<span class="i1">What though th' unfeeling world suspect a stain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But little fears the world a heart with anguish bleeding.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">'Tis better we should never meet again—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our love's renewing were but thy undoing:<br /></span> +<span class="i1">When I am gone, time will subdue thy pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou wilt yield thee to another's wooing—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">For me, I go to seek a name in story—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To find a future brighter than the past—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Yet 'midst my highest, wildest dreams of glory,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet thoughts of thee will mingle to the last.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">And though this widowed heart may love another—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For living without love, it soon would die—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">There will be moments when it cannot smother<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy sweet remembrance with a passing sigh.<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Amidst the ashes of its dying embers<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For thee there will be found one deathless thought;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Yes, dearest lady! while this heart remembers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Believe me, thou shall never be forgot.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">Once more farewell! Oh it is hard to yield thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lose for life, forever, thing so fair!<br /></span> +<span class="i1">How bright a destiny it were to shield thee—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet since I am denied the husband's care,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">This grief within my breast here do I smother—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forego <i>thy</i> painful sacrifice to prove,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That I have been, what never can another,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hero of thy heart, my own sweet victim love.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_FADED_ROSE" id="THE_FADED_ROSE"></a>THE FADED ROSE.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY G. G. FOSTER.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Torn from its stem to bloom awhile<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Upon thy breast, the dazzling flower<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Imbibed new radiance from thy smile—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">But, ah! it faded in an hour.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So thou, from peaceful home betrayed,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In beaming beauty floated by;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ere thy summer had decayed,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">We saw thee languish, faint and die.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>Extempore. On a Broken Harp-string.</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Too rude the touch—the broken cord<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more may utter music-word,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet lives each tone within the air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its trembling sighs awakened there.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So in my heart the song I sung,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When thou in rapture o'er me hung,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still lives—yet thine is not the spell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lure the music from its shell.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_CHILDS_APPEAL" id="THE_CHILDS_APPEAL"></a>THE CHILD'S APPEAL.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span> + +<h3>AN INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION.</h3> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY MRS. MARY G. HORSFORD.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Day dawned above a city's mart,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">But not 'mid peace and prayer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The shouts of frenzied multitudes<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Were on the thrilling air.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A guiltless man to death was led,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Through crowded streets and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a fairy child, with waving curls,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Was clinging to his side.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The father's brow with pride was calm,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">But trusting and serene,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The child's was like the Holy One's<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In Raphael's paintings seen.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She shrank not from the heartless throng,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Nor from the scaffold high;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now and then with beaming smile<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Addressed her parent's eye.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Athwart the golden flood of morn<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Was poised the wing of Death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As 'neath the fearful guillotine<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The doomed one drew his breath.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then all of fiercest agony<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The human heart can bear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was suffered in the brief caress,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The wild, half-uttered prayer.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But she, the child, beseechingly<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Upraised her eyes of blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whispered, while her cheek grew pale,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">"I am to go with you?"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The murmur of impatient fiends<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Rung in her infant ear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And purpose strong woke in her heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And spoke in accent clear;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"They tore my mother from our side<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In the dark prison's cell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her eyes were filled with tears—she had<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No time to say farewell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"And you were all that loved me then,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">But you are pale with care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And every night a silver thread<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Has mingled with your hair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"My mother used to tell me of<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A better land afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I've seen it through the prison bars<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where burns the evening star.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Oh! let us find a new home there,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">I will be brave and true,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You cannot leave me here alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Oh! let me die with you."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The gentle tones were drowned by shrill<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And long protracted cries;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The father on his darling gazed,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The child looked on the skies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Anon, far up the cloudless blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Unseen by mortal eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God's angels with two spirits passed<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To purer realms on high.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The one was touched with earthly hues<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And dim with earthly care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The other, as a lily's cup<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Unutterably fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_OLD_FARM-HOUSE" id="THE_OLD_FARM-HOUSE"></a>THE OLD FARM-HOUSE.</h2> + +<hr class="short" /> +<h4>BY MARY L. LAWSON.</h4> +<hr class="short" /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I love these gray and moss-grown walls,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">This ivied porch, and trelliced vine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lattice with its narrow pane,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">A relic of the olden time;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The willow with its waving leaves,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Through which the low winds murmuring glide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gurgling ripple of the stream<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That whispers softly at its side.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The spring-house in its shady nook,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Like lady's bower shadowed o'er—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With clustering trees—and creeping plants<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That cling around the rustic door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rough hewn steps that lend their aid<br /></span> +<span class="i1">To reach the shady cool recess,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where humble duty spreads a scene<br /></span> +<span class="i1">That hourly comfort learns to bless.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Upland the meadows lie around,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Fair smiling in the suns last beam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath yon solitary tree<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The lazy cattle idly dream;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Afar the reaper's stroke descends,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">While faintly on the listening ear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The teamster's careless whistle floats,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or distant song or call I hear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And leaning on a broken stile,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With woods behind and fields before,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I watch the bee who homeward wends<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With laden wing—his labors o'er;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The happy birds are warbling round,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Or nestle in the rustling trees—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Mid which the blue sky glimmers down,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">When parted by the passing breeze.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And slowly winding up the road<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The wane has reached the old barn-floor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where plenty's hand has firmly heaped<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The golden grain in richest store.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This 'mid the dream-land of my thoughts<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With smiling lip I own is real,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet fancy's fairest visions blend<br /></span> +<span class="i1">With all I see, and all I feel.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then tell me not of worldly pride<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And wild ambition's hopes of fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or brilliant halls of wealth and pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Where genius sighs to win a name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give <i>me</i> this farm-house quaint and old,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">These fields of grain, the birds and flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With calm contentment, peace and health,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And memories of my earlier hours.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TIS_HOME_WHERE_THE_HEART_IS" id="TIS_HOME_WHERE_THE_HEART_IS"> +</a>"'TIS HOME WHERE THE HEART IS."</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span> + +<h4><i>WORDS BY MISS L. M. BROWN</i>.</h4> + +<h3>MUSIC COMPOSED BY KARL W. PETERSILIE,</h3> + +<h5><i>Professor of Music at the Edgeworth Seminary, N. C.</i></h5> + +<h5>Presented by George Willig, No. 171 Chesnut Street, Philad'a. [Copyright secured.]</h5> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 654px;"> +<img src="images/music1.png" width="654" height="800" +alt="'TIS HOME WHERE THE HEART IS." title="" /></div> +<br /> + +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 571px;"> +<img src="images/music2.png" width="571" height="800" +alt="second page of music" title="" /></div> +<br /> + +<h4>SECOND VERSE.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I've courted the breath of a balm southern clime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where sweetest of flow'rs, soft tendrils entwine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have listed the song bird's notes borne on the air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That wakens and wafts the rich odors elsewhere;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As tones on the ear so the dream of the past,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Softly plays round the heart-green isle of the waste;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yes! 'twas all a life-dream, and still 'tis not gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, 'tis home where the heart is, where the heart is 'tis home.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h4>THIRD VERSE.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I've cross'd the blue sea, I've sought out a home<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the land of the free, freedom beckon'd me come;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And friends of the stranger have sooth'd the sad heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With kindness and sympathy, sweet balm for the smart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The light of the soul, doth play round it still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like the perfume the urn, in which roses distil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thoughts of affection forbid me to roam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, 'tis home where the heart is, where the heart is 'tis home.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="REVIEW_OF_NEW_BOOKS" id="REVIEW_OF_NEW_BOOKS"></a>REVIEW OF NEW BOOKS.</h2> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Hawkstone: A Tale of and for England in 184-. New +York: Standford & Swords. 2 vols. 12mo.</i></p></div> + +<p>We were attracted to this novel by seeing the words +"fifth edition" on its title page. After reading it, it is easy +to account for its popularity. It is at once a most exciting +romance and a defence of an unpopular religious body. +The author (said to be Professor Sewall,) belongs to the +Oxford School of Episcopalians, or to adopt his own view +of the matter, to the one Catholic church. The object of +the novel is to present the ideas of Church and State held +by that class of religionists who are vulgarly called Puseyites. +This is done partly in the representation of character +and narration of incident, which constitute the romance +of the book, and partly by long theological conversations +which occur between a few of the characters. The interest +of the work never flags, and it is among the few religious +novels which are not positive bores to all classes of +readers. In respect to its theology, it gives the most distinct +view of the doctrines of the High Church party of +Oxford which we have seen. The author is as decisive +and bitter in his condemnation of Romanism as of dissent. +He considers that the peculiar doctrines and claims which +distinguish the Roman Catholic church from the Church +of England are <i>novelties</i>, unknown to the true church of +the apostles and the fathers. He has no mercy for the +Romanists, and but little for the young men of his own +school who favor the Papacy. Those who are accustomed +to associate Puseyism with a set of sentimentalists, who +mourn the Reformation, wish for the return of the good +old times of the feudal ages, and give Rome their hearts +and Canterbury only their pockets, will find that such doctrines +and practices find no favor in the present volumes. +The greatest rascal in the novel is a piece of incarnate malignity +named Pearce—a Jesuit, whom the author represents +as carrying out the principles of Romanism to their +logical results in practice.</p> + +<p>But if the reader will find his common notions of Puseyism +revolutionized by the present novel, he will be a little +startled at its real doctrines and intentions. The author +has the most supreme and avowed contempt for liberal +ideas in Church and State; and for every good-natured +axiom about toleration and representative government he +spurns from his path as a novelty and paradox. There is +nothing dominant in England which he does not oppose. +The Whig party he deems the avowed enemies of loyalty, +order and religion. The Conservatives, with Sir Robert +Peel and the Duke of Wellington at their head, he conceives +destitute of principle, and the destroyers of the +British empire. There is not a concession made to liberal +ideas within the present century which he does not think +wicked and foolish. The manufacturing system and free +trade, indeed the whole doctrines of the political economists +in the lump, he looks upon alternately with horror +and disdain. He seems to consider the State and Church +as an organized body for the education of the people, +whose duty is obedience, arid who have no right to think +for themselves in religion or politics, for they would be +pretty sure to think wrong. All benevolent societies, in +which persons of different religious views combine for a +common object, he considers as productive of evil, and as +an assumption of powers rightly belonging to the church. +Indeed, in his system, it is wrong for any popular association +to presume to meddle with ignorance and crime, unless +they do it under the sanction and control of the church. +He considers it the duty of a church minister to excommunicate +every man in his parish who is <i>guilty</i> of schism—that +is, who has the wickedness to be a papist or dissenter. +But it is useless to proceed in the enumeration of +our author's dogmatisms. If the reader desires to know +them, let him conceive the exact opposite of every liberal +principle in politics, political economy and theology, which +at present obtains in the world, and he will have the system +of "Hawkstone."</p> + +<p>A good deal of the zest of the novel comes from the +throng of paradoxes in which the author wantons. He +has a complete system of thought to kill out all the mind +of the English people, and render them the mere slaves of +a hierarchy, and all for the most benevolent of purposes. +In his theory he overlooks the peculiar constitution and +character of the English people, and also all the monstrous +abuses to which his system would inevitably lead, in his +desire to see a practical establishment of the most obnoxious +and high-toned claims of his church. He is evidently +half way between an idealist and a sentimentalist, +with hardly an atom of practical sagacity or knowledge of +affairs. The cool dogmatism with which he condemns +the great statesmen of his country, is particularly offensive +as coming from a man utterly ignorant of the difficulties +which a statesman has to encounter. It is curious also to +see how extremes meet; this theory of absoluteism "fraternizes" +with that of socialism. A person reading, in the +second volume, the account of Villiers' dealings with his +tenantry, and his new regulations regarding manufactures, +would almost think that Louis Blanc had graduated at Oxford, +and left out in his French schemes the agency of the +church, from a regard to the prejudices of his countrymen.</p> + +<p>With all its peculiarities and heresies, however, the +novel will well reward the attention of readers of all +classes. It is exceedingly well written, and contains many +scenes of uncommon power, pathos and beauty. With +these advantages it may also claim the honor of being the +most inimitable specimen of theological impudence and +pretension which the present age has witnessed.</p> +<br /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>The Planetary and Stellar Worlds: A Popular Exposition +of the Great Discoveries and Theories of Modern Astronomy. +In a Series of Ten Lectures. By O. M. Mitchell, +A. M. New York: Baker & Scribner. 1 vol. 12mo.</i></p></div> + +<p>Mr. Mitchell is not only an accomplished astronomer, in +every respect qualified to be the interpreter of the mysteries +of his science to the popular mind, but, if we may +judge from the style of his book, is a fine, frank, warm-hearted, +enthusiastic man. On every page he gives evidence +of really loving his pursuit. By a certain sensitiveness +of imagination, and quickness of sensibility, every +thing he contemplates becomes alive in his mind, and an +object in which he takes a personal interest. This gives +wonderful distinctness to his exposition of natural laws, +and his delineation of the characters and pursuits of men +of science. His Copernicus, Kepler, Gallileo and Newton +are not dry enumerations of qualities, but vivid portraits of +persons. He seems in close intellectual fellowship with +them as individuals, and converses of them in the style of +a friend, whose accurate knowledge is equalled by his intense +affection. So it is with his detail of the discovery of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span> +a new law, or fact in science. His mind "lives along the +line" of observation and reasoning which ended in its detection, +and he reproduces the hopes, fears, doubts, and +high enthusiasm of every person connected with the discovery. +His delineation of Kepler is especially genial +and striking. By following this method he infuses his own +enthusiasm into the reader, bears him willingly along +through the most abstruse processes of science, and at the +end leaves him without fatigue, and ready for a new start.</p> + +<p>In the treatment of scientific discoveries, by minds like +Mr. Mitchell's, we ever notice an unconscious personification +of Nature, as a cunning holder of secrets which only +the master-mind can wrest from her after a patient siege. +The style of our author glows in the recital of the exploits +of his band of astronomers, as that of a Frenchman does +in the narration of Napoleon's campaigns. This is the +great charm of his book, and will make it extensively +popular, for by it he can attract any reader capable of being +interested in a tale of personal adventure, ending in a +great achievement. We can hardly bring to mind a popular +lecturer or writer on science, who has this power to +the extent which Mr. Mitchell possesses it. He himself +has it by virtue of the mingled simplicity and intensity of +his nature.</p> + +<p>One of the most striking lectures in Mr. Mitchell's volume +is that on the discoveries of the primitive ages, in +which he represents the processes of the primitive observer, +with his unarmed eye, in unfolding some of the laws of +the heavens; and he indicates with great beauty what +would be his point of departure, and what would be the +limit of his discoveries. This lecture is a fine prose poem. +There is a passage in the introductory lecture which +grandly represents the continual watch which man keeps +on the heavens, and the slow, silent and sure acquisitions +of new truths, from age to age. "The sentinel on the +watchtower is relieved from duty, but another takes his +place, and the vigil is unbroken. No—the astronomer +never dies. He commences his investigations on the hill-tops +of Eden—he studies the stars through the long centuries +of antedeluvian life. The deluge sweeps from the +earth its inhabitants, their cities and their mountains—but +when the storm is hushed, and the heavens shine forth in +beauty, from the summit of Mount Arrarat the astronomer +resumes his endless vigils. In Babylon he keeps his watch, +and among the Egyptian priests he inspires a thirst for the +sacred mysteries of the stars. The plains of Shinar—the +temples of India—the pyramids of Egypt, are equally his +watching places. When science fled to Greece, his home +was in the schools of her philosophers: and when darkness +covered the earth for a thousand years, he pursues his +never-ending task from amidst the burning deserts of Arabia. +When science dawned on Europe, the astronomer +was there—toiling with Copernicus—watching with Tycho—suffering +with Gallileo—triumphing with Kepler."</p> + +<p>We trust that this volume will have an extensive circulation. +It will not only convey a great deal of knowledge +to the general reader, but will also inspire a love for the +science of which it treats.</p> +<br /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Harold, the last of the Saxon Kings. By Sir Edward Bulwer +Lytton, Bart. New York: Harper & Brothers.</i></p></div> + +<p>This is Bulwer's most successful attempt at writing an +historical novel, but with all its merits, it is still rather an +attempt than a performance. Considered as a history of +the Norman invasion, it contains many more facts than can +be found in Thierry, at least in that portion of his work +devoted to Harold and William. Bulwer seems to have +obtained his knowledge at the original sources, and the +novel is certainly creditable to his scholarship. But he has +not managed his materials in an imaginative way, and fact +and fiction are tied rather than fused together. The consequence +is that the work is not homogeneous. At times +it appears like history, but after the mind of the reader has +settled down to a historical mood, the impression is broken +by a violent intrusion of fable, or an introduction of modern +sentiment and thought. It has therefore neither the +interest of Thierry's exquisite narrative of the same events, +nor the interest which might have been derived from a +complete amalgamation of the materials into a consistent +work of imagination. Considered also as a reproduction +of ancient men and manners it is strikingly defective. +With many fine strokes of the pencil, where the author +confines himself to the literal fact, his portraits, as a whole, +are overcharged with <i>Bulwerism</i>. His imagination is not +a mirror. It can reflect nothing without vitiating it. He +does not possess the power of passing a character through +his mind and preserving its individuality. It goes in as +Harold, or Duke William, or Lafranc, but it comes out as +Sir E. Bulwer Lytton, Bart.</p> + +<p>The novel contains much of that seductive sentiment, +half romantic, half misanthropic, which is the characteristic +of Bulwer's works, and it is expressed with his usual +beauty and brilliancy of style. Here and there we perceive +allusions to his own domestic affairs, which none but +Lady Bulwer can fully appreciate. Every reader of the +novel must be struck with its attempt at the moral tone. +Edith, the heroine, is the bride of Harold's soul, and Platonism +appears in all its splendor of self-denial and noble +sentiments in a Saxon thane and his maiden. History pronounces +this lady to be his mistress, and it certainly is a +great stretch of the reader's charity to be compelled to +view her in the capacity of saint. Not only, however, in +the loves of Harold and Edith, but all over the novel, +there is a constant intrusion of ethical reflections, which +will doubtless much edify all young ladies of a tender age. +These would be well enough if they appeared to have any +base in solid moral principle, but they are somewhat offensive +as the mere sentimentality of conscience and religion, +introduced for the purposes of fine writing. Suspicion, +also, always attaches to the morality which exhibits itself +on rhetorical stilts, and the refinement which is always +proclaiming itself refined. Since the time of Joseph Surface +there has been a great decline in the market price of +noble sentiments.</p> +<br /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>The History of England, from the Invasion of Julius Cæsar +to the Reign of Victoria. By Mrs. Markham. A New +Edition. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.</i></p></div> + +<p>This is a new and revised edition of a work which has +long been used in the education of boys and girls. Its information +is, of course, milk for babes. We think that +books of this class should be prepared by persons very different +from Mrs. Markham. She, good lady, was the +wife of an English clergyman by the name of Penrose, +and she wrote English history as such a person might be +supposed to write it. With every intention to be honest, +her book has many facts and opinions which boys and girls +will have to take more time to unlearn than they spent in +learning, unless they intend to be children their whole +lives.</p> + +<p>There is, however, a story in the volume regarding the +Duke of Marlborough, which we think few of our readers +have seen. The duke's command of his temper was almost +miraculous. Once, at a council of war, Prince Eugene +advised that an attack on the enemy should be made the +next day. As his advice was plainly judicious, he was +much exasperated at the refusal of the duke's consent, and +immediately called him a coward and challenged him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span> +Marlborough cooly declined the challenge, and the enraged +prince left the council. Early the following morning he +was awoke by the duke, who desired him instantly to rise, +as he was preparing to make the attack, and added, "I +could not tell you of my determination last night, because +there was a person present who I knew was in the enemy's +interest, and would betray us. I have no doubt we shall +conquer, and when the battle is over I will be ready to accept +your challenge." The prince, seeing the superior +sagacity of Marlborough, and ashamed of his own intemperance, +overwhelmed the duke with apologies, and the +friendship of the two generals was more strongly cemented +than ever. The anecdote is of doubtful origin, but it is an +admirable illustration both of the character of Marlborough +and Eugene.</p> +<br /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Letters from Italy: and The Alps and the Rhine. By J. T. +Headley. New and Revised Edition. New York: Baker +& Scribner. 1 vol. 12mo.</i></p></div> + +<p>We believe that these were Mr. Headley's first productions, +and were originally published in Wiley & Putnam's +Library. The present edition has a preface, devoted to the +consideration of the new aspect Italy has assumed since +the book was written, and a very judicious flagellation is +given to that arch traitor and renegade, Charles Albert, +King of Sardinia, whom events have transformed from a +trickster and tyrant into a patriot leader. We agree with +Mr. Headley in thinking that the Italians are more likely +to be endangered than benefitted by his position at the head +of their armies.</p> + +<p>"The Alps and the Rhine" is, in our opinion, Mr. Headley's +most agreeable work. The descriptions of scenery +are singularly vivid and distinct, and are given in a style +of much energy and richness. The chapters on Suwarrow's +Passage of the Glarus, Macdonald's Pass of the Splugen, +and the Battle of Waterloo, are admirably done. +That on Macdonald is especially interesting. Those who +doubt Mr. Headley's talents will please read this short extract: +"The ominous sound grew louder every moment, +and suddenly the fierce Alpine blast swept in a cloud of +snow over the mountain, and howled like an unchained +demon, through the gorge below. In an instant all was +blindness and confusion and uncertainty. The very heavens +were blotted out, and the frightened column stood and +listened to the raving tempest that made the pine trees +above it sway and groan, as if lifted from their rock-rooted +places. But suddenly a still more alarming sound was +heard—'An avalanche! an avalanche!' shrieked the +guides, and the next moment <i>an awful white form came +leaping down the mountain</i>, and striking the column that +was struggling along the path, passed strait through it into +the gulf below, carrying thirty dragoons and their horses +with it in its wild plunge."</p> +<br /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Principles of Zoology. Touching the Structure, Development, +Distribution and Natural Arrangement of the Races +of Animals, Living and Extinct. Part I. Comparative +Physiology. By Louis Agassiz and Augustus A. Gould +Boston: Gould, Kendall & Lincoln. 1 vol. 12mo.</i></p></div> + +<p>The name of Professor Agassiz, the greatest of living +naturalists, on the title page of this volume, is of itself a +guarantee of its excellence. The work is intended for +schools and colleges, and is admirably fitted for its purpose, +but its value is not confined to the young. The general +reader, who desires exact and reliable knowledge of the +subject, and at the same time is unable to obtain the larger +works of Professor Agassiz, will find in this little volume +an invaluable companion. It has all the necessary plates +and illustrations to enable the reader fully to comprehend +its matter. The diagram of the crust of the earth, as related +to zoology, is a most ingenious contrivance to present, +at one view, the distribution of the principal types of +animals, and the order of their successive appearance in +the layers of the earth's crust. The publishers have issued +the work in a style of great neatness and elegance.</p> +<br /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>The Writings of Cassius Marcellus Clay, including +Speeches and Addresses. Edited with a Preface and +Memoir by Horace Greely, New York: Harper & +Brothers.</i></p></div> + +<p>This is a large and beautiful octavo, and is embellished +with an admirable likeness of Mr. Clay. The people of +this country are so well acquainted with the peculiarities +of Cassius M. Clay's manner, that we will not pause to +characterize it; and his views upon public subjects are so +partisan that we leave their discussion to the politicians of +the country. The eminent abilities of Mr. Greely are +displayed in the execution of the duties of editor; and +the memoir which introduces the work does full justice +to the subject.</p> +<br /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>The Odd Fellows' Amulet, or the Principles of Odd Fellowship +Defined; the Objections to the Order Answered, and +its Advantages Maintained. By Rev. D. W. Bristol. +Auburn: Derby, Miller & Co.</i></p></div> + +<p>This is a beautiful little volume, admirably illustrated. +It is well written; will be read with interest by the +general reader, and should be in the possession of every +member of the great and beneficent order which it advocates +and vindicates.</p> +<br /> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>The Baronet's Daughters, and Harry Monk.</i></p></div> + +<p>Mrs. Grey, who is recognized as one of the most accomplished +female novelists of the present day, has recently given to +the public another interesting volume, bearing the above +title. There are two stories, both of which are marked +by the ability which characterizes the whole of Mrs. Grey's +works, and are well calculated to make a sultry afternoon +pass agreeably away. The American publisher is Mr. T. +B. Peterson, who furnishes a neat and uniform edition of +Mrs. Grey's novels.</p> +<br /><br /> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>TO OUR READERS.</h2> + +<p>The Proprietors of "Graham's Magazine," desirous of +maintaining for it the high reputation it has secured in the +estimation of the people of the United States, are determined +to spare no pains to increase its value, and make it +universally regarded as the best literary publication in the +country. To this end they have placed in the hands of +several of our best engravers a series of plates, which will +be truly remarkable for their superiority in design and +execution. As usual, the pens of the best American writers +will be employed in giving grace and excellence to its +pages, and in addition to articles which have been secured +from new contributors of acknowledged ability, they have +the pleasure of announcing that an engagement has been +effected with <span class="smcap">J. Bayard Taylor</span>, Esq., whose writings +are so extensively known and admired, by which his valuable +assistance will be secured in the editorial department +of this Magazine exclusively. This arrangement will, we +are assured, be hailed with pleasure by the host of friends +which the Magazine possesses throughout the Union, as +an earnest that no efforts will be omitted to show the sense +the proprietors entertain of past favors, by rendering their +work still more attractive and deserving of patronage for +the future.</p> +<br /><br /> + +<div class="footnotes"> +<h4>FOOTNOTES:</h4> +<br /> +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a> +<a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> The Italian.</p></div> +<br /> +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a> +<a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Norman.</p></div> +<br /> +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a> +<a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> The French.</p></div> +<br /> +</div> + +<p><b>Transcriber's Note:</b></p> + +<p>Certain irregularities in spelling and grammar have been left as in the original. Small errors in +punctuation have been corrected without comment.</p> + +<p>1. page 122—added apostrophe to word 'wont' in phrase '..he wont be my hero...'</p> + +<p>2. page 123—corrected typo 'will' to 'well' in phrase 'They are all very will for rich people.'</p> + +<p>3. page 125—corrected error in text 'almost wondering at first what Angile meant.' to 'almost +wondering at first what Augusta meant.'</p> + +<p>4. page 130—corrected typo 'spedily' to 'speedily' in phrase '...fit a mast to it, which was +spedily done.'</p> + +<p>5. page 143—corrected typo 'brightnesss' to 'brightness' in phrase '...the beauty and brightnesss +of that sweet...'</p> + +<p>6. page 153—corrected typo 'stong' to 'strong' in phrase '...or some stong emotion...'</p> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30076 ***</div> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/30076-h/images/illus120.png b/30076-h/images/illus120.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ae309e1 --- /dev/null +++ b/30076-h/images/illus120.png diff --git a/30076-h/images/illus195.png b/30076-h/images/illus195.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4bf0585 --- /dev/null +++ b/30076-h/images/illus195.png diff --git a/30076-h/images/illus215.png b/30076-h/images/illus215.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f05ed7c --- /dev/null +++ b/30076-h/images/illus215.png diff --git a/30076-h/images/music1.png b/30076-h/images/music1.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..bc30e11 --- /dev/null +++ b/30076-h/images/music1.png diff --git a/30076-h/images/music2.png b/30076-h/images/music2.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0151ba3 --- /dev/null +++ b/30076-h/images/music2.png |
